#(like ‘yeah she’s the most important person in my life and I love her infinitely more than my long term boyfriend’)

[reflectionsofgalaxies]

the more photos of Sophie T I see the more I understand why she’s so beloved in the fandom. she’s just a whole fucking mood. like

first one she’s completely dead pan doing a perfect thumbs up

second one she’s doing an exaggerated stereotypical Italian hand gesture

and in the third one she’s just fully stanced up with her fucking coffee. what an icon.

[ghost-proofbaby]

I'm gonna cheat because I don't listen to TS but you know how much I love our pair from Maroon. can you tell us which of her newest songs you most associate with them right now. any tidbits you feel like sharing

^ it's me pleading for special treatment because I love you

abi babe i will always give you infinite special treatment always. however i apologize for how long this is because, uh, this is the couple who i specifically think dominates my brain while listening to TTPD.

i've already covered "I Can Do It With a Broken Heart", so that one 100%.

besides that, though...

Down Bad. the entire premise of the song being compared to being abducted by aliens and when you're returned to earth being like "actually i liked it better up there take me back" as a metaphor for love feels very much like when you had a good relationship, something you expected to last forever, and it just gets taken from you. however, to spice things up - i think it works better applied to how eddie feels. the whole 'fuck it if i can't have him' is exactly how he feels as he's completely destroying himself in the aftermath. and just for fun, so you don't necessarily have to listen to the songs if you don't feel like it my love, i'm adding the specific lines from each song that i feel apply the most.

"how dare you think it's romantic, to leave me safe and stranded? 'cause fuck it, i was in love. so fuck you, if i can't have us."

^ it applies to both reader/sugar and eddie. first half feels very her, because he left her behind to not risk exposing her to a life that had begun to decay him. but second half feels very him cause... fuck it, ya know?

So Long, London. this one is about just being sad and mad about the end of a relationship, and that's where both eddie and sugar still are mentally. to build something so sacred up only to watch it be burned down by the other person. sugar is far angrier than eddie, though, since she's not really taken the time to work through how she feels with the end of it all.

"i didn't opt in to be your odd man out. i founded the club she's heard great things about. i left all i knew, you left me at the house by the heath. i stopped cpr - after all, it's no use."

also.... honorable mentions to the entire goddamn bridge, but specifically "you swore that you loved me, but where were the clues?" and "i'm just mad as hell 'cause i loved this place for so long"

I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can). it's a bit of a spoiler, and a bit of a reach, but i think it's a good perspective from the others looking in. the media, but also specifically corroded coffin. this really only applies to post break-up them story-wise, too. he's wrecked himself, destroyed all that he was, and sugar is the only one seeming capable of bringing him back to what he once was.

"i can fix him - no, really, i can. and only i can."

loml. i guess what i'm saying is basically every single song where taylor got very vulnerable and terribly sad about the end of an important/long relationship. this one speaks for itself quite a bit because of the theme of the guy saying "you're the love of my life" repeatedly, only to leave. which is exactly what eddie did, in the grand scheme of things. and taking it a step further? the small implications of a breakup and attempt at rekindling? yeah, yeah that's them alright, your honor.

"who's gonna stop us from waltzing back into rekindled flames, if we know the steps anyway?"

^ literally what they are doing as we speak ^

The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived. this one i would mostly apply to all of sugar/reader's anger pre-reunion. that anger of a man who simply ghosts you. she didn't let herself feel the 'breakup' much, but she did go through some of the stages of grief - and she got stuck at anger.

"you kicked out stage lights, but you're still performing. and in plain sight, you hid. but you are what you did."

^ all his self-destruction when she sees it at surface level :) just seeing him as doing nothing more than throwing a tantrum :)

this is getting a bit out of hand now, but when it comes to the double album bit, there's even more. i don't want to bore you to death so i'm just going to list those songs but. yeah. this album felt very maroon coded to me. the losing and the anger and the sadness and the clinging to what once was. should've expected it, in all fairness.

from THE ANTHOLOGY, i'd say that 'the black dog', 'chloe or sam or sophia or marcus', 'how did it end?', 'i look in people's windows', 'the prophecy', 'peter', and 'the manuscript' are the ones that fit best for maroon. some are a stretch, some it's solely based off of one line that i couldn't get over, and some i just simply think it's the vibes. a true matter of the illness that is "they're my blurbos so i'll apply whatever song i want to them".

i'm sure we'll see a few of these as chapter titles going forward, including the anthology ones, so that'll probably be when i dig in a little deeper about specific lyrics. or when i post ominous music posts.

anyways if you made it to the end (especially you abi) i love you so fucking much and thank you for enjoying my absolutely insane ted talk i just basically did on how TTPD is very very sugar x eddie coded <3

[13xwishes]

Thoughts on the core trio? If you don’t want to answer them in one ask then you can just do Frankie

CHARACTER OPINION MEME || { ACCEPTING }

Anonymous Wishes || Core Trio Gen 1 (Frankie, Draculaura & Clawdeen)

Good thing I have the braincell! I decided to do all three. This is gonna be a bit of a long post so bare with me.

Frankie is the perfectly imperfect main ghoul

As far as it comes to the main, even as one of the ones shown the most, I feel like they did a good job with Frankie's character. She's not just a teen monster at Monster High, but THE teen to help you guide through it and relate to. I thought I wasn't going to like Frankie as much because of how they constantly show her most of the episodes but she balances out with her freaky flaws and difficult struggles.

Frankie's personality is what you expect for a teen experiencing High School life for the first time and is trying to fit in while going on a journey. And she takes us on the journey pretty well. She understands and learns along the way, is VERY protective of her friends and loves them enough to even DIE for them. She gets major credit for that. Plus even when the movie does focus on her, she never really overshadows the other monsters. Instead it feels like she brings them into the fold.

If there's any teen you can relate to the most, it would be Frankie in this series.

Clawdeen the fashionista is a good main that struggles

Ngl, Clawdeen was annoying at the start of her introduction, coming off as a bit of a hypocrite to contradict what she says. But eventually she builds up better from that. Clawdeen is the kinda ghoul that you wanna see throw down and look good doing it. Like her only time she threw hands was during 13 Wishes (best boovie of all) when she finally got to PUNCH someone!

Clearly Clawdeen is the tough ghoul who dreams big and even though she wasn't expanded as much ad Frankie and Draculaura, there were times I understood her plight. Like wanting to impress the people you look up to (she and Howleen are alot alike than they think), dealing with complicated younger siblings in the same school and trying to NOT knock the other monster who is giving you and your friends flat so you don't get suspended.

Scaris happens to be one of my favorites because of how it balances out and how Clawdeen got to balance herself out and learn along the way. She started off stagnant but develops along the way. She's honestly the one in the trio that needs to be exploited more.

Draculaura... the over populated one

Yeah I'm gonna say it: she's overrated (Love you Sam but not sorry!). I mentioned before that Draculaura is listed as one of my top five LEAST favorite characters, but it's not because she's a bad character. She has good morals, she supports her friends and deals with her own struggles. But its more like she's... overly spoiled? Like it's clear she is the brand favorite if you look up how she has the most amount of dolls in the franchise. And even in the remakes she lives one of the best lives in the monster world.

As for her character in itself, I honestly have a hard time sympathizing with her. Even when the movie focuses on her such as WHY DO GHOULS FALL IN LOVE or FRIGHTS,CAMERA, ACTION, the movie instead overshadows the plot for something Laura wants rather than something important such as NOT LETTING DISCRIMNATION RUN FOR THE MONSTER WORLD VAMPIRES!

Draculaura can also be invasive at times to the point where its uncomfortable for the ghouls such as GHOULS RULE on trying to force Clawdeen on a date with a guy (before she's canonically a lesbian). She WAS the head of the gossip pool before Spectra came along. And also she tends to be over-materialistic. If it wasn't for the amount of money or hierarchy she has, I'm pretty sure she and Cleo would be banned from every kind of transportation system EVER. I'm also kind of bitter for the webisode 'Draculocker' of how instead of giving her some kind of infinite purse like Jimmy neutron style, they fill up the school with giant lockers so she can store stuff. THIS IS NOT HOW YOU SOLVE YOUR HOARDER PROBLEM!

So yeah for Draculaura, not hate but they could've done better with her character and humble her down. There are other monsters in the franchise that deserve limelight time.

[nono-bunny]

I tried watching the 2009 K-drama of Boys Over Flowers, but unfortunately by the fourth episode I decided to drop it because it just felt like a bad attempt at recreating the 2005 J-drama while also attempting and failing to create a new backstory for Tsukushi. I tried to write a post about why exactly I didn't like it, actually, but I shelved it because honestly, it was difficult to put into words why everything about it felt so wrong, but like. It did, and I dropped it

Anyway, I went on to try the other HYD adaptation on Netflix, which is the 2018 Chinese Meteor Garden. Going into it, I mostly just knew it was gonna kinda write out the bullying thing, and also that apparently Yoko Kamio really likes that version in particular anyway? So like, I didn't really know what to expect... But ngl, I was not expecting to like and respect it as much as I do

First of all!!! It is undoubtedly the adaptation with the most true-to-manga version of events, which. While I actually really enjoy the weird timeline mashup of the J-drama, after reading the manga I definitely really did wish to see a version that didn't cut out Kazuya and Kinsan, among other things, but yeah honestly I just really wanted to see these two lmao

It also??? Does a fantastic job at creating new things (they might have been in the OG Meteor Garden but I didn't watch that so,,) and adapting to the weird censorship around the instigating events of the story in a way that's genuinely so fun, while also managing to find ways to keep the characterizations of the characters that very easily could've been lost when taking out the whole malicious and violent nature of the F4. It does GREAT character work in general!! Li Zhen being a Makiko-turned-Sakurako as opposed to just erasing Makiko (which I still find hilarious considering the manga literally acknowledges that) by introducing Sakurako in her place is such a unique and fantastic solution to get around the bullying again while giving her a new, sympathetic motivation that feels much more in tune with this less extravagant (as in, making it just slightly less about the class disparity lol) version of the story, and!! As much as I love Sakurako, I feel like I appreciate Li Zhen just as much for like,, losing herself over her jealousy, and coming out of the whole ordeal as a much more confident person who's able to be a better, more proactive friend. Their motives and backgrounds are different, but the results end up roughly the same, and! I'm fine with, heck, I actually rather like Li Zhen not being the cackling narcissistic love rival (as much as that's probably like, my favorite trope), it works well for the story and she's portrayed really well by her actress!

Also, as expected, I love Qinghe, he's my boy!!! God fr I simply do not understand why Kazuya is only a part of the Meteor Garden adaptations of the story, he's so fucking great and it's heartbreaking that he got taken out of most of the adaptations when you can see how much he adds to the dynamic. Like, fr, Kazuya and Tsukasa competing over fishing is so iconic, it's such a dumb, joyous thing they do, like, peak of what "boys will be boys" should be, and!!! As expected it's SUCH a fun thing to see adapted

Kazuya being the loveable loser comic relief added so fucking much to the manga, because like, fr, both of the versions that I've seen that cut him are infinitely more depressing to watch!! He's so important to preserving the emotional balance of the story, not to mention how much better the story feels when Tsukushi DOES have an actual, genuine friend that goes to Eitoku with her. J-drama Tsukushi hangs out with Yuki and Okami A LOT to make up for the lack of any supportive people in her school life outside of F4, and without Kazuya around, ultimately, Tsukushi is definitely less close to the F4 than she is in the manga where his hijinks allow them to genuinely become friends, and the K-drama just didn't have any fun(ny) characters to replace him and it made it so difficult to watch!!! But Qinghe is such a bro, he's just as fun as I expected him to be if not *more*, and! Him being included makes such a huge positive difference

So far, the K-drama is obviously my least favorite adaptation, but I'm genuinely having trouble deciding whether I like the Japanese or Chinese one better, because both offer very different things and I actually love both!! The Japanese version is definitely like,,, the easier version for me to connect to, just because I already know the character names, and the jokes and most of the plot is consistent with the tone of the manga because it's the same setting (my very basic knowledge of Japanese definitely helps too lmao), but. The Chinese version is more fun to watch by virtue of being less depressing (fr, Kazuya makes ALL the difference), which also in a way makes it easy to get invested in it

Overall I'm actually very happy with what I've seen from Meteor Garden so far (I'm about halfway through it rn), and it's great to have another version of the story to cycle through because HYD has very quickly become one of my comfort media

[iloveubee]

I Will Forever love my girlfriend, She Is the most important person to me and, to be honest even if i am with others Like Friends, no one Is at the same level as her, even if il with others without her i feel lonley...She Is the love of my Life and the emotion i have for her are infinite i wanna be with only her for the rest of my life, i can see myself with any other girl other that her, i want i bright future with her, i want to be with her Forever and live togheter in a nice house and be finally Happy. So i was thinking in the future or when we can to propose to her, i wanna make the most breathtaking, emotional and real proposal ever, so i wanted to remake a scene from Steven Universe One of her favourite cartoons of all time, (also i know that It becomes a sad and goes badly but its so pretty and meaningful) i wanted to recreate the proposal scene of Connie and Steven in Steven Universe Future, its so pretty and romantic, also where i live Is full of beatches, and maybe i know the closest match, i have the pick Nick set thats probably the easyest part, gettin the food Is not that difficult, the there Is the outfit idk if i would be wearing the same outfit at Steven, idk maybe i would look cheesy, but maybe yeah to be accurate, the only problem Is the Song part, i can't play a ukulele, but maybe i could Just sing idk or i would entirely skip the ukulele part? Idk i still Need to figure It out, i Will still propose with the glowstick bracelet Like Steven but i Will propetly attach the Ring box with It? Idk i Will surely buy her a Pink or purple ring with a meaningful gem, idk i have still planty of time to decide and, for now i Just i wanna see her so bad, i miss you bee.

[astralanthropologists]

can you talk a bit about the dynamics of Bones, Jim, Anna, and Riona in your polycule? you sometimes talk about them as each other's sun, moon, and stars, and I'm super interested in how you conceive of those relationships and what that means to you

Oh, man. This is a whole like. Thing. XD Charlie (@aseelierose) and I always throw our OCs into any fandom, and I think that Charlie was super excited when I got into Trek, because they've always been a big fan of it (and are currently getting their partner to watch all of Trek, too). They've always paired Anna with Jim, and I absolutely fell in love with Bones (obviously). And, well. Charlie and my OCs are very bisexual. AOS McKirk is, in my opinion, not even subtext, but y'know. Ship and let ship, and I love watching other people bring other ships to life, especially in rp.

And we're gonna take that quote about dreamers and realists from Modern Family:

“There are dreamers and there are realists in this world. You'd think the dreamers would find the dreamers, and the realists would find the realists, but more often than not, the opposite is true. See, the dreamers need the realists to keep them from soaring too close to the sun. And the realists? Well, without the dreamers, they might not ever get off the ground.”

~*~

For a personal rundown: Riona—Jim is the Sun; it’s also a star, and they’re similar, and he reminds her of her home amongst the sky. Len is the Moon; it’s part of the night sky and pulls the most focus as the brightest light in the darkness. Anna is the Stars; they are her home and most natural place of being, and that’s Anna; she just feels free with Anna. Note: Riona is also a dreamer. Len—Jim is the Sun; he rebuilt his entire fucking life orbiting Jim Kirk without even realizing it. Anna is the Moon; she’s his anchor the way the Moon achors the tides. Riona is the Stars; not only can he not associate them with her, but he just feels like Riona is infinite. Note: Len is also a realist. Anna—Jim is the Sun; he’s been the brightest light since she met him. Len is the Moon; quiet in his brilliance, but no less important. Riona is the Stars; again, the association, but also because of the stars as hope. Note: Anna is also a realist. Jim—Anna is the Sun; she’s big and bold and brilliant and vibrant, and he just feels warm. Bones is the Moon; he feels like losing Bones would be catastrophic. Losing the Sun causes basically instant death. But losing the Moon causes devastation while life can still be sustained, and he doesn’t know how to lose Bones. Riona is the Stars; again, the association, but also because the Stars are constant, and Riona just feels like she’ll always be around for whatever he needs her to be. Note: Jim is also a dreamer.

~*~

So, yeah. It started with Riona/Bones and Jim/Anna, but Riona and Anna almost always end up in a friends with benefits situation, because it's easy for them to sleep together when they're not communicating their feelings to other people. And it's not that they don't have feelings for each other. Riona's love for Anna is something that is very freeing and needed in this verse in particular, as Anna's the first person Riona's fallen in love with since her faerie partner, Aidan, was killed. Aidan's death was what prompted her to join Starfleet; she just didn't feel at home in the faerie world anymore, despite having her family (Aislinn, Aleria, and Logan). It wasn't their whole family, and she just couldn't live with the fragments. Anna, being half-Betazoid, gets a lot from Riona that Riona doesn't say, and Anna is just as open and honest with Riona because of this and because of her Betazoid culture. Anna has a bad break up in Academy that makes it very convenient for her and Riona to get closer, and it's just easy for them. 

~*~

Now, McKirk is something to me that is just obvious, and I have a lot of posts about the two of them. But what it comes down to is that they were both at the lowest point of their lives when they found each other in that shuttle, and then they built these new lives together.

They don’t know how to separate themselves from the other person, and if you don’t believe me, just look at how they react in Into Darkness. When Jim thinks that Bones could die because of that torpedo? He is on the edge of breaking, even though he knows that he would still need to push forward and keep captaining the Enterprise. And Bones? Look at his reaction to opening the body bag and seeing Jim’s corpse. Everything drains right out of him. He’s broken and can’t even stand. He collapses and barely even breathes. 

The two of them have a dynamic that works for them, but it is extremely codependent.

~*~

Jim/Anna is the first couple that like. Actually gets their shit together. Granted, there is some small manipulations there. Spock would call them "calculated decisions". It's an away mission, and they have to pretend to be a couple, and Anna's half-Betazoid and their chief of security, so it makes sense for her to be undercover in this to protect Jim during what is supposed to be a diplomatic event. And playing these parts and having to pretend to be together forces them to actually confront their feelings.

But it's a wonderful slowburn, because the two of them are made of the same stuff. They hide behind big, brash personalities in order to keep their insecurities hidden and put up this wall. But they get each other. They see each other's heart, and they love the way that the other cares so fucking much. They both have so much that they want to go and explore and learn and do, and they realize that they want to do that together. And, for as much as they're similar, they're also different. Anna's more of a realist, and she helps ground Jim.

~*~

Anna/Bones is the foundation of this polycule, though. Maybe it's because they're both the realists; maybe it's because Into Darkness was particularly traumatizing for them. But they have a lot of realizations together and pretty much vow to be there, not only for each other, but for their dreamers. They bond a lot during the two weeks Jim is out before he fully wakes up from being dead, and they have an implicit understanding of each other. That time, that shared trauma, and their understanding is also why Anna is the one other person in the entire universe who is actually able to call Len Bones, but only during very specific instances. They are the ones who make the polycule possible, though.

~*~

Len/Riona is, well, one of my favorites. I'm a sucker for idiots-to-lovers; I'm a sucker for mutual pining that they think is unrequited. I'm a sucker for how they can't quite figure out their timing. They're both so scared, so hesitant. They're so in love, but they're both of the opinion that if something goes wrong, then it's over. Bones is more than content to just be Jim's friend; that relationship doesn't have to be romantic. He accepts his feelings, and he just kind of tucks them away. If Jim ever felt the same, that'd be great, but it doesn't matter.

With Riona, it's different. They are all or nothing, and that's so terrifying to both of them. Riona, especially, because barring some extreme traumatic event, Riona's outliving Len by an eternity. She knows she will lose him someday. And it's easier to pretend like it won't kill her when it happens, and it's easier to not take the risk of making their friendship more, because if it goes wrong, then she lost the person who makes her feel safe.

And all of this is also why, when they finally admit how they feel after dancing around it for the better part of four long years (though they both knew before that, so....), they don't have to date. They already know each other inside and out, know their fears and insecurities, know the way they fit together and can just breathe.

~*~

Jim/Riona is the last piece of the puzzle, and it's their similarities that finally pull them together. The way neither of them know how to give anything less than all of themselves, the way they both are constantly craving home and connections, the way that they both love the stars as if the stars flow through their blood. Sometimes, they're the only person who can get the other one to stop. They're always turned up to an 11, always at the highest setting, but they bond in the quiet moments. They figure things out in shared bad feelings, in taking a breath and looking at the stars, in getting the other out of their head. Jim is the only one who can get Riona to just sleep. And it's usually because he needs to sleep, too, and having a light sleeper makes it so that he can't just get up and go think about things. They're the dreamers, but that means that they can whisper about the bad parts of being dreamers, too.

~*~

And then putting them all together is just....they all came from places of loneliness, of loss, of trying to find who they are. And they found each other. They found themselves along the way, and they owe all of that to each other. They brought light back to each other's worlds.

[love-strawberry]

you and midnight walks

summary : in which they're so in love that it makes everyone jealous.

pairing : ben barnes x reader

warnings : language

author's note : had so much fun writing this!! hope you all like it <33

tagged : @mrsben-barnes @ellora-brekker @slut4benbarnes

masterlist

navigation

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liked by tchalamet, freddycarter1, kittheyounger and 3,428,926 others

y/n_ when you're giving him the silent treatment but then HE starts to give YOU the silent treatment<<<

tagged benbarnes

98,628 comments

username dump him, marry me

username he looks so good

username yeah ben wtf

daniellegalligan_ smh ben

username i love them so much your honour

benbarnes i'm sorry, please let me in now

-> y/n_ no

-> benbarnes i made you coffee

-> y/n_ opening the door as we speak

username their relationship>>>

username he's so beautiful

jessie_mei_li forget him, let's date, i'll give you all the attention you want bb

-> y/n_ benbarnes bye, i love you jessie

username 🦋🦋🦋

freddycarter1 did you let him in? he's been texting me constantly

-> y/n_ yeah i did, it's so hard to stay mad at him

jacktwolfe you guys>>>

username ❣️❣️❣️

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liked by y/n_, lewistanofficial, amitasuman_ and 3,628,528 others

benbarnes wife appreciation post cause she deserves it. thank you so much for making everyday feel like a dream, i love you <3

tagged y/n_

98,827 comments

username im sobbing

username them them them them them them them them them them

username they invented being in love

kittheyounger stop making all of us feel single, it's not pleasant

username when will it be my turn?!

amitasuman_ the happiest, the most beautiful and loving person i know 🦋🌙

username me on my knees for y/n y/l/n and y/n y/l/n only

username 🛐🛐

username ben 🤝 everyone : simping for y/n

username he loves her so much i can't-

lewistanofficial 🤍🤍🤍

username me @ god for not giving a soulmate : 🖕🏼

jessie_mei_li 💟💟

y/n_ ahhhhhsjhdjsks i love you so much, thank you for being in my life and making it infinite times better

-> benbarnes ❤️❤️❤️

calahan.skogman you guys 🤍✨

username 💕💕

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liked by jacktwolfe, archierenaux3, benbarnes and 4,729,529 others

y/n_ you and midnight walks with you are my favourite <3

tagged benbarnes

101,268 comments

username alexa play late night talking by harry styles

username wow, i feel so single rn

username hahaha i hate this hahaha

daniellegalligan_ my loves 💕

freddycarter1 where are you both? your bf is needed on set

-> y/n_ we're getting ice cream, we'll be there

-> freddycarter1 niceee get me cookies and cream. and mint choco chip for jack

-> y/n_ ofc

username fuck romeo and juliet, i want what these bitches have

tchalamet y'all make me sick with love

lbardugo babies 🦋🦋

username no one simps for ben more than y/n and no one simps for y/n more than ben

username their love for eachother is all i want in life

benbarnes these talks about random things with you are my favourite :)

-> y/n_ sameee i love them so much, it's so interesting to hear you talk about memes and how important they are to society

username i wanna hear ben talk about memes

username ben and y/n>>> everyone else

jessie_mei_li making me wanna get in a relationship

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liked by tchalamet, kittheyounger, jessie_mei_li and 4,182,927 others

benbarnes happy happy happy birthday to the love of my life <3

tagged y/n_

99,628 comments

username HAPPY BIRTHDAY QUEEN

username Y/N SUPREMACY>>>

username she's so pretty wtf

daniellegalligan_ my wife's birthday :)

username 🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍

username i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her i love her

username she's so beautiful, ben's so lucky

y/n_ omg i love you!! thank you so much <333

-> benbarnes i love you more <3

username brb gonna cry

jacktwolfe on my way with freddy and kit

username 🥳🥳🥳

username the queen's birthday ayyyy

username her style is top tier

amitasuman_ 💋❣️🦋💕

lbardugo happy birthday to my favourite child <3

username ✨🤍

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[rphelperblog]

Gilmore Girls Quote RP Meme

requested by the lovely writer and person @offorester

"I'm afraid that once your heart's involved, it all comes out in moron."

"Well, you know my babbling capabilities are infinite."

"This town is like one big outpatient mental institution."

"Reality has no place in our world!"

“I live in two worlds, one is a world of books.”

"It’s all any of us wants, to find a nice person to hang out with ‘til we drop dead."

"Breathe in, folks. Smells like Fall."

"Why did you drop out of Yale?!"

"Every day that you breathe, you make my life harder."

"People are particularly stupid today, I can't talk to any more of them."

"It’s all any of us wants: to find a nice person to hang out with till we drop dead.

"If you're going to throw your life away, he better have a motorcycle!"

"It's a show?" "It's a lifestyle. It's a religion."

"I'm fine. I'm just being dramatic. It's what I do."

"You can use your mother's old golf clubs. They're upstairs, gathering dust, with the rest of her potential."

“And if eating cake is wrong, I don’t want to be right.”

"You're going to kiss me now? So incredibly predictable."

"Are you ever gonna ask me out? You flirt with me. You act like you like me."

"I just take a book with me everywhere. It's a habit."

"You're a book tease."

"You've got such a great brain!"

“A little nervous breakdown can work wonders for a girl.”

"People can live a hundred years without really living for a minute."

"Coffee, please, and a shot of cynicism."

"Life's short. Talk fast."

"It's not too much food. This is what we've been training for our whole lives. This is our destiny. This is our finest hour."

"I don't know if she ever realized the person I most wanted to be was her."

“I hate when I’m an idiot and don’t know it. I like being aware of my idiocy.”

"Because I love you, you idiot!!"

"I want to live my life so I can read an in-depth biography about myself in later years."

"It’s times like these that you realize what is truly important in your life."

“I need coffee in an IV.”

"Well, if you expect that muffin to fly back to the kitchen by itself you better go get it a cape."

“You have to sleep, it’s what keeps you pretty.”

"I am attracted to pie, but I do not feel the need to date pie."

"Every relationship is just a big honking leap of faith."

"I have liked you for some time now and I don't think this feeling is going to go away."

"It’s just my favorite time of year. The whole world changes color.”

“Everything’s magical when it snows.”

"Oh my gosh, he kissed me."

"I love you, you idiot."

"It is what it is. You, me."

"No men. Just lots and lots of Chinese food."

"It was a great kiss. If one of us had been a frog, it would have had some seriously impressive consequences."

"But marriage is not about always being happy. It's about compromise."

"The Long Island Ice Tea makes you do things you normally wouldn’t do."

"This thing we're doing here -- me, you -- I just want you know I'm in. I'm all in."

"God, that's terrible. It's like drinking a My Little Pony.""Yeah, I'm fine, I'm great. It's a big, fat, happy sunshine day for me."

"You know what I just realized? Oy is the funniest word in the entire world."

"You gotta realize the only way out is in a body bag."

"I'm attracted to pie. It doesn't mean I feel the need to date pie."

"You've got to be patient and wait for what you want to appear, then pounce."

"It's always best to tell each other major life events, so there's no awkwardness."

"You have to tell me why we're committing a felony before we do it."

“Yes, I left behind a glass slipper and a business card … just in case the prince is really dumb.”

"Every relationship is just a big honking leap of faith."

this thing we're doing here, me, you. I just wanted you to know I'm in. I am all in."

"Having babies doesn't mean you can't be rock and roll!"

“I cannot do this alone, I need my mommy and I don’t care who knows it.”

"I'll help you shower when I become a superhero."

"Relationships need verbs."

"If you're going to throw your life away he better have a motorcycle!!"

“You’ve got such a great brain!”

"Mom, you've given me everything I need."

“I’m fine. I’m just being dramatic. It’s what I do.”

"We're almost there & nowhere near it. All that matters is that we're going!"

"I had a meeting at the bank earlier, they like callers."

"I smell snow."

"Oy with the poodles already!"

“Nothing says coffee like six in the morning!”

“Mom, you’ve given me everything I need.”

"You gotta realize the only way out is in a body bag."

“There’s plenty to do tonight that we can be mortified about tomorrow.”

“I’m going to have to quit drinking coffee! And I love coffee — I really love coffee!”

“I need caffeine. Whatever form you’ve got it. I haven’t had any all day. I’ll drink it, shoot it, eat it, snort it, whatever form it’s in, gimme.”

"People can live a hundred years without really living for a minute. You climb up here with me, it's one less minute you haven't lived."

"It's club soda,."

"Oh God, I hope nothing's happened to him. You get so attached to their little faces, sometimes you can hear them talk to you at night."

"My books look sad. Can books look sad?"

"I'm here because I enjoy books, and because I read books."

"Gnome kicking says a lot about a man's character."

"No, it's National Baptism Day. Tie your tubes, idiot!"

"Excuse me. There is a phone call for you and if I'm to fetch you like a dog then I'd like a cookie and a raise."

"Then give me a boa and drive me to rino because I'm open for business!"

"Oh, people die, we pay. People crash a car, we pay. People lose a foot, we pay."

"Cranking Metallica. Is that some sort of drug reference, it's not funny."

"Really? You can see the driveway with your head way up in the air like that?"

"Tell her I gotta take another crack at that closet. I think I hung my Tool t-shirt next to my Metallica t-shirt and they don't really get along."

"I gotta tell you, out of all the nutty barn-raising shindigs this town can cook up, this one wasn't half bad."

"Oh, do you see the books? Feel it. Feels good, right? Now smell it. Nothing, nothing smells like that."

"We could go to a bookstore, I'll watch you browse for six or seven hours."

"Coffee, please, and a shot of cynicism."

"I can't believe we get to sit around and talk about books and get graded."

"We're almost there & nowhere near it. All that matters is that we're going!"

"I don't like Mondays but unfortunately they come around eventually."

“I’m not broken. Maybe just a little chipped.”

“There’s plenty to do tonight that we can be mortified about tomorrow.”

“I can go from zero to studying in less than 60 seconds!”

“Oh, I can’t stop drinking the coffee. I stop drinking the coffee, and I stop doing the standing, walking, and words putting into sentence doing.”

"If it was physically possible to make love to a hot beverage, this would be the one.”

"Give me a burger, onion rings, and a list of people who killed their parents and got away with it. I need some heroes."

"Who cares if I'm pretty if I fail my finals."

"I can be flexible, as long as everything is exactly the way I want it."

"Oh yeah, I've got gold stars plastered all over my forehead."

"Well, I'll bring dick up on the internet and see what comes up."

[musclesandhammering]

Every Single Issue I Have With S*lki (It’s Not Just The Selfcest)

Here goes. I threatened to post this a few days ago and never did, but I just saw a s*lki stan Twitter account claim that Loki caring about Sylvie more than the whole multiverse was a Good And Romantic thing and it pushed me over the fucking edge, so now you all have to read this. I’ve divided it into categories cause there’s just THAT much.

OOC Bullshit

• First and foremost, no amount of mental gymnastics you do will ever make me believe that this specific Loki- the one that just invaded New York, that just came off a year of Thanos Torture, that just got done being influenced by the sceptre, that was literally in the middle of a crisis already, and then on top of that went through all the trauma of Ep 1- would even be worried about a romantic relationship. That would be the furthest thing from his mind. Go back and watch how he acted in Avengers- you think that guy would abandon his previous mission to become a snivelling simp for a girl he’d just met 3 days prior? Yeah, there’s no universe in which that makes sense.

• “It’s very in character for Loki to fall in love with himself lololol-“ NO, it’s literally not. Out of all the characters in the mcu, I don’t think I can think of anyone that genuinely hates themselves more than Loki. He even referred to all his other male variants as “monsters” and said meeting them was “a nightmare” in this series. He’s got so much self-loathing, plus the fact that he genuinely thinks himself to be an evil backstabbing scourge- so there’s no evidence at all suggesting that he would ever develop a fondness for, or even be inclined to trust, another version of himself, after only knowing them for 3 days.

• Building on that, the whole concept of Loki falling in love with a version of himself just feeds into the annoying ass misconception that he’s a narcissist. No matter which way you stack it, he’s not. If you’re referring to NPD, he doesn’t fit the criteria, and if you’re saying “narcissist” just as a slang term meaning “selfish and arrogant”, that still doesn’t accurately describe him. But when creators like Waldron and Herron do things like having him fall in love with himself, it makes it so much easier for casual viewers to think that he is.

Shitty LGBT Rep

• It’s kinda sus that Loki’s are allegedly genderfluid and yet the only female-presenting variant we see (and apparently the only female-presenting variant there is, cause the male Loki’s all seemed unfamiliar with the concept) is treated as some kind of mind-bogglingly special paradox. Also very sus that, out of all the Loki variants, the one our Loki falls in love with just so happens to be the only female one. What a coincidence.

• The fact that the creators of the show went around bragging about Loki’s bisexuality and Marvel purposefully (lbr) allowed stories about Loki possibly having a male love interest to circulate, specifically enticing queer viewers to watch the show (you know, the definition of queerbaiting), and then instead of having a male love interest (Loki was the first queer main character, so it was the perfect opportunity) they gave us *gestures to this dumpster fire* this… it’s just a middle finger to LGBT fans. The fact that they would rather have this relationship with all its myriad of problems than have a gay relationship is just……. Very telling.

• While him being with a woman obviously doesn’t refute his bisexuality, the fact that they showed/talked about him being interested in 3 different women (flight attendant, Sylvie, Sif) and never even hinted at him being attracted to a man, definitely makes it seem like they were trying to cover up his bisexuality to smooth things over with the more homophobic viewers. You know? It’s like “I know you’re pissed that we sorta confirmed Loki as bi, so we promise we’ll never mention it again! Or even hint at it! As a matter of fact, we’ll give him lots of female lovies and make him seem as straight as possible! That’ll take your mind off of that horrible crumb of queer rep, right? Please please please keep giving us your money!!!”

• Aside from all the other issues, at its core, the biggest reason why I think I’m so irritated with s*lki is that it took one of the most interesting, complex, and diverse characters in cinema atm and squished him into a tired ass unnecessary heteronormative subplot…. Like literally every. single. other. protagonist. ever. Loki is such a unique character, and it’s so so so incredibly disappointing that they stuck him into that same boring cookie cutter romance that happens to every other character in every other movie I’ve ever seen. It’s a disservice, and it’s honestly just not compelling or entertaining at all.

Thematic Issues Galore

• His arc didn’t need a romance. With anyone. It was unnecessary and it didn’t make sense plot-wise. In fact, one of the reasons he was my fav prior to this was because he was the only big-name mcu character whose story wasn’t muddied-up by a romance that didn’t need to be there. So much for that.

• He wasn’t emotionally ready for a romantic relationship with anyone. Hell, just a genuine friendship would’ve been pushing it for him at this point. He was in such a bad state that any relationship he got into would’ve been toxic and unhealthy for both him and the other person, and it doesn’t make sense why the writers would want to put him in one when there were so many cons and essentially no pros (other than “Uwu aren’t they cute together”).

• Sylvie’s character in general was unnecessary and Loki’s character was robbed just by her being there. The whole show became about her post-Ep 2. They spent most of the time giving her backstory, building her up, telling us how awesome she is, trying to convince us to like her, etc when what they really needed to be doing was building Loki up- cause I gotta say, if I had to describe TVA!Loki in a few words, they would be Flat, Boring, and Weak.

• The romance overtakes the plot. They spend time portraying their supposed connection that could’ve been spent adding depth and complexity to literally any of the characters. They make the big Nexus Event them giving each other googly eyes on Lamentis when it could’ve been so many other way more profound things that speak to the fundamental nature of Loki’s. They have the climax of the finale be “oh no she betrayed him to kill He Who Remains” when it could’ve been something way more compelling (Loki having a moral crisis over whether or not to kill HWR, Loki contemplating the state of the multiverse and weighing the pros and cons of freedom vs order, Loki looking into some What If situations and getting emotional about what could’ve been regarding his family, Loki realising the gravity of HWR’s offer and finally coming to terms with how important he is to the universal cycle, etc etc). The entire plot suffered in favour of a romance that half of us didn’t even want.

• It essentially reduced all of Loki’s potential character growth down to “He did it for his crush.” He seemed to at least have some motivations of his own in Ep 1-2 (feeble as they were) but after Sylvie showed up in Ep 3, literally every action he took was just him being a simp for her. Why did he lie in the interrogation? To try to protect Sylvie. Why did he fight the minutemen and Timekeepers? To survive kinda, but mostly cause it was important to Sylvie. Why did he get pruned? Cause he got distracted trying to confess his crush to Sylvie. Why did he try to get out of The Void? Cause he thought Sylvie needed him. Why did he stay in The Void? Cause Sylvie was staying. Why did he try to enchant Alioth? Cause Sylvie told him to. Why did the multiverse get cracked open, leading to an infinite number of Kangs waging war on all of existence? Cause Loki didn’t wanna hurt Sylvie in their fight at the Citadel and then get distracted by her kissing him. It’s uninteresting and honestly pretty embarrassing.

• Throughout their “relationship arc” the writers do their absolute damndest to convince us that we should like Sylvie more than Loki. And you know what? It’s the most hypocritical shit I’ve ever seen. They preach and preach about how Sylvie’s life has been so difficult/we should feel bad for her/she had it so bad/poor poor sylvie/she had it SO much worse than pampered prince Loki…. But then they never even touch on any of Loki’s trauma of hardships (the ones that have been ignored for literally 3 movies now). They frame Sylvie as a good person and a Freedom Fighter after she spent literal decades/centuries mass-murdering brainwashed TVA agents and showing exactly zero remorse for it….. but then they make it their mission to constantly remind us that Loki is a terrible person and constantly put him in situations where he’s forced to acknowledge his wrongdoings/show remorse/admit to how “evil” he is for being a mass murderer for like 2 years. They show him on-screen having a wider range of powers than her, and perpetuate his whole shtick of being a “master manipulator” or whatever….. But then they make Sylvie “the brawn” more competent, intelligent, and physically capable than him. Tell me how it’s a good thing for a ship to be so narratively biased toward one character.

Missed Opportunities

• If they absolutely had to have a romance subplot, then they could’ve paired Loki with one of the characters that have already been established OR one of the characters that were a big part of the whole TVA storyline anyway. It would’ve been so interesting if they’d revealed that Loki had a history with some of the players from previous films (Sif and Fandral both come to mind). It also would’ve been really interesting if they’d given Loki a love interest that actually had some allegiance to the TVA as a whole (Mobius maybe, but not necessarily. It also could’ve been Renslayer or B-15). Hell, imo it would’ve been cool if they’d followed through with that “See you again someday” line that he said to the flight attendant in Ep 1. ALL of these characters have way more chemistry with him than Sylvie, and they were also already relevant to the plot without wasting half the show to give background info on them.

• If they absolutely had to have a hetero-presenting love story involving an enchantress-type figure, then there’s a whole Enchantress (Amora) that was actually Loki’s love interest in the comics. Plus, fans have been screaming for Amora to appear in the mcu for years. Plus, Tom literally pitched an Amora/Loki storyline way back in 2012-13. Also, Lorelei (another enchantress) is also one of Loki’s love interests in the comics, and she already exists in the mcu (she was on Agents of SHIELD). There were several different established characters for them to choose from. Creating a whole knew amalgamation of a character and going with the “she’s a Loki variant” storyline was just completely unnecessary and made no sense.

• They completely robbed us of a Chaos Twins dynamic. Had they handled Sylvie better and not forced her and Loki to smooch, the two of them could’ve had a really really complex and interesting sibling relationship. Loki could’ve stepped into Thor’s shoes and sort of used that new role to gain some self importance, and Sylvie could’ve finally had somebody to look out for her/teach her magic/be there for her. It would’ve been very aesthetically pleasing, the vibes would’ve been out of this world, it would’ve been way more profound than this bs, and frankly it would’ve been much more entertaining to watch.

• Loki’s relationship (read: obsession) with Sylvie completely overshadows all Loki’s other relationships in the show. Loki and Mobius were literally the focal point of the series in Ep 1-2, but after Sylvie showed up in Ep 3, they barely had any interactions with each other, and Mobius pretty much faded to the background entirely. Loki had the beginnings of a pretty interesting antagonistic relationship with Renslayer (with her wanting him pruned, then arguing with Mobius that he couldn’t be trusted), but after Sylvie showed up the dynamic shifted to focus on the history between her and Ravonna. Loki and B-15 started off very badly and openly disliked each other throughout Ep 1-2, and then in the end of Ep 2, Loki showed a little bit of concern for her when she was possessed, hinting that they might be inching toward a reconciliation- especially considering how obvious it was that Loki was gonna uncover the TVA’s sins eventually. There was so much potential for him to be the one to give her her memories back and convince her to change sides, but no, of course that honor went to Sylvie. In fact, after Sylvie showed up, Loki and B-15 never even spoke to each other again.

Various S*lki Fails

• If they were trying to convince us that this affection was mutual, they completely failed. There’s nothing I’ve seen that even hints at Sylvie feeling the same way about Loki that he does about her. At most, I’d say she has a slight endearment to him. She finds him likeable and she’s grudgingly fond of him, but she definitely isn’t in love with the guy. Maybe she thinks he’s cute and hopes that he gets out of this mess alright, but her mission obviously comes before him- whereas, it’s been confirmed multiple times that Loki cares about her above anything else. She doesn’t trust him, she looks at him like he’s an incompetent fool half the time, she shows little to no reaction during most of his confession moments, and she kissed him as a means to distract him so that she could get him out of her way. Look, all I’m saying is, when you get into a relationship where one of you is way more invested than the other, it never ends well.

• This goes without saying for a lot of us, but the selfcest is just straight up odd and cringey. If you’re cool with that sort of thing, fine! People can ship what they want! But don’t pretend it’s not at least a little bit uncomfortable. Yes, I know they’re not technically siblings so it’s not technically incest, and they’re also not technically the exact same person, but they’re similar enough that it makes things weird. And yes I know selfcest can’t happen in real life, so there’s no way to judge it morally, but neither can most of the other stuff that happens in these shows/movies (the Snap, Loki destroying jotunheim, superhero with powers being held accountable, mind control) and yet we still find ways to judge their morality, because they all mirror real-world events. (The snap= genocide; Loki destroying Jotunheim= bombing other countries; superhero accountability= weapons accountability; mind control= grooming and coercion). And lbr the closest real-world mirror to two versions of the same person (who may or may not share DNA, family, backgrounds, physical and emotion characteristics) being romantically involved with one another is incest. And you can be ok with that if you want- that’s your prerogative- but don’t get pissy just cause a lot of us are squicked out by it.

• The whole mirror metaphor (learning self love via each other) thing just fell completely flat. First of all, having Loki learn to love himself by looking at someone who mirrors him did not, in any way shape or form, require them to be romantically involved. But they were. Of course. Secondly, the creators have contradicted themselves so many times on whether Loki and Sylvie are the same or not, that it doesn’t even really register to the viewer that the mirroring thing was what they were going for. Finally, Loki and Sylvie are shown to have so little in common- and to have only the most bare minimum of similarities personality-wise- that it doesn’t even make sense that Loki would “learn to love himself through loving her”. Like? They’re nothing alike. So how would he make the connection that he himself is actually pretty cool, based on her alone? There’s virtually nothing in her that reflects him.

• I know the objective of the entire show was to convince us of how awesome and unique Sylvie is, but honestly her relationship with Loki just did the opposite. A hallmark of a Mary Sue is having her constantly upstage the male lead, and then having him instantly fall madly in love with her anyway. And that’s.. exactly what happened here. Everything they’re doing to try to force her character to be more stan-able is really just forcing her to look more like their self-insert OC. Which is exactly what she is. It would’ve been so much more satisfying if she didn’t have to try so hard to look cool, if they didn’t have to try so hard to make her backstory tear-inducing, if they didn’t have to turn our protagonist into a snivelling simp just to prove how incredible she supposedly is. Very much #GirlBoss energy and we all know how performative and cheap that is.

• The entire thing was too rushed, there was too little build-up, and it was nowhere near believable. As stated above, it’s ridiculously unlikely that Loki would canonically even be interested in Sylvie, and this show did nothing to explain why he was. He just suddenly was. There was nothing they showed us as viewers that would justify a guy as closed-off and preoccupied as Loki falling head-over-heels for a girl he just met. Their was no explanation, no big revelation, no reasoning, it just… kinda happened. And I’m also severely skeptical of any love story that has the characters go in this deep after only 3 45-minute episodes of exposition.

I’m sure there’s other stuff, so if anyone thinks of anything, let me know and I’ll be more than happy to add it. Tagging @janetsnakehole02 @raifenlf @natures-marvel and @brightredsunset800 for expressing interest. This is all your faults.

[work-of-waking-up]

It’s funny how a lot of people are saying season 4 sucked, (not including the ending obviously) except for the scenes with villanelle and eve in the last episode. Um? What? This season literally gave us some of the best scenes/stuff ever. Jesusnelle? We were gifted Jodie Comer in drag ffs. Villanelle killing Hélène? It’s honestly one of my favorite scenes of the whole show, so hot, which is made infinitely better by the fact that it’s preceded by the glorious look of betrayal and jealousy when V learns of Eve and Hélène. Eve dressing Villanelle? That killed all of us. So soft. And all the other soft moments, soft touches, soft looks. Cupid and Psyche. Them meeting across the fish tank, the look on V’s face, just pure awe and adoration. Eve dressed in leather and shooting someone. Gunn and Villanelle. Eve climbs a tree and then gouges out someone’s eyes? Hell yeah. Eve and Hélène.. my personal fav being when Hélène holds Eve’s hand onto the stove. Villanelle watching (and also struggling to watch) Eve get undressed in the hotel. Literally all of the callbacks to the other seasons, subtle or not. I seriously live for that kind of shit. Anytime Villanelle looks absolutely feral, as always. Finally we get Carolyn and Villanelle scenes (even though those scenes look different in retrospect) and I was surprised to like them together that much! They actually would have made a good team. Eve simply coming into her own and her newfound confidence and skills. Jodie Comer’s fucking hands. The music. The tension, as delicious as always. Some of the clothes/outfits/styles *chefs kiss* So many people are saying the writing was terrible, and I’m not saying it was perfect, it never can be, but I really kind of loved a lot of it. I thought a lot of the dialogue was really beautiful and refreshing. The timing of the silence between dialogue was spot on. There were some very poignant moments, revealing moments, and poetic moments, and as a poet I loved all of that. And then, of course, every single minute (except the last 2) that Villanelle and Eve are together in the last episode, which is truly just cinematic poetry. So say what you will, I really loved a lot of what we were given this last season. I do think a lot of it comes down to what you were looking to get out of the show and what was most important to you. This show and these characters are literally larger than life. Full stop. The reason everyone feels so differently about everything comes down to one of the beautiful aspects of this show in that it contains so much complexity and nuance as well as the constant inability for these characters to remain the same. The past 2 seasons have been hard because there has been a disconnect caused by the writers not fully understanding the characters and where they should be. But Jodie and Sandra understood their characters the whole way through, so they carried the show. Many things were left unsaid and undone. We can’t change the choice they made to continue to switch writers so all we can really do is appreciate the good parts we are given. I’m glad I got to enjoy it. And I really am sorry if you didn’t. And this is absolutely in no way an endorsement of Laura Neal’s shitty choices, she failed us. But there was good.

[thedeadhandofseldon]

The Anti-Mercer Effect

On the Accessibility of D&D, Why Unprepared Casters is so Fun, and Why Haley Whipjack is possibly the greatest DM of our generation.

(Apologies to my mutuals who aren’t in this fandom for the length of this, but as you all know I have never in my life shut up about anything so… we’ll call it even for the number of posts about Destiel I see every day.

To fellow UC fans - I haven’t listened to arc 4 yet, I started drafting this in early August, and I promise I will write a nice post about how great Gus the Bard is once I get the chance to listen to more of his DMing).

Structure - Or, “This is not the finale, there will be more podding cast”

So, first of all, let’s just talk about how Unprepared Casters works. Because it’s kind of unusual! Most of the other big-name D&D podcasts favor this long, grand arcs; UC has about 10 hours of podcast per each arc. And that’s a major strength in a lot of ways: it makes it really accessible to new listeners, because you can just start with the current arc and understand what’s going on!

And by starting new arcs every six or seven episodes, they can explore lots of ways to play D&D! Classic dungeon delve arc! Heist arc! Epic heroes save the world arc! Sportsball arc! They can touch on all sorts of things!

And while I’m talking about that: Dragons in Dungeons, the first arc, makes it incredibly accessible as a show - because it lets the unfamiliar listener get a sense of what D&D actually is. (It’s about telling stories and making your friends feel heroic and laugh and cry, for the record). If I had to pick a way to introduce someone to the game without actually playing it with them, that arc would definitely be it.

And I’d be remise not to note one very important thing: Haley Whipjack and Gus the Bard are just very funny, very charismatic people. Look. Episode 0s tend to be about 50%(?) those two just talking to each other about their own podcast. It shouldn’t work. And yet it DOES, its one of my favorite parts, because Haley and Gus are just cool.

And a side note that doesn’t fit anywhere else: I throw my soul at him! I throw a scone at him - that’s it, that’s the vibe. The whole podcast alternates between laughing with your friends and brooding alone in a dark tavern corner - but the laughs never forced and the dark corner is never too dark for too long.

Whipjack the Great - Or, the DM is Also a Player!

I think Haley Whipjack is one of the greatest Dungeon Masters alive. The plots and characters! The mechanical shenanigans! The descriptions!

Actually, let’s start there: with the descriptions. (Both Haley and Gus do this really fucking well). As we know, Episode 0 of each arc sees the DM reading a description - of a small town, or the Up North, or the recent history of a great party. And Haley always strikes this tricky balance - one I think a lot of us who DM struggle with - between giving too much description and  worldbuilding, and not telling us anything at all. She describes people and events in just enough detail to imagine them, but never so much they seem static and unreal - just clear enough to envision, but with enough vagueness left to let your imagination begin to run wild.

While I’m thinking about arc 3’s party, let’s talk about a really bold move she made in that arc: letting the players have ongoing control of their history. Loser Lars! She didn’t try to spell out every detail of this high-level party’s history, or restrict their past to only what she decided to allow - she gave them the broad outlines, and let them embellish it. And that made for a much more alive story than any attempt to create it by herself would have - but I think it takes a lot of courage to let your players have that agency. Most Dungeon Masters (myself included) tend to struggle with being control freaks.

And the plots! Yeah, arc one is built of classic tropes - but she actually uses them, she doesn’t get caught up in subverting everything or laughing at the cliches. And it’s fun! In arc 3, there really isn’t a straight line for the players to follow, either - which makes the game much more interesting and much trickier to run. And her NPCs are fantastic and I will talk about them in the next section.

Above all, though, I think what is really impressive is how Haley balances mechanics, and rules as written, with the narrative and rule of cool - and puts both rules and story in the service of playing a fun game. And the secret to that? She’s the DM, but the DM is a player, and the DM is clearly having fun. Hope Lovejoy mechanically shouldn’t get that spellslot back, but she does, and it’s fun. The changeling merchant in Thymore doesn’t really make some Grand Artistic Narrative better, but wow is it fun. And she never tries to force it one way or the other - the story might be more dramatic if Annie didn’t manage to banish the demon from the vault, but it’s a lot cooler and a lot more fun for the players if Annie gets to be a badass instead - and the rules and the dice say that Annie managed it.

Settings feel like places, NPCs feel like people, and the narrative plot feels like a real villainous plot.

Anyway. I could go on about the various ways in which Whipjack is awesome for quite a while - she’s right, first place in D&D is when your friends laugh and super first place is when they cry - but I’m going to stop here and just. Make another post about it some other time. For now, for the record I hold her opinions about the game in higher esteem than I do several official sourcebooks; that is all.

Characters - Or, Bombyx Mori Is Not an Asshole, And That Matters

Okay, I said I would talk about characters! And I will!

Just a general place to start: the party! All of the first three parties are interesting to me, because they all care about each other. Not even necessarily in a Found Family Trope sort of way, though often that too. But they generally aren’t assholes to each other. The players create characters that actually work together, that are interesting; even when there’s internal divisions like SK-73 v. Sir Mr. Person, they aren’t just unpleasant and antagonistic all the time. Listening to the podcast, we’re “with” these people for a couple hours - and it isn’t unpleasant. That matters a lot. (To take a counter-example: I love Critical Role, but the episode when Vox Machina pranked Scanlan after he died and was resurrected wasn’t fun to listen to, it was just uncomfortable and angering and vaguely cruel).

All of the PCs are amazing, and the players in each arc did a great job. If you disagree with me about that, well, you have the right to be incorrect and I am sorry for your loss. Annie Wintersummer, for one example: tragic and sad and I want to give her a hug, but also Fuck Yeah Wintersummer, and also her familiar Charles the Owl is the cutest and funniest and I love him. And we understand what’s going on with Annie, she isn’t some infinite pool of hidden depths because this arc is 7 episodes and we don’t have time for that, but she also has enough complexity to be interesting. Same with Fey Moss: yeah, a lot of her is a silly pun about fame that carries into how she behaves, but a lot of how she behaves is also down to some good classic half-elven angst about parenthood and wanting to be known and seen and important. (Side note: if your half-elf character doesn’t have angst, well, that’s impressive and also I don’t think I believe you).

There are multiple lesbian cat-people in a 4-person party and they both have requited romantic interests who aren’t each other. This is the future liberals want and I am glad for it.

Sir Mister Person, the human fighter! Thavius, the edge lord! Even when a character is “simple,” they’re interesting, because of how they’re played as people and not action-figures. And that matters a lot.

In the same way: the NPCs. There really aren’t a lot of them! And some of them come from Patreon submissions, so uh good work gang, you’re part of the awesomeness and I’m proud of you! The point being, the NPCs work because enough of them are interesting to matter. It’s not just a servant who opens Count Michael’s door, it’s a character with a name (Oleandra!) and a personality and history. They’re interesting. Penny Lovejoy didn’t need to be interesting, the merchant outside the Laughing Mausoleum didn’t need to be interesting, but they ARE! And Haley and Gus EXCEL at making the NPCs matter, not just to the story but to us as viewers. I agree with Sir Mister Person, actually, I would die for the princesses of the kingdom. I actually care about Gem Lovejoy of all people - that wouldn’t happen in an ordinary campaign! That’s the thing that makes Unprepared Casters spectacular - and, frankly, it’s especially impressive because D&D does not tend to be good at making a lot of interesting compared to a lot of other sorts of stories.

And, just as an exemplar of all this: Bombyx Mori. Immortal, reincarnating(?), and described as the incarnation of the player’s ADHD. I expected to hate Bombyx, because as the mom friend both in and out of my friend-group’s campaigns, the chaos-causer is always exhausting to me. And yeah, Bombyx causes problems on purpose! But! She is not an asshole.

And that’s important. Bombyx goes and sits with the queen and comforts her. Bombyx gives Annie emotional support. Bombyx isn’t just a vehicle to jerk around the DM and other players; Bombyx really is a character we can care about. To compare with another case - in the first couple episodes of The Adventure Zone, the PCs are just dicks. Funny, but dicks. Bombyx holds out an arm “covered in larva” to shake with a count, and robs him of magical items, but she also cares about her friends and other people! She uses a powerful magical gem to save her fertilizer guy from death! Yeah, Bombyx is ridiculous, but she’s not just an asshole the party has to keep around for plot reasons; you can see why her party would keep her around. And one layer of meta up, she’s the perfect example of how to make a chaotic character like that while still being fun for everyone you’re playing with, which is often not the case. And I love her.

The Anti-Mercer Effect - Or, “I think we proved it can be fun, you can have a good time with your friends. And it doesn’t have to be scary, you can just work with what you know”

The Mercer Effect basically constitutes this: Matthew Mercer, Dungeon Master of Critical Role, is incredible (as are all of his players). They’re all professional story-tellers in a way, remember, and so Critical Role treats D&D like a narrative art-form, and it’s inspiring. Seeing that on Critical Role sets impossible standards - and people go into their own home games imagining that their campaigns will be like Critical Role, and the burden of that expectation tends to fall disproportionately on the DM. And the end result, I think, of the Mercer Effect is that we get discouraged or intimidated, because our game isn’t “as good as” theirs. (And I should note - Matt certainly doesn’t want that to be our reaction).

So the Anti-Mercer Effect is two things: it’s D&D treated like a game, and it’s inspiring but not intimidating. And Unprepared Casters manages both of those really freaking well. Because they play it like a game! A UC arc looks just like a good campaign in anyone’s home game. They have the vibes of 20-somethings and college students playing D&D for fun because that’s who they are (as a 20-something college student who plays a lot of D&D, watching it felt like watching my friends play an especially good campaign). They’re trying to tell a good story, sure, and they always do. But first and foremost, they’re trying to have fun, and it shows, and I love the UC cast for it.

And that’s the other half of it: it’s inspiring! It’s approachable; you can see that Haley and Gus put plenty of work into preparing the game but it also doesn’t make you feel like you need hundreds of pages of worldbuilding to run a game. Sometimes a cleric makes Haley cry and she gives them back a spell-slot from their deity! That’s fantastic! It’s just inspiring - listening to this over the summer, when my last campaign had fallen apart under the strain of graduation, is why I decided to plan and run my new one!

That quote from Haley Whipjack that I used as the title for this section? That’s the whole core of this idea, and really, I think, the core of the podcast.

The Mercer Effect is when you go “that’s really cool, I could never do that.” But Unprepared Casters makes you look at D&D and go “wow, that looks really fun. I bet I can do that!” And I love the show for it.

And I bet a lot of you do too.

[tennessoui]

FeralObi anon here. How do you come up with these so fast?? Are you an infinite number of ideas and worlds in human-shaped form? I love both of those ideas. The first one kills me tho, Obi gets his first kind touch in years from lil Anakin. Also you can have lil Anakin coming home one day with a skulking, snarling nonverbal murder puppy and saying brightly, "He followed me home, can I keep him?" Schmi thinks this is definitely worse than the time he brought a krayt dragon home.

ah! hello! yes this is the first idea of a feral obi-wan who meets anakin when he's still on tatooine. i will also still do the second idea because like. i liked them equally as much rip me

but i told myself these were going to both be very short snippets and instead this one is uh 2k so i'll post the second one tomorrow instead of tonight!

(ficlet where obi-wan is captured by pirates/unspecified forces at a young age and then tortured for a decade before he escapes to tatooine when anakin is like 6. obi-wan, after a decade of torture is....not alright in this fic though he's only here at the end) (2k)

Shmi had known that when she sent her little Anakin away to follow after the stern-faced, warm-eyed Jedi Master, that this would not be the last time she ever saw her boy. She couldn’t explain how she knew, just as she had not been able to explain how she became pregnant, but she knew beyond a doubt that one day, she would see her little boy back in her arms.

She just hadn’t known it would be so soon.

“He died, Master Jinn died,” Anakin mumbles into the front of her dress, unwilling to move his head far back enough from her hug that he could talk clearly. “On Naboo. And the stupid Jedi council refused to train me even after I was so amazing in the air. Mom, I destroyed a blockade! Entirely! And they wouldn’t--they didn’t--” his little face scrunches up and then he’s bawling into his hands.

A slave, a born slave, knows intrinsically the injustice of the galaxy. It is not often they know hope.

“Oh my boy,” she whispers, smoothing a hand over the top of his head. She has questions. She has so many questions about everything he’s just said and what those strangers have put her son through, but the most important thing is a question she cannot wait until he has cried himself out to ask. “Is your chip gone, Ani? Did they remove your transmitter?”

Because she had sent him away from her so that he could be free. And that had been her own twisted version of hope, that her son could know a life she never would again. If the Jedi masters had proven to be just like every other master in the world, she would find herself sobbing into her own hands.

“Yeah,” Anakin sniffles and wipes at his ruddy cheeks, pulling back a few steps. “They removed it and everything. And--”

He pauses and drops his satchel to the ground in front of her. “They gave me credits. To buy you. For my trouble.”

He spits out the last three words like they’re the most disgusting thing in the entire world. As if Shmi’s freedom isn’t laying at their feet, mere centimeters away.

“Republic credits are no good here,” she hears herself say faintly.

“Padme, the handmaiden you met, she talked to the queen about me I guess,” Anakin mumbles, kicking his feet. “And when the queen learned that the Jedi didn’t want me even after all that, Padme says the queen says I’ll always have a place on Naboo. Me and my family. And then she took the Jedi credits and gave me these instead. It should be enough, Mom.”

Shmi sits down on the floor. With shaking hands, she opens the bag and looks inside. Yes. Yes.

There’s more than enough.

There’s enough to buy her freedom and take her boy away from Mos Espa. There’s enough to take her boy away from Tatooine completely.

“I…” she says. “Ani, I…”

“Padme said she’d send a ship for us,” Ani reports as if their lives are not changing right in front of their eyes. “In two days ‘cause I told her it might take a little bit of time to get Ben to come with us. But we can’t leave without him.”

This is said fiercely and with his arms crossed tightly over his little chest.

Shmi stares at him.

“I’ve already left him once!” Anakin says, stomping his foot. “But that was okay, because I knew you would bring him food and water and stuff. But if we’re both gone, no one’s going to be there for him.”

Shmi bites at her lip. There’s a lot of things happening very quickly right now, and she doesn’t know how to process half of them.

Her son has come back, after only being gone for a week and a half.

He has apparently either endeared himself so much to the queen of Naboo that she was willing to give him the money necessary to buy his mother from slavery and also promise him sanctuary on her planet. He says he’s done this by single-handedly ending a blockade, which is something she just cannot even think about right now.

He has told this queen--queen--that he will gladly live on Naboo with his family. Yes. Alright.

His family seems to include his imaginary friend, Ben.

Anakin has been talking about Ben for years now, ever since he was six and a half years old and sent by Watto to retrieve any scraps he could from what looked to be a crashed pod in the Wastelands. She’d let him ramble on about the ghost of a friend, because she’d known it to be something all children go through and experience. She hadn’t thought Anakin a lonely child, not with the friends he made in Mos Espa, but she’d always known that Anakin had a wandering spirit, ill-suited for Tatooine. If he liked to imagine an older man from a strange world hiding in the caves of the Wastes, then she wasn’t going to say anything.

“You have been leaving him food, haven’t you, Mom?” Anakin asks, almost accusatory. “I told him to expect you and everything.”

No. Shmi has not been traveling to the edge of the Wastelands every day during her precious few hours of free time in order to leave food to be picked apart by womp rats and desert critters and not her boy’s imaginary friend.

“Ani,” she says cautiously, quietly, “we cannot...we won’t be able to bring Ben with us when we go.”

Anakin, predictably, does not react well. “Why not!” he yells, backing away from her even further and looking as if she is the enemy. “Padme’s fine with it!”

“Aren’t you a little old for imaginary friends?” Shmi asks desperately, feeling cold suddenly even though the heat of the mid-morning sun has not abated at all.

If anything, her son looks more offended. “He’s not imaginary! Saying...saying that he’s not coming with us...is...is a bunch of poodoo!”

“Anakin!” Shmi gasps.

“Come on,” her boy says forcefully, grabbing at her hand and tugging her towards the door. She gets on her feet reluctantly and has half a mind to pull back just because he needs to learn that this sort of behavior is not okay, war hero or not. “We’re going to buy you from Watto. And then we’re going to go visit Ben!”

---

Buying her freedom takes less time than Shmi Skywalker ever thought it would. It feels distant as well, as if it’s happening to someone else.

It doesn’t help that her Ani is impatient and surly by turn, spilling the coin out onto Watto’s counter and barely waiting for him to finish counting it before he’s looking at the price of renting a four-person speeder parked outside.

“You won’t survive out there on your own,” Watto sneers, even as he’s passing her the kill-switch of her own slave chip. “Days. It’ll be days until the Hutts find out there’s a newly freed slave with no connections out there in the open. Ripe for the pickin’.”

Watto doesn’t have to tell her any of this. She knows. Gods, does she know.

But Anakin seems so sure about possessing the favor of the Queen of Naboo, or at least her handmaiden, which might be close enough to the same thing. She thanks Watto--she thanks him and then doesn’t even know why--and meets Anakin outside.

He’s bouncing around the speeder, little hands clutching his satchel to his chest. “Good!” he says when he sees her, hopping onto the machine and putting the parcel between his feet. “I got Ben something called a fig on Naboo, but I don’t know how long it’ll take for it to go bad. Apparently they’re sweet.”

Shmi goes along with it. Shmi doesn’t know why she goes along with it, but she does. She can see this is important to her boy, and though she’d rather spend the afternoon and early evening saying goodbye to her friends, she will allow Ani to say goodbye to his imaginary friend. Maybe she’ll even talk to it. “Hi, hello, I’m so glad you’ve enjoyed the imaginary blue milk and delicacies I’ve left out for you this past week and half. Oh no, it was no bother. My son insisted.”

The ride is quick--Anakin has always been a driver to push the limits of any engine he comes across--and before she knows it, he’s dismounting on a piece of desert and rock that look exactly the same as the last four pieces of rocky terrain they’ve past.

“Ben!” Ani calls, satchel clutched firmly in his hands as he makes his way deeper into the crevices of the landscape. “Ben, it’s Ani! I’m really sorry that I left! Ben? Ben! I’m back now! Ani’s back!”

It’s actually...quite pathetic, to watch her boy speak so pleadingly to the cold stone faces of the rocks around them, but if this is what he needs to do to say goodbye to his life on Tatooine, Shmi won’t say a word.

“Ben--” Anakin draws in a breath to call again, but then there’s movement out of the corner of Shmi’s eyes, and something jumps from the rock down to land on her boy.

She screams and darts forward, but the thing on top of her son snarls at her in guttural warning.

“No, Ben,” Ani coos, stroking at the face that yes, is human, now that it’s not in unnaturally fast motion. “That’s my mom, Ben.”

Ben--Ben??--growls anyway, pinning the boy--her boy--beneath him with his legs and arms.

“She’s fine,” Ani murmurs gently, one hand reaching up to stoke over the beginnings of a beard on Obi-Wan’s face “Oh Ben, I’m sorry.”

The man on top of Shmi’s child finally looks away from her and at her boy, which is both better and worse.

“Ani,” Ben drawls out, as if the word--or perhaps forming the word--hurts him.

Anakin is happy. Shmi can tell he’s happy without even being able to see much of him. It’s like the very air vibrates with his joy. “Yes!” her son says. “Ani. Ben.” He taps the man’s chest. “Ben. Ani.”

The man buries his head into Anakin’s hair, hands rubbing up and down his sides and his arms and his face.

Shmi needs to say something, wants to say something about this strange man touching boy like he owns him, but the memory of his growl and the flash of his golden eyes stops her from stepping forward.

“Anakin, get away from him,” she hisses instead of stepping forward and tearing the stranger off of her son. She has the distinct feeling Anakin wouldn’t let Ben go anywhere, not with the way his little hands are holding so tight to the man’s shoulders. The man’s shoulders that are covered with one of her old tunics that Anakin had told her became unsalvageable after its last wash.

“No,” Anakin says, tightening his hold on his...friend. “He says you didn’t give him food the entire time I was gone! He’s hungry.”

Shmi thinks there’s a very good possibility that this Ben is going to eat her, but she knows not to say anything of the sort. Not when it’s two against one.

“He hasn’t said anything!” She cries instead.

Anakin huffs at this and pats at the feral’s head. “Maybe not to you, but he talks to me.”

Shmi stares at him and wonders if there’s something she’s supposed to be doing or saying here. The man won’t allow her to tear him off her child, she knows that automatically. But she can’t--she doesn’t know--

“Anakin,” she tries, desperately.

But Anakin doesn’t even look at her, too busy petting over the man, who has at least allowed him to sit up. “Hey, I’m sorry, I thought she would,” he tells him in an undertone. “I really thought she would, but I’m back now. I’m not going anywhere without you again--”

He extends his hand and Ben presses his cheek against it with enough force that it pushes him back slightly.

“You’re coming to Naboo with us, Ben,” Anakin promises, clutching at the ends of the man’s long hair. “Or I’m not going at all.”

To Shmi, it sounds like a threat.

The way her son’s eyes flash an unfamiliar golden color makes her feel cold as a Tatooine night. She shivers, but no one notices.

[jediken0bi]

The Lucky One

Spencer Reid x Reader

Summary:

Spencer has always been good at keeping secrets. This secret just so happens to walk into the BAU to bring him his lunch. The team, supportive as ever, decides to tease him a little and Derek learns a little lesson about making assumptions.

word count: 2763

-

You and Spencer have only been officially dating for about 3 Months.

3 Months, 4 days and 13 hours you hear a voice inside your head. One that sounds suspiciously like Spencers.

You let out a small giggle before shaking your head slightly.

Things couldn't be better between the two of you. You guys had spare keys to the other persons apartment and while that might seem like a rush move for a lot of people you two have agreed that this is the easiest way to maximize your time together. So more often than not, you were staying over at each other's apartment.

You were currently on your way to bring him his lunch since he was in a rush this morning and forgot to take it.

Nothing new to either of you. He often tends to leave his lunch at home only to realize it when he's already on his break resulting in him usually buying himself a cheap sandwich or skipping lunch all together. You decided that, for once, he deserved to have a proper meal. He's been working a lot of overtime lately and it's starting to take a toll on him. On both of you really. He was constantly exhausted and you had to watch him work himself into over drive. Ever since the Hankle case, he's been scared to let even the smallest details go unnoticed which meant that he often spend much longer than the rest of the team on studying the files and trying to solve cases at the speed of light. It's something the team has noticed too over the last couple of weeks. They've been trying to get him to go out with them more often to take his mind off things but he usually rejects them by coming up with some fake excuse.

The reality was that he usually wanted to come straight home to you. He told you the reason he hasn't told the team about you two yet is their constant meddling and involvement in his life. He loves them all dearly and he wouldn't change a thing about either of them, but this was his and his only. He wasn't quite ready to give up the only thing he didn't have to share with anyone. He wanted you all to himself for as long as possible and while you can admit that you were skeptical at first, it's fair to say that you've come to understand Spencers point of view a lot better since then.

So, while you knew all about his team, they knew nothing about you. It didn't offend you though. You are confident that you and Spencer are in this for the long run.

Of course you were slightly worried about running into one of them while bringing him his lunch but that's a risk you were willing to take if it meant that Spencer didn't have to spend another day hungry and exhausted. It's not likely for him to get mad at you if it were to happen anyway. He keeps making small remarks to test the waters.

At this point, he might be scared you don't want to meet his team by the way he's tip toeing around the subject.

Finally arriving at the big scary FBI building you walk inside with caution.

Logically speaking the FBI is the last place you should feel scared to be at, but you can't help but think that this is probably the most intimidating place in the U.S. All those important people in their suits and pencil skirts and their stone cold expressions made you question how Spencer could be so different.

Before you could finish that thought you pass the security check and run straight into someone else on your way to the elevator.

You couldn't get a word out before said person started talking.

"Oh my god i am so sorry, gorgeous! I'm usually more coordinated than this i swear. It's just been a very stressful morning and now i've made yours worse by bumping into you-"

You smile widely as you realize who you must be talking to.

Tech Genius Penelope Garcia

"It's completely fine honestly! It was totally my fault anyway. It's my first time here and i'm a bit nervous"

You felt a bit rude interrupting her but based on the things Spencer told you about her this apology would've went on for at least another two minutes and you would much rather spend that elevator ride having a conversation with her.

After all, she was the BAU sunshine.

And bright she is with her colorful clothes and awesome glasses you think to yourself in that very moment.

It was a nice change of scenery after hushing around serious looking people before.

"Well, looks like we were both a bit dazzled just then! First time huh? Yeah there's definitely something scary about this place. What's a pretty gal like you doing here on a saturday morning? Oh! Are you visiting someone special?", Garcia says in a excited tone before quickly pressing the button taking you two up to the BAU floor.

You were grateful for that because it meant you didn't have to explain why you had to go to that floor too. Of course Penelope was way too hyper to realize i hadn't pressed another button in that moment so i quickly answered her to draw her attention to something else.

"Yeah, i am. I'm bringing my boyfriend his lunch. He hasn't been taking care of himself recently and i want him to at least have a proper meal in his stomach"

Garcia smiled at you with a small nod.

"That's so cute! He is lucky to have you, sweetie. I'm Penelope Garcia by the way!"

She extends her hand and you immediately shake it with a small smile playing on your lips

"I'm Y/N. Very nice to meet you, Penelope"

Not 3 seconds later the elevator doors open and you follow Garcia out of it and straight into the bullpen.

You didn't make it very far before a guy you strongly assume to be the infamous Derek Morgan approached Garcia and, by proximity, you.

"Now that's what you wanna see first thing in the morning! How is my Babygirl?"

Yep, definitely Morgan

"Infinitely better now that i've seen you, hot stuff" says Penelope without even having to think about it.

You can't help but snort at how adorable their friendship is. They're so comfortable with each other.

Derek looks past Garcia and straight at you with curious eyes.

"Well hello mamas. Who do we have here?"

Garcia turns around and has a surprised look on her face when she finally notices you behind her.

"Y/N! I thought you were on your way to meet your boyfriend for lunch?"

I opened my mouth to explain why exactly i was there but Derek beat me to it.

"Now why don't we just forget about that boyfriend and you let me take you out for lunch instead?"

Penelope hits him in the shoulder and i just laugh. Derek looks at me smugly and raises his eyebrows as a way of asking 'What do you say?'

You're tempted to just straight up tell him who you're here for to save everyone from a potentially awkward situation but just as you start talking you see Spencer sitting at his desk focused on his paperwork.

You make the quick decision to simply show Derek instead.

Without saying another word you simply walk past him with a big smile and head towards your destination.

"Hey handsome"

Spencers head shoots up as soon as he hears the familiar sound of your voice. He stares at you with wide eyes. He's clearly shocked to see you and you don't blame him. You just hope he's happy to see you.

"Y/N! What are you doing here?"

Now, if it had been anyone else you're sure this would've sounded rude, but you know Spencer so you know he doesn't mean for it to sound accusing. He's genuinely wondering.

You put on a playful pout.

"Is that a way to talk to the wonderful person who came all the way to the fbi to bring you lunch?"

Spencer finally stands up and looks down on the bag in your hand. He smiles and suddenly it's like he's at home with you. No one else around.

He walks up to you and wraps his arms around your waist.

"No, of course not. Thank you, beautiful"

He presses a small but firm kiss to your waiting lips and you smile up at him.

"You're welcome. I know work has been rough and i thought maybe a proper lunch could make up for some of it. I know it's not a lot and it doesn't cure the bad thoughts but you should know that i made today's lunch with an extra amount of love"

You joke.

You push one of his curls out of his eyes so you can properly look at him. He was already gone by the time you woke up so this is the first you're seeing of him today. He looks tired. Exhausted. And it's breaking your heart.

He gives you a smile that reaches his eyes. The first one in days. There's a feeling of pride blooming inside of you.

"How could i say no to some extra lovin'?"

Your eyes immediately widen and a blush creeps up your face.

"Spence!" You hit his shoulder and he tumbles back a tiny bit, laughing.

"I'm sorry, love. I really am grateful for this. You didn't have to do this"

It's only then that you realize you're not in the confide space of your apartments. You're in the bullpen of the BAU surrounded by Spencers friends and second family.

Spencer seems to realize that too because he suddenly let's go of you and clears his throat.

Confused about what just happened you turn around to spot Derek, Penelope and two women who you assume must be JJ and Emily staring at you with wide unbelieving eyes.

"There ain't no way. Pretty boy!! My man!"

Derek breaks out of his shock first and proudly points between the two of you.

Garcia doesn't waste a second following his example

"Reid is the boyfriend who hasn't been taking care of himself?!"

"What?" JJ, Emily and Spencer all ask at the time.

You can't help but laugh out loud at the absurd situation you got yourself in.

You turn around to look at Spencer. One hand grabbing his chin so he looks at you.

"Yeah, that would be him"

Spencer goes beet red immediately and the team goes wild.

You only smile wider at him and he pulls you back against his chest, wrapping one of his arms back around your waist. He goes to hide his embarrassment by burying his face in your shoulder.

He hates being the center of attention especially when it comes to his team.

"Spence, i didn't know you were seeing someone! How come you hid her from us?"

JJ asks him all excited. She was clearly happy her best friend has finally found someone he loves and trusts.

Spencer grumbles and lifts his head to look at his team.

"I wasn't hiding her! I just wanted something for myself for a little while. We're all up in each others business all the time and i love you guys but it was nice not having to share this part of my life with everyone for a bit. JJ, you did the same when you started dating Will!"

The team looks at each other for a moment and suddenly they all nod understandingly

"Fair enough" they all say.

Spencer hums approvingly and you just smile at the scene before you.

That wasn't that bad! I don't even know what i was afraid of

You were about to bid your goodbyes to the team and Spence so they could get back to work when Dereks next comment urges you to stay for a little while longer.

"Now Reid don't get me wrong but how the hell did you land a smoke show like this? No disrespect kid but i admittedly tried to flirt with her before i knew who she was"

Spencer smiles uncomfortably and shifts from one foot to the other.

"I don't know i guess i was just being myself? I saw her in my favorite book store one day and i just asked her out. Unusual for me, sure, but it's like i didn't have to be afraid with her. I don't know that probably sounds weird"

Your eyes soften and you lay your hand on top of Spencers on your waist. You turn your head a little to press a small kiss to his cheek.

"It doesn't sound weird, Spence. I'm glad you asked me out. I wanted to ask you but i couldn't bring myself to build up the courage. I think you're brave for taking a risk but trust me there was no way i was going to say no to you"

Emily, JJ and Penelope all seemed to melt over the cute interaction between you two but Dereks focus was somewhere else.

He didn't mean any harm you're absolutely sure about that. Maybe it's your instinct to protect Spencer or maybe it's your way of showing him exactly what he's worth but you can't find yourself feeling sorry for what happens next.

"Hold on, you were scared to ask him out? Pretty Ricky over here intimidated you? That's got to be a first"

He laughs with no real malice behind his voice. He's just joking around after all.

Spencer looks down in slight embarrassment at his friends teasing and you decide that now is the time to show them exactly what kind of girlfriend you are.

"I'm not sure we're looking at the same person here Derek because when i was at that bookstore creepily drooling over this hot as hell 6'3 doctor with great taste in literature i knew i had to ask him out. He's the kind of man you want to spend your life with. Not some cheap fling or meaningless 2 week dating experiment. I knew that, once i had him, i was going to hold on to him. So yeah, i was intimidated. It was like staring into your future and i was scared of messing it up. I've never been happier than i am now with Spencer"

Spencer stayed silent the entire time only pressing you closer to him. Once you're finished talking he presses a long firm kiss to your head.

"It's okay. I know, love. Me too"

He whispers loud enough so you could hear it but not loud enough for the rest of the team to hear.

"Woah little mama i meant no offense! I don't call him pretty boy for nothing. I'm just playing with y'all. I love the kid and i'm happy you two have found each other"

He smiles warmly at you and you give him a smile in return.

"I know you didn't. Spence told me all about you guys. I just don't like it when people make assumptions about my relationship with him. Because if anything, i'm the lucky one.

Spencer snorts and you lightly elbow him in the stomach with a grin on your face. You both look at each other with a glint in your eyes

"Agree to disagree" you both say at the same time. It's kind of become your thing. This isn't the first time that debate has been discussed between you two.

"Oh my god they're total nerds in love. Love Nerds!"

Penelope says in a squeaky voice.

You all laugh at her enthusiasm and you turn around to look at your boyfriend once more.

"I better get going. I didn't mean to stay this long anyway. I'll see you tonight? Your place? I'll order us some chinese"

Spencer takes your hand in his and nods with a smile.

"Yeah i'll be there"

You grin and lean up to kiss him goodbye. Seconds before your lips meet you whisper

"You better be. I'm planning on cashing in that promise for some extra lovin' tonight"

You finally press a kiss to lips and turn around as he turns bright red.

"Y/N!!"

You laugh loudly.

"Two can play this game baby!"

You're practically running out of there to avoid any further questioning from his team. All you hear is a chorus of laughter and Spencers embarrassed voice as he tells them to shut up

[that-blue-vault-dweller]

So there’s a bit of dialogue I’d never heard from Nick before. We were just strolling through Boston and he goes “Y’know, it’s too bad you aren’t a synth. Then we could do this till Judgement Day- although I think that happened a while back.” Think you could do a one-shot where Nora finds out she’s a synth when she visits the Institute, and Nick’s subsequent reaction(s)?

Aww!!! 🥺💙💛 I’m not sure I’ve heard this dialogue before, but for some reason it’s familiar to me. Maybe I’ve watched a playthrough or listened to a audio file with it, lol.

I hope you enjoy! I threw 10 times more angst than was necessary, but maybe you’ll still like it??? 😅😅😅💙💛💙💛💙💛

Word Count: 1097

  “Nick…. All of my life… It was… It was fake. Everything I remembered. My son… My husband… It was all a lie,” Nora brokenly admitted to him, hugging herself as she rested her head against his shoulder. He kindly patted her knee, squeezing gently in that fatherly manner that came so naturally to him.

  Nick sighed slightly, his lips a thin line as he furrowed his brow. He knew how hard this must be for her. He knew it must have been torture to find out that everything you know to be true in your life was just a constructed memory by some group of people that want to play God.

  She had just come home from the Institute several days ago. Nick had headed to Sanctuary as soon as he heard, and from what Piper had told him, Nora was an absolutely enormous mess the first day and still was not doing well at all. So he had asked her to go for a walk with him, and they had ended up sitting on the embankment near the creek that ran nearby Sanctuary.

  It was there that they began this conversation.

  “I’m sorry,” he finally expressed to her gently, his voice quiet as it rumbled in his vocal processor. She removed an arm from around herself and looped it in his softly, making a small negatory hum.

  “It’s not your fault… You’re the last person to blame for any of this. It’s the Institute’s fault. I was a toy… An experiment for their own sick enjoyment,” her voice cracked with the last statement, and he could practically feel the oncoming tears that were threatening to take hold of her.

  “I buried Nate, Nick… I remember it. I buried him, didn’t I?” Nora questioned, a bit of hysteria creeping in at the edges of her words.

  “You buried him, yes,” Nick acknowledged, well-remembering the day that they buried Nate. They also buried many of the other vault-dwellers since Nora felt she owed it to them as the only survivor of the vault.

  “Who… who did I really bury? Who was that man?” Nora questioned, her tone quite shaky, and Nick shook his head, not sure how to make this situation any better.

  “I don’t know… Maybe he really was Shaun’s father?” Nick suggested, and Nora shuddered a little, pressing her cheek a bit harder against Nick’s shoulder.

  “Maybe… I guess the poor man deserved to rest. It’s absolutely horrible that I took his wedding ring from him. He wasn’t my husband, and it wasn’t right for me to take something to remember him by when it’s really his reminder of his actual for real wife. Now he’s not only rolling in the grave from his son, but he’s also had one of his most important possessions taken away, too,” Nora told him dejectedly.

  “It wasn’t horrible… If it makes you feel any better, we could go bury it just on top of his grave. That way it’ll be there with him forever,” Nick tried to reassure, desperately attempting to think of something that might make her feel at least a little better about the whole thing.

  “I just… Can’t believe it’s all fake,” Nora expressed, and Nick glanced in her direction, noticing that there were indeed tears flowing down her cheeks at this point. He moved his arm from her grasp and placed it so that it encircled her shoulders, letting her hug him from the side as he held her gently.

  She silently cried, her shoulders shaking every once in a while as she tried to hold herself together while failing miserably. Nick just let her cry, knowing that sometimes people just needed to have a good release of emotions.

  After a while, she finally pulled herself together, sniffling a bit still and pressing her face to his chest as she closed her eyes tightly. Nick just squeezed her shoulder, rubbing her arm gently as he tried to reassure her.

  Once several beats had passed, Nora suddenly spoke up, her voice rough and hoarse from the tears.

  “Do you remember when you said you wished I was a synth, too…?” Nick immediately quieted, immediately knowing where she was going with this. It filled him with dread, and if he were human, he would be feeling quite sick at this moment.

  “We were in south Boston,” she reminded him, and he realized that he had yet to respond to her question.

  “Yeah,” Nick trailed off, trying to let her finish her thought. He tried to keep his face as neutral as possible.

  When he had told her that he wished she was a synth alongside him, he had meant he wished she was a prototype like him. It had never been confirmed that third gen synths lived forever. In fact, from what Nick had learned out in the Commonwealth, the only third gens that seemed to be programmed to live forever were the coursers.

  Which really made this entire conversation infinitely more heartbreaking for him.

  “I guess…Well… Does this mean we’ll be together forever?” Nora questioned, and her voice was so sweetly hopeful that he could not bring himself to crush her hopes and dreams. She was such a wonderful friend to him, and he cared for her like family.

  “I guess you’ll be stuck with this ugly mug for a while longer,” Nick replied in his typical self-deprecating manner, avoiding telling her an outright lie but avoiding the entire truth as well. She seemed to be satisfied with this, and a bit of peace came over her as she wiped at her eyes and just hugged him carefully.

  “That’s… That’s really comforting, Nick. I’m really glad I won’t lose you,” Nora spoke, her voice growing quite solemn as her mind no doubt started to wander to her other friends that were not synths.

  “You’ll always have me, kid,” Nick replied to her with confidence, his words full of nothing but the truth at this point. He would never leave her, and even when her time comes, he planned to be there until the bitter end.

  She then smiled at him for the first time since he had arrived there in Sanctuary, the smile itself a ghost of her usual bright, loving grin that she bestowed upon her favorite people in the world. He felt himself filling with a combination of affection and guilt.

  He would tell her when the time came. There was no reason to hurt her any more than she already was now.

  He just wished she could be right about the whole thing.

[etheriadearie]

“Promise”

Why can't you just… Promise ?

Today's goal is an in-depth look at one of the most beautiful and breathtaking episodes of She-ra: "Promise"

Storywise, it's incredibly important to the series, and focuses entirely on Catradora. It's the first time since Adora left Catra behind to seek out the sword that the girls really have an opportunity to talk, and things are not going well. Both of them are royally pissed off at the other, with good reason.

For Adora, we're gonna deflate that proud hair poof of hers a bit, as we'll take an honest look at her as a person at this point in her life. And Catra... she's really guarding her feelings closely, as she's already deeply angry with Adora. But we will use the combination of Catra's younger self in the memories they see, plus looking at other times in the series that relate to this episode, where she was less guarded, in order to understand her as a person at this time. Also: warning: tl;dr, best enjoyed while cozy with a drink..

To get started, we skip to when they end up stuck together…

After Adora takes drastic measures to ward off the security spiders by collapsing the tunnel, the girls are now stuck together, and so… they talk...

We immediately see how incredibly irritated they are with each other as Adora chides Catra for being in the Crystal Castle, since the monsters will continue to attack them as long as she's protecting Catra… only to have Catra retort that she didn't ask for protection. Some snippy bickering back and forth happens, then...

Adora asks: "Does Shadow Weaver know you're here?" Very deadpan assertion from Adora. She knows Catra must be disobeying orders, she just doesn't know why.

"I'd say Shadow Weaver has bigger problems right now". Catra is already starting her move against SW back at the Horde. With SW abusively blocking her every move within the Horde, and now that Catra knows that SW was going to mind wipe Adora, Catra has decided she must deal with her abuser.

Adora puts on her telltale sideways grin, and Catra chafes at Adora's flirtation, saying "I told you it's not because I like you” downplaying Adora’s suggestion that this was the reason she let her go. Catra freely admits here that she does like Adora, but it's not the real reason she did it. Still, Catra doesn't explain further, and we see later that Catra often lets Adora explain away her actions this way... but that Adora constantly misses the deeper truths.

"Where are your new best friends? I thought you did everything together". She's very snarky and dismissive of Adora and her flirting. She's mad about Adora leaving her for her new life.

"The ones you let SW imprison and curse?" Adora is angry at Catra for what she did, which was a sudden escalation of things by Catra.

"Yeah obviously, what other friends would I be talking about?" An obvious dig at Adora for leaving her, everything behind. She deadpans this, staring back plainly. Catra is obviously really angry at Adora... while Adora is legitimately mad at Catra for doing something so nasty to Bow and Glimmer...

::Let's take a moment to talk about Catra's feelings about Adora's new friends: Catra feels horribly betrayed by this. Adora completely tossed her aside, and replaced her with Bow and Glimmer. What comes to mind is at the end of Sea Gate, Catra is thrown in the water and then looks up at Adora, who is celebrating and cuddling with Bow and Glimmer. Catra is emotionally forlorn watching this, as Scorpia comes to drag her off to safety, Adora doesn't even look back towards her.

She's forgotten, Adora showed no love towards her at all in that scene (and then hardly any at Princess Prom, either). Adora ignored her plea for her to return, she didn't reach out to Catra at all. And now she watches her cuddle with her new friends: everything Catra thought she had with Adora meant nothing, and she's been replaced with these feel goodie goods who are fawning all over Adora.

Suffice to say, Catra couldn't do this, she's got way too many issues with emotional intimacy and touch aversion. So she watches Adora, seeing that what she offered her wasn't good enough, knowing because of it she's forgotten. Catra was trying really hard to be a close friend to Adora in spite of her issues, but as we will see, Adora wasn't trying to understand what was going on with Catra. And because of this, Catra was too afraid to express her affection openly, and yet here's Adora... accepting all of Bow and Glimmer’s love, for which Adora really did nothing to earn. Adora took Catra’s friendship for granted while ignoring her deeper needs, as will be explained, then completely abandons her, not even seeming to miss her. Catra is deeply hurt by the unfairness of this.

>Catra stares back at Adora, frustrated when she doesn't even acknowledge their lost friendship.

"Well, we don't need to go together. You do your weird little magic quest thing I'll find my own way out". Catra looks resentfully at the sword on Adora's back as she says this. Catra is laying down boundaries, except it's useless since they are trapped together. But, boundaries are important to Catra and as the episode progresses, Adora shows that she doesn't really understand Catra's.

>As they walk along, both girls' shadows loom equally tall. The symbolism is that in this story, both are equally important... it's also a shockingly beautiful sequence. (pic above)

After entering the room of infinite darkness, Catra tries to separate from Adora but the door is gone, they are stuck together. Weird things start happening. As the Fright Zone appears, both of them are confused. Adora decides to suspect Catra, after all, she attacked her friends. But as Adora grabs Catra, Catra is surprised and confused... Catra doesn't like being touched unexpectedly, Adora knows this but is ignoring that and attacking her. She gets treated as an enemy when she clearly hasn't done anything wrong, and it sets the tone for the two of them: Adora has constantly treated Catra as an enemy since the very moment she defected, not even trying to understand Catra's point of view. And so Catra increasingly emotionally distances herself from Adora. Catra angrily casts Adora's arm aside, not liking being vilified by her, and Adora doesn't understand why Catra is so upset. Catra slips away to explore, needing space from her.

The way Adora immediately suspects and then attacks Catra is symbolic to the whole episode: by defecting to the Rebellion, Adora chose to start treating Catra, and her entire unit, as enemies, backing it up with hostility. But Catra doesn't really agree that the horde is evil... in her experience, it's just how life is.

>The two girls, now separated, call out to each other. Adora hears Catra's call, then another: young Catra is behind her, looking lost and insecure. Catra joins Adora as their first memory has just begun…

~DISCLAIMER TIME~ A lot of information in She-ra is inferred by emotional context, so if this seems a bit head-canon-y, I assure you, I have data! Please ask questions and seek clarifications, I promise to answer back! ~EtheriaDearie

>A worried and hurt young Catra runs to young Adora's side. She is emotional and needs support. Adora checks her out then gets the real deal: Catra was in a fight with an adult. It hints that Catra always had to deal with people messing with her, even before SW began her abuse. This is a guess, but it's probable: this is likely a happy memory of the two of them right before the hurting began. Along with the "promise" memory and the moments immediately preceding their entering the Black Garnet chamber, these scenes set the baseline for what their friendship was like before Catra suffered SW’s abuse. Also, this memory is a happy one, and how Adora remembers their friendship: it was likely triggered by her memories. The next ones are not, as I believe they are triggered by Catra, who is trying to explain to Adora what was so painful about their childhood...

>Catra doesn't know what to expect when she shows Octavia to Adora. She probably expects Adora to try to apologize on her behalf, or to give her a hard time about what she did. Instead, Adora sticks with her friend and yells “Hey Octavia, you're a dumbface." This brings young Catra much joy, Adora is sticking with her, not passing judgement. The two young girls run together hand in hand, experiencing childhood bliss, but it doesn't last. The present versions of themselves return, holding hands...

They share a brief moment of connection before Catra pulls her hand away in anger. Adora is surprised at the strength of Catra’s reaction. They are not on intimate terms any more, in fact, I suspect they had been struggling for a while before Adora's defection. Adora doesn't want the moment to stop, but Catra does. It hints that the gulf between them is already wide.

"How can you deal with all this magic stuff?" Catra has a deep distrust of magic, as it was used in her abuse. She resents it, and throughout the series whenever anything magic happens that she doesn't see coming she gets creeped out.

"I'm only dealing with it because I need to figure out how to heal Glimmer after someone got her cursed." It's a valid criticism, but Catra deflects it.

"What do you want? An apology? You're not getting one." We don't get the full story on this moment until season 5 when a young Catra tells Adora she'll "never say sorry to anybody, ever." Adora doesn't like Catra just refusing to explain, and as Catra pushes her away, Catra is full of reproach at Adora's judgement.

::As an abused child, Catra was continuously vilified and abused by everyone but Adora. And when Adora would suggest she apologize throughout their lives, she can't understand why Catra won't. It comes down to literally everyone in the world judging Catra and being cruel. Not once did any of them apologize to her, even though she didn't do anything to deserve the abuse. Except Adora... but that has issues, too. In fact, SW literally tells her "I won't apologize" regarding her abuse of Catra. Can you imagine the hurt at that?

[pic caption: Catra refuses to apologize, Catra often shows her deeper emotions while blinking, in this case: the incredible pain she experienced from SW’s abuse.]

So no, Catra won't apologize, she had a thing she was trying to do by kidnapping Bow and Glimmer and taking her sword, and it ended badly. But she felt she had a good reason to do it: she wanted to force Adora to see her, to make her acknowledge how big of a part of Adora’s life Catra used to be. And it's not like anyone has been helping Catra, she's had to make every single decision on her own her entire life and live with the consequences.

Also, mistakes for Catra have an entirely different meaning than they do for Adora. Whenever Adora made a mistake, she was given an opportunity to fix it. This is a theme of their relationship: Adora expects Catra to let her fix her mistakes. But for Catra, she learned that any mistake she made was dangerous, as when she did make a mistake, SW would torture her for it. And if other people saw it too, they'd use it to perpetuate the notion that she's some kind of no good fuck up. So Catra is extremely careful to not make mistakes, and if she does, she tries to cover it up, distance herself from it. (note: this isn't the same as Catra's intentional rebellions against this system where she was unfairly targeted for abuse-). This is why Catra simply cannot forgive Adora easily for breaking her promise: in Catra's world, she had to be perfect, or she could have been dead by SW's hand. She wasn't allowed to make mistakes like Adora is, she is what is clinically known as 'hyper vigilant' and always preparing for the worst. And so she applies this standard to be perfect all the time to Adora, and therefore she won't give Adora the same license to make mistakes with their friendship. Catra thinks Adora should know better, and see the consequences of her actions.

>Adora lets it go: when Catra seems to shut down, Adora does her best to try to accept her. Adora tries a different track. She asks Catra why she let her and Glimmer go when SW had them imprisoned, when it could have resulted in Catra getting in trouble. Catra walks ahead, trying to distance herself from having to answer. But the magic of the Crystal Castle intervenes: as Adora slips and begins to fall, Catra saves her. It's a symbolic moment: Catra has always tried to protect Adora, to save her from pain. It's why she changed course to give the sword back to her, partly.

"Did you really think I'd just let SW erase your memory like that?"

"I don't know. Probably." Adora shows such little understanding of their friendship. It shows Adora really is thinking of Catra as an enemy, not as the complicated person stuck between protecting her friend, and the cruel necessities of her life.

Catra looks at Adora with disappointment. "Yeah, well, you never did have too much faith in me." Adora tries to understand Catra's emotions, fails.

"Huh, can you blame me?" Ouch. Adora smiles at Catra, trying to show love for her roguish quirks. But it just shows how little Adora understands: she is repeating a negative stereotype of Catra that everyone in their old life believes and perpetuates. And Adora should know better, instead of just assuming the worst about her. That persona is one which Catra uses to protect herself, partly from her own emotional feelings, but also as a necessity to protect herself from SW. She had to act like she doesn't care, doesn't try, so SW wouldn't see her power.

"Psh, not really." As Catra turns away, again she deadpans this but you can see pain and disappointment leaking past her indifference.

As she walks away she trails her tail across Adora's hand, flirting and drawing Adora's attention to her butt. It's a cute little moment of telling a truth to counter the lie: 'Adora, you should know me better, and also, I like you.' Still, it's only a half truth: Catra couldn't let SW win because SW is Catra's true enemy. But, Adora takes the flirtatious hint, as always. She accepts it and doesn't dig deeper.

Catra asks Adora about their childhood, trying to understand how Adora could just throw it all away. Adora gives a very direct and impassioned speech, she looks Catra in the eyes, trying to convince her and make her understand why leaving was the right thing to do. Catra hides her emotions, weighing Adora's answer. She doesn't agree with her sentiment, in Catra's experience good and evil are relative and exist as such everywhere. Also, she's right: we meet many people in the Horde who aren't evil. And Adora's finding the sword is one giant sinister manipulation by Light Hope. Moral grayness is a constant theme in this show. Still, this isn't really why Catra chooses to stay with the Horde.

Adora sees her explanation failing to convince Catra, so she tries reminding Catra of their deeper friendship, telling her she misses her too. Catra is temporarily taken aback at being called out before remembering to deny it. She tells Adora to get over herself, and Adora tells her she won't stop until Catra says she likes her. They flirtatiously rough house, and Catra smiles during it: yeah, she does. But she denies it anyways.

::Adora often tries to be respectful of Catra's personal space but is making an exception here: she's telling her that she finds her desirable, and if Catra wanted it, they could be together. Adora can't understand why Catra feels the need to resist this, but she knows doing it helps her friend feel wanted. Still, this shows how casually Adora views their attraction.

Yes, they should be together. And actually, they had an unspoken agreement that they would be. But Catra's not going to open herself up to that just to serve her desire. She wants more from Adora, for Adora to show her that she really does see her, and cares about her. If she did, maybe Catra could open up about some of her pain. Being intimate without doing that would be impossible, and so far Catra's life still isn't safe enough to risk her feelings. Adora's promotion could have meant the beginning of something new between them, where they worked together to build a more secure future together where Catra didn't have to be fearful all the time. But instead, Adora left her.

So begins the second memory. The two girls, now teenagers, compete against each other in sparring. It's clear they are flirting, and neither is fighting all out. When Catra taunts Adora by putting her finger to her forehead, she shows how much better she is at fighting. She full heartedly laughs, Adora enjoys this and then throws a purposefully weak strike to restart the fight. When Adora seemingly turns the tables through brute force, Catra plays hurt to exploit Adora's naiveness. As Adora tries to show concern, Catra turns the tables back. She wants to teach Adora a lesson: that not everyone will play fair, as Catra knows all too well from SW's abuse. But Lonnie interrupts her. Catra doesn't appreciate this and makes quick work of Lonnie, showing just how good she is. Adora attacks, getting the predetermined win. Catra doesn't enjoy the beat down but accepts Adora's help up. She heads to Lonnie as Adora receives compliments from their commander.

As Catra confronts Lonnie, she tells Catra "you were playing dirty, I was just leveling the field". Catra will hear these words again when she leaves Adora behind in frustration near the end of the episode. They are significant: these are stereotypical views forced on Catra, and those views ignore that Catra was just doing something she felt was important: teaching Adora about the harsh realities that exist in the world. Real enemies don't play by the rules, and will be unpredictable.

As Catra’s anger rises at this, Adora puts her hand on Catra's shoulder to calm her down, then compliments Catra on her fighting skills. Catra ever so casually tosses the comforting hand aside. She's saying 'I can handle my emotions without your help, but thanks for asking.' As she tells Adora she let her win, Adora tries to tell if Catra really is ok.

Thus starts one of cutest exchanges between the two of them: as Catra tries to explain why she lets Adora win, Adora puts on her sideways 'you like me' grin while she playfully denies that Catra let her win. Catra gives a very animated and obviously made up explanation about not wanting to have people expect things from her. Adora grins along, and halfway through her lie Catra leans in, staring at Adora's lips before looking up into her eyes. Once again, Catra is undoing a lie by telling a truth: she let her win because she likes (loves) her. But it's only a half truth, once again...

Adora accepts the explanation, keeping her sideways grin: 'it's so cute how you like me'. Catra's explanation done, Adora moves on, wanting to catch up with their unit. Catra lets her do so while excusing herself. As Adora leaves, a huge amount of meaningful information passes across Catra's face…

First, Catra feels bad about having to lie to Adora, and it shows. Then, as Adora leaves to socialize, disappointment and rejection shows: Catra had hoped Adora might look deeper, and try to see the deeper truth. As Adora turns away and leaves we see a look of total love and adoration on Catra's face. She really, really loves Adora. She's the light of her life, a real idiot no doubt but Catra will always love her for exactly who she is.

The girls remain their younger selves as the rest of the memory plays out, Adora staying to accept praise while Catra separates to deal with her internal feelings which Adora always fails to see: the hurt and aloneness she feels.

>A frustrated young Catra cries, expressing her repressed emotions. It would be easiest to assume she cries because she's sad about losing, but we have to look ahead to the next memory to find the real truth.

Catra is sad because she never had a choice. SW took that choice from her, and while Catra is happy to let Adora win because of the love she feels for her, it hurts that she never really got to decide. And Adora doesn't see that, doesn't see the pain Catra is bearing, hiding. And so she cries for that, too. The one person who should love her doesn't really see her. As she looks up in the mirror to see herself, since no one else in her life seems to see her pain, she sees her present tearful self looking back. The pain of the past is real in the present, and while she's older now and won't let herself give in to tears, she feels the pain as she did back then. (pic 1, below) She sees the tears and it snaps her back to her present self, totally unnerved by the simulation as the security detects her and attacks. A fearful Catra screams, wanting help, wanting Adora.

>Adora snaps back to herself, having been participating in the replay of the memory post Catra excusing herself. She tries to run to help Catra, full of worry. She sees a terrified Catra trapped by the spider. As the spider begins to drag her away the two girls lock arms, trying to free Catra. But it's too strong, and as we see their grip start to slip, Catra looks to Adora wanting, pleading for help. As Catra is pulled away, Adora feels helpless, knowing she couldn't help her friend. She thumps her head in frustration that she wasn't there for Catra.

The scene speaks to an obvious truth: Adora has never quite been there enough for Catra. She's always less present, less aware of Catra's reality than she could have been. But since Catra was experiencing a painful memory when this happened, her reaction shows her vulnerable emotional state, and so she called out for help: Catra just wants to feel safe, for Adora to be there to help her. But she wasn't.

>As Catra is dragged away, she feels helpless, and calls out mournfully for Adora. But she's long gone; Catra is alone and scared, as usual. She screams out her frustration, the realization that she’s never gotten the help she needed, she always ends up alone. She cries tears for the suffering and anguish she feels from that. (pic 2, below) It’s a moment that shows us the real inner Catra: She feels deeply, whether it be her desire to be seen, loved by Adora, or the fear she feels in this moment and others. She tries her best to act confident in herself, but it's a lie: she needs support, yet is left behind by everyone, including Adora. She was willing to bear her pain for Adora's love, but she has become increasingly aware of how tenuous that really was growing up.

>Catra digs deep, like she's always done. She will handle this, won't take the abuse lying down. She shifts her mentality to being the survivor, the person who has survived years of abuse. She frees herself and gets to her feet, accessing her foe, determined to defeat it. She attacks, using her anger to deal damaging blows, seeking to destroy her enemy, to make sure she survives. She stands back, confident she's won, proud of herself for it. She doesn't quit, she always perseveres against those who want to destroy her. (pic 3)

Adora shows up, finishing the monster. Catra doesn't drop her mentality, this person who has lived a separate life from Adora and survived on her own, doing the hard things like winning fights and resisting Shadow Weaver's abuse.

Adora walks forward, seeing Catra's anger, determination. She looks blankly, trying not to upset Catra. She's trying to get a read on Catra but not having any luck, so she's being cautious. She asks if Catra is ok, casually pulling webbing off Catra's shoulder, trying to exist in her physical space without upsetting Catra further. "I had it" says Catra, not dropping her fighter stance, mentality at all. Catra is very much feeling the aloneness of her life from everyone, including Adora.

Adora tries to casually put aside Catra's assertion that she had it, she smiles diplomatically. She tries again to touch Catra, to break down her animosity and get her to calm down. It doesn't work. "We need to make sure we stick together from now on." As Adora touches Catra, she tenses, uncomfortable. Catra has strong touch aversion, and Adora knows this but she also knows doing it sometimes helps Catra shift her mentality, so she's trying to get Catra to connect emotionally, to get her to accept care.

"Will you stop telling me what to do?" An exasperated Catra says. We see a look of total dismay cross Adora's face. She's not understanding why Catra has so much animosity in this moment. (pic below)

As Adora looks at Catra, she hunches her body, looking misunderstood and isolated. Adora has consistently failed to see Catra's emotional states and so Catra is feeling more and more apart; that the mentality of the survivor she's feeling now is the right one. Adora didn't really help her at all growing up, and she doesn't see her for who she really is, either. Adora always took the easy explanation, like saying that Catra did things for her because she liked her. Never looking deeper, trying to see her struggle. And so Catra doesn't drop her combative pose, she stays in it because she feels in control, less vulnerable.

As for the words "stop telling me what to do", that's an essay in itself but consider: just now Adora became frustrated when she lost Catra, and now tells her they need to stay together. But they didn't, they never did, and even when they are together Adora is no real help to Catra. So she reacts in anger to Adora trying to direct her. After all, in the next scene we will see that Adora leads Catra into danger, and then doesn't really help her as she gets abused. Adora is no great leader, not according to Catra's experience.

::Adora is having a total loss, here, as she tries to understand Catra, why she's angry at her: It's because she has never really known this 'survivor' side of Catra. Adora wants to comfort her and calm her down, but Catra isn't having it. I think this is when we first see Adora begin to realize that there is something is very wrong with her friend that she has completely failed to see, and she's deeply worried by it. (pic 2)

[pic cation: Adora can't read Catra's emotions, Adora realizes Catra is deeply angry. Outside SW’s chamber, Adora wants to take Catra’s hand.]

Adora loves Catra, but can't seem to get through to her: Catra is holding herself apart from Adora. Again, Catra pushes Adora's hand aside, frustrated. She expresses her exasperation at the situation, saying she's sick of what's going on. Adora follows along, confused. As Catra seemingly purposefully leaves her behind, Adora demands to know what Catra's problem is, saying that she was trying to save her. Catra looks down at her confrontationally, frustrated with Adora's lack of vision. "For the last time, I don't need you to save me. I've been doing just fine on my own. No thanks to you." Uh oh.

The words "no thanks to you" are especially cutting. Adora has totally failed to see the struggles Catra had all her life, she didn't understand the hurt and abuse Catra was fighting against. And so Catra did it all on her own, protecting herself and trying to remain strong. Her love of Adora might have helped her have hope, but fundamentally Catra overcame the abuse by not giving up on herself, believing she had worth, and not letting others tear her down.

Adora runs to Catra's side, taking her arm in one hand. Feeling her friend becoming increasingly distant from her, Adora tries authentically telling Catra her feelings, hoping to make her friend see her desire to help and understand her. Adora explains that she's sorry for leaving and that she did it because she couldn't stand the war the Horde has pursued. Her next words are telling: "but I never wanted to leave you". 'Want' is an important word in this series, and it comes up again in season 5 when Catra asks Adora "what do you want, Adora?”. By choosing to leave the Horde, Catra feels that Adora wanted that more than she wanted what they had together. Also, promises are not something you're supposed to break over a 'want'. And Adora so casually breaking their promises makes Catra think she doesn't matter to Adora. It's not the truth, but this belief still determines her reaction in this moment. Even though Adora dearly loves Catra, including at this point in the story, she hasn't shown it in a way that Catra can see as meaningful. As Adora finishes saying this, Catra looks back, feeling alone and unwanted, seemingly thinking 'but you did leave me, Adora.'

Adora tries to appeal to Catra to join the rebellion with her. Then she says "I know you're not a bad person, Catra. You don't belong with the Horde." Catra must be thinking 'Ok so at what point did you become the authority on whether someone is good or bad, Adora?' Adora has shown no interest in understanding Catra's position, she treated her as an enemy without fail since she left her, literally in every single case including at Princess Prom when Catra was trying so hard to romance her. And Catra doesn't accept Adora's naive black and white view of the world. Think about it: when Adora defects she begins treating all Horde with hostility, including her dearest friend, she judges them all and doesn’t even try to see them as the complicated people that they are. So when she suggests Catra doesn't belong with the Horde, Catra looks back at her, feeling totally isolated from Adora. Even though Adora's plea is earnest, Catra declines it.

>As the next memory begins, we see Adora now has both hands on Catra's arm, she's desperately trying to hold on to her bond with Catra and show her desire to fix things between them. Catra doesn't drop her wary demeanor at all, and Adora looks lost and anxious over this as a young Catra runs by.

The memory starts out full of childhood innocence as the two of them play together. When the girls see that the Black Garnet chamber is open, young Adora remarks "we're definitely not allowed in there." Young Catra looks at Adora, seemingly asking if she wants to go in, trusting her. Young Adora runs off, and Catra follows her in. Yes, Catra participates in the decision, but she's not the one who runs towards the chamber, and that's important to what happens next.

A worried (adult) Adora looks to her friend who seems so distant, stoic. Anxiously, Adora tells Catra "You don't have to go in there." Adora knows what happens next is very bad, that this is a hurtful memory for Catra. As an unwavering Catra begins to walk towards the chamber, Adora looks down at Catra's hand. [pic above] She wants desperately to reach out and take it, to hold Catra back from this terrible moment, to tell her she's sorry for messing up. Adora knows now that she screwed up, that she's let Catra down, somehow more than she ever realized. She doesn't know what to do about it… she follows Catra inside.

The young girls explore, Catra touches the black garnet and gets shocked. Adora has second thoughts, she realizes they're trespassing.. but of course, SW returns, so they try to hide. As SW takes off the mask, Adora cries out, taken aback... young Catra looks at her in dismay. She's about to pay for Adora's mistake with a lifetime of suffering. Offended, SW tells them to "Get out!" but rethinks. She puts the mask back on, and decides to use this moment to instead abuse the girls and use the crime of their trespass against them. As SW tells Catra to stay, Adora turns around, seeing that Catra is caught, and she's scared for her friend. She really did make a poor decision, and as a highly empathetic person, what happens to Catra scars Adora, too.

Held powerless by magic, Catra tries to explain that they were just playing. SW's words to her set the stage for a lifetime of physical and psychological abuse: SW leans over her menacingly, telling her "Insolent child, I've come to expect such disgraceful behavior from you, but I will not allow you to drag Adora down as well." Again, it's not Catra who decided to go in, so it's really not her fault. SW disparages her and heaps blame upon her for Adora's bad choice, ignoring the truth.

Adora weakly tries to protect Catra, saying "SW, it wasn't her fault. It was my idea too." It's an understandable response, as they're just little kids. Still, Adora could have taken the blame for their trespass, since she led Catra inside. But it's about to get a lot more hurtful for Catra...

SW's voice echoes through Catra's head as she trembles in terror: "You have never been anything more than a nuisance to me. I've kept you around this long because Adora was fond of you but if you ever do anything to jeopardize her future, I will dispose of you myself. Do you understand ?" Catra trembles in fear, her eyes unfocused, the room empty but for SW menacing her. She's in a dissociative state, terrified and helpless. I think some people probably feel like this must have been a idle threat, but it isn't: SW abuses Catra many times after this for her mistakes. And the depiction of the dissociative state helps us understand just how damaging it was. While Adora seemingly goes on to not realize the importance of this memory, for Catra it is formative to her entire life.

Again, Adora tries weakly to stop what's happening, putting herself between them. She tells SW "please, stop" then looks over at Catra, full of concern. Running over to SW, she tells her "she didn't mean to". This is so hurtful, as young Catra is very smart. Catra knows Adora has blown it again, after all, what is it that she "didn't mean to" do when it was Adora's idea to trespass? Adora isn't getting the magnitude of the situation, and Catra is very much left to fend for herself.

SW then does a very insidious thing to Adora, a very directed abuse that's meant to work against her personality and empathetic reactions to others pain. She tells her "Adora, you must do a better job of keeping her under control. Do not let something like this happen again..." SW follows this up with years of manipulation to make Adora even more susceptible to abuse. But in this moment, SW again heaps the blame for Adora's mistake onto Catra, who did nothing wrong. For Catra, she comes to believe that what she did doesn't even matter, nobody cares what the truth was. Even Adora. But for Adora, the hurt goes deep as well. She made a bad decision, her friend gets hurt for it, and she never comes clean... instead, she's told she has to do a better job of controlling her friend, and that she has to be perfect so that it doesn't happen again. It's a deep and hurtful moment for Adora, just like it is for Catra. But the hurt is much less direct, and more sneaky. Nonetheless, Adora struggles with this moment, this abuse of her, in the most intimate and painful ways all throughout the series.

Young Catra watches on as SW completes her manipulation of Adora. For Catra, she's left with the feeling that nothing she does matters, she was blamed for something she didn't even do. And Adora seemingly took the easy out, spreading the blame. But she doesn't realize this moment is so insidious for Adora, that it attacks and manipulates her at her emotional need to help others. From this moment on, Adora is afflicted with a desperate fear that she can't protect others, and must lead perfectly so they don't get hurt. This internal conflict erodes Adora's self worth, and causes her great emotional pain throughout the series. Catra, instead, believes she is being told she has no worth, and isn't even allowed to make her own decisions. It's hurtful, and it's part of why she tensed so badly at Adora for trying to tell her what to do earlier. We see this realization cross young Catra's face: she feels forgotten in this moment.

We see the young girls walking away from SW's chamber, Adora with her hand around Catra's shoulder. This comfort is not enough... Catra really needed Adora to stand up for her there, to come clean, and she didn't. Trying to comfort her now seems hollow. As they flash to their present selves, Catra knocks Adora's arm aside in frustration, accusing her of needing to play the hero.

Adora responds, saying she was only trying to protect her. Catra's next words tell the real truth of their childhood: "You never protected me! Not in any way that would put you on SW's bad side!" Adora at first chafes at this statement, feeling like she did try to protect her, then crosses over to confusion at the strength of Catra's assertion. Catra is telling Adora she was blind to her pain. She wasn't there for her, and this is very much at the core of Catra's disappointment with Adora: the fact that she never stayed, never tried to understand. Adora let SW control her, make her ambitious, and so Catra was put to the side of that, and over time Adora grew apart from her. Catra’s exact words here are important: she says that Adora ‘plays’ at being the hero, yet always seemingly protected her status as the favorite, never standing up to SW and risking harm onto herself in order to save Catra from pain.

And so, the fact that out of seemingly out of nowhere, Adora decides to risk everything and defect in order to fight for people she doesn't even know, insults Catra. Adora abandons and consequently fights against her own people, leaving Catra behind, unilaterally treating her as an enemy. Never, in their whole lives, did Adora ever fight for Catra, only offering affection afterwards to make up for the cruelties that happened to Catra. So no, Catra doesn't want Adora to save her, or her sympathy, when she seemingly cared so little about her pain. Adora was no hero to her.

Now an obvious question might be: if the manipulation is that Adora is supposed to protect and control Catra, then shouldn't she have had to see SW abuse Catra for it to work? The first part of the answer is that it was never really about that, once the idea was put in Adora’s head, SW used it to manipulate her further into a mentality where Adora would accept praise, promotion on her path to becoming a force captain.

The other is that when someone is being hurt like Catra was in that moment... if the one person in the world who is supposed to get it doesn't get it... then it becomes very hard to ever bring it up to them again. It's a specific type of hurt and abandonment: for Catra, she goes on to believe that this is her burden, that somehow she alone is supposed to learn these hard lessons. And so she doesn't tell Adora about the abuse. Also, keep in mind that they are small children, and Catra doesn't want Adora to hurt like she does... so she's actually protecting her, in her mind. But the fact that time goes by and Adora never seemed to care, to stop and see Catra's pain, was very hurtful to her. And Catra’s feelings of betrayal at Adora’s not seeing the hurt are justified: in episode 1, we see Adora watch SW menace Catra, then happily run off to accept her promotion, only remembering to check on Catra as an afterthought. Catra needed Adora's support, and never really got it.

[pic caption: (left to right) Adora’s apparent willful ignorance of the abuse.]

So Catra believes she learns these hard lessons so Adora won't have to, but is left alone in her pain. This also means that SW specifically abused Catra at times and in places so Adora wouldn't be aware, which again, tells us it was never really about making Adora responsible for Catra's decisions. No, the reasons were much darker, and Catra bore it all alone.

The girls flash to their younger selves, and Catra accuses Adora: "Admit it, you love being her favorite." Catra is telling Adora that she was disappointed and hurt that Adora kept accepting praise and privilege from SW, after that moment when she so clearly should have seen how SW abused her, and the maliciousness of the death threat. In Catra’s mind, Adora could have rejected SW. As painful as it is for a small child to be without any parents, it would have been the right thing to do, for Catra. SW was no good to Catra, and they could have shared the pain of being orphans who only had each other, but instead Catra ended up bearing all of the abuse while Adora was given privilege.

Adora denies this assertion, and yet she did accept the privilege SW offered her. Catra's next words show how ignorant Adora was to the realities of their lives as they flash back to their present selves: "Oh yeah? When you left, who do you think took the fall for you? Who was protecting me then ?" Catra bore all the abuse and punishment for Adora's leaving, and Adora wasn't there to see it. Catra did this bravely for Adora, in fact, up until before Princesse Prom, Catra did everything she could to cover for Adora, just like she asked, protecting her, hoping she'd come back to her. But Adora shows no understanding at all for what Catra went through, she didn't even think about what must have been happening to her. Adora has never taken the time to think about how her actions affect Catra's life.

Adora counters, suggesting that Catra could leave the Horde, and therefore get away from SW's abuse. Catra just glares back at her, disappointed. Catra knows running from the abuse won't solve anything.

::What this comes down to is a totally different understanding of the world. For Adora, she thinks she became a hero for leaving the Horde, and becoming She-ra. She doesn't realize she was lucky to fall into the situation she did, with Bow and Glimmer helping her gain acceptance and protecting her. She's totally unaware that the reality that her becoming She-ra is a manipulation born out of evil intent. For Catra, she's always known that the world is harsh, and that bad people exist who will try to destroy you. She's not afraid to fight, she's had no choice learning these harsh truths. It's a jaded view that negatively affects her perceptions of people, but it prepares her for the worst, and so she relies on it. So when Adora suggests she run from it, she rejects her as naive. They flash back to their younger selves after Adora suggests Catra can leave like she did, and Catra accusingly points out that she doesn't need to follow Adora around. That they're children is relevant to the previous memory where Adora led Catra into danger, and then didn't protect her. Catra isn't interested in following Adora blindly after she's put her in danger so badly in the past.

Flashing back present selves, Catra tells Adora she doesn't want to leave. As she says this her face conveys her anger at the world, her drive to face SW instead of flee. She says "I'm not afraid of SW anymore, and I'm a better force captain than you ever would have been." Let's take this in parts: Catra won't run from her abuser, she's already planning to take her down. Doing so is important to Catra, as it fixes her world in an important way. And that Adora can't see this just shows how far apart they are now. In Catra's mind, Adora was supposed to stay, and as they rose to power together, they would have supplanted SW, fixing Catra's world. The two of them would have been stronger in the end. But Adora did leave, so Catra impatiently tries to get Adora to see that she won't just run away. If Adora doesn't want to help Catra overcome this evil, then she'll do it on her own.

Her disappointment in Adora for abandoning this fight is apparent, what comes to mind is when Catra calls Adora weak in the Sea Gate episode. And now Catra knows she's got the power to do this, she's a force captain, and if she can just find a reason to depose SW she knows she has the station and fighting ability to take her down. She always knew she could lead, but was happy to let Adora have success because she really didn't want that responsibility. So she points out her superiority, not to show that she's better than Adora, but to tell Adora she was blind to Catra's worth, and to be hurtful to Adora for abandoning her.

They flash back to their child selves: Adora looks at Catra, hurt and confused "You always said you didn't care about things like that." Adora is feeling hurt by the idea that she was unknowingly taking advantage of Catra, because Catra has seemily just told her she was lying.

Now, this next part is important, and it's important that we are seeing Catra's reaction as her child self: Catra looks sad and lonely as Adora finishes her question, and she's crying. Something adult Catra would never let herself do. So we're seeing a much more authentic expression of Catra's hurt and emotions than if it were her present self. What you need to understand here is that those emotions don't really match her words... Catra tells her "Well I was lying, obviously!" But her face says she's angry and hurt at Adora for not seeing her pain.

As she delivers those words her face is full of accusation and insult, she's being dramatic, something we will see Catra do time and time again. She stares down Adora, eyes scrunched up, showing Adora how betrayed she felt by her insensitivity. Then we get sadness, disappointment. Finally, we get a lonely kind of furious sorrow: all that time feeling alone and Adora didn't bother to understand is written on her face.

The tears are still flowing, but as she turns away they shift back to their present selves. Adult Catra looks totally alone, heartbroken.

Ok but how we REALLY know Catra isn't telling the truth is this: almost word for word, this moment exists in episode 1. ANY time you see that happen in this show, you need to look back to find the meaning of it.

>We will need to look in totality of this scene in episode 1: An excited Catra pounces on Adora, asking her what SW said. She sees the badge and takes it. Here's a funny thing, because we see Catra jump on Adora you might think Catra is always like this, she just comes into Adora's space as she pleases. But once Catra has the badge, we see no anger or jealousy. Just total wonder. She shows nothing but exuberation and happiness for Adora's promotion (pic 1, lower left fyi).

Catra knew this could be the turning point she's been waiting for, that Adora was due for promotion. And so she's jumping all over Adora, full of joy. We only see her attitude change once Adora tells her SW isn't letting her go on missions. And so, we can infer a lot of information from this...

Catra expected this moment to change their lives for the better. That Adora's rising in rank means freedom, the beginning of something new. Some many new things, in Catra's case. But Catra definitively shows us in this scene that she doesn't desire the success for herself. She only shows happiness for Adora, for them together, and she's ecstatic. (pic 1, fyi)

This, in Catra's mind, probably means the start of their romantic lives. If Adora is the force captain that brings them to victory, SW won't be able to just trample all over their lives. Catra can begin letting down some walls, maybe even let Adora pursue her romantically. If they're together, and Adora is on her side because of that, she becomes safe from her abuser. It's a much better outcome than trying to fight SW, but that's not how the story goes. No, Adora leaves her instead. How's that for emotional whiplash? All of these truths are laid bare in s3ep5, when we see Catra's perfect reality, when she and Adora are together romantically. Catra only wants to be safe and to be loved, but when Adora leaves her she loses trust in the goodness of Adora, and in people in general.

> Adora tells Catra she shouldn't be surprised she's been cut of of the mission because she's so rude to SW, to which Catra responds by calling Adora a people pleaser, then storming off in anger...

::Note, as this is important: Adora is taking SW’s side, and not Catra’s, which is entirely opposite of their early childhood memory of Octavia. It shows how Adora had started listening to the negative judgements others placed on Catra...

>Adora goes after Catra, finding her sulking on the roof. Catra is angry, betrayed by the world, at the injustice that SW is in her life. Adora asks "I didn't even think you wanted to be a force captain?" Catra tossed the badge at her, saying she doesn't. Then she folds her body up, holding herself. Adora sees this, but doesn't touch her. She's being careful to respect Catra's boundaries. But the anger Catra feels here isn't about being denied the chance to be a force captain, it's at all the hurt that SW has dealt her and continues to do so. And Adora doesn't see that, which disappoints Catra. But, she's unable to verbalize it herself, she is too insecure in her emotional vulnerability, so she lets it slide.

What we have here is two different instances of the same question with two different answers, but in both cases Catra is telling the truth. In episode 1, it's the truth that she doesn't care about being a force captain because of her love for Adora, and the promise, in her mind, that they will eventually be together. In episode 11, Catra then says she lied, and this now is also true: Catra did think about what she was going through, all the pain and sacrifices she made for Adora, which were done in the name of love. But Adora doesn't love her the way that Catra loves Adora, instead leaving her behind. And so now that Adora didn't ever see how excellent a person Catra actually was, how dedicated to her she is, and the pain she was willing to bear for her sake, it does matter. Because that's shitty of her, and so now Catra will survive on her own by her own excellence, her strength that Adora never stopped to see. So Catra is guilting Adora, trying to make her see how blind and unfeeling she is.

>Back to ep11: Catra tries to walk away from Adora, who desperately chases her, trying to understand why Catra is becoming so distant, wanting her to tell her what's wrong. She reaches out for Catra's shoulder in one last attempt to get Catra to talk, she knows touching Catra could maybe get her to be more open. But the truth is Adora has been far too easy on Catra, she needs to be more forceful if she wants Catra to talk, which she later comes to understand... she's been coddling Catra, and so Catra is allowed to wallow in her unhealthy mental states.

Catra takes Adora's hand, forcefully holding it away from her and delivering a hurtful line: "Why do you think I gave the sword back to you in the fright zone? I didn't WANT you to come back, Adora!" This hits Adora like a load of bricks, her dismay is evident. And it's all true, which is the sad part. Catra was already preparing to cut ties with Adora, as even by that point she had come to a realization, a decision: if Adora doesn't want to be with her, then she'll do it herself. She will do the hard things on her own.

She turns away from Adora, looking hurt and betrayed. And Adora is at a complete loss, she doesn't know this side of Catra, this part of her that has survived hardship all these years... she lets her leave, not knowing what to do.

Adora is then attacked by the security, which takes up her time. As that happens, we see memories only shown to Catra. Catra runs, emotionally overwhelmed as all the unfair judgements, the abuse, and hollow apologies ring out around her. All the years of frustration and sadness weigh on her, she tries to keep it together, lashing out at the holograms. She falls to her knees, fighting back emotion and trying not to cry, her inner, vulnerable self is near the surface, and she's trying not to break down in tears over all of the hurt she's had to bear...

… and then she hears soft crying...

She turns to see her younger, tiny self, crying. Then, a tiny Adora joins the tiny Catra. Unlike the other memories, Catra never flashes into her younger self, she just watches...

The tiny Adora pulls the blanket down, Catra hisses at her... Adora sits down next to her tenderly. And we finally get the promise, the two parts that Adora has so tragically broke...

Adora tells her "It doesn't matter what they do to us, you know? You look out for me, and I look out for you... nothing really bad can happen as long as we have each other." The tiny Catra looks at Adora, wanting to trust her, to believe in her. As she says the question, present Catra echos it: "You promise ?" This was a sacred moment that gave Catra hope as a young orphan, that maybe she would be ok.

And so, the present Catra echoes it. Adora tells her she promises, as the skeptical present Catra looks on. Tiny Catra is still sad, insecure... she hugs Adora, needing this. Adora suggests they go back out to play... and we see tiny Catra look at her, still afraid, reluctant, wanting to stay. But she decides to trust Adora, and so they walk out, holding hands. Then something unique happens. Tiny Catra stops to look up at her present self: note, this is entirely a unique moment in the simulation, it never happened in reality... and yet Catra is given this moment...

The innocent child stares up Catra, making her see her. It's a look full of meaning, it doesn't carry any specific emotion... only innocence. Catra is having an inner child moment. That most deep and innocent part of her, her vulnerable self who feels love, is communicating with her. It's asking her to see it's vulnerability, and it's pain. Catra sees this, all of the pain Adora has caused her, the breaking of the promise, the promise that this innocent part of her was holding on to desperately with hope. She is forced to acknowledge Adora's disloyalty to her, her carelessness. Catra is reflecting on how she did her absolute best to keep that promise, even after Adora failed to look out for her in SW's chamber. Catra was so loyal and so good to Adora all of their lives; she made sure Adora had a good life, and she played by SW's rules so Adora could be the chosen one, wanting to protect her. All in the hope that they would be together, and that their love was real. But Adora couldn't even do that much, she left her. And Adora doesn't understand her, she doesn't even seem to miss her.

[pic 9: Broken Promises, Catra’s inner child, The Hero goes Her Own Way].

Present Catra watches her tiny self leave, coming to the tough realization: that she's never been able to trust Adora, not really. Her love isn't reciprocated, not by her standards.

…. which makes Adora a deeply unsafe person to Catra...

Catra survived SW's abuse, learning to believe in herself, protect herself because no one else would. All while keeping this hope of love in her heart, this vulnerable core of herself that has tenderness and loves Adora, and needs love back. But, her need for love goes to such a deep vulnerability that giving in to it and then again being rejected or forgotten by Adora would simply destroy her. SW held the threat of death over Catra’s head her entire life, and Catra resisted it, got through it by being tough and trusting in herself. So now she sees she can't trust Adora: everything that happened since she left her behind, the fact that Adora always treats her as an enemy, that she seems to show no lingering desire for her, and doesn't even seem to miss her while replacing her with new friends, seems to confirm her worst fears. Fears that have been building over the years, starting when Adora broke their promise in SW's chamber, and then as Adora pursued her success while accepting praise and privilege from SW, ignoring the abuse Catra bore because of it. She decides she can't trust Adora. Love is a lie, a weakness. A weakness that could destroy her last bit of individuality, and belief in the world.

And so, Catra, The Survivor, makes the decision... in her mind it's the brave one, just like way back when and she decided to bravely stand up to SW's abuse and not let it destroy her: she will stand up to the threat that is the weakness of her love for Adora. Adora is selfish, she doesn't deserve Catra's love. She was stupid to believe that love was even possible, for someone like her… who has always been ignored, and told she is unworthy of praise or even existence. There's only one thing left for her to do: she will be alone, strong on her own, for herself.

Her gaze hardens... that part of her that has made sure she survived SW's abuse, and made sure she won fights when she was threatened, is now the decider. It will protect her from her vulnerability, and reject Adora for her. I suppose you might be confused as to what I'm referring, or maybe not... If you haven't had to fight for your life, whether physically, mentally, or otherwise, you might not know this side of yourself well. But we all have it, it's The Survivor. And while I knew mine would protect me, I didn't accept it as my real self, I didn't accept its necessary but vicious deeds as my own. This is very much how Catra is, and as the series goes on she puts this survivor in charge of more and more decisions, we watch her deteriorate as this part of her gets out of control, protecting her from darkness with more darkness. All the while her vulnerable inner self suffers, watching the horrible deeds and becoming more and more alone, desperate for affection.

>Adora is outnumbered, eventually ending up hanging from the cliff's edge by spider webs. She hears Catra return, dealing with the spiders. Adora looks up, hopeful because Catra has returned...

Catra saunters in. Let me say a few things before we go through this part: Catra is about to say a lot of things that aren't really true. They are instead meant to be hurtful to Adora, Catra is being intentionally mean. We shouldn't take her exact words as her authentic beliefs, because they're not... no, Catra is doing what she believes she has to so she can be apart for Adora, and be safe from her. The truth is, Catra needs to be away from Adora. She's too scared of the vulnerability that is her love for Adora, because Adora hasn't shown her that she cares. And she can't do that by defecting, no, she must stay with the Horde. It's the only thing she feels there is left for her to do.

Now, let's go through this: and heads up: I'm getting at something very powerful that's going on here that you may not have realized. This speech is, in fact, a heroic moment. A heroic moment... for Catra. Not Adora, for Catra. And you just need to open your ears to hear it...

"Hey Adora."

🎶 is sad

"Catra! Help me, please!"

"This thing wouldn't work for me if I tried, would it? It only works for you... then again, you're special... that's what Shadow Weaver always said..."

🎶 is melancholy

"Catra, what are you doing??"

"Ah, ya know, it all makes sense now... you've always been the one holding me back... you wanted me to think I needed you, you wanted me to feel weak."

🎶 has even tone

"Every hero needs a sidekick, right?"

"Catra that's not how it was.."

🎶 rises, falls, sad (“Promise” begins playing)

*Catra chuckles* "The sad thing is I've spent all this time hoping you'd come back to the Horde... when really you leaving was the best thing that EVER happened to me..."

🎶 lowers, is dark, is dramatic. -Note: we see Catra seemingly become deranged as she says this line. This is Catra deceiving herself out of perceived necessity.

"I am so much stronger than anyone... ever... thought." *she cuts part of the web*

🎶 begins to rise, uplifting

"I wonder what I could have been if I'd gotten rid of you sooner." *she cuts the rest of the web, Adora falls, catching herself*

🎶 rises, is dramatic

"I'm sorry! I never meant to make you feel like you were second best. Please, don't do this."

🎶 is still rising, uplifting

*Catra stands proudly, nobly, looking at the sword. She looks down at Adora, then she casually tosses the sword past her...

🎶 is rising, hopeful, heroic.

"Bye Adora, I really am going to miss you..."

🎶 is heroic, violins now playing, adding depth

*Catra turns and walks away from Adora, proudly*

🎶 has risen to its height, crests, is heroic.

"Catra... Catra, no!!"

🎶 remains high, cresting, heroic

*Adora cries, sad, confused by Catra's leaving her...*

🎶 crests again, fades out...

Ok, so... let's talk about what just happened here. The undeniable conclusion is that this was meant to be a heroic moment, and a damn heroic moment... for Catra. The writers are telling us that Catra leaving is an important part of her hero’s journey, and that it was the right thing to do. You might be wondering, how can that be? The short answer is, Catra is on a hero’s journey unlike all the other hero’s journeys normally portrayed in fiction. All of it, even her darkest deeds, all her cruelty towards Adora, will be part of a very... important... and powerful... journey. One which will forge her into a hero in this series, in her own incredible right... how this is, what she is, is yet to be revealed... but make no mistake, she's a hero. Just not the one you expect…

We see Adora open her eyes, and see Light Hope. She tells Adora to let go. She means of her emotional attachments, as we find out. Adora cries for her lost Catra, that she couldn't bring her back to her. She lets go...

BIG ASSERTION TIME: Now, I know it's a common theory that these memories were all just an elaborate manipulation by Light Hope to divide the girls from each other, but I don't agree with that. No, I believe this was a memory journey guided by Catra, subconsciously, to help her tell Adora why she couldn't come with her, why she has to be apart.

Take for instance the memories and visions that Adora sees when she's on her way to the Heart of Etheria in season 5: this system exists apart from Light Hope, who dies at the end for season 4. This simulation comes from somewhere more primal: in my belief, it is the deep magic of Etheria being visualized through the First One's tech. We see the simulation show Catra the promise memory, something Adora isn't shown at all, and then allows her to see her inner child's hurt. Something deeper is going on here, and you should consider how strongly the magic of Etheria is resonating with Catra when it does. Because the magic of Etheria will again speak directly to Catra, this isn't the last time... In short, the magic helps the two of them to understand each other, because Catra is an important part of Adora's true She-ra journey.

I also believe that a theme of this series is that abusers, like L. Hope, are not perfect vindictive manipulators. They are flawed, and L. Hope in particular, I believe, is no genius: she fails time and time again. That L. Hope uses the moment to get Adora to let go is her using the moment to her advantage, she didn't play ultimate control over it. She just piggy backed on Catra's hurt to do it. So that last memory really was for Catra... Furthermore, I simply cannot believe L.Hope would understand the concept of the inner child… as she can't even understand sarcasm.

But now, because of this, Adora now knows of Catra's pain... and this is the beginning of Adora's long journey back to Catra, of her repairing their bond…

Let's address the obvious counterpoint: Adora now knows that Catra is hurt, but she doesn't yet understand why. And it's not really her fault, as Catra doesn't know how to talk about her feelings, among other things. But it's apparent that Adora doesn't remember these crucial memories as well as Catra does, even though they were critical in her development as well. Adora is a mess of emotions, just like Catra, and (if) she has ADHD, it might be one reason why she doesn't really get Catra. Especially if her parental figure has been manipulating it against her. Adora very much vibrates between stimuli anxiously, so SW might have made her forgetful by distraction over time. Also, the way in which Adora treats Catra as an enemy when she doesn't accept Adora’s (totally rushed, afterthought, and hollow) ultimatum that she defect with her, is a reflection of Adora's ingrained Horde war training… this is something she has to unlearn, as it is wrong. But Adora is a good person, she really, truely, is, because Adora never stops trying to make it better. And so, she slowly, but surely, comes to understand Catra’s trauma.

We get one last scene of Catra returning to the fright zone. We get to see Catra's truth here: She walks, as if she's not even there, she's deadened by the sorrow and the inevitability of what her life will now be: one of hard work, and zero joy. She will try her best to stand on her own, and put Adora out of her heart, slamming its doors shut against love. It doesn't work, but that's what she's trying to do, nonetheless. This is the beginning of a profound depression that builds over the next 3 seasons, and combined with new traumas, nearly takes her life.

But the tech Catra has brought back will end up giving her what she needs to face down and depose SW, just like she needed...

::Here is another complicated twist that's so essential to She-ra as a series: Catra, in fact, protects Adora by taking down SW. Catra may go on to command the Hordes forces so effectively that it pushes the Princess alliance harder than it's ever been pushed before, but her deposing SW is extremely important in the story. She both removes SW’s ability to attack Adora, and then denies her any sorcerous power by taking the Black Garnet from her, since SW needs an external source to draw power from in order to use her vampiric powers...

Ok so more theory time: it's a common belief that Catra stays with the Horde, and goes on to try to conquer the world out of some deep need to externally validate herself, and to prove she was the better child by beating Adora. I don't think any of these explanations are true. Catra may go on to play such a character on a surface level, but every time she professes to have any such ambitions, she is either in the presence of Adora, or under incredible stress. In the one case, she's saying those things to try to hurt Adora, and make her see how naive and foolish Adora always was, especially now that Adora thinks she can fight against her.

In the other case, it's actually her survivor mechanism trying to take over, to make her world safe. In every case where Catra says something about ambition, somewhere in that scene, Catra shows the distinct emotions of her true inner self: generally, these emotions are sorrow, fear, and loneliness. They don't exist on screen long, they are what is known as micro expressions. (See below for a short discussion of Catra’s micro expressions.)

To put it simply, the only reason Catra stays with the Horde is so she has somewhere she can be separate from her feelings and heartbreak over Adora, and then she climbs the ranks in order to find safety, first from SW, and then Hordak, once he threatens her life with his temper tantrums. That she fights against Adora is just a collateral consequence, she isn't out to get Adora, but nor does she care if Adora gets hurt, because she’s hurt her. Catra does fight against the princesses, though (including She-ra).

A core feature of Catra's character is indeed one of personal power. She's a person who is told to hurry up and die at an early age, but refused to do so. So her arc, her issue, isn't a cautionary tale about chasing validation, it's about her overcoming her fear of vulnerability and allowing herself to rely on others in a way that lets her be safe without needing to combat the darkness with more darkness. But vulnerability scares her because of the abuse she experienced.

As for validation, the only person she would want that from is Adora. This is because Catra believes in herself already: that she has a sacred right to exist, no matter what SW and others may tell her (note: Adora struggles with this, she's actually the one who seeks validation). But, she also needs love, and she is too fearful that Adora doesn't really love her and is afraid of being hurt by that. It's also why I think she's so chaotic towards Adora: her inner child tells her adult self to protect her from her love for Adora, which it tries to do, but that same child misses and needs Adora in so many ways. So she's trying to be mean to compensate for the incredible desire she feels towards Adora. I love it when Adora calls her a brat in season 5, it's such a well deserved line, mmhhmmm.

Actual discussions of how these particulars play out in the show are better left for another time, but there you have it.

Promise sidebar discussions: Catra’s micro expressions; Catra nearly dies at the Battle of Bright Moon

“White Out” microexpression discussion: [see pics below] This is the first time since the Battle of Bright Moon that Catra and Adora meet. So it's a good time to talk about Catra’s micro expressions. Picture 1: Adora says “Hey, Catra” out of the blue and Catra is completely blindsided, she figured she wouldn't be bothered out in the middle of nowhere. She's anxious and unhappy to be seeing Adora. Along with her suspicious absence the episode before in “Roll With It”, the answer is obvious: Catra has been avoiding Adora. She may have cut ties with her in “Promise”, nearly bested her at the Battle of BM, but she doesn't want to see her. She doesn't know what she feels about her.

Picture 2: Enraged monsters are decimating the base, and a battle breaks out over the corrupted disc. Catra is desperately trying to protect it, because she can control Adora if she has it... and she needs this chance to have her back. As Catra reaches to pick it up, she's facing away from everyone and so no one can see her desperation and sadness from missing Adora. (pic 2) Shortly after, we also see her clutch the disc desperately to her chest in a way that's very endearing, right before the monster attacks her and makes her drop it. Then, as she's about to die in its jaws because she doesn't want to give Adora up again, Scorpia breaks the disc and saves her life. We see in this episode as Catra completely loses track of her emotions, and now realizes she has to come to terms with the fact that she's so desperately sad from missing Adora, she was willing to die just for a chance to have her back.

Pic 3: Catra hates working for the Horde. She HATES it. She gets zero joy from the job, and she’s already figured out that Hordak will kill her if she screws up too badly. She didn't want this job, plain and simple, but now feels stuck with it. None of this is the life she wanted. Combining this knowledge against Catra’s declaration to Adora at the end of Promise, we know she's not happy that she had to go her own way...

Catra’s near death experience at the Battle of Bright Moon

At the Battle of Bright Moon, Catra leads Adora (She-ra) away. They battle, but then Catra retreats and instead starts listing out every single worst fear of failure she thinks Adora has. It's a dark moment, she's acting much like SW did to them as children, and we watch her manipulation take root in Adora. Finally, her words are too much, and as Catra looks down at Adora's (She-ra's) back, we see Adora become deranged, overcome with her fear of failing everyone... (pic1, above) she picks up a boulder and throws it directly at Catra. Catra is knocked flying, and only by the barest of margins does she keep from falling to her death. Adora nearly kills Catra. And so, as Adora drags Catra up from the cliff and slams her into the wall, we see a totally heartbroken and emotionally crushed Catra. In this moment, Catra believes all of her worst fears are confirmed: Adora only cares about being She-ra, so much so that Adora would kill her in the name of being that hero. Catra uses this moment, this belief, to justify her division from Adora. Sadly, she's wrong... she's ignoring the seriousness of the threat that the battle poses, and as Adora was facing away from her during that moment, she doesn't see the terror and desperation Adora experiences due to her cruel words…

Oh, and one more thing before we go: when Catra says “What, did you really think this was about you ?” SPOILER ALERT: It was. Because She-ra is one big Catradora story… and we love it.

As always, thanks for reading. <3

~EtheriaDearie

P.S. :: as I am new to tumblr, if you enjoyed reading this, please consider giving me a reblogg! Thanks!! 🙇💛

[thefanficmonster]

You Never Notice

Sykkuno x Reader (Female)

Warnings: None

Genre: Fluff

Summary: The center of someone’s world is never aware of their importance even when everyone else is in the know. People are hard to understand, no denying, but if we all spilled our truth like how Y/N admitted her feelings to Sykkuno, mutual understanding would be achieved a lot more easily. JK, she needed an eternity and maybe a thousand pushes. What’s important is the result though, right?

Requested by Anon. You are my first Sykkuno request and I wish I could thank you with a tag. Instead, I’m gonna thank you with a fic in which I put my all. Thank you for the request, hope the final product doesn’t let you down. 🥰

Here we go again. Sykkuno’s love life is brought up. This time it’s more frustrating cause I can’t shout how wrong he is about himself and the effect he has on the people around him. He has no room to speak, he hasn’t experienced what I have - one of your best friends living in your head rent-free because you’re just that whipped by them. That’s right kids, some of us never grow past the middle school crushes - they are a constant for some. That can be a good or a bad thing, it completely depends on how you view it.

Currently, him and Rae are addressing some dating rumors that started spreading about them earlier this week while Felix, Sean and I are kicking each other’s butts in Party Animals. We’re not all playing together, actually, we were all playing different games when we hopped into the call and just grouped together after playing solo got boring. Rae and Sykkuno are playing Among Us on a random server, her being the only person who’s streaming right now. She said she just wanted to clear up the dating rumors cause they were annoying to see popping up on her feed on every social media platform she’s active on.

“It’s ridiculous, really. People just look for online personalities to put in imaginary relationships. Are they that bored? I know quarantine is getting to everyone, but damn“ Rae says, laughing a bit to take the edge off her words but I know she’s bothered by this ordeal more than she’s letting on. I know how much it bothers her when people ship random youtubers and streamers together, even when she’s not involved. 

And I agree. Ever since I started streaming I’ve been shipped with my friends left and right. First Corpse, then Dave, Joel...you name them. It gets kinda gross cause these people are legit like siblings to me. Unlike Rae, though, I don’t waste my breath trying to clear those ‘talks of the net’ up. I don’t know if it’s for better of for worse that I remain silent on the issue when I’m involved but am willing to stand up for my friends when they find themselves in a similar situation. Some people think the reason I don’t share my thoughts is because the rumors are true, but the hint is most often taken, resulting in the ship ending. Well, that ship ending, there’s always a new one popping up. As Rae said, it’s ridiculous.

“Why does everyone think I am ever dating anyone? I’ve already commented on this: no one would date me.“ Sykkuno says through a sigh-like laugh.

“Why are you so sure?“ I blurt out without as much as a second thought

My eyes widen just a bit, just a bit. I’m not too surprised with myself. I am slowly losing control of my raging emotions and I’m afraid of what I’ll turn into when all my restraints snap. A mess, that’s the most likely answer.

“Well....“ Sykkuno trails off, clearly more than a little nervous, “I don’t have a girlfriend right now, and I haven’t had one in a while...Nor has a girl shown any interest to be more than friends with me in what feels like forever.“

“I’m sure you just don’t notice the hints girls drop. We can be pretty subtle.“ I try to sound as nonchalant as possible while I’m still in my panicked animal mode. And by animal I mean a cub. A scared cub that is now showing confidence but will run and hide right afterwards. I silently thank the universe that I’m not streaming right now. I can feel the heat on my neck and cheeks which is pure embarrassment and would have been more than evident on-camera.

“Yeah Y/N’s right, Sykkuno. Girls can be very subtle, but they will always let you know if they like you, even through the smallest of gestures. You gotta keep your eyes open.“ Rae backs me up reassuringly.

“Guys never notice anything.“ I say, rolling my eyes. I feel the pressure lessen thanks to Rae’s involvement in the conversation.

“That’s not true.“ Sean protests, “We pay close attention, especially to girls we are attracted to.“

“Yeah!“ Sykkuno pipes in again, “I’m pretty sure I would notice if a girl was dropping signals that she likes me.“

Now that stings. That legit makes me wince and cringe as though his voice delivered an actual physical hit to my chest and stomach. It’s really unpleasant, painful even.

“You never notice.“ There’s something about this triple opportunity - proving him wrong that he’d catch onto a girl’s signals; proving him wrong that girls aren’t attracted to him; coming clean about the biggest emotional struggle I’ve experienced in recent years; - that snaps my last emotional restraints. I will totally regret this later, but after the regret comes the relief which is 100% worth it. 

“What?“ He sounds very puzzled. I can just about imagine him frowning as he tries to wrap his brain around something even I can’t wrap mine around.

“You say you’d notice a girl’s hints of attraction. OK.“ I nonchalantly throw Felix off the submarine in Party Animals while I keep talking, “Would you notice if a girl purposely doesn’t kill you in Among Us when she’s impostor? Or would you notice that a girl always sends you links to videos she finds funny? Or that she always shares music and movie recommendations with you and you only?“ 

Dead silence ensues. I feel like they have all glitched, considering Sean didn’t even try to put up a fight when I lifted him and threw him in the ocean as I previously did with Felix’s avatar.

Maybe I was a tad too specific and made the whole situation hit a little too close to home for me. 

Sykkuno and I have become really close friends and we chat and play games regularly. As I mentioned, I give him movie and music recommendations and I only recently started acknowledging the fact that I’ve never killed him in Among Us. Natural instinct I guess. In fact, I feel the need for vengeance when he’s killed. I refuse to even vote for him unless it’s absolutely necessary.

Now that I think about it, it’s not his fault he has no clue. I just don’t know how to properly drop hints.  

“Um...I mean, I guess I would notice but I’d never think they are that type of hints.“ He finally replies.

On point there, dear. On damn point.

“What does it take for you to be convinced that a girl is into you?“ Who cares that a bunch of people are about to witness this outpour? It’ll make it more real, yes, but it will also help me believe that it happened so I don’t try to crawl back to the point where return is an option. No return now. You’ve already passed two thirds of the way. The last one will set you and your mind free. 

“The only way I can be sure is if she tells me, really.“ He sounds so nervous and shy, like he’s trying to draw as little attention as possible.

He doesn’t have to worry. I’m about to pull all the attention on me.

“Well in that case....you leave me no other choice.“ My screen displays me as the winner of this round of Party Animals - an easy one considering my friends are glitched in real life. “I like you, Sykkuno. I like you a lot. And I know you will see it from every context except the one its meant to be in so I’ll be even more head-on - I’ve liked you, as more than a friend for quite some time now, but buddy, you can be sooo oblivious sometimes. Anyway...“ Here’s that regret I was talking about, it’s already creeping in. “Don’t feel the need to say it back. I don’t wanna hear it if you don’t mean it. And Rae,“ I can’t help but laugh at the thought, “Sorry for making your chat go crazy. Peace!“

And I disconnect from the Discord call.

“See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?“ I say out loud, staring at my desktop. “The cat’s out of the bag and you can move on now.“

I push myself to get some work done in order to get my mind off the mess I’ve created. I’m afraid of thinking about it, I know I’ll get too upset to do anything with the rest of my day if I do.

Suddenly, just as I’m about to open my email, my phone chimes. My brain doesn’t bother to stop my arm from automatically reaching out and checking the notification. A message.

From Sykkuno.

~ I knew you didn’t suggest me ‘My Best Friend’s Wedding’ for no reason

Me ~ So...?

~ So, I’m not the only oblivious one here, Y/N

Me ~ Wait WHAT?

~ ‘Nick And Norah’s Infinite Playlist’?

Me ~ Oooohhhh...I see

It takes him a few seconds to reply, the bubble with the three bouncing dots popping up and disappearing a few times now. I just now feel my heart banging against the inside of my ribcage, my pulse echoing in my ears.

He did seem a little too eager for me to watch that movie...

~ So, movie date?

I laugh, wholeheartedly and honestly. Genuine joy running through my veins.

Me ~ So it is.

The grin that is now decorating my features promises to stay there for the rest of the day. I bite my bottom lip at the thought that pops into my head.

Me ~ Phew, I can stop sparing you in Among Us from now on

He sends me three cry-laughing emojis in return, but I don’t need those. I can just imagine him laughing as he usually does with one hand covering his mouth. And here I thought my grin couldn’t grow wider.

 Imagining him happy makes me smile. His happiness makes me happy. He makes me happy.

Even better...

I think the feeling’s mutual.