#also who was in charge of naming these characters

[aimfall]

REALLLLLL okay so I have this dnd character named ms erwie and she’s a great eared nightjar artificer who’s 130 years old. a surgeon fucked up her hip (shout out kiwi) like a bunch of years ago, so she made her own wheelchair. and it’s Amazing. its base is modeled off of a motorized wheelchair, But it’s a steampunk setting so it’s not electricity powered & smoke pours out of pipes at the back.

But what you wanted to hear about was the Attack wheelchair. she has different modes on it and one of it is Attack Mode. in this mode, her wheels get giant spikes on them & a bunch of weapons come out of the back (akin to like. the bridge where papyrus gets out all the weapons surrounding frisk). her combat is silly because she has a charge attack (homebrewed and named “beep beep”) where she can run people over. her spells are also all done by her wheelchair and not herself. and I was going to make her attack like wild magic with the explanation that she has so many buttons that she made Years ago that she doesn’t remember what does what, but I didn’t end up utilizing that last session </3 maybe next one

here she is. she’s running over the current american president in the second image

i think cane swords are cool conceptually but i think nobody is going far enough, we should be putting weapons in more mobility aids. i want to see characters with bazooka scooters. crossbow crutches. service dog: with a gun. try petting me now, fucker.

[hai7ani]

yves!! the kpop anon here :p i dont know if you already got an ask about this, but what do you actually think about bonten trio? a lot of people say they wouldnt get along, but i like to think that they would😭 what do you think?

Bonten trio

Ngl realistically they don't get along well at all. Especially Ran and Sanzu who has had some kind of vendetta against each other going on since Kantou Manji, so I think it'd be hard for them to be in the same room long hours without some stuff breaking out. I do think that Sanzu in general is a very difficult person to handle as well, hence why. There's of course more stuff between him and the brothers that has made them so hostile with each other.

I think this also applies to all of Bonten in general like they're not bosozoku kids who rev bikes and fight idiots who badmouthed about them anymore. They're wanted criminals who kills and trade drugs/weapons/prostitutes for a living, drive million-dollar cars and stay in penthouses all over the world. They live looking over their shoulders all the time.

Extras

Lore accurate Bonten trio?

Bonten trio only came to be because they're the most popular characters in Bonten, but I think realistically the Bonten trio should be Kakucho, Kokonoi and Takeomi. These three are the real pillars of Bonten. One's in charge of money, one's an advisor who Mikey listens to a lot and plans most things since he does have ample knowledge of the underworld, and one's his left hand who oversees most things in the organisation. Think of Mikey and Kakucho as K-Drama My Name's Choi Mujin and Jung Taeju. Sanzu.... he's always off doing his own thing if not serving Mikey, so I don't think he fits into the list, or he even wants to fit in at all. He doesn't like anybody, doesn't get along with anyone.

Kakucho and Ran

Kakucho and Ran have a decent relationship since last time. They're able to sit together and have a drink from time to time, talk about life, but both are smart and clever enough to respect boundaries and not overstep. They are good with words. But one time Kakucho tried advising Ran on something that he thinks Ran is doing wrong/going off track and Ran got pissed. But they don't argue/go back and forth like Rindou and Kokonoi would, like in Helheim where they quarrelled in front of everyone because of a girl. Instead, a lot of passive aggressiveness and stern tones are used between the two. Sharp mouths and clever minds at work.

Rindou

Rindou doesn't care about anything. I've thought of this before and I really can't see Rindou being involved in the organisation as much. I do think that he tried leaving Bonten after witnessing Mikey kill someone (during the shift from Kantou Manji to Bonten after their win in the Three Deities) and realising the weight of all this, but couldn't, so he stayed, but he doesn't like it. He has the mentality of "I didn't ask to be here, so why should I care?" Something like that. He was only dragged into Kantou Manji/Bonten because South lost.

Kokonoi and Kakucho

Kokonoi and Kakucho have a strict business-only relationship. Other than organisation stuff, do not fucking talk to me. But they're cool with each other to say the least. Nothing wrong with each other.

Takeomi (and Kakucho)

Takeomi has that relationship with everyone but he and Kakucho are the closest/have the most interactions because of their positions (even though it's also pretty clear that they don't fancy each other, Kakucho only entertains Takeomi because he knows how to separate work and personal, Takeomi can't). But even so, Takeomi picks fights the most, probably because of his age multiplied by his position that he thinks it's no problem to order the executives around.

I love this specific panel in chapter 212, I really liked the way Kakucho talked to Takeomi here, like damn Kaku you're quick with it 😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨

Rindou and Takeomi

Rindou thinks the guy has a special vendetta against him because he keeps biting on Rindou at any chance he gets.

Rindou and Kokonoi

The two have nothing to say to each other. The two might be tied together by some stuff that requires Kokonoi's help since he's in charge of finance, but Rindou thinks other than that he has nothing to talk to with the guy. All of them in general have had interactions with Kokonoi because of this reason. He's a cool guy, but it's strictly business-only (no money no talk) with him.

Mochi

As for Mochi...... I don't know honestly. I don't know much about him because his aura in Tenjiku and his aura in Bonten are completely different. No backstory given either like ZERO. All we know is that he used to fight with the Kawata Twins before Tenjiku and he's a fucking beast. At least for the Haitanis they have delusional-enough fans to make things up. But for Mochi???? Can someone share us some thoughts... I'm not in that radar 😭🙏🏻

Mikey

I don't have anything to say about Mikey because I still don't understand his mind even after rereading the manga. Like. I don't know if it's accurate to say that he doesn't care? He lets them handle things their own way, which to him is considered very lenient (he can be more fearful if he wants, but he doesn't need to, because the others already know better than to get cocky around him) and only gives out approvals. Maybe if he wants something or a certain territory he'll give out orders. But he still has his own methods for handling certain stuff. I like to think that all of them are constantly trying to live under his radar so that nothing troublesome happens. For example, they're handling some stuff, and the one thing they always say as a reminder (either to each other or to underlings) is to "make sure Mikey doesn't know about this" or "make sure you're doing it right. You don't wanna piss Mikey of." Just something along those lines. They won't involve Mikey for petty stuff

Lol i know anon only asked about bonten trio but i wanted to take the chance and talk about the others too. Lmk if yall have any other thoughts lets chatttt

[for-my-mind-to-run-around-free]

The rest of the chapter, now officaly done!

“Read it out to me,” Regulus gently requested. Upon seeing James’ questioning brow continued with a verse “Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard /Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on.”

James made eye contact with him and continued, “Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d, / Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: / Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave”

Regulus swiftly but gently interrupted as James was taking a breath, “Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare; / Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss,” regulus realised they’d both started grinning at some point in between the verses. He paused, and looked at James.

They kept conversing like this, quoting each other lines from years and years of poetry, or simply going into snappy but friendly banter. They didn’t learn much about each other, except their shared love of poetry and the ability to give back as good as they got. Hours passed without Regulus even noticing, until James’ watch pinged.

ping-ping-ping

three in quick succession and then one last ping, like a cartoon character vomiting bubbles

“oh - right - ok - yes” James seemed to be overcome with a sudden urgency as he muttered out “I’ve gotta go now but it was so nice to meet you. Umm- would you mind checking this copy out for me?”

“right, yes, of course, it is my job” Regulus replied while trying his best to not show his disappointment- what did he even have to be disappointed for anyways? The stranger who ruined his art suddenly departing with no way to contact him- Ah right. ok.

Regulus guided them back upstairs and through the small maze the back of the shop was before taking his place at the back of the counter and grinned.

“Welcome to Cemetery Gates, my name is Regulus. How may I help you today?”

Something lit up in James’ eyes as he replied.

“Oh right. yes. I came to get a book for my son. He is almost 1 years old and seems to be in a phase where he tries to roar at anything that resembles a lion… I was wondering if there was anything that had lions in them that I could read to him?”

Regulus assumed he wasn’t really a father to a one year old, and he was just joining in on the joke but he still took a minute to consider the information over carefully. He wasn’t usually in charge of stocking the infant books, and wasn’t extremely familiar with the inventory but he was sure he could find something interesting. But the thing that took up the most space in his brain, almost stopping him from formulating the coherent thoughts that came before was the fact that James might’ve had a son. James was potentially a father. James’ son, most likely also had a mother as babies tended to have mothers. Regulus didn’t quite understand why this information was really upsetting, but he decided not to ponder over it for much longer. This must’ve been a good decision, since James had started looking at him funny at some point during his now intense prolonged silence.

“Mate, you all good there? I can’t actually get Harry the book now, I was only joking, I really do need to go. I’ll stop by and get it on Sunday.”

“Right, yes, I’m perfectly fine thank you” but Regulus still took the moment he turned away to check the label of the book and get James a complimentary bookmark as a moment to compose his face to a completely neutral expression.

He really wasn’t joking about having a son.

The man he just spent hours potentially flirting with was as straight as he looked and even had a son.

He was just being friendly and as always Regulus found a way to ruin it all in his head.

Still, being friends with James wasn’t such a bad idea as this would increase the number of friends he had from 1 to 2. Pandora always said he needed to make more. As he reasoned his way into keeping in touch with James, his hands did something so impulsive, he was pretty sure he hadn’t done anything this impulsive since the act of leaving home.

He scribbled his number at the very last page of the book with a pencil nearby.

‘0755XX XXXX - if you ever want to try and beat me to a quote or return the jumper, Regulus x.’

He decided that if he took one second to consider what he’d just done, he’d burn the entire volume to its ashes but instead he turned around, slid it across the counter and told James’ his total, who chose to make a very quick contactless payment and promptly dissappear. If Regulus wasn’t too busy thinking about the hands that picked up the volume, he would’ve noticed James almost running out of the store.

He allowed himself to smile one more time before resuming the work he was supposed to be doing.

Let's go where we're happy

you may wish to go to the end of work for authors extensive ramblings.

Chapter 1: Meet not so cute

It was an ordinary day at the shop for Regulus. Stacking books, filing the returns at the back (though Regulus never understood why someone would return a book they purchased anyways, it was one of life’s mysteries) and being forced to paint that damn display in the children’s section between aisles for 10-12s and 8-10s. Truly ordinary, completely undistinguishable Sunday at The Cemetery Gates.

As it quite often did round this time of year, it was pouring out when Regulus squeezed the white on to the punched folder pocket that he decided would be his easel that afternoon. He found a comfortable position where he could reach the clouds. Round brush dipped into the paint and scraped around a little bit before touching the soft wood of the shelves. He pretended to hate Barty for being forced to do this, but it wasn’t so bad when he actually got to work and honestly, he could even admit to enjoying the art and the rest from the stressful customers once he focused.

His mind finally started wandering into the happy place hidden at the very back of his mind, somewhere he could only visit when he felt truly safe and zoned in. He finished the clouds and got started on Cinderella’s apron, while Piglet and Winne the Pooh dried in the other corner.

It was then, when his guards were completely down, out of nowhere, something pointy, freezing cold and soaking wet crashed into him.

Paint water spilled all over.

Regulus found himself crushed between his painting, now leaving an impression of Piglet on his left cheek and the thing that seemed to be a black haired soaking wet creature that stumbled over him.

He tried to shake free out of his position, which must’ve alerted the being that left a dark spot on his shirt, as he suddenly became overly animated, backing away and speaking so fast it was undistinguishable.

Regulus, finally finding space to turn around, faced the mystery. This was quiet unfortunate for him because he realised that the creature responsible for ruining hours of his work happened to be a man with a very smooth face, hazel eyes that felt like the galaxy was hidden in them and jet black hair that was stuck to his face. His slivery black octagonal glasses were so stained with rainwater, regulus wasn’t surprised that he couldn’t see out of them. His features were distinct, could even be called handsome. However, Regulus was not going to be calling the mystery gentleman who he must hate and hold a grudge against for ruining his work anything positive let alone handsome in this century.

Regulus realised the gentleman’s mouth was moving, and he snapped back to reality.

“— I’m really sorry, oh god, I’ve ruined your painting as well and is there any way-” Regulus cut him off as his rambling really started to become more indistinguishable.

“Ehm this is quite alright, I was getting the white to paint over the whole thing anyways” He didn’t know why he lied to him, but oh he was so apologetic and those eyes. No. Focus Regulus.

“Oh but really you’re also damp now, I really didn’t mean to-”

“You are quiet the rambler aren’t you” he scoffed light heartedly, turned around around and started walking towards the employees only area. Why was he doing this? Why was he being kind? He wasn’t a kind person, thank you very much. He certainly wasn’t one to be kind to complete strangers he had every reason to hate.

He turned back after a couple of steps, “Come along then, let me get you something to wear before you catch your death” The nameless gentleman looked up in slight disbelief and started following him. Regulus was still internally stunned at his own behaviour, was his coffee drugged this morning?

They finally reached the employees only area at the back and Regulus lead the stranger inside.

The door with the sign DO NOT ENTER swung open to reveal a small room with an old arm chair that could’ve belonged in the Buckingham palace had it not been so worn down and on the the right there was a faded green sofa that looked like it was straight from a sitcom. The rug on the floor was plush and comfortable, but it was clearly originally not such a dark shade of grey. The entire room had an air about it, nothing felt like it belonged, it was out of time, yet at the same time you couldn’t imagine the room in any other way.

Regulus always loved the come and go room, its what they’d nicknamed the staff area after they realised how many strays were brought here by the employees. You could always find what you needed in the smallish room in a very inexplicable way. Regulus pointed towards the unassuming wardrobe in the corner and sat the stranger down on the green sofa next to it. He pulled out a sweater from the common drawer that he was 97% sure belonged to Barty and another one from his own.

In a moment of impulsiveness, he realised he wanted to see him again.

He passed his own sweater to the gentleman and pointed towards the second door in the room.

“That’s the bathroom, there’s a hairdryer and clean towels in the third drawer down”

He faced Regulus as he said a gentle “thank you” and moved towards the bathroom.

Regulus took of his own apron and jumper and quickly changed into dry clothes before the stranger came back. He heard the faint sound of the hair dryer turn on and after a while turn off.

Not long after the gentleman walked in, wearing the slightly oversized jumper (regulus always swam in it so it really fit him perfectly) and sporting a blow dried hair. It seemed he must’ve helped himself to some of the multitudes of bottles of hair products in front of the mirror because he looked really good. His hair was soft and silky and regulus wanted to touch it .

Wait. what. He absolutely didn’t want to touch a complete strangers hair.

“—he hairdryer is ancient mate, I’m surprised you guys haven’t gotten electrocuted just by its mere existence,” Regulus realised belatedly that the man had come in and started chattering on immediately while he was busy adoring staring noticing the improvement in his hair “and oh by the way my name’s James,” Regulus must’ve forgotten to move his face as the man continued with a small cough and a very unsure face “and you are..?”

Regulus decided to stop staring daggers at him, finally compose himself and respond simply with “My name is Regulus Arcturus. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

James laughed with a smile that reached to his eyes. It made Regulus view his face in an entirely different light. Maybe he wasn’t so mad about him ruining his work.

“You’re posh”

“You’ve used my hair products”

“and you’ve noticed”

“yes. I have noticed.”

“are you mad about it, i really should’ve asked”

Regulus gave a non committal shrug, he really didn’t like strangers touching his belongings, but James wasn’t a stranger now. He was wearing his jumper for gods sake. He realised, he wasn’t actually mad, and there wasn’t his usual viperous tone behind the snappy argument they had started to communicate in.

James asked another question, it seemed he didn’t really care either.

“So, how come you’ve got such a cosy place in a shop called ‘Cemetery Gates’”

“Cemetery gates don’t always open to hell, but sometimes to what one considers to be heaven. Death only exists in the way we perceive it.”

James paused, seemed to consider it for a moment. Regulus, shocked at his honesty, also stopped. The latter was the first to speak this time.

“Your expression to that tells me that your soul hasn’t seen enough poetry, let’s get you some of my personal recommendations.”

“Maybe, just maybe, you’re wrong in your assumptions this time. But. I would still like to lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence with you.”

Regulus’ change in heart rate definitely wasn’t in response to the very handsome stranger that quoted Oscar Wilde seamlessly. No, definitely not. Instead of quipping back another line, Regulus just started walking down the stairs and gestured James to follow.

The adult non-fiction section downstairs was decorated in a much more gothic style with a consuming ocean of darkness greeting anyone who went down, although somehow there was still enough lighting provided by the chandeliers to clearly see the titles scattered around randomly on dark wooden shelves. Regulus was the only person who knew the exact madness in which this section was organised, as he did it himself personally. This wasn’t to say there wasn’t a method to his madness, but it seemed nobody else could figure it out and he never tried to explain himself. He liked the mystery it created, and it didn’t seem to be affecting the sales so no one really minded that much.

As Regulus determinedly walked them towards poetry, they passed by several busts that were resting on the shelves; Athena, Persephone, Aphrodite and Demeter, all looking towards the entrance greeting everyone that passed by.

Finally Regulus came to a stop on another surprisingly soft round blood red carpet that covered about 2 meters across and wide. He sat down and gestured James towards the books that were behind him but in front of James.

“The ones behind me, you are familiar with, I see.”

James looked over, picked a random one up and read the cover.

“So you did recognise Wilde” James indicated

“Of course I did”

“Not so uneducated then am I?”

“The poetry of earth is never dead. But I still feel there is work we must do,” Regulus, without moving an inch from the position he was sitting at, now pointed towards the books that were on the shelf in front of him and behind James “Keats and Yates are all on that shelf, you should pick one out.”

James silently obeyed, but the way he browsed, pick up a book and turned the page was so methodical it would be idiotic of Regulus to even consider James had never touched it before. Regulus was actually pretty sure James had memorised it from cover to cover with the way he handled the volume, finding his way to a specific poem.

“Read it out to me,” Regulus gently requested. Upon seeing James’ questioning brow continued with a verse “Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard /Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on.”

Hello world, so, just as promised, here's the first chapter of "Let's go where we're happy", fic title taken from the song Cemetery gates by the smiths. Obligatory, I do not wish to be associated of she-who-must-not-be-named and her horrible acts, this is a fic made out of love for all those who made the marauderers what it is. Thank you all for reading. (Also will be cross-posted to AO3, link here, when it has been.) also this will be extreme slowburn as promised, just this first chapter doesn't quiet give that impression but please do trust the process. (also I might make a chapter 1.5) ok i'm going to shut up now, thank you so much if you've read it this farrrr ahhhh!!!

[perilegs]

i hauve a crush on rellana

[funkle420]

some of the things I've learned in the Adventurer's Bible are so chilling... really drives home the fact that this is a completely different world with medieval-like stuff going on. I'm especially chilled by what Laios and Falin said about the "mountain people"...

[deaddriv-talks]

Konoha's name in braille

Japanese braille (tenji): このは あきのり

English braille: Konoha Akinori

Korean braille (jeomja): 코노하 아키노리

This is so random. I really need to increase my skill range. By the way, fun fact, Japanese braille has spaces unlike Japanese. And this is kana braille because kanji braille is way too complicated for me.

Unicode versions in case anyone's interested (warning, it looks a little misleading: dots on the right look like they're on the left):

このは あきのり ⠪⠎⠥ ⠁⠣⠎⠓

Konoha Akinori ⠠⠅⠕⠝⠕⠓⠁⠀⠠⠁⠅⠔⠕⠗⠊

코노하 아키노리 ⠋⠥⠉⠥⠚ ⠣⠋⠕⠉⠥⠂⠕

[tracle0]

So I've been having a problem with The Crows Death:tm: for a while, but maybe have a solution? Hello, void, I'm here to yell again.

A big part of TCD is that Andy - POV character 1 - gets kidnapped and held hostage for most of the book by people who are inherently prejudiced against him - Foxes. I'm excited about the Foxes, I think they have an interesting dynamic with each other, with him and their culture.

Sadly, Andy himself is not at all interested in their culture, and the stupid man is too invested in getting himself free to even consider taking note or wondering what they're doing and why they're doing it.

The other POV character I have - Atlas, beloved - is mostly out of the Fox-ish picture, following in Andy's footsteps to try and help him and dealing with Mental Turmoil, so is also not too interested in what Fox rituals and ceremonies and traditions.

This has dissuaded me from writing for a while, in all honesty. I wanted to talk about the Foxes and what they're up to. The few snippets I had managed to write were focused on their traditions and interactions, and it made me paranoid that I was side-lining the POV characters. I felt rather lost and confused with the story, not sure how to do what I wanted and tell a compelling and logical story as well.

And then I remembered the Best Character of the story.

See, there's two POV characters, and then three major secondary characters - Dolly, Andy's official bodyguard and royal necromancer, Olly, her brother and Atlas's partner... and Sam, travelling healer and very enthusiastic sociologist.

Even if she only sees the tail end and remnants of Fox camps, long after they've moved on, she'll recognise at least a few traditions, the signs of rituals that Andy perhaps witnessed but didn't know what they were for. And she will tell everyone who'll listen about them.

In retrospect, it's very obvious. I was focusing too intently on the POV characters and what they'd understand, and side-lining the others. But hey, I figured it out in the end, and it makes me excited! Andy can see something and then Sam can fill in the context for it without him there! So he's left unaware and focused on his escape, and the reader gets to know what the vibe is!

Could even be a fun thing of like. She notices some certain sigils or herbs burned or something, and is like oh these specific herbs are used for only two ceremonies - there's this one, that forewarns a gruesome but justified murder, or this one, gives the benefits of Nice Breath. The only difference is if they burn it in a pot or just raw. Previously, Andy would have noted it was burned raw, meaning Gruesome Murder, but the others are like. Well let's hope it's Nice Breath????

Dunno what this ramble really is but you have it now. Maybe a lesson in trying to notice the obvious answer when it's sitting in front of you rather than trying to be clever. Or taking a break from stories sometimes, let the mental eels settle.

[ralistrasz]

My Pathfinder 2e group just party wiped today, due to our general lack of party heals. Our poor DM tried so hard to help us out in that fight, but the dice gods demanded blood. Good fortitude modifiers only do so much with the long odds of the boss recharging its AoE burst literally every round after the first recharge. it blasts us for around 50 damage for every failed roll, half on a successful roll. The only reason we lasted as long as we did was by having three party members having a feature that allowed us to treat successful fortitude saves as critical successes, but in the end... it didn't even matter. We were overwhelmed, and we were too deep in the thick of the campaign to realistically have a backup band of adventurers capable of stepping in to stop the events that would destroy everything.

I shared this with our DM, despondent that he'd killed his party, and said,

"you let the six-year-old win"

[fifteen minutes of silence]

"i forgor to finish my thought. let your inner child be this six year old for a minute and take joy in winning."

anyways thank you for sharing

My friend sometimes brings her six-year-old to our DnD sessions and my husband (the DM) lets her roll for all enemy attacks and sometimes he will show her a few figures and let her secretly pick what creature we meet next. Who needs encounter tables when you have a first-grader around

[causeimasinger]

don’t give kids video games. it’s a trap. my 7-year-old nephew just gave me a 15 minute rundown of poppy’s playhouse and then QUIZED ME ON IT

[time-was-over]

not to vaguepost but those takes are actually so bad holy fuck

[torpublishinggroup]

Celebrate Pride with Tor Publishing Group!

The Water Outlaws by S. L. Huang

Mountain outlaws on the margins of society, the Bandits of Liangshan proclaim a belief in justice—for women, for the downtrodden, for progressive thinkers a corrupt Empire would imprison or destroy. They’re also murderers, thieves, smugglers, and cutthroats. Together, they could bring down an empire. 

Now available in paperback!

Somewhere Beyond the Sea by TJ Klune

The long-awaited sequel to The House in the Cerulean Sea is a story of resistance, lovingly told, about the daunting experience of fighting for the life you want to live and doing the work to keep it. Welcome back to Marsyas Island—home to six magical and purportedly dangerous children. This is Arthur’s story.

The West Passage by @jpechacek

When the Guardian of the West Passage dies in her bed, the women of Grey Tower feed her to the crows and go back to their chores. No successor is named, and no hand takes up the fallen blade, so the West Passage—the ancient byways of the beast—goes unguarded. This is a weird and delightful journey across a deliriously medieval landscape where decay thrives in abundance and giant Ladies rule a palace the size of a city. 

Blood Debts by Terry J. Benton-Walker

On the thirtieth anniversary of the largest magical massacre in New Orleans history, Clement and Cristina Trudeau mourn their father and care for their sick mother. But their mother isn’t sick, they learn: She’s cursed. Cursed by a member of the same magic council over which she used to preside. Cursed by someone who will come for Clement and Cristina next. 

Now available in paperback!

Bury Your Gays by @drchucktingle

After so many years, Misha’s big Oscar moment is here. All he has to do? Kill off the gay characters in his long-running streaming series, “for the algorithm.” Misha refuses, but that’s hardly the end, because monsters from his old horror movie days have begun to step out from the silver screen and stalk him. 

The Brides of High Hill by Nghi Vo

The Cleric Chih accompanies a young bride to her wedding to Lord Guo, the aging ruler of a crumbling estate, but amid the elaborate courtesies and extravagant banquets, they realize something haunts the shadowed halls. As the big night nears close, Chih will learn that not all monsters dwell in shadows; some hide in plain sight. 

Remedial Magic by Melissa Marr

1) An unassuming librarian falls in love with a powerful witch. 

2) Previous librarian discovers she too is a witch…

3) …and that she must attend magical community college to learn how to save her new world from annihilation. 

Swordcrossed by @fahye

Part-time con artist / full-time charming menace Luca Piere didn’t expect to get blackmailed into teaching a chronically responsible merchant Matti how to wield a sword. He also didn’t expect to find his charge so inconveniently handsome, or to get so entangled in his tale of intrigue, sabotage, and matrimony. 

It’s important to read Swordcrossed because while you’re reading gay fiction, you can also study the blade.

Celebrate Pride with more titles from Tor Publishing Group here!

[deathsmallcaps]

I tried reading this urban fantasy called Jane Yellowrock or something like that, and she was basically a base-cougar shapeshifter. Like she could spend a lot of time as a cougar comfortably, and it matched her body mass pretty much. When she was little, she had a bobcat or something. Oh, and being shapeshifted gave her twilight-werewolf-kind-of-immortality, though that might’ve just been a her thing. She spent like a century in cat form.

Transforming into other animals was harder. When she needed more mass, I think she ate? And/or used a stone or log lying around and absorbed its mass. It’s been a while. When she turned smaller, she converted her extra mass into a stone and generally tried to get that stone back, because it was magically easier to reintegrate.

She had to keep a body part from the animal to shift into it I think. And she always shifted into that specific individual. And I think she was kind of getting swallowed by the part of her that spent a ton of time as a cat.

I was trying to think about the ole "what would shapeshifters do with their extra mass when they turn into something smaller" and I thought "maybe they just convert it all to energy" and then I thought "uh my guy that's a lot of fucking energy"

[masterhallmark]

Rant incoming

I feel like the problem with a lot of Disney's live action remakes (and arguably Wish) is they're trying to appeal to a crowd that no longer exists, namely the people who used to claim that the Disney Princesses were sexist.

All the interviews tend to include, "Well she's not chasing a MAN anymore" which...almost no one sees the princesses like that, anymore. Virtually NO ONE still believes the princesses are man-chasing sexist caricatures of women.

Cinderella is now hailed as an abuse victim who stayed strong long enough to get help to get out of her situation. Anyone who says she should have saved herself is basically regarded as a victim blamer. And it's very clear in the film she wasn't looking to marry the prince, she just wanted a night off. She was the only one who wasn't in line to meet him. She didn't find out she met the prince until he went looking for her!

Snow White is now hailed for her negotiation skills, ability to calm down after extreme stress (she had a moment of panic and had to cry for a bit, but who wouldn't after finding out The Queen hired someone to kill you?), and ability to take charge of a house of adult men. And again, she was an abuse victim, this time trying to escape ASSASSINATION ATTEMPTS. While she dreamed of her prince, it was secondary to her main goal of SURVIVAL. There are also entire video essays about how Snow White gave hope to people during The Great Depression.

Everyone acknowledges that Ariel wanted to be human BEFORE meeting Eric. We all know she was a nerd hyperfixating on humans, and also standing up to her prejudiced father.

We understand Sleeping Beauty wasn't the main character, the Three Good Fairies were, AND PHILLIP WOULD NEVER HAVE BEATEN MALEFICENT WITHOUT THEM! He literally depended on them! WOMEN SAVED THE DAY! But even then, is it really such a sin for a girl to fantasize about romance and fall for someone with corny pickup lines?

We all understand Jasmine just wanted someone to treat her LIKE A PERSON. She rejected every Prince before Aladdin because they treated her like a prize. So why did they need her to want to be Sultan? How did that make her more feminist when she already wanted to be treated like an equal and have a say in her future? Is it only empowering if you want a career in politics?

We admire that Belle, despite living in a judgemental village, was kind to everyone (even though she found the village life dull), and her story teaches girls that the guy everyone else loves isn't always a good guy. What's sexist about teaching girls about red flags? And she didn't start being nice to The Beast until he started treating her with respect and kindness.

Do I really NEED to defend Mulan or Tiana? I think they speak for themselves.

Rapunzel was yet another abuse victim who just needed a little help to get out of her bad situation. In this case, she also needed to learn that she was an abuse victim, and that what Mother Gothel did WASN'T normal, much like many victims of gaslighting.

And don't get me started on the non-princess animals.

Perdita had a healthy relationship with Pongo to the point she was open to express her pregnancy fears to him, and was ready to TEAR APART Cruella's goons for daring to touch her puppies as well as adopting the other puppies. Like, she was so ferocious the goons mistook her for a hyena! She's basically that "I AM THAT GIRL'S MOTHER!" scene from SpyXFamily if Yor were a dog. She and her husband were a TEAM.....but they made a Cruella live action to turn her into a girlboss?! The literal animal abuser!? THAT'S the woman you wanted to put on a pedestal when Perdita was RIGHT THERE!?

Duchess kept her kittens calm after they had been catnapped and was classy as heck. Nice to everyone regardless of social class during a time period where that was uncommon.

Lady stood up to Tramp when she believed he had abandoned her and didn't really care about her. She found out he was a heartbreaker and was like, "Nuh uh. No. You are not doing that to me! You put me through enough."

Miss Bianca from The Rescuers was IN CHARGE the whole movie, and was willing to risk life and limb to save an innocent child. THAT TINY MOUSE TOOK ON ALLIGATORS! And she picked Bernard to accompany her because he was the only one who wasn't ogling her. And then in the sequel SHE DID IT ALL AGAIN! I wish I were as brave as her.

Like, the public haven't accused these ladies of being sexist caricatures since 2014 (Actresses and actors don't count, they're out of touch like the rest of Hollywood) yet Disney is operating under the assumption that the public still thinks that way, hence all the "sHe'S nOt AfTeR a MaN iN ThIs VeRsIOn" talk.

The live action remakes are trying to attract an audience that doesn't really exist much, anymore, and back when it did exist, was comprised mainly of people who didn't actually watch the films. The Disney princesses are no longer seen as sexist, and feminine qualities are no longer seen as weak or undesirable.

[fantastic-nonsense]

it's actually super funny when you think about how the Superfam 🤝 Flashfam 🤝 Arrowfam 🤝 Wonderfam = basically all collectively being friends with and/or respecting the hell out of Dick Grayson

You think it's just Clark but no. Lois loves him. Post-Crisis!Kara thought of him as a mentor and big brother figure. Kon canonically thinks Dick is cool. And Jon looks up to Dick a lot (and obviously Clark literally put Dick in charge of looking out for Jon while he was off-planet)

And then you think it's just Roy, but no. Lian calls him "Uncle Nightwing," Dinah thinks he's good for Babs, Connor's generally chill with him, Emiko thinks he's nice and hot (lmao), and Ollie's apparently fond enough of him that we're told Dick is the one who named the Arrowcave

And then you think it's just Wally but no. Wally's kids love him, Barry likes him, he's on good enough terms with Bart to get a focus panel at Bart's funeral, he's led Jesse on two separate teams, and Jay's willing to swing by NYC with the rest of the JSA to help him move out of the Cloisters after Final Crisis

And THEN you think it's just Donna, but no. Diana watched him grow up and thinks fondly of him, and Cassie respects Dick enough that she not only took Damian onto the Teen Titans on a trial basis just because Dick asked but he's also the first person she calls when she thinks Tim's gone crazy after Bruce's death

truly the linchpin character of the DCU, we have no choice but to stan

[ratatattouille]

Why Arcane's Finale Fumbled Pt. 2

In my last post, I argued that Arcane's second season was artistically beautiful and thematically cheap. I broke down where I believed the writers fumbled with Vi's, Jinx's and Viktor's characters, and how the conflict of season 2 should have centred around a war between Piltover and Zaun rather than Piltover/Zaun against Ambessa and cosmic robots. I asserted the the real let-down of Season 2 had to do with its themes and its refusal to commit to the political story it had set up.

Well, folks, on further examination, it actually looks worse than I thought, and I'm going to use two characters--Silco and Mel--to break down what makes the message of Arcane so hollow and even a little dangerous.

Let's get into it.

Silco: The First Proposition

Silco and Vander:

Silco is a character CENTRAL to the themes of Arcane. The setup of the entire drama of the show, the central theme, are these questions: what is the price of progress and are we willing to pay it? Should we pay that price? Or as Silco says it quite bluntly to the first kid we see him give shimmer to: “Real power belongs to people who are willing to do anything to get it.” This story isn’t merely about ambition, but a dialogue on what actual progress costs and looks like. What does a better world look like? Is the better world we’re fighting for better for us or others? And what (or who) are we willing to sacrifice to achieve that goal? Vander, when faced with that question on the bridge answers, “No dream is worth the loss of those we love.”

The death on the Bridge of Progress during the early war/conflict had too high a cost to Vander. Silco, however, “had enough.” Unlike Vander, what happened on the Bridge of Progress radicalized him. Silco, while being drowned by Vander, realized in that moment that he would do anything, not just to live, but to achieve his dream of a free Zaun. With or without Vander. Even if he had to sacrifice Vander. And we soon see, that while Vander dedicated the rest of his life to keeping the vulnerable in The Lanes safe (even if it meant making deals with enforcers), Silco was willing to throw citizens of The Lanes to the wolves on his way to achieve independence for Zaun. Silco calls it, “The necessary violence for change.” And in this episode (3 of Season 1) Silco sets forth a proposition for the entire show: does the path to a better world require violence?

Silco and Sevika:

Silco’s new approach to crossing the bridge of progress, the path to freedom is winding and twisted. Silco embraces that, because only the goal matters: an independent Zaun. Silco won’t be at the mercy of the Council or anyone in The Lanes, and Sevika is into that shit. We saw that she percieved Vander as weak and servile to enforcers. Who she deems abhorrent without remorse (Vander and Grayson are both despised by Sevika and Marcus because they are percieved as being too lenient with their enemies). Silco, however, has an ACTUAL plan.

He creates a shimmer enterprise because having this control not only gives him a monopoly on The Lanes (and the gangs within), but leverage when it comes to manipulating the Council. Violence and the threat of war are the official languages of both Zaun and Piltover. It is how anyone bothers to listen to Silco both in The Lanes and within the Council. We know that the rich Piltovians (like those IRL) only speak money. “Progress” to them is prosperity and legacy (and I’ll get more into that later).

By creating the shimmer enterprise, Silco not only gets his foot in the door, monopoly over the other gangs and factions (thus uniting them), but a metaphorical seat at the table. His name has weight now, which positions him to make demands of Piltover and give Zaun a thriving industry (at least when it comes to money). Especially because (as we see with Salo and Lest) shimmer is also used by the elites. Silco is a brilliant tactician who exploits the hubris of Piltovians (like Marcus, who wanted to be in charge so he can neuter Zaunites indiscriminately), and manipulates them to his own advantage (much like Mel). But when Renni’s son is killed in the mines, Silco’s proposition is confronted once again: isn’t it easy to justify necessary violence when no one you love is the collateral?

Silco doesn’t care about Renni’s son, doesn’t see himself as remotely near Renni’s position. When Twitch calls Jinx his “dog” (something Sevika herself wanted to do lmao), Silco gets twitchy. He doesn’t recognize any similarity between his relationship with Jinx and Renni and her son. Jinx is not someone he would ever consider as up for debate. Which was the point of tension between him and Sevika (a Sevika who’s loyalty he KNEW he needed in order to keep control, especially in the wake of Jinx’s volatility and unpopularity). Nevertheless, Sevika doesn’t betray him in that moment, because she still sees Silco as stronger (even though she believes Jinx is a weakness he needs to get rid of). As with Vander, Sevika views affection for their own at the cost of freedom as weakness.

Yet, funnily enough, she is fiercely loyal. She, like Jinx, is Silco’s “dog.” She shares his weakness, the weakness that makes her zealous for a better world in the first place. But what Twitch and Renni pose to both Silco and Sevika is the unsettling question of: are you really willing to go far enough? Or do you still see yourself as an exception? Regardless, when it comes to Silco’s proposition, Silco WAS SUCCESSFUL (and also accurate in his deductions on what would get both cities to respect him and eventaully give him what he wanted - Zaun). His determination and focus paid off, indeed, it’s hard to see how he could have been successful without the “necessary violence”. It is clear that he wouldn’t have. No shimmer, no independence. Silco, for all his gruesome methods, WAS RIGHT. Except . . .

Silco and Marcus:

By exploiting and manipulating the vulnerable of The Lanes, Silco also ensured he would suffer the same fate as Marcus. Unlike Silco, Marcus did horrible things to protect his daughter. Marcus, at first, had started out as a zealous enforcer, eager to clean out the rats of The Lanes. Although he didn’t plan for Grayson to be killed, he was willing to get rid of her in order to ensure that he would get into a position that allowed him to do what he wanted to do: exterminate rats and be the hero of Piltover.

Silco offers him bodies for Stillwater in exchange for ease of shimmer distribution. Silco is willing to sacrifice his own people, the people Zaun is ironically for, in order to gain influence in Piltover. Silco, however, did the opposite. Because he loved Jinx, he recognized her deepest insecurity and sought to assuage it (inadvertently weaponizing it against her and those who loved her). He let Jinx get close and gave her responsibility so she could feel like she belonged (he let her drug his eye, a delicate process, while she was still thought of as reckless and untrustworthy). He brought her deeper into the heart of the violence and taught her to embrace it. He made her a child prodigy of warfare.

He takes a different approach to Vander (who kept telling the kids to stay out of trouble where they could and used himself as a buffer). So was Silco wrong? Was Vander? The answer was, quite poetically and profoundly, their deaths and the resulting silence. Both died, more or less, at the hands of their daughters. This is something overlooked often by fandom. It was Vi’s choice to lead her brothers and sister into Jayce’s apartment that would eventually bring the enforcers down to The Lanes, sparking the chain of events that would lead to Vander’s death (or had things gone “well,” his arrest). Vi is also how Powder got the arcane stones in the first place. Vi’s encouragement (well-meaning and innocent as it was) played a hand in the disaster that followed.

But the fact that both Vander and Silco die regardless, paints an excellent portrait of the constraints of oppression. Both tried different methods when it came to rearing their daughters. Both methods got them killed and thrust their children into peril. Vander could only have shielded Vi for so long, and Jinx could only have taken so much so young before she broke down completely. The fate of the girls is not merely their fathers’ fault, nor their sister’s. The tragedies of their lives happen due to the simple fact that they were born in The Lanes. No choice, on either Vander’s, Silco’s, Powder’s or Vi’s mattered in the end.

They were always playing a losing game, which is what makes it so fucking INFURIATING when S2 comes along and suggests that “ACKTUALLY the reason everyone’s happy in Ekko’s AU is because Vi died/hextech was no more/Silco and Vander made up).” All of those were symptoms of the bigger issue, not the issue itself. And that is the horrible irony of Silco’s story. He WAS right. But his folly was viewing himself and those he loved as exceptions to the rule. For when Zaun demands the final price, when Jayce asks for Jinx in exchange for his dream being realized, he isn’t willing to pay anymore.

Marcus only crossed the bridge of progress into Zaun for the sake of his daughter (as is shown in a chilling scene where he finds Silco playing with her in her room). Likewise, when Silco FINALLY finishes, after all those years, his march on The Bridge of Progress, like Marcus, he dies in a swarm of bullets. But unlike Marcus, he is afforded time to tell his daughter, “I wouldn’t have given you to them. Not for the world.” Not for his dream. So what did Season 2 do with that?

Summary of Fumblings:

-I’ll tell you what Season 2 did. Season 2 took the biggest shit on one of the most fascinating characters in animated history. The reason I didn’t put that much critique up there was to show you how complex, layered, deep and thoughtful Season 1 was with Silco’s character. Silco in S2 became a cheap gimmick flung in our faces like the marketing team was trying to sell Silco plushies following the release. His back-story in Season 2 clashes horribly with Season 1. If Vander, Silco and Felicia were such chums back then, why did neither Silco nor Vi recognize each other when they met in Season 1? They were quite grown by the time the March on The Bridge of Progress happened. Honestly, there’s too many mistakes and inconsistencies with how Season 2 handles the backstory I don’t even see a point in getting to it

-(excerpt from one of the writers) I can't BELIEVE MY FUCKING EYES! Silco’s respect for Vander, despite the fact that Vander tried to drown him (most likely after the carnage on the Bridge of Progress where Vander realized the cost of war), was that Vander remained dedicated to Zaun’s independence, at least, until he began prioritizing the safety of the children over Zaun’s freedom. Silco’s respect for Vander had never been a goal or motivation. Silco never expressed any desire to be respected by Vander. He merely expressed respect, ONLY because Vander, up until he became the enforcer’s “lapdog,” shared his pursuit of a free Zaun. Silco killed Vander for the same reason Vander tried to drown Silco: they had become a threat to what they held dear - Silco, his pursuit of Zaun, and Vander the safety of his adopted children.

-”We build our own prisons. Bars forged of oaths, codes, commitments.” This conversation is SO FUCKING—rips into mattress and pulls out stuffing Jinx hallucinates Silco from within the cell she’s in at Stillwater, maybe the same one Vi had been in. Silco starts off saying something like “It’s funny how Marcus thought putting Vi in this cell was a greater mercy than killing her,” cluing us in to not just Jinx’s mental state but the very real torment it must have been for Vi as a child as well. SO JUST TO RECAP, WE ARE TALKING ABOUT THE PRISON OF THE CYCLE OF KILLING AND VIOLENCE, OKAY. In addition to that already horrible quote above, Silco says, “. . . and it will continue, long after the two of you.” So, folks, IN CONCLUSION, this cycle of violence (which I have already established like a fucking broken record is EXPLICITLY started and perpetuated by Piltover) is eternal and inevitable. Just let that fucking sink in. Let it settle nice and sour in your gut and then tell me how that GERD feels. Not only is that an appalling thing to suggest about any oppressive regime, it’s also untrue. Yes, humanity has not gone a decade without some form of conflict and struggle, but individual societies have been PROVABLY capable of both progress and regress. Both of which require the agency and active participation of others. And Arcane seems to want to show that progress is indeed possible, but it has already declared it, to some extent, a pointless pursuit in this conversation. Which is it, Arcane S2 writers? Is progress worth striving for, or is it pointless? “Oh my god, you’re so dumb ratatatouille!” you say. “Of course they answered the former! Duh! In Ekko’s monologue when Jinx is trying to kill herself, he tells Jinx that someone special once told him that no matter what happened in the past, it’s never too late to build something new - someone worth building it for.” GREAT! DELICIOUS, EVEN! Now why is it that Ekko says this instead of Silco? Why isn’t this something Silco would say, given that this was the entire point of his and Vander’s story? That this is what his arc embodied and explored? “You’re so silly! Obviously Silco is a hallucination!” The show explicitly frames Silco as RIGHT and tries to tie in what Silco says with what Ekko says. More sympathetic viewers will say that since Ekko discovered that Jinx was never the problem, that hextech was, and that Jinx was actually the path towards progress - a path Silco had walked so she could run - Ekko approached her as someone he could finally save (and oh boy am I going to get into why that doesn’t work AT ALL later). Is is not Jinx, but the hextech, the ARCANE, that is dangerous. The hextech is the true jinx. It is what will keep the cycle going. That’s why Silco holds the arcane stone near his eye like that in the scene.

And to that I say . . . WELL THAT’S FUCKING STUPID. I don’t care that “Arcane” is the title of the show. It is the cheapest story gimmick I have seen since vibranium, except vibranium REMAINED a plot device and didn’t usurp the theme or political/interpersonal conflicts in Black Panther. Hextech was a PLOT DEVICE meant to be used to explore the themes which became the ENDPOINT. And this story SUFFERS SO MUCH from that simple change. This is why most critics of season 2 say the story should have remained focused on the interpersonal and political reasons characters did what they did, rather than siphoning all their stories into a mission to stop the evil, mystical stones. It is a fucking stupid distraction in S2, where in S1 it had been a beautiful metaphor, a fragment of a mirror that the characters held up to examine their faces.

But by claiming the cycle was the hextech all along, you just shat on everything that made S1 good.

Which brings me back to what Ekko tells Jinx, that she can still build a better world for the people she loves (like Vi, I guess). That’s why she comes back to help her sister. She cuts her hair (a symbol of letting go of the past) and joins Vi to defeat Ambessa and evil Viktor. This is treated as some kind of continuation (or the true point) of Silco’s “ending the cycle” speech. By letting go of Vi (literally) and Silco (also literally), she can finally . . . er . . . stop “running in circles.” So the show tells us she is BOTH supposed to fight one more time to achieve an autonomous Zaun AND fuck off to a new land to escape said cycle—which, what was the POINT of fighting if she still had to “escape” it in the end anyways?

NO S2 HALLUCINATION SILCO, JINX AND VI DID NOT BUILD THEIR OWN PRISONS. THEY SURVIVED THE CAGES THEY WERE PUT IN AS CHILDREN AND THEY DESERVED BETTER THAN THAT GODAWFUL DUMBASS SPEECH.

Do you see why this writing is so horrible? It contradicts itself so many fucking times, no matter how you splice it. Whether it’s about the cycle of violence being the fault of unforgiveness or hextech. None of it makes any sense because none of it was ever established in season 1 as being the cause for any of those things. And by even SUGGESTING that either or both of those could be the cause, the writers send us two very troubling messages: oppression is inevitable and also, somehow, the fault (rather than responsibility) of the oppressed. Actually no, I think the suggestion from the writers is even stupider: oppression is an option and you can opt in or out.

And that is the ultimate insult to Silco’s character and what he did for the story of the show.

Mel: The Counterpoint

Mel and Jayce:

Mel is Silco’s thematic counterpoint. In the story, Silco proposes that progress costs some “necessary violence.” Mel is faced with this same question as a child, when Ambessa presents her with the last remaining heir of a nation Noxus had conquered. Ambessa asks young Mel if they should kill or spare the girl. “Kino says war is a failure of statecraft,” Mel had said, when her mother told her about how her father had made her retrieve knives on the battlefield at ten so she’d know death. War, Mel is sure, is REGRESS not PROGRESS. It is the breaking down of the state, not the making of one. It’s obvious to Mel that sparing this girl, who looks about her age, is the progressive, less barbaric thing to do. Yet Ambessa insists, “Your brother thinks he can talk his way out of anything,” Likening him to being a fox among wolves when a good ruler needs to be both. To which Mel goes on to describe the kind of ruler the new conquered kingdom will need. A woman “with a kind, fat face to charm her subjects”, but moldable, to which Ambesaa basically says “So basically you? Cool. I’m down, but you have to prove yourself to me. Prove you can take it.” This is when Mel is presented with the ultimatum: choose to spare the girl or kill her. “We can show the people we are merciful,” she pleads on behalf of the girl. But Ambessa is firm. If Mel kills her now (a symbol of the old “regime”), she won’t (maybe) have to deal with any uprisings and kill thousands.

But Mel doesn’t swallow this poison, insists that diplomacy is the superior way, and is banished to Piltover, where she undertakes the task of proving herself. She tries to become the fox. She uses her kind, fat face to charm the Councilors of Piltover and utilizes Jayce to use hextech for Piltover so that her work in the city becomes impressive, cements her legacy as a Medarda, validates her as one of them, and ALSO proves her mother wrong, thus liberating herself from her mother’s cycle of violence and re-instating her rightful station as a worthy member of the Medarda clan.

But it’s not JUST that, though. Jayce’s enthusiasm to improve the world with hextech inspires Mel and validates what she felt so strongly as a child that Ambessa staunchly denied. When Jayce shares his dream with her, she goes all soft and says, “We’re (the Medarda’s) not often in the position to give back.” Which is . . . funny, lol. I think she was talking about herself rather than her entire family. Anyway, to Jayce, Mel was the one who gave him a second chance. He and Viktor wouldn’t have gone anywhere without her help. Jayce is likely the first person she’s felt capable of helping (especially outside Ambessa’s shadow), and likewise, Mel makes Jayce feel indominable (remember: “Nothing feels impossible when I’m with you”). Jayce makes her feel good about herself, hopeful that her ways can work. After all, being the fox has worked for Jayce and Piltover.

But Mel isn’t just the fox, and not for the reasons S2 thinks. Why? LONG before Ambessa sets foot in Piltover, Mel receives a letter from a correspondent overseas. She despairs that Jayce is not ready to be the success she needs him to be. Even after he confides in her about Viktor’s illness, to her it is not a personal loss. Like no matter what the meljayvik or melvik shippers say, Viktor and Mel DID NOT GIVE A FUCK ABOUT EACH OTHER OUTSIDE OF JAYCE. Jayce wants to uphold his promise in helping Viktor, the man who saved him from his own death (AND TRUST ME, WE’LL GET TO THAT) but Mel wants Jayce focused on keeping her investment and legacy IN PILTOVER safe from Ambessa.

So what does homegirl do? She manipulates Jayce into creating hextech weapons. The reason she moves for a vote to make Jayce a councilor on Progress Day is in light of Jinx’s attack. The councilors are worried that someone in the undercity got their hands on hextech and can use it against them. Jayce, feeling responsible for the situation (and that probably having something to do with Caitlyn nearly dying in the attack), proposes to pause all hextech developments until the threat is neutralized. Instantly, we see Viktor’s and Mel’s reactions—panic. Both are running out of time. Mel to make Piltover a success (in that it is able to defend itself from Ambessa), and Viktor to help those dying in The Lanes. So Mel proposes Jayce become a councilor instead.

We next see her examining Jinx’s bomb with Viktor and Jayce. Jayce asks Viktor if it’s possible that Jinx could create something resembling hextech. Viktor, who is busy marvelling at Jinx’s ingenuity and feeling a little proud of his people, says very confidently that “It’s a leap.” Meaning it’s far away from what Jayce and him are developing. But Mel needs SOMETHING to intimidate Ambessa. That, or she recognizes the undercity as a real threat to her dream of progress and prosperity. Legacy. The undercity is ugly and she wants to neutralize it before she loses her chance. Regardless, here, we see her make the choice to be the wolf. The relentless and unmerciful. Focused and driven by her ambition. She will be a Medarda, unlike last time. Armed and prepared. When Jayce asks if she knows for certain that Zaun intends to turn the gemstones into weapons, Mel says, “That doesn’t matter. We’ll assume,” which pisses Viktor off. But then she performs the ultimate manipulation on Jayce. She uses Jayce’s care for the Kirammans and Piltover to convince him that it’s necessary to “protect your people” which, Viktor can tell, does not extend to the people of the undercity.

Once again, Mel is demonstrating that she doesn’t see Zaunites as people. She barely acknowledges Viktor when he protests, saying “That’s not what we invented hextech for!” She merely looks at him, then looks back at Jayce and talks to Jayce. She repeatedly ignores Viktor, talks over him, as if he isn’t there. Doesn’t matter. After all, Jayce is the only one in Piltover worth her time. Piltover is her project, not the dirty undercity. Mel had already sown the seed for Jayce’s rampage by the time Ambessa showed up.

“Stay away from Jayce!” she says, and yet Mel is what brought Ambessa close to Jayce both physically and ideologically. For hextech and Piltover (the City of Progress) to be safe, Jayce has to commit some “necessary violence for change.”

This isn’t only Ambessa’s fault, but Mel’s and Jayce’s errors as leaders. By neglecting the undercity, Jayce fails to see how his innovations could be weapons until it's too late. Mel is also so focused on Ambessa as a threat that she neglects the threat of the undercity, a place that only became a threat because of YEARS of failed state-craft.

Jayce acquiesces to Ambessa's rhetoric since the attack at the bridge, and proposes to the other council members to go into The Lanes with force, which they are all (including Mel) hesitant to do. But then Jayce goes ahead anyways, and kills a kid (which we’ll come back to), and he not only regrets it, but does a 180 and returns, like Mel, back to his core values — peace and progress over prosperity or legacy. He makes a deal with Silco and then goes and tells the Council what’s up. Mel, now utterly convinced of her position, is the first to cast her vote in favor of an independent Zaun, and removes the Medarda ring while she does so, signalling her disdain for all the clan represents. Not only that, but she smears gold over the Noxian ships in her painting, which her mother correctly reads as a rejection of Noxus and an embrace of the Piltover her and Jayce want to build. Mel does not anticipate the attack, and Mel, in the last frame of the finale of Season 1, is the first target of Jinx’s bomb, the first councilor it was going to hit while her back was turned to it.

Mel and Viktor:

Mel’s parallel with Viktor is interesting. Mel’s interest in hextech (and initially Jayce) are to her own ends, later becoming altruistic (Viktor’s interest in Jayce also starts as an interest in his theories although his motivations were altruistic from the start). Jayce reminded her what she wanted to be in the first place. That her family name, like Jayce’s was to his, was a ball and chain around her neck. Holding her back from true progress. From a better world. A better legacy. Viktor comes from nowhere-land. Viktor doesn’t have a family legacy to inherit. Viktor is a Zaunite. And soon, much like Viktor, Mel is going to have to work hard to create her own legacy. Both Viktor and Mel are sort of outsiders in Piltover. As is shown in S2 with Salo, Piltover, the Fake City of Progress, has no accommodations for the disabled, which makes Viktor stand out like a sore thumb (also, Viktor is the one who made his own leg brace). Mel is a foreigner who has to make a name for herself before she can latch onto the Medarda title. Viktor wants the city to be good, while Mel wants the city (and herself) to look good by matching the strength and prosperity of Noxus.

This is why Viktor gets so sassy with her lmao. He sees through her manipulations and notices that she is pulling Jayce away from what they’d set out to do together (he is also annoyed at how easy it is for Jayce to forget). Mel is the one who tells Jayce it would be wiser to let the council members get away with their criminality (all while cracking down on The Lanes), which makes them wealthier, something that pushes Jayce deeper into his own prejudices against Zaun, where he starts seeing himself as primarily a caretaker of Piltover rather than hextech, as a councilor rather than a scientist, and it jeopardizes his relationship with Viktor.

But Jayce helped her re-connect with the values all three of them shared deep down. The desire to help people and make the world a better place. After the bridge massacre, Mel wants to put her charm and diplomacy to good use, and she does so in the Council Room when she votes for Zaun’s independence.

But here’s where the FUMBLE happens. In S2, we see that Mel’s magic seems to have shielded Jayce and herself, but not Viktor. Not only that, but it’s hinted that Viktor’s magic is resistant to her touch. We don’t get any answer as to why that is (although I’d like to think that was Viktor being petty even while unconscious). This is especially weird since the arcane is alluded to be where the mages get their power (and isn’t it convenient that Viktor became a mindless war machine controlled by the corrupted/corrupting arcane instead of a mage when we see that in other universes he is indeed a mage already?). Not only that, but Viktor can clearly “touch” her magic through the puppet, later on.

Jayce keeps asking her why he was spared and Viktor wasn’t, and Mel, once again, cannot answer him. She knows that her magic protected her and Jayce, but once again, Jayce is lowkey asking why all these horrible things keep happening to Viktor instead of him. Why he is spared instead of Viktor. Unlike Mel, I have an answer. The answer IS PRIVILEGE JAYCE NOT THE FUCKING ARCANE AND THE MYSTICAL NATURE OF MAGIC OR SOME UNKNOWN FORCE OF FATE. Viktor’s tragedy was something that could be helped by both hextech and just Piltover not being a bunch of fucking asswipes. Viktor’s “bad luck” was actually just piss poor governance, or as Kino would say, “a failure of statecraft.” When Mel forsook her original ideals in order to pursue her mother’s acceptance and her family legacy, she did what all the other council members did: make themselves comfortable in places of power at the expense of the oppressed. In order for her to reclaim herself, she had to abandon Noxus and her dream of returning or belonging to the Medarda Clan. Mel has to choose between her family’s legacy and her own longing for progress and dedication to mercy over violence.

Mel and Ambessa:

While Jayce has to fight Victor (who is really now reduced to just another weapon Jayce created that’s gotten into the wrong hands - and more on THAT later), Mel’s task is facing down her mother. By removing the context of oppressed/oppressor inherent to the Piltover/Zaun dynamic, we fail to explore S1’s setup for Mel. IT SHOULD BE NOTED that the reason diplomacy worked for Mel and not Silco was because of their differences in power. When Viktor tells Jayce “There is always a choice” after Jayce expresses his doubts regarding what Mel said about the Zaunites making hextech, Viktor was talking about Jayce’s choice. Mel’s choice. Mel could have chosen to be diplomatic, even with the threat of Jinx. But instead she forsook her ideals in pursuit of her desire to become a Medarda and, like her mother in her dream, preferred to eliminate the threat rather than integrate (Zaun). Even if she back-tracked by the time her mom came back.

Mel has to face the fact that, like Jayce, she betrayed her values and initiated something horrible: the war she’d always dreaded and despised. Mel is why Ambessa heard of the weapons in the first place. But S2 doesn’t focus on this at all. It barely acknowledges it. Instead, Mel is sucked into the Black Rose and told she’s a mage and that her mother must die for the sake of nameless nations the Black Rose mentions. You see, Ambessa is a scapegoat. An excuse to halt and dissolve any meaningful discussion on Piltover’s (and Mel’s) hand in the plight of The Lanes.

By making Ambessa the big bad, the council members and other Piltovians complicit in Zaun’s desperation get a free pass. Both in the show and by fandom. In fact, Mel can now be regarded as a hero (one of the GOATs of Arcane, if I recall) for killing Ambessa, then being christened the wolf by her mother. We don’t have to reckon with the fact that for most of the time she ignored Zaun, and that when Zaun got her attention, her first instinct was to weaponize Piltover, saying, “The peace was already broken.” And I’m pretty sure the reason she did this was LARGELY for ambition, because not more than an episode later, she’s backtracking, insisting that Jayce doesn’t know war like she does, that they should simply give Silco what he wants.

So Viktor was right. She wasn’t forced to create hextech weapons. She wanted to do it for her own gain. And Jayce rightfully gets mad at her in S2 when he recognizes her manipulations (even if he himself was complicit). He does, however tell her that “No one can control you and you’ll never be a passenger.” Once again affirming her incredible power—only this time, the focus is magic and not her political prowess. AND ISN’T IT CONVENIENT THAT MEL “DOESN’T UNDERSTAND” HER EMPATHIC POWERS SO SHE CAN BE TECHNICALLY EXCUSED FROM HER DECISIONS IN S1? HOW COOL IS THAT?!

Lmao when Mel starts lecturing her mother in the finale with “Mother, look at the price of your ambition,” it’s like . . . okay? You exacerbated this war long before your mother, girl. You were the one on the council for YEARS before she arrived. Mel, like Caitlyn, gets to play saviour while barely taking any credit for the fact that she was largely responsible for where Zaun and Piltover ended up (sis literally determined council votes singlehandedly). When Mel stands on the other side of the Bridge of Progress, she sees a trail of violence. She decides to cling even more firmly to her core values. Silco was right, but so was Mel. You see, diplomacy wouldn't have worked for Silco, but it could work for Mel, because Mel had power.

Summary of Fumblings:

-And what was that, “(Piltover is) the city I built for my family” BS? By the end of S1, it is clear that Mel wants NOTHING to do with being a Medarda anymore. She wants to keep Noxus and Piltover SEPARATE. So why does she tell her mother, “You will never be a Medarda” as some kind of gotcha? Lmao, like why tf does that matter? How would she know? Why would she care? Other than her and Kino, what other benevolent Medardas are out there that makes her say this?

-The Black Rose warns Mel of Ambessa’s “thirst for legacy” (much like Mel’s) leading to a worldwide calamity. Mel wants to imagine that her mother prizes her own children over her pride, but the Black Rose insists that’s not true. That Ambessa is willing to sacrifice her children for more power and legacy. We do understand, however, that when Ambessa is confronted by the Black Rose, she is resorting to hextech so she can avoid using Mel (”she’s safer as our enemy”). AND THAT WOULD MAKE SENSE IF THE THIRD ACT ACTUALLY ACTED LIKE IT. How is Mel going to be this really great weapon that Ambessa doesn’t want to use because she loves her (which like, why didn’t she love Kino then if it wasn’t about magic?), but also simultaneously SENT AWAY TO A DISTANT LAND OUT OF HER WATCH? So now she’s hiding Mel, but she wants to pursue the arcane that is waking her mage-ness up and making it impossible for Mel to hide? Ambessa was literally there in the council room in the aftermath of the explosion. She knew Mel had used magic to protect herself and Jayce, but she didn’t do anything? Say anything?

Now most of this is clearly setting up another story in Runeterra (which means my criticism will ultimately be left to conjecture), so I’m going to focus instead on her last words to Mel: “You are the wolf.” The wolf being a symbol (at least in callback to season 1) of ruthlessness and fearlessness: the opposite of mercy. Why does her mother say this? Because Mel finally made a kill? Or because she killed to protect what she built? Finally embraced her power? Yeah, let’s go with that last one. Mel’s development in S2 becomes one where we focus on the power she’s always had, both magical and influential. Yet the show focuses more on the cool magic part than the rammys of Mel’s decisions in S1. It ignores her political power and frontlines her magical abilities, even making her political prowess partly due to her magical empath powers . . . like . . .

-Mel had dislodged her legacy from the Medardas by the time S2 rolls around. . . except no she hasn’t. In the end, Mel is sailing back on the Noxian ships she painted over, and she is doing so as the new Warlord (even wearing what looks like her mother’s cape) because she is the badass wolf, the leader that her mom wasn’t. And how did she achieve that power? Magic. Why does she want to go back? To reform the Medarda name? To take on the mission her mother couldn’t finish against The Deceiver? Because Jayce is dead? Who even cares at this point, this is mainly happening for the spinoff. It isn’t illogical, it’s just the least interesting approach to her character. Mel had much more agency in S1, and her political prowess made her formidable. But that doesn’t matter anymore.

-Her whole arc in S1 was all about her finding the courage to leave the Medarda name behind in pursuit of true progress, but then she kills her mother and sails away from Piltover, the city she fought to protect and killed her mother for and is all about probably reforming the Medarda name—and that’s her job done? Is it me, or is that a reversal of her—pardon the pun—progress? Also, she grew up in Piltover, it must be more of her home than Noxus ever was. Not only that, but making Ambessa go from an imperialist tyrant to this woman bravely fighting against a larger, more powerful threat cheapens what Noxus represented for me. Sometimes conquerors do be conquering, and they make threats up to justify their greed. Not the other way around. It’s not too egregious, but it would’ve been nice if the Black Rose had been more of an epilogue thing.

-sigh I know I’ve said it before but it’s because it’s true . . . the conflict should have remained between Zaun and Piltover and Ambessa was a cheap way out of what S1 was building up

-Ambessa was not who Mel needed to physically defeat, but someone she needed to ideologically defeat. And we don’t see any of that. By the time Ambessa calls Mel “the wolf” it’s hollow, because it’s about Mel being a more powerful combatant than a wise ruler. In this moment, her “foxness” is about how she figured out the “deception” of the Black Rose and not how she outmaneuvered her mother politically. Perhaps it would be epic if we knew what the fuck she meant by “I see your face deceiver!” and then super sayan-ing out of nowhere. Her not having mercy on her mother is about being a Medarda, a question that wasn’t the focus of season 1, merely a catalyst. Becoming a Medarda was the goal Mel had, not the need. She needed to learn how to rule. Instead, she learns how to kill. And then she’s off to her home in Noxus as more of a soldier and spy than a queen. 

Which likely means two things:

-S2 got bored of Mel and just gave her cool reflective powers to make up for it. Making every interesting development about her character happen off-screen, in the writers room, or on another show.

-S2 was deliberately trying to communicate that it sided with Ambessa. That violence and combat, war, is not merely a failure of state craft, but necessary or inevitable to political growth. That militarism is the only thing that can answer militarism. That the only way to ensure the progress you make is secure is arming yourself. Even though this topic has some grey areas, Arcane explicitly picks a side by narratively using Ambessa to justify Piltover’s weaponization of hextech.

i know fandom has a lot to say about Mel being a “strong-black woman” character, but as a black woman myself, I hated how they stripped her of what made her such a strong, enigmatic presence in S1. Her prowess, her wit and cleverness. Her sheer intellectual power made her so FORMIDABLE.

She’s just a lost, hurt uwu little puppy for most of S2 before she’s given her US government assigned Avengers superhero uniform.

Mel in Act I was already using Lest to spy and we almost got a good story then—POOF!—Black Rose.

-Mel’s contribution to the development of hex-tech every step of the way is completely ignored. Instead Viktor and Jayce take full responsibility.

Conclusion:

Mel and Silco's arcs both ask: is violence necessary for progress? Both answer yes, but Mel's remains a little unsatisfactory. Because Mel had a choice. She had power. Power that Silco was willing to do (almost) anything to get. Both Mel and Silco's presence in S1 were formidable, and what made them so intriguing was there thorough understanding of people, both the good and the bad. But in S2, at least for Mel, what made her such an agentive character is thrust aside for spinoff hype. It's not that it isn't cool, it is. It's just one of the things that made S2 feel not only chunky, but disconnected from the roots of its story in S1. Both Silco's and Mel's characters in S2 reveal a very poor (or troubling) view of oppression, power dynamics and politics.

Anyway, that's just me. I was gonna do Ekko, Caitlyn and Jayce as well, but this post got too lengthy. I'll probably need to whittle it all down later. I've already cut so much.

[clare-875]

OMG, Hey, I'm new to this blog. I just read the "New Names" fic you recently wrote. Since Shanks is my favorite character, can you do one of him with the reader?

New Names pt.2 (Shanks, Sabo, Crocodile)

_____ Pairings: Shanks x Reader; Sabo x Reader; Crocodile x Reader Summary: His reaction when you call him buddy, pal, etc. Warnings: Mostly fluff, Slightly suggestive, Female Reader A/N: I decided to add some characters! I hope you like it! <3 [One Piece Masterlist] [Part 1: Luffy, Sanji, Zoro, Ace, Law] [Part 3: Corazon, Killer, Mihawk, Penguin] [Part 4: Kid, Katakuri, Smoker] _____

- Shanks -

(A/N: Slightly longer fic than the others <3)

You sigh as your crewmates look at you with shit-eating grins on their faces. "A deal's a deal [y/n]," Yassop tells you, leaning back smugly as you regrettably accept defeat. You had been playing a game of cards, but this time the only thing on the line was the loser having had to do one thing that the winner pleads. Yassop had (unfortunately for you) won, and he wanted to mess with his Captain through you. "Come on, is it the worst thing I could've asked you to do?" You roll your eyes.

"Fine, I'll do it."

You instantly hear the uproar of cheers from around you and smile despite yourself. The crew must really be bored to find such keen interest in such a little prank. But you would be lying to say you also weren't intrigued about your boyfriend's reaction. You get up from your chair and the crew looks on, amusement lingering in their gazes. Luckily for you, as soon as you stand, Shanks makes his way onto the deck. His eyes shine as soon as he sees you approach.

"Hey, love." He grins wide, beckoning you over.

You teasingly smile, but instead of running into him as you usually do, you pat him on the shoulder and walk past him.

"Hey dude, I'll see you in a minute. I've just got to talk to Benn about something."

You walk off, going to find the second-in-charge whilst trying to stifle your laughter. It's as though instantly you broke the man.

"Wait what-"

Shanks reaches for you but you are already gone. His grin fades and his form goes rigid, it's as though the renowned empower was reduced to something like a child just by your mere words. He looks as though he's seen a ghost.

"What did I do?"

He turns to his crewmates who look on, trying to stifle the laughs that threaten to break free. But ultimately they are able to play dumb.

"Don't ask us, Captain."

The rest of the day, Shanks is at your heels following you, talking to you, trying to figure out if he had done something wrong. But it is either you were truly indifferent or you were great at acting because, despite the name you call him, you hadn't changed. You still looked at him lovingly and happily returned conversation, but that only made the red-haired captain more frustrated.

"It's okay dude, I've got it."

"I'm doing great dude, how are you doing?"

"Hey, dude, mind passing me that?"

It drives your Captain insane.

You only break when night falls, and finally, Yassop's word means nothing as the day has passed. You were lying in bed next to your boyfriend and you could feel his burning stare on you. You turn, and sure enough, your Captain looks at you intently, a crease between his brow.

"What is it?" You say, an amused tone lingering beneath your words. Shanks looks as though he is almost pouting and you have to stop yourself from laughing at the childish display of sadness placed right in front of you.

"Love, did I do something wrong today?"

You tilt your head to the side as the red-haired man in front of you finally spills the words he has been holding onto all day.

"You kept calling me dude."

You try to hold your facade, but light laughter falls from your lips, and it only causes the crease between Shank's eyebrows to deepen. A frown lingered on his face.

"Love," you say, and you instantly see the way his irises enlighten even in the darkness of the room. "It was a prank. I lost a bet with Yassop, I'm sorry." You smile sheepishly and your Captain looks dumbfounded as he stares at you blankly. But you yelp as he suddenly pulls you into his side. When you look up he is staring at you with a burning intensity.

"So you're saying I suffered all day, because of a stupid bet?"

You nervously look to your Captain and mutter a small yes. You swear you capture a glimpse of a relieved smile, but he takes you aback as soon, his lips capture yours.

"You'll pay for that princess."

He murmurs to you teasingly and you laugh before he kisses you once more, warmth igniting within you. His hands are in your hair as your lips move against his more fervently, your touch travels among his bare skin.

"Sure, dude." You mutter.

You can hear Shanks growl lowly in your ear at your response.

- Sabo -

It was a normal day at the Revolutionary Army's base and Sabo hadn't a care in the world. Or at least that's what he thought. Unbeknownst to him, however, were you and Koala planning to make the most of a rare, quiet day. And by making the most of it, you meant ruining Sabo's peace. You were sick of him hanging up on you prematurely and ignoring you when he got too engrossed in a mission.

You both wanted to get him back.

"Come on, [y/n], here he comes!" Koala all but pushes you in the direction of your boyfriend, as she holds a hand to her mouth to stop her giggles. You roll your eyes but wink in her direction, hiding your own grin as you approach. It was just a small prank, after all, nothing to worry about. As you get closer, Sabo looks up from a map he was observing and he smiles at you.

"Love! Take a look, it's for the next mission Dragon-san set us."

You smile softly at his devotion but continue on your secret task at hand; you know Koala is somewhere still watching.

"Looks cool, man. Have you gotten far with the planning yet?"

Sabo is about to reply, but he suddenly freezes when the words you say click in his mind. You stifle a grin, as you watch his eyebrows furrow together and his lips downturn. He gazes at you, but instead of the loving stare you had just seen, all you see is confusion and slight worry.

"Love, is something wrong?"

You smile softly trying not to let it turn into a grin.

"No, of course not... man."

Sabo freezes once more in disdain at the choice of your words. His keen eyes seem to travel yours looking for answers, and you can see his increasing frustration when he finds none. However, he seems to stop when he sees something behind you.

"What-,"

You hear a squeak and you know that it is a Koala, most likely spotted by your boyfriend. You see his lips quirk upwards slightly. Trying to keep up a facade you try to save it by interrupting him.

"Anyway, we should really be getting back to the-"

But your boyfriend seems to have caught onto the game you both were playing and he leans into you teasingly.

"Really, love? Why is Koala hiding behind the wall over there?"

"I don't see anyone." You say as you try to play dumb, but the grin on Sabo's face only widens. Your smile on the other hand wavers and it slowly turns to a pout as you realise he has caught on so quickly.

You turn your face away from your boyfriend defiantly but Sabo is quick to reach out and keep you facing him. You look so pretty to him, even when you're upset. Sabo lets out a low chuckle, but when you meet his eyes you are surprised to see the adoration and relief etched within.

"You know, love. If you wanted attention, you could've just asked."

He leans forward and kisses your pouting lips until he feels them upturn against his once more.

- Crocodile -

As you wait in your shared chambers after lord knows how long, your bored mind starts to wander. You come up with an idea that may not be a good idea in the face of a former warlord of the sea, but you already find yourself convinced. Crocodile had been busy the past weeks and you had barely seen him. You missed him but it also made you petty.

You find yourself hiding a grin when your stoic boyfriend makes his way into the room. He seems tired and smoke still blows from the cigar in his mouth. You stand instantly, giving him a kind smile and you momentarily see his eyes soften at the sight of you. You gently pry the jacket from his broad shoulders and hang it up on the wall.

"Evening, love."

His words are murmured lowly in your ear as he walks past. Your heart thrums faster in your chest, but you decide to go through with your little game anyway.

"Evening, pal. How was your day?"

Your words are softly spoken and soothe Crocodile's raging mind after a strenuous day. However, as soon as he picks up the change in the name you call him, irritation brims, causing his eyes to sharpen when he turns to you.

"What was that?"

Your boyfriend's voice is anything but even. It takes on a deadly edge but you know that despite his tenacious nature, he wouldn't exactly do anything to you for a small prank. Or at least that's what you thought, and so you continued.

"What was what, pal?"

You have to fight a grin at the decomposition of your boyfriend's usually sure facade. But soon, the smile on your face fades and in its place anticipation thrums through you. Your boyfriend is suddenly hovering in front of you, a hand placed surprisingly gently under your chin and forcing you to look at him.

"Don't start now, love." He growls lowly into your ear, and your heart picks up pace from the sudden proximity. You feel yourself falter, but you are determined to see your little plan through.

"What are you talking about, pal?"

If it weren't for the intensity in his stare, you would've laughed at the almost comical name you called such a serious individual. However, Crocodile seems to have had a long day, and now as his beloved seems to want to play games, the day seems scarcely over; punishment is in order.

"I think it's time you remember, exactly who you're calling pal."

You let out a gasp as he hoists you over his shoulder, and you struggle only for a minute before giving in.

You should've known that messing with Crocodile would come with consequences.