#More so regarding their CSA experiences. I believe it can be a powerful story to write

[chuchayucca]

Tbh I'm surprised nobody else has brought up the idea of Richard being abused too

It feels like a lot of potential for it and an explanation (aside from their status) as to why Roy never got help for it either -- Richard thought it was normal.

Now this is just making me imagine a scene where Carmen remarks that Roy will "grow out of it" (it being his behavior) like Richard did in front of the other Hatz and Ross and Robert just share a Look

Anddd now I'm wondering how much Carmen knows

TW for discussions of fictional CSA/SA and mentions of alcoholism

Me too, I thought it would be an obvious assumption but I guess not.

Exactly, I’ve seen the fandom explore Carmen and Roy’s relationship regarding his CSA but never with Richard. I think it’s ashamed because there’s a lot you can write for the relationship, even outside of their CSA.

Omg that’s a good scene idea. The Hatzgang are realized there is a deeper issue, and Roy has to unfortunately unpack that generational trauma. I can see how learning his dad is a possible CSA victim, like him, starts pushing Roy to tell his parents but also discourages him because basically Richard unknowingly knew Roy was SA but never recognized it because he doesn’t know he was SA too. I also believe Richard normalized his brother’s actions too. It’s truly devastating how Richard indirectly contributed to the normalization of Roy’s abuse but he doesn’t know it’s SA. He believes those fun “games” him and his brother played were normal family bonding activities and is happy to hear his son is getting along with his brother, a brother he admired when growing up.

These headcanons might change as the series continues and the deeper I get into research.

I headcanon Carmen doesn’t know anything but has suspected something was off a few times. She never thought anything of Richard’s behavior at first because he alway been this way. When they became adults, she started questioning as Richard still had issues with intimacy at that point in their relationship and his alcoholism was at its worst. (Short ver: Richard started drinking at a young age to cope with trauma of his SA and the Uncle encouraged this, buying him alcohol for various reasons. Modern day, Richard is a functional alcoholic but has gotten better with his drinking)

As of the moment, Roy’s parents are unaware of Roy’s CSA. The day the Uncle died, Roy did get in trouble but for separate reasons. Carmen and Richard were mad at Roy for hanging out with “plebeians” and sending them to one of his uncle’s private properties. Roy doesn’t feel comfortable telling them yet because they’re snobby, judgmental people, so he assumes they won’t react well.

[stardustizuku]

Part 1: The Politics of AoB

When I was first reading Ascendance of a Bookworm, I found something rather odd, and that’s: the politics of the light novels. More importantly, the way that a good 70% of the story was focused on the politics of noblemen, yet it very rarely bothered to engage with politics from “our world”. 

For the longest time, I chugged it off to me simply being unable to understand the japanese politics it was engaging with. And I still do believe that a large part of the political message being conveyed is something I can’t understand because I lack the cultural context of it. 

But as I read further, it became clear that there was a political context there that I could actually read in. Proven to me was simply at the end of Part 2, where it’s revealed that Fran is a victim of CSA, at the hands of the previous orphanage director. The way that CSA referring a man is handled - that’s to mean with respect - and how Arno is framed (as someone so diabolically evil for blaming Fran, not only for what happened to him but the orphanage’s director death, to the point of even warranting his death) is definitely a statement. One that not even I, someone so culturally removed from the situation, can overlook. Paired with the way Wilma is treated in regards to her trauma to men, as something she needs to overcome but not something to be pushed by others, led me to believe that: yes. 

Ascendance of a Bookworm is in fact, trying to speak about politics. In specific, gender-based politics. It’s trying to critique certain power structures, based on gender and perhaps even a critique to nobility. 

And, while I was able to identify the gender politics, the nobility critiques were a bit harder to parse through. At one point, I was just straight up lost. 

I could understand that Ascendance of a Bookworm was trying to say something to me, but I just couldn’t grasp what it was trying to say. 

Again, for a while I simply waved it away as me, being unable to properly understand the culture it was created from. Maybe there’s parallels to the government I can’t pinpoint, maybe the experience of a woman in Japan is too fundamentally different from that of a Mexican woman, that I had no hope of ever fully understanding what it was trying to say. 

That, however, changed when Part 4 started, because it took me that long to identify just how much of an unreliable narrator Rozemyne truly was. Sure, I knew she had a different set of values from nobles, but until the Royal Academy (and the side characters in the Academy’s POV) it was difficult to identify just how off her values and upbringing differed from other nobles. Not only that, it took me that long to stop seeing Rozemyne as just “someone from our world who doesn’t fit in the isekai new order”, but as someone from our world, who even by our standards is pretty wild and unconventional. 

And, can you really blame me?

Yugersmitch works are so fundamentally different from our world, that things we may consider morally bad, aren’t framed by the REST of the characters as such. The only true moral judgment ought to be Myne. In any other Isekai, her job would be to tie us to the moral understanding of our world, while trying to compare and contrast. “These backward people aren’t doing things how they should be doing them, so I will teach them how to do it correctly”. 

(There’s definitely an imperialist undertone to it, but that’s a topic for another day).

BUT AoB approaches it differently, precisely because Myne's internal understanding is off.

I haven’t been the first one to point out there’s a high likelihood of Rozemyne straight up being neurodivergent, and I think the faster you come to terms that she works on entirely different logic, the faster you can understand the themes implanted in AoB, and Rozemyne as a character. 

I do not struggle to understand her actions, her tendency to interpret things as  literally as it can be and ignore things that aren’t important to her - can absolutely lead even people from our world to find her annoying, hard to understand or even illogical at point. She’s an extremely unreliable narrator, not only because she has no Noble Context to guide her, but because even her definition of hard work, love for books and strong values are just something that can be alianting. 

For one, hard work to her has the connotations of a Japanese work culture, yes. That means, you have to work a lot, constantly trying to improve yourself, for the betterment of others. But those aren’t her only attributes that make her a great leader. She knows about task delegation and focusing yourself to the areas you are better at - things that anyone from our world would see as highly valuable, yet she sees them almost trivially. Doesn’t seem to understand just how valuable they are, and by extension, her ability to use them seems to go unnoticed. 

Her hyperfocus on books, permits her to have a clear and focused goal, but at the same time it’s not exactly considered “normal” even by our standards. Many have pointed out that her obsession with books can be off putting or unrealistic, just to have neurodivergent kids say that it’s an accurate portrayal of their experience. Including the idea that these types of people gravitate to one another, even if the light novels refer more to it as “highly skilled people attract equally as skilled people”.

So this creates a situation where Myne’s internal logic sometimes doesn’t align with the reader’s, and Myne’s own internal logic does not align with commoners, commoner’s logic does not align to those of the Nobles in Ehrenfest, and those Nobles (namely, Sylvester and Ferdinand)’s logic does not align with the rest rest of the Nobles in Yurgenschmidt. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 & Part 4 respectively. 

By the end of it, we have this confusing swirling mess that is highly difficult to put into words just what part of it is the “correct” answer, the “correct” solution, who is evil, who’s an ally, or even who is worth redemption or not. 

This ends up with very little room for a sound moral basis, and as a consequence, very little way to compare and contrast the correct and the incorrect way of running things. And that’s the thing. There’s no good or bad sides, there’s no good or bad characters. Rozemyne herself says as much in Part 3 Volume 5. 

“To complicate matters further, not everything those nobles had said was untrue. It was fair to say I was the reason Veronica had broken the law, since the specific intention had been to sell me to Count Bindewald, and an argument certainly would have been made that Ferdinand was pulling the strings from the shadows, since he had long been working to remove the High Bishop. From Bezenwanst’s perspective, he had set out to commit one simple crie, only to have Ferdinand dump a huge list of violations onto him - violations so small that even Bezewanst himself had forgotten about them. It would be harder to think Ferdinand hadn’t lured him into a trap”.

That’s by design, Ascendance of a Bookworm, at the start, is more interested in the hows and the whys of the past policies in this fictional world - just lightly trying to adapt them so that they don’t completely crumble, rather than a strict 1:1 translation. It’s more of a case study on how certain systems would behave and taking as seriously as it can the Royal and Nobility drama. 

Take Hasse for example. 

While from our moral standing selling children is wrong, and kicking a temple isn’t grounds for executing an entire town, neither the nobles nor even commoners of the duchy see anything wrong with it. This is our first true and brutal introduction to the politics of this world. The cultural shock Myne receives rings as true as our own. Where human life is not as inherently valuable or equal to another. 

And if we want to save the town, we have to play the mind games nobility has established.

Again, rather than forcing her own ideas of right and wrong, Rozemyne is quite literally forced to adapt to these new values. If she wants to survive, and if she wants to help others, she has to play the game. 

Although Myne herself never surrenders most of her values, she does adapt her reasoning for them to better integrate them into society. No longer does “you can’t kill people” become her argument but a “we can have a better punishment that serves us”

That’s how, instead of saving an entire town, Rozemyne has to work a plan to save as many people as she can, while navigating the politics of nobility.

For the longest time, I thought that was just it. How do you navigate these situations? Like an interesting puzzle to solve, with as much creative thinking and outside the box logic. Genuinely, I thought this was the “Politics” part of AoB. I never thought it was trying to convey a particularly interesting message other critique other than "politics are complicated"

Until. 

Part 5 happened. 

Something interesting happened in Part 5, and that is that Ferdinands is gone. While it’s a honestly traumatic thing for Rozemyne, narratively wise it marks a point of no return. Ferdinand acted as her guide in Nobility, as well as a sturdy shield - both to contain her from others, and others from her. 

Without Ferdinand there to, basically, put her on a right-path track, she was forced to build her own path. 

And this, THIS, is where Ascendance of a Bookworm truly starts.

MASTERLIST >> NEXT

[babyjakes]

forever and a day | 50. trapped.

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summary | a story in which america’s favorite captain gives a new life and family to a five-year-old girl who has suffered well beyond her years at the hands of hydra.

characters | dad!steve rogers, girl/willa rogers (original character)

warnings | AU similar enough to OU to include spoilers to many Marvel movies (Age of Ultron and beyond). action and fight scenes with violence and killing. injuries/mild gore. mature themes related to and semi-graphic depictions of child abuse/neglect, past CSA and CSM, and their aftermath (emaciation, wounds, scarring, etc). medical abuse (including sterilization) and experimentation. ptsd/trauma symptoms in a child (developmental discrepancies, de-humanized behavior, detachment, extreme fears). medical treatment of CSM and other aftermath of abuse.trauma-informed therapeutic treatment of ECT. minor mentions of disordered eating. themes relating to abuse of power/authority and immoral interrogation tactics including SA (with brief depictions.) evil!Tony Stark.

[Steve]

Looking over the piles of paperwork in front of me, I suck in a deep breath, leaning back against the kitchen chair I’m seated in. For almost the entire afternoon, I’ve been stuck here reading over legal documents regarding the case Bruce and I have been building against Tony. It’s been a long, tedious process, but each further step we’ve taken has felt unmistakably right. Finally, it seems like the scientist will be put in his place and held accountable for his terrible treatment of my sweet little girl. Finally, I believe, I’m getting Willa her justice.

It’s been a few weeks since the child and I moved into our apartment, and during this time we’ve mostly just been focusing on getting the poor kid feeling better. Bruce has been coming over every few days to check in on how her incision is healing, and we’ve had to make several adjustments to our normal routine to accommodate her recovery process. Instead of baths, we’re doing showers for now, due to the fact that she can’t be submerged under water. As she’s still fairly weak, I’ve been standing in the tub with her in a pair of swim trunks, holding her in my arms while helping her wash herself. It’s been a heartbreaking experience every single time, cradling the tiny girl’s quivering body against my own as she’s too frail and frightened to do the simplest of tasks. She’s also been requiring a lot more rest than before, and she’s generally too tired to engage in much substantial play. Honestly, it’s been miserable for the both of us, for her because she’s living it, and for me because I hate to see her this way. Thankfully, though, the past few days have brought some signs of improvement, so at this point, we’re just being as careful as we can and hoping.

Deciding to take a break from the paperwork, I push my chair out from the table, rising to my feet and heading over to the fridge. As I open it and grab out the carton of orange juice, I hear light footsteps running back in the hallway, followed by a door shutting abruptly. She must’ve run to the bathroom, I think to myself.

Willa’s been playing in her room for most of the afternoon, something she does often. Many times I join her, and I always love to do so, but it’s also nice that she’s old enough to play independently when I need to get other things done. She’s loved every new toy she’s tried, but her favorites so far have definitely been the set of animal puzzles ‘Uncle Clint’ got her, as well as her superhero coloring books and box of crayons from Wanda. The first time she tried them out, she colored in a picture of Captain America with all the colors of the rainbow. When she finished, she tore it out and gifted it to me, one of the best presents I’ve received in a long, long time. None of the colors were accurate, but that just made it even more special, and I could clearly tell she had put so much time and effort into it; it simply melted my heart. The picture now hangs on the wall beside my bed where I can look at it every morning when I wake up. I figure it’ll be one of those things I’ll treasure forever as a parent.

Closing the fridge up and grabbing a glass from one of the cabinets above the countertop, I hear water start to run from the back of the house, which I’m guessing is the sink. Tiredly, I pour myself a full glass of the juice, taking in several gulps at once before stopping and setting the cup down on the counter. Gazing back over at the mountains of work left to do on the table, I sigh, deciding that I’ve done enough for the day. More than anything, I just want to relax now and hang out with Willa. As soon as she comes out of the bathroom, I’ll ask her if she wants to watch a movie or something, I tell myself. Maybe we’ll invite Buck over and order a pizza.

Picking up my glass once more and taking a few more swallows, I pull my phone out of my pocket, unlocking it with my thumb and swiping the screen open. Aimlessly, I begin to scroll through my email, finding nothing new. Thankfully, these past few weeks have been quiet in terms of issues needing to be addressed by the Avengers. There have been a few small missions that’ve popped up here and there, but Nat and Clint have tackled all of them, which is usually how slower times go.

Getting bored with my inbox fairly quickly, I switch off my phone, finishing off my glass of juice and rinsing it in the sink before loading it into the dishwasher. Still hearing the water running from the back of the apartment, I decide to find something else to occupy me while I wait. I shut off the kitchen lights as I head out into the living space, slumping down onto the couch and kicking my feet up on the coffee table. Grabbing the remote, I flick on the television, not looking for anything in particular. As the screen lights up, a news channel begins to play mid-broadcast and coincidentally enough, Tony Stark’s face appears in a photo next to the news anchor as she vaguely reports on the 'legal dispute between Captain America and Iron Man.’ I sigh, immediately switching the channel, and a cooking show pops up. Deciding it’ll do for now, I take in a deep breath, setting the remote back down on the couch and shifting my position slightly against the pillows behind me.

The show barely keeps my attention, but I do my best to focus on it, not wanting to think about anything related to Tony or the legal situation. Surprisingly, a commercial break comes, then another. And before I know it, the whole episode has ended. As the credits roll, I pick up the remote again, muting the television. I pull my phone out from my pocket again and check the time. It’s been almost an hour since I was checking emails. My stomach twists as I focus my attention on the noises in the apartment, finding that somewhere in the back half of the house, water is still running.

Putting my phone away once again, I rise to my feet, swallowing dryly as I begin to make my way back through the apartment. A million questions start racing through my mind as I come up to the closed bathroom door. What’s Willa been doing in there for almost an hour? Is she sick? Why is the water running? As I pay closer attention, I realize that the sound isn’t the sink at all; instead, it’s the tub.

“Willa?” I call out, knocking against the sturdy wood in front of me. “Everything alright in there?” There’s no response, and my gaze falls down to the light peeking out from under the door, my anxiety only worsening at the silence I’m receiving.

“Honey, you’ve been in there for a while. Is everything okay?” I try once more. Again, there’s no response, and I sigh, deciding at this point I don’t have a choice whether or not to investigate further.

“I’m coming in,” I say a little bit more firmly as I reach out and twist the knob, pushing the door open in front of me and stepping inside. My eyes immediately scan the room, and at first, I don’t see the child anywhere. The room seems completely empty as I look it over, noticing the faucet in the tub running steadily. Then, something catches my eye. A hint of brown hair peeking out from above the off-white porcelain.

Quickly stepping further into the room, my breath catches in my throat at the sight before me. Willa is laying in the tub on her side, distanced a few inches away from where the water is running down into the drain to avoid getting wet. Her mouth is clamping down on a damp washcloth, her face soaked with tears as she cradles her left arm to her chest, her hand caught up in something. As my eyes focus on the contraption, everything finally registers in my brain. “Shit,” I curse under my breath, immediately piecing together what’s happened. Somehow, Willa found the rat trap I set up under my bed after Bucky mentioned spotting a rodent in the parking lot. It was in the one place I decided she would be completely safe from it, but clearly, I was gravely mistaken. Remembering the passage of time, I realize she caught herself in the trapnearly an hour ago, and it seems like she’s just been trying to hide it from me ever since.

“Willa, sweetheart,” I begin, bringing my voice to a volume that just barely rises above the rushing sound of the water. Noticing my presence for the first time, the little girl’s eyes lock with mine; when they do, a wave of terror completely washes over her face. My heart aches in my chest as she bites down harder on the cloth shoved between her lips, letting out a frightened cry that’s barely audible over the water.

As I take another step towards her, she lurches back, hugging her trapped hand closer to herself, clearly terrified that I’m about to try to hurt her more. “Hey- it’s okay. It’s okay, Willa,” I begin to soothe even though she most likely can’t hear me. As carefully as I can, I make it the rest of the way to the side of the tub, kneeling down on the shower mat and reaching out to shut off the water. The child cowers under my extended hand, appearing to brace herself for a blow. My heartache only grows at her actions as I send her a reassuring look while twisting the shower handle to turn it off, the room finally falling silent as the water stops. But almost instantly, the quietness is filled with muffled whimpers and sobs coming from the frightened girl through her makeshift gag.

“Willa, hey,” I murmur, guilt rising in my stomach as I eye her injured hand, now able to fully see the damage that’s been done by the powerful contraption. If it had been just a common mouse trap, that would’ve been one thing. But I had opted for the much larger version, hoping of finding the little creature before it found Willa and frightened her. Looks like that plan backfired, I sigh to myself. The poor girl’s tiny fingers have turned black and purple all the way through, caught painfully under the metal trap’s heavy force. “Sweetheart, hey,” I call softly, trying to gain her attention as she chokes and heaves into the cloth, seeming to be having a hard time focusing on me through the agony. She flinches at my voice, her body shaking so violently against the tub beneath her that it sends a faint rattling noise through the wall behind her. “Hey- shhhh,” I soothe, feeling absolutely awful for how terrified she is of me in the current moment. “Shhh, sweetheart. It’s okay,” I hum, not sure what my next move should be. My first instinct is to get her hand out of the trap as soon as possible, but judging by how hard she’s trying to keep that hand away from me, I wonder if removing the cloth from her mouth first might not be a bad idea.

“Here honey, let’s get that towel out of your mouth, okay?” I suggest gently, not wanting to startle her with any sudden movements. The child’s eyes widen at my offer and she simply sobs in response, shoving her little body up against the back of the tub as much as she can, trying to get as far away from me as possible. “Here, it’s okay,” I coo, reaching out and taking what I can of the cloth in my hand. Willa squeezes her eyes shut in fear, her bottom lip trembling horribly as I remove the gag from her mouth. As soon as it’s pulled out, she begins sputtering and whimpering, and my guilt only worsens as I realize that the part of the cloth is soaked through with vomit, meaning she was using it not only to stay quiet, but to keep from becoming sick from the pain as well. “Oh sweetheart,” I choke out, unable to hide my pure heartbreak. While I have seen Willa in many sad states, I think that this could very well top them all.

“P-p-ple-ease,” she chokes through her tears, her breaths heavy and choppy as she struggles through the pain. “’m s-sorry, learned m-my lesson, p-please.”

“Shhh, it’s okay,” I murmur, her terrified pleas tearing my heart in half, “you’re okay. Can you tell me what you mean, Willa-bug?” I ask sadly, raising my brow at her. “What lesson, sweetheart? There’s no lesson.”

“W-won’t play under D-D-Daddy’s bed again, ’m s-sorry, p-please,” she sputters, hiccupping violently every few syllables from her heavy sobs.

“Sweetheart, hey,” I shake my head as my heart drops even further in my gut, trying to catch the girl’s gaze with mine, though I find no success; she’s much too scared to look me in the eyes. “Can you listen to me, Willa-bug? Please honey, let Daddy explain.”

“Won’t d-do it again, never do it ag-gain, p-please,” she implores, gasping pathetically between almost every word for air.

“Willa, baby, please- please listen,” I try, desperation seeping into my voice as I struggle to reason with the child, “the trap wasn’t set there for you, sweetie. It’s meant for mice and rats, not people. I put it there the other day when Bucky called and said- hey, hey,” I soothe as she begins coughing on her tears and spit, her breaths only becoming more uneven as the moments pass. “Sweetheart,” I whisper defeatedly, wishing more than anything that I could just wrap her up in my arms and make all the pain go away. “Hey, you gotta breathe for me, Willa,” I plead, not wanting her to hyperventilate or vomit.

“P-please, won’t d-do it again… won’t ever, I-I-… please, p-please,” she squeaks, only continuing to work herself up into more of a panic.

“Willa, Willa,” I call to the poor girl, trying desperately to just get her to listen to me. “Come on, honey. I need you to breathe for me. In, and out. You’ve gotta breathe, sweetheart. You’re gonna make yourself sick.” Turning my attention back to her hand, I sigh, realizing that a large part of her reaction is probably being fueled by the pain. “Here, let’s get you out of that thing, sweetie,” I decide, reaching out towards her. But as I do, she flinches back harshly, letting out a terrified whimper, clearly perceiving my advancement as a threat.

“Please no, p-please,” she begs despairingly, “d-don’t hurt me, ’m s-sorry, please…” Tears continue to pour from her eyes as she holds her injured hand tightly against her chest, her fearful gaze locked on my outstretched hand.

“I won’t hurt you, sweetheart; I just wanna help you get out of that thing. You’re not in trouble, Willa-bug. Nobody’s here to hurt you, it’s okay,” I reassure her, though I know my words will probably do little to help.

“B-bad, was p-playing under D-Daddy’s b-bed,” Willa insists. “P-please, learned m-my lesson,” she whimpers. “D-don’t hurt me m-more, please don’t hurt m-me more.”

“No sweetheart, you were not bad. Not bad at all, Daddy didn’t put the trap under there for you, Willa. It’s meant for rats. Bucky saw one in the parking lot the other day, so I set up a trap just to make sure it wouldn’t come and chew up our stuff. I didn’t think you’d be playing under there, honey. It wasn’t set up to punish you.”

“W-will be good,” Willa chokes, and at this point, I realize she might just truly be past any threshold of reasoning.

“Okay Willa,” I murmur, coming to the decision that for right now, what’s most important is to free her from the rat trap. Damage control will have to come after that. “Here, we’re gonna get you out of that thing,” I tell her as I reach out, ignoring her flinching and heartbreaking protests as I gather the small child in my arms, pulling her out of the tub and onto my lap. She completely withers as I set her down on top of my legs, collapsing into an even more fearful puddle of tears than before. “It’s okay, baby-bug,” I coo as I gently but firmly take her hand in mine, prying back the metal clamp and releasing her poor fingers from its grip. Due to my super-soldier strength, I end up breaking off the metal piece completely from the wooden board, dropping the broken parts on the ground beside us. Once the broken trap is out of reach, I take Willa’s tiny fingers in mine, causing her to jump as I hold her gently upright with my other arm.

“N-no, please,” she begs, her bottom lip wobbling uncontrollably as her big green puppy-dog eyes peer up at me.

“I won’t hurt you, sweetheart. I’m sorry, Willa. I’m so sorry. I didn’t think you’d get caught in the trap; I had no idea you liked to play under my bed. But it’s not your fault, honey, and you’re not in trouble. I should’ve told you about it so you knew it was there, or I shouldn’t have put it out at all,” I soothe, rocking the trembling child back and forth as gently as I can. Looking down at her discolored fingers, another wave of guilt hits me; my guess is that most if not all of them are broken, or at least severely bruised. “Bruce is coming over before dinner, remember? We’ll have him take a look, okay?” The little girl sniffles, not saying anything as she continues to look up at me. Judging by the amount of fear that’s still left on her face, I can tell it’s gonna take more than just some reassuring words to ease her worries.

“Here, let me show you something,” I say softly, lifting her up in my arms as I stand up, carrying her out of the bathroom and through the house to the kitchen. Opening up one of the drawers where we keep office supplies, I pull out the package of traps, showing it to her. “See? Those are mice,” I tell her, pointing to the pictures on the cardboard packaging. “These things are meant to catch them if they’re in your house. They’re not made for people, sweetheart. Not made for hurting or punishing.”

“M-mice,” Willa mumbles, her tears beginning to slow as she looks over the package.

“That’s right, doll. Meant for mice, not people.”

“N-not p-people,” she repeats, her trembling finally beginning to die down as she seems to settle into this fact.

“Not people,” I say again, putting the traps back in the drawer and shutting it before reaching up and brushing her hair back out of her tear-stained face. “See? It wasn’t set up to hurt you, sweetheart. I would never hurt you, especially not for something like playing under my bed.” Willa sniffles, swallowing down another round of tears she was holding back before I proved my point to her. “What were you playing in there?” I ask, hoping to start easing the conversation in a lighter direction.

“D-om'noes,” she tells me, “lining them up, like Daddy showed me.”

“Dominoes, huh? Do I get to see what you were making?” Willa nods, leaning the side of her head gently against my chest, seeming to be completely exhausted after the whole ordeal. “Hey sweetheart?” I ask, causing her to look up at me tiredly. “You know how we’ve been trying to work on coming to Daddy when something’s wrong instead of hiding it away?” The girl shrinks back slightly at my question, a look of shame appearing on her reddened face.

“Th-thought you’d hurt me more,” she admits softly. I nod, wishing I knew a way to truly prove to her that she’s safe with me, no matter what. This has been an ongoing problem ever since she entered my care; she simply refuses to ask for help. And in situations like this, it just makes things a hell of a lot worse, for everyone involved. “D-don’t be mad, please,” she adds weakly.

“I’m not mad, Willa-bug. Not mad at all. I know you only hide things because you’re scared; I know you can’t help it, sweetheart. We just need to work on it, okay?” She nods warily, not seeming entirely sure that I’m not angry with her for it. “Why was the water on, honey?” I ask, guessing I might already know what the little girl’s about to say.

“D-didn’ want you t'hear me crying,” she mumbles. Proven correct and saddened, I nod.

“And that’s what the cloth was for, too?” I ask, earning a nod in response. “Okay doll. We’ve gotta work on it, okay?” I tell her again. “You’re only five, sweetheart. You’re too little to handle everything by yourself. That’s what Daddy’s here for; he’s here to help you, remember?” Willa nods, but I can tell by the look on her face that she doesn’t completely believe it. Not sure what else to say about the matter, I sigh, making a mental note to talk with Bruce about the issue. I don’t know how we’re going to solve this problem, but things can’t go on like this. The bottom line is: I can’t be a good dad to Willa if she won’t let me.

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[silverquillsideas]

My thoughts on the ending of banana fish

Banana Fish ended on the 20th, and then onward, a lot of posts have been made regarding the ending and what people thought about it. I’ve seen mostly negative posts, where fans were openly hostile to the ending and I get where they are coming from. There was the occasional positive response, and I understand their views too.

My stand on BF and whether the ending was justified falls on the grey area. I tend to oscillate between hating the ending, and liking it for being a powerful, emotional, and haunting experience. Why can’t I decide? Because I’ve got questions I just can’t justify in my head. I can’t come to a reasonable conclusion because of the loose ends that I feel were left in the manga by the author.

This is not meant to be an emotional rant, please bear in mind. I finished the manga back in July, and I’ve had months to ponder over these questions, and reached no conclusion.

Hence, I’ll just place the specific issues I personally had, and hope that, I’ll eventually figure out why it was created the way it was.

I’ll divide this post in 3 parts :

1. The events leading up to Ash’s death

2. Ash’s choice to die

3. The role that other characters played, and why the author chose to ignore their “fates” if you will, and only deemed it necessary for ash to meet his end in that way

I’d like to thank @angofwords, @lynxash @yoru-no-gaspard @ash-callenreese @saishii , with whom I discussed this over months, and finally @shu-kaku, who practically kicked me in the butt to get me to write this post, because I wouldn’t shut up about the  arguments :’D 

Also, to @zaenaris and @soso1777, my replies have been abysmally late, but here is what I had planned to say in response to you both.

A. THE EVENTS LEADING UP TO ASH’S DEATH

The battle at Mannerheim’s institution finished with Dino, Foxx and Mannerheim dying. Blanca, Sing, Ash, Cain, and all the gang members return safely, with few casualties on their side.

Afterwards, there were clearly two days before the manga ended : Day 1 , where Sing confronted Yut Lung, and Ash and Blanca talked in the park.

Day 2 : where Eiji leaves for Japan, Sing gives Ash the letter, Ash gets stabbed, the story comes to an end.

My question is regarding the behaviors of the characters in these two days, or rather, how Yoshida-sensei chose to write them.

Firstly, Sing Soo Ling, the very competent gang leader, who knew that his brother, hell bent on hating Ash for being a “monster who killed Shorter” and apparently on the mission to “harm Sing” , was missing, never once thought of tracking him down? Provided he had two days at hand? Sing had cleared his animosity with both Ash and Yut Lung, and I’m pretty sure, as a gang leader, he had conveyed both these details to his underlings. Therefore, it’s unlikely, that Lao, could NOT have heard it from at least one person in the gang (even if he was not a part of it anymore, I’m sure he had people close to him), if not from Sing directly. Lao was the only family member Sing had in the Chinese gang, so it seems a very far stretch that he would not have made any effort to get him back in the ring.

Ignoring the above question, assuming Sing was very busy, or the question escaped his mind, my second problem, Lao Yen Tai.

He was under the impression that Ash was a deadly enemy to Sing. His goal : kill Ash anyhow, even if he died in the process, so that Sing could be saved.

So, on that day, he followed Ash around (there is no other way he could have known Ash was at the library)

This is him spying on Ash and Sing talking in the reading room : 

Ash and Sing then went outside, and argued loudly for sometime. Lao, of course, followed them, and saw Sing and Ash yelling at each other. Sing ran away, very much unharmed, and alive, after yelling at Ash Lynx’s face. Lao saw the whole thing.

So, my question is, Lao DID NOT come out of nowhere, he was observing the whole exchange. If Ash Lynx was bent on killing Sing, or fighting him one on one, he had plenty of room to do so, but he didn’t. so, why didn’t Lao, go after his brother, and try to clarify the situation before going at Ash on a suicide mission? The excuse that he was “scared and confused and wanted to protect Sing” breaks down here. Logically speaking, Lao should have followed Sing, instead of going at Ash with a dagger. But Yoshida mysteriously chose to overlook this.

Third question : the blatant disregard for reality, in the following situations :

1 A gunshot going off, no one comes to investigate

2 Ash drips blood all over the staircase and goes back to the reading room 

No one notices

3 A human being bleeds out, sitting in a chair, in what I’m assuming is the Rose Reading room of the NYPL, which is very much NOT CARPETED and no one notices the blood (~3 to 4 L of bleeding is needed for an average human to collapse and die) in fact, in the screenshot I see, there is NO BLOOD, running out on the floor, not even a single splotch. 

Very interesting choice on both the author’s and animators’ parts

4 Also, since the anime time-line is the present day, I’m assuming there will be stuff like surveillance cameras present, so, my question is, what were the security people doing?

The readers are expected to keep the sense of reality suspended for all of the above points.

B ASH’S CHOICE TO DIE

First off, I’m a staunch believer, that Ash wasn’t suicidal, and that he didn’t actively go out and seek situations that would put him at risk of dying. I don’t know how the fandom views him as, but to me, Ash is an extremely resilient human being, and he wouldn’t give up his life just like that unless something major was at stake.

Ash says in ep 13, at the pier, that “there were times I felt that death would be a better option than what I was going through at those moments”

This is not the statement of someone who was trying to give up his life willingly, but only considering that choice under extreme situations. Ash had gone through a lot, more than any one of us, and especially me, who has had zero experience of depression or CSA or trauma of that nature, can fathom. And of course, there were times he felt that death would end his suffering, but also, he had a strong desire for survival and freedom from all that he was going through, and the goal to get revenge on those who had wronged him. 

In Angel Eyes, he says this to Shorter, and I think that’s proof enough of how Ash was ready to bend his horrible destiny to his favour and survive whatever he was going through. 

With all of that out of the way, I’ll point out the reasons which (according to me), served as his reasons to choose to die:

Why Ash did not seek medical help/call out to someone : Ash’s legal status was still that of a criminal, a gang leader, and whatever might have been his reasons for committing those crimes (ie -for survival), the law wouldn’t see him as anything but that.

The reason Blanca prevents him form going after Eiji to the hospital after he is shot, is precisely this :

There would be too many questions about who he was, what he did, etc, and invariably, the police would’ve been called on him by the hospital staff, since he was technically being treated for a potential homicidal would (a stab to the abdomen). Ash would’ve been questioned by the staff, asked for records, etc. If the police got involved, he’d have been taken into custody after being recognised. Even if Jenkins and Charlie stood up for him, and his status as a victim in the Club Cod trials was taken into account, Ash would not have been able to escape some sort of legal penalty, imprisonment or otherwise.

On further questioning, the names of his accomplices, ie, Eiji, Blanca, Max, even Sing, would come into the light. That was a mess I’m sure Ash wanted to avoid.

Any sort of contact with legal or law enforcement was a big no no in Ash’s current situation, and remember that the police were already looking for Ash at that time, and how Eiji refused to give them his location.

Let’s assume that Ash goes to the hospital / is taken there by people who saw him bleeding out, and he is eventually tried for his crimes. His case is widely publicised, since he is the biggest witness/victim in the Club Cod case. The Corsican foundation was still active, and Ash Lynx was still a successor of Dino Golzine, who had previously bought legal custody of Ash from the state of New York, which means, Ash’s identity as A J Callenreese, was no longer valid. The Corsican hotshots would still come after him, one day or the other, in order to go after Dino Golzine’s empire.

I’m excluding petty gang violence from being a threat to Ash, since at this point, all the major street gangs of NYC were Ash’s allies.

The Govt officials being tried by the court were also potential enemies. Club cod trials would mean more exposure of the politicians, more risk of Ash being the target of thugs or assassins in revenge (like it happened before with Kippard, where he sent the female assassin after Ash in the hospital)

Considering all of this, it’s obvious to me why he didn’t want to drag his life on, especially after the stabbing was done.

A more poetic explanation would be : to keep Eiji safe. It’s needless to elaborate. Ash had already made up his mind that he would remove himself from Eiji’’s life altogether, since he couldn’t risk putting Eiji in the position where they would have to look behind their backs all their lives, or be on the run, or worse still, his enemies tracking back to his friends, including, Eiji, Max, Sing, (or even Blanca), to hold them as leverage to get back at Ash. 

Yes, I do agree that his decision was majorly influenced by this wish to keep Eiji safe, forever, by choosing to get himself out of the picture, but only because he was put into the place of choosing in the first place by the author. 

I don’t agree with stuff like destiny, or fate, or paying for your actions because of a mysterious force in the universe decided so, because all of those are apt for ballads and fairy-tales, not real life. The above were reasons I could come up under realistic settings. In an ideal black and white worlds, all crimes are punished and all wrong doings are judged fairly, but not in the world we live in , and certainly not in Banana Fish’s world, where the “good guys” paradoxically suffer much more than the “bad guys”.

I’ll also don’t agree with Yoshida on Ash having to “pay for his crimes, as he had blood on his hands, so he had to die” mindset that she allegedly had. If that logic is applied, then I don’t see why she applied it selectively to Ash and not to Banca, Yut Lung, or Sing or any other person involved in gang life.

Instead of that, I’ll see Ash’s death as his choice, and his alone, not because he had to pay, but because he had decided to let go of all this continuous tug of war with his life and end it on his own terms. I don’t think Ash would’ve liked to suffer alone, all his life, in imprisonment by the state (if he was caught), or being held captive by another Golzine/Foxx wannabe.

I respect and agree with his choice, even if it’s not possible for us to ever know for sure why he did it.

C. THE ROLE OF OTHER CHARACTERS

The best possible outcome for Ash’s story, as I see it, would be taking up Blanca on the offer, or at least, if not go to Caribbean, then let Blanca provide him means to remain in NYC in a safer way.

Blanca is an anomaly in Yoshida’s world. He’s the only person who mysteriously remains alive, despite being an assassin, and committing perhaps even more crimes than Ash. He not only escapes his work related enemies, but the entire USSR (during 1980s) and manages to remain under an alias/ second identity. He escaped from the Kremlin, and its ruthless organization, the KGB 

If living such a double life is possible in Yoshida’s world, then why did the author not find a similar way out for Ash? It looks a feasible option to me at least.

Second comes Yut Lung. His situation is made prey clear in the manga. The whole fiasco with Banana Fish was cleared up, the Lees died, Yut Lung got his revenge, and struck up a potential friendship / truce with Sing. It’s made clear that he repented his decisions to go after Eiji, or to get Ash to acknowledge his worth as a rival, by whatever means he could. 

He let down Sing and Blanca by how he acted, who were the only two positive influences in Yut Lung’s life at that point. He would not have gone after either Ash or Eiji afterwards. So his status as Ash’s enemy was nullified.

The options open to Ash at that point (if the very stupid Lao fiasco did not happen) :

1. Live his life as a gang leader, and always stay on the lookout for his life from his enemies

2. Remove himself slowly from the violent life and maybe assume a different identity like Blanca did to escape all of that for good.

But under no circumstances can I see Ash and Eiji reuniting immediately after the canon events. Anonymous communication, or though friends like Max or Ibe-san, that I can picture, but not ash risking Eiji’s safety by meeting him. Not until years have passed, and Ash’s life became somewhat stabilised, if that were even possible.

It would have hurt, sure, but his unnecessary death could be avoided.

TL;DR : 

My point is, I wouldn’t have been confused by Ash’s death or even agreed with it, if only it had been written in a more natural fashion, in accordance with the rules Yoshida set for the ENTIRE manga. She wrote Ash to be a superhuman being, dodging bullets from automated weapons, surviving gunshot wounds that would be fatal on other people, and being able to completely override the effects of anesthetic drugs, in the final battle at Mannerheim’s (as a med student, that is one fact the I find ridiculous, only because its so unrealistic, and impractical) and lots of other fantastical characteristics.

So, his death at the end felt like the author had already decided on having a certain ending, and then lazily arranged the characters and scenarios to fit her choice.

That’s why, my stand on the ending will remain ambiguous, because I cannot accept all these logical fallacies and call the ending realistic or well thought out. Did it pack a punch and make me cry? Yes. Was it haunting and emotional? Yes. But was it a justified or logical ending? No.

The decisions on Ash’s part were consistent with his overall characterisation, but not the circumstances which lead him to make that choice. The arguments that “Ash’s past will definitely catch up to him one day, so death was the best option” is pretty ambiguous. Even if it did, choosing Lao to stab Ash as an example of it, was poorly thought out in my opinion.

The points I wrote above are subject to faults, of course. This is just one way to look at it. Feel free to counter my points, I’m not a US citizen, and I don’t know how politics, law or gang life works there, hence, my reasoning is based off common sense and parallels under similar situations. Maybe I am wrong in certain aspects too. I’d love to hear what you all think.  

[the-resurrection-3d]

“i was an island” 15 16 20 25 :3

15. Was there anything you had to research for this fic? Do you usually do a lot of research?

Not that I can recall! The amount of research usually depends on how much I think something matters to a fic -- this fic, back when I was writing it, was kind of an offshoot of the nightmare scene in minotauromachy, and that fic I put a lot more research into because I knew I'd wanted to do a collage-hybrid (I believe it was actually a comment on "I was an island" that reminded me of how much I missed collage writing, lol). "minotauromachy" as it's published now doesn't really contain much of that research, but I still think the research experience was productive: "The House of Asterion" is a fucking banger short story, and I also still think about certain lines from Chaim Koppelman's "Power and Tenderness in Men and in Picasso’s Minotauromachy" even all these months later.

16. What was the easiest scene to write?

The majority of the dialogue was pretty easy to write-- my real problem with jokey dialogue is getting myself back on track, especially in anything sexual. I'll be real with y'all: in every smutfic I've ever read that was worth reading, the actual sex was the least interesting part.

(17. What was the hardest scene to write?)

I know you redacted this question but I want to answer it briefly -- the incest part wasn't /difficult/ to write, but I definitely was pushing myself out of my comfort zone. Back then, the most graphic thing I'd written regarding anything incest/csa-related was "but I am home," and that fic is intentionally light on the actual details. I wanted to put it in after a conversation with a straight friend about the amount of women he's hooked up with that fetishize the idea of him fucking them in front of their moms -- I know incest porn is bigger now because of Game of Thrones

(though how much of it is actually trying to be incest porn and how much of it is content creators just spamming popular tags for attention?),

but the presentation is always very disconnected from reality, if that makes sense (to put it into the words of a certain ex-brony anime critic: "You don't actually want to fuck your sister, you want to fuck the concept of a sister"). A weird indirect incest revenge-fantasy is more realistic in the worst ways, which is part of why I think people acknowledge it even less.

If you've read the line "But the thought burns with anger far more than desire and lingers like stomach bile you can’t quite brush away, so Alberto has only jacked off to it twice," you've read everything I've ever written.

20. What is something you wish more people noticed about this fic?

I don't necessarily care whether or not people comment on the incest stuff -- I didn't expect anything -- but I do want people to know that this fic (and that specific scene) led indirectly to the creation of fic after Nick's Other Dad messaged me with fanart of half-transformed Luca. Fun times!

21. What is something you didn’t expect people to notice or gravitate towards in this fic?

If you think any of my fics are hot I am sorry to tell you this but you have bad taste, please know that help is out there.