#the thing is nobody has ever even known they exist before so it didn't matter but now I've made a post about them for anyone to know

[bogos-bint3d]

Ok now that I've mentioned my AU Chara I suddenly feel like I need everyone to know every single thing about them right now

[teencopandthesourwolf]

He freezes. Doesn't know what the hell else to do. 

He can't picture it: Derek can't remember the last time somebody put their arms around him. 

Was it Laura?

Of course it was Laura. How could he forget that? Derek has gotten pretty good at blocking things out—a little too good, it seems.

She didn't tell him anything before leaving New York. Didn't say a fucking word, just up and vanished. Derek had woken up one morning and she was gone, because she'd known without a shadow of a doubt that Derek would've only followed her if she'd have said a single word to him.

Nobody ever granted Derek’s wishes, no matter who he prayed to. Those desperate pleas where he asked to go back and get a chance to fix things, they all went unheard.

Laura left to go back to the place they both wished still existed just as it had; a place they were wanted alive, not dead. It wasn't fair that it was the very same place they would be hunted down if they did return, like the rabid animals the Argent's presumed they were.

Leaving the way they did meant they hadn't gotten the chance to see if anything was left at the house. They couldn't even mark graves, and grieve properly. 

That same place also happened to be the place they'd been born, the place they'd grown up and called home.

Derek had never wanted Laura to face all of that alone.

The burnt down house. The nothing where there was once everything.

The thought still haunts him. One of so many. 

Beacon Hills is home—but it's the home Derek had helped raze to the ground with his selfishness and stupidity. Everything he and Laura had ever known, everyone they'd ever loved, it was all gone, now. Derek had taken those things away from his sister and hadn't even had the guts to tell her. Tell Laura they were all gone because of him, tell her that everything that had happened to their family, to them, was all his fault.

In the aftermath of the fire Laura hugged Derek, and had kept hugging him, over and over in those weeks and months and years that followed. She would pull him into her arms hold him tight, whenever she could sense it was all getting to be too much for him again.

Alpha.

Big sister.

But Laura only knew about some of the reasons why it sometimes felt like too much effort for Derek to keep on breathing.

He never told her about Kate.

And Derek, the fucking coward, he'd allowed Laura to hold him, feeling the flames of shame on his cheeks every time, hot as those that took the lives of his parents. His family. His pack. 

Now, he remembers that last time. 

“I'm going out.” 

Laura stood up, walked around the two mismatched armchairs and stopped him by throwing both her arms around his neck, pulling him into her and hugging him, scenting him. 

It always took him a moment to respond these days, but Derek hugged her back. 

“What's this for?”

“You. Because I know whomever's bed you end up in tonight, you won't be asking for one of these.”

Oh, fuck no. Derek couldn't handle that. Did she think he was out sleeping with people? Never again, not after…

He pushed his sister off him, gently; a stark contrast to the harsh words that followed. 

“Don't fucking coddle me. And fuck you, Laura—I don't sleep in anybody's bed but my own.” A single mattress on the floor of the lounge of their shitty one bedroom apartment. Derek had so many shameful memories, and crawling into his sister's bed every night for the first year after the fire was one of them. “Just—leave me alone.”

Laura was the one—the only—person Derek had left in the entire world, yet his guilt was constantly pushing her away. 

“Where do you go to, little brother? You might not be clinging to me anymore, night after night, nightmare after nightmare, but you're rarely in your own bed most mornings.”

She hadn't meant it as a dig. Derek knew that. She was his sister, and she loved him.

Maybe she thought he was making progress? Seeing people. Moving on.

Derek spent his nights waiting outside of dive bars, and hanging around in back alleys and dark places, desperate to find scumbags to taunt who were big enough and hard enough to at least attempt to kick the living shit out of him.

Derek hated being a werewolf, now. He wanted to get hurt and stay hurt.

“Just—out.”

Then Derek turned his back on Laura, leaving her to stand there and watch him walk away as he left her to go out looking for a fight, without looking back. 

That was the last time somebody put their arms around Derek—and the last time he saw his sister alive.

It was two years ago. Derek doesn’t think he has taken a full breath, since. 

Now here he is—standing in his stupid big loft that he bought for his betas, yet another pack he managed to destroy—having given away more than he should, with skinny yet strong arms wrapping as far around his shoulders as they'll reach. 

Stiles.

“You don't have to hug back. But you can, if you want to. I won't tell,” the kid jokes. It's his way to connect, his connection to the world. A coping mechanism, Derek thinks.

He knows all about those.

“I…” he doesn't have the first fucking clue of how to handle this. Or how to admit he needs it—to himself, let alone somebody else. He doesn't know how to admit that he wants it. 

But this is Stiles. The one person in Derek's life who seems, for some unfathomable reason, to give a fuck about Derek. To care about him.

Slowly, very slowly, Derek lifts an arm and awkwardly rests a hand on Stiles's upper back, feels the muscles jump slightly under the kid's baggy clothes as he tentatively spreads his fingers and finds the back of Stiles's neck. 

Stiles's voice hitches just a touch as he says, “These can be on tap, you know. If you want them. Stilinski hugs are the best hugs, dude. Believe.”

And Derek finds he does believe. For the first time in forever, Derek believes there could be something good in his life again.

More confidently, now, he brings his other arm up to wrap around Stiles's waist and hugs Stiles tighter, properly, and allows himself to be hugged back.

Derek wonders how he has gone so long without this kind of closeness. Lived without this kindness.

He decides to let the 'dude' pass. Because maybe—maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all, to be somebody's dude? 

Stiles's dude.

It's a fucking ridiculous moniker and yet Derek suddenly couldn't care less. 

“I think I'd like that,” he whispers into the forbidden place where Stiles's jaw meets long, pale neck. "Dude."

Derek can feel Stiles's smile as the kid squeezes him harder. And, ironically, Derek feels as if he can breathe again. 

.

for @greyhavenisback bc i want to hug you in person and can't <3 (unedited, forgive me!)

[thousand-winters]

Something I love about TOH is how it lets adults be wrong and make mistakes and be whole messes that do not have their shit together because... yeah, that's just life. Adults aren't so put together as one believes when they're a child, and of course they can act rashly and fuck up because of their emotions and generally experience the entire spectrum of human emotion.

It would be lovely if the fandom would be less racist about it tho.

It keeps driving me mad to think about because with characters of color, one mistake is taken and generalized as their entire behavior despite having proof that it was a one time thing, a extreme born out of emotion or after many things have happened, while for white characters it's well understood it was a one time instance.

Nobody took Eda's "I'm going to break every bone of your body" toward King (who, mind you, is like 8yo and the kid she raised since he was a baby) seriously, nor said "Eda totally threatens King with bodily harm every time she's angry". It wasn't a serious threat, King wasn't bothered by her because he knew that, and the world kept spinning, nobody made a bigger deal of that than it had to be, despite the fact that it's objectively a horrible thing to say to your kid.

Nobody said either "every time Eda is feeling unneeded, she avoids talking to her kids and ignores them for days and then attempts murder-suicide on the name of good", although the avoidance aspect of it at least IS more in tune with her general lack of coping mechanisms.

Now, Camila making Luz go to camp? Suddenly she was the devil and evil, and Eda should take full custody of Luz, despite the fact Camila was shown as gentle and loving since moment one, and your kid endangering other kids by bringing live snakes and fireworks to school is objectively something alarming that can't be swept under the rug. There was no point at which Camila was depicted as anything but loving and concerned, even during Grom, Luz's fear was about hurting Camila rather than Camila hurting her and yet people insisted she was abusive until Thanks to Them.

Even after Yesterday's Lie. I mean, Luz is 14. I don't know about you, but if I had a kid known for being a bit careless and reckless and act first before thinking, I would be worried sick knowing she's in a land where half the things alive try to eat you and it's also ruled by a genocidal emperor. Hell, even if my kid wasn't reckless, I would be clawing at the walls about it. Camila wasn't being evil for wanting Luz to stay by her side, especially since they only had each other.

Then, of course, there's Darius.

I'm so sick of people being condescending to people who like Dadrius, even in art posts, all like "guys, but don't forget Darius was shitty to Hunter for years", because it's exactly what I'm talking about of taking one event and extrapolating it toward his entire behavior despite the fact the information we have been provided indicates that was a one time thing. Not only we have the Palisman Logs that confirm Darius usually didn't pay attention to Hunter, which, mind you, isn't a crime because he had no responsibility over Hunter and everyone thought Hunter was being treated well by Belos, but we also have the hint of Darius reacting so viciously because of Hunter sewing the Golden Guard's sigil on his cloak and reminding him of his mentor, which is not something that happened every thursday.

I know everyone understands actions born out of emotion in adults, no matter how wrong they are, because of Eda and even some of the other adults who objectively speaking did way worse in the matter of mistakes toward their children, like Gwen or Alador. Yet, people keep refusing to believe that Darius only did that once but nobody ever says "yes, here are the examples and clues that he was this way for years" (because they do not exist) and just keep repeating that he did or that he has the vibes of someone who did (bestie, that's just racism).

It's so strange because Hunter is not stupid. He knew to be on guard of Kikimora and Kikimora was always shitty to him. He can take a clue, he's not a baby. He refused to accept the help of the Owl Fam and the Hexsquad for a good while because they were "the enemy" and in his head he had the idea that he shouldn't trust them even if he wanted to. Hunter's behavior is affected deeply by Belos' abuse, but he wasn't reacting to everyone in the way he did to Belos, excusing their behavior and generally letting them all walk all over him.

If Darius really had picked on him for years, he wouldn't have been so quick to trust him after Any Sport in a Storm, and we got a bunch of little mentions and hints that point to how their bond started to grow behind curtains, which would be really weird if Darius had always been an overly hostile presence in Hunter's life before. Can you imagine him being all chill with Kikimora if she had hypothetically went "oh, well, I guess I was wrong for trying to murder you"? Hell no.

Even Perry and the Parks didn't got spared from this.

Of course their reactions to their kids getting expelled could have been more graceful, but they were evidently not thinking super clearly at the moment and every other moment we've seen them with their kids, they have been loving and supportive. Hell, even in that same episode we saw how the Parks were, if anything, more concerned about Willow's education to the point they were willing to change their whole life to be able to stay to homeschool her.

Adults make mistakes. People make mistakes.

Stop acting like people of color can't make mistakes without being the epitome of evil.

[acourtofthought]

My husband finally put into words for me something that has been the main problem with this whole Anti Gwynriel because of Gwyn's past narrative.

According to Anti's, it's not ok to ship Gwyn with Az because she's not healed enough and hasn't shown that she's ready for a relationship.

According to Anti's, fanart of Gwynriel in provocative positions are not appropriate because it's disrespectful to Gwyn due to her SA, that she needs to first give verbal consent before we're allowed to imagine what a HEA for Gwynriel might look like.

And at first, it almost feels like a gotcha for them because you question whether you're disrespecting real survivors by saying, "she doesn't need to give consent for us to ship them since it's a book." This statement is true, I don't think readers should be forced to abide by real world morals when it comes to possible paths a characters arc might take, however it makes you pause for a moment to question whether what you're saying is disrespectful to those who have been victims.

But he actually flipped that entire thing on it's head when he said, "if the issue is about consent, then why is only being applied to a SA victim? Shouldn't consent be applied to everyone?"

It was kind of a lightbulb moment for me because those Anti's never vocalize how it's wrong for people to ship Eris & Az, Mor & Emerie, Vassa & Lucien (SA victim), Lucien, Jurian & Vassa, the LoA & Helion (because at this point they are not a consenting pair), Nesta & Eris. There are a bunch of non canon, non consent ships in this series and nobody has an issue with those. Nobody takes up the crusade arguing that it's wrong for people in the fandom to imagine those pairings together or drawing fanart of them in NSFW positions. Most of the time they're celebrated but has Emerie consented to having a sexual relationship with Mor? All she did was call her beautiful and Feyre had done the same in ACOMAF. Why do they never call out fanart of that pairing? Or Neris after Nesta harshly rejected him? Where Eris is currently suffering torture at the hands of Beron and we've got no clue as to his sexual preference. Also, Elain only consented to a fully clothed kiss in the bonus (remember, she grew up with human morals which she still holds fast too, she didn't jump right into bed with Graysen), we have no evidence she wanted more yet there's plenty of NSFW E/riel artwork out there and I'm betting some existed before SF, before she even consented to a kiss.

The only time I've ever heard anyone argue for consent or argue against NSFW art is in relation to Az and Gwyn and the message they're sending is that only female characters who have been SA need to give consent before fans should be shipping them.

That's when the shipping agenda makes itself known because if no other non-canon / non-consenting pairing disturbs them to the point they need to create post after post surrounding how wrong people are for shipping them, then it's clear to see that it's only Gwyn being shipped with Az that they take issue with and when only E/riels make these arguments, it seems highly suspect.

Gwyn's SA is irrelevant in terms of consent because EVERYONE should have consent before engaging in physical acts with others no matter their past. However, Gwyn's SA should not be the weight dragging her character down, the scarlet letter on her chest that means the fandom isn't allowed to give her the same treatment that all other characters receive. Where we're free to imagine and create fanart / fanfiction / headcanons (even the NSFW variety) for any pairing that we desire, regardless of their past or preference, even those who have never expressed romantic interest towards one another, except for Gwyn.

Consent in the actual book will be important but consent having already been given in our imaginations so we can imagine possibilities beyond what is currently written is the right of any reader.

[set-wingedwarrior]

I should have known that people would have acted annoying about the Team's reunion and, after the dumb takes I saw, here I am to make a breakdown of their reactions in relation to the context because that's defenitely how my psychology majoring is supposed to be used apparently

Before I dig specifically to each character I'd like to remind people that, like Weiss herself said, everything happened so fast. It's not just that the time itself wasn't that much. In between the fight and them trying to find each other in the Ever After it would have been, what? An hour?

It's been 2 years for us guys, for them it isn't that much time to justify the super touchy and hugs reunion like we got in V5, or V6 in Argus, or V8 when they meet back (except for Blake, but I'll get there). You all need to remember that media in general for stories like this aren't your fluffy fanfic full of feelings and hugs and kisses all the time.

Now, welcome to my psychology class! First on our list, our one and only traumatized team leader child, Ruby Rose.

"Why didn't ruby rush to hug her sister?"

Well, let's see it from her point of view; actually, we litterally saw it at the start of the episode! We saw how fast everything went from her eyes!

She had to go in fight mode in a fucking instant because, differently from Blake (who was trying to jump after Yang) and Weiss (who was busy stopping her), Ruby has been attacked immediately by Neo after her firt attempt at her life failed. She didn't even have the time to process what happened because she was already fighting for dear life!

Our brains are very resourceful machines that always try to save energy (it's why stereotypes exist, it's our brains identifying stuff by one thing to not think about it too hard), and considering how complex and crippling the feeling of loss is, and how much it takes to process, in a life or death situation our brains would just shut it down.

Because we're all different people it might not work the same for everyone, but Ruby is a trained fighter, she's a huntress, her body and mind falling in fighting mode is actually the most logical reaction in the given situation because it falls both on habit and instinct.

And given that she didn't even have the time to process the the thought that Yang might have been dead (even during the fucking fall she had to fight Neo still, give my girl a break!!), it's very reasonable that despite the frustration and stress of everything else in the Ever After, she wasn't too worried about Yan'g safety. Because she never got time to even think "I lost her" that she got in the very same situation. So, "If I fell and I'm here and I'm okay, then Yang is too, she must be fine".

Besides, Ruby did run towards her after fighting the thing!

Yang just interrupted her with her "Dammitt! You're not supposed to be here!" before Ruby settled to get near her and "If you thought we wouldn't come for you then you must have forgotten who raised me", so any argument about them not caring is just really dumb.

In conclusion, considering that she found out that her sister was probably okay before her brain could have even processed the concept of her loss, and all happening in a very short spawn of time, it makes 100% sense that Ruby wouldn't need to jump in her arms and cry or whatever. They're in a weird place but they are okay and that's all that matters (before Ruby will discover the horrors of what happened after she fell and the horrors of her quickly approaching breakdown, but that's for another time!)

Blake on the other hand.

Blake is the one that speed into action the moment she saw Yang fall. When chaos wa around nobody went to attack her, she saw Yang disappear in the void. Now, she got to feel the loss, the pain, the weight of failure because she failed to save her!

And her first reaction was to fucking jump after her. Because she couldn't fail, she couldn't lose her, she must save her! And Weiss had to drag her up the platform herself to stop her from doing so because they had a job to do and Blake was blinded by pain!

Then, she got blinded by rage. It wasn't her fault, it was Neo! And Cinder! And I think that in that moment of emotional disregulation it's reasonable to think that Blake wasn't acting for the good of Mantle, of the plan, or anything else. We all saw it in her eyes, it was pure rage, she wanted revenge! And that's completely reasonable in that given moment. She saw the love of her life DIE because of them, OF FUCKING COURSE SHE'S BLINDED BY SUCH POWERFUL EMOTION.

As you can probably already tell, Ruby and Blake's actions are dictated by very different feelings! Even if the action itself, fighting, is the same, the mindset and motivations differ completely!

So, what happens when she meets Yang again? That after the danger is over (because it's not like she dropped everything, they fought the thing and waited for the situation to calm down and be safe. She also waited for Ruby to say her things first tbf) she fucking runs to tackle her!

Because Blake actually got to see and feel the loss! She thought she had lost her! She thought that she died because she wasn't fast enough! So, even regardless of the romantic feelings (that obviously play a part because come on, they've been inseparable for volumes now, it's obvious that she would have felt it all that harder), it makes sense that Blake's the one to feel pure utter relief in seeing Yang still alive! And she'd need to go to her, feel that she's there with her!

Now, probably the most complex one to explain: Weiss.

In a way, she's middle ground between Ruby and Blake. Weiss wasn't attacked right away either, but she had to jump in action to stop Blake. That means that she stopped to see what was happening and at Yang's "death" she just assumed what Blake was about to do or else she wouldn't have ad the time to stop her (we saw how fast Blake was)

That means that, in some way, she got to take in what was going on before going in fight mode, but she still didn't get to process it herself because she needed to act on the others' behalf. Where Ruby was litterally just hanging in there and Blake was blinded by her pain, both of them against Neo, Weiss saw what happened and told to herself "I must keep going with the plan, I must protect who's left, I can't let Yang''s sacrifice go to waste" and went to fight Cinder alone (until Penny arrives).

Weiss during the fight is the one more "emotionally stable" (more like she efficiently locked them to be functional in the fight), she's well aware of what is going on and doing her best. In this mindset, she got to fight but also to see more clearly everything that is happening.

She's also the one who stayed there the longest. She's the one who saw the worst because she's been there long enough to witness more horrors, but despite the awareness she didn't get the time to really feel them. When does she though?

After she saw all of her teammates, her family, die. When she's almost completely alone. Only her Penny and Jaune left, Cinder towering them while she's using Gambol Shroud, everything she has left of her family, to try keep fighting. Because at that point there's less chaos, less things to prioritize her focus on, the evacuation is done, she just has to not let Cinder get Penny's powers.

We didn't see Weiss and Blake finding each other, but my guess is that either there was a hug off screen or, more likely, she kept it together because they logically needed their weapons and teammates back first. She then chooses to stay focused (and cheer for Blake, bless her), and work, and shuts down every question about what happened because she knows that talking about it would break her down and be a distraction from their objective.

Which is why she doesn't speak until they're all together: withouth a distraction, she's crying before she even got to start.

The pain added up and got to her, and I'm pretty sure that Ruby's big reaction wasn't just because of the news on their own, but also the feelings Weiss was letting out while telling them (you know when you feel someone is feeling bad even when they don't tell you nor openly act up on it? And you still feel deeply bad/uncmofortable?).

I got overboarded here, but in short Weiss didn't act too clingy in the reunion either because she was busy staying focused first and then dealing with EVERYTHING that happened earlier and that she needed to tell them. Like, after getting both to Blake and Ruby, Yang's safety was basically 100% sure anyway, so. And, again, everything happened so fast.

It's been 2 long years for us. Not for them. So, to the people who have been complaining, you're just projecting your own personal feelings on them and then calling it bad writing when they're not acting like you feel right now.

Class dismissed.

[nocturnesanomaly]

Chapter 4: I've never been one to let go

(Series Masterlist: Divine Violence) (Read on Ao3) (Inspired Playlist)

Series:The Divine Violence - Chapter 4: I've never been one to let go

Wordcount: 5.9K

Pairing: Simon "Ghost" Riley x John "Soap" MacTavish x Gn!Reader

TW: (View masterlist for series tw and tags) - DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT, Religious Trauma, PTSD, Flashbacks, Hallucinations, Anxiety, Paranoia, Disturbing themes, Grooming, Self-harming behaviours

Description: You share your knowledge with the team, reminding you of darker pasts, while Simon seeks to rekindle his familiarity with you.

A/N: You. Yes you. Go drink water. Right now. Good job :)

[Prev chapter / Next Chapter]

The meeting room has lost its fresh smell a long time ago. Too many of the early morning hours spent looking over papers and files, that are all entirely useless to you. Paperwork. It had always been the bane of your existence, even back when it truly mattered to your career. Necessary, and all the more frustrating for it.

The morning sun had already arisen to be at the perfect angle, right where its shine hits you in the eyes when you bend down to read. It had no business being that sharp in this season. It provided so little heat in the late November days, and tended to become more of a hindrance than anything.

Every file on the table listed people of interest, cities, landmarks, field reports from past agents. You flip another one over, trying your best to ignore the file that lays at the edge of the table. The list of casualties. All the crimes of the cult wrapped up into one set of clipped documents. You didn't dare look, to see how many of the names and faces you'd recognize.

"Auness, Backfield, Springview..." Gaz lists off the cities on his document, "I haven't even heard about half of these."

Soap leans over the table from across him. He snatches the paper out of his hand, despite the little protesting sounds Gaz let's out. "Ah, think I’ve been to Springview once...lovely neighbourhood," Soap says with a grin on his face.

"They're all small communities, some were only truly fostered to life after the cult's influence," you inform them. The document in your hand lists off a field report from years ago, a group of soldiers passing by Backfield only to be met with hostility. There had been 10 when they went in, 2 came out. That had been the true start of it back then, when things really derailed.

It had been all over the news for a time. It's incredible how quickly the world forgets.

"All done by the dishonourable... Michael Wilder..." Gaz picks up the document that had been placed in the middle of the table. The only person that ever took any responsibility for it all. Though never suffering the consequences for his crimes, he let it be known he was the one that stood behind it all.

"Ah expected his name to sound different....well...anything other than Michael..." Soap makes a distasteful face, leaning back in his chair. "What kind of cult leader is named Michael, it's not a very intimidating name." Rich coming from a guy named Soap, you think, but the comment never leaves your mind.

"I think that's the point," Gaz corrects, to which you can only nod.

He did have another name once upon a time, but you can scarcely remember it now. Perhaps even before you truly got to know all the things he's done. Maybe he had a nicer side once, that was lost to some tragic event from bad people. It didn't do any good to dwell on it. Who he is now is your problem.

"Murder, Torture, Arson, Kidnapping, Rural crimes...bloody hell, what hasn't this guy done," Gaz says exasperated. There’re many things that man hasn't done that he wanted to; you don't doubt that he would've done a lot worse if there hadn't been a collapse in management. He was building something grand.

"Speculative all of them...can't connect him to all of it, but there's nobody else that could have possible been responsible, the cult is a collective." You can still remember what it was like the first time you walked amongst these cultists. The clear admiration, the shock and awe, the forsaken faith in a brighter future. They might have been misguided, but they truly believed in what they were doing, there was no deceit from them.

"Shit, even something as small as vandalism, who'd have thought" Soap points to it on the list.

"He burnt down a chapel."

Both of them turn their heads to you in an instant, the surprise on their face shows most of their thought process to you. There's not much to explain, the whole ordeal was pretty straight forward. The only crime you personally had physical evidence of still.

"Ah thought they were supposed to be a religious cult..."

"They are. And still he set fire to the chapel, watched it burn down along with the surrounding forest."

You don't feel like their open mouth in awe reaction is warranted. The cult has been responsible for far worse, is planning far worse, is doing far worse as you all speak for all you know. There's only one true problem with the retelling, you're not about to bore them with the details.

"Were there people inside? Any get out?" Gaz asks carefully.

"Twenty-two, none recovered."

The silence stretches out to an uncomfortable extent. You've already made it awkward. That's got to be a record for you by now, how long has it been? Not even 30 minutes. Despite how much you want to refute your words, they are true. There is nothing remotely funny about the group of people you're after.

"There's been more documented causalities, everything is accounted for," you try to sound reassuring, but it comes out as uncertain. The two men either don't care or don't seem to notice.

A chill runs through you, unexpected, a subtle reminder of the eyes on you. Once upon a time you'd be worried about sharing too much information with the wrong kinds of people, the reminder had been helpful then, now it was a nuisance.

"At least we finally have a good shot at getting to these guys," Gaz speaks up and tries to break the uncomfortable atmosphere you've created. "This is extensive work," he nods to you and gestures to the entire table, "impressive."

Soap nods to agree, and you follow the motion idly without thinking. A little too late, you let out a rushed, "thank you."

You block out the rest of their conversation, only perking up your head when anything of relevance was shared. The two kept a good flow of idle chatter and gossip. Nothing you paid any mind to, gossip wasn't why you were here, you reminded yourself.

"So have ye ever actually spoken with any of them?" Soap asks.

"Wha..what?" You stutter. The question came seemingly out of nowhere. You almost drop the pen in your hand. It would have made an annoying clattering sound if you did. The thought makes you tighten your grip.

"They seem like a nasty bunch, preaching all of that with no remorse," Soap continues in an attempt to explain himself, "have ye met with them? Spoken to Michael?"

You want to snap at him. It's a dumb question you want to say, inappropriate and entirely irrelevant to the investigation. Except it's not.

You want to shut him down just as badly regardless.

"Uh... I..." *Fuck me* "Yeah...he's not pleasant...listen I need to get a few of these files scanned in, so I can send them over to Laswell, you two just keep at it, and I'll be back." It's an obvious lie to everyone in the room, a bad attempt at getting out for fresh air. Neither of them comments on it, and within a flash you're gone.

Opening the front door is a dreaded action. You can already imagine the battlefield you'll be entering; the feint mumble of raised voices can already be heard from your position. The minefields are always planted carefully, specific spots that you don't expect unless you've been traversing those dirts for years at a time.

It's never specific, never the same thing.

One wrong step, and you've got someone screaming down your face.

That battlefield was your home.

Opening the door only makes the feint screaming louder to your ears. You quickly locate it to be the kitchen, easy enough to avoid. Just have to kick off your shoes, place them neatly, tiptoe past the little opening and through the living room, to the stairs and your room. All without being noticed.

"Deus spes nostra, my child."

You stop abruptly. The only reason you don't let out a loud squeak of surprise, is the hand you slapped across your mouth. Your head whips towards the couch, gone are all thoughts of the perfect view into the kitchen you're right in the middle of.

Your expression falls when you realize who it is. An old friend of your father's from his military days. He sat on the couch with his usual poise and striking manner. He'd been staying here for the last two months, something about vacation, something about deployment, something about no money, something about too much money.

You had tried asking your father several times, whenever he was in the mood for your presence. Each time you got a different answer, and there was no way you'd find yourself asking the actual man himself.

In no way did you dislike him. He'd always been nice to you, making conversation in the silence, giving you gifts when you were upset. He'd almost been a part of the family since you were young, but he'd been gone for several years, and now you felt like a different person to back then.

"What?"

A grin breaks across his face. His form relaxing into the cushions behind him as he regards you just long enough that you're about to repeat yourself.

"Did your father never teach how to properly respond?"

He runs a hand over smooth blond hair, bleached you'd say, but you have no doubt he'd disagree. Ever since he had come back, he tried to make conversation with you, foster a friendship with you, trying to become some type of adult figure in your life. You don't know what you actually see him as. A man, your father’s friend, a stranger mostly.

"Respond to what?"

"Deus spes nostra, you respond with Deus lux mea est." His stare is a piercing blue, spikes digging into your soul and setting hooks in flesh and meat.

"Why," you ask sceptically.

"It's an affirmation of our faith, an identifier, so to speak." He sees the way you stare quizzically, the way your brain is picking up on the small things, learning the minor details that you haven't even realized yet.

A loud bang can be heard from the kitchen, the split and shatter of glass, and then silence. Your mind panics at the implication, old defence mechanisms going into place. You flinch and move quickly to the nearest couch, curl up on it, making yourself seem as small and unnoticeable as possible. Every fibre in your body told you to end the conversation and go to your room, but the man didn't feel like letting you go just yet.

"Easy, my child, nothing will happen to you as long as you stay with me." He speaks soft words of comfort. It does nothing to ease you.

You try to combat the tremble in your voice, you put on a fierce look, one of strength and deep hidden anger.

"I'm not a child."

He chuckles at that. Two breaths, dry, not believing.

"Oh sure, you do seem very mature for your age."

He's mocking you. It's nothing you haven't heard before, despite the truth of the statement, you were still deemed a kid by most adults in your life. You felt like you had grown faster than the others, you acted with more care, more knowledge, and somehow you still feel behind in every aspect.

"I guess...people have told me that a lot" You look towards the opening to the kitchen. All it would take was for the conversation to become too loud, to bring attention upon yourself. It would be so easy to bring on the wrath of your father or the disgust of your mother. You had the marks to count for it.

"You're a special one, your father tells me as much. I can still remember when you were younger, always a bit peculiar." That would be a head turner if you've ever heard one. There’s no part of you that actually believes his words, yet he says them with such conviction.

Any word that comes out of your father’s mouth about you has never been in a positive light. Occasionally he'll drop a hint of satisfaction whenever you do something for him, but that's as good as it's gonna get. Being called special or peculiar by your father must be more of an insult.

The man reaches out and places an unwelcome hand on your knee. He seems to notice the change in your expression. An uncertain frown settling on your lips. "Not in a bad way, dear, you've got something others don't, a potential that others can't see, but I do," he says.

That doesn't reassure you in the slightest, but the little flame in your heart is already lit.

"You're turning eightteen soon, isn't that right? Next year?" He asks and pulls back again. He takes note in the way you seem to release the tension in your shoulders. There's no longer any noise from the kitchen. You don't hear it.

"Yeah..."

He smiles.

"Have you ever thought about enlisting? Serving with your brother and sisters in arms, I'm sure it'd make your father very proud." He seems too sure, and perhaps he was right. Your father's time in the military had always been described with honour and respect. A time of his life where he did something worthwhile, it made him the man he is today.

"Uh...I...No...I haven't"

You never want to be anything like him.

"You can't be serious, Simon!" Your voice echoes throughout the graveyard. A few of the crows in the trees fly off into the sunset. Simon knew you'd react like this. He thought himself prepared for your outrage, ready to comfort you and make you understand. Your emotions are intense and renders him silent.

"You can't go! What about everything we have going on here, we had a plan you know! You can't just bail on that."

The plan had always been a fantasy, he thought you knew that. Something you would whisper aloud in the quiet of the night. Dreams of running away, of scraping enough money to get a small flat together, of helping each other through the adult years of your life, at least until you both got stable.

He had seen it for what it was, a childish fantasy. It wasn't a reliable solution.

"God, and even just listening to the stories from my dad, it's awful there, why would you want to be a part of that!"

The graveyard feels ice-cold. The spider lilies are dead. There's no warmth to gain from the lowering sun, painting the sky in gold and orange. You've never looked more beautiful than this. Emotion so evident in your eyes, and the sun's glow reflecting it. He doesn't fail to notice the tears lining your eyes, the breaths you hold in an attempt to not cry.

You look divine, an angel on earth.

The last thing he wants is to see you plunged into darkness. Something he fears will happen when he takes his departure alone. He adores you, he always has deep down, but he needs to prioritize himself, get himself out before this place kills him completely.

"I thought we were in this together! I thought you cared for us, for me, for all this!"

Your words are chipping away at his patience. Your inability to understand his side of things, the unwilling part of you that won't even try. He understands as far as it allows him to. He knows you're afraid of what will happen if you're separated. You've always struggled with believing in yourself.

He knew you'd be fine. He knew you'd find your own way out, that you could be reunited in a few years somewhere better, healthier and safer.

"We are!" he yells back, "I care so much for you, for what we have even when it's here."

"Then why won't you-"

"But I can't stay here spider, it's killing me" he cuts you off.  The words leave a sour taste on his tongue, it's the bare-bones truth that can be applied to both of you. Your own childhood homes weren't safe for neither of you. Mentally nor physically.

"I get that...but...what about me..."

"Spider, not everything is about you!" he regrets his words just as quick as they leave his mouth. He can see the look of betrayal on your face, it matches the dread he feels in his stomach. You take a retreating step backwards. "Wait-" he calls your name; he reaches for you, but you don't let him touch you.

"You have to understand, this is the only way out for me. In the military, I might actually be able to do some good," he tries to explain to you.

You're not having any of it.

"Fine, go then! Get yourself killed" you shout, turning on your heel before he can stop you. His brain screams at him to follow you, to comfort you, to get you to understand so you won't be mad at him, but he doesn't.

After years and years of searching, Simon has found that roaming the halls aimlessly has become an adequate stress relief. There are certain times of the day when the halls are completely deserted. Each step echoes and bounce off the walls around him. A rare occurrence when he doesn't care to make his steps featherlight, he let’s people hear he's coming.

It makes for a good trance of thought. He disliked most of the walks outside around base, the frost biting at his covered skin, and damp boots seeping water into his socks, but the hallways were dry and quiet. Most of the time.

He's solved a lot of internal problems this way. Stomping through the hallways deep in thought and looking as intimidating as ever. Back when he and Johnny were new and uncertain, he used to avoid him this way. One easy way to avoid someone who was always looking for you, was to always be on the move.

Of course, it hadn't worked forever, Johnny eventually found him, and made him confront his own feelings despite how uncomfortable it made him.

This time around, his thoughts drift to you. They always drift to you these days. Like a disease you've infested his thoughts, reminded him of things that was once buried deeply. There's still a lot of things unresolved between the two of you, things he wishes he could sit you down and talk to you about.

Ever since you've arrived, you had a weird effect on him. You manage to leave your presence in every room you walk into, he can almost sense where you've been, the people you've talked to. You're everywhere, and whenever he needs to find you, you disappear completely.

It's a frustrating cycle.

Perhaps for the first time, he understands how frustrated Johnny must have been those years ago when he avoided him like the plague. You seem to be doing the same thing now, whether you're conscious of it or not.

Part of him is completely fine with it. You stay out of each other's way, avoid bringing up any bad blood. It doesn't absolve his endless questions, however. He can barely focus, even when he's with Johnny, every scar of his that he lets his eyes run over, his thoughts go to yours. How did you get them, who gave them to you, are they still alive?

He could always figure it all out on his own. There was no real need to ask, but he still held a modest amount of respect for you.

He doesn't pay attention as someone zooms right past him. Whoever they were, they were in a hurry, and in his mind, it was no concern of his. More than likely just a recruit late for training, or a soldier forgetting their report.

It's only when he refocuses his eyes and sees Johnny standing in the distance with a look of disbelief on his face, that he turns around to see you zooming away in the distance, rounding a corner when you finally get far enough.

He raises his brows behind his mask, his eyes turning to narrow slightly as he pieces together a situation, which he has no context to.

"They finally get sick of you?" Simon questions broadly, his voice taking a joking tone with the man lingering in the doorway.

Johnny didn't look all that much amused, his eyes continuing to follow you until you were completely out of sight. "They're an interesting one," Johnny mumbles while letting out a sigh.

"Don't like them?"

"Ye kiddin? Ah adore the dark, mysterious, quiet bastards that somehow always enter my life" Johnny's tone comes across as sarcastic, but there's truth to his words. Early on in their relationship, Simon had been convinced that Johnny just had a huge case of saviour complex for him. He still doesn't know if it actually did start out like that, but he can say with certainty it's developed much more complex.

Simon scoffs and shakes his head. "They didn't use to be so..." he trails off, looking back at where you went as if he could catch another glimpse, but you were already gone.

"Moody?" Johnny proposes half serious.

"Distant," Simon corrects him.

Johnny nods. He walks out of the doorway, does a gesture to someone inside, and lets the door close behind him with a soft click. The hallway is plunged back into silence as the two look at each other. Simon has never really liked intense eye contact, but he makes way too much of it on purpose.

"Have ye talked to 'em yet?" Johnny walks over to the nearby wall, leaning against it lazily. He looks tired, worn out, which is a surprise from the lack of meaningful things to do over the last while. It's not completely nonsensical, Simon is well aware of how easily Johnny can be drained from lack of activity. Having something to do is what scratches that needed itch deep in his brain.

"I've tried to." Johnny doesn't look like he believes him. He would like to convince himself that it's true, but a part of him hasn't been searching for a level ground with you either. He has no idea where to start, how to re-establish that familiarity you once shared. It makes all the deep corners of his mind stir.

Johnny gives him a look he knows well. He knows he should get on it, push past any fears and at least get back on a professional standing instead of skittish cats tiptoeing around each other like the other is going to strike.

"Don't look at me like that," Simon says defensively. Johnny puts his hands up mimicking surrender, his teeth flashing through in his smile. The smirk could easily be wiped off his face, but he has no energy to do anything about it.

"Just talk to them already, ah can practically feel the tension three rooms over every time ye two are in each other's vicinity." Johnny shakes his head, before urging Simon on his way.

A droplet of sweat falls into your eyes. It stings and leaves a burning sensation behind. In any other scenario, you'd be fighting yourself to get it quickly wiped away, to get the pain to stop. Your focus is elsewhere. Plastered on the punching bag in front of you.

Each hit sends you further and further into a locked state of mind.

One two one two one two.

It keeps your thoughts occupied. Prying them away from the creeping shadows and their tempting whispers.

Miss it. Miss it.

Hit yourself. Hit yourself.

You close your eyes and continue to count.

One two one two

Bang your face against the wall till the bone inverts.

They're insistent tonight.

You switch up your stance. Circling the bag before taking it on at a different angle. You want to excuse your jittery movements on too much coffee, but you know the reminder of how close you're getting to going near that hell is enough to have you like this.

The more you think about it, the more the small whispers in your ears taunt you. A scent of sulphur and burnt flesh sometimes pass you by. It makes you do a double take in your movements, before you can tell yourself that it's not here. It doesn't make it go away, but if you focus just a little more on the red fabric of the bag instead of the red on your knuckles, then maybe it will tone itself down.

It's a futile attempt. The voices never really listened, no matter how much you answered them or ignored them. Independent of your reaction, they only seemed to want to taunt your mind. You could hardly recall back when your mind would be relatively empty, but the time had been there.

You try to circle the bag again, coming back and forth between the space you're allowed. Your respite comes in the knowledge that nobody would be here to observe your uncertainty. There was hardly anyone at the gym this late at night. The reason you chose it in the first place.

You were rusty, a bit out of shape, but you still had your technique. It had been hammered into you for years, you wouldn't forget it that easily. Each hit to the bag makes it sway slowly around, the massive weight not being very deterred by your punches.

Blood rushes through your veins, your heart pounding in your chest and causing you to breathe unevenly. It's an afterthought to put yourself through small breathing techniques between sets. Every sound that emits in the room plays into your mind, flashes images to the forefront of your brain.

The sound of the wind outside splashing against the windows. The sound of your punches against the bag. The sound of distant footsteps. The sound of a barking dog outside, one that would bear red crosses on white pelt. The sound of low murmuring all around you. The sound of a gunshot.

You whip your head around, choking on your own spit, when you're met by the sight of the man you've been avoiding. Your eyes flicker to the person behind him, made of shadows, smiles and bad omens. It puts an uneven hand on Simon's shoulder.

The sound of your beating heart is loud in your ears, you almost fear he can hear it as well. Your breath is low, uneven, easily excusable to the exercise you were doing instead of the nightmare standing there. You clench your fists, nails digging into your palm. Small droplets of blood trickle in-between your fingers.

He hands you a water bottle. It takes you by surprise, a sudden gesture of kindness. "You look about ready to collapse," his voice is gruff and tired. You bite the inside of your cheek when you accept it.

The cold water is like heaven for your dry throat. Your body graciously accepting the hydration it's clearly needed for a while now. He wasn't totally wrong about your state. You heard the whispers, how you've been looking sick the entire day. Then again when don't you.

"Thank you..." you mumble quietly, taking another gulp from it.

"Yeah..." he looks at you like he's expecting something from you.

You stare at him wearily, trying your damned hardest to discern whatever expression he's making under the mask by his eyes alone. More than anything, you wanted to pull it off of him. You wanted to see him, truly see him.

Would he have stubble? A full-on beard, maybe. Would he have the same hair length as back then, would he have smile lines, wrinkles when he laughs? His voice was deeper, would his laugh sound different now?

"We need to talk," he says your name so quietly, like he's afraid to utter it, as if you'd spring on him like a monstrous creature or haunted ghost.

"We're talking," technically you aren't, but for you this might as well be a conversation already. Heat blooms in your chest, rising unwillingly to your cheeks. Once upon a time that would've been from bashfulness, now it was more of a deep-rooted shame, a fear of your own anticipation for what's to come.

"I'm..." he stutters over his own words, "I'm not entirely sure what went wrong between us."

He pauses and your eyebrows furrow, your mouth quivering with words unspoken.

"Maybe it was something I did, being the reason, we stopped talking but..." your eyes flicker around his mask, the urge turns pained in your chest. He shakes his head. "I hope we can put it past us, for the sake of the mission."

You hand the water bottle back to him. He accepts it, but you can see in his movements how he takes it as rejection. Your eyes are clear on the target he's becoming.

"No, I..." your voice comes out raspy. You clear your throat. "I'm not sure either, what went wrong, but I hold nothing against you...Simon...I guess we just grew apart." It's a big fat lie, but the millisecond of what you'd call relief that shows in his eyes are well worth it.

He exhales his breath loud enough to be noticeable, his form sagging just a little without breaking. "You don't?" when you nod as confirmation, he matches it. "That so...I'd like to start again...I'm curious where you've been all this time, it would be nice to catch up...begin again."

That little voice in your head bristles. A quiet little thing that belongs to a childhood version of you. It wants him to shut up, to stop the pretending front he's putting on. Then there's the other little voice, a voice of reason, one that's still young and malleable. They fight over your decision-making.

He looks down at your hands, notices the feint trail of blood where you split a knuckle. His eyes go small, focusing on it a tad too long before you can pull your hands out of view from him.

Your teeth catch your lip before you make the conscious decision to let it go. "Yeah...we can...try again...from the beginning," the dry laugh you let out doesn't sound convincing, but it seems to be enough for him to buy into. Maybe all you had isn't dead just yet, and when the call comes crashing it all down, you can use the connection for your own burning benefit.

"Right..." there's a note of excitement in his voice, the slightest change in octave and rhythm. "I'll be looking forward to it," he takes his turn to leave the same way he had sneaked in. "Oh, and spider, clean yourself and the equipment up, gonna give yourself a bad reputation like that."

He's being cheeky behind that mask, you can tell. Yet the reawakening of the nickname stirs the softest of a smile to almost make it to your lips.

Your feet hurt. Every step sends another spike of pain up your legs, every swaying movement threatening to send you barrelling forward. You're late. Horribly late. Each breath catches in your throat, and you barely look at the road before you pass it. Only a loud honking alerting to just how close you were to being run over, but you couldn't stop, you had to catch him in time.

You couldn't believe you were almost missing this. Your last chance at seeing him before he leaves for good. The wind hisses in your ears, the cold burns at your uncovered feet. You couldn't believe you had let it come to this.

For the last few weeks, you had been ignoring him, only sharing the most necessary of things. There was no banter between you, no jokes or laughter, and all because you couldn't contain your own anger for his decision.

His stupid, stupid decision.

You couldn't talk him out of going.

He couldn't talk you out of resenting him for it.

The sky is on fire. Rays of the sun blinding you on your way, making you squint your eyes to see. The oranges mixed with yellows makes the clouds look unreal. It's a thing that would have stopped you if it weren't for the agonizing consequences of your decisions weighing on your shoulders. The sky meant nothing to you now.

The graveyard is a welcome sight, the rusted gate creaked open wider than normal. You zoom past it, stumbling over one of the larger rocks scattered about. It propels you forward into the yard, crashing your knees against the gravel. It cuts and stings, but the buzzing under your skin is too loud to notice.

You call out his name. Your voice holding no bounds for your desperation. The only sound that comes back is the crows squawking, the fluttering of wings as they fly far away from you. There's no answer to your call, no familiar voice sounding out to meet you, no warm hand on your shoulder that would pull you into a hug.

He's gone, you realize all too late.

One forgetting mind, two arguments with your mother, and a punishment to follow, all for nothing. You missed your window. You missed the time he'd said he'd wait. He's left and with what, the only knowledge that you're angry with him. He's putting himself in potential danger, and he thinks you resent him.

More than that, he's actually out of reach for you now.

A fear that had infested your bones long before his ugly announcement. A fear that was now no longer just a fear.

Your breathing stutters. Your vision blurs. Blues, oranges, greys and reds, blobs of nothing filling your vision spilling down your cheeks. They might as well freeze in place. Your legs refuse to obey, your body hunches over from every dry heave, every soundless sob and every claw at the ground.

You were alone now.

Yet a hand places itself on your shoulder. It spooks you enough to let out a scream, yet when you whip around, you're only met with a soft smile. The hand is too big to be Simon's, too rough and too scarred. You stare into the eyes of a different man.

A friend. An enemy. A figure you could cling your shattered mind to in your late teen angst.

"You'll be alright," he mouths the words, and you're sure he speaks them, but they never reach you.

"You can meet him again," he stands tall, watches down at your kneeling form with a twist of something that churns your stomach, "I can show you the way to him."

"What?" Your voice is barely audible.

"Through the path to God we may find redemption, and through that path you may find your friend once again, we are all the same under His light."

He tosses a lighter down on the ground next to you.

"Let me show you the path to the light."

You can smell the smoke in the air, taste the ash on your tongue, feel the blood beneath your nails.

It's too late to let go now the hook has sunk into flesh.

The flame is already lit.

Likes, Reblogs and comments are always appreciated, love ya! <3

Taglist: @chickennn-soupp @unlikelyaperson @ghostlythots @lilynotdilly @islnd-vybz @spicyspicyliving @kaoyamamegami

[c-is-for-circinate]

Ok so regarding the stranger things extended universe, i definitely want to know more about nancy and her storyline, like does this become her career ? investigating government conspiracies? And how does she feel about it? About not living a more peaceful life after everything?

After something like Hawkins, there are three ways to go if you want to keep sane, Nancy thinks. Or, well. As sane as any of them are, now.

Some of them went out into the world ready to grab life and joy with both hands and all their teeth, the memory of how close death came to devouring them enough to spur them on to devour life right back. (Eddie's playing Boston next week, wants to know if she'll go to his show; Max and El, last Nancy heard, are learning to surf.) Some of them went out into the world still full of combat reflexes they didn't mean to keep and tripped into a new fight, a slower quieter more mundane one. (She saw the photos Jonathan took last time he visited Steve and Robin in Chicago, the protests last month, the signs, the flags.) And some of them...well. Some of them left the lessons of Hawkins a little less behind than that.

They won in Hawkins, inasmuch as burned-out buildings and the town memorials and the deep scars cutting through a still-damaged downtown count as winning. That battle's fought and won and done. But Nancy hasn't forgotten who started it, and it wasn't Henry Creel.

(She'll argue with Dustin about it, over a mountain of fried shrimp and a pitcher of beer he's somehow old enough to legally buy, because Dustin's always cared more about the how than the why. He thinks the important lesson of Hawkins is that the laws of physics known by everybody across the global scientific community are wrong. They spend an hour and a half going back and forth about Oppenheimer and Eisenhower, Regan and Brezhnev and Martin Brenner, because one of the only differences between Vecna and a nuclear bomb is still the fact that nobody thinks Vecna could exist, but Dustin is wrong about why that's important.)

Science can do a thousand things nobody thinks it can do. Science can split an atom. Science can split dimensions. It doesn't matter why it's possible; it doesn't even really matter what's possible, beyond the fact that massive governments with thousands of soldiers and billions of dollars can always kill when they want to. Whether it's a bomb or a child experiment or a gas leak.

What matters, every time, is that people are dead. What matters is that the public needs to know.

Nancy makes her name in college breaking a story about illegal sewage dumping near a residential neighborhood before the Boston Globe even has it. She gets a professor fired for plagiarism. She almost gets expelled for libel when she tries to run a story about date rape on campus. (She almost gets caught slashing tires, after that one, but she learned from the best. Erica Sinclair taught her plenty about stealth, and Murray's been trying to drive in the idea of patience since the first time they met.)

It's not about monsters, it was never about monsters. There aren't any more monsters, Nancy thinks. (She keeps a licensed handgun in a shoebox in her apartment, because she ran out of ammo for the Makarov years ago, because monsters aren't the only things that like to threaten too-curious reporters in the middle of the night, and because you never know.) It's always been about the people the monsters destroy.

Nobody will ever believe the story of what destroyed Hawkins, probably. (Maybe someday they'll declassify. Nancy has a four-hundred-page memoir under lock and key in the safe where she doesn't store her gun, if the world ever gets there. Maybe she'll just pass it down to Mike's grandchildren.) But people know now that it was Hawkins National Lab. That some kind of government weapons research, right there on Indiana soil, broke a small town in half. That's something.

Nancy graduates college and interns anywhere she can get a foot in the door. The Globe. The Times. The Washington Post. The Post, finally, sticks. There's an editor there who loves to give new reporters just enough slack in their leashes to hang themselves with, so they can fill the back of the paper with issue-selling scandal and then have somebody to fire if the wrong person in power gets upset. Nancy does three months of research, jotting off puff pieces and human interest stories about charity work and bills with no opposition, quietly filling up file folders of photos and receipts and evidence that nobody can prove she didn't obtain legally. Her first headline runs on a Tuesday morning and gets a White House senior staffer fired by Thursday afternoon.

It could have gotten her clearing out her desk by the end of Friday, but Nancy was careful. Nancy was smart. It chafes from the inside out, like a blister on her soul, but she knows all about water it down. She could've implicated a dozen elected officials in this, and ten of them would have skated right by with no trouble, just plenty of cause to make Nancy trouble right back. (There are already people in Washington who know her name. Nancy knows there are files about her in the Pentagon.) So she's careful, she's delicate, and she implies nothing at all about anybody she can't demolish outright. She waters it down. It gets her a promotion.

.

Nancy doesn't drink icewater vodka, herself. She likes whiskey instead, in her coffee, in her tea. She talks on the phone with Murray Bauman at only the most irregular intervals, and he sneers at her in a way that Nancy's pretty sure translates, on Murray's tongue, to a colleague's respect. She tries not to lie. She's better at it, nowadays.

Nancy is hungry, has always been hungry. Has always been starving, one way or another, all the way back when she was twelve years old thirsting for adventure in the basement with her little brother, fifteen and ravenous for a challenge, an experience, the chance to grow up. She's choked on what she thought she wanted enough times that you'd think she'd learn by now. Mostly what it's done is toughen her teeth and teach her to chew.

She wants truth, and she can have it for herself, if she's good enough. If she doesn't try to force-feed it to the rest of the world too hard. She wants respect, she wants justice, she's selfish and selfless and hungry for all of it.

She wants to not be so afraid. She wants to not be so alone. She wants, sometimes, just once in a while, to be a little bit quiet and a little bit soft and rest.

It didn't work with Jonathan the same way it didn't work with Steve, or Liam, or Casey, or Diane. Nancy aches to be a little less alone, but she doesn't starve for it. Never once in her life has she been hungry for a person the way she's hungry for everything else. Never once in her life has she actually fallen in love back.

But Jonathan is at her front door again, because Jonathan is a yo-yo to all the people he's ever loved: backing off to give them time and space to grow, rocketing off into the world alone just for a little while, just as long as he can bear it, and then slinging himself back. Back to her again, this time.

Jonathan knows the score. Knows she loves him as much as she's ever loved anybody, other than Barb and Mike and her mother and Holly. And if it's not hunger -- if the closest Nancy has ever gotten to hunger for another person tends to happen in that oh-so-very, very discreet bar where Nancy can wear a perfectly-tailored suit and buy whiskey sours for girls in short skirts with no nightmares behind their eyes -- well, Nancy's never wanted most of them past the next morning anyway.

So sometimes Jonathan is on her couch and sometimes he's in her bed, and sometimes they fuck and sometimes all they do is sleep. When she needs a photojournalist, he's never once let her down. When she has nightmares, she wakes up just as terrified, but it's so much easier to pull herself together with someone to pull it together for. And Nancy Wheeler has never been in love, will never be in love, but she doesn't know what it could possibly have to offer that she could want more than that.

.

Does Nancy like her life? Wrong question. Stupid question. Better to ask if Nancy would have it any other way -- and well, yeah, she'd have a president who didn't sexually harass interns, a national defense budget that wasn't ten times the size of the department of education's, and a coffeemaker in the office that didn't get grounds in everything. She'd live in a world that didn't need her, find a new thing to be hungry about. Maybe she and Barb would both be on track for tenure by now.

In this world, she has half a dozen Pulitzer nominations and a Polk Award on her bookshelf. She has a locked filing cabinet full of other people's secrets and a locked safe full of her own. There's a file with her name on it somewhere in the Pentagon, although she hasn't managed to sneak in to read it yet. She's pretty sure the files on her desk about Pentagon staff are thicker.

[foodfightnovelization]

Errors And Inconsistencies

Hey everyone, this is just a short post I'm making to address a few mistakes I've made over the course of writing this blog. That's right, despite how much time I've dedicated to Foodfight! my knowledge of it still isn't perfect, and I got a couple things wrong. I'll start with the more minor of my errors- in many of my posts, I've stated that my copy of the novelization is the only one in existence. While this is true in a roundabout sense, recently someone who worked on the movie explained things in a little more detail. To put a long story short, the novelization WAS published...in a very limited print run, intended to gauge interest for a wider release. However since the actual movie it was supposed to tie into was nowhere completion at the time, the audience it was intended for literally didn't exist yet and so it failed, never to be given a second chance.

All this time I thought the copy I had really was the only one ever produced, like it'd been commissioned by Kasanoff specifically to impress investors or show off at a book fair or something. But no, it did have something of an actual release, just in very small quantities. However even that short print run didn't sell well, meaning there are likely barely any copies in circulation due to nobody actually buying it back when it was out. So for all intents and purposes my copy of the novelization IS still, as far as we know, the only one LEFT in existence- but there could be others out there, it's possible. So if for some reason you wanted to add this book to your collection, don't give up hope just yet! Another copy might show up someday, who knows? I sure don't! However, it's incredibly satisfying to finally get the scoop on just what the deal was with the novelization- it's something I'd been curious about ever since I started this blog, and now we finally have answers. So if you ever find another copy of the novelization at a thrift store or eBay or anything, please let me know!

But now onto much more important matters. If you've been following this blog for a while, you may have seen my post titled "Every Real-World Brand Mascot In The Movie". In this, I claim to have gone through the film with a fine-toothed comb and made note of every single character based on a real-life grocery product. However, I guess my comb wasn't fine-toothed enough (whatever that means) because it turns out I actually missed one. This blue knight is the mascot for Armour Star, a brand of canned sausage and various other meat products. Now, in my defense, Armour Star doesn't actually HAVE a mascot in real life- it seems as though this character was created specifically for Foodfight! and has never represented the company or their products before or since. On top of that he isn't named in the credits, even though most of the other brand-name products are, making his presence even easier to miss. Hungry Man doesn't have a mascot in real life either though, and yet I still managed to spot the one they created for Foodfight! while watching it, so really I have no excuse.

Honestly, the only reason I noticed him at all was because I was watching the movie in 1080p (yeah, high-def!) and realized the telescope Dex uses around 53 minutes into the movie was cobbled together from cans with some kind of product logo on them. I took a closer look and realized they said "Armour Star", put two and two together and realized the background character with a star on his head and the word "Armour" on his chest was likely this brand's mascot. But I mean, I'd never even HEARD of Armour Star until I spotted, this... had anyone else? I feel like they can't be particularly well known, as in the 12 years this movie's been out not a single person has made the connection until now. However, as resident Foodfight! blogger, I take it upon myself to be as accurate and truthful as possible when writing these posts, and by failing to notice the Armour Star mascot I ended up unintentionally spreading lies to the community. Let it be known, there's a fictitious mascot for an obscure real-life brand of canned meat in a slightly less obscure 3D animated children's movie about grocery products fighting Nazis in a thinly-veiled parody of Casablanca! Let the world know about the Armour Star can man! And to those readers who bore witness to my initial post where I claimed there were 18 real-world brand mascots in the movie, I was wrong and I apologize for misinforming you. There are actually 19. I forgot about the Armour Star can man, and I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive me for such an egregious transgression.

I'm just joking around by the way, it's obviously not all that serious... but I really didn't notice the Armour Star mascot before, that part was true. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this educational correction of accidental misinformation, and stay tuned as there's still more to come from this blog! I know I teased some fascinating Foodfight! news recently, but unfortunately it's still not at the point where I'm allowed to talk about it. However, fingers crossed I'll be able to in the coming weeks, as it's a HUGE deal and I can't wait for everyone to be able to see it! I tell you, the excitement really never ends when you're a Foodfight! fan...

[aqours]

hi i'm gonna rant about rwby for like the first time in 6 years

ok i'm gonna rant about how this season didn't matter + Ruby's suicide attempt (because yes that's what it was) hi i haven't been involved in this fandom since like fucking season 3 ended

so at the end of the day Jaune is back to not being old and Ruby didn't become Ruby 2. this is slightly better than my predictions because i FULLY anticipated Ruby post-ascension would essentially become a new character that would also just fully be one of Jaune's cheerleaders down to her core so that Jaune could fully replace Ruby as the mc once and for all

i can't tell if it's better or worse that the 2+ year wait for RWBY fans and the end result is an entire season where NOTHING happened. there are no lasting consequences. it was a waste of fucking time and it's clear they genuinely thought the Justice League movie, which was based on a crossover comic that literally nobody liked would be what would save RWBY, a show produced by a company that is in incredibly hot water that prooooooobably wants to wash their hands of it by now. instead, just as the comic was dogshit, the movie was also dogshit. there's not even a scene to hype up a potential season 10 lmao

i genuinely think they were betting all their money on the Justice League movie and oops it's gonna sell like dogshit

and what gets to me is like. the fact NOTHING mattered. i thought for SURE that they'd keep Punished "Venom" Jaune because it makes him look more like Miles or that they would kill off Ruby as we have known her to make Ruby 2 again to make Jaune the new mc as Miles has clearly wanted for ages so there would be lasting consequences but there isn't? the entire thing was actually the equivalent of those like, old filler arcs Naruto and Bleach used to have back before the industry started preferring anime seasons over the show never stopping and its BAFFLING

and all for what? suicide analogies? i actually saw someone be like "WHY IS IT THE MOST MEDIA ILLITERATE PEOPLE BECOME RWBY CRITICS anyways it's clearly not a metaphor for ascension because the ever after people-" yes for THEM its not fucking suicide. for the people native to this world returning to the tree and being reborn is not suicide. that's how their world works. they're born for purposes. they fulfill those purposes. they can keep doing what they do as long as they want but? there's no stigma for THEM to chose to end their current existences so they can be reborn as something else. a scene i actually REALLY liked was when Weiss was like it IS really weird, to them, because they are NOT native to this world and thus it's such a bizarre alien aspect. and that Jaune was kind of forcing their worldview on the Paper Pleasers who were clearly OK with it. in the context of the native inhabitants of the people of the Ever After the context of ending your life so you can be reborn is not harmful to them- it's a NATURAL part of their world and that's OK! it's weird to them, to us, but that's OK! it's a fantasy fairy tale world that works differently than the real world and Remnant with a COMPLETELY different philosophy surrounding death. when you know for sure you'll be reborn as something else in a fictional setting, the philosophies and morals of death can change. that's fine.

in the context of RUBY it was suicide. in the context of RUBY ROSE who is NOT native to this world it was a suicide attempt. she was MISERABLE. she was depressed. Yang fucking stepped in front of Blake and glared at her like an enemy. Ruby was at her most horrific mental state yet and was completely ignored by everyone until it was too late. Neo actively manifested physical trauma in front of her until Ruby reached such a breaking point after seeing her mouse friend be killed she actively decided she wanted to end her existence as Ruby Rose. she did not want to keep being herself. Ruby decided that for her existence as Ruby Rose was completely destroyed and she became somebody new with no memories of her past that it was preferable to being alive as she was now. the sheer brutal reality is that if Neo had handed her a rope instead? probably the same result.

Ruby committed suicide in front of her best friends and five minutes later they were smiling and hugging and basically saying well maybe she'll come back BETTER maybe it was a good thing she did that what the fuck

nothing in this season mattered. it was a fucking filler season. nothing of long-term consequence happened. clearly the writing team fucking loved 13 reasons why and you know what i don't judge for shit like that but why was it in RWBY. why did this show of all things do this weird suicide thing with Ruby and present it as a good thing. "she was taking her medicine" no Yang was fucking HORRIFIED to see it. they just justified it like ten minutes later. she committed suicide and everyone was like "well maybe that's not so bad actually" and then it went from "she committed suicide" to "it was a suicide attempt" instead.

nothing mattered except that we know clearly 13 reasons why is the writer's favorite show. it's obvious that this was a filler season and instead all of the actual manpower and effort went into that movie in the hopes that it'd attract DC fans to the fandom in the vain hopes that the DC fans + bumblebee canon now would be enough to save it. please for the love of god let it die

[opinated-user]

(note: it's ok if we disagree, i admit i might be jumping to conclusions due to lack of info that is currently unknown)

I respect your skeptical approach to any new info about LO. However I can't not point out that most structured info about her is based on what she does or says, or ppl's stories that are/was around her. Plus, fun fact about internet - no one is truly anonymous. Like everyone's, LO's personality slowly leakes in public through her lies, jokes, preferences and other forms of media she interacts with. It's quantity and quality, gathered together, creates a stable believable trend in which Courtney's story fits right in. It feels like one of those "final" pieces that connect everything else and that's why I don't think it could be specifically made up or imagined by someone genious.

What I'm trying to say - in my opinion, it fits all too well with what was already known. It isn't just disturbing, it screams!

To this point, I personally believe that LO doesn't seek popularity and plays it low on purpose. She had whole childhood to learn how to be a sneaky predator under everyone's noses. That's a skill.

i don't disagree with any of that, anon. the biggest reason why i try to remark that all of that are allegations and we have no strong evidence that it happened is an attempt to avoid people asking "then why she isn't in prison", "why nobody has called the police" or similars.

taking out of the way for a second that the police are many times ineffective, that many crimes go unpunished for many reasons, even with evidence behind it, and lack of a police record doesn't mean that someone hasn't done something wrong in their life, the truth of the matter is that we don't have anything from Courtney but allegations. this is not Courtney's fault either because she was a literal child when all of that happened, but it is what it is. do i believe those are credible enough considering the kind of person LO is and her actions? yes, just like i also believe that the sankaku accounts are or were hers. but that's not ever going to work as evidence in a court of law or for a police officer to do anything. i can't offer to anyone any other stronger evidence that maybe she did those things beyond fanfictions or posts or maybe some stream clip, and i can't blame anyone either if none of that is enough for them to change their minds about whether LO actually did those things or not. i bet anything that at least a portion of the people who read this blog won't ever believe Courtney's word without a direct confession of LO, which we also know won't ever happen, and i can't blame them either because nobody wants to believe that someone would be so awful of a person and kept living comfortably without any major issues for so long. we don't want to believe that such a person could exist right under our noses and we just didn't see it before. just like many just refuse to believe that LO would go so low as to lie about having cancer. just like many don't believe that LO did enjoyed images made with actual CSA of real children knowingly. some of it will always seem "a step too far" or "not even LO would go that far" to some people, even if LO hasn't actually done anything to give anyone that impression, and there's nothing i can do about it. so i can only talk about that as allegations and claims, because i have nothing else.

[obsidiannebula]

but when I put my work out there no one gives a shit. even the AI gets more of a reaction out of others, even if its purely negative. admit it, people only started to pretend to care about smaller artists and writers to stick it to the AI techbros

You're experiencing something that every creative on the planet has been struggling with since forever: the crushing disappointment of "I worked really hard on this but nobody even seems to notice it."

We've all been there. It sucks. We tend to feel a need for recognition and validation when we do or make something. Just about every artist or writer on here has experienced that disappointment, and wondered in despair if it's even worth continuing to make and post the things they make. After all, why put in all that effort to make something and share it, when nobody seems to care? Why keep investing so much into something you love, only to share it and find that no one else appreciates it like you do?

Well, if you've been in creative circles for a while, you've actually probably seen some answers to this question. See, we HAVE cared about our fellow small creators since long before """AI""" was really a concern. For years we've been making and sharing posts to help and uplift each other. We've told each other, don't create with the hope of getting fame and adulation, or you'll almost certainly be disappointed. We've told each other, create for your friends, for the 3 people who are as deeply invested in your rarepair or niche fandom as you are, create for yourself, create for the joy of creation. We've spread posts reminding people that a like is nice, but if you really enjoy someone's art, it helps the creator much more to reblog it, because it increases the work's visibility and reach. We have encouraged people to commission artists- and we have actually done so! See my little icon in the corner there? I commissioned that from a friend, who is a small artist themself. (@oriathura here and on the website formerly known as Twitter, in case anyone would like to commission them!)

The creative community has been supporting each other for a long time, whether you were aware of it or not. I've been on Tumblr since 2017, and have been following artists and writers that whole time, and began posting my own art and writing soon after joining. I have seen thousands of posts of the sort I described, trying to help motivate, reassure and uplift other creators. I have seen friends and mutuals get discouraged by the lack of response to their art, and wonder if they should give up. I have seen them carry on anyway, and I have seen them grow and develop as artists. I have posted my own work and gotten silence in response, and I have persisted anyway and continued to improve my craft and make work that I am proud of, regardless of how many people saw it or validated me through praise.

Because I wanted something to exist, and I made it exist, and I deserve to be proud of that. No matter how many people saw it or liked it.

You didn't ask for advice, but I'm going to offer some, and you and any other creatives reading this can take it or leave it, as you like:

*Find community. Follow some creative people, maybe acquire some creative mutuals. Join a Discord server for artists and/or writers. Get involved with a small group of fellow creators and hype each other up!

*Learn how to tag your posts. Don't spam a bunch of unrelated tags, of course, but learn how to add plenty of relevant ones. Lots of people follow tags for characters, fandoms, and even the "my writing" and "fiction" tags- I know I do. That will put your post on the dash of some people who are following those tags. The more people who see it, the more likely it is to reach the people who will enjoy it- because no matter the subject or even quality of the work, there IS an audience for it. Following and posting in these tags may even help you find community!

*Make something with no intention of ever sharing it. If you love to create but find yourself discouraged and frustrated by a lack of positive response when you share your work, make something just for yourself and keep it to yourself. Learn to appreciate creation for creation's sake, for the joy you can bring yourself. If you're feeling really bold, make something and then destroy it. Rip it up, burn it, hit delete. Art is valuable even when it is fleeting.

*Create for an event. One of the best things that ever happened to my writing was participating in TAZ Pride Week 2018. I wrote a new fic every day for 8 days, pushing the limits of my creativity and writing skill. I tagged each work with the event tag, allowing others to find it and the organizer to reblog it to the event blog, which lots of people were following. Many people saw and enjoyed my work as a result. I saw the work of numerous others and was inspired. I even gained my first artsy mutual (aside from my irl friends) because of this event, so this can also help you with building community! People organize art and writing events all the time, especially for fandoms. Seek these out and see how you can get involved!

Sometimes, creating can feel like thankless work. But that doesn't mean it has no value. If it meant something to you, it was important. And it may become important to someone else one day. Some of my works that flopped hardest on publication are the ones that still get the occasional note or AO3 comment here and there months and years later, because they appealed to very few people, but those few people are very excited on the rare occasion they find something that scratches the particular itch they have!

When I was in 7th grade, we read Summer of My German Soldier. I don't know that I'd recommend the book to anyone else; in truth I don't remember much from it, aside from the main character getting a bad perm. But one quote from that book has stuck with me my whole life. It led to me the understanding of creation as a powerful, almost sacred act, regardless of how many people view it. For "there is more nobility in building a chicken coop than in destroying a cathedral."

[backupthere]

💁 (for any if the Back Up There stories!)

Did readers influence/change any part of this story?

Since you didn't ask for any particular story, I'll talk about the series as a whole.

The short answer would be "no", in that each story is always complete before I start posting, so nothing that happens in the reactions to one chapter will change what happens in a later chapter.

However, there are a few things that do make an impact. The cast for the universe is huge, and sometimes I like to outsource the creation of characters, which helps to lower the risk of the background characters just being the same four guys over and over again. Those kind of things happen here rather than on AO3, where I'll post asking people to give me a number or a name so I can throw together some character lists. (Once a guy has a name he usually grows a personality by himself...)

The other thing that happens is when somebody leaves a comment about a character reminding them of somebody - particularly if they're talking about guys in the UK leagues, but it can happen with anybody - sometimes a background character gets a face or a skating style due to those comments. It's always clear that the commenter isn't doing it on purpose, and I think if it was deliberately done to try to influence a characterisation it wouldn't work.

One rule I have for myself with this 'verse is that once a fact is established, no matter how tiny, that's canon and cannot be changed. So a casual comment that gets me thinking (did these guys know each other in juniors?) or a response to a plea for character names throwing up a new guy who shares a surname with an existing character can lead to an indisputable fact - there's a guy on the Eagles who has a cousin on the Pumas and they have never interacted in any of the stories so nobody would know this, but the fact remains that they are related because somebody said so and I said "okay then". (I think that might even have been you...)

The very early stories in the 'verse, the short ones that aren't as good because they were silly throwaways before I realised that this thing was just going to be my entire life, also came from more of a chat background, where somebody (@swedishgoaliemafia) would say "hey wouldn't it be neat if - " and then just sit back and watch the carnage. The very first story came out of a chat about why a team had turned up with no backup netminder, and what might have happened to him, and although that wasn't technically influenced by a reader on the basis that there wasn't anything to read at that point, the series as a whole probably wouldn't exist if that conversation hadn't happened.

I also try not to change what I write next because of the audience - I've seen some talented writers get too caught up in their readers' demands for "I wish you'd write a fic where - " and start churning out stale and repetitive work because they stopped writing for themselves, and I don't think I could go down that route... not that that's really a thing for me, as nobody ever sends me prompts or requests for some reason! I do however have in mind that what I'm writing is intended to be read and enjoyed by somebody other than me, and I think there's always subconsciously going to be a little bit of that running through things. I might not set out to write a story or a character or a scene because of something a reader said to me, but it's always hugely satisfying to get a comment saying "X made me cry" when I'd known that it would as I wrote it.

I'm writing for myself, but I'm thinking about you guys as I write.

[casspurrjoybell-19]

Does it Matter? - Chapter 25 - Part 2

*Warning: Adult Content*   

The first light of dawn coming in through the window deepened the shadows on Brayan's face.

He looked sad.

"Do you think that's the right choice or is it just the one you're stuck with?"

Bug hesitated.

"I feel like it's the right choice but what I think... I don't know, sir. I used to trust it so much. I could walk down dark alleys at night and go drinking in questionable bars and I knew nothing could touch me because I would be warned."

"Doesn't seem like it's quite that reliable anymore."

"No," Bug admitted.

"It still helps me from time to time but it stopped being reliable the day Hytheon was attacked. I was there with the horses and the cart, trading some of my family's goat cheese and other goods. I had no warning and I decided to stay and hide instead of abandoning the cart because I believed that if anything bad was going to happen, I'd know and now I'm a slave, so you can imagine how that went, Sir."

"It sounds like whatever force controls your visions built your trust and then set you up."

"Maybe. I've thought about it a lot and that's the most logical conclusion but it never really feels like a malicious force. Perhaps I just put too much faith into it and it's simply not as reliable as I believed. It still shows me things that won't ever happen, so clearly it's not perfect."

"You mean the dream?"

"Hmm. The dream."

"What's so impossible about the dream?"

Bug made a face.

He really didn't want to delve into this, especially not after he had so spectacularly failed at seducing Brayan.

"Does it matter, Sir?"

"I don't know, but I enjoy a good puzzle and I'd like to have all the pieces of this one if you don't mind."

Bug chewed on his lip.

"Do you want to hear the whole dream?"

"Yes, please."

Brayan lay back down on the bed, flat on his back.

With Bug squeezed in against the wall there was just enough space for the two of them but it was rather snug.

Bug wondered if perhaps Brayan would not have chosen this exact moment to get cosy again if he'd known the nature of the dream Bug was about to tell him about.

"It's always exactly the same. I'm laying on a bed in a dark room. A man has his arm around me. I can feel a rough cord around my neck and a pendant resting against my chest."

"Ah. That's why you wanted the pendant."

"Yes, although I don't know that it's the same one or even particularly similar. I never see it or touch it with my hands in the dream or vision or whatever it is."

"So far this is sounding like us, five minutes ago."

"Well, it gets different because in the dream I'm naked and I've recently had sex."

"Ah," Brayan said.

"So that's why you wanted to have sex with me."

Bug opened his mouth to deny it, then realised he wasn't so sure himself.

"Maybe subconsciously that was a part of it."

"None of this sounds very impossible so far."

"The impossible part was that I could feel that I'd recently been on the receiving end of sex with a man but there was no pain. Just a dull ache and uh... a little wetness."

"You know that is also not impossible, right? It doesn't have to hurt."

"No, I know, I mean, I've... Fraccus wasn't the first man I'd been with, sir. I had sex with men before I was a slave but after Fraccus, my body isn't the same. I don't think it would be possible for me to do that without pain anymore."

"Hmm," Brayan said.

"Was that it? Was that what was so impossible?"

"Yes, I suppose Sir but I mean, it's scarring so it's never going to heal."

"There are ways around that. What if the man had an unusually small penis?"

Bug almost laughed, although Brayan had sounded completely serious.

"Maybe, Sir but I felt stretched, just not in pain."

"Okay, fair enough. Magical healing, then. That exists."

"Nobody would waste that kind of magic on me, especially not just so that I could comfortably have sex."

"Hmm. I don't think it's quite as unlikely as you imagine."

"What do you mean? Oh," Bug said as realisation hit him.

"Is Dara a healer?"

Brayan turned his head to squint at Bug through the dim early morning light.

"Ah. Shit. I thought I was being subtler than that. That was supposed to be a secret."

"I won't tell anyone, sir. I promise."

"Hmm."

Brayan rolled his head away to stare back at the ceiling.

"It puts the rest of us to shame, really. It should have been obvious, with the way he acts but none of us had any idea until it was practically spelled out for us."

"Really, I should have figured it out the moment you told me that he would be able to recover from that fall, Sir. I know a bit about all of the different Eth powers and how they manifest and only a healer can do that. I just wasn't thinking."

"Well, anyway, I'm not saying that he will be willing to heal you or that he'd even be able to but it seems like too much of a coincidence that the one very rare thing that could make your impossible vision possible is right here and somewhat indebted to you."

"I didn't help him. Nothing I did mattered."

"Maybe. Maybe not but either way, you put yourself in harm's way and will likely suffer consequences because you tried to help him. Getting us to him promptly isn't nothing, either, even if it wouldn't have made any difference to whether he lives or dies."

"Do you think my vision will happen, then? Do you think it's real?"

Brayan sighed.

"Again, you have to ask yourself whether you want it to be. Whether you want some mysterious force to get to decide what your future is. Seems to me that if you just decide not to wear any necklaces, that future can't come to pass."

"No, I want it to happen, Bray... sorry."

Brayan shook his head.

"It's fine. I don't actually care if you say my name. I was just... I don't know."

"I want it to be real more than anything. It's hard to explain. I've had that vision since I was a child. I used to call that man my husband, though I doubt that's actually the case but I've had feelings for him for so long."

"Based on what?"

"The way I felt laying in his arms. I don't experience my future thoughts or emotions when I'm in a vision. None of the mental things but there's a physical side to emotion. You can tell in a very sensory way whether or not you feel safe, for example."

"Makes sense."

"It's hard to describe what I feel when I'm with that man but I've been searching for it my whole life. I don't just want this, want him because I'm hoping for something better than the life I currently lead. It's what I've always wanted and I'm not about to give up now. I have to try to find him."

"Do you know his name? What he looks like? Anything?"

"No. It was dark. I couldn't see anything. I've heard him say my name a thousand times but he was sleepy. It might not sound much like his normal voice."

"I don't suppose it matters. Something has led you here. If it intends for you to have this thing it's promised you, I believe you'll find a way there."

Bug wanted to reach out, to touch Brayan in some way but he restrained himself.

"You really think so?"

"Yes but Bug, no love is worth what you've been through. Never forget that you are not its first priority."

[rainglade]

so... a post for those curious about my names, why i have more than one I use both professionally and socially, etc (if this is new to you, surprise! i've actually been going by different names since around 2013 lol) but anyways...

So, mostly everyone I've ever known pre-2020 has always known me as 'Pranav,' which is a very nice name, and it still is my name in every way that it matters. It is the slightly incorrect romanization of the Sanskrit name प्रणव, which is romanized as 'praṇava,' and it is another version of the universe's sacred vibration, ॐ (ōṃ). It shares roots with the dharmic and yogic concept of "prāṇa," the life force or "flame within." It also can be split into its oldest parts, "प्र" meaning "before," and "णव" which is the oldest word for "atom." It is the culmination of the three aspects of existence and the three states of consciousness. I love this name; I love my name.

The only time I've ever not liked the name is when dealing with people who don't put the effort into understanding cultures different from what they are used to. Names are the closest thing we can get to summarizing our entire sense of being into a word, hence why they hold such high meaning and significance in Deśi cultures. In Sanskrit, pronunciation, diction, and enunciation are very important to the meanings of words. Because of this, I can understand why Western monolinguals have so much trouble understanding and pronouncing things; they speak a language where their words can be pronounced 20 different ways and still hold the same meaning.

When I left everyone I knew and started fresh in university, a university where I knew pretty much nobody, I realized that it was a chance to make people pronounce my name correctly. However, when I started doing this, not only was it tiring to constantly correct people (they either spent 10 minutes trying, which is very kind but gets tiring after a while, or they just kept mispronouncing it and didn't care to try to correct themselves), but when people started to actually pronounce my name correctly, it felt... too intimate. A friend of mine mentioned feeling this as well recently. Her name is pronounced similarly to the Hebrew/English name "Hannah," and she prefers that non-family call her Hannah rather than her name, 花, romanized as hānā. When I started hearing non-family pronounce my name correctly, it somehow felt wrong; I felt uncomfortable with it even though I thought it was what I wanted all along.

I also realized that it wasn't exactly the most unique name. In just my first month in university, I had met or heard of at least 15 other "Pranavs" out there, and knew that there were plenty more. One of them I met had the same hair type as me and a similar facial structure. Since he went to a lot of parties and was more well-known, I was mistaken for him on a few occasions, which initially was okay but soon became a bad thing once he did some not-so-good things while drunk at a party.

It was then that I started using the name Daya (properly romanized as dayā), which is a Sanskrit name meaning "mercy." It was a nice name, but it felt inauthentic since I was mainly using it to have a name that was easy to pronounce while being connected to my roots. I also realized that while the Sanskrit name is pronounced like "duh-yah," there are similar names in Hebrew and Arabic that are spelled similarly in English but pronounced differently (like "day-yah" and "day-yuh"). Since the Hebrew version is much more common, I was faced with mispronunciation once again.

It wasn't the first time I had socially gone by a different name, though. In early middle school, I sometimes used the name "Mikaal," an Abrahamic name I co-opted, or "Day," a nickname taken from a book character. In late high school, I occasionally used the name "Amani," a Kiswahili name meaning "peace."

It was after the "Daya" mispronunciation that I started to think more about what a name means to me and being more open-minded. I figured that if people were going to mispronounce my name regardless, it might as well be a name that is salient to me. Those who know me know that I absolutely love linguistics, so I put that knowledge to use to put together a name for myself. The name started out as Katres (properly romanized as qātreis or "ḳātreis"). It includes elements from the Suvarnadvipa word for love and the Bantu word for "to be healed." For a while, I used this name, as healing and love are things that are salient to who I am, and who I always will be. I knew that it was important for my name to represent aspects of my identity that were core to who I am, rather than things that would change over time. Although change is the nature of reality, there are some parts of who that are so fundamental to yourself that even if they shift, they still will be with you.

It was half a year after using this name regularly that I felt that there was something missing. I knew that I didn't want to change my name yet again (for personal and practical reasons, as I had already started using the name socially) so I decided to revise it. I noticed that "saī" partially aligned with an old Sanskrit word that didn't have any direct English translation but loosely meant "divine balance" or "mediation." I then blended it with Katres to create "Katresai," properly romanized as qātreisaii or क़ात्रॆसाई in Devanagari and ક઼ાત્રૅસાઈ in Gujarati script. (I also loved my name as it was easy to create nicknames like Katres, Sai, and Trés from it.)

Sure, it comes with uncertainty. Sure, it comes with challenges. I've been using the name for around 3 years, so I've had a fair amount of unpredictable experiences, and I know there's more to come. Still, though, I don't really think I would want to go back and change it.

As I mentioned before, I approach my names in a more open-minded sense. I sometimes use the word "nickname" to describe Katresai since people are understanding and comfortable with the concept of a nickname. However, it's not a nickname. It's just my name. Pranav is also my name, and both names represent who I am in different ways. One is not more important to me than the other, and the idea of "names" rather than a "name" is comforting to me, even though it might not be for everyone. It gives room for change, for possibility, and for the evolution of self.

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also lol, thought this post was relatable and funny:

[marcspectrr]

Nobody ever talks about the fact that Layla not only had to watch her husband get killed, but also come to terms with how sudden it was. Slowly discovering the full trauma someone you love went through but not getting the chance to help them? Let me explain through my tears.

Sudden as in... in all the years she's known him, all the time she's spent with him, it didn't even come close to feeling like enough.

Sudden as in yeah, they fight, sometimes over things they wished didn't have such a heavy hand in their arguments like how recklessness could literally get the other killed and that stubbornness doesn't make it hurt any less. But they are still each others safe place at the end of the day, their arms providing unconditional strength and love.

Then suddenly she meets Steven and suddenly one thing becomes just as clear as it is unthinkable; that he holds all the vulnerability. He is the softness that Marc can't have, the innocence he's lost, the ease of being driven by lighter sentiments.

This thing she knew existed but was never sure how to approach quite right, until the pieces start coming together. She's looking into the eyes of her husband, but they're not fully his, they're different, more at-risk and less reticent. She's searching his face as he asks for help. ("I think I'm in real danger and I think that maybe you might be the only person that can help me. Please.") It's dizzying, throwing her world off balance. It's all she's wanted to hear for a long time, she realizes. She's supposed to be angry with Marc, and she is, but suddenly she finally sees how much pain he was in with clarity, learns the unadulterated extent at which he suffered and the self-inflicted blame he still harbors, often clinging to it like an addiction.

Then she's gently asking to be let in. ("What happened?" "Doesn't matter." "We could've handled it together.") Things are different now, so she plans on trying again. Has to try again, maybe after things slowed down. But they don't.

Suddenly he's silently begging for her forgiveness even though he's convinced he's undeserving. Suddenly he's pleading for her safety before the gunshots are piercing through the tomb, leaving a ringing in her ears that's a mix between 'too late' and 'the end'.

Suddenly she understood the sides of him he's given her, as well as the parts he so desperately tried to mask, before all of it is suddenly laying under her head as she quietly sobbed into his unmoving chest in the water.

Suddenly she can't reach out her hand to help anymore, because suddenly he's gone.

[cherryjuicegf]

Jaskier looks younger when he sleeps.

It's a sudden realization, one that has Yennefer freeze as she stares at him, so close and yet she can't bring herself to feel the warmth of his body beside hers. She doesn't dare to. Because he may not be the same as a decade ago but he is, undoubtedly, young.

And against everything, this is where her own doubt comes in, desperate as it is. And she has learned in the past that doubt is the only feeling of those that make her skin tingle that she should trust. And why, pray tell, why would he ever stay here? With her? He is a poet, a known lover, a fool, and even if his eyes are so warm when he looks at her, even if the lines of his face soften, why would he ever settle? And why would it be for her?

She wants to blame him. She wants to blame him so much.

She wants to look at him and seethe with rage, curse him for being the same with everyone, for having the choice to leave her behind. She wants to rip her heart out of her chest and bury it under the ground so that it may stop clinging to his eyes that glint bright as her hope every time she meets them, clinging to this hope as though it has rewarded her before. And it traps her, but it's more of a hug than claws, yet she can't help but search for a way out. A way to choose her heartbreak, at least.

She stares at him. Shoulders rising softly, lips soft and bitten by her own loving rage, faint lines beside his eyes and between his eyebrows, a single one that she doesn't remember being there when she had last met him. And he was smiling so wide last night. And the wider he smiled, and the softer he kissed her, the more her heart wailed, the more her skin shivered because it couldn't be that easy. She never gained anything the easy way, let alone this. More than this.

Nobody gave it to her.

And why would Jaskier?

Then again, he had never been a good liar, not with her. Perhaps he only had time to practice.

It doesn't matter, she decides. His body is warm and smells of comfort but it doesn't matter. She cannot go down this path, not again, not with a light heart. The only thing she can do is leave first. Choose the ending. The heartbreak. Something.

It has to work.

She props herself on an elbow and clenches her fists and at least, she thinks, at least leaving is still difficult. But in a way, she gains that too. Gains the priviledge to keep the remaining pieces of her heart to herself.

It's so hard to look away from him. The morning light is just beginning to shine behind him. She bites her lips and turns away.

It has to work. She had never been doubtful while building her walls.

And yet as she stares at the wall ahead of her, still tangled in the bedsheets, she finds herself more vulnerable than a baby bird.

"Yen?"

She curses under her breath. Eyes fixed on the wall. She swallows, voice suddenly choked. "Yes?"

A sigh, deep and muffled. "What time is it?"

Of course. She wants to laugh. Of course he didn't wake up for her, and when did she become so foolish? She has to get away. "Early. Go back to sleep."

Jaskier hums and she feels him closing his eyes, drifting back to sleep. Feels his shoulders slumping and gods, she is not even looking yet she has come to feel his existence crawling under her skin as though it's her own.

He must have slept, she thinks now, and her legs are aching to run. He must have. It's absurd, how she deceives herself to avoid hurting him.

She stares at the wall, still.

He hasn't slept, no. His eyes are closed but it's like he is waiting, like he needs to see her lying down to ease too himself. She ponders on a spell. It's the only way.

Fingers between hers, then. Lacing together, tight and still loose enough for her to choose, a grip on their want and longing as a last attempt to hold the space between them still warm. She doesn't move but doesn't tense either. Shivers run down her spine. She wants to cry.

Jaskier gently pulls her hand to his chest, and presses a kiss on her knuckles. Then he sighs, and she feels him drifting again.

Her hand is still trapped in his.

And suddenly she turns at him, a lump forming in her throat because where would she go, where would she ever again find a cage she would be willing to sleep into? It's more lonely than she thought, staying cold. And her hand is going limp in his and he holds on, as though he can only sleep basking in her warmth, knowing she is there.

As though he knows the same goes for her.

With a sigh, she lets her head fall on the pillow again.

Maybe this time it's easy. This time Jaskier takes his heart and puts it in her hand intact, no questions asked, no favours granted, no debts. Only the love. And it makes her wonder if it had always been supposed to be so easy.

She shuffles closer, silently, and tightens their fingers, and realizes she doesn't need the pieces of her heart, because his is already fitting in her chest. He drapes an arm around her in his sleep, and pulls her impossibly closer.

A single tear flows down her face. A smile. Easy as that. She glances at him once more before closes her eyes, and sleeps.