#Car wars tm

[subjectnamemissing]

Full lot - 60$ event parking, 2.5$ bus ride to within 2 blocks of the stadium. Suburbanites are freaks.

[catsconflictscopicsandchamomile]

SPN POSTCANON UPDATE: Dean sighted in Roanoke VA, then soon after in Argentina

Seems alive(?), healthy and in one piece, but under a lot of stress. Has lost some weight and powers aren't working too well from what I can see. Hanging out w a pooka that's PROBABLY Baby, but with shapeshifters who even knows.

Dean is working with YET ANOTHER DUDE WHO SEEMS TO BE HIS BROTHER. Pretty clear that if they do share a parent, it's John. Their dynamic is good, a lot like Dean and Sam except this guy is NOTHING like Sam, honestly he's pretty feral. Huge guy easily meeting "giant" height, seems to prefer range combat but can hold his own in melee as well. Calls himself a hunter or tracker of some kind, mostly goes after human targets. Understands a little of what's going on w the Fae/Rome/etc but doesn't get the full picture. He's curious and eager to fuck around and find out

Physically he resembles John a LOT, and could easily be his kid- but also bears resemblance to Balor. w the whole Vessel situation going on rn its unclear who this guy's "father" actually is besides the fact that he's a piece of work. Also of note, this guy is confirmed to have a nonhuman lineage, unclear on which side. Features include giant stature/build, enhanced senses, expert/preternatural marksmanship, the usual super strength(?), animalistic/survival mindset as baseline, and hair seems more like fur, possibly seal fur. Doesn't seem to have any connection to the possible-Selkie girl in Maine.

...all in all, Balor is looking like a more likely candidate for this guy's dad, which would explain why he and Dean currently have this sibling relationship due to (THE BOYS S4 SPOILERS). Also still some chance of a Fomoire/Fae/Fuath/Campbell family connection that I haven't noticed.

Dean is tied up in more Roman nonsense and appears to have ended up owing a blood debt (in his own blood) to some late Roman military-cult god I've vaguely heard of bc he killed said god's brother. Lots of modern folk magic/esoterica, severed limbs and possibly at least one demon deal. Given the location and the events set to unfold this summer, can't rule out Croatoan fuckery going on here as well. Dean also had a new Magic Knife(tm), bone handled with a steel, iron or possibly silver blade. gave it to this new guy, probably for protection.

I'll look into if Balor had any children in the mythos (current/recent Antichrist Situation notwithstanding).

Not sure why Dean is headed south, not sure I want to know. If he weren't the type to run directly INTO danger every time, I'd say he was trying to get out ahead of the absolute shitstorm hitting the Northeast US coast in a month. I rly hope he's not planning on picking a fight w that Brazilian pantheon over what happened w Sam... its not their fault and if anything someone should warn them. Wars between seasonal deities WILL spread just as climate change does, and if one of them was already dragged into it, that whole mythos is at risk. ...Hopefully Dean is there to warn them, not. stab them.

Dean pls just be decent to the other pagan gods this once please.

Also, Garth and his wife are now in a threesome! with BENNY.

and they are ALL married to each other

that's odd, its not bad, its just ODD, I'm happy for them. 10/10, they were always like the 3 most functional characters in the whole show anyway, and I'm sure Garth's kiddos will enjoy having yet another fun dad.

congrats to whatever's going on over there.

ALSO! Rowena's back! Yay!!! She seems to have given up trying to escape Death and now WORKS for Death, namely corralling the souls of children who don't want to go to the afterlife... or... something vaguely like that idk. She likes her job, or at least likes continuing to exist while doing something in her vague field of interest. However she DOES appear to be sniffing around near all that recent activity w Azazel's return, I hope she stays safe or just finds somewhere else to hang out. Of relevance re: Rowena's current activities are:

-two VERY talented ghosts who help other ghosts pass on and hunt the occasional monster, they are amazingly skilled and there's a lot to learn from those two.

-Tom Tildrum, or possibly Tim Toldrum, idfk its one of the cats to go by the title "The King Of Cats". I think he's Cat-sith on at least one side (Faerie/Sidhe cat) and may be in charge of them.

-Jenny Greenteeth, who may have Fomoire heritage and may ALSO be Balor's relative/child. She seems nice, if in over her head. Not sure she remembers what she is.

-Yet Another Second Generation Special Kid. this one has ALL kinds of other weird going on tho, gotta look into that

[iwatcheditbegin]

Still remember the absolute chaos of the midnights ( till dawn edition) drop. On CD only and only at those MetLife shows. And then we fought a kandroo

[star-trek-fandom-confessions]

#932

Honestly, Enterprise is The Star Trek show for being about a crew that are Just Some Guys (gender neutral) that get put in Situations TM. They just want to make some friends, but instead they get dropped right in the center of a temporal Cold War. Like, they’re in space, chilling, sipping on a soda on the front porch vibes while also simultaneously stumbling into the entire galaxy’s business. They’re the kid that waves out the window of their mom’s subaru, not realizing it’s the local mob boss in the next car over. Top tier.

[shallowseeker]

It’s kind of a gross misstatement to say Cas was simply a bad friend during the season 6 arc. Dean was also a jackass. He refused to even listen that Cas had his own problems to contend with in heaven and just insulted him (Baby in a Trenchcoat) or took him for granted and prayed when he needed some angelic boost like the time travel. It was only after months of this that Dean finally had a half-ass “Hey Cas, if you need any assistance with your heavenly war, let us know”. Dean and Castiel are both equally at fault for the initial breakup.

I'm not sure why I'm getting this particular question, but yup, I agree that the situation was complex.

One of Dean's legendary coping mechanisms/neuroses is to get prickly and mean when the going gets tough, and I love to talk a lot with regards to both the fighting/hunting and the parenting of Jack Kline.

For Dean and Cas, they're both deliciously Going Through It (TM) in season 6 in different ways, Cas dealing with paranoia via the fallout of Heavenly betrayal and Dean with his complicated feelings of displacement into civilian life.

I sort of miss the days of TV when people got to screw up this badly with one another, but not in such a way that it’s bludgeoning, mean-spirited cynicism, hehe. (((For example, I struggle to think of a modern era of SPN where Bobby's frustration and worry over Dean would boil out in this horrifying way: "You sorry--you're not a person," when in actuality, he's desperately begging Dean not to die, and it's coming out all wrong. Or Dean's indirect forgiveness of Cas, that Cas picks up on immediately by tone alone: "Bottom of the ninth...I'd rather have you, cursed or not.")))

But if we're talking about season 6, Cas is controlling most of the means of communication from the get-go, and the power is definitely weighted in his favor. He sets the tone for it as soon as his big heart leads him to abruptly flit from the car to go and rescue Sam. BUT it's also no accident that Dean's narrative nickname for Cas is SUPERMAN. A perfect, invincible superhero. Dean took him for granted, hero-worshipped him, and conceptualized him as perfect... something Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets reflects back in an off-key manner: "I thought he was perfect...he was a monster (and hurt my child)." The truth with Dean and Cas is not either extreme, however. ("That nifty metaphor has holes:" Cas was trying to save Sam from the get-go, on multiple occasions.) It's the humanity that's in the middle.

It's lovely! And to me, it feels so real, too. Maybe someone else can chime in, but I don't have any huge, complicated feelings about this except that I really, really like the disillusionment period on both sides!

“We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.” - Pema Chödrön

Love isn't baggageless perfection. It's understanding, forgiveness, resilience.

DEAN (in the dream state, to MARY): I hate you. (Deans voice breaks as tears run down his face) I hate you. And I love you. 'Cause I can't – I can't help it. You're my Mom. And I understand...'cause I have made deals to save the ones I love more than once. (Mary continues to look away but seems to hear him) I forgive you. I forgive you. For all of it. Everything.

[rayshippouuchiha]

Ray! Have you ever tasted the pure Schadenfreude that is WinterIron post cacw fanfics?

Because, let me tell you, there needs to be more of them.

Just, the beauty, the energy, the absolute fuck you of that entire scenario is truly delicious.

Bucky gets pulled out of the ice, the triggers are gone, and maybe the rogue avengers have been pardoned, or maybe it's in the works, but he's in Wakanda and he's thinking to himself: fuck this shit.

He's not an idiot, nor a pushover, and his life for the past 70 years has been him, unable to make his own decisions or do anything for himself. So he does what anyone would well, anyone smart and invested in integrating into the modern world what? and he starts researching. He learns what he's been missing, what events he was part of and what he caused. He learns about the avengers.

But most importantly, he learns about Iron Man.

He learns about a man, the son of his friend, his victim, the guy whose expo was one of his only happy memories that he hung onto from before the war (because how cool would a flying car be, right? God, every time I forget that Bucky Barnes is a Fuckin' Nerd TM) who was tortured for 3 months and managed to build himself out of a cave. This guy became the first modern super hero, he took a multi-billion dollar weapons manufacturing company and changed it completely and it worked. More personally, he shot at the guy who blocked his bullet at point blank range.

Bucky goes all in learning about Iron man and looking up videos of what the suit can do and can only come to one conclusion: if Stark had wanted him dead, he would be a smear on that bunker floor.

And he has absolutely No Idea, where Steve is getting anything that he's saying about Stark. They didn't win that fight, he knows that, it's only because Stark was pulling all of his punches that they got out of there. None of what the rogues are spitting about Stark is making sense, because he actually watches the news: Stark's paying for damages and cleaning up messes and trying to get them pardons for christs sake!

So, when they do finally get back to the US and see the Avengers again, Bucky takes to watching Stark because he can't not. And it grows from there: Bucky getting access to Tony's lab and acting like the scifi nerd that he is, conversations while Tony is fixing up something on his arm or late night meetings in the kitchen. Just... excellence.

But where, you ask, is the Schadenfreude? Well, it's been right there the entire time, because what would be more delicious than Steve watching the man he fought for, searched for, lied for, and told a majority of the world to fuck off for, choose the opposite side?

This went on longer than I meant it to but I have feelings ok?

Oh absolutely fucking yes. This is honestly my entire vibe with post-CW WinterIron. It's so goddamn delicious.

[prototypelq]

if i may ask, what's your favorite fictional horsie? (ask inspired by the recent darksiders posting, which btw has some awesome-looking horses :D)

MUTUAL YOU HAVE STEPPED ON A LANDMINE. or more like a pressure plate that is wired to a nuclear landmine under Me.

oh no I am forced to confront my sins over unhinged animal obsessions now, okay

(MAGIC HORSEGIRL TRANSFORMATION SEQUENCE)

sidenote: while writing this I realised that the ask implied any kind of fantasy horse, but I'm now shoulder-deep in gaming horses tangent soooooo lol sorry not sorry. as for fantasy outside of games I really like the idea of Sleipnir, or any other kind of multi-legged horse, Ghost Rider flaming spirit horse is also super cool. Any horse-like creature that is predatory is freakishly awesome. Additional points for adding horns, scales, or swapping hooves for split-fingered/artiodactyl-like legs.

To be honest, I wish this ask was harder to answer than it is, because truth be told, there are very few games with horses. Decent horse animation is even less common than actually good horses, which is another factor that makes me very sad and harder to enjoy these mounts. Additionally, most of the games use horses as... 'car stand-ins' basically, there's very rarely anything uniquely Horse TM about the mounts, and usually they feel like glorified speed booster with questionable animations.

(spoiler: no, rdr2 does not have good horse animation, I have looked with literal scientific lens at thas game, consulted with different horsegirl enthusiasts about it, saw literally every available to public lecture on everything-horse-developed for it, and have concluded that, horse animation is overly complicated with little to-no noticable results, as are most things with that game. more on this later)

I'll obviously be forced to come back to RDR2 topic, but shelf it for now. Here be some of my fav horsies in games, not in any particular order (except RDR2 which will be discussed below).

Darksiders is pretty much a DMC-cousin series but with horses and this makes it so cool. The designers of horses for the Riders of the Apocalypse have gone out of their way to make all the Riders and their mounts look absolutely stunning. Despair looks both awesome and riveting and is my personal fave, Rampage has Mane Magic TM same as his rider Fury, Mayhem looks really cool in that armor, but, of course, Ruin is the posterchild for the series, and rightfully so!

Ruin is built absolutely true to his name. This horse looks like it runs on V8 infernal engine and pisses nuclear monster energy. He has fangs. His hooves scorch the ground underneath. This horse has the muscle mass of a red giant sun about to go supernova. He looks absolutely insane, the only thing you could fear more than this horse in a room is the person who is controlling him. So yes, an extremely fitting mount for War. (Ruin also has awesome mane physics, much appreciated)

Sadly, out of four Darksiders games, there are horse levels only 2 of them - those being the first two games (3 and Genesis are good, Genesis especially, but they both distanced themselves from 'big maps with dungeons' style maps, so horses are not really needed. Genesis has levels you can ride in, but the horses are not really needed in it, still, they are a welcome addition, especially with fans getting the final fourth horse design). Darksiders I and II are very much horsegirlgamer games, as both have Mounted Bossfights, which are BADASS, the Guardian fight in DS2 especially. Both really make you feel like the mythic Rider of the Apocalypse, they are amazing.

Darksiders II also gets an important mention from me for having The Best Trot Animation In Gaming To This Date. The horse trot is fluid, looks very expressive and it's clear Despair slows a lot of this, so it's not his preferred gait for riding, but the main highlight is Death's animation.

Most of the games are lazy with trot, as one of the riding techniques for handling it is just...sitting in the saddle aggressively (I mean it literally, as horse movement on trot is designed to throw you off, so technique number one is basically pushing yourself back into the saddle to counteract this). So the games are usually lazy and just glue the rider to the saddle to show this. However, the second, easier really, way to ride on trot is posting, which is standing up and down in rhythm with the horse's leg movement. Problem with trot is that you need to relearn it for each individual horse, as they all have different builds, leg lengh, breed, etc. With one horse it's easier to stay sitting, with another it would be impossible, but posting will be easy to do, and with some horses you can't do either, so your only hope is holding on until you change speed and gait.

Death's movement in this trot animation is so fluid, so minimal and effortless - it's natural for him. He is in complete harmony with Despair, and the way he posts shows exactly that. 10/10 best trot animation ever, fight me.

Okay so, from a very much deserved highlight, to a not really deserved one - Dragon Age Inquisition. I'll say from the get-go, the mounts in this game suck, they don't even alter your speed of movement! They are completely useless. You could rip a minecraft horse in their place and it would feel better to control, be more useful and have better animation than DAI native mount system. That said, their designs are so cool, Dracolisks especially.

Fun fact, even the game's Horsemaster pretty much throws hands at seeing these things. You know how a normal horse when mean transformes into a 400 kilo beast with immense bite force and body mass that can crush you? Well, dracolisks don't look that heavy, but they also seem to be ready to hunt you for sport and giggles. 10/10 intense factor, they look awesome and as a supposed leader of a world-saving institution you look very impressive while riding them (and frighten 99% of the population). (it's also hilarious to imagine a Maximus-Flynn situation from Tangled between these temperamental beasts and your poor party members or love interest)

Thankfully, most of my mutuals have been acquired pretty recently, meaning, after my Big Horizons Phase xD I really love HZD, and one of the neat things about it is actually horses!

Horizon ZD is the game that has the best controlling horses out of all the games I've played (yes, even rdr2 loses to it for a big reason I will elaborate later on), and the formula of it's success is very fun to look into: it lies in three very important factors: horse brain, player controls and animation, all of which have been solved simply, yet with grace.

HZD has made sure that your chosen mount has it's own pathfinding system, which does not turn off when the player starts riding the creature, so you can, and I almost quote the devs here - you can ride into a patch of woods on high speed, leg go of your controller, and the horse will avoid collision on its own. Isn't it just great when your supposed animal has it's own pathfinding made to simulate brain activity and their feeling of self-preservation. Point two: controls. The most important aspect of HZD mount controls is that - you keep controlling Aloy, the moment she starts riding there is no magical control transition in favour of your mount. There is no 'go forward' button, even pushing the stick forward works only for walk. You keep controlling Aloy, who is now riding on top of a horse-like-machine, so to go faster you press the button for her to kick the horse into next gear. To stop or slow down, you don't use sticks and don't let go of 'go forward button', that will actually do nothing, instead you need to press the button to make Aloy hold the cords of the machine closer. Under the surface, every game's horses are just 'reskined cars', but details like this make the player feel different, make you feel like your controls don't magically transcend to the animal your controlled character is on top of. This detail is small, but it's impact is very big, I assure you. Point three: animation. HZD devs did an awesome animation trick for the running cycle of Aloy and the horses, as those two are the ones players see the most of, and they are the first ones to get repetitive and boring for the player. Basically, animators did three variations of run cycle with different weight distribution (model veers sideways and steers back into weight neutral position), then coded in a system to randomly blend bits of these run animations together. The result is a partially randomised run animation, made out of fleshed-out hand-made ones, so it always looks good, quite diverse, and is not as repetitive. (I wish I remembered the specific talk where devs explained this, but there are so many of them, all fascinating btw, and its been a few years so sorry no source for you)

Two honourable mentions for the games I have not played myself, but they really deserve it when we're talking about horsegirlgames: Zelda BOTW and Shadow of the Colossus. These games have horses right out of every horsegirl's dreams - they are big, their manes long and gorgeous, their run animation so cartoonishly expressive yet graceful, it's mesmerising. Certified horsegamergirl games.

Honestly, it's impossible to not fall in love with them (unless you don't have a platform to run either of these, ahaha, fuck console wars).

And now. Now for the black sheep of my horsegames list. RDR2.

Disclaimer: I have spent way too much time in this game. 'got Zoologist' kind of too much time. While I will be critical, the game is certainly an acquired taste, and there have been enough people singing praises to it and never having the issues I got after putting hundreds of hours into it. I had a great time, which turned very sour after these hundreds of hours. Some players keep loving this game forever, some despise it from the start. Play on your own to formulate a personal opinion and don't defer to any of these camps.

RDR2 is a western movie through and through, and by that I mean that the game is extremely pretty on the outside, but has nothing substantial on the insde. This illusion held for me for long enough, but I was much saddened by peeking behind the curtain, and seeing what I found there. Again, this is a personal issue, it doesn't mean the game is bad or good, but my dissapointement is tied pretty much directly to how the game handles horses, since, y'know, this is supposendly 'the ultimate horsegirl game'.

The sad truth is that RDR2 horses are exactly 'reskinned cars', which is the trap that renders most of gaming horses so so so boring, but the illusion the game creates holds strong for a long while, plus the personification of your horsie (saddle, mane customisation, etc.) actually strenghtens that illusion big time.

I have pointed out what HZD did right for horses to feel so good thoroughly for a reason, said reason is: RDR2 got every point on that list wrong.

Let me show you some examples of RDR2 horse pathfinding.

I chose these two specific clips for a reason - both are prime examples of exactly how lobotomised RDR2 horses are, but in different ways. First clip is user error (besides the fact that no horse could ever run on railways but I digress) - I have been enjoying the scenery too much, and the stick angle proved too much, so me and my beloved horse fell straight to our deaths off the side of that railway. I think it's pretty self-explanatory that irl horses are very self-preservation centered animals, and they don't just fall down random pits. If the RDR2 horses had kept their AI pathfinding running while the player controls them, this simple user error could have been negated - as the pathfinding system would quickly flash a 'don't fucking run into a pit', keep input from registering and the horse would just follow the side of the road without tumbling down. Which, in gamer's eyes would also roleplay as horse having it's own brains. The second example is even weirder - I've been using the 'cinematic mode', which means I put down the controller, and the horse is following the road to my chosen destination on his own, so, y'know, this should be a prime example of horse pathfinding. Wrong again! Granted, that weird woman is some sort of random event, she is not usually there, nor are there barrels, but if the object has a collison parameter it should have been freakin registered and the horse was supposed to jump over it.

So yeah, RDR2 horses are completely lobotomised to any sense of navigation, this has been likely done in favour of more direct player control and easier cinematic setups.

Point two: controls. This one is actually mixed, and I'll start with the good thing for a change. The good thing is RDR2 is literally the only game to allow for lateral movement for mount, in short, this allows you to turn around your horse clockwise while remaining in one place, basically spinning, on trot and gallop too no less! If you try the control inputs for this in any other game, you will end up circling around a set point, and not spinning in place. Which, very cool actually, and yeah the opportunity to do this feels good. Another great detail is Handling stat - which is, how responsive is your horse to your inputs (ex. more or less maneuverable, time to turn after input, how much you mash X to speed up to another gait), which all feel very distinct. Arabians are known for having exquisitely tight handling, you need only to lightly tap the button for them to listen to you, in contrast, work or draft horses will make live for your big thumb a living hell, as they need to be kicked a lot of times to do literally anything. This idea of changing character controls for each horse is very very good, and this I will gladly praise.

On the other hand RDR2 horse controls (dreadfuly). First off - your horse works based on a 'go forward' button mechanic, also the gait change is tied to it, and if you, for some reason, just 'let go' of your 'go forward button' you will after slowing down. I remember seeing a meme where the trigger and the X buttons were duck-taped to be constantly pressed on their own, and I can tell you it's not a joke. You just might need another controller after all the X mashing this game requires you to do. Just for horse controls - you mash X to go faster, you keep pushing X to remain at current speed, and the only time you let go of that button is to either mash it again, or if you want to slow down for a stop.

If you look at HZD controls explanation again, you might see just how damaging this control scheme is to the feel of your horse being an actual animal with their own head and brain, pair this controls madness with nonexistence of pathfinding, and well, RDR2 horses are justt lobotomised to a point of being a 'reskinned car'.

Last point, might be our saving grace here - animation. And, ehhhhhhhhhh, this one's positive but mixed. RDR2 devs did a great job at recognizing how different gait speeds for horses work, as well, gait is just the type of movement horse uses, it is not as strictly tied to speed as you might think. Just as you can hop down the street, or walk down the street at the same speed, trained horses can gallop at practicaly walking speed for shows (this does not work in reverse though - you cannot reach gallop speed while trotting). Game animators did their best to recognise and implement this, so the game is calculating leg movement and is blending animation when the gait-change is happening. However, what I ended up with in game, a lot of the time, is this:

I am not sure what this is caused by, I interpret this as the animation engine shrugging and going for a coffee break. This mistake is not uncommon at all, and there will be a lot of time when you see your horse 'hopping' like this with both front and back legs for a couple of seconds.

Let's just say, this is not how horses run. This is not even how they could run if they want to, or are trained to do this. Horses' entire anatomy revolves around their movement, which is built on a foundational truth that legs move in a set pattern, if that pattern is broken - horse will damage itself.

Again, this is likely just a technical issue, it appears often enough, but unless you know this is an error, you will likely sleep soundely at night. As you can see, I am not one of those people. I did not sleep soundly at night after looking into this. I have also consulted with all my horsegirl friends and a horsekeeping student over this and all of them confirmed this as an error. Still, it is very strange, that a game that bragged it has horse testicle physics down, has this blatant and frequent animation error in it.

Okay, I've thrashed RDR2 quite enough I think, the last bit I wanted to list here is another positive one. Muscle animation and animal sounds is this game are certified clinically insane. All the breathing muscle movement after cantering has been noted and animated to a golden standard, head muscle, snorting, leg muscle, all of these look insanely good. I mean literally insanely good, the animators that worked on this deserve awards.

Also, you could never say no to horse customisation. So, I wanted to wrap this monster of a post with a compilation of my RDR2 pretty horses photomoding.

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

bro i’d illegally download you af but im far too shy to be non-anon for now. thank you for responding to my previous Ask. I interpreted that theres a lack of reciprocity about how tsumiki views gojo. Almost like a “legal kidnapping”. Cuz sure megumi may have consented (as much as a 6 year old can consent) but she definitely had zero say in her adoption. It just sort of happened to her, much like how it just happened to yuuta waking up from a concussion to learn he’s got a “new dad”.

Im happy to learn that your fans will be indulged in the future regarding this!

Q: is yaga turning a blind eye or completely unaware that his school is now essentially harbouring an anti-zenin crime faction? Only asking because of your response to your previous Ask. i imagine he is bound to find out that a special grade teacher, the ONLY doctor, and a grade 1 sorcerer are currently out of commission.

You illegally download me but I’m very glitchy and probably infected with malware and I accidentally repeat the same story nine times and don’t reach the end during any of those times

Tsumiki sooo often becomes the Good Girl TM in fics and I just love her as messy and conflicted and hurting. I won’t make any binding statements as to what will be discussed/revealed but my girl needs to be allowed to be angry and upset and conflicted about her childhood. She had a pretty fucked time of it.

Also I’m pretty sure gojo straight up didn’t even legally kidnap him he fully kidnapped those children and then said “who’s gonna stop me lol” and no one was powerful enough to. Does he even have paperwork for them. There is no way it’s legitimate if so. A seventeen year old can’t even legally adopt children. What did he tell their school.

As to yaga, it’s more that there’s been such little time passed and he was too swamped to do anything immediate about it.

Like, Yaga knows that gojo and Shoko fucked off. A decent percentage of the jujutsu world knows it. It’s just that he hasn’t really had the time to do anything about it.

It’s only been like, maybe five hours since Gojo and Shoko finally made it to jujutsu high.

A general timeline of the events of sea flags gardens:

December 21st: Geto declares war.

December 22nd: Megumi is taken.

December 22nd-24th: megumi is in the disciplinary pit, only tsumiki knows he’s missing.

December 24th-25th: Yuuta defeats Geto, passes out after Rika moves on, and wakes up to discover the higher ups are already making a move on him

The night of December 25th: The Zenin force Megumi to summon the great serpent, he takes the bite.

December 26th: Yuuta meets Nanami, his new not-dad.

December 27th: Yuuta’s meeting with the higher ups. Nanami is suspended.

Very late on the 27th: Tsumiki discovers Megumi unconscious and delirious on the kitchen floor, steals a car, and brings him to the school. Yuuta unlocks reversed curse technique and maintains it throughout the night.

6amish on the 28th: Gojo and Shoko arrive at jujutsu high

(this won’t be in the fic, but basically it took Maki ages to get into touch with gojo because of how busy he was, and when he rushed to get Shoko, she was in the middle of surgery and had literally no one to replace her. By then, Yuuta had unlocked RCT, so they had a very tense night with Nanami monitoring Yuuta to make sure that he was able to keep Megumi stable while Shoko tried to not kill the guy on the table in front of her, biting their nails about whether Megumi would last until they got there. Straight up, Gojo had teleported back and forth multiple times in the night to check on Megumi, but Yuuta was so focused in maintaining RCT that he didn’t notice him. Gojo went out of his way to make sure Yuuta wouldn’t notice him, because he didn’t want to distract him and risk him losing his grip on the RCT before Shoko could take over. He was waiting just outside of the infirmary more than once in the night to make sure Megumi was still breathing. All of the adults are sort of hauntingly aware that if Yuuta hadn’t figured out RCT, Megumi would have died before Maki could even get in touch with gojo and they’d all be burying him right now. None of them have come off the panic of that yet.)

1pmish: Megumi wakes up.

It’s been less than 12 hours since gojo and Shoko fucked off, and yagas too busy trying to find replacements for their workloads to have to decide whether he’d turn a blind eye.

Gojo was legitimately covering more than the rest of the workforce combined, and that load dropping down on you when you’re busier than ever really shows. Shoko’s less obvious, because she can’t work as long as gojo can, so there’s a decent few people that still think she’s probably just sleeping or something. But when you have a society that just got off a war and literally one healer, then people notice when she leaves and doesn’t answer her phone. Yaga knows that gojo and Shoko are gone, but he doesn’t know why. Gojo hasn’t read him in on anything to do with Megumi since they had to go no contact with the Zenin. He thinks Nanami’s not around because he’s suspended, but he doesn’t know what the hell happened to make gojo and Shoko go awol, and he just hasn’t had the time to find that out.

Ijichi’s the only other one who gojo told about what happened. He’s also gone awol, but he’s been in and out of campus trying to get information on what happened and running necessary errands while everyone else has been tied up with megumi. He did get to visit Megumi while Yuuta was asleep, but Megumi was too out of it for anything to be said.

[theemporium]

Okay but I know there’s car manufacturers who make baby strollers (i know because I’ve been eyeing the Mercedes one even in my dreams for my niece) but the scenario of Toto bringing one to Maxiel which both are taken aback by the gift and Christian popping out of nowhere bringing the same goddamn stroller.

Maxiel shrugging and accepting both because you know what, never hurts to have a backup one.

Also sorry the visual of Toto being a Dad(TM) to any driver baby and said driver baby is happy everytime Toto does uppies. Christian fuming because that baby is a Red Bull baby why is it being friendly to Toto.

What I am saying is: Warring Team Principals Are Not Immune To Driver Babies.

TOTO AND CHRISTIAN’S RIVALRY GOING FROM THE TRACK TO THE BABY😭

but the way toto makes a point of always dropping the baby off with new mercedes merch

and christian is always making sure to switch it to red bull and chucking the mercedes onesie out

and maxiel watching this whole thing going on whilst you’re trying to convince these two grown men to stop dressing your baby up because you already have so much merch for both teams now and it’s getting ridiculous😭

[snow-lavender]

Re-watching OSP's Trope Talk: Those Dang Phones and having Fable Thoughts TM

If you haven't seen the video, go watch it, it's really good. In it, Red breaks down how the technology of a certain time influences what its contemporary writers think of as normal, possible, and impossible. It looks at the sudden popularity of magic smartphones in fantasy and sci-fi and goes from there, looking at a century of stories. Again, go watch it, it's really good and this rant won't make much sense without that background. But I think there's something related that Fable SMP exemplifies that's also really interesting.

So everybody in Fable has a cellphone. They call it a communicator (because it descends from a larger mcyt fanon but that's a whole other rant) but it's a cellphone for all intents and purposes. Every character can communicate through instant text and audio calls. If they need to fly away and retrieve something, continuing a conversation is rationalized in-universe by turning on comms. The whole village is in a group chat, and has some of the same culture around that that exists in real life (mainly, panicking when you send what was supposed to be a DM publicly, or complaining about repetitive pings). Like Red's thesis in the video states, this is a reflection of what technology is normal to the cast.

But something else that carries over is the timeline of technological development that the cast considers normal. Because while every character has a cellphone that they use regularly, none of their parents do.

Whenever part of the previous generation's story is revealed, this technology isn't a part of it. Any communication between the characters is non-digital. Soul and Isla communicate through written letters. Enderian travels to the Nether to talk to Soul in person. All of Wolf's war reports are handwritten and, presumably, delivered by messengers. Even Ven's propaganda, while reproduced on a mass scale, is physical. The previous generation didn't have the same access to digital communication as their children do.

This is reflective of technological development in the real world. We've made leaps and strides in communication in recent decades. What used to be a fantasy of the elite is now accessible to nearly everyone on the planet. We don't communicate the same way our parents did.

People our age witnessed huge changes in communication from early childhood. I think we all grew up hearing grandparents and even parents talk about how bulky, complicated, and limited phones and computers used to be. When I was six, we still had a tape deck in the car and a record player at my Omoe and Opa's. My parents didn't get their first cellphones until well after I was born. Now everybody has Spotify on a touchscreen the size of three large crackers. It's not at the forefront of people's minds, but I think witnessing that in your key developmental years sticks with you.

So this major change was folded into what the writers thought of as normal too. Not only is it "Of course everyone has instant communication over distance," it's "Of course their parents didn't have that."

(And, if I can be cynically critical for a second, it does introduce a kind of crazy timeline of development in-universe. Like, my parents didn't have cells as teens, but they had faxes and landlines and shit. Isla didn't even have a telegraph.

TO BE CLEAR: I'm not saying this is a mark of bad worldbuilding. Haley and Sherbert made a normal low-tech fantasy world for the backstory and pulled from what they were used to for the present story. This sort of reflection of reality that Red talks about is unconscious, that's the whole bit. It's just a little silly if you think about it too hard.)

Anyway, I think it's interesting how fiction mirrors not just our present but our history. I'm interested to see how this sort of carryover develops. Gen-Z storytelling is still pretty relegated to social media and indie projects. I can't wait to see how the mediascape changes as our perspectives make their way into the mainstream. In the meantime though, I'll just sit over here thinking way harder than the cast intended about my beloved little cube people.

[sleepy-seal]

{hi gale!! this'll be coming in waves so I don't flood your inbox too hard lmao. anyways part 1}

LORE Gale

What was the inspiration for his blue arc?

How was it putting ocean through every trial imaginable lmao

Not exactly LOREgale but why was Swap!Gale's hell Walmart. secondary why was shell in hell in the first place

At what point did the car dealership/rental service/whatever in Nebraska realize that something was Certainly And Extremely Wrong with Gale

Is he ever able to get therapy

Do you think when it was all calm he got some shitty storemade cake to celebrate

Did you ever want them to Go Insane?

Gale and Acher. can I ask about ocean's thoughts on the strange tiny murderous robot turned silly not-so-murderous robot throughout the arcs

Did anyone from Gale's old town wonder where they went?

Does he ever casually turn into a cat and then both people for a day

Has Gale ever gone to the ocean. because I think shell might like that. what was it like for them during Ocean Trip TM

OH BOY!!!!! MY FAVORITE

- the inspiration was partly inspired by, well, the pawn promotion. by becoming a queen lore gale became much more powerful than acher, and therefore much more dangerous. blue was kind of an improvised decision, as one of the main articles of clothing gale was wearing was . well, blue. so i kind of leaned into that a bit. the other part was well. the magnus archives. i made lore gale's character way more jarchivist coded than i intended so i leaned into it a bit, especially with gale progressively Losing their sense of humanity and their struggle trying to accept it.

- it was very fun lmao. they are my webkinz doll i am soaking with milk and throwing against the wall.

more answers under the cut because this is Long and i have a lot of things to say

- swap!gale's hell is walmart because 1) my partner moth goes there frequently and laments about how much of a labyrinth it is and 2) have you Seen walmart?? also the reason why sale is in hell is. um. fraud?? and also being a willing accomplice in and also enabling some of moth's war crimes.

- probably the moment gale walked into the dealership. they were glowing and sweaty and looked like they just got out of a fight (which they did) and immediately asked for a rental which. uh. definitely set people off. also their fingers were blue.

- maybe! once they are financially capable of it at least.

- probably! it would probably be a time when gale isn't in Stress Baking Mode but also too fatigued to make anything so they just buy a single cake slice and eat that. it tastes terrible but it's probably the most comforting thing they've had in a while

- yes. absolutely. 100%

- okay so i will try to simplify it enough in a way that Makes sense but also gives some insight to their thought process.

> gale under the belief that acher Really Is Moth or close to it and treats them as such, upset that "moth" is not really moth. they are also afraid of her

> they abandon "moth" and cut them off for a brief while, sabotaging its plan

> pure fear. they don't want to die to "moth". they briefly consider murder but quickly write it off

> truce. a calm period where gale thinks there may be a chance of redemption and rekindling

> moth comes back. he takes his eyes off acher and focuses more on shell's friend

> neutral, almost unfamiliar. acher asserts that they don't Actually care about anyone and gale believes them. since the real moth came back they can focus on them instead of the doppelgänger of the friend.

> rocky. they are on uneven ground and since the truce is technically off, it doesn't take much for acher to get on their bad side. this is probably the stage where gale is at their most unstable and willing to hurt back.

> truce, but better. gale hasn't quite forgiven acher yet. they can't. but at the very least they trust him enough to try again.

> trust. acher is a friend. they put their full faith in acher on improving and growing, even if forgiveness is not in sight yet.

- sorta? there were people gale knew before they ran away that considered gale a friend, but not the other way around. some of them think that they probably died, and some of them think they ran away because life was just too hard. their family misses them technically, but they also blame ocean for being so selfish.

- YES. 100%. turns out there are multiple benefits to being a cat. 1. is nobody will question you when you are annoying, because that's Just Cat Things.

- THEY HAVE! gale visited gem's cousin jeremy once or twice. he lives in california with his boyfriend, and they occasionally come by for family reuinions. mostly to see gale. but gale LOVES the ocean. they didn't get to see it much but it's always so big and they don't stop talking about the phenomenon that occurs in the sea.

[carcass-confessions]

Things I've learned from my dad on the car ride home after getting flowers for mothers day:

Israel has done nothing wrong, they're America's best ally

The IOF hasn't been slaughtering and/or raping civilians, that's just propaganda, in fact it's entirely hamas doing the raping and killing

Children aren't dying, that's just propaganda

All the college student protestors are secretly being organized by some unknown higher power

(In fact, most of the protestors aren't even students)

"My generation" is just naive and wants any excuse to jump on innocents because of mob mentality

The police aren't shooting rubber bullets, that's just not true, why would the police use excessive force against some dumb college students

Hospitals were never bombed because Israel said so and they're our greatest ally

Yeah there's good and bad on both sides but it's a war, that happens, and besides, hamas attacked first so anything Israel does is justified

Rafah isn't being bombed, that's propaganda

There's no famine, that's propaganda

Israel is actually the ONLY democratic country in the entire region, so they're the Good Guys

he's In The Know and is very involved in national security so he knows everything about The Situation TM

Protestors are never violent or even disruptive if they want to prove a point, that's counterintuitive, just look at Martin Luther King Jr, he was TOTALLY peaceful.

I don't know how the FUCK I'm supposed to argue with this man when not only does he just not accept any piece of evidence I provide, but I get way too emotional and can barely talk through tears let alone REMEMBER anything specific enough to make me sound at least a little informed.

And then he says I need to stop shutting down and giving up the moment someone has an opposing viewpoint, and "what this country needs is calm civil discussions" as if there isn't a literal genocide, which you cannot be neutral about

[alltimefanfiction]

So I’m in desperate need to find some new stories to read I haven’t read. I really only read Jalex and the smuttier the better but I’m not picky 😂 just would love to know some of you guys favorites or ones you have recently read so maybe I can discover a new story or maybe revisit some I forgot about

Well The Bandana Code would probably be the best place to start.

Star-Crossed Lovers TM (still updating)

Christmas Countdown

Scream Your Heart Out

Those are basically chaptered porn lmao, but I recently made a handy dandy post of all my faves fics here which are all Jalex and range.

~ Molli

Oooooh, I always find these questions rough because I'm never sure what ones you'd know well/have read recently/etc.

So of course we have this page with every mod's faves tag. There's a lot of overlap but if you wanted to flick through our historic favourites, that is your best bet.

However I'll list some anyway that I think are worth checking out/revisiting off the top of my head. I'm assuming you want chaptered so I'll try to stick with that but I don't think any of these are extremely smutty.

The Freudian Slip

Coin-Operated Boy - incomplete (?)

Let Me Drive You Home

Never Lost A War + sequel Put Your Flowers Down - sequel incomplete

The Truth Is Hard To Swallow - mpreg, please give it a try even if you're not that into mpreg though because that's what I did back in the day and I absolutely loved it

Would You Believe Me If I Said I Didn't Need You?

Can We Fast-Forward To Go Down On Me? - long-ish oneshot

Could This Be Out Of Line? - girl!ATL, long-ish oneshot

Car Tows and Railways (and How I Met You) - long oneshot

69 BRO! (The Walk Of No Shame) - long oneshot

And I know you said Jalex but I urge you to give these Callakarth fics a go. They're completed if that helps entice you into them and they're just... SO GOOOOD.

The Devil Wears Prada

City Lights

Perfect Game + sequel Welcome To Miami

EDIT: If you are just looking for straight-up porn... well, we have so many lists for that that it would pain me to make a new one BUT I COULD TRY.

-Eve

[shallowseeker]

btw i know you said asks off so i wont be offended if you refuse to answer but im always thinking about how touched cas must feel when dean comes storming in during the diner scene in lily sunder... his friends care about him!!!!! :)

Oh. Hehe. I guess when I turned it off, I only turned off anon asks. :-)

No, no. Not offended at all. I just turned off the anon asks cause I was getting a lot of bizarre messages, some of them really out of line. (I think mostly due to me posting a Rowena-pegs-Sam joke on a poll that was apparently more high-stakes to some folks than I ancitpated.).

BUT YES LILY SUNDER OH GOD LET'S HAVE LILY SUNDER HOURS TOGETHER

You know, I wonder! I think he was touched, but he was feeling some mixed emotions, too. Namely, irritation and eventually horror.

I'm not the best Cas understander out there, so maybe a Cas-pert can weight in but... here we go.

///

At the beginning of the episode, we find Dean and Cas in a Cold War, both irritable with one another for...simply put, being heroes. Neither wants the other to "be a hero" and get hurt. The feeling is mutual.

Cas wanted to protect Dean from his stupid deal, and then Mary stepped in to take on the burden of the stupid deal, and then Cas stepped in to override Mary and got Cursed (TM).

OMG Look at Dean's FACE when Cas says, "I have to go."

////

And yes, it appears you're right. He wanted their support!

///

I wonder how heavily Cas's need for appreciation is weighted into this?

I'm thinking particularly of this line: "...and appreciative, too!"

He wants Dean to appreciate his heroics.

We see this desire repeated in the 12x19 Future script, with the mental picture of a strong, shirtless Cas and the hyperfocused closeup of Dean saying, "Thank you..."

///

And Dean is grateful.

From Sam's words, it sounds like Dean is the one who started the Cold War. The end of this episode will bookend with Dean trying to put to words why he's so pissy.

(He's worried.)

///

Looking at the diner scene today...

I honestly think annoyance might be winning for Cas overall. :D

///

He needed to talk the soldier talk, and he does: complimenting his fellow soldiers' dominations of their vessels and "keeping them" all these years.

Yikes, I'm not sure he'd engage in that kind of "angel bro talk" with Sam and Dean present. It's like they're talking about their cars.

Cas is here with one goal in mind, to get intel. He resolves to be cool-headed.

And Cas resolves to put up with it. For the sake of strategy and intel.

///

But then Dean charges in, and this is the face of an angel "losing face" and alllllll his negotiation power:

Sam and Dean have unwittingly taken away his ability for locker-room talk.

///

And then, things go to Hell. Ishim gets mad.

///

With a lap-full of Dean, Cas tries to salvage what little trust he had: "I only brought Sam and Dean."

And Dean, in Ishim's eyes, starts "mouthing off" and "getting cute." He hates it.

(I think Ishim reads them, and he's jealous about it, to be honest. Cas was everything Ishim wanted to be as a soldier, and Cas's humans truly love him.)

///

And Ishim continues his insults, which has the effect of successfully drawing Dean AND Sam into an argument as they defend Cas.

///

Cas tries to give Sam a BIG hint.

//

And then... Cas loses the discussion. Ishim closes up and decides NOT to play ball. Ishim redirects, "I have a safe house nearby."

This is a face of, "fuck you guys. Look what you did. You've made him shut down AND he's demanding I move the conversation to a 'safe place.'"

And a safe place like that is safer for ISHIM but not for Cas. It's not the outcome Cas wanted. He wanted to get to the meat of things: intel.

And he wanted to do it in a public place with backup.

///

Now that I look, I think... I think yes, he's certainly touched to have their support, but in the moment, his annoyance is winning out.

This has the vibes of, "Don't make things needlessly complicated, as you humans tend to do."

YOU DESTROYED MY NEGOTIATION, DEAN.

///

Later, of course, there's the fight.

And Ishim wipes the floor with them.

This and what happens with Ramiel in Stuck in the Middle with You are two of Cas's worst moments. I think they're huge parts of what triggers his lone wolfism at the end of this season.

He may want support, but he doesn't want them to protect him.

That's unacceptable / devastating / frightening!

(Cas, afraid he's going to have to watch Dean die.)

Dean lowers his hand, and we don't GET Cas's reaction when he does, but I can imagine it was one of the most devastating moments of his life.

Aside/// Someone smarter than me... Is that even a proper banishing sigil? It doesn't have the usual triangle that I've seen the boys use. I know Samuel used some different ones...

///

And Ishim, who already "read" Dean in the dinner, is now wanting to punish Castiel for having THE THING HE HIMSELF wanted...

...and so of course he calls his bluff: "That's what I thought."

//////

I rate it MIXED. I think Cas is having majorly mixed feelings about all this! I think he wants his family's support, but when he finally gets it, it's the WORST feeling. It's maybe the worst thing that's ever happened to him.

[writingplotbunnies]

Best Served Cold (Part 9/?)

Pairing: Jax Teller x OFC

Summary: Jax and Sophie have a long overdue conversation, about everything.

Word Count: ~2800

Warnings: angst, illegal activity, possessive behavior, sexual content, canon typical violence

Pulling into the TM lot, Sophie saw Jax step out of the clubhouse. Happy rolled to a stop next to her. They didn’t say anything, but she read the look in his eyes. A familiar look she’d seen with the members of her teams over the years after something had gone sideways, when there was bad news to be conveyed. She nodded as he parked his bike with the others. Sophie slid from her car and walked past Jax who followed her into the clubhouse. She didn’t say anything as they walked down the hall to his dorm. 

Closing the door behind them, she paused, hand pressed against the wood. Gathering her thoughts she marveled at how she’d found herself here. If she believed in angels, she’d claim Olivia had taken over watching out for her - a certain knowing humor to her guidance. Behind her, Jax met her silence. His own filled with a banked frustration she could feel mounting. A sigh on her lips, Sophie reached for the hem of her shirt. Fisting the material in her hands, she tore the shirt over her head before she could rethink her choices. 

“Sophie.” 

Her name was an exhalation of breath from Jax. She could imagine his thoughts, could hear the way his desire for her warred with his irritation with her actions. 

“Count them.” 

“Sophie.”

“Count them, Teller.” 

Behind her, she heard the blanket shift against the sheets as Jax stood from the bed. His heat hit her back first, then his breath against her neck as he moved in close, crowding her against the door. His fingers against her skin shocked her nearly as much as Happy’s had. As he traced the outline of each petal, she shivered. 

“Twenty-nine,”Jax whispered. 

“That’s the number of confirmed kills I have. Zobelle is going to be number thirty.”

Gentle hands turned her to face him. She saw the confusion, the knowing look that united those who had shed blood. 

“The Marines made me a sniper. I’d killed people before I could legally order a beer. I’ve done a lot of things I’m not always proud of, but I figure a man like you would understand that better than most.” 

Sophie paused, felt the way Jax cradled her face in his hands.

“Babe - ”

She silenced him with a shake of her head. “I met with the Niners because I needed Laroy to get me a rifle. I knew the club was on good terms with them, so it seemed the best solution. We hadn’t started whatever this thing between us is when I set up the order. Laroy came through; I paid him. No blow back. Even came to an understanding about Happy showing up today.”

“Is that right?”

She ignored the skepticism, the slight accusation in his tone. Knew she’d earned at least that much from him. 

“Yeah, said he understood wanting to keep his woman safe. Happy said the same thing, well, said something about me being your Old Lady.” 

“You went behind my back.”

Flinching at the accusation, she shook her head. “No, I didn’t. I took a calculated risk that would have still been a risk if all you were to me is a cute mechanic who fixed my car. I won’t let you or the Sons get in my way, Jax.”

Jax leaned back, scrubbed a hand down his face. He wore an expression of pain, of exhaustion. 

“Zobelle is club business now. He went after Gemma and that doesn’t go unanswered.”

Sophie nodded. “Of course not. They need to pay for what they’ve done. But it’s not just club business, and you need to understand that.”  

“Don’t make me choose between you and the Club. Neither of us is gonna like how that goes.” 

Picking her shirt up, Sophie stalled for time as she put it back on. It made piss poor armor, but it was the best she had at the moment. She wanted to laugh at the quickly hidden pout on Jax’s face, but now wasn’t the time for levity. But, it was good to know that he found her sexy even when he wanted to toss her ass all the way out of Charming. 

“I’d never ask you to to chose. Why do you think I worked so hard to keep things separate? Why do you think I keep pushing you away? Pretending that I can be in the same room as you and not want to be in your arms? I know how this goes, Jax. I might not understand all the complexities, but I damn well know what that VP patch on your chest means. I respect it - even though you don’t believe me. But, it’s my sister. My family. I couldn’t save her. What I can do is kill the fucker who murdered her. Your mother is alive and unharmed because of what I know - what I learned as a result of my sister being beaten and raped until she died in a hospital bed alone.”

The tears started sometime during her tirade, not that she noticed them until Jax’s thumbs gently wiped them from her face. He crushed her body to his chest. At first, she just let him hold her, her own arms hanging like limp noodles at her sides. As he whispered nonsense in her ear, she began to stitch herself back together. Feeling a bit like Sally in that Tim Burton film, sewing her limbs back to her own body. 

“I’m not trying to cut you out,” Sophie said, blinking up at him. “I know this affects you, too, but I know enough to know that you’ll take this to your stupid ass table and come up with some half-assed revenge plan that won’t work and before he’s even sold his first white hate cigar, Zobelle will have you all in the morgue or the state pen. I’ll bury you myself before I let that happen.” 

“Give us a little more credit than that.” 

Sophie forced herself to take a breath. They both wanted the same thing. She could work with them, but only if she made Jax understand. “You would have beaten the shit out of him, maybe even killed him that night at the hospital and we both know it. I don’t blame you for the impulse, but I won’t let you fuck this up because you can keep your shit together.” 

“Clay’s not just gonna back down from this.” 

“I’m not asking anyone to back down from anything. I’m begging you to be smart about this, to let me help you. If it was just as easy, as simple as killing him - well, he’d’ve been dead before my car needed your help.”

Her dry laugh felt more self-deprecating than it should. “I’m good at dropping bodies. But this guy? He’s too connected, and I wanna know the fucker who pulls the strings.”  

“You can’t just go off on your own, Soph. Club’s got a lot of shit going on, and I can’t be sending Happy to follow you every time you decide to go make a deal with someone.”

Sophie nodded. “Done. Laroy provided the last thing I needed anyway.”

Jax raised an eyebrow. “He provided, did he?”

“Don’t be gross. I needed a clean Barrett M82A1.” 

Jax whistled through his teeth. “That’s kinda hot. And a little terrifying.” 

Sophie smirked up at him. “Good. I want you describe me like that to people - hot, and a little terrifying.” 

Olivia used to mention “Club Business” when they spoke. Things that she couldn’t share, even with her own sister. As long as she was safe, Sophie had always respected Olivia’s privacy. She knew that Drifter told her everything. Like Jax had told her Old Ladies either knew everything or nothing. Figured it was her turn to either shit or get off the pot. 

“Everyone but you has called me your Old Lady.” 

Jax ran a hand through his hair as he took a step back. He sat heavily on the bed, holding his head in his hands for a few seconds before looking back up at her.

“You wanna do this now?”

“It gonna be any easier to do this tomorrow?” 

He shook his head. Sophie moved to stand in front of him. Taking his hands in hers, she knelt on the floor in front of him. 

“I know this is heavy. I told you before that I only had one secret, and now that doesn’t even matter because you know everything I would have wanted to hide. But, I can’t be one of those women who’s kept in the dark. It’s not me. I’d dig. And I’d resent you for keeping shit from me. It would feel like there was no trust - and if there’s no trust, then I’m gone. Simple as that.” 

“Nothing simple about trust.” 

“Jax, you either trust me or you don’t. Either way, tell me now.” 

He stared at her. She felt him trying to peel back all of her layers; it made her want to squirm because she feared he’d find something he didn’t like. But, she couldn’t remain in limbo with him, not anymore. Either they did this thing all in, or she walked away. It would suck, but she’d heal. What she wouldn’t survive would be staying, half in - waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

Jax brought their clasped hands to his lips, pressed a kiss to the back of hers before tugging her to stand, then sit next to him on the bed. Releasing one of her hands, he traced her cheek, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. 

“I trust you. It was never about that for me. You always seemed half out the door, and I can’t go there again. I can’t be waiting around for you to decide you’ve had enough of club shit and leave. Tara did that, and I need you to choose to be here. All in.”

“I’m not gonna be one of those women who just gets told to sit quietly while the men handle business - ”

Sophie held a hand up when Jax opened his mouth. 

“That doesn’t mean I don’t understand that you have rules, that the Club has rules. The night Bobby came home, that fight. I could have handled that idiot on my own, but I know you needed to be the one to deal with it because of some chest pounding man rule you boys all have. Fine. I can deal with that, but I’m not damsel in distress, and I won’t have you disrespecting me by treating me like one.” 

“You’re sexy when your bossy.” 

“Good,” Sophie smirked. “I like being bossy.” 

“I’m gonna mess up your rule, just letting you know from the jump. Part of you being my Old Lady is letting me take care of you, keeping you safe from the dangerous part of this life. It’s in my blood, but I’ll try.” 

“I can work with that.” 

“Anything else before we start arguing about where you’re gonna wear my crow?” 

Sophie smirked. “Only one.” 

“What’s that?” 

Her eyes turned serious. “I know about the road rules, Jax. When Olivia had me come out and meet Michael, the guys made a point of telling me all about road rules, and how things were done. I pulled my .40 cal from my hip, pressed the barrel against his jewels and asked him if he had any questions about the consequences of stepping out on my sister - rules or no rules. Hear me now because I won’t say it twice. You step out on me here, there, or anywhere - I’m gone and you’ll never see me again. No second chances.”

“You worried about CaraCara?” 

Sophie shook her head. “No. Plus, porn is good business for the club. Legit, and brings in money.”

“You really held a gun to the Sargent at Arms of an MC on your first visit?”

Sophie laughed. “Yeah. I didn’t know anything about the MC life. Didn’t care because it was my baby sister.” 

They both stared at each other for a moment before grinning.

“You’re imagining me holding a gun to Tig’s dick, aren’t you.” 

Jax’s face went through a series of emotions from shocked amusement to disgust to something bordering on rage-filled jealousy.” 

“I wish I wasn’t, but yeah. And the sick fuck would be turned on by it. We can never tell him.” 

“So that’s it,” Jax finished. “Everything you didn’t want to know about the Sons.” 

Sophie blinked up at him. They’d laid down on the bed, each staring at the ceiling while Jax caught her up on the current shitshow the Club found itself in. Given Tara’s involvement and then abandonment, she hated the doctor a bit more now than she had before. No wonder Jax had been a bit hesitant to trust her. 

“Stahl’s the biggest problem. I mean, she set Opie up to take the fall. Clay fell for it, and we’re all lucky that Tig can’t hit the broadside of a barn. Donna’s lucky to be alive.” 

“He can’t be trusted.” 

Sophie rolled onto her side, pressed her hand against his chest. “He’s the man who raised you. I know this has gotta be eating you up inside.” 

“Clay doesn’t see the road he’s leading us down ends with all of us bloody or locked up again. All he sees is the money.” 

“What’s the plan for retaliation?” 

Jax raised an eyebrow at her, small smile tucked into the corner of his mouth.

“What?”

“Just hard to believe you’re real. Mom was right.” 

“Right about what?” 

“Not everyone is cut out for this life. I thought if I loved Tara enough that it would all work out, that our love would be enough. She helped save Abel’s life, so I’ll always be grateful to her, but it never would have worked between us.” 

“Nothing about what you do, who you are scares me. It’s kinda comforting because it’s oddly familiar. Different uniforms, different rules, but same underlying ideals.”

“Clay wants us to blame the Mayans. Trouble is, we got no beef with them.” 

“No one would believe Clay and Tig acted without a vote?” 

Jax sighed. “I don’t know. If they do believe it, then they have a prez they can’t trust. If they don’t, then they have a VP they don’t believe in. Either way could kill us, break us apart from the inside.” 

Sophie nodded. “I think that’s why you should make Clay and Tig confess. Donna didn’t die. She’s gonna heal up just fine, and while it doesn't make anything they did okay, it should at least buy them their lives. Just maybe not their specific seat at the table.” 

“What are you saying?” 

“Relax. I’m not saying anything. I’m still the new kid here, remember? But, I know how a chain of command works - and how it doesn’t. If you don’t trust Clay, which it’s clear you don’t - and how could you? That shit spills over because you start second guessing everything he does, makes the others start asking questions because I’m guessing before this you and Clay had a pretty solid relationship, right? I mean, I’m sure you fought because what father and son don’t, but still. Family means something.” 

“I’d need evidence that Stahl was responsible. It’s not like I don’t understand why Clay did what he did. I just don’t like his hair-trigger recently; it’s not good for the Club.” 

Sophie pressed a kiss to his chest. “Sounds like you already know what you need to tell the guys.” 

Jax let out a long sigh. “Clay won’t go down that easy.” 

“Then don’t start with Clay. Start with Tig.” 

“Tig?”

“Yeah. I know he’s six types of crazy, but he’s no mindless killer. He wouldn't just go around shooting Opie’s wife, even if Opie had been the rat. The guilt is probably eating him alive, but he’s rationalizing it because he was following orders. And, again, given what they knew at the time, it tracked. Stahl is a dirty bitch. Give me a day or two and I’ll have something on her that you can use.”

“Not sure I can stall them that long. We’re meeting for Church in a couple of hours.” 

Sophie shot from the bed. Jax lazily turned his body to follow her movements. She quickly found her shoes and put them back on her feet.

“What are you doing?” 

“Fixing your problem, Teller. You need info on Stahl, enough to stall the retaliation. If I can’t get the info to you fast enough, let me know where the hit is going to go down, and I’ll make sure it doesn’t.” 

“You can’t shoot anyone, Sophie.” 

“I have more skills than just shooting people, Jackson.”

Part 10

Master List

[uboat53]

All right guys, we need to talk. Time for a LONG RANT (TM) about an important topic.

INTRODUCTION

Over the last few years, you may have noticed that Republicans and conservatives have made a lot of noise about protecting children. Some of it came as part of the QAnon conspiracy theory about pedophilia and child sacrifice and some of it came as part of culture war issues like the existence of LGTBQ-etc people.

But one thing that's kind of gone under the radar is all the ways that these same people who claim to be protecting child welfare with every fiber of their being have actually made things far more dangerous for children. Let's run through the list.

INFECTIOUS DISEASES

Honestly, the most important thing that's been done for child welfare in the history of humankind is the massive decrease in child mortality that's been achieved in the past century. Seriously, until the mid 20th century, it was perfectly normal for about half of all children to die before the age of 5. We've come so far on this that now it's a rare tragedy when this occurs.

Part of this mortality was due to malnutrition, we've overcome Malthus (see the Malthusianism Wikipedia article if you're interested), but a huge amount of it is the power of modern medicine to deal with diseases that used to ravage children. Measles, Mumps, Smallpox, Influenza, and a huge amount of other diseases used to sweep through the population regularly either killing children or weakening them for another disease or condition to do the job.

Vaccines have been a huge part of this progress and are a major reason why viral illnesses no longer ravage the population on a regular basis (antibiotics have been similarly effective for bacterial illnesses) and yet there remains a disturbingly large and well-funded movement to advocate against vaccines and particularly childhood vaccinations, largely based on fraudulent claims that have been debunked more than a decade ago.

While it is true that this vaccine skepticism has strains across the ideological spectrum, it is only in the Republican Party where the idea has been given power by elected and appointed officials. No Democratic Surgeon General, for example, has recommended against the (exceedingly safe!) Covid or Measles vaccines, but that's exactly what the Surgeon General of Florida, Joseph Lapado, has done.

This is, of course, far from an isolated incident. A quick search will find dozens, even hundreds, of cases of GOP elected and appointed officials inveighing against vaccines, pushing to remove vaccine requirements, pushing to limit funding to vaccination programs, and generally echoing the most extreme and unproven claims against one of the most powerful public health tools for the protection of children that has ever been developed.

GUN VIOLENCE

Time to talk about guns. For a long time, this was a secondary issue, automobiles were the largest leading cause of death for children pretty much since we dealt with diseases (see the last section). However, over the last several decades, we've worked hard to implement all kinds of safety features that have dramatically brought down the number of children killed in car crashes. Guns, on the other hand…

Well, gun deaths among children have almost doubled in the last decade and, for the first time ever, they are now the leading cause of death for those under the age of 18 (otherwise known as children).

This increase seems to be largely driven by assaults rather than suicides or accidental deaths (though both of those have increased as well). Now, I'm not going to claim that there's a silver bullet for dealing with gun violence, but there are policies that are well supported by research and shown to reduce gun violence. It's also the case that, considered overall, states that lean more toward Democratic policies have significantly lower (and increasingly lower) levels of gun violence than states that lean toward Republican policies.

All the specifics aside, it speaks to priorities. If gun deaths are now the number one killer of children, anyone interested in protecting children would want to do something about that. My accusation of Republican/conservative officials is not that they don't want to implement my preferred policies to address this issue, it's that they consistently refuse to implement any policies that, even theoretically, would be aimed at addressing this issue.

CHILD LABOR

In the early 1900s, child labor was common and widespread, with children often working 12 hour shifts or more with very little in the way of safety and oversight. Over the course of the first four decades of the 20th century, numerous laws were passed to make it illegal to employ children in dangerous jobs or for long hours that would interfere with their education.

Now, despite an uptick in child labor violations and numerous stories of children killed while illegally working dangerous jobs, Republican governors and legislatures in states as disparate as Wisconsin, Iowa, Arkansas, Ohio, and Missouri have been pushing for and passing laws that weaken the protections in place for child workers as young as 14 and sometimes even younger.

RACISM

Racism isn't generally seen as a child issue because it's assumed to affect all ages about equally, but we have to take into account the demographics of this country before assuming that. In fact, children (those under 18) are actually the most racially diverse group in the United States with older groups being much more homogeneously white. In fact, because of this racial difference, racism has a far greater effect on the average child than it does on the average adult.

And, to be clear, there are numerous ways that ongoing racism is actively affecting the health and well-being of children in this country today. Republicans, though, overwhelmingly believe that enough has been done to combat racism and that nothing more should be done to address it.

ACTUAL CHILD ABUSE

Okay, QAnon definitely took this issue and ran off into the woods to do unspeakable things to it, but child abuse is definitely a real issue that impacts children. Unlike the QAnon caricature, though, child abuse tends not to be something carried out by shadowy strangers hidden from public view, but is overwhelmingly (over 90%) committed by someone the child knows personally.

The problem is, by spreading the idea that child abuse is a stranger-danger type of problem, this idea directly impacts efforts to protect children from abuse by draining resources from evidence-based policies and pushing them into nonsense.

Now, you may say "hey, that's QAnon, not Republicans" and, sure, but many elected Republicans are supporters of the QAnon conspiracy (among others) and even those who don't openly profess support are either silent or press for policies based on the conspiratorial worldview. In 2020, 97 open QAnon followers ran in political primaries with 22 Republicans and 2 Independents among them making it to the general election, numerous representatives and party officials have taken part in QAnon organized events, and even Donald Trump, the de facto head of the party and its likely presidential nominee, has repeatedly expressed support for it. It's also notable the only prominent Republicans who have spoken out against QAnon have either been out of office or have quickly either retired or been defeated for re-election.

So, yes, the source of the issue is QAnon, but QAnon is part of the Republican Party now.

LGBTQ-ETC YOUTH

One of the main dangers that Republicans and conservatives like to say they're protecting children from is LGBTQ-ect people, but this also ignores the fact that many children are or will turn out to be LGBTQ-etc themselves. The statistics are pretty clear that suicide rates among this group are twice as high or even higher than the general population but the research is also clear that LGBTQ-etc youth with supportive families and communities have suicide rates that are almost completely back in line with the general public.

There's also no evidence to support the idea that LGBTQ-etc people abuse children at any higher rates than any other group, so targeting them not only fails to deliver any particular gains in child protection, it also alienates LGBTQ-etc youth and drives them to suicide.

POLICIES VS OUTCOMES

So far I've only talked about specific policies, but what do the outcomes look like? There's numerous ways you can measure child well-being, but I figured I'd go with deaths. Specifically, I was able to find good data for both infant mortality and child (1-14) mortality. I then compared this with Ballotpedia's information about party control of state governments over the last 10 years (this link brings you to Colorado, but you can change the state name in the URL to get any state).

Crunch this data and what you find is that Republican control of state government is bad for infant mortality but is REALLY bad for child mortality. There are some outliers, but the pattern is pretty clear that, the longer Republicans had control in a state government and the more control they had, the worse the outcomes are.

Infant mortality is almost 25% higher and the mortality rate of children aged 1-14 is OVER 80% HIGHER in states fully controlled by Republicans than in states fully controlled by Democrats. These patterns also generally hold for the level of partial control as well.

A WORD TO REPUBLICANS/CONSERVATIVES

If you're a registered Republican, if you vote Republican, or if you consider yourself a conservative, you may look at some of this and think "that's not what I believe". And, yes, that's fair, this doesn't perfectly represent the views of every Republican or conservative everywhere.

What it does represent, however, is the view of a large number of people in the party and movement with power. Power that they're using to enact these very policies which, as I think I've shown, endanger children.

You may not identify with these, but your party and movement do.

CONCLUSION

Republicans and conservatives talk a really big game about protecting children but, when you look at what they're actually doing, their policies are one of the biggest threats to children. I don't need a longer conclusion than that.

As usual, if you disagree or have anything to add, please cite your sources appropriately. I think I've done a decent job of that, so I'll just ask that you do the same.