#they’re horrifying even by my standards

[and-then-there-were-n0ne]

I read this week that Instagram is pushing “overtly sexual adult videos” to young users. For a Wall Street Journal investigation, journalists created accounts that could belong to children, following young gymnasts, cheerleaders and influencers. The test accounts were soon served sexual and disturbing content on Instagram Reels, alongside ads for dating apps, livestream platforms with “adult nudity” and AI chatbots “built for cybersex”. Some were next to ads for kids’ brands like Disney.

This is something I’ve been trying to get across to parents about social media. The problem is not just porn sites. They are of course a massive concern. Kids as young as nine are addicted. The average age to discover porn is now 13, for boys and girls. And many in my generation are now realising just how much being raised on porn affected them, believing it “destroyed their brain” and distorted their view of sex.

But the problem is bigger than that. Porn is everywhere now. TikTok is serving up sex videos to minors and promoting sites like OnlyFans. The gaming platform Twitch is exposing kids to explicit live-streams. Ads for “AI sex workers” are all over Instagram, some featuring kids’ TV characters like SpongeBob and the Cookie Monster. And there’s also this sort of “soft-porn” now that pervades everything. Pretty much every category of content that kids could stumble across, from beauty trends to TikTok dances to fitness pages, is now pornified or sexualised in some way for clicks.

I think this does a lot of damage to Gen Z. I think it desensitises us to sex. I think it can ruin relationships. But beyond that, I also believe a major problem with everything being pornified is the pressure it puts on young girls to pornify themselves. To fit the sex doll beauty standard; to seek validation through self-sexualisation, and potentially monetise all this like the influencers they’re inundated with.

Which, of course, puts girls at risk of predators. Predators who are all over TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat. Predators whose algorithms helpfully deliver them more content of minors and steer them towards kids’ profiles. Predators who are taking TikToks of underage girls and putting them on platforms like Pornhub.

And this is even more terrifying because adolescent girls are especially vulnerable today. They are vulnerable anyway at that age—but today they have far less life experience than previous generations of girls did. They are extremely insecure and anxious, and much less resilient. Combine this with the fact that they are now more easily exposed to predatory men than ever before in history, and served to strangers by algorithms. And another thing: girls are also able to look way older now. They have AI editing apps to sexualise themselves. TikTok filters to pornify their bodies. And access to every kind of make-up and hair and fashion tutorial you can think of to look sexier and more mature. I don’t think enough parents realise how dangerous this situation is.

Which is why I find it so frustrating to see some progressives downplay the dangers of all this. Those that dismiss anyone concerned about the pornification of everything as a stuffy conservative. And somehow can’t see how the continual loosening of sexual norms might actually empower predatory men, and put pressure on vulnerable girls? That seems delusional to me.

Let’s just say I have little patience for those on the left who loudly celebrate women sexualising themselves online, selling it as fun, feminist and risk-free, but are then horrified to hear about 12 year-olds doing the same thing. C’mon. No wonder they want to.

But I also find it frustrating to see some on the right approach this with what seems like a complete lack of compassion. I don’t think it helps to relentlessly ridicule and blame young women for sexualising themselves online. I don’t think it’s fair either. We can’t give girls Instagram at 12 and then be surprised when as young women they base their self-worth on the approval of strangers. We can’t inundate kids with sexual content all the time and be shocked when they don’t see sex as sacred, or think sex work is just work! We can’t give them platforms as pre-teens where they are rewarded for sexualising themselves and presenting themselves like products and then shame them for starting an OnlyFans. We can’t expose them to online worlds where everything is sexualised and then be confused why some of Gen Z see their sexuality as their entire identity.

And again, on top of these platforms, girls are growing up in a culture that celebrates all of this. They are being raised to believe that they must be liberated from every restraint around sex and relationships to be free and happy, and many have never heard any different. Celebrities encourage them to be a slut, get naked, make/watch porn and make money! Mainstream magazines teach them how to up their nude selfie game! Influencers tell millions of young followers to start an OnlyFans, and pretend it’s about empowering young girls to do whatever they want with their bodies! I can’t say this enough: their world is one where the commodification and sexualisation the self is so normalised. It’s heartbreaking. And cruel that anyone celebrates it.

So sure, young women make their own choices. But when we have children sexualising themselves online, when girls as young as 13 are using fake IDs to post explicit content on OnlyFans, when a third of those selling nudes on Twitter are under the age of 18, I think it’s safe to say we are failing them from an early age.

I guess what I’m trying to get across is this: it’s tough for girls right now. It’s tough to be twelve and anxious and feel unattractive and this is how everyone else is getting attention. It’s tough to constantly compare yourself to the hyper-sexualised influencers that the boys you’re interested in are liking and following and thinking you have to compete. It’s tough to feel like the choice is sexualise yourself or nobody will notice you. The sad reality is we live in a superficial, pornified culture that rewards this stuff, and in many ways punishes you if you’re modest and sensitive and reserved, and a lot of girls are just trying to keep up with it.

We need serious cultural change. We need to wake up to how insane this all is, how utterly mental it is that we allow young girls anywhere near social media, and how we’ve let the liberalising of sexual mores escalate to the point where pre-teens are posing like porn stars and are lied to that it’s liberation. And where we need to start is with an absolute refusal from parents to let their kids on these platforms.

So please. If the relentless social comparison and obliteration of their attention span and confusion about their identity wasn’t enough, this has to be. Don’t let your daughters on social media.

[dailydegurechaff]

Tanya²

Today's Daily Degurechaff is… I’ll do you one better: Tanya³

(+ a small fic I never finished.)

Erich… isn’t sure what he’s seeing. He knows he’s wearing his glasses and he definitely has not been drinking… So what in the world is going on here? Why is he suddenly seeing things in triplicate?

Three of them. There are three little Degurechaff Devils in an office where there should only be one. 

When he’d knocked on her door, she’d called out that she needed a second. He hadn’t listened to her and opened it anyway. He’s regretting that now. Staring at them, both his head and his stomach are starting to hurt. 

All three of them are staring back at him. One is looking at him in abject horror, the next one’s eyes flash in recognition and she actually smiles (even more shocking, she does it in a way that isn’t uniquely terrifying, but perhaps actually cute), and the final squints at him a bit, as though she doesn’t know him. 

One of the three, the one who looks absolutely horrified, opts to greet him after a moment, “Ahaha—… Colonel Lergen… did you need something?” She sounds like she might be freaking out a bit. Erich feels similarly to her.

The second Degurechaff, the one who had smiled at him, turns her head to look at the first. She looks confused now. “Did you just say ‘Lergen?’ Not Rerugen?”

The first responds again. While she sounded nervous a second ago, it’s forgotten as she turns to her counterpart, “Seriously? You’ve been speaking this language for over a decade and your accent is that bad? Yes, I definitely said Lergen. Why would you pronounce it Rerugen?”

Now it’s the third one’s turn to speak, “No, I agree, it’s definitely pronounced Rerugen, but… this isn’t him. Rerugen has dark hair and brown eyes… and if I’m going to be honest, a fairly unfortunate haircut too. This guy looks too normal to be Rerugen.”

Degurechaff One immediately disagrees, “What are you even talking about? Lergen’s always had blonde hair and blue eyes.”

The second one backs her up, “Yeah, I agree this is definitely the right sort of coloration, but… now that I’m looking at him, Rerugen is supposed to be more handsome than this.”

“Handsome?! Has Being X poisoned your brain that badly?” Number Three yells at Number Two.

Two snaps back at her immediately, “That’s not what I meant at all, and you should know that! I meant by conventional standards! You know, stronger jawline, sharper features!”

Did— did she just say he was ugly?

Before the other two start arguing, the first one cuts them off, “Hold on. Are we sure we’re all talking about the same person here? Maybe you both are thinking of someone else, this is Colonel Erich von Lergen, my superior, formerly a part of Personnel, but now he works in Operations in the General Staff. He’s been looking out for me for a while now. For example, he made an effort to keep me off the frontlines, and when I was stationed in the southeast, he gave me a preliminary warning that Dacia would invade. Things like that. He’s a very good superior. Does any of that seem familiar?”

“Ah… that does seem to match up with who I was thinking of. I wonder why he’s so different from what I know…”

Now that Erich’s kind of over the shock now, he’s a bit tired of being talked about like he isn’t here. Interrupting the conversation between them, he finally speaks, “Degurechaff… what is going on here?”

All three seem to remember that Erich is actually here and a part of the conversation suddenly. They turn back to look at him, but none of them seem to really know what to say, faces varying shades of hesitation, confusion, or irritation.

The way they act and carry themselves is… actually slightly different. Looking closer at them, maybe it’s only that there’s one Degurechaff and two extremely close doppelgängers? If he studies them, yes they’re close enough to be siblings, but there’s differences between each.

The first one is the one he recognizes, the one who looks as he expects her to and also is getting his name and appearance correct. She’s just the slightest bit taller than the other two, but it’s a marginal thing. She’s paler than the other two in all aspects, a corpse-like pallor to her skin, hair colored platinum blonde, and eyes the color of ice. When he meets her gaze, it’s easy to tell her apart. It’d be impossible to mistake those disconcerting eyes that look a bit dead, or perhaps look like she’d want everyone around her dead if it’d bring her a bit of peace. So this one he mentally categorizes as ‘Original Degurechaff,’ or perhaps more accurately ‘The Degurechaff That I Know.’

The second one that he heard speak— the one who had called him ugly?— is the smallest of the three. Of course, Degurechaff has always been small, but this one beats the other two. Actually, she even looks younger than the others, if that was even possible, and honestly she kind of acts like it as well. She has shorter, curlier hair than the others, and it’s much brighter in color— much closer to gold than platinum blonde. Compared to the one he knows, she seems more… emotive, perhaps the best word for it is. So this one has to be ‘Little Degurechaff’ or something to that effect.

The third one is about a midpoint between the two in hair color and stature, though her hair is a right mess. A prominent flyaway sticks out of the top of her head, refusing to lay flat. Framed by pale lashes, her eyes are a more vibrant blue than either of the others, but they’re just as cold-looking and tense. He wouldn’t call any Degurechaff patient, but this one gives him the impression she’s much more irritable than the others. Her uniform is also starkly different from the other two, who are almost matching, but all three carry a recognizable Silver Wings Badge. This one… perhaps he should denote her as the ‘Irritable Degurechaff’? She’s always been irritable, though, hasn’t she?

The designations are a start, but still he has to wonder... Why? Why is this happening?

Ah, hold on. Is that it? Is this a punishment from God, specifically designed to torment me?

[himegureisu]

Hiii! Just got home from a horrifying midterm exam. It went horrible, none of the questions were even in the lesson plan. Although it did give me an idea for this request :')

It's practically universal knowledge that Snape is a 'terror prof' (iykyk) at Hogwarts — his standards are high, he's very particular with essays and it's practically expected that every major exam, tears will be shed in and out the classroom with the amount of curveballs he throws at you.

(I'd feel like he'd be the type to have a True or False exam with choices like: True, Partially True, Partially False, False, and if none is applicable write the correct answer and all of it is situational)

He's married to the reader and they're both teachers, so they help each other on their loads. Much more efficient that way. One night after a particularly hard-hitting major exam in the semester, reader encounters tear stains and snot and a few drops of blood from a nosebleed on one of the exams (witnesses this once lol) and decided to confront him husband about it. Thank you! I hope this isn't too specific ;w;

Questions and Answers

Pairing: Severus Snape x Reader

A/N: I'm sorry you had a horrible exam day and thank you for preventing me from pulling my hair out of frustration because my Notion page was not cooperating when this request came through. I hope you enjoy this! 💖

——————————— 🪄———————————

“Severus, darling, why do your exam papers have at least two different types of fluids on them?” your fingers flip through the unfinished stack, your eyes scanning them.

This was the thirty-fifth test paper from his pile that you graded. His second-year tests were stained by a range of substances you curiously identified through a spell.

Did he truly not notice them?

“There’s a combination of either snot, sweat, tears, or,” you paused, taking one of the papers you already graded, to present to him. His dark eyes highlighted by the round reading glasses made for a rather attractive sight but focus, “On the rare occasion, blood,”

“Oh,” he simply said, looking up at you, “And?”

“Is that all you can say?” you frustratedly run a hand through your forehead as you sit on the edge of his desk causing him to stop, “What are these questions even? It’s a major exam for second years, not OWLs or NEWTs, Severus. My head hurts not only from the answers but also the questions,”

“If they can’t answer then they’re not competent enough to proceed to the…” his sentence undone by the beginning of your ramble, an attempt to explain why his methods were not feasible.

“Can you imagine the physical, mental, and emotional drain that major exams cause to students? You can reminisce on your time as one if it helps but it’s not good and then to be brought to this level of inquiry as if they were taking a mastery,” you explained, “There isn’t even a 50-50 chance to get the answer right only 25 because you decided that it would be better if there would be four very similar but distinct answers to the multiple choice questions and not a chance of redemption for those who don’t know the question if the said answer is one they needed to correct. I can better understand your students’ frustrations from this version of your exams,”

“To adjust the exam would mean that there would be a lower level of understanding…”

“That’s the point though since they’re just building the foundation of what they know for potions!” you exclaimed, “If it were a muggle game, Severus, it should be easy, medium, and then hard but your exams are hard, hard, and then hard on every level. Do you understand?”

“Yes, but…”

“Sev, imagine this,” you sit on his lap, cupping his cheeks for him to focus on you as you say, “Imagine a child, our child, a little boy or girl coming home to us in tears because of a similar test that they’d taken on that day,”

“It would be different. They would be ours,” he grumbled, pulling you in closer to bask in your warmth, “We wouldn’t teach them to be like that,”

“Sev, just imagine!” you sighed exasperatedly, his face buried beneath your chin, “Your little girl coming home in tears crying for us wanting a hug because of an awful exam day,”

His breathing was in sync with yours, trying to understand your reasoning. His imagination slowly conjures a little girl in your image. Her face was stained with big fat crocodile tears, a snot-filled nose, and books slung defeatedly on her arm. His heart tightened at the image of it, protectiveness surging from within.

No one was allowed to make either of you cry.

“Can you imagine?” you softly asked, running a hand through his hair, as he mumbled, “Yes,”

“Can you change the way your tests are written?” you silently prayed that he would, he breathed in and faced you to answer, “Fine, and you’ll help me,”

“I expect as much,” you smiled.

As you were about to get off his lap, his arms quickly pulled you back and in doing so, caused the chair to stumble a bit from the force. His nose on your hair, breaths warm, and hug unwilling to let go.

“Sev?” you glance back to see his darkened gaze, “What is it?

“Do you want children?” he asked, it wasn’t something both of you discussed in depth before, “I realized that after four years of marriage, we didn’t elaborate on our expectations on that particular topic,”

“If we’re blessed with children, then I’m happy,” you informed, tracing the contours of his face. No matter how many times you’ve seen him it’s like there’s another new thing to catalog in your mind, “If not, then I’ll be happy having you all to myself,”

“I don’t know if I want children,” he admitted, and you kissed his cheek, “We’ll get there when we get there, Sev, for now, don’t think about it,”

[xenon-demon]

only one (1) coherent thought in my skull right now and it’s domestic steddie with Steve washing Eddie’s hair after he’s discharged from hospital post-Vecna.

I’m imagining Eddie’s being discharged to Steve’s house, because Steve is but a simple man with a saviour complex (and also a crush on Eddie) so he’s letting Wayne and Eddie stay with him. Partly so they have somewhere to be while the government sorts out some new housing for them, but mostly because Eddie needs support for these first few weeks out of hospital and Wayne is away at work a lot. Having Steve around as well means Eddie won’t end up in a situation where he needs a hand but is stuck home alone for hours.

Eddie’s recovered enough for discharge but still requires a lot of physical therapy, and one of the things he still can’t do is raise his arms above his head. He can’t wash his hair pretty much at all, and while the nurses washed it for him in hospital, they didn’t do it frequently enough for Eddie’s standards. His hair has been driving him insane, as the limp, greasy feeling against his face, neck and scalp makes him want to claw his skin off. When he’s told how long it’s expected to take before his arms have full range of motion again, he makes a joke-that’s-not-really-a-joke about going back to his buzzcut days just to avoid dealing with the feeling.

Steve is horrified at the suggestion, and immediately offers to wash Eddie’s hair for him. He also divulges that part of the reason he styled his hair the way he did in high school was because he played a lot of sports, and couldn’t stand the feeling of sweaty hair against his neck and face. Sure, he genuinely did want his hair to look good, but styling it up so it was out of his face was an added bonus.

Eddie’s hair is driving him so crazy that he says yes, especially once he realises Steve might actually get where he’s coming from.

Cue an emotionally tense shower, where both Steve and Eddie are stripped down to their boxers because they don’t want to this fully clothed but they sure as fuck don’t want to do it naked, either. (Spoiler alert, they’d both actually love to have a naked shower together, they’re just both too nervous to bring that up at this stage!)

But then Eddie slips while in the shower, still unsteady on his feet and learning to adjust to his bad leg, so Steve makes an executive decision to switch over to the bath. After a bit of manoeuvring they find a comfortable position to do this; Eddie sitting in front of Steve in the bath, Steve’s legs stretched out either side of him. Between the physical intimacy of having your hair washed by someone else, and the way they don’t have to look at each other’s faces as they do this, they end up talking. They get a lot more personal than they were able to in hospital or during Spring Break, and it’s such a nice experience that they’ll each happily put up with the sensory hell of waterlogged boxers.

Eventually - after Eddie and Wayne have moved into their new place, but Eddie and Steve are over at each other’s houses often enough that they might as well still be living together - Eddie can move his arms enough to wash his hair on his own. He’s gotten more used to his bad leg and can stand long enough to even shower if he wants to. They go about three weeks with Eddie washing his own hair, both of them desperately missing this little routine they’d built but not wanting to admit it. One day, however, Eddie feels so lonely and so tired from physical therapy that day that he asks Steve to wash his hair for him. Steve accepts in a heartbeat, almost before Eddie’s even had time to say the words.

It feels different that time. The energy between them is charged, everything feeling more intimate somehow. It’s so palpable a difference that after Steve runs the conditioner through Eddie’s hair to let it sit for a few minutes, Eddie turns around in the bath to face Steve. He takes a breath, trying to steel his nerves, and asks: can I kiss you?

Steve doesn’t answer him; he thinks the way he leans in and slots his lips in between Eddie’s is answer enough.

[silvantransthranduiltrash]

Okay listen, absolutely joining the Legolas is old af boat, love the vibe, but what if he is genuinely that old AND still considered ‘young’ by his people? I recon that the silvan concept of age is vastly different to the noldorians simply because they didn’t start shit and typically minded their damn business meaning more of them survived. So he’s essentially super old by noldorian standards but considered pretty young by silvan standards. Pretty much ever other elf he’s met just assumed he’s ‘young’ by their typical standard (joyful personality only exacerbates this) and vastly misjudged his actual age

Also hello I love your blog!! Hope you don’t mind me adding this!

OH MY GOD YES, WELCOME ABORD!! AND OMFG THAT’S HILARIPUS I CAN JUST IMAGINE IT:

Legolas: casually comenting on how he’s one of the younger silvans on occasion

The noldo/sonda: ph, so he was probably born in the third age then, and this is his first tussle woth sauron, and he’s never even witnessed morgoth’s bs woth his own eyes

The twins (yes, i will alwys use the peredhel s a medium for these bizarre reveals bc i feel like they’re more open to asking questions about the silvans: *trying to figure out if they’re older or younger than legolas* so when were you born then?

Legolas, after thinking for second: well i was born about 1000 years before the feanorians landed on these coasts, so about *counts fingers* only 8 thousand years.

Elrond, who’s walking past: HOLD ON, WHAT-!?!

Legolas, continuing: None of my peers ever let me forget it, when we’re off duty i’m always refered to as the “baby captain”. With my siblings i can put up woth it, but oh my god, assholes, get over it! If they can bitch about it, they can work on their skills. Then they won’t have to take such a youngen’s orders!

Elrond, slightly histarical: hold on hold on hold on- you’re how old?!? That’s older than me! That’s older than my parents! Or my grandparents! You could’ve known luthien-

Legolas: -i did know luthien-

Elrond: AND YOU SAY YOU’RE YOUNG!?!-

Legolas: i am young:

Elrond: what am i a baby in your eyes??? A fetus?? Or my kids just eggs??? Oh my god, does that mean that all the times thranduil refered to himself as one of the youngest of the avari/silvan rulers, that doesn’t actually mean he’s that young either? Wll, he’s your dad, so he’s at least older than you- *horrified gasp* *horrified whisper* does that mean all this time we commented on his “young age” he was looking at us like we were fucking morons???

Legolas: i mean, tbf, 95% of the avari/silvan rulers are all elves that awoke at the lake way back when, while my father was born the old fashioned way, so when sm1 says they’re younger than the avari/silvan rulers, it don’t mean much…

Elrond: wait, but how are you still considered young by your elves’ standard?? Aren’t there a lot of older elves that have died?

Legolas: well, for one we haven’t killed each other for jewelry.

—————-—————————————————————————

No, but it probably helps that legolas is the younger/youngest sibling, and all the elves just automatically assume that, bc he’s the youngest of his siblings, he’s young. For some reason, a lot of people have a bad habit of considering the “-er” and “-est” to mean essentially the same.

[whereserpentswalk]

The Night Hunt

I need to eat. It’s not eating anymore. It doesn’t feel like thirst or hunger. It’s not something I would have understood as a human. I feel like I’m going to die. I don’t want to die. I don’t think anyone would mind if I did. My mouth is shaped so differently than it once was, I can’t move my jaws, I feel empty, I need it to fill me, and I feel empty.

The upper west side vampiric community center was cramped, getting everything it could from limited funds and real estate. The walls were white and the lighting sterile, their deadness only broken by overly enthusiastic posters. It was strange looking at the other vampires in the building, most of them seemed to be doing much better than me. Even most of the ones that ones you could tell weren’t human at a glance usually looked more human than me. It felt like everyone I saw was doing better than me, the petite girl in a black dress talking to her parents on the phone, the bearded man with cats eyes dressed in fancy clothes he had probably owned some version of for centuries, the snake mouthed person guzzling down a can of commercially sold blood like it was soda. I could assume a lot of the vampires I saw here had supportive families, and many others were old enough to be well adjusted to their lives. It almost hurt looking at vampires who could pass better than me, or who could better mask vampiric traits, this embarrassing envy, that I was a monster even by the standards of monsters.

I could have socialized, but I was too tired, and too thirsty. I had just been denied a good behavior slip by the New York State government, and thus denied a month’s supply of donated blood, and the building stopped being somewhere I wanted to be. Most vampires can’t get a good behavior slip, A lot don’t even try just because of how humiliating and restrictive life during the audit can be. A lot of them live off of relatives’ and friend’s blood, or buy it wholesale. I don’t have the option for either of those, at least not consistently.

I walked up Broadway, when I left, below the safety of the dark sky, and the calming yellow light of the windows, past the old brick buildings of a childhood that now seems alien to me. Best to get outside time in while I can, it’s summer, giving me few hours before the sun rises. It’s strange to remember when I walked down that street as a human. That deep loss of something I can remember but will never feel once more. Remembering how easy things were. When the restaurants smelled good to my body, instead of sickly sweet. It would’ve made me cry to see myself reflected in a window, if my eyes had tears to cry. To see I was the type of vampire other even other vampires shunning, too vampiric perhaps, to close to what they all fear being, too close to what they’re all accused of. I used to think of losing my humanity was a horrible fate, and now I am the bad ending for so many other nonhumans. I wonder how many of my kind’s advocates think I’m worthy of oppression. They say not all vampires look horrifying to humans, but I look horrifying to humans. They say not all vampires think violent thoughts about humans automatically, but I find myself doing that so often. They say not all vampires are weak to sunlight, or are hurt by symbols of their prior faith, but I am, and it hurts, and if acceptance means telling people it doesn’t hurt I’ll just get hurt more.

I tried to think of something to distract myself. Tried to think of friends who still cared about me, about that show I wanted to finish, tired to think about that Lord of the Rings fanfic that I wrote in middle school that I had though about on that street, on a bright day so alien to the humid night I walked through. No matter what I thought about there was always blood in the back on my mind. Even when a vampire isn’t thinking about blood directly, when they’re low, as almost fatally low as I was, it’s always able to be felt in the background. I could feel my body’s desire for blood, feel the pain and weakness of not having it. It was strange, to know that my body hurt because it wanted like, that my body only transformed into a vampire because it would have died from being bitten by one if it hadn’t. My body wanted to live as a vampire so much more than I did. My hands shook, my gate more unbalanced, more stumbling than it usually was, my twisted and inhuman mouth, the most inhuman part of my body, salivating. The staggered and almost animalistic walk must have made me look even more like a monster. The pigeons flew away when they saw me, they must have known, or maybe that’s just what pigeons are like.

 My once tan skin now so pale my organs are visible, my once fit body now skinny, my brown eyes forever white, and my mouth perfectly round and unmoving and filled with sharp tooth after sharp tooth like a lamprey. All so perfect to drink blood, all built to drain blood. It hurts to think I’ll probably be in this body for centuries. The same hoodie I’d been wearing for days still covers me a bit, as does my mess of uncut hair, I don’t really have to wash these things without human oils on my body anymore. It’s not good to think too long about that fact. There is no wonder my parents would rather consider their precious daughter basically dead, than know that she lived as this. I might do the same if I had a choice. I think about when I was turned sometimes, how I didn’t get to be turned out of love, or lust, or spite, how the bite was meant to kill me, how it would have killed me if I wasn’t rushed to the hospital, or if I hadn’t fought the attacker off. I never even knew the name of the vampire who attacked me. I didn’t know why he did at the time, I assumed it was from hate, I understand now, I would never defend attacking someone like that but I understand, he was hungry, I know how it feels to want blood like how he must have. People would have had me better in their memories if I had died, nobody admits it, but it’s true, my parents convinced themselves I had on religious grounds, saying my soul had left my body, I understand why, my reputation was not tarnished.

As I walked past stores and restaurants that had closed hours earlier, saw how little the world wanted me. I wondered how I would keep existing. I remembered that my transformation has made it so I wouldn’t age, couldn’t die a natural death at all, I realized how strange it would be for me to exist in a body like the one I did for hundreds more years, thousands if I got lucky. There was the feeling that maybe I’d be murdered, most of society didn’t even want the most human passing, most privileged vampires to live, it sucked even for people who had it so much better than me, maybe I’d just die, maybe one of those monster hunter gangs would finally due me in like they always threaten to online. But what if I didn’t, what if I had to still live. If I actually had put the work in to having positive relationships with the community maybe some vampiric elder would be able to tell me. As it was I felt lost, I didn’t know what I could be doing a hundred years from where I stood. Would things be better than, for me, for us? Would I be ok?

For a moment my eye caught a girl around my age. As a human I would have felt lust for her, she had that exact look that I used to like. Glistening hair dyed a candy colored red, a pale pink Cowboy Bebop t-shirt covering her chest. I would have felt lust, or perhaps a more noble sounding attraction, but now that part of me is gone, and seeing a young healthy body like that just makes me think about what it would be like to drink her instead of making me think about being in bed with her. I knew it was wrong, but it would feel so good, to feel my mouth punch into her neck, and drain her dry. I don’t want to feel this way, the logical part of my brain doesn’t like feeling this way, but it’s a feeling in my body. When I looked at her soft skin my teeth ever so slightly extended outwards, and the tiredness from the pain of thirst temporarily ceasing as my body filled with energy, my dreaming mind fantasizing about holding her as I drank her blood, as ashamed as I am of such thoughts, as little as I’d want to ever hurt someone like her, it felt so good in the moment just to fantasize. It was the closest I still had to feeling anything sexual or romantic, as many social media posts as there are telling you it’s a myth that all vampires lose their sexual or romantic feelings, it’s true for me, I don’t even have breasts or sex organs anymore, as horrifying as that is to even acknowledge about myself. Just another thing that makes me seem less human, and just another thing that makes drinking human blood seem to desirable. I didn’t want to hurt her, just looking at her walking, she seemed so happy, so pure.

I did nothing, yet she still crossed the street. I understood, it was late, and I was a ragged looking vampire walking near her, she had a right to feel safe. I ran, as thirsty as my body was I didn’t want to be near her, and didn’t want to cause a scene.

Best to flee uptown, Time Square is filled with Faeries, and Central Park with werewolves, and neither take kindly to my kind in the places they tend to hang out. There is a safety in being human, despite all the stories of young maidens scratched up in monster’s arms, with blood contrasting on top of their pretty white skin, most monsters with ill wills are way more likely to target other species of monster rather than humans. Humans are often well armed, and well defended by the law, and so many monsters are so eager to prove their kind’s validity through their hatred of another species of monster.

My running only stopped when I had to cross the street to avoid a church. One of those big ornate ones you’d see a vampiric villain hang out in in a thriller movie, with that shining stained glass they haven’t built in generations. They say it’s not anything divine that burns vampires that are weak to holy symbols, it’s just the memory of faith that hurts, the memory of the most human of all actions. Doesn’t change the fact that the pope still says we don’t have souls. The church ghosts all fled, they floated somewhere else just from seeing me, I wanted to yell to them “What? Are you too good even to haunt me.” I didn’t of course, I didn’t want to cause a scene. Maybe I would have if I wasn’t so weak from thirst.

I can’t get blood. The state won’t give it to me. My friends would say no if I asked. I can’t afford to buy it. I dropped out of school when I was turned, there wasn’t accommodation, and late classes were hard to get. Most of the friends I still have either treat me like a tragedy to fawn over, or like I could kill them at any time, they’re only human after all. I guess that’s why they recommend socializing with other monsters. I barely look for work anymore, even well-meaning humans are uncomfortable around me, though to be fair I’ve done nothing not to make them uncomfortable, and it’s impossible to ask them to close daytime windows, or keep silver and garlic away.  I spend so much time on the internet. I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t ask to be this thirsty. I don’t want to look this way, and I don’t want to need blood. I never chose any of this, never chose to be bitten, never chose to be saved.

For a moment I saw another person on the street, alone with me. Some rich kid staggering drunk and barely knowing where he is, a sweatshirt from some fancy wizarding school clinging on to his body. His rosy yet pale cheeks, so vulnerable, not so privileged that he could hurt me, just privileged enough to feel like every bad though I could have towards him was punching up. He was the exact type of asshole that I’d expect to call me a slur, to be proud that wizards like him had engaged in just enough vampire hunts in the thirties and forties to be considered another type of human. But he didn’t. He didn’t notice me at all, he just sang to himself with his earbuds in and his eyes glued to his phone as he stumbled past closed stores.

I can smell blood on his lips. I remember that there is another way to quench my thirst. I’d have to drain him dry so that nobody would know. I don’t want to. I don’t want to be that type of vampire. His body is so fresh, I’d be full for like a year. I can’t stop looking at him and remembering my life. He’ll run but I can catch up to him, and he’ll taste so good. And I would be so hard to catch if I drained him to death, he’s a stranger, the case would go cold. I need blood, and he has blood, it’s like a trolly problem, you don’t need sadism to pick yourself when you’re tied to the tracks. And I can’t think of another way I could get blood before starving to death.  It feels weird to grab his wrist as he struggles, too thirsty to think too deeply. I don’t want to look at his face when he screams, but something deep within me is excited to hear a human scream. I feel sorry for him I think, he didn’t deserve this, I didn’t deserve this, if things were different… well they aren’t different. God my voice sounds demonic with this mouth. “I’m sorry, but I have to do this.”

[unfortunatelysage]

Must’ve Been the Wind

Like a rodent, the tiny scampers along the wall, silently running underneath tables and countertops to avoid detection. There’s no time to gain awareness of their surroundings, not in such an active living space. It was their mistake to sneak in and scope out this space at this hour, since any normal human would be awake in broad daylight like this.

Not like they had much choice. The tiny winces at the crash of a branch slamming against a nearby window. Some of the worst wind they’ve ever experienced, its consequences sending shockwaves through the empty room.

Well, empty for now. Subconsciously, the tiny’s breath hitches at the all-too-familiar tremors of footsteps approaching the room they’re in. Figures. At least they’re already hidden. One less thing to worry about.

Hinges squeak ever so slightly as the giant of the hour walks into the room, clicking the door closed behind them. They have a smaller stride. Short… by giant standards. The sudden sound of flowing water alerts the tiny to the presence of a sink in this room.

Unsatisfied with their current placement, the tiny takes advantage of the present sound and slowly and silently shuffles sideways, plastering themselves against the wall as they move away from the door and toward the sink, hidden well beneath a table occupying the space next to it.

The water stops, and the massive feet in front of the tiny step back away from the sink as the giant indulges in a drink. Chills are sent up the tiny’s spine before they can even process what happens next.

“I don’t want to tell you what to do,” the giant speaks, seemingly to no one.

“And it doesn’t bother me that you’re here,” they continue. Oh no.

“But I’d be remiss if I didn’t at least warn you.”

The giant walks slightly to the side, the tiny tracking their every movement. They stop once their feet are positioned in front of the tiny’s hiding spot. “I know my housemates well. And I know tinies well. You would regret running into one of them.”

The color drains from the tiny’s face as the larger-than-life being bends down, making effortless eye contact with the now horrified intruder. “And you aren’t as great at hiding as you think you are.”

The giant sets down their water cup on its side, allowing the last bit of water to slide down toward the lip of the barrel-sized container. “Drink up,” they tell the tiny. “What you do after that is up to you.” The titan stands up once again, exiting the room and closing the door behind them as they had when they walked in.

The tiny’s mouth and throat go dry as they stare at the supply of water just gifted to them. Nonetheless, they’re unable to move.

[ultfreakme]

Okay I’m still on the verge of tears and can’t do this rn so buddy daddies ep 10 jumbled thoughts

Idk wtf anyone says anymore the entire kazurei relationship is queer there is absolutely NO denying it anymore. That scene where Kazuki is looking at kids with their moms, then it cuts to himself? Yeah that’s basically insecurity and feeling terrible he can’t fit their own family into societal standards. Yeah it’s about Miri missing Misaki, about how their careers aren’t meant to accommodate a child but its also about how society has made us all internalize that a ‘right’ family involves a mom, a dad, and a child/

Miri is absolutely sad that Misaki isn’t with her, but she’s never like, so upset she gets devastated. Misaki herself asks “do you like it here better than with me?” and what does Miri answer? She doesn’t says “yeah i like it better here”, BUT she also doesn’t say “I like it best with you!”, she completely dodges and says “I love you mama, and papas too”. Any time a situation involving a mother comes up, she’s like “would be nice if mama were here....anyways!” and doesn’t dwell on it.

I thought Rei smiling would kill me but Kazuki almost CRYING DESTROYED MY SOUL. It’s like watching either of my parents cry its heartbreaking and horrible and i want it to stop. He thought he’d never find that normal happiness, wanted it oh so desperately and then it’s....gone. The Ferris wheel symbolism was horrible I hate the OP for doing that to me. That opening where they’re in front of the billboards was just-- IT WAS IN FRONT OF US THE WHOLE TIME

I think even Rei almost cried. On the ferris wheel, when they focused on his mouth and it twisted downwards before Miri pointed to the city. Kazuki crying was bad enough and had me tearing up too. If Rei was added into the mix I’d have been in shambles

Misaki holy shit wtf, life hates her, cut the woman some slack wow. Throughout the show she was defined by her singing and they took her voice away. It’s horrible, but I’m glad she has parents to go back to. I’m not fully convinced she can take care of Miri, but if she’s being genuine I think she’ll be just fine and would learn just like Kazurei.

Rei sounded so devastated when he was like “you can’t do this when we’re all attached”. Yeah this was his glimpse at normalcy, the one time in his entire life he got to be part of something that didn’t stifle him and it’s gone now. 

Kazuki wrapping the scarf around her- hey why don’t I just eat glass? Why don’t I just go on top of a cliff and scream?? Or set fire to my bed???

“I guess we can’t change” BABY NO YOU CAN. YOU CAAAN!!!

I thought Rei would defy the organization and say “screw it I want to protect this family I have”......but his most prominent memory of his mentor is him dying. How defiance led to his and his wife/gf’s horrifying death. In his head he’s probably thinking that’d be Kazuki and Miri if he doesn’t quit while they’re ahead. Alive and miserable, or dead while holding onto hopeless situations?

Kazuki.....idek.....just Kazuki baby I’m so sorry

[foldingfittedsheets]

Sometimes my betrothed and I talk about homebrew magic items for DnD. Specifically, off the grid sex magic stuff. Because honestly, if you think about it, the market for sexy magic would be through the roof.

A mage who invents a new sex spell would have it made, that’s it, they can just cast this one spell forever and be set for life. People love getting it on and they love gadgets with which to do so.

Because this is a niche topic I’m gonna stick it under a cut, read on for sexy silliness.

Some of the items we imagine are very standard, just nice ways to magically improve a sex life. Easy access to magic lube, portable sex toy storage, specific toys. The idea I came up with yesterday however is… very cursed.

It came up from us discussing our characters sex lives, as you do. My character Orion is gender fluid and can rearrange their anatomy at will to suit whatever they’re feeling. Kahriq is a cis lady. We’ve already posited that there’s a ring of dick-having if Kahriq wants to mix things up sometimes.

But my betrothed was asking if they’d ever use a toy even though Orion can have a penis and I was like, oh, of course, sometimes you need that for different positions. Then after a pause I was like, “It’s too bad they wouldn’t be able to feel what the toy was doing though.”

And from this seed my betrothed and I came to two very different conclusions. Their idea was to have a magic item you attune to that transfers sensation from the toy to your own body so it feels like you’re doing the fucking. This is a solid magic item, feeling the sensation on your own body is a great concept.

My idea was to have a magic cock ring that popped your penis off and made it into a sex toy. Like a penis portal cock ring. When I told my betrothed this idea their whole face scrunched up in absolute disgust. “Popping the dick off?! That’s what you came up with?!”

“Yeah, and you could give yourself a comfortable blowjob by just detaching it which I think is pretty cool!” This was a lie. I thought my idea was bizarre and a little unsettling to picture but I’m nothing if not a sales person.

They argued that it was in fact horrifying to pop off body parts and if we’re being honest I have to agree that their idea was just better in every way. But mine still has a certain charm. I bet my penis pop off cock ring would still sell.

Edit to add: it would appear I am not the first person to have this idea which is comforting in its own way.

[harleyxhoward]

Analyzing The Abilities of Characters From The Boys Pt. VI

🐍Zoe Neuman🐍

Zoe, growing up in both a multiethnic and affluent home, is both marginalized and privileged in a myriad of ways. Her ethnicity, along with her mother’s, is never acknowledged outright on the show. For all we know, the directors could have cast white actresses for the both of them and the core of my analysis would be null and void, but I believe the fact they aren’t white provides a certain layer of tragedy to Zoe’s character in particular.

Going off of personal experience in uppity East Coast spaces, Zoe’s presumably one of few ethnic children in her social circle. While she’s debatably white passing, this would undoubtedly have led to numerous instances of her facing prejudice and most likely teasing of various kinds.

This is where her unique ability of generating snake-like tentacles from her mouth presents itself. Her being injected as a preteen means her body analyzed her current surroundings and decided what she needed most at this stage in her life was some form of aggressive defense that could come from her mouth. This most likely resulted from her being mocked, teased, harassed, or discriminated against, and wishing there was a way her “sharp tongue” could actually cut them. Now with these serpents that expel themselves from her mouth, she’s capable of holding her own against anyone who wishes to insult or berate her.

Her being subjected to Red River felt like karmic irony, Victoria injecting her in adolescence* because she decided having any ability at all would be better than being powerless. I’ve mulled over this decision from Vicky, but ultimately settled on it being near sighted and power hungry on her end. She knew full well that Compound V resulted in the death of her own parents, and could very well have given Zoe a disastrous mutation, if not killing her in a long, drawn out body horror scenario. Even Stan Edgar was repulsed and horrified at the idea that Victoria would stoop so low as to inject Zoe with V, which put the gravity of the situation into perspective.

Vicky additionally knew that, while she was getting herself tangled up in Vought and Homelander, that her life was on the chopping block, and if she died, Samir wouldn’t be able to fend off Firecracker, let alone all of Vought’s forces. This would, assuming Homelander didn’t execute her daughter, land Zoe in the same place Vicky ended up after the death of her parents, which is exactly what happened.

While this seemed unfair at first, I saw it more so as a cautionary tale of what corruption does to a person. Vicky wasn’t satisfied with what she had, and strived for absolute power at the expense of her daughter’s well being. The shift from a loving mother willing to give her child the world to a power hungry tyrant injecting her daughter with a potentially lethal drug to turn her into a #girlboss didn’t happen randomly. I can imagine every thought that went through Vicky’s head as she decided to this to Zoe, especially explaining away the consequences as trivial costs to her daughter’s safety.

My response to that, aside from it not panning out how Victoria intended, is to look no farther than Kris Jenner with Kim Kardashian. In both mother-daughter duos a power/money hungry mother mutates/exposes her child all in the name of giving her a “better life” at the cost of robbing her of her agency and ultimately her humanity. Society blames Kim for perpetuating beauty standards, all of which were thrust upon her by a mother who just wanted a bigger mansion.

*The horror of Vicky’s decision stems mostly from the fact that the older you are, the worse the mortality rates/negative mutations are with V injections. Stan and Vicky already knew this, and it’s why people were contemplating whether Ashley would die at the end of S4 or not. Babies appear to be more malleable, and while some gain adverse mutations, they’re hardly ever lethal, and may even be tailored to Vought’s liking (so it seems).*

[theshadowrealmitself]

The reason I haven’t been making Vulcan posts lately is because other than the fact that I’ve been obsessed with this one fandom lately that has. incredibly unsatisfying (to me) fanfics (so much of it is either ambiguous/unhappy ending, not tagged as such, and also a ton of the pairing ones are actually just “implied” pairings), I’ve been obsessed with this one idea that I have no idea how to articulate, but my stomach hurts rn and I can’t sleep till it stops so I’m gonna try rn:

Old-ish Vulcan, def old by Human standards, not so much by Vulcan standards, getting their life saved by a Human child, and the Human kid is like,, the epitome of like,, a very specific type of sci-fi show protagonist, like it’s just this tiny kid with a ray gun getting into impossibly large situations and always finding away out of them with their can-do attitude and snark at adults, and these really are horrifying and traumatic situations but the kid just!! always makes it out of it!! (Indomitable human spirit or smth idk)

So anyways, they meet the Vulcan, save the Vulcan’s life out of a situation the Vulcan thought 100% would kill them, and then leave into the night

And they just keep meeting like that, just this Human always going in blazing, uncovering plots, saving lives just because it’s the right thing to do, and then leaving just as quickly

So by now, the Human is an adult and is in Starfleet, trying to sniff out a traitor amongst the crew, and the Vulcan is there for unrelated reasons, but sees the Human there and can already tell that something is up, but trusts the Human to handle it

And there’s this sort of little assumption the Vulcan is making, I mean, the kid (now an adult but it’s hard for the Vulcan to look at them and not see the tiny child they first met) gets out of every scrap practically unharmed, always shows up to help, and always just leaves without being questioned afterwards, so obviously, they have to be working with some organization (maybe not as a kid but definitely as an adult), trained to do all this, and this is all sanctioned by the organization

But nah, they’re a lone wolf, technically breaking a shit ton of laws, but when they get found out that they lied to get into Starfleet, the older, well-respected Vulcan vouches for them, so no one even questions their presence, everyone just thinks they’re a. extremely secretive spy hired by Starfleet.

Idk it’s just all funny to me

Edit: And yes, the Human is from the past, cryogenically frozen and woken up in what’s considered the future for them, and they’re just crashing their way through life, somehow living a nonstop action adventure, barely understanding what’s actually happening some times, just accidentally living a really chaotic life

[detentiontrack]

I WANNA HEAR ABOUT YOUR RABIES FUN FACTS GUS ‼️

Thank you for asking!!!!!! /gen 💓💓

After I typed this out, I realized that none of these are actually fun facts, and in fact, they are horrifying and gruesome and disturbing facts, which is probably why my family didn’t want to hear them. So um. Trigger warning for death and disease.

1. Dogs and other animals receives rabies shots as a preventative every few years. There is NO real frequent preventative rabies shots for humans and the preventative rabies shots for animals don’t work on humans. If you get exposed to rabies, you need to get an emergency rabies shot immediately. (There are pre exposure rabies vaccinations for humans, but they’re only for people very high risk of contracting rabies like if they work with diseased animals, but it’s not really like the same preventative shot animals get and not always accessible to the public)

2. Rabies has an almost 100% fatality rate in humans and animals. If you don’t get the vaccine immediately, you will certainly die. Once you start showing ANY symptoms, it’s already too late.

3. Rabies symptoms can show up months or YEARS after you get exposed to rabies depending on your immune system. It can show up between 4 days to SIX (6!!) YEARS!!! after exposure. Standard incubation period is about 1-3 months. You can get bit by an animal with rabies, feel completely fine, and then be DEAD.

4. You will die within 1-2 weeks of getting symptoms. Most people go into a coma first.

5. You can get rabies from SCRATCHES too, not just bites.

6. A lot of people with rabies die from dehydration before the actual symptoms kill you. This is because rabies causes severe hydrophobia, a fear of water. If you’re still cognitively there, you understand that you need to drink water, but you can’t.

7. Hydrophobia occurs because rabies affects the areas of the brain that control speaking, swallowing, and breathing. I believe it’s the medulla oblongata that it targets, but don’t quote me on that because I’m not super sure. Even the THOUGHT of water can make your throat spasm so hard you can’t breathe and start choking, let alone trying to drink it.

8. Rabies first presents with flu like symptoms. Weakness, muscle aches, fever, headaches, malaise, etc. So you can think you’re just coming down with the flu, but then 1-2 weeks later you die of rabies. There’s nothing anyone can do for you after symptoms start.

9. Rabies can be transmitted from a human to another human! One of the biggest signs is uncharacteristic aggression so it is very likely if you’re a medical professional treating someone with rabies, they’ll bite you and then you’ll get it too if you don’t get treatment.

10. Up until recently, it’s been thought that rabies can ONLY be transmitted through a bite or scratch that breaks the skin. BUT it has been discovered that you can actually get rabies through the AIR. These cases are EXTREMELY rare, and it could only happen if like. You walk into a cave FULL of severely infected bats that never leave the cave and the cave is small, hot and humid, and not well ventilated. My internet isn’t working right now so I can’t look it up but I believe there’s only a VERY small number of cases of airborne rabies.

Anyway, this is why rabies is my #1 fear and I would get the dog rabies vaccine myself if it worked on humans.

[bewitchedsouls]

I know you mean good but fat girls can also break easily. I also don’t mean to sound rude or offend you but it’s rare for fat girls to be 6 foot, I know you might be fat and 6 foot but it’s pretty rare. I think most people stick to petite girls in cod stories because it would be scary and horrifying if they gave reader their sweater and all the sudden reader fits or barely fits in it and it only works as a crop top on them. And please try to remember just because their fat doesn’t mean they aren’t clean fat girls bathe too and do their eyebrows too they aren’t slobs. Fat girls can break when they get laid and yes I believe they also will jiggle around in the process so please try to be mindful when bringing up cod guys with a fat girl

i’m extremely confused but this might just be me not having enough sleep, what are you questioning here? i try (i’m pretty sure i haven’t either) to not mention body types, sizes, descriptions etc, i want everyone to feel like they can read a fanfic i have written because they can imagine themselves as the person, i know in one i said simon could practically engulf the reader but that is because i see simon as this big military man who’s built like a brick wall so that just how i tackle it in writing, as a person who has always struggled with my weight it’s nice to be able to read about a love interest who (not matter your size) can pick you up or put you on his lap, i don’t like writing for body types because it can discourage others and make them feel as if they aren’t good enough or have something wrong with their body when infact i think all body types and sizes are beautiful and think that no matter your size you should feel included in a fanfiction because as it says in the name, it’s fiction, something where you can imagine yourself in that position, if someone struggles to do so i understand that it wouldn’t feel good to be excluded especially when i have been victim to writing that is catered towards a specific body or feature, now if someone wanted a plus sized reader fanfic i would be more than happy to write that, my requests are open as stated and i would do everything to make sure it is up to their standards and their body description if i am given one.

I am also confused at your point of saying ‘just because they’re fat doesn’t mean they aren’t clean’ ???? this is extremely baffling and you mentioned eyebrows, once again ??? i’m seriously hoping this was meant for another post because you may not want to offend but what you have written to me i find extremely disrespectful and rude, just because you say don’t mean to offend/no offence doesn’t mean anything you don’t have the right to talk to people who go out of their way to write fanfiction for people to read when they’re bored, lonely, seeking comfort (as i have myself many times) i have a full time job that i don’t get home form till 10pm (hence the lack posts) you do not get to slander people who don’t have to write fanfiction but choose to in order to make others happy. My last point to add on is that you said ‘yes I believe they will jiggle around in the process’ this is going to sound rude but whatever, are you even a plus size person yourself? as you sound unsure as to what happens when someone is plus size and has sex? i think it’s extremely rude that you think you can make those kind of comments and come on my page and try to tell me what my body is and what i can and cannot write about.

IF YOU FEEL MY WORK IS NOT FOR YOU EITHER POLITELY PRIVATELY MESSAGE ME AND TELL ME SO I CAN EITHER FIX IT TO BE MORE INCLUSIVE OR CAN WRITE YOU YOUR OWN COMPLETELY NEW FIC!!! OTHERWISE GET OF MY PAGE AND DO NOT INTERACT WITH ME OR MY WORK!!! I DO NOT NEED TO PUT UP WITH HATE AND NEGATIVITY WHEN ALL IM TRYING TO DO IS BE CREATIVE AND MAKE PEOPLE HAPPY!!!!

[lightwise]

TBB S3 E10 Reaction

Life has been a bit busier the last few weeks so I am finally catching up on my episode reactions (I’m determined to do all of them this season!) And I apologize y’all, this episode made me very snarky apparently.

I’ll be honest. When this episode first came out I was nowhere near as surprised by it or horrified by it as reviewers seemed to be. Nothing about Palpatine hunting down force sensitive children as experiments and using Cad Bane to do it is a surprise, and the Vault feels so much like Andor. But even on a rewatch this episode holds up so well and honestly just starts to give a cold chill under the skin as the quiet horror of it sinks in.

- Cute kid. And the Batch nowhere to be seen. This is going to be a different episode isn’t it

- Oh no. He’s force sensitive 😫😫😫 hmmm how could that possibly go wrong

- This is giving Andor vibes 👀

- It’s always interesting seeing “regular people” in Star Wars and little markets and how they’re just trying to go about their daily lives.

- Don’t go around snitching people! Nothing good ever comes of it!!!

- Yeah this guy is worse than Timm from Andor. Wtf dude. You’re turning in a baby!!

- Also is it just me or typical Star Wars “houses” end up being pretty dark and depressing?

- Wait okay okay. So this is the CX chamber. Why can’t we see any of them yet 😩😩 what is this red fog? What are these weird conditioning pods? What kind of armor is on this datapad?? *trying to crawl inside my screen* I NEED ANSWERS JENNIFER!!

- “Do you trust me?” Ooooh why do I think that’s going to come back around

- But also, babygirl, I don’t think you actually know what you’re signing up for

- “I could be more useful” “you wish to be the new chief scientist Dr. Karr?” “I believe I’ve earned it.” Alright. This. This is interesting. This fully encapsulates the dynamic that these two have shared. Emerie knows that Hemlock only values things that are useful, and probably only sees her own value in the light of what she can contribute, due to how she was raised and the circumstances she has been trapped in. Hemlock’s tone of voice implies that he has never considered her as being the new chief scientist, and yet he acquiesces quite quickly, almost as though he’s just too busy to think about it and if it means things are brought back up to production standard then he’s fine with it. His utter disregard for Emerie as an actual human and someone with merit is disgusting though.

- But I get it, the man’s busy, he’s got a lot of evil shit he’s trying to do all at the same time 🙄

- So we have “the assets”, which is the area that Hemlock took Palpatine in the first episodes, where the orange containment pods are and the zillo beast is being kept. We still don’t know what those assets are. The Vault is something different.

- Well. Shit. It’s Andor and Narkina 5 for kids. Lovely 😳💀

- “There are few adults left with such characteristics” I WONDER IN THE NAME OF ONE EMPEROR PALPATINE WHY

- Okay so this entire exchange is awful. The kids are so cute! Hemlock is so cold. “Specimens. Assets” ughhh Emerie what are you getting yourself into!!

- Is this the first time we’ve heard the word glasses in Star Wars?

- Oh no. So THIS is why Cad Bane was brought back 🥺🥺

- The score in this episode is perfectly eerie

- Lol Todo is not good with kids huh 🤣

- That poor mama when she wakes up and finds her baby is gone

- I hope that dude has his entire life flash before his eyes as he’s trying to pick all of those credits up

- “My name’s Eva” 🥹🥹🥹 Emerie has no idea how to handle this 😂

- I still wanna know what’s happened with these commandos. No way a clone of Jango Fett is able to look a child in the eyes, call them a “specimen” and not have even an ounce of remorse as they stun them point blank.

- “Jax?” And Eva just points. The power in knowing someone’s name vs a dehumanizing number

- It’s also interesting that these kids are species that are red, blue, and green, and when they get Bayrn in, he’s white. RGB colors make up white light when put together.

- The little peeks of Emerie’s backstory we keep getting are so interesting. She was abandoned by Nala Se. She knows that these children don’t belong here, the same way that Omega told both her and Crosshair that they didn’t belong here either. Nala Se says that the Empire will hold these kids to control them. Emerie feels like she has no power to do anything differently. So much to unpack here.

- Why is Tarkin’s holo so large?

- Lol I honestly love getting to see the backbiting politics of how the Empire functions. It’s so bad and so funny

- Also love that Project Necromancer is so secret that even Tarkin doesn’t know what it is. He’s so nosy

- Okay why does he bring up the CX schematic again and why is it so different than the one we saw earlier??

- Whoa Cid was tortured???

- “The other operatives aren’t ready to join you in the field” why????

- We’re visiting a lot of space stations this season

- Man I wish Emerie had fudged this test

- Nooo let the poor baby go home 🥺

- Oh and now we’re putting kids in solitary confinement. Great.

- C’mon Emerie. Keep clicking that moral compass until it points north

- She kept the straw Lula. She’s giving it to Eva 😭. There’s hope for her yet

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

ALEX DEWITT (DC COMICS)

1.) The term “fridging” is literally based on Alex and what happened to her. She was killed off violently by a bad guy trying to get at her boyfriend only a couple issues after she was introduced (making it obvious they only brought her in to kill her off for shock value). Her death did very little to the narrative other than hurt her boyfriend Kyle and was done in an exceedingly horrifying and violent way. (Bad guy came to the door with flowers and threatening note, broke in and attacked her, choking her to death, before [off panel] chopping her body up and sticking it in the refrigerator as a “surprise” for her boyfriend. This obviously is really fucked up and she deserves better and should win this actually (a vote for Alex is a vote for all fridging victims [in spirit])

2.) It doesn’t get much worse than being the character whose death originated the “fridging” trope. In Green Lantern Vol. 3 #54, Kyle Rayner comes home to find that Alexandra, his girlfriend, has been killed by the villain Major Force and stuffed into the refrigerator.

Alexandra DeWitt is the character whose misogynistic treatment coined the term where a character, usually female, is killed off purely to make the main character, usually male, feel bad. Even if there are other characters who have been subjected to similar levels of misogyny, Alexandra DeWitt’s treatment has been essentially immortalized.

3.) I know she’s not going to win but shout out to my home girl, literally the trope namer for women shoved in fridges. All anyone ever knows about her is that she was Kyle’s girlfriend and got murdered for his character development, even though she had plenty of potential to be her own character.

LEAFPOOL (WARRIOR CATS)

1.) For context, she’s a medicine cat, which is essentially the priest/healer of an ancestor-worshipping religion called StarClan, and there’s a rule in the living Clans prohibiting anyone from dating outside their Clan, and also prohibiting medicine cats from dating/having kits.

So she’s breaking the law by seeing a cat named Crowfeather in another Clan, and eventually gets pregnant. She secretly gives the children to her sister to raise instead, because the kits would’ve grown up in misery if their true parentage was known. When the secret gets out that they’re her kits, Leafpool became demonized to hell and back.

Crowfeather, who ALSO broke the law and fathered the kits, only got a slap on the wrist, and he’s almost certainly going to become leader. But Leafpool was demoted from her role as medicine cat (by her FATHER), treated like scum by her whole community (aside from her sister and best friend), and her children despise her for lying to them (one even tries to get her to kill herself). The narrative constantly paints her as a liar that’s getting what she deserves, and even has her children insult her at HER FUNERAL, years after the secret got out. She’s a main character and she dies OFF SCREEN between books!

It’s not even over when she dies. StarClan decides to hold a trial for her when she dies to see if she deserves to join them, or if she’s banished to cat hell for eternity. War criminals who abetted in genocide never got a trial, they were just let in. An incel who tried to kill 4 people because he was mad his ex dumped him got let in without question. But the cat whose only crime was dating someone in another Clan and having kids gets a full trial? Keep in mind their sire gets a whole book about StarClan coming down to help him, because clearly only she deserved to be punished.

Leafpool’s life is nonstop suffering because of misogynistic double standards. Treated like the devil for getting pregnant and wanting to give her kids a better life, while all the men involved get excused, coddled, and placed into positions of power.

2.) she went through So much bullshit. squirrelflight (her sister) too. i’m sure she’ll also get submitted. Cat God (starclan) vaguely told her to run away with the man she liked and then got mad at her when she did it. and then she was punished for it the rest of her life. She had kids with him and those kids were like Incredibly Important and wouldn’t exist if not for her but she’s still punished for it. BY STARCLAN. Who told her to have those kids in the first place . and of course the books just treat this like it’s pretty much normal and fair

3.) just like her sister squirrelflight, she does many things that male characters do and faces drastically different consequences. she and another cat, named crowfeather, run away from their clans to get cat married. this is illegal because they’re from different clans. when they get home, leafpool is pregnant. when all of this is revealed(years later) their punishments could not be more different. when they first come back, leafpool is suspected, talked poorly about, and outlasted. we aren’t shown any consequences towards crowfeather at all. after the grand reveal of leafpool having kids(and giving them away to her sister since she’s a doctor and doctors can’t gave kids) leafpool is forced to give up her position as doctor, is disowned as her kids aunt figure, and completely outcasted by the whole clan(mostly the same happens to her sister). crowfeather is just minorly treated poorly and gets a cat divorce.

[artoriarts]

borked coloring but Adam & Eve prime. While I’m of the mind that p-3 probably should probably be Lucifer (though it would fit the tragedy if he wasn’t even strong enough to be a prime. Simply a man concerned of his lord’s work damned with the rest. but I’m getting ahead of myself) or another Greek figure to keep up the theme, that don’t stop me from thinking. Cracked lore under cut

Don’t have any specific specifics but my general idea is that, unlike Minos and Sisyphus who remain in the world via willpower, the lovers here do so out of a combination of latent power as the first humans and sheer denial and the simple urge to live. Due to God’s shame robbing them of an explanation, neither of them even *know* why they’re in hell, whatever sin put them there in the first place. They barely even know what hell is. All they know is each other and the eternal torment that their minds reject. This, understandably, left the two bitter and paranoid and angry and, above all, horrified of everything around them, and cultivated their first response to anything being incredible violence, which eventually got them locked up by heaven in their flesh penitentiary or whatever prison synonym we go for. When v1 finally comes along and frees them, they’re barely coherent enough to even give their speech, and they have not a shred of the valiance their fellow primes have shown - they harbor no grudge against the angels, their only wish to be free, but upon registering v1’s presence, the only response they can muster is fear, and consequently try to fight it. Upon their inevitable defeat, the two, again, free of malice, and now drained even of self-defensive anger, can only embrace and cry together one last time.

During their fight itself, I'm imagining that the two are completely animalistic - they move nearly as fast and erratically as v1 itself, dependent a lot more on direct movement than the teleports Minos and Sisyphus work with, their state of "rest" when out of stamina being skating around and peppering v1 with thorns of eden much akin to v2's combat. Their main combos, their "Thy End is Now!"s and "You Can't Escape!"s have the main caveat that most parry opportunities from Adam are immediately either preceded or proceeded by an unparriable from Eve, and fucking up one will usually confirm the other. Other assorted ideas are:

Vine whip that, while also used by them in their movement to redirect their momentum, can be used like a Hideous harpoon. The way they use this most commonly is to spear v1 and then string it up and suspend it in the air, forcing it to either rely almost entirely on dash i-frames to dodge or quickly kb'ing the whip and slamming back to the ground. Also thinking that their power allows them to instate their presence on the world around them, allowing eden to partially take over the penitentiary, making bramble a hazard that they can just, y'know, grab and fling v1 into.

Previously mentioned thorns of eden are hitscan pellets that they can either fire rapidly, like the gutterman's chaingun, or in short, 2-shot bursts akin to v2's revolver. Also like v2, they can shoot coins with the thorns - And speaking of coins, they also have a sort of coin derivative in seeds of eden, which they can throw out in arrays, which will hang in the air for a moment before homing onto v1. They will do nothing but follow until v1 or A&E shoot it, at which point they will explode, ricocheting around all present seeds, ending the chain with the seed closest to the target (v1 if A&E shoot it, vice versa).

The two have three phases, two health bars - The first health bar is a standard prime fight, with their stamina growing and moveset getting a bit more deadly after hitting half heath, gaining the briars seen wrapping around them in the photo as their "crowning" similar to sisyphus gaining his beard and minos his aura, but the second health bar is much more dramatic, with them struggling to right themselves after the damage v1 has inflicted, with eve, in the struggle, managing to pull her half-formed body out from adam's, standing on her own for the first time since becoming a combined prime on a knotted tangle of veins and translucent guts, the two's spirit reinvigorated by the distress of their separation and the physical agony of being mutually disemboweled, then fighting together as two separate targets. Eve takes half the damage Adam does, but is less aggressive, taking most of the ranged role from him and meleeing only when joining in his melee combos, and, due to half her current body mass being vascular system, is also constantly bleeding fresh blood, essentially having a permanent mini-screwdriver in her.

okay that's all i got for now thanks for reading my illness <3