#It's also a second propaganda post to spread my headcanon

[leniisreallycool]

Everyone's all like "oh Solomon is canonically a bad cook!" The infinitely funnier option is that he actually is a good cook and every just overreacts because it's a weird mix of human world food and Devildom food. Man's been around for thousands of years you think he'd subject himself to shitty food for that long without learning to cook

"Oh but he says recipes are suggestions!" How do you think new dishes are created. Solomon is probably responsible for half the different types of human world food

[etherealhoneybee777]

Okay, the mp100 fandom (and other fandom spaces as well) makes me really hopeful✨

The internet is mostly a cruel and terrible place. It largely exists as an instrument of global capitalism. Governments use social media to push propaganda that either reinforces their fascist, conservative ideals or instills leftists that want to fight back with a sense of hopelessness that paralyzes and scares them. And we’re also getting to a point where much of the content we see online is not only made by AI, but interacted with by AI as well. We’re seeing “art” and ragebait stories that aren’t even made by real humans, but are spread online as if they’re true. Transactions are everywhere, but because everything is a subscription service, we own nothing. Corporations are putting advertisements on even the most sacred corner of the web & encouraging people to constantly consume, to BE consumed with the desire to consume more things, and to fill up the little time we have left with constant, buzzing productivity—because the internet is an instrument of capitalism, and capitalism is about constant expansion, expansion that won’t stop until everything in our lives is quantifiable and our whole being is stretched thin in service of a pointless, unstoppable economic growth.

In the face of that, I think your mp100 art is amazing. I think your fic is amazing. I am glad you decided to share it with us. I am glad you took the time to analyze Mob or Serizawa or Tome. To post screen grabs of Dimple or gifs or animatics or anything else. I’m glad you reblogged my post and added some silly or thoughtful little hashtags. I’m glad you DM’d me or posted a long ramble about Ritsu or Teru or reigen.

People don’t have to do these things. They don’t have to sketch characters or share headcanons or write fic or make watch parties on cute little discord servers. But they do. They do it because it’s a fun thing to do & because they’re talented and passionate. And it makes me happy that on the internet—which is increasingly being used to alienate and control us—still hosts real communities and real people making real art and writing their real thoughts without any kind of profit motive or manipulative agenda. People are literally just posting because they want to share their work and connect with others. It reminds me that no matter what capitalism does, we live in a fundamentally social world & we’re constantly trying to connect with each other about the things we like. MP100 is the thing I like and the people here make me hopeful. I see people post their art/writing/headcanons and I get super happy. I get inspired. I look at people’s bios and all the different countries they’re from and get really happy that the internet can be used as a tool to connect people across the world with the same interest together.

Choosing to create and make friends and be nice and spread positivity over the internet is a uniquely powerful thing. It may not seem like much, (and being on the internet is often framed as “wasting time”) but the Internet is important and the things you do here are actually tangible and real. Making and sharing art—making friends—sharing writing and blurbs and headcanons is a legitimate pushback against the terrible capitalistic machine that the internet has become. I’ve heard a lot of creators say that their art doesn’t get noticed/doesn’t matter because it doesn’t get a lot of attention. But it DOES matter. Because, for every second that someone spends seeing your art, that’s one second that they don’t spend on government propaganda or brain-numbing advertisements or ragebait or AI generated “content”. And even if no one sees your art, YOU spent time making it. You loved it and cared for it and valued it in a way that capitalism can never profit from or understand.

I hope you know that I see your art & love it. I look at it when I’m sad. My gf and I look at mp100 art while we sit outside and feel the world leave our bones. Maybe this is too much, but I’m feeling earnest and joyful tonight & am trying to lean into those feelings.

I’m just thankful. You create and share just because you wanted to create and share. You’re making the world a better place.

[aberooski]

I'm about to go to bed it's literally midnight rn but I would like to once again spread my "Alexis suffers from paranoia and separation anxiety for a while after Atticus returns" headcanon propaganda.

And she completely does, at least for the remainder of season 1 as far as what we see from her on screen. By season 2 he's been back long enough she's probably gotten better at handling it but still deals with it, just maybe not as strongly anymore.

But think about it. Atticus was her whole world, he taught her how to play Duel Monsters, he's literally the reason she's taken her life in the direction she has. They never tell us exactly how long he was missing but I've always been under the impression that he's been gone for a year. Which is a long time for a person to be missing. And all that time Alexis's biggest concern was finding her brother. That's her entire motivation in the first season, everything she does is to try and find some kind of clue or something that could help her find Atticus. Or if it's not the main reason, she's got that thought in her head and often remarks or has an inner monologs moment about how it's a possible outcome in situations that she might find something.

And she puts on a brave face but you know this situation has really affected her, and I hate to say it but there is no way she never once thought that he was dead or just gone forever with him being gone for so long. She's adamant about finding him but also she leaves roses at the abandoned dorm, and in the dub and we all know I'm an expert on the dub lol at least she always says the same thing when she does that: "be at peace, brother. Wherever you are." In my mind I've always seen it like she really does believe he's still out there alive somewhere and she'll be able to find him and bring him home, but there is a part of her that's still worried maybe he's really gone. And that's a lot of intense emotions to be juggling and carrying around all the time. She loves her brother more than anything and all she wants is to bring him home but you know she was worried and scared that she'd never see him again too.

And then he returns.

After all that time, all the fear and worrying and anxiety and tireless searching, Alexis has her brother back again. And thus now we see her grow to be very protective of him and reasonably so. Especially considering that when he returns, he's very unwell. Both from the duel with Jaden, and I assume also probably from being under Nightshroud's control for such an extended period of time. So he's stuck in the hospital recovering the majority of the rest of the arc. Atticus is both physically and mentally unwell after his return, spending most of the time unconscious or just kinda quietly staring out the window because he can't remember anything and the toll this has taken on him is exponential to say the least.

Also after his return, Alexis spends practically every second she can spare by his side. She's not letting him out of her sight ever again if and when she can help it, it's just not an option. No one is going to harm or take her big brother away from her again.

Smash cut to "The Seventh Shadow Rider" where Banner under the guise of Amnael starts to make his move. Alexis is walking outside of the obelisk dorm when she hears glass break in the dub (my beloved) they remove the audio cue for no reason so she's really just got a spidey sense bro aksksks and immediately just knows Atticus is in danger and runs up to his room to check on him only to discover the place is trashed and he's missing. So she runs after Amnael demanding that he return Atticus to her. I touch on this in my shadow rider arc rewrites should be under my "abby rewrites yugioh gx" tag if y'all wanna find that post but they really give him no reason to kidnap Atticus aside from luring Alexis out so he can duel her and take her key. In my version he has other reasons for taking Atticus apart from that which is 👍.

I'm tired, it's literally been like 45 minutes since I started this post so it's like quarter to 1 am rn, and lord knows if I've even remotely explained it well, but given all of the context clues and inferences that can be made about Alexis pre-Atticus return and what we see from her post-Atticus return I find it entirely possible that after he comes back, Alexis suffers from separation anxiety and maybe even a little bit of paranoia about his safety. And I write her with that in mind in my fics every time. She's very protective of Atty and she always needs to know where he is and if he's safe and won't trust him to anyone else, even Jaden, if he's in trouble. She also gets nervous if they're not together and she doesn't know where he is, I know I've got moments like that coming up in fics I'm working on right now.

Long story short, Alexis has separation anxiety with Atticus and it makes me upset and If I have to suffer the emotional damage so do the rest of you.

[300iqprower]

For the character ask, a non fate character and a fate character

Ike (Fire emblem)

Avicebron (Fate)

Ike:

Favorite thing: He made the series several times more popular in the west through sheer meme power and being fun in Brawl

Least favorite thing: That hasn't made his games any easier to get ahold of :( which is why unfortunately i cant go too in depth on him since i've still never actually played the radiant games, so expect more Heroes-related stuff...

Favorite line: (does it count if it's Fallen Ike?) "I won't lose to anything - ANYTHING! Least of all this rage inside me!"

brOTP: Soren, Stefan that second one largely just cause I really like Stefan

OTP: Soren

nOTP: Don't know enough to say so i'm just gonna say Shinon since i know he's a bastard

Random Headcanon: Nephenee ended up teaching him country-style cooking since he loves red meat so damn much

Favorite Image: Anything Fallen!Ike related

Song I associate with them (My favorite part):

Avicebron:

Favorite thing: Finally, some good fucking Jewish representation in this series. Also *see entire Anastasia Lostbelt*

Least favorite thing: Immense wasted potential in Apocrypha with both him and spartacus regarding the homunculus rebellion. Also terribly designed in fgo gameplay but that's basically the norm for any non SSR....

Favorite line: "Good intentions notwithstanding, a massacre can still occur - A massacre is not always some sinister thing arranged by evil men who seek to murder the innocent. They are like brush fires, sparking and spreading out of control. Hoaxes, history, hatred, misinformation, racial discrimination, disparity of wealth, pride, panic, propaganda... All of these things mix together in a nightmare slurry. What is more, these things do not happen gradually, as in the proverbial slippery slope. What happens is that frustration and discontent continue to build to a breaking point until the tiniest spark causes a tremendous explosion."

brOTP: Everyone. He's called Avicebro for a reason. ...But especially Mephistopheles, Shakespeare, Asclepius, Abs Hassan, Spartacus, Sanson, Enkidu, Valkyrie, Xiang Yu, Lakshmi, Weebat and you're gonna ignore that this is much less brOTP than it is "characters i think he would have really interesting friend dynamics with"

OTP: Medea

nOTP: any of the other jewish servants - that shared trait isn't enough to justify a ship but that's typically what I see with what little Avicebro shipping i've seen. Also Blavatsky.

Random Headcanon: Where the FUCK is that post about Solomon(s)- FOUND IT

Favorite Image: In lieu of a thousand Pixiv links from the rabbithole i'd fall down, i'll just reuse the first one I picked for his HRU post

Song I associate with them (I've been waiting for this!):

For Apocrypha Avicebro specifically, Override and Conquer, but for FGO Avicebro as well as his character as a whole, Firewall:

[neapolinyan]

BWGEHWGGEHWHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

yeah I literally just Created legends arceus I'm the Pokémon creator it's me

I actually watched that one hour long video of Every Single Volo Scene on YouTube not only for the actual Volo lore but also so I could take a bunch of screenshots

I have an entire Volo folder just dedicated to images of him from canon it is well past 200 ,(which sounds like a lot but there's a different folder I have for a character from a different show that has over 900 screenshots from canon episodes, so, yknow)

I'd have a Melli folder too if he had more than 15 seconds of screentime

But like, yeah, Melli is canon. i will hopefully push more of this out on my main blog soon and be able to get some stuff drawn or some headcanon explanation posts out lol

THATS?!?!?! A LOT OF SCREENSHOTS. HELLO?

god bless 🙏🙏🙏🙏 excited for u to spread psychic melli propaganda i will rb all of it that is a threat 😊 /j

[carcinized]

Hey hey hey I don’t have Tumblr BUT I saw your post about C!Tubbo dissociation headcanons and here I am, asking for them. And possibly more C!Tubbo headcanons. Preferably angsty. Just. Any of them. Please. Thank you.

oh, a fellow starved c!tubbo enthusiast. hello there, i do have some headcannons to spare luckily, hope you enjoy!! mostly this is the dissociation ones but i have some miscellaneous ones & songs at the end for you :]

so obviously uhhh tw for dissociation/depersonalisation/derealisation in this post!!! also going to put them under the cut bc this is long lmao

oh and disclaimer: this is very much based off my own experiences with (near constant) chronic dissociation so it might be different from other experiences!! yeah.

oh ALSO this is disorganized and probably missing stuff because i am going through a bad bout of spaciness as of right now, so apologies if anything is confusing, feel free to ask for clarification!

idk background timeline stuff so it fits into the story

at first he didn’t even realize he felt disconnected from things. it started off as a coping mechanism during combat and felt so similar to the feeling of being “in the zone” he’d known before that he didn’t question it

after a bit, it spread from only being there during battle to during conflict in general. still, he didn’t mind it—it actually made arguments more bearable because they felt almost secondhand.

eventually he came to use it as a crutch so much that it became constant.

that was when he started wanting it to go away.

and then because i can’t bear to give my precious c!tubbo constant dissociation he probably gets breaks from it sometimes idk lmao

his experiences:

gaps in memory

auditory processing issues

lots of depersonalisation and not recognizing himself in the mirror (which is even more fun/terrifying if you add in shapeshifter headcannons)

a lot of the time he feels like his actions aren’t his, which helped him to feel less bad doing morally ambiguous things (spying, exiling tommy, hunting technoblade, etc)

after it all he was left with near constant dissociation almost all the time.

it nearly always feels like the world is secondhand to him and he has no control/impact (ironic considering the power he has, and he knows that, but)

often wonders if he is dreaming and just waiting to wake up from a coma he’d gotten from one of his many battles.

when things get really bad he wishes he could just wake up from it.

often doesn’t recognize his hands looking down at them, especially with the burns he has now. they’re not his hands, right? but they are. they’re his hands. huh.

uhhh examples of where it could have been shown in plot if you squint lol

for example, that famous clip of him dancing while wilbur and tommy argue in the background would be a physical representation of him zoning out (dissociating) to get out of/away from an argument.

the whole yes man thing could have either been an auditory processing issue where he replied yes to wilbur without hearing what wilbur had asked OR a gap in memory where he didn’t remember telling tommy the opposite

he pulled away for like 5 months into snowchester and talked to hardly anyone but his husband and son. dissociation is hard to interact with people during because you feel so isolated for so many reasons—sometimes you feel you’re the only real thing there, sometimes it feels there’s a glass wall between you and everything else that IS real. and even ignoring that, most people can’t relate to feeling that way, leaving you even more alone. he could have pulled away because it was too much too keep going through that (i did that don’t recommend it tubbo JSJD)

miscellaneous headcannons that i don’t see very often:

after winning a battle, his instinct is to play a disc and look out at the sunset because that’s what he and tommy always did (see his lore yesterday (june 18th)—he did it with ranboo despite tommy not being there)

i’m rather fond of my original-l’manberg-citizens-consider-haircuts-and-fixing-up-appearances-affectionate-because-wilbur-did-it headcannon so i’ll add that here—basically wilbur gave everyone military cuts and new suits and everything. and while that was just for war, it was also because he cared about all of them. ever since, they all considered fixing up someone’s appearance an act of love.

tubbo refused to let anyone cut his hair after the red festival, not trusting anyone. he would probably let ranboo do it now, only he’s rather attached to the way it hides his burns and some of his horns and keeps him warm in the freezing snow.

he builds walls like how tommy builds cobblestone towers—a reflex, a coping mechanism, a habit. he built the l’manberg walls and ever since the defense has been second nature, whether for the best or the worst.

ive been waiting forever to share these i have way too many. i pass the hours staring out the window listening to misterwives and imagining c!tubbo animatics to it and now i have a chance to share them oh my god

so without further ado,

c!tubbo animatics i have in my head:

whywhywhy by misterwives: ok this one isn’t chalked out but it has him vibes

alone by misterwives: just him and ranboo. figuring things out. helping each other heal. i legitimately have an entire animatic in my head to this lyric by lyric and could make a fucking storyboard for it if only i could draw. if anyone wants me to write out lyric by lyric what it WOULD be though feel free to send an ask aHAHHAHAHA

over the rainbow by misterwives: a montage of c!tubbo just. finally going apeshit. that would be so cathartic alright and it’s such a badass song he deserves it

it’s my turn by misterwives: pretty much any times that tubbo finally got to do something back at someone who wronged him—the butcher army going after technoblade, him yelling at quackity about borders saying “well don’t i get to put my foot down too?” the lyrics “i know you’ve got your version of the story, i’m sick of saying sorry, i’m sick of always having to explain” during his spy arc PLEASE he had to justify everything he did and the “are you happier?” comment and schlatt breathing down his neck aAAAA give my boy a break (also the instrumental uses a lemon demon-type sound which makes me think of ranboo so i love imagining a cool bee dup building the outpost montage there snhshagahffn)

find my way home by misterwives: idk the vibes just fit man

oxygen by misterwives: hhhrnggg clingy duo angst oW

i did say i spend a lot of my time listening to misterwives and daydreaming c!tubbo animatics didn’t i?

anyways yeah. here’s some c!tubbo content to help us poor starved c!tubbo enthusiasts :’D also misterwives propaganda go listen to them female led band with a fucking badass lead singer with banger songs and incredible vocals and lyrics ANYWAY

[bookenders]

Happy Storyteller Saturday~! 💖 Let's see... I'd love to learn more about your Fish Food cast, how about: If each oc had to (and I mean HAD TO. No getting out of this >.>) participate in an art exhibition of some kind, what would they make? Is it actually good? Would they enjoy making it?

Storyteller Saturday!

Ah, @quilloftheclouds, continuing your tradition of asking me questions that make my brain run off into the sunset with an army of ideas, I see. 💜

I think I’ll take this one in a few different directions. I’ll do one for them as heroes/villains and one for them as off-duty civilians. The civilian ones will be listed first. And as for them being good, that’s up to you! 

This got long, so my very fun answers are under the cut!

Iron Will: One of his powers is structure-strengthening, which is also his favorite (because it’s the most helpful without being too damaging, of course), so he’d make a big twisty metal sculpture that looks like a demolished building. But if you look at it from certain angles, it takes the form of twisted metal bird wings. At a glance, you wouldn’t be able to tell how in the hell this thing is staying together. The artist is just that good. (Nope, he’s cheating, but he doesn’t care. Might as well use what you’ve got, right?) And he does enjoy making it. It’s not often that he gets to use his powers the way he wants to.

His hero one would likely be co-opted by the Coalition and turned into a big PR stunt because the poor guy can’t catch a break. I see it involving making statues by touching a big marble/stone block and strengthening the shape of the statue within it before they smash it and the statue emerges. Every sculptor’s dream. It works to show off his powers, his skill with said powers, give the COH some positive community-based PR, and show everyone how powerful they are. Will thinks it’s dumb, difficult, boring, and needlessly complicated.

Overseer: His civilian exhibition would be something goofy like making gingerbread houses out of circuit boards.

His villain one would be a little more intense, since he has to impress the higher-ups. And he’s got one word for you: drones. Programmed aerial drone sculptures a la Superbowl Lady Gaga. Drones flying around like swarms of swallows and bats. Drones programmed to fly in the shapes of heroes who get defeated by the great villains of the council. He goes absolutely hog-wild with it.

Lithium: As a civilian, an open house of her bar with all of the hero memorabilia all over the walls specially lit for artistic viewing, accompanied by multi-media projections/holograms of life-sized heroes walking around among the patrons (she totally asks Overseer for help with this). As a hero, a black and white photo collage of her high-fiving people she’s saved interspersed with her high-fiving the villain’s she’s helped arrest. All on the scene and in costume, of course. 

The first would be social commentary on how people tend to idolize heroes while they exist as “one of us,” walking among the masses just like anyone else. The second would be commentary on how villains and civilians are one and the same, just requiring different methods of intervention. Both would get her reprimanded by Coalition HR, of course. Making Statements isn’t something the Coalition likes their employees to do. (She super duper doesn’t care though. My goofy headcanon is that she laminates her favorite reprimand letters and puts them in a photo album that she proudly displays in her living room.)

She loves making both of these because 1) she gets to show off her pride and joy and 2) she gets to stick it to the Man.

[She’d try being a human trampoline first before giving up on it after she convinces Iron Will to jump on her stomach to test it out, quickly realizing that it is a terrible idea.]

Babylon: They see this as a waste of time, but hey, there’s no getting out of it, so might as well make the most of the situation. But they wouldn’t put very much effort into it unless it’s for work.

As a civilian, they’d probably just transcribe a bunch of popular songs into the International Phonetic Alphabet and watch, very amused, as people try to read the lyrics out loud.

As a hero, they’d make sure only agents of the Coalition were invited, because their piece is a two-parter: First, a wall on which a bunch of head molds of various people are hung. Nearby are boxes of props, prosthetics, hats, wigs, glasses, makeup, etc. It’s an interactive exhibit based on disguise. Second, on the opposite wall, a neat collage of full color photographs of what appear to be 20 different people, but are all Babylon in various disguises. Is it braggy? Definitely. Do they care? Definitely not.

Nightmare: This one’s tough. Let’s see…

As a civilian, she’d do something like paint a huge mural in one of the poorer neighborhoods mocking the propaganda posters the Coalition puts out every once in a while. She’s big into satire.

As a villain… she’s practically the head of the CIIP, so it’d have to be big. Part of me says that she’d paint all the streets to mimic a Monopoly game board to make fun of the city’s not great economy, but that’s too tame. Since her power is inducing panic responses, I think she might collect blackmail material on as much people as possible and post it anonymously all over the city. No names, no identifying information, just dark, embarrassing information spread in the dead of night. That’s sure to send everyone into a panic.

Sparkplug: Her civilian art piece would be forging very cool light metal prosthetics and gifting them to veterans. She shouldn’t be the only one with a very cool and comfortable free one. Spread the love, as she says.

Her hero (or, rather, mercenary) exhibition would be hacking into large screens all over the city and showing real footage from heroes’ body cameras during big battles. Nothing too graphic, though. Just the kind of footage that shows people what it’s really like being a hero for the Coalition.

Hydrophase: Well, since I haven’t fully revealed what happened to him yet, I’ll include him for funsies. His civilian exhibition… hmm. I think he’d do something with old t-shirts. Like start a community project to collect people’s old shirts and make quilts out of them or somethin’ and donate them after the exhibition. He’s a nostalgic guy.

As a hero, I think he’d make one of those splash pad things that kids play on at malls and water parks and stuff, since his power is water-based. It’d be on an elevated platform and he’d stand under it and control all the water spouts and things and invite neighborhood kids to come play because he’s a very good dude. He has just as much fun as the kids.

There’s also a secret character who appears halfway through the story. I don’t wanna reveal who they are just yet, but what I can say is that their exhibition would be sword sculptures.

[leahazel]

Verity & Allegra: ♥ - family headcanon☮ - friendship headcanon

oh W O W where do I start even

okay let’s try this: 

♥  - Allegra

I think I mentioned several times that Allegra’s mother and grandmother never got along. In fact, they detested each other. Katherine had Big Plans for all her children and her Plan for Oswald did not include him falling in love with a pretty, flighty thing like Flora, however charming she was. She wanted him to marry a sensible woman who would steady his flights of fancy and his impulsivity, and bring out the best in him. But Oswald, like his older sister before him, went and inconveniently fell in love, and was utterly adamant that he could wed no one else. You know the rest: too many children and too much spending and way too many unsound financial decisions. He nearly lost them the family estate, more than once. And Flora in no way curbed his wilder impulses, so it’s not as though Katherine’s feelings towards her were unreasonable. 

There’s another side to the story, though. When the coup happened, they were forewarned because Oswald’s brother Victor is an officer and he had prior knowledge. That allowed Katherine the time and space to put in place the machinations that allied them with the new regime, and protected them from reprisals. The Chases of Arrowfield are an old blood family. They (claim to) trace their ancestry back some five hundred years, back to the old empire. So Katherine was willing to do just about anything to protect the family by cosying up to the new royals, and distancing themselves from anyone who could compromise them. That included Flora’s parents and brothers. Despite her personal frivolity, Flora came from two dignified, long-lined old blood families, Witherwend and Taryn, the latter of which even had (distant) family ties to Katyia’s line. 

As far as Katherine was concerned, any contact with them had to be forsaken, and in this matter, Oswald completely sided with her. Flora hasn’t actually spoken with or written to anyone in her family in almost twenty years. They may have suffered reprisals, she doesn’t know. Information of that nature doesn’t spread very well outside of the immediate neighborhood. When it does, it’s mostly in the form of rumor, gossip, and propaganda scare tactics. The worst of it? Part of cutting off her family entirely meant that she was forced to be absent from her mother, Eleanor’s funeral. So, she also has extremely sound reasons to resent Katherine, even other than the fact that she never made her feel welcome in the family. And Flora is a forgiving person by nature, but she’ll never forgive this. 

The other big secret is that at least one person from Flora’s family is still alive, and they may show up later on in Allegra’s story. No promises. 

♥  - Verity

Verity? I have developed her family, at this point, almost as extensively as Allegra’s, but some of the best secrets in that backstory remain spoilery, so I lean away from them in my stories. This one, though, is free: in “Masters of the Hunt”, Verity tells Kavita that she and Constance are half-sisters. This version of Constance is completely different from Felicity’s Constance. She’s ten years older than Verity and Dion, and she’s the daughter of her father’s first queen. Her mother passed trying to deliver a baby boy when she was about eight. Less than two years later, she was already dealing with a young stepmother and two squealing infant half-siblings -- one of whom, by virtue of having been born a boy, was automatically the new favorite. 

Constance strongly favors their father in looks, dark-skinned and slender with long, straight dark hair. Verity and Dion favor their mother, plumper and curly-haired. Although Verity’s particular dark blonde shade of hair is a peculiarity, since both of her parents are dark-haired. And I think I told you (although I didn’t post it publicly) that, although Verity is very attached to Constance, Dion barely knows her. 

There is also something about the twins’ mother Agnes, and her father and his second marriage, but that veers awfully close to spoilers. It’s an interesting story, although the family ties are incredibly convoluted, and I haven’t named all the characters. It’s worth noting though that the only one of her grandparents that Verity ever really got on with is Agnes’s stepmother, Primula. When she mentions learning Onvu from her grandmother, that’s who she’s talking about. 

☮ - Allegra

Prior to the summit, Allegra really didn’t have that many friends. Many acquaintances, and contacts, and invitations. And, you could say, assets. And she had Leonie, who is just about as close to a friend as she ever had in the capital, but Leonie is more like half-friend, half-rival. And she definitely thinks Allegra is a spy, but I won’t get into why that is. 

After the summit... Well, it hurt her to leave so many people behind, not knowing when or if they might meet in person again. But that is part of the uncertainty that’s native to their style of life, and she’s never known anything else so she doesn’t expect anything else. And I believe I mentioned once, Allegra is a very good correspondent. How well she keeps in contact with people is entirely dependent on how diligent they are at answering her letters. So it breaks down something like this: Cordelia, Penelope, Lyon and Avalie write frequent, long letters. Lisle often doesn’t have time to write and always feels guilty about it, but Penny sends updates from him. Emmett’s letters are disorganized and sporadic, but always heartfelt. Zarad’s letters aren’t frequent, but they’re long and juicy and extremely filled with gossip. Hamin is not much of a letter writer but he somehow finds other ways to keep her updated, and certainly knows way more than he has any business to about what she’s up to. Jasper writes... once or twice. Anaele... honestly, I think she might be the only one Allegra completely loses contact with. And Ria is a special case. 

☮ - Verity

So many spoilers, just so many. I’m... actually working on a story from Nerissa’s POV right now, and it’s been an interesting journey for me. 

Both Kavita and Nerissa are less sincere friends than Verity chooses to see them as... to start with. Kavita is very fond of Verity, but she has a job to do as the ambassador’s wife and she has a whole life and web of connections back in Corval that she never speaks with her about. But for the sake of her connection with Constance, she’s tried to keep an eye on the Princess, to make sure she’s as clever as she thinks she is. That’s part of why she directed Petra her way. Petra is more of an ally than a friend, but she’s trust-worthy, and there’s a lot yet to happen that will change the way she and Verity interact. 

Nerissa is a complicated case. She’s a widow and she has all the ambitious widow’s weaknesses, and in many ways she’s even worse than Allegra at treating people like assets instead of friends. But at least she has a reasonably good excuse. For Nissa, people can be family or they can be strangers, but her mentality has no category for “friend”. 

Gisette is much the same way. She has genuine affection for Verity, who is after all always surprising her by being smarter and more competent than she initially appeared to be. But as the immortal quote goes, love is never any better than the lover. Gisette is cold, cruel, and selfish, and her love for Verity is much the same. She is also unwavering, but that’s already edging into spoiler territory. Violetta is much the same: she’s a moody, inconstant narcissist, so her love for Verity as a daughter-in-law, while certainly as genuine as she is capable of being, is capricious and self-serving. 

Of all the supporting characters I have introduced so far, I think the only ones who approach Verity without any sort of self-serving agenda are Desmond and Una, and maybe the guardsman Alek. I haven’t really gotten around to developing them properly, though. 

[atsinnermonologue]

...my ex from high school followed me on twitter,

...which, although unexpected, is not altogether odd, because from time to time I receive follows from people from my past. That said, it’s officially been ten years since I’ve thought of him in that way. Since the #MeToo movement a couple years ago, he has crossed my mind countless times, but I have chosen not to speak about it because it’s hard to define assault when both parties in question were fifteen and inexperienced at the time. It’s common knowledge, however, that the human brain is fully developed around your mid twenties--and as of 4 days ago, I have reached that point. Despite my ridiculous headcanon that this magical transformation occurs on an individual’s twenty-fifth birthday, I do think that I am old enough now to understand the nuances of consent and assault in ways that I was too naive to recognize before.

When I was fifteen, I landed my first real long-term boyfriend, and thus, my definition of personal boundaries was decided for me. 

-Our “dates” consisted of going to the movies, to his house, or some other private and/or dark place where we could safely make out for hours at a time. At first, it made me feel desired and normal--but it got to a certain point where he began to pressure me to progressively branch out and do other things, most of which made me uncomfortable--and the more he pressured me, the less attractive he became to me. I began wanting to go to the movies just to see a fucking movie, and nothing more. I feel knots of disgust in my stomach when he actually managed to convince me to wear pajamas with him to an evening show so I could easily fondle him. He told me not to wear a bra that day, and I listened to him because I (stupidly) thought he valued me as a person. I was not comfortable.

-He bought me nice gifts for my birthday and Christmas, and he was charming and fun to hang out with when we were with other friends and family. I sought out “friend dates” because I wanted to avoid doing sexual things with him, which could not be avoided when we were alone. I was not happy.

-But could I blame him fully for having expectations when I invited such attention? Sometimes he wanted to sext with me--because, of course, at age 15, everyone texted their significant other all day every day--and I would go along with it because it was easier than the emotional manipulation I would receive if I denied him. “Don’t you love me?” He would ask. If I didn’t respond to texts within 20 minutes or so, he would follow up, “Busy?”, almost as if I was not allowed the agency to live my own life (at least not without him having to constantly keep tabs on whatever I was doing). I was made to feel guilty if I did not constantly reassure him that I loved him and that he was the greatest thing to happen to me. I was not happy.

-Despite my naivety, I put my foot down when he tried to pressure me outright into having sex. At the time, his argument was that his best friend was having sex with his girlfriend, and they were the same age as us. I told him that we were not Jake and Emma, and I was not ready to do it. It certainly did not stop him from trying, however. Apparently sexting is the same thing as consent for actual sex, according to his logic (”you’re a tease,” he would say). I was not comfortable.

-In hindsight, I should have noticed the first red flags immediately when I met him. We were in marching band and played the same instrument, and since he was a grade above me, he would give me “tips” on what to do, chat me up during practice, and so forth. It was relatively normal and I actually thought he had a girlfriend at the time because he spent a lot of time with a particular senior girl named Liz. When we first began talking, I cannot recall if I asked him about it or if he told me unsolicited, but he admitted that they used to date and that he was trying to get away from her because it was a toxic relationship--supposedly, SHE couldn’t let go of him. A person like him could have told me a lie, but since it was cooked with half-truths, it was difficult to call him on it. I remember in our early days of dating, he would complain about her showing up to his house and yelling at him for seeing someone else. At one point, he showed me a faint white scar on his wrist--which, quite frankly, could have occurred from anything--and claimed that she had clawed him during a fight, but did not elaborate further. I was expected to believe, in the beginning of my first real relationship, that this behavior was normal and typical for below-average-looking 15-year-old boys dating 18-year-old women. I digress, but I was naive. I will forever regret not asking Liz for her side of the story. I have heard plenty of stories like mine that, incidentally, involve boys and their “crazy” exes. Something tells me that Liz was not the crazy one.

-The kicker is that he was the one who cheated on me, despite the fact that he was always so insecure about me potentially cheating on him. Once again, it is a story straight out of the toxic relationship textbook, but that didn’t make it hurt less. I was expected to forgive him because he never “did” anything with the other girl in question, other than seek out an emotional connection, which was the only thing I actually cared about at the time anyway. I am also not certain that it would NOT have turned physical, if a girl in my biology class who was friends with the other person did not tip me off first. (You don’t realize this, but that was an MVP move, Emily. Thank you.) This only happened a matter of months into the relationship, and I had debated breaking up with him for it--something I cursed myself for when I finally had the courage to do it a year later.

-I actually broke up with him twice. The first time, it was because I had stopped having romantic and sexual feelings for him long before, but he managed to guilt me into getting back together with him. It was the first and only time I recall crying at school. It was only a matter of days, but he had already spread negative propaganda about me to his posse of asshole tenth grade friends, and I never felt comfortable being around him at that point because I was not sure what he had told them. Evidently, it was bad enough that one girl in particular hated my guts (as far as I know, still does to this day) and he made sure I knew that, I guess as a punishment for having the gall to try and end what had become a very unstable and unhappy relationship. Funny enough, within those few days, he immediately entered a relationship with another girl just to get back at me, and somehow, I was supposed to be the bad guy. He was still “in a relationship” with her on Facebook--a big deal, back in 2010--when we got back together. In hindsight, I feel bad for the other girl in that situation, because he really did drop her like a sack of potatoes when there was a chance of us getting back together. In 2020, that experience tells me a lot about what he thinks about women and how they should be treated. Disposable. Lesser. Something he is entitled to.

-When I broke up with him the second time, I was fed up with his toxicity and guilt-tripping, added on top of the fact that I still did not really have feelings for him--admitting my own fault, I toyed with him towards the end because I was scared of the thought of being alone, in the off chance that nobody would ever desire me again (though he is an easy scapegoat to blame for that negative thought pattern, whether he instilled those thoughts intentionally, consciously or not). They say you learn a lot about a person based on how they treat you after a relationship ends; to that point, I knew I made the right decision. I will never forget my little sister--with whom I shared a combative and competitive relationship with, at the time--telling me that he was tweeting negative things about me nonstop knowing that it would alter other people’s perception of me and ruin my reputation, when I did not even have my own Twitter account to defend myself with. Unfortunately for me, he had managed to infiltrate my friend group when we were together, and as such, he felt comfortable staying friends with some of my friends, and he used those relationships as leverage to belittle me, drag my name through the mud, and generally make fun of me all in the name of “joking around.” High school is terrible precisely because this type of behavior was acceptable, but my aggravated retort, “This is why I dumped you!” was somehow crossing the line. You cannot back a wild animal into a corner and not expect it to bite you. Despite the fact that we broke up during my sophomore year, he still acted in this way until we graduated. Somehow, he felt he had the right to speak his opinion on my relationships with other guys (”they’re awkward together,” he told a mutual friend about someone I dated during my junior year, as if his input was supposed to hold any water). If he was in love with me--and I am sure he was, despite his toxic way of showing it--he never really got over it. Straight white men sometimes really do deserve their reputation for being nasty when rejected.

-I found out months after we dated that he was a habitual cigarette and weed smoker, which I was adamantly against at the time. I partake in the latter these days, but I am still morally opposed to the former, because it killed two of my grandparents and will surely contribute to future health problems with my parents, as well. I won’t get into it, but it is a big deal for me and it always has been. He was aware of this at the time and still hid it from me, rather than quitting for his own health, and it only fuels the flames of rage that burn within me when I think about how deceitful he was. I am disgusted with how easily tricked because I did not know better, and moreover, that he knew I was naive and took advantage of it.

-Everything we ever did together, sexually, was a result of his pressuring me and wearing me down to eventually accepting certain things, despite my obvious fear, hesitation, and even disgust. We were both kids at the time, but we were old enough to understand basic human emotion and he was certainly aware of how I felt about it. He did not care. He was always a selfish person who prioritized his own needs over mine (and other women’s as well, I suspect). I am thankful that I managed to stave off sex and “save” my virginity for someone who really deserved it--though to be clear, I believe virginity is an archaic and sexist concept that really holds no ground in our post-modern society, but I digress--the point is, really, that I CHOSE to have sex when I was ready to do so, and even with all of its faults, this ancient relationship cannot take that away from me. It certainly gave me an unhealthy view about my own body and consent, which contributed to problems in other relationships, but thankfully, I am now with someone who respects me and my needs, as well as his own. The bar is on the floor when it comes to relationships, unfortunately, because I notice that basic human decency and respect are not required or expected. In fact, these qualities are praised as a “bonus” rather than a given, and that truly sickens me.

-I am talking about all of this because I have a lot of pent-up feelings I need to let out. In my first-ever post on this blog, I was conscious of not blaming the other person I was talking about because I recognize the complexity of human relationships and perspective, but I don’t necessarily feel that it applies in this scenario. Truthfully, I don’t care if I am dragging this person’s name through the mud and/or blaming him for all of these issues, because now that I am older and have little to no emotional attachment to the situation, I can view it clearly, at least from my perspective, and understand that a lot of the issues that arose were a result of hypocrisy, disrespect, and gaslighting on his part. I will admit that I was not faultless, either--I took advantage of his obsession with me and dragged the relationship out for far too long because I liked the power--but for the most part, I can understand that I was a victim of emotional abuse, even if he was not completely conscious of the negative effects his behavior was having on me. Surely by the time he was a senior in high school, however, he was aware and yet still continued his toxic, shitty behavior, so I am bound to give him less leeway in terms of perspective. I cannot honestly imagine a scenario in which a 15-year-old girl deserves to be guilted and pressured into sex when she has repeatedly said she is uncomfortable with it. I cannot imagine a scenario in which it’s okay to ruin someone’s reputation and mental wellbeing because you are personally hurt by their decision to end a relationship (which, might I add, was not particularly harsh in terms of the actual breakup, if I remember correctly, which I think I do).

-About a week ago, this ex of mine followed me on Twitter after having had no account for the last few years. I followed him back because I have hardly no followers as is, and it’s a number for me--but I don’t necessarily need to justify it either because we don’t speak regularly and I had no reason to think anything would come of it. However, almost immediately after I followed back, he DMed me to ask how I was doing. I sent a generic message back the next morning, but to this day it appears he has not been on the account since the day he messaged me, because he didn’t accept any more follow requests (he’s a private account) and he did not tweet, like, or respond to anything or anyone since. It’s actually a bit cryptic because it seems like he only created the account to post a handful of strange drunken tweets and then never look back. Most of the tweets were akin to “anyone want to chill? DM me” and random strings of words that don’t make any sense. His avi is presumably a recent photo of him, considering the fact that his hairline is halfway up his scalp. I will not lie--I took pleasure in noticing that. When I noticed that he did not access the account after that first day, I checked his likes to see if he was active, and honestly, that was the thing that triggered my fight-or-flight response. He has always been an emotional person, to the point that I’ve always felt he was more “girlish” (excuse the misogynistic term) than me, so I was not surprised by the weird tweets, but I WAS surprised by the fact that the only two tweets he liked were from c*m girls posting photos of themselves in lingerie with a paragraph of SW-related hashtags. I won’t flatter myself by the coincidence that both women looked a lot like me, but I couldn’t help but notice it. Maybe he’s living rent free in my head, but I still blame him for it. Anyways, all this did was prove the inevitable, which is that boys like him become men of the same breed, only markedly worse because they do not have the excuse of youth and hormones.

-I plan to give it a few more days to see if he logs into the account (I am a fan of the “infiltration” technique when it comes to learning about people through their online presence). If there is no activity, I fully plan to block him, because I don’t see a reason why his pathetic number is worth the association with my own Twitter account. It is clear his behavior will never change--he will always feel entitled to women and their bodies--but maybe one day I will have the courage to expose him for real, to people who actually know him. Maybe one day people will understand where I’m coming from, rather than assuming I am the villainous bitch he claimed I was. Maybe I am the “Liz” to another one of his more recent exes. I wouldn’t be surprised.

All I know is that I feel validated by my teenage emotions after analyzing them as an adult, especially after seeing other women coming out about their experiences as well. It is clear that women can be equals on paper, but they witness and endure things every day that will never be understood by men. It’s as plain and simple as that. That same ideology goes for people of color in general (Black folks in particular) as well as LGBTQ+ folks and other minorities, but I won’t get on that soapbox now. Tomorrow is another day, however.

Venting is exhausting. I’m glad I didn’t handwrite all of this.