#(( screw the rest of society and what everyone thinks of her someone needs to SHOW UP for these guys

[variantia]

BELLUM. *clears throat*

hero Elsa is gonna help every single surviving LoV member thru villain rehab / reintegrating with society / being personally available to help them and talk and whatever they need

and NO U CAN'T FUCKING STOP HER

[coffeebanana]

Fanfiction vs English Class

It’s funny the way that society looks down on fanfiction, although I DO think that’s steadily changing. But if you think about it, fanfiction does exactly what our high school English teachers were trying to get us to do. The difference is...it’s catered to what people want to see. To the things than millennials and gen Z have come to expect from fiction. Don’t worry, I’ll elaborate. English class had us deconstruct stories. To look for symbolism, to decipher metaphors, to deconstruct plots and pick out the climax of a story. And to be honest, I always felt like I struggled with that. Funny thing for a kid who walked around with her nose in a book all the time. To be fair, I almost always got an A, but it never came as easily as my other grades. Because a part of me...the writer part I suppose...just never understood the obsession. Why did it matter what a stupid shell symbolized if I just found the book about all the boys running around killing each other to be anticlimactic (you’re perfectly entitled to like Lord of the Flies, I just...didn’t...)? Didn’t my teachers understand that sometimes a red dress is just red dress? Because maybe the writer liked that colour? How could they know for sure what the author meant? (They couldn’t.) Why did I lose marks because I disagreed with my teacher about what the climax of the story was? Is literature not supposed to be subjective? But what does fanfiction do? For the most part, at least the way I see it, instead of taking apart the plot and the literary devices associated with a story, fanfiction analyzes the CHARACTERS in a body of fiction. And that’s exactly what we’ve come to expect from media in our day and age. The fact that TV shows have become so much more popular as a form of media is in part due to their treatment of characters. Remember all those book to movie adaptations that left you disappointed? Consider any book series that has been turned into a movie and then later into a TV series. Didn’t the show have more time to explore these things? Didn’t the show consider options the book hadn’t, and present us characters depicted in new and interesting lights? (I’d also like to point out that in some sense, movies and TV shows based on books ARE fanfiction, although, those have always been a socially acceptable form.)

Maybe I’m biased, because I’ve always been character driven, but I think that what our generations want to see most of all is complex, realistic, often morally grey characters. People we can relate to. My grade 12 literature teacher used to say that the “hero” of the story evolved with the generations. In the time of  Beowulf, people lived harsh lives and they needed their hero to be strong. So he was. The romantic hero, compatible timewise with the Renaissance period, was all about new ideas and introspection and challenging norms. And, as far as I’m concerned, our hero, who we look up to, is FLAWED. They struggle. They make mistakes. They LEARN from them. They keep going when things are hard, and sometimes things are too hard, and they break down, and that’s ok. That’s LIFE. It’s real, it’s raw. It’s imperfect.

That’s not to say that symbolism and all the rest of it doesn’t have its place, because it absolutely does, but I will argue that characters are more important. They’re what make us fall in love with fiction. They’re what help us understand ourselves and the world around us a little better. 

Fanfiction takes characters and makes us figure out their essence. We take pieces of them, different adaptations of them, and throw them into different scenarios to explore what they might do. And in order to do that, we have to understand the characters and their world. We’re doing exactly what we were always supposed to be doing in English class, but we’re doing it with characters. We’re doing it for ourselves. We’re doing it without having anyone tell us we’re wrong, because...we’re not. We never were.

Fanfiction taught me that the beauty of writing is NOT analyzing a piece and having everyone come to the same conclusion. It’s that 10 different people will read the same thing 10 different ways, and still get something out of it. And THAT is beautiful. THAT’s why I love writing and sharing my work: the connection I feel when I see a comment on one of my fics and I know that somebody FELT something. That what I wrote gave something to someone that they didn’t have before.

So to anybody who puts fanfiction down? Screw you. You don’t get it.

Anyways, I’ve been mulling over these feelings for a while, and I just wanted to get them all out in one place.

[markleesthighs]

good 4 u

pairing: guitarist/singer!y/n (fem) x badboy!jeno

genre: angst, fluff (if you squint), smut, strangers to lovers to enemies

song: good 4 u by Olivia Rodrigo

a/n: mentions of cheating, breakup, depression, underaged drinking (please be safe!!) picture/GIF from @pureboyjun​

Everyone told you to watch out, everyone warned you about him, Lee Jeno. You and Jeno weren’t in the same friend group, you were as what society called an “art freak” with streaks of colors in your hair and black eyeliner. You also always kept guitar picks with you, always wanting to sneak into the music room and practice on the electric guitar. The wannabe’s compared you to an Avril Lavigne-type girl. Your best friends were also your bandmates, supportive of you and your dream, unlike your parents. You and your parents had a deal, as long as you kept good grades you could continue to play music as a “hobby.” 

You also worked at a music store, which is how you ran into Lee Jeno. He was looking for vinyl of a specific artist which happened to also be one of your favorites so you knew exactly where it was. He thanked you and you hoped that would be the last you’d see him. But he came in every day to talk to you and eventually had the courage to approach your lunch table. All your bandmates glared at Lee Jeno, knowing his reputation and his motives. Once he left they’d all trash him for trying to talk to you. 

“y/n you shouldn’t really associate with him.”

“Yeah, all of his ‘fangirls’ will tear you to shreds.”

“Jeno hits and runs, you better stop talking to him before it turns into something dangerous. You’ll only get hurt.”

You didn’t think much of their words, since Jeno wasn’t really your type anyway. There’s no way you could ever fall for him. Oh boy, were you wrong. Jeno went out of his way to swoon you in any way he could. He’d walk you home at night, visit you in the music room and at work, he’d even invite you to his lunch table where you’d be met with his other ‘bad boy’ friends. He would get you your favorite coffee, just the way you like it, and get your lunch order so you wouldn’t wait in line. All of this attention grabbed the attention of his fangirls, constantly threatening you about how “Jeno is mine!” and bullshit like that. You honestly didn’t care because you reassured them you and Jeno were not dating. 

That was until he invited you to a party, saying that you could meet his one friend that was also into music and could help you break out into the music industry. You agreed, excited to meet someone in the industry. When you arrived at the party, you met his friend who worked at Columbia Records, you bonded and everything got his contact information in hopes of getting an internship. Jeno met up with you again, asking you to repay him, in a game of fear pong (beer pong with truth or dare elements). You agreed, joining him on his team against Johnny and his girlfriend. One of the dares you guys had to do was make out for one minute or drink. You were about to drink when Jeno grabbed your face and started to make out with you. 

God, did he taste good. His lips were soft brushing against yours the taste of beer and light cigarette smoke made his lips only more addictive. Everyone watching was hooting and hollering at the two of you. Jeno licked the bottom of your lip, which you opened your mouth to let his tongue enter, causing your tongues to fight for dominance. Jeno’s ultimately dominated and touched your throat. You gave a small moan which only made Jeno kiss you harder. Johnny coughed causing you two to stop. 

“You realize you two were making out for like 5 minutes right?” Johnny laughed.

You pulled away but Jeno held on to you by your waist. 

“What can I say, Suh, she tastes really good, I wanted to savor it.”

That made you blush. You guys continued the game and you and Jeno won, out of excitement (and slight intoxication) you kissed Jeno. He looked at you in shock and you apologized before he kissed you back. Since that game, you two were attached to the hip the whole night. Jeno didn’t feel safe letting you go home so he let you sleep with him in a bedroom upstairs. When you guys were tucking in for the night he wrapped his arm around you pulling you closer to him. 

“y/n, I love you.”

You giggled “You’re drunk Jeno...get some rest.”

“No, I mean it.”

“You’re really funny.”

“Do you need me to prove it to you?” He spoke in a deep voice, shifting his body to hover above yours. 

“If I didn’t love you do you think I’d be feeling like this right now?” Jeno whispered into your ear. When he leaned down you felt his member rock hard against your thigh. 

“J-jeno, you’re confused, do you know what you’re doing right now?”

“If you want me to stop I’ll stop. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, I can take care of myself in the bathroom if you don’t want to do it.”

As Jeno was moving off your body you wrapped your arms around his body to pull him back.

“N-no, stay, please.”

“Are you sure y/n, you sure you want to do this?”

“Y-yes.” Little did you know that you would regret sleeping with Lee Jeno. 

Jeno kissed your lips softly, knowing how tired you both are. You felt his member twitching with every kiss. He moved on to your neck, leaving soft kisses and a purple mark on your collarbone. He moved all the way down your stomach down to your flower. He kissed your thighs and ate you out vigorously, he was sucked down on your clit while fingering you. You were trying to hide your moans but Jeno hit your sweet spot almost every single time, causing you to not be able to contain yourself. You were tugging and pulling at his har which also caused him to moan. You were about to climax when Jeno pulled away which caused you to whine and pout. Jeno kissed your pouty lips as he pulled out a condom from the drawer (be safe kids!) and tore it open and put it on his member. 

He looked at you and asked again for your reassurance and you nodded. 

“I’ll be slow and gentle I promise.”

He slowly slid into you as you clenched around him you squeezed your eyes from the pain, he was a lot bigger than you thought. Jeno moans harmoniously along with you as he waited for you to let him move. 

“P-please m-move..”

Jeno smiled as with every thrust he kissed you, he made you feel comfortable in his arms. 

“F-faster, please...”

“What’s my name?”

“J-jeno! Please!”

“That’s daddy to you.” He said as he thrusted harder inside of you.

“Y-yes, daddy, please go faster.”

“Good girl.”

Jeno pushed harder and faster as you moaned louder and louder, finally climaxing with Jeno. Jeno removed the condom and threw it in the trash as he walked to the bathroom and cleaned you up along with a few kisses. 

“Hey Jeno?” Jeno turned to look at you.

“I love you too.”

After that night you and Jeno were going steady for a couple weeks until he ghosted you. He stopped talking to you and his friends would laugh at you or Jeno would tell you to go back to your old table. You heard their conversation as you were walking back. 

“I can’t believe Jeno got her to sleep with him.”

“Easiest fucking $100 he’s ever made.”

 When you went back to your bandmates you were broken. Endless nights of tears and suicidal thoughts swamped your mind. Why me? Why did I have to fall for his stupid trap? He only wanted me for some cheap cash huh? How can he just move on so easily? Did nothing we have mean anything? Well screw that and screw you, Lee Jeno. 

“Hey y/n?” One of your bandmates asked. 

“Battle of the bands' championship for the school is coming up, do you know what song we are going to cover?”

You looked at Jeno. “Oh, I fucking know what song we are going to sing.” 

You and your bandmates got the sheet music for good 4 u by Olivia Rodrigo and practiced it until it became natural for everyone. Finally, the battle of the bands' championship occurred. It was hosted by your school to fundraise for the music program and scholarships. Before your group came up, you all huddled, and they all gave you the words of encouragement you needed to perform in front of Lee Jeno. 

“Sing it from your heart bitch.”

“Kill him with those words.”

“Make him feel like the shit head he is.”

As they hyped you up, you felt much better as you all walked out to stand on the stage. You saw Jeno in the crowd with his new supposed girlfriend. You began playing the first notes on the guitar. 

Well, good for you, I guess you moved on really easily You found a new girl and it only took a couple weeks Remember when you said that you wanted to give me the world?

You stared right into his eyes singing every lyric, letting him know what a scumbag he was for dating someone new in a few weeks when he confessed to you after he fucked your brains out. What kind of a person does that?

Now you can be a better man for your brand new girl

You raised your hand and pointed right at him and his new girl who looked like every other bitch who wanted to get with Jeno, you couldn’t compare to her, you had to show Jeno he made a mistake leaving you for $100. You wanted to make those $100 worth nothing because he left you for someone who’s only worth $1. 

Well, good for you, you look happy and healthy, not me If you ever cared to ask Good for you, you're doin' great out there without me, baby God, I wish that I could do that

You sang you heart out to those lyrics almost feeling emotional. How could Jeno sit there with a smile on his face while you almost crying during this set. You then realized Lee Jeno is an emotionless piece of shit. But just this once, you wanted to see him cry. 

I've lost my mind, I've spent the night Cryin' on the floor of my bathroom But you're so unaffected, I really don't get it But I guess good for you

It wasn’t fair that you cried endless tears, while Jeno came to school with a smile on his face. Your eyes would be dark and baggy from all the crying and endless sleep, but he came to school happier and brighter than ever, fuck you Lee Jeno. 

It's like we never even happened Baby, what the fuck is up with that?

Everyone forgot about you and Jeno the moment he dropped you. How come everyone took his side and let this slide past everyone? Did no one care about how you felt? How humiliated you were? How can someone forget something like that?

And good for you, it's like you never even met me Remember when you swore to God I was the only Person who ever got you? Well, screw that and screw you You will never have to hurt the way you know that I do

Jeno and you became strangers, nobodies, to each other just back at square one, how did this happen? He would complain about how his friends would make fun of his music tastes and hobbies, making you think you were the only one who understood him and supported him. You wanted to make him feel guilt and shame for toying with you. 

Maybe I'm too emotional But your apathy's like a wound in salt Maybe I'm too emotional Or maybe you never cared at all

You’ve thought about how you were the problem, that Jeno didn’t want you for you. He would act reassuring when you were in bed, but once he left you, he brushed off every concern you had. He never had any feelings for you. He never cared about you. 

Before the final chorus you pulled out a picture of you and Jeno printed out on paper and one of your bandmates set it on fire. The picture of Jeno’s face starting to well up with tears when everyone in the gym started to stare at him. It was music to your ears. 

Good for you, you're doin' great out there without me, baby Like a damn sociopath

You were now crying in the last chorus not out of sadness but out of joy, finally, Lee Jeno knows what it’s like to have his heartbroken. All of the other girls and guys were screaming and singing along with you, you were jumping and high-fiving all of them, rocking out to the music. Your mascara was dripping down your cheeks and you looked emotional and powerful. 

Well, good for you, I guess you moved on really easily

As you played the last chord on your guitar everyone was cheering. You thanked everyone for the performance as your group hugged your bandmates thanking them for getting you through the performance. You turned to look at Jeno one last time to see him crying. It was beautiful. 

good 4 u, Lee Jeno. 

[zuko-always-lies]

Katara, Gender, the Double Burden, and the Problematic Gender Norms of Modern Western Society

To start this off, I want to make it clear that I absolutely love Katara as a character. I think she’s amazing, complex, and interesting.

Yet I find the way the narrative of ATLA frames her to be intensely problematic.  Much more under the cut:

So, to start off Katara is depicted as someone deeply interested in learning how to fight, despite the entrenched sexism she faces within Water Tribe society. That’s not an issue with her character and is in fact one of the more endearing parts of it. And, of course, Katara is an amazing combatant and frequently takes the lead in fight scenes, bearing the full burden of fighting the war on the frontlines.  She can also heal, but until LoK’s questionable depiction of her, that was never the center of her character.

The problem with Katara’s depiction is the other half of it. We find out this out in “The Runaway”: 

Katara: Fine! It's a lie. But you've been so out of control lately, I knew something was up. I knew you were hiding something, and you were. (Toph knocks the poster from Katara's hand and walks away.) Don't you walk away from me while I'm talking to you! Toph: Oh, really, Mom? Or what are you going to do? Send me to my room? Katara: I wish I could. Toph: Well, you can't. Because you're not my mom, and you're not their mom. (She points to Aang and Sokka.) Katara: I never said I was! Toph: No, but you certainly act like it. You think it's your job to boss everyone around, but it's not. You're just a regular kid like the rest of us, so stop acting like you can tell me what to do. I can do whatever I want! Katara: (chagrined) I don't act that way. (in a shrill and anxious voice) Sokka, do I act motherly? (Sokka, alarmed, decides discretion is the better part of valor.) Sokka: Hey - I'm staying out of this one. Katara: What do you think, Aang? Do I act like a mom? Aang: (digging nervously at his eye) Well, I... Katara: Stop rubbing your eye and speak clearly when you talk! Aang: (chastened) Yes, ma'am.

And this:

Toph: So let me guess. You brought me out here to tell me your sister's not as annoying as I make her out to be. Sokka: Nah, she's pretty much a pain. (Katara scowls.) She's always got to be right about everything, and she gets all bossy, and involved, and in your business. Toph: Yeah, I don't know how you can deal with it. Sokka: Actually, in a way, I rely on it. Toph: I don't understand. Sokka: When our mom died, that was the hardest time in my life. Our family was a mess, but Katara, she had so much strength. She stepped up and took on so much responsibility. She helped fill the void that was left by our mom. Toph: I guess I never thought about that. Sokka: I'm gonna tell you something crazy. I never told anyone this before, but honestly, I'm not sure I can remember what my mother looked like. It really seems like, my whole life, Katara's been the one looking out for me. She's always been the one that's there, and now, when I try to remember my mom, Katara's is the only face I can picture. (Katara is overcome with emotion.) Toph: The truth is, sometimes Katara does act motherly, but that's not always a bad thing. She's compassionate and kind, and she actually cares about me. You know, the real me. That's more than my own mom. (Katara lowers her head, in sadness or perhaps shame.) Don't ever tell her I said any of this.

We also find this out in the very first episode of the show:

Katara: Ugh, I'm embarrassed to be related to you! Ever since Mom died I've been doing all the work around camp while you've been off playing soldier! Sokka (noticing the cracking iceberg): Uh... Katara? Katara: I even wash all the clothes! Have you ever smelled your dirty socks? Let me tell you, NOT PLEASANT! Sokka: Katara! Settle down! Katara: No, that's it. I'm done helping you. From now on, you're on your own!

So Katara is firmly established as Team Mom. However, there’s something very screwed up here. You see, Kya died when Katara was 8 years old and Sokka was 9. 8 year old Katara stepped up to be the “mother” of her family and became the caretaker, both physically and emotionally for her older brother to the degree he can’t really remember his mother because it seems like Katara has been always been his caretaker. This is clear example of parentification, something deeply traumatic to a child.

Katara’s official show bio even said this:

Fourteen-year-old Katara is the heart of the show. She is a caring and passionate teenage girl. Kindness and empathy are her most endearing traits.  When outraged, her desire to rectify wrongs often overrides the trio’s safety. Katara is determined to save the world, despite her limited abilities.  Katara’s dogged determination keeps her going.  Katara is very mature and responsible for her age and always plays the mediator between Aang and Sokka. She is the glue that holds them together.

And we get the sense that she has to be the mature and responsible one in “The Desert.”

Katara is also someone who very much bears the burden of looking after the emotional needs of the rest of the Gaang. She gives comfort more often than she receives it.  Here’s a classic example from “The Southern Air Temple”:

Katara:  [In the background, Sokka is hunched over his rock, clenching his teeth together. Katara shouts calmly with a sad expression on her face. The camera slowly moves in on her.] Aang! I know you're upset and I know how hard it is to lose the people you love. I went through the same thing when I lost my mom. [Diverts her eyes. Shot switches to a frontal view of Aang, his tattoos glowing and wind swirling around him; his clothes flutter in the storm. Sokka runs over to his sister in the background.] Monk Gyatso and the other airbenders may be gone, [Close-up of her as she looks up at him.] but you still have a family. Sokka and I! [Sokka opens his eyes and glances at his sister.] We're your family now!

Even Katara’s trauma regarding her mother’s death is usually brought up not for its own sake but in the context of making her emphasize with the issues of other people(for instance with Aang in “The Southern Air Temple,” with Haru in “Imprisoned,” and with Zuko in “The Crossroads of Destiny”). Her deepest pain becomes a tool to make her more empathetic and caring.

Katara is also the member of the Gaang who we most regularly see doing basic chores:

What does this all mean?

a) Katara is someone who has experienced the deeply traumatic experience of parentification.

b) Katara, like many women, is someone who bears the double burden of both “working”(i.e. fighting in ATLA’s context) and being a caregiver. She has to be healer, fighter, emotional caretaker, and physical caretaker all once.

To be clear, there’s nothing wrong writing Katara that way. The issue is that the narrative never depicts 90% of what Katara has to undergo as being problematic or traumatizing. The fact that she has to be responsible for her age and has been a primary caretaker since she was eight is considered endearing, rather than something traumatizing.

Why is that so? Because the dominant modern western cultural ideal for women is for them to bear the double burden, to both be workers(with all the attendant demands) and to be self-abnegating caretakers. Moreover, the fact that Katara is a girl of color encourages people to see her as older than she is. 

[early2000smovieimagines]

Meeting and Dating Draco Malfoy

(Not my gif)(Requested by anonymous)

(Since it came up in the meeting situation: if you request crush headcanons, they’ll include the boys reactions to falling for all the different houses<3)

- You and Draco first meet when you both begin attending Hogwarts.

- When it comes down to it, the platinum blond has a rivalry with just about everyone his age; besides his somewhat mindless goons, so there’s going to be a rivalry involved in your “relationship” regardless of who you are. The question is: how does said rivalry play out? Which is where your house comes into play. 

- If you’re in any other house besides Slytherin then you’re in for a bumpy ride, though don’t get your hopes up Slytherin, it isn’t smooth sailing for you either. 

- Either way, Draco is very much a “pull your pigtails” type of boy. He’s constantly teasing you, being rude, making insults, etc. If you’re a Slytherin then he’s recruiting you as one of his “followers”, acting childishly possessive over you, demanding that you come with him or scolding you when you hang out with people outside of your house. The older you get and the stronger his feelings, the worse it’ll get. 

- Even though he acts cruel to you, he’s always eager to hear what you think about him; what you’d said to your friends about him and so on. Of course, deep down it bothers him when you express your contempt but he pretends it doesn’t, being particularly rude to you the next day to try and make himself feel better. 

- On the same note as Draco’s eagerness to bully people: while I don’t think it’s impossible for Draco to fall in love with a half blood/other type of witch, I do think that he wouldn’t allow himself to be with one purely because of what he’s been taught and the fear of his fathers wrath. 

- So, when does the snake boy stop seriously screwing with you? Around second year; if we’re referencing the other houses relationship with him. The two of you were paired up for a class around that time and slowly but slowly found yourselves on alright terms with each other. 

- Because of this, it became far less shocking for people to see the two of you together and during that time, he was able to realize that he may or may not have liked you, and that he could be around you if he wished to. 

- Finally, it all comes to a head around third year when he first see’s you stepping out of your carriage looking more radiant than ever and positively glowing as you laughed with your friends. 

- Maybe it was the fact that he went the whole summer with the realization that he liked you and with no chance of seeing you. Maybe it was because you’d matured a bit and lost more of your babyface. Either way, he was in trouble. 

- He approaches you with his usual last name greeting and you roll your eyes as per usual but as your relationship last year would suggest, he’s not nearly as rude to you as he once was.

- In fact, he’s uncharacteristically kind to you, well, as uncharacteristically kind as Draco can be while trying to remain unsuspicious. He starts making up any excuse to talk to you, goes to you for details when something happens within the school; even though you’re probably far more clueless than he is, sits/stands next to you in class, and most surprisingly, he actually acts sort of sweet to you when you’re all alone. 

- If you’re a Slytherin then forget it, he’s constantly around you no matter where you are. He even openly flirts with and acts like he’s interested in you; though he tones it down so that he can keep up his reputation. 

- It’s for all these reasons that you actually find yourself agreeing to go to Hogsmeade with him when he approaches and borderline tells you that that's what you’re doing. The two of you narrow your eyes at each other for a moment before you decide that you just can’t decline, as much as you want to because of his tone of voice and way of asking. 

- So he takes you to Hogsmeade and you find yourself genuinely having a fun time, especially after the two of you end up in a snowball fight with each other. The two of you got progressively more elaborate with your snowy attacks until you’d wound up on the ground together with you just about ready to dump a big pile of snow on his head.

- In that moment, he’d linked his arm around the back of your neck and pulled you down to kiss him as you kneeled in front of him. The snow dropped from your hands, mostly missing his head but he didn’t stop. His playful, somewhat rough kiss softened and before you knew it, you were melting into him. 

- You’re his girl now whether you like it or not. He wanted you and he always gets what he wants, doesn’t he? 

- Draco has a reputation to keep up so he isn’t gonna be all cutesy and lovey dovey with you in public, though he does show you quite a bit of pda. He gives you that “I’m tough and she’s mine. Look I can touch her, see.” type of affection. 

- Having his arm around you constantly; especially when he’s glaring down and trying to intimidate someone who’s looking at you too much for his liking. 

- Temple kisses. 

- Hand kisses. It’s a habit he picked up from his father. 

- Sweet, soft kisses. You certainly didn’t anticipate him being so loving with you when you first started dating; due to his usual behavior, but you were, at times, pleasantly surprised. 

- Dominating, somewhat rough kisses; especially when he’s in a bad mood for whatever reason. 

- Him lounging dramatically in or across your lap. 

- He’s quite a big fan of cuddling but he’d die before he let you or anyone else know that. The two of you usually cuddle hugging each other, your legs tangled together and his lips pressed to your forehead.

- If you’re not constantly by your boyfriends side, are you even dating? Why would you need to be anywhere else? You’re his girlfriend, you should be jumping to be seen with and spend time with him; especially since he’s a Malfoy!

- Him forcing people out of his and/or your way, and making Crabbe or Goyle do things for the two of you. The two boys really don’t mind helping you since you’re usually so much nicer about it than your boyfriend is.

- Sneaking around after curfew together. 

- Wandering the grounds together. He’s got a few particular places that he likes bringing you to.

- Him pretending not to enjoy the things you do with him or the places that you take him to, even though you know damn well that’s he’s lying and just won’t admit that he’s having fun. 

- Getting tickled or at least prodded in the side when you’ve said something teasing towards him, or just when you’re distracted. He finds it funny when you jolt and swat his hand away. 

- Being lovingly referred to as your last name. When the two of you are alone together, he’ll let a “darling” slip here and there, usually without even meaning to. It’s another habit he picked up from high society life. 

- Affectionate bullying. He makes fun of you in a much fonder tone now that you’re together. 

- Sending notes to each other in class.

- Always being escorted to class.

- Stopping him from doing something stupid, even if it may or may not cause a fight between the two of you.

- Being forced to cheer him on at Quidditch games, even if you’re in a different house. He takes great offense if you don’t.

- He’s constantly trying to impress you and get your validation. He’s always bragging to you about his accomplishments, usually sprinkling in little white lies to make them sound even better.

- Him exaggerating how hurt or sick he is for more attention, especially when you’re completely focused on him; he wants to keep it that way for as long as he can.

- Either gaining favoritism from certain people; people like Snape, or being relatively disliked by association. Although, once people see that you’re sort of like a buffer between them and his wrath, they usually warm up to you more.

- Getting him to be nicer to people.

- You’re practically the only one he really listens to, even if it’s usually done so begrudgingly. He’ll later say that it’s just because he didn’t actually feel like doing it or tell you that you’re lucky “you’re cute” in a grumble to save face.

- Gossiping and peoplewatching together. He likes seeing you be a little mean, he finds it entertaining and gives you praise whenever you make some snide remark.

- Snowball fights. 

- Going to Hogsmeade together. He treats you to a butterbeer or candy from Honeydukes whenever you go. 

- Being spoiled. His father can afford the best and Draco wants to ensure that you’ll put up with his insecure ass even though he’s sometimes sorta mean to you. He also just likes the feeling he gets when he knows that he’s the one who’s made you happy. 

- He probably gets you a silver necklace/bracelet either in the shape of his name or with it engraved on it, or with green jewels on it; especially if you’re not in Slytherin.

- Getting your stuff stolen. He’s a bit of a kleptomaniac so expect to find your some of your stuff in his room.

- Try not to mention it when he clings onto you at a sudden movement/sound or when something otherwise scares him. He’s sort of a coward; especially before the whole deatheater thing, and he’ll get angrily embarrassed if you do say something, denying it adamantly before avoiding you for the rest of the day out of spite. 

- Occasionally dealing with his mood swings. One moment he’ll be all over you, the next he’ll be a foot away and acting cold. It’s nothing that you did, he just suddenly becomes very aware of how vulnerable or soft he’s being and get’s kind of insecure, not wanting to look too weak. 

- His father will hear about you!

- Watching how his personality changes when he’s around other people, particularly his father. He isn’t a total git when the man isn’t around but he certainly acts like more of a gentleman and less like himself when he’s being observed; mainly because his father will audibly warn him to play nice.

- His parents probably have fancy parties that he may or may not be allowed to bring you to. If you’re from a well respected, pureblood family then his parents will accept you with open arms and happily welcome your appearances at said events.

- Listening to him complain about how boring or stupid things are, whether during or after they happen.

- He’ll try to keep his pride and insist that nothing is wrong; or that he isn’t as upset as he actually is, but you’ll be able to tell that somethings bothering him; usually his father. When he’s upset, you’ll merely be extra sweet to him and stick by his side for the rest of the day. It’s in those moments that he realizes just how much he loves you.

- Though you’ll have to find out about them soon enough, he definitely keeps some big secrets from you. You’ll be able to tell that there’s something wrong, that something is weighing him down, but he refuses to let you know until he’s finally forced to.

- Possessive boy. You’re his girlfriend and no one else should even look at you unless it’s to feel envious of him. 

- He has nasty little habit of getting jealous over just about anyone who’s capable of taking you away from him; regardless of how irrational it may seem, or is otherwise making you happier than he can. He gets incredibly annoyed when he sees you with other guys and tends to either scare them off or glare at the two of you until you join his side.

- After that, he’ll make a few passive aggressive comments until you kiss his cheek and fluster/reassure him enough that he forgets about it.

- He’s incredibly protective of you; especially in the later years of your relationship/school life. In the beginning, he’ll pretend like he doesn’t care as much as he does but will always act in your favor and/or stick up for you on his own cruel way. When you’re older, he’s more willing to blatantly show that he cares and keep you away from danger.

- He’s a bit sensitive so the two of you have quite a few fights. He might insult you or cause problems for one reason or another but you just ignore him and give him the silent treatment when he’s acting like an ass.

- He watches you intently when you’re ignoring him, usually with a glare and especially if you’re around other guys. He keeps waiting for you to approach him but when he realizes you won’t, he’s forced to do it himself.

- At some point, he’ll force you to come with him so that the two of you can talk, trying to just “forget about” the issue before finally admitting that he was wrong. Depending on the issue, he might not give a full apology, telling you not to push your luck when you mention it.

- He doesn’t give you a ton of “I love you’s” but he does force himself out of his comfort zone to say a few. He’ll only ever say it when you’re alone and won’t look at you as he does so, usually trying to breeze past it like it didn’t happen as he blushes. The longer you’re together, the more willing he is to say it.

-He’s going to marry you is what he’s going to do! Why wouldn’t you want to marry him? He’s a pureblood, a Malfoy, and alright, he might just so happen to be really in love with you.

[shoichee]

Request is about Rakuzan manager, who is a foreigner (from Russia). She is really popular in school, because the Japanese thinks that Russian are very pretty. But she thinks that she has ordinary appearance. Besides she always does her best for the team, tries to be the best manager for them and takes care of them because of her kindness. So Rakuzan boys warm up to her slowly. And Ore-Akashi slowly started coming to his sense (he's Boku-Akashi now), because she reminds him his mother.

Hi hi hi! Even after researching to portray this accurately, I am more vague on the specificality on Russian culture, especially in a Japanese high school setting, in order to make this more relatable and applicable. Still, I took care to implement some core values/general traits you’d see in Russian society // I HOPE I DID THIS JUSTICE;; 

[Rakuzan Manager f!Reader Headcanons]

you’ve always been the center of attention ever since you transferred to Rakuzan, a private school with extremely high standards

not to mention, your aura and looks completely encompasses that perfect “high-caliber student” look that every student wants so badly… so effortlessly? a lot of the students instantly took a liking to you just because of your appearances and how easily you stood out against the rest (especially in a collective society like Japan’s, where everyone is highly pressured to blend in)

but coming fresh from Russia, a society that focuses on individualism, you didn’t really see why everyone would suddenly worshipped you just because you expressed yourself freely… even so, in trying to make friends as a rare foreigner, you made sure to be kind to everyone

you made it out of your own way to always help the student council out with menial tasks, even if you weren’t a part of it, or always reached out a helping hand to other teachers, staff, and peers

so that may have shot up your popularity even more

your altruism easily reaches within earshot of Higuchi, the current 3rd-year manager of the Rakuzan’s basketball team, and he immediately soughts after you to invite you to the position of manager alongside him

after all, he’s going to graduate this year, so he wants to ensure that the team would be in good hands for the subsequent years

still, he’s quite nervous about introducing you to his… superiors, mostly because the team leadership has become quite… scary and strict this year

Higuchi brings you along as he slowly approaches Coach Eiji and the Rakuzan captain, who were both discussing about the imminent future of the team’s starting line and debating whether or not to switch around some players

Eiji noticed you first, and after hearing Higuchi’s suggestion, he immediately recognized you from how much the teachers and his coworkers had been praising you; hence, he has no doubt about you or anything… but he turns to Akashi to hear his input

all the while, the captain has been staring silently at you… and assessing you

“What do you think?” Eiji spoke up, glancing down to the 1st year in the corner of his eye.

“...” Akashi continues to sit with his hands clasped in front of his mouth

“It’d be an honor to become a manager for such a capable team!” you say, putting yourself into a deep bow to try to express your sincerity

“W-Wait, (y/n)-san, there’s no need to go to that extreme,” Higuchi says hurriedly, ushering you up

“S-Sorry, but I believe bows are used to express utmost deference and appeal?”

“Ahaha… only a few cases warrant a bow as deep as that.”

“Right, right! Noted…”

Akashi’s eventual sigh interrupted the both of you as he drops his hands into a more relaxed posture

“She’ll be useful. I have heard about her from other students within the student council. Shōta, you will keep her in line, correct?”

“Of course!”

“Then there is no need for this conversation to go any longer if this is settled with no further objections?” he turns to the coach for any further comments

“Yes,” he nods in agreement. “I hope you know this team expects nothing from the best from you, even if you’re only a manager.”

. . .

so here you are, on your first day as a manager alongside Higuchi, being taught the ropes of your duties: noting players’ favorite snacks and food, making sure there’s plenty of water bottles left, changing towels if needed… these honestly felt like normal chores to you, so you didn’t feel overwhelmed at all

“W-W-Whoa!! Our new manager is a girl?—Ow, Reo-nee!”

“Sheesh, show some respect to the manager! Quit looking at her like that!”

“B-But…”

“Hello!” you waved at them, popping up right in front of them, and Hayama quickly jumps to gain some distance for himself out of shock

“The foreign transfer student?!”

“I’m a new manager here, and I hope we get along!”

“Ah…” Mibuchi turns to you with a hand on his chest and a slight bow of his head in acknowledgement. “I must compliment you on your Japanese. You speak as if you’re almost native—in fact, your way of speaking is more elegant than most people here.”

“Thank you!” you beam at him. “Yes…! I’ve worked to at least become fluent for the JLPT N2, so I’m very glad you complimented me so!”

“Reo-nee, you tell me to back off, but you’re being chummy with her right now! Ei-chan, look! Don’t you agree with me?—Wha, where did he go?”

“Who knows?” Mibuchi shrugs indifferently. “But it’s no wonder that it’s been a lot quieter around… by the way (y/n)-chan, are all Russians as striking as you? It makes me a tad bit envious that such beauty is effortless to you.”

“No, no!” you deny with a laugh. “We’re quite ordinary, you see? I think everyone has their own type of beauty to admire and appreciate.”

“Oh! Beautiful words spoken by a beautiful person! Ah… I’ve been called by Higuchi-san. I must part but I hope you’ll allow me to ask you more questions later!”

as you wave off Mibuchi with a smile, Hayama only frowns at you as he crossed his arms, irritated at the fact that you don’t seem too keen on using honorifics for the upperclassmen:

“Look, you might’ve gotten Reo-nee to approve of you, but don’t think the rest of us will be just as accommodating. We’re serious about basketball, so don’t slack off and bring us down.”

but you only turn to him with a smile before giving a slight bow before replying: “I will put 100% of my time and effort, so everyone can do their best on the courts with peace of mind!”

Hayama immediately gets flustered, not expecting such a warm response to his words and he scratches head and replies loudly, “U-Uh… yeah, just, just don’t screw it up for us.”

the first week of being manager was just like what Hayama spoke about: most of the players were wary of you because you were extremely different in how you carried yourself, or curious about you for that same reason… perhaps you were recruited out of pity?

there were a handful of teammates who were brave enough to ask you questions about your culture or personal background

Eikichi, on one hand, asked about your cuisine and whether there were “big guys” like himself that can be a challenge to his strength (you only laugh at him as you easily answer all of his questions)

“I heard the Russian men are unbelievably strong! *flexes his own biceps* Their muscle masses are rumored to be insane!”

“W-Well… it’s different for everyone, but I agree that we’re very strong-natured and have dignity for ourselves.”

“Ohh, (y/n)-chan… that must be why you stand out so much yourself!”

“Mibuchi-kun, you’re very striking yourself, you know…”

and here is Hayama petulantly huffing all the while, doubting you all the while still

“Here you go again, forgetting to add senpai after Ei-chan and Reo-nee!”

“Why should I?” You tilt your head in confusion. “Whether I add such honorifics or not doesn’t change how much I respect them, Hayama-kun.”

“It’s Hayama-senpai to you!”

“If you’re spending this much time fixated on this, then you can spend that much time practicing and showing me the skills to earn the respect you want! Come on! Chop, chop, chop!”

. . .

“Ei-chan! Don’t you get mad when (y/n) doesn’t address you properly?! Reo-nee, what about you?!”

“Huh? I’d never be mad at someone who doesn’t seem to mind me burping at all, and she never scolds me about this stuff like Reo does—”

“Who wouldn’t?! It’s gross, seriously! While I do not understand her tolerance of your vulgar manners, her eloquence and natural aura is equal to those of Sei-chan’s… so in my eyes, I see no need for her to use such honorifics.”

“HUH?! Reo-nee, but why?!”

his opinion of you only gradually changes when you never seem to snap at him back even though he’s being a little shit when you’re around… you remind him of a motherly figure… but a kind, level-headed one, which is slightly different from the naggy mother-hen (but good-intentioned) vibe Mibuchi gives off

besides, anyone with eyes can see how much you scurry around holding handfuls of towels and bottles for all the players, even for the bench players

people think it’s really odd that you’re so physically close to the teammates, especially when you link arm in arm with them or give little distance when you talk with them; as a result, a lot of speculation of “dating” and “relationships” pop up when your name is brought up

the Uncrowned Kings easily squash those rumors… Akashi’s presence alone is also enough to silence them LOL

Mibuchi is the main guy who always likes to link arms as a symbol of your shared friendship

. . .

it’s an odd relationship between you and Mayuzumi… no matter how much you call out to him, he ignores you, and no matter how much he ignores you, you still treat him the same as ever

“Stop pestering me,” Mayuzumi clicks his tongue, blatantly making the effort not to face you properly, and you finally smile, seeing that he finally acknowledged your presence

“Ah, you’re quite the blunt one, aren’t you, Mayuzumi-san?”

“If you get that, then go away.”

“Well, I can’t! You’re part of the lineup, so I am especially not going to neglect you.”

“Are you this mindless to help people like a saint and then expect everyone to adore you? As far as I’m aware, most see you as some ‘exotic’ curiosity and nothing more. And I frankly love myself too much to be associated with such people. If you’re only here out of pity, beat it. Now.”

“Well, it seems like you care enough to tell me that,” you muse, but your face hardens with a serious glint in your eye. “But heed my words when I say this Mayuzumi-san. I am not doing this to be a people-pleaser. I am doing this for myself and only myself. I want to be a good person because it is a decision I make for myself. When there is a choice of being a good person versus bad, I’ll choose to be the best version of myself at any moment. That is my own definition of self-respect. No way in hell I’m doing this because I feel sorry for you… I will complete my duty with my pride as Rakuzan’s manager on the line.”

he’s stunned at your words, and he instantly relaxes his posture before he turns to continue reading his novel on hand… “I see.”

he actually likes the fact that your culture allows people to be more outspoken about their opinions, since he’s all too aware how the majority of his own peers are constantly worried about collective reputation and doing things for the sake of others

Mayuzumi becomes a lot more… cooperative with you from that point on

he relates to your words of having high self-respect and pride, and he’s pleasantly surprised that you actually know how to hold your own ground despite being very kind // even if he finds it weird that being a manager makes you happy… but since it’s something you do for your own sake, he can learn to respect it; after all, he reads light novels for his own happiness

imagine his unadulterated surprise when you not only brought him bottles, snacks, and a towel (that’s the part he expected from you), you slipped in new issues of the latest light novels within the towel bundle (this is what caught him off guard)

you’re suddenly seen in a good light in his eyes

. . .

it’s been almost a month since you’ve been recruited, and most of the teammates have now accepted you as one of their own, more or less, but something bothered you that you couldn’t help but ask Rakuzan’s senior manager

“Higuchi-san, don’t managers need to do some analytic work for the team statistics? It seems that all we do is mundane tasks.”

“Ah, most of the analytic work is done by Akashi.”

“But why? Does he not trust the managers with this work? Does he see us as not capable?”

“Not exactly… he’s very… particular about ensuring the best possible strategies for victory. So far, whatever he’s been doing has earned him complete trust from the entire team and even our coach.”

“Wow… that’s… a really impressive feat for a 1st year…”

“No one’s really surprised though. (y/n)-san you may have just transferred here so you might not know, but he was Teiko’s previous captain and the main public face of the Generation of Miracles…”

after he finished giving a crash-course on their prodigal status in the basketball world, you’re more fired up to work harder for Rakuzan as the manager

“Besides, (y/n)-san, our main duty of being a manager is to maintain the well-being of our team. All these little things add up, and surely, the team knows to appreciate these gestures from us.”

you actually later approach the Uncrowned Kings to playfully complain about why they didn’t tell you how prestigious they truly were on the courts (after learning about their status from Higuchi)

“Huh? (y/n)-nee, now you wanna show respect to your senpais, huh?”

you don’t miss the playfulness in his complaint as he tries to ruffle your hair… and also the way Hayama has recently addressed you differently

“This is different, Hayama! You have such titles under your belts because of your skills and accomplishments on the court… that is extremely admirable!”

“D’awww, it’s nothing, really.”

of course, they all have pride in their titles, but they all immediately turn the direction of the conversation to Akashi, saying they were nothing compared to him

that only made you more curious about the captain

you actually never made conversation with him throughout the month because you were so busy with your duties and helping out everyone… but you finally decided to try to help the captain in any way

Akashi has been observing you for the entirety of your time in the team… that much is to be expected, considering that he needed to evaluate your performance and compatibility with the rest of the teammates to make sure that there is still unity even with the addition of a new person (after all… as much as he doesn’t want to admit, he is still fearful of the possibility of his team crumbling from the inside again)

the fact that you even got Mayuzumi to approve of you in his own way actually impressed him; even he himself had to be authoritative to get Mayuzumi to be cooperative on the team

it’s the little things you do that reminds him of the tickles of nostalgia, when he first played basketball with his late mother, within his mind: the way you were the only one giving positive encouragement to the players in a club filled with cutthroat competition and perfection; the way you made sure that everyone was calm and collected before they walk into the courts; the way you diligently remember and cater every care package and preference to every unique player, in addition to your minimum duties.

he unconsciously mellows out whenever you approach to him to speak, and he only realizes that fact every time you leave the conversation to continue your next to-do on your schedule

“Akashi-san!”

he turns to look at you impassively, but he stands to wait to hear what you have to say

“Can I help you with anything in any way?”

“Are your assigned duties of manager not enough?” he asks, but he continues to give little away from his blank expression

“No, no, that’s not it,” you reply. “I was wondering how I can extend my hand to also help out the captain of the team as well. After all, it’s important for the managers to care for the well-being of every team member… you’re no exception!”

“Do what you think is best to ensure victory,” was all he said before he left

you’re now confused… did he mean for you to keep up your work as normal? did he trust you enough to let you decide what to do on your own? his vague words certainly threw you in for a loop

still, the Rakuzan teammates were able to breathe easier whenever you were in the same room as Akashi, because there’s always a gentler aura around him when you’re near the vicinity

sometimes his Orekashi side slips out, whether he gives an open compliment to a good play (albeit, delivered in a calm, spartan way) or when he gives an occasional perfect-rhythmed pass that leaves his teammates in a stupor

Akashi’s mannerisms towards you as the manager is as subtle as a speck of dust, but he’s grown a quiet sense of respect for you and the atmosphere you’ve brought to the team

however, it will only be at the final game where his Orekashi side will fully reawaken again

if any student dares to approach you with insensitive questions and comments about your race and culture with stereotypes, they should be expecting all hell breaking loose from the basketball team in 3… 2… 1…

[bookwyrminspiration]

is it still council-hating hours? even if not, this is something that's been bothering me for....so long. and i am going to explode if i don't say it right now. (In fact i actually have a doc titled "council incompetence rant" that is. getting a little long.)

One of the things that annoys me the most in Keeper is how utterly incompetent the Council is. They are shit at their jobs! They don't make sense! And that would be fine if that was something that was explored and talked about in the story, but it's not?

Like, sure, it's brushed on a little, but Keeper never goes in-depth in order to explain just how flawed and corrupt the system is! We have no idea how far the rot goes because we haven't been given a chance to see how far it goes, and despite the earlier books being really great setup for all kinds of plots and discussions surrounding the Council, it feels like Messenger is completely dropping that in favor of..."Neverseen Bad, Council + Black Swan Good". Which I call fucking bullshit on, by the way, because this series has gone to pretty decent lengths before to show that it's not the case! So WHY are we getting to that now?

Well, I think all of this is the symptom of a bigger problem.

Note: I don't want to be mean, and please tell me if I'm being too critical here, but this series has some serious problems actually delivering on what it's saying.

Like, it's trying to tell us that Sophie shouldn't be doing all this because she's a kid, but then it treats her very own existence as a project as background information when that should absolutely be at the forefront (like it was in earlier books)!

It's trying to tell us that discrimination against the Talentless is bad, but then every single member of it's cast has an ability, has a strong ability, and regularly uses their ability! Even Dex, who could have easily been talentless and good with tech, gets to be a Super Good Gadget Person thanks to his ability as opposed to his own creativity and ingenuity.

It's trying to tell us that maybe banishing children is bad, but also tells us that Exillium is now """fixed""" because Oralie gave them...better tents? Food? And never touches on the fact that children are still. getting. banished. It doesn't explore Tam's anger in detail, Linh is only there to be the token asian girl, it does nothing to fully dispel any thought of the Council being alright.

And it's trying to tell us that the Council fucks up, it's showing us that Councillors have no problem being incredibly selfish and violent and so many other terrible things, but that never changes. Nothing in Keeper is changing. It is only maintaining the status quo!

I'm confused as to what Messenger is trying to tell her readers! Are the Council good or bad? Is working with the Council good or bad? Are the Black Swan and Neverseen actually morally grey? Should I be angry at what's happening in these books? Am I meant to look at all the rot and shrug because "that's just how it is"?

And like...I wouldn't be mad if Keeper was just...bad! I mean, I would, but I wouldn't be as distraught! What really grinds my gears is that Keeper has the chance to be good. It has the chance to do great things - and at times it absolutely does! - but it keeps reinforcing belief in a deeply flawed and broken system that is regularly hurting people. And those examples were just off the top of my head!

And again, if this was explored within the series, that would be amazing, but the problem is that it's...not. And that's just...a real fuckin' shame, honestly.

- pyro

(sorry if this was like...too angry? i started and then kinda just...couldn't stop. i should probably get a hobby that's not tearing a middle grade series apart. oops.)

it may have been over a week since you sent this (thank you for being patient with me!!), but fuck yes it is still council hating hours. it is always council hating hours in this household that is not actually a house. (also that incompetence rant sounds intriguing)

yes! you are right! they are so bad at what they're supposed to be doing it's like they're just figures for people to look to and say "yea they'll take care of it" to keep everyone else from acting out! but it's really interesting to see a government so awful and incompetent be such an integral and influential part of the story...without acknowledging that they're actually really bad? I know in Unlocked there's a line where Shannon says something like "Sophie had to figure out who the bad guys were: the black swan? the council? someone else entirely?" but then it's never touched on again that I can remember. Thinking through the series, I honestly can't think of a situation that the council, of their own volition, saw was an issue and corrected in a way that was beneficial to those who needed it. Like yea, Oralie gave money to Exillium, but that was after Sophie chewed her out about it. I think i've said it before but in case not: it feels like they've taken the "for the good of the many over the good of the few" ideology too far in a society that doesn't work for. If someone threatens the majority (and often that's just in appearance only) they get rid of them to preserve the image of the rest. It doesn't care about their people, it cares about the majority of people feeling undisturbed.

considering Sophie is part of a huge organization created literally because their society, led by that system, isn't working for a lot of people, they (the Black Swan) sure do go along with the council a whole lot. I think one of the linked posts in one of my masterposts is specifically about how making the Black Swan work so closely with the council screwed them over and completely undermined everything they were working towards. I'm going to make a very vague comparison here, but the Black Swan feel like "we need to fix the system" while the Neverseen are "the system is broken lets start over" (except the Neverseen added a lot more violence into the mix). It's absolutely infuriating to have them working side by side: one, because the Black Swan aren't accomplishing any of their goals and should cut their losses and go back to being mysterious underground groups with more freedom to move (in my opinion), but two, because it makes the council seem like it's trying to fix things when really it feels like a publicity thing to make the public think they're addressing the rebel issue while they're really just showing up in places and causing problems. And!! that's another thing! it feels like their collaboration with the Black Swan is to address the problem of having rebels, not the problems these rebels have identified and are trying to fix. Unfortunately, it seems the council is getting their way more than the Black Swan, getting them to act more legally and work closer with less room for working outside the system. if that makes sense.

considering it's literally stated in unlocked that there is no "good" and "bad," there does seem to be a lot of focus on associating the Black Swan with being Right, and the Neverseen with being Wrong. I can hope that it's the outward reactions to the Black Swan realizing they've done some fucked up stuff (Sophie) and are now overcompensating and trying to make sure their every move is the correct one. But I do think it will be interesting to see if Sophie makes the connection in canon (as she's already started to) that there isn't always a right option, there's just the best you can do with a situation and the Black Swan's insistence that she was "in the wrong" (a summary) helps her realize her own values and think through their decisions with her own perspective instead of just trusting them

response to your note: you're fine! you bring up a good point that this book sounds like it wanted to be a unique perspective (by having the "good guys" also be questionable and give the "bad guys" reasonable motives) but the execution misses the mark for a lot of us. so you're qualms and observations are entirely valid and I don't think you're being mean at all! I think you're expressing a frustration you have with something, which I support and encourage.

at times it feels like Shannon bit off more than she could chew in terms of all the complicated things she could get into when it comes to this series. not saying she's doing a bad job or a horrible author or anything, just that there are some things she introduced that kind of get left behind or unexplored because there's so much else going on. I think we can see that in the whole being experiment part of Sophie life. we saw sophie was uncomfortable with it in the first few books and would sometimes bring it up, but I personally would've been more satisfied if she'd either taken the time to process it (opposed to her think about that later strategy) or come to the realization that no, she isn't okay with it and she deserves to have her thoughts on the matter heard. she was literally created to serve someone elses purpose, and brought into the fight too early at that. and yet it's treated like an "oopsie, guess we just gotta go with it" thing, like this minor part of her story when I bet her thinking about it for more than a minute at a time would absolutely wreck her. but I'm getting caught up in this, so moving on!

I think we can see it in the talentless too, as it's treated like a "that doesn't affect me" thing for Sophie. because she doesn't have any friends that are talentless right now--the closest she's got is Marella, who I think is still legally considered talentless with her pyrokinesis. it's been acknowledged that she doesn't think the way talentless are treated is right, but it doesn't impact her right now so she's not really doing anything about it. maybe if this was brought back later with someone like Jensi, then that would be a satisfying conclusion to this issue (not a conclusion, but it wouldn't be left hanging, if that makes sense). And I can understand the benefit of leaving things open to go back and explore later from a writers perspective, but at a certain point it becomes more of a hindrance to the story than anything else.

and exillium! I have so many thoughts on Exillium that I actually started talking about it earlier in this post. They're not doing anything unless prompted and what they do is the bare minimum. With the tents and the food, they aren't fixing Exillium, they're making it into what it should've been at the very least were they going to actually go down that route. So I can't praise them for it when it's just basic decency to provide literal children with food and shelter when you force them to be somewhere they don't want to. But all this doesn't fix Exillium, because the problem is that it exists in the first place. The problem is that the council saw children who were struggling, and decided the best thing to do with them was to just get them out of the way for everyone else. Three coaches total for leadership? yeah, there's no way that place was ever supposed to be "alternate learning" or however Oralie phrased it, that was just so you could say you hadn't completely abandoned them in the middle of nowhere.

you're so right about the council fucks up bit--I think the most obvious example of this is with Sophie's ability restrictor. Yea, she's not wearing it anymore, but that's not because the council changed their minds. It's because she broke the law and the didn't punish her for it. this is a great example of how things keep trying to move forward, but the council isn't doing anything to stay up with it. "they are selfish and violent[...] but that never changes." yes!! this!! you put it so well! the council is still the same old council that we saw in book one, concerned with their own interests and their own views, just trying to mitigate the damage Sophie and her friends are capable of doing to their system. Note: the fact that a handful of teenagers who haven't even graduated can do this much damage might be telling of the structural integrity of their system. Bronte and Terik did a little flip, and Alina replaced the Now Crispy Kenric, but aside from that nothing has changed.

I will say, I personally don't want it to be clear who the good guys and bad guys are. (not saying that's what you're asking for! just piggybacking off your comment on the confusion). I'm glad that the characters make me think and I'm grateful there isn't just the "we're good and they're bad" element you see in other stories. not that that's bad, i just think realistically they'd be more complex and their simplicity grows repetitive after a while. But like I said, at times it feels like there's too much going on for there to be a clear message, which in and of itself could be the message. i could be seeing something where there's nothing, though. I think part of it might be Shannon trying to take on all these complex narratives and perspectives with a limited perspective (as in she only has Sophie to tell the story through), while also needing to make it enjoyable and palletable to a young audience.

and I agree with you! I think it's a lot of the potential we see not being used that makes us so infuriated (or me at least). Because there are some stories yo uread where you're like "ah. it's just one of those stories. cool." and you move past it. Because you know it's going to have a set perspective and you know it's going to accomplish what it wants, but Keeper seems to have so many possibilities and Shannon's getting stuck in this rut of good and bad after so long. maybe we'll get out of it in the next book with sophie thinking the Black Swan was in the wrong, but I also wouldn't be surprised if that Didn't Happen.

it's just like what i was saying about Ro! There's all these opportunities for these characters and this world to be really explored and fleshed out and complex, but we've gotten stuck in this romance drama and loosing fights again and again with little progress. All their actions are undoing the Neverseen's actions and counting it a victory because no one is dead. I just think there could be so much more that we're not getting because the story tried to go too broad when it wasn't ready for it.

this response got very long but in essence: I agree with your assessment of the story. is frustrating to see so many of the details and paths we'd like to see explored that often aren't in fiction just pass us by.

there is a special place for keeper in my heart and I will always appreciate it for that, but I also mourn what it could've been.

(also: you are not too angry! you have genuine thoughts about this series and they deserve to be heard! we are allowed to have complaints, even about the things we like. we don't have to appreciate every single aspect and we're allowed to be mad at the things we don't like.)

[lunarliza]

Dirty Little Secret | Chapter One: Blankets

fuckbuddy!JJ x Kook!Reader 

You and JJ are fuck buddies- strictly physical. But what happens when you find yourself falling more and more for everyone’s favorite golden boy even though all he can see you as is a spoiled rich girl? 

You stared at the ticking clock among the sea of giggling preppy girls. Time had to be running in reverse. There was no way you still had an hour left. 

“Alright ladies, let’s now form a single-file line and practice our curtsies,” the cotillion instructor, Linda, ordered. The over-privileged girls hurried to the end of the ballroom, one carelessly stepping over your foot. “Ouch!” 

You glared at their backs and non-existent asses as they scurried, being the last one to sulk to your place behind a tall girl named Caroline. The leggy blonde snickered and leaned back slightly once everyone got into formation. 

“You look like a beat up mule,” she joked. 

You snorted and got on your tip-toes, muttering into her ear. “If I hear the words ‘prim and proper’ one more time, I might actually vomit on the spot.” 

You both peered over to Linda who was busy adjusting some of the girls in the front with her annoying pointer stick. It was only a matter of time before she would eventually get to you and criticize, well, everything. Your posture, clothes, hair, attitude. 

“If you do,” Caroline added, “make sure to get it all on Delilah in the front left. She totally swiped me for runner-up Miss Teen North Carolina last year.” 

You chuckled and shook your head. 

Caroline was probably the only thing getting you through these treacherous debutante lessons. She was your typical tall, thin socialite with a Benz and Prada collection to match. Ironically, you guys had more in common than one would think- hating just about every single girl in the room. It may be for different reasons, but the principle was there. Caroline was as competitive as they come and always had to be the center of attention, not that it was hard given her model height. 

You, on the other hand, couldn’t care less about becoming a high woman in society- evident in your ability to show up 20 minutes late to each lesson and royally screw up the dance number each chance you got. Caroline admired your talent of not giving a fuck and took a liking to you after you posed non-threatening to her spotlight. 

You faked yawned and checked the clock once more. 

“Alright I’ve had enough.” You held out your hand to Linda, causing the pageant girl in front of you to wrinkle her perfectly threaded brows. “Linda, I need to use the restroom,” you announced nonchalantly as everyone’s beetle eyes punctured you. 

“Very well y/n,” the monotonous instructor answered with her thin-framed glasses hanging on her beak nose.  

“See ya next week,” you sneakily whispered to Caroline. You proceeded to hop out of line, snatch your canvas bag at the entrance, and whisk out the door and into the busy street before anyone could see.

It was 3 p.m. on a Thursday afternoon. Your ferry left in an hour, and til then, you were ready to wander around the streets of Chapel Hill. 

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

“How were lessons today?” your mother asked, taking a sip of her 1999 Vineyard Merlot before setting the glass on the black marble table.

“Fine,” you answered, picking at the halibut on your plate. 

Her glasses were perched at the bridge of her nose as she scrolled through items on an iPad. You silently glanced over to your little sister, Macy, who slid her green beans onto your plate and threw you a thankful grin. 

“What did you go over?” your stepdad, Ted, asked half-heartedly as he scrolled through his phone. 

“Uh, we did some curtsies and practiced the dance,” was all you cared to mention as you munched on your sister’s veggies. 

“That’s funny,” your mother lifted her eyes from the screen, “because Linda called and said you went to the restroom and mysteriously disappeared. And you were late.” Her tone was much more adamant at the second part, but your face stayed cool as you took another bite of the awful fish. 

“There was backup when I left the ferry,” you lied and your mother rolled her eyes, tossing the iPad onto the table. 

“Y/n, you need to take this seriously. Ted spent weeks trying to get you into those debutante lessons and we’re paying a fortune for Linda alone!” 

“It’s not my fault she has a stick up her ass just like everyone else there,” you countered. Your mom was seconds away from fuming, so you decided to add a little extra fuel. “Also someone stepped on my foot with their heel so I had to rest it or else I wouldn’t be able to properly do the dance.” 

“Enough of this, y/n,” your mother snapped at your terrible sarcasm. Macy and Ted stopped eating and watched you both with hints of concern. You didn’t understand why it was so startling to them. It was just any other Thursday evening with your mom if you were being honest. 

“If I get another call from Linda, we’re taking away your keys.” 

“Take them,” you said, stepping up from your chair and towards the kitchen. You tossed the half-eaten food into the trash and stuffed the plate into the dishwasher. “Not like I have anywhere better to be on this God-awful island.” 

You rushed to your room upstairs and kicked the door shut behind you. You sank into your bed, face first, and let out the longest, dreadful groan into the comforter. 

This was your life now. After almost a year, you would think that you’d adjust to this pretentious Kook life, but it only made you feel more stranded than ever. It started when your real parents announced their divorce a few years back. Both yours and Macy’s hearts shattered at the news. Your family lived perfectly in a tiny home until you turned thirteen. Your dad- the one who taught you how to ride a bike, swim, fish, and play poker- got a new job where he would go overseas for months on end. You hated not being able to see him and your mom hated it even more- enough to leave him. Your mom ended up taking full custody of you and Macy. Soon after, she met money-bags Ted, and, before you knew it, your bags were sealed packed as you sailed away to a fancy new home along Figure Eight complete with housekeepers, a pool, and etiquette lessons. It was supposed to be this “better lifestyle” your mother tried to paint into your head- but you saw right through it. No matter how green the grass or white the fence, you still felt like you were being locked up on an island you had no interest in exploring. 

Making new friends was also a hassle- first coming in as a high school sophomore, and then not knowing how to engage in Kook-speak with the others. It’s not your fault you weren’t well-versed in luxury cars and handbags. You had one or two friends, but spent most of your days alone. It was well past midnight when you caught yourself drowning in your own self-loathing thoughts. A sudden tap on your window startled you as you turned to find a familiar blonde boy struggling to lift the glass. You watched, unimpressed, as he finally got it open enough to slide his lean body in and land straight onto your window seat. 

“You’re late again, JJ,” you said, getting up to lock your door. 

“Phone died and there’s a guard on duty, so I had to come in through the long way,” JJ stated, plopping himself comfortably on your bed. 

He wore his usual fit- dark cargo shorts and a navy button-up with hardly anything buttoned. He reeked of weed and seawater, wearing a sleazy grin on his face. You wanted to swipe it off. Cocky bastard. 

“For the last time,” you retorted, kicking his feet off your white blankets, “no shoes on my fucking bed.” 

“I love when you talk dirty to me,” JJ snarkily replied as he slipped off his boots.   

This was JJ: your fuck buddy. You couldn’t pinpoint exactly why you were involved with this delinquent of a boy, but he was enough piss off your mom and Ted- not that you would ever tell them. You didn’t know what it was about him, but causally sleeping with JJ made you feel more in control of your life. So, once or twice a week, you two would meet up, do the deed, and go your separate ways without a word. No strings, no feelings, hell, not even a friendship. And not a single soul knew. You both understood the terms of your agreement and will stand by it until the day you both die. “Are you just gonna stand there and stare or are we gonna get to clapping cheeks? I don’t have all night dude,” JJ nagged, interrupting you from your thoughts. 

You flipped him off. “If someone showed up during their regularly scheduled time, I would have had a lot more energy.” You peeled off your cropped tee to reveal a lacy black bralette and climbed into his lap. His hands cupped the globes of your ass before sliding them into your shorts, mouth connecting with your neck. 

“Let’s make this quick,” he added between short breaths, “I have to meet some friends in an hour.” 

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

chapter two

[loudstan]

Epiphany

A collection of  NCT werewolf AU stories.

Doyoung (pt.1) (p1.2)  (pt. 3) (pt. 4)

Summary: The wolf population kept decreasing and those who were left had a hard time trying to fit  into society. Sure, people didn’t consider them as dangerous as vampires, but wolves could still sense some hostility every time they did as much as go for a walk in a public place. Thanks to wolves’ natural magical abilities, NCT (one of the remaining packs) found a safe place among witches in a town where no one knew their secret, allowing some members to finally get a job, study and interact with others without fear of being rejected.

Life seems to finally be peaceful for them… except that wolves have needs, and one of those needs is finding their mate.

Pairing: Werewolf! Doyoung x Witch! female reader

Warnings: Eventual smut, Doyoung being stubborn, a bit suggestive at the end of this chapter.

Everyone knew Doyoung had had a bad day as soon as he walked into the house and slammed the front door. At times like these, most members shy away from even making eye contact with him, and then we have fearless  Chenle, following Doyoung on his way to his room and asking all types of questions that would make him snap anytime soon.

“Aren’t you moodier than usual?” he dodged a pillow Doyoung threw his way and ignored the other members’ alarmed expressions as he continued. “Is it hard making friends with that personali-” before Chenle could finish that question Kun lifted him from the ground and carried him away reminding him that he needed to work on his timing when giving his opinion.

 Doyoung paid no attention to them as he continued looking for something he was sure he had left on his nightstand. He ran his long fingers through his hair and pulled it a little, frustrated with everything and everyone.

“Where.the.FUCK.are.my.suppressants?!” he roared at the few members who were still standing by his door. Immediately, everyone ran away except for Taeyong.

“You gave them to Haechan last month when he presented,” he replied calmly, arms crossed, leaning against the door frame as if he wasn’t facing the wrath of a wolf in pre-heat. “You can take mine,” he added and walked away.

 Doyoung sighed and followed his leader to the kitchen, where he was waiting for him.

“Sit down,” Taeyong said gently but there was no room for disobedience. “Here you go. You know my suppressants are a bit stronger than average, so next month you need to use yours.”, he offered him a small jar of pills. Taeyong’s heat was impossible to control with regular suppressants so he had these made especially for him. “And drink this. It will help you ease the pain,” he added handing him a glass of a sparkling potion.

 The leader sat down in front of Doyoung and stared at him attentively as he swallowed the medicine. Doyoung noticed the house was suddenly very quiet and he wondered if he had scared everyone to the extent they had to go out and leave them alone. To be fair, they were more afraid of Taeyong so it was probably his dominant presence and pheromones while trying to put Doyoung in his place that made everyone feel threatened. 

 “I’m sorry,” the black haired wolf finally said.

Taeyong nodded, his fingers tapping on the table and his lips pressed together becoming a thin line as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t find the right words.

“What is she like?” he finally asked, leaning forward, his eyes never leaving Doyoung’s.

“Who?” Doyoung replied but, unlike his leader, he looked away. Taeyong scoffed.

“Your mate, Doyoung,” he smirked and lowered his voice even though there was nobody else around. “The reason you are going into heat early. Your heat isn’t due until the end of next month.”

“...Do you keep a track of everyone’s cycles?” 

“Don’t you?”

“No?” 

“Hm… It comes naturally, it’s like remembering birthdays. Don’t you remember all of our birthdays?” 

“Only the members that are not annoying. That’s like three birthdays.” replied Doyoung, glad that they were changing the topic.

“Don’t change the topic,” it was like Taeyong could read his mind. “Who is she?”

Doyoung sighed exasperatedly. The older wasn't giving up.

“She is a freshman law student,” he finally said, choosing not to talk about how good you smelled and how he wished he had taken you right there before the other students arrived. “And she doesn’t know anything yet.”

“I can’t believe you are the first one to find his mate. You are so...self-controlled, so disciplined,” Taeyong’s eyes were shining because of how excited he was. One of the members of the pack had met his mate, which meant there was probably someone out there for each of them. “I guess I just thought someone more in touch with his animal side would be prone to  go through this first.”

 “Yeah,” Doyoung agreed, not as enthusiastic as the leader. “Me too…”

“So...How will you approach her?”

“Oh,” Doyoung looked at his now empty glass and whispered, “I wasn’t...planning on approaching her.”

“Excuse me?”

“I just don’t think...it’s the right moment.”

“The right moment?” Taeyong was astonished. “The moment your mate shows herself to you is the right moment, Doyoung. There is no way back, it’s either her or living a life of solitude.”

Doyoung looked up into Taeyong’s eyes, confirming that a life of solitude was exactly what he was thinking about.

 “Is she really that bad?” Taeyong couldn’t believe someone would throw away an opportunity like this.

“No. Well, I don’t know. I don’t really know her,” Doyoung’s head was spinning because of the heat symptoms and all the information he was processing. “I just never thought about this type of situation before.”

 Taeyong seemed to take pity on Doyoung’s poor state. “It’s a lot to take in, isn’t it? You should go take a rest. The suppressants should kick in in the next twenty minutes,” he gives Doyoung a sympathetic look  as the younger walks towards his room. “You need to remember something though; once a wolf finds his mate, the suppressants become less  and less effective  until they are completely useless. I can’t guarantee they will work next month.”

 “...Yeah, thanks.” Doyoung replies before closing his door. Suppressants were meant to help wolves who didn’t have a mate yet to go through their heats, but they could never compete with the pheromones gone wild when their true mate materialized. He knew that much, which made the situation more annoying.

 He took his shirt off , turned the AC on and laid down on bed trying to sleep. He was aware suppressants needed some time to work but he was feeling so hot it was unbearable.

 It was all your fault. That dumb freshman who couldn’t wait one more year until he graduated to enter university. Stupid girl. Stupid Y/N… 

His eyes snapped open. How did he know your name? You didn’t get to introduce yourself… Oh, right. He heard a guy, another freshman, call you that when he was asking you to join him for lunch.

 “Y/N…” He purred as his hand traveled down his abdomen absentmindedly. He repeated your name louder, this time his back arching and his hand tugging insistently and he knew he was screwed.

[rainydayhogwartsimagines]

Fred with a Muggle!reader:

Warnings: swearing, sexual innuendos

He met you after the battle of Hogwarts.

He needed something from Charlie and Charlie wanted to meet in a muggle bar

"I can't get over the fact that you frequent a bar. With a muggle running it. And she knows you're a wizard." Fred admitted.

"I'm not the only one that frequents here, a lot of ministry members come here too." Charlie shrugged.

Fred had heard a lot about you, Charlie saying you often listened to people's problems, occasionally giving them free drinks if they've had a lousy day.

He'd never actually seen you. Charlie was always shit with descriptions

That's when a glass was put in front of Charlie and Fred looked over

Your hair was in a ponytail, a dishrag over your shoulder and a black cami that seemed to make your eyes pop.

"The usual?" You asked Charlie.

"Thanks dear." He nodded as you poured a glass.

"And you?" You asked Fred.

The second your eyes met his you felt something similar to a shockwave go down your spine.

"....Uh.... I'm... Not much of... A drinker.." Fred said making Charlie raise a brow.

"We have different sodas. If you want any of that." You said.

"... Root beer." He finally said making you nod.

From that point on, Fred showed up every Wednesday, it being the most empty so he could talk to you in peace.

"Hi Weasley." You said not even looking up from the book you were reading.

He sat at the bar.

"interesting story?" He asked.

You lifted the book so he could see it's title "Fantastic Beasts and where to find them"

He rose a brow. "How'd you get your hands on a wizard book?" He asked.

"It had a muggle release. I bought it after finding out it was real." You admitted.

Fred chuckled. "Curious about the wizarding world?" Fred asked.

"how can I not be? This world I live in... It's boring." You said.

"Surely it's not that bad." Fred said.

"Oh but it is. See I'm supposed to be a productive member of society. This isn't considered that apparently." You said.

"screw society." He shrugged.

"I think I'm beginning to really like you Weasley." You said with a smile.

He gave you a smile and your heart pounded.

Since then Fred basically visited you every day now.

He'd watch you work if you were too busy but on the empty days you'd sit at the bar with him.

Today was an empty day, much to Fred's luck.

"Hello there." You greeted.

"Helllooo" he said sitting down.

You sat next to him, a look of obvious exhaustion falling over your face the second you made contact with the chair.

"long day?" Fred asked.

"Long. Long. LONG. Day." You sighed.

"the ministry men just kept coming in. And that's not a problem. The problem is they all order the same damn drinks and I'm always on my feet" you groaned.

"prop your legs up on me, I really don't care." Fred suggested. You did, moving the chair closer.

"I have a question." Fred said.

"I have an answer." You replied.

"Do you own this bar?" He asked.

You nodded. "Used to be my brother's." You said.

"What happened?" Fred asked.

"...There's a reason why I'm allowed near magic." You said.

It registered with Fred what you meant.

"Your brother's a wizard?" He asked.

"He was." You said.

Fred frowned.

"He died in the battle for hogwarts." You said softly.

Fred realized your last name... Your brother saved his life.

"Sorry... Was Charles L/n your brother?" Fred asked.

You nodded.

"Your brother saved me." Fred said.

You blinked.

"You... You're the wizard he...."

You swallowed looking in Fred's eyes.

"Fred.... Thank you." You said.

"For what?" He asked.

"For not letting my brother's sacrifice be in vain. Charlie tells me how much you've helped people after the war... I'm glad you're living your life." You said sincerely.

He almost expected anger from you. But instead you were grateful.

He looked in your eyes and you looked in his.

Fred finally got the nerve to kiss you.

You looked forward to seeing him every day now, always smiling as he entered

He'd kiss you from across the bar making you smile as you worked.

One day you decided to close early though and Fred wanted you to actually see the wizarding world.

So he took you to the burrow to meet his parents for the weekend.

You were nervous the entire time but he kept reassuring you that Molly would fucking love you

Spoiler alert: she did.

Harry didn't seem to mind you either, you shaking his hand.

It felt nice for him to meet someone and not have them go "OH MY GOD YOU'RE THE BOY WHO LIVED!"

"So what do you do for a living?" Arthur asked.

"I uhm. I own a pub." You admitted.

"So that's where Fred has been running off to." George chuckled.

Percy walked in and you rose a brow.

"....Wait you're their brother!?" You said.

Percy gave you a "Don't you say a word" look but George blinked.

"How do you know Percy?" Fred asked.

"He comes to the pub every now and again." You admitted making him facepalm.

Fred and George gaped.

"Our brother. In a bar? Have you no shame Percy?" George said.

"Fred's girlfriend owns that bar, which he goes to everyday, and I'm the spectacle here?" Percy asked.

"Yeah because you have a constant stick shoved up your--"

"OKAY GINNY!" Percy cut her off making you laugh.

Fred wrapped his arm around you with a smile.

You ended up really enjoying your time there, answering questions Arthur had about muggle objects.

You went to bed early your first night there Molly sitting down with Fred

"We love her." Molly said.

"Really?" Fred asked.

"She's amazing Fred. Truly." Arthur agreed.

Fred felt relieved hearing this.

He showed you all sorts of things in the wizarding world

Your personal favorite was butterbeer.

When you had to return back to the muggle world you were kind of disappointed.

But you started making weekend trips to the Burrow a regular thing.

There was this one night you were really busy though.

This time the Weasley's came to you.

"What are you all doing here?" You asked.

"Y/n, I need an ale!" Someone yelled making you groan.

"Give me a table." Fred said. Him helping out wasn't uncommon.

"Five." You said, handing him a notepad

The family watched you two in action, both of you working around each other in impressive yet strategic ways.

"Can we help?" Ginny asked.

You whipped around and nodded.

"If you come across any empty glasses, clean them." You said. Molly and Arthur sat watching their children all assist you.

"Shit!" You grumbled as the jukebox glitched again.

"Repairio." Hermione said making it work.

"You are a godsend Granger. Truly." You said with a laugh as you sped past her.

Your balance skills with treys of alcohol was honestly impressive

Along with Fred and George's speedy order taking.

Before you knew it the bar was empty.

You finally turned off the open sign and hugged Fred.

"Thank. God." You whined.

He chuckled and Ron gaped.

"This is what you do? All day? No magic?" Ron asked.

You nodded.

"Goddess. Your girlfriend is a goddess." Ron said making you snort.

Fred kissed your head and you sighed pulling off the apron.

"Alright. Tell me we're going home, I am exhausted and looking forward to Molly's cooking." You said making Fred's brow raise.

"Did you just call... The burrow home?" George noticed.

"...I guess I did." You shrugged.

Fred already was forming wedding plans in his head.

George, Fred and you all rode separately from the rest of the group.

"Alright. Be real with me. How many times have you shagged on the bar?" George asked making you choke on air.

"Christ George!" Fred gaped.

"I'm just saying, it's right there!" George said.

"....Like three times, but that is besides the point!" You answered.

"I knew it!" George said.

"and how, pray tell did you know that?" Fred asked.

"One of your shirts were behind the bar." George said making both of you groan.

Fred didn't mind helping you out during the busy days.

A secret passage to the wizarding world being right next to it didn't hurt either.

Fred and you now had been seeing each other for about a year.

The Christmas season was a nice one, spending it with his family

Molly made you a sweater, which during the winter never came off.

Fred however was gearing up to ask you to marry him.

You already moved in with him after your six month anniversary.

Now he was fidgeting with a ring in his pocket as you worked.

"So this would go... Here." You muttered to yourself.

Fred just had to find the right time.

"Fuck, why is the scotch missing a cap?!" You groaned.

When it was just you and him.

The bell on the door rang, indicating the last customer left and Fred used a quick spell to shut off the open sign.

"thanks." You sighed as you found the missing Scotch cap.

"Hey. Why don't you take a break?" Fred suggested.

When was the right time to even ask you?

You nodded and sat next to him.

"What's in your pocket?" You asked noticing him keeping rather close to it.

Well. Now was the perfect time!

Fred swallowed and leaned forward taking your hands into his.

"I love you." He said.

"I love you too. Are you dying or something?" You asked concerned.

"what? No-- no." He shook his head.

"I love you so much and I want to make you happy for the rest of our lives." He said making you raise a brow.

"What--"

He pulled out the ring and your eyes went huge, looking at him and then the ring.

"Fred..." You breathed.

"Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?" He asked.

You looked at him almost the exact same way you did a year ago, the same shocked and vulnerable expression on your face as you held his hands.

"...Yes Fred!" You said before he slid the ring on your finger and kissed you.

He called his brothers-- all of them, telling them with no context to get their asses to the burrow.

They all did, now standing confused in the living room.

"Why are we here fred?" Bill asked, Fleur equally confused.

"I'm waiting on mum." Fred said as she finally walked down with Arthur.

"What's going on?" Ginny asked.

"I asked Y/n to marry me." Fred said.

"and I said yes." You said making everyone gasp.

Molly was a happy crying mess, hugging you saying she gained a new daughter.

Harry was happy that you weren't going anywhere along with Ron and Hermione.

Charlie was cracking a massive smile.

"This happened because of you Charlie." You said with a laugh.

"Finally! She gives me credit!" Charlie said making you laugh.

"welcome to the family Y/n." Arthur said with a smile.

A few months later you were married, the bar eventually making it's way into diagon Alley

You closed down the original location but made the second one equally comfortable.

Every night without fail, Fred would find his way to a seat at the bar and would watch you work.

Harry would occasionally visit with Ginny, you two being the first to know about their engagement.

"I've got the coolest in laws ever!" You'd say making Fred chuckle.

You would have days where the family would sit around after closing, telling you stories of hogwarts before the war as you sat in a chair with Fred, him holding you in his arms with a smile.

You wouldn't trade any of this for the world. Because this is where you belonged.

This was your home.

[jazy3]

Thoughts on Grey’s Anatomy: 17X13

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Oh my gosh! Wow! There’s so much to say about this episode. I'm so glad that Meredith woke up and appears to be on the mend. As much as I loved the beach, I am ready for Meredith to rejoin society and the land of the living and get back to doing what she does best! I'm glad that Meredith got closure and that we as fans got closure too not just with Derek but with George as well. The beach wedding scene was perfect and the dialogue throughout was great.

I laughed out loud multiple times and Meredith and Derek’s scenes were both funny and bittersweet. I particularly liked Meredith and Derek's lines about how Meredith hates weddings, but Ellis hates the Post It Note story and wishes they had a big wedding. That she would give her that big wedding if she could. I felt like she was also saying she would give Derek that big wedding if she could. I also loved their conversation about Amelia. Derek told her what she needed to hear. Sometimes losing someone close to you at a young age makes you stronger and sometimes it turns you into Amelia.

Amelia has grown so much, but she spent most of her life a mentally unstable drug and alcohol addicted mess spiralling out of control in large part because she witnessed the brutal murder of her father at the age of five. And that’s not to say that Derek wasn’t just as screwed up by what happened to their Dad. He like Amelia became a neurosurgeon always chasing the high. He stayed in a loveless marriage he hated and when Addison cheated on him with Mark he moved to Seattle where he pretended to be single and pursued a relationship with Meredith.

Even after he and Meredith got together, he lied and cheated and repeated that pattern over and over again. First with Nurse Rose and then with Renee his research fellow in D.C. Derek could be selfish, cruel, hypocritical, and jealous. While Amelia’s scars and trauma were more obvious and blatant Derek was just as affected as she was it just showed up differently. Derek makes it clear he does not want that for Zola, Bailey, and Ellis and after talking to him Meredith realizes that she doesn’t either.

I loved seeing Meredith talk about how well Amelia is doing and Derek saying, “I know!” From the moment Derek on the beach I had a feeling they were going to talk about Amelia and the kids and all of that and I’m glad they did. One of my favourite moments of the episode was when Meredith told Derek that Ellis hates the Post It Note story and wishes they had a big wedding and Derek said, "She gets that from my mother!" I loved that they showed Ellis’ drawing on the fridge when Maggie is talking to Winston on the phone.

I love that Meredith and Derek got their beach wedding like Derek talked about in Season 5 when he made Meredith a bed in front of the fireplace. She went from never wanting to get married to marrying Derek on a Post It Note, getting legally married at the court house so that they could adopt Zola, and then marrying him on the beach in her COVID dream and giving Derek and Ellis the big wedding he always wanted and the one Ellis dreams of. So beautiful. I’m glad that they got closure and that Meredith decided to go back and that she knows Derek will be waiting for her when she’s ready, when it’s her time. When she’s old and senile and smelly just like they promised.

But now is not that time. She has kids to raise. Patients to treat. Sisters, friends, and family that need her. And a certain Irish doctor who would very much like to take her for a drink once she’s feeling better. I loved that Meredith realized through talking to Derek that even though her body was tired her soul was still fighting and that she needed to go back to her life. I loved her scene with Zola when she woke up and said, "We love you so much," meaning both her and Derek. That Mommy and Daddy love her so much and that’s why Meredith came back. She gave up on an afterlife with Derek to be with her children, friends, and family in the real world. That was so beautiful.

I loved Maggie's talk with Zola. I love that she took what Catherine gave her about screaming out your feelings and used it to help Zola who has been through so much express her emotions in a healthy way. I really felt Zola's heartbreak and how much she missed her Mom and Dad. I'm glad that Maggie decided to take Zola to visit Meredith. It was risky, but it paid off. The set department did a great job with Zola’s room. When she’s sitting on her bed crying you can see the photo of Meredith and Derek holding her at her first birthday party. You can also see a sock monkey that she had at the dream house.

The slop of the roof indicates that her room is in the attic. At last we saw it Lexie was living in there and Mark was visiting her while they were sneaking around, and it was an unfinished space with wood panelling. It appears that since that time as her family expanded Meredith had the attic finished and turned into a proper bedroom for Zola. We don’t know how big the attic is so it’s possible that there are more rooms up there or that there are more rooms upstairs than what we’ve seen.

I'm glad that Derek was there for Meredith in her time of need and helped her find the will to fight even though she was exhausted. I'm interested to see what's next for Meredith. If we'll see her being discharged in the coming weeks or if they will do a time jump. Will we see her at home with the kids first or back at work? Will her and Hayes finally have that drink? If so, how soon? I want to know more! I’m excited to see Maggie tell her about her engagement to Winston and see her meet Winston properly and get to know him. I’m also excited for what I’m sure will be an emotional scene when she thanks Amelia and Link for taking care of her kids while she’s been sick.

I’m also expecting some very emotional scenes with Richard and Bailey. I’m interested to see how they will address DeLuca’s death. I’d also like to see Jackson’s reaction when he returns from his most recent quest and finds out that Meredith has woken up and is doing better. I’d also like to see someone notify Cristina, Alex, Arizona, Callie, and April that Meredith is doing better. I can’t wait to see Hayes’ reaction to finding out that Meredith is on the mend! My heart!

Now let us turn our attention to the other shenanigans that were going on at Grey Sloan Memorial this week while Meredith was busying getting closure with Derek and waking up. We saw Teddy back at work trying her best to move forward. I was glad to see that she found a therapist that works for her even though it has to be virtual due to the pandemic. I'm glad that Owen was there for her. She really needs a friend right now and as Owen said previously, he's well placed to be that person. I like that he backed her up, but also pointed out that she would be destroyed if something went wrong with Meredith. That lead to her paging Winston to scrub in with her which I think was the right call.  

I think Owen did the right thing by rejecting her kiss but choosing to stay with her and let her cry and breakdown. She needs the support right now and while I’m not usually an Owen fan I think he did a good job supporting her this episode. I also really felt for him when he lost a patient he thought they were going to be able to discharge and struggled to tell the family. As he says to Teddy, they did this all the time during the way, but this is different. They are losing patients on a level that they’ve never experienced before, and they can’t even take a moment to catch their breath because they have more patients to treat and pronounce.

My heart breaks for the real life doctors and nurses who are dealing with stuff on a daily basis. It’s so hard. On a lighter note, I really loved Amelia and Link's patient storyline this week. It was funny and interesting, and it was great to see Amelia back in the OR. While it was wrong of Amelia to steal Link’s patient and I think she did overstep I understand why she was so eager to get back into the OR and she was right about what was wrong with the guy.

I understood Link’s anger and frustration, but I also appreciated that he understood Amelia and was there to support her and build her up. I like that he brought in Tom and had him on standby, but also showed complete confidence in Amelia. His line about how Amelia always likes to raise the stakes was hilarious and accurate. Another scene I loved was when Amelia and Link were leaving the hospital and Link thought she was using sexual innuendo and then she clarified that she needed to get home because her boobs felt like they were going to burst, and she needed to either pump or breastfeed. That one cracked me up!

We also saw some amazing acting by Caterina Scorsone when upon arriving home and finding Link’s parents looking after Bailey and Ellis, they rushed to the hospital thinking something was wrong with Meredith. Amelia was riding high from the surgery that day and when she thought Meredith had gotten worse, she panicked only to realize that Meredith’s condition hadn’t changed. Her sobbing and desperation as she said over and over again that she really needed Meredith to live were gut wrenching. Caterina did an amazing job.

I also really liked Bailey and Levi’s patient storyline. The peanut butter brittle woman who took up roller skating was the best! She was funny and helped Bailey see that you need to rest and also follow your joy. The scenes where the woman gave Levi the brittle and then he was smelling it made me laugh! As a result of treating that patient Bailey decided to reverse her earlier decision and let Jo switch specialities. While I’m not on board with that storyline I'm glad that Bailey decided to support Jo in following her joy. Making someone stay in a role they don't like will only make them resent you and make everyone involved unhappy.

That being said, I hate this career switching storyline. It’s so dumb. I've realized with this episode that my opinion on this storyline isn't ever going to change. If they use it as a segue for Jo adopting Luna that could be interesting, but watching Jo leave general surgery behind and re-specialize in OBGYN so she can stand on the sidelines while all the other characters do ground breaking work and cool procedures just seems dumb to me. I am not invested in this storyline at all.

Levi and Jo have great comedic timing which was on full display in this episode. Jackson was MIA this episode because he went roaring off on another one of his quests leaving the person he’s dating in the lurch and telling them about it after the fact. He took a leave of absence from work and then left Maggie a voicemail back in Season 15 telling her he needed some time to think and then went camping in the woods to look at trees which lead to him talking to April and texting a woman he met on this trip behind Maggie’s back. He then left her in the fog on a dark road in an area with bears at the end of Season 15.

Now he’s left Jo to go on an unknown quest that’s 11 hours away. When did Jackson become the guy that just vanishes at random to go do whatever the heck he wants? I was surprised that Nico asked Levi to move in with him at the end of the episode. That was not at all the answer that Levi was expecting so I understand why he ran off and said he promised Jo he'd do a movie night with her. Levi wanted to move in with Nico last season and Nico didn't want that, but instead of just saying that outright he dodged the topic and was a real jerk about it. That resulted in them breaking up and Levi moving in with Jo.

They only got back together because of the pandemic and in the intervening time Levi has grown as a person and no longer wants that kind of a relationship with Nico. When he told him that him leaving his bathroom bag at his place didn't mean he was going to move in with him he was being sincere. He just didn't want to have to keep carting his toothbrush back and forth all the time. In response Nico realized he's always running away from what scares him and pushing people away when they get too close and he wants to fix that, so he asked Levi to move in with him.

Therein lies their problem. They're never on the same page. When Levi wanted to move forward and take that next step Nico didn't want to. Now that Nico wants to move forward and take the next step Levi is no longer interested. What a dilemma. I also noticed that Jo and Levi had very similar outfits at the beginning of this episode. You know you’re becoming good friends with someone when you start unconsciously matching outfits.

Onto the next episode’s promo! We see Jackson driving in the rain, showing up on someone’s doorstep talking to himself about how his appearance might seem impulsive, but he has thought it through. The door opens to reveal April who is holding Harriet in between clips of his and April’s relationship. I have a few theories about this. First off, I think they are faking us out. If there was trouble in paradise and things weren’t going well with April and Matthew, they wouldn’t have had Jackson make a comment in the first half of the season about how Matthew is spending more time with Harriet then he and April are because they are taking more COVID shifts.

April is a deeply religious Christian woman whose faith is really important to her. She was vehemently opposed to getting a divorce even though her relationship with Jackson was clearly over because of her faith. Marriage is not something she takes lightly so I have a hard time seeing her divorce Matthew out of the blue because Jackson shows back up and is in crisis when her and Matthew have been together for the past three seasons and have been married for two.

Also, they are raising two children together and co-parenting one of those kids with Jackson. A lot of court services were shut down in the first few months of the pandemic for safety reasons which made it difficult to get a divorce and this episode takes place in June of 2020. So even if April and Matthew split up they couldn’t legally get a divorce very easily at this time and if April and Jackson got back together they would still have to interact with Matthew on a regular basis because they are co-parenting kids together and there’s no way that April would walk away from Ruby.

The only way I could see April and Jackson getting back together is if Matthew has died or fallen ill somehow. Otherwise I just don’t see it. I think they’re faking us out. I think the clips in the promo are there to entice japril fans and play into that because logistically I don’t see how a storyline in which April and Matthew suddenly divorce and April and Jackson get back together in one episode is possible.

Until next time!

[jq37]

The Case File – Mice and Murder Ep 4

The Case of the Puzzling Painting 

Welcome back to Loam Hall where our Sylvan Sleuths are still hanging out in a room with a dead body. When we left off, Gangie had been snooping into Sly’s conversation about Fletcher Cottonbottom and now, he uses his Criminal Contacts feature to see what he knows, if anything, about a recent return. With a 26 he knows that his family used to be well respected but after the whole business with the insurance fraud and Sly busting it, the family kind of fell out of favor. So Fletcher was in a weird position where he was rich and a part of high society and had enough dirt on everyone to get them to do things for him but couldn’t actually show his face because he was disgraced. Gangie also knows that it’s rumored that Fletcher’s weapons running scheme was actually a front for moving art. 

With regard to more recent news about Fletcher, Gangie was never in direct contact with him but he knows that 3-4 years ago, his most trusted henchmen started going missing--people attributed it to some kind of “Cottonbottom Curse” and that rumor is part of why Gangie decided to get out of dodge in the first place.

Buck does an insight check on the rest of the PCs and, with an 18, doesn’t clock anyone there as especially suspicious (Lars isn’t there but like..it’s Lars). Ian tries to give Squire Badger his last rites but ends up pulling the knife out, putting it back in, flapping blood everywhere with his feathers, and sending Constance into a badger rage. Buck tries to help smooth over things, claiming his big screw up was a new style of avant garde church ritual (Ian appreciates the support--who ministers to the ministers, you know?) and in the process sees his knife for the first time. Which, you know. He obviously suspected before but never nice to see.

While this is going on, Daisy sneaks off to try and check on the secret door and everyone sees her do it/eventually follows her but we’ll get back to her once we check in with Lars who is en route to the kitchen. Once in the hallway, they do a perception check and, on a 15, there are 3 doors and Ally gets to pick one. There’s a kitchen where Gilfoyle is talking to a group, a door where someone is crying behind it, and a door where they can hear nothing. Ally, the galaxy brained genius, goes for the quiet door. That’s the money door and with their ears pressed against the door, they can hear Edwina and Carolyn--the two mice maids that overheard Buck’s conversation with the Badger--whispering about what happened there and wondering if they should pay back the money they were paid to by Buck.

Gilfoyle walks out and sees Lars snooping but on a Nat 20 deception check, Lars is able to play dumb and skate by suspiciousness. Also, with a dirty 20 perception check, when the mice maids leave, Lars sees that they’ve been stealing silverware. 

OK, back to Daisy who is getting to the séance room as quickly as possible. She has two rounds before people catch up to her so she’s trying to make the most of it by Investigating the painting she noticed was bolted to the wall earlier. She first rolls an 11, getting no new information. This is so frustrating to her. She’s good at this dammit! But being around Sly is rattling her terribly. She has feelings for him--strong ones. But she isn’t herself around him. How can she be with him if he makes her so unlike herself? Her introspection is enough to earn her advantage from Brennan on her second roll and boom! 25! Daisy is back. 

With that roll, she notices that the eyes in the painting actually move and can be used as a spying post on the other side. Then Sly runs in and they start bickering immediately. Daisy throws a crystal ball at him and absolutely brains him on a nat 20--the first combat roll of this very RP oriented season. 

Buck and Ian are still in the room with the body for the moment and Buck asks Ian about the first few names on the list Gangie gave him. There were a bunch of members of the Burrows family--a working class family that all died of a consumptive illness. And then the Diggories who died in a carriage accident. The connecting thread? All badgers. Buck then zooms away to follow Daisy, Ian follows, and Lars, seeing them as they leave the kitchens, also follows. 

So all the PCs are in the séance room now and they kinda have the sense of, “OK y’all, we’re all screwed but we’re al screwed together so we better throw our lot in with each other and start working together so we don’t die because no one else here is on our side.” Buck proposes an alliance and they all agree to share info. Sly asks about Buck’s knife and Buck admits it’s his but says he didn’t do it. Sly believes him--not because he wouldn’t do it but because he has no motive (that he knows about anyway. Buck doesn’t spill about the contract). 

Gangie shares the list of names from before with the whole group.It’s like half badgers and then some other critters (full list here). Sly doesn’t share any of his secret info Grant got texted. Daisy and Buck don’t share about the key (though Sly you’ll remember sat her steal it). Buck does however mention his suspicion about the fact that Gilfoyle wasn’t around when Squire Badger gave his speech and Daisy does the same about the fact that he said he would call the cops but the cops haven’t arrived yet. Lar’s remembers that Jez’s husband is gunning for at seat in parliament and wonders if this is related somehow. Daisy mentions the eyes in the painting and everyone is like way to bury the lede dude! Especially when they’ve just all spilled their secrets. Everyone checks on the painting and with a 25 Gangie can intuit that this is probably used to spy on rich people when they’re mid-séance and vulnerable and spilling secrets (which he doesn’t share but Daisy comes to a similar conclusion on her own). Buck on a 23 can smell ledgers (idk how but the DM said so and I’m reporting it) and guesses that that’s where the Squire’s real office is which means that’s probably where the contract he needs to find and destroy is too. 

 The group makes a list of their loose ends which are what’s on the other side of the painting, what’s up with Fletcher, and the smell of ozone. Plus Ian remembers that the date on the bust in the study is wrong and shares with the class. 

Lars tries to get to the other side of the room by ripping the painting off the hinges with a very impressive 26 but there is fully a wall behind it and the noise brings Gilfoyle, Harding, and the Badger kids running. Lars notes that in the stone behind the painting it says “⅓”  and then hurriedly puts the painting back. Daisy thinks that might refer to a secret third floor or basement accessible by the elevator (but my first thought was that there were 2 other spying paintings in the house somewhere).

Everyone in the room hears the Gilfoyle and co. coming and try to act natural. There is a group stealth check that they all tank so heavily that all the suspicious staff and kids need to do to suss them out is roll above a 5.

AND THEY ROLL A TWO. 

With that, Lucretia appears, totally buys that they’re doing very important spiritual work in there, and in fact guards the door for them. They use the privacy bought by their very vigilant sentry to plan their next steps. Sly, Daisy, and Ian will check out the study while they rest of them check out the elevator. As they exit, Lucretia asks if they got the answers they needed out of the spirits.

Oh yes, says Daisy, echoing Lucretia’s nonsense prediction from last episode. Either something good or bad might happen. Either way, I’m excited! 

Case Notes

How baller of a player move is it to say a line so poignant that the DM is forced to let you roll with advantage? I have been on the other side of that as the DM and it’s so great. MAD respect to Rekha for that. AND THEN THE DICE COOPERATED. You simply love to see it. 

The other best Rekha line is Daisy to Sly upon being called out about stealing the key in his normal, coy, quippy way: You saw me bitch.

Shout out to Grant also for being constantly on as Sly. The guy is on point always. Impeccable.

I am SO SO SO happy Daisy and Sly are on the same mission team. If I was friends with either of them I’d be like, “This is a toxic relationship, they make you too crazy.” But as an outside viewer I want them to be within crystal ball throwing distance always.  

The question I’m sure we’re all asking: Is Brennan enough of a minx to invoke the butler did it trope? I know everyone at the table is thinking it even if none of them have said it outright. I figured the reason the cops haven’t showed up yet was the storm but who knows?

Two pieces of housekeeping, only Buck and Gangie know what the room behind the painting is with their high rolls and, after the bit of passing it back and forth with Buck, Daisy has the key. 

I really can’t do the bit about Gangie’s mom justice. I wish there was a comedy Emmy for actual play DnD shows so D20 could get the accolades it deserves just for that bit. 

Brennan indicated that the conversation between the mice maids was the most interesting info (Gilfoyle convo to staff was too public to be juicy/they could get the info from one of the many gathered staff people and crying is info on its own--though I am curious about who the crying person was) but I’m wondering what he meant by that. Because the fact that Buck paid them might be interesting if Buck did it. But we know he didn’t. Is it the fact that they were in the room at all? Again, info that the party knows if not Lars specifically.  The fact that they were stealing silverware? What’s Brennan’s game here?

[mollyscribbles]

Owl House rewatch thoughts

* Hard to say from what little we see of her, but I think Luz' mom might have been less worried about her daughter reading fantasy and more about the "multiple incidents of bringing uncontained live animals and explosives to school" thing.

* If Eda considers Luz' Azura book as being only useful as kindling, it means she's not inclined to view human books as something she can make snails on.  Considering how unique her portal to the human realm is treated, where did Amity get her Azura books?  I've seen people suggest the author travels between realms, but if that were the case, Amity would've been able to get the latest volume from a local store rather than needing to borrow Luz' copy.

* Suggestions for other species that escaped from the Boiling Isles: the platypus and peacock mantis shrimp.

* "Weak nerd arms" ok really identifying with Luz here.

* Really love this take on Chosen One stories.  Because yes, there is an appeal in being told you're special, you're unique in the best possible way, but ultimately this is a story about people who aren't "special" so much as outcasts who do their best with the situation they're in.  Which is something that a lot more people can aspire to be.

* The fact that this was a set scheme(as the multiple fake maps would indicate) rather than a trap specifically designed for Luz indicates that even people who've spent their lives on the Boiling Isles would be drawn to the idea of being a magical chosen one. I bet Amity's not the only one to have an interest in fantasy literature around here.

* Oh wow Amity's first appearance outside the credits is . . . something.  It's easy to forget just how far she grew in one season.

* Eda's not a *bad* teacher, so much as she has yet to learn that teaching requires expanding on a concept you introduce and explaining your reasoning.  "Here is what you can learn from tasting snow" instead of just "here, taste these different kinds of snow"

* Hm.  For someone who despairs at the concept of the school teaching blind obedience, her teaching style kinda relies on it.  Bit of a hypocrite there, Eda.

* Gonna be honest, the first time I watched this and King mentioned Eda sneaking a drink of elixir, I thought it was going to turn out to be a magic-looking flask.

* It seems slightly odd that King's apparently known Eda for a while but didn't have any idea of the curse.  Maybe she was just REALLY good about keeping up with her elixirs pre-series.

* Really like the metaphor for a chronic illness that's kept under control by medication.

* If the Emperor's Coven provides access to all forms of magic, you'd think others aspiring for a spot would be permitted a multi-track education at Hexside.  That might be why none of them seem to be that impressive at magic when they're supposed to be the "best of the best" -- even if they have *access* to all forms of magic, they've only had training in one specific field during the bulk of their education.

* lbr, Lilith's cheating was worse because at least Eda told Luz what she was doing.

* You'd think Willow and Gus might have caught on that Luz didn't have permission for them to come over when she told them to hide from Eda.

* It's nice that Eda realizes raising a kid with a "screw the rules" mindset will result in a kid who breaks her rules sometimes.  Cleaning up the mess she caused is really the correct punishment for Luz; directly dealing with the consequences of her actions but otherwise considering it a lesson learned.

* Reading to kids in the library is an A+ way to shift Amity from "Jerk" to "Jerk with a heart of gold" territory.

* Prediction: At some point, Luz will return to the human world (probably only briefly but Eda won't know at the time) and Eda will come across the "Coping with empty nest syndrome" book Luz got her from the library.  She'll cry.  King will cry.  Hooty will cry.  Every viewer will cry.

* Pretty sure that, given what the world is like, if any of them ended up questioned about their actions during the body swap episode, they could just say "Oh yeah I was body swapped that day. What'd I get up to?" and everyone would consider this a perfectly logical explanation for them acting out-of-character.

* HC that Hexside is fully aware some illusion-track students skip class by having an illusion of themselves attend in their place, but they figure a student maintaining a decent replica of themselves for the duration of the class period requires enough effort to count as a form of class participation, so they just let everyone think they're getting away with it.

* Gus and Willow are really ride-or-die friends.  Always nice to have.

* Probably some of the mystery appeal will be gone from the Human Appreciation Society once a legit human is just attending classes on a regular basis; being able to get definitive answers to questions rather than spending your time speculating would cut back on the draw.

* I love all the details they include on this show -- a lot of other shows would just stick in scribbles while panning past pictures instead of writing out all of Eda's incident reports.

* The pallisman is a neat concept; sort of like a mix of a wand and a familiar, a magical control that will have opinions of its own.

* Given Bat Queen apparently has enough of, um, a biological aspect to have kids, I wonder if that means Owlbert is capable of laying eggs.  Or having eggs with another owl/pallisman if the male pronouns are anything to go by.

* I mean even Phineas and Ferb didn't question Perry laying an egg when he uses male pronouns so could go either way in terms of what Disney would allow.

* Reading the book fair signs, it looks like sci-fi is a popular genre in the Boiling Isles.  Makes sense, since what we'd consider Fantasy would be more contemporary/urban fantasy to them.

* Getting the vibe that someone on staff had a less-than-amicable experience co-writing with a friend to inspire this one. And/or experience with shitty contracts.

* The Hexside requirements also required knowledge of basic runes, but given Luz apparently had no issue with that I'm guessing she just picked those up offscreen.

* "I've seen worse" is the ideal admissions response tbh.  Like . . . she pulled off the required spells and the headmaster has seen decades of students' awkward first attempts.  It probably counts as a good day when no one's admissions test resulted in needing to bring in someone from the Construction Track to repair the building.

* It's very reminiscent of D&D that the majority of the cast has the response of "This is clearly a trap.  Let's check it out!"

* You'd think that carnival fortune tellers wouldn't have the same appeal in a world where it's something you study at school.  Unless it's viewed the same way as those "magic" shows they have sometimes where the tricks all involve chemical reactions.

* Kinda surprised a school that teaches kids fire spells doesn't have some kind of fire suppression system in place.

* Hrm.  Guessing the mind guardian went back and undid their own damage offscreen; otherwise they'd have had to go re-do the repairs before leaving.

* Good they had the wifi and charging cable coming through the portal to explain why Luz' phone still has service and the battery's not long dead.

* Luz, how have you survived this long with your instinct for pushing buttons.  The same as the rest of humanity in a world full of buttons, I suppose.

* Probably if they thought about it, the best criteria for picking Grom royalty would be less who's the most skilled at magic and more who has the most low-key fears. . . . nvm, having a Stay-Puft incident would cause them to reasonably scrap that approach.  Maybe appointing someone who obsesses over grades would have better odds of producing a relatively-simple-to-combat exam paper.

* I'm thinking the letters are written by Eda, who doesn't intend anything sinister by it so much as being the type to cover her bases when pulling off a scam and realizing Luz' mother would need some evidence to indicate her daughter was safely at camp.

* The band-aids clearly have some healing spell built-in, considering they've been used to heal inanimate objects.

* someone on the writing staff has a long-standing rant about Quidditch they've been holding back on.

* I know that normally the humor in the cut from "she's finally growing up." to Luz planning the heist would be that she's doing something that sensible adults would consider to be a bad idea, but if Eda saw her just then she'd wipe away a tear of pride and go "Her first self-planned heist! They grow up so fast!"

* Eda's the one who talks about cheating at stuff, but Lilith has a habit of playing *dirty*.

* I would like to say I appreciate them going with a more serious credit sequence because it was disconcerting with Star Vs when a dark ending was followed by "I THINK EARTH'S A REALLY GREAT PLACE"

* Lilith may have made a 30-years-late attempt to redeem herself, but I really don't trust her.  I don't quite want her dead, but she DID spend decades trying to force her sister to join the Emperor's Coven as a prerequisite for curing her curse.

[twilightknight17]

We’re at the end of the road, folks.

And god damn, I feel so validated by my Sojiro characterization. Wow. Thanks for basically making me canon for ten more seconds, Atlus. XDDD

So when last we left our intrepid heroes, they were laying at the bottom of the Jail of the Abyss, because Ichinose is an asshole. So we had to fight our way back up, carrying Sophia’s unconscious body. Which wasn’t that bad; the Jail isn’t very big. We left Sophia at the door to keep her safe, and then charged back into the hall of the Ark to hack Ichinose’s exploding crystal box thing.

Ichinose doesn’t understand why we came back.

So, yeah. I guess like... bizarro-world Maruki? Maruki wanted to alleviate suffering by granting everyone’s wishes. EMMA’s going to make it so that people can’t wish for anything.

After a kick-ass hacking battle set to the new version of Rivers in the Desert, Ichinose yells at us about our right to judge. Why should humanity keep this painful world, just because WE’RE strong? Just because we’ve never screwed up or suffered?

Which, clearly she has no idea who the fuck she’s talking to.

We’ve worked too hard to listen to that kind of bullshit.

Ichinose proclaims that “humans don’t need hearts” and charges up the laser crystal to blast us again, and Sophia steps in to block the attack. She’s still fighting Ichinose’s control even though Ichinose insists that she’s just a faulty prototype.

Apparently Ichinose created Sophia in the first place because she spent a lifetime being called a heartless doll, so she made an AI to help her learn about the heart.

I think you’re the problem, but not for the reasons everyone else is saying.

But she got angry when Sophia started asking questions of her own and basically tossed her aside, until EMMA found her and dropped her into the Shibuya Jail.

And Sophia, unlike her creator, has learned and grown, and is tired of being given orders. She’s ready to make her own choices.

That is certainly a persona.

I gotta admit, they got me. I was wondering why Sophia didn’t have her arcana yet, but for some reason, I also wasn’t expecting her to get a proper persona. I’m now wondering about the implications of someone being able to code an AI capable of developing a soul that can summon a persona. There’s a zero percent chance that Ichinose had any access to plumes of dusk, which are the reason that Aigis and Labrys gained enough consciousness to have personas. So Sophia is legitimately a miracle piece of technology.

Pandora is an interesting choice, but I dunno if I can articulate that beyond a surface-level, “Oh, because she’s Hope, and Hope was still in the box.”

I swear to god, every major villain in this game is trying to be Goro Akechi. For the last goddamn time, we don’t kill people. Get up, Ichinose. We’re leaving.

Ryuji literally grabs her by the arm and drags her out, because she’s trying to stay behind. Which just confirms for me that if Goro hadn’t put up that bulkhead door, we’d have dragged his stupid ass out of the Ship, too. XD

Back to the real world, and Tokyo is blacking out, and the Tower is losing its shit.

The metaverse is fusing with reality, the Tower is becoming the Tree of Knowledge, and hell yes we are climbing this tower after all!

Morgana points out that this is the same thing that happened last year, and Zenkichi freaks out a little bit.

You’re lucky you moved to Kyoto, sir. You missed quite a bit.

I love these kids, though. They’ve got so much black humor about this whole god thing.

The metaverse encroaching on reality means that everyone has to cram into the bus in their thief gear. Zenkichi, please. Your hat. Sir.

I love climbing this tower. I’ve been here, too! Also they have butter. XD

I was expecting the Mementos version of the lower observation deck, and instead I got some weird amalgam between Mementos and Azathoth’s boss chamber.

We had to fight Metatron as the guardian of the last elevator, which is another parallel to Yaldabaoth’s archangels. And then it’s up to what I guess used to be the high observation deck to fight the big box.

EMMA insists that all humanity wants is to let it give them all the answers, and it throws them into some sort of alternate fog world full of the voices of the public.

The Thieves are all separated, trapped in the fog. Each of them has to find their way out, and they realize that the fog of the Desires is protecting EMMA. EMMA knows exactly how calling cards work, so they won’t work on her. Instead, the Thieves decide that they need to send the calling card to the public, so that they’ll become aware of their desires again and the desires will crystalize.

...oh come on, Atlus. We’re right in the endgame.

One last hacker battle to break into EMMA’s server room in the tower, and Futaba and Ichinose manage to hack EMMA itself to deliver a calling card to everyone at once.

Love you, Zenkichi. We’ve taken out two gods already. We’re good.

Confronting the Ark again reveals a bunch of freaky tentacle arms grabbing the desires, and then the box turns into some sort of massive figure that looks sort of like Yaldabaoth, except less robot and more seraphim. It literally names itself the Demiurge, so I feel like EMMA may be drawing something from the lingering dregs of Yald’s influence? It’s cool.

Clearly no one told you what happened to the last false god that thought it knew what was best for humanity. ;) “Hope binds humanity to misery” is bullshit.

After a... not very difficult first phase, the Demiurge reveals its true form, and we split into three teams to take out its support orbs (modeled after the sephirot) and the main body.

I really liked the setup for the last boss. The teams were the first instance where it was really apparent that the whole team was fighting together. Each of the three battles was happening concurrently, and destroying the orbs has a concrete effect on the main fight. I wish we’d gotten to do things like this more often, especially during the Shadow Thieves fight.

That said, the main body was actually the easiest part of the fight? All the attacks were really telegraphed, and not particularly hard to avoid. Except for the spear jab.

But it finished off with a full-team all-out attack, and that was awesome.

The desires began to return to their owners, and we get to bask in a job well done once again.

Upon returning to the real world, it’s the next morning. Sophia’s happy that she got to be a hero, Zenkichi’s heading off to properly arrest Owada, and the rest of us need to head home, because we were supposed to be home last night. Zenkichi can’t figure out why we consider him a phantom thief, since he “only joined [us] to use [us]”. Which is silly. The Phantom Thieves are built on the bonds of friendship and stalking! It’s too late, Zenkichi. You and Akane have been adopted.

I’m a little disappointed we didn’t get to tell Akane the truth. That would have been great.

Atlus personally reaches out and pats me on the head, because Sojiro has the absolute perfect reaction to his kids coming home after a nationwide manhunt for them.

I feel so valid making him serve Lavenza coffee and be completely nonplussed about a guy marrying Death. I love him. We’re so lucky to have Sojiro. XDDDD

The next day, the kids have a celebration party for their victory, and learn that Akira is going home the next day. This kid needs to catch a break. He can’t even have a few days to relax with his friends. X’‘‘D

Everyone goes to see off Akira, though we detour to Shibuya to meet Ichinose. A news report shows that Owada was successfully arrested, and apparently Ichinose tried to turn herself in to the police, and they didn’t believe a word of it.

This is just highlighting my issues with Maruki. Even if he doesn’t think he did anything wrong to society as a whole, he never apologizes to them for what he put them through. Especially Akira. Ichinose turns around and helps them stop the final boss, and her last scene is her apologizing to the Thieves and trying to make amends for her actions. Maruki’s last scene is... “If things get bad, you can start over like me! Now we’re even!” We are not.

Sophia leaves to help Ichinose learn about the heart, Akira promises to come back for winter break, the Phantom Thieves go their separate ways once again, and the credits roll.

I’m gonna leave my final impressions in a different post, because this one is long enough already. So... look forward to that?

[wizardouxie]

Evil Douxie AU Ash Dispersal Pattern is something I Have Not been able to stop thinking about. Just, whoever the leader is, seeing this moping emo kid working in a cafe and being like “ah. New recruit.” Douxie gets dragged along to a meeting somehow (cough Archie gently bullies him into going cough) and he picks up the guitar. For the first little while he’s grouchy and adamantly refuses to be pleasant or even civil. After he meets the old lady, his jabs start to get more friendly and 1/2

teasing and the band notices and responds in turn, until you eventually get an exchange like this: “aw, you know you love us” “...” “YOU DIDNT DENY IT” “waIT NO SHUT UP” “YOU LOVE US” etc etc and just,,, this group of college kids forcibly adopting Douxie makes me soft. How accurate would you say this is to your AU?? -M.H. Anon 2/2

VERY ACCURATE.

[ DISCLAIMER: This is... very very long. That’s all. ]

Ash Dispersal Pattern took a hard hit this year, losing their guitarist in a nasty fight after a gig. Because of that, they were forced to opt out from the Battle of the Bands. Of course then the end of the world happened three times, which also sucked.

But you know, life is too short so might as well say ‘screw it’ and find a new member right? The member that left can eat dirt for all they cared now. And so they put up flyers calling for auditions as a guitarist.

...no one shows up.

Okay so they gotta figure out a new plan. And what better place to do so than in a cafe? So here they are trying to figure out how to get a guitarist. Douxie shows up with their drinks and one of them goes “ayo what’s up!” only to receive a “tch” in response. They’re confused.

“Yo what’s his problem?”

“He’s probably having a rough day, maybe family issues?”

“I dunno man, but his hair looks sick as hell,”

And then it clicks to them. Maybe... him?

And now Douxie is surrounded by strangers that vaguely look around his age, well roughly give or take a few centuries, and he’s biting his tongue.

“I said no.” he replies firmly, backing away. He slings his jacket over his shoulder and eyes a stray black cat curled up nearby before heading on his way. Weirdos. A discussion immediately blows up among the members.

“Are you sure you wanna go with this guy? We’ve had our share of jerk guitarists,”

“Okay but can we talk about his hair? It’s so cool, I bet he has tattoos too,”

“Enough about the hair! Look this kid’s tryna play tough guy with us, but I think we can soften him up, it’ll just take some time.”

“Aight you’re the boss here, but if he screws us over, you’re taking responsibility,”

Archie overhears the conversation and smiles. These children seemed kind, and Douxie could use some normal friends. Nothing against the Arcadia gang, but they have more than enough on their plate and he can’t exactly force them to integrate the ex sorcerer into their friend group.

Douxie hates the idea. It’s stupid.

“You’ve already signed me up for two jobs and school. I don’t even need school! I have centuries worth of knowledge these mortals can’t even dream of knowing,”

“Yes, but we are trying to blend in, Douxie. And besides, I remember you used to play the lute. The guitar is quite similar I believe,”

“Arch I haven’t touched that instrument for god knows how long,”

“Have you forgotten how to play it then?”

Douxie goes quiet. Archie smiles. Well that makes his job much, much easier. He readjusts his glasses.

“I overheard their next meeting is this Thursday, and you’re going. Isn’t that convenient? You don’t work any shifts on that day. It’ll be good for you,”

“That’s what you say about everything!”

“Have I ever been wrong?”

Silence again. So Archie may have developed a talent for shutting up his familiar. He doesn’t really know if that’s a good thing, but it’s definitely frequent.

Thursday rolls in and Douxie shows up to rehearsal grudgingly. The members are surprised. He tells them not to get cozy; just wanted to try something new out. Luckily for him, the members had a backup guitar. The strings feel strange against his calloused hands but also familiar in a way. He strums a chord and a chorus of “ooooo”s fill the room.

“What? I’m competent,” he snaps. The leader raises her hand.

“Didn’t imply you weren’t.”

And so the first few weeks pass by without much conversation. Rehearsals weren’t so bad on the musical aspect; Douxie could play the guitar pretty effortlessly, much to their astonishment. They regularly complimented him even when he did things his own way rather than follow the sheet music. They rarely ever got a response though. Maybe a “hm” if they’re lucky.

Stage presence on the other hand... he was too stiff and lacked energy. Not to mention he constantly looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here. This was where the others started to get slightly ticked off.

“He’s sucking the life out of us dude, like we’re Ash Dispersal Pattern and he’s the freaking vacuum!” the drummer complained

“He doesn’t even sing with us! It’s supposed to be a group effort,” the bass player added.

“Yeah... honestly playing without a guitarist seems better than this,” the vocalist muttered quietly. Everyone looked at them and then the leader.

The leader pinches her nose. So that’s what they all thought huh? And as much as majority would usually win, this wasn’t what she wanted, to lose someone at such an early stage. What they’ve got going is not bad; it just could be better.

“Look, I get it, we’ve had a hard year and him being difficult doesn’t help us. But don’t you think he’s having it hard too? And we’ve all been there before. We’ve had our fights with parents, schools, society and he’s clearly going through it. Right now our best course of action is to just let it pass and let him approach us instead of coming on too strong.”

“Ah so that’s why we chose you as the leader,” the bass player jokes. The leader rolls her eyes.

“Can it, buttsnack.”

Miracles start occurring after the introduction of the little old lady. Douxie no longer keeps on a straight face. Rather, his eyes wonder curiously, mouth forming expressions that he’s not even conscious of. One day the drummer catches him... pouting. Now that’s an expression he didn’t think he’d get to see. 

“You okay there, Hisirdoux? Something get you down?”

“The stairs,” he jokes halfheartedly. 

He gets startled when he hears the drumsticks rattle against the floor. The drummer is running upstairs, yelling. And then he comes back dragging the leader who’s looking at him with concern.

“Yo Hisirdoux my dude, tell her what you told me!” 

“He asked me if something got me down. I said the stairs. Thought it was funny,” the guitarist shrugs. The leader snorts.

“That’s the best you can do?” she comments smiling. Douxie returns the smile much to her surprise.

“Of course not, but do you deserve my best?” The drummer’s jaw drops. Oh snap. The leader on the other hand is very pleased. This is what she’s looking for.

Suddenly Douxie’s phone rings. He picks up while the others listen curiously. His face breaks out into a huge grin. It’s the little old lady.

“Hello love, I’ll pick you up in ten minutes, sound good? Just finishing up rehearsal,” he says softly.

The drummer wiggled his eyebrows at the leader.

“Ooooo we got a lovebird in the band!”

Douxie chokes. 

“Are you okay Douxie?”

“Yeah, yeah, something came up but I’ll be there okay!” He ends the call promptly and shakes his head furiously.

“Aww Douxie’s such a cute name, why can’t we call you that?”

“FIRST OF ALL SHE IS NOT, ahem, she is not my girlfriend. That would be awkward because she is um, sixty to seventy years old,” 

He doesn’t tell them that technically he is 919. The leader meanwhile, looks pointedly at the drummer who is slowly shrinking in his spot. Whoops. Bad call. Douxie looks at the clock. 5:20 pm. He starts packing up, slinging the guitar backpack over his shoulder.

But before he leaves, he surprises them one more time.

“You guys can call me Douxie or Doux too, by the way. The name is growing on me.”

Rehearsals are so much better after that. Douxie’s smiling and talking to them, performing much more animatedly and giving it his all. He still kinda jabs at them, but there’s no tension behind it.

Nowadays he practices at home instead of waiting for rehearsal. It’s a little hard to fit time what with schoolwork and shifts, but he makes it happen. Archie stares at him fondly. This was the life that Douxie needed. One with a balance between honest work and fun.

One day, Douxie brings in some takeout from the bistro. A little celebratory gift because Ash Dispersal Pattern finally got a successful gig after so long. They open up all the boxes, set out plates, napkins flying all over the place. It’s loud, chaotic, a little dirty, but it doesn’t matter to Douxie because he’s with his friends.

Wait.

“Dang Doux, you didn’t have to do all this but you did anyways. I bet you love us. don’t you?” the vocalist teased.

Douxie remains quiet. Friends. As in, people he really cares about and looks forward to spending time with. People who he wouldn’t mind spending the rest of his life with. People who he --

“--LOVES US SHUT UP OH MY GOD!” the drummer yells, taking him back to reality. He looks at them with a smile and a shrug and suddenly he’s being attacked with hugs. They’re all screaming about how he’s always been soft and loved them from the start.

And then he’s crying. Everyone starts to panic and they’re scrambling off of him, asking him if he’s okay, if what they did was too much or anything like that. He shakes his head, trying to wipe his tears. It’s just... he’s never been held like this by so many people and for so long. He was so touch starved that he didn’t know what to do with this much love and appreciation. Quite frankly it’s been so long since it felt like he was truly wanted. 

He tells them it’s okay, really, he was just a little overwhelmed. But now the craving for their touch is so much stronger.

“Can you hold me again like that? Just for a bit? It was nice,” he asks timidly and they nod eagerly. Within ten minutes, they fall asleep in each other’s arms. Archie quietly pulls a blanket over them and sleeps on Douxie’s lap.

His work here is done.

[littleblackqrow]

((I think the most frustrating part of watching people analyze the actions of characters in vol8 is that the biggest complaint is that logic is thrown out the window and I would argue that’s the point. Especially because of the perspective of the show. I really hate to keep picking on Ironwood, Qrow, and RWBY, but those characters are the ones driving the plot, so I guess we gotta.

Lets start with RWBY. They’re kids first off. WBY are all about 19-20 years old and Ruby is 17. Lets start off by saying those are ages not exactly known for smart, long term decision making. Most people that age are trying to figure out what they want to do for the rest of their lives, struggling with college, dates, drinking, sex for the first time. They’re stumbling around in adult bodies while still having more or less the mind of a teenager because society has suddenly stopped treating them like a kid and expects them to be an adult. Except instead of having to struggle with decisions about their near future, RWBY is being asked to save the world. If you think you could handle that pressure well at 17-19, you’re lying. 

Does it make their decisions right though? No. The way they treated Ozpin for hiding the worst of his abuse and the fact that his ex-wife was an insane bitch who is functionally immortal is wrong. But again, I ask you, could you handle having all that dumped into your lap in an already stressful situation? The person who should be (and rightly is) condemned for his reaction is Qrow for throwing a punch. No matter how upset you are no hitting. Once you throw a punch in that situation, you’re the bad guy. And until he makes an effort of an apology he’s the bad guy in that situation. 

The biggest problem that team RWBY has is that all of their terrible decisions throughout the show have either been rewarded, or the got bailed out from having to see the real consequences. 

Ozpin allowed Blake to hide her White Fang past and therefore missed the least subtle component of the Fall of Beacon. Things could have been significantly less bad if he’d known about their involvement and was able to send Qrow in to spy on their operations. Maybe he could have figured out what Roman or Adam was up to, realized they were working for Cinder and by extension Salem.

Ozpin allowed team RWBY to do a mission that was a couple grades too advanced for them because he knew they’d break the rules otherwise. That was a tacit acknowledgement that he thought whatever they were up to was alright, and that they had his blessings on whatever it was that they wanted to do.

The best example of terrible decision after terrible decision that RWBYJNR makes is Argus. They have no idea how they’re getting the Relic to Atlas, and they seem road blocked. Jaune suggests stealing an airship, and Qrow, the adult in the room tells them that this is a bad idea, and if it goes bad it has the potential to screw up their entire life. He’s right. The problem is that he’d run off on his bender, and therefore the kids, and we in the audience, are supposed to see this as an unreasonable suggestion. 

However, it plays out as him being right. The incredibly complicated plan did go wrong. Now, they had no reason to suspect at the time that Adam was stalking Blake at the time (and I could go into why thats perfectly ic for him at another date), but there were a lot of moving parts in this plan and literally any of them could have broken. Everything that happened after they put this plan into motion was reactionary. Cordovan, obsessed with showing the Might of Atlas (TM), jumped into the mech suit. At that point, Ruby didnt really have a choice of not breaking it. But the ensuing fight created enough general unease that it summoned a Grimm hoard.

By rights, Argus should have fallen because of their bad decisions and in spire of their best efforts. Instead, Cordovan had a change of heart at the last moment and bailed them out.

This just reinforced the flawed idea that RWBY is always in the right and directly lead to s7′s climax. They are the unstoppable force.

Now you have Ironwood, quite literally the unmovable object, which I now realize is sort of his name. Ha.

Ironwood’s behavior does not come out of nowhere. Since his appearance, he’s had problem stamped all over him. He showed up with an entire goddamn army to a supposedly peaceful event that is to promote unity and the excellence of each kingdom. His rationale is that the people are going to be impressed with his big guns and feel safe. Ozpin gently points out that those big guns also signal to people that there is something out there that those big guns are designed to shoot. 

If its not a Grimm, could it mean that Atlas intends to shoot people?

Remember we’re not even 100 years out from the last World War, one that was basically started by Atlas. People are nervous. There are still grandparents and great grandparents alive today that were kids when the Great War was happening. Not only that but we’re also made aware that Atlas has rolled in the apolitical protectors of the people, the Huntsmen, into its military. This elite fighting force that is basically above the law and can go to any country in the world whenever they want, is now part of the military. The ONLY standing military that Remnant seems to have.

All of this has obviously caused friction in the Inner Circle. Qrow is not quite and never has been quiet about his disdain for James’ heavy handed techniques. Glynda calls James’ actions a dick measuring competition, and Ozpin was trying to be gentle about it, but he was clearly telling Ironwood to get his army off his fucking front lawn. And what did Ironwood do? He’d gone around Ozpin and talked to the Vale council.  They were threatening to remove Oz fro his position because they agreed with Ironwood: he was being too passive. Ironwood even tells Glynda that he cant believe that a man he trusted for so long would just sit by and stand to the side instead of meeting the problem head on. He didnt seem to understand why Qrow would want to go gather intelligence on an operation before sending in the big guns. 

Ironwood has never been a man to put a well thought out plan with all his ducks in a row into motion. This is a man who plows through opposition at every opportunity.

And when we see him again, we can see him steamrolling through opposition again. Somehow he got himself two seats on the council. That gives him an enormous amount of power. And his position as general means that at any point he can declare an emergency and become the de facto dictator of Atlas if he deems it fit. The problem is that he’s having these arguments against Jacques Schnee a man that the audience rightly hates, so he seems reasonable. Who gives a fuck about Jacques loosing business, he’s a dickhead. We’re not noticing the fact that James is consolidating power, or that he’s using that power to make unilateral decisions with no one telling him no.

There’s no one left in the room who is able or willing to tell him that these are bad ideas, that there will be consequences that he cant foresee. His  bullish behavior lead to both Robyn Hill and Jacques Schnee running for an empty council seat, and that created the environment that we walked into in s7.

Now, not all James’ ideas are bad. The Amity Project is actually a really good one, and James is right in wanting to keep it from the general public until its near completion. But you know who should have known? The other fucking council members. Probably the candidates. Playing your cards too close to the chest when you clearly need help and allies is a bad thing. But again, James didnt even trust Ozpin to be able to run his own kingdom, so durr hurr of course he’s the only one who can take care of Amity. And run a kingdom. And run an academy. And protect an ageing, ailing Maiden. And of course he doesnt have time to treat his horrific PTSD from the Fall of Beacon.

So when things go tits up because again, of course they will with a plan that complex James Ironwood doubles the fuck down on his terrible solo decision making. Clearly, non of this is his fault. No one is listening to him. He cannot trust others to make decisions so he’s going to make all of them. There’s no one around him to tell him no, especially because the first person that tried was publicly executed. 

James is scared. He’s had a mental break because of that fear. His paranoia, his PTSD, and the fact that there’s nothing there to help him back to stability means that he’s just going to be bouncing from one terrible choice to the next. He’s Hamlet in the throes of paranoia, heading down a road that is going to get everyone, including himself killed. He is King Lear as the world crumbles around him, acting cruel and making unreasonable, horrible demands of those around him. 

Working with Watts seems like an absolutely terrible idea, but to someone who thinks that he is in control of the situation because he has to be in order to keep functioning, there’s no way that this can bite him in the ass. For James, if no one is willing to follow his orders, he’s going to make them. This attitude is probably exactly why Watts did what he did and joined Salem in the first place. 

So when you combine the unstoppable force of Team RWBY, who’s been told they’re the child saviors of the world, and who’ve been either rewarded or bailed out of their bad decisions against the immovable object of Ironwood and his absolute conviction in himself, you have the mess Atlas is in now.

Honestly I find it kind of brilliant.