#Each Individual Person Is Very Individual | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

divasae · 15 hours ago

Text

yandere tartaglia x reader

desc: yandere tartaglia, childhood best friends, forced marriage, etc.

word count: 2.4k

Gusts of wind splayed across the serpentine path, rendering it difficult for you to make your way home. Your hair billowed in the wind as you fought against the frigid weather, making use of the pointer arrow's to navigate your way back into the village. To the average person, such weather would be unimaginable to trek across, but to a Snezhnayan, this was all to be expected when making a journey.

As you dwindled down the narrow road with supplies in hand for supper, your ear suddenly caught wind of distant cheering, from what seemed to be from your own village. You looked ardently in the distance as you approached the noise, only to see a crowd of people surrounding what appeared to be something.

No. It was someone. There was a considerable amount of people encircling what appeared to be a young man, with tufts of ginger hair sticking out. You squinted your eyes from afar in an attempt to make out the stranger's features, only for his head to turn in your direction. You were immediately met with captivating azure blue eyes, staring right into your own, practically paralyzing you into place.

You knew those eyes. You knew him. For a fraction of a second, you stood there motionless, as your mind rewound back to the past, fervently trying to identify his place in your memories.

It's natural for a human to lose track of the many people that appear in their lives, destined to eventually become a distant, hazy memory. This man was not one you could forget so easily, however. You remembered him, although as a very different person.

You had known him from childhood. His childhood self to you, was the very embodiment of innocence. Despite being very distinct individuals, even from a young age, fate pulled the both of you together.

He was a fascinating boy, completely shrouded in mystery to your eyes. At times when you were outside all alone, he would appear suddenly, keeping you company. It was as if he were an imaginary friend, coming and going so frequently. He was like your little secret, one you took refuge in, as did he.

You held a feeling of admiration for him, despite never having voiced it aloud to him. He was incredibly bright for his age, even if he tended to be overshadowed by others. You saw what others couldn't see in him, and you two were bonded with an understanding of the other. Even at that tender age, it was as if the both of you were drawn towards each other.

And yet, you didn't have the slightest clue as to what his name was. On a snowy night, as you gazed upon a serene pond, admiring the shimmering ripples under the moonlight's glow, you suddenly felt a hand grip your shoulder ever so slightly.

You pivoted from your place to see the source of touch, only to be met with a familiar pair of azure eyes staring into your own. The rays of light from the moon bounced off his irises, capturing the beauty and tenderness of his expression.

Your face was etched with awe as you took his appearance in, before enwrapping him in a tight embrace. "Ajax!" you exclaimed, as you began to chat with him excitedly.

When the time for you to make a leave crept up so suddenly, you finally asked the question that had been at the back of your mind, ever since you had seen him for the first time.

"My name?" he asked you softly, as you nodded your head vigorously, a bright smile plastered across your face. He appeared to be taken aback at first but smiled as he looked at you, before answering.

"It's Ajax".

Unbeknownst to you, that would be very last encounter you would share with him, before he had disappeared from your life. You waited, and waited, but would come out more disappointed and hopeless as time went on.

Were you that unimpressionable, to the point where he had forgotten about you? As the months passed by, your mind was consumed by his thoughts, making you restless.

The day you would see him again was one you had least expected. As usual, families would send their young boys to fight for the Fatui, or they would willingly give themselves up. When word had gone around about a particular family sending their boy to straighten him up, you hadn't thought much of it, seeing how common it was at that time.

That was until you had seen who that boy was when the fatui rounded up the new potential members. You could have recognized those tufts of ginger hair from anywhere. It had to be him. Your heart swelled with happiness, as you saw him before your eyes again.

You had gone to call out his name, the name he had left you with before disappearing. However, your words had gotten caught in your throat, when you had taken a proper look at him. You stopped in your tracks, as you watched him intently from the distance.

He seemed to be unaware of your eyes on him, as he prepared to take off with the Fatui. He was the same Ajax you had known, you were sure of it. However, something about him changed, even if you were unable to put your finger on it at that time.

The former look of innocence had vanished from his eyes, replaced with what appeared to be a void of emptiness. Whatever was in front of you, it wasn't the Ajax you knew. He appeared to be a mere husk of his former self, broken and hollow on the inside.

You had always assumed he had simply forgotten about you. Something about that day, however, made you uneasy. You looked at the back of his head as he took off with the fatui, knowing this would really be the last time you would ever see him again. Tears filled the brim of your eyes, as it occurred to you that now, you had truly lost your friend for good.

The sudden transition from him being a sweet boy to a broken man unnerved you. The days of you both being free-spirited and unaffected by the outside world were long gone. Those days were but a shadow of your youth, which you both had gone past by.

Slowly but surely, you became immersed in your own duties as time went on, slowly forgetting about that little boy who you so deeply cherished. However, there was always a trace of him that lingered deep within the back of your mind.

To see those alluring eyes again, those same eyes that you thought you never see again in your lifetime, sent you into shock. You looked at him in astonishment, your eyes widening.

He too looked at you with an expression of surprise, although one of thrill, as he flashed you a dashing grin. Your heart lurched as you caught his smile at you. There were many ways you had imagined a reunion with him, but this? This was one you had never seen coming, even from a mile away.

You didn't have the slightest clue as to why you were running away, but all your mind was preoccupied with at that moment was to take you to a faraway place, anywhere he was not. Tears stung the corner of your eyes as you rushed out of the village, the harshness of the wind blowing into your face.

He was different. He had changed. He appeared to be the same, charming Ajax he once was, but you knew better then that. He could play a facade, put on the mask of the former person he once was, but only you saw through it. His eyes, they were absolutely chilling to look at. That look he had, was one you wished you would never have the inconvenience of looking at again

Echoes of the cheers for the 11th Fatui Harbinger rung in your ears as you set off, your dress flowing as you rushed in the opposite direction you had been walking in.

Past memories you had of him flashed in your head as you ran frantically, tormenting you with every step you took. You didn't bother taking in your surroundings, as if you had tunnel vision, and could only see what was in front of you.

Sobs wracked your body, as you had finally stopped to look where you had gone to, only to see the last place you had wished to see. The familiar body of water you had seen years ago was placed in front of you, as if to taunt you even further, for what you had landed yourself into.

It was nearly impossible for you to be unable to recognize it. When you were younger in both age and spirit, you would frequent the area, just to see if he would return for you, as if some kind of miracle would be bestowed upon you. Clearly, your wishes had never been answered, and so it had become a distant memory over time. To see it once again destroyed you from the inside.

Your eyes swelled as you cried your heart out, unable to face the boy you held so dear to your heart so long ago. To imagine what that boy did to become a harbinger, it haunted you.

After what had appeared to be hours, you looked down at the pond once again, still and motionless as it had been when you first arrived. You took in your blurry appearance, as you wiped the tears tracking down your face.

As you gazed into the pond, your reflection was suddenly disturbed with the reflection of another figure, that had approached you from behind. You pivoted around suddenly in surprise, but before you had the chance to look at the stranger's face, they had used their hand to push your head into their shoulder, as they pulled you into a tight embrace.

"I knew you would be here, [Name]" a deep voice whispered ever so slightly. Immediately, alarm bells swarmed your head, as you realized who it must have been. You pushed Ajax off with a sudden force, taking a step backward in hesitation.

"Ajax..." you said quietly, your chest heaving up and down in fright. All you could think about at the moment was how many lives he would've taken with those hands he touched you with, making your pupils dilate in fear.

"I'm here darling," he said in a soft voice, taking a step toward you. Your immediate reaction was to take another step backward, which he took notice of. He stopped suddenly, as he took in your fearful expression.

"You wound me, dear," he said, smiling. "And here I thought you would jump into my arms once you had taken sight of me".

You opened your mouth to speak, but could not utter anything out. All you could do was shake your head frantically. "You're scaring me, Ajax" you stuttered out, close to tears yet again.

"I'm scaring you?" he asked, in a whisper, suddenly taking your hand in his own. You yelped as he firmly pulled you towards him, placing a chaste kiss on your hand.

"Do you have any clue as to how badly I wanted to see you again, [Name]?' he asked, as he wiped your tears with his thumb. "Wherever I had gone, it was as if you had come along with me in my heart" he whispered.

"You're so beautiful, [Name]" he continued, bringing his gloved hand to caress your cheek. He was so tender with you, yet it sent chills down your spine. You couldn't read his expression at all, his empty eyes rendering it impossible.

"Won't you give me just as much as a glance, sweetheart?" he asked with a sigh, as you swatted his hand away, refusing to make eye contact. "You kill me, you know?"

He used a finger to tilt your face upward, looking at you with adoration. "I must say, I've come here with a purpose" he said suddenly, taking you by surprise.

You looked at him with a stricken face, your lips slightly parted. "What purpose?" you asked in a quivering voice, as you took in his ecstatic expression.

He smiled at you, before continuing. "I've already spoken with your parents, they've already blessed our union" he said, beaming. Your blood suddenly ran cold at his words, wondering if you had heard him right.

"What?" you asked hoarsely, your throat dry. All he did was smile further to confirm, as he took your hand once again, and enveloped it within his own.

"We're to be wed soon," he said, his elated expression radiant in the face of the moonlight.

He took notice of your thunderstruck face, and chuckled. "Oh come on, there's no need to look like that" he said heartily. "Do you remember when we promised ourselves to each other once we were all grown up?" he asked with reminiscent eyes.

You shook your head slowly, unable to believe any of the words coming out of his mouth. "That was years ago, you're insane Ajax" you cried out. You felt trapped all of a sudden, you felt as if you were going to suffocate.

With that, your dress twirled as you attempted to pull away from him. But he had grown so strong. He grinned at your weak attempts to get away from him, using his hand to pull you closer into him. As you fell into him with your back pressed against his chest, he wrapped you in an even tighter embrace, the side of his face pressed against yours.

"You're going to be such a good wife sweetheart" he whispered into your ear, as the hair on your neck stood on end. His gloved hands snaked down to your waist as he spoke, and he continued. "I can't wait to have you all to myself," he said hungrily, as you fought against his hold.

You had always wished to reunite with your dear friend, but if you had even the slightest inkling of what would happen if you did, would you have thought differently?

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loverslodge · 2 days ago

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leading up to the date

You have been very unlucky in love. You were a thoroughbred romantic but that definitely wasn't a good thing when it came to actual experiences.

You had been in quite a lot of relationships, none of which lasted more than six months. Now, here you were, at the ripe age of 30, wanting to finally settle down and have a consistent lovelife. But when has your plans ever worked out for you? With no potential partner and an exhausting dating scene, you were worn out.

So you decided to do what you do best. Watch rom-coms, cry over how perfectly the couples fit each other and have wine and pizza.

You got tipsy, more on the drunken side and a thought popped in your head. So you opened your email and did the one thing only a drunken desperate idiot would do. Send emails to every famous crush of yours to ask them on a date for one night. You were feeling generous so you also added that you will pay them $10000 for their troubles. You wrote a few of your conditions and it was a surprise that for a tipsy person, your email was well written.

…………………..

Three months had gone by and you had completely forgotten about what you had done. Honestly, when you woke up the next morning, you thought that either the people you emailed to will either spam it, delete it or laugh at it. So you laughed at how ridiculous it was and just went on with your days.

You were working from home that day, luckily, and things were going just fine. You were on a lunch break when you heard two pings from your email box. Thinking it must be work, you popped open to see your personal email had received two replies. The subject line glaring at you and your breath quickened.

You had received responses, on your three month old desperate email. By one Steve Rogers and one James Buchanan Barnes. They both had agreed to every terms and conditions and were asking when it would be okay to meet for the date.

You spent two days contemplating. Should you even agree? Did your drunken thoughts even matter? Even if you do agree, whom will you choose? You liked them both. Of course you didn't know them personally but their public presence has always attracted you to them in a way. They were the two men about whom you've daydreamt, occasionally with a vibrator but also, respectfully.

On the third day, you decided that it would be best to leave this decision on both of them. Make them choose who wants to stay for the date. Because you were really using up a lot of your money to pay one person. Why try and lose sleep when you can throw the ball in their court?

You opened their emails and sent them the exact same reply saying that they can meet this Saturday at your usual cafe and then plan from there. Surprisingly, you received both their replies within an hour agreeing.

………………….

Life had been very unforgiving to Steve and Bucky. While they did have women fawn over them, they were having a hard time dealing with the female fanbase.

Bucky tried it once, one night stand with a fan. It did not end well. She had to be dragged away by security and Bucky started questioning what went wrong. He withdrew completely. He did flirt but that was the end of everything. He called it healthy flirting, good to practice just like training.

Steve, after witnessing this, drew back even more. He had been in love with Peggy, still. Seeing Sharon, he saw hints of Peggy in her and so developed a relationship with her. It didn't end well. After just two months of trying, Steve found the relationship exhausting which it shouldn't. He talked to Sharon about it and they both deemed it best to end things while they were ahead. They were just colleagues now.

But one fine day, in the middle of the night, both of them received the same email. A random woman had asked them out on a date and was willing to pay them $10000 for their efforts. Well, not them together but individually.

They were sitting together when this happened. They found it ridiculous and joked about it. Later, bidding each other goodnight, when they were in the comfort of their own room, they both actually started thinking about the proposition.

They both asked FRIDAY, separately, privately, to look into this email. They wanted to make sure they were not being lured into something unknown. All they received was a photo of yours and very clean data. They started thinking about this more.

Finally, they both mustered the courage to email you back saying they agree. Both Bucky and Steve wanted to add that they don't need money but thought they will refuse the money once the date is over.

Steve never actually wanted to date again. He had his chance to go back to Peggy but he didn't want that either. He saw her life flourish and he wanted her to rest now. He said yes to your email mostly because he found it interesting. Also, it was for one day. It was a no strings attached offer and it will help him get his mind off of his stagnant love life.

Bucky found this entire thing funny. But he said yes regardless because he wanted to talk to the brilliant mind that came up with this. But somewhere, in the back of his mind, Bucky also thought that this idea of one day romantic excursion without expectations was titillating.

Steve and Bucky were having dinner together when they both received your email confirming their email and set up the day and time. They both pretended that there was something very important in their phone and agreed to meet you.

The rest of the week was torture for both of them. They wanted to tell each other about this thing but also wanted to hide because who in their right mind would agree to something like this?

They spent the rest of the week separate. The rest of the team found it weird but did not question it. They didn't want to get in the middle of whatever was going on.

As Saturday rolled by, Steve left almost two hours early for the date. He didn't want Bucky to ask questions. He went to a local florist and bought three pink roses for you.

Bucky also wanted to be sneaky so he waited till he heard nothing but silence to leave the compound. He went to a local florist and bought three pink roses for you.

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hollowed-theory-hall · 2 days ago

Note

hello! i was wondering whether or not you can envision someone as better suited for tom/voldemort since i remember you saying neither harry nor hermione would be a match — them being the most popular two characters shipped with tom. and on that note, what do you think about bellatrix and voldemort? pro/against?

i tend to get a bit blindsided by the sheer obsession she has for him, honestly. i mean… i feel like she would be willing to shape herself down to the last atom to what appeals to him, if he ever were to show any true interest, and that’s very… sad.

Hello 👋

Thank you for the ask and as with all ship asks, ship what you ship, these are just my subjective opinions.

Now, what I said about Tomarrymort is that I don't think they would realistically get together and have a functioning relationship, I didn't say it wasn't fun. Like, I love Tomarrymort, but only if the relationship is a messy push and pull that makes everyone (both involved and uninvolved) miserable.

Now, as for Bellamort...

Do I think they had sex at some point in canon? Maybe. Like, that's not the most absurd thing about CC for me, so I consider it plausible.

Do I think Voldemort actually likes Bella romantically? Not really.

Do I think their relationship works like an actual equal functional relationship? Not one bit.

Do I think their relationship is entertaining and interesting? I mean, clearly, many people do, but I don't like Bellamort.

Like, it really doesn't interest me. There's a reason I only like Tomarrymort when there's a push and pull and Harry and Tom are portrayed as the equals they are. Like, I don't like Tomarrymort where Harry is completely submissive to Voldemort and Bellamort for the same reason — these aren't the kind of relationships that make Tom interesting.

I like both Tom and Bellatrix a lot as individuals, but I don't think a romantic and/or sexual relationship between them pushes their characters to interesting places. They are both stagnate in this relationship and, for me personally, that just doesn't interest me.

Like, Bellatrix is completely submissive to Voldemort nodding her head excitedly and panting after him: "Yes my lord! Whatever you say, my lord!" And this is not the type of dynamic that'd push either character towards growth. They don't push each other into a character arc, which is what I usually like my ships to do.

Additionally, this dynamic basically means Voldemort always gets what he wants, and Bellatrix is happy with it, as you said, she'd shape herself for his every whim. This isn't a relationship between equals. It's a relationship where she worships him and he doesn't respect her or care about her as a person. Like, at all.

The dynamic we see from them in the books gave me the impression Voldemort cares about Bellatrix. He doesn't want her to be hurt or to die:

Bellatrix’s gloating smile froze, her eyes began to bulge: For the tiniest space of time she knew what had happened, and then she toppled, and the watching crowd roared, and Voldemort screamed.

(DH)

But he cares about her like how you care about your favorite pet. He relished in giving her orders and having her submit completely:

“Master, I am sorry, I knew not, I was fighting the Animagus Black!” sobbed Bellatrix, flinging herself down at Voldemort’s feet as he paced slowly nearer. “Master, you should know —” “Be quiet, Bella,” said Voldemort dangerously. “I shall deal with you in a moment. Do you think I have entered the Ministry of Magic to hear your sniveling apologies?” “But Master — he is here — he is below —” Voldemort paid no attention.

(OotP)

He doesn't actually care about her being hurt if it's not too bad, he doesn't care about her feelings or apologies, especially not when Harry is right in front of him — his obsession, his one failure. Bellatrix takes a backseat, basically always. He doesn't care about her all that much. He cares and respects her like a loyal dog, not like a person he has a relationship with.

He also relished in humiliating and embarrassing her. He likes making fun of her in ways Bella clearly does not enjoy, which isn't something you'd do to someone you love:

“I’m talking about your niece, Bellatrix. And your, Lucius and Narcissa. She has just married the werewolf, Remus Lupin. You must be so proud.” There was an eruption of jeering laughter from around the table. Many leaned forward to exchange gleeful looks, a few thumped the table with their fists. The great snake, disliking the disturbance, opened its mouth and hissed angrily, but the Death Eaters did not hear it, so jubilant where that at Bellatrix and the Malfoys’ humiliation. Bellatrix’s face, so recently flushed with happiness, had turned an ugly, blotchy red.

(DH)

she's desperate to please him, to tell him everything she thinks he wants to hear and she happily lets him treat her like fucking dirt. I don't find a relationship like that compelling, as I said, Voldemort would never change for Bellatrix and Bellatrix honestly deserves better than this. He even lets other Death Eaters jeer and laugh at her, this is not a romantic relationship.

Like even if he had sex with her, it was purely physical as he just doesn't care about her as a person like this. As more than a faithful servant (which he enjoys making fun of, as he does so for many of them).

And he is unwilling to show her real, unintentional weakness or ask her for help:

“My Lord, let me—” “I do not require assistance,” said Voldemort coldly, and though he could not see it, Harry pictured Bellatrix withdrawing a helpful hand.

(DH)

He does trust her with one of his Horcrux as the cup is kept in her vault and she seems to know what it is:

“Be quiet! The situation is graver than you can possibly imagine, Cissy! We have a very serious problem!” She stood, panting slightly, looking down at the sword, examining its hilt. Then she turned to look at the silent prisoners. “If it is indeed Potter, he must not be harmed,” she muttered, more to herself than to the others. “The Dark Lord wishes to dispose of Potter himself. . . . But if he finds out . . . I must . . . I must know. . . .”

(DH)

He trusts her loyalty, and she is one of his preferred Death Eaters (he doesn't hate her like he does Wormtail, Tom appreciates courage and loyalty, which are both traits Bellatrix possesses) but he clearly doesn't trust her with his backstory in the first war:

“Shut your mouth!” Bellatrix shrieked. “You dare speak his name with your unworthy lips, you dare besmirch it with your half-blood’s tongue, you dare —” “Did you know he’s a half-blood too?” said Harry recklessly. Hermione gave a little moan in his ear. “Voldemort? Yeah, his mother was a witch but his dad was a Muggle — or has he been telling you lot he’s pureblood?” “STUPEF —” “NO!” A jet of red light had shot from the end of Bellatrix Lestrange’s wand, but Malfoy had deflected it. His spell caused hers to hit the shelf a foot to the left of Harry and several of the glass orbs there shattered. [...] “He dared — he dares —” shrieked Bellatrix incoherently. “— He stands there — filthy half-blood —”

(OotP)

She doesn't really know who Voldemort is. She worships the persona of Voldemort. She loves his lies and masks. She doesn't actually know Tom Riddle. And I don't think she could accept and love the real Tom Riddle behind the title of Voldemort — the poor but brilliant nerdy half-blood who craves recognition. She would find him pathetic.

It's basically Hinny, isn't it?

She adores his persona and fame and what people think he is without actually knowing or understanding him. She changes her personality to fit what she thinks his girl needs to be because she is so focused on being with him. And He likes that she doesn't get in his way and lets him do and say whatever without crying about it but doesn't care about her or her feelings nearly as much as people think.

Bellamort is just Hinny with a different skin, and I never liked Hinny.

Like Hinny, they don't know or understand each other, and it's clear Bella and Ginny care about Voldemort and Harry more than the boys care about them. Like, yes, Harry would be devastated if Ginny died, but he'd get over it way faster than he did about Sirius. Same for Voldemort, he cares about Bella, but not as an equal he understands and cares for the feelings of. Voldemort got over Bella's death fairly quickly as well, he's way more focused on Harry.

So, with all of this, who do I think is the best pairing for Voldemort?

If we're talking about canon characters who are actually characters in the books? Then Harry is my top choice. Harry is the only one Voldemort would see as an equal and can actually push and change Voldemort as much as Voldemort changes him. There is no other character in canon, I believe, who would be able to do this to the level Harry could. Their dynamic is just so mutually obsessive and tense that a relationship like that can't not change both of them in a myriad of interesting ways.

Though, I was thinking about it, and Severus/Voldemort have potential. Voldemort clearly respects Sev and his opinions more than the average Death Eater:

Snape did not speak. “Perhaps you already know it? You are a clever man, after all, Severus. You have been a good and faithful servant, and I regret what must happen.” “My Lord—”

(DH)

He cares about him and regrets having to kill him:

Harry saw Snape’s face losing the little color it had left; it whitened as his black eyes widened, as the snake’s fangs pierced his neck, as he failed to push the enchanted cage off himself, as his knees gave way and he fell to the floor. “I regret it,” said Voldemort coldly

(DH)

Voldy is willing to forgive Sev for things he'd kill most for. They have so much shared experience (poor, muggle childhood in incredibly abusive environments) that would allow them to understand each other. They probably both get frustrated over pureblood idiocy. Both are intelligent and share many interests, like they're both magic nerds who'd talk all night about magical theory...

So, I think, under the right circumstances, Severus is a pretty good pairing for Voldemort.

The only real downside is that depending on when they get together, they'd push each other to be more extremist and overall worse. Like, they'd push each other to have less empathy for other people if they get together, say, during the first war. Well, it might not be a downside. It really depends on how you look at it.

If they get together in the second war, it's different, and in my opinion, more compelling and interesting for both of them. Like, pairing them up after Voldemort's return and after Sev already turned traitor opens so many interesting avenues. I mean, Sev was someone Voldemort actually regretted killing, that was remorse there, wasn't it? It means Severus could push Voldemort to change in a way Bellatrix doesn't. Because Voldemort respects Snape in a way he doesn't respect Bella. I mean, think about how many times Voldemort shut Bella down when she kept insisting Snape is a traitor — it's clear he values Snape more than he values her.

If we're also looking at side characters we don't know as much about, then we have some more options.

@iamnmbr3 has convinced me that Alphard Black/Tom Riddle is an option, and I have been very compelled by it. We don't know much about Alphard, but that never really stopped me because what we do know is interesting.

We know he is Sirius' uncle. He was born after Walburga but before Cygnus, probably closer in age to Walburga. So, I headcanon he was born in 1927 and was in the same year as Tom Riddle.

We know Alphard was a Slytherin since Sirius mentions all his family was in Slytherin, which would include his uncle. And we know Alphard was burned off the family tapestry when he gave Sirius money when Sirius ran away from home.

This leaves us with a character, who's cunning, capable of listening to his older sister Walburga go off about whatever without making the fight worse but has a spine to stand up to her bullshit when it's actually important. This gives him the right characteristics to be able to wrangle a character arc out of a romance with a younger Tom Riddle (and perhaps the older one, too).

He's a pureblood who's open-minded enough to support Sirius and not hate muggleborns (probably). He likely has the subtlety necessary to fix Tom without Tom feeling like he's being fixed. Alphard, used to his very eventful family, is an expert in dealing with dramatic people (like his siblings) and how to undercut their drama instead of pushing them further into their position (which is what Harry would do, for example. Harry and Tom would keep pushing at each other while someone like Alphard would be able to just remove the heat from the argument and allow it to not get as extreme).

Again, it's not much to go on, but it has so much potential.

(Also, @iamnmbr3 has this post about how Voldemort’s violence became worse in 1979, which happens to be the same year Alphard Black died, and while I don't agree with all the points made there, I find it to be a super fun concept)

Voldemort/Lily also has potential. She's smart, stubborn, academically inclined, and has the right rough edges to have the kind of push-and-pull dynamic with Voldemort that I like with Tomarrymort. Lily is probably the kind of witch Voldemort could grow to respect as well. I don't think he would've agreed to spare her for Snape if he didn't respect both of them. JKR also said he tried to recruit James and Lily, so, he was aware that she was talented.

I think, though, Lily/Voldemort would be slightly better than Harry/Voldemort in some aspects. Lily isn't as hot-headed as Harry. Lily's anger is usually much colder, which I feel would work better with Tom just because she wouldn't push all his buttons (just most of them). She would still push him into a character arc, but it would be a gentler nudge than if Harry did it.

My only real rule when shipping Tommy Boy is that he can't be shipped with someone mediocre, he'll just steamroll over them completely, and that's not as fun, in my opinion. He needs a partner he can grow to respect and see as an equal (or close to it) and that has the spine to stand up to him, otherwise, he'd just keep getting what he wants, and I think that's the opposite of what Voldemort needs in a relationship.

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damnfandomproblems · 2 days ago

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Fandom Problem #6345:

Does it feel like every female to female and male to male friendship in movies and TV is being headcanoned as secretly gay? Like, when did that happen? When did all these nuts start thinking that 2 individuals of the same gender who are friends with each other are secretly in love each other, even if 1 of the persons in the friendship is married to someone? It's very creepy. Let friends be friends!

#ask box submission #fandom problem 6345 #shipping problems #character problems

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lazy-sixteen · 22 hours ago

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Daniil why would you say that???

Watching Pathologic (classic HD) while on break from suffering in Pathologic 2, and it really struck me how different the first meeting with the Bachelor was in each game.

Pathologic 1, well, only a screenshot can do it justice,

(Yes . . . far be it from me to call myself a person of mystical inclinations. However, when I look at you, I get the feeling that nature is playing jokes on us. It is as if both the left and right hand have clutched the head to realize for the first time they are two parts of a single whole.

>Why?

>I get that feeling too. Does that mean that we are alike?)

That's like the first thing he says to the Haruspex, and while yeah everybody in Pathologic talks like that to a degree, even in game, in character that's a wild thing for Dankovsky specifically to say.

We just spent an entire playthrough as this guy mocking and/or having breakdowns over the existence of the supernatural - especially precognition. And in strolls this 6'2 resting murder-face dude with half-a-medical degree, widely thought to be a serial killer (kinda true), and Dankovsky's like,

"BTW, my heart is telling me we're kinda two halves of the same whole.😊❤️"

Absolutely hilarious. Even funnier is that the Haruspex, grumpy at baseline and currently having the worst day of his life (so far), can agree with him. Great first impression all around!

Then over in Pathologic 2, the Bachelor is high-key fumbling, like fumbling so hard you can get an achievement for it.

Carpetbagger - Remind a colleague of the Hippocratic Oath -- and fail

Not to meme on the guy (who is of course, multi-faceted and at his core deeply altruistic even if he often seems to have trouble expressing that on an individual basis), but initial Pathologic 2 Bachelorencounter is Daniel at his most prickly prick.

He gets Artemy's name wrong (possibly on purpose and definitely twice),

condescendingly demands the Haruspex be his errand boy,

basically calls himself the smartest person in a room of 2,

and can accidentally imply that he left a couple of orphan children to die because he doesn't treat mutts (he actually refused to treat the orphans' dogs).

Yikes - no wonder Artmey spends the first couple of Days taking cheap shots at the guy.

I mean in both Haruspex routes eventually he ends up very friendly with the Bachelor, which makes senses on a thematic level given the some of the Haruspex's major themes/ideals are connection and community. You could say their first meeting was changed to be funnier ("Vorakh") or more in character for the expected tension between two people under a lot of stress who can both be difficult to get along with at baseline

However, what about if we look at it from a meta-narrative level?

While you can play Pathologic 1 as either the Bachelor or the Haruspex on your initial run, it's pretty common knowledge who you are supposed to play first.

"Daniil Danokovsky's Fun Steppe Vacation was just the tutorial for Artemy Burakh's Tormentous Nightmare" - HBomberguy in Pathologic is Genius and Here's Why

This means that the player in Pathologic 1 has already been introduced to Daniil - even if Artmey hasn't - and the game reflects that! You the player know the Bachelor, you've been him, and you probably got really attached after keeping him alive for 12 horrible, horrible days.

Even though you know he can be a bit sanctimonious and dismissive, the player knows he's rational and compassionate and thus already used the evidence at hand to figure out Artemy hasn't killed anybody!

Of course one of the first things you (the player) would want to do as the new protagonist is check on your former avatar, and the game rewards you for it! Talking with the Bachelor on Day 1 as Artemy can raise your reputation - which is super critical. It might be the increase that keeps you from getting hunted in the streets or starving as shops refuse to sell food. What a great first (Second?) impression!!

Daniil's unprompted "hey are we soulmates or is it just me?" line is funny, but meta-narratively it is also true. They are the player's first two avatars, taking turns being puppeted by the same you as protagonists through the same overall story to two opposing conclusions. They are (your) right and left hand. You've played Dankovsky, (you) know this and having previously been the protagonist this new Dankovsky seems to subliminally know this too.

Meanwhile over in Pathologic 2, the only route is the Haruspex - disregarding the Marble Nest (worst day of Dankovsky's life [so far, ad infintuum]) which has enough time fuckery going on that I shall disregard it for this analysis - you can only be Artemy Burakh.

Either under the assumption that the player of Pathologic 2 hasn't played Pathologic 1 or that they've played all of Pathologic 1 including Changeling' Route's extended murder hide and seek between Dankovsky and Burakh, We (the player and Artemy) don't know Daniil when we meet him in Pathologic 2 as anything but the broken man we saw in the depressing into.

Is he our friend this time? Is he our enemy? Whatever he is, he's certainly a sanctimonious prick.

(Today's tragedy won't be the last. I was blessed with a naturally high intelligence, and my observations indicate that a very deadly visitor has come to this god-forsaken town. That's all I can say for now.

>...I don't like you, Bachelor Whatever.)

In Pathologic 2, both the player and Artmey meet Daniil Dankovsky at at his worst, and slowly work-up from there because both of us are meeting, getting to know, and building a relationship with him for the first time.

This is actually parallel to how you first meet the Haruspex in Pathologic 1 as the Bachelor!

If you are playing in the intended order, both the player and Daniil don't know anything about Artmey besides the serial killer rumors, and likewise you meet him at his worst - (in prison and later he murders a young woman to get Daniil the infected heart he needs to try and develop a vaccine). Much like we see the worst of Daniil's classism, arrogance, and inability to connect beyond quid pro quo (hehe, latin) in our Patho2 intro; in Patho1 we initially only see Artemy's standoffishness, brutality, and stubbornness.

Interestingly, following Daniil's themes/ideals of transcendence and rationality we (the player and Daniil) don't actually end up connecting much with Artmey on the Bachelor's route. The player is influenced by the puppet, and why would Dr. Daniil Dankovsky - whose route is plagued by betrayal, manipulation, and the difficulty of connecting to even people who do selflessly care for him (like Eva) - make friends with a violent, possibly dangerous guy who practices a sort of medicine Dankovsky doesn't believe in?

(I couldn't find a good screenshot for this, but mentally insert a picture of Artemy doing a roadside dissection)

Basically if Daniil is the player's protagonist he won't reach out, because in-character why would he?

If Artemy is the player's protagonist, Daniil will try to be friends in Patho1 (because of the player's previous actions affecting both avatars) or in Patho2 Artmey will eventually connect with him because that's in-character for him.

Overall, I suppose this means that Danii's instant and uncharacteristic buddy-buddy attitude with Artemy on the Haruspex route Patho1 is completely justified from a meta-textually narrative, as is his horrific fumbling in Patho2.

And it is also very, very funny.

#Pathologic #Pathologic 2 #daniil dankovsky #artemy burakh #TLDR: You (the player) are making your former favorite and current favorite doll bestest friends #No idea what any of this implies for the changeling's route #this isn't really a shipping post but u could take it that way #long post #pathologic spoilers

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emilywaters · 3 days ago

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I have so many thoughts on the motives of the different gangs and what they represent in the musical bcs it directly correlates to reasons why gangs are formed in the first place, which is in direct contrast to the message from the 1979 movie portraying all gangs as ones of pointless violence and wrongdoing.

1. The warriors - support and sisterhood

Right from the start we see the warriors looking out for each other. Cleon's first concern after Cyrus was killed was her warriors and getting them out safe. Every time they fought, it was to defend themselves, to get home alive. The warriors exist as a place to belong. We see this in 'A Light or Something', where we learn that Swan was homeless before Cleon took her in. The warriors exist for community, for support. The first thing they do after getting away was making sure everyone got out after Cleon went down. This is in direct contrast to the rogues, where the moment Luther lost they began running. "My crew would die for me, loyalty matters." They exist to uplift each other, for community and family to people society ignores and abuses.

2. The bizzies and the hurricanes - justice

Both the bizzies and the hurricanes went after the warriors to get justice for Cyrus. It was out of outrage, righteous anger fueling their desire to hurt them back. This shows another, more active, form of protection. The two groups have never met, but for that moment where they were fighting for Cyrus they were unified in the way Cyrus was hoping to achieve. If the warriors exist to give a safe space to marginalized communities, the bizzies and the hurricanes exist to defend that space, to stand up to those who threaten that community.

3. The orphans - ego and power

From the very start we see the orphans ego. They talk misogynistic rhetoric and boasts and gloat bcs they don't see the warriors as a threat. They exist to copy off bigger fish and live vicariously by terrorizing those they consider weaker. But the moment the warriors decided to stop pandering to them, they ran off. There is no real power in them and they exist to bully the weaker while themselves never fighting those stronger than them. They're no better than schoolyard bullies, each of them enabling the others. The orphans exist to cushion each other's egos, with nothing substantial. If I had to use a modern analogy, they would be the boys who listen to alpha male podcasts then be dicks to everyone around them.

4. The rogues - violence

Luther commits violence for the sake of violence. He benefits off a divided system, there he can cause havoc and slip away while blaming someone else. He would be a policeman's last suspect, bcs everyone believes the white man. He is free to do as he pleases with no consequences. But if Cyrus's plan worked, all the infighting would stop. Then his actions will be spotlighted and he would have to deal with the consequences of them. If Cyrus's plan worked he would loose his advantages of favouritism. So he kills Cyrus. With her dead and the gangs back at each other's throats, he's free to run around unnoticed, with his violence for the sake of violence. He has no personal motive outside defending the privileges he holds. His violence is purely to allow him more violence. And when he gets caught he melts into a pathetic creature whining and whimpering bcs at the end of the day he wasn't anything more.

5. The police - hypocrisy and the law

The police exist solely to chase after the warriors with no regards to their innocence. They do not believe them, or trust them, or help them. People who are supposed to protect the most vulnerable individuals intentionally do the opposite. The policeman at the park shamelessly catcalls the girls. The officer in the station actively chases them, despite having no real reason to. The officers are the worst bcs they are supposed to be the ones protecting them and instead become the perpetrators of these crimes and then get away with no repercussions. And then you see why the gangs were formed.

If the people meant to protect them do the complete opposite, assume their guilt, accuse and abuse and treat them as inferiors, then they need to get together and protect each other.

And there we have our answer. Gangs exist to protect those the city refuses to protect. From the power tripped assholes down to the gun wielding murderer. Even when Luther was taken in that was done by the Gramercy riffs. The police did absolutely nothing other than arresting Ajax for self defense and killing fox after actively chasing them for no reason other than bone deep prejudices and bigotry. Gangs exist to defend the members of their communities, to defend themselves, to get justice for their families, to do what society and the law refuse to do, to create a place for them to not just exist, but to thrive.

"And they deserve a city where they'd be alright, where they all come home alive.

And someday in the city we won't have to run each time somebody broken gets ahold of a gun.

Breathe easy every night knowing we'll see the sun, when we all come home alive"

#dam that is a lot of yapping #if im wrong my defense is that it is 1 in the morning #ignore the spelling and grammar mistakes #it's 1 in the morning #if you read all this #mad respect #lin manuel miranda #the man you are #warriors concept album #warriors musical #warriors album #the warriors musical

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theamazingdigitalraceway · 2 days ago

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She's a runner she's a trackstAaaAaArrrr

Just kidding ANYWHO

WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF THE CAST MEMBERS WERE SELF AWARE OF US

AND I MEAN

A/N: us? .....OH. hehehehehe~ alright then

RACEWAY AU REACTS TO THIRSTY FANS

WARNING: kinda suggestive, kinda cringe BUT SO MUCH FUN

~~~

CAINE: Surprisingly bashful. He has no problem with attention, he lives for it, but THIS might be a little much for him. He'll confidently roll with the jokes and comments, but on the inside he is flustered and screaming for help. Thirsty fans have him sweating.

POMNI: Tsudere to the MAX. She tries way too hard to be unbothered that it circles back around to be very bothered. She's a flustered mess every time there is a flirty message or romantic gift. She doesn't care tho. Baka.

RAGATHA: She's as red as her hair, but is SUPER flattered. She'll personally thank each person that says something nice to her. The more suggestive comments will leave her speechless.

JAX: He loves that there are fans out there that would do anything for him, no matter what he does. Takes FULL advantage of them. If you love him, you'll be his footstool. (Unless he comes across a more assertive individual. It doesn't take much to turn the tables.)

GANGLE: She laughs nervously and backs away slowly. She's shy under the best of circumstances, but this will have her running away. Even if you're thirsty, please be kind to her.

ZOOBLE: "Weirdos." Very aloof, but if you look closely. They're blushing.

KINGER: He's super bashful about it. Not ashamed, but he's shy about that kind of attention. He doesn't feel he deserves it.

GUMMIGOO: Are you a furry? Jk, it doesn't matter. Who doesn't love a big, strong, confident reptile? Even if things could get a little...sticky.

LOO: She's a diva. She's a superstar. Signed pinups, anyone? She has an entire wardrobe ready for a photoshoot.

SETH: He LOVES the attention. Thirsty fans are how he became a more developed character. A thirsty fan literally became his canon partner. He knows the crowd is down bad for him and he's living it UP.

ABEL: He's...surprised. Then again, he can understand being attracted to power. He finds its allure to be rather intoxicating. He'll hear you wretched little heathens out. There's a chained collar with your name on it.

#tw suggestive #tw cringe #the amazing digital raceway #raceway au #tadc raceway au #the amazing digital circus #tadc #tadc au #raceway seth #raceway abel #tadc caine #tadc pomni

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antianakin · 2 days ago

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Oh I LOVE the idea of memorial tattoos! That's so sweet (obviously in an incredibly sad way, but still). There was a fic I read once where Cody gave himself tattoos for people he loved who were still ALIVE, with the intention that he'd cut through them and create a scar over the tattoo if the person died as a visual representation of that memorial while also being a reminder of the people who are still with him, and that's stuck with me to this day. I have no idea which fic it was anymore off the top of my head, but it's such an interesting way to utilize tattoos because it lives somewhere in-between using tattoos to just represent people you care about who are either still alive or who have already died. But getting a tattoo for people who ARE alive but who are incredibly likely to die soon due to their circumstances and so he has a plan to sort-of... visually mar the tattoo with a different type of body modification adds so much nuance to it in a way I've never seen anywhere else.

And that's what I find most interesting about it, how the clones choose to utilize this art form to define who they are, not JUST as individuals, but as a CULTURE amongst all of them. And how is this culture different from anyone else's, how is it impacted by the experiences the clones have had and are currently having? How does this impact their approach to art, which could certainly be tattoos, especially in their early days, but might also make its way into things like songs and poetry and storytelling that are oral art forms, or things like cooking maybe that could be impacted by both the approach to their diets by the Kaminoans as well as the amount of traveling they do later and the interactions they might have with other cultures.

I just love looking at what makes the clones UNIQUE and how different aspects of their culture might be different from others specifically as a result of their incredibly unique upbringing. That's why I loved the fic with Cody's memorial tattoo because it's such a unique concept, having to build a tattoo design for people who are still alive but with the knowledge that it will very likely need to BECOME a memorial later. How many other cultures would even need something like that? The clones have such a low life expectancy because they've been built to die and they're also so often separated from each other and they probably have very few ways of keeping around things that remind them of their loved ones. So they come up with tattoos that can be a remembrance for someone still alive but separated that can be turned into a memorial for someone who has died and it doesn't actually take away from the tattoo design. What other culture would have a similar need for that kind of thing?

And of course they can have happier or sillier options, too, like putting a loved one's face on their body in tattoo form, or maybe a lot of text options later like poems or songs or recipes that mean something to them and that they want to make sure can't get lost (we don't know if they have access to PERSONAL padds of any kind where they could write things down that aren't related to work and even if they do, the possibility that it could be lost or broken is pretty high).

I feel like there's WAY more attention paid to armor than tattoos in clone culture within fandom and I think tattoos deserve more attention than they get (and armor less). Because yes, we do obviously see different armor designs and the like, but we also see a LOT of clones wearing pretty much the exact same armor design as a lot of other clones (the Doylist explanation for this is obviously that the animators weren't going to come up with separate armor designs for every single background clone, but I'm taking a Watsonian approach here), whereas any time a clone has a tattoo somewhere, it's never the same thing twice.

Armor designs are fun, they're nice, but armor breaks and gets lost while the tattoos are on their bodies FOREVER. We've also seen a few clones who have armor designs that match their tattoos, and I'm headcanoning that the tattoos came FIRST. So even some of the clones who we DON'T see have matching tattoos to their armor designs probably actually do somewhere. So like Waxer and Boil didn't just put Numa on their helmets, helmets get broken and destroyed, they got her face tattooed on their bodies somewhere, too. Rex has the shriek hawk eyes tattooed somewhere. Cody has the sunburst tattooed. If the design means something to them, it's been tattooed on their bodies, too.

I want more shared tattoos between clones who care about each other, too. Probably not the same as the one they have on their armor, but something else that's special to just the two of them. Fives and Echo could have a little domino tattoo somewhere to represent not just their bond, but their bonds to the rest of the squad they lost. Sometimes it's a memorial for someone they've lost, like maybe Jesse and Kix have a tattoo for Hardcase after Umbara, or Fox has one for Thorn after Scipio.

Tattoos are also a lot easier to hide and keep private from certain people if necessary, while armor designs are always able to be seen no matter what. So tattoos can be a LOT more personal than an armor design, too. They can represent terrible traumas or the deepest dream, something they don't dare even discuss with anyone else but don't want to forget. Clones with tattoos of coordinates to a planet they might one day want to call home, clones with tattoos of quotes that inspire them or maybe the last words spoken to them by a loved one or a promise made to someone else that they hope they can keep. Many clones have plant tattoos of some kind, the first flower or tree they ever saw, to remind them of the beauty that exists in the galaxy and what they're fighting to protect. Names are incredibly common tattoos once they've chosen it, either written out in letters or represented in an image somehow.

Over time, maybe in a happy fix-it AU where they have the ability to really let this develop, certain designs and patterns start meaning certain things to the clones and so they become shared across MANY clones as almost a shared unspoken language. A specific design might mean loss, or specific achievements in life.

Just... more about the tattoos in clone culture, they're SO underexplored.

#clones #clone culture #i just love considering what's DIFFERENT about the clones to anybody else #there already IS a culture hyperfixated on their armor and what the designs on it mean #i want the clones to have something else - something uniquely theirs that's related to their own experiences and values #as opposed to plopping some other culture's values onto the clones and calling it a day

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cosmererambles · 2 days ago

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So...People have been asking for my Kelsier Essay.

I'll publish it in several posts that are qued apart.

Kelsier Essay

This is not a formal, academic essay. It’s a loose one but I feel it drives home the point well enough and brings forth good evidence.

I hope the dear reader will forgive my use of a proper noun as I write this essay; it removes somewhat of a formal aspect from its words but I must admit, it does come from a personal place of my heart. While this essay is meant to be persuasive, it’s also meant to be constructive and to drive a point home that I have been musing on for quite a while. This essay has major spoilers for the entirety of the Cosmere. If you haven’t read all of Mistborn, SH, and all of SL, please refrain from reading this.

In the endless expanses of the Cosmere, there are hundreds of characters whom many hold dear and just as many whom people hate. You could say this is due to the brilliance of the author, who, despite his busy schedules and near constant time spent behind a keyboard, finds time to sign sheets and answer questions. Why is signing sheets and answering questions relevant to beloved and reviled characters? Read on.

Brandon Sanderson answers hundreds of questions, many of which are inane, innocuous, or silly. Some are deeper, others delve into the basis behind some of his choices while writing. Still others pertain to characters. We get to the meat of it. This particular character is known, through the writing, as a brutal man, who let nothing stand in the way of his goal, who, while cleaving the noble class of his society in twain, uplifted the peasants and upended the thousand-year reign of his deity and ruler. Yes, we’re talking of Kelsier, the Survivor of Hathsin, hero of the Final Empire, and a character that leaves many people puzzled.

Reddit forums are frequented by questions about him. r/Mistborn and r/Cosmere alike have had their fair share of debates, and there was one thing I noticed in many of these: they take the words of Sanderson very, very seriously. Why shouldn’t they? He’s the author, is he not? Back in 2013, Sanderson had a Q&A session where someone asked him who his most disturbing character was. The WoB is as follows:

I_are_pant

1.Which of your protagonist characters do you dislike the most as a person? Taking in account that you know all of their inner secrets and motivations. 2. On the flip side, which of your antagonists do you connect with the most? The Lord Ruler seems an obvious choice as he was misunderstood by everyone for so long. But still, I’m curious.

Brandon Sanderson This is a tough one, as while I’m writing, I HAVE to like everyone. However, the most disturbing of them is probably Kelsier. He’s a psychopath—meaning the actual, technical term. Lack of empathy, egotism, lack of fear. If his life had gone differently, he could have been a very, very evil dude.

This Word of Brandon has had a decided effect on the fandom, namely in the fact that critical thought surrounding Kelsier, his motives, his struggles, and his successes, has all but been erased. He has been branded a psychopath, and there is nothing anyone can say against it.

The word “psychopath” is a very negatively charged word. To preface things, I want to be clear that this essay is going to refer to “psychopathy” as Antisocial-Personality Disorder. The term psychopath is very old, and largely refers to individuals with this particular disorder. The traditional definition of psychopath is someone who both lacks a conscience and lacks empathy.

Through this essay, I plan to painstakingly showcase that Kelsier fits neither the outdated term nor the criteria for the actual disorder, through canon book citations. I will break down each diagnostic criteria for Antisocial Personality Disorder (Henceforth shortened to ASPD) and Kelsier’s character traits at large. I wish to not only prove Brandon wrong (It is a very old WoB and I doubt very much he still believes this.) but to prove to the fandom at large that Kelsier is a good man. A flawed man, but a good man. I will also note specific character traits that I feel are of note in discussing him, his motives, and his current ideologies.

(Please note that there are plenty of individuals with ASPD that are not bad people. Your actions make you bad, not your mental health. I will be using terms such as “bad” and “wrong”, but this is in regards to a fictional character, NOT a real life human being.)

Antisocial Personality Disorder is a disorder characterized by the DSM-V as a Cluster-B personality disorder. It shares its family with Narcissistic, Borderline, and Histrionic disorders, and is characterized by a “continuing disregard and violation of the rights of others, occurring since the age of fifteen. To be diagnosed with ASPD, you must show a pattern of three or more of the following characteristics:

· Failure to Conform with Laws and Social Norms

· Deceitfulness (Repeated lying or conning of others for personal profit or pleasure.

· Impulsivity or failure to plan ahead.

· Irritability or Aggressiveness (Repeated physical fights or assaults.)

· Reckless disregard for the safety of others.

· Consistent irresponsibility. (Failure to keep a job or honor financial obligations.)

· Lack of remorse.

Psychopathy is a term that was coined before this disorder was identified and refers specifically to a person lacking in both empathy and a conscience. The term is still widely used today, along with the term Sociopath, often interchangeably. For this essay, I’ll be largely relying on the psychiatric standards set in the DSM-V.

#Cosmere #Kelsier #Mistborn #Brandon Sanderson

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sokkastyles · 2 days ago

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Got into an argument with an Azula stan who said that Azula foregoing revenge against the Fire Warriors in "Azula in the Spirit Temple" for "betraying" her was Azula learning a lesson after Ty Lee's "betrayal."

And while I do think Azula did learn something from Ty Lee's defection, and that that did influence her decision not to seek revenge against the FW, I don't think she necessarily learned anything about morality or treating people better.

The main lesson Azula takes from Ty Lee's defection is that she can't control people through fear the way she had previously thought she could. Her relationship to the Fire Warriors is similar in that she does control them through fear, but she also uses other manipulation tactics to keep them in line. Specifically, she convinces them that they are better off working for her than they were before, and what better way to do that than to target women who were institutionalized, who she can easily convince that she is saving? That way, she has people whose obligation towards her she can leverage to ensure that she stay under her control.

But then she runs into the same problem she did with Ty Lee, not predicting that the FWs would be more loyal to each other than they are to her, especially when she puts one of them in danger and asks them to disregard one of their own for loyalty to her alone.

There's that tragic scene at the end where Azula is looking down on her former Fire Warriors, and realizes that they, just like Ty Lee and Mai, have with each other something that Azula utterly lacks, and that's companionship and genuine caring for one another. And on some level, I think Azula decides to forget her revenge because she envies that. But if Azula has learned a lesson about truly caring about others, it's only on a subconscious level, because her conclusion is that she can just find new followers. Presumably, ones that she can control better, instead of trying to fight against those she can't control.

So what has Azula really learned? Ty Lee and Mai's betrayal came as a shock because it was the first time someone had ever really stood up to Azula. And as Mai says, Azula failed to understand people in the way she thought she did. But now, Azula knows she can't control someone through fear when friendship and love exist as stronger forces. If anything, she lets the FWs go because she's learned more about when she can control someone, and what kinds of circumstances make someone easy to manipulate.

We don't know very much about how Mai and Ty Lee became friends with Azula, bit their backstories imply that both of them had an emotional void that Azula was able to fill. Ty Lee because of not feeling like an individual in her family, and Mai because of feeling repressed. But that changes when Ty Lee and Mai find something else to fill that need, Ty Lee's being the circus, and Mai's being Zuko. Azula had to take those things away to keep her friends loyal, but that loyalty would not last, because she no longer had that emotional hold on her friends.

So when Azula seeks out new followers in the Fire Warriors, she picks women who are especially vulnerable, whose families have cast them aside, who are desperate. She convinces them that they need her. When they finally realize that they don't, that's when Azula has realized she has lost her main advantage.

This is why a lot of manipulative people end up becoming worse in therapy. Understanding people better can teach a person to empathize, but it can also teach a manipulative person how to manipulate better. Where Azula goes from here is up in the air, but the choice, as it has always been, is hers, whether she chooses redemption or just finds someone else to fill that need for control.

#azula #azula in the spirit temple #ty lee #mai

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ateez-himari · 3 days ago

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Hi bb!!! Long time no see I missed you smm😔I hope you're doing good and resting well💗💗I had some annoying questions (as usual)

-I was watching some old bts mvs and I had a question which is, did pre-debut hima ever make a cameo in any bts mv before?

-this might sound weird but is there a specific meal or dessert or anything food related that is special to mingri? Like for example there's a lot of dishes that I connect with certain people either because we had a great memory while eating it together, or because they just remind me of it

-who are hima's closest idol friends and is there a specific idol that she opened up about her past to before she did that publicly

-has mimi and mingi released a song before dating that had some unsaid feelings? As they are both songwriters and alot of songwriters use songwriting as a way to portray unsaid emotions or feels towards a specific person

-last one I promise, is there any specific routine that the members started doing because of hima like it could be anything that she used to do alone that slowly became something they all started doing

I love you so much bb please eat and rest well mwahh💗💗🙏

OMGGG MINA HI!! I missed you too 🥹I'm doing okay don't worry, a little busy and you know uni stress, but I'm managing well! I love your "annoying" questions don't worry 😘

• Yoongi wanted to protect his sister from the media until her debut but the other members really wanted to involve her in a project, so he caved in and allowed her to appear briefly in the 'Run' music video. In an individual scene they can be seen at a small street shop, the girl almost 14 at the time, was pointing at a certain food very insistently and Yoongi eventually bought it for her with a falsely exasperated expression before ruffling her hair as they walked away. As per the rapper's very strict requests the scene was filmed in such a way that her face was not fully visible, only ever showing either her eyes, the back of her body, the lower half of her face, but never her entirely

The credit scenes also showed brief footage of them play fighting on set before he let her throw him onto the couch, grabbing her as she tried to run away in order to tickle her. Since news of their sibling relationship was not announced until 2019, people had many speculations about who this girl was but due to her visibly young age they simply wrote her off as a child actress that had grown close to the members

• When Mingi was feeling down she would bake him small tiramisu portions and sit in silence with him as he ate, often resting on his shoulder as reassurance, so in turns he attempted to make it as well. Unfortunately it did not turn out very edible and he was forced to sheepishly ask her for help, leading to the two bonding over it during one of the darkest days of their lives. Ever since then it's become a little habit to make this sweet treat for each other whenever they feel like the other needs comfort

• Hima, our little social butterfly, knows many people in the industry but is closest with; Jihyo and Momo (though she's close with TWICE as a whole), Jungkook, S.Coups, DIno (they have a secret maknae gc), Hyunjin and Bangchan. (She's also recently made friends with Kiss of Life's Julie, XG's Jurin and Chisa, and they're besties idc) The first ones to know about her past were obviously BTS, then ATEEZ and Taemin just so happened to guess from her behavior that something along those lines happened, leading to her opening up to him. Due to the very close sister-like bond, Jihyo also learned about it in detail prior to it becoming public knowledge. The only people who really know exactly what happened between her and Yoongi however are J-Hope and V (who overheard the conversation)

• Mingi wrote 'The Letter' using his longing for her - disguising it as nothing more than inspiration from some story he heard - and ironically enough Himari's song was also approved to be in an official album last minute under the name 'All About You'. The rest of these songs are still deep in their hard drives somewhere as neither wanted to have these feelings in the public eye due to this being a sensitive and painful topic

• It's usually Hima that picks things up from the members but one specific thing they began doing subconsciously is her little zoning out habit; whenever she zones out she tends to stick her tongue out a bit and they - mainly Wooyoung and Yeosang - started copying this. When she yawns she usually stretches her arms out in front of her and makes cat paw-like gestures to loosen her fingers and San actually picked up on this - our nyang-teez. While it's not much of a routine, she'll build stone towers to pray for the members' health habitually and seeing that it was very special to her they began doing it too

I love you too my sweet! Take very good care of yourself okay ? Mwahh 🥰🩷

#ateez au #ateez imagines #ateez extra member #ateez 9th member #ateez female member #kpop oc #himaask

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homestuckreplay · 3 days ago

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[EOA2] Years In The Future, But Not Many: Adolescence and Time in Act 2 of Homestuck

‘Stories of cultural evolution and of individual adolescent development prioritize the ending; they are primarily narratives of fulfillment.’ – Nancy Lesko (2001)

Act 2 of Homestuck takes place in a single afternoon, and also spans the whole history of life on earth, from before the Pacific Ocean formed to a post-apocalyptic wasteland. As time flashes and contorts and makes a maze of sequential storytelling, our main characters remain frozen at thirteen years old, locked in time at the end of the world. The modern teenager is culturally constructed as a person who is always waiting and preparing, running to keep up with milestones and punished for stepping outside a correct order. Teenagers’ only, and very difficult, job is to adequately prepare for adulthood – an adulthood that is always years in the future, but not many.

This essay looks at adolescence as it is theorized in society and in young adult literature, with a focus on its temporal dimension. It then applies these theories to Act 2 of Homestuck, asking to what extent Homestuck recreates, explores or subverts dominant ideas of adolescence with its characterizations and nonlinear storytelling. It’s about 8,000 words; to skip the theoretical background and just read the Homestuck analysis, Ctrl+F for ‘Paragraphs in the future…’ and read from that section onwards.

This essay is also hosted on ao3 and has a bibliography.

Background: Normal Teenagers, Normal Development

‘A child’s social, and ontological purpose is therefore, it would seem, not to stay a child… any signs of entrenchment or backtracking, like play for example, may be interpreted as indicators of a failure to ‘develop’’ – Chris Jenks (2009)

All current adults have experienced childhood and adolescence – it is ‘the only truly common experience of being human’ (Jenks). Adolescence was not theorized in academia until the late 1800s, but had a social meaning much earlier; in 1818, Isaac Taylor published Advice to the Teens, Or, Practical Help Towards the Formation of One’s Own Character at the tender age of fifty-nine. G Stanley Hall, the first scholar of adolescence, was also fifty-nine in 1904 when he characterized the teenage experience as ‘storm and stress’, a time of turbulence, mood and behavioral changes, and conflict with authority.

In this early era of research, children and adolescents were studied in terms of their deviations from the ‘normal adult’, who was explicitly characterized as a middle-class white man. Young people were seen as speedrunning all stages of human evolution before reaching this ‘enlightened’ state at the onset of adulthood; the entirety of history recreated in each individual life. Those seen as ‘further down’ the evolutionary ladder – people of color and the working class in addition to adolescents – were viewed as biologically determined, controlled by their hormones and ‘underdeveloped’ brains, making it the job of those more ‘advanced’ to restrict their behavior. In this way, minors became a marginalized group, and adolescence became a training ground. By positioning teenagers as not yet capable of rational thinking and decision making, it was easy to justify controlling them until they were ‘ready’ to be full members of society.

Modern social scientists generally believe that our idea of ‘the adolescent’ was constructed in the early 20th century, in response to specific social conditions – but many people, including parents, teachers, journalists and young adult fiction authors, retain ideas about the ‘inherent nature’ of teenagers. Science surrounding the ‘teenage brain’ is picked up by popular media and adopted as proof of a biological basis of behavior, and two studies found that preservice teachers saw their future teenage students as ‘incomplete people’. Teenagers have long been described as overly emotional, as unstable due to raging hormones, as disrespectful and rebellious towards authority, delinquents and criminals, lacking individuality, lazy and disengaged, loud and disruptive, politically inactive, hedonistic, immature, as wasting their youth and health, and as not to be taken seriously. In the 21st century, the discourse shifts slightly: teenagers are just as much of a problem, but now they are entitled, inattentive, lacking in intelligence, work ethic and critical thinking skills, reliant on technology, spending too much time indoors, self- and celebrity-obsessed, irresponsible with money, overly sensitive and nihilistic towards the future. When these beliefs are dispersed throughout society and reiterated from all angles, it is no surprise that young people internalize them, and fulfill the prophecy they are told is unavoidable.

Politically, the ‘correct’ development of young people is crucial. The youth are the future adults, and as future adults, it is crucial that they advance society in the ‘right’ direction, and continue along the same path as the current adults. Hand in hand with the idea of teenagers’ inherent nature is the idea that their future trajectory can be changed through the right guidance and the right policy. Placed in a political spotlight, young people are always the ones to be concerned about, never able to formally raise their own concerns. Teenagers are denied the right to vote in countries they will likely be citizens of for their whole lives, and if they attempt to enter political arenas, are widely disparaged with their ideas seen as unrealistic and overly radical. They should instead be waiting their turn, with the expectation that their views will become more moderate by the time they are ‘mature’ enough to guide society.

In her re-theorization of adolescence Act Your Age! A Cultural Construction of Adolescence, Nancy Lesko points out that adolescence is defined through chronological age, and therefore through time. Pointing to theories of the clock as the technology that best defines the modern age, she discusses how youth are kept to a schedule of universalized milestones. One example is age graded schools, where all students are expected to turn thirteen during the seventh grade, and to all achieve the same defined educational standard at this age. Activities such as learning to drive and entering paid work are legally prohibited until a certain age, but people are expected to do these shortly after reaching these milestones, or they will be seen as falling behind. Physical markers of puberty are expected in narrow age ranges, and teenagers are medically pathologized if their bodies mature too fast or too slow. Social development, such as the expectation that adolescents will have their first kisses and first romantic relationships in their early teens, also qualify as milestones. Placed in narrowly age-grouped environments, young people will continually compare themselves to their peers, and those who reach milestones on time are socially rewarded by each other as well as by adults.

These milestones are not end points in themselves, but simply necessary steps along a path of becoming, always focused on the adult a teenager will be. Adults are positioned as superior in society, and to develop as a child is to become more adultlike. When a young person is given increased freedom and responsibility, it is bestowed by adults with the expectation that they will make the decisions of the adult – a teenager told they no longer have a curfew is probably still expected to come home at an adult-defined ‘reasonable time’, otherwise, the curfew will likely be reinstated.

The significance of adolescent decisions and experiences are often minimized. A first heartbreak, a failure to qualify for a sports team, or a decision between two potential friend groups or two academic tracks has a major impact on a teenager’s day to day life, but adults are typically dismissive, framing the issues from their perspective – when the teen is older, they will surely realize the insignificance of this training-ground decision to the arena of real life. Future reflections are privileged over in the moment feelings.

Time, more broadly, has been theorized by philosophers in many different ways, and studies have shown that humans intuitively understand time as both linear (happening one moment after another, continuous and unstoppable) and spatial (held in memory, with moments from the past able to be recaptured and moments from the future rehearsed). Western society heavily privileges the linear view, where time is measurable, unidirectional, and correlated with progress. Once a milestone has been reached, regression is unacceptable. A teenager putting away their Lego sets to get a part time job would be criticized for quitting that job and returning to their toys, and a high school that sees a year-on-year decline in standardized test results is seen as ‘failing’, regardless of other metrics (such as students’ mental health). Individuals and societies must continue to grow and advance with time; a logic which guides our current economic system as well as previous colonial projects. The fear of a society in decline is arguably the primary driving force behind the general obsession with youth, and with the ways the current adolescent generation is inferior to the previous.

This runs contrary to real experiences of time, which involve expansion, compression, twists, circles, loss, gain, running out and having too much. Time passes faster for a fifty year old compared to a fifteen year old. It passes faster when spending time with friends than when waiting for a bus in the rain, faster when anxiously preparing for a final exam than when waiting for results with fingers crossed. Adolescence, in its entirety, passes faster for a teenager raised in poverty who helps provide income and childcare at the age of fourteen than for an upper middle class teenager given a sizable income until they leave college at twenty-two. The past is returned to, over and over again, by adults who relive their high school yearbooks, watch television shows set in high schools, and reconceptualize their own adolescence by watching their children. My personal experience of time changed radically when I took on a seven year project, and started planning for a long term future as well as a short. Time is important not only in how it is spent, but in how it is captured, preserved, and shared.

Technological developments have further changed the experience of time for people of all ages. Writing in 2008, Judy Wajcman discusses the common belief that the pace of life is speeding up, as studies have found that across the second half of the twentieth century, people subjectively experienced feeling more rushed with decreased time for leisure. Some possible explanations discussed are how mobile communication has led to people organizing their lives around blocks of time instead of physical locations, as more activities are available ‘on the go’. There are greater expectations for people to do multiple tasks simultaneously, and mobile devices allow for people to plan and coordinate their time, and therefore optimize it for maximum productivity. Communication and the search for information happen at beyond-human speeds, and time that would historically have been ‘waiting time’ becomes obsolete.

For teenagers especially, social media has changed the experience of time, with young people feeling increased pressure to post frequently, respond to messages in the moment, and record their lives. One teenager explained social media as ‘kind of like documenting your life – you can look back in ten years time, you'll have all these pictures and comments’ while another, discussing taking photographs at Madame Tussauds, suggested that ‘the images became significant after the visit when they could be used to “tell stories” to others, providing digital prompts and enabling conversation about culture’ (Manchester & Pett, 2015). As affordable cultural spaces for teenagers decline, with fewer discos, malls and parks as well as a cultural shift away from parents allowing their children to roam outside, teenagers’ use of time also changes, and young people – especially the working class – report finding themselves with nothing to do.

In contrast, some middle-class young people have the opposite problem, their lives a far cry from the ‘leisure class’ of their peers fifty years before. Some schools begin careers education in middle school, and high achieving youth with college prospects are encouraged to fill their time with extracurriculars, volunteer work and academic preparation, held up against their peers who are using their time more effectively now, and are sure to see better futures because of it. In this way, some teenagers find themselves quite literally waiting for the time to pass and the next stage of life to arrive, while others find themselves working against the clock, trying to complete all preparatory work in time for their entry into adulthood. Despite attempts at standardization, real experiences of both adolescence and time are highly variable, responsive to individual differences, social positions, and new technologies.

Background: Narratives About Youth

‘Behind every disempowered teen narrator is an empowered adult author conveying ideology about the superiority of adult norms.’ – Petrone et al. (2015)

As teenagers became a distinct marketing group, new culture industries grew up around them. The first teen movies, focused on delinquent teenage boys committing crimes due to lack of adequate parenting, were released in the 1950s. In his book The Road to Romance and Ruin: Teen Films and Youth Culture, Jon Lewis argues that via these movies, adults projected their own discontent with modern society onto the teenage characters they created. He views all narrative as ideological, as even the most rebellious and anti-establishment teen movies end up reinforcing adult authority, with characters coming to regret their deviance and ‘reform’ themselves, or being punished for their actions.

Young adult literature was slower to develop, but grew in popularity throughout the 1970s and 80s. So named because it focuses on similar themes to adult books but intended for a younger audience, young adult books can work in any genre, but focus on teenage protagonists and coming of age narratives. Whether real or fantastical, these protagonists navigate the rules and power structures of the world around them, go through some type of trial and eventually learn a lesson crucial to adulthood. It has been argued that the classical narrative is inherently adolescent, as stories by their nature deal with development and change; postmodern fiction does not always follow these rules but it is true for many works for all age groups.

Jon Lewis also discusses the ‘notion of cause and effect’ as it applies to teenagers being ‘at once a mass movement and a mass market’. Many people have argued that the ‘teenager’ was partly created by marketing industries, who, noticing young people’s increased free time and money in the 1950s, created products to fill that niche. Other scholars assert the agency of young people in creating their own subcultures, saying that teen culture arises spontaneously, with adolescents just as likely to adopt a symbol not specifically marketed to them – such as the safety pin’s role in punk culture – as to be swayed by intentional marketing.

In media, the product being sold is an identity to embody. The protagonist of a teen movie can be both relatable and aspirational – they reflect both who the viewer is, and who they want to be. A teenage protagonist is described as ‘relatable’ and ‘authentic’ if they appear to reflect experiences of actual teenagers, who are conceptualized here as a monolith. Petrone et al. point out that such an analysis would seem ridiculous if a character were described as an ‘authentic adult’. They advocate for a more nuanced discussion of ideas surrounding adolescence in fiction – a Youth Lens, which questions how literature represents adolescence, what assumptions the story makes about youth and how that frames plots and characterizations, and to what extent the text reinforces or subverts the dominant understandings. They believe this could pave the way for more varied representations of teenagers, which could positively impact young readers, as ‘writers who foreground examples of youth who do not follow conventional expectations of adolescence can shift how youth might be understood’.

Young adult literature is typically written by adult authors, capturing a reflection of teen culture instead of the reality. It is also regulated by adults – editors and publishers who decide whether a book can be marketed for young adults, and librarians and bookstore owners who decide whether to categorize it as such. Mature themes – including mental health, death, drug abuse, sex, and structural issues such as racism – do feature in young adult fiction, but there are no formal guidelines, and any book seen as ‘going too far’ is liable to be kept away from teenagers.

Writing about young adult fantastical fiction, Alison Waller shows how fantasy narratives reinforce adult norms just as much as realistic fiction; the expectations of growth on a young witch, werewolf or ‘chosen one’ are not radically different from those on real life teenagers. A common theme in dystopian and high fantasy fiction sees a teenage protagonist framed as the only hope for the future, a person prophesized to both change and save their world. Although this narrative may seem progressive as it allows for radical change, in reality these characters are generally guided by wiser adult characters who influence their decisions, and the story is not so different from the real life expectation that the next generation will save us from the problems caused by the previous.

In time travel narratives specifically, a protagonist may go back in time to a situation where they have improved agency and a subjectively better life, but by the end of the story, will voluntarily decide that returning to the present is the right thing to do. A temporary move backwards gives this character the tools they need to succeed at the next stage of life, and overall, their chronological and developmental trajectory is not disrupted. Where a secondary character chooses the past over the future, the narrative tends to treat them with anxiety, positioning them as cautionary tales or as mistakes in need of fixing.

Novels, movies and video games are typically released as completed works – the creators know how the story ends before the work is released. This may not apply to books in a series, and also does not apply to many television shows, comic books, or audio dramas. In a format such as the sitcom, the growing up narrative is complicated – a teenage character may learn a lesson about sensitivity to others’ emotions in one episode, and return to their previous self-centered ways in the next, thereby allowing ‘adolescent’ to be a primary descriptor of the character, not a state to be grown out of. Creators who are teenagers themselves, such as published British author Rachael Wing and many online writers producing fanfiction and original fiction about characters their age, also present a new paradigm. Although they may be influenced by the judgments of adults, they are still writing based on their present experiences instead of memories and observations.

The internet expands possibilities for both narratives and creators. A work posted serially online has the chance to respond in real time to a young audience, and there are far fewer restrictions on what can be posted on the internet, meaning that stories can be made accessible to young adults even if a major publisher or a parent would disapprove. As the internet itself is an ‘adolescent’ rather than a ‘mature’ medium, exploring the possibilities of the medium itself could go hand in hand with disrupting a typical coming of age narrative.

Paragraphs in the future…

‘Try not to be so linear, dear.’ (p.421)

Homestuck is written by Andrew Hussie, a former teenager who turned 30 while writing Act 2 in 2009. Its principal characters are teenagers and like most stories, it is written from memories of being a teenager and observations of what teenagers are like today. Its first act is entirely linear, but Act 2 begins to explore time, continuity, and cause and effect. Readers can no longer assume that a page takes place after its preceding page, and the main characters – John, Rose, Dave and the Wayward Vagabond – all exist at different points along the timeline.

I believe that Act 2 represents time as it is actually experienced by teenagers, where growth and personal development are not always linear and not always in sync with that of others. John, Rose and Dave are all growing up in the 2000s USA, and are all subject to roughly the same cultural expectations as described in the earlier sections, just as the overall work is written in that context. Looking at each character in turn, I will discuss to what extent they conform to dominant conceptions of ‘the teenager’ and how they experience time within the narrative, with a view to asking whether Homestuck could offer a new understanding of adolescence.

John Egbert

‘And even meanerwhile, in the present. Sort of. Once again, the slippery antagonist eludes you.’ (p.385)

As the principal character and the first introduced, John’s time is arbitrarily defined as ‘the present’ – pages 334 and 385 both say as such. However, at the end of act 1, John is transported to a ‘realm untouched by the flow of time’ (p.421) and while time continues to pass for him, it’s not necessarily in step with Earth time, indicated by the ??:?? timestamps on his Pesterlogs. As such, John’s ‘normal’ development has been stalled on the day he becomes a teenager, and he’s locked off from the future of his society.

For John, time and space are linked. Although he has been removed from time and therefore from normal expectations, he’s still stuck in his house, the one piece of his culture that he brought with him. The picture John’s dad pinned to the fridge and the green slime pogo ride John continues to define himself by in this act both keep him tied to his childhood. While he’s here, John can’t escape a multitude of authority figures. His dad has been kidnapped, but still leaves notes around the house congratulating John on his maturity – ‘You are strong enough to lift the safe. You are now a man… I know you will take this responsibility seriously’ (p.546).

With Dad gone, Nannasprite steps in, having not seen John since he was very young. She restores John’s bedroom door to its hinges and restores the family order in the house, giving advice, controlling what John knows, and baking unprecedented amounts of cookies. Nannasprite calls John a ‘good boy’ (p.428), and the Wayward Vagabond’s first command to John is ‘BOY.’ (p.252), a word with assumptions about both John’s gender and current stage of life. Rose and WV also have guardianlike roles over John, able to control how he spends his time.

John is younger than Rose and Dave by a few months, but retains far more childlike qualities. His priorities lean towards play and silliness, as shown when he captchalogues shaving cream in case he suddenly needs to make a Santa beard (p.488) or makes a tent out of cruxite dowels (p.615), and he isn’t in any hurry to reach the signifiers of adulthood, such as shaving (p.544) or taking personal responsibility (p.643). The trait John most shares with the stereotypical teenager is poor emotional regulation – both his excitement and his frustration are obvious on his face and regularly interfere with his behavior (for example, p.429, p.637).

He passes the time instead of using the time, and is easily swayed by his peers. He has a drive for autonomy and self preservation, and will attempt to stand up for himself, but usually ends up deferring to the authority of his friends or guardians. He’s not very self-motivated except when it comes to putting bunnies back in boxes, and he enjoys consuming media, not all of which is age-appropriate – three of the movies on his wall are R-rated, including Con Air. He also plays popular video games and buys media merchandise such as T-shirts and posters, so falls into a mainstream youth marketing demographic.

As a prophesized savior positioned to undertake a hero’s journey, John is a classic young adult protagonist. He demonstrates the idea that the youth are our only hope, though they still require guidance from previous generations and are defined by their opposition to adulthood (seen through Nannasprite’s presence). However, despite Skaia influencing Earth since before life itself existed (p.757), it wasn’t until its power was harnessed into a video game that it began to threaten the world – youth’s popular culture is the thing that sends us all into decline, even if that culture was created and marketed by adults.

The earth already being ‘done for’ (p.427) allows for a subversion of the typical progress narrative. Page 757 indicates that Sburb may be influenced by ancient technology from outside of Earth, The end goal is not known, making John’s narrative defined by the journey and not by the ending, highlighting adolescence as a meaningful experience in and of itself, not only because of where it leads. And Sburb is already poking fun at John’s culture – the echeladder (p.405) parodies the milestone progression of youth, filled with meaningless and generic titles placed in an arbitrary order.

John’s destiny to ascend through the Seven Gates to Skaia, fighting with the light kingdom and attempting to overcome the dark forces’ destined win, could be read as an ascension from childhood to adulthood. John would be moving away from the sinful childlike state where young people are ruled by their base instincts of hunger, sleep, hormones and emotions, towards a rational and enlightened adulthood. But an inversion of this metaphor would work, too. John could move away from his culture’s ideal adult that he’s been told he’ll become – a person who is cynical, conformist, an obedient worker, driven by money and personal success – back towards the childlike state, retaining the open-mindedness, sense of whimsy and possibility, and creativity of childhood. Earth is done for, and so there’s no reason John should still be tied to the linear march of the culture he came from. He is perfectly positioned to imagine a new paradigm of adolescence, if he can break away from the ties – his house and his guardians – that try to tie him down to the ‘old ways’.

Rose Lalonde

‘To hear his mammoth belly gurgle is to know the Epoch of Joy has come to an abrupt end.’ (p.302)

In the narrative, Rose’s time is defined as the near future. Although her story directly overlaps with John’s, putting them at the same point in time, Rose is three timezones ahead and refers to other timezones as ‘younger’ (p.174). It’s night time for her, which visually distinguishes her panels and gives her story a more adult atmosphere. She is future oriented and proactive, planning for the next thing, and typically portrayed as one step ahead of John.

Rose has experienced the passage of time quickly, and has not had the luxury of lingering in childhood as John has. With a mother who is inattentive towards raising her and communicates through daily arguments (p.389) and ‘notes’ on the fridge (p.366), Rose likely had to develop independence and adult traits at a young age. She would be considered ‘precocious’, a word typically carrying a negative or judgmental tone describing a young person whose achievements or inclinations are happening ‘too soon’. In the narrative, Rose is continually running out of time, watching the battery on her laptop slowly drain and the forest fire surrounding her house creep closer. This anxiety of something yet to come positions Rose as a teenager who is awaiting the future and making use of every possible moment to prepare for it.

Educationally, she has a larger vocabulary than the average person her age, and likely a higher reading level. Practically, she understands construction and generator safety, has a good grasp of modern technology such as computers as well as classic skills such as knitting, and the hand eye coordination to do these things well. She demonstrates abstract and critical thinking, and attempts – with varying levels of success – to understand the consequences of her actions. She shows an understanding of a world greater than herself when she wishes Jaspers had been allowed to decompose (p.414) and avoids allocating her grimoire to her strife specibus (p.297). Despite being raised by a rich mother, she enjoys a challenge and is willing to work hard, rejecting childlike wish-fulfillment fantasies such as princesses and wizards.

Rose is a teenager who attempts to fill her time with activities she sees as productive and as bettering her as a person. She has internalized adult values and would prefer to get there too soon than be left behind, and she works hard to define herself through timeless, sophisticated hobbies such as literature, knitting and the violin, generally resisting mass culture that would be typically marketed to teens; unlike John she disrupts the idea of the teenager as mindless consumer or as defined by her peers’ interests. She tries to avoid juvenile behavior and scorns it in others (p.249) and is very attuned to cultural expectations, feeling a nebulous pair of eyes upon her judging the appropriateness of her actions, which affects her decisions (p.370), almost as if she is trying to skip the complicated, messy parts of being a modern teenager and move directly from childhood into rational adulthood.

It’s rare for Rose to regress into childlike behavior, such as the ‘W’ mustache (p.370) and the Youth Roll (p.379), and she usually ends up regretting or correcting the behavior afterwards (p.398, p.380). Her disdain for her mother suggests that she is self-correcting and trying to parent herself in response to these ‘slips’. Notably on page 440, Rose works on her GameFAQs, which are intended as an informative guide to future players. Accidentally slipping into a frustrated and self-berating personal anecdote, she strikes out the passage and again criticizes her own regression, which is immediately followed by a narrative shift into Rose’s actual past.

Rose struggles with patience, and with waiting for other people to catch up to her. She understands the seriousness of her situation; for her adolescence is a time of survival, her decisions now liable to affect her entire future. Act 2’s title, ‘Raise of the Conductor’s Baton’, appears in the text in relation to Rose - ‘Somewhere a zealous god threads these strings between the clouds and the earth, preparing for a symphony it fears impossible to play. And so it threads on, and on, delaying the raise of the conductor's baton’ (p.307). This certainly links to Rose’s experience of time, her living in expectant mode for a terrifying, looming future.

Primarily Rose strives for the ‘positive’ markers of adulthood, such as responsibility and educational attainment, but she also tries to be casual regarding sex, such as claiming to enjoy Dave’s bro’s websites (p.419). The only markers of adulthood she openly rejects are alcohol and domestic chores, both of which the text associates with Rose’s mother, who Rose views as a cautionary tale and the ‘wrong’ kind of adult. Through Rose’s relationship with her mother, there is space to question the idea put forward by other media that teenagers become dangers to society through poor parental oversight; Rose is certainly a rebellious and anti-authority teen, but her ‘rebellion’ consists of asserting her own capability and responsibility, such as turning down alcohol in favor of water (p.388).

Rose sees herself as the more responsible of the two of them, but it remains uncertain whether the narrative will legitimize this. By being positioned in a guardianlike role over John she disrupts the typical adult-youth dynamic, and is given a chance to prove her chesslike skills of thinking several steps ahead while staying responsive to new information, evidenced by her GameFAQ updates. However, in the final page of the act, Rose’s ability to manage her own life reaches its limits, and it is her mother who saves her by opening a secret passage, having apparently planned for this all along. Here Rose’s independence is taken from her and she is once again the teenager who needs a firm guiding hand, despite apparently working much harder than her mother. This reinforces a typical authority structure and is dismissive of Rose’s legitimate problems with her mother, as despite her flaws she is still a necessary figure in Rose’s life.

In future acts, Rose’s character arc could go multiple ways, particularly once she enters the Medium and is presumably separated from her mother. The story could legitimize her drive to grow up at a young age and allow her to take on a leadership role that she does seem well positioned for, given her ability to keep a clear head and solve problems in real time. In this narrative, Rose would not be punished or put back in her ‘rightful place’ for speeding through time, instead, her early development would allow her to be valuable to the group, and to challenge herself in ways a thirteen-year-old would not have access to in the real world. Alternatively, Rose could have an arc that allows her to go ‘back in time’ and reclaim her more youthful traits, taking on some of John’s silliness, handing over responsibility or making bad and uninformed decisions when in a new context, for example when she becomes a client player. This could also be subversive if returning from a more adultlike to a more childlike state is portrayed as a valid and meaningful journey in its own right, instead of as someone who grew up too fast returning to their ‘correct’ place in time.

Dave Strider

‘You just don’t have time for this bullshit. You’ll catch up later.’ (p.332)

Dave’s narrative time is defined as the past. His story begins on page 308, at the same moment where John’s story began on page 1. John and Rose are several hours ahead of him by now, and Dave’s storyline is constantly racing to catch up. Like any teen looking around and watching their peers maturing physically and socially while they fail to keep up, Dave is always missing information and excluded from his friends’ activities. The narrator makes sly references to Dave being in the past and unaware of what’s to come (p.314) like a nagging thought in the back of his head, and in every page, he has the relic of a five-year-old movie stamped on his face.

In reality, Dave is not failing to meet developmental milestones – quite the opposite. In a world where the athletic achievement of young men is prized and adults are expected to be in control of their own bodies, Dave is physically fit with quick reflexes, able to fight, jump, dodge and perform an ‘acrobatic fucking pirouette’ (p.579, p.665), even without regular access to food. The original, early 20th century Boy Scouts prepared boys for military service primarily through obedience, a sense of duty, and personal responsibility towards physical development; Dave’s brother with his strict sword-training and Saw trap regime is instilling similar values.

Dave does participate in mainstream culture, evidenced by his regular reading of GameBro and his desire to be ‘cool’ and to like the same things as his brother – but he’s not only a consumer of culture, he’s also a producer. He writes a blog, ostensibly on a regular schedule, and produces a webcomic, combining creative and analytical pursuits. He regularly refers to himself as ‘busy’ (p.309, etc) and says he ‘doesn’t have time’ for things (p.310, 332), has ‘a lot on [his] plate’ (p.333), and that it’s ‘hard to get any work done’ (p.381). Dave sees his internet projects as work, as commitments he needs to make time for, and he’s not afraid to push back against the player’s commands if he thinks they wouldn’t be a good use of his time.

He has the Complete Bullshit desktop application and keeps up with his brother’s projects, and likely other internet culture too, to stay on the cutting edge of irony that he prides himself on. It seems like Dave’s time is largely full and he struggles to fit everything in. He is very aware of the constantly changing, modern society that he lives in and wants to stay on the pulse of these changes. Less than six months after Obama’s election, a black president is no longer noteworthy to Dave (p.287), and he creates remixes with electronic samplers instead of playing classical instruments like his friends. He’s always online and always keeping in real time contact with his friends; he ‘pesters [Rose] like clockwork’ (p.415). Trying to keep the beat of an ever-shifting internet meme culture to stay cool and avoid being outdated at all costs is exhausting, and it’s no wonder Dave sometimes struggles to keep up.

Living in the city, a place where the pace of life is quickest, in a time of rapid technological and cultural change already creates a ‘racing against the clock’ mindset, and Dave’s relationship with his brother compounds this. By modeling himself on Jigsaw, a villain who created complex, physically violent traps with strict time limits, he forces Dave to be constantly on guard, constantly expecting the next danger, yet often a moment too late for it, behaving like an intense ‘no pain, no gain’ style sports coach. On the surface, Dave’s sunglasses, frown and monosyllables look like a rebellious teen movie protagonist, but beneath that, Dave best corresponds to a real life high achieving teenager who is put under pressure to achieve even more by the adults around them.

Dave’s story so far has focused on the ‘campaign of one-upmanship’ between himself and his brother as he fights for his brother’s Sburb game discs – his brother is an obstacle to both his plot development and his emotional development (for example, admitting that he’s uncomfortable with his brother’s hobbies). This is likely setting up a ‘loss of innocence’ story, where Dave has to come to terms with harsh realities of the adult world by recognizing that an authority figure is imperfect. This is a fairly typical growing up narrative that does not disrupt conventional ideas of linear growth, as the adult world is widely seen as darker, more serious, and something young people need to be protected from.

However, I think Dave’s status as a subcultural producer places him outside a typical youth/adult binary. Dave is not overall presented as adultlike, as he follows trends and is fully subservient to the adult in his life, and his hobbies – Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff, sweet bro’s hella blog, and remixing music – don’t place him on a typical path to adulthood. By establishing that Dave sees these as responsibilities, and as things he creates for a real audience of at minimum four people and potentially many more, Dave’s teenage experiences and creations are given importance without needing to be legitimated by adults (such as the narrator or his brother).

Dave’s self-motivation when it comes to his creative pursuits also disrupts ideas of teenagers as lazy or needing to be shaped by outside forces; he’s capable of sticking to a self-imposed schedule. However, his creative drive is part of a real-time responsiveness to internet culture – if he is taken to the Medium, outside the normal progression of time, would he be able to maintain this? An arc that focuses on Dave as a creator instead of Dave as a soldier could do more to complicate a typical youth narrative.

Wayward Vagabond

‘The APPEARIFIER cannot appearify something if it will create a TIME PARADOX’. (p.752)

The Wayward Vagabond is not a human adolescent, and does not come from the same culture as John, Rose and Dave – they discover the concepts of ‘cutlery’ and ‘politeness’ in Act 2, so are a long way from internalizing age-based ideals. As such, although WV exists in the future – their story taking place 413 years after the human characters’ – they are not more advanced, or more adult, than the others.

Alone in a wasteland and free from social influences, WV does not regulate their eating, is described as physically weak, expresses black and white opinions on governance, and loses track of time playing pretend games. At the same time, they show a good understanding of art, chess strategy and precise movements and distances. They pick up social and technological skills quickly and are very attuned to positions in space (p.743), but far less attuned to positions in time (p.755). Many of their actions are similarly nonsensical to John’s, and these moments of whimsy frame WV as childlike.

However, WV has a privileged position in time. Not only are they in the future, but they have the technology to experiment with temporal mechanics. Through a set of screens they are able to look back at and directly influence events from the past; they have authority over at least one young person, and can appearify objects from other points in time.

Being an adult and a child at the same time feels like a time paradox to us, just as appearifying a rotten pumpkin they ate earlier is a time paradox to WV. Having authority over a young person who, if he continued to grow in linear time, would be long dead by the time WV enters the bunker is also a paradox of normal development. By mixing childlike and adultlike traits, WV draws attention to the way roles in society are socially mediated and may not exist outside of their cultural moment. By living in a post-apocalyptic wasteland where advanced technology is lost to the ravages of nature, WV represents a type of person who could live in the future if the world does not follow a path of strict linear progress, but simply of change.

The appearifier and command station in WV’s bunker fundamentally change the function of time in the narrative. Although WV’s mastery of time is limited by the need to avoid paradoxes, if characters take actions to influence or improve the past, they disrupt the norm of future orientation and give equal importance to the past. Indeed, the pages titled ‘Years in the future…’ are not presented as the desirable end goal of the narrative, nor are they a terrible fate to be avoided. They are interesting asides to the story, but they are asides, with the bulk of them taking place in pages hosted outside of the main story. The story structure lets the past and present be centered in themselves, not just through their leading to the future.

The Narrator

‘Maybe you could go bug someone somewhere else for a while? Or at the very least, somewhen else.’ (p.440)

The position of any given Homestuck page within the timeline is uncertain until established by the narrator, who regularly exercises their power to shift back and forth, and to conceal these movements until the player has made a fool of themself. In this way, the narrator is positioned as an adult with perfect knowledge of the timeline, viewing adolescence in its totality. They have transcended the limitations of adolescence and have moved onto a real and meaningful time of life, and will occasionally reference their superior knowledge of future events with winks to the audience while keeping characters out of the loop – ‘you can’t imagine how a video game could save someone’s life’ (p.314) or ‘only… babies who poop in their diapers believe in [monsters]’ (p.387).

However, moments of the narrator criticizing or speaking condescendingly to the teenage characters is surprisingly rare. It happens occasionally, like with ‘This is COMPLETE BULLSHIT.’ (p.458) or ‘The circle of stupidity is complete’ (p.490) but the vast majority of narrative criticism is directed towards the Wayward Vagabond, the only character the narrator regularly speaks directly to. The narrator calls WV stupid on multiple occasions (for example, p.437, p.746), and tells them to defer to Rose’s decision making (p.277), but the majority of narrative text criticizing the kids’ behavior is actually just reporting their own thoughts, either towards themselves – ‘It seems the woman has you at a clear disadvantage’ (p.373) – or towards each other, such as ‘What the hell is that nincompoop doing?’ (p.508). When a command would lead to a bad decision, it’s generally the character who refutes it, not the narrator (p.489). In this way, although the narrator does have superior knowledge, they give center stage to adolescent perspectives.

Implicitly, the narrator controls the flow of time in the story – deciding who to switch to and in what moment of their story, allowing characters to speak or moving focus away from them – and the narrator is willing to indulge the characters in their non-plot critical diversions, rarely hurrying them along when they take extended time to read books or rearrange their sylladex, but allowing the minutiae of their experiences to matter. The narrator lists characters’ interests without judgment – adult characters are interested in clowns, wizards, puppets and sugary foods, while adolescent characters are interested in computer programming, knitting and specimen preservation, with no clear line on ‘acceptable’ interests for a given age group.

Zooming out a layer, Act 2 posits the idea of John, Rose and Dave’s stories available for viewing through a screen, four hundred and thirteen years in the future. As well as reflecting the existence of the webcomic itself, this contrasts the idea of adolescence as a transient state. The 13-year-old versions of these characters are frozen in time on the Wayward Vagabond’s screen. Born in the mid-1990s, these characters are among the first to grow up with social media, and with an internet moving away from anonymity. Their lives being recorded on the command terminal, in Rose’s GameFAQ screenshots (p.510) and in Bro’s Jigsaw puppet (p.570) are not a million miles from the teenagers documenting each other’s lives on Facebook in 2009 – and at the time of Act 2’s writing, it’s not yet certain what the real world impacts of this will be on current young people’s experiences of time.

Conclusion

‘Temporal movement into the future is understood as linear, uni-directional, and able to be separated from the present and the past… a conception of growth and change as recursive, as occurring over and over again as we move into new situations, would reorient us.’ - Nancy Lesko (2001)

Written in 2009, Homestuck carries the baggage of over a hundred years of public discourse around the teenager. Adulthood is seen as the most important stage of life, with teenagers as flawed, incomplete versions who need to be corrected before reaching the end goal of conventional adult society through conforming to a series of linear milestones. The expected development of real teenagers is reflected in the stories told about them, which focus on characters ‘coming of age’ and successfully internalizing adult norms.

By introducing nonlinear storytelling in Act 2, Homestuck represents time as teenagers actually experience it, which gives the comic a chance to explore and question dominant ideas of adolescence and adolescent time. John and Rose have relationships with guardian figures, including the narrator, that reinforce adult superiority, and all three kids have communication breakdowns between themselves and their guardians – but the skills and interests of teenagers are also given importance, and adults are not exempt from narrative criticism. The narrator is happy to indulge the teenagers just as often as to correct them.

The end of Act 2 positions Sburb as an organic entity of sorts, not necessarily created by adults in universe. Sburb encourages linear gameplay with progression up the Echeladder and through the Seven Gates, but the Medium’s position outside of time, and the fact that restoring the Earth is not the game’s goal, allow for narratives of change that are not necessarily narratives of progress, as the characters’ future in rational adult society no longer exists. The comic’s focus on creativity – both the potential of Skaia and with Dave’s role as an artist – means the story could focus on the importance of not losing childlike traits along the path to adulthood.

The narrative structure allows teenage characters to be nonlinear, to move between past and future moments, to experience sudden growth and moments of regression, to overtake their friends and then fall behind. The real-time nature of Homestuck’s creation allows readers to linger in the characters’ day to day moments and to experience their present alongside them, instead of tightly focusing on their plot development, and the reader submitted commands central to Act 2 mean that real life teenagers likely contributed to their own story. Homestuck is still early on in its story, but has already laid the groundwork for a novel conceptualization of time, and therefore an understanding of adolescence as more than just its ending.

#eoa2 #milestone #analysis #homestuck #to be honest i think i aimed too high with this and that what i wanted to do here is beyond what im currently capable of #but it was a very valuable experience! and i hope to work on these skills over the next couple years #and to look back at this and see lots of improvement over time!#i do also think theres a lot of good in the bones of this even if the execution isnt great! and so its still important to post :)#chrono

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