#Black Fire This Time: Volume 1
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#african/black experience#culture#afrikan#Amiri Baraka#Ishmael Reed#HAKI Madhubuti#Black writers#Black Fire This Time: Volume 1
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The Dragon's Pretty Treasure - Part 1
[NSFW | 18+]
Characters: m!dragon x f!reader
Content: kidnapping, mild dub-con, inhuman anatomy, size difference, two dicks, dp, tail action, fluids, koala bear fleshlight
(Note: part 1 is just the setup and only contains kidnapping - aforementioned cws are for the whole story)
Series complete: [Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4]
⋆ ⋅ ☽ ⋆ ☾ ⋅ ● ⋅ ☽ ⋆ ☾ ⋅ ● ⋅ ☽ ⋆ ☾ ⋅ ● ⋅ ☽ ⋆ ☾ ⋅ ⋆
Opening your eyes, you blink a few times, trying to adjust your vision to the darkness surrounding you. There is a faint glow that gently illuminates the space around you but everything else is mostly darkness and all you can make out are vague shapes and shadows. Looking around, you see that a small bit of light is coming from some embers in a dying fire next to you. This is definitely not your tiny studio apartment back home.
Where the hell are you?
As you sit up, you rub your eyes, groaning at the stiffness in your joints. From the aches in your muscles, you must have been asleep for a while. Looking down, you realize that you are lying on a bed of what seem to be soft furs or pelts of some kind. A cool breeze drifts in from somewhere and you shiver, realizing that you are also naked.
What the fuck happened?
But before you can try to rack your foggy brain to figure it out, a giant yellow eye the size of your head blinks open at the edge of the darkness across from you. Yelping in shock, you scramble backwards as the eye rotates to reveal a second one just as large and luminescent. Both eyes have giant slitted pupils and seem to glow in the darkness. Before you can get far, something smooth and cool wraps around your waist, holding you in place. Heart pounding in your ears, you glance down to find that it is a dark green, almost black, appendage covered in scales. Extending from the darkness, it winds around your stomach with the end coming to a tapered point near your navel. It squeezes gently, hard enough to hold you firm but not enough to hurt.
Holy shit, is it a tail of some sort?
Too terrified to move further, you hold your breath and look back up at the giant yellow orbs peering at you from the shadows. Slowly, they begin to draw closer, and you hear heavy, measured thuds echo off the walls. As the eyes approach the dying fire, a massive snout comes into view and then a head the size of a car follows. Your eyes bug as you take in the scaly surface of a face, with ridged brows and a line of spikes running in increasing size from the tip of its snout up and over the back of its head. Two large horns protrude from above its brows and curve backwards towards where you assume its shoulders would be.
When its snout is a few inches from your face, you tremble as its nostrils flare and it inhales deeply. Then it exhales with a low rumbling sound as its hot breath fans across your face, blowing strands of hair off your shoulders.
It’s…sniffing you!
You nearly jump out of your skin when a deep, inhuman voice booms through the cavern and you have to cover your ears from the sheer volume.
“You are awake.”
The voice continues to echo off the walls for a few moments and then silence settles again, apart from the monster’s deep rhythmic breaths and your pounding heart. Slowly, you lower your hands from your ears and realize, belatedly, that it hadn’t moved its mouth when it spoke.
Had it projected its voice or are you just going crazy? Probably just going crazy.
“Where…where am I?” you manage to stammer out.
“My cave,” it rumbles again, softer this time, as if it realized its voice was too loud.
Oh fuck, you are going to die here, cold and naked in this cave.
Beginning to hyperventilate, you start to struggle in the grasp of its tail.
“Please don’t eat me!” you shout.
You need to figure out a way to get out of here!
It lets out a low, chuffing sound, which must be a chuckle and says, “I don’t plan to eat you.” And before you know what’s happening, its jaws part slightly and a giant, tapered tongue slips between massive, razor sharp teeth and licks up the side of your neck.
Shit, this monster definitely wants to eat you.
“Why am I here?” you squeak, utterly terrified but trying to keep it talking in the hopes you can figure out an escape plan before it decides it’s done playing with its food.
“I wanted a pretty treasure for my horde.”
A pretty treasure?... Does he mean you?
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I promise there will be smut in part 2!
[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4]
Bonus: here is a size comparison if you're wondering just how big this guy really is...
#monster fucker#terato#monster x reader#monster x lover#monster#monster boyfriend#monster x human#these lovely monsters#dragon#tlm dragon#tlm stories#monster smut#m!monster#f!reader
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Object of Despair (2/3)
[ dark • Aemond x Arryn • widow female ]
[ warnings: dubcon, oral sex, fingering, hate sex, smut, angst, domination, violence, swearing, humiliation, hard chauvinism ]
[ description: Aemond is forced to marry a widow from House Arryn as part of the alliance and support of his brother in the war against the Black faction. After their wedding night, which went completely differently than he imagined, Aemond tries to return to his daily routine. The female character has a specific eye and hair color. Lots of hate sex, violence and chauvinism. ]
Part 1 − Object of Desire Part 3 − Object of Delight Epilogue
* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *
My other works: Masterlist
_____
Their wedding night was so different from what he had imagined that he was at once horrified, ashamed and intrigued by the person who had been living in the chamber next to his for several days. She wasn't seeking his company or attention, appearing only at suppers spent together with his family.
He knew he could have summoned her to his chamber at any time, and it would have been her duty to come and give him what he wanted, but every time he meant to do so he changed his mind and resigned, frustrated, staring into the light of the fire burning in the fireplace, sitting in front of it on his ornate wooden chair, thinking about that evening.
After what had happened between them it seemed to him that they had both suddenly come down to earth, not knowing what to make of how aggressive and full of rage the rapprochement had been.
He let her go and watched her, breathing unevenly, tying back his breeches, as she immediately covered her buttocks back up with her nightgown − he could see that her whole body was shaking, her lips trembling, her eyes big, her cheeks puffy from the tears that ran down her face.
She calmed down a little after his words and reassurances, but she was still terrified.
She asked him in a breaking, weak, quiet voice if she could now return to her chamber, and although he had originally had no intention of letting her lay in his bed, he felt disappointment at the thought that she had not begged him to let her stay.
Not wanting to show weakness or allow her to think that her presence was something he craved, he allowed her to do so with a nod, and she left without a word, neither bowing to him nor wishing him a good night, quietly opening and closing the door of his chamber behind her.
The next day, during the duel with Criston Cole, he could not concentrate − whenever he caught sight of a shade of blue out of the corner of his eye he involuntarily looked in that direction, thinking it was her in her gown that he remembered so fondly, his heart pounding hard with shame.
He pressed his lips together, turning his head away, snorting, playing with the hilt of his sword in his hand with apparent impatience, seeing some other woman − Cole watched him vigilantly, but not dared to ask either about her or his impressions of her.
Her presence was a taboo for him.
That same day, he walked and spent long hours in the great royal library, despite the fact that he usually instructed his servants to bring thick, old volumes filled with the history of his family and all Essos to his chamber. He hoped to meet her there, to confront her again, this time clearly showing her where she belonged.
To his disappointment, he did not see her until the evening − her blue gown immediately catched his attention, sewn from a soft, lovely fabric it fell heavily over her pleasant, girlish curves, accentuating her figure.
He swallowed hard as he looked at her face and noticed a large red bruise under her eye, which must have been the result of the moment he grabbed her by the hair and slammed her head on the table.
She was discussing something in a whisper with Helaena, his sister bent over her with concern, playing with her fingers in a nervous gesture they had all inherited from their mother.
They fell silent when they noticed him − her violet eyes looked up at him, sad, resigned and tired. He thought, feeling a burning embarrassment in his chest, that explaining to her who had the final word on what their marriage would look like was no longer necessary.
Sitting down at the table next to her he knew what awaited him − when his mother walked into the chamber and saw his wife she froze, the smile gone from her face.
She looked at him with pain, with disappointment he could not bear and he closed his eyes, thinking only of the fact that he wanted to sink to the ground.
"Dear sister-in-law, has my brother given you another gift besides, we all pray, his future heir in your womb?" Aegon asked with a sneer. He clenched his teeth, sucking in a deep breath, looking at his brother with grim fury, to which he only smirked, popping a grape into his mouth, biting through it with a loud crunch, amused.
He felt his wife shift beside him − his heart began to beat faster in panic at the thought that she was about to say something to humiliate him, to mock him in front of his entire family to take revenge on him.
"I slipped in the bath, my King." She replied simply, without emotion, regret or anger. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, surprised at the ease with which she lied despite it being obvious that everyone around her had guessed what had really happened.
His brother raised an eyebrow clearly impressed, cocking his head, leaning back in his chair with a loud creak of wood.
"You slipped." He repeated softly and she replied nothing, looking at him calmly.
She and Aegon exchanged glances for a moment − it seemed to him that she feared neither him nor his position.
"I hope no more such unpleasant…accident happens to you, my Lady. Such a pretty face." He hummed, reaching for his cup, but she merely blinked, no grimace passing across her face, as if his words did not bother her at all.
He himself didn't know what he thought of all this, so he decided to go back to his daily routine, pretending that she simply wasn't there, convincing himself that it would be better that way.
He didn't need her, he didn't want her, and her silence and distance were doing him a favour.
He watched her sometimes from afar, seeing her pleasant silhouette glide between the columns as he trained in the courtyard, always headed for the garden, the tree he had read about before she came to King's Landing, and at which he understood the Northerners prayed.
He did not think of it at first, but then he began to notice the gazes of the men and guards fixed on her as she passed them, their smiles, their dreamy gaze as if they were imagining what they would do with her body, the body of his wife, his right and his duty.
It planted a seed of doubt in him − he wondered if perhaps she was meeting her lover there, if he was a source of ridicule in the keep because the servants already knew that she had not been faithful to him, that she had betrayed her crippled husband.
This thought made him furious, but having no proof for his supposition he decided one day to change his plan for the afternoon and watch her through the window − as soon as he caught sight of her figure passing through the cloisters he left his chamber, moving unhurriedly after her.
As he walked between the tall shrubbery, hearing the grass rustling and the birds singing, he tried to focus on other sounds, expecting quiet moans and panting to reach his ears, but heard only his own footsteps traversing the path strewn with small rocks rattling under his feet.
He stopped as he stepped into a small clearing − a large, white weirwood with a disturbing, wrinkled, red face on its trunk looked at him ominously, his wife lying on her back on the grass beneath it, her eyes closed, her dark, loose hair surrounding her head, her hands laid on her stomach.
He stood motionless, wondering if she was waiting for someone, however, she did not open her eyes or look around.
He thought with surprise that she was asleep.
He swallowed loudly, for some reason feeling desire at the sight of her lying silhouette, the fact that someone could see and hear them, that she was his wife, and he could take her here and anywhere else he wished.
He felt how his cock swell in his breeches, his lips tightening into a thin line as the heat spilled in his lower abdomen.
She shuddered and opened her eyes when she heard him move towards her − she lifted herself up on her arm, her lips parted in disbelief, however for some reason she did not rise or try to escape.
He stood, towering over her, feeling his superiority and dominance over her in this position and this situation, his fingers slid down to his breeches, untying them in a calm, nimble manner.
"Come here, wife. I promised you something, didn't I?" He asked, feeling his heart pounding like mad, releasing his aching erection, its pink tip glistening from his precum.
It seemed to him that she was shocked by his insolence, by the fact that he wanted to profane her sacred place, after a moment, however, the expression on her face changed. He parted his lips noticing how she rose slowly, kneeling before him as if to pray, with a light flick of her hand sliding the material of his breeches lower, looking him straight in the eyes.
No fear, no terror, no regret.
He sighed and immediately grabbed her by the hair, wanting to be in control of what was happening when her hand grasped his throbbing, hard cock in her soft palm, squeezing it at the base. He drew in a loud breath as her lips brushed its tip without any hesitation, her pink, shiny tongue licking it encouragingly. He tilted his head back, delighted.
"− fuck − keep going −" He commanded, impatiently pressing her closer to his lower abdomen, watching her with excitement and curiosity, his manhood quivering with desire in her hand, her fingers giving it a calm, assured strokes. He groaned involuntarily when he saw how she slowly slid the fat head of his cock between her lips, the tip of her tongue teasing him lazily.
She sighed as the thrust of his hips slid it deeper into her mouth − he heard her almost choke when it hit the back of her throat, her palate wonderfully wet and warm, her lips clamped down on it, in some natural, subconscious reflex beginning to suck it.
"− that's it − there you go −" He gasped with awe at the perverted sight before him, his fingers entwined in her smooth, soft hair, clenching down on it, controlling himself, however, so as not to cause her too much pain, forcing her head not to escape when his hips with sure deep pushes invaded her throat.
"− did you often satisfy your late husband like this? − it's clear this isn't your first time − little slut −" He exhaled, groaning lowly listening to the loud clicks of her saliva each time his aching cock disappeared again and again deep into her mouth, her hand tightening on it more firmly, making him accelerate his pace.
"− stop − that's enough −" He muttered, having no intention of wasting his seed, wanting to finish inside her, trying to push her away, but he felt her tongue trailing down his length, her free hand clamped down on his buttock, not allowing him to escape − he had to lean against the tree trunk, his other hand holding her hair as his cock thrust into her greedily.
"− f-fuck, fuck, fuckkk −" He hissed out in rage combined with delight and groaned loudly in relief as he felt his semen spill over her palate. He looked down at her, her eyes closed, all around them only the rustle of the leaves, his shaky, loud breaths and the sound of her swallowing, so lewd it sent shivers down his spine.
Slowly she slid it out of her mouth, his cock all slick and glistening from her wetness − her soft, pink tongue licked it for a while longer, teasing and sucking lightly on its tip from which the remnants of his seed still flowed. He stroked her smooth hair, feeling his body still shudder with shivers of pleasure after such intense fulfilment.
"− you look perfect like this −" He gasped softly, his thumb running over her cheek, noticing with some kind of relief that there was hardly a trace left of the bruise from a few days ago.
"− you will spend this night in my chamber − you should try how it tastes sticky with your moisture − don't touch yourself −"
That evening he waited impatiently for her, strangely excited and anxious, pacing around his chamber, absorbed in his thoughts.
He feared that she would humiliate him, show him, by not coming to his summons, that she despised and disrespected him, and then force him to use violence against her again.
He did not want any more accusing glances from his mother directed towards him at the table.
He shuddered as the door to his chamber opened suddenly − he turned over his shoulder and swallowed hard, noticing her figure covered only by her night gown and the cashmere blue shawl thrown over her shoulders − her long dark hair were loose, the look of her violet eyes calm and full of some kind of curiosity.
"− have you touched yourself? −" He asked coolly as the door closed behind her with a loud clatter of wood, turning towards her, walking in her direction with his hands folded behind his back.
"− no −" She replied softly, without any pleasantries or further elaboration, looking straight into his face without a sign of fear or uncertainty.
He intended to regain control of the situation she had taken from him when she decided when he would come and how, all by herself.
Stupid cunt.
"− undress and lie on your stomach −" He commanded in a dispassionate, cool, deep tone, from which her gaze darkened a little, as if clouded, her plump lips parted slightly but no sound came out of them.
She walked past him without a word, heading barefoot towards his bed and climbed onto it, her back turned to him as she sat on his bedding, letting him watch as her fingers slid the fabric of the robe off her shoulders, letting it fall down, revealing her naked, smooth body.
His hands began to undo the clasps of his tunic as she lay on her stomach following his command, her face turned the other way so that he could not see her gaze − the sizzle of the fire in the fireplace all around them, and besides, a complete silence filled with a heavy, stifling tension, a threat of what was about to happen between them.
He felt what he saw in his cock, his manhood expressing painful impatience, throbbing in his breeches at the thought that he intended to come deep inside her that night more than once.
"− did you love that fool? −" He asked indifferently in a voice slightly hoarse with arousal, licking his lips with his tongue in satisfaction to see that her whole body tensed, her fingers clenched on the pillow lying under her head, her back rising in a shuddering breath.
She was silent for a long moment, as if his question had startled her − he watched her vigilantly, pulling his boots off his feet, staying only in his undershirt and breeches as she lay exposed, bare, vulnerable, condemned to him and him alone.
No matter what her answer would be.
She shuddered, as if snapped out of her reverie, as he sat up behind her, his large hand running over and stroking her full, soft buttocks.
"− speak −" He hissed, his hand slapping her bare skin so sharply and quickly that she bounced and squealed. He gave a reassuring stroke to the spot, red and throbbing in the indistinct shape of his hand − involuntarily his lips curved into a teasing smirk as he noticed the moisture glistening between her thighs, her folds pink, throbbing and swollen.
She liked this kind of games, he knew that.
"− I was the furnishings of his household − I loved him as much as his chair, his bed or his table could −" She muttered, and he looked at her, surprised, not knowing himself what he thought of her words. He stared at her face, her gaze fixed on his window, her lower lip trembling as if she was trying not to cry.
He hummed, intrigued, moving forward, placing his hands on either side of her head, his long hair tickling the bare skin of her back and shoulders, making her gasp loudly, her body quivering all over in anticipation and uncertainty, fear and curiosity at what he was about to do.
"− I am, I believe, in his debt − he taught my wife how to suck cock so well −" He whispered quietly with a hint of dark mockery and threat, her lips parted wide in a quiet moan as he slid one of his hands under her stomach, parting her legs with his knee, forcing her to spread them in front of him, his mouth ran over her neck as his fingers sank into her leaking, soft, hot womanhood.
"− but did he fuck you good? − hm? − did he know your weaknesses? − your most sensitive points? −" He murmured, her whole body breathless, her buttocks bucking up towards him and rubbing against his hard cock, moving to the rhythm of his fingers as their tips dug into her tender skin, trailing around her bud, teasing her once in a while, his hand all sticky with her juices.
"− fucking answer me − he fucked you with his fingers 'till you mewled his name? − 'till you begged for his seed? −" He growled, crushing her with the weight of his body, his other hand clamping down on her neck, careful not to overdo it though − she whimpered loudly, writhing beneath him as he quickened his pace, running his fingers over her puffy slit again and again, leaking from her fluids, his fingers invading her fleshy folds with a loud, lewd click, his aching manhood hitting her buttocks.
"− yes − he's gained experience with whores and servants before, just like you −" She hissed out, her breath caught in her throat as his fingers tightened harder around her neck, his two fingers forced their way inside her, stretching her tight, hot, wet walls with sure, deep pushes to which her hips responded greedily with rocking, meeting him halfway.
"− shameless whore − maybe I should care less about your pleasure, hm? − fuck you so that you cry out in pain −" He threatened, and she laughed, struggling to catch air, her lips parted wide, her eyelids clenched.
"− objects do not know fulfilment or disappointment − love or hate − do what you want with me −" She breathed out, her eyes opened, releasing a wave of tears that ran down her cheeks, seeing this he slid his fingers out from inside her and let go of her neck, quickly untying his breeches, for some reason furious at her words, his nostrils twitched dangerously in accelerated breath.
His thumbs spread her folds wide to the sides, allowing the fat head of his cock to force its way inside her with her loud moan of surprise, his one, brutal push was enough for him to thrust deep into her with a sigh of pleasure and satisfaction.
"− listen − that sounds like disappointment to you? − like hatred? −" He sneered, panting loudly, placing his hands on either side of her head again, his knees spreading her thighs wide so that he slid fully into her, bucking his hips, his thrusts violent, sure and deep, each time his thighs slapping against her buttocks with a loud click of her moisture.
"− fuckin' leaking − all thirsty for my cock −" He gasped, feeling her muscles squeeze him tightly in pleasure, his face sinking into her soft, fragrant hair, his hands in some subconscious, natural reflex found her breasts, caressing and kneading them between his fingers, teasing her nipples with his thumbs.
"− ah −" She cried out innocently, girlishly − he stifled a low groan hearing that sound, accelerating his pace, opening her slick cunt wide on his cock again and again with brutal, quick thrusts, his mouth sliding down to her neck, clamping down on her skin, sucking her so painfully hard that she hissed, grabbing him helplessly by the hair.
"− I promise you that when I'm done with you, you won't be able to sit up tomorrow − your stomach and womb full of my seed −" He growled out into her ear, his breath caught in his throat as her hands found his, clenching on his fingers, entwining them together, her hips responding to his thrusts so eagerly that he struggled to restrain himself from coming just yet.
"− don't stop − fill me, please, please, please −" She mewled so loudly and sweetly that he lost control completely; he could feel the sweat trickling down his back from the exertion, one of his hands slid down her stomach, giving her pearl a few encouraging strokes from which her whole body quivered.
"− good girl − say my name −" He muttered with his face pressed against her soft hair, no longer controlling his movements, his hips slamming into her involuntarily, aggressively and quickly, no longer sliding out of her, chasing his own fulfilment, her walls clenched against him greedily, sucking him inside, wet and hot.
"− Aemond, fuck me, fuck me, f-fuck −" She whimpered and that was the end of it, from her lips came sounds of pleasure and relief he had never heard before, sweet, girlish, innocent, vulnerable, he felt her moisture trickle down her thighs, soaking him all over, her core throbbing hard in fulfillment, giving him wonderfull squeeze.
He gasped loudly, letting go at last, coming so hard inside her that it went dark before his eyes, his fingers tightened on her body to make sure she wouldn't escape him, their bodies writhing in convulsions, overwhelmed by how intense the fulfilment was, slapping against each other.
"− oh gods −" He mumbled, stroking her smooth shoulders, breasts, hips, thighs with his large, rough hands − he felt as if the scent of her body, her hair and her moisture had completely overwhelmed him, filling his lungs and his head. He closed his eyes, panting loudly with her, only realising after a moment that the fingers of one of her hands were still entwined with his.
They lay like that for a moment, trying to calm themselves, his lips finding her cheek, neck and shoulder, placing hot, lazy, wet kisses on them. He heard her sigh softly, her words like honey to his ears.
"− I want to taste you now −"
_____
Aemond Taglist:
(bold means I couldn't tag you)
@notnormalthings-blog @nikstrange @zenka69 @bellaisasleep @k-y-r-a-1 @g-cf2020 @melsunshine @opheliaas-stuff @chainsawsangel @iiamthehybrid @tinykryptonitewerewolf @namoreno @malfoytargaryen @qyburnsghost @aemondsdelight @persephonerinyes @fan-goddessing @sweethoneyblossom1 @watercolorskyy @apollonshootafar @padfooteyes
#aemond fic#aemond fanfiction#aemond targaryen#hotd aemond#ewan mitchell#ewan mitchell fanfic#dark aemond smut#dark aemond targaryen#dark aemond#dark aemond angst#prince aemond#prince aemond targaryen#aemond#aemond one eye#aemond kinslayer#aemond smut#aemond x oc#aemond x original female character#targaryen smut#aemond targaryen smut#ewan mitchell smut#hotd smut#aemond angst#hotd angst#aemond targaryen angst#aemond fanfic#hotd fanfiction#hotd fanfic#hotd fic#aemond x original character
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Forced Soulmate AU
Danny Fenton and Sam Manson enter the ghost portal shell together when Tucker dares them to both go in. A single entity leaves, a ghost named Nightshade.
Nightshade has snow white hair that falls to their neck and glowing green eyes, and wears a black and white hazmat suit with a circle on their chest. They look at Tucker and call his name as if unsure if its really him, their voice has an eerie echo, like two people talking at the same volume at the same time.
As they reach towards him a ring runs across their body, leaving Sam and Danny desperately holding onto one another. They look at each other for a while, almost seeming to have a conversation without words.
Other things @itshype and I decided for this AU but I couldn't find a way to put into this little story snippet
1). They have to be within arms reach of one another to transform, or it hurts both of them and the transformation isn't nearly as powerful
2). They feel empty when not in close proximity to one another, because their ghost, and thus their souls, have fused together.
3). Their ghost form has traits of both of them, both personality wise and appearance wise. Most traits meet halfway.
4). If they are apart long enough Sam and Danny start to get ill.
5). The Manson Parents are a bit more supportive of Danny in this AU, as Sam's Physical Wellbeing is tied to Danny, and vice versa.
6).When Vlad tries to clone Danny and takes from Nightshade to do it, it makes Ellie Sam and Danny's daughter.
7). They always know in what direction and how far away their other half is. in addition they have telepathy between their human forms, and just between them.
8). Nightshade has all of Phantom's powers, as they are half Phantom, but Sam brings in portals, hypnosis, and fire, amongst whatever else people want to add.
@hdgnj @evilminji @hypewinter @radiance1 @spidori @lolottes @the-witchhunter @mutable-manifestation
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The Crossroads of Destiny
Strap in folks it's finally finale time!
I'm getting a bad feeling from the 'previously on' segment.
*gasp* Song's bird horse!?!?!
Toph gets some serious speed with that earth tongue walking.
Ty Lee's flattery gets less and less subtle. I get the feeling that a lot of Azula's more worrying tendencies could have been curtailed if someone had stuck her on stage as a child.
Is Zuko taller?
The cuts between these scenes are getting ridiculous. Some of these scenes are maybe 15 seconds long.
Zuko knows what's up. He and Iroh have teamed up on that particular fire breathing party trick before.
"It's time I face Azula." Buddy. No.
"You're so dramatic." POT. KETTLE. BLACK.
The last time Iroh and the Aang Gang teamed up, it was also against Azula. She has a way of uniting enemies.
The longer I stare at this the more I giggle.
"Good inside him isn't enough. Why don't you come back when it's outside him too, ok?" Congratulations to Sokka for articulating one of the fundamental human truths. Intentions can go take a hike when all that's visible are actions.
I love that! Iroh says he brought someone along in a tone that very much implies that he asked for help from a friend! Then you go outside and see he kidnapped a dude! And then they just leave him there!
I see your fake meditation. No one as rotten inside as this guy actually meditates properly.
The Dai Li be like
Katara? Why are you ripping into Zuko? Why is Season one bitchy Katara back? I don't want season 1 bitchy Katara to come back.
"No offence." "None taken." Iroh loves his nephew, but Iroh knows his nephew.
The one time Iroh's advice is explicitly solicited is the one time his advice is corny crap. That sucks.
Ba Sing Se is a tel? That's neat.
Hey Toph? Now would be a great time for that new metal bending trick of yours.
Avatar inadvertently validating my fear of subway grates.
I know this is life or death serious and all, but isn't the Sokka and Ty Lee dynamic cute?
MOMO!
This episode's thesis statement boils down to "what happens when you cancel arts programs and theatre kids don't get a chance to monologue in controlled conditions."
Honest question: Is Azula actually so deluded to believe that Divine Right of Kings crap she just spouted, or is she saying what the Dai Li needs to hear to side with her? Usually I think everything out of Azula's mouth is a calculated statement for manipulating others, but the way the show framed that monologue makes me think she actually believes what she's saying.
This conversation between Katara and Zuko, aside from showing that Katara is as capable as Sokka at sticking her foot in her mouth, is actually showing Zuko's growth well. So many of the things that he waves away with an "it's ok" are things that would have made him explode back in season one. It's about time he redefined that scar of his too.
"Aang! I knew you'd come!" "Uncle! The fuck?" Zuko truly has a way with words.
Hey Iroh maybe save your heart to heart until after you've exited the prison?
Wait so this episode is named after Zuko's arc? It's Zuko's destiny this finale is dealing with? Poor Aang's not even the main character in his eponymous show's season finale? Dang.
What was I saying about waiting to chat until you're outside the prison?
So every word out of Azula's mouth here is definitely a lie. She doesn't need Zuko at all. She's got a whole army and already has possession of the throne. What does she need with someone she considers to be an inferior firebender?
Father's love? That guy who burns off faces? The audacity.
"You are free to choose." Is it really freedom of choice if choosing the answer Azula doesn't want to hear ends with Zuko in a crystal cage?
Gotta say I'm intrigued by how quiet Zuko's being for this whole episode. Compare it to the volume of his confrontation with Azula at the Spa place at the beginning of the season.
This is so awful. This is so skin crawly. This is so going to end badly.
Toph can turn doors into ping pong balls. I like that. And what does she need Sokka scouting for Dai Li agents for? She can sense people for miles.
I love the line read on the "I'm not leaving without Bosco!" But does this guy really think he's in a position to make demands, after all the stuff he's ruined in the last, what, two days?
This is a cool move. Full body air bitchslap.
Katara cut her hair! That's kind of like what she did to Pakku with the ice disks.
How has no one been knocked out yet? Everyone in this fight should have at least 5 concussions by now.
I don't know what to make of it, but when Zuko says "I have changed" he sounds more calm and confident than he has all season.
I love the dynamic between Sokka & Toph and Mai & Ty Lee. Everyone involved knows they're second string and no one's really that invested. So they're all kind of chill.
I don't know what's going on in this fight, but Zuko is far too talented and Katara and Aang are both going down too easily.
And this right here is why this fight is only going to end badly for Aang. As soon as Azula's tired of playing, she'll call in reinforcements. Aang doesn't have those.
I hate Azula so much, which means I'm very annoyed to say that she and Zuko actually make a good fighting team. Did they practice drills together or something back in the day? They way they tag out and back in, and exchange fights, flows so well.
Jesus
Crap ok
She nerfed him in the power up sequence! That's not allowed!
So help me god if the writers hook these two up after pulling this crap I will riot.
Iroh could have been helpful if he'd been there earlier. Guess it takes a while to break out of crystals. Although I do like the detail that he stops fighting as soon as Aang and Katara are out & safe.
I was wondering why the magic water was randomly brought up earlier after disappearing for the entire season. I figured it had been lost in the desert with the rest of the stuff on Appa's saddle.
I'm so sorry, but the way Aang's arrow flashes once to confirm that Katara's saved him makes him look like an external USB device confirming successful connection.
I'm loving how immediate the regret from Zuko is. Proof that he has learned over the last two seasons.
"The Earth Kingdom... has fallen." AND WHOSE FAULT IS THAT? This King rubs me the wrong way. Consistently.
I'm fascinated by the fact that they managed to securely transport a bear on Appa's back.
Final Thoughts
Poor Aang has been demoted to secondary character in his own show. This finale was all Fire Nation.
Well done Azula. No matter which way you look at it, she won. If Azula was the main character, this episode would be the crowning glory series finale.
Sokka and Toph spent the whole episode running around putting out fires, only for five more to spring up in their place. I honestly don't know how they and Appa reconnected with the rest of the Gaang to fly out at the end. There's this feeling the whole episode of being consistently one too many steps behind, and I think it's most obvious in their incessant side quests.
Poor Katara went through about seventy billion emotions this episode. I take back my anger at her bitchiness. She deserved a vent session, although I don't think Zuko quite deserved to be the recipient of it. But he took it well.
Congratulations to Zuko for falling backwards into the only right choice for all the wrong reasons. This episode was only going to end with Azula victorious. She recruited an army and successfully executed a coup without breaking a sweat - that is not a level of enemy that Aang and friends has ever faced before, and not one they can realistically win against. Like with Long Feng, this is not a threat you can hit. You can't bend at ideologies and loyalties.
Zuko was going to end this episode siding with the Fire Nation as a free man, or in Fire Nation custody. This way, someone with an actual semi-functioning conscience now has access to the upper levels of the Fire Nation. This could be really interesting.
To be clear, I fully believe that Zuko chose to side with Azula because he swallowed her offer hook, line & sinker. For the guy who invented "Azula always lies" he sure does fall for her lies a lot, especially when she's saying exactly what he wants to hear. I believe Zuko believed her about getting his honour back bla bla bla, chose to follow her because of that belief, and has already realised at least some of what she said was lies by the end of the episode. Which is promising! It looks like there's potential for a Zuko mole next season!
I'm worried for Iroh. Firelords who burn their children's faces off with no shame don't strike me as the type to shy away from executing their brothers.
The Aang fakeout death at the end was not remotely believable unfortunately, mostly because kids' cartoons don't ever pull a Psycho and kill the nominal main character half way through. It probably would have freaked me out if I'd seen this episode as a kid though.
Azula hitting Aang during his power up sequence was inspired. A very well done subversion of expectations, which finally validates my frustrations with the concept of power up sequences in general. Few things bug me more than the mooks politely waiting their turn while the good guy does a quick wardrobe change.
So... is the war over? The Earth Kingdom's fallen, the Southern Water Tribe have been functionally out of the game for a while now. There's only the Northern Water Tribe left, which are only still standing because of a Hail Mary that I very much doubt Aang can pull off twice. So is next season's focus going to be defending the Northern Water Tribe from a final Fire Nation push? I think that's the only place that isn't conquered by the Fire Nation in name at least. On the bright side, this means the Gaang won't be returning to Ba Sing Se. Good riddance. I hate that place.
I've never seen a show with a finale that focuses so intensely on the conflict of someone other than the main character. I don't really know what to make of this episode. I think I liked the one before it better. To be clear, everything that happened made sense - characters were in character, events unfolded as expected (if you handwave an elite force of earthbenders preferring a 14 year old over their seasoned leader), but something about this episode is just a bit boring to me. Maybe they telegraphed it too hard in the previous episodes? I don't know. I'll have to chew on this one a bit.
#atla#avatar: the last airbender#avatar the last airbender#the crossroads of destiny#a resounding meh
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Persephone's Binding Part 4
AO3 Prompt Part 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Jazz guided Jason through the halls to the library, it seemed to be in a different wing of the castle from where the living spaces were. When they reached a split between a hallway and a set of stairs she hesitated, placing a hand on one one of the banisters and turning to face him. She looked at him considering before nodding to herself and picking up her skirts to go up the stairs.
"We'll take a shortcut over the wall, because you're death-touched you can safely breathe the air without it overwhelming you with intense emotions and obsessive behavior." She said absentmindedly to him as if air that could cause such things were normal.
"Uh, glad for that then?" He said following her. She opened the door at the top of the stairs and strode outside, not even glancing at the absurd sky.
It was eerie to say the least, swirling Lazarus and emerald green with purples and blacks making the sky look like an oil slick. He expected the air of the dimension that contains all the afterlives to be colder, but it was pleasantly warm with a gentle breeze blowing by. If he closed his eyes he could imagine standing on a hill watching the clouds go by. On one side of the wall they were atop was a courtyard containing plants that Ivy would drool for, it was nearly as overrun as her greenhouse.
He noticed one of the towers had what appears to be an observatory, though he wasn't sure what besides doors, floating islands and general terrifying shapes they would see through it. "What's with the observatory?"
She glanced at it and gained a fond smile on her face. "That's Danny's. He always wanted to be an astronaut but circumstances prevented that. That telescope can connect to any telescope in our home universe. Even the ones in deep space. He's going to IRU right now for aerospace navigation. There's a dimension he was hoping to spend a couple years in before he has to take the crown that has intergalactic space travel as the norm." She seemed to light up when she spoke of her brother, obviously proud of him.
"Wait, Danny's who you're Regent for? Not a son?" Jason wouldn't have minded if she had a kid kicking around, but to find that the kid he met earlier is the future King of Everything In-between was surprising.
"Oh, yes, Right, I'll explain everything I can once we get to the library, it's just through here." Once inside again, she took brisk steps forward to doors directly across the hall. "Here we are, my favorite spot is just this way."
They stepped out onto a second floor balcony of a three story high library. Books spanned from floor to ceiling in a room the size of a small stadium. Shelves and tables made from a purple wood polished to a shine. Deep red velvet seats on all the chairs and couches in each of the reading spaces. Jason stood flabbergasted at the sheer volume of books present. He felt a hand on his shoulder and he turned to see a conspiratorial smile in teal eyes. "I had the same reaction when I first came here. Come on, my favorite spot to talk is this way."
They made their way to a corner of the library that had a pair of chairs, a tea table between them and a small fireplace, lit with a ghostly blue flame. They sat and she looked at the fire, then at him, then back at the fire and sighed heavily. She closed her eyes, gathering her thoughts before she spoke.
"Once upon a time there were three scientists in college who wanted to build a portal to the 'Ghost Zone' as they called it so they could study an research entities they referred to as 'ghosts'. Their definition being that any entity that produces, metabolizes or consumes the substance ectoplasm is a 'ghost'." She paused here, clasping her hands together and looking down at them. "There was an accident, I'm not going to go into too many details for now, but just know that one of the scientists became something more than human. The first of his kind in a millennia, a statistical improbability. Some things happened and he believed that he lost the only woman he could ever love to the man that caused him to become something other than human, to become partially one of the creatures they sought to capture and experiment on.
She glanced up and stared into the middle distance, remembering. "Twenty years pass and the two other scientists are now married with children. They've had a lab in their home since they graduated college at the top of their field in ectoscience. They have a daughter and a son, both are born ectocontaminated though they don't know for years later. They've been working on a new portal, this time bigger, large enough to fit a car through." She laughs lightly. "I remember coming down and shoving granola bars and thermoses filled with soup when they were on work binges, determined to get 'just a little bit more done Jazzy-pants, then we'll go to bed'" She gazed wistfully at the fire. "They usually did once they finished whatever food I brought to them, not wanting to have a repeat of the last time they left something with old food in it and it gained sentience and mass enough to chew a few hazmat boots."
She seemed lost for a moment before she cleared her throat. "Sorry, um, where was I?" She blinked before raising a hand up pointing at the ceiling. "Right, the portal. So they spent a good decade start to finish on it. It was going to be their crowning achievement, but when they plugged it in they saw some sparks, but nothing else happened." She folded her hands together on her lap. "They left for a weekend. Went to search for some cryptid they had been meaning to go find for years, but had put off to work on the portal. I was in charge for the weekend, a thing I was used to from whenever they were on design binges. Danny had his friends over and I was in my room studying. I had my headphones on, I don't even remember what band was playing, and I think I was working on chem homework?" She shook herself from the thought. "Anyway, there was this power surge, I remember just thinking that I was mad that it happened right during my favorite part of the song and I was singing into my pencil. When the lights went out, I had the usual expected dread in the pit of my stomach, but something felt especially frightening in this moment. I didn't have time to dwell on it, shaking it off as just being paranoid. I was more concerned with getting my music back on after that. I should have realized something had happened." She tightened her hands until the shook, pale knuckles stood out.
"I'm not telling you details, but there was another accident with a portal, this time it was Danny. He became something more than human. He became the second halfa in a millennia."
"Halfa?"
"Yes, Half human, half ghost. An anomaly, a myth, a statistical outlier. He walks the line between life and death. He will have many titles once he takes the throne, and one of those will be the Balance."
"Damn, that's a lot to put on a kid. How'd that happen?"
"I found out all of this second-hand mind you. I may have known his secret when it all happened, but he didn't know I knew yet."
"How'd he hide suddenly having powers? I don't expect he had particularly good control over them at first, I know several supers who didn't."
Jazz hung her head in shame. "I was too deep in my own head at that point. I was neck-deep in research on how to parent troubled teens because while I missed all his slips for power usage, I did not miss his decline in grades. Especially when the chemistry teacher approached me about the fact he kept 'dropping' equipment." She held up air quotes. "Turns out not being able to control tangibility can cause mass amounts of property damage, who knew?" she shrugged her shoulders.
"So basically, the original halfa guy from earlier managed to gain wealth and power using his powers in increasingly shady ways. He also grew obsessed with my mom and blamed my dad for turning him into a halfa. He wanted revenge. He invited us all to a college reunion where he found out about Danny. Things happened and they became nemeses with Vlad wanting Danny to denounce our father and become his son with my mom at his side. You're allowed to say ew, it was very ew for a long time." She laughed at his scrunched up face. "Anyway, he finds out about ancient ghostly artefacts that are supposed to give the user unimaginable power, and finds out where they are. He finds out they are locked away with the former King of the Realms, and he expects to be able to just grave rob the ruler of the Infinite. He manages to get the Ring before Pariah wakes up, and somehow manages to escape back to out home dimension. All ghosts flee the Realms through the most stable portal available; the one in my family basement. This causes alerts to go out all across the town and my parents put up defenses for people to huddle under during everything. Some stuff happened and it ended up leading to Danny taking a suit our parents had built and defeating the former King Pariah Dark and sealing him away in the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep.
"Infinite Realms Law dictates that if the leader is defeated in single combat, and the combatant continues after said encounter, then they are to be crowned High Royal and any family members gain royal titles as well. Danny is, however, too young for his classification. He is too young by human years, he must be twenty-one for that, and too young for halfa standards, he must be a halfa for a decade. He won't be of the majority for at least another five years, and then he must have it on the following solstice. Until that time, he is High Prince and must work on learning leadership and combat skills." She gazed calmly at him, resigned for her brother's fate.
"So how'd you end up Regent?" She sighed and closed her eyes, shoulders dropping.
"We had a council for a while, the Council of Ancients, new and old working alongside the Observants. It worked for a little while, but something happening in my home dimension was causing issues. You see, the ghost problem in our town after the portal opened became a pretty big issue when property damage resulted in the thousands and you can't bill the dead. Danny was doing his best to fight off as much as he could, but he wasn't trained and was very new to his powers. It didn't help that our parents were shooting at him while he was trying to save people." She grumbled and Jason's hands tightened to fists.
"What do you mean they shot at him?" He asked as evenly as he could. He could feel the tinges of old hurts coming to the surface. A Batarang to the throat.
"They never hit him, he dodged every time. They didn't know it was him. They thought it was just a ghost, and to them, all ghosts were evil. They had a lot of bias in the majority of their research, but as soon as they found out who he was they immediately changed tack. They had Danny stay at Vlad's for a weekend, which was it's own can of worms, while they disarmed the house and set everything to ignore his ecto signature." She looked thoughtful. "Apparently Vlad wasn't a complete jerk that weekend either, Danny told him what they found out and Vlad, worried for the second of his species, actually helped him through some emotions and helped him train some. I think it's what started on his redemption actually."
Jason breathed out heavily letting his rage dissipate. "You keep saying 'the second' instead of the 'the only'. There are more?" He quirked an eyebrow at her.
"Oh, yes, there's Ellie and Dante. Ellie is my younger sister, she's a clone of Danny Vlad made, and Dante is an evil alternate timeline version of Danny and Vlad that fused together and is inhabiting a clone of Danny Vlad wasn't able to pull into consciousness." She let him digest that for a moment.
Jason choked out a laugh. "Man, and I thought my sibling situation was weird."
Jazz's eyes narrowed, appraising him almost like a predator eyeing prey. "Hmm. We'll discuss your family situation later." She cleared her throat gathering her thoughts. "Anyway, so the property damage led to the government getting involved. More specifically a branch known as the Ghost Investigation Ward or GIW for short. They were founded on the first research papers my parents produced which were heavily biased against ecto-entities on a whole. They were extremely prejudiced against ghosts.
"They started out as a nuisance. Someone easily distracted by getting their suits dirty or faulty equipment. Then the Anti-Ecto Acts were ratified. Then they got bolder. They paid my parents a fake amount of money to buy the house as-is with the portal. They planned to send a nuke in to destroy the Realms believing it to be full of horrendous monsters. Thankfully the nuke was a dud model and someone definitely got fired that day in ordering. But after that they just started to get worse and worse. They were starting to go after anyone who pinged on their detectors, which were just getting more and more precise as time went on.
"Here's the thing about Amity Park, my hometown. It was founded by witches fleeing the witch trials. It sits at the crossing between ley lines, and it's always been a spot that the veil was thin. Ectoplasm would leak through natural portals that popped up from time to time. Add a stable portal to the mix? The entire town was now ectocontaminated. They were now classified as liminal. They were now death-touched enough that they pinged on the GIW's equipment. They began raiding people's homes, accusing them of harboring ghosts. Danny's entire home room got taken in for questioning one day, they had set up little interrogation rooms like a blood drive in the gymnasium." She chuckled darkly. "They got so close so many times, too many times." Her left hand clenched into a fist.
"My parents found out about Danny when the raids first started. He'd decided it was time to come clean because it was only a matter of time before they came knocking at our door. Thankfully, they came while Danny was at Vlad's and they never had the guts to storm the billionaire's house. I managed to avoid detection by wearing a Specter-Deflector and my parents were always in their hazmat suits so they didn't ping either. Things got worse, Danny had to beg the Council to make an edict to not come through the portal for the foreseeable future.
"It didn't work, various beings saw it as a challenge. They began to lose faith in their future ruler. If he couldn't protect his little town and the people in it, how was he supposed to protect them? It was a common sentiment. It was something I grew tired of hearing during one particular fight." She stared at the blue flames of the fireplace, not seeing the flickering light. "Danny was down. Mom and Dad and Vlad were fighting together to both capture the ghost before they could do more damage and stop the GIW from capturing another ghost to experiment on and dispose of. The ghost was the fourth one that week spouting the same bullshit." She spat the word out like a curse, growling before looking into the middle distance with sad eyes. Softly, she spoke, "There was an explosion." She blinked, coming back to focus. My parents were down. My youngest siblings were now fighting. I made a decision." She squared her shoulders and tightened her jaw, determination filling out her features. "I had been helping Danny study to become King, I had read up on all the important laws. I took the Specter Speeder to the council chambers. I stood before them and declared as the eldest and therefore heir and head of the Nightingale family, the Royal family, and that I was at the majority for my classification, I would be taking the title of Regent until Danny reached his majority. I took the Crown and the Ring and my own suit and went to the fight.
"I told Dante and Ellie to get Danny and go, there was nothing that could be done for our parents. I subdued and contained the ghost and then beat back the GIW until they were at the borders of Amity. Then, using power I had just gained, I pulled the entire town into the Infinite Realms." She held out her hands, gesturing to the general vicinity.
He sat with that for a moment. "Wait, wait wait, you're just gonna skim over the fact your parents died?"
Jazz's eyes hardened. "Never." Her eyes glowed yellow for a moment and her hair seemed to float a bit when she said the word. "I just met you, and it's still a sore wound, I'd rather not get into it if that's alright with you." She held herself rigid as if expecting him to press the issue.
"Whoa, it's okay, nevermind, touchy subject, I get it. Most people I know have their parents as a touchy subject. Especially dead ones." He kept his posture open, slouching a little to show he didn't mean to pry.
She hummed thoughtfully, appraising him once more. "So, I told you my story, earlier you told me some of yours. I think that's enough sharing for one day. I don't know about you, but I am very tired. If you like, you may stay here. Just ring the bell on the mantle and Jeeves will be here to assist you. If not, I'd be glad to walk you back to the guest rooms, they are down the hall from the family rooms." She stood and waited for his response.
"Um, yeah, let's walk back together. I had a couple questions about some of the books in my room?" They walked and talked together as they made their way towards the bedrooms. They parted ways with a promise to read the same book and give each other feedback on it in a week.
"Well, this is me." He said awkwardly indicating the hall his room was in, hers was in the opposite hall.
"Yup, I'm not sure when I'll get the chance to see you tomorrow, I have a full day up until dinner, but I'll see you then?" She looked inquiringly at him.
"Yeah, definitely! See you tomorrow!" He said and turned down the hall. He jogged until he got to the door, opened it and then leaned against it falling to the floor. "Okay, so I may not have entirely screwed this up, but man, she's been through a lot already. Do I want to add my shit to it?" He thought to himself, spiraling until he was clutching his hair. He growled and stood up, then stalked towards the bed and flopped down on it, back first this time.
"I mean, I might be stuck here, so would my baggage really matter that much?" He laid there for a moment before deciding to get ready for bed. Once laying down again, he kept thinking of all the different ways he as a person could fuck this or her up if he pursued a relationship. He worried himself to sleep that night.
#dpxdc#fanfic#long post.#jazz x jason#hardcover ship#anger management ship#sacrificial bride au#Persephone's Binding#I'll post AO3 and such later
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Gender of the Planets
Note: this post will present the conditions necessary for planets to have a more masculine or feminine expression; it has nothing to do with an individual's gender. Also this is worded in a black and white manner just to help you understand the concept better. The source of this information is the book Ancient Astrology in Theory and Practice: a Manual of Traditional Techniques, Volume One: Assessing Planetary Condition by Demetra George.
I prepared some example for you guys to follow and hopefully be able to apply the knowledge in your own charts as well. Enjoy <3
Masculine energy/expression is initiative, quick to act, welcoming of change
Feminine energy/expression is receptive, takes her time and is resistant to change
The Masculine and Feminine Planets
Masculine planets: Sun, Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn
Feminine planets: Moon and Venus
Most actually consider Mercury to be a neutral planet; I am going with Masculine.
Now to figure out which expression these planets shift to, while taking into consideration their essential gender, we will look at the following conditions:
1. Zodiacal signs:
Masculine signs: Aries, Gemini, Leo, Libra, Sagittarius, Aquarius (fire and air signs)
Feminine signs: Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, Pisces (water and earth signs)
Masculine planets act more in accordance with their basic nature when in masculine signs (Mercury in Sagittarius)
Feminine planets do the same when in Feminine signs (Venus in Pisces)
Masculine planets when in feminine signs (Mars in Taurus) do not operate so well and vice versa (Moon in Aquarius)
2. Solar phase (morning or night):
A planet is considered to be more masculinized when it is rising before the Sun, and becomes more feminized when it is following the Sun:
Pisces Venus example: (before, masculinized)
Sagittarius Mercury example: (after, feminized)
3. Quadrant:
This one is pretty simple. If the planet is between the Ascendant (ASC) and midheaven (MC), or between the Descendant (DSC) and Imum Coeli (IC), then the planet is more masculinized, otherwise it is more feminized.
By applying this we can see that the Pisces Venus in this chart is more masculinized in this way, and that the Sagittarius Mercury becomes more feminized.
Demetra also mentions Celestial Latitude; however, I do not know a lot about it so I decided to not include it in this post.
So you see, we started out with Mercury, a Masculine planet, being in the sign Sagittarius, a Masculine sign; this tells us that Mercury is in its element here and is able to express its masculine well, which would indicate that the native is the type to be an active and fast communicator. But then when looking at the solar phase condition we determined that this particular planet is of the evening phase. In other words, that it does not rise before the Sun; this caused Mercury to become more feminine. And then when we considered the Quadrant condition, we found that Mercury was in the second house therefore between the ASC and IC points, this leading the planet to become more feminine as well. So do not judge by Zodiacal signs only!!
Feel free to reach out if u need help with applying this knowledge on ur own chart!!
Thank you for reading <3
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#astrology#astro notes#astrology made easy#astrology basics#astro community#astro tumblr#ancient astrology#western astrology#hellenistic#hellenistic astrology
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I had a weirdest dream.
RWBY: the Movie, but directed like those late 2000s/early 2010s adaptations.
By that I mean the movie itself tries to cram as much plot as possible into the 90 minutes runtime (say, volumes 1 through 3), and the point-of-view character is more of a secondary character (Jaune) through which we see the main characters (Ruby and co.).
What's weird is that I even pictured the visuals.
It would have started with Jaune as a kid being bullied by everyone at his village for being half-faunus (his mother side, hare). His dad tries to cheer him with the tales of huntsmen and huntresses, but the stress of an entire village gets to him, so he runs away to become a huntsman and be more for his family's sake.
Cut to the classical montage of visuals and music intro of movies from that period, with a cover/remake of 'This Will Be the Day' that focuses more on the battery than on the singing.
The visuals themselves are Team RWBY in their trailer fights, only hyper saturated in a way that they were more like flat colors silhouettes with only small break (Ruby was all black and red, Weiss white and silver, Blake black and white and Yang gold and black).
It's all quick cuts between all four, gaining speed between the cuts until they're interrupted by the big bold letters of "RWBY: the Movie". Then those get smashed by Team RWBY jumping to the side in a team shot, followed by teams JNPR and CFVY, Penny and Sun, finally cut to black to display the in memoriam for Monty Oum.
Plot wise, the first act is teams RWBY and JNPR (without their names or teams formed yet) learning the ropes of Beacon academy, with Team CFVY being some sort of 'the ace' for the academy. At first Ruby and Jaune are antagonistic, with the 'teams' heading to a fight until they're interrupted by two giant grimms attacking Beacon. They learn to work together and all it's good.
Second act is a crimewave by Roman and the White Fang, but it's revealed none of the White Fang are faunus and they're posing as such to cover their tracks. Ruby meets Penny and Jaune meets Sun, with both teams converging in a fight with Adam and the fake White Fang (forcefully revealing Blake is a faunus and ex-member of the real White Fang).
In the end it's revealed that it was all a distraction and the real deal was an all out assault (Fake Fang and a wave of grimms) on Beacon. Big fight again, with Team CFVY joining in and showing off. In the middle of it, Ruby, Weiss, Jaune and Pyrrha make their way through a literal wall of grimms into the main building, witnessing Ozpin dueling a hooded woman (and getting thrown out of a window).
Final fight is with all four tag teaming the hooded woman, with Red Like Roses in the background. They're overwhelming her until she lands an arrow to Pyrrha's heel, which makes Ruby's eye glow and she goes berserk, blitzing the hooded woman so fast it looks like she's in four places at the same time, forcing her to escape.
Jaune saves Pyrrha's life by discovering his semblance (a plotpoint of the movie), and Ozpin appears again. He explains that what happened was in order to uncover a secret in Beacon Academy that could either save the world, or set it on fire.
Movie ends with a ceremony where Teams RWBY and Team JNPR becoming official and running off the academy's entrance for a wide team shot.
So, yeah. My dreams are weird like that.
#rwby#rwby au#is this an au?#i really don't want to tag this as rwby the movie#this fandom has gone through enough without that fakeout#ruby rose#jaune arc#you think linkin park would do covers for rwby's songs?#overall the feeling was gijoe the movie and doctor who the movie
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MIS ch.6, p.179 - Sorry About That
You can also find this page (and all the ones before it) on these sites: Comic Fury Tapas DeviantArt
Things seem to resolve much more peacefully with this group for now. XD
I'll let the page do the talking for itself today. For now, there's something else I'd like to focus on. As you may know, I don't like to advertise, but if there's one time of year I really ought to, it's right now. Is this because of Black Friday? Technically, yes. But today is also the 14th anniversary since Rain began! So, I'm gonna pretend today is all a big Rain celebration and nothing else! XD
First: Use the coupon code HOLIDAY30 to can get 30% off all of the Rain books on Lulu! Volumes 1-6 are currently available. In addition to telling the main story, these books also offer bonus chapters which expand upon the story. Already have them? Well, thank you! They also make great gifts for your friends, family, and loved ones! This code will work from now through December 2nd! https://www.lulu.com/spotlight/LittleLynn84
(Also, Volume 7 is still coming. I know I said 2024 last year, and I am sorry. It's been a rough year. I'll strive to get back on track with this next year. Thank you for your patience and understanding.)
Second: Save up to 60% on other merch on RedBubble! No code necessary! There are dozens of designs, including Rain or general queer art, or more lowkey things (for you closeted folks) like the Toaster on Fire logo, Black Wings Kaminari logo, or any of the magic alignment symbols from MIS. And all of these can be put on t-shirts, hats, notebooks, mugs, water bottles, stickers, pins, and more! https://www.redbubble.com/people/littlelynn84/shop
Happy 14th Anniversary, Rain! :D
And thank you so much for your support if you're able to buy anything, but please don't sweat it if you can't. ^_^
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Rose's favourite fics
(in no particular order)
part 2 here
Apparently I've linked about 50 fics so I'm sorry, I'm not going to add all the summaries for these fics.
Blue Lock
For Blue Lock I'd recommend checking out smallghosts and explorerseel8's profile
pride hath no place by vani_em (NagiReo)
raison d'être by explorerseel8 (ReoNagi)
Take Five by explorerseel8 (ReoNagi)
truth or drink by smallghosts (ReoNagi)
AITA for “abandoning” my best friend by smallghosts (ReoNagi)
fall forward/spring back by nagireo (NagiReo)
as long as I'm with you by okonomiyakein (NagiReo)
Player 2 by explorerseel8 (HioRin)
Kuroko no Basuke
Please read literally everything by umisabaku
A Kinda Sorta Fairy Tale by Lys ap Adin (MidoTaka)
But I Lived by exuberant_imperfection, kate882 (MidoTaka)
Designation: Miracle (series) by umisabaku (KagaKuro, KiKasa, AkaFuri, AoMomo, MidoTaka)
as small as a world by umisabaku (MidoTaka)
in the liminal darkness by 100demons (MidoTaka)
Haikyuu
(the sad thing is that I read a ton of Haikyuu and KnB fics before I got my ao3 account so it's a slow journey finding all my fav fics again)
I put my hand out, unfolded, into the sunlight by carafin (BokuAka)
I'll give a bouquet to these unending days by sparksandsalt (BokuAka)
love in the time of wifi by dalyeau (BokuAka)
tea-stained polaroids by dalyeau (BokuAka)
video games and gold rings by gnomeo (KuroKen)
Ear to Ear by darkmagicalgirl (AoFuta)
Yaku and the Beanstalk by Mysecretfanmoments (YakuLev)
One Piece
For my fellow ZoSan fans: literally everything by Hazel_Athena, Harubo, 8ball, donutsandcoffee and three_days_late are worth checking out
More Ace-centric: Dezace and stormy1x2's fics that make me Feel Things
Wanted by Hazel_Athena (ZoSan)
Disoriented Envy by Hazel_Athena (ZoSan)
Can you hear me now? by Alexis_C (ZoSan)
Learning to Listen by three_days_late (ZoSan)
this, at least by adietxt (ZoSan)
come on, come on (turn a little faster) by donutsandcoffee (ZoSan)
Late Night with Sanji Black by Harubo (ZoSan)
Love's First Blush by Hazel_Athena (ZoSan)
they said love is reaching blindly at a pit full of snakes by summermidnights (ZoSan)
Complex Buddies by threesipsmore (ZoSan)
you and me somehow by losingcontrolnow (AceSan)
Cryptid Sightings Volume #1: Portgas D. "Fire Fist" Ace by Dezace (Gen, Ace-centric)
Spades On-Screen by stormy1x2 (Gen, Ace/WB pirates-centric)
whatever you can still betray by midnightluck (Gen, Ace/WB pirates-centric)
Hide the Knives by SrirachaBunny (Gen, Ace/WB pirates-centric)
The Wanderer by MaiKusakabe (Gen, Badass!Marco)
Genshin Impact
For Genshin, I'd recommend heartslogos and smallghosts
Burgeon by gloomyparfait (HaiKaveh)
Forget Your Name (Replace it with mine) by princesscas (Thomato)
the purest form of water by eversall (XingYun)
to be unbroken and brave again by magicities (XiaoVen)
Chonghua's Layered Frost by pureofheart_rareofpair (XingYun)
cloudburst by smallghosts (XingYun)
keep the caffeine away from kids by shynkai (scara-centric, slight HaiKaveh)
The Verdure and the Puppet by kimekosu (Gen, Nahida & Wanderer)
truck, barter and trade by Seungshi03 (Established HaiKaveh, them raising Wanderer)
James Bond (Craig movies)
I remember really liking anything by Jen, skylights, scioscribe, pdameron, and opalescentgold
Memos from Q branch by AviaCarter (Gen, background 00Q)
Sic Pravis Magna by blackidyll (00Q)
ordinary, everyday things by pdameron (00Q)
Dramatic Arts by scioscribe (00Q)
Ordinary Numbers by BootsnBlossoms, Kryptaria (00Q)
#blue lock#bllk#reonagi#nagireo#haikyuu#bokuaka#kuroko no basuke#knb#midotaka#one piece#zosan#portgas d ace#genshin impact#haikaveh#xingyun#plus a dash of#00Q#fic rec#more of a compilation of my fav fics for easy access really#a fic rec in 2023??? yeah i know#this feels like me baring my soul to whoever's reading this
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My favourite moments from Justice League x RWBY Part 2, as 30 screenshots:
(Most of these were posted back in October when I was talking about what I liked after first seeing it, but thanks to @strawberry-seal77 I realised not everyone interested in seeing screenshots from that movie would have seen that post, and this time there's a minimum of my rambling)
Starting in Vacuo:
Sisterly love. Also Bumbleby moment 1: they're totally holding hands behind Yang's thigh.
I love how Ruby's just resigned to Yang shoving her head out of the way.
Blake ready to get a padlocked door open.
Gambol Shroud ready too.
A slash and a kick and BAM! Breaking and entering 101 by Blake Belladonna.
Bumbleby moment 2: a wink and a finger gun = blushing Blake.
Newly arrived on Earth and Yang notices something is missing from her girlfriend... aka Bumbleby moment 3.
Poor Blake does not approve of missing cat ears. Same, Blake, same.
Blake's hand on her shoulder makes Yang pause.
Also known as Bumbleby moment 4: Blake being a supportive girlfriend.
Sisterly love again. Aww. Hugging it out.
Ruby giving Yang some reassurance.
Two Grimm learning not to mess with Yang. Especially when Burn is charged up.
Yang: on fire but not actually screaming. Just a battle cry.
If Grimm had the sense they'd run from Yang when she's like this.
Catching Wonder Woman's fist mid punch.
A possessed Wonder Woman I might add. That's really Kilg%re Yang's punching.
Sending possessed!Wonder Woman flying.
And through at least two trees.
Checking on Ruby after she got hit by possessed!Wonder Woman.
Worried Yang.
Expressing concern again.
Silver eye reflecting Yang, a neat mirror of what happened in Volume 9.
Good news: they got Kilg%re out of Wonder Woman.
Bad news:
There's a reason why that grin isn't normal for Yang...
Kilg%re creeping out Blake. Also not on one of these pics: Bumbleby moment 5 when Blake tells Kilg%re he could never fool her while pretending to be Yang.
Weiss: "You can't have her!"
Black Canary catching Yang after they get Kilg%re out of her.
Blake and Weiss supporting Yang while she recovers from having Kilg%re in her head.
Yang very much unimpressed with Watts.
Victory celebration, with the second Bees kiss on camera (Bumbleby moment 6)
And I've finally hit the image limit on a tumblr post. That was the end of them though.
#Justice League x RWBY#Bumbleby#Yang Xiao Long#Blake Belladonna#RWBY Ruby#Weiss Schnee#long post#deadbeatbirdmom posts
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Falling
Crowley has never been one for relationships. Neither have you. But when a meeting in your favourite Angel's bookshop leaves you both breathless, you might just allow yourselves to finally be loved.
Crowley x fem!reader
Use of y/n, dual perspective
Warnings: None! Crowley being an idiot xoxo
1,419 words
................................................................................................
Chapter 1
You sat curled up in an armchair, laptop balanced on your knees, fresh cup of tea steaming on the coffee table beside you as the rain drummed against the windows in your favourite spot to get some work done. You’d befriended Aziraphale months ago when you’d discovered his bookshop, which stocked so many beautiful and unique volumes that you couldn’t help but return multiple times a week. Eventually, you began to use the space to work, both you and Aziraphale providing quiet companionship to one another. You’d laughed at first when Aziraphale confessed that he was an Angel, believing him to be jesting as you so often did with one another. However, after much questioning (and many hours listening to his stories gathered over thousands of years of existence) you came to realise that his little quirks made sense for an other-worldly being and your friendship became even more dear to you.
Tapping away at your keyboard as usual, you heard the little bell above the front door tinkle, signalling a customer. You didn’t look up, the appearance of a customer being nothing out of the ordinary, until something in the stranger’s voice as he greeted your friend stilled your fingers. He had marched over to Aziraphale’s desk, asserting in a low growl “Aziraphale, we have a problem. It’s…” His voice trailed off as he noticed the cease in the click of your fingers against your keyboard. You lifted your head to greet your friend’s guest, but words seemed to fail you as you gazed upon him. Tall, slender, slicked back red hair, dark sunglasses, and impeccably clad from head to toe in black. He was… well, he was gorgeous.
~~~
Crowley forgot why he was angry. If he was honest, for a moment he couldn’t remember why he’d come to find Aziraphale. Hair nonchalantly pulled back out of your face, wide eyes, plump lips parted slightly, curves in all the places he liked them. He had taken many intimate partners over his thousands of years, but you were something entirely unique. Never had Crowley felt self-conscious before, but when your eyes met his, he was awfully aware of his arms. How did he usually stand? Surely his arms didn’t always feel this heavy and awkward?
Thankfully, Aziraphale swooped in to his rescue. “Crowley, this is my dear friend [y/n]. [y/n], Crowley.” “Pleasure.” Crowley murmured, his gaze never leaving yours. You smiled. Hell, Crowley swore it was the prettiest damn smile he had seen in his entire existence.
~~~
“You had a problem?” You reminded, feeling your cheeks begin to heat up under his gaze. Despite standing across the room from you, his stare had you pinned to the chair, feeling as though he could see straight into your soul. “A… Ah, yes! Aziraphale, I need to speak with you in private.” Crowley remembered, finally breaking eye contact and rushing your friend into the back room.
You sat, fingers frozen above your keyboard, staring at the door Aziraphale and Crowley had just disappeared behind and let out a breath you didn’t realise you’d been holding. You were a flirt. You loved to make people chase you and relished in their satisfaction when you finally gave them what they wanted. You loved a passionate fling that ended in fire. Rarely did anyone take your breath away quite like Crowley had in this very brief introduction. You wanted him. Badly. But something told you he was not the type to chase after a woman. You would have to change your approach.
Just as you were resolving to lay your flirting on thick to ensure he knew what you wanted, the door to the back room flew open and Crowley marched out of the bookshop without so much as a glance in your direction. You sat dumbfounded, staring at the door swinging closed. Aziraphale hurried out of the back room, flustered. “Oh don’t mind Crowley. He’s not really a people person.” He apologised, punctuating the last two words with exaggerated bunny ears.
“Is he… like you?” You asked, finally dragging your gaze away from the door and over to your friend. “Yes. Well… sort of.” He replied, flipping distractedly through the pages of a large volume he was studying. “Sort of?” You pressed. “He’s a Demon.” Aziraphale replied quietly. “A Demon?” You asked incredulously, laughing a little. “As in, fallen Angel, lives in Hell kind of Demon?” “Yes.” You stared at the Angel. You wouldn’t have believed him had you not already known all of the stories your friend had recounted to you. “Well, he only ever goes back to Hell reluctantly, but yes, he is a Demon.” You were silent for a second, before thinking out loud, “I didn’t expect Demons to be so…” you struggled to find the most appropriate word, “pleasing to the eye.” “They’re not all so…” he turned to face you, “attractive?” He tested. You blushed. Aziraphale opened his mouth to taunt, but you interjected, “not a word!” The Angel mimed zipping shut his mouth and turned back to his desk, stifling his giggle.
~~~
Crowley returned to the bookshop almost daily. He would greet you, if you were there, with a curt nod of his head and a quick smirk, but couldn’t bring himself to talk more to you and it was frustrating him. Even worse, Aziraphale had noticed something was amiss. Crowley couldn’t blame him; he had visited the Angel’s bookshop more times in the past week than he had in the past year.
“Spit it out Crowley, what’s going on with you?” Aziraphale asked after Crowley had slumped into your armchair with a huff one day when you weren’t there. “Why would you think anything’s going on?” Crowley retorted sulkily. “You’re moping.” “I don’t mope.” Crowley insisted, dramatically resting his elbow on the arm of the chair and dropping the side of his head to his hand. “What you are doing is the very definition of moping.” Aziraphale insisted. “And I think it has something to do with [y/n].” “Why would it have anything to do with her? She’s not even here.” Crowley complained. “Exactly.” Aziraphale observed, causing Crowley to huff. “You should ask her on a date. She would say yes, I think.” “A date? I don’t date.” Crowley retorted. “Court, wine and dine, whatever. Just take her out to dinner and get to know her. You’ll like her.” “I don’t want to like her.” Crowley snapped. “Liking her is the issue.” “Ah,” Aziraphale sighed knowingly, irritating Crowley even further. He huffed and shot up out of the chair, beginning to pace around the bookshop. “Liking people makes things too complicated. Feelings make things too complicated.” Crowley explained. “I don’t do complicated. I see someone attractive, I sleep with them a few times, then we part ways.” “It isn’t complicated when they like to in return.” Aziraphale advised. Crowley stopped his pacing suddenly. “She likes me too?” He asked. “Ah, well, I really shouldn’t…” Crowley shot over to the Angel, whipping off his sunglasses and staring face-to-face with his friend, yellow eyes suddenly extremely serpent-like. “Angel, don’t torment me. Does she share these feelings.” “Yes! Yes she does.” Aziraphale relented, slinking away from the demon as his pupils began to dilate again.
~~~
You entered the bookshop and stopped in your tracks. The air felt electric, making your skin prickle. “[y/n]!” Aziraphale greeted, almost nervously, hurrying over to you and taking the laptop from under your arm. “Is everything okay?” You asked cautiously, your eyes finally finding Crowley at the back of the shop. Aziraphale didn’t answer as Crowley turned and began to approach you. He stopped, so close to you that you could feel his body heat. His sunglasses were clutched in his hand, allowing you to see his eyes for the first time. They were unlike anything you had seen before, and you were mesmerised. Yellow-gold irises and serpent-like oval pupils gazed into your own eyes, causing your breath to catch in your throat. “Would you join me for dinner this evening?” He asked quietly, the sultry growl in his voice making your stomach flip. “I’d like that.” You replied softly, trying to conceal the smile that was tugging at the corners of your lips. “I’ll pick you up at eight.” Crowley asserted, putting his sunglasses back on and striding out of the shop. You stood in silence for a second before turning to Aziraphale. “He doesn’t know my address.” You stated. “I’ll pass it on.” He replied with a smile.
................................................................................................
chapter 2
#good omens#good omens x reader#crowley x reader#crowley#crowley good omens#gomens#ineffable husbands x reader#anthony j crowley#crowley x you
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On Heteromorphs and Heteromorphobia (Arc XV - My Villain Academia)
(Skewing away from the wiki arc titles here, because come the eff on; everyone on god's green earth calls this My Villain Academia, not "The Meta Liberation Army Arc.")
At the request of a kind asker, I'm trying something different with footnotes this time; you'll find them at the end of the relevant bullet point, rather than at the bottom of the post. I've also flagged the numbers in purple, though I left the text itself the default color. I hope people find that a little easier to handle than having to scroll all the way to the bottom, have two tabs open, or wait until the end when they've forgotten the context.
Content Warning: Mentions of the KKK, as well as anti-Korean hate crimes/speech in Japan.
The My Villain Academia Arc (Chapters 218-240)
Chapter 218:
Tsuyu’s weakness to cold is noted in-canon, rather than in a volume extra profile.
All of the people featured specifically in the Detnerat commercial are heteromorphs—a four-armed woman, a walrus gent, and a little gelatinous boy. Re-Destro pontificates about how people with these “newer types of bodies” struggled in the new era because they couldn’t find products that would meet their daily needs; mass production was not equipped—could never really be equipped—to handle the endless variety of body shapes and sizes that came about due to the Advent of the Extraordinary. It recollects the mall scene back in Chapter 68—or, even further back, Ojiro’s character sheet and UA’s lack of varied desks—and calls the reader to consider, once again, the sorts of special needs that those with heteromorphic bodies might have, and how difficult it can be to meet those needs. RD says that his company’s ability to rapidly customize and produce unique goods for every customer has made them #1 in their industry (lifestyle goods). Assuming there’s at least some truth to the commercial shpiel—and the newscaster does at least call Detnerat “a big player”—it suggests that plenty of other companies are not so good at the rapid+customizable combination. Of course, not all companies are trying to be all things to all people, but specialization costs money—as do speed and customization, really, and note that nowhere in the commercial is there a talking point about affordability! So mainly what the commercial leaves me wondering is what degree of inconvenience is still felt by heteromorphs, especially those who are somewhat cash-strapped. That strikes me as a particular hazard when it comes to child bullying. Of course, Japanese schools have uniforms, but I wonder how available tailoring and alterations are for students with particular needs? Is there a provided budget for that sort of thing? Financial aid? How much did Ojiro’s parents have to pay for him to have a full set of uniform pants with a hole for his tail in them? How about Shouji getting all his uniform tops made sleeveless? What arrangements had to be made for Shouto’s gym uniform to be fire retardant? Even setting uniforms aside, there are also their social lives outside of school to consider. Kids will absolutely notice when one of their number wears the same clothes all the time, or home-made clothes instead of name brand, or with obvious patchwork and repair. As in real life, it’s at the intersections of more than one type of disadvantage—in this case, a heteromorphic body combined with a low-income family—that problems become more likely.
Here in 218, almost fifty chapters after the first mention of them, we finally get the proper introduction and explanation of the Meta Liberation Army. Of course, they aren’t heteromorph-specific—the closest any of the named commander-types in RD’s inner circle get is Curious, with her bright blue skin and black sclera,[1] though certainly Re-Destro himself has drifted somewhat away from baseline compared to his ancestor. Regardless, their foundational belief is the deregulation of quirks, stemming from a time when any deviation from the norm made meta-humans targets. The compromise society reached—that quirks require a license to use—is restricting enough on those whose abilities are found with a baseline body, but, as I’ve brought up before, it makes life even more potentially fraught for heteromorphs. That kind of thing is basically a pre-written excuse for heroes or police to stop and harass a heteromorph they don’t like the look of! And while the evidence of that kind of bias has been pretty circumstantial thus far, it’s about to get way, way less so. [1] Wacky hair colors being somewhat de rigueur in anime, we’ll give her a pass on the purple hair.
Chapter 220:
Here we finally hit the major leagues: the Creature Rejection Clan, or CRC. The Japanese is igyou haiseki shugi shuudan, with igyou and shuudan being pretty straightforward—igyou is, of course, “heteromorph,” and shuudan is any sort of organized or self-identifying group of people, anything from a family unit to a business organization, even all the way up to a nation. Haiseki shugi is the important bit, with shugi meaning “doctrine; principle” and haiseki meaning “rejection; expulsion; boycott; ostracism.” Thus, “group whose doctrine is the rejection of heteromorphs.”[2] Note that, in the Japanese, the word in the group’s name is heteromorph; they didn’t pick something more insulting or derogatory. They didn’t really need to, since igyou is, as discussed back in the introduction to this piece, plenty derogatory all on its own. So Caleb Cook went with a translation of igyou that would better get that derisiveness-in-the-context-of-a-hate-group across than his choice way back in Chapter 14. Creature Rejection Clan is a fairly localized translation, but Cook was pretty frank in his Twitter thread on the chapter that he was thinking about the KKK when he made the decision. And it’s not an unwarranted comparison! Of course, I wouldn’t think to presume Horikoshi’s that up on the history of racism in the U.S., but combine the cod-religious trappings and the full robes and hoods with an explicit textual description of hate crimes, and it’s an extremely easy parallel to draw. [2] The Japanese also gives the abbreviation of CRC, with the databook eventually coming out and revealing that it really stands for the name they’ve chosen for themselves in English, the Curious Rejection Committee.
That established, it’s notable that Spinner, in describing them, says that they commit hate crimes against “people with heteromorphic quirks”—a nearly word-for-word translation of the Japanese igyou-gata no ningen. This leaves aside the idea I’ve spent so much time talking about, that heteromorph discrimination is aimed broadly at those with heteromorphic bodies, and not only those with the more narrowly defined heteromorphic quirks. Shortly, however, I’ll cover some evidence that Spinner is over-generalizing, or just misinformed.
In the meantime, take note of a few things the CRC guys[3] actually say here, starting with the fact that they call Spinner a lizard. Instantly, a word that was previously a snippy and dismissive little shrug in Dabi’s mouth takes on the weight and ugliness of a slur. Further, they call the League of Villains “sins against nature”—or, in a more literal translation, “impure criminals.” I provide the more literal translation there because it’s more specific. My immediate question of the English translation would be whether the CRC judge the League as being sins against nature simply because of their criminality, or because of their association with Spinner, but the Japanese makes clear that there are two separate labels being flung there: the League are both criminals and impure. This idea of impurity brings in a religious dimension to heteromorphobia, a dimension heightened by the line (dropped by the English translation) in which the CRC accuses the League of invading a sanctuary—in Shinto, shrines have to be kept pure. The CRC calling their hideout a sanctuary, with the added context of, “They have a lizard with them. How disgusting,” thus makes it pretty clear that the impurity is about Spinner’s presence, not just the League’s assorted crimes. This spiritualistic justification for bigotry will later be made even more explicit in Shouji’s flashbacks. [3] With skull masks right there on their hoods! A real, “Are we the baddies?” moment, but given some of the other things we get on them later, it's possible the skulls are meant to contrast what e.g. Spinner or Koda’s skulls might look like: baseline human versus animalistic or “misshapen.” Credit to @codenamesazanka for connecting the dots on that!
Spinner also gives us here the line that I covered back in the terminology section at the beginning:
We’ll go with the official version this time.
So here we have the observation that the word absolutely everyone uses, the word that, as far as we know, academically defines an entire category of quirks, is an unpleasant, even rude word. But what is the alternative? We’re never given one. Indeed, Spinner doesn’t suggest one; he says that the nice thing to do is “avoid” the word instead. In other words, talk around it. See again what I said at the start about all the difficulties baked into that prospect.
Later, we get the first drops of Spinner’s backstory, and hit again on the “lizard” thing, with the note that Spinner’s backwater, stuck-in-the-last-century hometown called him “the lizard freak.” He grew up with it, grew accustomed to it, thought there was nothing he could do to change it—he might even have internalized it somewhat, though clearly by the time Chapter 160 rolled around he was ornery enough about it to complain. It's perhaps also notable that Spinner knows who the CRC are. Though we’ll later find out that their numbers have hugely diminished, he not only recognizes them, he’s not even surprised to see them—unlike many, Spinner knows the CRC never truly went away. (Compare his lack of reaction to, for example, Shouji's unsuspecting classmates, who will later be shocked, just shocked, that this kind of ugliness still exists in their country.) So just to state the obvious here, yes, the presence of active hate groups does irrevocably shift the lens on everything we’ve seen up to this point. You can’t say calling a heteromorph an animal is harmless, a little insensitive at worst, maybe even meant as a cute nickname, when that same language is used by openly violent bigots.
The volume version gives us, at the end of the chapter, further notes on the CRC. It’s full of relevant tidbits, so I’ll provide the text in its entirety:
Once superpowered society grew more stable and less chaotic, this group emerged, based around a lack of acceptance for those with body-altering quirks. They started out with demonstrations and protests but eventually started committing violent hate crimes. Most felt this was taking things too far, so the group saw a sharp decline in membership and a scattering of factions. These days, one faction might only reject people with animal properties, while another focuses its hate on people with irregular heads. These two, among others, have very few members left. The faction that Tomura and the villains attacked was one that stood by the original group's fundamental tenets.
So what is there to gather from this? Let’s break it down a point at a time.
“Once superpowered society grew more stable (...)” If you’ve ever lived through a time of increasing acceptance for a marginalized group, particularly if that acceptance involves measures for legal protections being passed, you’ll recognize what this is. Just to pick a few U.S. examples, the KKK didn’t exist until after the Civil War;[4] proactive federal bans on same-sex marriages didn’t start getting passed/proposed until individual U.S. states started legalizing them and civil unions. When opposition to something is the norm, said opposition often doesn’t start organizing until they see that status quo being threatened; they weren’t organized before because they never imagined they’d need to be! That’s what we see with the CRC: they didn’t formally declare themselves until it started looking like quirks—and especially non-baseline quirks—were going to find legal acceptance. [4] Literally. The last day of the war was May 26, 1865; the date the first Klan was founded was December 24 of the same year. Easily the most vile thing I learned in the process of writing this piece.
“(…) based around a lack of acceptance for those with body-altering quirks.” This is what I was referring to when I said Spinner's characterization of the CRC might be a little bit off: the CRC wasn’t founded because of a hatred for specifically heteromorphic quirks; they were founded because of a hatred for different bodies, a descriptor that could also apply to those with transformation-style quirks! Those, too, are quirks that alter bodies, after all; it’s just possible for people to turn them off, which is not the case for those with heteromorphic quirks. So Spinner was not quite on the mark before. Further, note that the phrase “body-altering quirks” is used here—a phrase that’s similar in meaning and much less othering than igyou. It doesn’t fully cover everything I use “heteromorphic” and “non-baseline” to cover, in that it’s still murky in situations like e.g. Cementoss’s, where his emitter quirk is entirely independent of his oddly shaped head, but it’s still a useful term! Except for the small complication of where it isn’t found: anywhere in the actual story. The fact that Horikoshi uses it in an author’s note, but it comes up nowhere in BNHA proper, puts it in an unclear place as far as in-universe alternatives go. Has it just not come up because Horikoshi hasn’t thought to include it? Or has it not come up because it’s not a phrase people in-universe use?
“They started out with demonstrations and protests but eventually started committing violent hate crimes. Most felt this was taking things too far, so the group saw a sharp decline in membership and a scattering of factions.” Confirmation here of what Spinner said about the CRC and hate crimes, but note what this doesn’t say: that the CRC was outlawed. There are, I suspect, a couple of factors influencing that. o Firstly, while Japan has legal methods to restrict undesirable organizations,[5] making it difficult for them to raise funds or engage in publicity, the country doesn’t actually de facto criminalize membership in such organizations. That distinction is part of the legacy of violent crackdowns on labor groups and protest movements in the first half of the 20th century; people tend to get very loud about anything that whiffs of the government trying to give itself the power to get that heavy-handed again. Assuming that the laws haven’t changed overmuch in HeroAca!Japan, then, I wouldn’t expect membership in the CRC to have been criminalized outright, but the volume extra doesn’t mention any kind of legal repercussions at all. That, I think, may go more to my next point. [5] The relevant laws are aimed mostly at terroristic groups or organized crime. o Secondly, another thing Japan has very, very little of is hate crime legislation. From my research, there are only two laws of any note: a federal law passed in 2016 and widely regarded as toothless thanks to it lacking any criminal provisions targeting offenders,[6] as well as a local ordinance passed in Kawasaki in 2019 that went as far as mandating fines against repeat offenders, among other measures.[7] [6] It required the government to start “implementing measures” to eliminate such speech/behaviors, as well as to “respond to requests for consultation” from victims, but did not directly mandate consequences for offenders. [7] I suspect from some of what I read that Osaka has picked up a similar ordinance, but I didn’t find anything detailing it specifically. Osaka and Kawasaki are home to the largest and second-largest population of Koreans living in Japan. One major thing neither of these measures did, though—and something activists have been pressing for—is to establish standards for considering discriminatory motivations when issuing sentences against those who have committed violent crimes. To pick an example that made the news last year, a man committed arson out of openly admitted hatred for the Koreans he targeted, but nowhere in the trial or discussion of his sentence did the prosecution ever bring up discrimination.[8] [8] https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20220829/p2a/00m/0na/015000c Also, it’s worth noting that both of these measures were aimed at ethnic discrimination—speech and behavior targeting people living in Japan while being themselves, or being children of, people of non-Japanese ethnicities. They did not address discrimination based on e.g. religion or sexuality. Folding both of those points together, the image we have of the CRC is of a violent hate group whose existence is regarded as perhaps distasteful and extremist, but not actually illegal. Even what few laws Japan has now wouldn’t have applied to anti-heteromorph discrimination, because, while they may look wildly different from a prototypical Japanese person, heteromorphs still are Japanese, and therefore not protected by a law based solely around ethnic discrimination. Incidentally, the ordinance in Kawasaki laid out a number of specific examples of the kind of behavior it was looking to address, and one of those examples was likening victims to something other than human. I know why that was included in the context of anti-Korean sentiments,[9] but it certainly does shade e.g. Dabi calling Spinner a lizard more harshly to know that there’s legal precedent for categorizing such dehumanizing language as hate speech. [9] An extremely common form of anti-Korean hate speech in Japan is to refer/allude to Koreans as cockroaches.
“These days, one faction might only reject people with animal properties, while another focuses its hate on people with irregular heads.” This is a good echo of the sort of factionalization you see in organized religion, wherein the minutiae of tenets that seem similar to an outside eye are the topic of vicious, vehement inter-group debate. More to the point, however, it provides an excellent illustration of the senselessness of bigotry. They can’t even keep their own discriminatory dogma straight! Probably the second most common complaint about the story’s use of heteromorphobia—after calling it retconned-in bullshit that didn’t exist until Chapter 220—is that it’s illogical, that it makes no sense to judge people because they look a little different in a world where everyone is now a little different from the way we see the world. And I wonder if the people who say that are listening to what they’re saying. “Illogical bias that has no foundation in reality is unrealistic?” What do these people think bigotry is? Racism, sexism, xenophobia, ableism, religious discrimination, all the many different shades of queerphobia: all of these are built on foundations of fear and hate for people who are fundamentally still as human as anyone else, yet they all exist, and have existed, and will go on existing for quite some many years still. Because irrational hatreds are, by definition, irrational. Heteromorphic discrimination is the most realistic societal dynamic in the entire series! That little rant aside, I also want to highlight the first group in the excerpt above—people with animal properties. Check any talk on the theme of, “So you can believe dragons but not black people in fantasy?” and you’ll run into the ways people are much more ready to suspend their disbelief for full-on fantasy than for something that, rightly or wrongly, pings them as incorrect, and it’s easy to imagine animal-associated heteromorphs running into a similar issue: it’s fine for people to just look weird, but looking like an animal, that’s bad and unnatural. A heteromorph who just looks like nothing in particular other than “non-baseline” is not evoking the baggage of animal anthropomorphization and cultural animal symbolism that someone who looks like a bird, a lizard, a dog, an orca, etc. is.
Chapter 223:
Shigaraki refers to Gigantomachia as a gorilla. It’s debatable how much this is of a piece with Dabi calling Spinner “Lizard”—Machia’s only actual animal quirk is Mole, not anything simian, nor is Machia particularly ape-like in anything other than his large size—but it does stand out to me that Spinner, who we know to have strong opinions about animal epithets, just refers to Machia by name or as “the big guy.”
Chapter 224:
Mr. Compress calls Machia “our pet gorilla”; see note above.
Chapter 226:
Curious introduces the idea of quirk counselling, telling us that its goal is to align people to a unified understanding of how the world and society work, but that it’s flawed in that it winds up emphasizing peoples’ differences instead. The advisor at the hospital raid will include quirk counseling in his litany of grievances, so I’ll discuss its possible utilization against heteromorphs more there, but for now, recall that I talked previously about how quirk-based behavioral tics might vary from person to person by comparing Hound Dog with Sansa. With that in mind, it’s not a big reach that some heteromorphs might run into similar problems with quirk counselling.
There are a good number of what appear to be heteromorphs through the Curious fight; whatever the MLA’s core views on quirk supremacy, the organization self-evidently makes ample room for heteromorphs, even if, like e.g. the red panda guy in the crowd jumping Toga inside the noodle joint, they don’t seem to have any other stand-out powers beyond the fur and fangs.
Chapter 229:
Twice notes in his flashback that something about his eyes always rubbed people the wrong way, scared them. We’ll eventually see this same thing with Tenko on the street—a totally normal-looking child, but the look on his face scares people away even more than the blood. And I can’t help but think, “If even a totally baseline person’s eyes can creep people out, how much easier—and more extreme—is that reaction for the more out-there sort of heteromorph?”
Gori makes the tiniest of cameos in Twice’s flashback, playing backup off to the side when we will, in current times, find him having worked his way up to the interrogation chair himself.
Chapter 230:
Geten brings us quirk supremacy via his understanding of the MLA’s goals. It’s hard to say how accurate this is, since the MLA leadership is inconsistent on what exactly their vision of Liberation entails. Whatever it is, it certainly doesn’t seem to dissuade the MLA’s own heteromorphs, though of course there’s a big difference between how e.g. Spinner or Ojiro versus Gang Orca or Mirko would fare in a societal quirk free-for-all. Likewise, the MLA is a cult, so one can’t discount the likelihood of double-think in its members.
Chapter 232:
Re-Destro talks about the state of the country in Destro’s infancy, a period in which metahumans suffered “constant abuse—blatant discrimination.” Merely for speaking out that her child was just like everyone else—that his special power was just a quirk—Destro’s mother was killed by an anti-meta mob. This gives us further evidence of the violence metahumans faced. Of course, in that time, the hate wasn’t distinguishing between types of quirk, but with that being said, an emitter and a transformer can still hide the truth about themselves with far more ease than heteromorphs—recall All Might’s discussion about the early days of quirks back in Chapter 59, in which the panel showing four people with quirks contained only one baseline person. It would be entirely unsurprising for an outsized number of the metahumans killed in those days to be heteromorphs.
Chapter 233:
The confrontation between Trumpet and Spinner gives us Trumpet clucking about Spinner having a weak meta-ability—Gecko lets him cling to walls, and that’s about it. It’s a striking contrast to someone like Mirko or Gang Orca, or even Tsuyu, all of whom have some combination of big power moves and a veritable fleet of sub-abilities. We can see the way Hero Society prizes powerful, flexible quirks in this. Having a strong quirk can help overcome the societal bias about heteromorphs, but if you’re stuck with a weak quirk and a weird face, you lack that metaphorical ticket out.[10] [10] Incidentally, the fandom reflected some of that attitude as well. There was a widespread assumption that Spinner’s quirk would be really useful or situationally powerful, otherwise why would Horikoshi have hidden it for as long as he did? Then, after the reveal, there was a certain amount of complaining that Spinner was useless to the League, and why even bother with him? Sometimes, life imitates art in some very unflattering ways.
Trumpet brings up that Spinner was a recluse, “mocked and pilloried,” and we see Spinner in his hikikomori days. What we’ve gotten on Spinner up to this point suggests that the abuse he endured was mostly verbal, though one can imagine it was pretty rough when he was young enough to be the target of school bullies. There’s a certain amount of temptation to minimize that in comparison to his response: most people who are bullied or targeted by discrimination don’t grow up to become terrorists. But there was, we will eventually find, more visceral stuff going on—and parts of the country that were even worse than Spinner’s hometown.
Spinner spent most of his life trying to fit himself into the world around him; his strongest parallel in the League in this regard is Toga, as they were the two that held themselves back, let the world define what they were and how they should act, right up until they saw something that caused them to snap.[11] Trumpet tries to do much the same to Spinner here (albeit probably less as an intentional psychological attack than Skeptic’s attempts on Twice), but Spinner, like Toga, is long past the point where he would swallow that abuse without fighting back. When you tell someone they are something long enough, they eventually start to believe it—but if you aren’t careful, they’ll start to embrace it, at which point those weaponized words change hands. [11] Shigaraki and Dabi, by contrast, pushed back harder, trying to get the world to accept them and never accepting it when their families (and particularly their fathers) told them to stop. Twice was ejected without getting the chance to try to contort himself into a shape that fit the world, whereas Mr. Compress seems to have been raised to reject his society's accepted norms from the start.
Chapter 234:
We see an image excerpted from Quirks and Us, a children’s book published by Curious’s outfit, that exhorts the reader not to judge people by their quirks. It really, really begs the question, “If this is what’s being said in literature published to coax people towards anti-suppression radicalism, what on Earth is normal society saying?” Regardless of that absolutely wild disparity, though, the fact that there are children’s books being published about quirk bias being wrong suggests that the world very much does have a problem with quirk bias. Indeed, that much has been shown throughout the series, not merely in terms of anti-heteromorph bias, but also the bias against “villain quirks,” as well as the widespread idea that people with weak quirks—or no quirks at all—are weaker people overall, pitiable folk who lack the power to live their fullest lives or pursue their dreams unhindered.[12] People on more than one of these axes of discrimination will, as in real life, be more likely to experience discrimination and violence. [12] Villains like All For One and Geten may say it more loudly, but it’s not only villains who believe it—perfectly good-hearted people like All Might and Midoriya Inko fall into that trap as well.
Chapter 237:
Nothing much to say about Shigaraki’s flashbacks save to note that, if people won’t stop to help a lost and bloodied (and baseline) child, they sure as hell won’t intervene in anti-heteromorph bullying. Recall that Kirishima was accused of sticking his nose where it didn’t belong for trying!
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Thanks as ever for reading along, everyone! How was the new footnote format? Should I keep that up for lengthy meta going forward?
I was kind of expecting to be able to wrap this up (the main canon, at least) in one more post, but I underestimated the amount of writing I'd be doing for the first war arc. For next time, then, I'm looking to cover the Endeavor Agency, Paranormal Liberation War, and Dark Hero Villain Hunt arcs. See you all then!
#bnha#heteromorph discrimination plot#on heteromorphobia#bnha worldbuilding#bnha meta#my writing#creature rejection clan#tw racism#tw hate crime#bnha spinner#iguchi shuuichi#meta liberation army
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This week at work has run me over, I'm so glad it's the 'weekend' I'm going to try and catch the new Arcane episodes at some point. I bought Little Mushroom and first volume of SVSSS on kindle. They have moved us completely outbound at work which means I have no down time in which to read between calls so I think I'm going to focus on buying danmei through kindle. I am planning on buying TGCF in hardcover and have already preordered vol. 1.
As much as I'd love to have this robust collection of physical books, I just have no space for it.
Though lemme tell you my poor kindle is on it's last legs. I might end up picking up a new kindle fire on black friday/cyber monday sale. I really want an ipad but the 7inch kindle is just so perfect for on the go.
Of course this would require I sort and organize all of my saved fanfiction which....I am not looking forward to.
So much so I am not working on that and instead reading TGCF's manua on my laptop tonight instead. :P
I'm also looking forward to starting SVSSS sometime this weekend. I've already nommed onto original!Shen Qingqiu/Yue Qingyuan after just watching the donghua. Yes, I am utterly ridiculous a person, I'm aware of this. I'm sure I'll enjoy the main pairing but give me my angsty, doomed side characters with unrequited doki doki for one another that demand random fix-it fics. Even knowing Shen Qingqiu original flavor is a humongous asshole and petty as fuck little bastard, I was sold just watching Yue Qingyuan interact with his beloved shidi.
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Groundhog Day Chapter 3
BuckTommy Fix-it Fic Rated: T
4,571 Words
No editor/editing
On Ao3
Chapter 1 on Tumblr
Chapter 2 on Tumblr
The lights are too bright, even behind Tommy’s closed eyelids. Groaning, he turns over and attempts to pull the comforter over his head, but fails when he realizes he’ll have to try more than he wants to because it’s tucked in with hospital corners at the foot of the bed. Snorting his displeasure, he rolls back onto his back and pries his eyes open, one painful centimeter at a time until he’s staring at a room that doesn’t feel familiar through a half lidded gaze.
Wrinkling his nose, he pushes himself onto his elbows and does a head swivel of his surroundings. The space is cozy - lived in but not messy - with a half full hamper and a few articles of clothing that must’ve just missed being thrown in. There’s a set of matching dark wood dressers pushed against one wall; a walk-in closet packed to the gills peeks out from a partially cracked door. Another door, overflowing with well worn sweatshirts and baseball caps, opens into a mostly tidy bathroom. An old, frayed, grey washcloth is bundled up on top of the white marble countertop next to a black toothbrush holder. The gold colored faucet gleams like a brand new fire truck.
A sharp pain nails him in the temple and he closes his eyes as he breathes through it. It takes much longer than it should have for the pain to go away, though it sits at the fringes of his awareness. Grunting, he opens his eyes once more before pulling himself into a sitting position. He’s shirtless, but he’s in his trusty rust colored sweats. As the pain ebbs, one of the doors rockets open and a tiny ball of fury whips through at warp speed, jumping like a spider monkey into his lap as it screams, “Daddy!” at full volume. His brain short circuits again at the title. He’s not anyone’s dad. Right?
Realizing the creature is a little girl, all he can do is watch as she wraps her arms and legs around his own legs, pinning them in place. The breath is knocked from his lungs when she turns his face up to look at him, grinning with a gap toothed smile, the top front left one missing. She’s got that round, cherubic face only the young seem to have, but what catches Tommy off guard is just how much she looks like B… like Evan. Like his genetics really said copy and paste after bullying the other party’s genes out of the way. Her glacial blue eyes are wide open and shimmering under the filtered morning light. Her head is covered in nearly butt length loose curls that folks would argue over whether she’s a blonde or a brunette.
“Pipa!” A familiar voice chides, followed by a visage Tommy dreams about on the regular. Evan… No. Buck. Buck enters the room carrying a breakfast tray, the smell making Tommy salivate like Pavlov’s dog. He swallows hard, heat pricking at his eyes though he’s not sure why.
Seeing Tommy is awake, Buck approaches him and drops off the tray before leaning in and pecking Tommy on the lips. One hand strokes his daughter's hair until she sits back. “Morning babe.” Buck grins, the crows feet in the corner of his eyes more pronounced than Tommy can seem to remember. He looks… Different. But how?
Buck turns to Pipa as he says, “We have to let daddy eat. Let’s go downstairs to get ready for school.” She shakes her head with vehemence.
“No! I want to stay with daddy.” She scurries up the bed, definitely leaving a bruise on his leg as she uses it as a springboard to launch herself forward. Before he knows what’s happening, the little bundle of energy is burying herself under his arm against his side making the most adorable pouty face he’s ever seen. She has to be a Buckley, alright, with a pout that lethal. Pipa crosses her arms over her thin chest and glares daggers at Buck.
Evan.
The man sighs and places his hands on his hips. Anyone else would have likely been considered looming, but he just looks like a giant teddy bear in need of a hug in his sweatshirt and jeans and wild, loose, curls. His daughter remains unfazed, burrowing further into Tommy even. Not knowing what else to do, Tommy wraps an arm around her and musses her hair a bit. He receives exactly one giggle before she’s back in tantrum mode. “Pipa. We need to get ready for school so daddy can drop you off in a bit.”
“No!” She huffs, turning her face into Tommy’s pec, burrowing her nose against it.
“Pipa.” His tone is more serious now, and he’s no longer smiling with that exasperated fondness so many parents seem to hone with their children.
“I said no!” She screams as she wraps her arms around Tommy’s middle, her voice an ear piercing shriek. Tommy feels dampness against his skin and is shocked to realize that this little girl is really spilling tears over this. Overwhelmed, he leans over and places a kiss on her head before turning his gaze back to the man still standing over them.
“Pipa.” Buck’s tone is absolute no nonsense now, and Pipa realizes this. She grabs the edge of the blanket and bunny kicks it until she can slip under the comforter before pulling it up over her head. “That’s enough young, lady. I’m not playing around anymore.” Pipa whines and flops around some, continuing to bunny kick under the blankets, jamming knobbly limbs against Tommy. “If you don’t get over here right now I won’t allow you to go to Melissa’s birthday party this weekend.” Oh that was the wrong threat because Pipa howls as though she’s been pierced through with a steel arrow laced in poison. Her trickle of tears becomes a torrent.
“Hey, Buck.” Tommy says, grimacing because it feels like it’s not his place to tell the man how to raise his kids. He doesn’t immediately notice the way Buck flinches at his own name. “It’s fine. Why don’t we let her stay up here while I eat, and then I can help her get ready for school.” Said child sniffles and nods emphatically against him. It’s ticklish but he tries his best to remain stoic. He doesn’t want Buck to think that he’s laughing at him.
That’s when he notices the devastation on the younger man's face, his expression crestfallen, arms limp at his sides. His mouth flops open and closed a few times, but eventually it snaps shut and he nods. Shoulders hunched in on themselves, he turns away and begins to shuffle towards the door. What the hell? “Buck?” Tommy says, voice soft, but confused. The man goes even stiffer, if that’s possible, and he shuffles faster. “Evan!” Tommy calls sharply. He stops, still trying to make himself smaller than an ant. “What’s wrong? Is it okay if Pipa stays up here?”
“She can do whatever she wants.” His voice is wet, tone clipped. Tommy’s confusion grows even more. What the hell is going on? “I’ve got to get ready for work, I have a 12-er today.” His hand touches the doorknob before he says, snuffling, “I’m sorry if I made you mad.”
“Mad? Why would I be mad? I don’t care if Pipa stays while I eat breakfast. I didn’t want you to get upset because she wasn’t listening to you.” Little fingers angrily pinch his side and he responds by giving her a squeeze to let her know that her behavior isn’t okay, but she can stay because Evan needs a break.
He’s quiet for so long Tommy honestly thinks he’s not going to answer but he finally says, stilted, “You called me Buck.”
Tommy’s brow furrows. “Well. That’s your name, isn’t it? Didn’t you say that’s what all your friends call you?” He grunts when pain reminiscent of a needle drilling into his skull shoots across his temples. The hand not holding Pipa shoots up to grab at it, eyes screwing shut until it passes.
Buck is speaking but Tommy finds it difficult to hear through the pounding. “But. You’re not my friend.” He pauses. “I mean, you are but… You’re my husband. You’ve only ever called me Buck when I’ve done something wrong.”
More searing pain. Gritting his teeth Tommy hunches forward as he tries to fight back the nausea rolling through him. Husband? He and Buck… Evan… are married? He pries open one enough to look down at his hands where he spots a brushed copper band a few millimeters wide on his left ring finger. Taking deep breaths he pulls himself back into a sitting position. Pipa is staring him down with worry in her eyes, her own issues forgotten in lieu of her fathers plight. God they look so much like Evan’s. It’s painful to look into them and see pain reflected back. Evan’s expression morphs into one of serious concern as he reaches back towards Tommy. “Hey, are you alright? You’re looking kind of pale.”
Tommy waves him off, plastering a grin on his lips. “No, I’m all good, sorry. I think I’m just feeling a little sleep fogged still. I didn’t mean to upset you, babe. Come back here.” He holds his hand out and waits for Evan to take it before he drags him in to kiss him lightly. Pipa protests, pushing away from his body but can’t get far with his arm still locked around her. “I’ll get her ready for school as soon as I’m done, okay?”
Sighing, clearly still a little bit upset, he nods and pats Pipa’s head, cups her jaw for a moment and then trudges out of the room, shoulders still hunched.
“Is papa mad at me?” Pipa asks, blue eyes looking extra wet.
Sighing, Tommy shakes his head. “No honey, I think he’s upset with me. But that’s okay, it will be fine. Why don’t we eat this delicious looking meal that papa made just for me before we’re late?” A single stem of lavender pokes out from what looks like a repurposed saké jar, and two overly fluffy pancakes sit stacked with a large pallet of melting lemon butter and a dollop of whipped cream on top. There’s a tiny silver carafe of warmed maple syrup that Tommy pours in purposeful drizzles over the breakfast cakes.
Over the next twenty minutes, he alternates taking his own bite, before then offering one to his daughter who hums happily with an added excited wiggle. Once she has her fill, she slips out from under his arm and dashes out the door yelling, “Jonah!” as she clomps down the stairs. Chuckling, he finishes the last few bites before setting the breakfast tray aside and hauling himself out of the king sized bed. Stretching, he searches the room, trying to decide where to start. Groaning with an extra good stretch, reaching his arms above his head with his fingers laced, and palm facing upwards, he decides to start in the bathroom. He wastes no time brushing his teeth and giving himself a cursory shave. The counter is so clean the lights reflect off the surface. He plucks at his curls a bit, trying to make them lay a certain way, and fails so he sighs and goes out and into the walk-in to grab clothes. Grabbing a navy ribbed long-sleeve shirt, he shimmies into it - it’s form fitted to his figure - before grabbing a pair of dark wash jeans with a little bleaching effect along the thighs. They fit snuggly, enough to show off his powerful thighs and give his ass a little squeeze but the waist is perfect, and comfortable. He slips into a pair of tennis shoes before leaving to head downstairs.
Outside their room is a hallway with three other doors. Two of them are covered in decorative bubble letters spelling out each of the kids' names, and a few silly posters. Another door leads into another bathroom that has a very clear frog motif going on with the giant lilypad shaped bath mat, and a cartoon poison dart frog on the shower curtain. Two frog face shaped step stools are lined up neatly against the double vanity. Tommy grins, just knowing that it was Evan who helped choose the decorations. Those kids probably know more about frogs than any kid their age should. Especially ones of the poisonous variety.
Smirking, Tommy takes the staircase quickly, barely holding onto the railing. As he reaches the first floor landing, a young boy barrels on by, backpack flopping half open behind him. Evan shouts after him, “Jonah, your bag is open. Close it before you lose your schoolwork!” He sounds irritated and Tommy wonders if it’s because of him. “Pipa, where are your shoes? I have to leave and daddy needs to get you to school.”
“I can’t find my unicorn shoes!” Pipa screams as Jonah shouts, “I won’t lose anything, papa, it’s fine. See?” He turns his bag upside down just for a shower of loose pencils and papers to come cascading out of the top.
“Whoops.” He looks up sheepishly. It’s like a gut punch, seeing the face of the man he loves from thirty years ago staring up at him with the same crooked grin and tiny port wine birthmark in a damn near identical spot. Unbidden, a quiet whine squeezes past Tommy’s lips so he coughs to hopefully cover it up.
Not that he has time to contemplate because Evan huffs with such rage that Tommy’s eyes go wide with surprise. “Jonah, this is why I told you to close your bag all the way. Look at the mess you’ve made, and you’re already running behind. And Pipa you’ll just have to wear a different pair of shoes today. I don’t have time to help you look.” Tommy doesn’t know the last time he heard Evan’s voice so hard, his expression so serious. His eyebrows are knit together in the center and his mouth his whipcord thin, frown lines deep along the corners.
Jonah’s bottom lip trembles and his eyes drop to the floor. Pipa is hollering behind him about how she wants those shoes and that she won’t go to school if she can’t wear them. “Jonah, apologize to papa. Now. And Pipa, if you keep behaving this way, one more sentence out of your mouth that isn’t ‘yes daddy’ or ‘yes papa’ you absolutely will not be attending that birthday party.” Tommy steps in, hoping to keep the pot from boiling over. “We don’t reward misbehavior in this house.”
This causes Pipa to lose it as she falls to her knees and screams. Tommy lets her, hoping she’ll tire herself out. Jonah kneels down to begin picking up his mess. Ever so quietly he apologizes, sounding sincere, “I’m sorry, papa.”
“And what will we do next time Papa asks us to do something for our own good?” Tommy quirks an eyebrow, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Listen.” Jonah sniffles, crumpling the papers he’s picking up as he crams them into his bag.
Sighing, Tommy goes and kneels next to him, stilling his little hand. “That’s right, Jonah. Thank you for saying you’re sorry. Would you like me to help you clean this up?” He nods just the smallest bit. Tommy says nothing but pulls the little boy in so he can kiss the top of his head, ruffling those same disastrous curls he loves on Evan so much, to show he’s not angry. He sniffles once again before giggling, pushing Tommy away. The two of them make quick work of the mess and this time, Jonah makes sure to close the zipper all the way.
Evan is over with Pipa, doing his best to calm her down but she’s not having it. Sighing, he stands up and shakes his head. “I don’t have time for this. I need to get to work. Sorry Tommy.”
“Hey, don’t worry about it. Thanks for making me breakfast. It was amazing.”
“Don’t mention it.” He runs a hand through his hair and blows out a raspberry, trilling his lips as he surveys the area around him. “I guess I’ll leave it to you, then.” Shrugging with another heavy sigh he goes to walk past Tommy without even a touch but Tommy grabs his wrist and stops him.
When he turns to look, Tommy pulls him into another gentle kiss and brushes his hair out of his face. “Have a good day at work, Evan. I love you.” He kisses him on the lips again and then the tip of his nose. “I’ve got things handled here, so go in with a clear head, alright?” The first smile Tommy’s seen all morning crosses his face, tiny as it is; nothing more really than a quirk of the lips. But it’s a smile nonetheless. Nodding he takes in his family once again before disappearing around the corner. A couple minutes later Tommy hears the sound of a door swing open and then shut, and then the sound of a garage door opening.
He turns his attention back to the two little humans now solely in his care. Jonah has gone up to his sister and wrapped her in a hug, whispering that things will be alright. Clearly, he’s got a soft soul, and Tommy prays to a God he doesn’t believe in that the world doesn’t beat it out of him. The world at large needs more soft hearted people. Pipa’s crying has ceased but now she’s hiccuping, heaving breaths, cheeks tear stained and eyes red. “Now that that’s all squared away.” He’s stern as he looks down at the kids. “Pipa, you’re going to find a different pair of shoes to wear-” she opens her mouth to protest and Tommy holds up a hand, palm facing her, “- do you not remember what I said about not saying any other words besides ‘yes Daddy’ or ‘yes Papa’? Because just because Papa has left for the day doesn’t mean that threat doesn’t still hold. I don’t want to hear another argument from you or you can kiss your fun weekend goodbye.” The dramatics of a six year old. Pipa slumps to the floor and pounds her fist against the carpet. Tommy says absolutely nothing. Just waits.
Jonah comforts her by running his hand up and down her arm. She tries to bat him away but he doesn’t give up. Eventually the crying stops. “Are we done?” Tommy asks. Nothing. “Pipa. Are we done throwing a tantrum and getting all our big feelings out?” She pounds the floor exactly two more times before dragging herself into a sitting position and nodding. “What do you say?”
“Yes daddy.”
“That’s great, but don’t you think there’s maybe something else you should say after upsetting papa by not listening when he was already stressed?” Tommy crouches in front of her and gently rubs her shoulder.
“I’m sorry.” Her bottom lip quivers and she pounces forward, wrapping herself awkwardly around Tommy’s middle. He opens his knees a bit more for balance and drags her in for a proper hug.
“Thank you. And I expect you to tell papa that when he gets home tonight, okay?” She nods. They hug for a minute more before Tommy unlatches her and slowly gets to his feet, grimacing as his knees crack. Getting older sucks. “Now. Let’s find you some shoes and head out. We’re running really late and I don’t want to be yelled at by the receptionist.” Both the kids giggle. Pipa does as she’s told, running to the front closet to grab a different pair. Jonah takes Tommy’s hand and drags him to the garage door to wait.
Less than ten minutes later he has them secured in their booster seats in the back of an SUV he doesn’t entirely recognize, and they’re navigating through morning rush hour. He pulls up to the drop off zone with five minutes to spare, traffic was forgiving this morning, and he hustles them from the car. Wrapping a hand around their shoulders, he guides them into the building, stopping in the in-between foyer to kiss them good-bye and to tell them to have a good day. They wave enthusiastically as they pull open the heavy inner doors and run down the hall towards where their teacher waits outside their classroom. She lifts her hand in a wave as they squeeze past her, so he waves back, grinning. He stays long enough to see her get them into the room.
As soon as he’s back in the car he takes a deep breath to center himself. What a morning it’s been and it’s only just past nine. Smirking because everything feels ridiculous, he puts the car in drive and heads out. Something guides his hand because he finds himself pulling into Harbor maybe half an hour later. The tarmac is mostly empty except for a few pilots who seem to be cleaning their birds while it’s slow. Pain zings through his left temple and he winces, pressing a couple fingers there. It doesn’t last. Weird. He thinks, face sliding back into the indifferent mask he’s known for. Choosing not to think too hard on it, he drives around to the side of the hangar where the employee parking is. To his surprise, all the spots are full, but he swears he works today. Another zing of pain spiked energy.
Tommy can’t help the inkling of concern creeping its way in. He’s never been the type of man to get headaches, and certainly not random cranial pain throughout the day. It’s now happened multiple times that he tries to access a certain part of his memory and is then tormented by a nail to the skull. Grimacing through the pain, Tommy pulls off to the side where he knows he won’t be in the way and hops out, not bothering to lock the doors.
The sun overhead is bright which doesn’t help the pain and Tommy has to squint to be able to get anywhere. He holds his hand at his eyebrows even to make a visor of sorts. The pain isn’t fading, it remains a dull throb at the edge of his consciousness but he’s got to get rid of this nagging feeling in his chest. He makes it across the tarmac and enters into the hangar itself, which is bustling. Stuffing his hands into his pockets, he searches for anyone familiar. That’s when he hears, “Kinard?” from his left. Turning, he sees a younger woman, early thirties probably, standing by one of the birds not outside. The access panel to the engine hangs open and a rag covered in grease or oil hangs out the back pocket of her flight suit which she has the top half undone and hanging loose, wearing an LAFD issued t-shirt tucked in.
“Hey… Um…” He stares at her face and blinks rapidly a few times but for some reason it’s like she’s a frame in a movie where the DVD got scratched up. Her features are distorted, so much so he’s surprised he can tell what color her hair is. Screwing his eyes shut, he rubs at them with his thumb and middle finger so long and hard he sees stars. When he opens them, not only is it not better but it’s like she’s physically glitching, multiple horizontal panels flickering and fuzzing in and out. Then the pain hits, and it’s nothing like he’s felt before.
It’s so aggressive that he crouches and holds his head in his hands, grinding his teeth to keep from screaming. “Tommy?” The woman whose name he doesn’t even know sounds so concerned but it only makes the pain worse. Her voice is closer and a moment later a petite hand clutches his shoulders, gently shaking him. “Hey, Kinard, are you okay? Do I need to get a medic over here?” He can’t see her turn but he feels it. Reaching up he grabs one of her wrists and shakes his head.
“Fine. I’m fine. I… I don’t know w-what’s wrong with me. I’m just going to… head home. I can’t work today.” He inhales deeply through his nose to push back the nausea rolling over him like waves on the ocean shore. The whole world swims and he’s sinking.
She tenses. “Work? What are you talking about, Tommy? You retired over six years ago. Once your husband got promoted to captain you guys decided only one of you needed to work.” She pulls her arm from his grasp and steps back. Tommy only knows because he’s opened his eyes fractions of an inch. Any more is too painful. The strange woman, apparently someone he doesn’t work with, states, “I’m going to get one of the paramedics over here to look you over. Did you maybe hit your head recently? Do you have any other symptoms?”
Struggling to stand, Tommy takes multiple staggering steps backwards, holding out his hand in a warding off gesture and says, “No, sorry. I’m just fine. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Just been a weird morning I guess. Thanks for the concern, but I’ll get out of your hair now. Y’all have a nice day.” He chances looking at her and the air whooses from his lungs when she’s in clear focus; no more weird glitching like he belongs in the Matrix or a bad video game. The nails in his temples are almost nothing but a memory.
“If you’re sure…” She looks ready to stop him if a single thing more happens, and he won’t take it well if she tries, so he turns on his heel with a wave and makes as quick of a dash to his car as he can without a word.
As soon as he arrives home he bustles into the house and finds the hard liquor, downing at minimum two shots of whiskey. The niggle in his mind is becoming an earworm, digging at him, nagging at him, but he can’t seem to burrow deep enough. Leaning against the counter, he lets his head drop as he breathes, eyes closed.
After a few minutes, he gathers himself enough to make it to the couch where their black cat Rain sleeps at one end, a black hole against a grey background of fabric, and Rusty - their old basset hound - curls up on the floor in front of it. Rusty lifts his head when he senses Tommy but snorts his disinterest before laying back down, sighing deeply as he falls back asleep. Tommy spends around five minutes dissociating with the remote in hand before eventually turning the TV on and losing himself in some game.
That evening, after Evan safely tucks the kids in their beds, and Tommy reads them each a storybook, Evan takes Tommy slowly. He enters him, rocking his hips as Tommy wraps his legs around him, needing Evan’s warmth and reassurance. They kiss and whisper reassurances to one another. When they’ve both come, sated and satisfied, Evan cleans them both before snuggling under the blanket and bringing Tommy against his body, burying his nose in his neck as the two fall into deep sleep.
Tommy wishes he could’ve fallen asleep with peace of mind, but subtle terror remains, eating away at his mind.
#bucktommy#tommy kinard#evan buckley#tevan#911 abc#kinley#911 on abc#groundhog day chapter 3#my fics#kinkley#bucktommy fic#tevan fic#kinley fic#kinkley fic#firepilot#firepilot fic
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Fic Masterlist:
hi i'm murph ✴ links below for fics & ao3
In a Jegulus and Rosekiller sandwhich.
Finished:
✦ Microfics on my other account @viyyasvividry
☼ It's Beginning to Look alot like Avoidance: 6/6
Jegulus — Coffee shops; Christmas markets and scarves; friends, cackling fires, knit blankets and Christmas lights; All things Regulus hates to admit that he kind of loves. But that’s it—that’s the only room he has for love in his life, especially this time of year. The one thing he will not admit is the way his mind is also infected with twisted sheets, and the smell of oak and whiskey. It’s beginning to look alot like avoidance, whether that’s purposeful or not.
☼ Love Was The Law: 1/1 -TTPD Gift Fest
Jegulus — James wipes his tears between laughs, kissing Regulus on the head as he tells a familiar story he’s heard a million times about people they’ll never see again. The air is thick, but James has never breathed easier. Love spills from them in waves that stretch to every corner of the universe. It wasn’t long ago that James realized the truth. The truth in the power of his silly little invisibility cloak. Or: their story in canon but without all the death.
☼ Venom Dripping In Your Mouth: 1/1 -strutting slut fest
Jegulus/rosekiller — Regulus is a bio-chem undergrad fulfilling a humanities credit when he realizes there may be something strange about his professors, James and Evan. He finds more than he bargains for when he decides to test his theory with his best friend Barty in tow, leading to Regulus and Barty becoming human sippy cups.
⚘ Meet Me In The Woods: 1/1 -Black Star Productions
Rosekiller — Barty and Evan have been on the run for months, leaving their disapproving fathers in their wake. Traveling the countryside, they wither and fade into the landscape as points A, B and Z blur into each other and any sense of direction seems lost to time. Sometimes, adventures help us grow, sometimes we lose ourselves along the way.
⚘ On Those Peanut Butter Vibes: 1/1 -the marauders creature fic fest
Rosekiller — Barty is a shapeshifter, Evan is his boyfriend, and they go to the fair.
Works in progress:
✴ A Song of Serpents: 19/36 for volume 1
Jegulus, Rosekiller, Dorlene - background Wolfstar; Canon Divergent Hogwarts/post Hogwarts au; Regulus, James, Evan, Barty, Dorcas POVs — Love is in the air, but so is war. War is violent, but so is love; and grief is the stain left behind when love bleeds.
ⵜ A Taste of Sin: 7/16 -Siriuslyhozierfest
Rosekiller - background Jegulus, Dorlene; Muggle fame au; Evan & Barty POVs — Every story has an ending. Barty knows that his own is no different. One day he will slip into nothingness, and there’s comfort in that certainty. But until the hounds of hell drag him away with their teeth, Barty wants whatever version of life is raw, and uncut. | Everything changes for Evan the night that Regulus brings Barty home with him. He meets those green eyes and knows that he will never be the same. Never.
✴ Into the Abyss: 7/?
Jegulus & Rosekiller & Wolfstar - and various combinations of those. Mainly Jegulus/Rosekiller; Wizarding AU - very Canon divergent — It's on a fateful evening that everything changes for Regulus, James, Barty, and Evan, when Evan and Regulus decide to take a glimpse into their future, only to find horrors beyond anything they can imagine. Desperately, the four of them do whatever they can to try and change it, even if they have to change themselves along the way.
arviyya & thejessalope
Also fuck jkr.
#left field brainrot#a little bad day blues#ask box#poetry for the damned#masterlist#i love this so much#art for the soul#in the depths#murph yaps#murphsmicrofics#rosekiller
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