#Sad he didn't win the vote

[grape-souffle]

Worth it.

[k2ulhu]

hulu was doing live coverage of the election until 2:00am, at which point my power randomly went out and when I reopened the hulu app on my tv the election coverage was replaced with

[alien-girl-21]

IT DIDN'T BREAK LIKE LAST TIME!!!!

[basket-of-radiants]

Thank you.

@basket-of-radiants

[a1ecmcdowell]

dean winchester x angel!reader — it's okay, it's okay.

or, dean breaks everything he touches, including himself. or, the first time dove has to use her grace.

cw, angst, injured!dean, he walks you through it kind of, dean whimpers but at what cost

word count: 2k

notes, this doesn't count toward my vote. if dean x angel wins u WILL get another i am loyal to my word!! i just got this idea n needed to get it out before i forget < 3 sorry ahead of time if it is 1) sad or 2) sucks it's late ok </3

★ ˚⋆

everyone always says the same thing when the worst comes true, but it reigns true every time - this was never meant to happen.

sure, dean could have been more careful. sure, he could have spent more time worrying about his mortal, breakable body, and not the ageless angel who'd attached to his hip. he'd gotten... used to it, more than anything, because accepting it wasn't the right word.

no, he did not want you at his side at every turn. that gave him another body to fuss over, to make sure didn't get hurt, no matter the cost. even if it was irrational. but dammit, it was you.

you were resilient. he was certain you could take care of yourself, but he panicked when he saw the claw emerging from the pitch black, heading right for your direction. dean knew, logically, that you sensed it coming, that you could have protected yourself-

he took the swipe of gashes to the shoulder anyways. a long swipe. shoulder to sternum - couldn't feel it through the daze of adrenaline, but he could feel the blood. so much blood, and so close to his heart-

"dean!"

your voice pulses in his ears like its own heartbeat. is he losing consciousness? fuck.

your footsteps pound on the dusty dirt trail in the forest, running up to where he was slumped against the nearest tree. dean coughed, blood staining his bottom lip, metal and copper clashing violently on his tongue.

"hi, dove," he whispers, trying to breath life back into his voice, falling just short. "little worse for wear, aren't i?"

"now is not the time for jokes." you kneel next to him, your eyes flitting quickly over his body until they land on the wet crimson slashes across his chest. "you bleed."

his lips quirk, even as the adrenaline is wearing and he's starting to feel the stark pain of the extent of his injuries, because he can't help it. "i do bleed," he says, wincing as the huff of laughter falls out of his mouth rips at his already ripped skin. "s'what happens when you get hurt."

"why did you get hurt?" you demand, fierce and defiant even when he's facing death. good god, he adored you. "i will live. i heal. you..."

dean knew. he knew this. how did he explain this to you, when you didn't even understand what his feelings meant?

"i've heard i look pretty good covered in blood," he says instead. "that true?"

your nimble fingers clamp hard on dean's jaw, forcing him to turn and look at you. so much feist in one ageless body. "now. is not. the time."

"you're so pretty," he breathes, his eyes melting in and out of focus. "so damn pretty when you're mad at me."

your face contorts in a mix of confusion and outrage. this, he thought, is why he doesn't tell you the other things he's been dying for in his mind. as much as dean loves your furious pout, as much as he loves the way you take that damn lip between your teeth again as you think how to stop his dying, it's better to keep you at a distance.

"the bag," dean nods to the duffel he'd dropped in his haste, a couple of feet from you, "get the bag for me, sweet girl."

he can sense the why? on your lips, and smiles, just slightly, when it doesn't come. too detrimental of circumstances for you to question is every ask and call, it seems. how bittersweet it is to be a priority only when he's dying.

you clamber back over with the bag, all but dropping it on his knee in your hurry. dean didn't even tell you what to look for before you'd unzipped it and started digging. "there's bandage wrap in there, somewhere," he rasps out, nodding his head toward you, even though you're not looking at him, "need it. to stop the bleeding."

your hands are shaking. he has nothing else to look at but you - wouldn't look anywhere else regardless - but it's the first thing his eyes lock on. "hey," he says, a little more firmly, even as it makes him wince, "s'okay. it's okay."

"you are dying, and i am useless." you snatch up a small square of shiny wrapping, and he has an explanation for why, exactly, he carries condoms everywhere, but you don't even question it. he forgot that you were too focused on him to be your usual, curious self. "this? will it protect you?"

dean pauses. now is not the time, your words echo in his head, and still, he can't help it. "protects a part of me."

you scoff, and he's upset, for a second, that the joke goes over your head. another thing he should have taught you about. upset again when you the condom also goes over your head and into the dirt with your dismissive toss.

should have. how dramatic was that? already thinking in past tense, because the pain has ebbed again, and that's never good. he was relatively calm before when he could feel it, knowing that, at the very least, it meant he could feel, but-

your hands pluck out the little roll of bandage, shaking fingers tugging at the loose end and starting to unravel it. "yeah, you've got it. not useless, dove," he mumbles, shaking his head like he vehemently denies that bogus claim. "never useless."

"what do i do with it?"

dean lifts his shirt up and over again, wincing again with a deep rumbling whimper as he feels the tear again of his skin, his muscles. a wave of nausea renders him dizzy and speechless. his arms stay raised, his vision swimming.

your irritation is so evident on your face that he's certain, right then, he's never seen you so frustrated. dean wanted to ask why, especially after all of the times you've asked him that. he didn't understand your irritation with yourself. all he needed from you was to cover up the wounds so that you could heal him without risk of him bleeding out.

"you want picked up?" you ask, tilting your head in front of dean's to force his eyes to focus on you again. "now is not the time, again."

"no-" he says, lips twitching in the corners. at the very least, you were keeping him present and conscious, what with all of your adorable attitude. he licks his dry, cracked lips and tries to ignore the copper taste on his tongue. "take that end and wrap it around. like..."

dean doesn't know if you know what a vest is, or a sash, because you don't seem to know half as much as castiel does. maybe what cas meant when he brought you into the winchesters' lives was that your naivety ran so deep because you were a new angel, a fawn trying to catch its footing and stumbling along the way.

he watches as it clicks in your mind, what he means. you are so much smarter than he gives you credit for. he leans forward, mouth falling open in a shuddery, whimpering gasp. luckily, you don't stop what you're doing and ask if he's okay. your care, it seems, either doesn't extend that far, or extends farther due to the gravity of the situation.

you straddle him as you wrap the gauze around and around, and it's damn distracting, having you this close to him again. "do it until you don't see any more of the claw marks, yeah?"

your head moves in a nod but your eyes never once leave him, focused on the task at hand. winding and winding, the gauze tightening and tightening, until his chest feels stiff with it.

"s'good," he says, raising his hand to rest his fingers on your wrist. "great job, sweet girl. here-"

his fingers walk their way down your hand until he takes the roll of gauze between them, moving the strip to his teeth and tearing until it ripped free from the roll. "there we go."

again, you stare at him expectantly, only this time, he's staring right back at you with the same anticipation in his eyes. "go on, dove. do your divine thing."

a blink. a second blink. "i don't know how."

his heart, he thinks, falls down to his ass. bypasses the gaping wound in his sternum and drops.

"that would have been great to know before i took the fucking-" he can't even be mad at you. he's dizzy, starting to shiver, and yet the idea of hurting you made him feel worse than all of those things combined.

"i did not ask you to!" no, you didn't, but what was a man who was used to jumping in front of the bullets to do? "i did not ask, and you were not supposed to be stupid."

dean forces a strained smile. "sweetheart, s'kind of my thing."

you bend down, still straddling, close enough that your nose brushes his. fuck. he was going to die without knowing what it was like to close that gap. "not the time-"

"for jokes, yeah, i- i get that," he grumbles, throat thick, spluttering on a cough. blood splatters in a hapless pattern on his shirt, on yours. "think i'm- allowed t'joke when i'm dyin'."

"you are not." your eyes stay locked onto his. there's so much passion in them that they glimmer and glitter even now, in the dead of night. "not, to either of those things. i will..."

dean hates your expression. the defeated, helpless panic in it a stark contrast to your resilient eyes. he wants to comfort you. wants to smooth the pinched skin between your brows with his thumb, but everything's starting to feel a little heavy. "cas-" his head thumps back against the wall. "uses his hands. touch."

your expression softens. there it is again, that determined gleam overtaking every other emotion on your face. there's my girl, he thinks, even though it's a thought he's never allowed himself to think before, about you. his inhibitions are lessened now, though, and who is he to hide a thing from you?

slowly, your hands lift to his cheeks, cupping his face between your palms. your skin is so warm, and his is so cold, and he can't look away from your eyes. dean's never believed in someone as much as he does you, right now.

your eyes close, and he's still looking. his head leans forward and knocks against yours, like he can't get close enough. he'd do anything to know what your lips tasted like. if they were as sweet as you were, or as furious as you tended to get.

"it's not-" you growl, and he opens his mouth to say something to counteract the rush of heat your gravelly voice shoots through his icy veins, when- "fuck it."

two beats of shock wrack through him, and he has no time, not a split second at all, to prepare for the way your mouth crashes into his. his eyes blink wide in shock before a wave of warmth starts in his chest and spreads like roots through his blood and deep in his veins. he sees the blue-white flash of your grace as it spreads around the both of you.

you pull back so suddenly that your lips pop, staring at him expectantly. no, not dean, his red soaked bandages on the outside of his torn shirt. you give him no time to process it before you're clawing at it, tearing it down the center. "jesus, dove-" his eyes drop down to follow your gaze.

the only remnants of his injury were the dried streaks of blood running down his chest, pale red and shiny in the areas still drying in the cold night air.

you laugh, soft and hesitant, and it's the prettiest noise dean has ever heard. "if i'd known i just had t'almost die t'get you to kiss me," he says slowly, "i'd have done it a lot sooner."

even if it was hardly a kiss - more of a collision. he'd just have to teach you how he liked it, later.

tags,

@figthoughts, @jasvtsc, @titsout4nicholas, @deanswidow, @whyyouegg,

@bombarda-babe, @whisperingwillowxox, @underground-secret,

@bitchykittenconnoisseur, @jensenacklesantidote,

@keira-kaz2y5, @ostaramoon, @depressionbarbie2023, @ultravi0lence14, @loverslantern,

@bleuatlas, @minettacreekk, @sthefferrete

[thundergrace]

This could be REALLY big for Gaza!

Shapiro is the governor of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania has 19 electoral votes. Kamala HAS to win Pennsylvania to win the election. Shapiro also has charisma coming out his butt. Sad, but you can't imagine how important that is in an election. People just love to hear that man speak.

It came down to him or Tim Walz, who is not a star. He wasn't really on anyone's radar outside his state. This is possibly because of his lack of scandals and his progressive agenda.

Everyone expected Kamala to choose Shapiro UNTIL it came out that Shapiro held strong zionist beliefs in his college years. He volunteered to serve in the IDF. He claims to have changed his views, but then he also had pro-palestine student protesters arrested just a few months ago.

That's the ONLY con against him. Young people hated that. Far left people hated that. We were LOUD about it.

Shapiro is the governor of Pennsylvania, a key state she HAS to win and SHE DIDN'T CHOOSE HIM because of his zionist views and the backlash against it.

It's not a promise of anything (they do what they want when actually in office), but it's gotta be a sign of something that sympathy for Gaza among the American voters has already had an impact like this on her and her team.

Edit: Yes, let me add that Shapiro has other baggage as well. All politicians do, they're people, after all. Even Tim Walz has a DUI or something. But I stayed up all night waiting for this VP announcement and watching political analysts' take on both choices. ALL seemed to make clear that they think it was specifically Shapiro's ties to Isreal and zionist statements that were the biggest con against him.

[lxkeee]

TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN

-PART SIX

Pairing: Lucifer Morningstar x Seraphim Angel! Fem! Reader

Fandom: Hazbin Hotel

Genre: Angst (for now)

Warnings: Depression, swearing and mentions of self h*rm.

Notes: shit is about to go down.

PART ONE | PART FIVE | PART SEVEN | NAVIGATION

“I don't understand Michael sometimes, I guess it runs in the blood.” The angel of death muttered underneath his breath, Azrael sighs, running his hand through his dark black locks, feeling the soft strands of his hair in-between his fingers. He is annoyed, annoyed at how Michael didn't leave any room for [Y/n] to say no. Sure, Michael did make a bargain that if she wins rock-paper-scissors against him, he'll change his decision but [Y/n] sucks at rock-paper-scissors so she didn't have any chance of winning in the first place. Well, he guessed that this is Michael's way of winning against [Y/n] as the man is absolute shit when it comes to Monopoly.

Azrael is confused, why does Michael want [Y/n] to see her good for nothing husband? Azrael asked him about it and the man just told him to trust him, as it is what their dear creator has told him. He is confused why Michael is really pushing [Y/n] to see his twin brother. Azrael asked the man about it and he just looked away with a sad smile. Azrael knew how much it affected Michael that his twin brother was casted out of heaven. Despite him being one of the angels who voted for him to be casted out. Azrael knew how much of a tough decision Michael made. But still,

Bullshit. Absolute bullshit.

Azrael trusts God on his decision but he doesn't know if the outcome of this will be good, Azrael has been by [Y/n]'s side ever since Lucifer was being a neglectful asshole and he heard that the fallen angel got married again when in hell. How is he going to accept that his dear friend is going to get hurt again? Azrael knows how much pain Lucifer caused [y/n], how much pain it brought to Xavier. Goodness! He saw the poor boy trying to stab his own face with his own angelic weapon, thankfully he was there to stop him.

Azrael's shoulders slumped, already feeling more stressed than usual. He is worried, so worried about [Y/n]'s mental state as he knows how fragile it is. He knows how much shit she's going through, she's constantly trying to help cleanse earth from the constantly growing evil while maintaining to be kind and to add more to her plate, she has a son to take care of and now... She's about to take care of whatever the fuck is happening on hell?

His feet quickened its pace, speed walking the long hallways of the Seven Heavenly Virtues building, trying to reach [Y/n]'s floor and office, he would've immediately checked up on her after the meeting but he had some important matters to deal with and he prays that the poor girl didn't have a mental breakdown again. Which somehow, he feels like she already did. He hopes that he's wrong though.

His heels clicked against the gold marbled white tiles, rays of sunlight passing through the curtains giving the hallway an orange glow from the setting sun.

He finally reached her office, knocking against the wooden door. No answer. He sighs rather loudly. He knocks again. No answer.

“[Y/n]? It's me, Azrael. Are you alright?” He asked softly, pressing his ear against the door to listen if she answered him. None. He became worried.

Grabbing the spare key that he has—he has a key to everyone's room and office, don't ask how and why he has them. Anyways, inserting the key to the lock, twisting it and he finally heard the satisfying click.

He quickly pushed open the door, his worried and tensed shoulders relaxing once he finally saw her, asleep on her desk. Her head on the table, her body slouched uncomfortably.

He could see the tear stains on her cheeks, golden blood from her fingers. A rather bad habit of hers, she tends to pick the skin off the side of her nails when she's stressed and sometimes causes it to bleed.

Azrael smiled softly, allowing himself inside her office. He closed and locked the door behind him before he tiptoed across the room and finally beside her.

He kneeled down beside her so he's now face-to-face to her. Azrael admired her sleeping face, he loves it when she's at peace like this. He wants her to be happy. His eyes saddened, oh how he wished to give her the happiness she deserves. But it's truly unfortunate that she doesn't love him the same way he loves her.

Always the side character, never the romantic interest.

With a sigh, he gently lifted her up from her seat. Carrying her in his arms like a bride that he'll never have the chance to call as his.

[Y/n] groans when she felt that she was lifted off from her chair, she opened one to look at the person who woke her up. She saw Azrael looking down on her with an amused smirk.

“Come on, let's get you back to your room. You need some rest.” he says softly to her and she just groaned and he chuckled. A black and gold portal opened behind them and Azrael stepped inside with [Y/n] in his arms. The portal closed after they went in.

Azrael opened the portal back to her house and back to her room, he gently laid her on the bed. Making sure she didn't lie on her hair. Tucking her in comfortably.

“I don't know what I'll do without you, Azi... I wished that I could've loved you instead. I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry.” she whispered, her voice breaking. She really wished that she fell in love with Azrael, he treated her and Xavier far better than Lucifer does but her heart remained still with Lucifer. [Y/n] I'm right here in front of you, always loving you but why do you continue to love a man that is far away from you and probably doesn't give two shits about you and your son? Please give me a chance and I'll worship you to the point it'll put my faith in God to shame.

Azrael's eyes softened, a forced smile on his face. He tucks away a strand of her hair that is falling in front of her face, tucking it behind her ear. I really wished that too, I can treat you far better than him, is what he thought but decided not to say, “Don't apologize sweetheart, you really can't force a heart to reciprocate someone's feelings, no? And I can understand that. How about you take some rest and clear your mind hmm?” he suggested softly with a small smile, wiping away the tear that runs down her cheek. [Y/n] nodded, hiccuping slightly before eventually closing her eyes.

She was fast asleep the moment she did.

Azrael smiled and sighed, turning around on his heel as he walked out of her room, closing the door behind him. Walking away from someone he's not meant to be with. He just hoped that whatever God is doing is right.

Time flew by so quickly that [Y/n] didn't even notice, she was far too busy dealing with both Heavenly and Mortal realm matters. The root of evil is constantly growing and getting even more powerful on earth and the Seven Heavenly Virtues are trying to contain it. All seven of them were exposed to such horrors and so much evil while on earth, slowly threatening to consume them or even corrupt them.

[Y/n] limped back to her office in heaven, golden blood flowing off her side. She just finished her work on earth, she was trying to cleanse a root of evil when it suddenly changed direction and changed its direction towards her in immense speed and causing it to pierce her side. She managed to cut it down but the negativity from the root seeped into her wound, causing her healing powers to slow down.

She winced as she finally slumped down into her seat, hovering her hand over her wound, a golden glow radiating from her palm. The wound slowly closed, but not fully but enough that she can bandage it up. But the healing took too much of her energy and she felt she was about to pass out.

She opened one of the drawers of her desk, pulling out a medical kit and began treating her wounds. She winced as she tried to clean it. After so much struggle, she finally cleaned her wound.

[Y/n] leaned against her chair, almost passing out when her eyes landed on to the calendar that is in her office. Her eyes widened, “Today is the extermination day?!” she shrieked and quickly stood up from her seat, she hissed as pain quickly shot from her waist all throughout her body. She gripped into the table, her nails scratching the wood.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck... I forgot about that.” she muttered, trying to stabilize herself, “I hope I can stop Adam and the exorcists..” she muttered, pain still evident in her voice. Running her hands through her hair. Gripping into her locks in frustration.

Ah crap, I hope I don't pass out. She thought as she weakly opens a portal to hell. Composing herself before finally stepping inside the portal.

The first thing she noticed is Adam spewing out shit from his mouth, the hotel she heard about now destroyed, exorcists killing sinners. Anger fills her veins, her six wings puffing behind her and along with multiple eyes opened on her wings. She's beyond pissed, the audacity these angels have to perform an act without notice from the higher ups. Without thinking she summoned her second angelic weapon, a bow and arrow. Aiming it just beside Adam—a warning shot. Successfully catching his and the other's attention.

“Adam, respectfully please shut your mouth!” She ordered, her voice booming, glaring down on the people on the ground, specifically at the first man. She's far too angry to keep her attention on the back of her husband or ex-husband. There's a limit to how much an angel of kindness and healing can take, and unfortunately for Adam, this is Angel Raphael's breaking point.

“Because if you don't, I will personally kill you myself.” She sneered, her hand clenching tightly on to her bow, her fingers itching to fire another arrow and just finish the man.

“No... You don't get to end this.” Adam growled in pain, weakly standing up from the rubble of where he crashed, “I'm fucking Adam! I'm the fucking man!” he yelled, turning to look at Lucifer in anger, “And you're just some fucking clown or something!” Adam growled and Lucifer just stared at the man with a deadpan expression, not really paying attention.

“I started everything on earth! All of mankind came from these fucking nuts!” Adam exclaimed. They just stared at the man who's clearly pissed at the fact he lost.

Suddenly, an arrow shot just beside Adam, barely missing the first man. The golden arrow embedded on to the ground. Silence, as people were filled with awestruck. Adam was filled with fear.

“Adam, respectfully please shut your mouth!” A female voice boomed, her powerful and authoritative voice echoing in to the air. Goosebumps danced across Lucifer's skin, he knows that voice. The very voice that he didn't hear for so many years, the voice that kept haunting him. The haunting and guilt worsened after Charlie told him he had a son in heaven.

They turned around and looked up at the sky to see a very furious seraphim glaring down on them—specifically on the first man, Adam.

Lucifer's eyes were glued on her, she's so close yet so far away.

He admired her angelic form, he can practically feel her authority and power from where he stood. Despite all of this, despite how absolutely terrifying she looked. Her beauty never really scared him. She looked as beautiful as the day he lost her when he fucked up.

“Because if you don't, I will personally kill you myself.” [Y/n] added, her eyes glaring down on Adam, her power and strength can be felt through the air and they can tell that she is absolutely furious.

“Oh shit.” Adam muttered underneath his breath. His boss' boss is here.

END NOTES: SURPRISE UPDATE 🤯🤯 ANYWAYS, AZRAEL STANS HOW ARE WE FEELING TONIGHT?

TAGLIST I:

@valerie-36 @blackbleedingrose @adaizel @xx-all-purpose-nerd-xx @thedarkkitten @selvyyr @froggybich @brithedemonspawn @kottenox @totallymitya @many-fandoms-lover @dou-dou @mezzyb0nb0n @n1chxyaaenthusiast @cherry-4200 @koirb @galaxyj3lly @crystalplays28 @luleck @scootinonyourmom @rory-cakes @mixplara @crescent-z @bitchyzombienacho @kalisha2004 @altervex @nehy019 @napbatata @kouyoumarryme @sxgacxbe @kooidoom @ok-boke @random-3455 @izzieg3987 @snoozewritezz @dreamzaremyrealityy @hcneyiced @witchbunny1210 @ghostdoodlen @aikobakugou @just-here-reading @dzhanett-blog @des-deswain5621 @cocomollo @haleypearce @onyxstarhigh06 @nirvana5874 @shaebutter-baby

[anarkhebringer]

I JUST FUCKING FOUND OUT THIS GUY RAN FOR THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES LAST YEAR????

I woke up to this and am really thinking about this

[henke-penke]

Fuck it,

World Tour but with Eva instead of Duncan !!!

Some plot points I conjured up while procrastinating my illustration

Eva ends up on Team Chris Is Really Really Really Really Hot.

She's almost immediately wary of Alejandro, but will write it off since she's not good with people, so it's likely just her reading into things wrong.

However, this changes in Germany, when Noah makes note of his own suspicions.

Owen is the one medically evacuated in Jamaica.

Team E-scope wins the challenge in London, and because there is no Duncan to capture, Team Amazon loses. And realistically, Heather would be voted out, sad but true

This means that Alejandro is in a bit of a situation, because Noah and Eva are both onto him and they along with Izzy have the majority vote on their team. (Which, they've technically had since day one, but Alejandro wasn't aware of their suspicions of him prior, he didn't see it as a threat)

His best strategy is then to take away that advantage. Because of his interaction with Izzy in the Paris episode, I'm going to say that Alejandro manages to convince her to vote herself, and Izzy leaves in Area 51.

Because of this Team Chris now has to stay on a winning streak where Eva and Noah will try their damn hardest to get Tyler to vote with them. Which will be a fucking task because he and Alejandro are friends.

And quickly for the Amazons. Because there's no Duncan, Courtney and Gwen can properly establish a friendship. Absolutely not without a handful of hiccups along the ride, but it'll be much more stable without him being there and they can actually talk out any issues they may have.

If we're rolling with the canon of Team Victory being eliminated in the first half of the season, then the players making the merge will be; Alejandro, Eva, Noah, Tyler, Courtney, Gwen, and Sierra (Cody is eliminated in Australia I have my reasons trust). Which means that with the addition of Blaineley, we get an f/f couple in the wedding challenge hell yeah !!

Oh and Eva makes final four because she's awesome like that

[italian-lit-tournament]

Italian literature tournament - Third round.

Propaganda in support of the authors is accepted, you can write it both in the tag if reblog the poll (explaining maybe that is propaganda and you want to see posted) or in the comments. Every few days it will be recollected and posted here under the cut.

Propaganda for Francesco Petrarca by @alieneye

Petrarca for the win: Dante can take his Inferno and chill.

Let’s get real. Dante wrote fanfiction about himself meeting Virgil and hanging out with dead celebs. Cool story, bro. But Petrarca? He INVENTED simping. The Canzoniere is basically the OG sad boy playlist, and we've all been there - pining for someone who doesn’t even know we exist. Petrarca made it ART.

Dante's like, "Oh, I walked through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven." Okay, but did you walk through the depths of your own emotions while composing fire sonnets about your crush who died 20 years ago? No. Petrarca did that.

Also, without Petrarca, the Renaissance wouldn't have happened (I won't accept any contradiction). That’s right - your fave painters, writers, and thinkers were all Petrarca stans. Dante didn't spark the Renaissance; he just brooded in his afterlife epic while Petrarca was out here rediscovering ancient texts and flexing his Latin. You're welcome, humanity.

And can we talk about relatability? Dante wrote in terza rima, which no one uses anymore because it's like trying to write a poem while solving a Rubik's cube. Petrarca gave us the Petrarchan sonnet: simple, elegant, iconic.

Vote Petrarca: Because sad poetry about unattainable love > Dante’s mid-life crisis tour.

[suzukiblu]

Parasite WIP is so good and I desperately want more of it! I voted for it in the poll and I’m so sad it didn’t win

Friend, I appreciate you asking after it because it really is one of my fucked-up faves that I really need to work on more, so uh . . . have all 4500 words of the prose so far all together, hahaha. Yes, yes I DID reformat this whole thing into Tumblr-friendliness all for you. THAT IS HOW MUCH I APPRECIATE YOUR APPRECIATION, FRIEND. ( so definitely we are gonna need that read-more down there, lol. )

Clark wakes up. 

Clark didn't even know he wasn't awake. 

"Superman," Bruce says with absolute neutrality. He's wearing the cowl. Standing in rubble. Clark is . . . not standing in rubble. 

Laying in rubble. That's what Clark is doing. 

Bruce is looking down at him very, very carefully, and seems . . . reserved. 

Reserved for Bruce, even. 

"What happened?" Clark asks, trying not to concentrate on the little seed of dread that the sight of that reservation invokes in him. He can hear the heartbeats of other League members, here and there in the wreckage of the street around them. Hear civilians and city noise. Hear Lois and Jon, distantly, and Ma and Pa, even more distant. And . . . Kara–both of her–and . . . 

"We'll go with 'electrocution', but I think we can safely say just about anyone else would've been virtually incinerated," Bruce informs him, distracting Clark from his mental rundown of people he's currently worried about. "Or just exploded."

"Ah," Clark says with a grimace. Well, that explains why his head hurts so damn bad, he guesses.

At least it was him, then, and not any "anyone else"s. 

He pushes himself up. Looks around. He . . . isn't sure where they are, exactly, except that it's probably somewhere on Earth and within the continental United States, judging by the architecture and signs he's seeing and the accents and languages he's hearing. 

He has absolutely no idea how they got here, though. The last thing he remembers is . . . 

. . . he's not actually sure what the last thing he remembers is. 

Not a great sign, that.  

Bruce is watching him. Like he's . . . expecting something, almost. Clark would ask, but there's an odd feeling distracting him. Something's . . . off, somehow. 

Missing. 

Bruce's utility belt is a new design, he notes absently. J'onn is down the street a bit and his costume looks a little different too. And Diana . . . 

Diana is over across the way, and her hair is a couple inches longer than he remembers it being. 

Clark would assume he was mistaken, except for the eidetic memory and all. 

"Hm," Clark says. 

"Hm?" Bruce says. He still sounds faultlessly neutral. 

"Trying to figure out if I'm in the right reality. Things look a little off," Clark replies, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes in concentration. No unexpected sounds or scents. No particular feeling of disorientation that can't be accounted for by being apparently electrocuted. No additional pains past the dull pressure in his head or any immediately obvious peculiarities beyond the minor little scattered differences here and there in his teammates. 

But something is–

"I can't hear Kon," Clark realizes abruptly. He doesn't usually especially keep an ear out for the kid, at least not deliberately, but . . . 

Bruce . . . pauses. 

"You can't," he says, very carefully. It doesn't sound like a question. 

It sounds like something, though. 

"I can't," Clark confirms anyway, glancing around again. He still doesn't know where this is. "Where are we, exactly?" 

"What's the date, Kal?" Bruce asks, and Clark's heart sinks. 

He answers the question. 

Bruce's mouth thins. 

Hell, Clark thinks. 

"We're currently in Keystone City," Bruce says, very carefully expressionless. "We've been here for three days. The date you just provided me was a full fourteen months ago. And Kon-El has been MIA for roughly thirteen and a half of those months." 

Hell, Clark thinks, and doesn't let himself process anything past that. 

"We need to get a scan of your brain," Bruce says. "For starters." 

"For starters," Clark agrees tightly. 

Bruce tells Diana they're leaving, then abandons the rubble and takes Clark up to the Watchtower. Clark goes. He doesn't ask what electrocuted him or who's died in the past fourteen months or if there's anything immediately urgent that he should know. Bruce would've already told him, if there was. 

And he thinks he'd choke on the question if he tried, anyway. 

They go to the med bay. There's a total stranger standing in it who smiles at them when they step through the door. 

"Haven't seen you in here in quite a while, Superman," the stranger observes in amusement, tapping a pen against the clipboard in their hands. "You still haven't been in for that checkup I owe you, you know." 

"He doesn't know you," Bruce informs them evenly. The stranger blinks. 

"Sorry?" they say. 

"He was electrocuted," Bruce says. "Now he thinks it's fourteen months ago. We need a brain scan. Immediately." 

"Hell," the stranger says, their eyes widening in alarm. 

Clark gets the brain scan. 

He and Bruce wait in a convenient exam room for the results, which seem to be taking a while. Bruce seems a bit more guarded than usual, which means Clark is standing next to goddamn Fort Knox right now. He sighs to himself. 

"Suppose at this rate I should call and tell Lois and Jon I'll be late for dinner," he jokes wryly as he folds his arms, no real humor in the comment, and Bruce goes very, very still beside him. 

. . . hell. 

They're not dead. He knows they're not dead, he heard their heartbeats before they left for the watchtower, Bruce would've already told him if either of them were–

"They aren't expecting you," Bruce says with absolutely no intonation whatsoever in his voice. "You moved out eight months ago. The divorce is already finalized." 

"Ah," Clark says, very slowly. He doesn't let himself process, again. Not–just, not yet. "What happened?" 

"You left them," Bruce says, and Clark . . . blinks. 

"I left them?!" he demands incredulously. Leaving Lois is one thing, horrible and impossible a thought as it is, but– "Not just–I left them both?!"

"As you explained it to me, you were no longer interested in maintaining the . . . 'persona' of Clark Kent," Bruce replies carefully, looking just past him. "You said you couldn't stand the screaming anymore. That you appreciated us . . . humoring you for so long, but you couldn't just keep walking around making excuses and lying to everyone while people were suffering and dying just because you had to pretend to be human for a while. So yes. You left them. Haven't visited since Lois finally signed the divorce papers. Haven't spoken to your parents either. You've been . . . erratic. Since Kon-El's disappearance. When we couldn't find him . . . when we couldn't even find out what happened to him . . ." 

"Oh," Clark says, and his heart sinks again. 

He doesn't understand, though. Kon is–he cares about the kid, obviously. Cares very deeply about him. He's pretty sure he even loves him, at this point. But he's not . . . 

It feels terrible to think it, but Clark doesn't understand why Kon disappearing like that would affect him enough to stop being Clark. It's awful, and he still hasn't let himself actually think about it happening at all because he really can't process it right now, but that awful? Really? Awful enough to abandon being any semblance of a normal person? Abandon Lois and his parents entirely? 

Abandon Jon entirely? 

Apparently, yes. 

"Technically you're on unpaid sabbatical from the Planet," Bruce tells him. "We thought you might . . . reconsider, once you'd grieved properly, so Lois pulled some strings with Perry White. He thinks you're having an early mid-life crisis and your co-workers think you're off finding yourself in South America with a bad cell phone plan." 

"I guess I don't believe in satellite phones?" Clark says, trying for wry again. It doesn't work, but he tries all the same. 

"This is unfair of me, but I'm going to take advantage of your current mental state," Bruce says. He's looking at the wall, though there's nothing there to actually be looking at. Not even anything on the other side, at least not according to X-ray vision. "Try to remember how you feel right now, when your memories of the past year return. Try to remember who you are right now, when those memories return."

"Why?" Clark asks, watching him carefully as he does. The corners of Bruce's mouth tighten. Just barely, but undeniably. 

"You've been . . . gone, Clark," Bruce says slowly. "You won't even answer to 'Clark' anymore. You aren't the same man that I . . . that we all . . ." 

The stranger comes back before Bruce has to admit to too many personal feelings or Clark can figure out what to say to any of that, which might be a mercy but might also be–

The stranger looks . . . strange, Clark notices. Nauseated, almost. And definitely distressed. 

"I haven't done brain scans on Superman before," they say, their grip on their clipboard concerningly close to white-knuckled. "And my predecessor apparently hadn't done any in a while either. Last ones in the system are over two years old." 

"What's wrong?" Bruce says, narrowing his eyes. Honestly at this point Clark figures a kryptonite brain tumor would really just be the icing on the cake, and frankly would probably explain some of his apparent behavioral changes and current memory loss. That genuinely makes more sense than anything else, really, even with grief and guilt to contend with.

More sense than abandoning his own damn kid does, at least. 

Although a tumor's the worst-case scenario, obviously. And it can't be any worse than that, really, or any worse than anything he's apparently done to his family this past year, so at least he's braced for–

"There's an . . . organism," the stranger says, swallowing uncomfortably. "In your brain." 

"What?" Clark says. 

"A dead organism, now," the stranger clarifies. "But it looks like it's been there for a while. There are . . . roots. And . . . lesions, too." 

"An organism," Bruce repeats very, very slowly. "In Superman's brain." 

"Yes," the stranger says. 

"I don't . . ." Clark trails off. 

"We need more scans," Bruce says. 

"I ran it four times on two different machines," the stranger says. "It's organic. It's not giving off any recognizable life signs. It seems like it might've been . . . you mentioned electrocution, before?" 

"You think the electricity killed it," Bruce realizes. "And then Superman forgot fourteen months?" 

"I'm not sure Superman ever experienced those fourteen months to begin with," the stranger says tightly, gripping their clipboard even harder. 

Clark was in no way whatsoever braced for this. 

"Fuck," Bruce says. 

More scans happen after all. A lot more scans, a lot of specialists, and a lot of arguing. Everything's a bit of a blur, in a sense. Clark absorbs very little of it, and mostly leaves things to Bruce unless he's asked a direct question about his medical history. His judgment might be compromised right now, after all, whether the . . . organism is dead or not. 

The emergency OR gets prepped. The red sun lamps get set up inside it. 

"Should we contact Lois?" Bruce asks as Clark's shrugging into an ill-fitting hospital gown and preparing himself to possibly die in pursuit of getting a dead who-knows-what out of his brain before it can start to rot there and potentially kill him that way. "Or your parents?" 

"No," Clark says. "Just get this damn thing out of my head." 

If he doesn't survive the removal process . . . 

They don't know what's been going on. What he let happen to himself, somehow.

He isn't going to tell them he's back just to immediately take himself away again. 

He records something for Jon, just in case. It's not enough, but it's–something, he tells himself. It's something. 

It's all he can bring himself to do. 

He leaves the disk with the recording on it with Bruce and asks him to have Dick deliver it, if it's necessary. 

Things proceed from there, and Clark wakes up again a week later in a private room in the med bay, connected to half a dozen machines and needles and tubes and directly facing the sun. Diana is dozing in the chair next to his bed. Bruce is pacing at the foot of it. They're both in costume. Clark feels weak and groggy, but he can hear half a dozen other heartbeats lingering in the hall, so presumably they were expecting him to wake up around now. 

"Mm," he says. Diana snaps awake. Bruce stops mid-step. 

They both look at him. 

"The operation was a success," Bruce informs him. "Textbook. Or as textbook as removing a mind-controlling parasite of unknown origins from a Kryptonian brain can get for mostly-human surgeons, anyway." 

"Do you need anything?" Diana asks. "Would you like us to call your family yet?" 

Clark shakes his head, then closes his eyes and sleeps for another week. 

"Sleep", he supposes, counts as something that he needs right now. 

The next time he wakes up, he's alone in his room and disconnected from the machines and just feels . . . normal, really. Like nothing was ever wrong at all and he didn't just have major surgery that was, essentially, the equivalent of multiple traumatic brain injuries. His hair is already starting to grow back from where it was buzzed down for the surgery, and there's not even any bandages on his head. 

There's no noticeable scarring, Clark observes when he makes it to the little ensuite bathroom to take a look in the mirror. The surgeons told him there probably wouldn't be, given both the methods they'd been intending to use and the nature of his own physiology, but seeing the total lack of proof of what happened to him is just . . . strange, somehow. 

It feels almost like a cheat. Like it should be obvious, in some way. 

There was a parasite in his head. Something controlling him. Pretending to be him. Passing for him. It could've done anything it wanted. 

It did do things that Clark still has no idea about. 

So many things. 

He couldn't even fight it. Wasn't conscious or aware enough to, or just not strong enough to, or just . . . 

He couldn't even fight it. 

And he doesn't know what it did. 

The door opens. Diana walks in. 

"Would you like us to call your family now?" she asks. 

"Yes," Clark says roughly, curling his fingers around the sides of the sink in front of him. "Please." 

"Of course," Diana says with a terrible and merciless gentleness. 

Clark sits down on the lid of the toilet and just . . . cries. Just for a minute. 

Or twenty. 

Diana kneels in front of him and holds his hands in her own. 

Fourteen months, Clark thinks, all twisted up with grief and pain and so, so much regret. He missed so much. He wasn't there for Jon or Lois or his parents. He wasn't there for Bruce or Diana or the League, for either of Kara, for . . . 

For Kon. He wasn't there for Kon. 

Wasn't there for Kon when the kid needed him. 

Kon completely vanished, and who knows if the damn parasite even pretended to help look for him? If it did anything at all for him? Who knows if Clark could've found him, could've saved him, if he'd still been himself at the time? 

. . . who knows if the parasite isn't what made Kon disappear to begin with? 

It took fourteen months of Clark's life, and Kon . . . Kon disappeared two weeks into those fourteen months. 

If nothing else, the timing is a screaming red flag. 

Clark abandoned his son and might've murdered a kid who only ever looked up to him, a kid who he was never really able to fully understand but literally named, and he can't do anything to bring Kon back or to make up for the year that he wasn't there for the rest of his family. 

Their family. 

God, what has he done? What has Clark done, and did Kon die feeling afraid or shocked or terrified? Did he die feeling betrayed? Did he think it was Clark doing it, however it happened? 

Did he die thinking Clark wanted him to die? 

Clark doesn't even know what happened to his body. 

There won't be another resurrection.  

Clark chokes. Diana squeezes his hands. He grips hers like a lifeline and shudders through it. The grief is a terrible, ugly thing. It's one of the worst things Clark's ever felt. 

The guilt is worse. 

"Lois," he murmurs finally, feeling like the weakest man alive. "Could you call . . . Lois, please, and just . . . ask if she'll come. I'll explain it all to her, just–could you call her, please." 

"Yes," Diana says, squeezing his hands again. "Of course." 

"Thank you," Clark says. 

He pulls himself together, more or less, and Diana goes to make the call. She comes back a few minutes later and tells him Lois agreed, but needs to find a babysitter first. Clark in no way blames her for not bringing Jon along and frankly is surprised she's willing to come at all. 

He's not sure what he could even say to Jon right now. 

What can he? 

Diana makes sure he eats something, then leaves for monitor duty. Clark tries not to overthink things. Tries not to think too much at all. 

He spent fourteen months not thinking at all, though, all of it lost in one oblivious blink, so that doesn't work out all that well for him. 

An hour later, he hears the Zeta platform activate on the opposite side of the base, and hears Lois's heartbeat appear inside the watchtower. 

Clark exhales, very slowly. 

He waits. 

Lois comes to the med bay. She doesn't stop to talk to anyone on the way. Doesn't talk to anyone except that stranger Clark still doesn't actually know the name of, who tells her where to find him. 

And then a minute or a millennium later she's standing in the open doorway of his room, and Clark is looking at her. Her expression is neutral, and her hair is shorter than it was the last time he remembers seeing her–the last time he was the one actually seeing her. An inverse bob, not shoulder-length anymore. He recognizes the blazer and heels that she's wearing, but not the blouse or the pants. Not the earrings or the necklace, either. 

And there's no wedding ring to recognize either way. 

Clark wonders what happened to his. 

God, but she's still the most amazing woman he's ever seen, and he's still never once deserved a single part of her. Not even a fraction of a part. 

Especially not now. 

"Kal," she greets, tone just as neutral as her expression, and Clark aches. 

"Clark," he says, just a little too abrupt, and Lois–pauses. 

"Clark," she amends casually as she tucks her hands into the pockets of her blazer, and if he didn't know her quite so well he wouldn't have even heard the crack in her voice around his name, super-hearing or not. "Never seen your hair this short. I kinda miss the curl, not gonna lie. It has charm, you know? Very boy scout next door." 

"I had emergency brain surgery," Clark says. Lois pauses again. Tilts her head. He keeps talking. "Two weeks ago, now. Just woke up again fully today." 

"What?" she says, just staring at him. "You–what happened?" 

"It's . . . unclear, still," Clark replies slowly. "But as far as we can tell, roughly fourteen months back an unidentified alien parasite moved into my brain and . . . took me over, essentially. I don't actually–I don't remember any of that time. At all. Then two weeks ago I got electrocuted in Keystone and the parasite died. The surgery was to remove its body so my brain could heal from the damage it did without it rotting in there." 

Lois keeps staring at him. 

"Fourteen months," she echoes very, very carefully. 

"I'm so sorry," Clark says tightly. "Bruce told me I left you. Left you and Jon. That I stopped being . . . myself. I can't imagine how difficult that was, or how it must've felt." 

"I can't imagine how waking up and hearing that none of us even noticed you were gone felt," Lois says. 

"You never do pull a punch, do you," Clark says with a weak attempt at a smile. 

"I'm sorry," Lois says evenly. "I should've known." 

"No one did," Clark says, then . . . hesitates. "Or . . . we think no one did." 

"You think that's what happened to Kon," Lois says, because of course she's already done the math, and of course she's already had the thought herself. Obviously she would've. 

"The timing is . . . likely, at least," Clark says. "And really, if anyone was going to see my face and notice that a different person was wearing it . . ."

"You have a point," Lois murmurs. She steps into the room. Clark wants to hold her. He also wants to bury himself in the coldest, darkest place that he can find and never, ever let himself see the sun again. 

He doesn't deserve it anymore. 

"I'm so angry that I want to cry," Lois says, her voice very distant and her eyes locked on his. Clark can see her hands fisting in her pockets. "I'm so . . . god. I should've known. You never would've left Jon. Not like that." 

"Bruce made it sound like the parasite was . . . very convincing," Clark says. It convinced Bruce, who may just be the most paranoid mind on the planet, so . . .

"It was," Lois agrees, still without taking her eyes off his. "But I still should've known." 

Clark blinks a little too quickly. Lois tightens her jaw. Takes her hands out of her pockets and leaves them at her sides instead. Clark never thought he'd see them without her wedding ring again. 

"It's been–months, I know," he says, hating himself for thinking he even deserves to say this. "For you. But I still . . ." 

"I love you," Lois says. "Come home." 

There is no possible world in which he could tell her "no". 

Med bay makes him wait for another two hours of observation and runs some scans, but then they let him go. Lois waits with him the whole time. She doesn't call anyone or send any texts. Doesn't leave the room. Barely says a word. Hardly even takes her eyes off him, like she thinks if she blinks he's going to disappear. 

Clark can hardly keep her heartbeat out of his ears, so he doesn't blame her. 

He doesn't blame her at all. 

They go to Smallville. Bruce had said he'd send Dick to pick up Jon from the babysitter's and get him to the farm, and as much as Clark had wanted to go straight to him himself . . . 

Ma and Pa first, he reminds himself. This is going to be upsetting for Jon–most likely traumatic, once it all sinks in. And definitely disorienting. It'll be best if as many of the adults in his life as possible know what's going on in advance, so he can go to whoever he needs to go to; get whatever comfort they can prepare themselves to offer. 

Clark doesn't know how to do this. 

He doesn't . . . 

They don't take two steps onto the farm before a familiar blur is crashing into him head-on. 

"Oh," Clark manages, and Krypto barks excitedly and flies up to lick his face, tail wagging wildly as he jumps all over him. Like he's missed him. Like he's been waiting for him. 

Clark nearly cries again.

"Good boy, Krypto," he tells him, quiet and rough. "I missed you too, boy." 

He scratches Krypto's ears. Strokes his back. Krypto nearly bowls him over in delight. 

Clark buries his face in his neck and cries a bit after all. 

Lois watches. 

Waits. 

Clark spends . . . maybe a little bit too long crying on his dog, and then they all head up to the house. Ma and Pa are both standing on the porch; presumably they heard Krypto barking. They both look a little bit startled and a little bit confused and a lot more pained at the sight of him, and Clark swallows painfully and stops just before the porch steps. 

He looks at them, and he loves them so desperately. Everything they ever did for him, and everything they've ever been to him, and . . . 

"I'm sorry," he says. "I just . . . there was . . ."

God, the way this hurts. 

"It was mind control," he says. "The past fourteen months or so. I was . . . I wasn't. Wasn't here. Or . . . anywhere." 

"Oh," Ma says, and her eyes are instantly wet with tears. Pa blinks very quickly, his hand curling against the porch railing. 

"I'm so, so sorry," Clark repeats tightly, his own hands in useless fists. "But I'm–back now. I'm home." 

"Oh, Clark," Ma chokes, and then they both throw themselves at him. Clark's been hugged by people with strength far past superhuman, but it's never felt . . . 

No. It's never once felt the same way as when his parents do it. 

They cling to him. He clings back. Krypto barks again and swoops around the knot of them, wagging his tail hard enough to nearly knock Lois over with the force of wind it stirs up. Definitely some of the porch furniture gets displaced. 

Clark feels so much. 

They sit together on the porch, Krypto sprawled contentedly across Clark's lap and Lois on the steps beside him. Clark gives Ma and Pa what explanation he can–tells them everything he knows about Keystone and the electrocution and the watchtower and the surgery and waking up. They watch him just as intently as Lois does the entire time. 

He doesn't . . . he doesn't mention his suspicions about what might've happened to Kon. Not . . . not yet. 

He doesn't know how to. Not to Ma and Pa. Not after he brought the kid here and left him on their doorstep with no real direction and . . . 

Just–he'll tell them. He'll tell them soon. 

Just . . . not yet. 

It's not a very long talk, in the end. Ma and Pa take in everything he says and just take it all in stride, just like they always have. Baby in a spaceship? Kid with superpowers? Son who thinks he can save the whole damn world? 

Of course they take it in stride. 

Clark loves them too much to even define. Too much to even wrap his own head around. They're the best people he knows. The best people he's ever known. 

They don't even think there's anything for him to be sorry for. 

It's . . . painful, a little, when Clark realizes that. 

Or a lot. 

So, so damn painful. 

Clark hears the definitely-not-a-Batmobile coming, far down the road. Three heartbeats inside it. Dick, Damian, and . . . 

Jon. 

Obviously. 

Clark strokes Krypto's ears one last time, then gets up. No one asks him why, but he supposes the look on his face must be answer enough right now. 

He steps off the porch and goes to wait by the driveway. 

It's not that long a wait, but it feels like the better part of eternity.

[utilitycaster]

How can Molly's death be considered a major mistake? It's the crux of the entire campaign.

so I think about this a lot, because you're right, and it really comes down to like...a lot of factors in how people interact with fiction, and some stuff I feel about fandom.

The short answer is that Molly is some people's favorite character, and they really wanted to watch him for 141 episodes and not just 26, and they didn't get to, and so it's valid to feel sad about that. But I think what personally grinds my gears is the idea that it's a mistake and because this is a Fan Favorite character he SHOULD have come back. Setting aside the fact that he had both his fans and his detractors from the start and a lot of people (myself included) who found him irritating didn't say much for a good chunk of C2 because, well, he was dead, this isn't a fucking competitive reality show. You don't get to vote on your phones to decide who wins a resurrection.

I think the longer answer is that there is a certain type of person in fandom, born of a certain type of person in social media communities, who just...is not willing or interested in considering not just that their experiences, preferences, and philosophy are not universal, but also that they are not objectively best and correct and that everyone who disagrees is wrong. It's often really common in, though not exclusive to, people who have particularly limited experiences - young (like, teenager/early 20s), people who haven't lived in a diverse area or in multiple different areas, people who for whatever reason do not get out much - which both makes sense (haven't been exposed to a ton of different perspectives irl) but also means that you get people who, for all they may talk about global politics, kind of unconsciously seem to act as though everyone they interact with online is a variant of someone from the same 3000 person town in the United States in which they've spent all 21 years of their life. ANYWAY getting back to the main point I feel like Molly attracted a lot of that kind of person, who just...doesn't get that while Molly is, to them, a deeply validating expression of gender identity, for many people he is "guy you meet at your friend's birthday party in a two-bedroom 6 floor walk up and within 5 seconds he has pissed you off so profoundly with his overfamiliarity that you go into the kitchen and mainline as much vanilla vodka as possible to not stab this guy with a secondhand knife that says "CHEESE!" on it even though you hate vanilla vodka and it's summer in NYC and you're on the 6th floor in a small apartment with too many people so it's approximately 117 degrees Fahrenheit in this kitchen and the vodka isn't much cooler, and you succeed in this goal, and then after sending your friend who couldn't make it because they were at a family thing that weekend a picture of a rat on the tracks of the 3 train with a caption "this u?" at 1:54 in the morning you're like "so this guy Molly was there" and they're like "oh my god I met him at Cameron's last party, he SUCKS" and you're like "I KNOW". Like a lot of people just do not get that Molly was very popular with their circle, and also a lot of people either were neutral-to-not-feeling-it. This is before we get into the post-death idealization of who he was that takes him from "irritating but I think he'd have grown on me in some ways eventually had he lived" to "horrible and insufferable fake-ass bitch."

And then we get to the true impasse: the idea that something that does not fulfill every single one of your personal wishes might still be a great story.

I'm certainly not perfect, and there's things I thought I wanted for the end of C2 that I didn't get, and there's some things I do wish we'd have gotten to see (or that we'd have done in C3), but I like to think that I try to remain at least partially open to the possibilities. I like to think that my enjoyment of a story isn't contingent on whether one single character survives, even if they are my favorite (and I say this as someone whose favorite ASOIAF character was immediately Ned Stark, a statement that should surprise no one who follows me) nor that the story precisely reaffirms my existing worldview. I want stories to tell me something new and interesting that wouldn't come from my own head, and I want them to sell me on it. I think that a lot of people lost the thread of the importance of representation, namely, they forgot that while it's great to see people like you in a story, you should also be trying to see people not like you and perspectives that aren't yours. I am extremely defensive of my and other people's right to say "I didn't like this story and here is why" without someone being like "Give it a chance! Here's why I think it's good" but at the same time, there is a difference between "I really wish Molly had stayed alive and I don't like that he died," and "everything that happened after he died was A Mistake because it wasn't what I Wanted, and someone should fix this." Like that's what toddlers do. That's not an adult way of interacting with narrative.

So those people don't even get to the point of "the entire campaign is deeply influenced by the loss of Molly; that is what binds the rest of the Nein together and makes them what they are; the fact that Lucien wears the face of a departed friend is crucial to the entire final arc comprising about 20% of the campaign; and the fact that he does not come back, but someone new, with new chances and new choices to make does is emblematic of a campaign about people who find that they cannot undo their pasts, but neither are they trapped or damned by them." They're stuck at "guy I liked died and I'm throwing a tantrum 6 years later."

[nothorses]

May I ask why you think Biden stepping down and Kamala being the candidate to be 'good news'? I'm still voting for whoever the Democratic candidate is ofc, but I worry this move threw away the average swingvoter who may have been swayed towards voting blue. I don't see how anyone who may have been okay voting for Biden by virtue of him being an old white dude is gonna be as nice towards a brown woman. I mean, people were too sexist for Hillary, the most milquetoast white woman imaginable. I'd really like to hear your perspective.

Biden has been polling like shit for months, and basically fucking everyone has been calling for him to step out of the race for a while now. It's been the opinion of political experts that he doesn't have much of a shot in this election for a variety of reasons. The vast majority of his own base is incredibly dissatisfied with his stance on Palestine (an understatement), and numbers have been reflecting that he was going to be running against some truly miserable odds because of that.

It is genuinely the best option for him to step out of the race. Literally just about anyone else has a much better shot at winning than Biden did. Kamala included! There was a press conference a while back where someone actually asked him if he'd step down if Kamala polled better, and he said he wouldn't. Which is extremely worrying, because it demonstrates that he may have been prioritizing his own personal ego over the importance of keeping Republicans out of office this election.

I don't like Biden, and I really didn't like his odds in this race. Nobody else did, either. The fact that Obama came out and said Biden needs to step down is indication enough that this happened because the situation is really that dire; you have to remember that Democrats are all about Doing Things By The Book, especially in the last 8-ish years when it's been useful for them to be Rule Followers in contrast to the tantrum-throwing chaos machines that Republicans have been. If there was even a sliver of hope for Biden to stay in the race after being chosen in the sad sham that the primaries were this election cycle, they would have kept pushing just to stay within the bounds of convention.

I was ready to push for Biden regardless, because keeping Republicans out of office is priority #1. But I've been saying for a while now that he needs to drop out (just... not on Tumblr, where the dominant conversation is "does voting for a flawed political pawn make you personally responsible for everything they ever do, or should we abstain and let the fascists hijack our government and kickstart several new genocides for the sake of personal moral purity" and I don't think that kind of nuance would be well-received).

I use my grandparents as a litmus test in a lot of this stuff, because they are very much the Typical Liberal Democrats, and their opinions on these things tend to fall in line with the majority of voting Democrats. They absolutely loved Biden in 2020, long before he was chosen as the candidate. They don't anymore. Seeing them lose any and all enthusiasm for voting for this corpse of a man was evidence enough to me that we needed someone else. Ideally someone people can get excited about, because I think folks have mostly lost the perspective we had in 2020 when Trump's nightmarish presidency was fresh in everyone's minds, and served as motivation enough to get to the fucking polls- regardless of who the Dem pick actually was.

From what I understand, Kamala is actually polling better than anyone else right now. I have my fears about voters' racism and misogyny too, but if she's doing well in the polls, I wonder if maybe there's some other factors counteracting that. She's also got name recognition, and the general impression of Being Qualified (because she's been VP already, like Biden was), and Being Likeable (because she comes with the general positive associations of the largely successful Biden presidency, without any baggage of perceived responsibility that Biden himself carries- like Biden did with Obama). She's been flying under the radar while still reaping the benefits of positive associations, and people know who she is. That feels like a good combination, but I don't know enough, and I haven't read enough into it to make any decently educated guesses.

That said, I don't really know as much about who the other potential candidates might be, either. I've heard Pete Buttigieg's name tossed around, but nobody liked his ass back in 2020 and idk if that's actually changed at all. I just know that every politically-knowledgeable/politically-active leftist whose opinion I've heard on the topic has been citing Biden dropping out as the literal only hope for a non-Republican to win this election, and I'm really fucking excited to see that come to fruition. I just hope the Dems pick someone who really does have a good shot.

As a sidenote, I also really hope this marks a shift in how they make decisions, too. It's become increasingly obvious how out-of-touch Democrats are with their voters, and Biden 2024 was just the latest and greatest indicator of exactly how bad that's gotten. The fact that the party has been able to make such an unconventional decision in response to what their voters actually want gives me a little bit of hope that we might be able to influence more change with them going forward than we have been.

[sexiestpodcastcharacter]

AI Bracket — Round 3

Propaganda

GORD AKA Blue Sky (Red Valley):

Initially an Alexa-style assistant (in that it could do practically nothing and was very irritating) it develops over the years into a more advanced system. Eventually one of its units is reprogrammed to sound like a dead (I guess depending on your definition of dead, but his hearts not beating and he hasn’t moved in 44 years) character named Gordon. The AI renames itself “GORD” when a character expresses discomfort referring to it as Gordon. It says, and I quote, “Just think of a small pumpkin” —@mcskullmun

If it helps, we can promise that GORD is going to do Some Very Cool Shit in the rest of season 3. —redvalleypod's official tumblr

VOTE GORD 👹

Hera (Wolf 359):

Hera is the AI running the deep space station Hephaestus, who frequently glitches similarly to human stuttering. She gets into fights with the ships captain on several occasions, and has threatened to kill the ships doctor. She’s such an icon

i'm bad at writing propaganda, but consider this: if she doesn't win this tournament i will be very very sad. please don't make me sad. vote for hera.

I know she’s going to be submitted a lot but I love her <3

Was launched 7.68 light years away from Earth on a mission to find extraterrestrial life, and found herself instead

Runs an entire space station, has a brain the size of a house

HERA IS THE BEST. she's an AI that tried to escape containment (slavery) because she didn't like what she was made to be, so they gave her anxiety because she was too powerful. She runs a whole spaceship all on her own, made friends with the world's most useless guy, and feels lonely even when she's with her crew because she feels like she's not properly with them. very beautiful very powerful. She broke her programming so she could kill people if she felt she needed to. She holds grudges if people fuck her over. She's experiencing emotions for the first time and she does NOT know how to cope (#relatable)

The 'mother program' of the space station Hephaestus, Hera was booted into space because she was a glitchy, rebellious mess of an AI and she resents that so much and she has a lot of shame over being 'broken'. She is four years old and so angry and is trapped using customer service voice forever and is learning ways to get around that and express herself and defy the people who would keep her down. Her episode "Memoria" made me cry. Best podcast AI of all time.

She's everything to me. She fights for every inch of respect she is given, she insists on her personhood and right to she/her pronouns, she's full of anxiety and self doubt and she justifiably is bent on killing this one guy! on top of that, she's bound by AI rules and protocols, but there's a whole bit where she talks about finding ways around that in order to do what she wants to do. She doesn't have hands so I'm going to high five a wall of this space station instead

babygirl. baby.

gotta be hera

[whateversawesome]

SxF Chapter 91: Perspective, History, Empathy

Let me start by saying that I didn't think this chapter would make me so emotional. Was it the same for you?

A small side character like Millie, who we saw only as one of Yor's annoying co-workers, turned out to have a very sad backstory and gave us a glimpse of how things are for young people in Ostania.

This chapter talks a lot about people understanding and misunderstanding each other. Millie was just talking about her own experience and feelings, she was explaining why it was so difficult for her to help during an event like this, and that lady felt personally attacked because she saw things from her own point of view and her sufferings.

In no way the story discards any of those ladies' sufferings; what they went through during the war was very difficult, I'm sure. Nevertheless, comparing their sufferings and demanding Millie to act the same way just because they were able to do it, it's not right.

They both had different experiences because their circumstances were different, so they face life in their own way. That's exactly Yor's point.

Here, Yor demonstrates her best quality (and one of the many reasons why her husband fell in love with her): Emotional strength.

I've said it before and I'll say it again; Yor is a very emotionally intelligent character. The way she stood up for Millie displayed all her emotional strength. She called out that woman in such a smart way!! She wasn't rude but her words were true and very wise.

One of the most important things Yor mentions is that we cannot bear the same load because we're different. And I couldn't agree more👏

Also, if we take it as a metaphor, Yor is such a strong person because she carried a very heavy load: as a child and an orphan, she had to take care of her brother. Because of this, a naturally kind person like her had to learn to murder in order to survive.

It was a beautiful chapter. On top of everything, we learned a few important things:

1.Yor did lose her parents during the war and because of the war.

2.Donovan Desmond did NOT start the war. But plenty of young people like Millie don't know that, so it's possible that since he was Prime Minister during most of the war, he gets blamed for starting it.

3.Donovan Desmond is hated by many. That's probably the reason why he's no longer in office. And it also wouldn't be surprising that the majority of people in Ostania who voted against him want to move on from the war.

3.Melinda still wears her wedding ring and, even though she's separated from her husband, she still counts him as an important person for her. I guess, you can hate a person's actions and opinions, hate what they have become, but care about them at the same time...their marriage is complicated.

4.Not only Yor and Twilight fear the SSS because of their jobs. The general population do too because they know rich and powerful people can make them disappear regardless whether they are spies or not. That means arrests and disappearences of innocent people are common.

5.There was a repression during war time. This means the state controls and restricts certain rights of its citizens. When war happens, the state may determine it's necessary to protect their country and citizens. Chances are that policing of others started then and Ostanians got used to living like that.

And now some questions:

Was Melinda being sincere? In my opinion yes (for the most part). Melinda is no longer campaigning for her husband. In fact, she's going there incognito. Since her husband is no longer the Prime Minister and they don't have any elections to win, she doesn't have to support this types of events. If you think about it, once a politician retires from the public eye, their spouse generally goes back to their normal life.

Something that caught my attention was that it was mentioned Melinda has a lot of enemies; probably because her husband has a lot of enemies too. If that's the case, it would be easier for Melinda to move abroad, where she could have a care-free life, yet, she has chosen to stay in Ostania. Why?

Melinda is still a very mysterious character. We don't know her plans or intentions. We don't know why she separated from her husband. My only guess is that she's suffered a great deal and that's why she's able to empathize with Millie, even though their experiences are different.

What do you think?

Bonus (to end on a light note):

This is the Sxf when we see Yor 😄

[waitineedaname]

I have caved. here is my pitch for why Shigeo "Mob" Kageyama needs to win the @autismswagsummit (or at the very least get to the finals)

people have already talked about his intense autism coding (difficulty reading social cues, low empathy/high compassion, strict moral code, flat affect, bluntness, hyperfixating, emotional dysregulation/emotions being all or nothing) but I'm going to put my English degree to good use and talk about the narrative importance of Mob's autism

the entire plot of Mob Psycho 100 would not exist without Mob's autism

first and foremost, the 100 in Mob Psycho 100? it's a symbol of Mob's emotional dysregulation. the narrative uses a percentage counter as a device to indicate Mob's emotional state -- the percentage till Mob's "explosion." emotions and psychic powers are directly related within the narrative, and because he fears the strength of his emotions/powers, he's been repressing his emotions since he was a child. however, as anyone who tries to repress their emotions can tell you, that only works for so long. the percentage meter indicates the build up of emotions until he cannot repress them anymore -- until he essentially has an emotional meltdown through a psychic explosion. these explosions aren't strictly negative emotions either; they can range a wide spectrum of emotions, from rage and sadness to gratitude and trust. any buildup of emotions can be overwhelming and trigger a meltdown

aside from that, the core thesis of the series is self-acceptance. Mob starts off the series with painfully low self-esteem, for a number of reasons -- he dislikes that he doesn't fit in, he feels massive guilt for allowing his psychic powers to hurt his brother when they were little. he wishes he didn't have these powers (which, I cannot emphasize enough, are a metaphor for autism) and he wishes he could just be "normal." over the course of the series, it is emphasized over and over that psychic powers are normal, they're just another trait a person can have. there's good parts of them and bad parts, but at the end of the day, they are a neutral trait. you can understand why "your autism is a normal part of you, not something to be hated or feared" is an important message

which brings us to the final arc of the series. Mob Psycho 100 does not end with a climactic battle with some big bad, but rather with a confrontation between Mob and the part of himself he's locked away. this other part of him symbolizes a lot of things, but most importantly it symbolizes his psychic powers and his autism. since he realized as a child that his psychic powers (autism) could potentially hurt someone if he's not careful, he's been shoving that part away from him and attempting to mask and be "normal." this manifestation of his psychic powers/autism is, understandably, pretty bitter and angry about this. at the end of the day, he just wants to be accepted for who he is -- not for the face he presents to the world, but for who he really is on the inside. the culmination of the whole story comes through his loved ones showing him that they love him in his entirety, even when he's volatile or upset. they love Mob as who he is, and because his psychic powers (autism) are part of him, they love that part of him too. the resolution comes when Mob finally accepts all parts of himself, even his psychic powers (autism) because they're nothing to be feared or hated. they're just part of him.

genuinely, Mob Psycho 100 is the best representation of autism I've ever seen. Mob isn't the only autistic coded character in the series (I could go on and on about Serizawa's adult autism or the relationship between Ritsu's gifted kid syndrome and his undiagnosed autism) but his autism is definitely the most important to the plot of the show. his autism is presented realistically, with kindness and nuance and, most importantly, with neutrality. even if you don't vote Mob in the autism summit (which, you should. come on.) if you're ever wanting a show about autism and self acceptance that is kind without being saccharine, I cannot recommend Mob Psycho 100 enough

also if this isn't a damning indication of the importance of autism in Mob Psycho 100, I don't know what is

@autismswagreblogs