#wished we lived in a world where scheduling conflicts didn’t exist

[vaguedoctor]

at first I lol’d

then I serious’d…..

Source: Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Wizard & Fourze: Movie War Ultimatum

[thesoulspulse]

When Blue Eyes Meet (Good Vlad AU ~ Oneshot)

Summary: I couldn't sleep and got this beautifully heartfelt idea in my head about how my Good Vlad met his cat Madison for the first time and how she helped turn his life around. It's about she adopted him, sensing how bad Vlad needed a friend after Jack and Maddie moved on with their lives until they finally meet again at their college reunion. Warning, this mentions character death.

Vlad's POV

I'll never forget that day, the day I met a very special little lady.

I had only been fully discharged from the hospital for a few weeks but...after I insisted on making sure Jack and Maddie could move on with their own lives without me since I wouldn't drag them down, but once returned home I was suddenly reminded of how alone in the world I really was now. Both my parents had passed away before I started my freshman year of college but they left me with everything I would need to secure a bright future, even the house which gave me a place to return to in the first place since we had no idea the accident would result in me being bedridden for several years.

But as soon as I stepped inside the house, just like my heart it felt so...hollow.

The warmth I used to feel there was long gone, and it had nothing to do with still needing to pay the heating bill. And I suppose it's fortunate that the money I had set aside to pay for my school supplies and my half of the rent was enough to pay for my hospital bills so I had just enough left over to invest in gaining a new lease on life after the accident. It would take time, but I was confident I would be able to go back and continue my studies eventually, but for now I need to focus on figuring out how to cope with the other huge transformation I had undergone.

I almost had to laugh at the irony because perhaps I'm only living a half-life since the accident turned me half-ghost. It was difficult at first, hiding the truth about my condition not only from Jack and Maddie, but the nurses and doctors as well. Thankfully, I inherited my father's sharp wits and managed to conceal my powers fairly well. As for the rest, it was just easier to let people assume they were only seeing things whenever they saw a strange light or my hand seemed to pass through solid objects. After all, who would ever believe that a human with ghost powers could possibly exist...?

Still, I suppose one good thing about returning to that house is that it was nice to finally be able to relax somewhat knowing I wouldn't need to hide my powers from anyone, or at least not nearly as often when I was still a patient. I would still have to be careful if someone came to visit me, but honestly the odds of that happening ere  highly unlikely. I say this because I have no living relatives left. No parents, no cousins or siblings, just me.

Sighing I set down my bags and started unpacking boxes. I needed something else to occupy my thoughts because I still hadn't quite gotten over the fact that I lost my scholarship. Realistically I knew that couldn't be helped given what happened to me so instead I turned my attention to the things I still could control, such as ensuring I still had a place to live since I was no longer a student and Jack wasn't my roommate anymore.

Speaking of which, right from the start I wanted make sure to avoid living somewhere with too many people around so although my original plan was to move back here after graduation I made the decision to return to this town ahead of schedule in light of my extenuating circumstances.

There were still faint traces of my old life here back from when my parents were still alive such as my father's desk and my mother's cooking supplies. And quite honestly, being back here and suddenly feeling their absence all over again...it made me sad. I missed them, just as much I miss Jack and Maddie but I had to start moving on too. So I shook my head, turned our old record player, and kept myself busy by unpacking my belongings.

Luckily I had everything I owned in the dorm moved here after it became painfully clear I wouldn't be able to attend classes anymore due to my critical condition. Jack and Maddie offered to do it for me personally but I declined their kind off because for one thing I didn't want them to find out where I live before I had enough time to gain full control of my powers, and for another I wanted to make a clean break for their sake...

I was dangerous to be around whether I liked it or not so exposing them to danger while my powers were still a bit difficult to control was not a risk I was willing to take. Especially since those two are all I had left and someday...I really hoped I'd be able to meet them again and tell them the truth about my powers. But until then, all I could do was try my best to start over and hope for the best.

~

Once I settled in, I began testing out my powers more, taking notes, pushing my limits, and yet the more I learned about myself the more I wished I had someone to share my discoveries with. Jack could be overzealous at times, but I missed how excited we both felt after making a new discovery about ghosts or ectoplasmic energy. And Maddie, she always knew how to reign us in so we could look at things more objectively even though she was usually just as eager to find out more too.

Having no one left to talk to or come home to had finally started to get to me and sadly as a result that's when the nightmares started up again too. Just like back in the hospital I would wake up in a cold sweat, clutching the sheets in both fists as the ghostly blue glow of my eyes cast flickering shadows on the walls. I had gotten careless because I thought I would be alright as long as I didn't have to worry about a doctor or a nurse walking in at any second and seeing my eyes glowing in the darkness.

That's when I realized I had to do something about this before things escalated even further and my emotions spiraled out of control again without some sort of outlet. I needed to make a connection, a way to overcome this shadow looming over me, so I considered seeing a therapist to prevent these nightmares from overtaking me. But I was afraid that if I did talk to someone...what if I became too emotional and exposed my powers to them? That could be a huge problem. I could always overshadow them, but I'd still be avoiding dealing with this terrible helplessness I felt.

That day, I was wandering around town in a daze, conflicted about how to deal with the problem when I happened to enter a local animal shelter. The people at the front desk were friendly, but I had never considered how my...ghostly attributes might make most animals wary of me since they have a sixth sense for the supernatural which quite honestly made me feel even more detached from the person I once was. As a boy I got along well with most animals but I never felt particularly attached to them. Dogs were a bit too energetic for my tastes and I had to deal with that enough with Jack but cats on the other hand, well I have always appreciated their independent spirit but I never considered them to be very affectionate animals...

That all changed the instant I saw her.

On my way out the door after satisfying my idle curiosity about how animals seem to perceive me now that I'm only half human I noticed this sleek black kitten staring directly at me with the most stunning blue eyes I've ever seen and when our eyes met, what I felt...I can't even describe it. It felt as though she was looking right at me, into my heart, and for the first time since the accident, it was like someone had noticed how lost I was and there was this unmistakable look of gentle sympathy in her eyes.

Mesmerized by her gaze, I turned around and asked the person at the desk more about her and they told me she had been abandoned which I could relate to to some degree. To be fair I hadn't been abandoned necessarily, but I felt that way sometimes since it was gradually becoming harder and harder to wake up alone in that empty house every morning, not sure what I should be doing with the rest of my life now that I'm all alone and don't have friends to confide in anymore I can visit whenever I want.

Impulsively I asked if I could hold her and they agreed, smiling at me secretively as if they already knew I felt an instant attachment to her and as soon as they handed her to me...she clung to me like her life depended on it and then crawled up onto my shoulders, wrapping her tiny body around my neck as much as possible and as soon as she was comfortable she started purring. It was like a hug of sorts and I had no idea how starved for the gentle contact from another living creature of any kind from someone that wasn't just another doctor poking and prodding me that all I remember is falling to my knees soon after, sobbing and resting my cheek against her head as she rubbed against me, licking away my tears.

Finally, I thought, this is what I've been searching for ever since I came home. I've missed having someone there who cares about me, someone to remind me that I'm not alone, someone who can stay by my side so I don't have to suffer in silence anymore without a friend there to comfort me just when I start to think I can't bear it anymore.

I'm sure everyone who saw me that day were just as stunned as I was by my meltdown, but I didn't care. I needed her. And she needed me, no, for reasons I cannot even begin to fathom she WANTED to be with me and no one else. It's like she had been waiting for me to walk in that door from the very start. Waiting for me to give her a home, a family, and most importantly...a name. And that name would become a bond that could never be broken, not even after her tragic death some years later when she returned to my side once more as a ghost because she knew I still desperately needed a friend-

And that's how Madison became my closest and dearest companion.

We’ve been inseparable ever since.

[a-edgar-allan-hoe]

The Last Chthonian

Part 17

Bucky x Reader, Sam x Reader, Zemo x Reader

A/N: It is here! So sorry for the late update lovelies! I’ve been having really bad writers block lately and my job keeps switching my hours up so now my sleep schedule is all fucked up. And after writing this part I want to go stargazing so bad but the light pollution kind of sucks where I live. 🥲 Also this is my first time writing a steamy scene so I’m sorry if it’s awkward. Feedback is much appreciated and let me know if you want to be added to the tag list. 😊

Summary: Imagine being Hekate, the Greek goddess of magic and witchcraft, the night and the moon, doorways and crossroads, creatures of the night, and ghosts and necromancy. You stumbled upon Earth many centuries ago and since then have resided on the foreign planet. During the recent years you created an alias for yourself to hide your true identity, and after the war against Thanos you chose to live out your days in the Scottish countryside, until a certain trio appears at your doorstep one day.

Warnings: language, angst, some foreplay and making out

You had still been wrapped in Zemo’s arms, the two of you indulging in each other’s presence in a silence, which combined with the faint beating of his heart, you only found to be comforting. The meteors still swept by the earth’s atmosphere above you in flashes that lit up the sky, leaving behind trails of white that resembled the strokes of a brush, as if your mother Asteria had painted the celestial bodies using diamonds onto a canvas that was the night sky. You could only make out the few stars and constellations that were scarcely scattered across the vastness above you, caused by the light pollution that unfortunately managed to mantle the wonders and beauty that settled just beyond, separating humanity from the marvels of the universe. The stars flickered like the diminishing of the flame of a candle, a farewell to the billions of years lived by the remnants of those enormous spheres of hot plasma, thus leaving behind the birth of other stars to fulfill their legacy. However, there was a certain star that did not flicker like the ones around it, a certain spectacle distant in time and space that still managed to burn bright despite the innumerable amount of light-years that separated Earth from it. The remaining light of your planet Olympus. You stared at that particular star, your brows knit together and your face etched with this certain melancholy that one could not explain. How could one thing be so near, within the reach of your fingertips, and yet be entirely outside the capacity of reach.

“Draga.” You heard Zemo softly speak, his chest slightly wavering beneath your cheek from his words.

“Hm?”

“Something troubles you.”

“What makes you say that?” You stared off, your eyes still fixated to the fading existence of your world.

“Your eyes draga.” Zemo looked down at you, his eyes scanning over the troubled creases that masked your features. “I have seen this shadow in your eyes that has seemed to occupy them as of recently. What troubles you?”

“…………You see that star there, right between those two constellations?” You pointed above you.

“Mhm.” Zemo nodded as he followed the line of your finger, his eyes now focused on the same exact star yours have not yet left.

“That’s my planet………Olympus.”

“You’re welcome to tell me about it if you’d like.”

“Well, when I was little, I used to live with my mother in this quaint cottage by the sea, similar to the one I live in now with my daughter. She used to bring me out most nights for stargazing. She had built this outdoor platform with bedding and blankets and we would have a small fire going to keep us warm as we watched the stars and constellations while she told me different tales and epic poetries. As silly as it sounds, she would make shooting stars appear in the sky for me knowing how much I loved them. Gods, I wish you could’ve seen my home back in its days, back when everything still remained. Everything was so…..beautiful, and the skies, gods the skies, you could see the different planets and galaxies as if they were only miles away. To this day, I have yet to see anything in my travels that compares.”

“I would have loved to seen it Schatzi. Your mother sounded like a wonderful person.”

“She was the kindest soul I knew.” You turned your body so that you could look up at him, resting your chin on your hand.

“You miss her.”

“There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t miss my family and planet.”

“I’m sorry about what happened to them Schatzi. I wish you never went through what you did.”

“If only I could bring them back. I’d do anything to be able to just see them again.”

Zemo was silent, believing that no amount of words could have provided you comfort, no matter how deep the meaning or how significant. He could not imagine what you went through. He had lost his country and his family, and you had lost your family as well, but you lost your world, your entire race, leaving you to be the last remaining entity of your people, the last Olympian and the last Chthonian. Words could not bring your family back, just as they could not with his. So he only did what he was able, making a silent unspoken promise within the abyss of his damaged heart to be there for you as he held you closer to him and pressed a kiss to your forehead.

A sudden feeling of guilt crawled up your spine like a venomous scorpion ready to sink its stinger in your skin with means to cause nothing but pain and suffering. You felt guilty for being here, lying next to Zemo wrapped in his arms like a pair of star-crossed lovers from the pages of a novel. A part of you felt selfish for what you did, undeserving of the affection that was bestowed upon you from a man who had suffered enough from the loss of his family. How much longer did you think you could give in to your mindless emotions without a single thought of the consequences it might bring about. Did you really think you could go on as if nothing is happening? As if you can conceal your true form from him forever. No. You could not. You did not have the heart to keep such knowledge from him. If you wanted to pursue what you had with him, you would have to tell him the truth when the time came.

“We should probably get back before Sam and Bucky notice.” You mumbled, blinking back the tears, your heart aching to go back to the way things used to be, wishing you could leave all of this and just be able to go back home. You didn’t belong here on earth, an immortal amongst mortals. At least on Olympus, if your titaness form had been revealed, many would not have bat an eye. They had already seen the likes of Titans before and the locals had become accustomed to you. But here on earth, you were nothing but a stranger, a drifter.

The two of you walked back to his place in silence, the only sounds being the whistling of the wind, the chirping of crickets, the voices of the few pedestrians and the humming of the cars that drove by. Your hands brushed against each other, craving to intertwine your fingers with his as you walked down the stone paved streets lit by the lamps that lined it, the two of you still withdrawn despite what occurred between you both. You felt it would have been silly, holding his hand like a couple of teenagers, though a century ago, you wouldn’t have gave it a second thought.

You arrived at his place, standing at the bottom of the steps in front of the double doors with Zemo opposite you, illuminated by the street lamp that stood just behind. Feelings of conflict washed over you, drowning you in waves of despair. As much as you wanted to be with him, a small part in the back of your mind kept telling you that it was wrong. Neither of you wanted to go through those doors just yet, wishing you could have spent the night under the stars. But life seems to have a way of working against your favor. The Wakandans would be here to collect him possibly tomorrow, and you would have to bid him farewell, separated from each other for what could be forever. As much as you did not look forward to that moment in having to turn him in and never see him again, you wouldn’t stop the Wakandans from what they were promised. And though you hadn’t said a word, Zemo had already knew what your decisions were regarding it, and he could not blame you for it. You were a woman of justice and you followed a code, and he respected that.

“Zemo.” A frown appeared on your face.

“Please,” Zemo whispered to you as he pushed a strand of your hair behind your ear, “Call me Helmut.”

You looked at Zemo once more, a look of longing hidden behind your eyes as you unconsciously swiped your tongue across your mouth, watching how his eyes followed the movement before lingering on the wetness of your lips that resembled the petals of a rose after the pouring of cold rain in the midst of spring. Oh how he wished to be the drops of rain that were gifted the pleasure of grazing upon the velvety petals that belonged to such beauty of a flower, a symbol of union between the two domains in which the heavens came down to declare its love for the earth. A pulling sensation filled within your core, drawing yourself to Zemo as if he were the sweet berries of deadly nightshade that have lured many unfortunate souls. Banishing the thoughts of doubt that clouded your mind, you grabbed him by the collar and pulled him to you, crashing your lips against his in a heated kiss. Zemo was initially shocked by your bold gesture and stiffened from the way your mouth moved against his, surprised you would pull something like this when just a wall away Sam and Bucky were awaiting your arrival, before loosing himself into your embrace.

Your fingers clenched the collar of his sweater and your fingers grazed across the exposed skin of his neck while his hands went to your waist in a desperate attempt, fumbling to grab at anything and bunching up the bottom fabric of your sweater as he pulled you against him. The tips of his fingers brushed against the skin of your waist that was exposed below the hem of your sweater, leaving behind goosebumps in its trail. You smiled into the kiss from the way he completely melted under your touch, a part of you amused from the affect you held over him as you managed to elicit a moan from deep within his throat. Zemo’s brows were furrowed in the passionate moment, something you have noticed when you first kissed him, a small crease in the muscles of his face that showed just how lost he was when encased in this moment with you, and it absolutely melted you. He was addicted from the warm numbness, the ecstasy he felt from kissing you. Your lips were like heroin to him, leaving him yearning for more, and it didn’t ameliorate the fact that his years spent in a German prison had left him somewhat inexperienced and filled with a chasmic longing for touch and intimacy from the lack thereof. Deep within him, masked by his ideas and objectives, Zemo wanted to be able to love someone again, a chance at a new life and a family, and perhaps, he saw that possibility with you. But, behind the passion of the kiss you shared with him, there was something else, a poison that laced your lips with feelings of despair and forbidding that consumed you as if you had tasted those sweet berries of nightshade, slowly loosing yourself to its malice. His lips which were at first warm to the touch, now felt cold like ice and sent shivers of dread through your veins, as if this would be the last kiss you shared with him.

You pulled away from the kiss to catch your breath, your teeth softly grazing against his bottom lip as you did so. Both of you were left breathless as you rested your foreheads against each other, panting as your breaths fanned each other’s face as if you had just been trapped in the depths of the ocean before breaking through the surface to allow oxygen to fill your lungs.

“If you keep doing that Draga.” Zemo rasped between breaths, “I won’t be able to compose myself.”

“Good. Maybe I don’t want you too.” You smirked before placing a playful kiss on the tip of his nose. “But I really should go back inside, and you should do the same. Just make sure you go unnoticed.” You slipped his coat off your shoulders, his cologne that lingered on his fur collar leaving your senses with discontent as you returned his coat to him before going over to the doors, stopping to turn back to him with a smile before stepping inside and closing the door behind you. Gods, what the hell did you do that for???? You felt your cheeks heat up in embarrassment as you wanted to slap yourself for pulling a move like that.

“Gods I’m stupid.” You muttered to yourself.

“Hey.” Bucky smiled once he spotted you, his voice soft as if he were afraid you would shatter at any moment from the discussion that took place earlier. “How was your walk?”

“It was nice, relaxing. I went to the park to stargaze.”

“That’s good. As long as you feel better.”

“I do, actually. Thanks Bucky.”

“You look flushed. You okay?” Sam noted as he stepped over to you.

“Huh?” You stopped short. “Oh yeah, I’m fine. I just had to kind of uh power walk back here so you guys wouldn’t get worried. But I’m fine, yeah. Anyways, I’m going to hit the sack since I’m feeling a bit tired. Goodnight you guys.” You waved them off before going to your assigned room, making Sam and Bucky give each other questioning looks before they both shrugged it off.

You shut the door behind you, letting out a breath of relief that they had not caught on to anything and praying that Zemo had managed to sneak in. You had just gotten off the phone with Maze and your daughter, catching up on their activities after cleaning yourself up and changing into your nightgown. You had pulled up a chair next to the window that was in your room, your feet tucked underneath you and a warm cup of rose and blackberry tea in your hands. Your robe hung loosely off your shoulders as your index finger twirled above the small silver spoon that swirled in your cup, mists of violet wrapping around the handle of the spoon as you used your powers to stir the contents of the tea. You stared out the window onto the old streets of Latvia before glancing down at the teacup that was nestled in your hands, the glow of your eyes reflected off the window pane along with the tiny stars that swirled through the small globe of your necklace your mother gave you. You hadn’t stopped thinking about the moments that passed and the ones that have yet to come.

There was a knock on your door, interrupting you from the thoughts that had resided in your mind. “Come in.” You spoke as you looked through the reflection of the window and saw a figure step in. “Zemo?” You stopped using your powers, the clinking of the spoon scraping against the sides of the porcelain cup coming to a stop. “You know, you gotta stop sneaking into my room.” You teased before frowning, seeing the expression that sat on his face. “What’s wrong?” You got up from the chair, setting your cup down on the table before walking over to him.

“The Wakandans will…….be here for me tomorrow.” His eyes were lowered to the floor, the browns of his irises which reminded you of the dunes of the Sahara desert were whirling in thought, resembling the dunes caught in the midst of the fury of a sandstorm, as if searching for an answer to his troubles.

“Ze-Helmut, I………” You sighed, your tongue and mind lacking the ability to compose any words that might have provided some solace. “I’m sorry………..I don’t know what to say.”

“Y/n, schatzi” Zemo grabbed your hand, tracing his thumb over the bumps of your knuckles. “You don’t have to say a word. My actions………must be accounted for.”

You were silent, your brows knit together and your lips sealed as if your voice was ripped from your throat. Your heart wanted to tear itself from your chest, begging to be released from its cage so that it could be free to lament, so that it may be able to express the words that held it captive. But your tongue was tied, held back between the prison that was your teeth as you clenched your jaw. Zemo’s hand still held yours, stroking the soft skin on the back of your hand which were a contrast to the small rough patches on your palm, before you heard him speak again. “Can I kiss you?”

You blinked at him, lips parted in surprise that he would even ask such a question when you were honestly willing to kiss him any time of the day. The Zemo you had come to know was far different than the one you had heard about, his cold demeanor seemed to completely fade when he was around you, like a fog that dissipated with the coming of daylight. A part of you pondered whether this was how he used to be, before the events that happened. Though he hadn’t had a chance to share such affection with anyone and lost practice, you still found him to be great kisser and it always managed to leave you breathless. “Yes, please.” You whispered, your voice barely audible before you felt his lips brush against yours. What was sweet at first became more feverish and filled with hunger as an unfamiliar spirit seemed to possess your body, darkening the amethysts and golds of your eyes that resembled the galaxies, into the blackness of the abyss that swallowed the outer edges of space where not even the slightest bit of light could reach, almost as if you were sinking your claws into your prey.

A heat pooled in the pit of your stomach, filling your body with an electrifying warmth as his mouth moved against yours more confidently this time, catching you utterly by surprise and leaving your knees weak, a feeling similar to the stillness in the air a mere second before lightning strikes the ground beneath your feet. His hands slipped down to grab the flesh of your waist, dehydrated, and filled with an intense thirst that could only be quenched by your body that was the ocean, your skin separated by the silk fabric of your nightgown. Your hands went up to grip his shoulders as a gasp escaped your lips upon feeling him move down to your jaw and neck. Gods, since when was the last time you were touched like that?

“Helmut.” You rasped, struggling to hold back a moan as his lips sucked on the skin where your collarbone met your neck, making you lean your head back to allow him better access. Your robe had fell to the floor, leaving your arms completely bare while Zemo’s hands caressed the skin that lined them before resting on the dorsal part of your upper arms, the combination of the frigid air and his fingertips that felt like the touch of fire sending shivers through your body. “What if they hear?”

“Let them.”

“No……….I’m…….serious.”

“Well if you’re that worried Draga.” Zemo stopped to look at you. “The walls are thick enough.”

Gods that completely sent you over the edge. It felt as if you were on a high, your mind was not even within this dimension as Zemo met your lips again. You had to throw your arms around his neck to keep yourself from collapsing as the two of you shifted in the room, Zemo guiding your body before the back of your knees came in contact with the side of your bed. You let yourself fall back into the soft mattress, bringing Zemo down with you. You both were a mess, your hair disarray, the thin straps of your nightgown fallen past your shoulders had almost left your breasts exposed, and the skirt of your nightgown had ridden up to your thighs as you wrapped your legs around his waist. Zemo squeezed at the soft flesh of your thigh before attacking your neck again. He didn’t know how to describe it but you tasted absolutely divine. Perhaps being a goddess made you taste of ambrosia; the golden, honey-flavored fruit that grew on the trees of Olympus. You were in absolute bliss and thanked the gods he wouldn’t be able to leave a mark, at least you hoped not.

“Helmut.” You moaned, your nails digging into his biceps as his warm lips made a trail down your collarbone and lower to where the lace trim of your nightgown met just above the curve of your breasts, lingering on the space between, filling your mind with thoughts of a certain region you desired those lips to be. “Fuck.” You hissed from the contact, your hand moving its way to his head as you ran your fingers through his soft hair, your nails raking across the back of his scalp as the heat between your thighs only grew. You unconsciously pressed your heel to the lower part of his back, beckoning him closer to that heat between your thighs as you bucked your hips up. Zemo growled at the movement, slightly nipping at the skin where your breast had started to form, causing you to gasp and your eyes to fly open from the sensation.

“Apologies draga.” You heard him mutter before tenderly kissing the spot where his teeth had been.

Seeing Zemo in a close proximity above you in such a position had you dazed, wanting him to take you right then and there and not caring if the others heard you or not. And as your eyes wandered lazily over the sight of him, they widened in horror once they glimpsed at the image of your hands. Your nails became sharp, claw-like, and that deathly color had returned once again, slowly making its way up your arm like the tendrils of a shadow belonging to a demonic spirit.

“Helmut.” You whispered, your voice becoming panicked as you loosened your grip on his arms, being careful not to pierce his skin. “Helmut wait.”

Zemo stopped, pushing himself up to meet your eyes as his concern grew from seeing the frightened look that filled them. “Schatzi, what’s wrong?” He brought his hand up to your face, brushing away the strands of your hair. “If you’re uncomfortable let me know.”

“No, gods no. If anything I don’t want you to stop.” You breathed out, trying to catch your breath. “It’s just that………….”

“What is it schatzi?” His voice was soft as his fingers caressed your cheek, afraid that he might have offended you in some way, afraid that he might have been too forward.

“I’m sorry Helmut. I want to, I really do, but not like this.” You shook your head as you got up, shifting over to where the dark shadows of the room fell on the bed to hide your arms, afraid to meet his eyes as if you had made a fool of yourself. “Not like this.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me y/n.” Zemo smiled at you. “If you’re not ready, than I’m not ready.”

“Thank you Helmut.” You smiled back before giving him a delicate kiss. “I’d………uh like to think some things through.” You prayed that he didn’t see your hands, hoping that the darkness of the room managed to disguise it.

“Of course draga.” Zemo placed a lingering kiss on your forehead before leaving your room, stopping at the door to give you a comforting smile as he carefully shut it behind him.

Your eyes still lingered on the door, waiting to make sure he didn’t come back before turning on the bedside lamp and staring down at your hands. You had managed to stop the color from spreading up your arm, yet it strangely still remained, stopping halfway up your forearm. This wasn’t good.

“What the hell?” You scrunched your nose, trying to use your powers once again to remove it but to no avail. Fear coursed through your veins as you attempted to remove the color, spell after spell, hoping those vine like tendrils would crawl back down your hands and disappear. You cursed under your breath as each attempt proved to be as futile as the one before. What the hell was going on? Why were your spells not working? It vanished before from your magic, why wasn’t it doing so now? You were struck with a sudden realization that perhaps this change would become permanent, that maybe suppressing your true form for all those years had caused it to spiral out of control and in turn try to overpower you as if it had a mind of its own. You growled through gritted teeth, the furniture around you shaking as your fists were clenched in frustration, the violet mists of your powers encompassing your hands and sparking with small bolts that corresponded with the vexation that overwhelmed you.

You closed your eyes and took a deep breath, the mist around your hands disappearing and the shaking of the furniture coming to a stop. You had to work something out. You were left no choice but to keep your hands covered from now on until you found a solution. If any of them questioned it, you had to have a damn good lie. Getting up from the bed, you walked over to the double doors that led to the small balcony and opened them, your hands gripping the cold iron rail as you stared out at the view of the Latvian streets and buildings before you. Oh how you wished your sister Athena were here. She knew everything.

“Oh Athena.” You stifled a sob as you stared up at the stars, focusing on the light of your planet as if she could have heard you, a tear cascading down your cheek and dropping to the streets below. “Gods I wish you were here. I really need your help.”

Despite your pleas, you knew she wasn’t there, her existence only an artifact of the past. You were praying to nothing but a memory. It was extremely urgent that you got information on this matter of your form and the words of the prophecy that still threatened and echoed within the depths of your mind. And since you couldn’t obtain such knowledge from another Olympian, you would have to gather it from the old texts. Muttering a few words in Ancient Greek, you waited, searching, until a small white moth came into view, fluttering in your direction. You held out your finger, letting the tiny creature come to rest upon it.

“Hello little one.” You smiled at the moth as you gently stroked it in greeting, bringing it closer to your face so that you could speak to it in your language. “Please send word to my familiar and tell him to gather as much information he can on Titans and the prophecy. And tell him to come find me when he is done. Thank you.” The moth looked at you with understanding behind his tiny black eyes, it’s antennaes twitching before fluttering away into the moon. You sighed, watching it disappear into the night before giving your distant planet one last glance before shutting the doors and going back over to the bed. You laid down under the covers, your hands rested on your stomach as you stared up at the ceiling, dreading the day to come. How could you face Zemo? And however were you going to keep your hands a secret? Surely the three are bound to find out sooner or later? You just prayed that the message you sent would be returned in a short time. You needed to fix this before it would be considered too late. And the sooner you found Karli the better. Your mind was racing with thoughts, but you closed your eyes, desperate to get some rest and forcing those thoughts away. Gods help you from this moment on.

Tag List: @girl-obsessed-with-things @aerynchromie @sunshinepower17 @viviace @kakimakiloh @thehornyles @awhorewithissues @gambitsqueen @spookycereal-s @lulu-yuming @mochminnie @Gabitanaka47 @s00nhi @vanteguccir @tomhollandsslilslut @dracoxxyoflam @suchababie @uhhhcrypticbastard @on-my-way-to-erebor @thewinterrbucky @mylifeispainandiloveit @fillechatoyante @padmoonyfeorge @montypythonsholysnail @pollynx @aziraslowlylosestheirshit @roundbrownlover @awesomeowlbook @bookloverfilmoholic @hargreevesd @death-is-beautiful @ilovespideyyy @peakyrogers

[thoughts-on-bangtan]

I’m guessing all Vmins were right Sweet night is about the past. I guess it’s why Tae give it for the movie instead of for his mixtape. I’m guessing JM gave him the ok to do so and why he’s been silent about it cause it’s over between them. TK are making it too obvious. jk treating JM like they aren’t friends suddenly. jk in purple/green all the time. v not shutting up about jk suddenly. JM is not handling it well. I guess it’s why v said he likes JM the most (guess as friend) cause he feels bad

Admin 1: “Sure, go and release a song easily identified as being about us and your hope of me giving you a second chance with a hopeful ending seeing as we aren’t together anymore, sounds like a nice idea to me. Go, Taehyungie, do it. Then also let me hold your hand on national TV and show it to the cameras happily, smile sweetly at you while we stand next to the president, talk about our song and memories and how much they mean to me, perform this song that's essentially a love letter to our bond in a live-streamed concert for almost 800k people, and when you tell me you like me the most, I’ll say I like you a lot as well. Because we’re over and not even friends anymore.” Sounds like some sound logic to me, and I mean that in the most sarcastic way possible to humans.

Honestly, either I’ve just been around too long and all these asks are starting to sound the same and impossibly uncreative, or they are just getting more farfetched and bizarre. If you want a proper answer, I told you, bring something to the table that hasn’t been talked to dust yet, or leave it be.

To quote Tae, the man who knows best what he feels: 95z is love.

Until he (and Jimin) changes his mind, this is the answer I have for any and all Xkooker ask, as well as any other ship involving Tae or Jimin.

Also yes, I did see the hate against Jimin that exploded yesterday, we even have an ask about it in our inbox, and honestly these types of questions, anon? Yeah, you're not helping, in fact, you are part of the problem, just saying.

Admin 2: Man, man, man!

We didn't really want to answer these types of questions anymore, but this ask takes the trophy when it comes to delulu/nonsensical questions, so I decided to answer it after all. Because it’s hot and I need a distraction.

Also, this question basically confirms most of our suspicions we’ve had so far. Let me explain.

Folks, who is behind these kinds of stories which are being presented and preached as truth on various sns?

I don't believe this is any single persons invention (in this case, that anon came up with this idea “without help”), if anything it’s the result of delulu, and often times toxic, scenarios and stories created by a group of people intended to further a narrative and actively disrupt the “peace” within ARMY (or at least that’s what it feels like since all these things do is ignite hate and toxicity). Where is the origin of it all? Ship centric YouTube channels.

It is very evident that these "imaginative creators/shippers" behind those videos have no consideration of the consequences and harm their content does because, in my opinion, the more controversial and clickbait-y, the better. You know why? More views means more money, which is the goal of it all. We’ve spoken about this before, I believe, how these videos on “ship evidence” and “ship drama” for Xkookers are the most beloved topics of these videos and thus make up one of the easiest means of generating income, in some cases even something upward of $80k a year depending on the channels CPM, sub and view count.

The average person has to work hard all year round to make this amount of money, if they even have a job that brings in that much. So, it is not surprising that these content creators go very far in their fantasies to support their claims and keep their viewers/costumers engaged and coming back.

I wouldn't be surprised if the creators (or rather the whole lot of them) of both Xkook camps are basically the same people, because their ideas, conclusions and explanations all sound the same and follow the same nonsensical patters. Which is why we’ve already told you many times that the best thing you can do is stay away from this type of content altogether.

So! Let's analyze this ask a little more:

"…Vmins were right Sweet Night is about the past. I guess it’s why Tae give it for the movie instead of for his mixtape."

Ok, let's say Tae wrote "Sweet Night" for Jimin, but in the meantime he has changed his feelings (that's how I understand the question) so he gave the song to the Itaewon Class OST instead of putting it on his mixtape. I wanted to note that Taehyung's mixtape isn't finished yet and we will probably wait many more months for it.

It seems to me that Taehyung really wanted to show his feelings to the world, so he saw an opportunity with the OST, and therefore a quicker release for SN, and took it. The fact is that SN is about the past, but there is also hope for the future, hope for the fulfillment of wishes, which likely did come true judging by how Tae said he wrote SN during tour abroad (so sometimes summer/early autumn 2019 perhaps) and we saw vmin holding hands at the airport on Tae’s birthday in 2019 when they thought no one would see, just three months before SN was released (and likely long schedules for said release since these types of things don’t just happen overnight) and many, many other such things.

“I suspect that JM gave him his consent and why he kept silent about it because it was over between them, TK makes it too obvious. "

And I suspect that Jimin was very touched by Sweet Night and ultimately wrote Friends in which him and Tae sing: “Many promises and memories / and more to come / Someday, when these cheers die down, stay hey / You are my soulmate”

The fact is that BTS didn't say much about SN, but it was the same with many of their other SC releases as well, so it wasn’t unusual, especially since SN came out while they were promoting MOTS7. Also, in my opinion, the content of this song is too personal to be able to describe/discuss the song in detail beyond the bit that was mentioned during Tae’s vlive with Namjoon. During a Japanese interview, the members basically confirmed/pointed out how romantic Tae is and when SN came up, Namjoon “coincidentally” turned around toward Jimin who has a similar facial expression of pressed lips as he did during Let’s BTS.

"JK treats JM as if they suddenly weren't friends"

And here I have caught you, dear anon. I think you're not even looking at the original BH content, but that instead you are basing your conclusions and opinions on manipulative YT ship videos instead because if you would’ve watched the original content like RUN, the recent SOWOOZOO concerts, and interviews, you wouldn’t arrive anywhere near such thoughts and conclusions.

Jimin and JK are still close, also Jimin calls JK his little brother (dongsaeng) and JK describes Jimin (or associates these words with him) as charm and cute. Does there seem to be any kind of conflict between Jimin and Jungkook? Certainly not, no.

„JK always in purple / green. v not shutting up about jk suddenly."

You mean their microphone colors? I wanted to point out how Tae wore a yellow shirt during the concert, which is the same color as the chick emoji ARMY associates with Jimin as well as his mic color. LOL.

As far as I know, when Tae has something to say, he will say it, and if he is praising JKs songs, and especially You Eyes Tell which we know is a song Tae liked a lot, that is a good thing. It simply means Tae appreciates the song JK created, appreciates and values his talents and hard work. If the entire band praises Namjoon and his lyrics/contributions on their songs, does that automatically also mean all six are “not shutting up about him” and therefore must be in love and in a relationship with him, or it’s an indicator of it? If anything, it’s merely an indicator that Tae is an honest person and JK did a good job on those songs. Easy as that.

That's my favorite part of the question: "JM doesn't handle it that well. I think that's why I said he likes JM best (as a friend, I guess) because he feels bad."

Personally, I consider myself a person with a great imagination, but I wouldn't really come up with a scenario like that.

How cruel of a person do you think Tae is? Imagine they aren’t together anymore or close anymore, or whatever else you tried to insinuate anon, and then Tae would go on national TV and do this whole thing of asking for the card in his letter to Jimin to be blurred and then said “Jimin-ah I like you the most”? To do something as hurtful as that you either have to be a sadist or an asshole and I’d like to believe even you, anon, don’t think in such a way about Tae, of all people.

Perhaps that’s something dumb teenagers or kids would do, but not adult men in their mid-twenties who see each other every single day, are part of the same team and have to work with each other. This is real life, not a soap opera. If these types of dramas really would be happening within BTS, they would’ve stopped existing as a band a long time ago because no one would be able to live with such actions and people for a prolonged amount of time. BTS are grown men, best friends, even found family, and not actors on a badly written TV show for our entertainment where they act out increasingly stupid relationship drama in which JK somehow ended up being the toy going from hand to hand like he’s not even an actual person anymore.

In summary, this question was written by a child, teenager, or an emotionally immature person naïve enough to buy into outlandish ship narratives.

Anon, hear what the members had to say during FESTA 2021. Make your own conclusions and stop watching and believing the nonsense on YouTube. As Tae said: Get out of your imagination. It’s not good in there.

[solastia]

Love And Lies | 3

Pairing: Kim Seokjin x F!Reader

Summary: You are a simple maid. When your lady and dearest friend need help escaping an arranged marriage with King Seokjin so they might be together, you do the only thing you can - take her place. 

You followed behind the man who introduced himself as Chancellor Namjoon Kim, listening to him halfheartedly as he explained that while that was his official title, he was more of a Jack-of-all-trades and preferred calling himself the King's right-hand man.

You smooth your hands down your gown, hoping it was grand enough to disguise the commoner wearing it. You’d changed for supper, something that Eleanor had told you was common for people at court. According to her, depending on the person they might even change outfits as many as three or four times a day! The nobility were a ridiculous bunch, you sniffed derisively to yourself. You couldn’t help but feel sorry for the maids that had to care for all that clothing and the laundresses that cleaned them. Two times a day - not counting your sleeping gown - was extravagant enough for the likes of you.

The ensemble that you had now made you feel like a fairy princess of legend. You were a shimmering cloud of pink and white as you glided along the stone floors. The dress was pink velvet lined with white silk, along with white ermine fur on the edges of the sleeves and bottom of the gown. The bust was embroidered with silver thread and decorated with glistening pearls. You were also very happy to note that the top was much more modest this time around, though not by much. Eleanor had let you pick the jewelry yourself, so you’d settled on a simple strand of pearls around your neck and tiny pearl earbobs. Your hair was left loose and free of any painful and tedious styling with the hot iron.

Truthfully, you rather liked this dress. The fabric was soft to the touch and very comfortable. You even liked the little slippers that matched. When you asked Eleanor why she was letting you wear something like this, she had told you that your previous ensemble had been to impress the King, and this one was to appeal to the man. It was an odd statement considering that your goal was to not appeal to him, and she’d seem rather conflicted saying such a thing. You wished you’d had the time to question her further, but the Chancellor had shown up before you could.

In the end, it wouldn’t matter if you looked rather pretty in your outfit because you knew that eventually, he’d move on to the other women. You had literally nothing of interest about you to keep royalty interested. After all, what could you speak to him about beyond stain removal techniques and how to haggle for the best prices at the market?

Chancellor Namjoon opens a door and ushers you inside, seeming to not notice or mind that you hadn’t even been listening to him talk this entire time.

“His Majesty will be with you in a moment.”

He nods and leaves briskly, closing the door behind him. You take the chance to look around, your mouth falling in awe as you take in the rows and rows of scrolls. So this was a library! You had heard of such things but had simply chalked it up to the fancies of nobles, but this was truly amazing. Beyond the scrolls, there were even parchment tied together filled with writing and little sketches. A few were even covered in decorated leather, something that boggled your mind. Books! You had never thought to see one in your life.

You adored the family you worked for, of course, but not a single one of them had any use for reading and writing. Eleanor could write a little, mostly her name and a list of things she needed that looked like badly designed inkblots. Jungkook was a little better but mostly relied on drawing things out. You remembered the departed Duchess had a slanting script that was like beautiful art to your young eyes. She’d taught you how to read and write before she’d passed, but you rarely got a chance to use that knowledge. You never had anyone to write to and the Duke saw no use for books.

Your hand trailed reverently across the hard leather of one of the bound pages, wishing you had the freedom to peer inside.

“Do you like to read?”

The voice startled you, and you gasped and turned with your hand on your chest.

“Goodness. I’m...sorry, Your Majesty.”

His smile was kind, but his eyes looked like he was laughing at you. “It’s quite alright. So, do you?”

“Hmm?” You hummed softly, distracted by the way his now silver tunic made him glow like an otherworldly being. “Oh, read?” You smile sheepishly, forcing yourself to focus on the conversation and not on his lips. “I don’t get to very often, but I like stories.”

He seemed pleased with your answer, gesturing towards the book. “We got this one from a visiting Monarch years ago. Livres des merveilles du monde. It’s about a merchant named Marco Polo who was an adventurer for a while and traveled through the Orient. I was certain I was going to grow up and conquer the world someday when I first read this.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Ah, the bane of my existence. Responsibilities,” he says dramatically, obviously trying to make you smile. “You may borrow it if you like. I’m not certain if it will be riveting enough for you, but you’re welcome to it. Or anything else here, during your stay.”

He picked up the book and handed it to you, his grin growing as he watched you cup it in your hands and stare at it in awe. A whole book!

You smile up at him genuinely for the first time, your smile wide and beaming with joy. “Thank you, Your Majesty. I’m not certain I’ll have time to finish it since I read so very slowly, but I thank you for the chance.”

He nods, his cheeks pinkened slightly. He gestures with a hand towards a table in the corner.

“I have some warm wine and honey pastries if you’d like to join me. I thought we might have a chance to get to know each other a little more before we have the pressure of an entire room watching our every move.”

“Oh...yes, that will be...tense” you gulp and sit as gracefully as you can in the highbacked wooden chair.

His smile is soft and kind as he pours you a drink. “I suppose despite your status you’re not quite used to court life. Your father mentioned you preferred staying home.”

“Yes,” you stuttered nervously. “I found I was more comfortable tutoring at home rather than being fostered out. I’m afraid the one time I tried, I found the group of ladies rather spiteful and begged Papa to come home after only three months.”

Which was a true story. Eleanor had been sent to the Duchesse Aline Villeneuve - the King’s very own aunt - to learn how to run a keep and other “women’s arts” not long after her mother had passed away from a sudden illness. According to Eleanor, she had been horribly bullied by the other ladies in the Duchesse’s care and she “hadn’t cared to make friends with such vain and heartless wenches, anyhow.”

Personally, you had rather fond memories of that summer, as with Eleanor away you’d had the freedom to do as you pleased and you’d even made a new friend for a few months - a village boy with the most annoying laugh you’d ever heard but had been sweet and fun. The two of you had been inseparable for the entire summer until one day he didn’t show up to the stream you often met at. You still thought of that boy from time to time and hoped he was doing well. You never did learn where he disappeared to.

King Seokjin nods in understanding. “Unfortunately, it’s not going to be much better here. Gossip is practically a form of currency, and whether it’s true or not doesn’t matter,” he rolls his eyes and sits back in his chair, bringing up a mug of steaming spiced wine to his lips. He gulps and sighs, setting the cup back on the table.

“And in your case, it will be twice as bad as you are...well…” he coughs lightly, his cheeks blushing once more. “A high contender to be Queen?”

You sputter on the drink of wine you’d just taken, trying to hastily wipe any spilled droplets before he sees them.

“Yes...err, I am...that.”

“So,” he says loudly, slapping his hands onto his thighs. “I mostly wanted to set aside some time right now so you can tell me things you like to do. I’m afraid I have to live my entire life by a set schedule, so if I had some ideas for my courting days with you that would help greatly.” “Oh,” you smile mischievously, “Yes, I imagine it must be difficult trying to balance so many suitors. Romantic sailing on Monday, serenading on Tuesday, kissing in a dark alcove on Wednesday...”

“You have no idea, “ he groans, only to still and gape at you in astonishment. “You’re making fun of me!”

“I would never, Your Majesty,” you drop your eyes to your lap, still smiling despite the way you were internally smacking yourself. This wasn’t home, you had to curb your tongue.

He squints at you suspiciously. “I have a feeling you would and will. You have some spirit hiding under that demure stance, don’t you Lady Eleanor?” He cocks his head and looks at you with an expression of pleased wonder.

“Perhaps, Your Majesty.”

“I think,” he begins softly, his tone making you lift your eyes to meet his. “In private settings like this, you may use my first name.”

Your eyes widen incredulously. “Oh, I couldn’t!”

“I can order you to if I must,” his smile is playful, even while his eyes are staring at you intensely.

“I...alright. Thank you...Seokjin,” you respond quietly and no doubt with crimson cheeks.

“There. That wasn’t so hard. And...I liked hearing it.”

He stands up and offers you his hand. “It’s time to head to supper. I can escort you as far as to the hall, but I have to go to the high table without anyone seeing you with me. Don’t want them to see you entering the dining hall on the King’s arm; that would make you a target for the harpies,” he winks, linking your arm in his. “You can send a list of activities we can do together later.”

The walk down the hall is too short, but you’d enjoyed the feeling of his strong arm encasing yours and the occasional sneaky peeks of his beautiful side profile. He releases you as soon as the noisy dining hall is close enough to hear.

“I must leave you here, but I look forward to speaking with you on the morrow. I’ll have someone bring the book to your room tonight.”

“Thank you, Your M…” you begin, only for him to raise an eyebrow at you daringly. You glance around you for eavesdropping servants and sigh. “Thank you, Seokjin.”

His beaming smile is worth your embarrassment. “Well done, lambkin. Be sure to try the custard tarts, they are the best!”

He waves and strides off, leaving you to find the waiting Jungkook and be escorted to your seat. Something pricked at the back of your mind, however. Lambkin? Why did that seem so familiar? Perhaps you were just overwhelmed. You shake your head and focus on the elegant supper in front of you as you find Jungkook waiting just inside the door, and he gestures for you to walk ahead of him. You can tell from the way his jaw is clenched he’s dying to ask you about the meeting, but there is no way to subtly speak to him at the moment.

The dining hall was brimming with people and you praised Eleanor for being the sort of noble who kept to herself, since the chances of anyone knowing her here were incredibly low. Your seat is incredibly close to the high table - in fact, it was directly above you. A few more steps to your right and His Majesty would be getting crumbs and wine on your head.

You’re not brave enough to look at him yet, though, and decide to look around for your “competition.”

Your table seems to be where they are all located, judging by the way most of the women gathered around you meet your curious gaze with measuring looks of their own. Most of them turn away after a few seconds, obviously dismissing you as not a threat.

One girl that looks similar to Eleanor all the way down to her bouncing curls grins at you playfully and waves at you with the chicken leg in her hand. You nod in answer, adding a slight smile as you decided she seemed nice enough.

A regal brunette meets your eyes with a quirk of her eyebrow, blatantly looking you up and down. Her lips thin and she pointedly turns away with a sneer, clutching her silverware almost threateningly. Alright, she will not be someone you want to know.

Directly across from you is a redhead and you snort, coming to the realization that His Majesty literally has every color of the rainbow to pick from for his bride. Variety is the spice of life, you suppose. This woman seems very disinterested in everything around her, however, focusing on her meal and only interacting with servants to refill her goblet.

At the head of the table and directly at your elbow is the one that you can only assume is the Princess. She is incredibly pretty, you have to admit. Her dark black hair is mostly loose and cascading about her in waves. The sides have been pulled back and secured with a large golden hairpin the size of a dagger with little jeweled flowers adorning it. Her dress is strange yet beautiful. Silk or satin, if you had to guess. The top was lavender and embroidered with flowers and some sort of serpent that vaguely looked like a dragon. The bottom was nearly peach-colored and consisted of the same decorations. Her features were sharp and sculpted, with high cheekbones and a thin nose. She looked exotic and lovely, but it wasn’t until her smile blinded you that you realized she was beautiful. She met your eyes with a twinkle in hers, reaching her delicate hand up to point at herself.

“I am Hosook. You?”

“I am Lady Eleanor Rose D’Aily, Your Highness,” you answer slowly, assuming that the way she was squinting while you spoke was her concentrating on your words. Perhaps she was learning the language still.

“You for him too?” she asked with a wave behind her at the high table.

“Yes, I was brought here for the King. I’m sure you’re a much better choice.”

The Princess smiles her understanding and waves away your compliment. “Too...ugg,” she grunts, obviously failing to find the word she wanted. She chose instead to flap in the general direction of King Seokjin like she was shooing away a fly.

“You...aren’t attracted to His Majesty?” you ask in a hushed voice. How could anyone not find him the most beautiful being to ever walk this earth?

She sticks out her tongue, “Reminds me of Haraboji...uh...Grandfather?”

You sputter a laugh which you know is too loud, but you can’t help yourself as Princess Hosook giggles with you. You feel yourself being watched and glance up to lock eyes with the very man in question. The King looks down at you curiously, his lips tilted in an amused smile as you can’t stop your giggles. Suddenly, he winks at you and you look away quickly as your laughter dies down into a shy smile.

“Oh,” Princess Hosook says slyly, clucking and patting your hand with a grin. “I see now. You nice, make pretty Queen.”

“Goodness, it’s not like that at all. We just met,” you rush to explain, your excuses being waved away yet again.

“I like…” she waves between the King and you. “Nice together. Uh...need more words,” she grumbles quietly, biting her lip.

“I could help, if you like? I helped my Lad...err...my Ladies Maid learn how to read and write.”

Her smile was beaming as she nodded her head in agreement. “Yes. Need be better to deal with them,” she nods her head towards the gaggle of noblewomen surrounding them.

“I understand. I have to wait to hear which days I need to spend with the King, and then we’ll set aside some time for us!” You smile kindly at the Princess, who grins back and attends her meal with much more gusto now that she had something to look forward to. You sigh and quietly thank the powers that be for making some sort of friend to get you through this, and one that you were able to fall back into your natural state of submission with. It would be easier to explain any lapses in your behavior if you were just a mere Duke’s daughter shadowing a Princess, rather than being with the other women who were basically your equals and expected you to be just as much of a spoiled prat as they were.

The meal comes to a close (and you were amazed that you only caught yourself staring at His Majesty less than five times), and Jungkook is back at your elbow to escort you to your rooms. As you accept his helping hand, you feel someone tap on your shoulder. Princess Hosook flicks her eyes up and down Jungkook with an exaggerated waggled of her eyebrows. Her hand goes to her chest and she mouths something that you assume is complimentary. Jungkook’s eyes are huge as he tries to follow what’s happening.

You giggle and slap his arm. “She thinks you’re handsome.”

“TAKEN…” he squeaks, “I’m taken. Sorry..uh...lady...majesty…”

“Always pretty ones,” Princess Hosook sighs and waves goodbye with fluttering fingers, disappearing with her own small army of attendants.

You continue to laugh quietly as Jungkook begs you to stop. You pause just before leaving the hall and catch the King’s eye right before he leaves for his own apartments. He smiles and shallowly bows, and you watch him until his broad shoulders disappear from sight.

“Sis,” Jungkook mutters quietly as he herds you back to your hallway. “You can’t…” he sighs. “I’m sure you think he’s handsome and he seems to be nice to you, but you can’t be with him. You remember that, right? You’re not who he thinks you are and he’d find that out if you were to marry him. I am literally stealing a potential bride from him, and the moment he finds out, he can kill us all.”

“I know, Jungkook. I’m not an imbecile.”

“I know that, but you’ve never been courted before. I forgot about that and now I’m worried that you’re over your head.”

You sigh and loop your arm in his as you walk. “I suppose I forgot that he’d be trying to win me over as much as the rest, at least at first. I might have let the sweet words and smiles affect me, but I promise Jungkook, I’ll remember. Besides, I saw the other potential brides. I am no match for them. The novelty of someone new will fade in a few days, and I pray that we have the deed to the keep no later than a month. Then, I will tell him that I don’t think I’m a good match for the Kingdom and we can be on our merry way.”

He sighs wearily and tugs you close for a quick hug. “I know, I trust you and your judgment, I just got worried. If he does anything that makes you uncomfortable or makes you feel compromised, let me know. I don’t care if he’s the king, I’ll throw down my glove.”

“You’ll not duel the King, Jungkook. Go seek your bed, brother dear,” you say with a tiny smile, pushing him away from you once you reach your room. “Tell Eleanor when she comes back from the kitchens she can go straight to her room. I won’t bother her tonight because I’m so exhausted from all this excitement I’m going to fall asleep the moment my head hits the mattress.”

Jungkook grins, a look you really don’t want to identity lighting his eyes. “Will do. Sweet dreams, sis.” He stomps off and leaves you to close the door to your opulent apartments.

You yawn and observe the room as you undress, leaving the layers of clothing across a chair to be taken care of the next day. The room was spacious and absolutely gorgeous, decorated in lovely shades of robin’s egg blue, white, and gold. There was an entire room just for clothing, one for washing, and yet another whole room for your ladies maid - something that Eleanor had seemed suspiciously excited about. You worried that she was going to try yet again to seduce her love now that she had a new sort of freedom without her father about.

You crawl onto the giant golden bed and arrange the blankets over you as you fight off another yawn. A full belly and an overwhelming day full of excitement seemed to be all your poor body could handle. Another yawn and you drift off to sleep, visions of warm brown eyes and smiling lips filling your dreams.

A/N: 

1. Yes, that is Hoseok. He’s a pretty princess today. 

2. I don’t really like using the term “exotic” but since this is a historical and being done from the viewpoint of a person in the middle ages, it seemed fitting. 

3. Oh, look at that totally huge and obvious hint to the past. Hmmm....

[alittlefrenchtree]

I feel so conflicted about Timmy. I loved the sweet, humble guy he was, but now he acts like the biggest diva, going to fashion shows, only hanging out with famous people. I miss the old Timmy, what I see now I don't like. And I don't like that he left earlier and didn't care about Armie, but can stop rehearsing to show his face at fashion weeks. I feel at the beginning it was only about his talent, now it's more about his fashion choices. I don't want to hate, I just feel different about him.

Me @ everyone who will read this answer : Please be kind?

Seriously, just be kind. That’s not a question, just be kind.

More important, unless you’re Nonny and looking for an answer of mine you really don’t have to read all of that. It’s mostly an observation on how Timmy’s career and image is handled right now and nothing groundbreaking at all. There a little bit about his relationship with Armie towards the end. Honestly even you, Nonny, you weren’t probably asking for an answer this long. I just love to hear myself thought, apparently. Sorry if it’s boring as hell for you 😅

I choose to believe that this ask isn’t coming from a wickedness place and doesn’t want to be mean. That’s the main reason why I’m answering this ask, instead of deleting it.

The second reason is because I’ve been contemplating the same kind of questions and the same kind of issues about Timmy for a while now. And since I’m now mostly at peace with all of it, and with the way I see him, I thought it could be interesting to share around that.

By sharing my view on how things are at this moment, I don’t want to invalidate your feelings, dear Nonny (or anyone who feels the same way). Like I said, I understand where they come from. I only hope that, by reading a different point of view, you’ll managed to feel a little bit less conflicted and maybe go back to enjoy some Timmy content like you used to. I hope I won’t sound to harsh or anything. This isn’t my intention at all.

I think the most important thing to remember is that 99% of what we see of Timmy is work. The work of an actor is not only acting. Especially when you have the ambition to become and to stay the kind of actor Timmy wants to be. Every time you see him at a public event, he’s working. Networking is working. Existing in the media eyes is working. Attending as fashion shows is working. That doesn’t mean that, in the case of fashion show for example, Haider isn’t also his friend. Of course they’re friends and of course he’s also showing support for his friend’s work. But it’s also a work relationship. That’s why it needs to be public. Haider is the one dressing him for the premieres of his movies. Haider is one of those who helped build his fashion reputation. Being seen together and publicly supporting each other work, it’s good for both of them, professionally speaking. What I mean is, when you see Tim at a fashion show or at a Hollywood party, it’s not free time for him. It’s a scheduled event on his work schedule. So when you said that he stops rehearsing to go to fashion show, that’s not entirely true. Firstly because it’s on week-end. Secondly, it would be like saying that he stops acting to do promo. Both things are work. Attending to Haider’s fashion show is also work.

Beside the London-Paris journey is hardly an effort. It would take me almost the same amont of time to go to Paris using public transports and I’m living like really close to Paris. And beside bis Timmy has seen SWM within the window of two days that was allowed by his work schedule so it’s not like he has never managed to make things work for Armie either.

For me, the problem is that Timmy has three jobs at the moment. He’s ‘one of the best actor of his generation’, the ‘most influential man in fashion’ and ‘a heartthrob for teenagers and young adults’. I’m phrasing things this way on purpose, because it shows how much weighs on him at the moment. All of this means a lot of expectations on him, a lot of judgements but also a lot of money depending on him. Even if all of his current statuts has been happening in a more or less natural way (he’s one of the best actor of his generation because he’s good at acting, his interest for fashion seems genuine and… well… He’s damn cute so of course he’s a teenage dream), my main concern is the fact that, right now, his public image is handled to encourage these three status at the same time. As long as his acting career is doing fine, it’s not a problem. If his acting career starts to be on the skids, or if one of his parts on a movie is suddenly having very bad reviews, the whole world will start to look at him and at his fashion/heartthrob statuts with different eyes.

But that moment hasn’t happened yet so I think it’s unfair to call him out on that now. He has shown nothing but hard work on the acting part of his career, and he has great things aligned for the next year. He’s a lead on the Dune remake by Denis Villeneuve, he’s starring on a Wes Anderson movie, he has that Bob Dylan thing who he seems really committed to and he’s about to do a run of a promising play. I think his choice on going back to theater, where everything is about acting, is really relevant of how focused is still he’s on acting.

I think it’s also interesting to notice the timing. For the past two years, Timmy has always been disappearing around that time of the year. So much that the Timmy drought has become a thing in the fandom. In the past, Timmy has expressed his need of disappearing and ‘going back in the mud’, both literally and figuratively, after being exposed to public eyes at this extend and for a long period of time. Truth is, I believe that Timmy is not allowed to disappear anymore. I don’t think you’re allowed to disappear for a while when Legendary Pictures is betting a lot amount of money on your pretty face. Because to disappear means media and social media will talk less about you and, in this industry, if people stop talking about you it basically means you’re dead.

So he can’t disappear. But somehow he found a way to focus on acting through theater, even if he has to do it in front of the public eyes. To be honest, I think it’s the least bad solution. I think the need to disappear for him (or anyone for that matter) for a decent period of time is really crucial for mental health and he hasn’t had this opportunity for a while, and I’m afraid he won’t have it either for the near future. Don’t get me wrong, I love that he’s doing theater again. I love having the opportunity to see him live perform I just wish he has a little bit more time to stay off the radar before going back for a whole year of craziness.

I understand that it can be frustrating to feel like most of the talks about him are about something else than his roles or his movies or his acting skills. Like I said, it’s part because of his/his team’s fault because they’ve been feeding the talk so it can keep going and going. It’s also part because the world works this way and is superficial as hell. Movie talks last a few months with the pre-promo/the premieres/the actually promo. A little bit more if you’re lucky enough to get nominations and awards. Then it becomes old news. Timmy’s persona exists every day. He’s doing and wearing new things every day and people are always more excited by what’s new. And the media will keep on using anything to have him as click-bait. It’s a win-win situation for both sides.

Except you never know when people are going to switch. One day they keep on waiting more and more of someone and the next day, they already grew tired of thi person. It’s been too much. They over did it. I sometimes use a tag that say something like « when can we say that too much is too much? » to react to what people and media sometimes do/write/say about Timmy to express this kind of feeling. Of course Tim and his team can’t control everything that is being said about him but I believe that the decisions they made in the past year? year and an half? have lead to this kind of craziness. This makes me think of that french paper, which was basically saying ‘why don’t we stop to consider Timmy as a kitten and make a fuss of everything he did and why don’t we start focusing on how he acts, because that is the real interesting thing to talk about.

Despite everything I can’t hold all of this too-much-ness against him when he’s still working so hard on his roles. I can’t blame him when I think of him giving so much on himself in that before-the-battle speech in The King that I want to go fight with and for him. I can’t blame him when I see him giving so much of himself for Laurie that he’s making me laugh and melt in the middle of a cinema room full of people when I’m usually pretty stoic in public. I just can’t blame him when I hear him talk about Dune and being so excited that he literally can’t stop himself for bouncing on his chair. I just can’t.

What I can do is not not pay attention to everything. I know it’s not an easy thing to do on tumblr and on social media when he’s everywhere and people are retweeting and reblogging the same things over and over again but if I’m not interested, I try to not pay attention. Back during CMBYN and BB era, I think I was looking at and reading everything. I’ve stopped shortly after. I didn’t read the article you’re referring to, for example. Because what’s Timmy is wearing interests me but not the shallow and irrelevant articles people will write about it. Most of them will say the same thing, that it’s Timothée Chalamet world now and us peasants are just humbly living on it. It’s going to be said over and over again until something newer, younger comes along. It’s ok. Being a teenage heartthrob will pass. Being the most influential man in fashion will probably also pass. I mean his fashion choices will probably keep on arousing interest but the world is going to catch up. Eventually.

But acting will stay.

And if in the meantime, he manages to enjoy a little bit of more superficial things and take a shot or two of confidence along the way without regretting too many decisions he made, I say why not let him do that? It’s not like we have a word to say anyway.

I understand what you mean about missing him being sweet and humble even if I disagree with you. I’m not saying that he’s not sweet and humble anymore but I felt something shift between the BB era and TK era. It’s also frustrating because it’s more a feeling than something I can prove or explain. I just don’t think he’s changed, I think he’s a little bit more guarded than before. And if I look at things from an human perspective, it makes sense?

The more people are watching me, irl or online, the more I’m going to be cautious about things I said and how I behave. The more guarded I’ll be. And in my case, we’re only talking about dozens from a few hundreds tops of people tops. Can you imagine living your life in front of millions people? I’d put some distance and some defenses between me and the world as well. He has to if he wants to survive.  

We’ve been lucky to have witnessed something as precious and rare as what we have witnessed during the CMBYN and a little bit during the BB era. It was something beautiful but it wasn’t meant to last. Not in the same kind of proportions anyway.

So I don’t think Timmy is acting like the biggest diva. Like I’ve said, what we see of his life is 99% work-related and we see about 10% of his time? Less of that?

Like for example, he’s been in London for what? 10-12 days now? And if I’m not mistaking, we haven’t seen him anywhere except from fans meeting him briefly outside of the theater and him picking up food? Whatever he’s doing, if he has a wild life or if he’s in bed at 9pm every night, he’s being discreet about it. Like he’s always been discreet about his private life, his close friends and his family. Just because he’s discreet about it doesn’t mean he doesn’t see them — old friends and people who aren’t famous. He just doesn’t feel the need to post their face on social media or meeting them in front of paparazzis.

Of course if I wanted to see him as a diva, I could. I’d look at him wearing sunglasses inside and declare that he’s a diva. When there could be thousands of reasons for him to wear sunglasses inside. I wouldn’t surprise me to learn that flashes during fashion week are painful for the eyes, especially for people with color eyes as light as Timmy’s. Especially if you’re tired. Or hangover. Or maybe he’s just thinking of sunglasses as an integral part of his outfit. Like shoes or socks or jewelry or backpacks. Or maybe he just feel safer that way and it helps his anxiety. I tried wearing sunglasses all day long at a couple of occasions when I was particularly tired and it was kind of amazing. Plus it allows you to avoid eye contact with humans which is also amazing.

I wanted to touch a little bit on the fashion topic before moving on to the Armie one. I’m guessing you’re not really passionate or fond of fashion. It’s ok. You’re allowed to and fashion and haute couture don’t do much to help themselves. Or didn’t do much. I guess things are slowly changing like everywhere else. But there are a lot of ego, of superficiality, a lot of changes and improvements that could be made. A friend who has worked for designers and still work in the fashion industry once told me that the industry wouldn’t be that bad if designers stop acting like they were saving the world with their clothes. My point is, just because something has a reputation, doesn’t mean every person who takes part of this thing has the same reputation. There are people in fashion who are truly passionate about what they’re doing and teach you things about fashion that make you look at clothes as wearable pieces of art. Because when you look closely at haute couture, you can see that fashion can take its influences in architecture, sculpture, painting and in many many others artistic disciplines. It has its own history, its own revolutions, its own movements. It tells something about our time and ourselves as a society. All of that goes without even mentioning the close relationship between fashion, high fashion and movies, which I’m sure is very interesting from a Timmy perspective. (I swear I wrote all of that before reading the Dazed itw. Like pinky swear).

At this point, Timmy could have a seat in the first row for every fashion show of every brand. He could attend to all of them, with a different outfit for each, make a show every time and take all the clothes that designers would sell their cat to see him wearing. He doesn’t. He shows up for about two designers and communicate about one more and that’s all. It’s work. Something related to his red carpet premieres. It’s fun and something he uses to express himself and his personality. I think he said something in the Dazed interview among these lines. That fashion is fun but is main focus in on acting.

Here :

“With the development of my career, I also slowly entered the fashion industry. I can feel that fashion and movies are similar to a certain extent. For me, participating in a movie or wearing a suit is about the people I work with, not the brand or money. That's why I keep working with Haider and Virgil. I also maintain good relationships with many brands, but I will not be overly tied to fashion for this. Because my career is an actor, my dream is to be an actor, and I am very satisfied and very happy to be an actor.”

Regarding of Armie… Honestly I’m kind of tired of the debate. Because I’m tired of what the debate says about how we see relationships these days, without even talking about Armie and Timmy.

I’m still trying to understand at which point we has started to need public proofs of private relationships. Likes, Facebook statuts, pictures shared publicly, couple selfies… I mean what the point? How have we become so insecure about relationships and ourselves that we’re now feeling the need to share proofs of private relationships with the whole world to believe it? And to the point that we are now projecting our own insecurities on relationships of others? It makes absolutely no sense to me.

If I wasn’t talking with/seeing my close ones for a whole year or a whole decade for whatever reason, they would still be my close ones. I believe the same thing about Armie and Timmy. Except these two idiots seems to be talking to each other all the time and seeing each other pretty regularly. But because Armie isn’t about work anymore, we don’t have to see it.

Over the past four years, they’ve done nothing but showing and saying how much they care about each other and know about each other and how much they’re still close. Timmy literally said I love you to Armie in a damn public speech. Name me another person for whom he said that. The three words, plane and simple.

If you’re willing to believe that liking each other post on social media or showing up at a public events or pose in front of photographers are better proofs of closeness that what they’ve been doing so far, that says something about how you see relationships, not about how they really are.

Loving someone is not always about rubbing it off publicly for everyone to see. More often than not, loving someone is about answering your phone in the middle of the night, because the person you love and care about can’t sleep or is on another time zone and needs you. That something you can show off on social media or get papped. And maybe we need to start to believe that it’s even more valuable exactly because of that.

[megaboy335]

Mega’s Top 2020 Anime

The year 2020 is finally coming to an end. It’s been an unusual year to say the least. Coronavirus more or less almost cancelled the entire spring anime season, which lead to a strange anime schedule for the rest of the year since delays have trickle down effects to what was in the pipeline. To be completely honest, this was not a good year for anime. I watched only a handful of very good shows, and the rest were mediocre at best. The top 5 shows I talk about here are definitely worth watching at least.

So with the introduction out of the way, lets get into this. As usual this list is just my opinions. Don’t take it too seriously.

1) Kaguya-sama Love is War? (Season 2)

The second season of Kaguya-sama took everything from season 1 and brought it up a level. The visual gags became more impressive, the voice acting was just as good, and the show is delivering sharper writing as we get deeper into the manga. 

Season 2 added two new notable aspects to the show. First, a new member to the main cast by the name of Iino. She adds a new angle to exploit for the skits as someone who adheres strictly to the rules. This often means Iino and Kaguya frequently bump heads. In fact how they interpret a situation can be entirely different, which creates numerous misunderstandings between them. Second, Kaguya-sama began expanding the skits into long form stories. There were a series of skits that form an arc spanning an entire episode, or in some cases multiple episodes. Episode 11 was the highlight of the season where Ishigami confronted his past to overcome the bad stigma surrounding his character. Additionally, the story added depth to his connection with Shirogane while making us realize there was more to Ishigami than meets the eye. Kaguya and Shirogane also both became a little closer as the tangled web of their schemes yielded unexpected results at times.

Kaguya-Sama has an ova and season 3 planned. I eagerly look forward to seeing what new crazy situations the characters find themselves in. 

2) A Certain Scientific Railgun T (Season 3)

After waiting 6 years since the conclusion of season 2, the Railgun anime finally returned to adapt two more arcs from the manga. 

The first half was a Railgun version of the Daissheisai Festival arc. This version focuses on a completely different event in the arc with a story involving Misaki, Misaka, and Dolly. It pulls us deeper into the story threads established in the Level Upper and Sisters arc of what the scientists were doing out of the public eye. We meet the original Misaka clone and how Misaki came to meet her which adds a new layer to the current Misaka and Misaki relationship that we never knew. We see how Misaki is also a victim of the dark experiments occurring behind the scenes in Academy City. The experiment to turn Misaka into a level 6 was a very hype moment. Railgun’s Daissheisai Festival arc definiely hit all the right notes.

The second half of Railgun season 3 was the Dream Ranker arc. Like in previous seasons, I found the 2nd cour arc to be weaker than the first half. Indian Poker is a fun concept, but didn’t cleanly tie into the overall story. I also found it weird how special cards that can exchange dreams suddenly exist out of nowhere. Additionally, this arc brought it characters from the Accelerator spin-off which I wasn’t familiar with. It had a few cool and funny moments scattered throughout. The final fight at least brought the conflict to a satisfying conclusion. The only thing holding back Railgun for me like always is my lack of knowledge of the greater Raildex universe. Hopefully this won’t be the last we see of Railgun in animated form because I picked up the manga and the next arc is pretty neat.

3) The Journey of Elaina

The Journey of Elania is an anthology-centric anime where we follow Elania on her adventures. The first episode is a prologue to how she became a witch and the origins of her ambitions. Episode 2-onwards follow a fairly straightforward template of Elania arriving at a new location. She notices something isn’t quite right or learns about something from a local. As the story unfolds, Elania often takes a backseat role and opts to watch things playout. An anime of this style always brings a mixed bag to the table with the kind of stories that are told within the universe. Each episode/adventure is only loosely connected through the main character Elania traveling to a new location, but otherwise they are mostly independent besides a handful of recurring characters. 

Naturally this format means there are both great and not so good episodes. There are bitter sweet tales, comedic, and even a few darker entries mixed within this show. In particular, there were a few standout episodes that cemented this show as something worth watching. Episode 7 was a comedy episode split into two halves. One half showed how two towns divided by a wall were ironically doing the same thing to the wall on each side. The second half recalled how Elania accidentally started a grape stomping tradition in a tiny village. Then there was episode 9, the darkest entry of the show so far, when Elania went back in time to help someone save their childhood friend. However, this person came to realize she hardly knew what her childhood friend was really like. Lastly, the last episode was unexpectedly deep where Elania met various alternate versions of herself and had to confront a dark version spawn from the events in episode 8. It showed how her journey can take all sorts of directions if events had transpired even a little differently.  

A high part of the appeal to me was never knowing what kind of story we would get each week. Was it going to be light-hearted? Serious? Would it focus on Elania or not? Her adventures were certainly full of unexpected happenings. The light novels are 17 volumes in and still going. I wouldn’t mind seeing more if they ever wanted to make another season.

4) Tonikaku Kawaii

From the prolific author Kenjiro Hata comes an anime adaptation of his newest work under the “Crunchyroll Originals” label. The story is simply about a guy who is head over heels for his new wife and can’t get over how awesome it is living with her. Tonikaku Kawaii is a simple show that chooses to highlight the little moments between our main couple Nasa and Tsukasa. We go through all sorts of everyday events with them such as the act of buying a ring, a new television, bedding, and meeting each other’s family. All the characters are so earnest you can’t help but enjoy their silly banter. There is little to no drama here to drive the story forward. You just get to enjoy a newlywed couple discovering new things about each other as they go through everyday life.

However, at the end of the day Tonikaku Kawaii is far from complete and is honestly the type of show that likely wouldn’t make my list most years. It hardly scratched its overarching story during the 1 cour run. The thing that put it over the top for me was simply how likable each of its characters were. They all present their emotions like an open book and you come to enjoy the little quirks of each one. I was slightly confused at how this show became a “Crunchyroll Original” when anything by Hata would have probably gotten an anime sooner or later. There are plenty of other Weekly Shonen Sunday series that could really use an outside force to help them get animated. I can only hope it did well enough for Crunchyroll to consider investing into more from the magazine .

 5) Ahiru no Sora

As usual, my list usually contains at least 1 show that began in the previous year. Ahiru no Sora is an anime that not a lot of people watched, but became one of my favorites each week. This is a 4 cour basketball series about a main character named Sora who is too short for basketball. Despite this set-back, he has a deep passion for the game imparted from his mother and wishes to someday find the same success as she did at the sport. The story begins when he enrolls in a new school and has to build the basketball club from scratch. However, the catch is the basketball team is basically non-existent. He ends up creating a team from a group of unlikely people: the ones who were bullying him. Ahiru no Sora presents a down to earth human side to the sport. There are no fantasy or supernatural elements found in this story. It follows a group of rough around the edges guys whose lives gets back in order through playing basketball together.

All of the main characters go through a decent amount of growth as their personal stories are explored, and Sora especially is taken through a series of events that allow his character to grow more than anyone. I was pleasantly surprised at how emotional it got at times. There was some real heart put into this series. In the middle of the show it genuinely felt the team had hit rock bottom. They lost a major game, the club room was lit on fire, and Sora lost his mother all right in a row. It was the recovery from that period and how each member matured from their experiences that solidified Ahiru no Sora as one of the top shows this year. The only thing holding back the show is that it's left incomplete since the manga is on-going (and actually on hiatus at the moment). I hope there will be an opportunity down the road to have more episodes.

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Disappointments of 2020

1) Deca Dence

I enjoyed Death Parade, Mob Psycho 100, and Detective Conan: Zero the Enforcer was pretty good too. So I figured another original anime from Tachikawa Yuzuru would be something I would like, and yet Deca Dence barely resonated with me. I could never wrap my mind around the setting of the show where robots would enter an alternate world called “Deca Dence” for sport or how these robots had a human persona in the game. The humans were effectively NPCs in the game to the eyes of the robots. The show no doubt had a story it wanted to tell, and it certainly went through the plot beats it wanted to hit, yet I could never get invested in the show. I’m still looking forward to whatever Tachikawa Yuzuru does next. I’ll just consider this as something was not for me.

2) The Day I Became God

This show marks Jun Meada’s 3rd anime original project with P.A. Works. I understand that Angel Beats and Charlotte are flawed shows, but that did not stop them from being enjoyable for me. This unfortunately did not apply to The Day I Became God. At a base level it has many of the usual troupes you would expect from a Jun Meada title: the humor, baseball, an emotionally driven story. The place where this shows failed hard was having no backbone to back up the story it was trying to present. I enjoyed the comedy in the early episodes quite a bit and was somewhat intrigued by a subplot in the background that was slowly creeping up on the main plot. Ending each episode on a countdown to the end of the world helped to keep a looming sense of unease during the early part of the show.

Then in typical Jun Meada fashion, the plot of the show hit all at once. Episode 9 was the big climax where the subplot and main plot collided to send the show into its “true” storyline. The hacker kid who uncovered everything about Hina in the early part was poorly utilized and underdeveloped. So when he joins our main group in episode 10 for a short period of time, his presence makes very little sense. I can only describe that part as a 10 hour VN plot condensed into 10 minutes. The male lead Narukami has almost no personal stake in the story. Hina is hilarious in the comedy episodes, but lacks any sufficient character arc built up to carry her into the final section. Jun Meada is trying to sell this as a love story between Narukami and Hina, but I just don’t see it. Narukami spent at least half the summer trying to wow his childhood friend only to suddenly change at the last minute. It felt so haphazardly put together.

The Day I Became God is an extremely bare bones Jun Meada story. It goes through the motions of similar elements to his previous works, but comes out feeling emotionally hollow. While Angel Beats and Charlotte also felt rushed in the grand scheme, I can at least say he got the emotional aspect right. This will be remembered as one of, if not Jun Meada’s weakest title.

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Top OPs/EDs of the Year

1) Jujutsu Kaisen Opening 1 - The song is great, but it’s the visuals that really sell this opening. Each shot is brilliantly connected to showcase how everything in the world of Jujutsu Kaisen is layered. There is far more than what meets in the eye in our surroundings. Curses and humans co-mingle more than you might think.

2) A Certain Scientific Railgun T Opening 1 - There still hasn’t been a bad Railgun opening yet. Flipside once again delivers a song that once again never failed gets me in the mood for the episode each week. The visuals highlight some of the best action moments in the arc too.

3) Black Clover Opening 10 - Unlike the other songs on the list this year, this a slower somber song. It always makes me think of Nero’s backstory and how the story was leading up to the fight versus the devil. The black and white aesthetic with rain conveys how everything is laid bare for this major story climax.

4) Kaguya-Sama Love is War? Opening - Just like how this season is more character focused, the opening animation is basically a 90 second skit. It never fails to get to get me in the mindset for the hijinks that are ahead in the episode. The song itself is also a great follow up to the previous opening.

5) Rent-a-Girlfriend Opening - It’s a colorful opening that highlights the best aspects of each character. It completely conveys what the show is about with some nice music. I love how fun and upbeat this opening is. It definitely helped to set the tone for the episodes each week.

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....and so, that brings 2020 to a close. The North American anime scene is shifting once again with Sony buying out Crunchyroll. Hopefully the result of the merger keeps Crunchyroll as an entity alive. I’ll be curious to see how everything shakes out. In the coming year I am most looking forward to Chainsaw Man’s anime. The manga is quite an experience and anime viewers will be spinning their heads over learning how such a series was published in Weekly Shonen Jump. I think it has a good chance of being one of the most talked about shows in the new year.

Lets hope 2021 is a good one.

[fieryfantasybooklover]

Halos And Hellfire - A Malec angst/sad fic

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Long ago, when the universe was still new, 10 incandescent stars were exiled from the sky for their kindness.

The stars are cold beings that care for nothing and nobody. They burned entire worlds to the ground and enjoyed doing it. Because the primal energy of the universe was harnessed in the stars, and they decided there was no reason they shouldn’t use it. The stars could control all the elements, shift their forms, and teleport. And they used that power. Entire species met their ends in seconds, the last things they saw being terrible waves of fire and horrible all-powerful entities descending from the sky.

These 10 stars were born and they saw the universe for what it was - beautiful and worth saving. Those stars dared to dream, to have faith, to believe. Their thoughts were occupied by dreams of a better life. One where there was something beyond this - an endless stream of death and the cold void of space. These stars tried to save lives, save worlds. Their opinions were not shared by the other stars, so these brilliant entities that only wanted peace were cast from the sky. They fell in the form of gorgeous winged beings. And after falling for a thousand years, they landed.

At first, everything went fine. The star’s DNA altered to fit the environment. The planet was named “Earth” and it was perfect in nearly every way. It was lush and green, filled with water and even a native species to interact with. Half of the angels made their home in the sky, the other half in the underground part of the planet. Everyone lived in peace for some time, an era that became known as the Golden Age. But then there was a betrayal. An underground angel (as they had started to call themselves) clashed with an air dweller over the death of an air angel general. Both sides of the world blamed the other for the death. The force of the conflict nearly brought the planet to the ground.

Everything the stars had fought against for all their lives forced its way into their lives and brought fire and chaos with it. The war raged for nearly 100 years, nearly causing the angels to go extinct. Finally, peace was brokered… if both groups of angels promised to remain in their respective domain and only interact on earth, who’s residents were blissfully unaware of their existence.

As time passed, animosity grew and made itself at home. It grew to the point that the “dark angels” of the ground hated the “light angels” of the sky. The angel children of both sides were taught to hate the “enemy angels” from the time they were born. It remained this way for so long that all hope for happy coexistence seemed lost to the clouds.

*1000 years later*

“Do you have any idea what’s happening?” Catarina asked Magnus. Catarina and Magnus were best friends and high ranked soldiers in the Light King’s army. All the soldiers had been called to the courtyard for a speech from the High General, and were milling around while they waited. “I’ve got absolutely no idea. Maybe the General is finally letting us spruce up the barracks. Of course, me being my fabulous self, has still fought this topic despite the lack of help.” Magnus snarked at Catarina. “How long are you going to be mad at me for that? Just because I chose the improvement of the armory of the improvement of the barracks outward appearance doesn’t mean-”

Magnus shushed her as the General stepped up to his plinth. A hush fell over the crowd as General Charmeine stepped up and cleared his throat. “As you know, all of the soldiers have been summoned here for a speech. I am sure that you are all wondering why. I will not mince words, for as you are about to find out we have very little time.” The general paused and it seemed that every fiber of the world held its breath. “Our sensors have detected 10 bursts of pure undiluted energy emitting from an unknown source. And they are headed straight for this planet. These pulses are scheduled to arrive around this time tomorrow.” The general paused again. “To put it clearly, we have only a day left to live. Along with every single being on this Earth. I hereby release you all from your posts. You are free to live your last day however you wish.”

With that, the General took flight from the plinth, spreading his pale gold feathered wings and soaring off into the night, leaving chaos behind. Magnus stood there shocked, unable to process the devastating axe blow that was this news. Catarina did her bets to rouse him, but Magnus was lost beyond hope. Anger, pain, hate, confusion, and despair were cascading through him, mixing and leaving little room for Magnus to breathe. Moving like a robot, he spread his pure gold wings, a rare color among angels, and took to the skies. Not being able to stand looking at his home of 25 years, he turned to Catarina and spoke. “Caty. You were the best friend I could ever hope for. I wish you all the best in these last hours.” And with that, Magnus took off, flying as fast as he could in an attempt to forget everything he knew and wished he didn’t. That would be the last time he has his best friend.

The poor angels had no idea of the source of the power pulses. In fact, those stars that had once exiled the original 10 angels had found them. And decided to have a little fun. By blowing up yet another planet. Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the world a similar situation was playing out.

Alec spread his wings and took off without a second thought, not even hesitating for his best friend Jace. “How am I supposed to fucking deal with this? I’m told the world is ending and I’m released from my service? What do they want me to do? I’m sure as hell not going to stick around that’s for sure.” As Alec soared through the skies, he spotted a speck of gold on the roof of an extremely tall building in New York City. “Oh god, it’s an air dweller. Well, I have nothing left to lose anyway.” With that Alec began his descent towards the angel that would change his life, no matter how much remained of it.

Magnus stood on top of the building, surveying the skyline of the world that would soon cease to exist. It wasn’t until he heard the quiet swooshing of approaching wings that he realized another angel was approaching. Magnus turned and nearly lost his breath as the approaching angel landed. The angel was clearly dark, marked by the silver ebony runes spidering up his arms. The dark counterpart to Magnus’s silver runes. The angel was tall, dark haired… and unbearably smoking hot. He had breathtaking ebony wings that shimmered and shined with purple, gold, red, blue, and so many other colors. His skin was beautifully tanned and a pair of brooding deep blue eyes stared at Magnus with a thousand years worth of prejudice.

“Ummm… hello?” Magnus managed. “I am assuming you just got the news as well.”

“Yeah. And I don’t want to talk about it. We’re enemies and we always will be. I just don’t want to spend the last day of my life alone.” Magnus, shocked at the brief flash of emotion from this angel with a “Go to hell” attitude, just nodded. Both angels silently took off, with no particular destination in mind. They just needed to fly.

The existential dread faded as the angels soared through the sky, finding it in their hearts to be able to stand each other's presence.

The pair took turns choosing destinations, not even bothering to share names. They toured the Pyramids of Giza, flew over the Great Wall of China, and visited Tikal before finally pausing to rest atop a tree in the Amazon rainforest.

As they lounged, Alec worked up his nerve to speak to the golden vision that had suddenly appeared in his life. He rationalized that it was probably normal to want to talk, to experience, to feel. After all, he was only 25 and about to lose everything he had ever known. “Hey… what’s it like. What’s it like living in the clouds?” Magnus looked over, surprised at the question. “Well… it’s beautiful. Everything is made from white, gold, and silver. The sky is stunning and you get to see the most beautiful sunsets and sunrises. I love to stargaze… the sky is panoramic to the maximum when you’re up as high as we are. When I look at the stars, at the galaxies and the lights that fill the sky, I feel hopeful… but it’s also humbling. It reminds you how small we are to the universe. How much beauty there is beyond this world.”

Alec realized just exactly how beautiful the other angel was, silhouetted against the setting sun, ringed in gold. All of a sudden all the emotions Alec had been suppressing welled up inside him and he had to fight back tears. To stop himself from crying, Alec began talking. “I love living beneath the surface of the Earth. There’s so many mysteries down there that even we don’t know. We build everything from red and black colors, and it’s always warm. We can fly around the endless caverns we build. The kids play there and the teenagers sneak out there to make out. I love the earth. It’s grounding and it’s real. It keeps me tethered to reality.”

Silence echoed between them, but it was considerably more comfortable than it was before. Without a word, the two angels took to the sky to live out the remainder of their lives. Even if it was only 9 hours.

The two angels still did not share their names, even as they explored the catacombs of France, snuck behind massive crashing crystalline waterfalls, and explored the unmapped parts of the Sahara desert. They paused again at the top of Mt. Everest, when the talk turned to romance.

“Did you ever have a girlfriend or a boyfriend?” Magnus asked Alec as they gazed at the breathtaking Himalayas. “For me, it would be a boyfriend. And no, I never had a romantic partner. Us “dark angels” only marry once and it’s for life. I haven’t met that one person yet. What about you?” Alec inquired, gazing at Magnus with a surprisingly open and earnest face. “Well… it isn’t uncommon for us to have more than one lover. We don’t limit ourselves as we believe love is essential. We don’t marry as much, it’s more common to live with somebody and share a relationship and not be married. We don’t like to bind ourselves down with things like marriage.”

With those phrases, a passing on of knowledge to outsides, the barriers between them fell more. The pair took to the sky for the last time. They had less than an hour left to live.

The two angels landed on some unnamed beach. They stood there looking at the sun slowly lowering itself to set over the ocean. There was still no sign of the energy pulses set to destroy the world. As time ticked by and the world edged closer to extinction, neither angel said anything. There was nothing left to say.. Atleast not till they were sure nobody would live to repeat their words.

With under 10 minutes left to live, both started talking, talking over each other and talking like they would never be able to again. Which they wouldn’t.

“I hate the world. It’s full of hate and pain and anger and sometimes I think it would be better off to start over. To wipe the slate clean and hope that some decent race will rise from the ashes. That’s why I bolted when we got the news… because I was scared to admit that I thought it might be better. People destroy far more than they create and there is so much more bad in the world then there is good… and I just-- I GET SICK OF IT. BUT THERE’S NOTHING I CAN DO TO CHANGE IT. And I can’t discuss it with my people - they believe that the world is unconditionally good! And I just can’t see it. Maybe I’ve just seen too much.” Alec stopped his rant, gasping for breath as if he had just run a marathon. Magnus stood there quietly, not judging, agreeing, or disagreeing. It took a minute for Alec to realize that Magnus had started talking.

“I am in a constant never ending battle with the devils in my head. One’s that have never seen the light of day because we do not let people show weakness. Shadows and darkness scream that I’m alone, that nobody is truly there for me. I never had parents - they didn’t want me and I was left on a friend’s doorstep. I was bullied growing up because I was different. It got bad… so bad. But then I pulled myself out of it. I pulled myself out of that pit, that void, just to die young.”

Both of the angels, descendants of ancestors who hated each other, looked at the other in shock. They had just exposed demons to their sworn enemy… and they didn’t even know the other’s name. Silent words flew between them, words that didn’t lie words that told the bare ugly truth. Words that said “I see you I understand you I agree with you. You don’t have to pretend here. You’re allowed to be dark because the world is dark with much to dislike about it.” Words that said “Maybe if things had been different, we could have loved each other. Maybe if there weren’t so many factors stacked against us. Maybe. But we’ll never know.”

With a roaring growing in their ears, the angels decided that there was nothing left to lose, nothing left to prove, nothing left to deny. And in that minute, with crushing finality, their lips met. It was a kiss like a thunderclap, like a lightning strike, a kiss like a sonic boom. It was pure exhilarating freedom and a wild howling wind. A kiss that sounded like thousands of years of hate falling to the ground with roaring and noise. It was a kiss of anger and pain and like-minded souls. It was a burning kiss as Magnus tangled his hands in Alec’s ebony hair and Alec wrapped his arms around Magnus to pull him closer as he ran his hands up and down the golden angel’s back. It was a kiss that silently spoke of what-ifs and maybes and if onlys. It was a final middle finger to the universe and everything that told them what they’re allowed to be. It was a kiss of passion… a kiss of halos and hellfire as the world fell to pieces around them.

3

2

1

Darkness. Darkness and nothing and nothing and darkness.

[folkelorde]

ADMIN TIPS! WHAT MAKES OR BREAKS A ROLEPLAY?

this has been sitting in my drafts a while because with about ten years of roleplay experience, i’ve been in a lot of group and seen a lot of different kinds of admins. now, i can look back and see the point where things started to die or the point where a group was really saved – whether i was the admin or someone else was. 

 i know being an admin can be hard work and sometimes a group can die based on circumstances that aren’t in your control, so taking the initiative to start a group can be a big risk; a lot of work for little payoff, and i think it says a lot about the passion of the writers in our community that we keep doing it. 

lately, i’ve been getting really frustrated with joining groups because they die so quickly. however, there are a few things i notice keep happening that can make a huge difference on whether a group succeeds or fails, so i’ve put some encouraging words and advice under the cut. please note that these are just my opinions and things i’ve seen that work for me.

1. SET AN EXAMPLE.

as an admin, it’s hugely important to take the leap! when your group opens, be the first to post and break the ice, be the first to post an intro, and be the first to reach out and message people. you can’t just open and then sit back and let people come to you. additionally, be sure to open the group or start events at a time that works for YOU. seriously, it makes a big difference when the admin can be online for those things. also, i find that as an admin, i have to be a little more active than what’s expected because i find it really important to create plots and connections with EVERYONE, respond to every starter possible, and make sure that i welcome every person into the group. if there’s a new member, be that person that reaches out to say hello and welcome them. be that person to post the first open starter, etc. essentially, be the sort of group member that you want to be the admin for and i think that goes a long way for creating an inclusive community. this is really the NUMBER ONE thing that i see makes or breaks a group – groups that i join where the admin is plotting w/ people, reaching out, and in on what’s going on always last longer. tbh, i’ve never been in a group that lasted where i didn’t have a plot with the admin, so make sure you have plots and connections with your members! 

2. COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR MEMBERS. 

i think it’s important that people know what’s going on, every step of the way. if you think you’re going to open at a certain time, tell people in advance. if you wish there were more open starters in the tag, tell your members. if you don’t have time to answer all the asks you have, let people know. tell people when plot drops and events are coming up and ask people what they want to see. let group members be part of discussions and your decision process. essentially, as an admin, i never feel like i have to build this big wall and filter information about the group. when i’m a member, i love when it’s clear what’s going on in the group when. there are definitely times where you should keep that wall up though, like when you’re dealing with any ooc drama. in my experience, keeping conflict resolution off the dash as much as possible is key to dealing with problems. i notice that unless the group has been around a long time, an ooc matter that’s dealt with really publicly usually leads to the death of the group. if you have to communicate about what happened with your members, it’s usually best to find a way to do that privately.

3. DO NOT GIVE UP. 

this is the BIGGEST reason that rps die. almost every rp i’ve ever admin-ed has a “drop-off rate” after opening and sometimes it can be pretty large. the first activity check, for an appless rp especially, is almost always pretty brutal. however, if you can make it over that first “hump”, the odds of your rp lasting are a lot higher because i really feel like most rps die within the first week or two. if you lose a lot of members or activity slows after the first couple of days, don’t stop. keep promoting, keep posting (both in character and out of character). i find that it really helps to have a big event or plot drop within the first week to give characters something to start off with immediately and it also gives people inspiration for starters. regardless, activity on the main is going to slow after opening, that’s just inevitable. you’re going to get less asks or apps in a day, sometimes you’ll get none, and that’s okay. if it flops, it flops, but give it a week or so before you abandon the main and you might see the turnaround that i’ve come to expect. some of the most loyal members and best connections in my groups have joined in the second or third week or month. 

4. HAVE A PLAN. 

when i start a group, i usually have at least the next couple of plot drops and/or events planned out in my drafts when i start. give yourself goals to work towards and know where things are going. when i open a group, i usually have the first event or plot drop already written out and drafted, ready to post on the first or second day. at the very least, it’s good to have a little brainstormed list going of things you want to do at some point. i find that it never works to run in blind and expect that the plot will just go from there – even in a plotless town or school rp, you need to have a few plot drops or big events planned. for me, it helps to think of my roleplay like a television show and my plot drops/events are “episodes.” all the characters will have their own subplots, but there should be things that bring them together as one. additionally, once things open, it can feel like a bit of a whirlwind and you’ll be really excited about the subplots for your own character, so it’s good to have the overarching stuff planned in advance. 

5. KNOW YOUR IDEA.

i really think motivation matters. i think if you’re like “i really want to be in a group like this but it doesn’t exist and i have so much muse” always turns out better than “i want to be an admin, what will people want to be in?” don’t worry about what other people want from you when creating your plot. focus on what you want and what you have muse for, otherwise it’ll start to feel like a chore. being an admin is hard fucking work, alone or with a few other people. the plot has to really matter to you and be something that you desperately want to do, don’t base it around what you think people will be interested in. DON’T SECOND GUESS YOURSELF. if you think it’s cool and you want to write it, other people will too. some plots are more popular or are in popular genres, so they might get more attention and kick off faster, but if you stick to it, either way you’ll find your people. 

6. ESSENTIALS

these days, groups tend to have a few regularly scheduled parts of their structure needed to keep things going. these things are: honesty/meme days, tasks, events, and plot drops. 

honesty/meme days should come either once a week or once every other week depending on the activity level and size of your group. when i ran a really large group, we had them every week because there was so much going on, but with smaller groups i tend to have them when it feels right or after a plot drop/event since that’s usually when characters have a lot of new material to talk about in their answers and asks. tbh, these are really fun and help character development, so i really think they should be an essential part of your group. 

tasks for character development may seem tedious, but i do really find that they not only liven up the dash, but help people keep their muse! in a roleplay, i always make these optional, since no one HAS to do them, but it’s also a nice way to give people something to do if the dash is a little slow on a particular day or whatever. depending on the amount of effort the task takes and the size of the group, i’d say you can do these weekly or bi-weekly. 

events should be done at least once a month! most roleplays now operate with “dash events” which seems to work best since people are in all different timezones and have lives so it’s nice to have the event span over a couple of days. i really think the sweet spot is about 4-5 days, but if you have a group that gets really into them (which i have, generally in a big group), you can make them a week, but no longer than week or things will definitely stagnate. 

plot drops matter, even if your group is “plotless.” plot drops differ for events because they don’t always put all of the characters in the same vicinity and don’t have a time frame. essentially, plot drops just give characters something to talk about or make starters about. i’ve run groups with and without plot drops and without plot drops, i generally can’t keep things going for more than twoish months, so i’ve noticed the difference and they’re really a necessity for me. groups that are more plotless and character driven generally don’t need these as often as groups with a more central plot and worldbuilding.

i also really like to open the floor for members to suggest tasks, events, and plot drops – some of my best events have come from things that members have expressed to me that they really want to do. sometimes, members will send me something they want that i already have planned in my drafts, so that’s just some extra validation for me that i’m clicking with them. 

YOU CAN DO IT.

if you wanna do admin stuff, i seriously admire you. it’s exhausting, it’s hard, and it’s stressful because you care about your idea and your characters so fucking much, but it can be so worth it. being a good admin is almost like having another job with all the tasks you have to do, but when you create a plot and group that people get invested in and enjoy being part of, it’s the most rewarding thing in the world. i seriously wish you all the luck in the world with your ideas and if you need any help or advice, i’m here for you.

[cheshiresense]

Hey, speaking of the Aizen/Ichigo time travel notfic, I just want to say I really love the way y ou write Aizen when he isn't just the villain. Like I don't even know why Im surprised, it's /you/, your characterization is always amazing. Do you think you can write a few more snippets or hcs with him and Ichigo? Maybe some interactions or convesations between them? No pressure ofc, thank you for everything youv'e already blessed us with!

Lol thank you! That’s good to hear, I always find flat characters painful to read so I do my best to round them out whenever I can. Aizen was a new one for me, this is the first time I’ve explored his character beyond - as you say - just the villain of the story that’s been defeated or needs defeating.

Here’s two more short scenes in this ’verse. I actually really like this AU, which surprises me because before this, I didn’t have any interest in writing Aizen at all.

Pinglist: @yoshifics @bewarethemandragora @runeofluna @selenedreamwalker @hypnos28 @verticallychallengedintrovert @fandommaniac2401 @lovingempress @cynthia-of-the-wallflowers @shadowsofmoonracer @pairp @warriorofbooks @charlottedabookworm @lyra689 @sheyrenawyrsabane @sora-the-empress @xadriannax @yumeniai @arrysa @lirial89-fanfiction @skysong246 @caiahat @grimreaper19 @arosethornbyanyothername @mtkiseki @kaminoko-x @nesskyru @tatarako @parklena42 @zibeth-a @aerdnanocte @timegrenades @healingmichiko @shiko-rae @soraofmelody @fandoms-make-the-world-go-round @north-peach @yannilicious @wolfsrainrules @franticchanges @tremendouslyminiaturequeen @moon6shadow-main @naramyon @presumenothing @miralifox @nonbinary-hawke @dejunco @yuzukimist @raz-ia @13oddballbooks 

[Dinner]

Sousuke generously reserves a table for two at the sushi restaurant a block down from the Academy. He only has to wait ten minutes before Ichigo slouches into the seat opposite his, looking like every student who’s ever pulled three all-nighters in a row rushing for exams.

Sousuke arches an eyebrow. “I did not think the course load you are taking would be difficult for you.”

Ichigo shoots a glare at him but doesn’t seem to have the energy to hold it for longer than a few seconds before he’s slumping again and reaching for the menu instead.

“The course load is fine,” Ichigo tells him irritably. “But one of my teachers used to be Thirteenth Division and has some stupid grudge against Kaien because Ukitake-san passed him over for lieutenant even though he had a longer tenure than Kaien or something. So he’s taking it out on me by giving me extra assignments out of the blue every week. Says I’ll fail his class if I don’t do them.” He waves a dismissive hand. “I kinda wanna call his bluff, but it’s whatever, I just wanna graduate as soon as possible, and I can deal with a case of asshole. It was just a little tougher lately cuz of midterms but today was my last one anyway.”

Sousuke studies him for a careful moment. “You could mention it to your cousin. I am sure Shiba Kaien would jump to your defense, especially when he is involved.”

“Yeah, and that’s exactly why I’m not gonna tell him,” Ichigo scowls. “He’ll go charging in and kick up a huge fuss and definitely go overboard defending my honour or some shit. He’ll probably get Hisakawa fired, which I don’t really care about, but he’ll also draw a crapload of attention, and I don’t want anybody tossing words like nepotism and favouritism around. You told me yourself the Twelfth doesn’t seem to have many big clan members, and it’s not exactly a shock that Kisuke chooses people for his Division according to their intelligence. I don’t want him thinking I’m coasting by on my clan’s reputation or something, and that’s exactly what will happen  if I get Kaien to step in for me for every little thing.” He pointedly sticks his menu up between them. “Now can we order already? I literally haven’t eaten anything but instant ramen in a week. I’m getting everything here since you’re paying.”

“Oh I am, am I?” Sousuke enquires dryly.

“I’m poor, deal with it.”

“I am fairly certain your clan would shower you with money if you mention that you need it,” Sousuke points out. “And nobody else would even know if you are so concerned about reputation.”

Ichigo grimaces even as he glances around to catch the waiter’s eye. “Kaien’s already giving me a stipend every month cuz I’m family but I wanna save that for an apartment when I graduate. Besides, I don’t like asking people for money.”

Sousuke gives him a flatly droll look. “And yet.”

Ichigo meets his gaze without hesitation, a smirk curling at his lips, one that teeters between gruff amusement and a reckless sort of mockery. “Consider it payment for creeping on me when I was a kid and then dragging me into a war. You almost killed me multiple times; sushi’s the least you owe me, bastard.”

They pause for a minute to place their respective orders, and neither of them speaks until the waiter is out of earshot again.

“I wonder,” Sousuke murmurs, eyeing Ichigo thoughtfully. “If you blame Urahara Kisuke for ‘dragging you into a war’ as much as you blame me.”

Ichigo snaps his chopsticks and then jabs them at him. “Kisuke apologized. You didn’t.”

“And I never will,” Sousuke agrees, because he won’t, not with any kind of sincerity, and he’s noticed that Ichigo has a knack for picking out that sort of thing. Sousuke isn’t sorry. Perhaps his ambitions and plans gave the boy very little choice in the matter, but at the end of the day, it was still Kurosaki Ichigo who chose to fight instead of bow or run away, and Sousuke can respect him enough as a former formidable enemy to give credit where it’s due.

Ichigo made his choices, just as Sousuke made his own, and they’ll both live with them just the same, good and bad.

“No,” Ichigo acknowledges easily, and Sousuke knows no one else who can say that in this situation with no anger or bitterness, just a resigned sort of acceptance as if he made his peace with this truth a long time ago. Instead, he only points his chopsticks at Sousuke again. “But that’s why you have to pay for my sushi and Kisuke doesn’t.”

Sousuke watches him for a moment longer and idly wonders if he’ll ever understand the kind of person Kurosaki Ichigo is. One day, perhaps, but at least in the meantime, he won’t be bored.

He inclines his head just as the first of their dishes arrive.

“As you say,” He acquiesces, and Ichigo flashes a grin like he’s won something important. Oddly enough, it amuses Sousuke more than anything else. But there are worse things than amusement, and for now, he lets it be.

Well, he lets that be anyway. Ichigo is a… puzzle that Sousuke probably won’t tire of putting together for a good while yet, and that suits him just fine.

On the other hand…

He steps quietly into the classroom, shutting the door behind him. The click makes the man sitting behind the desk at the front look up. “Aizen-fukutaichou? This is… unexpected. Did we have a meeting I forgot about?”

Hisakawa’s confusion is understandable. As far as Sousuke can remember, in both timelines, he’s never spoken to the other Shinigami. Hisakawa was insignificant before - sub-par intellect and mediocre strength, not good for anything but canon fodder, which Aizen had plenty of Hollows for - and he’s just as insignificant now. It’s just that he’s also making a nuisance of himself this time around, which is unfortunate for him.

“Hisakawa-sensei,” Sousuke greets with a pleasant smile as he approaches. “We do not, as far as I am aware. I simply wished to speak to you about one of our mutual students.”

“Oh, well, of course,” Hisakawa frowns quizzically. “Which student are you talking about? Is it a schedule conflict? Those should’ve been ironed out months ago though.”

Sousuke supposes the man gets points for touching on the only problem a student attending both their classes could have. Hisakawa teaches history - a core class - while Sousuke only teaches calligraphy as an elective. They don’t have much else in common.

Then again, if schedule conflicts were ironed out months ago, it obviously can’t be that, and there’s no point bringing it up. Sousuke takes it back. Hisakawa is still just as much of a waste of space as Sousuke has always believed him to be. Honestly, the hiring standards these days. If this was Shiba Kaien’s competition for the lieutenant seat, no wonder Ukitake refused to fill the position with anyone else even if it meant waiting a decade for the Shiba Clan Head to accept.

“No, it is nothing of that sort,” Sousuke agrees. “But it has come to my attention that Shiba Ichigo-kun has been receiving quite a number of… extracurricular assignments from you.”

Hisakawa immediately bristles, and a sneer slashes itself across his face. “Oh, he’s been complaining, has he?”

“He has mentioned it to me,” Sousuke says mildly.

Hisakawa snorts. “I wasn’t aware Shibas even knew calligraphy existed,” He mutters snidely before saying, louder and more patronizing, “You shouldn’t listen to him, Aizen-fukutaichou. You know how Shibas can be, they’re always exaggerating. I’m not giving Shiba more work than he needs. His history marks could use some work, and I’m trying to help. I hear he wants to graduate in a year, and he can’t do that if he fails a core class.”

Sousuke hums a considering note. “He is in danger of failing? How strange. Shiba-kun takes after his cousin, does he not? Another prodigy.”

Hisakawa’s sneer only grows more pronounced. “They give that title to any clan kid these days, it doesn’t mean anything. Trust me, Shiba’s history marks alone will probably see him here next year, especially if he’s going around whining about not getting special treatment.”

Sousuke raises an eyebrow. “I admit, I am rather surprised by that. You see, I have read some of Shiba-kun’s history papers.” He hasn’t had much of a choice. For whatever reason, Ichigo likes working in his office, and he has the strangest tendency to paper his work all over the floor. And paperwork gets boring, and Ichigo’s thought process can be… interesting, even on the most mundane topics. “I am no expert on the subject of course, but from what I could tell, his work is always thoroughly researched and well-written. Perhaps you should take another look.”

Hisakawa’s face turns steadily red, and he pushes to his feet even as he accuses, “So you think just because he has a clan backing him, he should get special treatment too! I thought better of you, Aizen-fukutaichou.”

Sousuke has to suppress a chuckle but amusement slips into his expression anyway, because Hisakawa’s features darken to something downright hostile. “His marks will stay the same. In fact, I might fail him just on principle! I didn’t think Shiba was a coward too, sending another teacher to beg a better grade out of me just because he can’t handle my class.”

Sousuke stares him down for a long unblinking moment, until Hisakawa is almost twitching from the tension stretched between them. Only when the man opens his mouth again, no doubt to splutter out something belligerent, does Sousuke sigh and drop a hand to his Zanpakutou.

“Well, I did try,” He muses, mostly to himself.

He draws his blade. Hisakawa stares and doesn’t even make a move for his own Zanpakutou. What a fool.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Normally,” Sousuke explains courteously. “I would not bother stepping in on behalf of a student, especially when that student would - I dare say - be rather cross with me should he find out. But we have plans to carry out, and I will not allow something so trivial to hinder them.”

Hisakawa gawps at him. How unsightly.

“You need not worry,” Sousuke adds. “You will not remember a thing.”

Finally, Hisakawa reaches for his Zanpakutou, the first blush of alarm rising in his features. “Wait, have you gone insane, Aizen? What do you think attacking me is even going to do? I- I won’t be threatened-!”

“Shatter,” Sousuke cuts him off, smiling benignly even as his reiatsu swells around them. “Kyouka Suigetsu.”

And Hisakawa’s expression goes slack as the hynosis takes hold, slithering into the deepest recesses of his mind.

“You should be honoured,” Sousuke murmurs. “This will be some of my finest work. After all, anything less and Ichigo-kun might notice. And I would rather not be scolded again.”

(This Is A Time Skip But Also Does Tumblr Not Know How To Center Shit)

[Sight]

Sousuke glances up as a shadow passes through his window before returning to his paperwork. “Shouldn’t you be working?”

A disgruntled noise answers him. “Kis- Urahara-taichou is neck-deep in a new experiment; he’s not gonna notice I’m missing for days, never mind one afternoon.”

“And you decided to come visit me?” Sousuke can’t help but find that amusing, considering their past. “How thoughtful.”

He pauses when Ichigo doesn’t snipe something back, as is fairly standard these days. He looks up. Ichigo isn’t even looking in his direction. Instead, he’s still perched on the windowsill, and his gaze is slanted to one shadowed corner  above the bookshelf across the room.

“…Ichigo-kun?”

Ichigo blinks, then turns to him and hops down into the office. “Hey, so, I figured it out,” He says abruptly. His eyes flit around the room again, and Sousuke notices the way they dart from shadow to shadow before finally focusing on him again. “The seeing into their little shadow world thing.”

Sousuke straightens. “Oh?”

“Yeah,” Ichigo lifts a hand, and pale blue light sparks off his fingertips.

Sousuke stares. How fascinating. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen any other Quincy wield reishi so casually.

“I think I can make it so you can see them too,” Ichigo continues. “I’m gonna have to… fiddle with your eyesight a bit though.”

Sousuke pins him with an assessing look before slowly reaching up to take off his glasses. “If you end up blinding me, I will stab you before you make it out of this room.”

Ichigo rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, whatever, but I’m not gonna do that. Now hold still and close your eyes.”

It takes effort not to flinch, much to Sousuke’s irritation. But the grip he still has around his writing brush tightens anyway when cool fingers touch his eyelids.

It barely feels like anything. There’s a tingle that itches a little, but it’s there and gone within seconds, leaving only an odd chill behind, not unlike getting a cold gust of wind to the face during winter. Ichigo withdraws, and Sousuke opens his eyes.

Nothing looks different. He doesn’t actually need glasses to begin with so everything is clear. He cocks a questioning look at Ichigo, who shakes his head.

“Wait for it,” He murmurs, taking a seat on the edge of Sousuke’s desk and absently shuffling through the top file in the inbox. “They’re not always spying on everyone. But you’re a person of interest to them, you know that, so I think they check in on you pretty often.” He pauses, and his gaze slides across the room before he focuses on the file in his hands again. “Here he comes. Don’t let him see you watching him.”

Sousuke follows his brief line of sight, just in time to see a very familiar blond head bob into view in the shadow cast by the couch set against the wall. It isn’t a very big shadow, a foot high at most, so Sousuke only gets to see the face and part of his neck and a little of the high white collar of his uniform, but it’s enough.

The next second, he’s reaching for one of his books and flipping it open like that was why he looked up from his paperwork at all. But now that he can see that he’s being watched, can sense it even, and so blatantly too, the urge to simply get up and run the Quincy through for his gall is tempting. Only the knowledge that he can’t at the moment stays his hand.

Can he hear us? Sousuke scrawls on a spare piece of paper.

“No,” Ichigo mutters back. “I tested it. It’s like a soundproofed window. I mean, it is now.” He smirks triumphantly out of sight of the Quincy. “Before I figured it out, it was like one of those one-way mirrors. Now we can see them too. But we can’t hear them, and they can’t hear us. They might know how to lip-read though, so be careful anyway.”

Well, obviously. Giving the game away this early would be foolish.

Sousuke watches through his periphery as the Quincy gives them both a last cursory blank look before his head moves out of the shadow and disappears again.

“Jugram Haschwalth,” Sousuke murmurs, surveying his office before turning his attention to Ichigo. “And they can see through every shadow in Soul Society?”

“As far as I can tell, yeah,” Ichigo scowls darkly. “They’re a bunch of regular Peeping Toms.” He grins for a moment, all teeth. “You would’ve made great friends.”

Sousuke narrows a reprimanding look at him. Ichigo just grins wider, not at all repentant, but he doesn’t push further either.

“What should we do now?” He asks instead. “I’m still working on figuring out a way to get through, but at least we can see them. Do we just keep doing what we’re doing and try not to draw their attention?”

“Yes,” Sousuke decides. “But also, mark down who they look in on most, who they consider to be the biggest threats, and who they’ve overlooked but can be threats to them.” He puts his glasses back on. “How long will I be able to see them?”

Ichigo shrugs. “Eh, not sure. You’re my first guinea pig.” Sousuke sighs. At least Ichigo looks a little sheepish now. “We can do a few tests over the weekend or something when I don’t have work. I probably should get back now.”

“I thought you said Urahara wouldn’t notice,” Sousuke says sardonically.

“He won’t,” Ichigo confirms. “But Hiyori will. She’s yelling at the science department at the moment though, and that always takes at least an hour, so I figured I’d take the chance to come show you this-” He waves a hand in the direction of the shadow Jugram was in. “-since I finally got it down this morning.”

Sousuke glances lingeringly at him. You could have waited, he almost says, but the words don’t come in the end, and a moment later, Ichigo is halfway out the window again.

“Anyway, see ya later,” He calls back briskly. “I finally got my first paycheck yesterday so I bought groceries. If you want free dinner, swing ’round my place and I’ll feed you. And we can talk more about the Peeping Toms.”

And then he’s gone in a rush of Shunpo, leaving Sousuke to stare after him, feeling strangely wrong-footed.

But then, Ichigo has a habit of leaving him that way.

Sousuke sighs again, puts it out of his mind, and gets back to work, firmly ignoring the blond-haired spy that sidles back into his office via the shadow in one corner of the ceiling this time.

But he can’t wait until Ichigo figures out a way to get through. He’s chopping the head off of this one personally.

[alexboehm55144]

Alex Final Wars 2: Dark Alex, Chapter 15 - Vacation in Chima

Hello everyone! Sorry it's been a while since the last update, but I've just kinda been being a bit lazy because it's summer. But I am trying my best to push myself to write more! This chapter I did have to kind of whip up quickly, after receiving some advice from my friends. Anyway, no flashy drawing this time, but it's the words that are really important, and let's get to them!

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The typhoon had been diverted back to Chima after receiving a report about a reemergence of Chinese forces in the region. The first place Heroes checked out was the base where they had first met the dark counterparts. However the base was deserted, and no tribe had claimed the structure as an outpost. Before leaving, Heroes made sure to destroy the base with explosives so that no faction, hostile or benign, could occupy it.

The team had voted to stay in Chima to get some rest and relaxation, as for the past few days they had been going through battle after battle. Many had left the typhoon to spend time in the beautiful nature of Chima, or to examine the culture of the many tribes that inhabited the land.

Captain Boehm has woken up early, as they would be assaulting the base at dawn, but because there was not a threat, his early awakening had been for nothing. He was tempted to go back to sleep, however, he knew that if he did then his sleep schedule would be messed up. So now Alex was going out and spending time in the beautiful landscape of Chima. The captain loved nature, it offered him time to think and be alone with his thoughts. Although he was fond of his friends and allies, time alone was special to him, and the captain spent most free time in his cabin alone.

Alex rode his speedor past old ruins and down dirt paths carved throughout the forest. At one point he accidentally strayed into the falling jungle and had to quickly accelerate to avoid being crushed by the falling trees. Thankfully he soon found a nice spot next to a gentle river and laid down on the soft moss covering the ground.

It was time for him to do some thinking about the current state of affairs. Although Heroes had been victorious in many engagements, the tides of war had not yet shifted in favor of the United States. The captain was still fearful of the destruction the dark heroes could wreak, and he wondered how many US soldiers had died by their hands. He didn’t even want to think about the countless lives that had been lost during the war. The captain wondered how they would eliminate the rest of the dark counterparts, although they had taken out Dark Laval, he was still nervous. Hopefully, everyone in Heroes would emerge unscathed, but Alex was filled with anxiety about how the battles with the dark heroes would turn out.

Captain Boehm wanted nothing more than to see this horrible war be over, and the world once again returned to a time of relative peace. He would give everything for a world full of happiness, where people understood each other differences and got along fine. Of course, that was wishful thinking, and he would be out of a job if that was the case. But that was why he fought for peace, to make a world free of oppression and conflict.

The captain threw a few rocks into the river, and just wished the world could work itself out. There were times when his existence seemed bleak. But he took a deep breath and decided he should focus on the present, for what mattered now was defeating the Chinese. That would be his driving force in the coming battles. He remembered what he told JayJay, that they would stop at nothing to win the war.

As if on cue, a speedor pulled up with JayJay at the controls. She greeted the captain cheerfully and joined him in laying down on the bed of moss that covered the ground.

Alex felt better when he had her by his side. Having an ally calmed his nerves, and an ally meant another warrior to charge into combat with.

“What are you doing out here all alone?” JayJay asked

“Just doing some thinking, about this war and everything related to it.”

“Like what? The tactics? The soldiers?”

“More so about my own place in this conflict. I’m driven by nothing except my desire to stop this war, I just want to put an end to all the abuses & sneaky tactics that China uses. I want to stop this war that’s claimed so many lives.”

“See, that’s where you and I are alike Alex.” The wolf said, patting her friend on the shoulder. “I want to do the same thing. All the oppression that’s happening, I want to stop it.”

“I just hope we can actually do it. China is a powerful enemy, and now they have our dark counterparts at their disposal.”

The wolf sighed. “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried. I know I put on a tough face, but deep down I am nervous about whether or not we can beat our enemy & emerge unscathed.”

“Well, we beat Dark Laval and we’re all fine. We’ve beat dozens of Chinese soldiers and we’re fine.”

“And you're worried? You have this confident attitude when you're talking to me, but you need to turn that attitude on yourself. Instead of boosting the morale of others, trying doing the same to yourself, you might feel better”

“I could try doing that, maybe it would help me stop worrying about the future.”

“We don’t know what future battles hold, but there’s no reason to get worked up over something you don’t know is gonna happen or not.”

“Your right, thank you.” The captain said, feeling newfound determination coursing through his veins. “And I know you're nervous about upcoming battles, but remember that I’m here to help whenever you need me. It helps to have an ally to go into combat with.”

“Well, you do calm my nerves. Thanks for being there for me.”

“No, thank you for being there for me.”

The pair laughed and decided they should spend the day doing something more lighthearted. Climbing on their speedors, they drove off to find a beautiful natural monument to examine or a speedor track they could race on.

000

Although Jack and Skye had been all over the world on missions for the ZIA, Chima was one place they had never gone. The couple hadn’t even read any database entries on the region, but now they were determined to increase their knowledge of Chima, and what better way to do that than experiencing the land firsthand.

Having borrowed a Jeep from the typhoon’s vehicle bay, the two were getting ready to head out of the typhoon, but first Jack had something he wanted to do. The rabbit walked up to the fox he loved, with something hidden behind his back.

“Here Skye, I picked these for you.”

He revealed what the hidden item was, a bouquet of flowers wrapped in some spare cloth that came from somewhere on the typhoon.

“Oh! Jack!” Skye said, quickly taking the gift & looking it over. The flowers were an array of colors, and they smelled heavenly. “Where did you get these?”

“When we landed I spotted a field of flowers nearby, and while you were in the shower earlier I went out and got these lovelies for you. There’s no flower store around here, so I just improvised.”

“I love it.” The fox said, kissing her rabbit on the forehead.

“Glad you like it. So where are we heading?”

The pair climbed in the Jeep and Skye examined a map.

“Hmmm.... it says here that the home of the beaver tribe is not far off. Let’s go there”

The fox drove the vehicle out of the typhoon and through the forest, heading for the location on the map. Jack examined the Heroes database on his phone, in order to get more information about the tribe.

“It says here they are master craftsmen, and love to fix and build things”

The terrain was tougher than Jack and Skye expected, and the Jeep was getting jostled as it drove over rocks and logs.

“You know you could have taken the road,” Jack said, holding on as the Jeep went over a small riverbed.

“I thought this thing could handle it!” Skye responded, trying to avoid hitting trees.

By the time they reached the home of the beaver tribe, the Jeep had sustained some damage, but it could be quickly remedied back at the typhoon. The fox and bunny examined the main tribe structure, which was a massive wooden building, enclosed by a wall of logs surrounding it.

The pair pulled up to the main gate and hopped out.

“Please tell me you can fix this damage,” Jack said, looking at one of the tires, which had become loose.

“Of course, you doubt my skills as a mechanic?” Skye said smugly.

A beaver with dirty tan fur walked up to the two.

“Welcome! What brings you to the beaver tribe today?”

“Oh, we’re just exploring,” Skye said calmly “seeing what the tribes are like that inhabit Chima.”

“Well most tribes do a lot of fighting, but we beavers like to build and repair.” The beaver examined the Jeep. “I do see that your vehicle has sustained some damage. Would you like us to fix it?”

“Oh, sure! That would be great!” Jack said.

A group of beavers rushed over with tools, chanting the phrase ‘fix it’ They quickly went to work on the Jeep.

Jack and Skye walked off to let the beavers work, and to get a breath of fresh air.

“Toothdee wasn’t kidding when she said this place was beautiful,” Skye said.

“No, she wasn’t, speaking of which, what do you think about everyone on the typhoon, you know besides Nick and Judy.”

“Toothdee doesn’t say much, but her actions speak louder than words.”

“Yeah, she’s not really one for a lot of conversation.”

“JayJay is rather chatty, and Alex, well let’s just say I think he would be a good fit for a ZIA agent.”

“He definitely seems determined, as does everyone else. That’s the reason we’re all together, we are all determined to end this war. You and me to keep Zootopia safe, and I imagine the same is true for Nick & Judy.”

“I think the desire to defeat those dark counterparts is also a driving force for toothdee. I think she might be a little nervous, she told me that she doesn’t want Heroes to somehow become like their counterparts.”

“Like that saying that goes, ‘...you live long enough to become a villain’ ?”

“I think so, something like that.”

“Well I guess we should be wary, to make sure these talented people don’t get on the wrong side of the law”

“Yes, but enough about work. Let’s just enjoy ourselves, we’re in one of the most beautiful locations in the world.”

“It’s not as beautiful as you” Jack flirted.

“Oh Jack”

The pair leaned close and exchanged a loving kiss, before continuing on their way.

After their walk was done, the pair returned to the beaver tribe, where the beaver from earlier greeted them.

“Ah, your back! Good! We repaired all the damage to your vehicle, and made some modifications!”

Jack and Skye’s jaws dropped as they looked at the Jeep. The vehicle now had wooden wings coming out of the side, along with a bunch of other unnecessary wooden pieces. Jack facepalmed and shook his head, hoping Skye would be able to undo all the modifications the beavers made.

000

Jasiri had opted to spend her time in the typhoon cargo bay, organizing the crates and vehicles stored inside the ship. However, despite having the cargo bay crane to help, it was still backbreaking work. It didn’t help that the temperature controls for the cargo bay had malfunctioned in an earlier battle, making the room very hot and forcing Jasiri to wear a tank top and shorts.

The hyena moved a container full of perishable goods, which thankfully was build to keep the food inside fresh, and was unaffected by the increased temperature. The same could not be said for Jasiri though, sweat ran through her fur and her body ached. She sat down on the crate and breathed heavily, wiping the sweat from her forehead.

“Now there is a tired and thirsty hyena.”

Jasiri turned to see Kion entering the cargo bay, offering her a bottle of coke-a-cola. The hyena graciously took the drink and quickly downed part of it, feeling the cool liquid running down her throat.”

“Man, if you told me I was gonna be doing this when I joined Heroes, I might have not joined at all,” Jasiri said, while Kion sat down next to her.

“Hey, don’t get yourself down, Heroes is a great gig. There’s never a dull moment, and you can feel good knowing that you're making the world safer.”

“You sound like Judy. But I guess that’s why we do what we do because we want to see a better planet.”

“That’s the spirit. Besides, we’re good at what we do. How many battles have we won now? I’ve lost count.”

“Yeah, your right about that. We get to help people, dive headfirst into the action, and get to know other skilled individuals.”

“Now you're getting it. Doesn’t this job make you feel proud.” The Lion put his arm around the hyena he loved, not caring that she was sweaty.

Jasiri thought for a moment. “Ok, you're correct. It does feel really good to know that you're doing something right.”

“Doesn’t it, that’s how I feel whenever we complete a mission.”

“Running into combat would be more exciting than moving crates the cargo bay.”

“Hey, this was a volunteer job. You did it because you wanted to help, which is the same thing you want to do when you run into battle.”

“Wow, you are on a morale-boosting streak today. But on that note, I better get back to organizing this place.” Jasiri said, standing up, and wincing as she rubbed her sore back.

“Now you know how I feel whenever you have me stock the shelves in the convenience store.”

“Hey, you help a lot!” Jasiri said, playfully hitting him.

“Well, allow me to be of help here then.”

The pair began to move the crate they had been sitting on, and Jasiri was glad to be working alongside her boyfriend, both in and out of battle.

000

Alex and JayJay had been going all over Chima, examining the landmarks and natural wonders on display. One such place they visited was an area known as the fangs, a landscape filled with dark rocks that were in the shape of sharp fangs. However now they were sitting on top of Spiral Mountain, a massive rock formation that looked like a giant screw drilled into the ground. Their eyes looked over the land of Chima that was stretched out in front of them, full of lush forests and untapped natural splendor.

“How can a mountain be this shape?” JayJay asked, feeling the stone beneath her.

“Beats me, Chima has been widely shaped by 2 events, both of which are known as the great illumination, so that probably has something to do with it. But you know what, I just remembered something. Give me a minute.”

The captain reached into a compartment on his speedor & pulled out a knife that had a long blade that was white as snow, and a handle decorated with what looked like crystals. JayJay’s eyes lit up upon seeing the knife

“A lion warrior gave this to me once, the blade is made from chimoralium, a mineral only found in Chima. I want you to have it.”

“What?”

“Most of us heroes carry knives for both survival and combat purposes. You need one, and I’m not using this knife, so I figure you can put it to use.”

Alex held out the knife and let JayJay take it from his hand.

She felt it in her hand, marveling at its beauty and fine craftsmanship. The blade and crystals seemed to glisten in the sun, and it felt really light.

“I love it, thank you,” JayJay said, rewarding the captain with a quick peck on the cheek.

“Hey, that tickles,” Alex said, playfully pushing her away. A smug grin crossed the wolf’s face and she tried to land another peck on him. However this time Alex was ready and managed to keep her back. After a few seconds, JayJay stopped her attack and the 2 laughed together.

“Did you enjoy getting out and seeing the beauty of Chima today?” Alex asked, hoping JayJay had a good time.

“Yes, plus I liked hanging out with you.”

“Hey I’m always gonna be on the typhoon, take a look at Chima while we’re here.”

“There’s so much nature in this place,” JayJay said “even more than Zootopia”

“Well one thing I like about Zootopia is how it has so much nature in it for a city”

“It's a really beautiful city. I’ve lived there all my life, and yet still find new ways to marvel at it”

“The city also has a lot of species in it, and an interesting cast of characters, like yourself”

“Ha, thanks”

“I would say you are one of the only reasons I like the city so much.”

“Oh stop it,” JayJay said, blushing and playfully pushing Alex’s shoulder.

Just as Alex was about to say something else, the sound of a distant explosion cut him off. The pair turned towards the sound to see a massive ball of fire erupting from a set of tall rock spires in the distance. Those spires were the home of the Eagle tribe, and now they were engulfed by thick black smoke.

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Oh! cliffhanger! I know someone who's gonna like that. But, that's another chapter in the bag, and I'll see you all for the next exciting update!

[tachipaws]

so uhhhhh

I watched the Game of Thrones finale just a little bit ago

and I have some thoughts

spoilers under the cut.

Firstly, seeing Tyrion find Jaime and Cersei together had me almost burst into tears. As soon as he saw Jaime’s golden hand I kinda thought, oh this is a big gag, the hand will be there with Cersei and Jaime will come sidling out from somewhere, he lived thank god. But no. Jaime died in the arms of a woman he loved, taking all these years of beautiful character development with him. And I don’t say this solely as a Braime fan. I LOVED Jaime’s character. He always tried to do the right thing, and even when he was tempted by Cersei, even when he gave in, he still came back and tried to do what he thought was best. He saved thousands of lives when he killed the Mad King, and he suffered in silence for it. He stood with Brienne and with the Starks in the Battle of Winterfell, even when his own queen refused to send her help. He tried to save Cersei from certain death, and their child, tried to get her to leave and live with him in obscurity, because they would be safe and happy and their child would grow and live. But no. They die, and all it serves is to give Dany her win and Tyrion some last-minute angst. But god, seeing him crouch over his beloved brother and sister, I could feel that he felt responsible for their deaths, and it was heart wrenching to watch.

And then Dany. Oh, beautiful Dany. I’ve loved her character from the start, and all through her arc, even when she made choices that weren’t for the best, even when they put her on a White Savior complex, even when it became clear the writers had lied and were going to make her turn out just like her father. I knew she’d die this episode, but it didn’t make watching it any easier. I had so much hope watching through the series that Dany would be the one to dethrone the Lannisters, give the people a kind and just ruler, and be everything she set out to be. For her to lose so much, from her family to her friends, and then die with nothing as well, broke my heart and even as I sit here typing I have to hold back tears. I loved Danaerys’ character so much, and I’m disgusted that she was turned into a Mad Queen. The writers don’t know jack shit about character development and it really shows with her. She should have grown and realized that maybe she wasn’t best suited for a throne, at least not the one in Westeros, and either become an adviser or return to Mereen when all was said and done. I’m so glad Drogon destroyed the Iron Throne, because it’s nothing but a death sentence anyway. Fuck that throne and fuck the writers for making it so unnecessarily important. Danaerys Targaryan was meant to be different, was meant to break the wheel. But in the end, she was crushed by it like her father and so many others before her. The Targaryans die out after a legacy of incest, mental illness, fear, and death. A complete waste of an incredible character played by an amazingly dedicated actress.

Bran being named King of Westeros was something I knew was coming bc I’d asked for the spoiler, but it was still kind of a surprise in an “are they REALLY gonna do it” kind of way. I really fucking hate that his title is Bran the Broken, as if that’s the only B word that can possibly describe a man who defied death and became the Three-Eyed Raven, but again these writers are fuckin terrible so I guess that’s what we get. I didn’t like how Sam’s idea to have the people choose a ruler was sneered at so harshly. It just shows that everyone there enjoys having all the power, which goes against the characterization of at least half of them. But I guess all the upper-class have to be assholes at least a little, huh.  I don’t know if I do or don’t like Bran being the king, but I did like how it was brought up. He is the living history of the realm as Tyrion said, and now he will live on to be its future as well. For a kid who was tossed out of a window after seeing the former queen having sex with her brother, I’d say that’s a pretty good decent glow up of sorts. I almost wish there would be another season, if only to see how Westeros fairs under Bran’s rule with Tyrion at his side. I can only hope everyone lives to see the peace they finally deserve, after suffering so much under the rule of families hungry for fame and riches and titles.

Arya leaving is the one thing I’m just, really fucking bothered by. I don’t recall anywhere her having a desire to travel and see new parts of the world. When she left Westeros she did so because it was life or death. She came home to be with her family. And now she’s leaving them for god knows how long to go god knows where. I can’t believe after all the chaos and death these kids have faced and grown up around, she wouldn’t want to stay in Winterfell to be with Jon and Sansa. I just don’t like it. Arya is one of my top favorite characters and watching her grow from a stubborn child into a ruthless assassin was amazing, but somehow her ending off as an explorer just doesn’t feel quite right.

Jon being sentenced to live out his days in the Watch is the cruelest joke in this whole fucking show. Right back where he started, the bastard son of Ned stark, forced to live out his days in the cold and snow at Castle Black, never to have any family or land of his own. After all the attempts to hype up the R+L=J shit, which so many people figured out way too easily, after uncovering the mystery of his real lineage and discovering he’s one of the only two Targaryans left in existence, after all the struggle within himself of not wanting to take the throne from Dany even though he had a legitimate claim and her Mad Queen story line made her unfit to rule (and after having to listen to Varys insist only men can rule properly, tbh I’m not sad he died, I never liked him and he got what he deserved for that shit), he ends right back where he started. Jon was my first favorite character, and I always hurt for him, how he was raised with the Stark children as Ned’s bastard, how much Catelynn seemed like she wanted to love him like her own but just couldn’t, how much it must have hurt him knowing he was hurting her and her just by existing. I would have loved to see Cat find out the truth and their relationship become something different, as he was the son of her husband’s beloved sister and she would have embraced him with open arms and a thousand apologies. She just didn’t know any different, and by the time Jon knew, it was all too late. He’s lost almost all the family he’s ever known, and all the real family he ever had. His whole character arc amounted to nothing. NOTHING. My only hope is that he just goes off north with Ghost, Tormund, and the wildlings, because who’s gonna bother to make sure? Aegon Targaryan will have never existed.

AT LEAST, he finally gave Ghost the fucking pats that direwolf deserved. I was actually really happy to see Ghost and Tormund again, and even happier to see Jon acknowledge Ghost, who’d been by his side from the very start. I’m at least glad knowing they’ll still be together in the true north.

And now the grand finale, the one thing I was completely satisfied with.  Sansa Stark The Queen in the North Seeing the crown placed upon her head, seeing her take her rightful place, and hearing her men shout “THE QUEEN IN THE NORTH” made me feel swollen with pride. Sansa has been through hell and back. She watched her father die at the command of a king who tormented her, she was raped by another man who executed her youngest brother, she lost her mother and her oldest brother to a supposed ally, and spent so many seasons a hostage or a tool for other people. But she fought, and she grew, and she became shrewd and cunning at the table. Sansa calculated every step she made and it saw her to ascend the throne, and take her rightful place as the oldest Stark heir. She secured her people’s land and ensured their safety. I can only imagine how proud Ned, Catelynn, Robb, and Rickon would be if they could see Sansa now. No longer is she the scared, air-headed little girl who just wants to marry a noble man and live life in the luxury she’s always known. She’s a war veteran, a general, a wolf through and through.

I started watching Game of Thrones in season 5 I believe, with a group of friends in a stream. I knew about the show but had just never bothered to sit and watch it. After seasons 6 ended, I figured I may as well start at the beginning and have a better understanding of what’s going to happen in the last 2 seasons. I spent about three or four weeks slowly marathoning it around my oldest daughter’s schedule (she’s only six and there’s no way she’s watching it any time soon lmao) and I couldn’t help but fall in love with the characters, the world itself, and the stories being played out. I have to say though, along with so many others, I’m utterly disappointed at the ending, and season 8 as a whole. It felt unrefined, and rushed, and there was no sense that anything meaningful happened in the end. When I saw the writers so brashly say that story lines were for 8th grade books, I realized just how little they care about actually writing, and this season truly reflects that. The deaths were for shock value more than anything else, and the major conflicts were solved so easily it felt as if all the buildup for them had been for something else entirely. I don’t regret watching Game of Thrones by any means, but I do feel sad for Martin that his beautiful complex stories full of beautiful complex characters, were reduced to nothing more than a circle story. All this talk of breaking the wheel, and yet it just rolled right back around to see the unspoken main character end right where he began. Because what’s the point of a story when there’s CGI dragons and big fight scenes?

[charlierejouis]

Avengers Endgame Q & A Review (Spoiler Edition)

With a few days left until Spiderman: Far From Home, I think it's safe to talk about this movie in more spoiler-y terms. I think the spoiler ban has been up for a while, but I still know people who haven’t seen this movie yet. As usual, here’s an example of how this will go.

What do you think of the Endgame re-release?

It’s a hilariously transparent attempt to overtake Avatar as the highest-grossing movie that my only reason for not taking part in is scheduling conflicts and lack of money. I am pathetic and I don’t know for why.

Let’s go!

How has your view on Endgame changed in the months since seeing it?

Since seeing it, I’ve come to recognize more and more things about it I love and appreciate it. I genuinely can’t imagine another movie that’s been in the MCU topping it, nor do I expect a movie to have higher highs than it. However, I can appreciate people who would say that Infinity War or some other movie was better than it.

Are you willing to group this in with Infinity War, similar to how you see the Iron Man movies as equally good?

I can’t even say that Endgame stops being Infinity War until after the time skip. These two movies are different in both tone and motivation. I think they deserve to be seen as their own movies. Not to mention, much of the reason for my views on the Iron Man trilogy is because it is the trilogy of my favorite character in the MCU.

Which Avenger had the best run in Endgame?

This might upset some people, but I love how Thor was handled. Dude goes 0-2 against Thanos in the last movie and you don’t expect him to go depressed once he can’t get the revenge he wants? I said this before, but I love that this movie made me care about Thor: The Dark World, one of the worst movies in the MCU. I’ve been going through his movies again because I want to talk about how Thor has been throughout the MCU. What I will say is that Thor in the hands of James Gunn may result in an even better version of Thor than we’ve seen before.

Which Avenger had the worst run in Endgame?

I hinted at this before, but I don’t love the Hulk’s transformation being skipped. I get that it’s a long movie and we need to get to other points, but I do wish we got more of Professor Hulk’s development before he was plopped onto us after the time skip. Of course, the movie works as it is, but it would be better if we got more of that.

How does Captain America’s ending fall on that scale?

He had an awesome run in this movie. The events of the past few phases of the MCU, especially Infinity War, have given us a broken version of the once Star-Spangled Man with a Plan. That he decides to retire the way he does at the end of the movie is something I didn't allow myself to believe was possible but I should have expected nothing less from the directors responsible for his best movies and the writers behind his trilogy, especially once time travel was introduced as a plot point. For the consideration of some, I’ve seen the writers confirm the theory that Peggy’s husband in Winter Soldier was always meant to be Steve.

What did you think of the scene with Carol? You know, that scene?

When I originally planned to tackle this question in this post, I was planning on dealing with people who were mad at the scene for pandering. Now, we’ve gone the opposite way and people are arguing that Marvel Studios was wrong for having this scene exactly because of their less-than-stellar representation of women characters. At the time, I was caught up in the euphoria of the final battle that for like a half hour I lived in a world where political agendas didn’t exist. It took until I left the theater to realize I saw a tweet that hinted at this and days until I realized why people would have issues with it. I will say that Nando v Movies gave an improved version of this scene.

What are your thoughts on the Black Widow drama?

I find it all hilariously ironic. This time last year, people were mad at the concept of a solo Black Widow movie, making arguments for some other MCU heroine with a fraction of the screentime or relevance to get her spotlight. I even saw a post suggesting that they could recast Scarjo as Black Widow for the movie. Now that they killed her in Endgame, some of these exact same people want to act like they were her biggest fan and that the choice to have her die was motivated by some form of sexism. And the cherry on top of this whole situation? The Russos are being called sexist because one woman who helped work on the film thought it was a sacrifice needed for her to take over Clint. After Endgame and this drama, I’m even more motivated to see this movie and hope it does and is better than Captain Marvel, at the very least.

So, you think that Black Widow’s sacrifice was done well?

Kind of? I found it weirdly hilarious that the Soul Stone came down to the two characters argued to be the most useless within the Avengers, watching the scene play out in theaters. Frankly, I don’t know that there was a better choice between her and Hawkeye. They just decided to go with the one that allowed an actual family reunion to be possible. With the benefit of time, I’ve come to see how this works for her arc as she finally found a way to get the red out of her ledger. While I don’t think it’s bad to have this kind of thing happen, I wish we did get more of a proper memorial or funeral for her.

How do you feel about the information we’ve learned about this movie’s events in interviews?

I don’t exactly love it.  While it’s an unpopular view, I consider “canon” [what is presented in a work] and Word of God [what is revealed by series creators] to be on about the same level. Consider part of that comes from my more biblical background being applied to these terms and my work in fan writing relying on both. I love that we have so directors and writers who recognize that they are making a movie that millions of people are interested in their work and willing to add insight to their thought process months before we’ll get their commentaries on the film. However, I don’t love hearing them explain stuff that could and probably should have been made clear within the actual movie. I wish some of the things made clear by the writers or directors were already clear within the movies, even though I don’t think the movie is made worse by it. I don’t think a lot of it comes from a sense of “trying to cover their tracks” but it can feel like that when you do this and I don’t love that.  

With all the changes you wish happened, why would you still call this the best movie in the MCU?

I think that there are a lot of issues with this movie that could be addressed by some of the fixes others have suggested, including the ones I’ve brought up in this post. However, for every genuinely good and relevant change that I have seen made to this movie better, I’ve seen a heck of a lot of absolute zero takes on this movie and suggestions to fix this movie that make it worse than what we got. Around the time I posted my other review, I got to sit with some other people who saw the movie. When I told them some issues people I know had with the movie, they were shocked these could even be seen as issues. As low as this movie gets, I can’t say they’re issues that are bad enough to earn a lower spot in my ranking of the MCU movies than where it currently is and I can’t imagine one taking that spot soon.

So that’s been fun. It’ll be a while before I see Far From Home, but I have no reason to think it will be a bad film. See you!

[rebelwithalens]

“TALK To Me”

What you should know about National Suicide Hotlines.

The following post mentions rape, abuse, and suicide but does not explore these issues or use any graphic language to discuss them. It merely provides insight into how these Hotlines are operated.

In a past life, I used to listen to people’s problems for very long stretches of time.

And no, I didn’t work in customer service.

I used to speak to people who were stressed out about applying to colleges and where everything was headed for them.

I spoke to people who had been raped, people who were feeling the debilitating fear of leaving and fear of staying with an abusive partner, and people who had just lost a child.

I spoke to people while they were literally in the middle of trying to kill themselves — and I mean that “literally” literally.

To sum it up, if you were talking to me, you probably weren’t having a very good day.

In fact, most times, I was speaking with a person on one of the worst days of their life.

For thousands of hours, I was a crisis counselor — The EMTs of the psych world.

We triaged, we bandaged, we applied compression to gaping wounds — some of which were catastrophic. We tried to keep hearts beating.

Our job was to give first aid and then get them to professionals, groups, organizations who could help them further.

But more and more people are coming forward with stories about negative experiences with the same hotlines whose numbers are widely circulated every time there’s a new celebrity suicide in the news.

If you’ve ever called 273-TALK, there’s a very good chance that you haven’t received the care that you needed and deserved.

Here’s why.

Disclaimer: I have zero experience with crisis centers outside of the United States so what’s being discussed is possibly not applicable to where you live. Please look into how these situations are handled in your area and in your country. I welcome you to share your own experiences and insights in the comments.

Suicide hotlines like 273-TALK are national hotlines. This means that when someone dials them, their call is automatically directed to the crisis center nearest to them. If the center is closed or the lines are busy, the call will jump around until someone, somewhere answers it. So, although you’re calling from Wisconsin, there’s a good chance that you won’t be talking to a counselor who’s also located in your state.

This creates a good foundation for a fundamental problem to thrive.

There is no uniform, universal protocol for crisis center operations and procedures within the United States nor is there a standard for hotline operator training and this is a huge contributing factor as to why experiences vary wildly. I worked at a crisis center that had an intensive, long training schedule — at the time, it was regarded as one of the most extensive training programs in the country. But in contrast, the only other crisis center in a 50 mile radius — which was located just one county over — was disorganized and dated, and to throw kerosene on an inferno, they let volunteers on the phone after just a few hours of orientation. Yes, people who were taking suicide calls. To put that into perspective, at my organization, we were required to complete over 600 hours of training before we were a certified “solo” counselor.

Part of our training required us to learn how to use our organization’s resource database.

Which leads to the next fundamental problem that exists.

There is no universal referral database for crisis centers.

Local crisis centers should have referrals that are a good fit for their demographic but even if they do, problems still occur with a national hotline that diverts calls.

Let’s say you call from Maine, but the person who picks up your call in in Maryland. The information they’ll have on therapists, hospitals, etc. located in Maine would be extraordinarily limited. Maine isn’t the demographic that they’re intended to serve, and additionally, it might be in conflict with their funding.

Not only does the counselor not have accurate and complete information on the options available for the caller but the criteria and policies that govern admittance and qualification for programs can differ significantly from state-to-state and insurance plan to insurance plan (of which we have no information). This means that it’s very possible that you have better options available to you than you’ll be made aware of. Many people struggle with saying, “I don’t know” and unfortunately frame their remarks as absolutes in an attempt to appear competent.

Additionally, there are crisis centers that are equipped to only provide references and have never received counseling training at all. Someone in crisis shouldn’t have to be told “I’m sorry, but we just give out referrals” if they start talking about their circumstances. I know how devastating a response that can be for someone whose finally asking for help.

There’s a pervasive belief in many industries that once a solution’s been invented that a problem is “figured out”. There are countless ways that this could be made better and so that people who ask for help are met with empathy and competency.

Should you really have to wonder about a counselor’s training while you’re in a fight for your life? No, counseling requires trust. You deserve someone who’s willing and able to listen effectively. Someone who can empathize with your situation and understands how this system works. These aren’t things learned during a weekend seminar.

High-profile tragedies push this subject to the forefront of our society’s conversations which is important but the issues at hand are far more insidious and systemic than most realize. I have a different perspective — I see things differently because I’ve been on the other side of those calls and I have first-hand experience with who may be answering it. 

That’s why I needed to share this with you.

Please don’t ever stop asking for help.

Please don’t be beaten down by all those who refuse to listen to all that you’re saying and all that’s left unsaid.

Don’t stop talking until someone starts listening.

That’s hard. That’s really hard. But you deserve to be heard and to be believed.

Our hotline was anonymous but, if by some chance, our paths crossed. I’d just like to say:

I don’t know how you kept breathing but you did.

I don’t know why you stayed on the line but I am so damn happy that you did.

I am so humbled that you trusted me — a complete stranger, a disembodied voice — when you were ripped raw.

I hope you are well.

I wish you peace.

My little corner of Tumblr is all about stories. You are welcome to share yours in the comment section. Thank you for listening to one of mine 🍍

[murasaki-murasame]

Episode 23 of :re continues to be a really solid adaptation, even if it’s of some very flawed material. And this final arc at least feels a bit less exhausting and overdone than it did in the manga, so that’s neat.

Anyway, detailed thoughts under the cut, and spoilers for the whole manga.

As I expected, this episode covers the first half of volume 16. Like, literally half of it. The volume is roughly 320 pages long, and this episode adapted the first 160 pages, lol. And as I also expected, it worked out just fine, pacing-wise. Barely anything actually got cut. A few scenes got made a bit more concise, and Takizawa didn’t watch Donato and Amon fight, but that’s about it.

At least in terms of the stuff specifically from this part of the manga alone. I think it’s worth noting that they bring Ayato back into the story in this episode, but they don’t really talk much about what he was up to, and it looks like they’re completely cutting out the detail of him bringing back some feral children that lived underground.

I think I like this change a fair bit, even though I can tell it’s gonna annoy a lot of people. I always really disliked how Ishida handled the entire plot point of Ayato finding that underground city and the corpse of the old dragon, so I can certainly live with how the anime is removing a lot of the focus on it. The time spent setting it up in the manga just made it all the more disappointing when absolutely nothing of value came of it, so at least in the anime it’s upfront about how much of a background detail it is.

On the topic of things I didn’t like from around this part of the manga, I’m vaguely disappointed that the anime kept the stuff with Eto being brought back at the last minute, but I can’t really blame them for just being faithful to the manga. I still think that the anime is at it’s best when it’s actively going against the execution of the manga, and this is something where I think they could have easily just cut it out. I have a feeling it’s also going to be something where anime-only people wind up understandably assuming that the manga must SURELY have done more with this plot point, and taken even the SLIGHTEST effort to actually explain why the fuck it’s happening, but yeah no lol. The way that Ishida brought her back out of absolutely nowhere and then almost immediately kills her off was so awfully handled that most of the fandom genuinely hates it and wishes it never happened. There’s a lot of things where I’m in the minority for disliking some parts of the writing, but trust me when I say that nearly everyone hates what Ishida did with Eto here. I honestly still don’t fully grasp what he was even trying to achieve with this, other than him trying to bring the Owl back for the final arc just to . . . make some last-minute parallels to the end of the first series? Who even knows.

That’s actually my only real complaint about this episode, though. Everything else was very solid and well-executed. They didn’t really add anything or flesh anything out beyond what happened in the manga, but they just adapted what happened in the manga in a really solid, satisfying enough way.

I remember disliking how the Donato-Amon and Yomo-Uta fights were handled in the manga, but I think that was mostly a pacing issue. The manga devoted several chapters exclusively to those fight scenes, which just felt unnecessarily drawn-out. It feels a fair bit more natural in the anime, partly because both of those fights are a bit more concise than they were originally, and partly because I think the anime cuts between them a bit more than the manga did, which makes it feel less like you’re following one fight for a weirdly long time. I’d have to reread this part of the manga to remind myself exactly how I feel about it, but I also think that the resolution between Yomo and Uta felt more satisfying and less underwhelming than it did originally.

Also, I can’t really remember if an anime-only person would know about Amon’s history with Donato by this point. I never got around to watching Root A, so I genuinely have no idea if that season talked about their backstory. I know that it hasn’t come up in the :re anime, but even in the :re manga there’s barely any references to Amon’s childhood. So maybe that whole scene was something that wouldn’t work at all for anime-only people, but I can’t tell.

I still have a lot of complicated feelings about Amon’s entire place in :re’s story. It ultimately just feels really unnecessary, like he was mostly brought back just so he could wind up dating Akira and have a happy ending. There’s not really much that the story actually does in :re to substantially develop him or explore his character. On it’s own his whole confrontation with Donato is very nice and bittersweet, and it’s good to see him acknowledging that he’s a part of the warped world he lives in, and that he can’t avoid taking responsibility for that, but overall it feels particularly odd to have his big final moment as a character be focused on his relationship with Donato, given how little screen-time that plot point gets, especially in :re. It feels more logical for the story to focus on how conflict with Kaneki, but that whole thing just gets kinda . . . brushed under the rug in a really unsatisfying way.

I’ll at least say that the disappointing aspects of how Amon is handled as a character are much less obnoxious and jarring as they were in the manga, if only just because the anime has been covering like two thirds of :re in twelve episodes. It’s more reasonable for Amon to not have THAT much focus or development in a 24-episode anime than it was for his moments to be so few and far between across 180 chapters of a manga that ran for like three years. It’s still not the most satisfying thing ever, but at least people watching the anime didn’t have to spend literal YEARS watching basically nothing happen with his character, lol.

Oh right, I just remembered that V exists, and that I guess they’re another part of the episode I disliked. I mean, they’re involved with the whole Eto thing, but my reasons for disliking them are entirely separate. They’re another whole plot point that I think Ishida handled terribly, and there’s not much the anime can do to improve that. They’ve always just been this really lame, cliche shadow organization with murky goals, and nothing much ever gets done with them. I can’t blame any anime-only people for thinking that they’re really boring and under-utilized and unexplored, but the manga doesn’t do much more with them. To be blunt, the fact that I completely forgot about them right after the episode ended kinda says everything you need to know about how badly they’re handled even though they’re kind of sort of the Big Bads [tm] of the entire series, lmao.

I said before that this episode didn’t necessarily add anything new to what was originally in the manga, but after going back through my copy of volume 16 [I donated my English TG manga collection to my local library last week but I still own the last three volumes of :re in Japanese], it looks like that short scene with Mutsuki getting protected by Urie and Akira was anime-original. Which is a bit surprising since it was a fairly minor scene that didn’t impact much. I really liked it though. It’s just a neat detail to show Mutsuki’s friends and colleagues protecting him, and there’s something really bittersweet about how it comes across like he was willing to accept his fate and let himself be killed by the fake Owl, and was surprised to find himself being protected. It helps really hammer in the character growth and reconciliation that’s been going on with him and those around him lately, and it just works really nicely. It continues to be really interesting to me that almost all of the most major changes/cuts/additions in the anime thus far relate to Mutsuki’s character, and in general improving upon how Ishida handled him originally. I really appreciate it, but I’ve already talked about that a lot so I don’t need to go back over it.

Getting to the final part of the episode, the whole scene with Kaneki confronting Furuta wasn’t substantially different to the manga in how it plays out, and what sort of a note the episode ends on, but it’s interesting that the anime is portraying him in a more serious and genuinely threatening light, whereas this bit from the manga really played up his joke-y attitude. I think I prefer it this way, but it’s not the biggest change ever. In general I really like the note this episode ended on. I think the fact that they cut out one or two instances of Kaneki cracking his fingers previously in :re helped make this moment feel more important and surprising, so that’s cool.

Now that we’re halfway into the final volume of the manga, that just leaves the final half of it to adapt in the final episode, which should be totally fine. There’s a lot of scenes that can go by REALLY fast in the anime. Especially the epilogue, since a huge chunk of that can probably just be handled as a montage while the ending theme or whatever plays, rather than how we had to slog through so many pages of so many pointless narrative exposition boxes in the manga. Some of the final scenes between Kaneki, Furuta, and then Rize also felt almost comically drawn out in the manga, which always felt a bit weird given how rushed the overall ending felt, and how tight of a schedule Ishida was working on. You could really tell that he tried and failed to get the ending extended by an additional three chapters.

We don’t know what the final episode will be called yet, but they’ll probably have that sorta info up in the next day or two. I’m kinda excited to see what they call it, since the final episode of :re s1 ditched the naming scheme of the rest of the episode names to give it something more unique. So it’ll be neat to see what they do for the final episode.

I’m of course gonna hold back on giving my final thoughts on the :re anime until it all ends in the next episode, but I think we’re close enough to the end that my feelings on it won’t really change much, so I just wanna reiterate that I genuinely really love it, in spite of it’s flaws. I would have preferred something more . . . ‘transformative’, if that makes sense, but as an adaptation that takes the existing story and just tells it in a better way, I think the anime works surprisingly well. This final season in particular has been a big step up from the manga.

All in all I just have a lot of affection for it and what it’s been trying to achieve [especially with how they’ve done so much to improve the endless list of issues with how badly Ishida handled Mutsuki as a character], and I don’t think that goodwill could be tarnished at this point with just one episode left. I’ve jokingly said before that even though there’s more objectively good options, this is probably one of my favourite anime of this year, but I think I genuinely stand by that. There’s been some REALLY great stuff this year, even in terms of just stuff I’ve fully watched [like Devilman Crybaby, Revue Starlight, Planet With, etc etc], but I just feel really strongly about the :re anime. Also there’s some recency bias going on, lol. It’s been so long since I watched Devilman Crybaby. This year was a goddamn decade long.

[cwl190]

Week 5

Benjamin Percy’s “Making the Extraordinary Ordinary”:

“Burton was enamored with the gritty nightmare of Gotham, the whiz-bang awesomeness of the Batmobile, and was carelss with characterization. So I didn’t believe... I was only a child, but after dreaming my way darkly through Gotham, the movie felt comparitively silly. Because it had no heart” (66). 

“I remember my mother crying and running upstairs when I was suspended. I remember my father ripping up my report card and hurling the pieces across the room like the saddest sort of confetti, not saying a word, just staring at me with hooded eyes” (66).

“Silence, I came to understand, was knowing when to shut up” (67).

“Saunders reinvents grief by giving it a beating heart. And he normalizes the weirdness by giving her a pitiable desire we can all relate to. Would the story be just as effective if it were told as realism? Some might say so. But fantasy allows us truths that might otherwise be unavailable. Normally a reflection means little except as a way to check our teeth, to smear on makeup, but before a warped mirror we pause, studying ourselves with awe and care, struck by a new way of seeing” (71).

“We expect winged men to be angelic, muscled and white-robed and blonde-haired and backlit by radiant light, but Garcia Marquez plays against our expectations: this figure is far from heavenly. They call him an “angel”, yes, but they also wonder if he is Norwegian or a sailor, a “castaway from some foreign ship wrecked by the storm.” And he is not exalted, as we would expect, but persecuted. He performs no miracles. He cowers pitifully. They cage him, prod him, pick his feathers, throw stones at him, burn his side with a branding iron. And in this way Garcia Marquez not only makes the fantastic accessible but captures the human tendency to fear whatever is different and the desire to label, define, control” (73).

Benjamin Percy’s “Get a Job”:

“Whether we like it or not, work defines us. Work dominates our lives. And we have an obligation, in our prose and poetry, in the interest of realism, and in the service of point of view, voice, setting, metaphor, and story, to try to incorporate credibly and richly the working lives of our characters” (140).

“Nor, tonally, should you build baroque sentences when the mind of your character is empy, his life unadorned. Her voice shouldn’t sound like white lace and gold trim when her home reeks of cheap whiskey and wood smoke” (144).

“It is a job that frames and sets into motion every element of your story or essay or poem- and it is your job to do the required research that will bring the language and tasks and schedule and perspective of your characters’ work to life. Google can do only so much for you. The library can only do so much for you. You need to write from the trenches” (145).

“Writing is an act of empathy. You are occupying and understanding a point of view that might be alien to your own- and work is often the keyhole through which you peer” (149).

Tom Perotta's "Ordinary People"

““I can’t look at everything hard enough”: The tragedy is that, while we’re alive, we don’t view our days in the knowledge that all things must pass. We don’t- we can’t- value our lives, our loved ones, with the urgent knowledge that they’ll one day be gone forever. Emily notices with despair that she and her mother barely look at one another, and she laments our self-possession, our distractedness, the million things that keep us from each other. “Oh, Mama,” she cries, “just look at me one minute as though you really saw me.... Let’s look at one another.” But mother and daughter remain self-absorbed, each in a private sea of her own thoughts, and that moment of recognition, or connection, never comes. Eventually, Emily has to return away” (130).

“Some people think of Our Town as being sentimental. Obviously, there’s a wish-fulfillment aspect here: the character who returns to the past, in a sense conquering death for a moment. But what’s unsentimental is that it’s too much, the way the experience is heartbreaking for the character. There’s a real emotional courage in the fact that there’s not a catharsis: only an unflinching acknowledgement of the gulf between the town and the cemetery. The living don’t appreciate the dead; the living don’t even appreciate the living. For me, that’s not sentimental- it’s unbelievably tough. The play presents us with a difficult truth, and forces us to take a long, hard look at it” (130-131).

Leslie Jamison's "On Commonness" 

“You remember too much, my mother said to me recently. Why hold onto all that? And I said, where can I put it down?” (158).

“I want to tell you how much it hurts, but I’m also going to tell you that there is a vioce inside of me, dogging me at every moment about tryingtoo hard to tell you how much it hurts... Carson’s mode of self-awareness doesn’t apologize for its emotion...” (158).

““I thought I would die” It’s so willfully plain. There’s something moving to me about saying it so embarrassingly straight. The following line, “This is not uncommon,” can be read so many different ways. The tone might be clinical or dismissive, as in, this is not an uncommon symptom of the disease of heartbreak. But it’s also an acknowledgement that what she’s going through is in no way extraordinary. It’s something that’s been felt before, and it’ll be felt again. Yet she owns this commonness, without apologizing for it, relinquishing it, or dismissing it” (159).

“I think there’s an additional layer of use when it comes to personal experience: You just see the events of your own life so differently after more  years have passed. That doesn’t mean that the truest version of an event is going to be the version you write when you’re eighty. But your perspective keeps changing” (162).

MAKING THE EXTRAORDINARY ORDINARY—TRUTH:

The truth that exposes itself in “The Miniature Wife” and “The Infamous Bengal Ming” is the failures in the narrator and his wife’s ability to communicate with one another and that wild animals cannot mingle with humankind. The narrator’s wife being shrunken down and the negligence of the narrator portrays how she herself has literally been minimized through the course of their relationship. The marital problems between the narrator and his wife have existed even prior to the events of the story, and now it’s presented as the main conflict of the story. Gonzales reveals that it’s not really the incident that was the problem between them, but rather the catalyst.

In “The Infamous Bengal Ming”, the truth that becomes available in this story is that humans and animals cannot cross the bridge between their nature. Whether or not this is due to a communication problem is up to our interpretation, but everything the tiger does that he thinks will aid humans is villainized and he suffers the consequences of it. In the end, it doesn’t even matter because the tiger’s idea of love becomes distorted due to his senses. He finds some type of twisted euphoria in killing a woman he despises, and because of his hunger he eats her. The tiger still calls it love even though it’s clearly not, and I think Parameswaran is trying to make apparent the futility of trying to bridge that gap between species.

FEAR: 

This observation applies to “The Miniature Wife” through the narrator’s fascination with his wife. Rather than try to find a solution to her problem, he observes her as if she is a wild animal as well as gives her a habitat for his own self-gratuitous reasons. We see that views her more as a test subject than as a person through ways such as peering at her through a microscope, prioritizing crafting a dollhouse for her to live with and not making any pursuits to undo the shrinking ray effects. Instead of handling her infidelity with communication, he fears the ramifications of anyone finding out he has two shrunken people in his house and kills his co-worker. 

In “The Infamous Bengal Ming”, this theme is present all throughout the story. The tiger approaches humans with good will, but almost everyone recoils away in fear and is killed from the tiger’s advances (understandably). The tiger's position as an apex predator puts him at the forefront of their defensiveness and rather than embrace him, they seek to restrain and control him based on their preconceived notion of tigers being a threat. Fear moves along the plot. The tiger runs away in fear of the consequences for killing the zookeeper, leading him to the house where the woman and her child live in, and because the woman is terrified of the tiger's presence in the room she drops the baby, causing the tiger to catch it with his jaw and eventually kill it. It leads the reader to wonder, what would have happened if the people in this story were not as terrified as the tiger as they were? Would that have changed the way the story spiraled out of control, or would the tiger have given into his animalistic instincts earlier?

CONNECT THE DOTS—GET A JOB AND GONZALES: 

The narrator’s world revolves around his job. The way he handles the situation, his relationship with his wife prior to shrinking her and how it ends is all because his job is his life. Due to the way he got caught up in his work, he was never a very attentive husband and always left his dishes in the sink and didn’t clean up even after his wife reprimanded him several times. Because of his constant pursuit of knowledge, instead of doing the reasonable thing and trying to grow his wife, he instead observes her as if she was an experiment rather than his partner. Because of the narrator’s occupation, he has been portrayed as a very cold, obsessive, and negligent man, or maybe that was the kind of person he was to be suited to the job to begin with.

ON COMMONNESS: 

I think it’s a matter of the ego? The author summarized why the describing the full scope of your genuine feelings can be seen as something to rag on at pretty well. Adding “This is not uncommon” is a self-aware statement that tells you they’re aware it’s not that big of a deal. I really liked the examination of this concept because being sincere is a scary thing to do when you write, or even in your everyday life. Your works are somehow a bit of an extension of yourself, and by shoving that into the forefront of everyone’s judgement you are exposing your expressed thoughts and feelings. You don’t want to be completely genuine because you’re usually not. There’s not much I can add onto that because I think the essay put feelings into words that I wasn’t able to do myself. 

ONE THING: 

The fake grandmas was something that I felt was done in a way that could really make us suspend our belief. When they mentioned how when visits from kids became more of a chore than something they enjoyed was the correct time to kill the grandparents off, it made so much sense to me. That was such a calculated strategy on their part because most children’s memories change with the passage of time. They won’t remember every feature on their grandparent’s face, so using their naivety to the business’s advantage works perfectly in the context of the story to me. 

Also, the way the stand-ins are required to memorize the entire family tree as well as their parent’s vacations, photoshopping photos to put them in it. It all seems like a huge elaborate gaslighting project. The moment the grandparent is killed off is the moment when the person they’re tricking decides it of their own accord without even realizing it. It made me realize the inevitability of family relationships eventually growing apart. A lot of people aren’t close to their grandparents at all so it was pretty easy for me to accept that them eventually being phased out of their grandchildren’s life is pretty believable.

WILSON: 

The narrator’s way of seeing the world definitely bends around her work. Her ability to disconnect from relationships at her job translates into her everyday life, where we see that she doesn’t bother with building her own attachments. She isn’t married, doesn’t have any kids and she refuses to enter committed relationships with other men. Whether or not this is due to the nature of her job or because of her past we don’t know, but we can glean that someone who treats familial relationships as a transaction isn’t very authentic or sentimental.

We especially see this when the narrator converses with her co-workers, who all seem to have a bitter, snarky approach to their jobs. They make death into a lighthearted subject manner or something with a double meaning. When Martha says “I was so good, fams were going to keep me until I outlived all of them. They were going to be leaving me money in their wills” (14) and the narrator reminds her that they all have due dates at one point. it’s not really just about the completion of their agreement as a stand-in. It can serve as a foreshadowing to when being a stand-in truly takes a toll and the narrator is no longer competent to their job.

ORDINARY PEOPLE: 

Perrotta’s ideas of ordinary details come in the form of people’s mannerisms: The breakfast they eat in the morning, how someone might put up their hair, etc. The “Grand Stand-in” makes all of those ordinary details into it’s own concept. It’s the grandparent’s job to embody those details and form themselves into a believable person. The narrator is transfixed on the lullaby because she feels the need to prove herself as a professional. Every part of their job is calculated, all those little details that make up their identity is the bizarreness of being a stand-in. The ordinary things about these grandparents are what makes them fascinating because it’s not them at all. 

CONNECT THE DOTS: 

The “Grand Stand-in” follows Boyle’s advice in “How Stories Say Goodbye” and has a closure where we are more or less satisfied with the ending. The narrator goes through an epiphany where she realizes that she doesn’t want to continue with her job due to wanting something real. The loss she experiences by cutting herself off from all the families is a hallmark of these change because although all the families she involved herself in was nothing but a fabricated lie, quitting unexpectedly gave her “deaths” meaning. She states herself that the sadness she feels is more rewarding and genuine.