#( how dare children set their own boundaries right ???? )

[daybreakrising]

i had to listen to ignorant people spouting bullshit on the dog walk today so i am now in a very.... agitated mood, shall we say

gonna bury myself in some writing or something for a while and try to alleviate said mood

[rebelspykatie]

When Hell Freezes Over 

@steddie-week Day Six - Misunderstandings 

Link to AO3 | Chapter 1 | 3.3k | Rated T

Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

There’s something freeing about this time of day. Early morning light peeking through the windows at the top of the rink. Birds chirping outside, barely audible over the steady hum of the cooling system keeping the ice frozen. No unruly children learning how to skate for the first time, or rambunctious teenagers that never take skating safety seriously. It’s just him and the ice.

He used to hate it, back when he first started competing. Wasting away hours of his life that he’ll never get back. There was a desperation back then, a fire that burned in his belly to be the best, to impress his parents and live up to their expectations and become a star. All it did was remind him that he would never be good enough, not for them, and not for the world.

When Steve turned eighteen, he fired his coach and cut off his parents. He almost quit skating altogether, but he wanted to give it a shot without their influence. To finally do something for himself. It took some time, but he finally got back a piece of himself, something he didn’t even realize was missing until he took them out of the equation. His love of skating was stolen from him and decimated by the competitive drive to be better than everyone else for the sake of impressing two people whose love he never should have had to earn.

He forgot how freeing it felt to glide across the ice, wind whipping your hair into a tangled mess and the cool breeze clearing your mind. No feeling on earth compared to this.

He wishes he could go back ten years and tell himself to never lose this feeling, to stop listening to critics and beating himself up every time he stepped onto the ice. Luck was on his side that an injury never took him out permanently, given how hard he was pushing himself. Every year the sport gets more competitive, with younger people coming to the forefront and forcing older competitors out of the rink. New daring tricks that his aging body can’t quite accomplish in the same way as those ten years younger than him.

Now, his routines are wholly his in a way they never were before. Moves choreographed to fit his body and skillset, instead of pushing the boundaries on how many turns he can make in the air to impress the judges. His programs are set to music that Robin and Dustin help him select and rework to the right tempo, less classical music and more piano covers of his favorite top forty hits. His new coach listens and never pushes him to do things that could lead to career ending injuries.

That’s not to say he doesn’t still have a competitive drive, but he’s thankful everyday that he’s no longer subjected to the specific brand of emotional turmoil that came from three different people critiquing his every move on and off the ice. His body thanks him everyday, too. He’s never more thankful than in moments like this, when he’s gliding across the ice and able to just take it all in.

Maybe if he had done more to relax and appreciate the outlet skating gave him, he wouldn’t have reached the boiling point that forced his parents out of his life. Or maybe that was inevitable. A product of their own design from years of emotional abuse that turned into their own brand of physical abuse under a coach that pushed a sixteen year old to the point of panic attacks. Either way, he’s better off now, in his own world, with himself in the driver's seat of his future.

Growing up in this rink, he can almost close his eyes and blindly make his way across the ice. The precise counts it takes to glide from one end to the other ingrained into his muscle memory after years of training. He hasn’t forgotten, even when he moved on to larger rinks at the behest of his former coach. With no one else here besides the handful of employees that open the rink bright and early, Steve can sail across the ice with no barriers or distractions.

The silence is almost overwhelming. Gone are the days of his coach spouting harsh criticisms or his parents tisking from the rafters at each under rotation. He might miss a handful of things when it comes to his parents, mainly the money, but that is not one of them. There’s this deep recess of his brain that stores all of those criticisms and sometimes he can’t help but still think back on them, but he tries to keep it from influencing how he skates now. His current coach is always doing double duty, assisting him in becoming a better skater, and also rewiring his brain to override what lives there from his parents.

“Hey, twinkle toes,” interrupts his peace and quiet, “time to let the real men take the ice.”

Steve is groaning before he even turns around. He knows that voice. It belongs to the bane of his existence, Eddie Munson. It was only a matter of time before he showed up to ruin Steve’s morning. He completely ignores the comment about real men. Munson gives the kids a run for their money on immaturity and it’s best to not engage.

For the past few weeks, Eddie and his Hellfire hockey club have been interrupting his morning workouts. Steve hasn’t been back in town long, and the club is new, so they haven’t had a lot of opportunities to run into each other before now, but at the moment, they can’t seem to go one day without butting heads. He had no way of knowing that these guys had taken over his time slot on this ice, but Eddie has been hellbent on making sure Steve’s mornings end in chaos.

“Munson, you know for a fact that my name is on this time slot with the office,” Steve says, skating over and coming to a stop at the barrier around the rink.

Eddie waddles over on his skate guards and peers over the railing to look at Steve.

“Yeah, I know, sweetheart, but your time ended ten minutes ago,” his voice tinged with a faux saccharine quality and a cocky, fake smile on his lips. “I was kind enough to give you some time to figure it out, but it looks like your spandex might be a little too tight. Is it cutting off the circulation to your brain?” Eddie leans against his hockey stick. “You haven’t gone over your time in weeks,” he adds, matter-of-fact, with almost a hint of concern.

That can’t be right. Why would Munson be worried about him? Had he really been skating for over an hour already? There’s no way. But sure enough, the giant clock on the wall reads eleven minutes past his time.

“Oh shit, sorry, man,” Steve apologizes, even though the last thing he wants to do is give Munson something to hold over his head. It’s embarrassing that Eddie caught him so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t even realize it was so late. “It’s all yours.”

Steve feels Eddie’s eyes follow him as he snaps on his guards to exit the ice. It’s unnerving having Eddie’s attention on him like that, eyes glued to his every movement. He wonders if Eddie is doing it on purpose, as some kind of intimidation tactic to scare him away from their practice time. They’ve been more amicable towards each other in recent weeks, though.

They’ve already gone through the whole song and dance of trying to scare each other off. That first week was a tense battleground for heated arguments and accusations about favoritism thrown around. Those arguments ended when Eddie insinuated that Steve’s parents were paying off the rink owner and Steve had quietly admitted that he no longer speaks to his parents, so they wouldn’t do something so bold for him these days.

Now, they have an unspoken truce, to leave each other alone and respect the time slots, only heckling each other a bit during the trade off. Steve’s the one who broke that truce this morning. Eddie has every right to be pissed and stare him down, but it doesn’t make it any less uncomfortable. He’s not even sure that Eddie’s mad, he’s just staring at Steve like he’s trying to solve a puzzle.

What’s even more unnerving, is that Eddie doesn’t follow the rest of the guys out onto the ice. Gareth throws a confused look over his shoulder as he goes to warm up, but Eddie ignores him, his focus solely on Steve.

“You’re awfully quiet this morning, Munson,” Steve remarks, hoping to break some of the tension that has cropped up in the last few minutes. He sits down on one of the benches where his duffle bag is resting, digging through it for his change of clothes before he heads to the locker room.

“I’ve just never seen you give up that fast,” Eddie shrugs, looking down at his skates and spinning his stick back and forth in a dizzying motion.

“Are you saying you wanted to fight with me?” Steve looks up puzzled.

An unreadable expression passes over Eddie’s face before he says, “Of course I don’t want to fight with you, I’m just saying it’s weird.” He hesitates for a moment, then adds, “Is this some kind of psychological warfare you learned about from your fellow ice ballerinas? Trying to score more time for your silly little routines?”

Maybe they’re more alike than Steve is willing to admit, as he just had the fleeting thought that Eddie was doing this to mess with him. Eddie doesn’t need to know that, though.

It takes all of Steve’s willpower not to just glare at Eddie, but he’s always had a sharp tongue. All bark with no bite. Steve’s figured out how to best deal with him after a few weeks of being at each other’s throats. Never back down from a challenge. Eddie can smell blood in the water, like a circling shark.

Gathering his change of clothes in his arms, he stands up and walks over to Eddie.

“Contrary to popular belief, my world doesn’t revolve around you bucket heads,” Steve knocks a knuckle against Eddie’s helmet, grinning at the thunking sound. “Trust me, you’ll know if I’m fucking with you.” A bewildered expression passes over Eddie’s face. “Besides, you sure do have a lot of thoughts on figure skating for someone that’s never tried it.”

Eddie huffs out a breath. “That sounds exactly like what someone that was fucking with you would say, you know. I’m onto you, Harrington.” He narrows his eyes and makes a two fingered motion from his eyes to Steve’s. “I try not to think about figure skating at all, but you keep screwing that up for me.”

“Oh,” Steve inches closer, tapping a finger under Eddie’s chin, “thinking about me that often, sweetheart?”

“I- that’s not what- Jesus H. Christ, fuck off,” Eddie sputters, cheeks flushed pink. “I am not thinking about you that often. You’re just always-” he waves around one hand, “here. Doing your dumb little flips and jumps. Giving skating a bad rep.”

“That’s not exactly denial,” Steve says, just to rile him up, smirking at the indignant huff Eddie lets out. They’re standing way too close because Steve can feel that puff of air on his chin. He takes a step back.

“Must be easy to get lost out there when you’re just going in circles,” Eddie adds, trying to redirect the conversation, once again trying to undermine figure skating.

“It’s not just circles and flips,” Steve snaps. “Figure skating is just as difficult as hockey.”

Eddie rolls his eyes. “Sure it is.”

It’s a good thing Steve has years of patience from dealing with his parents, because if not for that honed skill set, he’d probably have punched Eddie in the face long before today for his snide little comments. Now, Steve almost gets a sick joy out of watching Eddie squirm. There’s probably something wrong with him that he wants to use everything in his wheelhouse to get Eddie to flush pink like that again, or look at Steve with that intense stare that burns a hole right through him. Eddie always makes him feel like his skin is on fire.

“What, you think I’m not a real man because I skate around to music instead of slamming my body into someone else and grunting like an animal?”

“We do not grunt like animals!”

“Oh please, you guys are like rabid animals out there, slamming each other into the glass and fighting over a tiny puck.”

“Well, at least we still have our dignity,” Eddie says, smirking, like he’s won this argument.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Steve asks, confused about not only where Eddie is going with this, but also the turn his morning has taken. He really didn’t anticipate getting into this argument. He thought, given how much Steve took of their ice time, that Eddie would’ve been out of his hair by now, but no. Here he is, fighting with Steve like it’s his favorite pastime.

Maybe it is. Maybe they’re equally as infatuated with each other.

“I mean look at all the spandex, man,” Eddie gestures to the stretchy leggings that Steve has on.

“Is your masculinity so fragile that you can’t handle spandex?” Steve tosses back. “You think wearing pads makes you more of a man?”

“They’re more manly than spandex.”

Running a frustrated hand through his hair, Steve groans. He tries not to grimace at how greasy and sweaty it feels. All he wants is to go take a shower, but instead he’s arguing with Eddie like they’re in middle school. “You’re one of the most infuriating people I’ve ever had the misfortune of speaking to, you know that, Munson?”

“You know I aim to make your life miserable. It’s one of the few things that brings me pure joy,” he leans on his stick, pointedly looking at Steve’s leggings with disdain.

The thought barely forms in his head before Steve blurts out, “I bet you couldn’t do half the things I do on the ice.”

A skeptical frown creases Eddie’s forehead. “Are you challenging me?”

“You’re the one that wants to argue about the difficulty of figure skating and whether I’m a real man, which is frankly misogynistic and rude. So, prove it.”

Robin would be so proud of him right now. Sticking up for himself and pointing out that Eddie is shitting on his sport for no reason other than societal views on masculinity and sports. He’s used to being the butt of the joke around his family, but he doesn’t have to put up with that anymore. Least of all from Munson, who is the closest thing he has to a mortal enemy outside of his own parents. Although wanting to watch his cheeks turn a pretty pink under the fluorescent lights of the rink while they argue is probably not typical enemy behavior.

Steve’s aware that he’s a freak. He’s just ignoring it for his own sanity. Some wires might’ve gotten crossed in the development of his brain. That’s not his fault.

“By doing what? You want me to go out and spin around and do a jump?” Eddie asks, grimacing as if even the thought is inconveniencing him.

“I want to see you try to do even half of my routine.” Steve’s coming up with this on the fly, not sure where this is even coming from, but he wants to put Eddie in his place. Prove a point.

“And then, what? You want me to admit you’re a real man?” Eddie cocks an eyebrow and tisks. “When hell freezes over.”

“Sure,” Steve agrees. “I don’t really need your approval to be secure in my own masculinity, but I think you could learn something. Maybe before hell freezes over.”

He knows that there’s no way Eddie is going to be able to follow through on this without leaving the ice with his tail between his legs. Figure skating is difficult. People see it and think, oh it can’t be that hard. Yet, there’s a reason there are only so many elite skaters in the world, all fighting for a top spot. It’s incredibly demanding and takes years of training to get to the top, if injuries don’t knock you out before that.

Eddie is delusional if he thinks that he has an ounce of talent that translates from hockey to figure skating. Sure, the basics of skating, like how to stay upright and physically glide across the ice, are the same, but the mechanics are totally different. Figure skating requires a certain degree of flexibility that’s not a part of playing hockey. They both require a certain agility, but it’s in different ways. It’s simply arrogant for Eddie to assume he can do what Steve does. And Steve’s going to prove it to him.

“What about you?” Eddie asks, tone challenging and a tad condescending. At Steve’s questioning look, he adds, “If I have to prove something, so should you. Let’s see how confident you are when three grown men are body slamming you into the boards.”

He tries to hide the smirk that wants to form on his face. Munson is in for a rude awakening. While his name is well known in the world of figure skating, less is known about his connection to hockey. It’s a sacred sport in his family, one all of the men grew up playing as soon as they could walk. One of his uncle’s is on the board of governors for the NHL and another one owns a team. There’s no way Steve would ever divulge that information, especially not now that he’s challenged Eddie. He already thinks Steve is a spoiled brat down on his luck just waiting to crawl back to mommy and daddy. He doesn’t need to add any fuel to that fire.

It wasn’t until Steve was eight that he made the switch to figure skating and realized he was more talented at that. But the hockey roots are there. He still played rough matches with his cousins every winter until he cut off communication with his parents. He tries not to grin too wide and give anything away. Munson’s walking right into his trap.

“Challenge accepted, Munson.” Steve holds out a hand. “I’ll take on a quick hockey match, if you try my routine.”

Cautiously, Eddie reaches out to shake it, eyes narrowed like Steve is deceiving him, agreeing too quickly for his liking.

“Will you two quit flirting and get out here, man?” A voice calls out from the ice. Steve’s pretty sure it’s Gareth, but it’s hard to tell with all of their equipment and the distance between them.

Interestingly enough, Eddie flushes a darker shade of pink at that, but he’s rolling his eyes and shouting back, “I’m coming, calm down, dude,” before Steve has time to analyze it. He walks backwards towards the opening to the ice. “Tomorrow morning, Harrington. We’ll use both of our time slots to make this challenge happen. Deal?”

“Deal,” Steve agrees. “Should I bring some extra tights?”

Eddie flips him off and turns around to pop off his guards, but not before Steve catches the grin on his face. It’s wide and sincere and not at all like the mocking smirk he’s received all morning.

A warm feeling takes up residence in his chest, one that he doesn’t have time to examine. He has no idea how to explain why he relishes Eddie’s attention. It makes it feel like a bee is caught in his chest trying to break free. He ignores the flush on his own cheeks and throws his bag over his shoulder, making his way to the locker room.

[moonxsuncelestials]

Aftermath: Leaving the Oasis (Part 2)

It was natural for Yun to have looked back a few times once he got past the house, looking at Castle who nodded at him, and he saw the Ferals who wanted to follow him. Hope had to help in convincing the Ferals that they must wait for Yun to settle into his new home; so that until then, they must remain in The Oasis, watch over the children and keep their home safe. It wasn’t easy but eventually the dragon made it to the end of the path that led to Hell and there stood Beezlebub, leaning on a tree as if he had been waiting for him.

And the moment Beelzebub opened his arms, Yun just dropped everything and ran to him; Beelzebub catching him in his strong arms, only stumbling back a little while he held onto the dragon tightly, crooning softly at Yun while the dragon just cried into his chest, rubbing his dragon’s back, caressing him; and only when he was positive that Yun could stand without falling over, did he help get his bags and then just get him home. 

That first night Yun just stayed in Beelzebub’s arms and the next day they went on to the palace.

Those first few months were the hardest, as Yun would often question if Yue had always been that stupid and naive to see the manipulation tactic, if his twin even truly loved him or was she just playing her part. The questions only further ignited his rage and yeah, Yun became rather destructive; it would take him hours to calm down and Hope hated not only the man who caused his beloved Bright One this kind of pain–ranked him right up there with Ptolemy– but also Yue for hurting his beloved dragon. If Hope was honest, he had questioned the same thing about Yue, but came to the conclusion that no, she wasn’t playing a part. She does genuinely love her big brother, she’s just been blind to what Yun has had to endure his entire life. 

It was around the third month that he finally mustered up the courage to speak with his family about his decision. And Yue by then had gone off to China so it worked in his favor, despite getting into another argument with some of the family, but thankfully Syrina was the voice of reason during that meeting in the manor.

“It’s not our decision.” She said ever so factly and in a calm manner that shook most of the family. Well, most of the Egyptian half of the clan outside of Set who smoked calmly. 

 Yun for a moment feared he angered her, only for that fear to be banished as she looked at him with understanding shining in her golden eyes. “You’re doing what is best for you and that’s often the hardest step when it comes to creating your boundaries. As much as it hurts to hear you say how you’ve felt that most of our family failed to notice how you’ve been made to be the villain, you’re right.” Jackal had taken over and despite the tantrum he gave, one look from Syrina quieted him. “I understand where Yun is coming from, Jackal. You, Anubis, Dad, and I were made out to be villains long before any of us ever set foot upon the dunes. Nana Neith predicted those paths and everyone herded us to those paths because they didn’t want to give us a chance to be anything else. Anubis culd have become a magnificent performer, with how powerful that voice of his, right Hathor? And Dad coud have been the greatest of Pharaohs-in the end no one wanted to see us as anything but villains. Am I wrong?”  

Jackal grumbled, not thrilled that Syrina had a point. Glad that she had quieted her big brother, she glanced around the room and seeing how no one else dared to interrupt her again, she continued. “We each have made our choices, for better or worse, which helped in forging our own destinies despite what Nana Neith predicted.” She then looked at Yun and added, “Know that we still love you, Yun and I’m proud of you, Kiddo. Just promise me that you’ll be careful and drop us a line once in a spell, okay?”

“I cannot make excuses nor can I turn back the hands of time, but I do offer my apologies Yun.” Sekhmet said with a heavy heart. She had tried her damnedest to give Yun the same love-where did she go wrong!?

“Mom…While I appreciate it, I don’t want apologies as they are nothing but words to me now. What good are words when the actions have yet to be taken?” He asked as she and Bast smiled sadly at him. He was right, apologies were too late though at least he appreciated them. “Look, I’m not here to fight, there’s been enough of that as is. I spoke with Castle and Beelzebub about The Ferals who have decided to remain loyal to me and will live with myself and Beelzebub in Hell. I merely was giving everyone here, the courtesy of informing you of my decision. I cannot live where I’ve been made to feel like I don’t belong. And as much as I would love to put the entirety of the blame upon members of this family who stood by and didn’t bother to help me stand; much of it is also my fault.” He had paused and looked around at his elder siblings, at his adopted parents whom he loves dearly. “Mom, Dad…I know you two tried your best. But I feel happier in Hell, I belong there.”

[crimsoncircle2]

so, carry on | trial 5 | execution reaction | dmitri

Nona Blacklung, he had said, wanting Gia to grow as old and comfortable as she desired. There’s a glorious transition which occurs when the skin begins to sag and the muscle begin to pop out less, when the sun spots dapple and darken and lay down in patterns like a sailor’s back tattoo, taking him home. How he had hoped to still be visiting her when she was eighty and he was fifty, how it would feel to be as grown as Gia La Malfa was when she changed the course of his life forever, and by then, she would’ve stopped smoking. Nona Blacklung, oh, Nona Blacklung.

It’s not for him, he thinks, the words of sons to a man failed by parents at every corner, weighed down by the sacrifice they made for their children. His mother would say the same sometimes, whenever she was mad, whenever she felt old, or ugly, or wanted to be alone: Haven’t I sacrificed enough in this family? How she had, yes, she had given what was in her material means, the bread and the house and the water. It is not meant for him, but still Gia’s words reach out to his core as though they could absolve him. The tears don’t stop. They are soundless little things, hitting the floor and shattering like glass. In another time he may have offered himself up to trade, exchanged cogs in the wheel of sacrifice, but he had told Gia a commitment to living after over a decade of looking to die. A hundred times she would’ve smacked his hand away if he offered to exchange places. A hundred times, he would’ve felt a horrible, dirty coward.

When the execution begins, he is stunned still. It would be insult to try to pry open the doors for Shisa, and it would be sacrilege to, as one of the votes for her, tremble his lip, look away, or apologize. But Gia might catch something he leaves to the wind on his voice, there as he leaves her the last comfort he can, and perhaps the only thing he is now able to do for her:

I will see it through.

Then she’s off to die.

Dmitri, for once, raises the eyepatch off, squeezes it in the palm of his hand, and witnesses a demise with two of his eyes, as he does for his opponents in their earnest, final moments— a respect he only gave when completely alone, here, surpassing all barriers and boundaries of his conduct because it is for Gia. The stage presents him with a story of a what-if, a Gia La Malfa who became a boss in her own right, and dares to imply that she was a fruit of the same tainted tree his ilk derived from, destined to sow seeds that would rot the ground further. Her love, left to sea, swallowed by that legacy, and her son, now severing her to set himself free from that hellish yoke and mantle, to suggest that this, at her core, might be what it means to be Gia La Malfa as she sits in that very same spot, closes her eyes, and bleeds.

But it is not, and may he crack Leviathan’s jaw and split them down the middle for even so much as insinuating such a thing.

The Gia La Malfa who he knew came to him in spite of the ways he was gleeful and wild and obviously grieving, and never asked him to change, or hide his face, or stray from the path he was leading. She put down her gun and chose another path, one where she gives a young man chocolates and reconnects with a lover and around the world serves and host and guest and pillar. Her warmth was not of a fire, but perhaps a coal, an ember, kept in the pocket of a coat to keep the soul warm at the coldest, cruelest hour, a figure in the distance and the wind pushing you onwards. Gia La Malfa had loved, and lost, and found, and in every confident stride, in every smile and touch on the shoulder, she lived with the tenacity to show the world of discarded assassins that their world was not yet over.

Her time was up, and the change she championed, perhaps she always knew it would never be by her hands, bloodied with feuds, splattered by mothers and fathers taken before their proper ripe time. And perhaps she always knew she would join them, humoring Dmitri when he always counted just how much she had grown old when he counted her wrinkles and wanted to mark that she had passed one hundred. Perhaps at that bridge she wished he was eight and she was almost forty and she could have done something more besides break the bones in his body. There was no means to undo what had happened to the boy, but she set the man on a path that would at last open the eye he had closed to the world, the very path that would convince him to transform his scales into vines. They could never be family, but they were far from coworkers, delegates, master and apprentice, a relationship which would forever blur the lines of definition, but the depth of what was there was always felt, if not said. 

(In his own words, he would imagine it’s the love and forgiveness you wish you could give to your younger self. How you are so different from them now, how she and him were never quite the same, but he wanted to raise his head and ask her so many things about the future, and she could tell him about all the ways it would turn out okay.)

Around him brews vengeance, rotting in the air as it grows thick, stagnant, iron. A rage of revenge has birthed its own, and the cycle of scorn may continue yet again, held in the knives of two children and the breath of a man who slew his own father in turn, rage communal, collective, stemming from the young thousands in the world of assassins who killed for someone dead. He too could join them, calling for this to be solved all with Leviathan’s head— but for a moment, just an infinitesimal moment, it’s as though the islands themselves speak to him.

The crack in his face is where it all pours in. Grief delirium, maybe, a pain he swallows so deep down to prevent its bubbling that it takes him out of this moment to see the foundations upon which this place is built. He thinks of all the blood spilt so far, the bodies on the beach, lining up by the coast so that their blood trickles into the water as one red cloud. Perhaps he places Atticus’s mother there, and Gia’s father, her grandfather, and Shinichi’s parents, Arcadia there as well. Bodies upon bodies stack up by the coast, those he knows among them they have lost, and those beyond, the rising cascade of corpses from people he has no idea the validity of but knows must have died in the pursuit of all this, and suddenly each grain of sand is a grief of someone who once loved. A world not built on good deaths, or necessary ones. It was built on rage, and betrayal, and no hand with which to hold someone. He wonders if Gia, standing on this shore, knowing its truth, had to close her eyes when the noon light reflected off the water. Leviathan contents to burn it all down, leave them all messily afloat, and Ouroboros intends to build it better, stronger, arrange the bodies in the walls so they hold tight like a word in a throat. Neither of them, in his eyes, truly cares for those who died.

Dmitri is awash with guilt, and grief, and every emotion on the spectrum which makes him feel adrift. But unlike ever before in his life, even as his knees shake and his stomach churns, Dmitri Zakharchenko has a promise, a direction, and a future to build so others may go.

It was a world without legacies! A world where we don’t have to prove ourselves in tests that break us! A world where you don’t have to do what you’re doing right now…!

And he wants to cry to the beyond: What a beautiful world it is, Giovanya! I want to see it! I want to touch my forehead to its grass and kiss its dirt!

Some part of him alters, another metamorphosis of his self. Dmitri suspects he will never be Sasha again. That was the name a boy chose when he had nothing else. But for the sake of what she entrusted him with, he will become the man who can see that through. It hurts. It hurts. But he will rise above it, as he has again, and before.

Giovanya, Nona Blacklung, товарищ, тётя, woman like the sun, woman whom that wolf loved. I will not do it for you. I will do it for myself, and everyone, as you would give me the right to choose. Forgive me for what I have taken from you, this life, your world— but only do so after I have given enough back to the world, ten, hundred, thousand-fold.

[aquafaith]

My lengthy, angry ACOSF rant review.

Spoilers, TW for mental, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse.

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I loved ACOTAR. I still love ACOTAR. I always will love ACOTAR. But every book afterwards made me give up more and more. ACOMAF romanticized an abusive relationship and assassinated characters for the author's convenience. ACOWAR was a bunch of boring and inconsequential death scares. ACOFAS was all-round dreadful. And each book kept shitting on and pushing away Lucien for no reason.

I'd like to preface this by saying I hated Nesta too. I hated the way she treated Feyre in ACOTAR especially, and I wasn't even too excited for this book because I wasn't that keen on Nesta as a character.

Nesta's POV and her backstory changed my perspective. It does not excuse her actions. All Nesta stans can hold these characters accountable for what they do - trauma is a reason, not an excuse. I, and many others, sided with Nesta because of the way she's treated by everyone else in this book. Also, if you're going to hate Nesta for not teaching Feyre how to read and letting her hunt at fourteen, (which I did, and are very valid things to hate), AT LEAST hold Elain accountable too.

This book. This fucking book.

Shall we start with the intervention? Feyre on her little power trip thinks that her boyfriend that hates Nesta and Nesta hates back, Nesta's ex-best friend, and her possible mate who she never talks to should be at this stupid fucking intervention??? Excuse me???

Remember in ACOMAF when Feyre wouldn't shut up about how rich Rhysand is? Feyre literally has four or five houses and is always talking about how much jewelry and lingerie she can afford because Rhysand is so rich??? Well, Nesta has a few shots. So you know what Feyre does? Humiliates Nesta at this "intervention", TEARS DOWN HER HOME, and forces her to go to the Illyrian training camp.

That was the god awful premise for this book.

Did you think Elain wasn't there because she was against the "intervention"? Nope! She was packing Nesta's belongings without permission.

Remember in ACOMAF when it's made a big fucking deal that locking up a traumatised woman is extremely damaging? Well, when Nesta decides she doesn't want to be in Illyria, Feyre locks her in the House of Wind. Nesta can't fly, so her only way of leaving is down the TEN THOUSAND STEPS, that Feyre KNOWS Nesta isn't capable of climbing.

Feyre's pregnant. In ACOFAS she randomly decided that she wanted a baby to remember Rhysand by if he dies. Which doesn't make any sense because they made that stupid fucking death pact in ACOWAR. It's just SJM superimposing her pregnancy onto her early 20's protagonist. Ignoring the fact that Feyre isn't ready for a baby and Rhysand CERTAINLY isn't, and with a war just ended and another looming and so much trauma and a DEATH PACT are all such horrible circumstances to bring a child into, Feyre is already pregnant. Remember when SJM made a big deal about Fae babies being so hard to conceive, and Feyre said in ACOFAS they wouldn't have to worry for a long time because it can take years to conceive your first Fae child? Well it's been no more than 3 or 4 months and Feyre's already pregnant. Yep.

Also the birth will kill her. Because of course it will. Rhysand KNEW this, and still agreed to try for a baby.

There's no solution. Abortions don't exist for some stupid reason, and a C section would apparently kill Feyre?

(Wasn't this book supposed to be about Nessian?)

In ACOWAR, Cassian was on the battlefield with his entrails around his knees. Someone had to literally hold his guts in for him, and he's fine, but you're telling me a C section would kill Feyre?

Don't worry, this is just setting up the AWFUL ending to this book.

ACOSF amounts to Nesta being gaslit into believing her abusers are right. Her friends and family slut shame her and shame her for her lifestyle constantly. Cassian says it took him decades to work through some of his trauma, and he tried to drink and fuck it away too, but suddenly when Nesta does so it's heinous? Nesta's barely twenty five and she's expected to cope better than these ancient immortals.

Hell, didn't SJM write ACOMAF? Nobody expected Feyre to pick herself up so quickly. The IC (excluding Rhysand) respected her boundaries for the most part and understood when it was grief, trauma, and turmoil that made her angry, sad, want to be left alone, etc. But that's all forgotten here.

Amren also compares Nesta to the people in, and says she belongs in, The Court of Nightmares. You know, the murderers, abusers and rapists? This innocent woman who had a few shots and a bit of sex is on par with them, apparently!

The sex scenes.

SJM is scared to say vagina so she says sex.

She says seed to mean semen.

Apparently the word cunt turns SJM on. I just found Cassian saying that kinda cringe because I'm Bri'ish so the word cunt really isn't a big deal.

Back to the baby killing Feyre, because this is definitely what we all wanted from this book as indicated by the change in covers and format and title... Rhysand decides not to tell Feyre. He tells her friends and family, and tells them not to tell her.

SJM loves sweeping Rhysand's abuse from the first book under the rug and claiming it's always about Feyre's choice... where is that here, MAAS? WHERE IS IT?

Anyway, when Nesta rightfully decides to tell Feyre (although it is kind of out of spite), Rhysand threatens to kill Nesta.

And I believed him. With the way he treats his """mAtE tHaT hE lOvEs sO mUcH""" and all the people he's mindlessly killed before, do you really think he wouldn't kill the person who gave Feyre an inch of autonomy?

So what does Cassian do? His lover who he cares deeply about and suspects is his mate has received a death threat from tHe mOsT pOwErFuL hIgH lORd iN hIsToRy.

Cassian simply gets Nesta out of the court.

EXCUSE ME?

He doesn't breathe ONE word to Rhysand about this. This Illyrian WARRIOR who fought with his GUTS HANGING OUT didn't dare step up to the hIGh lOrD who he considers his brother and sparrs and fights with all the time?

Cassian literally does nothing.

Was it not Rhysand himself who said Mated males are dangerous? Can kill anyone who looks at their mate? Can be dangerous simply leaving the house? Rhys and Feyre both pull the Mate card to justify their bad actions on the other's behalf... and Cassian just tried to get Nesta out of the court?

Also, this High King bullshit.

I swear to fucking god, if SJM DARES to make this abusive, power-tripping, mOsT pOwErFuL hIgH lOrD eVEr, husband-insert of hers hIgH kInG, I will fight her in the street.

My beloved Lucien is in this book. Only for him to be used and shat on.

I really liked it when he calmed Cassian down with just a look though. Yes please fox man.

Helion is also in this book. Nothing to do with Lucien.

Eris is also in this book. ERIS. Lucien's eldest brother. The same one who abused him for years, but according to SJM he's slightly better, because at least he didn't agree to kill Lucien's lover. He betrayed his daddy that one time, therefore Eris is good. Y'know, the same Eris who abused Mor? Left her laying on the Autumn Court border with a nail in her womb? Well SJM is going back on her own canon to redeem yet ANOTHER abusive male, while continuing to demonize Tamlin for things he only happened to do when SJM decided the villain from the first book was sexy.

Nesta and Cassian are Mates.

Remember when Mates were supposed to be a rare and sacred thing? Now SJM dishes them out like Oprah.

I don't want these characters to be mates. I want to see them slowly fall in love. But SJM is incapable of writing that so she forces them together with the mAtInG bOnD. That's literally the only basis for most of these relationships, Feysand especially.

The only relationship where the bond would make sense is between Helion and The Lady of Autumn. Who still isn't named. But I will die on the hill that they're mates, I can feel it between them.

I wanted someone to die in this book. I predicted that it would either be Helion or Tarquin, but Tarquin isn't even in this one.

And the ending.

SJM can't write a decent climax, so she kills both Feyre and Rhysand for the second time. Yep.

The baby is being born which stupidly kills Feyre, and thankfully takes Rhysand with them.

Nesta decides to save them. Bad choice. But she decides to save them! Because she's so powerful and she ATE THE CONTENTS OF THE CAULDRON and she's CONNECTED TO THE MOTHER.

Do you know what happens.

Nesta loses her powers.

NESTA.

LOSES.

HER.

POWERS.

The powers we've hardly seen, the powers that were briefly mentioned and used ONCE in ACOWAR, then we saw like two flashes of in this book? They're GONE now. GONE SO NESTA CAN SAVE HER ABUSIVE SISTER AND ABUSIVE HUSBAND WHO ABUSES THEM BOTH.

Nesta is just an Amren now. They both fought for their powers, and had to give them up to save people who didn't deserve it. Now they're anticlimactically trapped in powerless bodies.

Also, and I can't BELIEVE I didn't originally include this - do you know what else Nesta TRADED HER POWERS FOR?

Illyrian anatomy so she can carry Cassian's baby one day.

EXCUSE ME?

I am so fucking SICK TO DEATH of the narrative that every woman needs a man and children to be happy. SJM clearly loves this because she's literally only keeping Amren and Nesta alive now to be sex objects to their partners and nothing else seeing as their POWERS WERE RIPPED AWAY FROM THEM, and now NESTA TRADED THOSE POWERS TO HAVE A BABY SHE DOESN'T EVEN KNOW SHE WANTS? Nesta does NOT strike me as a motherly type. She's the wine aunt, she and Cassian are the couple that go on holiday a lot and and babysit their nieces and nephews, but nope. Nesta HAS to have children.

The Feysand baby is called Nyx. That's just so underwhelming, you go from these huge, multiple syllable names like Amarantha and Morrigan and Lucien to Nyx? I get it's supposed to be unique but it's not even meaningful. It's just more shit-flavoured icing on the hAHa nIgHt uWu cake. I prefer Renesmée.

Nesta is wrong somehow. She says she's sorry as she's saving them. FOR WHAT? For being a little rude to Feyre as all sisters are? And rightfully hating your sister's abuser?

Oh yeah, remember in ACOWAR when Nesta took care of a comatose, starving Elain for months? Elain is randomly okay now because she takes care of her mental health the stereotypical way of baking cakes, and not drinking and fucking, which she shames Netsa for.

Remember the slut shaming, demeaning comments that the whole iNnEr cIrClE made about Nesta? They all expect apologies from her. For some reason.

Nesta has done nothing wrong. She coped with her trauma and minded her business in her own ways, and she's expected to apologise to the people who control and emotionally abuse her.

Nothing that any of these characters did to Nesta is right. Nesta wasn't okay at the end, this wasn't Nesta's healing story. This is Nesta being shamed and degraded until she submits.

Oh I can't believe I forgot to write this in my first draft of this review, do you know how Nesta "overcomes" her grief about her Father's death and her conflicting feelings about him and his life and her guilt? When she visits his grave for the first time, she takes Nyx.

NYX.

She holds NYX up to the grave and talks about how it's his grandson.

GO AWAY YOU STUPID DEMON BABY THIS IS NOT YOUR BOOK.

Speaking of, it's revealed that Nesta was abused by her mother and grandmother in this book? Something we were all looking forward to is seeing more of the Archeron's mother seeing as Feyre was so young when she died, but... nope. She gets a few vague mentions, and this newly revealed abuse is entirely glossed over. Nesta was also actively groomed by an older man at 14. But SJM glosses over this because of course she does.

Finally, the bonus chapters.

My edition came with a bonus chapter from Feyre's POV. It was pointless and I hated it.

There's another bonus chapter from Azriel's POV. Once I'd finished this book, he was one of the few characters I still harboured a shred of respect for.

Then I read his bonus chapter.

This exists to purely objectify Elain.

Whether you ship Elain with Azriel, or Lucien, or neither, this chapter is disgusting. He thinks about her coming on his tounge, and other things simply just to please him.

He then dares to suggest that "the Cauldron picked wrong" in choosing Lucien as Elain's mate?

No Azriel, SJM picked RIGHT in not giving each Archeron sister a bAt bOy.

Rhysand does the only right thing he's ever done by telling Azriel to stay away from Elain, but then he has to ruin it by clarifying that it's only so they can manipulate and use Lucien more.

Oh, and Azriel wants to kill Lucien.

Need I remind you that Lucien respects Azriel? Lucien is another victim of the Night Court's needless, baseless torment, and Azriel is no exception.

Lucien stays well out of Elain's way because she makes it clear that she's not interested in a mate, but Azriel wants to kill him simply for being her mate.

Lucien has done nothing. And I mean literally NOTHING to warrant any of this treatment. From the bAt bOyS, from Feyre, from his family, from SJM, from the deluded part of this fandom that think he's done wrong. NOTHING.

All I liked about this book was the Lucien scenes (which is a given), ((although I hated the way everyone talks about him behind his back)), Nesta's relationship with the house, Emerie and Gwyn, the evidence that Gwynriel is endgame and subsequently Elucien, and the book love. Everything else was horrible. Oh, and Nesta hates Rhysand. I love that for her, because everyone else bows at his feet.

Oh yeah, when Nesta DARES suggest that Rhysand is an "arrogant, preening asshole" which I think is a compliment, Cassian can't take Rhys' cock out of his mouth for one second, and has to get mad at her for having an opinion. Don't even get me started on Azriel in that scene.

If each book after ACOTAR made me slowly give up, this book made me give up altogether. I cannot go on to support this victim-blaming, abuse-forgiving, misogynistic series. I've given up on SJM, and the only characters I care about anyone are Lucien, Nesta, Helion, and Tarquin. I'll continue to read this series to see if SJM redeems herself, but I'll be downloading them for free. I'm not giving this piece of shit any more of my money.

I hope we don't get the Lucien book. I don't want her to slaughter my fox in the way she slaughtered LITERALLY EVERYONE ELSE.

Thanks for listening.

Edit: I put the review on Goodreads!

[ash-and-books]

Rating: 2/5

Book Blurb: A contemporary YA romance with a paranormal twist: what happens when in between trying to decide which boy is the right boy, a girl finds out the funeral home her family owns might be haunted? Elaine's home is a bit . . . different. It's a funeral home that has been in her family since the 1800s—and it's why everyone calls her Funeral Girl. And even though she's lived there her whole life, there are still secrets to be found. When Xander, a cute new boy with a penchant for ghost hunting, arrives in town, Elaine feels an instant spark. His daring and spontaneous ways help her go from Funeral Girl to Fun Girl. Then there's Miles, Elaine's oldest friend, who she's starting to see in a completely new light. After Xander convinces her to stage a seance one night, Elaine discovers that her home might be haunted by a kindred spirit—the daughter of the funeral home's original owner. But who wants to be haunted by the dead when there are boys to spend time with? After all, you only live once. . . .

Review:

A girl who works in a funeral home finds herself having to decide between the new boy in town who is obsessed with ghost hunting and one of her oldest friends, on top of that she has to deal with the fact that her parents constantly need her help with the funeral home and that her home might actually be haunted. Elaine’s family owns a funeral home, it’s been her family’s business since the 1800s and its definitely the reason why everyone calls her Funeral Girl. Yet with the constant pressure and need to help her parents with the home, Elaine dreams about being freed and about getting out. It doesn’t help that her dad is pressuring her to take over the family business and that she can’t stand to disappoint her parents, to the point where she is constantly canceling plans with her friends. When a cute new boy named Xander comes into town, he is obsessed with ghost hunting and reels Elaine into joining him. He is especially interested since her own home has its own ghost... All the while Elaine’s best friend Miles, has started dropping hints he wants more. Stuck between deciding which boy is right for her and how to set boundaries with her parents and go after what she wants for her future, Elaine will have to deal with a lot of decisions and seeing if she has the courage to finally make up her mind and make some decisions for herself. This book was definitely not what I thought it was going to be, I was expecting more ghosts and paranormal aspects but what was the main focus of the story was the love triangle ( which I already didn’t enjoy) and Elaine struggling to say no to her parents. I wad so intrigued by the premise but the actual story itself felt anticlimactic and a bit lacking for me. I didn’t really enjoy any of the romance because it barely felt there at all and the love triangle was eh, I was hoping it would be stronger or more fleshed out since it was one of the main points of the story but it really wasn’t. This felt more like a coming of age story about a girl who works at a funeral home rather than a fun romance with paranormal elements, it definitely felt very juvenile and I guess just overall eh. 

*Thanks Netgalley and Random House Children's, Delacorte Press for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

[sorryyourenglishteachersucked]

The thing about how modern fandom has organized into a war between "antis" and "proshippers" is that...there are so many things that are WAY bigger than fandom wank wrapped up in this, and it is terrifying how all of this gets reduced into ultimately meaningless wank about which fictional dolls should kiss.

Let me ask you a couple of questions:

When you say "antis DNI", do you mean "antis" as in people who claim to be "protecting fandom" with their ship policing but have only ever gone after ONE het ship en masse for SOME ~inexplicable~ reason, assume their (mostly queer) peers are sexual predators by default and have to be trained out of predation and that many of us can be corrupted at the drop of a hat, see a fan space that isn't designated for them and assume it must be so closed off to harbor child abusers, hear "sexual expression" in largely queer spaces and immediately think "PEDOPHILIA AND INCEST!!" with absolutely no critical thought, are content to throw really heavy violent criminal accusations at largely marginalized people over flimsy-at-best evidence (and yes, finding entertainment value in the fictional dynamic between two people with an age gap that may be questionable irl IS flimsy at best), think that fandom will somehow manage to promote incestuous abuse even after Game of Thrones failed to do so despite having a much larger audience and having framed its questionable content as being ~there for realism~; and instead of just Disliking things, insist on finding reasons that no one can possibly like it without being A Horrible Person, often while arguing that questionable content in their own preferred media is Totally Fine IRL Actually and in the MOST extreme cases, actually seeking out real CSAM to weaponize against the targets of their ire?

Or do you mean people who dare to acknowledge that hey, there's a lot of irresponsible-at-best marketing and framing in mass media, like how rich and famous writers and directors insist on including gratuitous graphic sexual violence and excluding POC for "historical accuracy" in fantasy settings with dragons and shit, and a lot of racism and other really questionable shit in fandom, the fact that fandom is mostly composed of marginalized people does NOT make this okay, and hmm, maybe we need to criticize that and find a way to reduce it?

When you say "proshippers DNI", do you mean "proshippers" as in self-righteous edgelords who treat anyone setting a boundary about potentially triggering content in their own fan space as a personal attack, cannot hear criticism of their favorite thing without screaming "CENSORSHIP!" just like any right-wing chud but veiled in the language of social justice, defend hate speech and symbols in fan spaces in the name of "protecting freedom of expression" (at least as long as the hate is not aimed at them); turn edgy fanfiction into the golden calf of queer liberation such that it is not just an EXAMPLE of queer media that is often disproportionately attacked, but THE be-all and end-all of queer rights, make openly hating children and infantilizing teenagers into a cornerstone of their public-facing personalities and act like random rude 14-year olds on the internet are a bigger threat to queer expression than SESTA/FOSTA and payment processor cutoffs; deliberately chase children out of fandoms of media for children, and often create content with the primary motive of upsetting as many people as possible more than actually enjoying it themselves?

Or do you mean people who recognize that designating spaces for freedom of expression, including sexual expression, is really, really important especially for the historically marginalized groups that created the framework of transformative fandom culture; that there will ALWAYS be people who want to explore darker subject matter in fiction and coming up with tools to make that safer for all involved is a more beneficial AND more practical endeavor than banning most "bad" content outright; and that broadening the definition of "pedophilia" (which, yes, the former definition of "antis" ARE very much doing - here's a hint: for just one example, no matter the age gap, a relationship between two adults will NEVER be pedophilia, ever) and assuming it MUST be at the root of any "deviant" sexual expression has a long and bloody queerphobic history and it's REALLY FUCKING ALARMING how that mentality, right down to "freak" as the peak insult, has been so thoroughly introduced into a microcosm that is mostly composed of queer and otherwise marginalized people just by disguising it in the language of social justice?

Because, idk about you, but I don't want either of the former definitions up in my shit, but the latter? The latter positions can and should coexist.

We should be criticizing how entertainment juggernauts abuse their power and reach to keep society venerating people who look and act like their CEOs above all else, we should be criticizing the way "conventional" (read: "slap a bikini model on the ad and frame her as the product") sex appeal is treated as a necessity for marketing anything to adults, and we should be criticizing how often taboo fetishism is marketed by multi-billion dollar companies to the demographics most likely to be desperate enough to forget that some taboos exist for a damned good reason (i.e., lonely straight men with disposable income) just because that might give them a better quarterly report!

We should also be criticizing the wave of "LGBT-positive" thinly-veiled conservatism that's popping up in line with rainbow capitalism and teaching people how to recognize that just because someone can speak the language of progressivism and social justice, that doesn't necessarily mean their values have the best interest of marginalized people other than themself at heart.

The fact that this near-inevitably ends up spiraling into a highly polarized screaming match, occasionally touching on the bigger picture but only briefly before circling back to what is still EXTREMELY niche drama is...disheartening to say the least, because these are very real issues with way bigger implications than just ship wars. Bigotry making excuses for itself (the eagerness to call a ship "pedophilia" that is rarely directed at het ships, the fact that the energy put into fighting "problematic ships" by mostly queer and disabled small-time creators is rarely directed at major media creators, the ableism of "yeah well toughen up or gtfo snowflake", the defense of hate speech in the name of "freedom of speech" as if that hasn't been a neo-nazi dogwhistle for decades, etc.) and the concept of how hobbies can be used to radicalize people into some really awful ideologies, misdirection, overstatement of harm, understatement of harm, echo chambers that enable such overstatement and understatement of harm, the veneration of a platonic ideal of "children" as a rhetorical device while throwing actual children under the bus (exactly as anti-choice politicians do, but yet again veiled in the language of social justice) - all of that is wrapped up in this.

It is, by far, my least favorite mass fandom drama to date.

[mybg3notebook]

Gale Summarised Analysis

Disclaimer Game Version: All these analyses were written up to the game version v4.1.104.3536 (Early access). As long as new content is added, and as long as I have free time for that, I will try to keep updating this information. Written in May 2021.

The majority of sources used for this article are in the game itself (this includes my Gale-solo playthroughs as well as a combination of the videos by munmomuu and selphie1999), and the few dev’s notes provided by pjenn. Gale as origin is not taken into account since it’s not finished and has little to none Gale-related content. There will be little datamining content as well since pjenn said the game contained almost no gale-related notes (only in the Weave and in the Revelation scene).

Additional disclaimers about meta-knowledge and interpretations in (post)

The number between brackets [] represents the topic-block related to (this post), which gathers as much evidence as I could get.

We can infer about Gale by analysing what he approves and disapproves of. Sometimes, we can even lightly infer some information from his neutral reactions, but let’s be honest: this way of analysing a char is pretty poor since it leaves everything to speculation. Neutral reactions can only be analysed, in very rare instances, by contrasting the same situation in other contexts, and seeing what other options Gale approves or disapproves of. With these considerations in mind, we can proceed to describe this character.

Disclaimer: this is a meta with my personal interpretation of the character, sticking as much as possible to the facts and leaving little to “desires” or “projections” of what I want him to be. If I do so, I will state it explicitly in the text for the sake of analysis honesty. I want to be clear about what is canon (facts shown in bg3 EA), from what’s personal interpretation with little proof.

Understanding Gale (integrated text)

We are none of us monsters. We are merely hatcheries for monstrous things. So we fight them

---Gale 

Collecting most of the information provided in-game, we know he has a cat, a Library, and writes poetry sometimes. One of the first things that Gale will reveal is that he is a private person. He easily and clearly sets boundaries from the first moment, showing Tav where they stand. The second aspect he makes us aware of is his pragmatic thinking and his preference for diplomatic approaches. A third aspect that stands out on its own: he is a very verbose person, maybe as a result of his academia background in combination with his poetry hobby. He also has a bad posture when talking, but I’m not sure if this is intentional or a bug.

We can assure that Gale certainly is a man of the city [13], and may have a decent social status. It's impossible to say for sure if it's noble or rich or both, or it is just a natural consequence of being a wizard scholar: he is frustrated by the harshness of the camping life, he misses the civilisation of the city which offers well cooked meals, soft beds, and scented baths. Not by chance he is the only companion in the group who would approve of giving Oskar 200 gold to fight “the discomforts of the road” [13]. However, he adapts. Despite the lack of luxuries, he managed to survive in the wilderness.

Gale and his link with magic is unquestionable. Magic is life for Gale, metaphorically and literally speaking since it's magic what allows him to stay alive despite the "orb" in his chest. If we talk about Magic, we have to talk about Mystra and the Weave. The Weave is not only the embodiment of Mystra, it's an extension of Mystra herself. It extends across many planes of existence and is in almost all parts of Faerûn. By dragging power from it, Magic can be performed. 

Mystra, for lore reasons and conjectures that I will discuss in the post "Mystra and her Chosen ones", turned teenager/young adult Gale into one of her Chosen, making their relationship more intimate and granting Gale a deeper access to the Weave. This put Gale into the category of an archwizard. It's clear that Gale was and still is a devotee of Mystra, which could give us a hint of his alignment since she is a neutral good goddess and she expects for her Chosen to align around it.

Gale likes confidence, in others and in himself. He is confident in his looks (he has described himself as a “handsome devil” and answered during the romance/Revelation scene that he knew he was beautiful under the light as well as Tav). But beyond these two lines, qualifying him as a narcissist seems extreme. He is surely very confident about his knowledge, and we see he is not just mere words: his Mind Flayer knowledge is at the the same level of what githyankis know. If we compare how Astarion/Tav struggled with the book of Thay, and then we see how Gale manages it (sadly the scene is not complete yet in EA, and there is almost no datamining info of Gale), we can conclude once more that his knowledge and power of the mind are real (he is, so far, the main companion who allows us to explore the lore of the game in a deeper way during his conversations). We also know it's a bit more complicated to intrude into his mind using the tadpole because he has knowledge and mental tools to protect himself (check the post about the Tadpole inside Gale). He is certainly a very verbose and confident scholar, who knows his limits, and in occasions he seems to dabble into an ego-teasing play as an attempt of levity, displaying his “insufferable side”, as he has described himself (his self-awareness of these traits is remarkable, and it is the reason why I avoid qualifying him as arrogant. Arrogant chars are hardly self-aware of their own bad manners or insufferable traits). But we can see it's usually done as a joke or, with an evil Tav, as an aggressive reaction. For a deep analysis of this aspect, check the post about "Gale Hypotheses- Part 2", section: "Narcissism". 

Based on his approvals and disapprovals, we can see that Gale has a strong preference in avoiding fights, violence, and bloodshed [1]. He will always prefer diplomatic and persuasive approaches [2]. Reasoning is his best weapon, but if the individual we are dealing with can hardly be persuaded, he would approve of a deception or an intimidation as long blood is not spilt. Here is where we see his pragmatism in action, all the time. His primary goal at every moment is to avoid bloodshed. His philosophy could be summed up in the line “the means [as long as they don’t kill gratuitously] hardly matter if the end is worthy”. And for Gale, nothing is more worthy than life [3]. This doesn't cover only the life of innocents he cares about, it includes the life of the most dubious characters as well, such as Rugan or Crusher. Gratuitous death is meaningless for him. During the scene of Nettie we can have a glimpse of his philosophy towards life: he viscerally hates treating life as if it were nothing: 

Gale: How dare she snuff out life with as much thought as snuffing out a bloody candle? […] It's not right to feel the cold breath of death in your neck, then move on as if it was nothing but a soothing breeze. One respects life by fighting for it, and one respects death by fearing it.

Gale: One should never be afraid to live life to the fullest.

Probably the limited amount of life he has due to the "orb" increased his sense of respect for life and its celebration. I personally understand Gale as a character who embodies the perspectives of a seriously ill person, knowing that their life may be short, but they will try to make the best out of it. 

He doesn't only respect life per se, he also cares about its dignity. This can be seen in his explicit rejection to undead existences such as Connor (he explains that it would be merciful to put an end to his undead nightmare), or in his disapprovals of humiliation and torture [9]

 We could suspect that this emphasis in protecting any life comes from the fact that only people who are alive can (sometimes) be forgiven or/and change. This is not explicit, but since he is a character who talks about being better and wiser than his previous self, about acknowledging mistakes, about forgiveness, this interpretation seems reasonable. 

These concepts of kindness and compassion combined with “the mistakes of the youth” are repetitive in his interactions and approvals [5,12]. Of course, they echo in his soul since they are reflections and desires of his own experience. This pattern covers forgiving children in particular [5], and disapproving hard judgements [16], especially on matters whose story is not fully understood by Tav. This means he doesn't like quick judgements when he doesn't know the whole story first. This scenario can be easily seen during Karlach's quest, he reserves his judgment until knowing Karlach's side: There are always two sides to each story.

Gale: I have to say I don't know if agreeing to this hunt was such a wise idea. Who's to say who's the real villain in this tale of devils and masquerades? [...]When we track Karlach down, let's chat before we chop.

Similar concept appears during his Revelation scene, when he encourages and keeps asking Tav to listen to him first before judging. This is also the reason why in his Loss scene he would disapprove if Tav quickly assumes that his loss of Mystra was due to arrogance. Tav judged him without knowing the whole story. However, once Tav knows the whole story, Gale will accept any judgement from them without approval penalties during the Revelation scene.

He approves all actions that imply helping others in hard times and disapproves of them if they were done out of greed [4]. He is an animal lover [6,7]. Being kind to animals and treating them good will increase his approval, while animal cruelty will earn his disapproval. Same goes for humanoids: any display of gratuitous violence that could have been prevented with a trick or a diplomatic approach, any humiliation forced upon others, any torture or situation of slavery, is disapproved [8, 9, 11]. 

In particular, Gale seems to advocate the philosophy of “give others their own medicine”[18] or in other words: poetic justice. We can see this during the Myconid colony; he approves of helping the Myconid to avenge the young killed by the Duergar, adding the comment: “Wicked killers deserve wicked ends”. He is implying to give them a similar, wicked medicine to the Duergars. Another less deadly situation of this kind is shown during the foot situation with Crusher: Gale is the one suggesting “pungent poetic justice” and telling Tav that they should force Crusher to kiss their feet. 

The most iconic scene, however, is during Nettie's, if Tav lies during her interrogation. As a hot-headed reaction, Gale states that he would have poisoned Nettie if this situation would have happened to him. Although, after calming down, he approves of and confirms Tav's actions [if Tav managed to persuade Nettie to give them the antidote]

Gale: A taste of her own medicine is what she deserves! […] But you handled it, and you handled it well. 

 In this scene we also see a pattern: Gale is shown as a fallible human; his most visceral reaction during the first moment is anger and indignation, giving us a hint that he is not so rational when it comes to emotional states. An extremely obvious, human concept. 

The scene of Nettie trying to kill a potential menace (the victim of a MF) reverberated in his consciousness, projecting immediately a fact in his mind: if he ever dares to reveal his "orb" problem, and anyone knows what a danger he represents—no matter how stable it looks—people will want to remove the menace by killing him. 

This is the reason behind his words “It's just that, had it been me... had it been...” Gale knows that this simplistic and common thinking in removing what's dangerous would end up turning into a more destructive tragedy in his case than in any infected victim of the tadpoles. So this combination makes us see, for the first time, an emotional Gale. After some seconds, he cools down and returns to his more rational, diplomatic, and moderate self. What we can read here is that Gale would be very prone to rush decisions or to make mistakes under emotional circumstances. We will learn later that the other mistake he made under emotional stress ended up with the "orb" stuck in his chest. A third mistake was done during the party, once more under the emotional stress of a potential abandonment by Tav due to the true nature of the orb. 

Everything related to the “orb”—which is his most traumatic experience—naturally makes him more emotional and prone to mistakes. To see how truly traumatic the "orb" is in his life we can notice the following patterns during the meeting scene: he speaks about the tadpole in a relaxed, rational way, despite the traumatising experience. He first asks for an archwizard instead of for a cleric, because his priority is the orb. Gale's main fear is not the tadpole, but the orb. If we remember his words after the consumption of the artefacts, we realise he lives in a permanent state of anxiety and raw fear, and probably pain too, given his facial gesticulation when anything interacts with the "orb" (whether artefacts or Tav's hand). His banter with Shadowheart reinforces the concept that he always has a knot in the stomach. When he accepts the deal with Raphael, it seems to be related to the orb, not to the tadpole. The effect of the "orb" has ceased, but the tadpole is still in Gale's head since we still need to roll against a high DC and not only against a 1DC during this scene, so we can assume he still has the tadpole despite Raphael's deal. See the post about "The Tadpole" in Gale for more details.

Gale is a character that represents human experiences deeply related to growing up: mistakes done in the past, and the acceptance of not being forgiven despite the desire of wanting to. This can be easily seen during the conversation of the second tadpole dream, where Gale's mood is foul and we learn that his deepest desire is for Mystra to forgive him, but he also knows it's impossible for that to happen. He detects the lie in this dream because he has accepted that Mystra will never forgive him. Gale is the story of mistakes done during youth with grave consequences, of acknowledging them and trying to make them right, of surviving those mistakes, and depending on the interpretation, he is also the story of an ill dying man, with a gentle vision and deep care for life. 

The great majority of his approvals are based on actions that show kindness and compassion, both reiterative concepts that are so important in his character that they come from his lips when we see the goblin party: 

Gale: The shadow within is spreading like poison, corrupting kindness and compassion. [Only after a tough DC of 15]

In combination with: Gale: I don't know myself anymore. All this... It's not who I am. Around you, I'm not who I want to be. I should leave. 

These lines show how, in a sudden change to an evil path, Gale would start doubting his own morality, explaining that the cause of it is the "orb" itself, corrupting the most core aspects of his personality. This corruption may or may not be lore-related. It's not completely clear what Gale's "orb" truly is. For more details, check the post of the "Orb".

 His constant critical thinking comes from his advocacy to non-conventionality [15]: a true scholar will always explore all the options and hypotheses before reaching a conclusion. Therefore, Gale would approve of any non-conventional way to fix a problem [15] as long as it doesn't potentially cause harm or bloodshed [1,2,3,8,9]. Due to his own background, Gale will always advise to be very careful of the consequences of one’s actions. This can be easily seen when, after encountering the caged goblin Sazza, Gale would advocate to explore the possibility of reaching Gut Priestess to cure the tadpole. However, when Tav helps Sazza to escape, Gale will comment briefly against this action.

Gale: I know I said it's not inconceivable a goblin priestess could help us. And yet... was it really wise to set another goblin free so she can arrange introductions? […] consider the consequences. What if she leads her entire tribe to the grove? Tav: I don't care, I owe this grove no allegiance. Gale: No allegiance, no. Though we don't need to sign its death warrant

Once more we see that Gale is up to using any (unharming) means to get a goal, but not at any cost. He has a clear line he doesn't like to cross: life [3]. Avoiding putting other people's lives in danger is very important for him. We see this concept over and over in most scenes.

He doesn't likerushed decisions, and in that same train of thoughts, he will disapprove any use of unknown magic or tricks when nobody in the group can truly understand how they work [17], for example the tadpoles or Raphael's deal (he is against accepting it quickly, but he will approve of having a more cautious attitude and carefully thinking about it). 

Since the moment we meet him, we can infer he is obsessed with the artefacts. It's obviously understandable: he doesn't want to die, but also, he doesn't want to kill all those that will be caught in the eruption of the orb. For this reason he will insist on the loot in the Temple Ruins despite knowing that grave robbery is not correct. 

Gale: Bad form, isn't it? Grave robbing? […] Let's have a look at the loot. It isn't for your pockets only. 

He keeps pondering life over death: although he respects the dead, he will always value more the living creatures in the present. This is also what pushes Gale to suggest Tav to open Rugan's chest. Stealing from the evil Zhentarins is not something that will weigh on his consciousness too much. Besides, he knows it belongs to a wizard: meaning that the chance for it to contain a powerful artefact is really high. Similar suggestions will be said about the Idol of Silvanus, but talking with him in the camp will show us that he won't approve of taking it, only as a last resort. He keeps pondering the living over a sacred piece of stone, since he knows the druids won't take the stealing very peacefully. Once more we see Gale's respect and care for life, trying to minimise damage as much as the circumstances allow him.

Gale is also a survivalist. He doesn't want to die, he loves celebrating life in its more mundane and small details. He is an emotional character for a wizard, a bit strange since they are usually portrayed as more rational and cold, losing their lives among dusty books. However, Gale has shown in many scenes that he prefers to survive without killing, but if he has to, he will do it, dealing with the weight of it in his consciousness because killing unprovoked affects him (scene in the camp after killing the druids, or the goblin party scene). 

His moral in preventing gratuitous death sometimes will conflict with his own survival, especially if he is by an evil Tav's side. He couldn't accept bloodshed when other peaceful options were available and possible to reach. This is clearly shown during the goblin party, where Gale's consciousness suffers and feels the corruption of the "orb" killing the kindness and the compassion inside him. He accepts that wanting to live is a powerful drive, but he doesn't support this massacre, questioning if all that blood was necessary. A Tav killing the tieflings seems to lose the possibility of pursuing Gale romantically, at least in EA so far. For Gale, survival is important, but the means to do it (when they can cause death) matter too. Life is worth preserving.

 The usual archetype of survivalist tends to be an individualist one who would survive at any cost without remorse because that's the “law of the jungle”, the strongest must survive. However, Gale seems to embody a different concept of survivalist that it's hard to put in words: a sort of communal survivalist, trying to survive in coexistence with his community: he wants his survival to imprint the least harm possible (even though sometimes it would not be possible), trying to help those around him as long as his condition allows it; for example, despite wanting Gut's potential cure for the tadpole, he would disagree in helping Sazza escape because she will lead the goblins to the Grove, no matter the fact that doing this will grant them their introduction to the priestess. 

His list of approval shows that his sense of survival is always pondered with the consequences that it can cause on others (check the post with the "Extensive list of Gale's approvals"). The whole concept of the "orb" has this motivation as well: he wants to live and survive, but he also can't give up because his body would kill many, so he needs to do as much as his moral allows him to keep it in check. If he cannot do it any longer, he promises to minimise the disaster as much as possible by erupting in the deep Underdark or in a desolated corner of Faerûn (and considering his ridiculous list of approvals and disapprovals, we know he is honest in not wanting to kill gratuitously). Gale acknowledges his own mistakes, trying—to the best of his ability—to deal with them without catching others in them. Although all his speeches keep emphasising that he is a mere human, and plans may fail. 

At some point, if he wants to survive “not at any cost”, he will be forced to ask Tav for help during the scene of the stew (available only for medium approval or higher). As a gesture of honesty, Gale will set a boundary before making this request, acknowledging its unfairness but giving Tav the decision to proceed or not. He is not denying to explain the details later, but at the moment he can't speak the “why” of his condition no matter how curious Tav is. Tav will decide whether they can keep their curiosity on the matter. 

We will understand later that this impediment comes as a precaution as well as consequence of his personal trauma with Mystra and the "orb" (See post about "Gale: Manipulation, Lies, and Trust"). So, he is very clear about setting the conditions in which this conversation will happen from the beginning. The easiest way for Gale to avoid this whole situation would have been by simply lying, but he opted for an honest approach with clear out-loud reservations, knowing he was asking for more trust than he was allowed to, but the intention behind is more than important. There is a clear, huge contextual detail that we can't miss: this scene doesn't happen because of Gale's whims, he is forced to ask for help since his condition “is not a patient one” and will endanger everyone if not kept at bay. 

This detail where Gale explicitly asks for an exchange of trust is not present if Gale's approval is neutral or lower. In this case, Gale would not care about giving a context to his strange request: he doesn't trust Tav and he doesn't expect to be trusted either, he only wants the artefacts to keep his condition in check for his sake and the sake of others. We can understand this change of attitude depending on the approval as he doesn't want to give any extra explanation to someone he is not interested in building a relationship with. For more details, check the post about "Gale: Manipulation, Lies, and Trust".

I personally support the idea that nobody in canon Faerûn is free of racial prejudices since Forgotten Realms lore has been created based strongly on fantasy racism. I've read that WotC wants to move forward and improve this aspect in 5e, but so far what they allowed Larian to do with the Tieflings in BG3 seems to show the contrary. So, since apparently we are going to face fantasy racism anyways, I will try to analyse racial prejudices from all chars. When it comes to Gale, it's a bit far-stretched to point out unjustified racial biases. He has a vague comment about Rashemi that some people may consider a faerunian saying. Personally, I think that line is a bias forced into him to have a particular dynamic with Minsc (the Rashemi “silly” companion -we all can see where Larian seems to go with this). Gale clearly sees tieflings, gnomes, and even goblins as people, and has a cautious attitude towards some githyanki (at least that's what we can infer with Lae'zel when we find her in the cage), but given the githyanki lore it's pretty reasonable to see them as dangerous creature that could kill people on the spot. So far, he seems to have no racial preference either [10]. 

As it was said before, he prefers to avoid killing people, but that doesn't mean he won't do it if his life depends on it. He will prefer persuasive and defusing approaches, but if he needs to kill to defend innocents or his own life, he won't hesitate. So therefore, stories about characters making mistakes or having violent excess in an effort to protect themselves or what they hold dear will be understood by him but hardly approved [19]. He tends more to approve a call out of that excess than approving an excuse for it.

Gale has deep abandonment issues that can be easily seen when he defends Astarion from being handed over to Gandrel. We need to put this in context before going on: for Gale, Astarion represents a danger as a vampire who attacked one of them during their sleep. By the display of meta-knowledge, we know with certainty that their approvals and disapprovals are mostly opposite: What one approves, the other will disapprove and vice versa. Getting rid of Astarion should be something that Gale would approve, however, he doesn't. If we explore his comments we will realise that what Gale disapproves from this situation is Tav's abandonment. After Mystra's abandonment, he knows very well that “Loyalty is such a very rare commodity”, and the few situations in EA in which Tav can display abandonment, resound strongly in Gale. 

Gale is a scholar with a strong balanced rational side. But unlike the trope, he also embraces an emotional side that, so far the info we received in EA, it's the side that makes him prone to mistakes. 

As an amateur poet, Gale loves words. We can obviously notice this in his verbose attitude, but also in the way he carefully uses words. One of his characteristic words is “spectacle”. He has also shown a reiterative—although not always—uneasy use of the word “fun”. Using “fun” as a way to describe the night spent with Gale gives him a slight uneasiness. “That’s a word for it.” He disapproves of using the word “Fun” after the Mayrina/Connor situation, in which scene Gale alludes that “your new company may be a proof of how depraved and twisted you are to see that tragedy as “fun”. Personally I think this is a direct allusion to Astarion, who considers Mayrina's situation as “entertainment”, in the same way he considered as “fun” the show of Arabella's death (two of several instances where he used that word). Gale also doesn’t use the word sex during EA, instead he uses romantic ones such as love-making, intimacy, art of the night/body. In the most technical case: coitus (used only when he is talking about “goblinoid intimacy” in the expression “post-coital snack”). These details are showing not only his poet/romantic side, but also his interpretation of sex from his perspective: sex can only be possible through a connection. We know he doesn’t engage in casual sex with Lae’zel if he is not romanced, and his romance can only potentially start if Tav shares that deep connection with him through the Weave. 

Another detail related to words is that Gale has always used an infection/disease-related vocabulary to explain the “orb” stuck in his chest: infested, taint, shadow spreading 

[…] I failed to control [this chaotic magic]. Instead it infested me. […] This Netherese taint... this orb, for lack of a better word [..] […] the shadow within is spreading like poison, corrupting kindness and compassion. [...]

Gale apparently has a particular way to sense magic. I have no way to check this in-game, but it seems very strange how he immediately identifies magical artifacts without casting Detect Magic. There are some extra scenes as well where he says to taste or smell the magic in some objects. Even his encounter with Shadowheart, besides being considered a flirt, could be also interpreted as him detecting the magic that we saw later in her hand or maybe the dark magic that blocks her memories, since Gale pointed out about a curtain covering her soul: “if the eyes are the mirror to the soul, yours have dark curtains across the mirror” (a very ominous flirting if it’s only a flirt)

This makes me suspect that, if the "orb" is not giving him this skill, it may be a consequence of having been Chosen of Mystra (for more details read the post about "Mystra and her Chosen ones"). If this is the case, he may have hindered remains of theirs powers when it comes to detect magic at will.

Gale has a perception of magic with all the senses: he sniffs and tastes magic. During the mirror scene you have an option related to [Arcana] tag where he “Sniff the mirror, trying to understand the nature of its magic”. A wizard Tav will just “Inspect the mirror”. He also said that he could “taste” the magic in the necromancy book and in the runes of teleportation. 

What we know of his family is little: when he was a kid there was a housekeeper in his life (mentioned only once during the scene of the harpies) and his mother that seemed to have personally raised and cared for him (mentioned twice: in the ruin temple scene, and in his banter with Wyll) 

Tav: Why care about decorum in a long-abandoned tomb? Gale: Because my mother raised a gentleman. Then again, to be alive is to be curious. 

Wyll: Between the orb and the bug you've got more than your fair share of unwelcome passengers. Gale: What can I say. Mother always taught me to be a gracious host.

This post was written in May 2021. → For more Gale: Analysis Series Index

[robininthelabyrinth]

Do you think it's would make a difference of the war aftermath, if nie huaisang Mother was a wen ?

Nie Mingjue had never really known what to do with Nie Huaisang’s mother, a feeling that was most decided mutual.

Concubines were quite common among the regular folk, but they were fairly rare for cultivators, a function of the relative rarity of female cultivators; virtually all the men Nie Mingjue knew preferred visiting prostitutes or setting up mistresses from the ranks of women who couldn’t cultivate over bringing them into the household.

And yet Nie Mingjue’s father brought her home, pale-faced and already pregnant, after having spent nearly two months away at a discussion conference to rehash the boundary lines, and married her according to their clan’s customs, bringing her into the household to stay.

There were whispers, of course. There’d been talk about how his father ought to have another son to replace Nie Mingjue ever since his mother had left as swiftly and unexpectedly as she’d arrived. But that sort of talk faded soon enough when a rumor leaked that the Wen sect had sent her to Nie Mingjue’s father’s quarters as entertainment, and had never expected him to marry her to legitimize the child.

Nie Mingjue didn’t hear about that until much later, when he was older, but he thought they might even be true – a disappointing failing in a man he’d always revered, but it wasn’t as if he could or would say anything about it. At least his father had always treated her well, no matter how she flinched and shied away from everything at the start. The rare few times Nie Mingjue saw her, she was always looking wan and sad as if she’d left her heart behind in Qishan.

Maybe she had.

But she was his father’s concubine, so it wasn’t as if Nie Mingjue could ask, nor do anything about it if he did.

She fell sick not long after the birth, which was a difficult one, and became bedridden; to ease her burden, Nie Mingjue quietly took over caring for the baby, his brother, with the intention of handing him back to her when she was better.

She eventually got better, mostly, but she didn’t take Nie Huaisang back.

Instead, she burst into tears at the sight of him, every time.

Nie Mingjue might be a child, and more inclined to be martial than cognizant of feelings, but he was still young enough to be hurt and indignant on his brother’s behalf. He still remembered the bitterness of asking why he didn’t have a mother only to learn that she had left him behind – he had no memories of her – and to think that this mother was right here, and yet…

In the end, he continued to raise Nie Huaisang as best as he could between training and classes and learning to be a sect leader, and began to treat her coldly, like a stranger.

Still, when his father lost his mind, she was the second person he thought to save, after securing Nie Huaisang’s safety: like a little bird, she was fragile and delicate, faded from years of self-imposed confinement even though Qinghe lacked the restrictive rules of Qishan – she wouldn’t last a minute against the full force of his father’s mad range that even he could only redirect, not stop.

(He woke up, later, to her trembling hands trying to apply healing salve onto his injuries, and he thought it might be the first time she’d ever looked directly at him. It didn’t last: she didn’t speak other than to ask him if Huaisang was all right, and he’d snapped in a helpless rage that she’d lost the right to ask him that years before, and after that they had mutually agreed that it would be best if he locked her in her room for her own protection until his father died.)

After that he became sect leader.

“I have a request,” she said to him one day, a few weeks later. “If you would grant it.”

Nie Mingjue shrugged and gestured for her to come into his office. Nie Huaisang was sitting in the corner painting a family picture – Nie Huaisang and Baxia, himself and Aituan – and he looked up briefly, curious to see what woman was brave enough to dare his brother’s temper, but the interest quickly drained out of his face after he’d managed to place her.

“You want to go back to Qishan?” Nie Mingjue asked when she seemed to be unable to speak. “My father is dead; surely your mother’s family would take you, if you didn’t mind the rumors.”

To his surprise, she paled and shook her head rapidly.

At his questioning look, she lowered her head and whispered, “The women of Qishan Wen cannot – it would be a disgrace. And it is – it’s a harsh place to live, cruel and unkind.”

Nie Mingjue had always supposed that to be the case, but he thought he might as well ask. “What, then?”

“I…I would like to bring someone here. If you don’t mind.”

Nie Mingjue’s eyebrows arched. His father hadn’t been in the ground a full month, and she wanted to move her lover in? He ought to cut off her head even for suggesting it.

But she was Nie Huaisang’s mother, however much he despised her for neglecting him, and so instead he said, “Who?”

She told him.

Baxia screamed in metal and Nie Mingjue was on his feet, feeling his eyes pound as his sight flickered red with rage: “You had children?!” he snarled at her, ignoring how her eyes went wide and she backed away from him even though after everything that had happened with his father he hated being feared the most. “You had children and you left them there?!”

“Da-ge, you’re blocking my light,” Nie Huaisang said, not looking up from his painting, and the moment Nie Mingjue saw how his knuckles had gone white around his brush he turned to face the wall to take deep breaths until he was calm again. He was still facing it when he heard Nie Huaisang speak again, his voice even. “You should leave, Concubine Wen.”

“I only –”

“It’s your fault he’s so angry,” Nie Huaisang said, and his voice was as mature as a seven year old could make it – mature, and angry as well, in his own way, really angry rather than throwing a temper tantrum that was halfway for effect. “Go away before you make it worse. We’ll have an answer for you later.”

She left.

A small hand made its way into Nie Mingjue’s, squeezing it lightly. It helped, a little. “What did she do?”

“She has children,” Nie Mingjue said, still staring at the wall. “A girl and a boy – their father died shortly before she met our father. She just…she left them behind in Qishan, which she clearly hates, and she never…she’s lived here for years. The boy’s only a year older than you. And I had no idea! She never once mentioned them, or visited, or let them visit, or – anything.”

“Why do you care?” Nie Huaisang asked, tone curious.

“Because it’s wrong,” Nie Mingjue said. “She abandoned them. Just like –”

He shut his mouth, unsure if he wanted to say you or me, but nevertheless Nie Huaisang’s hand tightened on his own, understanding.

A better man might think to himself that this loss was the reason behind her reluctance to get close to Nie Huaisang; Nie Mingjue, whose mother had left him behind and through another woman’s negligence became a parent when he was the same age as her older son would be now, had no space in his heart for sympathy, and all he felt was disappointment.

Still, it was not in the nature of the Qinghe Nie to do nothing when faced with an injustice.

It took a few months to make it work, painful negotiations with Wen Ruohan smirking at him across the table because he had something Nie Mingjue wanted and he knew it, but in the end he managed to arrange for the two children to come to visit Qinghe without explaining exactly why he wanted them.

Not to stay, because Wen Ruohan wouldn’t have leverage that way, but it was – something.

“Nie Huaisang can show you around,” Nie Mingjue told them, because they were obviously terrified of him and no one, not even little sheep-like Wen Ning, could be scared of Nie Huaisang. “And take you to meet your mother, if you like.”

“And what if we don’t?” Wen Qing asked, crossing her arms. She was a little older, though still a few years shy of Nie Mingjue’s age.

“Then don’t,” Nie Mingjue said shortly. “I brought you here for your sake, not hers.”

Somehow, and he really didn’t know how, that day had ended with him teaching Wen Ning how to shoot arrows to Nie Huaisang’s over-excited cheering and Wen Qing’s dramatic eye-rolling, and by the time they left they were calling him da-ge the way Nie Huaisang did, even Wen Qing.

He still wasn’t sure if they’d visited their mother.

But then – that wasn’t the point.

“They’re your brothers and sisters, you know,” he told Nie Huaisang, a slight frown marring his face. “They’re as close to you in blood as I am.”

“Obviously,” Nie Huaisang sniffed, rolling his eyes – an entire production when he did it, shoulders shrugging and head lolling. “Why do you think I told them to call you da-ge? Brother and sister of a brother; it’s close enough.”

Nie Mingjue rolled his eyes in return and cuffed him as a brat, but his heart was lightened, a little. From what he knew of the woman, the two Wen children might never have a proper mother, but that was fine; he could do that for them, the way he’d done it for Nie Huaisang, and this way Nie Huaisang would have a er-jie and a san-ge as well.

But the thought was easier said than done – Nie Mingjue was determined to go to war against Wen Ruohan to avenge his father’s murder, and it was difficult to balance that enmity with the need to ensure Wen Qing and Wen Ning remained safe, and were not considered hostages.

Jin Guangshan, of all people, ended up helping with that, his mouth so full of sly innuendo about pretty young Wen Qing that even Wen Ruohan seemed halfway convinced by it, and equally convinced that Nie Mingjue would get bored of her quickly enough, an impression Nie Mingjue did his best to encourage.

On the surface, he even let that seem to be the case, letting the visits cease and adopting a blank and uncaring expression any time she was mentioned.

When the war drew nearer, Wen Ruohan’s excesses more unforgivable, Nie Mingjue sent a missive – through five different layers of secrecy that Nie Huaisang had somehow concocted, and Nie Mingjue really didn’t want to think about how his useless baby brother figured out something his spies couldn’t – asking if Wen Qing and Wen Ning would be willing to seek refuge in Qinghe.

Wen Qing refused, but shared all the information she could, as a healer, in good conscience pass along. She thought they could do more to help people by staying where they were, and Nie Mingjue couldn’t fault her for that even if he disagreed – and she promised him that both she and Wen Ning were doing everything they could to fight against injustice, no matter what the circumstance.

Nie Mingjue tried his best to keep track of both of them.

He didn’t want to find them dead with a Nie saber in their chests, but he couldn’t let people know about their connection, either, or else it’d be a Wen sword in their backs instead. It was a hard balance to draw.

After Meng Yao killed Wen Ruohan, and the sun on earth fell from the sky at last, leaving all those surnamed Wen to pay for the sins of their clansmen, Nie Mingjue made it a priority to find them.

“You won’t be able to find anyone if you can’t walk,” Nie Huaisang scolded him, shoving him back down onto the bed. “I’ll go look for them myself. It’ll be fine.”

“If you can’t find them in any of the remaining Wen strongholds, try the prisoner of war camps,” Nie Mingjue said muzzily. He wasn’t sure what was in the medicine Nie Huaisang continuously poured down his throat, but it was very strong; he could scarcely feel how many broken ribs he had, but he couldn’t feel much else, either. “Maybe someone took them somewhere they’d be safe…”

“They’d better be safe. They promised.”

“Huaisang…”

“What if they’re not safe?” Nie Huaisang fretted. “They’re still surnamed Wen. Someone could be bullying them –”

Nie Mingjue reached out with a hand to pat Nie Huaisang’s knee. He missed the first few times, but eventually got it. “Don’t worry about it,” he said firmly. “They may be surnamed Wen, but they’re wards of Qinghe Nie; if you see someone bullying them, bully them back – who’d start something with us now?”

He was speaking lightly. Unfortunately, given that he was talking with Nie Huaisang, he probably shouldn’t have been.

“So, there’s good news and bad news,” Nie Huaisang announced, blowing into Nie Mingjue’s office. “Also, you shouldn’t be working.”

Nie Mingjue’d heard the same thing from about seven different people – “you’re still three broken bones over the work limit, Sect Leader” – but he was dying of boredom; they should all be happy he was voluntarily limiting himself to paperwork instead of seeing if willpower and some braces could stand up to a basic round of saber training.

“What’s the news?” he asked, then brightened when he saw Wen Ning trailing after him. “You found them!”

“I did! Well, Wen Ning, but he says Wen Qing is still free and looking for him, so I can’t imagine she’ll be that hard to find. Also, I may or may not have started a war by stabbing one of the Jin sect main family cultivators.”

Nie Mingjue stared at him.

“He was beating Wen Ning!”

Nie Mingjue glanced at Wen Ning, who looked anxious enough for it to be true. “Well, in that case, he deserved it,” he said, a little bit begrudgingly. “Is he dead?”

“Maybe?” Nie Huaisang thought about it. “…probably. You know how Aituan gets. I’m not sorry; Jin Zixun was an ass.”

“Did you at least challenge him to a duel first? It’ll make things easier if you did, though I suppose it’s not strictly necessary…”

“You’re not mad?” Wen Ning blurted out, wide-eyed. “Sect Leader Nie, if you have to fight another war because of me –”

“Against Lanling Jin?” Nie Mingjue snorted. “I could beat Jin Guangshan with both hands tied behind my back even if I were twice as injured as I am now, and that’s assuming he lets it get to a fight. He’ll want something else instead; the question will be to see if it’s something I’m willing to give.”

What he wanted was Wei Wuxian’s head on a platter, or at least his Stygian Tiger Seal.

Nie Mingjue thought about the rumors about Wei Wuxian, frowning, and agreed to think about it, committing to nothing.

He was glad for that, later, when the man himself showed up at one of the Jin prisoner of war camps that Nie Mingjue was demolishing, Wen Qing at his side, clearly ready to tear down the sky to get Wen Ning back.

“Uh,” Wei Wuxian said, staring blankly. “You’re – taking them somewhere?”

“Back to the Nie sect,” Nie Mingjue said. “You too, Wen Qing; we’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

“Is this okay?” Wei Wuxian asked her.

“This is fine,” Wen Qing said, beaming. “Da-ge will take care of us.”

“…us?”

“After that scene you made back at Lanling, you’ll need it,” she said briskly. “Didn’t you hear? Some people were saying that you killed – what’s his name. Jin Zixun.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Nie Mingjue said. “Nie Huaisang killed him.”

“Nie Huaisang?”

“Yes.”

“With – what?”

“His saber, of course.”

“His…saber?”

“Yes.”

“No wonder they think I did it,” Wei Wuxian said. “Even I don’t believe that story. No offense, Chifeng-zun.”

Nie Mingjue suppressed a sigh, though in fairness he really couldn’t blame him. “Does he really need sanctuary?” he asked Wen Qing. “The Jiang sect…”

“He needs it,” she said firmly.

Nie Mingjue’s eyes narrowed, because he knows his younger siblings too well. “You did something.”

“How do you do that?” she complained.

Nie Mingjue just shook his head. “I’m your da-ge,” he said. “All right, come on; help pack everyone up and come to Qinghe. We can deal with the rest of it later.”

“But –” Wei Wuxian started to say.

“You can argue back at Qinghe. It’s probably better than wherever you were planning on taking them, anyway.”

“…I was thinking Yiling?”

“The Burial Mounds? My young siblings? Absolutely not.”

(When they arrived, there was a woman standing at gate, watching them. She seemed pleased.)

[secret-engima]

Team Gremlin verse: The Reunion

(So this is ... a very rough draft so to speak of what I wanna do for the reunion scene with Oscar and Ozpin. I’m not dubbing it ‘canon’ yet because I’d have to wait for the actual fic to catch up and then tweak accordingly but so far- this is what is in my head and I figured I should let others enjoy the angst :D)

...

     Ozpin slipped away from the crowd exiting the tent with a pounding heart. He could feel his fingers shake on the hilt of Long Memory as he managed to duck into the shadows outside the large emerald and gold tent. He had found him. All this time searching, all this time praying and hoping and looking only to be too late and he had found him. He had sat in the stands and seen the boy in action, heard the music and seen the magic both fake and real, and felt the sheer energy and joy the little Ringmaster felt in his performance like lightning in Ozpin’s own bones. And then- the song. The final song. Because Oscar always rounded off with a song, ones not meant for spectacle, but instead for the heart. A sincere wish and message for those fortunate to sit beneath the ceiling of the Emerald City for the night.

     The song alone could have brought him to tears. But to hear it sung by the little boy in the ring, the impossible, wonderful, miracle child who had every right to lash out at the world in hate, yet instead chose to fill it with wonders … it had been all he could do to keep from crying with there in the stands. To not try to climb down the makeshift seating and into the ring because all he’d wanted was to hold him.

     His son. The son he had never seen outside of grainy photos and shaky recordings, who he had tried desperately to find the more he learned what the child had lived through. And now Ozpin had found him. Now Ozpin had a chance to meet him. He just had to get backstage.

     It wasn’t hard to escape the eyes of the crowd, and it wasn’t much more difficult to slip through the shadows to the little ring of emerald tents set up behind the big top, the tents where the various performers of the rare and popular Emerald City act stayed. He hesitated on the boundary, trying to pick out which one of the colorful, green-themed tents belonged to the Ringmaster —his son, his child that he had never gotten to meet, would never have known about save a series of accidents—. He heard laughter and activity behind him, the performers returning to their temporary homes, and he ducked forward into the shadows of a tent at random. They would run him off if they found him, he was certain of that. He was a stranger to them at best, or worse, a known player in the war that had created the boy he hoped to meet, that had no doubt hurt many of those who followed him —such as Hazel, and how the man had ever been swayed from Salem’s promise of revenge, Ozpin could not fathom but did not want to test—.

     He heard no activity from the tent he was hiding behind, and while the air whispered with hints of magic, it wasn’t coming from this tent, so he moved on to another. This time, he dared peak into the tent flap, but saw nothing but the vague shadows of personal belongings. No sign of the little Ringmaster —his son, his child—.

     Ozpin backed away from that tent, heart drumming anxiously in his chest. Then he turned and froze.

     The massive Grimm, the strange one that Qrow called Hound. The monster that for some reason Ozpin never wanted to contemplate —but had spent many hours doing just that— followed his son everywhere. Behaved like it was tame and natural rather than a creature of Darkness that longed only for destruction. It stood just a few feet away, so large it’s head was even with Ozpin’s chin as it watched him with flat, glowing red lights for eyes.

     His fingers tightened on the hilt of Long Memory, lifetimes of instinct screaming to raise his weapon and attack first before it could kill him or anyone else here. But he had seen recordings of this same Grimm, dressed up in ridiculous costumes to hide its true nature from unpracticed eyes, parading around in the circus ring like a big dog. He had seen his son ride on its back and balance on its head and Qrow had recounted more than one instance of Oscar and the other children escaping on its back. It hadn’t been present for this particular show, but he had seen multiple recordings of previous ones where it entered the ring and no one had been harmed. Of course, Ozpin’s son —Salem’s son, for all the second half of that coin tore at his guts— had been close by all those times, but here there was no one in sight but the two of them.

     The Grimm tilted its head slowly to one side, a ragged ear pricking like an actual dog’s. It wasn’t attacking. Even though Ozpin knew he must stink of so many different types of fear he could attract an entire pack of Beowolves all on his own. It just … studied him.

     Slowly, it’s jaws opened, and Ozpin prepared to dodge some attack. Instead, the large, blood red tongue slid out from between massive teeth and lolled there, a slow, thoughtful trio of pants before it licked its teeth and shut its jaws again. Without any further reaction, it lowered its head and turned away, walking slow and ponderously toward one of the tents that had light peaking through the bottom. Ozpin watched it leave with a blank, confused mind, then startled when it stopped and twisted around to look over its shoulder at him.

     It looked like it was waiting.

     It looked like it wanted him to follow.

     Inhaling raggedly —this was the stupidest thing he had done in lifetimes he was sure—, Ozpin started following in the Grimm’s footsteps.

     It led him to the tent farthest from the bigtop, nudged open the flap with something like practiced ease, and shouldered its way in. Ozpin lingered outside, suddenly too afraid to go a step further. There was a Grimm in there, but somehow, the realization that his son might be in there was even more terrifying than that. If he stood out here too long, he would be caught, he knew that, and yet…

     “Hey, Sondor,” murmured a voice through the tent fabric and Ozpin’s world crystalized, “Everything alright? You left in a bit of a hurry.” A deep rumble, inhuman and bass and … oddly content sounding. The voice —a child’s voice, a gentle voice, a voice he’d just heard laughing and waxing dramatic for a show of fake magic and real mysteries— laughed faintly, “Checking on someone then? You know everyone has to stay up late on performance nights.”

     If he held on any tighter to his cane, he thought it might shatter, but the feel of it grounded him like it always had, and with the last bit of courage he possessed in this lifetime, he pushed the tent flap open and slipped inside as the voice —his son— finished saying, “We’ll be sure to take long naps in the morning.”

     Ozpin was here. He was standing in the same space as his child, without a crowd to be wary of or a performance to keep them apart. He was standing in some kind of makeshift workshop, with a cot on the floor on the far side and the vast majority of space taken up by a battered, foldable metal table that seemed to be a desk and all the tools of a magician’s trade. Cards and wands and hats, gloves and fanciful outfits and a hundred thousand other things that didn’t matter, because amid all the mess, with his back mostly to the entrance and a massive Grimm lying contentedly next to his feet, was the Ringmaster.

     His child.

     The Grimm raised its head again to stare at him, a low noise he’d never heard the monsters make before rumbling from its chest, and the boy tilted his head toward the tent entrance absently, still not looking away from the Dust gem he was setting in his elaborate cane, “Hey Neo, you’re back early. I thought you were still scoping … out…” he finished setting the Dust in his cane, looked up and saw Ozpin standing there. Neither of them moved. Green-gold eyes in a young face —he looked ten had Qrow really been correct on estimating his age closer to twelve or thirteen?— went wide, and the magic passively swirling through the tent shrunk in on itself until he couldn’t feel it.

     It occurred belatedly to Ozpin that while he had essentially been stalking his son for the last few years in an attempt to meet him and make sure he was okay, the boy wouldn’t know him at all. Or worse, had only heard of him from people who hated him —from Salem herself even—. And now Ozpin had just shown up in the boy’s living space without warning or invitation.

     Terror and nerves tangled up all the words he wanted to say, all the ones he’d longed to say, and instead he found himself folding both of his shaking hands on the pommel of his cane and bleating out the first, most habitual line currently living in his brain, “Hello, I’m Professor Ozpin-.”

     A shout, loud and gutted, and all his words died in his throat again as the boy threw himself off his little camp chair and at Ozpin. Long Memory clattered to the ground unnoticed as Ozpin instinctively raised his hands to wrap around the little body that collided with his waist, slender arms tightening like a vise around him and Ozpin couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe-.

     Had he really said-?

     A hiccuping sob from the child in his arms, a fully body thing that shook him from his tousled black hair to his shoes while that word spun endlessly in Ozpin’s mind, haunting him and confusing him because he couldn’t have heard that right. He couldn’t have heard…

     “Dad.”

     The word echoed between them again, muffled by a young face buried in his suit jacket, and Ozpin felt his own breath start to stammer as he clung tighter to the boy in his arms, sinking down to his knees despite the screaming in his leg and burying his face in flyaway black hair, “I’m here.” He choked out, “I’m right here. I’ve got you. You’re alright. I’m right … I’m right here.”

     Magic pressed against his skin, burrowed into his soul, needy and desperate and fearful in a way his daughters’ had never been until the very end —until the moment his shield broke and he could no longer protect them—. It begged him and Ozpin forgot about everything else, forgot every other concern or person in the world as he let his own magic unspool and twine with the younger, needy magic begging him for comfort. Behind his closed eyelids he could see it, the colors spinning and twisting in the space between their souls. His ever-dwindling green wrapping around a younger, deeper, stronger wellspring of emerald laced with snapping red, whispering black and dancing flickers of purple, gold, blue, and white.

     The younger magic coiled tightly in his, desperate and pained, crying in relief and fear just as loudly as the sobs that shook his son’s body. It was open to him, painfully open and raw, trusting despite how this boy had every reason to fear another’s magic. In the breath between crying and comforting and accepting, Ozpin’s magic brushed up against what could only be called a crack in his child’s soul. A jagged old wound that had never properly healed. Glass sharp and weeping and-.

     Pain-pain-pain-fear-fear-please-pleasedon’tleavedon’tleaveme-.

     Magic, green and old, bodiless and desperate and half-mad with agony sinking inside and locking in place in a message that screamed all the way down to bone marrow and soul fiber.

    Mine-my-child-I-love-you-I-loveyoumychildmy-

     “Oscar.” Ozpin choked out, struggling to shake off the remnants of memory hidden in soul shards and old wounds. Realization reeled, pulled at the fabric of reality beneath his feet. “Oscar,” he repeated, rolling the name of his son over his tongue and wondering at the sensation of right, of familiarity even though he had never met this child before. He had, of course, known his name. The boy made a little joke of it at the beginning of all his performances, but now the name had weight. Had an echo of knowledge to it that he couldn’t quite grasp.

     Even though, somehow, his son knew him. And perhaps that should terrify him. Because his son was a child still, yet somewhere in the spaces between incarnations, or in the moments between life and death and dreams, his child remembered him and clung to a message of love even though it had been tangled up in so much pain.

     “I tried,” Oscar sobbed into his chest, “I tried, I’m- I’m so sorry-.”

     Ozpin hushed him, ran shaking fingers through his son’s hair and ignored the way his glasses had completely blurred over from the tears they caught, “I know. It’s alright. You’re alright. You’re alive, Oscar.” He guided his son’s face to his scarf and pressed his cheek against the top of Oscar’s head, “You’re alive. That’s all that matters to me.” He inhaled raggedly and set aside the spinning theories trying to take root, the odd mix of age-youth-age and time-turned-back in Oscar’s magic that made him wonder. He had long assumed that Oscar’s aging was … strange, a byproduct of being the child of two immortals. Yet feeling Oscar’s magic, the soft echo of bells and clockwork gears hidden inside it, he couldn��t help but remember that gravity and its magic was an aspect of space and space was a partner of time. There had been spells that toyed with time long ago that left impressions on the souls that used them, though never on such a large scale as what Ozpin was contemplating.

     But if anyone could reinvent a way to turn back the hands of the world’s clock, it would be the child of Ozma and Salem, surely —had his son known a previous incarnation, or had his son met Ozpin himself in the future, had he lived a prisoner of Salem until he was a teen or even an adult, only meeting his father to see him die in agony at his mother’s hands, had a single dying message of love amid a lifetime of darkness truly been enough to make him fight time itself to make things right—.

     But that didn’t matter right now.

     He was here. Oscar was here. They were both alive and safe and his little boy was tucked trustingly in his arms, and that was what mattered right now. It mattered more than anything else in the world.

     “I love you, Oscar,” he whispered into his son’s hair as he rocked them back and forth, uncaring of his jacket and scarf becoming soaked with tears, or the way Oscar’s magic coiled around his soul so tightly it was almost burning, “I love you. I’m here.”

     “I missed you,” Oscar choked out between sobs, another piece to Ozpin’s puzzle set aside for later times, “I love y-you t-too.” A hiccup, loud and ugly, a shiver in Ozpin’s arms, “Don’t go.”

     “I won’t,” Ozpin promised, hand cradling the back of Oscar’s head, trying to shield him from the nightmares he could sense lurking within, “I won’t go. I’m right here.” He exhaled wetly, “I’m right here.”

[yasbxxgie]

Twenty-eight years ago, famed science-fiction author Octavia Butler published her apocalyptically prescient bestselling novel Parable of the Sower, which illustrated what America would look like when climate change, economic instability, and a white Evangelical Christian fascist movement took hold and converged.

Sound familiar?

The eeriest part about this novel is the way in which cultural and political norms were slowly erased. There was no major war, no invasion; instead, a sense of collective lethargy set in across the nation, and things went from bad to worse. Religious fundamentalism seized the country, slavery was reintroduced, water was scarce, and all the social safety nets that the government once provided were rolled back in favor of privatization. If you could afford police protection, health care, the creation of roads and bridges, great—if not, you were out of luck. Butler was clearly ahead of her time. She combined her brilliant imagination with a keen understanding of human behavior to illustrate where the U.S.A. was headed if we continued our ostrich behavior of sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that what was unfolding before our eyes wasn’t happening.

Right now, America as we have come to understand it is unraveling. In this radically new normal world, doctors and health care workers are accosted for trying to keep the public safe, poll workers are threatened for counting votes, anyone who aides a pregnant person seeking an abortion in Texas can be sued, mass shootings are commonplace, and historic climate events are happening weekly. Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright famously said regarding fascism, “If you pluck a chicken one feather at a time, people don’t notice it. So I am concerned about chicken plucking.”

We all should be very concerned.

Contrary to what people think, America’s democratic erosion didn’t begin with Donald Trump; it began with the birth of the Tea Party as a response to a Black man having the audacity to think he could be president. It was the first time in modern history when White Americans were demanding to see the president’s birth certificate because in their minds even though Black Americans were brought here by their ancestors and built this nation, we certainly didn’t have a claim to it — let alone be permitted to run it.

President Barack Obama wanted to believe in the best of Americans as opposed to the reality of who they truly are. Better put: Obama is who America aspires to be while Trumpism is who America is and sadly has always been.

We are a country that made Juneteenth a federal holiday while criminalizing the teaching of critical race theory. We are a country that goes around the world scolding underdeveloped nations about democracy and women’s rights while refusing to pay women in this country equal to men and disallowing people with uteruses to make decisions about their own bodies. We’re a country wrought with blatant contradictions and saddled with elected officials who spend their energy gaslighting the public into believing all is okay and that if you just use paper straws and vote, all will continue to be well.

The reality is much starker.

Under Democratic presidents and congresses, we have witnessed the gutting of the Voting Rights Act, the demolition of Roe v. Wade, and a rise in White supremacist groups. As our country grapples with multiple climate disasters, we have Democrats like Joe Manchin who are “uncomfortable with climate language” in a historic infrastructure bill and actively deny Black and Brown Americans access to the ballot in favor of upholding the filibuster. You see, it’s too easy to just slap the blame of where we are right now on Republicans and Republicans alone. The reality is that you teach people how to treat you, and most people will do their worst if unchecked — insert Trump’s criminal presidency and the January 6 insurrection as examples.

Like children, politicians need boundaries and accountability; otherwise, they will run amok.

The 243-year American experiment is facing an existential threat like we have never seen before. Voting alone will not save us. We turned out in record numbers during a pandemic, and instead of celebrating our resilience, Republicans are punishing Americans for daring to believe they have a voice in their democracy.

How can you change what you refuse to face? How can you build tactics for what you choose to willfully ignore because the reality is just too hard to swallow? Democracy isn’t stagnant. If done correctly, it evolves as often as the people do. It expands. It grows.

America is changing. The ground we once thought was stable is shifting beneath our feet. It’s scary and it’s painful like all births, but we must push through if we are to survive. Lauren Olamina, the heroine in Butler’s Parable series, said this, “All that you touch you change. All that you change changes you. The only lasting truth is change. God is change.” What we change into, however, is still very much up to us, but only if we take our heads out of the sand and decide to get to work.

[alt|h/t]

[itsnothingofinterest]

I’ve often said that it seems like a lot of the main pros below All Might seem to end up representing serious flaws in hero society; specifically the ones on the hero side of things. So as a fun little exercise I thought I’d go over all those main pros and what flaws they represent (should be easy, they’re usually their own personal character flaws). Maybe also give my assessment to what I think their chances of living to the end of the series are while I’m at it, since representing serious flaws in the old guard can be hazardous to your health if treated poorly.

Endeavor

A man who needs no introduction if you’re any kind of HeroAca fan. love or hate him, everyone knows the new no.1.

Funnily enough, he’s actually the main exception to the rule we mentioned before about a pros’ character flaw being the flaw they thematically represent. See, his character flaw is that he focus so much on heroics, his career in heroics, or just his own general needs over his family; to the point that he only had a family to have children he could live vicariously though, and felt no obligation to love the ones he couldn’t live through. What he represents, is actually two-fold: 1) the toxicity of the ranking system which makes heroics so competitive and encourage heroes focus on some arbitrary number, and 2) the power heroes have that let them do horrible things and get away with it. They’re connected concepts, for sure, but not exactly synonymous.

And with that said, what are his chances of survival? Well, the ranking toxicity is out of his hands, but besides that...it can be hard to tell. He has, under semi-aggressive guidance of his family, publicly taken responsibility for the things he’s done and vowed to make up for it; which helps his chances considerably. But in that same scene he also said that the only way he can atone is to keep doing what he’s always done; beat up villains and at least 1 family member. It sends a mixed message. But in general; I want to say that he’s gotten enough development that he doesn’t feel set to fail his arc now. I’d be tempted to say his chances look pretty good...were it not for all the separate reasons I think he’s likely to die anyway. Oh well, no one’s situation can be perfect.

Hawks

The controversial hero; Hawks!

I’ve summarized Hawks’ main flaw before as ‘hubris’, partially because he’s an Icarus figure so generalizing it like that feels clever, but it’s a bit more complex than that. Hawks main flaw isn’t so much pride as it is self-righteousness. Hawks represents the belief that everything is just right as it is, and the status quo must therefore be protected at all costs. A denial that the heroes he believes in have done anything wrong even after staring their mistakes in the face and spending months talking with those the heroes failed. In fact to contrast Endeavor’s line to the press; Hawks tried to excuse what he did as though it had to be done. That’s the opposite of promising.

With that said, what are his chances of survival? Well, I’d actually put him at 50/50 odds; since I see 2 endings for him, and it’s too early to tell which is more likely. See, while we’ve only got two instances of a “pattern,” Hawks seems like a guy who falls to the ground, recovers and gets back up, only to fall even further down because he never learns. So his two futures are either: A) To actually learn. Take a fall so hard that in the aftermath, he can’t convince himself he was right all along. Maybe he gets Endeavor killed, or does something to sever their relationship. Something that’d force him to self-reflect. B) To take a fall so hard it proves fatal; his mistakes catching up to him in a way that doesn’t give him a chance to self-reflect.

Best Jeanist

Sir Long Neck McImagine Obsession himself.

Best Jeanist represents the self-interest in hero society can have over justice itself. Already known for being focused on superficial image; he’s dramatic reappearance revealed just how deep that went. For when it’s revealed by a villain that a hero has committed great crimes that ended up motivating that villain’s actions; Jeanist’s immediate concern was the damage this would do to the reputation of heroes. More than what kind of person he’s been working alongside, and even more than saving lives, Jeanist’s first thought went the wellbeing of the industry he works in and how bad they would collectively look to the public; that’s what he’s most angry at Dabi for.

Chances of survival are...maybe 40-50%? There’s no real leaning one way or another frankly, so that kind of feels like it’d put him at even odds for the exact opposite reason as Hawks. Will he live? Will he die? Who can say? Leaning just a bit towards death though, because again, representing flaws in the old guard can be hazardous to your health.

Mirko

And here we have the violent one.

While I’m tempted to lump this one with Hawks, I actually think Ms.Mirko represents the heroes use of incredible violence best. See, Mirko is someone who really likes to beat people up, even once in a spin-off said Bakugou’s drive to murder was a good thing in a hero. And while she won’t even feel the need to kill like Hawks apparently did, her response to fighting the High End Nomu was something like “finally, some villains I get to just kill with no ethical issues, that makes things easy”. (Which, considering the High Ends are sentient is, um, hmm). Her love of violence borders on villainous, and she freely admits it is simple obligation that prevents her from crossing that boundary. It’s reminiscent of when Shigaraki pondered what the difference really was between heroes’ & villains’ violence. And, well, if it closes the gap in morality between heroes and villains, it’s going on this list.

Regarding her chances of survival, like Jeanist she’s not exactly defined enough to really say anything for sure or end up on any extreme end; I’ve no real reason to think she’s very likely live or die. That said; on the one hand she seems a bit more eagerly reveling in the flaw she represents, plus a blood knight getting back into the fight after sustaining heavy injuries is never a good sign. On the other hand, Horikoshi clearly likes her for reasons we won’t address here. I think I’m gonna average it out to 50%. Maybe even 60%.

Kamui Woods & Mt. Lady

You wouldn’t think some of the most plain as bread heroes would be joining the ranks of the problematic, and in fairness that’s because they mostly aren’t, but they are the ones who best represent a serious issues with heroes. They represent the way heroes will focus on flashiness & the problems they cause/exasperate in the process. Misconduct performed in the quest for fame; in so many words. Kamui showed this in chapter 1; calling a giant purse snatcher “evil incarnate” because that villain was attention grabbing and disturbing the peace. This is especially noticeable in hindsight, after we’ve see some real problems heroes could be dealing with but aren’t; like lost children on their way to becoming villains. And Mt. Lady represent it by how she operates in a big city despite her powers really working better for more rural or neighborly environments; because city work makes her more popular and rakes in the cash (that she loses paying for repairs).

That said, even if those are flaws I feel are highly associated with them, none of that is stuff they’re actively involved in; they’re naïve at best, and have already improved considerably (for minor characters at least) into better heroes. Frankly speaking, their changes of survival are probably averaging at 85% (80% for Kamui, 90% for Mt.). Like, they’re not gag characters per se; but they’re not super serious characters, they’re not connected to the MCs in any real way, and they don’t knowingly contribute to any of society’s corruptions. Really, so long as big H doesn’t really want to off someone we know for a shock, they’re probably fine.

Gran Torino

And lastly, the only non-big shot on the list, the unpleasant old geezer himself; Gran Torino!

What GT represents better than any other, I think, is the idea of passing any blame a hero may have for the actions/very existence of a villain on to the villain in question, thus allowing the heroes to better absolve themselves. You know like how with Shigaraki, he ignores any fault he has with that guys’ existence and simplifies him down to a criminals they can only beat down; and how dare he exist and thereby hurt Toshinori’s feelings. On that note, I’d say he also represents the idea that the villains are what they are, they’re too far gone, and there’s nothing the heroes can do about it. The most convenient excuse to not ever have to try to make up for what they did wrong, which you can’t even blame them too much for because they “tried their best” (even if they really didn’t).

So, what are his odds? Well frankly I wanna put him at 0% just cause he’s so old that if a villain doesn’t get him, time will. But that’s cheating. In actuality, it’s hard to say; dude’s a stubborn old man, and it really feels like it will depend on his ability to admit how wrong he handled things regarding Tomura. Now admittedly, he did admit to making the wrong choice in handling Kotaro, but he’s said nothing of Tomura so far. For now I’ll put him at 30%, but we’ll have to see if he sticks to his guns regarding current events next time he talks with All Might or whoever to really get a gasp on his chances.

And that’s about all the big ones so we’ll wrap it up. Anyway the point is it feels like a lot of heroes are gonna need to get their acts together lest they risk coming down with Not Alive Syndrome sometime in the future.

[plutoswrath]

i’m jealous of your big heart when it comes to animals lmao. i’m arachnophobic and it can be so annoying to have sometimes. i haven’t been able to tie it back to astrology, as much as i would like to. i asked because i was wondering if there was a clear indicator based off certain placements like how 6th house rules animals, 6th is ruled by mercury so i jumbled them even though i probs shouldn’t have lol. and with venus it ties to personal taste so i wondered if it could indicate a liking towards a certain animal. i have sag and sag venus in 6th and embarrassingly enough, i was obsessed with horses. like i came out of the womb adoring them. as soon as i learned to talk i was a walking horse encyclopedia. my obsession died down. i’m not a horse girl, i swear on my life.

i agree with you about the cancer loving animals. animals are babies and momma cancer loves to nurture the babies. i feel like cancers are the most likely to hate the “are you a dog or cat person” question. they’d get offended because how dare someone assume their heart isn’t big enough for both. more than both, really. throw a turtle in there. a rabbit even. cancer asc peeps usually have a shit ton of animals. it’s probably the sag/abundance in the 6th. or they either own a horse or Great Dane. but this is off topic because i forgot i had a follow up question.

if you could tie an animal or a couple animals to each sign that you think best represents that sign? or just seems like one they’d like? some are so easy and others just leave me blank. my arachnophobia thinks scorpio’s deserve better than scorpions but my terror blinds me. but i was looking up the symbolism behind animals and tying them to signs. so far, i’ve concluded that while horses should go with sag, their highly intuitive and empathetic animals. their behavior is like a mirror so if you’re nervous, they are too. so pisces or cancer actually seems to be a better fit. and to stay on topic of cancer with animals, i always tie wolves and dogs in general to cancer. the wolves are tied to the moon and familial dynamics and also i think they’re a great symbolic opposition to leo and how leos tend to resemble cats. sun and moon, dog and cat, night and day, that sort of thing. i realized i’ve rambled but i’m looking forward to your opinion because i’m so lost on what other signs would have. it’s been a year old question in my brain and it’s time for help from the master.

I'm sorry to hear that, I'm had a friend once who was arachnophobic and having phobias like these is really no fun, I can't imagine what it feels like really having them. And omg don't feel bad for liking horses when you were a child, literally so many children, especially young girls, like horses simply because people decided horses where a 'teenage girls only' thing somehow?? (and I will have to dig deeper into this at a point because here where I come from the horse girl thing is soooo painfully real and I want to understand the phenomena). And if I'm not mistake, arachnophobia (like most types of phobias), stem from some kind of trauma right? I absolutely don't try to get to personal but if we look at phobias in that way, maybe it's good to also include looking at planets/asteroids that point to trauma or aspects that can represent/indicate traumatic experiences in that sense! And I agree wholeheartedly to the 'dog or cat' question, I don't get offended by it but I hate this question in general because every animal deserves my love and empathy adfghj and yes, mother feelings definitely play into this haha! I think cancers enjoy (to an extent) having that occasional (or constant) outlet for their nurturing side and the bound you have to animals is also very intuitive and requires a lot of patience and getting educated as well as being observant and reading between the lines somehow and all that dedication paired with emotional knowledge just really speaks to water signs in general (and animals don't judge openly with words, just your energy asdfgh) Uhh, I like the question regarding the animals and I agree with your takes on it so far!! I think one animal can not represent all the core traits of a sign alltogether, but I'll try my best here! and psdfghj no need to call me master because I'm literally so far from anything close to that but thank you so much still, I feel honored really!!

The Signs as Animals:

Disclaimer: some of them are inspired by my ‘the Wild Unknown Animal Spirit’ tarot deck.

Aries: House cat. I know, I always thought cats actually link pretty well to Aries! Cats are just the perfect mixture of intelligen and curious, reserved, stubborn, aggressive, senstive as well as playful/impulsive! They are quick to learn and not afraid to face off against any other, bigger animals, but also can live pretty well together with other pets in the house, as long as they don‘t bother them too much. Especially when it comes to intimacy/pda they are very picky, but forceful when demand it. Seem flexible and unbothered at first but actually have the firmest boundaries when it comes to their personal freedom. Will let you believe they need you but give it a few weeks and the neighbor has better treats than you and gone they are asdfgh, but it's actually a harmful stereotype to believe that cats don't need you because they can become extremely fond of you and grow very attached.

Taurus: Elk. Based on the interpretation of my tarot deck. The elk represents earth energy, it is grounded, is established in itself and knows their core values and acts according to them. They show consistency, coherence and care. Dedicated to who they love and what they care for. Can become narrow minded due to knowing what's best, based on their perception of what's right and necessary, which can effect their ego negatively. Very Taurus for me. Gemini: Dragonfly. I refer to the interpretation of the Dragonfly based on my tarot deck. The dragonfly represents the mind: everchanging, quick, fascinating, a reflection of the world inside us and aroudn us. As the dragonfly is very quick (refering to Mercury's fast and nervous energy) the dragonfly also calles for paying attention to what quality our mind has and to become mindful, because on first glance things always appear different tahn on first glance (Mercury floats between detail-oriented and paying attenetion and being too fast, impatient). The dragonfly is joy and magic, as well as impatience, restlessness and being unable to concentrate. Cancer: Killer Whales (but also whales in general)! I thought especially about Killer Whales, because I once watched a documentary on them and they went in depth about how they have different cultures and different languages even (if I remember correctly) in their familys. Cancer often gets associated with the home life, but I think I wanted to look at it from another perspective, as in how does family 'become' family and how do those family roots develope, what do they consist of, how do we define family and what holds it together (and especially: how do our roots shape our own emotional patterns and nature in life?). I think the mystery of the Killer Whales but the whole complexity that lies behind the fascination of how these animals function and also how deeply affected Killer Whales are by their emotions/when they are absent from their kin, just opens up another big question of family dynamics and how we relate to one another and how principles we always condoned to human beings now apply to animals too. I think the whole part about the Killer Whales relation to emotions and their family's cultures just really made me link them to Cancer. Leo: Otter. I refer o the meaning of teh Otter based on my tarot deck. The Otter resembles the energy of the inner child: it's pure bliss, playfulness, they love to live and live for life itself, and out of this eagerness to enjoy life comes also a contentment and completeness towards life itself. To reconnect with otter energy, it is advised to step into settings of celebration, or total creative self expression and from the outside looking 'unproductive/selfish' indulgence. But actually, this energy is what makes life so enjoyable in the first place.

Virgo: Octopus. Highly intelligent beings that can quickly adapt and take the initiative. Self sufficient by nature, they aren't aggressive unless provoked, they like to mind their business unless they get curious (then they cling heavy onto you because you are their new object of interest). They can change color if it's needed (Virgo is a mutuable sign and can blend in perfectly in social occasions/new situations) and tbh the inking part about octopus just reminds me of the fact that most Virgos have a really quirky side to them you only get to see when you annoy them long enough (aka you are a long term friend). Libra: Gazelle. I refer to the meaning of ten Gazelle based on my tarot deck. The gazelle combines the creation of beauty and harmony, creativity and hyper awareness of it's surroundings, very affected of the imbalances in it's environment, but in it's try to remain this beauty around them, they tend to forget their achievments and stay in the present with their thoughts, as they constantly wheigh out the 'what if's'. A very perceptive animal in the tarot deck and this attribute is equally it's strong suit and downfall. Scorpio: Tiger. I refer here to the meaning of the Tiger based on my tarot deck. Waits in stillness and darkness to reconnect to their own inner power. Healing in isolation with the help of the lunar forces, waiting to regenerate. The Tiger energy shows itself in being passionate, sensual and stepping into ones own power, recognizing ones strength. For me, this is very Scorpio (Moon) for me. When the Tiger in unbalanced, it becomes overstimulated and acts according to this hyperawareness. Sagittarius: Zebra. I refer here to the meaning of the Zebra based on my tarot deck. The Zebra stands for an open mind, visionary and eccentric, new thinking, as well as being young at heart and expansion. I personally connect horses with passion and drive, because they are truly powerhouses. Based on the meaning of my tarit deck, the Zebra also is sociable, at least people find themselves drawn to the energy of the Zebra because it triggers their desire to learn, and I think this is something very beautiful Sagittarius symbolizes when they come into your life: be prepared to broaden your horizon for more. 

Capricorn: Camel. I refer to the meaning of the Camel based on my tarot deck. Camels here represent absolute dependence on self and being able to find the answer to problems in oneself. This self reliance and capability reminds me of capricorns, the camel is finding the 'cool' aka water inside of them and Capricorn is traditionally also symbolized as the sea-goat (which I seriously think should really be considered when anaylzing this archetype) and Capricorns have (imo at least) a rich emotional life, but it's just deeply locked within. The Camel represents showing responsibility for their own actions, regulating the self and circumstances around them as best as they can, which makes sense for Capricorns, ruled by Saturn they usually are confronted with task in their life. If the Camel energy is out of balance, it shows a lack of vitality, with Capricorn representing the senior age in life makes sense, especially since Capricorns can tend to feel very old (exhausted)- Aquarius: Platypus- and no, I’m not using the Platypus because ‚wow all Aquarius are so weird like straight up aliens 🤪🤪’ I think the platypus is a good representation because it makes us question what we’ve known so far about animals and Aquarius too is a sign that introduces us to new ideas and perspectives all in the favor of progress and considering alternatives, leaving the status quo. Pisces:  Raven/Crow. I name these two in particular because as far as I know it’s only the ravens that have been documented intimating people’s voices and tones, but crows are definitely more known for their bright mind. For me people often forget Pisces mutable nature and how quick witted they actually are. These birds are hyper intelligent and their observational skills are truly amazing. In my Wild Uknown Animal Spirit deck, the crow is an animal carrying 3rd eye energy. Here, the view is clear, the crow is moving through different dimensions and sees what other’s cant. For and the emotional depth (void) Pisces is conencted to it just seem to make sense. 

[princess-of-inarizaki]

Hi can i have a headcanon with miya osamu and atsumu when their s/o is autistic ? Ps: i love your writing

Hello luv!! I'm sorry I couldn't write this sooner. I had to do a bit of research because I wanted to do my very best for such an important prompt :D I really hope you'll enjoy this 💖💖 with that in mind, please tell me if something is not to your liking, or if I've gotten something wrong ^^

My inbox was also very full and I had to make my way to this request 😭💖✨👉👈

I thank you from the bottom of my heart for sending me this and I love you so much!! Please stay safe, and take care!!

Atsumu

Very gentle! He thinks of you as his precious little angel, and he's always trying his best to make sure you're comfortable whenever you go somewhere new or different, or just anytime in general.

Always asks you if it's okay if he holds you or initiates physical contact. If you say yes, he scoops you in his arms and holds you tightly, pressing kisses on your forehead and nose! Of you say no, he completely understands, and will just remain close to you, whispering softly that he loves you.

Very proud of you! If someone dares say anything hurtful about you, you can just bet Atsumu is there to defend you right away, and give that person a piece of his mind. He can't stand other people being ignorant, and after trash talking them to the ground (without you being present, of course), he tells them to be more mindful towards other people.

He's mindful of your feelings. It's very important to our darling Tsumu that he's aware of how you're feeling, and what's okay and not okay for that time. If he thinks the crowds are getting too much for you, he'll gently steer you away to a less crowded area.

If it's too loud or noisy, you can just bet Atsumu is there to softly whisper “I love ya” in your ear and take you to a quieter place.

Admires how straightforward you are. Since Atsumu is a very honest person himself, you are the perfect pair since he never has to beat around the bush or disguise his intentions when it comes to you. It's all about healthy communication!

If you stim, he's smiling and thinking you look adorable. Waits till you calm down before ruffling your hair with a fond expression. “yer so cute” he whispers under his breath.

Finds it very informative if you begin talking about something you like! ( Special interests ) he might not always be listening 100% but he admires how dedicated and attentive you are to finding out as much as you can about the things that you're interested in. He understands it very well, since he's a volleyball player who's extremely passionate about his own sport.

Loves making you music playlists and gives you a pair of f/c (favourite colour) headphones on your birthday. You listen to his playlists, which not only calm you down, but also remind you how much he loves you through the lyrics.

Definitely shares a special song with you, and whenever either of you are going through something, or miss each other deeply, you play the song and smile.

Probably has a very cute nickname for you, and he loves calling you that (if you're okay with it), and telling his brother how "(nickname) is just the coolest person ever."

He also talks to all his teammates at msby, and friends about you, constantly telling them a new story, or just about the smallest things in general. They're all very sure he's so extremely whipped for you xD

Probably loves playing board games with you. Is very competitive, and appreciates it if you are too. Definitely make it a weekly thing to play board games together and even keep track of who wins more.

Winner gets cuddles ;D

I think despite everything, Atsumu really likes clothing, and will buy you clothes he thinks looks nice on you. It would make his day if you wore it somewhere, because he'll feel so proud to know you trust his style judgement.

The same way, he respects your opinion and even asks you questions often, because he loves hearing your point of view on things and taking it into account when he makes decisions.

All in all, 10/10, the most wholesome and precious boy you will ever find, next to his brother. (HC below)

Osamu

Sometimes, when you find a new topic of interest that gets you super excited, he smiles happily and listens to you attentively. It could be when he's making onigiri and you're sitting on the counter, talking with so much enthusiasm, he just falls deeper in love with you.

Makes food that fits your preferences! (Because I read that sometimes, it differs by colour, and sometimes if differs by flavour). He's always ready with a personalized bento box for you, made with so much love and affection, and you know food from him tastes like home, because he has you in mind when he makes it.

If you follow a routine, Osamu is the perfect man for you. He's very disciplined and tries his best to stick to a schedule just like you. Although they're different routines, you appreciate him understanding if you can't be somewhere, due to a certain routine you need to follow, and he doesn't just randomly have dates, taking the effort to plan and tell you in advance.

Appreciates how you find joy in the little things, and how curious you can get about things sometimes. He thinks it's adorable, when you have this face, when you're learning about something new, and his spirits are lifted when he's the first person you tell about it to. It makes him feel so special.

If you dislike crowds, Osamu is perfect for you (yet again). He definitely prefers to stay at home and watch a movie, or cook you dinner instead of going out to a restaurant, since he loves the comfort of his own home, and quietness when you spend time together.

You help him out at his onigiri shop, sometimes, happy to support your boyfriend. Since he knows you aren't good with social situations, he teaches you how to make the onigiri instead.

Since it's an important part of his shop, it shows that he really trusts you, and teaches you with care and patience until you've mastered it. The smile on your face after making it perfectly was enough for him.

When you two are apart, he sets a specific time to call you every day, and without fail, your phone rings at the designated time, and he greets you with a “hey babe, what're ya doing right now?”.

Likes going stargazing with you, and the both of you learn about the different constellations in the sky so that you can name them the next time you spot them.

Your parents adore him! I mean, he's polite, kind, soft-spoken, but most importantly, they can see that he genuinely loves you with all his being. The trust him completely and always joke around saying they can't wait till he becomes a part of the family officially.

If you have a younger sibling, they're definitely fond of him too. Osamu is amazing with children. He makes them pancakes whenever he visits, and loves reading them stories or watching shows with them.

Oh and much like Atsumu, Osamu is also very mindful and observant of you. He's always keeping check of how you're feeling and understanding boundaries and space, respecting you completely. If you feel uncomfortable, he apologizes immediately, and stops whatever he's doing.

Asks you before he does anything, like hug, kiss, or other forms of physical contact. (king of consent!!)

Radiates protective vibes! Without being overbearing or suffocating. He cares about you, but not so much that it becomes possessive or a problem.

Is just a genuine sweetheart, and would treat you like a queen/king. Wouldn't look at anyone else, and often says that he's “fallen in love with you”, with a small twinkle in his eye.

Thinks you're the most beautiful human he's ever met, not just on the outside, but the inside too.

Taglist: @k-sakusa-old @osamusriceballz

[chibimyumi]

how would you describe ciel’s and sebastian’s relationship? like yes literally it’s contractor and the one who agrees to the contract. but like their day to day relationship with eachother. i dont ship them but i love how they interact with one another but don’t know how to characterize their relationship.

Dear Anon,

O!Ciel and Sebastian’s relationship is not something I could fit into any inter-human relationship categories. This is because theirs is simply something that seems very unlikely for humans to have in our society. However, that is exactly what makes this master-servant duo interesting.

Most clinically, O!Ciel and Sebastian are indeed master and servant, child and adult. Though surely very rare, child-employers with adult-employees might exist in our world. What makes O!Ciel and Sebastian’s relationship unique is by no means limited to this ‘subversion’ of child-adult dynamic. Let us unpack this master-servant bond category by category, layer by layer.

1. Child vs Adult – Age Dynamic

A unique characteristic of O!Ciel and Sebastian’s relationship is how they do not behave like any child vs adult would. Sebas treats O!Ciel like a child, but he does not see his master as a child. And by ‘child’, I mean more specifically ‘a less-than-adult’ person. To Sebastian who is centuries old, a human who is 13 is as inexperienced and foolish as a 30 or 60 year old human. Instead, it seems like Sebas treats O!Ciel like a child only because it gets on his master’s nerves and it is entertaining.

We must remember that humans are cattle to Sebas, and that O!Ciel is no exception. For analogy’s sake, let us imagine a pig. Humans usually don’t have a higher regard or respect for adult pigs than they have for piglets. We don’t take adult pigs more seriously than we do piglets.

2. Master vs Servant – Power Dynamic

The most unique part in O!Ciel and Sebas’ relationship is not that a child is the employer of an adult, omnipotent demon. The uniqueness is in the detail that this specific employer has absolute command over Sebastian, and can even use the demon’s powers against him at will. We see in the Werewolf Arc for example, how O!Ciel has practically already broken his end of the contract. Sebastian was in full right to claim his payment for his service and return home. But since the contract was technically not over yet, O!Ciel stopped the demon from exerting his right with just one simple phrase: “it’s an order.”

Sebastian may seem all-powerful, but if O!Ciel wishes to make Sebas do something against his will, O!Ciel merely needs to use the binding magical term “it’s an order”. This binding term is so powerful it can infringe all of Sebastian’s personal autonomy, and it would be ““legal””. What if Sebas doesn’t want to be touched? “It’s an order, let person X touch you and get away without harm.” What if Sebas doesn’t want to expose himself to lethal danger? “It’s an order, do it anyway.”

This is the reason why SebaCiel could never work (even if O!Ciel were an adult!), simply because the power balance is inherently tipped way too much to O!Ciel’s side. A romantic and/or sexual relationship cannot work as long as the power balance is off, and true consent cannot be given on all sides. Consent that can be coerced, or cannot be withdrawn freely, is not true consent, after all.

3. Master vs Servant - Bickering

There is a lot of back-and-forth bickering between O!Ciel and Sebastian, which is very uncharacteristic of employer-employee relationships (No way I’m going to bicker against my boss!) Sometimes the bickering is light-hearted and comical, and I surmise this is part of the reason people might have the illusion that their power-dynamic is not completely off (as described above).

This light-hearted bickering is a great appeal, and it makes the master not behave like a full master, and the servant not like a full servant. On surface their contract bears semblance to a friendly relationship wherein both parties also fulfil their respective roles in this employment. This is a powerful ingredient in their usually fantastic cooperation during their missions! O!Ciel allows Sebas some freedom (when he sees fit), while Sebas returns this ‘kind gesture’ with helpful initiatives (when he sees fit). I dare say that many if not most ‘Kuroshitsuji’ fans are here exactly for this reason. Regardless of how fantastic this cooperation might be however, at core their relationship is still ‘employment’.

On the darker side however, this bickering is also one of the fruits born from insidious manipulation. In this post I discussed how Sebastian stretches his arms and legs as WIDELY as possible within his tiny constraints. To a certain extent, O!Ciel turns a blind eye (pun not intended) to it. Why though?

Of course O!Ciel is not a complete tyrant towards Sebastian, but this is the result that Sebastian managed to fight and win for himself. All the way back in chapter 138 Sebas didn’t even know O!Ciel yet, and yet he already made very clear that:

He should not try to exert too much control over him

That if he does try to do so, he should be careful with words

That if he is not careful, Sebas will take any opportunity to punish him for careless word-choice

In this small incident O!Ciel learned that if his demon misbehaves, he’d have himself to blame. THIS is the silent lesson Sebas instilled into the boy; that if Sebas mistreats O!Ciel, it is not Sebas who crossed boundaries, but that O!Ciel didn’t set the boundaries right. “O!Ciel had it coming”. This lesson taught by Sebas leans dangerously close to – if not downright within – the category of victim-blaming. (Sebas you trashy Trash Demon™, I love you.)

3.1. Circus Arc

So far in the manga, the most obvious example of this victim-blaming dynamic is the incident with the snakes in the Circus Arc. Sebas very clearly reminded O!Ciel that he is not above allowing his master to get hurt semi-mortally. O!Ciel was seething when he found out, and justly so. But did Sebas show any remorse? Of course not. Instead he blamed O!Ciel for:

Not being careful enough with his commands

Being too boring to see the ‘fun’ in this game

3.2. Jack the Ripper Arc

Far more dramatically, this same victim-blaming dynamic can found in the Jack the Ripper Arc, and this one arguably even dictated how O!Ciel is going to become as a person.

In the Ripper Arc Sebas also obeyed O!Ciel’s order to the T. But that’s it; only to the T and nothing more. Because the demon deliberately withheld information from his master necessary for the investigation, more victims fell while the case was still in O!Ciel’s hands. Who gets the blame? Jack the Ripper obviously. But who is made to bear the guilt? O!Ciel is; through the victim-blaming Sebastian made him internalise.

O!Ciel is still O!Ciel, so he probably didn’t really lose any sleep over the deaths of 5 people. But had he not been him, then surely this guilt would have been mind-crippling. However, we need to bear in mind that O!Ciel was not unaffected; had Sebas not withheld information, then O!Ciel would have stopped the murders earlier, and presented a scapegoat to the Queen. Let’s be fair, had Madam been arrested then she’d still be awaiting capital punishment. But as the Watchdog, O!Ciel pulls some strings. He would have tried VERY hard not to lose his aunt too.

As it is however, the enormous guilt about the death of his own aunt is what Sebas made O!Ciel suffer through slow and insidious manipulation. Sebas never gave O!Ciel the time to mourn his aunt, and instead pressured the boy into admitting that he ‘callously sacrificed Madam as a pawn’. He made him mentally TAKE the blame for the murder that Grell committed, and Sebas could have helped prevent.

As we can see in chapter 13, O!Ciel was desperately trying to externalise the blame, coming up with excuse after excuse, justification after justification. None however, works. Good seasoning skills, Sebas, amazing food-prep.

I am fairly certain that O!Ciel doesn’t even realise how much he’s being emotionally manipulated by his butler throughout the years. This insight about emotional manipulation and psychological abuse is something that requires a level of abstract comprehension we cannot expect from most people, let alone a 13 year old child (however smart they may be.)

4. Conclusion

In conclusion, both Sebas and O!Ciel exist in this relationship rather amicably on surface level, but they are inherently toxic to each other. Sebas is continuously manipulating and emotionally abusing O!Ciel, while O!Ciel holds the absolute power to infringe all of Sebastian’s autonomy.

This ⇊ illustration by Yana is the perfect symbolisation of their bond.

We can attach adjectives like “f*cking toxic” and “fascinating” to this relationship, but we can’t find a category of inter-human relationship to fit O!Ciel and Sebastian into. In real life there are no children who can wield magical command to strip someone entirely of their autonomy. Likewise, there are very few adults who would not consider a child as ‘less-than-adult’. Should we try to shoe-horn O!Ciel and Sebas into a human category, then we risk over-simplifying this relationship. Over-simplification of this relationship can be very harmful, because the subverted formula of “child-master and adult-servant” SEEMS to compensate for the inherent power imbalance.

Yana however, managed to write this relationship SO brilliantly complex, that Sebas will always remain the servant who is at O!Ciel’s mercy, while O!Ciel suffers continuous mental abuse despite holding the ultimate ace card against a demon. This complex relationship is the ultimate evidence that even the most toxic relationships can look functional on surface level, and I love hating it!

I hope this helps give some insight!

[shesclearlya3]

Class Fight (p.1)

pairing: teen!dandy mott x teen!reader

word count: 3,303

warnings: language, jealous dandy, slightly au!dandy, all characters are 18

part 2 part 3

1.

It was the first semester of your Senior year. The first month of school had flown by, and the Fall dance was just a few weeks away. Your small group of girlfriends was anxiously awaiting for their crushes to ask them.

You weren’t particularly concerned with this. The dance fell on the one Saturday of the month where you had to accompany your mother to some stupid Tupperware party. It was the newest trend in American dining, and your mother needed you as her plus one. It wouldn’t hurt to miss one dance… right?

Your best friends Winter and Zoe were excited, but they were devastated you couldn’t come. You always went with them as a trio.

“Are you sure you couldn’t cancel?” Winter asked while you washed your hands in the bathroom sink. The school day was over, and you planned on accompanying her to the diner for greasy food and to catch up on homework.

“I already promised her weeks ago,” you said, drying your hands. “There’s still prom?”

Winter nodded in understanding, and you both knew it was the end of that discussion. Zoe came out of the stall, her face flushed and hair tied back. She looked clammy.

“You alright in there?” Winter asked her as Zoe took a disposable cup and drank some water.

“Kyle asked me to the dance!” Zoe replied breathlessly. You and Winter both congratulated her, and Winter asked why she looked so sick.

“I just got overwhelmed, you know? He came up and asked me right as I put my books away. I didn’t think he was going too, he never brought it up before-.”

You followed them out as Zoe recanted the story of how Kyle asked her. The halls were mostly cleared now as kids scrambled to leave as soon as possible.

“You’re riding with us, right?” Zoe then asked you, raising a neat eyebrow at you.

“Yes, Dandy probably left already.”

The girls both smirked to themselves, but you ignored it. You were used to it by now.

The thing was, Dandy Mott was the best looking guy in school, in your opinion. You had never attended a public school in your life, but you knew those boys could never compare. Dandy was from the wealthiest family in your private district, and with his looks, girls were all over him.

However, he was quite the character. 

Dandy didn’t necessarily associate with a particular group of kids. He was reticent and didn’t bother with any clubs, but he was quite attuned to the drama program. He was also known for his temper if things didn’t go his way, but age matured him, mostly. You were one of the few people who he actually gave a damn about in life. You attributed that to knowing him before school. Your grandfather was a business partner with the Mott family, where your family name found their wealth, and how you two were friends.

You weren’t bothered by the unwanted attention you got from girls attempting to weasel their way into your circle for the chance to talk to Dandy. Most of them gave up quickly, and that was that. Plus, you had Winter and Zoe as your protectors. They weren’t afraid to kick a bitch in the vagina if they overstepped the clear boundaries you had set for yourself. Dandy trusted you, and you weren’t about to fuck that up.

Plus, his mother, Gloria, was continually trying to set him up with girls in other parts of town. 

You climbed into Zoe’s new car, buckling your seatbelt and glancing across the almost deserted parking lot. You spotted him instantly, sitting in his car and staring right back. You slowly raised your hand, giving him a wave. Dandy slowly reciprocated the action, and you swore you saw him smile.

You spent the evening with the girls, eating dinner and trying to explain the symbolism in the required reading in English. The football team had finished their practice and were crowding what few booths and tables were left. You tried to block out their raucous laughter, loudly asking Zoe to read your theory to see if it were plausible. 

Winter had noticed the Quarterback, Jason, occasionally staring at you as he chewed his burger. Your back was to him, so you had no idea. She didn’t say anything, instead watching him from the corner of her eye, figuring he wouldn’t approach your table. 

“I just think it only makes sense to me,” you told Zoe, scratching your head. “I can’t concentrate with the boys screaming for no reason.”

“I think it makes perfect sense. You did misspell authority, though…”

You laughed to yourself, glancing around the diner as Zoe fixed your spelling. You were so distracted, you misspelled simple words. 

“We should get ready and go, it’s getting stuffy in here…” Winter commented, closing her English book. 

“Just a moment!” Zoe said excitedly, scribbling down in her own notebook now.

You had started gathering your things when both Zoe and Madison looked behind you, looking a mix of concern and amusement. You glanced behind you to see Jason Dean, smiling down at you. His dark hair covered his eyes, and he pushed it back.

You had no idea what to say. The last conversation you had with Jason was probably in fifth grade when he commented that women were weak while helping you carry boxes of school supplies, and you accidentally dropped a massive box of markers on his foot. He cried for an hour. 

“y/n,” he addressed you. You glanced at your friends who were eagerly watching you with their faces hidden behind their textbooks. Winter’s was upside down.

“Hi, Jason,” you responded, hearing the confusion in your voice. You listened to his friends giggling behind you, and you wondered if this was a joke. 

“I haven’t seen you in a minute,” he said cheekily, and you nodded. “You look good.”

You quickly looked him up and down. Jason was muscular but not bulky, and he was definitely a whole foot taller than you. He grew into his facial features, and he was a handsome guy. You assumed he was just talking to you on a dare, so you finished putting your things in your bag. Zoe and Winter didn’t budge, still pretending to read their books.

Jason realized you were dumbfounded at his statement. He quickly backtracked, “I just wanted to say hi. I’ll see you around.”

You bid him farewell, turning to your friends who were having a hard time concealing their laughter. You heard Jason’s best friend, Matthew, call him an idiot and what sounded like a smack on the back.

“y/n, you have a boyfriend?” Zoe asked, smirking at you.

You glared, standing up as they shouldered their bags and grabbed their books. “You know perfectly well I don’t speak to him.”

“I bet he wants to ask you to the dance.” Winter grinned at Zoe, who nodded in agreement as you stepped into the cold autumn air. 

“I’m not going either way.” you mumbled, and the girls dropped it until the next morning. 

2.

You didn’t think it was that big of a deal that the Quarterback tried to talk to you at the diner a few nights before. All the students who were present spread gossip like wildfire. You ignored it. You knew they were just children speculating what it could mean when it probably meant nothing. 

Zoe and Winter never brought it up again, and you were relieved that your friends didn’t dwell on it for too long. You loved that about them. 

It was after lunchtime when you sat in your History course, going over the notes for the test. You heard Jason and a few of his friends pile in, laughing and making comments under their breath. They took their designated seats in the back, and you felt eyes on the back of your head. 

A group of popular girls across the room started to giggle, and you glanced up to see Dandy walk in, his nose up and sauntering to the seat directly behind you. You wondered why he didn’t acknowledge you, but you didn’t dwell on it long. Dandy was often absent from any social interaction. 

Your teacher began the class the moment the bell rang. She decided to go over the notes an extra day and postponed the test. You were mildly disappointed but knew the material well, so you decided to doodle in your journal. One of the girls in the front occasionally popped her gum. 

Ms. Strode was talking about World War II when you felt something hit your elbow. You glanced over and saw a balled-up piece of paper. You glanced around to see most people were either frantically jotting down notes or not paying any attention. You picked it up, assuming it just needed to be passed ahead.

However, you read your name in neat cursive and opened it under the table.

Would you go to the dance with me? - Jason

You read the short invitation a good ten or so times before you could comprehend what he was asking. While the teacher wasn’t looking, you peeked over your shoulder to see him staring at you. His buddies were hiding their own smiles, but you didn’t see any malice behind it. Was he serious?

Of course, you’d have to decline. You already have an engagement. You promised your mother. You already declined the evening with your two best friends.

You didn’t send a note back, knowing it would be too distracting trying to pass it. Dandy would never try to give a stupid message.

However, Dandy had been paying attention and had managed to read the note over your shoulder when you laid it on your pencil case. He became green with envy, closing the book he hadn’t been paying attention too in the first place.

You hardly spoke a word to him this year. He wondered why that was. Dandy was very particular who he said too, and gave any sliver of his precious time. You were a comfort to him and probably didn’t realize that. Dandy knew he couldn’t seem desperate for your affection, or at the very least, your attention. He had hoped you’d be waiting for him in his car after school like the previous years before. Did he do something to upset you? Were you too good for him?

Dandy spent the rest of the class staring at the back of your head. He knew that wasn’t the case. Perhaps it was his behavior that steered you away. Of course, he liked being friends with you, but maybe it wasn’t enough. He was a loner who enjoyed his alone time. Dandy heard what people said about him. The general consensus was that he was doing everything right. 

When the class was dismissed, he hung back, watching as you quickly gathered your things and paced out the door. 

“Tough blow, man!” he heard Matthew say.

“She’ll come around.” Jason replied, his tone snarky. Dandy watched as they walked out of the room, his brows furrowing as he debated on taking the high road and asking you to the stupid dance himself. He wouldn’t go willingly. His mother, Gloria, needed him to be involved as much as possible. To keep up appearances, of course. Not for Dandy’s own goodwill. 

Dandy trailed out of the class, seeing you across the hall at your locker. Winter was beside you, somehow talking and applying lipstick at the same time. He stood off to the side, not minding all the bodies bumping into him and temporarily panicking that he’d yell at them.

This is it, Dandy thought. It’s a war, whether Jason Dean knew that or not. 

3.

Jason approached you the following day and asked if you’d mind talking to him at lunch. You hesitantly agreed, catching Zoe’s eye as she hugged Kyle before going into her class. She smiled at you, and you gave her a hesitant one in return. 

He definitely matured through the years. Jason was interested in you, and you felt comfortable talking to him through the entire lunch period, even catching yourself laughing at his sense of humor. Dandy played with the apple in his hands, glaring daggers at the back of Jason’s messy head. Winter noticed from her spot at your usual table and nudged Zoe, gesturing for her to look. 

“He looks pissed.” Zoe giggled, and Winter nodded in agreement. 

“I think Mott is going to kill him!” Winter said, stabbing at her steamed broccoli.

“Shouldn’t we let y/n know?” Zoe asked.

“I think she’s about to figure it out.” Winter said as Dandy stood up, heading directly to the table where you were sitting with Jason. Zoe and Winter fell into a hush, shoving food into their mouth and intently watching what was about to unfold. 

Jason saw him approaching first and paused, sizing the other guy up and down. Jason was bigger than Dandy in height and muscle tone from being an athlete, but Dandy wasn’t lanky either. You turned around, shocked to find Dandy staring down at you. 

“y/n,” Dandy nodded at you, ignoring Jason.

“Dandy, hi!” you said, genuinely happy to see him. “How are you?”

“I’m decent.” he said, smiling a little. “Could I have a word?” 

You glanced at Jason, who seemed timid, but he nodded. You stood up, promising Jason you’d be back as you followed Dandy out to the hallway. Multiple eyes followed you, and you heard the whispers starting as the door swung shut. 

“How are you?” Dandy asked now, looking down at you. His dark hair was neatly gelled and had a slight curl. 

“I’ve been good. I haven’t heard from you in a while…” you said.

Dandy nodded, “I could say the same. I assumed you’d come back around soon enough.”

You felt he was hurt by your absence. Dandy looked bothered, and you felt terrible. However, he was capable of approaching you as well. Which is what he thought he had to do. 

“Is everything okay?” you questioned, hoping his mother was doing well. You hadn’t seen her all Summer. 

“y/n, you know you’re one of the only people I care about in this stupid town,” Dandy said, glancing towards a teacher walking to the lounge. He gave you guys a questioning look but didn’t comment, disappearing into the next room. 

You weren’t sure how to respond to that, so Dandy continued, “Which is why I think you shouldn’t go to the formal with Jason.”

You frowned, “How do you know he asked me?”

“The whole school knows!” Dandy retorted, and you remembered. “I think it’s a bad idea.”

“It doesn’t matter, I’m not going either way.”

Dandy looked surprised, and you saw the relief in his eyes. He laughed a little, his fingers drumming against his leg. “Oh.”

“What, are you jealous?” you asked, laughing at him. Dandy tried to hide his laughter, but it didn’t work. The quiet hallway was filled with your giggles.

“That’s for me to know and for you to find out.” Dandy said, and you were saddened to hear the bell ring. Dandy straightened up, the smile leaving his face as kids filed out of the cafeteria and the surrounding classrooms. Kids stared at you and whispered, many laughing and wondering if you were now a couple. 

Jason slowly walked in your direction, but you didn’t want to say goodbye to Dandy. You were ashamed that you had avoided him for so long. You missed him. Dandy glanced behind you, his eyes sharpening as your new suitor waited patiently, his hands in his beige jacket. 

“Be careful around him.” Dandy whispered to you before he disappeared down the hall.

You approached Jason, who gave you a soft smile, “Am I missing something? Are you two together?”

You shook your head, a light smile on your lips, “No. We’re just friends.”

“Oh…” Jason nodded, “Look, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry if I freaked you out the other day. We don’t have to go to the dance together, but-.”

“Oh!” you gasped. Jason frowned, giving you a quizzical look. “The dance… I forgot,” you lied. “Uhm, I’m actually not going. I have other plans…” you said.

Jason looked defeated but took the rejection gracefully. You promised you’d sit with him again tomorrow, and he visibly cheered up at that. You ended up having to sprint to your locker for your books after saying goodbye, but you couldn’t stop thinking about Dandy’s warning. 

“Be careful around him.”

The Friday before the dance went to complete shit.

That morning you ate your breakfast slowly, listening to your parents argue in the kitchen over a business deal your mother thought was a bad idea. Your father was greedy and looked towards the top dollar than what was best for the business and the family. 

If that wasn’t bad enough, Winter fell sick and couldn’t go to school. You had to wait for your father to finish getting ready before he could drive you. You were ten minutes late and got a verbal warning; you never got in trouble at school. You had three tests in a row, and by lunch, you were about to rip your hair out.

Jason was nowhere to be found, so you sat with Zoe. She was worried that Winter would miss the dance but was happy that she’d at least have Kyle if Winter canceled. Kyle came and sat with you guys, his shaggy blond hair wet from the downpour outside. 

You were anxiously looking around the cafeteria for any sign of Dandy. He had missed a few days of school, citing a fever when you called his house and spoke to his maid, Dora. You wished him well and knew he’d pull through fast. Plus, you saw his car this morning when you got dropped off. 

“They’re going to cancel the dance if more kids fall ill,” Kyle said as he ate a burger. Zoe glared at him, telling him to look on the bright side of things. 

“What? I am!” Kyle replied, smirking at his new girlfriend.

“I’m sure they won’t cancel.” you placated Zoe, who beamed at you. “All the parents who gave money will be pissed.”

You ate most of your lunch when the principal walked in. The room immediately quieted as he observed the tables before landing on you. He walked to you briskly, and you felt your heart racing as he approached. 

Am I getting detention? I’ve only been late once!

“Ms. y/l/n, could you come with me?” he asked politely, smiling at you, Zoe, and Kyle.

You nodded slowly, bunching up your trash and placing it on the tray. Zoe told you to leave it, and they’d take care of it. You quietly thanked her and followed Principal Harmon out, struggling to keep pace with his long, thin legs.

“Is everything alright, sir?” you asked. Now wondering if your parents died in some fiery crash or if you failed a class. 

“There’s been a disturbance outside this afternoon,” Harmon replied, his voice grim. “With Mr. Mott and Mr. Dean.”

You were shocked to hear this. You were silent during the rest of the trek to his office. When he opened the door, you saw both boys sitting in chairs. They both had packs of ice on their faces and sheepish expressions.

“What were you thinking?” you hissed to them as Mr. Harmon gestured for you to take the empty seat next to Dandy.

“Well, now that y/n is here, I think you both owe her an explanation and an apology.” 

Jason and Dandy shared a look. Dandy now looked pissed, and you could only imagine what lead to this. 

Oh, I have a pretty good fucking idea.