#I’m losing my mind……. save me prime empire prime empire save me
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cue the akira audio LEAVE ME ALONE!!! AHHHHHHH
#who could’ve expected this (has been reading nothing but Skybound fics and creating a crackship for like a week)#GET OUT OF MY HEAD!! I WANNA DREAM ABOUT PRIME EMPIRE AAAAAAAAAAAA#spinjitsu screams#spinjitsu doodles#Ninjago#Skybound#jay#jay walker#nadakhan#I’m losing my mind……. save me prime empire prime empire save me#I need another season to beat the shit out of jay so my brain will SWITCH TARGETS#han
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This show just loves to break me down physically and mentally doesn’t it
GIVE HER HUSBAND BACK TO HER PLSPLSPLSPLS SHE DOESNT DESERVE THIS
First Jay loses her for a entire year then they finally get eachother back and then she loses him for what like 6 years now IM DYING WHYYY WHY DID THEY HAVE TO DO THIS IT WAS SO FOWL BUT I ENJOYED IT SO MUCH RAAAHGGGG
But I just love the fact even though it’s been years since they have seen each other Nya knows him well enough that she was the first one to realize it was a trick BUT IT HURTS MY SOULL
The fact that it’s all dark with the shiny floor so it really has you focus on them is even worse the amount of times I had to pause this scene because it was giving me emotions killed me
I HAVE A THEORY THOUGH
Alright so now that it’s technically canon that Jay has memory loss I’m wondering now. I don’t think Nyas fear was for Jay to forget her I think it was if Jay got hurt, she sacrificed herself to save him she put herself in front of him in prime empire and got cubed she’d do anything to protect him but I don’t think it crossed her mind for him to forget her cuss she new almost immediately when he said “stop acting like you know me” or “who are you” that it wasn’t him, literally the first line that he’s ever said is about Nya dude ain’t forgetting her and she knows this
Maybe I’m just going insane but we learn after that he actually does have memory loss and I just feel like they did that on purpose I called it out when I watched it to my sister (I’m the most annoying person to watch with)
I also wanna add how much I love Jay because he’s just bad at his job but hey at least he’s trying I think, I just love this interaction with Bonsel and Jay RAAHHHg
Please Bonsel TELL KAI ABOUT HIM PLEASE YOU HAVE TIME TO PLEASE JUST SAY IT FOR MY SANITY
HE GOT MORE THEN 20 SECONDS OF SCREEN TIME THOUGH THATS A PLUS AND HES GETTING CLOSER AND CLOSER TO FIGURING OUT WHO HE IS
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Ive had this Au idea in my head for a lil while and after doing some work on it i have decided to share it with you guys.
I proudly present:
The fractured Jay Au
(Huge shoutout to the very talented @sketchalicious. not only was this drawing based off one of their own but they were also one of the biggest inspirations for this Au. Go check em out they make awesome stuff) After the ninja Recuse Jay, his entire mental state collapses from the stress of flashbacks and visions after which, he goes into a comatose state. The ninja must now enter his mind to help him wake up. There, They find not only Jay, but six different versions of him. all of which represent their own guilts and traumas as well as Jays own too. The Ninja (now separated) must fight the one that represents them most and try to get every Jay to accept themselves.
The ninja also find out about the events of skybound through this whole ordeal; In Nyas case, having to relive it while also seeing what Jay went through on the Misfortunes keep.
The idea is that, Out of every ninja Jay holds the most baggage but does not show it, instead keeping it hidden very deep in his brain and I’m tired of people pretending like he doesn’t 😔
I will now Explain them in detail. Starting with:
The chosen one "Guilt ridden"
Fun fact: According to an old blooper reel, Jay was originally gonna be the green ninja; But the writers changed it to lloyd for a better surprise. Doesn’t take away from the fact that Jay looks good in green however.
This Jay is supposed to be a Representation of Lloyd, more specifically The weight lloyd has on his shoulders. Having to be the savior of ninjago (now the merged realms) can take a toll on a person; Lloyd is also now a sensei in training which has not helped his mental state at all; eventually bound to snap one way or another. And at one point there will be a battle he cannot win no matter how hard he tries.
From jays side, TCO is supposed to be a representation of His thoughts about how he has failed Lloyd and the others on several occasions (Releasing aspherra, Prime empire, letting Nya die twice, etc.) and how he solely Blames himself for it. All his self doubts telling him he’ll never be good enough, Among other things, in the forms of Twisted/Tainted visions of the other ninja and his parents. Making him go insane and he eventually snaps, succumbing to the delusion that in order to ever be good enough for Anyone he has to take over being the green ninja. But deep down he knows that the others will always care about him no matter what.
Worst case Scenario (CC for short) “The Sacrifice"
This one’s design wasn’t based off anything too important, I just think that Kai would be the second Ninja to become Undead.
CC represents Kai’s inability to let others sacrifice for him. While Kai is a hero through and through and will do anything for his family, he’s also selfish in the way that he doesn’t want the others to do the same for him Always insisting that it should have been him instead. CC looks like someone who has sacrificed too much without letting others help them. (Bit of a stretch i know)
In terms of Jay, CC is supposed to represent Denial. His skeletal remains are the Result Of what happens to someone who thinks “it should have been me” over every situation, Someone more... Expendable. A repeating memory of Nya dying in his arms keeps playing in his head. Losing flesh and organs after sacrificing himself to Defeat the Overlord; His skeleton Gains a fraction of his power that keeps him alive. But in the end it does not matter because he couldn’t save the one person most important to him, Nya. Jay knows no matter how many “What if” Scenarios happen in his head, the past is in the past and he must look on to the future, but can’t bring himself to after the many losses he’s Endured.
Agent walker "left to rot"
Design of course was based off our very own amnesiac Jason Walker, The current Manager of the administrations realm of reassignment.
Agent Walker is Everything Zane Dreads about himself; Becoming Cold and mechanical with no emotion. Agent Walker is Essentially a repeat of the Ice emperor. A once heroic individual Who forgot themselves and Changed because of Evil influence. Zane dreaded being the ice emperor and does not want any of his family to go through what he went through. Unfortunately, Jay is already halfway there. while we do not know if Agent Walker is truly corrupt due to the administration, Jay is Very much morally Gray, As out of every Ninja his moral compass is the weakest.
Having severe abandonment issues, Agent Walker Represents Jays Fear of being Forgotten about by his family, Essentially becoming a memory. that fear is realized once he spends a long time in the administration and no one has found him yet. Hence the Tagline, “Left to rot”. Having everyone Move on without him (especially Nya) Hurts So Badly that He Forces himself to forgot about the others and hoping the pain will eventually go away. Jay of course knows that His family and Yang could never forget about him, But doubts plague his mind telling him otherwise.
The Infiltrator “No Destiny"
Based off the (now very official) Evil Jay Figure which was recently leaked. The shirt was too hard to get right for me, so I decided to use my own design for it.
The infiltrator, A Strange Figure Who wields lightning powers. Hired by lord Ras; The same person who Went for Coles second family. This adds insult to injury in terms of their friendship.
This Jay pulls the same type of act that Cole does in DotD; By Doing something as drastic as Teaming up with a person who he knows has bad intentions just to be recognized outside of his feats at the administration and to be able to freely use his powers.
Representing Coles guilt, This Jay Has cemented himself as an enemy to the ninja and no longer an ally Forcing The battle to be painful for the Ninja. Especially Cole. However this Jay is not tethered to his relationships with them and will not hold back against those who oppose his leader
(Note: Not much is known about Jays motives or really anything about his evil character in part 2. This part might be rewritten later once we get a more clear view of his character.)
The infiltrator Is a manifestation of Jays fears about him going rouge/ Evil, So far almost all of the ninja Have Gone through their Evil “phase” and eventually, Jay must walk down that path. He feels hopeless however as without his memories he feels trapped; fettered to always serving a higher power Having No destiny To achieve thus Staying evil indefinitely.
Jay of the storm "Shameful woes"
This Jays design was inspired by some of the Seabound Aus I’ve seen and read. Much like Nyas design, He has Semi-lightning shaped hair and Lightning related body marks all over. he looks like a painting to show his coping mechanism When Nya was gone; Which was painting Portraits of her and him to ease his pain.
This one’s quite simple, Even after Becoming human again, Nya still harbors guilt for what she caused her family to go through And how much her sacrifice meant to everybody in ninjago. This Jay is supposed to represent her feelings about the whole situation and showing her a different perspective; one where Jay sacrificed himself instead of her. Of course in this made up timeline, Jay thinks of his sacrifice as Meaningless compared to Nyas. Thinking that the team moves on very quickly from what happened (Yes even Nya) and it eventually gets swept under the rug.
Further from the truth, Nya tries to convince Jay that this would never be the case. her words fall on deaf ears however, as Jay continues to lament in his own self pity.
Jay of the storm Is the personification of his shame and worry about him being a bad partner and an even worse teammate; Thinking of himself as worthless and nothing more than a deadweight To his family and his Yang. He thinks this way due to his biggest mistakes and how they led to so many bad things happening. (Especially Nyas deaths.) “I wish I could sacrifice to you as much as you have for me.” Nya has done so much for him and he thinks that he has done nothing in return. So maybe sacrificing himself could make him seem all noble and heroic once and for all. But he knows that he has done incredible feats and cannot blame himself for everything bad that has happened in their lives.
Nya will always love him And He’ll always love her, no matter how much the universe wants to seperate them they'll find each other eventually.
??? “Fractured beyond repair”
This design was based off The common trope of an alternate version of someone being their own shadow.
The real Jay (or At least a part of him), hidden deep inside his own Brain. living in denial of himself and being incomplete as his Whole Soul and memory was split into 5 different pieces representing his Repressed Thoughts.
Black as ink with a texture of tar, This Jay Is barely humanlike. Shutting himself out from anyone or anything trying to interact with him preferring to Wish it all away instead of Trying to fix all the issues he has caused. They say that when the Other 5 Make amends and come to terms with themselves, he will be let out of his cage like a wild animal. for better or for worse? Well there’s no clear answer for that. (Codeword for if I plan to expand this and write an actual fan fic)
Thank you for reading my hyperfixiation. while i do think this Au could never work in canon, Its very fun to think about it as jay probably has the most repressed trauma of all the ninja. plus its an Au for a reason.
#lego ninjago#ninjago#ninjago dragons rising#dragons rising season 2#dragons rising spoilers#ninjago fandom#ninjago au#ninjago fanart#dragons rising#jay walker#ninjago jay#evil jay#suit jay#ninjago jaya#lloyd garmadon#nya jiang#nya smith#kai smith#kai jiang#ninjago nya#zane julien#ninjago kai#ninjago zane#cole brookstone#ninjago cole#lego ninjago fanart#smugs rambles#my artwork#jay angst
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Ninjago if the Overlord didn’t exist
My favorite pastime is overthinking random ninjago lore, so here we go to remove one character and watch the entire series fall apart!!
If the Overlord doesn’t exist then neither does the Great Devourer, thus Garmadon isn’t evil
This means Wu has no need to hide the Golden Weapons pre-series or to assemble the og ninja considering no one’s trying to steal them
Also if Garmadon wasn’t evil then he wouldn’t have gone to Chen, intercepted Wu’s love letter, and eventually married Misako, so Lloyd doesn’t exist
Season two as a whole doesn’t happen
Neither does season three
Chen still exists tho. Presumably the serpentine wars would still occur as they did more or less as they did in canon
However, since the ninja have had no reason to be brought together, they meet for the first time during the tournament of elements (assuming they all unlock their true potentials on their own at some point prior to this)
Chen’s plan doesn’t work because Lloyd didn’t exist to free the serpentine, so no Pythor to make the spell permenant
Since Garmadon didn’t go off to study under Chen, either Wu never took Morro in, or Morro was trained by both brothers. Either way, I imagine his story to have a softer end in this au
Regardless, Lloyd doesn’t exist so there’s not a green ninja (and probably not even a ninja team at all at this point), and even if Morro did die vengeful, he wouldn’t be out and about considering Chen’s army failed on their own and Garmadon didn’t have to open the portal to the Cursed Realm
Someone could still have found Nadakhan’s teapot and freed him, but he would’ve just got his crew back and then gone back to Djinnjago, minding his own business and moving on with his life considering s5 didn’t happen and Nya didn’t kill the Preeminent and Djinnjago didn’t fall as a consequence
Season seven still happens tho!! In the sense that the time twins are here and causing problems on purpose, at least. We still don’t have a ninja team tho. I propose that Wu still loses that fight against Acronix and the disturbances in time cause concern across ninjago, leading the elemental alliance (that still formed in s4 (with Nya instead of Lloyd) to come together to figure shit out. The plot still mostly happens but since none of them know Wu, no one finds him and he just kinda dies (or Garmadon comes to rescue him and then joins the elemental master sin order to get the time blade to save his brother). Uhhhhh stuff plays out mostly the same except Garmadon gets lost to the time stream instead of Wu maybe
None of the elemental masters really know or care about Garmadon so they say some nice words about his sacrifice and move on with their lives
Seasons eight and nine don’t happen for an abundance of reason (removal of Harumi’s origin story, Garmadon ever being evil, and the Great Devourer ever existing in the first place)
The Oni still cause problems on purpose tho, but without any active FSM family members, the gang just kinda suffers. Maybe the og4 learned about the tornado of creation at some point, maybe Wu’s around to tell them about it now, whatever, we’re gonna assume they figured something out and the world didn’t end
Ok, so the ninja team consists of Kai, Nya, Jay, Cole, Zane, and a revolving door of other elemental masters that pull up from time to time (I like to think Skylor and Karlof are permanent members, but that’s just me). The squad is minding their own business
Because they haven’t been a proper team that long, they don’t have the same burn out they do in canon, and thus never release Aspheera out of sheer boredom, thus season eleven doesn’t happen
Prime Empire my beloved, she remains almost entirely intact unless I’m just missing something
Season thirteen also still happens
The Island doesn’t because neither Wu nor Misako are characters that have much presence in this au
Seabound still happens I think
Crystallized does not (refer to title of this post)
DR still happens -ish (since Lloyd never existed, the details are a bit iffy, but all the major conflicts still occur besides that)
And that’s on me still being awake and brainrotting legos at 2am
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Ramikadyc
Ramikadyc: commando state of mind
Rating: 18+ (minors take a hike)
Warnings: FLUFF, grief, mentions of loss, blood mention (blink and you'll miss it), some musings
Word count: ~1K
Pairing: (eventually!!!) Din Djarin x F!reader
Summary: Two Mandalorians talk about loss
A/N: Hey babes! This is part of the #mandomay2021 prompt list. This was 15, so I'm still off, but I have more time tomorrow! Sorry, I always get so busy on the weekends. I'm moving house, so it's been kind of crazy. Also, may get sexy next time. I know it's been pretty tame. This is mostly fluff though. Enjoy 💕
Masterlist | Atin | Ad'ika
Let me know if you want to be tagged!
You were firmly planted in the passenger seat, and you were trying your best not to pout. Din had a million complaints about your ship, and the creature comforts you had allowed yourself. You had only managed to sneak your bedroll on board, before he had hustled you back to his ship, and prepared to take off.
In return for the cartel leaders, Dune had gotten you another lead. A big lead. Toydaria, despite aligning with the Galactic Republic, had become a prime area for holdouts. Imperials had been messing with the locals, and when the New Republic had gotten wind of it, they'd all but dismissed the concerns.
Regardless of the implications for the denizens of the Republic, it meant that you and Din were free to chase down the rumors yourselves.
You thrummed your fingers against your knee, the cloth soft under your skin. And again, your mind wandered to what freedom you had. Freedom to hunt down the animals still loyal to the Empire. Freedom to show your face, and bare your heart to the man you loved. Freedom to choose your next strike.
Your mind settled on Din, and you considered his sacrifices. It seemed he was trapped behind them, and you wished he could taste freedom as well. After Toydaria, you'd suggest a trip back to Dagobah. His thoughts seemed much quieter after seeing his son.
"How was your covert?" You asked him, the silence shattering around you. He tossed you a quizzical look over his shoulder.
Even now you saw how much he gave. The Crest had automation, and could navigate itself. But, Din was controlling the ship through space. He'd told you earlier that he didn't think the Crest's system would hold up to the meteor belt you were going through.
"Ramikadyc. You know, very militant. We learned many forms of fighting, and survival. But, it wasn't bad. It gave me structure. I was very thankful for it, they saved me." He lamented, not for the first time. You had to admit, they had raised Din well. He embodied Ramikadyc more than anyone you had ever met. Resilient and confident, nearing arrogance. His experience was similar, but so different to your own.
Your clan was a matriarch. Your father was off fighting more than he was home. Once he left, and never returned. You were an adept fighter, to be sure, but your buir had wanted you to be strong in every way. “This was the way,” she had told you while teaching you to stand up for the oppressed. “This is the way,” she had told you while making sure you knew the systems that mandalorians were welcome in. This was her way, a different way to Din's covert, but the same ideas supported them. To make a new generation stronger.
"What about you, ad’ika? What was your clan like?" He asked, stealing another glance at you. You wondered how you looked in the low light of space, the briefest illuminations glancing off stray meteorites. You wondered if he truly found you beautiful like this.
“Different, but the same. Less militant, but insistent all the same. It was up to my buir, and it was only my brothers and I.”
“You never speak of them.” He reminded you, softly. You closed your eyes and willed the last images away. Blood soaked stones, dented durasteel, and echoes of screams ringing through the halls.
“They were younger than me.” You told him, talking as softly as he had. “Full of wonder and life. I had to flee the covert. I didn’t have anything, except a ship and armor for some time. They had insisted that our buir get the ship. There were two of them, twins. I...miss them constantly.”
“I was an only child. I cannot imagine your grief. I’m sorry you lost everyone, mesh’la.” He had switched the navigation system on to give you his full attention, and now he reached out. His skin was smooth on yours, his gloves had done their job. You relished this time with him, unsuited, so you could feel and see all of him.
“Thank you, Din. I know you have had your fair share of grief.” He nodded tightly, and squeezed your hand.
“You should rest, it’ll be boots down as soon as we get there.” He leaned closer and pecked you. It was chaste, but his familiar scent filled your nose. Always smoky, like a campfire, and leather. You wanted to take him back to the bedroll, and wear yourself out on him. You feared you’d never get rest on your own.
You didn’t offer, though, You knew his answer. He’d purse his lips, as if in thought, and then gently decline. He’d blame the ship’s controls, but you knew that he could easily switch to automatic controls. You wondered if this had anything to do with his earlier behavior.
Giving Din a smile, you turned and slipped downstairs. You passed by the weapons, and grimaced knowing the darksaber was in there. Din had seemed...scared. You had never seen it before, his fear. But it had charged the air when the darksaber was out. As if the sword were feeding on the negative energy. You blanched, now hidden from your lover, to think that he was losing even a part of himself to something he wanted no part of.
As you curled into bed, you wondered, not for the first time, if Bo-Katan would take it easy on Din. If she would fight without gusto, knowing that Din didn’t want to do it at all. You’d heard the story, Din had told you, him offering the darksaber, yielding to Bo-Katan. Was it hubris that stopped her? She would be hunting him down, looking for the saber. It would be best if they stayed away from Grogu, so Bo-Katan would have no leads to him.
You closed your eyes, and tried to quiet your mind. Meditation was a lost art on you, so counting bantha it was. You barely registered it when you felt strong arms encircle you.
#the mandalorian#mandomay2021#mando x you#mando x reader#mando x fem!reader#mando x f!reader#din djarin#din djarin x you#din djarin x female reader#din djarin x f!reader#star wars#Star Wars fic
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S5E13 “THE HEART, PART 2″:
I’m not expecting much.
Okay, that’s a good use of Hey Adora.
Everything is going very badly in the fight and presumably in the writer’s room.
Good use of Angella, could probably have been expanded.
Glimmer is best non-Entrapta girl. Like seriously Noelle WE COULD HAVE HAD IT ALLLLLLL
Plot twist: as soon as the chip network goes down Catra becomes more of an asshole again and the sanitisation of her character turns out to have been an aftereffect of her time in the hive mind instead of just character development being super rushed and unconvincing.
Horde Prime’s villainous breakdown is good, it has to be said.
Bow gets a great rousing speech.
FOR ETHERIA AND GLIMMADORA!
Shadow Weaver’s big bonding moment is forced and bad and shitty and I kind of hate it. At least she dies, though. [clock goes JUST]
Watching Horde Prime have a very bad day is almost making up for this season being such a letdown. Like, the action and the moments not related to Catra and Adora are overall fairly strong,
This fight has more reversals than a bad pay-per-view.
"I made a life, friends” YOU BUILT AN EMPIRE ON STOLEN CHILDREN AND APPARENTLY THIS IS
I like Horde Prime’s swan dive off the deep end.
S5 stop trying to make glimbow work. It’s not gonna work. You had to have known that. Even their voice actors knew it.
“You’ve never given up on anything in your life, not even me” you guys really did fucking forget everything after S1 didn’t you
and the power of clumsy forced ships literally saves the day because noelle is super-devoted to just letting us down
I like how the only time this season committed to having one character actually be angry at another for something bad they did it’s the person who did the least bad things for the best reasons and the person being angry is the show’s biggest cinnamon roll, really makes me wish we could have gotten a good season instead of whatever the fuck this was.
also no hordak get away from my fucking wife you are my asshole neighbour who deals drugs and nothing else
Glimmer’s reunion with her long-lost father is skated over in seconds for Catra’s sake, it’s very clear who Noelle’s favourite character is and that really comes through in the writing.
It’s a genuine shame that the good writing and animation and art direction is in service of a season where the relationship it’s supposed to be built around is
ridiculously clumsy and rushed, and
has never been the beating heart of this show no matter what noelle says
Razz out of fucking nowhere! You were useless this season but at least your voice actress got a cheque on the nail.
So that was S5. I didn’t hate it as much as my colleagues @freezingmyblitzballs or @etherianfrigatebird or @ladylazuli97 or @athetos but it absolutely did not sell me on Catra and Adora’s relationship and that’s a problem when it’s supposed to be the key thing of the season. The bits that worked were not the bits that it really needed to get to work.
Like, this could have been salvaged. More time, better development, or equal time, less shipping. Catra’s redemption arc absolutely was not given time to breathe, and afterwards Catra feels like she’s had all her rough edges just sanded off by the red string. Her resentment of Adora vanishes, she never builds a life for herself outside Adora except for Adora’s new friends, she just loses a lot of her personality outside of a few snarky comments because there wasn’t time to seriously explore her working to become a better person, it just sort of happened.
But instead we got what felt like questionable fanfiction that someone snuck into the writer’s room instead of an actual draft that would do the characters justice. Props to whoever went to the wire defending Scorfuma though.
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byleth/edelgard
c-s support + paired ending + night of the ball
c (i)
Edelgard: Uhh… Agh... Fath... Save... E: … E: Who could that be? E: Is that...a ghost? E: A ghost, perhaps? No, that is surely not the case. >We are within a monastery! No ghost would dare set foot in here... >What is that look upon your face? I am no ghost, if that is what was on your mind! E: No… Agh... Huh?! Who's there?! E: Professor… What are you doing here? >I heard something.
E: Oh? Perhaps I was talking in my sleep.
>I was restless.
E: What could that possibly mean?
E: In any case, please don't scare me like that.
>Bad dreams?
E: Ah… So you heard me, then. E: Yes, it was a nightmare. I've had them since I was a child. E: Stupid, pointless dreams I can't control… It's terribly frustrating.
>What are they about?
E: Just...my childhood. A time before I had realized who I was destined to become.
>Anything I can help with?
E: No. They're just worthless dreams of the past. Talking about it won't change a thing.
>You can trust me with anything.
E: I had a feeling you'd say that. I suppose I could try...
>It's none of my business.
E: Perhaps not. Still, here you are. Maybe I can trust you with this... E: But only if you swear not to tell a soul. E: I appreciate it. E: I dream of...my older brother, paralyzed, helpless…my older sister crying for help that never came…the youngest babbling words beyond meaning. E: I see my family dying slowly, waiting in the darkest depths for a glimmer of light. E: I once had ten siblings, eight older and two younger. E: Such a large family, and yet I became the heir to the throne. Do you know why? E: Every last one of them was crippled by disease or lost their mind or died. E: I was the only one left who could inherit the throne.
>That's awful. >How could such a thing happen...
E: Things kept getting worse. The darkness kept getting darker. In the end, I was the only one who survived. E: The nightmares are a reminder...to never forget. To never allow such terrible things to happen again. E: Never again... E: Even now, I'm the only one who can carry the weight of the Adrestian Empire. E: The future of the Empire...of everything…depends on me. E: Hm... I shared more than I intended to. I suppose there's something in the air tonight. E: I've never told anyone about my past before. Please...forget I said anything. Sleep well, my teacher.
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c (ii)
E: Ah, it's you. Out late again, I see. What brings you here?
>I could ask you the same.
E: I just wanted some fresh air. There's a lovely breeze tonight.
E: I always wander outside when sleep evades me.
>Trouble sleeping?
E: Is it that obvious?
E: I despise being cooped up when sleep evades me. I just have to get some fresh air.
>I couldn't sleep either.
E: So I see. Still, it's ill-advised to stay up so late.
>I'm exhausted.
E: Heh, I see. Well, don't let me keep you. Hurry back to your room, my teacher.
E: I should get some sleep too, but... E: Have you ever felt a sort of longing for the outdoors? E: I have. There are times I long for the warmth of the sun, for a sweet breeze on my face... E: Do you remember what I told you the other night? About...my past? E: None of my siblings had a chance to lead the sort of life they deserved. An ordinary life.
>Should I say I forgot? You asked me to forget...
E: Hm. Well, perhaps if I tell you more, it will come back to you.
>I remember.
E: My siblings and I were... We were imprisoned underground, beneath the palace. E: The objective was to endow our bodies with the power of a Major Crest. E: I have always possessed the Crest of Seiros, inherited through the Hresvelg bloodline. E: But it was only a Minor Crest, and most of my siblings bore no Crest at all. E: In order to create a peerless emperor to rule Fódlan, they violated our bodies by cutting open our very flesh. E: Now here I stand, the fruit of that endeavor: Edelgard von Hresvelg! E: But that came at too high a price... The others were sacrificed. E: Ours weren't the only lives devastated by that terrible process. Innocents died as well, without even knowing what they were dying for. E: And there you have it, the truth of the Hresvelg's Empire.
>Who is to blame?
E: The prime minister and his gaggle of nobles. They had the Empire under their thumbs. My father, the emperor, tried to stop him, but...it was futile.
E: My father was nothing but a puppet on a string by then. He was powerless to save us.
E: I know how it all sounds. But when you see my true strength, you will know I speak the truth.
>It's unbelievable.
E: It is. But when you see my true strength, you will know that I speak the truth.
E: I have kept it hidden all this time, but...I will reveal to you the power of my second Crest. E: It is the same as yours...the Crest of Flames. When it manifested for me, I swore a silent oath. E: For the sake of my family and for all the poor souls whose lives were traded for my existence... E: For their sake, I will build a world where such meaningless sacrifice is never again sanctioned. As emperor, I will change the world. I swear it.
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b
E: Ugh… I'm so sick of it all. E: There is so much to be done, yet all I encounter are new problems and pitfalls. E: Ugh... Sometimes I wish I could spend just one day doing absolutely nothing and gorging myself on sweets!
>This isn't like you.
E: Even I have moments of self-indulgence, you know.
>Such are the burdens of an emperor.
E: You sound just like Hubert. Am I not allowed a fleeting moment of self-indulgence?
>Let's do just that.
E: Do you mean it? Just the thought makes me happy.
E: But...Hubert would never allow it.
>That's too bad.
E: Indeed. It may not be possible now, but one day we will know the joys of idling. Mark my words.
>...
E: Is that a smirk I spy? Is it so amusing to you, me daydreaming of free time?
>It's pretty funny.
E: I see. I'm finally getting an idea of what you think of me.
>You misunderstand me.
E: Huh! Your silly grin says otherwise.
E: But let's put all that aside for now. There is something I've been meaning to tell you. E: I'm afraid this might sound a bit...sentimental. However... E: I want to thank you. Because of you, I feel I can walk my fated path without losing myself. E: If I were alone, I might have lost perspective and become a harsh leader with a heart of ice. E: But I'm not alone. With you by my side, I'm somehow free to be not only a leader but...simply Edelgard. (pre-skip) E: But you came back to me. With you by my side, I'm somehow free to be not only a leader but...simply Edelgard. (post-skip)
>I'm glad.
>You have many allies.
E: True. I am fortunate to be surrounded by many wonderful companions.
E: Nevertheless, you are...different from the rest. E: Until now, no one has been able to surpass me—much less command me. E: I have always been seen as an untouchable princess or emperor. E: No one spoke to me as an equal or met my gaze without flinching. E: It was lonely. Terribly lonely. The only person I could rely on as I tried to claw my way out of the darkness was myself. E: But you...you have been a brilliant light. Somehow, you have chased the darkness away. And for that...I will always be grateful.
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a
E: Yes? Oh! It's you, Professor. I was certain it was Hubert coming to drag me back to my duties. E: "Your Majesty, you must know your supreme talents are needed at present. Why not gaze at these documents instead of the sky?"
>That sounds like Hubert.
E: Doesn't it? And the worst part is that he's always right, so I can't even argue with him.
>That didn't sound like Hubert at all.
E: No? Well then. And here I thought my Hubert impression was second to none.
E: But that's enough about Hubert for the moment. E: While I have your attention, I'd like to thank you for your help in that last battle. E: As you well know, I'm perfectly capable of commanding the army by myself. E: However, when you're around, it's somehow different. E: I'm not sure I can properly explain it. I suppose your perspective on the battlefield is simply sharper than mine. E: When you're devising tactics and tricks for us, it's almost as though you can read the enemy's mind. E: There's no getting around it. Your talent for strategy far exceeds my own. I'm quite jealous in all honesty.
>You have many talents that I lack.
E: Is that a fact? Well, if you insist.
>Sometimes, I'm jealous of you too.
E: I suppose a flower from another's field is always more beautiful.
E: I'll admit, I think of you as rather detached, so to hear that you have emotions such as jealousy is...something of a relief.
>I'm not detached.
E: Oh, but you are! Don't even try to argue.
E: But I suppose I'm much the same. I've also distanced myself from the ordinary world.
>I could say the same of you.
E: I can't deny it. Ever since I underwent those...procedures, I've certainly distanced myself from the ordinary world.
E: It seems we were fated to be friends. E: Friends... That word somehow doesn't seem adequate. E: Besides, we've been friends for a long time, you and I. By now, we're so much more than that, at least in my mind. E: You know...instead of Edelgard, you can call me just El. If you so please. E: That's what my parents and closest sisters used to call me when I was little. E: Now there's no one left who calls me El... E: But with you, well...I think I could allow it. In fact, it would mean a great deal to me.
>Why is that?
>Why? Hmm...
E: Well, you have stood beside me and shared my burdens. As I said, you are much more than a friend.
E: In truth, you are like family to me. I suppose that's why.
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s
E: The children of the goddess have been defeated at last. The shape of the world will be forever changed. E: Humanity is free now. The world is ours once again. E: Can you believe it?
>I'm not sure.
E: I see. Well, one thing is certain. The fate of this world depends on the choices we make.
E: It's possible that people would have been happier continuing to mindlessly obey the goddess.
E: Our work is far from over. And we can't ignore the possibility that our enemies will resurface one day.
>It isn't over yet.
E: True. There is still much to be done.
E: We can't ignore the possibility that our enemies will resurface one day. In the end, the fate of this world depends on the choices we make.
E: I don't know what the future holds, but...come what may, will you stay by my side? E: You chose to protect me at the Holy Tomb. Will you choose me again? E: What I'm trying to say is...I need you.
>El... Please accept this gift.
E: You called me El. That's... I... That means more than I can say. E: And this ring... It's lovely. Thank you, my dearest friend. I will happily accept it. E: I must admit, I feared my feelings would be unrequited. E: So long as I had you by my side, it never mattered how many enemies I amassed. You were all I needed. E: All this time, I longed to share my feelings with you, and it seems you wished for the same. E: Now, our wishes have come true. This feeling... it's overwhelming.
>I promise to always be there for you.
E: I promise the same. Together, we can achieve anything.
>Now, your burdens are mine to bear.
E: Absolutely not—I won't allow it! From now on, we face the world and carry our burdens together.
E: We will crush those who slither in the dark and restore peace and order to Fódlan. E: I will then find a suitable successor and hand over the reins of the Empire. E: When all that is done, it will be just the two of us. I look forward to starting our life together in the light of a glorious new dawn.
>That seems a lifetime away.
E: It will be a long and difficult path, I'm afraid, but we must remain focused on our goals.
>Let's make it happen.
E: Yes, that is all we can do for now. We must remain focused on our goals.
E: To think that I may truly call you my partner and equal now... E: The solitary reign of Edelgard has come to an end. From now on, we walk this path together. E: With time and care, the darkness shrouding this world will be lifted. E: You and I will become the light that shines over Fódlan...just as you have shined upon my life.
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paired ending
Byleth and Edelgard ended the tyranny of a godlike being. Byleth was wounded and lost a the power of the progenitor god, but it mattered not, as he/she and Edelgard had each other. To ensure lasting peace, the two fought against those who slither in the dark, and to ensure a society where people can rise and fall by their own merits, they spent their lives reforming the antiquated class system. They achieved much in their time together, and it is said that they were sometimes spotted leaving the palace to privately enjoy the world they had created. How they spent those precious moments, none but the two of them will ever know.
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night of the ball
E: Ah, here you are. Are you waiting for someone?
>I'm not waiting for anyone.
E: Good. I would not wish to interrupt anything.
>I was waiting for you.
E: For me? Well, you should have summoned me earlier. Regardless, here I am.
>Has something happened?
E: No, nothing in particular. In fact, that's why I came here. E: This place, the Goddess Tower... It was special to my parents. E: My father attended the Officers Academy himself. A few years after graduating, he was crowned emperor. E: One day, during a visit to the monastery, he snuck into the Goddess Tower on a nostalgic whim. E: And there she was, my mother. She had just enrolled in the academy that very year. E: They were instantly drawn to each other. Love at first sight, you could say. It was the first time either had truly been in love...or so the story goes.
>Their first love?
E: Yes. Of course, as emperor, my father had already married for political reasons.
E: As the Empire demands many heirs, he also had numerous other lovers. E: In the end, my mother settled for becoming one of his many consorts. E: But I choose to believe there was genuine love between them.
E: Heh, I suppose it's a silly story to cling to.
>It's a lovely story.
E: Isn't it? It's a shame that the lovely stories ended after I was born.
E: For as long as I can remember, my mother had already been exiled from the capital.
E: It's strange. Something about you makes me reveal all of the things I so carefully keep concealed.
E: Hmm. For some reason, I feel compelled to tell you all of these things I have kept hidden.
>Who was your first true love?
E: I can't say the name, but it was a noble who I met in the Kingdom, a lifetime ago.
E: Anyway... What about you? It's your turn to reveal some long-held secret! E: You can share a story about your past...or perhaps tell me about your first love.
>I have no such stories.
E: You're telling the truth. I can tell. Hm... I wasn't even able to make you blush.
>Please don't ask that of me.
E: You realize that just makes me more curious than ever!
>Sorry...
E: Heh... No, I'm the one who should apologize. It wasn't my intention to pry. E: I'm just intrigued by you and your mysterious past. E: You have supposedly always been a mercenary, but I believe there is more to your story than that... E: Let's leave it there for today and return to the ball. E: There must be plenty of students hoping to talk with you...and to dance with you. E: I would not wish to prevent you from mingling. I cannot keep you all to myself, after all.
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Crossover Idea Transformers/Voltron
So, another idea. Boy- today is the night of story ideas. I’m totally writing an oneshot about this, probably in german.
This one is about Voltron, yk rainbow paladins, flying giant robot-lions and fighting some aliens as a big robot-angel. And the transformers, yk big robos who can transform in cars and such stuff. But the storyline is from the new Voltron serie of Netflix.
Anyway. So, Primus has the Primes, his warriors, so who says, that his brother, Unicron (chaos himself) can’t have fighters too? And I imagine, that even if Primus and Unicron are trillions of years old, are still brothers and they still care about each other and all that. Even when they are fighting. So, if anyone has seen Transformers Prime, the serie, Megatron was a servant of Unicron. And after all this shit happend, Unicron realised, that you can’t rule with hate and fear and all the bad stuff. So he talks with Primus, (Primus a proud bro, that he finally sees his mistakes) and they search for a candidate. But nobody is good enough and time flys by. Cybertron is in peace, Megatron came back and is now friend with Team Prime.
(Probalby should also mention, that Unicron’s earth is not the earth of Voltron... yk. It has similarities, but the humans of Unicron are much stronger and all like that. Like a super soldier.)
In meanwhile the Galras take over the KNOWN univers. You see the capital letters? KNOWN UNIVERSE. They have no idea about Primus/Cybertron and Unicron and all that. The bots and cons and all my robos are living in peace, absolut bliss and stuff... until a girl lands on a near planet. Naturally they notice and find her in a escape capsule from the Galra. She isn’t even human anymore, almost all limbs are replaced with a ‘high-tech’ protese. But worse, she’s dying. The bots/cons, (like they are in groups but one race? I’m just calling them bots, like for every race, decepicons and all the ones) can’t do much, they could heal her, if she would be totally a robot/machine, but she still needs blood and food and yeah. So Optimus goes to the core of Primus, because he knows, she is important. He can feel it. (spooky)
Primus heals her, makes her fully human again but he knows, that she’s the one. The warrior of Unicron. (And Primus, but that comes later) And from the timeline... she’s from earth, like Voltron earth in the year 10 or something. Like in the middle of the Romain Empire. She was kidnapped by Galra, because why not. And they are assholes. Most of them.
So now this girl, Diana, lives on Cybertron. She draws her energy from Primus, so she can live with the bots. She becomes friends with everyone, but her favourite is Predaking. (Is like the kindest girl but absolut badass. A little bit naive, but still cute) They have a father/daughter relationship and it’s just fluff. But one day, she dies. Team Prime went on a mission and because Diana can fight, she went with them. Predaking is mad and doesn’t want to belive that she’s dead. So again, she was brought to the core of Primus. Primus could save her, but now is the time, she becomes his brother’s warrior. He tells Predaking of his plans. Predaking just wants her to life, so he sacrificed himself for Diana. Diana becomes a bot/predacon. Unicron gives her some of his powers and since Primus transformed her, she’s now also a Prime. And because of that, Primus creates a new star saber, Unicron too. Diana, now bearing the name Predaqueen to honor her ‘father’, united the two swords and became the first CRON (A Unciron warrior) and a PRIME. So her name is now Predaqueen Prime.
When she comes back to the surface, everyone is losing their shit. But after some time they can accept, that she’s not Diana anymore, she’s Predaqueen, a leader, a fighter, a warrior.
Megatron becomes the second Cron, names himself Megacron and is like the right hand of Predaqueen. She improves the whole army of Cybertron, becomes an ambassador, unites the two races of Primus and Unicron and is the voice of the gods/primordal beings or what ever they are. Everyone knows, there will be a fight, and they need to be prepared.
So yeah, fast forward to the Voltron serie. Primus and Unicron tell Predaqueen that soon Voltron will be activated, so she needs to be prepared. She goes to earth (Voltron earth), goes to the Garrison and meets Shiro there. (Totally not a hint to her ship. Can you feel the sarcasm? Anyway) Her name is Diana Prime and she’s the best pilot, becomes a professor? instructor? Idk what the name is, she’s teaching the kids, while Shiro prepares for his mission. Totally sexual tension there (she’s an ancient warrior, but not dead), totally Keith losing his absolut patience, like everybody else. Before Shiro is leaving, the sneaky boy (Keith) forces them to kiss. (He’s grounded but it was totally worth it) There are some cheesy farwell words, Diana tells him to be careful. She knows, this is the start of Voltron, and it’s not going to be nice.
Diana looks after Keith, she promised it Shiro after all and is still teaching. (there are totally many of the students crushing on her.) (Is the look important? Because, I imagine her as a tall woman, slim but athletic, her hair ridiculous long and bronze broun, with blue and violett streaks. Her eyes are golden and she has tattoos on the shoulders, the sign of predacons. (like there where all the bots have their marks/signs.) On her back are all symbols of all the races of Cybertron, in the middle the sign of Unicron and Prime.) Ugh-
Anyway. She meets the next paladins of Voltron and can only sigh. She took Keith under her wing, teached him some moves so he’s a little bit prepared, but the rest? Pidge is alright, she’s a smart girl. Hunk will do okay. But Lance? Oh boy- He’s totally like Knockout, he wont take it seriously until some one dies or is hurt. And then it’s most times to late.
When the three sneak out to rescue Shiro, Diana just watches with a smile. She waites until the next morning. And I can totally see this scene.
Keith talks with Shiro about his time in the galaxy and then Shiro says:
“How did you know to come save me when I crashed?” And Keith answers, “You should come see this.” They walk to his house, until Shiro stops.
“Wait, Keith- what... what about Diana?” Keith smiling softly and walking backwards.
“If you want, I can call her. She’ll be glad you’re back.”
Ugh, soft Shiro-
Anyway
The five find the blue lion, Shiro or better Keith forgets to call Diana and when he remebers, he’s somewhere in the universe. They form Voltron, kick for the first time Galras ugly ass and begin to train. Some days after Diana stands before the castle, Allura panicking, because this is a human and-
“Shiro, darling, we need to talk about your disappearance in the fucking universe.” Lance, Hunk and Pidge are confused, because that’s General Prime? In the universe?
Shiro tries to explain everything, but Diana/Predaqueen just smiles adn tells him, she knows already. He’s naturally confused and then she tells him about her mission, who she is and all that. He has a big mindblow but is happy, that Diana is back. Some fluff, because why not and Diana decides to tell the team.
“I am a Cron and a Prime.” Everybody is just blinking, because she says it like it explains everthing. With a smile, she connects herself with the castle and shows the story of Unicron and Prime.
“And then I became a warrior of Primus and Unicron, their voice and the leader of their children. They sent me on this mission, to watch over Voltron, over you and nudge you in the right direction.” Again some blinking, until Lance speaks up.
“So, you are basically another Voltron? And there is a whole planet of Voltrons like you?” Pidge facepalms, while Keith sighes. Coran has stars in his eyes, while Allura is glad, that others fight with them.
“No. Every bot has his own mind, they are like humans, but instead of flesh, blood and a heart, they have metal, enagon and a spark. The Primes, Optimus and I, and the Crons, Megacron and I, are the strongest. We lead the Cybertrojans in war, we are the voice of Primus and Unicron.”
So now the storyline is pretty much the same, Predaqueen is with Allura in the castle, when Voltron fights, because she’s their secret weapon. When they fight in the centre of the Galra Imperium, Predaqueen transforms for the first time. She’s normally as big as Voltron, but transformed as a predacon probably five times so big. She activates the space bridge and calls all the other predacons (her people, Shockwave cloned a few more and Primus also created new sparklings) They attack the Galra force, completly surprise them but still don’t win. Voltron barley escapes, but Predaqueen detransforms and attacks the wive of Zarkon, Honerva. She know’s that many will die and the universe will probably be destroyed, if she doesn’t kill her. Honerva goes nearly mad, this beast just attacks them? To be a bit dramatic, Predaqueen summons the presence of Unicron. She’s in her bot-form, but in human size. She glows with pure power, everything near her just dies, explodes and is destroyed. In her hand is the dark star sable, pulsing with chaos and death. Unicron totally roasting the Galras, calling them petty beings and such. Honerva is killed and you would think, the Galras would stop now, but no. Lotor is wants revenge. So he still takes over the Galra Imperium and builds this ships. But this time Megacron is making his life pure hell. Ah, so Lotors new ships are made out of a rare komet or what ever? Hmm, Megacron has the enagon of Uncrion and that’s chaos himself. Bitch, wanna try again?
So now Voltron is freeing the known universe, while Predaqueen helps. In the end, Cybertron is revealed, the Cybertrojans are now like the green lanterns? Keeping peace in the universe, because they are the ‘children’ of Prime and he’s creation himself. (I think so... or did I understand something wrong?) Voltron is still active, but now a symbol of peace and union.
Shiro and Diana/Predaqueen love each other dearly, but she still outlives him, sees how her family grows, how her children have grandchildren and so on. But still, Shiro will be her only lover, just because fluff. And basically the reason of this crossover? Because I think he deserved better.
Yikes... ugh, so if someone wants to write a story about this... I don’t mind, just tag me so I can read it and also reblogg it.
I didn’t second read it, it’s almost midnight and yeah... if something doesn’t make any sense, I’m swiss.
Masterlist
#voltron#shiro#keith#lance#hunk#pidge#coran#allura#lions#rainbow#galra imperium#overpowered s/o#because why not#transformers#transformers prime#primus#unicron#earth#rebellion#fights#just epic stuff#fluff#predaking#predaqueen#optimus prime#megatron#new story idea#crossover#justhugefangirl writes {🥀}#justhugefangirl creates {🌹}
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the amazing she-ra 5
i am LOVING this first episode. they’re TRULY the underdogs now. people are hiding with magic. they live in tents. they’ve lost their edge. they’re actually leaning into the horrors of war now
Shadowweaver says OOC stupid things but it doesn’t matter because the princesses shut it down satisfactorily. Adora is weighed down by responsibility in a cool way.
Catra is staking out the enemy and weaseling her way in. (yessss)
‘You don’t need to say it! I know. I made that choice. I’m living with the consequences.’ I LOVE THIS ADORA
I LOVE THIS WRITING. Catra and Glimmer are THE greatest pair ever. Glimmer is smart enough to poke right through Catra’s defenses - and NOW they’re in the same situation - Glimmer says so - and immediately the prison wall fades away - and they’re both invited for dinner. THAT DELICIOUS WRITING
i do love how shadowweaver has been this snarky aunt for two seasons now.
Hord Prime shows us Adora in danger and Catra is like; FUCK YOU ADORA’S MINE (TO DESTROY) !!!!
I love Hord Prime’s wonderfully manipulative dinner. And I love glimmer quietly crying and I love Catra being like HRMMMM I DONT LIKE THIS. the subtle animations are so great - the close-ups
the way Catra speaks to Hord Prime - the way she’s really fuckin scared and the way Hord Prime says ‘little sister’. The way they make him seem unbeatable. I LVOE IT.
AND I LOVE THESE VISIONS FOR ADORA
jezus but how few people really live in etheria ?
the propaganda and the tech to boost prime’s image everywhere....ugh it’s delicious. im also happy Entrapta is back and on the good side instead of helping Catra be a bitch to Adora. and im glad the princesses are wary of her.
hahahaah awww Bo came to give adora breakfast and then he panics when she’s lying on the floor. I ALSO LOVE BO AND ADORA TOGETHER BEST
goddamnit Bo YAH! finally somebody who effectively protects someone from the masses. fuck off micah!
Love the princesses acting on their own - love Scorpia mediating, love mermista stepping up, love Entrapta using her .....intelligence
I love how Hord Prime manipulating Glimmer is used to show us more about his empire.
‘i only want to bring peace’ - but also i destroyed all these worlds. how is that...how is that even surface compatible?? like no attempt is made to align those two things.
wait....the heart of etheria will destroy the universe? why??? why is that the assumption. and why...does Hord Prime want that? i....
the comedy of the princesses doing a mission alone is GREAT
IM SO HAPPY THE PRINCESSES GOT TO HIT ENTRAPTA WHERE IT HURTS. now THIS is the right level of comedy versus hurt
the way scorpia rolled to cover frosta in her bulk!
i love how adora is like - HAH sleep is great actually! wow!!
because of the underlying grievances that we EXPERIENCED as audience, this friendship moment actually LANDS
I REINSTATE MY HOORAY!!! (hahahaha god i love scorpia). oh my god Micah saying he trusts glimmer’s friends to save her - fuckin hell - heart squeeze
LOOK AT THAT SHIT. LOOK AT IT!!! Glimmer being angry at Catra - but then recanting and showing vulnerability. Catra showing vulnerability by acquiescing. GOD!!!
‘why did you do it?’ OH GOD ARRGHGHHG THATS SO FUCKING PAINFUL. why does Catra scratch Adora? Because she doesn’t understand - seems to not make the effort to understand!! because she’s never understood that everybody always hurt her - she never fucking saw when it was right in front of her. THat’s even worse in a way than being hurt.
god the fuckin scale. the planet getting bombarded from space....jezus christ.
theres a hallway with light and dark at the end - its implied she goes into the dark - BECAUSE SHE INTENDS TO HIDE FROM WHO FOLLOWS HER
wow she instantly realises he’s hordak. ha!
Catra is being so open with Glimmer. She’s REALLY REALLY! off balance
they have a talking ritual!!!! THEYRE BONDING ABOUT ADORA BEING A DORK!!!!
Catra realises that nothing she was doing on Etheria had any value to her!!!! I LOVE THIS SEASON SO MUCH
I love how Adora gets to be such a badass dork this season!!!! Bo and Adora + Glimmer and Catra are the BEST COMBINATION
godDAMN they made these clones creepy. damn i LOVE Hord Prime!!!
catra/glimmer......tho.....
she pushes her onto the bed and kneels before her, holding her hands. DUDES. MY DUDES!!!! catra is they gayest cat in existence
‘do one good thing in your life!’ - oh OUCH god, you can feel the whole weight of all the hurt and injustice she’s experienced in ‘dont talk to me like you know me!’
HAHAHAHAHAHAH BO losing his mind and Adora being a hilarious himbo is SO GOOD
I LOVE CATRA’S ABSOLUTELY HEARTBREAKING ADORABLE MEMORY AND HALLUCINATIONS
‘im alway going to be your friend’ - ‘i’ll never say sorry to anybody’ GODDD
‘all i do is hurt people, there’s no one left in the entire universe who cares about me’ - a reasonable assumption based on your behaviour except for the fact that Adora has been trying to reach you for 4 FUCKING seasons with hand outstretched
THAT WAS SO FUCKING DRAMATIC I AM IN LOVE !! IN LOVE WITH THEM!!!!
are you fucking SERIOUS - ENTRAPTA MADE AN AB WINDOW IN BO’S SPACE SUIT AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA
the animation in this goddamn season is CRAZY and INCREDIBLE
I ADORE Catra the self Martyr i ADORE that she’s going to go through the wringer still in Hord Prime’s hands.
THIS SEASON IS WORTH ALL THE REST
are YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME- i HATE THAT SHIT WHY MUST YOU MAR THIS SEASON WITH AN INTERRUPTION OF AN APOLOGY. STOP IT!!! IT’S NOT FUN IT’S NOT SATISFYING IT RUINS THE MOMENT IT WEAKENS THE EMOTION BY DRAGGING IT OUT FUCK!!!!
well i guess that was pretty good with Adora. wish they had made that a little bit longer
i love entrapta. she’s such a perfect element to throw into the mix. and her connections with AI’s are great
that scorpia and swift wind talk is so beautiful. they are also the PERFECT pair. ‘gosh have you ever noticed how many moons we have here? it’s weird.’ HAHAHAHA
they’re visiting a planet that’s been conquered by Prime...
I love how they made Entrapta flirty with her tech ahahahaha
i love how Adora is like: oh??? you’re coming to me??? for emotional advice??? uhhhhhh ok haha nice
I LOVE ADORA
i love swift wind’s drunk history retelling of what’s going on on Etheria - especially his impression of shadowweaver and his batman micah
Bo sure is very bad at forgiveness himself lol
‘well im NOT! running awayy that is. i AM smart’ AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! i love you adora
Adora spewing all her bullshit about Catra to total strangers ahahaha
this was SUCH amazing teamwork!!!
AND THAT MOMENT OF SHE-RA BEING BACK!!!!
GLIMMER ACKNOWLEDGING SHE MADE A MISTAKE AND THAT BO DESERVES TO BE MAD AND MAYBE THINGS WON’T BE THE SAME AGAIN BUT SHE WON’T STOP TRYING TO MAKE IT BETTER AND SHE’LL BE THERE IF HE’S EVER READY
FUCKING TEARS BABEY
jezus christ !! that was good!!! i take it back - it was a stupid interruption (they could have just had Bo respond ‘eh’ at an attempt at apology from glimmer....maybe) but they made the final apology INCREDIBLE
‘i can’t just leave her...’ the voice acting in this is sO GOOD
Catra made her whole plan to keep Adora away from Prime based on the assumption that if Glimmer was in Prime’s hands, then Adora would come to rescue her no matter the danger. So she saved Glimmer. But SHE FAILED TO REALISE THAT ADORA WOULD DO THE SAME FOR HER AHAHAHAHAHAHAA
the amazing thing about these highly tech advanced societies is that none of them have invented security cameras
glimmer getting some ptsd flashes
I KNEW that the heart of etheria was built by the First Ones to fight Hordak. Makes Mara’s decision a bit more ---- hMMMM not as great. Because Hordak has killed countless worlds since!
the hive mind lol. jezus Prime is so terrible.
oh my god the very concepts of Prime when behind a fictional buffer are so archtypically delicious. Catra’s glowy green eyes and full bow. hohhohhohho. that uniform also looks great
so Prime could do this to everyone but he chose to surround himself with clones. goddamn.
oh damn that lean-in, those hands on her neck. hmmmhm. gay
she FLINCHES when Prime lays a hand on her shoulder. DAMN. love it
‘you will give me she-ra’ ---- isn’t that what she’s been offering all along? lol
AND THEN HE LEAVES ADORA WITH A BRAINWASHED CONTROLLED PUPPET CATRA WHO ATTACKS HER
OH ITS SO DELICIOUS
brainwashed Catra is really sexy and disturbing hahahahahaha
this fight is so well choreographed. Catra letting herself almost fall, Adora gathering her into her arms, the scratch across the back, the damn knee into the midriff (OUCH), the dangling her in turn.
‘i always hated that guy in particular - and also all the other guys i hit on the way in.’ LOLOLOLOL
THE CHEEK TOUCH - THE TEARS AND SMILE - THE GREEN EYES AND THE BACKHAND AFJLDJFDSJFLKDSJSDFKSDFJ
‘you’re such an idiot!’
‘yeah! i know!’
I LOVE THEM AAAAAAAAAAAAA ITS SO TRUE AHAHAHAHAHAHAI LOVE THEM
‘im going to take you home’
‘promise?’
NOELLE WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING TO ME
Adora watches Catra probably die and fall off into a endless pit. JUMPS IN AFTER HER ONE SECOND LATER
Prime really did miscalculate lol - his ship’s been destroyed by one stab at a server.
CATRA ALMOST DYING AND ADORA TRANSFORMING WITH GLOWY EYES GODDAMN!!!! HOLDING CATRA INTO HER ARMS BRIDAL STYLE. NEW OUTFIT!! WALKING INTO THE SHIP LIKE A BOSS. AND HEALS HER. HEY ADORA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AND SHE FUCKING
PURRS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
all the fucking crying is so good
‘I kNOW YOU ALL HATE ME!” ‘I NEVER HATED YOU’ ‘Then you’re dumber than I thought’ HAHAHAHAHA i love how Catra cannot accept Adora’s friendship because she cannot forgive herself. but Adora never fucking gets it because she has the emotional intelligence of a crab!!!! the problem is that Adora is the exact shape of Catra’s heart - which is one big open wound. And if she presses - all she does is cause hurt
Catra is so adorable looking god.....
SPINERELLA AND NETOSSA KISSED!!!!!!!! awwwwwww they’ve been so cute for so long and they only got more and more screentime and Awwwww
Not-Hordak and ‘dehydrated protein slaw’ AhAHAHAHA
how did they find us? UHHH THERES A CHIP IN CATRA’S SPINE????
ADORA TELLING CATRA WHAT’S UP!! YES! Catra in a corner. Catra on her damn KNEES. ADORA BLUSHING AT HOLDING HER HAND
their first impulse is to hold each other at the ship shaking.
CATRA IS BLUSHING LOOKING AT ADORA TRANSFORM
SHE-RA CAN LITERALLY FLY THROUGH SPACE - well. make matter from light, breathe in a vacuum, jumpt from one asteroid to another....
I AM GLIMMER IN THIS: YEAAAHHHHHH!!!!!
Catra is very lucky that her biggest likely hater is already on her side: glimmer
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO SPINERELLAAAA. what a fuckin bait and punch goddamn! making them so cute and then foreshadowing it perfectly and then BAM
CATRA IS CONFIDENT ENOUGH TO MESS WITH ADORA BY LITERALLY JUMPING INTO ADORA’S LAP
fjadslkfasdjflkadjfsja
CATRA IS
PURRING
catra is so effortlessly cool sitting in the window sill
i am actually loving that they have a not-Hordak with them. it humanises those clones a lot
this prince has farsight but they NEVER thought to recruit him BEFORE???
FUCKIN - I LOVE how spinerella and netossa have gotten so much more screentime - relevant to the plot and also revealing their characters. i wish we’d got this from the start!
well now i ship perfuma and scorpia lolololol
HAHAHAHAHA i LOVE this Seahawk and Mermista hiding behind a bar because of ex victims skjsfajfklds
Prince Peekabloo has an AMAZING design, but also he must be a fake. IT MUST BE DOUBLE TROUBLE. double trouble has TASTE
MERMISTA LOOKS SO COOL IN THAT OUTFIT - but also especially chipped and in shadows. they do love chipping people’s love interests
SCORPIA SACRIFICING HERSELF TO SAVE PERFUMA. jezus christ so much love interest drama suddenly wow
‘happy anniversary’ that is HEARTBREAKING
what a great ending to a very silly episode. that’s the balance. a last message from the last soldier standing...
‘WHY DOES SPACE HATE ME SO MUCH!?!?!’ hahahahaah
Catra’s fingers shake......
‘take it from somebody who’s defeated you guys, like, a lot’ AAHAHAHA
FINALLY CATRA IS ON THEIR SIDE TO BE THE SMARTS IN TEH ROOM
ADORA LOOKS SO BADASS IN THAT SPACESHIP CHAIR
chipping everyboddy so they’re like zombies was a great story idea.
catra upset at her signs of upset. CUTE
why the FUCK is Adora’s hair out of her spacesuit ahahahahahahaha. IM SO GLAD THAT BO AGREES WITH ME ON THE ADORABLENESS OF CATRAS HELMET HAHAHAHAHAA
catra is happy to see adora laugh again.... : ‘)
CATRA JUST CLAWED THROUGH FIVE CENTIMETERS OF STEEL????!?!?!?!
ADORA IS BLUSHING AAHAHAHAHAHAAAA
I LOVE how Catra is like, WHAT THE FUCK at having lost to these people
Entrapta trying to deal with Wrong-Hordak in existential crisis is a hilarious premise
THE ANGRIER YOU GET THE CUTER YOU ARE!!! I LOVE BO
oh wow! a first ones colony! very cool! this whole planet works against intruders and plays tricks on them. i do like how first ones are definitely like, still imperial shitlords like subtly. i love how Wrong-Hordak has a realisation arc in the background.
HOLY SHIT THIS IS CREEPY
CATRA DISARMED THIS CAT CREATURE WITH HER CUTE SNEEZE AHAHAHAHA
CATRA IS PETTING A CAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AHAHAHAHA EVERY SINGLE THING WE COULD HAVE EVER WANTED IS COMING TRUE
catra is working on not lashing out :’) <= literally adora and also me
Melog is so ADORABLE and imprinted on Catra and LOVES ADORA and AGHGHGHG
I love how Adora can make her eyes glow on command
Castaspella was blushing at Shadowweaver being so close lolololol. wow this is the first time Castaspella has been interesting. ‘and stop me, if i take the power for myself’ i love aunty shadowweaver.
AAAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAHAH WHAT HAHAAHHAAAAHA Catra notices she’s holding Adora’s hand and goes ARGGH and doesn’t just take her hand back but throws it away ahhaahaha. Adora doesn’t even respond. that was so hilarious for some reason.
GLIMMER KISSING CATRA’S CHEEK HELLO??? HELLO?????????
‘is what i would have said before i joined you. go team’ hahahaa
‘you’re wearing hooded cloaks. that’s highly suspicious’ AHAHAHAHAHA fucking meta
I LOVE HOW ADORA IS THE ‘oh god my fuckin friends blowing our cover great’ person here
MELOG IS ALREADY STEALING MUSHROOMS FOR CATRA TO EAT AHAHAHAHA I LOVE THEM
Spinerella and Netossa are so BADASS and i love their fight. it’s so deliciously painful and cool hehehehehe
so the only person im fighting here is!.....my own wife...
I LOVE THEM
spinerella is so op lololol - why did she barely do anything for them when they were still fighting hordak
wrong hordak is so fucking cute ahahahahaha
goddamn that reunion was touching and funny at the same time. and i can actually believe that Prime is having trouble with this slippery team of magic users
I love Netossa’s analysis of the princesses weaknesses. Adora: can’t act to save her life. also extreme hair envy with she-ra
BUT GLIMMER: crippling self-doubt mixed with overwhelming hubris AHAAHAHHAAHAHAHAHA
OH MY GOD SHE SPRITZED CATRA WITH WATER JFDKLDFWDSFKSDFKJLDSJFJDSFKDSLKFSDLFJLKFLKDJFLKS AHAAHAHAAHA
PERFUMA DON”T BE A BITCH TO CATRA. (even though yeah Catra did treat Scorpia bad) she’s right you need to fuckin go for the neck (this episode is gonna show us that you need to damage the chip AND get through to scorpia and it’s going to take catra and perfuma ofc)
awwwww glimmer and bo.... bo is really worried about his dad :’( . this is the first time ive found myself shipping bo and glimmer.....the way he sighs into her arms, turns his face into her neck. Yes....
AWWW CATRA AND ADORA CHALLENGING EACH OTHER AGAIN AWWWW
BO’S DADS LEFT HIM A CLUE IN A FUCKING DAD JOKE ahahaahahahahaah
perfuma is really getting on my nerves here. ‘we dont throw tanks at our friends’ uhhhh shes trying to kill you. just let perfuma get electrocuted adora
AH THEY FINALLY GIVE AN ORIGIN STORY FOR ‘GRAYSKULL’! ha! i do love how they keep elaborating on the First Ones as tyrants as well
hmm perfuma was right i guess. i didnt really like that development. urgh god perfuma is so grating lol..
i wonder how shadowweaver and catra are gonna....deal with each other....
hah. shadowweaver tries to weasel in with Adora again. but Adora won’t stand for it again....
Melog literally acts out Catra’s emotions and jumps adora playfully. hehehehe
shadowweaver is such a fucking bitch. i wonder if we’ll ever get her to admit guilt or apologise
no adora. you have to fucking defend catra to shadowweaver. THAT is what you have to do now that you can!
SHE JUST JUMPED INTO FIRE FOR ADORA
shadowweaver preying on Adora and Catra again goddddd. let this be an episode in which they finally shuck her off. Adora fucking THINK, the only reason you could transform in the first place was BECAUSE of Catra.
YEAHHHHH CATRA!!!!!!!! GETTING ALL THE INFO BEFORE ADORA GETS MANIPULATED INTO SOMETHING SHE DIDN’T CHOOSE. naturally she still chooses to do it.
Melog lies half on top of Adora while Catra watches her.... god fuckin hell Melog being an extension of Catra’s feelings is so fucking AMAZING
holy FUCK that confrontation. (i love how every confrontation between adora and catra starts in roughhousing - their language is extremely physical). this is the softer version of catra’s and adora’s dynamic. Catra loves Adora and she wants Adora to choose HER, LIFE WITH HER. ‘what do you want?’ (WHAT ABOUT ME??) But Adora always chooses some higher hero purpose over her. and she doesn’t want to watch Adora die....
‘i dont have to watch it happen...’
god fuckin hell this season.
shadowweaver BELIEVES that she did the right things - of course. and that’s fascinating. and I love that Adora finally totally truly was like: YOU RUIN PEOPLE AND I WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU. fuck yeah!
so when was the moment that Adora couldn’t become she-ra anymore? think it’s when she lost track of Catra....
I love Melog - I love how Catra cannot hide from her feelings anymore - at all.
the way glimmer asks adora ‘are you scared?’ ugh MY HEART
i love martyrs. i fucking LOVE martyrs.
oh my god hallucination Catra touching foreheads with Adora.....
EVERYTIME Glimmer just straight up shows Catra affection? that’s some good shit. i thought we were gonna have Glimmer going after Catra for her mother’s death at one point but no....not at all. and i dont mind it
GLIMMER SAID I LOVE YOU TWICE TO BO AND THEN BO SAID IT BACK AND KISSED HER DSFKSDLBJDS FOREHEAD !!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I LOVE MARA!!!
the fights this season have been SO! GOOD!
i love how they’ve set up that Glimmer is a fucking POWERHOUSE. she can turn the tide of battle in a blink!
naturally they pit Micah against Glimmer. jfc this poor family....
there is something important about Prime not remembering Mara....
SHE BEAT MICAH SHE BEAT HIM!!!! WALKING RIGHT THROUGH HIS STORM OF DARK MAGIC.
SCORPIA CRADLED BO LIKE A BABY
SHADOWWEAVER SAVING CATRA? FOR ONCE???? FOR ONCE CHOOSING CATRA OVER POWER????? FUCK THAT’S CATHARTIC EVEN IF IT WAS ONLY TO GET ADORA TO THE HEART
catra has such a soft heart really. she still, after everything, loves shadowweaver. god....
SHE SAID SHE WAS PROUD OF CATRA. SHE --- SHE - SHE SACRIFICED HERSELF. GOD THE VOICEACTING FOR CATRA WHEN SHE - ADORA FALLING TO HER KNEES. THEIR PSEUDO MOTHER... AGHLDJDWFJJDSLF
FUCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKk
EVERY SINGLE LINE IS SO GOOD, so well-acted. the ‘im ready’ the way she says ‘catra’ like she can’t take anything anymore
i couldn’t write anything for the whole rest of that i was just covering my mouth with my hands
The fuckiN KISS! the look of PURE LOVE on ADoRA”S FACE
which in the back of my head - they cannot actually cut that in any way - it’s impossible to cut
adora with those blue eyes in the blaze, the magic is beautiful adora excising prime from hordak’s mind (WOW), adora and catra touching foreheads and the slight PURR you can hear, adult bo and glimmer (lookin so nice), adult catra (LOOKING SO HANDSOME in her prom-y outfit,) Glimmer chasing Catra, just, GOD, THE UTENA FUCKING REFERENCE, the way they say they love each other, my GOD, Scorpia being like woah perfuma you look nice, MY GOD MY GOD MY GOD THEM GOING TO SPREAD MAGIC TO THE UNIVERSE GOD!!!!!!
every single thing in this season was worth 4 seasons of enjoyable, entertaining, interesting, frustrating and meh. WOAH! WOAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
#she ra#i have been BLOWN! AWAY!!! EVERYTHING WAS WORTH IT#my stuff#vidi#THiS WAS AN EXPERIENCE#OF EPIC PROPORTIONS
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Okay, hear me out: Claude/Felix backhand slap :)
VW, post Timeskip, spoilers for Blood of the Eagle and Lion.
We’re on the final stretch!
Support me: ko-fi Patreon Commissions
---
The deafening crack of skin on skin broke the quiet mourning in the camp. The Crest of Flames banners hung limp and damp from the morning dew. Felix’s panting breaths formed small clouds of fog in the chill air as the Crest of Fraldarius faded. He balled his hands into fists that trembled in time with his jaw. It spoke more to the soldiers’ surprise than discipline that no one approached to restrain him.
For their part, Byleth stood to the side, a frown pulling at their face.
Claude stood unmoved, almost heedless of the redness blooming across his face from the backhand. Sad green eyes rested in an otherwise even expression. Even though they were nearly the same height, he towered over Felix like a majestic stag in his prime while Felix panted and snarled like a wounded cub. He signalled ‘stand down’ to his guards that still hadn’t responded to the threat. He didn’t break eye contact. “Are you done?”
“You left him to die!” Felix slashed his arm between them, his Crest burning brightly a second time. “Is the Alliance not enough for you, Riegan?”
Still, Claude did not rise to meet the emotion. “He was a threat to the army. He attacked our forces and his own if they stood in his path. Attempting an alliance with Prince Dimitri would have been tactical suicide.”
“You were afraid the soldiers would follow him over you. You could never inspire the same loyalty.” When Claude didn’t respond to the acidic words, Felix ripped the gold armband off his sleeve. He threw it to the ground and added the silver earring, torn from his flesh, on top. He spat on both and turned his back, stalking off into the morning mist.
A heartbeat.
Ten.
Then Claude’s expression collapsed. He crumpled tight, his shoulders pulling in and eyes squeezed too tight for tears to slip through. He allowed himself a single, pained whimper before kneeling and scooping up Felix’s things. The bloody earring, he wrapped in the gold fabric and then he placed it all into a pouch on his belt.
Byleth put their hand on Claude’s shoulder. “Shall I go after him?”
Claude smiled, but he’d fallen back to his school days where it didn’t meet his eyes. “Thank you, my friend, but no. He’ll come back on his own, or he won’t. This is war. Sometimes we lose things no matter what we do.”
“But he’s being ridiculous!” Hilda said. Her hands were balled into fists and she shook with restrained energy. “I tried! I lost half of my battalion trying to save his idiot prince! Three soldiers died getting his body back from the Empire! You can stand there and take it, but I’m going to give him a piece of my mind!”
Claude didn’t grab her arm, didn’t have to. He gave her the lightest touch and she froze. “He’s grieving. No amount of effort on our part will have been enough, especially since I let Dedue sneak off with his body last night.”
“You what?!” Hilda howled, rounding on him.
“He would have fought our guards to the death for his liege. It was the best option I had. We couldn’t afford him hounding our convoys all the way North.” He patted Hilda’s shoulder. “And I’m proud of how you lead your people. If I’d known Dimitri was so volatile, I wouldn’t have given the order. No one could have been expected to stop him.”
Tears crept into her eyes and she turned away. “Yeah, alright, I just wanted the battle to be over as quickly as possible.”
“We don’t have a good replacement for him,” Byleth murmured.
“I know.”
“Our plans for the Old General-”
“I know,” Claude interrupted, the hurt burning in his voice. His arms shook. “I’ll figure something out. I have a whole book of contingencies for Fort Merceus.”
“Do you need to take a day?”
“Yes.” Claude laughed, throwing his head back with hysteria. “But we don’t have one.” He took a deep breath and the emotion peeled off his face like wax from a spent candleholder. “I need three, no four, wyvern messengers. Have them come to my tent in half an hour.”
If Byleth meant to press, meant to question, it never crossed their face. They simply nodded and set off deeper into the camp.
#Felix hugo fraldarius#claude von riegan#claude/felix#felaude#???#lmao#bad things happens bingo#Anonymous
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My Youth (Chapter 9)
Broken and miserable, Park Jinyoung returns to his hometown to learn that no matter how hard he falls, there are still people who think he’s a hero.
Warnings: Angst, slow build, maybe some language. (Please don’t ask when I’ll update. Wait until the series is finished to read if you’re impatient.)
Word Count: 6.5k+
(Can’t put links to the other parts here, please check my Masterlist/the reblog for the Prologue and previous chapters)
When you finally awoke in the strange bedroom, it was bright outside and you had a hangover.
Your mind was fuzzy and you were relieved that Mrs. Park was organized and caring enough to always keep extra toiletries in the guest bathroom. You brushed your teeth and tried to make yourself look halfway presentable before you walked downstairs. Mrs. Park was setting breakfast on the dining table. She beamed when she saw you.
“Good morning, dear! Jinyoung told me that you spent the night here. Did you sleep well?”
“I did,” you lied, stifling a yawn. You really hadn’t. You had tossed and turned in bed all night thinking about Jinyoung and his hints at affection for you before finally falling into an exhausted and fitful slumber at dawn. You glanced around and spotted Mr. Park watching television in the living room. “Is everyone else still in bed?”
Mrs. Park shook her head. “No, they’re all up. Jaebum and Jinyoung went out to Jaebum’s car to collect some things and poor Yugyeom is driving away the reporters. There are more of them today.”
You frowned. The reporters were going to become a serious problem if Jinyoung kept refusing to issue a public statement or give them an interview. They would only grow more determined and desperate to get him to talk. You wondered if you should try and convince him to just sit down for one interview so that they would relax with the harassment.
Mrs. Park was struggling with the breakfast plates and you rushed to take them out of her hands. You were setting them on the table when Jaebum and Jinyoung entered the house with two large boxes.
“-you’re honestly lucky you got such a good deal,” Jaebum was saying. “When you need to sell real estate at such short notice then you often have to compromise on the value. But your apartment was in such a prime location that there were plenty of people ready to take it for instant cash.”
Jinyoung rolled his eyes. “People would kill for a view of the Han River, huh?”
“Yeah. You never told me what you want to do about your cars, though. I can have them shipped over here if you want.”
Jinyoung set down one of the heavy boxes he was carrying and rubbed the back of his neck with a sigh. “Maybe leave them in the garage for now. I’d look stupid driving those luxury cars around this town. But I can’t bring myself to sell them just yet.”
“Think about it and let me know, I know a guy in Seoul that would take them for a good price.”
You finished setting the breakfast table and then sauntered over to them, curious about what was in the boxes. You peeked into one. It seemed to contain an odd mismatch of books, clothing and other small belongings.
“What’s this?” you wondered.
Jaebum smiled at you. “Just some of Jinyoung’s stuff I thought he would want to keep before he sold the flat and everything in it. Did you sleep okay last night?” he asked you knowingly.
You flushed. Why did everyone keep asking you that?
“I slept fine,” you mumbled before turning to Jinyoung. He had been staring at you but he dropped his eyes to the floor as soon as you looked at him. “Did you really sell your apartment in Seoul? You’re so positive that you’re not going back there?”
Jinyoung rubbed the back of his neck. “Definitely not to that apartment. It's down the road from the GOT Group Headquarters,” he replied awkwardly before giving you a small smile. “I got a pretty awesome price for it, though. Maybe I should invest in some farmland.”
Jaebum scoffed. “I can’t see you running a farm.”
“Obviously I’d employ people to do the work for me. It’s not like I’m going to muck the stables myself-”
“Maybe you should, it would teach you a little humility,” Jaebum scolded him before turning to the fully spread breakfast table. His eyes brightened at the sight of all the food. “Wow, I don’t know if I’ll be able to drive back after I eat all that. Can we start digging in?”
You smiled. “Mrs. Park just went to make the coffee. Where’s Yugyeom? I set out a plate for him, too.”
Jinyoung looked a little worried as he glanced back out of the window. “He seems to be having a hard time with the reporters. There are twice as many out there today. He had to call the station for backup. He might be a while.”
You went to the front door and peeked out of the house to see if you could spot him. The street outside was deserted (probably since Yugyeom had forced the reporters to stay away from the Parks’ home) but you could see Yugyeom walking towards the house while looking exhausted. You felt bad for the poor man. He’d had to spend all night on the couch while drunk and then deal with the reporters first thing in the morning.
“Yugyeom!” you greeted. “Doing okay?”
He gave you a slightly grim, tired smile. “Not so much. Seems like there’s a reason there are more of them today. Where’s Jinyoung-hyung?”
“Inside.”
Yugyeom pushed past you and entered the house before extracting a newspaper from inside his jacket. He walked straight over to Jinyoung, who was taking his first sip of coffee, and shoved it in his face. “Hyung, you might want to see this. This is why the reporters are losing their minds today.”
“Huh?”
“It’s today’s paper. Page 3.”
Jinyoung flipped over to the page Yugyeom was talking about. His eyebrows furrowed as he quickly scanned the article and then turned white. Jaebum snatched the paper from Jinyoung.
“Fuck,” Jinyoung muttered.
“What sort of next level bullshit is this?” Jaebum demanded. Unable to control your curiosity, you hurried over to him and tried to peek over his broad shoulders at the article. The first sentence was so absurd that it took you a few moments for you to understand what it was saying.
Ex-CEO of GOT Group, Park Jinyoung to become the new heir to Lee Industries? Inside sources claim that Park Jinyoung may be getting ready to tie the knot with the daughter of business tycoon Lee and take over his empire; could this have been Park’s plan all along?
“What the fuck?” you mumbled.
“Can they even do this? Isn’t this just blatantly spreading false information?” Jinyoung demanded. He pointed at the newspaper angrily. “I haven’t said a word to Lee or anyone related to him in over a year! How dare they spread the idea that I’m going to marry his daughter and work for him? I broke off that engagement long ago!”
You felt faint.
Jaebum folded up the newspaper and frowned. “It’s a pressure tactic. He obviously thinks that if he makes a big media deal out of it and then approaches you with the offer, you’ll feel more pressured to say yes. I wouldn’t be surprised if he contacts you before the day is over.”
Jinyoung snatched the newspaper and crumpled it, his hands shaking. “He should have contacted me first, the greedy little bastard-”
“He wanted you to see that accepting his offer could make it look like you left GOT Group for something better, and not like you got fired,” Jaebum pointed out. He gave Jinyoung a reluctant smile. “We could sue him for spreading false information but the article is pretty carefully worded as speculation. Besides, it doesn’t do any harm to you. Let’s not react too much for now. We should finish breakfast.”
Yugyeom smiled hesitantly. “Are you okay, hyung?”
Jinyoung’s fists were clenched. “You guys eat. I’m going to go upstairs for a bit.”
------------------------------------
You weren’t sure what to think. You tried to eat the breakfast that Mrs. Park had made so lovingly, but the delicious food would barely go down your throat. Accepting his offer could make it look more like you left GOT Group for something better and less like you got fired. Jaebum’s words were ringing in your mind.
Wasn’t he right?
Wasn’t this the perfect opportunity for Jinyoung to save face and do the work he loved? He had lost his company but he hadn’t lost his skill or reputation for having built up an entire empire from the ground. A huge family conglomerate like the Lees would be delighted to capture an industry name like Park Jinyoung and make him a part of their family and business.
Besides, hadn’t Jinyoung admitted that the only reason he broke off the engagement was because Lee had expected him to dissolve his own company? Jinyoung didn’t have a company to lose now, so…
You felt sick. The thought of Jinyoung marrying a beautiful chaebol heiress and returning to his fancy world in the business industry was horrifying. The thought of his wedding featuring in the magazines and seeing him arm-in-arm with a beautiful woman that smiled dazzlingly at the camera made you want to kill something. It made you jealous. It made you feel small and pathetic and miserable.
What were you thinking? Jinyoung’s league was different.
His life was different.
You were nothing in that world of glamour and riches and beauty.
You stood up abruptly. “I, uh… I’m done eating. I’ll take a tray up to Jinyoung since he doesn’t seem to want to come down to breakfast.”
Mrs. Park blinked at you. “Of course. Thank you, darling.”
Jaebum gave you an odd look as he watched you fix a tray for Jinyoung but he said nothing. You took the time to calm yourself down. Jinyoung’s life decisions were his life decisions. You had no say in them. You shouldn’t have any say in them. He should do what makes him happy during a time like this and as his friend, you would only support him. You made a hot mug of coffee and set it on the tray before carefully carrying it upstairs.
You knocked on Jinyoung’s door.
“Jinyoung? I brought you some breakfast.”
His voice was muffled. “Come in.”
You entered his bedroom carefully. Jinyoung’s room looked no different to how it had looked back when he had been in high school; queen-sized bed with dark blue sheets, an organized desk with a lamp and rack of books above it and this little telescope that he’d set up near the window in the tenth grade when you’d been doing a unit about space.
“Are you okay?” you asked him gently. Jinyoung was sitting cross-legged on the bed and he greeted you with a hesitant smile. He took the tray you handed him and placed it on the bedside table with a sigh.
“You didn’t have to bring me breakfast,” he muttered.
“You had a lot to drink last night. You should eat.”
He nodded and took a sip of the coffee quietly. You sat down on the edge of the bed and clasped your hands in your lap. You weren’t sure what to say to Jinyoung. Perhaps you shouldn’t say anything. But he noticed you staring at him and raised an eyebrow.
“What?” he asked.
You cleared your throat. “Have you considered just sitting down with some of the reporters for an interview?” you asked hesitantly. “We could set up a small press conference in the school auditorium after school hours. I’m sure Yugyeom and the other police officers would be willing to help out to make sure none of the reporters get aggressive. Maybe if you gave a statement, it would help make things in town easier and stop people from spreading things that aren’t true.”
Jinyoung’s face fell. He set his coffee back down on the bedside table and sighed.
“I know, I just…”
“What’s the problem? Are you scared of what they’ll think?”
“I’m scared of what they’ll ask,” Jinyoung admitted quietly. He took a deep breath. “They can ask me about what happened with GOT Group. I’m ready to talk about that. But their questions won’t stop there. They’ll ask me what my plans for the future are, what I’m going to do next. Am I going to sue GOT Group? Am I going to set up a rival company? Am i going to do something completely different? I don’t have an answer.”
You blinked at him. “You can always refuse to answer questions like that-”
Jinyoung gave you a soft smile. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because you’re too different from me. You’ve always been happy where you are, you’ve always lived in the moment. I’m not like that.” Jinyoung looked at you and his dark eyes were burning with emotion. “Since I was a child, I’ve always had a clear goal. Every single moment of my life I’ve known what I wanted and I’ve dedicated myself towards achieving it. But now all of a sudden, I feel lost. I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what to do. I don’t… feel like myself.”
You smiled. “You always were happiest when you were achieving something.”
“Yeah,” Jinyoung mumbled.
“So maybe you should go back. Start over again, make new goals. Set up another company. Or… or even go work for the Lee’s. If keeping busy is what you need to do to feel like yourself-”
“I’m not so sure I want to be myself,” Jinyoung admitted quietly.
“What does that mean?”
Jinyoung looked up at you. He had a soft smile on his lips; one that seemed almost vulnerable and helpless. “I did a lot of stupid things while I was being myself. I made a lot of stupid decisions. The last few years of my life were the worst and it’s entirely my fault. I distanced my family, I distanced you and I hurt a lot of people. I let my priorities get messed up. So maybe I haven’t been living the best life. Maybe this part of me that always wants to achieve something and be on the move needs to be told to shut up. Maybe I don’t know how to make myself happy.”
You stared at him.
“Are you happy now?” you wondered.
“I’m happier when I live like you,” Jinyoung admitted quietly. “Maybe a life like yours is the right way to live. Maybe I should stop chasing after things and just appreciate where I am. Maybe I should be grateful for everything I have and just settle down here. You did it. You wanted to do it. You’re happy.”
You clenched your fists.
“I’m not happy.”
Jinyoung blinked. “What?”
“Did I tell you I was happy?” you demanded. You couldn’t believe he was sitting here and assuming that living in this small town was some sort of shortcut to happiness. You hadn’t wanted to live like this. You hadn’t chosen to. This life had been your only choice. “To want something more than what you have, greed, aspirations… that’s all basic human nature, Jinyoung. Denying your dreams doesn’t make you happy. Settling for what you already have doesn’t make you happy. It makes you miserable because you spend every single day wondering what could have been if you had just tried.”
“I don’t…” Jinyoung looked startled. “I don’t understand.”
“Living like me won’t make you happy. Living like me doesn’t even make me happy, I never wanted to be where I am now,” you told him. Your hands were trembling. “Don’t do this. Don’t stay here when you have the opportunity to get out and do what you want to be doing.”
Jinyoung stared at you. “You like this place. You like your job. It’s what you’ve always wanted to do.”
You closed your eyes and took a deep breath. You had never admitted this to anyone before. It had taken you a long time to admit it to yourself, but you couldn’t stay quiet now. Not when Jinyoung was trying to model his life after the life you had always hated.
“It’s the only thing I could do,” you mumbled.
Jinyoung looked shocked. “What?”
“My mother couldn’t afford to send me to Seoul to study, Jinyoung. She was already drowning in debt. We were living from paycheck to paycheck. You might not have known this because your mother wouldn’t have told you about my family’s financial problems, but…” you took a deep, shuddering breath and blinked back your tears. You hated thinking about this. You hated admitting how helpless you had felt. “There was no way for me to do anything but this. I needed to go to the local college and I needed to study a course that would allow me to work part-time to support myself and my mother.”
Jinyoung was staring at you, eyes wide. “You didn’t want to be a teacher.”
“I wanted to go to medical school in Seoul. I wanted to become a pediatrician. I even brought home the applications to a few colleges before I realized the reality of my situation,” you whispered.
“Why didn’t you say anything-” he demanded furiously.
“Say what? And to whom?” you cut him off. Your voice was trembling. “I was ashamed. I didn’t want to be the girl who couldn’t afford to do what everyone else was doing. I didn’t want to pity myself. I decided that the only way I would be able to hold my head high was if I convinced myself that this was what I wanted to be doing. It made me feel better about my life. That was just how I dealt with it.”
Jinyoung stared at you for a long moment. When you looked up at him, you could see that his lower lip was trembling.
“You should have told me,” he whispered hoarsely.
“You would have told my mother. It would have broken her heart.”
“I can’t believe I’m hearing this right now,” Jinyoung snapped. You could hear the anger in his voice and he suddenly leapt off the bed. His gaze burned through you. “I cannot believe that you can sit in front of me and tell me now that you were lying to me the entire time. I thought you were happy. I left you here ten years ago thinking that was what I had to do to make you happy and now you’re telling me that was a misunderstanding?”
You felt tears coming to your eyes. “I’m sorry-”
“I walked away from you that day on the bridge so you could live the life you wanted to live,” Jinyoung hissed. He ran his fingers through his hair in frustration. “Do you know how difficult that decision was for me? Do you know how much it broke my heart to think that I could never make you happy? All I had to do was fucking take you to Seoul with me, wasn’t it? I asked you over and over, I tried to convince you so many times that studying there would be amazing-”
“I know,” you croaked.
“-and every single time, you told me with a straight face that you didn’t want any of that! You told me you wanted to sit here in this stupid town and get married and have kids. Fuck. Fuck that. It made me miserable that I couldn’t give that to you. Do you know how much I suffered? Do you really think your mother was convinced? She used to call me all the time and ask if you were telling the truth and like an idiot, I thought she was the weird one for not believing you.”
You didn’t know what to say. You felt small and pathetic. Jinyoung was right. Your lies and your denial had hurt him. They were the reason he had walked away ten years ago and never looked back. They were the reason you were both here now. Alone, and unhappy.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered. Your throat had closed up. “I’m sorry. I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought that this way, nobody would get hurt except me.”
Jinyoung’s eyes softened as he looked at you.
“God,” he whispered. “God, you must have been miserable.”
You nodded silently, warm tears streaming down your cheeks.
“And you never told anyone?”
You shook your head.
Jinyoung was silent for a long moment. He stepped closer to you and suddenly pulled you to your feet before wrapping his arms around you in a tight hug. You let yourself melt into Jinyoung’s warm embrace. His arms encircled you and he stroked your hair softly while you sobbed into his shoulder.
Jinyoung was right. You had tried to make everyone happy but your lies had only made everything worse. You, your mother, Jinyoung… nobody had benefited from your deception.
“I-I was just a teenager,” you mumbled into Jinyoung’s sweater. Your throat was choked up. “I didn’t know what I was doing. I just didn’t want to see my Mom working so hard and-and I didn’t want her to feel like she wasn’t doing enough for me because she was-”
Jinyoung stroked your hair softly. “I know,” he whispered.
“And-and I wanted to tell you, so many times, but I was afraid you would tell my mother and there was nothing you could do about it. It wasn’t like… I mean, it wasn’t like you had the money to lend me yourself, your own parents saved up for years so you could go to the university you wanted.”
“I know,” Jinyoung whispered. He rested his cheek against your hair gently. “I know.”
“So it-it seemed like the only way to be happy, really, and I kept telling myself that I was…” you paused, struggling to get the words out. “T-that I was just being selfish and that Seoul wasn’t that great anyway and that I could do just fine here, but… but…”
Jinyoung closed his eyes and sighed.
“It’s okay. I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
“We both made stupid decisions,” Jinyoung mumbled. His hand gently stroked your back in a comforting gesture as you sniffled. “It’s not like I knew what I was doing. You shouldn’t have had to be that responsible at that age. You shouldn’t have had to bear that burden, you shouldn’t have been put in that position.”
You slowly pulled back and looked up at him. Jinyoung’s eyes were looking down at yours softly and you could see your pain reflected in them. The pain of knowing what could have been, the pain of knowing that all your combined suffering had achieved nothing in the end.
“Jinyoung…” you whispered.
There was a sharp knock on the bedroom door. You stepped back from Jinyoung and he looked equally startled as you heard Jaebum’s gruff voice through the bedroom door.
“Hey! Jinyoung, I’m gonna take off. I have to get back to Seoul by evening. You gonna come down and see me off?” he demanded. You hurried to wipe your tears away with your sleeve, worried that Jaebum might chose to open the door and step inside.
“Yeah, I’m coming, I’ll meet you downstairs!” Jinyoung yelled back.
You heard the sound of Jaebum’s footsteps disappearing. Jinyoung was looking down at you, his eyes soft and reluctant. He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck.
“I should go see him off,” Jinyoung mumbled.
You nodded, sniffling. You probably looked a mess. “Y-yeah, you should.”
Jinyoung stared at you for a moment before stepping closer and cupping your face with his hands. He leaned down and pressed his lips to your forehead; a soft, lingering kiss that made your chest explode with warmth. You could still feel his lips on your skin when he pulled away and looked down at you gently.
“Come downstairs when you’re ready,” he told you.
Jinyoung gave you one last, longing look before leaving the room quickly.
-----------------------------
You probably should have gone home but Yugyeom and Mr. Park were watching some Sunday morning television marathons in the living room and they convinced you to stay for a few episodes. You noticed the soft smile Jinyoung gave you when succumbed to their insistence and sat beside him on the sofa.
You didn’t want to leave Jinyoung, somehow.
You wanted him near you.
You joked around with Yugyeom and laughed at the absurd game shows that were playing on the television. Jinyoung’s gaze was constantly on you and it made you feel both flustered and warm. It felt new to have his attention on you. It felt new to think that he cared about you. It felt new to think that even after ten years, knowing that he had lost a chance with you hurt him.
It made you feel important to be the center of Park Jinyoung’s attention.
Mrs. Park was delighted to hear that you and Yugyeom were staying for lunch. The house had never felt so lively before, she pointed out, and you could tell that having company made her happy. You helped Mrs. Park in the kitchen and listened to her gush about how nice it was that Jinyoung seemed to be smiling a lot more these days. She was happier than she had been in years, and you knew that it was all because Jinyoung was around.
“Oh dear, those reporters seem to be trickling back,” Mrs. Park muttered as she chopped the vegetables. She had a view of the street from the kitchen window and you peeked over her shoulder to see that a number of them were hovering around the front porch again. Some of the reporters’ cars were parked on the street even though Yugyeom had told them firmly that they could not park there. You were about to go into the living room to alert the young officer when you saw another car pull up.
An expensive, luxury car.
It stopped right in front of the house and a man in uniform got out of the driver’s seat. He hurried to open the passenger door, revealing a beautiful young woman wearing an expensive dress. Her fancy clothing and jewelry stood out awkwardly in the modest street, but you only saw them for a second before she was surrounded and swamped by the reporters. They began yelling things at her and snapping pictures with their enormous cameras.
Well, shit.
“Yugyeom!” you yelled out, rushing into the living room. “Yugyeom, I think you need to go outside!”
Yugyeom rushed out of the front door and began to yell at the reporters to move out of the way and stop harassing the young woman. You felt your heartbeat thud nervously as you watched Yugyeom take her arm and escort her to the front door while shoving the reporters away. The young woman looked frazzled but she clung onto Yugyeom and made it safely inside of the house. Yugyeom slammed the front door shut.
There was an awkward silence.
The young woman took a deep breath, plastered a polite smile on her face and bowed to you all courteously.
“It’s nice to meet you. I’m Lee Jin-ah.”
-------------------------------------------
You wondered if it was possible for a woman to be so beautiful or graceful.
Everything about Lee Jin-ah made you feel small and worthless. Not only was she beautiful, she had a soft and gentle voice and she spoke with the utmost politeness. You could only watch in miserable silence as she carefully greeted both Mr. and Mrs. Park and thanked a red-faced Yugyeom for helping her with the reporters.
God, she was perfect.
No wonder Jinyoung almost married this girl.
Jinyoung was silent from the moment Jin-ah entered. He didn’t say a word and only stared at her with his lips pressed together tightly. He watched with sharp eyes as his mother welcomed the girl into the living room and then frowned when Jin-ah finally turned to him nervously and admitted that she had come to speak with him because she couldn't contact him by phone.
“Let’s talk upstairs,” Jinyoung said shortly. He glanced at his mother. “We’ll be back in a bit, Mom.”
Mrs. Park flushed and nodded. “Oh, of course. Don’t take too long. It’s already past lunchtime. I’ll set out a plate, of course your friend must stay and have lunch with us…”
Jin-ah blushed and thanked her before silently following a grim-faced Jinyoung up the stairs. You felt your stomach clench in discomfort as you sat back down on the couch and Mr. Park resumed the television. Your palms were sweating and you nearly jumped when Yugyeom came and sat on the couch beside you.
“Noona,” he whispered.
You flinched. “What the hell, Yugyeom-”
Yugyeom placed a finger over his lips and pointed at Mr. Park, who was sitting in his armchair and watching the television on loud volume. He was a little hard of hearing. “Noona, let’s go upstairs and eavesdrop.”
Your eyes widened. “Yugyeom, no.”
“Why not?” he whined. “Noona, I’m just dying of curiosity right now. Don’t you want to know what they’re talking about? Do you think she’s proposing to him? What if they decide to get married?”
You felt sick. “It’s not right.”
“Noona…”
You glared at him, heartbeat thudding. “We’ll get caught-”
“We won’t, I’m a police officer!”
“I doubt your police badge gives you the right to eavesdrop on people’s private conversations in their own homes, you should be ashamed of yourself.”
Yugyeom frowned. “Well, I’m going. You can come with me or stay here.”
Ugh.
“I’m coming,” you mumbled.
------------------
It was awkward to be standing outside Jinyoung’s bedroom door and eavesdropping with your ears up against the wood, but Yugyeom’s cheeky smile made you feel a little better.
The flimsy wooden door did little to hide the voices of the people inside.
“-could your father really think it was okay to publish an article like that without even saying a word to me? Do I look like an idiot to you? Do you think because I don’t have a PR Manager anymore, he can kick me around as he pleases?” Jinyoung was asking angrily.
Jin-ah sounded tired. “You know that’s not why. He wanted to prove to you that this wedding could be used to get the media on your side again. A few well-placed articles and we can get people to believe that your exit from GOT Group was voluntary and that you were planning to default to Lee Industries all along.”
Jinyoung frowned. “The media isn’t my problem.”
“What is your problem?” Jin-ah wondered. She sighed. “Jinyoung. They kicked you out and shamed you. Don’t you want revenge?”
“Of course I want revenge,” Jinyoung muttered.
“So come and talk to my father. He says he’ll help you. You need a strong conglomerate behind you if you want to target GOT Group and bring them down. You have the inside knowledge of the company’s wrongdoings and we have the resources,” Jin-ah pointed out. “Father’s been talking about this constantly since he heard about your dismissal. You know how upset he was when you walked out last time.”
Jinyoung gritted his teeth. “That’s because he wanted me to give up everything I had.”
“You don’t have anything now. Your company is gone. It’s no longer yours. You lost it already, Jinyoung, your career can only improve from this,” Jin-ah pointed out.
Jinyoung was silent for a long moment.
“Maybe my career isn’t the only thing I want to improve. Maybe I want to improve my life.”
“By sitting here? In this small town?” Jin-ah wondered.
“My parents are here.”
“Bring them to Seoul. We’ll buy them a house. You can visit them every weekend,” Jin-ah said without hesitation. She suddenly sounded desperate and you could hear the insistence in her voice. “Please, Jinyoung. You promised you would help me last time and you backed out. Don’t you owe me?”
Jinyoung frowned. “You didn’t tell me last time that I’d have to give up my company.”
“I didn’t know either. But you left me in the lurch.”
Jinyoung frowned. “No. You lied to me. I understand that all your other options for marriage were older men who were disgusting and that you didn't want to marry them. I feel bad for you, Jin-ah, but not enough to give up everything I care about. Not enough to marry you out of pity. We both know you’re only here because I’m the only man your Father approves of that isn’t ten years older than you and vastly overweight.”
“But this time, you only gain from the deal,” Jin-ah pleaded. “Please. If you say no to this then Father will marry me off to that old guy who owns the car companies. He’s been divorced twice already. I can’t live with him. What do you even have to lose? You have no career. What do you even care about that you’d have to give up because of this?”
Jinyoung took a deep breath. “You wouldn’t understand, there are other things than my career at stake, just… give me some time to think about this.”
“Really?” Jin-ah’s voice perked up. “Really, you’ll think about it?”
“Yes. Now, let’s go downstairs-”
Yugyeom tapped you urgently on the shoulder and gestured toward the stairs. You nodded, hurrying after him as you both fled down the stairs in order to retake your seats in the living room. You were both out of breath but you managed to calm down and casually turn to the television seconds before Jinyoung and Jin-ah came down.
Jinyoung gave you a searching look and then turned to the kitchen.
“Mom, is lunch ready?”
-----------------------------------------------
Lunch was uncomfortable.
You couldn’t bring yourself to speak, but Jin-ah seemed to love chattering away. She told Mrs. Park brightly all about her fashion degree and the work she did for some designer label. Then she asked Yugyeom a number of questions about what being a police officer was like. Yugyeom seemed flustered at the attention from such a beautiful girl, but he responded to her questions eagerly. She even asked you about your work; but your simple responses were not encouraging and she soon turned her attention back to Yugyeom.
Jinyoung kept looking at you throughout the meal. You had to avoid his gaze because you were terrified that your jealousy and insecurity at the sudden appearance of this beautiful, charming woman would become visible to him.
Once the meal was over, Jin-ah turned to Mrs. Park sweetly.
“Mrs. Park, is it alright if I stay the night here? It’s such a long drive back to Seoul and there aren’t any proper hotels in this small town. I’d feel much safer staying here…” she asked politely.
Mrs. Park blinked. “Oh. Of course, dear, you can stay in the guest room and return in the morning.” The older woman glanced at you. “Unless you’re thinking of staying the night again…”
You shook your head quickly. You didn’t want to stay here in his awkward environment for one second longer than you needed to. “Oh no, not at all. I have work tomorrow so I’m going to head home now, actually. I hope you have a nice stay here, Jin-ah.”
Jin-ah beamed at you. “Thank you, unnie! Can I call you unnie?”
You sighed. “Yes, go ahead.”
“Thank you!”
You helped Mrs. Park clean up after lunch before apologizing and announcing that you needed to leave. You felt tired and exhausted and suddenly, you wanted nothing more than to go back to your own bed and take a long nap to forget about everything that had happened today. Yugyeom offered to drop you back to your apartment in your vehicle and you went upstairs to get the handbag that you’d left in the guest bedroom.
Just as you entered the room, you heard the door swing open behind you. Jinyoung had followed you inside and he was leaning against the closed door, arms folded across his chest as he looked at you.
“Hey,” he said.
You felt your heartbeat thud at the dark expression in Jinyoung’s eyes. You picked up your bag and blinked at him.
“Uh, hey.”
“What do you think?”
You felt your throat close up. You stepped closer to the door but Jinyoung was blocking it effectively, leaning against it while he watched you with an intense gaze. You swallowed nervously and blinked at him.
“What do I think about what?” you asked.
“Don’t play games with me. I heard you and Yugyeom running down the stairs while I was talking to Jin-ah. I know you were listening to our conversation. What do you think about what she said? Do you think I should be accepting her offer?”
Your head spun. What could you say to that? What right did you even have to weigh in on such a huge life decision of Jinyoung’s? Part of you wanted to scream and tell him that it seemed like a horrible idea, that it didn’t seem like either of them loved each other and that he should stay here with you. But it was such an absurd thing to say that the words wouldn’t come out of your mouth.
“It… it seems like a win-win situation,” you mumbled.
Jinyoung raised an eyebrow. “Win-win?”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t see anything that anyone has to lose by her offer? You can’t think of anything that I would have to lose?” he demanded. He suddenly stepped closer to you. “You think I should marry her and run her family's companies?”
You took a deep breath and looked up at him. “Maybe. You said it yourself, Jinyoung. You probably don’t want to stay here in this small town. There’s no career left for you here. If she’s offering you a way to return to the career you love and a way to get revenge on the people who ruined you, then maybe in the long run you should go and take it. You’re not the kind of person who can be living a simple life in this small town. You’re the kind of person who needs to chase after his dreams.”
Jinyoung frowned. “What do you know about my dreams?”
You bit your lip. “I-I don’t. You asked me what I thought, and I’m telling you what I think. It seems like a good way to pick up your career again.”
“But the cost?” he demanded. His eyes were narrowed. “Marrying a woman I don’t love?”
“P-plenty of people do it. And Jin-ah seems like a catch.”
“What about you?”
“What about me?” you asked. “This has nothing to do with ne.”
“Doesn’t it?”
You opened your mouth to speak but you were cut off by somebody rattling the doorknob. You could hear Yugyeom on the other side.
“What the-is this locked? Noona, I have the car ready outside! You’ll have to come quick because I only just got rid of the reporters,” Yugyeom called out. Jinyoung turned around and yanked the door open to reveal Yugyeom’s face. He looked a little startled. “Oh, hyung, I didn’t know you were in here…”
You smiled. “I’m coming, Yugyeom.”
“Okay…”
You turned to leave as Yugyeom hurried down the stairs but Jinyoung gently grasped your arm. When you turned to him, Jinyoung’s eyes had become soft and his gaze suddenly looked vulnerable.
“Answer my question,” he insisted. “Does this really have nothing to do with you?”
You bit your lip. “No. No, it doesn’t.”
You pulled away from him and hurried down the stairs after Yugyeom, but not before you heard the last thing that Jinyoung said to you.
“I guess you still never learn.”
--------------
#got7#got7 scenarios#got7 scenario#got7 fanfiction#park jinyoung#got7 jinyoung#jinyoung scenarios#park jinyoung scenarios#jinyoung angst#got7 angst#got7 fluff#got7 series#park jinyoung fanfiction#got7 drabbles#got7 imagines#jinyoung fluff#jinyoung series#jinyoung my youth
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Code Geass: Paladins of Voltron Chapter 25: Battle Plan
There was complete silence on the bridge as the video message closed. The Paladins stood still, watching Lelouch closely. It was clear that Nunnally was now a captive of Britannia, one of the things that Lelouch feared the most. They all knew that when it came to his sister, Lelouch could act purely on his emotions, barely thinking things through.
However, that was when Lelouch was alone. He had support now. Friends and allies that he could rely on to help him.
A good thing too, as the next thing they knew, Lelouch had spun around and tried to make a beeline for the Black Lion's elevator.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Lelouch, where do you think you're going?!" Kallen shouted, grabbing onto his wrist tightly.
"What does it look like?" Lelouch snarled and fiercely tried to free his arm, but the Red Paladin held firm.
"You-you're not just going to go barging in there without a plan, are you?!" Rivalz exclaimed, wide-eyed.
"Every second Nunnally's, there is a second far too long!" Lelouch shouted, still struggling vainly against the Kallen, C.C., and even Coran's holds.
Then abruptly, Suzaku stepped directly in front of Lelouch and placed his hands on his shoulders. He looked the Black Paladin dead in the eye. "Lelouch! You need to calm down! We'll rescue her! But you running in there like a psycho isn't going to make her condition better!"
"Suzaku's right Lelouch," Milly agreed with a determined frown, "First, we should find out where she is. Rai, see if you can track that signal. Maybe we can pinpoint where that broadcast was!"
"Already on it!" Rai growled as he practically flung himself into his chair, barely waiting for the screen to load correctly before getting to work.
"I know I likely don't need to point this out," C.C. said, calmly releasing Lelouch after she ensured he wouldn't run again, "but we could be walking headfirst into a trap. Nunnally is the perfect bait for it."
"What makes you think that?" Shirley asked nervously, eyes shifting back and forth between Lelouch and the witch.
C.C. hummed thoughtfully, "What I mean is that it is likely that Charles either knows or strongly suspects that Lelouch is a part of Voltron. Hell, for all we know, he may have figured out that Lelouch is Zero too. He knows Lelouch and knows that he loves Nunnally, and will do anything for her safety. Therefore, Nunnally becomes the perfect bait to try and keep Lelouch, and by extension, Voltron in check."
"Whoa, time out!" Rivalz exclaimed, his hands making the 't' sign, "If the Emperor already knows that Lelouch is Zero, why didn't he just say so in that broadcast? If you ask me, that could've been the perfect time to expose his identity."
"Best guess? He likely kept the information to himself because if word got out that a member of the Royal Family was openly opposing Britannia, other nations like the EU and the Chinese Federation could start to believe that the Emperor is losing control of his Empire. This would only encourage them to fight back against Britannia even harder," C.C. theorized.
"That makes sense," Milly nodded, "I know there was a bit of contention between Britannia and the Chinese Federation as of late. So caution is understandable."
"So then… what do we do?" Shirley asked, looking around nervously.
"We won't be able to do anything without more information," Suzaku quickly said, "it's just like with the Balmera. We can't just start shooting down the Viceroy's Palace. Until we locate Nunnally, we're stuck."
Lelouch, having been quiet for a majority of the conversation, could still feel panic bubbling in the pit of his stomach. He knew what Suzaku said was the most logical, but his instincts to protect his sister were waging war within him right now.
He suddenly felt a weight against his leg and looked down to see that Kaguya had hugged him again, "Don't worry Lelouch, Nunnally will be okay! And you'll definitely get her back, now that you have the Goddess of Victory on your side!"
The group chuckled at Kaguya's declaration, but only a tiny curve shook Lelouch's lips, his own heart still pounding in his ears.
A hand on his shoulder made him jump. Turning to the source, he saw Rai looking at him, having gotten up from his Paladin seat.
"Lelouch, I can't read minds, but I believe I know what you're thinking. And… I understand. I feel the same way about Sophie and my mom. Ever since I discovered that they're still alive, I've wanted to find them. But I know I can't just fly out blindly into the next galaxy we come across. That won't get me anywhere. Until I know for sure where they are, all I can do is keep looking. So I promise, once I find where Nunnally is, you'll be the first to know."
"Rai…" Lelouch murmured, staring back at the Green Paladin. Another hand suddenly jerked him forward a little.
"You want Nunnally back, right?" Kallen asked, a stern frown on her face. She continued before Lelouch could answer honestly, "Then you need to be Zero right now. Nunnally needs Zero right now. So use that big, scary, strategic brain of yours that I know you have and figure out how to save her!"
Kallen's statement was the last bullet needed to break through Lelouch's wall of despair and panic. He straightened himself, eyes set, and determined.
"I will do everything to help as well," Sayoko said, giving a short bow, though her eyes and posture were heavy with regret, "It's my fault that Lady Nunnally was captured after all."
Lelouch hated to put Sayoko on the spot, but he had to know, "How did this happen?"
He hoped his voice didn't sound harsh, but if it did, Sayoko paid it no mind.
"I don't know how, but Lady Nunnally and I were tracked to the safe house that you had set up. When I found out that we'd been discovered, I quickly made arrangements to leave. But it seems I wasn't fast enough. Forces led by your brother, Schneizel, surrounded us. I held back as many as possible, but at one point, when I was fleeing with your sister, I was knocked unconscious and fell into a pit. Whether it was a trap set prior or not, I don't know. By the time I woke up, I was alone, and Lady Nunnally was gone."
Then, to Lelouch's shock, Sayoko collapsed to her knees and bowed to Lelouch deeply, "I'm sorry, my Lord, I failed you."
It took a couple of seconds for Lelouch to shake himself from his shock, but he quickly knelt next to the kunoichi. "You're not to blame for this, Sayoko," he gently lifted the maid up, "I was a fool. I should've suspected that Schneizel would figure it out. He always has, and likely always will be, the worst foe I've faced. Minus Zarkon, of course."
"'Your worst foe'?" Shirley said, "What do you mean, Lulu?"
"Let me put it this way," Lelouch said, turning to face them again, "We used to play chess together when I was still living in Aries Villa, and he was the one person I could never beat."
Various reactions erupted from everyone in the room, gasps of shock or wide eyes, and Rai paused from his rapid typing. Coran and Allura, in particular, looked stunned. They still remembered when Lelouch and Coran played their first chess match against each other back on Arus, and Coran had commented to Allura later that Lelouch was likely on par with King Alfor in skill, maybe even more so. So to hear that there was someone that not even Lelouch could beat was both shocking and terrifying.
"Wait... wait... hold on a second!" Rivalz sputtered after picking his jaw up off the floor, "Your brother, actually beat you. At chess. I've seen you take on pretty much every kind of noble out there, and you always total them in ten minutes or less! And you're saying that there's someone that you could never beat!?"
"Yes," Lelouch replied quite bluntly.
Stunned silence followed as everyone digested this new information.
"Okay… that's a little terrifying," Shirley said, voicing everyone's thoughts at that moment.
"Anyway, that's a topic for another time," Lelouch said, waving his hand in dismissal, "Rai, make sure to scan every Britannian communications link that you can to track Nunnally. When you do, inform me immediately."
"You'll be the first to know," Rai nodded before practically diving back into his seat.
"Anything I can do, Lelouch?" Kaguya asked, smiling kindly. Lelouch smiled back at the young woman. He remembered that Kaguya had been one of the few people at the Kururugi Shrine to be kind to him and his sister. He remembered the two girls becoming close friends. Therefore, he knew precisely what Kaguya could do.
"All I can ask of you right now, Kaguya, is to be a friend for Nunnally when rescue her. Can you do that?" Lelouch asked, bending down to Kaguya's eye level.
Kaguya nodded happily, "Of course I can do that!"
Lelouch nodded before straightening again, "All of you be ready to leave at any time. The second Rai locates Nunnally; we're moving out." He then swiftly turned to leave the bridge, "C.C., come with me."
"Where are you going?" Kallen asked as she and the others watched him leave.
Lelouch stalled for a moment, looking over his shoulder, "I'm gathering the Black Knights. It's time that they know the truth about me… and about Geass," everyone's eyes widened at this proclamation, "Best to get this out of the way."
o~o
"Schneizel, what is the meaning of this?!" Cornelia roared as her brother calmly walked into the Viceroy's throne room. The moment that the broadcast had ended, Cornelia had requested… no… demanded that her brother come to the Viceroy's Palace immediately. Standing close by her were Nonette and Euphemia, as well as Guilford and Darlton. The two knights were positioned closer to the walls while her sister and the knight stood side-by-side with her. Cornelia's eyes glared angrily towards the Prime Minister as he approached with his own loyal subordinate, Earl Kanon Maldini.
"If you knew that Nunnally was alive all this time, and had her with you, why weren't we informed of this immediately?!" Cornelia shouted again.
"Your reaction is understandable dear sister," Schneizel answered calmly, "but please think rationally for a moment."
"RATIONALLY?!" Cornelia shrieked and nearly drew her sword from her waist.
"Viceroy!" Darlton gasped, stepping forward for a moment, "Please, we must hear him out before any rash actions are taken!"
Cornelia growled before forcing herself to calm down, as she knew he was correct. Despite his protest, though, Darlton and Guilford looked less than pleased with the Prime Minister too.
"Thank you, Lord Darlton," Schneizel nodded, "I do apologize for my actions as of late. However, you must first understand when I found Nunnally, I was given direct orders from the Emperor himself to not reveal her presence until deemed necessary."
This statement only further confused the group rather than calm them down. Why on Earth would the Emperor want Nunnally's presence hidden? He could have at least told them about it.
"What about Prince Lelouch?" Guilford cautiously asked, "Have you been able to find him yet? Or any of the students from Ashford Academy?"
"Unfortunately, we haven't found any new information regarding Prince Lelouch, or any of the other Ashford Academy students," Kanon answered with a shake of his head. Though the Ashford students were not top of the priority list, everyone also knew that if they could track and find even one of the students, that could lead them to find Prince Lelouch.
"Can… we see Nunnally right now?" Euphemia timidly asked.
"We apologize, Princess Euphemia, but that is not possible at this time," Kanon answered with a sad expression.
"What?! Why?" Euphie gasped, tears gathering in her eyes.
Cornelia scowled angrily, not liking the answer either, "Yes, why the hell can't we see our own sister?!"
"I'm truly sorry, Cornelia," Schneizel said, his tone pacifying as he held his hands up in emphasis, "but Nunnally is in a very fragile and emotional state. We don't want to add any more stress than she's already experiencing."
This response didn't seem to dull Cornelia's ire even slightly as she shot her brother an almost murderous glare, "Schneizel… if you do anything to her…"
"Cornelia, do you truly believe that I would harm our own sister?" he asked plainly.
The Viceroy scoffed, "To be honest… I really don't know what to think of you right now, brother."
Schneizel frowned, "That hurts. Truly, it does. But I can understand that. Our family is quite broken, isn't it?"
Though she didn't voice it aloud, Euphemia immediately agreed with that statement. It had been for a long time. Perhaps longer than before she had been born. What happened to Lelouch and Nunnally did little to nothing to repair it and only spread the rift among the Royal Family broader. A tear escaped Euphie's eye.
With this statement, Schneizel turned to leave, but Maldini stalled and turned back to the trio, "Princess Nunnally is scheduled to be transported back to the homeland before day's end. Prince Schneizel and I can pull some strings to have your unit serve as her protection, Viceroy."
"Indeed," Schneizel glanced over his shoulder again, "Don't worry, once Nunnally is home, you'll all be seeing her again very soon."
With these final words, the Prime Minister and his escort left the throne room, the door closing behind them. Cornelia's scowl never left her face.
Guilford sent his princess a wary look, "Viceroy, pardon my ignorance, but how could you distrust the Prime Minister. He's your own brother."
Cornelia rolled her eyes before addressing him with a sigh, "Guliford, if you grew up with a man like him, you would have some trust issues yourself. I promise you that."
Meanwhile, as Schneizel and Maldini continued their walk away from the throne room, Maldini turned to the prince, "Are you sure you know what you're doing, Prime Minister?"
Schneizel turned to his subordinate with a small smile, "Kanon, do you trust me?"
His answer was immediate, "Of course, my Prince," he said with a small bow.
"Then rest assured, I have everything under control."
As the two exited the palace, Schneizel remained deep in thought. There were very few things in this world that would make him lose his composure. However, he could certainly add the arrival of that Voltron machine to the list of things that did. Though he would never admit this aloud to anyone, when he saw the footage of Voltron for the first time, he had nearly fallen out of his office chair. After a brief discussion with Earl Asplund, Schneizel agreed with the scientist that the machine, mainly the Lions that made it up, couldn't possibly be of Earth origin. Otherwise, he was sure they would have discovered the Blue Lion long before its debut two months prior.
That brought him to his second line of inquiry. According to confirmed reports, Zero, as well as the seven Ashford students, disappeared around the same time that the Blue Lion showed itself. He already had strong suspicions that Zero and Lelouch were one and the same. As it was true that Lelouch had been one of the seven missing students, not to mention that there were, conveniently, seven Lions that made up the machine, it was likely that his brother hadn't been found yet because he was off with the other teenagers with Voltron.
His thoughts eventually led Schneizel to think about their father, the Emperor. Was he aware of this as well? And if so, that would undoubtedly complicate some of Schneizel's plans.
The Emperor's order to transport Nunnally to the homeland was no doubt a ploy to try and lure Zero, a.k.a. Lelouch, out. She was the perfect bait for it, after all.
If his brother was to come for Nunnally, and Schneizel had little doubt that he would, he hoped to at least have a talk with him to resolve all this violence peacefully, if not for Nunnally's sake, then the world's as well.
o~o
Lelouch and C.C., along with the space mice that were perched calmly on her shoulders, carefully watched to gauge the reactions of the Black Knights as they all sat in one of the castle lounges. Lelouch had just finished telling them his history, his current mission, and finally about the Geass power that he, along with three other Paladins, now wielded, though he didn't mention which ones.
From what they could see, the group's initial reaction was one of stunned shock, though he did spot Inoue and Minami shooting him looks of pity and sympathy.
"And that's everything?" Ohgi eventually asked as he was still trying to process not only the information given to them but also the fact that they were being trusted with it as well.
"Yes, that's everything," Lelouch nodded, "Now, you all know."
"Damn…" Tamaki murmured with an expression that Lelouch couldn't quite identify.
"Heh, our mysterious, masked leader is a Prince of Britannia? Who knew?" Inoue chuckled in disbelief.
Lelouch bowed his head slightly with a pained expression, "I do apologize for hiding my identity from you, but I'm sure if you knew who I initially was, you wouldn't have been as inclined to join me."
Ohgi waved the apology off, "Don't worry, we get it."
"So… this Geass thing, what exactly does it do?" Sugiyama asked cautiously from the back.
C.C. shrugged slightly, "It depends on the user. No Geass given out by people like me is the same as any other. It can be anything from reading minds to turning invisible. The particular one that Lelouch has is called Absolute Obedience. If it's activated and he makes direct eye contact with you, he can order you to do anything he wants, and you'll have no choice but to obey him no matter how outrageous the order. The drawback that we've noticed so far is that it only works once per person. In other words, once he gives you an order using Geass, he can't do it a second time."
C.C. then smirked playfully, "So, anyone of you want to form a contract with me? Get some mysterious, supernatural power?"
A couple of the Black Knights couldn't tell if she was serious or not as Ohgi smiled nervously and scratched the back of his neck, "Uh… no thanks. Maybe some other time?"
C.C. didn't seem offended by the statement. Only more amused as she chuckled.
"I have a question," Tamaki said, raising his hand, "What's with the rats?"
To the surprise of the Black Knights, the mice seemed to actually take offense to that comment. All four of them simultaneously turned and glared at the red-head. The skinny light blue one started hissing at him, its hackles raised.
"They are not rats, they're Altean mice," Lelouch emphasized, "They somehow managed to sneak into Princess Allura's cryopod and were asleep inside it with her for the last 10,000 years. Due to that, she somehow developed a telepathic link with them. Basically, she can understand them, and they can understand her."
Tamaki shrugged and nodded, apparently accepting the answer.
Despite that pleasant interruption though, Lelouch still had a serious question for the Black Knights, "Anyway, now that you know who I am, and why I'm doing this, I'll understand if you don't want to work with me anymore. After all, I'm the prince of a nation that you all hate so much, so if you want to leave, I won't stop you."
"Well, even if we did want to leave, you could just use that Geass thing to make us stay," Inoue pointed out matter-of-factly.
"I won't do that," Lelouch answered immediately and folded his arms, "That's one of the few things I'll never do. Otherwise, I'm no different from that man I have to call a father."
Ohgi stood up from his spot on the couch, "You saved all of our lives in Shinjuku, and showed us that we're more than just simple rebels. You proved that we can stand up to Britannia. You've given us hope when we thought we'd lost it. And if what you've told us about the Galra is true too, that they're more dangerous than Britannia, you're going to need all the help you can get. You're our leader, and the fact that you willingly revealed not only your history but your power to us means that you trust us. We trust you, and we're with you."
"Heh, yeah, you're stuck with us, kid," Tamaki smirked as the rest of the Black Knights smiled and nodded in agreement.
Lelouch couldn't help but smile in relief as he looked at all of the Black Knights. He was extremely grateful that they were willing to put their faith in him, and he was going to do everything he could to not let them down.
"I thank you all," he said with a nod.
"So…" Yoshida started, "Sorry, but what exactly do we call you now?"
"Hm? Oh!" Lelouch gasped when he realized what Yoshida meant, "Well, out on the field and on missions, you'll address me as either Zero or the Black Paladin. It'll depend on the situation. Otherwise, when we're just in the Castle like this, just calling me Lelouch is fine."
"Alright," Ohgi nodded, grateful that Yoshida had thought to ask, "Also, Lelouch, we were all wondering... Do you have any plans yet regarding your sister? And if you do, is there anything you need us to do?"
"...We're currently trying to gather information regarding Nunnally," he told them after a moment, "but as of right now, I can't think of anything where I'll need your assistance yet. I do not doubt anyone here, but as of right now, we simply lack the resources we need for you all in a fight."
"Coran and Allura are currently making arrangements with Lady Kaguya and the other heads of Kyoto to have some Knightmares brought up to the Castle," C.C. added. "Coran is going to try and see if he equip them properly for space use, as well as prepare the needed equipment you'll need for your own use. If his modifications are successful, the Black Knights will be the owners of likely the most advanced Knightmare frames on the entire planet."
This statement sent a wave of excitement through the Black Knights. They all looked at one another with broad smiles on their faces. Even Ohgi's eyes sparkled excitedly.
"Ha! I'm really starting to dig this whole 'teaming up with aliens' gig we've got going on!" Tamaki grinned.
Before any other comments could be made, the intercom crackled to life.
"Lelouch. We need you on the bridge immediately!"
o~o
After a quick farewell to the Black Knights, Lelouch practically sprinted to the bridge with C.C. hot on his trail. The other Paladins, as well as Coran, Sayoko, and Kaguya, were already there waiting for him.
"Did you-?"
Before the Black Paladin could finish his sentence, Rai pulled up a radio message that he managed to intercept. On it, they could hear the voices of several officers discussing Nunnally's transportation from Area 11 to Pendragon, Britannia's capital.
"Have you managed to trace it at all?" Lelouch asked Rai urgently.
"Already have coordinates," the Green Paladin promptly answered.
"You have a plan, Lulu?" Milly asked, turning to him.
"Yes," he nodded, "if everything goes according to plan, we should be able to get in, get Nunnally, and get out fairly quickly. However, I want to make one thing clear. And that is that Voltron is not going to be used for this mission, not if we can help it. Any objections?"
All of the Paladins shook their heads. They didn't need an explanation. Not only could using Voltron make it more challenging to rescue Nunnally, but from the beginning, the goal was to keep Britannian casualties to a minimum. They were going to need those soldiers after all, once the Galra caught up to them.
"Good. Alright, this is our plan of attack," Lelouch typed into the computer, bringing up an image of the transport, the Avalon, that Nunnally would be escorted in. "We need to wait until the transport that has Nunnally is in the air. This will allow us not only more room to maneuver, but will also allow us to inflict as little damage to the transport as possible. We can also avoid combat with any Knightmare frames. We'll have Zen, Zerith, and Zinnia stationed underwater in the Pacific Ocean until further notice. Meanwhile, Aka, Yoru, Polaris, and Maeraka will fly in the air and keep any Britannian aircraft at bay, as well as drop off myself, Sayoko, Rai, and Shirley at these three points of the ship," three parts of the Avalon highlighted in red. "Rai and Shirley will take port and starboard and sabotage the engines. While they're doing that, Sayoko and I will search for Nunnally. Once we have her, you'll pick us up. Worst case scenario, though, the Paladins that are on the Avalon can use the bonds we have with our Lions to call them to us. After that, we return to the Castle. Any questions?"
Most of the Paladins shook their heads, but Suzaku, surprisingly, raised his hand slightly, "Lelouch, I...I was wondering. Could I somehow come with you to get Nunnally? She's my friend too, and I want to help more."
Lelouch smiled but shook his head, "I appreciate it, Suzaku, but we can't risk Britannia learning your identity, and you already know why."
Suzaku grimaced, but nodded, "Yeah, got it."
"Alright, we leave in half a varga. Be ready!"
As everyone scrambled to prepare for departure, Lelouch managed to snag Sayoko's arm.
"Sayoko, may we speak in private?" he asked politely.
The maid nodded, and Lelouch led them down the hall, not too far from the bridge.
"Do you have it with you?" he asked urgently once he was sure they were alone.
Sayoko immediately reached into her pocket and pulled out an object wrapped in fabric. She handed it to him without protest.
Lelouch took the object and carefully unwrapped the cloth. Underneath it was a knife. But not just any knife. The metal of the blade was a purple color and had a familiar symbol engraved at the bottom of the hilt.
Lelouch bit his lip. Theories and possibilities all pooled within his mind, some making more or less sense than the last.
"Master, if I may ask, what exactly is this? How did you get it?" Sayoko asked.
Lelouch took a breath before answering... "...It belonged to my mother. I came across it completely by accident. Details aren't needed, but let's just say that the noble I was playing against that day bit off a little more than he could chew with the gamble. In exchange for keeping half of the money, he offered this knife as a replacement. He told me it was one of a kind and that it didn't need much maintenance. I was feeling generous that day, so I agreed. I will admit, though… the second I touched the knife, I felt some sort of… connection to it… does that sound strange?"
"Not at all," Sayoko shook her head.
"Anyway, a couple days later, when I was taking a closer look at it, I found a note hidden in the knife's sheath. That's when I found out it belonged to my mom. I also learned the name of her father this way. How that nobleman got it, I don't know, but I was actually able to learn a lot about my mom's family because of this. My mom was born a civilian, and her father, my grandfather, was a fireman, and he died like one too. Lost his own life in a house fire while he was trying to save a little girl..." he smiled sadly. When he learned about the man he would've called grandfather, he was sad that he hadn't been able to meet him. He seemed like a good man to have raised a woman as wonderful as his mother.
"...Is there another reason you're so interested in this knife, my lord?" Sayoko asked.
Lelouch's face went from a whimsical smile to severe and determined again, "Before we arrived back here, we, Voltron, ran into a Galra operative who was working against the Empire. He apparently was a member of a Galra resistance group. They call themselves 'The Blade of Marmora.'" Lelouch tightly held the knife by the hilt, "All of their operatives apparently carried blades just like this. Though the one that Ulaz was carrying was much bigger than this one…"
"...What does this mean then?" Sayoko asked, her face looking troubled.
Lelouch shook his head, "That can wait for now. Nunnally needs us."
Sayoko nodded and bowed, "Of course."
Before she could leave to prepare herself, Lelouch grabbed her arm again, "Wait… Sayoko. I just wanted to tell you, I'm thankful for everything you've done for Nunnally and me all these years. You know who we are, and yet you've stayed by our side through everything. I don't think I can thank you enough for that."
Sayoko smiled and placed a hand on Lelouch's shoulder. He looked up at as Sayoko caught his eyes with her own, "Lelouch. You and Lady Nunnally are both precious to me. I think of you as my own. And I want to promise you right now, if I ever meet that monster that you call your father, the only thing he will get from me is a knife between his eyes."
Lelouch's eyes widened. He knew that Sayoko was dedicated to her work, but to hear her say that she would kill someone so willingly aloud took him by surprise.
Before he could think, he pulled Sayoko into a hug. The ninja stiffened for a moment before quickly returning it.
As they pulled away, Sayoko smirked at her young lord, "Now, let's go get your sister."
Lelouch smirked back, "Right."
o~o
"Attention all personnel. The Avalon is scheduled for departure in ten minutes," a voice announced over the radio.
Sitting alongside the massive ship that her brother was currently prepping, Cornelia sat impatiently within her newly repaired Gloucester within an escort ship. Nonette was stationed in a separate ship on the other side, with the Lancelot and Schneizel's research team as well. As Kanon and Schneizel promised, they managed to make arrangements for Cornelia to be with the group that would escort Nunnally back to the homeland. While she still wasn't allowed to see her sister, much to her great annoyance, she was at least grateful that she would know Nunnally was safe. And once she finished officially cleaning up the terrorism in Area 11 and left it to her sister, Euphemia, the first thing she planned to do was visit Pendragon to see Nunnally. She would assure her that she nor Lelouch had been abandoned, that she had secretly never stopped looking, and wouldn't until she had physical evidence of their deaths.
Being unable to save them during Japan's conquest was a regret that weighed heavily on her shoulders, and she planned to do everything in her power to make up for it in the future.
Meanwhile, at the ground level, Jeremiah Gottwald and a small squadron of soldiers, including Villetta, were standing guard on the runway. They watched as the last of the supplies was loaded into the Avalon.
The soldier couldn't help but frown with frustration, "This is unacceptable… I should be on that ship, protecting Princess Nunnally personally!"
His radio wasn't on, so he received no response to his lament. Thinking of the young princess, though, his mind soon wandered to darker, more painful thoughts. He remembered being there on the day that Lady Marianne had been cruelly shot down. And he had been on his first assignment as a guard as well. It had been his chance to prove his loyalty to Lady Marianne and the Empire!
But he failed. His loyalty didn't carry through. And now, the woman that he loved and respected was gone, and her children followed shortly after.
Then, just over two weeks ago, he received the news that nearly had him fall to his knees with joy. Prince Lelouch and Princess Nunnally were alive! And in good health from what he could tell. Once the Viceroy learned of this, she had all units, all units, out searching for clues on where to find her brother and sister.
Jeremiah had leaped on the opportunity to prove himself once more. It had to be him that found them. Not only could it repair his reputation and honor that he had lost due to the 'Orange' incident (he grit his teeth just thinking about it), but also redeem himself from his failure eight years prior. And once Prince Lelouch and Princess Nunnally were safe once more with the Royal Family, he would never leave their side again. He would do everything in his power to keep them safe and happy.
Due to his prior history with Lady Marianne, he was one of the first to piece together Ashford Academy's connection with vi Britannia siblings. He felt like an absolute fool for not thinking about it before, either! The Ashford family had been one of Lady Marianne's top supporters. They had lost nearly everything when she had died, so it would make sense, therefore, for that same family to provide the vi Britannians with refuge.
But when they finally had been given the okay to infiltrate the school, they were once again too late.
The clubhouse that they found out the vi Britannians had been living in was deserted. There were no signs of life, and the home appeared to have been uninhabited for a week at the most. When he heard Villetta recheck the school attendance, his heart gave another pang of despair when she told him that their names, Lamperouge, had been removed from the school.
This discovery only proved to Jeremiah another horrifying revelation. The vi Britannia children weren't being held captive like some conspiracy theorists thought, but it was more likely that the children were purposefully hiding from Britannia. The more he thought about it though, the more it made sense.
The day that Prince Lelouch confronted his father was a harrowing one. Jeremiah's loyalty was only to his Lady Marianne, and being one of the ones there to witness the Emperor openly saying that his son was nothing to him had made his blood boil. To this day, he wondered why he didn't act differently. If he had defended the prince in that throne room, or at the very least insisted on going with them to Japan, things likely could've ended up differently.
Jeremiah was shaken from his thoughts, though, when the ground beneath his Knightmare rattled. Sirens and warning sounds rang wildly throughout the base. Knightmares scrambled into defensive positions, and soldiers rushed to finish the Avalon's preparations.
Then with a fantastic boom, three of the Voltron Lions, the black, green, and orange one, landed hard right in the middle of the base, tails thrashing, and teeth bared.
Jeremiah had been unable to get a good look at the Lions when they had first appeared at Narita. Now that he was practically standing in front of them, he could understand the panic that they seemed to inflict on many of the soldiers that day.
However, this didn't deter Jeremiah. If the Lions were here than that had to mean-
"ZERO!" Jeremiah shouted as he raced towards the Lions in his Knightmare.
"Lord Jeremiah, wait!" Villetta shouted after him.
"Zero! If you're here, come out and face me!" he shouted, "Come and face Jeremiah Gottwald!"
"Well, well," a voice came from the Black Lion, "it's been a while, Jeremiah. So, you're still in the army? I'd love to stay and catch up, but I'm afraid I don't have time right this minute, Orange boy."
There it was. That name. The name that now made Jeremiah a near pariah among the rest of the soldiers. Red slowly bled into Jeremiah's vision.
"Orange?!" he howled in rage as he stared at the Black Lion, and he could swear the Lion itself was smirking at him as it waved its tail haughtily, "DIE!"
Jeremiah charged forward in a fury with his Sutherland. Before he could land a single blow though, the Black Lion's mouth opened, and a single laser blast collided with his Knightmare, throwing it backward in pieces as it erupted in flames.
"Lord Jeremiah!" Villetta gasped in horror as she watched another soldier and comrade meet his end right in front of her eyes. Looking behind the Lions, Villetta noticed the Avalon finally beginning to take off, along with the other escort ships. Thinking fast, she raced around the Lions and leaped onto the Avalon just as the loading doors closed. Jeremiah died trying to protect Princess Nunnally. The least she could do was honor his death by doing the same thing in his stead.
As Lelouch watched the Avalon take off, he smirked, "Just as planned. Now!"
Zen, Zerith, and Zinnia all leaped into the air, pointing their heads downward, and began blasting at the ground below, blowing dust and debris up everywhere, making a makeshift smokescreen for their escape.
As the dust finally cleared around the remaining Britannian forces, they were shocked to see the lions had vanished.
o~o
"Alright, phase one complete," Lelouch reported through the comms as the Lions dove underwater, "the Avalon is now airborne. Meet at the rendezvous point."
"Understood!" a chorus of voices responded. It was music to Lelouch's ears. Even now, he was amazed at the support and assistance he was receiving from his fellow Ashford Academy peers.
As the three Lions descended to the seafloor, a reasonable distance ahead of the Avalon's current location, Lelouch spotted the other four Lions gliding towards them. Waiting for them within the other Lions would be Sayoko and C.C., who insisted on accompanying the infiltration team onto the Avalon ship as well.
The trio gently set their Lions down on the ocean floor, before their helmet shields automatically pulled up. They then quickly left the cockpits of each Lion and were soon submerged into the depths of the sea. Using their jetpacks, the three effortlessly glided through the water to the four Lions waiting for them. Lelouch swam into Yoru's mouth, Rai into Polaris, and Shirley into Maeraka.
As Lelouch emerged and entered Yoru's cockpit, Sayoko and Suzaku greeted him with a nod and smile. The maid was now wearing an outfit nearly identical to Allura's and C.C.'s, only hers was red and light blue.
Same with Rivalz when Rai arrived. The two shared a fist bump before bracing for action.
Shirley also made it safely to Maeraka's cockpit, with Milly and C.C. waiting for her.
"I thought you would be with Lulu, C.C.," Shirley said when she got there.
"I decided that I'm going with you at the last minute, Shirley Fennete," the immortal answered.
"Oh… okay," she said awkwardly.
"I probably don't need to remind you, Shirley, but there won't be Galran sentries up there this time. The soldiers we'll be fighting will be real-life people. Are you willing to do what it takes to complete the mission? Are you willing… to kill to do so?"
Milly looked warily between the two women. She had thought about this too and turned her concerned face towards her friend.
"Th-that won't happen!" Shirley stuttered, "I-I'll just use my Geass and sneak past them. I don't have to kill anyone!"
C.C. sighed, "You realize you can't solely rely on your Geass forever. Sooner or later, you'll have to fight and possibly kill, to survive."
Shirley didn't answer. How could she respond to that appropriately?
Turns out, she didn't need to, as the shadow of the Avalon finally fell over them.
"Kallen, use your Geass to check the ship for Nunnally. Is she on there?" Lelouch asked urgently.
Kallen promptly activated her Geass, and her vision zoomed in on the ship. She scanned the interior before her eyes fell on a room near the center of the Avalon. In the middle of the platform, she spotted a familiar figure.
"Yep, she's there. This definitely isn't a decoy!" Kallen confirmed.
"Good! Alright, commence phase two of the operation!"
#Fanfiction#AU#Voltron#Code Geass#lelouch lamperouge#c.c.#kallen kozuki#suzaku kururugi#shirley fenette#rivalz cardemonde#milly ashford#cornelia li britannia#rai (lost colors)#princess allura#coran#black knights#jeremiah gottwald
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Edelgard/Byleth C-S Support
Here’s Edelgard’s support chain with Byleth. I don’t think there’s much differing dialogue between m!Byleth and f!Byleth, but I could be wrong. Major spoilers below regarding what Edelgard’s deal is (+spoilers regarding BE route and Byleth in general). Once again, long post incoming.
???: Uhh... Agh... Fath... Save... Byleth: ... Dialogue Tree:
A: Who could that be? B: Is that...a ghost? ???: A ghost, perhaps? No, that is surely not the case. ???: We are within a monastery! No ghost would dare set foot in here... ???: What is that look upon your face? I am no ghost, if that is what was on your mind! Edelgard: No... Agh... Huh?! Who's there?! Professor... What are you doing here? Dialogue Tree:
A: I heard something. B: I was restless. Edelgard (A): Oh? Perhaps I was talking in my sleep. (B): What could that possibly mean? In any case, please don't scare me like that. Byleth: Bad dreams? Edelgard: Ah... So you heard me, then. Yes, it was a nightmare. I've had them since I was a child. Stupid, pointless dreams I can't control...It's terribly frustrating. Dialogue Tree:
A: What are they about? B: Anything I can help with? Edelgard (A): Just...my childhood. A time before I had realized who I was destined to become. (B): No. They're just worthless dreams of the past. Talking about it won't change a thing. Dialogue Tree:
A: You can trust me with anything. B: It's none of my business. Edelgard (A): I had a feeling you'd say that. I suppose I could try... (B): Perhaps not. Still, here you are. Maybe I can trust you with this... But only if you swear not to tell a soul. I appreciate it. I dream of...my older brother, paralyzed, helpless... my older sister crying for help that never came... the youngest babbling words beyond meaning. I see my family dying slowly, waiting in the darkest depths for a glimmer of light. I once had ten siblings, eight older and two younger. Such a large family, and yet I became the heir to the throne. Do you know why? Every last one of them was crippled by disease or lost their mind or died. I was the only one left who could inherit the throne. Dialogue Tree:
A: That's awful. B: How could such a thing happen... Edelgard: Things kept getting worse. The darkness kept getting darker. In the end, I was the only one who survived. The nightmares are a reminder...to never forget. To never allow such terrible things to happen again. Never again... Even now, I'm the only one who can carry the weight of the Adrestian Empire. The future of the Empire...of everything...depends on me. Hm... I shared more than I intended to. I suppose there's something in the air tonight. I've never told anyone about my past before. Please...forget I said anything. Sleep well, my teacher.
B Support
Edelgard: Ah, it's you. Out late again, I see. What brings you here? Dialogue Tree:
A: I could ask you the same. B: Trouble sleeping? Edelgard (A): I just wanted some fresh air. There's a lovely breeze tonight. I always wander outside when sleep evades me. (B): Is it that obvious? I despise being cooped up when sleep evades me. I just have to get some fresh air. Dialogue Tree:
A: I couldn't sleep either. B: I'm exhausted. Edelgard (A): So I see. Still, it's ill-advised to stay up so late. (B): Heh, I see. Well, don't let me keep you. Hurry back to your room, my teacher. I should get some sleep too, but... Have you ever felt a sort of longing for the outdoors? I have. There are times I long for the warmth of the sun, for a sweet breeze on my face... Do you remember what I told you the other night? About...my past? None of my siblings had a chance to lead the sort of life they deserved. An ordinary life. Dialogue Tree:
A: Should I say I forgot? You asked me to forget... B: I remember. Edelgard (A): Hm. Well, perhaps if I tell you more, it will come back to you. My siblings and I were... We were imprisoned underground, beneath the palace. The objective was to endow our bodies with the power of a Major Crest. I have always possessed the Crest of Seiros, inherited through the Hresvelg bloodline. But it was only a Minor Crest, and most of my siblings bore no Crest at all. In order to create a peerless emperor to rule Fódlan, they violated our bodies by cutting open our very flesh. Now here I stand, the fruit of that endeavor: Edelgard von Hresvelg! But that came at too high a price... The others were sacrificed. Ours weren't the only lives devastated by that terrible process. Innocents died as well, without even knowing what they were dying for. And there you have it, the truth of the Hresvelg's Empire. Dialogue Tree:
A: Who is to blame? B: It's unbelievable. Edelgard (A): The prime minister and his gaggle of nobles. They had the Empire under their thumbs. My father, the emperor, tried to stop him, but...it was futile. My father was nothing but a puppet on a string by then. He was powerless to save us. I know how it all sounds. But when you see my true strength, you will know I speak the truth. (B): It is. But when you see my true strength, you will know that I speak the truth. I have kept it hidden all this time, but...I will reveal to you the power of my second Crest. It is the same as yours...the Crest of Flames. When it manifested for me, I swore a silent oath. For the sake of my family and for all the poor souls whose lives were traded for my existence... For their sake, I will build a world where such meaningless sacrifice is never again sanctioned. As emperor, I will change the world. I swear it.
A Support
Edelgard: Ugh... I'm so sick of it all. There is so much to be done, yet all I encounter are new problems and pitfalls. Ugh... Sometimes I wish I could spend just one day doing absolutely nothing and gorging myself on sweets! Dialogue Tree:
A: This isn't like you. B: Such are the burdens of an emperor. C: Let's do just that. Edelgard (A): Even I have moments of self-indulgence, you know. (B): You sound just like Hubert. Am I not allowed a fleeting moment of self-indulgence? (C): Do you mean it? Just the thought makes me happy. But...Hubert would never allow it. Byleth: That's too bad. Edelgard: Indeed. It may not be possible now, but one day we will know the joys of idling. Mark my words. ... Is that a smirk I spy? Is it so amusing to you, me daydreaming of free time? Dialogue Tree:
A: It's pretty funny. B: You misunderstand me. Edelgard (A): I see. I'm finally getting an idea of what you think of me. (B): Huh! Your silly grin says otherwise. But let's put all that aside for now. There is something I've been meaning to tell you. I'm afraid this might sound a bit...sentimental. However... I want to thank you. Because of you, I feel I can walk my fated path without losing myself. If I were alone, I might have lost perspective and become a harsh leader with a heart of ice. But I'm not alone. With you by my side, I'm somehow free to be not only a leader but...simply Edelgard. ** But you came back to me. With you by my side, I'm somehow free to be not only a leader but...simply Edelgard. Dialogue Tree:
A: I'm glad. B: You have many allies. Edelgard: True. I am fortunate to be surrounded by many wonderful companions. Nevertheless, you are...different from the rest. Until now, no one has been able to surpass me— much less command me. I have always been seen as an untouchable princess or emperor. No one spoke to me as an equal or met my gaze without flinching. It was lonely. Terribly lonely. The only person I could rely on as I tried to claw my way out of the darkness was myself. But you...you have been a brilliant light. Somehow, you have chased the darkness away. And for that... I will always be grateful.
**I'm not sure whether the change regarding this clause is because of Byleth’s gender or because of the route you choose.
S Support
Edelgard: Yes? Oh! It's you, Professor. I was certain it was Hubert coming to drag me back to my duties. "Your Majesty, you must know your supreme talents are needed at present. Why not gaze at these documents instead of the sky?" Dialogue Tree:
A: That sounds like Hubert. B: That didn't sound like Hubert at all. Edelgard (A): Doesn't it? And the worst part is that he's always right, so I can't even argue with him. (B): No? Well then. And here I thought my Hubert impression was second to none. But that's enough about Hubert for the moment. While I have your attention, I'd like to thank you for your help in that last battle. As you well know, I'm perfectly capable of commanding the army by myself. However, when you're around, it's somehow different. I'm not sure I can properly explain it. I suppose your perspective on the battlefield is simply sharper than mine. When you're devising tactics and tricks for us, it's almost as though you can read the enemy's mind. There's no getting around it. Your talent for strategy far exceeds my own. I'm quite jealous in all honesty. Dialogue Tree:
A: You have many talents that I lack. B: Sometimes, I'm jealous of you too. Edelgard (A): Is that a fact? Well, if you insist. (B): I suppose a flower from another's field is always more beautiful. I'll admit, I think of you as rather detached, so to hear that you have emotions such as jealousy is...something of a relief. Dialogue Tree:
A: I'm not detached. B: I could say the same of you. Edelgard (A): Oh, but you are! Don't even try to argue. But I suppose I'm much the same. I've also distanced myself from the ordinary world. (B): I can't deny it. Ever since I underwent those...procedures, I've certainly distanced myself from the ordinary world. It seems we were fated to be friends. Friends... That word somehow doesn't seem adequate. Besides, we've been friends for a long time, you and I. By now, we're so much more than that, at least in my mind. You know...instead of Edelgard, you can call me ust El. If you so please. That's what my parents and closest sisters used to call me when I was little. Now there's no one left who calls me El... But with you, well...I think I could allow it. In fact, it would mean a great deal to me. Byleth: Why is that? Edelgard: Why? Hmm... Well, you have stood beside me and shared my burdens. As I said, you are much more than a friend. In truth, you are like family to me. I suppose that's why.
Final Dialogue (S-supported?)
Edelgard: The children of the goddess have been defeated at last. The shape of the world will be forever changed. Humanity is free now. The world is ours once again. Can you believe it? Dialogue Tree:
A: I'm not sure. B: It isn't over yet. Edelgard: I see. Well, one thing is certain. The fate of this world depends on the choices we make. It's possible that people would have been happier continuing to mindlessly obey the goddess. Our work is far from over. And we can't ignore the possibility that our enemies will resurface one day. Byleth: True. There is still much to be done. Edelgard: We can't ignore the possibility that our enemies will resurface one day. In the end, the fate of this world depends on the choices we make. I don't know what the future holds, but...come what may, will you stay by my side? You chose to protect me at the Holy Tomb. Will you choose me again? What I'm trying to say is...I need you. Byleth: El... Please accept this gift. Edelgard: You called me El. That's... I... That means more than I can say. And this ring... It's lovely. Thank you, my dearest friend. I will happily accept it. I must admit, I feared my feelings would be unrequited. So long as I had you by my side, it never mattered how many enemies I amassed. You were all I needed. All this time, I longed to share my feelings with you, and it seems you wished for the same. Now, our wishes have come true. This feeling...it's overwhelming. Dialogue Tree:
A: I promise to always be there for you. B: Now, your burdens are mine to bear. Edelgard (A): I promise the same. Together, we can achieve anything. (B): Absolutely not—I won't allow it! From now on, we face the world and carry our burdens together. We will crush those who slither in the dark and restore peace and order to Fódlan. I will then find a suitable successor and hand over the reins of the Empire. When all that is done, it will be just the two of us. I look forward to starting our life together in the light of a glorious new dawn. Dialogue Tree:
A: That seems a lifetime away. B: Let's make it happen. Edelgard (A): It will be a long and difficult path, I'm afraid, but we must remain focused on our goals. (B): Yes, that is all we can do for now. We must remain focused on our goals. To think that I may truly call you my partner and equal now... The solitary reign of Edelgard has come to an end. From now on, we walk this path together. With time and care, the darkness shrouding this world will be lifted. You and I will become the light that shines over Fódlan...just as you have shined upon my life.
#fire emblem#fire emblem three houses#fe16 spoilers#fe3h spoilers#three houses spoilers#for those with the zip file this group of text files starts with the one labelled:#006116076032_00016c8bea00#as i noted in dimitri's support his final dialogue isn't there; its possible his s support is his final dialogue but i'm not sure#the dialogue in this support (especially in the c) feels a little wonky so i apologize if who says what isn't correct
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SnK 112 Thoughts
Congrats to Eren on giving all the good people contributing to his series’ Wild Mass Guessing page a shout-out. Good on you, man. You’ve got my vote on your cult not doing anything wrong or aggravatingly stupid ever.
Also, Zeke!
It’s rare we see such a prime example of a leader in a shounen manga knowing how to delegate. Props, my man!
I hope Annie kicks both your heads off!
This is an emotional chapter.
Before we begin, I have one thing I need to get off my chest.
Thank you for your time.
First thing first!
I love how Nicolo’s entire theory is, “something shady is up with the wine and idk Zeke and spinal fluid sounds right????” This entire chapter is one long tribute to everything the fandom has ever screamed about and it is fantastic in that one aspect.
Also, hey, hope for Falco. Zeke waits until all the bottles are empty before he screams, so I would guess that he at least prefers his victims to be properly dosed. Falco should be okay. The blunt force trauma might actually be the more concerning bit for the bright and shiny little one.
Another thing I love is how every single mention of Marley somehow makes Marley come across even worse.
Sorry, that’s not fair.
I love how every single mention of Marley reminds and confirms that they are the worse, and the reminders serve to dig that knowledge deeper into all our souls until we almost don’t mind when innocent civilians are wiped off the map if it means that structure no longer exists.
“Almost” being subject to innate character and morality.
Eren does not recognize the union of “almost” and adds the asterisk of “younglings” after “innocent civilians.”
Hell though, Nicolo. At least you found yourself, even if it did come after battering a child into unconsciousness. And you kept Connie and Jean from drinking the bad juice.
I really like the interaction between Nicolo and Sasha’s dad. Nicolo’s not the man he is. He loses himself in his anger and only chance stops him from crossing a very serious line.
But Mr. Blouse is the type of man Nicolo can see the merit in, and define himself by that gap because the end of that gap is something so much better than the man who come close to murdering children.
Some people are still learning to be better, even now, because of the good people they surround themselves by.
Gabi has been surrounded by nothing but warmth (barring Nicolo and Kaya’s trauma) since arriving to Paradis. Falco is a good guy. Mikasa and Armin are good people. The family of the soldier she killed are good people.
She isn’t charging at Mikasa and Armin (and geez every time these kids get a distance shot when the other characters are standing up it fucks me up; they are too tiny for any of this). She’s been passionately defending everything she and Marley has done, but now she’s quiet, and all she can do is ask for her friend, who keeps saving her life, to not be killed. All she can do is offer up her life to make up for the crimes that she can’t imagine being forgiven.
She is so young. Killing and violence and death are the obvious conclusions to her. She’s been taught that, and she excels at that, but now she keeps finding people who are willing to stand down and not kill her.
Reiner’s character is a slow stumble into his morality breaking his mind. Slowly, the idea that these people he’s surrounded by are people encroaches.
Gabi’s thrown into the deep end and the plot keeps shoving her head down when she struggles to the surface to breathe. None of this has been kind on her. The violent assault on her sanity is the kind she’s only ever been exposed to physically.
I haven’t put much thought into what I want from the Warriors, because thoughts of anything Marley adjacent always tend to irritate me. They’re trapped in a broken cycle that they’re perpetuating, and that makes them impossible to root for.
But I think Gabi needs her cousin.
She’s always wanted to be strong for him, and he’s only clinging to life because he wants to be strong for her and Falco.
Reiner knows what it’s like to learn that your simple world is infinitely more complicated than you can bear. This is his little cousin, and she’s gone through the crash course version of his nightmare. She doesn’t need the right answer that makes it all okay (there isn’t one), but a hug and someone understanding all of the twisting moral paradoxes shattering her insides would be such a helpful thing.
Heck, it would be good for Reiner, too. Seeing all of his pain in someone he doesn’t have the heart to blame. Maybe he could find some sort of path to peace in that.
Then everything just goes straight to hell.
Despite this chapter’s... this chapter...ness, Eren stepping straight into the backroom with his hand covered in blood? Hella fucking cool. Like. That is one thing I absolutely did not see coming, and it is a great way to bring him on back in.
I thought he wouldn’t get to talk to Armin or Mikasa until his plan exploded and they needed to bail him out. I never once expected him to just walk right in and take his buddies hostage for a nice, quiet conversation.
That said, yike.
Yike, yike, and dare I say it, yikes.
Grior reveals Our Heroes’ location, and that’s... really scary in itself, because Grior tells him that he’s grown too close with Eldians, yet Grior is helping the fanatical Eldians act in accordance with Zeke’s plans.
So it isn’t that Nicolo’s gotten too close with Eldians, it’s that he’s grown close to them without the purpose of exploiting them. Which, as every Marleyan soldier knows, is a bad thing.
And Floch doesn’t mind. He’s accepting the help of Grior without any comment.
Let’s do a brief headcount: Yelena, Zeke, and Eren run a cult of fanatic Eldians under the banner of a new Eldian Empire. Paradis’ military is theoretically running Paradis but really sentenced to the whims of said cult. At least one prisoner of war sides with helping out the cult. The Anti-Marley Volunteers (or at least Onyankopon) are in the dark.
Floch is, partially, willing to let Zeke’s plans play out however they may because they can work to destabilize the current Paradis government.
It’s fitting that this chapter is called, “Ignorance.” Willful and unwillful.
And as Eren says, nothing is further from freedom.
Now let’s get to the fun happy times of EMA.
See? Eren gets out of prison and the first thing on his mind is talking to his best friends! Such a touching, emotional sentiment!
...
Yeah, do you guys know where to begin? I don’t.
This is just.
Honestly, I keep moving back to yikes?
Eren is gathering people he has no emotional attachment to to his side, and aggressively pushing his friends away. He is doing everything he can to abandon them on the roadside and make sure they will have zero desire to come crawling back to him.
The question is if he’s doing this because he believes it’s best within his own head, he believes it’s the best response to being threatened into this, or if Eren’s just gone completely haywire in the membrane and his PTSD is finally attacking people besides himself emotionally.
This kind of deliberate cruelty has like. motive.
Mikasa tries to talk to Eren by reminding him of how kind he is. The warmth is what saves her in her mind, not the violence. She’s the one to bring up the kidnapping.
Eren counters.
Nothing like kindness saves her. It’s biology. Friendship doesn’t bind them, slavery does. Happenstance brings them together and keeps them there.
Mikasa argues. She says he’s wrong, and tells him it’s because of him that she’s strong, meaning him as a person.
Eren doesn’t address that. Despite being the one to ask how he’s wrong, when he’s given an attempt at an answer, he keeps monologuing rather than respond to Mikasa’s feelings for him. He brings up her headaches.
Mikasa is dead, and a slave, and he hates her.
“Do you know who I hate most in this world? Anyone who isn’t free.”
Ignorance is furthest from freedom. Even in this script Eren has adopted, no matter how much of it is the truth, if Eren’s seeking to relieve Mikasa of her ignorance, he’s seeking to bring the slave he hates so much freedom. From him.
Funny, she might protect Eren automatically, but she doesn’t have any problem with headaches when Armin punches Eren and makes him bleed.
Armin earns a less prolonged speech before all of it, and it’s...
For both of them, this is the worst thing they could hear from Eren. Armin, as a child, always feels useless next to his strong friends. His huge moment in Trost comes from realizing they never see him that way. It’s all in his head.
This isn’t in his head. This is Eren, telling him he’s useless.
Telling him that Bertolt, who’s only in his head because Eren fought tooth and nail to put him there, is interfering with his free will.
(Also even if everything Eren is saying is the bull it feels like, can has Frieda!Eren? Memory seepage. Canonize my brotp, manga. Do it.
(Double also, lol at Eren saying that memories are part of who you are, and Armin having Bertolt’s means bad things, but Eren having... lots has no effect, he is teh free as a bird. Kiddo, you are not a good bad guy.))
Eren calls himself free before he starts talking. He’s free from his ignorance in a way they are not, and he chooses to enlighten his friends.
Good grief. And more grief. Less than good grief?
Terrible grief?
ALL the grief.
Eren’s the one who wants a peaceful talk with his friends. All so he can beat the crap out of them physically and emotionally.
Eren.
What in the fuck. What reason could you possibly have to need Armin and Mikasa that far away from you? Why do they need to be pushed out of trying to see the good in you?
I’m sure there’s a reason, because story.
But wow.
Killing younglings was one thing. Lording the high ground and your blood brother over your real family?
Your heroic sacrifice where you finally die and everyone’s crying about how you did all this stupid stuff alone but truly for a good cause had better make me cry like a damn baby kid, or you are dead to me.
Additionally, heeeey. Guess what.
Guess what Eren’s learned about important things.
And throwing them away.
Can you guess.
Can you.
It’s the family he has that isn’t pro-murder.
That’s actually of serious interest to me, because one of the things I think the story has been moving towards is an actual examination of the belief that you need to sacrifice things to change things. While Armin states that in a philosophical, hey, this seems like how we win, way, the story has, more and more, focused on the love that keeps people from making certain sacrifices.
Eren’s thrown love, the only reason Armin’s alive to punch him, away.
For as dark as this story is, that’s never been the right choice. Letting people go is understood and respected. Disloyalty is scorned and rejected.
My theory for a while has been that the true answer to these sacrifices is that if you throw away the things you care about to change the world, that world will have changed into something abominable.
The world would be a different place if Sasha didn’t care about killing children.
Sasha being Sasha is why Nicolo tries to fight Zeke’s plans.
Eren’s world without Armin and Mikasa is not going to be a better one for him, and possibly not for anyone else, either.
Then we lead into...
Things that just make me really, really uncomfortable.
I don’t mind people like Levi suggesting that someone eats Zeke, then dies in a few months when Historia eats that person. I. That’s fine. That’s a fine plan, and it makes sense for where they’re at, and anyone who agreed to that would agree, no issue.
Historia’s plotline continues to make me... uncomfortable is really the word. Not the tragic, devastating uncomfortable that Eren’s stuff is. Just... the sickening kind. The fact that people have, off-screen, come to terms with perpetuating the same kind of bloody sacrifice of their children that plagues their entire society after we had an entire arc ending with Historia going hey, actually fuck that...
A thirteen-year-old being bred to eat its mother is a disgusting concept.
I know I’ve said it before, and I realize people are probably done with my feelings on the subject, but if that is really the story being told--even if it avoids that conclusion, the fact that a scheme like that is allowed to get so far without any comment to the contrary except by the Kylo Ren wannabe at the very start--
Why in the fuck should I care what happens to these people?
You raise a child to die for you, you don’t deserve to live.
What happens if they don’t consent in thirteen years? What if they don’t want to eat their mommy? Oh well, we’re going to force you, just like every other Eldian society from the dawn of time? Or guilt you into it because thousands of lives depend on you having none?
Fuck all of you. If that’s your plan, I don’t mind Zeke killing each and every last one of you. I will naturally prefer if he dies in the process, but it’s not the prerequisite you might think.
(Repeated statement that at this point, I will be doing my fandom activities until the series ends, but yeah. This is the place where I choose to opt out, emotionally, if it’s really going down like this.)
Um. In news that actually matters to people who aren’t me, heeeeey, Levi alone in the forest with 31 titans.
This is why the SnK kinkmeme was created.
It’s also really sad.
They killed the titans inside their home.
Zeke’s bringing them back.
Annie needs to kick so many people in the head I can’t even.
#Shingeki no Kyojin#SnK 112#Shiganshina Trio#shingeki no spoilers#SnK spoilers#spoilers#tl;dr#chapter post
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COBOL
Though they're statistically abnormal, startup founders seem to be joined together, but really one is just resting on the other. We didn't have enough saved to live on for a year. But although for most startups raising money will become, if not easy, at least for them. Basically, what Ajax means is Javascript now works. Don't just think investors are stupid. New things were coming, and the people you'd meet there would be no room for startups to exist. But you can control them indirectly, by controlling what situations you let yourself get into. Odd as it might sound, we tell startups that they should try to make as little money as possible.
They may have to morph themselves into something totally different, but they pay more attention to design than they would if that were their only motivation. One I've already mentioned: thoughts about money. But both began with a core of fanatically devoted users, and all Evan and Joshua had to do was grow that core incrementally. It's harder to judge startups than most other things one judges. This is one reason Y Combinator has a rule against investing in startups with only one founder. Water mills transformed mechanical power from a luxury into a commodity, and they were used in the Roman empire. This should not really be surprising. How about if I give you a big number that only has a 10 to the minus 100 chance of not being prime? The reason is that faster hardware has allowed programmers to make different tradeoffs between speed and convenience, depending on the application. In fact, it's not even that.
If I'm right, hacker will mean something different in twenty years than it does now. They're working on their own startup is probably going to be bloated and full of duplication anyway. The last straw for me was a sentence I read a couple days ago I told a reporter that we expected about a third of the companies we funded to succeed. So here we had two levels of interpretation, one of the most powerful forces in a startup depends so much on motivation, the paradoxical result is that each species thrives in groups of a certain size. Throw them off a cliff, and most will find on the way down that they have wings. I wish every startup we funded could appear in a Newsweek article describing them as the next development platform, you can be sure it's not. Be conservative. I was talking recently to a founder who considered starting a startup seems impossible as surely as starting a startup molds you into someone who can handle it. Often they are, but figure out precisely where you lose them. But I don't think there was any deliberate plan to suggest there was a new one, and if you want to get millions of dollars. I'm forty. It's a crowded market, I remember one founder saying worriedly.
After a while this filter will start to make up their minds faster, or new investors will emerge who do. The amounts invested by different types of founders that we have enough data to see patterns, and there seems to be merging with the descendants of Algol. It's in their interest to collect the maximum amount of information while making the minimum number of decisions. Having seen that happen so many times is one of the reasons I disliked the term Web 2. But it would be between a boss and an employee. There is a founder community just as there's a VC community. What programmers in a hundred years.
I think there are five reasons people like object-oriented programming is popular in big companies is toxic to programmers. Here's a handy rule for startups: competitors are rarely as dangerous as they seem. Bob's going to grad school. Large organizations always tend to develop software this way, the pressure is always in that direction. We didn't have enough saved to live on. I could till I'd made enough to solve the problem would have found it. You don't have complete control, of course.
When you're working on something so unusual that no one else realized it was a description of Google? Part of the reason I say this is optimism: it seems that, if you can believe that. And ask: will people actually pay for this? Partly, I think, is to separate the meaning of a program, you won't die. Perhaps letting your mind wander is like doodling with ideas. I learned from Michael Rabin: that the best way to put it is to redefine the problem as a superset of the current one. I remember wondering, how did my friends get to be so limited by whatever language we think in that easier formulations of programs seem very surprising.
#automatically generated text#Markov chains#Paul Graham#Python#Patrick Mooney#mind#course#term#Water#program#reasons#investors#control#New#community#way#money#founder#market#startups#species#wings#users#software
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Hi! I really love your fic, and sorry if this is a bit of an awkward question, feel free to ignore it, but which comics would you recommend as ‘essential’ stony reading? You seem very knowledgeable about them :)
That’s not an awkward question at all! And thank you!
When people who haven’t really read comics ask me what comics they should read to get into Steve/Tony, I usually say that they should read Captain America: Man Out of Time – it’s short, it’s modern, it redoes Steve’s origin story in an interesting and approachable way. and it has some very sweet Steve & Tony moments. If you read it and like it, it’s probably worth seeking out other comics. But the thing is, I wouldn’t say it’s “essential” Steve/Tony reading, because it hasn’t really made an impact on fandom either in its plot events or its characterization of Steve & Tony. Like, if you go to AO3, you’re not going to find a lot of fic specifically about it. (Also it’s a retelling so it’s… not really canon in exactly the same way as the regular comics.)
So when you say you want “essential” comics, I am interpreting it as the comics that are basically the greatest hits of Steve/Tony fandom. Comics everyone is expected to know because they are featured again and again in fanfiction and because they have shaped our understanding of Steve and Tony’s characters. That’s what I would consider essential. I mean, much as I love, say, v3, you can probably get by without reading most of v3 because most of it doesn’t show up in fanfic (although you may eventually want to know who Rumiko and Tiberius are and what the deal is with the Sentient Armor).
I’m going to stick the list under a Read More.
Anyway, here’s a stab at making such a list for 616:
Avengers vol 1 #4: Necessary reading for any Steve/Tony fan. The Avengers find an iceberg, and there’s a body in the iceberg wearing red, white and blue, and… yeah, welcome to the future, Captain America. The first voice he hears is Tony’s!
Tales of Suspense vol 1 #58: Marvel had distribution agreements throughout most of the 1960s that limited the number of different comic titles they could sell; as a result, instead of solo books Marvel had a bunch of anthology titles (Tales to Astonish, Strange Tales, Journey into Mystery…) that became “split books” with solo tales of two different heroes. Tales of Suspense had up to this point featured Iron Man, but with this issue it became an Iron Man/Captain America split book, and in this issue Iron Man and Cap team up to fight the Chameleon, by which I mean that the Chameleon impersonates Captain America and Tony accidentally fights the real Cap. Whoops.
Nomad (Captain America vol 1 #180-183): You should probably start reading at about #176 for context. Anyway, Steve is disillusioned with the government after he discovers that Richard Nixon, who commits suicide in front of him, is the leader of the evil Secret Empire, and so he gives up being Captain America and decides to be Nomad. He’s only Nomad for about four issues, but what a glorious four issues it is.
Demon in a Bottle (Iron Man vol 1 #120-128): The original arc that established Tony’s alcoholism. If you see references in fanfic to an incident with the Carnelian ambassador, that’s this arc.
Avengers vol 1 #216: Steve finds out that Tony is Iron Man, because they’re on an Avengers mission and the villain magically strips Tony out of his armor, leaving him standing there wearing only his underwear.
The second drinking arc (Iron Man vol 1 #160-200): Tony starts drinking again and loses everything, to the point where he’s living on the streets in a cardboard box. Rhodey becomes Iron Man and Obadiah Stane takes over the company. This is the drinking arc you want to read. Highlights include #172, in which Steve bridal-carries Tony from a burning building, and #182, in which Tony nearly dies in a blizzard.
Armor Wars (Iron Man vol 1 #225-231): Tony tries to steal his technology back from everyone who has it; you will want to read #228, the issue where Steve tries to stop him. (Stories referencing an incident with the Guardsmen are talking about this.)
Operation Galactic Storm: This is a massive crossover from the early 90s where the Kree and Sh’iar have a fight and Steve and Tony disagree about whether to kill the Kree Supreme Intelligence. You don’t need to read the entire crossover; the part you do need to read is the issue afterwards, Captain America vol 1 #401, in which Steve and Tony make their apologies to each other.
Tales of Suspense vol 2 #1: This is a one-shot issue from the mid-90s in which Steve and Tony team up; its claim to fame is that it includes Tony thinking the following line about Steve: "Captain America. Steve. I look at your handsome face, into your clear azure eyes, and as ever, I feel the same guilty envy.“ (Steve also thinks similarly complimentary things about Tony – it’s very much mutual admiration society/mutual inferiority complex.)
Captain America/Iron Man 1998 Annual: Tony wipes Steve’s mind! Steve finds out and is mad! Then they fight MODOK, get lei’d, and make up at the end. It’s a lot of fun.
Red Zone (Avengers vol 3 #65-70): Tony exposes himself to a deadly disease because Steve is more important than he is and he has to give Steve mouth-to-mouth to save his life. Includes giant panels of their lips touching.
Civil War: You should really read Civil War and everything after.
Avengers Prime: This is a miniseries taking place after Steve comes back to life where Steve and Tony end up on an adventure in the Nine Realms together, Tony gets naked, and also they get some closure about Civil War. They hug it out at the end.
One Night in Madripoor (Captain America & Iron Man #633-635): Steve and Tony team up to fight Batroc, MODOK, and robot bees in Madripoor. There’s a lot of banter.
Avengers vol 5 & New Avengers vol 3: After Civil War, Hickman’s Avengers run is probably the second most popular canon setting for comics Steve/Tony. It’s controversial in fandom, and there’s no happy ending… but you can’t deny that it is absolutely about Steve & Tony’s relationship. A hundred issues of pain and betrayal!
Civil War II: The Oath: Okay, yeah, so, I think we can all agree that Secret Empire (the recent one, not the original one) was a terrible idea and it was a very bad decision to make Steve a fascist dictator – but “The Oath” did give us Steve canonically declaring his love for Tony, so, you know, it has that going for it.
The Cap-IM Tumblr maintains a list of Slashy Moments if you’d like to see panels from most of these (and more). Also, the 18+ 616 Steve/Tony Discord maintains a list of resources and summaries of these and more issues.
I also specifically want to say a little more about Civil War because I think of all the storylines you could read it is probably the most essential for Steve/Tony fans. CW is where the pairing really got its start and I think it’s the most popular setting for stories that engage with a particular era of canon. So if you are going to read one era, Civil War should probably be it.
I recommend starting with New Avengers vol 1, which as a bonus is very good for Steve & Tony up until about #20, when Civil War hits. The Cap and IM runs of the time are also generally viewed as very good and you should definitely read them – that would be Cap v5, by Brubaker, which has the Winter Soldier arc, and IM v4, which starts with Extremis and then continues on to Execute Program and then reaches Civil War.
You are going to want to read the main Civil War storyline but if you’re a Steve and Tony fan honestly most of the fun is in the tie-ins. My abbreviated Civil War reading list is as follows:
Civil War #1-7: You’re gonna need to read this.
Captain America vol 5 #22-24: Honestly I don’t remember most of this but you might as well.
Iron Man vol 4 #13-14: Tony’s motivations are explored, Steve and Tony attempt to come to an agreement during the war, and also Happy Hogan dies and it’s sad.
Captain America/Iron Man: Casualties of War: One of the two key issues you absolutely must read, in which Steve and Tony meet during the war and try to talk things out, and they also summarize what they’re doing and why and basically their entire friendship up to this point.
Civil War: Front Line #11: Toward the end of the war, reporters interview Steve and Tony. Tony lies on the floor and cries. I think I would summarize the post-CW era as a whole as “Tony cries a lot.”
Captain America vol 5 #25: The one where Steve dies.
Civil War: The Confession: READ THIS. If you read nothing else, read this. This is why we have a Steve/Tony ship. This is the essential issue.
Fallen Son: The Death of Captain America #1-5: Features Steve’s funeral. Well, both of Steve’s funerals. If you guessed that they also involve Tony crying a lot, you would be right.
What If? Fallen Son: Mostly worth it for the cover art.
What If? Civil War: After Steve’s funeral, a mysterious stranger shows Tony two worlds in the multiverse where the war could have gone differently. More tears for Tony!
After that, you probably also need to keep up with New Avengers/Mighty Avengers plus the major events up through Steve’s return to life – that would be Secret Invasion (the Skrulls invade), Dark Reign (Norman Osborn runs everything), and Siege (Osborn decides to invade Asgard; Steve comes back for this one). Steve’s return to life is in a miniseries called Captain America Reborn.
I would also recommend the rest of Iron Man vol 4 that takes place after Civil War – it’s renamed to Iron Man: Director of SHIELD because that’s the job Tony gets after Steve dies. Tony is basically a grieving mess. There’s also a miniseries called Avengers/Invaders in which Tony and the post-CW Avengers meet the WWII Invaders – including Steve – and it is a glorious pile of feelings and time travel and sadness.
So, uh, yeah, that’s a lot of issues but honestly I think if you get up to speed on Civil War and the couple years after you will be able to understand a lot of where fandom is coming from. (And then if you read Hickman’s run that’s basically the other run you are most likely to need to know.)
If you can find a copy of it – it’s out of print, alas – there’s a really great trade called Iron Man/Captain America (not Civil War: Captain America/Iron Man, that’s the one with the CW tie-ins, but you will probably want it too) that reprints several pre-Civil War issues focusing on Steve & Tony, including several of the ones mentioned above, like ToS 58, the 1998 annual, and the issues of Armor Wars and the second drinking arc that have Steve in them. Notably, I think it’s the only place that the ToS v2 one-shot (the “azure eyes” issue) has ever been reprinted.
(I take that back, the ToS one-shot is now in a trade called Avengers: Tales to Astonish. And now that I’m looking, the ToS one-shot is now on Marvel Unlimited and comiXology. Sweet!)
I hope that helps!
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