#// it would help give me kin euphoria

[jiraikasa-kun]

Daisuke Hirose Internet Yamero cover when?

[motherofmisfits]

Hey, if you don’t mind another god saying hello, my name is Marco, or Ace. I’m basically the god of humanity, hope, and determination, and I’m also a Kamen Rider, specifically Geats (Oneness).

I was wondering: do you have any tips for living as a god here? I find… I get pretty burnt out easily, and my emotions feel too big for this brain, sometimes. If you have any advice, let me know. Anyway, it’s good to see another deity around here.

Hello, my fellow deity.

It is an honor to meet you.

As for advice, I don't have much to offer as I also struggle with much of what you said. But I can offer this.

First of all, do not let anyone, including yourself, talk you out of your identity. If you are a god, you are a god. Do not doubt yourself, and do not let others sway you. With that, you also get to choose how you portray and express your identity. For me, I enjoy making colorful posts (as you can probably tell). For me, that brings me much kin euphoria. Find what helps you and makes you happy, even if others might disagree.

Second. Remember that you are not your body. While we may be stuck in human vessels, it isn't our body that we are. This distinction can be helpful when dealing with the dysphoria this human vessel can bring.

Third. You are a god. Feel free to worship yourself. Treat yourself. Gift yourself offerings. I've found it's been helpful to my self-esteem and self care habits when I view it that way.

Also, connecting with others has helped me, which is why I made this blog.

Sadly for the emotions feeling too big, I have yet to find a good way to deal with that. I'd recommend creating something as a vent. Whether art, a poem, a flow of thought rant, or even just a piece of furniture. I have found that to help. Also, taking a moment to take care of yourself can help. Do things you enjoy to take your mind off what is bothering you. I've also sometimes talked myself through big emotions like a mother would to a child. That has helped me, though it isn't for everyone.

The main thing is to just take a breath and remember who you are.

I wish I had more to give you, but I hope this helps.

Have a lovely day/night, and may you be blessed.

It was splendid to speak to another god. <3

[gone-fish-mode]

I’m just copy-pasting a post I had already made earlier (with additions), since I was wondering if you’d like to help (since you said you’d like to do kin-help for questioning folks and such)

I’ve kind of been questioning being some kind of aquatic creature. I’m unsure, since it feels a lot closer to kith than kin, but I still can’t figure out what I am. I know that I’m definitely smooth- whether it’s feathers, fur, or skin/fleshy scales (It feels like it should be dense, penguin-esque feathers). Additionally, shallower water (salt or freshwater) gives me a lot of species euphoria. I get a ton of species euphoria from webbed hands/feet- especially from swimming while wearing webbed hands- specifically the kind that seabirds and waterfowl have (such as cormorants, gannets, boobies, pelicans, and some ducks).

The way ducks and some other birds swim (like above) is really euphoric. However, I feel like I’d also have some form of wing(s) that have become streamlined into flipper-like limbs (similar to shearwaters, penguins, great auks, and sea lions). A more two toned coloration feels good, but I don’t think it would be a strict black and white like some animals. I don’t believe I’d be able to breathe underwater. The webbed feet and hands of otters are also very euphoric, as well as the paddle-like tails of crocodilians and the scutes towards the end of their tails. Also, (I just realized this quite recently) shallow parts of lakes and rivers, (especially when they’re clearer) are AMAZING. Looking for fish and paddling around is good, and I should be able to fly overhead and plummet or dart around in the water after fish.

You’re aquatic so maybe you have a better idea of what I am?

Ok, I have a few ideas! And not all of them have all your requirements, but I'm going to throw things on the wall and hopefully one or two of them stick. I'm not going to be getting into more niche species because there are just too many, but if you have a specific biome that you gravitate towards, let me know and I can dig deeper and pull up some more specific species. I've got three main ones, and then a list of minor ones.

Anyone who wants to add onto this is more than welcome to do so!

First that comes to mind is a gull.

They've got the webbed feet, they float like ducks, and are just neat guys in general. Their wings are nowhere near as sheared as some of the examples you provided, but I'd argue that they're fit for the job. There are also multiple species of gull, so you've got some different coloring options, including those wonderful mousy browns.

They're found near fresh and salt water alike, so you've got lots of variety.

These were the first to come to mind. Gulls have a bit of a bad rep, but they're pretty neat birds. I feel lucky to be around them often!

You mentioned shearwaters, so I assume you're also familiar with the petrel! These guys are pretty neat, and fly super close to the water, picking out fish that swim near the surface (which reminded me of how you described your love for shallow waters). They've got webbed feet, float like a duck, and have those awesome wings.

Some good coloring, too!

I think the Procellariidae genus in general would be a good idea to look into, although I'm sure you've already done so, seeing that they're in the same family as shearwaters! Not all of them are saltwater, either! So you've got some wiggle room

Grebes also came to mind for the obvious reasons, but more specifically for their weird feet! They are strange little things! But they just remind me of how you spoke about otter hands? I'm not sure- they're good enough to swim like ducks but are so very distinct. And this may be a bit of a stretch, but the shape also reminds me of a crocodile tail. birds also technically have scutes ;] but again, a bit of a stretch. Not the same look!

They're in the family Podicipedidae, which are described as "foot propelled diving birds." Most are freshwater, although they can be found in salt water. Lots of different colorations and plumage types.

There are many other birds that i thought of, but upon further research they didn't seem like too great of a fit. I'll list them out for you, though! Just in case.

Puffin, galapagos penguin, albatross, frigatebird, skimmers, kingfisher, osprey, sea eagles (as well as other fish-eating birds of prey), and wading birds such as bitterns, herons, or egrets.

You mentioned flying specifically, but there are a few non-avian critters that I also wanted to put out there, primarily the marine iguana and platypus. They've got a mix of traits and I just wanted to toss them out!

Tagging a bunch of different communities in case someone has some more ideas :]

I also wanted to say that I think it's OK to not know what you are specifically, or to feel like you are a mix of many different things. It's very nice to have a solid answer, to point and something and go "hey! that's me!" but I think it can be just as fulfilling to generally understand yourself as nonhuman, without feeling the need to classify all the phantom sensations into preexisting species. Sometimes we're just our own thing, sometimes we are whatever feels most natural in the moment! And of course this will change depending on what type of nonhuman you are, but I think it can be good to keep in mind. Felt like i should tack that on somewhere ;]

ANYWAY! So sorry for the wait! I had like five other paragraphs for different birds and then kept finding more and rewriting and changing my mind. And then I had a transatlantic flight! So many delays. Thanks for being patient :]

And again! If you have any specific feelings about any of these or want me to take some other things into consideration, let me know! I'd be more than happy to dig and pull out something a bit more detailed.

Thanks for the ask <3

[rowanwolf]

Talking About 'Linking

I don't talk much about being a fictionlinker. Mainly because that's voluntary. I talk much more about being a wolf and a gryphon and a kitsune, because I didn't chose to be those things. Theriotypes and kintypes aren't chosen, so I feel a little more free to talk about them. But linktypes are chosen. And I think there's a sort of gatekeep-y weirdness about not being able to (or not feeling that I'm able to) talk about my linktype. And I want to kind of get into that a bit.

I am, on the whole, against KFF. If you're not familiar with that term, it means "kin for fun." Not because I feel there's anything inherently wrong with taking on an identity voluntarily, even just for fun. My opposition to it comes from the terminology. "Kin" is our word - and not a verb. It's shorthand for "otherkin" and widely used in the otherkin and therian community. As I said, I don't feel there's anything wrong with taking on an identity because you want to, but use the right term. That's what the terms "linktype" and "link" exist for. The issue with KFFers is that they've hijacked the community's terminology and invaded spaces that are refuges for otherkin and therians. And then the bigger issue is that a lot of them (from what I've seen) turn around and call those of us who are actually otherkin or therians crazy. Because our identities are genuine.

So I do really advocate for the use of the terms "otherlink" and "-linker" and "-linking." It just helps distinguish actual 'kin from folkel who have taken on their identity voluntarily. But at the same time, I don't feel that I can talk about having done so myself. I have a copinglink that I've developed. Firekeeper helps me deal with stress and stressful situations. She started out as mainly to do with things relating to my therianthropy. She's physically human, but was raised by wolves and identifies as a wolf. Over time, she's become something that helps me deal with stress in general. And I took her on voluntarily. She's a part of me, but she was a choice I made and she feels very different to me than my theriotypes and kintypes.

On topic, though, I don't typically feel like I can talk about my linktype, because I don't want to be seen as "faking it." But just because that one identity is voluntary, that doesn't mean the rest are. I'm not a wolflinker or a gryphonlinker, I'm a wolf therian and gryphonkin. But I am not fictionkin, I'm a fictionlinker. They're different things. And I feel that, although my experience as a fictionlinker is different than my experience as otherkin (I feel that's maybe closer to fictionkin than therianthropy, since my kintypes are mythical creatures) there are similarities: I find a great deal of euphoria and comfort in reading Firekeeper's source and I do shift involuntarily at times - although I think that may be more that my brain has decided this is a good coping mechanism for stress. I have an extremely strong attachment to her and to her brother, Blind Seer. He feels like family to me.

But I don't want folkel to look at my having a linktype and immediately label me a fake or a KFFer as far as actually being a therian and otherkin. And that's a divide I think needs to be addressed. If folkel would use the correct terminology, I think that would be a good start. Having that established, separate terminology would help create a distinction of space and give room for respectful discussion. I know one thing I've heard mentioned with regard to issues with calling KFFers problematic is that some of them might be actual otherkin or therians who just haven't figured that out yet. And I think having that division of space would actually help that. It would give folkel with voluntary identities - 'linkers - their own space within the broader alterhuman community. If 'linkers were able to interact with the otherkin community in a manner that respected our 'kin identities as real and genuine and not chosen, it would allow for better discourse. And while you'd still get those folks who decide we're nuts for believing our identities to be true, I think that calming of the hostilities that have come largely from KFFers trying to invade 'kin spaces could allow 'linkers who are actually otherkin or therians to be able to discuss and explore that facet of their identities.

I don't know, that's just my two cents. I'm old and first joined the community when therians and otherkin were still very much separate (hence my distinction in my referring to them), but I think that with a respect for boundaries, things could improve greatly. I do have more to say about Firekeeper, but I'm going to make that a separate post. I feel this is probably the outer bounds of this post's topic.

[fictionkinfessions]

the camera cuts to me laying face down in my room with 3 fans pointing at me. its so humid here and it reminds me of home a little bit because- well- I literally lived behind a waterfall on an island that was almost always sunny. i at least have electricity for things like fans and ac now but geeze louise is it uncomfortably hot so so often. i want to cut my hair to help get some of this heat off of me but having my hair raggedy and a bit long gives me kin euphoria since its almost like my fur..... eh at least i can take sun naps with my cats around me like the little monkey's used to be.....

-a very very hot sun wukong, the monkey king, great sage equal to heaven (jttw+lmk, would do full source names but my phones overheating,,)

#🦂🩸

[disposablelimb]

oh i wanted to share a trick i learned recently. it might not work for everyone, especially those who don't think visually or have aphantasia, but i was excited to discover it in myself.

my kintype has a large cannon attached to his right arm. it was a part of my body, not something that could just be taken off; it was made of living cells, nerve endings, and blood, as much an extension of my arm as my hand. naturally it's something i feel phantom sensations for quite frequently.

these sensations were aggravating. i constantly felt that dysphoric "something is missing" alarm and the only way to sort of relieve it was to apply pressure on the area, usually with some kind of band i could wrap around my arm. this was awkward to do and not an ideal solution.

then one night i realized: in headspace, where i take my kintype's form almost exclusively, i've never permanently had my cannon. i've made it appear once or twice to do a specific task, but i've always dismissed it. i think it was because i was worried walking around with a gun stuck to my body would scare the others. i want to project an air of approachability to my headmates, so i must have consciously or otherwise suppressed it.

anyway, i visualized myself with my cannon, "giving" it back to myself permanently. my dysphoric sensations were relieved almost instantly. i went from feeling annoyed over its absence to being giddy that i could at least see and feel it in headspace. i basically tricked my brain into feeling free kin euphoria. i still somewhat miss having it on me physically, but it's much better now.

i'm a headmate in a system, so i already had a headspace and knew how to access it. that's one big reason why i'm not sure this would work for just anyone. i think singlets should be able to do it, i don't see why they wouldn't, but if you don't already have a headspace or similar thing it could be harder.

meditation would help, probably? i don't meditate but i've heard of people using meditation for similar things. actually, people who do meditate might already know about this trick. maybe it's a really super common thing that alterhumans who meditate do. i dunno. but it was a not insignificant discovery for me

[sleepyrosegirl]

Something i never hear anyone talk about when it comes to transitioning is the absolute freedom you get when it comes to the things you like. Things you were passionate about that didn't fit with the societal gender norm were hidden away, deep inside you.

For example, I loved the Mario Princesses as a kid. Obvious crush and some mild gender euphoria 15 year old me didn't have a name for yet, but also i loved their designs and personalities, and when i was at high school and was alone i would consume fanart of Peach and Daisy and Rosalina like i had just made it off a desert island and found my way into the Pizza Hut Buffet table. The one time i set my tablet wallpaper to a drawing of Rosalina, the entire class turned on me frame one. I was the "big, tough, tall guy" i wasn't supposed to like things like that, and everyone made sure i knew. My backgrounds became way more generic for years because of it, because what if they saw again? That shame was brutal, it made me dread going to that class for the rest of the year.

When you transition though, things are a bit different, in two main ways. Being trans is seen, by a large amount of people, as a taboo thing that most cant even wrap their head around. To be trans is to sign yourself up for societal ostracization for the first few years of your life, and then the rest of your life once people cant tell but find out. However, it also helps funnel you into other trans people, who are more accepting of you for who you are, and not what society conditioned us to believe we had to be. In my experience, the combined effect is i can like whatever the fuck i want openly because the people that don't matter to me either don't care or don't have an opinion i value, and the people that do matter to me will either be "oh, cool" or engage openly with it because they love it too.

Essentially, being trans made me more "cringe" but i adore it! Past me would be mortified, but i can openly say i love My Little Pony, one of my favourite romantic pairs is Sonic and Shadow, i instantly lock the female villager anytime i play Mario Kart, i adore the lore of FNAF, and one of the best nights to me involved heavy blankets, a cold breeze, a cup of tea, and a shipfic of RariPie or RariDash because both of my girlfriends show traits relating to Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash, and they both agree, to the point that the character names also double as pet names for all of us. and yes, i still love the Mario princesses. My name is a family name, but its no coincidence that its close to Rosalina.

It can be terrifying being trans, and i will never try to convince anyone its all sunshine and rainbows, but if i can give any reassurance, its that once you transition, what you like isnt nearly as big as a deal. you may be seen as weird for loving bionicles or warrior cats or being a furry or kinning or watching bluey, but you will also be accepted for it, and you wont have to feel shame for it. I used to be so scared of being cringe, now its one of my favourite things about me. I am cringe, but i am finally free

[dragon-in-the-mountains]

hello! this might be a bit of an odd question, but do you do anything to feel species euphoria, or anything of the sort? if not, then at least thank you for ya time, youre cool :] /lh

A few things help me with species euphoria and although I'm still looking for more things to assist with achieving it, these have done pretty good so far for me.

For General Euphoria:

-Eating things my kintypes would eat (or at least as close to it as possible because, yanno, sad sensitive human tummies). So these are things like fish for my light fury kintype, fruits and seeds like my tapu koko kintype, and I even enjoy more heavier meats to connect with my singetail heartype~

-Rollercoasters! So pretty much all of my kintypes fly and I have a season pass to a fairly nearby theme park where rollercoasts are A+++ for getting that "Oh wow I'm actually flying!" feel. Funny enough, The Fury coaster we have is the absolute best thing to connect with my light fury kintype and it's the only thing that really have me that sweet phantom wings shift. I love it.

-Color coordinating. So unlike my kintypes, I have to wear annoying clothes. However, I like to utilize my outfits to kind of have that 'kintype aesthetic'. My light fury kintype is white with very subtle blues and pinks, so anything with a base white is great and blue/pink accessories really brings it altogether. My tapu koko kintype has feathers from the waist down, so any orange-ish skirt or dress kind of gives me that feeling of those feathers. So use your outfits to subtly express your kintype and perhaps get that wonderful euphoria feeling~!

-Audio aesthetics! I love listening to ambience and music, so I often times like playing whatever kintype of mine is strongest at the time. Rivers, waterfalls, and forest sounds for my light fury kintype, and beach sounds for my tapu koko kintype. This is my go-to for ambient sounds that I'll sometimes play alongside of kin-themed music I've chosen that just reminds me of my kintype.

For My Light Fury Kintype:

-Make-up! Glittery eye shadow make-up is my go-to and I also enjoy painting on little white scales around my eyes for that. Nothing drastic, just subtle things.

-Gear! I bought a 3D printed headband that has light fury ears on it, I have light fury hand warmer gloves, and even lil light fury wearable wings (though they're a bit small, so I'll need to look into something new.

-Going to the mountains. There is a beautiful ridge a little ways away from where I live that my spouse and I take trips to and it's a beautiful drive up and around the mountains (my hearthome) and it's almost like flying because you can sometimes actually get above the clouds depending on the weather and the scenery is just amazing.

For My Tapu Koko Kintype

-Summertime! Tapu Koko are tropical creatures, so they live in hot and humid areas. Since where I live gets pretty hot and humid, I can use the season to my advantage!

-The beach. Although any beach I get to go to (when I can) isn't anything like where my kintype lives, it's still something!

(Sorry if this got a little long!)

[gonbitespeople]

uquiz masterlist

https://uquiz.com/uaYG3F - answer some questions and i’ll assign u a daddy from mha

https://uquiz.com/a87wVw - assigning you a batshit freudian concept

https://uquiz.com/UmGTL5 - i assign you one of my ex’s red flags (that i ignored) [nsfw]

https://uquiz.com/jgJa73 - i assign you something insane my ex said to me during our breakup

https://uquiz.com/wfR9Dv - i guess which mental illness you have based on your attack on titan kin

https://uquiz.com/btET6W - judging you based on how similar your music taste is to mine!

https://uquiz.com/idiGdD - pick some anime characters and i’ll give you a song rec!

https://uquiz.com/6LkrLF - pick some clothes and i’ll assign you a demon slayer hashira

https://uquiz.com/kO6Ksh - pick some things from my workplace and i’ll give you a song rec!

https://uquiz.com/ldzQi2 - tell me about them and i’ll give you a feeling

https://uquiz.com/1S85lb - tell me about your middle school experience and i’ll assign you a demon slayer ship

https://uquiz.com/U6axlQ - what are the actual chances of you hooking up with 001 from stranger things

https://uquiz.com/XJ9mCm - which anime antagonist is going to help you ruin the met gala?

https://uquiz.com/HUSrkJ - which character from stranger things s4 are you?

https://uquiz.com/7l7QsS - which female manipulator song are you?

https://uquiz.com/YpPhJb - which of my toxic exes are you?

https://uquiz.com/wrFo7T - which scene from s2 ep.6 of euphoria are you?

https://uquiz.com/G2gv46 - which tokyo revengers boy would develop a middle school crush on you?

https://uquiz.com/zvAvu7 - would eddie from stranger things actually date you

https://uquiz.com/zfS9eP - your government-mandated tokyo revengers kin

[karak9]

day 10 - what have other people said about your nonhuman nature?

I’ve had people say I’m doglike before without knowing I’m dogkin, which makes me SO happy lol. as a kid I would straight up act like a dog a lot and my friends would point it out and say that I am a dog. I can’t help myself so I still kinda act doggy around my friends now who don’t know I’m kin but they just see it as some quirky thing based on my online persona which has “dog” in the name and my pfp being a hellhound, combined with me being a furry I guess (which is funny bc I barely count as a furry). but they go along with my antics like “oh kara is a dog irl, don’t you know?” and lowkey it gives me species euphoria. apparently the best way to get everyone to reaffirm your species identity is to trick them into thinking it’s just some silly thing you do! the moment it becomes serious it’s “weird” apparently lol.

[shadowfae]

(1) So I've had a lot of fickin awakenings over the years, but recently, I had a super intense fickin awakening that just is something that I can't stop thinking about because it makes too much sense and puts so much of my current life into context (also in hindsight I was already kind of acting as if I was that kintype when I was 16, I just didn't know the word to put on it and thought I was just doing it for fun). It also feels the most, idk, right out of all of my kintypes - the kin euphoria

(2) (not necessarily species, but like the feeling I get when I'm called by my name from that life and thinking about how that life was) is kind of overwhelming; I first noticed it when people jokingly called me by the name and I was like 'Wait, this feels weirdly good' and was like 'oh my god I think I am them???' and kinfirmed it relatively quickly compared to other kintypes because it just feels right - the most right out of all my kintypes so far. Is that a normal thing?

That happens. Happened to Poppy, more or less happened to me with Luteia and with Pale, although I had to work all the details backwards to fully understand it.

This is a pretty common awakening story that I hear - you get a lot of "well I don't know what I am but it's Not Fucking This", a lot of "I am vaguely in this ballpark but what exactly", a lot of "well I don't know what chords this is hitting in me but it's hitting them", and like you, a lot of "well shit. There's a name for that. Fuck."

I would still give it a few months, probably not touch the source material, and see if it still feels like you at your core, and what it's like to be what you are day-to-day. That'll help a lot.

[rhydium]

Info dumbo about the StarFinite story?

aright u asked for it anon GET READY [cracks knuckles] this is gonna be long so obligatory cut in 3, 2........

...1!

so the uh, the au! the story!! w/e yall wanna call it! full disclaimer, i only began working on this whole thing a while ago, but it's totally taken over my fukn brain. like, we're talking big hyperfixation hrs. am i cringe for being this invested in my own content? yes? cool i do not Care >:3€

i should also throw it out there real quick that i am kin w/ infinite, n this is actually one of my two canons (both of which are my own aus lmfao wow). i didn't go into it expecting it to be but sfsfsgdfs here we are ig!! for that reason it's got extra importance to me n this definitely contributes to the euphoria i get from it!! it's a lil odd writing ur own canon,,? but i kinda just go w/ the flow!

the au n, the story that i will start Eventually, revolves around infinite n starline (obvi) n it's honestly just ... the tl;dr is big healing momence n, what's this? uh oh sisters !!! they are falling in love 😳😳😳

uhhhh so infinite is an android, made by eggman. that's like, the most notable canon divergence here! super important context to have. i've got a whole big theory on the possibility of sega originally intending infinite to be an artificial being (which i explored in the works for my Other canon too), stemming from not only the scene in forces wherein infinite comments on sonic's "data", but a line of dialogue from tails in one of the last stages of the game where he Literally Says "so this is where eggman built infinite". that ... i mean. that contrasts w/ episode shadow pretty hard don't it?? would explain why that dlc was so rushed, n the comic too. ANYWAY adsfsfs um that's a seperate ramblepost. yeah!!!

they are also agender n use they/them (primarily) as well as he/him!! so i'll be refering to them w/ those pronouns!

after the war, infinite is taken in by the resistance n, instead of being dismantled, they're basically given a chance to rehabilitate themselves. it's agreed that they won't be reprogrammed, as despite the potential risks, it feels wrong to do so; like a violation of their free will, individuality n thinking. if infinite is to be a good person, it's not gonna be bc other ppl recreated their entire personality, it's gonna be bc it's what they themselves truly want. robot ethics idk man!! u can't tell me that sonic n co wouldn't offer this to infinite if they offered it to metal in IDW,,,, i am Standing By This!!!

it's, yknow, a bit rocky, at first. infinite has to really fight the urge to return to eggman (something they already tried once, before the resistance found them; they were cast out). it's a struggle against what they were built to do, against giving into unhealthy familiarity over facing a, while healthier, unfamiliarity. new faces, a new life, turning their back on their mission n creator, it's like, a lot.

they work for/with the sonic crew, rebuilding the world they tore down as deemed fitting justice, being closely monitored for a bit as a natural precaution. as it becomes apparent infinite truly no longer has any ambition to harm others (they don't have much ambition for anything, really), they're then granted more freedom, n start taking on more important missions!! it at least gives them something to do, keeps them occupied. they have issues with dissociation, unreality, whether they're truly a real person bc, well, android. feeling purposeless, n a lack of worth, especially. a need to prove themselves. heavy stuff. i'll kinda go into that a bit more in a sec. their work grounds them, if only temporarily.

n soooooo... IDW comic stuff happens. metal virus time. starline gets kicked out of the empire.

now, as the comics are ongoing, n as this is already an au, there's gonna be divergence, n i must admit i haven't planned out all that yet. there's a lot i have to consider!! infinite being w the resistance/restoration is a big game changer ... tho i Do believe that they were absent, likely on a far out mission during most of the chaos. eggman doesn't know abt them, nor does starline or anyone else other than the sonic crew; n some civilians that recognise them.

i'm not 100% sure of Exactly when it happens, but i think it's just after bad guys, that infinite is sent to locate n bring in starline. it doesn't prove too difficult. there's a whole, starline realising "oh fuck it's you???", some bickering n, the two don't hit it off right away. they're both kinda like. not mentally stable ddgddgdds,,,

so uh. starline ends up essentially going thru the same sorta shit as infinite. careful watch, rebuilding, all that jazz, making sure he can be trusted. he's like... very very lost, quite like infinite is. the world has kinda calmed down, in the meanwhile.

it's at this point i'm gonna go ahead n drop a bit of a ramble i subjected my friends to a while ago, to articulate the way i see the two, n their dynamic together!! i was considering making this it's own post a while ago!

analysing their characters a bit... let's look at starline. Like. so we have this, in bad guys, which SENT ME tbfh;

i feel like it's the moment that triggers starline onto the path he is rn canonically,,, he's clearly like. rly mad n bitter. the core of this?? he wants his work n his efforts to be acknowledged.

he's big angry. still kind of in denial at this stage. he has himself obsessed w/ the idea of making eggman see him as Worthy, that if he just tries hard enough, that'll happen. he's dependent on eggman's validation, n i mean, it's no surprise; he's followed him a Long Time by the sounds of it.

then in the recent issue, hold the fuck up, bc we got, This;

god. my god it's all comin together now homies. this???? this right here??? it is the CLASSIC "i have to do this to prove i'm strong n powerful n smart n worthy n should be respected please Give Me Acknowledgement" ..... n who else is Like That? can u see where im going w/ this?

i think most ppl are aware of infinite's character being extremely indicative of self worth/esteem issues n the need to prove themself, right?? the extreme adversity, repulsion, perhaps even fear toward the idea of being weak. the compulsion to prove otherwise, to show their strength, to become powerful, to conquer to make a point. their theme exudes this same energy as their behaviour in-game; an aggressive attitude, trying to assert themself, while if u rly listen...? the lyrics are actually really sad in places. it reeks of cover up, although composition wise, a v interesting thing to note is a lot of the more telling lyrics are prominent while some of the affirming ones are in the background. indicative of a desire to have their true feelings be heard but caught in a vicious loop?

okay okay that's yet Another different analysis. AHEM.

not to get deep on main (oh who the hell am i kidding that's the point of this entire thing) but i think starline has issues w/ his worth in a similar way to infinite. they both seem to have this need to Prove something, whether it's to others or themselves, n get caught in a toxic spiral of doing worse n worse things for Some kind of validation or acknowledgement. they'll go to really big lengths chasing that, n both of them ultimately sought validation in the wrong place n wrong way.

this is a big part of my starfinite dynamic,, n so, what happens, as they get closer n open up??? we have them BOTH realising together that they don't have to do fuck all to prove anything to anyone. they don't need to do all this to show they're strong n smart n worth something, not to anyone else OR themselves. they're enough as they are. they bond over that shared feeling that they have to do xyz, to prove themselves, n that desire to just finally be acknowledged n appreciated n help each other thru it. to help each other understand that other ppls approval, or lack thereof, doesn't define them, their strength, intelligence, and worthiness.

i feel like they have an interesting parallel between them in like... the above could be taken as a general analysis, but to go more in depth on this au specifically?? ...

starline followed eggman for presumably a long time n it no doubt left him feeling a heavy and deep regret for all that time wasted n spent on an unhealthy path. infinite kinda teaches him that what matters is what he's doing Now n also reminds him that if none of it happened, starline wouldn't have learnt a lot of the serious skills he has. n while starline still feels bad, he also realises himself that, he likely never would have crossed infinite's path if none of it happened. for that reason, he wouldn't take it back.

infinite has only been recently made, on the other hand. they haven't really existed long, yet, but so far their experiences haven't been very positive n it can be .... discouraging. starline sorta, shows infinite their limited experiences w/ the world are a very tiny fraction of what's out there, n things can absolutely change, yes, including for the better; that's the essence of life, a neverending, constant flow of change.

it's a big tale of moving on n letting go, honestly; made easier as they're doing it together. n as they heal n grow, well... these bitches gay. sfshshdgds like, ig that's putting it p bluntly but!! they start to trust each other, understand each other more. as they get to truly know who the other is, they both start developing The Feelings. they're both pretty oblivious n the reveal is totally unknown so far!! yeah, i know, bummer. i suck. boo. adafsfsds however i can say there will be lots of content in the making!! if that soothes the soul! i've got of ideas i hope to bring to life.

ofc there's still a lot of more specific things i haven't covered here so! if y'all want more juice hmu w/ more focused questions but !! this is the overview n i hope it was a decent read now that gave some uhhh! Cool Insight! yea!!! ✌

[tarithenurse]

If I succeed - 15 (final chapter)

Pairing: Geralt of Rivia x fem!Reader Content: Action, angst, gore, badassery, feels, fluff, angst, caring, tiny bit of smut. Probably some errors due to lack of proofing. A/N: So...this is apparently the end of the story. Thanks for the comments and reblogs, it’s been a joy seeing the reactions to each chapter. HUGS!!

15 – Soft Dogs

...   Jaskier   ...

If teeth had been gold coins, the Witcher be rich A monster less monstrous, it whines like a -

No I can’t use that! Annoyed with the lack of progress, Jaskier lazily swirls the wine. Having no problem letting the other two deal with the messy part of things, the bard has decided to spend the waiting time composing a song of the ultimatum Geralt has given the vampire. The Bloody Barter...oh, that’s a niiice title.

Half of the Higher Vampires fell as they had decide among each other which of them got to live – it turns out that such decisions are quickly made by ripping the weaker individuals’ hearts out. Now, a musty smell of burning flesh and rot is lifting to the night sky together with the embers and smoke thanks (again) to the stronger vampires’ hard work. It took little time for them to create a pyre due to the adequate amount of slaves blindly following command. And those bloodsuckers? All are lying in a heap, waiting for their turn to impersonate a roast dropped in the cooking fire.

“Would it have been too much to ask that they smelled more appealing?” Jaskier sighs.

“Hm.”

At least [Y/N] eyes him wearily. “Would it be too much to ask that you help?”

She’s standing by Leif Nordbergar. His own faith is sealed too: like the last few vampires he will have his teeth pulled and hands cut off. But for now, he has remained calm and collected, enforcing the orders upon his kin, never wavering under the feather light touch of the woman’s silvered blade as his children have died and his plan gone up in smoke.

No longer.

With a ferocious snarl, he bashes her arm aside, sending the weapon clattering towards the fire where Geralt is tossing the remains into the flames, and latching on to a portion of bared flesh at the crook of her neck.

Before Jaskier can fully register what is happening, a familiar sword skewers Nordbergar’s face with a sickening sound, causing both monster and woman to fall and the other bloodsuckers to flee.

“[Y/N]!”

The bard can’t see the anything but the broad back of Geralt as he comes to a skidding halt on the ground by the fallen, unceremoniously shoving the vampire aside and ignoring the pained moan from the creature...but he can hear the break in the voice, a panic he had never expected to witness coming from the stoic hero.

“C’mon, my flower...” Each word is pulled from the bottom of the Witcher’s heart, filled with ache and longing as though he fears for a loved one’s life.

Wait. “Ger...what’s...is she...?” Jaskier crawls across the dirt of the cave floor, afraid his legs won’t carry or that he should fall if the fear growing inside him is validated. “She isn’t...”

Rounding the hunched figure, nothing looks real anymore. Not the blood seeping between the fighter’s fingers as he clasps them to [Y/N] neck, not the already ashen skin, not the tears obscuring the yellow eyes. This isn’t happening! They were meant to...and then...the romance! Damnit! There were so many times Jaskier could have said something, made them realize what they were feeling for each other except now...Too late.

“Jask, give me the square vial in my satchel.”

How can a young land deny such a request, meaningless though it may be, when spoken with a voice thick with desperation? He can’t. Scampering in a frenzy, the bard does as ordered and watches in reluctance as the Witcher pulls the stopper and pours a thick white liquid into the woman’s mouth. The scene conjures a ridiculous image in his mind.

“It would take a kiss. In all great ta-”

And there it is: the bard has been stunned into silence as Geralt’s lips softly seals [Y/N]’s mouth, tears still dripping onto her cheeks where the last glow lingers – perhaps out of stubbornness to celebrate how she was in life.

...   Reader   ...

Dazed and confused, your entire world consists of the sensory inputs. Numbness in your limbs. A flaring pain in your neck and chest. A foul, sticky taste in your mouth. But most of all, what you feel are the warmth enveloping you and the gentle begging of lips upon yours.

“Geralt,” you mumble in between returning the kisses.

“Wild flower.”

The taste of his smile is soothing. Reassuring. Curling up slightly to get comfortable in his arms, you are ready to fall asleep then and there knowing that he’ll keep you safe. Someone interrupts the calm, though.

“Wait, WHAT?” You know without looking that Jaskier must be flailing his arms. “That’s IT?! Where’s the moment of clarity? The serendipity?! Are you real- oh!” He must have realized something. “Oh, I see! And how long has this been going on? When did you decide ‘Let’s not tell Jaskier, let’s make him look like a fool.’ Haha! Well joke’s on you! I’ve known from the beginning that...that...oh fuck it.”

Disgruntled, he returns to his seat only to have faith mock him as it turns out the wine has been spilled.

You don’t care. At least not right now.

“You’re a mess, wild flower.”

“Guess you get to clean me up when we get a chance then.”

You can feel the soft of him humming in agreement when he kisses you again, though the sound is drowned by a Jaskier,

“Oh, come ON!”

...   Geralt   ...

The trio is tired as they start their descent. Jaskier is still moping about the surprising turn of events but at least he does so quietly for the fear of the wyverns abandoning the hunt on the few vampires that fled – apparently the creatures hold a grudge. Similarly, the Witcher is on edge, his eyes darting to the shadows that are beginning to lose their hold in the greying dawn. His sword is drawn as a necessary precaution as much as for the sake of [Y/N] whom he carries on his back. She is too weak to walk still, caught somewhere between unconsciousness and sleep save for the few times the jostling movement stirs her and she releases a puff of hot breath against Geralt’s neck, sending shivers down his spine.

The sound of birds have accompanied them for a while when they reach the remains of the temporary camp where Roach greets them with a soft, worried whinny muzzling at them all in turn though paying special attention to the prone woman.

“She’s fine,” Geralt mutters, silently appreciating the horse’s gentleness.

“Yeah. Well. I’m still in shock.” The bard might complain, but his genuine concern returns straight away. “Is she...how long will she be like...that?”

Who knows. “The potion draws upon her own energy to rekindle her life. It’s taxing on the body.”

...

The sun is setting on the other side of the valley which is stretched out below like a sea of greens and golds, inviting and enticing with the promise of gentle travels and warmer winds. Still, they have made decent headway, distancing themselves from the threat of vampires and wyverns alike to the point that Geralt decides to make camp not far from a stream running past the first decent thicket.

It does not take a lot of convincing from Jaskier before the Witcher half assists, half carries the unnaturally weak woman towards the waters and once there (hidden from the bard’s eyes and ears), he seats her with the back against a large rock heated by the sun. Stripping, methodically pealing off the black armour, he places everything within reach on the bank before turning to [Y/N].

“Hmm.”

She stirs, understanding what is going on, as he frees her off the bloodied clothes but accepts when he gently swats her hands away that her attempt to help largely is a hindrance. Leaning against him, the large man feels the softness of her curves and the slowly returning strength in the arms that embrace him.

“This is...aaall backwards.” Despite the resignation in the voice, she still smiles.

“Hmm?”

A bit of deviousness bubbles to the surface, ghosting over Geralt’s skin together with her lips when she leans in to whisper. “I’m normally the one saving you.”

Turning to capture her lips, he lets the final piece of garment drop to the ground in favour of picking her up. So...giving. Neither for the first nor the last time does the Witcher envy Jaskier’s skill with words. The resentment at his own lack of skills is willingly swept away by the frigid water which he backs them into because the gasps escaping [Y/N] brings other things to mind, generously aided by the stiffening of her body which she presses against him in the hope of borrowing his heat – a heat that swells and grows as his hands start sweeping off the filth.

“Fuck me sideways, it’s cold!”

He quirks a brow at the exclamation, catching the glimpse of realization on her features. “Don’t worry, wild flower. I’ll make sure you don’t freeze for long.”

Continuing the ministration, Geralt makes sure no inch of skin is left unclean, fingers adeptly rubbing and stroking until the gasps due to the cold turn to soft moans of pleasure, stolen out of the evening air by his mouth. Still, afraid the low temperatures might get to her he begins to walk back to the shore, only stumbling once when she repositions in his arms and manages to sheath the head of his cock into her burning heat.

Falling to his knees, how can he not worship the woman on his lap? Slick with water droplets like precious stones scattered across her skin, she fits effortlessly around him, pliable beneath his hands as she allows him to control the pace by lifting and lowering her with a strong grip on her ass. [Y/N]’s breasts are within reach, nipples perked and begging for the attention of a tongue as she arches from the first spark of euphoria.

Don’t hold back. Never hold back.

“Lo-ove you, Gera-a-alt.”

Let me take care of you. “And I...I love you.”

[savage-rhi]

what would higgs do if gene was like unavailable relationship-wise because we all need jealous Higgs in our lives ok

@avenged-nightmare YO. You made me think of this whole drabble when I was in the car doing errands. I think you’re right we need some jelly Higgs 😂💙

Higgs was never the type to regret much, but he could feel it twist and coil in his chest as he watched the locals in town dance to music a small band was playing. As his eyes scanned the horizon, looking over everyone’s happy-go-lucky demeanor, his gaze settled on Gene. Under most circumstances, he would have been amused watching her having fun with folks. Higgs wasn’t a social butterfly, hadn’t been for three years since he went into hiding after Amelie tried to destroy the universe and all life in it, but Gene made it interesting for him. That was until Nick came into the picture. 

Higgs was beating himself up, watching Gene and Nick from afar laughing at some sort of joke before they started dancing. The two couldn’t keep their hands off each other even if their lives depended on it. 

Since Higgs and Gene decided to rest in a settlement after escaping MULEs and needed to ration up for the delivery Eastbound, she had been with Nick the entire time. He was local, an ex-porter turned carpenter in a world where BTs no longer dwelled on earth and civilization could rebuild. A young guy in his late thirties, dark features, a muscled body, had his shit together unlike someone else. Nicks energy outshined Higgs’s charisma, and Gene took to him like a moth to a flame. There was chemistry, even if Higgs dismissed it. 

It shouldn’t have bothered Higgs. Gene could mingle with whoever she wanted. She had needs and Higgs respected that, but that didn’t tamper down how pissed off he was knowing they were joined at the hip the last three days. His mind stupidly wandered over thoughts that further aggravated his stress.  His blood constricted as he caught those little teases of the assumption his brain had conjured about the relationship brewing between Gene and Nick. 

Higgs squinted his eyes, glaring menacingly as he noticed Nick’s arms wrap around Gene’s waist, pulling her closer to him while the music went from vibrant to sensual. His blood boiled. Higgs was tempted to use the last of his remaining powers to put Nick in his place right then and there. 

“How are you holding up?” One of the locals asked Higgs, making him clear his throat as he tried to gain his composure. 

“Pardon?” Higgs asked. 

“You look like you’re close to going on a killing spree,” the man chuckled, shaking his head as he looked in the direction of Gene and Nick. The two were laughing as they swayed, their bodies perfectly synched with the music rising through the crowd. 

“You know, if you want to impress your lady friend, you’re going about it the wrong way.” The man stated as Higgs furrowed his brows, looking over him like he was a lunatic. 

“Ya’ll got the wrong idea, we ain’t an item. I’m just the bodyguard.” Higgs said, crossing his arms. In turn, the local shot Higgs a look that screamed he knew a liar when he saw one. Higgs growled, shaking his head as he looked away and back at the pair. 

“Sure doesn’t explain the crap you’ve pulled these last few days trying to one-up Nick at everything when your porter gal comes around. The arm-wrestling match, the banter, you sabotaging one of Nick’s buildings on purpose, trapping the poor guy in a ditch, trying to knock him down when he was on the portapotty before your gal caught you red-handed and bitched you out in front of everyone and their kin,” the local laughed, slapping Higgs’s shoulder as he shook his head. 

“Call it whatever you want, people can see through your bullshit.”

“Why don’t you fuck off and leave me be?” Higgs said firmly, his voice low as he looked down at the local, who shot his hands up in surrender. 

“Alright, alright, don’t get your panties in a twist if he goes in for the kill tonight cause you were too stubborn to say anything about it. I had an idea to help your little predicament, but I guess you’re too proud.” He smiled at Higgs, genuinely, then began to leave. 

Higgs sighed, rubbing his face before he hollered.

“I’ll bite! What the hell ya had in mind?” 

“Thought you’d never ask!” 

 The music settled down while the band adjusted the set. The local shoved a guitar in Higgs’s arms while he bs’d with the lead singer for a moment, talking on Higgs’s behalf while Higgs looked at the crowd. No one was paying attention, too busy enjoying their drinks and chatter to notice what was going on at the front. He eyed Nick and Gene who were taking a break, drinking together. Higgs felt his fingertips squeeze the neck of the guitar, watching how genuine Gene’s smile looked while Nick’s larger than life persona engulfed her attention. 

“Okay! You’re lucky I know the band. You get one song. Make it count,” The local chimed in, snapping Higgs out of his trance as he swallowed.

“What?”

“Haven’t you been paying attention? What song are you gonna play? You said you were good at guitar, no?” 

“Yeah, I am but--”

“Don’t get cold feet, you’re this close to serenading your girlfriend.”

“She’s not my girl you two-faced fuckin’ shit weasel--!”

“And you’re on!” 

The local grinned from ear to ear and backed off with the band members. The focus was on Higgs the moment the crowd noticed there was only one person on stage. Higgs would have given anything to punch not only the smug look but thick mustache off the guy's face as he gestured for Higgs to follow through. 

“Fuck me,” Higgs murmured under his breath, gently strumming the strings. He took one last glance over the small waves of people, seeing Gene wasn’t paying mind to anyone but Nick and his shit-eating grin. He could put a cupie doll to shame as far as Higgs was concerned. 

Taking in a deep breath, Higgs sat down on the stool the singer had been using and started to hum. His fingers tested the waters of the instrument, strumming a soft melody as his body began to move along with the beat. 

His brain was fighting with itself, wanting to focus on his envy while the other half debated on what to sing. He had no time to prepare and had never performed in front of a large crowd before. When Higgs was a porter before he threw his lot in with Homo Demens, he played here and there for associates during breaks but that was the extent of showing his talents and hobbies off. 

It was now or never. 

“Unkempt hair, unbroken gal. Strong as the rocks cuttin’ her feet. Never seen somethin’ like you. No, no, I never did. Strange creature, what are you doin’ in an untamed land?” The words broke through Higgs’s lips, voice steady like water smoothing the edges of a rock over time. 

“She crawled up the mountain to me. Her voice soft and steady, I-I don’t know why I never saw stars until that day. Those long, long days. Somethin’ about the way your hair falls in your face brings me back to a place where I could run, and never look back again. Too much spirit for me to take, she’s gone again, free of me free of sin.” Higgs closed his eyes, letting the instrument and its rustic tune speak words that couldn’t be spoken, only felt. He didn’t sense the crowd, not even Gene and Nick--too enraptured in the memories he had of when they had first met.

“Those eyes wide, that smilin’ shine makes me make a beast of myself. Come back to me, come back to the mountain and be with me. Her voice soft and steady, I-I don’t know why I never saw stars until that day. Those long, long days.” There was a pain Higgs allowed to come through his voice, his renewed feelings for life clashing with old ideals and bad habits he had spent years in hiding trying to reconcile. 

“Crawl up the mountain to me. Just a while longer, no-no-no,” Higgs briefly opened his eyes, and he swore in a single split second, Gene was staring right at him. Peering at a past reflection of Higgs that once upon a time begun to quit surviving and started to live when he first became a porter. He’d never admit how much he loved that. Not even to her. 

“Little warrior, crawl back to my mountain and be with me.” Higgs finished, feeling euphoria push down the ill feelings he carried as he received applause. He was quick to let the band go back to their routine, not wanting to steal their thunder despite how much his inner child was relishing at the moment--feeling like a rockstar for a few seconds. 

He needed air. He needed it fast. 

Higgs let out a deep sigh of relief when he exited the huge tent. His fingers shook, carding through his hair for comfort. In hindsight, he probably embarrassed himself, but Higgs wasn’t going to lie, it was beautiful getting a taste of what he could have done with his sad life. 

“Hey,” Gene’s voice broke his train of thought after a while. Higgs cleared his throat, shooting her a quick smile.

“Hey yourself darlin’,” Higgs mused. His face felt warm as she smiled back.

“I didn’t know you wrote your own material,” Gene laughed as Higgs grinned briefly, giving a playful smirk.

“You never asked.”

“That’s fair.” Gene nodded. 

“Where’s Nick?” Higgs asked, looking over Gene’s shoulder before she shrugged. 

“Probably getting more beers,” 

Higgs could sense a disturbance in Gene’s voice, and a twinge of guilt began to sink his gut. As much as he was a jealous asshole, and had been a dick to both of them, deep down Higgs didn’t want to take away Gene’s fun. He knew he was a selfish bastard, realizing it even more so than before.

“He’s probably lookin’ for you. You’re like a mother duck and he can’t stop paddlin’ towards ya.” Higgs said sarcastically.

Gene snorted, shaking her head. 

“I don’t care. I’m sure he’s got plenty of others he can entertain.” 

“Guy’s a-walkin' distraction. Hell, I thought I was a peacockin’ creep way back when. I see what folks admire about Nick.” Higgs chuckled. 

Gene smiled slightly, before taking in a breath. “Can I ask you a personal question?”

“If you’re ready for a personal answer,” Higgs smirked. “Shoot.”

“That was us--wasn’t it? The song.”

Whatever grandeur persona Higgs had been putting on during this conversation lept out a window and dived headfirst into an ocean. He was silent for a long time, almost to the very second where Gene prepared to change the subject.

“It was you,” Higgs murmured. “It was all you.” 

Gene’s mouth formed into a grin that made Higgs’s knees feel heavy. Nonetheless, he realized he must’ve embarrassed her doing that whole stunt, much like he did the past few days terrorizing both her and Nick. He was surprised when he felt Gene’s lips on his cheek, her nose softly nudging his skin. 

Gene shrugged keeping her gaze down, smiling big as she walked off to their camp. Higgs watched with a look of awe on his face before he murmured a proud yes to himself. 

He didn’t have the balls to admit his growing attachment to her, the mere porter he bumped into a year ago, but Higgs owned the little victory. It was enough for him. 

**A link to my ko-fi account. If you enjoy my content and want to support me getting my monthly medication for fibromyalgia and arthritis, I would be eternally grateful. It is NOT a requirement however! All my work is free to read!**

[aroworlds]

Those With More, Part One

When Mara Hill's magic results in her brother's impossible, wondrous transition, of course Suki wants to know how she did it! What if Sirenne's magic workers can help others find euphoria? What if this magic can heal Suki's hands—or at least lessen her pain? But Mara, distrustful of priests after their failure in protecting Esher, won't share her power.

A senior priest must bear responsibility, but Suki suspects her problems lie deeper than lack of oversight, and her reluctance to discuss her aromanticism with a woman who needs support only proves it. Would she have preserved Mara's faith and Esher's health if she hadn't first avoided revealing herself to her aromantic kin? If she'd faced their expectations that she shoulder their pain and grief as well as her own?

Suki has lived her life by the Sojourner's second precept, but how does she serve when she doesn't have more to give��and never will?

Contains: A disabled, non-partnering allo-aro woman struggling with the expectations of her young, fledgling aromantic community; an autistic, aromantic priest reconsidering their expectations of their community's leader; and an allo-aro woman in need of support as she struggles with her non-partnering, aro-ace brother's illness. 

Content Advisory: Please expect many references to or depictions of aro antagonism, allo-aro antagonism, amatonormativity, familial abuse, mental illness, suicidal ideation, death, gender dysphoria, chronic pain, ableism and ageism. This piece contains non-detailed, non-specific reference to a character's past suicide attempts. 

Length: 4, 409 words (part one of two). 

Note: This is the last story in my Suki mini-series, but it refers to characters introduced in The Sorcerous Compendium of Postmortem Query and is best read following the stand-alone story What Makes Us Human. You can find links to all on my pinned post or on this Tumblr master post.

Non-romantic love, to Suki, serves a similar role as the Sojourner or any other god: a fine concept in theory, but while she respects others’ need for a guiding framework, she can only nod vaguely at love’s existence.

***

They talk in a west-facing corner of the inner gardens, the sun edging towards the valley’s cradling ridgelines. Suki sits with careful stillness, resting her bony wrists and fingers in her lap. Her companion, Mara Hill, twirls a lock of dark hair around her finger with the ease of a woman unaware of her movements’ toll. Few people reach the ends of their lives untouched by disability, but Suki still aches to watch others take their youthful ability for granted … even if Mara’s restless fidgeting suggests anxiety as much as mind-type.

Suki was an artist once, albeit not the kind of craftswoman draped in the world’s renown. She built wonder from bare ingredients. She made the needed and the practical from scraps of thread and fabric. She took her hands’ ability to knead and shape for granted, revelling in others’ appreciation, until the pain built to a degree even she couldn’t deny. Given the option, she’ll always sit in her garden with her knitting needles or workbasket, making.

She can’t reconcile herself to hours spent halting her fingers and wrists in too-often-futile hope of preserving later use.

“Must I explain, one trans woman to another, why we want this?” Suki works to ease her voice, to sound possessed of patience and released of jealousy. “We … dabble, in spells and medicines, parlour tricks to lessen anguish, but this … it can be freedom. When wrought correctly.”

Now, Suki sees little sense in seeking such a transition: she’s had time to forge an accord with her body and gender. If said accord holds a touch of the defiant, rebellion nonetheless sheltered her through aching moments of feeling her body less hers than a chafing suit she’ll endure for this life. Gender, though, only began the war of Suki’s selfhood separating from her own blood and breath, and it long ago won second place on her list of impossible wishes.

What if Mara’s magic can do more than change a body’s sexual characteristics?

What if it can ease Suki’s hands, heal her knees, return to her the gift of unthinking movement?

Mara shifts her hands to twist the untied lace dangling from her bodice. She’s a handsome woman: tall and long-limbed, her cheekbones sharp enough to slice hard cheese. Full lips, wide skirts and a waist-length sable braid soften the flat planes of her face, shoulders and hips. Suki can’t call Mara beautiful, but she may have used the word “ethereal” if Mara didn’t also bare her haphazard humanity: hair falling out of its pins, scores of grass stains marking her petticoats, a waistcoat absent any matching buttons, a dress ten years out of style knotted up to bare clashing stockings and scuffed boots. Life with Mara, Suki suspects, is no small amount interesting, but one needn’t fear from her airs or pretentiousness.

This conversation, regardless, comes none the easier.

“I know you understand,” Suki says, attempting a beseeching gentleness. “How can’t you?”

“It’s a secret.” Mara stares at Suki with a distressingly direct gaze, as though hoping to emphasise her sincerity through eye contact. “Handed down from witch to witch. I’ve sworn oaths to the living and the dead. I can’t. And I won’t.”

Mara Hill is also a terrible liar.

“You insist this isn’t sorcery. It’s witchcraft—a type of magic that can be taught! Why, then, can’t you teach us? Can’t you imagine what we could do, if we could study and understand it?”

Just as Suki regrets such desperation-fuelled bluntness, flashes of brown, red and grey show through the eucalypts and fern-encrusted rockery dividing the outer garden from an interior courtyard. Only two other people in Sirenne stand tall enough to be seen over said wall of rocks, and neither looks towards her. Moll, their face set in their accustomed expressionlessness and their iron-grey hair scraped back in a braid, walks close by their companion: a man with Mara’s cheekbones, his gaze distant and his face cavernous. While health warms her sienna skin, even when moistened by anxiety and dappled sunshine, his sallow complexion provokes no kind adjectives.

Esher Hill is the gaunt, walking embodiment of the nightmare Sirenne’s priests struggle to dispel when discussing medicines and spells—a man who appears drugged and ensorcelled into a puppet-like lifelessness, a state absent all vitality.

His sister caused, provoked or necessitated most of it.

Most.

Like too many guests, Mara brought her brother to the monastery when absent solutions in her home village’s offerings of lay priests, physicians, magic workers and well-meaning family members—a last, desperate resort. Esher wasn’t happy or healthy, but he had muscle and energy enough that Suki decided his taciturnity somewhat intentional. He stopped to pet Sirenne’s horses; he allowed their cats to settle on his lap. He scowled when faced with chattering acolytes. He reacted.

Mara’s power stripped his bones of flesh and tissue in the quest to craft him an almost-cis body. New organs, somehow, grew; others withered and sloughed away like an unused cocoon. Such impossibility should be a miracle, but can one fairly call a tempest that devoured his body and hammered his mind miraculous?

What if, though, this transition becomes a goal identified and worked towards with desire, preparation and consent? What if a patient understands what lies ahead? Can one then cope with magic’s trauma, a difficult moment endured in travelling a chosen road? Or what if they narrow the scope to one change, one part of the body?

Will she then see a butterfly, bloodied but eager to take flight?

Will she then be able to live her last years still wielding her pastry brushes and knitting needles?

“It’s dangerous!” Mara follows Suki’s gaze towards the rockery, her lips pressed together in pale, thin lines. “Can’t you see that? Shouldn’t you?” Her husky voice sharpens like a blade on a grindstone. “And what makes you think I should trust you with it? Or would?”

Suki bites her lip while counting backwards from ten. Her tongue runs to tart even when voicing second and third thoughts, and she fears she offers little sympathy when she finds something worth speaking: “But less dangerous in better circumstances? If he knew, was prepared, agreed, expected…”

If a witch doesn’t work her magic behind the priests’ backs, but that’s less Mara’s fault than Sirenne’s.

The question remains: if a witch fears dysphoria's ache the cause of her brother’s depression, why didn’t she offer this magical transition weeks or months earlier? Why didn’t she gain Esher’s prior agreement and approval? Why did Mara bother to take him to a monastery? That she wrought this after Sirenne’s failures dashes Suki’s hopes: Mara’s supposed witchcraft is sorcery, unpredictable and unreachable. Nothing more than a panicked, desperate deal made with demons, a grave power Sirenne can’t replicate ... even should a priest be fortunate enough to make the same bargain with the same brace of demons.

If demons routinely offered such vast power, how many trans people wouldn’t sell their soul for a body suiting their nature?

“Prepare? After you made me—” Mara’s voice cracks like thick, shadowed frost under morning’s first footstep. “If there were anywhere else, if I thought … we wouldn’t be here!”

Suki shifts in her chair, her hands and feet aching as though a purple-black bruise engulfs her joints. Is it a wild, ridiculous joke that her body throbs as if beaten while showing no wound to draw sympathy? Why must a black eye or nasty scrape provoke sorrow while injuries or illnesses unable to heal garner, at best, a mute acceptance? Why do people following the Sojourner’s path lack comprehension in the second precept’s broadness? Why must a priest spend her day asking questions lacking comforting answers?

Because Amadi’s ideal became her god: question.

Mara’s desperation, too, deserves an answer.

“We failed,” Suki says, her own throat roughening. “We failed to serve Esher’s needs. A man who has too long had those needs unmet, and believes he has failed in even wishing his needs met, reacted to this lack in despair. There’s nothing irrational in that.” She wants to smile, because she can’t not know the rationality behind such a conclusion, but Mara won’t understand. She doesn’t know about Mama Lewis. “We went over our changes with you, for we can’t allow this to again happen. I ask you sincerely: are we now doing something inadequate? Are you unhappy with Moll or Thanh’s service? Within the limits of our resources and ability, what aren’t we doing that you think we should? How can we better help Esher? Help you?”

Suki didn’t assign Esher’s first priest. She didn’t speak or condone the words that gave him reason to lose the last shred of a trust abraded by too many authoritative people. She didn’t know why he needed consideration in the priest given to guide him; the unasked question wasn’t hers to speak. Ignorance, nonetheless, rings like an intimate, personal failure.

Not a failure Sirenne’s priests share as a collective whole.

A failure, terrible and tragic, in Suki.

Could she have tried harder to serve as an aromantic priest?

Mara purses her lips, her green skirt clenched in tight-knuckled hands. “He’s … always been. A little. But only in the last few years was he so distant, and I don’t think … he wasn’t bad like this until after the Thinning and Benjamin.”

Suki takes Mara’s non-answer as indication that, at least for the moment, she has no objection—and perhaps that’s a victory, but what good is winning when the war shouldn’t be fought? Suki sighs, shaking her head, as Moll and Esher move past the gap in the trees, vanishing behind canopy and granite outcrops. Only her garden, in its art-defying muddle of ferns, trees, mushrooms and bright-coloured orchids, remains—and while, ordinarily, such clashing shades appeal to her, today those greens and reds feel another mockery, a symbol and privilege undeserved.

Even when Moll gave her the opportunity to address her neglect, she took retreat in her brusque manner and authority, confident that a conscientious priest wouldn’t examine the shallowness of her answer. She offered reassurance, solved a problem, revealed herself in the most cursory of ways and fled with fears and feelings still buried within her aching bones.

Question.

If she considers god her ideal and Amadi’s ideal her god, why didn’t she?

“Benjamin is your partner, yes?” Suki shifts her left ankle, thinking even a circumlocutory attempt to build rapport better than another futile attempt at questioning. “May I ask what happened at the Thinning? You needn’t answer.”

Mara’s body softens, although she doesn’t ease her grip on the skirt. “Have you had … family, friends, come visiting? After they … pass?”

For all that belief in the Sojourner’s path embodies the human struggle to conceptualise, negotiate and accept death, hir followers still deal in euphemisms. Family come visiting. Bad like this. Suki, in the outspoken rebelliousness of a would-be priest, spent a year into her novitiate chanting “death, death, death” at her mirror before bed, just to prove that death isn’t a black-cloaked reaper summoned upon saying hir name.

Such boldness failed her, of course, when Mama Polly passed.

“There’s always spirits flickering about, but few speak.” Suki barks a hoarse laugh. “A man who desired me and told me that he’d never have broken his neck if I’d first wed him. Both my mothers. Mama Lewis talks too much.”

Such events aren’t for Suki as unusual an occurrence as they are for the non-necromantic laity, but the conversations between the returning dead and the priest who offered guidance on their paths through the life now history aren’t for outsiders. There’s always a few, often those who died in the last year and haven’t yet had their connections to this world stretch thin, who come back to speak rather than observe. Sometimes those spirits come burdened with regret and recrimination; sometimes they express gratitude or relief. Death, drawing closer with every breath, grants the living a night a year where one must look into hir shadow and fearlessly accept, even celebrate, hir company.

She’s none too fond of Mama Lewis’s bitter postmortem moaning, but a salt circle and poker at least puts paid to that nonsense.

Respecting the sacred covenant of life and death doesn’t mean tolerating abuse.

“Really?” Mara blinks, shaking her head. “She came to me, with other dead relatives and villagers—my Aunt Rosie. I think she knew I needed to talk to her. She told me that I don’t have to romantically love a girl to want or love a girl, and they told me all the ways they didn’t love, which made me feel that … I could talk to the woman I wanted. So I did.” A sweet warmth softens and curves her lips, but the speed with which Mara flattens them suggests she isn’t easy with smiling in current circumstances. “And we’re together, now. But Esh … he doesn’t want anyone, and that should be fine, but maybe … it wasn’t good for him to see me and Ben happy.”

She leans forwards, coughing, before wiping her palm on her skirt.

Suki clenches her hands, fighting to ease her expression before Mara catches her face. It rankles, to say the least, when someone happy in an intimate partnership—however non-romantic!—suggests that those without must be broken in their loneliness. How can she ignore the reflections of Mama Lewis, one shape of expected love or partnership replacing another in the same unyielding structures and assumptions? Mama Lewis cut and hewed the shape of Suki’s illnesses, not another’s possession of something she doesn’t want!

Non-romantic love, to Suki, serves a similar role as the Sojourner or any other god: a fine concept in theory, but while she respects others’ need for a guiding framework, she can only nod vaguely at love’s existence.

Anger, though, doesn’t explain the terror stiffening her body.

“Or after seeing you find a less-conventional form of the coupled happily-ever-after,” she says in a voice perilously close to “glacial”, “your kin and village increased their expectations that he should find the same?”

Mara stares, her lips parted as if in surprise or hurt. “I … Uncle Sascha would say that, I guess. So would the Fisher sisters.” She sighs, frowning. “I don’t know. Just that he got worse after Benjamin … right when I thought he’d get better, because Aunt Rosie said that we’re … real, human. Just a less-known ordinary. Even if we didn’t know the specific word before Moll said it.”

“Only your brother knows why,” Suki says in the mild, self-evident comment a guiding priest says to people having difficulty observing—or permitting themselves to observe—the truth before them. The mild, self-evident comment a priest, who doesn’t fear the direction of this conversation, may say to a guided guest. “So why bother yourself with if I didn’t non-romantically pair up with a girl, maybe he wouldn’t have tried to kill himself drivel? Can you go back in time to not pair up? No! Nor should you halt your life just in case it may be the reason!”

Mara’s half-raised eyebrows suggest that she doesn’t agree.

“Girl, the world tells you in so many ways that you shouldn’t non-romantically partner. After all that repetition, you’re inclined to find excuses to obey that! Keeping my brother from attempting suicide feels more reasonable to you than most puerile objections, but is this reasonable? Are you helping him by thinking this? Or are you obliging everyone who thinks you shouldn’t exist by undermining your partnership with misplaced guilt?”

She refrains from mentioning the insult in anyone’s assuming that depression must be provoked by the existence of someone else’s intimate partnership, as though such relationships are so fundamental one must sicken in witnessing another’s contentment! She refrains, unable to think of anything that doesn’t sound like an observation based in betraying knowledge. Shouldn’t they focus less, anyway, on Mara’s limited understanding of non-partnering people and more on the real issue at hand: her trying to craft another impossible?

Even if it means making herself the cause, Mara seems set on wishing together a world possessed of perfect assurance that her brother won’t again attempt suicide.

Sorcery is by far an easier art, but that’s no comforting truth.

Mara glances at Suki’s belt, as if in need of reassurance that she talks to a senior priest. “Are you, uh … well...”

“Am I what, girl? Don’t cluck!”

Mara swallows, stumbling over the word likely strange to her voice. “Aro … aromantic? Because you sound like…”

Aromantic.

A word in a book, discovered by accident.

A word feared, weighted down by her obligation and pain.

A word unsaid, a man nearly dying of its absence.

“Aromantic and allosexual. I like men for bedding. I don’t like partnerships.” Suki speaks with the casualness that shaped her words when speaking to a distressed priest in a vegetable garden, words said now as if they’ll make up for their silent past. Words said devoid of her terror. “I have enough of one with myself.”

She waits, wondering if Mara will subject her to the young, abled trick of past tense, as though sexuality must be Suki’s history and not her present or future. Something accessible only to the hale and young, presuming her sense of another’s sexual attractiveness withers along with her body? Or will Mara grimace, disgusted by the notion of an elderly, disabled woman whose sexuality hasn’t “decently” become distant memory?

She waits for the accusation: why didn’t you say this before?

“So you understand … why it’s … hard, to live unknowing who you are and what you want, what the words are?” Mara’s brow furrows, her hesitant speech giving way to a spurting rush of feeling: “That’s what Aunt Rosie gave us that night, but it came so late. I lived for so long not knowing, without a word, without knowing it an option! That it had a name! And that hurts, even now I have what I didn’t know I wanted or could want. For so long, I didn’t know! Maybe … that’s it, for Esh, the hurting? Or part of it? How can’t it be…?”

How old is she? Twenty-five? Thirty at most? One needn’t own precision in telling another’s age to know that Mara’s adulthood, outside of accident or illness, stands years distant from death’s shadow. Suki draws a sharp breath, fighting to swallow the tart, quill-bristled question clogging her throat: And when do you think I found the word, girl?

Amadi gifted her the other-shape-of-normal permissiveness, but ey died unknowing of the word describing them both.

Ey died, leaving her alone in a world where she feels outdated and unwanted, where everyone sharing in the known power of the word aromantic can’t comprehend her pain but expects her to, immediately and easily, carry theirs.

Mara needs her pain acknowledged, to have someone confirm that possession of a happy non-romantic partnership can’t and shouldn’t erase ignorance’s lingering hurts. Someone who acknowledges that such bruises are long in the fading but one can still build a life worth living. Someone who reflects understanding and the vital, powerful sense of aromantic siblinghood. Someone who can give what she needs and deserves.

Why must Suki provide it? Why not Moll? Why not anyone else?

“Yes.” She swallows, shifting her throbbing hands, fighting to keep the growl from claiming her voice. Another failure! “We all feel the … betrayal, the years lost to ignorance. Why didn’t I know? You’ll have times of hurting, of struggling, of wondering what could have been if your family knew, your friends, your neighbours. When something isn’t yet recognised or accepted, despite being extant and common … pain, for those of us ahead of that coming, isn’t optional. You aren’t alone in that.”

Suki isn’t gentle. Increased social permissiveness towards the crotchety manner discouraged in children and younger adults stands as one of age’s rare benefits. Mama Polly joked that Suki was set to be a grandmother while still a maiden, but Mama Lewis—curse her long-dead soul—didn’t laugh. Even after half a century gone, Suki can still recite her clipped lectures, delivered in the hope that decreased acidity and increased sweetness will help her daughter find the happiness packaged in a loving, romantic partnership.

Mama Lewis’s shade, returning for her once-yearly lecture, still hopes that her now-elderly daughter will soften enough to allow love into her heart.

It should amuse Suki that such gentleness is now demanded whenever she dares reveal herself as aromantic.

Mara nods, her lips pressed together, her jaw tight, her glistening eyes angled towards her lap.

“It could be part of your brother’s feelings. It could be something else. But this second-guessing of his motivations doesn’t help you or him!” Suki changes the subject for Mara’s sake: for a woman fighting to keep from breaking down before a near-stranger. “Where does this get you but exhaustion? You’re only going to chase your guesses around and around until you’re a dog barking at a rat behind a grate—only to finally spot a different rat gnawing on his brain, realise you’ve been barking at this one for no reason, and there’s actually a score of invisible rats feasting on his poor, bloody brain. Does this help you see those invisible rats? Does this barking help your health, girl?”

She absolutely, assuredly isn’t changing the subject because Suki fears the explosion of her own anger and hurt while discussing aromanticism.

Question. How can she?

Mara’s eyes meet Suki’s face in the bulging stare had by someone imagining rodents chewing on grey matter. “R—rats?”

“Chewing brain rats. You want pretty metaphors for a bloody illness? Don’t talk to a priest, then. Pretty metaphors leave people telling themselves depression isn’t illness, just something that can be shouted, shamed or pressured into abeyance. I don’t hold for that.” Suki sighs and attempts to ease Mara’s shock, hating her bluntness’ sharp, gleaming edges. Is she trying to hurt Mara, wounds delivered in return for those unintentionally given? “I know you want to help your brother. You’ll do more for him by asking what he needs, and listening to what he tells you even if it’s ‘nothing’, instead of chasing every rat in the hope they’re the ones eating him. There’s too many rats, girl! When he’s able to cope with your asking, ask. Leave handling the rats to us—because that’s what we’ll teach him.”

If only they’d thought to ensure Mara realised this before she attempted to bludgeon the rat labelled “dysphoria”, but who imagined a village witch owning such power or ability?

Mara nods: perhaps accepting such advice, perhaps planning to avoid future commentary on what she thinks provoked her brother’s attempt. Her silence is, though, more honest than immediate agreement. Better that than false approval or out-of-hand rejection, especially when she hasn’t agreed to a guiding relationship between priest and guest. Especially when Suki has already stepped further over that line than is wise for a priest struggling with herself! Anyway, hasn’t she gleaned enough to make a solid guess—that Mara sold her soul to purchase Esher’s transition? What more need they discuss?

She isn’t a powerful witch keeping her magic a solemn, oath-bound secret.

She’s a frightened sister doing everything she can to hold her brother into life.

Is that another rat set to gnaw on Esher’s brain? Is that, as much as distrust or fear of priestly reaction to sorcery, reason for her denial? Does she seek to keep this secret from Esher and the priests involved in his care to avoid making yet another rat? Does Moll realise this?

Is Mara all that different from Suki herself?

“I’m sorry that I can’t help you.” Mara stands and bows in the abrupt, jerking movements of a woman looking to leave before the conversation leads them anywhere uncomfortable—and Suki feels unreasonably relieved. “Thank you for your advice—and wisdom.” She hesitates, leaving Suki certain that “wisdom” is nothing more than politeness. “I’m glad, I suppose, there’s more people like us here. Maybe … maybe that will help Esh, if things go better.”

“If you think a priest’s guidance may be useful for your own sake,” she says, falling back on well-worn script in the surety that her own words are far too confronting, “please know that our service extends to all. And I hope, one day, aromantics are so ordinary there’s no need to comment.”

Mild, facile, trite.

Her hands throb, and Suki fights to unclench them.

Mara’s face shutters. “You’ve more than enough work with Esh.”

She bows again and, in a frenetic, long-paced stride best described as “hurrying”, heads down the garden path towards the guest quarters.

Trust.

Can she blame Mara for not trusting her when Suki has none to give?

She sighs and stares at her orchids, at the stone rising behind the tangle of shrub and ivy, at the blue-tinged mushrooms threatening to take over the lawn, at the green grass beneath her chair and the cloudless sky overhead. She stares at the rocks and leaves of her sanctuary, thinking about Mara, thinking about Mamas Lewis and Polly, thinking about the conversation with Moll in the vegetable garden, thinking about words unsaid and feelings concealed … but as the sun ebbs lower, she finds no course of action but the obvious.

Question.

Why has she, for so long, chosen avoidance over service? Why has she refused to face her pain, even while knowing the impact her absence has on others? If she preaches the sacred power in guiding another to a better road, why does she refuse another’s gift of the same? Will she leave this world as Mara is now? Or will she trust her own kin, her own ideals—the only god worth her wholehearted belief?

“Aziz!” Suki waves a hand at the acolyte reading on the lawn just out of non-shouting earshot. “Tell Moll that I’d like them to attend me here at their earliest convenience. Please have the kitchen arrange sweets for both of us and my afternoon tea.” She pauses, considering, as Aziz scrambles upright and straightens hir brown robe. “My shawl. And ask Thanh for an additional dose of my pain medicine. Thank you.”

Question.

If Moll is good enough for Esher Hill, they ought to be good enough for Suki of Sirenne.

[quiltwork]

But to go on a weird tangent; That voices book reminds me a whole lot of internal family systems therapy.. WHICH REMINDS ME OF MY (Old??) PARTS I HAD when I was a kid/teen. That I OFTEN ASSOCIATE WITH KINS BECAUSE THAT IS THE BEST WAY I’VE FOUND TO DESCRIBE/SHOW THEM OFF, OKAY??! Don’t make this weird...

So going off of the book’s categorization of voices and the roles of internal families, I’ve summarized my parts to be:

The Queen Bee, Manager. Full of Pride and Self-Justification. Brandy Harrington from Brandy and Mr. Whiskers. This part covers up “weaknesses” of being autistic, learning disabled, domestic violence, emotional neglect, multiple family member abandonment, and child on child sexual abuse. She represents that 11 year old me who tried so hard to fit in and emulate her abusers. All she wanted was to be affirmed, valued and validated.

Same with the other “Queen” Manager lol. Another part full of Pride. This one specifically I held onto at 13 because I just could not get any real discussion going with my mom on why I questioned my sexuality, and I just felt super invalidated so I rebelled as a form of “self care”. The difference between the Queens is one wants to fit in, the other wants to stand out but still be the Best That Ever Was, hahaha. They cover up all the same so-called weaknesses still (ZIM covers up grooming abuse as well), and really just need to both know they’re valued by Jesus, so they can celebrate their strengths instead of using them as a shield.

And this is the final Queen, the Dream Queen Manager. Sawyer from Cats Don’t Dance. Basically the idealized working class woman who finds success eventually after hustling to the max. My teenage dream come true to finally reaching adulthood after the mess of childhood and coming out on Top Better than The Rest. A sort of weird euphoria fever dream of “I can’t wait for my life to start in college and career!” completely disregarding my mental health. Still needs to know she’s loved by God and it’s okay to be disabled, use her strengths instead for her community.

Foreign Exchange Boy, the Manager. Self doubt, self condemning, second guessing. Steven Universe. 15-16 year old victim wearing the disguise of a boy because she hates her body that much by now and wishes she were the opposite, a strong fat boy. This part literally ran on shame in a way that was running away from sexual traumas instead of facing them and accepting them (like all Managers do, basically). This voice reveals our human limitations. Through biblical self awareness, she can hold herself accountable as a girl without striving for the impossible. She can learn to love her body.

Good Girl Nice Girl and/or Runaway. Mihashi Ren. I see them as a mixture of both Manager and Firefighter. Normally people pleasing at the expense of herself, but ready to run somewhere else if things get out of control. This parts been around for as long as I can remember, since my preteens, actually. This part says it’s good to serve others and share in their happiness. 

Being a good kid and meeting my peers’ expectations of a nice girl who would do anything so they wouldn’t leave, and that she could absorb their identities and self esteem. Jesus taught it was good to serve without expecting anything back. You typically won’t, anyway, with the way this part likes to go about it. When she runs, she can run to God’s rest in prayer like in times’ past. He doesn’t grow weary from work that He should want breaks from us. 

The Revolutionary Manager. Dan from Dan Vs. From 16 to 17 as I was still trans, I was absolutely fed up with the world by this point that I snapped. Not that I haven’t before, many parts beg to differ... This voice Resents, Condemns and Controls Others to try to fix the broken world, so they in turn can fix themselves. Real petty stuff, but funny in a cartoon. The good thing this part means to say is it’s good to look out for your neighbor, esp if they’re on a harmful path. Jesus shows how He challenged others without forcing them to be like Him, but to forgive and trust their lives in the Father’s hands.

The Lovesick Love Interest Manager. Yuno Gasai. I didn’t know there was a character who could so accurately describe a part, and her show came out a year after this part took over, so there were no influences. At 14-15 years old, I developed love addiction for this girl and convinced her to date me so I could stave off suicidal thoughts from my emotional neglect and abandonment. She’d cheat, me being immature thinking she was too cowardly to tell them to leave her alone, I’d fight off boys at every turn.

Exalting myself to prove my worth, people pleasing her to keep her around and have an identity and self worth, and overcorrecting and fighting rivals to keep the relationship safe. All in the game of covering up the sexual abuse, grooming abuse and neglect which lead to this. Eventually when I lost her due to putting up boundaries after saying yes to too many things I didn’t truly agree to, this Manager slowly faded into the Revolutionary. Whoops. Jesus still sees and loves her in her weaknesses, she doesn’t have to earn His love because He stays anyway, and He doesn’t have favorites.

A Manager I don’t have a kin for. Mute was silent in public. Schools and everywhere else, she kept quiet to avoid ridicule and rejection. Exalts Others by fading into the background. Wishes she could make friends, but can’t out of fear. Assumes she’s in good standing and is noticed already for it, but is instead ignored or denied a personality. This voice says it’s good to listen more than quickly speak. God sees me and wants to be my friend. Nothing I do could surprise Him enough to give up on me.

We’re onto the Firefighters. This is Ghost. A couple times during toddler years, once during my preteens, Ghost’s dissociation was a mainstay at 13 onwards. Sometimes floating around causing chaos without realizing it, for me to come to and be horrified at the awkward consequences. Because of outside or inside stress, she zones out somewhere. 

She held back traumatic memories with amnesia, as well. This response is a God given pain medication and sedative, but during inopportune times, we need to dance, stomp our feet, feel textures, notice colors and food tastes to wake up. Or remember something funny or lovely from nostalgia if emotionally numb, too. 

The others I don’t have kins for. I can only describe them. Bingey feels the worlds out of control, so she overeats to calm down. I may not be able to control what the world does, but I am accountable to how much food I take in. I make our meals every 4 hours with snacks in-between. I’ve found I love cooking, and it’s okay to enjoy life’s pleasures in moderation. Daydream jumps on dissociation wagon by hanging out in the bedroom all day to go to another fantasy world. This voice shows us it’s okay to have dreams and be in awe of God’s creation. He has a hopeful future for us that we’ll love and we can worship Him for His work, instead of escaping into illusions and never going outside.

Itch is the unaware self harmer. Skin picking. Whenever stressed, here it comes. This voice reminds me that we need care. Like a toddler crying and tugging on our clothes for help and love. Gently redirect the Itch somewhere else to take care of the child underneath.

There’s Masochist. Self harmer who uses sex. Born out of shame, sexual traumas, family dynamics. Masochist loves to bully “weaknesses” like being too skinny, eating too much, having a female body, being a sexual object, being stupid. Feeds on rape fantasies by themselves or showing up to keep relationships safe when I don’t feel like being intimate with others. But in Jesus, I can love myself for my weight, sex, and disabilities because He does and He made me this way. He shows me I can be sexually pure in marriage with a godly man who loves me for me. If marriage is not destined, I’m still okay with God. 

Finally, Student is the workaholic perfect kid to deflect attention away from obvious dysfunctional family dynamics, so nothing worse happens in foster homes. Born from domestic violence, school torture and seclusion, training and brainwashing beliefs of internalized ableism and masking, and the idea from family to never tell the truth about home life. There’s nothing wrong with working, but we can’t be perfect or hide everything forever. I can work for God and tell Him the truth without fear of tragedy.