#ANYWAY I STOP WITH MY RAMBLINGS ABOUT DESMOND BUT YOU KNOW | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

dazais-guardian-angel · 4 years ago

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This post has been sitting in my drafts since like mid-November around when I finished replaying the game, long enough for me to write and upload a fic about some of the concepts I wrote here, what the fuck. DGS brainrot is real. But aNYWAY finally, here are my massive thoughts on Unwound Future, the golden child of the PL series. This is literally *checks* 8k words, because I can never shut up!! and because there is just SO much going on in this game at all times, so many different interweaving plot threads and funny moments and incredible, fascinating characterization, especially combined with the games that come after it; I just had SO much to say. So much analyzing and headcanons and crying galore. :’) There’s a reason this is considered the best game, and that’s why I had so damn much to talk about.

behold the incoherent, rambling, unconnected mess of a novel that I hope makes a modicum of sense under the cut:

Continuing the trend, this game has simply AMAZING graphics/art/music, with a huge uptick in cutscenes and voice acting, and I feel like the sound/music quality is greatly improved too? I love the main bgm for London in this game, never really remembered loving it before, but it’s just *chef’s kiss* and so is the song that plays in other areas like the hospital and subway

Quickly mentioning the gameplay, I really love all the minigames, and the storybooks are especially hilarious to play with putting the wrong things in the spaces to create mad libs-esque crack that makes no sense; it’s so fun lmao

The beginning flashback segment with the time machine demonstration is honestly just so funny, for so many different reasons: Dimitri droning on and on with time travel technobabble while Luke, Bill, Chelmey, and Barton represent the definitive last four brain cells. Hershel being skeptical about successful time travel after all the magical shit they went through just like a year or two ago. The way that Bill’s sprite slowly and nervously shuffles onscreen after Dimitri calls him to the stage, like omg I don’t know why that cracks me up so much but it does. Dimitri’s lowkey savage shade he’s throwing at Bill throughout this whole thing. The way Bill says “wHAT” when Dimitri asks him to help, clearly about to shit his pants. Dimitri just standing there completely unfazed as the smoke from the machine flies past him. And of course, “sOmEtHiNg’S gOnE vErY wRoNg!”

…okay but in all seriousness, am I just stupid or do they never explain how they get Bill to the underground city, like the machine CLEARLY explodes with him in it, there was no secret elevator built into the thing like at the clock shop, so…???

also the presenter’s voice is really funny lmao

Still disagree that this is the biggest mystery they’ve ever encountered, despite being near the top; Luke you say that literally every game!! so what is the truth!!

Spring’s face is terrifying as FUCK in the two cutscenes in the clock shop… why they decided to show both of them in ominous, shadowed lighting in those scenes I do not understand a;lskdl;fds

I need someone to draw a diagram of how exactly the shop looks as a giant elevator because frankly I still can’t wrap my brain around it-

THE FACT THAT WE NEVER GET TO MAKE UP WITH HAZEL IS A TRAVESTY, HONESTLY

Belle… why…… ugh

Wish they’d had “Schrader” drop a casual nod to the events of Diabolical Box; it would have been cool :’) (especially since this is Paul so he’d know about all that)

College-age Hershel is just….. the pinnacle of adorableness. someone protect him from all the pain

One of the few flaws/plot holes in the story of Unwound Future that I only noticed during this replay with more media under my belt, is the that the developers didn’t really decide on what kind of time travel they wanted to portray, or more likely just didn’t scrutinize Clive’s fake role enough when writing it. This is blatantly obvious upon the very first meeting with Clive where he desires to test Hershel to make sure he’s really him. Obviously in a closed loop scenario, everything Luke and Hershel are doing “Future Luke” should remember doing himself in his past, so a test would not be necessary; this is a major trip-up on his part that it’s very odd Hershel doesn’t notice for how smart he is, imo. However, later on when meeting “Future Layton”, Paul calls Dimitri out on this exact principle, proving that he’s not actually Future Layton because he doesn’t remember the absence of a pen in Hershel’s pocket in this moment in his past, and it’s a nice little touch that Paul, on the other hand, an actual scientist, would mention this. Back to Future Luke, though, he should know how everything goes down with stopping Future Layton, because he lived it all as a child with Hershel, which makes it even more dubious to the fact that after seeing all this, Hershel still goes dark and everything plays out the exact same way it’s portrayed in the “future” of the game; it’s the idea that destined fate can’t be changed, but the suspension of disbelief is quite high, especially since we already doubt that Hershel would ever do such a thing, knowing what kind of person he is. Of course this wouldn’t be the case in an open-loop/branching timelines universe, but since the game uses the former type with the pen argument (and something else important I’ll mention in a second), I feel like the rest of the game should have adopted this idea as well and addressed it. Because Dimitri is outed via the fact that he should have memory of things he doesn’t, so it would have been easy to simply add Hershel adding that argument into his final explanation in the bar (”my suspicions were first raised when we first met Big Luke, and he didn’t know if I was really who I said I was- [etc etc]”). Even if they didn’t want Hershel to bring this up early else the entire story would fall apart, they could simply draw attention to the fact that he notices something in these moments, like with a “...” or “Hmm”, and then he explains it at the end like I said. Interestingly enough, Clive actually addresses these concepts at one point in the game with Luke in the statue plaza: he doesn’t want to tell Luke how things play out in his future, so that… things play out the way they’re supposed to…? Even though his entire story here is that he wished Hershel hadn’t gone dark and distanced from him, and ruined the city? But then he makes the suggestion that they could instead be operating on an open-loop/multiple timelines system, where in his past he never travelled to the future, but in our Luke and Hershel’s timeline they do. This is only a hypothetical he gives though, with him seeming unsure of how things truly are, which… again, in this story he’s concocted, he should know for sure, because if he doesn’t “remember” time traveling and how everything went down, then they’re operating on different timelines and it shouldn’t matter how much he tells Luke about his future. You can definitely argue that in-universe Clive didn’t think all this through when planning his dialogue for this role (but I honestly find that hard to believe, since he’s so intelligent, and he nailed the realism of everything else to a T), but it’s obvious just that the writers didn’t think it through, because like I said Hershel really should have picked up on his blunder when they first met, as well as later when Clive is surprised to see Flora suddenly with them and didn’t know for a fact that she and Chelmey/Barton would arrive there. Since the time travel scenario in 99% of the game isn’t actually real, I don’t entirely fault the writers for not getting every single detail right… and yet, that 1% exists where time travel is real, with Claire’s situation. It’s a very isolated incident though that wouldn’t be replicated, with only her going to the future… and yet, she does return to the past again, if only for a split second before dying and thus not enough time to do anything with her future knowledge, the real thing to note here being that they took care to show that she was wearing the same outfit when she died that she gets in the future, one she wasn’t wearing when she entered the lab originally. So they DID think about some things very well, like such a minor and easily-overlooked detail here (but that blows your mind once you realize it). All this is hardly enough to ruin the game or break the immersion completely though, especially since the player is already predisposed to heavily doubt everything with PL’s “the town is a lie” track record lmao, but I can’t help but be bothered by it now after playing games like Zero Escape and watching time travel shows like netflix’s Dark, which have bootstrap parodoxes and timeloops galore looool. My friend who watched me play the game blind this time around brought up all these questions as Clive said things, as someone who didn’t know if it would end up being real or not, and so I spent a lot of time puzzling (har har) it out with her… even though it wouldn’t matter lmao.

……In short, if it wasn’t obvious, despite Unwound Future’s time travel setup being completely fake, I’m really fascinated by the notion of how it would all work if it was real. >.> …and I mean, I know I’m not the first one; monocle Layton aus are popular, after all, but I don’t really care quite as much about the allure of an “evil Layton” as I do just about how everything else would be, I think.

Because, like, lets be real? taking the prequels into account with Unwound Future’s proposed setup, the potential is endless. It honestly KILLS me that the prequels didn’t exist yet at the time of UF, because!! so many people from Hershel’s past!!! SO MANY REASONS FOR HIM TO WANT TO HARNASS TIME TRAVEL AND CHANGE THE PAST, NOT JUST FOR CLAIRE’S SAKE. FOR RANHENGELA’S SAKE. FOR LUKE AND EMMY’S SAKE. FOR HIS PARENTS’ SAKE. FOR DESMOND. listen, listen, you don’t understand how much the idea of Desmond being involved in UF’s concepts destroys me. I wrote about this in my last fic but. imagine if Desmond learned about Hershel going down a dark path for his sake and everyone else’s, just like he did. Or imagine if, instead of Hershel being the one to do it, it was Desmond himself; he’s willing to play the bad guy once again, one very final, this time definitely final, time, if it means he can undo everything that caused all of them so much pain in the first place: his betrayals, the death of his former wife, he and Theodore’s separation, their father’s betrayal, ALL of it, and Hershel would never know. When Luke first is like “oh it’s gotta be Don Paolo right” and Clive says no, i LITERALLY screamed “BUT IT COULD BE DESCOLE!!”. JUST. PAIN. And where would Randall be in this future; what would he, too, think if it was Hershel going after time travel? Imagine him trying to smack some sense into him just like Hershel does in MM, trying to tell him that despite those lost 18 years of his life, despite everything wrong he ended up doing, he’s still happy, and so are Henry and Angela. So is Desmond. And Emmy, she wouldn’t want undone those years she had with Hershel and Luke and then Aurora and Desmond, despite how sadly it ended. Just… so much pain. So much potential. I hurt :’)

and adding on to this, i love love LOVE the idea of Clive knowing about some of this stuff in Hershel’s past, in order to faithfully play his role as Future Luke. Like obviously he wasn’t in Misthallory with them all, he wasn’t on the island in ED, he wasn’t at Monte’dor, and he wasn’t on the Bostonius or at all those Azran ruins that I can’t remember the names of right now, of course he wouldn’t know the intimate, specific details of what all went down, but if there was just one npc who was in the right place at the right time at any of these locations, who knows what beans they could spill? Maybe even an ex-Targent person or something. Hell, fucking Bronev is in jail for at least a little while before the events of UF. There are possibly MANY people Clive could have gotten information from to pull off this role - he’s a reporter, he’s skilled at digging for stuff. Not to mention just reading and hearing about large incidents in the news. And this makes his character so much better because he’s admired Hershel for so long, grateful that he saved his life all this time, to the point that he asks him to unknowingly come and save him again… and he most definitely didn’t know back when he first encountered Hershel that he’d already experienced so much loss and pain as well (some of which Hershel hadn’t even gone through yet by that point), but learning about everything he’s suffered? I think it would really affect him, and possibly contribute to why he asks him for his help in the first place in UF: because Hershel has suffered just as much as he has, and he feels a connection to him, feels like he can relate to him, and wants someone who can empathize with him, and show him how to cope. All of these reasons and emotions would probably be completely on an unconscious level, but they would exist - he’d use this limited but meaningful knowledge to try to connect with Hershel more when he’s still in Future Luke mode, to try to convince him he’s really Luke, at first, but unconsciously it’d be an effort to get closer to him emotionally, which is what he truly desires deep down, until his so-called act somewhat stops being an act, and talking about these things makes his vulnerabilities start to show (again, i wrote a fic about this). This all just adds to why Hershel is the perfect person to help and support Clive - the prequels make their similarities even stronger, more than just with Hershel losing Claire, and those accidental parallels when the writers hadn’t even conceived the prequel trilogy at the time of UF are just *chef’s kiss* beautiful.

THE CASINO SCENE IS JUST ICONIC, IT’S SO FUNNY. LUKE BEING SCARED OF THE SHOOTING AND HERSHEL JUST DITCHING HIM. CLIVE’S LITTLE HOP AND ROLL BEHIND THE SLOT MACHINES. THE SLOT MACHINE GUN IN GENERAL. THE CLONE FAMILY MEMBERS FALLING OVER LIKE DOMINOS UPON BEING HIT. BOSTRO CRYING AND SPLINTERS AND LOCKJAW RUNNING IN CIRCLES PANICKING WHILE LAYMAN JUST IS LITERALLY PUSHED BACK SLOWLY WITH ONLY A CHAIR TO DEFEND HIMSELF, I CANNOT STRESS ENOUGH HOW FUNNY LAYMAN AS A CHARACTER IS TO ME. it’s just so glorious, oh my god. this series is ridiculous i love it so much lmao

Luke wanting to use the time machine though… there are so many reasons why he might want to, mainly from Azran Legacy. :’)

The statue is the worst thing ever for multiple reasons. The fact that it represents Hershel & Luke’s relationship, the two main characters, who have been through so much together and have such a strong bond that can never be broken, and how it ties into the whole Evil Layton scenario and seems to foreshadow that their bond does end up breaking, as “Future Luke” seems to be proof of (though the game doesn’t really put much emphasis on this; Luke is more worried about the fact that he’s moving away soon straining their relationship, and not the whole Future Layton thing. imo it would have been interesting to see his actual thoughts on/feelings about it, since he’s surprisingly calm throughout the entire game before the reveals happen; you can argue he just has complete faith in Hershel and doesn’t think he would ever go dark, but then why doesn’t he bring this up, insist that this can’t be true? I think he should have). The fact that as I just said it foreshadows how Luke will leave Hershel at the end of the game, something that Luke worries about later on in the game. And most of all, the biggest, worst thing it foreshadows… Hershel’s relationship with Clive. Clive had that statue made himself, put it in his giant set. He WANTS that kind of mentor-student bond with Hershel, that’s how he sees them, just from their one interaction in front of the exploding buildings… or at least, that’s how he wants to see it. He sees how close Hershel and Luke are throughout the entire game, and he yearns for that kind of bond with Hershel, too. The fact that the boy in the statue story has an illness that he eventually dies from, but that their friendship withstands… it’s probably meant to represent Clive’s insanity, that he hopes Hershel will save him from - he is Clive’s light of hope in his despair. Or, to be more accurate to the statue, even if Clive’s madness ends up killing him (which it very nearly does, and by that point he fully expects that it will), he’ll still have had those memories of that time he spent with him, and Hershel will never forget him, and that will mean something special. man though can you imagine an AU where Clive is literally terminally ill too, and that’s why he’s yolo-ing this entire thing so hard and doesn’t care if it ends up killing him in the end, at least he got to be with Hershel one more day; ahahahaha turn up the angsttttttttttttt-

Shmelmey and Shmarton do not at all look like Chelmey and Barton, smh

For everything Clive accounted for with his role and setting, he’s honestly way too rude and crass sometimes to be Luke lmao, even if you try to imagine a world where Hershel did go dark and Luke was changed by it… at least imo

the like 4 puzzles that give Clive’s solving animations/dialogue are the most serotonin-boosting things in the world

“you will come back, won’t you?” Clive asks Hershel about his trip to visit Chelmey, desperately wanting him to stop him before it’s too late :’)

Rosetta and her....... sessions....... with Hershel........ hajkkALSKDLD

Okay but Hershel is kind of dickish sometimes though, despite his whole “gentleman” thing??? There’s the elephant in the room which I’ll Get To, but like first he guilt-trips Chelmey into getting him access to confidential information about the lab explosion, and then he has the absolute balls to tell him “Bill Hawks is being held in the future” and that’s IT. No explanation, nothing else, just THAT, and then he LEAVES, after he’d promised to share every last detail with him. I don’t blame Chelmey at all for tailing them and barging in to get information himself, like damn Hershel, why so savage sometimes in not a good way

which brings me to Ranting About Flora’s Treatment, Part 3: The Finale. Y’all I literally cannot even BEGIN to describe how much the way Hershel and Luke treat Flora in UF specifically makes me seethe..... It was already bad in DB, no doubt, but in this game they are straight-up rude to her, mostly Hershel, for absolutely no reason, and I CANNOT fathom why. He constantly makes the excuse that he’s concerned for her safety, and that the places they’re going to are too dangerous for her, but it all exudes a level of thinly-veiled annoyance, even confusion as to why Flora is so upset that they never bring her along and wants to go with them at all... almost like her “frail” feminine appearance (which isn’t helped by how the games make her feel sick or dizzy or tired multiple times), compared to someone like Emmy who could fight and has more masculine traits, means she’s less capable in Hershel’s mind, which, like, even if it’s unconscious on his part... how about no?? I could accept being worried about her, even if I’m still frustrated at her being left behind, and her constant kidnapping (which isn’t Hershel’s fault, even if he probablyyy could do a better job both times at protecting her), but I CANNOT excuse how short and dismissive Hershel is with her in this damn game; it honestly borders on ooc to me for him, I don’t know what the writers were thinking; do they just hate Flora that freaking much??? He treats her like a burden the entire time, apologizes to people for her, acts irritated at having to accommodate for her, when poor Flora just wants to spend time with him and feel like an equal to him and Luke. Meanwhile Clive of all people is the first one to treat her with kindness and respect and pleasure to see her when they first meet, like when Luke bitches about Flora being excited to see the river and not taking things seriously and Clive tells him to go easy on her (Clive, the one who has been rushing them along this entire time himself). honestly can see why it’s so easy to ship them, when literally everyone else treats her like crap It’s SO depressing honestly. Flora asks them if they thought to wonder where her future self was, and Hershel is just like hhhhh we’re kinda busy thinking about... you know.... important things... sorry not sorry....... like BITCH I WILL STRANGLE YOU, BE NICER TO YOUR DAUGHTER!!! Luke at least is a kid, but Hershel??? there’s no excuse!!! Luke be like “damn I hope Becky doesn’t look down on us for leaving Flora behind... >.>” THEY KNOW. THEY KNOW IT’S NOT RIGHT BUT THEY DON’T CARE AND DO IT ANYWAY. I’M SO MAD

Beasly just gets... straight-up murdered yo... between him and Subject 3, what were they smoking when coming up with the animals in this game, jfc. Test subject animals?? that’s unnervingly dark, despite how glossed over it is and how hilarious Subject 3 is a;lksd

LUKE LOVES SHERLOCK HOLMES THIS IS NOT A DRILL. THE DGS CROSSOVER IS WAITING, LEVEL-5 AND CAPCOM. MAKE LUKE’S (AND MY) DREAMS A REALITY

the intentional zoom-in on Clive’s sinister face in front of the tower will never not amuse me, and baffle me as to why they drew attention to it lmaooo

And okay back to time travel bullshit shenanigans, WHY the fuck does Dimitri not pick up on why him not remembering about the pen is such a big deal as soon as Paul first brings it up?? bruh. bruh. aren’t you a fucking TIME TRAVEL SCIENTIST. WHY DO YOU NOT KNOW SUCH A BASIC CONCEPT THAT BREAKS YOUR WHOLE FACADE IN SECONDS. It’d be one thing if he just couldn’t provide the right answer, but no, he straight-up HAS NO IDEA WHY HE SHOULD HAVE TO KNOW ABOUT THE PEN. “HOW THE FUCK SHOULD I KNOW-” bruhhhh. Dimitri. my dude. i love you but you are actually so dumb sometimes, like holy shit (more on this later though)

Paul talking to Dimitri about his plan is really good; he has a “...” moment before telling him what he’s doing can’t be excused, like “oh shit let me jump on board, wait fuck i gotta stay in character, Layton is a wuss he would never agree to this god dammit Layton-”. jokes aside though, I’m honestly confused as to how much he actually knew before Dimitri’s exposition in the pagoda, and why exactly he goes along with helping Hershel stop him... and what Dimitri was thinking roping him into this. Because I can’t really figure out Paul’s motives here and how they changed, if they did at all. The only information we get about how he first became involved is that Dimitri was paying him a lot of money to get Hershel to the pagoda and to him - he knows that “future London” isn’t real, he knows Future Layton isn’t real, so the extent of his knowledge seems to be that “this man wants to screw Layton over somehow and is giving me $$$ to get it done; there’s no downside here, never mind this suspicious as fuck fake London and all these people that shouldn’t be here”, but then Hershel gave him more information, probably that Claire was involved in what Dimitri was doing, and his concerns about a traitor being involved if he had already begun to suspect Clive by that point, and then he suddenly decided to turn against Dimitri? Even though you’d think saving Claire would be a reason for him to want to help him...? Or did he plan to turn against him from the very start, and wanted Hershel to come because he knew he could stop all this (part of his character development)? The latter is the most likely, though I still don’t entirely understand or maybe I’m just having a brain fart, that’s very likely too. And Dimitri on the other hand, did he know that Paul liked Claire too and would want to save her (and maybe about his salt for Hershel too), and that’s why he got his help? That makes more sense... but also doesn’t, cause as I said it seems like Paul didn’t know Claire was involved until Hershel told him and then Dimitri told everyone at the pagoda, so maybe he literally just said “here’s some money, help me fuck over Layton, not telling how” and just trusted in him that much, even though Paul is an evil genius who could and does put a stop to all his plans with his machines... once again, Dimitri looking dumb....

Clive, in the most deadpan voice ever at the top of the pagoda: oh no, the prime minister is in danger, someone help him

Flora as they’re escaping the tower: “professor no please take me with you instead of future Luke” Hershel: *ignores her feelings and makes a decision for her yet again* Clive: “shhh don’t worry Flora; i know i’m going to kidnap you in like an hour but i’m just trying to rescue you from these insensitive jerks. not Don Paolo though; he’s a gentleman.”

It’s interesting to me that Luke and Hershel keep acting as if Future Luke and future London are legit even after Future Layton has been revealed to be a fake. Hershel at least probably knows none of it is real by now, even if he hasn’t exactly figured out Clive’s role in everything yet, and is just not revealing his knowledge for now, but Luke is still rolling with it... wonder what’s going through his mind by this point. again, it frustrates me that Luke really has no emotional reaction to anything in UF, aside from the statue and his worries about leaving Hershel soon and how that in particular will affect their relationship

I also wonder what Clive is thinking by this point. Now that the Future Layton jig is up, what kind of story is he going with now? We never find out because Hershel reveals everything completely the next time Clive joins up with them again, but in the (unreasonable) case that he hadn’t, would Clive have just acted like he didn’t know that Alain Stahngun was actually someone named Dimitri, who was actually pretending to be Layton, and that the real Layton was somewhere else out there that they needed to find? I don’t know WHY I’m so interested in details like these that don’t matter at all in the long run a;lksdfklfd, but I am... he tells Flora to continue the “investigation” without him, so clearly he still had something in mind, and didn’t expect Hershel to out him quite so soon after that even if deep down he wanted it

Chelmey really cares for Barton and it’s actually so sweet, oml :’)

I didn’t really praise Paul’s character development in this game enough before, but I really do love it, even if I don’t quite understand the circumstances that started it. It’s not something I would have expected with how he’s presented in CV and DB, but it’s very nice to see this be the culmination of his character, and it’s kinda sad that it feels a bit more natural than Descole’s sudden shift in backstory/character between ED and MM/AL... It’s very funny and good to see him and Luke bicker at each other, and how he seems to have a soft spot for Flora... it’s all cute. I just wish there’d been a bit more time for him to talk to them, but that’s what fanfic is for

Don’t make me have to see Hershel beaten up in the street :’(

The sprite of Dimitri standing in the bar is incredibly hot.... damn why are all the older male characters my type >.>

Alright but it’s about time I finally talk about Dimitri without dissing him for being stupid sometimes and say that in short, I love him. He might even be my favorite new character in UF, even more than Clive; I don’t know if it’s just the Liam O’Brian Tragic Sexy Tired Villain effect or what (nah let’s be real, that’s a huge part of it lmao), but he’s fantastic and utterly breaks my heart, in a much more understated way than how the game shoves Clive’s angst in your face, but his tragedy is nonetheless impossible to ignore. The flashback with young Dimitri is my favorite scene in the entire game, it is devastating and feels so cinematic, so raw and painful, and I’m glad they animated that part because it humanizes him so much more. Claire was his everything, he loved her so much, but it is so obvious to me (and to a lot of the fandom too, I think) that his love was entirely selfless - he might have been a little sad, but he was still mostly content letting Hershel have her, and when it comes to after her death, Dimitri would have been absolutely happy not being able to have her if he managed to save her life; he just wanted her to live. He was in love with her, yes, but he also loved her, as a friend, as a scientist, as a person whose time was cut far too short for entirely selfish and unnecessary reasons, and the majority of his anger and bitterness and drive came from a desire to fix such an injustice - to save an innocent person’s life. And the saddest part of him doing all this and trying to sustain Claire’s existence in the present once he finds her, if you go with the closed loop time travel theory, is that Dimitri should already know it’s impossible for him to succeed in this as long as he remembers finding her body in the past - him succeeding would create a paradox, thus, he can’t save her. But he’s so deep in his despair and obsession and insistence on preserving her life that I don’t think he ever stops to think about this - or he does, but refuses to acknowledge it. I’m sure he was incredibly sweet and kind and soft in the past, with her, and with his passion, and it’s heartbreaking to see how broken he is now, how miserable and tired he is, how much everything changed him. And wanting to get back at someone like Bill, who had it all to begin with and then carelessly used them to gain even more, well, I don’t blame him for that. >_> Not to mention his relationship with Clive, which is all kinds of fascinating to think about: the most chaotic, dysfunctional mess of a half-business partnership half-father/son relationship there is, ahaha... Both of them are unhealthy to the extreme in different ways, but with how much time they spent together, it’s inevitable they had vulnerable moments around each other... Clive is the only other person Dimitri would have around during his research to possibly grow to care about, even if it was entirely unconsciously. Learning he was using him would, well, ruin their relationship even more than it was already messed up, but maybe he would visit Clive in prison at least once, assuming Hershel was. I just crave content for them, ugh. Dimitri just deserved so much better, he makes me so sad </3 and I honestly hate that we don’t get to see him say goodbye to Claire at the end before Hershel; sure it would have utterly killed me, but surely he deserved that much...

The utter, frankly amazing, stupidity of Flora’s kidnapping has been stated everywhere, we all know it, but just.... yeah. smh

Seeing the mobile fortress be like *war flashbacks to the Detragon* “Not This Shit Again” Hershel why tf you putting Luke in more danger AGAIN???

The car scenes with the mobile fortress are, at least to me, the funniest parts of the entire game, even better than the casino, oh my god they’re AMAZING. Luke screaming and flailing his arms while Hershel deadpan flings the car towards the fortress, all the bumps they hit riding across it later on, the car just FALLING and Bill almost falling out of it, and then the plane, all the while Hershel displays no more than mild frustration while everyone else is PANICKING... “a plane? This is an automobile!” ...iconic. top PL moments ever. Luke don’t you recall the time when Hershel built an entire mini plane out of a chainsaw and a barrel in ED, come on now

Onto Claire. Claire doesn’t get much screentime, but some of the moments she does have are very good; she’s one of the best and most fleshed-out female PL characters imo, and like a lot of things, I appreciate her a lot more after this replay than I did years ago... LayClaire is a cute ship and all, but I was never really obsessed with it; rather, I’m realizing now I’m more invested in what Claire has to offer by herself. I hate to use the term “strong female character” cause that sounds so cliche... but she really is strong. The entire part with her wanting to save Clive, their conversation, and her bringing him out... god it gets me, it really does. She’s known she’s going to die for ages, and at this point in the game she knows it could be any moment now, so she has no reason to try to keep herself safe; she’s doomed no matter what, so she might as well spend the last few minutes of her life saving another life, and not just anyone: someone who’s just killed countless people, who anyone else would see as insane, who doesn’t care for her, doesn’t care if he lives or dies - but Claire is compassionate enough that, despite everything, she fiercely believes he deserves to live. Because of her own guilt and sins she believes she bears, yes, but also simply because she believes he can still change, and doesn’t deserve to die, despite the HORRIBLE atrocity he just committed. She’s just that good a person. It’s no wonder she and Hershel loved each other and were made for each other; both of them are such kind, loving, selfless people who see the best in anyone no matter what. Perhaps she hoped and suspected that Hershel would look out for and care for Clive once he was in prison, so she wanted to make sure that could happen, even if she wouldn’t be around to ever see it.

sorry I just get really emotional about this part, about the entire mood and tone of Claire desperately trying to save this kid, and the way the camera focuses on the massive scale of the fortress and how it dwarfs them in size... It’s a really powerful and melancholic scene (just like Dimitri’s flashback scene; have I mentioned how much I adore the atmosphere and cinematic direction of this game? cause god I do) with the knowledge of her real identity and circumstances, the visuals and the music are so good, ugh i just have so many feels. mom Claire hurts me </3 she’s so good... Despite the fact that she dies, and so much of what everyone is doing is because of her death, her presence in the story is so strong, and it never feels like her only purpose is to die for everyone else’s development and that’s it (unlike... well, a lot of other pl females :’); she has her own things to do, she stops the fortress alongside Hershel, and literally saves the main antagonist’s life. Seriously I just adore the fact that she of all people is the one to rescue Clive in the end even though she wasn’t at all obligated to (although I’d be interested and cry over an AU where Hershel saves him instead; it honestly surprises me that he wasn’t going to until Claire said something...), because Clive is the only character (of the adults) who doesn’t have a direct relationship with Claire, but they’re still connected by the explosion, and so it makes for an interesting and terribly sad dynamic, even if they only have a few minutes with each other, for all the reasons I said earlier. Claire doesn’t think what he did was right, but she knows what she and the other scientists did wasn’t right either - and it’s too late for her now, but it’s not too late for him; she knows he has a kind heart, deep down, and that he needs help if he wants to redeem himself. She feels responsible for him, feels like she owes him that second chance, after indirectly taking his parents from him and causing him such misery and brokenness... She’s so brave and strong-willed to be able to do and admit all that she does; I just love her. It clearly kills her to leave Hershel, I don’t think she intended at first to ever let him know who she was (hence Celeste), but she’s not too upset in the end, because she (rightly) knows that he will be all right. ;; She’s so beautiful, too... wish we could have seen her interact with so many of the other characters </3

and so my favorite “insert Descole into the main trilogy” AU is where Descole intercepts Claire and makes some sort of body for her, like how everyone headcanons that for Aurora post-AL. (or/also just mobile fortress vs. Descole robots, that’s cool too lol)

And finally, Clive, the infamous star of Unwound Future, thought I talked about him a bit already (and also in this post a few weeks ago). Clive is probably the PL series’ best written villain Anton excluded, I absolutely love him, like everyone does. Nothing really about him hasn’t been done before elsewhere, but that’s not a bad thing; when I was younger and first played the game I really only paid attention to his sympathetic side, but now I’ve also grown an appreciation and fondness for that kind of unabashedly awful, manic, evil insanity a villain like him has, it’s just SO entertaining to watch. If PL was a more mature/higher rated series I’d love to see his chaotic crazed energy played up even more, just to really hammer in how messed up he is, ahaha, but of course that would make it harder to sympathize with him..... and unfortunately, it already is kind of hard, because.... shit, the number of people he must have killed? It’s a LOT. A FUCKTON. The level of sympathy the game gives Clive and the way it presents him at the end is not at ALL relative to the astronomical amount of people that had to have been squashed to death by his machine, to the point that it honestly makes me uncomfortable, and I try to just retcon that in my head, as hard as it is to imagine a scenario where that thing could have come up to London and not hit any houses, because like..... There’s no coming back from that. He knew exactly what he was doing, madness or not, and I honestly just... don’t want him to be such a mass murderer. Maybe it’s wrong to ignore it, but the game wants me to feel sorry for him and see his potential for redemption, and his relationship with Hershel is so good... dammit game, why’d you have to show those houses being crushed. Ugh. Because Clive is so compelling as someone who feels betrayed by people in power, who desires revenge not only for himself but for all the people who suffered just like he has that he says he bore witness to as a reporter; it’s a very relatable position and a good story, for his well-meaning intentions to be skewed and lost in the midst of his rage and despair and hatred and insanity, where his very valid point of “hey people in government are fucked up and don’t give a shit about us and that needs to change” gets turned into “they all need to die even if the very innocent people I want to save get hurt by this as well”, and I really wish that whole angle of it had been played up a bit more, and there had been more of an opportunity for Hershel to reason with him and argue that in the midst of his blind need for revenge, he’s become even worse than the people who need justice handed to them (cue some Descole allusionssss). He wouldn’t have to win him over, Clive is already too deep by that point despite how much he wanted to be stopped, but just having more of that than just what happens in the surveillance room would have been sooooooo good, I love that conversation. It would have made Clive even better and really drive home that he’s 1) kinda right about some things and wants better for people 2) still very fucking wrong and selfish at the same time and has taken it all way too far 3) very fucked up and broken. Not that the third point isn’t already abundantly clear, but... yeah. It would have given him even more depth, made him more sympathetic, and helped juuust a little to offset how much the game handwaves his mass murders... just a little... One of my favorite Clive scenes though is when the fortress is breaking down and he’s still there, desperately trying to save it, still in denial about the fact that all his plans have failed and that everything he’s done (and himself) is about to go up in flames; I know everyone loves making fun of him and that that scene is pretty memeable (he does get bodied so much in the game, lmaooo), but it makes him look so vulnerable, all alone in there by himself, like a child, which is what he really is, deep down: he never truly wanted to do something so abhorrent and evil, but his emotions and mind spiraled so badly out of control and it led him to such a dark, horrible place, where he couldn’t stop himself, no matter how much he wanted to, and in the end all he can do is watch helplessly as the reality of what he’s done and his unwound future all comes crashing down in front of him, never to be salvaged. And he believes wholeheartedly that he is going to die, that he deserves to (this is my favorite Clive scene; he’s so hurt and resigned, the voice acting kills me ugh), he doesn’t understand at all why Claire wants to save him, especially if he knows she’s one of the scientists (as his line of “why are you of all people helping me” implies), because he always thought none of them ever cared about him and people he saw as like him, thought everyone was like Bill Hawks, but Claire still cared enough to want to save his life, even though she was one of the people he was actively targeting with his revenge... I wonder how he would have felt at the time if he had known about her situation and that she was dying. </3 I just want so many good things for him, as so much of the fandom does. He’s so messed up but that’s what makes him so interesting, and his potential relationship with Hershel that the ending of the game suggests could happen is so touching and lovely and uplifting, one of my favorite kinds of relationships in fiction: Clive’s issues would persist for so long, for forever, really, but Hershel would support him and help him heal, and be there for him always, no matter how much Clive would feel like he didn’t deserve it. I eat this dynamic up, I really do, every single time I encounter it in a story, and it’s made even better by the fact that as I’ve said, Hershel has so much in common with Clive, and so they would get along very well for that reason, and Clive could unknowingly help Hershel just as much Hershel tries to help him. They’re so good for each other. Add Luke too, and Flora, and Desmond...! just ahhhhh........ there’s so much goodness. Clive you absolute glorious, fucked-up mess of a character, I love you. :’) and I love fic writers who explore facets of his personality and write about him. He’s only in one game, and there’s still a few hiccups, as I said, yet he’s handled far better than Descole or Randall in my opinion (though I love them too)... just an amazing fucking villain, and character. I wish UF could have gone deeper with him than it did, but even so, the possibilities with Clive are endless. I love him, so much ;;

and some of the themes of the plot in this game, uhh, hit a little close to home in good ole’ 2020/21 time we live in? :’) #FuckBillHawks

Hershel saying goodbye to Claire.... god. One of the top scenes in the entire series, probably the #1 most iconic I’d even go so far as to say. I don’t even really ship LayClaire, but there’s an indescribable emotion that finale gives me... it’s just breathtaking, in the most gutwrenching, nostalgic, beautiful way. I still maintain that Diabolical Box’s ending is sadder than this one, for a multitude of reasons, just comparing the stories and situations the characters are in, but I 100% don’t blame people for bawling at this scene more than any other, just because of the way it’s done yes I know I won’t shut up about the cinematography; the lighting, the camera angles, the pacing of it, Hershel’s fucking kicked puppy faces, the dialogue oh god the dialogue; it ALL hits like a TRUCK and comes together beautifully. At this point in his life Hershel has been through so much loss, so much so that it is unbearable - when he cries that he doesn’t want to say goodbye again, that he can’t say goodbye again, that he refuses to, nothing in the world is more true: this man has been through too much, and he’s hit his breaking point. even if you don’t have the prequels in mind when watching this, as most people don’t/didn’t the first time through, the overwhelming sense of burden and loss Hershel is feeling is so palpable, so painful - you get the sense that this isn’t just about Claire; Hershel has never shown emotion like this before up to this point, so for him to finally break down like this... it speaks volumes. After so many years of holding everything in, he finally can’t take it anymore, and basically stabbing me in the fucking chest would hurt less </3 I complain about Hershel never showing emotion like this (never crying) in the prequels whenever he’s hit with an equally horrible bombshell, and I still feel that way, but at the same time a part of me is also glad that’s the case, because it makes the very last (two) scenes in the entire series hit so much harder, knowing that he finally loses his composure after dealing with so much. As the titular character of the series, Hershel’s development is very understated and subtle, so it’s all the more meaningful when he actually snaps, because it makes him feel so much more real and human than he ever is the rest of the time, when he maintains his facade of being a perfectly composed, calm, and together gentleman; this scene finally say that, no, Hershel is a person, and he is broken in a lot of ways, because some puzzles you just can’t solve no matter how hard you try, and it’s so sad. And this sad tone of loss and longing permeates the entire cutscene; the way the title is dropped in Claire’s dialogue (both versions equally haunting imo), and Hershel taking off his hat for the first time ever, and the pan up and transition back to show the falling snow as “Time Travel”, my favorite instrumental in the series, kicks in... y’all there is no other feeling in the world like the feeling that elicits, there really isn’t ಥ⌣ಥ ❤️💔 the only thing that might even come close to it is the ending of Azran Legacy with Surely Someday, simply because it was the ending of the series, but the ending of Unwound Future hits me harder knowing it’s the end of the timeline, and with everything else in hindsight. And then an unknown amount of time later, even with Luke gone and Hershel only having Flora there with him anymore unless we headcanon DESMOND COMES BACK BECAUSE OF COURSE HE DID RIGHT, Hershel is still no longer wearing his hat, to show that he’s finally started to heal from his pain, and accepted the loss(es), because throughout all of UF Hershel had never really gotten over Claire’s death no matter how much he tried to pretend like he had, but you don’t realize that until you see the ending, until he got one final chance to see her. I just... ugh I love it so much, so much. It means so much, for Hershel and for the series, and that’s why it makes me cry (and don’t even get me sTARTED on Luke’s goodybe, and how upsetting yet beautiful THAT is. yes, Luke isn’t a gentleman yet, and Hershel finally learns that maybe he doesn’t always have to be one, either :’’’’’’)

Unwound Future is a masterpiece. Diabolical Box has my favorite characters and story for the new characters, and favorite settings, personally, but Unwound Future is such top-tier storytelling and writing; it feels so epic and sweeping and (here i go again) cinematic, it’s so polished and everything flows so well, the pacing is wonderful, everything ties up so perfectly and there’s very little I would change Flora bitching aside and practically nothing that feels like filler, even though some of it technically is. The tone stays consistent and they really push the boundaries of how serious and heavy these games can be, and it works, and doesn’t feel silly or glossed over or too unrealistic or too heavyhanded like some of the other games are at times; the plot twists/reveals feel the least absurd and the most grounded in reality, despite still being wild, and it focuses on some really relevant stuff and themes (again, it feels really grounded and raw, and the least fantastical, which isn’t a bad thing for the other games/movie per se, but being more realistic works in this one’s favor. No one is going to have their family separated and murdered by a criminal secret organization working to unearth ancient advanced civilized ruins, or lose years of their life and memories in said ancient ruins, or have their life ruined in an eternal unaging state from hallucinogenic gas, but being screwed over by people in government who will do anything to make sure they never have to face consequences? now that’s a mood). It’s just a really fucking good game, by far the best Professor Layton game, and I’ll always stand by that, despite preferring DB just a bit more cause it hits more of my personal tastes (DB is still very good too though, don’t get me wrong), and it’s also enhanced even more by the prequels, though it stands perfectly on its own. The perfect culmination of Hershel’s character arc, and the absolute high point of the series. It’s one of the ones I keep coming back to the most, just because it has so much to offer; as someone who is absolutely enamored with near-perfect stories of this caliber, I couldn’t ask for more. ❤️

#professor layton #professor layton spoilers #meta #who wants to read 8k words about a 12 year old game: no one #who's still gonna post it: this bitch #i actually got emotional near the end writing hjklskdfkfldlksk watching the end of uf always hurts :' )#me: 'db is my favorite' also me: 'rants and cries about uf for almost double the length of the db rant'#It's About The Potential.jpg #i didn't even talk about the puzzles much at all lmaooooo none of them really stood out to me #just........ story........ so good...... emotions go brrrr #i need ALL the dimitri fanfic tbh #and dimitri and clive #and CLAIRE and clive #and clive and hershel ofc #catch me being obsessed with time travel in a game where 99% of it isn't time travel ahjsdffkldskkdfl #It Could Be That Deep.jpg #need to write my other uf ideas.... and then get to the prequels already #but i also wanna replay pl vs aa... and the aa trilogy...... so much to doooooo

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ladye11e · 6 years ago

Text

Deception pt 34

The conflict between the Assassins and the Templars is getting out of hand. Lies, deceit and subterfuge, now you must pick a side...

Tagging @geekgoddess813 @sweet-flash @ermergerd517 @i-wontgivein @imakemyownblog 💕

If anyone else would like a tag, shoot me a dm 😁

Link to the full fic so far is Here.

Jumping up off your sofa and peeking through the spyhole in your door when three heavy bangs came from next door, you gingerly poked your head out into the hallway, and coughed loudly to get the delivery boys attention.

"They're on holiday. I'll sign for it."

Gist had sent the package with excellent timing after you had told him that the old couple next to you had gone away; letting him send you something without it getting trailed back to you. Signing for the expected package quickly and slamming the door shut in the poor delivery boys face, you ripped open the cardboard packet, and tipped its contents out on your counter eagerly.

Carefully picking up the disk; dismissing the thick bind of papers for the moment, you put it in your laptop and grabbed your headphones, drumming your fingers impatiently while you waited for it to load up. A whole month you had been waiting for this. Weeks of sneaking around, late nights and chasing numerous dead ends, but hopefully Gist had helped you find the proof you needed. Picking up the translation transcripts that Shay had done for you when several male Russian voices blared in your ear, you flicked through them quickly, almost dropping them when the person you were looking for appeared on the screen.

"Hello, Daniel. My my, you have been a naughty boy," You chuckled with a wry grin. "Sorry to throw you under the bus like this, but it's either you or me."

You knew there was something, off, about Daniel Cross as soon as you had met him in Russia on your last assignment. He had seemed, cagey, and your spidey sense was going mental every time he visited the new bureau, plus there were the little telltale signs that you used to do when you first started working with the Templars. Dismissing his withdrawal jitters as he was going through rehab for his drug problem, he always had a habit of disappearing whenever Shaun had made a new breakthrough in the security programmes, or had managed to locate a consignment that would stop the Templars from funding their work. Then there was the barrage of questions that seemed innocent at the time; such as when more people were coming over or how well you got on with the Russian assassins, but thinking about it afterwards, there was no reason for it, unless he was up to something. If you hadn't have been doing the same thing, you would never have noticed, but unfortunately for Mr Cross, his luck was about to run out.

Having the perfect scapegoat within your grasp; plus a plan B under your belt in case this didn't work, a wicked grin crept up your face as you came across the translation of what he had just said to a man who was hiding exceptionally well in the shadows.

"Bratstvo ne znayet. Now take me to Vidic."

Jackpot.

Reaching over and grabbing your phone, you keyed in Gists voicemail number that you had committed to memory before your old phone had been taken off you, and hummed softly to yourself while you waited for it to kick in, clearing your throat when it beeped so you didn't sound as excited as you felt at the moment.

"You wonderful men. Thank you ever so much, it's exactly what I wanted. Hopefully, I'll see you soon."

Downloading the video off of the disk and sending it to Altaïr through a dummy (and fingers crossed) untraceable email address, all that you could do now, was wait.

In attempts to keep yourself occupied for however long it would take, you had given your apartment a much needed clean; as you could have made a sculpture out of all the dust that had accumulated, and now had your music turned up full blast while you attempted to catch up on your mountain of overdue paperwork. You were so engrossed in writing up all of the mundane tasks that you had done over the past few weeks, that you didn't notice that your phone was ringing until it nearly vibrated off the table.

Catching it in the nick of time and grabbing the remote so you could turn the music down, you answered the call as nonchalantly as you could when you saw that it was Desmond ringing you.

"Hey, what's up? If you're calling to send me out on another bodyguard errand, forget it."

"(Name)! You're not gonna believe it! I can't believe it! I dunno how, or what happened, but, but, it's great!"

"Woah Woah, Desmond, calm down. What's great? You finally beat Altaïr in a fight or something?" You snickered, knowing full well what he was babbling on about, but decided to entertain him anyway.

"No, it's better than that! You're in the clear! You all are! They found the traitor!"

Sitting back with a beaming smile as he carried on enthusing about how brilliant this news was, you looked at your phone when it beeped in your ear in between Desmond's ramblings, just resisting the urge to burst out laughing when it was a message from Jacob saying he was, 'Freeeeeeeeeeee!!!!'

"(Name), (name), you still there? Aren't you happy?"

"Course I am! Was just waiting for you to take a breath. So who betrayed us then?"

"Oh. Sorry." he chuckled sheepishly. "Dunno who it is, the boss wouldn't tell me. He said he's gonna have to investigate into it more, but you're definitely out of the weeds."

"Thank god for that. Thanks for letting me know, we still on for the gym Sunday?"

"Course, wouldn't miss the opportunity to get my revenge! See you then."

Taking a massive sigh of relief as you hung up and dropped your phone back on the table, you clambered up when your stomach started growling and plodded over to the kitchen, rummaging through your cupboards before settling on a share size bag of chips to munch on while you worked. No sooner had you sat back down your phone buzzed with another message, but figuring it was Jacob yet again you just ignored it, determined to get caught up on your work once and for all.

"Right, where was I... Time log...Time log..." You grumbled to yourself, trying to remember the exact millisecond you had threatened William Johnson's secretary in Starbucks.

Clicking your tongue against the roof of your mouth when your phone went off yet again, you snatched it up with every intention of replying with a lengthy abusive message but instead scrunched up your brow when the texts were from an unknown number. That was soon replaced with a sly smile though when the first message said 'Coffee?' looking around furiously when the second said 'Put down the Doritos and let me in X.'

You about jumped out of your skin when a soft rapping suddenly came from your window, more than slightly bewildered when you opened it and let Shay climb in from the fire escape, all dressed up and carrying a couple of expensive looking bags.

"What you got there Romeo? You didn't need to climb all the way up here, I'm off the hook." You grinned as he planted a kiss on your cheek and scanned your apartment.

"Aye, I know that, the chatters gone crazy. Your entourage are still downstairs, so didn't wanna raise any suspicion just yet. Nice, place you've got here."

Rolling your eyes when you could tell he was being sarcastic, you peeked into one of the bags when he dropped them on the table; pushing them towards you and gesturing for you to take them, but you couldn't see anything apart from tissue paper.

"They're for you love. Go an get changed; we're going out."

"Where?"

Holding the bags to your chest when he picked them back up and handed them to you, then gently guided you to what he assumed was your bedroom, you raised your eyebrow when he just chuckled and ushered you inside, pulling the door to with an alluring wink.

Slightly stunned as you finished doing up your shoes and smoothed out your dress, you adjusted your pathetic excuse for a mirror so you could see most of yourself, and deemed you looked pretty damned good considering you had only spent fifteen minutes getting ready. The dress fit you perfectly, a simple black thing with spaghetti straps and came down to your ankle on one side, with a lace panel running down the other that stopped just above your knee; which meant you had to forego knickers to wear it. Cheeky bugger, you sniggered to yourself as you reemerged from your room.

Barely suppressing your smirk when Shay gave out a low whistle as you struck a pose for him, you stuffed your phone and keys into your bag that you had fished out before taking his hand and clambering back out of the fire escape.

"You going to tell me where we're going yet?" You asked again as you walked through the back streets behind your apartment.

"Always need to know don't ya? C'mon, in ya get."

Your eyes widened when he opened the door to an Audi r8 that was parked a couple of streets away, recognising it immediately from the garage at Templar headquarters as you slid into the front seat.

"Take it you've made up with Haytham then?"

"Yeah. We've had our falling outs before. Nothing as bad as this time mind, but life's too short to hold a grudge like that. Was gonna borrow the Rolls, thought that might've drawn a bit too much attention though."

Thinking he made a good choice as you definitely didn't want to be in that particular car again, you let out a little chuckle and spent the short drive in silence, trying to figure out where the hell you were going by the route he took. You had completely given up by the time he'd parked down some dank alleyway and took your hand to lead you through a side door, taking you through a very busy, and delicious smelling kitchen. A couple of the chefs looked up as you went past, but none seemed fazed in the slightest that you were there; making you slightly on edge that they would be used to people coming in through the back.

Your mouth formed a small 'o when you were finally taken to a small private room upstairs, and you could see out of the patio doors onto the balcony, now knowing that you were in the L'Espalier restaurant right next to Shays hotel.

"What's the occasion?" You asked, barely above a whisper as you took your seat at the candlelit table for two when the waiter pulled the chair out for you.

"Realised that we've never actually been on a date, figured today would be the perfect time to change that." He said simply, but by the look on his face, you could tell that there was something that he wasn't letting on.

"Hmm, I figured you for more of a bowling kind of guy."

Grinning when he just rolled his eyes and chuckled, you opened the menu and pouted when you couldn't read a word of it, promptly snapping it shut much to Shays apparent amusement.

"Ya don't need to worry lass, the owner here's a friend of mine, and it's Templar run. No eyes on us here."

It was only then you realised that you had been looking about and over your shoulder, making a mental note of possible exits and hiding places in the room, smiling sheepishly as you sat back and relaxed slightly.

"Sorry, force of habit."

Even though you had never been to a restaurant this fancy before you were aware of the etiquette, (letting Shay order for you thank god) and using the obscene amount of cutlery from the outside in and so forth, surprisingly enjoying being spoilt like this. Catching up and filling each other on everything that you had missed over the past few weeks after not being able to see each other; nearly spitting your wine across the table when Shay told you that Christopher had managed to electrocute himself mildly the other day, you eventually stopped giggling when your food turned up, which was nothing short of heaven on a plate.

Delicately crafted hors d'oeuvres, followed by a beautiful soufflé that was so light felt like you were eating clouds, delectable meats, vegetables and fruits, every bite so delicious that you wished you had room to eat it all again. You couldn't remember a time when you felt so, content if that was the right word for it. Talking and laughing until your ribs hurt, wined and dined like a queen, and tonight, you weren't an Assassin, nor a Templar spy, just an ordinary girl out on a date with her partner.

Your initial instincts that there was more than one reason for going out tonight were confirmed when the waiter poured two glasses of champagne before retreating to the shadows, narrowing your eyes playfully when Shay took your hand and led you out to the balcony.

"When are we gonna get the chance to do something like this again? Might as well make the most of it, love."

"True. Tonight has been amazing. Thank you," you breathed, placing your glass down on the small table and leaning on the rail as you took in the view.

You never realised Boston could be so serene. Usually, you were too busy running around to notice things like this, and from up here it almost seemed picturesque, not on the verge of becoming a battleground. You closed your eyes as Shay wrapped his arm around your waist and nuzzled into your neck, softly sighing when he placed a soft kiss just below your ear and squeezed you gently.

"(Name)?"

"Hmm?"

Flickering your eyes open when you felt his other arm curl around your front, your heart jumped when you saw a thin silver chain woven around his fingers, a beautiful rectangular pendant dropping in front of you when he opened his palm.

"Happy birthday."

Now you knew why he had gone to so much trouble tonight, you hadn't even noticed the date even though you had spent most of the day writing it down. Swallowing hard as you timidly took the pendant in your fingers, you brushed your thumb over the intricate lines on the front, turning it over to reveal an engraved phrase that was in a different language on the back. Your stomach was doing somersaults as he carefully fastened it around your neck and spun you around so he could admire you wearing it, before cupping your face with both hands and kissing you deeply.

"What does it say?" You whispered when he pulled back slightly, your face breaking into a broad smile that a Cheshire cat would have been jealous of.

"That side is Ogham, the first written language in Ireland. This side..." He paused for a moment as he turned the necklace over and ran the tip of his finger over the words. "Is Gaelic. It means..."

You both let out an exasperated groan when he was cut off by your phone ringing loudly from your bag, mentally chiding yourself over and over for not putting it on silent while you were out tonight. Just when you thought whoever was calling had finally rung off, it started up again immediately afterwards, Shays phone joining in a split second later from his jacket pocket.

"Both of us?! We better see who it is love."

Cursing under your breath as you fished your mobile out of your bag, your brow furrowed when you saw it was Altaïr calling, only just resisting the urge not to snap when you finally answered. Cocking your head when Shay mouthed that it was Haytham calling him and he responded to his phone, you both just stared at each other wide-eyed as you each listened to the frantic babblings, blurting out 'On my way' and hanging up at the same time.

"The warehouse?!"

"Aye. This isn't good. You still have some stuff at the hotel, are you sure you're up for this?"

Giving him a determined nod and grabbing your bag, you took a deep breath before almost sprinting down the stairs and towards the Mandarin; thankful that it was only about a minute away, hoping that Altaïr was exaggerating and that you weren't about to join in a full-blown war.

#assassin's creed #assassinscreed #modern au #fanfic #reader insert #shay cormac #shay cormac x reader #sfw #desmond miles

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abandoned----blog · 8 years ago

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because i love her | | [ cisco ]

a/n: This was requested from my other writing blog ( @geek-imagines ) but felt like I should introduce my writing on here as well. Nevertheless I hope you don’t mind but I do sincerely apologize the reader doesn’t make a major appearance as this is between Julian and Cisco with word prompt given. I also hope Julian isn’t too out of character, I’m still warming up to his character and writing for him. Gif © polybarry, not mine. Word prompt is taken from here ( x ) . Requests are open unless stated otherwise by me !

@fuckkoffcourtney requested: 20 where the reader is julians sister and shes with cisco and cisco says this to julian?

20. “I’m sorry if this upsets you, but I’m going to marry her/him.”

Relationship(s):

Cisco Ramon/Reader (dating), Julian Albert & Reader (siblings)

Cisco and Julian’s relationship would be considered not the strongest out of Team Flash relationships, especially since well, they came from very contrasting backgrounds. Julian and Y/N was from a very high class family with old money that could be from traced back to their ancestors, there was no doubt that the Albert family would never have to worry about anything. While Cisco came from a not so friendly family where his older brother was always doted and he, being left out had to start from the ground and up. But you do remember the old saying of how opposites attract one another right? That was what happened between you and Cisco when you came from England to find your brother after he’d left. The British male wasn’t the fondest of Cisco and neither did Cisco like him any better but when it came to you, you were perfect.

You were Y/N Desmond Albert, the quirky middle child of Mr. and Mrs. Desmond Albert with Julian being older than you and Emma being younger. Unfortunately tragedy struck when you were eighteen when your little sister died from her illness which is why your brother left, it was heartbreaking since it caused your parents to stop talking and you felt alone. Until that is you could no longer take it before fleeing to find Julian regardless of the threats of your parents before finally finding your brother in Central City whom told you to leave before giving in after your pleads and tears. After moving in with your brother in the new city, you began working at CCPN and meeting Iris West whom you quickly became close friends with. How you became into Team Flash was complete accident as you were curious as to why Julian was lying to you at some nights before he came clean about working with The Flash and getting Barry to agree to let you join. And that is how you became acquainted with Cisco, Barry, Joe, Wally, and Iris. You couldn’t believe that your friend Iris was apart of the team but yet again Barry was her fiancé.

Today you were out with Iris and Barry to help plan some things with their wedding that was still very slowly progressing as you had always wanted to help with such an important event. You had always dreamed of getting married yourself and would’ve totally became a wedding planner if you could but enough with that as you went back in reality to help pick a theme.

Meanwhile Cisco and Julian bickering at one another, sometimes they worked well together but today was just not the day. Even H.R couldn’t lighten up the atmosphere as he was only met with glares from both colleagues so he left the two at it. Julian wasn’t really against your relationship with the engineer but he wasn’t completely for it either, but that was how he was with any guy whom tried to date you. Perhaps it was him just simply trying to be a protective brother since he was older and you both already lost Emma, he couldn’t bear the thought of losing you as well.

“I don’t understand why Y/N would even go with someone like you. My sister deserves someone much better than that.” Julian spat out with a slight glare at the other as he crosses his arms, “I know how much you make her happy but Y/N deserves someone far better.”

The dark haired male raises his eyebrows before the other as he blinks a few times, biting his bottom lip along with it as his hands rested on the desk surface. “What’s that supposed to mean? Oh now I’m sudden not good for her, huh Julian? I’m sorry if this upsets you, but I’m going to marry her. You know why? Because you know, I thought she was going to be another person who was going to walk out that door. But no, she didn’t. She could’ve so many times but she always came back and you know how incredible that must feel for me? Damn great and I can sit down while listing all the things I love about sister. Y/N means the whole world to me as well Julian.” Cisco manages to speak out without taking a second breath as he pulled his chair over to sit down while waiting for your brother’s response.

The English man didn’t say anything as he listened to the words Cisco spoke, not cutting him off this time and realized how right he was. You could’ve just left whenever you wanted, you were a very independent person even though you would get anxious at times but you seem to know your place around. Then thinking of the times from Cisco hugged you tightly after being kidnapped by a meta and slept by your side because you were so scared to the way he looked at you while you went off rambling about something with Barry or Iris. Julian realized how much Cisco loved you and you loving him back, before straightening himself up to fix his royal purple silk tie. “I seem to have underestimated you Mr. Ramon. I- I just guess I’m afraid to lose Y/N because I simply can’t bear the thought of losing her like Emma. We were close when we younger and had so much pressure from our parents to keep the family tradition alive, our parents wanted to pick our suitors so I guess that’s why I thought you weren’t good enough. You and I come very different places in this world so I apologize for my behavior. All I ask Mr. Ramon is please take good care of her, Y/N has had heartbroken one too many times. Her happiness means everything to me.”

Cisco smiles at Julian during the whole entire time as he offered his hand toward the scientist, “I guess that would understable considering I probably be the same way if I had younger sister who was dating you. Do you think maybe, we could call it a truce? For now anyway? And Cisco is fine, you don’t need to be all proper here you know.” He says as Julian looked down at Cisco’s outstretched hand and him before shaking on it.

“Truce Mr. Ram-Cisco. Cisco. And thank you. But speaking of which, when are you exactly going to propose to her?”

#the flash imagine #cisco ramon imagine #julian albert imagine #fuckkoffcourtney #cisco ramon x reader #julian albert x reader #{ requested imagine by user }

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cho-sekiei · 8 years ago

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The Mom-friend trope in fan fiction and why it is problematic (an essay by me)

@eloarei asked:

So I saw that post about Ignis and the mom-friend trope, and I feel like I get the gist of what you're saying, but I guess I wanted to ask if that means you actively dislike it when people refer to him as the mom-friend? Or perhaps you just dislike that trope? Or maybe you just don't like tropes at all? Personally, I love tropes (esp. mom/dad-friend) probably more than is reasonable, as long people don't reduce good characters to JUST those tropes. (Same as any label; we are more than a word.)

Okay… let me try to organise a bit what I have to say because there are several things here. Also I’m going to take FFXV and Ignis as an example here, but this can be applied to lots of different fandoms where a caring male character exists (for example, Hakkai in Saiyuki would be the same, Shiro in Voltron, Sugawara in Haikyuu, take your pick).

The first problem is language related, the name of the trope itself. Not because of the words themselves but because of what they reflect. Do I have a problem with Ignis being referred to as the ‘mom-friend’? Yes, I do. I’m going to explain why, but, in short, this trope glorifies the existence of damaging gender-roles and I think it’s important to be aware of it and recognise it. I should point out here that while I have a problem with the existence of the trope, this is not an attack on all the stories that use it. They are too varied and numerous for me to talk about them as a whole. So not all of what I say here applies to all stories using the trope.

I know it’s an accepted fandom trope and people don’t mean anything bad by it, but it’s interesting to analyse why we say the things we say and to question whether we should at all. Words have power. They are the reflections of our beliefs and attitudes, they have implications and hidden meanings. But they're not innocuous, they can perpetuate hurtful stereotypes and systems of oppression which is why it's important to recognise the implications behind the words we speak and write. The fact that as soon as a male character is empathic and caring he becomes automatically referred to as having feminine traits or attributes (the mom) is a reflection of the rampant and toxic masculinity that exists in modern patriarchal society. Suddenly, he doesn’t fit with the typical image of a male anymore, he has to be the kind-of-feminine-friend. It’s the same kind of attitude that prevents men from recognising and expressing their emotions, the eternal ‘boys don’t cry’ thing, which is unhealthy and damaging. It’s one of the reasons men are so much more likely to be successful when they attempt suicide, because they are raised in a way that forbids them from expressing / dealing with their feelings without feeling weak and questioning their own worth. It also leads to violence against others as an alternative reaction / outlet as well. And it feeds homophobia.

The second problem is that in a lot of cases - not all - identifying the character with that trope will automatically give them attitudes they might not have at all in canon. The mom-friend often becomes nagging and annoying, the dad-friend is cool and fun. Again, what is reflected here is internalised misogyny (even from female writers… and I’m not saying this as a criticism. I still catch myself every day doing or thinking things that are stupidly misogynistic, because our society raises us to believe a lot of stupid things about women’s character or abilities. It takes a lot of self-awareness and introspection over a long period of time to recognise them). As you say, using a trope doesn’t mean you are going to fall into all the pitfalls that come with it but it’s a dangerous slope since some negative attitudes might be so engrained within the trope that they might seem natural and get integrated in your writing without you even realising it. It’s why we refer to ‘internalised misogyny,’ because it’s all but obvious or conscious.

As a brief tangent (I’m not going to go into it too much because I’ve promised @terra-bunny to write a whole post on the topic of toxic relationships in fandom), using the mom/dad trope automatically creates a situation of power imbalance between the characters with some being in charge and some being infantilised with part of their agency and autonomy being taken from them (again that’s coming from the kind of vocabulary that is being used). Of course, the extent of it will vary with the individual story, some will be a lot more extreme than others in their portrayal of the trope. However, in many cases, it doesn’t stop the two types of characters from being shipped together and it’s often presented as a cute and healthy relationship. I’m afraid it’s not. This is not a case where power exchange has been negotiated and ways out agreed upon as in a healthy D/s relationship. It’s not a relationship where the characters are on equal footing. It’s manipulative and a dangerous glorification of abuse, grooming and pedophilia. What matters here is the power balance between the characters rather than their age. If this sounds harsh, I mean for it to be. Our modern societies are way too comfortable with the romanticisation of abuse and exploitation of vulnerable individuals. Creative content does not get a pass on those issues because it's dealing with fictional characters.

Does that mean you can’t write about it? Of course, not. Writing is awesome because you can write whatever you want if it fits your story. What you shouldn’t do is pretend it’s a healthy model to follow. If you write about those topics, then you should be aware and explore the problems that they raise and how those can be resolved (i.e. by restoring / creating a healthy balance of power) or not; and if they cannot be resolved then you should definitely question whether that relationship should continue. Not doing so is passively condoning it as okay. As Desmond Tutu would say 'if you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.' Now I should point out here that the smart way of addressing problematic situations is through a clever plot rather than a moralising author's rant.

You can see the tendency of glorifying that kind of unbalanced relationships in fan art as well, with the physical size difference between the characters being over-emphasised, the less powerful character being more slender and given a more youthful face than canon, etc. I have been made very uncomfortable recently by some of the Gladio x Prompto fan art on my dashboard. Without knowing the characters and their age, it looked like pedophilia. It felt very wrong and it is a problem. I don’t think we can pretend it’s not just because it’s part of the fandom. Fandom can be problematic and we should speak up about it.

Now, obviously, I know some people are going to wonder why I get so worked-up about those things. After all, we’re talking fan works, as part of a fictional universe. It’s entertainment, it’s fun, why would I drag all those issues into it? And my answer is because the stories we tell matter. They reflect what we believe in and they might also send some messages to our readers - some of whom might be in vulnerable situations - that might either reinforce their acceptance of or lead them to question problematic attitudes. Being aware ourselves when we write of why we would portray a character or a situation a certain way is the first step towards questioning whether we should. One story won’t change the world, but words have power. The other reason is that you can learn a lot about yourself by looking at what you write and how you write it. Who doesn’t want a good journey of self-discovery? :) And this might end up changing how we act and the problems we recognise in real life as well.

Parenthesis about tropes in general: Not all are problematic. And they’re often part of the fandom life (coffee shop or flower shop AUs for example). We’ve all read them, we all love them. Tropes that give characters stereotypical behaviour (mom-friend), I have more problem with because they tend to lead to paper-fine, somewhat OOC, portrayals of complex characters. But obviously, that depends on the individual writer.

I guess my view on non-damaging tropes depends mostly of what a writer is trying to do. If it’s filling a fandom need, have fun with a stereotypical story, then most of the time they’re fine. Fandoms are interesting because no-one would read twenty novels about people working in a coffee shop… but then we’ve all probably read that many fanfics about it - if not more. I also think tropes are useful to help inexperienced / beginner writers get started. From that point of view, they can be very beneficial.

Now, if you’re trying to write a more nuanced and original story, tropes can actually be dangerous. They will simplify the characters and the plot, they might make them caricatural, less alive and credible. They might rob you of your own creativity. You can use tropes as a tool to get started, but for a more ambitious piece of work, it’s good to stop and think about how you can subvert or move beyond the scope of the tropes, and whether problematic situations in the story should be addressed at some point (as previously mentioned, I’m not talking of doing this in a moralistic way, more in the plot itself).

@eloarei asked:

Anyway, sorry for rambling in your inbox so incoherently. It's hard to explain my feelings about this in so few words. But to get to the honest point of the matter: I'm actually writing a fic that sorta revolves around Ignis as the "mom" type (not /exactly/, but you know, that's why I use quotes), and I'd hate to think that someone I admire (you) would find it distasteful. So if it's something you have strong feelings about, I'm happy to take advice on how not to be tropey about it, at least.

First, let me blush like mad. 😳 ‘Admire me?’ 😳 Why would you do that? 😳 I’m honestly a badly put together mess. Nothing to admire here. 😝 It’s hard for me to tell you if I’d find it problematic without reading it. I just want to emphasise here that I have no problem with Ignis being a caring (sometimes a bit overbearing) character. That’s canon, that’s who he is. The problem is not that Ignis is caring, it’s how it is often portrayed. I often write Ignis telling others what to do because he’s a bossy jerk who thinks he knows better (and he often does) and he cares deeply about his friends and tries to stop them from getting into trouble. I guess the question to ask is whether the way you write him falls into any of the pitfalls I’ve described above (does he get feminised or appear weak for being caring? does he come across as more nagging and annoying than in canon? does he respect other characters’ agency and autonomy or not? and if not, is it acknowledged as problematic at some point in the story? etc.). You could even push this further and subvert the mom-friend trope by engaging with the character’s experience of his own identity and how a toxic vision of masculinity might hurt him and make him feel vulnerable even as he tries to come to grips with his caring nature. But obviously, that’s a much more engaged and deeper kind of story.

I hope this makes what I meant a bit clearer. I probably think about that kind of thing too much, but I can’t rightly ignore it either. Also stop saying ‘sorry’, you have no idea how much I love talking about all that stuff. ^ ^’’’ If you want me to expand on anything, let me know. ;)

#ffxv #eloarei #replies #writing #fandom #writing as a craft #writers #writers problems #feminism

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