#you could say it's a cop-out OR that it's realistically complicated but I like how alan balances his feelings

[jimmyspades]

"When did you have your last abortion? Until you know everything that goes with it, don't you dare lecture me or anybody about–" "I know what goes with it! Obviously I haven't experienced the physical part, but I know the overwhelming emotion that goes with it. I know the sense of loss, I know the doubt, the guilt, so please, don't–" BOSTON LEGAL 5.08 "Roe"

[signanothername]

yooo, it's me the playlist/fic anon! tysm for the songs and playlists, COMPLETELY FORGOT OUT 6UP 5OH COP OUT BY WILL WOOD I FUCKING FORGOT IT HOW COULD I IT DOES FIT SO WELL

AND OFC I CAN SHARE THE FIC WHEN i'M DONE I'D BE HONORED IF YOU READ IT ONCE I GET THE FIRST CHAPTER DONE GHJOH

I'm mainly writing it based on killermar,e but it's canon, and Nightmare realizes he's attached to Killer, and starts being a bitch, before *slightly* favoring him, but Killer is pretty certain this is just Nightmare tryna get him to fuck up, to use this aganist him, right? And the Nightmare realises, oh I am a HUGE fuckign asshole.

Don't normally ship Killermare, but the urge to write had gripped me and will not let go

Sup!!! And you’re very welcome <3333

AND FR IT DOESSS!!!

And EEEEEE THANK YOU CANT WAIT ID BE HONOREDTO READ IT :D❤️🌷✨

And omg yesssss, like I always wanted a more realistic depiction of how Killermare would be y’know? It’s absolutely not a relationship that’s all flowers and roses, it can even be right down toxic and/or abusive, full of doubt and obstacles to go through before the two actually settle down chhcch (slow burn relationship fr)

Nightmare being an absolute bitch while still feeling attached??? That’s literally how i see their relationship to be like from Nightmare’s pov hdhdhdh

But ugh Killer’s doubt that Nightmare’s just trying to pin something on him YES, Killer isn’t the most trusting person nor is he trustworthy himself (if we’re talking about Killer during stage 2 at least) so him just not trusting Nightmare’s motives??? Yes sir!!! Tho I’d say that depending on which stage Killer is in, he could feel a bit paranoid (stage 1) or he could just not give a fuck (stage 2) he could alternate between stages even cause of their relationship

And honestly we all need Nightmare to realize how huge of an asshole he can be hdhdhdh

Killermare is a fascinating ship to me to say the least, it’s a complicated relationship that has so much to explore, so even if I don’t really ship it myself i’m not opposed to it by any means, and i do enjoy it even <3333

I just usually prefer platonic relationships cause ugh they mean so much to me and they’re super underrated, that’s why i love to explore Killer’s and Nightmare’s relationship without my art necessarily being killermare, there’s just something special about platonic relationships to me :D

Anyway CANT WAIT FOR THE FIC GDHDHHDHDHD

[krikeymate]

have you read the scream 5 draft script? because it's two scenes of christina (or susan as she's called in the draft) are fascinating and they are now how i picture her. also richie's got these two really fucked up lines that i wish had been kept in. The first one he says to Sidney "And to think: if you'd only opened your legs up for Billy earlier, like he wanted, Sam wouldn't even exist!" and then he says this to Sam "You know what the best part of fucking Billy Loomis's damaged daughter was? Making her feel loved, just so I could take it away from her." It just makes him even more deplorable.

I actually haven't! I've seen a few pages, mostly regarding the Amber/Tara relationship that they scrapped.

Let me take a look. (this took me 2.5 hours).

What the original script had to say about the mum:

Tara asked if her mum talks about her in group - that's sad.

She refers to her mother by her name.

The mention of 'group' possibly being: AA, NA, for gambling or for kleptomania - and people still think Sam's mental health issues are from daddy, c'mon, this woman fucked up.

The mention that the mum was not going to tell Sam that Tara was attacked.

Mum being drunk at the bar.

The scene of Sam & her mum at the Carpenter house: "You did this to her, didn’t you? Because you’re like him. Even when you were a kid I could see it in you... and now you’ve gone and hurt my baby girl..."

What was in the original script that was better:

Her trying to blackmail the guy on the phone - a shame we didn't get that, it's a nice piece of character personality.

"Fuck you, you're weird." - why is that so fucking funny.

Honestly, the whole sending the boob pic and the "this isn't Amber but I enjoyed the picture you sent me" is really fucked up and would have been incredible, it would make the situation even more creepy.

In the movie they change the person who Tara texts from Amber to Wes, and I don't like that.

It looks like half of Billy's conversations were cut, and they would have been better if left alone.

Amber: "you bought a date?" / Tara: "don't start."

The conversation between Sam & Tara is nice because you can see the strain. The "No. Shit, I’m sorry- I love you. Can we start over?" I love love love because straight up Sam just goes 'I love you.'

Vince's death scene was better but was also the best thing to cut because it would have taken quite a bit of time, and it makes the 'who was this Ghostface and how did they manage it' much more complicated. Realistically, Vince had to be Amber because Richie was attacking Sam at the hospital.

The Sam being attacked scene in the hospital was better in the script, with the "call the cops / I am the cops / call more cops" conversation being fucking hilarious and such a realistic thing to say. We also had Sam say to Richie just before this "I thought you were going to a hotel."

The friend group conversation in the police station would have been so important for fleshing out their characters and their relationships with one another. Presumedly cut because they cut the Amber/Tara/Wes thing.

The Judy & Sam conversation.

Tara throwing the cup as she yells at Sam to get out, it works with my belief that Tara has anger issues.

Sam trying to get Dewey to talk to her: "you’re a suspect in a homicide, so go ahead, call the police!" - this works really well with how Tara talks to person on the phone in the beginning. It also has the sister parallel of Dewey eyeing a photo of Tatum.

Sam: "There are no rules. This isn’t a game, or a joke, or a movie. Real people’s lives are at stake-"

The scene of Sam going to the house and leaving a voicemail for Tara should have stayed, however, I see why they cut it once they cut their mother out.

The whole Wes situation being cut was good for his character, but I don't mind the death scene we got. The Ghostface REVEALING themselves to Judy, jesus that would have been so good. It's totally Amber.

The Mindy & Sam being cut (it's a deleted scene in the movie) was tragic because it really explains why she blows up at the deputy and why she suddenly thinks Tara is in trouble.

They had Sam lifting Tara into the car and Sidney helping, that would have been so nice to see, and also would make more sense for the tracker situation.

I'm sorry but the whole Liv with a bedazzled knife is hilarious and I wish we could have seen that.

Sam allowing Amber & Tara the opportunity to talk but also going with them. The way the script shows Sam giving in to Tara, being soft for her. The 'On Sam. Hates this.'

The Richie trying to convince Sam that Tara is the other killer is slightly better in the script.

"You know what the best part of fucking Billy Loomis’s damaged daughter was? Making her feel loved, just so I could take it away from her. Pretty fucked up, huh?"

What changed that was better:

The choice to change to an inhaler - although they could have done both the necklace and the inhaler, to convey how close Amber & Tara were, even as best friends.

Adding the "I just couldn't be around you anymore, Tara" and the way Tara reacts to it really works for how the conversation falls apart.

Cutting the "I don't care" from Gale.

The script had Sam banging on the bedroom door and the girls not hearing that, it wouldn't have worked. The part where she's standing downstairs when Sidney called so the camera can pan out to her in the doorway was a really good choice.

In the original script, Amber knows about Sam's father because: "About your father? It’s a small town. My uncle went to school with all of them, he knew Billy was banging your mom behind Sid’s back." I think changing it to something more ambiguous about hearing from Sam's drunk mother works better.

The change to Tara attacking Amber with the crutch instead of a poker makes more sense. Richie shooting at her and missing I also wouldn't have bought.

Amber sending Tara through a window would have been incredible, but it would have made it more implausible for her to appear to shoot Amber.

Amber shoves a fork through Sidney's foot? Was she not wearing shoes lmao, this would have made no sense.

Some general notes:

I think most people can agree that they should have kept Amber & Tara as girlfriends, it would have been so awful/satisfying for both sisters to have been betrayed by their partner.

The whole "maybe: name" thing that comes up on Sam's phone in the movie is weird, and it should have just stayed an unknown number.

Interesting choice to change from Mindy pointing out Chad's bruises to Amber.

"But then why kill that random Vince guy? It doesn’t fit the profile-" except it does because Vince worked with Tara. This is called back to later with the "So why then immediately go murder some guy who was stalking Liv?" conversation in the twins' home, which cements it for me that Vince actually died because he knew Tara, him being a Macher was incidental.

"Maybe it’s the nice one, maybe the funny one, maybe the quirky one." -> Maybe it's Wes, maybe it's Mindy, maybe it's Liv.

I wonder why they changed the name from Meeks-Martinez to Meeks-Martin. Gonna be honest... the choice feels kinda 'this is too ethnic let's dial it back' :/. Melinda.

Also, something that doesn't make sense that is in both the script and the movie is them all knowing it was someone in a Ghostface costume, it seems to imply Tara 'finally wakes up' twice: once to tell people about the Ghostface and what happened, and again when she texts Wes that she's finally awake.

The way Sam goes "it wasn't you, it wasn't you" is so interesting because it really reveals where Sam's state of mind was - that she actually thought it could have been her and she just didn't remember, because of all the people accusing her.

Richie telling Sidney the comment about opening her legs: it's an interesting thing to think about. Would Billy have been satisfied with Sidney? Who knows. Interesting to think about. It definitely says something about Richie, given the situation where he was getting some from Sam, but also possibly Amber.

[idkwhatimdoingbutslay]

on vi's enforcer arc; i personally have my reservations about it because it seems kind of sick and twisted for vi to join the people who abused her for 7 years. but personally i don't understand the whole "it sucks because they're cops!" reasoning. hear me out: arcane's world is built around real principles and morals from our own world which makes it feel realistic, tangible, complicated and nuanced much like our own, but arcane isn't taking some big political stance based on contemporary politics, and it's not being preachy either, it's just telling a story. i feel like people should disconnect arcane from modern politics a little bit. i feel like i worded this poorly but idk how else to say it

YOU ARE RIGHT !!!

I made a slightly joke-y post before about how we can’t properly analyze Arcane through the lenses and only the lenses of modern politics.

I also totally get it being completely sick and twisted to make Vi an enforcer but we have to remember that Vi won’t just be joining the enforcers to join the enforcers. There’s a story behind it, there’s emotion behind it and there’s a goal. That goal (I presume) isn’t copaganda. It’s about moving forward, changing the system and coming together as one while still respecting individuality and the past.

How could we expect Piltover and Zaun to get along and grow if they continue to be separated and distant ?

[kim-ruzek]

Aww, I loved Mack calling Adam Dad so casually. I also liked that Kim didn't mind because, if I'm honest, I thought she might have a problem with it.

I was really unsure about the Mack, Kim and Adam family for many reasons (a black traumatised child being cared for by two white police at a time when the divide is so clear and the fact that the writers did nothing to address this. I need to stop because I could rant about this for quite a while) but the actors and the young actress have really made it work.

I knooow I love love love that she said it so casually. Especially as that's something that does happen, that sometimes it's a huge thing where the child wants to ask before saying it and sometimes it just becomes something so simple that it just is, and the child just says it. And I honestly thought that when it happened cpd would make it be the former, but I loveeeee that it was the latter so so much.

I think especially because it just shows how loved, safe and secure she feels it that home, and with Adam. And shows that she does have a connection with Adam that isn't tied through her connection to Kim, which is really important.

I also love it because I wondered if they'd do it, or not. Obviously Adam can function as her dad and be seen through her eyes as dad without that name, and I wondered if that'll be the direction they go in, especially as it would be completely realistic for Mack to have negative associations with that title, but the fact that she doesn't shows an element of how well they've both supported her overcoming the traumas she's faced.

I was never worried about Kim having a problem with it personally. I mean maybe last season, but this season has been really strong and with Kim moving them in to the house and essentially trusting Adam to take on an even bigger load of the parenting as she goes to therapy, I was fairly confident that she wouldn't because (and this is just in universe, ignoring all the out of universe reasons I was confident ofc) she's very much let him take upon that role with little interference or misplaced protectiveness/possessiveness over Mack. But I will admit it was very relieving that she didn't, because you never know.

I was also pretty unsure about the family, which tbf was also because of other non race factors. I put a lot of it behind me fairly quickly though, I think especially once it became abundantly clear that they weren't going to tackle any of the complications. Not because they no longer bothered me, but because it'll drive me crazy otherwise and I just forced myself to make peace with it as much as possible.

And a lot of the reason as to why I could was because of the actors involved, both Marina's and Paddy's tenderness in the scenes actually featuring Makayla, and Ramona's acting itself really helped it work. (And of course the inclusion of Uncle Kev and Jordan this season helped even more).

And I mean, I have some white family members myself so I am always a little soft towards multi racial families (just would maybe not put a traumatized black girl with two white cops. They made it work and I do prefer in many ways them having a black/poc kid as a low semi regular on the show than a white kid but it also should've been a drawing board idea only and despite how well it's turned out and that I probably wouldn't trade this in for anything I will still always stand by that).

Thank you for asking!! 💖

[indistarlight]

"It's when a dog doesn't eat. That's when you know something's really wrong."

This line from Sam in My Bloody Valentine has always come back to me throughout the show and as we see Dean's copping mechanisms. (I'm only halfway through s13 so while I know what comes after, I won't be touching anything beyond that point.) It's meant to be a remark on the worrying nature of Dean not being his usual foodie self and contrast with everybody else getting affected by Famine.

But I think it also says a lot for what Sam looks out for when he believes Dean isn't okay. And it also shows how much he misses because of this thought process.

I think the beginning of s13 contrasted with most other occasions when Dean was struggling in recent seasons (post-purgatory and MoC) is probably the best example. s13 has Dean very very clearly emotionally destroyed; he's lost quite a few people in one-go, he's lost any modicum of faith he had even in the goodwill of Chuck, he's being forced to play nice with a confusing entity who may or may not have brainwashed Cas into death and could destroy the world. And Sam sees that and is attempting to "fix" it. So: Dean not acting like his usual (in this case the baseline is faithful-to-their-line-of-duty-being-a-good-thing) sets off all the alarm bells for Sam.

But. Why? Arguably, Dean is reacting pretty damn realistically. Those eps all together in the timeline are like two weeks tops. He's still functioning, trying to help people, amenable to Jack as time goes on. I'm not saying Dean was right, but he was sympathetic. Most of the confrontations in this period are because Sam is trying to persuade Dean into normal, into Sam's perspective on things, into denial rather than depression. The episode with the psychiatrist is very interesting and lowkey fucked in this regard, because Sam creates a false narrative that Dean has to play a part in, but also get interrogated about very, very real wounds. The tables get turned however, and Dean confronts Sam on not being able to cope, or even accept their losses.

I think this shows how much Sam needs Dean to be alright so that Sam has the freedom to not be alright. If Dean is the dog that doesn't eat, Sam is the dog that'll eat himself sick (ironic given their respective appetites). Dean reacts hard and heavy and pushes himself through it, Sam doesn't react until it blows up internally or externally. Let's not forget it was always Sam as the angry brother, when push came to shove! He's still deeply angry, like in American Nightmare where Sam is decidedly Not Reacting about Mary leaving until he says this to the other complicated mother character:

"God doesn't care what kind of life you live. Trust me. And God didn't kill your daughter. You did." This is guilt. This is anger. These are the thoughts that Sam tries very hard not to think about.

For Sam, it's about control, pop psychology his way through life, doing things the Right way. And eventually that blows up in his face, but damn if he won't keep suppressing. He doesn't know how to deal but he can sure help Dean deal the right way.

What's extra wild about this is that he then is almost obliviously blind to Dean when Dean is acting Normal. Good examples are the early seasons, where Dean's laughing just to keep Sam happy during s3 or when Sam relaxes at the sight of Dean having come home after a wild night (I love love love the meta that Dean set it up to get Sam off his back, good shit yall). I think this is very fun when put next to the near erasure of Dean's trauma concerning hell, purgatory, or even the MoC really. The Cage and Sam's actions during s5's end are brought up a decent amount (not enough tbh, but that's a whole different issue) but because Dean doesn't seem to outwardly dealing with those ramifications, they can all just move on.

This isn't (much) hate against Sam by the way. Dean, for better or worse (mostly worse, for them both), was Sam's truly reliable parental figure. You want the person you rely on to be okay, so that you can continue on relying on them. There's a reason why it's Sam who'll go all the way to human sacrifice to bring Dean back, unlike Dean who'll stop after lying and self-sacrifice. Dean moved on for a year after Sam's death, no matter how much it hurt him. We all have seen s4, no need for me to repeat those points. But regardless of the reasons, there is a very set status quo that Sam relies on, and it can end up being suffocating for Dean.

[mochegato]

Hope on Board

Chapter 25 – Out of Time

Chapter 1     Chapter 24

Dick woke up to a far too early knocking, more like pounding, on his door.  He and Jim Gordon had been up half the night talking about the corruption in the police force and whether Dick should join, before deciding he could make a difference if he did.  He would be able to help Jim slowly weed out the corruption if he was working with him from the inside.  They’d even filled out all his applications for the Police Academy, starting in a month. He would have to be away from Marinette and the twins during the day, but he would be able to come home to them every night.  If she let him.  And she would know where he was.

But all that talk meant he had only gotten a few hours of sleep last night and he was dead tired this morning.  He really just wanted to go back to sleep, but the pounding on the door continued unabated.  He groaned and made his way to the door.  “Answer your damn phone, asshole,” Jason growled at him, pushing past him to look around the room.  “We’re fucking thrilled if you and Pixie got back together, but let us know you both aren’t dead.”

Dick shook his head and scrunched his face in confusion. “That we’re what?  I haven’t gotten to talk with Marinette yet.  I’m hoping that’s how it will go, but I think that’s probably overly optimistic.”

Jason’s expression turned in an instant from annoyed to scared.  It was not a look he was used to seeing on Jason’s face.  Jason never got scared, or if he did, he never showed it.  “Pixie is here, right?” he asked again, enunciating each word clearly.  “She’s with you.”

“No…  I just woke up.  I was talking with Commissioner Gordon all night.  Why would you think she was with me?” Dick shook his head again, trying to make sense of what he was saying.  Had Marinette planned on meeting him here?  Maybe she came back and fell asleep.  He ran to her bedroom to check, but the room was exactly as it had been for the past few weeks.  No sign of Marinette.  He returned to the living room and shook his head.

“Shit!”  Jason looked around desperately.

“Tell me what is going on right now.  Why did you think Marinette was with me?” Dick asked carefully.  His breathing became strained.  This isn’t the way this was supposed to go.  He had saved her.  He had stopped the Court of Owls.  He stopped their plot.  She was safe.

Jason pulled out his phone and called Tim, talking as he did, without bothering to acknowledge Tim when he answered and putting him on speaker as soon as he did.  “She’s missed all her appointments today.  Adrien said she said she was going to talk with you today.  She isn’t in Adrien’s apartment or Wayne Enterprises. Her phone is in her studio, but she isn’t,” Jason answered slowly, eyes darting around as if calculating something. “We figured she must be here.”

“We didn’t set the time yet.  I haven’t heard from her.  When was the last time someone saw her?” Dick asked frantically, running to his bedroom to start getting dressed.

“I’m going to start going through security footage around Adrien’s apartment and her studio,” Tim reported.

Jason’s phone started flashing with another call. “Patching Adrien into the call too,” he informed them and pushed a few buttons to enable it.  “Adrien, tell me you have something.”

Adrien’s voice hesitated for a moment.  Dick and Jason shared an apprehensive look.  “I have something, but it’s bad…  Someone told me you’d know how to get in contact with Batman?”

Jason froze and looked up at Dick with a panicked expression.  There was no way that was good.  “I think we might have a way to contact Batman, why?”

“I know where she is, but we’re going to need Batman and his team to get her back.”  There was barely a quiver to Adrien’s voice as he spoke, but years of training made it come across as clear as glass to the others on the call.

“Where is she?” Dick yelled into the phone.

“Dick?  They don’t have you?  That’s good… I guess.  It means they only wanted her… Actually, no, wait, maybe that’s worse,” Adrien prattled.

“Who is they?” Dick demanded.

“Some people with owl masks.”  There was a hedge in his voice as though he didn’t think they would believe him.

Dick stopped breathing.  The Court had taken Marinette.  No, no, no, no.  He had stopped them.  He had made sure Marinette was safe.  He had protected her from them.  That’s what the past few months of hell had all been about.

“You can get ahold of Batman, right?” Adrien asked again, in a more strained voice.  “I know someone who’d like to talk to him.”

Jason furrowed his brow and looked to Dick to see if he had any ideas.  “Who?”

“Chat Noir.”

Jason looked at Dick communicating their intentions and agreement through minute body quirks and purposeful looks.  “We can get ahold of someone.  We will make sure someone is on the top of the Wayne Enterprises building in half an hour.  Is that enough time for him?”

“He’ll be there,” Adrien confirmed confidently.

Jason cut Adrien’s connection and glared at the floor in thought.  “Why would they want Marinette?”

“The plot you stopped was all about the power grid, wasn’t it?” Tim interjected.  “Trying to run up prices for some of their members who owned supply and power companies?”

“Yeah…” Dick answered uncertainly.

“Then there was no reason for them to be at the Stone concert, right?  Those execs were from Netflix, no way associated with this,” Tim elaborated.

Dick drew in a deep breath and cursed.  “They were there watching Marinette.  They were planning this all along.  They wanted Marinette from the beginning.  Why?”

“Everyone go get suited up.  Get there as soon as possible.  I’ll text the others,” Jason stated, moving quickly toward the door so he could get to his apartment.

<><><><><> 

Batman, Red Robin, Signal, and Red Hood made it to the rooftop with time to spare, since they were already close to their costumes. Nightwing, Black Bat, Spoiler, and Robin had further to go to get to their costumes and had to trickle into the meeting, but they kept track of the conversation through the coms until they could be there in person.

“Chat Noir.” Batman stepped forward and nodded.

“Batman.  Bats and Birds.” Chat Noir nodded to Batman and the rest of the bats.  “I was thinking there would be more.”

“They’re on their way but listening in,” Batman assured him briskly.  “Let’s start with how do you know where she is?”

Chat looked over to the edge of the building at the sound of two sets of boots landing, he continued to speak as he silently acknowledged Nightwing and Robin.  “I’ve been keeping a close eye on Marinette since the pharmacy incident.  You might say I’ve had a catbug on her… with her permission of course.  She sent the scout to find me when she thought they were in her final location.  They didn’t seem interested in immediately harming her or the scout would have stayed.  We have time, I just don’t know how much.”

“Do you know how she was taken?” Batman asked.

Chat nodded, annoyance settling in his expression as he did. “A couple men dressed as cops approached her at her studio and said something happened to Dick, her boyfriend… kind of… it’s complicated.  She went with them.  By the time she figured out they were not headed to the hospital, there was a knife digging into her bump.”

“Any ideas on why they took Pi… her?” Red Hood broke in.

“They said something about a Grayson, so I have to imagine it’s to get at Dick Grayson, the babies’ father, for some reason or to get her twins perhaps for ransom.  I don’t suppose you have any ideas why they would want to get back at Dick, would you?  Is he a member?  Did he double cross them?” Chat mused.

“What?” Nightwing exclaimed.  “No!”

“Well…” Spoiler hedged as she and Black Bat landed.

“Dick Grayson didn’t do anything to them,” Nightwing gritted out.

Chat Noir studied Nightwing carefully then suddenly whipped his head over to Red Hood, running his eyes over him in a calculated manner and moving quickly to do the same to Red Robin.  “Fuck.  That’s why he said you guys would know how to get in contact with Batman.  That’s why you’ve been disappearing.” He stuck an accusatory finger in Nightwing’s direction.  “Why the fuck didn’t you just tell her that, you fucking dumbass!”

“See!  Even the catman agrees.” Red Hood exclaimed.

“She wasn’t supposed to get stressed and I didn’t want her knowing I was putting my life in danger every night, constantly,” Nightwing attempted to defend himself, but even to himself, his voice sounded unsure.

“She put up with me for years.  She is perhaps the world’s foremost expert in dealing with idiots who constantly put their lives in danger,” Chat exclaimed exasperated.  He had to have known that.  Marinette had talked to him about how frustrated she had gotten with Chat.  Hell, he was there for some of those conversations with Dick, while she glared at Chat the whole time.

“You think memories of that didn’t add stress?” Nightwing exploded, stalking slowly toward Chat as he spoke.  “She still has nightmares about it.  And pregnancy hormones make nightmares even more realistic. You weren’t there almost every night when she woke up crying because she saw you sacrificing yourself in new ways or when she dreamt it was me instead of you.  And the last one she had before our fight…  She sobbed almost nonstop for almost an hour.  I was terrified for her.”

“And you weren’t there when she was sobbing because you said you loved her then ran away like she didn’t matter,” Adrien returned just as angrily, standing his ground against Nightwing.  “Or when she broke down because she couldn’t trust you anymore. Because you spent months lying to her. Not because you had a secret. Secrets she understands, intimately. Because she trusted you and you lied and without an explanation, she had to assume you lied about everything.”

“I was protecting her from the Court of Owls,” Dick yelled.

“So that’s what the cult is called?  Bang up job, there.”  Chat growled back.  He moved away to collect his thoughts and deescalate the situation.  Fighting now wouldn’t help Marinette.  They needed to work together to rescue her.  Finally, he sighed and rubbed his hand across his forehead like he was trying to ward off a migraine.  “She owes me a hundred euros for this.  So, what’s these guys’ deal?  Do they know who you are or are they asking for ransom?”

“We don’t think they know who he is, but ransom isn’t really their deal either,” Red Robin answered.

“Why would they want her otherwise?” Signal asked.

Chat opened his mouth a few times before cocking his head to the side and furrowing his brow and grimacing as if trying to figure out how to say what he was thinking.  “Could they know about… her association with the Paris heroes?”

“What exactly is her association with them?” Batman asked

Chat opened his mouth and closed it quickly.  “That sounds like a question for Marinette.”

“Well she isn’t fucking here is she?” Red Hood pointed out curtly.

“Close.  Very close,” he answered carefully.

“Clearly,” Spoiler huffed motioning to Chat.

“Closer than that.” He grimaced.  He was definitely skirting the line of flat out telling her secrets, but if it saved her babies, he was sure she would be okay with it. He just wasn’t sure yet if it actually related at all.  “But I don’t know how they could have found out.  She hasn’t been around any costumed heroes in years.”

“And they said this was about Grayson,” Robin pointed out.  “It is far more likely they know Grayson’s identity and this is punishment for stopping them.”

“If they’ve been tracking her since the concert, maybe earlier, it isn’t just about ruining their plans,” Red Robin clarified.

“They were doing what?” Chat’s head whipped around to look at him.

“I saw a talon at the Stone concert.  That’s why I disappeared.  I was investigating,” Nighwing explained distractedly.  “We can figure out the reason later.  Let’s focus on freeing her, making sure she’s okay.  You said you know where she is.  She’s probably terrified, and she doesn’t need more nightmares.”

“Yeah, she’s being held under here,” he pushed a few buttons on his baton and sent the location to the Bats.

“How did you do that?” Signal asked with amazement in his voice.

“Magic,” Chat answered, flaring out his fingers.  

“So what’s the plan?” Stephanie asked.

“Oracle do you have the building layout?” Batman asked into the coms.

“I’m having trouble getting in.  It looks like they have several layers of security and self-contained power.  It might take me a bit,” Oracle responded.

“We wait to see if we can get insight into the building then create the plan.  Our tech person is having difficulty getting in,” Batman stated so Chat could hear.

Chat nodded and teetered back and forth from his toes to his heels, anxiety ramping up in the silence.  “So, any tips or tricks I should know before fighting these guys, if that’s what’s happening?”

“The guys with glowing yellow eyes are highly trained. The rest will try to kill you, but they’re like drunken toddlers, it’s the yellow eyed bastards you have to watch out for,” Red Hood answered as he leaned against the half-wall running along the edge of the building.

“They’re not drunken toddlers.  They’re dangerous too,” Batman emphasized affronted.  He’d fought those guys in a group.  They had almost overpowered him.

“Okay fine,” Red Hood waved him off, “but not like the talons.”

“Any weaknesses for those yellow eyed talon guys?” Chat asked apprehensively.

“Not really.  They’re highly trained, highly skilled, superhuman speed, superhuman healing,’ Nightwing answered.

“Fuck,” Chat answered with a whistle.

“Appropriate response,” Red Robin nodded.

“They need a substance to keep healing,” Batman corrected.

“So if we injure enough of them they won’t have enough substance for everyone?” Chat offered.

“Not the route I want to go, but yeah,” Signal agreed.

“And cold.  They’re susceptible to cold,” Batman added.

“Cold?” Chat clarified, suddenly listening very intently.

“Yeah, it interferes with their healing,” Red Hood explained.  “Makes it so their injuries stick.”

“So if we could make it freezing cold down there…” Chat trailed off.

“Doesn’t have to be the whole place, just where the talons are,” Red Robin mused out loud.  “There likely won’t be many, if any.  They can’t be expecting us yet.  They were too careful.  If it wasn’t for Chat’s scout, we’d have no idea.  But yes, if you can make them cold, we’d have a better chance.”

Chat stopped and looked contemplative for a few moments. “Let me make a quick call.”  He turned around and walked a few steps away. After a few minutes he returned. “Snowflake will be here in 35 minutes.”

“The ice chick from New York?” Red Hood asked.

Chat nodded in response.  Damian eyed him suspiciously.  “That’s awfully quick.”

“She’s going to catch a ride with Uncanny Valley and Uncanny will be able to hack into their security as soon as she gets here.  She just has to be close.  We can get the plans from her and break into their security system.”

“How can she do that?  No offense to your friend, but if Oracle can’t do it, it’s unlikely anybody else would be able to so quickly,” Red Robin asked.

“Thank you,” Oracle cut in.

“Uhhh… magic?”  Chat offered with less enthusiasm than before.

“Let’s move to a closer position while we wait.  We’ll come up with a plan once we have more information,” Batman said already taking out his grappling hook.  “We have family to save.”

Chapter 26

Tags:

@dickinette-february @demonicbusiness @ichigorose @iloontjeboontje @ladybug-182 @toodaloo-kangaroo @dast218 @golden-promises @trippingovermyfeet @emimar7 @laurcad123 @lady-bee-fechin @thewitchwhowaited @redscarlet95 @jayjayspixiepop

[bloodbenderz]

Can I ask what your season 1 Lok reboot looks like?

this is about 3k words i checked lmfao dont say i didnt warn u

a key part of the whole thing is that korra gets way more perspectives and more experiences representative of like, normal people in republic city bc i think something that really defined what a good avatar aang was was how many people he met and got to know and how he didnt exclusively or even mostly associate w cops and bureaucrats and leaders. so mako and bolin. well first of all their backstories are a little more fleshed out and we get a less black and white view of the “triads” (lol) and mako and bolin’s experiences w them. cuz the show very much does the whole thing of like Criminals Bad but dont worry even tho mako and bolin did commit crimes theyre not Criminals!! so just a little more nuance on the alleged gang problem and the poverty in the city

korra does start out very naive w very black and white ideas (ex. “you guys are CRIMINALS?”) i think a really good way of developing her away from her sheltered naive worldview is putting her in whats clearly an incredibly complicated city w an absolute cesspool of political conflicts, ethnic tensions, the lasting effects of colonization, etc and having her try and understand the needs of “the people” in a more complicated way than “i have to save the good guys from the bad guys” ykwim? and i think the absolute WORST way to do that is what they did. bc we get mako and bolin who could contribute genuinely compelling thematic elements to the story: one parent who was indigenous and one who was from a colonizer background in the decades directly following the end of the war, kids who grew up in poverty apparently without any familial support, and who now are trying to be “respectable” members of society (especially mako). and then most of that is pretty much tossed aside bc asami swoops in w her capitalist dad and her piles of money and the class issue is just never talked about again.

so the way i’d fix all that is like. introducing more, like, normal people. some nonbenders, more workers, more immigrants, etc, to show what daily life is actually like for people. because. we dont know! we dont have any context about whether the nonbender oppression thing is actually an issue bc we dont KNOW any nonbenders with normal lives! and spoiler: the nonbender oppression thing is not an issue. bc it doesnt make historical sense. lok is set 7 decades after the end of the war. that is not by ANY stretch of the imagination long enough to heal from the scars of imperialism, ESPECIALLY not when lok is also set in a settler colonial state. like that fact should have featured PROMINENTLY in the political and social setting! realistically, nonbenders arent an oppressed class, earth and water nation people are, regardless of bending status! as in all settler colonial states, the colonizers and their descendants (in this case fire nation people) retain most of the financial and political capital, leaving the colonized and racialized immigrants (in this case earth kingdom and water tribe people respectively) generally impoverished and politically suppressed. like aside from the fact that theres no way toph would have become a cop, it’s so ridiculous to think that an established privileged class of fire nation colonizers would EVER accept being policed by earthbenders!

imagine how much more nuanced and interesting it would be to set republic city as a remnant of a colonial past still fraught w the violence and tension that colonialism and the associated ideology imposed?? instead of some vague ideas of criminal who wear 1920s outfits and harass shopkeepers think about why extralegal and violent groups like that might form! earth kingdom people trying to push for the reclamation of their land? ethnic groups protecting themselves against corrupt cops? ESPECIALLY w the history that the fire nation has of SPECIFICALLY jailing and killing earthbenders and waterbenders BECAUSE of the potential they have to resist against fire nation imperialism like it just makes no sense at all that earthbenders would be privileged on land that, 70 years ago, they would have been imprisoned on! like these various paramilitary groups falling along these different ideological or ethnic lines, fire nation or earth kingdom or water tribe, pro colonization or anti colonization, pro cop or anti cop, pro immigrant or anti immigrant, and then you juxtapose that w depictions of a govt thats failing to keep this all under control w tenzin trying desperately to keep it together despite the fact that it’s becoming increasingly obvious that the state has no interest in taking the conflicts seriously and would rather just point vague fingers at criminals and gangs? and THEN you bring in korra, who has no idea about any of this and thinks that all its gonna take is kicking some ass every couple days, meeting normal people who offer all kinds of different opinions abt the efficacy of the state and the different violent or nonviolent groups and ideologies clashing in the city and the way all this shit is affecting people’s lives and livelihoods and relationships w other citizens??

theres so much good shit there so many incredible things u could do w that like Where do we go after colonial atrocities? is it possible for a settler colonial state to take revolutionary or indigenous ideas seriously? is liberal reform enough in a state like this? and then all the growth that korra could do going from a simple black and white life about mastering the elements to this messy complicated sociopolitical knot of a city? and all the different kinds of characters u could introduce in this city? like why would u EVER think that the most interesting characters that this story has to offer is a police chief a congressman and a billionaire????

but anyways. that’s what the Setting of my idealized version of lok is. as for the actual plot, it is as follows

it starts out similarly as the show. republic city is MUCH more fraught w political tension and violence and korra knows this but assumes that it’s just a matter of throwing a few gang leaders and corrupt officials in jail. tenzin manages to come see them in the south pole and intends give korra real lessons while he’s there but they receive news of a terrorist attack in republic city only a few days after he gets there so his family has to pack up and leave again.

korra stows away to republic city (katara catches her leaving and gives her blessing im a SUCKER for that moment). she does have a hard time adjusting but she doesn’t do what she did in the show lol the first person she meets in the city is this older woman who works on the docks, directs her to a place where she can eat and gives her a roof to sleep under for the first night. so korra’s first exposure to republic city is just about forming connections w ordinary people like ship workers and a family owned restaurant and people practicing their bending in the park. and by the time she reaches air temple island a day or so later her head is spinning w all this new information and the way that nothing is really what she expected it to be. tenzin gives her his own perspective on everything and pema gives her her own perspective on everything and even those two seem wildly different from all the people she’s already met. and so korra starts to get a kind of outline of the conflicts plaguing the city as extremely complex and a lot more influenced by older ideas of fire nation imperialism and earth kingdom land reclamation than she had any idea about.

mako and bolin are still pro benders but not like. super famous like they are in the show. korra’s picked up a couple friends by now and one of them takes her to a gym where a lot of amateur pro bending (is that an oxymoron? lol) matches happen and thats how she meets mako and bolin and joins their pro bending team. Unfortunately for korra, this gym is run by lin beifong, and also has the distinction of being one of the most notoriously anti settler state organizations in the country. lin beifong is NOT a cop but she runs this gym (and the pro bending league) as a way to offer support to local earth kingdom/water tribe youth, teach self defense skills, a center of community organizing, and sometimes to act as a front to hide revolutionary/combat organizing against the pro fire nation paramilitaries/police force. tenzin is DISTRAUGHT that korra does this and this is where the friction btwn them comes from bc (from tenzin’s perspective) she does things like this without thinking or even fully understanding the context behind them and tenzin will have to deal w the political fallout of the avatar openly aligning herself w a very divisive figure in the community and (from korra’s perspective) tenzin is too unwilling to take sides in a conflict that’s claiming lives and when the state is clearly not taking sufficient steps to protect people well then why the hell shouldnt she align herself w lin beifong, who IS taking steps to protect and support people?

as korra more fully integrates herself into the city and learns more abt how different people think abt everything going on this is where the real exposition abt the equalists begins. they’re a paramilitary group w an ideology thats gaining increasing support among middle/upper class fire nation people, esp nonbenders. on the face theyre abt putting checks on “bender oppression” but really it’s an excuse to persecute and surveil earthbenders waterbenders and airbenders, bc fire nation people have all this leftover fear about benders who arent fire nation Rising Up Against them and these people who r using their Savage Excuse for Bending to terrorize good innocent (fire nation) people. theres all too frequent terrorist attacks that the equalists claim credit for mostly against monuments to earth/water/air nation people and earth/water nation community centers (one like it was the event that forced tenzin back to republic city) but also like the govt doesnt take a lot of these seriously or if they do only a couple people are charged without doing damage to the entire organization

this is also around the time that they meet asami and she becomes part of their friend group. asami likes pro bending but her dad HATES it so she sneaks out to watch matches at lin beifong’s gym (korra says ironically like don’t u know how ~divisive~ that is and asami answers that the only reason its Not divisive is that gyms like beifongs are the only place where nobody recognizes her). and asami alongside korra is also kind of developing a more nuanced perspective on the city that she lives in cuz obviously the only worldview she’s ever been exposed to is her father’s right? and she keeps pushing it off making excuses not to bring mako and bolin and korra around to her house or even not to be seen w them in certain neighborhoods until they call her on it and she’s like Well honestly my dad might do something awful to u! and i dont wanna risk it!

and as time goes on we see more abt asami’s home life like her father’s hyper conservative politics and asami keeps these secrets abt her hobbies and her friends from him but she’s still clearly under his influence and mako bolin and korra r getting increasingly worried abt it cuz like...asami seems to tend to make excuses for him so that she wont have to be drawn into conflict and originally they think its just her being privileged and thats def part of it but the more they find out abt it the more they realize what a tight fucking grip he has on her and the way that like. asami sneaking out once or twice a week is the Only thing she does for herself. and it really starts freaking them out how influential this billionaire is and all the information theyre getting from asami abt what a piece of shit he clearly is. and so that whole plot thing comes about and shows us how deeply embedded these “equalist” ideas are in conservative republic city politics and how much influence theyre actually having in policy making and law enforcement.

asami suffers in the aftermath of this like being forced to truly confront the harm her father is doing both to the city and to herself. and she ends up leaving home when this discovery really breaks. but bc of the deep corruption in govt and police sato isn’t really....dealt with? like this big story breaks and everyones like Oh, My God! Hiroshi Sato Is Funding An Illegal Paramilitary Group! and theres all kinds of inane political discourse about it and he’s arrested but he bails himself out immediately and his finances are examined but he maintains control over them and after a few weeks the gang (bc they Have become close among all this w much less interpersonal drama lol) has to admit that this news story hasnt done what they thought it was going to it hasn’t dealt the equalists a real hit its just given them a very high profile ally

and this is when things really start to ramp up in terms of action like up until now korra’s daily activities are mostly like hanging around in the city w her friends  (which in part entails doing little avatar stuff that people dont feel comfortable going to police with, like Can you help me my ex husband wont pay child support or Please help i got robbed and i really needed that money for rent next month or Help my son keeps skipping school can you talk to him cuz im worried abt him being safe and doing well in school) and pro bending and airbending lessons (which i know ive neglected this part of the story in terms of her whole spiritual/physical conflict but it’s more of a subtle thing like it’s one of tenzin and korra’s more frequent arguments like tenzin says she needs to focus on spirituality and korra asks why she even needs to bc republic city is a sociopolitical problem not a spiritual one) but now the equalist threat seems to really be looming on every level of society like the storyline of equalists preventing pro bending matches happens here and everyones just at a total loss of what to do next. plus increasing and scary rhetoric about tenzin and his family that destroying the last airbenders is necessary to preserving the integrity of the united republic

and so theres the equalist takeover of the city. the people who are mostly resisting this are lin and ragtag group of people who have been resisting colonial rule for a long time (including suyin, who is part of a communist anti colonial community outside the city, because i said so and i think it would be fun), people who have been visiting her gym for years, members of her amateur pro bending league, plus asami and korra and tenzin. korra and tenzin have a sweet moment (bc they do genuinely care abt each other a lot even if their relationship has been marked w a lot of tension and arguing) where tenzin says like you know i think that ive lost focus on the kind of spirituality that might actually help you. korra says what do you mean? and tenzin kind of gestures to where theyre sitting with people buzzing around organizing to take care of innocents and civilians and to fight the equalists and he says this is a kind of spiritual too, isnt it?

and something something plot plot blah blah i havent decided on the details of the plot climax yet but that’s the climax of korra’s character development and what helps her connect w her spiritual side in order to protect the city: the realization that community is its own kind of spirituality. and it kind of represents the real development that i want her to have going from somebody who thinks that the world is divided into criminals and victims and she has to save the victims Into the kind of avatar who understands the people that she’s bound to serve. she becomes an avatar of the people!

and then happy ending lol korra and asami get together lin and tenzin reconcile after years of being at odds the show ends on a hopeful note that the inhabitants of republic city and the united republic as a whole Can move on from the scars of colonialism by reckoning w the remnants of fire nation colonial ideology and reparations to the earth kingdom people whose land this is and destruction of colonial systems that have maintained and enforced colonial violence all these years

[meggannn]

shepard/garrus?

oh boy, sorry for the late response! I always end up posting these things and then going to read/take a nap/play a game or something. anyway writing this up took two hours, i hope it is even slightly interesting to read. cut because this is looooooong

What made you ship it?

I think I was interested in this ship before I even played ME. I was just like “I know Shepard is a character and an alien named Garrus is a character, and people draw porn of them together.” because I think it’s reasonable to say it’s one of, if not the most, popular ship in the fandom, or at least in ME’s tumblr fandom? and the way people talked about it, I knew their tropes were #banter, #battle couple, #partnerships, and... and as we’ve learned from royai, I am a bit weak to those tropes (assuming I like both of the characters). the way people talked about them also from a “best friends” angle—which is sort of forced in-game in a way that seems strange to me now—was also a plus in its favor at the time. (if they get together, I do see their friendship/companionship, in whatever form, in some ways integral to their romance—unless you’re playing full far-right renegade who’s like a xenophobe and hate-fucking Garrus, I guess?—but Bioware also kind of shoehorned Garrus into that best-friend role and that’s a topic for another day.)

What are your favorite things about the ship?

(my friend will hit me if I say “partnerships” again) I’m gonna talk about the way I play my Shepard now, because so much is dependent on the unique Shepard. for Lydia’s journey over the series, I see a large part of her journey as basically a study of her (often self-inflicted) loneliness. and she never entirely breaks her habits of self-isolation, but the events of the series force her to be vulnerable in a way she would prefer not to be in front of a crew, or, y’know, ever. Garrus becomes an integral part of that story to help her break her out of these bad habits (all of the crew does, particularly also Ashley for my Shep), but to my eyes, the story of “Shepard and Garrus’s relationship” is also one of mutual respect, burden-sharing, and sanity and morality checks.

I don’t think of their “mentor” relationship in ME1 very often mostly because I don’t think it was done particularly well, but for all its faults, I do like how naturally the jump from “subordinate” in ME1 to “ally” in ME2 felt; once you meet Garrus on Omega you feel more on the same footing as two friends greeting each other because you’ve both recently been through trauma and the sight of a friendly face in a station full of hostiles is so unexpectedly welcome that it lets them both hope things will be okay for a minute. starting from that moment, Garrus becomes one of the few people who can see “under” her mask, I guess: partly because he’s one of the few combatants from the SR-1 who knows Shepard well and sees who she is both on the field and onboard the SR-2, with the ability to compare both to the times of “before you died”; partly because he has trauma response training and recognizes it in others even if he doesn’t in himself; partly because his loyal personality makes him sensitive to wonder how she’s dealing with being resurrected; and also partly because they’ve both gone through similar things. namely, getting your squad killed and blaming yourself for it, and it possibly being your fault (BioWare is inconsistent on what Shepard’s role was on Akuze, but in ME1 she has the chance to reply that she was responsible for getting them out safely, and failed).

necessity forces Shepard to adapt to things like being effectively forced to work for terrorists; being isolated from her support system; being resurrected and feeling like a stranger in her own body; later, getting decommissioned for making an incredibly difficult call to save the galaxy; watching your homeworld burn; being forced into a political role negotiating high stakes you don’t know how to play; being told you’re the spearhead of a galactic war; doing all of this without a full crew complement; the list goes on. those are all, on their own, incredibly isolating, traumatic experiences, and my Shepard’s not emotionally sane at the best of times. (emotionally stable, perhaps, only in the most literal of terms, at least on the surface. she’s like a rock when shit hits the fan. emotionally sane, no, for that reason and more.)

the tables have turned, and Garrus ends up becoming a large part of helping her regain agency in most if not all of those things: in ME2 he was a former crew member she trusted, and he was eager to work for her and be distracted from his failures on Omega. over in the battery, he is himself recovering from a major injury (like Shepard) and going through the aftermath of a bloodbath he feels responsible for (like Shepard), working on a crew that holds him at arm’s length, that he also... arguably... didn’t have much choice in joining (like Shepard—I’m assuming he wasn’t held hostage and joined voluntarily after waking up, but lbr this is unconfirmed). their reasons are different and varied, but they don’t realize until much later that they have found each other at the most opportune time, providing a sense of stability for each other, and also, frankly, sanity and morality checks.

in ME3, he steps into this role more fully because he’s become more disciplined, is doing work firmly in his wheelhouse, and paired up against Shepard struggling with their positions somewhat reversed from ME1: him more confident and her now completely out of her element, floundering with her place on a galactic scale. without Garrus—and Chakwas, and Joker, and Tali, and later the loyalty of the entire SR-2—the story of ME would be a tragedy, and it would end shortly in ME2; it’d be the story of how my Shepard slowly went insane being forced to fight boogeymen under a terrorist banner. Garrus isn’t, like, the keeper of her sanity, but their ability to check each other, and see themselves in the eyes of each other, provides stability and occasionally a bit of a wake-up call to both of them. when they’re both vulnerable, they both feel most seen, and most understood, by an alien that listens.

one angle of this ship that highly interests me at the moment, along with the above, is that while it’s not illegal for them to be together, it’s still... a really bad fucking idea lmao. (I could make the argument that it’s a bad idea for Shepard to be in any relationship with their crew but I think there are a few ships—Garrus, Tali, any Alliance crew at all—that realistically would be huge political clusterfucks.) so overcoming personal insecurity and fear of the unknown to acknowledge interest in each other, and the desire to become an item, getting roadblocked by a reality wake-up call with the fact that 1) she’s his boss, 2) Garrus comes from a society where station matters, like, sort of a lot and it even determines your job and how much legal power you have, 3) the potential political blowback (which would be ENORMOUS because lbr the hierarchy may not care about what turians do in off-hours but they WOULD care about the superior/subordinate thing, the human thing, the fact that they’re doing this while a war is going on. basically one of their best agents is on the Normandy to negotiate their interests and they’re basically at the whims of their relationship the whole time)... it’s a lot! all of that sort of makes it tragic, but I’m curious to see how they’d overcome it.

anyway, all of that is where I’m coming from when I think or write about this ship, but there’s a lot more I’m not mentioning here. there are a lot of juxtapositions that in my head that I’ve either added or extrapolated from canon that also interest me about this pairing. Garrus is a former cop, as is his father; Lydia is a poor kid who used to be in a gang out of necessity. Garrus is a turian with often traditionalist thinking; Shepard is a human who has much less sociopolitical power than him, even if she is his superior on the Normandy. both of them are roughly as old as the First Contact War, when their people were at each other’s throats not thirty years ago. Garrus idolizes Spectrehood while Lydia hates it, feeling it was forced on her. they can’t eat the same food. and yet despite all of that, and the fact that they need translators to communicate, they manage to understand each other when a lot of the world around them doesn’t.

god this is not even the full list of it. anyway I could go on but I’ll stop there lol.

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

oh jesus, so much. I’m a grouchy and picky shipper, be warned.

pining can always make my ships more interesting, and imo it’s a consistent part of any ship of Shepard’s, considering it’s wildly inappropriate and unprofessional for her to be fucking any subordinate, so I think more consideration could be given to shakarian in the “we shouldn’t be having a thing and oh also you’re an alien and I’m kind of scared of both your government and your body” angle! I hope to explore that a bit with a fic I’m writing (if I ever finish it, god).

I hate the flavor of fandom!shakarian where Shepard romanced Kaidan in ME1 then felt “betrayed” when he’s confused and hurt on Horizon, so she gets with Garrus as like... revenge? idk. and then Garrus usually develops this bias against Kaidan as a sort of author mouthpiece (which is inconsistent with his characterization cause Garrus is nothing but pleased to have Kaidan back on the SR-2 in ME3!) and takes up the anti-Kaidan crusade cause K ~questioned the commander~ (since when does Garrus fall over himself defending a superior from criticism?) like, idk. I think Garrus can be sensitive to the fact that that reuniting must’ve been painful for Shepard, but also be aware that it was also really painful for Kaidan because all of Kaidan’s complicated feelings about Shepard’s resurrection were, realistically, things Garrus should’ve felt too! this trope is very popular but just feels like manufactured drama for drama’s sake, idk, I’m also not big on love triangles so. I would much rather people just rescue Ashley on Virmire and avoid the whole thing rather than have previously-romanced Kaidan around in ME3 for the sole purpose of forcing him to watch Shepard/Garrus being happy together tbh.

I think full goody-goody paragon Shepard is too preachy to make a good partner for Garrus and full shoot-anyone-in-my-way renegade Shepard encourages and emboldens his worst tendencies (and Castis Vakarian is right to disapprove of them). most people end up playing some combination of both, or if they do settle in one camp or the other, usually there is some sense of realism where Shepard doesn’t play nice/naive or play mean all the time, so it’s rare I see either of those kinds of extreme Shepards depicted, but in general if there is a Shepard that is so far in one direction it seems illogical to me that they ever stay together.

I think wanting a mShep romance for Garrus is a pretty welcome idea in fandom, but adding onto that, I think Garrus should’ve been romanceable in ME3 for players who changed their minds on other romances or want to play slow-burn romances! we had it for Kaidan—and should’ve had it for Ash—so (pounds fist on desk) Garrus too imo!

I hate the canon get-together because Shepard walking into the battery and asking “do you want to fuck” feels very tailored to the players who want to romance Garrus, not to who Commander Shepard is, imo. it lacked all of the subtlety and depth of some other romances—until the scene of Garrus coming to her cabin with a wine bottle, at least, cause I do like that scene, but anyway, I dislike the actual get-together.

just in general, I’m a stick in the mud, so my favorite iteration of this ship is where Shepard is resolutely professional, and the challenge of it becomes him getting her to open up, not the other way around. like, I think on some level every iteration of Shepard is a bit of a lunatic/eccentric, because you have to be to do the things they do, but I like to see their flirting with less of her calling him “big guy” (not sure where that came from, is that in canon? I must’ve missed it, but personally I don’t like it) and more of Garrus making wisecracks in the canteen while he’s talking to Joker, but he’s looking at her out of the corner of his eyes and he really said his joke with the aim of making her laugh, and as she’s reading her datapad she hears him, and even when she wants to chuckle she stops himself and just smirks cause she doesn’t want to give him the satisfaction of a laugh, but he sees her lips twitch and feels his heart flutter. that. I want more of that.

oh lastly, I hate “Shepard takes Vakarian clan markings” in any iteration. there is no canon relation to turians being poc—in fact I’d argue they have sociopolitical privilege real-world bipoc do not—but the concept of social face markings, face tattoos, etc., is rooted in non-white cultures and with the fact that 1) turians had a literal civil war over the territories those markings represent, 2) we don’t even know if marriage is how markings are shared or if non-turians are ever invited to wear them in the first place, 3) most of the art of this trend, lbr, is of mostly white Shepards in wedding dresses and blue face paint... all that combined just makes me frown and scroll faster every time I see it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bipoc Shepard with Vakarian face markings in fic/art, and that to me is very telling (not because they should have them, but because bipoc fans who make bipoc Shepards usually recognize when a racially-coded trope is uhhhhh not so great to appropriate for someone not of that group).

[pretend-writer]

Until The End Of Time (Diego Hargreeves x reader)

Summary: After being separated from Five’s time traveling from 2019, Y/N reunites with Diego for the first time in two years. Noticing that Diego brought a friend with him, she started to become jealous. 

Pairing: Diego Hargreeves x reader

Title Reference: Until The End of Time x Justin Timberlake 

Word Count: 1.8k words

Warning: swearing

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Diego’s pov;

Maybe it was because I haven't seen Y/N in a long time, she seemed different. Sure her hair got longer, her smile was pretty as it had always been and her 60s styled outfit looked really good on her. But it was more than the change of her appearance.

It was as if she didn't notice me at all.

Ever since the family split up after Five time traveled from the apocalypse in 2019, I did everything I could to find Y/N. All the stores and the alleyways I've been at, she was never there. Eventually, some lunatic called the cops on me for disturbance and they decided to stick me here in the institution.

I couldn't lie about the fact that my emotions got to me to make stupid decisions. I've gotten angry at a man I tried to ask questions regarding Y/N. His rude response got the best of me and I punched him, called him fouls names.

If he hadn't said and I quote "No, I don't care about your bitch", he wouldn't have gone home with a broken nose and a black eye. It wouldn't have landed me at this institution either.

Couple months later, Five found me at the institution, told me he hasn't found anyone else in the family yet. The first thought I had in mind was Y/N and the possibility of her still being alone in the streets of Dallas.

Being a great brother that Five was, he left me in there. After I knew that the rest of the family had maybe landed here in Dallas as well, I had to try more to find Y/N. I needed to see her again.

With the help of my new friend Lila, we barely escaped from the institution. We've almost got busted by the security guards and the police officers that were looking for us but we managed to get their eyes off of us for a bit.

Who would've thought after busting my ass to find Y/N, she'd welcome me back with cold shoulder.

I'd thought the reunion with Y/N would be romantic in a sense, or at least heartwarming. She avoided eye contact with me, barely touching me as we hugged each other. I couldn't question her though, maybe later when we were alone.

Y/N’s pov;

Maybe I was overthinking, realistically I had no right to be angry or upset but I was. Diego returned to our family with a girl by his side. Not only was she a girl, she was unique and pretty badass. Not to mention they were oddly close to each other. This Lila girl and Diego looked like a good pair.

Yeah, I was jealous.

How can I not be? I've been away from my family for nearly two years after landing in 1961. Of course Diego found someone new, an upgrade if you will. After upgrading himself with nice hair and a beard.

It was still upsetting that after all the years of serving as a detective, going through hoops looking for him and Diego appears out of nowhere. I guess maybe I was the dumbass that waited years for him.

'Let's meet back together tonight to talk about dad and his whereabouts.' Five said as he stood up. 'If any of you are late I swea-'

'Yeah, yeah. You won't do shit to us.' Klaus smiled, tapping on his shoulder.

Everyone laughed in sync, Five rolling his eyes knowing damn well that we will at least 10 minutes late. 'The things I do for you guys.'

Allison giggled, pulled on my hand as she pulled me to the corner of the room. It had been years since I've seen my sister, her and Diego were the only two in the family that I haven't seen since the apocalypse.

'I can't believe you have a husband... again!' I poked her on the shoulder, 'Allison Chestnut does have a nice ring to it.'

'It does sound good, doesn't it?' Allison smiled, 'And Ray is great, amazing actually. What about you? Found anyone during the time you were here?'

"Pathetic" was the first thing I thought in my head when I realized the past two years, I didn't even bat an eye for anyone. There were other detectives and officers that were attractive of course but I didn't care to build a relationship past friendship with any of them. My mind was too focused on Diego and only him.

'A few dudes from work, yeah.'

Allison raised her eyebrows, immediately started to laugh as she detected my lie. 'You're still the worst liar I've ever met. Is this abou-'

'You know it is. Sh! Don't say it too loud.'

'So what? You waited for him and now you're not gonna talk to him?'

Having Allison as my best friend was a blessing and a curse, she read me like a book even when we haven't seen each other for years. Granted mind reading was my specialty, I always felt like Allison had this secret power and never told anyone.

'Well, in case you became blind in these past three years you've been stuck here, he has a girl with him.'

'I don't know, it doesn't seem like anything to me.'

'Okay, so you are blind.'

'Y/N, you're over thinking. The shit you always pull, I'm not even surprised.'

'I am not overthinking!'

She crossed her arms, fed up with this habit of assuming everything. She'd thought after this two years I'd be different, 'Then go read his mind then.'

'I don't need my power to figure this one out.' I chuckled under my breath, 'Did you see the way she was touching his thighs when Vanya was talking about her amnesia? Oh my g-'

Allison puckered her lips, nervously smiling but she wasn't smiling at me. 'Oh hey Diego! Long time no see brother!'

I glared at Allison before I turned around and flashed a fake smile towards Diego, I was definitely going to run my mouth about this after this encounter was over.

'Hey Allison. Congrats on your marriage.' Diego smiled sweetly, the same smile I loved for as long as I can remember.

'Thanks, thanks. Excuse me while I go talk to Luther.' Great, not only did she not warn me about Diego coming by but she left me alone with him as well.

It wasn't just me that felt the awkward tension between us because Diego was acting very strange too. 'I see you grew your beard.'

'Yeah, figured I'd do something different.' He breathed, looking at me up and down. 'You look really great Y/N.'

'Why are you telling me this?' I didn't mean to blurt it out, my stupid thoughts just came out of my mouth without me even thinking.

Diego just scratched his head, not knowing what to say after that. 'Because you do, why else would I say it?'

'Well, you need to stop.' I bit my lips as I walked out of the small apartment, making my way down the alley.

'Why are you acting like this?' He followed me. Man, I wish he didn't. Diego just made things even harder for me. 'I thought you'd be happy to see me.'

'I thought so too but-' I stopped myself, knowing that whatever came out of my mouth would definitely change everything. I couldn't do this to myself or to Diego.

'But what Y/N?'

'Nothing. I'll see you at the next meeting.'

'Wait-wait!' Diego caught my hand before I walked off, 'I've searched through this whole city looking for you. The least you can do is owe me an explanation.'

Immediately, I pulled my hand away. If I stayed here more with him I knew that I'd either get pissed off or I'd start crying. Either way, I didn't want Diego to witness that I care about all of this.

'I think the person who owes an explanation is you, Diego.'

Diego’s pov;

My brows furrowed, confused about what Y/N was going on about. What did I need to explain to her that made her to hate me so much?

Was she mad that I've beaten someone up without thinking of my consequences? Y/N used lecture me about controlling my emotions but there was no way she'd know about the reason why I got sent to an institution. Unless Five told her, of course.

But would she be this angry was the question. The way she reacted when I came to talk to her was as if I did something to upset her personally.

Then it suddenly hit me; the possible reason why Y/N was pissed off at me. The typical assumption and overthinking shit she pulled even back when we were in our old timeline.

I couldn't help but laugh, the way Y/N was eyeing me down as if she wanted to slit my throat. It was sort of kind of cute in a way, she really loved me that much to get this jealous over Lila.

'What the hell are you laughing about?'

'You're fucking adorable.' I continued to laugh, holding onto my stomach. 'You know there's nothing going on between me and Lila, right?'

Y/N's shoulders dropped as the tension in her muscles relaxed. She even had a slight, very slight smile on her face. I knew I hit bullseye the way she bit her lips and how her eyes wandered.

'Yeah, that's what I thought.'

'Shut up!' She playfully hit me on my arm, not going to lie it did hurt a little. 'Diego, I-you had me all confused... uhm wow I feel stupid.'

I pulled Y/N in for a hug, kissing her forehead and rubbing her back. 'For a mind reader, you sure assume the stupidest stuff.'

She hugged me back tightly and mumbled under her breath. 'I know, I know. When it comes to you, I go crazy.'

'It's okay, baby. We all have our moments.'

Y/N looked up at me, cupping my cheek and gently ran her finger like she used to do all the time. 'I'm so sorry, Diego. I spent these past two years looking everywhere for you and when I saw-'

'Sh, sh.' I licked my lips and stared at her eyes, it was hard to believe that she waited for me for two years. 'None of that matters anymore. We're both here now.'

A smiled formed on her face as she pulled me in for a kiss. This was a better reunion than I imagined, despite the complication we had a few minutes back. With all of this, I appreciated Y/N more and I was definitely glad that we've found each other again.

'I love you.' Words escaped my mouth as we both pulled away. 'Don't forget that.'

She kissed me again, running her fingers through my hair. 'I love you too, Diego.'

'Mhmm.' I said as I smirked, 'You know it's kind of hot when you're all angry and jealous for me.'

Y/N rolled her eyes, 'Too soon buddy. And that's not funny.'

[cupidlakes]

Hi! New anon here ❤️ I’m starting my dnf writing journey and was wondering if you have advice for characterizations? Or people who you think write D & G well? Thanks!!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️

uhh i’m not a writer so i don’t know how helpful my advice will be :) but i’ll give you some things that to me make a “realistic” dream and george!! all of this can be /p btw and to write gen fics i’m just outlining things about them that stand out to me as defining characteristics

a “realistic” george to me will be where he’s equal parts jokingly snarky smug a little bratty and stubborn but also smart accommodating levelheaded and logical he’s not outwardly overly emotional and i feel like people tread into an area where they make him so drastically different because they’re writing about the ship (or friendship) and feelings come into play obviously but you can still have a realistic response to complicated feelings and yearning without any of the “i care so much about dream i’m crying everyday over it” that radiates ooc-ness it also generally takes quite a lot to outwardly affect george he isn’t quick to anger and the very few times we’ve seen him sad he’s been quiet and subdued but this could just be him not wanting to be vulnerable on stream

george is pretty witty and well liked dialogue where you can show him bouncing off others really well being will always make people’s writing stand out to me george also jokingly flirts and toes the line a lot i feel like it’s fun to play off that making him a flustered blushy mess is boring to me but i do like when people can do him being taken aback by the things dream says right to use an example loads of people might be familiar with, that one scene in heat waves is so good i think, it floored me when i read it for the first time

a “realistic” dream to me is one controlled by his emotions he can be rash sometimes acting out of impulse and what he feels in the moment he can be prone to getting jealous but he’s very sweet caring and earnest too he feels a lot and you can probably make him a crier because he’s admitted to being one many times

he’s also headstrong, self assured and very confident if there’s a goal in mind he’ll do whatever to achieve it he can get easily frustrated with the bumps along the way but he won’t give up

imo you can do slow burn with dnf really well because of how they are irl and how they constantly toe the line without actually crossing it they flirt and flirt but at the end of the day they’re just friends right but in fics if you wanna do that gradual realisation of feelings making it realistic is hard i think but if you do it right it’s really satisfying i think on georges side making him more affectionate in the way he shows affection (through quality time) is a good route, highlighting his need to be with dream and his want to bridge the physical distance (if it’s set in real life) is good, in general just making him want to spend as much time with him as possible and also getting jealous and attention grabby when something is occupying dream is all him and we can have clingy george as a treat

on dreams side making him more obsessed works, he talks enough about george as is where it can border on romantic but making it more and also showcasing the various ways dream shows affection particularly towards george with a boost in flirting is a recipe for obvious in love-ness

i definitely missed out some stuff but i hope this was helpful in any way!! i want ppl to know you can write dream and george however actually and if you wanna stray away from their real life personas i get that but these are the things i love to see in fics i just like when they’re fleshed out and you see the actual bits of dream and george there and replacing their names for example with any other people would make a difference

i don’t know about recommending specific writers because i have so many faves this seems like a cop out but it’s true and i also don’t wanna miss anyone but yeah sorry this was so long omg

[bettsfic]

february pinned: the real & the ideal

in this month’s edition of my lowkey writing-related newsletter, in addition to my writing-related post roundup and consultation availability, i have short story recommendations for you and an essay on the nature of reality in fiction! 

if you want to receive my lowkey writing-related newsletter directly, you can subscribe here.

in other news, i finished two fics this month:

digging for orchids (hualian, 43k, explicit, fake marriage au)

let ruin end here (hualian, 8k, mature, neighbors au)

full newsletter below the cut, or you can read it here.

oof,

what a month. january is already a rough time. throwing in a pandemic, a coup, and an economic revolution spearheaded by reddit just seems unfair. as for me personally, the spring semester came at me fast and even though it’s only week 2, i am already buried in grading. which i realize is my fault, considering i’m the one who assigned homework.

so after hearing your feedback, i thought i’d make this newsletter even more writing-related by writing more about writing. this month i’ll start off by talking about the nature of reality in fiction in a segment i call “been thinkin a lot about.” more on that below.

new resource

i’ve compiled a folder of PDFs of the short stories i teach most often, which is to say, the stories i like enough to re-read every semester. most of them are literary fiction but a few veer into fantasy, sci fi, and horror.

i know before the MFA, i didn’t really know what a short story was. like i knew, abstractly, the concept of a short story (it is as it sounds), but i could only list a couple i’d ever read as an adult, and i hadn’t read anything that had been published in the last decade. i remember wondering why i was even being asked to care about short stories. who writes short stories? who reads them? apparently, a lot of people. short storyists are a lot like fanwriters in that they make no money and when you talk about your writing in public, people give you that “why would anyone waste their time with that?” look.

so here’s why i was asked to care about short stories: a good short story gives you the entirety of a world in a very condensed space. moreover, it can sometimes leave you as satisfied as a novel in a fraction of the reading time. all the stories i’ve compiled here are ones that stuck with me, that i find myself recommending over and over to writers who want a good example of developing character, or weird narration, or establishing stakes.

if you’re a writer considering publication or an MFA in creative writing, i highly recommend familiarizing yourself with short stories, if for no other reason than to get the feel for them so you can write some of your own. if you can get a few short story publications under your belt, it’ll be easier to open doors when you’re ready to query agents for a novel. also, short stories make a great writing sample for grad programs, workshops, fellowships, residencies, and grant funding.

if you want to check out more short stories but have no idea where to start, the 2020 best american short stories just dropped in november, or if you want a cheaper one, used copies of 2019 and earlier are available on thriftbooks. if you want an overview of the history of the (american) short story, there’s also the best american short stories of the century. fair warning, though, while it’s more diverse than expected, it’s still a bit heavy on dead-white-dude writing.

content warning: the stories in the above-linked folder may depict instances of sexual assault, suicide, and/or abuse. i have not labeled them individually with warnings but i hope to soon, as well as provide a catalog with summaries.

i’m also still working on my essay and novel recs. more to come on that hopefully next month.

writing-related posts

how i quit my banking job to do a creative writing MFA

how i learned to read faster/stop subvocalizing

how to write when you have no time or energy to write

my experience writing fic in small/dead fandoms (aka fics that will probably not get any traffic)

how to describe facial expressions

how to ask for help from your professors

how to navigate tenses during flashbacks

how to separate yourself from your work

how (and why you might want to) write a shitty first draft

why you should consider making the climax the inciting incident

for a complete list of my writing-related posts, check out this masterdoc (which i still need to update it with the past few months’ posts).

stuff i’m into rn

i’m about halfway through the rhetoric of fiction by wayne c. booth which has more or less become my narrative bible. it’s a little dated (1961) but it tackles banal writing adages that are somehow still believed, like “show don’t tell” and whatnot, and breaks them down with amazing insight, clarity, and research. it’s a bit of a dense text so i’m only reading a few pages a day, i think the first time i’ve ever let myself read something so intentionally slowly. now i’m kind of obsessed with doing things slowly. reading slowly, writing slowly, cooking slowly. i even drive slowly, because it’s so rare to go anywhere at all, and i want to enjoy it. also, it’s very snowy where i am. also also, the battery died in my car this month and i really have to make it a point to drive more often.

february availability

i have 2 openings for initial writing consultations in february! if you’re interested, please fill out this google form.

you can learn more about my services on my carrd.

been thinkin a lot about

compulsory reality in fiction. many of us have probably received feedback along the lines of, or thought to ourselves as we read, “that’s not realistic.” many of us believe, consciously or not, that fiction that is more “realistic” is inherently better than fiction that is less “realistic.” for some of us, real means a saturation of details, the clear depiction of the surfaces of things. reality is found in the rendering thereof; if you can “see” it, it’s real. for others of us, it might be the development of complex characters and their growth across a narrative. and for yet others, reality is subtlety, or misery, or the idea of “slice of life,” a term i don’t think means anything, because aren’t all stories a slice of a character’s life? what would a story that’s not a slice of life look like? you’d either have to take away the “slice” part and render a whole life, which is impossible, or you’d have to take away the “life” part and create a dead story, which may be possible, but why would you want to? even if you wrote a story about a rock, the rock would be brought to life by virtue of being written about.

anyway. i think the word “real” is a shitty word for the same reason “slice of life” is a shitty phrase: everything is real and therefore nothing cannot be real. slices of life are all we know because we are alive and cannot truly perceive not being alive; reality is also all we know, and any depictions beyond reality are thus made real because they have been depicted.

so the “goal” for fiction to be “realistic” seems to me to be a false one. all fiction is real because it exists and no fiction can be truly real because it’s only a facsimile of reality. not to get all “this is not a pipe” but writing is just making squiggles, and we as a community of English-knowers agree that certain squiggles correspond to certain sounds, and certain sounds together make words which conjure meanings. and words put together into sentences into paragraphs conjure even more complicated meanings. and when those paragraphs are woven into narrative we create yet more and more complicated meaning.

every time you write anything — a text message, an email, a tweet, a fanfic — you are taking the infinite abstraction of your own cognition, narrowing it into a single concept, and representing that concept with patterns in the form of sounds represented by letters and given meaning with words, so that the infinite abstraction of your own conscience can be fractionally witnessed by the infinite abstraction of someone else’s. and even though we can’t definitively prove for ourselves that any other thing possesses a consciousness, writing shows us the shape of someone else’s mind, and tells us we are not alone.

and yet we still expect writing to be “real.”

have you ever read a story where a character sneezed? like just, a description of a sneeze for the sake of it, with no purpose or function in the plot? if not, is it because our characters aren’t real enough to sneeze, or because the sneeze isn’t relevant to their plight? what would a written sneeze look like, and why would somebody want to write it? moreover, why would somebody want to read it? that leads me to wonder, do we depict reality in the service of narrative, or narrative in the service of reality? in other words, do we write to portray reality (sans sneezing), or do we depict reality to constrain our writing, the way one might request bumpers when bowling so as not to fall in the gutters?

i’ve never read an artful rendition of a character pissing or shitting, either, even when those things are related to a character’s plight and circumstance — stories involving long road trips, living in the woods, being kidnapped. the only exception i can think of is when those things are eroticized (we do not kinkshame here in this lkwrnl), the same way it’s rare to find detailed sex writing that isn’t for the purpose of reader arousal. are there just some things about the nature of being human that are too intimate, too complex, or too boring to write?

once i wrote a murder that takes place in a small fictional midwestern town in the 90s (for the ~aesthetic), and it went uninvestigated by said town’s police force. early readers repeatedly commented along the lines of, “that’s not realistic.” and i thought, no, if anything, the incompetence of police is too realistic for the heightened reality i’m trying to render. have you ever heard of a cop solving a murder that didn’t come with an obvious suspect or immediately found evidence? i haven’t. that doesn’t mean those cases don’t exist, but i definitely think they’re less likely than mass media has us believe, and the average small-town police force has far less motivation (and possibly training) to solve crimes than we think.

i started working on the above-mentioned novel in 2016, and my goal was to depict a reality that hovers above the surface of plausibility. in this novel, which is based on macbeth, a preteen girl, mercy, becomes jealous of the love her best friend elisa shows to her father. mercy decides to get her older and very unstable brother to kill him. naturally the deed goes awry, but it does occur, and the cleanup is far messier than anticipated.

is it plausible for a 12 year old girl to plot and execute the murder of her best friend’s father? no. is that what this book is about? yes. a book about a 12 year old girl who has a perfectly healthy relationship with her best friend and who has no feelings toward her bff’s father one way or another is probably far more “realistic,” but that’s not the book i’d want to read and certainly not the one i want to write. my goal of a heightened reality is what henry james calls the intensity of illusion, the thing that allows a reader, through the witness of one’s distilled cognition into language, to exit physical, knowable reality, and enter a new and unknown reality. and isn’t climbing to that higher place, that intensity of illusion, the purpose of fiction? if it’s not, what is?

the best feedback i got on the aforementioned murder scene was from one of my professors, who, of the perfect calm of all children involved, said, “they just shot a guy. at least one of them would be freaking out.”

he was totally right, but it opened up a lot of questions for me. by what standard did he reach that conclusion? was it something in the chapter itself, was it his personal understanding of the work of narrative, or was it the logical conclusion of the slim plausibility of the scenario? moreover, where did i come up with the idea that all of my preteen characters would commit a murder and proceed to be very chill about it? if an implausible scenario begs the expectation of emotional distress, would it be more compelling to buy into that expectation or deviate from it? is it even my obligation to be compelling when i can never have a cogent grasp of the personal tastes of my audience?

that brings me to what appears to be reality’s opposite: idealism, the state those of us who write fanfic are often trying to achieve. we’re working in an entire genre of ideals, of happily ever afters, of hurt that is always followed by comfort, of glossily rendered sex during which everyone orgasms and no one has to pee afterward. we fix broken texts and continue incomplete ones. sometimes, we want to make existing things better, deeper, more complicated. but all the time, we want to make a text more than what it is.

some see this process, this drive for the ideal, as antithetical to realism, and i think that’s part of the reason fanfiction and other idealistic genres (romance, etc.) get a bad name — the assumption that more real (which for some means more miserable) is better, and therefore its opposite, the ideal, is worse. for them, i have this quote from vladimir nabokov:

For me a work of fiction exists only insofar as it affords me what I shall bluntly call aesthetic bliss, that is a sense of being somehow, somewhere, connected with other states of being where art (curiosity, tenderness, kindness, ecstasy) is the norm.

the ideal, aesthetic bliss, the intensity of illusion. these are all phrases that boil down to the same thing: you the writer get to define the constraints of your own reality. you get to choose if your world even complies with the known laws of physics. and if it doesn’t, you get to choose which ones to break, and why to break them. you get to choose if your stories take place in a real house in a real town on a real day. if you wrote a story that takes place on september 11, 2001, would the events of that story be shaped by the events of that actual day, or are you writing a better world where 9/11 doesn’t happen? consider the consequences of both: why might you want to write reality? why might you want to write ideality? how do these things shape your identity and goals as a writer?

no matter where a work falls on the real-ideal spectrum, you have to accept that prose itself will only ever be a verisimilitude of reality and therefore an interpretation of it, one that might be interpreted differently by a reader. in writing and everything else, you can never have complete control over what others perceive. it’s like giving someone cash as a gift. they might buy themselves something nice with it, or they might spend it on groceries. the point is, eventually we all have to let go of our realities.

[cryptovalid]

The weird politics of the Blip

The more the MCU fleshes out the events after Avengers: Endgame, but especially in Falcon and the Winter Soldier, the less sense the geopolitics of the MCU makes to me. In this essay I will be sharing my perspectives on politics in the MCU. If you’re not interested in that sort of thing, don’t feel obligated to engage. Also, by the very nature of this essay it will involve spoilers for the MCU and discussions of topics like state violence and terrorism, so consider this a trigger warning.

It’s an understatement to say that the world would change radically if half the population would randomly disintegrate, and I understand that speculating on the consequences of those people coming back after five years is no simple task. There might even be story considerations I am unaware of.

But the idea that the world’s governments would immediately start forcibly removing people from the homes they lived in for five years, to accommodate people who were declared dead five years ago sounds really strange to me. Let’s explore this.

If you were the survivor of a disaster that cut the world’s population in half, what would this look like to you? You’ve presumably went through a lot of hardship and trauma in the years following. You’ve sold some of the things belonging to your deceased loved ones, or bought stuff from other people in a similar situation. You may have relocated, started a new family. Grieved.

And suddenly those people you literally saw turn to dust in front of you just appear again, like nothing happened? Literally in the same befuddled state in which they died. 

And I have to stress: they died. there is no way to suggest that a person can be atomized and still be alive.

So why would you even trust that this was the same person? In a very real sense, it’s an identical copy of your deceased loved one. Similar to teleportation, this should cause us to wonder if they were truly resurrected, or merely cloned. What kinds of rights do they have, being legally deceased? Would we even know if these were impostors, if the situation changed them somehow?

I’m not saying there’s no answer to these questions, just that people should disagree on this. People would have high-minded philosophical, scientific and religious debates. Conspiracy theories and fistfights. This is by far the most world-changing event ever recorded. It should have massive ethical, political and spiritual implications.

And what I think we should think about is that these people who returned have nothing. They have no memory or lived experience to prepare them for this different world, all of their material possessions belong to someone else now, and by definition, all political, economic and military power is held by those who stayed, who now have a material conflict of interest, because if they acknowledge that you are the same person and deserving of the things you had 5 years ago, they have to give it back. Even without the administrative nightmare this would represent, the returned have nothing. Even their work experience is practically meaningless, especially in high-paying jobs. 

What would happen if Steve Jobs somehow magically returned, having no idea what Apple had been doing in the last couple of years, and demanded to be put back in charge of Apple? It’s not exactly an easy ‘yes’, is it? The world’s power balance would be forever shifted. 

I’m not saying everybody would be unsympathetic to the plight of the people who unblipped. But I am saying there would be a massive movement or series of movements opposed to giving them back their stuff. And I’m saying that movement would not only be popular but also backed by every powerful business interest and government.

Because realistically, the unblipped would be the refugees. They are the ones who would have lost everything, fighting an uphill legal battle to even be recognized as alive and as the same person they were 5 years ago. They would be the ones in camps, waiting for supplies.

Ironically, they would be the ones most hurt by the status quo returning to normal, as there is no way to keep massive famines and shortages from happening in this situation without international coordination. 

So why did the MCU decide on the opposite idea? There are two arguments I can think of: one narrative, and one political. On a narrative level, speculating on a changed world is complicated and risky. If Marvel wants to make stories relevant to us in our world, they have to more or less get back to a status quo we would recognize before it would complicate their properties going forward.

The second reason, I think, is that to truly explore a world like this is radical and potentially a liability for Disney, both in terms of their audience and their relationship with the US military.

Of course any real discussion on policy in this situation requires the heroes to at least pay lip service to a political opinion, which could cost them a lot of fans. We are talking about the legitimacy of borders, of private ownership. Any examination of the edge cases will cause people to have Strong Opinions of their own. In a crisis like this, can people squat in empty houses? Do these people have human rights and refugee status, and how should those be protected in the real world? Can any state justly displace people and if not, are these people allowed to disobey the government or even fight them?

Since the US military subsidizes Marvel’s use of military hardware, it has script approval. So that can also explain why they can’t make the US government the bad guy or present a truly different world where the US military is rightfully no longer in control. 

Who can legitimately deprive people of things they need to survive in a crisis like this? What’s more important: the right to own a house and keep it empty if we so choose, or the right to live in a house? 

If we get too deeply into it, Karly’s position (in theory) seems very compelling, like Erik Killmonger’s before her. And so, they have to make her (like him) a hypocrite who goes too far, so it doesn’t seem like the MCU is advocating violence against the state. 

Karly’s ideology is muddled by the writers because the violence she performs has no chance of actually achieving her goals of global solidarity. It feels tacked on to make her less sympathetic. Realistically, someone like Karli would be holding political rallies, sit-ins. Writing op-eds, staging marches and organizing her community into self-sufficiency. Possibly getting into fights with the cops during evictions or protests. If you read Falcon and the Winter Soldier as a kind of allegory for American politics, then Walker represents Trump, Sam represents Obama, and Karly represents... whatever conservatives think socialism/BLM is?

So it feels like FatWS is trying to thread the needle: Nationalism is bad, but so is statelessness. A state should have integrity, and benevolence. And it can have those things, if represented by the right people. Then, the violence is just and measured. It’s barely even violence at all.

I’m kidding of course, the kinds of solutions the MCU offers are basically ‘Co-Intelpro, PMC’s and neighbourhood watches... but run by morally perfect people’. It’s the way a propagandist would represent clandestine domestic espoinage or police brutality: Sam and Bucky would never kill anybody defenseless, and they would never interfere with legitimate polical movements. Because the writers create a perfect world where it’s always clear what everybody’s intention is before the fighting starts, and non-lethal violence is a reliable default option, no more morally problematic than some rough-housing by rambunctious kids.

I know I can trust Sam and Bucky because the writers would never give them realistic implicit biases in a way that would endanger their moral character. They are perfect because they are not real.

The robots, aliens and wizards are not the only unrealistic thing about the MCU. we have to be aware of how artificial the politics are, even if we want to suspend our disbelief. Or else we end up trusting politicians when they embrace a fundamentally immoral status quo, and let thousands die to maintain it (I know, a WILD hypothetical that will surely never come true, but worth keeping an eye out for.)  

The politics that a blip would realistically set in motion are so different from our own, that it would call into question the legitimacy of private ownership and the state. In order to avoid upsetting its fans and its financiers, the MCU has to return to a status quo where those political realities can be taken for granted.    

[ms-rampage]

Eden’s Gate: The Mother Chapter 11 - All Hope Is (Not All) Gone

Warnings: Light swearing, talks of child abuse and neglect. Fluff (towards the end). 

Word count: 2.3k

Where it all began. 

Summary: Mandy gets help from a Militia group that can help her with getting out of the Cult. Also Mandy gets a spell that can help stay off of Chucks and as well as all other celestials' radar. 

Guest OCs: Barbara Teller (FC: Katey Segal), Marie Campbell (FC: Fairuza Balk), Dawana Floyd (FC: Anna Diop)

Guest Characters: Tammy Barnes, Eli Palmer, and a young Wheaty. Raphael [Supernatural; female vessel]

Note: None

_____________

Flashback September 2011

Des Moine, Iowa. 

Paige and Kate get taken to the Des Moine police station for questioning. 

Mandy is under temporary house arrest, but will have charges of child abuse and neglect on her.

“Has your mother ever abused you?” an officer asks Paige. 

She shakes her head, “No, she’s never hit me, or my sister”. 

In another room, an officer asks Kate, “Has your mother ever neglected you?”. 

“No” she quietly answers, shaking her. 

“You don’t have to protect her. You can tell us and you won't have to be scared anymore” the officer tells her. 

Back to the elder sister. 

“My mom has never hit me, or my sister” Paige tells the officer.

“Then how do you explain the scars and bruises on your arms and hands?!” the officer asks.

“I got into a fight” she explains, “I was protecting my sister from some stupid bitch boy bully”.

He raises his eyebrows at her, and asks “A junior high school bully did that to you?”. 

She nods, and tells the cop “Yes, he was some stupid typical bully. Picking on my small sister, and I fucked him up because he deserved it. Kate doesn’t deserve the treatment she gets from some of the kids at school”. 

Back to the youngest sister. 

“Your mother has never hit you?” the cop asks, “Ever abandoned you?”. 

She shakes her head, “No”.

“What are the wounds on your arms?” she asks. 

Knowing she can’t tell the truth because the wounds she and her sister have are from a vampire attack. They were ambushed, they were able to fight them off but were left bruised and wounded afterwards. 

“They-they were from a bully” she tells the female cop, “From school”. 

Back to the elder sister.

“Are you afraid of losing your family?” he asks Paige, “Afraid you’ll be torn away from them?”.

She looks him in the eye, not even blinking and says, “The only thing I’m afraid of is dying alone. Unloved, and unwanted”. 

_________

At the end of her rope, Mandy doesn’t know what to do anymore. She doesn’t want to sit back, and watch Joseph hurt innocent people anymore. 

She knows she has to do something about this. She goes for a drive through the Whitetails to clear her mind. She stops at the side of the road, and walks up a grassy hill. Overlooking the mountains. 

Standing towards the edge, letting the cool breeze fly past her. Feeling at peace for once. Also figuring out how she’s gonna get out of this whole mess with the Cult without Chuck’s acknowledgement. 

Her help comes when she hears a pistol cock behind her, and a woman’s voice. 

“Don’t move” she orders her. Mandy puts her hands up. Walking forward with her hands still up with her back to the woman.

“You’re one of them, aren’t you?” she asks, “You a peggie?”. 

“I’m not a peggie” Mandy responds.

The lady scoffs, “Bullshit. I know who you are. You’re “The Mother”, Amanda Campbell”.

Mandy rolls her eyes, “My real name is Mandeline Winchester, and I’m an undercover FBI agent”. 

The lady scoffs back, “Yeah sure, anything to get your ass out of trouble huh?”. 

She hits Mandy in the back of her head with her pistol, knocking her out. She takes her inside a bunker and ties her up to a chair with a sack over her head. 

She wakes up an hour later, tied up. She can hear the faint voices of two people, a man and a woman. Sounding like they’re having some sort of disagreement. 

With the sack still over her head, she tries to pry herself out of her restraints. Then the door opens. 

“It’s useless to do that” she tells Mandy. 

“What do you want?!” she asks her. 

“I could tell you the fucking same thing” she responds, “Where are you lurking around the Wolf’s Den?!”. 

The door opens again and she hears a man’s voice, “Tammy what are you doing?!” he asks.

“Damn it Eli I’m in the middle of an interrogation!” she tells him.

He scoffs and asks Mandy, “Who are you? Why are you lurking around our bunker?!?”. 

She sighs, “I told you already. I didn’t know there was a bunker here, I was just wandering around, clearing my head”. 

“You’re with the Cult? Aren’t ya?” Eli asks. 

She sighs again, “Yes I’m with the Cult, but I’m trying to get out. I don't know if you heard or not, but I’m The Mother. I’m trying to get out but my boss is telling me to stay with Joseph”. 

“Your boss?!?” Tammy questions her. 

“I told you. I’m an undercover agent and I’m trying to get out of the Cult” she further explains to them, “I was hired as a double agent to bring them all down”. 

Eli removes the sack off her head, “What kind of agent?”. 

“FBI, I have my badge in my truck” she tells them. 

Tammy and Eli look over at each other, “Where’s your truck?” he asks, turning back to Mandy. 

“It’s parked down by the road at the end of the hill” she tells them. 

Eli goes to open the door, “Try not to kill her” he tells Tammy before closing the door and leaving. 

An hour later, Eli returns with Mandy’s stuff, he enters the same room as before.

“Well turns out she is an FBI agent” he tells Tammy as he walks into the room. He hands her the badge. 

“Special Agent Mandeline W. Campbell” she says as she reads the fake, but also very realistic looking FBI badge that she had made from Keekos with the help of her two nephews. 

“The W means Winchester. I have two last names, my maiden and by a past marriage” she tells them. 

Eli goes to untie her, “What are you doing?!?!” Tammy asks, getting irritated. 

“This proves we can trust her” he tells her as he unties Mandy. 

“Are fucking serious?!?” she protests, “She could be a fraud?!?”.

“If you wanna call my boss, her number is on the back of my badge” she tells them.

Mandy grabs her phone from her bag and calls her “boss” who is actually her younger sister Marie. Since they have different phone numbers for different reasons. 

Putting it on speaker phone, it rings a couple times, and she hears her little sister’s voice. 

“Director Irwin” she answers. 

Mandy clears her voice, “Hey boss, I’m calling to check in”. 

Marie plays along with her sister's skeem, “Agent Campbell, how’s the investigation with the Seed mission?”. 

“It’s going great, I have enough information to put on file to charge the whole family but I still have a lot to do before completing the mission” she tells her “boss”. 

“Okay good. We still need everything. All counts, document everything. Every little thing, Joseph and his family do. So we can send in the national guard after them and put them all away” she replies. 

“I will do that, and I’ll get back to you once I have everything” she tells her “boss” and hangs up. Showing Tammy that she is 100% legit.

“I told you, I’m not a fraud. That was my boss, Head FBI Director Diana Irwin of Phoenix” she tells them,”I was sent to be a part of the Cult to get dirt on them and have them all sent away”. 

Eli shrugs, “Well you don’t need to convince me”. 

Tammy groans, rolling her eyes, “Okay fine, I guess you’re not a fraud” and she leaves the room. 

Eli shows Mandy around the Wolf’s Den, and meets a young Native boy.

“And this is Wheaty” he introduces her to the young boy who is looking through a milk crate of vinyl albums, and looks around 12-14 years old. About the same age as her youngest daughter Kate. 

“Hi Wheaty, I’m Mandy” she introduces herself. 

“Hi” he mutters, giving her a soft smile. 

“She’s gonna help us with the Cult” Eli tells the young boy, “Put an end to them”

“I’m an FBI agent” she tells him, “I’m working undercover, well more like a double agent”. 

His eyes light up, filling with hope. “See” Mandy shows him her badge. They leave him be, letting him look through the crate of vinyls records.

“Where are his parents?” she asks Eli. He sighs, “They were killed by the Cult, I was close friends with his parents, and I took him in after they were killed”. 

“Wow, that’s sad to hear” she mutters, looking over at the young boy “I lost custody of my daughters several months ago. He looks like he could be around the same age as my youngest daughter. My husband died in a house fire 13 years ago”. 

“I’m sorry to hear about that” he tells her. 

“How long ago did they kill his parents?” she asks him. 

Eli thinks for a few moments, “A few years ago. He was lucky to get away, before they got him”. 

*******

A few hours later, Mandy returns to Joseph’s region and goes about “her job” and get “more dirt” on the family. Fearing that Chuck might have seen, heard everything, and is now working with the Whitetail Militia. 

Mandy goes inside hers and Joseph's shared home, and calls Barbara asking if she can find anything that’ll help her stay off of celestial radar, and that includes God as well. 

After a few hours, Barb calls her back with some good news, and she found something that’ll help her. 

“Hey Barb so what did you find?” she asks her friend over the phone. 

“It’s a spell, but it’s a very difficult one and you’re gonna need help with it” Barbara tells her. Mandy sighs, “That’s fine, I can get help with it. What’s the spell?”. 

She sighs, “Like I said it's complicated. It’s an old invisibility spell. Invocation of Invisibility is the name, it must be said in Enochian”. 

“Okay that’s fine what are the verses?” Mandy asks. 

“The ritual is Uranun Caripe Baglen Olgemeganza de-Noan Chiis Gosaa Zamicmage Oleol Ag-Sapah arphe, Oresa ethamz taa, Tabegisoroch, Zodinu, Ar zurah paremu. Zodimibe papnorge maninua zonac. Dodsih hoxmarch trian amonons pare Das Niis kures. I’ll send you the words in a few minutes” Barbara tells her the ritual in Enochian. 

“Okay thanks a lot Barb” she thanks her. 

“No problem, I’ll send you the verses for the ritual in a bit” she tells her and hangs up. 

 gets a visit from Raphael shortly after her call with Barbara, but he was in a different vessel instead of his usual male vessel. 

“Mandy” he says, in a different voice. She turns around and sees a woman in a power suit. 

“Raphael?!” she questions her. Unsure if this is her Archangel or another one of Heaven’s warriors. She slowly approaches her, “Yes, I had to change vessels” the Archangel explains to her. 

“Umm that’s fine. I guess” she stammers, “Where have you been?”. 

Raphael sighs, “Heaven, other than your work here. Chuck has been creating other universes”.

“Other universes? For what?” she questions her. 

Shrugging, “I don’t know. He doesn’t tell us much about his work”. 

“Well I have some good news” she tells him/her, “I got a spell that can help keep me off of Chuck’s and other celestials radar”.

The look of relief on the 3rd Archangel’s face, “What’s the spell?”. 

“Invocation of Invisibility” she tells him/her, “It’s said in Enochian, and I’m pretty sure Dawana can help me with it”. 

He/she sighs, “Okay good because I know it keeps getting worse and worse for you down here. I know what happened to you with the Militia”.

Her eyes widened, “You-you saw all of that?!?”.

He/she nods, “Yes, good thing Chuck is too focused on creating new universes because he would’ve ended everything with you. Killing you and casting me out of Heaven’. 

Mandy lets out a relieved sigh, “Okay, okay good. If it stays that way then I can get myself out of this without Chuck finding out a thing”. 

Raphael nods, “Good, I’ll go back to Heaven and I’ll be sure to keep a close eye on everything down here”. 

He/she disappears and goes back up to Cloud City. Mandy contacts Dawana asking her for help with the Invisibility spell. 

The Voodoo Priestess agrees to go through with the spell, but she tells her it has to be done on a New Moon at 3am. It'll help with being hidden from the man upstairs and his angels. 

The next New Moon will be within 1 month to that day. Until then Mandy must go through her usual route of being The Mother. Staying close to Joseph as his bride, until the New Moon arrives. 

________

6:00am, the next morning Mandy wakes up with Joseph’s arm around her. 

Brushing her hair away from her face, gently kissing the nape of her neck and shoulder. 

Whispering sweet nothings into her ear. “You’re beautiful, my light, my bride”. 

Entwining their hands together, his normal size hands covering her small hands. He plants a kiss on her lips, turning her to face him in bed. 

“I love you, my love” he whispers, moving her hair behind her ear. 

“I love you too” she tells him, and gives him a kiss on the lips. Spending the next hour in bed, holding each other. Being like a usual married couple, but with this case their “marriage” is not 100% legit. 

[dropintomanga]

“My Broken Mariko” Reveals a Broken Real World

“I’m so broken...I don’t know where to start fixing myself anymore.”

As someone who’s experienced thoughts of suicidal ideation, I can say that Waka Hirako’s My Broken Mariko is a title that hits me harder than most media do when it comes to the topic of suicide. The manga, which I think is one of the best manga of 2020, does not hold any hands throughout the story and there’s so much to unpack. Reading this has made me think about my thought process on suicide and my belief that suicide is a very systemic issue that involves everyone.

My Broken Mariko is about a young woman named Tomoyo Shiino, who just found out her best friend since childhood, Mariko Ikagawa, killed herself a week after they hung out. Filled with despair and unable to process Mariko’s death, Tomoyo decides to go to visit the home of Mariko’s parents and steal Mariko’s ashes from them. Mariko had a history of being abused ever since she was little, so Tomoyo felt it was her duty to free Mariko from that burden. After taking Mariko’s ashes, Tomoyo goes on a journey to a place called Marigaoka Cape as she remembers Mariko wanted to go there with her. Tomoyo goes through hell and back to let Mariko’s ashes be free in nature, but she does eventually start to realize that the best way to honor Mariko’s life is to keep living.

I’m not sure where to start with this. I’ve read multiple interviews with Waka Hirako since there was a good amount of promotion for My Broken Mariko. I wasn’t prepared for how absolutely realistic this story was. And I’m glad for that. Mariko’s history of being abused by her parents (and also a boyfriend when was an adult) shows how prevalent victim-blaming is. Mariko tells Tomoyo that her parents blame her for acting in ways that aren’t to their standards. Everything’s her fault, Mariko says. While Tomoyo was there to support her, Mariko didn’t have extra help beyond that. She had no one else, professional and/or peer-wise, who can empathize with her struggles. Mariko felt too defined by her circumstances to the point where she didn’t know who to turn to anymore for the help she truly needed.

In one moment of her journey to Marigaoka Cape, Tomoyo lashes out in anger at Mariko and herself at a bar. The words she says made me think about how suicide is treated by almost everyone.

“My memories of her keep fading away, even as I stand here! I’ll only remember her as perfect...even though - I thought she was such a pain...so many times..!”

The last part where Tomoyo where she said that Mariko was annoying due to her constant troubles says a lot. Almost everyone doesn’t know how to deal with heavy issues. We’re not equipped to talk about darkness because emotions are placed in this dichotomy of being either good or bad. I sometimes thinks no one wants to admit that we might end up in bad situations ourselves compared to anyone we love who’s suffering/has suffered.

I’ve been thinking a lot of suicide prevention lately as suicide rates continue to rise despite more awareness and helplines. There’s a question posed by a mental health professional about where to go with dealing with loss in this Mad in America article about suicide hotlines tracing calls to the harm of disenfranchised people who need help.

“Is it the path where everyone is so terrified to talk about suicide because of consequences, like having the cops called on you even by confidential hotlines? Or is it the path where we know that we’re going to lose people, and we create as much space as we possibly can to be with people in darkness and talk openly about this and support people?”  

I wondered if people like Mariko were so afraid to talk about their emotional pain due to fear of consequences. I also wondered if people like Tomoyo are unable to deal with so much darkness. I remember how I was hospitalized back then and how my high school friends all distanced themselves from me slowly but surely. No one wanted to put up with my mental illness back then.

Also, I wanted to kill myself back in 2016. I made an awful mistake of saying that I wanted to die on Twitter. I thought someone wanted me dead. A colleague of mine thankfully called a hotline for help. Police actually came to my door that night after midnight. I calmed myself before then after realizing I couldn’t do it. My interaction with the cops ended up with no consequences.

To be honest, I’m afraid of dealing with cops and hospitals due to my mental illness. I didn’t enjoy my hospital experience because it felt so limiting. I also realized at the time, my mental illness wasn’t as bad as it was initially perceived. I did discuss that I faked hearing voices in my head for attention. It’s tricky for professionals to handle cases like me because you do have to take things seriously when it comes to mental illness. 

But I also realize that the mental health system is sometimes too standardized for its own good. A bunch of its solutions do not work well with people (especially minorities) that experience trauma from societal circumstances. A mental health treatment that works well with middle-class white folks may not work at all with a black person stuck in poverty. Yes, Mariko was so broken that she was beyond help. But what if the help she got wasn’t enough or made things worse? 

I loved how Tomoyo tells Mariko in her own mind that it was never her fault and that it was the people in her life that projected their insecurities onto her. Tomoyo does wish that Mariko asked her to die alongside her. I can’t blame her for thinking that as there’s so much hyper-individualism ruining what it means to connect with someone in a meaningful way. Tomoyo and Mariko had a genuine friendship that was still maintained despite their evolving lives.

At the end of the story, Tomoyo opens up a final letter from Mariko mailed to her before she died and the contents of the letter are unknown to the reader. All we see is Tomoyo’s response, “Mm-hmm,” while she holds the letter to her face. It’s very open-ended, but I think that’s the point. Human beings are complicated creatures full of entanglements that make and/or break them. We all have kinds of feelings that can’t be easily labeled despite whatever perception is given of us. We’re all open-ended in our own ways. 

That’s why I wish more people “open up” and realize that suicide is a people problem. There’s people who say having suicidal thoughts is abnormal. Let me say this - if you are oppressed by all kinds of stressors and impacts that are usually caused by other people and no one truly cared about you, I think it’s normal to feel as if dying is your option. I sometimes feel that we have too many people well off compared to people who aren’t. Maybe that’s one reason why thoughts related to death are so taboo. 

I’ll reveal something that most people don’t know - I still think about death sometimes. I just don’t let it overwhelm me. Or maybe I realized that I’m sick of certain injustices in the world. Thinking about suicide was somewhat of a stance against that. It’s similar to what martyrs believe. However, I do feel that you need to focus on the light hidden in that darkness (sounds Kingdom Hearts-ish, but it’s also true) and make it so that living is a better option. It takes a people solution to find that. I found that I wasn’t alone in how I thought at times and it helped me a bunch to process what I was feeling.

There’s a wonderful line near the end of My Broken Mariko and it’s found on a beach sign. It said “Suicide isn’t a crime, but littering is.” I sometimes feel that suicide is still treated as a crime even by those who want to help. I think that’s why you hear questions like “Why did they do this? How could they?” Most police responses to people with mental illness do not end well. Sometimes, psychiatric help does more harm than good. I’ve had bad psychiatrist/therapist experiences that felt too “medical.” That’s why I want more community efforts emphasized to tackle suicide and not just only rely on the standard solutions.

This is what I think My Broken Mariko is calling for - a communal stand against the injustices that lead people to consider suicide as an option. And I’m glad someone like Waka Hirako feels the same way I do.

There’s a wonderful guide on Psyche, “How to talk to a suicidal friend” with resources and books. Also, please remember that it’s possible that you can’t save someone in the end even if you tried as best you could to help (like Tomoyo did for Mariko) and no one should ever shame you for that. Here’s a list of resources for suicide bereavement.

[ikesenlemonadestandstories]

Level 34

Thanks to everyone who asked how I was doing! I really appreciate it <3

Guess who got some free time today :) This gal! Hope you guys enjoy! Fingers crossed it stays slow for a little bit.

Master List

Tagging: @loudartanimeeclipse, @ihavenotfallenyet

Warnings: None

Level 34

The first thing you had done last night after getting home from your adventure was unblocked Masamune. What were the actual odds of something like that happening, you wondered. Sure, you had known the people from Team Kasugayama, but that was because it was a group of friends who had invited their mutual friends to play. Meeting someone in person that you’d only ever encountered in an online game had to be almost entirely unheard of. With a smile on your face, you headed off to bed, you had to be at work early tomorrow, and you desperately needed to avoid Sasuke and Yukimura for as long as possible. 

Fortunately, your instinct had been correct. The extra fifteen minutes had guaranteed you a spot on the early shuttle from the garage to work in near silence. It was peaceful, especially with the rain, and you were hoping for the day to stay that way.

It wasn’t busy in the lab, which meant you had time to fine-tune some of the more specific gating elements in your new test. With the day slowing down and the sample load dwindling, you put on your headphones and planned to hunker down at your desk until the end of the day. 

Unfortunately, things don’t always go as planned; you were so concentrated on your work that when Yukimura and Sasuke swarmed your desk, you nearly jumped out of your seat. So close, you had been so close. 

“What can I do for you, boys?” You asked, granting them a side-eye as you shifted your headphones. 

“We need bodyguards.” Yukimura let out, exasperated. 

“Oh? Not sure why you’re telling me unless you want me to know in case you disappear?” You teased.

“This isn’t funny. It’s one thing to win a tournament. It’s another to land a hit like that on Kenshin.” Yukimura sighed. “We have to live with your life decisions, you know!”

“Not my fault he couldn’t take a well-placed hit.” You shrugged, enjoying the way Yukimura bristled. 

“It was indeed. Though I might need a place to lay low for a while if you don’t mind.” Sasuke complimented you. 

“You guys are acting like Kenshin is going to off you IRL. Chill out or call the cops, my dudes.” You laughed as they both shared a look. 

“If we disappear, can we count on you to call in detectives?” Yukimura asked.

“All I ask is you remember us fondly,” Sasuke said with a bow.

“You guys are ridiculous. Stop.” You snickered as you continued. “I’m honestly surprised, we’ve been playing around with my luck stat, so I didn’t know if our plan would work. I was sure Edo was going to have to come to bail me out.” 

“I know your speed stat has no rival, but mixing that with high luck is a dangerous combination I’d never even entertained. Well done.” Sasuke congratulated you with a pat on the shoulder. 

“Why are you congratulating her? Kenshin is going to make our lives a living hell online for the next month.” Yukimura pouted.

“You act as though we’re the only ones who will be affected.” Sasuke pointed out. “YN is going to have to watch out as well.”

“Me?” You balked. “Why me? Because I beat him?”

“Precisely.” Sasuke used the dramatic pause to push his glasses up his nose before continuing. “I would be prepared for a flurry of battle requests from him.”

“Oh, is that it?” You wondered aloud. “He’s been blocked for months, remember? Just like the rest of you? He couldn’t send me requests if he wanted to.”

“AUGH!” Yukimura burst out as he slumped forward. “This just got so much worse for us.”

“I’m sure you’ll be okay; you’re both resourceful.” You consoled, swiveling in your chair to try and hide your amusement. 

“She acts like she’s never played with him before!” Yukimura whined.

“I did; he liked me.” You teased, “What have you been doing the past few months that you still haven’t managed to win him over?”

“Shut it!” Yukimura’s agitation grew the more prolonged the encounter drew on, and it was showing. 

“Yanno, I was down here minding my own business, not talking to anyone until you two showed up.” You pointed out, turning your attention back towards your computer. 

“What do you have there?” Sasuke asked, leaning in to take a look at your computer screen. 

“Validation data.” You scooted your chair over to make more room for your now curious friends. 

“Ah, is this your project with Dr. Tokugawa then?” Sasuke asked as Yukimura looked on, confused.  

“Sort of? It’s been my project for a while. He’s thinking about running a study that needs specific testing.” You shuffled around your plots and pulled up some data on the computer. “It just sort of happened that I was already cooking something up.”

“Interesting. What a lucky twist of fate.” Sasuke pondered.

“How so?” You mused.

“It’s not every day that you get to work with a partner in real life and a video game like that.” Sasuke continued.

“I’m not following you at all there, buddy.” You grimaced, trying to put your finger on what Sasuke was trying to say.

“Dr. Tokugawa is Edo is he not?” Sasuke tilted his head as he asked you his question. 

“I don’t know who Edo is.” The confusion was evident on your face. “What makes you say it’s Ieyasu?”

“Yoshimoto told us.” Yukimura chimed in. “Didn’t he tell you?”

“No. How does he even know that?” You could feel the grimace starting.

“They have, history, yes - history.” Sasuke struggled to explain it well.

“I’m surprised he didn’t tell you.” Yukimura pointed out nonchalantly. 

“Maybe he doesn’t know it’s me?” You tried to offer, knowing full well you’ve potentially told your crush some super deep things.

“While that is possible, you will never have an answer unless you ask.” Sasuke offered. 

“Why would I ask? What if he doesn’t know? That’ll just make things awkward.” You could feel the anxiety rising in your chest. 

“Knowing you, it’s already going to be awkward now that you know.” Yukimura chuckled as he patted your shoulder. “You’re better off just asking before you explode.”

“Why, why did you have to go and make this more complicated?” You begrudged. 

“I’m sure you would have found out eventually.” Sasuke offered.

“Is that your way of trying to make me feel better?” You sighed.

“No, I’m being realistic.” he fixed his glasses. “You’ve been working with him both here and online for a long time. You have feelings for the man in real life. It would have eventually come up.”

“I mean, yes, you’re right.” You glared at Sasuke, knowing he had a point. “At least that is more organic than whatever I’m about to go do now.”

“Oh, can I come to watch?” Yukimura asked, not even trying to hide the amusement in his voice.

“No.” You deadpanned. 

“What if I say I’m there as emotional support?” Yukimura offered.

“Accept, we both now know you’re not?” You snickered, despite the turmoil in your brain.

“Fine, good luck and have fun, I guess?” Yukimura tossed his hand in the air. “C’mon, Sasuke, we need to get back to the floor.”

“Do we?” Sasuke wondered before checking his watch. 

There wasn’t anything said after he raised his eyebrows above his frames, and both of them took off. Alone with your thoughts now, the panic started to kick into overdrive. What were you going to do? If Ieyasu was Edo, you had quite literally told the man you had a crush on him! Should you even approach this? What happened if he did find out somehow that you knew? Would he think you were using him, that it was a lie? Gods, you didn’t want that either. A string of curses flew out of your mouth, and you picked up your desk phone before you had a chance to change your mind. 

“Hi, Dr. Tokugawa? Do you have a minute?”