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daylite-writes · 1 year ago

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Traitor readers always hit different! How about traitor reader with all of the harbingers (but I got a special bias for Pierro) 😫. Like betraying one is bad enough betraying and hurting all? Oh boy

Oooh I like this! I am gonna split it up into separate little instances of what I think they’d be like though for my sanity. I may expand to a few other full traitor fics (esp the Pierro one I really popped off on that damn) later on if I get ideas!

Certain characters take it MUCH better than others, varying from a scale of “Oh that’s Lowkey Hot” to “DIE”.

cw: yandere (?) behaviors, murder, manipulation, imprisonment, forced marriage, forced experimentation

~~~ Harbingers reacts to Traitor!Reader (ordered best to worst ~~~

Childe definitely takes it the best. In fact, this is honestly preferable for him. He’ll let you escape back to your leaders after you find out, giving you a head start before chasing you across Teyvat. The adrenaline is the hot part. He can’t get enough. He’s so easily bored. Come on baby, run a little faster. Make it fun. And after he follows you to your master’s base of operations, he’ll slaughter them and offer you an official place within the fatui’s ranks. Under him, of course! He won, after all, and the winner takes all.

Pantalone doesn’t see this as the worst thing. He’s very familiar with traitors, spies, and secrets. Though how you got around him for so long is a mystery. Once he finds out he’ll just be so sweet. Come on, treasure, just tell him everything and he’ll protect you. No? Oh well. A pretty enough price—or a favor from his more violently inclined coworkers—will have them abandoning you forcefully or not. Then he can scoop you up and… convince you to come home with him. It’s just more leverage to have over you, and it’s perfect for a man with control issues.

Pulcinella just… drops you. He has a nation to run, and his proximity to important information is too valuable. Unlike many of his colleagues he is not willing to bend the rules for feelings. He’s old, and he knows whatever feelings he feels towards you (platonic, romantic, familial, whatever) will pass with time. He reports this information to the proper place, and trusts the people he commands to take care of you properly. It hurts, but most things do at first.

Signora really thought you loved her. She hasn’t felt passion in centuries, and now as soon as her frozen heart thaws it’s revealed you're a traitor? Her heart can hardly take it. It hurts so much. Leave. Go now before she changes her mind and kills you. She cannot bear to have another lover dead in her arms. So take this chance and go, if you don’t, ice will encase her heart and she will slaughter you.

Columbina goes the kidnapping route essentially immediately. You can’t be a spy if you can’t report back to your masters! She’s very gentle though, running her fingers through your hair, humming happily, showering you with beautiful outfits and clothes. Even if you’re paralyzed from her haunting melodies, and feathers and eyes unfurl from the corners of your vision. Like a bird in a cage. It’s really your fault for catching the attention of someone so insane and powerful.

Arlecchino reacts similarly to Capitano, she is very proficient at breaking people down, ruining them, and turning them into what she thinks you ought to be. How dare you? This is a betrayal she will have to remedy. Loyalty is necessary. She’s crueler than him about it. Less patient. You will not be coming out of this unscarred. It’s better to just give in quickly, convincing her you learned your lesson, that you’d never betray her again. Reguardless of what you do though, several house of hearth members will be stalking you whenever you’re away from her, so don’t even bother trying to get back to your masters. It will not end well.

Pierro. Oh Pierro. You’ve never seen the man so sad. For a second, he looks almost pathetic. That is, before he motions for his men to drag you down to whatever dungeons are within the palace. He doesn’t visit you for weeks, but as soon as you start to think he’s never going to look at you again, he’s there, outside your freezing cell. The sadness so heavy in this man is wiped away by fury. He, personally, drags you from your cell. You can’t even walk as he pulls you along, stumbling every time you try to get your footing. He drags you for what seems like forever, ignoring you. Eventually, you’re in the Tsaritsa’s cathedral, with the ice goddess herself standing where the priest was. She smiled at you, and fear floods your body as he forces you down the aisle. He mutters something about how lucky you are. How many strings he had to pull with his god to allow this. You’re married there, ice freezing your ankles as you stand where a bride would, heart heavy in your throat. You know then that the only option is to say “I do”.

Scaramouche does not and will never take this well. Another betrayal? Typical of humans. He will go into a rage when he faces you, and chances of you escaping that rage in one piece is slim to nothing. If you don’t, ice floods his veins as he curls around your body, just asking why why why. If you do, he’ll drag you to the infirmary, force some poor healer to fix you, and then toss you in the dungeon similar to Pierro. He won’t visit you, thinking that this is a proper punishment. You abandon him? He’ll abandon you. He’ll come around sometimes though to yell at you or sob on your lap. Other than that, expect a life of imprisonment with mild favoritism and some physical scars.

Sandrone doesn’t take it well at first. When faced with your crimes, she immediately lashes out, destroying several of her newest machines and scarring you physically. After she calms down, though, she’ll calmly figure out everything that you leaked, who you leaked it to, and begin to work while you stay in a cell in her lab. She comes back to you a few days later, in which you’ve been completely abandoned, with some sort of mechanical collar and a tracking chip. Oh calm down, she’ll say as she rolls her eyes. The surgery is quick, but done without any anesthesia. The collar records everything and will shock and paralyze you upon exiting her laboratory. The chip is for tracking, but it can also release poison into your bloodstream. There! She was being so nice, not turning you into a machine. Say thank you, it might make her more likely to feed you.

Dottore has a breakdown almost immediately upon hearing this. He’d cackle, pacing in front of you, rambling on about how bold you were to try this shit with the cruelest of the Harbingers. Really? Playing with his heart is probably the worst mistake a person could ever make. He’s never been too enamored with human bodies, but monsters? Abyssal creatures? He finds them so beautiful, and he’s been needing a new subject. Don’t worry, it won’t hurt! Just be quiet and let him make you into the ideal version of yourself. He’d never dare do this to you if you weren’t a traitor, he loved you, but all bets are off as soon as you sabotaged his work and smuggled information. And the worst part? You’d still be his lover. Forever bound. Just more monstrous than before.

~~~

Lowkey I can’t believe I wrote for all of them. I didn’t think I do them all but then I had IDEAS. Which is somewhat uncommon for me. Everyone clap!

#genshin yandere #Yandere Genshin x reader #yandere harbingers #yandere dottore #yandere childe #yandere sandrone #yandere pierro #yandere pantalone #yandere Signora #yandere scaramouche #yandere arlecchino #yandere Pucinella #technically? I mean he’s here #yandere columbina #i think that’s everyone #asks #requests #genshin fanfic

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nataliasquote · 1 year ago

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Promises | n romanoff

Summary: Natasha and Anastasia didn’t know love… not until they found it in each other. But the Red Room was cold, in more ways than one

Warnings: Red Room, death, blood, shooting

Pairings: young!natasha x young!OC

wc: 2.6k

Notes: this one hurts but I’m proud of it. Another oldie again

- ⧗ -

30 pairs of pointe shoes became 20.

20 filled beds because 10.

10 black leotards became 5.

30 terrified girls became 5 ruthless ones, eyes trained... emotionless killers.

Their dainty arms capable of a swifter death than a gun. Slim fingers able to twirl a knife like someone would spin a pen.

Sleep not filled with dreams of puppies and ponies, but the haunting features of their victims. The screams, the looks of pain and anguish on their faces that each girl took in only moments before each life was ended.

Each life less important than the last.

The air was cold. No signs of love. No comfort. Just stone cold harsh reality that they had grown accustomed to. Freezing their young hearts to not feel pain.

Teaching them to crave the feeling. The satisfaction of a clean kill. A bullet straight through the heart. A silent knife slice to the throat, lodged in the stomach of an unsuspecting victim.

Somehow, the inside of the ice covered building was colder than the outside. The only sounds were barking orders and screams of pain. Each gut wrenching noise not affecting the 5 girls who remained.

Their faces were cold, no expressions as they fought through the day. No words of conversation passed between roommates, no cheers of congratulations as sparring matches were won.

These girls weren't friends. They were competitors. And losing to someone else meant death.

But there was an anomaly within. A flicker of light in the endless pool of darkness. A spark.

Hope.

Natasha Romanoff. The girl most likely to succeed. She was the top girl. Loved by all the trainers, she was the favourite. Her ruthlessness, her seductive ways were well beyond her years. So much strength in a tiny 15 year old body.

Yet she risked throwing it all away. For a girl.

Anastasia Vladimenkova.

The dark haired girl who was an incredibly skilled dancer and knife thrower. Her accuracy was unbeatable, but her sparring was not up to the same standard.

Somehow, the tiny piece of Natasha's heart that still remained took pity on her and trained her secretly at night, so she wouldn't be killed off in the next ceremony.

The girls formed an odd friendship, if you want to call it that. They didn't know love, but somehow found it in each other. And suppressed feeling spiralled quickly, so the friends turned into lovers quickly.

They would sneak out at night for stolen kisses and private moments, hands just roaming each other's bodies, trying to hold on to the last moments they got with each other. No one knew when their last day would be.

But the ceremony was looming over their shoulder, knowing their group of 5 would become 4 by tomorrow evening.

It was 2am and Natasha had taken Anastasia to the shower room, as the barred window let the moonlight shine down onto the cracked tiled floor, lighting their faces slightly.

Their bodies were pushed into the corner, Natasha's back against the cold stone as Anastasia laid her head on her chest. The atmosphere was different, they could both feel it.

"I don't want tomorrow to come." the brunette whispered, breathing in Nat's scent as she spoke.

"I know. I don't either. Especially not if it means I lose you."

Anastasia swivelled round and sat opposite Nat, her hand on her cheek. "You're not gonna lose me. You know they don't put us against each other. We're too valuable to them."

Natasha sighed, the moonlight in the small bathroom window catching her eyes. The moon and stars looked so free, something the redhead craved more than ever. "I don't want to be an object anymore. I want to run away. With you." She turned her head back to Stasia and pulled her closer, their faces inches away from each other.

Green eyes stared into chocolate brown ones, fear dancing across their pupils. They could be as hopeful as a child on christmas, but it wouldn't stop the brutal ceremony from tearing them apart tomorrow. No one could predict the outcome, and it was something Natasha hated.

"I don't want to lose you. I cant lose you." The redhead whispered, her eyes glinting as tears filled up to her waterline.

"You have me right now. And I love you."

That was enough for the teenagers to gently press their lips together, eyes closed in the blissful moment. It wasn't passionate or lust filled like it should have been, because the girls had never been exposed to that. The kiss was light and sweet, their lips moving together but nothing more.

"Natty." Stasia mumbled against her lover's lips. "We can escape. Tomorrow night. All we need to do is get through the ceremony. And then we go." The brunette pulled away and sat back on Nat's thighs, her legs hooked around the redhead's waist. "We can do it. We can make it work."

Nat shook her head. "How Stas? You know the guards; they're everywhere. We're small, but not that small. We can't slip past them without being seen."

"We can Nat. Please, we need to try."

Anastasia’s voice had raised slightly, which wouldn't have been an issue if everyone in their dorm room was asleep. But one blonde girl in the bed closest to the bathroom was laying awake, the sound of muffled voices sparking her curiosity.

Saskia crept out of her bed, her stealth skills coming in handy as she padded across the stone floor. Sticking to the shadows, she tiptoed across the room, hiding by the doorframe as she finally got a look at the girls who were hiding.

The red hair was an instant giveaway, and the girl she was lip locked with on her lap wasn't difficult to make out either. Natasha and Anastasia. The top girls in the class. The Madame's favourite girls.

As they spoke, Nat suddenly shushed Stasia, feeling a presence in the room. Saskia pressed herself closer to the wall, holding her breath. But Anastasia just giggled and pulled Nat's face back to her, joking about her being paranoid, which Nat accepted with a kiss.

Saskia smirked to herself, knowing how she instantly had an advantage the day before the fighting ceremony. She hovered for 10 more minutes, her smile growing wider as Anastasia’s excited voice muttered over their escape plan. It layer out perfectly in the blonde's palm and she scurried back to bed, finally able to sleep peacefully.

- ⧗ -

5 teenagers sat on the head table, tactical suits on their bodies, hair braided and pulled back out of their faces. Porridge filled their bowls, but none of them wanted to eat, the fear filling their empty stomachs, taking the space of any food that would give them energy to fight.

Saskia wandered in late, a smug expression on her stark features. She glanced at Stasia and Natasha, who were sat on the other end of the table, her eyebrow quirking up. Her plan was working.

As the girls lined up at the edge of the sparring mats, Nat reached out and linked her pinky finger with Stasia’s, their little promise ritual they performed before every fight. It was small and subtle, but it gave them a small promise and it had worked in every single fight they had done. Their promise to be there for each other. To not leave, to not betray and to not die.

Madam walked into the sparring area, her hands clasped as tightly behind her back as her hair was pulled up in a bun. She scanned the teenagers in front of her, eyes lingering on the redhead and brunette for a split second longer.

"As you all aware, today is your final sparring ceremony. The girls who survive will go on to become the greatest assassins the world has ever known. The KGB will be grateful for your services."

Anastasia gulped, her heart rate picking up. She always hated sparring; it wasn't where her skill set lay. If this was a knife throwing competition she would win by a mile. Her accuracy was unmatched.

"Natasha Romanoff." Madam's heavily accented voice called out, her eagle eyed gaze locking firmly on the redhead. Nat walked forward, wanting nothing more than to hug Stasia, but knowing it would get her killed.

"And your opponent will be... Anastasia Vladimenkova."

The girls' hearts dropped to their stomachs. No. This couldn't be happening. This wasn't part of the plan. Not at all.

With shaking hands clenched tightly into fists, Anastasia walked onto the mats, her head held high. She couldn't show her emotions right now, as much as she wanted to burst into tears. She was supposed to be made of marble, they both were, and so couldn't show weakness when put against each other. They were nothing more than sparring partners, fighting for their life.

They waited for the signal before starting to circle, fists raised in defence in front of their faces, eyes locked on each other. Natasha wished she had telepathic abilities so she could talk to Stasia, trying to form a plan in her head.

They were pulling their brunches as they fought, not wanting to cause serious injury, but causing the odd bruise here and there so it didn't look too suspicious.

But after 15 minutes, Madam called out for them to stop. She called 2 guards over and they grabbed Nat by the arms, causing the redhead to instinctively lash out, kicking and punching at her attackers.

"Nat!" Anastasia cried, running forwards before she too was dragged back. She didn't care that Madam was watching her. She didn't know where they were gonna take Natasha and terror flooded her body.

But she stopped fighting as Nat was forced into a chair, her face still as stone like and straight as ever. Not a single emotion flashed behind her eyes. Not when her wrists were tired. Not when Madam grabbed her face. Not when Anastasia had a gun forced into her hands, guards aiming their own guns at the back of the brunette's head.

"Love is for children. Are you a child Natasha?" Madam spat, her russian accent thick.

"No Ma'am."

She turned to Anastasia. "Are you a child Anastasia?"

The brunette's hands shook around the gun that was clasped between her fingers, aimed at Natasha who was sat straight on the chair. "No Ma'am."

"Weakness." She growled, her ice cold palm slapping Natasha across the face. "You are to be made of marble. Not wasting your time making faces at things like that!" Her bony finger pointed in Anastasia’s direction, seeing the weaker girl flinch under her gaze. All of Stasia’s training had gone out of the window, pure panic flooding her veins as she saw Natasha sat before her.

"Yes Ma'am." Nat's voice was emotionless, the sparkle Stasia was used to seeing completely distinguished.

"Natasha Romanoff you would have been the top student. I had high expectations for you, and you've thrown it all away. Thank you Saskia, for showing me that you're not truly cut out to take your place in the world."

"I have no place in the world." Natasha mumbled, her eyeline dropping to the floor.

"You're right. You don't." Madam turned back to Anastasia, who had dropped the gun to her side. "Anastasia. Shoot her."

"I- what?" Stasia’s eyes went wide, but there was no hint of a joke in her instructor's eyes.

"You heard my words Vladimenkova. Kill her. You will not have any weaknesses."

Anastasia gulped but raised the gun, eyes locked with Natasha. Sweat trickled down her brow and she gulped, feeling a tear slip down her cheek.

"Nat." She whispered, trying to get a reaction from her.

"It's okay Stas. Do it. I'm with you baby. I'm always with you." Nat pushed down all of her fear. The sight of the gun brought relief, which was twisted. She was 15 years old, a gun should spark fear. Not be a source of comfort to end her pain. In her mind, if she couldn't have Stasia then she didn't want to live. And the Academy wouldn't allow her to have both.

"Nat no. I can't." She dropped the gun.

Big mistake.

The moment the metal clanged against the tiled floor, Natasha knew it was over. The guards' reflexes were fast. Too fast. The girl's pale fingers dropped the weapon and a shot was fired into her skull at the same second.

Nat had wiggled her way out of the rope, so the moment Anastasia’s body dropped to the floor, she leaped out of her chair and raced across the floor, screaming out as blood stained the old tiles. Anastasia’s body was limp as Nat got there, her eyes dull as she stared up at the ceiling.

"No!" The redhead yelled out, startling the giles standing on the opposite side of the room. She looked up at them, scanning and analysing each and every one of them. They were all scared, showing the same expression.

Except one.

Saskia had an guilty essence about her and Nat saw it straight away. She saw red and glared at her, breathing heavily through her nose. The snake. The reason her love was sprawled on the floor, a bullet hole in her skull.

Natasha's fingers curled around Stasia’s, their pinkies locking together like they'd done less than an hour before. Her tears dropped onto the brunette’ chest and she cried out before anger took over again.

Still clutching Stasia, she lifted her head again and locked eyes with Saskia, her bottom lip trembling. "YOU!"

But her rage was never taken out as 2 guards surged forwards, grabbing her arms and pulling her away. Nat's stone cold facade had dropped away and she screamed out for Anastasia, her gaze fixed on her best friend, her lover, the light in her dark life, her body laying abandoned on the floor like she was garbage.

"Stasia!! Stas no!" She kicked and screamed, fighting with all her might to get away from the guards. But her tiny 15 year old, malnourished body was no match for the 6 foot guards built of pure muscle. Not in her hysterical state. Assassin Natasha could take these guys out with 2 moves, but her body and mind weren't working as one.

She screamed and cried the whole way down the corridors, not even taking in her surroundings. She didn't know where she was until she was thrown into a cell, hearing the barred doors clang shut. But she didn't move. Her body landed in a heap on the stone floor and she stayed and wept, clawing at her chest and arms in pain as she wailed. She passed out hours later, her hands clasped together...

Her pinkies linked together.

Like the ghost of Anastasia was with her, watching over her and looking out for her, like they had always promised.

#fanfic #marvel #natasha romanoff #natasha romanoff x reader #red room #natalia romanova #black widow #oc #natasha romanoff oneshot #natasha romanoff angst #wlw

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laughingogre · 2 years ago

Text

The Recluse and The Huntsman

Teaser/chapter 0 for the fic I’m writing since I have Miguel ATSV brain rot and I can’t keep all this good stuff to myself anymore. This wasn’t edited or anything like that so expect possible changes to both the characters and the plot in the future. Okay byeeee! EDIT: I made a playlist to go along with this story, the first 3 tracks accompany this chapter.

Premise: Miguel has always felt like an outcast in spider society because of the way he got his powers. But after meeting Saanvi, he’s never felt more proud to be one-of-a-kind.

Pairings: Original character x Miguel O’Hara, anti-hero x hero, enemies to rivals (it’s complicated) to lovers

Warnings: Violence… and that’s about it for this piece of the story but this list is going to get much longer very quickly.

Driving rain and the slight fog that followed with it brought a neon haze upon Nueva York tonight. A fusion of colors so outstanding that memories of another life were starting to shake off dust in her mind. Flashes of memories from an annual fireworks festival sparked a little warmth in Saanvi’s heart. Less than thirty seconds went by before she snuffed it out, leaving herself icy; instincts sharp and ready. Long, slender fingers on sure hands opened the heavy black case that lay next to her on the rooftop. Satisfaction curled her lips into a small smile as the new and improved rifle looked back at her, gleaming in the neon haze.

Hellooo beautiful, she thought. While assessing all the upgrades, the multi-functional scope and walkable trigger she requested had her grinning maniacally. She made a mental note to give Drago a little more praise for his gunsmithing as she set up a stand in the darkness of the alcove. Cycling through the scope’s options allowed for eight different modes of visibility and detection, with heat-seeking sensors that stood up against even this night’s hellish weather.

Scanning the city for a few minutes allowed Saanvi’s dark eyes to adjust to the new level of detail the scope afforded them. Once her senses were fully immersed, the hunt was on. A den of data pirates had been having way too much fun with the identities of over half the city’s even-remotely-wealthy citizens. Ever the champion of fair play, she was going to bring that fun to an end by leveling their ranks. A glance at the watch face on the inside of her left wrist showed it was just before 02:00 AM. If the intel she scrubbed was accurate, a 12-person heat signature would pop up in less than 60 seconds.

Rifle loaded and ready, she took aim and waited. Intel was good—a warehouse four klicks away lit up with bodies. Once she had a count of twelve, her finger slipped into the trigger guard and onto the trigger in a swift motion. It didn’t leave the trigger until none of them were left standing. Smoke drifting from the barrel caught the light of an ad for aphrodisiacs and coiled pink and red against the shadows of the alcove. A smile cut across her face again as a leap off the building’s edge plunged her into the deluge.

Broken glass and rubble crunched underneath graceful steps as she leisurely filled a bag with data drives, cash, and whatever valuables her victims had stashed away. Once their warehouse was picked to the bones, Saanvi took a few photographs of the scene. Horrific images of bodies that were all bloated and bruising from the new ammunition she and Drago had developed. She knelt down near the worst-looking of the bodies, preparing to take a sample. As she pulled out a small vial and tool kit, the incoming presence of another threat sent her up the wall and into the ceiling’s vent system. Damn… intel must’ve been bad… there’s more of them. Sight limited by the vent grates, alarms went off in her head to escape as she felt the intensity of the aura peaking. There must be at least five more people about to walk into this room. Morbid curiosity won over her senses, so she repositioned herself in the vent to catch a glimpse of the intruders. Footsteps that seemed almost deafening from the intensity with which she listened for them indicated it was only one person. Good strategy, sending a scout. Eyes glued to the vent, she saw a massive silhouette peel around the corner. Her senses flared up at the sight of the figure beneath her: a man standing at least six feet tall, clad in a form-fitting suit that was dark blue with pulsing sections of red. The mask on his face had a menacing symbol on it that seemed to move the way facial expressions would. It started to stir a memory inside of her but an old emotion bloomed before recall could happen. For the first time in years, fear filled Saanvi’s veins. Thoughts only of escape and safety pinging in her mind. Run. Hide. Home. Run. Hide. Home. Go. Her head became a glitched mp3 but she couldn’t take her eyes off this predator. While the hulking figure below spoke in a low, annoyed growl to someone she couldn’t see, she stilled her mind and listened for the sound of pouring rain. The sound that would lead her away from this thing beneath her as fast as possible. Her crawl through the ducts to safety began with bated breath, a silent prayer that finished only after putting two klicks of distance between herself and whatever anomaly was in that warehouse.

Once back on the rooftop where her night began, her body shuddered hard, trying to fight off every feeling of the last few moments. She failed, senses made raw and primal by a hit of animalistic fear. Suddenly she could feel everything—single drops of rain and the chill that was trying to rob her of every last iota of body heat. Memories of another life came to her again, this time in echoes of her mother’s voice bewaring her of those made to be like her but not born as they were. ‘The universe is wide and more wild than our forest. You may meet something made to be even deadlier than you or I.’ The steel in her mother’s voice at that moment wasn’t lost on her then or now.

Saanvi had finally crossed paths with Miguel O’Hara that night. Only she didn’t register him as such. To her, she had come face to face with her mother’s fear made flesh: an unnatural union of arachnid and human.

***

It had been two weeks since that night and the nightmares weren’t letting up. Tonight was no different. Having been woken up by her own fearful thrashing yet again, Saanvi migrated from the bedroom to her studio. A pot of Cuban coffee brewed in the corner, filling the air with a pleasant smell. Fingers rapidly gesturing at holo-screens that were returning more of the same useless information. She knew everyone called him Spider-Man. She knew everyone (or almost everyone) considered him to be a hero. But she wanted more than just news articles and conspiracy theories from bloggers. What she wanted more than anything was to find out what Hell he came from so she could send him back to it. There was only one way to do that where he wouldn’t be pointing his fangs at her. Before falling into a deep, dreamless sleep at her desk, Saanvi had pinged a few connections. By the time the sun shone on the city again, she had unofficially launched an infiltration and intelligence gathering mission against Spider-Man.

#miguel o'hara #fanfiction #fanfic #miguel o’hara x oc #across the spiderverse #atsv #spider man #spider-man #spider-man 2099 #Spotify

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ackerifle · 1 year ago

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Captain Levi x prisoner of war reader please 😊 🙏

spoils of war!

yan. captain levi ackerman x fem captain. reader (ft. special operations squad)

+ CW. — au: canon adjacent, war crimes, treason, imprisonment, abuse of power & authority: mistreatment/abuse of pow, non-sexual nudity, choking, restraints & hot iron branding, uncharacteristically long post because it’s combined with another work i was making; not proof-read.

it came as no surprise that paradis island was capable of producing and preparing such an overwhelming abundance of competent and proficient soldiers. even if many civilians had initially criticized their old-fashioned choice of weaponry, their contentious plays on the battlefield, and even their morales as a stand-alone concern in itself; their doubts would soon be long forgotten once the soldiers had returned, claiming their first victory that would soon become countless victories. the war may still have yet to be won, but it is no secret that lady luck certainly favored the survey corps’ soldiers with all she had.

and that is precisely why levi had so easily been able to whisk you away with not so much as a glance from his subordinates and superiors alike, during an attack no less. in retrospect, you should have adamantly defended your right to fall back on this particular mission to your commander, should have let this great burden fall onto the shoulders of one of your fellow captains, and have been done with the whole situation entirely. but there was much more for you to prove to your commander and newfound nation than your other marleyan peers.

even if you had demonstrated your worth as a valuable asset time and time again, had gotten your hands dirty for the sake of marley’s name and conquest, serve your own motherland and its peoples only to turn your back on them halfway through the war; you would remain the only ‘foreigner,’ in power, a potential traitor in the eyes of soldiers who were your supposed comrades. if you could betray once, you could betray again— and those who held such leery and low beliefs of you simply could not be reasoned with.

but the judgment and distaste that was made very well clear to you by the marleyan military was nothing in comparison to levi's contempt. actually, it was captain levi now, although that isn’t such a shocking revelation when you take into account that you had also been promoted to captain status during your years away from home. however, your title was a gift from marley, not paradis, and that alone made all the more difference.

you hadn’t remembered him when the two of you came face to face after half a decade. when all of your soldiers had either met their final fates or been broken down with wounds beyond repair, captured and detained; you too, had fallen with them. and when levi had stormed down the ghastly corridor of deadmen and far worse to reap his reward of the fight well won, he had found you. the first thing he noticed was that you looked better, happier. far happier than he could’ve ever dreamed to see you when you were still in paradis— even with the absolutely disgusting mud, grime, dirt, blood, and shit smothered onto your raw and tender skin, with injuries that were likely already infected and guaranteed to last you a lifetime of scars, and well over half of your comrades-in-arms deceased. for someone who was just about to lose everything, you seemed so alive.

at the time, he had approached you wordlessly. slowly trekking his way down to your pathetic and forlorn figure, limp with lassitude and slumped in defeat in a messy pool of your own blood. given enough thought, levi thinks he must’ve looked angry back then. teeth grinding together behind a disturbing sneer, and eyes left wide open until they felt dry enough that he may as well have cried; levi acted far quicker than even his own thoughts could. as the end of his blade dipped beneath your chin, experimentally tapping the sharp side against your neck before raising the entire weight of your head until you could face him.

for but a moment's time, something vulnerable had flashed through levi’s eyes, and he remembered this feeling from his youth, that of a scared boy. his relentless heart wouldn’t stop in its persistence to beat out of his rib cage, and his sentiment, his fondness for you had resurfaced with bone chilling ardor. he was rendered completely, and wholly speechless. mouth agape and stunned into silence, but levi must have let your name slip from his lips in a voiceless whisper, because you finally opened your eyes, “do- do i, know you.” and so you had forgotten all about him.

you truly had done something so utterly unforgivable. leaving him all alone and abandoned while he remained under the unanswered pretense that you were taken; only to have been double backing on paradis the entire time, while he was the only one suffering, left in egregious shambles over your absence. so now he was going to do something unforgivable to you.

“get up.” levi always finds a way to announce his presence before making his way down to your cellar— as if the sound of him (unnecessarily) slamming the rickety door open and stomping on the the concrete steps wasn’t enough for you to catch the hint. a faint window of yellow light from above could be seen framing his silhouette on the uneven stone ground, and you brace yourself for whatever words of wisdom levi has so graciously decided to enlighten you with today, “it’s your lucky day.”

biting back a mirthful huff and an equally incredulous leer, you study his next words carefully, “we’ve got visitors coming today.” you’re quite observant of how he intentionally takes his time when it comes to unlocking your cellar door, his eyes don’t leave you, as if he enjoys seeing you imprisoned behind bars, and it makes your skin crawl, “visitors?”

your copycat repetition was intended to be silent, though you can’t help but ponder his statement aloud. there is something odd here, levi slides the door open and enters the caged room with you, you don’t know what it is, he grabs you by the arm far too intimately for someone holding a hostage, no— you know what it is; his voice, levi doesn’t bother to close the cellar door as he guides you down the ill lit, damp and dreary hallway, he almost sounds like he’s looking forward to having these ‘visitors’ coming today.

“you’ll be happy to see them.” as if reading your mind, levi offered his ominous words of assurance, if one could even call them that. opting to ignore his response in favor of studying your surroundings, partially because you weren’t conscious for the trip down, and partially to soothe your nerves, you have distant memories here— “familiar to you yet? the old headquarters’ basement.”

levi bites his tongue to refrain from adding in a sardonic jab about how you would have been there to witness the construction of the new headquarters, the symbol of paradis island’s first victory in the war, if you had simply stayed. but levi trusts that he’s spent enough time re-indoctrinating your pasts together with the days he’s been granted leave to tend to his war trophy. but his heart still aches every time he remembers your neglectful memory was due to your own carelessness, nothing to do with marley brainwashing you, or any sort of militaristic torture into subservience. was he that insignificant to you that over the span of five short years, you would think no more of him?

the two of you seem to recall your trainee days on paradis very differently, and the notion itself puts levi in a sour mood, “hurry up, the ropes don’t make you fucking immobile.” he barks with a shove in between your shoulder blades, “cuffs with enough leeway for me to move a single centimeter at a time? how accommodating!” levi shoots you a dark glare, “behave.”

it leaves your body sore when you come to a standstill atop the steps, vision straining at the introduction of an unhealthy combination of natural and artificial lighting on your luminescent-deprived eyes. levi takes advantage of your poorly adjusting eyes, suavely escorting you into a new room. there is something that you notice immediately upon entering the unrecognizable area, it is the smell of smoke. instinctively, your eyes frantically search the room to locate the source, landing on a small coal fire, all the while levi continues to usher you forward until you bump into a wooden surface.

peering down, you’re greeted by a low, yet unusually and unconventionally capacious table. each corner holds an individual ring of rusted metal, hooked to the ends with suspicious purpose. but before you can dwell on it too much, the force of levi’s hands on your shoulder and waist have you coming to your senses. with one calculating motion, he swivels you around, turning your body until you’re faced towards him, and although your hands are tied together behind your back, you struggle like you can touch him. levi is unfazed by whatever attempts you can bring yourself to muster to aid in escaping his grasp, dropping his hands to your torso with dangerous constriction before slamming you down onto the table with all his might.

your lower back takes the brunt of the force, and by god does it hurt. the edge of the table digs spitefully into your back and spine, causing you to momentarily scream in agony. and in an instant, levi distracts you from the pain when his hands start roaming your body, starting with your shirt. when he gets closer, the severity of the situation finally sinks in, and you only hope you’re wrong about what will happen next. wildly moving in his hold does little when your limbs are bound, and your legs are lifted too high from the floor for you to even do anything, and despite still maintaining full control over your movements, levi lets out an annoyed grunt either way.

his right hand quickly descends down onto your neck, enveloping your airway with a firm squeeze, enough to get you to stop violently staggering about. levi is more concerned with the position this has now put him in, only a menial worry, really; unbuttoning your shirt with one hand proves to be rather difficult, so he’ll have to tear at the fabric. like it was an ordinary sunday morning, he is more worried with the tattered frays and cloth pieces your blouse will discard, than you, a literal captive, scrambling to get out from beneath him. he decides he will both unbutton and rip the shirt, using his thumb to sloppily shove the buttons through while also dragging the article further down your body.

“fuck, don’t. this is inhumane, even for an enemy soldier!” it hadn’t crossed his mind that you may have taken this the wrong way, his intentions that is. but you did give him an idea for another day, “well, you aren't quite a soldier— no, not even a civilian of paradis anymore, now are you?”

levi halts his movements, but doesn’t release you, instead, feigning a thoughtful pause before continuing, “but that doesn't matter, even if you miraculously find your way back to marley, they won't want you back, not after i'm done with you.” your heart drops, and your thrashing increases tenfold, causing his grip on your throat to loosen with every move, but levi is able to ignore it with his determination to get those insufferable buttons undone.

the sound of a door and hurried footsteps interrupt any frenetic and hysterical thought you’re having, even levi tilts his head in the direction of the clamoring, “hm, it seems they’ve arrived.”

casual chatter could be heard nearing the two of you, and when voices were revealed you were horrified. gathering at the open doorway was a group of four soldiers, or so you had presumed, as they had the same matching uniform as levi. there were three men, and one woman; all of which who are holding something. two with the same rope that had your arms and legs tied together, one with a singular iron rod, and the lady with a water basin and a washcloth resting halfway inside the bucket and halfway on the outside. and what terrified you even further was that they seemed unperturbed by the sight before them, it’s almost as if their smiles grew wider.

“sorry we’re a little late, captain!” the woman chirped, lowering the water basin in her hands to a more comfortable position to allow gravity to uphold its weight, rather than her arms, “it’s about damn time you all finally show up, restrain her.” levi was blunt and to the point, glossing over greetings entirely, and aiming his index finger in your direction.

there was a lot going on, and levi disappeared behind the three figures approaching you in the midst of it all. the short-haired woman must have placed the basin on the floor, because her hands were definitely free when she reached for your shirt, “it’s been so long since we’ve last seen you, you know.” how she had managed to keep such a cheery tone and face while also single-handedly witnessing your torment and anguish was beyond you, and you leaned away from her touch.

“yeah, captain said you forgot all about us.” it seemed that distancing yourself from the chipper lady had landed you into the trap of another, this time, a blond man with a blithe though hurt grin on his face, “we’ve got so much to tell you.” the tallest of the three added, carelessly placing a hand on the buckle of your belt.

entering your peripheral vision was the final soldier of what you presumed to be levi’s squad, he had been the one carrying the iron rod in his hands, now absent, as he made his way towards you, finding a spot next to the woman, “a lot happened while you were away.”

that’s right, you remember them. these soldiers were of the plethora of cadets that had enlisted in the military when you and levi had graduated. you had only encountered them a handful of times, but they were recurring guests in your life thanks to levi preparing for his promotion, the one you never had the chance to witness for yourself due to your leave. who knew they would be the same people to disgrace your pride and dignity by stripping you naked, even if they were much gentler than levi ever cared to be with you, there was no greater comparison than a pack of hungry wolves. and it was so draining to fight them, you tried and tried, but when the ropes had come out, you gave in.

and their names, they were: petra, eld, gunther, and oluo— which you had only picked up thanks to their small-talk with one another as they defiled you. shutting your eyes to avoid dwelling on the feeling of having your arms and legs strewn out, wrists and ankles bound by the rope that had been threaded through those worn out coils. all attention was focused on your shallow breathing, praying to disassociate hard enough to block out their jovial conversation. but you had picked up on something else, the burning coals. expectedly, the room was airless and sultry with a running fire and six people confined to such a small room. but this scent was different, like you could smell the heat, and that heat smelled like iron.

snapping your eyes open, you raise your head as much as your neck would allow it in your pitiful position, desperately scanning the room for answers. and you get them when you finally hear levi’s voice, “grab her arms and legs, i didn’t get this shit custom made for her to fuck it up.” readily, as if anticipating this specific command, petra and oluo had taken hold of your calves, while eld and gunther grabbed the inner side of your elbows. when levi leisurely drew near the side of the wooden table, the only thing you could see was the iron bar in his hands, the black metal now a light ash grey, emanating heat even with the distance levi was holding with you.

“wait, stop. get that fucking thing away from me!” the only control you had over your own body seemed to be your mind and mouth. even when you banged against the table, pulling away from the left side of the table where levi menacingly stood, recoiling as much as you could through the grip of the four soldiers and the ropes.

if it was forgiveness you wanted, you wouldn’t get it. that much levi would make sure of. if you wanted to run away? to be disobedient? then he’d reward your bad behavior with a deservingly bad punishment. carefully, levi lowered the scorching iron pole to align with the left side of your hips, though he wasn’t cautious for your sake, of course not, you deserved this and much more, but because he refused to let your little tantrum screw this up. you could feel the metal before it even touched your skin, burning away any body hair that may have been there to a crisp, and the sheer radiating from it had you screwing your eyes shut. you braced yourself, preparing to feel the searing iron, but it never came. levi contemplated whether or not he wanted to do it slowly, or to startle you after letting fifteen seconds pass, he fancied the latter.

it was so much more painful than you thought it was going to be. the sweltering hot iron rod blistered your sensitive skin, and you shrieked and cried in pain. it was scalding hot to the point it felt as if the metal was actually ice cold, and it pressed stiffly against your side, sinking into the fat of your hips. you had screamed until you couldn’t no more, until your voice cracked and your vocal cords bled, something the soldiers restricting you seemed to ignore. but the smell, the smell of your flesh being burned to the point it would leave a fresh, bloody mark. it was nauseating, and you gagged and heaved, but nothing to come of it. and despite how hellish it was, how it caused you unfathomable pain, caused you to convulse and spasm in your restraints, the pressure of the iron rod only lasted five seconds.

levi had counted, retrieving the metal pole and alleviating the pressure of its marking on your body after five maliciously counted seconds. you couldn’t tell if it hurt worse when the cold air nipped at the new wound than it did when it had been applied to your skin. tears fell from your eyes, and you don’t recall when you had started crying, but your face was wet with those salty droplets. shuffling resonated within the room, and the weight on your limbs was released. how tired you were, defeatedly laying your head until you could feel the rough surface of the wooden table. eyelids getting heavier by the second, you dared glance at the brand on your hip, the two letters ‘LA,’ bold and clear.

if you had the energy to, you would have flinched when a hand holding onto a lightly wetted rag came into contact with the new marking. the hand was tentative and mindful, applying little to no pressure on your hip, but just enough to cleanse the burn. you could have sworn you heard the sound of humming, but you knew you heard levi’s voice, “if you so much as think of betraying me again, i’ll do more than just mark you with my initials.”

#ackerifle #yandere #yandere x reader #yandere attack on titan #yandere aot #yandere aot x reader #yandere levi ackerman #yandere levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman x reader

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neoliberalbrainrot · 2 months ago

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Fuck, I'm not traumatized enough for this

Means-testing is a quintessentially liberal idea. Instead of presenting a program or benefit (eg: student debt relief) as a human right available to everyone, liberal politicians often make sure it’s means-tested, restricting the benefit to only those who fit certain criteria. These criteria are usually numerical, reflecting the neoliberal obsession with quantification and collection of data. This doesn’t help people who fluctuate above and below the threshold, and it hurts people who do qualify when they aren’t able to get through the bureaucracy in order to claim their benefit.

What does this have to do with trauma?

The means-testing of trauma and oppression is sometimes seen as a useful method of determining someone’s moral superiority in leftist spaces which, I think, are corroded by neoliberal brainrot. The thing being gatekept can vary widely; it might be a community of some kind or something more specific like a publishing opportunity. The basic idea is that you must be this oppressed to enter. Someone’s perceived identity is used as a way of determining how much trauma they have purely from demographic information, remarkably similarly to real means-tested programs, and has nothing to do with the person’s actual life experience.

Because means-testing implies a kind of quantification, if only between more or less, a hierarchy of suffering can be constructed and further used as an indicator of moral purity. The most oppressed person in a group might be seen as morally correct more often, as if there is a neat spectrum of moral correctness. In addition, this person, despite being considered morally correct, might not actually benefit from this perception if they are marginalized and face marginalization from the same people putting them on a pedestal.

This is similar to the phenomenon colloquially called the Oppression Olympics, a competition to see who is more oppressed. The pejorative name is used by those who think it is a pointless exercise that detracts from making meaningful change. In the vast majority of cases, it is, and the discussion only serves to boost the ego of the winner of the competition and cement their status within the community.

Sometimes there is even a chasm between the material status of the person who “won” the Oppression Olympics and the person who is, when measured through more objective metrics, actually the most oppressed. This is a potential avenue for elite capture; someone who is able to communicate their experience using the potent buzzwords of the scene or who otherwise has more social capital may be able to capture the clout that comes with being recognized as the most oppressed.

The competitive nature of this exercise plays into neoliberal subjectivity, with its focus on being the best, or in this case, the most oppressed. Oppression is a competition—like the Olympics. This implies there’s something to be gained. And if there’s something to be gained, is there also an incentive to lean into any experiences of oppression you can claim? I’ve observed this behavior in people, but calling them out on it is an extremely risky and usually futile proposition.

There is actually no need to determine who is the most oppressed in the vast majority of situations, so engaging in this debate takes valuable time away from doing literally anything else. It also strongly implies that vulnerability is mandatory, that you must share your experiences of marginalization in order to be seen as moral enough for the cause. I’m sure I’m not the only one who has had icky feelings when presented with an obligation to list off all the identities I can claim, as if they’re synonymous with the problems in my life.

Of course, there are many situations where it is appropriate to means-test access to a resource; for example, if there is a limited about of funding to distribute to people with the greatest need. In writing this post, I’m mainly thinking of social dynamics in activist groups and even in social groups that just happen to be left-leaning. This is trend among modern leftist “culture,” if culture can be defined as behavioral and belief patterns in a group of people.

Whatever the case, I still think it’s important to examine the idea that means-testing and hierarchies of oppression emerge as viable concepts only because neoliberal ideology is the water many Americans swim in. It might just seem natural to place a more oppressed person (whatever this actually means) higher in the hierarchy, but why? Whether or not it’s the right thing to do, why does it seem natural? Is the hierarchy important to understanding the situation, or is it being emphasized because someone stands to gain something from its enforcement? Is it being built only because the people involved are used to thinking that way? Does it create problems where there weren’t any before?

PS: if you find my writing interesting or educational, please reblog! like artists, writers depend on reblogs to make sure new audiences see their work. thanks for reading!

#social justice #call out culture #cancel culture #purity culture #oppression olympics #neoliberalism #neoliberal capitalism

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minty-mumbles · 1 year ago

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Flared Fins Mer AU Lore Dump

You can find the fic on tumblr and on AO3

Character Breakdowns:

Wind: 8 (Pup) - Tropical Mer

Adult coloring will be Orange with light blue splotches, like a koi fish’s pattern

Fun fact: He and Warriors are, in fact, very distantly related.

Hyrule: 13/14 (Juvenile) - Octopus Mer

Adult coloring: Green with golden freckles all over him

Fun fact: His healing magic is not as strong in this fic, or at least not as developed. Most of his magic

Wild: 15/16 (Juvenile) - Deepsea Mer - Adult coloring: Dark blue with teal lines. The markings on one of his arms are strangely more of a green color, for some reason

Fun facts: His fins are bioluminescent (and his markings as well, when he gets older.) He has giant fins that are good for threat displays but are very delicate. He’s a better fighter then Hyrule, but being in more fights leads to him having a lot of torn fins. Due to being a deepsea Mer, who would naturally have less opportunities to eat, he metabolizes his food well and doesn’t need to feed as often.

Four: 16 (Juvenile) - Tropical Mer (Based off a beta fish)

Adult coloring: On one side is green fading to red on the fins, the other is blue fading to purple. As a juvenile, he only has the split green and blue

Fun fact: Four absorbed his twin in the egg, which is why his colors are split down the middle. He is the most territorial in the pod. When he and Wild get to know each other, they like to flare their fins at each other to show off and get rid of territorial aggression. Four bites

Legend: 19 (Almost an adult) - Tropical Mer (Based off a Sea bunny, which is a kind of sea slug)

Adult coloring: Light Pink with red markings

Fun facts: He is courting Ravio (A purple sea bunny.) His tail ring functions the same as his pegasus boots, which is why he could catch Hyrule

Sky: 21 (Adult) - Tropical Mer (Based off the flying fish)

Coloring: Red with silver fins and small yellow marks

Fun facts: He is courting Sun. He has a giant pet Grouper called Crimson. (Sky: Crimson is friend, not food!) Crimson is nine feet long and can pull him along faster than most mers can swim. (Groupers really can get that big. They probably aren’t really that fast though.)

Twilight: 23-25 (Adult) - Tropical/Freshwater hybrid

Coloring: Dark green with gray underbelly and thick black marks

Fun fact: His colors are so much duller because of his freshwater ancestry. He can survive in freshwater for a lot longer than others can. Sometimes goes and hunts in nearby rivers. He has an orca tooth necklace that can turn him into an orca. Yes, the Orca is called “Orcie.”

Warriors: 25-27 (Adult) - Tropical Mer

Coloring: Royal blue with orange marks on the ends of his fins. HE has a kind of iridescence to his scales that most Mer consider very pretty

Fun fact: Warriors has a twin, Linkle, who is currently very lost, wandering around in deep sea Mer territory.

Time: Very old (Adult) - Tropical Mer

Coloring: White/silver with thin red and blue line markings

Fun fact: He is mates with Malon, who is a deepsea Mer. Malon prefers to live in the deep, but they visit each other often. Yes, it is weird that a deepsea Mer would take a permanent mate but Malon does what she wants. She thinks it’s very funny that her husband adopted so many kids, and dots on them when she visits.

Worldbuilding:

Very young Mer are called fry. They are a lot more competent than human babies, being able to swim right after hatching, but during the first year of their life, they run mainly on their fish instincts. Fry are not considered super valuable to Mer, because Mer may have up to 20 fry from one clutch of eggs. Very few of survive the fry stage. Often a pod will choose the best looking/biggest fry and focus their energy on them, leaving the others to fend for themselves. (They won’t be chased away or killed, and if one does make it to puphood by themselves, all the better. But smaller pods can’t afford to feed 20 new mouths at once when all of them won’t survive.)

Those that reach a year old are called pups, at which point they shake off the more intense instincts, and become a little more reliant on their guardians. At 12-14 years old, they become juveniles. They have a huge growth spurt, and they turn from their dull pup colors to their main adult colors. Pup colors are usually either neutrals (other than white) or a very desaturated version of their adult colors. They are considered adults at around 20, around which time they gain their makings. They stop aging at around 30 years old, but keep getting bigger.

Tropical Mer stay in their birth pods unless they get a mate and decide to go to their mate’s pod, or decide to try to start their own pods. There are exceptions though, where juveniles/new adults will leave their pod because they don't fit in well.

Mer “Species” are more vague categories. There are tropical, deepsea, fresh water, octopus, etc. Most of them can still interbreed with only a little difficulty, (as long as they can get over their different social practices) so they’re not really distinct species. (Thought sometimes interbreeding can be difficult to achieve, and sometimes those children turn out sterile, like Mules are)

Tropical Mer are territorial, but they do still interact with neighboring Pods and trade at designated market areas. They aren’t isolated. Deepsea Mer are solitary, and Octopus Mer are solitary/only share territory with mates. If you are part of a social species but do not have a pod, you are considered a loner.

For one reason or another, Time ended up taking each of the boys under his fin, so to speak. Four was abandoned by his birth Pod because of his strange colors when he became a juvenile. Twilight went exploring up a river where his Tropical Mer mother could not follow, and couldn’t find her again when he came back. Sky fell asleep as a pup and got left behind when his pod moved on. Due to being twins, Warriors and Linkle were small coming out of the egg, and their pods decided to focus more on their other fry. Warriors never really integrated himself into the pod after that and left early. Things like that.

Mer can’t breathe air. A typical adult Mer can hold their breath comfortably for about 30 minutes though, so they still like to sunbathe on beaches if they can. They have gills on their neck and sides of their chest. Water flows into the neck gills and out the chest gills. The mouth is just for vocalizations and eating. As long as their necks are in the water, they can stick their heads out of the water as long as they want. They have bad eyesight above the waves.

Mer have their own language that needs to be taught to children, but they also have more internal vocalization that does not need to be taught. These vocalizations can get across more specific messages than just emotions, but the meanings aren’t as advanced as language. If you spend a lot of time around a Mer, you will be able to pick up on some of their vocalizations’ more subtle meanings, like discerning “hello” from “good morning/evening/etc.”

Mer are mostly carnivores, and they obviously do not cook their food. They do not scavenge unless they are desperate, preferring to hunt for themselves. Sometimes they eat plants like kelp for variety, but that’s not essential. Mollusk type shellfish (Clams, oysters, ect) are good snacks but aren’t really filling.

Mer that are social sleep cuddled together and all intertwined, to keep themselves from drifting apart while they're asleep. (Less of a fear when sleeping in a cave, but in the open ocean? Many pods have been permanently split on accident because of currents moving them three miles apart in the night)

Hylians exist in this au and they know that Mer exist, but they don't interact much. There’s a language barrier, and Hylians can’t make the right sounds for Mer language and vice versa. There have been exceptions, where one species’ sign language is taught to a member of the other, but this isn’t common. Hylians are at the same level of development as in the LOZ games. They do not have modern science, etc

#linked universe #lu mer au #lu wild #lu hyrule #luwild #lu legend #lu time #lu sky #lu four #lu warrior #lu wind

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skysquid22 · 1 year ago

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In Mine’s backstory in the RRGO story he doesn’t take Daigo’s warnings or authority seriously until Daigo reveals he shares the same sentiment that life is more valuable than money and saves him from his own actions. And……. Augh the little parallels between that scene at the docks and the end of Yakuza 3…….

What defines Mine's motivation is that he's struggling between two different ideals--believing that he can find someone to put his trust in vs believing that everyone is a liar who's only after their own gain. Mostly, he's acting on the latter with his actions and thinking. Seeking power in monetary gain with how he rises in the Tojo Clan ranks in his RRGO backstory and all of his actions during Yakuza 3. Kiryu calls him out on this method and Mine refuses it since he wants to believe in that other ideal. It is very, very apparent that Mine is desperate for someone he can trust for once in his life. He's searching for that answer in his backstory and he's at the point where joining organized crime is a good idea AND he nearly puts his faith in fucking Kanda. [All these excerpts are from the translation I linked above.]

But later, Kanda abandons him using the excuse that the younger brother sacrifices himself for the older brother to live which pretty much seals the idea that the bonds of the yakuza aren’t true trust between others. Factor in Mine saying his belief that their lives are more valuable than money and Kanda immediately valuing the money and the time/effort it took to make than money over Mine… it’s a complete and utter rug pull. One that he knew not to put much value in but did anyway because he wanted to believe in someone more than believe that people only care about power. Who is Mine but two wolves trying to kill each other and the winner dictates his mental and emotional state.

Wolf B won this round and Mine (implied?) doesn’t fight back and just outright asks the second acting Nishkiyama patriarch to kill him faster.

And the same process more or less happens at the end of Y3. He’s losing his reason to live only it’s worse now since he committed himself more to Daigo than he ever did to Kanda. He’s not going to try again and look for an ineffable bond because he had that with Daigo and it’s gone—the thing he’s been searching for all his life and joined the yakuza to seek becomes completely nonexistent to him. All that's left of his beliefs is the one he's been leaning on since he was a kid, that life doesn’t have value over money and everyone lies.

But just like at the docks, Daigo comes back and proves him wrong.

At the docks, Daigo proves to him that there is such thing as a bond you can fully believe in. And on the roof, Daigo wakes up, which completely upends the entire reason Mine fully adopted his nihilistic thinking and killed the optimist inside him. Kiryu was able to get Mine to understand that his thinking was completely wrong, leaving him lost and like his world had collapsed because it did practically. Both core tenements of himself were burned to ashes. With Daigo waking up, Mine realizes that he can still believe in another person.

Before he was ready to die thinking he was ‘right’. At the end, he knows he’s wrong, but he doesn’t believe he’s deserving of that bond anymore. Instead of rediscovering his reason to live, he just found a reason to die. It hurts… I imagine that if Mine was successfully talked down the vibes probably would’ve been similar to this scene in RGGO: Recognition of mistakes from both parties, Mine’s apology (which he does on the roof), Daigo offering a solution, Mine affirming his kinder core belief, and Daigo believing in Mine (ALSO happens on the roof).

Last point on Mine’s state of thinking and the parallels between his origin story and the events of Y3—Daigo straight up tells Mine that his thinking that people only lie to each other and care about power will get him killed. I love foreshadowing when writing a prequel. ALSO crazier to me is after Mine meets Daigo for the first time he’s disappointed in him because “He’s the same as me. Or how I once was…” which says so fucking much about his emotional state at that time AND his relationship to Daigo. The quote is specifically referring to the family bonds within the yakuza and how those outweigh the pursuit of power through monetary gains. Mine constantly assumes that the world is shit, thus acts accordingly to protect himself, but is clinging desperately to the idea that he can come to trust someone. A belief he’s so desperate for he joins the yakuza and nearly forces his answer as Kanda. Mine finally finds it with Daigo, I wonder if he would still consider them the same as one another. (I suppose this kinda supports the idea that Daigo could be Mine, but chose to live life with faith 'forward' rather than assume the worst of people.)

Daigo quite literally brings out the best in Mine. He’s not only Mine’s reason to live... Daigo is Mine’s proof that putting faith in trust is the right answer.

To recap:

#yakuza #yakuza 3 #rgg #mine yoshitaka #daigo dojima #minedai #might as well tag that #skyspeaks #this was written for myself but y'all can enjoy my brainworms too #reference #for my own purposes

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bl4z33467 · 30 days ago

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The Vulpixen Cannon 2

Part one^^^^^

A couple years pass. Novos trains harder than he ever had, knowing the atrocities he committed, desiring for no one to know what he has done. He believes the stronger he gets, the less likely people will know of his attractions. He tries to put on muscle, but fails due to his poor diet. Ceaser, learning from his mistakes with Altilis, makes sure that his protege, Novos, doesn't end up overweight and unwilling like Altilis. So, he makes sure he is on a strict diet, keeping him underweight (i swear this is a plot point guys). In the meantime, Altilis had been growing more mature. He began to be able to accept himself and realize the importance of his role in the legion. He became content with not becoming the next Kaiser.

Then it happens. Caesar is found dead. The tumor won. A large ceremony is held as Vulpes Novos Inculta is deemed the new Kaiser. His first act, he makes Altilis his advisor. For the next few years, the clones nearly double the legion's territory. During these years, Altilis's population grows, people begin respecting him more for his flawless battle plans and knowledge of terrains. One very interesting thing with Novos being the kaiser, he no longer has someone telling him what to do, particularly what to eat. This is a detriment to him, as he no longer was constantly on the battlefield and had whatever he wanted to eat at his disposal for the first time in his life, he began to get fatter. At first, it was good as he was sickly skinny. After a while though, legionaries began confusing the twins. This didn't bother Altilis but miffed Novos. Instead of changing his horrible diet, he trims his lovely blond curls and dyes it brown. Along with this, he gets more elaborate robes, having lots of pelts, feathers and gold accents. This only helped partially, as more and more legionaries began commenting to him that he reminded him of Altilis. He began to get more angry about this. They're saying he looks like him, acts like him, IS HIM? No! He wanted to be LIKE him, not him! novos needed to change this. But how. He was too stubborn to change his own ways, so he had to get rid of the problem itself: Altilis.

"Why do I have him around anyways" Novos thought, "The legion is doing just fine with me leading them."

Novos fails to recognize how much Altilis does to help the legion.

"I can't just, banish him. i mean, hell i could but that would damage my reputation to the legionaries" Novos begins to ponder. What can make him able to send him away. He wonders around fortification hill, studying all the various Tents buildings and other things. He spots it. A medium sized, shottily thrown together building. Altilis Library. His brother had been an avid scholar his whole life, collecting books of all sorts and maps too. A wealth of knowledge extremely valuable to the legion, that he let any legionary come and use. Novos chuckles lightly to himself, cocking his head. "Would be a shame if something happened to it" he says under his breath. He glides over to the building, and walks in. Altilis is there, nose in a book as usual.

"Hello Kaiser Novos" he says in a neutral tone, without looking up.

Novos doesn't respond but walks over to the desk Altilis sat at.

"I dont see you here often on your own acord" Altilis says while flipping a page in his book, "anything in particular you want? A map, im guessing?"

"Not this time. I was wondering, how do you keep this place bright even if its walled off?" Novos inquires.

Altilis looks up from his book finally. He looks at Novos dead in the eyes. "Candlelight....? Like we do in most areas??"

Novos smiles faintly "Thats what i thought." (He turns to leave before pausing. "Do you think you can do something for me?"

"Anything you wish, Kaiser Novos" Altilis says. Despite being Novos being Altilis's younger brother, Altilis still had great respect for Novos.

"I need you to gather me more intel of the terrain up north. As soon as possible, and as much as possible. Okay?"

Altilis nods. "Yes Kaiser" he says while putting his book down and goes off to grab an atlas.

"I need it soon and fast, so you will stay up until you've given me sufficient material" Novos said gruffly.

"Kaiser Novos, I will need to sleep soon, it has already been a long day for me and-"

Novos lifts his hand, shushing him.

"Yes, Kaiser Novos. My apologies" Altilis says. The scholar began to compile stacks upon stacks of information on the north as fast as he could. It drained the life out of him to stay up all that night and the next day before Novos waltz back into the Altilis's Library in the evening.

"Hows that information coming" Novos says with a hint of smugness.

Altilis, weary from his lack of sleep and studies, coughs up an answer. "Its been real tough, some of these areas seemed even uncharted before the war-"

"YOU LAZY BASTARD" Novos screamed, slamming his fist on the table. The candle, which was nearly burned down, wobbled. He slowly moves his head over to it and smirks, then looks back to Altilis. He whispers "No one is going to believe you." Altilis's weary eyes go shot. Novos bats the candle off the table. Altilis takes a moment before trying to put it out, but Novos had pounced on him, pinning him down. Altilis would have usually overpowered him, but his exhaustion made the effort futile.

"Novos! Brother! Why are you doing this?!? What have I done to deserve this??" Altilis cried.

"They were thinking i was you." Novos sneered.

"We have the same genetics! Of course they would, we are basically twins!" Altilis proclaimed.

Novos furrows his brow. "Not that, Altilis. They thought I ACTED like you, and you acted like ME. They were challenging my authority by insinuating that we are one in the same." The flames began to leap higher around the men.

"We aren't. You know we aren't. I know we aren't. I don't want to take your place, Novos!" Altilis said, beginning to squirm as the heat was getting to him.

Novos loosened his grip on his older clone. "I know you dont, but I want no questions about who's running the show. I can do this without you." A book shelf toppled under its own weight from the fire eating the wood below. A bunch of books topple onto the ground near them. They both look over and see a tattered old book. The title read "Canids." Both remember that night, oh some 15 years ago.

"But you- you said" Altilis said, confusion and fear in his eyes.

"I was a STUPID child!" Novos barked, If i woulf have known what was to come, I should have never given you that book." Novos gets up, and lets Altilis get up. Novos shoves him, causing the still exhausted altilis to stumble as novos dashes out of the flaming building. Altilis makes it out soon after.

The next day dawns. The library, where nearly all of the legion's books and other important paper records where held, was burned to the ground. Novos sat in on his perch atop of Fortification hill as he called out. "Fellow legionaries!" He cried, "Look at the devistation that was caused!" He motions to the smoking pile of wood. "I was there when it happened. My evil, EVIL, clone tried to light me ablaze! But I made it out, alive to tell the tale."

The crowd roared. Celebrating Novos surviving, and shouts of calls to kill Altilis sprang up across the mob.

"Pretorians! Bring me the criminal!" Novos shouted, almost theatrically.

4 men brought the weary Altilis before the crowd. His face reddened by the flames, clothes and accessories singed from the blaze.

The crowd began to shout, at first clattered and confused, but began to chant "crucify him!" Novos's breath hitched. He looked at the crowd and to his older brother. A man who he once loved and looked up to. He couldn't. He couldn't kill him. But the legionaries wouldn't accept sparing him. He had to give him a chance, something to make it out.

"LEGIONARIES! Calm down! I have a worse punishment in mind! Look at this man! He could survive years without food! I propse to let him rot in the dessert ALIVE."

The crowd roared again. It was settled. Novos motioned for the pretorians to follow him, which they did. The 6 walked deep into the Mojave desert before Novos grabbed Altilis from the pretorians and threw him to the ground. Altilis looked up to him, hopelessly. "Why... why didn't you just KILL me..."

Novos kneeled down to him, and gently kisses him on the forehead. "You're free, brother." He whispered. Novos gets up and walks back to fortification hill . Altilis, lying there to die.

#fallout #fnv #new vegas #fallout new vegas #fallout oc #fallout au #the vulpixen #vulpes novos inculta #vulpes altilis inculta

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centrally-unplanned · 4 months ago

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Do you think Germany could have won on the Eastern front?

Finished Stahel's Kiev book, which is basically more of the same from Barbarossa. He seems like he feels the need to prove Germany couldn't win, not just that he believes it and argues why.

From Tooze we know German war production was geared to aircraft well prior to Barbarossa, and Hitler refused to release large numbers of extra tanks until right before Typhoon. So there's at least some slack here.

I wish he turned the question around, asked what it would take to knock out the USSR, then see if Germany could've managed it.

~Woo Stahel posting! He is definitely a fun read regardless of if one agrees or doesn't. I am infamous for being a Barbarossa truther, I think Germany definitely "could have won" in the East. But of course, it is all around what we mean by that. If I was isekai'd into the head Third Reich in July of 1940 with a cadre of mutuals wielding absolutely authority, could I have beat the Soviets? Absolutely, none could possibly resist my strategic genius, honed on endless rounds of Hearts of Iron & Lesswrong blog posts. But that isn't a realistic scenario right, that isn't going to happen; Nazi Germany didn't have nearly enough hot elf chicks to attract any isekai protagonist portals, for one. We need to be specific here.

I tend to think the material constraints are definitely not overwhelming, the Nazis had a ton of slack. You mention the withheld reserves, and as you know from Stahel's earlier works the entire operation was run on blindly optimistic assumptions, the simple idea that a massive operational victory would usher in complete collapse, and so reserves were unnecessary. A me-at-the-helm Germany with no extra magical resources could still have had double the tank numbers, double the planes, probably a solidly higher cadre of rolling stock for resupply, and certainly things like better winter equipment (there would be hard limits, like truck supply isn't getting much higher I don't think). Something I have often highlighted is that while the Germans were "fuel constrained" it was with a policy of keeping fuel in reserve in large quantities, they were not close to the bottom in 1941. If they treated 1941 as "maximal effort, do-or-die", as I think they should to exploit their real-but-definitionally-temporary doctrinal-tactical advantage, they could not only have had bulkier armored formations and more supply "units" but ran more units in the field at the same time and for harsher tempos - part of why they didn't "field more tanks" is that they thought they were at their supply cap, but that was a policy choice.

I think you in other posts have shown you read the recent ACX review of How The War War Won, a stellar book. They mention in that review that the Germans had as many people working in airplane manufacturing as the US did in late war - of course making far less planes. But still, that was far higher than they were in 1941! Those people generally existed then, many were Soviet POWs but by no means all. Germany "woke up" to the stakes of their war in 1942, and began much more intensive economic mobilization then; nothing material was stopping that sooner.

Something that the Battle of Kiev also breaks down is a common idea that the Nazi operational advantage was predominantly in the surprise of the opening operation, that all their units were pristine and executing long-rehearsed plans, and that the path of Barbarossa was a sort of inevitable fade of that surprise. There is truth in that of course but Kiev was well after the surprise had worn off, and using units that on the Nazi's own operational charts said were so shredded as to be "unfit for offensive operations". And they still pulled off the greatest operational victory Nazi Germany ever achieved anyway. So much of Stahel's (very impressive and valuable) work is listing out like August 1941 memos and diary entries about how the Mud Sea of the Russian Steppe and the endless hordes of Soviet bodies had burned down the spirit of the soldiers, and how all the German officers were getting into fistfights with each other over a broken operational plan they had to pivot on the fly. But they kept winning, so?

Something I will criticize Stahel for is that, to make his case work, he needs Kiev to be exceptional, which he finds in Stalin's idiocy and meddling, making it a battle that should never have happened, that any sane leader would have averted. And Stalin is no strategic genius, for sure. But the case is way too strong - it rests on the hindsight 20/20 idea that the Soviet Union could just toss aside the economic assets of the Ukraine and just go on fighting. We know that that happened, that they could do that. But their victory masks how close to economic collapse they got, the days the spent on starvation-level calories building tanks that broke down after a single battle while running their rail stock and truck fleet into the ground. Perhaps, to not get into it right now, to only be bailed out by Lend Lease, the scale of which in 1941 the USSR could not have bet its horse on. He presents an overly rosy view of the idea of "strategic retreat" that the reality of war and internal Soviet thinking doesn't quite match.

Which is all to say that, under many timelines, the Nazis would have found victories like Kiev, and the Soviet leadership was not comically stupid. Our scenario of victory does no rely on a rigged game of the Nazi leadership becoming ubermensch while the Soviet rats witlessly scurry about their sinking ship or anything. I do think that a Nazi leadership that took the Soviets seriously, prepped intensively, understood the stakes that failing to achieve a quick victory meant a two-front war with probably the US on England's side, a war where they would be outnumbered 5 to 1, and so any price to boost the odds was worth paying, could have at least set themselves up for something like a win. Not guaranteed or anything, maybe not even 50% odds, but a solid chance.

Okay this went way longer than I expected, so to wrap it up quickly the next level is to ask - could the existing Nazi leadership have realized that? Can I kill off or brain-transplant just like few people and change how they operate enough while still keeping them as coherently the same entity? And I think to that the answer is probably not. I'll set aside the long case here, but you know it from reading Stahel - they had awful infrastructure for strategic planning, the median think tank today has a bigger staff than OKW did, they had ideological blinders on Soviet capabilities which they could not shed pre-first blood, etc.

And more importantly, in 1941 they were winning. They seemed safe, they seemed fine. Like, all that 1942 mobilization of the economy? It was done in part via mass-scale slavery and forced starvation. Something the Nazis were perfectly willing to do in 1943! But after they had just conquered Paris? Telling its new allies in Romania or whatever "hey we conquered Europe but our situation is so desperate we need forced labor battalions to man the Skoda Works factories"? This just isn't how politics works, no combatant did that in World War Two. The Allies in their ludicrous industrial might could afford that mistake; the Axis, trying to thread the needle of victory through the miracle eye of unlikely probabilities, could not. I don't think getting so deft a strategic tailor at the helm of the Nazi strategy was in the cards in 1941 in any of the "adjacent" timelines. You would need something pretty big to shift.

#World war two #Operation Barbarossa Discourse Blog #I have written 50% of this before sorry about that

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earthravenclaw · 2 years ago

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Neteyam and Kiri pregnancy and birth headcanons/extrapolations

Neytiri becomes pregnant during her first mating with Jake.

During Grace’s attempted consciousness transfer, Mo’at (translated) says “Hear us please, Great Mother. Take this spirit into you, and breathe her back to us. Let her walk among us, as one of the People.” And Eywa does. She takes Grace into her, and makes a copy of her nature. She keeps the copy that includes Grace’s nurture, and puts the fresh version in Grace’s avatar: but not in her brain. In her uterus. Everyone believes that the transfer has failed.

Grace’s human body is buried in a traditional Omatikaya ceremony. This is the first time this has happened to anyone. Mo’at and Neytiri want to bury her avatar body alongside it, but Norm and Max get Jake to help convince them otherwise, at least for a while. Many Na’vi see keeping an empty body as disrespectful, but the argument is made that it will be kept to further understand avatar and Na’vi biology and that Grace would have wanted it.

As soon as access to Hell’s Gate labs are restored and proper equipment can be used, a very thorough initial “autopsy” is conducted. It immediately becomes apparent that Grace’s avatar body is just barely pregnant, which is incredibly confusing to everyone. Word inevitably gets out to the general Omatikaya population, but no one claims paternity. There isn’t really anyone they can test, since there are no suspects at all. This is the first documented case of an avatar becoming pregnant.

For a while, no one really knows at all what the fate of this unprecedented little guy will be. Will they even survive? If so, for how long? Will they have health problems? Jake and Neytiri decide between themselves that, if a child is in fact born, they’ll take them. They feel that they owe it to Grace. No one has any reason to object to this, and certainly no one has more claim, so everyone accepts this.

Neytiri discovers her own pregnancy, much less dramatically. She’s been pregnant for longer than Grace, but since she was never specifically and thoroughly examined, it of course takes longer for her to figure this out. This is the first documented case of an avatar impregnating someone.

Jake and Neytiri are certainly not going back on their plan, so now they’re prepping for twins. Neytiri is only carrying one in her body, but in every other way, they will be having two. Multiple births are less common in Na’vi than in humans, since they are intelligently designed (not that anyone in this situation knows that). Single births mean fewer complications, and easier population control/family planning.

It’s very difficult for Jake to convince Neytiri to allow herself to be examined in the lab. Breaking the Three Laws hurts enough already, when it’s to do with violence, something already so ugly. But when it comes to pregnancy? At first, it’s unthinkable to Neytiri, and Mo’at as well. People, especially Jake, hate to push it, but it’s clearly much more necessary here than with normal Na’vi pregnancies. Eventually, she’s won over by the argument that it will be incredibly valuable to be able to compare the development of both foetuses. She’s able to feel like she’s doing something good for the health of all four of them. She did agree to become pregnant with a tawtute’s child, so this is sort of inevitable.

At first, these examinations are still very difficult for Neytiri emotionally. Norm and Max are often there, but they, while having a lot of experience with and knowledge about the Avatar Program, don’t actually know much about natural pregnancies. So, there’s always at least one other scientist there, which sometimes puts Neytiri off. Sometimes, Mo’at attends and tries to bring some tradition to the proceedings as tsahìk. When she first sees something on the screen that actually sort of looks like a baby, and she can feel the movements in sync with the visual, she cries. A lot. Jake does too, a little. Mo’at refuses to look.

Neytiri is there for as many of Grace’s examinations as she can be. These days, her avatar is spending a lot of time both in and out of her amino tank. Neytiri is actually quite useful for this: as a Na’vi, she’s able to safely touch the amino fluid, something the human scientists could do, with protective gear. Neytiri is sometimes able to help with the removals, reinsertions, and handling of the soaked body. Beyond the physical help she can offer, she feels obligated to be there both for Grace and her child. She knows that it probably won’t make a difference to either of them. But Grace was her friend. Grace was her teacher, someone she called “sa’nok.” And while this body may not be her, it used to be, and it still looks like it is. She breaths, in and out, when she’s decanted, but she can’t wake up. And then there’s the child: Neytiri sings to them. She tells them stories, and touches Grace’s belly. Maybe it’ll mean something. Even more unlikely, it’ll connect something between the twins. She knows it probably doesn’t make sense, but she wants them to be physically close to each other. It feels right.

Neytiri actually gets very into photos of the babies. She’s always loved photos and videos, and she especially does now because they’re the only way she can see far too many of her loved ones now. She and Jake both keep ultrasound pictures of the babies. Of course, there is a lot of material about them in the lab, but some of it is distinctly affectionate, like the photos Grace used to have (which are now distributed among various people, including Norm, Jake and Neytiri). (Years later, Kiri will look at these photos, ordering them and comparing the dates, watching her and Neteyam grow together. She’ll feel a sense of twinness that she rarely feels that distinctly, since she and Neteyam aren’t very similar in many ways, and Kiri tends to be closer with her other siblings. But she will feel it, then, seeing the two of them get bigger and more defined in near parallel, in different mothers’ bodies.)

They find out Neytiri’s child’s sex first, since they’re older. He’s older. It doesn’t occur to her not to. Knowing pretty much any of this information about the baby is unprecedented, so to her, the sex is grouped with the rest of that. Shortly after, Jake and Neytiri learn that they’re having a daughter too.

Omatikaya names are never completely chosen until after birth, since the sex isn’t known until then. Near the end of the pregnancies, Jake and Neytiri are pretty much referring to the babies as Neteyam and Kiri. To keep with tradition somewhat, they at least avoid ever saying their full names.

Neytiri gives birth easily and quickly, at home. Mo’at, who has delivered many babies, and Jake, who helped make this one, are the only witnesses. Jake is so anxious, it’s a bit ridiculous. He suggests trying to make it to the lab, but is immediately unanimously shot down. Everything is going typically, and recent exams have shown that Neteyam is quite healthy. Eventually, Mo’at even tries to kick Jake out, but Neytiri won’t have that. The moment Neteyam is placed in Jake’s arms, something in his soul shifts, expands. He cries like he’s never cried in his life. Neytiri doesn’t experience this quite as strongly, because she’s already been carrying him inside her body for some time. She’s used to how he feels. It is certainly odd, though, for her to readjust to not having him inside of her. When he’s returned to her chest, she whispers, for the first time, “Neteyam te Suli Tsyeyk’itan.”

Not long after, Kiri is determined to be grown enough for birth. Neytiri wrestles with deciding whether or not to attend the operation. She wants to be there, for Grace and especially for Kiri, who will actually, certainly be able to see and hear her then. In the end, though, she can’t stand the idea of seeing a pregnant abdomen cut into, not while hers is just still shrinking. She resolves to wait nearby.

A small group of Grace’s former students work together to weave a blanket for her baby. They surprise Jake and Neytiri with it a few hours before the scheduled birth. (Years later, Kiri will still use this blanket. She’ll wrap it around her shoulders as a shawl when she is forced with violence to leave the only home she’s ever known. For now though, it represents happier new beginnings.)

When the moment comes, Jake is in the room. Norm and Max are there, plus a few other essential doctors who have been there throughout the gestation. When she’s pulled out, Kiri is immediately handed to Jake, and he holds her to his chest, amniotic fluid, blood, and all. Neytiri insisted on this before the operation began, on the grounds that the very first moments after birth should be spent skin-on-skin with a parent. After a while like that, she’s briefly examined and cleaned, and then wrapped in her blanket and returned to her father, who brings her into the next room. There, Kiri’s mother, grandmother, and twin brother wait for her. When Neytiri first touches her daughter, when she unwraps her and holds her to her chest with the blanket draped over both of them, she feels whole, more than she ever has. This time, it’s Jake who says “Kiri te Suli Kìreysì’ite. And for now, everything is okay.

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somer-writes · 11 months ago

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pestilence au dump time :D this time ft dawn and hyrule!

hyrule is 15 and is a sophomore though he missed a lot of school as a child so his grades aren't great. fable helps him study

hyrule's family was killed in a house fire when he was 5. somehow he escaped (possibly by some miracle hmmmm) and since then has been passed from home to home

hyrule currently lives with extremely distant relatives. or at least that's what he's been told. nobody has any idea how he relates to them

mabe is a blue collar suburb of castle town. most of the houses are built up rather than across and are close together. a lot of mabe is lower and lower middle class

hyrule's guardians are in the lower income class and he's often left to his own devices as they have 3 (much younger) children of their own. he's not close to his current guardians nor their kids

hyrule basically lives with tarin and his family

hyrule's of fae descent though he's unaware of this

hyrule and legend often share clothes and a bed

legend and fable are hyrules only friends and the three of them are mostly inseparable

hyrule struggles to fit in with people. he doesnt like the city and is very outdoorsy. hes a bit of a pushover so gets bullied often

hyrule doesnt eat meat typically and has a major sweet tooth

hes very good with gardening and enjoys flowers

dawn is 13 and is an 8th grade junior high student

she's from castle town

dawn is blind from birth, though she can make out light. she cant make out the color of the light but she can see when it moves or changes

dawn usually has a cane. she does not have a seeing eye dog

aurora is dawns older sister by 2 years

dawn often wears skirts and tights. she wears sunglasses as a protective measure to keep her eyes from getting damaged further but they were left at home when she and aurora fled

dawn has a very small amount of the divine bloodline. both she and aurora are capable of using magic but only dawn can use divine magic.

dawns parents wanted her to have fulfilling life where she chose her path so kept her magic hidden from the temple so she wouldn't be forced into clergy against her wishes

dawn is quite small for her age and often gets mistaken for being 10-11

dawn's eyes looking the same as a seeing person's, so she often gets mistaken for not "actually" being blind

dawn relies on hearing and touch for most of her sensory information. touch is the most valuable to her

she's extremely shy but can be noisy once shes comfortable

the kokiri forest is within the lost woods in this au

there are multiple skull children but only one Skull Kid. the title changes depending on who won the last game. the Skull Kid gets a staff with bells and dried deku seeds

skull children are capable of illusory magic and usually use it for mischief purposes. while not malicious, they will often play with lost children until those children inevitably become another skull child

the current Skull Kid is several centuries old.

the koroks are the great deku trees direct servants more or less. they tend to the tree and look after the forest

the fairies are humanoid, just incredibly small. they have a variety of wing styles--butterfly, dragonfly, be etc and often have skin in shades of pastel colors rather than typical skin tone. most fairies are androgynous and wear simple outfits made from leaves/flowers/small trinkets

fairies rarely leave the forest as birds eat them

there's less magic present in hyrule so the lost woods are mostly thought to the be a fairytale. the forest only becomes the lost woods when the fog rolls in

the great deku tree watches over the sacred grove, one of the few holy grounds left in modern hyrule

the fairy queen also lives in the kokiri forest, although she hasn't made herself present in a very long time

#somer writes #pestilence au #lore dump #still deciding if hetsu exists here or not and in what capacity

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blowflyfag · 11 months ago

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WRESTLING SCENE Presents RINGSIDE : November 1983

MIKE ROTUNDO Young Star on the Rise

As told to Jack O’Shea

We would like to welcome everyone to our RINGSIDE interview and this month’s feature was conducted with one of the fastest rising stars on the wrestling scene, Mike Rotundo. Everyone who has seen this talented youngster in action agrees that he is a future superstar! Be on the lookout for this up and coming sensation for you definitely will be seeing and hearing quite a bit more about him in the future.

RINGSIDE: Mike, it’s a pleasure seeing you in action. I’ve watched you quite a bit in the last two months and you are very impressive. I really think that you have a very bright future ahead of you in professional wrestling.

MIKE ROTUNDO: Thank you very much for the compliment. It’s nice seeing you again and like you said, I feel that I do have a bright future. I basically attribute this to my background. I’ve been wrestling since I was 12 and I'm now 25 and since I’ve been in the Mid-Atlantic area I’ve been able to gain plenty of valuable experience from facing the caliber of top competition that is competing here.

[Rotundo drop kicks Howard.]

RINGSIDE: Tonight, competing in Greenville, we have three World’s champions; two former champions as well as the current NWA World’s champion Harley Race. Will you be watching their matches?

ROTUNDO: That’s right! Ric Flair will be here trying to regain the World’s crown from Harley Race and that will be one exceptional match. Besides, Dory Funk Jr. will also be here and every opportunity I get I make it a point to watch the matches. You can learn so much just by watching top stars such as Flair, Race, and Funk.

RINGSIDE: How many years are you wrestling professionally? ROTUNDO: I’ve only been wrestling a little less than two years.

RINGSIDE: Actually in two years time you have made a great deal of progress. How do you feel you would fare against the World’s champion at this stage of your career?

ROTUNDO: Right now it would take a great effort by me to win that belt but I have confidence to overcome any lack of experience which I may have. I know I am capable of defeating the World’s champion and on any given night anything could happen.

RINGSIDE: What made you pursue a professional mat career? ROTUNDO: I was approached by a New York promoter after I won the Eastern championship for Syracuse University. He asked me if I was interested in a professional wrestling as a career and I told him that I was. I then began to watch the matches more intently and I became hooked. I always wanted to be a champion someday and when this opportunity came along I felt that I now had a chance to make something of myself. I trained hard and I’m happy that I chose this profession.

[Mike Rotundo stands in the ring and awaits the start of the action.]

RINGSIDE: Were you always athletically inclined as a youngster?

ROTUNDO: Yes I was. In high school I wrestled and also played football and baseball and I was offered scholarships in all three sports to different universities across the country. I accepted a football scholarship to attend Syracuse where I played defensive end and I also wrestled. I‘ve been in sports and physical fitness all my life and I wanted to continue this. That’s the main reason why I got into professional wrestling.

Actually for me, my best sport was wrestling. I really didn’t pursue baseball and I often wonder what would have happened if I pursued that. I caught and I had decent size for that sport too but as it worked out I excelled more in wrestling. I enjoyed playing football but I realized that the longevity of a professional wrestling career is much greater than one in professional football.

RINGSIDE: How tall are you and what is your current weight?

ROTUNDO: I’m 6’2 ½” and I weigh 240 pounds.

[Rotundo has Bill Howard trapped in his airplane spin. Rotundo makes his way to the ring.]

RINGSIDE: You have a very impressive physique. How do you keep yourself in such superb condition?

ROTUNDO: Since I’ve been in this area I’ve been training with Rocky Steamboat who I feel has the best build and is the most athletic wrestler in the profession. He is able to keep that flexibility inside the ring and had numerous opportunities to train with him and he’s really helped me a lot. I’ve worked on the weights and I still do my running and quite a bit of stretching besides working on the various moves to use in the ring.

RINGSIDE: Unlike many of the other wrestlers who have only been wrestling a couple years, you are very aggressive inside that ring. You never hold back and constantly go after your opponent. This oftentimes makes the difference between winning and losing.

ROTUNDO: That’s correct. I feel that if you’re aggressive the people will support you. I go after my competitors with the purpose of pinning his shoulders to the mat. If you go after your opponent then you are in command and it makes it that much easier to come out on top. If you stay within the rules and wrestle, you will always have the people behind you.

[Rotundo applies pressure on Jake Roberts’ leg.]

RINGSIDE: Do you have any favorite finishing maneuvers?

ROTUNDO: I like the airplane spin the best. I feel if i could put my opponent up on my shoulders and spin him, then he has no control at all. I also use the roll-up-and-bridge which pins the man’s shoulders to the mat and when I bridge there simply is no escape. There are a lot of others. Actually I use whatever is best at that particular moment. You have to keep an open mind when you are in that ring and be ready for any situation which may airse.

RINGSIDE: What is your nationality?

ROTUNDO: I’m Italian. My parents are from the U.S.A. but my descendants are from Florence, Italy. So the name Rotundo is definitely Italian.

RINGSIDE: Over the years there have been many Italian superstars.ROTUNDO: That’s right. Bruno Sammartino for one is an idol that I’ve watched many times. I like his style of wrestling. He was aggressive and a former World’s champion too! I would love to go home someday and have the opportunity to wrestle in New York!

[Rotundo applies a side arm lock on Bill Howard.]RINGSIDE: When time presents itself what are some of the hobbies you may have outside the ring?ROTUNDO: I like to do some fishing. I used to hunt but I haven't had the opportunity to do too much hunting and I really love the beach, the sun, and the women. When I have time off I really like to go home to see my family and relax. As a professional wrestler, we have a very demanding schedule with the traveling and all the dates that we have to keep so any kind of hobby that involves relaxation is nice.

RINGSIDE: We see that Jerry Brisco has now changed his style and is not adhering to the rules. The other night you had a little altercation with him. What happened?

ROTUNDO: Gerald and Jack Brisco, since they have captured the World tag team title from Rick Steamboat and Jay Youngblood have changed their outlook somewhat and it was just an incident where I was watching the match and Gerald passed a remark which I didn’t care too much for and we got into a little scuffle. Jack then came out to help his brother but Jay Youngblood was right there with me and we came out on top. RINGSIDE: Just like you have been doing in the Mid-Atlantic area! We hope to see you win a couple of championships here in the Mid-Atlantic and then eventually capture the big one, the World’s crown. ROTUNDO: I hope so too! Thank you very much and I want to also thank the fans who have been rooting for me and pulling for me everywhere I’ve appeared. They really mean a lot to me.

#mike rotunda #IRS #magazine scan #magazine transcript #irwin r schyster #you guys didn’t think dinner was over yet right???#WRESTLING SCENE Presents RINGSIDE #WRESTLING SCENE Presents RINGSIDE 1980s #1980s #1983

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teleportationmagic · 1 year ago

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Most days Acier spends her time in the library.

The simmiering sheen on the banners that sweep through the space glitter back at her, a pale purple. Her family's colour. She'd always been partial to blue herself, but there was something to be said about rebellion.

Well. It had been rebellion at sixteen. Now that she was fully grown, it was disdain, maybe. Selfishness, if she was any less valuable a member of House Silva. How funny for them, that they had two heads of house, one which came from the outside and yet fit in perfectly, their own eldest daughter contenting herself in matters of war. They'd make a better set if they switched.

And yet. Here they were. She wonder how her husband is doing, handling his duties along with the children. She wonders how Nozel is faring, as a new magic knight. She wonders if Nebra and Solid have taken her death well.

She doesn't wonder about Noelle. Her heart throbs, at all once, and she puts it out of her mind. Unproductive and useless, she doesn't have the time for it.

The library is full of texts, none of them novel. Most of them have pages that have become blurry around the edges, from where Acier had rushed through them barely skimming. Grimgar was fully intact, thankfully. As were the pictures of her children's faces.

When she tires of it (or gets so much more tired of it, that staring at the tauntingly familiar texts goes from uncomfortable to untolerable,) she marched out to the courtyard and casts. Opposite castle Silva is a dark brick-stones spire of it's own - likely Spade's, considering the occupant and the decoration, though she's never bothered to ask - and above the both is a writhing mass of leeches.

She tries to ignore them. Her steel comes to her easy as always, sharp and pointed, an exercise in razor perfection. There's no more satisfaction in it, not for a long time, not since she came her and stopped being able to improve, but the motions are repetitive and rhythmic and soothing in their own way.

On some level she expects Vanica. This is as good as an invitation, after all, practising in full view of that eyesore. But she lets it come as a suprise, when her back is peirced.

She flips and turns, driving her own lance into her. They stand for a moment, taste of iron in the air, before the pull back.

She smiles. She always smiles. Acier can't - it would be irritating if she knew just ho much she valued to novelty of this fight - but Vanica always smiles enough for the two of them.

"Steel Magic; Dance of a Thousand Sparks"

The world lights up aroudn them, light reflecting off flecks of steel. She wants to make Vanica eat them.

She cackles, and responds with a barrage of her own, each parried against the legnth of her's. It's not a hard fight to win - in their past fight, Vanica had been far too depdant on Megicula and now stripped of her favour there was very little variety in her fight.

She wins. Predictably, her hand halfway through Vanica's chest, she wins. The soft flesh of her sticks to her hand as she pulls away.

"I won. Leave."

"I will. Just look here for a second?" And she does. She should have stayed her course, but let noone accuse her of cowardice.

Lips land against her, tasting overfermented. She destroys half her face for the insult, a cackling noise echoing around them both.

"Oh come on," She croons it from her place aginst the floor.

"Leave." Acier feels like pure ice. Or she should. Something moves in her, more than it should.

It's been a very very long time.

"Oh come on." She's pieces back together, bit by bit. Nothing changes here. "Aren't you bored, Acier?"

The kiss had done something fundamental to them, she was sure of that. "Not bored enough."

"So you will be!" She cuts her off before Acier can continue, another step into her personal space. "That's good to hear. Because I'm not bored at all - not so long as you keep beating me!"

A shudder shakes down her spine. Because that was the thing with Vanica - even when you won, you lost. "I will drag you back there, Vanica."

She grins, wide and manical. "Will you?"

She does. Forced to bear the disrespect, she does. The steel is marred, frayed, and she spends some time repairing the barrier before returning home.

After the library, she spends the most time on her bed. She can hear the siren song of apathy, and despite knowing she should be more insulated against it, sometimes...

Sometimes she wants to sleep forever. Most of the time, that disturbs her the most. Right now? She longs for it. Unconsciousness drowns her.

#black clover #vanica zogratis #acier silva #this is building off my Megicula steals Noelle fic I outlined a while ago #But yeah. In the meanwhile Vanica and Acier are trapped in a mindpalace together.#amber au #telespeak

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orchidsangel · 11 months ago

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okay so i’m usually more of a silent follower (i’ve only like sent one ask ever) but i kinda love your posts/talks about things that you love (even if it’s not necessarily something i care about,,i just love it when people talk about their interests it’s amazing),, so i’m kinda curious about why do you think sos should have won over midnights,,, not saying that sos is bad or anything i actually love the album and sza but i was rooting for midnights honestly and personally think it deserves the title for many reasons,,, like i’m NOT saying that sos didn’t deserve to be aoty on the contrary, all the albums that were nominated are amazing and all had their big impact and the title is very subjective and ngl, this is one of those years where the nominees are all so good it’s actually quite a tough competition to choose between, but personally i found that midnights deserved it the most so i’m actually really curious to know your opinion on why sos should have gotten it

(i’ve already seen so much discourse about this for the past week on twitter but obviously. it’s twitter. so they don’t have any valable reasons except just pure hatred, misogyny, slut shaming and obviously racism)

Okay, so first off, thank you for sending in this ask and allowing me to speak about something I care about!! Second of all, when you added racism in the "don't have any valuable reasons section" what did you mean by that? I'm not coming for you or anything. I'm just curious if you meant racism towards Taylor or if you mean racism towards SZA.

anyways, now for my thoughts.

So, while I obviously agree that SOS is a great album, the part I disagree with is Midnights being a good album. I don't like it; I never did, and I probably never will. And this isn't me being a Taylor hater; I am a Taylor Swift enjoyer and have sat down and listened to a few of her albums. While none of them absolutely stunned me, I do think she's an overall good musician and can make a relatively good body of work. Midnights is a snoozefest. It's boring and doesn't hold a candle to the rest of her discography, which I feel fine saying because I know there are a significant amount of swifties and non-swifties alike that agree.

To me, midnights is nothing special, and most of the songs blend together. It's not completely bad, though; it has its good moments, but the many cons, i.e., boring instrumentals, mediocre lyrics, no super deep meanings, etc. outweigh the very few pros, i.e., Snow On The Beach ft. Lana Del Rey, but more importantly, Snow On The Beach ft. more Lana del Rey. And I just can't get behind Midnight's winning album of the year after being the pinnacle of mediocrity.

Now, if you wanna talk about impact, let's talk about impact. Midnights broke tons of records, most notably taking up all ten top spots on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, a feat that no other artist has managed to accomplish. But that wasn't because the album was good or because the general public was tuned in; it's because of streaming culture, because, like most fandoms these days, swifties are rabid and reaching for the charts. That, combined with the sheer size of Taylor Swift's fanbase, means that the album was bound to do well regardless of whether it was good or not.

SOS, on the other hand, obviously didn't chart nearly as well as midnights (although it definitely did chart, like, let's get that straight bc Snooze didn't leave the chart at all last year). But that doesn't automatically mean that it was less impactful, because charts aren't that reliable these days so you have to find other means of calculating impact, and this is when we turn to social media.

(I'll be using tiktok for reference as I feel that since the app relies on music as its #1 source of content, that's the best representation for my argument)

So I'm an avid TikTok user, chronically online, way too invested in drama that doesn't involve me, a loser, blah blah blah whatever, who cares. The point is that I spend enough time on TikTok to be able to observe many different trends going on at the same time and their musical origins. There are so. many. songs. on SOS that trended on tiktok. You could not escape SZA on that app, not even if you wanted to.

Kill Bill, Seek & Destroy, Low, Blind, Snooze, Ghost in the Machine, Shirt, I Hate U, Good Days, etc.

All songs that I've heard on TikTok at one point or another, some of them having their own designated trends to go along with certain lines, and I'm sure there's more I missed.

This specific point means so much to me because I need you to understand that I didn't listen to SOS in full until WAY into 2023 (the album came out in 2022 for reference), and each track was so familiar because I had already heard so many of them on TikTok.

Now, I'm not saying that there weren't any songs on midnights that trended on TikTok. Obviously, there were. i.e., Karma, bejeweled, Midnight Rain, that one part in The Great War, etc., but when I say that most of the songs from Midnights that trended on TikTok were pretty much always used in the context of Taylor Swift, I mean that. I cannot stress this enough. If there was a song from Midnights playing in the video, then I can guarantee that Taylor was being mentioned in that same video, whether it be the eras tour, speculation about her and Joe Alwyn's breakup, her and Travis Kelce, speculation about which Taylor's version album was coming out next, or literally anything pertaining to her at all.

You might think that this is a stupid point, but to me, it's a good example of the fact that it wasn't an album the general public was interested in. And I think for an award like Album of the Year at the Grammys, the album in question should be one that is either objectively good, incredibly poetic, and thoughtful with a deep message, or beloved by the general public, and midnights wasn't any of those.

As for the misogyny and slutshaming, I'd never in a million years agree with that and don't condone that by any means. Pure hatred, if unwarranted, isn't something I really care about either because I'm a hater at my core and have a lot of one-sided beef with people who don't know me. But I will say that most people I know who don't like Taylor Swift do actually have one or two valid reasons. It's not that hard to find them, what with white feminism, not using her platform for good, dating a known racist, and committing ecological warfare, amongst other things.

If the racism you're referring to is in regards to people bringing up her privilege as a white woman, and it bothers you that people are bringing it up, then I'm sorry, but I'm not the person you want to talk to about that because I won't agree. The Grammys have a history of snubbing black and POC artists in general to favor their white counterparts; in fact, the entire music industry has a history of it, and this situation isn't any different in my eyes.

Anyway, that's most of all I have to say. Thank you for asking again, I'd love to hear why you thought Midnights should have won.

#☆ ro's headphones ☆#orchidsangels

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