#the first draft of this post was just 'imagine giving a child up for adoption and then listen to never love an anchor again.'

[bellaswansong]

hey guys is it just me or have we all been interpreting "never love an anchor" completely wrong this whole time? i finally gave in and listened to it a while back, and yeah, its super good (it gets stuck in my head all the time) but i think it's actually about something else

the line that stuck with me was "never tied your shoes." it just seemed a little out of place for the romantic reading of the song. now im not great at interpreting the entire meaning of a song just from listening to it, so i looked up the lyrics and it just made me even more sure

let's start with the last two stanzas:

"you are someone i have loved but never known" doesn't seem to me like it fits a romantic relationship very well; i realise that you can feel like you dont know someone if theyre super closed off, but the rest of the song seems like the singer is apologising for being closed off or inaccessible or not allowing someone to love them, and if we take it as the person being too closed off to get to know, this feels like a break from the previously described dynamic, as if the singer is reversing their positions.

"never soothed your fevers," "never tied your shoes," "never held you gently," all of these are things that parents do. "never had the chance to lose you" also just doesn't make sense if the feelings are romantic, because even if you never express your feelings for someone it still feels like a loss when you lose them.

and if we apply this parenthood interpretation to "you are someone i have loved but never known," it almost seems like the singer is talking about a child who died or a pregnancy they aborted, but the next stanza contradicts that by addressing the child as if they are still alive and able to interact with others; "i am all the things they might've said to you."

so i think this is about giving a child up for adoption.

the rest of the song still makes sense, too. here's the first two stanzas:

"it's a secret i keep tucked inside my chest" - it is so so so common for women who give up a child for adoption to keep it a secret from family and future partners. my grandmother had a child between marriages, gave it up for adoption, and then listed it as a past stillbirth on the birth certificates of all her kids after that.

"with this heart of mine that's guilty, not remorseful" - regret is one of the most COMMON things people talk about feeling when they miss their chance to confess to a romantic interest. this line does not fit with that interpretation, but it does fit with the adoption idea. the narrator is not remorseful because they know this was the best option for the child.

"i couldn't bring myself to hold you" this one just hurts man

and finally the middle stanza, which i think is the most ambiguous, but also hits the hardest when you have this meaning in mind:

(umbilical cord metaphor btw)

ok thats all. sorry about your ships but i think this song is about putting your newborn child up for adoption

[yvtro]

tell us about one of your jason wips 👀

i will tell you about one of my wips that is a bit uncharacteristic for me. lots of my drafts are reworking canon, or post-canon stories focusing on healing, but this one is more of a legitimate AU that focuses on parent-child relationships, and wherein jay is mostly a stable person already, living outside of gotham, with bruce never learning that he came back. the working title is rewind.

for the background, it is quite similar to the setting from my black out days fanfic. i was mostly interested in clashing together 'son of the demon,' and 'lost days,' while also keeping damian's character (as a plot device more than anything else, because he was brought up very differently than in canon). so, tldr, talia planned to give up the child for adoption -> ra's found out about it and she had to stay in the league with the baby -> a couple years later jason enters the picture -> they live in nanda parbat together for a while -> they manage to move.

in rewind the action starts in metropolis. talia is working for lexcorp. jason is a university student and au damian is around 10. talia's absent a lot, and jay is mostly in charge of the household, which he doesn't mind, because after the all caste training he decided to focus on himself (he still engages in vigilantism sometimes, but he doesn't have any particular persona and it's not his priority.)

the whole conflict of the story arises from the fact that damian was used to talia being around all the time when they were in the league, and doesn't understand why she prioritises her work now. and i always thought it was extremely interesting how understanding and sympathetic jason was in canon towards his mother figures (which does not translate to his attitude towards bruce); so jay doesn't get at all what damian's problem is. talia is her own person after all, not just a parent, and she spent years in an actual cult. and it's them that kept her there. did she even want to have kids? this much he tells his therapist over the phone. and damian, unfortunately, overhears it.

next thing jason knows damian is gone and there's only a message left saying that well, since their mother clearly has other things to do and didn't ever want him, he's on his way to find his father.

which gives jay a very bad sense of deja vu. he was in a situation like that before and looking for his other (potential, bio) parent did not end well for him. and talia is on a business trip (less lexcorp-bussiness and more taking-down-big-oil-bussiness, undercover) so he's alone with this situation. he gets on his way to gotham, for the first time in years, but it turns out damian is not there. he needs help finding him anyway, so he will have to work with the bats (and reveal that he's alive. awkward).

the whole point of the story is that jason now has to confront that everything he wants damian to understand about talia is something he should understand about bruce. he can't really say "well your mom is a person and she has certain responsibilities that come with her dedication to making the world a better place, so it's unfair to hate her because of that, she still loves you very much even if she can't meet your every need" and then turn around and go: "fuck you, bruce. batman sucks, you're selfish and you didn't do this one very specific thing i imagined you should do if you actually loved me."

i have lots to work out when it comes to this wip though, for example i'm not sure if jay should first try to contact the bats undercover, or if he would be panicked enough to just knock on the manor's door in a MetU hoodie being like "where's the child. please tell me the child is here." but i'm hoping it will come together soon because it's been cooking for a long time.

[youhideastar]

For the WIP title ask game: Alpha WWX Fertility Nonsense.docx please

Thanks for asking! For those following along at home, this is in reference to this post. So the file with that name is the long-promised sequel to And these are all for you; basically, there was this question that Wei Wuxian in that fic had for Lan Wangji (these characters have minds of our own): “Is there anything alpha-Wei-Wuxian has that you want? Like, that you want from me as an alpha, not just—Wei Wuxian?” That discussion ended up not fitting/making sense in the original fic, but I thought it was a really interesting question, and I still wanted to talk about it! Even more so when it turned out the answer was going to lead to some top-notch smut. 😂 It’s still in rough draft, but here’s the first scene (which does not contain top-notch or any other smut, alas):

Wei Wuxian has many flaws. And one of the big ones is that he just cannot leave well enough alone.

Here he is, in Lan Zhan’s bed, in Lan Zhan’s arms, with the moonlight filtering in—and instead of gratefully drifting off to sleep, he has to open his stupid mouth.

“Lan Zhan…”

“Mn?”

“When I asked what I provide for you.”

Beat.

“The—joy, and challenge, and purpose… those are all things… anybody could provide.”

“No,” Lan Zhan says immediately. He does not raise his voice, but it’s definitive like a closing door.

And… yeah, that wasn’t the best way to put it.

“Not anybody,” Wei Wuxian amends. “But—those weren’t things that—that an alpha, specifically, would give you.”

Beat.

“Mn,” Lan Zhan says – one of his “mn”s of agreement.

“And I… and that’s okay, obviously! I just, ah.” Beat. “I want to—this is stupid, but I—do you like that I’m an alpha? Do you care about it at all?” He doesn’t even know what answer he wants.

Beat. Lan Zhan does him the courtesy of considering it.

“I do not think I understand the question,” he says carefully.

That’s fair.

“I guess I mean… it doesn’t seem like you’re thinking I’ll… provide for you, like, materially. The way an alpha traditionally would. Which is good because I can’t,” and that hurts to admit, which is where part of this is coming from. “But do you—is there anything alpha-Wei-Wuxian has that you want? Like, that you want from me as an alpha, not just—Wei Wuxian who’s your mate?”

That’s probably not any more coherent than the last question, but Lan Zhan seems to understand it anyway. He nods and says, “Mn.”

Wary, hopeful. “Yeah? Really?” Well, Lan Zhan wouldn’t have said it if it wasn’t true, he knows that. What he really wants to ask is: “Um, what is it?”

“Wei Ying’s knot.”

Beat where WWX is light-headed. They didn’t do anything sexy tonight because Lan Zhan was still worn out from his heat, but wow. Wow.

“Wei Ying’s rut.”

Is it hot in here?

“And…” LWJ’s eyes cut to the side. “Wei Ying’s get. If Wei Ying is willing.”

WWX just about explodes. He wasn’t expecting that at all. He hides his face. “Lan Zhan! You’ve already given me one beautiful son. How can I ask for more?”

“Wei Ying does not ask. I ask.” Beat. “Only if—if it would bring Wei Ying joy.”

Beat.

“You’re serious.”

“Mn.”

Soft, disbelieving. “You really… you really want to bear for me?”

“I want to bear and raise children with Wei Ying.”

Beat.

“Well, I… I guess that’s something I can provide.” Wei Wuxian is kind of chuffed by that. He can give Lan Zhan a baby! That’s pretty good! Then the doubt creeps in. “Unless—I don’t know,” he realizes. “I don’t know if I can, I can’t imagine all that resentful energy is good for—what if I can’t? What if I can’t even give you that?” Quick beat of WWX self-worth spiraling. “If I can’t even give you a child, you have to—you have to find another mate—”

“No.”

“Lan Zhan—”

“If you cannot sire a child, we will get one the traditional way.”

“The traditional way?!”

“Adopt an orphan we meet on the streets of Yiling.”

BEAT – WWX GETS IT.

“Lan Zhan, stop being so funny! This isn’t a joke—”

“You would care for the child?”

“Of course I would—”

“Feed them, bathe them, keep them from harm?”

“Of course—”

“Give them your love – embrace them and praise them and teach them right from wrong?”

“I don’t know if I’m qualified to do that last part.”

“But you would try?”

Quick beat. Muttered: “I would try.”

Satisfied: “Wei Ying provides well for our family.”

Our family.

“Lan Zhan!” WWX wails.

Lan Zhan makes no retort – just radiates smugness. He thinks he’s won, apparently.

He probably has.

It’s not like Wei Wuxian can deny him anything.

“Wei Ying should sleep,” Lan Zhan rumbles. “His rut is coming.” MEANINGFUL STROKE. “He will need his strength.”

Wei Wuxian shivers. “Shameless,” he mutters.

But he’s pretty sure Lan Zhan means it. So he curls up against Lan Zhan’s side again and tries to sleep. It doesn’t take long.

[gothamscormorant]

this is how i imagine dick grayson…

click here for the other boys

this gets very um… ✨psych eval✨

- cannot cook to save anyone’s life.

- he eats cereal for most meals so he has a god tier level of judgement of different brands and types of cereal.

- really good at hacking.

- sings in the shower but is actually pretty good at it; and has 90s-Y2K music taste, as well as 80s pop.

- his first anime he watched was definitely the original fruits basket.

- dangerously impulsive sometimes.

- is extremely selfish when it comes to non-super hero things.

- like -based off my experience of being the eldest- he never had to do chores, never had to learn any homely skills really, gets away with doing whatever the hell he wants, things were just handed to him.

- didn’t know how to use a washing machine until he moved out and he still uses alfred to wash delicates.

- there’s no workers in the manor so i like to think after jason, bruce decided everyone had to pick up the slack.

- like vacuuming their own rooms, cleaning their own bathrooms, washing their own plates and cups, hang out the washing etc etc. (there’s definitely a cleaning roster)

- but dick doesn’t. he never had to and still gets away with not doing it when he visits.

- it’s beyond everyone else by this point how he does it.

- has an insane disregard for anyone else’s feelings, like they’ll yell at him for leaving his cereal bowls in the sink and he’ll just shrug and walk off.

- doesn’t mean he’s the favourite tho; just the eldest. he never gets away with things that require a bit of maturity, either hero work or wayne work.

- if he’ makes the wrong call on a mission or messes around in public or makes a bad impression on a client, he gets the phattest spray from bruce because he’s “older and should know better”.

- no one gets yelled at more than dick.

- which does not help the fact that dick has the shortest and most dangerous temper.

- ever heard of something along the lines of the eldest child was the rough draft, the children following were the more polished-parented ones?

- dick was the prime example of this.

- bruce was young when he adopted dick and still working through a lot of shit, a lot.

- (in the harshest way) his unresolved trauma was 100% the only reason he decided to adopt a random kid from the circus who’s parents just died.

- so though well intentioned, bruce didn’t do the best job of raising dick.

- he could hardly take care of himself and suddenly he was raising a child, and so dick wouldn’t have necessarily been nourished the way he should’ve.

- i reckon that’s something that hangs over bruce quite a lot as he aged (but this post isn’t bruce’s hyper evaluation so).

- in the end it resulted in a grown child who was used to getting what he wanted, hardly disciplined, unaware of how to properly express emotions, and in a constantly unstable environment; chasing adrenaline and risky activities (psychology 101).

- it’s no wonder dick would’ve responded badly to jason being adopted; a situation that he thought had become somewhat secure, was abruptly changed again without even a brief mention to him.

- he has a serious uncontrollable temper; where jason has PTSD to complicate his anger, he’s able to make rational (in jason terms) and controlled decisions -and have a decent patience- where-as when dick gets mad, he flies into a rage and does things he regrets afterwards constantly.

- dick’s funny and playful nature comes from needing to impress others and get their praise and attention.

- when he was little he would’ve had to entertain himself in the big manor, and when he joined bruce at galas and events everyone would gush over him -giving him the attention he so desperately craved (and probably anything he asked for).

- his ego and need for validation comes from the lack of attention and validation bruce gave him when he needed it most -whether he realises that’s why or not.

- which also leads into his tendency to be player. he knows he’s gorgeous, and he knows he can get anyone he wants, so he exploits that to solidify the thought that he is wanted, even when he mind tells him he’s not.

- i love bruce and i believe he is extremely regretful and actively trying to do better, however we can’t deny that dick -and jason- were more or less the failed test runs.

[killianglyndon]

Hope

Pairing: Obi-Wan Kenobi x Skywalker! Reader

Word count: 1.5k

Warnings: force choke, killing younglings (basically what had happened in rots...), death, age gap (16 years)

A/N: my first Obi-Wan Kenobi x Reader imagine haha, and I use some lines in ROTS for plot purpose. I have another one in my draft, will post it as soon as I finished it!

Tatooine, it at the same time felt like home and not. You and Anakin lived on this Planet with your mother for nine years, it still felt like yesterday to you.

Things happened quickly, you didn’t even have time to digest the recent incidents. You knew Anakin was struggling, his fear of losing Padmé. You tried to reach out to him, yet, he shut you out. Build walls around himself, keeping your reach in the force away.

(Flashback)

“Please Ani, don’t do this. The dark side is not the solution to this!”

“It is, sister. Join me, together we will be the most powerful.”

“No! Power is not anything. Did you hear yourself, Anakin?”

“It’s the only way. Chancellor showed me what Jedi didn’t teach us. You can too if you join me.”

“No, I will never pledge myself to the dark side.”

You never thought this would happen, Anakin had joined the dark side. His doubts to the Jedi council, his fear of losing Padmé, and the words of Palpatine, drive him to reach the dark side. How could you not see these signs? If only you could help him if you had tried harder. Maybe, maybe Anakin would not turn to the dark side.

According to master Yoda, not many Jedi had survived during Order 66. You were relieved that your Master, Obi-Wan Kenobi had survived.

“Obi-Wan! You’re alright.” You exclaimed while you ran towards him.

“(y/n)!” Obi-Wan pulled you to him and wrapped his arms around you.

You two had feelings for each other for a long time, but two of you knew it was against the code, you both buried your feelings and agreed to not do anything.

“I...I the younglings...Anakin killed them all…” You sobbed thinking about the image of that, he killed them in front of you. You tried to save them, but there was nothing you could do, Anakin used the force to pin you down. After he killed them, he used the force to choke you until you passed out.

“I know… we saw the security hologram…” Obi-Wan said and put his hand behind your head, trying to calm you down. “I’m sorry…” Obi-Wan trailed. He blamed himself for this, he had failed Anakin, he had failed you, he had failed everyone.

“Don’t. It’s not your fault…” you whispered against his chest.

“It is… I’ve failed him.”

“You didn’t. You’ve taught him everything you know. You’re a great master, Obi-Wan.” You pulled away to look into his ocean eyes, you had to be strong for him. You knew the guilt he carried, his eyes told you everything. His former Padawan turned to the dark side, the one who supposedly brought balance to the force.

Obi-Wan leaned down to kiss you on your forehead before C-3PO headed your way. “Master (y/n), the medical center requested you and Master Kenobi.”

——————

“For unknown reasons, we are losing her. If we want to save the babies we have to operate quickly.” The medical droid said.

“Babies?” Bail Organa exclaimed, looking shocked.

“She’s carrying twins.” The droid answered.

“Save them, we must. They are our last hope.” Yoda said.

After hearing the answer, the droid rushed back to the operating room, you and Obi-Wan followed.

You and Obi-Wan took Padmé’s hands, encouraging her not to give up. She screamed from the pain, the droid holding the baby, “it’s a boy.”

The droid handed you the baby, and you showed him to Padmé.

“Luke…” Padmé whispered and struggled to touch his forehead.

“And a girl!” The medical droid said.

Obi-Wan took the girl from the droid and showed her to Padmé.

“Leia…”

“You have twins, Padmé. They need you...hang on…” Obi-Wan leaned down to talk to Padmé.

“I… can’t.” Padmé winced and took Obi-Wan’s hand, holding Anakin’s japor snippet. “Obi-Wan, there’s… good in him. I know there is… still…” she gasped.

You looked at Padmé then Obi-Wan, tears rolled down your cheeks. You lost your brother to the dark side, and you lost your friend too.

——————

You, Obi-Wan, Master Yoda, and Senator Organa were in the Conference Room of the cruiser.

“Pregnant, she must still appear. Hidden, safe, the children must be kept.” Yoda said.

“We must take them somewhere the Sith will not sense their presence.” Obi-Wan recommended.

“Split up, they should be.” Yoda added.

“My wife and I will take the girl. We've always talked of adopting a baby girl. She will be loved with us.” Senator Organa said and looked at Master Yoda then you. Somehow, ensuring you that they would take good care of her. She would be happy, healthy, and grow up under the love they provided.

“And what of the boy?” Obi-Wan asked.

“To Tatooine. To his family, send him.” Yoda answered.

“(Y/n) and I will take the child and watch over him. If (y/n) want to, of course.” Obi-Wan said and turned to look at you.

“I want to.” You answered and gave him a sad smile. “That’s the least I could do for him and Padmé…”

“Master Yoda, do you think Anakin's twins will be able to defeat Darth Sidious?” Obi-Wan asked.

“Strong the Force runs, in the Skywalker line. Hope, we can . . . Done, it is.” Yoda trailed, then added. “Until the time is right, disappear we will.”

You, Obi-Wan, and Senator Organa stood up, heading out of the Conference Room. Before Obi-Wan left, Yoda stopped him.

“An old friend has learned the path to immortality.” Yoda trailed.

“Who?”

“One who has returned from the netherworld of the Force to train me . . . your old Master, Qui-Gon Jinn.”

“Qui-Gon? But, how could he accomplish this?” Obi-Wan looked puzzled.

“The secret of the Ancient Order of the Whills, he studied. How to commune with him. I will teach you.” Yoda answered.

“I will be able to talk with him?” Obi-Wan was stunned, and to be honest, maybe a little relieved. The recent incidents had him questioned himself, perhaps he could find guidance from his former master.

“How to join the Force, he will train you. Your consciousness you will retain when one with the Force. Even your physical self, perhaps.” Yoda trailed.

Before Obi-Wan left the Conference Room, “Jedi code, no more.” Yoda said, then added. “Feelings, you and (y/n) have for each other. Hide, no more.”

———————

You, Obi-Wan, and the newborn baby Luke were on the ship to Tatooine. Luke was sleeping soundly in his baby carrier. You couldn’t help but look at his face, he looked so peaceful.

You trailed your fingers softly on his forehead, for the first time in a while, you felt calm. You just sat there for a while before returning to the co-pilot seat next to Obi-Wan.

“How’s the baby?” He asked while changing the setting to autopilot.

“Sleeping soundly.” You answered.

Then it went to the comfortable silence again.

“(Y/n), I would like to tell you something.” Obi-Wan said suddenly.

“Yeah?”

Obi-Wan took a deep breath, “I want to be honest with you, (y/n).” He looked into your eyes. “I love you, for a long time. There are no Jedi codes anymore…” He took your hands in his. “We don’t need to hide our feelings anymore. Now, we have a chance to have a new life, together. Only if you want to…” He said, trying to sound hopeful.

“I’d like to.” You looked into his ocean-colored eyes.

His eyes lightened up when he heard you, “Really?” He asked.

“Yes. And I love you too, for a long time.” You traced your hand to his face, caressed it.

He eyed your lips, then back to your eyes. “Can I kiss you?”

“Please.”

He closed the gap between you, putting his big, warm hands on your cheeks. The kiss started slow and gentle, you two savored the moment, and you closed your eyes. It was like the world stopped, there were just two of you. This was even better than you had imagined. He delicately nibbled your bottom lip, sucking it a little. You put your hands on his nape, massaging it a little.

When he pulled away, you couldn’t help but giggle.

“What?” Obi-Wan asked.

“Nothing.” You smiled at him. “It’s just so… unreal. I can’t believe it’s happening.”

“It’s real, (y/n). This moment, you, and I are real.” Obi-Wan caressed your cheeks.

——————

You watched Obi-Wan hand Luke to Beru, you knew he would be happy there, living a life he deserved.

Obi-Wan walked back to you, standing beside you, and put his hand on the back. You two stood there watching Beru, Owen, and Luke, knowing there was hope after all.

[silverhyenaart]

Another Family Fluff Piece

Because I can’t resist posting bits and pieces of upcoming chapters.

Anyways, I could imagine that Tom and Maddie would have to become adept at wrangling their speedster son. (I mean, when you really think about it, Sonic wouldn’t have to listen to them if he didn’t want to. It’s just a good thing that he loves and respect them.) But of course, he’s still a kid, and kids get into mischief. Kids sometimes run where they’re not supposed to. So here’s a mostly first draft bit,

*******

Maddie nodded in agreement, turning around while still in her husband's gentle hold. She put her arms around his neck, pulling him in closer for a kiss. It was at that moment a 'WHOOSH' or air followed by a blue blur interrupted their tender moment.

“Oh! Errrrrmmm... sorry. D-didn't mean to interrupt your weird grown up.... ritual... thing,” apologized the little alien, all the while making a strange face while sticking out his tongue.

Kissing was just something Sonic couldn't wrap his mind around. Donut Lord and Pretzel Lady did it, people in various movies and TV shows did it, even a whole bunch of his classmates would do it, often brazenly out in the halls or the school yard. (But the sneakier ones would go to the bathrooms. Seriously, just to do that!) Locking mouths and “swapping spit” as he'd heard it referred to a few times before just didn't seem appealing at all! It was just so strange; stranger than the little kisses to the forehead and cheeks Maddie would often insist on giving him.

“To be continued,” muttered Maddie, giving Tom a mischievous little smile and wink before addressing Sonic, “And you, young man. Isn't it past your bedtime?”

Tom moved his arm to wrap around his wife's shoulder, giving the strong appearance of experienced and seasoned parents. (Key word here being “appearance.”)

“But Pretzel Lady, I'm not tiiiiiired,” argued the young hedgehog, all the while scratching Ozzie's head and ears once the old golden retriever padded to his side, “Donut Lord?”

“Sorry kiddo, this time I can't help you.”

Sonic cast an accusatory look to his caretaker. His hero. This betrayal! From the Donut Lord, no less. It couldn't be happening. There was only one other option now.

Already predicting what was about to happen next, Tom pulled out his phone, opening up the stopwatch app, “Maddie, your record is one minute and twenty three seconds.”

“I can beat that!”

“Don't be to sure about that, Pretzel Lady. You'll have to catch me first!” challenged Sonic, taking on a confident and defiant stance.

Human and alien stared each other down, asserting dominance, each one trying to intimidate the other, (all while struggling to hold back a fit of playful laughter as smiles threatened to crack.)

“And... GO!” Tom called, starting the timer.

Immediately, Sonic was off, dashing throughout the house in a streak of blue, leaving a gust of wind in his wake. Despite not moving yet, Maddie could already feel her heart pounding and blood pumping as adrenaline kicked in. She knew chasing Sonic directly was a fruitless endeavor. However, the woman watched for her adopted son's blue trail, following the pattern as she took her position. Letting out a deep breath, feeling another rush of air brush right by her side, Maddie squared her shoulders and kept calm, knowing that her little show-off couldn't resist coming back again for a second pass.

This time she was ready for the speedy little blue devil. Maddie knew he liked to go for the right on the first pass, left on the second. There was a bit of an impact; nothing that would cause either one of them serious harm, but it was enough to knock the wind out of the human. Despite that, Maddie emerged victorious, now holding a rather baffled-looking Sonic in her arms.

“Hey! W-what the-?! H-how did you-?!”

The little blue alien squirmed a bit in his caretaker's arms, still uncertain about how and when exactly this happened.

“So... you were saying that I'd have to catch you first?” questioned Maddie, shifting Sonic to lean against her shoulder while rubbing his back, “Well consider yourself caught, young sir.”

She was rewarded with a rather defeated yet still playful groan from the teenage alien.

“Yeah. Well, I'm still not tired...”

“One minute and eighteen seconds.”

At Tom's announcement of Maddie's new personal best, the woman excitedly pumped her fist in the air before returning to stroking Sonic's quills. Having a child was never easy; an alien child with superpowers more so. The two of them had been learning Sonic's preferred patterns over time to a point where both caretakers could predict his movements and catch him in a full run. Maddie and Tom would take turns while Sonic thought of it like a game. (A game he'd secretly just let his two favorite humans win, of course. Or at least that's what he kept telling himself.)

Despite having been “captured”, the boy was laughing while his short tail wagged. Gently, Tom ran his hand over Sonic's head, giving his ears a good scratch then gave Ozzie some attention. Now, over the last several months, the little blue space hog had become quite the conisuerrier of his caregivers' affection. The Donut Lord had larger hands, offering excellent coverage of all the good spots and had become a master of ear rubs. (No doubt with all the practice he'd had with Ozzie.) Pretzel Lady on the other hand had smaller, slimmer fingers with longer nails that could zero in on a single area with surgical precision. Wonderful, gentle hands that lovingly stroked through Sonic's blue quills practically causing the boy to melt in her arms.

“Let's get you to bed, little one.” Maddie said, lightly kissing the blue alien's forehead, causing him to let out a little groan as his muzzle reddened.

“H-hey, I'm not that little,” Sonic protested, resting his chin on Maddie's shoulder while she walked him out of the kitchen and up the stairs, “And I'm not -yaaaaawn- that sleepy either.”

“Hmph, you could have fooled me, bud,” observed Tom, following behind, “But if that's the case I guess you could say that-”

“No. Don't go there! I know what you're -yawn- gonna say...”

“You could say that in your case, sleep is in short order.”

Another one. So soon too! Tom just laughed as the blue alien tried to hide his still reddening face by burying it against Maddie's neck, all the while groaning loudly. It was dreadful. Terrible. But he'd expect nothing less of the Donut Lord.

******

So yeah, cute family fluff piece. If you’re interested in the story thus far, it’s called Sometimes All you Need is a Friend.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/26085514/chapters/63447325

Now, this was partially inspired by this post I saw on Tumblr, https://humanityinahandbag.tumblr.com/post/624134807767695360/sonic-the-hedgehog-very-serious-question

Thank you @shouto-midoriya for posting the link to this post for me and @humanityinahandbag for the original post!

[oss-crime]

Chapter 2-Project “Ma” –Eve–; Scene 3

Original Sin Story: Crime, pages 23-37

Apparently the carriage’s speed was enough to outrace their pursuers.

After they arrived at Nemu village, they headed for Eve’s house, which was also the residence of the village chief.

This village had no clinics. As he had some medical knowledge, the village chief also acted as the village doctor.

“Welcome home…And who are these people, Eve?”

Chief Zvezda’s eyes went wide when he saw Eve carrying in two men, one of them injured.

“They were attacked on the plains by the white army. This one’s wounded.”

“It looks that way…Well then, you sit over here. I’ll examine you.”

Seth obeyed the chief’s words, taking a seat in a chair set deeper in the room.

After watching him silently, Eve spoke up to Adam “Are you alright? You didn’t get injured or anything?”

“No, luckily for me. More than that—”

Before Adam could continue his sentence, the village chief cut in as he wrapped a bandage around Seth’s head, “Judging by your outfits…you two are researchers from the royal capital.”

“Ho, you’re quite well-informed.”

“Director Horus of the Royal Research Institute is an old acquaintance of mine. Is he still working hard on research artifacts as usual?”

Adam hesitated for a moment, before telling the chief, “No…He’s passed on. Two years ago. Right now I’m working as director in his place.”

“How…I see, I hadn’t known. I’ve stopped going to the Twelve Royal Capitals lately. And so that would make you—”

“Horus’ adopted son, Adam.”

“I’ve heard your name from him, but I suppose that would make this our first time meeting like this.”

“Yes, and—"

This time Seth butt in. “Erm…I’d appreciate it if you could patch up my wound first.”

“Oops, sorry.”

The chief flusteredly resumed wrapping bandages.

“…Hm?”

He made a puzzled expression, peering at Seth’s face.

“Your left eye looks funny. Is that injured as well?”

“Ah…No, it’s always been like that. I haven’t been able to see out of this eye from birth.”

“A defective left eye…Horus was like that too, as I recall.”

“Ha ha, that’s right. Just a coincidence.”

.

After Seth’s treatment was finished, the researchers bowed their heads to Eve and the village chief and said their thanks.

The chief offered for them to rest at the village for a while.

“The white army wouldn’t go as far as attacking us here,” the chief revealed.

Adam replied, giving him a courteous smile, “Is that because this place is a village of sorcerers?”

“…My my, so the son of Horus is able to glean that much.” The village chief sat down in a nearby chair, a hand on his aching hip. “Let me ask you a question instead, Adam. For what purpose did you all come to this remote place? I’d think that scientists would have little interest in an excavation site, of all things.”

“That’s not so. After all is said and done we’re researchers of the old legacy. It wouldn’t be all that strange for us to want to see where it’s excavated.”

“But up until this point we have never once had a scientist go visit there. Your aim is not the excavation site.”

The village chief’s tone had hardened, but Adam wasn’t intimidated. “Chief Zvezda—No, esteemed sorcerer Raiou Zvezda. It seems you have something in mind already. As it happens, we also have several things we’d like to talk to you about.”

“So I’m the one you’ve been after.”

“Actually, to be more accurate—” Adam turned to Eve. “—We came here to meet her.”

The peaceful atmosphere that had been in the room just moments ago changed in an instant.

Eve could feel a sense of unease.

This wasn’t a light matter; especially considering they had come here with a retinue of soldiers.

Appearing to guess at Eve’s anxiety, the chief said to her, “Eve, please go outside for a minute.”

But Eve shook her head.

“If there’s a reason why these scientists are interested in a humble village girl like me, then I want to know what it is,” she said, somewhat challengingly.

It wasn’t like she’d never done anything of note. Depending on the situation…there was a chance that she would have to drive off the scientists that she’d rescued herself.

“Oh dear, let’s all calm down now, everyone.” Seth stood in the center of the group, remonstrating all present. “Sorry for being rude. …I’m sure you are as well, aren’t you Adam?”

“…”

“None of us wants to see this turn out like what happened with the ‘Witch of Merrigod’.”

Upon hearing that name, the village chief’s gaze turned even sharper. “So…you two are on a ‘witch hunt’ after all!”

“You’re quite knowledgeable. I suppose you…suspected us of that from the start. You not knowing about Dr. Horus’ death—was also a lie, I imagine.”

“I said this earlier, but I haven’t gone to the Twelve Royal Capitals in some time. I rarely even go outside the village. …But sorcerers have a network that allows them to share information.”

“The spell that uses green onions? Talking to people at long distances…Well, leaving that aside you have several misunderstandings here, so I shall explain.”

Adam looked at Seth with dissatisfaction. “No, I’m the one who—”

“Just leave this to your underling. Mister Director.” After cutting Adam off, Seth once more bowed to Eve and the village chief. “I have yet to introduce myself. My name is Seth Twiright. I work for the Royal Research Institute, and I am the late Dr. Horus’ top apprentice.”

“…Self-labeled top apprentice,” Eve heard Adam quietly mutter.

.

Levianta was called a “Kingdom”, but at present the position of ruler was not something gained by heredity.

In this country that was born to protect the temple and flourishing through the legacy bequeathed by the gods, the “gods” were absolute, and all people were little more than their servants.

The one who ruled the country had to be someone who could hear “the voice of the gods”. And the one they deemed most suitable for that was a virgin who commanded extraordinary magical power.

For that reason Levianta was ruled through the ages by a “queen”, but there were various institutions that existed for selecting that queen.

The special orphanage owned by the Loop Octopus family, the Lighwatch temple managed by the Asayev family, the Royal Research Institute run by the Vaju family, etc…

This also served as a source of political conflict in the senate. Because whichever establishment the queen was born into decided who was the next head of the senate. The current queen Alice Merry-Go-Round had once been a child raised in the special orphanage.

“Naturally, the other families don’t just passively sit and watch. There are a lot of senate members who get worked up over making the next queen show up from their own facility. As for the Vaju family, they’ve been seeking out results from a certain experiment…”

The village chief covered his face with his hand as he listened to Seth’s explanation. “Scheming to artificially birth a child with strong magical potential…How frightening.”

“Be that as it may, if we hadn’t then the institute wouldn’t get its funding for the legacy research. Dr. Horus couldn’t afford not to comply.”

“There have always been shady rumors about the Royal Research Institute. That to birth the ‘next queen’ they abduct potential mothers from all over. …Though Horus never told me anything himself.”

“That’s another misconception. It’s not like the research institute is forcibly making off with these women. It’s all out of their consent—if it means performing a service to the gods then everyone is quite happy to participate in our research.”

The village chief snorted, clearly not believing him. “It hasn’t been like that recently, at the very least. You’ve all been carrying out ‘witch hunts’, even using troops for it.”

“To be accurate, they’re a peace-keeping force. And, well, we’ve found ourselves in certain circumstances that require we hurry.”

“Why is that? As I recall the current queen is still in her forties. Her dynasty should last for another twenty years more at least.”

“…The institute is no longer searching for someone to be the ‘mother of the queen’.”

“--? What do you mean?”

“We are trying to find a woman who can become queen. And the new queen will also become the mother of the gods…The ‘Ma’.”

“You can’t mean…!? The ‘Ma’ is little more than a fairy-tale!”

Seeing the chief’s astonishment, Eve asked, “Father, what’s the ‘Ma’?”

“…It is said that when catastrophe is on the cusp of visiting this world, the dragon god LeviaBehemo with two heads and two wills will have a second coming in this world as human children. And the woman who births these ‘Twins of God’ is ‘Ma’…the divine mother, Mem Aleph…It’s an old myth passed down from long ago.”

“Erm…” Eve then said to Seth, guessing on her own what the conclusion to the story she just heard was then. “…So if the gods must be reborn in this world…Then does that mean that there really is a catastrophe coming?”

Seth briefly clapped for her. “That’s correct, Miss Eve.”

“But what’s your basis for that?”

“It was none other than the dragon god LeviaBehemo who prophesized thus. Through the queen. We’ve never had an oracle be wrong before. The senate needed to come up with a countermeasure post-haste.”

And the countermeasure drafted by the senate head Miroku Loop Octopus was project “Ma”.

They changed the role of the next queen selection measures to search for a woman who could become the mother of the gods.

Once she had safely birthed the children that would become receptacles for the gods, she would obtain the position of queen in place of Alice, as reward for her service. …That sort of thing.

“But if you do that then the current queen will have to step down. Can the senate really decide that on their own?”

“The current queen agrees with this project as well, you see. …I mean, I think that the members of the senate wouldn’t be able to move with this much forward momentum if she didn’t.”

The one who managed to produce the mother of the gods from their institution would achieve glory as the savior who protected the world from catastrophe.

And also the position of next head of the senate.

“…Anyhow, the Royal Research Institute must also search for ‘Ma’ candidates under orders of the Vaju family.

Upon hearing that the village chief gave a sideways glance to Eve with a sullen expression. “And so…you’ve selected my own daughter as an ‘Ma’ candidate.”

“The Royal Research Institute is seen as the most plausible source for completing this project. So the head of the senate has given the institute several authorizations. Such as to freely make use of security forces and their information.”

“But if the Royal Research Institute were to successfully carry out Project ‘Ma’, Miroku will lose his position as senate head. Is he alright with that?”

“Well, I don’t know that far…But I imagine it would be pretty difficult to find the ‘Ma’ in Senator Miroku’s special orphanage. And so…maybe his plan is to be able to continue to wield some influence in the senate even after stepping down by collaborating with the facility most likely to succeed.”

“What an awful power struggle.”

“I agree. Well, anyway, it’s thanks to our information that we were able to learn of some rumors around here…”

That was, the rumors of the “Witch of the Forest” that supposedly would appear in the sprawling “Forest of Held” to the south of the village.

There was a girl who would use magic to drive off the tribesmen that would appear every now and then…She had green hair, and would cast lightning with a blue spoon…Supposedly.

“According to what we’ve heard, she’s the bearer of significant magical power. Only, this region is currently being terrorized by that savage clan. That’s why we brought along minimal guards with us…Though conversely, that seems to have just spurred them on.”

Listening to all that, Eve was reminded of the soldiers that they’d left out on the plain. “I wonder if…those guys are alright.”

Adam had been quiet this whole time, but he replied, “The peacekeeping unit…especially Gammon, are all strong men. They can’t use magic, but they are proficient with swords and guns. They won’t be defeated by the likes of those tribesmen.”

“But—”

“In the worst-case scenario, they’ll seek out reinforcements from the royal capital…Right now it’s us I’m worried about.”

Eve felt her cheeks flush from being looked at by this man so close to her in age.

There weren’t any intrepid, intellectual guys like him in the village.

“Hmph…It sounds like you two are mistaken about something.” The village chief cut in between Eve and Adam. “This ‘Witch of the Forest’…I’ve certainly heard of that story, but that isn’t Eve.”

“B-but, she has the same green hair, and her magical ability—”

As Adam tried to argue, the village chief quietly shook his head. “Green hair is a trait shared by the people of the forest…And as for magical ability, everyone in the village has it in varying measures.”

“…Let me ask then, Chief. Are there any other green-haired girls in this village—”

“No. We’re immigrants who originally wandered here from elsewhere. But Eve is different. She was abandoned and set adrift in a nearby river when she was a baby. My late-wife scooped her out. We raised her as our own daughter.”

“So then—”

“Did the intel you gathered claim that the Witch of the Forest was someone in this village?”

“No, it…didn’t say that…”

“If you’re looking for a girl with green hair, I’d suggest going to the Forest of Held. You’re sure to run into the people of the forest immediately.”

“…Seth.”

Adam gave Seth a prompting glance.

“O.K. Now it’s time for this.”

What he brought out was a small iron rod that forked into two prongs.

“This is an artifact. It can measure someone’s latent magical potential by holding it out in front of them like this…Augh!” Appearing to have realized something, Seth looked up to the ceiling and held his head. “We don’t have the output device! I left it in the carriage.”

“What!?”

“No…It’s understandable. With the way things were there wasn’t any time to take out something so heavy…”

“…Nothing for it. We’ll have to go back there and get it.”

Adam asked if they could borrow Eve’s automated carriage.

Given that it would be dangerous to bring a woman over to where there might still be some tribesmen, he apparently intended to go get the equipment with Seth.

“But you need magical ability to run the carriage.”

“Don’t worry. I have enough myself.”

Thinking on it, he had been riding in a large automatic carriage. Adam must have been driving that one too.

“Don’t break it. It’s very important to us.”

Adam nodded at Eve’s words, and started to move to leave the house with Seth along.

--But that moment, they heard the shrieking sound of a car wheel from outside.

“Huh!? …Could it be?”

Adam leaned out the window.

And there he beckoned over someone who was outside.

After a beat, a long-haired man walked into the room.

He had a gun and a sword sheathed at his hip. He appeared to be a military man.

“So you’re alright, Gammon.”

This man named Gammon exchanged a handshake with Adam.

“It was no big deal. There were just quite a lot of them, so it took some time.”

“You only have the one carriage? And I can’t see the other soldiers outside of your driver.”

“I sent everyone back to the royal capital. They’ll need to appeal for information, and reinforcements, depending on the circumstances.”

“Reinforcements?...If you were able to repel the tribesmen then there’s no need for that, is there? Don’t do anything too dangerous. This is supposed to be a peaceful—”

“I won’t be turning my sword on any witch. This is incidental. I want to take the opportunity to make a decisive strike on the white army.”

Adam heaved a sigh.

“…I suppose that is the official job of a peacekeeping force. But don’t forget. Your responsibility is—”

“Guarding you, I know. Naturally I will accomplish that properly myself.”

“Alone?”

“Is that not enough?”

“…It’s enough. You’re dependable.”

“You could stand to be a bit cheerier. I did bring you back what you forgot.”

Packed in the luggage compartment of the automated carriage that the captain of the security forces, Gammon, had rode in on was the device that Adam and Seth had left behind on the plains.

Once more putting together the magic measuring device, Seth started to take note of Eve’s magical ability.

“Though this isn’t a standard instrument. Using it in itself is quite simple. Please just stand perfectly still right there.”

Seth turned the iron rod's prongs in Eve’s direction.

After a while the box that was attached by wire to the bundle of metal let out a “be-beep”. Seth set it down and started to examine the numbers displayed on the box’s screen.

When he did, his expression grew crestfallen.

“…Your M count is 72. And your other numbers are average. That means you’re only a little bit stronger in magic than the average person.

Adam stood next to Seth and peered at the data output device.

“You’re sure the device isn’t broken?”

“I could check…Hey, Gammon.” Seth did a reading of Gammon’s magical ability just as he had done with Eve. “…M count of 0. Alright! You are, without a doubt, ‘magically impotent’!”

“…”

While breaking out into something of a cold sweat as Gammon glared at him, Seth then measured the magic potential of Adam, and then the village chief.

“…Amazing. The village chief is 200, and Adam exceeds 300. If you two were women you’d most certainly be candidates for ‘Ma’—At any rate, I think the device is working correctly.”

Upon hearing that outcome, the village chief slowly stood before Adam.

“And now we’ve satisfied you that Eve is not this ‘Witch of the Forest’.”

“…At the very least we’ve established that she can’t be an ‘Ma’ candidate.”

“I see…That’s good then, Eve.”

Eve wondered if it really was.

Maybe she had just let a chance for her to become queen slip out from under her very nose.

Queen…huh.

It was an unbelievable honor for a citizen of Levianta to obtain that position.

But I doubt my father would let me become queen.

Eve knew quite well that he was a man who hated politics.

It was only because there was no one else who could fulfill the role of village chief that he had bitterly accepted the role.

I’ve had to work specifically because he rarely takes in any taxes.

She thought her father was a splendid man.

But that didn’t mean she had no complaints.

<<prev------directory------next>>

[xparadisexlostx]

So Idk what possessed me to write this. I wrote it all in one go and it is in desperate need of a proof read and probably and edit... but I doubt I’ll ever do that lol. I’m tired and I’m getting a headache and I still have drafts to work on, so I’m just gonna post it before I lose confidence and hide it like the many, many other drabbles I’ve never posted.

I don’t know why I wanted to write this in first person. That usually annoys me, but for some reason it just sounded right in this case.

So this drabble is primarily about Beck and Cora, how they meet, and the relationship they have. Obviously I did a LOT, if not too much, condensing because otherwise this never would have ended. 

For context, Cora is Beck’s sort of adopted mom. She his a centuries old witch who was possessed, years ago by a spirit of hospitality. Over time the two merged into one being and that is why she’s pretty much immortal. Because of what she was she was made an outcast by her own people, the clan of the Grey Owls. Here is her face claim. 

_____________________________________________

A long life makes you accustomed to loss. You learn people are better at a distance. Far enough away that you can’t really make out their faces, and their voices turn to echoes by the time they’re in your ears. Any closer than that and you risk the pain that comes with a proper meeting. I found that out the hard way when Hattie passed. 

It was agonizingly slow. At first she just needed a bit of help with getting up after a long day in the garden. And then she couldn’t go as far on our evening walks. Eventually she couldn’t make it out to tend the flowers that she loved so dearly, and she forgot the names of the dairy goats we’d raised by hand and bottle. And when I saw Death come peacefully across the border of the Living Dream, shimmering in the late afternoon sunlight and invisible to my love, I lifted her up in my arms and carried her out to the fields of flowers. She didn’t remember my name, but she held me close to her with what dwindling strength remained in her arms, and laid her head on my heart while I whispered a silent goodbye.

We had never had any children. Back then we only escaped the scandal of being together by living on my family’s land and growing or making most of what we needed. People in the towns whispered, but they let us be so long as we didn’t make too much noise. That wouldn’t have been any life for a child. Children need community, friends, and more love than just two mothers could bring them. The mortals would have never accepted a child of ours, and the witches had cast me out years before on account of what I was---what I am.

I buried Hattie in the flowerbed, and I left my home after that. The place I had been made, where I had settled for three centuries, had nothing to give me but pain. Even England reminded me all too much of what I had lost. I was alone, and I imagined that somewhere else I could find a place where I was content with that once again.

And I did. In a cottage deep in the Sierra Nevada mountains, I found the peace that had evaded me for so long. People stopped by in the occasional way: lost travelers, rapscallion youths, the occasional farmer looking for good dairy stock. That was the way for well over a hundred years. It wasn’t until the storm of ‘01 that it all changed, that I noticed the pie I was cooling on the windowsill was gone, and there was only a small muddy handprint in its place.

In the afterglow of a lightning strike I saw him there. A great, hulking bear, tall as the horizon, pale as a fresh pressed bedsheet, illuminated against the black sky. On his head were horns made of trees, and his claws were gnarled roots. On his back he carried a forest with a heart-tree that glowed gold. My brother, older than me by millenia, scarcely seen but ever familiar, always present. He looked from me to the barn, and stared, transfixed, by whatever he saw, and then he was gone.

I pulled on a raincoat and stepped into my boots, and raced across the yard to the shelter of the barn. The goats stirred in their pen, and the chickens let out a low squawk of protest as the building flooded with light. I found my pie in the back stall and a trail of blueberry pawprints leading away from it and into a pile of hay, where I found a small, trembling kit, little enough to fit in my one hand.

She shook like a leaf, whining up a terrible storm, as I tucked her beneath my coat and took her into the house. The promise of a proper meal convinced her to turn back into the girl I already knew she was, but she still shook so hard that she lost half of every bite she tried to take. I might have scolded anyone else for stealing, but she was so slight, too small and slender for a girl her age, and she was covered in mud and briars and sticks that matted in her golden hair. And when I put her in the tub to scrub her clean I saw the bruises and the cuts that no branch had inflicted. 

Looking back on that night I never had the chance to hold her at arm’s length. From the moment I plucked her out of the hay and pressed her to my heart, she was mine. I couldn’t keep her. The Fox Bitch wouldn’t allow it. And no one would listen to me when I told them of the heinous crimes Elea Tandy was committing against her own kin. No one cared when I complained of the local coven teachers casting her out. 

I made myself content with what I could have, and I taught her what an old witch could when she escaped that awful house and made her way through the forest to me. I showed her how to sew up a skirt as well as a wound, and taught her what the woods had to offer when her mother denied her supper. When she couldn’t read my spellbooks I taught her songs and rhythms to help her remember words and order. How to milk a goat, how to shear a sheep, how to tie a good and proper knot, and how to cook anything you found or caught. Our time together didn’t always last long, and when she left I felt it like a stab to the heart, but she was mine. The baby Hattie and I never got to have, filled with more kindness and curiosity and life than anyone else I had ever met.

And I ought to have known by the sight of my Brother what she was, and that she could not belong to me, or to anyone forever, but it wasn’t until months later, when I saw him again, watching her ride through the woods with a wild abandon, that I understood. 

Feral. A term that makes every parent clutch her pearls and shiver in fear, even though they barely know what it means. Feral witches are born to leave. They are only a brief bridge between the Dream Realm and the physical, destined to merge once more with the Nature Spirit from which they came. 

She was not mine to keep, but I held on.

I held on in agony as she ran off, desperate for freedom and adventure and a respite from the violence of her home. I smothered her in loving arms every time she came back. But she came back less and less. It was too dangerous, and every time she risked us both. I told her I didn’t care, and that I wasn’t afraid of Elea Tandy… but I knew that she was.

She was right to be.

Even I had never imagined Elea could be so vile and twisted as to kill a familiar. And to make a child watch… It turns my gut even to think of it now. I thought it would be the death of her, and it likely would have been if her brother hadn’t turned on their mother himself. He tried to bring her back to life, and so did I. But there was nothing but fathomless despair behind those blue eyes. I finally had her safe beneath my roof, and she was dying in my arms just like Hattie had. No amount of love could ever replace what she had lost when Dawnbreaker had been hanged before her eyes.

After ages of lifelessness, she eventually became restless in her grief, and I imagined I was witnessing her end. I put her in my car and drove her as deep into the wilderness as I could, and when I wrapped my arms around her I said that same silent goodbye. I barely made it home before my own sorrow and anger threatened to drown me. She was too young, I thought, and how unfair it was that she should die having tasted so little happiness, having felt so few kind touches. Brother would care for her upon her return, but why had he ever allowed her to come from the womb of that wretched woman? I had gifted her all the love that I could, and it didn’t feel like nearly enough in the face of all the pain she had been put through.

I hated him for that. Perhaps I still do.

I left California the same way I left England, distraught, and purchased new land on the secluded shores of Lake Erie. I told no one where I went, and no one would have ever asked. 

When I saw the golden horse upon my lawn some years later I thought it was a reflection in the Living Dream, a spirit of what once was lingering, but the girl upon its back was no longer a child. Even at a distance, even after all those years, I knew her face, and when she ran into my arms I held her tighter than I ever had before. 

She was alive and more vibrant than I’d ever seen her---all golden curls and smiles and a wild glint in her eye. We rode horses on the shoreline and sang foolish songs around a campfire. She told me stories of where she had been and everything she’d seen as she wove crowns from wildflowers. The next evening she showed me the scars where the mountain lion had nearly ripped her life away, and then demonstrated her new form with such ease that I felt my knees go weak. Even at such a young age the power swelled around her.

Feral. The very thing that had made other witches reject her had allowed her to thrive. In the wilds she had found the peace and happiness that others had so cruelly robbed her of. And I felt a pride blossom in me that I’d never felt before.

She left me again, as I knew she would, as was her nature, but this time I didn’t feel grief. For as long as she was on this Earth, she would return to me. That much I was certain. And that much has always been proven true.

Now, without the fear of her mother’s viciousness, she comes to me more frequently, and she can linger in my house as long as her wild spirit will allow. Our time together isn’t so rare… and yet I know that it is still brief. 

Each visit I see the spirit grow within her, each year the magic grows stronger. It pulls in more animals, and it bends nature around her without her even noticing it. 

She doesn’t see my Brother when she is sitting upon her golden stallion, basking in the sun as it cuts through the forest branches, but I think she feels him. As the animals gather all around her and play like newborn lambs, as she feels the embrace of the woods around her, I think she feels him watching. Her eyes glisten and she smiles with a fondness that breaks my heart. I think that if she just takes one step she will be lost to me forever.

I call her name when she raises her hand to touch what she cannot see, and with the slowness of a drunkard she blinks her eyes. When she looks back at me in those moments I know she can see across the centuries. She knows what I am. 

Again I call her name. It’s selfish, maybe, to want to hold onto her. Perhaps I do nothing but hold her back. But she smiles at me, and the mist evaporates from her eyes to reveal that mischievous sparkle.

“Come away from there, girl.” I say, beaconing her back toward the house with a wave of my hand and I watch my Brother’s eyes with unbecoming smugness as she presses her golden stallion forward and exclaims “‘Race ya!’” as she charges back home.

[appalachianwiine]

Swim - Chapter 5 - A Light In the Darkness

I need light in the dark as I search for the resolution   

-"The Resolution" by Jacks Mannequin

“Well we’re not going to be starting Chemo tonight after all.” Dr. Rhee says as she walks in shortly after lunch. 

“We’re not?” Daryl frowns.

“No her post op lab results show just a little bit of an increase in white blood cells.” Dr. Rhee explains. “I’m going to give her some antibiotics and retest tomorrow morning. But the good news is that means she can go down to the playroom for a bit.” 

“Can she have visitors?” Daryl asks. Lydia had been asking about seeing Carl since the child life specialist, Beth, had left. 

“Yeah she can, but visiting hours for non family end at 8pm” Dr. Rhee informs him. 

“Want me t’ call ‘em baby girl?” Daryl asks. 

“Can you?” Lydia pleads. 

“Yeah.” Daryl picks up his phone and dials Lori. 

“Daryl?!” Her voice is a little strained. “We’ve been calling all day. Is everything okay?” 

Its with a rush of guilt he realizes he’s hardly looked at his phone since she called him yesterday. “Shit sorry Lori.” He gives her the short version of it all, about the leukemia, the lumbar puncture, the results they were waiting on.

“I can’t believe you didn’t call earlier.” Lori scolds. “Daryl, we should’ve been there. I can’t believe you had to do all this alone.” 

Daryl grimaces. “Sorry, I uh - I actually had a meetin’ this mornin’. With a nice woman who runs the support group here fer parents. She was a single parent when she went through this with her daughter.” 

“Oh.” Lori says. “Is - is there a lot of that? Single parents I mean.” 

Daryl glances over at Lydia, who’s drawn back into the television. “I ain’ even the only adoptive parent righ’ now. There’s a guy across the hall, Ezekiel, an’ his kid.” 

“Shit.” Lori mutters. “Well um - do you - do you want us to come by? Can she have visitors?” 

“Yeah she can. She’s been askin’ t’ see Carl. Real disappointed in not getting t’ see him yesterday.” Daryl says. 

“I’ll give Rick a call and we’ll be by.” Lori says. “You need anything from home?” 

“No we’re alright.” Daryl says. “Thanks Lori.” 

“Of course.” Lori says. “We’ll see you around 3?” 

“See you then.” He hangs up, turning back to Lydia, who’s watching him with hopeful eyes. “They’ll be here around three.” 

“Yay!” Lydia grins, bouncing up and down. 

“Ya know,” Dr. Rhee says. “Maybe Miss Lydia would like to check out the playroom. She’ll have to wear a mask and stay connected to the infusion pump, but they’ve got a lot of good stuff in there.”

“Can we daddy?” Lydia asks. 

“Sure.” Daryl agrees, he’ll do anything to keep her in good spirits right now. She seems to be feeling good and he’d like to keep it that way. “You know there’s a little boy yer age across the hall?” 

“There is?” Lydia asks. “Can I see him?” 

“Sure, lets go over and see if he wants to come with us.” Daryl helps Lydia out of bed and sets her carefully on the floor. “Hang on let me get the pole.” He reaches for the infusion pole, fumbling with the latch that attaches it to the bed for a moment. It releases and he pulls it towards him, it’s surprisingly heavy. “Alright lets go kiddo.” 

They have to pause twice for Daryl to gather up the tubing that comes out of Lydia’s arm and up to the bag of antibiotics. As he loops them around his hand it strikes him that this isn’t unlike Dog’s long line, wrapped around his hands and unraveling as they move. Lydia looks back at Daryl as they reach the door of 323. 

“You knock daddy.” Lydia mutters, reaching out to grab his hand. The wariness returns to her as they stand in front of the door. 

“Okay.” He says, squeezing her hand and reaching out to knock. 

“A moment!” Ezekiel’s voice comes from beyond the door. There’s some scrambling and then the door pulls open. “Daryl!” 

The booming voice makes Lydia flinch and draw closer to Daryl. Daryl reassures her with a hand on her head, stroking her hair back. “Uh, Ezekiel. This is Lydia.” He smiles. “She was wondering if - if Henry might want to come to the playroom.” 

Ezekiel kneels in front of them, and it’s then that Daryl sees he’s wearing a paper crown colored in yellow and pink. “Hello Lydia.” His voice drops. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m Ezekiel.” He holds out a hand. 

Lydia’s brown eyes look back up at Daryl, and then, slowly, she reaches out to shake Ezekiel’s hand. “Hi.” 

“Would you like to come in and meet Henry?” Ezekiel asks. Lydia nods silently, and Ezekiel stands, offering a smile and stepping back from the door. “Come in, he’s over there with Carol.” 

Daryl pushes the IV pole into the room, it’s a mirror image of their own, except this one is decorated. Behind the bed is one of those banners you get from the party store spelling out ‘Henry’ in bold green letters, and a bunch of printer sheet sized papers with colorful backsplash and lettering taped around the room. As he walks past one Daryl sees it’s a bible verse, the others appear to be too. Over by the window the bald little boy is sitting on Carol’s lap and holding plastic dinosaurs. 

“Henry.” Ezekiel calls. “Someone is here to see you.” 

The boy’s head turns and Daryl is struck by how in the light of day his skin appears almost translucent but his eyes are bright and alert. “Hi.” He says, climbing off of Carol’s lap and trotting across the floor, his own infusion tube trailing after him. “I’m Henry.” 

“Lydia.” She mumbles, hiding her face against Daryl’s leg. 

“Go on.” Daryl mutters, nudging her forward. “Ask him.” 

“Do you um… want to go to the… to the playroom?” She mutters, half into Daryl’s leg. 

“Sure.” A smile stretches across Henry’s face. “Can we daddy?” 

“Sure Henry.” Ezekiel says, already fumbling with the latch on the infusion pole. 

“Hi Daryl.” Carol says. “She doing okay?” 

“Yeah I think so.” Daryl nods. “Better now that she ate, and uh her friend is coming to visit soon.” 

“Are you coming with us?” Henry asks Carol as he drops a few plastic dinosaurs into a tub. 

“If your daddy doesn’t mind.” Carol smiles. 

“Never do.” Ezekiel smiles, sliding Henry’s own infusion pole over to them. “Ready?” 

The playroom is at the other end of the floor, it’s empty and clean, even here everything smells sterile and controlled. There’s a sign telling the kids to wear masks before they go in, and two boxes, one with princesses and the other with trucks. A bit gendered but it’s an option. Henry reaches confidently for the princess one and puts it on, Lydia on the other hand looks warily at them. 

“I don’t want those.” Lydia murmurs. 

“I know.” Daryl sighs. “But those are the rules, if you don’t follow them you have to go back to the room.” 

“Fine.” Lydia scowls, grabbing one of the pink princess ones and putting it on. “Can we go play now?” 

“Go on.” Daryl says, pushing her infusion pole over to one of the small tables and watching her drag out the barbies.

“They seem to be hitting it off.” Carol comes to stand next to him, Ezekiel is helping the kids pull the toys out, still wearing the paper crown. 

“Yeah.” Daryl mutters. “What’s uh - what’s with the crown?” 

“Oh,” Carol chuckles. “Henry was making us play something he calls ‘’Kingdom” It changes but the theme is usually he’s a prince and Ezekiel is the King and they have to fight monsters.” 

“Ah.” Daryl chuckles. “A fun kid?” 

“Oh tons of fun.” Carol nods. “When he feels good anyway, he’ll probably take a hit after this round of Chemo.” Her smile fades a little bit. 

“Oh.” Dary mutters. 

“Sorry.” Carol apologizes. “It’s just - it’s always a little hard being here.” 

“I can’t even imagine.” Daryl sighs. “Losing her it’s -” 

“Don’t.” Carol cuts him off. “I’m sorry just - the words don’t… they don’t help and you don’t need to go there right now.” 

“Right.” He’s quiet for a while, an awkward silence stretching out in front of them. 

“What do you do?” Carol says after a moment. 

“Cop. Special Victims, domestic violence and child abuse mostly” He nods. “‘S how I met Lydia. You?” 

“High School English teacher.” Carol says. Daryl chuckles. “What?” 

“I don’ know I didn’t picture that.” He shrugs. 

“Oh really?” Carol raises her eyebrows. “What did you picture Mr. Cop?” 

“I don’t know. I just can’t picture you as a strict highschool English teacher.” He scratches his chin. “You uh make the kids write a million drafts?” 

“If I don't, no one will.” She chuckles. “I wanted to teach Elementary though, but after Sophia… highschool was easier.” 

“Ah.” Daryl nods. “And uh, you an’ Ezekiel, how long has that been a thing? Just since he moved down here? Or did you know him before?” 

“Me and Ezekiel?” She raises her eyebrows. “Oh we’re not - no, just friends. Trust me the last thing either of us has the time or energy for is dating. He got in contact with me a lot like you did actually, referral through Maggie.” 

“Oh.” Daryl says. “I uh, sorry I just assumed, I mean Henry seems to adore you and I just assumed.” 

“It’s fine.” Carol promises. “So what’s her plan?” 

“Lydias?” Daryl asks, Carol nods. “Oh um, well apparently the lab is closed on Sundays, but we should have results by Thursday, but I think she’s supposed to start Chemo tomorrow. What uh… what can I expect? I mean Dr. Rhee told me but it’s kind of overwhelming.”

“Daryl.” Carol sighs. “Are you sure you can handle this right now?” 

“I’m fine.” He insists. “The hallway was just -” 

“It’s okay.” Carol reaches over and squeezes his arm. “You don’t have to explain, I promise we’ve all had breakdowns in the hallway.” 

“Right.” Daryl rubs his hands on his jeans.

“So um,” Carol says. “So they’ll probably give about four hours of fluids first, chemo does a lot of damage to the kidneys so they’ll want her to flush it as quickly as possible. So expect a lot of potty breaks, then she’ll get her chemo, then another four hours of fluids. She’ll feel pretty tired, nauseous, she might get constipated, and her blood counts will plummet.” 

“What does that mean?” Daryl asks. “Like what do I - what will she look like.” 

“Um, pale, they’ll watch her for a certain kind of bruising, she’ll have a higher chance of infection. It’s not too bad when they’re checking her all the time, but it’s nerve wracking when you’re at home.” Carol sighs, chewing her lip. 

“Her hair.” He says quietly. “How long… um will that take to…” 

“To fall out?” Carol says slowly, he can still sense some reluctance on her part. “Sophia's took about 2 weeks to really start coming out and then we shaved it after the third week, it was starting to upset her. But Henry kept all of his until it was gone and that was about a month.” 

“A month.” He mutters. “That’s uh - that’s not very long.” 

“No.” Carol shakes her head. “But you’re gonna get through this Daryl. It’s like Ezekiel said, you’re not alone in this. You can call me any time, seriously.” 

“Yeah.” He nods. “I uh - I will.” 

“I know that look.” Carol says. “Which means I’m going to be calling you to check in.” 

“What d’ ya mean?” He gowns. 

“That look means you’re not going to reach out first and you’re going to be stubborn about it.” Carol nudges him. 

He blushes, that had been what he was thinking. “Fine. FIne. I’ll call.” 

“Before you’re discharged. You’ll need help with that. There’s a lot that needs to be done for her to come home.” Carol insists. 

“Yeah alright. Before she’s discharged.” Daryl promises. 

They linger in the playroom for another half an hour, after which Henry starts complaining that he’s tired. Ezekiel takes Henry back to their room and Daryl helps Lydia put away some of the toys. 

“Come on kiddo, Carl will be here soon.” Daryl says, putting a few barbies in the bin. 

“Alright.” Lydia pouts putting a couple more barbies away. “Is she coming with us?” 

Daryl looks over at Carol who’s putting away a few plastic animals. “Um, I don’t think so. Why?” 

“I thought she’s Henry’s mom.” Lydia shrugs. “But he says she’s not.” 

“Yeah.” Daryl nods.

“You two want some help getting back to the room?” Carol offers. 

“Nah.” Daryl shakes his head, sliding the bin of barbies back into the cupboard and starting to gather up Lydia’s infusion line. “I think we got it. Don’t we Lydia?” 

“We got it.” Lydia nods. 

“Alright.” Carol smiles. “I’ll get going then okay?” 

“Yeah.” Daryl nods. “And uh… thanks for everything.” 

“Of course.” Carol says, holding the door open so he can push the heavy infusion pole through it. “And I mean it, I’ll be calling you. I want to see you in our meeting on Tuesday okay?”

Daryl’s about to answer but he’s cut off by a sharp yelp, Lydia has rushed forward to the end of her line and tugged it. “Lydia!” He mutters, hurrying over to her and kneeling in front of her, it doesn’t appear to have come out. “What are you-” 

“Lydia!” And in a blur another eight year old has rushed up beside him, hugging her tightly. 

“Carl!” Lydia grins, barely noticing the worry she’d caused Daryl. “Move Daddy!” 

“I - “ He looks over at Carol, she’s covered her mouth trying to suppress a giggle. 

“It’s cute.” She says apologetically. “Tuesday?” 

“Yeah.” His shoulders relax. “Tuesday.” Carol walks past him towards the elevator and Daryl pulls the infusion pump closer to them. “Carl where’s your mom?” 

“I don’t know.” Caryl shrugs, sticking his thumbs in his belt looks. “Somewhere.” 

“Carl Grimes!” Lori’s harsh voice says, coming up rapidly behind them, baby Judith on her hip. “Don’t you ever run off like that again you understand?”

“Sorry. I saw Lydia.” Carl shrugs. 

“I can see that.” Lori sighs. “Daryl, sorry about him he knows better.” 

“It’s fine Lori.” Daryl assures. “We’re just heading back to the room.” 

“Who was the woman?” Carl asks, holding Lydia’s hand as Daryl gathers up the cords again and loops them around his arm.

“Oh that’s Carol. She’s not Henry’s mom.” Lydia shrugs. 

“Then who is she?” Carl frowns. 

“I don’t know. Daddy's friend I guess.” Lydia doesn’t seem phased by it and the two start off down the hall, leaving Daryl and Lori to hurry after them. 

“Woman?” Lori raises her eyebrows. 

“Carol.” Daryl says. “She’s from the single parents support group. She uh - saw that whole fiasco.” 

“Ah.” Lori chuckles. “She's pretty?” 

“Yeah I guess. Why?” Daryl narrows his eyes.

“No reason.” Lori smirks. 

“Oh no no no.” Daryl says. “My kid has cancer, you're not playing matchmaker.” 

“You’re no fun.” Lori pouts. 

“Where’s Lori and Michonne?” He’s eager to change the subject. 

“Already in the room probably, they didn’t have a baby to hold them up.” Lori chuckles. “Or a little boy who likes to play the world tour of bathrooms every time we’re somewhere new. They brought some decorations for Lydia.” 

“Daddy look!” Lydia grins from the doorway. “Look what aunt Michonne and Uncle Rick brought!” 

Sure enough, when he gets to the door the entire room has been done up like a Little Mermaid party. Balloons, streamers, and a big ‘get well soon lydia’ sign hanging above the bed.’. He grins sheepishly at rick. “Y’all didn’t have t’ do this.” 

“Of course we did.” Michonne grins. “Now come on Lydia we brought you some presents.”

[liivkiss]

The prologue to a story I probably won't continue ...

Sooo... After years of creating an account, but only beginning to actually use it a few months ago, I decided to make a post. But, before the story itself, some information: -  English isn’t my first language. Then, you will probably find some (or many) errors;  - It is a Harry Potter’s fic inspired by the story "Bone of the Father (Blood of the Enemy)" by Ellory on AO3; - This is just the prologue to a story that I'm not sure will continue, but I have several ideas for that. It will probably be called "Blood and Magic (make us a family)" - If you like it and want to continue or use it as inspiration for something, just let me know. At the end I will put some of my ideas for this story. I hope you like it, anyway!

----------

Grapevines: For Intoxication and Bonds

Halina was sitting on her bed (if you can call it that) in the smallest room in the Dursleys' house. In front of her, a hand mirror was resting on the pillows.

In the mirror, instead of her reflection, Sirius Black's image, her Godfather and one of the last connections with her parents, glowed like a computer or TV screen. But it was magic.

She really loves magic… 

Sirius told her that Headmaster Dumbledore believed it would be safer if he didn’t contact Halina, since he was a fugitive criminal in the eyes of the Ministry of Magic, but he couldn’t do that. He failed with her as Godfather once, he wouldn’t do it again.

There was a lot to teach her about the magical world, especially since she didn't grow up in this world.

"Magic Inheritances aren’t transmitted only by words, by someone simply named their Heir." Sirius said calmly to her.

He wasn’t exactly happy with her treatment at the Dursleys, but neither of them had what they needed to get her out. Then, he taught it through the two-way mirror. What she owned now belonged to her father, James Potter.

“A connection, formed by bonds of Blood and Magic, is necessary for the Family Magic pass for the child.”

“So… How did you manage to make me the Heiress Black? Aren't we related? We are?” She tilted her head slightly to the right, frowning.

Sirius laughed a little. She liked to see Sirius smiling. He always seemed a little lighter when he did that. “We are, distantly, but we are.” He replied, still with a smile on his face "But that wouldn’t be enough to make you my Heiress."

*x*x*x*x*x*

"Let's go together, then." Halina said, looking at Cedric.

“Together?” The blond boy asked, confused.

"We touch the cup at the same time. We make Hogwarts the winner of the Tournament. Together." She answered.

"That sounds like a great idea for me." He smiled charmingly, as he always did for everyone.

She never really liked that. It looked so rehearsed. Malfoy's smirks seemed more honest than Cedric's empty smile. They always talk about how kind the boy was, but he never helped her with all the mockery and obvious bullying she suffered, even before that year.

But, well, nobody helped her. He wasn’t different.

“At three?” Cedric asked

“Yes.”

“One…” The Hufflepuff started counting.

“Two…” She took a deep breath.

“Three!” Both said simultaneously, touching the Cup together. She felt a twinge in his navel and the world around her turned.

*x*x*x*x*x*

“See, Hali…” Sirius started to explain “Between biological magical parents and children the blood connection, which I imagine is obvious here, and the magic connection happens naturally. Unless, of course, something happens to prevent this. But this is rare.”

Sirius waved his hand in front of his face with a nervous smile, dismissing the last comment.

“These connections, of Blood and Magic, are the bridge for the passage of Family Magic to reach the child and connect with him. If there isn’t a link between Blood and Magic, the Family Magic doesn’t reach the person. Of course, the connection of a Parent and your Child is only the natural way for that connection to form. There are others, Marriage, for example. But that is for another time.

“That still doesn't explain us.”

“I'm getting there.” Sirius smiled indulgently at her impatience. “The Magic Connection between two people is simple to form and there are dozens ways this can happen. Contracts, oaths, family relationships. In our case, it was a Godparenting Ritual. In the ritual, my magic connected with yours, thus establishing a magical connection between us.”

*x*x*x*x*x*

“Kill the spare” Halina heard the hissing voice order someone.

“No!” She shouted, but it was too late.

The green light hit Diggory and he went limp on the floor. Not a second later, she was gagged and stuck in one of the cemetery headstones. Only then does she realize who is doing all this. Pettigrew was quiet, arranging what appeared to be a ritual.

She could only see Diggory's body in front of her, her wand (idiot! - she thinks of herself) is lying not far from him and she is trapped in a tombstone by… Tom Riddle, apparently.

The damn rat puts a snake-like creature, deformed and strange, but vaguely humanoid, into the cauldron.

“Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!" 

Pettigrew recites, causing a bone to come out of the grave below Halina and float into the huge cauldron.

Oh, that sounds so wrong.

She's screwed.

*x*x*x*x*x*

“But if it was just the connection between Godfather and Goddaughter, you still couldn't be my Heiress” Sirius continued explaining.

She listened attentively to everything. She loved to learn every single thing she could about the Wizarding World. Even though it might sound tedious to most people, for her it sounded so amazing and wonderful.

*x*x*x*x*x*

"Flesh - of the servant - w-willingly given - you will - revive - your master.”

Pettigrew continues the ritual on top of what she supposes is some potion.

It was Black Magic, however. Not Dark, not Obscure. Not even Ancient.

It was the Addictive and Dangerous Black Magic.

*x*x*x*x*x*

“While not the most conventional, it isn’t the first time this has happened.” Sirius commented “But the blood connection needed for you to be my Heiress, for Family Black Magic passed on to you, it happened because of our distant kinship. Your grandmother, your father's mother, was Dorea Potter. She was born in the Black Family and was actually my grandfather's younger sister. We are cousins, kind of.”

“Hmm… So this is the blood connection between us…”

“Yes. There are other ways to establish a blood bond, in addition to looking for family members. Adoption, through the correct blood rituals, is one of those means. Other types of rituals and even some oaths require the use of blood. They don't necessarily form a strong enough link to the Magic Inheritance, but it's there.”

*x*x*x*x*x*

Pettigrew approached her and cut off her arm, taking the blood that was spilling from the huge cut.

“B-blood of the enemy… forcibly taken… you will… resurrect your foe.”

“Well, shit.” It was the only thing she could think of.

*x*x*x*x*x*

Sirius then stopped smiling and became serious.

“But remember Halina: Blood is the most powerful and dangerous thing in the Wizarding World. Don’t give your blood freely. Don't leave your blood behind. And do your best not to spill your blood by force. The most unimaginable things, on the good and the bad side, are possible to do using Blood Magic.”

“I understand, Sirius.”

*x*x*x*x*x*

The liquid in the cauldron immediately turned bright white. Wormtail falls to his knees beside the cauldron with the shiny liquid.

The cauldron was simmering, sending its diamond sparks in all directions, so blindingly bright that it turned all else to velvety blackness. Nothing happened… 

“Let it have drowned.” Halina thought, let it have gone wrong… 

And then, suddenly, she felt a strong pull on her magic. He got out of it and spun around, flying away. The sparks stopped coming out of the cauldron. A second wave of magic surrounded her and she couldn't tell where it came from, but it entered her body and settled in her veins and core.

A surge of white steam billowed thickly from the cauldron instead, obliterating everything in front of Hali, so that he couldn't see Wormtail or Cedric or anything but vapor hanging in the air… 

*x*x*x*x*x*

The blue eyes, cold as ice, shine with rage. It couldn't be. Not yet. His plans were just beginning to move! Years of planning, just for that girl to die before her time! The boy was back, he knew he was. So, he had plans to redo it.

Furious, he tosses the Daily Prophet on the table before getting up and leaving the room. In the newspaper, on the front page, a headline stood out in its big black letters in uppercase:

HALINA POTTER ASSASSINATED!

----------

- To make it clear: No, Halina (Fem!Harry) didn't really die. As in Ellory's fic, if that wasn't obvious, Halina ends up becoming Voldemort/Tom Riddle's adopted daughter because of the ritual. - Ideally, this wouldn’t be a Bashing fic for Dumbledore, but he would be Manipulator and the real villain here. Hence the falsification of Halina's death.

I have some drafts for the first and second chapters, but I'm not sure if I'm going to continue writing this fic. But can I bring these drafts here eventually, perhaps?

I would need to translate them, though. They are all in Portuguese.

But that's it. What do you think?

[thecasperanfamily]

Could you give us any info on lin's bio parents or is that too spoilery???

At the moment, the AU is still a sort of blog/asks-only thing, apart from the occasional oneshot (yes, I swear I am still working on the one about Lin’s inhibitor cuff, the first draft is about 3/4 done!), so you can ask anything you like and not have to worry much about spoilers!

I mentioned in a past post that Lin’s biological father is part of the New Order, a trio of human magic-users wishing to fill the power void left in the wake of the Arcane Order’s defeat. Unfortunately, since they are only human, their powers can never fully live up to what the Arcane Order was once capable of. That’s why they need Lin, or more specifically, why they need the thing that lives inside him. 

I haven’t talked much about the Cosmic Entity here, but it’s essentially a living star, a condensed mass of magic and energy that travels the cosmos. There are several of these Entities flitting around the universe, and there is some speculation that they might be the original source of all magic. Whatever they are, they are mysterious and powerful--certainly powerful enough to match or even exceed what the Arcane Order was capable of. 

Upon finding out that one of these Cosmic Entities would be passing close to Earth, the New Order set about preparing to capture and harness it. In order to contain it, they would need it to bond with a vessel, intertwine itself with another soul and inhabit a body with it. Unfortunately, this bonding thing really doesn’t work if you just try to shove the Entity into any old body. It has to be combined with a soul at the precise moment of its conception, be present with it as the body is constructed in the womb in order to fully integrate. ...So you can see where this is going now. 

Lin’s father Jasper is a shadowmancer, and definitely embodies every dangerous aspect of that brand of magic. I’m not sure who he was before he lost himself to the shadows, and I don’t think he remembers either. All that’s left now is an almost animalistic hunger for power and control. He’s manipulative, cruel, and chaotic, to the point of taking genuine delight in inflicting suffering upon others. More dangerous still, he is very good at hiding his true nature, and can slip between multiple personas with ease in order to get what he wants. 

Jasper and the rest of the New Order took advantage of Lin’s mother Rosa, who was struggling to make ends meet as a Mexican immigrant. I have no idea how she and Jasper met, but I imagine he immediately saw her as an easy pawn for the New Order’s plans. She was taken in and promised a hefty reward if she would simply comply with the New Order’s wishes. She was not given all the details, but Jasper seemed genuinely kind and well-meaning (he wasn’t), and the New Order was promising to provide for her in an otherwise unsympathetic country. Tired and desperate as she was, she went along with their request, and Lin’s carefully-orchestrated conception went off as planned. The Cosmic Entity was pulled from its course as it passed the earth and fused with the child at the moment of his creation. 

Unfortunately for the Order’s plans, Rosa, who was growing suspicious and uneasy about this whole thing, began to investigate the situation on her own, and discovered their intentions regarding her child. They intended to strip every part of his mind and will from his body, leaving only what remained of the Entity, which could then be used for their own purposes. Rosa fled with her unborn child and sought sanctuary in Arcadia, a place well-known for its association with the magical world. After Lin’s birth, she chose to put him in the Arcadian adoption system, knowing that the New Order was searching for her and that she couldn’t hope to evade them forever. All she could do now was lure them as far away from her son as she could before the inevitable came to pass. 

I’m not sure how long she managed to avoid them before they found her, but it was long enough that by the time they tracked her down, she was far, far away from Arcadia, and from the child they were seeking. Rosa made it abundantly clear that she would never reveal where she had hidden Lin, and as such, the Order no longer had any use for her. She was killed for her “insubordination,” by the same man who had claimed to love her before. 

Lin was only brought into Douxie’s life thanks to the courage and sacrifice of his mother, but he is far from out of danger. The New Order, including Jasper, still seeks him, and it’s only a matter of time before they realize where he is. 

...So that was probably way more information than anybody wanted!!! 🙃 Thank you so much for the ask, Non! As much as I love doing the little slice-of-life snapshots of life in the Casperan Family, I do enjoy diving into the deeper overarching plot of the AU quite a bit. ✨

[palmett-hoes]

since the first step in achieving your goals is to state them aloud, here's a list of aftg fics/ au s that i'd like to write some day

- pre-canon fic from aaron's perspective spanning the twins' first meeting till they're drafted by the foxes and graduate high school. i'm increasingly enamored with aaron as a character as well as with an outside perspective of andrew's actions and i think it would be very interesting to look at the foundation on which their fraught relationship is built and first developed

- even more pre-canon fic. andrew's early life in foster care. yes, we all know about the most... gruesome things that were done to him, but i believe that there is plenty more that has affected and shaped him, especially in relation to my interpretation of andrew as an autistic poc. this would not be a happy fic.

- anastasia au. neil as anya, andrew as dimitri. possibly a plot amalgamation from both the animated movie and the stage show, with changes as i see fit. (no, neil is not the prince of russia). what i find most compelling about this au is the story of neil and andrew as childhood friends and then the angst of having andrew, as an adult, teaching an amnesiac neil how to act like a noble while being convinced that neil is an imposter. good shit

- art school/dance club au. the foxes attend the palmetto school of art at prestigious edgar allen university. they're considered the school's charity cases, and they are NOT friends. andrew is a studio arts major with a concentration in sculpture who works in the campus coffee shop in the mornings and frequents night clubs that employ pretty boys in the evenings. neil is attending college completely on his father's dime, PROVIDED he study what his father wants, despite his desire to study dance and music. going crazy without an outlet, neil takes a secret job as a go-go dancer. look. this may slightly possibly be a result of me having planned to party hardy this summer, then having my plans ruined by the virus :c

- 1950s High School au. the 1950s aesthetics fucking rock even though the 1950s fucking sucked. kinda wanna tackle both. plus, andrew already has that james dean bad boy fast car appeal

- an exploration of mary and nathan's relationship and history. i get that neil's parents are both super taboo and both really really awful people, but i have questions and i want to answer them

- neil never returns from baltimore. in order to keep his deals, permanently, andrew kills riko and tetsugi, and gets over 20 years in prison. when he gets out, he just wants to be alone, but it seems there's a ghost haunting him. this was conceived for MAXIMUM angst, no getting around it. i got the idea from a badacts fic and it has haunted me ever since

- post-canon sexuality exploration fic. i have a real passion for quality sex education and healthy experimentation, and neil very clearly didn't get the chance for either. yet at the end of the books he finds himself in a very intense sexual relationship. i just really want to give him the opportunity to find out how desire works for him and what he likes, on his own terms. i read a lot of fics where neil's desires seem to be completely dependent on andrew's initiaton, and while i do believe that andrew is the only person neil is attracted to and will ever be attracted to, i also want to explore how his sexuality manifests on its own. the vibe i'm going for is, uh, HornySweet (tm), but also with a lot of genuine eductional material. i want this is to be something that offers real information to its readers that may have been inaccessible for a lot of people, on topics like like sexual hygiene, maturbation, and sex toys in a non-fetishy way. this will be very very E rated, but like,, in a very earnest and goofy way because sex and sexuality is neat and cool but it's also not all serious perfect fucking. it's just,, a topic that deserves to be DISCUSSED

- mobster au. andrew, having never met aaron, takes a job for the moriyamas to track down a runaway asset. Neil. upon completion, they make andrew the butcher's apprentice, and pull neil back into the fold as a commodity rather than a person. lots of violence, lots of shady underground dealings, lots of plotting, lots of secrets.

i'm gonna put some more under the cut, ones that i don't feel as strong a drive towards right now or that i haven't thought as much about. if you (yes, YOU) like any of these, or are interested in any of these, or wanna hear more about any of these, or are even inspired to write something yourself by any of these please, PLEASE, say something in the notes, or send me a message, or an ask or anything. ANYTHING. i am stuck inside, all the time, and i am so, so lonely. i answer from hoob-gooblin

- princess bride au. come ON. princess bride is one of the most romantic AND most snarky movies of all time, and andreil literally invented love and devotion sooooooo it's a perfect match. "yes or no" vs "as you wish" kings of consent and communication and unconventional love declarations. also,, he may not be how I imagine andrew, but a young cary elwes in dramatic black pirate getup is DEFINITELY a valid andrew

- hozier au. sometimes,, i listen to an album, and imagine a fic that encompases the whole thing. nothing speaks louder to me than hozier's discography. (also, yes, i am gay). maybe a little bit inside llewyn davis. neil wanders through a small town and takes up some small jobs, but sings his heart out through twisted metaphors once a week in a hole in the wall bar staffed by a very short, dead eyed veteran

- prince and the pauper au. on a stealth recon mission in enemy territory, andrew encounters a local lord who happens to have his face. in a moment of desperation to save himself from arrest, andrew knocks the lord out and assumes his identity. he returns to the castle just in time for prince moriyama to arrive with a shifty-eyed, red-headed handservant in tow. lord aaron of columbia, meanwhile, wakes up on a ship manned by crown traitor and fugitive kevin day, calling him by a name he's never heard before, and then he's in the hands of the guerilla rebel forces that have been attacking the kingdom. i watched barbie princess and the pauper as a child and that movie fucking slaps

- little mermaid/beauty and the beast/bride of the rose beast/ladyhawke au. in a last ditch attempt to escape his father, neil trades his voice and his tail for legs and washes ashore on a small kingdom with horrible secrets. because he cannot speak, read or write, prince aaron employs neil to serve the monster in the catacombs, the prince's twin brother. the twins are under a curse that turns them into terrifying monsters, andrew by day and aaron by night. aaron's affliction is a secret, as is andrew's humanity. this is such a hodgepodge idea lol. did neil also have to be a mermaid for this to work? no. is he? hell yeah

- new york private school/twin swap au. aaron wins a scholarship to a prestigious school that will guarantee him a future, but then he relapses. convinced he just needs a little more time to get clean, he makes a deal with his volatile new brother, andrew, to stand in for him at the school just until he can his shit together. neil and ichirou moriyama have been raised together their entire lives, always under the knowledge that ichirou will inherit the family empire with nathaniel as his right hand. they hate the idea, but they have no way to escape, and now neil is being harassed by ichirou's bitchass estranged brother at their stupid, fancy private school. LISTEN, we as a fandom do NOT take enough advantage of the twin swap possibilities presented to us. pathetic

- post-canon fic where ichirou, realizing that the life of a mob boss is a lonely one, decides that he needs... a friend. however, because of the nature of his work, he can't just make friends with anyone, so he decides to make friends with neil. without consulting neil first. cue a lot of very weird, very awkward coffee dates where neil is convinced he's about to be disposed of, and ichirou just wants to know about his cats. the thing i like about ichirou is he’s a complete blank slate. i can make him a good guy, a bad guy, an ally, the Big Bad

- Kill Bill au. mary survives a bullet to the head and wakes up from a coma over a year later. with nothing left to lose, she sets out to single-handedly dismantle the wesninski circle. good thing she used to be its top assassin

- single dad andrew au. except look, look, stay with me here, okay, aaron is his son, and he's adopted nicky and kevin. LISTEN. STAY WITH ME. JUST THINK ABOUT IT. tbh the idea comes from my interpretation of the andrew/neil/kevin dynamic as distincly parental, then extending that interpretation to andrew's protection over the rest of his family.

- fashion au. andrew is a fashion designer and photographer who frequently works with allison reynolds. one day she brings around a short, twitchy assistant who looks like she just plucked him out of an alley. somehow, he becomes andrew's muse. i watch a lot of fashion competition shows

- ghibli. either howl's moving castle (andrew as sophie, neil as howl) or spirited away (?). maybe both idk

- legally blonde au. legally blonde is so good guys

[sandalaris]

For the writer asks: 5, 10, 17, 22, 23, 30, 45, & 54!! :D

Finally getting around to answering these XD

5. Books or authors that influenced your style the most.

I read so much I feel like I can’t narrow it down. My favorite author is Ilona Andrews but they write almost exclusively in first person and have their fair share of action in their novels that I don’t think they’re that much of an influence on me. I’m trying to think of who I read that did the whole “people usually feel a mix of emotions over just one” thing that I know I’ve adopted, but I can’t think of who it is. (I can think of an author, who I do love the books of, who did the opposite and I found myself always confused about a character was supposed to be feeling/thinking and they probably influenced me to not do that, but I do like their books and that seems too much like I’m trying to be negative about them.)

10. Pick a writer to co-write a book with and tell us what you’d write about.

If I got to pick anyone, it’d be Marissa Meyer who wrote the Lunar Chronicles. It would be for one novel/novella, because I feel like the Lunar Chronicles has one more sort of side story in it and would want so badly for it to fit what the author has already written. If you haven’t read the series, it’s basically a retelling of various fairy tales just set in the future, like Cinderella has a metal prosthetic foot that keeps falling off and Rapunzel is a hacker living in a satellite orbiting earth. Everything is set up to perfectly fit a Beauty and the Beast side-story. Genetically altered super soldiers who are big and hairy and given animal aggression and had all their teeth surgically replaced with fangs for failing to pass a test as a child? Check! Now all we need is to write a story about the bookish daughter of a geneticist who gets blackmailed into staying with the “beast” and slowly learns that there’s a man inside of the monster and ends up figuring out how to reverse some of the alterations (because we already got the “I love him just as he is, fangs and all” thing from Scarlet and Wolf so we can have a little “curse breaking” this time around.) It can be set post-series, when some of the wolf-soldiers ran off and disappeared into various countries.

I once co-write a novel with my best friend about an evil warlock who fell in insta-love with a ditzy elf and spent the rest of the novel trying to avoid her so he could dodge his fate of retiring from villainy like his father and grandfather before him. He was determined to be the one villain in his family who actually went through with his evil master plan, dammit! It was a comedy, and kind of a spoof since we were at that age where romance novels were the thing to make fun of, but it still ended with him deciding he could do evil masterminding later and running off with the elf. What can I say, we were like twelve.

17. On average, how much writing do you get done in a day?

Eek, the problem with averages is that any sort of outlier knocks everything else off, and I have a lot of outliers, lol. I go through writing spurts, sitting down and all but knocking out an entire chapter/one-shot in one sitting followed by days where I won’t even open a word document. And then there’s sort of my inbetween times where I’m usually typing away on something, but it’s more editing than actual writing, so maybe 100 or so new words might get written, but what I’ve previously written looks better by the end, lol. This has been the norm especially lately with school and work taking up the majority of my time. And then it hits me and I just need to let the story flow out of me? Between 2k-5k a sit down session.

22. How many drafts do you need until you’re satisfied and a project is ultimately done for you?

I don’t really do true drafts. I write, I edit, I post, and then I suddenly see all my typos. On the rare occasion editing doesn’t fix the issue, I might cut the scene into chunks and sort of look for the line(s) that don’t fit and start branching off from there (like maybe someone’s acting out of character *glares at current chapter* and I just needed to look at it in smaller incriments to see where they started to veer off). Only once have I ever just completely reworked the extremely extremely rough draft I had written, but that was an original work I did for Nano and so was more concern with getting words on a page than editing as I go.

I suppose editing could count as a second draft, so two? Maybe three? What is considered One Editing? If I leave off and come back, is it an all new edit/draft, or am I picking up where I left off?

23. Single or multi POV, and why?

Nine times out of ten I seem to veer towards single, although I’ve had some fun with multiple POVs before.

Not really sure why. Maybe I just find it easier to burrow into one person’s headspace and go from there? I know there are times when I want to jump to another character for one specific scene, but I always feel like I’m already committed to telling things from the one character’s POV. Or maybe I just like the limited narrator thing.

30. Favorite line you’ve ever written.

Err.. I don’t know that I have one. How about a line I rather like? This is from a kind of Amaru/Brasa fic (kinda sorta. He’s got that whole mix of love and hate and resentment and worship thing going on, and she has her own twisted attachment to him) set in those six months between seasons. These lines are from a moment where Kate surfaces and Brasa fantasizes about taking out some of his resentment of Amaru on Kate. (He never actually physically harms her, Amaru would never allow someone to mark her vessel simply because its hers, but he likes to imagine.)

He thinks about wide green eyes looking up at him with fear, filling with tears as she whimpers out a “Please.” Imagines pressing a hand to her shoulder, pressing down down down until she’s kneeling before him, trembling as he cups her jaw, forcing her head back. He wants to press his thumb to the plump swell of her bottom lip, dig his nail in until the blood, her soul, comes to the surface. Filling the flesh with color until it spill across her chin in a vibrant slash.

and to give you an idea of how Kate is handling Brasa’s attempts to take his issues out on her...

He can see the muscle at the hinge of her jaw tighten, hear the harsh edge of every exhale, as she turns to look up at him mere inches away.  

“My name,” she clips, “is Kate.” She bites off the last, harsh sound, almost snapping her teeth at him.

45. Worst piece of feedback you’ve ever gotten.

I’m trying to think of actual feedback and not just like angry comments/reviews from people who didn’t like my fics (which tbh I haven’t gotten that much of because people aren’t generally that big of a dick to leave flames on fics these days.)

Someone tried to tell me that a character dropping the f-bomb was unnecessary and jarring and I should remove it from one of my fics. And hey, to each their own, but I personally felt it fit both the character (who cursed in canon) and the story and so kept it in. People certainly can write great literature without every putting down a single curse word, but there’s also great stories that wouldn’t be the same without a bit of foul language. What bugged me most about it was their insistence I should remove it.

Besides that the only other bad feedback I’ve gotten (besides obvious flames and people not liking the direction I’m going/have gone with a story), was someone who said that my clearly labeled unhealthy relationship fic was romanticizing abuse and they didn’t appreciate the one character manipulating the other character like that. They were actually fairly nice about it (if a bit of an anti about the whole thing), I just remember being a little bugged at the time because I had already tagged it as unhealthy/manipulative.

54. Any writing advice you want to share?

Don’t be afraid to experiment! And in that same vein, try out writing rules and discard them just as quickly if they aren’t for you, because there’s no set in stone way to doing things. Break all the rules if you want, the point is just to write. XD

Thanks!!

[dazais-guardian-angel]

This post has been sitting in my drafts since like mid-November around when I finished replaying the game, long enough for me to write and upload a fic about some of the concepts I wrote here, what the fuck. DGS brainrot is real. But aNYWAY finally, here are my massive thoughts on Unwound Future, the golden child of the PL series. This is literally *checks* 8k words, because I can never shut up!! and because there is just SO much going on in this game at all times, so many different interweaving plot threads and funny moments and incredible, fascinating characterization, especially combined with the games that come after it; I just had SO much to say. So much analyzing and headcanons and crying galore. :’) There’s a reason this is considered the best game, and that’s why I had so damn much to talk about.

behold the incoherent, rambling, unconnected mess of a novel that I hope makes a modicum of sense under the cut:

Continuing the trend, this game has simply AMAZING graphics/art/music, with a huge uptick in cutscenes and voice acting, and I feel like the sound/music quality is greatly improved too? I love the main bgm for London in this game, never really remembered loving it before, but it’s just *chef’s kiss* and so is the song that plays in other areas like the hospital and subway

Quickly mentioning the gameplay, I really love all the minigames, and the storybooks are especially hilarious to play with putting the wrong things in the spaces to create mad libs-esque crack that makes no sense; it’s so fun lmao

The beginning flashback segment with the time machine demonstration is honestly just so funny, for so many different reasons: Dimitri droning on and on with time travel technobabble while Luke, Bill, Chelmey, and Barton represent the definitive last four brain cells. Hershel being skeptical about successful time travel after all the magical shit they went through just like a year or two ago. The way that Bill’s sprite slowly and nervously shuffles onscreen after Dimitri calls him to the stage, like omg I don’t know why that cracks me up so much but it does. Dimitri’s lowkey savage shade he’s throwing at Bill throughout this whole thing. The way Bill says “wHAT” when Dimitri asks him to help, clearly about to shit his pants. Dimitri just standing there completely unfazed as the smoke from the machine flies past him. And of course, “sOmEtHiNg’S gOnE vErY wRoNg!”

…okay but in all seriousness, am I just stupid or do they never explain how they get Bill to the underground city, like the machine CLEARLY explodes with him in it, there was no secret elevator built into the thing like at the clock shop, so…???

also the presenter’s voice is really funny lmao

Still disagree that this is the biggest mystery they’ve ever encountered, despite being near the top; Luke you say that literally every game!! so what is the truth!!

Spring’s face is terrifying as FUCK in the two cutscenes in the clock shop… why they decided to show both of them in ominous, shadowed lighting in those scenes I do not understand a;lskdl;fds

I need someone to draw a diagram of how exactly the shop looks as a giant elevator because frankly I still can’t wrap my brain around it-

THE FACT THAT WE NEVER GET TO MAKE UP WITH HAZEL IS A TRAVESTY, HONESTLY

Belle… why…… ugh

Wish they’d had “Schrader” drop a casual nod to the events of Diabolical Box; it would have been cool :’) (especially since this is Paul so he’d know about all that)

College-age Hershel is just….. the pinnacle of adorableness. someone protect him from all the pain

One of the few flaws/plot holes in the story of Unwound Future that I only noticed during this replay with more media under my belt, is the that the developers didn’t really decide on what kind of time travel they wanted to portray, or more likely just didn’t scrutinize Clive’s fake role enough when writing it. This is blatantly obvious upon the very first meeting with Clive where he desires to test Hershel to make sure he’s really him. Obviously in a closed loop scenario, everything Luke and Hershel are doing “Future Luke” should remember doing himself in his past, so a test would not be necessary; this is a major trip-up on his part that it’s very odd Hershel doesn’t notice for how smart he is, imo. However, later on when meeting “Future Layton”, Paul calls Dimitri out on this exact principle, proving that he’s not actually Future Layton because he doesn’t remember the absence of a pen in Hershel’s pocket in this moment in his past, and it’s a nice little touch that Paul, on the other hand, an actual scientist, would mention this. Back to Future Luke, though, he should know how everything goes down with stopping Future Layton, because he lived it all as a child with Hershel, which makes it even more dubious to the fact that after seeing all this, Hershel still goes dark and everything plays out the exact same way it’s portrayed in the “future” of the game; it’s the idea that destined fate can’t be changed, but the suspension of disbelief is quite high, especially since we already doubt that Hershel would ever do such a thing, knowing what kind of person he is. Of course this wouldn’t be the case in an open-loop/branching timelines universe, but since the game uses the former type with the pen argument (and something else important I’ll mention in a second), I feel like the rest of the game should have adopted this idea as well and addressed it. Because Dimitri is outed via the fact that he should have memory of things he doesn’t, so it would have been easy to simply add Hershel adding that argument into his final explanation in the bar (”my suspicions were first raised when we first met Big Luke, and he didn’t know if I was really who I said I was- [etc etc]”). Even if they didn’t want Hershel to bring this up early else the entire story would fall apart, they could simply draw attention to the fact that he notices something in these moments, like with a “...” or “Hmm”, and then he explains it at the end like I said. Interestingly enough, Clive actually addresses these concepts at one point in the game with Luke in the statue plaza: he doesn’t want to tell Luke how things play out in his future, so that… things play out the way they’re supposed to…? Even though his entire story here is that he wished Hershel hadn’t gone dark and distanced from him, and ruined the city? But then he makes the suggestion that they could instead be operating on an open-loop/multiple timelines system, where in his past he never travelled to the future, but in our Luke and Hershel’s timeline they do. This is only a hypothetical he gives though, with him seeming unsure of how things truly are, which… again, in this story he’s concocted, he should know for sure, because if he doesn’t “remember” time traveling and how everything went down, then they’re operating on different timelines and it shouldn’t matter how much he tells Luke about his future. You can definitely argue that in-universe Clive didn’t think all this through when planning his dialogue for this role (but I honestly find that hard to believe, since he’s so intelligent, and he nailed the realism of everything else to a T), but it’s obvious just that the writers didn’t think it through, because like I said Hershel really should have picked up on his blunder when they first met, as well as later when Clive is surprised to see Flora suddenly with them and didn’t know for a fact that she and Chelmey/Barton would arrive there. Since the time travel scenario in 99% of the game isn’t actually real, I don’t entirely fault the writers for not getting every single detail right… and yet, that 1% exists where time travel is real, with Claire’s situation. It’s a very isolated incident though that wouldn’t be replicated, with only her going to the future… and yet, she does return to the past again, if only for a split second before dying and thus not enough time to do anything with her future knowledge, the real thing to note here being that they took care to show that she was wearing the same outfit when she died that she gets in the future, one she wasn’t wearing when she entered the lab originally. So they DID think about some things very well, like such a minor and easily-overlooked detail here (but that blows your mind once you realize it). All this is hardly enough to ruin the game or break the immersion completely though, especially since the player is already predisposed to heavily doubt everything with PL’s “the town is a lie” track record lmao, but I can’t help but be bothered by it now after playing games like Zero Escape and watching time travel shows like netflix’s Dark, which have bootstrap parodoxes and timeloops galore looool. My friend who watched me play the game blind this time around brought up all these questions as Clive said things, as someone who didn’t know if it would end up being real or not, and so I spent a lot of time puzzling (har har) it out with her… even though it wouldn’t matter lmao.

……In short, if it wasn’t obvious, despite Unwound Future’s time travel setup being completely fake, I’m really fascinated by the notion of how it would all work if it was real. >.> …and I mean, I know I’m not the first one; monocle Layton aus are popular, after all, but I don’t really care quite as much about the allure of an “evil Layton” as I do just about how everything else would be, I think.

Because, like, lets be real? taking the prequels into account with Unwound Future’s proposed setup, the potential is endless. It honestly KILLS me that the prequels didn’t exist yet at the time of UF, because!! so many people from Hershel’s past!!! SO MANY REASONS FOR HIM TO WANT TO HARNASS TIME TRAVEL AND CHANGE THE PAST, NOT JUST FOR CLAIRE’S SAKE. FOR RANHENGELA’S SAKE. FOR LUKE AND EMMY’S SAKE. FOR HIS PARENTS’ SAKE. FOR DESMOND. listen, listen, you don’t understand how much the idea of Desmond being involved in UF’s concepts destroys me. I wrote about this in my last fic but. imagine if Desmond learned about Hershel going down a dark path for his sake and everyone else’s, just like he did. Or imagine if, instead of Hershel being the one to do it, it was Desmond himself; he’s willing to play the bad guy once again, one very final, this time definitely final, time, if it means he can undo everything that caused all of them so much pain in the first place: his betrayals, the death of his former wife, he and Theodore’s separation, their father’s betrayal, ALL of it, and Hershel would never know. When Luke first is like “oh it’s gotta be Don Paolo right” and Clive says no, i LITERALLY screamed “BUT IT COULD BE DESCOLE!!”. JUST. PAIN. And where would Randall be in this future; what would he, too, think if it was Hershel going after time travel? Imagine him trying to smack some sense into him just like Hershel does in MM, trying to tell him that despite those lost 18 years of his life, despite everything wrong he ended up doing, he’s still happy, and so are Henry and Angela. So is Desmond. And Emmy, she wouldn’t want undone those years she had with Hershel and Luke and then Aurora and Desmond, despite how sadly it ended. Just… so much pain. So much potential. I hurt :’)

and adding on to this, i love love LOVE the idea of Clive knowing about some of this stuff in Hershel’s past, in order to faithfully play his role as Future Luke. Like obviously he wasn’t in Misthallory with them all, he wasn’t on the island in ED, he wasn’t at Monte’dor, and he wasn’t on the Bostonius or at all those Azran ruins that I can’t remember the names of right now, of course he wouldn’t know the intimate, specific details of what all went down, but if there was just one npc who was in the right place at the right time at any of these locations, who knows what beans they could spill? Maybe even an ex-Targent person or something. Hell, fucking Bronev is in jail for at least a little while before the events of UF. There are possibly MANY people Clive could have gotten information from to pull off this role - he’s a reporter, he’s skilled at digging for stuff. Not to mention just reading and hearing about large incidents in the news. And this makes his character so much better because he’s admired Hershel for so long, grateful that he saved his life all this time, to the point that he asks him to unknowingly come and save him again… and he most definitely didn’t know back when he first encountered Hershel that he’d already experienced so much loss and pain as well (some of which Hershel hadn’t even gone through yet by that point), but learning about everything he’s suffered? I think it would really affect him, and possibly contribute to why he asks him for his help in the first place in UF: because Hershel has suffered just as much as he has, and he feels a connection to him, feels like he can relate to him, and wants someone who can empathize with him, and show him how to cope. All of these reasons and emotions would probably be completely on an unconscious level, but they would exist - he’d use this limited but meaningful knowledge to try to connect with Hershel more when he’s still in Future Luke mode, to try to convince him he’s really Luke, at first, but unconsciously it’d be an effort to get closer to him emotionally, which is what he truly desires deep down, until his so-called act somewhat stops being an act, and talking about these things makes his vulnerabilities start to show (again, i wrote a fic about this). This all just adds to why Hershel is the perfect person to help and support Clive - the prequels make their similarities even stronger, more than just with Hershel losing Claire, and those accidental parallels when the writers hadn’t even conceived the prequel trilogy at the time of UF are just *chef’s kiss* beautiful.

THE CASINO SCENE IS JUST ICONIC, IT’S SO FUNNY. LUKE BEING SCARED OF THE SHOOTING AND HERSHEL JUST DITCHING HIM. CLIVE’S LITTLE HOP AND ROLL BEHIND THE SLOT MACHINES. THE SLOT MACHINE GUN IN GENERAL. THE CLONE FAMILY MEMBERS FALLING OVER LIKE DOMINOS UPON BEING HIT. BOSTRO CRYING AND SPLINTERS AND LOCKJAW RUNNING IN CIRCLES PANICKING WHILE LAYMAN JUST IS LITERALLY PUSHED BACK SLOWLY WITH ONLY A CHAIR TO DEFEND HIMSELF, I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH HOW FUNNY LAYMAN AS A CHARACTER IS TO ME. it’s just so glorious, oh my god. this series is ridiculous i love it so much lmao

Luke wanting to use the time machine though… there are so many reasons why he might want to, mainly from Azran Legacy. :’)

The statue is the worst thing ever for multiple reasons. The fact that it represents Hershel & Luke’s relationship, the two main characters, who have been through so much together and have such a strong bond that can never be broken, and how it ties into the whole Evil Layton scenario and seems to foreshadow that their bond does end up breaking, as “Future Luke” seems to be proof of (though the game doesn’t really put much emphasis on this; Luke is more worried about the fact that he’s moving away soon straining their relationship, and not the whole Future Layton thing. imo it would have been interesting to see his actual thoughts on/feelings about it, since he’s surprisingly calm throughout the entire game before the reveals happen; you can argue he just has complete faith in Hershel and doesn’t think he would ever go dark, but then why doesn’t he bring this up, insist that this can’t be true? I think he should have). The fact that as I just said it foreshadows how Luke will leave Hershel at the end of the game, something that Luke worries about later on in the game. And most of all, the biggest, worst thing it foreshadows… Hershel’s relationship with Clive. Clive had that statue made himself, put it in his giant set. He WANTS that kind of mentor-student bond with Hershel, that’s how he sees them, just from their one interaction in front of the exploding buildings… or at least, that’s how he wants to see it. He sees how close Hershel and Luke are throughout the entire game, and he yearns for that kind of bond with Hershel, too. The fact that the boy in the statue story has an illness that he eventually dies from, but that their friendship withstands… it’s probably meant to represent Clive’s insanity, that he hopes Hershel will save him from - he is Clive’s light of hope in his despair. Or, to be more accurate to the statue, even if Clive’s madness ends up killing him (which it very nearly does, and by that point he fully expects that it will), he’ll still have had those memories of that time he spent with him, and Hershel will never forget him, and that will mean something special. man though can you imagine an AU where Clive is literally terminally ill too, and that’s why he’s yolo-ing this entire thing so hard and doesn’t care if it ends up killing him in the end, at least he got to be with Hershel one more day; ahahahaha turn up the angsttttttttttttt-

Shmelmey and Shmarton do not at all look like Chelmey and Barton, smh

For everything Clive accounted for with his role and setting, he’s honestly way too rude and crass sometimes to be Luke lmao, even if you try to imagine a world where Hershel did go dark and Luke was changed by it… at least imo

the like 4 puzzles that give Clive’s solving animations/dialogue are the most serotonin-boosting things in the world

“you will come back, won’t you?” Clive asks Hershel about his trip to visit Chelmey, desperately wanting him to stop him before it’s too late :’)

Rosetta and her....... sessions....... with Hershel........ hajkkALSKDLD

Okay but Hershel is kind of dickish sometimes though, despite his whole “gentleman” thing??? There’s the elephant in the room which I’ll Get To, but like first he guilt-trips Chelmey into getting him access to confidential information about the lab explosion, and then he has the absolute balls to tell him “Bill Hawks is being held in the future” and that’s IT. No explanation, nothing else, just THAT, and then he LEAVES, after he’d promised to share every last detail with him. I don’t blame Chelmey at all for tailing them and barging in to get information himself, like damn Hershel, why so savage sometimes in not a good way

which brings me to Ranting About Flora’s Treatment, Part 3: The Finale. Y’all I literally cannot even BEGIN to describe how much the way Hershel and Luke treat Flora in UF specifically makes me seethe..... It was already bad in DB, no doubt, but in this game they are straight-up rude to her, mostly Hershel, for absolutely no reason, and I CANNOT fathom why. He constantly makes the excuse that he’s concerned for her safety, and that the places they’re going to are too dangerous for her, but it all exudes a level of thinly-veiled annoyance, even confusion as to why Flora is so upset that they never bring her along and wants to go with them at all... almost like her “frail” feminine appearance (which isn’t helped by how the games make her feel sick or dizzy or tired multiple times), compared to someone like Emmy who could fight and has more masculine traits, means she’s less capable in Hershel’s mind, which, like, even if it’s unconscious on his part... how about no?? I could accept being worried about her, even if I’m still frustrated at her being left behind, and her constant kidnapping (which isn’t Hershel’s fault, even if he probablyyy could do a better job both times at protecting her), but I CANNOT excuse how short and dismissive Hershel is with her in this damn game; it honestly borders on ooc to me for him, I don’t know what the writers were thinking; do they just hate Flora that freaking much??? He treats her like a burden the entire time, apologizes to people for her, acts irritated at having to accommodate for her, when poor Flora just wants to spend time with him and feel like an equal to him and Luke. Meanwhile Clive of all people is the first one to treat her with kindness and respect and pleasure to see her when they first meet, like when Luke bitches about Flora being excited to see the river and not taking things seriously and Clive tells him to go easy on her (Clive, the one who has been rushing them along this entire time himself). honestly can see why it’s so easy to ship them, when literally everyone else treats her like crap It’s SO depressing honestly. Flora asks them if they thought to wonder where her future self was, and Hershel is just like hhhhh we’re kinda busy thinking about... you know.... important things... sorry not sorry....... like BITCH I WILL STRANGLE YOU, BE NICER TO YOUR DAUGHTER!!! Luke at least is a kid, but Hershel??? there’s no excuse!!! Luke be like “damn I hope Becky doesn’t look down on us for leaving Flora behind... >.>” THEY KNOW. THEY KNOW IT’S NOT RIGHT BUT THEY DON’T CARE AND DO IT ANYWAY. I’M SO MAD

Beasly just gets... straight-up murdered yo... between him and Subject 3, what were they smoking when coming up with the animals in this game, jfc. Test subject animals?? that’s unnervingly dark, despite how glossed over it is and how hilarious Subject 3 is a;lksd

LUKE LOVES SHERLOCK HOLMES THIS IS NOT A DRILL. THE DGS CROSSOVER IS WAITING, LEVEL-5 AND CAPCOM. MAKE LUKE’S (AND MY) DREAMS A REALITY

the intentional zoom-in on Clive’s sinister face in front of the tower will never not amuse me, and baffle me as to why they drew attention to it lmaooo

And okay back to time travel bullshit shenanigans, WHY the fuck does Dimitri not pick up on why him not remembering about the pen is such a big deal as soon as Paul first brings it up?? bruh. bruh. aren’t you a fucking TIME TRAVEL SCIENTIST. WHY DO YOU NOT KNOW SUCH A BASIC CONCEPT THAT BREAKS YOUR WHOLE FACADE IN SECONDS. It’d be one thing if he just couldn’t provide the right answer, but no, he straight-up HAS NO IDEA WHY HE SHOULD HAVE TO KNOW ABOUT THE PEN. “HOW THE FUCK SHOULD I KNOW-” bruhhhh. Dimitri. my dude. i love you but you are actually so dumb sometimes, like holy shit (more on this later though)

Paul talking to Dimitri about his plan is really good; he has a “...” moment before telling him what he’s doing can’t be excused, like “oh shit let me jump on board, wait fuck i gotta stay in character, Layton is a wuss he would never agree to this god dammit Layton-”. jokes aside though, I’m honestly confused as to how much he actually knew before Dimitri’s exposition in the pagoda, and why exactly he goes along with helping Hershel stop him... and what Dimitri was thinking roping him into this. Because I can’t really figure out Paul’s motives here and how they changed, if they did at all. The only information we get about how he first became involved is that Dimitri was paying him a lot of money to get Hershel to the pagoda and to him - he knows that “future London” isn’t real, he knows Future Layton isn’t real, so the extent of his knowledge seems to be that “this man wants to screw Layton over somehow and is giving me $$$ to get it done; there’s no downside here, never mind this suspicious as fuck fake London and all these people that shouldn’t be here”, but then Hershel gave him more information, probably that Claire was involved in what Dimitri was doing, and his concerns about a traitor being involved if he had already begun to suspect Clive by that point, and then he suddenly decided to turn against Dimitri? Even though you’d think saving Claire would be a reason for him to want to help him...? Or did he plan to turn against him from the very start, and wanted Hershel to come because he knew he could stop all this (part of his character development)? The latter is the most likely, though I still don’t entirely understand or maybe I’m just having a brain fart, that’s very likely too. And Dimitri on the other hand, did he know that Paul liked Claire too and would want to save her (and maybe about his salt for Hershel too), and that’s why he got his help? That makes more sense... but also doesn’t, cause as I said it seems like Paul didn’t know Claire was involved until Hershel told him and then Dimitri told everyone at the pagoda, so maybe he literally just said “here’s some money, help me fuck over Layton, not telling how” and just trusted in him that much, even though Paul is an evil genius who could and does put a stop to all his plans with his machines... once again, Dimitri looking dumb....

Clive, in the most deadpan voice ever at the top of the pagoda: oh no, the prime minister is in danger, someone help him

Flora as they’re escaping the tower: “professor no please take me with you instead of future Luke” Hershel: *ignores her feelings and makes a decision for her yet again* Clive: “shhh don’t worry Flora; i know i’m going to kidnap you in like an hour but i’m just trying to rescue you from these insensitive jerks. not Don Paolo though; he’s a gentleman.”

It’s interesting to me that Luke and Hershel keep acting as if Future Luke and future London are legit even after Future Layton has been revealed to be a fake. Hershel at least probably knows none of it is real by now, even if he hasn’t exactly figured out Clive’s role in everything yet, and is just not revealing his knowledge for now, but Luke is still rolling with it... wonder what’s going through his mind by this point. again, it frustrates me that Luke really has no emotional reaction to anything in UF, aside from the statue and his worries about leaving Hershel soon and how that in particular will affect their relationship

I also wonder what Clive is thinking by this point. Now that the Future Layton jig is up, what kind of story is he going with now? We never find out because Hershel reveals everything completely the next time Clive joins up with them again, but in the (unreasonable) case that he hadn’t, would Clive have just acted like he didn’t know that Alain Stahngun was actually someone named Dimitri, who was actually pretending to be Layton, and that the real Layton was somewhere else out there that they needed to find? I don’t know WHY I’m so interested in details like these that don’t matter at all in the long run a;lksdfklfd, but I am... he tells Flora to continue the “investigation” without him, so clearly he still had something in mind, and didn’t expect Hershel to out him quite so soon after that even if deep down he wanted it

Chelmey really cares for Barton and it’s actually so sweet, oml :’)

I didn’t really praise Paul’s character development in this game enough before, but I really do love it, even if I don’t quite understand the circumstances that started it. It’s not something I would have expected with how he’s presented in CV and DB, but it’s very nice to see this be the culmination of his character, and it’s kinda sad that it feels a bit more natural than Descole’s sudden shift in backstory/character between ED and MM/AL... It’s very funny and good to see him and Luke bicker at each other, and how he seems to have a soft spot for Flora... it’s all cute. I just wish there’d been a bit more time for him to talk to them, but that’s what fanfic is for

Don’t make me have to see Hershel beaten up in the street :’(

The sprite of Dimitri standing in the bar is incredibly hot.... damn why are all the older male characters my type >.>

Alright but it’s about time I finally talk about Dimitri without dissing him for being stupid sometimes and say that in short, I love him. He might even be my favorite new character in UF, even more than Clive; I don’t know if it’s just the Liam O’Brian Tragic Sexy Tired Villain effect or what (nah let’s be real, that’s a huge part of it lmao), but he’s fantastic and utterly breaks my heart, in a much more understated way than how the game shoves Clive’s angst in your face, but his tragedy is nonetheless impossible to ignore. The flashback with young Dimitri is my favorite scene in the entire game, it is devastating and feels so cinematic, so raw and painful, and I’m glad they animated that part because it humanizes him so much more. Claire was his everything, he loved her so much, but it is so obvious to me (and to a lot of the fandom too, I think) that his love was entirely selfless - he might have been a little sad, but he was still mostly content letting Hershel have her, and when it comes to after her death, Dimitri would have been absolutely happy not being able to have her if he managed to save her life; he just wanted her to live. He was in love with her, yes, but he also loved her, as a friend, as a scientist, as a person whose time was cut far too short for entirely selfish and unnecessary reasons, and the majority of his anger and bitterness and drive came from a desire to fix such an injustice - to save an innocent person’s life. And the saddest part of him doing all this and trying to sustain Claire’s existence in the present once he finds her, if you go with the closed loop time travel theory, is that Dimitri should already know it’s impossible for him to succeed in this as long as he remembers finding her body in the past - him succeeding would create a paradox, thus, he can’t save her. But he’s so deep in his despair and obsession and insistence on preserving her life that I don’t think he ever stops to think about this - or he does, but refuses to acknowledge it. I’m sure he was incredibly sweet and kind and soft in the past, with her, and with his passion, and it’s heartbreaking to see how broken he is now, how miserable and tired he is, how much everything changed him. And wanting to get back at someone like Bill, who had it all to begin with and then carelessly used them to gain even more, well, I don’t blame him for that. >_> Not to mention his relationship with Clive, which is all kinds of fascinating to think about: the most chaotic, dysfunctional mess of a half-business partnership half-father/son relationship there is, ahaha... Both of them are unhealthy to the extreme in different ways, but with how much time they spent together, it’s inevitable they had vulnerable moments around each other... Clive is the only other person Dimitri would have around during his research to possibly grow to care about, even if it was entirely unconsciously. Learning he was using him would, well, ruin their relationship even more than it was already messed up, but maybe he would visit Clive in prison at least once, assuming Hershel was. I just crave content for them, ugh. Dimitri just deserved so much better, he makes me so sad </3 and I honestly hate that we don’t get to see him say goodbye to Claire at the end before Hershel; sure it would have utterly killed me, but surely he deserved that much...

The utter, frankly amazing, stupidity of Flora’s kidnapping has been stated everywhere, we all know it, but just.... yeah. smh

Seeing the mobile fortress be like *war flashbacks to the Detragon* “Not This Shit Again” Hershel why tf you putting Luke in more danger AGAIN???

The car scenes with the mobile fortress are, at least to me, the funniest parts of the entire game, even better than the casino, oh my god they’re AMAZING. Luke screaming and flailing his arms while Hershel deadpan flings the car towards the fortress, all the bumps they hit riding across it later on, the car just FALLING and Bill almost falling out of it, and then the plane, all the while Hershel displays no more than mild frustration while everyone else is PANICKING... “a plane? This is an automobile!” ...iconic. top PL moments ever. Luke don’t you recall the time when Hershel built an entire mini plane out of a chainsaw and a barrel in ED, come on now

Onto Claire. Claire doesn’t get much screentime, but some of the moments she does have are very good; she’s one of the best and most fleshed-out female PL characters imo, and like a lot of things, I appreciate her a lot more after this replay than I did years ago... LayClaire is a cute ship and all, but I was never really obsessed with it; rather, I’m realizing now I’m more invested in what Claire has to offer by herself. I hate to use the term “strong female character” cause that sounds so cliche... but she really is strong. The entire part with her wanting to save Clive, their conversation, and her bringing him out... god it gets me, it really does. She’s known she’s going to die for ages, and at this point in the game she knows it could be any moment now, so she has no reason to try to keep herself safe; she’s doomed no matter what, so she might as well spend the last few minutes of her life saving another life, and not just anyone: someone who’s just killed countless people, who anyone else would see as insane, who doesn’t care for her, doesn’t care if he lives or dies - but Claire is compassionate enough that, despite everything, she fiercely believes he deserves to live. Because of her own guilt and sins she believes she bears, yes, but also simply because she believes he can still change, and doesn’t deserve to die, despite the HORRIBLE atrocity he just committed. She’s just that good a person. It’s no wonder she and Hershel loved each other and were made for each other; both of them are such kind, loving, selfless people who see the best in anyone no matter what. Perhaps she hoped and suspected that Hershel would look out for and care for Clive once he was in prison, so she wanted to make sure that could happen, even if she wouldn’t be around to ever see it.

sorry I just get really emotional about this part, about the entire mood and tone of Claire desperately trying to save this kid, and the way the camera focuses on the massive scale of the fortress and how it dwarfs them in size... It’s a really powerful and melancholic scene (just like Dimitri’s flashback scene; have I mentioned how much I adore the atmosphere and cinematic direction of this game? cause god I do) with the knowledge of her real identity and circumstances, the visuals and the music are so good, ugh i just have so many feels. mom Claire hurts me </3 she’s so good... Despite the fact that she dies, and so much of what everyone is doing is because of her death, her presence in the story is so strong, and it never feels like her only purpose is to die for everyone else’s development and that’s it (unlike... well, a lot of other pl females :’); she has her own things to do, she stops the fortress alongside Hershel, and literally saves the main antagonist’s life. Seriously I just adore the fact that she of all people is the one to rescue Clive in the end even though she wasn’t at all obligated to (although I’d be interested and cry over an AU where Hershel saves him instead; it honestly surprises me that he wasn’t going to until Claire said something...), because Clive is the only character (of the adults) who doesn’t have a direct relationship with Claire, but they’re still connected by the explosion, and so it makes for an interesting and terribly sad dynamic, even if they only have a few minutes with each other, for all the reasons I said earlier. Claire doesn’t think what he did was right, but she knows what she and the other scientists did wasn’t right either - and it’s too late for her now, but it’s not too late for him; she knows he has a kind heart, deep down, and that he needs help if he wants to redeem himself. She feels responsible for him, feels like she owes him that second chance, after indirectly taking his parents from him and causing him such misery and brokenness... She’s so brave and strong-willed to be able to do and admit all that she does; I just love her. It clearly kills her to leave Hershel, I don’t think she intended at first to ever let him know who she was (hence Celeste), but she’s not too upset in the end, because she (rightly) knows that he will be all right. ;; She’s so beautiful, too... wish we could have seen her interact with so many of the other characters </3

and so my favorite “insert Descole into the main trilogy” AU is where Descole intercepts Claire and makes some sort of body for her, like how everyone headcanons that for Aurora post-AL. (or/also just mobile fortress vs. Descole robots, that’s cool too lol)

And finally, Clive, the infamous star of Unwound Future, thought I talked about him a bit already (and also in this post a few weeks ago). Clive is probably the PL series’ best written villain Anton excluded, I absolutely love him, like everyone does. Nothing really about him hasn’t been done before elsewhere, but that’s not a bad thing; when I was younger and first played the game I really only paid attention to his sympathetic side, but now I’ve also grown an appreciation and fondness for that kind of unabashedly awful, manic, evil insanity a villain like him has, it’s just SO entertaining to watch. If PL was a more mature/higher rated series I’d love to see his chaotic crazed energy played up even more, just to really hammer in how messed up he is, ahaha, but of course that would make it harder to sympathize with him..... and unfortunately, it already is kind of hard, because.... shit, the number of people he must have killed? It’s a LOT. A FUCKTON. The level of sympathy the game gives Clive and the way it presents him at the end is not at ALL relative to the astronomical amount of people that had to have been squashed to death by his machine, to the point that it honestly makes me uncomfortable, and I try to just retcon that in my head, as hard as it is to imagine a scenario where that thing could have come up to London and not hit any houses, because like..... There’s no coming back from that. He knew exactly what he was doing, madness or not, and I honestly just... don’t want him to be such a mass murderer. Maybe it’s wrong to ignore it, but the game wants me to feel sorry for him and see his potential for redemption, and his relationship with Hershel is so good... dammit game, why’d you have to show those houses being crushed. Ugh. Because Clive is so compelling as someone who feels betrayed by people in power, who desires revenge not only for himself but for all the people who suffered just like he has that he says he bore witness to as a reporter; it’s a very relatable position and a good story, for his well-meaning intentions to be skewed and lost in the midst of his rage and despair and hatred and insanity, where his very valid point of “hey people in government are fucked up and don’t give a shit about us and that needs to change” gets turned into “they all need to die even if the very innocent people I want to save get hurt by this as well”, and I really wish that whole angle of it had been played up a bit more, and there had been more of an opportunity for Hershel to reason with him and argue that in the midst of his blind need for revenge, he’s become even worse than the people who need justice handed to them (cue some Descole allusionssss). He wouldn’t have to win him over, Clive is already too deep by that point despite how much he wanted to be stopped, but just having more of that than just what happens in the surveillance room would have been sooooooo good, I love that conversation. It would have made Clive even better and really drive home that he’s 1) kinda right about some things and wants better for people 2) still very fucking wrong and selfish at the same time and has taken it all way too far 3) very fucked up and broken. Not that the third point isn’t already abundantly clear, but... yeah. It would have given him even more depth, made him more sympathetic, and helped juuust a little to offset how much the game handwaves his mass murders... just a little... One of my favorite Clive scenes though is when the fortress is breaking down and he’s still there, desperately trying to save it, still in denial about the fact that all his plans have failed and that everything he’s done (and himself) is about to go up in flames; I know everyone loves making fun of him and that that scene is pretty memeable (he does get bodied so much in the game, lmaooo), but it makes him look so vulnerable, all alone in there by himself, like a child, which is what he really is, deep down: he never truly wanted to do something so abhorrent and evil, but his emotions and mind spiraled so badly out of control and it led him to such a dark, horrible place, where he couldn’t stop himself, no matter how much he wanted to, and in the end all he can do is watch helplessly as the reality of what he’s done and his unwound future all comes crashing down in front of him, never to be salvaged. And he believes wholeheartedly that he is going to die, that he deserves to (this is my favorite Clive scene; he’s so hurt and resigned, the voice acting kills me ugh), he doesn’t understand at all why Claire wants to save him, especially if he knows she’s one of the scientists (as his line of “why are you of all people helping me” implies), because he always thought none of them ever cared about him and people he saw as like him, thought everyone was like Bill Hawks, but Claire still cared enough to want to save his life, even though she was one of the people he was actively targeting with his revenge... I wonder how he would have felt at the time if he had known about her situation and that she was dying. </3 I just want so many good things for him, as so much of the fandom does. He’s so messed up but that’s what makes him so interesting, and his potential relationship with Hershel that the ending of the game suggests could happen is so touching and lovely and uplifting, one of my favorite kinds of relationships in fiction: Clive’s issues would persist for so long, for forever, really, but Hershel would support him and help him heal, and be there for him always, no matter how much Clive would feel like he didn’t deserve it. I eat this dynamic up, I really do, every single time I encounter it in a story, and it’s made even better by the fact that as I’ve said, Hershel has so much in common with Clive, and so they would get along very well for that reason, and Clive could unknowingly help Hershel just as much Hershel tries to help him. They’re so good for each other. Add Luke too, and Flora, and Desmond...! just ahhhhh........ there’s so much goodness. Clive you absolute glorious, fucked-up mess of a character, I love you. :’) and I love fic writers who explore facets of his personality and write about him. He’s only in one game, and there’s still a few hiccups, as I said, yet he’s handled far better than Descole or Randall in my opinion (though I love them too)... just an amazing fucking villain, and character. I wish UF could have gone deeper with him than it did, but even so, the possibilities with Clive are endless. I love him, so much ;;

and some of the themes of the plot in this game, uhh, hit a little close to home in good ole’ 2020/21 time we live in? :’) #FuckBillHawks

Hershel saying goodbye to Claire.... god. One of the top scenes in the entire series, probably the #1 most iconic I’d even go so far as to say. I don’t even really ship LayClaire, but there’s an indescribable emotion that finale gives me... it’s just breathtaking, in the most gutwrenching, nostalgic, beautiful way. I still maintain that Diabolical Box’s ending is sadder than this one, for a multitude of reasons, just comparing the stories and situations the characters are in, but I 100% don’t blame people for bawling at this scene more than any other, just because of the way it’s done yes I know I won’t shut up about the cinematography; the lighting, the camera angles, the pacing of it, Hershel’s fucking kicked puppy faces, the dialogue oh god the dialogue; it ALL hits like a TRUCK and comes together beautifully. At this point in his life Hershel has been through so much loss, so much so that it is unbearable - when he cries that he doesn’t want to say goodbye again, that he can’t say goodbye again, that he refuses to, nothing in the world is more true: this man has been through too much, and he’s hit his breaking point. even if you don’t have the prequels in mind when watching this, as most people don’t/didn’t the first time through, the overwhelming sense of burden and loss Hershel is feeling is so palpable, so painful - you get the sense that this isn’t just about Claire; Hershel has never shown emotion like this before up to this point, so for him to finally break down like this... it speaks volumes. After so many years of holding everything in, he finally can’t take it anymore, and basically stabbing me in the fucking chest would hurt less </3 I complain about Hershel never showing emotion like this (never crying) in the prequels whenever he’s hit with an equally horrible bombshell, and I still feel that way, but at the same time a part of me is also glad that’s the case, because it makes the very last (two) scenes in the entire series hit so much harder, knowing that he finally loses his composure after dealing with so much. As the titular character of the series, Hershel’s development is very understated and subtle, so it’s all the more meaningful when he actually snaps, because it makes him feel so much more real and human than he ever is the rest of the time, when he maintains his facade of being a perfectly composed, calm, and together gentleman; this scene finally say that, no, Hershel is a person, and he is broken in a lot of ways, because some puzzles you just can’t solve no matter how hard you try, and it’s so sad. And this sad tone of loss and longing permeates the entire cutscene; the way the title is dropped in Claire’s dialogue (both versions equally haunting imo), and Hershel taking off his hat for the first time ever, and the pan up and transition back to show the falling snow as “Time Travel”, my favorite instrumental in the series, kicks in... y’all there is no other feeling in the world like the feeling that elicits, there really isn’t ಥ⌣ಥ ❤️💔 the only thing that might even come close to it is the ending of Azran Legacy with Surely Someday, simply because it was the ending of the series, but the ending of Unwound Future hits me harder knowing it’s the end of the timeline, and with everything else in hindsight. And then an unknown amount of time later, even with Luke gone and Hershel only having Flora there with him anymore unless we headcanon DESMOND COMES BACK BECAUSE OF COURSE HE DID RIGHT, Hershel is still no longer wearing his hat, to show that he’s finally started to heal from his pain, and accepted the loss(es), because throughout all of UF Hershel had never really gotten over Claire’s death no matter how much he tried to pretend like he had, but you don’t realize that until you see the ending, until he got one final chance to see her. I just... ugh I love it so much, so much. It means so much, for Hershel and for the series, and that’s why it makes me cry (and don’t even get me sTARTED on Luke’s goodybe, and how upsetting yet beautiful THAT is. yes, Luke isn’t a gentleman yet, and Hershel finally learns that maybe he doesn’t always have to be one, either :’’’’’’)

Unwound Future is a masterpiece. Diabolical Box has my favorite characters and story for the new characters, and favorite settings, personally, but Unwound Future is such top-tier storytelling and writing; it feels so epic and sweeping and (here i go again) cinematic, it’s so polished and everything flows so well, the pacing is wonderful, everything ties up so perfectly and there’s very little I would change Flora bitching aside and practically nothing that feels like filler, even though some of it technically is. The tone stays consistent and they really push the boundaries of how serious and heavy these games can be, and it works, and doesn’t feel silly or glossed over or too unrealistic or too heavyhanded like some of the other games are at times; the plot twists/reveals feel the least absurd and the most grounded in reality, despite still being wild, and it focuses on some really relevant stuff and themes (again, it feels really grounded and raw, and the least fantastical, which isn’t a bad thing for the other games/movie per se, but being more realistic works in this one’s favor. No one is going to have their family separated and murdered by a criminal secret organization working to unearth ancient advanced civilized ruins, or lose years of their life and memories in said ancient ruins, or have their life ruined in an eternal unaging state from hallucinogenic gas, but being screwed over by people in government who will do anything to make sure they never have to face consequences? now that’s a mood). It’s just a really fucking good game, by far the best Professor Layton game, and I’ll always stand by that, despite preferring DB just a bit more cause it hits more of my personal tastes (DB is still very good too though, don’t get me wrong), and it’s also enhanced even more by the prequels, though it stands perfectly on its own. The perfect culmination of Hershel’s character arc, and the absolute high point of the series. It’s one of the ones I keep coming back to the most, just because it has so much to offer; as someone who is absolutely enamored with near-perfect stories of this caliber, I couldn’t ask for more. ❤️

[meg-noel-art]

003 character - adora

DUDE, dude, yes.

A D O R A

I could talk about her forever lesgo:

1.) How I feel about this character:

I have never found Adora anything less than a fascinating and complex protagonist. She's got all the characteristics of a classic hero archetype: she's brave, kind hearted, strong, selfless.... But she's also unbearably human. She makes a lot of mistakes. She's afraid of her responsibilities and her 'destiny', she's stubborn and sometimes extremely narrow minded (her way or the high way kind of situation), she's insecure and has a guilt complex the size of the planet itself.

And what's great about that is that all of those flaws stem from her background as a child soldier. It's all surprisingly gritty and real for the protagonist of cartoon.

Her misguided motivations always make sense, they align with the character we've come to know and love for all of her complexities. She's a great role model in some ways, and in others, she's an example of behaviors to avoid. MORE CHARACTERS LIKE THIS PLEASE. More heroes with just as many flaws as the rest of us. Adora's easy to relate to in that sense because we all have issues too. And when the protagonist of your show, is as broken as your audience, it makes the entire world of Etheria seem that much more personal.

I love her.

2.) Any/all people I ship romantically with this character:

If you know me at all, you know I ship Adora pretty exclusively with Glimmer. But I also see merits to some of her other ships. I like the fact that Adora unabashedly crushes on giant burly lesbians. Like, amazing 10/10 writing. Same hat.

Anyway, I'm going to use this opportunity to go off on Glimmadora:

I love this ship. And sure, for all the normal reasons, it's cute, it's wholesome, it's soft. But I like it for a lot more than that. I sincerely think it's an excellent dynamic. The two start out as staunch enemies. But not personal ones. They've never wronged one another. They've never even met. They were simply born and bred to hate/fight one another. Glimmer is a princess, the very thing Adora has been trained from childhood to destroy. And Adora is a key cog in the Horde machine that took her father away from her, strained her relationship with her mother, and essentialy structured her ENTIRE life. She was born into a war, and has never known anything else. Neither has Adora.

And yet, within hours of meeting each other, when they are at first hostile, they are then forced to work together and quickly come to realize that there entire lives have been built on propoganda, essentially. Yes the Horde is evil. But this is just a girl who was drafted into an army, who has never seen the outside world until today, who doesn't know what her own birthday means. And this other girl is a Princess, sure... But she's not a monster. She's not burning villages or murdering Horde soldiers? Upon putting aside their differences, Glimmer and Adora accept one another for who they are as individuals and that only grows throughout the seasons. There's never a moment where Glimmer ever acts as anything but supportive towards Adora and her various insecurities for the first 3 seasons. And likewise, Adora depends on Glimmer's support and comfort and it bolsters her as both a person and in her role as She Ra.

More than that, they are both the person the other needs, in a sense. Adora needs a person who isn't afraid to challenge her own stubbornness and her sometimes single mindedness. She needs someone who gently supports her through the rough times, but who also pushes her to be better when she feels hopeless. Glimmer does all this for her and more, just by being herself. It's a wholesome, fluffy ship, sure. But it also makes sense and portrays what a sincerely healthy relationship looks like in media and that's SO GOOD. They have their drama, and their arguments, anyone in any kind of relationship does. But it all stems from a desire to protect and care for the other and I'm going on for far too long, moving on--

3.) My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character:

Scorpia!!! She and Adora are at odds from the get go because of their contrasting relationships with Catra. But they're really fairly similar and I think eventually they'll be good friends. They're both very kind hearted and brave and forgiving. I can imagine Adora really giving up on herself and Scorpia being there to tell her how great and strong she is like she always did for Catra. They'd also have 'strength-offs' or sparring sessions and it'd be super cute. Be friends pls ;-; season 5 pls...

4.) Unpopular opinion about this character:

Um.... I mean it's ship related, but I think Catradora is detrimental to Adora's character and development as a whole? It detracts from all of her growth as a character thus far as well as her escape from an abusive home environment. But that's a whole other post I could make, so I'll leave it there.

5.) One thing I wish would happen to this character in canon?

I think we all want this, but I want Adora to S N A P. I want her to break emotionally and let all that grief and rage and guilt fuel her for a bit. We've seen glimpes of it. But I want her to get a moment to FEEL everything she obviously stuffs down for the sake of being She Ra, everyone's hero and hope. I want her to just be Adora and to break down to her lowest point so that she can finally start to heal. I think season 5 has set it up perfectly and now it just needs to knock the pins down. And I can't wait to watch 👀

6.) Favorite friendship for this character?

BOW! Bow is a great friend in general, but he is EXCEPTIONALLY patient with Adora and really listens to her. I STILL remember the moment in Mystacor during season 1 when he listens when Adora says she used to punch things in the Horde instead of relaxing. When the hot springs don't work, his next suggestion is that they find her something to hit! He is a good boy ;-; and a gentle friend and I wish season 4 had given them more conversations. They had plenty of time together but they didn't actually interact or talk much, which is weird. Bow is the guy I can see Adora goes to when she has questions that embarass her about Etheria, or relationships, or big scary topics. Because he'd approach them calmly and wouldn't talk down to her.

I also really wish Adora and Mermista interacted more because their opposing attitudes contrast so hysterically.

7.) My crossover ship:

HMmMMmm interesting..... I'd probably go with Kara Danvers!! Supergirl. Both are essentially aliens to their planet, adopted by families that teach them how to BE a hero in both their personal and "professional" lives. They are both lovably dumb with hearts of gold that just want to do the right thing but fear they can't. They'd have a lot in common. Also both strong and blonde and blue eyed and I -- 👀👀

That's it!!! Thank you for letting me scream about Adora ❤❤🥺

[sleepymarmot]

Re-liveblog: eps. 4 & 10

Here's something I've been planning to do for a while -- rereading the liveblog of The Untamed I wrote a couple of months ago and looking at my own initial reactions to Jin Guangyao's storyline with new eyes. Returning to old liveblogs is always fun, but particularly when the perspective on something changes so much by the end of the story!

Of course, this turned into a monstrosity with word count in thousands that sat in my drafts for about a month, and involved rewatching most of the scenes the liveblog mentioned, and some that it didn't. Please be warned: this series of posts is not meant to be a comprehensive analysis, and will jump from one point to another or highlight only the things I have changed my mind about, or haven’t talked on this blog before. It is going to include some very personal interpretations and opinions, sometimes possibly (or definitely, in the case of this very post) unpopular or negative. I am here to reflect on my own experience of watching the show almost as much as to write meta about the show itself.

[All re-liveblog posts]

[ep 4]

is this shy illegitimate son the same person who summoned WWX in the first episode, or are they two entirely unrelated bastards? I don’t think the ages match up…

Oh, so that's what I was thinking during Meng Yao's introduction scene: trying to figure out whether he was the same person as Mo Xuanyu or not. That's funny.

[negativity ahead!]

Of course, I was also admiring Xichen's elegant way of Using His Privilege For Good, but I thought that was self-explanatory enough not to put in the liveblog. It didn’t occur to me this scene could be interpreted as a sect leader openly hitting on a disadvantaged youth, or that such an interpretation would be popular, especially in a literal and positive way as opposed to a dark or subversive headcanon. So even if this is ever confirmed to be an intended message of the scene, I’d just say “I recognize the council has made a decision...” and continue to disregard it. Kind of incredible how it manages to squick me in at least five ways -- and xiayo is one of my main ships in this fandom! And not only squick -- in my eyes, sexualizing LXC’s intentions in this scene not only adds something that I don’t like, but actively detracts from the textual, surface meaning and narrative function of LXC’s actions (establishing LXC as a Model Authority Figure who masterfully manipulates the social power dynamics not for self-interest, but for justice, kindness, and peaceful conflict resolution; see also the following scene with the Wens). And from the other side, I think Meng Yao is shocked and impressed specifically because someone like LXC would do this for someone like him without an ulterior motive; I suspect that if he saw this as LXC making an excuse to touch someone attractive, he would only be turned off: a sect leader who can’t keep his hands to himself is nothing new and nothing good from the point of view of JGS’s illegitimate child.

But if this brief brushing of hands holds any in-universe significance in addition to a possible foreshadowing of this relationship’s future importance -- I think I just finally realized what it must be! This interaction is an adaptation of the following scene from the book (which, to be fair, happens when MY and LXC already know each other, not during a first meeting):

Meng Yao had been a famous joke for a certain period of time, which was why a few recognized him. Likely thinking that the son of a prostitute perhaps also carried some unclean things with him, the cultivators didn’t drink from the cups that he had presented with both hands. Instead, they put the cups to the side and even took out white handkerchiefs. As though it felt too uncomfortable, they repeatedly wiped the fingers that they’d touched the teacup with, either intentionally or not. Nie MingJue wasn’t someone mindful to such things. Wei WuXian, though, caught sight of this through the corners of his eyes. Meng Yao acted as if he didn’t see anything, his smile unfaltering as he continued to pass around tea.

As Lan XiChen accepted his cup, he looked up at him and smiled, “Thank you.”

He drank a sip of the tea immediately afterward. Only then did he continue to converse with Nie MingJue. A few cultivators began to feel uneasy as they saw the scene.

(Chapter 48)

So CQL!Meng Yao’s eyebrows twitch in pleased surprise because the sect leader not only personally approached to verbally support him, but took something directly from his hands, not even trying to avoid him or flinching at skin contact. As if it didn’t even occur to the majestic Zewu-jun to think of Meng Yao as dirty or disgusting.

I don’t know if this is an intended interpretation either, because I don’t remember anyone specifically avoiding physical contact with MY in the show, and on the contrary, there were examples of both friendly (from Huaisang) and unfriendly (from the commander) touch. But I certainly prefer it to the other interpretation, and ignoring the interaction altogether seems a bit intellectually dishonest.

[/negativity]

On another note, much is said about JGY’s performativity, but check out LXC’s! Someone’s being bullied in his classroom? Not on his watch! Time to descend from his pedestal like truth coming out of her well, Very Pointedly and at length explain how this person Has His Official And Personal Approval And Is Very Welcome Here, then take the gift from him personally instead of letting a disciple do that. Note how in the following scene, he also personally accepts the gift from Wen Qing as a peacemaking gesture. I love how LXC’s character establishing event is about defusing not one but two uncomfortable situations in a row. Of the two brothers, all social skills went to him...

I have no comment on the goodbye scene. Just sadness.

Oh wait, after rewatching the entire show and coming back to the post, I do have something to say. This episode is the only time I can say with all certainty that all of Meng Yao’s words and reactions are fully sincere. After this point in the timeline, it will never happen again. :(

It’s a shame that the gifs I’ve seen of this scene end with the iconic stopped bow, because the final shots are also great! As soon as MY turns away, his face becomes clouded again, and seconds after the Sect Leader himself held his arms and assured they were peers, he felt the need to bow and lower his eyes as some unnamed disciples walked by. And the bitter look he sends after them tells the viewer how much he is aware of falling from the dreamland where a nobleman would compliment him like three times within three minutes, back to the regular life where it is better not to be noticed at all. Meanwhile, Xichen looks him in the back like “I want it to grow strong and healthy, I want to tell my friends and neighbors about it”.

[ep 10]

Alright, when 10 minutes ago I thought “Meng Yao, sweetie, kill that clown”, this is not what I had in mind

SOMEBODY GIVE MENG YAO A HUG (after some emergency medical care) HE HAS DONE NOTHING WRONG IN HIS LIFE. Can Xichen adopt him now?

Ah, the joys of the first viewing. 

At this point, I was thinking of both Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue exclusively as of father figures for Meng Yao. For LXC I think I slowly started to notice the romantic tension later but made a complete flip to the romantic interpretation only during the "late light talks... no sign of curse on his body" conversation. For NMJ it was during the head flashback. And as much as I like these pairings, it does feel like a loss that their existence displaces the very different pseudo-family dynamic. I think a story in which NMJ, LXC, WRH and JGS are all openly presented as competing father figures would be interesting; has anyone written that?

On rewatch, I was outraged by all of the blatant manipulation that I bought completely on the first viewing. MY is very good at playing a wounded bird -- especially when he's literally wounded. I had wondered why he just limped away without treating it, but now it's obvious he is using Stoic Suffering to invoke pity and admiration. Just like, a few minutes earlier, he showed NMJ that he was ready to be struck down, and it saved his life. He tells NHS with a sad but brave face “I won't be able to take care of you anymore” and on first viewing it worked on me just as he intended -- I thought “Poor boy, so trained to serve, he puts his duty to others above his own feelings even in this situation”. Ha...

And NMJ is only helping his case. He had the chance to explain everything and share the truth of MY's actions. And in the novel, he does take this chance, retelling the incident to Xichen (who chooses to turn a blind eye). Instead, NMJ basically confirms MY’s narrative: by hiding the reason for the exile, he makes it seem like there was no respectable reason at all. NMJ, all by himself, makes himself look like an irrational tyrant, and MY like a victim of an arbitrariness. And he does it in front of Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian, no less -- an heir to a major clan and his brother! By trying not to discuss internal problems with outsiders, he achieves an opposite effect. Luckily for him, JC and WWX don't give a shit... But imagine how different the plot would be if they had this information from the start?

What I still don't understand is -- what was Meng Yao’s plan in this episode? Who was he working for? Who was his accomplice, whose feet we saw in the later flasback -- surely not Xue Yang himself, he’s supposed to be under arrest! Was he working with the Jin secretly already? (I don’t think so: in a later scene, JGS asks him about this incident, seemingly ignorant.) Or with the Wen (I don't remember -- did Xue Yang go back to the Wen afterwards)? Or just with Xue Yang directly, setting him completely free just on the promise of future cooperation? This seems most plausible -- but to risk and lose everything over such an uncertain gamble doesn’t make MY look very smart.

I have some other things to say about the events of this episode, but they’ll be in the post about the flashbacks in episode 41.