#time to hear the same lines from the last decade of videos on this exact same fucking mod

[pippin-pippout]

I just watched MelonTeee's video on Ace and Worth and man the internal debate I have with myself on whether I agree with the choice or not...

Her video explains the fandom's love for the character so well, as well as why the tragedy hit so hard. For me personally I have not been that affected by a character death in a LONG time.

And I understand it from a certain narrative perspective – mainly how Ace's past continues to feature in the story a decade later, and Whitebeard's line that someone would carry Ace's flame, because that clearly describing Luffy. He goes after the mera mera no mi and finishes what Ace started in Wano.

But there are two major narrative reasons given for Ace's death that I disagree with. And are largely why I think it shouldn't have happened, and also why the death has hit me so hard.

This is going to get long, but I would really love to hear everyone's thoughts on it if you choose to read!

To give Luffy the push he needed to be stronger: I am pretty confident this is Oda's stated reason (in addition to Oda wanting to prove he could kill characters which I guess he said at one point and which is bleh given the level of injury a character sustains seems to have nothing to do with whether they die or not lol it's just what the author wants to happen). Anyway. That push already happened on Sabaody when Luffy lost everyone to Duma. He was HELPLESS. More helpless than he was through most of marineford. And when Rayleigh convinces Luffy to do the 2 years training, Rayleigh only brings up their epic defeat on Sabaody. He does not bring up marineford or Ace's death as a reason Luffy needs to get stronger. Because Luffy did not need that reason. The only argument I can think of is that maybe once he landed on Amazon Lily, and he realized the strawhats were likely alive, the terror he felt on Sabaody abated slightly. And therefore maybe he needed a reminder of what "loss" truly is to re-motivate him. However, I don't think that is really fitting with his character or the story.

Ace's dream was fulfilled: Oda has talked about the reason he doesn't kill villains is because not having your dream fulfilled is a worse fate than death. I think part of the tragedy of Ace's death was that his dream wasn't fulfilled. Even for those who accept his last words - that he had only one regret which was not seeing Luffy accomplish his dream - the amount of time he got to live with that dream was literally the last moments of his life. But I don't think just because you die with no regrets, does not mean your dream is fulfilled. Especially when Ace never truly internalized what his dream was. His final choice to turn around showed HOW MUCH he still was that lonely, scared little kid he was at 10 despite his warm smile and his growing family. The most heartbreaking part of the flashback was not Sabo's death. It was watching Ace asking the question "do I deserve to exist?" and giving all his devotion to those who said yes. It was him making the exact same decision he would make 10 years later, to refuse to run, because he felt like if he ran he would lose everything and Luffy was standing behind him. Ace's final words do more than state he has no regrets. He also gives the answer to the question he'd asked Garp, and that Garp had said only his actions could decide. Ace died thanking Luffy and his family for loving him despite the "worthless" or "good for nothing" person he was. Ace was moved to tears to hear his family emphatically saying "YES. You do deserve to live! We want you to live!" But Ace never actually believed it. His last words were a reflection of gratitude for the love he was given that he didn't feel he deserved. And thus his final answer to the question "Do I deserve to exist?" was no.

That he was too "good" This is kind of the most upsetting one I've heard (thankfully not a lot) and also the one easiest to dismiss. Ace, being the actual son of the pirate king, being super powerful, growing in strength and reputation faster than Luffy (debatable), put him narratively in competition with Luffy. What I mean by that is it positions him as too much the golden character, the mary sue, the typical protagonist, when One Piece is about Luffy's story, not Ace's. I disagree with the premise of seeing Ace's character that way. But also even he was "that" character, it's pretty clear Ace's dream would have taken him to becoming Whitebeard's heir - whose dream it was to build a family - while Luffy is Gol D Roger's heir. So Ace's journey would have supported the main story of One Piece and also be narratively satisfying.

---

What Was Ace's Dream?

The dreams Ace stated out loud were more reflections of his actual, deeper dream. "I want to be the king of the pirates" - because he wanted to prove his existence and his worth to the world. Which switched to "I want to make whitebeard the king of the pirates" - because Whitebeard loved him despite his blood, and so even if that wasn't what Whitebeard wanted, it was how Ace understood he could repay Whitebeard.

Both of those stated dreams get back to this question he'd been asking his whole life - that of worth. Worth and Love, which, for Ace's character, are inseparable.

For Ace's dream to truly be fulfilled, it's not enough for him to accept he was loved – which he did on the scaffolds, crying from happiness – he had to believe he was worth that love. He had to love himself.

Ace died with that dream tragically unfulfilled.

---

The Purpose of One Piece

Of course the decision to kill Ace makes the story more realistic and of course it is heartbreaking, tragic, moving, and obviously inspires deeper discussion.

However, what rankled me from when I first learned about his death, which was way before I was even introduced to the character in Alabasta, was that he is the only character of the younger generation (outside of flashbacks) to die.

Honestly when I first heard Ace was one of the only characters to die, I was just worried it would make him seem weaker or stupider than every other character, which is a personal pet peeve of mine. Luckily for most fans, it didn't do that.

Instead, what wound up upsetting me was how it seemed to contradict the purpose of the story that is One Piece (at least what I think the purpose is). In doing so, it opposes the meaning that many fans find in this absurd, ridiculous, inspiring, heartfelt, heroic tale about a boy made of rubber.

One Piece is an escapist story about a boy named Luffy who inspires every good guy he meets to pursue and achieve their dream. It's also about Luffy beating up every bad guy who punishments are that they cannot fulfill their morally reprehensible dreams.

Because of Ace's premature death, he is the only good guy character in the main timeline who does not get to pursue his dream. And what's extra tragic is that he is also one of the most deserving of seeing his dream fulfilled.

[ddyfckr-a]

if  i  ever  seem  curt  when  talking  ooc,  i  apologize.

i  have  been  in     &.     out  of  the  fandom  scene     &.     tumblr  for  a  little  over  a  decade.     at  this  point.     i'm  at  an  age  where  i  don't  have  the  energy  for  a  lot  of  these  things  anymore.     i  am...     afraid  of  reaching  out     &.     forming  bonds.     i  have  realized  that  this  is  evidently  my  fault.

i  am  always  eager  to  jump  in  with  a  writer     &.     make  stories,  exchange  plot  lines,  do  rapid  fire  roleplays,  bur  it  always  starts     &.     ends  the  same  way :     we're  both  invested,  we  make  all  these  scenarios,  we  exchange  in  depth  metas,  we  share  videos,  images,  memes  that  remind  each  other  of  our  characters,  we  talk  every  day  for  several  hours  on  end  etc  etc.

but  somewhere  along  the  line,  i  lose  them.     the  other  person's  interest  dwindles  until  i'm  trying  to  light  up  the  spark  in  them  again.     responses  become  less  enthusiastic,  less  detailed,  until  all  i'm  left  with  is  one  word  responses  or  even  just  emoji  reactions.     until  one  day,  i  realize  we  haven't  spoken  in  several  months,  sometimes  close  to  a  year     &.     it's  not  for  a  lack  of  trying  on  my  end.     i  leave  detailed  plots  or  messages.     or  sometimes  just  me  trying  to  check  in.     &.     i  get  crickets,  because  by  that  point,  the  person  has  already  moved  on  to  something  else.

it  sucks.

what  trips  me  out  is  that  this  doesn't  happen  once  or  maybe  twice  from  the  same  fandom.     this  has  happened  in  several  fandoms,  with  several  different  people,  at  different  stages  of  my  life,  playing  with  different  characters.     logically,  if  it  the  same  thing  keeps  happening  to  you  at  several  different  times  of  your  life  with  several  different  people,  that  tells  you  that  you're  the  problem.     but  it's  frustrating  because...     i  never  quite  know  how  to  make  it  better,  how  to  fix  it.

a  recent  incident  has  also  led  me  to  the  conclusion  that,  just  generally  speaking,  i'm  not  really  likable.     the  other  person  was  apparently  looking  forward  to  writing  with  me,  until  they  realized  that  i  was  someone  they  already  knew,     &.     all  of  a  sudden,  i  don't  hear  anything  from  them  anymore.     &.     i'm  not  saying  that  to  get  pity  points  or  anything,  even  in  real  life,  i've  been  told  that  i  can  come  across  really  blunt,  rude  or  selfish.     i've  been  trying  to  adjust  my  behaviors,  because  i  never  mean  ill  intent,  perhaps  my  personality  may  be  off  putting.

but  again,  it  becomes  frustrating  because  i  don't  know  what  exactly  to  do.     what  exact  behaviors  to  adjust.     previous  experiences  has  shown  me,  apparently  i'm  likable  to  a  point.     but...     then  stuff  happens,     &.     suddenly  i'm  not  interesting  anymore,  i'm  boring,  i'm  repetitive.     &.     yet  i  see  other  people  acting  the  same  way  i  do     &.     they  don't  seem  to  have  the  same  issues,  regarding  writing     &.     interacting / roleplaying  with  others.     

i  just  don't  understand.

people  tell  you  it's  natural,  not  everyone  can  talk  about  the  same  thing  for  several  years  on  end     &.     yet,  i  can't  help  but  look  with  envy  to  those  that  have  these  strong  friendships  that  last  years  on  end     &.     they  can  indeed  talk  about  the  same  ships     &.     the  same  plots     &.     everything.

so  i  feel  stuck,  tired     &.     not  really  eager  to  make  new  bonds  because  i  know  it'll  end  up  the  same  way.     i  just  came  out  of  this  very  situation.     i  had  a  roleplay  partner  on  discord     &.     we  spoke  for  about  just  a  little  over  two  years  about  our  ship,  but  then  gradually,  it  started  to  dwindle.     they  stopped  reaching  out,  they  stopped  getting  excited  to  see  me,  they  stopped  checking  up  on  me,  even  when  i  would  still  do  the  same  in  return.     &.     the  crazy  part  is  that,  with  all  these,  i'm  never  blocked,  i'm  never  '  broken  up  with',  these  people  are  theoretically  still  my  friends,  but  whenever  i  try  to  reach  out,  it's  like  i  have  to  reintroduce  myself  all  over  again.     it  hurts  because,  i  may  have  been  easily  forgetful  for  them,  but  for  me ?     i  remember  them,  i  go  back  to  our  messages     &.     i  read  them     &.     i  have  them  ingrained  in  my  head  because  they  are  people  that  i  want  to  talk  with     &.     continue  engaging  with.     but  the  feeling  is  apparently  never  mutual.

so  this  has  led  me  to  where  i  am  now,  where  i  do  want  to  roleplay,  i  DO  want  to  interact,  i  WANT  to  be  happy  to  get  excited  without  the  feeling  of  dread,  but  the  pain  of  potentially  going  thru  the  same  experience  is  too  much  for  my  mental  health,  so  i  just  keep  to  myself.     maybe  i  can  learn  to  hype  MYSELF  up,  to  get  excited  over  my  own  ideas  i  stead  of  seeking  constant  validation.     it  would  be  so  much  easier  for  me  if  i  didn't  care  for  interaction,  because  then  i  could  just  write  all  the  fanfiction  ideas  i  have,  but  have  no  motivation  to  write.     

but  i  do  crave  that  interaction,  so...     i  just  think  it's  best  if  i  keep  everything  to  a  minimum.     thus,  if  you  have  tried  to  reach  out  to  me     &.     i  don't  seem  that  receptive,  please  understand  that  it's  literally  not  you,  it's  me.     i'm  just  trying  to  keep  myself  guarded  for  my  own  mental  health,     &.     i'm  not  as  diligent  as  i  used  to  be  with  messages.     inbox  is  always  open,  starter  calls  are  obviously  open  if  i  post  them  etc.     this  isn't  to  announce  that  i'm  changing  anything,  this  is  more  of  an  explanation  as  to  why  i  am  the  way  i  am.

thank  you  for  reading  xx

[enluv]

do exes see their breakup the same way ?

— lee heeseung x gn!reader

warnings: angst, no seriously I had to take a pause (it hit too close to home), i'm sorry hee fellow stans </3

coco's note: this was particularly harder to write seeing as, y/n & heeseungs relationship is based on a past relationship i had with someone i loved dearly that did not work out - you'll see what I mean if you decide to read it!

others: other members versions found here!

tagging: @bloom-bloom-pow <3

[video opens to two people in different rooms, neither can hear what the other is saying]

— "What's your name and the name of your ex?"

Y/N: Hello, I'm Y/N and my ex is Heeseung.

Heeseung: Ah hello, my ex is Y/N and I'm Heeseung.

— "Today we'll be filming you two separately to see how your answers differ. Are you ready?"

Y/N & Heeseung: Yes!

— "How did you meet?"

Y/N: Much unlike our friends from before, Heeseung and I met through school, we were friends before we dated.

Heeseung: They were in my class and we got assigned to do some type of project together, we clicked and became best friends.

[directed at heeseung]

— "What grade was that?"

Heeseung: It was 1st year, uh 1st grade.

— "Were you nervous?"

Y/N: Heeseung was super popular in our school, of course I was nervous! He literally smiled and girls would swoon. I wasn't sure what to expect.

Heeseung: Y/N was so known around school so yeah. They're really smart and so the school allowed them to move up a grade. I'm older than them but don't ask them that or they'll deny it. They were the talk of the school, it wasn't common for people to move up. I wouldn't call it nervousness but more like I was expecting a lot.

[round one of questioning ends]

— "How long were you together?"

Heeseung: We were friends for eight years before I asked them out. Then we were together romantically for four almost five years.

Y/N: We were together for four years and eight months.

— "When did it end?"

Y/N: Almost a year ago.

Heeseung: I can't think of an exact date but it was a process, roughly a year ago I think.

[after the second scene is filmed the couple is ushered back to their places for the third set of questions]

— "Why did you break up?"

Y/N: Oh wow, we're just getting right into it huh. Okay buckle then. Heeseung and I were together for four plus years and most of the time they were filled with love but times get tough when you're with someone for a really long time, and you begin to drift. For some couples this strengthens a relationship and helps them last years and years, but for others it can cause a relationship to crumble, and for Heeseung and I, the latter was the case.

Heeseung: After almost five long years, we grew apart. It was like we'd learned everything about one another and after there just was nothing new. Y/N admitted to me that they didn't see a future with me, and of course that hurt but when I started to think more about it, I came to the realization that I too, did not see us continuing a already broken relationship.

Y/N: After we spoke our truths we couldn't let go. It was hard to let all that go. We were friends for a decade and then turned lovers after, but we knew we had to do it or neither of us would be able to move forward with our lives.

Heeseung: We broke up because we both wanted something new in our lives and in the end we realized that the something new we wanted, was one another.

[directed at heeseung]

— "Can you elaborate?"

Heeseung: We wanted new lives, we had new goals, and we couldn't do anything because the other had a different path. In the end, we realized that our relationship needed to change and it was us who wanted that.

— "Do you regret it?"

Y/N: At times yeah, but if we hadn't then we would have tied the other down in an unhappy relationship that neither of us wanted.

Heeseung: Always, but it was the right path for both of us.

— "Who broke up with who?"

Y/N: I think it was me who toed the line and brought it up first.

Heeseung: Me maybe, I remember asking them what they wanted and suggesting a break up.

— "Who took the break up the hardest?"

Y/N: I want to say me because just imagine having to let go of your other half. Heeseung was literally always with me, always on my mind, always in my life, and then suddenly he was gone. Someone who knew everything about me, the things I liked, the things I hated, everything, was gone. I had to start from scratch and that was so hard. Moving on from our relationship proved to be one of the hardest things I've ever done.

Heeseung: Honestly, I think everyone close to us felt it. I know that Y/N and I were hit hard but so were our friends and family. When we broke the news to our friends they were throughly surprised. No one had expected it. I remember getting a call from my brother asking me if something had happened to cause us to suddenly break up, hell even Y/N's mom called me.

[y/n and heeseung are asked to stay in place for the final question set]

— "What do you miss most about your relationship?"

Heeseung: I miss everything but mostly, the stability and loyalty. Y/N was and always will be my most loyal anything, and I will forever love them for that. I wanted them by my side forever.

Y/N: I miss our relationship before things went south. We matched one another perfectly and I'm glad we did, I spent my life with him and I'm forever happy that I was given that opportunity.

[a heartbreaking silence falls upon the studio as the staff and producer clap quietly before speaking up]

Producer: Thank you both for coming in today. We appreciate it a lot and wish you two the best, see you next time!

[the final lights switch off as the producer yells "cut!"]

coco's final note: this was not proofread seeing as I couldn't bring myself to go through it all again but I do hope you all enjoyed this fic :) if you have any thoughts on it lmk !! wonie's will be filled with fluff as a sorry for this one <3

[seerofmike]

The Writing In Apex Kinda Sucks And Also They Use Ship Bait As A Plot Device I Hate It Here

a stupid essay/rant encouraged by @zombiegloss that originally started as a youtube video script so if its like. weird at points. this was intended to be a verbal rant SNZISKSIA

basically i'm gonna talk abt the caustic-wattson-crypto relationship drama and how i think it was mishandled and how much the writers kind of Suck because i Can

you are free to disagree with me on any of my points and think that this aspect of the story was handled well, this is just my opinion, and i'd love to hear your thoughts and counterpoints !

first, addressing some things:

i know this is a battle royale and not necessarily a story-based game, so i can’t expect it to have masterful witcher-style writing.

but with the direction the game seems to be going; putting quests, evolving interactions, and comics in the game, plus coming out with a lore book and hinting at something bigger in the future, i think it’s fair to criticize it for lackluster writing, especially since what i’m criticizing has been something present since Apex’s story technically began.

secondly, i am not a professional writer. i’m a high schooler who writes as a hobby. i don’t have the decades of experience that some of the apex writers do, and i can’t claim to be a better writer than they are--but i also don’t have to be a five-star chef to realize that something tastes bad. when i critique something and give suggestions, i am not saying i could’ve done it better. i’m just bringing up what i think could have worked.

third, before i upset anyone , when i say a relationship is badly written, i’m not telling you that you can’t ship it or that your ship sucks. i’ll briefly touch on the shipping aspect of this and how it’s a detriment to the story but Ye

okay, so with that out of the way, let us Begin

relationships are often the emotional core of a story, and how strong your reaction is to conflict in these relationships depends on how the story sets them up. if you want the audience to care about these characters and what they go through, you need to develop them and establish the type of relationship they have well. it’s why so many people cried in the last episode of telltale’s the walking dead. you’ve spent roughly 12 hours bonding with clementine and protecting her, and your relationship with her is part of several story beats as well as character beats for lee. 

when these two characters’ relationship reaches its peak at the end of the game, it’s powerful, and it’s emotional. you care. you feel something, and the fact that you have to choose what to do to lee only makes it more gut-wrenching. 

now, the walking dead is entirely story-based and especially character-driven, so it may be unfair to compare it to apex, but i just wanted to lay the groundwork down for what i think is a strong relationship that makes you feel something when conflict arrives, in this case the conflict being lee getting bit and clementine having to decide his fate.

the broken ghost in general is kind of not-good sometimes, tom casiello previously wrote for soap operas and you can really, REALLY tell sometimes.

this story feels like it should’ve taken place a little later, and that we should’ve had a season to actually set up the characters and their relationships, but that’s a story for another day.

to put it bluntly, the set-up for the crypto, wattson, and caustic conflict is done poorly. for caustic and wattson's relationship it’s a little better, but not by much. 

wattson and caustic having a relationship was hinted at in season 2, when her lore indicated that caustic was among one of the Legends who comforted her after her father died. In season four lore materials posted on Twitter, an email from Jacob Young states that Caustic is acting paternal towards Wattson. In season five, interactions get added to the Game, and this is the first time we actually see their relationship in action, as they have unique revive voice lines for each other. in the quests, when wattson is injured, caustic lashes out at loba and attacks her out of what seems to be anger at wattson’s current state.

Side Note this plot point was really stupid and done for cheap drama because she literally wakes up like two chapters later and they don’t even give her anything to say it’s just suddenly oh yeah crypto and wattson are working together. the same exact injury thing happens to octane later but nobody gIVES A SHIT because again, it’s just cheap soap opera drama.

their relationship might seem a little bit sudden for anyone who wasn’t on top of twitter lore drops, but like, it’s okay, i guess. i’ll give it the slightest credit for at least establishing something between the two in terms of voice lines and stuff, even if for some it might seem like it came out of nowhere.

what did come out of nowhere, though, was crypto and wattson’s friendship. in the quests, crypto and wattson are tasked with rebuilding the broken ghost because of their respective skills, and they’re seen talking in chapter six while they work on it. we’re not really given a clear timeline on how long the story in the broken ghost is, but i think it takes about a week, maybe.

unlike wattson and caustic, their relationship has been given absolutely zero material to work with before now, not even a passing glance in the trailers--which is a little weird considering crypto took down the repulsor tower and destroyed wattson’s home, but. Whatever.

tl dr of the chapter: crypto and wattson talk to each other while doing nerd shit, crypto laughs at wattson’s bad pun, and then suddenly they’re BESTIEEEES, until a couple dozen lines later in the same chapter. then they’re Not.

crypto’s drone gets hacked by revenant while everyone was kind of on edge after the reveal of a spy in their midst, he gets framed as the spy by caustic, anddddd wattson gets upset.

before i get into how dumb this storyline is, i’m gonna talk about the set-up to this conflict.

we have been given no reason to believe that these characters have ever talked to each other, and quite frankly, their friendship doesn’t really make sense.

ignoring the fact that crypto destroyed wattson’s home--which she probably doesn’t know about, so that’s forgiven for now--crypto is a paranoid guy. in the lore book he makes people stand on fucking footprints in his house so he can scan them for weapons and listening devices, and he apparently doesn’t stick around much after the games and nobody knows anything about him because he doesn’t talk to them.

a key part of crypto’s story is the fact that he is undercover and afraid of anyone finding out anything about him ever. him becoming friends with wattson kind of comes out of the blue, and we’re not even given a reason as to why they supposedly became close in the first place. i would kind of understand if like, maybe he draws parallels with her and mila in his mind and it makes him open up a little more, but that doesn’t happen. he just laughs at her joke and suddenly they’re friends.

maybe they’re trying to go for this ‘wattson can become friends with anybody’ angle, kind of hinted at with caustic but not really we’ll get into that, but that also? kind of doesn’t make sense since so many of her voice lines straight-up say she doesn’t understand people and electricity is more her thing, but honestly, she also does have those really friendly elements in her voice lines too, so its not as egregious as what they did with crypto.

their sudden out-of-the-blue friendship would’ve been fine if they spent a little more time fleshing it out, and giving us something to work with, but instead, the story immediately tries to rip it apart and frame it as this grand conflict where crypto is framed as the mole, crypto then accuses caustic, and wattson feels betrayed.

except it doesn’t really work, because we don’t give a shit. for several reasons. 

one: crypto and wattson became friends and then ended their friendship in the same exact chapter. they did not speak to each other onscreen until this chapter began, you can read the entire quest on the wiki and see for yourself that their interactions up until that point were nonexistent aside from mentions in the narration that they were building something together.

the reason wattson feels betrayed is kind of stupid too. why does she really care that much if one of them betrayed loba? nobody else really cared about the fact that one of them was a spy, in fact, nobody even seems to like loba that much, and they just found out that loba’s been lying to them this whole time, and wattson was conscious for that conversation and had a speaking line, so she’s fully aware of the situation. 

maybe it’s just like, the idea that one of them lied, but that’s still kind of a weak reason. 

this entire betrayal thing is just dumb, and it gets even worse when you realize that there could have been an actual legitimate reason for wattson to feel betrayed by crypto--even if it still would’ve come across as weak conflict because of their newly established friendship, it would’ve made more sense than this. 

Crypto destroyed Wattson’s home. He took down the tower and then all the flyers and stuff invaded Kings Canyon and made it their bitch. Not only that, but Wattson considers the Syndicate her family. The Syndicate are the very people who framed Crypto for murder and he’s trying to take them down. 

They could’ve set up actual conflict with these things, and it almost seemed like they would, because Caustic briefly brings up that Crypto could be working with Revenant because he has something against the Syndicate but then that doesn’t really go anywhere and we’re just back to Wattson feeling betrayed because either Crypto or Caustic was a spy and she doesn’t know who.

Weak conflict could’ve been made better by a strong relationship and a weak relationship could’ve still been interesting with strong conflict, but both the relationship between Crypto and Wattson and the conflict that drives them splitting up as friends were really weak and didn’t make much sense. 

It would’ve been ten times more interesting if Wattson found out Crypto ruined her home, the arena she grew up in, and was now participating in the Games to take out the people she regards as her family. That’s where her distrust could’ve manifested and conflict could’ve began, but instead it was the stupid betraying loba thing. why do you care. you just started talking to this guy like 2 hours ago.

also caustic’s whole reason for framing crypto feels stupid as fuck. he didn’t just frame crypto randomly, he framed him specifically because he doesn't want him to influence wattsob because he likes her Big Brain, but this is the FIRST time we have seen those two interact. 

what influence is he talking about? wraith and wattson have been shown to be friendly with each other in the trailers, according to tom’s tweets, and in the story too so why doesn’t he frame her? at this point the audience had slightly more build-up for those two’s relationship than crypto and wattson and a betrayal storyline would’ve felt a little more deserved if still weak.

this is the point where i briefly want to touch upon shipping, and the fact that part of this conflict feels driven by shipbait. 

aside from their relationship coming out of nowhere and the writers trying to make the stakes seem high and deeply emotional to the characters involved (despite this essentially being the first time they’ve ever interacted) tom casiello literally addresses shippers in a tweet regarding chapter seven, and as the story between these characters progresses, it becomes clear to me, at least that the crypto-wattson thing is just bait for shippers, and it’s lazy. 

it’s easy to get away with giving your characters little to no relationship development if you’re just counting on shippers to do the heavy mental lifting for you

why should i put any effort into making this relationship seem believable? people are going to see a young guy and a young girl having bare minimum interaction and assume there’s romantic interest! then i don’t have to do any work, see look, it’s a ready-made relationship wrapped in a bow for me! all that’s left for me to do is give them conflict so i can keep teasing shippers with lines like ‘you never deserved her’!

i think it’s reasonable for me to suspect shipbait, since tom casiello likes doing darksparks shipbait on twitter, and i’m like, eighty percent sure mirage and bloodhound suddenly being childhood friends in the book is shipbait too, because these characters were the number one ship in apex for a long time despite little to no interaction, and then all of a sudden in the lore book they’re childhood friends despite this literally never being mentioned before?

like bloodhound is set up to be mysterious and nobody knows what they look like, or where they’re from, or who their family is--except for mirage Apparently, who played with them when he was a kid on their home planet, and has seen them with their mask off, because bloodhound did not wear a mask when their parents were still alive.

its weird.

i’m pretty sure they’ve said somewhere they were working on this book before apex even came out, so i could just be completely wrong and they always planned for mirage and bloodhound to know each other, but if that’s the case, why did they never mention it like they did octane and lifeline?

i refuse to believe MIRAGE never brought it up either like ‘heeeeyy bloodhound remember when we used to throw eggs at our parents lab haha wanna go do to that to bangalore’s room’ 

[silence]

‘good talk buddy’

ANYWAYS I GOT OFF TOPIC. POINT IS, shipping is a detriment to the story because the writers don’t feel like they actually have to put any work into establishing or developing the relationship between characters when they know the community’s just going to do it for them anyways, and that they can put in shipbait and it’s fine and it makes sense when it really doesn’t.

imagine watching captain america civil war after not seeing a single other marvel movie.

why would you care about the avengers splitting up or tony and steve butting heads or steve’s commitment to bucky? you wouldn’t care, at least not as much as someone who’s seen all the movies and knows the relationship between the characters and why the sokovia accords exist in the first place. you don’t have context and you don’t have any reason to be emotionally invested in these characters’ relationship.

 this feels like that. the writers tried to squeeze this relationship and stuff into a single chapter and we don’t fucking care unless we were already invested in the idea of their relationship (shippers) because we barely spent any time with it.

so to summarize this little section, the set-up of this storyline Kinda Sucks! crypto and wattson barely seem to know each other, because we the audience barely saw them together and the writers are relying on shipbait in place of a relationship.

wattson and caustic are a little better but not great, but the conflict is stupid and it only gets stupider.

moving onto summarizing the rest of the broken ghost, gibraltar and caustic talk, caustic LITERALLY confesses to being the mole and says he framed crypto so he couldn’t corrupt wattson and to appear innocent because his identity was suspected, then that wraps up the season storyline.

season six begins with new voice lines, where wattson has had enough of crypto and caustic’s shit and is all passive-aggressive and going ‘this doesn’t change anything’. she has to decide who to trust, and how to figure out The Truth for herself because she’s not a little girl anymore. crypto and caustic are both trying to convince her they’re innocent and it creates some interesting conflict.

just kidding. it’s terrible conflict. you want to know why?

BECAUSE GIBRALTAR TRIED TO TELL HER THE TRUTH, RIGHT AFTER THE SEASON 5 QUEST HAPPENED, AND SHE LITERALLY REFUSED TO HEAR IT.

LIKE THERE’S A SEASON 6 LOADING SCREEN WHERE HE’S TELLING EVERYONE THE TRUTH ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED, AND WHEN HE GETS TO WATTSON AND IS LIKE HEY I KNOW WHO THE MOLE WAS AND WHY THEY DID IT, SHE JUST GOES i dont wanna hear it. i need to think

IF YOU WANT THE TRUTH WHY ARE YOU REFUSING TO HEAR IT

SHE SPENDS ALMOST TWO ENTIRE SEASONS MAD AT CRYPTO FOR SOMETHING HE DIDN’T DO BECAUSE SHE TOLD GIBRALTAR TO FUCK OFF WHEN HE TRIED TO TELL HER WHAT HAPPENED

ITS SO DUMB

i think it was towards the end of season 6 or the beginning of season 7 where apex posted this picture of wattson asleep at her desk where she has a letter from gibraltar on it that looks like it tells her the truth, so she knows now, she knows what happened, but NOW her issue is the fact that she doesn’t know anything about crypto.

WHAT THE FUCK. WHAT IS YOUR GODDAMN DAMAGE. YOU DON’T KNOW SHIT ABOUT BLOODHOUND EITHER ARE YOU THIS UPSET WITH BLOODHOUND TOO?? HAVE YOU EVER TALKED TO PATHFINDER. DO YOU HATE PATHFINDER TOO

oh but she was friends with crypto and now she’s mad that he lied to her EXCEPT THEIR RELATIONSHIP WASN’T BUILT UP WELL SO IT JUST FEELS STUPID. THEY SPENT LONGER BEING NOT-FRIENDS THAN THEY SPENT BEING FRIENDS. THEY BECAME FRIENDS IN ONE CHAPTER AND THEN IMMEDIATELY AT THE END OF THAT CHAPTER THEIR FRIENDSHIP ENDED AND THEN WATTSON SPENT LIKE 2 SEASONS MAD AT HIM FOR SOMETHING HE DIDN’T DO . 

AND THE WRITERS TRIED TO RECTIFY THIS BY SAYING OH SHE’S NOT MAD ABOUT THE TRAITOR THING SHE’S MAD BECAUSE SHE DOESN’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT HIM AND IT’S LIKE WHY THE FUCK DID YOU NOT MAKE THAT CLEAR WHY DOES SHE SAY ‘IT DOESN’T CHANGE WHAT YOU DID’ IN HER VOICE LINES WHY DOES SHE CALL HIM A TRAITOR IF HER CONFLICT WAS HER NOT KNOWING MUCH ABOUT HIM . WHAT DID HE DO. 

HE JUST STOOD THERE AND LAUGHED AT HER JOKE AND THEN HE GOT FRAMED AND THEN THAT WAS THE END OF THE CHAPTER AND NOW SHES SUDDENLY LIKE IM ACTUALLY MAD BECAUSE YOURE A LIAR AND I CANT TRUST YOU EVEN THOUGH I NOW KNOW YOU WERE FRAMED I STILL DO NOT LIKE YOU AND HES LIKE YEAH THATS MY FAULT

The Caustic voicelines are stupid too, again his reason for framing Crypto was stupid and a lot of his voicelines just seem to be that shipbait thing again but like from the angle of overprotective dad who doesn’t like the new boyfriend. it’s stupid but not as egeregious as this next part which is

crypto telling wattson his identity.

CRYPTO was framed for MURDER and is paranoid and can’t trust anyone and doesn’t talk to anyone and the last time he did talk to someone he got framed for Another thing and the person he was talking to turned her back on him and actively refused to know the truth for like 2 seasons and then he went This Is Fine I Can Tell Her My Identity

the stupidest update to this storyline was crypto telling wattson the truth

why did they do it on the dropship where there are presumably syndicate members and other legends around.

why didn’t he scan wattson for listening devices like he did for pathfinder in the book.

why is he telling her his identity when he knows she has very close ties to the people that FRAMED HIM for MURDER. Does he trust her that much? WHY? They spoke to each other in a chapter and then spent two seasons not talking to each other beyond passive-aggressive BS. why are you so fucking stupid taejoon

their relationship was so poorly set-up that even if the writers maybe intended for them to come across as close friends who had spent weeks bonding, it really feels like they became friends in a single conversation, had a falling out, and now crypto suddenly trusts her with his identity after an undetermined amount of time because he wants to be friends again. 

that does not make SENSE this conflict feels contrived AS FUCK and the resolution feels even worse and unearned UGGGHHHH

it honestly comes across as crypto feeling desperate for friendship, and maybe this would’ve worked better if that’s the angle they played it as.

he’s been alone for roughly two years, and just wants a friend, and he’s honestly so lonely he just breaks down to the first person who’s really talked to him. it could’ve been an interesting little part of his character, and they could've gone into depth about how much this situation has affected him, but that’s not what they’re doing. he’s still paranoid and anxious and doesn’t trust anyone, except for wattson, because the plot needs him to or else there won’t be any stupid soap opera drama.

and to rub salt in the wound, wattson’s new voice lines with caustic have him telling her that she forgave crypto.

WHAT ARE YOU FORGIVING HIM FOR. ARE YOU FORGIVING HIM FOR BEING FRAMED? WHY DID HE HAVE TO APOLOGIZE TO YOU WHEN YOU WERE THE ONE WHO REFUSED TO HEAR THE TRUTH?

 did the conversation just go hey my real name is taejoon park and something bad happened to me and she went aight i forgive you WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT

Caustic’s new voice lines to Crypto where he’s like ‘what did you tell her’--YOU TOLD GIBRALTAR STRAIGHT-UP YOUR EVIL MASTER PLAN LIKE A SUPERVILLAIN AND NOW YOU’RE SURPRISED WATTSON AND CRYPTO ARE ON GOOD TERMS NOW?!

THAT’S LIKE TELLING SOMEONE YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER AND THEN BEING SURPRISED WHEN YOU BECOME THE VICTIM OF IDENTITY FRAUD. YOU SET YOURSELF UP FOR THIS WHY ARE YOU ACTING LIKE CRYPTO DID SOMETHING SINISTER OR LIED OR WHATEVER. WHAT THE FUCK. WHY DO YOU HAVE LIKE 3 BRAINCELLS

this is at like ten pages already so i’m going to just try and wrap this up quickly. 

it’s frustrating seeing this storyline play out when there are actually good relationships and storylines written into apex. i’m kind of getting tired of the loba and revenant conflict, but we at least had set-up to it in the form of a few animated shorts and it doesn’t play out as stupidly as this story does. bangalore and loba’s friendship is actually developed well, even if the point between the end of season 5 and season 6 where they suddenly talk like each other feels like it could’ve used a little more. 

where crypto and wattson having an established friendship in the broken ghost failed, lifeline and octane’s established friendship works because we’ve been told since octane’s release they were childhood friends and given lore materials that indicate they’ve known each other for a very long time.

apex wants this storyline between crypto and wattson and caustic to feel dramatic and tense and ultimately rewarding when crypto and wattson did become friends for real and stuff, but instead it just comes across as hollow and empty. 

there’s nothing there. it’s a case of tell, don’t show, and it looks like this stupid conflict is gonna keep going for another couple of seasons at this rate. 

side note: this entire script was written before the new twitter comics

please tell me ur thoughts and feel free to respond with ur own lil essay

also believe it or not this is not the "shipping is a detriment to apex's story" essay i was gonna write this is a completely different essay that has some overlap SKXISOSOW

[techmomma]

I made big progress with my trauma recovery the other day! I’m really proud of doing a very hard thing, and honestly doing so made me feel so much better.

Said growth involves realizing some unfun things, so y’know, look out for that under the read more, even if I consider this a hopeful, uplifting realization by the end. Christ this is long, have fun reading this word wall.

So I essentially lived in a bitter divorce household. Y’know, when the two parents have an awful, agonizing divorce that pits the kids’ loyalties against each parent and each other and themselves.

I grew up in that. Except they never actually divorced. Or separated. Not till after I’d moved out, anyway. So 20+ years of living in a household where my parents flip-flopped between “trying to make it work” and “screaming at each other and bitterly trying to corral their kids in this us-vs-them, me vs your other parent toxic tug of war.”

Why didn’t they divorce? Codependency and religious pressure because both were previous divorcees, one was an excommunicated catholic because of this, and the other was a narcissist who couldn’t admit defeat and made a promise to god to make it work for fear of the shame that would come from failing again! What a winning pair! Who definitely did not mutually cheat on one another and then act scandalized and eternally vindictive about this.

Anyway, what this meant for Steph’s psyche was every day was an eternal battleground of loyalty tests. Any disagreement was disloyalty. Saying the wrong thing could be taken as disloyalty. Yet, y’know. You don’t want to be disloyal to the other parent that you love. You don’t wanna throw them under the bus. You just wanna say what you saw happened.

Which meant every answer became this tightrope of not only validating and appeasing one parent’s ego, but also finding the diplomatic thing to say so as not to implicate the other parent, or get that parent in trouble, or appear disloyal because that too could come around to bite you in the ass. Sometimes we agreed with what one parent was saying, but taking issue with a small part or one aspect? This was seen as fully disagreeing and being disloyal.

You can imagine the pressure this put on an already socially-awkward kid, ages 4-20, to find the exact correct thing to say. It rarely worked out.

But I figured out a clever loophole early on: if I shut down, if I didn’t make a peep, if I said not one word—sure. That parent would be mad at me for not responding. They’d be made I wasn’t saying anything. They might yell louder, or guilt me, or threaten me with some form of humiliation.

But not saying anything was so, so much better than any alternative. Never once did speaking up end well.

If you know about pavlovian training, you can probably quickly see the conditioning that was set in. Parent would state an opinion, about anything. Give validation. Parent looks for validation about shitty feelings about other people? Don’t say a peep, let parent be mad, and eventually they’ll either get so frustrated they give up, or they say their piece and get whatever was on their chest off of it. Either way, they leave me alone. Maybe after three hours of screaming at me, but three hours could turn into six if I made them more mad by disagreeing or seeming disloyal.

And for the record, when I talk about loyalty, I’m not saying they were asking about actual loyalty. They wanted me to agree with their opinions. They wanted me to be on their side, their ally, no matter what the other parent said. It was all or nothing. “You’re with me or against me.”

Made all the more complicated that sometimes, if you seemed disloyal to the other parent, the supposed “enemy” in the situation, the first parent might berate you for that too. “How could you talk about your mother/father that way? How could you say those things?” Despite having been saying worse things minutes before.

They were volatile. The smallest, stupidest things could become full-blown arguments that could last for hours, at the top of their lungs. After which they might turn that to us, the kids, to get out whatever was left in their system I guess. Small questions, statements, became tests. Answer wrong, and there would be hell to pay. The most innocuous things could become loyalty tests. But most of all, the most discerning tests came when they were complaining about the other. When Dad complained about Mom, and when Mom complained about Dad. “Agree with me,” they said between lines, “Are you on my side? Aren’t they terrible?”

I just wanted to love both of my parents. I never wanted to choose.

My epiphany came when I realized that when others seek comfort from me, when looking for validation during shitty events or people being mean to them—y’know, normal things people do with friends—I was having emotional flashbacks. I was being triggered into a state of trauma, my brain receding to that familiar shutdown state. Terrified that whatever I say to comfort them, whatever I say to help them feel better, would be taken as a loyalty test. To voice even slight disagreement could be disloyalty.

My friends had never tested me. But my brain was reacting so firmly and my body so wholly that I had no idea. I try to be aware of my emotional states and how my body reacts but this shutdown response has just been so normal for so long, and such a large bodily feeling, that I never noticed what it was. And it wasn’t until watching a video about this type of situation, feeling like you have to validate someone not necessarily from a place of concern but of fear, that I realized what was happened.

I realized how deep the rabbit hole went. This has been happening for decades. At work, when coworkers would complain or even just chat normally about other coworkers, my brain was shutting down out of fear that my loyalty was being tested, I was being scrutinized for disagreement. When customers talked about my coworkers, my brain was shutting down, terrified to say the wrong thing and either disagree with said customer or throw my coworker under the bus. I shut down when friends talk about other friends, when people talk about other people and maybe I agree, but there’s an aspect or idea in the situation that I don’t agree with, or maybe I’m just seeing things differently from an outside perspective.

But every time, I was terrified. I was so scared that my brain returned to trauma, returned to that shutdown state from childhood (and some adulthood), because shutting down, previously, had always yielded the better result. Staying quiet, keeping my head empty and my thoughts blank, kept me safe for twenty years.

And now I can’t hear other people talking in a room without returning to that same shutdown state, for fear that they are arguing and I will be forced to choose between people. To love one friend more than another. Forced to pick a side, forced to soothe their emotions because if I don’t, things will be so many times worse. Heaven forbid they have disagreeing opinions, even if they’re calmly sorting them out, communicating in a healthy way. God help me if they’re actually arguing. I can’t think, I can’t even speak sometimes, voice pulled tight like I’m being strangled; I can’t even squeak out a sound. It hurts too much. It hurts so much.

Sometimes I can hear people through my earbuds or headphones and all I can do is lay on my bed and plug my ears with my fingers as tight as possible and try to hum a song, try to force a mantra to drown out the sound as I desperately try to soothe myself with some kind of stim, even if it’s just rocking side to side on the bed.

I knew I had problems with listening to people disagreeing. But I realized the other day how deep the rabbit hole goes. How often, daily sometimes, I’ve been having emotional flashbacks. How thoroughly this has been effecting my life, my relationships, my sanity.

It’s been so exhausting. Realizing how many things connect back to this central issue of toxic loyalty that I grew up with, how thoroughly engrained this trauma is in my life. Realizing I’ve been having emotional flashbacks almost every day, for decades.

I’m so tired.

But I’m really glad I did. It’s putting a name to the beast. I am finally getting to the heart of an issue that was so much larger than I originally thought but in turn, there is so much potential to truly grow and heal. If I know the beast, then I can know how to face it. I can know how to use CBT therapy for this, how to weaken it to progress. And I’m really glad for it.

I also did something very hard: directly forcing myself to face it, and told my roommates about this deep-set fear. I realized that I don’t often just talk about how I’m feeling, I usually do so in the context of like having an issue or a problem that we need to talk out or talk through. I don’t usually just say, “I’m really really scared of this thing.”

I told my roommates this realization and like the wonderful, amazing friends they are, they understood. It’s an internal problem for me, something just for me to work on. It’s my issue. But now... they know that if I go quiet when discussing other people, or leave the room when disagreements are happening, I’m not just trying to blow them off or or be wishy-washy. I imagine there have been many times in the past when a friend has come in need of support and my answer came across weird or like I was trying to change the subject and it was awkward and not what they were hoping for.

Now they know that my response might be weird because I’m having a flashback. I’m scared, my brain is shutting down and I can’t think.

And that’s okay. It’s okay to be scared in front of my friends. It’s okay to experience that trauma in front of them. I don’t have to try to pretend I’m okay or try to push through the fear when I really, really can’t. It’s okay to need a subject change or even to just listen quietly if I don’t necessarily want my friend to stop venting, I just may not be able to answer in a beneficial way. I may be shutting down and sometimes all I can do is wait it out. And that’s okay.

I don’t have to validate other people because I’m scared. Because I think I’m being tested.

I felt better not just because talking about these things helps but also because a weight was lifted. One of my main triggers is feeling like I have to respond and have to respond correctly Or Else. But now that they know, that weight is off of my shoulders. I can be afraid and not able to respond and they understand why now. I don’t have to try to keep up that lie or try to put on a face or try to push through it.

I can be scared. And letting yourself be scared is the first step to healing from it. I don’t have to pretend to not be scared anymore.

I always know I’ve hit the hammer on the head when it comes to my emotional issues because I start crying and even just typing this out made me weepy, haha. It’s a good weepy though. I made a big step, and I’m really proud of myself. My instinct was to take this and agonize quietly over it myself, find my own solution on my own and deal with it on my own. But I didn’t. I reached out, and it was scary and hard and it hurt and now I’m so, so much better off for it, and now I can really start healing. I can change this.

God I’m so tired tho. Holy shit.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

WIP Wednesday: Whumptober Previews, Take 2

I still have a few more to go, but I am in the final stretch for writing my @whumptober2020​ pieces! I already posted one preview of what I have so far (you can see Days 1-12 here), so here are previews for the rest of what I have written - and sneak peeks at what’s planned out but not written yet! 

Whumptober starts tomorrow - we’ll see how you feel about my work this go-round! Last year, Whumptober Day 1 introduced Daniel Michaelson. This year... it starts with Danny, too.

Day 13:

“Vanni, they thought he was you.”

“I know, Ridley!” Rossi never snapped at Ridley, but here it was, and Connor forced in a hitching, shaky inhale around the tremendous, inescapable weight pressing down on him, determined to keep breathing long enough to understand. “I know they did.”

“And they fucking poisoned him and then dumped him to fucking die-”

“I know!” The two men went silent for a second, Ridley staring with shock at Rossi and Rossi glaring furious towards the window without looking back. Connor’s breath, rattling in his struggling lungs, was the only sound in the room.

Day 14:

Peter glanced over his shoulder, back towards the house. The thermometer had climbed a little more, reading 98.5 degrees Farenheit now, and Peter blinked as he shivered again, swallowing without any saliva. His mouth felt dry, and strange. Why was he shivering - how did he have goosebumps - if it was almost one hundred degrees?

As if he’d heard Peter’s thoughts, the side door opened and Micheal came out, wearing his weekend outfit of slim black slacks and a pale heathered gray t-shirt, what Madam allowed him to wear. He was carrying a glass of water with ice and a little striped straw stuck in the top. The black shock collar he was never allowed to remove - not yet, Madam said, not until Micheal learned how to be silent without needing encouragement, to her satisfaction - cut a wide band across his neck, the black box small and nearly perfectly blended in at the back. 

“Peter,” He said in a low voice - not quite a whisper, but just as quiet. “I brought you a drink, I-” He looked up, squinting towards the sky. “It’s hot. Should you be out here?”

Day 15:

He drops back to the ground, groaning, eyes fluttering open and shut, before he reaches out to grip onto Ora’s arm again. He turns to look at them, and his eyes are glowing so brightly he can see the reflected light on Ora’s face, the flicker of yellow against their irises. There are things that move beneath the light in Ryan Michaelson’s eyes, and he no longer feels them pushed back under the surface of his skin. 

“I’m so fucking hungry,” He whispers, and his fingernails dig into Ora’s arm until they begin to bleed and whimper, but they don’t - can’t - pull away. Not until he lets them.

They will be lost in his eyes until he decides to let them go.

Day 16:

Count to ten, Tris! One… two...

Her voice is so loud he jumps, but when he looks to the left, nothing’s there. Just the white walls, plain and featureless, white tiles that were smooth under his fingertips back when he was allowed to touch them. 

Everything is cold, and the boy has been shivering for so long that his muscles ache from the constant tense-and-release, tense-and-release, struggling to keep him warm.

Day 17:

She giggles a little, then glances over her shoulder, mouths something at the cameraman. Oliver can guess what. Edit that out.

Kelly Donahue doesn’t want the episode to be aired with her giggling like a schoolgirl at a bit of idle flattery. Well. Everyone has their things they like to hide, don’t they?

She has her giggle. Oliver has a teenage boy locked in his bedroom.

Day 18:

“Your mother,” Patrick interrupted, with gentle violence, “believes that you are squandering an opportunity.”

“An-... a what-”

“We respect your decision - and your brother’s - to refuse interviews, especially at his early date.” Patrick sounded like he’d rehearsed this answer, delivered with the same smooth cadence he had during his speeches before the Board of Directors. “But, considering the effort it took us to find you-”

“The effort it took Nate to find us,” Ryan corrected, ice growing along his veins at the same time it took over his voice. “Nate. It was Nate who watched the videos, it was Nate who talked Abraham into showing him the yard, it was Nate who spent fucking night after fucking night trolling fucking satellite photos to try and find us. Don’t act like the effort came from you. It came from my brother’s goddamn fiance.”

Day 19:

“If this is a trap, I’m going to owe Gavin fifty bucks.” Vera checked and rechecked her handgun, as though it would suddenly be less loaded than it was just a few minutes before. Her jaw was set in a grim line, eyes flashing a kind of damped-down fire, embers ready to spark. Her thick black hair, showing growing hints of gray, was pulled into a tight bun at the nape of her neck, and she wore a pair of black pants and a tucked-in t-shirt, ready for the fight she was definitely expecting. “I don’t want to owe Gavin money, Isaac.”

“It’s not a trap,” Isaac replied, making his own nervous check and recheck of the table and chairs. “I don’t think it is, anyway. My instincts are saying it isn’t.”

“Your instincts-”

“My instincts have been spot-on for a decade, Vera. Just trust me on this. She let us pick the day, the time, the location… she let us give her the location with less than four hours’ notice, even. If this is a trap, she’s piss-poor at setting it.”

Day 20:

He’d been flying, and the fall had been worse than the arrow, at first.

The sudden burst of white-hot pain had stunned him, caught him mid-spin enjoying an early-morning chill, and sent him tumbling to the ground below.

He’d heard his own frantic keens of panic and fear as if from a distance, and then they’d been drowned out when he slammed into the trees, feathers flying all around him as they were ripped free by the branches he smacked into one after another on the way down.

Day 21:

"Mmhmmm. Christopher. Stanton." Nat listens for a long time, then says quietly, "No known health problems. Autistic."

Jake looks up, and Nat calmly looks back at him, while speaking into the phone. "Yes. Yes, I'm confident. He is sensitive to fluorescent lights, scared of needles, and terrified of sedation. Yeah, I realize that I just described the exact environment we’re sending him into.” Chris whimpered, and Nat’s voice went ragged, her eyes closed tightly against the sight of his face pale, sweaty, twisted with pain. “Listen. Just-... just put on the fucking papers that Christopher Stanton is fucking autistic, because that's what my goddamn rescue is - I'll sell someone else's firstborn to fucking Satan if he isn't, mark my fucking words - and we're wasting time while he gets worse!"

Day 22:

Rossi picks the glass up and just as he tilts it up to his lips, Connor rears back and up on his knees and swings one of his hands, the black leather ‘paw’ smacking into the rim of the glass and spilling it in an arc across Rossi’s suit, onto the table, soaking his cards and hitting the next person at the table right in the eyes.

“Connor, what the fuck?!” Rossi’s voice isn’t furious, not yet - he’s too shocked to get beyond the simple surprise.

Day 23:

The drugs in his system weigh him down, he is too exhausted to understand what’s happening or how to begin to fight it. His eyes keep trying to close and stay closed, and he whimpers, forcing them back open.

“Pozhaluysta…” He groans, collapsing forward against the heavy solidity of the man, the soft tailored fabric of his expensive suitjacket, the scent of clove cigarettes that clings to him like a woman’s fingers clutching tightly. “Pozhaluysta, otpusti menya…”

Day 24:

“My name is Melody,” The girl said, nearly extending her hand, but then she realized the creature’s right hand was nothing but wickedly sharp talons, and it was bound in front of him to his left. “Oh, I’m sorry. What’s your name?”

The creature blinked once, twice. Watched her, tense and maybe suspicious, and then shook his head. “No… no name.” He spoke slowly, as though words came only with difficulty but a soft little trill sounded under one voice, layered it with another. “Pet.”

Day 25:

“Wh, where, where, where-where, where am, am I-”

“Sssshhhh.” The person in the dark blue uniform presses a plastic-gloved hand to his shoulder as he tries to sit up, pushing him back down. “Hey no, you gotta stay steady, there. Don’t move.”

“Please-... please, sir, h-hurts-”

“Not sir,” The person says, gently, a bit of auburn hair falling over their forehead. “Can you see?”

“K-Kind... kind of... hurts-”

“Sssshhhh. I know. I know it does. Just hang on. Tori’s going to help me get you some paperwork going. Don’t worry, kiddo.” The person pats him, lightly, and then looks up, brown eyes scanning the hallway outside. “You’re not the first we’ve pulled through this.”

Day 26:

Calon Nie hummed to himself, tapping talons on the floor, watching the boy sit so still, as though stillness could protect him from the dangers of the world. “Good. Failed, you, to keep new eyes. Costs a life, to give something new. Killan Josta, human boy, he fail Calon Nie. He fail the life given, when eyes don’t work. Did not respect sacrifice.”

“I’m… I’m sorry,” The boy said hoarsely, curling in on himself even more, his wings instinctively curling protectively around him. “I… I don’t want anyone to d-die for me. I didn’t mean to-... I didn’t mean to fail. I, I tried to p-pray for them, to stars, to-”

“Paugh! Mysteries do not hear you.”

Day 27:

Jake answers, and on the other side of the door, the old woman stands holding a large cardboard box in her arms, her grandson present, as nearly always, at her side. He holds a large box, too - so big, in fact, that only the top half of his face is visible.

“They’re sayin’ it could be a week before we get power back,” Ruth says, with a world-weary sigh. “A full-on week. We figured we’d bring you some supplies.” 

Day 28:

Ora Collins is hungry.

Day 29:

Jake is a tall man, but the emergency room always made him feel so small. Even now, part of him rehearses the scripted stories. I fell while climbing a tree. I crashed my bike. I tripped going down the stairs.

He has lies to tell today, just like he always has, but today the lies are for Chris, not himself.

He’s my brother. No, different dads, that’s all. His mom lives a few states away, I handle all his medical stuff. 

Day 30:

(AKA Possession, Part 2)

Ryan and Nate take down Abraham Denner.

Day 31:

Danny is left for dead.

[jazzviewswithcj]

A deeper look at Merci Miles: (Warner Records, 2021)

Miles Davis: trumpet; Kenny Garrett: saxophone; Deron Johnson: keyboard; Richard Patterson: bass; Ricky Wellman: drums

By July, 1991 Miles Davis was music royalty.  The previous decade saw him reach a level of popularity and stardom seldom seen in jazz.  By the early 80’s the trumpeter had changed music multiple times, 4 to be exact, with his foray into hip hop, the first recording to be issued after his death Doo Bop (Warner Bros, 1992) , marking the fifth groundbreaking turn in his career.  Prior to his passing from stroke complications in 1991, he maintained a vigorous touring schedule, and the performances of his sextet of the period, the finest late career band he ever led (and arguably one of the best bands of his entire career) were supercharged.  The music captured on the newly released Merci Miles: Live at Vienne (Rhino, 2021) marks the first time anywhere save two YouTube videos the concert has been available in full, and is significant and historically important for two reasons:  it is one of Miles’ final performances in France available legally, and it features two compositions by Prince, the cheeky entendre laden titles “Penetration” and “Jailbait” that the late icon wrote specifically for Davis.  

The picture of the late singer/composer/multi instrumentalist’s involvement with Davis is much clearer through the release of Prince’s own Sign O’ The Times multi disc mega box set and the official release of “Can I Play With U?” a track originally written by The Purple One during the legendary Rubberband (Rhino, 2018) sessions.   Prince’s track was going to be included on what eventually turned out to be Davis’ first album with his new label, Warner Bros. Tutu (1986) but was eventually shelved.  The track was then slated to be issued in the original, much more substantial The Last Word: The Complete Warner Brothers Recordings box set from the early 2000’s (of which promo copies existed) but was fazed out due to rights issues.

The trumpeter always regarded France warmly, from the time he first set foot on French soil as a 22 year old in 1949.  The country was also where in the late 1950’s he recorded the innovative soundtrack to Elevator To The Gallows or Ascenseur pour l’echafaud director Louis Malle’s smoky noir film of which the trumpeter’s soundtrack, completely improvised featuring a top French rhythm section crystallized some of the ideas the trumpeter later would apply on Kind of Blue (Columbia, 1959).  France was also the setting for the infamous romance with the late French starlet Juliette Greco.  More importantly, France, being the first country to wholeheartedly embrace jazz and recognize creative improvised Black music to be on par with European art music, was ready for whatever Davis brought to the table, instead of the misdirected pining that many fans and critics demonstrated in the U.S. for his past, acoustic centered work.  

Merci Miles was captured on July 1, 1991 at the Jazz a Vienne festival, at a picturesque Roman amphitheater filled to capacity.  7 days later on July 8, Miles would revisit the material from Porgy and Bess, Miles Ahead and Sketches of Spain at the Montreux Jazz Festival  with a double orchestra conducted by Quincy Jones and featuring the late trumpeter Wallace Roney as a second voice alongside occasional spots for alto saxophonist Kenny Garrett.    The appearance featuring this music was followed by an appearance with former band mates in Paris on July 10 (a concert that unfortunately of this writing is  being thieved by bootleggers for album release), and the European swing wrapped up in Nice, France on July 16th.

Miles’ band that July 1st evening, featuring Deron Johnson (who grew up with Miles’ nephew and former drummer Vince Wilburn, Jr) on keyboards; Kenny Garrett on alto saxophone and flute) lead bassist and Parliament alumnus Foley, bassist Richard Patterson, and the late Ricky Wellman on drums were inspired and smoking.

“Hannibal” written by Marcus Miller, which appeared on the group’s latest studio album Amandla (1989) is the high energy set opener, with the rhythm section of Johnson, Patterson and Wellman in perfect sync.  Miles flies free with some solo lines before the head appears, and Kenny Garrett makes his first appearance with a lengthy solo.  Garrett (who has a new Mack Avenue studio album in August) is like a heat seeking missile, the rhythm section responding and creating inner dialogues with him in response to his impassioned, pulpit stirring cries.  Deron Johnson, often alongside with Garrett in taking some of the best solos of the evening, briefly dialogues with Miles before spinning off into his own, substantial solo turn.  Johnson is a complete history of the keyboardist’s who played with the trumpeter and distills everything in his sparkling, distinctive soloing voice, swinging slightly behind the beat against the mightily funky bass and drums underneath.

“Human Nature”, the classic ballad   from Michael Jackson’s Thriller (Epic, 1982) Davis first debuted on You’re Under Arrest (Columbia, 1985).  The sensuous existential track became a blank canvas for the Davis band to paint on nightly.  The trumpeter renders the melody with longing, then gradually shifts into a resourceful solo with a double time sprint.  Within Davis’ solo and the use of Spanish tinged scales, and the colorful keyboard backing, the intense drama of the beautiful arrangements that Gil Evans crafted for Sketches of Spain (Columbia, 1959) which Marcus Miller expanded upon in a sense for the film soundtrack Siesta (Warner Bros, 1989) are clearly felt.  Davis quotes “Nature Boy” and a few other asides before passing the baton to Garrett, who used the tune as a nightly feature for intense late period Coltrane trance like meditation.  Garrett fits in a quote of the old spiritual “Joshua Fit De Battle of Jericho” before rocketing into space; Wellman in particular follows him wherever he goes.  Every now and then Miles jabs some mood setting chords with his Oberheim OBX synth as cues, while Garrett continues to combust.  The saxophonist bursting at the seams as a fragment from the bridge to “Milestones” is used as an ostinato, Davis signals a quick blast with his trumpet and the tune ends.  Garrett brought the audience and listeners at home on a thrill ride.

“Time After Time” , the Cyndi Lauper classic is ushered in as volcanic applause erupts from the audience, nearly drowning  out the music.  For 9 and a half minutes, the show belongs to Davis, as he gently finds all the melodic contours he can in the tune.  Like “Round Midnight” and “My Funny Valentine” of decades past, “Time After Time” became one of Davis’ signature ballads.  He drives his improvisation the same way  as Aretha Franklin, Pavarotti, Bocelli or Carreras would, with a marked sense of passion and timeless beauty.

Disc 1 closes with one of the Prince tunes, “Penetration” where everyone gets off on the raunchy funk.  Davis and Garrett are one during the track, and it truly shows the admiration and border less musicality that both icons would have shared, Davis struts with swagger between melody statements and Johnson rips into his solo with passion, Garrett’s searing alto ups the ante further.  As a contrast, “Jailbait” on disc 2, is a gut bucket blues where both Johnson and Garrett take scintillating solos..

The show closes with “Wrinkle” a wondrous maze of a melody that is awe inspiring when played a top speed, and “Finale” a drum solo feature for Wellman that showcases his patented bass drum triplets while keeping rock solid time on the snare, a sort of shuffle where the bass and snare switch roles, and some lightning samba as well as his signature Go-Go groove.

Sound:

Merci Miles is taken directly from the original tapes recorded and mixed by Patrick Savey and Mastered by John Webber at Air Studios in London.  Similar to Sony/Legacy’s Bootleg Series releases for Davis, the tape is from the official broadcast, in this case captured by the small Zycopolis studios.  Curiously for 1991, the sound is mono which could be due to whatever technical limitations of the tape, but it is very good strong mono.  The Schiit Bifrost 2 DAC manages to wring out very nice separation for the band in the mono soundstage: In particular, Davis trumpet is vibrant, brassy, golden and present.  Richard Patterson’s bass is commanding and takes the center of the sound stage, deep and rich.  Ricky Wellman’s drums are full of gusto, there is a reason his nickname was “Sugarfoot” and you hear that in all it’s glory.  Kenny Garrett’s passion radiates past the speakers, Deron Johnson’s keyboards float above the proceedings and Foley’s lead bass provides a wonderful textural contrast to everything else.

Concluding Thoughts:

The 80’s and early 90’s Miles cannon  has seen relatively scant archival releases versus everything from the 50’s-70’s.  Merci Miles is a welcome document of a band that truly was at the top of it’s game and at the peak of its powers.  Miles Davis, judging from this concert was showing little sign of slowing down in his playing, there is a vitality and joy here that  easily places this alongside his Montreux concerts of the period and the excellent Live Around The World (Warner Brothers, 1996).  A wonderful present honoring the great musical icon thirty years on from his passing.  The CD (reviewed here) and LP packages contain some particularly touching photos in a triple gatefold in the French Flag colors of Miles memorabilia from that final tour provided by Vince Wilburn, Jr and a superb liner essay from noted scholar Ashley Kahn contextualizing the history of the trumpeter’s French sojourns and the event itself, alongside some great photos.  The cover also features some nice embossing of the album title text and Davis’ name.  If there is any doubt about physical media, this album is a compelling case for why it’s so good to OWN a physical copy of an album.

Music: 10/10

Sound: 8.5/10

Equipment used for this review

Audiolab 6000 CDT  transport

Schiit Bifrost 2 DAC

Marantz NR 1200 stereo receiver (as pre amp)

Marantz MM 7025 stereo power amplifier

Focal Chora 826 speakers

Audioquest Forest and Golden Gate cables

[dolphin-bouillabaisse]

Beards of a feather flock together

(I only wanted to write a short, jokey thing about lockdown beards for the Ineffable Husbands. Why did it turn into an actual fic-long jokey thing?!)

Crowley is using the lockdown efficiently, he thinks, to experiment with facial hair, like all the humans seem to be doing.

He knows he doesn’t technically need the excuse of ‘nobody will see me for a while, so I can let my beard grow out and play around with it’. He knows that he is using miracles for it anyway, and could do it any day and have it disappear and reappear instantaneously.

He knows that. He’s still using the lockdown as an excuse. He’s absolutely not above lying to himself, or making up explanations that sound far more plausible than “I was being extremely bored and had told Aziraphale I was going to sleep so I couldn’t even bother him without exposing that as a blatant lie to avoid being honest about wanting to come over to his place”. There's only so many times you can scream at plants and clean the entire flat top to bottom before you end up at this level of boredom, which was usually interrupted by a particularly wine-laden dinner or a quick run-in at a park, both out of the question now as well.

And so, Crowley is experimenting with facial hair this afternoon. He’s not done it a lot before, to be honest. Oh sure, he’s changed his hairstyle almost as often as his gender, if not even more, and he’s had the rare moustache when human fashion called for it, but he’s never kept any kind of beard for longer than absolutely necessary. He wonders why.

Seeing himself in the mirror, he realises why.

He’s decided to re-visit some old styles at first, but brushing along the small tuft of hair on his chin, all he can think about is the reactions he’d last gotten for it. Some drunkard in a tavern had compared it to a goat, he remembered, and Aziraphale next to him had giggled. Giggled. It had not felt good.

An angry snap of fingers later, and an equally troublesome moustache is staring at him in the mirror. He wonders if it had maybe been the glasses that had put this particular ensemble together decades ago, or the shirt, but he knows neither of it had been able to save him back then, and nothing was able to save him from it right now. At least this time around there is no angel to tell him that it seems less reminiscent of some movie stars and more of a dead member of his beloved rat army.

Snap after snap after snap, the dark red patches across his face change from bad to horrid to absolutely unmentionable, and his patience grows thinner than it has ever been before, and it's been pretty much at the level of a piece of rice paper for several centuries.

One last snap leaves him with just a regular, run-of-the-mill full beard, slightly darker than his normal hair, but styled just as meticulously. He runs his fingers through it, feeling the soft rasp along his hand.

“That's not half bad.” He reasons to his reflection. Not something he's going to go outside with any time soon (he's not going out anyway, but, just as a general point), but not so bad he'd have to fear more unwanted comments or giggles from certain blonde, one-style-fits-all-centuries angel.

The phone rings. He swirls around and almost races towards the throne room office, but remembers quickly enough that he's supposed to be asleep and not ready to answer the phone after the first ring.

He's allowed to pick it up before it goes to the answering machine, though, right?

“What.” He grumbles, hoping it sound sufficiently drowsy and just-woke-up-ish.

“Oh, my dear, I'm terribly sorry. Am I bothering you?”

“Told you I was gonna sleep.”

“Yes, I know. I only wanted to check. I thought I would get that horrid machine, anyway.”

“Why d'you need to check, then?”

“Well.” Quiet rummaging, shuffling. Crowley can see Aziraphale adjusting his waistcoat before his inner eye. “It's recommended.”

“What is?”

“Checking in on-” A soft pause. “Friends and family. Keeping in touch. You know.”

“Ah.” Is all he can manage to answer, which is not exactly anything, so the line stays quiet for a while.

Quite a while.

“Well, I shouldn't be keeping you from your sleep-” is said at the exact same second as his “How's your baking going?”

They pause again after that verbal collision, to gather themselves and their wits back up. Crowley clears his throat, but Aziraphale manages to break through first.

“Oh, my baking is going splendid. I'd say I've mastered the European styles by now. I've been experimenting with some Middle Eastern breads and desserts, and some things I remember from back when we were, um, stationed in the area. But it is awfully hard to find the proper spices and ingredients for it in the shops at the moment. Essentials, you know?”

Crowley doesn't know. Crowley hasn't set foot in a supermarket for years, but the idea of Aziraphale with a shopping trolley and a bag for life and a little list of items on a torn piece of paper makes him want to spend several hours at Waitrose's looking for whatever extinct herb Aziraphale needs.

“Sounds like you need something else to pass the time.” That is not meant to sound as obvious as it does, so a quick addendum is needed. “Reread all your books by now?”

“Well, yes, actually.” Aziraphale sighs. “Ah, I decided to look around on that interweb you set up for me a while back, as well, you remember?” Crowley remembers staring down the ancient desktop pc in the bookshop and telling it to better rear up a good browser and immaculate virus protection or so help it... so a quick hum is the only reply before Aziraphale rattles on.

“And, well, there are quite a lot of people talking about things to do during the lockdown, you know. A lot of people are baking, just like me! And they’re making all kinds of very entertaining videos, and jokes, although I don’t understand all of them. I think they are very popular media related, I’m afraid.”

“You're planning to become a youtube star now? An influencer?”

“Heavens, no!” He can hear the soft smile in that, and it's almost annoying that he can despite not seeing it. He had no idea how badly he wants to see it. Well, maybe he had, but he hadn't admitted it yet. “I'm only saying, humans are coming up with the most random things to entertain themselves during this horrid time. It's quite heartwarming.”

“I suppose.”

“And everyone seems to be using this unwanted time off to try new things! They're being so creative and courageous. The young lady down the street, with the flyers, you remember? I saw her at the grocer's, and she's shaved off half her hair! It does look marvellous, I have to say.”

Well, it's not exactly surprising for Crowley to hear, he thinks, because if he'd had to peg anyone on Aziraphale's street to go straight for some queer quarantine hairstyling, it would've been her. But he doesn't get much time to think about that before Aziraphale's voice pulls him back into the very one-sided conversation.

“It's all very inspiring. And I figured, well, why not? Nobody is going to come into the shop for a while, and I'm not going out, and I've always wondered-”

“Angel.” Crowley cuts through the babbling with almost a bit of dread in his voice. “Did you shave your head? Is that what you're trying to say?”

“Oh gosh, no, nothing that extreme! Really, would you actually believe me to do that? I know you like your hair changed every few years or so, but I-”

“What did you do, then? What did Holly and her shaved head inspire you to do?”

Another round of silence on both ends of the line. Crowley prepares himself for the worst, though he has no idea what that would be.

“I've grown a beard.” Aziraphale almost whispers.

“You what?”

“I've grown a beard!” He repeats, a tad louder. “I've always wondered – there's barely any angels with facial hair, and you used to have those- I just had no idea what I might look like with one, and I thought, if not now-”

“And?”

“And what?” Aziraphale huffs.

“What do you look like?” Crowley's grin is mischievous, and his voice really shouldn't sound like this, but he can't help the teasing as he rubs across his own beard, still not vanished away by miracle. He hears a soft scratching on the other end of the line.

“It's not- it's not bad, if that's what you're expecting to hear. Although it seems a bit patchy, the colour, at least.”

“Patchy.”

“Yes, there's this bit – in the front – my chin, you see. It seems an awful lot lighter than the rest.”

“Angel, you have to expect some white hairs after six thousand years.”

“You are mocking me.” Aziraphale tuts down the line.

“I swear I'm not. It's just hard to imagine you with a beard. Never seen anything on your face, even when it was the style for humans.”

“Well you certainly won't be seeing it anyway. I'll make sure to be presentable once the lockdown is lifted.”

“What?!” Crowley interjects a bit too shocked, maybe. “You can't do that to me, angel! You can't dangle this little morsel of information in front of my face and then never let me have it!”

“I'm not going to go outside or greet customers like this only so you can have a quick laugh, old serpent.”

“You leave me no choice, then.”

“What do you mean?”

“I need to see this beard of yours, angel. Even if it means coming over before regulations are changed.”

“Well.” Aziraphale says, and Crowley is sure he can hear a smile again, but definitely not a soft one. That bastard. “I simply can't keep you from breaking the rules, can I? You are a demon, after all. Not all your wiles can be thwarted, I guess.”

Probably not, Crowley thinks as he realises he's been had, but you're definitely an A-class tempter.

(the story actually goes further here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24402841

because nobody seems to reblog the second, longer version :( )

[lifeonashelf]

...INTERLUDE...

Come to Vegas! We can make out, gamble, and forget all our troubles.

This is quite possibly the greatest text message I have ever received. Four days later, I hit the road.

I have never driven to Las Vegas by myself. Once I complete the journey I can’t fathom why this is, because despite the extended sprawl of nothing between us, Vegas isn’t nearly as far away as I picture it in my mind. I arrive in 3 hours and 17 minutes (which, oddly, is the exact figure Google Maps gave me when I checked the route before leaving my apartment—this is even more astonishing when you factor in that Google not only calculated my precise rate of speed for the entire trek, but evidently also predicted that I would be pulling off the road for seven minutes to have a cigarette at a rest stop just outside Baker). On the way, I listen to two volumes of a 10-disc playlist I made a few months earlier. When I burn mix CDs for myself, they are ridiculously schizophrenic—crossing the state line, I hear Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody”, my favorite track by the death metal band Gorefest, and then “Cool For The Summer” by Demi Lovato in immediate succession, and I sing every word to each of them. Needless to say, it is an awesome drive.

Everything proceeds smoothly when I arrive. The Gold Coast has my lodgings ready for me two hours prior to the posted check-in time and they are able to accommodate my request for a smoking flat. I take my bag up to the 9th floor, set up my laptop at the table by the window, and then smoke a cigarette in my room just because I fucking can. I purposefully skipped dinner the night before so my stomach would be prepared to maximize the possibilities offered by the hotel’s Ports O’ Call Buffet. I tear that shit up, then head to the lounge to play a bit of video poker and get a cup of coffee—the machines at the bartop are not kind to me; that cup of coffee ends up costing me sixty dollars. Such is Vegas.

The day is uneventful, by Las Vegas standards. I drink more coffee, I gamble some more and win back my sixty bucks, I write a bit, I watch some basketball. But I am really just killing time. Because the passing hours are merely a preamble; the woman who sent me the text message which acted as the siren song for this trip is in the same town as me, and come “around 7ish” we will be in the same building.

She’s here on business. ___ is a reality television producer, and has been dispatched to Sin City to film the upcoming season of the show Hell’s Kitchen. I have not seen her in over two years, even though she only lives 30 miles from my apartment in real life and driving to Nevada is in fact way more effort than I would normally have to exert to visit her. But our real lives are rarely able to intersect. Besides, I love Las Vegas. And there’s something undeniably enchanting about the prospect of walking beside a beautiful girl amidst a panorama of brilliant dramatic neon and exotic stereoscopic night-sounds. Being in Vegas is like being in a movie, and the character you get to play has way more fun than you do when you’re not on-screen. Compared to my daily existence, and the daily existence of anyone who does not live here, the milieu of Vegas feels like an ethereal dream. That’s why it’s the perfect place to rendezvous with ___; being around her is so intoxicating that it feels much the same.

Our history spans nearly two decades. It is as complicated and messy and wonderful as any history I have ever shared with anyone. I cannot possibly recount all of it here, though I will tell you some. I lost a girlfriend when ___ and I became close because that girlfriend clearly identified that we were mutually attracted to each other. I would have never cheated, but my relationship imploded because I aggressively refuted her well-founded apprehensions and pretended like she was acting crazy for even insinuating I was drawn this person who I would 17 years later drive 230 miles to visit at the whim of a late night text. As a result I broke the heart of an incredible woman who deserved far better, and she broke mine by dumping me. Twenty-four hours subsequent, I was on a park bench making out with a girl who I swore up and down was merely a platonic acquaintance, and I was officially a liar.

I was 23 years old. I was also far more charming and attractive than I am now, and in the mindset to actively explore the positive corollaries which arose from that confluence. I spent a few years kissing a lot of girls because I was single and I was in my early twenties and it’s a good idea to kiss as many girls as you can when you’re single and in your early twenties because you won’t get to kiss too many more after that. Despite the sagacity I demonstrated by accurately predicting this, I was an unadulterated fucking idiot when it came to ___. I am horrified by my conduct throughout everything that ensued between us, and I will forever be haunted by the what-ifs brought about by the consequent brazen stupidity I exhibited.

From the moment we began groping each other at Cahuilla Park in Claremont, ___ became sort of a surrogate for the girlfriend I had sacrificed, a proxy upon whom I could bestow both the passion that had been extinguished and the anguish that had been stoked after the break-up. ___ did not kill my relationship, I killed it by being a callous asshole. But I think subconsciously I blamed her anyway (for having the audacity to enter my life and be the extraordinary girl she is, I suppose); that was far easier than owning up to the fact that I had acted like an irredeemable piece of shit toward the girl she supplanted. My pride and my heart were wounded and I couldn’t take it out on the person whose inescapable-in-hindsight decision had caused those injuries since she was no longer taking my calls. So I took it out on her replacement instead. And over the course of the several tumultuous months that followed, I proceeded to meticulously break the heart of another incredible woman who deserved far better.

I have never handled anyone as poorly as I handled ___. She was a dazzling and unequivocal gem, yet I treated her like she meant nothing to me at all. The mere thought of her being with anyone else drove me mad, yet instead of telling her this I told her time and time again that she could never have me all to herself and continued dating other people to underscore my assertion. More than once, I brought her to tears by stating in no uncertain terms that I never wanted to see her again, only to call her the very next night and ask her to come over as if that conversation never happened. I wasn’t simply emotionally abusive to ___, I was utterly fiendish to her. For every year of my life leading up to that one and every year since, I have been proud to conduct myself as a true gentleman, so I will never understand how I was even capable of hurting anyone as persistently and comprehensively as I hurt her. Rest assured, I didn’t understand it at the time, either. Nor did I understand why no matter how awful I was to her, she still saw the best in me and held out hope that I would come to my senses and acknowledge the singularly special thing that was standing right in front of me.

Unfortunately, I realized far too late that the reason ___ did so was because she was deeply in love with me. And I also realized far too late that I was deeply in love with her.

By then I had done about as much damage to her psyche as one person could do to another. Though she wouldn’t know it, my comeuppance was delivered by the next woman I entered into a failed relationship with, who put me through a lot of the same things I put ___ through and came up with several novel doozies of her own for good measure. ___ and I remained in sporadic telephone contact, though we rarely saw each other in person. Bizarrely, this had the upshot of emphasizing the indissoluble strength of our bond, since none of the interactions we had were stilted by our silence and distance—every time we came together, I felt as close to her as ever and she clearly felt the same.

Over the years, we’ve had numerous conversations about what happened between us. I wish to keep those private, but the essence of what has been expressed is that despite everything she considers me one of the people closest to her in the world. She also told me that “Perfect” by The Smashing Pumpkins is her song to me; I listen to it often, even though those beautiful and devastating lyrics always bring tears to my eyes.

Of course, along the way I finally did what she desperately wished I would have done 17 years ago. I came to my senses and acknowledged the singularly special thing that was once standing right in front of me. I made overtures to that effect on a couple of occasions when we once again found ourselves simultaneously single, but they were way overdue. She said she did still love me and always would, but the wall I forced her to build to shield herself from me had grown too tall and sturdy to tear down. A tacit understanding developed between us: we would be friends for the rest of our lives, but I had confused and harmed her enough for one lifetime and she was not willing to give me any chance to add to that abominable legacy. It’s a verdict I had no choice but to accept because it was a much better one than I deserved; she would have been undeniably justified in never wanting to speak to me again.

I know ___ has never wholly resolved the chaos of emotions I stirred within her, neither the amorous nor the angry. Some cuts are too deep to be sutured, and those tend to leave scars. Truthfully, I think she despises me as much as she adores me; she just adores me too much to let the other side win out most of the time. But this paradox is entirely fitting because our entire relationship is a paradox, a saga of two satellites which have shared each other’s orbit since they were launched and create a blinding explosion when they collide. Last night, she kissed me in the lobby of the Golden Nugget casino and we melted into each other just like we did that first time in Cahuilla Park, seventeen years erased by the touching of lips. When we came up for air, she wrapped her arms around me and buried her face against my chest and said, “god, I hate you,” with so much love in her voice that it made my stomach swim. It was the perfect thing for her to say in that moment, both because it is absolutely true and because it is the absolute opposite of the truth.

We had a delightful night on Fremont Street, both of us properly investigating that very cool region of the city for the first time. We had some drinks and we listened to some music and we played some poker and we held hands as we walked the promenade. For a few hours, we got to be the couple both of us wanted to be at one time or another, just never at the same time; we even fought like a couple for part of that span, since the resentment and pain she’s had to bury deep within herself to continue accepting me into her life despite my previous sins still gets triggered from time to time when we speak of the past. Regardless, I wouldn’t have changed a second of it. The night was absolutely magical, because ___ is absolutely magical.

But the spell of Las Vegas gets broken once you realize that nothing there is real. There’s an axiom people use to justify all manner of debauchery they engage in while visiting Sin City: “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.”  Tonight ___ is out with a large group of people who esteem her, and I am alone in a smoky room sitting at my laptop, which is a lot closer to what our individual non-Las Vegas lives look like. This artificial vacation existence in which we were united as one happened in Vegas and will stay in Vegas, because it has to. Because, truthfully, the life she built for herself without me is much richer than the life I built for myself without her. Tomorrow morning I will get in my truck and exit this city of lights to travel back across a stretch of barren desert the length of two mix-CDs, and after I arrive home I will spend the next interminable number of days and nights sitting at my laptop in a room that is less smoky than this one but no less lonely. Meanwhile, tomorrow morning ___ will continue to work her fascinating job and then she will leave the country on some adventure, and no matter where she is and what she’s doing, she will be surrounded by people whose company is far more gratifying to her than mine ever could be.  

The hours we spent holding hands on Fremont Street were unreal. But they were also so real that I am still reeling from the aftershock of our latest satellite collision. Our relationship, both the real and the unreal, befits that manner of contradiction. I don’t think ___ and I are still in love with each other, but I do still love her in a way that I have never loved anyone else. I have committed unconditionally to other women in her absence and redistributed the connection we share into a more manageable framework, but whenever there is no one in my life I can’t help but recognize that there very well could be if I hadn’t once been a soulless beast to someone who was merely pleading for me to appreciate them the way they sincerely deserved to be appreciated. ___ is without a doubt one of the most phenomenal and inside-out beautiful human beings I have ever known and I cannot conceive of my life without her in it, yet I still to this day find it difficult to face her. Every moment I spend with ___ feels like a gift, but those moments also sting in equal measure, because she is a walking reminder of me at my absolute worst.

I don’t think she has ever truly forgiven me. I’m not sure she really ever could, or should. Nothing I do today can undo what I did yesterday. I know that no matter how exhilarating it feels to look into her gorgeous and soulful eyes after we kiss in a glittering alternate universe, there are times when she looks at me and only sees a man who likely hurt her worse than anyone else she has ever known. I know there is a part of her that will always love me, but I also know there’s a part of her that wishes she had never even met me.

While I can only suppose what the world might look like if I had treasured her instead of trashing her all those years ago, I am positive that it would look far better and brighter than it does now. I’m aware that even if I had done the right things then, it’s improbable we would still be together today. Very few relationships go that distance, and despite our exceptional chemistry, ___ and I are not effortlessly compatible. I wouldn’t change a single thing about her, but there are unchangeable things about me I know she could not abide and no one should have to. She detests smoking; I enjoy smoking more than I enjoy most other things. She dreams of spending her days traveling and exploring; I dream of sitting in my easy chair and watching blu-rays.

She thinks I was worth falling in love with; I think strongly otherwise.

I don’t specifically wish ___ and I were together now. Yet therein lies another paradox. Because I got a little glimpse of what that might look like last night on Fremont Street, and it looked amazing. But that wasn’t real, that was Las Vegas; what happens there stays there. It was a magnificent movie, but that’s not what our actual lives look like. We could make out, we could gamble, but we could never forget all our troubles—no matter how much she loved me then and loves me now, I will always be one of hers.

So maybe what I do wish is that I could really be the person she was holding hands with in that unreal fantasy, the person who kissed her with abandon in the lobby of the Golden Nugget, the person she gazed at with unbridled tenderness during that joyful interlude when both of us were able to shelve our past and exist solely and safely in our present. The person she hoped I would become before I shattered her hopes by becoming a monster. Regrettably, untethered from our mutual orbit, I grew to be someone else entirely, someone with numerous regrets he can never completely atone for, someone she will always measure with a watchful and skeptical eye to protect herself. Someone who can never be anyone else except who he is. And that person simply would not be capable of making ___ as happy as she deserves to be, because he already had his chance to do that and made her miserable instead.

Besides, he can barely make himself happy most of the time.

 ###

 The trip home is an inexorably depressing conclusion to every great vacation—you’re doing the exact same thing you did when you set off, except there isn’t anything to look forward to when you arrive. Fittingly, an unseasonable rain is coming down when I hit the 15 Freeway. The water-dappled windshield and the desolate unfolding highway ahead evoke another cinematic scene, perhaps a montage in which the central character takes a long drive to think heavy thoughts. At the risk of becoming a cliché, that is exactly what I do.

My mix-CDs play on, the music blurring past with the miles. I hear “Wonderwall” and I hear “Stairway to Heaven”, which are two songs that everyone should listen to extremely loudly on the open road at least once in their life. Seaweed… Tiamat… Purity Ring… My Chemical Romance… P!nk… The Dillinger Escape Plan... Fleetwood Mac… Each one of them imparts a decisively fantastic tune, but this time I’m not singing along. I am instead blinking away tears as it dawns on me exactly how much I am leaving behind in Las Vegas. Not the money I lost at the video poker machines, but the luminous girl I wagered at the age of 23 when I made a much more foolish gamble than I could have ever imagined and ended up losing the most precious thing I never had. The fortune that I lose over and over again every time ___ and I part from each other and return to the real world.

I discover that her hold on me, this cosmic magnetism we share, has not diminished with time. And I discover that the axiom is not absolute—not everything that happens in Vegas stays there; some things follow you all the way home.

That night on Fremont Street, she told me that she will never be completely over me. At least that makes us even in one respect.  

Though the imprint I left on her heart was shaped like a bruise, there will always be a piece of mine that is the precise shape and size of ___. That piece belongs to her, and though it is a woeful consolation prize, it is the only one I will ever have the opportunity to give her.

But it does come with a vow: forever and always, whenever and wherever we meet, in Las Vegas and in real life, I promise we’ll be perfect.

 May 9, 2019        

[fmdjoosungarchive]

location: tokyo, studios

date: april & september 2019. march, september, & october 2020

word count: 1753

tldr; verification for sung’s song tokyo. partial lyrics, full comp & prod. the song starts in tokyo, when sung is missing his boyfriend. it evolves over time to be like a diary piece and since it serves as the first ‘chapter’ in his album, it’s also kinda like an intro where it talks through/foreshadows what will be in the rest of the album. sung’s affinity for natural sounds continues, as well as inspiration from @fmdxsuji’s song arari on the composition. again pls dont come for me if it isn’t a gayageum it Sounds like one (in the equivalent of white ppl playing the ukulele but still)

not all songs needed to be about one thing. tokyo, for instance, happened to be about ten different things at once.

it’d started in tokyo. element had a tour stop in the city, and sung wasn’t feeling as chipper as he’d have liked. he loved performing with everything in his being, but-- he still rested his head against the window, watching buildings and people pass by in blurs, no other care for conversation.

sung couldn’t quite make sense of what had caused such a mood in him on the plane from seoul. he supposed, part of it was that he missed daisuke. his boyfriend wasn’t from tokyo, far from it actually, which over time seemed to have made daisuke feel a bit bitter towards tokyo. it wasn’t close enough for his family to visit, which meant seeing them even less often than he would have through touring. sung understood that. he doesn’t like being so far away from his parents the few weeks at a time that element go on tour. years sounded impossible.

but, tokyo still reminded him of daisuke. being greeted at the gate, and hearing chit chat all around him in japanese, sat an ache in his heart. after all, coming to know daisuke over the last four years was the reason he’d come to be better at japanese. passing on by, he could understand most of what was being said, and that was all daisuke’s impact. most every sign he saw reminded him of his boyfriend, the food that he ate reminded him of what wasn’t with him.

maybe, he was just sad in general. that happened to sung, sometimes. he couldn’t pinpoint an exact cause of sadness, and was just sad. underlying issues he hadn’t dealt with could be the reason that happened, but it could also simply be his brain chemistry acting up.

that was his trouble; sung didn’t know. all that he could do was sit in his feelings until they lessened. he took a walk by himself before the concert, telling his manager he can ask for directions if he happens to get lost. that time alone was really needed. he called daisuke, but it seemed the man was busy, as he went to voicemail.

“hi, honey. um, i made it into town safely. it’s- it’s kind of loud here, this might have been the wrong time to call, but, um, i just wanted to check in. maybe see your face.” he’d stopped his path, leaning up against a building to look at the sky. “i miss you already. it’s hard being surrounded by so much that reminds me of you, when i don’t have... you.” his sigh probably sounded tinny over the phone. “anyway, um, call me when you have time, please. i love you!”

sung stayed in that spot for a while, long enough that he decided to record a video of the bustling landscape around him. as he started walking again, he caught all kinds of sounds, cars, trains, planes, click clacking of heels, even a siren. he ended the video with a short facecam, so he could cut that part of the video to send to daisuke.

over the rest of his time in tokyo, sung kept playing that ten minute video over and over, and over again. something about the ambient, faceless sound of human existence was calming, comforting.

in the shower after the concert, sung kept humming the same note pattern on repeat. at first, it was natural, as his brain kept coming back to it, without his active thought towards it. however, the more he repeated himself, the more sung thought that he should be keeping his melody in his head to record after he got out of the shower. it could be useful for something, at some point, he’d reasoned.

he was right, eventually. in the flurry of trying to write songs for his first solo album, sung had turned back to every piece of unfinished song that he possibly could. one of them was this piece, broken into the sounds of daily tokyo streets, and a short humming melody. it was... workable.

sung crafted a simple piano piece based on the humming, used some of the sound from his tokyo video, and just with those two things, it was a basis to write off of. he tried to recall the feeling of that day, by watching the full video of the street a few times over. getting back to that day wasn’t as hard as he thought. papers, then his computer, were dotted in with sing-rap lines about missing someone.

only partially through mixing that vocal line in, did sung think he might be wasting his time. the sound was so different from everything else he’d been working on, much too simply and abstract. and so, the playlist of tokyo was shelved again.

with march came the end of his second solo promotions, and in came the desire to write more music. it was then he came back to toyko, to fiddle around. sung wasn’t sure what he wanted from the song, or if he wanted anything at all, which took some of the pressure off in continuing to write. he made it much more complicated, at first, adding a plethora of digital instruments that he figured he could add in live later, should he so choose. in the end, basically none of that made it into the final cut. the negative of doing whatever he pleased, was that for the most part, he’d lost the point, and feeling, of the song.

what did stay, was something sung came to find integral to the piece. modeled after a recording of his own heartbeat, there was a drum line. deep, guttural, mixed into the piece as if it was still stuck in someone’s chest, and your ear was against it, straining to hear what was pounding into you without any effort on its part.

the song had started to be about life, and those held dear, which was a perfect place to use something that sounded like the foundation of life.

stumbling across the song for the last time was entirely accidental. sung would call it fate. that melody hadn’t crossed his mind in months, but the second he heard it again, it was stuck for weeks. there was nothing he could do to quell the sound in his brain than work on it.

first, he stripped back what wasn’t working, back to the simplistic version he’d started with. after adding on the drums, the world was his oyster. over the next couple of weeks, sung started writing lyrics, mixing where he was at back in tokyo, with his feelings of self. he wondered, if maybe part of his sadness, that day, was in missing himself, too. being in that sad area wasn’t what sung liked to consider part of him. it was something that happened to him, that he dealt with decently regularly.

lyrics took the majority of his time, as he mulled over this thoughts of what the song might come to be, if about anything particular at all. the next major composition change was quite quick, though. his interest had been piqued, the first time he heard suji’s demo of arari. sung had yet to attempt using traditional korean instruments in his music. really, the thought hadn’t crossed his mind until that moment, having his heart swayed by the beauty of the danso and suji’s beautiful voice.

he wasn’t very confident, never having trained with traditional instruments before, but there was a first step in everything. he’d gone to his usual music shop as soon as he had time to, to rent a gayageum. and, simple as the piece he wrote was, it didn’t take too much learning for him to get a good recording of it. listening to it again, with that addition, sung felt how much the song benefitted from that small change, and promised himself that he would continue to learn the gayageum, so that he could make something more beautiful to show the world in the future.

sung also made a note to thank suji for the inspiration.

the next change was quite a big one, though it didn’t deal with the composition. towards the end of september, sung thought he might want to go further than he did with moonchild, and have a song completely in english. even more ambitious than before, he knew, but he also had a slight edge of confidence, after having felt the power moonchild ended up bringing.

a creature of habit, sung called up the same songwriter he’d worked with on moonchild, to request help again. he didn’t really want to translate the words he’d already written, thinking that would flow much less smoothly as a full song, but rather, he wanted to take the feelings he’d put into the korean lyrics, and match it with english.

sung tried to take a more active role in writing the lyrics that time, because it was a full song, based on his own experiences and feelings. it worked fine enough, since sung had a decent grasp on understanding english, even if he didn’t think of it easily himself.

he’d insisted they keep one of the english lyrics that was in the original piece. it was a callback to another song he’d written for the album, talking about love and hate. tokyo was a place that held those feelings, from himself and his original inspiration for the song, just like seoul had from himself for the last decade.

getting to where he wanted was harder than it was for moonchild, since they were starting from near zero, from where sung usually started his songs, and because... sung knew he was being more stressful of a writing partner than he was the last time. every word he wasn’t sure of, he asked for in-depth explanations of, wanting each line to express exactly what it was he was going for.

sung couldn’t explain what this song was about, if he was asked, not in a pretty pink bow. the song was about tokyo, and what that city had brought to sung. that ditty, on repeat, with the sounds of scratched pavement underneath. music wasn’t always simple to understand. it could be a feeling.

the last thing sung changed about the song before sending it off in his final tracklist, was a clip of him humming at the end of the song, with that siren in tokyo in the distance.

[lockdownuk]

Lockdown Diary Part 7

A personal account during the lockdown in the UK due to the Covid-19 outbreak.

23/03/2020 8:30pm Boris Johnson, UK Prime Minister, gives a live address to the nation to, effectively, put the country on lockdown to stem the spread of the deadly coronavirus strain, Covid-19.

Many of us have been self-isolating for days but this latest development within the UK in reaction to the pandemic feels very serious and very scary. I decided to keep a simple diary and where better but online.

Day 181: Typing on day 182. I received an email from someone at DSM who had got my CV from Helen Proctor (she was the manager that interviewed me along with the founder) and wants me to interview for a IT business consultant role for a shoe firm (Loakes) in Kettering. I called the chap and had a quick chat and arranged it for Wednesday.

A few beers, as it’s Friday, and caught up via video chat with Foggy and Irish Mike (Foggy’s on quarantine having holidayed in the south of France). It was a late one and they were both pissed, but nice to chat. Andy and Ham were meant to join but were no shows - Ham had his sister’s funeral this week - might explain it.

Day 182: I messaged Ham - he went round his folk’s house after work last night as his two sisters were there. I have to admit, I am ignorant of all of Ham’s brothers and Sisters so he may well have meant one was Preaya in an urn.

Someone on the Oundle Chatter FB group asked about Google Hangouts (on behalf of her son who is attending college and they have online classes using it. I am now about to look into it for her. Why did I get involved. It’s 8pm on a Saturday, ffs!

Update, I researched it and messaged her - seems I hit a nail on the head and she seemed suitably grateful. Booze and pizza coming right up (at 9:15pm)

Day 183: Up at just before 2pm - I drank shed loads last night and went to bed after 4am. Faffed about but did manage my stair climb, a 10km walk and I am now making a roast dinner-ish tea (chicken breast stuffed with red leicester and wrapped in bacon) with all the veg and yorkies (I am trying to empty the freezer as it needs defrosting).

Day 184: I posted on FB that today was half a leap year of lockdown (that’s wrong, should have been yesterday). Rachel replied that it isn’t lockdown anymore. I replied that it is for me but that got me thinking - are we officially in lockdown still? Checked, and we are. Posted that on the same thread and Badger replied that the current level of lockdown has been uprated to level 4, whatever that actually means. Rachel’s post worries me - 1. ‘cos it’s indictative of the far-too-relaxed attitude and, 2. I wasn’t even sure even though I’m still observing the same lockdown behaviour that I was before Boris made his announce on March 23rd. Scary how facts bleed into fiction. 

Jim contacted me today, asked me to call. I did so, he says I’ll be asked to return to work (from home) on the 5th October (two weeks). Shirley from HR will be in contact. I’ll believe when I see the email from her! 

Day 185: Boris announced a tightening of the relaxed lockdown including pubs shutting at 10pm. None of it really affects me since I’m still in as full a lockdown as when it started.

Received an email from John Morton at DSM for an interview at Loakes tomorrow (Wed) at 09:30am.

Received a Facebook message from the editor at Oundle Chronicle - he wants to do a short article about the photos I take and post on the Oundle Chatter fb group.

Day 186: Interview went ok.

Called Dad and Rita to let them know that I received an email from RCI confirming that I will be back at work on the 5th of October.

In the evening, Facebook had posts concerning somebody walking round Creed Road with a knife in his hand, and the police getting involved!

Day 187: Spend spend spend. Paid my speeding fine today £357, my water bill £147, bought two new duvet cover sets and two new sheets £58, a new pair of walking boots (my relatively new Hi-Tec are leaking and falling apart) £75. Oh, and the car insurance renews day after tomorrow, £230. Thank fucking fuck I’m being taken off furlough!

Day 188: Friday and I’m going to have a few beers and watch a couple of films.  I’ve been trawling through Seinfeld and am most the way through S3, and it’s brilliant. The Kramer character is mentally good. One episode had the actress who played Janice in Friends - that episode is a classic - which also included an scene whereby the cast are all exclaiming ‘Saturday night’ similar to the Friends TikTok trend. Got a call this morning about a service delivery lead role for EPM, a education service provider, based in Huntingdon. It’s a good role, very involved, reporting directly to the head of IT. But it’s only £32k pa. I replied to the email the recruiter subsequently sent to say I am interested but that salary is less than £5k pa than I am on now as a 2nd line support techie!  Lastly, I am well on my way to doing 500,000 steps in September!

Day 189: I was woken by the doorbell - a delivery of one of the duvet cover sets. On the door mat was a missed parcel delivery note from Ryal Mail (I have to get whatever it is from Warmington PO) and a note from next door (No. 34) asking for me to turn my music down at 10.30pm. That’s fair enough but....10.30pm! What are they, 80 years old? I have felt low today. There is no rhyme nor reason as to my moods suffice to say I am not of the happiest dispostion on a permanent basis, resigned to being alone. In fact, I have come to terms with the fact I’ll die alone but, it seems, some days I cope with it a lot worse than others. On that cheery note, it’s 8.45 pm on a Saturday night so, I am about to launch into some beers, weed and pizza. I think tonight I’ll seek out the second John Wick film - watch the first last night - so fucking good. You gotta love Keanu!

Day 190: Hopefully the last Sunday of having an enforced no-work-on-Monday so I’m going to have a beer or two (it’s now 8:20pm - just cracked open a Bud), watch American Sniper and eat Chilli and naan bread and onion rings. I did a 12 km walk today - I recall a time when 40-45 minuts walking was enough. Today’s walk was 2 hours! I know it’s only walking but I feel fitter than I have for years; still unfit, but fitter. Day 191: Well, I enjoyed the decadence of boozing last night but it meant getting up at after midday! Still managed two walks, trip to Tesco’s in Hampton after picking up the mystery parcel from Warmington PO. It was two unknown bottles of beer for a marketing campaign I entered a few days ago! I have to not open the beers until I receive instruction whereby I’ll be joining in with other drinkers in video chat! Day 192: Smahed 500k steps for September with one day to go! Cleaned the kitchen - I’m going to do the whole house over the next few days while I have the free time since I’m back to work on Monday.  The lad from next door called round this eveing to ask if I got the note. When I said yes, he told me they (he and his partner) can still hear music. FFS! I asked where their bedroom was, it’s along side mine, so I guess it’s the TV sound that is travelling up and disturbing them. Great, fuck knows what I should do if I want to watch anything after 10:30pm. I suppose going back to work is good timing..I shall be going to bed around that time myself, especially if I want to get up early to get a walk in before starting at 09.00 am.

Day 193: Typing on day 194. Only managed one walk today, before 9.00am. It made a great change walking that early. I then set about doing housework (which I started yesterday) - I want to clean the house from top to bottom before going back to work. i.e. while I have time during the working week. I did the Kitchen yesterday and the whole lounge today. It’s fucking knackering. I managed 519k steps in September, works out at 9.6 miles per day, which is good and, also, annoying. I have taken delivery and laundered all my new bedding. It’s brushed cotton lushness, can’t wait to try it. Last ‘happy hour’ of (this current) furlough, so I had beers (and a fucking spicey sausage casserole)...hence penning this a day late.

Day 194: I didn’t get out of bed until nearly 2pm, FFS. Spome with Ricky Roberts about kayaking, it sound sliek something I could take up but, I would need to join the boat club to have somewhere to get in and out!

Day 195: Sueanne from work called to let me know she’s taking over from Jim ‘til new yer and that the team are looking forward to my return - lovely. Dad called, he and Rita are fine as usual - lovely.

Day 196: Got up fater 2pm. I was seriously fucking wasted last night. Had a video chat with Fog - just checked, it ended at 02.04am and I did a lot more drinking and smoking after that. I still managed a 9.7km walk and am now going to settle down to a few (just a few!) beers, shepherds pie and watch Casino. Day 197: Quiet Sunday with some bizarre results in Super Sunday in the prem. Man U lost at home to Spurs 1-6 and Liverpool were thrashed at Villa Park, 7-2. Work tomorrow, feeling a little apprehensive, not sure why. Got to go to the office (to reset password) at 09.00am

Day 198: Back to work. It went OK. I had to go to the office so that my a/c could be enabled and password reset and t get VPN working. There were a few problems but I was back home and logged in OK in the afternoon. Saw Mark in the office - he’s lost weight and was telling me about a cycling accident - I knew about it, but I didn’t realise he had been in hospital and had a plate put in his shoulder. He also has the exact same issue with codeine as me! I am pleased to be back at work but it’s different - no Jim and Sueanne in charge is the main thing. I’m just going to keep my head down; it’ll be for the best.

Day 199: Second day back at work and I’m (trying to) crack on with it. It’s all coming back... New walking boots arrived today (I have them on as I type); I reckon I’ll be OK to walk in them with no breaking in. That’s just as well as my evening walk took me by the marina and the path between the lock, the small bridge and, especially, the larger bridge into the field at the bottom of Basset Ford Road was flooded, no way my boots will be dry for tomorrow.  I did my stair climb before work, 3.5 km walk at lunchtime and then a long, second one, as mentioned, later. I want to try and do a short walk before work in future, hopefully. On the way back from the lunchtime walk, I saw the lad from next door who thanked for me keeping the music down as per the note he left, so, that’s all good.

Day 200: I’ve started a work diary,  à la ENDC....nowhere as urgently required but I just think it’s a good idea.

I wore my new boots for the lunchtime walk (3.6km) and they’re fine. However, I didn’t use them in the evening, they niggled the left foot a bit, so some breaking in is required. My usual ones were just about dry enough having been sat on the radiator! Day 201: Popped into the office today to pick up my full headset dongle, did a quick shop at Asda. So, only one walk today. I have not yet managed to get a walk in before work, just the stair climb, so missed out on a lunchtime walk today since I was shopping. Did 8.5km in the evening. Bought a card online for K’s birthday. Not sure why, we seem not to be communicating - I haven’t heard from her for over a month now which, as mentioned before, I shouldn’t find as hard as I do. The card’s pretty cool though, a quip about just getting a card as a present would involve non-essential travel. Now I am back at work, I want a to do loist app. I recall a smart one that was a linear/curved affair that I saw on Producthunt but, fuck me, I couldn’t find it after over an hour looking. Then I checked Google apps and there it was (Lightpad.ai) - I was chuffed and relieved. The lad from oundle School has been trying to get hold of me via Messenger (he tells me by email) so he can interview for the article in the Chronicle. He has pencilled in Saturday at 6pm.Fuck knows if it will go ahead, the whole thing is sketchy. Day 202: First week back at work over and done. I ordered some stuff from Amazon (slippers and socks) and they offered a free trial of Prime, which is the norm, but, seeing as I have had a free trial under that a/c, I assumed it would error, as I have seen before. This time it didn’t! So, tonight, I just about to have some beers, eat pizza and watch The Gentlemen,. It was suggested by Miles on FB when I asked for  recommendations. It’s been on my to-watch list since its release. I need some cheering up, I’m having a low ebb today.Day 203: Typing on day 204. The Gentlemen was pretty good. I had lots of beers and smoke and went to bed fucking late, gone 4am. Up at lunchtime. I was meant to be going up Foggy’s for a few beers and to listen to Cobblers vs Posh but I sacked that off. I went for a walk at tea time when it got dark fucking quick and pissed down. I didn’t mind ‘cos Posh won 0-2. I watched two films in the evening: Master and Commander: Far Side of the World and Official Secrets. Both excellent. Day 204: Another late night, so up at just before 2pm. 12.64 km walk! I’m going to make stirfry and watch Knives Out...taking advantage of Amazon Prime.Day 205: I didn’t watch Knives Out last night, Amazon Prime was playing up. Tonight, however, after uninstalling and reinstalling the LG app, it’s working again. But, rather than a film, I have started watching The Boys series. 3/4 through the first episode and I’m kinda hooked. Another long walk tonight (I didn’t go out before work or at lunchtime), over 5 miles. My new boots are a marvel...they’re still new - I can tell I’ve got a little bit of wearing in still to do, but, pretty much from the off, I can walk long distances in them. I’m impressed. I think, because they are so light, they may be susceptible to the cold, especially now I can walk for longer periods without hypo-ing. The snow and frost will be the test.Day 206: Bit of a frustrating day at work. I am pleased I have a diary of events to update, that’s all I will say on this potentially public diary. Had a chat with Mark about certain aspects of the day, it was a good chat whereby he agreed with some of my gripes. In the evening I took part in a Ipsos marketing test of two beers with a whole bunch of people online. Ultimately, you have to choose one of two beers you prefer and answer questions why. It’s then revelaed which beer you chose. The beer I iked best was Stella but 4.6%, I think that’s the next product iine for them. You don’t get to find out the other beer. I shoudl recieve a £15 amazon voucher for partaking. If that actually happens, I’m going to buy a pair of gaiters. My new boots are fab (although I did turn my ankle last night) but their insides don’t half attract gravel and debris.Day 207: A productive day incorporating ToDoist with work and GCal, I have sacked off Lightpad.ai (it was too cumbersome moving tasks between dates) - so I managed to tick a few things off the task list as a result (responding to Jo Broom’s voicemail, chasing an eye appointmen, for example). Tim came round and did the garden, nice chinwag. I saw little Derek the other day, as well, he’s not coping great with the whole pandemic atm, certainly now lockdown has relaxed, he’s not as social as before. Day 208: Had a chat with Sueanne today, which is not unusal, and I was asking about creating KBs...she remarked how well, and quickly, I getting up to speed. It pleased me. I am having battered fishcakes, potato wedges and peas for tea. I am looking forward to it the most ridiculous amount (it’s cooking as I type). I shall eat as I watch more of the rather excellent The Boys. Seinfeld is on the back burner atm. Day 209: Emily Folgate’s room mate at uni has tested positive for Covid19! Marc’s avoiding the pub and I am glad I didn’t pop up there last Saturday! Bumped into Ash and Dee when i walked past the vets, chatted for 5 mins, it was really nice to see them. The lady next door (38) stopped me outside to say she recently realised that it was me who posts photos to FB, and said they’re ‘amazing’! End of week 2 back at work. As I type, I’m on my first beer, about to have many more and a smoke, half way through The Trial of the Chicago 7 on Netflix. Living the dream! Day 210: Things got messy last night. Sugar levels were a mess. I couldn’t even make it upstairs at one point, laid down on the long rug nursing a big bottle of coke. Got up at around 1pm and did usual shit, now having a beer, spicy sausage casserole in the oven (and it is fucking spicy) and I’ll pick a film to watch in a bit. Posh won, 2-0 at home to Oxford, up to 4th, one point behind Lincoln.

[johannesviii]

Top 10 Personal Favorite Hit Songs from 2004

15 to 16 years old. A chaotic year for sure, but with a high quality soundtrack. So here’s a top ten list in which, as usual for that decade, several painful cuts had to be made.

Disclaimers:

Keep in mind I’m using both the year-end top 100 lists from the US and from France while making these top 10 things. There’s songs in English that charted in my country way higher than they did in their home countries, or even earlier or later, so that might get surprising at times.

Of course there will be stuff in French. We suck. I know. It’s my list. Deal with it.

My musical tastes have always been terrible and I’m not a critic, just a listener and an idiot.

I have sound to color synesthesia which justifies nothing but might explain why I have trouble describing some songs in other terms than visual ones.

To provide the usual personal context, that year, being that-weirdo-in-the-back-of-the-class suddenly became great when OTHER people were also considered weirdos-in-the-back-of-the-class, and together, with a guy who kept falling asleep in class because he had insomnia, another guy who had elocution problems, and a girl who arrived directly from Cameroun in the middle of winter and was kinda depressed, we formed some sort of losers club and suddenly things weren’t so bad anymore. Unfortunately I completely lost contact with these people after highschool and that’s one of the biggest regrets of my life.

And then in September I once again ended in a completely different class in Terminale (equivalent of Senior Year in the US unless I’m mistaken) and made another great friend. So while life at home was still pretty bad, at least it was much better at school.

At this point my parents also stopped checking what kind of singles I was buying, which means that instead of this madness from 2003 where I had to hide some purchases with other ones...

...I only bought this in 2004 and the rest were actual albums.

Also, I found some old tapes and oh my goodness look at the label on this one. Late 2002/early 2003 at its finest right there. Kyo written with a typo, next to Eminem, next to Mylène Farmer. Love it.

With all of that out of the way, here’s a list of honorable mentions first. A very, very long list.

Yeah (Usher feat Lil Jon & Ludacris) - Thank goodness I thought this song was pretty cool, otherwise I’d have been miserable while listening to the radio in 2004.

Milkshake (Kelis) - Ooooooh daaaaangerously close to the So Bad It’s Good category.

Let’s Get It Started (Black Eyed Peas) - Don’t have anything to say, it’s a lot of fun.

Dragosta Din Tei (O-Zone) - This took like four more years to chart in the US but we heard it all summer here. And it wasn’t unpleasant at all to be honest?

Heaven (remix) (DJ Sammy) - Hang on, wasn’t this on the 2002 honorable mentions? Yeah but it took two years to chart here so it was elligible for 2004 as well.

Turn Me On (Kevin Lyttle) - A quality earworm that somehow isn’t annoying? Sign me up.

Call On Me (Eric Prydz) - Hey, look, another repetitive dance track in my collection of repetitive dance tracks!

What You Waiting For? (Gwen Stefani) - I think this is the only Gwen Stefani song that never made me turn the radio off after a minute. Pretty good.

It’s My Life (No Doubt) - Love the original. This version, not so much.

Parce Qu’on Vient de Loin (Corneille) - Favorite artist of my best friend that year. That song was so moving and well-written. Never got tired of it but never actively listened to it either. If I had better taste it would probably make the list.

The Reason (Hoobastank) - I thought this was ok and pretty nice if a bit bland, and didn’t deserve the success nor the hatred it got. However, thanks to the rock journal I was buying at the time which was like “hey, please listen to the album itself, it’s great!”, I followed that advice, listened to the album at the cd store and bought it instantly. If you dislike this song, please listen to the rest of the album, I swear you’ll enjoy it. Here’s the first track, Same Direction, to get a general idea!

Don’t Tell Me (Avril Lavigne) - Her second album was very good, wasn’t it? What happened to her in recent years?

Je Saigne Encore (Kyo) - This was the last cut (HA, get it? cut?? ok sorry that was terrible) from the list. While I loved it back in the day and while I’m willing to ignore how cringy some stuff I loved as a teenager can be now, I'm not willing to ignore how this is basically a song about a white boy being dumped for the first time and hurting himself because he can’t deal with the mere concept of jealousy. And I’m like “holy shit calm down dude and please drop that knife”.

And now, the actual list.

10 - Hey Ya! (Outkast)

US: #8 / FR: #41

Who’s surprised. Come on. Everyone loved it. I even bought the single! And to think I almost considered leaving it out of the top 10 to put friggin Kyo on it, of all things. The indignity. But yeah, I genuinely loved this. The only thing I can say against it is that it’s a bit too exhausting to be listened to on a loop.

9 - 100 Years (Five For Fighting)

US: #77 / FR: Not on the list

I only heard this a couple of times that year and never paid much attention.

Then I heard it again in 2018 right in the middle of a very, very bad year, after losing my grandfather, and it absolutely destroyed me.

It’s very, very good.

8 - Face à la Mer (Passy & Calogero)

US: Not on the list / FR: #11

Very overplayed that year. A delight every single time it was on the radio, though. Don’t have anything else to say about it.

7 - Modern Times (J-Five)

US: Not on the list / FR: #26

A hiphop song sampling a scene from Modern Times with Charlie Chaplin. It peaked at number 1 here! Not kidding! I bought the single after hearing it exactly once. It’s fantastic and I’m really sad time buried it like it did. If you’ve forgotten about it or simply never heard it before, please give it a listen, it needs more love.

6 - Hit My Heart (Benassi Bros)

US: Not on the list / FR: #74

Remember last time when I said I was a major sucker for Benassi Bros? Well this isn’t an exception. That is a killer drop right there. It looks great and dark and glittery all at once and, by the way, the sunny and summer-y music video completely contradicted how the song looked like in my ears, haha.

5 - My Happy Ending (Avril Lavigne)

US: #54 / FR: Not on the list

I’m not entirely sure what went wrong and when in Avril Lavigne’s career the shift happened, but a couple of years after that song her music got a lot less interesting. I may have enjoyed her first album Let Go a lot, but this song might just be her best one ever.

The sudden shift from “YOU WERE everything” to “HE WAS everything” near the end, in particular, is great writing. Love that.

4 - Left Outside Alone (Anastacia)

US: Not on the list / FR: #76

Usually, voices, good or bad, have zero impact on me except when they border on unlistenable, or when they are physically painful to hear/look at. The guy from Muse for example has a voice that looks like the equivalent of a flashlight in the dark and it hurts, and I’m like dude. Can you please tune that down a little bit. Please.

This lady’s voice right there is fascinating though. Her voice is green and dark and it’s such a strange, rare voice I’m charmed whenever I hear it, and in this song in particular. This was on SO MANY of my tapes it’s not even funny. And the chorus is fantastic and a joy to sing along with even if you don’t have a good voice yourself.

3 - Orchestra (The Servant)

US: Not on the list / FR: #97

So we were on vacation, and they were giving away free cds at one stop. And I put the one I got in my portable cd player, and wasn’t that excited by the first tracks.

And then the fifth one started. And I was instantly captivated.

You already know I absolutely adored Placebo at the time (sadly, Protect Me isn’t elligible here either), and that guy from The Servant had a similar voice and the song was roughly in the same ballpark, and the lyrics were so, so weird.

There's an orchestra in me, Playing endlessly I even hear it now They play in the devil's key, An endless symphony I even hear it now And I listen to the music, Beautiful music Yes I listen to the music, Beautiful music

And, again, I’m terrible at describing sounds but the colors are so disquieting and there’s an unpleasant vibe except the song itself isn’t unpleasant? It’s so damn weird. And that band never struck gold again after that.

I still don’t know what happened or how all of this works. It’s a mystery. A very beautiful and curious mystery. This would have had a good shot at winning the #1 spot if it hadn’t been for [shakes fist] these other guys.

2 - Breaking the Habit (Linkin Park)

US: #79 / FR: #89

Only #2? Does... does that mean Linkin Park isn’t going to top my lists three years in a row? Holy shit, dodged a bullet there.

Should I really repeat my whole speech about Meteora. Should I really. Come on. It starts with the sound of a closing door, then broken glass, and then guitars explode in your face. The first line of the album is “sometimes I need to remember just to breathe”! Somewhere I Belong is one of my favorite songs from the band! I was trying to match the flow of Faint even if my English was still extremely shaky and my accent terrible!

And then there’s Breaking the Habit, which sounds almost pleasant compared to the levels of aggression displayed by the other songs. But it’s weirdly tense and stressful for that exact reason, because this relative calm sounds like a menace.

It works even better out of the context of the album, where it sounded a tad more aggressive than the average pop song, but still tense and stressful. And the music video is fantastic. I had it on a giant poster. I know I’ve kept it folded somewhere. If I only knew where it was, I’d show it to you. Covering up the (bright pink) walls in my room back then was a lot of work.

Edit: Nevermind. Found it:

Gotta say one thing though. At least they aren’t #1 for the third year in a row. What’s left of my dignity has been saved.

1 - Enjoy the Silence 2004 (Depeche Mode, Mike Shinoda remix)

US: Not on the list / FR: #89

Waiiiit a second. This was remixed by Mike Shinoda, wasn’t it. Mike Shinoda. From Linkin Park.

I guess Linkin Park IS topping my lists three years in a row in the end sdfghjhgfdfghjkjhg end me

But yeah. So. Enjoy the Silence tops a second list of mine, then. 14 years after the first one. I’m not gonna repeat what I’ve already said about that song. It simply got a brand new coat of paint, but still, even if it’s basically street art painted over a framed painting, what a masterpiece. Was genuinely gawking the first time I heard it on the radio.

And then Depeche Mode released one of their best albums ever the very next year, and it was the album of the year for me, and I became a big fan. So yeah, thanks for introducing me to their music, Mike Shinoda.

Bonus: I noticed my trusty old radio/cd player was in the background of a pic my brother took around that time! I miss that radio. It was pearl-colored and I had added stickers of birds and insects on it. So everytime I say “on the radio” in these posts, just picture this round little thing which was at the center of my universe back then.

Next up: Not the best song of the decade but pretty close

[marshmallowgoop]

Goop Plays Kill la Kill the Game: IF (Satsuki Episodes 9-10)

What.

Episode 9

Okay, before I get into the episode, I do have a confession to make: I did know some kinda spoilery things about the story mode before I started playing.

Me being me, I couldn’t help but read into every little thing that review copy owners said about the plot of the game prior to release. So, when my note about Hiromi Wakabayashi stating that IF was canon to the anime at last year’s Anime Expo seemed plausible enough to Globku that he even mentioned it in his review of the game, I figured something was up.

In a Discord group for IF, I wrote:

I think Globku was actually referring to a comment I made [in his review], where I noted that Wakabayashi said the game was canon at AX last year ^^;

But apparently it could fit into canon

Which....

mmmm

Dunno how to feel about that

Globku later responded:

@MarshmallowGoop correct

I was referring to your comment

that's the first I heard of it

I had thought "this could actually be canon" at the end of story mode

so hearing that made sense

And I answered:

I'm famous! :D

The thing is, though, I had thought it was a misspoken statement, given that the story was later stressed to be an AU. But here is the source:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nFRRTHkfwM&feature=youtu.be&t=45m2s

Or to sum it up, from one of my millions of articles: "We first got story details at Anime Expo’s Kill la Kill the Game: IF panel back in July, and the crowd there didn’t waste any time in asking if the game would be canon to the anime. Studio Trigger’s Hiromi Wakabayashi answered in the affirmative, prompting applause from the audience. 

'Yeah,' Wakabayashi said. “I consider them [the game and the anime] to be in the same universe, as part of the same story.'” 

I elaborated some more:

Takeshi Yamanaka, the game's producer, also said in a recent video, "Nakashima-sensei is going to be the one drawing the storyboards. As you might expect, there were parts of the story that he wasn’t able to tell in the anime, so he’s putting a lot of effort into writing a side story that wasn’t able to be told in the anime. It takes place before the point in the anime—before the Naturals Election takes place, so around episode… 8.5? It’s less of an alternate universe story and more a story that happened, but there wasn’t time to depict it. It wasn’t shown in the anime, but these events actually happened in Nakashima-san’s head."

Which... I thought was really curious.

source: https://marshmallowgoop.tumblr.com/post/185751744432/crunchyroll-on-twitter

And then I concluded by saying:

In any case, the confirmation that this "alternate story" could fit into the anime's story... kind of explains some things

Globku went on to warn me that “they really use a popular gimmick to make it all fit together” and I shouldn’t “get [my] hopes up,” and when Timodus, another review copy owner, shared the trophy list for the game, I immediately took note of how the achievement for beating the final boss in Ryuko’s story is called “Lost in a Dream.”

“inb4 the whole game was just a dream,” I said.

So, tl;dr, I was kind of expecting something like what happened in these two final chapters of Satsuki’s story.

But I’m still very, very lost.

Ragyo’s completely right. I’m not sure I can hope to understand!

Ragyo: You cannot hope to understand, dear.

I mean, what?

Ragyo: I suppose, though, that your obliviousness is what brought this situation about in the first place. A distorted world such as this can transcend space and time. One such as this can even be spun into a single yarn with the Primordial Life Fiber.

I suppose I should have seen something like this coming when it was stated in episode 4 that Life Fibers can transcend space, but I’m... very confused. Is this game a whole ‘nother universe that somehow ends up merging with the anime’s universe? Or is it just Satsuki’s dream, as the ending sort of implies? Or is it a “dream that’s more than a dream,” as is so common in Magical Girl stories (of which Kill la Kill takes many cues from)? Why does Ragyo refer to the world as “distorted”?

I’m sure Ryuko’s story will explain things more, but right now, I’m kind of scratching my head.

Trying to understand how this game fits into the anime aside, the battle with Ragyo in Shinra-Kouketsu is so much more difficult and more enjoyable than the final boss (as much as I enjoyed Junketsu-Shinzui). Once more, I really loved all the cute introductions as other characters joined Satsuki for the battle; Satsuki saying that she’s counting on Gamagoori and that she never imagined fighting with Ryuko by her side is so sweet. Satsuki’s comment to Nonon that she shouldn’t hold back also caught my interest, as it implies that Nonon might have seen Ragyo as a much kinder figure and wasn’t aware of her horrible abuses against Satsuki.

Hey, I know the consensus on this game has gone from generally positive to really mixed, but, uh, could we please get a Kill la Kill prequel someday? I mean, Little Witch Academia is getting another game despite the first one basically being a critical failure, right?

All that said, this episode really hammered home that I was definitely hoping for too much depth from a short story in an anime tie-in game. I kinda had the same reaction as Ryuko. That’s... it?

Ryuko: That’s it? It’s over?

And, uh, relating to my discussion of the last few episodes, Rei is totally dead, but is Ragyo? And Nui? I wasn’t completely sure, but if they are, is everyone just kinda “whatever” about that? They’re all teenagers who just killed a bunch of folks, nbd?

O... kay.

More positively, I loved the bit where Satsuki saw visions of the anime. All of those visions are about being with Ryuko, my heart. And the first one is her apology on the Naked Sol. My heart.

The style on these images is also really nice, too.

Can’t say I know at all what’s going on—does Satsuki end up just standing still after this because she realizes that the world is all fake or something?—but I was kind of expecting to dislike a gimmicky dream plot or whatever, but I actually... like it?

At least, so far, anyway.

Episode 10

Speaking of stuff I was expecting to dislike, I wrote a whole essay years ago about how I didn’t think Junketsu-Shinzui would be thematically fitting. In another essay, I argued, “Their [Satsuki and Junketsu’s] destructive “bond” is likely why Junketsu-Shinzui, the super-mode Junketsu version of Senketsu-Kisaragi, is never used. In a series quite literally about the power of friendship, having great strength come in the form of the exact opposite simply doesn’t work.”

But having Junketsu-Shinzui come from absorbing the uniforms of the Elite Four⁠—much like how Senketsu-Kisaragi came from absorbing other uniforms—made it work for me. It’s about friendship overpowering the monster that is Junketsu, not about power coming from domination, hatred, and control. It’s actually pretty sweet.

And Satsuki looks so beautiful.

However... I will say that I was hoping for a lot more from this story than what happened. There was none of the Senketsu and Satsuki bonding that I was dying for (sob), and Satsuki doesn’t grow at all as a person from the storyline here. She never realizes her mistakes and vows to be better as she does in the anime. 

Initially, I was really bummed by this lack of development. But as I thought about things more, I... didn’t mind so much. If this dream or universe or whatever is something that Satsuki “experiences” before the events of the anime, of course she won’t grow as a character here. Maybe this game is kind of the Kill la Kill prequel I’ve been begging for for over half a decade.

And as much as I didn’t get anything, I thought the ending bits between Ryuko and Satsuki were so good. 

Like, I suppose Ryuko’s absorbing the Life Fibers or something?? But wow, pretty.

And the part where they talk before Satsuki disappears? That’s my kinda anime bullshit. It’s the kinda anime bullshit I wanted from the OVA between Ryuko and Senketsu. 

You know that scene in Wolf Children where Hana and the Wolf Man talk in the end? I have a lot of problems with that movie, but I just love things like that. Good shit.

Satsuki: Thank you. I am sorry for all the trouble.

Ryuko: Huh! Don’t get all mushy. Besides, there’s a few things we still gotta settle.

Satsuki: Indeed we have. Until we meet again.

But, okay. My questions are endless.

Where the heck did Ryuko and Senketsu go in that last battle? How the heck can Senketsu-Kisaragi happen in Ryuko’s side of the story? What the heck happened to my boy, anyway? (I’m assuming he died, but....)

And what’s the symbolism of Satsuki needing to cut herself in half to “wake up”?

And why do all the ties between humans and Life Fibers have to be severed when Ryuko and Senketsu are so lovely together? Not to mention that Ryuko still has Life Fibers in her, right?

Satsuki: The ties between humans and Life Fibers... shall be severed!

And I thought I was expecting too much from those ominous trailer lines, but apparently not?

Ragyo: All of this is because of you, Satsuki. Because of who you are.

You cannot hope to understand, dear. I suppose, though... that your obliviousness is what brought this situation about in the first place.

But what does it mean????

Why is Satsuki having this “dream” or whatever in the first place? Did the Life Fibers ultimately want the ending of the anime, and this “world” is to help Satsuki and co reach that ending? I mean, why else would the Primordial Life Fiber baby show Satsuki all those bits from the anime?

Also, what is the significance of the final boss basically being a big baby.

I just. I don’t even know.

I do also have to wonder how much of this “world” that Satsuki remembers in the end. I tend to forget my dreams (when I actually have them) really quickly, and that’s honestly the only reason that I can make sense of this story. Satsuki experienced all of this stuff, but all she really remembers about it is that girl with the red in her hair and one half of a giant pair of scissors...

It’s kinda poetic. Nakashima is a playwright, I suppose.

The story also reminds me of a fanfiction I’ve wanted to write. In the story, I too wanted to use some BS Life Fiber explanation to justify time travel of sorts. The idea was that Ryuko would continuously go back to the past to try to prevent Senketsu’s death. But she’d only remember previously living through the events of the anime close to its ending, and no matter how many times she’d try, she’d never be able to change the fact that Senketsu had to perish.

The final time she tries, she’d confess everything to Senketsu, and he’d say something about how some things are just meant to be. The future is as set in stone as the past.

I don’t think I’ll ever write it⁠—especially after I just revealed the whole plot, lol—but I dunno. I kinda liked seeing something a bit reminiscent of my idea in an actual “canon” Kill la Kill story, and Senketsu’s line in the preview for Ryuko’s half of the game makes me curious if there won’t be some more similarities coming up.

Senketsu: When humans realize the world they desire is a fleeting thing, will they be able to accept it?

Maybe the world Ryuko desires is a world where Senketsu lives, but that kind of world would be fleeting—but that’s enough for her.

Orrr I’m probably just being too optimistic for more stuff about my babies. 

But, c’mon, Senketsu says he’s getting more action in Ryuko’s story! So! Let a girl dream!

At the end of the day, I think what I’ve wanted most from this story is more respect towards Senketsu. And... since I didn’t see Imaishi’s name in the credits, I’m hoping that at least that much happens.

But speaking of the credits, I’m sad I didn’t get mentioned, lol. Playing the game at Sakura-Con and Anime Expo apparently didn’t count!

[murasaki-murasame]

Thoughts on Fruits Basket 2019 Episode 11: “This Is A Wonderful Inn”

Funnily enough, an episode involving the characters literally soaking in a warm bath is exactly what I needed to watch after yesterday’s episode of Sarazanmai, lmao.

But this episode isn’t JUST pure fluff or anything. There’s a bit more going on with it.

Thoughts under the cut. [And spoiler warning for the whole manga]

Even though this episode ends at the same spot that episode 12 of the 2001 anime did, it ended up being a fair bit different in practice, as a natural consequence of how the last episode differed from it’s equivalent episode from the 2001 anime.

This episode adapted chapters 17 and 18 of the manga, whereas episode 12 of the 2001 anime just covered chapter 18, since it covered [parts of] chapters 15-17 in the episode before it. So instead of the hot springs trip being padded out into an entire episode, it only takes up the back half of this episode, and instead of being in the Valentine’s Day episode, Momiji’s story about the Foolish Traveler is in this episode. Which might be a bit odd to some people who just watched the 2001 anime, but this is a lot more faithful to the manga, and in terms of pacing I think it works a lot better.

For one thing, Valentine’s Day and White Day are a month apart, so the 2001 anime had to basically have a month-long time-skip in the middle of an episode since they crammed those two parts together, whereas in the reboot they’re separate episodes, so the jump forward in time is a lot more natural. And I feel like Momiji’s story has a bit more weight when it doesn’t get brought up in the exact same episode as Tohru buying everyone chocolate.

But even more than that, when I watched the 2001 anime for the first time a while back to prepare for the reboot, I thought that the hot springs episode was one of the slowest and most dull episodes of them all. It’s not a very eventful chapter to begin with, and padding it out into an entire episode was just . . . not great, especially since it involved them giving Ritsu’s mum like a thousand times more screen-time which pushed her way over the line into being obnoxious. Even in the reboot her whole brand of comedy still bugs me a bit, but at least there’s only, like, two scenes of it this time around.

And on the note of Ritsu’s mum, this episode reminded me that it’s kinda weird, in hindsight, how the English translation of the manga just has her straight up go ‘I hope you can meet my son one day, he’s a nice boy :)’, or something like that, considering that one way or another Ritsu’s gender is meant to be ambiguous. They even had Momiji refer to Ritsu with he/him pronouns in the scene afterward. I actually looked through both my English edition and my Japanese edition to make sure, and yeah the English version just adds in gendered pronouns and stuff that aren’t really meant to be there, and it leads to this really awkward situation later on where Tohru’s genuinely surprised to find out that Ritsu is a boy later on, which doesn’t make sense if you’re reading that translation, lol.

But anyway Ritsu as a character is a whooooole can of worms that I’ll get into when he comes up later on. If I remember right, I think the hint we got at the outline of season 1 from that one video Funimation posted implies that Ritsu’s intro will be in episode 17, so I guess that’ll be when that happens.

Anyway, even before the hot springs stuff, the first half of this episode is all about the Foolish Traveler story and how it relates to Tohru “self-sacrifice is my middle name :)” Honda.

It’s really funny watching so many new viewers be really thrown off by how dark the whole story is, and how it just ends with the traveler being a disembodied head with empty eye sockets. Though I think it feels especially creepy in this version of the story since it has such a unique and vivid animation style that really makes it feel like a dark fairy tale, which I loved.

Momiji pretty much spells it all out for the audience, but the whole point of the story, as it exists within the manga as a whole, is that while Tohru’s habit for self-sacrifice and selflessness is genuinely a character flaw that hurts her at times, it’s not something that should be exploited and belittled. It’s all about respecting how other people choose to express their kindness, and about pointing out how the people who choose to treat her badly are the ones who are in the wrong, not her.

I think the reboot in particular has been pretty good at portraying Tohru’s maturity and depth, but I hope this episode in particular makes it clear to new viewers that she’s not some cliche Mary Sue who’s super perfect and has nothing wrong with her. If anything, I’d say that part of the story as it goes on, even if it’s a small part, is about interrogating the way that we think about conventionally kind and feminine heroines in these sorts of stories. There’s a whole list of characters who have their opinion toward Tohru evolve as they get to know her and understand how she really is as a person, and the story also slowly peels back the layers on all of her repressed trauma and complexes that lead to her being this way in the first place.

It’s been really interesting how this reboot has inspired a lot of discussion from people who’ve been fans of the series for a decade or more, and how their feelings toward the series as a whole and Tohru as a character have evolved over the years. I’ve seen a lot of people talk about how they disliked Tohru when they were younger, because they thought she was stupid and annoying and overly perfect, but as they got older and looked back on the series with a more mature perspective, they realized how much of a genuinely good person she is. It’s kinda funny that stuff like this shows how different types of kindness can be misunderstood and disrespected by people [especially when it intersects with stuff like misogyny], considering that one of the first scenes that really shows Tohru’s true colours is when she talks about how her mother always told her that everyone has their own different type of kindness that they grow inside their hearts, and that those differences can lead to misunderstandings and conflict.

There also seem to be a lot of people who didn’t understand the point behind Momiji’s story when they were kids, and that’s basically the same thing. When you’re a kid, it’s easy to look at a person whose kindness is exploited by people with bad intentions, and to go ‘well they’re just an idiot who deserves what they get’. But that’s not really how it works.

It’s worth noting that in an interview you can find in the last volume of Yen Press’ collector’s edition of the manga, Takaya pointed out that after hearing Momiji’s story, Kyo decided to stop calling Tohru an idiot. It’s a really subtle detail that I know I definitely didn’t notice the first time around, but it makes sense, and it’s really cute. He’s such an incredibly Good Boy [tm] who’s trying his best to slowly improve himself and be kinder in his own ways.

Also the scene with them on the balcony with the sheets flying in the air and the neat direction trick where the shot of Tohru gets covered up by one of the sheets blowing in the wind and then when it moves away it shows Kyo was CINEMATIC POETRY and I am not emotionally prepared for when a very similarly framed scene is gonna happen way way later in the reboot.

The inn sequence was really fun and cute, but I���m really glad it was just half the episode rather than the entire thing. It’s not really enough material to carry an entire episode on it’s own.

It’s fun to watch new viewers get into legit shipping wars with the whole Tohru/Kyo/Yuki love triangle, lol. These early episodes are really leaning into the Tohru/Yuki ship-tease. I guess it goes to show how much they’re getting invested in the reboot, at least. I wonder how many new Tohru/Yuki shippers are gonna get disappointed over how their whole deal develops, especially after this episode.

I have a loooot of thoughts about the whole Tohru/Yuki situation in general, and it’s a bit too early to really bother getting into it, but I at least wanna say that it’s kinda funny seeing some Tohru/Yuki shippers who’ve read the manga be like ‘I’ll never be able to accept the idea that he just saw her as a mother figure! He was definitely crushing on her!’, since my opinion on the matter is somehow both more or less the same and also the exact opposite of that. Let’s just say that I have a lot of thoughts about Yuki’s performative attraction toward Tohru.

Anyway, I think that’s about all there is to say. Though I still think I ended up saying a lot more than I expected to. This wasn’t exactly the most eventful episode ever, but it was really fun and relaxing. It was a pretty necessary breather episode to have between episode 10, which was a fair bit heavier on the dark and worrying foreshadowing than most new fans probably expected, and the upcoming episode 12, which is probably gonna REALLY catch people off guard with how dark it’ll be, considering how well the reboot’s handled it’s more dramatic moments.

[franken-fan]

wanna tell us more about steven? i know the basics and i'm trying to do researches in details about his story in every album he's part of but i can't seem to find much :/

If this isn’t what you were looking for let me know! I can talk endlessly about this character!

I looked back at my first Steven info-dump and I already kind of did an album to album analysis (though it was very brief), but I guess I’ll go into more specific detail for each album and do a character study of sorts.

In brief, Steven is a recurring character created by Alice Cooper who is featured across many albums, some comics, and a full stage show. He is the main character of the concept album Welcome to My Nightmare, which is Cooper’s first solo album. Steven is essentially a personification of everyone’s child-like curiosity and sense of fear, in the form of a seven year old boy.

This is quite…..long. So I’m going to throw it under the cut. I’ve covered every piece of media that I can think of that Steven appears in. Not many pictures this time, but I’ve provided links where appropriate.

It should first be noted that there isn’t a ton of official, specific lore written about Steven. Everything comes from the albums, and as is with music, very open to interpretation (so my opinions are definitely not to be taken as fact). Cooper is a big fan of Kurt Vonnegut, and is often quoted as saying that the inspiration for a fluid, recurring character came from Vonnegut’s Kilgore Trout, who is similarly featured or mentioned in several of Vonnegut’s novels. Here is a link to a video of Cooper’s own take on Steven.

Summary: Steven is a man who experiences violent night terrors, and due to traumatic childhood experiences, spends much of his life stuck in the mindset of a young boy (approximately 7 or 8 years old). Most of his story is told through his nightmares, which are written out over the course of 4 concept albums, in which he is usually seen fighting against the devil. In a single track on the Hey Stoopid album, it is confirmed that Steven is in some sort of psychiatric care facility, and has been there for a majority of his life. Along Came a Spider follows the story of a serial killer named Spider, where Steven is specifically named in the epilogue at the end of the last song. It is stated that he has been in this hospital for 28 years, which means that Spider is another nightmare album. Steven faces his death in Nightmare 2, and is “officially” killed off at the end of the album. Steven is depicted as a very innocent, naive person who has a very black and white sense of morality (much like a child), but is still quite mischievous. It is clear that his abusive past has haunted him through the course of his whole life. He is a very dynamic character, and Cooper has put a lot of effort into developing him throughout his career, Despite his “death” at the end of Nightmare 2, I don’t entirely believe that he is done with the character either.

Welcome to My Nightmare (Album, Tour, Movie): The original Nightmare album follows Steven on a guided tour through Hell. In the album, the character Alice Cooper serves as Steven’s guide, while Vincent Price is featured as the Devil himself. The first half of the album occurs in Hell, where songs like Welcome to My Nightmare and Devil’s Food set up the premise of the tour. The album continues to progress through various scenes in Hell, very similar to circles of Hell as seen in Dante’s Inferno. The album itself does not really feature Steven’s own reactions to these songs, but in the accompanying television special, “The Nightmare” (which has finally been remastered in ridiculous HD and released on DVD after literal decades of it being impossible to find), has some small quips of Steven dialog, especially in the Devil’s Food and Black Widow scenes; he is simultaneously very timid and also not afraid to mock the Devil to his face in his own home. He is curious about everything that he is seeing, but seems to immediately regret almost all of his decisions. It isn’t until Years Ago that the album takes a more real turn, in which it starts to be suggested that Steven might not actually be the little boy he is written out to be. The song suggests that Steven is grown man who is mentally stuck in his childhood for some reason or another (this reason isn’t even explored in this album), but who has very little control over which version of Steven he is at any given time. The transition into the song Steven is amazing (and can only be truly appreciated on vinyl), and once more brings out more of Steven’s true character. From this song (and I say this hesitantly), he appears to suffer from some sort of psychosis, and has a very lose grip on reality; this idea isn’t touched upon more until Hey Stoopid, and the “calling” that he hears in Steven is likely the voice of his wife trying to wake him up, as he hurts her in his sleep (because of the night terror he is experiencing, a realization that he has in The Awakening and then tries to run away from in Escape). There are two main ways in which you can view the progression of the first half of the album: as either each song representing some sin that Steven is witnessing in Hell, or as each song representing some repressed part of Steven is experiencing (in his sleep or in his past, that’s up to you). Cold Ethyl is, ehm, questionable….in it’s true meaning to the character. I personally take it in the alcoholism interpretation rather than the necrophilia one. Only Women Bleed is a commentary on abuse, where I see it more as Steven’s personal stance and understanding, but Along Came a Spider most definitely skews this.

Alice Cooper Goes to Hell: This album is a direct follow-up to the Nightmare, in which Steven is once again stuck in Hell/his dreams. There isn’t a terrible amount of character development in the album itself, the album focuses more on the character of Alice than Steven. The dust sleeve included with the original vinyl release (and I believe the re-release too, I’m not sure though as I have a pretty decent original and didn’t feel like upgrading) has a little story printed on either side as a beginning and end to the album, which implies that in this nightmare, Steven is sent back into the Hell of the first Nightmare in order to go save Alice from his place in Hell (this is also touched upon in the title track of Dragontown). The exact wording in the text is that Steven must “free” Alice, and essentially take his place in the nightmare. This would explain why Steven goes from being an innocent, child-like character to becoming so malicious in subsequent albums, because it isn’t really Steven, at least mentally (and the Alice character has always been written as a villain). Whether this is a truly paranormal event or a psychological one is up for debate, and truly depends on how you personally view the character. This wasn’t a hugely successful album either, and is by no means his strongest one. I Never Cry, Wish You Were Here, and I’m Always Chasing Rainbows are my personal favorite tracks, and are honestly the most Steven-y, along with Wake Me Gently, in which Steven is once again struggling to wake up. The title could be a throwback to The Awakening, where Steven can’t be snapped out of his nightmares quickly without negative results, but the lyrics themselves show that Steven is drifting away from himself and he can’t control it, which would confirm the theory that Alice is taking over.

Hey Stoopid: So the only song on this album that directly relates to Steven is (my personal favorite) Wind-Up Toy, which is the final track on the album. This is the first time Steven is mention in over 15 years (since Goes to Hell), and he comes back in one hell of a track. In the song, Steven is in a hospital, grown up but clearly still stuck in his childlike state. He’s been abandoned by his parents and it is suggested that he is at the full mercy of the hospital staff, which he seems to claim as being anything but helpful. It is also suggested that he ended up here after being caught from escaping at the end of Welcome to My Nightmare (so then Goes to Hell is likely also a product of whatever drugged up stupor he’s been in), as seen in the line, “Preacher crucifies me, Warden wants to fry me,” so he’s clearly been caught for something that would warrant a potential death sentence. The lines, “I was never young, never just a little boy,” also confirms that Steven, at least in the course of the time frame in which Alice writes him, was never as young as the first half of Nightmare would have us believe. Steven’s name is also explicitly stated in the last couple seconds of the song, albeit quietly. In live performances of this song, he brings real life to Steven, and I am eternally hoping that he will bring this song back to touring. If you really wanted to stretch, you could argue that the rest of, or at least a majority of, the album could also be about Steven in some capacity (namely Might as Well Be on Mars and Die for You), but again that’s a stretch and not really worth going into more detail with.  

The Last Temptation: This is another concept album, which was accompanied by a comic book of the same name written by Neil Gaiman. The general plot follows the story of a boy named Steven as he is tempted by a character named The Showman (who is depicted physically as Alice Cooper) to join his traveling show. It plays on the themes of dystopian America and the issues of morality. I do not personally see this album as a development of the Steven seen in the other albums, but more of a spin-off. It honestly isn’t too far off from the original Nightmare. Stolen Prayer is basically a Steven soliloquy about his moral dilemma in regards to joining The Showman, and realizing how twisted his show really is, which is very similar to Steven fighting with the Devil in the Nightmare albums. In Unholy War, Steven decides against The Showman’s offer. In this song you can start to tell that The Showman is another Devil character. Lullaby is a killer track, though. It’s a direct conversation between The Showman and Steven, and is the best link to the original Steven character out of the whole album. This entity (The Showman or Devil or what have you) is turning on Steven now that it has realized that he’s a lost cause, and Steven admits that up until this point he has truly been deceived by this being. The voice acting in this track is incredible, and I think is just as strong as the original Steven song. The last track, Cleansed by Fire, shows Steven casting out The Showman (and confirms him as a fallen angel/the Devil by referring to him as “a fallen star”), but there are also a couple hints that could potentially link it to Along Came a Spider. Steven still questions what happens to him if he falls into the trap, but explicitly declares his victory over The Showman. One of the things that The Showman offers Steven is eternal life, and later in the song there is the passage, “What about death? What about sin? What about that web you’re trying to spin?” Now, there is a 14 year gap between The Last Temptation and Along Came a Spider, but Steven’s uncertainty in his own future after encountering The Showman could mean that Steven wasn’t as successful in his moral battle, and would directly link this album to the rest. The comic follows the same plot as the album, and the artwork is really gorgeous.

Along Came a Spider: This album is one of my all time favorites, and I wish he’d ended up doing the sequel he planned (it was to be called The Night Shift and I’m still mad it was never made, and am forever hoping that he’ll one day release some demos off of it). Along Came a Spider is about a serial killer known as ‘Spider,’ who wraps his victims in silk after stealing one of their legs. He claims that he has to do this to build his own spider, and thus needs eight victims to complete the task. He is a stalker, using this method to learn everything he can about his victims before using this info to make a quick seduction and then kill (as told in I’m Hungry and (In Touch With) Your Feminine Side). There are some slight hints at potential cannibalism (in I’m Hungry, obviously, and Catch Me If You Can with, “She was not the first and she won’t be my last, my hunger and my thirst”), though I’ve always taken these references less in the literal sense and more in the “hunger” equals “strong/insatiable desire” sort of way. Through the course of Feminine Side and Killed By Love (and INCREDIBLE ballad by The Coop), Spider falls in love with his final victim and struggles to come to terms with the “fact” that he must kill her. He lets her go after much internal debate (The One That Got Away), and starts to come to terms, or more so realization, with all of the horrible things he’s done. I Am the Spider/Epilogue is Spider’s confession and he’s not humble about what he’s done. The plot twist comes in the epilogue portion, in which Spider says, “We’ve been in this cell for 28 years, Steven. We couldn’t have done all those horrible things” (a part that had me screaming the first time I listened to it). There are a couple of interpretations that I’ve come up with on this point. The first is that this whole Spider scenario is another one of Steven’s violent nightmares, and all of these events have occurred solely in his head. After all, if Steven really has been hospitalized since before Wind-Up Toy, then he really couldn’t have been out there doing these things. The second (that I don’t like as much, due to the extremely negative implications of it), is that Steven and Spider are in fact the same person, in which case Steven either escaped or was released from wherever he was is Wind-Up Toy, committed the crimes chronicled by the album, and was then arrested as Spider. The re-release of the album features two bonus tracks (three, if you count the “acoustic” version of Salvation) which flesh out Spider as a character a bit more. Shadow of Yourself is Spider admiring his creation, and is basically a love song to his murder plot. I’ll Still Be There is another stalker song, though the way it’s written makes it sound like a letter he’d send to the woman he let go. Both tracks are absolutely phenomenal, and I honestly wish they’d been released on the original album because they are very, very strong.

Welcome 2 My Nightmare: This album is a direct follow-up to the original Nightmare, it can be looked at as if none of the albums between Nightmare and Nightmare 2 exist, or as a continuation of the Steven developed in those albums. This is also the last canonical appearance of Steven in the albums (though I always hope that he will pop up in the next album). The album opens with another powerhouse of a ballad, I Am Made of You (don’t be turned off by the auto-tune, this is one of his best songs), though who it is about, we just don’t know. He’s obviously fallen in love with someone and grown as a person because of it, possibly even out of his seemingly permanent child-state as this song boasts of a much more mature Steven, mentally and emotionally. However, he’s beginning to spiral again, and viciously fighting sleep in Caffeine. He knows what’s coming for him if he sleeps (“Because I know inside, if I close my eyes, it’ll be the death of me.”), and the line, “I’m shaking in the ice cold shower, I’ve been here for about a week,” suggests that Steven has been released from (or escaped from) the hospital he’s been in for so many years. He loses his battle with sleep and is brought back into the original Nightmare with the throwback track The Nightmare Returns. Now, Steven travels back through his Hell, but with little to no fear. This is another Dante-esque album, where the tracks The Runaway Train through Ghouls Gone Wild are another tour of the different rooms of Hell (featuring Rob Zombie as “The Guide” in The Congregation and Kesha as another incarnation of the Devil in What Baby Wants). This album also gives us a look into the event that likely caused Steven’s psychological trauma with the song When Hell Comes Home, which is about Steven’s father and some serious, serious abuse (the specifics of the abuse are not stated, but it’s definitely physical in the very least). This is not so much part of the nightmare as it is a memory. The tone and lyrics of the song are incredibly dark, and while the song is about one night in particular, it not so subtly hints that this is not an isolated event. Steven’s mother is in denial of anything that is happening, both to herself and to Steven, and this is what gets her killed. After the solo, the father’s enraged voice can be heard bellowing Steven’s name while Steven quietly chants, “no.” Clearly Steven is aware of what is about to transpire, because he says that this time he’s ready for him, and that he plans on fighting back (if not also killing his father). In I Gotta Get Outta Here, Steven recaps his nightmare for the album, and then realizes that he doesn’t get to wake up from this one, though he doesn’t want to accept that yet. The song ends a a sort of cliffhanger, as the last track is just an orchestra medley of both Nightmares. There are many bonus track associated with this album (spread out over many different editions). The two most important are Under the Bed which is an old school, scaredy-cat Steven track about a monster under the bed, and Flatline. Flatline is three minutes of ambient noise and a heart rate monitor. The monitor flatlines at the 46 second mark and then holds the tone until the end of the track. 12 seconds to the end, a voice calls out Steven’s name (Someone trying to wake him up? Or someone calling to him in Hell?), This track confirms that Steven is dead. Flatline was only released on the vinyl version of the album, but thanks to the vinyl purists of the world, someone took the time to convert the track to digital, which can be heard here.

Other: I personally feel like Paranormal from the album Paranormal is a Steven track. It’s a song from the point of view of someone beyond the grave comforting a loved one. Steven dies at the end of Nightmare 2 and has two ballads (I Am Made of You and Something to Remember Me By) on that same album. There is clearly an unnamed love interest for the character which would count as “unfinished business” for his soul. He also led a very troubled existence, so it wouldn’t be too far of a jump to assume that even though he died, his ghost remained behind (going by the stereotypical explanation for ghosts). Also, in Goes to Hell, Steven is contacted by Alice during the night (as seen in the sleeve text), and is tasked with going to save Alice by taking his place, who’s to say that Steven didn’t have to die to do this? In which case, the paranormal events of the song would be Steven following in the footsteps of Alice.

[friendlycybird]

Stanuary 2019 Week Three - Dreams

Stanuary Week Three - Dreams

Summary: Nightmares are nothing new for Stanley Pines. It's just these particular nightmares seem like they just might be cause for concern.

Word Count: 1663

Content Warnings: Nightmares. Suicidal thoughts, sort- of. ...are references to Bill Cipher a content warning? 

AO3

When Stan first remembered exactly how his final confrontation with Bill had gone, he’d relayed the memory victoriously. “...and then I punched the evil little nacho chip right in the eyeball!”

“Gotta admit,” Dipper said. “I’m a little jealous.”

“Oh this one…” Stan agreed “This is a memory I’m gonna treasure.”

So he really didn’t mind reliving that memory in his dreams. Just when it happened three nights in a row, it started to feel a little weird. He told Ford on his way to bed the fourth night. “Just hope I don’t dream about Bill again.”

“You’ve been dreaming about Bill?” Ford was clearly alarmed.

Stan sought to reassure. “Just the part where we pulled one over on him and I smashed him to a million pieces.” he didn’t like the way Ford looked at him for a long moment. Seeking out signs of a lie in his face. He wouldn’t find one, as much because Stan didn’t really have noticeable tells as because he wasn’t lying this time. Not really. It was just the one moment over and over again, but sometimes it would distort. There wasn’t a better word for it then that.

That night the distortion happened after the punch connected. He watched Bill shatter. Watched the flames rise higher. There was a glitch, like an old video cassette. Then suddenly millions of gold pieces flew together from the far reaches of his empty mind and re-formed into a familiar, and unwelcome figure.

“YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD GET RID OF ME THAT EASILY?”

Stan didn’t bolt upright from dreams often. He had his share of nightmares. With everything he’d seen in his life, the returning memories of times he’d almost died or worse, Stan’s dreams were often unpleasant at best. This was the first time sheer panic had forced him upright upon waking.  He gasped for breath a few times before catching it, heart pounding.

He laid back down after a minute, not the least bit tired. That hadn’t happened, he reminded himself. Bill had been destroyed with his memories. The problem was, of course, that his memories were back. So where was Bill? The question from the dream echoed in Stan’s mind, and with it, the faint sound of that monster’s laugh.

Somehow, he fell asleep again. Once again, he dreamed of Bill. This time of the heart-stopping moments right before the deal. When he’d wanted to cough, but he needed the tightness in his throat for a convincing imitation. The slow oscillation between two symbols coming to a stop on a Shooting Star. Ford grabbing him by the jacket and Stan finding a thousand tiny things in his performance that weren’t quite right and the cold terror that Bill would see any one of them. The way the stuffed sixth glove finger sat awkwardly alongside the rest as he offered his hand.

He didn’t remember if the moment that followed was an accurate account of what it had really been like. Maybe he never would and honestly, Stan was okay with that. The feeling of being invaded. Of your very personhood being pushed below the surface and held under, like being drowned in spirit but not in body. The sudden, disorienting, lack of awareness of his body and the even more sudden, reorienting awareness of his mindscape and the high-pitched grating feeling to match Bill’s voice that something here was not his, and not welcome.

He woke when Bill opened the door.

Two dreams of Bill in the same night. That was concerning. He told Ford, who was alarmed for a moment before schooling his features into something calm and patient. “Well, it was a traumatic experience for you. The source of all of the damage your mind has suffered. Given your miraculous recovery, we shouldn’t be at all surprised there are a few lingering psychological scars.”

“Given my miraculous recovery,” Stan answered “Shouldn’t we be worried that’s not all that’s ‘lingering’?”

Ford was tense and pale and silent for too long before he said “You’re worried Bill has returned with your memories.” Stan nodded simply. Ford exhaled, blowing out a long breath and falling silent again. “Stanley, I have to believe your dreams are just that, dreams. Bill is - was, a capable demon. If he didn’t want his presence known, you wouldn’t be aware of him in any capacity. If he did...we’d have more trouble than simple nightmares.”

Stan studied Ford for signs as to whether or not he believed his own words. Ford wasn’t a great liar, but he’d grown up telling half-truths. Typically on Stan’s behalf. If nothing had changed, Stan would know it. Should know it. Instead, he found Ford’s expression unreadable. None of the open honesty of their childhood, of course not. Ford was much too guarded for that now. None of the subtle tells of a lie either. Stan didn’t know where they stood, so he said “Alright, but if they turn out to be more than just dreams…” he hesitated, and turned to go, calling the last over his shoulder so Ford wouldn’t have time to react to it. “You’re gonna shoot me in the head again, this time with a real gun.” and Stan was gone.

That, he was aware, had been a little bit cruel. He didn’t care. He got the message across while conveying it was not up for discussion. Ford was quieter than usual the rest of the day. Stan couldn’t blame him. He wanted to apologize, but he wasn’t sorry. He wasn’t willing to take risks on this subject, and Ford needed to understand that.

In his dream that night, Ford understood that too well. The fear was only there a moment when he woke, before he began noticing the inconsistencies.The panicked way Ford checked his eyes was lifted straight from his first visit to the Shack decades ago. The rough way Ford had grabbed him and pushed him to his knees and the cold of the barrel of a gun pressed to the back of his head were memories that didn’t even involve Ford. The gun, he noted, had been the wrong shape. Like the normal gun he remembered, not his brother’s triangular one. He wondered if in that situation he really would growl out “Sixer, it’s me.”

“Is it?” Ford hissed, his voice sounding just like a burn felt. “How can I know? You don’t even know! You asked for this!” Stan could hear his brother’s pitch rise, his words speed, panic setting in.

“Hey, hey, it’s alright…” he said softly. How was he, the one on the ground with a gun to his head, the one doing the comforting? “It’s alright, Ford, you gotta protect the kids.” and why would he say that? He would never say that, he reflected. Not while it was still him. Not without damn good reason. He’d said it though, so that could only mean there was good reason. “Do what you gotta do.”

Ford was breathing like he’d been crying and Stan wanted to offer comfort. But there was a gun to his head and even though he’d personally just given permission to fire, instinct kept him from moving his hands. “Goodbye, Stanley.”

Before he could say it back, everything went black. He didn’t even hear the shot.

“Okay.” he admitted to Ford in the morning. “I crossed the line yesterday, I’m sorry.”

Ford looked startled, then relaxed. “Was your comment malicious? Or were you merely trying to prepare me for an ugly possibility?”

Stan grumbled a moment, then “That second thing, yeah.”

“Then there’s no need for apology.” Ford stated. He looked at Stan. “If anything, I should apologize. I’m sorry, Stanley. I won’t be following your demand. Regardless of the circumstances.”

Stan looked at him, then laughed. “You hear yourself? You’re apologizing for not being willing to murder me.  What are we?” he laughed again, and Ford cracked a smile. Stan was still smiling when his laugh died down. “Don’t get me wrong.” he said, serious despite the smile. “I’m still scared. I know too good to be true when I smell it and our little happy ending here reaks. So be careful.  Don’t...go outta your mind careful or go shooting without notice but. If it’s ever...you know. A choice. You know what I want.”

The way Ford looked at him then was uncomfortable. It was soft and open and something right on the edge of a smile stayed on his lips and Stan felt the weight of it. “I shouldn’t be surprised.” Ford said after a moment. Stan decided he didn’t want to dig into whatever led to that comment and mumbled something about cooking for them.

Stan still had nightmares after that, but they were about other things. Sometimes, they were memories. Sometimes they blurred memory and intangible fear. Bill was a subject sometimes, but often enough he wasn’t that Stan began to feel his anxiety about that particular series of dreams ease. Then one night, he had a good dream.

The kids were back for another summer. Dipper was noticeably taller than Mabel now, and made a show of rejecting Stan’s offer to mock her with him. Soos in the Mr. Mystery suit, but still sitting on the floor at Stan’s feet as they all watched an episode of Ducktective together, which proceeded to take over the dream and give Stan the exact series of plot twists he hadn’t realized he wanted from the show. For some reason, he still woke up startled. Breathing labored. It was only with a moments reflection that he realized he’d spent the entire dream anxiously waiting for something to go wrong.

He knew what to do to keep that from coming true.

Stan laid back down, lesson learned for the moment. Then, after several moments silence, he groaned aloud.

For the life of him, even minutes after the dream ended, Stan couldn’t remember those Ducktective twists his subconscious had made up!