#Listening Ears AU

[childotkw]

when was the turning point in listening ears au that dumbledure realized he f-uped with harry

I would say it’s probably the ““disappearance”” of Umbridge that finally, finally clues him into how badly he fucked things up.

Because students going missing at Hogwarts was an unfortunate and accepted occurrence. It’s gossip worthy and will become a cautionary tale in a generation, but it’s not uncommon.

But a professor vanishing? The Undersecretary to the Minister disappearing? That is not so quickly brushed aside.

Not by the Board and not by the Ministry.

The whole school goes into lockdown as the investigation cracks down. Everyone is interviewed, every potential lead run into the ground.

And, naturally, everything Umbridge was doing comes to light.

The detentions. The torture. The quill and illegal potions.

The collar.

The media have a field day.

Dumbledore doesn’t know for sure who spoke to the reporters, doesn’t know who let that detail in particular slip - but when reaches the papers that Harry Potter was forced to wear a collar that suppressed his creature nature?

Shit hitting the fan doesn’t even cover it.

Harry might be a polarising figure right now, he might have been having strips torn off him for months - but he was still famous, still a child, and this incident seemed to be the thing that finally reminded them all of it.

After all, the world loved the tragedy of Harry’s life. They loved to hate him and hated to love him. He’d saved them, and though that gave them the unfair belief that they were owed an opinion in everything he did, this time it worked to Harry’s advantage.

Muggleborns openly cried at his horrible experience. Purebloods demanded retribution in his name. Halfbloods shouted about the indignity, the injustice.

Dumbledore heard it all and saw it all.

And he watched from over the rims of his spectacles as Harry, with a blazing rash around his pale neck, calmly stared back.

The office was quiet, the air still and anticipatory, and for the life of him Dumbledore didn’t know how to ask.

Did you do something? Did you hurt her? Did you kill her?

The questions curdled on his tongue, refusing to leave his mouth. He…he couldn’t ask. Couldn’t shatter the deniability he was desperately clinging to.

Umbridge had gone to the Slytherin common room before she disappeared. The portraits reported her entering, and then leaving alone, shaken and uncomfortable. They lost her after she left the staircase, when she entered the second floor where there were no painted eyes to track her further.

By all accounts, she had stepped onto the second floor alone and vanished.

The second floor, where the Chamber of Secrets lay.

The Chamber of Secrets, accessible only to a Parselmouth.

Harry Potter, a Parselmouth and the current owner of the invisibility cloak.

Dumbledore couldn’t bring himself to ask and he realised, with a gaping pit forming in his stomach, that he couldn’t read Harry either.

The collar - different than the one he originally commissioned, but not so different that Dumbledore didn’t feel sickly guilty just looking at it - sat on the desk between them.

Harry didn’t even blink at it, didn’t seem surprised or bothered or even upset at being near the device used to torture him.

He just continued to stare at Dumbledore, quiet and reserved and wary.

That was the moment he knew he had broken something precious and fragile years ago, and he hadn’t even known it.

[kyri45]

Sometimes you just need to break all your walls…

Shadowpeach Bio Parent AU (PREV / FIRST / NEXT )

Mac is just- I'm not normal about this character. I think for a long time, he felt like he had to always be the voice of reason, the one who always stopped his companion into stupid situation, the helicopter mama when it comes to MK, the mature one between him and Wukong. Probably as a way to stand out of Wukong shadow, trying to compensate the areas he lacks, or to try to hide what he thinks are weakness

While, most of the time, he's just- so scared. like a little kid. I feel like sometimes, he just needs to be held.

[pixxlotl]

Going with the "Grian is the one who designed this game as opposed to the others" headcanon, it makes you think about the superpowers he gave his friends, how they were all laughing and having fun in the beginning, and that was intentional. It goes to show that even when forced to design the death game his friends are put through (a punishment for trying to usurp the Watchers time and time again), he still cares. They all know he's the one who designed this game, and he hopes they realize the little mercies he's giving them.

He gives Cleo the power to bring people back from the dead, just so he can have a chance to see his best friend again.

He gives Pearl the power to fly, and hopes she appreciates having her wings back, if only for a short time.

Jimmy gets to go invisible because Grian knows the Watchers aren't happy with the curse being broken. He wants to protect him.

As for Martyn? Grian doesn't really know a lot about what's going on with him and the Listeners, but he might as well try to strengthen that connection in the little ways he can without arising suspicion.

He says it himself in the beginning, "let's not forget this is a PVP series," but it sounds hollow even to his own ears. It's pandering to the watching eyes, making them think the lighthearted fun is all unintentional.

He falls out of the sky with the wings he gave to Pearl, and he wonders if the Watchers are starting to catch on.

[loveaurapearl]

Hey, I saw the new episode of Wild Life and it was amazing. I love how personal these choices are, even though Grian himself didn't choose who got what power. But seriously, it feels like all the powers were personally picked for each player. I've seen people analyze each ablity and their connections and I wanted throw my hat in the ring. (Okay, update. Watched Grian's video and it's clear that Grian did personalized the powers. He has a list of all the people who have what powers, he just didn't realize how dangerous some of these powers are with red names. He mentioned regretting giving Scar the sit command the first time Scar sat on him so yeah. Unlike the randomness of Soulmates in Double life, these powers aren't random. Just want to clarify that.)

The first one I want to mention is Joel's ability since it's the one that has stumped everyone. I mean, after all, what does triple jumping have to do with Joel? Well, at the beginning of his episode, he mentioned that he hears a slime sound effect when he uses his ability. I think his superpower was chosen because of the slime shop that Joel forgot to create for most of Season 10 of Hermitcraft. Now what do Slimes have to do with triple jumping? Well, slimes are bouncy and create momentum. Also, I think Grian put it in because it sounded like a cool power. Also, Also, it allows Joel to do a lot of PARKOUR! Which Joel is obsessed with.

Rendog got the power of masking himself as other people. This is amazing because he masked as Tango in Secret Life and the guy's an actor. He's always putting up masks like the Red King, the King of Hermitcraft, the Guard Dog of the Fairy Forte, and being part of the Gigaverse.

Gem has Astral projection which was given to her because she hates using freecam so it was a punishment to her for being so too good at the game. However, she was given the ability to give her more control over people since she was able to snoop on everyone. Kind of like a Watcher. (Or Listener in some people's headcannons. I've seen evidence for people to think this is a Watcher power or Listener power. I'm leaning on Watcher Power.)

Cleo was given the power to raise the Dead because she is a Zombie.

BigB is the power of the Creaking which is fitting since he became one of them thanks to living in their forrest.

Bdubs has the power of time because of his obsession with clocks and the power of sleep because the man is obsessed with sleeping in Hermitcraft.

Etho is an loof and sneaky man who likes to keeps his distance. He's also a coward so a quick escape plan by yeeting yourself with wind charges helps. Also, he did Frogger in Minecraft and that's a lot of jumping around.

Tango's ability is to flee like he never fleed before. Aka being a coward and also annoy people. (Someone mentioned the icewalker ability could be reference to Decked out 2. Also flee with extra flee.)

Ldshadowlady (Aka Lizzie) is just focusing on the shadow in her user name. It also represents her time falling in the Void in Secret Life. The void energy engrained in her.

Jimmy got invisiblity because the man is always sneaking around and the fact that Jimmy doesn't get this far normally. Normally he's not even alive at this point. So the narrative is kind of representing his unusual position. Also it feels like a very Listener kind of superpower.

Martyn's power is literally the power to LISTEN to people. Very Listener power.

Impulse's power is to swap places with people. It kind of represents how much of a flip-flopper he was in Third Life. Yeah know, traitor Impulse. Also, Enderpearl satis cambers and using weird glitches to find diamonds in Third life references.

Scott's ability of Animal shapeshifting is not only a cruel twisted torture made up by the Watchers because they hate Scott, seriously, it's the worst superpower, but it also represents Scott's kind and gentle nature. While the guy knows how to fight, most of the time Scott is a nice chill guy. He's friendly and charming like a passive mob. He does his best to support the team and he will sacrifice himself for the team. The guy is also soft with animals. Remember the cow and the pufferfish in Third Life? What about the Axolotos in Last Life? Also, the guy likes to get pets in Empires.

Pearl's ability to fly is the fact that she and Grian are Skyblings but also a more subtle connection to the watchers. After all, Watchers do have angel wings.

Grian's ability to mimic everyone else's powers is so Watcher-coded it's not even funny. It's like he's purposely making it clear to everyone that he's a Watcher now. And the fact that he made this Wild Card to get Skizz and Mumbo back is just icing on the cake. He just never realized how bad his wish to bring his friends back would bite him in the back so hard. Ah Grian, not thinking your plans ahead and thinking about the consequences. Just like always.

And finally Scar. Scar has wanted Super strength all season. He mentioned it in episode one and he's been testing it out every time a Wild Card has been activated except for when his teammates were on red. The guy loves the classic power to punch people and to yeet people off cliffs. It fits his namesake. And the power to sit on everything is just genius. Not only does it allow some very funny moments but it fits Scar's cowboy aesthetic. It's also the perfect fit for Scar because at first you think it's harmless. After all, you just get yeeted a bit and Scar rides on you. All fun and games. But once the fighting begins, this power shows how scary Scar actually is. Now you can't get Scar off you because he's sitting on you and you can't knock him off or hurt him. Sure he can't hurt you back, but it just means he's waiting his time. And the yeeting becomes more scary once your falling to your doom off a cliff. It's also a very protective power since he can make foes fly a million miles away from him, out of sword range and now the only way to hurt him is with a bow. A bow which Scar is way more skilled at using. After all, he is the HotGuy. Also he did mention HotGuy in his episode when he was trying to hit Tango. It's just that he missed it since Tango's so fast. (Oh yeah, I almost forgot, Scar got Thorns as part of his power set. Not only is it another defensive weapon since it makes people not want to hit him because they would be hurt back even with range attacks, but also it represents his connections to the earth. He is a terraformer. It also represents Double life since it kind of mimics the gimmick of if you get hurt, I get hurt of being soulmates. Just wanted to add this in.)

Anyway, I hope you like my analysis.

[aniisol]

gonna start crying from the implications of the lore stream and Martyn Inthelittlewood saying Martren was a form of torture. like

Ren genuinely wants to be kind. even when the "DNA abomination was taking over his brain" he was fighting it, rambling to himself that he couldn't hurt anyone. I made a post about this before, but Ren doesn't want to kill people or keep secrets. he only does when he has to, like someone he loves' life is in danger. usually that's Martyn, and for Martyn, usually that's Ren. take all of it how you like, but they're attached to each other, and love each other, and that's the only emotion the Watchers can't stand.

the Watchers forcibly separated the characters who were attached to one another with Double life (disregarding Grian and Scar, since Grian is a Watcher and allowed to manipulate the game as such). however, Ren found Martyn anyway, so, at the end of Double life, they took Ren away. this is where we see Martyn "become more selfish, a more self-absorbed character, willing to do what it took to win." the Watchers took away his moral anchor, the man who wanted to be kind.

after the two games that we see (there could've been more) Ren is back in Wild life, and he and Martyn head straight for one another. this is what the Watchers DIDN'T want, and after Martyn died, it was the Watchers who created "the DNA abomination." Martyn called it a kind of "gentle torture," both as a way to get back at Ren AND to see how "hosts" could affect the game, the intensified emotional output by multiple players in a single body. and since Martyn was "someone Ren held dear, someone he loved" it probably had a heightened effect. (please send help)

the Watchers proved that Martyn was willing to kill in Limited life, so would splitting him with Ren finally overcome Ren's desire to "be good?" are they torturing Ren with pain and confusion, or is it just the fact that he became what he became? I used to think Martren was his fault, a way to keep Martyn alive and in the game, but it wasn't his choice at all. Martyn Inthelittlewood we need to have a talk

[hypewinter]

The Titans set out to investigate a town rumored to be haunted. There they find a ghost boy tirelessly defending his town alone.

[talkativeanonymous]

Fine okay you can have more Mastermind Whit!! SIGH!! I guess!! /silly Transparents under the cut as usual <3

[fudgecake-charlie]

I am very good at doing what I need to do! You all get even more cosmic harbingers but this time it's Grian :] (Redraw from under the cut of this ask about a year ago.)

[ahollowgrave]

-- mistletoe. pt iv. (feat. the darling Rika of @darcar!)

You've unlocked a second, secret version:

[sweetybaty]

Flaky exposed!!1!!1!!!!

[dreemurr-skelememer]

Headcanon: what if Nightmare secretly had the paper of his AU from the doodle sphere in his book before he ate the apple in dreamtale?

Also second Head-canon, what if the other Nightmare had that same book that helped him gaining knowledge of other universes by taking their papers away?

i really really really like this idea.

.........so much so that i doodled a multiverse guardian nightmare.

this was going to be a tiny ask post but i went.......out of hand. thank you so much anon, you genuinely fueled something that SPIRALED OUT OF CONTROL

i LOOOOOVE this idea.

i like to imagine that he has a book that he stores the pages in.

and upon the discovery of the multiverse pages, he either asks ink to store them in his book for him instead of being scattered around, or..........

this is his multiverse now.

alternatively: i think that nightmare running off into the multiverse in curiosity and adventure because of this will cause him to leave dream behind and fend for the tree by himself,

making a whole new variant of a swapped dreamtale.

teehee anyway here's the designs side by side :3

[childotkw]

For the Listening Ears AU, how does Snape react to Harry's abilities? Does Snape still hate Harry even though he's in Slytherin?

Snape’s never hated Harry, but he’s always been suitably freaked out by him in this AU. Harry being a Slytherin puts an immediate stop to a lot of the canon bullshit behaviour we see Snape aim at him - if anything, Snape just pretends Harry doesn’t exist unless there’s a way to leverage his skills for an obscene amount of points for Slytherin.

Harry, for his part, doesn’t like or trust Snape the same way he doesn’t like or trust any authority figure beyond the orphanage matron.

Harry’s abilities do bother Snape, but he’s not affected by them because his mental defences are so top-notch. A siren’s voice can’t affect Snape.

But he’s rightly concerned over what Harry could potentially do with it, at first. Despite Harry being reserved and selectively mute, Snape still makes the mistake of assuming he’s been spoiled rotten. In the first year, he doesn’t know Harry was with the Dursleys, he doesn’t know about Dudley’s accident, or that Harry ran away and is now at an orphanage.

He thinks he spent his childhood being the prince of the wizarding world, and him having an ability that could literally force anyone to do anything unless they’ve specifically trained their minds to resist it? Yeah. He thinks Harry would abuse the fuck out of that.

He is, originally, supportive of Dumbledore’s idea to…suppress Harry’s ability while he’s outside Hogwarts. At least in the school he can be monitored and observed. Out in the wild though there’s nothing they can do to keep Harry from hypnotising every little person he comes across.

Snape refuses to see that Harry doesn’t talk. He refuses to think of why everyone he speak to - Draco, the first years, the older Slytherins, the teachers - all say they’ve never heard Harry say a word that wasn’t a hoarse, uncomfortable whisper.

His indifference leads to several misunderstandings - up to and including when Draco approaches him about the collar. Draco’s still young, caught between wanting to help his friend and not betraying his privacy until Snape agrees to help.

Only Snape hears ‘Harry’ and ‘suppressed’ and ‘acting strange’ and thinks ‘Potter’s complaining like a brat about having his special toy taken away from him’, and so shuts Draco down.

They never go to him again.

It’s only towards third year that Snape finally catches a clue as to what Dumbledore actually meant by suppress, and that his students have been trying to find away around a fucking collar that damages a young boy’s throat and vocal cords and magical core if he tries to use any aspect of his creature side.

He’s…disturbed.

Even more so when he finally, finally approaches Harry for a talk only to find an incredibly blank-faced, jaded young boy that stares at him with Lily’s eyes and a complete lack of trust in anyone but a handful of other children.

Because Harry’s long past asking for help when every adult has smacked his reaching hand away again and again.

Because Harry’s sick of giving second, third, fourth chances to people who always show up (finally, finally he’s so sick of finally) too fucking late to do anything.

[kyri45]

The chilly season is coming, they both need their living stove/pillow

(Yes, this is happening in the AU a couple of days after the recent update. No, I don’t know how I am surviving with these 2 still not together)

[relgnira]

why are they… “like that”

[pixxlotl]

I've been thinking a lot about Jimmy's deaths as the canary and even though the curse is "broken" I've been thinking about their context in Martyn's watcher lore. Specifically, the poem about the canary curse.

I don't know if this is intentional or not, but it fully could be since the episode with the poem came out after Jimmy's final death in Limited Life. I'm also aware this isn't the whole poem. Regardless, I find it interesting nonetheless how each of these parts of the poem seems to correlate with a time Jimmy has been "the canary".

Canary Call: Nothing too leading about this one, and no direct correlation to the way he died he was shot by an arrow in a battlefield. But Jimmy's death in third life, the first game, signifies the beginning of something worse. It's being set in stone that his call is the canary call.

First to Fall: This is the one that I realized was correlated and made me think about the rest of it. Jimmy dies by falling off of Mumbo's bunker-- specifically, by Grian's hand. I don't know if who pushed him can be considered relevant but I do want to explore the implications of the curse continuing by the hand of the only Watcher in the game, and whether those events are correlated.

Forever Caged: Two associations can be made with this line. One, the twist of this game: the fact that you're tied to someone else. You're stuck with them by the game's design, much like the canary is stuck in its cage until it's sent to its death (when the soultie/soulbound is over). You can also associate this one to Jimmy's death, trapped under a tree being trapped by an enderman, unable to do anything but cry for help.

In Different Walls: A bit of a reach, but one could consider "different walls" to be a different functionality to deaths than they're all used to. New game, new rules to play by, and the feeling of freedom by being allowed to die more often, only to have that stripped away when you realize death is inevitable and what you thought was a slightly more forgiving twist was actually the thing to doom you.

It's fitting that the curse is broken after Limited Life, even though there's no way that part of it could have been intentional. And again, these might have been purposeful associations from Martyn, but they're fun to dive into either way.

[aniisol]

What I concluded after watching the Eyes and Ears lore stream (and talking about it with @lillypad-monopoly !)

The Watchers are more involved with fighting the Listeners and keeping places in the Council, which leaves them less time to heavily focus on the life games. They still have to keep the games running, since they feed on their emotions, but have less time to spend on every individual player. (Thus, they've stopped keeping up with "The Canary Curse" and demanding that Jimmy die first.) They've focused their energies on a couple players instead of every one, and the more "admin" role has fallen to Grian.

Grian is a neutral party, and involved himself less with Watcher affairs, but is still a Watcher. He ran the wildcards in Wild Life, but didn't and doesn't monitor or control other players.

The three main players who are more "brainwashed" into ignoring the Watchers and the state of the game are Impulse, Jimmy, and Pearl. Impulse has always been desperate to win, so badly it affects his normal behaviour. He's, as Martyn said, "going mad with it." Jimmy, in his similar desperation, began praying to the Watchers. They had since abandoned his curse and the attention they paid to him, both letting him live past the first death and making him decide that they favoured him. Pearl was a character who "broke the rules," especially in Double Life, but in this case, that was what the Watchers wanted to happen. If they hate love and trust, why would they pair up people and force them to love and trust one another? Pearl, in her refusal to team with Scott and pretending to be red, did what the Watchers wanted. Since then, she's become more brainwashed into doing what they really want.

Martyn is NOT a Listener, but has had many experiences with the Watchers and Listeners, more so than most the players, and some of these interactions have stayed with him. He is less brainwashed than some of the others, but doesn't bother to educate anyone else because he knows what the consequences might be.

The three main players who are very aware of what is happening are Ren, Scott, and BigB. This is Ren's first season back after missing two. What did he see while he was gone? What did he learn about? He suggested that the players "team up to kill the maker," but died before he ever killed Grian. In Eyes and Ears, the failure of his superpower (to become Martren) was a Watcher's form of torture... so what did the Watchers desperately not want him to tell anyone? Scott and BigB both had their DNA infected, like Ren's, but instead, they became the Creaking. They are becoming far more lucid to the games in their actions and words. Scott was always a Watcher target, and BigB has become more distant-natured strange. Their DNA got infected just like Ren's, but they became less human as the game went on. Did the Watchers do that, to stop them from understanding? Made them less able to understand?