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littlemisspascal · 4 years ago

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Death and an Angel part 3

Death!Din and Cupid F!Reader

Summary: You and Din have an unexpected heart-to-heart about what it means to be Death and a Cupid on route to a planet where Din’s potential soulmate lives.

Rating: G

Word Count: 1,500

Warnings: Pining, smidge of angst, more plot development, Razor Crest (RIP I miss you darling!), a made-up home world for the reader (yes, yes, there’s like a million I could have picked but my brain said NOPE)

Author Note: Ahhhh, the comments are so amazing from you all! Thank you everyone out there sparing time to check out my little universe, it makes me sooo happy you have no idea! As always, I hope you enjoy this new segment as I try to plot this story out and get these two idiots to acknowledge there just might be something between them.

Also special thanks to @codenamewitcher for including the first two parts on Weekly Fanfic Recs. Be sure to go check out the list for a whole bunch of fantastic stories!

Links to Part 1, Part 2 and Part 4

Photo Inspiration: (What I imagine is beneath the armor in this scene...*dreamy sigh*)

There is a distinct silence that can only be found in hyperspace when the stars outside resemble sparkling streaks of silver tinsel and your breath is trapped within your lungs as you’re awestruck by the sheer beauty of it all. You experience this silence aboard the Razor Crest, sitting in the cockpit behind Din as he pilots his beloved gunship. It isn’t the first time you’ve been a passenger, having traveled with Din on two previous ventures where your Cupid services were required on planets far away from your home on Umbriel.

Off-world assignments for you were generally rare since your bosses were more inclined to choose Cupids of higher ranking to handle those clients, but sometimes you were the only available option left. Which, come to think of it, is exactly how you became the one roped into meeting with Death every full moon. Your bosses decided someone needed to check up on him to make sure he wasn’t reaping anyone before their fated time and thus messing with the natural order of things. You privately have reached the conclusion it was a decision made during a fit of paranoia as you had yet to find any evidence suggesting Din ever broke a single one of the universe’s rules, let alone even considered the mere possibility.

When you did travel for assignments, you never stopped feeling like a goldfish being dumped out of your familiar little bowl and into a massive ocean full of strange oddities. You would often find yourself wasting time trying to successfully navigate the unknown world when you should have been focused on tracking down your client’s soulmate.

That’s why Din had offered to start traveling with you. Actually, in his own words it was because, “You think about love so much you don’t see trouble until it’s an inch in front of you. Someone’s got to be there to look after you.”

You’d tried to argue, told him you had never experienced trouble and that if you did then you could handle it with your bow. All Cupid’s were required to master archery for self-defense purposes, though Din’s responding snort of derision made you suspect he wasn’t convinced of your skills. You wondered if he thought, just as humans incorrectly did, a Cupid only used their bow to spread love and lust. Or maybe he just thought you weren’t capable of such finesse. It was an insulting assumption, fueling you with the burning desire to prove him wrong. One day, you keep telling yourself, a repetitive chant. One day you’ll show him just how capable you are with your weapon and you imagine his look of shock, whether worn openly on his face or hidden beneath the visor of his helmet, will be utterly priceless.

But in the meantime, you’re in no hurry to encounter trouble. Finding enjoyment in taking these trips with him on his ship instead.

The Razor Crest had actually been a complete surprise to you when Din first welcomed you on it; primarily because the notion of him using such a primitive form of transportation despite the powers he possessed as Death was too outrageous to wrap your head around. However, it took less than ten minutes soaring through space for you to discover just how many details of the universe you were missing by relying on your Cupid abilities to teleport yourself between locations. Never would you have imagined Death to be the one to teach you to love the slowness of travel, to let your eyes linger on all the beautiful wonders along the way. But that’s exactly what happened.

You turn your head away from the window to look at Din. From your angle, all you glimpse is the back of his helmet, reflecting the passing starlight. Soon you’ll be introducing Din to the first immortal on your list of potential soulmates.

Death, you quickly correct yourself. He’s only Din when he’s around you.

You initially thought he elected to wear his armor because you told him he could to ease his comfort, but now you think it’s because this is him meeting his potential soulmate as himself. It is easy to forget sometimes this is the image of Death—a warrior enshrouded in beskar, cunning and ruthless—that is recognized throughout the universe. And feared.

If the handsome face he concealed was known instead, you wonder if mortals would readily choose to embrace the ending of their lifetime, rather than foolishly seek to run from its inevitability.

“What is it?” Din’s baritone voice startles you as it shatters the quietness. The modulator within his helmet gives his tone a low raspiness that never fails to send a chill down your spine when you hear it.

“Huh?” You respond ineloquently.

“You’ve been staring at the back of my head for the last five minutes, angel. I figured you had something worth saying.”

“Oh, no. I was just thinking about you.”

Immediately you wish a meteor would collide with the ship, providing you with the necessary distraction to escape and find somewhere you can hide until the end of time.

“...What about me were you thinking?” Din wonders after a solid thirty seconds of pure silence, voice somehow conveying an equally blended mixture of intrigue and wariness. He flips on the ship’s autopilot and turns in his seat to pin you with his gaze, apparently unwilling to let you try and weasel yourself out of the conversation.

You roll the question around in your mind, wanting to give an answer that satisfies him without it also embarrassing yourself further.

“I was thinking how much of an enigma you are,” you murmur at last, leaning back in the chair with your arms crossing over your stomach. “You wield such incredible powers and yet you choose to wear a human face, to call this man-made ship your home and to also spend your spare time living amongst those you will eventually reap. Why are these your choices?”

He tilts his head, and you just know there is a little crease of bewilderment appearing between his eyebrows right now even if you can’t see it. For as much as he is a puzzle you can’t put together, he is also at times an open book that you will never tire of reading.

“I would think you, more than most beings, would understand the discomfort that stems from loneliness and the lengths one will go to ease it,” he says, not unkindly. He mirrors your position, maneuvering himself until he’s comfortable in his seat and totally oblivious to the dilating of your pupils as you observe every subtle shift of his armor-clad body. “Isn’t that the true purpose of Cupids? To spare individuals the ache of living a life of solitude by introducing them to someone to love so they no longer feel it.”

“That’s a poetic way of putting it,” you answer, smiling softly and shrugging your shoulders. “My superiors would just quote our mantra back at me when I used to ask. Amor vincit omnia.”

“Love conquers all.”

You shouldn’t be surprised he’s able to translate such an ancient and obscure language, but your eyes widen regardless. “That’s right.”

His voice is unusually soft when he asks, “Do you like being a Cupid?”

You stare at him, caught off guard by how easily he’s changed the topic of the conversation from himself to you. You’re used to taking orders and being thanked for your services, but no one has ever asked you if you liked doing any of it.

“I’m good at it,” you finally say, even though it’s not really an answer.

He nods his head still, as if he understands. A part of you thinks he actually does.

You lick your lips, eyeing him hesitantly. “Do you...like being Death?”

“I’m good at it,” he echoes, but your words sound somber coming from his lips.

The cockpit fills with hushed silence again, but there’s a unique tenderness unlike ever before. Minutes seem to stretch on for entire seasons as you watch one another, content to simply coexist and revel in each other’s presences.

It would be so easy to slip off his helmet and kiss him right now.

You stiffen, stunned at your own thought, but you aren’t given the chance to analyze it further as an alarm on the ship’s control panel announces with a resounding beep you’ve reached your destination.

Din spins in his seat, reclaiming control of the steering to begin the ship’s landing process. You look out the front window at the large green-blue planet drawing nearer with every anxious tick of your heartbeat.

“We’re here,” you say needlessly, forcing excitement into your voice. Fake it till you make it, isn’t that the human expression?

“Who is it we’re meeting on this backwater skug hole?” Din asks, pressing a series of buttons above his head.

You kick the back of his seat. “Be nice,” you scold when he shoots you a look. He mutters something unintelligible under his breath as he turns back around, prompting you to roll your eyes. “She’s a goddess of springtime and motherhood. The locals call her Omera.”

Tag List: @leilei-draws, @theocatkov, @becauseican2, @vintagesaph, @stardust-and-starlight, @kay2304, @odelia-d32, @adrieunor, @remmyswritings, @gallowsjoker, @rhiannon-russo, @randomness501, @eleine-t1d, @nicotinebirds, @sylphene, @softly-sad, @maytheglitter, @melobee

#the mandalorian #mandalorian x reader #din djarin x you #din djarin x reader #Din Djarin #Mandalorian #soulmate au #my fic #my writing #death and an angel #Pedro Pascal #pedro pascal character fanfiction #din x you #din x reader

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catharsis-in-a-bottle · 4 years ago

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AHSDHFHHJKKHD

THE QUEEN’S GAMBIT. WAS SO FUCKING GOOD.

[spoilers below if you haven’t seen it and you want to]

Here are some of my (not in any particular order) bullet points. This is gonna be long as hell because, you know, brain dumps amiright

First off, Anya Taylor-Joy’s acting. Is just incredible. In particular moments, you can tell what she’s thinking with a simple hand gesture or with the tiniest raise of an eyebrow. She develops Beth’s signature facial expressions and movements throughout the show, and you just feel like you know her. And during her chess matches, sometimes it feels like she’s staring into your soul. Especially when she gives that badass chin-on-the-hands look and she knows she’s going to win. Powerful energy.

Secondly, I fucking knew I recognized Harry Beltik from somewhere else but my mom didn’t BELIEVE me and then I looked up the actor and he’s DUDLEY DURSLEY, I WAS RIGHT MOTHER, I WAS RIGHT

I love love love how they didn’t make, like, a major romantic plotline. Beth doesn’t end up with a partner - she ends with a bunch of super supportive friends that have her back by the time she gets to Moscow, and like, she has a crush on Townes but they end up being just like super good and healthy friends and I love it?? So much?? Thank you producers

Townes. Just, in general. I really like his character, he’s super nice and his voice is oddly soothing

BORGOV. I LOVE BORGOV. HE IS SO GODDAMN RESPECTFUL. Like, he seemed like a very cold character at first - well-mannered and extremely professional, yes, but rather cold. But when she wins in Moscow? “It is your game. Take it.” I LOVE THAT SO MUCH. AND HE HUGS HER AND STARTS CLAPPING AND THE AMOUNT OF RESPECT AND ADMIRATION AND AFFECTION IN THAT SCENE IS INCREDIBLE. And you don’t see any of that in Borgov’s face when he’s playing. His facial expressions do not change at all. But then his face when she wins!! He’s HAPPY! He’s like, goddamn, I’ve spent my whole life mastering chess, it’s about time somebody fucking beat me! I know I’m repeating myself but just his RESPECT I absolutely adore it

And Beth’s officer-watcher-person in Moscow was all like “ahhh be wary of the Russians! communism!!” but they absolutely did not make this yet another evil Russian show, like please that trope works for plots but it’s about time somebody did something different - they showed the US government as suspicious of the Soviets but then they showed the solidarity between the chess players that Benny talked about earlier (”The Russians work together, Americans work alone” or something like that), and then they showed the kind and excitable people on the streets, and the amount of support they would have had no matter WHO won that goddamn match. The old man she plays at the end. Everyone is a community.

Continuing that - I cannot for the life of me remember the name of the old man with the very puffy white hair, but I loved him too. He sees Beth as the rising star she is, and he respects her. He admires her. The dynamic there is absolutely immaculate, contrary to the dynamic between Beth and the man she beats earlier, the one who walks off and doesn’t even talk to her. We don’t like that man - we like the ones who admit defeat and respect Beth!! I love them!! They are extremely professional, and they show the warm-heartedness that often doesn’t show with all of the cold stares and glares that pass between players during matches.

Joline. I’m so glad she came back. I love her. She’s extremely independent but she comes back for Beth because Beth needs her but she’s also like “I’m not your savior! Get your shit together!” which is fucking awesome. And the fact that the two of them interacted like the best of friends even after years of separation was really sweet to me.

I nearly cried when Beth went back into the school. (I say ‘nearly’ because there were other people in the room and naturally I can’t do that in front of other people. If I was utterly alone, maybe on my own planet, I would have.) Because of all of it. Because of her trauma, because that’s where all the shit began... and the music during that scene. It was hauntingly beautiful, especially when the melody began switching to cello. And then Beth saw all the pictures and newspaper clips that Mr. Shaibel had saved, because he cared about her so much, because he started it all - he’s the reason she’s going to national tournaments, to Paris, to Moscow. And in that scene, we know he’s too old to be alive anymore, and she does too. The whole school scene in general just feels so ghostly and ethereal.

I love Borgov, did I say that already? I just... strive to exude his energy. I want to be good at things but I want to hold deep, genuine respect and admiration for others who are also good at the thing, because sometimes I just have the biggest fucking ego and I can get carried away. ‘Borgov, Borgov, Borgov.’ A mantra. He wins respectfully and he loses respectfully.

BETH’S MOTHER (the second one) JUST FUCKING DIED OUT OF NOWHERE?? AND I WAS SO SHOCKED? Which is really an accurate reflection of reality because death often comes out of nowhere, but DAMN I was not expecting that shit

And the fact that the mother just,,,, let her chug a beer,,,, oof

THE ADDICTION. BETH’S DOWNWARD SPIRAL. IT MADE ME FEEL SO HORRIBLE BUT IT FELT SO REAL. Everything about her progression through addiction was just... I can’t find an adjective. But when she just fucking inhaled that bucket of pills as a kid and then collapsed. When that addiction lasted into her adulthood - it’s really impactful and horrible and just so real. She needed proper care throughout this entire goddamn show and she never got medical care, she just got supportive friends - which, btw, that’s one thing that kind of threw me off. Like, she didn’t have withdrawal in Moscow, she went from chugging like four bottles of wine a day to... not drinking at all?? Without withdrawal symptoms?? And I’m proud of her for throwing away those pills but honestly it felt really fast, idk

GIVING CHILDREN TRANQUILIZERS WAS AN ACTUAL THING THAT HAPPENED. I DID NOT PREVIOUSLY KNOW THIS. BUT LEGITIMATELY, IT HAPPENED. HOLY SHIT.

HARRY BELTIK. He was like, awkwardly in love with Beth and that shit didn’t work out but even afterwards he FUCKING CARED. He’d seen his father drink himself to death and he knew that would happen to Beth and he was scared. So he came back, he tried to help her, and at that point (when she had that fucking scary eye makeup, yeah that was rock bottom) she didn’t care much about the outside world anymore. She was angry, and she was closing herself in. It made my stomach clench in physical pain. Which is a good thing. But also not.

Harry Beltik in general just being so supportive and wanting to help her though, like yeah it was very awkward, but they were vibing

AND BENNY WATTS IS FUCKING GREAT. THAT WHOLE COWBOY LOOK, COWBOY CHESS PLAYER, NOW THAT’S AN AESTHETIC. He was concerned for Beth too. He wanted to help her. He wanted to create that American solidarity that he knew the Soviet competitors had, and ultimately he did when he and everyone else called her in Moscow. Benny is... chaotic good? Neutral? He is quite an interesting character, and Beth’s persistent social awkwardness fades away with him because he knows how to interact with her. He’s a dedicated and smart narcissist, and I’m here for it.

The fact that they made me love and hate Cleo at the same time, and also question Beth’s sexuality when she first met Cleo. Like, she’s from Paris. She considers ‘tomorrow night’ to be a very long time away. I love her mysteriousness. But also, she was the catalyst for Beth’s downward drinking spiral before the match in Paris, so like... I like Cleo’s personality, but not her choices in those previous moments.

The music. Did I mention the music? The soundtrack. The orchestrals. That one song that the mother plays on piano that I hear all the time and I still don’t actually know what it is PLEASE HELP. The music is melancholy in the right moments, upbeat in the right moments, intense and suspenseful in the right moments - and also absent in the right moments. There’s tacet. There’s silence. And it’s always been my firm belief that silence can hold just as much impact as sound.

Just an interesting note, my mom watched the whole show before me and then re-watched it with me, and when Mr. Shaibel showed up she quickly reassured me that he wasn’t a child molester, because quote “it may be a creepy basement but he’s just really nice” so... I was reassured

I love Mr. Shaibel, and Beth just kept sticking up for him in front of the press and,,, yeah

I hated that bitch from the high school, what was her name?... The one who showed up in the store with a child? It makes me think about the fact that so many kids are just jerks in high school simply because they can be... and occasionally their fuckery lasts into adulthood but oftentimes it doesn’t. You don’t have to be a jerk when you’re an adult, and you don’t have to be a jerk in high school! People remember, people always remember! So, to the bitch from the high school: fuck you for making Beth feel like an outsider and then trying to reverse gears and accept her, cuz Beth isn’t falling for that shit.

The twins, Matt and Mike. They’re so doubtful of Beth in the beginning but then bam, she’s competing nationally, and I adore how the three of them become friends. All those men playing chess in Kentucky in the beginning seem so condescending, but ultimately they show respect because Beth absolutely fucking deserves it.

I enjoy the fact that we never *really* know Beth’s age. It’s just like... she’s 9, she’s 15, she’s 17, she’s... twenty something? Who the hell knows? As many characters say, when it comes to skill level, age ultimately isn’t an important factor. This young woman beats the oldest man with the bushiest white hair in Moscow and age. Does not. Matter.

The Jesus people lmaooooo when Beth said “because it’s fucking nonsense” I just. Mad respect ma’am, don’t take their money, go be a communist and “sPrEaD tHe aThEiSt AgEnDa”

Wow I really just... wrote all that didn’t I damn wish I could write essays this fast at reasonable hours of the day

Beth’s relationship with her foster mother is so fucking sweet until she fucking dies

And fuck Beth’s legal father. He is an asshole. That is all.

The mother deserved Manuel, she deserved that sketchy Mexican salesman goddammit

As my final bullet point: This has made me want to play chess. This has made me want to get good at chess. You know that thing where you like, download the personality of the coolest character for like a day after you watch something... I don’t do that anymore (maybe), but I want to download those mad chess skills. This has made chess seem so cool. I want to wear a fancy suit and compete with people. I just have to, you know, actually develop some strategy and stop losing brutally against people online. I wAnT tO pLaY cHesS dO yOu HeAr mE

I’m going to stop now, but I just,,, peeps, I love this show. I’m absolutely going to require a re-watch in the future. I just love it. The characters and their development, their relationships with each other, the progression of time and of Beth’s maturity... it is simply incredible. This concludes my brain dump.

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misslilli · 3 years ago

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Felix Felicis

MSR. AU. PG-13. | tagging @today-in-fic | read on AO3

Chapter 21 - The Halloween Fair

[ DS ]

On the afternoon of the Halloween fair, I take out the costume that Miss Hannigan picked out for me from the closet. Ever since I’ve got it, I’m beyond excited to wear it. It’s a black low-cut shirt, a white, checkered suit with a blazer that ties at the waist and a flaring skirt. As I put on the blonde wig and the black beret, I turn to the mirror channeling my best inner Faye Dunaway and say to myself in a breathy, southern lilt: “My, my, don’t you just look dandy, Miss Bonnie Parker!”

My friends have been roped into manning the booths of the fair and somehow, I’ve slipped under the town people’s radars, which leaves me able to roam around the fair, albeit alone. Since I’ve known most people in this town ever since I was little, I’m never actually alone at these happenings, people tend to just pull me into their conversation as I walk by. But as luck will have it, as I’m rounding one of the booths of the fair, I find myself face to face with the one person I had secretly hoped to see.

He’s wearing a brown tweed suit with a matching waistcoat and over the white collared shirt he’s tied an emerald green tie. Perched on his head is a white fedora. ‘Shit. He’s Clyde. What the fuck?’

We stop in our tracks and stare at each other for a moment, taking in our respective costumes. He’s the first one to regain his ability to speak.

“Hey Bonnie, the laws are outside, they’re blockin’ the driveway!” His Warren Beatty impression is perfect right down to the Texan drawl. ‘God help me…’

“Gosh, I hope you’ve parked the getaway car around the corner, Clyde!” I’m putting on my best Faye Dunaway impression again as I add a wink to my statement and just continue to walk past him. My heart thumping hard against my chest betrays my cool exterior, but that’s my secret and my secret alone.

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[ FM ]

When we finally get to the Halloween fair that Felix has roped me into, dressed up in a costume I didn’t even pick myself. We trail the grounds together and we’re drawn to the candy apple booth. Well actually, Felix draws us to this exact booth, the little sneak, but I can’t resist his pout and pleading eyes, so we end up getting an apple each. Munching away happily, his mouth full, he asks the question I’ve been too scared to ask myself: “Hey dad, do you think Miss Scully is here too with her friends?” I hope she is, if only to see what kind of costume she has picked out for herself, but I can’t tell Felix that. Instead, I just shrug and we continue our stroll across the town square.

When we round another booth, we both stop in our tracks as we see a blonde woman appear before us , dressed in a checkered suit and a beret on her head. ‘Bonnie. She’s the freakin’ Bonnie to your Clyde. Your sidekick. No, your partner in crime. The woman you love. In the movie of course. Insert awkward cough.’.

Felix is oblivious of course, he hasn’t seen the movies and I doubt he even knows what my costume is, let alone Miss Scully’s. I scrape together the last braincells that are left in my head and a stupid movie quote is the only thing I can think of at this moment.

“Hey Bonnie, the laws are outside, they’re blockin’ the driveway!” The retort she gives me combined with her wink render me speechless until she’s well past me and Felix, mingling with the small crowd that welcomes her into their midst just a few feet away from us.

Felix does the thing I wish I could bring myself to do, staring at her retreating form in wonder and he also speaks the words that have sprung to my own mind.

“Wow!”

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[ DS ]

Countless conversations later and a little tipsy on the delicious apple cider they always serve at the Halloween fair, I wander along the booths when I hear a voice I haven’t heard in over a year. And could’ve gone forever not hearing again. It’s my ex-whatever Steve, talking to one of his friends.

I’m hidden pretty well in the crowd of people due to my shortness but I can still catch flashes of their conversation. When I hear my name, I stop, straining my ears.

“Dana? Oh God, no. She’s not even close to being a serious contender for a relationship.” I wince at his statement as well as the tone of his voice. “She’s just always there, you know? Like a well trained Golden Retriever, I say the word and she comes running. Such an easy lay!” When they share a laugh I can feel the flush of shame and anger crawl up my neck.

The situation he describes is exactly what I’ve spent countless hours in therapy getting over. But what he says next really drives a stake through my heart. “It’s so pathetic, but if it’s what I have to do to get laid, whatever. She’s even dirtier in bed than any hot teacher fantasy you could ever imagine and what they say about good Catholic girls is very, very accurate, if you know what I mean!”

If he weren’t the demon I have to face every time I try to get over my past, I would’ve revealed myself and give his ass a good kicking for talking about me the way he has. But not knowing how I’ll react to being face-to-face with him, I stay hidden behind a group of mummies and zombies like a fucking coward.

I’m so furious with him and myself for not being able to stand up to him. Where the hell are my friends when I need them? I haven’t seen them all evening and I could really use their company to talk some sense into me. Since they’re nowhere to be found, I head towards the bar set up in the back and slide onto a stool, ordering a shot of Tequila. ‘Fuck it! That low-life is not even worth your time of day!’

On the surface, I’m so angry I want to set this whole damn place on fire, but deep down, the past hurt resurfaces to join the hurt from his words I just heard.

By the time I’ve downed my second shot, I’ve repeated the mantra that I’m a strong woman who’s better off without men in my head about a thousand times. I see someone slide onto the stool next to me out of the corner of my eye as I order another shot of Tequila to keep the two empty glasses in front of me company.

“A third shot of Tequila is just asking for trouble, if you ask me.” I turn my head slowly towards my bar-mate to tell him exactly where to shove his smart-ass remark when I’m faced with my supposed partner in crime, the charming one with the disarmingly innocent smile on his stupid face. I’m staring him down defiantly, my eyes never leaving his while the bartender places my glass in front of me and I grab it, downing it in a swift motion, daring him in my mind to say anything else. He doesn’t comment, good for him, and orders a shot for himself, just raising his glass silently and I clink it with my empty one – I’m tipsy, not insane, chasing one shot with another.

We’re staring straight ahead during our conversation, turning our glasses over and over between our fingers.

“Which guy seems to be the problem and how many rounds of ammo do I need to take him out?,” he asks after minutes of silence. I want to lean into him for just assuming that it’s a man that has me sitting here seething, but unfortunately, he’s right. This one time.

“How many rounds you got?” He scoffs at that.

“Plenty. And I know of exactly eleven ways to get rid of a body without raising suspicion.”

“And here I was thinking the FBI frowned upon their employees giving out top-level secrets on how to hide away evidence of a crime committed.”

“I’m not going to tell you, I wouldn’t want you to be held in contempt of Congress when questioned.”

“How do you know I wouldn’t rat you out when questioned by Congress?”

“Just a hunch… Talk to me, Red. What happened tonight?” He turns towards me and I can feel his gaze dancing over the skin of my face.

“You really want to know? Well, turns out the asshole of an ex of mine decided that today might be the perfect time to make an encore appearance in my life and reminded me again why I should’ve kicked him to the curb a long time ago instead of hoping I could change him.” Looking down at the bar, I trace my finger through the condensation drops, my anger slowly dissipating and my voice growing more and more quiet. “I heard him say some pretty awful things about me tonight.”

I relax into his hand when he places it comfortingly on my back, right between my shoulder blades, and huff out a sigh. “I’m sorry.,” is the only thing he says, but doesn’t add anything else, giving me the choice if I wanted to elaborate or not.

“What I witnessed today was the way he’s always been but I just couldn’t see through the masquerade of the sweet guy, he was so kind and said all the right things and he quite literally wooed the pants off me from the get-go.”

“Love bombing.” ‘Oh yeah, I forgot, you’re a profiler. You probably already got one worked out for me, trust-issues, anxious attachment style, possibly daddy issues, in short, a hot mess. Avoid at all costs.’

“Pretty much, yeah. And I was stupid enough to believe it.” I raise my hand to call over the bartender for another round.

“You’re not stupid. It’s hard to tell the difference between genuine interest and love bombing in the beginning.” ‘Yeah, no shit Sherlock. It’s exactly why I’m sitting here torn between wanting you to make a pass at me and being absolutely terrified that you actually will.’

“How about we pass on the shots and get some water instead before calling it a night?”

“I think that’s probably a good idea, Mr. Mulder!”

“You know, after tonight, what do you say we just drop the Mister?” I nods slowly, pursing my lips.

“So just Fox?” He makes a pained face.

“No, please don’t. Just Mulder is fine.”

“Mh-hm. I guess since we’re dropping the titles, that that makes me Scully? Little odd, but alright!”

We get the check and argue back and forth about who gets to pay, him putting an end to it with a firm “Will you give it a rest, you’ll get to pick up the next check!”.

In my attempt to slide off the barstool gracefully despite three tequila shots, my heel catches onto the rail at the bottom and I stumble over the stool, knocking it over in the process. I have only his quick reflexes to thank that I don’t follow suit, his arms catching me around my waist and pulling me upright again.

He has the audacity to laugh, the bastard, and I’m beyond mortified. “Easy there, partner! Do you need a ride home? Felix is at a pajama party at his friend Suzie’s house, so I’m free to be your pumpkin carriage for tonight.” ‘NO! Yes? No. Get your hands off me. Don’t let go just yet.’

I’m so confused at the tug of war in my fuzzy head but I hate getting a cab alone and I’m in heels on top of being tipsy, I don’t want to walk home alone at night.

As we walk out, his hand finds his way to the small of my back guiding me through the crowds while making sure I don’t stumble again.

On the drive to the beach house, I manage not to fall asleep despite how tired I feel, too afraid of snoring or, God forbid, drooling onto myself. His hands find my back again guiding me up the stairs to the front door and I turn to face him at the top, even more nervous.

“Thanks for the ride, Mulder. And for listening.”

“Anytime, Scully. Good night!”

When he leans in, I start to panic that this is it and I think it shows on my face, because he only kisses my cheek, just like I did after the birthday party before getting back in the car and heading home. I can’t decide if I’m relieved or disappointed.

I can’t ignore the flutter of excitement every time his hands land anywhere on my body but what I will absolutely deny, even to myself, is the way my heart constricts in my chest when he gazes at me that way and the sense of comfort that settles over me when we’re together.

Bodily reactions I can deal with, it’s when it comes to emotions is where it gets scary.

I just don’t think my heart can survive another Steve.

#xf #the x files #xf fanfic #msr #felix felicis #🥺

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youngclaire · 4 years ago

Text

One Last Final Goodbye

I rewrote sending Claire back through the stones at the end of book 2 but from Jamie's POV. I thought it would be a nice way to ease myself into writing these two. This is very book compliant, I actually bad the book open next to me whilst I wrote this in order to translate it from Claire's POV to Jamie's and it was a lot of fun. It's not a copy of the fuller chapter, it's been shortened down in places but the essence is there. I've also removed bits and pieces. Uhh yeah...all dialogue in this belongs to Diana and the book I'm just responsible for remixing the words. Anyway, I hope whoever bothers to read this likes it :)

(This is also my first fic in this fandom with these two so don't expect it to be perfect, it probably isn't)

- - -

He wouldn’t stop for anything; not food, water, or rest. He keeps the horse at a constant gallop at all times, scared that if he paused or hesitated for even a moment he would lose all courage and go neither back or forward.

I shall see my wife safe, is a mantra that keeps him riding. If he is to die tonight or on the battlefield tomorrow, he would not take her down with him; not her or the innocent being she carries inside her.

The stones come into view just above him. A cursed salvation of granite and Jamie tries not to see them, his gaze fixated forward. Behind him, Claire lets her displeasure be known, protesting against the idea. Jamie steels himself against them, clenches his jaw and gallops harder, fighting the urge to give in. This was the only way to see her safe and unharmed, he tells himself.

She protests still, even while he urges her up to the ruined cottage. She doesn’t realise he has no intention of parting with her right now, he just wants time to breathe, to think, to let the panic and worry abate. He sinks to the ground, his body cold and his mind racing.

“It’s alright,” he thinks he hear himself say. “We have a bit of time now; no one will find us here.” He shivers, though from the cold, and wraps his plaid around him.

God, he could still see it; Dougal’s lifeless eyes, the blood pooling out of him, the shock on Willie Coulter’s face. How long before everyone knew? How long before everyone found out he had committed familicide?

Jamie’s head falls forward onto his knees, a tiredness washing over him, fatigue clutching at his bones and eyelids. Tired as he was he could not sleep for fear of the images in his mind’s eye.

His breath comes out in ragged pants and he can barely stand the sound of it. He feels Claire’s warmth and presence beside him, uses it as something to anchor himself to.

What happened in that room and who knows wasn’t the priority, while Claire had yet to explicitly say so Jamie’s fate waited for him on Culloden Moor. Tomorrow he will die and all this will cease to matter. Claire will be safe.

His breathing eases back into its natural rhythm, the panic wilting away from the edges. He’ll take hold of Death’s hand, gladly accept his destiny knowing he did one thing right at last.

“I won’t go, Jamie,” she says, as if she’s read his thoughts. “I’m staying with you.”

Jamie shakes his head. She couldn’t persuade him, he couldn’t change his mind. He needed to do this.

“No,” he says. The firmness bites at him, makes him wince. He hopes she can hear the gentleness that lies beneath it. “I must go back, Claire.”

“You can’t,” she cries. “Jamie, they will have found Dougal by now! Willie Coulter will have told someone.”

Aye, that was a fact he had resigned himself to, a fact she must resign herself too as well. He grieved for Dougal, for the second father he had, but Jamie had done what he’d done- he would take whatever consequence waited for him behind that door. She talks of fleeing to France but it’s no use, he’s chosen his fate, set his heart and mind to it, accepted it. A traitor twice over, a rebel, a murderer…The English will hunt Prince Charles. The English and the clans will hunt Jamie. He was dead either way.

“Claire, I am a dead man.”

He watches the tears freeze on her cheeks. “No,” she says but the effect is lost, she knows he speaks the truth.

“I wouldna get very far anyway.” On its own accord, his hand runs through his red hair that makes him a beacon at all times. Not exactly inconspicuous. “I can save you, Claire,” With his other hand he brushes away the tears that continue to fall. “and I will. That is the most important thing.”

Then he will go back. If he finds he cannot do it for himself then he will find it in him to do so for his men.

“I think I can get them away,” he says thinking the plan through. “Even if it’s known what I’ve done, none will stop me wi’ the English in sight and the battle about to begin.” The plan visualises in his mind and he nods to himself. “I will bring them safely away and set them on the road toward Lallybroch.”

“And then?”

Well…wasn’t that obvious?

“And then I will turn back to Culloden.”

He lets out a breath, strong and final as his decision. He catches Claire’s worried look and gives her a smile.

“I’m no afraid to die, Sassenach,” he says, but then he thinks of that door, black and foreboding, the unknown behind it. “Well…not a lot, anyway.”

He hears a sound a human being should never be able to make as arms fling around him. He finds himself surrounded by Claire, caught in her tight embrace as the scent of her overwhelms him. He clutches her back, trying with all his might not to succumb and cry.

“It’s all right, Sassenach,” he says into her hair as she cries once more. “A musket ball. Maybe a blade. It will be over quickly.” A lie, they both know it, but Jamie will them both to believe it. He’s seen men die in battle, knows how horrifically slow it can be but it was better than waiting for the hangman’s noose, that would be the one thing that does not lie behind that door.

“I’m going with you.”

Lost in thought he barely registers it but when he does he reels at the notion, startling backwards.

“The hell you are!” He has a plan, damnit, and not even Claire will deter him from it.

She displays her argument but he will not listen to it, will not give it thought.

“No!” he says. “No, Claire!”

How could she suggest such a thing, knowing what they both knew? How could she be so selfish?

“If you’re not afraid, I’m not either. It will…be over quickly. You said so.”

You said so. What he said was a lie, did she not see that? A lie to comfort them both.

“Jamie- I won’t…I can’t…I bloody won’t live without you, that’s all!”

He had a thousand things to say and none at all. His mouth opens and closes before he shakes his head. Through the gaps in the ceiling he can see daylight dwindling, night approaching. The sky is painted red. Blood of a battlefield, blood of childbirth.

He reaches toward her, pulling her close. He knows where this fight comes from, if the tables were turned he would say the same thing, knows because he feels it too.

“D’ye think I don’t know?” His voice is soft, a whisper. “It’s me that has the easy part now. For if ye feel for me as I do for you- then I am asking you to tear your heart out and live without it.”

She lets out a whimper, clutching him closer. He fingers stroke her hair, whispering soft coos towards her.

“But you must do it,” he finally says, feeling his stomach twist and turn. “Ye must.”

“Why?” She is angry, considerably so. Confused and hurting. “When you took me from the witch trial at Cranesmuir- you said then you would have died with me, you would have gone to the stake with me had it come to that!”

He had said all that, and to this day, it remains true. He’d have rather died than to be parted with her.

“Aye, I would,” he says. “But I wasna carrying your child.”

The reason he is allowing them to part.

She is surprised, shocked, frozen in place as she looks up at him in bewilderment.

“You can’t tell,” she says at last, shaking her head. “It’s much too early.”

It makes him smile, brings amusement to him.

“You havena been a day late in your courses, in all the time since ye first book me to your bed. Ye havena bled now in forty-six days.”

She hurls insults at him, shocked he even managed to keep track of such a thing during a war but he had for hope they would have a second chance at raising a child and for fear that it would end like this.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” she tells him, rattling off reasons for why she might not have bled. It’s no use, she forgets he’s seen her so before, studied all the tell-tale signs of her body changing, committed them to memory.

“Claire…” His voice is quiet, not sounding like him. “Tomorrow I will die. This child…is all that will be left of me- ever.” He reaches for her hands, needing some part of her to hold. He casts his gaze to their joined hands, running his thumb over her fingers. “Claire, I beg you, see it safe.”

He keeps his eyes downcast while he waits for her answer, scared she’ll say yes, scared she’ll say no. The silence feels long and he shuts his eyes against the twisting of his stomach.

Finally her answer comes.

“Yes.” A whisper in the darkening cottage. “Yes. I’ll go.”

He nods, swallowing back the lump in his throat, hearing the sound of a flower stem snap.

.:.:.:.:.:.:.

After telling her to sleep, she doesn’t sleep himself. Time seemed wasted on that and they didn’t have much of it left anymore. In a few hours he will take her to the fairy hill and part with her forever.

He wanted to rage at the unfairness of it all. To brandish his sword and yell and scream and cry but he knew there was no point to it. He knew that what he had been handed was more than fair, that not many men live the life he’s led and are allowed to be rewarded in such a way.

Lord, ye gave me a rare woman, he had said to her, quoting what he would say to God when he met him. God! I loved her well. He had, he could really say that. He took this woman, in all her unbated strangeness, into his broken hands and within her found company and peace, a place to call home.

She loved me well, too, he adds, watching her sleep for the last time. Content and safe, here in his arms and their fortress of cloth. He had healed him with her touch and love and perseverance. Picked a broken man off the floor and carried him through towards the light at the end of the tunnel no matter the setbacks. She really was a rare woman, his sassenach.

He wraps his arms tighter around her, murmurs a quick thank you in Gaelic to God and to the fairies for dropping her into his life.

Pressed against her, safe in their fortress of clothes, her skin warming his bones, his eyelids grow heavy and he succumbs to sleep as the first inklings of tomorrow break across the sky.

.:.:.:.:.:.

She was gone.

Disappeared in the same manner in which she had appeared. Gone through the stones and back to Frank.

Jamie presses his hand against the stone. The hard granite presses back on his wound, her mark, the letter C, reminding him it was real, she was real.

Her arisaid lies on the grass, forgotten in their haste to love each other one last time. Jamie picks it up, bringing it to his nose, inhaling her scent still lingering on the tartan. Tears fall on their own accord as he prays she made it back, prays that she and the bairn are safe.

A cannon in the distance booms, startling the birds and startling him. It’s beginning.

He is hesitant to move, to leave the place of their last coupling, his last connections to her.

Yet destiny waits for him on Culloden Moor, along with his men. He pictures the thirty men waiting for their laird.

There is nothing he can do for Claire now but there is something he can do for his men.

He kisses the inside of his fingers, presses it to the stone and bids his soulmate one last final goodbye.

#outlander #outlander fanfiction #outlander fic #jamie x claire #jamie's pov #standing stones scene rewrite #i tried ok #and i am scared #im gonna go hide in a hole now #bye

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charcubed · 4 years ago

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PLEASE explain me what 'tea is gay food is sex' thing means. Also why 'fuck sarah z'? (Just curious, idk any drama or anything bad shes done ive just seen some of her videos)

Sure, happy to! Here’s a very quick summary :)

Tea Is Gay

The tea reference is commonly used to indicate homosexuality in literature.

It's used that way in The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, Moffat and Gatiss' favorite film, in which Holmes is gay. They often cite it as one of their biggest inspirations and influences.

“You mean you and Dr. Watson... He... is your glass of tea?”

Moffat has said a wider drink code exists in the show...

“If you watch the show carefully there is a subtext about John drinking.”

–A Scandal in Belgravia episode commentary

And tea being code is even explicitly referenced in series 4:

What this translates to is that scenes with certain drinks have subtext attached to them, as Moffat says. What a character is drinking clues us into their emotions in the scene.

Tea is a big one (and it has its roots in literature, as you can see), but there are others as well... like for example, coffee = heterosexual, as the opposite of tea.

Here’s a post with links for further reading about this topic, commonly known as “drink code.”

Food Is Sex–or more broadly, Intimacy

This old classic post is a good little primer on this and the scenes where food is mentioned in Sherlock s1-3, and I’m already linking it because I’m going to quote part of it below for expediency.

In my tenth grade English class, we read this handy book by Thomas C. Foster called How to Read Literature Like a Professor, and I’ve since kept in on a nearby shelf for easy access. The second chapter, titled “Nice to Eat With You: Acts of Communion,” describes how we get from food to sex. In literature (and to a smaller extent, in film and television),

“…writing a meal scene is so difficult, and so inherently uninteresting, that there really needs to be some compelling reason to include one in the story. And that reason has to do with how characters are getting along. Or not getting along.”

How do we know this applies to Sherlock? Well, like so many things, it’s spelled out in A Scandal In Belgravia as well through Irene. She flirts at Sherlock to try to throw him off by constantly saying “Let’s have dinner.”

John: “You flirted with Sherlock Holmes?”

Irene: “At him. He never replies.”

Her frequently-used mantra of “Let’s have dinner” is at minimum about going on a date, and at maximum ladened with innuendo, such as when she says in a text to Sherlock, “I’m not hungry, let’s have dinner.” And in the scene where she asks Sherlock if he’s ever “had” anyone (aka if he’s had sex), and Sherlock says he doesn’t understand the question, she then turns it into...

Irene: Let’s have dinner.

Sherlock: Why?

Irene: Might be hungry.

Sherlock: I’m not.

Irene: Good.

Sherlock: Why would I want to have dinner if I wasn’t hungry?

The show spells this out for us. We are meant to associate food with sex/intimacy, and the post I linked above covers some of the other times the fandom has found significance in some other moments by association.

Of course, one of the biggest ones? The night Sherlock and John met, and Sherlock asked him, “Dinner?” and John said, “Starving.”

Fuck Sarah Z (lol)

The reason for this is multilayered at this point. When she announced she was making the TJLC video, a couple hundred people basically begged her not to via tweets and emails. So people who were in TJLC, currently are, or were never involved but were in the wider Sherlock fandom... they all came together to ask her respectfully and calmly to not do this, especially since she was never part of TJLC herself. I personally know at least 7 people who emailed her in this way. No one wanted old fandom drama resurrected, and no one wanted her to misrepresent TJLC.

She ignored the people sending those messages. Then she made a shirt using our phrases from our media analysis, and started selling that shirt, solely to poke fun–because she clearly doesn’t even understand what any of it means, and didn’t try to.

She was meant to be making a video about TJLC, and yet she couldn’t even be bothered to understand the basic concepts I just outlined above, which are very well-documented and easy to find–or at least should be for a Youtuber claiming to be covering our content sufficiently as some sort of expert. (No shade to you whatsoever for not researching the answers, anon. I’m more than happy to answer your questions.) Instead, Sarah didn’t even do the bare minimum, and is profiting off of the work without understanding it. When people continued to express their ire at all of this, often in good faith, she then quickly transitioned to being openly snarky or hostile on Twitter about it all as part of her promotion for the video.

I wrote here about why the whole matter was extremely upsetting, and how absurd it is that we were then painted like the “bad guys” for being upset about someone outside our fandom community making a video we didn’t want and also weren’t consulted on. She didn’t even bother to reach out to some of the well-known people she name-dropped who are still around.

In the end, the video itself is more about unconnected fandom drama than TJLC itself. She barely touched upon the analysis involved, was inaccurate about its origins and content, clearly did very little research and mostly consulted a fanlore wiki, and her content focused more on the actions of people who just happened to be involved in TJLC as well as drama completely separate from TJLC at all. And yet people will now see it as a comprehensive and cohesive narrative “history” of this fandom subset, when that’s extremely far from the truth.

So... there ya go. Those are your brief (yes, really lol) answers to your questions.

I hope this helped! :)

PS haters don’t interact lol

#anonymous #asks #TJLC #Char writes things

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bananaofswifts · 5 years ago

Link

In the new Taylor Swift documentary, “Miss Americana,” which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival Thursday night, there’s a montage of derogatory commentary about the singer that has appeared on cable shows over the years. One of the less nasty remarks: “She’s too skinny. It bothers me.”

As it turns out, it eventually bothered Swift, too.

In one of the most revealing and surprising segments of the Netflix film, Swift talks for several minutes about having struggled in the past with an eating disorder.

After being pictured facing a phalanx of photographers after she emerges from her front door, Swift is heard in voiceover saying that “it’s not good for me to see pictures of myself every day.” Although she says “it’s only happened a few times, and I’m not in any way proud of it,” Swift admits there have been times in the past when she’s seen “a picture of me where I feel like I looked like my tummy was too big, or… someone said that I looked pregnant … and that’ll just trigger me to just starve a little bit — just stop eating.”

Swift elaborated on what she’s gone through with that in her interview with Variety for this week’s cover story, saying that it was difficult for her to speak up about it for the documentary.

“I didn’t know if I was going to feel comfortable with talking about body image and talking about the stuff I’ve gone through in terms of how unhealthy that’s been for me — my relationship with food and all that over the years,” she tells Variety. “But the way that Lana (Wilson, the film’s director) tells the story, it really makes sense. I’m not as articulate as I should be about this topic because there are so many people who could talk about it in a better way. But all I know is my own experience. And my relationship with food was exactly the same psychology that I applied to everything else in my life: If I was given a pat on the head, I registered that as good. If I was given a punishment, I registered that as bad.”

In the quiet of a hotel suite, she goes into greater detail on how formative an effect that one early tabloid torpedo had on her. “I remember how, when I was 18, that was the first time I was on the cover of a magazine,” she says. “And the headline was like ‘Pregnant at 18?’ And it was because I had worn something that made my lower stomach look not flat. So I just registered that as a punishment. And then I’d walk into a photo shoot and be in the dressing room and somebody who worked at a magazine would say, ‘Oh, wow, this is so amazing that you can fit into the sample sizes. Usually we have to make alterations to the dresses, but we can take them right off the runway and put them on you!’ And I looked at that as a pat on the head. You register that enough times, and you just start to accommodate everything towards praise and punishment, including your own body.”

She hesitates. “I think I’ve never really wanted to talk about that before, and I’m pretty uncomfortable talking about it now,” she says quietly. “But in the context of every other thing that I was doing or not doing in my life, I think it makes sense” to have it in the film, she says.

Wilson, the director, is proud of Swift for taking up the subject with such candor. “That’s one of my favorite sequences of the film,” she says. “I was surprised, of course. But I love how she’s kind of thinking out loud about it. And every woman will see themselves in that sequence. I just have no doubt.”

The filmmaker points out that there were clearly plenty of people who didn’t think Swift was too thin back in the mid-2010s. “You can also just not notice people being really skinny, because we’re all so accustomed to seeing women on magazine covers who are unhealthy-skinny, and that’s become normalized.” Even with non-celebrities, Wilson says, everybody’s a body critic. “It’s incessant, and I can say this as a woman: It’s amazing to me how people are constantly like ‘You look skinny’ or ‘You’ve gained weight.’ People you barely know say this to you. And it feels awful, and you can’t win either way. So I think it’s really brave to see someone who is a role model for so many girls and women be really honest about that. I think it will have a huge impact.”

As much as Swift may be seen as a role model for speaking frankly on the subject, she’s got her own favorite artist, so to speak, when it comes to advocacy for women’s bodily self-image issues.

“I love people like (actress and activist) Jameela Jamil, because she says things in a really articulate way,” the singer tells us. “The way she speaks about body image, it’s almost like she speaks in a hook. If you read her quotes about women and body image and aging and the way that women are treated in our industry and portrayed in the media, I swear the way she speaks is like lyrics, and it gets stuck in my head and it calms me down. Because women are held to such a ridiculous standard of beauty. We’re seeing so much on social media that makes us feel like we are less than, or we’re not what we should be, that you kind of need a mantra to repeat in your head when you start to have harmful or unhealthy thoughts. So she’s one of the people who, when I read what she says, it sticks with me and it helps me.”

In the film, then-and-now photos illustrate just how thin Swift had gotten during the “1989” era, versus the still svelte but healthier look she sported by the time she toured behind the “Reputation” album in 2018. Swift says that her under-eating in that earlier time severely affected her stamina on tour.

“I thought that I was supposed to feel like I was going to pass out at the end of a show, or in the middle of it,” she attests in the documentary. “Now I realize, no, if you eat food, have energy, get stronger, you can do all these shows and not feel (enervated).” Swift says she doesn’t care so much now if someone comments on a weight gain, and she’s reconciled “the fact that I’m a size 6 instead of a size double-zero.” Swift says she was completely unaware that anything was wrong in her double-zero era, and had a defense at the ready should it come up. If anyone expressed concern, she’d say, “‘What are you talking about? Of course I eat. …. I exercise a lot.’ And I did exercise a lot. But I wasn’t eating.”

Few women viewing the film will fail to nod their heads as Swift describes the impossibility of any body shape or size living up to all the standards for beauty. “If you’re thin enough, then you don’t have that ass that everybody wants,” she says in the film. “But if you have enough weight on you to have an ass, your stomach isn’t flat enough. It’s all just f—ing impossible.” As she became aware of the problem, Swift says in the film, it would cause her to “go into a real shame/hate spiral.”

The word “shame” comes up elsewhere in conversation with Swift, who by virtue of becoming one of the most celebrated women in the world has also had to deal with more catty comments than almost any celebrity in the world — and hasn’t always succeeded in shaking it all off.

“I was watching a Netflix Brené Brown special on shame, because I read a lot of her books, because I have dealings with shame every once in awhile,” Swift tells Variety. “She was saying something like, ‘It’s ridiculous to say “I don’t care what anyone thinks about me,” because that’s not possible. But you can decide whose opinions matter more and whose opinions you put more weight on.’ And I think that is really part of growing up, if you’re going to do it right. That’s part of hoping to find some sort of maturity and balance in your life.”

She continues, “I don’t expect anyone with a pop career to learn how to do that within the first 10 years. And I know that there’s a lot of bad stuff that’s gone on recently, a lot of really hard stuff my family is going through, and a lot of opposition and feeling pressure or suppression of one kind or another. But I am actually really happy. Because I pick and choose now, for the most part, what I care deeply about. And I think that’s made a huge difference.”

#taylor swift #exclusive #variety

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betweentheheavesofstorm · 4 years ago

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last night in the heat of emotions i was unable to form any sort of like, collected coherent thoughts, but now i have SLEPT and AWOKEN and i’m ready to talk (even more) shit about ACoM.

What is ACoM, you ask? A Court of Miracles, first of a trilogy by Kester Grant, a “retelling” of Les Mis and the Jungle Book with a focus on Eponine, Marius doesn’t exist, it’s kind-of-fantasy-Paris-but-there’s-no-actual-magic-to-speak-of.

That sounds bad, you say. I sigh wearily and think of the hours I spent reading it. Oh, I say. It is.

the good things: it would be ungenerous of me not to admit these. The (1) Hugolian device that Grant uses is “pretending this character, who is clearly Valjean, is not Valjean” which might have been intentional given she claims to have read the book, but given everything else I also kinda doubt that claim, so maybe it happened by accident. Secondly, I was admittedly hooked, mostly because I wanted to see where the trainwreck would go next. There was genuinely no way of predicting where the story would end. The game of thrones writers wish they had what Grant has.

literally everything else:

The choice of content is, of course, bad, but it’s worth noting that the writing isn’t particularly good, the pacing is all over the place and weird time-skips happen without clarification of how long exactly has passed. And, as many of the Goodreads reviewers have pointed out, we never see Eponine learning how to be a thief or acquiring her skills, she just suddenly tells us that she’s an expert and we roll with it

The politics is so incredibly vague, as we’re told the French Revolution was unsuccessful but, like, not at which point it suddenly deviated from our history. So Robespierre et al were significant enough that it matters that Enjolras “St. Juste” is Saint-Just’s nephew

Eponine ‘Nina’ ‘Y/N’ Thenardier has not one, not two, but three love interests: Enjolras (who goes by St. Juste for nearly all of the book) Montparnasse, who starts off as the most in-character Les Mis figure but almost immediately becomes too loyal and noble, and the dauphin of France

Valjean and Javert’s storyline is kind of happening in the background (and sometimes, quite literally, in a different room to our main protags) except Javert is a (blue eyed, redheaded ??) woman, who also seems to be a mashup with Fantine given that she was ~ betrayed by a man ~ who is very heavily implied to be Valjean. Fantinevert and Tholojean? ?? to make heterosexual valvert ?? this is the worst timeline

out of the Amis, only Enjolras, Grantaire, Feuilly and Joly appear. It’s like Grant played the “which four Amis do you want” except she also seemingly combined Feuilly and Combeferre, as the character known as Feuilly just sounds like Combeferre. Enter Combefeuille, my new favourite Ami.

There are occasional, jarring, quotes from the musical, especially during the barricade sequence.

In a bizarre mashup of canon events, Nina is with St. Juste and Gavroche at a deserted barricade. The flag has fallen, which St. Juste is upset about, so Gavroche goes to try and restore it. St Juste hurries after him to save him and is shot in Gavroche’s place. Apparently dying in Nina’s arms, St. Juste begins to sing “A Little Fall of Rain” only for her to slap him. JVJ shows up and carries St. Juste off (A Marjolras done the OTHER way round?) and Feuilly and Joly prepare to perform some kitchen table surgery.

Nina, who’s trying to get them to leave because they’ve been betrayed, throws water over St Juste to wake him out of his injured doze, then threatens him with a gun. She then goes off to wreak her revenge and gets all the Amis + Valjean arrested to protect them (it’s unclear if St. Juste has HAD the tabletop surgery ?? his injury is kind of forgotten about) only to get her other allies to free them

this is seriously, like, the tip of the goddamn iceberg, i’m not even going into how the “court of miracles” criminal underworld thing works, only that it’s Entirely Separate from the normal people (The Ones Who Walk By Day, i’m not kidding, that’s what they’re called)

It's very "feminism means women hitting things" with a side of "eyebrow waggling to convey flirtation". Nina isn't like other girls, she tells us repeatedly that she's not pretty, and constantly recites "I am the Black Cat of the Thieves Guild" as a personal mantra that seems purposefully designed to drive me up the fucking wall. It was supposedly written quickly, which makes sense given the bad pacing and absolute absence of Any research, but I'm astounded that it got published and by Knopf.

but, you know, kudos to Grant, because I absolutely cannot wait for the next two books in this clusterfuck of a series.

#CoM Salt #this book has Changed me as a person #I am a different creature than I was this time yesterday

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agentrouka-blog · 4 years ago

Note

Can you please give your opinion on Dany n missendei relationship in books? It's much more complicated than show n both characters are young.

So, Missandei. I don’t think about her a LOT but there was a connection to a theme that struck me when I compared her to the Stark sisters and it points to a relationship that is, let’s say, very different from what the tv show chose to do.

Long. Many quotes.

Preface: The talking bird – a lady’s armor – “Valar Morghulis”

I am always specifically reminded of Missandei when I read this Sansa passage.

Sansa could not bear the sight of him, he frightened her so, yet she had been raised in all the ways of courtesy. A true lady would not notice his face, she told herself. “You rode gallantly today, Ser Sandor,” she made herself say.

(…)

He was mocking her, she realized. “No one could withstand him,” she managed at last, proud of herself. It was no lie.

Sandor Clegane stopped suddenly in the middle of a dark and empty field. She had no choice but to stop beside him. "Some septa trained you well. You're like one of those birds from the Summer Isles, aren't you? A pretty little talking bird, repeating all the pretty little words they taught you to recite." (AGOT; Sansa II)

A bird from the Summer Isles, repeating words.

The concept of courtesy is a lady’s armor is tied to the idea of the talking bird. (Leaving out the obvious talking raven at the Wall for this, because I don’t see Missandei tied to the magical arc. I see her tied to the political one.)

The phrase “courtesy is a lady’s armor” shows up four times:

Sansa felt that she ought to say something. What was it that Septa Mordane used to tell her? A lady's armor is courtesy, that was it. She donned her armor and said, "I'm sorry my lady mother took you captive, my lord." (ACOK, Sansa I)

and

Sansa felt dizzy; one instant her head was full of dreams of Loras, and the next they had all been snatched away. Willas? Willas? "I," she said stupidly. Courtesy is a lady's armor. You must not offend them, be careful what you say. "I do not know Ser Willas. I have never had the pleasure, my lady. Is he . . . is he as great a knight as his brothers?" (ASOS, Sansa I)

and

“How old are you, Sansa?” asked Tyrion, after a moment. “Thirteen,” she said, “when the moon turns.” “Gods have mercy.” The dwarf took another swallow of wine. “Well, talk won’t make you older. Shall we get on with this, my lady? If it please you?” “It will please me to please my lord husband.” That seemed to anger him. “You hide behind courtesy as if it were a castle wall.” “Courtesy is a lady’s armor,” Sansa said. Her septa had always told her that. “I am your husband. You can take off your armor now.” “And my clothing?” “That too.” He waved his wine cup at her. “My lord father has commanded me to consummate this marriage.” (ASOS, Sansa III)

and

A lady's armor is her courtesy. Alayne could feel the blood rushing to her face. No tears, she prayed. Please, please, I must not cry. "As you wish, ser. And now if you will excuse me, Littlefinger's bastard must find her lord father and let him know that you have come, so we can begin the tourney on the morrow." And may your horse stumble, Harry the Heir, so you fall on your stupid head in your first tilt. She showed the Waynwoods a stone face as they blurted out awkward apologies for their companion. When they were done she turned and fled. (TWOW, Alayne)

So here we have a theme that ties the talking bird to something you were taught by a mentor, to lying, flattering, evading offense in a situation of powerlessness. To evading harm by hiding your true emotions.

So keep that theme of the lady’s armor in mind before we get to Missandei herself.

But there is another pattern of repeated words, and another Stark Sister with clear parallels to Missandei.

"As well ask what good is life, what good is death? If the day comes when you would find me again, give that coin to any man from Braavos, and say these words to him—valar morghulis."

"Valar morghulis," Arya repeated. It wasn't hard. Her fingers closed tight over the coin. Across the yard, she could hear men dying. "Please don't go, Jaqen."

"Jaqen is as dead as Arry," he said sadly, "and I have promises to keep. Valar morghulis, Arya Stark. Say it again."

"Valar morghulis," she said once more, and the stranger in Jaqen's clothes bowed to her and stalked off through the darkness, cloak swirling. She was alone with the dead men. They deserved to die, Arya told herself, remembering all those Ser Amory Lorch had killed at the holdfast by the lake.

The cellars under Kingspyre were empty when she returned to her bed of straw. She whispered her names to her pillow, and when she was done she added, "Valar morghulis," in a small soft voice, wondering what it meant. (ACOK, Arya IX)

Words by a mentor. The phrase becomes a mantra, it is repeatedly tied to her revenge name list and Jaqen’s iron coin and being unafraid. But she never learns what it means until Braavos. She is merely repeating the words, devoid of meaning. Parroting, the same way Sandor accuses Sansa of doing. But like with Sansa, the action serves to strengthen her.

"Valar morghulis," she told the old gods of the north. She liked how the words sounded when she said them. (ACOK, Arya X)

And..

She was only ten, a skinny girl on a stolen horse with a dark forest ahead of her and men behind who would gladly cut off her feet. Yet somehow she felt calmer than she ever had in Harrenhal. The rain had washed the guard's blood off her fingers, she wore a sword across her back, wolves were prowling through the dark like lean grey shadows, and Arya Stark was unafraid. Fear cuts deeper than swords, she whispered under her breath, the words that Syrio Forel had taught her, and Jaqen's words too, valar morghulis. (ASOS, Arya I)

And..

The captain turned it over and blinked at it, then looked at her again. "This . . . how . . . ?"

Jaqen said to say the words too. Arya crossed her arms against her chest. "Valar morghulis," she said, as loud as if she'd known what it meant. (ASOS, Arya XIII)

In Braavos, Arya begins to learn Braavosi, a variant of Valyrian. She becomes a multi-lingual servant in the House of Black and White, tasked with becoming no one, but always secretly being Arya Stark inside. A different kind of armor, a different kind of flying creature. Always playing a role.

Not Randomly:

Archmaester Ebrose, who has made a study of all known accounts of the affliction, believes that it is spread by the butterflies that the Peaceful People revere. For this reason, the disease is oft called butterfly fever. Some believe the fever is carried only by one particular sort of butterfly (a large black-and-white variety with wings as big as a man's hand is favored by Ebrose), but this remains conjecture.

Whether the butterflies of Naath are true handmaids of the Lord of Harmony, or no more than common insects like their cousins in the Seven Kingdoms, it may well be that the Naathi are not wrong in regarding them as guardians. (The World of Ice and Fire – Beyond the Free Cities: Naath)

So we have a connection to a lovely but deadly creature of black and white and Naath. A handmaid. A guardian. Let us keep that in mind, also.

Now let us look at Dany and Missandei directly.

This is how Missandei is introduced to us in ASOS, Daenerys II, when she negotiates for the Unsullied.

“Tell the Westerosi whore to lower her eyes,” the slaver Kraznys mo Nakloz complained to the slave girl who spoke for him. “I deal in meat, not metal. The bronze is not for sale. Tell her to look at the soldiers. Even the dim purple eyes of a sunset savage can see how magnificent my creatures are, surely.”

Kraznys’s High Valyrian was twisted and thickened by the characteristic growl of Ghis, and flavored here and there with words of slaver argot. Dany understood him well enough, but she smiled and looked blankly at the slave girl, as if wondering what he might have said.

“The Good Master Kraznys asks, are they not magnificent?” The girl spoke the Common Tongue well, for one who had never been to Westeros. No older than ten, she had the round flat face, dusky skin, and golden eyes of Naath. The Peaceful People, her folk were called. All agreed that they made the best slaves.

“They might be adequate to my needs,” Dany answered. It had been Ser Jorah’s suggestion that she speak only Dothraki and the Common Tongue while in Astapor. My bear is more clever than he looks. “Tell me of their training.”

“The Westerosi woman is pleased with them, but speaks no praise, to keep the price down,” the translator told her master. “She wishes to know how they were trained.”

Missandei of Naath, a pretty bird from the Summer Isles, repeating the words they tell her. But she, too, does more than that. She translates and manipulates at the same time, conveying intentions, hiding discourtesy. A diplomat, wrapped in lady’s armor. A girl of ten. With eyes as golden as Nymeria’s. She is, and the text doesn’t emphasize this enough, extremely intelligent. She doesn’t know Dany but she is able to read her reasonably well, while translating literally and figuratively, simultaneously. She is basically playing a Game of Faces, reading, translating, lying, repeating… She is basically a character that connects Arya and Sansa on the concept of lying and truth.

His girl conveyed the essence of his speech, more politely. (…)

“Tell her how pretty the pyramids are at night,” the slaver growled. “Tell her I will lick honey off her breasts, or allow her to lick honey off mine if she prefers.”

“Astapor is most beautiful at dusk, Your Grace,” said the slave girl. “The Good Masters light silk lanterns on every terrace, so all the pyramids glow with colored lights. Pleasure barges ply the Worm, playing soft music and calling at the little islands for food and wine and other delights.”

Missandei is a poet. She also echoes another poet.

She pictured the two of them sitting together in a garden with puppies in their laps, or listening to a singer strum upon a lute while they floated down the Mander on a pleasure barge. If I give him sons, he may come to love me. She would name them Eddard and Brandon and Rickon, and raise them all to be as valiant as Ser Loras. And to hate Lannisters, too. In Sansa's dreams, her children looked just like the brothers she had lost. Sometimes there was even a girl who looked like Arya. (ASOS, Sansa II)

Brothers and dreams. Let us keep that in mind, as well.

In ASOS, Daenerys III, Dany acquires the Unsullied at the “price” of a dragon, and gets Missandei tossed in as a bonus.

“Done,” the slave girl translated, “and done, and done, eight times done.”

“The Unsullied will learn your savage tongue quick enough,” added Kraznys mo Nakloz, when all the arrangements had been made, “but until such time you will need a slave to speak to them. Take this one as our gift to you, a token of a bargain well struck.”

“I shall,” said Dany.

The slave girl rendered his words to her, and hers to him. If she had feelings about being given for a token, she took care not to let them show. (…)

Dany turned away from him, to the slave girl standing meekly beside her litter. “Do you have a name, or must you draw a new one every day from some barrel?”

“That is only for Unsullied,” the girl said. Then she realized the question had been asked in High Valyrian. Her eyes went wide. “Oh.”

“Your name is Oh?”

“No. Your Grace, forgive this one her outburst. Your slave’s name is Missandei, but …”

“Missandei is no longer a slave. I free you, from this instant. Come ride with me in the litter, I wish to talk.” Rakharo helped them in, and Dany drew the curtains shut against the dust and heat. “If you stay with me you will serve as one of my handmaids,” she said as they set off. “I shall keep you by my side to speak for me as you spoke for Kraznys. But you may leave my service whenever you choose, if you have father or mother you would sooner return to.”

“This one will stay,” the girl said. “This one … I … there is no place for me to go. This … I will serve you, gladly.”

"I can give you freedom, but not safety," Dany warned. "I have a world to cross and wars to fight. You may go hungry. You may grow sick. You may be killed."

"Valar morghulis," said Missandei, in High Valyrian.

"All men must die," Dany agreed, "but not for a long while, we may pray." She leaned back on the pillows and took the girl's hand. (ASOS, Daenerys III)

Does she have a name. Still careful to guard her words. She will speak for Dany like she did for Kraznys. (Dany = Kraznys.) She has no other place to go. Valar morghulis.

Honestly, I wonder if Missandei truly did not know that Dany could speak Valyrian, or if the wide eyes and “Oh!” reaction were an act.

Have two Arya parallels:

"You are," he said, "but the House of Black and White is no place for Arya, of House Stark."

"Please," she said. "I have no place to go." (AFFC, Arya I)

We know how deeply genuine Arya’s devotion to the Faceless Men is…

And bilingual fun.

She said a silent Prayer to the god of many faces, slipped out of her alcove, and flounced up to the guardsmen. Mercy, Mercy, Mercy. "My lords," she said, "do you speak Braavosi? Oh, please, tell me you do." The two guardsmen exchanged a look. "What's this Thing going on about?" the older one asked. "Who is she?" "One of the mummers," said the pretty one. He pushed his fair hair back off his brow and smiled at her. "Sorry, sweetling, we don't speak your gibble-gabble." Fuss and feathers, Mercy thought, they only know the Common Tongue. That was no good. Give it up or go ahead. She could not give it up. She wanted him so bad. "I know your tongue, a little," she lied, with Mercy's sweetest smile. "You are lords of Westeros, my friend said." (TWOW, Mercy)

Dany uses the chance to grill Missandei on the loyalty of the Unsullied.

“If I did resell them, how would I know they could not be used against me?” Dany asked pointedly. “Would they do that? Fight against me, even do me harm?”

“If their master commanded. They do not question, Your Grace. All the questions have been culled from them. They obey.” She looked troubled. “When you are … when you are done with them … Your Grace might command them to fall upon their swords.”

“And even that, they would do?”

“Yes.” Missandei’s voice had grown soft. “Your Grace.”

Dany squeezed her hand. “You would sooner I did not ask it of them, though. Why is that? Why do you care?”

“This one does not … I … Your Grace …”

“Tell me.”

The girl lowered her eyes. “Three of them were my brothers once, Your Grace.”

Then I hope your brothers are as brave and clever as you. (ASOS, Daenerys III)

What other reason does Missandei have to not want to leave? Because she has THREE brothers within the ranks of the Unsullied. Brothers who have been harmed, twisted, enslaved. Brothers she may want to guard, like the butterflies of Naath.

From the moment we meet her, and certainly after she is handed over to Dany, Missandei serves as a tie to the human suffering on Display with the Unsullied. She explains the gruesome “training". She reveals having brothers among them when faced with the possibility that Dany might order their suicide.

But she also serves to comfort Dany numerous times in a way that Irri (her “not a sex slave”) cannot.

She sings.

The hours crept by on turtle feet. Even after Jhiqui rubbed the knots from her shoulders, Dany was too restless for sleep. Missandei offered to sing her a lullaby of the Peaceful People, but Dany shook her head. “Bring me Arstan,” she said. (ASOS, Daenerys IV)

She tells her stories of her home.

Do all gods feel so lonely? Some must, surely. Missandei had told her of the Lord of Harmony, worshiped by the Peaceful People of Naath; he was the only true god, her little scribe said, the god who always was and always would be, who made the moon and stars and earth, and all the creatures that dwelt upon them. Poor Lord of Harmony. Dany pitied him. It must be terrible to be alone for all time, attended by hordes of butterfly women you could make or unmake at a word. (ASOS, Daenerys VI)

Who else serves a “one true God”? Arya, with the many-faced god. With his servants in black-and-white. Dany hears a lot about the culture of the Peaceful People from Missandei. She seems to find it relaxing.

“Are there many flies on Naath, Missandei?”

“On Naath there are butterflies,” the scribe responded in the Common Tongue. “More wine?”

“No. I must hold court soon.” Dany had grown very fond of Missandei. The little scribe with the big golden eyes was wise beyond her years. She is brave as well. She had to be, to survive the life she’s lived. One day she hoped to see this fabled isle of Naath. Missandei said the Peaceful People made music instead of war. They did not kill, not even animals; they ate only fruit and never flesh. The butterfly spirits sacred to their Lord of Harmony protected their isle against those who would do them harm. Many conquerors had sailed on Naath to blood their swords, only to sicken and die. The butterflies do not help them when the slave ships come raiding, though. “I am going to take you home one day, Missandei,” Dany promised. If I had made the same promise to Jorah, would he still have sold me? “I swear it.”

“This one is content to stay with you, Your Grace. Naath will be there, always. You are good to this—to me.”

“And you to me.” Dany took the girl by the hand. “Come help me dress.” (ASOS, Daenerys VI)

I think Dany is projecting a lot onto Missandei. Her longing for home, for childhood. For loyalty. And yet…

Daario and Ben Plumm, Grey Worm, Irri, Jhiqui, Missandei … as she looked at them Dany found herself wondering which of them would betray her next. (ASOS, Daenerys VI)

And here Missandei witnesses an interesting turn of events.

Dany thought a moment. “Any man who wishes to sell himself into slavery may do so. Or woman.” She raised a hand. “But they may not sell their children, nor a man his wife.”

“In Astapor the city took a tenth part of the price, each time a slave changed hands,” Missandei told her.

“We’ll do the same,” Dany decided. Wars were won with gold as much as swords. “A tenth part. In gold or silver coin, or ivory. Meereen has no need of saffron, cloves, or zorse hides.” (ASOS, Daenerys VI)

Instead of eradicating slave trade, Dany allows it to wobble back into existence, because she had no better plan. Curiously, Missandei seems to support, even enable this. She turns Dany’s attention toward the Astapori practice. Why? That is.. seriously odd, for a former slave who is supposedly enarmored with Dany’s anti-slavery crucade, and thus loyal to her.

Missandei remains gentle, caring, ever so attentive. As Dany struggles with ruling Meereen, Missandei is there to hold her hand.

She was Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, khaleesi and queen, Mother of Dragons, slayer of warlocks, breaker of chains, and there was no one in the world that she could trust.

“Your Grace?” Missandei stood at her elbow wrapped in a bedrobe, wooden sandals on her feet. “I woke, and saw that you were gone. Did you sleep well? What are you looking at?”

“My city,” said Dany. “I was looking for a house with a red door, but by night all the doors are black.”

“A red door?” Missandei was puzzled. “What house is this?”

“No house. It does not matter.” Dany took the younger girl by the hand. “Never lie to me, Missandei. Never betray me.”

“I never would,” Missandei promised. “Look, dawn comes.”

The sky had turned a cobalt blue from the horizon to the zenith, and behind the line of low hills to the east a glow could be seen, pale gold and oyster pink. Dany held Missandei’s hand as they watched the sun come up. (ASOS, Daenerys VI)

Dany promises to take her home, Missandei promises to never betray her. Or “promises”? She now knows that Dany is certainly concerned with fear of betrayal. Yet her gentle presence allows Dany to refocus when she was tempted to leave Meereen behind.

“There is nothing to stay for,” said Brown Ben Plumm.

“Your Grace, the slavers brought their doom on themselves,” said Daario Naharis.

“You have brought freedom as well,” Missandei pointed out.

“Freedom to starve?” asked Dany sharply. “Freedom to die? Am I a dragon, or a harpy?” Am I mad? Do I have the taint? (ASOS, Daenerys VI)

Dany ends ASOS choosing to stay, to rule.

Of course, the deterioration of Meereen has a devastating personal effect on Missandei. Her brother is murdered.

She could hear the soft sounds of sobs. “Who is that weeping?”

“Your slave Missandei.” Jhiqui had a taper in her hand.

“My servant. I have no slaves.” Dany did not understand. “Why does she weep?”

“For him who was her brother,” Irri told her. (ADWD, Daenerys II)

(Subtext: Irri sees no difference between Missandei and a slave. Dany does not understand. She does not really comprehend how to MAKE it different.)

Mossador. Dany made a fist. Missandei and her brothers had been taken from their home on Naath by raiders from the Basilisk Isles and sold into slavery in Astapor. Young as she was, Missandei had shown such a gift for tongues that the Good Masters had made a scribe of her. Mossador and Marselen had not been so fortunate. They had been gelded and made into Unsullied. (ADWD, Daenerys II)

I wonder what happened to the third brother? Has he died by this point, as well?

Dany decides to employ torture to investigate the murder of Missandei’s brother and others by the Sons of the Harpy. The torture of a suspect’s innocent daughters, to be exact. Another step toward villainy.

When she returned to her rooms atop the pyramid, she found Missandei crying softly on her pallet, trying as best she could to muffle the sound of her sobs. “Come sleep with me,” she told the little scribe. “Dawn will not come for hours yet.”

“Your Grace is kind to this one.” Missandei slipped under the sheets. “He was a good brother.”

Dany wrapped her arms about the girl. “Tell me of him.”

“He taught me how to climb a tree when we were little. He could catch fish with his hands. Once I found him sleeping in our garden with a hundred butterflies crawling over him. He looked so beautiful that morning, this one … I mean, I loved him.” (ADWD, Daenerys II)

Mossador sounds a lot like Bran. Climbing, fishing.

Compare the images:

The night the bird had come from Winterfell, Eddard Stark had taken the girls to the castle godswood, an acre of elm and alder and black cottonwood overlooking the river. The heart tree there was a great oak, its ancient limbs overgrown with smokeberry vines; they knelt before it to offer their thanksgiving, as if it had been a weirwood. Sansa drifted to sleep as the moon rose, Arya several hours later, curling up in the grass under Ned's cloak. All through the dark hours he kept his vigil alone. When dawn broke over the city, the dark red blooms of dragon's breath surrounded the girls where they lay. "I dreamed of Bran," Sansa had whispered to him. "I saw him smiling."

"He was going to be a knight," Arya was saying now. "A knight of the Kingsguard. Can he still be a knight?" (AGOT, Eddard V)

Asleep in the godswood like Mossador had been in the garden. Surrounded by dragon’s breath flowers like he had been covered by butterflies. Two sisters thinking of their brother, terribly harmed. Where Bran survived, Mossador did not.

“As he loved you.” Dany stroked the girl’s hair. “Say the word, my sweet, and I will send you from this awful place. I will find a ship somehow and send you home. To Naath.”

“I would sooner stay with you. On Naath I’d be afraid. What if the slavers came again? I feel safe when I’m with you.”

Safe. The word made Dany’s eyes fill up with tears. “I want to keep you safe.”

Missandei was only a child. With her, she felt as if she could be a child too. “No one ever kept me safe when I was little. Well, Ser Willem did, but then he died, and Viserys … I want to protect you but … it is so hard. To be strong. I don’t always know what I should do. I must know, though. I am all they have. I am the queen … the … the …”

“… mother,” whispered Missandei.

“Mother to dragons.” Dany shivered.

“No. Mother to us all.” Missandei hugged her tighter. “Your Grace should sleep. Dawn will be here soon, and court.”

“We’ll both sleep, and dream of sweeter days. Close your eyes.” When she did, Dany kissed her eyelids and made her giggle.

And reading this, I just realized that there is a clear parallel to someone else: Taena Merryweather. Where Irri parallels the sexual abuse aspect, Missandei parallels the “sweet confidant” aspect of her relationship with Cersei. Sharing a bed, telling stories, secrets. We know how loyal Taena was to Cersei.

Missandei just lost her brother whom she loved enough to weep copiously for, yet she ends up comforting Dany, the exchange becomes about Dany. This reads sweet and mutual, but IS IT REALLY when you keep that turn of the conversation in mind?

Dany keeps projecting onto Missandei, and I think Missandei knows. I think Missandei is very aware of this and using it to stay afloat. Not because she is evil but because she is simply trying to survive and do anything he can to try and keep in contact with her brothers, to protect them. Her connection to Dany is the best way to do that.

Missandei keeps witnessing Dany’s lower points:

When Daenerys returned to her pyramid, sore of limb and sick of heart, she found Missandei reading some old scroll whilst Irri and Jhiqui argued about Rakharo. “You are too skinny for him,” Jhiqui was saying. “You are almost a boy. Rakharo does not bed with boys. This is known.” Irri bristled back. “It is known that you are almost a cow. Rakharo does not bed with cows.”

“Rakharo is blood of my blood. His life belongs to me, not you,” Dany told the two of them. (ADWD, Daenerys VI)

Interestingly, she is also reading “old scrolls”. Educating herself.

Dany remains happily intrusive in her command over her “handmaiden’s” bodies. It accompanies a very strange exchange between them.

A cool wind was blowing on her terrace. Dany sighed with pleasure as she slipped into the waters of her pool. At her command, Missandei stripped off her clothes and climbed in after her. “This one heard the Astapori scratching at the walls last night,” the little scribe said as she was washing Dany’s back.

Irri and Jhiqui exchanged a look. “No one was scratching,” said Jhiqui.

“Scratching … how could they scratch?”

“With their hands,” said Missandei. “The bricks are old and crumbling. They are trying to claw their way into the city.”

“This would take them many years,” said Irri. “The walls are very thick. This is known.”

“It is known,” agreed Jhiqui.

“I dream of them as well.” Dany took Missandei’s hand. “The camp is a good half-mile from the city, my sweetling. No one was scratching at the walls.”

“Your Grace knows best,” said Missandei. (ADWD, Daenerys VI)

It is not the Astapori scratching.

For a moment he saw only the blackened arches of the bricks above, scorched by dragonflame. A trickle of ash caught his eye, betraying movement. Something pale, half-hidden, stirring. He's made himself a cave, the prince realized. A burrow in the brick. The foundations of the Great Pyramid of Meereen were massive and thick to support the weight of the huge structure overhead; even the interior walls were three times thicker than any castle's curtain walls. But Viserion had dug himself a hole in them with flame and claw, a hole big enough to sleep in. (ADWD, The Dragontamer)

So Missandei is hearing the warning signs the others are missing.

Dany is trying, but the true cost of ruling – the abdication of one’s most personal choices toward the benefit of the many - chafes hard. Interestingly, Missandei is unusually outspoken on the subject. Downright testing the waters of her influence on the friendship track.

“Your Grace needs more than wine to break her fast. You are such a tiny thing, and you will surely need your strength today.”

That made Daenerys laugh, coming from a girl so small. She relied so much on the little scribe that she oft forgot that Missandei had only turned eleven. They shared the food together on her terrace. As Dany nibbled on an olive, the Naathi girl gazed at her with eyes like molten gold and said, “It is not too late to tell them that you have decided not to wed.”

It is, though, the queen thought, sadly. “Hizdahr’s blood is ancient and noble. Our joining will join my freedmen to his people. When we become as one, so will our city.”

“Your Grace does not love the noble Hizdahr. This one thinks you would sooner have another for your husband.”

I must not think of Daario today. “A queen loves where she must, not where she will.”

Her appetite had left her. “Take this food away,” she told Missandei. “It is time I bathed.” (ADWD, Daenerys VII)

Eyes like molten gold. Molten gold, a golden crown that men shall tremble to behold. Ominous.

I wonder what Missandei’s endgame here is. Why does she oppose the marriage? Why did she propose the slave sale tax?

Dany relies on Missandei emotionally. But Missandei seems to pull back, now that Dany did marry Hizdahr.

Dany flinched. “Who is there?”

“Only Missandei.” The Naathi scribe moved closer to the bed. “This one heard you crying.”

“Crying? I was not crying. Why would I cry? I have my peace, I have my king, I have everything a queen might wish for. You had a bad dream, that was all.”

“As you say, Your Grace.” She bowed and made to go.

“Stay,” said Dany. “I do not wish to be alone.”

“His Grace is with you,” Missandei pointed out.

“His Grace is dreaming, but I cannot sleep. On the morrow I must bathe in blood. The price of peace.” She smiled wanly and patted the bed. “Come. Sit. Talk with me.”

“If it please you.” Missandei sat down beside her. “What shall we talk of?”

“Home,” said Dany. “Naath. Butterflies and brothers. Tell me of the things that make you happy, the things that make you giggle, all your sweetest memories. Remind me that there is still good in the world.”

Missandei did her best. She was still talking when Dany finally fell to sleep, to dream queer, half-formed dreams of smoke and fire.

The morning came too soon. (ADWD, Daenerys VIII)

Missandei did not correct herself when she used “this one”, like she used to before. She does not enthusiastically agree to stay with her. “If it please you” is a phrase used with monarchs like Joffrey, Cersei, Stannis. Dany used it on Viserys, to placate him.

Missandei becomes even more openly critical just before the fighting pits open.

“Even if the pits must open, must Your Grace go yourself?” asked Missandei as she was washing the queen’s hair.

“Half of Meereen will be there to see me, gentle heart.”

“Your Grace,” said Missandei, “this one begs leave to say that half of Meereen will be there to watch men bleed and die.”

She is not wrong, the queen knew, but it makes no matter. (ADWD, Daenerys IX)

Once again, no correction on the “this one”. She doesn’t bother anymore. Still she makes a last-ditch effort to use her emotional influence on Dany. To no avail. Why does she not want Dany to go? Is it the principle of the thing? Is it to subvert the union? Is it because she knows something is going to happen? Does she Need Dany on a particular path?

Just before she leaves for the fighting pits, Dany has her last interaction with Missandei.

Missandei reemerged. “Your Grace. The king bids you join him when you are dressed. And Prince Quentyn has come with his Dornish Men. They beg a word, if that should please you.”

Little about this day shall please me. “Some other day.” (ADWD, Daenerys IX)

That’s it. Brushed off. Missandei stays behind. Dany goes to the pit.

Next we see her is in ADWD, The Queensguard. She is mostly unsupervised, alone.

The royal apartments were still and silent. Hizdahr had not taken up residence there, preferring to establish his own suite of rooms deep in the heart of the Great Pyramid, where massive brick walls surrounded him on all sides. Mezzara, Miklaz, Qezza, and the rest of the queen’s young cupbearers—hostages in truth, but both Selmy and the queen had become so fond of them that it was hard for him to think of them that way—had gone with the king, whilst Irri and Jhiqui departed with the other Dothraki. Only Missandei remained, a forlorn little ghost haunting the queen’s chambers at the apex of the pyramid. (ADWD, The Queensguard)

Dany and Selmy can forget that the kids are hostages. But Theon shows us that they never forget what they are. Irri and Jhiqui remain Dothraki. And Missandei? What IS she up to?

We gain a few more insights on her interactions in Meereen.

“She might be flying home,” he told himself, aloud.

“No,” murmured a soft voice behind him. “She would not do that, ser. She would not go home without us.”

Ser Barristan turned. “Missandei. Child. How long have you been standing there?”

“Not long. This one is sorry if she has disturbed you.” She hesitated. “Skahaz mo Kandaq wishes words with you.”

“The Shavepate? You spoke with him?” That was rash, rash. The enmity ran deep between Shakaz and the king, and the girl was clever enough to know that. Skahaz had been outspoken in his opposition to the queen’s marriage, a fact Hizdahr had not forgotten. “Is he here? In the pyramid?”

“When he wishes. He comes and goes, ser.”

Yes. He would. “Who told you he wants words with me?”

“A Brazen Beast. He wore an owl mask.”

Like Arya as a cupbearer, Missandei is both visible and invisible and has the opportunity to fade into the background but also make contact with numerous people while she had Dany’s ear, hypothetically. We certainly know that Missandei disapproved of Hizdahr, as well. Also, she is sneaky and can listen to conversations. We know she reads scrolls. Her outward appearance remains that of a loyal believer.

Selmy immediately decides to make use of that ability.

The worst were those who played the game of thrones. “Can you find this owl again?” he asked Missandei.

“This one can try, ser.”

“Tell him I will speak with … with our friend … after dark, by the stables.” The pyramid’s main doors were closed and barred at sunset. The stables would be quiet at that hour. “Make certain it is the same owl.” It would not serve to have the wrong Brazen Beast hear of this.

“This one understands.” Missandei turned as if to go, then paused a moment and said, “It is said that the Yunkai’i have ringed the city all about with scorpions, to loose iron bolts into the sky should Drogon return.”

Ser Barristan had heard that too. “It is no simple thing to slay a dragon in the sky. In Westeros, many tried to bring down Aegon and his sisters. None succeeded.”

Missandei nodded. It was hard to tell if she was reassured. “Do you think that they will find her, ser? The grasslands are so vast, and dragons leave no tracks across the sky.”

“Aggo and Rakharo are blood of her blood … and who knows the Dothraki sea better than Dothraki?” He squeezed her shoulder. “They will find her if she can be found.” If she still lives. There were other khals who prowled the grass, horselords with khalasars whose riders numbered in the tens of thousands. But the girl did not need to hear that. “You love her well, I know. I swear, I shall keep her safe.”

The words seemed to give the girl some comfort. Words are wind, though, Ser Barristan thought. How can I protect the queen when I am not with her?

Look at her tickling dragon-killing information out of Selmy while appearing very concerned for Dany.

Afterward, back at the apex of the pyramid, Ser Barristan found Missandei amongst piles of scrolls and books, reading. “Stay here tonight, child,” he told her. “Whatever happens, whatever you see or hear, do not leave the queen’s chambers.”

“This one hears,” the girl said. “If she may ask—”

“Best not.” Ser Barristan stepped out alone onto the terrace gardens. I am not made for this, he reflected as he looked out over the sprawling city. The pyramids were waking, one by one, lanterns and torches flickering to life as shadows gathered in the streets below. Plots, ploys, whispers, lies, secrets within secrets, and somehow I have become part of them. (ADWD, The Kingbreaker)

Again, reading scrolls and books. Again fishing for information. (Understandably, but also probably not innocently.)

Next, she is caring for Quentyn Martell on his deathbed.

Missandei sat at the bedside. She had been with the prince night and day, tending to such needs as he could express, giving him water and milk of the poppy when he was strong enough to drink, listening to the few tortured words he gasped out from time to time, reading to him when he fell quiet, sleeping in her chair beside him. (ADWD, The Queen’s Hand)

So she is undaunted in the face of death and physical atrocity, much like Arya. Giving comfort to the infirm not unlike Sansa with Sweetrobin.

She assumes the role of confidant for Selmy, as well. Seamless.

The tiny Naathi scribe looked up at his approach. “Honored ser. The prince is beyond pain now. His Dornish gods have taken him home. See? He smiles.”

How can you tell? He has no lips. It would have been kinder if the dragons had devoured him. That at least would have been quick. This … Fire is a hideous way to die. Small wonder half the hells are made of flame. “Cover him.”

Missandei pulled the coverlet over the prince’s face. “What will be done with him, ser? He is so very far from home.”

“I’ll see that he’s returned to Dorne.” But how? As ashes? That would require more fire, and Ser Barristan could not stomach that. We’ll need to strip the flesh from his bones. Beetles, not boiling. The silent sisters would have seen to it at home, but this was Slaver’s Bay. The nearest silent sister was ten thousand leagues away. “You should go sleep now, child. In your own bed.”

“If this one may be so bold, ser, you should do the same. You do not sleep the whole night through.”

Not for many years, child. Not since the Trident. Grand Maester Pycelle had once told him that old men do not need as much sleep as the young, but it was more than that. He had reached that age when he was loath to close his eyes, for fear that he might never open them again. Other men might wish to die in bed asleep, but that was no death for a knight of the Kingsguard.

“The nights are too long,” he told Missandei, “and there is much and more to do, always. Here, as in the Seven Kingdoms. But you have done enough for now, child. Go and rest.” And if the gods are good, you will not dream of dragons. (The Queen’s Hand)

Child he calls her, and yet…

“Ransom,” said Ser Barristan. “Each man’s weight in gold.”

“The Wise Masters do not need our gold, ser,” said Marselen. “They are richer than your Westerosi lords, every one.”

“Their sellswords will want the gold, though. What are the hostages to them? If the Yunkishmen refuse, it will drive a blade between them and their hirelings.” Or so I hope. It had been Missandei who suggested the ploy to him. He would never have thought of such a thing himself. In King’s Landing, bribes had been Littlefinger’s domain, whilst Lord Varys had the task of fostering division amongst the crown’s enemies. His own duties had been more straightforward. Eleven years of age, yet Missandei is as clever as half the men at this table and wiser than all of them. (The Queen’s Hand)

He takes political advice from the eleven-year-old translator. And he never stops to wonder what else she might be up to. Missandei is no sweet, innocent follower. Missandei is brilliant. She is a patient player. And she hides it so well.

In Dany’s mind, Missandei remains ever her loyal handmaiden.

Jhiqui and Irri would be waiting atop her pyramid back in Meereen, she told herself.

Her sweet scribe Missandei as well, and all her little pages. They would bring her food, and she could bathe in the pool beneath the persimmon tree. It would be good to feel clean again. Dany did not need a glass to know that she was filthy. (ADWD, Daenerys X)

and

As the world darkened, Dany settled in and closed her eyes, but sleep refused to come. The night was cold, the ground hard, her belly empty. She found herself thinking of Meereen, of Daario, her love, and Hizdahr, her husband, of Irri and Jhiqui and sweet Missandei, Ser Barristan and Reznak and Skahaz Shavepate. Do they fear me dead? I flew off on a dragon’s back. Will they think he ate me? (ADWD, Daenerys X)

Does she want her alive or dead? And what path does she want her to follow? Missandei’s specific goals are a mystery to me.

But I am loving this.

That relationship is one giant cauldron bubbling away. A big sign saying “Watch this Space”. I am excited for this. Considering the parallels to the Stark sisters, especially Arya, but also to Taena Merryweather, I am fairly certain Missandei is going to betray Dany and play a role in at least a significant setback for her. I do NOT think that Missandei genuinely cares for Dany. The details of her aims are fuzzy to me, but I suspect it’s going to prioritize her brothers.

Considering she was the last to care for Quentyn, I would be especially excited if she somehow came into contact with Dorne, especially Arianne and Aegon, before the end.

So yeah, those are my thoughts on that relationship.

#asoiaf #daenerys targaryen #missandei of naath #asks #my posts

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songtoyou · 4 years ago

Text

Mr. Evans and the Congresswoman - Part 2

Paring: Chris Evans x Politician Reader

Rating: PG

Word Count: 1,858

Warnings: Political topics such as Biden, Harris, our current White House occupant and the current administration.

Description: It is the week of the DNC and Chris is once again interviewing you for A Starting Point.

A/N: The DNC inspired me to write a second part for this story. This is pure fiction as I do not know what Chris believes when it comes to politics and policy issues. This is a complete work of fiction.

I do not permit my work to be to be posted on any other site without my permission.

Note: Updated for grammar and punctuation edits.

"Hi, Congresswoman Y/L/N?" Chris Evans asked with a smile.

He was once again interviewing you for ASP. This time it was during the week of the Democratic National Convention. Chris and Mark had already talked to other politicians such as Senator Cory Booker and Representatives Ro Khanna and Alma Adams. You were the last elected official he was slated to interview to wrap up the DNC week.

Truthfully, Chris was happy to get the chance to talk with you again. Your previous interview for ASP was such a hit that it garnered a lot of attention from fans and the media. However, it was not because you helped bring more legitimacy and attention for ASP, but instead, Chris found himself genuinely admiring you.

"Hi," you said to Chris, giving a small wave through the Zoom screen. "I told you to call me by my first name."

"I know, but I still want to show respect," Chris responded with a teasing smile. Was he mildly flirting with the congresswoman? Yes, but he had no shame in doing so. "How are you? You are looking well."

"I am doing well. Thank you. How about you?"

"Same. Just trying to stay sane through everything. I'm actually currently in London. Working on a project." Chris admitted.

"Uh oh. You better be staying safe and following the right procedures and protocols," you lightly reprimanded him.

"My fans ratted me out. They found where I was just by the hotel door. Can you believe that? That is some FBI-level investigating, right there. I'd be impressed if I weren't also terrified of the lengths some of these fans will go to scout my location," Chris ranted. He did not understand why he was sharing this with you, but a part of him felt comfortable doing so.

"That…is quite impressive, I must say. Creepy. Scary. But impressive. You need to learn how to put in a Zoom background. It would solve all of your problems," you suggested to him.

"I would, but I'm technology deficient. Maybe I should look up some Zoom tutorials on how to do it. Give it a try."

"There is no try…only do," you advised cheekily.

"Now you're quoting Yoda. A woman after my own heart," Chris replied. He knew he needed to refocus. "So, as you can tell, Mark won't be joining us for this interview. I'm going to hit record if that is okay?"

"Okay. I'm ready when you are," you said.

When the record notification appeared on screen, Chris introduced you and immediately went into the first question.

"How do you think the DNC is going so far, particularly how this year is more of a virtual setting rather than in-person due to COVID-19?"

"Despite not having the big in-person celebration/gathering, I think the virtual setting is working very well. Better than I expected, actually. It gives off a more inclusive and intimate vibe to the DNC that we haven't felt before. I like the whole documentary approach and feel to it," you replied honestly.

"Were you excited that Joe Biden chose Senator Kamala Harris as his running mate?" asked Chris.

"Oh my God! I was so happy that Vice President Biden chose Senator Harris as his running mate. Like, my staff and I were beyond ecstatic. There is no one better to be Biden's running mate than Harris. She is amazing. Such an inspiration. I'm not going to lie, but I'm really excited for the debate between her and Pence."

That made Chris laugh. "Yeah, me too. Senator Harris really knows how to pull all the punches. Her nomination as VP has been met with overall positive response. The Trump Administration and Republican pundits appear to have a hard time painting a negative image of Harris. Why do you think Trump and Fox News are struggling to provide a negative image for her?"

"That is an excellent question. The public's overwhelming response to Harris' nomination is because 1.) she is the first black and south Asian woman to be on a major presidential ticket, and 2.) she is likable and charming. She has this exuberant energy that attracts people to her. You know, black and brown women and girls finally have someone that looks like them running for the second-highest office in the land. That is huge!

"I also have to wonder if people have smartened up in the last four years and won't tolerate the…hypocrisy, sexism, and misogyny…in this case misogynoir that is thrown towards Senator Harris from the media, political pundits, social media bots, etc. So, what we are seeing with Trump and Fox News struggling to attack her is because…well…they just aren't smart. All we have seen from Trump in his attacks against her is that she was mean to Kavanaugh when questioning him during his nomination process. But none of what Trump says holds up because we all know that smart, confident women intimidate him," you finished off your point.

"There is also the left…or more of the progressive left who are unhappy with Biden choosing Harris," Chris spoke up and continued, "They say she is a cop and put people away for weed. That she took kids away from parents when the kid didn't show up for school. That Harris is too conservative. What do you say to that?"

"All of that is…you know…. Senator Harris one of the most policy progressive senators we have. Her voting record is more progressive than Bernie Sanders. All people have to do is research her time as a district attorney and Attorney General for California to find out what she actually did concerning policy. But as we both know, people nowadays don't know how to critically think, which scares me. Progressives need to look at the overall big picture. This election in November is crucial. We are in the fight for our democracy, for our country, and for our lives…literally."

"I talk with my brother, Scott, all the time about certain political issues," mentioned Chris. "He is a tad more progressive than I am. I can admit that I tend to be more centrist. The district you represent is a mix of blue and red areas; how do you balance opposing views from your constituents?"

You took in a deep breath before you answered. That was a loaded question. Representing a district that was not solely red, or blue could be difficult from time to time. You wanted to be respectful of the different viewpoints from constituents, but maintaining a neutral balance was hard and frustrating at times.

"The majority of Americans are centrist/moderates. You need a balance of both liberal and conservative policies. Bipartisanship is crucially important when developing and passing laws. We are currently seeing an overt of one-sidedness while sabotaging the other side, which is detrimental to our country's growth. It is important to reach across the aisle to talk with those who may have opposing views than you. At the end of the day, people just want to feel that their concerns are heard and valued. We all want to feel that way. So, as an elected official, I make sure to take the time to talk with those in rural areas, along with urban areas, about their issues and concerns," you shared.

"Do you ever get any pushback from Trump supporters in the red areas?" Chris inquired.

"Well, it is important to note that not all residents in rural areas are Trump supporters. They just tend to keep that to themselves. I have actually talked to Trump supporters in blue areas. We can never and should never assume that one area has this type of person and vice versa. I learned that the hard way when I was campaigning for city council early in my career," you revealed to Chris with a small chuckle. "But overall, my constituents will talk with me and have been respectful. Some of the concerns that have been shared with me do fall under the QAnon conspiracy theories, which do disturb me, I'll be honest. Um…when being confronted with someone who has that extreme of ideals, it is important to remain calm and not to come off combative. Meaning that I have to remind myself that I am not quite dealing with a rational person. The only thing that I can do is calmly talk to the person and respond back with facts. Either they listen or brush me off and call me a radical lefty."

"The majority of people are good, like you said," Chris reminded you.

"That's right. It's a good mantra to live by. I think the American people are tired and have been tired for the past four years with this Administration. We need a sense of normalcy and decency. Compassion and empathy, which were two of the big themes during the DNC. This week was a nice reminder that we, as a country, can have that again."

"I agree. Very well said. You always end on a positive. I appreciate that. Thank you, Congresswoman Y/L/N, for taking the time to talk with me. You always provide great insight into the world of politics and your experience as an elected official," said Chris and ended the recording. "That was really great, Y/N. I know Mark, and I really appreciate you taken the time to do these interviews for ASP," Chris added.

"Oh, it is no problem. Like I said before, I like what you both are doing with the site. Are you happy with how everything turned out?" you asked him.

"Yeah… it's…it took a while to just get the website up and running. I know there is still work that needs to be done. Some areas need to be fixed, but with a project like this, we can adjust. There is more room for improvement and growth," Chris communicated to you.

You nodded in agreement. "Politics is a whole different ballgame. Not many people are willing to venture into the field. It can cause a lot of annoyances and headaches. So, hats off to you, my friend," you said, giving Chris a salute.

"Thank you. Well, I better let you go. I know you must have a million things on your plate."

"Ah yes, I have to go and save the United States Postal Service from corruption. Talk to you later, Chris. Take care," you waved goodbye and signed off.

Chris had to admit, he was in awe of you. There was something about you that fascinated him. None of the elected officials he and Mark talked to for ASP had the liveliness you had. You were not jaded or defeated by the system, at least not yet, since you were still considered a junior member of congress. Chris hoped that the energy and enthusiasm you had for politics and helping people would not diminish. When his Uncle Mike was still a congressman, he shared with Chris that D.C. can cause a lot of strain on a person's values and beliefs. "I have seen too many of my colleagues succumb to the pressures of dirty politics," Uncle Mike once said.

Chris just hoped that you would not succumb to those pressures.

#chris evans #chris evans x reader #chris evans x you

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piisuke · 4 years ago

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@satorusangel HERE ARE THE HEADCANONS YOU ASKED FOR laugh with me

Itadori Yuji:

He's not a full crackhead but he's like a 7.5 out of a 1-10 scale

He went through a phase in middle school and dyed his hair red. That's why it's pink now.

Wants an industrial piercing but kinda has a thing against needles.

He's a great swimmer, but he only learned how to swim because his grandfather threw him in the pool and refused to help him.

Learned his fighting skills from anime.

Actually a really big anime buff.

He's big and strong bc he drank lots of milk as a child.

As we have previously discussed he puts empty milk cartons back in the fridge.

Had an absolute meltdown when Vine shut down. He didn't actually use Vine but compilations healed his soul.

Quotes iconic Vines a liiiiitle bit too much.

Knows too many Fortnite dances, but saves himself the embaressment and doesn't do them in public.

Memes. So many memes.

Accidentally sent the entire Bee Movie script to his teacher instead of an essay. It was his fault though bc it was due at midnight and he finished the actual essay at 11:52 pm.

Veggies gross keep away.

Will find the good in everyone. Except Mahito, he's just a dick.

Radiates confidence. Like it oozes out of him. He walks into a room. Everyone becomes confident.

Had a problem with acne in his early teenage years.

Dogs. That's it. That's the headcanon.

Fushiguro Megumi

Thinks humans are a disease but also hellbent on saving them from curses.

Hasn't brushed his hair in three years he just kinda lets it go.

His pfp on social media is usually art of a wolf that's been floating around the internet since early 2005 and no one knows the source.

Doesn't actually post on social media he just ghosts. This is how he finds out everyone's secrets.

His phone has been on vibrate since 2013.

Someone put a color other than black or white in this man's closet he's honestly obsessed with monochrome.

He's bi. He's not even in the closet, he just doesn't find his sexuality relevant.

His room is nice and tidy but also *insert that one video of that guy who uses a broom to get all of those empty water bottles from behind his bed*

He's super intelligent and would have gotten straight A's in school, except he just did not do the work. How did this man even get to the next grade idk.

Doesn't know how to process emotions does not plan to even try

Kugisaki Nobara

No one ever told you life was gonna be this gay.

I don't even hc her as being bi or lesbian when I hear her name that meme instantly pops into my head and idk why.

Probably because she has binge watched Friends at least three times by now start to finish.

Netflix whore. She's watched just about everything except maybe anime.

Serial killer documentaries are her favorite though.

Has the cliche Tik Tok color lights in her room, an upgrade from the fairy lights she bought in 2014.

Idk if this will still stand true after the Shibuya incident but Halloween is her favorite holiday.

Probably Wiccan or something. Living in a small town will do that to you.

Wears leggings and uggs occasionally because fuck you they're comfortable.

Has two looks: uwu look at me I'm CUTE and homeless. Depends on how much sleep she got the night before.

At least puts on mascara on these occasions, she has to have just a little bit of makeup.

Loves acrylic nails but is constantly breaking or popping them off so she just gave up.

"I'm fully aware Hot Cheetos and ice coffee aren't an appropriate breakfast I also just do not care"

"Sorry I'm a bitch, I'm a Leo"

Wants to like avacado, really, but it just taste like wet compressed grass

Gojo Satoru

Doesn't know how to drive and that's probably a good thing

Had a bit of a rebellious streak as a teenager but hey, at least his juvie record is sealed

Has paperwork sitting untouched on his desk from three months ago that he will not touch for at least another three months

He doesn't drink often but when he does oh boy

"Meeeeeguuuumiiiiii~" Oh boy he's in danger

*Insert that one meme of the drunk mom who starts watering her pool with the garden hose*

Honestly does some really stupid shit when he's drunk

Has a Tik Tok and is very active on it

Honestly mentally he never matured past the age of 15

Can fight high grade curses but scared of spiders, probably

Does the cross word puzzles in the newspaper every week

Uses humor as a coping mechanism and it honestly just became a personality

Constantly popping his joints. I'm sorry if you find this gross I too find it gross.

Probably brought home every stray animal he ever met ever until he was at least like 22 y/o

Ugly Christmas sweaters. Every year. Without fail. I only thought of this headcanon because it's October 26th and my grandmother is watching a Christmas movie and will continue doing so until January 1st.

Ryomen Sukuna

Probably eats babies idk

Jk I like to think that when he massacred entire villages he spared children under the age of like 13 bc I want to find the good in him

He's a womanizer but also stops being handsy the first time the word no comes out of her mouth bc nonconsensual sex is boring, that's also me just trying to find the good in him

If he was a normal person (like an au where he's Yuji's twin) he probably became an alcoholic at age like 14

Constantly groaning and sighing. Like he cannot stop. He's surrounded by idiots fighting other idiots trapped inside an idiots body

Looks off in the distance like he's in the Office and looking at the camera

"What the fuck" is like a mantra to him

God complex

Sometimes when I'm sad I imagine him rapping to the full version of Lost in Paradise. This isn't a headcanon but it feels relevant.

I was going to add other characters for you but my brain is kinda rotting rn

P. S. ily 🦐💕

#jujutsu kaisen #jjk headcanon #jjk #itadori yuji #yuji itadori #megumi fushiguro #nobara kugisaki #gojo satoru #ryomen Sukuna

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celestialtitania · 4 years ago

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A Gingerbread State of Affairs

Written for Day 23: Baking of the MF Advent Calendar. Can also read on AO3 or FFN.

Adrien tapped his foot impatiently, waiting for the bell to ring for lunch. He could feel Nino anxiously glancing at him every five seconds while fiddling with his hat. It was driving Adrien a little nuts, as he imagined every possible scenario Nino could possibly have to say. He’d come up with a dozen different possibilities, with both good news and bad news.

The second the bell rang, both boys turned to each other before pausing. How did they decide who got to go first?

Luckily for them, Alya also wanted to speak and she wasn’t about to wait for them to stop being awkward. “You busy after school today, Sunshine?”

Adrien glanced at her in surprise before cautiously shaking his head. He wondered what this was about, considering he and Alya didn’t spend much time together.

“W-would you be i-interested in doing a little baking and decorating?” Marinette piped up, as she leaned forwards a little, waiting for his answer.

“Baking? Me?” Adrien asked, a little bewildered.

“See, there’s this event Marinette’s parents do during the holiday season and we’re all going to go help. We were hoping you would like to come join us,” Nino shrugged.

“What sort of event?”

“You familiar with the story of Hansel and Gretel?” Alya leaned forward.

“Hansel and Gretel?” Adrien paused to think. “Two little kids go into a witch’s house and cook her in her own oven?”

“That’s the dark part of the story.” Marinette shook her head. “Do you know what the witch’s house was made of?”

When Adrien had stared blankly at them for a full minute, Nino jumped in. “Gingerbread, dude. A gingerbread house.”

The lightbulb went off. “Oh, so your parents are making gingerbread houses? Is it like a decorating event?” He asked eagerly.

They exchanged glances, making Adrien’s excitement fall a little. Was he wrong?

“Not houses. A house. Singular,” Alya corrected him. Adrien felt his brows furrow at her words.

“My parents love going overboard,” Marinette sighed. “They’re making one giant gingerbread house and need help decorating it. The idea is that all the kids in the neighborhood are like Hansel and Gretel and can come eat the house whenever they want. They just can’t be caught by my parents or the witch, I guess,” she confessed, putting the words “the witch” in air quotes.

“Wow! That’s so amazing, Marinette!” Adrien said, eyes wide in wonder, causing Marinette to blush pink at his words. Marinette’s parents were so nice and incredible for doing so much for the people of Paris. “What happens if the kids get caught?” Adrien asked curiously.

“They have to do one good deed,” Nino shrugged. “They have to have proof too or the Dupain-Chengs won’t believe they did the deed.”

“It’s all in the Christmas spirit!” Alya said cheerfully. “So, are you interested in coming to help?”

Adrien felt a grin stretch across his face before he remembered something vital. “I want to but...I have no idea how to decorate a gingerbread house. I don’t want to get in the way.”

His friends stared at him before Nino swung an arm around his shoulders. “Bro, now you definitely have to come with us!” Marinette and Alya nodded firmly in agreement.

Adrien beamed. “Sounds good!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“How much is left to make and decorate?” Alya questioned Marinette, as the quartet reached the bakery door.

“Not much,” Marinette shrugged. “We’re just adding the decorations on the walls. Papan said we could decorate the walls with as many doodles and candies as we like.”

“Sounds delicious,” Adrien sighed dreamily before catching himself. Nino, Alya and Marinette all burst into laughter as he joined in.

“I thought you said we would be baking though?” Alya questioned, once they had all calmed down. Marinette simply smiled at the other girl before leading them all inside.

“Maman! I’m home and I brought friends!” Marinette called out.

Sabine Cheng popped out from behind a door Adrien hadn’t even noticed before smiling at them gently. “Wonderful, Marinette. The supplies are all set up for you inside.”

Adrien, Nino and Alya all sent Marinette an inquisitive glance to which she simply pushed open a door behind her mother. They saw Tom Dupain working on one side of the bench, carefully focused on building large rectangular pieces of gingerbread.

Marinette shook her head at them and pointed towards much smaller trays with ingredients on them.

“We’re baking little gingerbread men!” She announced excitedly.

“Like a dollhouse?” Nino asked, a hand on his chin as he thought. Marinette laughed as she shook her head.

“Nope! These gingerbread men are going to be decorated outside the walls, kind of like a border. We’ll add candies too but that’s our main job.”

“Sounds like fun!” Adrien hopped in place, his fingers itching to get started. “Do you mind if I…” Adrien trailed off as eagerly gestured towards the kits.

Marinette blushed a little before nodding. “Get knocked out!” She said cheerfully before clamping a hand over her mouth. “I meant, knocked you out! No, wait! You knocked get out!” Marinette let out a big groan. “I meant to say….go ahead.”

Adrien smiled at her. “Thanks, Marinette!” He called out before rushing to pick a tray when he suddenly stopped short. “I could probably use some help,” he said sheepishly, rubbing his neck as he trained his eyes on Marinette. After all, she was the expert here and he didn’t want to bother Nino and Alya. He would just end up feeling like the third wheel as they made eyes at each other.

Marinette nodded her head in reply. “W-why don’t you get set up at the counter? I’ll join you in just a moment!” Her voice got a little squeaky at the end there, but Adrien figured it was probably due to having to explain things properly to Alya and Nino.

He always felt awkward too, but he was glad that Nino made time for him apart from Alya. He was really so lucky to have made such an awesome friend.

“S-so let’s get started!” Marinette stood beside him, as she fidgeted with her own tray. Adrien beamed at her, she was such a good friend.

“Okay, let’s add all the ingredients,” she told him, once they’d taken a glance at the recipe and set up all of their supplies.

“I’m glad you’re here too, Marinette,” Adrien whispered to the girl. “At least we can be third wheels together,” he nodded towards Nino and Alya, who were goofing around with each other, seeming to be lost in their own world.

Marinette blushed at his words before her eyes widened. “Adrien! You just poured in an extra half cup of flour!”

“Oops!” Adrien winced, as he fretted.

“Don’t worry, Sunshine. It’ll be fine. Just add extra of everything,” Alya shrugged at him, overhearing their words, as she tossed in three sticks of butter.

“Alya! The recipe calls for one and a half sticks!”

“I messed up the sugar and egg ratio,” Alya shrugged. “Don’t worry, girl! Cooking is all about improvisation.”

Marinette froze, as she stared in horror at Alya’s bowl. Adrien squinted at her expression before cautiously waving a hand in front of her face. That snapped Marinette out of her daze as she quietly spoke up. “Y-you put in the d-dry and w-wet ingredients in there together? Before mixing them separately?”

Alya nodded, tossing a confused glance at himself and Nino.

Marinette seemed to be struggling to breathe. “That’s fine,” she spoke in a tight voice. “This is supposed to be fun, it’s all right,” she chanted to herself like a mantra.

That made Alya roll her eyes. “Bakers and their need for control.”

“Chefs and their inability to follow recipes!” Marinette shot back.

“It tastes better that way!”

“It does not!”

“Wanna bet?”

That did it. Alya and Marinette shook hands determinedly before Marinette marched over to Adrien and pulled him to their station. “Our gingerbread men are going to be the best gingerbread men ever!”

“Y-yes, ma’am!” Adrien snapped to attention, even giving a mock salute as a joke. Marinette gave him a faint smile before instructing him. Even as she ordered him around, it was some of the most fun he’d had with Marinette in awhile.

Before long, the trays were in the oven. As they waited for the cookies to finish, they set about cleaning up.

Adrien stopped as he noticed the leftover batter on the spoon. Marinette followed his gaze and sighed. “You know it’s not good for you, right?”

“Theoretically,” Adrien sighed longingly. “I’ve just never had the chance to have any so…” he trailed off, seeing Marinette look determined once again.

“Just this once, alright?” She made him promise before handing over the spoon to him. Adrien’s eyes sparkled as he looked at Marinette inquisitively. “Go ahead,” she shook her head as she smiled, so he knew she didn’t actually mind. “Everyone deserves at least a taste.”

Adrien felt a smile stretch across his face. Marinette really was the most amazing friend he could ever have. Marinette smiled back at him as she waited for him to try the batter.

Adrien felt his eyes widen as he tasted the batter. He had never tasted anything so amazing before. Marinette let out a laugh at the expression on his face. Her laughter was infectious and soon enough he was laughing along with her.

Just then the oven dinged and Marinette quickly turned away to pull the cookies out. She looked over at Alya, who had just pulled out her own cookies.

“We have to let them cool for an hour. The judging can happen once we’re done icing them,” Marinette announced.

“Sounds good to me. What do we do till then, dude?” Nino asked as he stretched.

“Decorate the house, of course! Come on!” Marinette grinned as she gestured for them to follow her.

As she pushed open another door, Adrien felt his breath be stolen as he stared in wonder. The gingerbread house was magnificent and he spotted Tom and Sabine carefully adding gumdrops to the fully iced roof.

Tom grinned as he spotted the quartet and beckoned them over.

“Ready to help, you four?”

They nodded eagerly as he pointed them towards the selection of candy. “We have gumdrops, mints, M&Ms, sprinkles and mini candy beads. Plus icing if any of you are feeling artistic. Have at it,” Tom gestured before continuing to use icing to glue the gumdrops to the roof.

“Um, I hate to ask but what’s left to decorate?” Adrien asked Marinette, quietly.

“Well, the bottoms of the walls are going to be decorated with our gingerbread men but we have to add the candy to the window panes and anywhere where there’s still large patches of empty-ness,” she shrugged as she handed him an icing bag. “Draw whatever you want so long as it’s appropriate,” Marinette shrugged before heading over to Alya and Nino.

Adrien weighted the icing bag before shrugging. He was sure no matter what candy he tried to add, it would just fall off so he was better off just drawing. Hopefully, he would be able to manage that.

Adrien quickly spotted a corner of the wall which had been left undecorated and began working. He was so focused, he didn’t notice he was being watched until the onlookers began oohing and aahing at his work.

He looked up sharply to see Tom and Sabine marvelling over his work as well as the shock on his friends’ faces.

“Uh, guys?” He questioned, as he paused.

“This must be the most detailed part of the house,” Tom laughed. Adrien had drawn a beautiful snowy Christmas tree with presents, hiding underneath.

“How’d you manage that with just white, dude?” Nino asked, his surprise clear. Adrien simply shrugged at him.

“It looks wonderful, dear,” Sabine complimented, making Adrien blush. “Thank you, Mrs. Cheng,” he replied earnestly. That made Sabine frown and for a moment, Adrien panicked thinking he had done something wrong.

“Call me Sabine, dear,” she ordered lightly causing Adrien to nod without even realizing it.

Tom grinned at him. “It’s Tom for me too,” he added, before winking at Adrien. He and Sabine gave him another gentle smile, making Adrien feel warm inside.

“I didn’t know you could draw,” Marinette commented, her eyes wide, the expression on her face a little strange.

“I mean I don’t really draw,” Adrien shrugged. “All my drawings turn out terribly. The icing bag made it easier somehow?” Adrien really didn’t know how he had managed the drawing since he was a terrible artist, much to his father’s displeasure.

“A natural!” Tom boomed, as he patted Adrien on the back. It felt a little strange being complimented like this, but Adrien felt so good. His cheeks had turned pink but he was deliriously happy.

“I’m glad you’ll be helping to decorate our gingerbread men,” Marinette commented, as she smiled at him. Her expression was still a little strange but Adrien couldn’t figure it out so he let it go.

At long last they were finished decorating, beaming with pride that not a single part of the house was left undecorated. The inside had been decorated prior to adding the roof with red-vine licorice furniture.

“Your parents really did go all out, huh?” Alya remarked.

“It’s Christmas,” Marinette shrugged. “Let’s get our gingerbread men iced so they can be added to the house.”

“And so we can figure out who wins the bet,” Alya added. They nodded determinedly at each other while Nino rolled his eyes at Adrien.

“They’re so competitive, no wonder they’re best friends,” Adrien whispered to Nino. “Dude, I’m so glad we know how to chill out.” Adrien nodded, agreeing wholeheartedly as he and Nino fist-bumped.

“Ahem,” the girls cleared their throats, making it clear they were waiting for them to finish.

“Let’s go decorate!” Adrien cheered, making Marinette blush and nod.

While they decorated, Marinette continued to marvel at how well Adrien could use the icing bag.

“This is really your first time?” Adrien nodded, even as Marinette shook her head in awe. Pretty soon, they had enough gingerbread men for an entire army.

Each group separated one gingerbread man from the bunch before carefully taking the rest to add to the house. They would put the competition on hold until the house was finished. They had their priorities in order after all.

They all had their game faces on as they added icing to the backs of the men and glued them to the house. Once they were done, they all stood with Tom and Sabine to marvel at the house.

“Like a winter wonderland,” Adrien whispered softly, but everyone heard him and nodded in agreement.

“It’s gorgeous,” Alya agreed.

“We couldn’t have finished without all of your help,” Sabine thanked them, making them shake their heads even as they grinned under the glow of her praise.

“Now I hear there’s a competition going on?” Tom jumped in.

Alya and Marinette quickly explained the series of events to him making him rub his chin in thought. “Do you have a judge?” He asked when they finished, making them shake their heads.

“Would you both judge for us?” Adrien asked, excitedly. Tom and Sabine grinned back as they nodded at the kids. The duo followed the quartet to the stations, Alya and Marinette looking on anxiously as Tom and Sabine took a bite of each gingerbread man.

Both thought for a moment. “Count to three and we’ll point towards the gingerbread we liked best,” Sabine told them.

Sabine and Tom didn’t even talk, making Adrien think with awe and a little envy about how they were on the same page, so in sync with each other. He hoped he would have that with someone someday, and with a little luck that someone would be Ladybug.

“Three,” Marinette and Alya announced with bated breath. Immediately Tom and Sabine pointed towards the opposite gingerbread man.

“Oh dear, looks like we’re at an impasse,” Sabine said sadly.

“I suppose you both just have to live with the fact that both are delicious,” Tom laughed.

Marinette and Alya narrowed their eyes at them but sighed when they saw their minds were made up.

“Well, if it's a tie then we both lose?” Marinette asked dejectedly.

Alya glanced at her before sighing. “Nah, let’s both win. It’s Christmas time, after all. We have to have the spirit of giving.”

They smiled at each other before hugging. Adrien wasn’t sure what had happened but when he turned to ask Nino, his best friend just shook his head at him. Adrien supposed he was glad it wasn’t just him who didn’t understand.

“You know, we have some of the gingerbread men left over,” Sabine mused. “Why don’t you kids go make some hot chocolate and enjoy them?”

“We’ll get the house set up in the shop while you do that,” Tom agreed.

Marinette nodded at her parents, as he, Nino and Alya eagerly smiled at the idea of some warm cocoa. “I’ll bring you both some cocoa as well,” she promised, making them smile at her fondly.

They followed Marinette upstairs to her home kitchen, where Alya got busy setting up the kettle while Marinette brought out the box of cocoa and the bag of mini-marshmallows.

“The cookies are still in the bakery,” Nino realized.

“I’ll go get them,” Marinette volunteered as she pulled a few marshmallows out of the bag.

“Could we get a few extra?” Adrien asked, a pleading expression on his face. Marinette’s face tinted pink but she pulled out more marshmallows in response making Adrien beam.

“We can go drink outside if you guys are cool with that?” Adrien asked. “It would be nice to sit outside and drink something warm. We’d get the chance to look at the gingerbread house some more too.” They all nodded at him in agreement.

She and Alya finished making six cups of cocoa, with extra mini marshmallows.

“I’ll bring the cookies and join you guys,” Marinette promised as she took two cups of cocoa for her parents downstairs. Adrien grabbed a cup for Marinette as they all went outside to sit on the steps of the bakery, making sure to not block the entrance for any of the customers.

Within a few moments, Marinette had come out carrying the large plate of beautifully decorated gingerbread cookies and sat down to join them. Adrien handed her, her cocoa making her smile at him gratefully.

Their idle chatter and laughter filled the air as they enjoyed both their treats and each other’s company.

#ml #ml fic #christmas #baking #fluff #adrinette #djwifi #humor #friendship #ml fanworks

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