#also not them making it out to be like caleb avoids pretty much any big holiday celebration by making bad choices ;-;

[cagedchoice]

i'm looking at my old canon timeline bc i wanna redo it and add it to my carrd and just aaaahhhh the storytelling

March 20th, 2031 - Caleb's mother, struggling with undiagnosed schizophrenia, abandons him at a diner in downtown Los Angeles. Caleb is 8 years old.

February 19th, 2037 - Start of Second Russian Civil War. Caleb is 14 years old at the time.

April 17th, 2039 - Solomon build is first initiated by innovators Jean-Mi and Engerraud Serac. At this time, Caleb would be 16.

July 4th, 2040 - Caleb, at 17 years old, gets into a car accident involving alcohol. He breaks his arm.

December 22nd, 2042 - Caleb enlists in the US military.

[innytoes]

Road Trip AU / bonus points if it involves the GPP

-Ever since he was like eight, Willie has had this idea in his head that when he was 18, he was going to go on a Road Trip Across The States To Find Himself. Even though he's pretty confident in who he is now, he doesn't want to let down Tiny Willie.

-Except he's kind of maybe sort of part of this great big Polycule. And if he invites Alex, who honestly looks like he could use a Coming Of Age roadtrip, he has to invite his other boyfriend. And his boyfriends' girlfriends and girlfriends. And their girlfriends... and boyfriends. It's complicated.

-So clearly his idea to steal one of Caleb's cars... ahem find a car and hit the road isn't going to work. But doesn't want to give up on his dream, and he also doesn't want to leave everyone behind. What if they figure out they don't really miss him?

-Reggie finally teases it out of him, but Luke's the one who is most enthusiastic about it. For a hot second, Willie is worried his big adventure is going to be co-opted by some kind of music tour, but it turns out Luke just thinks it would be really inspiring.

-"And it'll be one last summer all together before everyone does their own thing," he adds shyly. Because yeah. Julie and the Phantoms is pretty much set to explode onto the music scene, but Flynn is going to head off to college. So, shockingly, is Carrie, after Dirty Candi crashed and burned their senior year.

-Carrie is the one who comes up with the solution. By which she means 'throws her dad's money at the problem' and suddenly they have a converted bus which is... like a tour bus-camper van-tiny house combined.

-She admits she knows it's not exactly the rugged living Willie envisioned, but she shows him that inside the storage, there's room for a bunch of tents so they can still go camping and stuff, too.

"You're going camping?" he asked.

"Obviously not, but you guys can and I'll make sure nobody steals the bus," she rolls her eyes.

-They set out and it's different than Willie imagined it, but also better. Like, he never expected that him and four of his friends would have to get their special Driving A Giant Ass Tourbus licenses beforehand, but it's better than Carrie's idea of bringing a driver. That's not very coming of age at all.

-There's people to bicker about the music with. He doesn't have to do all the driving, so sometimes he can just sit and watch the scenery. There's always someone to snuggle with, at any hour.

-They do a lot of things and go a lot of places that Willie never really thought about. Kayla and Flynn seem determined to hit up the weirdest tourist traps. Luke knows all the best music-y places to go. Julie keeps them updates about every region's cryptids, because her brother keeps sending her links. (Of course their giant fortress has perfect wifi.)

-Reggie really flourishes when they get to 'yeehaw country' and he makes them all go horseback riding with him. And line dancing. And there may be a mechanical bull that gets a lot of use while they're there. Even if Alex is worried they're going to break something until Reggie coaxes him on with him.

-Watching his two boyfriends on a mechanical bull together Does Things To Willie, okay.

-Okay, so maybe watching Luke on the mechanical bull also Did Things To Him, but he tried to avoid thinking of that.

-Between the mechanical bull, swimming in the lake at the park they stopped by, the campfire sing alongs, and seeing Luke in something other than IT'S ABOUT THE MUSIC mode, Willie is like: oh no I have a crush on my boyfriend's boyfriend.

-Of course Luke is still wrote songs, scribbling away in his song book, plucking at his guitar at rest stops (no guitars or skateboarding in the enclosed space with no escape while we're hurtling down the highway, they'd established.) But he also made time for all of them, and indulged every group photo in front of World's Biggest Bowling Pin or Ball Of String or what not, listened attentively to Reggie geeking out over a comic book exhibition they stumbled upon, and agreed to stay with Kayla while the others went on the Big Scary Roller Coaster so she wouldn't have to sit alone.

-And maybe there's more to Luke than meets the eye. They end up driving through the night together and talk, really talk, and yeah.

-Alex is the first to notice and just gives Willie a fake judgemental look. He and Luke never worked out romantically after they dated when they were fifteen, but he still knows the appeal.

-Reggie is over the MOON when Willie maybe kind of confesses it on one of their private walks. They all make sure to spend time together one on one, either splitting up to do different stuff when they hit a big city, or just going to different places to get food.

-Of course his stupid boyfriends do everything in their power to get him and Luke alone together over the next week.

-By the end of their big coming of age road trip, Willie may not have found some mythical version of himself, but he did find a new boyfriend.

[invisibleraven]

"You're safe, I promise." for Ray and any of his many children that may or may not be his?

No one ever told Ray how hard it would be being a single dad.

Especially when one of his kids comes with six extra ones who practically seem to live at his house.

Flynn he's used to, as Julie spent just as much time at the Taylor's house growing up, so he's never surprised to see the girl helping herself to his apples or stashing her secret soda supply there when her mom is on an anti sugar run.

Carrie had been a fixture for some time as well, then the girls had some kind of falling out. Now she seems to be back with a vengeance, a little sharper, a little more stand offish, but still herself in all her sparkly pink glory. He knows she's alone save for the occasional staff more often than not, so he doesn't begrudge her wanting a home full of people as opposed to that big empty mansion.

The boys are new.

They're a motley crew, full of noise and laughter and Ray honestly loves how Julie comes back to life around them. How the house is once more full of music, even if his fridge is a lot emptier and his grocery bill is higher thanks to their constant snacking.

Ray doesn't mind though, not really. Especially not after Julie thanks him for being so kind to her friends, whispering that none of them have great home lives. Ray is more than happy to provide them his home as a safe haven though, be a good dad, or at least caring adult in their lives when they seem to be lacking on those counts.

Luke is pretty open about his fights with his mom, and while Ray can see both sides of it, he does try to be supportive of the band, even offering to film their gigs for their social media. Maybe even mentions he has friends at a few clubs if they ever want him to put their name forward. Luke gives him a genuine smile at that, so Ray figures he's won him over.

Reggie is boisterous and cheery, but Ray can see how he freezes up at loud noises, how he retreats into himself when it's time to go. Ray always tries to be a little warmer and understanding around him after that. Inviting him to stay for supper, to show him how his cameras worked after Reggie showed the barest interest. But he also keeps Victoria informed-she's the best social worker in the area, and Ray hopes he's wrong, but he'd rather have her in Reggie's corner if-and hopefully not when-he needs her.

Willie he can't quite get a read on yet, but he's always respectful and sweet, skating in and out of the garage at will, so Ray likes him enough. He's heard a thing or two about his foster dad Caleb though, and always lets Willie know he's welcome any time, even if the band isn't there. The shocked look that fades into a tiny grin makes it all worth it, in Ray's mind. Even if he wishes the kid would replace his helmet with one that doesn't have that huge crack in it.

Then there's Alex.

Ray knows the Mercers by reputation, as Victoria has friends of friends who go to their church. Society and image obsessed with hate in their hearts and a very literal interpretation of the scripture. He doesn't have a very high opinion.

Especially when he sees how Alex acts around him. Around his friends Alex is sarcastic and silly. Happy enough to whale on his drums with a bright grin or dance around with Willie to the catchiest pop tunes. But when Ray comes in with a tray of drinks or a bowl of snacks, Alex freezes. Immediately lets go of Willie, stands straighter but also closing in on himself, avoiding Ray's eyes.

Then the rumours he's heard about Alex's parents make so much more sense, and it fills Ray with a righteous fury. When Julie came out to him as bi, he openly accepted her-she was his daughter, how could he not? Plus he and Rose had both experimented and landed somewhere in the not straight category, so it would be pretty hypocritical of him if he had shunned Julie for the same.

Thus he wants to find some way to let Alex know that he's accepted here, no matter what.

Of course, subtly had never been in Ray's vocabulary, and the large Pride flag flying in their front yard might be a bit much, but who cares as long as the message goes through right?

The next day, when Ray brings out the snacks, he sees that Alex stiffens in Willie's arms on the couch, but doesn't scramble to get up. He also notes how close Luke and Reggie are to Julie but he leaves worrying about that for another time, when she's ready to tell him exactly how that works.

"Thanks papi," Julie says.

"T-thanks for the flag," Alex pipes up.

"Of course," Ray says with a nod. "Here, no matter what, you're safe, I promise." He turns to go, but turns at the door. "I'm making spaghetti for supper, once homework and band practice are done. You're all free to stay if you want."

There's a course of agreement, and later, when Ray sees them all walk in, is happy to see Alex hand in hand with Willie, no trace of fear or shame in sight.

Sure, being a single dad to all these kids isn't easy-especially when most of them aren't his kids, not really anyways, but the feeling he gets from knowing they are all happy, healthy, safe, and most of all loved here makes it all worth it in Ray's eyes.

[moremusic]

I started this website to promote the Adelaide scene and the bands that make it great. But every now and then I hear a song that I can’t stop listening to, and even if the band isn’t from Adelaide I interview them. That current song is “Dive In” by this weeks guest, Gone Fishin’. They hail from Wagga Wagga. Here is their interview.

Tell us a little bit about Gone Fishin’? Members, how did you get together etc?

Gone fishin’ came about I think mostly through mutual friends. We didn’t all know each other super well but Joey Skewes our guitarist knew that we were all into the same sort of stuff. We started jamming on some originals straight away and got really close pretty quickly.

Bass and trumpet - Mitch Davoren

Electric guitar - Austin Bellany

Guitar - Joey Skewes

Drums and backing vocals - Lachlan Coe

Lead vocals and synth - Anna Skewes

What are you short and long terms goals?

In terms of this year we would love to have a show in a city, maybe Canberra or Melbourne would be amazing. We’d also love to have an EP out before the end of the year

Some long term goals we’re aiming for include some bigger headlining shows and mostly just growing our following as much as possible. A tour is something we all dream of, it’d be incredible to play overseas and grow our monthly listeners to the thousands.

How was it dealing with the Covid Pandemic? Is everything back to normal?

We managed to form just after things started to settle down in terms of COVID (start of 2022). We haven’t really struggled in that area of things which we are very grateful for.

What is your career highlight so far?

Definitely the release of our single ‘Dive In’. It was possibly a year in the making, just with things going wrong with recording and sending it off. Thankfully Austin did amazing engineering and managed to get it across to Caleb Skewes who did an incredible job for us on the production. We’ve been so happy that so many people have been enjoying it.

Your song “ Dive in” is beautiful. I listen to it a lot. What is it about and how did you come up with?

The song sort of speaks to a girl who has rushed into a bunch of different relationships and has been constantly hurt over very small and short romances. And something that we’ve seen through school in particular is that potential friendships are often ruined by this unnecessary pain, and people feel like they have to avoid each other. Hence the line ‘no need to try and hide from your boyfriend’. I think overall we are trying to encourage younger people to slow down and think about who they chose to become romantic with to avoid pain and heartbreak.

Have you got any new music coming out? Or are you still recording?

We’re currently in the decision phase where we love all our songs and can’t choose which ones to release. We’re hoping to get in contact with some professional producers and studios to get at least a couple more songs going. Our good friend Josh Barr has been a huge help in linking us up with some big names.

Who are the greatest influences on you? Individually and as a band?

Joey Skewes - Alvvays

Mitch Davoren - Coldplay

Lachlan Coe - Spacey Jane

Austin Bellany - Snarky Puppy

Anna Skewes - The 1975

As a band I think someone we all take influence from would be The Strokes. Especially there debut album ‘Is This it’. We’ve written a few tunes that take from the choppy and tight movement particularly in the guitar and bass lines.

If you could invite 4 musicians to dinner dead or alive) who would you invite?

It’d have to be Paul McCartney, Lauren Hill, Phil Collins, and Chris Martin

Any gigs coming up you want to promote?

We’ll be playing at the Jungle Duke in Wagga Wagga along side The Radicals and Social Afterparty on the 17th of June! Starting at 8pm

And again in Wagga at the Festival of W on the 1st of July which will be awesome:)

If you were given the chance to support one artist in the world, who would you pick?

We’d all agree on Gang of Youths for sure. A few of us saw them live with Greta Ray opening who did such a great job, it’d be a dream to be up there with them

If you were stuck on a deserted island with only one record, what would it be?

We think something pretty influential, like

In Rainbows by Radiohead, incredible album

Where can people find out more about you?

Check out our Insta and Facebook for more info

https://instagram.com/gone_fishinofficial?igshid=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==

[loquaciousquark]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E125 (Feb. 16, 2021)

Goooood evening good evening good evening, all! I hope you’re all staying warm and safe and dry in this chilly weather. Tonight’s guests: Travis Willingham and Laura Bailey. 

We open tonight with Travis ribbing Brian for his continuous remodel of his office space. Laura demands a second introduction of herself as she wasn’t paying attention during the first one.

Travis: “You’ve gotta love Julianne Moore. She’s the only actress who can cry and show you all her teeth at the same time.” I was listening pretty closely when he said this and I’m still not sure it had any context. 

Jester thinks there’s a strong possibility at least half the party will die against the Tombtakers. Fjord doesn’t think the odds are quite that high, but it will be dangerous. Laura points out that most of the M9 are also willing to sacrifice themselves for the rest of the party, so that changes their odds as well. Travis: “The game is not a stress reliever. It is not a stress reliever. I mean, it’s fun as shit, but it is stressful!”

Laura thinks Essek will give them a better chance. Travis: “A plus-one? A powerful plus-one, but a plus-one?” Did you see his reaction when we gave him the lowdown? Let’s be real: we kinda trust Essek. I got $50 that when we come back, he’s gone.” Laura is convinced he is trustworthy & wants to lighten his soul.

Jester spent so much time trying to bring out the Molly side of Lucien that to have him then betray them sucked. She knew that trying to bring the good out of everyone they met would eventually fail, but it stung that it was the most powerful one they encountered to first betray them.

She tries to talk about finger gestures during the answer as a reference to the HBO show “Raised by Wolves,” and Brian and Travis tell her to keep digging this hole she gets herself into about fingering. Travis: “Just get off the interstate at the next exit and turn right.” Laura, of course, immediately mimes turning a hard left, and they spent the next few minutes laughing at her inability to tell right from left and that even now she still has to hold up her hands to tell left from right.

Fjord is furious that they nicked the Bag of Holding. The loss of Vess DeRogna is bad enough, but he is genuinely IRL anxious about the loss of the Cloven Crystal. Laura points out that Fjord has also explicitly talked to Lucien about the deep sea creature patron he used to follow as well. He’s terrified one of Lucien’s scimitars is suddenly going to have a big eye sticking out of it. Laura suggests they’ll just succeed, bring back the city, and wake up Uk’otoa for the heck of it.

It was really rough to go from the Gelidon fight to the Tombtaker fight, especially since the first fight sent so well. Travis felt great that he initiated the dragon fight - he knew they had a far advantage in the numbers and felt that it was an open and shut case.

Laura does boggle that if Caleb hadn’t asked for that item from the Bag of Holding, they might have slept all night before realizing it was gone. They’re both relieved that they now know so much more about how the Tombtakers fight, especially the anti-magic cone. The most anxiety-ridden part was when they were trying to run and the TTs weren’t letting them. “You know when you don’t even have squares, when Matt’s black-tableclothing it, you’re in deep shit.” Laura had no spells left - she was so worried if she dropped the polymorph she would have had nothing left.

Travis: “Thanks for healing me, babe.” Laura: “You’re welcome, baby. It was ultimately a waste, though, because we took a rest immediately and you could just spend your hit dice.” Everyone laughs at Travis’s pain. She does say it was worth it in the moment since they didn’t know if they would be able to get away.

They joke that Laura’s just wearing the Fire Resist ring on a chain around her neck/Sprinkle is wearing it now to keep it safe since she’s not attuned to it anymore. It’s pretty hilarious!

Travis hoped that the TTs were originally actively looking for more acolytes rather than just having Caleb & Beau read the book. Otis needs to die. He’s relieved they have an idea of what all their blood rites do. Laura thought the time with them was fun, but it makes her retroactively wish that she’d dropped Zoran in the lava when they had the chance. Travis wishes they’d put a chime on the door of the tower.

Laura loved the tarot card reading, since Taliesin sent her really detailed breakdowns of the cards & gave her a real deck for Christmas. Taliesin told her she did a great job afterwards which she really appreciated, since she’s not sure what she’s doing. She does wish that she knew why Lucien seemed so nervous when she was talking about rebirth.

Cosplay of the Week! @clever_comics on twitter with a lovely Veth in her snowy lavender-colored outfit and pigtails.

Travis on confessing to Jester: “It FUCKING made me crazy!” He’s never been an instigator of campaign romances in the past, but because he loves Laura and was able to connect to her on that level he felt like it was a good challenge instead. He doesn’t think he could have done it with someone he wasn’t comfortable with. It was also important to him for it to be founded on real-game moments and after real-game time had passed, and he felt it was a very natural progression. Seeing the statues rip five years from her in such a benign situation made him realize that to let the opportunity pass wouldn’t have been worth it. He wishes he’d told Vandran what he meant to Fjord as well.

Laura loves that Fjord is becoming more confident as well. The post-Gelidon smooch took Laura completely by surprise since she’s finding Jester is a little surprisingly awkward with IRL affection, and she was surprised Fjord was the confident one there. “It’s so wonderful. It’s a matter of finding a way to get comfortable with it with her away from the Tombtakers.” Travis thought it was important to continue the “go for it” mantra. He notes that he’s pretty private about his personal life IRL, so it’s been a bit of a shift. It’s slower in a way - not a “you’re my one true love” kind of thing, more of a “let’s see where this goes and act on what you can” thing.

They were all “poopin’ in their pants” to get to go to Emon. The worst part was not getting to explore outside the tower since they had to leave again immediately. Kima is so cool, and Travis was actively trying to get Kima to come with them. Everyone boggles that they got to borrow Allura’s staff.

Laura only was thinking about the item-tuned-to-the-target-plane because she’d been texting with Liam trying to iron out their spell choices. She’s so relieved that they were able to get something tuned to the Sea from Allura.

For the most part, Laura knows what spells are the most useful for Jester, but every now and then she does get caught by major component requirements that she hadn’t noted. She wants to get another chalice for Hero’s Feast before they go into the Sea.

Dani points out that a lot of their allies right now are mages (no Kashaws, no Kimas, no Grogs) and they’re heading to a bad place for mages.

Travis has a sudden brain wave about all the TTs being from the Claret Order and wonders if they should investigate that before they pursue. I don’t even remember what that order is and I feel terrible!

Fanart of the Week! It’s a beautiful card by @crovyne on twitter of the Cree counterspell.

Laura really wants Brian to shave the sides of his hair and do Viking braids in the rest. I didn’t want to say anything out loud, but Brian’s hair is really looking pretty...pandemicky.

This is Dani’s four-year-anniversary of her start for Critical Role! Awww, Dani! You’re so short in real life.

Fjord is stoked that the Star Razor is a Vestige, and more now that he knows in-character what that means. It was great to see Allura react the way she did.

Jester doesn’t think they can really go to Nicodranas - they don’t have anymore time. Even more, Jester’s avoiding going home because she doesn’t want the Ruby to see that she got aged up/hurt on her travels.

Travis honestly assumes that the TTs are spying on them 100% of the time now.

Does Jester feel better now that the crest is away from Lucien? Yes, even though it’s gone off course. She thought dropping the crest where they were was a HORRIBLE idea and was appalled so many people were suggesting it. She saw the city with her own eyes, knows the danger of what’s coming, and if they had dropped it in flight she would have dropped with it and defended it as long as she could if that’s what would have kept them from getting it.

Travis thinks that if they can negotiate with Lucien, they should try. Everyone is super worried about Caleb’s and Beau’s new eyes and are fully anticipating they’re on a clock at this point. They wonder if it’ll drive up their exhaustion, allow Lucien to force them to fight against them, maybe make them willing slaves to the mysterious voice...they need to solve it sooner rather than later. 

And that’s all for tonight! New episode this Thursday - usual time, usual place. Stay warm, friends, and is it Thursday yet?

[alirhi]

10 Sebastian roles as boyfriends

Because... I'm bored and I feel like it. 😂 Probably some spoilers for, like... everything? So yeah... That.

Putting it under here for easy scrolling:

10: Chase Collins

Who doesn't love a goofball? In the first half of the movie, Chase is basically perfect. He's sweet, funny, not all caught up in his ego, and actually pays attention to what the girls around him are saying, not just to what he wants to hear. If not for the whole... it was all an act to get close to Caleb and try to steal his magic thing, Chase would actually be a damn good high school boyfriend. He's adorable and would be a fun date, but he's also only 18 so best not to start making long-term plans lol. Also, y'know... the whole psycho revenge/power grab thing.

9 Jack Benjamin

Y'all. Y'all. Words cannot describe how much I love Jack. Pretty sure I've made this clear. As a person/character in general, he's absolutely in my Top 3 - not just of Sebastian's characters, but any character ever. ❤ But as a boyfriend? Boy's got baggage. It's what makes me so protective of him, but seeing as how he's trapped in the closet thanks to his overbearing homophobic family and the insane expectations heaped on him, as the show left him, he can't handle an honest relationship. He's too easily influenced by all the wrong people, poor babe.

8 Chris (Destroyer)

On paper, undercover cop sounds cool and exciting, but even if you ignore the fact that he, y'know, dies... Chris got in too deep and kinda lost the mission, so to speak. Best case scenario, you're his sexy partner and in on it all with him and end up on the lam for the rest of your lives. Worst case, this man lies for a living, so can you even trust him? And... yeah. The whole dead thing. Chris is hot af but getting involved with him is a recipe for disaster.

7 Ben

Min and Hathor have mercy, I love Ben! He's smart, he's snarky, he's caring and loyal... he's an absolute disaster. He's another one who seems allergic to honesty, until his lying and avoiding nearly kill his girlfriend. Not exactly relationship goals lol. Everything before totally was, though! Ben's adorable, and I love how he stayed up all night to protect his girlfriend (from a ghost/demon thing... with a baseball bat. I said he was smart, not perfect, okay? XD points for effort lol)

6 Mickey Henry

I. LOVE. MICKEY. Oml I love Mickey. He's a spazz and - even more so than Ben - an absolute disaster of a human being, but I love him. Pros for dating Mickey Henry: he's fun, he's carefree, he'll cook for you even though he's kinda bad at it lol, he loves his son and wants to be a good dad, he wants his partner to be happy and to love life as much as he does. Cons, and the reason he's not higher on the list: He's a pushover; easily influenced by the toxic people in his life, and it gets him into a lot of trouble. Being easily influenced by toxic dumpster fire of a human being Chloe almost lost him the partial custody of his son that he barely even had. He's an absolute sweetheart, but he's a complete man-child, and dating him would often feel more like raising him.

5 Frank "Suffer Buddy"

Come on! You know he and Mickey had to be back-to-back - they're practically the same character! 😂 Frank is Mickey... slightly more grown up. He's still a disaster, but he's respectful of boundaries, he's caring, he's funny in a dry, witty way that I just adore, and hoo lordy that man is a giver! 🥴🥵 Honestly, if he didn't smoke and didn't ditch Daphne in the middle of a party hours away from everything familiar to her surrounded by strangers to go do drugs, I'd call Frank perfect. He listened, he respected her wishes, he tried to keep some distance between them when he found out she'd gone on a date with his best friend (it failed utterly and brought us to the "damn that man's good with his mouth" portion of the movie lmao but still)... I don't have a whole lot of experience with men who actually give a shit, okay? So Frank is like a goddamn unicorn to me lmao. But that drug thing... That keeps him at the bottom of the Top 5 for me. Sorry, bb

4 Bucky

I can already hear everyone on here raging at me for placing Bucky so low on this list, but hear me out: I love this man. I love all four iterations of this man. Flirty 40s Bucky was a doll (fun date, not commitment material). Post-POW camp 40s Bucky had a fire to him that set me on fire. The Winter Soldier can choke me any damn day. Unf. And TFATWS Bucky... Oh, lady above, 2023 Bucky is a gem! He's sweet, snarky, and broken. He feels utterly, wretchedly alone in the world, and everyone around him, including his only friend, is telling him to "man up" and "make amends" for shit that was never his fault to begin with, rather than helping him come to terms with all that he's suffered and all that he's survived. Bucky needs and deserves love. A relationship with him would be so solid, if he found the right person... But it would take a fuck ton of work. He needs someone strong, patient, and more stubborn than he is to prod him until he finds a better therapist and actually opens up, and to keep him on track because even good therapy comes with homework. He does have to "do the work," Sam was right about that much, but he was way off base with what that "work" is. Bucky needs help and understanding, and he would be an amazing boyfriend... if he found someone with the strength to help him weather his nightmares and flashbacks, and help pull him out of this PTSD pit he's been in since 1943.

3 Chris Beck

Big brains turn me on, okay? 😂This man is an astronaut and a surgeon! Yes, please! Come here, you sexy genius! He's smart, he's funny - pretty sure Sebastian is incapable of playing anyone who's not delightfully snarky lol. He's pragmatic when he needs to be but there's also nothing he wouldn't do or risk for the ones he loves. This man is husband material and I cannot be convinced otherwise! So why isn't he #1? Cuz of the whole... spending years in space, thing. Super cool job and I'd be his biggest fan on the ground, but god damn, I would miss him while he's away!

2 TJ Hammond

Look, I'm gender fluid and he's a little bit bi 😂😂😂 Let me have my fantasy, okay? TJ's definitely got a lot of shit to work through, but love brings out the best in him. Before that fucking closeted shitbag broke his heart and stomped on it for good measure, TJ was clean and sober for months, he was happy, he was playing piano again, he was pulling himself together. Not only would he be an amazing boyfriend, but his partner would get the extra joy of getting to watch their love and devotion to him be the thing that saves this beautiful man's life. It's not healthy overall to tie your self worth and will to live to a relationship, but if he found the right person who would be there for him through all of life's shit and stick it out, I think he'd be okay. Even after his lowest point and without the support of his family, TJ still had a dream and he still chased it. He's not just the sweetest person to ever grace our screens, but he's ambitious and business-savvy, too. Keep him off drugs and watch this man take over the world, I'm telling you!

So why is TJ only #2? Well, besides the fact that he's like 99% gay and I have no bits he'd be interested in lmao, there's also the fact that this guy owns my heart:

1 Will Franklyn

And not just because we get to see him wet and mostly naked lol. Will is fucking perfect. I would die for this man... because he's already shown that he would die for his love. He almost fucking did, and they weren't even together yet! He's smart and very aware, he's a writer so we'd get to bond/geek out over books together, he's not all full of himself (self-deprecating humor ftw!) and he's willing to help a total stranger despite actual mortal peril, just because it's the right thing to do. Fierce, intelligent, sassy, strong-willed, and a flawless moral compass? YESYESYESYESYES! Forget boyfriend - let me MARRY this man! 😍🥰

[trulyhumblenarcissist]

Abourt Rei Himura and BNHA Chapter 301

Now that I've read the official release of chapter 301 I can finally try to gather my thoughts. I think this time the particular rendition of dialogues and inflections provided by Caleb Cook is more crisp and clear than usual, especially in throwing "shade" upon Endeavor as a father figure. But let's do things in order...

Title: THE WRONG WAY TO PUT OUT A FIRE - a simple, but stark message that doesn't leave space for ambiguity. There was a fire, an imminent tragedy that could and should have been avoided, but whoever tried to fix it, did it all wrong and now we have to deal with a huge arson.

CARLESS HANDLING OF FIRE, on the other hand, doesn't quite cut it for me, because it seems like everything was caused by a foolish mistake. "I was carless and now I'm in a pinch"- type of situation, while it's perfectly clear that Endeavor and Rei decided purposefully which "strategy" to use with Touya. A BAD one to say it lightly. Rei's contribution and complicity is debatable, of course, and I'll touch on this later.

Let me get this clear though: I'm not trying in any way to critique the hard work of unofficial translators. I can't say anything relevant because I'm not a translator in the first place (I can barely understand English and my native language on a good day) and also because I am so grateful for everything they do in order to give us really good material FREE OF CHARGE basically a second after the release in Japan. I'm just interested about the different shades of subtext we can catch if we read the story through multiple filters. Every translation is unique because it carries the personal spin of the author even if the bias should be inexistent or ideally undetectable...

However, back to the chapter

REI'S CAGE

The first scene opens on a luxurious classic Japanese villa, with Enji, Rei and her parents discussing the motivation behind Enji's proposal. Or at least we initially think that's what's going on... Because in reality Rei's family couldn't care less about the motivation. Everything these people see is a wealthy, famous guy the next number one hero ready to take their daughter in marriage. I guess the Himuras are pretty broke, thight on cash, their old prestige is definitely gone and all they can do to save themselves from shame and poverty is "to sell" their only remaining asset.

During the whole ordeal, Rei is standing still, silent, cold as ice. She knows she doesn't really have a choice. How mortifying and sad is this? An adult, capable woman has no agency whatsoever, she is used again and again and she stoically accepts this treatment from every single dominant figure in her life until she can't be stoic anymore. I really hope Horikoshi's going to give her a much more proactive role in saving her family and it seems the narrative wants us to expect this type of character development.

I'd like to point out 2 panels in particular:

First one

In this scene the Todorokis are back from their trip to the doc, who clearly said they shouldn't try to conceive a child with a perfect quirk mix because it is dangerous (and morally questionable too). Rei understands this fact and tries to dissuade Enji, but he doesn't listen, because he's projecting all his pent-up resentment and frustration onto Touya. He knows how it feels to crush against an unbreakable wall, since he can't surpass All might and his son can't too. He had to learn this truth the hard way, so Touya needs to do the same. Enji is purposefully throwing upon his son years of failures, self consciousness and despair, just because the boy has to get it into his thick skull that he is a dud, just like his father. This is not a hopeless dad making a mistake bona fide, this is a broken man trying to destroy his self reflection by proxy, annihilating everything Touya is, swiping the kid's identity under the rug. He describes his son's dreams and sadness as something birthed from stubbornness. He is auto-convincing himself however (because Endeavor is not stupid). A little bit later he's basically saying: "Touya let's play make believe! We can go on like everything I had engulfed in your psyche never existed, you're a failed attempt so you don't exist. Your needs and wants are silly and useless, nothing worth dealing with now that I can't make you my prodigy. Why don't you go play with the other failures so that I don't have to look at myself while taking actually care of you. I don't want to see you, because it's too painful, because you're a remainder of my own inadequacy."

Note: If you want to read an incredibly well done analysis about Endeavor's motives and psyche, you can get it on @thyandrawrites , she's dwelt on everything extensively and way better than me.

I really want to talk about Rei though. In the panel I showed above, her expression is a bit tricky to analyse. At first she is very vocal about her position. She doesn't want to put Touya through useless suffering, especially since they have a scientific reason not to. They have no guarantee of success with other children, besides, they could possibly have to deal with other health related issues. However, all it takes to convince her in the end is Enji's half assed attempt at the "It's for Touya's sake" shtick. Is it really? Why doesn't she question her husband anymore?

Well... I think before Natsuo, she was probably hoping Touya would let go "naturally", with time and growth, maybe by taking interest in his other siblings. Rei said she wanted to have more children because in her mind they would have supported and loved each other. Maybe she was naive enough to think that a big family full of kids few years apart from each other was all Touya needed to distract himself from his purposes... BUT and here is the point I want to get across: She was deluding herself too, much like Enji. The ugly truth, in my opinion, is that Rei is a person prone to protect herself by going with everything other people want, especially if said people are capable of hurting her. Yes, she was hurt time and time again, but what would have happened if she really tried to stop Enji?

What I am trying to say is that Rei is the kind of person who endures to survive. She holds a "captive" mentality in which, by indulging her captor's desires, she can continue living with less possibile damage. If I stay still and silent, if I don't make a scene, I can go on, I can hold onto the few things I have that actually make me happy.

Let's think about it... Enji was so obsessed with his psychotic, power-hungry quest that he would have probably disown Rei. She would have been thrown away for a more compliant woman with an ice quirk, or something similar, this resulting in her probably losing everything, the respect and love of her family (the Himuras) and also her own children. Because we know Endeavor can definitely hold a grudge and is vendicative.

So, clarifying, Rei doesn't put up a fight because she is scared for herself in a way... She is scared to be hurt in the worst possible way (by losing her little bit of serenity), so her strategy is to endure and to keep up a facade of control and purpose.

Rei, ironically just like Touya and other characters in mha, doesn't really get what unconditional love is. Her family loves her until she can be useful to the Himura name and status, her husband loves her for her quirk. Her children, however, love her for who she is and she wants to stay with them... Only to be forced to leave them later anyway.

The few times Rei actually smiles are when she is with her babies. She is a deeply loving mother in her core, but her declining mental health makes her a very lacking caregiver.

This panel, in my opinion, shows the point of no return for Rei. She can't keep the glacial facade forever...

After Natsuo's turn to be deemed a failure, Endeavor is crazier than ever, because All Might is as popular and loved as ever and he hasn't make any progress into his eugenetic games. The last two images of Rei are very telling. She is exhausted, but she knows what her husband wants from her this time too. She looks like a lifeless doll and honestly I can easily see Shouto's conception as... Non consensual and I will stop here.

Then Shouto is born, the last, perfect specimen... And Rei isn't doing much for Touya, we can see she's apparently blind towards her eldest son's distress already after Natsuo's birth... But why?

Because she is actively avoiding to face the Touya's problems too.

If Touya is still suffering, is still feeling stressed and worthless, then everything Rei has endured, everything she pretended not to feel for the sake of her family has been completely useless. What Rei cannot look at is her own parental failure, is the concrete proof that while protecting herself and her peace she did not protect her children too, because the two interests were never really aligned, even if she really believed so. She never had a functional family to preserve in the first place and everything she accepted to do was all for the sake of a false sense of belonging.

However is too easy to say she should've rebelled against Enji and dumped his sorry ass. Abuse traps you and your abuser too in a cage tricky to escape.

What I imagine will happen next chapter is one of two things:

Enji stops Touya by using brute force, probably also saying something really scarring to reinforce the notion that Shouto is the only child he cares about.

Rei stops Touya by using her quirk. This act could be considered by Touya another confirmation that even his mother actually does something by her own accord only when Shouto's safety is at risk

Necessary conclusions

I don't blame Rei for her actions too much. She is a victim turned abuser by circumstances, but more importantly she's actually taken mesures to prevent herself from hurting her children again. She's trying to heal for her family's sake, really this time. Ten years spent dealing with guilt and having actual therapy seem a good plan to me. And now she's the one ready to snap Enji back to reality.

Enji, on the other hand, is trying too. It's too little too late, but if he stops avoiding reality and hardly works on understanding his family's point of view I don't think he is completely unredeemable. I don't see him surviving his last confrontation with Touya, thought... But I could be totally wrong.

Obviously everything I've said it's my personal analysis on Rei's character, as I interpret her actions and words, so feel free to contradict me and/or to add anything you might see fit.

[lynkhart]

MAJOR spoilers for the C2 finale of Critical Role so read at your own risk of you haven’t caught up!

I have so many feelings regarding Caleb and Essek’s intertwining character arcs I needed to explore, so strap in folks, you’re in for a bit of a ride! (But seriously though, this is like 4000 words long, I basically wrote an essay 😂)

At the start of the campaign, Caleb Widogast was dripping in guilt and self loathing and refused to believe he could ever absolve himself of his sins. Essek Thelyss was a cold, aloof individual who betrayed his people for selfish goals, and their differing yet mirrored narratives have been an absolute delight to watch unfold.

In the beginning Caleb truly hated himself. He shot down any attempt at a compliment, described himself as a ‘disgusting person’, outright rejected the idea that he was worthy of love, and never let the blame shift from him for what he’d done. When Beauregard and Veth/Nott pointed out that he was coerced and manipulated into killing his parents, he reacts in an incredibly visceral way, and I’ve seen several comments likening it to a victim of child abuse who was groomed into believing they were as responsible as their abuser, and I think that’s exactly how it was meant to be read. He doesn’t see himself as a victim, only a murderer, and punishes himself for it every day. We see this in the way he presents himself, dirty and unkempt because in his mind he doesn’t deserve to feel good about himself in any way. Other than Nott/Veth and Beau to a certain degree, he purposefully isolates himself from the rest of the group and it’s a long time until he feels relaxed enough in their company to drop his defences a little.

(Speaking from a purely meta point of view, Liam did an absolutely phenomenal job of showing this through body language and I’d love to see someone do a compilation video of it. He starts off very hunched and guarded, leaning his body away from the closest person to him and avoiding eye contact and physical touch; but by the end stands tall and sure of himself.)

Early on there were a few moments where he had the option to do some pretty dark shit, and I’m sure there’s a possible timeline where he gave into his desire for revenge and really lost his way, but I’m glad he stuck it out and worked through his trauma in the way he did. His PTSD and disassociation when casting with fire was tragic, but over time he was able to work through it thanks to the constant love and support of his friends who kept him from going off at the deep end.

Molly’s death was the catalyst for change in a lot of the party, and Caleb is no exception. On the verge of leaving the group prior to his death, the grief they shared, combined with their frantic attempt to rescue the other half of their party put things in perspective and gradually he learned how to be a person again, to care.

Altering time to save his family had been Caleb’s only goal in life, and so when Essek and by extension, dunamancy was introduced, you could see his eyes light up at the possibilities.

A huge turning point for him is aligned so closely with Essek’s redemption arc which feels quite apt I think. When Essek confesses to his crimes, Caleb delivers a beautifully iconic piece of dialogue where he acknowledges their similarities and how much he himself has changed as a person since meeting the Mighty Nein. (Source - CR wiki)

‘You listen to me. I know what you are talking about. I know. And the difference between you and I is thinner than a razor. I know what it means to have other people complicate your desires and wishes. And I was like you. Was. I know what a fool I have been for years. You didn't account for us. Good. That is life. Shit hits you sideways in life and no one is prepared. No one is ready. These people changed me. These people can change you. You were not born with venom in your veins. You learned it. You learned it. You have a rare opportunity here, Thelyss. One chance to save yourself, and we are offering it.’

This is not the same Caleb we met back in the Nestled Nook inn way back in the first episode. While not yet fulfilled or entirely convinced of his own worth, he knows he’s on the right path. That alone is progress enough, but that he uses his own experiences to help another escape those same chains of guilt says such a lot for his development. When he tells Essek that his ‘venom’ was learned, he’s also talking about himself and his own history of being manipulated and gaslit, with the implication being that it can be un-learned just as efficiently.

Caleb Widogast is selfish no more, or at the very least, doesn’t let his goals undermine anyone else’s anymore. Contrary to what he himself might still think, he is in no way a bad person. He loves fiercely and cannot abide seeing those he cares about in pain.

Early game Essek is what Caleb could have been if he’d rejected his friends and focused solely on his own selfish goal to undo his mistakes. Both are impassive at first and see the Mighty Nein as means to an end...until they get to know them and then their fate is sealed. The Power of Friendship wins once again!

At the beginning Caleb said he wanted to ‘bend reality to my will’ (sic) and in the end he does just that, though not in the way he originally intended. Destroying the T-Dock, and by extension the one thing he’d been building towards from the start, the chance to go back and change time, for me personally was the absolute peak of his journey. I rewatched the scene where Caleb revealed the truth about his parents death today, and it was really jarring to see just how far he’d come since then. It made me oddly proud actually.

I always felt like his plan to save his parents was the one thing holding him back from truly accepting their deaths, which is why the final scene of him in the cemetery with the letters for them hit so hard. He never truly gave up hope that they’d be reunited, but ultimately he realised he was merely postponing the inevitable and never allowing himself to live his own life. While time travel shenanigans would have been incredibly interesting to explore in game, choosing to let the past lie and not go back for them finally allows him to grieve and move on, and perhaps most importantly of all, to forgive himself at last.

I know some people were annoyed by Caleb’s decision in the finale to spend the rest of his life teaching rather than continuing to adventure, but I see it as the natural conclusion to his whole arc and his own personal victory.

He looked Trent Ikithon in the eyes, a man who he’d spent years wanting to kill and run from in equal measure, stripped him of his power and his voice (and ultimately his ability to harm anyone else) and finally spared his life so he had to live with the indignity of his defeat for the rest of his miserable existence. You couldn’t have asked for a more damning rejection of everything he’d been brainwashed into believing as a child. His dismissal of Trent’s position in the Assembly played into that as well. He never really wanted power for the sake of it; he had no desire for politics, he just wanted his family back, and while he didn’t get the one he started with, he made a new one for himself in the end.

As Caduceus once very wisely said:

‘Pain doesn’t make people; it's love that makes people. The pain is inconsequential; it's love that saves them.’

Caleb gets to break the cycle of abuse and teach a new generation of mages the way he should have been, with kindness and respect, and I’m pretty sure he’d have introduced a handsome drow as a guest lecturer from time to time. 😉

Speaking of...

Essek described himself as selfish and as a coward, forever putting his own wants and desires first, yet over the course of his journey with the Nein we see his priorities change drastically.

Having friends gives him people to care about, something he’s never had before, and it changes his outlook on life completely. For me, the first time we really see this is when he joins them for dinner in the Xorhaus and stops levitating. It’s a subtle thing, but meaningful. He explains that it had become an expectation of him, a quirk he’s known for, and so to feel comfortable enough around the Nein to drop that pretence is quite bold I think.

Much later, when he chooses to destroy the mini beacon they discover in Aeor in order to give everyone a long rest before the final confrontation with Lucian, he’s essentially giving up everything he betrayed his people for, just to keep his friends safe. The existence and context of that single artefact could have had an earthshattering impact on the Dynasty’s entire culture, forcing them to reevaluate their entire belief system and attitude to the Luxon, something he’d wanted from the start, something he helped start a war for, but he offered it up as a sacrifice without a second thought.

I’d say that’s a pretty big morality shift, and I’m super interested to see if Matt reveals if his alignment changed in the post campaign Q&A. I have a feeling he set him up as a potential BBEG but the party was like ‘no, you can’t have him, he’s ours now’ and that was the end of that. 😂

I think it says so much about the other characters too, that they befriended this person they barely knew, and when he was revealed to have done such terrible things, their first reaction was to give him comfort and an opportunity to atone. Jester held his hand while he confessed, and afterwards, while they didn’t immediately forgive him, they saw the good in him and wanted him to be better, which ultimately feels like what the entire campaign was about, leaving places (and people) better than they found them. It’s obvious that he’s never really had many friends before and has therefore never had the opportunity to be emotionally open with anyone, so seeing him gradually warm up to the Nein and allow himself to soften around them was really lovely to watch.

(Obviously, from a realistic moral perspective, he still fucked up big time. He’s still a godsdamned war criminal and really should have been put on trial for what he did, but I think from a narrative and personal point of view, his redemption arc was far more satisfying, so I’m glad it happened the way it did. (And not to derail but the rest of the gang have done some pretty horrific stuff as well, though perhaps not quite on the same scale)

He has a few moments towards the end that I absolutely love because they show that beneath the guilt and anguish, there’s an incredibly sweet and sensitive soul in there, just wanting acceptance. His dry jokes which often don’t quite hit, (the ‘I will punish the bakery’ line is such an under-appreciated one 😂) his simple joy at learning to garden in the Blooming Grove, and realising that he’d never been asked what his favourite food was before was actually kind of heartbreaking, because it highlighted how lonely his life must have been until that time. There was a moment pretty early on I think when he cast disguise on the party and Jester asked if he could cast it again to change the look of her outfit a bit and while he seemed to find it amusing, he refused, not wanting to waste a spell on such a frivolous request. Cut to their time in Aeor where he burns a fly spell just so he and Caleb can flirtatiously swoop around each other for a couple of minutes, all the while trying to beat Lucian to the city.

His breakdown when Molly’s resurrection failed really cemented to me how much he’d grown as a character. He never met Molly, his only knowledge of him was secondhand, through the eyes of his friends, but seeing it fail just broke him because he knew how much it hurt them to go through it all over again.

His comment to Caleb about not admitting defeat and wishing he could do more did get me wondering at the time if he was going to try and do something crazy, perhaps sacrificing himself via the Temporal Dock to make amends or somehow forcing another reroll, but I’m glad he didn’t. The conversation following that with Fjord was one of my favourites- he shows him acceptance and belief in his potential for the future, something he’s lacked for a long time, and when Caleb bluntly affirms afterwards that he is indeed an official member of the Mighty Nein, it’s the start of the rest of his life, and something he’s exceptionally grateful for.

It all leads to that final moment in Aeor with Caleb, when, presented with the opportunity to alter time and undo everything, he chooses to accept his decisions and carry the weight of his sins for the rest of his long life. That’s...huge.

He’s essentially choosing to live the rest of his existence as a fugitive, forever on the run, with no guaranteed peace or safety. He chooses to spend his life making up for his deeds, rather than looking for an easy way out.

I think that may have had a big impact on why Caleb ultimately made the same decision, as if Essek had been up for altering his timeline I think he’d have struggled to resist it himself. The conversation they had earlier in Aeor about their priorities and resisting temptation really comes to mind as well.

Now, to the relationship.

It was subtle, and not as ‘in your face’ obvious as the other characters, but I’ve been watching and hoping for a long time and I must say, it feels good to be vindicated.

(And if you have any doubt, both Matt and Liam confirmed on Twitter that their post finale relationship was 100% romantic)

I’d been hoping that Shadowgast would be a canon endgame relationship for a while, so the finale, and the aforementioned T-Dock scene in particular had me quite literally shaking with emotion as I watched live. Here you have two men, both damaged and guilt-stricken in their own ways, who find in each other a kindred spirit and a path to redemption.

They’re both very guarded and closed off people, but Essek in particular has a definite shift in the last arc of the campaign especially when it came to his interactions with Caleb. At the start he was quite aloof and stoic, though charming, and they had an instant connection through their shared love of the arcane, (anyone who couldn’t see them making heart eyes at each other when Essek was describing the different types of magic he could teach Caleb was clearly blind) but by the end he was incredibly open to showing his vulnerabilities and that takes a lot, especially for someone whose primary focus was to stay in control of every aspect of his life. The ‘Caleb, I’m scared’ moment during the Trent fight in particular made my heart ache.

No, we didn’t get a dramatic declaration of love or a cinematic mid-battle kiss, but I’d argue that their relationship was just as, if not more intimate than any of the other main characters were. They understood each other in a way the others didn’t, their shared guilt, feelings of inadequacy and their obsession with magic forged a deep connection from the get-go. Neither of them are big fans of PDA I think, though Caleb is tactile as hell (forehead touches and kisses, oh man, I’m so weak for those 😩👌) and some of their most iconic moments have them putting themselves in harm’s way to protect the other. Essek shaking off his forced guilt trip immediately after the now infamous forehead touch in ep140 was beautifully poetic, as was using his fortune’s favour to pull Caleb out of the rubble moments before. Caleb trying to include him in his Sphere of Invulnerability in the finale and Essek staying close to him the whole fight despite being obviously terrified of Trent was the icing on the cake. It’s clear that they care for each other a great deal; whether by the finale they’d consider it love is up for debate, but we know that’s eventually where it ended up and honestly, I love that. I deeply appreciated the fact Matt and Liam both emphasised that they took their time with their relationship, letting each other heal in their own way before they took the next step. All too often in media, and real life too sadly, a romantic relationship is seen as some kind of quick fix, and that a lover will somehow complete you or make all your problems vanish. They knew this wasn’t the case here, and that made it all the better.

While I would have *loved* to have seen them together as a couple right to the very end, the change in their relationship felt right, if bittersweet. I doubt they ever stopped loving each other, and if anything, choosing to shift to a deep and lifelong friendship over a romance that would cause them both so much pain is one of the kindest things you could do for someone you love. After all, friendship isn’t a downgrade, just another way of experiencing that same love, and it wasn’t as though they broke up and never saw each other again, it was pretty strongly implied that they remained a major feature in each other’s lives, they just changed their label slightly. Caleb would hate to have forced Essek to watch him wither away, and although his eventual passing would hurt Essek regardless, incompatible lifespans being what they are, having a period of time to adjust to it, to give them a buffer between the inevitable heartbreak was actually really sweet.

Their romance was no accident, they knew going in that it had a time limit, that it wasn’t going to be forever for one of them, and the fact they did it anyway says so much. They began their adventure wholeheartedly believing that they were both, in their own way incapable of love, only to later find it with each other. Whether their relationship lasted for a couple of years or multiple decades is irrelevant, what matters is that while it did they had a happy and fulfilled life together.

I know some folk wanted Caleb to use the transmogrification spell on himself so he could live on with Essek as another elf, or make him human instead, but that would have been way out of character for both I think. If they could have backwards engineered one of the rejuvenation stations in Aeor and used it to extend Caleb’s life by a hundred years or so, so he’d have a similar lifespan to Veth, now, I could have seen him possibly doing that, so he could spend more time with his best friend too, but nothing further I think. He longed to be reunited with his parents too much to postpone death unnaturally like that.

That both Caleb and Essek ultimately chose to live with their mistakes and make peace with themselves was incredibly cathartic, and I couldn’t imagine it playing out any better.

The fact Matt has explicitly stated Essek is Demi too means so much to me personally because the latter is a label I’ve been identifying with a lot recently, and it’s so rare for aspec relationships to get any representation! It has honestly given me a lot to think about over the last few days, and I really appreciate it.

To conclude, here’s a bit of shameless self promotion. I wrote this after watching the finale and honestly feel like it sums up my feelings on the nature of their relationship pretty well.

‘A casual hand on a shoulder, a waist, a wrist; a gentle kiss placed on a forehead is common between them now, an intimacy born of trust and mutual affection. Over time it grows, like a fire born of seasoned timber; gradual and steady, no spluttering kindling that flares and sparks, but a slow burn, one which lasts.

Their love is embroidered into every aspect of their lives together. Acts of service, of comfort, of understanding.

Sometimes a kiss leads to more than a kiss, sometimes it doesn’t. Either way they are content.‘

So yeah, I love these two wizard boys so very much and I couldn’t be happier with the conclusion of their stories. ❤️

[your-turn-to-role]

Hello there! i saw someone else doing this and i thought it was a fun and cool idea so: Headcanon Saturday (or sunday if its sunday for you): share a favorite headcanon (or lots of headcanons), big or small, if you feel like it! Your blog is very cool and I love seeing your thoughts whenever they pop up on my dash! keep doing what you do :D

it is in fact sunday for me! (or, it was when you sent this, it's wednesday now bc i had an assignment i had to do and uh, nz just went back into major lockdown so that’s fun)

but thank you so much!

and honestly this question had me stumped for a bit, because, in theory i have some, right? but, one, i'm less of a theory fan and more of a collector fan, i can put together minuscule details from all over the show to get a big picture of a character, but i rarely have headcanons that aren't based in some show evidence or other

and when i do have some, they either end up in a meta post im writing, or in a specific tag (like my cr nd headcanons i'll link a bit further down), or in a fic that i will write half of and never post bc i am chronically terrible at finishing things 😂

that said! i have scoured through fic ideas and discord server messages, so here have a few

fave headcanon that's not mine

disabled essek. like, thank you fandom for this one, it's incredibly dear to my heart, i consider it canon, nothing can convince me otherwise, it is going in all my fics, just.... comfort character

sometimes a character can be a neutral evil criminal and a disability icon okay

fave identity headcanon

see this tag for my various "why cr characters are neurodivergent" essays, also, fjord and jester are arospec thank you good day

a couple ones just based on dnd mechanics that i enjoy

- gilmore is a couple levels self taught in wizard

(he at the very least would have magic initiate if you were to build him like a pc bc he has identify, which is not a sorcerer spell, but... something about how he loves magic and was very determined to stand out but also something happened to him with the whole runechild thing that makes him scared to admit he is one so obviously he wouldn't flaunt that power, also the way he's kinda self deprecating whenever he has to admit he doesn't know wizard stuff, yeah, he definitely tried to teach himself magic the non sorcerer way)

- percy has a pristine organisation system for every room he owns and if you mess it up he can no longer find anything

this one is based off of two things. 1) percy is canonically a very neat and tidy person. after the feast with the briarwoods he goes home, wrecks his room trying to vent his feelings, and then barricades himself in his workshop. when vox machina find his room the next morning matt notes that percy's room is never messy like this. also, just in how he talks to grog when grog's snooping in his workshop, percy definitely knows the precise location of every tool in there. also he's just a precise person in general.

2) taliesin's weakness in rolling good for percy is investigation checks. he fails them almost every time. he has a decent int mod, but the dice just decided no investigation checks for you! (also, i haven't gone back to confirm this, so i may be wrong, but i'm pretty sure one of the few good investigation checks he makes is in whitestone castle). strict organisation system. he is absolutely useless without it 😂

aaaand, fave angsty headcanon (bc it's me, there was gonna be one)

the blumendrei didn't leave their hometown for days after they killed their parents. like. okay i've had a fic i've been lowkey writing for ages about these guys (yes i have like 40 cr fics in some form of wip status, no none are finished, this is how i exist), in the aftermath of that, bc i love them and i have a lot of thoughts about it

(also, not that i can prove it bc the fic was never posted but i kinda predicted the, cold stone tower overnight thing, which had me feeling A Way when that became canon!)

but anyway what this is based on is like... there's an idea in the fandom that trent directly ordered them to kill their parents but he really didn't. like obviously he put every step in place, but when caleb's telling that story, trent barely even comes up. he talks about how he found out his parents were traitors and how he "knew what he had to do"

so honestly, given everything we know about how trent engineers situations, it makes the most sense to me that the blumendrei, didn't want trent to know about this at all

like they believed the lie that their parents genuinely were traitors, so if you find out that horrifying secret, in the environment they'd been in for the past two years? that's shameful, horrifically so. why would they tell trent about that if they could avoid it? why risk getting branded the same, you've been told up to this point you're special, and you'd kill to keep that title. why on earth would you admit that your bloodline is tainted like that?

no, they would have tried to cover it up, as long as they could. which, is exactly what trent would want bc that again puts them on the back foot, but like... yeah, i fully believe they waited it out for a couple of days before going to trent until they were sure they couldn't wait any longer for bren to get better without drawing even more suspicion. and, since their cover story is they were supposed to be visiting their parents anyway, maybe they didn't go all that far

[saphirered]

Beau x Yasha X sorceress SO whose wild magic is seemingly getting out of hand. (Nothing disastrous but getting feather beards and kissing someone might not be the best. Nor is having a random unicorn try and mow you down)

I love Wild Magic Sorcerers. They’re one of my favourite subclasses. A few headcanons for certain effects and one short bit about one effect in particular. I hope you like it. ☺️

Your wild magic surges were something for sure and while there were plenty good effects there were also many bad ones. Not all bad effects were necessarily harmful to yourself or others but were mostly just an annoyance. Beau and Yasha had come to accept these surges from the moment they met you. They are apart of who you are and while they may wish some effects rather not happen or happened, they wouldn’t change you for the world. 

While doing some recon one time you cast a detect magic. The side effect of doing so this time resulted in you being able to see any invisible creature within line of sight. And see someone you did. You were able to point this out to Beau who of course immediately took action. A soft punch to your shoulder quickly turned to her wrapping an arm around you complimenting your good work. 

In a fight you had some pretty good offensive spells. An unlucky release of wild magic grew you nearly a foot within seconds making as tall if not taller than Yasha. While it was a bit of a change to adjust to none of you complained. If anything, Beau did kind of like the new dynamic of having two tall partners at her sides. She could still kick your ass regardless of height but that didn’t stop you from placing things just out of reach of her at times laughing as she had to all but run up walls to get it while you and Yasha could just reach. 

The random bunch of Flumphs appearing and screeching as they ran away from you while the three of you were having some down time in the hot tub got a little bit annoying for all of you but Beau and Yasha assured you it was fine as you waited for the creatures to disappear. 

A funny one if it hadn’t been the worst time for it to happen was you casting suggestion and the next thing coming out of your mouth were pink bubbles. Even Yasha had a hard time keeping it together for that one. She just wrapped an arm around you pulling you into her side as you wait out the effect begrudgingly. It took Fjord quite a bit to explain what happened there without revealing you casting a spell and those you were talking to did not take the sudden pink bubbles too well. They managed to smooth it out quickly luckily. 

While shopping for some curiosities you cast a quick detect magic to see if you and Yasha could find something interesting as a gift for Beau. A unicorn appeared out of nowhere and if the store wasn’t already a mess, it was now thanks to the bull- well unicorn in a Hupperdook shop, literally. You managed to make yourself scarce but the unicorn followed you, sticking to your side like a lost puppy trying to get your attention. It kept munching on your hair, clothes and even wormed its way between you and Yasha, nudging her out of the way. Yasha of course asked if you wanted her to get rid of it and you debated taking her up on the offer, it would probably make it more difficult to deal with should another unicorn appear next time. While maybe slightly possessive and jealous, at least this unicorn didn’t try to run you over and attack you like the last one…

The random illusory flower petals and butterflies floating around you gave you the appearance of a creature straight from the Feywild. Yasha admired the floral patterns while Beau was practically drooling over how ethereal you looked. You had to snap her out of that one. 

Mirror Image… that’s one’s been fun… No further comment… Nor would any of you ever mention that one to anyone else…

And the most recent one:

With the recent paranoia of being watched you resorted to casting see invisibly every once in a while to make sure you weren’t being watched. You prayed to all the gods you wild magic surges would be kept at bay but sadly the gods did not hear your prayers. A long brightly coloured feathery beard reached down to your knees. Now you’ve dealt with this one before. Getting rid of it was easy. You just had to sneeze. Yeah… Easier said than done…

Beau emptied out a pouch of pepper in her hand and blew it in your face. Your eyes teared up and you had to rinse the pepper from your face quickly but no sneezes. 

Yasha tried to cast light, telling you she heard looking into the sun or a bright light made people sneeze? You tried over and over again and nothing happened.

Beau tried scaring you. You’re pretty sure that’s just supposed to work for hiccups. No effect. 

Plucking a feather from your new beard didn’t work nor did trying to scratch your nose with it. Tickle attacks were to no avail either. 

Strong perfume from Jester’s mom, tilting your head back, eating some dark chocolate (you have no idea how they got that), Caduceus’ spices, and even sniffing Nott’s dirty shoes didn’t work. Though the latter did almost make you faint from the smell. 

“I give up. I guess I’m stuck like this until something makes me sneeze.” You sit with your head leaning against Yasha’s shoulder, Beau sprawled out across the two of you absentmindedly stroking the long soft feathers. 

“We’ll find a solution. Don’t worry. We’ll get rid of the feathers.” Yasha tries to kiss you but the feathers are in the way too much so she instead kisses the top of your head. All of you are just exhausted. 

“Caleb mentioned something about some dust he may be able to find that makes you sneeze uncontrollably. If all else fails we can resort to that.” Beau plays with the feathers with one hand while patting your thigh with the other. The three of you remain seated like this for a while to the point where you’re almost falling asleep. Beau’s already asleep and has cuddled up with the feathers using them as a pillow. You and Yasha agree nonverbally to just stay where you are and attempt to get some shut eye too. 

You adjust your position a little bit to avoid your limbs getting numb. Beau adjusts too in her sleep and the feathers scratch her nose. She sniffs once, twice, trice and then sneezes a couple of times loudly. She accidentally pulls on the feathers and you feel the familiar tingly… You breathe in once, twice and sneeze! The feathers burst from around your face in a big cloud, like someone just exploded a large bird. You burst out in laughter, the feathers finally released from your face, interrupted only by more sneezes from you. 

“Seriously! That’s what it takes?!” Beau exclaims with slight exasperation referring back to all the futile attempts made over the past hours. 

The moment you stop sneezing and your breath returns to you, you give them both a quick thank you kiss as you brush off the feathers and make yourselves more comfortable after an exhausting day.

[illusivekati]

15,16,17, 18, for Luca.

37,38,39,40 for Adria and Karlie

hello nonny owo a very big ask love it :) shows how much you want to know about them :)

First is Luca here we go :)

What is the first thing people notice about them? When people first meet him and without conversation it would be they think he is a very athletic person which they aren't wrong but he just does anything athletic a little bit differently and without the whole excersie equipment he goes for jogs and alot it would be from building and when someone has a conversation with him they would pickup his awkward

What do they look for in a friend? A love interest? someone who is understanding that don't mind helping out with things, Luca when his with someone love language would be affection and reassurance

Who are they soft for? Do they find being soft easy or difficult? I would say family wise it be Adria outside of family it be Lexie as for if its easy or difficult mostly easy being soft but sometimes on the situation he feels it could be hard

Describe your character through a Brooklyn 99 gif or line. I know not much of this show but I feel this describes him more

Next up is Adria :)

Your character has been kidnapped. Who has kidnapped them and how do they escape? " Hmmm not sure but she certainly would drive them crazy haha if I were to pick someone who would it probably be Caleb, as Caleb in my game tends to like the pretty girls in my game like literally I would make one and one way or another they would end up crossing paths with Caleb even when I avoid him and he would turn them endless circle but she would probably drive anyone who kidnaps her crazy so therefor they would have no choice if they had nothing at their disposal to get peace.

How does your character unwind after a long day? Adria you would find her in the garden actually so anything garden she would unwind with weather its weeding, watering or even at the flower arranging bench.

What's your character's guilty pleasure? experiencing the night life with any chance she gets and ohh those trashy romance novels.

Your character's friend has just been mugged. What's their reaction? I reckon that would traumatize her Adria would freeze in fear but she would try and reach her phone and would either contact her brother or Sergio for extra help

Next is Karlie

Your character has been kidnapped. Who has kidnapped them and how do they escape? " if someone did it be some crime boss from her mothers past cause her mother tends to piss alot of people off and not to mention her mother is criminal turned spy if Karlie hasn't escaping she would observe her surroundings for potential way outs and how many lets just say guards would be guarding and observe that too waiting for that opening and will pin point it and use it to her disposal she is also very tech savvy so if there's tech she would use it to her advantage if she can :)

How does your character unwind after a long day? Ahh a couple drinks and a night of dancing and hanging out and having her smokes :)

What's your character's guilty pleasure? taking selfie after selfie til she gets the perfect one, singing or dancing like nobody watching

Your character's friend has just been mugged. What's their reaction? Karlie would sus out the connections she has, or her mother has to hopefully provide some backup if needed she would make sure her friend is alright and will probably chase the culprit down and teach them a lesson and salvage anything of her friends belongings

[ticklishnonsense]

Hmm, I don't have any fic prompts, but what are your Mighty Nein headcanons?

THIS GOT... LONG. under the cut.

mollymauk-

you all know 18,000 words of my thoughts on this matter. world’s biggest switch. #alltieflingsareknismos. et cetera

as a ler - demon status but never cruel. he’ll tease and laugh at his lee without end, and he WILL remember their worst spots to the grave, but he’s also in it for the physical closeness and shared laughter as much as the tickling. even outside of full-on tickle fights, he’s always tweaking his friends’ ribs or tickling under their knees. it’s a form of intimacy for him. and he’s not brutal about it - he wants his lee to be coherent enough for banter

as a lee - CEO of dishing it out but not being able to take it. yes he loves getting tickled. yes he turns into a puddle when that fact is pointed out. squirmy as hell, not a loud laugher but lots of giggles and snorting and trying to protest. hard relentless tickles get him bad, but tickle talk and teasing ruins him.

worst spot: lower back and sides get him shrieking.

he loves tickling & getting tickled by anyone interested, though caleb is probably his favorite for both, with yasha a close second. he also thinks about fjord’s teasing OFTEN but can’t quite get up the courage to ask for it. (yet)

caleb-

kryptonite to the world’s biggest switch. he is a merciless ler. doesn’t tend to laugh along or even crack a smile. does tend to remember his lee’s worst spots exactly. if he and his 16 cha decide to tease it’s all over.

as a lee, he does all these complicated mental gymnastics to justify enjoying it to himself; a lot of what it boils down to is that he has a hard time accepting touch unless he feels like he’s struggled against it. likes being helpless more than he’ll admit but he doesn't think he deserves the peace of mind or the affection. enough tickling does strip away his defenses and get him shockingly cuddly and affectionate for a bit

i also adore the headcanon that’s been going around here that he needs to get in his head about it to be ticklish. it takes a few minutes of gentle teasing for him to really start processing the fact that he’s getting tickled, but from there it’s all downhill.

he is so bad at fighting back. he doesn’t know how. he tries to cast slow on the ler. slow has verbal and somatic components. now he’s just getting wrecked with molasses on his lips. dude’s str score is 10 and even if he could get off a useful spell he can't maintain concentration. all he can do is flop around

worst spot: under the book holsters. he thinks he’s protected there. he is not. obvious fic rec

not to show my widomauk agenda but i think molly is his favorite both lee and ler. he likes lees where it’s really obvious they like it, and he likes lers who will gently push him into it, and purple problem causer is both. and he also likes jester as a ler a lot; she’s so unembarrassed about tickling that he starts feeling a little less embarrassed in turn

yasha-

absolutely brutal ler. she’s very shy about really letting loose, but if she gets coaxed into it her lee is done for. no need for restraints when you’re a barbarian. my favorite headcanon is that she gets so focused at a certain point she doesn’t even really notice her lee’s reactions, so they’re often completely worn out by the time she thinks to stop. and she’s a HUGE fan of cuddly tickles, kissing the laughter out of her lee’s mouth, stuff like that.

just the sweetest lee. she’s strong enough that if someone’s tickling her it’s because she’s letting them, so it’s usually just her curling up with quiet squeaky laughter and letting it happen. she also starts crying with laughter pretty easily, which can be honestly worrisome if you don’t know

worst spot: ribs & the tops of her thighs.

she’s tickled most people she’s fond of at one point or another, but her favorites are beau (who’s just so spluttery about it), molly (best friend & clearly loves it), and fjord (so easy to fluster)

beau-

mean ler. goes into tickle fights like a game of chess. plays to win. her favorite tactic is pinning her lee down, getting her fingers into whatever she's deduced is their worst spot, and tickling there until they cry. also, makes liberal use of stunning strike.

she’s pretty ticklish herself and it’s the bane of her life. on the plus side it’s very easy to provoke her into a tickle fight if that’s what you’re looking for. on the minus side you are now in a tickle fight with a 20 dex flailing ball of limbs

worst spot: she's immune most places but under her arms is killer.

to her, tickle fights are just another way to affectionately give shit to the people she loves. she tends to get into it a lot with molly and jester. tickles caleb just to give him a hard time & because she knows he can’t really fight back, but she doesn’t always have the patience to wear him down. gets tickled by yasha a fair amount because yasha thinks she’s cute and beau unfortunately will do just about anything for that

vethnott-

keeps herself removed most of the time - she had a lot of body hatred for a while. once she's veth again, she's a little more comfortable with it, but still stays kind of separate from things.

she doesn't start tickle fights but if she gest dragged in she WILL end them. when she's a ler she's a wicked ler. tiny hands, massive sleight-of-hand.

worst spots: her tummy, and if you squeeze around her delt.

she has that little crush on fjord for a while and tickles him to deal with it. it's her version of a teenage girl not knowing how to flirt so she steals her crush's baseball cap and just kind of wears it around

after molly provokes her enough she'll also tickle him just to shut him up. he deserves it

fjord-

i... feel like he didn’t get tickled much as a kid and so he only really discovers that he's ticklish with the nein. he can't help but envy the physical closeness he sees, but he's also very nervous about the whole affair, so he avoids the tickle fights for a while.

he trusts jester most so he probably goes to her in private once and asks her about it. and she laughs at him but she does tickle him very gently for five minutes or so and he's like. okay yes I can handle this. and then she flops down over his lap and says "now me!" and he's nervous all over again

he's insecure about being a bad ler so he tends to rely on his silver tongue a lot. brutal, brutal tease.

worst spots: ears and neck. his sides are pretty bad too

once he gets more comfortable with tickling he's just a bit of a demon ler. tickles the mischief out of molly, tickles veth to bond with her, tickles jester because she often demands it.

he's got such an air of authority about him that it actually takes a while for anyone to start getting him back but when they figure it out. oh boy. yasha gets him the worst. the wings. yeah

caduceus-

reasonably ticklish, but doesn't mind it at all. he likes laughing and generally doesn't fight it. but then it's just not as SATISFYING, ugh.

he's a very gentle ler. always asking what the lee wants, rubbing their shoulders comfortingly between tickles. and he'll be like "now that's better, isn't it" at the end with that peaceful smile.

worst spots: his ears are badddd. he snort-laughs and flicks them around involuntarily

easily figures out that almost all his friends enjoy getting tickled. will call them out for it if he's feeling particularly mischievous. but he's also the one that people will often go to for cheer-up tickles, or if they're just feeling the itch.

jester-

loves tickling. loves everything about it. likes it as much as molly does but without the embarrassment. she's always in ler mode; there is never a moment of safety around her. big fan of tazing people and blowing raspberries and all that prankster stuff.

she's also always in lee mode and if she isn't getting tickled she WILL straight up demand it from whomever's around.

worst spots: her back, her toes, and just under the spade of her tail.

she's the one who starts the tickle fights. she and molly are also always getting into it - they'll tickle each other pretty much any time they're in proximity, even if just for a moment

AND ESSEK, BECAUSE I LIKE HIM-

so so so ticklish. hasn't really gotten tickled since he was a kid but he has not forgotten. when he befriends the nein and sees them getting into it with each other he gets That™ squirmy feeling in the pit of his stomach and floats off to the side and tries to seem like it's all beneath him. unfortunately they're his friends and they know him so it's only a matter of time til someone notices that he's sweatin and goes for the kill

couldn't he at least have the very small mercy of his laugh being calm and quiet? no. high-pitched and noisy

after failing enough concentration checks when he tries to use defensive spells, he figures out he can start jabbing people's sides mid-tickle fight and gain a moment of relief. he hasn't gotten to a point where he'll fully tickle someone back yet but it's only a matter of time.

touch-starved enough that he DOES end up trying to provoke tickling sometimes. will not admit this under pain of death

worst spots: definitely his feet. secondarily, all around his ankles and up to his knees. and the palms of his hands & the undersides of his forearms are shockingly ticklish. light tickles ruin him

jester tickles him the most but really it's all of them.

[captainsspnanon]

C2E29 - The Stalking Nightmare - rewatch/liveblog

I forgot to mention it before, but it still applies.  This little arc really does show off how well Caleb is capable of being a leader.  He avoids it, he does not want it, but he’s GOOD at is.  While the Nein are very good about being a group without a real leader, there definitely are the arcs where one or two PCs really pick up the charge.  Starts out with Fjord, then Caleb, then Fjord again, then Caleb/Beau during Xhorhas, then Jester for Travelercon.  I really do like it, it’s a very realistic way that a group would function.  No one standing up and saying ‘you follow me and do what I say’, but people recognizing when one is more capable in a certain situation than others and defaulting to them, or at least letting their opinions have a bit of a greater weight.

Watching the fireside chat a bit early because I misjudged the timing (should have watched after the liveshow), first time I’m seeing this!  I’m LOVING seeing the creation of Orly (WHO IS AMAZING AND I LOVE HIM SO MUCH) and hearing Matt kinda play with a voice and it not being Orly’s voice at all, but seeing how it’ll get there.  UGH, I love him sooo much, and I’m so excited because Matt has no idea that he will become such a big NPC.  Especially considering the fan created NPC and monster for C1 were pretty shortly there and very forgettable (at least for me), to have this one become essentially a second-rank core NPC is so incredibly heartwarming.  (first rank NPCs are like the Gentleman, Essek, Pumat Sol, second rank are like Yussa, Orly, Allura, third rank are like Bryce, Darrow, Marius, and lower rank NPCs I don’t consider ‘core’)

Awww, I really like the fireside chats.  I always want them to be like an hour longer at least!  That might just be my love of behind-the-scenes stuff though. The c2 wrap up was four hours long and I felt like it wasn’t nearly enough.  I kept hoping they’d do a second one, like how there was the official c1 wrap up, but then there was a c1 fireside chat wrap up because there were still so many questions left over.

ALRIGHT.  LET’S DO THIS LIVESHOOOOWWWWW!!!!!  I can’t remember if they wear costumes or not!  I’m so excited!!!!

(I miss the liveshows so much, even though yes, at times they were hard to hear and at times the playing to the audience was a little over the top, but a handful of liveshows a campaign just add so much to it I feel, I really hope we can get these back with c3.  Go away pandemic, stop ruining things)

Wait, does this mean I’ll be ringing in the new year by watching the live show?  ...I’m cool with that.  I’m in a CR mood today, definitely want to keep watching.  Gonna go make me a boozy drink :)

WAIT BRIAN HAS A GLITTER BEARD I NEVER NOTICED THIS

Ah, no full on costumes, but Liam, Marisha, and Taliesin hitting me with ALL the bisexual glory.  UNF.  I am respectfully thirsty.  (Ashly and Matt looking great too, but not as dressy.  Sam is…...well.  Look, there are times where I can admire Sam’s attractiveness.  But 99% of the liveshows I cannot because the OUTFITS.  So I am admiring his absurdity instead.)

(also apparently I’m having Matt hair envy this episode.  SO FLUFFY!!!!!   I know, I know, why is this episode different than any other episodes.  But it just looks REALLY GOOD to me right now!)

MATT’S REVENGE WITH THE SAM SHIRT YEEESSSSSSS

I love Caleb using the Invisibility scroll, and I LOVE Keg not having object permanence.

The audience shouting “don’t fuck me Gil”, and Marisha guiltily having to inform them that it wasn’t a Gil die.  MY HEART MAY NOT SURVIVE THIS EPISODE.  I feel like these liveshows mean so much more to me now, just because of all the context I’ve now gone through of all of C2, C1, and C3.

It makes sense that it wasn’t really RPed, but I am kinda sad that it was never really gone into about what Yasha, Jester, and Fjord had suffered during their time.  Maybe they got lucky and because it was only a day/day and a half that they were there that they were just put into cages and not dealt with, but maybe they were.  And I don’t think it’s ever touched upon.  But like I said, the show – despite getting into dark shit – never actually goes THAT dark.  Injuries to the PCs are all resolved in a long rest without real repercussion, emotional trauma from the in game activities is glossed over (backstory emotional trauma is different), and it makes sense in the fact that it’s just a GAME that they play for fun.  But I admit, this is where the appeal of fanfic comes in, to touch on the heavier and darker aspects that they don’t play out.

THE AUDIENCE FREAKING OUT AT THE SHAKASTE REVEAL, AND THEN EVEN MORE WHEN KHARY COMES ON STAGE

I do with the Nefertiti statue’s face was more visible.  (also why the fuck did I struggle with how statue is spelled?  I’ve had less than a shot of alcohol, I shouldn’t be that affected yet!)

I…...forgot this episode is almost entirely combat.  I’m still focused, but not much to say.  It’s combat.  Not feeling the need to speed it up, so that’s good.

Insect Swarm!!!! Used a good handful of times, but much more a flavor aspect of Cad rather than a primary combat.

LOL new years hit riiight after break.  Paused to text friends/family and get a call from the parents, and now waiting for some of the cheering outside to die down.  I think I’ll take a quick shower then get into the second half.

(also I want a shiny party hat wurmple, but this’s not about that right now.  I didn’t get a shiny spheal with scarf, which genuinely makes me sadface because spheal with the scarf is so fucking cute.  There aren’t many costumed pokes that I love, but there are a few and these are two of them)

Mmmm, I think I’m starting to lose focus now.  And as I haven’t been saying much because it’s just combat, I think I’ll head off for the night, finish this tomorrow.  Lorenzo has been revealed, and Cad has just shown why you don’t make him do wisdom saving throws (casual 27, anyone?), so that’s a good place to pause.

Poor Shakaste, I forgot that he struggled so much during this fight!

Wondered why Caleb didn’t use Shield, but maybe he’s out of first level spells?  I know he kills Lorenzo with a cantrip, so he was pretty dry at that point….  According to the critrolestats, Caleb went into this episode with two first level spells only, however, after the Scorching Ray he only uses cantrips, so maybe he thought he only had one first level spell left?  Or maybe he was saving it for Shield in case he thought he may be at further risk?  (I’m leaning towards the former)

Sharp toothed fairies for Spirit Guardians???  Okay…..I feel like he moves towards the insects and beetles for the Guardians soon.  It’s interesting, this doesn’t seem to fit Caduceus at ALL, but I wonder how his character would have adjusted had this been the theme for his Guardians going forwards.

Ah, there’s the remembering that Firbolgs don’t have Darkvision.

Spare the Dying and max healing for an unconscious person.  Taliesin discussed in the last Talks how he decided to make a cleric to help the party from getting gunshy because of the death, to be able to give them a bit of comfort making more risky decisions, and this here is exactly the display they need.

I get really happy with the audience chanting Beau Beau Beau after Marisha stuns Lorenzo.  I know from her interviews that she seems to be able to let the internet hatred roll off of her back, but GOD the hate that she got for Keyleth. And then even some for Beau!  I’ve seen a good chunk of people feel about Beau how I feel about Molly.

Oh hey, they fuck up the Stun here.  Stun is supposed to last until the end of Beau’s next turn, not the stunned person’s turn.  OH WELL STILL WORKS OUT. (also lol at me actually knowing shit.  During first watch I was slowly gaining the ability to understand rules and shit while watching, but 100% would not be able to say when they were ‘wrong’ or not XD)

Mass Healing Word – you can heal everyone but Caleb.  XDDDDDDDDDD

This may be my bias, but I HAVE to give props to Liam for this episode.  This is a very very combat heavy episode, and while there is some RP, there’s not much.  That tends to lose me, as I’m much more interested in the RP than combat.  But Liam is RPing his ass off this entire episode, just by his little monologues and nervousness and EVERYTHING that he is putting into basically every turn.  And yes, the other players are certainly doing some, and I appreciate it every time it happens.  But Liam is just FEEDING ME and I can’t help but to love him so much for it.

Keg’s ‘what the FUCK?!’ after Liam describes the HDYWTDT is PERFECTION.  The perfect little tension release after the very descriptive and violent end.

“You shouldn’t have killed my cat” oh I have THOUGHTS about that line.  Honestly, the first time watching that was even more confirmation for me that Caleb couldn’t have actually cared about Molly dying because duh. Yeah….I admit that was my bitter biasness there.  Rewatch though? It’s very powerful about the connection that Caleb has with Frumpkin and what Frumpkin means to him, connecting to his childhood and trying for redemption, it’s also this level of disconnect about avenging Molly because the emotion is there but he just can’t focus on it in the moment (alright that’s speculation but it seems to fit), and then lastly, if you watch Liam, Caleb is starting to risk dissociating HARD with the rapid blinking and somewhat vacant gaze (wisdom saving throw coming up), so it makes sense that his immediate thought would be about something that just happened a few minutes ago, rather than the bigger thing that could be too hard to think about in the moment.   (I’ll also admit I still have a very biased headcanon for the moment, but I won’t share that because no-one needs to hear it)

“Case closed” SERIOUSLY heartbreaking and heartwarming at the exact same time

Also rescued prisoners coming down right after the battle ended, y’all are dumb fucks and could haven ended up dead, wtf.  Stay upstairs where they told you to.

Also also, this is now the start of an AU, as the end of this episode and beginning of next episode get into wonky changing what happened stuff, but that’s okay. XD

MATT AND SAM’S FACES WHEN BEAU PROPOSITIONS KEG

Sam on those skates is TOWERING over everybody omg

Also I am just barely taller than Ashly Burch, so that’s a perspective on heights.

@suicidallyreckless

[stillness-in-green]

Part 2 of the response to this ask:

Part 1 was about where I think Geten’s story is going, and if I think it’s likely that Dabi will kill him; it dealt mainly with how those characters are set up in canon. Part 2 is far more about the fandom, and the assumptions people make that lead them to theories like the one above--specifically, the assumption that the League was always planning on bailing on the PLF. Hit the jump below with me and I'll go over why I think the common arguments for that are misguided at best, and willfully misreading the text at worst.

WARNING: Contains some generalizations about parts of the fandom that I have mostly taken steps to avoid seeing on my dash, so some of my characterizations may be out of date. I’ve tried to desalinate this post as much as possible, but as an unapologetic fan of the MLA and of Spinner (who I do not bring up incidentally), this is a topic I feel particularly strongly about. Apologies, but I Have Seen Things.

DISCLAIMER: I like Geten better than Dabi. I don't think he's better developed; I don't think he's a better character--I just like him better. This is largely down to the fact that I find the MLA fascinating from a worldbuilding perspective and its members compelling personally, whereas I’m less interested in Dabi personally than I am the Todoroki Drama on the whole, and have been tired of Fanon Dabi for approximately 83 years. I’ll also be the first to admit that my take on Dabi is pretty mercenary--hardly the irredeemable psychopath the Hero Stans on Twitter see, but nothing close to Secretly Soft Big Brother Touya, either. If that’s not your bag, you may want to skip this one.

So, here's a bullet point list of the reasons I have personally seen on why the League was always planning to turn on the MLA:

Dabi and Toga mention "getting started early," and Shigaraki mentions a plan, suggesting that the League had a plan in place independent of the one they arranged as the PLF.

Shigaraki says he won't forgive the Liberation Army for messing with peoples' feelings, so he would never really mean it when he forges an alliance with them.

The MLA is quirk supremacist, like Endeavor, so Dabi would never work with them.

Dabi is just using Skeptic against Skeptic's will; it’s not a willing partnership.

Mr. Compress rejects the PLF moniker for Shigaraki, ergo Mr. Compress didn’t genuinely associate Shigaraki and the League with the PLF.

Toga hated Curious, so she wouldn't want to work with the MLA either.

Twice would never forgive them for what they did to Giran.

[Error: argument about Spinner's opinion on the PLF not found.]

So, let's go over those, shall we? Note that a lot of what I'm going to lay out below isn't conclusive. What I want to establish is simply that the canonical evidence isn't conclusive, certainly not as much so as the people who support this view espouse.

|| Dabi and Toga mention "getting started early," and Shigaraki mentions a plan, suggesting that the League had a plan in place independent of the one they arranged as the PLF.

In responses to my recent Overhaul post, I defended Viz’s official translation as an accurate rendering of the dialogue in question. In general, I feel like Caleb Cook is pretty reliable in his translations, if sometimes kind of stiff or dry in localization. However, there are times he makes assumptions about lines--as indeed a translator for a currently-running series will sometimes have to--and sometimes, those assumptions don’t pan out. This is one of those times.

Dabi's line, "Shall we get started early?" is based on an assumption Cook made about a line that doesn't have an actual subject. In the original dialogue--Hayame ni hajimaru ka--there is no “we,” not even in the form of some implicit collective in Dabi’s grammatical inflection, nor is there a question of "should." All Dabi’s doing is musing that the start (again, there’s no subject, and so no indication of the start of what, or the start as initiated by who) is happening early.

Toga's line communicates much the same, save that she does specify that the schedule/plan/arrangement is happening earlier than expected--which is totally true, since her line is in response to Dabi observing that Machia moving must mean Shigaraki's awake, and Shigaraki was supposed to be down for another month.

Shigaraki's line, like Dabi's, lacks a subject to describe what exactly is supposed to start as soon as Shigaraki wakes. He's saying something that would, in a more stilted way, be, "I wake up and then it's the start, right?"

None of these lines suggest that the characters are necessarily talking about any plan other than the one the PLF laid out. Yes, it looks somewhat damning that Shigaraki's first action (after getting himself a cape, anyway) is to have Machia bring him the League, but heck, maybe that was always the plan. Just because Shigaraki wants to rejoin his comrades doesn't mean the rest of the PLF didn't already have machinations that they were supposed to set into motion the moment Machia left. After all, the plan as Hawks understood it did involve simultaneous attacks on major cities--maybe the League was going to be spearheading one of those attacks. Further, Shigaraki knew something was wrong from the moment he regained consciousness, and we don’t know how that knowledge affected the call he made. Hell, maybe the original plan was for the League to be brought to meet him somewhere in a chartered limo; we don’t know.

It's telling that this idea that the League had a Secret Plan to screw over the MLA rarely seems to account for Mr. Compress and Spinner being confused over the suddenness of events. The response to questions about this seems to be that the "villain trio" knew about it, so the ignorance of the rest of the League can just be handwaved--the important members knew, and that's enough. This is ungenerous towards both Twice and Mr. Compress, but I have got particularly little time for Spinner, the narrator of MVA and guy who decided to devote his all to Shigaraki, being disrespected in this fashion. More on that later.

|| Shigaraki says he won't forgive the Liberation Army for messing with peoples' feelings, so he would never really mean it when he forges an alliance with them.

Shigaraki does say he won't forgive the MLA, but consider what he did to the MLA and its leader. He destroyed most of their stronghold, killed scores of them, is directly responsible for Re-Destro losing his legs, and saw that vaunted descendant of Destro about six inches shy of full forehead-on-the-ground dogeza. The League Shigaraki commands killed a great many more of them, including one of their inner circle. He commandeered the Liberation Army, its resources, and its grand cause. I think it’s safe to say he’s more than responded in kind!

I'm not saying Shigaraki feels for the MLA the same way he does about the League, far from it, but I do think he's practical enough after two hundred chapters of character development not to throw them away out of spite. In Chapter 246, he tells Ujiko explicitly, "When someone offers me something, I take it," and, "I'm done taking the heroes lightly. I'll use everything I've got to obliterate the dregs All Might left behind." From a purely practical standpoint, if he intends to throw everything he has at the heroes, he has no reason to throw the MLA under the bus, and 116,000 reasons to keep them around. I'm altogether sure that, so long as they stood to be useful to his plans, he would have kept them around.

|| The MLA is quirk supremacist, like Endeavor, so Dabi would never work with them. + || Dabi is just using Skeptic against Skeptic's will; it’s not a willing partnership.

I hadn’t seen the second point in the wild, but I suppose it must be how the “The League will betray the MLA” theorists are getting around Dabi and Skeptic’s clear collaboration and how that collaboration totally scuttles the first point, huh? Hilarious.

Anyway, setting aside the fact that Dabi showed up to the one planning session we were shown when even Geten didn’t, there’s evidence in the canon that Dabi was working with Skeptic since even before the raid. Consider that Dabi’s video was filmed at the villa (the wall paneling and the style of the couch both match) and ask yourself where the camera he used came from. Once the filming was complete, where was the video stored such that Skeptic could access it from his laptop? If Dabi’d had it on an SD card and Skeptic was seeing it for the first time, why didn’t Spinner, Compress and Toga watch it alongside him? Surely Skeptic would need to watch it through at least once to know when to splice in the footage of Jin’s death for maximum dramatic impact? On that note, by far the most telling piece of evidence is this: if Dabi wasn't already working with Skeptic, then why was he wearing one of Skeptic's body cameras during his confrontation with Hawks?

Further, Skeptic's protest when he’s pulled onto Machia isn't that he doesn’t want to be with the League; it’s that he doesn’t want to leave Re-Destro behind. Once he's resigned that it's going to happen, though, he's cocky about his talents and complimentary of Dabi's big reveal, even if he is exasperated about the League's antics. It's ambiguous, I admit, but given that Dabi's wearing his cameras, he had to have known Dabi had a reason for them--and given that he is both abrasive and mouthy, I can’t imagine he wouldn’t have demanded to know what that reason was.

Hell, Dabi even thanks Skeptic for his editing work, which is more direct positive approval than he's ever shown anyone in the League (give or take the high-five with Twice, which, genuine or not, he would have known he was doing on camera). That much-vaunted panel of Spinner telling Toga to come back to the League? Dabi's grinning, which in isolation you could read as a certain rueful affection, but with the full context of the chapter, it becomes apparent that Dabi is grinning at Skeptic's laptop, seconds after telling Skeptic to "hurry up." Skeptic is, at that moment, probably gearing up the video to project nationwide, and Dabi’s more focused on that than he is Toga’s crisis, even when Compress directly appeals to him for aid. He tells Compress he doesn’t care, the same way he told Hawks he doesn't give a damn about the League.

Let me be clear here: I'm inclined to take Dabi at his word. I think Dabi hangs around the League because, for all that he says one man's conviction can shake the world, he also knows his own limits, and the League offers safety in numbers and an avenue to pursue his revenge. Maybe he finds them acceptable enough company, maybe he even does like them a bit despite himself, but I think any affection he might have for them is entirely incidental to his views on their usefulness. In the same way, while he's willing to bail on the MLA when the heroes attack, I don't think it was his plan to do so, especially not given his apparent immediate regard for Skeptic, as seen in the deleted scene here. Sure, he dislikes Geten, but ultimately, Geten is a stupid kid too tied up in his care for Re-Destro--who's now worshipping the ground Shigaraki walks on--to really be getting in Dabi's way.

Maybe if the MLA really were as quirk supremacist as Geten makes them out to be, Dabi would be actively looking for a way to see ‘em burn, but as I’ve said countless times before, Geten is not a reliable narrator vis a vis the MLA's doctrine. Now, obviously I don't expect Dabi to give them an unearned benefit of the doubt,(1) not after what he heard Geten say, but if Dabi has been working with Skeptic, it doesn't take a genius to realize that while Anthropomorph is a perfectly good quirk, it is categorically not what primarily defines Skeptic’s "worth" in the MLA societal microcosm.

Nothing that Skeptic does reflects the way Geten talks about "elevating one's ability" or "sheer strength" in the way that HeroAca fandom tends to understand as referring to flashy and offensive quirks. And yet, Skeptic is a ranked advisor warranting an introductory panel with RD's inner circle and Geten is not. Perhaps, just perhaps, this might have led Dabi to reevaluating his initial assessment just slightly?

|| Mr. Compress rejects the PLF moniker for Shigaraki, ergo Mr. Compress didn’t genuinely associate Shigaraki and the League with the PLF.

So, this one's pretty wild, because, in the same chapter that had people crowing about Mr. Compress's dialogue, Mr. Compress's actions show the exact opposite of the conclusion this theory would demand. Specifically, if it was always the League's plan to ditch the MLA, Mr. Compress would have darted right past Skeptic, ignoring the man's cries for help. He doesn't--he picks Skeptic up on the way past and (at least in the volume corrections) deposits him safe with Dabi in Spinner's scarf. Of course, Skeptic still stands to be useful, but if one acknowledges that Skeptic's usefulness is reason enough not to abandon him, then what exactly is the argument for leaving 116,000 perfectly useful warm bodies behind?

But let's set aside Compress rescuing Skeptic and focus on the actual point, because that point in itself is still flawed. Mr. Compress's thoughts on the PLF in the specific talk bubble in question are somewhat ambiguous. It's another case of the Viz translation making a couple of assumptions that are just that--assumptions.

Compress's words in the Japanese are as follows:

Chōjō Kaihō Sensen.… Viran rengo no Shigaraki Tomura ga…

Viz then renders the line like so:

The Paranormal Liberation Front's… No, the League of Villain's Shigaraki…

Note that in the Japanese, the possessive no is only included once, to indicate Shigaraki's association with the League. Further, the original doesn't indicate any negation in Compress's thoughts. Yes, he could be rejecting the PLF association for Shigaraki, but he could as easily be narrowing his scope to Shigaraki as the figure he represents to the League, rather than the figure he represents to the PLF--not rejecting wholesale, but rather becoming more specific. Compress might also be thinking first of the PLF as a general organization, then narrowing down to Shigaraki specifically.

Rather than reading this line as an indication that Compress regards the PLF as temporary, I was heartened by the fact that Compress thought about the PLF at all! If the League really had been planning to discard them this entire time, then there's no reason for Compress to have ever taken the Front seriously enough to have thought about them in that moment of crisis. You can carry this back further, too. In Chapter 258, when Twice is asking Hawks for help, he says that Spinner and Compress have been in meetings for days. Coupled with Compress's first thought about the entity that will carry out Harima's desired reformation being the Liberation Front (or possibly "the Liberation Front's Shigaraki"), this indicates to me that Compress was taking it seriously, not just gorging himself on sushi on the MLA's dime.

Indeed, back in Ujiko's lab, when it was just Shigaraki talking about his backstory and his dreams of destruction, Compress looks the opposite of impressed; we know from his narration in 294 that he liked the League because they didn't place any importance on one another’s pasts. Yet, at some point, his view shifted to believing that fulfilling his ancestor's ambition, his bloodline’s duty, really might be back on the table. We as readers don't quite know when that shift happened, but given, again, his initial mental invocation of the PLF, I think we can assume that it's tied to that alliance, those resources. And sure, when the moment of crisis happens and he's really defining who and what Shigaraki is to him, and where his values and priorities lie, it's with the League and Shigaraki as the leader of the League. But that doesn't mean he never had his hopes for the PLF at all, or was partaking in plans to ditch them.

Also too, this is a man who was lamenting the loss of their partnership with Overhaul, a man who personally maimed him, on top of killing a comrade. You're telling me the guy who shrugged off his animosity towards Overhaul would willingly allow the League to plot sabotage against even wealthier collaborators against whom he has even less reason to hold a grudge? Come on, guys.

|| Toga hated Curious, so she wouldn't want to work with the MLA either.

This one's easy: Toga pretty explicitly hated Curious, but she's even more explicit that she likes the MLA because she thinks the world they want to create is wonderful. She says this verbatim at the end of 225, after Curious has spent the entire chapter hounding her with explosions and intrusive questions. What turns her animosity on Curious is not some reveal that the MLA's world would be terrible after all, but Curious calling Toga's "normal" miserable and tragic. Essentially, she doesn't object to the world the MLA wants to bring about; she objects to being turned into a martyr for that world, especially when that martyrdom requires that the things that make Toga happy be characterized as horrific misfortunes.

Toga doesn't like Curious; she kills Curious. And then she comes into a position of leadership, and we don't know a lot about how that position takes her, but she seems delighted to be walking out onto the stage to be announced as such, and she makes active contributions to the discussion of the PLF's plans in Chapter 245. We are, again, given no indication that her lethal response to Curious means that she's planning to ditch the MLA on the whole.

Incidentally, Curious asserts what she does about Toga only in the context of the world as it stands. The world's rejection of Toga's normal, and the extremes that rejection drove Toga to, are what Curious considers tragic and miserable, not Toga's fascination with blood in and of itself. She clearly believes that, in the world the MLA envisions, Toga's life would not be so miserable because she would never have been oppressed to the degree that she snapped. And frankly, Curious isn't wrong. The only reason she is a villain in that scene is that she's willing to murder Toga to project that tragedy to the world. If she'd been willing to sit down and have a civil interview with Toga to print it in a relevant magazine, she would have been fine.

|| Twice would never forgive them for what they did to Giran.

You know, this is a totally fair point. It is, however, somewhat complicated by the fact that Giran himself never left the PLF. Now, there’s almost certainly something to be said about Giran’s whole information broker shtick being terminally compromised by his capture, his maiming, his client list being hacked, etc. He had a bunch of identifying items strewn all over the country that were covered in the national news, items that people who associated with him closely certainly would have recognized. Maybe he’s laying low for a while?

I don’t know why Giran was still around by the time of the raid. I can theorize about his pragmatism or what have you, but the canon really doesn’t give us anything to go on. Still, if he really hated the MLA all that much, as he would be totally justified in doing, it’s pretty bizarre that Horikoshi showed him twice in PLF crowd scenes post-Deika looking nothing worse than kind of confused and uneasy. Heck, you’d think he would at least have merited a better seat in the crowd for the big merger announcement.

Giran aside, the fact that Twice never does hit it off with anyone in his regiment is, I think, telling. If there’s anyone in the League that intentionally kept himself at a distance from the MLA because of hard feelings, it’s likely Twice. After all, if he had befriended anyone, he presumably wouldn’t have needed to go to Hawks for tutoring almost an entire month after Deika. That said, the fact that Twice does go running to Hawks for tutoring shows that he’s at least doing his best to act in accordance with what he thinks Shigaraki and the rest want. That doesn’t preclude the League having a secret plan that he’s either in on and playing along with, or hasn’t been told about because he might not be able to stop himself from vocalizing about it. Still, while absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, obviously absence of evidence is not evidence of presence. So, lacking any sign that the rest of the League is planning treachery, I’m not inclined to assume Twice’s lack of forgiveness is indicative of anything other than his own feelings.

|| [Error: argument about Spinner's opinion on the PLF not found.]

:: INCOMING SALT WARNING :: INCOMING SALT WARNING ::

This is the one that really gets to me. I have never seen an argument that the League is planning to betray the PLF that convincingly explains the fact that Spinner, to all available evidence, threw himself wholeheartedly into trying to make the PLF succeed. To be more precise, I have seen one explanation, and that explanation is that the plan to ditch the MLA was a secret that only Shigaraki, Dabi and sometimes Toga knew about, and to reiterate, that is bullshit.

In my experience, this is an explanation proposed by people who care about Spinner only insofar as he can be a Soft Gaymer Boyfriend or score them rhetorical points, but have little to no interest in his ongoing--and, indeed, increasing--importance to the League generally and Shigaraki’s arc specifically. The dude who talked about how Twice’s home was the League, who got through to Toga while still respecting her choice when no one else could, the guy who recognized the hollowness within Shigaraki but also bonded with him over video games, the man who Mr. Compress said was Shigaraki’s most devoted follower(2)--this man did not do all of that for people in this fandom to say, “Oh, well, the others probably just kept it a secret from him because they thought he’d be bad at lying.”

Really? “Bad at lying?” And that’s an adequate justification, is it, for Shigaraki letting Spinner toil for months under false pretenses? For lying to the man who adores him the most? Of course it isn’t, but the people who theorize this don’t really care about Spinner’s adoration for Shigaraki, or the fact that Shigaraki rewarding Spinner’s feelings by allowing him to dedicate himself unstintingly to something Shigaraki was planning to discard from the beginning would be a blatant abuse of Spinner’s trust.

I have never seen anyone try to argue that Spinner was in on a plan to betray the MLA all along. That’s because it’s patently obvious that Spinner--forthright, direct Spinner, who named the merged organization with Re-Destro, spends all his time in meetings, has a direct exchange with Re-Destro about the state of their plans, and is probably the reason RD started wearing polka dots--went all-in on the PLF. But for the people who propose the “the League was always going to bail” theory, Spinner and his labors are an afterthought.

Spinner is not an afterthought. Where Mr. Compress has been captured, Toga could hypothetically be peeled away from the League via Uraraka, and Dabi almost certainly will be peeled away via the Todoroki plot, Spinner’s driving motivation at this point is Shigaraki himself. He connected to Shigaraki’s nihilism, his hatred, but also his humanity--the humanity in Shigaraki Tomura, not in Shimura Tenko. His empathy didn’t spring from contrived psychic glimpses of crying 5-year-olds, but from long months of observation, doubt, and gradually deepening wonder. He’s the only person currently with Shigaraki that I can see caring enough about Shigaraki’s welfare that he might sacrifice his own goals and desires to help Deku save him.

Spinner is not an afterthought, and I refuse to build or entertain theories that treat him that way. So as to his opinions on the MLA? Despite having his own reasons to be leery of them based on how shabbily Trumpet treated him, he was obviously trying to make the Paranormal Liberation Front succeed, which means he must have believed that Shigaraki wanted it to succeed. Therefore, unless you’re prepared to assert that Shigaraki (and everyone else who was in on it!) was cruel enough to lie to Spinner about something he was devoting so much time and energy to, the inescapable conclusion is that Shigaraki also wanted the Front to succeed.

(Note: After letting a friend pre-read this, I have been informed that there is, in fact, one explanation offered for Spinner knowing the League was going to abandon the PLF but working his ass off on the venture anyway, and that explanation is, “Something something wants to prove himself because low self-esteem.” This is so ridiculous I can’t even bring myself to edit this post accordingly. Low self-esteem! Because nothing would alleviate Spinner's low self-esteem like toiling for months over something that holds no worth to the people he actually cares about, right? Right?? Bah. Humbug!)

And but so, to wrap all that up: I fundamentally disagree that the League viewed the Paranormal Liberation Front as a temporary arrangement, at least to the extent that they were actively planning to betray their newfound--new won--allies. The fact that I don't think the League intended to discard the MLA out of hand does, thus, influence my opinion that, whatever Geten's fate will be, I'm pretty sure it's not going to be, "He gets murdered in a way that resembles nothing so much as a sick revenge fantasy dozens of chapters after the last point when such a death would have been remotely tonally appropriate."

Thanks for the ask, anon! Sorry about-- *waves at all of this*

-------------------------------

(1) Not that Mr. “Burns Random Delinquents Alive For Not Measuring Up To His Standards For Villainy” has any moral standing to criticize others for how they determine the value of peoples’ lives, mind.

(2) Other translations for the verb in Mr. Compress’s Japanese line of, “You are the one who ____s Shigaraki the most,” include yearn for, long for, pine for, miss, love dearly, adore, idolize, and revere. “Most devoted follower” is accurate enough, but considerably less homo than some of the things we could have gotten there.

[loquaciousquark]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E111 (Redux! Oct. 13, 2020)

Gooooood evening good evening good evening, all! I started the VOD late for this recap and somehow the first four or so minutes of the show have a Twitch audio copyright claim, so I am reduced to only reading Brian's lips when he asks if we're on the internet. Hilariously, Marisha's background room is a comfy-looking blue/gold fabric wall with a ceramic colorful abstract lamp and a yellow silk scarf over the lampshade, and Taliesin's is an industrial looking games room in grey and black with multiple monitors, overhead speakers, and mysterious metal fixtures behind him. What a treasure this group is, honestly.

Tonight's guests: Marisha Ray & Taliesin Jaffe, discussing episodes 110 and 111 again. I wildly speculate once more about what might have caused their absence: jury duty? Sam appearing on The Masked Singer? Something to do with the animated show? One day, we’ll know, one day... (One day this “copyrighted audio” section will come back from the wars, too. Ugh!) Finally! The audio comes back to reveal Brian discussing the endless reality of digital meetings and Marisha talking about (I think) her glare-reducing glasses she’s wearing. Welcome to the New Age (welcome to the New Age, to the New Age).

Announcements: Marisha suggests checking out Dimension20, another live tabletop gaming group, which premieres live on Wednesdays at 4pm (CollegeHumor). 

Brian immediately wants to know how they feel about the revelation that Molly is alive. Taliesin’s personal reaction: he “knows some things” he can’t talk about and is aware of several possibilities that might be going on, but had a sneaking suspicion that there would not be a body for them to find. He says it’s almost all there for anyone to see in past material. Marisha’s personal reaction: she just wants to know how she’s doing with her theories, & was trying to block Tal’s face out deliberately as she was going off on her theories in the last episode. Taliesin says he thought her ideas were pretty good!

Cad has no clue what to think - it’s like listening to your friends talk about Buffy. Marisha thought it was a 50/50 Molly would still be there, but Beau had no idea. Not that it mattered, because as soon as Matt went through with it the reveal still blew their minds. Tal laid out his plans for the character with Matt during Campaign One (towards the end) after they all got their VM tattoos.

It is a “horrifying and gross” thing to dig up a body, and Beau was pretty reluctant to do it. Tal, as Cad: “Sometimes dead’s better.” The moral quandary of trying to speak with a dead friend was very different here than the frequent occasions they used the spell in C1.

Taliesin says his poker face is very bad, so it’s easier for him to over-react and let it all play out. The only other player he can see very easily from his place in their current setup is Travis, and because he knows Travis doesn’t watch TM, tweet, or participate in social media, he admits he thoroughly enjoyed watching Travis freak out at his freaking out. He says he only knew about 20% of what Matt described at the end of that episode. He was picking things to mug to increase Travis’s surprise. I love this so much.

Taliesin provided the table left leg shake; Travis provided table right. Ha!

Beau is really accepting her role in the Cobalt Soul. It’s good when “as a person, you feel like you can settle into your calling. Sometimes you can do more from the inside than fighting from the outside.” It’s a mirrored but opposite path of Keyleth from C1; Beau felt like she was too good for her duty, while Keyleth thought she wasn’t good enough.

Caduceus is not a big believer in jumping to conclusions. He does have an idea/notion of the “city of the undead” and thinks all this necrotic energy must come from somewhere, and wonders if this is the “capital of anti-death.” He’s willing to believe whatever he sees. This is one of the few things that trigger a bit of loathing and disgust in him. It was terrifying that the Wildmother didn’t know anything.

Beau is pretty confident in her Charlie Day impression laying-out-the-research last episode. She enjoyed taking the things that were known & extrapolating around them; this is a huge facet of Marisha’s own personality and she really enjoys it, so she built a character this time that would allow that kind of puzzle-solving. It’s also why she repeatedly notes when Beau journals, so she can avoid metagaming. Trent’s mention of Vess Durogna’s tomb raiding was completely circumstantial, and the only reason she’d made the connection to the Tombtakers was because she’d recently reviewed those notes for a separate unannounced project. Sometimes she tries to make connections and Matt is like, “It was...just descriptive. Just flavor. The curtains were red...” and she has to discard a paragraph of notes. She feels like it’s still something they have to do because of “look at what he does! Look! It’s totally valid!”

Cosplay of the Week: @kitsunstudios with a gorgeous Caduceus with a very intricate silk vest.

Caduceus’s takedown of Trent! One of my favorite moments in the entirety of C2. Taliesin felt Trent was an asshole; Caduceus felt sorry for him because of how dumb he thought he was. Caduceus’s response was "this is the dumbest man I’ve ever met in my life. He’s so dumb! Is nobody going to tell this guy how dumb he is? Oh, they’re all freaked out. Somebody needs to tell this guy he’s an idiot before somebody gets hurt.” (Marisha: “Before?”) Tal says it was the product of several years of therapy and many drunk conversations with Whitney Moore. It was from a genuine place of concern from Caduceus. “How are you allowed to have this much power and be that dumb?”

Brian loved how funny it was to watch everyone tiptoe around Trent and then Caduceus bulldoze through the end of the meal.

Taliesin: “Damage doesn’t make you interesting or better. It’s not what makes you good. Character isn’t found in damage. Just recovery.”

Brian & Marisha commiserate going through the stage where believing surviving something automatically made you a stronger person, better for the pain; instead it just meant you had to pick up the pieces after. Marisha talks about how strength through survival may be true for some people, but it shouldn’t be considered a necessity. Taliesin talks about how he used to think he had to be miserable to write. Brian talks about how believing he liked reading and writing miserable things only limited him for years.

Marisha feels it’s a C2 theme that almost all the PCs have someone trying to handwave or take credit for their accomplishments or explain their pain as being for their own good (Trent, Beau’s dad, Obann). She thinks it’s interesting to see all the various ways people try to take credit for your work/delegitimize you as a person. She loves that RPGs allow you to explore these odd moralities in interesting ways. The only way to fight it is to have a sense of your own self-worth, which is a problem a lot of the M9 started with.

Caduceus likes everyone, and really likes people who appear to need role models (Eodwulf). “With the right friends and the right bar and the right attitude, I think he’d be okay. Come over here where it’s so much better. That seems like an exhausting friendship that you have there.”

Marisha loves the mix of personalities in the M9; Veth, Cad, & Jester were all “we kind of like them!” after the dinner, and she immediately made eye contact with Travis and they both shook their heads. She knows Beau has to go along with it for Caleb’s sake for now, but she & Fjord are pretty sus of Trent’s proteges.

Beau is less concerned about Artagan’s relationship to Jester because “he showed his ass--she’s less worried about Jester now because a little of the magic is gone.” It’s a little like becoming an adult and realizing your parents are also just adults & human. Caduceus wasn’t suspicious of the Traveler for a long time until they got to the island. Aside: Taliesin loves the pantheon in D&D. “The notion of attempting to apply common Western conceptions of religion to a world where you have a pantheon of interventionist gods as baseline makes no sense to me. Everyone admits that every other god is there and doing shit; it has more in common with ancient Rome than anything else.” Now that he knows it was a con, he feels the wind had been taken out of it. He does have a sense that Jester’s gotten back together with an ex: “I hope that I’m really happy for you.” They’re both interested to see how Jester navigates the new relationship.

My internet goes out, of course. I panic for a second, thinking I’ve lost everything above, but all is well! Thanks, Form History Control addon!

Marisha loved punching Artagan, but regretting rolling so poorly. “I miss violence.” Dani lets us know it’s been about four episodes since the last battle.

There’s no way the Cobalt Reserve doesn’t have a single document on the Eyes of Nine. Beau believes “there are no real secrets” because people are just bad at not writing things down. For there to be no information at all seems really suspicious for her.

Fanart of the Week: @oddalchemist on twitter with some awesome Beau conspiracy red-thread boards overlaid a distant shadowy Molly walking away.

Caduceus feels a little guilty for really enjoying his time right now with the M9 and not wanting to go home. He’s starting to suspect that he’s going to go home very different than when he left. “He has the softest problems. I don’t know if I want to move back in with Mom & Dad.”

Beau is trying to get comfortable with the idea of being happy. Jester is probably Beau’s first real best friend & one of the first healthy female friendships she’s ever had. As long as she still has Jester in her life, she doesn’t care. For Yasha... “At the end of the day, Beau is a lonely person and has always been a lonely person. And I think you kinda reach this point where once you’re not lonely anymore, you can kind of come out of the fog and realize that was horrible! And terrifying! And is even more terrifying now that I know what I could have, and I don’t want to go back to that. At the end of the day Beau doesn’t want to be lonely anymore. There’s always been that flirtation with Yasha, but everyone had to figure their own shit out. And now it feels like it’s coming out a little bit of that haze, maybe this actually could be...” There are a lot of ways they complement each other & are good-different from each other. Marisha believes people can be attracted to more than person at once.

Caduceus doesn’t think nature turned against him on Rumblecusp, it was just a reality of nature being dangerous and violent. “He has a complex relationship with nature.” He doesn’t expect special treatment.

Thoughts on the mansion: “Man, it’s nice to be seen.” Marisha: “I don’t know how I ended up becoming the Scanlan of this campaign, but I’m living for it.” It felt like an echo of “I’m better for having known you.” They compare Marisha taking specific notes on the campaign to Liam taking specific notes on people’s favorite tapestries, comics, etc.

They talk about missing theme parks and daydream a park version of the mansion in CritRoleLand. It’s lovely.

Taliesin never expected Divine Intervention to work; he just wanted to roll some dice. He’s still processing what he saw/heard. They all agree it was very useful in the Vokodo fight.

Vilya! Marisha: “Ah! Ah! Ah!” As a player, Marisha was so deep in Beau’s eyes she didn’t pick up it was Vilya at first (especially since Matt really emphasized they should not be looking for C1 NPCs). Marisha’s brain melted. She bawled her eyes out on the ride home after that episode. Right after it ended, Laura told Marisha “Keyleth finally gets her happy ending,” and it makes Marisha emotional again since Keyleth’s story ended so bittersweetly. She talks about the very real feelings of “just wanting them to be happy, though!” She went back and listened to all her old Keyleth playlists. Everyone was teary after the episode. “Everyone has these 100% real memories of being these characters and having these good times.”

And that’s that for that! Thanks for your patience, all, and is it Thursday yet?

[missorgana]

looks a lot like christmas

pairing: alex/willie, background julie/luke

fandom: julie and the phantoms

rating: general

word count: 1634

warning: swearing, referenced homophobia, dysfunctional family

summary: It's the first Christmas in the afterlife, and Alex misses Willie. (first christmas together, canon compliant)

(my 12 days of fanfiction event is now upon us!!! thank you @sayankotor for the prompt, i hope you enjoy this ❤️ and don’t forget, you can still send me prompts if you haven’t already!)

read on ao3

Alex is anxious. Then again, when is he not?

He certainly didn’t expect this to continue after he, well, died, yet here he is. 

After meeting Julie, getting to perform again, Caleb’s curse, him and his boys not disappearing forever, let’s just say there’s been a lot going on. Some peace and quiet serves him right, Alex thinks.

Oh, but meeting Willie, that was also something. Something completely different, so Alex doesn’t quite know where to place this feeling fluttering behind his chest.

In all honesty, he hasn’t seen Willie since they said their goodbyes. Of course not, the shorter boy thought he would fade away. Whether that be by the hands of Caleb or their own salvation.

Alex misses him. Of course he bloody does.

Luke and Reggie’s been comforting about it, even assured him he’d see Willie again, but Alex isn’t that sure.

He doesn’t know where he is, but he’s scared. What won’t Caleb do if he finds out the skater boy helped them out of his grasp?

And, of course, because Alex is just so obvious, according to Luke, he wishes he’d said something to Willie.

Something like a reply to the shorter boy’s line in the club.

“There’s a lot to like here.” What’s that supposed to mean? Alex knows what he  wants it to mean, but he was so shell shocked, he didn’t even react. He let Willie walk away.

And, oh, “I’d do anything for you.”

Luke likes to remind Alex just how not straight that sentence was, but the irrational fear in him still can’t help those nagging doubts in his head.

But why think of those when it’s Christmas, right?

That’s how Reggie gets him out of his own head. He’s always looked forward to Christmas, sometimes with a frightening obsession, but it’s nice of him to use it as a distraction, as well.

They’re good friends. Too good. Julie too, who lets them help decorate, with Carlos as well, of course, letting him in on their little family secret with their dad blissfully unaware. Alex is sure he wouldn’t mind.

In fact, while their dad’s at work, Julie and the boys work on the Christmas tree as a team effort.

There’s barely any tree visible at this point, presents filled up on the floor, Julie taking a hold of the glass ornaments, so the ghosts don’t risk smashing anything, and themselves focusing on glitter, light chain and the like.

She teaches them to fold these paper decorations, too, and Luke laughs at Reggie’s overly eager running about.

Julie takes Luke’s hand for a moment.

It’s different now that they can actually touch, and Luke smiles shyly. Maybe that just makes Alex miss the skater boy more.

But, of course, before Christmas day, the boys want to pay a visit to their families. Reggie found both his parent’s new homes, a month after it all went down, and despite it all, it gives him some peace looking after them.

Same goes with Luke, who receives a kiss on his cheek before poofing out.

And, well, that leaves Alex. He does poof out, too, giving the brightly smiling girl a wave, despite her eyes definitely looking through his facade.

Alex knows where his family is, just as much as his boys. And that’s where he goes. He’s not quite sure how much peace, or warmth, or fulfillment that brings him, though.

He rather just deems it a necessary thing to get done.

…

As Alex poofs into the stark white house at the end of the road, lavender painted window sills at the courtesy of his mom, and space enough for a garden for the dog, just like the old days, he’s ready to be let down.

He’s already been that anyway, he’s used to it.

When Alex went here for the first time since they died, just a month ago, actually, he was shocked at just how little had changed.

Inside, too. Living room seemed untouched since he ran away to sleep in the garage with the boys. Only difference being the huge portrait of himself over the fireplace.

That surprised Alex, too.

His father didn’t look at him the same way since he came out, and even though his mother didn’t admit to not accepting him, the sad look she gave him hurt even more than the spiteful words said to his face, for some reason.

Alex thought he was lucky his brother wasn’t home to hear it, which is just as depressing as everything else.

They’ve stuck with the traditional Christmas family gathering, still. And just beneath his own face staring back at him, on the mantelpiece, was the angel that always had its home there for the holidays.

It’s almost like the family used his death to forget what made him run away. Or rather, made them push him out, because God knows he didn’t want to be, excuse his language, fucking homeless at the age of 17.

Is it too tragic that dysfunctional families are what tied him and the boys together, made them inseparable? Perhaps.

Alex’s mother still had that sad look in her eyes when she looked at his portrait. Well it’s fair enough, if she hadn’t acted like that when he was alive, too.

But after mulling the thoughts from his first visit over, he didn’t have the energy to be bitter anymore. He’s just disappointed in them.

And Luke and Reggie, and Julie were right every time they told him it’s his family’s loss, and immediately stopped him in his tracks when he tried to blame himself, or regret he ever told them.

Now he can sit beside that very fireplace, and observe his strained family eat of the Christmas dinner, a painful silence settled on the resident.

Way to have Christmas cheer, huh.

Except, a poof, a sound he’s oddly familiar with by now sounds from the entrance. Alex expects it to be one, or both of the boys, picking him up on the way back to Julie because he hasn’t watched the time.

It’s a boy he knows, but one he’s missed.

Willie.

He doesn’t even contain the surprise to his own head, but says it out loud, he realises, when the skater ghost is standing in the archway, looking at Alex like a lost treasure.

There’s this feeling in his stomach like the first time they met, which is insane because they’re  dead , he’s not supposed to stomach aches, or any aches for that matter.

“Hey, hotdog.”

Alex probably looks like a computer in shut down mode. It’s okay though, he supposes, since his silence doesn’t scare the shorter boy from sitting down next to him.

Okay. Calm down. Butterflies in his stomach, ghost butterflies, what the fuck?

The boy, now next to him, who’s just too pretty for Alex to process, duh, he’s been since the first day, puts his gaze on the gathering in front of them.

He can hear the fire crackling behind him, and he feels warm. Because of blushing, more likely.

Can ghosts even blush? He doesn’t have blood anymore, for God’s sake.

Alex ends up interrupting Willie when he tries to say something, stupid, yet the skater boy urges him to continue first.

“How’d you know where to find me?” he finds himself asking. Not “Where have you been?”, like a rational person. But he never claimed to be rational, did he?

Willie smiles softly. Fuck.

“I have my ways.” is all Alex gets, and instead of elaborating, he takes this as his cue to talk, “They’re not big on the holidays?”

Alex turns back to the dinner table, and the thick, uncomfortable aura.

If they knew he was there, watching them, all hell would break loose. Or if he was still alive, probably more so. He hates that thought.

He gives Willie a shrug, “They used to. I guess a dead gay son kills the mood.”

Alex got that sarcastic, borderline depressing humor from time to time. It’s not something that came with death, but perhaps, a bit more recurring now.

Reggie, the ever optimist and dork he is, always made it a mission to scold him for those kinds of jokes, and that’s what friends are supposed to do, right?

Willie looks at him. Concerned, but understanding. Alex’s not sure how he knows, but trust him, he just does.

“At least you got a portrait.”

And that’s where Alex takes his chance, “Where have you been?”

The words seem harsh, but Willie smiles again, so maybe it’s his own overthinking taking a toll.

“Avoiding Caleb, mostly.”

“Did… I-did he do something? To you?”

And the boy, an  angel , more like, knows those nervous eyes, it seems, and for some reason, thanks to whatever good forces out there, he takes his hand.

“You worry too much.” is all he says.

Well, he’s not wrong. Definitely not the first time he’s heard that statement.

Also, that’s not in any way an answer to his question, but Alex has developed a feeling of when he shouldn’t ask further.

Willie doesn’t seem as distraught as he expected. It’s weird, because just like before after all that mess, he reappears into his life- uh, well, afterlife, just as randomly as the many times before.

He’s soft. Alex doesn’t have other words to describe him, at all, like in the Hollywood Ghost Club.

And he even convinces himself to form words, an invite to Julie’s, not willing to risk the skater boy disappearing in front of him, too soon, too often, but Willie reads his mind all over again, “You wanna get out of here?”

Alex sighs in relief.

It’s warm now, the silence, because of the boy next to him. He’d rather prefer that warmth somewhere… warmer, in general. Not here.

“Please.”