#“It WAs thE exEcuTOrs” oh fuck off

[lizzybeeee]

Inquisitor: "Is there any way Solas can be reasoned with?"

Me after Solas has killed Varric, used blood magic on me, trapped me in the fade, created the blight, made the titans tranquil/fucked with the dwarves, started the chain of events that led to Southern Thedas being destroyed, and stealing all my good gear from Inquisition:

[vatelixx]

The visionary, the willing executor,

Spencer Reid x afab!UNSUB!reader (written with mid!seasons Spencer Reid in mind)

SMUT!! copious amounts of angst (there’s traces of fluff in there as well if u get out ur magnifying glass)

BASED ON THIS SONG (it got so stuck in my head that I had to write something that correlated):

──── autistic spencer (it’s not explored that much, but it’s always gonna be present in my oneshots), evil evil reader (im not being dramatic this time. she’s literally a serial killer. like her ‘body count’ is copious. but idk, she’s kinda sweet. if u squint and ignore the bodies). They were in love ur honour !!! they’re still in love ur honour !!!! She pays him a visit two years after he found out about her homicidal tendencies (they miss each other, Spencer might also hate her a little but it’s okay, don’t worry about that).

Warnings: sub spencer (aaaaaaalways), maybe perhaps some vague, very faint mentions of switch!spencer but idk i blacked out writing this, choking, mentions of death and general behaviour that would get you a life sentence, praise more than degradation surprisingly, coming untouched, crying (you’d think that was a kink or something?), she fucks the good out of him, hopeful ending (eh, kinda), mentions of dante’s inferno, copious amounts of religious imagery, greek mythology references, this isn’t dead dove at all i promise.

w.c: 5k

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Spencer would consider himself a good person, by default. It’s reasonable: a renowned member of the BAU, with intellect he’s weaponized for morality. The blood etched onto his hands is justified. Necessary evil for greater cause. He’s willing to blemish his skin for the virtue, for the lives of others.

He remembers naivety. He remembers being so fragile he could easily crack into fragmented pieces of wasted innocence. Maybe that’s been stolen from him now, maybe the ruins of his sacrifices are too sharp to touch upon still, but he’s good. He knows he will always be good.

And yet, there’s a bruise. Something ugly and distorted that stains his skin. Something that has the ability to crawl deep into his bones and leave behind a mess of pain. Something bad. Festering and tainted, it haunts him with every breath.

You.

You, who came into his life as an abundance of sunlight. Helios personified. Pretty and warm, and everything he needed. He wanted to kiss you: the moment he stumbled into the coffee shop, tousled hair, overworked and raw from a burdening case. When you took his order, marking constellations onto the styrofoam cup. Andromeda, Ursa Major, Cassiopeia. Later, much later, then when you became an indomitable presence to his apartment.

But for all the good he’s preserved, Spencer knows he’s not allowed to receive it.

“You shouldn’t be here,” is the first thing he says when he finds you waiting for him. He always knew you would come back; you’re bound to follow him indefinitely. Like his shadow, his guilty consciousness, his cracked past of addiction and pre-pubescent torment.

He let you go. When the act was over, the curtain drawn, when he saw you. Homicidal, the perpetrator of the case he was working on, malevolence packed into the frame of perfection, oh even still, he let you go. Free to continue the cycle of death, he was left to scramble in the mess of his own misguided heart.

There’s risk in reward, and reward in risk. You’re meticulous, hedonistic to the last detail. But Spencer? Well, he will always be the one loose end you could never quite force yourself to clean up. The thread that kept untangling, even as time passed. Cut it off, you should be rational, wash every bleeding trace of him from your skin.

But there’s irrationality in love.

Blood adorns your features; there’s no need to touch up your appearance, to return to the domesticated facade you once used on him. No, he’s been exposed to the ugly now. There can be no do overs, no back-tracking, game over try again doesn’t exist in real time.

“What are you going to do about it?” you ask, and god, hes just as beautiful as the day you left him. So perfectly real, with dragging exhaustion and pretty brown eyes to ease the sting of his tight-faced, troubled expression.

You didn’t cut the phone lines, nor move the gun he keeps stashed in his cabinet drawer. Down the hall, to the left. You know he won’t make any abrupt actions. Know, in an intuitive way, telepathic communication between past lovers.

“It was a gamble coming here, aren’t you pleased to see me pretty boy?”

Spencer has to fight every urge he has, every moral he believes in to not lunge at you; to not strangle your slender neck, crack you in half, destroy you the way you’ve destroyed his sanity.

Two years, 8 months, 11 days since you cataclysmically uprooted his routined life. He fell in love with softness, not the jagged edge of a blade.

“I let you go. Wasn’t that enough?” it feels too natural, fighting in his apartment, some sort of twisted lovers quarrel. There’s a definite list of everything he should do in this moment, and despite all logic, he just blanks at the sight of you.

“You had to come back. Rub salt in the wound. Do you get off on this?” a sigh falls from his pretty lips, “Actually, don’t— don’t answer that. We both know the answer.”

“I get off on you,” you correct.

It’s true. If he was to analyse you, profile your warped brain like his other unsubs, he’d find nothing but unyielding loyalty to him. For all the damage you’ve done, there’s always been one anomaly to your detachment.

He stands right before you.

And, sure, maybe you’ve got a leg up in this situation. Perhaps the distorted memory of you holds him back: lazy nights and tangled sheets, his body pressed up against yours. The way he’d talk, quantum physics, philosophy, rambles that dissolved into open admissions of feelings. There’s a lot that was fake, but to be a good liar, you have to add subsidiary details of truth.

God, he wishes the world would be cruel—a cosmic alignment of karmic righteousness that would grant him relief: some kind of justification for what he must do. But the universe is indifferent, nothing but a distant star, a fleeting speck of dust in the grand scheme of life. There’s no such thing as good or bad, only consequences.

Consequences. Consequences for his actions. Butterfly effect. He can comprehend it. But, there were many things he adored about you, while the illusion of love was tangible. The way your hair would curl just above your shoulders, your skin in the morning light. The way you’d laugh at one of his obscure Star Trek references, better yet his criticism on modern, inaccurate horror. He could stare at you for eons, as though he was trying to make out the secrets of the universe in the constellation lines of your scars.

The illusion of love, as it was. He sees you now with the clarity of reality, the same way a mirage fades away as you approach; a distortion of perception.

“And you get off on me. Even now. Don’t you?” you say, shifting forward to close gravitational space.

There’s no way to disregard this morbid connection. No psychological justification he can exploit to demean your feelings. You’re not a psychopath, nor anything that relates to a lack of empathy. You feel— you feel empathy for all of your victims, the line of bodies that mark your path. But it goes deeper than that. There was reasoning for your actions, just as there was for his.

“Say it,” you goad. And there’s satisfaction here, sure. Something mean and condescending. But there’s also hurt, because he was supposed to be a means to an end, and now, he might very well be your end.

“Say you miss me. C’mon boy genius, a few little words and i’ll have enough content to satisfy me for years. Don’t be mean— you know I hate being edged.”

He does miss you, every day that he wakes up, his bones too hollow and cold to leave his bed. The ache in his chest where his heart was supposed to be, too empty to function. No amount of caffeine can fill the void in his skull where thoughts of you used to reside. The longing, the desire for the past to rewrite itself.

“You’re sick,” he tries. But he’s not good at this. Not when the love remained after the inevitable fall out, not when the darkest parts of him still clung to want, even after he realised the truth.

“You’re sick, and..” he tries again, “and I hate how much I miss you. There? Is that enough? Are you happy? Got what you wanted?”

You let out an exasperated sigh, “No. If I ‘got what I wanted’, I would still have you.”

Spencer dies. Metaphorically, literally, what does it even matter? He dies, respawns, and then kisses the admittance from your lips.

Instinctively, just like the past, your hands tangle through his hair, and perhaps there’s a sense of ownership to the gesture. The knowledge that he will always be yours. Scarred from your touch, returning to your lips like a dog with a bird. There’s a mindless attempt at anger on his part, biting lips and rough teeth, but just like always, he quickly melts.

He melts, and you catch him. Because for all it’s worth, lies and deceit aside, you’ve always loved him.

There’s something powerful to the gesture; knowing you have someone wrapped around your finger. Even after you’ve bared the worst of you, the ugliness of man-kind. There’s someone out there that will wipe the blood from your cheek, and kiss you through it.

“Oh, even better,” you mutter against his lips, “Much, much better. C’mon Spence, show me just how much you’ve missed me.”

Two years, 8 months, 11 days since he felt like he could breathe.

It hurts, it hurts so much, because there’s a sense of coming home to the kiss, and he just wants you to stay. To ruin him forever. To leave behind a deformed version of him, something unrecognisable and equally scarring.

You’re too loyal and he’s too susceptible to any form of attention. Because you want him, and it’s easy to fall into a cyclical cycle of self-destruction when you’re the catalyst.

“I did miss you.” he admits again. “You— crazy, homicidal excuse of a person.”

Spencer’s hand comes up to touch your cheek, the rough texture of skin meeting something soft. His thumb traces down the curvature of your jawline, a silent hello that doesn’t linger long, too soon to be replaced with his lips.

You push him back against the wall, a painful groan escaping your lips when you feel his hips canting forward, searching aimlessly for a friction you’ve both been denied. Two years. His body still aches for you. It’s primal, something perverted and tainted and so very good.

You knew this would happen. There was not a doubt in your clouded mind that he would deny you. What you do to me, I do to you.

“There’s my boy.” you mutter when you grip said hips, fingers finding their natural, fated position against divine bone. When he begins to find a stable pace, bucking up to meet you with every kiss that you press to his lips.

He whimpers when you touch him, soft sounds of need slipping past his parted lips into the confines of his empty apartment. He’s trying so hard to maintain composure, but he can’t find it in him to fight the inevitable. The ache of separation between himself and you. So he lets it happen, like he always does.

My boy, the possession goes straight to his head. One simple phrase and he’s untangling, breaking to pieces because yes, he is yours. And yes, he will forever want to be reminded.

“Mhm, mhm. Oh— oh, fuck.” he’s so hard, clothed cock pushing up against you with every movement. He could get off on less of you. He has. Every night.

And yes, it certainly feels like home. It’s only the thing your body has been aimlessly yearning for, day in and day out. It’s not fair, not fair to you, that you’ve allowed your resolve to crumble, your strategic, one-track mind, for the fleeting body of a past lover.

But then again, demeaning him to a past lover doesn’t even begin to articulate this.

You’re fairly certain he was put on this earth, just to torment you.

And you’re fairly certain you’ll always let him.

“God, you’re such a slut for me.” you say, drawing back from the friction just to prove your point. The disintegrating whimpers that bleed out of his mouth in response are enough alone to confirm.

His head falls back against the wall, baring that lovely length of his neck and its pretty bruises. He wants you to kiss him there, to leave one last mark before he says ‘I won’t see you again’ and means it this time.

“Don’t— don’t stop—” even as he speaks, a mess of jumbled words and breathless sentences, you’re still teasing him. He hates how much it works, how much he’d rather fall into the pleasure of your hands.

“Fine. Whatever. Yes. What do you want to hear? That it’s whorish the way I want you. That you’re able to just… corrupt me with all these dirty words, even though I have an extensive vocabulary. Even though i’m supposed to be—“

He’s not even sure what he’s supposed to be anymore.

“You know the extent of my devotion.” he concedes.

There will always be sadistic pleasure in reducing him to such an ignominious version of himself. You’ve seen it before, back when you were trapped in an artificial, yet domesticated, haze of bliss. But to hear it now? Even after everything has been said and done?

That’s a new type of pleasure.

You know he still holds onto the facade of you, aimlessly reaching for something intangible, something that never truly existed. “You want me to be good for you, huh? Just pack up my shit, leave it all behind, get better? Think about it. White picket fence. Coffee every morning. God— it would be insufferable. Coming home to feed the dogs, talking every night over the phone, begging you to be safe on a case, or or—“

Spencer breaks. Silencing your words with a pained whimper.

Usually, he doesn’t allow himself to think about that fantastical hypothetic. He can’t afford to. Months after he let you go, when the truth had been exposed to his naive eyes, he’d spend hours in a mess of aching limbs, dreaming up alternative realities where your hands weren’t stained from blood, and the most despicable thing you could do was make his coffee bitter.

So when you force him to open old wounds, to rehash past hopes, he falls apart. A whine escapes his lips, hips bucking, once, twice and then he’s coming untouched. Making a mess out of himself— and it’s sick, so very sick to get off on the thought of you permanent, the epitome of good.

Something he could hold onto without slicing open skin.

It’s not a good orgasm, it never is without your direct help, but at least it’s some form of release. In the aftermath, he blinks away tears, vaguely aware of the cum staining his boxers, creating damp spots through fabric.

There’s something painful, cutting to your gaze when you look at him. At the debauched sight, corrupted from just a few words.

Give it all up? For what? Him?

All things considered, it’s tempting.

“Spencer,” you mutter in the serrated moments between. When he’s still nebulous, caught in the aftershocks of abrupt pleasure. When he’s just gotten off, untouched, on the notion of a domesticated life with you.

He’s struggling to breathe. He’s spent nights gasping for you, reduced to the most debasing version of himself. So out of touch, you drove a blade through his back, catching his heart on the way.

“Why are you— doing this?” he asks, but before you can even answer, provide him with an explanation that will devastate, he’s lunging forward, kissing the lies that cling to your lips. Kissing you because his mouth hurts when it’s not attached to yours.

“One last time.” he says; he’s too intelligent, too intellectually adept, to allow this swallowing cycle of humiliation to continue.

But, underneath it all, he’s also inherently selfish for you. He’s fairly certain you were engrained into his skin, long before he fell into your barbed trap, teeth and penetrative ruin.

“Then you leave. You actually leave, never contact me again. No showing up at my apartment unprovoked. I have a good life without you. Understood?”

You scoff. He presses forward, “Understood?”

You don’t protest when he elucidates his life as good. Even if it’s quite the contrary. Even if he has to bare witness to depravity every single day, scrutinise his way through the minds of the most perverse. Perhaps this is a social experiment to him, perhaps you are the guinea pig, Laika sentenced to space. You know he loved you once, but it’s hard to comprehend the feelings remained unscarred, it’s hard to imagine you’re anything but a test subject now.

You look at him. Look at that pretty face. Your undoing. He could be your achilles heel, hamartia in its rawest form, or maybe you willingly chose to do this. Maybe fate, and divine intervention played no part in your attachment to him. Maybe it’s just chemicals. The logics explanation. Imbalanced, skewed chemicals.

“Don’t worry, boy genius.” you respond, “You won’t get anything, not even a postcard, from me. It’ll be like I never even existed.” no trace. D.C has always been a monotone cesspit of nothing anyway.

It’s cruel. Because if you leave, truly leave. And he never hears from you again, never catches you in his kitchen, drinking coffee with an unadulterated smile, then he will begin to forget.

The curve of your spine, the scars beneath your chest, the way your fingers fit into his own. The way he was able to memorise your body until he could draw it in the dark, when your body was pressed to his, when there was nothing but a false establishment of safety.

He knows he can’t forget. Not technically. But it’ll grow distant, it’ll be replaced with new normals and routines. That, that, he can’t compute.

“Good,” he says, kissing you again, kissing you because this is it.

Spencer wants you. In every sense of the word, he wants you so badly it’s killing him.

His bedroom still holds traces of you. That, itself, is a crime. But he just falls into you. The way lovers do. Your hands against his skin— his hair threaded through your fingers, your lips at the base of his neck. He lets you leave another bruise, a mark, a confirmation of possession, because even if this is the last time, he is, and always will be yours.

“Still the prettiest person i’ve ever seen,” you admit when he’s flushed naked beneath you.

There’s something in those doe-eyes, brown irises blown out of proportion, that hooked you. Even at the worst, it was still soft with him.

Slender frame, slightly arched, you want to bite into his hips, mark every inch of him as yours. It’s greedy, gluttonous, his messy hair, fanning out like a halo, the tangled curls he never bothers to properly care for.

“God, fucking look at you,” you grip his jaw, tilt his head back to bare that blemished neck of his. To have and to own. He’s so inexplicably different to you, so good it runs down to the bone. And maybe you’ve always been insatiable for what you’ve lacked.

He can’t take this. He can’t, not again. The past, the future will have to dissolve with this moment, because there will never be another again.

You will never get this close to him. It’s a terrifying thought, that this’ll be the standard of intimacy, of love - because he knows it isn’t. But he can’t risk the reality he’s faced with, the reality of living without this. Of living without you.

Your words only make it worse. He wants to beg you to stop. To cease the torture.

“Shut up.” He kisses you, as if to remind you that your mouth is made for kissing, for his lips, for a litany of dirty words that he can’t bear to hear. Those words are for someone else. For someone similar. Not him. Never him.

Defying fate. He gets off on being something bad beneath the surface. No one would ever expect it; boyish maladroit Spencer, the youngest of the team, willingly allowing, condoning, a killer to sink into his skin.

“Don’t tell me to shut up,” you respond, muffled against his lips. “If this is the last time, i’m going to enjoy it. Going to enjoy the sight of you, all desperate for me alone.”

“You assume i’ve ever been desperate for anyone else—“ he counters.

“Oh, that’s it. Keep talking dirty to me.”

“It’s not dirty. It’s a factual statement.”

You pull away, a trail of saliva bridging the space between your mouths. If there is higher power at play here, you want to curse, to spite your creator. Because if ‘things’ had been different, if you had been born from the same rib, this could’ve ended differently.

Or for that matter, never ended at all.

“Sit there and watch me.” you say, and Spencer hates the way he obliges. Pushing himself up against the headboard, he stares at you, at the way you position yourself, standing by the foot of the bed.

“Do you even know what you do to me? Do you even understand the gravity your existence has on me?” you continue, unfastening the lace corset that clings to your frame. When it drops to the floor, breasts exposed, you run your hands across them, catching pierced nipples for a vindictive moment of pleasure.

“I— uh,” Spencer is admittedly a little distracted. Sex had always been something ruinous between you two. Something that conflicted his lack of experience, forced him to adapt.

He always wondered how someone so soft, the epitome of light, could be this obscene. Now he understands.

“Lost your words? Come on, pretty boy. I thought you had an ‘extensive vocabulary?’ Hm?”

He wants to touch himself, to ease the pulsing throb that centres in his cock. But he doesn’t, because despite the time that has passed, he still knows your rules. “Don’t use my words against me. I’m being tortured.”

“Tortured, huh?” your hands fumble over buttons until you’re reduced to a pair of panties, soaked throughly, leaving scarce to the imagination.

“So so tortured. Oh my god, who are you? Can I please have my soul back?” he’s joking, but not really.

“Well maybe if you beg for it,” your words fade into a mess of moans, fingers slipping beneath fabric to graze your clit. Spencer’s head spills back against the wall; he looks more affected by the movements than you.

It’s easy to fall back into old habits. Relapse.

“Come here, come here, i’m having an existential crisis.” he says, watching as you slip one finger, then two inside you, struggling to stand now. It’s strange how pleasure can reduce the most antagonising minds to vulnerability.

“Please— oh fuck, please. Please. Don’t make me watch, I can’t. Need you. Need you so bad.”

He thought he found the core of torture in you touching yourself, but he was wrong. Because when you crawl closer, when you slot yourself between his thighs, lips finding skin that only you have ever touched, he sees the root of evil in his brain. The ninth circle of hell.

It’s justified, he supposes. For all the good he’s done, he has betrayed. Himself, his friends, family, existence itself. There is not one thing he wouldn’t ruin, just to feel you. It’s incriminating, so yes, he deserves to freeze in Cocytus. He’ll willingly plead guilty, accept his entrapment in the ring of Caina.

“Poor baby, look at you.” you say, kissing his tip, catching the pre-cum on your tongue. Spencer responds: fisting bedsheets, fighting the restraint to buck forward, to find misplaced solace in the warmth of your mouth. He’s sprawled out across sheets now, lying back in a tangled heap of want. “Shh, it’s okay,” you continue, “I like my men desperate.”

“Desperate? Ah—,” he fights the urge to shut his eyes, too aware that this is the last memory he will ever retain of you.

You, painted into his mind. The final evidence left in the fire: mouth sinking down his length, taking him to the hilt, watery eyes and leaking mascara.

“This isn’t even desperation. You’re killing me. Just, oh oh— please, don’t. ‘M gonna cum. Gonna cum—“

Is it sick that he doesn’t want to? If only to prolong this transitory moment of destruction? Like the lotus eaters, he will always be mindless in the pursuit of more, more, more of you.

You draw back from his cock, only to press a soft kiss against the tip. The gesture alone has him reeling, has him begging to be saved, to atone for every sin he found in the comfort of your divinely crafted lips.

“Gonna let me sit on that pretty cock of yours, hm? Let me use you one last time? Promise i’ll be good,” a lie, “So so good.”

“God, yes. Yes, please. That would—“ You take him deep, deep enough that everything aches. He only feels alive when you’re wrapped around him, when there���s not an ounce of distance between your bodies, when he can touch the insides of you. Pry open the raw, unfiltered version of you.

He only feels alive when he’s sunk inside the harbinger of death. He’d laugh if it didn’t hurt.

You’ve got one hand tangled in your hair, the other pressed flat against his waist, supporting you through each bump of movement. Eyes like marbles, Spencer looks up, and wonders why this will never be enough for you.

You look back, meet his gaze, as if you’re Orpheus, predestined to turn around, to always return. Even if it’s just for one last second. Even if the fall-out is so much worse than pushing forward blindly.

Oh, hes certain you’re carving a hole inside him, something that will only grow and expand, imploring to be filled by it’s inventor. It’ll hurt, for the rest of time, he supposes.

When he finds your hand around his neck, he isn’t startled. Neither, when your thumb presses against his throat, applying pressure until the world cracks and fades, distorting his refined mind to the here and now. He floats, feeling transient in the curse of your touch.

“That’s it. Just let go. I’ve got you.”

He is a sacrificial lamb. The priests favourite. He will take the knife every time, and thank you for it after.

You release the tension, hand taking his instead. For all the cruelty you possess, you’d never think to harm him. Not physically at least. The emotional damage, however, finds you both. There can be no happiness in either of your worlds, not when the memory of each other festers. “Good boy— taking it so well. God, no one is ever gonna compare.”

He cries at the words. Pretty tears streaming down his face, because the reciprocation to his undying piety will forever trigger the warped chemicals in his brain. Will forever reduce him to something saccharine.

“Love you. Love you so much. Don’t go. Please,” he fractures, “please don’t go.” he begs, besmirched words he’ll regret in the wake of his pleasure. They don’t count, and yet, he knows, in the most depraved sections of his mind, they’re true.

You ride him harder. Back curved, finding god in the washed-out body of someone fatally destroyed. “Not going anywhere— fuck, fuckfuckfuck. That feels so good. You’re so good,” maybe it’s a kink to ruin something so perfectly spotless.

Maybe it’s a kink that he wants it.

“Say it. God, just say it. This once.” for old times sake, he almost adds. But that wouldn’t be objectively correct. For all the intimacy you shared, you never once articulated those three words. Perhaps it was to save your dignity, to hold pieces of yourself in the lies you beautifully crafted.

His thumb runs over your clit, and in the tangle of your orgasm, he almost thinks you forget about his demand. But after, when you’re still taking him, when you’re still clenching, unclenching, clenching around his cock, when you know you own every part of him, you answer.

“I love you.”

He falls apart. Hips canting, body squirming, whimper after whimper escaping his bruised lips as he releases inside of you. Pushed deep, defiled to the limit. For a moment, everything is okay, everything will be alright, because there’s pleasure, and it’s you. It’s always you.

How can he justify falling in love with you again? How can he, when he still clings onto the artificial love of the past? He’s not sure his heart can handle one set of feelings, nevermind two.

He takes you again, well… mostly you take him again. In ways that have him polluted with the remnants of your teeth. Canine marks, etched deep enough to bleed. He hopes the swelling leaves behind perennial scars, anything to remind him. Anything to hold onto when you’re gone and it’s cold.

After, when you lie together, he presses his forehead against yours and wishes he was in any other universe. One where you’re happy. Where everything is pure and simple, clean from sin.

There was always truth in what we shared before, you admit. Lazy nights spent draped over the couch, kissing him to silence convoluted rambles. Your presence in the morning, bathed in holy glow, sunlight bleeding over the pretty sight of you. The first night he touched you and saw god. And then the following night, when he ascended all over again.

He wakes to find no body. He wakes to find nothing. It feels like self-sabotage, the promise that you would leave, even if it’s quite the contrary.

In the absence, abstinence of your presence, he discovers traces of you in everything he sees, all of it, everything consumed, returning to the simple thought of you you you.

When the first postcard comes, Portland, dreary weather— beaches and ports, there’s no anger. No exasperation that you broke your word.

You love him, it’s morbid, but for someone like him, it overrules everything. Sanity, dignity, his own stable existence.

You overrule everything.

[comicaurora]

Nick Bostrom's "Fable of the Dragon Tyrant," which CGP Grey adapted into a video, left me feeling unsatisfied, and I got a certain unsettling vibe about the entire story.

I don't think it was the dragon's lack of agency, that just makes it an unusually traditional Western dragon.

You're a master at picking narratives apart to figure out why they don't satisfy. Do you have any insight, opinions, or cracktheories about why this story might be unsatisfying to some folks?

Probably because it's a very unsubtle metaphor casting the dragon as death, and death itself as a cruel, malevolent beast devouring and subjugating humanity for its own whims. This is very much intentional on the part of the writer. The paradigm of the story is that the dragon is huge, terrifying and incalculably cruel, and everyone lives their lives in the shadow of its terror or are just too deluded to recognize that it's COMING TO EAT THEM OH GOD

Intrinsic in this metaphorical structure is the idea that the dragon, aka death, is an artificial imposition on the natural order, and if we just got rid of the big ol' mean dragon, everybody would live forever and be fine. Accepting that the dragon exists is framed as a sign of desperation or even cowardice. This is an understandable read when facing a monster that only SEEMS timeless and inevitable (like LeGuin's thoughts comparing the current state of capitalism to the historical acceptance of the divine right of kings) but becomes bizarre when applied to something as legitimately factual as biological death. It's not even framed as unnatural death - the dragon specifically gets sent mostly old people. The metaphor is very explicitly about trying to frame death from old age as a big horrible dragon that everyone only thinks is unstoppable.

I get what they're going for here. The purpose of this story is to make the audience question if death is a true inevitability or if it can be fought, staved off, even defeated. But in the process, the story frames the systems of the world that have formed around death - doctors, pallative caregivers, will executors - as macabre gears in the machine dedicated to the genocidal cruelty of feeding the dragon.

In the dragon tyrant framing, these people only exist to make the rest of the world more okay with flinging themselves down the gullet of the dragon and to streamline the process by which everybody dies. By casting death as the enemy, everybody whose jobs are based on the compassionate act of comforting and aiding people suffering from loss become reframed as collaborators with the incalculably evil enemy, and everyone who's ever accepted their own death becomes a loser. This is a deeply cruel way to frame people who dedicate their lives to helping people through one of the hardest and most tragic aspects of life.

Damn, that's fucked up. Look at this eloquent idiot, explaining why we should be okay with letting a big dragon eat us because it's the natural order. Clearly he is wrong and it's not debasing at all to want to stay alive and not get eaten by a big dragon. This is a fallacy of false analogy: death is like being eaten by a big mean dragon. All his arguments look ridiculous when applied to getting eaten by a big mean dragon, therefore they must be ridiculous when applied to dying when your organs start failing because they've been running nonstop for nine decades and biological systems accumulate wear and tear like literally everything else in the universe.

Entropy increases; systems break down, from DNA to planetary orbits. Successfully shoot down the dragon and you'll end up outliving everything you thought was eternal, even the stars. The goal of immortality isn't really to personally witness the sun exploding, it's to have more good time. It's to make your twenties last into your sixties. It's to keep your back painless and your vision good for longer. We want to postpone the story's end as long as we can, and so we extrapolate "more time" into "I never want to die, I want to be young and healthy and hot forever" even though "forever" doesn't exist. To look to "forever" is to understand that your culture and language will drift, your home will eventually crumble out from under you, your shoreline will erode and change, your climate will transform, your tectonic plate will subduct or shatter, your moon's orbit will slow and tidally lock, and eventually your sun will start burning helium and cook your planet. You don't want "forever" to look like that, you want it to look like your twenties felt. But at that point you aren't fighting the Big Mean Dragon That Eats People, you're fighting the ocean and the biosphere and the earth and the stars, trying to hold them in place against entropy so your immortality can have an equally immortal world to enjoy it in. No, this argument doesn't want true immortality, it wants their twenties to last longer. But it can't admit that.

Back to the story. There's a condescending and spiteful tone in the narration. Death (being eaten by a big mean dragon) is OBVIOUSLY awful and we should all be fighting as hard as we can to make it stop happening. Even a child can see it.

The story even helpfully adds a lengthy moral explanation at the end, in case you didn't understand that the dragon was the inevitability of death and we should dedicate all our resources to figuring out how to make a big rocket and shoot it.

"Nobody should ever die" is generally understood to be a childish dream with extremely obvious and unpleasant consequences that would turn its realization into an unending and waking nightmare, and once out of the confines of easy metaphor, the story tries to act like that wasn't what it was just saying. But its more realistic proposed substitute, "It would be great if people could live longer and have more healthy, youthful years in them," is probably the world's most uncontroversial statement. This story frames it like a bold revelation that the world will attempt to beat down and crush out of a misguided acceptance that Big Mean Dragon comes for us all. It's a morality fable whose conclusion is "I hope science improves the length and quality of our lives, potentially even to the point where we never have to die at all," which has been the number one goal of huge swaths of science since the invention of agriculture. This is not a bold or controversial take. It's just being written as though we're all looking at the naked emperor and pretending he's wearing pants.

[cerastes]

I didn’t love the Executor 2 event but it was ok, just ok(tm), proverbial mid. I like smaller scale stuff that informs us about world building more than anything but I feel like they can do that midst a larger plot with pay-off by this point. Just sort of stings a bit having secluded pieces like this that could be arcs in bigger stories, be the main story of an event.

That said, Federico Fedex the Executor is a funny fucking guy so it was nice seeing him in action. I like the other laterano in a love to hate them kind of way, they reinforce the notion that the Laterano we know and like are very much outliers because they are mcfucking weird and eccentric by lat standards and thus cool in the rest of the world (Fedex, Ambriel, Arene), or just so good at being a lat that they loop back to being cool (Exusiai).

Lemuen is a pretty cool character that shows institutionalized bigotry in an otherwise very decent person. I don’t agree with the whole “Oh Lemuen is actually fucked up” take, too shallow and surface level, Lemuen’s shown plenty that she’s a good person, she’s also a high ranking member of the whimsical ethnostate armed forces, and grew up with whimsical ethnostate beliefs and assumptions because, yeah, that’s what happens when you grow up in a whimsical ethnostate that has in fact provided for you all you could ever want in a famously cruel world. She’s representative of how Lats are pretty insular but not inherently vile or discriminatory, same way Sarkaz are not all bloodthirsty mercenaries and crooks. If you had the ability to empath with select people, then you likely would think a bit badly of those you can’t empath with. Lemuen’s a bit above this because of Fiammetta, and as we’ve seen, people like Exu and Ambriel are perfectly socially adjusted with non-Lats.

Stuff like how Lemuen is a window into good core values vs. institutionalized bigotry is where Arknights’ writing shines. They just need to land narrative pay-off better at this point. So yeah, ok event with highlights I appreciate.

[solaiced]

CASE 4: DON'T MOVE, FUSHIGURO TOJI IS YOUR EXECUTOR!

!content!: knife play, creampie, cuts, consensual but not safe or sane and Toji is an asshole.

wc: 1,3k

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆

You snarl as the battle finally comes to an end, pushing the black haired man on the tatami floor. He grunts in pain as his chest and chin hit the ground, as his arms are pinned on the small of his back, where you sat.

“Toji…” You drawl, combing your fingers through his hair while you disarm him of his prop knife.

“I know. I was just… distracted.” He grumbles, trying to shake you off gently.

“I’m not getting off.” You announce, bouncing on his folded arms to cement the idea into his brain. He grunts once more, your weight on his back pushing him down when he shook.

“Get off me woman. Or I’ll use the knife on you while I fuck you.” He threatens. But that gets you an idea, loosening your hold on him as he takes the chance to flip you over and lay between your legs, pinning your arms above you with a single hand.

“Now, you’re distracted.” He grins, smacking a sloppy kiss on your cheek. You squeak, the saliva smearing on your face.

“Ah, you pig!” You scold, squirming to get out of his hold. He laughs, pinning his hips to yours so you couldn’t move anymore. The air in the rooms suddenly changes, the tension hotter, and your breaths mingle with each other from how close your and Toji’s faces are.

His chuckles die down, cool green eyes piercing into yours. Silence fills the room. You don’t know who leans in first, but your lips crash together, in a mess of saliva and teeth and tongue, while he lets go of your hands so that they could wrap around his head and bring him impossibly closer. He grunts, hips moving unconsciously as your legs wrap around them.

Toji pulls away, huffing. He stares at you, eyes lidded in lust, he looks like he’s about to devour you. You slide your hand from his nape to his cheek, swiping a hand on his growing stubble. He leans into it, planting a kiss to your palm.

“Can we try it?” You ask, nervous that he would refuse. But truthfully, you knew he would accept, because he was always into freaky stuff with you, always open to trying new things in bed.

“Try what?” He straightened, sliding his hand under you to bring you to sit on his lap. You plant your knees beside his thighs to steady yourself, although he already did so when he wrapped his arms around your waist.

“Knife…” You pout in embarrassment, looking away as your cheeks warm. He smirks, lifting his head to nuzzle your neck.

“Really?” He drawls, suckling a part of the underside of your jaw. You nod, unable to voice your embarrassing wants. He kisses the place he was sucking a hickey on and pulls away, pushing your chin to face him.

“I was waiting for you to ask that, actually.” Of course he did. Freaky as he is.

“Oh.” Is all you say. Toji places you on your back on the tatami mat and leaves the room to get a knife. Small enough so that it wouldn’t cut too deep, but sharp enough to hurt deliciously.

He returns, said knife glinting in his hand as he heads over to you. He gives you a sweet smile he’s never shown any of his victims before and crouches in front of you.

“So, you want me to cut your clothes?” He asks and it's the weirdest thing he’s done in a while.

“What do you mean?” You inquire confusedly.

“Well, usually, you take off your clothes before I come.” He slices your sports bra off with the sharp edge of his knife, you yelp.

“That was my favorite, you jerk!” You try to cover yourself, but he puts the knife at your neck, immediately immobilizing you. Your chest, however, heaves in panic, your breath quickening.

“Don’t move, woman.” Toji threatens, moving the knife to slice through your leggings and panties next. You stay still, shell-shocked at the fact that he would threaten you. He rips the tattered fabric off of your body, revealing you to him. He chuckles, lifting your chin with his knife so that you would look up at him.

“Smile, you look so much prettier when you do.” He croons affectionately, the blade cutting your skin as deeply as a scratch. You wince nonetheless, nipples hardening at the stimulation and the cold of the room. You’d been training for so long you had began sweating, which in turn made it colder.

“Excited? You should be.” Toji slams his lips against yours, moving in sync with yours. The knife pulls back so that he wouldn’t accidentally skewer you. You whimper in his mouth, putting both hands on each of his cheeks, bringing him closer.

He groans, putting the knife down as he tugs his sweatpants and boxers down, revealing his half hard length, twitching in anticipation. He takes off his shirt in a hurry, the air suddenly too hot when he fees you staring.

“Enjoy the view?” He moans when your hand reaches out to stroke his cock, thumb lingering just over his tip to collect the precum that had gathered at the slit.

“V’course, I do. You’re my favorite.” You kneel on Toji’s strong thigh and grind slowly on the hard muscles. You feel him get harder in your hand and get off of his leg to hover over him. He looks up inquisitively. You always asked for prep, did you feel you were wet enough to take him?

“Cut me or I’ll do it.” You warn, sliding your hand down to your pussy and spreading yourself, he obeys you, picking the knife back up with a clank. Swiping the sharp edge on your thigh, you both watch as blood spills out of the tiny cut, beading at the surface. You feel a wave of heat travel through your veins as the pain registers in your brain, and he cuts you again and again until each thigh has the same amount of blood pooling on your skin, lust overriding the agony when you press Toji's tip to your entrance. The man's cock twitches and he grabs your thigh to brace himself, other hand careful not to stab you.

A loud moan traverses the training hall, but you couldn't figure out whose it was. He mumbles something while he tries to not cum in two seconds and a half. Shutting his eyes, he opens his mouth to order you to move, but you were already a step ahead, bouncing on his lap like he was a trampoline.

Again, he slices you open, this time, on your hip. You’re not sure who shakes, him, from pure pleasure, or you, from the little cuts he littered on your thighs and hips. But, as you bounce on his cock, he's sure he's never seen blood Look so pretty on someone. Or, maybe, it's the opposite. Maybe, it's you who’s pretty covered in blood. Toji feels like a sap, but he almost proposes on the spot when you finally pick up the pace, rubbing nonsensical patterns on your clit.

He throws the knife away and grabs your hips, staining his hands with your life force, hips buckling up to get more of heaven (your cunt).

Slapping of slick flesh fills the air, sex is the only thing that you smelled in the room. He groans, trying to warn you of the upcoming danger. But alas, he was too late, ropes of cum filling your unprotected cunt.

Toji huffs as his back hits the floor, chest frenetically heaving up and down. Your head goes to follow and lay on his left pec, cheek smushing against it.

“You’re going to have a hell of a shower with that much wounds.” He chuckles breathlessly.

“You mean after you make me cum, Mr. Premature Ejac.” You joke back. He groans, flushing in embarrassment and covering his eyes with the crook of his elbow.

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll make up for it.” He grumbles, a hint of a smile in the corner of his mouth.

[fenharel]

some of my thoughts after finishing veilguard a couple days ago before i start my second playthrough :)

ok i think its important to note first that the things i was most looking forward too was 1. solas, 2. solavellan, 3. lore. im self aware enough to know that this will have had some influence towards what i expected from the game and what i enjoyed/cared about or not 👍

good

solas: im honestly so happy. my man is finally happy and reunited with his wife!!!!!! my heart feels so full 😭 this game was a solas fans wet dream. absolutely loved everything we got. hunting down regrets and watching old memories. talking to him in the fade. the entire crossroads!!!!!! him shit talking elgar'nan. watching him go trickster mode and imprison rook. fighting the archdemon as the dread wolf!!!!!! i could go on forever. CHEFS KISS TO IT ALL<3333333333333 if anything i wish there would have been MORE im greedy what can i say

solavellan: screaming crying throwing up. i still cant believe it oh my fucking god

lore reveals: i found all the reveals about all our old theories so fun. i didnt like all of them (old gods are just dragons? c'mon.) but overall it felt so rewarding to have picked up on it all. or be totally surprised by something (mythal and solas the reason for the titans and the blight? wow.)

the executors, forgotten and forbidden ones: the next big bads of the next game huh!!!! loved what we got for the most part, the mysterious circle codexes where probably the most interesting in the game. anaris actually showing up shocked me. i wish bellaras brother didnt say "for plot reasons i must die" and actually told us something about him but oh well. im cautiously optimistic about the secret ending for now. what it implied could go either way for now...

main quest: not all of them, but a lot of them were awesome. dare i say some quests were up there with the best main quests in da??? weisshaupt was epic. or the blood of arlathan. every time we get to talk to solas (thehe<3). the final bits. the strong points were so strong that the low points got highlighted a bit too much imo

act 3: by far my favourite act. this was soooo good. the romance finally (?!) kicking it. suicide mission 2.0 stressed me tf out. the varric reveal? send me to the asylum. solas tricking rook? king behaviour i was cheering for him while crying about varric. the dread wolf transformation. the conversation between solas/mythal/lavellan at the end. i basically was in tears throughout half of the thing. couldnt read the credits at all. act 3 was amazing

minrathous vs treviso: i loved this especially with the angst of playing a shadow dragon who failed minrathous. and then the consequences and quest changes this causes throughout the game was really cool. i wish there were more bigger choices like this since it felt a bit flat choice wise besides of this one, but it was amazing.

villains: ghilan'nain and elgar'nan were great. they really felt like the tyrannical gods they were supposed to be. im so glad there was mostly no corypheus-esque cringe. (tho especially ghil had some video gamey lines but sdjkfhjksdf i still love her)

neutral

rook: i dont really care much about rook.. 🙈. mind you rook was certainly not the reason why i wanted to play this game so im sure a second playthrough will make me warm up to them more, now that my head is more free, but it just didnt insta click. rook didnt feel like a real person to me, almost nobody had any (to my taste) realistic reactions towards them. the stakes just were too high for them to get treated this way (nobody is pissed off that they freed the gods? everyone just believes them when they say gods are walking around? everyone just agrees to work with them? nobody cares how rook is doing? or who rook even is? idk.) i didnt like the introduction much either. the shepard treatment didnt work for me here, just believing that rook is fit for the job because varric says so wasn't enough for me. rook also has barely anything going on for them either besides of being the relentless "good guy". we never see them doubt themselves or be fearful or be mean. all the dialogue options are the same as well. its.... boring. anyway i dont wanna bash on rook, i know i'll end up liking them more later. the headcanons will be headcanoning<3

companions: i... don't have strong feelings about most of them? all of them got to me sooner or later, made me cry. but afterwards im still 🤷‍♀️ about most. i didnt feel like we get to know them as deeply as we get to know companions in the previous games. i really really missed sitting in the lighthouse for hours and talk to them, ask them about their profession or what they are about outside of cutscenes like in the previous ones. i think that would have helped me click with them faster. i didnt find all companion quests very strong either. the "high stakes" of the main story made some conflicts feel a bit like we can just fix that after the story lol. i did not like the mass effect 2 treatment of them much... (but me2 is overrated anyway sshh dont kill me<3) some companion quests i did find interesting lore wise (bellara, harding) even if i wish that some of them would have went a bit deeper there. anyway i know i'll probably end up loving them all after a couple of playthroughs, this almost always happens to me, dai is the best example.

combat: don't care. this isn't my type of combat, i don't play a lot of super actiony combo dodge dodge block combat games. still hate the limited abilities. at least it didn't feel too clunky on mouse and keyboard and it was "fun enough" to me so thats good

puzzles: i could put them into the bad category but at least they weren't too terrible so i don't want to be too harsh. but i don't enjoy doing them. i dont want to search for a crystal in a bush. i mean i did them all but at what cost. this felt like filler i thought they wanted to avoid by not adding fetch quests???

bad

pacing: this games hardest battle imo. the pacing of the game is... strange. act 1 is way too fast. it feels like we're running and have absolutely no time for anything. (makes sense! didnt work well though). act 2 then drags a bit with all the companion quests, and the mix really drags the progression of the romances as well to a ridiculous degree. at least with lucanis, idk how it is with the others. i love him and i can headcanon to fill in the blanks so i liked his romance, but it does make it seem like nothing is happening for 50 hours for everyone who doesnt like to headcanon around. anyway, the pacing/storytelling felt often not fitting. it was trying to be mass effect in a story that is too complex and the lore too rich to run through it. this felt like the main reason why we just never went very deep into the lore of the factions or new npcs, or learn or see certain things, the complex nature of the crows, or tevinter magisters and their slaves, we are just running all the damn time? we never get to explore certain things that would feel unnatural to come up in a conversation or in some other way because we are limited by the things the story "has time for". or what the devs had time for.

wishy washy writing: not everywhere but in some places and im not used to that in a da game so its a bit baffling. "the blight is different now so thats the reason for x trust me bro" ok....? "the first of my people do not die so easily" = mythal is shattered and lives on, makes sense. but the other evanuris are all dead, even the ones that were "dead" already? why? idk........ i shall stay delusional for now and hope i've missed something in my completionist run that i now in my next run will find somewhere lol. besides of that, the tone and language used by rook and companions is strangely unfitting as well. coloquial words like "it's cool" are frequently used, among other things. it stands in contrast to the writing of the previous games and is often immersion breaking.

limited worldstate: i had hoped they at least commit to it when i heard about this. but then adding little references that could have just been made personal by switching one line just made the reference a bit jarring sometimes instead of exciting. or making morrigan eat mythals memories for the regret quest....really? this could have been the well of sorrows choice, why could they not have just made the inquisitor show up in the crossroads if they were the one that drank from it. this whole choice thing + some other problems ended up feeling like something they didnt really want to do but ended up doing because the game was in development for so long they just had to finally fucking finish it. and it sucks for us.

the veil: why... is it still there? they left breadcrumps of clues throughout the entire series about all the positives it would do if it was gone, even add a damn prophecy, and then just dont do it.... ever perhaps? must the blight really be cured for this? demons forever feared? listen im just glad solas is ok at the end of the day but he could still have had his redemption/healing/forgiving himself moment after destroying it imo.

i wish the inquisitor was more involved in everything :((( the moments we did get made me SO happy but. yeah.

no quicksave and the skip button that ruined my screenshots deserve their own bullet point what the hell

anyway enough yapping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! overall i loved the game because the stuff i cared about the most was the best aspects of the game sdkjhsdjkf im not ashamed to admit that this is my new solas 2.0 game. ..... <3

[weixuldo]

Allow me// ch 4

Vader x Reader

a/n: Hello hello!! sorry for the wait! I will say that were entering more of the “x reader” content that I know most of you are looking forward to heh, but who doesnt love a good slow burn?? hah ty for reading :)

Your boss is not happy about your absence yesterday

warnings: Cannon typical violence, force choking, real choking (and not in the fun way lol), Death, implied death, cursing, anxiety

_____________________

“You never arrived at your posted station yesterday officer y/n, so where in the galaxy were you?!” your red faced manager shouted at you as he dabbed at the sweat forming above his bushy brow. 

“I was pulled aside to complete-” 

“I don’t give a fuck about who asked for your assistance, you report to me. And unfortunately your task was not completed yesterday so who do you think got chewed out? Me!” he huffed, not allowing you to finish your sentence. This was causing a bit of a scene in the semi-public hallway.  

If he weren't always like this, a passerby might think he was going to go into cardiac arrest. 

“Sir, I am truly sorry, but when Darth Vader himself asks for your assistance, you can't really deny him,” you tried to explain calmly.

The winded man in front of you let out a gargantuan laugh, “You're tellin’ me… Darth Vader? The most revered Sith lord in the galaxy… asked for your help?! Hah! You gotta be outta your mind little girl”.

“It is true sir, I didn’t get a chance to tell you after I finished because It was late and our wing was closed”.

“Oh yea, I'm sure you did get back pretty late” he laughed.

“Pardon?”

“We all hear what the troopers say about you little miss, surprised you didn’t take your knee pads yesterday, well with all that dick you’ve been sucking”

Wow, this puny man was really proud of himself, wasn't he. It was honestly disgusting.

“I do not think that is appropriate workplace behavior, sir” you tried to remain as cordial as possible; with basically the whole executor aiming for the target on your back, you felt like you had to be on your very best behavior all the time. 

“Yea, well in my department, I make the rules and since you carelessly neglected your duties yesterday, I’m giving you the highly acclaimed task of cleaning the restrooms in the communal sector, and once you're done with that I think I’ll give you a task all the way in the bridge” the man smiled a toothy grin before insisting time was “of the essence”.

The cool bathroom floor made you shiver as your knees hit the tile, you went through so much schooling and apprenticeships to do ….this. 

Wonderful.

To make it even better you had to keep the door open because the cleaning chemicals needed to be aired out or else they would be too strong; that gave your whole department the lovely view of your ass bent over the toilets, scrubbing away the grime.

It was humiliating, but what were you going to do? Defy your manager and possibly lose your job? No.

It was bad enough that everyone here seemed to hate you, why would you lose a decent paying job too?

You sighed as you heard some of your co-workers snickering;

“I bet that tile is uncomfortable”

“I wouldn't worry about it, she’s probably used to being on her knees hah!”

Finally, you reached the last stall and you were getting high off of the fumes of the cleaning materials. You felt gross and you were getting a headache, your boss didn’t even give you the health regulated mask to use as you worked with the chemicals. 

You were gathering up the cleaning bottles and rags when you heard the bustling of your office grow silent. That wasn’t normal, usually there were at least a few yappy voices gossiping about some dumb drama within the department. 

You were inclined to peek around the doorway of the bathroom, but you decided not to do anything that could get you yelled at…again.

Suddenly you heard a hushed voice, “He’s coming”.

At that, your senses heightened. Could it be?

Him. 

You had no reason to be excited for his arrival, after all it's not like you were in a fantasy story where he would whisk you away and make you his-

The familiar sound of the steel door sliding to the side filled the bay and in came those heavy boot steps, patterned breathing, and demanding aura. 

Darth Vader was here. 

“My Lord, how may I be of assistance” your boss bowed at the dark figure before him; his face finally cooled down from the bright red it was when he yelled at you earlier.

“I need to speak with one of your mechanics” the Sith spoke, surveying the room. 

“Yes, of course! We can get you someone right awa-’

“You misunderstand, General. I need one specific mechanic” Vader corrected.

“Oh! My apologies, who may you be in search of?” Your boss recovered his mistake, though you could see the redness creeping up the back of his neck again.

“F/N L/N.”

Did you mess up your details yesterday? 

You felt less worried for your safety then you once did because you had shared a few one-on-one moments with the dark lord.

But

His sudden appearance in your wing did confuse you. 

You peeked around the bathroom door’s opening and saw your boss nervously glancing at the bathroom door.

“Ohh, um, of course My lord…. Though might I add, if some repair was done incorrectly I apologize on behalf of the mechanic’s branch… she tends to do faulty work– and we will deal with her accordingl-”

“Quite the contrary, general.”

The-now- red faced man blinked in surprise at the Sith’s words. 

“M-My Lord?” 

He stole another glance back to where you were. 

“What is in the bathroom that is so interesting that you cannot focus on our conversation?” The cloaked figure demanded as he made his way over to where you were. 

Quickly you scurried away from the entrance and went back to cleaning on the other end of the facility; You'd rather not be caught actively eavesdropping.

The Sith stomped into the bathroom with a determination that gave you butterflies. His helmet turned towards you before he commanded you to rise.

Oh… maybe he was frustrated with you.

Your excitement turned into uncertainty as you followed the man out of the restroom.

“Leave the bucket” he added, talking about the pail with all of the cleaning supplies and rags. 

You stepped out of the chemical filled bathroom and inhaled a deep breath of clean air; as you followed the flowing cape of the man in front of you, everyone’s eyes were on you. 

Vader suddenly stopped, causing you to almost run straight into his broad shoulders. 

“Would you care to explain why a mechanic of the empire was wasting time sanitizing the restroom facilities and not a cleaning droid?”

“Well, My Lord, she had not arrived at her posted work station yesterday, so we thought it best to punish her accordingly” Your boss replied with a nervous toothy grin. 

“Who approved that method, General?”

“Well- Umm” the shorter man stammered.

“Because I see no advantages to this situation. More work is delayed and the cleaning is less efficient”

Damn, he really just implied you didn’t know how to clean a toilet.

“Yes, Of course My Lord, My apologies… it will not happen again” Your boss profusely apologized.

“Very well. I am not pleased when workers take their own liberties when abridging protocol on MY ship” The Sith proclaimed irritably. 

The sleazy man cowered and stepped aside, allowing the cloaked Sith passage.

“Y/N, you are to come with me” Vader spoke, without turning to look at you.

Your whole body felt tingly as you walked behind him (and not in the fun tingly way…. More like dread). You weren’t used to him taking a demanding tone with you. 

You followed him out and his squadron followed closely behind you; the hallway was silent except for the shuffle of the trooper’s boots and the man’s breathing. What had you gotten yourself into?

Only around halfway down the hallway the man in front of you suddenly stopped, prompting you to halt abruptly behind him. You were so close that his cape brushed the tip of your nose before you took a few steps back. 

Vader slowly turned his head to the side as if he were sensing something. Was he feeling your fear?

The profile of his mask seemed more and more ominous with every second. 

You were about to ask him what was the matter, but before you could he walked past you back towards where you both just were. 

Were you supposed to follow him? 

He had already entered the room when you caught up with him. You weren't sure what he was doing, but you sure didn’t expect to see him choking your boss in the middle of the room.

The smaller man had no chance as the dark giant held him firmly in his gloved hand. It was almost sad how much your boss was struggling; he kicked his feet and clawed at Vader’s iron fist. 

“Would you care to repeat what you just said, general?” Vader questioned.

All the man could muster was broken chokes and gasps as his face turned bluer by the second.

“First you think you can change protocol and then you have the audacity to insinuate my business with one of your mechanics” he scoffed before dropping the man from his grasp. 

He fell hard with a thud and gasped for air.

Vader straightened his form and took a look around the room at all of the terrified workers.

“Do not be so ignorant as to think I do not hear your childish gossip on my own ship.”

Suddenly you realized what this was all about…

the rumors. 

Of course a mighty sith lord wouldn’t want to be talked about behind their back, especially if people were insinuating they were getting their rocks off, but there was a certain double standard among the men of the galaxy. It was seen as something to be proud of when a man would bed many women or have “sex slaves” (for lack of better terms). 

You really didn’t understand why he was so heated… was it because it was you?

A sudden wave of nausea washed over you; was he only disgusted because they were pairing him with you? Did he think you were that embarrassing to be associated with? 

Vader turned his attention back to the man on the ground.

“Pathetic” he huffed before turning back to the gallery of shocked workers.

“Let him be an example for you all” 

In a swift motion he turned his clench fist and the man’s neck snapped with a sickening crack.

Your eyes widened and you heard others gasp; you had only ever heard of the Sith’s capability, never seen it.

Vader turned on his heel and promptly left the room, strutting down the hall quicker than he was before; you were frozen for a moment, but then you hurried after the Sith. Hopefully what he needed you for would be something less… deadly. 

___________________________

The room was freezing and the fabric of your uniform was not doing much to help with the cold.

After the ordeal at your workplace, Vader brought you to a room that you had not previously seen. In keeping with the rest of the ship, the room was the rich obsidian that you grew accustomed to. There was a large seat in front of the window that beautifully displayed the vast view of space. 

Currently you were seated on a couch that was in front of the chair; much to your surprise it was a pretty comfy one.

None of the troopers entered the room with you and the Sith, so you worried this was it. You were going to die. 

He asked you to take a seat but then disappeared into another connecting room.

In his absence, you recalled all of your interactions with him, trying to figure out what grounds he had to kill you? Nothing you had done was out of line, it was more the mistakes of those around you… but what were you going to do, protest the Sith’s plans? 

You became sad when you reminisced on your feelings for the man… What a fool you were. You really thought that the cold and stoic man liked you. You thought you were connecting with him- and he even allowed you to drop formalities around him-

What went wrong?

You were too naiive, that’s what was wrong. 

Your nerves began to settle a bit when he hadn’t returned, it had been around two hours by now. Whether he wanted to play a cruel waiting game or not was becoming more and more irrelevant to you. 

You were sure your fate was sealed, so what was a few more hours? Plus you had a very emotionally taxing day and your lack of sleep was catching up with you. 

This couch was feeling more and more appealing and your eyelids were getting heavier and heavier…

Maybe a little nap wouldn’t hurt, you would just make sure to set an alarm on your watch for you to wake up. 

yeah… just a quick-

***

a/n: alrightyyy thank you for reading and if you guys have any questions about the pacing of this story or enigma, dont hesitate to shoot me an ask! Love you all :)

taglist: @vadersassistant @sxoulohvn @khaleesihavilliard @kashasenpai @darling-murdock @beautifulbearpolice @salvatoresister1 @lune-de-miel-au-paradis @blueninjablade3 @jujuba096 @missmannequin @jellydodger @mirastark @wyvernthekriger @duckyhowls @monada43 @lauriidoesstuff @vienettacream @ray-rook @itswhatever06

[spearofthetenno]

[[AN.HONEST.TRUTH.cmd]] [[SHOW? Y/N]]

[[SOURCE: ZARIMAN 10-0 COMMUNICATION LOG BETWEEN USER: “LIASON TO EXPEDITIONARY COMMAND: QUINN” AND USER: “HEAD OF SECURITY: CAVALERO”]]

[[ARCHIVAL DATE: UNKNOWN-andbsksbejsbdbdan PRE VOID JUMP INCIDENT]]

[[ORIGIN:]]

[[BOTH USERS LOCATED IN THE ZARIMAN 10-0.]]

[[TEXT FEED: AVAILABLE]] [[CONTINUE? Y/N?]]

[[SHOWING NOW]]

Quinn: I suppose you have met our latest addition, considering what I have heard?

Cavalero: That I have, kid has a mean right hook. The other guy is still in the infirmary wing. Heard he’ll be there for the next week.

Quinn: I did not expect the Dax our masters would send to be so … unruly.

Cavalero: Oh for-not this shit again. He’s not a fucking Dax Quinn. He’s a kid, no older than your boy-Executor’s tits man, your boy is probably older than him.

Quinn: Do not take the Golden Lords’ words in vain. And I asked the Executor for Dax reinforcements at your request and you’re complaining?

Cavalero: He’s not a DAX, Quinn. He’s a Dax Initiate-there’s a difference! One has Kuva blood and can drop most things in under a minute and the other is still a fleshy human being like the rest of us. The Executor is playing you for a damn fool-he’s giving you the leftovers if that.

Quinn: I wasn’t aware there was a difference, much less you. “Above your pay grade” as you would say.

Cavalero: If you got off your high Kaithe for five seconds you’d understand that even if it’s above our pay grade-us Mercs still need to know shit. This is one of those things.

Quinn: And why would the immortal Dax need such a rank regardless?

Cavalero: Even the mighty Dax need replenishing of the pool sometimes. Either cause they need new talent or the genetic pool is getting a little thin. So occasionally, they open the gates just a little and “invite” people to try to become Dax.

Quinn: “Invite”? You make it sound like a threat.

Cavalero: It effectively is. They take young people-kids cause they’re easier to shape to mould into something proper-the smartest and the strongest of our clans and put them through trials.

Quinn: And what are these trials?

Cavalero: No one knows. The only people who know are the people who run them and the people who do them. And well, they wipe the memories of the kids.

Quinn: I…see…and what of their families? Surely they are honoured by the Golden Lords for their sacrifice?

Cavalero: You gotta get into your mind, Quinn, those Lords don’t care. You give up everything to be an initiate. Family, clan, name-you give it all up to become an initiate.

Cavalero: They didn’t give you a Dax Quinn.

Cavalero: They gave you a traumatised kid who’s had his very identity taken from him and only knows how to fight and kill.

Cavalero: Even your boy still has you. And even if his mum denies it, he still has her when it comes down to it.

Quinn: Don’t. Cavalero.

Cavalero: Quinn, even if your relationship ended. And she…disowned him. She cared enough about either you or him, perhaps both to help out with the teaching of the void travel. You got to make that clear to your boy. And…you got to forgive yourself for it too.

Quinn: I will…think on it. What about the Initiate? What will you do for him?

Cavalero: Right now, I’m letting him stay with me. Kid has no where to go and until we can get a dormizone cleared for him-he’s on his own. Probably get him into the classes as well. Don’t want the other security guys getting suspicious that we’re using kids now.

[[WARNING: VOID INFLUENCE DETECTED-hbabdbajdbsjadbsnbabdba ]]

[[WARNING: VOID CORRUPTION PRESENT IN ZARIMAN LOG]]

[[TERMINATING CONNECTION]]

[trickphotography2]

Oh man, I'm so fucking happy right now. My dad just got his 100% service connect (SC) with the VA!

For those who read D-Day, I actually used my dad's cancer story for Darlin's dad. Dad was a jet engine mechanic with the Air Force for 26 years and was exposed to jet fuel all day, every day. And he was trapped in a hanger when the fire suppressant system went off, and inhaled all of that shit. I have been on his case to get his disability re-evaluated since he separated and only got 10% for asthma, and he was worried about losing it if he went through the evaluation process again because his asthma has improved.

Dad was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma in 2016. Thankfully, surgery and chemo went really well (he literally walked marathons during his infusions because he was bored), and he's been in remission for years. Earlier this year, there was a scare that my parents didn't tell us about until Mom visited last month. Ever since that diagnosis, I told my dad that he needed to get his VA SC looked at because jet fuel has been linked with that form of cancer, and the Toxic Exposure Act meant he could apply. He never wanted to do it, but I guess earlier this year he told my mom he was ready to do it. So he's been going to doctor's appointments for months and submitted his claim 2 months ago. Come to find out, my dad's been keeping quite a bit of stuff to himself about his military service and experiences he had, and I wish he would have gone for PTSD because he would have qualified.

While the monthly check is nice, I'm just relieved that they have their health insurance sorted out for when they retire in a couple years.

It's kinda satisfying when your parents FINALLY listen to you.

(Not as fun was finding out that I'm the executor of their estate, but that's a story for a different day and not something I'm gonna think of for a long ass time).

[lizzybeeee]

THE ENTIRE DRAGON AGE AMA IS A DUMPSTER FIRE

They avoided all the high-rated questions with genuine criticism (not blind hate!) and went for questions that were safer and allowed them more leeway. After that awful IGN article and that treatment of Davrin...God, just put it down. I have no faith that BioWare will be able to continue Dragon Age or Mass Effect with the respect it deserves.

Edit - They had an opportunity for genuine discussion with fans who were concerned/unhappy with the way Veilguard was -> people unhappy with the story, the marketing, the lack of 'RP' options in an RPG, etc... Instead they just doubled-down even more, avoiding those critical questions, with no real acknowledgement that fans have very reasonable problems with this game.

Some Highlights & My Initial Ramblings Below:

The Executors

"They attempt to manipulate events in the most subtle way they can manage."

So, very clear that they're not simply observers of what is happening in Thedas: they're manipulators...

"Magical Illuminati Confirmed! Lizard People Did 9:30 Dragon!!!!"

All that complexity of character -> his hatred of Orlais, his experience as a general, his relationship with Cailain, and the influence of Howe...all diminished. Any influence from a shadow cabal is too much influence - all the humanity of Loghain's choices/consequences...God, what a waste.

Not to mention what this does to other events/characters in the series -> they imply they've been intervening as far back as the magisters breaking into the golden city. I do not find this compelling! At all!

2. Solas and the Executors

Oh my god, he sounds like such a fucking Mary-Sue I'm so sick of Solas at this point -> "Actually, I know more about the Executors than anyone alive - not even the rest of the Gods know as much as me."

("I'm also, like, an Ancient Elven God, I'm responsible for the Blight and the Veil, and I kind of locked the Gods away cause they were evil - but, like, I'm really sad about it. Also the Herald of Andraste thinks I'm cute <3")

<- Previous comments: massive oversimplification, obviously

But I miss the days when not everything was about Solas. It removes so much interest and wonder in this world when the fucking egg is behind it all. I loved him as a character in DAI and now I just feel this bone deep tiredness when I see his stupid face.

Don't you dare threaten to bring Gareth David-Lloyd back -> keep him away from this mess!

3. The Fate of the Rest of the Evanuris

Yay. I'm so looking forwards to "The Return of the Elves: Electric Boogaloo 2" - it was done so well the first time!

"It was the elves all along!"

The only character with any potential to be interesting is Andruil*, but how they handled all this lore was done so shallowly and so poorly that I find it hard to give a damn anymore. Not to mention that the game literally mentions Ghilan'nain mourning Andruil - so is this a retcon/redirection/or have you confirmed that one of the most interesting members of the Evanuris' is dead?

*interesting in that she's established in lore to potentially have a tonne of really cool things attached to her (the void armour, the great weapon she has etc...). The rest of the evanuris are nowhere near as well established as she is.

4. Southern Thedas, Sociopolitical Issues, and Future Games

NOW YOU WANT TO INCORPORATE GEO-POLITCAL EXPLORATION?? You avoided any meaningful discussion like the plague in DATV but now you're acknowledging it?? OkaY. okAy.

They couldn't even give us the long-term ramifications of the mage/templar war how the hell am I supposed to believe that they will be able to pull off 'elven gods are real' etc...? For a game series that totes : your choices matter -> they have not proven that they have been able to show that in a meaningful way. They literally cleaned the slate with this game to avoid doing that.

So, what, does that mean that the Veil is never going to come down now? Or are you going to have the entirety of Thedas build themselves up again just to have the Veil fall and send things into chaos once more?

What a fatalistic, miserable outcome for Thedas -> why the fuck would anyone bother to live in Thedas if you're going to keep throwing meteorites at them? By all means, change/conflict has to happen for the series to move forwards...but this is just so miserable at this point.

(The Elder Scrolls, at least, gives people room to breathe between crisis' or sets them up in different areas of the world! Bethesda treats past installments/your decisions with greater respect than DATV does.)

Even, then, if the Veil remains up, that means that the spirits are just trapped in the Fade being miserable for the rest of existence. The entire series has been humanizing spirits, from Justice to Cole, and now they're just throwing in the towel? I guess they can stay in the fade now! Problem solved!

What do you mean the Evanuris are not a threat anymore? IN A PREVIOUS QUESTION YOU LITERALLY SAID SOME ARE STILL POTENTIALLY KICKING AROUND THE BLACK CITY?

Weakened, sure, but Solas was 'weak' in DAI. You're giving yourself an out if you decide to go back to the elves again. Please do, I'd love more content on how the elves alone fuck everything up!

5. More Southern Thedas, the Chantry, and Tevinter

Thanks for the confirmation that things in the South are so fucked up that they have to work alongside the 'Slave Capital' of the known world to rebuild!

Slavery was one of the biggest things that caused a rift between the north/south chantry system -> one of the reasons why there were exalted marches -> a uniting belief in the south is that slavery is fucked. They didn't address slavery in DATV - what hopes are there that they will do so effectively in a future game?

Don't tell me that Dorian fixes everything off screen either -> either he solves slavery off-screen or the south is being forced to work the slaver-capitol because their land is nuked and they have no ground to stand on.

I'm so thrilled.

6. Solas and the Idol / The Blight

I will never get over Solas fucking curing the Blight off-screen and no one asking questions/giving a shit. Hello?? The Hero of Ferelden would like a word with you???

So the Blight is calcified in Minrathous, at least, but everywhere further away is still fucked! Once more, the South is doomed to suffer from the long-term effects that regular blights have -> not to mention the red lyrium (which still exists according to the AMA) across the south.

I don't care; it's lame. It's a lame way to conclude the blight and I hate it. This game did not earn 'cure the blight from thedas' at all. You could have had us learn how to soothe a titan and see how that can diminish the blight but you did it this way.

Another 'magical ritual' because Solas has such a good track record with them lmao.

7. The Agents of Fen'Harel / The War with the Qun / The Crows

Turned him against the idea of being a leader???!!

Fen'harel's Call to the Elven People After the events at the Winter Palace, elves left the Inquisition under mysterious circumstances, as did elven servants across Thedas. None could say where they went, but those who believed the Inquisitor's story about Fen'Harel wondered just how large the Dread Wolf's forces were... and what the ancient elven rebel had planned. This is from the Trespasser Epilogue, Epler!

Your concept art for Joplin literally had him as a leader of a faction of elves. Just be honest that it's a retcon and you changed course - don't try to save face with this reasoning.

About the Antaam: "We needed some big mindless bad guys to fight and so we did this because we didn't want to address the Qunari War/Invasion we set up in Trespasser".

You had to canonize Sten as being alive and Arishok in order for this reasoning to work -> you didn't even come up with an alternative Arishok to take Sten's place.

Yeah, the exchange that set up the Crows we see in the game as "idealists" did not make the game. I can confirm that!

I'm sorry, "Caterina kept Illario in check?" as in, 'kept him an idealist and not the usual Crow'? The woman that beat him with a cane and starved him and his cousin to train them as Crows. Fuck off.

lmao -> tell me you're coming up with this on the spot without telling me that you're coming up with this on the spot.

8. World State Discrepancies - Isabela

Outright ignores the very real criticism about the marketing from this game and World States.

"there are absolutely places where we unintentionally suggested there was a hard canon (...that Isabela is always assumed to have joined Hawke's party.)"

Unintentional?

Excuse me, you have her talk about Merrill and the Kirkwall Crew as family - that was not unintentional in the slightest. Not to mention Sten, Blackwall, Sera, and Cole are canonized as being part of your world state no matter what.

You had a story you wanted to tell - one that only fit a few world states - and you went ahead with it and disregarded those choices. Don't try and lie about this all being a big misunderstanding.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Edit - They could have taken the opportunity to address the very reasonable criticisms that people had with this game but they cherry-picked questions and avoided/minimized anything remotely critical.

They could have provided us some insight into the game development time but each time they approached the topic they settled for "we're happy with what we delivered and it was well optimized."

They had an opportunity to acknowledge that people were bothered by the handling of the lore/stories (to potentially mention they could course-correct/ rethink their plans) but instead they doubled down on everything that they did and even 'justified' some decisions. They doubled down on the Executors, Solas's changing motivations, the destruction of Southern Thedas, and the elves/Solas being at the heart of everything etc...

This AMA basically confirmed that the only reason they did what they did to the south was for a reset -> It's not a compelling or fulfilling narrative to have everything we've done reset back to ground zero off-screen. BioWare games differentiate themselves from other RPG's by their import system from previous games - it was compelling and exciting! With DATV they set the expectation that BioWare can outright throw out entire games worth of choices/build up, not solely retcon them.

Justifying your choice to water down the lore/world of your story by saying you'll address it in the 'next game' does not instill me with confidence, BioWare! It doesn't explain that lack of it in this game either!

They avoided every question that, rightfully so, pointed out the misleading comments made by devs in the pre-order period of the game:

the fact that there were only 3 imported choices from previous games was leaked by a reviewer -> BioWare was vague from the start about choices

that this game was the most 'romantic' in the series

that world states/ headcanons wouldn't be disrespected

that there are 'lore' reasons for bad darkspawn design

that there are lasting, impactful choices/consequences to be made in this game

that the lore/world was not watered or toned down

that companions are deep and you can disagree with them etc...

BioWare's behavior towards their customers in the lead up period to this games release was downright scummy. I absolutely felt misled after playing the game for myself and recalling what I read in interviews put out. While EA is undoubtedly poison, you can't hold them solely accountable for this.

I feel for the individual developers who worked on this in what was undoubtedly a toxic environment from EA - but I feel that it's pretty clear that BioWare itself has a lot of problems within and in their leadership/executives. Working for EA does not give them an excuse to mislead their customers.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I already had a very grim outlook on the franchise from the end of DATV but this literally look my interest out the back and sent it to God. What a disaster.

[unproduciblesmackdown]

speaking of how going wheeee joe iconis halloween kicked off the combo move of not only "wheeee joe iconis oeuvre" but also the very funny identification process of being like yeah hang on jeremy morse what am i thinking of here & in a one-two Voice Smile recognition going like hey yeah oh my god the 7pm krampus, ft. cyril even here, & how fantastic it's even once again a funny little roles duet with your supernatural kindred spirit you're also fucking, wherein then i also end up going oh yeah bloodsong, finally time to get into that proper....also the resulting humorous thought like well first of all genuinely fascinating when the Funny Little Guy performance i [standing saluting >:'I ] for is put into a duet like that, where there's plenty of overlap like [role you could expect could go to will roland = to jeremy morse; vice versa] like both jeffing, jeremy of frequent similarly "now who's this funny little guy. uh oh is he okay" andy's songing (also was wondering like is Kevin in this vein? & just it also generally not being Unexpected like ah what if someone who can do fun & harmless turned out to really be doing Oh No, This Sicko, except also everyone of any initial apparent effect can be doing the Sicko pivot lol so. but there is at least One potato filmed jeremy morse kevin of yore) but like okay & so what happens Together lol

and what happens is what is fun about Funny Little Roles Together in a context in which a comedic lens is applied to Everything rather than being like ha ha with this lens you can burn who you turn it on, there's a boundary between who can be laughed at & who can do the laughing & Never be laughed at, & i'm remembering the other day like "wait people really have bad dreams about Oh No Everyone Laughing At Me??" b/c i have literally never had anything like that despite basically constant anxiety scenario dreams but there's also not these High Stakes like oh god what if i'm Laughed At as an expression of like negative judgment / contempt b/c like oh a tuesday 11am? nothing to do w/the general anxiety of "it's pathologized if you're anxious when potentially being around Anyone Else at home at school at work in public is indeed Unsafe; but if people find themselves unable to see a movie in theaters like they want to b/c they can't find a pal to chaperone them lest absolutely anyone think they look like a Weirdo or Loser or Geek or Whatever then that's just called being Normal & they should go pwn someone for finding phonecalls out of reach while also liking text messages too much etc" where was i. Not having a boundary between What Can Be Laughed At and You Yourself, who can safely Never be laughed at, or indeed the need to Wink at the audience like ah we're both in on it & both would never really be of [whatever is laughable], not the need for anyone to signal being Above It in whatever way, or for material worth taking seriously to be Not Comedy, or for like some end goal / truly Worthwhile way to be comedic being like ah it's just me being so good at Laughing At & passing that along to an audience whose laughter is "you're so right" & Knowing i could never be worth laughing At, not Really, my expertise in regardless creating that Effect, like when it's considered Actor Prestigious when like supposed states of Inferiority similar to "can be laughed at" like what if someone was Disabled or Ugly or Poor or Fat or Trans etc is performed by someone We All Know To Be So Totally Not That in a as to be typecast as Worthy Leads / Heroes lol & it's all done in a solemn dramatic fashion like wow what a Feat then

lost in the sauce back to What If Two Executors Of Funny Littleness when there's no presumed Boundary of [can be laughed at / L] vs [can Never be laughed at / W] (also like. well a tangent i'll set aside for now lol. heroically) & that it's so interesting & lively the Range therein because nobody's held back from "do NOT give this role depth like they have feelings & character too" so we don't get confused about who's the Real person in this scenario, & more specifically like if we look at the Straight Man role as like, not "try finding someone in the iconis zone where i don't assume everyone's gay unless & until like ah i see married to a woman for what that's worth, anyone can do anything lol" but like let's say the person in a scene who gives the audience Reference for what their Expectations are, so that a context is created where someone can do the Unexpected & there's your comedy. & it's fun how not only is it Already Flexible like well i'd say when the cyril / krampus scene started off last christmas it was the krampus who starts off in the straight man position while cyril is Doing The Unexpected. but then naturally it's the singer in my best friend's a skeleton who gives us context for what to expect, yet including introducing a bit of tension already like what's it mean that your best friend was heard coming from miles away cuz his bones make a ruckus when they hit the ground? & the A Skeleton is the unexpected. but then like even gets in the way of comedy when there's More Expectedness like we can expect the straight man to be the site of What We Should Expect & whomever to disrupt that, & that like really when that boundary is kind of there like the blessed can't be laughed at (save as punishment) vs barbarous can be laughed at (for existing, perhaps Gifted with being taken seriously one moment ever) (cough, e.g. billions) it's those who are Laughed At-able who get more thorough capacity as characters really rather than held back by the scruff of the neck in the realm of supposed guaranteed [everyone will always see you as Dignified & Admirable & Worthy] like yeah have fun

& so the way also that even within, say, a comedic duet / two-person scene, who is operating within Expectation & who is bringing the Unexpected can pass back & forth a bit & even be left entirely behind by both parties b/c the audience still has enough context for what all is going on to not simply be at sea in confusion as to what the effect is even supposed to be, though not suggesting a [??] moment/effect can't be humorous too lol & like i just love that for us. everyone can break out the range b/c nobody has to be the Not Laughed At Ever role & everything just becomes much more flexible, kind of like the range & flexibility granted to any & everyone in any situation where there is not a context of the worthy vs unworthy Lol Lmao, how about that

anyway this comedy commentary was all kind of a tangent as per my original joke being like yeah my sorta humorous thought like "big cabaret won't let there already be dozens of will roland jeremy morse funny little duets b/c they're SCARED" (of the power that would have) but then just last night while hopping around some vaguely relevant videos like omg THAT one yeah i KNOW her!!! you rang

(speaking of will ending up morse so the straight man role but not entirely. & obvious also less joke answers like even with "try finding funny little people who Don't perform delightfully together & have dozens of Recorded & Uploaded instances of this" but & like oh hi also one of the classic sam salmond "in new york" performances where will's singing the So You're Alone while jeremy is in the barbershop quartet, or this apropos cabaret "celebrate christmas (with me)" video....even One nice long crisp number like this like if that cup don't runneth over. while understanders in the comments like speaking of Big Cabaret Is Scared where it's also like well two for two beautiful love songs, someone identifying this as such, or the person right on the same page about this power whose coincidental use of the word bomb got a bath bombs reply lmfao & in that very vein of "source of many views on this vid from '16" someone a little confused but got the spirit in being like shoutout to the other guy, drew! like no & will is not alex. shoutout from Me to the whole thing obvi but also physical comedy or just Acting like parallel threads of what they do during giving the reins a Slap or the subsequent Just Two Dots On A Map which gets a nose (ft. vocal) Boop at one point & then later with more successful affinity a fist bump [slap] & returned form of the boop being Got Your Nipples [two dots on a map] like fantastic lmao. comedy so appropriate that when jeremy inexplicably like clacks his teeth as a Choice does will smile as himself or his role? as he gets to be this fun little guy who still also gets to be the "more normal" one for intents & purposes when you're not Guaranteed pushed into "oh You're the one we Laugh At" & we're not really doing that dichotomy anyway & there's only more surprises & possibilities for all roles & audiences if at any given time any given role might Not be contained within "well, doing things wrong. comedy" gay baby jail)

[varl-the-sloth]

A Scarlet Slaughter

An exhausted and wounded soldier draped in red beheld his greatest nightmare, a terrible mockery of life. Amidst a field of corpses, the lone Death Knight stood; its once black armor now stained with the blood of his fellow soldier. It moved slowly towards him, a distinct lack of haste in its approach. A stillness hung in the air as it loomed over him with a gore-caked runeblade in its clawed hand, with only the din of rainfall and distant battle to punctuate the night. He could see no discernable face upon the Death Knight's visage, only the perpetually-grinning sight of a skull staring blankly back. "You monster," he had managed to say between pained breaths, "I'll kill you!"

He spit at the skull-faced Death Knight, though it was difficult to tell if he had hit his mark. The Knight did not deign to respond and the rain quickly washed any signs of spittle away.

"Strike me," it finally spoke.

If ever there was a chance, that was it. The Scarlet poised his blade to strike at the heart of the unholy creature and lunged, but his blade failed to pierce armor and glanced harmlessly to the side. "Again," the Knight demanded.

Another strike of the sword aimed at the Knight's shoulder. The man's whole arm rattled violently as his blade bounced right off.

"Kill me. I am waiting," it spoke once more.

The Scarlet soldier wailed on the Death Knight with his blade. Blow after blow, every strike of the sword harmlessly rung off of its wretched saronite armor with nary a scratch. With the last of his strength wasted, the soldier dropped his sword to the ground with a hollow clatter. It was hopeless. He could never fell the undead.

"How droll, but now you know the futility of your faith. You will die knowing the Light has failed you, " the Death Knight spoke flatly as it reached for the Scarlet's throat and lifted him off the ground. The soldier choked as his windpipe was slowly crushed under the force of the undead's grip. He gagged and tried to yell out, but he could not find his voice. With a sickening snap, his head lulled to the side and the whole of his body fell limp. The Death Knight released the fresh corpse and it awkwardly collapsed to the ground.

"No way. Varl? Varl! That's you, isn't it?" a gravely-sounding voice suddenly called over the sound of the rainfall, followed soon after a howling cackle.

"Oh, fuck me," Varl grumbled to himself.

A worgen, heavily scarred and worn from an age of bad ideas, stepped into view. He wore dark robes suited for combat and in his wake followed a small horde of demons. He looked around at the scene of carnage before addressing the Death Knight again, "Phew, boy. You really did a number on these guys." The Death Knight turned to face his brother, making his disdain known as he spoke, "...Mian. How good it is to see you." Mian nodded. Whatever vitriol Varl's voice conveyed went completely ignored. "Yeah, man! I thought I'd see you around since I heard the Forsaken were going to lend a hand. It's been a while, always so busy these days with 'Forsaken business', right?" the worgen said, leaning forward to jab Varl with a cheeky elbow.

Before Varl could answer, "Forsaken business" came to him. A rail thin undead, wearing leather armor adorned with the crest of Lordaeron, climbed down from a nearby rooftop and stood before Varl to salute. "Executor! I am ready to report," she proclaimed.

"Good. I will hear it, Deathstalker," Varl responded, holding a hand up to Mian for him to keep quiet during the report. Mian glanced between Varl and the Deathstalker with his maw firmly shut, but his excitement at finally getting to see Varl at work was more than palpable.

The Deathstalker launched into her full report, "Priority targets have been assassinated as per your instructions. We've some wounded, but all will make a full recovery. Scarlet resistance is waning as they are beaten back to their last foothold: the cathedral. Victory is inevitable. Lastly, your abomination reports a complete massacre. What are your orders, Executor?"

"The Deathstalkers are to lend their blades to the battle. Retrieve any wounded allies you may find and bring them to a medic. This is to include the Alliance as well. Do not discriminate. Otherwise, I will feed you to my abomination, am I clear?" Varl issued his commands, "And speaking of Killzone, you may issue them my order to patrol the outskirts of the city and execute any Scarlet stragglers that may attempt to flee. Dismissed, Deathstalker."

The Deathstalker saluted once more before answering with a, "For the Forsaken."

Varl parroted the motto back as the undead ran off to continue her duties, finally turning back to stare at the worgen that had whiled away the time by having some sort of hushed discussion with an imp that had perched on his shoulder.

"Mian. This is hardly your fight, what are you here for?" Varl asked of the warlock.

Mian rubbed the back of neck as the imp hopped off from his shoulder. "Ah, you know," he said vaguely as he turned to look back toward the distant sound of battle, watching a meteor of fel hurtle through the sky and disappear behind the horizon of the cityscape before a loud crash had heralded its landing, "the wife."

If Varl could grimace, he would. The Death Knight rarely feared mortals, but Mian's wife was a terror unlike any other.

"When Sam heard that some Scarlets were squatting in her house, she had some pretty choice words," Mian continued, "so we're kicking 'em out."

"Right. Of course," Varl muttered as he stepped over Scarlet corpses. A rune on his blade began to glow sickly green as he waved a hand over the deceased. The Knight's necromantic powers willed the dead to slowly rise to their feet, groaning and shambling after their new master.

"Also... Killzone? Really? Seems a little on the nose for you, man," Mian prodded with a snide remark.

"It was a name they chose for themself. They insisted upon it," Varl clarified as he gazed upon his newly risen army, "Enough chatter. We wouldn't want to keep Sam waiting."

[gauntsghostsfieldguide]

Anarch- Part 21 and last

TWENTY-TWO: THE VICTORY

"‘When were you hit?’ asked Mabbon. ‘Doesn’t matter,’ said Rawne. ‘You’re hit?’ asked Varl. ‘I said it doesn’t matter,’ said Rawne." I think you'll find it very much does, Rawne. You idiot.

"‘Oh feth, Eli,’ said Varl." I know Rawne's in a bad way when Varl says that and he doesn't snap at him.

"‘Now I’ve met the only fething pacifist objector in this whole fething galaxy.’" Technically not, since he met Dorden a long time ago. Though Mabbon's the only one now that Dorden's dead.

"He felt himself slipping into the dark place he’d spent his life fighting to avoid." ;_;

"The launcher tube had been buckled when the blast slammed it against the wall. He’d noticed that the moment he’d picked it up." Aww, darn.

Poor Mabbon. He may be done with war, but he lives in the world of always war.

"‘A curse,’ said Mabbon. ‘It let me see the truth. The deranged hell of the immaterium and those gods which dwell within it. I saw them all. I saw myself. I saw how he had changed me. I saw what he had made me. It was enough. I turned my back on war forever.'" Interesting, that he saw how Chaos works and responded by turning away from it, instead of going insane or joining closer.

"‘I never asked for it,’ said Mabbon. He spat yellow blood, his eyes neon fire. ‘I never wanted it. But he blessed me anyway.’" And he turned it on Sek as much as he could.

EPILOGUES: ONE WEEK LATER

There's now eight stones in Imperial custody, four mostly burned. That's more than five, but less than the ten that would indicate two sets (one fake). It's gonna show up again.

"But something either side could use." So they're gonna try and use it. So much for Mabbon figuring the Imperium wouldn't figure it out.

"‘I didn’t mean to disturb you,’ Criid said, wiping her eyes. ‘This is just the first chance I’ve had to come down here. To see.'" ;_;

"‘They weren’t tricks to me,’" D: ;_;

I hate this whole plotline so much, tbh. Retconning the two kids in the regiment, the hope of the future, into a Chaos sleeper weapon is just... too grimdark. Too "haha, you thought things could look up?"

"It should be easier to issue commendations now the Tanith First is the formal escort brigade of the Lord Executor." Of course they are. They won't be parted from Gaunt, if he can help it.

"It may get very ceremonial from now on." Until the next book, anyway. Ceremonial's too boring for a plot.

"He took off his cap, stepped forwards, and kissed her cheek. She stayed very still." Fucking finally. Please no more love triangles.

"But just to be on the safe side, you know, he should try to be the best fething person he can possibly be for the rest of his born days. See? Just to hedge his bets? In case the absolution didn’t take." Please, Blenner, please take this advice. Don't be an asshole anymore.

"‘Yes, that was a mistake,’ said Rawne. ‘It didn’t hurt when I was unconscious.'" And now he's feeling better, because he's instantly dry and sarcastic.

"‘We lost a lot. It’s hard to take in.’ ‘It always is,’ said Rawne." Good old unexpectedly sincere Rawne.

"‘I was holding this for you,’ Bonin said, matter-of-factly. ‘That cot’s free, so you can have that.’" Oh, Bonin, so deadpan about Mkoll showing back up. And Milo.

"The boy was never coming back" That's what you think. He's already back, he just hasn't seen you yet.

[captainyonghoon]

first of all i miss yuji so bad. i was really hoping he’d come back but he was like the only one that didn’t. he can’t still be in jail

anyway i guess it makes sense for jinsu to become an executor but also huh. what. is he just special or does it mean something else like this is where the executors come from? assholes like jinsu who are responsible for people dying over the concept of sin? AND it didn’t happen until he actually looked in the mirror for long enough and let it get him. like how denying the truth about everything was safer for him and when he admitted it was when everything was ruined. a+

and i need to know more about what park jungja’s hell was like. if she didn’t know what jinsu was talking about and obviously she didn’t become an executor and she came back with one (1) psychic ability but she was also completely insane for four years (? four years right) afterwards what the fuck happened to her

i love park jungja bc her fate is so grossly ironic. like the whole point of her is that she is just a person, she isn’t representative of any organization or principle, she just wants to live and be with her kids but that’s exactly why she has to be the Resurrected One and why all of them are fighting over her. and another thing!! before jinsu’s demonstration he said he was leaving the fate of the world in the hands of the detective guy. in HIS hands because he gave him the choice between revealing the truth and living his normal human life. and you could say that all of this happened because of him but him choosing to stay with his daughter is the whole point. this guy and park jungja and the taxi driver from s1e6 are the only ones who get it

and until they showed that jaehyeon had been resurrected too i thought this was actually the end of the series for sure. and it still might be but it’s open ended enough that they could continue it i guess? anyway WHAT is hell like for a newborn baby?? and she turned out normal (supposedly). oh i forgot about the mass decree and jungja saying the world was ending soon lol. well

but surprise i’m so obsessed with jinsu still. this post will NOT be about sungcheol but ohh my god. the transformation from arrogant douchebag “this world is doomed without my guidance” to crying mess “fuck this world i just want to stop suffering” is so fucking tasty. like the same man who used to save children from burning buildings or whatever is doing a january 6th and doesn’t care how many people die or what happens bc he just wants to maybe hopefully stop seeing the executor in the mirror. it’s so good. i wish the beatings had continued but ykw i got more than i could have asked for in the beginning

basically i’m so happy netflix pulled off a good second season. and this is not just bc of sungcheol either but season 2 might have even been better than season 1. i may be able to recover from sweet home after all

@ my hellbound friend i will message you tomorrow i’m omw to sleep and collecting my thoughts!!

[microraptorreactor]

replace 'final episode' with 'recent quest' and 'His Dark Materials' with 'Warframe' and 'hilarious' with 'mind-numbing' and we have my thoughts on Jade Shadows. Jesus Christ I wish this fandom could pay attention to themes and through-lines. Like I think the quest needed to be longer and spend more time with Jade but.

oh my GOD PEOPLE

THIS GAME HAS ALWAYS BEEN ABOUT MOTHERHOOD. Did we all collectively forget about Natah? Who's inability to have biological children is like. A massive part of her character? Did we forget about Eluria Entrati? Margulis? Hell, Phagrasa?

ONE STRAIGHT COUPLE DOES NOT CANCEL OUT THE FOUR QUEER COUPLES WE'VE HAD IN A ROW. Seriously. Jade's existence doesn't erase Loid, Albrect, Parvos, Suda, Dante, Ticker, or any beloved queer character from this game. This quest is not homophobic. Y'all can go stare at any of the canon queer characters at any point (And you have to fucking TALK TO ONE IN THE EVENT) except for the forty minutes of this quest.

And I know that this game's cast of villains has been a bunch of literal child murderers, but like. The Sisters of Parvos have always been a more sympathetic group, even if they are evil. Having a commander draw the line at shooting a literal newborn infant is like, nice? Not every villain is absolutely irredeemable in this game. Having a character realize that maybe her goals require crossing some ethical lines she can't bring herself to cross is a nice ark. She also needed more screentime tbh.

And Jade herself: yes, DE kinda fumbled the landing there. They could have explained more. But she was an executor, and likely a literal embodiment of the Jade Light. She's the last weapon of the Orokin. So she decides that she would rather use her light to create life, Sirius/Orion, then continue to destroy. She decides that it's time to bury the Orokin once and for all, and let the world move on. ITS SYMBOLIC Y'ALL.

I'm so tired. This isn't the worst quest ever, it was just a bit rushed. I enjoyed it more then having a fifth old man yaoi ark in a row, would have preferred Yuri but I like that they tried something new. It was clumsy at points, sure, but it's not the horrible misogynistic mess that people are saying it is. Jesus Christ y'all.

Anyways rant off. Not going to tag this so I don't get burned at the stake.

I'm gonna be honest the final episode of His Dark Materials brought out some of the worst literary analysis I have ever seen and it is hilarious to watch.

[ludi-ling]

how do you think remy reacted when he first found out about rogue being caught in terrigen mist and when he realized rogue wasnt in a good place mentally when she was in avengers?

Sorry it took so long to (at least half) respond to this. I needed to wait for the creative inspiration to strike, so to speak. Covid over the holidays is great for sitting round and waiting for your muse to rock up.

I hope you still get to see this anyways, anonymous asker. Merry Christmas. 🎄

----------------------------------------------

Next-of-Kin

               Avengers Mansion, dead as a doornail, quiet as a mouse. Everythin’ packed up and ready to be sold or auctioned off. Anythin’ here worth stealin’? Maybe, probably. Very likely.

               It’s only out of respect for the person I’m here for that I don’t go rootin’ around to find out.

               I turn a box-lined corridor and who should I see but Deadpool, lackadaisically standing guard outside the door I’m supposed to go into.

               “You’re an Avenger?” is the first thing that comes to my mind, and I can’t help but say it.

               At the impromptu greeting, he pushes away from the wall, arms spread.

               “Me? An Avenger? Pfft, naw. Who’s dumb idea would that be, to make me an Avenger?”

               “My thought exactly,” I respond as I draw near.

               “Yeah, well… Stark’s gone bankrupt,” Deadpool shrugs. “Not enough money in the game to make it worth my while.”

               “I hear that.” I glance at all the boxes, ready to be moved out. “How the mighty have fallen. Or somethin’.” I run a hand through my hair, expecting the worst, hoping for the best, wanting this to be over with either way. “Thanks for callin’ me,” I say; but he just waves me off.

               “Don’t thank me. This was Cap’s idea. Said you were on her next-of-kin list. Told me I should call you.”

                ‘Next-o’-kin’? I don’t like the sound’a dat. The past few months all I been doin’ is playin’ sympathetic-ex-boyfriend to whatever the hell she sees herself right now, and this feels like an extension of those duties. If she’s put me down to be the executor of her will, I’m gonna be real pissed.

               “Is, ah… Is Cap in there?” I ask nervously, figuring Wade doesn’t need to know a damn thing about my current relationship with Anna.

               “Don’t worry, Gumboid,” he replies. “The old man said that since you have a warrant out for your arrest, it’s best if he ain’t around if you happen to turn up.”

               Whew. Thank fuck for that. Don’t think I could handle Captain Boy Scout hovering over my shoulder at a moment like this.

               “Thanks,” I say, reaching for the handle. “And by the way. There are at least 5 warrants out on my head.”

               I lean into the door, and I’m just about to open it when he stalls me.

               “Hey, Gambit. While we’re on the topic, you know a guy named Chalmers?”

               I pause. I level him a look.

               “Deadpool, dis ain’t the time for dis kinda shit…”

               “I know.” He grins. At least I think he does behind that mask. “I’m just sayin’. You’re a thief. There’s a fun li’l gig lined up for you, if and when you can squeeze one in-between your ‘next-of-kin’ duties.”

               “G’bye, Wade,” I shoot acerbically at him, and let myself inside.

               I ain’t prepared for what I see on the other side.

               Rogue, lookin’ like shit.

               I shut the door behind me quietly. I let out the breath I’ve been holding in. I walk to her bedside and see just what the Terrigen Mists have done to her.

               “Oh, Anna,” I murmur to myself. “Whatchu gone done to yourself, chere?”

               She can’t hear me, hooked up like she is to all this equipment, in what I can only assume is an induced coma. The fact that she can’t hear or see me is the only reason I’m here. We laid out some ground rules for one another after all. I gave her permission to walk away, and she took it. I’m your home, your harbour, I said to her in one of my rare, earnest moments. You’ll come to me when you know that. But don’t come to me before. Which means – for now – don’t come to me at all.

               I scratch the back of my head awkwardly at the memory. Those words had felt unnecessarily harsh at the time, for both of us – but it had obviously been what she needed to hear. She had never come back to me. Not once. Sure, we’d run into one another, now and then. Traded kind words, smiled. Hugged. Perhaps even flirted now and then. But she’d never come back in the way that mattered, in the way I wanted, or hoped for, or both.

               Y’know, I hear things. I know about Mags. I know about Johnny Storm. Can’t keep things hidden for long wit’ the X-Men. S’like livin’ in some podunk town in the middle of nowhere. Everyone knows everybody, secrets will out. Jubes loves secrets.

               I’m a big boy, but there are some secrets I wish I didn’t haveta hear.

               I dunno how contagious this disease is, but I’m all gloved up, so I reach out and touch her blistered hand. It’s a simple thing, but how many times has she pulled her hand away from mine? How many times have I only been able to touch her like this? Gloves on, skin covered? The moment she gained control of her powers felt like the moment she started to withdraw from me, like she wanted to try to touch everyone and everything that wasn’t me. That smarts. It stings, when we’re both here, and I’m touching her like this.

               I draw up a chair beside her and sit. Again I think about how I’m breaking some sort of rule in being here, this understanding we have, the one I don’t want. The one where I step aside and make way for her to live her life. Where I wait for her to figure out I’m the one she wants.

               Fuck that.

               “I get it, chere,” I murmur into the quiet, half resentful, half helpless. “You want me when you’re on death’s door. You put me down as your next-o’-kin so I turn up by your side when you’re so fucked up you don’t even have to be conscious to know I’m there. You trust me with your life. You just don’t trust me with your love.”

               It’s infuriating. It’s infuriating to know that’s how it is, despite everythin’. I didn’t make no grand sacrifice, voluntarily stepping away from her, for purely altruistic reasons. I did it because I knew she wouldn’t choose me. I knew she’d choose Mags. And I just hadn’t wanted to be there to see it.

               And this is the prize I get. Havin’ the privilege of bein’ with her again when she’s like this.

               I link my fingers with hers, raise her hand to my cheek. Careful our skin doesn’t touch. Conscious of how we’ve both played this game before. Don’t touch!—her perennial warning. Me, pushing the boundaries, so damn hard, all the fuckin’ time. All I ever wanted was this. To feel her warmth.

               “Guess I should be flattered you put me down on the list of people you wan’ around when you’re dead or dying,” I tell her. Am I sounding bitter? Maybe a li’l. “They tellin’ me they’re workin’ on a cure, that Hank and Stark are optimistic, that you’ll pull through. They don’t need to hide it from me though. They’re worried. Real worried.” I slide her a weary smile. “They dunno how often you and I danced dis tango though, do they, chere? You, on death’s door. Me, sittin’ here by your side, willin’ you to wake up, be strong, get better. And you always do.” I laugh softly, squeeze her hand. “Y’know, for someone who’s ‘well-nigh invulnerable’, you don’t half end up in a coma often, mon amour. Why is dat?”

               She don’t answer. She might look like a hot mess right now, but that pretty li’l face of hers don’t even twitch in reply. The soft blip of the heart monitor is the only response I get. I’m used to this. Not gettin’ answers from her. Her, runnin’ away when shit gets real.

               Shit’s real now, chere. They tell me you could die. And if you do, would all’a dat runnin’ been worth it?

               Not dat you’d be alive to care.

               But I’d be. I’d be.

               The harried smile drops from my face. I take her lifeless hand between both of mine. I press my lips to my knuckles, cos I can’t press them against hers.

               “Lissen, chere. Word is, you could die from dis. Too early to tell yet, nobody knows what dis M-Pox thing means. Me, I think you’re too much of a fighter for this to end you. I know you, chere. But if you don’t… if you don’t get past dis… I want you t’know somethin’. I love you. I put a space b’tween us knowin’ I could deal with it because you were out there tryin’ t’be happy. But if you weren’t out there… if the space between us means you ain’t never comin’ back… I don’t think I could live with it. Livin’ in a world wit’out you wouldn’t be worth livin’, chere. I mean it.”

               I pause. As always, no answer.

               Go figure.

               “So you live, girl. Live, so we continue to get that chance we might never take.”

               I gently rest her hand back down by her side. I don’t think there’s anything more I can think of to say. I stand. I give her hand one last squeeze.

               “Love you, Anna Marie,” I say, before I leave.

               I’m surprised to see Deadpool still standing sentry outside the door.

               “You still out here?” I ask.

               “Hey, Cap said I should keep a look out for her while you were here. I hear things about you, y’know, Gambit. I know all about your weird kinks!”

               I raise an irritated eyebrow at him. Why the hell Cap’s lettin’ him run wit’ de Avengers is beyond me.

               “Yeah, well, takin’ advantage of my comatose ex-girlfriend ain’t one of ‘em.”

               I turn to leave.

               “You goin’ already?” Wade asks.

               “Yeah. She looks stable. I’m trustin’ Stark and Hank will take care o’her better than I could. Just make sure you call me again, if things look bad.”

               “And if they look good?”

               I stop, think about it.

               “Yeah. Lemme know. Just don’t expect me to rock up again. She won’t appreciate it if she wakes up and finds me there.”

               “Huh. She wants you there when she’s about to kick the bucket, but not when everythin’s all fairy dust and unicorn farts. Sounds like my kinda woman.”

               Ugh. I’m outta here.

               “G’bye, Wade!” I nearly holler at him.

               I’m halfway down the hallway when I think of something. I halt, spin round.

               “By the way. That Chalmers job?”

               “Yeah?”

               I grin.

               “Deal me in.”

-END-