#Not even every episode. Demons and vampires could still be human guys | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

blind-rats · 4 years ago

Text

The Rise & Fall of Joss Whedon; the Myth of the Hollywood Feminist Hero

By Kelly Faircloth

“I hate ‘feminist.’ Is this a good time to bring that up?” Joss Whedon asked. He paused knowingly, waiting for the laughs he knew would come at the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer making such a statement.

It was 2013, and Whedon was onstage at a fundraiser for Equality Now, a human rights organization dedicated to legal equality for women. Though Buffy had been off the air for more than a decade, its legacy still loomed large; Whedon was widely respected as a man with a predilection for making science fiction with strong women for protagonists. Whedon went on to outline why, precisely, he hated the term: “You can’t be born an ‘ist,’” he argued, therefore, “‘feminist’ includes the idea that believing men and women to be equal, believing all people to be people, is not a natural state, that we don’t emerge assuming that everybody in the human race is a human, that the idea of equality is just an idea that’s imposed on us.”

The speech was widely praised and helped cement his pop-cultural reputation as a feminist, in an era that was very keen on celebrity feminists. But it was also, in retrospect, perhaps the high water mark for Whedon’s ability to claim the title, and now, almost a decade later, that reputation is finally in tatters, prompting a reevaluation of not just Whedon’s work, but the narrative he sold about himself.

In July 2020, actor Ray Fisher accused Whedon of being “gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable” on the Justice League set when Whedon took over for Zach Synder as director to finish the project. Charisma Carpenter then described her own experiences with Whedon in a long post to Twitter, hashtagged #IStandWithRayFisher.

On Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, Carpenter played Cordelia, a popular character who morphed from snob to hero—one of those strong female characters that made Whedon’s feminist reputation—before being unceremoniously written off the show in a plot that saw her thrust into a coma after getting pregnant with a demon. For years, fans have suspected that her disappearance was related to her real-life pregnancy. In her statement, Carpenter appeared to confirm the rumors. “Joss Whedon abused his power on numerous occasions while working on the sets of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ and ‘Angel,’” she wrote, describing Fisher’s firing as the last straw that inspired her to go public.

Buffy was a landmark of late 1990s popular culture, beloved by many a burgeoning feminist, grad student, gender studies professor, and television critic for the heroine at the heart of the show, the beautiful blonde girl who balanced monster-killing with high school homework alongside ancillary characters like the shy, geeky Willow. Buffy was very nearly one of a kind, an icon of her era who spawned a generation of leather-pants-wearing urban fantasy badasses and women action heroes.

Buffy was so beloved, in fact, that she earned Whedon a similarly privileged place in fans’ hearts and a broader reputation as a man who championed empowered women characters. In the desert of late ’90s and early 2000s popular culture, Whedon was heralded as that rarest of birds—the feminist Hollywood man. For many, he was an example of what more equitable storytelling might look like, a model for how to create compelling women protagonists who were also very, very fun to watch. But Carpenter’s accusations appear to have finally imploded that particular bit of branding, revealing a different reality behind the scenes and prompting a reevaluation of the entire arc of Whedon’s career: who he was and what he was selling all along.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer premiered March 1997, midseason, on The WB, a two-year-old network targeting teens with shows like 7th Heaven. Its beginnings were not necessarily auspicious; it was a reboot of a not-particularly-blockbuster 1992 movie written by third-generation screenwriter Joss Whedon. (His grandfather wrote for The Donna Reed Show; his father wrote for Golden Girls.) The show followed the trials of a stereotypical teenage California girl who moved to a new town and a new school after her parents’ divorce—only, in a deliberate inversion of horror tropes, the entire town sat on top of the entrance to Hell and hence was overrun with demons. Buffy was a slayer, a young woman with the power and immense responsibility to fight them. After the movie turned out very differently than Whedon had originally envisioned, the show was a chance for a do-over, more of a Valley girl comedy than serious horror.

It was layered, it was campy, it was ironic and self-aware. It looked like it belonged on the WB rather than one of the bigger broadcast networks, unlike the slickly produced prestige TV that would follow a few years later. Buffy didn’t fixate on the gory glory of killing vampires—really, the monsters were metaphors for the entire experience of adolescence, in all its complicated misery. Almost immediately, a broad cross-section of viewers responded enthusiastically. Critics loved it, and it would be hugely influential on Whedon’s colleagues in television; many argue that it broke ground in terms of what you could do with a television show in terms of serialized storytelling, setting the stage for the modern TV era. Academics took it up, with the show attracting a tremendous amount of attention and discussion.

In 2002, the New York Times covered the first academic conference dedicated to the show. The organizer called Buffy “a tremendously rich text,” hence the flood of papers with titles like “Pain as Bright as Steel: The Monomyth and Light in ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer,’” which only gathered speed as the years passed. And while it was never the highest-rated show on television, it attracted an ardent core of fans.

But what stood out the most was the show’s protagonist: a young woman who stereotypically would have been a monster movie victim, with the script flipped: instead of screaming and swooning, she staked the vampires. This was deliberate, the core conceit of the concept, as Whedon said in many, many interviews. The helpless horror movie girl killed in the dark alley instead walks out victorious. He told Time in 1997 that the concept was born from the thought, “I would love to see a movie in which a blond wanders into a dark alley, takes care of herself and deploys her powers.” In Whedon’s framing, it was particularly important that it was a woman who walked out of that alley. He told another publication in 2002 that “the very first mission statement of the show” was “the joy of female power: having it, using it, sharing it.”

In 2021, when seemingly every new streaming property with a woman as its central character makes some half-baked claim to feminism, it’s easy to forget just how much Buffy stood out among its against its contemporaries. Action movies—with exceptions like Alien’s Ripley and Terminator 2's Sarah Conner—were ruled by hulking tough guys with macho swagger. When women appeared on screen opposite vampires, their primary job was to expose long, lovely, vulnerable necks. Stories and characters that bucked these larger currents inspired intense devotion, from Angela Chase of My So-Called Life to Dana Scully of The X-Files.

The broader landscape, too, was dismal. It was the conflicted era of girl power, a concept that sprang up in the wake of the successes of the second-wave feminist movement and the backlash that followed. Young women were constantly exposed to you-can-do-it messaging that juxtaposed uneasily with the reality of the world around them. This was the era of shitty, sexist jokes about every woman who came into Bill Clinton’s orbit and the leering response to the arrival of Britney Spears; Rush Limbaugh was a fairly mainstream figure.

At one point, Buffy competed against Ally McBeal, a show that dedicated an entire episode to a dancing computer-generated baby following around its lawyer main character, her biological clock made zanily literal. Consider this line from a New York Times review of the Buffy’s 1997 premiere: “Given to hot pants and boots that should guarantee the close attention of Humbert Humberts all over America, Buffy is just your average teen-ager, poutily obsessed with clothes and boys.”

Against that background, Buffy was a landmark. Besides the simple fact of its woman protagonist, there were unique plots, like the coming-out story for her friend Willow. An ambivalent 1999 piece in Bitch magazine, even as it explored the show’s tank-top heavy marketing, ultimately concluded, “In the end, it’s precisely this contextual conflict that sets Buffy apart from the rest and makes her an appealing icon. Frustrating as her contradictions may be, annoying as her babe quotient may be, Buffy still offers up a prime-time heroine like no other.”

A 2016 Atlantic piece, adapted from a book excerpt, makes the case that Buffy is perhaps best understood as an icon of third-wave feminism: “In its examination of individual and collective empowerment, its ambiguous politics of racial representation and its willing embrace of contradiction, Buffy is a quintessentially third-wave cultural production.” The show was vested with all the era’s longing for something better than what was available, something different, a champion for a conflicted “post-feminist” era—even if she was an imperfect or somewhat incongruous vessel. It wasn’t just Sunnydale that needed a chosen Slayer, it was an entire generation of women. That fact became intricately intertwined with Whedon himself.

Seemingly every interview involved a discussion of his fondness for stories about strong women. “I’ve always found strong women interesting, because they are not overly represented in the cinema,” he told New York for a 1997 piece that notes he studied both film and “gender and feminist issues” at Wesleyan; “I seem to be the guy for strong action women,’’ he told the New York Times in 1997 with an aw-shucks sort of shrug. ‘’A lot of writers are just terrible when it comes to writing female characters. They forget that they are people.’’ He often cited the influence of his strong, “hardcore feminist” mother, and even suggested that his protagonists served feminist ends in and of themselves: “If I can make teenage boys comfortable with a girl who takes charge of a situation without their knowing that’s what’s happening, it’s better than sitting down and selling them on feminism,” he told Time in 1997.

When he was honored by the organization Equality Now in 2006 for his “outstanding contribution to equality in film and television,” Whedon made his speech an extended riff on the fact that people just kept asking him about it, concluding with the ultimate answer: “Because you’re still asking me that question.” He presented strong women as a simple no-brainer, and he was seemingly always happy to say so, at a time when the entertainment business still seemed ruled by unapologetic misogynists. The internet of the mid-2010s only intensified Whedon’s anointment as a prototypical Hollywood ally, with reporters asking him things like how men could best support the feminist movement.

Whedon’s response: “A guy who goes around saying ‘I’m a feminist’ usually has an agenda that is not feminist. A guy who behaves like one, who actually becomes involved in the movement, generally speaking, you can trust that. And it doesn’t just apply to the action that is activist. It applies to the way they treat the women they work with and they live with and they see on the street.” This remark takes on a great deal of irony in light of Carpenter’s statement.

In recent years, Whedon’s reputation as an ally began to wane. Partly, it was because of the work itself, which revealed more and more cracks as Buffy receded in the rearview mirror. Maybe it all started to sour with Dollhouse, a TV show that imagined Eliza Dushku as a young woman rented out to the rich and powerful, her mind wiped after every assignment, a concept that sat poorly with fans. (Though Whedon, while he was publicly unhappy with how the show had turned out after much push-and-pull with the corporate bosses at Fox, still argued the conceit was “the most pure feminist and empowering statement I’d ever made—somebody building themselves from nothing,” in a 2012 interview with Wired.)

After years of loud disappointment with the TV bosses at Fox on Firefly and Dollhouse, Whedon moved into big-budget Hollywood blockbusters. He helped birth the Marvel-dominated era of movies with his work as director of The Avengers. But his second Avengers movie, Age of Ultron, was heavily criticized for a moment in which Black Widow laid out her personal reproductive history for the Hulk, suggesting her sterilization somehow made her a “monster.” In June 2017, his un-filmed script for a Wonder Woman adaptation leaked, to widespread mockery. The script’s introduction of Diana was almost leering: “To say she is beautiful is almost to miss the point. She is elemental, as natural and wild as the luminous flora surrounding. Her dark hair waterfalls to her shoulders in soft arcs and curls. Her body is curvaceous, but taut as a drawn bow.”

But Whedon’s real fall from grace began in 2017, right before MeToo spurred a cultural reckoning. His ex-wife, Kai Cole, published a piece in The Wrap accusing him of cheating off and on throughout their relationship and calling him a hypocrite:

“Despite understanding, on some level, that what he was doing was wrong, he never conceded the hypocrisy of being out in the world preaching feminist ideals, while at the same time, taking away my right to make choices for my life and my body based on the truth. He deceived me for 15 years, so he could have everything he wanted. I believed, everyone believed, that he was one of the good guys, committed to fighting for women’s rights, committed to our marriage, and to the women he worked with. But I now see how he used his relationship with me as a shield, both during and after our marriage, so no one would question his relationships with other women or scrutinize his writing as anything other than feminist.”

But his reputation was just too strong; the accusation that he didn’t practice what he preached didn’t quite stick. A spokesperson for Whedon told the Wrap: “While this account includes inaccuracies and misrepresentations which can be harmful to their family, Joss is not commenting, out of concern for his children and out of respect for his ex-wife. Many minimized the essay on the basis that adultery doesn’t necessarily make you a bad feminist or erase a legacy. Whedon similarly seemed to shrug off Ray Fisher’s accusations of creating a toxic workplace; instead, Warner Media fired Fisher.

But Carpenter’s statement—which struck right at the heart of his Buffy-based legacy for progressivism—may finally change things. Even at the time, the plotline in which Charisma Carpenter was written off Angel—carrying a demon child that turned her into “Evil Cordelia,” ending the season in a coma, and quite simply never reappearing—was unpopular. Asked about what had happened in a 2009 panel at DragonCon, she said that “my relationship with Joss became strained,” continuing: “We all go through our stuff in general [behind the scenes], and I was going through my stuff, and then I became pregnant. And I guess in his mind, he had a different way of seeing the season go… in the fourth season.”

“I think Joss was, honestly, mad. I think he was mad at me and I say that in a loving way, which is—it’s a very complicated dynamic working for somebody for so many years, and expectations, and also being on a show for eight years, you gotta live your life. And sometimes living your life gets in the way of maybe the creator’s vision for the future. And that becomes conflict, and that was my experience.”

In her statement on Twitter, Carpenter alleged that after Whedon was informed of her pregnancy, he called her into a closed-door meeting and “asked me if I was ‘going to keep it,’ and manipulatively weaponized my womanhood and faith against me.” She added that “he proceeded to attack my character, mock my religious beliefs, accuse me of sabotaging the show, and then unceremoniously fired me following the season once I gave birth.” Carpenter said that he called her fat while she was four months pregnant and scheduled her to work at 1 a.m. while six months pregnant after her doctor had recommended shortening her hours, a move she describes as retaliatory. What Carpenter describes, in other words, is an absolutely textbook case of pregnancy discrimination in the workplace, the type of bullshit the feminist movement exists to fight—at the hands of the man who was for years lauded as a Hollywood feminist for his work on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.

Many of Carpenter’s colleagues from Buffy and Angel spoke out in support, including Buffy herself, Sarah Michelle Gellar. “While I am proud to have my name associated with Buffy Summers, I don’t want to be forever associated with the name Joss Whedon,” she said in a statement. Just shy of a decade after that 2013 speech, many of the cast members on the show that put him on that stage are cutting ties.

Whedon garnered a reputation as pop culture’s ultimate feminist man because Buffy did stand out so much, an oasis in a wasteland. But in 2021, the idea of a lone man being responsible for creating women’s stories—one who told the New York Times, “I seem to be the guy for strong action women”—seems like a relic. It’s depressing to consider how many years Hollywood’s first instinct for “strong action women” wasn’t a woman, and to think about what other people could have done with those resources. When Wonder Woman finally reached the screen, to great acclaim, it was with a woman as director.

Besides, Whedon didn’t make Buffy all by himself—many, many women contributed, from the actresses to the writers to the stunt workers, and his reputation grew so large it eclipsed their part in the show’s creation. Even as he preached feminism, Whedon benefitted from one of the oldest, most sexist stereotypes: the man who’s a benevolent, creative genius. And Buffy, too, overshadowed all the other contributors who redefined who could be a hero on television and in speculative fiction, from individual actors like Gillian Anderson to the determined, creative women who wrote science fiction and fantasy over the last several decades to—perhaps most of all—the fans who craved different, better stories. Buffy helped change what you could put on TV, but it didn’t create the desire to see a character like her. It was that desire, as much as Whedon himself, that gave Buffy the Vampire Slayer her power.

#Joss Whedon #Buffy The Vampire Slayer #Ray Fisher #Charisma Carpenter #Feminist

159 notes · View notes

teamfreewill2pointo · 4 years ago

Text

Transcript of End of the Road Special

Transcript of End of the Road Special.

Please let me know if I made any errors in transcription. Twitter version Family Don’t End with Blood Transcription Winchester Mythology Transcription

Dabb: Ultimately, we came up with something that we're all very proud of Singer: You never know what the audience is going to like so we really tried to say "what would make us happy? Would we be satisfied with where we've taken them?"

The Carry On song was a guideline.

Singer: The myth of what these brothers were throughout 15 years... We didn't shy away from fatalism, but we wanted to be able to have it be kinda uplifting as well.

Dabb: If you're going to do something that feels like a complete arc, you have to kinda go back to the beginning of it (clips of them hunting vamps from s1 & 15.20) When it comes to Sam & Dean- it's all about getting back to, in some ways, these two guys on the road in this car.

Dabb: They've been doing this job for 15 years now. They've fought everyone from demons to vampires to God himself, but at the end of the day, they're still working guys, out there on the road & taking cases. We've tried to never lose sight of that.

Dabb: There are times when we've been wrapped up in our own mythology a little bit. We've always tried to get back to the basics, which are: these two guys, saving people, hunting things.

Eugenie: I think we sort of knew generally what the ending would involve.

Eugenie: We might not have known the mechanics, but we sort of knew there would be a victorious, glorious sacrificial ending bc I think sacrifice is a big theme in the series.

For every great thing you do, a cost must be paid.

Singer: Andrew & I talked about it. We were in agreement pretty quickly... talked to the rest of the writing staff & let them know what we wanted to do and we were open to suggestions. And then we pretty much pitched it to Jared and Jensen.

Jensen talks about flying to LA. Jensen: So before we ever even started 15, we knew how the last portion of the story was going to go. We didn't know how we were going to get there, but we kinda knew the final- the finish line- we knew what... what that was going to look like.

Jared: I don't think there's ever been a season of SPN in 15 years where the way the writers thought the show would play out for that season- ended up being the way it played out And so we were aware of that. They told us here's what we're thinking, here's what happens to Castiel

Jared: In the finale, Dean dies & Sam lives on. And then we think they're going to meet up in heaven.

I remember Jensen... just because I know him so well- he seemed to bristle a little bit.

Jensen: It was hard to hear then & it was hard to read now. Not because I didn't like it, not because I wished it had gone differently... I'm not adverse to it. I think it's a great ending. I'm proud to film it.

Singer: And we just aimed for that, you know, throughout the season. We knew where we were going.

Jensen: Reading it & knowing that... there's just a weight that is so much larger reading these scripts than I've ever experienced before.

There's an emotional weight that these scripts are going to carry & these episodes are going to have that I don't think we've ever seen before.

Brad: [J2] were so young when all of this started. They brought to it such conviction & such commitment to the effort.

That's one of the things that kept the show going for so many years... a show that was designed for very young guys, footloose & fancy free, & on the road…

Brad: To see these guys grow up b4 your eyes into- men, not boys any longer- was amazing.

BABY Jared: Though the story does involve Sam & Dean chasing supernatural things, it really is a story about two brothers that love each other & ultimately will do anything for each other.

Jensen: There's really one person that gets it on the level that I get it, and that's Jared. Jared: I've never spent as much time with another human being as I have with Jensen Ackles. He will be my friend and brother forever. And I know that.

BABY Jensen: There's a lot of dynamics between the two brothers, there's a lot of history between them, there's a lot of banter between them... it's good stuff S15 Jensen: We had a partner in crime & we leaned on each other for, you know, for times when it was tough.

Jensen: But we also won together. We got to share the experience of success & the experience of getting picked up for another season. Watching these two characters go through what they're going through, when we're working 14 hours & it's 2-3 o’clock on a Sat morning and we're just now finishing filming out in the rain and mud and we gotta race to the airport to get on a plane because we've got a photoshoot in LA & we've gotta do on camera interviews and we gotta promote the show that we love so much that we were just in the mud & the rain filming hours before we're exhausted and it's like there's only one person that gets that right now. That gets how I feel and that's this guy standing next to me. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool to have somebody like that.

Brad: We knew it was going to be impossible to tie up every aspect of all of the cans of worms that we opened up.

We did want to bring a proper ending to the guys, the guy's relationship.

Brad: Then of course we had this huge corner we painted ourselves into with the most powerful thing in the universe being the big bad of the season. We try and find a proper send off for Jack & for Cas. What to do w/ the boys & is that a together farewell or an individual?

It was just... lots of moving parts.

Dabb: I give a lot of credit to Bobo who really was the one who started banging the drum early & often to ending the mythology in 19 and end the characters in 20.

Brad: You're battling God & battling God & you have this epic situation going on through the first 3/4 of the show & then what? You send off Dean in act 4? That just felt wrong. Eugenie: We had this obligation, it was really mandatory, that we tie up the mythic narrative and leave the final episode for the emotional resolution. I [was] more on the side of not wanting to best God. To have God change to be more like his creations. So there were philosophical arguments, but we always knew God's resolution was going to be a big ticket item.

Jensen: We'd started day 1 of the 2nd to last episode, 19. We were 1 day down on that episode & we were just about to start our 2nd day & we got the call that morning that we were not going to be coming in that day.

Jensen: So we figured ok, we'll figure out protocol, figure out what we need to do, & we'll just regroup, come back on Monday. As that day progressed, it was like- this looks like more of an apocalypse that is ascending upon us than just a bad cold.

They pulled the plug & they said everybody go home.

Singer: Fortunately, we got assurance from both the studio & the network that one way or another we were gonna finish the series. That was comforting to us, but we didn't know when we were going to go back.

Eugenie: We didn't know what we were going back to... if this was the last time we would ever see the set. There was no plan. It was just get out of dodge. Dabb: When it first happened, we thought it would be a couple of weeks, maybe a month.

I had conversations w/WB where they expected everyone to be back shooting in June & then things got worse & pushed & pushed.

Eugenie: Slowly as we settled into that 4 or 5 month period, discussions were going on w/the studio, & the networks, & the actors. We knew there would be restrictions on what we were allowed to shoot, but finally, the mechanics were figured out.

Singer: So they were ready to go pretty quickly, shooting in Van, where covid wasn't quite as virulent as it was [in LA].

Dabb: We were one of the first shows, one of the first WB shows to start back up. So in a way, we were kinda a guinea pig. But, in being that, I think everyone took it really seriously. We had 0 positive tests. Crew members weren't going out on the weekends.

They were like look, if I get sick, it hurts the whole show. That speaks to the family culture up there, where we've had so much of our crew for so long. Where J2 & Singer provide such great leadership.

Singer: When I was in prep for 20, I was basically in the office but couldn't go to the set. It was very odd for me not to be able to go to the set while I was in prep.

Everybody just hung in there & did what they were supposed to do.

Brad: Then we were faced with the dilemma of having to rewrite a lot of the stuff bc of the pandemic bc of the limitations that we knew were going to come on the production.

Jensen: We were gearing up for, not only the end of that season, but the end of the series. There was a lot of big, big things written-packed- into those last two scripts.

Jared: At first, it was supposed to be a lot of our old cast from prior seasons in a Roadhouse with Kansas.

Everybody had already agreed. Kansas was going to be in Van. We were going to have dad there & mom there. Just probably 20 or 30 different actors & actresses who had been a part of the SPN's canon over the last 15 & a half years.

Jensen: It was scheduled to be the last day that we were going to film, so it was almost like rolling right into a nice wrap party on camera.

Brad: The idea of flying a boatload of ppl up there to quarantine for 2 weeks so they could shoot for a day was making less & less sense.

Eugenie: How do we make this work? And while you're doing that, you also don't want to sacrifice the heart and soul of the project.

So we came up with a reduced, much more intimate ending. It has been replaced by something equally magical & rewarding.

Singer: I felt an enormous responsibility in directing the finale of a show that's been on for 15 years. Andrew, when he saw the cut, he said some really nice things to me as to, you know, the way I handled the material.

Jensen: The scenes that were filmed on our last day on the sound stages were filled with the most emotion of the final episode.

Singer: One of the really hard things was we're on another stage that wasn't the MoL stage & they started wrecking the MoL sets

They'd been working on this set and been apart of this- this family for just as long if not longer than the set's been around. I was like "it's really sad seeing this get taken down" and the other guy said, "I'm trying to hold back tears while I'm swinging this hammer."

Jared: As we start saying goodbye to characters, to locations, like it just seems like every day you would wake up and there would be some reason to cry.

Misha: This is a show ultimately about love, & empathy, & caring, & I think that Castiel embodies that.

Misha: Half the crew was crying. It was really such a sweet, supporting environment to be in for the demise of a character that, of course, for me is really important.

But it was so lovely to see that, you know, the folks that I'm- I'm working with were also there for Cas at that moment.

Alex: To get to work with these caliber people & see your friends every day is really special & is not something that often happens in this business for this long. It's been definitely a topsy turvy last couple weeks here with us and the crew.

Jared: Friday of the final full week was the big scene in the barn with the vampires where Dean suffers his fate. They did the first two days with the entire stunt team & the young boy actors.

And then they cut it for Thursday night and they're like, okay, Friday, tomorrow, we’re starting the dialogue. Dean, you're on the post. Sam, you just cut off the last vampire's head.

That was the scene- that was where Supernatural was really encapsulated.

Jensen: And then the next week we kind of had this- on the road encore get together filmmaking scenario that felt more like we made it & it was more pats on the back as opposed to tearful goodbyes.

Dabb: In a weird way you can look at the 15 seasons is like Sam & Dean's emotional evolution. You know instead of therapy, they kill vampires, but other than that it's kind of the same & brings them both to a very good place. And a place where they can, as the song says, you know, lay their weary head to rest.

This felt like the most honest & emotionally fulfilling episode for these characters to us. Jared: I got thinking about how Supernatural started & how the majority of times how I thought it should end. It started with Sam & Dean Winchester. I think it's proper that it ended with Sam & Dean Winchester together again.

Jensen: When the cameras stop rolling & Bob yelled, “Cut!” and Bob yelled, “That’s a series wrap on Supernatural.” There was- a there was a loud cheer that echoed through that canyon we were filming in. I will- I will happily say that there were hugs that happened and that needed to happen. Those are people that I spent not just years with, but so much time with- it's like brothers in arms and so to put it to bed the way that we did felt really good and then felt good to hug some people, I'll tell you that much. Singer: I thanked everyone, but I wanted to really thank people who had been with us from the beginning and as I looked around, there were so many people who had been there from the beginning.

We really were a family. I always say about this show is one of the reasons that it was a success and is that it was not only about the Winchester family, but it was about the Supernatural family.

Jared: So now that's all said and done, I guess I can look back at it and just be proud that I helped this show carry on and I'm really proud of the blood, sweat, and tears that I put in, and I feel like- I feel like that sacrifice was also maybe one of the things I learned from Sam, you know? Sam had to sacrifice a lot. So, I'm honored and flattered and grateful that I got to be a part of that journey.

Dabb: You're never going to have another show like this. You're never gonna have another experience like this. For a lot of different reasons, from how long it ran, from the family that the show became, from the amazing fans that we have. [Footage of us] From the emotional investment people can put in over 15 years of their lives.

Some started watching this when they were in high school, when they were 15, they're 30 now, they might have kids. That's their- that's like half their life. They've been with this show. You're not gonna have that again. Shows just aren’t gonna run this long, especially genre shows, but I don't know that I'm ever gonna do anything else in my career that I'm gonna be more proud of than having been involved in this show.

Jared: The things that stick out are just how important it is to keep putting one foot in front of the other. And keep on working and wake up every day and treat it like it could be your last and- and if you make it out the other side, you'll be happy and proud of what you did.

Jensen: The crew had packed up, they had cleared the bridge, and they were all starting to, you know, load their trucks and get moving. And Jared and I just kind of hung back, and we just took a moment. I looked at him and I said, “I’m proud of us, man. I'm proud of what we've done.”

We know that that's the collective we, that is everyone that is involved, that is- you know from the top down. You know, for our portion, for what we contributed to this monster of the show, he and I reflected on that, and still able to see and smell the roses.

#supernatural #spn #spnfamily #spn family #spn 15.20 #spn s15 #spn s15 spoilers #carry on #spn finale #spn spoilers #sam winchester #dean winchester #jared padalecki #jensen ackles #brotherlylove #sam&dean #brothers man #bts #actor opinions

64 notes · View notes

americachavez · 4 years ago

Note

did cas really tell dean to kneel before their new god? did that actually happen? i thought him beating the shit out of dean in that alley was the most unrestrainedly horny thing this show had ever done ACTUALLY you know what scratch that new question: top horny moments from the cw's supernatural (2005 - 2020)

getting this ask feels like my sins of the last week have been weighed against the Trials I Have Gone Through since the premier of supernatural on the wb in september of 2005 and I’m not sure if it is a punishment or reward

some notes before we begin:

the ep with dean’s male siren was like, conceptually horny but not actually that horny because the dude was uglie. I’m sorry to this man

all you sam girls out there. I respect you but I do not respect jared padalecki who is JUST tall and has zero sex appeal. but those eps where he’s like, drinking ruby’s blood and then eating her pussy are. you know. I’ll give you that

I am ONLY UP TO SEASON 10 so fair warning this is not comprehensive but the horniness does seem to drop off sharply after the mark of cain is no longer in play lol gotta love a good demon murder tattoo plot

this is easily the most insane thing I’ve ever done, including the destiel manifesto

S1 EP12: the scene where dean gets healed by the faith healer, on his knees with a hand in his hair and looking somewhere between religious ecstasy, brain death and an orgasm. starting this list off great

S1 EP22: azazel possessing john winchester. no I will not explain further if u know u know <3

S3 EP10: dean being taunted by a dream version of himself, this is where we first got the daddy’s blunt little instrument line. still burned in my hippocampus a good 13 years later thank yew

S4 EP1: dean crawling out of his own grave covered in grave dirt. hot. the HANDPRINT. HOT. also tangent but this reveal after the s3 finale was WILD back in 2008 I hollered in my dorm room after canvassing for obama. simpler times man

S4 EP 1: cas’ intro scene. the barn. the shadow wings. the hair??? getting stabbed in the chest by the man you just pulled out of hell. getting aaaallll up in that personal space. his little eyebrow. “you don’t think you deserve to be saved.” OUTRAGEOUSLY FLAMING

S4 EP02: “I dragged you out of hell I can throw you back in.” <<< this angel tops. mark dean down as scared and horny etc

S4 EP16: this ENTIRE EPISODE but specifically the part where dean tortures alastair as some kind of foreplay and then alastair kicks his ass. carved you into a new animal. jesus.

S4 EP16: wait I forgot about the part where cas also gets his ass kicked and looks all....hm. dazed and covered in blood while he’s on his knees and about to die. yeah.

S5 EP4: I mean this entire ep is unfairly horny considering everyone is dying of a zombie plague and hasn’t showered in like, 4 years but if I had to pick one hmmm. the dean/dean interrogation scene with the panty kink yeah I know it’s not original but hm. it happened. also misha collins just being able to convey that CAS IS A FLEXIBLE SLUT with a single roll of his shoulders. who SAYS this man can’t act!!!!!

S5 EP18: the ALLEY SCENE. DEAN DOESN’T FIGHT BACK. CAS HOLDS HIM UP OFF THE GROUND AND THEN THROWS HIM ACROSS THE ALLEY. WHY DID EVERYONE THINK CAS COULDN’T TOP. you all had brainworms.

S5 EP18: when cas locks dean in the panic room to stop him from saying yes to michael and “well cas not for nothing but the last person who looked at me like that I got laid” I hate this show. wait I think the blow me cas line is in this episode too what the fuck were they on here

S6 EP5: the scene where dean gets turned into a vampire. between the old dude who I think calls dean a pretty boy (??) and soulless sam....watching??? no ******* but there were just some absolutely foul energies in that scene and I still do not understand WHAT they were thinking

S6 EP20: cas doing a double smite on two demons by slamming them to the ground and then shoving another demon back in its vessel and then smiting him in the same motion. TOP. ENERGY.

S6 EP22: season 6 is possibly cas’ horniest season because he’s like, going through angel puberty after getting his first boner for dean, but the final cas eps are. whoof. cas eats a bunch of souls and proclaims himself to be a new god in order to handle said boner, and then the season ends with cas telling them to bow down and profess their love to him, their new lord, or he will destroy them. note: the way this is framed makes it look like cas is only staring at dean while he says this, even though sam and bobby are also there. the season ends with dramatic zooms on both cas and dean’s faces respectively. this made me actively regret ditching this show after s5 lol

S8 EP??: literally EVERY SINGLE PURGATORY FLASHBACK. cas dean and benny are all purgatory hot in the “pop 10 cranberry pills and risk the UTI” kind of way but also. dean being the hot girl bottom between two tops who hate each other. I really. whew. I need to go take a shower.

S8 EP17: if I get canceled for including the crypt scene on this list I blame you bud. but dean on his knees begging a brainwashed cas to stop killing him WAS sexy. how many times has dean been on his knees in this list wait there’s another one coming up next jsldjfsldkjf

S9 EP2: abaddon getting dean on his knees (YEAH) and pulling his hair and praising him for always coming when called HELLO???? the only thing that ruins this is dean says “I can’t tell if we’re gonna fight or make out” because this is the CW and they won’t let him say fuck

S9 EP6: ah. this entire episode is Emotionally Horny but the horny horny part is when they’re in the car and dean is telling cas to unbutton his shirt and. watches. I know this was on my destiel manifesto but I need it here too

S9 EP9: cas, covered in blood, slitting another angel’s throat and eating his grace after getting tortured. that shot alone made me understand why this website was so goddamn horny for misha collins for nearly a damn decade

S9 EP11: MARK OF CAIN BABEY. cain watching dean beat up a bunch of demons as an audition for taking on the mark, while crowley also is a fucking voyeur to the whole thing. cain is also a hot silver fox with daddy energies. I said what I said

S9 EP 16: dean getting the first blade. he’s chained to a pillar and being menaced by a foppish dandy who wants to add him to his “collection” (WOW). dean then kills him with the blade and whew. murder is sexy sometimes

S9 EP21: dean being pinned against a wall by abaddon’s power, then using the mark of cain to break her hold, calling the first blade to him psychically and then killing her. god the mark of cain is hot

S9 EP23: dean waking up with the demon eyes NUT

S10 EP2: demon dean beating up that dude with the boring backstory and kicking his ass. really was a go on baby I got your flower moment because I hated that dude and I love demon dean

S10 EP3: demon dean being chained up and taunting sam about how his brother is gone, then hunting sam through the bunker. demon dean in general was VERY fun for me, someone who loves trash

S10 EP9: dean going berserk and killing a bunch of pedophile rapists/child abusers. I’m sorry I know this show is trying to preach morality at me about monsters and unnecessary murder and humanity or whatever but we blew past that like 8 SEASONS AGO. also the mark of cain is sexy

S10 EP14: the rest of this list is really gonna be mark of cain stuff isn’t it look I’m here to have fun. cain and dean’s fight. cain continuously tossing his mane of hair back and taunting dean with the picture of what he’s going to become, who he’s going to kill. dean begging cain to tell him that he can stop, and then ultimately killing him. rip daddy.

S11 EP4: again I have not watched this however. every shot of this episode is PRESTIGE TELEVISION because driving a muscle car is sexy. and especially the shot of dean all beat to hell and begging his car to start and giving her a little kiss from his fingers to her dash. ugh. masculinity.

S12 EP10: the bearded salt-and-pepper daddy look returns, only it’s an angel this time and he’s wearing a vest and shirtsleeves and he swordfights with a hot redheaded lady in a suit and an eyepatch. this show is good sometimes!!! and oh fuck lol I just realized this is the same guy who played krissy’s hot hunter dad in s7 probably the first guy who’s hotter as an angel than a hunter. huh.

S12 EP 11: dean riding larry the mechanical bull to “broomstick cowboy.” I have no idea where this factors into the ep but I have seen. the youtube clip

S13 EP23: from what I can tell s13 is way more emotionally horny than boner horny, although dean burning cas’ body was sexy. but the horniest part was dean saying yes to michael and then michael taking over and saying “thanks for the suit.” we are going to ignore the silliest fight scene in existence as well as the final shot ending on a FREEZE FRAME like a goddamn tiktok

S14: not gonna pick a specific moment because I have not watched yet!!! but michael dean is hot. idk why michael is weirdly hot and I cannot stand any iteration of lucifer on this television programme. it should be the reverse but I’m forever an older sibling stan apparently. someone who is catholic could probably explain this better.

S15 EP13: genevieve padalecki and danneel ackles fight flirting as ruby and anael I CANNOT BELIEVE THEY HELD OUT ON THIS TILL THE LAST SEASON

I know I am missing things but this is already an absolutely incomprehensible screed. I know I’m missing shit from the latter seasons but give me time I’m pacing myself

#reply tag #spn tag #literally no one read this lol this is insane #Anonymous

304 notes · View notes

hamliet · 4 years ago

Text

The Girl Who Gets to Have It All: Buffy Summers

So with @linkspooky‘s encouragement, I have binged Buffy the Vampire Slayer and relived my childhood culture. And, it's a 10/10 for me. Not that it doesn't have flaws, but it's genuinely one of the best stories I've seen, with consistent character arcs, powerful themes, and a beautiful message. It's also like... purportedly about vampires and demons and superpowered chosen ones, but it's actually all about humanity.

Buffy was able to be a teenage girl, allowed to like the things teen girls are scorned for (boys, shopping, etc), to be insecure about the thing teenage girls are insecure about (future careers, dating, school, parents), and to be a superhero with its good and its bad aspects. The story wasn’t afraid to call Buffy on her flaws (sometimes she got in a very ‘I am the righteous chosen one’ mode) and to respect and honor each of her desires (to be a good person, to be loved, and more). The story listened to what she wanted and respected her desires, giving her the challenges needed to overcome her flaws while also never teaching her a lesson about wanting bad boys or romance is silly or any manner of dark warnings stories like to throw at teenage girls.

It respected teenage girls--nerdy girls like Willow, jocks like Buffy, lonely wallflowers with trauma like Dawn, and popular/snobby ones like Cordelia, girls gone wild like Faith. It never once reduced them to the stereotypes that were lurking right there: each character was fully rounded, human, flawed and yet with respected interests and goals. This is so rare for a story that I’m still in awe.

The story as a whole follows Buffy from 15 to 21, of her as she grows from teenager to adult. She acts like a teenager and grows to act like a young adult, wrestling with loneliness and duty. The adults, like Giles, Joyce, and Jenny, are not perfect either, but neither are they “bad parents” or “bad mentors” necessarily. Joyce in particular says something terrible to Buffy, but she tries to do better, and it’s rare to see a parent in YA stories shown with such nuance. Basically, it wrote the long-lasting adult characters as human beings, too.

Speaking of growing up, I appreciated how Buffy’s love interests mirrored this. Angel was someone Buffy loved and admired, wanted to be like, but who was always either extreme good or extreme bad, and combined with Buffy’s own tendencies towards black-white thinking, made for a beautiful relationship to help her grow, but didn’t necessarily form a foundation for a long-term partner. Spike, on the other hand... they both saw each other at their worst and were drawn to each other even then, and were inspired to become better because they couldn’t bear to be a person who treated the other person so wrongly. They pushed each other to become the best them they could be, and believed in each other. Also, Spuffy is an enemies to lovers ship for the ages.

(Also, most of the other ships were well-done or at least can be understood. Riley was very obviously wrong for Buffy which paralleled Harmony and Spike in being 100% wrong for each other. Cordelia and Xander were a fun ship even if we all knew it would never last, and Willow and Oz were beautiful and cute. But Xander and Anya and Willow and Tara? OTPs. As were Giles and Jenny, the librarian and the computer teacher.)

That said, it’s not a perfect series. No story is. All of the characters and ships had problematic aspects to them worthy of critique, and the writing is very 90s in a lot of ways. It’s a product of its time, and in many ways it’s good society has progressed beyond some of the tropes/metaphors used in the show. In other way, though, the show was ahead of its time, and in a good way it wasn’t bound by the fear of purity policing with its takes on redemption (many characters would never fly today).

So, in order of seasons ranked from my very favorite to my “still enjoyed it very much” (no season was actually bad, imo), here’s my review. I’ll also review my top 10 villains in the show, because Buffy does villains very well in terms of the redeemable and irredeemable.

Season 7: Yep, the final season was my favorite.

Overall Opinion: Buffy's finale is literally "f*ck them men, our power is ours" and while it seems cheesy it actually works (also, f*ck in both a literal and figurative sense). The series strongly hit all the themes: love as strength, and redemption. Buffy consistently shows love as her strength--*all* kinds of love. Friendship w Willow/Xander, familial with Joyce/Dawn, romantic with Spike/Angel. These types of love are also never pitted against each other as is so often the case in current-day media. It's beautiful. Also, Spike’s confrontation with Wood was so powerful in terms of exploring forgiveness, redemption, and reconciliation: where they overlap and where they don't, and what it means to move forward.

Unpopular Opinion: I have seen a lot didn’t like the inclusion of Potential Slayers, and while I agree they could have been better incorporated/characterized, it was a great way to show Buffy’s final stage of growing up to be ending her chosen one status and projecting/multiplying her powers over the world.

Biggest Critique: Kennedy was female Riley--the anti-Tara to Riley’s anti-Angel (by ‘anti’ I mean opposite in every way). Kennedy was annoying and immature. Her role, like Riley’s, was less about exploring her as a character and more about her just being stamped as “love interest: lesbian.”

Favorite Episodes: Beneath You, Lies My Parents Told Me, Touched, Chosen

Season 6:

Overall Opinion: I said this on Twitter, but I felt like this was Buffy’s The Last Jedi or Empire Strikes Back moment. It is polarizing and dark, deconstructing the tropes it stands on--but by digging to the core of these tropes, it actually makes what’s good about them shine brighter. Everyone’s enemy was the worst versions of themselves. Giles left Buffy, Willow's struggle to relate to the world led to her trying to destroy it, Buffy hurt everyone through her anger, Xander abandoned Anya at the altar, Spike... yeah. It ages well as an integral part of the story, and the Trio were eerily prophetic.

Unpopular Opinion: Dawn is a great character with a good arc. A traumatized teen acting out and struggling to come to terms with loss and identity? She wasn’t whiny; she was realistic.

Biggest Critique: Willow’s addiction coding (I’ll discuss this below) and Seeing Red as an episode. I see the argument for both of its controversial scenes from a narrative perspective: Willow starts the season not grieving Buffy but instead being determined to fix it with magic and needs to learn to grieve, but. Still. Bury your gays is not a good look. For the Spike scene... he conflates sex/passion and violence (”love is blood, children” is something he said way back in season 3), but like Tara’s death, it had more to do with Spike (as Tara’s death did for Willow) than with Buffy’s arc, and as for the actual execution... they really botched that. Did it like... have to go on that long or go that far? No. Also, the framing was good, but inconsistent with the rest of the series (Xander to Buffy in the hyena episode, Faith to Xander and to Riley, etc.)

Favorite Episodes: Once More With Feeling, Smashed, Grave

Season 3 (tied with Season 5):

Overall Opinion: The opening continuity of Buffy meeting Lily/Anne after saving her life in Season 2 was sweet. The Witchhunt episode had really powerful subtext: stories of deaths that aren’t even true are actually demons that possess the town and convince them to turn against their children in the name of protecting the children. It’s a good commentary on, oh, everything in society. Faith’s character arc was fantastic, and her chemistry with Buffy was off the charts (look, I may be Spuffy all the way, but Fuffy has rights). The finale was satisfying in so many ways, seeing the entire graduating class unite to destroy the Mayor and the school with it, symbolizing Buffy et al’s readiness to move on to college. Oz's relationship with Willow was very sweet and meaningful for a first romance for Willow.

Unpopular Opinion: I actually don’t really have one. Maybe that the miracle in Amends was earned? I think you can make a decent case that Season 3 is the best written of the seasons, but can only truly be thematically appreciated to its full potential in the light of subsequent seasons (which finish Faith’s arc and deconstruct Buffy’s).

Biggest Critique: It forgot Buffy killed the hyena guy in Season 1, making her continual insistence that she can’t kill people very ?????

Favorite Episodes: Lovers Walk, Amends, Graduation Day Part 2

Season 5, which ties with Season 3:

Overall Opinion: The entire season is about family and what it means, from Tara’s to Buffy’s to the Scoobies. I loved Glory aka Enoshima Junko as the Big Bad, I loved Dawn’s interesting meta commentary on retconning (like, the fact that she’s retconned in matters), and most of my ships are still alive. Joyce’s relationship with Spike is one of the most heartwarming aspects, and Spike’s arc’s desire is clearly highlighted: he wants to be seen as a person. The episodes after Joyce’s death are the most honest portrayals of grief I’ve ever seen, and absolutely brutal to watch.

Unpopular Opinion: Buffy’s choice at the end seems a deliberate inversion of her choice at the end of Season 2 (sacrifice a loved one to save the world), but it actually isn’t: much like at the end of Season 2 where Buffy skips town because she’s devastated after killing Angel and doesn’t want to sort out being expelled, her mom knowing she’s the slayer, and her own trauma, Buffy’s sacrifice here was as much about her wanting the easy way out of relationships, family, college, etc. as it was about saving Dawn. Buffy’s death is coded as a suicide, which Season 6 emphasizes as well.

Biggest Critique: Like Season 3, I don’t have a lot to critique here. I wish the suicidal coding had been a little more obvious in Season 5 itself, but also I’m not sure it could have been more obvious; it’s pretty apparent if you pay attention. Maybe also that Buffy and Riley’s relationship failing should have been more squarely blamed on Riley, you know, being insecure and cheating.

Favorite Episodes: Family, Fool for Love, Intervention.

Season 2:

Overall Opinion: Heartbreakingly tragic but exciting and revealing at the same time. It asked the viewer interesting questions about redemption and forgiveness and atonement through Angel being honest about his past, and then decided to show us his past now reenacted, challenging us. And still, we saw them save him in a parallel to saving Willow in Season 6 (but Season 2 was tragic because it wasn’t enough, while Season 6 was not). Jenny’s death was agonizing, and the scene were Angel watches Buffy, Willow, and Joyce get the news through the window was powerful. We didn’t have to hear them to get the grief.

Unpopular Opinion: Jenny’s death isn’t a fridging; it works for her arc too when you consider her history. She worked to save the person whose life she was tasked to ruin, and it cost her her own--yet she still succeeded, because Jenny brought joy and wisdom to the show. Kendra’s death, on the other hand... was because they needed the stakes to be high--but we already knew that before she died. So, her death was useless.

Biggest Critique: The subtext was Not It. It was essentially “do not have sex. Your older boyfriend will lose his soul, kill your friends, you’ll lose your family, your school, your home, and have to kill your true love or else hell will literally swallow earth.”

Favorite Episodes: School Hard, Passion, Becoming Part 2.

Season 1:

Overall Opinion: I really liked it; it’s just lower on this list because the others are just better. It’s a great introduction to the series and to its characters, from Giles to Buffy to Willow to Jenny to Cordelia. It has great subtext a lot of the time (for example, Natalie French as She-Mantis is a literal predatory bug who engages in predatory behavior with students). Additionally, it subverts the typical YA trope of two guys and a girl, in which the girl is usually the least interesting character. Buffy and Willow were both fully fledged characters from the beginning with distinct strengths (even before Willow became a witch, as she wasn’t one in season 1 yet), while Xander was the more ordinary of the group.

Unpopular Opinion/Biggest Critique: Xander’s arc showed its first flaws that unfortunately continued throughout the series: his writing was either very good or very indulgent in ways it never was for other characters. (cough, the hyena episode, cough, in which he gets to skirt responsibility--and acknowledges that he is skirting it--for something the show will later hold others to account for). Xander’s just kind of inconsistent, which weakened his character over all. (Which is why both his love interests--Cordelia and then ultimately Anya--were good for him: they did not indulge him.)

Favorite Episode: Witch, Nightmares.

Season 4:

Overall Opinion: it’s still a good season. It’s a good portrayal of college and the growing pains of branching out, the strains of college growth on relationships (romantic and platonic). It shows us the first hints of Spuffy, giving us some serious Jungian symbolism between Spike and Buffy early on, and does well in establishing Xander/Anya and Willow/Tara as beautiful OTPs. Faith and Buffy’s foiling is fantastic. The Halloween episode was very fun as well. However, it suffers because its Big Bad, Adam, is not all that compelling thematically--yet, he could have been. See, the final battle pulls off the Power of Friendship in a really strong way but notably the season does not end there. Instead, it ends on dreams of each character’s worst fears, continuing what we saw in Nightmares in Season 1. Why? Because it shows us that the characters’ wars aren’t against monsters, but monsters of their own making: their flaws. Adam, as a literal Frankenstein, exemplifies this, but it wasn’t capitalized on as well as it could have been.

Unpopular Opinion: Beer Bad isn’t a bad episode, at the very least because Buffy gets to punch Parker. It’s not one of the series’ best, obviously, but it does give Buffy an arc in that she gets her daydream of Parker begging her to come back, but she has overcome that desire and her desire for revenge. If we wanna talk about bad subtext in Season 4, Season 2′s Not It sex subtext continues in the Where the Wild Things Are episode in this season; it’s a powerful callout of abusive purity-culture churches, until the fact that the shame creates a literal curse undermines the progressive message it’s supposed to send. Also, the Thanksgiving episode (Pangs) is a nightmare of white guilt and Oh God Shut Up White People.

Biggest Critique: Riley is awful. Like Kennedy, he had “love interest:normal” stamped on him and that was it. The thing is, he could have worked as an Angel foil, representative of the normal-life aspect of Buffy to Angel’s vampire/supernatural aspect, but the writers never explore this and seemed to even try to back away from that later on. They threw all the romantic cliches at the wall to see what sticks, from klutzy “I dropped my schoolbooks, that’s how we met” to cliché lines that had me rolling my eyes. Do you know how bad a romance has to be to make me dislike romantic tropes?

Favorite Episodes: Fear Itself, Hush, Restless

Villain rankings:

Dark Willow, the only villain to be truly sympathetic. While the addiction coding was insensitive and, while unsurprising for its time, aged extremely poorly. That said, Willow’s turn to the dark side after Tara’s death worked well for her character and the story: it was believable and paid off what had been building since Season 1's “Nightmares” episode (Willow’s inferiority complex).

Glory managed to be genuinely terrifying, and humorous/enjoyable too. Her minions and their numerous nicknames for Glorificus were hilarious, as was her intense vanity. Her merging with Ben--a human being who genuinely wanted to be kind and good--added complexity and tragedy to her role.

The First. A really good take on Satan. The seventh season as well as the First’s first appearance in season 3′s “Amends” had kind of blatant Christian symbolism, and so the First being essentially Satan works. Their disguising themselves as dead loved ones and the subtle manipulation they used to alienate people was really disturbing and well done.

The Mayor, who was a terrible person but a truly good father. He provided an interesting contrast to the normal ‘bad dad’ bad guy character, in that he provided Faith exactly what the other characters refused to: he saw the best in her and offered her parental support, while the heroes didn’t and wound up pushing her away.

The Trio, who were villains ahead of their time: whiny fanboy reddit dudebros, basically. The stakes seemed so much lower than fighting Glory, a literal god, the previous season. But that’s why they worked so well for Season 6′s human themes, and were especially disturbing because we all know people like them. I also appreciated the surprisingly sensitive takes on Jonathan and Andrew, who got to redeem themselves, but Warren did not, and I don’t think he should have either.

Angelus + Drusilla. I’m ranking them below the Trio because Angelus was just sooooo different from Angel that it was difficult for me to feel the same way for him. He was still Angel, so it wasn’t possible to enjoy his villainy, but he also wasn’t nearly as sympathetic as Dark Willow, had no redeeming qualities like the Mayor, and wasn’t as disturbingly realistic as the Trio. However, the emotional stakes were excellently executed with him as the Big Bad, in that you were never quite sure how to feel and it just plain hurt. Also, Drusilla was a favorite recurring character. She was sympathetic and yet batsh*t enough to be enjoyable as a villain at the same time.

The Master, who was just completely camp and really worked as an introductory villain. He was scary enough to believe he was a threat, and was funny enough to introduce the series’ humor as well. He was, like Glory, an enjoyable Big Bad.

The Gentlemen, the one-off villains of Season 4′s Hush who were genuinely terrifying. It’s not as if they got a lot of explanation or any backstory, but they didn’t need it.

Caleb, the misogynist priest. Fitting with the First’s Christian symbolism, Caleb serving as a spokesperson of all bad religious beliefs felt appropriate. He was also a good foil to Warren--being actually supernaturally powered instead of a wannabe--and to Tara’s family in being full-out evil. I despised him.

Snyder. Okay Snyder is not a Big Bad like Adam is, but let’s face it: Adam is lame compared to the other villains. But Snyder as a principal? He was so irritating and yet really well used in the series to critique overly strict, hypocritical teachers. Like, we all know teachers like him. I loved to hate him, and his ending was so satisfying.

#buffy the vampire slayer #btvs #spuffy #buffy summers #dawn summers #spike #angel #cordelia chase #btvs giles #willow rosenberg #tillow #tara maclay #anya jenkins #xanya #xander harris #jenny calendar #kendra young #faith lehane #hamliet reviews

163 notes · View notes

popculturebuffet · 4 years ago

Text

Prince of Wishful Thinking (Tom Retrospective): Tough Love or The True Monster

Hello all you happy people and welcome back to Prince of Wishful Thinking, what is usually my look at the life and times of Tom Lucitor but since I NEED to cover the season 3 finale as vital part of Tom’s story, we’re taking one last look at the tragic tale of Meteora Butterfly before the finale sends these two stories hurtling together. You’d THINK this would be the last detour of this already sizeable arc.. and you’d be wrong as i’ll also be covering Kelly’s World, as I feel it’s vital for both “Curse of the Blood Moon” and “A Boy and his hard to remember title”, as it provides extra context for Marco’s anguish in the former.. and provides extra evidence for why a CERTAIN MOMENT in the latter pisses me off to no end.. seriously even when as universe dies and the only people left are Frankllin Richards and Galactus, there will still be a little note reading “Fuck how they treated Kelly” written in all caps so Galactus remembers to yell it.

So sadly that DOES mean it’s been three entries in this retrospective in a row that either haven’t feature Tom at all or in the case of the last episode only had him in short cameos. I mean we did get his love affair for pie but we also got a creepy goblin man forcing his girlfriend and best friend to kiss each other, his best friend being WAY to eager to jump to that conclusion, and neither considering using Marco’s Scissors because the writers only remember he has those half the time in Season 3... and clearly I ddn’t either as I forgot to mention that plot hole, something @jess-the-vampire brought up to me. Sadly I DID forget to consult on this when we talked earlier this week , and she’s not online as I write this so I won’t have her insight for this one.

But if you want some Tom content, i’m happy to share my crossover ship for the boy with you. I’ve been shipping him with Octavia from Helluva Boss lately. Because of course it’s Helluva Boss, i’ve not been at all subtle with my obession with it and much like Letterkenny, X-Men and Dragon Ball Z Abriged it is a love I never plan to be subtle about.

But I just think they compliment each other well: They have contrasting atittudes, and tastes in music, but seem like they’d share hobbies. Like taxidermy.. I could see Tom buying this... demonic combination of a badger, a skunk, a deer and my nightmares Octavia is preciously holding up.

Granted I also feel tom would both animate them with their dead souls.. and then use his new woodland friends of the dammned as a chorus to sing “Can You Picture That” from the Muppet Movie, because that’s what my mind does on a regular day. I think the contrasting attitude creates great chemstiry and it made me also realize I have a thing for ships with directly contrasting home lives. Tom has two loving decent parents who deeply love one another and at worst simply didn’t reign in his worse behavior because it was standard for demon stuff. Octavia in contrast simply has two parents, one who DOES love her and tries his best, but his best includes calling his side piece “My big dicked blitzy” right in front of her and hiring said side piece to guard them, and her mother who clearly thinks so little of her daughter’s emotional well being she hired a cowboy to shoot her daddy dead in the middle of a large crowd. The point is I think they’d be adorable and they both badly need to be happy after being emotionally fucked over by people they care about.

But alas my new ship will have to wait as we marginally important things to get down too.. things that will impact both this season and the next’s endgame and utterly destroy Eclipsa and Moon’s relationship for good. Sound fun? Well if so join me under the cut won’t you?

We open in the Pidgeon Kingdom.. and things aren’t exactly great.. and by that I mean Meteora stomped a hole through it and ravaged the place and Rich demands blood.. and vengance.. and possibly blood vengance. But not Tekken Blood Vengance.. he already has like 5 copies of that on dvd. Still needs it on Blu Ray though, hook him up if you got it.

So Moon and Eclipsa are trying to smooth this over/find out which way did she go George which way did she go, and are angrily dismissed after they try Rich’s patience, not helped by Eclipsa not being familiar with the Pidgeon Kingdom because they hadn’t slaughtered everyone who used to live there yet. Look that’s what happened, Star outright mentions in the Big Book of Spells that htey suddenly sprung up where another kingdom was and no one knows what happens. There was some bird murders up in that place.. or birdur if you will. Some birds drank some human blood. This is what Alfred Hitchock tried to warn us about with his film built on horrifying actress abuse.

The point is with some more pidgeon-led murder stabbings on the cards our heroines are trying to find her since their attempts to convince Rich not to go on an Archer Style Rampage fell on deaf ears.

But it’s clear from the second the two are alone both have diffrent priorties: Eclipsa desperatley wants to find the daughter she lost and talk her down from what sh’es become, help her become better and hopefuly heal from the pain she’s been in. She’s lost her husband, her kingdom and centuries. She can’t loose her baby girl too.

Moon on the other hand... clearly has no intrest in helping Meteora or stopping this peacefully. Her first thought is stopping Meteora. Her living through it is not necessary. It’s also clear her racisim isn’t REMOTELY gone depsite Buff Frog and Star’s best attempts and despite learning just how deeply and horribly Mewni’s engrained racism has hurt eclipsa and destoryed Moon’s own family history. To Moon this is just a big monster to fight.. i’ll dive into this more in a bit.

For now our heroines encounter an angry mob. This time their not here for Homer Simpson, but for Meteora as her rampages have destroyd their towns, livelehoods and given some weird guy a hat. It’s the best bit of the episode and i’m embarassed I forgot it happened.

So with them being no help our queens back out but end up finding some actual help: Eddie! You know the guy from the episode I skipped over... River’s cousin or something like that. He dosen’t have a wiki entry, I do not know why. He’s voiced by Rhys Dharby of Flight of the Conchords Fame whose since made quite the career as a voice actor. No major roles yet that i’m aware of, but a lot of delightful minor ones like this. It’s good to see him he was one of the highlights of that show and not just because he sang this..

youtube

Eddie showed up in the Bog Beast of Boggabah and I honestly forgot he was in this episode.. but again, it’s Rhys Dharby. It’s not like suddenly finding out “Aw god dammit Pauly Shore is in this”. So Eddie agrees to help as he’s been tracknig Meteora.. and we find out something troubling: Meteora is getting BIGGER. Gradually, to the point the bog from said episode Is skipped over is drained because she DRANK IT. We also get a great exchange “I’d hate to see the size of her mother” “Actually her father more than helped with that”

Awwwww.... seriously Esme Blanco is a national treasure and has some great deliveries in this one.. and some heartbreaking ones. But before we can get to that it turns out Meteora sucked the powers out of Eddies family.. who he misses..e xcept one guy> That guy can fuck right off. Seriously Eddie is also a national treasure and I wish he’d shown up in season 4. I mean he couldn’t of HURT it. For one it’s Rhys Dharby and for another that season shot itself in the face, both feet, the groin and then the face again enough that I don’t think anything could hurt it as bad as the writers already did.

But sadly we say farwell to Eddie as he goes out how men have since the begining of time.. deciding to poke a strange creature till it murdered him. Or took his soul out in this case, speaking of which...

Yeah while I couldn’t get Jess in time for this review, she did bring this up in the past: Meteora’s ablility to pull a

Comes right the fuck out of nowhere with no build up and no explination for it. She DID drain personalites and according to this episode youth.. but that was with a big ole machine. It MIGHT have been intended to be one of Globgor’s powers.. but that makes zero sense, as if he COULD do that, as we saw with Toffee last season when he had that power, also out of nowhere but at least it made a touch more sense given his power was draining magical energy anyway at the time, so adding souls to that isn’t a huge stretch, but as we saw that would’ve been game over for the comission, especially since we DO see him fighting them one on three next season. If he had this power, he wouldn’t be in crystal and I think they realized that, but just tried to act as if his daugther COULDN’T do that and assumed everyone would casually forget. And I get not accounting for me writing about this years later, even I wouldn’t of thought that, but not counting on fans both young and old to latch onto a continuity error? Have you met fandoms Disney, have you? It dosen’t bring the story down entirely and I get WHY ti’s there, so she can nonlethally kill people so we’re not down most of the cast for Season 4, but it feels like an easy win button and one she barely uses despite it being eye beam activated. It should be easy enough to pull, boom, soul suck, win, rinse and repeat. It’s okay to have uber powerful tequniques but they have to have a drawback. For instance the Kaioken from DBZ. It’s a really damn cool technique that gives the user a neat red aura and amplifies poewr.. but the more you amplify the more strain it puts on your body and the more likely you’ll die, and Super later creatively explained why it hadn’t been used since Super Sayian was introduced because said form would’ve sped it up so much it’d be too much for a body to take. Here whie Meteora dosen’t use it in EVERY fight, she uses it enough that it makes no sense this isn’t just her first move for every fight she gets into, mental breakdown or not.

That being said Meteora’s current mental state as she talks to her mother, having regressed to talking in only a few words and acting like a child, makes perfect sense. Henious already wasn’t in great mental shape to begin with, having a slow sustained breakdown since Marco overthrew her. and now on top of this she remembers her whole life has been a lie, starts to mutate into her natural state at a rapid and likely unehalthy pace, and then finds out on top of all of this Mewni is rightfully owed to her. Given she ended last episode blowing a guy up for rejecting her, it’s not a stretch that given even more power and no time to process anything, Metora would deteroate further.

Esme and Jessica really knock this scene out of the park as Eclipsa presents Metora with her old doll Bobo and gently trying ot talk to her.. but you also get the fear Eclipsa feels as she tries to awkardly manuver around the fact her daughter is far more unhinged than she was prepared for, even threanting Eclipsa simply because Eclipsa wanted to be called mother instead of mommy. But despite this fear.. Eclipsa wants to help and Walter beautifuly captured metoera as a hulk like tragic figure:a being with low sanity and too much power desperate to be loved by the one person it cares about. And it makes it even more heartbreaking as Eclipsa explains what happened: bad people trapped her , a disfunctoinal society with a racist queen and even more racist subjects has taken hold in her absence... and it’s clear both want opposite things: Meteora wants what sh’es owed, her family back on the throne and Mewni back in her graps, but has lost herself so much to rage, anger and insanity she can’t see it’s not hers to take, while Eclipsa.. just wants her daughter back. She’d be happy just settling down with her and having a LIFE after hers was taken away. Eclipsa just wants a chance to be with what family she has left. It just HURTS to know that despite RIGHTFULLY hating the comission, despite having eveyr reason to take the crown from Moon by force and make the world better by force.. she dosen’t want that. She just wants some peace. It’s selfish... but it’s hard not to be when you havealmost nothing to hold onto. Eclipsa has lost her legacy, her husband and her crown... Meteora is all she has and all she wants and sh’ed of been happy if she just accepted that. If that was enough.

But the real telling part, and the thing that ultimately makes this go as bad as it does.. is Moon’s reactions to all of this. Sh’es CONFUSED by Meteora having a toy as if that’s foreign to her a monster would, and she’s cleaerly livid , if restrianing it, at both Meteora’s deire for the crown and Eclipsa RIGHTFULLY calling out the state of how things are, and mildly at that. Despite seeing how much damage Mewni’s inherent racisim has done, how it lead to her living a lie, ruined Eclipss, Globgore and Metora’s lives, despite how DESPERTLY her daughter struggles to fight against it, despite seeing firsthand that Monsters can have famiies and lives... she can’t let it go. She can’t see monsters as people. SHe dosen’t see a flawed person who was turned into a metpohrical monster by years of brainwashing and abuse and is slowly unravling under the weight of her true self.. she just sees a threat to her kingdom. She dosen’t see her kingdom as racist, just as it should be. And she dosen’t see herself as stepping down like hse damn well should’ve the MOMENT she found out everything. Because at her heart Moon can’t accept the truth and clings to her racisim.

And that my friends.. is what ultimately leads to Tragedy. Not Meteora’s unraveling mental state, not Eclipsa’s naitvite. What happens next is ENITRELY Moon’s fault. Whle Eclipsa was failing to get through to Metora, she was trying her best and might of gotten somewhere.. but Moon was already settling to attack.. and does so, making it look like Eclipsa set her own child up.

A fight ensues, a suprisingly even one... but Eclipsa breaks it up and PROVES her way could’ve worked. In one of Esme’s best performances sshe tearfully tells her daughter she loves her.. that ALL she wants is time with her to make up for what she’s lost.. she dosen’t need a kingdom or her crown or her wand, all things she DESERVES... she just wants her daughter. She just wants to help her baby girl before she goes so far down this path of hatred and vengance she’s alreayd well trod upon there is no point to return to.

It gets through to Meteora, makes her stop... and Moon TAKES ADANTAGE OF THAT. She then restrains metoera with a magical rock barrier and starts palpatineing her to death. It’s a horrifying moment that ultimately shows who Moon really is.. that when given the chance to let Meteora go, let her CHANGE and grow as a person and help the kingdom.. she instead tries to kill her. When she’s no longer a threat, hasn’t seriously hurt her in their fight, and could use her power to RESTORE the damage she’s done, fix what she’s broken and help the kingdom grow and mend the bridges racisim has torn down. But all she can see is a monster, and something to destroy.. not someONE to save.

So Eclipsa does what Moon would do if it were star about to die and saves her daughter, desperatly trying to stop mooon.. and allowing Meteora to get a clear shot and take half of moon’s soul. While Eclipsa is able to stop her from taking the full thing, Moon is left disoreinted and half alive and leaves on insticnt to parts unknown while Meteora escapes. Eclipsa is left alone, devistated and with her daughter truly lost. And the worst is truly yet to come.

Before we get into final thoughts i’d like to talk about how this scene impacts Moon’s betryal later. To me having rewatched this scene.. it only makes it work MORE making it clear Moon simply can’t fahtom racial equality and that she can’t fahtom that eclipsa had very good reason for doing what she did ... to me it comes off as her using Eclipsa betryaing her as a very flimsy justifcation to not validate her rule and to first retire and then try a coup. That “Well she “BETRAYED” me so i’m fine. “ But in truth... she betrayed Eclipsa first. She attacked her daughter TWICE when Eclipsa was close to getting through to her Her reasons are flimsy.. because i’ts not ABOUT eclipsa, but what eclipsa represents: equality with a race Moon dosen’t see as people. It’s about Moon’s racisim coloring everything tills h’es truly blinded and should have lost everything She didn’t because the ending is a fucking disgrace, but we might get to that at some point, the point here is for all that disgrace’s faults... it did get it right here, and Moon was always portrayed as being unable to let go of her racisim no matter what it cost her or how much her daughter despteratly tried to change her. Trust me as someone whose Dad used to argue that gay marriage meant he should be able to marry his cat, and who still argues against trans people using the bathroom of their choice, I get trying desperatley to change someone who don’t wanna. “Sigh”.

Final Thoughts: This episode is truly excellent. The writing is top notch as is the voice acting for all involved and the climax isa true, well led up to tragedy. The animation is also on point, with the characters emotions on perfect display. This is an episode I now realize is one of the series best and worth ar ewatch if you haven’ts een it. Truly amazing stuff that gets me pumped for the finale.. and disapoints me in how the series could reach these highs for one finale.. but would sink to it’s lowest point for next seasons. Next Time on Prince of Wishful Thinking: Star tries depseratly to find her mom, while Marco, Tom and a motely crew of misfits try to take down Meteora and Tom learns the awful truth from the photo booth and wears a zuko ponytail which weirdly looks good on him. That boy can rock anything let me tell you.

If you enjoyed this reviews, please consider joining my patreon at patreon.com/popculturebuffet. As mentioned my 30 dollar stretch goal includes a review of the cluster fuck that is the series final arc, and the goals up to that , me making 20 and 25 dollars a month repectively, have their own nifty rewards: At 20 i’ll review Darkwing Duck once a month, the two remaning Ducktales 87 mini series I have not covered and the Danny Phantom film The Ultimate Enemy. 25 meanwhile gets you reviews of the Proud Family Movie, the theatrical recess movie and the Kim Possible almost finale movie so the drama. And 30 also gets you reviews of every episode of gravity falls season 1 at least one a month till I finish it at some point, so as you can see you get a lot of bang for your buck and these reviews will be public for everybody. Not only that but joining my patreon gets you a review a month if you pitch in 5 dollars and evne if you can’t swing THAT much just 2 bucks gets you access to my discord, a guarnateed pick in my shorts, votes for patreon exclusive reviews, and SAID patreon exclusive reviews. It’s a lot of bang for your buck is what i’m saying so please help me out so I can make a living off this and sign up today. I even JUST ADDED an exclusive and utterly insane scrooge mcduck review, The Great Wig Mystery. So throw in a buck to check that out.

And if your intrested in Tomtavia... please hit me up. I’m really proud of it and until then... i’ll see you at the next rainbow.

#star vs the forces of evil #tom lucitor #prince of wishful thinking #meteora butterfly #eclipsa butterfly #moon butterfly #rhys dharby #disney xd #disney channel #disney plus #reviews

29 notes · View notes

my-sherlock221b · 4 years ago

Text

Supernatural Rewatch Ramblings: Wendigo

Wendigo

The long line of the MoTW series in Supernatural starts off with the Woman in White which is fairly well- known legend/ myth in most countries. Then we get this one next which claims origin from the Native American mythology.

Here is a review of the Wendigo episode with thoughts from me and @soulmates-for-real

I have always wondered why they were not so inclusive or better at being inclusive as a show. Yes, they did have many women and people of colour in important and strong roles, both positive and negative (though they could have done so much better!). But they steered clear from some of the huge mythology lores like that from Native Americans, Hindu, Latin American cultures. This may have been a wise political strategy to avoid conflict and so they stuck to the Judeo- Christian core but still managed a rather radical take on it!

Spoiler alert:

*God was the final villain?! Who would have guessed? And that the angels were dicks, relentlessly, and demons were in fact ex-humans.*

So back to Wendigo.

What a monster the Wendigo is!! In later seasons when we got only angels and demons and some vampires etc the other monsters were monsters in and of themselves. Like they were born that way—needing to eat human pituitary glands or whatever.

But Woman in White and Wendigo, and even Dead in the Water, or the Shapeshifter --the monster was created by circumstances. Betrayal and infidelity leading to murder suicides, extreme starvation leading to cannibalism and eternal hunger.

Far more terrifying than someone who is born a ghoul perhaps.

So here we are in Wendigo, at the forest/camp site with these fake, charming, rather useless camp rangers who carry M&Ms (nice touch and throwback to E.T. !), don’t wear shorts ( which anyway seems like a weird thing to wear when there is grass and stuff—why would you want to expose your legs?!), can’t see bear traps ( Seriously Dean?! ).

Sam is still restless and bristling at Jess’s death, as well as angry at Dad. All those years of separation do not seem to have given him any peace in his relationship with his father. Now to add massive insult to his already injured sense of self—he has lost his girlfriend in exactly the same way as his father lost his wife—making them even more identical.

So he is cranky and unwilling to give in to any of Dean’s suggestions. He denies his own nightmares, refuses good advice and food and is generally misanthropic. While Dean on the other hand seems to be enjoying this like a happy jolly road trip. The monster is almost like a secondary priority now.

What is most important, (and this becomes even more obvious in a re-watch post finale)—what is THE most important thing is that Sammy is riding shotgun, is in front of his eyes and safe.

Miserable and bitchy but safe.

That allows Dean to dial back a bit and bring into focus what has always been, for him, the really important part of their lives—saving people. This is always more important to him that hunting things. So, when he finds out about someone’s brother being lost and the coordinates match what his dad has left, well there is no choice really.

They have to find a way to save him.

If they find Dad there, well, good, but that is suddenly not a priority for him at all. He turned up at Sam’s doorstep, and as we know from the finale, waited there for HOURS since he was unsure of his welcome, then broke in at 3 am or something like an idiot….but anyway…..all that was because Dad had been away on a hunting trip and hadn’t been home in a few days…blah blah blah.

The first contact Dean makes with Sam who left home to go to college is to recruit him to help find Dad—the same guy who told Sam that if he went away to stay away.

And then suddenly now that Sam is with him, finding Dad is like meh. If we find him somewhere by the wayside while you and I hunt monsters Sammy, then yeah sure, great.

If not…well….we have stuff to do you and I…saving people, hunting things. The family business.

And John Winchester….well, what can I possibly say about him without taking up pages in ranting?! Why did he ditch the first monster? Why was he in SUCH a hurry to leave that he left his journal behind??

My theory of course is that he had to run away from the Woman in White since he had been unfaithful to Mary ( yes yes I know it had been YEARS at that point, but hello, this man made his life a crusade for revenge and sacrificed his kids’ lives also to that darkness, so…yes, being with Adam’s mother was an infidelity and you can’t change my mind on that !).

So naturally John was afraid he would be killed.

But still….he left coordinates for the next hunt in the journal and just ran off?!

The other question is what the hell is happening in motels across USA? Guys like these can just check- in on fake credit cards, leave a room full of satanic and serial killer-y documents, sometimes dead bodies, lots of salt at the door and windows, and just disappear without checking out….

Though the police do seem quite alert and swift in action in the Pilot compared to some of the laidback and clueless ones we see later.

What is most interesting is to see the character of season 1 Dean emerge.

He sass, he boss, he flirt, he lie, he charm, he fight, he save.

In fact, the very first time I saw Supernatural, it seemed that Dean occupied so much of the narrative space that I barely noticed Sam except as a foil to and a brother to Dean.

Now in the re-watch what is fascinating in retrospect is to watch Sam slide into ‘the life’ without a hiccup. He reads the journal, he figures out it’s a wendigo, he gets the civilians to cooperate, he also fights and saves.

And that look he gives Dean in the car?

Well, those who missed the signs in Pilot and didn’t ship Wincest from day one, surely started doing it then!

https://www.geekgirlauthority.com/supernatural-rewatch-s01e02-wendigo/

This is also the first episode that gives a clear parallel to the Sam and Dean relationship through the B plot. When Haley says she MUST go to find her brother –Dean nods in instant understanding while Sam is pissed off at having to ‘babysit.’

We see this in many more episodes in the future, and what is fascinating is to see Sam gain insights into his brother with every such parallel. To recognize what being the big brother has meant to Dean and how much he has done and given and even suffered for that. We will discuss this in more detail in the next episode review! ( Dead in the Water)

The chemistry and ease, almost a fluid sense of flow between the two actors is unmistakable in this episode. Even as Sam is really being a bitch and Dean is being a jerk, there is a definite undercurrent of something holding them together. It may be all about revenge for Jess’s death and finding Dad for Sam, but he will still stick with Dean and want to protect him as fiercely as Dean wants to protect Sam.

Sheila O’Malley has given a detailed explanation for the acting styles of Jared and Jensen and what she said about Jared is spot on and brilliant. He does what she calls active listening.

It is amazing how once you realize that you notice it all the time.

The reason why Dean can manage such perfect comedic timing or non- verbal communication is because Sam is always ALWAYS tuned into him. Listening, watching, reacting, observing.

Once again, for those of you interested in the meta and more erudite and informed reviews that this one 😊 do read what Sheila O’Malley has written.

Here are some excerpts which will entice you!

“David Nutter, who directed the pilot, also directed episode 2, and there’s a new DP here, the phenomenally talented Serge Ladouceur, who is still shooting the show. If the DP for the pilot, Aaron Schneider, helped establish the dark mood and horror-movie feel of the series, then Ladouceur just helped deepen and strengthen that continuum. The look of the show has changed, by Season 9. I would say that it has a more glamorous look now, more colorful, while certainly still very dramatic (even melodramatic). Supernatural is (and has been) one of the best looking shows on television.”

“The ranger comes in to talk to them, and they pose as environmental studies majors at the university in Boulder. Sam says they are “working on a paper”, clearly improvising, and you can watch the glorious schtick of Jensen Ackles as he adjusts to the new information of who he is supposed to be pretending to be. God is in the details, people, and it’s the detailed scene work of both Ackles and Padalecki that keeps this show going. David Nutter referred to Jensen Ackles once as a “meticulous actor” in terms of his preparation for every scene, no matter how small, and it pays off. He knows what the fuck he is doing. So does Padalecki. I couldn’t give two shits about the demons. It’s that DYNAMIC that is so entertaining and watch-able.”

And here are some thoughts on the episode from @soulmates-for-real, my partner in crime for the rewatch 😊

Except the fact that Sam is quite secretive about his nightmares but his body language is quite open and his expressions easy to read. On the contrary, I saw Dean posturing a lot with other people, pouting, flirting, making eyes...trying to be all nonchalant. But when it comes to Sam we see a different Dean - the more antsy and angsty Sam gets, the more intensely Dean reacts to him and you can see Dean's concern shining through. Leading to Sam coming to some kind of resolution and giving Dean 'that look' at the end!

#spn #supernatural #spn meta #spn reviews #j2 #wincest #fandom

32 notes · View notes

prose-for-hire · 4 years ago

Text

Cordy the vampire slayer

Cordy and Buffy Bodyswap au

Request: Hi, if you have time could you write a Buffy and Cordelia Body Swap fanfic? Set in the early episodes of Season 2? Giles tells Buffy about a special holiday for slayers, where the slayer can temporarily switch bodies with anyone she chooses and after an argument with Cordy, Buffy accidentally makes her choice. The only problem was that Giles never got to finish telling Buffy how long the switch would last — three months!

Requested by: Anon + @archiefan23

A/N: Just a little warning that Cordy kisses Angel as Buffy at one point. I really enjoyed this one !! Sorry it took so long to post love 💖

It was late morning. But the heat was rising by the minute. It was the kind of sunny day that held a multitude of possibilities. The temperature in the high school library was warmer still, but not uncomfortably so. It surrounded them in a glow that marked the beginning of summer. The kind of summer they hoped would spell demons and the like taking the same long break to sunbathe as they wished to.

Giles was in his usual suit, he wore his old faithful no matter the weather. The others figured there must be some kind of magic, breathable material tailored to him as otherwise he would be sweating buckets.

Xander, Buffy and Cordelia were waiting for Willow to arrive as Giles paced, figuring out how exactly to begin his speech without boring the teenagers to death. Unfortunately, this particular battle was one that would never be won.

Willow arrived, apologising and rushing to sit beside Xander giving him a bright smile. Giles nodded at her before turning to reveal

Giles sets the green, jagged stone in the centre of the table. Everyone just stared. It had begun to glow. The first time in a few decades.

“In every generation-”

“Oh I know this one!”

“-Yeah, there is a chosen one, yada yada-”

“No, well – yes. But, that was not what I was explaining. It is good, however, that you do actually heed what I tell you”

“God, Giles, nobody can forget it”

“I have dreams of that speech” Willow agreed.

“Nightmares” Xander added, shuddering.

“Yes, well, moving on from that enthused rally of support – in every generation there is a moment in the Slayer’s life where her consciousness may switch with that of a human. It is tradition that this would allow her to hone her skill and-”

“Well, I’m sold” Buffy shrugged, thinking of all of the free time she could have.

“-It was, ah, a vacation in some way and in others it was a sentence upon the woman that she swapped forms with”

“A sentence? Like, she had to write a paper on being a Slayer for the day? That’s horrible” Cordy said as Willow and Xander rolled their eyes at each other.

“Well, no – no nothing like this. The woman would endure being the slayer and survive unscathed would walk on the path of the righteous. She could be mythologised depending on how well she adapts to the gift”

“Yeah, like it could even be that hard!” Cordelia immediately scoffed whilst filing her nails.

“You wouldn’t last a minute, Cor”

“Oh yeah? Try me. I could slay twice as good as you!” she insisted indignantly, her hands on her hips.

“Yeah but Buffy would still get all the credit – you would be operating her body like some kind of whacky sci-fi feature” Xander added which made Cordy consider it. But, nonetheless she snatched up the stone and gestured for Buffy to do the same.

“Well, like, we would all know”

Buffy was pleased, mostly she wanted to have the day off. She thought Cordy had a pretty sweet gig. She was popular, athletic and people seemed to respect her. Plus she had seen the barista in the local coffee shop always gave her free Frappuccino’s.

So, they agreed. Giles asked several times if they were sure and they both raised an eyebrow and tried to get him to hurry up. Cordy decided she could track Devon down and show him exactly what he deserved for ignoring her for so long.

Giles put his hands over theirs who were clasped around the stone, palms glowing green as he recited the ancient rites. They stared at each other, their own bodies and facial expressions looked almost alien. It was really strange and Buffy couldn’t stop staring down at Cordy’s hands that were now hers.

The bell went and everyone went their separate ways. This could be fun, both thought at the exact same time. Cordy and Buffy couldn’t stop beaming for the entire day. They were really enjoying the swap. Cordelia would even write a paper on her day she was in such a good mood.

Cordy immediately skipped her morning classes and went to the beauty salon, to try and do something about Buffy’s hair and nightmare she called nailbeds. She was doing the girl a favour and it relaxed her anyway.

She found Devon and flipped him over her head with ease, warning him to call Cordelia back which he insisted he would and scrambled away. She dusted her hands off and put her hands on her hips proudly.

Buffy on the other hand went to all of Cordelia’s classes with little to think about other than whether that hot guy at the back was staring at her. She could just sit there with little expectation of her and enjoy it. She didn’t have to think about anything and it was really fun. She didn’t even mind sitting for Harmony for half an hour discussing the merits of a new hair serum.

It was going well. That first day was the easiest one and they were both convinced the other had it easy still. That was, until the revelation Giles was about to bestow on them. It was the end of the day and both met at the Library at the end of the day.

They returned to Giles in order to switch back. They just presumed this holiday was for a day before they were allowed to turn back. When they said this, Giles had to break it to them. Giles squinted, realising he hadn’t explained properly. They would be doing this for three months. At this revelation both of them began speaking over each other in their horror.

“That’s not a vacation, that’s squatting! This is a human rights violation, she should be paying rent to be living in there” Cordelia, from inside Buffy’s body, screeched.

“You should call your lawyer. Oh, wait – is he my lawyer now?” Buffy asked, deep in thought.

“Perhaps, uh, this will prove a pivotal part of understanding the other’s-”

“Oh my God! This is so not happening!” Cordelia spoke over Giles’ probably very profound explanation and instead stormed away.

She got in her car and started to drive towards her house, realising that she couldn’t go home. She scowled and reversed, driving to Revello Drive and tried to figure out which of the tiny box rooms was hers.

Buffy stayed with Giles and tried to see if there was a quick fix, but there was honestly nothing that he could do. He offered to drive her to Cordelia’s house and insisted that he would be there for her and Cordelia for the next few months.

The first month:

It had been a struggle. Neither of them were communicating much and Gies had insisted that the slayer still had to

It was ruining Cordy’s social life (not that she was convinced that Buffy had one anyway). She turned up to school after being driven by Joyce which she found kind of embarrassing but again, didn’t really mind seeing as nobody would know it was her.

Buffy’s arm was in a sling as she walked through the corridors. Cordelia had been trying to slay the night before and had fallen awkwardly onto her arm. No thanks to the real Buffy, who hadn’t come to help her.

As she was passed by herself, she reached and clasped her good hand around her wrist and pulled her with her. She tried to struggle but her new superstrength gave her the upper hand.

“Bathroom. Now!” Cordy squinted at herself and pulled Buffy with her again when she didn’t move of her own accord. Cordelia checked that the bathroom was empty before rounding on her.

“You know… if that happened last night your arm should be healed. Benefit of the slayer deal” Buffy offered before she could open her mouth, still trying to get used to navigating Cordelia’s body.

“Oh, yeah, I know - it’s fine. I just wanted a little sympathy but everyone kinda ignores you in the halls, huh?” she muttered, taking the sling from her shoulder and trashing it.

“Well-”

“Not the point! Where were you last night?! There was a vampire and it was like he knew every punch I was gonna throw!”

“How rude of him”

“I know!” Cordy agreed before stopping, realising Buffy wasn’t actually as invested as she was.

It was weird to Buffy how easily she had slid into being the popular girl again but it was a complete breath of relief. As if the entire world had been removed from her shoulders. She felt so much lighter.

“Ugh, just ‘cause you’re so boring and take slaying so seriously and vampires are like obsessed with you doesn’t mean that you have to be such a bitch!”

“I’m a bitch? You’re the queen of b-”

“You’re so gonna regret this, Buffy, I could make your high school career a living hell! Worse than any Hellmouth-!”

“Do you know what? I’m Cordelia Chase – I don’t take crap from anyone! Have a nice slay, oh, I mean day!” Buffy smiled overly sweetly before walking away. Cordy screamed in frustration, slamming her hand against a bathroom stall and ending up punching her entire fist through it in her frustration. Leaving her screaming again, but this time the door took the brunt of her annoyance.

After their exchange in the bathroom, both women decided they were going to make the most of the swap. By messing with the other and their lives. They were set on annoying the other just like they annoyed them.

Both ended up bickering more than usual if they ever saw passed each other. They started to say things or do things slightly out of character to annoy the person whose real life it was. This carried on for a few weeks. Cordelia started to show her strength more obviously, making more and more people question Buffy. Buffy started to pretend she couldn’t pick up even the easiest part of choreography for cheerleading.

Then, one day something happened that Cordelia saw as the final straw. Buffy walked in, as Cordelia, with her hair in a complete mess. She didn’t style Cordy’s hair and walked around all day with a birds nest. Cordy grabs her and tries to style it out, attacking her with a hair brush.

“Does my face really do that when I’m annoyed?”

“All the time” She replied, rolling her eyes. She tried to brush her hair again, but it was no use.

“No, I think the style’s really gonna catch on” Cordelia’s own face was smiling infuriatingly back at her. She was horrified. She was sure that she would never live this down. Her hair looked horrific.

“Fine. Then- then I’ll let everyone know I’m a slayer. I’m sure your Mom-”

“Cordelia! You can’t!”

“Then someone will have to discover that a tangle teaser is our friend”

Buffy soon realises that Cordelia means it and eventually gives in, which allows them a tenuous truce from there on in.

Cordelia and Buffy walked back home in the dark together, mostly in silence. They walk side by side until Buffy says goodnight and walks towards Cordelia’s house which would probably be empty when she got there. Cordelia warned her she wasn’t allowed to drive her car, she didn’t trust her.

It suddenly begins to hit each of them though, as they walked their separate ways. That their lives aren’t quite as easy as they expected.

Cordy realised she’s suddenly making all the tough decisions. The responsibility on her shoulders. Everyone automatically looked at her for guidance, to make the decisions – just because she had Buffy’s face. It was actually really hard.

Not to mention, Joyce’s parenting style was almost suffocating to her and Cordelia barely held back her snapping. She wasn’t used to someone asking after her every movement.

Plus, it was absolutely exhausting juggling slaying, sneaking out and pretending to be normal. She didn’t know why Buffy bothered. Because some gross men said so, like years ago? Cordy insisted if she was Buffy she would have quit. But, again, here she was still playing along even for the next few months without refusing to slay.

Meanwhile, Buffy was feeling how acutely Cordelia’s loneliness appeared to bleed into every aspect of her life. At home, she wasn’t really listened to no matter how rude or loud that she was. Her parents were rarely ever present and when they were it was to give her gifts to make up for all the time they were about to spend away again.

Buffy didn’t enjoy hanging out with Harmony and the rest of Cordy’s friends. None of them seemed to genuinely care about the other. Or share any meaningful bond. In fact, it didn’t seem that they cared for anyone except themselves and as soon as one walked away, they appeared to immediately begin to be rude about the others.

These new realities they have been planted in, these new perspectives gave them both something to think on. But it didn’t take from the fact that they were still so very annoyed with the other.

Month Two:

They had a lot of time to think, while living the other’s life. There was chance to reflect on themselves and the life of the other. In some sense, they were jealous and completely relieved there was an end to this.

The pair had began to bond a little more since the previous month where they were at each other’s throats. There was something about literally living another’s life that made them suddenly bonded together. Even if they didn’t really want to be.

Buffy just tried to avoid Cordy’s friends as much as possible rather than being rude to them. She didn’t want to upset Cordelia’s chance at popularity too much – she was starting to get it now, it was the way that Cordy could feel better about herself.

Towards the end of the second month, Cordelia had got into the swing of slaying by herself since those first rocky weeks. She found herself enjoying the daily exercise routine (she decided she would totally be bringing that back with her when they swapped back).

Cordelia and Buffy had been spending a lot more time together. Cordelia was in her own room – finally. Buffy’s home was a lot smaller, something she called ‘cute’ to her face but Buffy knew what she meant by it.

“When you said have a walk in your shoes, I wasn’t expecting to have to run the vampire-mile in last season’s boots” Cordy huffed, combing through the blonde hair she was still trying to get accustomed to while she looked in the mirror. She was getting angry at it, it was near-impossible to maintain in the way she was used to. Buffy always made it look so pretty. She missed her own brunette hair. She missed the way people would cower as she walked through the halls. She missed not having to

But, she liked that she could relax around the Scoobies and not have to worry about her image, not that she would admit it of course.

“Well, I always wear a heel that has a supportive ankle - y’know, for maximum slayage” Buffy shrugged and smiled, filing her nails in the way that Cordelia usually would. The change was a lot easier for Buffy seeing as this was the life she lived in Emery. It was sort of nostalgic to relive her more carefree years.

“It’s not even that hard, Cordelia. I mean, I don’t know how you hang out with Harmony and those other girls. They’re so shallow and kinda cruel” Buffy held herself back from including Cordy in the kind of girl that was cruel too.

Buffy, despite noticing the drawbacks of Cordy’s life really needed the holiday. She didn’t have any responsibility. She didn’t have to lift a finger at home and she could basically do whatever she liked whenever she liked. Cordelia’s parents barely even saw her.

“But, it never stops! Ever!”

“You’re doing this for what? Another month. You’re doing such a great job – really. Just let me have this last month and then everything goes back to normal”

“That’s easy for you to say! I mean, I have to be the Slayer and what? No soul-having hunk of goodness on my arm!?” Cordelia continued to whine as she got the comb caught in her blonde hair again. She tugged too hard and snapped the object clean in half. She groaned in annoyance. That was the last straw. She huffed and threw the pieces of the comb to the vanity table.

Buffy bit back a smile at Cordy’s overreaction. It was the opposite for her, an inconvenience not to have her strength. She felt weak and had a newfound appreciation for how her friends managed to fight vampires without any powers at their disposal.

However, Cordelia was sick of superstrength and vampire dust that seemed to get everywhere. This gave her an idea that would stay in the back of her mind. Cordy remembered that Angel had been out of town and would be returning for Buffy’s birthday. Interesting.

Buffy looked up, feeling sorry for Cordy. She knew how it felt to be out of your depth and she didn’t have the same kind of support system that Buffy did. Despite Buffy enjoying the freedom she had, she knew that this meant Cordelia wasn’t close with her parents. And her friends were shallow and wholly unsupportive. This realisation is why she offered what she did.

“Cordy? I can help, you know. With the slaying” Buffy offered softly. She was starting to realise she had just left Cordelia to it. Had begun by making her actual life harder too. It made the other woman look over, raising an eyebrow.

“Why would you want to help me?” Cordelia squinted as if she was suspicious, but Buffy just shrugged.

It made each woman think about why they had agreed to swap and what it would mean to work together rather than struggle alone. They nodded at each other, not really sure where they stood with the other.

Month three:

By the third month, both women knew the drill. Buffy would help train Cordelia and provide her with the most knowledge she could about slaying and how to improve. Which, the girl was surprisingly taking in her stride. She had slain three vampires by herself and with a very artistic flourish the night previous.

Cordelia used Buffy’s strength to her advantage spinning into a kick that would have made her overbalance before. She landed a few blows this time before she was thrown into a gravestone. She got up immediately, not allowing herself to stay down. She then charged at the vampire, plunging the stake into his chest leaving him dust in the wind.

She grinned in excitement. It truly was getting easier that slaying gig. She knew she was right – she could totally do it.

“Yeah! Take that, creep!” Cordy shouted at the pile of dust before jumping up and down over how easily she had taken that vamp down.

“Now we just need to work on your puns” Buffy added, her arms crossed as she watched.

“Only people with nothing interesting to say uses puns… oh, and you, obviously” Cordy added with a little shrug. They decided to call it a night and both were only hoping that no apocalypses threatened whilst they were still swapped. She was getting good but still.

During this time, Cordelia had also given Buffy pointers about how to enhance her popularity. To follow the age-old saying ‘Be more Cordy’. She helped her make up with Harmony by buying her something expensive and definitely not apologising to her.

It was still hard and Cordelia was always complaining whilst simultaneously gushing about the work-out routine she was picking up from this swap. She insisted she was going to do a slayer-inspired exercise video and make, like, millions from it which always made Buffy roll her eyes.

Buffy was sitting with her now usual gang of Cordettes hanging around her. She was counting to one hundred mentally in her mind until she would make an excuse and leave them to go to the library. She just hoped that she wouldn’t get seen entering again or face another war of passive-aggression with Harmony. This was one daily battle that she would rather take on an apocalypse over.

“So, what about you and Devon? He’s totally hot” Harmony afforded, “Not as much as my guy, obviously, but some people just have to lower their expectations right?” She smiled sweetly in that way Buffy had now become accustomed to.

“Yeah, Mr invisible sounds totally hot” Buffy quipped, knowing she could at least get away with that. It made the others giggle. Harmony always talking about this mystery guy but nobody had ever seen him.

Buffy sighed as she thought about all of the men she had encountered since she had swapped bodies with Cordy, and what they had propositioned to her at the Bronze. Buffy realised that men tended to try to use Cordelia and then just as quickly begin to ignore her. She does use her looks but she never ends up getting what she wants. She wants a committed relationship, companionship. It made Buffy really sad for her, she finally understood what Cordelia meant about being lonely despite having so many people around her.

She then turns to Harmony and insists, scarily exactly like Cordy would, that he was a total burnout loser with no prospects and even less in his pockets. Total no-go. The way gossip worked at Sunnydale, Devon would be blacklisted by anyone who was anyone by the final bell.

Which, is something she probably wouldn’t have done if she had known what Cordelia was planning to do that evening.

Cordy greeted Angel that evening and he smiled. It was Buffy walking towards him, how could he not smile? Angel opened his mouth to say something but she immediately crashed her lips to his. She kissed urgently, a hint of desperation and need that he would have found nice if it had actually been Buffy kissing him.

He frowned, somehow he could just sense that something wasn’t right. He stilled her, his hands on her upper arm. He pulls back, scanning her face. He squints, not sure if he should say something.

“You’re not…”

“Oh, come on… baby, I’m the slayer and you’re the soulfully good vampire. Let’s- do it” Cordy used her best seductive face, which admittedly worked better with her own features but she worked with what she had.

“Buffy, maybe we should… patrol” angel said, his voice wavered as his forehead furrowed. Something just wasn’t right.

Buffy sighed deeply and rolled her eyes and it reminded him of someone. She turned to leave but he called to her before she did, “Cordelia?” Angel tried and Buffy’s eyes met his immediately.

“How…?”

“You’re not her…” Angel admitted, looking at the floor.

“But I look like her, I’m stuck here with her entire wardrobe! What’s the big?” She sighed, her loneliness bubbling back to the surface. Ashe didn’t know whether to lash out or just cry at the rejection. She was a strong person and yet she was crumbling at the way that even as Buffy who appeared to have everything she couldn’t replicate it the same.

“Love isn’t about looks. Or, how nice your outfits are, which, um – they are pretty” He assured her, trying to soften the blow, “It-it’s something you feel deep inside. Something you know without having to question or second-guess yourself. It’s… her”

Cordy sat on the side of her bed and Angel sat beside her, comforting her. She was upset at this. Nobody had ever felt so deeply for her, she was sure of it. And it stung.

“Why does nobody like me for me? Why do I do everything and still have nobody?”

“You’re a great girl-” Angel started awkwardly, not really sure how to comfort the girl. But at these words, Cordelia suddenly stood up and left, running to Buffy’s house and hiding in her room. Just hiding her tears until she closed Buffy’s bedroom door behind her. She wanted a love story. Why did she feel like a secondary character in her own life?

The next day at school, it was finally the day. The day that Cordelia and Buffy were supposed to swap back.

Angel had explained to Buffy what had happened (although his eye contact was anywhere but her face as he found it weird to be so comfortable talking to Cordy this way). But rather than Buffy flipping out, as she might have done say three months earlier, she realised exactly why Cordy would have tried it on with Angel. Especially so after realising just how lonely it can be living Cordy’s life.

“Cor, I know what happened last night”

“Oh, yeah? What is loser just stamped on my forehead?” Cordy sighed and when she saw the look her own face was giving her she understood. Buffy wasn’t trying to be cruel or laugh at her rejection. She softened slightly, “I’m sorry okay? I am”

“Look, I know we’re not close-”

“And our hair is a very different style and texture” Cordy added without thinking.

“Our slaying abilities are different too” Buffy muttered under her breath and then shook her head at herself. She really was easily sucked into being the popular girl, “We’re not close but we’re a lot more similar than I ever thought. I get it, okay?”

Buffy took Cordelia’s hand in her own and offered her a comforting gesture. So much was left unsaid and yet both felt understood by the other in a way that had never really happened before.

“It’s tough at the top and we’re just both at the top of our worlds” Cordelia nodded along. Buffy’s the slayer of slayers and she slays the rest of the student body to be the most popular. It can be so lonely at the top and both understood the other in a much different way than they ever had before.

Cordy’s words made Buffy smile but she nodded. It was easier for Cordelia to express herself this way. Both of them were glad that they were changing back but they would miss the way that their weird friendship had blossomed through the last three months.

They understood completely now the pressure the other was under. Their points of view. Their lives. They were both hard in their own way. Maintaining Cordelia’s popularity alone was exhausting.

Giles returned to the library, nodding at the pair of them. Telling them that he was proud of the pair of them. Cordelia really had proved herself and Buffy had shown herself as someone who can support others and allow them to learn under her guidance. This admittance made both women gasp, both of them longed for a father figure and Giles saying this made both of them remember this moment for a long time after.

He recited the words, safe in the knowledge that both girls had learnt to work together in the way he had hoped upon his suggestion. Buffy needed to take a step back to have a break to appreciate her gift whilst understanding she had allies she could equally turn to for support.

A green hue lit up the room as their bodies swapped back. There was a final rush of cold air, making them both shiver and instinctually step back from each other.

This was right. Their own body, lives, returned to them. They shared a smile, a small nod of understanding before Buffy launched herself at Cordy. Pulling her into a hug. Both of their eyes were watering, it had been a long past three months.

The girls had never felt close, mostly because they hadn’t really understood the other. Not like this. But now they were sure that they would keep this bond for the rest of their lives.

#Cordelia Chase #Buffy Summers #Buffy #Cordy #btvs #btvs imagine #btvs fic #Buffy The Vampire Slayer #buffy the vampire slayer imagines #bodyswap au #bodyswap #buffyverse #buffy x cordelia #Buffy Summers x Cordelia Chase

31 notes · View notes

chaoticlarrie · 4 years ago

Text

Watching spn for the 1st time in 2020 - Human Cas

So I’m on season 9, episode 3.

Cas has been human for a few days, battles hunger, thirst, the need for sleep and is on the run from every angel.

And a girl find him as a homeless man, bring her to her appartement and fucks him ????

Seriously ???

A universe with angels and demons and vampires and ghosts is more believable than a universe where a sweet girl fucks a homeless man she just met.

This show man...

They really want you to believe that every girl wants to fuck you in the 5 min after you met them.

And Cas ? A few days ago he was a celestial being with no gender, no apparent need for sex. And he just... goes along with it ?

Like, it’s so painfully obvious that all of this is written by straight guys ^^

Let’s say that Cas has a new desire for sex now that he is human, and that he searches comfort with it. We’ve seen him talking with other humans, guys, spending time in a shelter, breaking loneliness by talking with other guys. He didn’t seek out a sexual relationship with those guys. So you’re gonna tell me that straightness is implemented in him the moment he becomes human??? And that a 5 min talk with a girl is enough to break milleniums of comfortable abstinence?? When the only meaningful relationship he’s ever had with a human is with a guy that he’s supposed to get back to ?!

That’s not even funny anymore. This show is queerbaiting at its peak and at the same time reinforce the narrative that straight sex is the one fundamental natural norm of every human.

Like...

And with the discourse I’ve seen since the finale, I get that they wanted the fans to believe that the destiel ship could not be canon also because one is an angel, the other a human, like they’re supposed to be above romantic and sexual feeling because of it. The kind of same excuse we have for Crowley and Aziraphale not fucking in good omens.

At this point in the show, we’ve already seen Dean fucking an angel under human form and we’ve seen the child of a human and an angel.

Funny how the excuse “angels don’t love romantically or sexually” only works with queer relationships >.>

Edit: okay so the girl was a reaper so it’s slightly more plausible that she chose to have sex with him but it’s still doesn’t explain why cas goes along with it 😅? And it’s still painfully obvious that they just wanted to show cas having STRAIGHT SEX™️

Also another example of an immortal supernatural being having sex with a human but apparently it can only works with 2 different sets of genitals 😂?

#spn #supernatuaral #spn spoilers #supernatural spoilers #destiel #deancas #1st spn watch

27 notes · View notes

levyfiles · 5 years ago

Photo

Last week the @skepticbeliever-bookclub prompted us to post a selection of our favourite shyan fics so there’d be a nice little way to highlight all the hidden gems of favourites we might already recognise and love while sharing a few we might never have found otherwise. Last December I posted a little list of some of my favourites so I figured I’d dust off that list with a few new additions of particular favourites I treasure.

Be All My Sins Remembered by spoopyy

Summary: In every lifetime, they find each other.

Review: This fic manages to take you on a long journey through what feels like a series of AUs and they all weave in and out of the wealth of their relationship with some vivid descriptions of the historical settings their journey takes them through. As someone who grew up reading Anne Rice’s epics through historical events, this fic is right up my alley. A vampire Shane passing through the wave of human society’s climb searching for a reincarnated Ryan again and again, trying to hold on to him and keep him through great tragedies and timeframes that just don’t let them be together. This was one of the first fics I read when I was only a lurker and to be quite honest, I need to give this one a nice re-read, maybe for the book club which would be loads of fun. Either way, 10/10. Would be Hurt in the heart again.

Perfect Fit by @beaniegara

Summary: There’s a legend that says anyone able to take all of statue Shane’s cock will summon the god to the mortal realm. Given the statue’s excessive size, no one has ever succeeded to prove or disprove the story. Until Ryan that is.

Review: Listen. You wanna talk actual fandom legends. This fic is one of them and it pulls out all the stops on being delicious and evocative. Also features one of my favourite incarnations of size queen bergara. Good stuff and you’re really rooting for Ryan in this lol.

a prize for rotten judgement by sarcasticfishes

Summary: “You’d drive each other crazy. You sit together at your office all day, and then you’d be commuting home together, eating dinner together, watching TV together, going to bed — well, not together, but you get it, right?”

It doesn’t sound so awful to Shane. There are worse people he could be spending all his hours with than Ryan Bergara.

Review: The moment I happened to glance at the notes of this and saw that Fie’s secondary title for this would have been Ryan and Shane move to the Suburbs, I about lost it with excitement. Primarily because the show this references is one of my favourite comedies and that is one of my all-time favourite episodes. Let me tell you though, even if the reference is lost on you, this story is so much gold rolled into a heart-gripping tale of two best friends who spend every waking moment together taking the plunge to share a home and they were roommates oh my god they were roommates. Shane is pining and you’ll pine right along with him as you’ll yell and holler for him to stop being so damn real and full of doubt. It really is worth every gasp of pain and all the more for the execution but the delivery will leave you in delight. Certainly had me yelling at the author. This fic is gonna be one of my timeless favourites; I knew it the moment I began.

Everything’s Weird and We’re Always in Danger by beethechange

Summary: Ryan perches on the edge of the bed, an indistinct shape that Shane can only just make out in the dark, so he turns the lamp back on. He wants to see Ryan’s face, wants to know that he is alright. Ryan’s cheeks are damp, his hands fisted in the hideous flowered duvet.

“It won’t go away,” Ryan says miserably. “I’ve been like this since we got here, basically, and it won’t fucking—”

“Ah,” Shane says. “Well, you know, sometimes fear…adrenaline…they can affect people. Physically.” He waves his hands indistinctly crotchward. “It’s a, a scientifically known phenomenon.” Shane feels a little better staying in the realm of scientifically known phenomena.

Review: Word of advice. You see a fic is authored by beethechange, run don’t walk because you’re absolutely always going to be treated to the best of banter, the best of prose, chemistry, organic execution and feels right up the bottom end of your heart. This fic, this changed everything I thought I knew I wanted out of a bed-sharing fic. It’s got a little bit of two treats here. You got a sex-pollen-esque situation mixed with bed-sharing and holy fucking damn that is more than you think you deserve, but read this because you do deserve the best of the best. The build up, the dialogue, the surprisingly hilarity of it, the hotness woah, and The Aftermath. When you think you know what you’re in for, you’re wrong and you’re most pleasantly surprised. Get this fic in your life and honestly? while you’re at it, you could do a clean sweep of every fic in her list of works and while my less than adequate reading time management may still be short on some of her most well-recommended pieces, I have an adamant faith that Bee doesn’t disappoint. Go get y’all juice.

Maelstrom by thewindupbird

Summary: Here’s the thing about driving halfway across the country to see someone. You can’t really deny, after that, that you’re pretty much head over heels for them.

Review: Listen. One morning on a day off, I just laid in bed and read this– all 40k+ words– while lying there clutching my pillows, hurting and loving every moment of it. The descriptions of Americana, the slow steady metronome rhythm of Ryan’s feelings as frightened and helpless as they feel when you’re relating deeply to them juxtaposed with the deep-seated struggle of understanding what it is to be with someone you love so much but your mental health is burning quiet holes in your ability to express it in a way that can be understand. Ryan’s fierce determination, breaking through the silence of their non communication is really Everything to me in this fic. i think I really left my heart in the scene in Shane’s parents kitchen. That finished me. Read this fic and understand the deep relief you get when you’ve finished a fight with someone you fiercely care about and they understand you and you understand them and it’s OK; it’s gonna be all right. Augh.

5 times Shane had to overrule Ryan’s “No Homo” + 1 time he didn’t have to by ghoulboyboos

Summary: There was only one thing that would truly drive him up the wall with Ryan, much more than any debate about ghosts ever could: Ryan’s consistent twitches of “no homo” when any sort of physical contract between them happened.

Review: I have such a soft special spot in my heart for this fic particularly because Lud manages to examine a trope I tend to avoid in such a sweet and honest way I couldn’t not love this fic. The story takes a painstaking and very real look at the “no homo” issue as it weaved through the journey that was early days Ryan and Shane. Shane’s reaction to in this and how he communicates with Ryan has such a very heartfelt and once again, real quality to it. I get in my feelings all over again about how far they’ve come and what it meant for Ryan to have Shane there. Lud really nails this piece and it’s a classic in my eyes.

A Burial on Box Hill by InkStainsOnMyHands

Summary: The Celtics believed that the yew flower symbolized both immortality and death. Meanwhile, for centuries, the buxus flower was seen as a symbol for safe passage into the afterlife.

Or,Shane and Ryan were never the same after investigating the Black Forest of Germany alone.

Review: Let me just quote my bookmark comment here. Usually I flee from tragedy like a cat spotting a cucumber but the brevity and the prose dragged me in and now I’m a functioning mess. Bless this fic. Oh my god it’s short and reads like one of those quick horror stories you’ll read to your friends just as the scary stories are transitioning from the urban legends to the ones that feel real. Big warning for main character death but still read it if you appreciate a good story told.

Body Farming by shiphitsthefan

Summary: Failed suppressants and a surprise heat: the worst of cliches, and here Ryan stands, living the trope on location with the alpha he’s hopelessly in love with. Even worse, they’re spending the night in the famous Bell Witch Cave, completely alone and with no way to contact the outside world.

Ryan knows he can survive and keep his preheat a secret, as long as Shane will stop being so protective and concerned. After all, it’s not like Shane wants to bond with him.

Right?

Review: Now judging from the reactions of many people I’ve spoken to, big heavy ABO kink is not popular here but guys, GUYS. This one. Let this one in I promise it is not what you think it is. The dynamic is organic and the worst side of the trope is subverted in all the best ways and lord help us, the smut is hot, like swelteringly smoking. It’ll stay with you.

Believer by cellard00rs

Summary: Some demons and otherworldly creatures love climbing up the power ladder. Shane is not one of these. He likes where he is (thank you very much) and has no interest in moving up. All he wants is to give his friend Ryan a nice birthday gift. So, naturally, everything goes to hell.

Review: This fic is another fandom legend. When I think demon!Shane. It’s this and one other one that always pops right into my mind. This was my first exposure to the bureaucracy meets the supernatural!Shane trope and I was sold from the get-go. The Shane in this fic is everything I imagine a demon!Shane is and his ginger care for Ryan, the concept of their bond and how even though Shane is a demon and responsible for keeping the supernatural a firm secret from Ryan and the rest of the world, his skepticism is relayed through his status as a demon. I want to talk more about it but I think so much of the enjoyment comes from the surprises as the plot unfurls.

hey boy, take a look at me by weakspots

Summary: Ryan is 27, for Christ’s sake, and he’s not exactly hideous, so there’s really no reason to spend his money on a dude — a dude — whose face he’ll never see but whose livestreams he’s been jerking off to for roughly 4 months now. He should be going out and partying and fucking random chicks. Or a guy, whatever, just to get it out of his system and confirm to himself that he really is 100% straight.

Because he is. This is morbid curiosity, if anything.

Review: I’ve been a long-time fan of this universe and it was a universe I didn’t know I needed until this author gave it to us. We or rather me, a desperate audience, just devoured this with every update. Not only is it hot, but it has the delicious intrigue of secret identity, anonymous stuff and a LOT of blush-worthy prose therein. This version of Shane makes me thrive but the titillating nature of straight-identifying!Ryan being bowled over by the turn of events that leads him to his world tilting into the gravity of a camboy just--you Have to read this one!

Heartbeat by quackers

Summary: So the guy Ryan sits next to at work is a vampire. That’s no big deal, right?

Review: I could talk your literal ear off about this fic. Vampires, man. I love the trope; you don’t know me as a person if you don’t know this at least. And this fic kept me fed all damn year. It was a readable garden. If there is one thing I can guarantee about quackers’ work, it’s that their world-building is a festival of detail. The realms and alternate universes they work with while still managing to keep Shane and Ryan’s voices so familiar and real is a talent not attributed to your everyday author. This fic propelled me into wanting to write more and more because quackers makes stories so much fun! Reading their work is, to me, not unlike the feeling I got when I was younger and finding series that speak to my need to escape this crummy existence, made me want to believe in fun spicy things like a vampire that lived through centuries, cynical but still searching, navigating a world where people are still people, adjusting to differences and prejudices, finding comfort in a guy that understands that and more. I’ve talked about this fic in more than a few different posts so I’d just be reiterating a lot of things I loved about the more historical aspects of Shane’s journey, the way Ryan is so firmly curious and inventive in ways to connect with Shane. Look, even if vampires aren’t your thing, I can promise that if you visit quackers list of work, you will find something for your supernatural-lovin’ palate that speaks to a gentler side of your own curiosity about monsters and the jocks that love them. lol.

I’ll Crawl Home by carrieonfighting

Summary: “Shane was almost unnerved by how quickly he’d settled into this body, this name, this life - his friendship with Ryan was the most time he’d spent with any human before, and yet the man fascinated him.”

Review: This is the second fic I think of when someone says the words ‘demon!Shane’ to me because ohhhh my word, this fic is a masterpiece. I really am hard-pressed to find anything better than the feeling I get when I think of demon!Shane headcanons interwoven with the irl Buzzfeed reality and the idea of the Ryan as we know him being protected and watched and loved so deeply by a demon that found him so long ago and wanted nothing but to protect him. I feel an almost vicious glee reliving that moment when Ryan and Shane are on goatman’s bridge and man, I just really love canonical fic mixed with a slight twist. The writing in this makes it work so well with lines that still haunt my heart and soul like “Ryan liked popcorn. So did the demon. Genuinely, not just out of a desire to please the human – he liked the way it crunched between his vessel’s teeth. There were some aspects of taking a corporeal form that were… nice; laughing, coffee, feeling warm. Ryan made him laugh.” FUCK! The beautiful agony of it, watching the demon fall in love with Ryan through the eyes of his vessel. Just stark with pain and unspoken, well-written angst and pain with a perfect ending, I wouldn’t change for anything. I love this for us as a fandom and will always love that author crafted this piece and shared it with us. (Also every time I hear Work Song by Hozier, I think of this fic again and sigh).

#shyan fic #shyan #shyanbookclub #otp: we took an oath

208 notes · View notes

elk-ambrose-scott-writing · 4 years ago

Text

Legato Bluesummers

Source: Trigun

Trauma-Rama: Childhood sexual abuse, sexual slavery, murder, body modification

Adulthood in twenty words or less: Emotionless killer bent on destroying human life, especially the good twin, blows shit up with his mind

Why they’re deplorable: Legato is cool as hell. He survived a horrible, horrible childhood because Vash the Stampede’s evil twin, Millions Knives, blew up the town he lived in and Legato started following him around because he had no one else. Now, he’s a psychic killer, using his mind to ruin everyone’s day. He hates Vash for...reasons. He just hates the guy because the evil twin hates him, and he wants to corrupt him and force Vash to admit that he’s just as bad as everyone else...he’s a turbo pessimist with the powers to back up his drive to be the ultimate Debbie Downer. He’s not the main big bad, but he’s one of the better villains Vash fights during the series.

Crowning moment of evil: You’ll have to head to my blog to find out

Ryo (Satan)

Source: Devilman (and it’s many, many incarnations)

Trauma-Rama: Literally being Satan, dead father (before he remembers that he is literally Satan)

Adulthood/Adolescence in twenty words or less: (As Satan) You can’t friendzone the devil/(As Ryo) In love with his stupid best friend, big guns, and killing demons

Why they’re deplorable: Ryo is almost cheating. He isn’t the antagonist until the end of the series, and it’s not a stab in the back like the next entry on this list because he’s so creepy the whole damn show! His hoe/foe-yay with Akira is actually canon, and the yaoi fan-critter in me rejoiced. So, at the start, you think he’s a strange guy who’s discovered the true threat of demons and needs his pure-hearted best friend Akira to become Devilman to help him stop them. And then, he gradually realizes that he is the literal devil. Honestly, Devilman is so bonkers and batshit that I can’t help but love it, and Ryo.

Crowning moment of evil: Visit the blog for video evidence

Griffith

Source: Berserk

Trauma-Rama: Loss of parents, war, engaging in sex work for war funds

Adulthood in twenty words or less: Asshole bird-man with a god complex who did everything wrong

Why they’re deplorable: Griffith is...you fall in love with this stupid bird bastard in the beginning of Berserk, and then he goes and betrays Guts and ruins everything for everyone and becomes Femto, member of the Godhand, and then he becomes Griffith again, commander of a monster army, and I want to kick him in the dick until he pees blood. I cannot stress this enough. Even knowing that Griffith turning evil, raping Casca and torturing Guts was coming, I still fell in love with Griffith and I was dreading the Eclipse with every fiber of my being. He makes you empathize with him before he betrays the audience. I can’t imagine reading or watching Berserk when it was first coming out, because that would have devastated fans. I have so much I could say about Griffith, so I should shut up and let you continue reading.

Crowning moment of evil: you probably know already, but you should still visit the blog anyway

Gilgamesh/Archer

Source: Fate Zero, Fate Stay Night, Fate Grand Order

Trauma-Rama: Losing his best and only-est friend

Adulthood in twenty words or less: I’m the King, bitches, and everyone who disagrees is getting hit in the head with my fanciest shit

Why they’re deplorable: Gilgamesh is an amoral demigod summoned as a “heroic spirit” to fight in Holy Grail wars. But he doesn’t want the grail for it’s awesome wish-granting powers. He wants it because it’s shiny and he likes treasure. That’s really it, at first. Then he wants to take over the world, which is also in character, because the world is also shiny. He’s just so self-assured of his own greatness that you both a) love watching his arrogant ass prance all over the screen and b) can’t wait for him to get his comeuppance. He’s such a bastard. The golden, crowning standard that all bastards strive to be.

Crowning moment of evil: How can you pick just one--check out the blog to find out which one made the top

DIO

Source: JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure

Trauma-Rama: Child abuse, death of parents

Adulthood in twenty words or less: Turbo-bisexual vampire with an irrational hatred of shirts and other clothes that make sense

Why they’re deplorable: I truly saved the best (worst?) for last. DIO (and yes, you can only write it in caps lock) is the most meme-able anime villain of all time. He’s so bat-shit evil, and has such a good time doing it, that you just can’t help but watch. He manipulates everyone into hating his foster brother, kills his dog, assaults his girlfriend, and then acts like a whiny bitch when JoJo whoops his ass. And that’s just the first two episodes! DIO becomes a vampire and then turns his evil up to eleven, killing people, making zombies, kidnapping children...and then tops it off by stealing Jonathan’s body in front of his foster brother’s new wife. On his honeymoon. Despicable. He returns for part three as a vampire cult-leader with an army of trained stand users bent on destroying the Joestar bloodline. And he refuses to wear a shirt. I think he comes back in part six, but I haven’t read it yet so I don’t know what he does in it. He doesn’t give a shit about anyone but himself, and revels in how selfish and evil he is. DIO is an incredible adversary, and there’s never a dull moment with DIO around.

Crowning moment of evil: You get a bonus: it was his whole life. But still, check out the blog here: https://elkascott.wordpress.com/2021/01/23/top-five-anime-villains/

15 notes · View notes

bnhayyy · 3 years ago

Text

The Call (3)

Chapter Title: Secret

Wordcount: 8.2k

Fic Tag: Click

Ao3 Link: Click

Chapter Summary: Between civilians learning about the supernatural and a new player introducing herself, Mikasa has a hard day. And Annie lies. A lot.

Notes: Preemptively, I want to let you know that chapter lengths for this fic are going to vary wildly. I outline chapters before I write them and use events and intensity to pace out what all goes in a chapter. Chapter length is simply however many words it takes to turn the outline into an actual chapter. This means that while the average chapter length will probably be about 4k, some will be significantly shorter, while others, such as this one, will be significantly longer. Also! If you are enjoying this fic, please consider joining my writing discord.

Erwin called Mikasa after trigonometry the next day, just before she could start her patrol. When she didn't answer, he sent a text. That, combined with the knowledge of just how rarely he texted, made her pause.

Smith: Meet me in my office

Smith: It’s urgent

Mikasa frowned down at the message. To say that she didn't relish the thought of jumping at the watcher's beck and call was an understatement, especially when doing so would delay her patrol. However, despite her attempts to avoid him, she had come to realize that he was not the sort of man to use words like 'urgent' lightly. For him to do so now…

Mina hadn't returned to class that day.

Mikasa pursed her lips and allowed herself to get lost in her frustration as she gazed down at the text for a moment longer. Then, with a furtive glance at the rapidly darkening sky, she shoved her phone in her pocket and turned on her heel.

It was a short walk to Erwin's office. Located on the second floor of the English department building, it wasn't especially large or convenient, but it was simple. Inconspicuous. It was, she supposed, what he could manage as a teacher at a community college, for that was what he was to the public.

She wasn't certain how he had convinced the administration to allow him to paint the walls pink.

Armin had suggested that it was because he was charismatic. Personally, she didn't see it, but that didn't particularly matter. None of it did, in the end. She was probably going to be told about a particularly vicious vampire preying on college students. Or maybe a flesh-eating demon, considering that there hadn't been any remains found. Whatever it was, it would be horrible news. And if she was going to receive that horrible news inside a small pink room, then she was going to receive that horrible news inside a small pink room. The only thing that mattered was that she learned what she had to learn and killed what she had to kill.

The whole thing was perfectly laid out in her mind. Perhaps that was why she didn't bother knocking when she reached Erwin's office; she thought she knew what to expect.

She didn't expect to open the door and find four people crowded around Erwin's desk, one of them holding a red-stained cloth to his neck.

Mikasa automatically stumbled a step back at the same time that five pairs of eyes swung toward her. It was with a faint burst of surprise that she realized she could recognize all of them. Reiner was standing in front of the desk, his face a mask of grave urgency. Jean sat in a chair beside him, clutching the cloth to his bleeding neck. Whereas Reiner seemed unsurprised by her arrival, Jean's eyes were wide and shocked. Finally, a pair of goofballs from her history class stood off in the corner, whispering frantically to each other even as their gazes remained locked on Mikasa.

They only stared at each other in silence for a moment. It was a moment too long for Mikasa. With a tense knot of discomfort growing tighter within her by the second, she turned her attention to the person she least wanted to see right now, but most needed to hear from.

"Erwin," she croaked. "What's going on?"

"Mikasa," Erwin began, his expression steady and voice damningly even. Like his urgent matter hadn't just called her into an office full of civilians. Like it didn't look like something was happening that was very much not supposed to happen. "There was an attack on campus today."

"A vampire attack," Jean muttered, the shell-shocked disbelief plain in his voice. Reiner gave him a sympathetic look and a pat on the shoulder. Jean immediately winced and rubbed his free hand against the base of his neck, causing Reiner to withdraw with an apologetic look.

"A vampire attack," the ponytailed goofball repeated, her voice a conflicted mixture of excited, awe-struck, and terrified. Her friend, meanwhile, just looked horrified. It was a look that she saw mirrored on Jean's face, although he also seemed a little more distant and nauseous. Probably because of the blood loss.

Mikasa tried to ignore all three of them. Even so, she couldn't help but shoot brief glances their way every few seconds. Erwin, however, had no such problem. He just spared Jean a short, semi-concerned glance before continuing. "Mister Kirstein was attacked in full view of Miss Braus and Mister Springer. I arrived just in time to see the vampire dispatched by Mister Braun." He paused, casting a long, searching look at Reiner.

"And now they know," Mikasa said, unsure if she was numb, or feeling too many things at once. She supposed it was a good thing that Eren wasn't there. The office suddenly felt too damn claustrophobic without an extra presence, even one that didn’t really exist.

"Well, I've known about stuff like this for a while," Reiner admitted with a shrug. Despite having the full force of Erwin's piercing gaze on him, he managed to look only a little uncomfortable. At another time, she may have been impressed.

"I thought you might," Erwin said. "Most civilians don't walk around with stakes on them."

"Is that what that was?" the bald goofball murmured. There was a distant, shaken quality to his voice. Mikasa could understand it, but couldn't quite get herself to care right now. Heedless to her judgment, the goofball continued. "A vampire killing thing? I've seen it before, when you were getting stuff from your bag. I just thought you were really into woodworking."

Reiner blinked. "I'm terrible at carpentry," he said.

"Really?" the bald guy asked. "You don't look it."

"Are we really having this conversation right now?" Jean whispered.

"No," Mikasa cut in.

To Erwin, she asked, "why did you call me here? Do you think this vampire is the one responsible for the disappearances?" Three civilians finding out about the existence of the supernatural had the potential to be bad, but she didn't see how calling the slayer into the situation could make it better. She couldn't see how getting her involved could do anything but make it worse.

But if Erwin had called her in to talk about the vampire, why did it sound like Reiner had already killed it? And why did he call her in while everyone else was still there?

"I doubt it," Erwin said, lending unfortunate credence to the sinking feeling in her stomach. "If a supernatural being is behind those, it has been far more careful than this vampire was. It may have been emboldened by the disappearances, but that is likely the full extent of the connection."

"So you don't think a demon is behind them?" Mikasa challenged. At the same time, the girl with the ponytail piped back up to ask, "wait - so Franz and Hannah and all them; a vampire was behind all those?"

Erwin frowned. In the seconds that he took to compose his reply, Jean grumbled, "I thought they were talking about demons."

"Vampires are demons," Reiner chimed in. "It's just that not all demons are vampires."

"Right," Jean said, a heavy sigh leaving him along with his words. He slumped forward, closed his eyes, and pinched the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb. "I guess it doesn't matter if there's something out there killing people either way."

"We don't know that," Erwin finally said. Meeting Mikasa's gaze with his own, he said, "I'm not saying that it isn't a demon responsible for this. However, most demons leave some form of remains behind and don't bother hiding them well, let alone this thoroughly. We cannot afford to dismiss the possibility that there is a human behind this."

Jean dropped his face fully into his hand and made a noise that was halfway between a laugh and the sound of someone choking. "And I don't suppose there's any chance that this could all be one big coincidence?"

"Yeah," the bald guy piped up. "That guy tried to take a chunk out of Jean's neck, but I mean, have you met Jean? I can't say I'd blame-"

"Shut up, Connie," Jean grumbled.

Reiner tried to hide a laugh with a cough into his fist. Jean raised his head and lowered his hand to shoot him a glare. Meanwhile, Erwin offered a small, sad smile.

"It is possible," the watcher said. "But at this point, it would be best not to get your hopes up."

"Yeah," the ponytailed girl murmured. "Take a look around; it's been starting to feel like an episode of Frontline around here."

"Don't be silly, Sasha," Connie chided, his already shaky voice sounding that much more agitated. "There are no vampires in Frontline."

A thoughtful look flickered across Erwin's face. "Actually-"

Mikasa felt something inside of her snap. "So you aren't ready to commit to it being a demon," she said, voice cold as the arctic. "Fine. You still haven't told me why I'm here ."

Erwin's expression shifted, but it was too fast and undefined for her to stand a chance at telling exactly how. That was fine. She didn't particularly care at the moment.

"Jean, Sasha, and Connie all know about the existence of the supernatural now," he began, his voice never once rising or showing any sign of losing balance in face of her ire. "For their own safety, it would be best for them to learn more."

Mikasa had to fight back the urge to grind her teeth together. She wouldn't have bothered if it was just her. Unfortunately, allowing this collection of near-strangers and one almost-friend to see how much he was getting to her was simply unacceptable. Instead, she kept her voice even and measured in its coldness as she said, "and you want me to teach them."

"No," Erwin said. "I wouldn't expect that of you. I will tell them everything that they need to know. I called you here because if there are more people in the area who are aware, it would be safest for us to know about each other."

Unthinkingly, Mikasa's gaze drifted to Reiner, and his eyes met hers.

There was a moment of silence in which one could hear a pin drop.

Unfortunately, Erwin was good at reading things like that. "Is there something I should know?" he asked.

Mikasa and Reiner maintained eye contact for a long moment, him frowning while her expression remained stuck in one of neutrality, unsure of what to think and feel. She had known that the existence of a second slayer was something that she should come to her watcher with. It had simply been too easy not to with everything else that was clogging up her mind. But now the subject had resurfaced, and she found herself unsure of what course of action should be taken.

It was supposed to be the watcher council's duty to assist and guide the slayer. That did not mean that they were beyond reproach. She knew of their capacity for failure, was always aware of the damage that might have been avoided if they had simply been a little faster, a little smarter, found her a little sooner

That was damage wrought by inaction. And unfortunately, with how long that inaction had persisted, she did not yet have any true way to gauge what harm they may do when they were actually involved.

With everything so unsure, what right did she have to hand Annie over to them?

Perhaps it was a good thing that it had come up while one of Annie's friends was around. That meant that it ultimately wasn't her call to make.

Mikasa couldn't help but feel a burst of selfish relief when Reiner finally turned his gaze toward Erwin, a heavy sigh leaving his lips.

"My friend Bertolt also knows," Reiner hesitantly admitted. "Because our friend, Annie, is also a slayer."

Erwin froze. His normally composed facade fractured just enough for a hint of shock to bleed through. Mikasa may have enjoyed it were it not for how his sharp eyes immediately sought her out. It seemed that her apparent familiarity with Reiner had made him dismiss the possibility that his words were as much news to her as him; that look was commanding her to talk.

Not demanding. Commanding. She didn't know exactly what the difference was, but in that moment, she knew it was there. It told her that she would not be able to worm her way out of this no matter how hard she tried. That was why, for the second time in as many days, she forced those horrible words out of her mouth and tried not to let them touch her. "Something happened not long after I was called. I died for a few minutes."

Suddenly, she was acutely away of Jean, Connie, and Sasha's silence, of their eyes boring into her. Her skin crawled beneath Erwin's piercing gaze. Even Reiner's contemplative expression, for all that she'd already told him this story yesterday, felt like too much.

She tried to brush the suffocating feeling off with a shrug. When that failed, she added, "I didn't think it was important."

"It is," Erwin said.

"Yeah," Mikasa murmured. "I can see that."

That horrible silence returned. Or at least, it tried to. Sasha interrupted it by taking a step forward and stammering out, "So, I- uh- I know that this might be a bad time, but. What's a slayer?"

Erwin cast Mikasa a long look. Then, slowly, he said, "I think it might be better to discuss this with all of us here." Turning his attention to Reiner, he asked, "do you think your friends would be willing to meet with us tomorrow morning? Say, in the library, at nine o'clock?"

"There's an us now, huh?" Jean murmured. His expression was lost and distant, save for the hint of sadness that flickered across his features when he glanced at Mikasa every few seconds.

Meanwhile, Reiner slowly nodded. "Yeah. Bertolt might have work, but Annie- I can't promise she'll be happy, but yeah, I think I can swing it."

"Good," Erwin said. "Mikasa-"

She cut him off, clinging to one of the only thoughts she could formulate at the moment. "You said it's safer for everyone who knows about the supernatural to know about each other," she said. "Do you really believe that?"

The council had done nothing to earn her trust, but she could admit that Erwin possessed a decent amount of expertise on certain matters. Enough so that his opinion may be worth considering here

Erwin blinked. "Of course," he said. "It's safest not to know, but where that fails, there's safety in numbers."

"I'm going to tell Marco, then," Jean said, voice steadier than it had been throughout the rest of the conversation

"I strongly advise against it," Erwin cautioned. "It may be hard to believe, but it is safest not to know about these things. Once you are aware, the odds of you being targeted by a vampire or demon increase exponentially. After what happened earlier, it would be irresponsible for me not to teach you how to defend yourself, but believe me when I say that your friend is better off not knowing."

It looked like Jean had more to say, but Mikasa didn't see a point in sticking around to hear it. Not when she already knew everything she needed and had so many reasons to leave. She gave a stiff nod and said, "I'll bring Armin with me tomorrow."

With that, she turned around and swept out of the room - and away from all of the pitying looks.

She had to patrol.

***

The sun had long since sunken over the horizon by the time she was able to head out on patrol. She couldn't help but be irritated by the time lost despite knowing that it probably wouldn't make any difference. Most demons, especially vampires, weren't truly active until two or three hours after nightfall. The meeting may have eaten up a chunk of her time, but it hadn't taken that long. It was most likely that she hadn't missed anything at all.

Most likely. What about the times when unlikely things happened? If there had been something out there and she had missed it...

Mikasa fought down the frustration threatening to well up and forced herself to focus on the situation as it was. If something had happened in the extra time that she was away, then she had missed it. There was nothing she could do that could change that. What she had to do now was keep her eyes peeled for potential threats.

The graveyard seemed empty aside from herself; not even Eren was there to accompany her. That was good. She wanted space after what Erwin had dropped on her. However, there was something about the emptiness that set her on edge, the creeping feeling that she was wrong, that she had to be missing something. It almost made her wish that-

"Well," a bright, mocking voice reached down from above. "If it isn't the slayer. Sun set... oof, over an hour ago, but hey. Don't rush on my account."

Mikasa turned around, stepped back, and looked up. There was an old oak tree not five feet away from where she was standing. Its branches were wide and sprawling. Sitting with her feet dangling over the edge of one of the thickest ones, dangerously close to directly over her, was a woman. She thought she saw brown hair and freckles, but it was difficult to make out between the low light of the evening and the additional shade of the tree. The thing that really stood out was her grin, wide and jeering. Like someone laughing at a joke that they hadn't yet seen fit to let anyone else in on.

In a situation like this, odds were that she was the joke.

Mikasa took a few more deft steps back, just to put some more space between herself and the stranger. Then she scowled. Questions like 'who are you' and 'what did you want' were worse than pointless. So instead, she commanded, "get down."

"Mmm, no," the woman said. "I don't feel like fighting tonight. Besides, you should be happy to get a break."

Mikasa didn't say anything. She looked over at the oak tree and followed the path up to the branch that the woman was sitting on, trying to figure out how to get at her without giving her an advantage in the process.

The woman didn't seem at all bothered by her silence - or by her very visibly scoping out the situation. She cheerfully continued, "I mean, you work your ass off pretty much every night, even when there isn't actually anything to do. But I can guarantee that nothing's going to happen tonight; not with me around."

That made Mikasa pause, but not for a good reason. She felt every muscle in her body tense as her gaze jerked back to the woman. "Why is that?" she asked.

"Why else?" the stranger asked. "Paradis is a small pond, and I'm the biggest fish."

The biggest fish.

With recent events, what would being the biggest fish entail?

As far as Mikasa was concerned, it was as good as a confession.

She was moving before she even stopped to think about it. She spun around to the other side of the tree, putting some distance between herself and the stranger, and planted one foot firmly amidst the roots at its base. Her other foot was placed in the middle of the trunk. One push, and she was able to reach out to grasp one of the low-hanging branches. Mikasa pulled and quickly twisted herself up to the top of the trunk, where it split away into a maze of branches-

And was met with a grumbled, "for fuck's sake." In the milliseconds she spent straightening up and catching her balance, she saw the woman jump off the branch and gracefully land on the cemetery ground.

She landed crouched. It was an eye-catching pose, but also one that would put unnecessary stress on her shins. She was showing off.

The stranger straightened up, met Mikasa's eyes, and raised an eyebrow. "You sure you wanna do this?" she asked,

Mikasa jumped down, landing on the balls of her feet.

"Fine," the woman grumbled. "Guess I can spare a few minutes."

Mikasa stiffened, one hand reaching toward her bag, and kept her eyes glued on her opponent. Said opponent put a hand on her hip and scoffed.

"Waiting for me to make the first move?" she asked. "I told you, I'm not looking for a fight tonight. You wanna do this, it's on you."

Mikasa grit her teeth, but complied. She lunged at her opponent's left, only to switch and throw a punch at the right side of her face at the last second.

The feint didn't matter. The woman just stepped backward, far swifter than Mikasa had expected - possibly, she faintly realized, faster than she could keep up with.

"Fast," she taunted, "but not the fastest."

Mikasa leaned forward and swung a leg out. Her foot clipped the side of the woman's leg, but she wasn't fast enough to keep her from dodging most of the blow with a clumsy jump.

She did, however, get her face to morph into the lumpy, fanged, snarling visage of a vampire.

Mikasa drew back several steps, shrugged her bag off to dangle from the crook of her elbow, unzipped it, and pulled out her stake, all in no more than three seconds. As she did, the vampire paused.

"Oh, no," she said. "I'll let you know when I'm ready for a deathmatch, thanks."

This time, when Mikasa lunged forward, so did the vampire. Mikasa aimed for her chest, aim true and stake primed to plunge into her heart. But when the wooden tip was only centimeters away, the vampire shoved at Mikasa's shoulder while veering sharply to the side. Mikasa heard and felt her stake sinking into flesh, but knew without looking that she had missed the heart. She couldn't look, for it was a blow driven by pure momentum, the force of the shove having lifted her off her feet and sent her flying. She could only be grateful that she didn't hit a gravestone when she slammed against the ground.

Her second time knocked off her feet in as many nights. Once again, her head began to ring, be it from the new impact or agitating what might have been a lingering concussion. The echo of pain emanating from her ankle was definitely leftover from the night before. This time, however, she didn't hesitate or allow either of them to overcome her.

She scrambled to her feet as soon as physically possible. As she did so she heard the vampire indignantly mutter from several feet away, "aw, fuck. That shirt was a gift."

The vampire. Vampires weren't strong enough to do that; not the ones she would usually find wandering graveyards and stake on a patrol. That meant that this one had to be old. Old and powerful, and too big of a threat to be left alone.

The sort of vampire that would have no problem picking off college students and hiding their bodies.

Mikasa got to her feet just in time to see the vampire yank her stake out from where it was wedged in her shoulder. She winced, but most of her attention seemed to be on her shirt - and the significantly sized bloodstain slowly spreading through it.

"When were you turned?" Mikasa demanded.

"About five or six years ago," the vampire mumbled. She didn't even bother looking at Mikasa, instead tugging at the edge of her shirt with the hand that was still gripping her stake while poking at it with her pointer finger.

For a few seconds, Mikasa could only stare at the vampire with wide, disbelieving eyes. When she found her voice, it was to sputter, "that's-"

"What can I say, some vampires are stronger than others." The vampire finally let go of her shirt and looked at Mikasa. Her face split into a shark-like grin, an action that was closely followed by a laugh. "Or maybe I'm just special."

The vampire tossed Mikasa the stake, which she caught on reflex. She didn't dare look away from her, but the sticky warmth coating the lower half of the stake told her what she would see if she looked. Blood, where if Mikasa had been a little better, or maybe just had a better idea of what she was dealing with, it would be covered in ash.

"I'm Ymir, by the way," the vampire remarked.

Mikasa narrowed her eyes. "I didn't ask." If this vampire was as young as she said, then knowing her name probably wouldn't help anything. Not that it mattered. Even if she had to figure it out by herself, she didn't plan on this vampire being around for much longer. She couldn't be allowed to kill anyone else.

"Well, I wanted you to know," Ymir said. She took a step back and offered Mikasa a lazy wave. From the arm that wasn't near the stake wound, Mikasa was almost pleased to note. "See you around, slayer. I'll let you know if I decide I want a deathmatch with you after all." The vampire began to turn around, only to pause and offer Mikasa one last mocking grin. "Oh, or the other one. It'd be rude not to keep both slayers in the loop."

With that, she turned around and ran. Mikasa took off after her, but was quickly outpaced. Before she knew it, Ymir had disappeared into the distance, leaving Mikasa standing at the edge of the graveyard with nothing to show but anger, frustration, and more questions than she could begin to know what to do with.

***

Annie was almost electric with anger. It wasn't quite enough to breach her composed surface, but she could feel it, pulsating just beneath her skin.

Reiner was smart enough that he wavered at the look Annie gave him when he first told her what he'd done. However, that flash of fear hadn't lasted. Now that they were approaching the library, the bastard even had the gall to look entirely unrepentant.

"They'll probably end up killed, now that you've dragged them into this," Annie whispered, thinking of the three dipshits Reiner had deemed worth dragging them into this situation.

Reiner shrugged. "Eventually, maybe."

"So why did you save them?"

"I like them," he said, like that answered everything.

Annie shot him an annoyed look.

"They're fun," he elaborated. "Or at least…" He gave a snort of laughter. "Connie and Sasha are fun; Jean's just entertaining in general. Even if something gets them later on, they're worth keeping around for a while longer."

"Implying that you aren't going to 'get them'," Annie muttered.

Reiner shrugged again. "Like I said, I like them."

Again, he said it like that was all that mattered. Maybe it was. Apparently, it didn't matter if someone was a good person, or if they had a good life ahead of them, or if there were people who would miss them. Whether someone's life was worth saving, or even just sparing from his killing spree, was determined solely by whether or not he liked them.

Annie stared at her companion for several long seconds before she broke and looked away.

The rest of the walk to the library was spent in silence.

They both hesitated when they reached the door. For the first time since breaking the news to her, Reiner looked doubtful.

Perhaps that, combined with her anger at him, was why she opened the door and strode in like she owned the place.

She immediately knew where she was supposed to go. From the entryway, she could just make out a motley assortment of people gathered around a table tucked into the corner. She had known to expect them, but that didn't make seeing them together any less strange. Sasha Braus and Connie Springer were there, both of whom she recognized from the art class Bertolt had encouraged her to try in an attempt to have some "fun" during the mission. Jean Kirstein also shared that course with her, although based on how much they bickered with each other, she doubted that he was actually friends with either of the buffoons. Finally, there was Erwin Smith. Her English professor.

The watcher.

Annie didn't let herself hesitate beyond the moment it took to spot the group. Perverse though it was, if she wanted to avoid being suspicious, she had to keep going. Reiner's footsteps, surprisingly quiet for those who didn't know his true nature, informed her that she wasn't the only one.

Good. If he was going to get her into this mess, the least he could do was help her see it through.

She could tell the exact moment that the watcher noticed her. It wasn't in how he straightened up or even how he looked her way; the other three all did something similar as she approached and she didn't see anything special in those reactions. Smith's tell was in how his eyes gleamed, bright and warm, but with an unyielding sharpness hidden beneath.

That gleam told her that she would have to step carefully. That this man was dangerous.

"Miss Leonhardt," he said, rising from his seat when she reached the table. "It is a pleasure to meet you properly." He extended his hand. Annie forced herself to reach out and shake it without hesitation.

"Likewise," she murmured.

"Your other friend wasn't able to make it?" he inquired. His eyes were bright with curiosity as he asked, but nothing more dangerous. Not that she could see, anyway. She could be wrong. Even if she wasn't, simple curiosity was dangerous enough. One small misstep could see it turning into something more threatening.

"Bertolt takes online classes," Reiner said as he walked by, before she had a chance to say anything. "He works most of the time during the day. Kinda sucks, but it pays the bills." He pulled up a chair beside his pets and sat down in a leisurely sprawl, like this whole ruse was no real stress to him. She supposed she should be happy about it right now.

"I see," Smith said, shifting his gaze toward Reiner. "Well, I would love to meet him sometime."

Reiner shrugged. "We can probably make it happen."

Annie forced herself not to react, not to frown or glare or feel like Reiner was throwing Bertolt under a bus. He wasn't; they'd all trained for this. Even without the gem of amara, it would take more than one meeting with a watcher to figure Bertolt out.

Smith turned his attention back to Annie, reams of questions dancing in his eyes. However, another voice piped up before he could ask any of them.

"So, Annie's the - er, wait - a slayer?"

Annie frowned at Sasha. She wasn't the only one; Connie groaned while Jean shook his head and Reiner raised an eyebrow at her.

"I already told you that," Reiner pointed out.

"I know, " Sasha defended. "But it's one thing to hear it and another totally to see that it's actually Annie. Like, Annie Leonhardt Annie."

"Did you think it was a different Annie?" Connie asked.

"No, but like... we know her."

"We know Mikasa, too."

"We do ." Sasha leaned back in her chair, balancing it on its back two legs as she looked up at the ceiling and groaned. "God, this is so weird. Demons are a thing and vampires are a thing and slayers are a thing and we know both of them ."

"I mean, it makes sense that Mikasa and Annie would be slayers," Connie said. He looked over at Annie as he added, "you're both kinda... intense. The same brand of intense, sorta."

"And you're both idiots," Jean grumbled.

Connie shot him a grin. "You're just upset that you have to share the secret with us and not Marco," he said.

Jean scowled. "Of course I am," he snapped. "Marco actually has a few brain cells to his name."

The conversation devolved into bickering from there. Annie tuned it out, instead keeping her gaze glued to Smith as she followed him back to the table and took a seat. He seemed fondly exasperated, like he was watching a group of bickering toddlers rather than the college students he apparently planned on teaching about the supernatural. But that was toward them. Toward her, he seemed not quite trusting, but not actively suspicious either.

Good. She hadn't managed to fuck it up within the first five minutes.

As Smith himself took a seat, Annie allowed her gaze to drift over to Reiner. He still looked perfectly comfortable, now with a bright grin adorning his face as he watched Jean and Connie bicker. Of course. Connie was fun and Jean was entertaining.

Annie wanted to close her eyes, to let herself drift off and away from this place. But she couldn't do that. So instead, she did the next best thing - she changed the subject.

"Where's Mikasa?" she asked, looking back at Smith.

The watcher frowned. "I'm sure she'll be here soo-"

He was interrupted by the sound of the library door opening; the devil herself come to prove him right. Or maybe she was the angel in this metaphor. Annie certainly couldn't picture herself as anything but a devil, given the circumstances.

Mikasa looked exhausted. Not horrible, not quite, but close. Close enough that it had to be costing her. There were dark rings under her eyes and she was visibly favoring the foot that she had injured the night Annie saved her. Her eyes, while still bright with the sort of obsessive determination that drove someone to patrol even when they were at their limit, also flickered with shadows.

She wasn't alone.

"Armin," Annie called, part greeting, part observation. She didn't bother hiding the surprise that crept into her voice or keeping her eyes from widening. From what she'd seen, Mikasa was enough of a loner that she figured anyone would be surprised to see her bring someone with her, especially with how insistent she seemed to be about slayers keeping their nature secret. Even if that someone already knew about her.

At least, those were her feelings. A quick glance around the table revealed that no one else seemed caught off guard - like they'd known to expect an extra person.

Annie narrowed her eyes at Reiner, who just shrugged.

"Armin," Annie returned, a slight smile touching his lips. "It's nice to see you."

"You know each other?" Smith asked.

"We study together," Armin said.

"Interesting." Smith cast a long look around the table, then turned his attention back to Armin. "Do you know Jean, Connie, and Sasha as well?"

"Yes," Armin said. "We've met. I think - I think everyone here knows each other in one way or another."

Smith nodded. "That'll make this easier, then."

Annie caught a hint of doubt flash across Mikasa's face as she walked past her to take a seat. One chair down from her, specifically. Armin sat down between them, probably prepared to play intermediary between two surly women.

Smart. Unfortunately, if the plan was going to be a success, she needed to get Mikasa to trust her enough that she didn't need an intermediary.

Mikasa barely spared Annie a glance. Her gaze was all but glued to Jean, Sasha, and Connie. "What has Erwin told you?" she asked.

"A lot," Connie said, while Sasha let out a tiny groan and dropped her head back.

"He told us what the slayer is," Jean said. "A girl with super-strength, chosen by the ‘powers that be’ to defend humanity against vampires, demons, and the ‘forces of darkness’." Although his words were outwardly respectful, there was an unmissable hint of disdain, like he was still expecting to be told that this was all some big joke. It was annoying, but probably a better coping mechanism than breaking down outright. "Everything, basically," he finished.

"He can't have told you everything," Mikasa said, tone sharp. "There hasn't been enough time."

"Mikasa is correct," Smith said. He offered Jean a placating smile. "I'm afraid what I've told you so far are only the basics. It will take far longer to get you caught up completely."

Sasha let out another, louder groan while Connie gave a dismayed squawk. Jean frowned, but like Armin, Annie thought that she caught a flicker of interest on his face.

"For now," Smith continued, "I would like to get everyone on the same page." Annie felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up as the watcher turned his attention toward her. "Annie, am I correct in assuming that you have never had a watcher?"

"You are," Annie said.

"I see." As he spoke, there was a shift to the gleam in his eyes, something sharper than curiosity coming into play. Doubt. Suspicion. She was going to have to step carefully now, and apparently, she was going to have to do it in front of everyone.

Fine. All the better to make them think that she had nothing to hide.

"If you don't mind me asking," Smith continued, "without a watcher, what made you suspect that you're the slayer?"

They were waiting for me to be called.

"Things started coming after me," Annie said. "I've always taken martial arts, but I was suddenly a lot stronger. And they started calling me the slayer." She shrugged. "You can test me if you want. I'm the real deal."

"You seem very certain," Smith said, an unexpected hint of appreciation in his voice. "So your local demonic community told you that you're the slayer; how did you find out exactly what a slayer is ?"

"Google," Reiner said.

Smith paused, a frown creeping across his face. "Google," he repeated.

"Google," Reiner confirmed.

"It was the same for me," Mikasa interjected, a faintly pensive expression drifting across her face. "It wasn't easy to find, but the information's there. And once I found something that matched what was happening to me..."

"I tried looking stuff up last night!" Sasha piped up, grinning. "I didn’t get really far; 'vampires' was kinda broad, and demons, well..." Her grin faded into something caught between a frown and a grimace. "It gets weird on the internet," she summarized. "But I tried!"

"Congrats on your freaky porn," Connie remarked.

The effect was instantaneous. While Annie resisted the urged to roll her eyes, Jean scowled and scooted his chair away from Sasha, Armin turned red and looked down at his lap, Mikasa gave Sasha a look that was caught between disapproval and judgmental, and Reiner fell short of holding back a snicker.

"I didn't say it was porn!" Sasha cried.

"But you did say it was the internet," Reiner pointed out, a shit-eating grin on his face.

"We're getting off-topic," Smith patiently pointed out.

"Thank you," Annie muttered.

"Reiner," Smith began, "you said that you and your friend have been with Annie since the beginning?"

"Yeah," Reiner said, his expression drifting back into something more serious. "She came to us when she got her power-up and we helped her figure out what was happening. And after that..." He shrugged. "We weren't going to let her deal with that stuff alone. "

Smith nodded slowly. "That's very brave of you," he murmured.

He said 'brave', but a faint flicker in his eyes and something tucked into the cadence of his voice made her suspect that he meant something else, or at least that there was more to his feelings than what he expressed.

Annie frowned and tucked the observation aside to examine later, but opted to leave it alone for the time being. Whatever he was thinking, she didn't get the sense that it was dangerous to her. The watcher was free to think and feel whatever he wanted as long as it stayed that way.

"Now, I understand that this may be a difficult question to answer, but I'm afraid that I do need to ask." Smith paused for a moment, probably to make sure that they were all listening. Dramatic. " Do you know when you were called?"

"About three years ago," Annie said.

Out of the corner of her eyes, she noticed Mikasa stiffen.

"Can you get a little more specific?" Smith asked.

Of course. I could tell you the exact day, if I wanted.

"I think it was probably sometime in June," Annie said. "But that's the best I can do."

"And when you say three years ago, you mean June of 2018?"

"Yes."

They lapsed into silence, a thoughtful look descending over Smith's face. It didn't hold any sort of blatant warning signs. However, Annie was frustrated to find that she didn't have any idea what he was thinking beyond that. Each second that passed by without him saying anything felt like a nail scratching across her skin and trying to worm beneath. The difference was that no one would have blamed her if she had reacted to something like that, but she couldn't risk letting her impatience surface here.

The relief that washed over her when Smith started speaking again was almost physical.

"You're definitely experienced, but there are bound to be large gaps in your education," he said. He almost sounded more like he was musing to himself rather than speaking to anyone in the room. "We could all do with some backup as well." The watcher paused to give all of them a once-over. "I'm going to call a couple friends of mine and ask if they will join us."

"Watchers?" Mikasa asked. Her cool voice held a hint of unexpected tightness, and when Annie looked at her, she saw that her eyes had gone hard. Annie couldn't help but blink at the sight. Their previous interactions had left her with the impression that Mikasa was firmly in the council's pocket, just like a good slayer should be. But looking at her now...

"One of them is a watcher," Smith admitted. "The other is more along the lines of a free agent."

"But it would be the council sending them," Mikasa stressed, seemingly heedless of how Annie couldn't help but stare at her.

"No," Smith said. "If they come, it will be as a favor to me. Hanji often works independently from the council, and Levi..." He paused, a slight smile twitching across his lips. "Levi would be upset if he heard someone thinks he works with the council, let alone for them."

Mikasa's frown was threatening to turn into a scowl. It was an understated shift of her features, but Annie was watching closely enough to catch it. Apparently, she wasn't the only one.

"But he'll work with you?" Armin asked, caution and curiosity intermingling in his voice.

"We have a history," Smith said.

Armin nodded. Then, carefully, he turned to Mikasa. "Some more experienced help would be a good thing right now," he gently pointed out. "Especially with recent events."

Mikasa hesitated for a moment. It ended with her turning her gaze to Annie. Consequently, the hesitation shifted over to her, not quite ready to believe what was happening. Mikasa Ackerman didn't strike her as a particularly considerate person; did she really want her opinion on the matter? Slayer or not, they barely knew each other. Her opinion should mean nothing to her.

Except apparently it didn't. When the silence dragged on for too long, Mikasa prompted, "Annie?"

Annie shrugged, doing her best to put on the disinterested look of someone who was barely affected. "I'm alright with it," she said.

Because it would be suspicious if she wasn't. She wasn't allowed to care that she, Bertolt, and Reiner would have to spend hours talking and planning before the newcomers even arrived. Maintaining the ruse took priority over things like comfort and rest.

Mikasa nodded. When she turned back to Smith, her gaze was still hard, but it was a different kind of hardness now. It was the stony glint of someone on a mission rather than someone with a grudge. "You should tell them about the disappearances," she said. "And that I think I know who's behind them."

Everyone, Smith included, startled at that, which gave Annie and Reiner the opportunity to shoot each other a short, bewildered glance.

"You do," Smith said, voice impressively composed for all of its urgency.

"A vampire named Ymir," Mikasa confirmed. "She calls herself the biggest fish in the pond, and she's - strong. Stronger than she should be."

Annie and Reiner gave each other another look - unreadable, for that was all they could afford right now. One that promised that they would talk about this later. Annie had no idea who this Ymir was, but by the sound of it, she might make for a good scapegoat - at least for a while.

She just had to make sure that Reiner didn't take Mikasa's suspicions as an excuse to do whatever he liked.

Smith's expression had turned into something grave by the time Annie looked back at him. "We should discuss this later," he said. She didn't need to know him well to know that his tone suggested that it would be a detailed conversation.

"Fine," Mikasa said. With that, she glanced at her wristwatch - although glanced was a generous term for it. It was the very shortest of looks, just to confirm something that she already knew. Annie was struck by a sudden understanding; Ackerman hadn't been looking forward to this meeting, so she had arrived late when she knew that she would have to leave before long.

"I need to get going to history," Mikasa said, all but confirming her theory.

Smart, for a girl who wouldn't even take a night off to make sure that her exhaustion didn't get her killed.

Sasha groaned. "I don't suppose this is important enough to warrant a note?" she asked, shooting Smith a hopeful look.

The watcher smiled. "I'm afraid that you and Mister Springer should get going as well."

That got a groan from both of the dumbasses. Nonetheless, they began gathering their stuff together. Armin and Jean also murmured something and started getting ready to leave. Whatever they said, Annie didn't catch it. Her attention was on Mikasa, who was doing her level best to look like she wasn't dead on her feet. It was an imperfect performance, which only highlighted how bad it must be, for Annie was confident that she was practiced in putting on such acts.

She was probably planning on going patrolling again tonight. If she had gone out last night despite the state she'd been in when they met - which she must have, given her current condition - then this wouldn't be enough to stop her.

A look Smith shot Annie told her that she wasn't free to go quite yet. Of course not. The watcher had probably only just gotten started on the mountain of questions he had for them; she and Reiner were going to have to make good use of the backstories they'd fabricated. Even so, when Mikasa began to walk away ahead of everyone else, Annie met Smith's gaze and said, "I'll be right back."

She didn't wait for a response. Annie turned around and swept off after Mikasa; despite the height difference, she was able to catch up to other slayer in a few seconds.

"Let me patrol for you," Annie said, voice low but firm.

Mikasa stopped walking. "What?" she said.

"You're exhausted," Annie pointed out. "You'll get hurt again if you go out tonight."

Mikasa pursed her lips, whispers of pride and defensiveness playing across her features. Annie made sure to keep talking before any of them could override her common sense.

"Your grades have to be slipping too." She didn't pause, but the faint thrill of triumph that ran through her as Mikasa's features shifted ever so slightly made it easier for her to continue on. "That's an extra distraction. Rest, catch up on your assignments, and let me patrol for you for a few nights. Then you can be useful when you return."

Annie was making sense. She knew she was making sense - she'd spent much of the night thinking about and refining the offer, back when she'd assumed that the other slayer would have at least had the sense to take the previous night off. The deal was made that much sweeter by how much she had worn herself down. And yet, be it because of some heroic sense of dedication or just plain obsession, Mikasa hesitated.

"Two slayers are better than one, but there's no point if you keep pretending that you're the only one," Annie pointed out.

Mikasa sighed, shoulders drooping ever so slightly. It was at that instant that Annie knew she'd won.

"Alright," Mikasa acquiesced.

Annie nodded. "Alright."

With that, she walked back to the table and whatever quasi-interrogation Smith had planned for her.

Reiner shot her an approving look as she sat down. Annie tried to ignore it.

She failed, and her stomach twisted.

#mikannie #mikasa ackerman #annie leonhardt #erwin smith #jean kirstein #sasha braus #connie springer #ymir #ymir snk #reiner braun #snk #snk fic #attack on titan #my fic #my writing #the call

4 notes · View notes

whentheynameyoujoy · 4 years ago

Text

Women in SPN—Seasons 2 and 3

Previously on Joy Obsesses over a Show That Creatively Expired in 2010

Tessa

Introduced back when the Winchesters dodging the coffin actually qualified as an episode, she follows in Meg’s tracks by continuing to make monsters seem more approachable and less a malevolent force of nature. Starts off with a completely flat affect but gets annoyed with the Winchester bullshit real quick—a sure-fire sign of an SPN character with a brain. A powerful being capable of returning one’s memories by a smooch which is… convenient. As is the fact that bad guys keep using her for their ebul plans. Serves the typical secondary-character function of a springboard for a main guy’s development. Plants hints of the “natural order”, “destiny”, and “inevitability” which will become major themes down the road and be explored by characters with deeper writing.

Status: Alive as of s5

Importance: Minor, remembered primarily because she keeps popping up.

On her own: A nice addition to the lore.

Jo Harvelle

Originally Dean’s love interest until she got written out for the crime of having tits around the fandom’s husband. Driven by a wish to honor her dead father and become a hunter, she’s held back by the unfortunate fact of not being all that good at it. Cheerful, temperamental, and a pretty skilled hustler, she’s mortally wounded when charging in to protect Dean. Ends up sacrificing herself so that others can escape and attempt to end the Apocalypse.

Status: Dead as of s5, dragged back and disappeared again in s7

Importance: Major

On her own: A soldier going out in a blaze of glory. I bawl every time.

Ellen Harvelle

Unlike her daughter, very good at what she does. No-nonsense authority figure, she’s one of the few in the show to pull off a combination of a hand-wringing mama bear and a pro-active badass with a life outside her family. Not perceived as a threat because fans don’t know the meaning of MILF yet, and so is allowed to stick around for the season 2 finale. Dies to make Jo’s plan to obliterate Meg’s hellhounds work, though it’s strongly implied she mostly refuses to survive her kid.

Status: Dead

Importance: Major

On her own: SPN’s Molly Weasley, sullied by the implications of her death

Lenore

A head-strong leader of a nest of vegetarian vampires, she’s deliberately contrasted with Gordon’s Terminator schtick and to a lesser degree with Dean’s black-and-white monsters vs. humans kill-everything grief-cope in order to further cement SPN’s ongoing crusade of challenging who in fact is the monster around here. Has a crowning moment of awesome when she refuses to feed while covered in Sam’s blood. The entire point of her is her determination not to give up her humanity even when no longer human. Would be shame if the show decided to later abandon this essential part of her character and twist it for cheap drama…

Status: Alive as of s5, annihilated in every way in s6

Importance: Minor in the overall narrative, major in the episode and the boys’ development

On her own: An effective mirror to Dean’s stroll down the slippery slope

Diana Ballard

TheGoodCop manipulated by her professional and romantic partner, she has a surprisingly functional tension with Sam. Luckily for Linda Blair it goes unnoticed because the fandom doesn’t view older women as competition. Noteworthy mostly because she actively participates in uncovering the episode’s mystery which automatically elevates her above the standard clueless civilian, man or woman, who needs the duo to save them. Despite fewer appearances arguably more memorable than Henriksen, precisely because of her active involvement.

Status: Alive as of s5

Importance: Minor overall, a major player in the episode

On her own: Interesting take on the usual boilerplate cop

Ava Wilson

To present a very, very generous interpretation, she foreshadows Sam’s eventual turn to the dark side. Spirited, a little bit airheaded, and freaked about her Azazel-given powers, she gives enough of a damn to prevent her visions of people dying from coming true, though she clings to her intention to lead a normal civilian life. Does a complete switcheroo off-screen to become a villain because… power is awesome? Ends up the most advanced special child in season 2’s battle royale, the very concept of which is just… eh? Still gets dispatched no problem because… why not?

Status: Dead

Importance: Minor

On her own: A prime example of why the special children subplot is just…wot?

Molly McNamara

Memorable primarily because of the experimental (for SPN) narration which frames her as the duo’s partner when in fact she’s one of the things being hunted. For plot reasons spends her episode switching between being terrified, worried for her missing husband, and heartbroken. Can be somewhat tortuously argued to fit the theme of (not) overcoming grief and letting go, one of the few detectable threads in the directionless slog that’s season 2.

Status: Dead

Importance: Minor overall, major because she’s arguably the main character of her episode

On her own: Torture porny. Very torture porny.

Madison

Intelligent, educated, and with an endearing love of soaps, she’s responsible for one of the three watchable sex scenes in the entire show. Has a nice theme of personal growth and healing from trauma going on, although it’s cut short and undermined when she’s revealed as a werewolf and euthanized by none other than Sam himself. Her death is filmed as a narrative-changing tragedy before it goes on to become a joke in season 4.

Status: Dead

Importance: Major

On her own: No matter how you look at it, she’s a diseased dog that needs to be put down for her own good while the menz wallow in their manly manpain. A rare example of a storyline I don’t think can be tweaked to be even marginally less awful.

I believe maestro may have wanted to portray sadness here.

Tamara

Told to be an excellent hunter, she’s shown as needing to be saved in order not to end up like her husband who’s literally forced to gargle bleach. Introduces the notion of growing hostility against the Winchesters in the hunting community. Full of wrath to fit the episode’s one-off seven deadly sins schtick, she’s emphasized as emotional and not in control of herself to such a degree that it overshadows how she’s in fact fairly competent in the second half of the episode.

Status: Alive as of s5

Importance: Minor

On her own: Wouldn’t stand out this much if she weren’t one of the few POCs in the blinding whiteness that’s SPN’s Americana.

Ruby

Doesn’t have the most organic introduction (A cool intriguing sexy French fries loving not like other gurls sassy badass, with a superdooper special knife? How 2000s cringe can you get?) but quickly becomes one of the show’s most distinctive villains allies. She’s an ally. Totally. Don’t worry about it. A sarcastic smartass jerk who breathes lies and manipulation, she’s resourceful, thinks on her feet, and throws herself into the thick of action without hesitation—a trait that gets especially interesting in retrospect as it suggests a fanatic devotion to her real goal. Sadly, her motivation doesn’t get fleshed out beyond “she really likes Satan, I guess” (which, hey) as the writers prioritize the surprise of the revelation over her further character development. Has the second watchable sex scene in the entire show; the fandom weeps itself to sleep. Gets killed by her own weapon when the writers decide that a character who’s smarter than both protagonists combined could well do with a bit of the good ol’ lobotomizing.

Status: Dead

Importance: Supermegadoublemajor

On her own: The stupid nature of her demise and occasional wooden acting do their best but never overshadow the awesome that’s Ruby.

Lisa Braeden

Dean’s past fling who becomes a living symbol of his desire for the white-picket fence. Is implied to possess mad financial skills as she owns property on a yoga teacher’s salary while a single mom below the age of 30. A blank slate the likes of Cassie, she’s salvaged by better acting. Frequent frowning suggests the presence of an inner life though it doesn’t tend to manifest itself on screen or affect the plot. Her single established trait—blow-out assertiveness the moment things get too far—is exercised mostly in service to her son. Exists solely to give Dean something to pine for.

Status: Alive as of s5

Importance: Major

On her own: A tertiary character who so-so sustains her own episode.

Bela Talbot

The best expansion of the show’s lore after the host of heaven, she’s unequivocally a bad person who nevertheless evokes huge amounts of sympathy. A cynical self-serving dealer in supernatural objects who mirrors Dean’s cracking tough guy persona, due to her abuse and the resulting trauma she refuses to open up and rely on anyone out of principle, or be indebted to them. Her pride makes her clinically unable to ask for help until it’s too late, and even forego mentioning personal history when it’d actively benefit her by softening the horrible impression others have of her. Switching between being an antagonist and the duo’s reluctant ally, she manages to outwit them roughly 90% of time. The fact that she has sexual tension with Dean while Sam lusts after her to the point of literal drooling sends fans apoplectic.

Status: Dead

Importance: Major

On her own: A complex character brought down by her own flaws.

Casey

A demon, she’s torn between wanting to enact the Apocalypse and just chilling with her soulmate. Definitely a fanfic reader because her idea of dealing with danger is to shut herself with her enemy in a room and have a lengthy theological debate. Very outspoken about humanity’s propensity for evil. Outcomplexes Lilith and to a lesser extent Ruby as she’s allowed to openly address her life philosophy. While the dialogue format of her scenes is designed to give Dean space to talk about his feelings regarding his impending demise, it’s more or less an equal push-pull exchange. She’s smart, captivating, capable, and in love, i.e. things SPN just isn’t interested in keeping around.

Status: Dead

Importance: Minor in the overall narrative, major in the episode and Dean’s development

On her own: Could have been so good if allowed to stick around

Gertrude Case

A rich elderly creep whose gropy ways are played for laughs because she’s a woman I guess. Either can’t read social cues or doesn’t give a fuck about people’s obvious discomfort. But don’t worry, it’s hilarious. She’s a woman, you see. What harm have those ever done.

Status: I’m going to assume dead by now, otherwise alive as of s5

Importance: A major figure in Sam’s life since she sexually assaulted him. Otherwise minor.

On her own: Sexual harassment is fun, kids

Lucy

Take Molly McNamara, strip her of any pretence at thematic relevance, minimize her importance while playing up her suffering, and then remove her like a broken Christmas decoration while making sassy remarks—voilà, you’ve ended up with the exact simplistic image that pops into one’s head when the words Supernatural and women are mentioned in a sentence.

Status: Dead

Importance: Non-existent

On her own: Just… why

Astaroth

Approaches awesomehood as her demonic business operation is built around preying on bored suburban hausfraus and taking their souls in exchange for magical powers, which they then use to secure benign materialistic keeping-up-with-the-joneses crap and devour one another like a bunch of assholes whose death you can’t help but eagerly anticipate. Srsly, eff those ladies. Stands out as the only (implied) lesbian in the Kripke arc.

Status: Dead

Importance: Minor, not even the real monster of the week when compared to the coven

On her own: There’s probably another discussion about Doylist sexism hidden around somewhere that I’m not really interested in having. Go Astaroth.

Nancy Fitzgerald

Sugar and spice and every other cliché about kindness combined in a pretty sweet package. Plot demands her to be a virgin for some reason, even though this aspect of her character doesn’t amount to anything in the story and only serves to contrast Nancy’s… purity with Ruby who we’re being constantly told is a “slut” and a “whore” and I have no idea how that’s supposed to work. Then again, Nancy’s virginity is framed as a valid personal choice in a rather empowering moment so that’s good. Has standards because even after deciding to let go of her chastity vow, she won’t settle for just any loser who happens to stand around converting oxygen into CO2. Her “cause manpain out of nowhere”-type death is one of the few of this category in the show which actually work because the cruel pointless nature of it is precisely the point (and at least she’s not the only one who doesn’t survive, please ignore how the episode literally says her demise is the most tragic because she never got laid, barfs).

Status: Dead

Importance: Minor

On their own: A textbook definition of a cinnamon

Lilith

An overarching menace that doesn’t spend too much time on screen, she’s a prop rather than her own person. This gets highlighted the moment the show stops casting her as a clichéd creepy child who likes to larp as that Twilight Zone kid, and turns her into the standard hawt chick in a will-they-won’t-they episode. No interiority as she goes along with a plan which requires her obliteration, without at least allowing her to explore her religious motivation. Ruby does all the heavy lifting in this partnership.

Status: Dead

Importance: Major

On her own: For the life of me I can’t make sense of her actions in s4. But the clichéd creepy kid is adorbs so points for memorability.

Maggie Zeddmore

The straight man to the Ghostfacers’ utterly delightful douchefacery. Manages to keep up with Harry and Ed in terms of hilarity because not only is she exactly as out of place as them, she decides to role-play her childhood-friends-to-lovers fanfic in the middle of a haunted house as the best sister that she is.

Status: Alive as of s5

Importance: Minor

On her own: Love at first geek

Next, season 4 and 5 before I try to figure out what this all adds up to.

#spn #spn critical #supernatural #supernatural critical #sexist writing #tessa #jo harvelle #ellen harvelle #madison #ruby #bela talbot #lisa braeden #nancy fitzgerald #lilith

11 notes · View notes

getreadytosmash · 4 years ago

Text

Small smash headcanons I was thinking of and to put out my reboot designs

Skaar

Skaar took a more gladiator look from his time on Sakaar and no longer wears the loin cloth except for when he's on off days

His hair gets to around his upper back and often tends to be in buns and ponytails

Working on his reading and writing and gets help from Hulk and goes to the Xavier Institute for sessions with his mind control and memories

Got introduced to queer stuff by Rick and he was THRILLED to find out about this stuff and the footage of Skaar carefully picking out non binary, asexual and panromantic stuff was trending for a month

Yes I'm going into pridecanons a little more

Skaar's very happy with his own feelings of being nb. The rocks below him whisper about it always being fine and he doesn't need to care about what others say anyway. Not when they're too busy calling him a monster to care about his gender

Anyway. Skaar's sex neutral and I say this because its quite often the theory that all ace folks won't have kids blah blah but??? Some aces want sex to have kids and that's Skaar.

Ridiculously good sword fighter and often meets up with Nightcrawler and Shadowcat to have sword fights and compare tricks

Lots of whipping scars on his back and some around his mouth that hardly anyone knows are from

Has a matching scar with Red of a circle on the back of his neck as well as running lighting scars up his hands and feet with Rick, Red and Jen from where the Skrulls tried to harvest their gamma

Absolutely has the tattoo and has no clue about it

Occasionally has days where he can't remember the entire event and Skaar's become rather thankful that they can rely on Rick's cameras to guide him home if needed.

Adores the Savage Lands and is best friends with Kazaar and Zabu

Sometimes copies memes from Rick and it’s terrible

Likes having Jen help him with normal stuff, especially when she helps him learn stuff like reading and writing

Rick

Yeah, can’t feel anything and that causes a few secret depression episodes aha

Big on other sensory stuff now. Really likes to savour sights, sounds, taste and smells since he lacks a big ass part of it now. It really isn’t that uncommon for Rick to have a low of flowers within his bedroom and shit.

Has to file down his spikes since they keep growing and often Hulk does it for him while Rick falls asleep

Rick needs a lot more protein now and often eats eggs or fish and gets into big fights with Red over it daily

Uses a stylish for everything since his fingers don’t work on touchscreens anymore

Often wears sleeveless jackets with different pins. Owns four of them with three of them entirely dedicated to alien, mutant and bi rights

Well known Youtuber and I really need to get around to writing some videos he’s done god someone remind me to put out that shit

Hardcore gamer and still screams at Samuel to help make a dating sim come oN-

Can hold his breath for an hour and a half and didn’t realise until he fell asleep in the bath and got woken up by Hulk panicking and tossing him out of the water

Very intent on mutant rights and often helps out with teenage mutants and raising the social status of the school

Loves bi culture and is very defensive over aspects of his identity after years of feeling lost among the orphanages

Has gotten more comfortable with his gender since he’s been wearing kilts and skirts for almost two years now

Used to have scars across his hands and thighs from years of canings from the nuns but now has a large cracked scar across his chest after Abomination ripped his shell off

Red unintentionally fathers him and blames Hulk

Best pals with Jen and Betty and is the only one who gets to join them on Ladies Night with Lyra and Marlo

Stands on his tip toes when talking to Hulk often because he wants to be tall and it amuses Hulk to no end

Jen

Has a lot of different costumes she changes regularly and Rick always posts a vote on “What outfit has Jen got this week?”

Freckles and curly hair galore

Hulk paints her nails and she does the same for him and it isn’t long before Skaar joins in

Works in New York but stays at Vista Verde for her time off

Yes i do want a all female gamma mutate team and yes they are A-force

They consist of Jen, Betty, Lyra, Carmilla and Marlo but are sometimes joined by other female heroes

Wears sweatband wrists, left one is the bi flag and the right one is the trans flag

Was afraid about being open towards loving women for a few years since Jen knew her father didn’t do anything about Bruce’s abuse, what would happen to her if Brian found out she liked more than boys? Came out after hulking out and is happier than ever

The same goes for being trans since Jen’s form is based heavily on her mentality of her body. Gamma gave Jen the body she wanted and she was SO pleased with it

tbh I do imagine she was more comic/noodle armed at the start since Jen wanted to look rather feminine but over time she’s gotten more comfortable with her body and idea of who she wants to be and slowly she got beefier

Has two wardrobes at the base and makes Red help rearrange stuff for laughs

Pals with Samuel and often enjoys sitting around and dragging him out for shopping and starbucks while discussing cases

The one who appears in Rick’s youtube videos the most

Can never finish a book and feels deep seeded adhd guilt

Sings outloud to every thing she hears

Likes grape flavoured stuff and she is so thankful that she can’t die for that sin

BEST pals with Betty and Rick. Like. There’s a reason my “Betty is the OG Hulk and is a lil wlw with Jen” has happened honestly

Has vitiligo patches of grey around her arms that were left over from her more traumatic transformations

Watches Red bake if she’s having a panic attack and the videos don’t help

Red

Has a lot of scars over his body from where Ghost Rider’s chain dug into him and left him burnt. idk seems really fucking cool

Like Jen, has yellow patches along his spine and hands from where he was joined mentally with Zzzax

Still gets nightmares about said incident and is still scared for the day that a nightmare is actually happening

Started to bake because it helps from when he couldn’t control his heat powers or during ptsd attacks

Tends to get lost in work alongside Samuel, especially if they’re overly excited about a certain idea

Hulk fondly calls him a nerd for this exact reason and Red tackles him over it to this day

Tech reacts to him badly sometimes due to his possession issues and there’s been once or twice where he’s had some...odd experiences when it’s come to certain technology or alien tech

Stays the same mostly with his outfits but occasionally wears a leather jacket and fuck it takes his shirt off a lot he’s a dilf he can do that

The one who crouches for humans the most and it isn’t uncommon for him to do it purely to unsettle the humans. Ass

Uh. Likes women but??? Sometimes there’s an annoying guy and shit being able to be easily suplexed now means that anyone who can do it can kinda catch his eyes and he fucked a demon- uh. Red has a lot of thoughts now about dating and it’s nerve-wracking

Still does missions with his Thunderbolt team and still hangs out with Hell’s Circle team when he met others that had been dragged down to hell as well

Gets courted by vampires and hates the fact that the others laugh at it

Gets nightmares of crashing, of electric burning him away but doesn’t want to admit to the fact that he has some ptsd

Not really Red but fuck it Betty has her own team and I’m shifting the Gamma Corps for Betty so her team involves; Betty (Harpy), Marlo (Sirin), Clay (Hulkverine), Lyra (Athen), Carmilla (Scorpion) and Gwen (Daydream)

Right. Uh. So for those who don’t know who Daydream are, basically the writer at this time had been going through a bad divorce and he treated Betty like SHIT which involved breaking Bretty up before they could have a child, making Betty suffer a miscarriage, killing her and having the villain Nightmare raping her in her sleep and having Betty give birth to Daydream who appeared for one arc and was never seen again. So. I’m mad.

anyway fuck him but I did like Daydream so instead she was an experiment from gamma base as a unique weapon that got used to infiltrate the Agents sleep but was later on rescued along with the rest of the gamma experiments. Got adopted by Betty when she found out Gwen had her DNA and went “oh worm?” to getting a baby i have more thoughts about this but u know. carry on.

Hulk

So Tired. Part time team leader and Avengers and even has his many own adventures of trying to help so many people out

I imagine he has a lot of the same issues as Steven in suf where Hulk often stresses out more about not being able to help people since he worries about the worst case scenarios

Gets forced to take days off by each of the team and appreciates it but dear god if he doesn’t get anxiety about the whole situation every time

SomeTIMES he wears a blue shirt but only sometimes and that’s if he’s actually prepared for missions. Also has boots Red got him but Hulk keeps those clean and safe instead

Team dad for a reason. Fathers anything he can get his hands on and well known for it enough that Rick and Skaar get him something for fathers day every year and Jen gets him goofy ties because she KNOWS he doesn’t throw them out

Pretty relaxed about being pan and yes he makes jokes about being attracted to kitchenware he’s THAT terrible Rick wants to die and not come back pls

Buys a lot of pride stuff for the others. Skaar owns so many nb and ace colour chalks he needs help

Really wants to own a guinea pig but he’s worried about scaring it or not being around all that often to take care of it properly

Falls asleep through almost every movie that he usually starts one half of it one day and finishes it the next day

Meets up with Ben Grimm and Logan Howlett every Wednesday for a night out. Usually they do bowling, play cards or go out to eat. It’s isn’t uncommon for other heroes like Spidey or Gambit to join them occasionally

Has business lunches with Betty to discuss movements of gamma mutates that turns into a fun brawl because they’re immortal children

Keeps a whiteboard in his room so that he can have arguments with Joe and Bruce.

Samuel

Keeps his outfit relatively the same but adjusts it slightly so it isn’t the exact same outfit he wears back when he was evil

Tends to cover up more after he gains a power that lets him control people just by touch

Aware of this power and thus often awkwardly flitters when someone near him might be upset and keeps spare gloves or arm sleeves on hard just in case

Has the sharpest teeth of all the hulks and actually tends to file them down so he doesn’t need to “scare people off” when in reality he’s self conscious about his teeth and the fact that he keeps biting his tongue by accident

Buys and redesigns Icarus’s cage every other month to make it more elaborate, is currently fighting the constant urge to buy more rats for this reason

Demiboy! Fine with what he is, doesn’t give a shit. He rules hell and he’ll send you there if you argue with him so who the fuck cares if Samuel wears dresses and makeup?

Big stupid bi. Cannonly into women who are more powerful than him with examples being Rikki (Aka Brilliance, a female Leader) who kicked his ass and threw him across the room with her more advanced mind, Betty Ross...who can blame him, and lately is that one scientist in Hulkverine who Samuel literally fell for within one night sksksk

Big manipulator for people he cares about. Samuel has and will make elaborate plans to keep someone he cares about safe and is more than willing to kill anyone who has hurt his loved ones

Owns a large collection of nail polishes and tends to vary them when he’s bored and creates amazing art. Red watched Samuel once spend and hour re-creating all of Van Gogh’s paintings on his nails

Really good friends with Betty surprisingly, mostly because she can make jokes about being dead and he’ll just snort and go “same”

Has the second best sense of smell after Skaar as he can smell early signs of sickness as well as a wider range of emotions

Info dumps so much and has long winded theories about the oddest things that resonate really well on the Youtube channel

talks to his oversized rat so seriously

Suffers nightmares and currently runs the Down Below and is so tired

Has actually died from exhaustion twice already

Has large sockets in his back due to the fact that Samuel physically cannot hold the information he knows all the time and uses it to charge his phone

Still hangs out with villains like Loki and Mystique tho

#Headcanon #found in body lost in mind (Skaar)#movie star (Rick)#green goddess (Jen)#one man army (Red)#the loneliest there is (Hulk)#he swims in a sea of regret (Leader)#hate and love are both red (Betty)

13 notes · View notes

museflight · 3 years ago

Text

The Call (3)

Chapter Title: Secret

Wordcount: 8.2k

Fic Tag: Click

Ao3 Link: Click

Chapter Summary: Between civilians learning about the supernatural and a new player introducing herself, Mikasa has a hard day. And Annie lies. A lot.

Smith: Meet me in my office

**Smith: **It’s urgent

Mina hadn't returned to class that day.

She wasn't certain how he had convinced the administration to allow him to paint the walls pink.

The whole thing was perfectly laid out in her mind. Perhaps that was why she didn't bother knocking when she reached Erwin's office; she thought she knew what to expect.

She _ didn't _ expect to open the door and find four people crowded around Erwin's desk, one of them holding a red-stained cloth to his neck.

"Erwin," she croaked. "What's going on?"

"Mikasa," Erwin began, his expression steady and voice damningly even. Like his urgent matter hadn't just called her into an office full of civilians. Like it didn't look like something was happening that was very much _ not _supposed to happen. "There was an attack on campus today."

"A _ vampire _ attack," Jean muttered, the shell-shocked disbelief plain in his voice. Reiner gave him a sympathetic look and a pat on the shoulder. Jean immediately winced and rubbed his free hand against the base of his neck, causing Reiner to withdraw with an apologetic look.

"I thought you might," Erwin said. "Most civilians don't walk around with stakes on them."

Reiner blinked. "I'm terrible at carpentry," he said.

"Really?" the bald guy asked. "You don't look it."

"Are we really having this conversation right now?" Jean whispered.

"No," Mikasa cut in.

But if Erwin had called her in to talk about the vampire, why did it sound like Reiner had already killed it? And why did he call her in while everyone else was still there?

"So you _ don't _ think a demon is behind them?" Mikasa challenged. At the same time, the girl with the ponytail piped back up to ask, "wait - so Franz and Hannah and all them; a _ vampire _ was behind all those?"

Erwin frowned. In the seconds that he took to compose his reply, Jean grumbled, "I thought they were talking about demons."

"Vampires are demons," Reiner chimed in. "It's just that not all demons are vampires."

"We don't know that," Erwin finally said. Meeting Mikasa's gaze with his own, he said, "I'm not saying that it _ isn't _ a demon responsible for this. However, most demons leave some form of remains behind and don't bother hiding them well, let alone this thoroughly. We cannot afford to dismiss the possibility that there is a human behind this."

"Yeah," the bald guy piped up. "That guy tried to take a chunk out of Jean's neck, but I mean, have you met Jean? I can't say I'd blame-"

"Shut up, Connie," Jean grumbled.

Reiner tried to hide a laugh with a cough into his fist. Jean raised his head and lowered his hand to shoot him a glare. Meanwhile, Erwin offered a small, sad smile.

"It is possible," the watcher said. "But at this point, it would be best not to get your hopes up."

"Yeah," the ponytailed girl murmured. "Take a look around; it's been starting to feel like an episode of _ Frontline _ around here."

"Don't be silly, Sasha," Connie chided, his already shaky voice sounding that much more agitated. "There are no vampires in _ Frontline_."

A thoughtful look flickered across Erwin's face. "Actually-"

Mikasa felt something inside of her snap. "So you aren't ready to commit to it being a demon," she said, voice cold as the arctic. "Fine. You still haven't told me _ why I'm here _."

Erwin's expression shifted, but it was too fast and undefined for her to stand a chance at telling exactly how. That was fine. She didn't particularly care at the moment.

Unthinkingly, Mikasa's gaze drifted to Reiner, and his eyes met hers.

There was a moment of silence in which one could hear a pin drop.

Unfortunately, Erwin was good at reading things like that. "Is there something I should know?" he asked.

Mikasa and Reiner maintained eye contact for a long moment, him frowning while her expression remained stuck in one of neutrality, unsure of what to think and feel. She had known that the existence of a second slayer was something that she should come to her watcher with. It had simply been too easy _ not _to with everything else that was clogging up her mind. But now the subject had resurfaced, and she found herself unsure of what course of action should be taken.

That was damage wrought by inaction. And unfortunately, with how long that inaction had persisted, she did not yet have any true way to gauge what harm they may do when they were actually involved.

With everything so unsure, what right did she have to hand Annie over to them?

Perhaps it was a good thing that it had come up while one of Annie's friends was around. That meant that it ultimately wasn't her call to make.

Mikasa couldn't help but feel a burst of selfish relief when Reiner finally turned his gaze toward Erwin, a heavy sigh leaving his lips.

"My friend Bertolt also knows," Reiner hesitantly admitted. "Because our friend, Annie, is also a slayer."

Erwin _ froze_. His normally composed facade fractured just enough for a hint of shock to bleed through. Mikasa may have enjoyed it were it not for how his sharp eyes immediately sought her out. It seemed that her apparent familiarity with Reiner had made him dismiss the possibility that his words were as much news to her as him; that look was commanding her to _ talk_.

She tried to brush the suffocating feeling off with a shrug. When that failed, she added, "I didn't think it was important."

"It is," Erwin said.

"Yeah," Mikasa murmured. "I can see that."

That horrible silence returned. Or at least, it tried to. Sasha interrupted it by taking a step forward and stammering out, "So, I- uh- I know that this might be a bad time, but. What's a slayer?"

Erwin cast Mikasa a long look. Then, slowly, he said, "I think it might be better to discuss this with _ all _of us here." Turning his attention to Reiner, he asked, "do you think your friends would be willing to meet with us tomorrow morning? Say, in the library, at nine o'clock?"

"There's an _ us _ now, huh?" Jean murmured. His expression was lost and distant, save for the hint of sadness that flickered across his features when he glanced at Mikasa every few seconds.

Meanwhile, Reiner slowly nodded. "Yeah. Bertolt might have work, but Annie- I can't promise she'll be happy, but yeah, I think I can swing it."

"Good," Erwin said. "Mikasa-"

The council had done nothing to earn her trust, but she could admit that Erwin possessed a decent amount of expertise on certain matters. Enough so that his opinion may be worth considering here

Erwin blinked. "Of course," he said. "It's safest _ not _ to know, but where that fails, there's safety in numbers."

"I'm going to tell Marco, then," Jean said, voice steadier than it had been throughout the rest of the conversation

"I strongly advise against it," Erwin cautioned. "It may be hard to believe, but it _ is _safest not to know about these things. Once you are aware, the odds of you being targeted by a vampire or demon increase exponentially. After what happened earlier, it would be irresponsible for me not to teach you how to defend yourself, but believe me when I say that your friend is better off not knowing."

With that, she turned around and swept out of the room - and away from all of the pitying looks.

She had to patrol.

The sun had long since sunken over the horizon by the time she was able to head out on patrol. She couldn't help but be irritated by the time lost despite knowing that it probably wouldn't make any difference. Most demons, especially vampires, weren't truly active until two or three hours after nightfall. The meeting may have eaten up a chunk of her time, but it hadn't taken _ that _ long. It was most likely that she hadn't missed anything at all.

Most likely. What about the times when unlikely things happened? If there _ had _ been something out there and she had missed it...

The graveyard _ seemed _ empty aside from herself; not even Eren was there to accompany her. That was good. She _ wanted _space after what Erwin had dropped on her. However, there was something about the emptiness that set her on edge, the creeping feeling that she was wrong, that she had to be missing something. It almost made her wish that-

"Well," a bright, mocking voice reached down from above. "If it isn't the slayer. Sun set... oof, over an hour ago, but hey. Don't rush on my account."

Mikasa turned around, stepped back, and looked up. There was an old oak tree not five feet away from where she was standing. Its branches were wide and sprawling. Sitting with her feet dangling over the edge of one of the thickest ones, dangerously close to directly over her, was a woman. She thought she saw brown hair and freckles, but it was difficult to make out between the low light of the evening and the additional shade of the tree. The thing that _ really _stood out was her grin, wide and jeering. Like someone laughing at a joke that they hadn't yet seen fit to let anyone else in on.

In a situation like this, odds were that _ she _was the joke.

"Mmm, no," the woman said. "I don't feel like fighting tonight. Besides, you should be happy to get a break."

_ That _ made Mikasa pause, but not for a good reason. She felt every muscle in her body tense as her gaze jerked back to the woman. "Why is that?" she asked.

"Why else?" the stranger asked. "Paradis is a small pond, and I'm the biggest fish."

The biggest fish.

With recent events, what would being the biggest fish entail?

As far as Mikasa was concerned, it was as good as a confession.

She landed crouched. It was an eye-catching pose, but also one that would put unnecessary stress on her shins. She was showing off.

The stranger straightened up, met Mikasa's eyes, and raised an eyebrow. "You sure you wanna do this?" she asked,

Mikasa jumped down, landing on the balls of her feet.

"Fine," the woman grumbled. "Guess I can spare a few minutes."

Mikasa stiffened, one hand reaching toward her bag, and kept her eyes glued on her opponent. Said opponent put a hand on her hip and scoffed.

"Waiting for me to make the first move?" she asked. "I told you, I'm not looking for a fight tonight. You wanna do this, it's on you."

Mikasa grit her teeth, but complied. She lunged at her opponent's left, only to switch and throw a punch at the right side of her face at the last second.

The feint didn't matter. The woman just stepped backward, far swifter than Mikasa had expected - possibly, she faintly realized, faster than she could keep up with.

"Fast," she taunted, "but not the fastest."

Mikasa leaned forward and swung a leg out. Her foot clipped the side of the woman's leg, but she wasn't fast enough to keep her from dodging most of the blow with a clumsy jump.

She _ did_, however, get her face to morph into the lumpy, fanged, snarling visage of a vampire.

Mikasa drew back several steps, shrugged her bag off to dangle from the crook of her elbow, unzipped it, and pulled out her stake, all in no more than three seconds. As she did, the vampire paused.

"Oh, no," she said. "I'll let you know when I'm ready for a deathmatch, thanks."

This time, when Mikasa lunged forward, so did the vampire. Mikasa aimed for her chest, aim true and stake primed to plunge into her heart. But when the wooden tip was only centimeters away, the vampire shoved at Mikasa's shoulder while veering sharply to the side. Mikasa heard and felt her stake sinking into flesh, but knew without looking that she had missed the heart. She _ couldn't _look, for it was a blow driven by pure momentum, the force of the shove having lifted her off her feet and sent her flying. She could only be grateful that she didn't hit a gravestone when she slammed against the ground.

She scrambled to her feet as soon as physically possible. As she did so she heard the vampire indignantly mutter from several feet away, "aw, fuck. That shirt was a _ gift." _

The vampire. Vampires weren't strong enough to _ do that_; not the ones she would usually find wandering graveyards and stake on a patrol. That meant that this one had to be _ old_. Old and powerful, and too big of a threat to be left alone.

The sort of vampire that would have no problem picking off college students and hiding their bodies.

"When were you turned?" Mikasa demanded.

For a few seconds, Mikasa could only stare at the vampire with wide, disbelieving eyes. When she found her voice, it was to sputter, "that's-"

"I'm Ymir, by the way," the vampire remarked.

"Well, I wanted you to know," Ymir said. She took a step back and offered Mikasa a lazy wave. From the arm that _ wasn't _near the stake wound, Mikasa was almost pleased to note. "See you around, slayer. I'll let you know if I decide I want a deathmatch with you after all." The vampire began to turn around, only to pause and offer Mikasa one last mocking grin. "Oh, or the other one. It'd be rude not to keep both slayers in the loop."

Annie was almost _ electric _ with anger. It wasn't quite enough to breach her composed surface, but she could feel it, pulsating just beneath her skin.

"They'll probably end up killed, now that you've dragged them into this," Annie whispered, thinking of the three dipshits Reiner had deemed worth dragging them into this situation.

Reiner shrugged. "Eventually, maybe."

"So why did you save them?"

"I like them," he said, like that answered everything.

Annie shot him an annoyed look.

"Implying that you aren't going to 'get them'," Annie muttered.

Reiner shrugged again. "Like I said, I like them."

Annie stared at her companion for several long seconds before she broke and looked away.

The rest of the walk to the library was spent in silence.

They both hesitated when they reached the door. For the first time since breaking the news to her, Reiner looked doubtful.

Perhaps that, combined with her anger at him, was why she opened the door and strode in like she owned the place.

The watcher.

Good. If he was going to get her into this mess, the least he could do was help her see it through.

She could tell the exact moment that the watcher noticed her. It wasn't in how he straightened up or even how he looked her way; the other three all did something similar as she approached and she didn't see anything special in those reactions. Smith's tell was in how his eyes _ gleamed_, bright and warm, but with an unyielding sharpness hidden beneath.

That gleam told her that she would have to step carefully. That this man was _ dangerous_.

"Likewise," she murmured.

"Your other friend wasn't able to make it?" he inquired. His eyes were bright with curiosity as he asked, but nothing more dangerous. Not that she could see, anyway. She could be wrong. Even if she _ wasn't_, simple curiosity was dangerous enough. One small misstep could see it turning into something more threatening.

"I see," Smith said, shifting his gaze toward Reiner. "Well, I would love to meet him sometime."

Reiner shrugged. "We can probably make it happen."

Smith turned his attention back to Annie, reams of questions dancing in his eyes. However, another voice piped up before he could ask any of them.

"So, Annie's the - er, wait - a slayer?"

Annie frowned at Sasha. She wasn't the only one; Connie groaned while Jean shook his head and Reiner raised an eyebrow at her.

"I already told you that," Reiner pointed out.

"I _ know, _ " Sasha defended. "But it's one thing to hear it and another totally to see that it's actually Annie. Like, _ Annie Leonhardt _ Annie."

"Did you think it was a _ different _ Annie?" Connie asked.

"No, but like... we _ know _ her."

"We know Mikasa, too."

"We _ do _ ." Sasha leaned back in her chair, balancing it on its back two legs as she looked up at the ceiling and groaned. "God, this is so _ weird_. Demons are a thing and vampires are a thing and slayers are a thing and we know _ both of them _."

"I mean, it makes sense that Mikasa and Annie would be slayers," Connie said. He looked over at Annie as he added, "you're both kinda... intense. The same brand of intense, sorta."

"And you're both idiots," Jean grumbled.

Connie shot him a grin. "You're just upset that you have to share the secret with us and not Marco," he said.

Jean scowled. "Of course I am," he snapped. "Marco actually has a few brain cells to his name."

Good. She hadn't managed to fuck it up within the first five minutes.

Annie wanted to close her eyes, to let herself drift off and away from this place. But she couldn't do that. So instead, she did the next best thing - she changed the subject.

"Where's Mikasa?" she asked, looking back at Smith.

The watcher frowned. "I'm sure she'll be here soo-"

Mikasa looked exhausted. Not _ horrible, _ not quite, but close. Close enough that it had to be costing her. There were dark rings under her eyes and she was visibly favoring the foot that she had injured the night Annie saved her. Her eyes, while still bright with the sort of obsessive determination that drove someone to patrol even when they were at their limit, also flickered with shadows.

She wasn't alone.

"Armin," Annie called, part greeting, part observation. She didn't bother hiding the surprise that crept into her voice or keeping her eyes from widening. From what she'd seen, Mikasa was enough of a loner that she figured _ anyone _would be surprised to see her bring someone with her, especially with how insistent she seemed to be about slayers keeping their nature secret. Even if that someone already knew about her.

At least, those were her feelings. A quick glance around the table revealed that no one else seemed caught off guard - like they'd known to expect an extra person.

Annie narrowed her eyes at Reiner, who just shrugged.

"Armin," Annie returned, a slight smile touching his lips. "It's nice to see you."

"You know each other?" Smith asked.

"We study together," Armin said.

"Interesting." Smith cast a long look around the table, then turned his attention back to Armin. "Do you know Jean, Connie, and Sasha as well?"

"Yes," Armin said. "We've met. I think - I think everyone here knows each other in one way or another."

Smith nodded. "That'll make this easier, then."

Smart. Unfortunately, if the plan was going to be a success, she needed to get Mikasa to trust her enough that she didn't _ need _ an intermediary.

Mikasa barely spared Annie a glance. Her gaze was all but glued to Jean, Sasha, and Connie. "What has Erwin told you?" she asked.

"A _ lot_," Connie said, while Sasha let out a tiny groan and dropped her head back.

"He can't have told you everything," Mikasa said, tone sharp. "There hasn't been enough time."

"Mikasa is correct," Smith said. He offered Jean a placating smile. "I'm afraid what I've told you so far are only the basics. It will take far longer to get you caught up completely."

Sasha let out another, louder groan while Connie gave a dismayed squawk. Jean frowned, but like Armin, Annie thought that she caught a flicker of interest on his face.

"For now," Smith continued, "I would like to get _ everyone _on the same page." Annie felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up as the watcher turned his attention toward her. "Annie, am I correct in assuming that you have never had a watcher?"

"You are," Annie said.

"I see." As he spoke, there was a shift to the gleam in his eyes, something sharper than curiosity coming into play. Doubt. _ Suspicion. _She was going to have to step carefully now, and apparently, she was going to have to do it in front of everyone.

Fine. All the better to make them think that she had nothing to hide.

"If you don't mind me asking," Smith continued, "without a watcher, what made you suspect that you're the slayer?"

_ They were waiting for me to be called. _

"Google," Reiner said.

Smith paused, a frown creeping across his face. "Google," he repeated.

"Google," Reiner confirmed.

"I tried looking stuff up last night!" Sasha piped up, grinning. "I didn’t get really far; 'vampires' was kinda broad, and demons, well..." Her grin faded into something caught between a frown and a grimace. "It gets _ weird _ on the internet," she summarized. "But I tried!"

"Congrats on your freaky porn," Connie remarked.

"I didn't say it was porn!" Sasha cried.

"But you did say it was the _ internet_," Reiner pointed out, a shit-eating grin on his face.

"We're getting off-topic," Smith patiently pointed out.

"Thank you," Annie muttered.

"Reiner," Smith began, "you said that you and your friend have been with Annie since the beginning?"

Smith nodded slowly. "That's very brave of you," he murmured.

He said _ 'brave_', but a faint flicker in his eyes and something tucked into the cadence of his voice made her suspect that he meant something else, or at least that there was more to his feelings than what he expressed.

"About three years ago," Annie said.

Out of the corner of her eyes, she noticed Mikasa stiffen.

"Can you get a little more specific?" Smith asked.

_ Of course. I could tell you the exact day, if I wanted. _

"I think it was probably sometime in June," Annie said. "But that's the best I can do."

"And when you say three years ago, you mean June of 2018?"

"Yes."

The relief that washed over her when Smith started speaking again was almost physical.

"One of them is a watcher," Smith admitted. "The other is more along the lines of a free agent."

"But it would be the council sending them," Mikasa stressed, seemingly heedless of how Annie couldn't help but stare at her.

Mikasa's frown was threatening to turn into a scowl. It was an understated shift of her features, but Annie was watching closely enough to catch it. Apparently, she wasn't the only one.

"But he'll work with you?" Armin asked, caution and curiosity intermingling in his voice.

"We have a history," Smith said.

Armin nodded. Then, carefully, he turned to Mikasa. "Some more experienced help would be a good thing right now," he gently pointed out. "Especially with recent events."

Except apparently it didn't. When the silence dragged on for too long, Mikasa prompted, "Annie?"

Annie shrugged, doing her best to put on the disinterested look of someone who was barely affected. "I'm alright with it," she said.

Everyone, Smith included, startled at that, which gave Annie and Reiner the opportunity to shoot each other a short, bewildered glance.

"You do," Smith said, voice impressively composed for all of its urgency.

"A vampire named Ymir," Mikasa confirmed. "She calls herself the biggest fish in the pond, and she's - strong. Stronger than she should be."

She just had to make sure that Reiner didn't take Mikasa's suspicions as an excuse to do whatever he liked.

"Fine," Mikasa said. With that, she glanced at her wristwatch - although _ glanced _ was a generous term for it. It was the very shortest of looks, just to confirm something that she already knew. Annie was struck by a sudden understanding; Ackerman hadn't been looking forward to this meeting, so she had arrived late when she knew that she would have to leave before long.

"I need to get going to history," Mikasa said, all but confirming her theory.

Smart, for a girl who wouldn't even take a night off to make sure that her exhaustion didn't get her killed.

Sasha groaned. "I don't suppose this is important enough to warrant a note?" she asked, shooting Smith a hopeful look.

The watcher smiled. "I'm afraid that you and Mister Springer should get going as well."

She didn't wait for a response. Annie turned around and swept off after Mikasa; despite the height difference, she was able to catch up to other slayer in a few seconds.

"Let me patrol for you," Annie said, voice low but firm.

Mikasa stopped walking. "What?" she said.

"You're exhausted," Annie pointed out. "You'll get hurt again if you go out tonight."

Mikasa pursed her lips, whispers of pride and defensiveness playing across her features. Annie made sure to keep talking before any of them could override her common sense.

Annie was making sense. She _ knew _ she was making sense - she'd spent much of the night thinking about and refining the offer, back when she'd assumed that the other slayer would have at least had the sense to take the previous night off. The deal was made that much sweeter by how much she had worn herself down. And yet, be it because of some heroic sense of dedication or just plain obsession, Mikasa hesitated.

"Two slayers are better than one, but there's no point if you keep pretending that you're the only one," Annie pointed out.

Mikasa sighed, shoulders drooping ever so slightly. It was at that instant that Annie knew she'd won.

"Alright," Mikasa acquiesced.

Annie nodded. "Alright."

With that, she walked back to the table and whatever quasi-interrogation Smith had planned for her.

Reiner shot her an approving look as she sat down. Annie tried to ignore it.

She failed, and her stomach twisted.

#mikannie #mikasa ackerman #annie leonhart #erwin smith #reiner braun #jean kirstein #the call #snk #attack on titan

3 notes · View notes