#Does she like her opportunity in the union? Did she have opportunities when she was in college? These are my questions

[oodlesodoodles]

[nebulaafterdark]

At The Pleasure Of The Crown (Part 2)

Summary: Aegon and his wife regularly visit the silk streets. One night they happen upon Aemond behind one of the curtains, the rest is history.

18+ ONLY MDNI Targcest, smut, infidelity, manipulation, etc.

Aegon Targaryen x Velaryon(Strong)!Reader

Aemond Targaryen x Velaryon(Strong)!Reader

Part 1

Aegon and Aemond have been at war from the time they were boys. Over what exactly, neither can say. For Aegon’s part, he’s never truly known the love of his mother, not the way Aemond did. Mayhaps that is where it started.

The tree remembers, the axe forgets.

Despite the teasing his elder brother inflicted upon him, Aemond wanted only to win his approval; and that of his father. Marrying Y/N boosted Aegon’s worth in Viserys’ eyes, while Aemond remained the boy irreparably damaged, over an insult.

The tree remembers, the axe forgets.

Then of course there is Y/N, the only daughter of Rhaenyra Targaryen; used as a means to broker peace between warring houses since she was no more than a child. Made to ease the suffering of those around her, at great personal expense.

The tree remembers, the axe forgets.

Each of them shaped by unsteady hands, hoping only for the best.

The tree remembers, the axe regrets.

Over the moon turn since Aemond hath inserted himself upon their union, not one of them has known peace. All angry or pining for another, because of a misunderstanding. Because of a book, because of a sword fight, because of a single glance.

Even seated round the council table, Aemond stares at their entwined hands. Love is a curious thing, in all its different forms. Y/N is never going to love him the way she does Aegon.

“What will my children call you?”

“Aemond, or uncle. Same as they always have.”

“What will your children call me?” The wound is still fresh, raw and aching as Aegon presses against it.

“It will be nearly impossible to tell…whether they are yours or mine, until they are grown.” Aemond admits, “I suppose they might call us both father.”

Y/N buries her head in her hands, sick with the guilt of what she’s done.

Dying in the name of love is noble sacrifice, killing one’s self to love another is a senseless endeavor.

“Sometimes these things happen.”

————————————————————————

“Are you not speaking to me?” Aemond asks, when he manages to get Y/N alone.

“What difference does it make? My words mean little to you.”

Aemond sighs, “I apologize for my lapse in judgment. I should not have said those things to Aegon.”

“Knowing what he means to me, how could you be so cruel?” The princess snaps.

Aemond purses his lips, “my brother made fun of me for the whole of my life. I saw an opportunity to return the favor. I am sorry for it.”

“Is that what this is to you?” Y/N whispers, “is that what I am to you? Revenge against your brother, at long last?”

“No,” Aemond growls, “you are…you know what you are to me.”

“Speak it.” Y/N insists, “tell me what I am to you.”

Aemond closes the space between them, taking her face between his hands. “You are my friend.”

“And that is enough for you?”

“If that is all I’m allowed.” Those who are starved will eat anything.

“Even if we were to marry, it would not be fair to you. I love Aegon, I will always love him. We grew up together, he and I. Day and night for ten years, we have been together. I enjoy your company and I should like to keep it, but I am in want of a friend. I have a husband.”

To be so tragically entangled.

“It matters not if he is studied in the histories, or if he holds interest in matters of the court. So long as I am studied, so long as I hold interest in the court. The duties are mine, the burdens are mine.”

“I only wish to help you,” Aemond breathes.

“You can’t,” Y/N shakes her head. “You cannot help me. You cannot come into my life and uproot it. I’ve children, Aemond. Aegon’s children, who need my love and affection more than anyone.

Children who grow up in the absence of love spend the rest of their lives wanting for it; no matter how much they are given. Like pouring into a bottomless cup, endless and painful because it never fills. It is cracked from the time they are small and can never be fixed. I’ve seen the difference between children born of love and those born of duty. My children will know which they are.”

“Who fills your cup once he’s drained it?”

“The gods provide.” Y/N swipes at traitorous tears, threatening to fall. “They always do.”

“Whores then,” Aemond understands. Why the pleasure house, why the wine, why the constant thirst for knowledge. “I could fuck you as well as any.”

Y/N turns away from him. “It would mean something more to you and…”

“It would not mean a thing to me.”

————————————————————————

Aemond makes his way to the silk streets, tearing back curtains, until he spots the silver sheen of his brother’s hair. Pressed back into a pillow as one of the brunettes works herself over his cock. It is not lost on him, how much the pretty little thing resembles Aegon’s wife. “I need a word with you.”

Aegon huffs a laugh, feeling the woman above him begin to pull away. “Ah, ah,” he chides, “you stay right there. Doing the gods’ work, you are.”

The woman sighs, happily, “thank you, your grace.”

He gives her hips an affection squeeze, before turning his attention back to Aemond. “What is it you need?”

“I was hoping to apologize, for the way I have conducted myself.”

“All is forgiven, brother.” Aegon waves a dismissive hand. “My wife is an endearing mystery, it is not your fault for taking interest.”

Aemond cocks his head to the side, “to what do I owe your sudden change of heart?”

“Y/N and I talked,” Aegon grins. “Whichever parts of her you are stimulating, do it well for me. Tell her I love her, while you’re at it.”

Part 3

Series Taglist : @oh-you-mean-me @callsignwidow @iliterallyhavenoideawhattosay @cluz1babe @visenyareads @kiwibaekie

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Some Law-Related Vocabulary

for your poem/story (pt. 2/4)

Admiralty - of or relating to conduct on the sea

Alter ego - second self

Attractive nuisance - a thing or condition on one's property that poses a risk to children who may be attracted to it without realizing the risk by virtue of their youth

Bequest - an act of bequeathing

Bequeath - to give by will

Bona vacantia - goods that are unclaimed and without an apparent owner

Capricious - governed or characterized by impulse or whim (e.g., lacking a rational basis; likely to change suddenly); not supported by the weight of evidence or established rules of law—often used in the phrase "arbitrary and capricious"

Colorable - having an appearance of truth, validity, or right

Damnum absque injuria - a loss for which the law provides no means of recovery

Dying declaration - a statement that is made by a person who firmly believes that he or she is about to die and has no hope of recovery and that concerns the circumstances or cause of the presumed death

Eleemosynary - of, relating to, or supported by charity

En ventre sa mere - in the womb

Euthanasia - the act or practice of killing or permitting the death of hopelessly sick or injured persons in a relatively painless way for reasons of mercy; called also "mercy killing"

Exculpate - to clear from alleged fault or guilt

Filius nullius - an illegitimate child; bastard; called also "filius populi"

Finger - to accuse or identify as guilty

Fireman's rule - a doctrine holding that a property owner or occupant is not liable for unintentional injuries suffered by firefighters or police officers in responding to a problem on the property

First blush - initial view, appearance, or consideration—used especially in the phrase "at first blush"

First degree - the grade given to the most serious forms of crimes

Hereditament - inheritable property

Homestead - a home and surrounding land

Inchoate - not yet made complete, certain, or specific : not perfected

M'Naghten test - a standard under which a criminal defendant is considered to have been insane at the time of an act (as a killing) if he or she did not know right from wrong or did not understand the moral nature of the act because of a mental disease or defect; called also "M'Naghten rule"

Mulct - fine, penalty

Mysterious disappearance - the loss of property under unknown or puzzling circumstances which are difficult to explain or understand

Pierce - to see through the usually misleading or false appearance of

Poison pill - a financial tactic or provision used by a company to make an unwanted takeover prohibitively expensive or less desirable

Prior art - the processes, devices, and modes of achieving the end of an alleged invention that were known or knowable by due diligence before and at the date of the invention

Pur autre vie - for another's life

Shark repellent - any measure taken by a corporation to discourage a hostile takeover attempt

Silent record - a record of a criminal proceeding which does not show that the defendant acted with knowledge or understanding of his or her rights (as in entering a plea of guilty or waiving the right to counsel)

Sui generis - constituting a class alone; unique or particular to itself

Vexatious - lacking a sufficient ground and serving only to annoy or harass when viewed objectively

Wrongful birth - a malpractice claim brought by the parents of a child born with a birth defect against a physician or health-care provider whose alleged negligence (as in prenatal testing or diagnosis) effectively deprived the parents of the opportunity to make an informed decision whether to avoid or terminate the pregnancy

Yellow-dog contract - an illegal employment contract in which a worker disavows membership in and agrees not to join a labor union in order to get a job

More: Law-Related Words More: Word Lists

[coochiequeens]

‘100% feminist’: how Eleanor Rathbone invented child benefit – and changed women’s lives for ever

She was an MP and author with a formidable reputation, fighting for the rights of women and refugees, and opposing the appeasement of Hitler. Why isn’t she better known today?

Ladies please reblog to give her the recognition she deserves

By Susanna Rustin Thu 4 Jul 2024

My used copy of the first edition of The Disinherited Family arrives in the post from a secondhand bookseller in Lancashire. A dark blue hardback inscribed with the name of its first owner, Miss M Marshall, and the year of publication, 1924, it cost just £12.99. I am not a collector of old tomes but am thrilled to have this one. It has a case to be considered among the most important feminist economics books ever written.

Its centenary has so far received little, if any, attention. Yet the arguments it sets out are the reason nearly all mothers in the UK receive child benefit from the government. Its author, Eleanor Rathbone, was one of the most influential women in politics in the first half of the 20th century. She led the National Union of Societies for Equal Citizenship (Nusec, the main suffragist organisation, also formerly known as the National Union of Women Suffrage Societies) from 1919, when Millicent Fawcett stood down, until the roughly five million women who were not enfranchised in 1918 gained the vote 10 years later. In 1929, aged 57, she became an MP, and remained in parliament until her death in 1946. While there, she built up a formidable reputation based on her advocacy for women’s rights, welfare reform and the rights of refugees, and her opposition to the appeasement of Hitler.

It would not be true to say that Eleanor Rathbone has been forgotten. Her portrait by James Gunn hangs in the National Portrait Gallery. Twenty years ago she was the subject of a fine biography and she is remembered at Somerville college, Oxford – where she studied in the 1890s and ran a society called the Associated Prigs. (While the name was a joke, Rathbone did have a priggish side – as well as being an original thinker, tremendous campaigner, and stubborn, sensitive personality.) She also features in Rachel Reeves’s book The Women Who Made Modern Economics, although Reeves – who hopes shortly to become the UK’s first female chancellor – pays more attention to her contemporary, Beatrice Webb.

A thrilling tome … The Disinherited Family by Eleanor Rathbone. Photograph: Alicia Canter/The Guardian

But Rathbone, who came from a wealthy dynasty of nonconformist merchants, does not have anything like the name-recognition of the Pankhursts or Millicent Fawcett, or of pioneering politicians including Nancy Astor and Ellen Wilkinson. Nor does she enjoy the cachet of writers such as Virginia Woolf, whose polemic about women’s opportunities, A Room of One’s Own, was published five years after Rathbone’s magnum opus.

There are many reasons for Rathbone’s relative obscurity. One is that she was the first woman elected to parliament as an independent (and one of a handful of men at the time). Thus there is no political party with an interest in turning her into an icon. Having spent the past three years writing a book about the British women’s movement, I am embarrassed to admit that when I started, I didn’t know who she was.

Rathbone was not the first person to propose state benefits paid to mothers. The endowment of motherhood or family allowances, as the policy was known, was written about by the Swedish feminist Ellen Key, and tried out as a project of the Fabian Women’s Group, who published their findings in a pamphlet in 1912. But Rathbone pushed the idea to the forefront. A first attempt to get Nusec to adopt it was knocked back in 1921, and she then spent three years conducting research. The title she gave the book she produced, The Disinherited Family, reflected her view that women and children were being deprived of their rightful share of the country’s wealth.

The problem, as she saw it, was one of distribution. While the wage system in industrialised countries treated all workers on a given pay grade the same, some households needed more money than others. While unions argued for higher wages across the board, Rathbone believed the state should supplement the incomes of larger families. She opened the book with an archly phrased rhetorical question: “Whether there is any subject in the world of equal importance that has received so little consideration as the economic status of the family?” She went on to accuse economists of behaving as if they were “self-propagating bachelors” – so little did the lives of mothers appear to interest them.

Rathbone’s twin aims were to end wives’ dependence on husbands and reward their domestic labour. Family allowances paid directly to them could either be spent on housekeeping or childcare, enabling them to go out to work. Ellen Wilkinson, the radical Labour MP for Middlesbrough (and future minister for education), was among early supporters. William Beveridge read the book when he was director of the London School of Economics, declared himself a convert and introduced one of the first schemes of family-linked payments for his staff.

But others were strongly opposed. Conservative objections to such a radical expansion of the state were predictable. But they were echoed by liberal feminists including Millicent Fawcett, who called the plan “a step in the direction of practical socialism”. Trade unions preferred to push for a living wage, while some male MPs thought the policy undermined the role of men as breadwinners. Labour and the Trades Union Congress (TUC) finally swung behind family allowances in 1942. As the war drew to a close, Rathbone led a backbench rebellion against ministers who wanted to pay the benefit to fathers instead.

Rathbone celebrates the Silver Jubilee of the Women’s Vote in London, 20 February 1943. Photograph: Picture Post/Getty Images

It is for this signature policy that she is most often remembered today. At a time when hundreds of thousands of children have been pushed into poverty by the two-child limit on benefit payments, Rathbone’s advocacy on behalf of larger families could hardly be more relevant. The limit, devised by George Osborne, applies to universal and child tax credits – and not child benefit itself. But Rishi Sunak’s government announced changes to the latter in this year’s budget. From 2026, eligibility will be assessed on a household rather than individual basis. This is intended to limit payments to better-off, dual-income families. But the UK Women’s Budget Group and others have objected on grounds that child benefit should retain its original purpose of directly remunerating primary carers (the vast majority of them mothers) for the work of rearing children. It remains to be seen whether this plan will be carried through by the next government.

Rathbone once told the House of Commons she was “100% feminist”, and few MPs have been as single-minded in their commitment to women’s causes. As president of Nusec (the law-abiding wing of the suffrage campaign), she played a vital role in finishing the job of winning votes for women.

The last few years have seen a resurgence of interest in women’s suffrage, partly due to the centenary of the first women’s suffrage act. Thanks to a brilliant campaign by Caroline Criado Perez, a statue of Millicent Fawcett, the nonmilitant suffragist leader, now stands in Westminster, a few minutes walk from the bronze memorial of Emmeline Pankhurst erected in 1930. Suffragette direct action has long been a source of fascination. What is less well known is that militants played little part in the movement after 1918. It was law-abiding constitutionalists – suffragists rather than suffragettes – who pushed through the 1920s to win votes for the younger and poorer women who did not yet have them. Rathbone helped lead this final phase of the campaign, along with Conservative MP Nancy Astor and others.

Rathbone was highly critical of the militants, and once claimed that they “came within an inch of wrecking the suffrage movement, perhaps for a generation”. Today, with climate groups including Just Stop Oil copying the suffragette tactic of vandalising paintings, it is worth remembering that many women’s suffrage campaigners opposed such methods.

Schismatic though it was, the suffrage movement at least had a shared goal. An even greater challenge for feminists in the 1920s was agreeing on future priorities. Equal pay, parental rights and an end to the sexual double standard were among demands that had broad support. After the arrival in the House of Commons of the first female MPs, legislative successes included the removal of the bar on women’s entry to the professions, new rights for mothers and widows’ pensions. But there were also fierce disagreements.

Tensions between class and sexual politics were longstanding, with some on the left regarding feminism as a distraction. The Labour MP Marion Phillips, for example, thought membership of single-sex groups placed women “in danger of getting their political opinions muddled”. There was also renewed conflict over protective legislation – the name given to employment laws that differentiated between men and women. While such measures included maternity leave and safety rules for pregnant women, many feminists believed their true purpose was to keep jobs for men – and prevent female workers from competing.

Underlying such arguments was the question of whether women, once enfranchised, should strive for equal treatment, or push for measures designed to address their specific needs. As the debate grew more heated, partisans on either side gave themselves the labels of “old” and “new” feminists. While the former, also called equalitarians, wanted to focus on the obstacles that prevented women from participating in public life on the same terms as men, the new feminists led by Rathbone sought to pioneer an innovative, woman-centred politics. Since this brought to the fore issues such as reproductive health and mothers’ poverty, it is known as “maternalist feminism”.

Rathbone and other Liverpool suffragettes campaigning in 1910. Photograph: Shawshots/Alamy

The faultline extended beyond Britain. But Rathbone and her foes had some of the angriest clashes. At one international convention, Lady Rhondda, a wealthy former suffragette, used a speech to deride rivals who chose to “putter away” at welfare work, instead of the issues she considered important.

The specific policy points at issue have, of course, changed over the past century. But arguments about how much emphasis feminists should place on biological differences between men and women carry on.

Eleanor Rathbone did not live long enough to see the welfare state, including child benefit paid to mothers, take root in postwar Britain. Her election to parliament coincided with the Depression, and the lengthening shadows of fascism and nazism meant that she, like her colleagues, became preoccupied with foreign affairs. In the general election of 1935, the number of female MPs fell from 15 to nine, meaning Rathbone’s was one of just a handful of women’s voices. She used hers to oppose the policy of appeasement, and support the rights of refugees, including those escaping Franco’s Spain. During the war she helped run an extra-parliamentary “woman-power committee”, which advocated for female workers.

She also became a supporter of Indian women’s rights, though her liberal imperialism led to tensions with Indian feminists. During the war she angered India’s most eminent writer, Rabindranath Tagore, and its future prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, when she attacked the Congress party’s policy of noncooperation with Britain’s war effort. Tagore criticised what he called the “sheer insolent self-complacency” of her demand that the anti-colonial struggle should be set aside while Britain fought Germany.

Rathbone turned down a damehood. After their first shared house in Westminster was bombed, she and her life partner, the Scottish social worker Elizabeth Macadam, moved around the corner to a flat on Tufton Street (Macadam destroyed their letters, meaning that Rathbone’s intimate life remains obscure, but historians believe the relationship was platonic). From there they moved to a larger, quieter house in Highgate. On 2 January 1946, Rathbone suddenly died.

Rathbone’s blue plaque at Tufton Court. Photograph: PjrPlaques/Alamy

A blue plaque on Tufton Street commemorates her as the “pioneer of family allowances” – providing an alternative claim on posterity for an address more commonly associated with the Brexit campaign, since a house a few doors down became its headquarters. She is remembered, too, in Liverpool, where her experience of dispersing welfare to desperately poor soldiers’ wives in the first world war changed the course of her life, and where one of her former homes is being restored by the university.

I don’t believe in ghosts. But walking in Westminster recently, I imagined her hastening across St James’s Park to one of her meetings at Nancy Astor’s house near the London Library. Today, suffragettes are celebrated for their innovative direct action. But Rathbone blazed a trail, too, with her dedication as a campaigner, writer, lobbyist and “100% feminist” parliamentarian.

 Sexed: A History of British Feminism by Susanna Rustin is published by Polity Press (£20). To support the Guardian order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply

[kckt88]

Drowning Inside You II

Summary:

Aemond and Valaera settle into life as married couple and Valaera's heat arrives earlier than expected.

-Features an Aemond POV.

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT!!

Warning(s): Mini Time Skip, Inner thoughts, Language, Kissing, Smut, Heat/Rut Cycle, P in V, Breeding Kink, Knotting, Mild Angst, Possessive Behaviour.

Word Count: 4620

Author Note: An Alpha/Omega Story.

Inspired by the song Call My Name by EMO + Yolo.

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the House of The Dragon or Fire & Blood characters nor do I claim to own them. I do not own any of the images used.

Comments, likes, and reblogs are very much appreciated.

Ever since Valaera had taken his eye that night on Driftmark, Aemond had envisioned the various ways in which he would exact his revenge against Valaera Velaryon.

Maimed, half blind and now the rider of the largest dragon in the world.

For years he’d hated her, even thinking about Valaera would send Aemond into a rage of epic proportions.

He would spend hours in the training yard, sparring with Ser Criston or deliberately starting fights with other Alpha’s.

His only reprieve from it all was Vhagar.

She was far too large to be housed inside the dragon pit, so she had taken to resting in an outcropping of caves beyond the Red Keep.

His old girl didn’t fit in anywhere and neither did he.

Even before he lost his eye, he never felt part of anything, his older brother was a massive twat, and his sweet sister was far too invested in her bugs too notice anything else. Even his younger brother Daeron was a stranger to him.

His older brother was rather fond of making Aemond suffer through his awful practical jokes, and relentless teasing. Even more so when their ‘strong’ nephew would join in.

Behold the Pink Dread.

Valaera was the only one to apologise for the pig, offering her uncle some lemon cakes she’d managed to steal from the kitchens.

After Driftmark, Aemond devoted himself to his studies and training. Becoming the perfect second son, even as Aegon would squander every opportunity that was given to him.

Before his presentation as an Omega, Aegon would spend his days drunk and cock deep in some whore on the streets of silk.

Yet all that stopped when he was given in marriage to Jacaerys Velaryon. Aemond had to admit he thoroughly enjoyed the look of horror on Aegon’s face when their father announced their union.

Yet his brother for all his desire to flee Kings Landing on the back of Sunfyre remained and married his strong bastard, with the pair of them becoming so happy it would make Aemond’s stomach turn.

Since she cost him his eye, Valaera would avoid Aemond like the plague. Always fleeing the room whenever Aemond entered or hiding behind her mother’s skirts.

Which suited Aemond just fine, the less time he spent in the company of Valaera the better. Yet as he got older, he realised it wasn’t just hate that he felt for Valaera. It was something far deeper. Rooted in his very core.

At first, he was unsure what it was.

But as Valaera got older and presented as an Omega, one sniff of Valaera’s sweet scent and that was it.

Aemond knew it was no longer hate that was driving him. It was desire.

As his niece grew from a plain faced pup into a stunningly beautiful pearl. Aemond knew he was done for.

Countless nights he would imagine the pretty noises his niece would make as he took her to bed and ravished her with his tongue, his fingers, and his cock.

Valaera always had this way of looking at him and it would drive him to the brink of insanity.

Those beautiful brown doe eyes, so innocent. So perfect.

Aemond would strip his cock raw every night as he fucked his fist, to the thought of Valaera.

Of course, the girl was still terrified of him and while part of him still rather enjoyed it, another was so desperate to have the Omega that he would do anything.

Aemond knew that suitors would soon come to Kings Landing in their droves to beg for the hand of Driftmark's heir.

The pearl of the realm, given in marriage to some unworthy dog.

No, he wouldn’t allow it. Valaera had left her mark on him when she'd carved out his eye and Aemond would ensure that the Omega would belong to him and no other.

It was easy enough to convince his father. After all, Aegon’s marriage to Jacaerys had been successful. The two of them had already been blessed with one pup and Aegon was currently expecting their next.

His mother however was more resistant to the match and Aemond prayed every night to the seven that his father would remain steadfast in his decision.

Luckily the gods answered his prayers and now Valaera Velaryon belonged to him.

Bound for life.

Aemond thought nothing could top the sight of Valaera at their wedding.

Oh, how wrong he was.

The sight of his sweet Omega laid bare before him, begging to be bred would remain with Aemond far beyond his death.

He could feel his cock going stiff at the thought of fucking Valaera again.

But that would have to wait, as Criston’s morningstar came flying towards him. The shield in his hand shattered upon impact. Discarding the splinted wood, Aemond expertly dodged the repeated attacks and soon his sword was pointed at the Kings guard’s throat.

“Well done my Prince. You’ll be winning tourneys in no time”.

“I don’t give a shit about tourney’s” replied Aemond as he spun the long sword in his hand and cast his eyes to the sky, watching two dragons race each other.

Aemond smiled when he heard his Omega’s gleeful laughter, as her dragon Arrax nimbly darted around Vermax and shot off into the clouds.

In the weeks since her wedding to Aemond, Valaera had come to realise that being married to him wasn't as bad as she thought it would be.

In public he was stoic and quiet, always standing with his arms folded behind his back, his posture rigid and firm yet in private he was passionate and unyielding. He was a giving lover in the marriage bed and he would often seek her touch during the night, ensconcing her in his arms, making her feel safe.

On this particular day, Aemond was training as usual so Valaera decided to visit the library, there were so many books that she wished to read before her next name day.

Aegon of course had previously made fun of her calling her a 'bookworm' and then stated that her and Aemond were perfect for one another as he loved books too, what Aegon didn't know was that sometimes Aemond would join Valaera in the library and he would fuck her against one of the bookcases and not much reading would be done on those occasions.

During her reverie Valaera began to notice that the walk back to her chambers felt peculiar. The latent arousal swirling inside her as she thought of her Alpha felt different, but in a really familiar way strangely enough. Her breath suddenly became more laboured, and a tingling sensation appeared inside her.

The empty feeling in the pit of her stomach becoming more pronounced.

Surely this couldn’t be her. Oh no. The Maesters had always been accurate about her heats. She wasn’t expecting it for another few weeks.

But something was off, extremely off, because soon she felt her legs start to shake with every step she took, and she was practically hyperventilating.

The closer she got to the chambers she shared with Aemond, everything started to blur, even the light, it was so bright that she had to shut her eyes, it made her stop in her tracks and lean against the wall.

The arousal she previously felt in her abdomen had now turned into excruciating pain. Valaera could smell almost every single Alpha in the Red Keep, but the scent of HER Alpha overpowered them all, she needed him.

Oh, gods she needed him so much, she felt so empty, she needed his knot, she needed his seed, she needed to be filled with her Alpha.

Slick started running down her legs, she was so wet, and her clothes felt so constricting, she needed to get them off before she was suffocated.

“Princess. Are you alright, shall I alert your mother?” asked a guard, he was sweating profusely, his scent was making Valaera feel sick, his voice was too loud, and he was too close to her. She wanted to run away, she wanted to run to Aemond, but her legs were completely useless.

The tears began running down her cheeks, she was getting desperate.

Alpha. Please. I need you. I’m frightened. Where are You?

Then she heard a loud growl. Her Alpha’s growl.

Yes! Yes! Her Alpha had come for her! Her Alpha had come to finally breed her!

Valaera’s inner Omega let out a loud cry, practically a scream as she heard the growl, eager to reunite with her Alpha.

“Get. Away. From MY OMEGA” snarled Aemond his voice was deep, low, and dangerous, his scent dark and violent.

He sized up the guard with his remaining eye, growling once again. The guard growled back at first but quickly retreated once the full force of Aemond’s Alpha pheromones permeated through the air.

Aemond turned his attention to Valaera, throwing himself at his whimpering Omega. He put his arms under Valaera’s legs and back, lifted her up and began to carry her toward their chambers.

Valaera swung her arms around Aemond and buried her face in his neck. She began to desperately kiss and suck on Aemond’s throat, she couldn’t help himself, she needed to get closer to her Alpha’s fucking intoxicating scent.

Both of them were a sweaty mess by the time they reached their chambers. Valaera couldn’t keep her hands off of Aemond, nor could she stop scenting and sucking on the mating mark on his neck.

Aemond nuzzled her neck affectionately, then he reached down and grabbed Valaera’s behind, squeezing it hard. His Omega responded by moaning loudly before unlacing his breeches and shoving her hand inside to fondle his cock, which had grown rock hard. Valaera needed it deep inside her now or she would explode.

Aemond grabbed her jaw and turned her face upwards so he could reach her mouth. The Alpha’s tongue felt so good in her mouth, she had to moan once again, this time into Aemond’s mouth, making him grunt loudly in response while still kissing her. 

They fell backwards together, landing on the bed, never once breaking their kiss.

Aemond was a grunting mess, almost whimpering every time Valaera’s tongue swirled around his. Their clothes were a hinderance, and they needed to get them off.

So that they could feel each other properly. Aemond hooked his fingers into the seams of Valaera’s dress and ripped it from her body, buttons and fabric flew everywhere.

Aemond’s breeches were the next victim, shredded to pieces as he clawed at them, his tunic was also ripped from his body, the tattered threads landing somewhere on the floor after he discarded them.

Valaera’s eyes rolled back into her head as she felt her Alpha’s naked body against her own.

Aemond’s pheromones burned brighter as his mouth dove into her scent gland, sucking eagerly while scraping his teeth against the mark he’d previously left on her skin. Valaera was absolutely crazed by the movement.

“My Omega. your scent. It’s so fucking amazing” whispered Aemond, whilst inhaling his wife’s unique scent.

“Take me Alpha, breed me, your Omega needs your seed” begged Valaera.

Tears of joy were rolling down her face, so fucking happy that her Alpha would finally fill the aching emptiness in her abdomen.

Aemond grunted loudly in response and reached down to align his huge cock with Valaera’s dripping wet hole, instantly pushing inside, making them both moan in sync as his hard and pulsing cock found Valaera’s warm, wet heat.

The Alpha thrust his cock into Valaera at a relentless pace almost immediately, giving Valaera no time to adjust to his size. 

Valaera wrapped her legs around Aemond’s waist and squeezed as tightly as she could, she needed to be fucked again and again, she needed her Alpha to pump her full of his seed and put a pup inside of her. 

Her Alpha fucked her hard and fast, his hips pounding against hers. The sound of skin slapping together echoed around the chambers.

Aemond gave a loud grunt and stilled, throwing his head back while squeezing his eye shut, giving Valaera exactly what she wanted.

Rope after roped of his seed spilled inside his Omega, which made Valaera scream in joy and throw her own head back, as she reached her peak, clenching around her Alpha’s pulsating cock.

 It didn’t stop there, Aemond only needed a few moments of rest before growing hard inside of his Omega again.

As Valaera’s legs relaxed and let go of her hold on Aemond, he moved backwards and raised himself to his knees between Valaera’s legs.

The loss of her Alpha inside her made Valaera whimper as the ache quickly returned. 

 Please. Alpha. I need you. Don’t stop. Don’t leave me.

“Roll over” ordered Aemond. It was a command, an Alpha command, and Valaera whimpered as she felt it take control of her body, she had to obey, she had to please her Alpha.

She was now on all fours in front of him, ready to be mounted again. Her heat sent out new waves of scent and slick, which made Aemond almost stagger. He pushed his cock into the whimpering Omega once more with shaky hands and proceeded to pound her even harder and quicker than before, snapping his hips against her while grunting loudly, driving needy moans out of Valaera. 

Aemond was gripping her hips so hard that his nails were digging into her skin, leaving marks everywhere, the pain drove Valaera wild with need and she needed to feel more of it.

Almost as if he could sense what she needed, Aemond reached forward and grabbed Valaera’s hair, making her head shoot back. Valaera cried out to her Alpha in pleasure, making Aemond growl.

His knot started to slowly push inside Valaera, and she let out a feral cry as the knot made its way deeper and deeper inside of her. It swelled up so much, it hurt, it hurt so good.

“I will have you dripping with my seed my sweet Omega. I can’t wait to see you swell with my pup, everyone will know your mine-“ moaned Aemond.

Aemond thrust one, two, three more times before growling once again, shooting his seed deep inside Valaera, filling her up. He grunted out Valaera’s name chasing the pleasure of his own peak. He then let out a deep, satisfied breath before collapsing onto his Omega.

Aemond moved his face to Valaera’s neck again, and lovingly nuzzled her.

Valaera was trembling next to him, trying to catch her own breath. The throes of her heat satisfied for now.

But soon it would take hold of her again, her body constantly craving the touch of her Alpha.

For the next three days, she was fucked senseless by Aemond. Everything falling by the wayside as the Alpha took care of his Omega.

After her heat had ended, it took a solid day for both of them to fully recover. They were completely exhausted yet completely satisfied beyond all comprehension.

If Aemond clenched his jaw any harder, his teeth would shatter.

His Omega was stood talking to Alyn of Hull and Aemond hated every single second of it.

I swear if he leans any closer to Valaera. I’ll slit his throat. I’ll tear him limb from limb.

The Alpha inside him was growling, the desire to protect Valaera was overwhelming his senses.

“Brother, you need to relax”.

“I will relax when I remove that Beta cunts fucking head from his shoulders” snarled Aemond.

“He’s only talking to Valaera” sighed Aegon as he gently rocked his newborn pup in his arms.

“I don’t like him leaning close to Valaera like that” muttered Aemond awkwardly.

I don’t like how he looks at Valaera. I don’t like how he smiles at her.

His Alpha was screaming inside his head. Protect. Protect. Protect.

“Alpha instinct, I get it. But in all seriousness, you need to stop lurking in the corner and join the celebration” replied Aegon.

“I need to…Keep an eye on Valaera”.

“No. You need to hold your niece whilst I get some wine” retorted Aegon as he placed his daughter in Aemond’s arms and reached for the nearest pitcher of some ghastly coloured wine that Aemond had always thought looked a little bit like piss.

Probably tastes like it too.

Whilst Aegon was busying himself with the wine. Aemond looked down at his sleeping niece and smiled. She was such a perfect little thing. Whilst her features bore a strong resemblance to Jacaerys, her head was graced with a tiny tuft of silver hair. Yet her older brother Jaehaerys was dark haired and looked more like Aegon.

Aemond wondered what his children would look like. Would they have his silver hair or would they have his Omega’s dark curly locks.

He had thought he would like to have a son first, but as he held his niece, Aemond knew he wouldn’t mind a daughter. A little girl who would sleep on his chest as he read to her, a little girl who would cling to him as he took her on flights with Vhagar. A little girl who he would hold in his heart forever.

Suddenly Aemond was snapped out of his reverie by Maela shrieking loudly.

“She can’t be hungry again” groused Aegon.

“Well, whatever she needs. Only her mother can provide” replied Aemond as he handed Maela to Aegon and returned his attention to Valaera who was still talking to Alyn.

“You’re going to burn a hole in Alyn’s head if you carry on looking at him like that” muttered Jace as he wrapped an arm around Aegon who was busy trying to sooth their daughter.

“I will look however I please” snarled Aemond.

“Oh, for the love of-“ groaned Jace as he spotted Alyn gently placing a hand on Valaera’s arm.

“Aemond. Don’t even think about it” warned Aegon as Jace quickly manoeuvred him and Maela away from Aemond.

HE DARES TO TOUCH WHAT IS MINE!!

Aegon’s warning fell on deaf ears, as Aemond charged across the throne room and viciously shoved Alyn away from Valaera.

“Aemond-What” squeaked Valaera in surprise.

“Don’t ever presume to touch my Omega again” snapped Aemond.

“I-I wasn’t. I-I didn’t mean too” stuttered Alyn.

“Alpha please. You’re making a scene” whispered Valaera.

“I think you need to go and cool off brother” urged Aegon.

“Fuck off Aegon”

“Hey. Don’t speak to my mate like that. We are supposed to be celebrating my daughter’s birth and your ruining it” snapped Jace.

“Fine” retorted Aemond as he turned on his heel and stormed out of the throne room, completely ignoring his mother’s concerned calls.

“I better go after him” muttered Valaera sheepishly.

Stupid Beta thinking he can touch my Omega. Who does he think he is. I should go back in there and…

“Aemond. Wait”.

“What’s with the touching. Why was he touching you?” growled Aemond as he abruptly stopped in the middle of the corridor.

“I felt a little faint and Alyn was just helping me” muttered Valaera as she collided with Aemond.

“Why what’s happened. Do you need a maester?” asked Aemond his anger over Alyn overridden by his concern for Valaera.

“No, I don’t need a maester” replied Valaera.

“Are you sure. If you’re sick, then mayhaps we should get you checked over just to be sure”.

Oh, I knew something was wrong. Valaera’s scent has been different these last few days.

“I’m not sick. Well, I am but…”

I knew it. Something’s wrong. We’ve only been married a few months. I know can’t live without her. I need her to be ok.

“Tell me please Issa dōna omega” murmured Aemond (My sweet omega).

“Alpha. Nyke rūsīr riñnykeā” (I am with child).

“T-Truly” gasped Aemond.

“It might have happened during my heat, but yes, my love. Nyke carry mirrī zaldrīzes iemnȳ hen issa” (I carry a little dragon inside of me).

“My Valaera. My sweet” whispered Aemond as he cupped Valaera’s face in his hands and placed a gentle kiss upon his Omega’s lips.

“A little piece of you and me. Together” mouthed Valaera as she took one of Aemond’s hands and lowered it to her stomach.

She was with child. His Omega was carrying his pup. He was going to be a father.

“Thank you, Issa prūmia” (My heart).

“I guess your possessiveness makes sense now” said Valaera as she wrapped her arms around Aemond and held him close.

 Yes, it did. The need to protect Valaera. The urge to be close. It all made sense now. His Alpha was roaring his delight at impregnating his beautiful Omega.

“I was merely acting on instinct”.

I cannot wait until Valaera’s belly starts swelling. Everyone will see. They will all know who’s babe dwells within. His sweet Valaera all round and soft. Breasts swollen with milk. The thought was very pleasing.

So, pleasing in fact that Aemond could feel himself growing hard in his breeches.

“Please. Alpha” whined Valaera sensing his arousal as she stood on her tip toes and pressed a series of desperate kisses to Aemond’s lips.

“Hm” growled Aemond.

“T-Take me. Please. I need you” begged Valaera.

Aemond didn’t need telling twice. He took his Omega’s hand, and they made their way back to their chambers with every intention of having their own celebration that would end up lasting well into the hours of the night.

As dawn broke, Valaera was far to satisfied and exhausted to even think of leaving the bed. Sharing their good news with the rest of the family would have to wait, until Valaera was sure she could actually walk.

“Drakari pykiros, Tīkummo jemiros, Yn lantyz bartossa, Saelot vāedis” (Fire breather, winged leader, but two heads, to a third sing).

Valaera closed his eyes at the sound of Aemond’s voice.

“Perzyro udrȳssi, Ezīmptos laehossi, Hārossa letagon, Aōt vāedan” (With words of flame, with clear eyes, to bind the three, to you I sing).

Valaera smiled as he felt Aemond rest his head on the round swell of his stomach.

“Hae mērot gierūli:, Se hāros bartossi, Prūmȳsa sōvīli, Gevī dāerī” (As one we gather, and with three heads, we shall fly as we were destined, beautifully, freely).

Ever since Valaera revealed she was carrying his child, Aemond had devoted himself to pouring over countless books in the library to gain as much information as he could about pregnancy and how to raise a pup. Apparently, he also found a book that said babes can hear sounds from the womb after the sixth moon of pregnancy. So, Aemond never missed a chance to spend time talking or singing to his stomach.

Valaera of course didn’t think too much of it at first, but as her stomach began to swell, and the babe began to kick, she noticed that he or she would always move around more whenever Aemond spoke.

Aemond of course was delighted when Valaera told him. She knew her Alpha was worried about becoming a father, given the fact his own wasn’t a very good one and it terrified Aemond most days, that he would turn out like Viserys.

But Valaera new deep down that Aemond would be a fantastic father, he was utterly devoted to their unborn pup.

“What do you think of the name Rhaegar” muttered Aemond.

“I like it” whispered Valaera.

“But…”

“I l-love you and if we have a son, I wish to honour you in some way, so I was thinking about Vhalarr” asked Valaera nervously twisting the bedsheets between her fingers.

“In honour of my dragon?”

Oh, he hates it. Such a stupid idea. Why did I have to say that? I’m such a fool.

Suddenly Valaera burst into tears.

“Hey, what’s wrong? Valaera. Laera, Talk to me my sweet” whispered Aemond as he moved up the bed and took the sobbing Omega into his arms.

“Y-You hate the name I chose and I-I j-just thought it would b-be nice to h-have an o-original name,” cried Valaera.

“I don’t hate it. I’m truly honoured that you wish to name our pup after my old girl”.

“I-I know how much Vhagar means to you and I just-“ squeaked Valaera as she buried her face into Aemond’s chest.

“Issa jorrāelagon, kostilus ȳdra daor cry” muttered Aemond as he ran his fingers through Valaera’s long dark curls (My love, please don’t cry).

“I-I’m s-sorry. I-I c-can’t help it” sniffed Valaera as she wiped his nose on the sleeve of her robe.

Alpha is here. He will comfort me. He will make everything better.

“Avy jorrāelan sīr olvie Aemond” (I love you so much).

“I love you too Issa dōna” (my sweet).

“S-So you like the name?” asked Valaera, her voice still slightly muffled.

“I do and if we have a son, I will stand proud as he’s given the name his Muña chose” whispered Aemond as he gently lifts Valaera’s face from his chest and places a gentle kiss on her forehead (Mother).

“I-I’m sorry for crying. I just feel so emotional lately”.

“It’s fine. Your carrying our pup” replied Aemond as he rubbed Valaera’s stomach.

“T-Thank you for being so understanding” sniffed Valaera.

Aemond simply smiled and held Valaera tighter. He knew Valaera had been feeling overwhelmed lately with all of the changes her body was going through and as an Alpha he had a duty to soothe and protect his mate, during her delicate time.

After Valaera had fallen asleep, Aemond took the time to admire his Omega’s features. The long dark silky curls, the pale Targaryen skin, her perfectly shaped plump lips. The dark eyes. He once scorned Valaera for her ‘strong’ yet entirely coincidental resemblance to the former commander of the city watch, yet in truth she was wholly unique, in the sea of silver and amethyst.

As he closed his eye, Aemond knew with absolute certainty that he was where he was meant to be.

“A-Aemond. Valzȳrys” whispered Valaera as she gently shook his sleeping Alpha (Husband).

“Hm”

“Aemond. Wake up” urged Valaera.

“Valaera” grumbled Aemond as he began to rouse from his slumber.

“I can’t sleep”.

“Is everything ok? Is it the pup?” exclaimed Aemond as he shot up in alarm.

“The pup is fine. I-I need…Honey cakes”.

“Cake? You’ve woke me up because of cake?” asked Aemond rubbing his eye.

“I can’t stop thinking about it” muttered Valaera.

“Can’t you just wait until morning?” grumbled Aemond.

“No. I can’t sleep because I’m hungry and I keep thinking about cake”.

“Is this like the time you couldn’t stop thinking about pears” mused Aemond.

“That was weeks ago. But yes, it’s exactly the same. I-I can’t help it”.

Aemond sighed and got out of bed. Praying to the seven that the kitchens had some honey cakes left over.

“Avy jorrāelan issa zaldrīzes” (I love you my dragon).

“I’m sure you do Issa prūmia” replied Aemond as he quickly pulled on his breeches and a loose tunic. (My heart).

“Kirimvose” (Thank you).

“Hm” muttered Aemond as he gave Valaera a quick kiss and left their shared chambers.

The Red Keep was eerily silent as Aemond wandered through the corridors towards the kitchens. No doubt the nighttime appearance of a Prince in the kitchens would give the maids something to gossip about for the next few days.

I should be asleep. Yet here I am trawling through the Red Keep in search of Honey Cakes for my Omega.

Aemond Targaryen rider of the mighty Vhagar the last living remnant of Aegon's conquest, reduced to a simple errand boy.

Last time it was pears, this time it’s honey cakes. Whatever next?

This is the last time. I’m being serious. If she wants pears or cakes then next time- Oh, who am I kidding, I will get my sweet Omega anything she wants, whatever it takes to make her happy, anything to see that sweet smile.

Luckily Aemond’s journey to the kitchens was rather uneventful, even if the cook did give him a strange look as she handed over a basket of honey cakes.

Back in his chambers, Aemond quickly decided that it had all been worth it. To see Valaera happily eating her beloved honey cakes made his Alpha pleased that he was taking care of his mate and their unborn pup.

“Right. Now that you’ve got your cakes. I’m going back to bed” exclaimed Aemond as he tugged off his tunic and breeches.

“Well, actually there was something else-“ whispered Valaera as she wiped cake crumbs from around her mouth.

“Oh no what” huffed Aemond momentarily horrified.

However, his horror was rather short lived as his Omega began pulling off her shift.

“I-I desire the touch of my husband”. 

“Is-Is that right?” growled Aemond.

“Please Alpha, I want your knot” begged Valaera as she wrapped her arms around her Alpha’s neck and kissed him. Letting out a small moan as she slid her tongue into Aemond’s mouth.

Aemond smirked as he backed his Omega towards the bed.

A good Alpha should always take care of their Omega.

[doxypsychlean]

Aegon II Targaryen x reader who is manipulative and uses the motherly love he never got to get her own way. They both love each other but in a toxic yandere kinda way 😂

Wrapped around your finger

Yandere!Aegon ii Targaryen x Yandere!Reader

Headcanons|

Warnings: none? pls tell me if I've missed sth

Thou shan't repost/copy/ translate any of my work or I'll sneak into your home late at night and bite your nose off!

English isn't my first language. I don't proofread. I slap commas wherever I feel they're needed.

A/N: Aegon and Halaena aren't together in this one. It's also pretty sweet, despite their ?yandere? tendencies.

Oh, he really thinks he's that good.

Then you come around.

You, a lady of noble descent and a member of one of the greater houses in Westeros, are also one of his greatest rivals when it comes to having the worst reputation in all the realms.

At first, it's just harmless fun. Nothing too serious.

But then you become a witness to the way his family treats him.

You work your way into his heart and head. I mean, who in their right mind would miss out on the opportunity of being Queen of Westeros one day, amirite?

He bites the bait pretty quickly.

Aegon is obsessed with the way you shower him with affection and love.

He'd be spending most of his time in your arms, begging for you to tell him how much you love, how unfair his mother is to him.

Alicent hates you at first.

The hatred turns to admiration with time, seeing as you gain complete control over her son and mold him to your liking.

But there's more to what she's feeling towards you- fear. With the way things are going, all it would take is for you to snap your fingers and Aegon would kill them all. For you.

You never do, thank the Gods, and for that you have the Queen's utmost respect and gratitude.

She never lays a hand on him again. She doesn't have to, but she's also too scared to do it.

He still drinks, maybe not as much as he did before, but he no longer chases after the servant girls. As if you'd even allow it to happen.

The first time you realize what you feel for him might be actual love, is when you order for some noble lady to be "displaced" from the Red Keep. You didn't like the way she stared at him. Cue, girly losing her eyes for that one.

He was yours and the only way to get him away would be to pull him out of your cold fingers. And you had no intention of dying any time soon.

Aegon rarely goes out of the Red Keep anymore and when he does, you're always with him. The Prince has glued himself to you, whether you like it or not.

On the rare occasions of you two not being present in the castle, golden scales could be seen shimmering high above King's Landing. Sunfyre loves you, the golden beast could feel the strong bond between his rider and you.

Expect lots of expensive gifts- lavish dresses, the rarest perfumes from Essos, jewelry, books, horses, ginormous bouquets of your favorite flowers, commissioned portraits of you two, gold, sweets, etc.

You want it? You'll have it. Simple as that.

He'd never thought of himself as a jealous man, but the second he sees his brother talking to you and you laughing... All Seven Hells break loose.

Aegon turns into a sniveling, whining mess, hands wrapping around you as if his life depends on it.

All the while shooting daggers at Aemond behind your back, daring him to come closer so he could claw his remaining eye out.

Few soft words from you and he's melting.

You love him. He loves you. Everything is more than fine. He completely forgets about Aemond, who's slowly backing away from you two.

You get married not long after. Neither one of your families is brave enough to say a word against the union, seeing as ...

You absolutely never tried to hide it from the public.

You're all over eachother for the most of it.

Both men and women are dropping like flies around you, if they just as much as stared at either of you for a second too long.

Both yours and his family are equally scared and would rather keep away, than try and separate you.

Word spreads around quickly. You're with child.

Aegon's over the moon. You're his. He's yours. Completely.

The prove pops out not long after. Then another. And another.

He would 100% elbow the midwife in the face if she tries to keep him away from you while you're giving birth.

"My Prince, you cannot..."

"Out of my way, you old hag, my wife is in there!"

He was there while you were making them, he has every right to be there while you squeeze them out.

Definitely cries his ass off when he holds your firstborn.

His tunic is discarded quickly as he holds the small bundle close to his bare chest.

Then he wraps one hand around you, almost crushing your neck with how strong he's squeezing you.

Same thing goes down every single time- he storms in, kid comes out, he's bawling his eyes out at the sight.

You pick the dragon eggs for each and every one of them together.

Aegon's just as obsessed with your children, as he is with you.

Gods forbid someone makes one of his little bundles of joy cry...Heads will be flying in all directions, no matter who they belong to.

Not even the Stranger would be able to pull you apart.

Even in death, you'd find a way to be back together.

[my-head-is-an-animal]

The Climb

Summary: You're a scientist, an engineer to be exact. Called to a meeting you had no real right to be at, Optimus Prime takes an exclusive interest in you, but you can't help but ask yourself at every turn, Why?

Rating: 18+ 🌹🩸🍆

Story Masterlist

Chapter 16

Lennox didn’t ask what had Optimus running off in the middle of the meeting, but he did offer him the opportunity to come clean.

     ‘Look, I’m just saying,’ Lennox said as they entered the Autobot hanger. ‘If it’s something that will help us help Jane, I’d like to know.’

     ‘I appreciate the offer, but I believe all has been done to help her.’ Optimus looked around the hanger for a moment, pensively. ‘It is up to her to return to us now.’

     Lennox nodded, knowing he wouldn’t get anything else from them. ‘I’ll keep you posted.’

     ‘Please do.’ Optimus turned and began transforming, driving himself away to a corner to rest presumably.

     Lennox caught Ratchet and Ironhide’s eye, they both made their way out of the hanger, gesturing for Lennox to follow, out of earshot of Optimus.

     ‘You guys got any idea what’s going on with him?’ Lennox asked as they got outside.

     ‘He’s in love.’ Ironhide shrugged, while Ratchet just folded his arms and shook his head.

     ‘With who? Harding?’

     ‘Indeed.’ The medical officer responded.

     ‘I knew there was something weird about them spending all that time together.’ Lennox almost laughed.

     ‘I believe she has accepted to join in union with him.’ Ratchet sighed. ‘And he is now aware of the true consequences of his actions.’

     ‘Yeah, that’s why he’s sulking now.’ Ironhide huffed.

     ‘Wait, wait, what do you mean joined in union? You mean like marriage?’

     Both Ratchet and Ironhide chuckled.

     ‘Nothing so ceremonial.’ Ratchet scoffed.

     ‘He gave a piece of his Spark to her.’ Ironhide explained. ‘That’s unbreakable and not a choice made lightly.’

     ‘If she wakes, Jane will know all there is to know about Optimus,’ Ratchet continued. ‘And he will know her… your human marriage falls so far short of what they have promised to give one another.’

     Lennox just looked between the two Autobots. ‘I don’t understand, she’s unconscious, when is this supposed to have happened.’

     The exchanged a brief look, before Ratchet went on. ‘Until the Spark inside Jane has learnt to fully understand the new body it is in, a connection will still linger between them.’

     ‘Does that mean he could revive her?’ Lennox asked, eagerly hoping there was a way for Harding to wake up faster.

     Ratchet kneeled in front of him. ‘Understand this: if Optimus disturbs her recovery in any way, it could make things worse. He cannot communicate with her, she must go to him, that is how we will know if she is strong enough to house his Spark.’

     ‘But if she’s made contact, isn’t that a good thing?’

     ‘It is a positive sign yes, but once is not enough, it may have been an accident for all we know.’

     ‘Could’ve been a dream.’ Ironhide suggested.

     ‘Indeed.’ Ratchet nodded, curiously. ‘You humans have a strange capacity for dreams,’ he began standing, turning his attention to Ironhide. ‘Yet another thing Optimus has not considered.’

     ‘Give the guy a break.’ Ironhide defended his friend.

     ‘He hasn’t thought this through, he did not act rationally.’

     ‘Love is not rational, you know that, but I trust his judgement. He wouldn’t have done this if he thought she couldn’t handle it.’

     Ratchet just grunted and folded his arms, turning to look at the horizon. Ironhide sighed and turned back to Lennox.

     ‘Everything will be fine.’ He brushed the conversation away and headed back inside the hanger.

     ‘You don’t seem convinced.’ Lennox commented to Ratchet, hoping he could get a little more information out of him.

     The medical officer turned his head towards him, again grunting in frustration.

     ‘It would not be wise to speak any further.’ He said, calmly. ‘I should not have spoken out of turn, this is not my decision to judge.’

     It was a far cry from the behaviour Lennox had just witnessed with Ironhide, but he couldn’t force Ratchet to tell him anything.

     Lennox decided to make a visit to Harding, to get an update like he promised Optimus he would. When he arrived, it was to find Smith arguing with one of the doctors.

     ‘Do you know who I am?’ Smith demanded as if he would get a different answer because of who he was.

     ‘I know you work for the president, but it doesn’t change a single thing.’ The doctor shot back.

     ‘What’s going on here?’ Lennox asked.

     ‘Lennox, this doesn’t concern you.’ Smith snapped.

     ‘This is a military hospital,’ Lennox was fed up now. ‘Military personnel only.’ He gestured to a couple of soldiers nearby. ‘Would you mind escorting Mr Smith out of here? I’m sure the patients could do with a little quiet.’

     Before Smith could say anything else, he was forcefully escorted out. The doctor gave Lennox a quick nod before gesturing for him to follow her into Harding’s room.

     ‘Any change?’ Lennox asked, quietly closing the door behind him.

     Harding looked helpless lying in the bed. The woman who climbed thirty thousand feet to save the world and here she was, struggling to wake up. She was hooked up to machines and every single aspect of her body was being monitored.

     ‘Her brain waves have shown some improvement.’ The doctor noted.

     ‘That’s a good sign, right?’

     ‘It’s an excellent sign.’ She smiled. ‘It was a few hours ago, when you were in your meeting with Smith, I think she had a dream, perhaps reliving some memory. Look here.’

     The doctor showed Lennox the tablet that recorded Harding’s brain waves, he didn’t fully understand it, but enough to know that this was a very good sign indeed. He sent the data to his own tablet and made a note to show Optimus when he got the chance.

     ‘I think it would help for you to stay for a while,’ the doctor went on. ‘She seems to respond best when people talk to her.’

     ‘Yeah, sure.’ Lennox smiled, still feeling the relief that Harding might have woken up soon. ‘Wait, did you say this happened during the meeting?’

     The doctor was about to leave the room, but Lennox stopped her with his question.

     ‘Yeah, they went on for about half an hour.’ She confirmed.

     Lennox thought for a moment. ‘I’ll be back. Do not let anyone but me in here, understand?’

     ‘Yes, sir.’

     Lennox tried to subtly rush towards the Autobot hanger, he didn’t want to draw any attention, but he did want to get to Optimus and Ratchet quickly.

     ‘Hey!’ He caught the medical officer’s attention, guiding him over to where Optimus was still sulking. ‘Optimus, you need to see this.’ The Autobot leader remained still, much to everyone’s mild annoyance. ‘Look, Harding’s brain waves were active-‘

     Before Lennox could finish the sentence, Optimus transformed back into his full form. He knelt in front of Lennox, waiting for him to continue.

     ‘When you did that union thing,’ Lennox caught the slightly angered expression between Optimus and Ratchet. ‘Her brain waves were more active than they have been since we started monitoring them. She’s in there somewhere and for half an hour, she was fighting to wake up.’ Lennox showed Optimus the tablet with the evidence. ‘Ratchet said that you couldn’t disturb her recovery, that it could make things worse, but you said it yourself that you don’t really know what will happen when a Spark is transferred into an organic host. What if she needs you to make contact? What if what Autobots need after the procedure is the exact opposite of what she needs?’

     Optimus waited a moment, clearly thinking fast. He looked to Ratchet for a conclusion, both Autobots stood tall for a moment and remained quiet.

     ‘What? What is it?’ Lennox asked.

     ‘I am uncertain the risk is worth it.’ Ratchet confessed. ‘Optimus, we cannot make a decision hastily, there is still a possibility it could make things worse.’

     Optimus was still quiet.

     ‘How long can she stay like this before you have to do something?’ Lennox reasoned, much to Ratchet’s disdain.

     Optimus knelt down again, he wore a serious expression. ‘You are aware of our union, Captain Lennox, you are aware of my feelings for Jane.’

     ‘You love her.’ Lennox nodded.

     ‘So, you understand that where her safety is concerned, I cannot make a mistake, I cannot act rashly… no matter how much I wish to see her again.’ He confessed more to himself. ‘We will wait a little longer before attempting to make contact. I only ask that you keep Ratchet informed of everything that happens to her, no matter how insignificant it may seem.’

     ‘You really won’t help her?’ Lennox asked, watching his eyes narrow for a moment.

     ‘Understand this, I have now given my dedication and devotion to her, I will spend the remainder of my life protecting her without condition.’ Optimus leaned forward a little more to make his point clear. ‘Help is such a small word to describe what I am doing for her. This is the right course of action. Jane will wake up on her own. Have faith in that.’

     Lennox swallowed, half annoyed, half understanding that he just didn’t understand everything. ‘Fine.’ He said. ‘Just do one thing for me. For her.’ Optimus nodded for him to make his request. ‘Talk to her. Sit next to her bed and talk to her, just for a while. The doctors say that when people talk to her, it helps. Don’t asked me how, but I think she’d appreciate it if you were there for a while.’

     ‘And say what?’ Optimus frowned, confused oat the human way of helping someone who was in hospital.

     ‘She’s your wife,’ Lennox chuckled. ‘Talk to her about what you normally talk about.’

     Lennox left Optimus with that single confusing thought, he chuckled to himself thinking on how he’d missed just how close they had become. He still had so many questions, but maybe Harding could answer a few when she woke.

If you liked this, please consider supporting me ☕ thanks for reading!

[dodorimo]

something old, something new - part 2

continuation to this. Raphtav. 1.6k

Raphael actually appears here. Car sex ensues.

AO3 link

· · ──────  ❊  ────── · ·

“Can we expect little ones soon?”

The coffee spews out of her mouth in a perfect arch. For an instant, she must’ve looked like one of those tacky, fish-like water fountains you often see in gardens.

Did Astarion wait until she took a big sip so she would make an even bigger mess? The bastard.

Tav quickly assesses the damage. Her new clothes have been spared, thankfully. The same couldn’t be said for the restaurant's table.

Their shopping spree had been a success. Somewhere along the way, Astarion convinced her she was in dire need of new jewelry, which brought up the matter of her complete lack of proper beachwear, and so on. There were almost too many bags to carry, all of them were from different brands: Hermès, Tiffany, Dior, Sephora (that last one was a little self-indulgence of hers).

“We’ve too much on our plate to worry about kids,” she said, grabbing a napkin to clean up her mess.

Raphael as a father? Hell would first freeze over.

“When you say ‘we’ do you mean ‘we both individually’ or ‘we’ as in ‘I don’t want it’?” He emphasizes his point by making quotation marks with his fingers. “With how quickly he put a ring on it, you’d think he’s plugging you full every night.”

And there goes the last sip of her coffee. Out of her mouth.

The lewd picture he conjured aside, she had to disagree that it was really that fast. Four months of dating is a perfectly reasonable amount of time for people over 30. Right? … Right?

“‘We’ as in ‘we’ have no vocation to be parents.”

“Hm. A shame.” Astarion makes a face. “Some would argue you two are too pretty for your union not to bear fruit,” he says and takes a bite off his ice cream… A bite. With his teeth. She’s pretty sure this is the first time she’s seen anyone do that.

“What’s your excuse?” she deflected. “You should’ve an army of nose-pickers by now.”

That managed to shut him up.

She seizes the opportunity to lazily scroll through her social media feed. All afternoon, she and Astarion joked about all the ways Raphael would get back on her for her (presumably) dress transgression. They had plenty of ideas: he would send her a text (signed with his initials, as he usually does), then come pick her up in his limo to give her a ‘stern talking to’. All meaningless jest, of course. With no basis in reality. None.

That's why when the notification pops up on her screen, she thinks it's her mind playing tricks on her. But the more she stares at it, the less likely it is to go away.

[17h14]  ❤︎ Million Dollar Man ❤︎ said: I’m outside - R

“Guess you're going to have to hitch a ride on your own now.” She tilts her phone so Astarion can read the message too. “Mine just arrived.”

Astarion sends her a look over his silver-rimmed sunglasses. He doesn’t seem fazed. “Oh my. Speak of the devil.”

They say their goodbyes (and in his case, good luck) and then she’s off to search for her fiancée. It doesn’t take long. In fact, it doesn’t take time at all. Parked at the front of the street and taking up most of the space is a black limousine.

Why the limousine today and not one of his many sports cars? She would’ve more luck making sense of a physics problem.

The car takes off the moment she gets in. She holds on to her seat to keep from tipping over. Gods, she forgot how fast those things were.

She remembers her first ride. The giddy smile on her face. Do you see me now, mother? It seems almost banal now.

Sitting across from her, Raphael is a sight worthy of a magazine cover. He’s dressed in a three-piece black suit today, with a burgundy tie and a golden watch on his wrist.

In other words, he’s looking every inch the filthy rich man he is.

Tav almost feels bad about her waist-high jeans and loose ponytail. Almost.

“You have coffee on your shirt,” are his first words to her.

And, just like that, all her goodwill goes out the window. She tactfully adjusts her hair so it covers the offending stain. “Hello to you too,” she mumbles.

Something is plaguing him today. His fingers drum on his thigh in a frantic staccato. Whatever he wanted to say to her, he didn’t like it at all. Thankfully, she finds out soon enough.

“I need a plus one for today’s inauguration party.”

“But I thought that was…”

“Taken care of?” He waves a dismissive hand. “So did I. Change of plans. Out of my control.” Annoyance reduced his usual flowery language to a series of short sentences. That bad, huh.

Today is her day off. He’s in big trouble.

“You’ll be thoroughly rewarded.” This is the closest he’d come to pleading with her.

The effort is good enough. She nods, a small smile playing on her lips.

Raphael lets out a sigh and it's as if the weight of the world has been lifted from his shoulders. She’s still staring at him expectantly, though. Was that really all?

“So… you didn’t come for the dress?”

For some reason, he found this hilarious. “Why? Is there something you wish to tell me, my dear?”

She doesn’t have to answer. The car slows down; they’ve arrived at their destination. His penthouse, by the looks of it. The one on the main street, to be more specific.

“Daniella will brief you on the details when you get there.” The mirth he showed earlier is gone. He’s all business now.

“You’re not staying?”

“I have other matters to attend to before the party. I’ll meet you there.” He moves to open the door.

“Wait.” She holds his wrist and looks at him in the eye, hoping her pouty lips and pleading gaze would convey her meaning.

Fortunately for her, it does.

Raphael tastes like whiskey and freshly picked cherries. The kiss starts slowly, a mere touch of lips, before evolving into something more intense, passionate. She gets lost in him, in the feeling of his body pressing against hers and his hand cupping her breast.

He pulls away suddenly. He almost seems angry at her, with his ragged breath and furrowed brow. She hears the door closing with a soft click.

“Ten minutes.”

Then he kisses her again.

Tav smiles against his lips. This is a lot more than she was going for.

Raphael parts from her just long enough to check if the privacy screen that separates the car from the driver’s seat is closed. It is.

As with most things where he was concerned, she struggled to wrap her head around his bed habits. He had all the pomp of a man who wanted to be in control, while sparing none of the effort.

But there is an appeal in the challenge, in the idea of bending him to her wishes. Just as she knows he would be doing the same to her.

With practiced ease, she pulls out his cock from his trousers and kneels in front of him. The car is big enough for her to do so without issue.

Tav knows by now just how much he enjoys a show. Almost as much as he enjoys the feeling itself. So she gives him what he wants.

She starts by teasing the sensitive skin at the base of his cock, her hand fondling his balls. He sucks in a breath. He doesn’t want to let her know how eager he is already. As if she couldn’t tell.

He's not idle, in the sense that he talks her through it. Praises her at every move, telling her how good her tongue feels on him, how pretty she looks with his cock down her throat, what a naughty little whore she is who couldn’t wait until they’re out of the public eye.

Tav wasn't completely honest with Astarion. Raphael is good at this. At telling her what to do. On most days, his voice alone is enough to get her off.

He commands her to pull up her shirt, move faster, put her little fingers between her legs. Where are the manners he showed her just now?

She kisses him and takes him whole and makes that little wet noise halfway between a kiss and a suck that he likes so much. She even gives her tongue a few taps with his cock. In a matter of minutes, he’s close to the edge.

“Get up.” Sweat runs down his temples as he struggles to keep hold of himself. “I’m finishing inside you.”

“I…it’s that time of the month.” She swears she told him.

For a frightening moment, he seems to be weighing his options, before deciding on sinking his fingers into her hair, pulling her to him. “Finish what you started.”

Gladly.

The hand at the back of her neck gives her little choice. She swallows everything he has to give, little tears pricking her eyes and, when it’s done, she sticks out her tongue for his perusal. Not a drop to be seen.

His smile is wide as he gives her cheek a playful slap. She is being dismissed.

She watches him as he fixes his clothes. His hair is disheveled in all the places her fingers touched. There’s a hint of pride in knowing she was the cause, in knowing she was the one to make a dent in his perfectly manicured facade.

It is only for the sake of her rebellious womb that she doesn’t guide his fingers to her wet cunt so he can finish what he started. Disgust be damned.

“Later then.” 

She gives him one last look before the door closes. His voice is husky when he finally answers, evoking a pet name coined long ago.

“Until later, little mouse.”

[ladyylavenderrr]

Talked about this in an ao3 comment so I’m repeating myself, but I always interpreted Mila’s rant to Garak in A Stitch In Time about assimilating into Cardassian society as very telling about what the nature of her relationship with Tain might be like.

Tw: sexual assault and a whole lot of internalized racism

After Garak returns from Bamarren, he’s being forced into the Obsidian Order and Mila is the one to walk him to their headquarters. She tells him “Understand, Elim-you are being given the opportunity to move above the service class.” The opportunity here is emphasized again and again in this scene.

When Garak tries to contradict her implication that the service class isn’t valuable or desirable, she becomes furious, speaking with a passion we haven’t seen her express ever before and don’t see expressed again. I just want to highlight the exact passage I find most important.

"Listen to me!" she said with a passion that startled me. "You are my son and you are a Cardassian. Not a Hebitian. Look around you!" she commanded. I did. We were in the great public area which is surrounded by the buildings that house the power of the Union.

"Hebitians did not build this. Cardassians did. Your father and I serve and maintain, but we do not influence or guide the destiny of the Union. You could. That's why you must submit right now! Do you understand me, Elim? Once we walk through that door," she indicated the one that led to the subterranean levels of the Assembly building-to the Obsidian Order-"you must submit to your fate."

Mila is a Hebitian woman and yet she obviously rejects that heritage and culture. She’s directly juxtaposed with her brother, Tolan, who is desperately trying to keep his identity alive. Meanwhile, Mila assimilates as much as she can. She demands Garak do the exact same. She glorifies the acts of Cardassians (in this case I’m using “Cardassian” to mean non-Hebitians). Most importantly, she tells Elim to submit, submit, submit. Whatever is about to happen to him, it’s going to elevate him from service class and Hebitian to upper class and Cardassian, the dominant and powerful racial category in their society. The message is obvious. The best thing a Hebitian can do is assimilate and submit to Cardassians.

I always saw this scene as a sort of extension of her relationship with Tain, or what it could be like. Her dialogue here obviously reads as her projecting onto Garak in some way, that’s very clear. She’s telling him to submit to the Order, yes, and the racial and class divide of their society, but more importantly, to Tain and his whims. After all, he’s the one at the very core of Garak being forced into the Order. And Tain very much represents this racial hegemony of Cardassians. He’s directly contrasted with Mila, Garak’s other parent, he literally lives above her and her Hebitian family, he has a collection of ancient artifacts from other cultures collecting dust in his study like some kind of commodity.

Mila wants Garak to submit to the racial and class hierarchy by assimilating, just like she does. She also wants him to submit to Tain, because he and that hierarchy are the same. So then, can we assume she has also submitted to Tain?

We don’t know much about the relationship between Tain and Mila, and what we do know (her being his employee) doesn’t scream perfectly consensual. This interpretation makes that dubious consent a lot more dubious I know.

To me, this scene makes me view the relationship between the couple as Mila having more directly submitted to Tain by being his lover, because it’s an opportunity (there’s that word again) to have some kind of power, to be near that racial ideal, to be more than a mere Hebitian, and more importantly, because she simply won’t ever fight back against the racial and class hierarchy (Tain) she’s trapped in, unlike her brother. What Tain wants, Tain gets. What Cardassians want from Hebitians, they get, so why fight back? This is the only way to survive for Mila and it might just bring her some kind of power, no matter how small.

Their relationship is a sort of microcosm of how Mila navigates being Hebitian. Cardassians dominate her and she doesn’t fight back. And even if she cares about Tain (the way she talks about him in TDIC makes this likely to me), they both know she can never be his equal and she’ll always be expendable to him.

I hope this analysis and interpretation makes sense

[tokiro07]

Undead Unluck ch.215 thoughts

[Fashion, Put it All on M-wait, did I do this joke already?]

(Contents: character analysis - Tatiana/Chikara, narrative analysis - Negator tragedies, predictions - arc progression, thematic analysis - Clothing as Freedom)

Tatiana's Characterization

After all these years, we finally get to see Tatiana living a normal life, and just like with the rest of the cast, I'm pleasantly surprised to see how much better fleshed out she's become as a character!

In L100, she was always pretty bratty, but this chapter gives her attitude quite a bit of depth! She's blunt and demanding, yes, but it's clear that she's also considerate and kind; she fired her bodyguards specifically because they failed to perform (reasonable), but also understood that she was the one who put them in that position in the first place, so she gave them an out that wouldn't impact their livelihoods going forward. An excellent example of the "kind but not nice" archetype

We see glimpses of this through the rest of the chapter too. She snaps at Fuuko whenever her attention isn't on her but also values her opinion, and later yells at Chikara for taking photos during rehearsal only to give him the photo back with an autograph once she sees how good of a shot he took, acknowledging his skill as a photographer. She isn't cruel or mean-spirited, just kind of abrasive, whereas in L100 she had a bit of a tendency to be petty and disparaging (refusing to share her dolls with Fuuko, calling Chikara names, etc.)

I think that Tatiana is a good demonstration of nature vs. nurture; she was likely always going to be like this, her kindness and abrasiveness being an aspect of her soul, but her ability to connect with people is vastly different between L100 and L101 solely because of the kind of life she's been able to live in the interim. Before, she literally lived in a bubble from a formative age, which greatly inhibited her chances at socialization, especially since the only people she got to be around from then on were the Roundtable members of the Union and maybe some of the rank-and-files. Now, she certainly has (or had) friends in school while she was growing up and has a much better understanding of how society and relationships function, even if she can be a bit unpleasant in how she presents herself

Of course, being a celebrity does seem to be having its own impact on her, as again she's being led down the path of isolation specifically because her fame is causing her to become separated from what she really wants: her family. I think we'll probably get another opportunity to examine that next week (or the week after) when her tragedy strikes, as I would expect it to be heavily tied to her catalyst

Tatiana's Tragedy

Speaking of, I do think that Fuuko's prediction that Tatiana's tragedy will occur during the fashion show may be a bit off. I've seen a few people discussing it already, but unless her parents are going to be attending the show and in danger, it really does seem like the personal stakes are lower if all that's at risk is a bunch of strangers. Sure, that tremendous loss of life would still be tragic, but accidentally killing 1000 people you don't know is not emotionally comparable to the weight of accidentally killing your own parents

In fact, even last chapter when Untouchable almost spontaneously manifested, it wasn't because she was surrounded by people; it was because she was reminded of how alone she was. The people around her were keeping her away from what brought her joy; in the moment, it was Pan-Panda, but that was a microcosm of her insecurity, that she was being slowly separated from her parents, who she ironically entered this lifestyle for. She sought to become famous for them, to make them happy, but all it did was put up a wall between her and them and make her miserable. That momentary shift in perspective was the catalyst, not the number of people who stood to be victimized

I think that Fuuko's misapprehension comes from the same place as ours, that she believes God is deliberately choosing "the moment to strike" rather than laying a landmine to be tripped. Of course she thinks that the opportunity for the numerically biggest tragedy is God's goal, she's seen Negator abilities take out entire towns before! She figures that the abilities just come at "the worst possible time," because hers manifested when her parents got on a plane surrounded by 200+ other people. She wasn't emotionally mature enough to understand yet that the real catalyst was either a) the joy she felt kissing her parents goodbye, or b) the fear she felt separating from them as they were heading to the airport

She has no way of knowing that Gina killed her townsfolk because she was despairing about the massive changes in her life that she couldn't control, or that Top killed his friends because he was actively denying the part of himself that enjoyed running, or that Shen killed Mei because he truly wanted to save her and was afraid he would lose her. It was never about anyone dying, it was about the emotions wrapped up in the moments that those people died

That's why Feng's tragedies never involved death, at least not directly. Because his tragedy wasn't about loss, it was about the emotional value he put on his own strength, either the despair at its loss in L100 or the joy and pride he felt achieving the pinnacle of martial prowess and believing his peers would always be there to push him even higher

I could go on and list the emotions that preceded everyone's tragedies, but I think I've made my point; the catalysts are never the circumstances alone, they are always the feelings associated with those circumstances. I'm sure there are moments that don't seem to fit, like Chikara simply crossing the street in L100, but we weren't really told what was going through his head or what was happening in his life at the time, so for all we know it's similar to him trying to express his desire to become a photographer to his parents in L101

The main point is that Tatiana's previous tragedy took place on her birthday because of the joy she felt being with her parents, possibly because of the hopes she carried in her heart as she made her birthday wish (one twitter user suggested she may have wished something related to being with her parents forever), so while she definitely enjoys being on the runway, I don't know if the joy she'll feel here will be comparable to that she feels being with her parents or the despair she feels worrying she won't get to see them

As it happens, Tatiana's birthday is mere days away in this chapter, so either her tragedy strikes now and her birthday will be a moment where she's shown that her life hasn't been ruined by Untouchable OR Fuuko is wrong and her tragedy was never meant to happen at the show at all. I'm personally expecting the latter, though I'm sure Tozuka will make it work either way

Tatiana's Philosophy

If the tragedy does occur during the show, I would expect the catalyst will have something to do with her philosophy as a model, that both her and the clothes need to be good to make for a proper performance. The smiles (or lack thereof) that she sees from the crowd are the deciding factor, so we're entering this phase of the arc with the implicit understanding that Tatiana does place emotional weight on how other people feel

Tatiana's phrasing that "the clothes are wearing me" also brings up a philosophical quandary I've had for many years - what makes someone "attractive?" When someone wears a stunning outfit or nice jewelry, we typically say "you look good with that on" or "it looks good on you," but don't those have opposing connotations? Did they not look good without it on? Will it look bad on anyone else? The phrasing of a compliment on aesthetics carries a lot of implications, intentional or not, and that's something I've personally been grappling with since adolescence when I was first learning how to talk to girls

Tatiana, being a model, is definitely thinking about it from the other direction, always striving to strike the balance between both forms of compliment. It's all well and good for Tatiana to be cute or for a dress to be beautiful, but if someone compliments her, then what's the point of the dress when she would have gotten the same compliment no matter what she was wearing? If someone compliments the dress, then what's the point of her as the model when any model would have gotten the same response?

I don't know what wording she's looking for exactly, but it's clear Tatiana wants to do the dresses justice by bringing something to the table that they aren't capable of on their own, that she doesn't want to just be an interchangeable mannequin serving as nothing more than a vehicle to get the dress to the other end of the runway. She has value to give to the dress, and the dress has value to give to her; it needs to be a synergistic partnership where neither overshadows the other

...Hm? A partnership...with an outfit? That sounds kinda familiar...

Clothes

Ah! Clothy!

"The clothes are wearing me." "I'll tame these clothes before the show"

"Once I've (Clothy) entranced you with my creation, you'll be my walking mannequin!" "Well I'll be, you took [Clothes] and made him your servant"

The wording is obviously different, but the spirit of the ideas is remarkably similar. I've seen a little bit of speculation already that Clothy would be making his reappearance in this arc, and I'm inclined to agree that it would be a great opportunity for him to do so since not only is it aesthetically appropriate, but also thematically

In much the same way that long hair is a symbol of isolation, I think that clothes in UU are a symbol of both restraint and freedom. Not only are Clothes a literal Rule that everyone must follow, but the ability to decide how that Rule is followed is a privilege that a good chunk of the cast is denied. Tatiana is the most notable example in that she can't wear clothes at all once Untouchable manifests, but Fuuko is forced to wear clothes that cover up as much skin as possible, a sentiment she makes clear as far back as chapter one. Isshin hides in her armor, Top's outfit is liable to be destroyed by his ability, Victor tried to force Juiz to wear armor for her protection, etc. etc.

On the flipside, other characters without those limitations use their clothes as a method of self-expression, like Gina emulating Japanese schoolgirl fashion, Ichico refusing to cover her breasts, Billy dressing like a cowboy, and of course, Andy being perfectly comfortable being naked at any and all times. Even when Clothy becomes bound to him, he never allows the clothes to wear him, he is always in control of what outfit he's wearing and how it looks on him. Ruin does this too through his partnership with Blood and Shadow, suggesting that he and Andy are two of if not the most free characters in the series (though that may be an illusion that we'll see broken later)

With how Tatiana's talking in this chapter, I wouldn't be surprised if she ends up being the one to tame Clothy this time, using his "perfect outfit" ability to bypass the Untouchable Rule ("I want an outfit that's intangible and not affected by Untouchable" or something to that effect) and keep Tatiana clothed at all times. Andy'd be out of luck, but with his high level of soul manipulation, I wouldn't be surprised if he can just project an outfit if he really wants. Bonus points if Soul gets mad at him for using his soul for something so mundane (though thinking about it, is that where the Master Rules get their clothes from?)

Tatiana's story really does lend itself to a friendship with Clothy better than Andy's, honestly, especially since there's nearly zero chance of Clothy taking damage with Tatiana and 100% chance of damage with Andy. While I never would have anticipated Tatiana becoming a model based on her story in L100, now that we're here, it's so incredibly obvious in retrospect. Perhaps Tozuka could have done a little more to foreshadow it, but I think the fact that it feels so natural is a testament to Tozuka's character writing

Tatiana's role as a model also provides that same retrospective justification to another character whose role changed between loops, but who I always thought was implemented in a slightly more awkward manner: Chikara

Chikara

While I understand the imagery of Chikara becoming a photographer, a tangible representation of both Unmove's effect and activation requirement, it was never stated that Chikara had any interest in photography in L100. We never heard anything about his extracurriculars or interests, whereas at least Tatiana's inability to wear clothes was a point of insecurity for her

This lack of explicit cohesion made me feel like Tozuka thought of it after the fact as it just happened to fit well, but seeing Tatiana as a model now and the compatibility between those two interests, I'm inclined to believe that Tozuka was planning for this to be the outcome for them for quite some time, especially since he's clearly been angling to make them a ship since at least ch.98, if not from the very beginning

If absolutely nothing else, that moment of Chikara reflexively taking a picture of Tatiana and her subsequent acknowledgment of his skills does way more for endearing me to their relationship than the *checks notes* near total lack of interaction between them aside from him seeing her naked and her calling him a pervert in L100. It doesn't help that Tozuka still isn't making it clear how old Tatiana is, especially since we no longer have the excuse of her growth being stunted by living in a ball, but again, I'm just glad to see that they have at least some chemistry this time around to make their feelings a little more believable/relatable

I do hope that they'll continue to get more cute interactions, cus I'd truly hate for Tatiana to get hit with the same complaints that people have about Leila not being enough of a character to justify Rip's decision to marry both her and Latla (a complaint I understand but wholeheartedly disagree with, by the by). Since Tatiana is an actual Negator and a major recurring character, I envision she won't get that treatment, but I would have said the same thing about Kururu

Predictions

At the very least, I expect that Tatiana's manifestation will result in Chikara awakening to his soul, possibly giving him the ability to perceive the boundaries of Untouchable and apply Unmove to it directly. It seems like the current plan is for Gina to use Unchange on some smoke or dry ice to make it visible to Chikara, but I expect it won't work out quite so well

I also think that with her own soul awakening, Tatiana will gain much greater control of the shape of Untouchable, either being able to mold it to her own form or to allow things she wants to touch to pass through and disallow anything she doesn't want (by the logic that she wants food and air and thus has the tube leading to her mouth, while also giving her the ability to prevent poisons or amorphous monsters from entering it). Kururu's soul let her aim Unchaste, so reshaping Tatiana's barrier should be easy enough, especially since she could already do that to some extent previously

As for the immediate next chapter, I think that it would be fun if Clothes showed up the same way that Color showed up at Chikara's graduation, making us think that he's going to be the catalyst for Untouchable only for him and Tatiana to become friends. Then, a few days later at her party, she either just happens to manifest it from her emotional state or a Master Rule shows up and prompts it, leading to more moments between her, Chikara and Clothes

As always, I'm probably nowhere close to what's actually going to happen, but I'd like it if I'm even remotely in the ballpark

Until next time, let's enjoy life!

[forasecondtherewedwon]

The Ladies Whistledown - final chapter

Pairing: Eloise x Penelope Rating: T Word Count: 3528

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Like a mythic sea monster, Lady Whistledown uncoiled herself from the depths and burst through the surface of the new social season. Her return was startling even while breathlessly anticipated. The ton was, as ever, beside itself with giddiness at the reminder that she had been watching all along, and had already formed predictions for certain gentlemen and young ladies that even the gentlemen and young ladies could not yet imagine would come to pass. Whistledown was their informant, their oracle, and, this year more than ever before, their protector.

This was Eloise and Penelope’s plan for the gossip sheet this season. As they had discussed for months, they would wield their power to specific effect, guiding and defending the women of the marriage mart. They would look out for their interests when their parents were uncaring or unable. They would expose the deceptions of gentlemen without remorse.

Marina now wore Colin’s ring as evidence of their betrothal. Through Penelope, Eloise had heard Prudence’s marriage to Dankworth was off to a happy start. Eloise was eager to do more good, to meddle in a positive way, but she knew there was still one woman to whom Whistledown had not brought satisfaction. It had never been a statement, not a public pledge, but Eloise felt bound to do right by Cressida Cowper regardless. She had not forgotten Cressida’s surprising candor at the Finch party late last summer. With her knowledge of Cressida’s fear, and hints, since their friendship began to develop, that Cressida’s parents were among those who would honour their own definition of an advantageous marriage without regard for their daughter’s preferences, Eloise was determined to intercede.

She spoke about it with Penelope. Pen was not overly fond of Cressida, had neither had the opportunity for greater closeness with Cressida nor sought it, but she was too good to refuse to help her. She would not make a special exclusion for petty reasons. No, it was more that she did what she did for Eloise. And Eloise saw that. So, it was terrible that Pen’s suggested solution made her laugh.

“What about Lord Debling?” was what Penelope said one afternoon, while they sat in the window seat within Featherington House.

“He is odd,” Eloise replied succinctly.

“As are we.”

Eloise glanced at her friend, her best friend, to make sure she had not bristled. Penelope did not seem to have taken offense at Eloise’s assessment. Good. Nor had Eloise taken offense at Pen’s rather accurate response.

“Yes,” she agreed. “Of course, Debling is not odd by our standards, Pen. If a fellow wishes to spend his time studying birds rather than the strutting human peacocks of the ton, he has both my blessing and my jealousy. Might he not be a little odd for Cressida, however?”

“He is single, he is rich,” Penelope enumerated, then paused. “What is it that she wants? What does she need to be happy?”

For a moment, Eloise admired Penelope’s earnest face, then she swallowed and thought back on the conversations she had had with their subject.

“The strangest things,” she said, wearing an ironic smile. “What Cressida wants from a marriage is to not be controlled, to be left alone as much as possible. In matrimony, she looks for freedom. In union, the possibility of herself and her husband leading two separate lives.”

“That is strange,” Pen agreed. How she smiled in return explained that Cressida’s needs were strange in the most understandable ways.

Eloise would not tell Penelope how Cressida’s mother dictated what she wore—Pen was already too familiar with such a practice—or how her father guarded Cressida’s time in such a way that it was nearly impossible for Cressida to sustain any friendship; all her time was meant to be devoted to catching a suitable husband. Eloise did not expect Cressida would wish this information to be shared, nor did she have the impulse to do so. Anyway, it was unnecessary to wheedle Penelope towards greater sympathy for Cressida when Pen was already so inclined. She had a powerful sense of fairness. This struck Eloise. To be sure, it had clearly waxed and waned over recent years, with the Society Papers as proof, but when Penelope was fair, her justice rang like a bell. None were unworthy.

“Odd, even,” Penelope went on. Her smile deepened to tease Eloise.

“Yes, alright, maybe Debling is odd in the right way,” she allowed. It should not be so much fun to lose an argument, but Pen had always been a gracious winner.

“Marrying someone so… unusual will affect Cressida’s reputation.”

“But I do not think she will mind,” Eloise offered. Thoughtfully, she chewed her thumb.

“It seems rather wonderful,” Penelope said abruptly, tilting her head dreamily against the glass. “Being too happy in one’s oddness to mind what anybody thinks.”

“A privilege, really.”

“Yes.”

“Not a bad way to live,” Eloise remarked, gazing at her friend.

Penelope smiled gently. “I do not think so.”

—

“Oh, Eloise,” Cressida had gushed. “It is so diverting! Emma Woodhouse is quite the best character I have ever read!”

Eloise had taken the novel Cressida offered and flipped to the first page, skeptical but curious. It was not that she distrusted Cressida’s taste, only that she doubted it was very much like her own. Would this Emma Woodhouse be as wonderful as Cressida promised, or insipid, predictable, caricaturish? To be polite, Eloise had gone away with the book.

She had read Emma in snatches ever since. Cressida was keen to discuss it when Eloise was finished, and Eloise quickly realized she would be before long. Her first had been absolutely correct: Emma Woodhouse was a most amusing character—not silly or dull, but flawed and proud and eager and loving. Eloise adored her. She had even stuffed the novel into her reticule and read on the way to church. The only thing about it that disappointed her was the impossibility of Emma falling in love with Harriet Smith. It seemed a shame; Harriet worshipped her so.

One day, midmorning, Colin surprised her in the drawing room while she was sprawled the length of the chaise, Emma propped on her stomach. Eloise was annoyed at the interruption; Jane and Frank had just made public their secret engagement! She closed the book with a loud sigh and sat up to make room for her brother.

“What’s that you’re reading?” he inquired as he sat.

“It is called Emma, by the authoress Jane Austen.”

“What’s it about?”

Eloise had not expected the question. She recalled the carriage ride to Aubrey Hall the year before, how Benedict had brokered peace amongst them by suggesting that Eloise might recommend some books for Colin’s travels. Apparently, her brother remained interested in what she read. It was… pleasant, she found. She appreciated his interest, and the open, earnest look in his eyes when he asked.

“It is a love story, unfortunately,” she said.

“Why is that unfortunate?”

“Well, it isn’t,” Eloise allowed thoughtfully, “for Emma. She is the protagonist. I suppose it is about a woman who is so busy matchmaking others that she misses her own perfect match right in front of her.”

“I wouldn’t have expected you to read a book about a woman who isn’t very bright, El,” Colin joked.

Eloise frowned.

“Emma is bright.”

“Then why does she not see this ‘perfect match’?”

“She has known the gentleman too long,” Eloise explained. “Their families are completely intertwined. She has always relied upon him, but never considered him. When they—”

“But you haven’t finished yet,” Colin cut in. His eyes were on her finger, tucked between the pages to mark her place.

“What of that?”

“Maybe Emma will marry someone else instead.”

Eloise scoffed. She shook her head and gave her brother a patronizing smile.

“No.”

“How can you be certain?”

“There can be no other,” was all Eloise could think to say. “No one else would be right.”

“Has Emma recognized that yet?”

“Sometimes it takes an outside observer,” Eloise bragged self-importantly.

“Indeed.”

And then—bafflingly and irritatingly—Colin began to laugh. Eloise stared at him.

“What on earth is the matter with you?” she demanded, unnerved.

“Forgive me, sister,” Colin said, still laughing.

“I certainly shall not until you explain yourself.”

Colin sighed out the end of his laughter and looked at her in a way that unnerved Eloise more still. It was far too knowing a look, and therefore did not belong on a face like Colin’s; he was hardly what she considered a shrewd observer. Perhaps that was ungenerous, but even he—she felt—could not possibly deny that his interest was more often turned inward. This was not a criticism, merely a fact. He thought much of himself, fixated on the man he was ever endeavoring to become. This had always seemed a safe trait for Eloise to tease him about. However, if Colin intended to redirect his self-examination, to look outward with the same ruthless sensitivity he employed on his self-reflections, Eloise was not certain she was prepared to be so studied.

Colin’s expression suggested whether or not she felt prepared was irrelevant.

“I wish to speak to you of something of a delicate nature.”

Not having the smallest idea what he meant, Eloise guessed, “Marina…?”

“Not Marina. No, I do not seek your advice on how to behave towards the woman I’m going to marry. Perhaps this makes me a hypocrite.”

“How so? Colin, I do not follow you.”

Colin shifted in his seat, twisting to better face Eloise.

“I’m going to tell you something—”

“Then just tell be already!” she burst out. “Stop telling me you are going to tell me, and saying you are going to speak to me. So far, you have said noth—”

“Are you in love with Pen?”

Her stream of words ran dry, and she was left gasping like a fish in the drained riverbed. In love with Pen. Eloise could not possibly own such a thing. She felt the blood drain from her face in horror, even while knowing her paling would make her more suspect. She knew she must answer in the negative. Swiftly. Deny it first, and then go back and find out what possessed Colin to ask the question.

Mutely, she shook her head.

Was there talk about the two of them? How? Eloise felt she had been so discrete with her feelings for her best friend that she had only recently recognized the full extent of them herself. How could another know? It defied logic. The only person who might have—

“Think hard, Eloise,” Colin bade her, too serious. “You will hurt her if you lie, and then you may not get another chance. What has happened for Marina and I is incredibly rare.”

“Pen,” Eloise forced out.

“Yes, Pen. Penelope Featherington. Your closest friend since childhood. There can be no other.” Colin had the gall to grin at Eloise as he spoke the words she had used to describe the inevitability of Emma Woodhouse and Mr. Knightley.

Eloise felt dizzy. She thought she might excuse herself to lie down in her bedchamber. If only there were even the faintest hope of Colin forgetting all this by the time she rose again. He could be so dreadfully persistent sometimes, and he had compared her and Penelope to himself and Marina. It could be that he felt his duty as a gentleman demanded he repay Penelope for encouraging him to court his first love a second time. If this were the explanation, Eloise had not a prayer of dissuading him from his purpose. A Bridgerton always honoured his debts—she had heard Anthony say so before. He was constantly imparting wisdom for his brothers to hear and his sisters to overhear (and sometimes roll their eyes at).

Before she could quip something clever at him, Colin was taking the novel from her limp hands and flapping it in front of her face as a fan. She realized she must have looked as if she might swoon.

“Did she… speak?” Eloise asked weakly.

“She did.”

“What did she say?”

Colin desisted with the book, though he still looked at her with concern in his eyes.

“I believe that is for Penelope to tell you.”

“But, Colin…” The dizziness had not left Eloise. She could barely believe she had been lying here reading about Emma Woodhouse and Frank Churchill and Box Hill not ten minutes prior. “How can you suggest it?”

“You and Penelope?” he asked, but she could see he had understood perfectly well. Her incredulity was natural; it was his nonchalance which was perverse.

She nodded anyway.

“You do nothing wrong,” Colin said gently.

Eloise’s nose felt hot and her eyes welled abruptly. She turned her face away, hearing her brother sigh.

“I’ll be back in a moment,” he said, and was gone.

Alone, Eloise felt as scattered as she had once seen Daphne’s bedchamber before a ball—glittering gowns and filmy organza gloves littered across every surface. Somewhere in the mess, Eloise was sure, were the pieces which were meant to go together, but she could not see them, or the whole they would make. She thought of running, from the room and the conversation, but something held her in place. Penelope. Colin wished to speak to her of Penelope. She wondered if it had been like this between her brothers when Anthony had decided on Kate. When it was serious, she supposed, there would be a conversation, a kind of dividing line between the days of courtship that could still be backed out of and the intention to marry. Though she could not marry Penelope, she was beginning to see Colin’s confrontation for what it was: a reckoning and a blessing.

When he returned, he brought Benedict. Eloise stared up at her brother helplessly. She was hunched forward, as though to protect the heart which beat so fiercely inside her. Now, Benedict sat next to her and Colin across from them, looking on.

“Eloise Bridgerton in love,” Benedict stated bluntly. “How the mighty have fallen.”

He looked as though he wanted to tweak her nose, so it was a testament to how thoroughly pathetic Eloise must have appeared that Benedict restrained himself from causing her any further indignity.

“You aren’t…” She glanced between her brothers. “…disgusted?”

“Oh, entirely,” Benedict joked brightly, “but only because you and I were meant to be single together forever, not because it’s Penelope. Of course it’s Penelope!”

He scrunched his face in exaggerated pity, as though this ought to have been obvious to Eloise as well. What was it that had set Colin laughing? Eloise’s speech about it taking an outside observer to recognize how well suited two people might be?

“Why are you so upset?” Benedict inquired kindly. Tears were wobbling in Eloise’s vision.

“It is because Eloise has always relied upon Penelope, but never considered her,” Colin broke in smugly.

Benedict turned to his brother with an expression of surprise. It was rather insulting, which was why it made Eloise smile even as she blinked her tears away.

“That is uncharacteristically sage of you, brother,” Benedict complimented.

Colin was too good-natured to be wounded, and happily gave credit where it was due: “They are Eloise’s words.”

“About someone else,” Eloise felt it necessary to clarify. “Characters in a book.”

“And yet…”

“Art imitates life,” Benedict supplied.

It felt to Eloise rather like being ganged up on, except they were both on her side. She was annoyed, but uncertain who should feel her wrath. To be not only understood but advised was alarming and confusing and maddening at once. How dare they tell her what to do! But how kind of them to take her as she was! Eloise could not place a value on the fact that her brothers were treating this no differently than she imagined they would have were it an eligible gentleman who had captured her heart. It was not only good or sweet to them, it was reasonable. And that was shocking. Why not Penelope, a person of Eloise’s long acquaintance? A young lady of high birth, from a family they knew well? It all made perfect sense! Except that they were both women! Eloise began to laugh. Embarrassingly, it sounded rather hysterical, but that was how she felt!

“What am I to do?” she demanded of her brothers, who watched her with a kind of amused panic.

“You haven’t compromised the girl, have you?” Colin whispered.

Eloise swatted his arm hard with her book.

“Then all you’ll need to do is tell her of your feelings,” he said.

Eloise looked desperately to Benedict for a different solution.

“You might be more ready than you think,” Benedict said.

No other options then, no other advice. Useless brothers!

“I can’t,” Eloise insisted.

“How come? Too much of a coward?” Benedict stuck out his lower lip and pouted mockingly at her.

Eloise leveled a threatening finger at him.

“Just you wait until it is your turn. When you fall in love, I shall not forget this.”

“By that day, which may never come,” Benedict said, “you and Penelope will be so awfully happy that you will not even think of revenge.”

“Well, I—”

“You are stalling,” Colin said. “You must speak to Penelope.”

“What do I say?” Eloise asked anxiously.

“You—”

Benedict leapt forward and clapped a hand over Colin’s mouth. Colin glared at him, but did not fight. Their treatment of one another had been long established.

“You do not listen to our brother,” Benedict said. “He may have travelled the continent, but he is still Colin. Use your own words. You have them.”

Eloise swallowed with difficulty. If she did have the right words, it might still be quite challenging to force them from her throat.

—

It was not the day of her brothers’ intervention that Eloise spoke to Penelope. It was a different day, and they were in the garden of Bridgerton House.

The wisteria was in bloom across the front of the house, and in the back, the lilac bushes had erupted with warm and cool shades of purple. A soft breeze helped the flowers scent the air. Eloise sat on one of the swings, Penelope on the other. They had been speaking about something… the birth… the baby, Victoria, who might someday be queen… but now they sat in silence. Eloise’s heart ached pleasantly as she looked at Penelope, and then Penelope turned her head and looked back.

It had always been Penelope who looked and Eloise who spoke, but that day, when Pen saw Eloise watching her, the words blossomed from her lips.

She had much to say. It was more than Eloise would have expected, had she expected that it would be Penelope who made the courageous first declaration of love. Pen was fearless. On the rope that hung the swing, Eloise’s hand trembled as she heard how much she was loved—how much she had been loved. She had seen Penelope write, ink staining her fingers as she put down her thoughts with such determination and passion. Still, Eloise had never anticipated hearing Penelope speak the way she wrote. She had not thought to be the story Penelope told, both plot and protagonist. Never had Eloise imagined she might be someone’s favourite character. How astounding to find out the life she had been living was a love story.

Eloise replied in fewer words, yet said as much—all that was needed for Penelope to grow teary and reach for her hands, and for Eloise to rise from her swing and trip to stand before Pen’s, and to cup her dear face, and to bow to her so their lips could meet.

The contact was shaky, and then sure as Penelope stood too, the both of them breathing hard and clinging fast. In those moments when Eloise held Penelope in a way she never had before, she decided no one would part them. They were forever joined in friendship, and business, and now this. She would share Penelope with no one—Pen was hers alone, and she Pen’s, and all as it should have been. They smiled at one another, and then Eloise pressed her lips to Penelope’s once more.

There would be so much ahead of them. Eloise’s family were out amongst the ton today, and she felt a curious heat as Penelope eagerly returned her kisses. The feeling made her want to take Pen by the hand right then and lead her inside, upstairs. But it was also enjoyable to be like this, in the May sunshine, below the blindingly blue sky. To tell Penelope again that she loved her. To see Pen’s eyes sparkle as she looked up and said, “And I you, El.”

“We will have to be careful,” Eloise cautioned, lovingly stroking Penelope’s cheek.

“There are those who will help us.”

“And if people talk?”

“It will only be gossip,” Pen said, wearing a smile so assured it provoked one of Eloise’s own, “and anyone who challenges us on that field will find themselves outmatched.”

[canonicallysoulmates]

J2 Gold Panel Minncon 2023

Quick psa/reminder that this con took place while the actor’s union, SAG-AFTRA, is on strike. This means the boys cannot talk about any past, present, or future projects. But for the sake of clarity, I will be mentioning projects the boys are referring to by name.

Before the panel starts Jared notices a fan with an I heart Jensen sign, and says he does too.

Jared shows off a bit of his and Jensen's unspoken lingo, he does the sign for a brief pause. They got it from their director, Jensen says they had a lot of different hand signals for communication, and they also had names for certain types of shots. Jared mentions they had a friend in Van who's a larger individual and was always smoking pot so if they start the scene with a high and wide shot they'd call it the Murph. When the camera is on the dolly track and does a creep in if it's a little creep they'd call it a Mickey Rooney then Jensen says there are other ones they won't mention because they're very inappropriate.

Jared reminds fans that actors are currently on strike and thanks the fans for their understanding if there are any questions that they cannot answer. Jensen says that Jared can talk about his gardening skills and Jared says he loves him some zucchini and that he harvested some the previous week...I'm not gonna say it, but you know what I'm thinking 😉

Do they follow the Texas country music scene?

Jared always goes back to when in High School or Middle School Robert Earl King. Or Pat Green.

Jensen mentions Jerry Jeff Walker. He also says Texas certainly has its own country core, it's not like traditional Nashville country. x

The next fan had already asked Jared this question and now they want to know Jensen's answer: what kind of car would he have if money was no problem?

He doesn't have a holy grail and the reason he doesn't is because if he did he'd spend all his time figuring out how to get it; he'll watch car auction shows, used to watch them with Clif, and every one of them he'll want. He did see one car once, he and Jared had the opportunity to go to Concours d'Elegance which is the best, greatest car show there is in Pebble Beach. They close off the 18-hole golf course and line up the cars all along the fairways. It's right there on the coast and they were walking past the pre-world war cars and he saw an Austin Martin that took his breath away. He was like "this is outrageous you probably can't even get your hands on this" but if he ever had the opportunity to own something like that- he took more pictures of that car than any other car. x

The next fan doesn't have a question, they just wanted the boys to wish her a happy birthday and also show the tattoo she has of Jensen's face on the inside of her thigh, which took her 6hrs to get done. Jared jokes Jensen can't last six hours 🤣

What's the backstory behind the bracelets Jensen sometimes wears?

They've all been gifted to him by someone in his life, usually his wife or his daughter but he has friends that he has also traded with; there's always some sort of a back story to what he's wearing he doesn't usually go shopping and just buy stuff.

Then they get told a naughty joke: if a blackbird has black babies and a bluebird has blue babies what bird has no babies? A swallow. Both men have to walk away from the mic 🤣

Jared asks the next fan if they have any babies and even he's wondering why he says what comes into his head 😂

If they had to pick tattoos for each other what would they pick out?

Jensen points towards the fan that has his face tattoed on her inner tigh and says she already has it he would put his face on Jared's and Jared says "yeah I'd be more handsome." Gentlemen 👀

Jensen then says would put a bear growling on Jared's right hand. And Jared's like "why do they exist?" and Jensen just goes "to scare big things like you." Which I found a cute little exchange.

Jared would make Jensen get an enter at your own risk and an arrow pointing to somewhere that he's not gonna say but it would be in an old English cursive writing. Again 👀

Jared asks the fan what they would put on them and the fan replies that they would ask what they love and what describes them

Jensen comments that he and Jared had talked about getting something that represents SPN because when you're in it you're not thinking about how long the show is gonna go and so you know they talked about maybe getting the anti-possession tattoo or there was also talk about symbols of MOL but it's really come down that now that they're a few years removed from it and they're able to look back on it they're able to realize how big that part of their lives was for them and how forever it will be. That's not to say tattoos always have to be amazingly meaningful, some are just fun, but he feels they would because of how that show impacted their lives. x

If they were in Van and had a ping pong tournament with the cast and crew of SPN who would make it to the gold round and come out the victor?

They would. Jared says he thinks it happened a few times and they had to hide said ping pong table from them because they would sweat their makeup off.

Jensen says they would play that game so intensely as if they were running a marathon. They would be called back on set and be out of breath, show up panting- they had very intense games. I wanna make a dirty comment so badly involving the other things they were probably might have been doing on that ping pong table but I'm gonna keep it moving.

Jared says they represented Texas pretty damn well, and they're asked if they doubled up or destroyed the other. Both say it was pretty split, pretty even. It got to a point where they were just exposing each other's weaknesses like Jared would figure out Jensen's forehand was a little weaker that day so he'd send it straight into his forehand. x

Next is a fan wanting to know what they thought of her tattoo, and if they could give her artist a shoutout. They thought it was really awesome and the artist did a great job. x

If they go to a diner how likely is it that they would actually order a salad and a cheeseburger?

Jared says at a dinner he's kind of greasy spoon type of guy so like a burger or something. That's at a diner, but he probably orders salads more than burgers.

Jensen would probably go burger or burrito if they have it. And Jared says that's cause it's probably 2am, probably on the way home. He knows hubby so well 🥰

Jensen comments there's a dinner close to where he lives that they go to sometimes, and he's a creature of habit so they have this big massive burrito that he has no business eating all of but he does.

He mentions it has hot sauce so the fan asks if they like spicy food, they do, and Jensen says he likes jalapeños on his pizza all the time. They also mention Hot Ones and how they'd like to do it. x

J2 Gold Panel Minncon

[evelynmlewis]

The Kingdom of Heaven: Bonus material and discussion questions

A reader requested these for a book club and I finally got them ready. Under the cut. Numbers refer to chapter number.

2. What kind of organization is DYNTEC? Have any real-world governments had a branch like this? What are some ways that the Settlement frames DYNTEC in a positive light?

3. What is suggested about gender roles in the Settlement?

4. “Detractor” is a word borrowed from the Soviet Union’s own description of its critics. What, in the Settlement, is Detraction? Who is a Detractor? How do you think the Settlement benefits from this concept?

5. Children in the Settlement aren’t allowed to go outdoors until the age of 16. What is missing from their lives? In what ways have real-life children’s opportunities and independence been reduced over time?

6. Why would the Settlement want Alex to be able to punch her trainer in the face?

7. A Kafkatrap is a scenario in which a person’s denial of wrongdoing is used as evidence of their guilt. How was Alex Kafkatrapped in this chapter? Can you think of any examples of this happening in real life?

12. Fact: Everything that Cam says in this chapter about the Biometric Analysis is true of a conventional polygraph test, including its bias against honest subjects and the methods of fooling it. The US government has been known to go after people who publicize this information about the polygraph, in order to maintain its perceived mystique as an interrogation method. However, The Kingdom of Heaven is a work of fiction and all resemblances to real entities are purely coincidental 😉

13. In your opinion, is the Settlement’s hands-off policy a good form of environmentalism? Why or why not? Do we see this form of environmentalism in any real life policies?

16. In chapter 11, Alex said, “I’ve never seen anything that tempted me to believe it was created by a god.” Why hasn’t she? What might be happening to her views now? Alex seems ill-prepared to experience nature. In what ways might the Settlement’s policies have contributed to Alex’s current predicament?

19. How has the Settlement’s low value placed on human life affected Alex’s opinion of herself? Why is the Kingdom different?

20. How is the education in the Kingdom different from the educational system in the Settlement?

21. Why do you think this hymn and this Bible verse were chosen for the book?

26. Why does Alex attempt to minimize the abuse she experienced when recounting in this chapter?

29. Does this chapter lend more credibility to the Settlement’s arguments that children are better off inside the Settlement? Why or why not?

32. The “plea bargain” that Alex is offered in this chapter is meant to resemble the types of offers that the Soviet Union and other totalitarian states would make people, often giving them the chance to get out of their “crimes” if they make ideological statements.

34. In the book 1984, the regime assumes its final and total psychological control over the individual not (as is commonly assumed) by making them state that 2+2=5, but by causing them to betray their loved ones. This destruction of people’s interpersonal bonds is what renders them incapable of organizing against the regime. Is this realistic? What position does this chapter take on this concept? What does the book suggest might grant people the power to resist the state in a meaningful way?

35. What does Alex feel guilty about on page 311? How is that different from what Dana means to accuse her of?

36. What has been added to Alex over the course of the book that might have given her the ability to resist? Why did the Settlement’s attempts to convey this power to her via training fail? What was missing from the Settlement’s attempts to forge Alex into a strong person?

38.

1) In this chapter, Cam shows distaste for the first time at making empty oaths. Compare this to Alex and her situation with the plea deal. Why couldn’t Alex just have the attitude toward her plea deal that Cam did toward his oath? What does Alex value that Cam is just beginning to value? Do we value this in our culture?

2) Read John 18:33-36. What do both Pilate and Dana Morris-Fletcher fail to understand?

45. Read Mark 9:43-47. What does the Biometric represent in this scenario? Consider also Revelation 13:16. What are some ways the Settlement corresponds to the archetypical figure of the Antichrist? Reread the opening quote by John Bunyan for help with this.

[anewnewcrest]

From Connor Culver's SimTube

MADISON'S BIRTHDAY: My beautiful wife turns thirty today and I'm celebrating her life and walk with the Watcher!

I'm so blessed and grateful to have a wonderful wife like Madison! She turns thirty today, and this is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate her life and her walk with the Watcher!

Precious Madison was born into a Watcher-honoring family. She's the oldest daughter of Pastor David Johnson of New Newcrest Church, who recently published his autobiography, Saved by the Watcher: A Candid Portrait of Church Leader David Johnson! She showed such a remarkable love for the Watcher and such a desire for spreading His word from such a young age, and from the time I came to Newcrest when she was just fourteen, her father spoke in such glowing tones of her meek and quiet spirit and her desire to be a wife and mother one day!

When disaster struck her family and her mother died, Madison did not rail against the Watcher as so many other young ladies in her position would have, but stepped up and took care of her house and her three younger sisters Savannah, Caroline, and Priscilla, who still look up to her almost as much as they would a mother, and supported them through this trying season of life, without ever losing her faith. In fact, speaking truth about the Watcher became even more important to her when she realized how cruelly short life can be, and just as a teenager, she started her own social media ministry for young ladies walking with the Watcher!

As she was also approaching her eighteenth birthday and my mind was slowly turning towards marriage, as every young man's eventually does, it was around this time that I approached her father David Johnson and asked him for permission to court his daughter, only after she turned eighteen, of course! We went on our first (chaperoned) date after he'd prayed about it and I obtained his blessing - it was a total surprise for Madison that I was interested in her, she is so modest and would never assume a thing like that!

After that, a fairytale romance followed, until we were married when she was nineteen and I was twenty-seven! The secular world might say that is too young to be married, but young women mature so much faster than men do, and the Watcher has clearly blessed our union, after we were sanctified by a harrowing period of infertility! We now have our two wonderful children, Connor Jr. and Celia, and we could not be happier, following the Watcher and spreading His word through our Social Media Ministry!

madison.culver OMG honey, thank you, that is so precious! I couldn't find anyone in the whole world I'd rather do life with than you!

flemingarrows I pray that the Watcher blesses you with more wonderful children in this season of life

abilene.johnson Happy Birthday Madison, your daddy and I love you so much <3

chelsea.graham So you were already checking her out when she was fourteen and you were twenty-two? That's so disgusting

mrs.moriah.james Such sweet babies! It’s a shame you haven’t been blessed with more, a lady’s fertility does start to go down in this new season of life. Praying for you! <3 <3

jdandalthea What a sweet love story- now you have me reminiscing about my own romance, before we were married and God decided we could handle three under four. Happy birthday!

[snoozy-red-panda]

okay. Thoughts in bullet point form because they are too varied for me to form a paragraph

- it is just a lie that a Trump Republican administration and a Harris administration would be the exact same for marginalized people. for one thing, that is not one single group of people. and it makes me mad when people lie to my face. don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining.

- it is gross to dismiss people's ethical aversion to voting for Biden or Harris as "just to make yourself feel good about your morals". if you don't have your morals what else do you have? and aiding and abetting an apartheid regime committing genocide is not some little oopsie. nor is it at all comparable to failures to significantly change the status quo in such domestic policy areas as health care. the president has much more power over foreign policy than domestic policy, and a sin of commission of this magnitude is not the same as a sin of omission.

- Harris is not the same person as Biden. this moment allows for opportunity to create greater pressure against potentially the next president. this includes issues like her choice for vice president and the party platform.

- yes Harris was essentially a cop. it is stupid in my opinion to try and split hairs otherwise when she called herself that. but it's worth understanding that any candidate for president (including Jill Stein) is running to be the top law enforcement official in the nation.

- the two parties are not exactly the same. Trump and Vance are not running to give us a second term of Biden. they are running to finish the job and install a christofascist regime full of their worst January 6th fantasies. I am too familiar with the worst impulses of Republicans. Republicans want mass deportations, a return to the 1950s for minorities and queer people and women, and a complete dismantling of regulations on big businesses. they don't believe in climate change, and their views on Israel are in general somehow even worse than that of the average Democrat. there is so much more that I don't have time or room to list but luckily they wrote a book called project 2025. if they win in November it will hurt people in blue states, red states, and outside of the country. and it is not fear mongering to point out obvious and real reasons for fear. don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining. and you are naive if you believe things cannot get worse.

- it is a two party winner-take-all system in an electoral college. it sucks. it should be changed. your vote in November still exists in that system. voting third party for president is essentially putting your ballot in a paper shredder.

- no, your vote for president does not matter the same in every state, because we have a horrible system called the electoral college. but I would caution you from believing that your state is "safe". and there will be more on your ballot where your vote will likely matter a great deal.

- not voting is not registered by anyone important as an act which they should pay attention to. not voting registers as silence. it is not the same thing as donating to people in need, protesting, organizing, unionizing, calling your congressperson, or many more proactive steps.

- it is far too possible for Trump to win again and Republicans to control at least one, if not both, chambers of Congress.

- it is very possible in my view to come to the conclusion that it is the most moral choice to vote for Democrats up and down the ballot (which includes so much more than just president!!) without concluding any of those people you are voting for are moral people who deserve your vote. yes this is a conclusion seeing one choice as the lesser of two evils. I do not think that voting makes you morally responsible for all of the actions that your elected officials take unless you hand picked them. you did not choose the choice before you but you do have a choice to consider. I think it is much more truthful and respectful to give a moral case for voting than suggest that you should discard your mortality.

... and post.

[cantsomeoneelsedoit]

Ch 42: As Long as They Don't Forget

They call him Captain Puppy Eyes

Did she atone by founding the Sunflower Nursery??

Andy tells her to pour Anheuser beer on his crew's graves to find forgiveness, and Fuuko sets out alongside him. He claims that he wants to make the saloon woman suffer, but Fuuko sees another side to his motivation. And then we get:

🐎COWBOY ANDY MONTAGE🐎

We see the four seasons representing the passage of time between them. In the first one, they're both shooting at a group of normal-looking old-timey Western guys. In the second, they're walking through the desert.

In the third, there's falling leaves and an angel in the background. It looks like they've got a child fighting with them. They're fighting two guys wearing suits and masks that resemble the Union Negator hunters from Chapter 1. The angel doesn't quite match up with the statue in the chapel in Longing, either. I'm so curious about this one!!

Angel comparison:

In the fourth, Andy has buried a friend in the wintertime. There are two other people dressed like Andy and Fuuko.

I love the way the narration boxes explain Fuuko's POV here. Describing the time as eons that passed quickly, like a dream, both rich and deep but also instantaneous--- that's a lot like the effect authors want to create when writing a good flashback.

We see some crumbs about Andy's current crew, and that he's drinking a Budweiser, which came out in 1876 IRL.

Andy and Fuuko's conversation about death raises some questions about Victor. When he's being suppressed, is he "alive?" Can you be alive if you can't challenge? If you can't change?

We see how Andy's crew formed. When they met him, everyone was wearing tattered clothes and looking like they were just in a battle. I'll bet Andy helped them out and then they started following him like Fuuko.

Fuuko tells him that she believes people who have passed remain alive in our hearts and talks about how she feels her parents guiding her.

Andy knows that he won't be alone anymore and he smiles. And then all readers collectively gasp at the next page:

FIRST OF ALL, {ohrwepo%9Ksd46<2[LJS:Fqj3nq4rwe^isdfah!

I can't believe it! The realest, non-battle-related, most solemn and serious moment of major romance, and they still don't kiss!

And she's right-- It's not really the same person and he doesn't really know her as well as she knows him at this point.

The line, "As long as I don't forget, then people won't die" is impactful to this story in so many ways.

First, Juiz has to remember to find people every loop. If she forgets to how to seek out the Negators or forgets who they are, she'll waste opportunities to defeat God.

Second, what does it mean when the story seals off Victor's memories? Are those memories "dead?"

Third, Andy has to remember Fuuko so he can find her in the future.

Also, Andy/Victor serves as a "witness" to the story to remember all the people and events that have happened. If they forget, they'll be missing valuable information that can help everyone.

In one way, it's really sweet that Andy now has a philosophy that he never really has to say goodbye to people bc they live on as long as he remembers them. But in another sense, it's horrifically tragic bc he's already forgotten so much. Everyone from before April 15, 1865 is dead to him, in all senses of the word.

What was the reason she began to fade away? Was it because she told him she loved him? Because he smiled? Because they almost kissed? And what will she find at the next stop in the book?

Masterpost