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shewrites444 · 7 months ago

Text

fire [coriolanus snow x reader smut]

[Hello! It has been awhile. I wanted to switch it up and try out a fic on young Coriolanus Snow’s character from TBOSAS after hearing about the new Hunger Games movie! Please let me know if you enjoy his character. I also apologize if this story has some imperfections, I did not edit it.]

WC - 4.3k

SUMMARY - The reader is a prestigious pianist and composer for the Capitol. She finds herself in a mental, and physical, battle against her attraction to President Snow throughout his dictatorial rule and loveless marriage as months go on. Attempting to get under his skin through a rather bold encounter, she finds herself back to where she started as he reminds her of their similarities, but she holds more power above him than anticipated.

WARNINGS - Cheating, angst, cursing, choking, fingering, detailed & unprotected sex. Coriolanus is a bit sexist and also doesn’t know how to shut the hell up, so fair warning on that.

Coriolanus had spent the past few months focused on nothing but his political reputation, and the power he only continued to gain in the Capitol, along with the Districts. Well, it was more of a submission than anything, fear spread through Panem as his reign as President, or as many called him, a dictator, was unveiled.

He had no focus on his chosen wife, Livia Cardew, knowing that she was solely a prop for visual acceptance, a showcase of a wife that he was able to find someone who supported him through his political career, and the most important time of the year, of course, The Hunger Games.

When the games were approaching, the Capitol organized several socials and meetings throughout the upcoming weeks in order to network Coriolanus with his political and social allies, the game-makers, the Academy students that were interested in working with Dr. Gaul and the rest of her associates, and any other connections that were essential to the duration of a successful season.

I found it disgusting, and inhumane, just like those in the Districts, but I, just like everyone else who was ranked underneath President Snow, had to find ways to cautiously approach such a season of brutality.

Serving the Capitol as a pianist and musical coordinator by trade, I found ways to avoid the Districts and remain in a fairly comfortable lifestyle as the years went on. I had been working mainly for Coriolanus’ wife, Livia, for her social events held with other women of the Capitol on weekends, typically. I had assumed Livia told Coriolanus of my talents, and the orchestra I would often accompany, so that’s when he had me perform before a meeting with several of his associates. That’s when it all began.

Was I just ashamed? Yes, but I was more disgusted with myself than anything. That was the best way to put it.

It was shameful, and quite out of character for me to be a mistress, for one, but it was worse to know the same man I often slept with was the reason for so many innocent and unforgiving deaths across Panem. How the hell was I supposed to get out of this entanglement, though? If I left, or even expressed that I was thinking about it, I’d be as good as dead.

I hadn’t seen him in a few weeks, but when the buzz amongst the games began to pick up, I knew he’d be in my vicinity soon enough. Livia had asked me to perform for a social before the Reaping Ceremony, which I obviously obliged to. Something in me felt that she knew of my arrangement with her husband, but something else told me she didn’t even care. She had all the power in the world, and Coriolanus wouldn’t dare harm her; it would forever damage his reputation. She had nothing to lose. She knew I had everything to lose.

“You were wonderful, as always.” Livia chimed, handing me a glass of wine as I walked onto the marble floor soon after my performance. I returned a gentle smile, sipping lightly from the clear glass before clearing my throat to speak up. I was used to being rather quiet, given my nature as a pianist. I spent most of my time practicing and playing in solitary, so I was not much of a talker, especially now that things had changed over the course of the past few months, but I kept my composure, and I remembered who I was conversing with.

“Thank you, Mrs. Snow. I find it an honor you allow me to perform for such special occasions.” I say, my eyes scanning the room as I watch men and women of heavy rank socialize throughout the floor, some already dining, some already on their second drink of the night, maybe more..

Livia looked me up and down briefly, watching my nervous demeanor unwind. She watched me stand still, glancing around the chattery room, my fingertips lightly tapping my glass. A small smile wrinkled onto her lips. “Well, I will leave you be, Miss [Y/N], I’m sure you are quite tired.” She reached to gently hold my shoulder, sending a cold shudder across my bare skin. “Have a wonderful evening, alright?”

“Yes, of course, you as well, Mrs. Snow.” I watch her walk away, feeling as if I could finally breathe again.

I felt faint, nerves stemming from Livia’s appearance sending me over the edge, and the usual guilt I felt only more demanding as seconds passed. I set my glass down before walking out the ballroom’s door, which led down a dim hallway stacked with offices, and a bathroom more towards the back. I had been here plenty of times before, so I knew a spot where I could cool off and freshen up for a few moments.

Opening the bathroom door, I felt a hand press against the wall beside me, to stop me. I glanced up, his pale, slim fingers planted to the side of my head, making my face turn white. I slowly let go of the door, turning to face Coriolanus. He looked down at me, a sly look on his already smug expression, no shame in his blue eyes. It made my stomach turn.

“President Snow.” I said, my eyes averting to each side of the hallway, scanning the wide space to assure that no one was around, before looking back up to meet his gaze. “You startled me. I was just going to freshen up before heading back to the party.”

“Please, spare me the formality, [Y/N].” He grinned, taking his hand off the wall before moving it to my cheek, making my face heat up. “Come with me, hm?”

“Your wife is not even two doors down, Coriolanus.” I drip his name out in a cautious whisper, which he had given me permission for ages ago. He struck me as the type of man who’d prefer a formal reference, maybe even find attraction in it, but I suppose he’d rather something else from me. I didn’t question it. “And the rest of your business partners, might I add.”

Coriolanus laughed, almost mockingly, at my seriousness. “You think she is not aware of you and I, [Y/N]? She is not a fool.” He patted my flushed cheek before he grabbed my hand. “Now come with me.”

I didn’t argue further, just nodding silently before following him down the hallway. I recognized where he was leading me, just from a different direction. The Capitol was like a maze, at least the inside of it, but I had memorized much of it from Coriolanus, and my work. We head to his bedroom, the sound of my heels clicking against the glossed floor while he walked me further.

I hear him close the door, mentally preparing myself for what was to come. It’s not like I didn’t want him, because I did, it was more that I didn’t want the reprimands of being caught, or feeling so dirty for what I was doing. There was an underlying guilt each and every time I slept with him, or even as much as I spoke to him, no matter what the circumstances were.

As the door locked, Coriolanus turned to walk towards me, before I took a step back, much to his surprise. He raised one of his light eyebrows, a confused, yet intrigued look on his face. I never denied him, and who’s to say that I was? I didn’t even know what I was doing, other than thinking out loud, which only made my blood run colder.

The tension in the room was tight, and could be cut from a string as thin as the threads that held what was under my gown together. I could hear myself breathing, and my thoughts racing to spit out of my shut mouth. My eyes lifted up to his own, and I stood straight, and firmly.

“Out of all the women in the Capitol, out of everyone you could have in the ways you have me, why did you choose to tangle me into your mess?” I ask, rather impressed with my own forwardness. “Why must it be me?”

Coriolanus shared a similar look as my own, but his expression curated itself into some sort of cheeky grin, almost as if he enjoyed my slight rebellion. He knew I didn’t take orders, so he never bothered ordering me around. He didn’t have to ask, he knew I liked it, and he knew I’d comply, and he also knew I felt guilty every time, but I never posed such a question, until now.

He tucked his hands into his slacks, stepping closer, his slim, tall build hovering before me.

“It is you because I find everything I prefer in you.” He answered flatly, following my questions. “My wife has no regard for anything but her own status, which I can admire, but she does not have any reason to achieve anything more. The women who seek to improve their status, say, by sleeping with me or attempting to, seek to achieve more than they ever will. Then there is you, who is firmly placed in between all of these women, who holds prestige, who holds respect, yet, in every way possible, feels that she is less deserving of it because she holds attraction to the one man she cannot have.”

His words frustrated me beyond my usual measure, and I couldn’t contain the pressure pent up in my chest, eagerly awaiting to push through my quivering lips. He angered me, and he made me feel lesser, when this entire time, he was the one who took out his frustrations on me, and he was the one who ran from every ounce of affection he was once offered, and threw it at me. It was always in the back of my head, yet I found myself in a delusion, one where I would never allow myself to see the truth, but it all came to me as he spoke.

“You are the one who cannot have me. How could I make that anymore clear? After all this time, all these months of you thinking your usage was one-sided, how could you not see it, Coriolanus?” I loosened up my posture, and stepped forward, nearly closing the irritable gap that was between the two of us. “You are the one who finds me after my performances, you are the one who pursues me, time and time again. I comply, yes, but I am not the one who soughts after you.”

He blinked. I could read it as clear as day that he was taken aback by my words. A satisfying feeling burned in me, yet the tension geared towards the uncertainty of our conversation never left. I spoke up, and I was not pretty about it. What would he do now? Surely a pianist disappearing wasn’t common, but I wasn’t Capitol royalty, so it’s not like he couldn’t disregard me if he wanted to. Would he do that? No, I was too valuable to him in more ways than one. How worked up he got over this affair showed me that.

“Seems we both have our issues.” He hummed. Another foot stepped closer to me, the tip of his shoe nearly stepping on mine, but he knew that. He reached forward after pulling his hands out of his pockets, and cupped my cheeks with both of his cold, large hands. His thumbs pressed against my lips, and I could feel my lipstick brush against his fingers. “Yet neither of us have ended the arrangement between us. Why do you think that is?”

“Don’t make me answer that.” I shake my head, reaching my hands up to pull him off of me, and lightly push him away. “I will not engage in such a conversation.”

“You’re the one who started this conversation.” Coriolanus grabbed my wrists, yanking me forward. He leaned down to press his lips against my own, causing me to gasp, and attempt to fight it, but I couldn’t.

He knew I liked it, and he knew how to use it against me. I sunk into the feeling for a brief moment, before I pushed him off me, my hands planted against his dress shirt as I gripped the material, holding him in place while he looked down at me, his once slicked back curls falling forward, a few loose hairs against his forehead as he grinned, my lipstick against his pale lips. He tilted his head, his hands moving to grip my waist rather harshly, just enough to keep me still.

“Do I have to remind you how crucial this arrangement is to you? To make you answer my question, hm?” He held me, walking me closer to the opposite side of the room. Aggressively, he kissed me once more, flipping my body to face his vanity, while still keeping my face turned to his own.

He ran his hands down the side of my gown, bunching it up enough that he could push it underneath my chest to remain upright. “You claim to despise what happens between us so much, and you hate that you are what stands between my marriage, yet you cannot seem to walk out the door. Come on, [Y/N], you and I both know you are a bit afraid to fully defy me, but you don’t even try to, until now. But it’s all talk, you’ll never really break anything off.” He reached between my legs, which nearly trembled at his touch, as his fingers slipped into my underwear.

“And you’re already wet.” Coriolanus mocked, looking at me in the mirror as he slowly slipped one of his fingers into me. He watched my mouth open, a pleased, and frankly, egotistical grin on his face, knowing he had gotten to that part of me so quickly. “Is this why you have not ended what continues on between us? Because no man can make you cum the way I do? Am I really so vital to you?”

“You are insufferable.” I gasp, closing my eyes as he began to work his fingers into me, the sounds of my pleasure much more relevant in his room than I’d prefer them to be. “There are many things you refuse to admit to me, too.”

“Exactly.” Coriolanus looked between my legs as I stood before him, the pressure in his pants brushing against the back of my gown. “We are two different people, yes, but we both have secrets that we strongly refuse to admit, yet we can read it on each other’s faces. You know I’m right. I see you more than anyone else, and you hate it. You hate that I can see you.”

“Then why do you treat this with such amusement?” I chime back, opening my eyes to glue them to what was occurring before me. I could feel his free hand move to begin sliding my underwear down. “Why do you mock me, when the scenario applies to yourself?”

“Because I have nothing to lose.” He returns, shooting me a glare as he drops my underwear to the floor as they pass my hips. “My wife is aware of my distaste for her, and for much of any affections. The Capitol will never question me because they know their lives, and their families, are at stake. No one will question me, [Y/N]. They have too much to lose.”

I feel him move his hand behind my back, tugging at the zipper that restrained him. He keeps his rhythm, and he keeps his eyes against my figure. He knew he had the upper hand, it would be impossible for me to overturn his rank, and his power, and nearly everything he had that I did not. I was constantly reminded of it, especially like this.

“Then why entertain the idea of me holding any sort of power over you through our affections? Why bother administering mockery upon me, Coriolanus?” I hiss through clear annoyance, struggling to hide the pleasure that wouldn’t seem to brush away from my core. He wasn’t giving up any sort of competence.

Coriolanus lightly pulled his fingers from me, grazing them against my inner thighs before turning me around, and holding them to his mouth. He licked his fingertips, causing my stomach to drop at the sight, while a smirk cracked onto his tinted lips.

“I have never been with a woman who tastes as good as you.” The sound of his tongue swirling against his fingers made me weak, and the way that someone so manipulative, so cruel, was licking a part of me, felt wrong, yet it didn’t. It was a confusing battle with oneself. “You hold that power, if you must know.”

He pulled his fingers away from his lips, wiping his hand against my dress before tugging it out from under my covered chest, standing straight as he began to pull it off me, and I just let him. Fucking hell.

“You think I’d fuck a woman I didn’t hold any sort of value to? You think I would waste my time with mindless affairs filled with women whose sole purpose in life is to please me, and to please their husbands? The only pleasure they gain from me is validation, nothing more.” He moved my dress down my shoulders. “You want me to fuck you, [Y/N]. Not just any man of rank, me. It makes you sick, doesn’t it?”

“You fancy me just as much as you do anything else you do for yourself.” I feel him move my gown above my head, over my long, slicked ponytail. “You do this for yourself, no one else. You like that I feel such a way.”

He shook his head, dropping my dress on the floor beside my underwear. “Power and value are different. If I wanted to have power over a woman, I’d be fucking my wife, not you.”

My eyes widened at his words. What was his angle here? This argument was endless. “Then why do you act like you have so much power over me? You want to talk to me about value, yet you show none of it. You only exert power, and your ego, against me everytime I feel your touch. You fuck me like you own me, like you hold such a rule, yet you claim that I hold some sort of power. You baffle me.”

He took my hands and moved them to his length, in which I nearly shivered upon touch, reminded of each and every time he came close to me, and how large he felt when he was inside me. I lightly stroked him soon after I spoke, watching his bottom lip slightly fall at my fingers. He began to unbutton his shirt.

“Am I supposed to make this easy for you?” He teased, sliding his shirt off his shoulders, now standing in nothing but his unzipped pair of pants and boxers that rested just above them. “Must all you women figure things out without assistance for once?”

“Oh, god,” I scoff, my eyes rolling off irritable instinct as I continued my actions against his stiffened cock. “You are-”

“Insufferable?” Coriolanus cued, raising his brows, his hands moving to guide me towards his bed, as we mutually climbed onto it. “I don’t imagine my cock is insufferable, at least, given your generous duration of touch.”

I groan, watching him lay as I motion my body on top of his. If I had some sort of power, as he seemed to suspiciously claim I do, surely I could show it? I glance at him, feeling his hands reach below to grab my ass, toying with the loose flesh as his instinct brought me above him.

I don’t respond, rather slide on top of him in a swift motion, causing the both of us to moan rather loudly, nearly echoing across his lavish suite of a bedroom. I watched his eyes fall to my bare chest, before gliding down to the movement between us, as I began to move my body forward.

“If you claim that I am of such value to you… and you give into submissions at times, then you’ll allow me to control you… hm?” I speak between heavy breaths, feeling his thick, restless cock bury between my thighs as I create a rhythm above him.

“Like I said to you before, [Y/N], I’m not supposed to make it easy for you.” His eyes never left our bodies while he guided me down. “You’ll see.”

I lean down, his cock angling itself at a curve as I reach to slide my hands to his shoulders, gently kneading at his flesh before resting both palms against his pale neck, my nails digging into the back of it, sliding into his blonde locks. A grin tugs at my lips while I press them against his own, feeling his tongue slide into my mouth and muffle the moans I made with each stroke.

I squeeze at his neck, my thumbs pressing against his adam’s apple while I ride his cock. Thrust after thrust, I could feel him twitch, knowing he was growing weaker and weaker as I went on. He liked the dominance, but he’d never admit it. Instead he’d toy with me, attempt to make me feel as if I had to work for his value, when I already had it. I had him, and I had all this time. I had nothing to lose.

“What if it melts?” I ask vaguely, looking down at him amidst the loose hairs against my face. “What will you do then?”

Coriolanus released his hands from my ass, moving them higher to my chest, his thumbs toying with my hardened nipples as he held me up, but my hands remained on his throat. I could feel it move as he spoke. “What if what melts?”

“Snow.” I breathe heavily at his stimulating touch, while I begin to pick up my speed between us. “What will you do if the snow melts?”

Coriolanus scoffed, pressing his thumbs down. “It won’t.”

I press down and lean down simultaneously, shaking my head as I laugh, the feeling of my physical position never leaving, only growing as I mocked him further. I knew how it felt now, to toy with the one who peaked your interest so high. No wonder he enjoyed this.

“If I hold such value, such power over you, Coriolanus, it’s bound to melt. Snow cannot be on top if something is to compromise it, hm? Must I remind you of what occurred the last time you allowed someone to hold power over you?”

I couldn’t believe I brought her up. Yes, I knew of Lucy Gray, just as many of us musicians did. I never knew her personally, but I was aware of what lengths Coriolanus went to erase her from existence for his political, social, and mental gain. Is that part of the reason I feared walking away, even if I wanted to? Yes. But I knew he wouldn’t kill me, or send me off. He’d have no one if not.

“Shut the hell up.” He moved his hands to hold me by my face. “This is different.”

“In some ways, yes.” I feel his hands move my hair behind my ears, his eyes locked against mine. He was angry, but he was allowing me to speak further, so not angry enough. “In other ways, it is quite the same.”

“Damn you, woman. Experiencing quite the power trip, aren’t you? Why don’t you do so after we fuck?” He growled, one of his hands reaching past my face to grab the end of my ponytail, yanking it down to cause my head to rise up, my back arching in the process, gasping as he thrusts upward, sending volts through my stomach.

Don’t lose control, [Y/N]. Don’t you dare let him fuck you into submission.

“If you think for just a second that this is not changing things for you, then you are a fool.” I spit, opening my eyes to stare down at him, fighting his grip against my ponytail. I feel his other hand move from my face to my jaw, holding my face down to face his own. “You can’t do this without me. You spend far too much time with a mistress to disregard her, and you fucking know it. That’s what makes you sick.”

All he could do was curse under his breath, his grip on my hair, and on my face, loosening. Was he admitting defeat? Was he finally showcasing some sort of disadvantage?

I leaned down to pull him into a sloppy kiss, my tongue sliding into his mouth as he lightly pressed his own against mine, yet allowing me to hold the dominance. The feeling was strange but enjoyable, knowing that I was able to hold mental and physical assertion over such a man.

I could feel him grunt underneath me, his body limp as I fucked his restlessly, until I could feel myself tighten against him, and his cock pump into me, lightly thrusting upwards to ride out the high that he pushed into me. I watched his face as I held his neck still, his eyes closed and his mouth agape while he came. His cheeks were flushed. I knew he felt defeated, and I knew in some way, he enjoyed it. It was a feeling he hadn’t felt in a long time.

I slowly got off of him, feeling his cum lightly stick between my thighs while I motioned to lay aside him. My hands were warm from their grip, and I rested one against his cheek, turning him to face me.

“Do you know what makes snow melt?” He asks through a horse tone, looking up to me. He knew I wouldn’t give him the answer he was looking for, so he watched me silently shake my head. He reached forward to hold my own cheek, pulling me down to his lips, but not for a kiss. He let me hover, before he spoke quietly, his hot breath against me.

“Fire.”

#coriolanus snow #coriolanus x reader #tbosas #the hunger games #coriolanus fanfiction #coriolanus snow x reader #coriolanus snow x you #x yn #x reader #smut writing #president snow #coryo snow #coriolanus snow fanfiction #coriolanus snow smut #coriolanus snow imagine

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cerastes · 5 months ago

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When Schwarz was new did people complain about her being too overpowered?

See, I've had this ask for two days, and I wanted to have a good chance to sit down and answer it properly, because it's a good springboard into something I find interesting, the zeitgeist back then and how it has evolved into current, modern Arknights. Let's do a little retrospective.

No, that didn't happen. As to why it didn't happen, well, there's a few factors, the first of which being Schwarz is not overpowered, she's a character with very evident flaws and very evident strengths, and these were, depending on the player, immediately understood or not really considered in depth.

See, Schwarz was the fourth 6* released after launch -- After Skadi, Ch'en, and Magallan, in that order -- and the absurd powerhouses back then were all launch Operators and arguably Ch'en: SilverAsh, Eyja, and Exusiai were the most popular back then, with Ch'en being a conditional potent burst damage dealer (her S2M3 was her main selling point, being an instant helidrop burst of damage that also hit air units). Schwarz was in a place similar to Ch'en in that she was conditional in how she blasted things; she has superior firepower but poor, strict range for a Sniper (back then, we had no such thing as categorized archetypes, so we just came up with nicknames, like "duelists" for what are now Dreadnoughts, "Schwarz-types" for Heavyshooters, "Enmity Guard" for Musha, and many others), and if you wanted to use her big killer skill, S3, she was only going to have a straight line worth of range to hit things.

See, the thing is, being strong wasn't an 'issue' back then. We wanted more and stronger units so we could break the monotony of SilverAsh swish swish, Eyja Volcano Hour, and Warfarin's Apple Pie Combo. A monotony that wasn't a monopoly, mind you, because it definitely wasn't the sole end way to deal monstrous amounts of damage and tackle hard content -- I myself was a dedicated Specter, Saria, and Angelina user -- but it was what practically all guide makers and tier lists suggested. Either way, the demand for Cool Strong New Units was definitely healthy back then, ESPECIALLY by the time of Schwarz' release, since Skadi and Magallan had been rather disappointing for 6*s; Skadi was the sole Abyssal Hunter buff that existed back then (Guard Specter had no Module, thus, no AH Buff), and without Modules or other AH buffs, all she could do was basically S2 Helidrop to kill something or use her S3 probably once per stage to become a raid boss and then sort of just stand there, offering nothing that other units couldn't since things back then were patently not strong enough to need her, as her 3* equivalent, Melantha, was pretty much enough to deal with anything that required a Dreadnought specifically, and you had other, stronger options that did more than JUST deal with strong enemies if a bomb of Skadi's caliber was needed, while Magallan suffered the unfortunate fate of being an early Summoner in a game where super instant DPS came free with your Xbox, leading to the vast majority of people to not really want to learn to play around her expensive Deployment Slot costs and dynamic gameplay, which also necessitated Mastery investment to put out numbers, investment that was not easy to make back then, as Masteries were something you REALLY rationed.

Another very important part as to why Schwarz didn't have to deal with this was because she was the only one of her type. She was a new way to play back then, so no one felt their favorite was threatened; Schwarz and Exusiai filled very different roles, with Exusiai being able to wreck high HP low DEF enemies with ease (which was basically 95% of enemies back then, notably All Bosses Except Big Bob, who has a DEF of 800) while Schwarz had HUGE chunky single hits that were meant to squash enemies even if their DEF was huge, but who ultimately would have less DPS than Exusiai in most cases. What's more, you would use Schwarz in plenty of set-ups anyways because she brought DEF Shred with her kit. People celebrated Schwarz back then because not only was she a cool new unit type, she could bring value to pretty much all sorts of parties with Physical damage, in a way that another unit I've omitted so far could for Arts damage, the support powerhouse of the early, mid, and modern game, throughout the years: Saria.

I make the specific comparison with Exusiai because eventually, the zeitgeist would change: Ash, from the R6S collab, made waves because she was strong, but also because it seemed like she'd steal away Exusiai's place as the Fast Shooter DPS Wrecker Supreme. Time would go on to prove that, no, she would not do that, because Ash is more of a Burst damage unit compared to Exusiai, with immense damage tied to a shorter window and the Stun condition, while Exusiai's DPS window isn't contingent on anything except "Does she do real damage or chip damage". But that was an early sign of things to come: Upstaging.

The initial fears of very strong units had more to do with "this unit is powercreeping an older unit" more than anything. Powercreep is inevitable, doubly so in gacha games where they gotta sell you the PNGs one way or another, and I'll always argue that Arknights has been incredibly good with handling powercreep compared to its peers (and just, as a game in general), but again, it's inevitable, so you end up with situations like Degenbrecher existing and Doctor Manhattan Exploding Ch'en and Irene right into niche uses (Ch'en nowadays being at her best as a support sub-DPS with her Module allowing for great party Offensive/Defensive SP charging, while Irene still has her powerful S1/S2/S1 loop combo with Dorothy) or, you know, Texas the Pale and Yato In A Fur Bikini completely obliterating Phantom out of the face of Terra.

All of this, in my opinion and perception, holds true nowadays: When a unit of a new archetype or playstyle releases and they are very strong, you only hear few people complaining about them being very strong, but when a unit could possibly powercreep an older unit, especially an older favorite, that number increases exponentially. Of course, creatures like Wisadel, Degenbrecher, and Ling exist, which blow other units out of the water entirely, and you've also had units like Surtr or Mlynar who aren't really directly powercreeping any specific units as much as powercreeping entire roles and concepts.

Arknights also does have more content creators now, which I also think worsens matters because they have an obligation and a blood oath to the algorithm to always make a video that goes something like "NEW OPERATOR EXTREMELY BROKEN?????" with a crappy clickbait thumbnail and since [GRUMP ALERT] most Arknights players hate thinking for themselves and love looking at The Content Creator to form their opinions on whether Unit Is Strong Or Not [/GRUMP ALERT], these sentiments, whether legitimate or not, tend to flare up more often. By the way, that's also not a good idea, because everyone thought Gnosis was an easy skip back when he released, and then it turned out Gnosis was cracked, and a shitload of CN players regretted not rolling for him, so hey, sometimes this does result in pretty funny things to occur, as it were.

But yeah, this has been a little retrospective of the zeitgeist throughout the years.

#long post #arknights #schwarz

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jelly-fish-wishes · 13 days ago

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Finished the game…and I have SO MANY THOUGHTS!!!!

Spoilers below!

Gameplay was standard for an RPG. Bros moves new and old were great! But there were other features that were great, like the second camera in the Fake Mushroom Kingdom! That was an amazing mechanic that was unfortunately used for that one moment. Luigi selecting with the A button is still a thing that bothers me, but it doesn’t affect the game and story, so it gets a pass. Exploration was fun! Everything felt balanced to me and the story was PHENOMENAL! Now for the story…

The game WAS DEFINITELY a little slow at first, but it took its time to give us a little world building before we got to the REALLY good parts starting with Desolatt Island and the introduction of Zokket.

Boy was HE a real menace. Intimidating. We didn’t know his motives until the end of the second ACT. And by then, his motives were beginning to reveal themselves to be strange. What was the point of secluding everyone? Being purposefully forgetful of the names of his allies and enemies?

The Extension Corps were not just likable. They were LOVEABLE!!! Ten with his “similar to Fawful’s arc, but not quite” complex, Ecks being the little twat that he is, and Shun being the silent, but smart and brawny one, uuughhh they’re all great. And their battle was definitely one of the most memorable of them all!

Team IDLE was adorable. At first I thought they’d be trouble makers, but they were quite the opposite. I kinda wish they’d stop with the obesity jokes with Ellow. And Loog was…just there ngl. Their bond with Peach was great tho!

Starlow.

I’m kidding, she was mostly there for cameos and references to other games, other than that she had no reason to be there. It would have been wrong to not include her anyway. She was an important character in the previous games, so her absence would have caused an uproar the way people wondered why Toadsworth was gone after a certain point in the entire franchise.

I can see how they really wanted to bring back the Firebrand and Thunderhand, but couldn’t for some reason, so they replaced them with the Firebrand and Ice Flowers. And PERHAPS the Thunderhand was ALSO replaced with Luigi’s Bros Attack “Zapperator.” I wonder why they couldn’t bring it back. If they did, would Heatfreeze, Skorcheen and Slippenglide have had Fire and Thunder Concordians instead? I get excited thinking about it.

Bowser coming in to kickstart the 3rd ACT was EXCELLENT! The action, the cinematography, the way Bowser changed targets the minute he saw the Bros. This koopa was a major inconvenience in a good way. Besides, if it wasn’t for him, we wouldn’t have found the Great Conductor, who I assume is the one who can technically go in and out of the Warp Zone AT WILL without a pipe! His attack in the Bros Attack says a lot about his abilities hehehe.

The reveal of Zokket as Cozette came as a surprise to me since Zokket calls himself a HE while Cozette is a SHE. Bro got so brainwashed that she forgot her own pronouns (this isn’t my joke, but it’s still true). Cozette showing remorse over actions beyond control made me attached to her. And then we are introduced to the one and lonely only: RECLUSA. OH BOY DO I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS ON TUIS BASTARD.

Reclusa, Reclusa…where do I even BEGIN???

He is the MOST SUCCESSFUL Villain in the franchise. He has destroyed countless of worlds and plans to keep going. He got a reaction out of Mario because he not only threatened the Mushroom Kingdom, but the entire world it’s on. The last time I saw Mario react in such an emotional manner was when had to leave Luigi behind with Dimentio in Super Paper Mario.

Speaking of SPM, can we talk about the similarities with it and Brothership? Villain is a guy in a tophat with three minions. Minions are beloved by everyone in the fandom. True villain is a zesty frilly bastard who disposes the one in a tophat and uses plants to control people and becomes a giant freak monster boss in the end and dies by the hands of love and friendship??????? History repeats itself…and I’m happy about that.

But…the ending…holy cow…

Reclusa clinging to what life he had left in him felt very somber. He had no regrets and yet he seemed remorseful in the way he was stuttering. His death…kinda hurt a little…kind of a shame he is definitely a character we’ll never see again like Dimentio or Fawful.

I was also expecting Cozette to purposely stay behind because of the guilt she had. Was it just me? No? Hmmm.

Also

I knew they were going to say goodbye but I suppose deep down I brushed off the idea that they’d never see each other again.

Ireen saying goodbye to Peach???

Or Snoutlet with the Bros…the widdle tear he shed…man……..

Like, man…Junior and Buddy…come on man…OOOUUUGHHH….that one hurt….

This game

Wow

10/10

#mario #luigi #mario & luigi brothership #m&l brothership #game review #Brothership spoilers

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m1ndbrand · 11 months ago

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"all it took was..." — The new President

WARNINGS: Coriolanus Snow is it's own warning(Snow after the 10thGames, 2 years after to be precise); Mentions of death and corpse(small description, nothing big).

SUMMARY: The 12th Hunger Games winner unfortunately fortunately gets the attention of President Snow.

WORDS: 1.384

DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the franchise The Hunger Games characters nor do I claim to own them. I do not own any of the images used nor do I claim to own them. I do claim what I wrote and only that.

A/N: If you know the tragedy of Coriolanus by William Shakespeare some names will be recognizable...Also I'm sorry but this chapter won't be the continuation of their little...encounter— but I promise, it's going to happen!

TAG-LIST: @sorry-mrs-jacobs; @phoward89;

MASTERLIST

He was never someone who believed in the stars and whatever they might mean to some people.

It seemed completely idiotic and beneath someone from the level of education, you would get from the Capitol to have this belief that in his humble opinion, of course — was archaic and beneath him.

Fate and stories written on the stars were all but a way of fairy tales being made, a topic on some and even a very important one at that "merging" some characters together like the universe itself deemed them a pair, one in two.

Star-crossed lovers.

How he hated that idea, he couldn't believe he even fed it to—

Let's not dwell on that topic, he had better things to do, like arrange a new Games Maker for the 12th Hunger Games.

Doctor Volumnia Gaul is no more, some freak accident with one or more than one mutt; it wasn't clear, the body was far too mutilated to be recognised by anyone at all if not for the DNA tests and well...the place of the accident, a place only a few people were able to enter and of course Doctor Gaul was one of those people, him included in the small pool.

It was slightly weird however how the mulls were able to break free, the reporters debated it for the first days the case broke daylight, but the theory was quickly suppressed.

After all, mulls were still in being tested and we're highly volatile, their behaviour unstable and unpredictable. And of course, accidents happen.

But the world continues to go around and so shall the Capitol, he needed to find someone and fast.

He should have looked more into it, the selection that is. But he had more important things in his place, strength the security in the several points of entry on all distractions, the training of the peacekeepers and the change of the uniform like he so petitioned for just to name a few.

The new and young president had more important things to worry about than some person who would probably be soon replaced if so needed.

The theme he chose ,he didn't even try to remember the man's name, was an advanced-looking arena; a sign of the year the Capitol got a new President. Coriolanus liked the idea. It painted his future reign as one that would lead them into the future, lead them into a better time.

It painted him as a good leader.

The reaping ceremony passed without a problem. Some students clearly didn't like something— their tribute lack of attributes to make them win or the idea of having to participate in such 'twisted games' as the rebel-like-youth liked to name his games. He honestly couldn't care less, blue-ice-like eyes looking straight at the screens with a fake polite smile when the camera twists at him, showing his all too polished self composed with a deep red suit and thick coat that made his figure even more imposing than it normally is.

He would soon return to his manor and actually work, the two hours of the opening ceremony put his work ethic behind schedule more than he liked to admit.

There was much to be done to make the Capitol and the Districts into the way he saw fit and Coriolanus shouldn't waste more time than he already has.

Not even a day later he would have the files of everyone who chose to review. For some reason the late president did this— the threat of the Rebels was still very much a problem and he was of course scared shitless by them so all 'useful' information was of course turned into two paper pages that it was his duty to read through.

Coriolanus was just about to skim through them all but the very first file caught his attention, District One female tribute.

Not the girl's image he didn't even look at it properly, he already saw every tribute face on the reaping ceremony... all looked underfed and clearly not fit for an entertaining games in terms of pure brutal strength, the mentors would need to sell them well to the Capitol. No it was her name. Her last name rang a bell.

A big warning bell was inside his head and it made his eyebrows furrow, hand picked up the two-page long file and flipped through the description of her family. Something was amiss, he could feel it in his bones. Something was wrong.

Coriolanus could almost feel the hunger tearing at his stomach, his small sweaty hand tightly gripping his equally moist cousin's hand as they received the news of his father's death.

His other small hand gripping the files of several names of supposed rebels that could be the reason behind his father's death. Blond hair falls against his sweaty forehead as at that time he didn't understand why he had to read the names of random men.

Brutus.

His hand grips the file on his hand, veins popping up as his eyes skim through the contents of the file, once and then twice. He didn't even sit down, reading in silence for 10 minutes over and over again to look out for another word, sentence, or anything more.

Only two people are still alive from her family— grandmother and little brother, Valeria Brutus and Menenius Brutus, then they got the last name from her grandfather. His hand moves the paper right and left, trying to see if her grandfather's first name was there. But it wasn't. It probably wasn't deemed to be useful information since he is dead. Putting the papers down he turns with a sigh to his window, chin rising as he looks to see all the perfectly arranged garden of pure white roses in the front of his mansion.

No this shouldn't matter. It didn't matter, not now. He got what he wanted he won, the victor. He was still standing with or without his father.

The nostalgic feeling of feeling hungry regrows once again and it makes him nauseous, sharp eyes turning to the face of the girl on the page. She looked like every other girl he reminds himself as he starts a little too long at her face. Eighteen, one more year and she should have been safe from the reaping.

A smile creeps on his lips. Amusement dancing in his eyes like he had just read a good enough joke.

He couldn't sleep.

Coriolanus hated to be in need of something even if it was just a simple pill to go to sleep. He was better than that, he could sleep alone thank you very much.

Couldn't he just get the information he wanted? He could, he had the resources, and he had the needs to if he so pleases, so why not?

No.

No, he wouldn't lose to this...whatever this is, curiosity, need— want to know. Closure.

Maybe that was it. Know the person or people that did this to him. To his family. The people that made him starve and struggle. Envy and step on people that he knew were living better than him, growing to bring them down so he could feel himself high above them all. Know the people that in a way, made him the way he is now.

Rising he presses the inside of his palms to his eyes.

For fucks sake— Shut the fuck up!

His mouth was open. Eyes shot open and hands grabbing tightly the silk covers, knuckles turning white. Did he shout those words? Wasn't it all in his head? His hands were shaking, face was slightly flushed red from anger.

It's one of those episodes.

Rising he curses under his breath, feet carrying him to one of the small tables with some pills on them. Deep eyes thin as he tried to look into the colours of the various drugs that looked like they were thrown there and he picked a deep purple one in the midst of the rainbow and quickly gulped it down without water.

His attention is caught by the silver-like glow of the moonlight slipping through his windows, blue tired-looking eyes looking up at the sky, they find the stars instead of the moon that sings for attention. Wishing to catch a stray star amidst the ones that stay. Maybe he could catch it as it falls.

With those thoughts, sleep would soon catch him.

#coriolanus snow x reader #dark!coriolanus snow x reader #coriolanus x reader #coriolanus snow #coriolanus x you #dark!coriolanus snow #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #tbosas x you #tbosas fanfiction #tbosas x reader #tbosas #the hunger games #thg x reader

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waitmyturtles · 1 year ago

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SOME GOOD SHOWS THAT I LIKED IN 2023! (AND SOME THAT I DIDN'T)

I watched A LOT of stuff that did not originally air in 2023 by dint of my Old GMMTV Challenge. This list is inclusive of this recognition!

THE BEST SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR: HE'S COMING TO ME

I have no other words: this is my favorite Thai BL of all time. Perfect length, perfect plot, perfect celebration of Thai culture, perfect acting, the greatest coming out scene of all time, the BEST of the best BL moms. Perfection.

THE OTHER BEST SHOW I WATCHED THIS YEAR: BAD BUDDY

I don't even want to think about how many words I've written on Bad Buddy this year, but they're well deserved for this REMARKABLE show. I've got a thing for shows by Aof Noppharnach that feature Ohm Pawat, what can I say!

THE MOST INFLUENTIAL SHOW(S) I WATCHED THIS YEAR: LOVE SICK AND SOTUS

The influence of Love Sick and SOTUS can be seen in SO MANY Thai BLs, even through today. Without having watched these two shows to start my OGMMTVC project, I wouldn't have the context for what later shows like Bad Buddy and Theory of Love were commenting on by way of their content and structures. Love Sick in particular was a HELL of a lift -- but I am damn glad I watched it, and I certainly feel nostalgia for it today.

Honorable mentions of influential pieces that had impacts on Thai BLs: Love of Siam and Dew the Movie

MY OTHER FAVORITE OLD SHOWS I WATCHED: UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN AND THEORY OF LOVE

BANGERS!!!

If New Siwaj ever tops Until We Meet Again, I'll fly to Bangkok and give him a gold medal. That long-ass show, 17 EPISODES, I WANTED MORE! OhmFluke's chemistry was great, the story delved SO deeply into historical homophobia and how culture and acceptance changes over time -- scrumptious. Theory of Love, man, the way this show ate up implicit compassion bias and gave it right back to us. I loved it. KHAI FOREVER!

THE BEST SHOW I WATCHED THAT ACTUALLY AIRED IN 2023: MOONLIGHT CHICKEN

Not only was Moonlight Chicken my first real live fandom experience on Tumblr, it was a hell of an amazing show, incorporating so much of what I love particularly about Thai BLs, and how many Thai BLs do not shy away from celebrating Asian cultural touchpoints. From exploring Jim's internalized homophobia by way of his rural upbringing, to juxtaposing Pattaya's spiritual symbols with growing development that upends older strains of local culture, Moonlight Chicken offered a lovely commentary on what it means to be queer in an ever-changing Thailand.

THE OTHER BEST SHOW I WATCHED THAT ACTUALLY AIRED IN 2023: WHAT DID YOU EAT YESTERDAY?/KINOU NANI TABETA? SEASON 2

BRILLIANTLY ACTED by literally the best actors in the Asian BL game: we are blessed that Nishijima Hidetoshi and Uchino Seiyou have given so much to this franchise. It's hard to write about this show because it's so perfect -- it needs no extraneous words. Plot, pacing, acting, character development, gratuitous food shots. It has it all.

THE OTHER OTHER BEST SHOW I WATCHED THAT ACTUALLY AIRED IN 2023: I CANNOT REACH YOU

Just like Bad Buddy looked at Thai BL tropes in the eye and said, "over my Nong Nao," I Cannot Reach You asked Japanese BLs about the efficacy of almost every trope we've gotten used to, and questioned them with efficiency. The biggest shocker for me? REAL COMMUNICATION, encouraged by the CIPHER, Hosaka, that allowed the two lead protagonists to confirm their love and understand each other. It was straightforward and FUCKING GOOD.

A SHOW THAT AIRED IN 2023 THAT I HAVEN'T WRITTEN ABOUT YET, THAT I NEED TO REWATCH IN CHRONOLOGY, THAT ALSO DID SOME TROPE/GENRE ASS-KICKING THAT I'M STILL THINKING ABOUT: LA PLUIE

La Pluie was FEARLESS. The show had a LOT to say about romance and soulmates not being as much of a realistic thing as content-makers... and, frankly, majority society would like us to think. La Pluie made its characters WORK for love and understanding, and had us viewers face our implicit biases about how romantic content should and could work. I watched this show out of order of the OGMMTVC watchlist to see it it was one of the best of the year, and it certainly is. I'm planning a deep rewatch for early 2024 to pen my words on it.

A SHOW THAT ALMOST TOPPED MY 2023 LIST BUT GOT DOCKED BECAUSE I ENDED UP LIKING THE NOVEL A LOT BETTER: I FEEL YOU LINGER IN THE AIR

@neuroticbookworm and @lurkingshan know that I flipped THA FUCK out over this show -- FABULOUSLY acted by Nonkul Chanon and Bright Rapheephong, FABULOUS cinematography, great story up until the end of the series. My fangirling led me to read the original novel by Violet Rain, and -- I found out that Jom was a lot more damn sassy than we got in the show! Tee Bundit's penchant for sadness won. This is not to dock the show, but the novel had more than enough material to carry the series through without repeating themes in the end. So it fell on my 2023 list, womp womp. BUT I STILL LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS SHOW, DON'T GET ME WRONG.

TWO SHOWS THAT I'M SUPER GLAD I CAUGHT UP WITH WHILE THEY WERE AIRING: THE EIGHTH SENSE AND BE MY FAVORITE

Be My Favorite looked at Krist Perawat's checkered past as a BL idol and said: we are going to examine this and make an honest BL out of inspiration from it. It wasn't a perfect show, the time travel shit didn't end up adding up in the end, BUT -- excellent acting from two GMMTV VETS made up for those tangles, and I loved the contextual philosophical references throughout the series. The Eighth Sense looked at the tug-of-war that Korean BLs have with K-dramas and their tropes and said, actually? We will have these dudes full-frontal kiss, and placed that energy against commentaries on mental health, both topics that Korea hasn't quite embraced as quickly as other countries.

HONORABLE MENTIONS OF OTHER AWESOME SHOWS THAT MAY OR MAY NOT HAVE AIRED IN 2023

Make It Right, Our Dating Sim, Dark Blue Kiss, Gay OK Bangkok, Dirty Laundry, 10 Years Ticket, I Told Sunset About You, I Promised You the Moon, 3 Will Be Free, Lovely Writer (underrated?!), Our Skyy 2 x Bad Buddy x A Tale of Thousand Stars (UNDERRATED!), and Manner of Death.

And the shows that are airing that I know will stay with me well into 2024: Last Twilight and Cherry Magic Thailand.

I had fun!

WHAT ELSE, WHAT ELSE: THE "NO" SHOWS: THE PROMISE AND STEP BY STEP

I'm not even hyperlinking my thoughts on these shows, nor gifting them with gifs. Insert Bugs Bunny NOOOOOO gif here! We got Man Trisanu, though.

THE SHOW I WAS THE MOST OBVIOUSLY DISAPPOINTED BY: ONLY FRIENDS

Despite my passionate disappointment for this show and how it ended: in the context of the OGMMTVC, Only Friends is still an incredibly important inclusion to the list. Some amazing Tumblr bloggers offered commentary that the bias against sex that OF contained within the show was actually importantly and culturally contextual to the still-conservative state of acceptance that Thailand is currently in (here and here for more reading).

Only Friends reminded us that despite any kind of marketing that we here on Tumblr, as a majority non-Thai audience, may receive about a Thai show -- that we are still not fully plugged into the non-verbal expectations of what a show like OF could promise to do, and to be okay when it doesn't reach those heights. In light of the seemingly pro-sex marketing blasts that previewed the series before its airing, OF ultimately seemed to want to take casual sex, chew it up, and spit it out. There might be reasons why that happened that we just don't know about as outsiders to Thailand. But as an Asian-American viewer that was hoping for neutral -- and maybe even supportive -- commentary on single folks having casual sex without judgement, OF did not deliver for me.

I'm ending the year reading Dr. Thomas Baudinette's book, Boys Love Media in Thailand, the first book-length ethnographic study on the impact of BL on queerness, media, and more in Thailand and across Asia. Baudinette comes from the world of Japanese queer media studies -- as someone who came to Thai BLs this year from Japanese BLs, I appreciate his trajectory. It's clearly a necessity for me to read this book in the context of the OGMMTVC, to understand how Thai BLs have changed over time, and to understand the incredibly larger impact of heterosexual/heteronormative media and themes on Thai media as a whole, as larger and larger swaths of Thai, Asian, and international societies welcome and watch BLs with open arms.

All of this feeds into my ever-growing body of knowledge about the impact of Thai BLs, both in Thailand and across Asia, as Baudinette writes about, and how these shows have and are developed/developing over time. It's been an AMAZING YEAR of watching old and new dramas for me, and I'm looking forward to seeing how the genre grows even more in 2024.

I also made AMAZING FRIENDS on Tumblr -- y'all know who you are! What a year of growth and discovery for me: this has been a fabulous experience, and I'm looking forward to even more growth in the new year!

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nadianova · 13 days ago

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hey sis (can i call you sis?), do you have any favorite vns you read this year?

yes

heatwave, also known as HEATWAVE MINIMUM WAGE MAXIMUM DEBT, was a punch in the gut figuratively and literally. its such a pretty and polishedl ittle work feeding on the horrors of just how abstract, unfair and arbitrary this world is and how it manifests in the minds of real people. teh visuals the sounds the writing and THE CHARACTERS have given me a lot to thikn about. andi ts hot. its really hot. its really fucking horny in an earnest way taht truly speaks to me. not only has heatwave been so fukken good it has given me a lot of practical and aesthetical direction on how i should remember to consider teh options i have for visual and story presentation when going forwards with my own projects

my second favorite vn i read this year was slime feet and i thikn the writer for that has got to be stalking me or something since the story was lazer focused towards teh exact emotional notes taht have been my life for the past 5 years or so. i couldnt stop sobbing. the texture of horny and tragic and just coming to terms with the cards yovue been given has been on my mind especially this year so tihs one hit even harder. i couldnt stop sobbing. i could not. stop. sobbing. anyway i look forward to more works like this from the makers (also i thikn tihs one too was inspired by heatwave regarding the presentation as well wild how it all connects together)

outside of these two named at teh bottom of my itch io page is a collection of cool games i liked and i updaet it when i run into cool games i want others to see as well

because ive been so busy and overwhelmed and going insane i havent had time to properly play yurijam entries yet ill just say that everyone should check out the submissions and play to find

#asked

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xmochaccinox · 2 months ago

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Kendratello: An Analysis

What’s up?

I wanted to do an analysis on this ship, and now I'm doing it!

If you are in the Rise Fandom and somehow you have never heard of it, Kendratello is basically a ship between Donnie and Kendra that’s slowly gaining popularity

For as long as I have been in the Rise fandom, I’ve been seeing this ship popping up more and more. By now, it’s almost impossible to meet someone who hasn't heard of the ship, and even though there’s not much content of it, there’s definitely more people who ship it than you think

However, despite the growing popularity, there are still a good chunk of people that hate it for various reasons

But how did it come to be? Where did the ship come from? Why is it so loved by some and hated by others? Well, I’m gonna answer all those questions and even share my own opinions on the ship!

But first a disclaimer!

This analysis is ONLY meant to describe why people like Kendratello or why they don’t like it! Any canon info I bring up will be provided in full context alongside descriptions of how Kendratello shippers may interprete said canon info in order to gain a better understanding of their perspective

Everything I say about the ship is mainly from what I know from the Kendratello content on Tumblr as I don't really use any other social media

I'll also mostly be focused on Kendra because most of the arguments against Kendratello has to do with her

This is NOT meant to be something to persuade or dissuade you from shipping Kendratello!

So let’s get started!

In order to begin, let’s introduce the lovely characters involved in this ship with a brief description

Donatello, also known as Donnie, is a softshell turtle and one of the middle children alongside his twin, Leo

Much like his other versions, Donnie works with tech, but what makes him more unique is that he displays a more mad-scientist-like attitude and has a huge theater kid persona

Kendra is one of the antagonists introduced during the first season. She’s the leader of a computer tech group called The Purple Dragons and specializes in working with computer software, hacking, and modifying

She and her group are basically trouble makers causing various kinds of chaos, to describe them incredibly briefly

So how do they meet?

Donnie and Kendra meet in the episode The Purple Jacket when Donnie sneaks into April’s school to help her with a project. It was there he first noticed the tech club. Well, not really the club, but more the jacket. He then immediately tries to join the club just to get his hands on said jacket by showing off his tech.

Kendra, seemingly impressed, allows Donnie to join and gives him Jason’s jacket. However, it’s revealed that the only reason why she let Donnie join was so she and her group could steal his tech in order to use them to rob various tech stores in order to then steal a code from some very important computer company. Of course Donnie and April stop them and get them arrested. The end

So that’s basically the beginning, now let's go over why someone wouldn't ship it

First thing to get it out of the way, you were ask why someone didn't ship Kendratello, then most of the time, they would say that it’s because of Kendra, so let’s talk about that!

Kendra is a bully. She uses others for her own benefit and causes mischief for her own entertainment, which can range from annoying yet harmless pranks to her getting people hurt

After she stole Donnie’s stuff and he got her arrested, Kendra retaliated by making Donnie think he’s just playing a normal video game when in reality, he’s controlling a giant robot that almost smashed his brothers, and then tries to do so herself when that fails for the sake of seeing Donnie’s reaction

She also convinced Shelldon (Donnie’s robotic companion who was feeling low when they encountered due to an argument he and Donnie had) into participating a deadly race known for causing many drones to get dismantled just to win her the Shadow Transmitter and then yelled at him and ditched him when he failed

And these are only things she did to Donnie. She also yells at and gets physically violent with Jason, and while she does see Jeremy more as an equal, she still snaps at him and shoves him around

She's sadistic, she's cruel. There’s a 50-50 chance that either she’s aware of how bad she is and doesn't care or sees nothing wrong with anything that she does. And judging by how done April seems towards her, and the way Jeremy barely reacts to anything she does, I’m gonna assume that Kendra’s been like this for a while

And yeah, she’s an antagonist, so no shit she’s awful

However, if we wanna play the Canon game, then canonically, Donnie altered his brothers’ minds to make them smarter, he gave Leo a shock collar as a present to “correct” his behavior, he chained up Sheldon as punishment for giving him attitude, and he almost destroyed a town just to prove he’s right

The only difference between the two is that

Donnie did feel remorse for all of them and tried to fix it to the best of his ability. Kendra on the other hand doesn't really show all that much remorse for what she does and has full intentions of doing it again if she ever gets the opportunity (and she has, multiple times)

I am purposefully leaving what Donnie did out somewhat of context just to make him look as bad as Kendra (specifically their intentions behind their actions)

(And just to get it out of the way, Jeremy and Jason are both just as bad as Kendra. Even though Kendra, for the most part, treats them like trash as well, they still willingly go along with what she wants)

However, there are others who don’t ship it because Kendra reminds them of someone in real life and it makes them uncomfortable

Now, I just wanna say that if you feel uncomfortable with Kendratello due to this, I completely understand

I also want to say that even if you don’t know anyone that Kendra makes you think of, it’s still okay to be uncomfortable with the ship. You do not need a reason why to not like a ship, and if anyone has a problem with that, that’s on them

So with that in mind, it’s completely understandable why anyone would dislike the ship. Based on the evidence, they would be an extremely toxic relationship. You’d have to be absolutely INSANE to even think this is a good ship, right?

Well… Here’s the thing

Like most ships in existence, you gotta have the art of interpretation and shutting off the canon brain, especially when it comes to Kendra

Sure, there are still some things that makes Kendra, Kendra, like her working with tech, her being super smart, her going by a purple theme, and sometimes she’s still a menace (depending on the story)

And the other thing you need to know is that Kendra, just like all the other non-important villains in Rise, is pretty much a one-dimensional character. Her character is literally just a bully who’s the leader of a tech club that's constantly after devices that can hack any computer. Other than a few things, we barely know that much about Kendra, so there’s room for people to add their own personal headcanons and stuff

And it's not like Kendra is going to be evil 24/7, which gives people a change to give Kendra more traits to be more than just that as well exploring the potential reasons she is the way she is

Basically what happens 90% of the time is that most of Kendra’s negative traits are turned into positive ones. For example, take the fact that she's manipulative, arrogant, insensitive, bossy, and aloof, and turn them into charismatic, confident, honest, assertive, and reserved. These are all words that have different associations, but they basically mean the same thing

And Kendra is usually either

Given some kind of tragic backstory (usually revolving around her parents getting a divorce)

Given a redemption arc

Given more likable traits

Most of or all of the above

There’s also a good chance that the Kendratello story someone is sharing either takes place after the series or it takes place in an AU, so of course the characters are going to be a little/very different. Although sometimes you'll find stories that take place before or during the series. Many people have their own ideas on how Kendratello would go. Though usually what I talked about above is often the formula used. You just gotta find the right story, or make your own story of how you think Donnie and Kendra would fall in love and eventually get together!

And keeping with the themes Rise has of being lighthearted, it’s pretty fun and hilarious to imagine those two bickering one minute and then making out the next. It’s pretty easy to see a bit of a slow-burn enemies to lovers where Kendra and Donnie both slowly realize that oh no, they’re totally into each other, but won’t say anything because of their pride and all that. So there’s the drama, the tension, the idea of will they, won’t they?

Plus, come on, lots of us love a good Enemies To Lovers story with some Slow Burn on the side

And imagine those two going on a date by committing various crimes and half the city is destroyed because of them and then they watch the news talking about what they did while cuddling and holding their new pet cat that they randomly got at some point

Overall, most of the time the story is about two messed up individuals who end up finding peace with each other. They feel like they're the only ones that can understand each other, and they hate it, but at the same time, they don't mind

However, that’s just one side of the ship

I said it in another post I made, but if we look at the ship through another viewpoint, the side that leans more towards the toxic side of the ship, then Kendra is the embodiment of Donnie’s deepest fears and insecurities

The biggest thing people tend to overlook about Donnie is that he cares very much about being useful to the people he loves. It’s why he behaved the way he did in Witch Town, because he’s terrified that if magic can do what he does but better, then no one will need him anymore

Meanwhile Kendra is someone who will very much jump at a chance to take advantage of anything that will benefit her, especially if it has anything to do with Donnie

Donnie is the provider, and Kendra is the exploiter

Those two are perfect for each other in the worst way possible and horrible for each other in the best way possible

And I will mention too that are things that happen in canon that people interpret to be Kendratello moments, or they say could be used as evidence for Kendratello

Kendra blowing a kiss to Donnie (The Purple Jacket: She does this before attempting to leave Donnie to deal with his tech turning against him (which she hacked) to go rob the world bank)

Donnie saying that “Cute but mean” is his type (War and Pizza: He says this while getting stomped on by a tomato animatronic, saying, “Oh you’re so cute, but so mean! Why do I always go for your type?!” before proceeding to electrocute it)

Donnie and Kendra flirt whenever they interact (purely interpretation)

Donnie wanting to join the Purple Dragons because he has a crush on Kendra (also purely interpretation)

Now my thoughts on the actual ship? Eh, it’s complex

I see them as a Doomed to Fail type. They would most likely end up in some kind of a codependent relationship because of their biggest flaws, and I can see the official break up being extremely messy on both sides (since I 100% see them taking several “breaks”). Then after a couple years, things are back to normal, with Donnie and Kendra being rivals, only this time they have a respect for each other and they even help each other out if the other person needs it. And even though they still have some feelings for each other, they choose to remain as exes because they don’t want to risk falling back into old habits

On the other hand, I’m frankly tired of the whole, “Bad Person’s Not Actually Bad, They’re Just Misunderstood And Need Someone Who Understands Them” thing

And before anyone tries telling me about Kendra dealing with her parents having a divorce

We don’t know what exactly happened during the divorce between her parents. There’s no cookie cutter reaction to how a teenager would react to their parents having a divorce no matter how well or badly it's handled

The only time Kendra ever brought up the implications that her parents are divorced was when Jason failed to get the Shadow Transmitter. She told him that she wished her father never married his mother, which implies the only reason why Jason is part of the Purple Dragons is because he’s her step-brother. So basically she’s telling him that if she could kick him out then she would

Now, I’m not saying Kendra’s dad and stepmom are the perfect parents, because clearly they’re not with what I’ve mentioned so far, but still

And don't get me wrong, I'm on team Purple Dragons Get A Redemption Arc, I just see it happening more in a way where they become anti-heroes because they got bored of going after the same goal over and over again

Alright, those are all of my opinions

So, overall, do you have to ship Kendratello? No

Is it one of the more complex ships? Oh yeah

Did me rewatching every single scene Kendra is in over and over again in order to describe how she is in canon make it really hard to make this whole thing without being biased? Most definitely

But really, the reason why people ship Kendratello? It’s just for fun!

I know some people in every fandom tend to take shipping and their head canons way too seriously for some reason, but here? It’s genuinely just for fun

That’s all I have to say, but hopefully you now know more about it! Again, if you don’t ship it cause it makes you uncomfortable, that’s okay! But it doesn't give you an excuse to harass those that do. If it bothers you so bad, then the block button is right there. People have their own ideas of how the ship would go and their own reasons why they like it

If you got any questions or something to say, don’t hesitate to send them my way. I can’t guarantee that I’ll get to all of them, but I’ll do my best!

#rottmnt #rise of the tmnt #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt donnie #tmnt donnie #rottmnt kendra #rise kendra #kendratello #analysis

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yuri-is-online · 8 months ago

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What are your ideas on Yutu’s Unique Magic?

Maybe Riddle!Yutu having a countering UM to his father, or Cater!Yutu having one that allows him to see the true in people, etc, etc…

Also, what if Yutu has a sister/brother back in his OG timeline? Did he bring them with or they just got left behind?

for context, check these posts (1) (2) or look at the Fyuuture kid section under series on my masterlist.

oof I have a lot. Unique magic strikes me as something that is supposed to be reflective of who the mage is as a person as well as the Disney character/concept the boy is based on. Since Yutu is not based on anyone really, we are more free with inspiration for his unique magic, with two exceptions. Idia and Kalim both have lines suggesting that their unique magics are passed down in their family's, though I imagine the incantation is different to each person; it makes sense for their Yutu's to have Gate to the Underworld and Oasis Maker respectively.

Before I really get into the weeds, I do like the idea of Yutu having (a) sibling(s) in the OG timeline, again because that can happen in Fire Emblem Awakening but also because it adds to the angst somewhat. As for whether or not he would bring them back in time, the answer to that is yes. Yutu has a few friends he traveled back in time with that are scattered around Twisted Wonderland with no way to contact each other, and if he had a sibling (with the exception of Malleus! Yutu whose sister is a bit... special) then they would be among that group. If you want some extra angst we can steal even more from FE: Awakening and make it so Yutu's sibling died before he arrived, maybe they turned into a blot monster that follows Grim's overblotted form as a replacement for his hench human.

We could even make it so Yutu's sibling doesn't have any magic, just like Yuu. You know. For the parallels ψ(｀∇´)ψ

Riddle! Yutu

Riddle! Yutu having a magic that counters his dad is such a good concept, especially for someone who initially hates him. There are two types of magic that we have seen counter Off With Your Head: Trey's Doodle Suit and a strong shielding spell used by Leona. I can think of a few directions to take this line of thinking, so let's start with the most grounded.

A strong shielding spell, one that can be applied to multiple people, sounds like a spell that thematically fits Yutu. We don't know a lot about how these spells function, but they're important for combat magic and shielding multiple people seems to be implied to be difficult. Let's say in this case it's natural for Yutu and essentially the same for him as shielding himself. This sort of spell feels like it should have a card themed name, Big Blind maybe? It's a term that refers to the minimum bet required to continue a poker game if I understand what I read correctly. The only card game I know how to play is yugioh

The less grounded approach could be a sort of spell that creates an anti magic field… it's a concept I did toy around with mostly because I was thinking about more Alice in Wonderland themed names for a unique magic, and thought up “Everything is Nonsense” or something along those lines. My one sort of caveat to this concept is that I think a spell like this would be heavily stigmatized, probably cause a lot of blot build up for a caster, and I'm uncertain of how it would work mechanically. Well that and I have an idea for a different Yutu who this spell would fit a bit better... but that would require me to cook with a different type of fire.

I did mention in my post about Riddle! Yutu that I liked the idea of his unique magic allowing him to shrink or grow because of Rule 42 in Alice Adventure's in Wonderland saying all people more than a mile high must be rejected from court. If Riddle is the Queen of Hearts, well then any time they argue all Yutu has to do is grow and then he won't be allowed to yell at him any more so there. As a side note do you think this logic could apply to the Chimera in the Prologue? Because I could see that being darkly funny if it comes up in game in that context.

Cater! Yutu

I had a really well thought out idea about Cater being able to see a limited amount into the future before I realized that I was describing the sharingan from Naruto so fuck me I guess.

So just hear me out, you know in twst battles you can see at least one of spells the enemy is going to use? That's sort of what I thought Yuu's unique magic would be if they had it, but I also like the idea of it being Cater! Yutu's. It would function more like an instinct than an actual vision (*clenches fist* just like naruto) but he can use his magic to tell what a person intends to do before they fully think it. Cater is skilled at divination so a unique magic that lets his kid see a little bit of the future feels like it could work for him.

Speaking of divination, I sort of also like the idea of Cater! Yutu having a magic that has something to do with stars and starlight. Maybe he can turn into a void like being made of cosmic energy, similar to how Cater's Split Card is symbolic of his many faces, Yutu's void form could be symbolic of how he feels displaced in the world.

Ace! Yutu

We don't know what Ace's unique magic is (yet) but there are a lot of theories. Time travel, something that steals another person's spell, something related to optical illusions?

I think it would be fun if Ace! Yutu could do something with reflections/mirrors. As in he can reach through mirror and attack, similar to how Hanged Man works in JoJo. The further the distance the more magic it takes, it can also work with things like water but that takes a lot more magic too.

Either that or he's able to travel between mirrors on his own without the dark mirror. That might be a much more difficult thing to do though...

Jade! Yutu

I have a very clear idea for what I wanted to do with Jade! Yutu's magic, but it's a bit complicated to explain because I'm not a physicist.

The basic idea was that Yutu is able to exert magical force on an object, so long as he knows it's exact dimensions and what it is made of. I called it "Crush the Heart" because I wanted both his and Floyd's Yutus to have magic to follow their dad's naming theme. To activate it he has to be looking at where the object should be and picture it in his mind, the more precise the crush the more concentration, control, and magic it takes.

The name could in theory be quite literal, but Yutu isn't quite there yet in his knowledge of biology or magical control.

Floyd! Yutu

Like I said, I want the twin's Yutu's to have a name that is similar to their dad's. Floyd's Bind the Heart uses Kanji that literally translates to "coiling tail"... which I guess is more similar to the magic I gave Jade! Yutu than the "gnawing teeth" that Shock the Heart does, but that magic is supposed to be something that requires calm collected control, which Floyd and his son simply do not have. Still, lets play off that and give Floyd! Yutu a magic that has something to do with shocks and teeth.

I think Floyd! Yutu should have a taunt. Floyd already loves the idea of a good fight, his son is really good at combat magic, and they both talk so much shit that the idea of that literally being his unique magic just sort of works.

Functionally the spell would work similarly to Jamil's, where the person has to look him in the eyes for it to work. The name of the spell could be something like "Reveal the Heart" but that does sound sort of stupid to me so I'm not sold on it. The spell makes a person unable to focus on anyone other than Yutu and wares off after a certain amount of time, it can fail in fashion similar to Riddle's if the enemy mage has a protection spell up.

Azul! Yutu

Another Yutu who I know exactly what I wanted to do with, I got the idea while playing Darkest Dungeon of all things. I feel like it's a bit lame though.

Azul! Yutu can create phantom limbs out of cosmic magic. When he is in octopus form those limbs take the form of human arms, and when in human form they take the form of tentacles. He says when asked that what he is doing is manipulating shadows because he likes to keep people on their toes (or fins take your pick) and he finds it very funny to watch people squirm when they realize there really is no escaping his grasp.

It is a very difficult magic to use, he needs physical strength to use those limbs because they are only as strong as his real ones, so he works out and a lot to make sure he doesn't hurt himself while using it.

Ruggie! Yutu

Laugh With Me is a perfect magic for a hyena to have, and it suits Ruggie's personality really well. Actually... I did write that his Yutu shares his laugh and I think it would be so painfully cute if that extended to his Unique Magic too. Ruggie makes a big deal about how he's kind of a crappy mage, how he has to do a lot of extra work to make up for his low mana pool and poor upbringing. Can you imagine how embarrassed, proud, and awed he would be if his son inherited his spell? That's something only great mages are supposed to have, not little guys like him. Good thing neither Yuu or Yutu care about that huh?

Vil! Yutu

I haven't done a post about Vil! Yutu really beyond this bit about him bonding with Vil, but I did mention what I think his unique magic would be.

I can't find it but I read a myth once about a painter who drew animals with a magic paintbrush that would bring them to life if he gave them two eyes, so he only ever gave them one. I thought it would be neat to have a spell like that and it feels like something that would fit Yutu Schoenheit very well. His magic allows him to create temporary familiars similar to Lilia's bats, bigger creatures take more magic and focus.

I wrote the name for this spell as "Technicolor Dream" since I thought it would be nice for the name of Yutu's magic to nod towards his father's job and his dreams about having his family back.

I have a lot more Yutu's chilling in my inbox, so I'll revisit this topic (lilia! yutu has a whole ask about his um that I really like) once we are done with round 2 of Yutu posting.

#<3 asks #twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #future kid au

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philtstone · 3 months ago

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24. Showing up injured at their friend/mentor’s house: for shawn? :)

[emerges from writing this fic bloody and beaten and on the verge of collapse] ill explore karen vicks character in an overly complicated post-episode missing scene fic or die trying! set immediately post "right turn or left for dead". i genuinely dont know if im happy with this but i also cant figure out how to fix it. actually, it would have probably been easier to write if i was willing to rewatch the episodes its based on. which i am not, because i am a sensitive little soul. so i winged it. i think there are like 10 different ideas that crop up and theyre all equally fascinating as character threads but i have no idea if i tied them together in an even remotely coherent way. also, WOULD she say that??? i had to call my brother twice to ask. this is what yall get for sending me actually interesting prompts, huh

“Oh, it’s no problem,” Henry’s voice said on the phone. “I’ll send Shawn over with them on his way out. He's going in your direction, anyway.”

In her short tenure as the junior detective to Henry Spencer’s lieutenant, Karen Vick observed two things:

First, that he was a far more clever strategist than most people gave him credit for. Despite the ongoing wreckage of his impending divorce and a kid who was slipping through his fingers as everyone looked on, Karen didn’t agree with the other junior detectives’ impression of him as a smash-the-door-down old school hard ass with thinning hair and a worst attitude. The man played four dimensional chess right out of a bonafide Star Trek episode. When he really wanted something done, Henry Spencer could bullshit and bluff and battle plan with the pros, and half the time you’d get too caught up in the blustering misdirect to realize his game was intricately thought out three steps in advance.

It was how they caught the Shorttown Killer, and also how they got that idiot Trembley at the mayor’s office to finally replace their coffee maker. Karen went home to her then-boyfriend, now-husband, and, right before bed, pulled out an old school workbook and took notes.

The second thing was that Henry Spencer loved his son.

Not a lot has changed since then, Karen thinks, staring down the weirdness that she now faces through her open front door.

“… Oh — Mr. Spencer,” Karen says, because it’s rude not to greet your employees when they show up at your home outside of work hours, and are also your old friend-slash-colleague’s kid. “Hello. Thanks for — bringing these over.”

“Dad said it was urgent,” Shawn says.

Urgent isn’t quite how Karen would describe it, but hearing through the grapevine that your department might be facing an audit sometime in the next quarter does light a fire under the proverbial ass. Karen would rather bend a few rules and make sure the last year’s i’s and t’s are dotted and crossed right than leave her detectives vulnerable to the whims of a mayoral stooge.

In general, Karen prides herself on caring about the people under her command just enough that it inspires genuine friendship and loyalty. The just is important. Care needs tempering – it’s important to pull back, press pause, keep certain lines uncrossed. It’s especially important if you want to be successful as a woman in an authority position where lives are often on the line.

What she’s saying is that she tries to make it none of her business what her employees get up to in their spare time. She really genuinely does. She’s shut O’Hara down gently midway through the twelfth sweetly-frazzled attempt to overshare about her dating life (or her efforts to befriend her next-door neighbor, or the endearing personality quirks of her last cat – rest in peace, Triscuit, you will be missed –) enough times to be well-versed in the art of I Won’t Ask, You Won’t Tell, But You’ll Probably Know I Care Anyway.

An invaluable rapport to maintain. In any situation, Karen thinks, but especially when you’re a person who regularly hires and works alongside Shawn Spencer.

She’s not sure whether what she’s looking at right now makes her want to second guess or double down on her usual policy.

“Special delivery,” Shawn adds, like everything is super normal.

Karen narrows her eyes. She glances behind them into the quiet residential street.

“Shawn,” she says.

“Yes, Chief?”

“You didn’t drive here, did you?”

“Ha,” he says, half rolling his eyes to accompany a weird aborted grin. “No. Even I don’t think riding a motorcycle with a concussion is a good idea. What if someone who wasn’t me got hurt? That’s — that would be no good, then you’d have to arrest me. Wouldn’t that be a huge bummer for the whole team, Chief? Gus would cry. And my dad wouldn’t let me take his truck.”

Karen stares at him. Shawn stares at the ground.

“I got a cab,” he says.

“And you are … taking another cab – home?”

Shawn looks quite suddenly like he’s going to be sick.

“Sure,” he says.

Shawn looks terrible. Bruised face, bags under his eyes, and a weird frenetic energy twitching in his limbs that doesn’t pair well with his general air of exhaustion. He’s holding his shoulders stiffly and can barely meet her eye. His t-shirt and sweatpants are rumpled, like he slept in them, even though it’s too early in the evening for Henry to have woken him up to send him here, and when he thrusts the promised files out into the air toward her, abrupt and, admittedly, Shawn-like, he only just hides the awkward wince that immediately overtakes his left side.

The last couple days have been a bit of a whirlwind, so Karen can’t say she necessarily blames herself for not looking more closely.

Even so.

Slowly, Karen reaches forward and divests him of the case files. They slip a little bit, because Karen can’t seem to stop peering shrewdly at Shawn’s face while she does it, and on instinct he reaches forward to stop the stack from toppling.

It does help, but the autopilot he moves on makes it harder to mask what is to Karen’s eyes a very obvious flinch.

“Alright,” is all he says. “Well, good to see you. Time to head back to the old hay stack.”

Like a needle in a haystack and time to hit the hay, Karen supplies needlessly in her own head. Aloud, she says, in many ways against her better judgment,

“Mr. Spencer, are you okay?”

Shawn sways on the spot for a second, one fist clenched, mouth half open. For a strange moment, Karen gets the impression that he’s trying really hard not to say the wrong thing.

“... As rain,” he finally manages, then nods to himself like he achieved some great feat. “Okay. Well –”

“Did something happen to your shoulder?”

“What? No!” Shawn’s eyes flutter closed and he shakes his head, “I’m – fine, Chief. It’s not – I mean, I’m – normal, fine. Fine in a normal way.”

“That’s not something an individual who’s fine in a normal way would say,” Karen says.

“Uh, is it not! It is. I would know, because I am that individual. It’s – I was – there’s just mild – pfft … stab wound – or something, who would even …”

Is Shawn broken? is the unhelpful thought that pops into Karen’s head. She’s never heard an attempt to bullshit collapse so quickly into pathetic nothingness before – certainly not from Shawn.

Perhaps even more than his father, the kid’s a pro.

And then the rest of the sentence catches up with her.

“A mild stab wound?”

Oh boy. She watches Shawn’s eyes widen with the panic that proceeds an unquestionable blunder.

“Chief –”

“In.”

“Chief, I really, really don’t think –”

“Inside my house. Now.”

He’s certainly uncoordinated enough that he doesn’t put up much of a fight. Karen herds him through the door as firmly as possible and leads them in a beeline past Richard’s office toward the bathroom, ignoring the reedy stream of consciousness that spills out of Shawn’s mouth as they go.

“Oh, hey, woah, it’s been like forever since I was in here. Did you redecorate? I swear that lamp wasn’t there the last time we visited. It could be the tacos I had earlier, but I’m sensing a distinct neo-modern Chinese aesthetic going on here, Chief, which calls to mind the merits of cultural appreciation in suburban home decor – hey, is that your husband’s office? Can I meet him? Is he home? That man is a true enigma to us, Chief, and it’s leading me to believe that he must possess all the facial and personality qualities of the pop superstar Mr. Pitbull Worldwide –”

Richard is home, actually, and Karen needs to alert him to the fact that they have an unexpected house guest, so, ignoring Shawn completely, she calls out,

“Honey? Shawn Spencer’s here for a couple minutes about a work thing! I’ll go up to put Iris to bed in a second!” in the finely-honed There Are Many Layers Of Complicated To This secret married tone that Richard should probably be able to catch through the closed office door.

“Alright,” floats out her husband’s pleasant voice. “Tell him hi from me.”

Perfect. There’s about a ninety-three percent chance he understood.

They make it to the bathroom, only stumbling slightly. Shawn says,

“-- or The Rock. Does your husband look like Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson? I really think that would make so many things about the Chief Vick family make sense –”

Karen closes the bathroom door with a snap and crosses her arms.

“Sit,” she says, in a voice that even he knows brooks no argument.

Shawn does. He looks – well, beyond uncomfortable, and more than a little bit miserable, and probably closer to completely dissociating than either of them are prepared for. Karen wonders belatedly if he's gotten any sleep at all in the last forty-eight hours.

“I’m assuming you have not been to the hospital.”

He gives her a baleful look, like he really expected better of her. She only just stops herself from rolling her eyes in response. And there’s that huge goose egg on his forehead, too. What, exactly, he got up to in between Carlton’s wedding reception and oh-eight-hundred hours this morning Karen has no idea, but he looks like someone’s run him through the world’s most aggressive industrial tumble dry cycle and spat him mercilessly back out.

Or maybe over with a truck.

Sending a silent prayer to the universe that Iris never hit puberty and remains a sweet-tempered six-year-old forever, Karen gets to business.

“Well, I had to at least ask. Shawn. Does it need stitches?” He mumbles the answer the first time, and then looks beyond startled when she grabs him under the chin so he’ll look her in the eye. “Listen. I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do. But you’re going to tell me the truth. Got it?”

Shawn grimaces so hard at her words it’s almost a flinch.

“No,” he says finally, clearly enough that she hears him. Karen raises an eyebrow. “No, I don’t think it needs stitches,” he articulates, but doesn’t meet her eye.

“Hm. Alright. I have gauze and tape in the medicine cabinet. Can I … is it alright if I pull up the sleeve of your t-shirt?”

Released from her hold, he groans and presses his face into one palm. “Chief –”

“I don’t really know what you expected, coming here! It’s not like I’m any less of a hardass than your father.”

“Yeah, but I can bitch back at my dad,” Shawn says, sounding like he’s finally realizing the magnitude of his mistake. Karen smiles grimly.

“Tough. Now pull your shirt up while I get the first aid kit.”

While Shawn proceeds to wrestle awkwardly with his t-shirt in a muted shuffle against the toilet seat, Karen rummages efficiently through the cabinet and eyes him through the bathroom mirror. He seems oddly reluctant to expose himself. In fact, in a stark contrast to his usual insistence on making his presence and contributions as obtrusively obvious as possible, Shawn seems intent on shrinking into the aforementioned Asian-flavored floral wallpaper (which does need an update, unfortunately) with all the equanimity of an anxious chameleon. Karen feels her eyebrows crease. Taking the first aid kit in hand, she brings it over and deposits it into his arms, ignoring his small startle.

“How about you hold that,” Karen says. Shawn does, against his chest, like a pillow. She walks around him and surveys the damage, antiseptic gauze in hand.

He wasn’t lying about the severity, at least. It’s a shallow thing, already mostly congealed, and has only stained his shirt in a small smattering spot of crusty brown blood.

Karen swabs at it with the alcohol using light careful fingers.

“Ow, ow ow ah –”

“Don’t be such a baby. It’s hardly a life-threatening injury.”

“Super insightful, Chief,” Shawn snaps, as genuinely sarcastic as he’s probably ever been with her, “never thought of that myself. Totally the reason why I just had to go to the hospital.”

He doesn’t pull away, but she can feel the tension radiating through his back. She blinks, one eyebrow crawling up her forehead.

Alright then. So that’s how it’s going to be.

“I’m assuming your father doesn’t know about this,” she says.

Shawn grunts, noncommittal. Huh. Maybe he does know, then, and has just been disallowed from doing anything about it right now.

She tosses the first used antiseptic wipe into the trash.

Goddamn four dimensional chess.

She supposes she’s never been bad at the game. She may as well work her way backwards through the moves: Guster, the most obvious node in Shawn’s turn-to-in-a-crisis-system, would never voluntarily abandon his friend in a time of need, so Karen assumes that whatever this is has either already included his support or not been made known to Gus at all yet. Henry’s likely exhausted his own usefulness in the situation, and Detective O’Hara is …

Karen has to work very hard for her hands not to pause in a way that gives away her hard-earned mental sleuthing. A bad feeling wholly unrelated to her ill-advised hangover of the day before begins to bloom at the back of her gut.

“You have really small hands, Chief.”

Shawn’s voice is notably more subdued than before.

“Do I?”

“They’re like … little kangaroo hands. Like the mom kangaroo from Whinnie the Pooh.”

“Didn’t you know?” Karen says, not unkindly. “They’re given out at the hospital when all first-time moms leave with their baby.”

He lets out a tired little laugh, more boyish than he probably means it to be, and in spite of herself Karen feels her heart clench. She isn’t blind. In all her last seven years as the leader of their chaotic little precinct, she has never seen Juliet O’Hara look as ill as she did yesterday morning. The usually sweet-faced young woman had all the pallor of a Victorian ghost, and stood so far away from Shawn in any given room that to an unassuming observer he might have had the plague.

There are only a handful of things, Karen thinks, that could have invited that particular evolution in their dynamic. She rips the surgical tape from its canister a little bit more harshly than is strictly necessary and fights the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose between her fingers.

“So,” she says conversationally, laying the tape down in neat, gentle little strips, trying not to pinch the wound too tightly. “Any fun plans for the evening?”

Shawn sniffs. She can see him gripping his hands together over his knee from where she stands above him.

“Um, yeah, uh –” he clears his throat, “you know me, Chief. We’re working our way through a Robert Guillame marathon, which means some good old fashioned Benson, running commentary on the quality of that child acting, naturally.”

“Naturally.”

“Then Gus and I were gonna hit up the new, the new chili cheese joint up by Hermosa, you know – they’re doing sliders –”

“Chili cheese sliders?” Karen hums, contemplative.

“Buy ‘em by the pound,” Shawn agrees. “Then I was thinking of getting a tattoo, maybe a belly button piercing, I’ve been really – really needing a change – would you let Iris get one, if she asked?”

“A tattoo?” Karen clarifies, cutting off the next piece of tape. The skin around the cut is warm to her touch but Shawn’s arms have goosepimpled. The hair at the back of his head sticks up unstyled, like he slept weirdly and couldn’t be bothered to fix it come morning.

“Of a marmoset. That’s what I’m thinking. With distinctly effeminate vibes.”

“Well, Dick hates marmosets. So I’d probably encourage her toward something else. Perhaps a sea lion.”

“Like Shabby.” The nervous note has bled into his legs again, and his earlier subdued tone has gone back to sounding strained. “Yeah, that’ll – that could be it.”

“All in one night, huh?” Karen says.

“I –” Shawn doesn’t even hiss when she presses down with a cotton gauze to cover the last of the thickened blood. His legs are properly jittering again. “I was – yeah, y-you know me, Chief, total night owl.”

“Shawn?”

“Yeah?”

“What about going home?”

Silence. Shawn doesn’t answer for a moment long and pregnant enough that Karen wonders if her question will be ignored entirely.

Then,

“Chief,” he says finally, in an awful, tiny little voice, “I really, really fucked up.”

Finally, her hands do falter in their ministrations; as emotionally exuberant as Shawn often is, she doesn’t think she’s ever actually heard him close to tears. For a horrible moment she wonders if Shawn Spencer will suddenly start crying atop her toilet seat for reasons neither of them are capable of discussing honestly. Then she wonders if her horror makes her a terrible boss.

Boss – mother – person.

Oh, dear.

She sets down the surgical tape and lays a ginger palm over the newly-bandaged gouge in his shoulder. It’ll probably scar, but not at all badly. She doesn’t like to think about the far more obvious one just below, puckering in a violent yet unassuming divot. Another narrow miss for Henry’s boy.

At this point there are so many of them to count, Karen has to question the statistical likelihood of the whole thing. Becoming a mathematical anomaly is, Karen can attest with confidence, not exactly the future the Lieutenant Spencer she knew dreamed of for his increasingly unmanageable teenager.

Doing what he loved, on the other hand – absolutely. Being with a person he loved, even more so. Karen grits her teeth at the irritating web she’s spent the last six years constructing around herself and wonders if this evening right here is some kind of cosmic karma for leaving Iris in the care of nannies for the first three years of her life.

That sounds like the kind of thing those horrible parenting magazines and Karen’s mother-in-law would claim, anyway.

“Shawn,” she says slowly, because she has to at least knock this possibility off the list before risking her career in an attempt to mediate her detectives’ love lives, “did you … you weren’t – unfaithful, were you?”

“What?!”

Shawn yanks his shoulder away and whirls around to face her with such a look of horrified betrayal on his face that it’s almost comical.

“No!”

Thank fucking God, Karen thinks. Aloud, she says,

“Well, I’m sorry, I had to at least ask!”

“No! No! What the hell, Chief!”

“Oh would you be quiet! I’m gathering my evidence here!”

“How could I – I would never – you’d even think that I could –”

“I know! Shawn, for God’s sake –” He’s scrambled to his feet in the cramped bathroom space, glaring, and has probably messed up all that surgical tape in the process. The half open first aid kit and his crumpled shirt press lopsided against his front and her garbage can is now full of oxidizing bits of cotton. Karen officially gives in to the urge to press her palms against her forehead. “I had to ask!” she repeats finally. “You and I both know you’re not gonna give me much else to work with, and you sounded so – so sad!”

Shawn barks out a hysterical little laugh. Karen almost growls in frustration.

“I am not going to risk all the very hard-earned rules I have in place without knowing for sure that my instincts aren’t wrong. Is that so hard to appreciate?”

Does it count as sound police work when the framework for your investigation is an unacknowledged lie? Karen doesn’t really know. Probably there’s another math metaphor to be made in there (you screwed your proof from the very beginning, maybe, Richard the professor would definitely have thoughts), or just a straight up joke. How to solve a case that’s cold before it ever has the chance to go live; a cover-up if she ever saw one. Unlikely that O’Hara will peep a word, and things will be a true mess for a few weeks, if she can’t make an educated guess about it. And no one will be explaining anything to Carlton, either …

Right before their goddamn audit, Karen thinks, aggrieved. She wonders if Henry considered this in his calculus. Send Shawn over, have her deal with him. Offer a huge unspoken you’re gonna be walking into a shitstorm tomorrow canary for her perennially chaotic mess of a coal mine.

She can’t help but feel begrudgingly grateful, but that doesn’t mean she and he won’t be having words about this later.

“Jesus, Karen,” Shawn mutters, pressing his face back into his free hand. Karen shakes her head and squares her shoulders.

“Well then! Back to the issue. You fucked up.”

“You know what? I can’t talk about this with you.”

“Oh, Mr. Spencer, I assure you I am more than well aware.”

Shawn blinks at her between his fingers, looking genuinely confused for the first time since he showed up at her door.

Karen does not bother to clear up his confusion; it’s better this way, anyhow.

“Will you be sleeping at Gus’s place or your father’s?” she asks, crossing her arms.

“I’m – I don’t –” Shawn doesn’t meet her eye. The earlier thread of anxiety is back. “I wasn’t …”

So, neither.

“Put your shirt back on,” she says. “We’re relocating to the living room.”

“Chief –”

“That was an order, Mr. Spencer.”

The living room is as quiet and mundane as it was an hour ago. It’s past Iris’s bedtime – she’ll have to go up, and soon at that. Karen seats her guest, retrieves a mug and a bag of chamomile from the kitchen, and removes the fluffy throw blanket from the basket behind the couch on her way back in. He’s deflated completely by the time the tea and blanket are set in front of him. Small and exhausted. Caught. It’s a horrible way to think about it. But she can’t avoid the hundred yard stare – Karen has seen it one too many times in people only just realizing they’re about to go away for life.

“Shawn,” she says, firm as she can make it. “Drink the tea. You’re dehydrated.”

“I’m … what?”

“Your lips are dry. You shouldn’t be dehydrated with a concussion.”

He doesn’t say anything for a minute, and Karen suddenly wonders if he’s going to get up and leave. She has experience with these things – she knows a runner when she sees one.

“I might as well have,” Shawn finally whispers.

She doesn’t catch it the first time. “What?”

“I – I might as well ha – Chief, I …” Deep shuddering breaths. He’s finally shutting down, she realizes. She can’t send him back out like this; Henry would give her the stink eye for a month.

Goddamn Spencers and their goddamn irritating overcomplicated lives.

Karen pushes the tea directly into his hands and tilts her chin so she can meet Shawn’s eye. He’s still lucid enough that she doesn’t think he’ll start hyperventilating, but now that the outrage and adrenaline has worn off, the symptoms of shock are pretty hard to miss. “Shawn,” she says again, and wills for him to understand.

“What if she – what if I never –” He can’t get the full sentence out. He looks at her, eyes wide and terrified.

Life sentence, Karen thinks again. The messy stack of files Shawn brought over sits almost unimportantly on the coffee table between them and a memory comes to her, unbidden, of words penned carefully in the corner of a modified police report that she pulled the minute the door closed on the McCallum case seven years ago.

Date: May 4th, 1995. Reporting Officer, Spencer, Lt. H. Perpetrator a caucasian male, brown hair, five foot nine, insists on wearing those stupid earrings just to spite me. What the hell do you want me to write here, Chief? Spent two hours in the fucking principal’s office convincing them not to expel him one month off from graduation. All that effort, and I still booked the kid. It’s gonna follow him for life, and it’s gonna be me that did it to him. For life. You think he’ll ever forgive me? He’s the greatest thing in my pathetic little world and he keeps breaking my heart, and I can’t even properly accept that it’s my fault.

How’s that for a fucking crime.

She needs to go put her daughter to bed. It’s the thought that keeps running through her head, oddly enough, like a strange antidote to the impotent anger and heartbreak and frustration she’s feeling for the people under her care.

With all the notes she took in that little workbook, she still let herself become complicit in the painstaking, convoluted resolution of Henry’s mistakes without accounting for all the variables.

Richard’s footsteps sound muffled in the next room; he’s made his way upstairs in Karen’s absence. She needs to go. She wants to hear the soft and sleepy love you Mama that with her unpredictable hours and regular long nights isn’t nearly routine enough.

“Shawn,” she says evenly. “Do you love her?”

It’s hard to reconcile the smarmy kid who tried to barter with her for twelve hundred a day with the devastated young man sitting on the couch in front of her.

“Chief …” he starts, barely above a whisper.

“Good. Then she’ll see that. Detective O’Hara is a smart and observant woman. What she chooses to do next is her decision, but … you might be – well, comforted by the fact that she’ll know that – truth.”

Shawn stares at her. The tea steams in front of him, cooling in increments. She takes a deep breath and gets to her feet, patting his uninjured shoulder brusquely.

“I have to go check on Iris. When I come back down, I can drive you to the Psych office.”

Iris is fast asleep when she gets there. A library book lays open face down over her stomach, and her soft brown hair fans out against the pillow, silhouetted by the soft glow of the unicorn nightlight in the wall above her. Karen turns off the bedside lamp, tucks her daughter in, and kisses her forehead. Just before she leaves, she hears it: murmured, half-awake.

“Love you, Mama.”

“I love you too, baby.”

Karen goes back to her living room, car keys in hand. She’s planned her next move in the driver’s seat enough times throughout her career that it shouldn’t be too hard.

#my writing #psych #psych usa #psych 2006 #shawn spencer #karen vick #henry spencer #shawn x juliet #shules #situations prompt meme #not sure if i want to put this on ao3 yet we'll see #if it gets zero traction on here ... maybe lol

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