#and also kill the person who decided every person on said discords would be generally unhelpful too

[zeravmeta]

i need to go back in time to kill whoever decided that discord was better than a dedicated wiki for information about topics

[red-riding-wood]

PSA - Community Predator

Over a series of months, myself and other Tumblr users -- fic writers, gif makers, fans of created content -- have been victimised by @mrkdvidal1989, who has extensively lied about who he is, preyed on multiple women and denied involvement -- therefore ruining friendships, reputations and feelings, and promised me life-saving medical treatment that he never followed through on.

More information including mine and their stories under the cut.

The reason I am going public with this is twofold:

A) To protect others from being hurt. He is known to reach out to many tumblr users, especially young women in the Cillian Murphy fandom -- but he may have a wider reach beyond this circle. B) Since his "disappearance" three weeks ago and the unravelling of his lies, this man has ruined my life and the only hope I had of obtaining treatment for a condition that has been plaguing me for four years.

Killian Vidal is the name he has chosen to give us, and has claimed to be both a officer commander and general in the mobility troop in the SAS (the general rank does not even exist), has beaten cancer a while ago (but said to another mutual that his "time was running out" and he is currently struggling with it), and a plethora of other life experiences and general knowledge about him that varies in consistency when talking to different people and is questionable in its validity. He has also shared pictures of "himself" that when reverse image searched, belong to different people.

I got to know Kill when he reblogged one of my fanfics (as the story seems to start with a lot of his victims) and he reached out via DMs. We quickly became close friends who called nearly every day on Discord and when I told him about my health issues, he immediately offered to pay for my medical treatment wherever I could find willing doctors.

I was hesitant to believe this at first since all of this seemed too good to be true (and was). He claimed to be very wealthy, enough to afford private jets like it was nothing and to rent me an apartment in the UK in the same building as him. Over time, I grew to trust him because he felt like such a genuine person and friend, which was made all the more believable by the fact that he has such a huge following on Tumblr and was, at the time, part of a vast social network of fans and friends (one of which he even claimed to know IRL -- who will remain anonymous unless they decide to speak out). I decided to ignore the little red flags because I was so desperate to receive this treatment that for me would be life-saving.

For four years, I have been plagued by an array of (mostly) undiagnosed digestive issues that have made my life almost unbearable and have on numerous occasions nearly killed me due to malnutrition. I've spent months in hospital, endured years of malpractice and misdiagnoses, undergone heart surgery, and have tried absolutely everything I can to get better. In the winter of 2023, I was told by my doctor that I was refused in the TPN program (a treatment that may have slowed or stopped my weight loss) and that with or without it, I was looking at mortality. Refusing to stop fighting but having exhausted the public health care system in Canada, I went into 2024 not really having much hope of anything anymore.

So, when Kill came along, that changed. He promised -- and I mean, from the bottom of his heart, promised -- that he would help me get treatment, that he would get me out of my abusive home and fly me to the UK, that he would be there for me as my friend, etc. I was beyond grateful, and as my trust with him built, so did my hope.

The travel plans kept getting put off; originally, he would fly me out as soon as the apartment became available, which was the 11th of Feb, 2024. He kept finding excuses to not book the jet. Finally, it seemed as if around the 15th/16th I would be flying. My health had been declining rapidly and the situation was becoming all the more urgent, and he said he was in contact with a pilot and would send the ticket soon and call me.

That was the last I heard from him. The 16th.

Initially thinking he had ended his life (he had discussed thoughts of suicide with me prior to this), I was beside myself with worry not only thinking one of my closest friends was gone but also that my chance at life was. I reached out to his other friends, and I made several calls to the UK authorities and emergency services and ended up requesting a welfare check be made to see if he was even alive.

They reported that no one under the name Killian Vidal was in the records of the building name he gave me -- the same building that I was meant to live in within that week.

After reaching out to my now beloved friend @kittenonpluto (A.K.A., Cas) on Tumblr, I learned that Kill was in fact alive, and had told her that he was in hospital for digestive issues in Indianopolis, United States (though again, no record of his name in their medical system). He still wouldn't talk to me, but told her to tell me that he would reach out when he was out of hospital.

Cas and I compared information he'd told us (her story will be attached to this post) and looked into the mystery more. He constantly dodged confrontation and questions about the fake photos and information he'd sent her, and seemed to use his completely fabricated hospitalisation as an excuse to not fulfil his promises to myself and her, as well as a means to garner sympathy.

It was quite obvious that he didn't know how the American medical system worked, and he even incorporated elements of my actual story and used them in his. When asked about his treatments, he responded with medically false information. He reported digestive issues, reflux, and having both an NG tube and TPN -- both of which I have experience with -- and let me say, I am beyond disgusted and infuriated that my real life trauma was used as a ploy in all this.

How do we know for a fact this is false? I checked the police case for his welfare check again, and they said that they confirmed him being in the UK at the same time he had told Cas he was in hospital in the States.

After a final confrontation from both Cas and myself (and a desperate final plea for the medical aid he promised me), he was never heard from again from either of us or our friend circles.

I'm now having to pick up the pieces he's left me in and to be honest, I have little to no idea of what the hell to do or how to save myself. The fact that he strung me along for a month and built up my hope that I was going to live only to abandon me without even a word is deplorable to me.

And mine isn't the only story. I've heard from four women on Tumblr (who, again, will remain anonymous unless they choose to speak out) who he has been romantic or sexually involved with (and lied about his involvement, made them out to seem insane or toxic, created rifts in our friendships, toyed with their emotions, and made false promises to of relationships, marriage, and finances).

And that's not including the ex-wife who came back to Tumblr to claim that her and Kill had never met nor married. She was promptly silenced by a "lawyer threat" that we have strong reason to believe was a bluff.

At the end of the day, there are so many lies, half-truths, inconsistencies, etc. this man has wrapped himself in and we don't know for the life of us what his motives are, but from the information that we do know is false, he isn't genuine. He toys with people. He hurts them. Myself and the others that have been affected by this want that to stop.

And at any point, he has the ability to make a new account, and take on a new persona, pretend to be someone else. Tumblr is a wonderful place and I have met so many cool people on here, but please be careful about who you interact with and what you share, because aside from making this post, it is beyond my power to stop him from doing what he does. But after what he did to me, I could not remain silent.

Other Stories

If you have an experience or story with Killian that you would like heard, please reblog it on this thread or make a post. With your consent, I can include a link to it below.

kittenonpluto's story

aurorag98's story

everyoneisawhore's story

your-nanas-house's story

hllywdwhre's story

Final Note

Lastly, if you have read this far, thank you.

If you want to reach out to me about this issue -- whether it's to anonymously share your experience, ask questions, ask for evidence (of which I can back up these statements with), or anything at all --, please do not hesitate to do so. <3

For those who may be worried about the potential legality of this post, everything that I have stated as fact is fact and it is not my intention to slander or spread false information.

[nojey]

impostor

quackity x streamer!reader

genre: fluff, crack

word count: 2,312 (my most so far 😳)

warning(s): (y/s/n) = your streamer name, (n/n) = nickname, cursing

synopsis: having a flirty personality was your nature, but when you use that to make a certain boy in your among us lobby blush, where does that leave you?

today was the day you were going to play among us with some of your friends, and new people you haven’t met yet. you were beyond excited to meet new people because that meant new friends, and new friends means new people to stream with. you hadn’t been able to make new friends recently because people always thought your flirty personality was too much to deal with and gave them mixed signals whether you wanted something more than just being friends. you genuinely didn’t have those intentions and it was something you were lowkey insecure about. your friends had assured you that it wasn’t your fault and it was just your personality but the new people you wanted to be friends with told you otherwise.

you had been streaming for the past 30 minutes waiting for someone to send the code in discord. talking to your chat about the lobby and who would be in it, “um the only people i know for sure are gonna be in it is poki, rae, sykkuno, corpse, and bretman. but rae did tell me that there would be some minecraft streamers,” you said lifting your eyebrows in a suggestive manner. your chat knew about you simping for minecraft streamers and they were excited for you, some of them warning you not to fall for one because they’ll just break your heart and flirt with each other. 

you heard the notification from discord coming from rae, sending the among us code and you immediately started up the game. waiting a few seconds, you put in the code and saw you were one of the last people to join. you entered the vc and heard them talking. “hi everyone!” you said in a cheery voice, smiling as they all replied with a greeting. “i’m (y/s/n), but you guys can call me (n/n)” you said. waiting for everyone else you weren’t familiar with to introduce themselves. everyone did and you figured out that you were playing with not only poki, rae, sykkuno, corpse, and bretman but also dream, george, and karl. “who else are we waiting for?” you asked, noticing the 9/10 on the bottom of the among us screen. as you asked that you heard a very loud scream coming from your headphones. you winced at the sound but soon heard a “i have arrived!” coming from the same voice that did that very loud screech. “nice of you to finally join us quackity,” karl said. you recognized the voice as soon as you heard him say ‘i have arrived’ and your eyes went big. you muted yourself in the discord call and talked to your chat. “holy shit chat, it’s quackity. like quackity the guy i’ve been SIMPING over for the past few months, holy shit.” you said, very surprised to see your favorite minecraft streamer in the same among us lobby as you. 

you unmuted and heard rae say, “surprise shawty!” and you immediately knew that she planned this. “who are we surprising?” george asked. “(y/n) is a very big fan of one of you guys.” poki said in a teasing voice. “oh who is it?” dream asked, sounding very curious. “it’s actuall-” you cut sykkuno off. “ah ha ha, *cough* *cough* *cough*, you guys, let’s start the game. ah ha my chat has been waiting for like an hour now.” “(y/n) bitch, you trying to change the subject?” bretman asked you. “oo now i’m curious too.” quackity said. you started blushing and your chat started teasing you. “mm i have no idea what you’re talking about bret, i just don’t want my lovely chat to keep waiting for this game. they’ve been looking forward to it as soon as they knew you would be in it. you know? bretman rock? singer, songwriter, actor, actress, athlete, activist, a scientist on the motherfucking side, the star of crystal of the day, and a coconut connoisseur. the baddest bitch out.” you said, hopefully distracting him from the previous topic. “okay bitch, just because you know i’m the baddest in this lobby; you’re off the hook.” everyone started laughing and as soon as it died down, dream screamed, “let’s get this game started!” rae then started the game and your adventure began.

the screen in front of you displayed “crewmate” and you were off to do your first task. you met up with sykkuno at the swipe card task and said “hey sykkuno!” he got startled and said, “oh! hey (y/n), swiping your card too?” “yessir! you know sykkuno, my chat always tells me to tell you that you should stop covering your smile whenever you laugh or smile in general and i agree with them. you have a very nice smile and you should show the world your pretty face.” you smiled. he laughed awkwardly, “oh thanks, (y/n)! i’ll- i’ll think about that. well. i’m off to my next task, bye (y/n)!” you bid goodbye to him as well and made your way toward electrical to find dream there alone. “oo dream, did you just hop out of that vent?” you asked, very much joking because he was on the 1 2 3 task, quite far away from the vent. “(y/n). are you serious? i am so far away from the vent! and you’re gonna sus me?” he said, faking offence. “well i don’t know. you do look sus just standing there for so long.” you said, putting up with the bit you guys were doing. “well what if you’re the one that hopped out of the vent? i had my task open and didn’t see you come in, why don’t you just kill me huh, (y/n)? kill me (y/n)!” you guys both started laughing and while you were in your fit of laughter, a body was called. 

“oo what are you guys laughing about?” george asked. “oh nothing. dream was just peer pressuring me to kill him.” he laughed even harder and said, “i was not peer pressuring you! you were sussing me and i was just sussing you just as much!” you laughed a little more and commented, “you know dream, you have a really pretty voice, it’s very comforting.” “oh my god! is dream the guy you’re a big fan of?” karl asked, thinking he made the biggest discovery on earth. “it actually isn’t” poki said, making karl quiet down. 

“anyways. who the fuck killed bretman?!” you asked, lowering your voice to sound more intimidating and finally looking at the screen to see bretman dead. your friends started laughing and corpse said, “i last saw him in o2 with quackity.” which made you a little embarrassed but you kept up with your act. “quackity, i swear to god if you killed the baddest bitch in this lobby you’re dead first whenever i’m imposter.” faking the same deep voice. quackity had started staggering his breath into his mic but finally let out, “i left him there and went to comms, it wasn’t me i swear!” and started to fake cry which made you let out a rambunctious laugh. “okay, okay. i believe it.” you said, still giggling a bit. “the thing is, i found his body in o2 and you were the last to see him, quackity.” rae said, still sussing quackity. “well, where was everyone?” you asked, hoping to get some sus off of him. “i know dream was with me in electrical.” sykkuno was in cafeteria, george and karl were in reactor, rae was obviously in o2 where she found bretman’s body, corpse was in lower engine, quackity in comms and poki was in admin. none of you really had any other susses other than quackity but you all decided to skip since it was only one kill and someone definitely could’ve vented into nav or something.

you started humming the tune to jesus in la by alec benjamin while on your way to electrical to finish your download. you then ran into corpse and started a conversation with him. “hi hi corpse!” and he responded with his signature, “what up baby” you giggled and replied, “my chat goes crazy every time you say that,” he laughed and asked, “if i say it more often do you think they’ll donate?” you laughed very loudly and said, “if they do, i’ll give you half of the donos” you guys both laughed and walked out of electrical to admin together and stayed together majority of the round till the lights got called. “corpse we have to stick together and don’t get gotted.” you said. but somehow along the way to electrical you lost him and just went straight to fix the lights. once you got there, sykkuno was already standing at the light panel but not fixing the lights. “sykkuno, why aren’t you fixing the lights?” you asked him. “oh i was, i just got here, haha.” he said, playing it off. as soon as you hit the last light switch, a body was called and it was dream. you looked to see that corpse and george also died.

“you guys kill bretman then you kill corpse?! who is the one to come face my wrath!” you said with an angry face that chat would probably screenshot or clip. everyone in the lobby started laughing and you held your serious face. “i’m not joking. i was with corpse until the lights got called then we got separated in storage. once i find out which one of you killed them, you better sleep with one eye open.” everyone started laughing even harder and even you cracked a small smile hearing all of them. “well i hate to say it but, i did see sykkuno last with dream.” poki said. “wha-what do you mean? i was in electrical fixing the lights right (y/n)? and i left dream near the beginning of the round” sykkuno replied. “i only saw you once i got there and you were taking a long time to fix them.” you said, hoping that you caught one of the killers. “but i told you that i just got there a few seconds before you.” he said in disbelief, thinking telling you that would help him. “you could’ve lied, sy,” you said, pulling out the nickname you had for him. “what?! me lie to you? i would never.” he said. “mm, he’s lying! he raises his voice a bit when he lies.” rae said, pointing out one of his tales. “that is true.” poki said, agreeing with what rae pointed out. “i can’t believe you would lie to me, sy!” you said. “just for that, i’m voting you.” you continued. “but we’re on 7! we don’t vote on 7,” rae said. “oops.” you said.

karl, and poki all voted with you on voting sykkuno out, leaving rae and quackity voting to skip but he ended up getting sent out of the airlock because sykkuno voted himself, thinking everyone would skip. you had hoped you really did get one of the impostors.

by this time you ended up just going by yourself and finishing your tasks. you haven’t seen anyone so you decided to go to security to spy on cams. no one was passing through until you saw quackity and he entered security and you both started talking. “hi quackity!” you said, very enthusiastic to be talking to your favorite mc streamer. “hi (y/n). how’s it going?” he asked. “well i can’t find anyone, no one has passed by the cameras other than you.” you said with your voice dripping in disappointment. “do you think we should go out and look for someone?” you asked. “no, we should just stay here and talk! we haven’t talked at all the whole game.” he said. “mm that’s true. so did you finish all your tasks?” you asked him. “no, BUT i do have a question for you ms. (y/n).” he said. you heart started beating faster, very anxious to hear what he had to ask. you hummed for him to continue and he asked, “who’s the guy you’re simping for?” you felt like your heart stopped but what you didn’t see was that he was blushing and reading his chat. “chat! i’m not simping! (y/n) is just very attractive, okay? there’s nothing i can do about that!” he said making a ‘>:(’ face, thinking he was muted. “you think i’m attractive?” you asked very shyly. “i- uh- what do you mea- i have no- what?” he stuttered and immediately killed you out of embarrassment. your screen then showed “defeat” and you gasped very loudly. 

“quackity! what the fuck? i fucking knew it was you sykkuno!” everyone started laughing and you heard a ding coming from discord. you saw it was a private message to you from quackity.

quackity: yeah, i do think you’re really attractive ;)

“quackity, you simp! i can’t believe you killed me because of that. you could’ve just told me. i think you’re really attractive too and i’d like to get to know you off stream.” you said, giving a big smile only your chat could see. “awe! (y/n)’s smiling really big! look at their stream!” rae cooed. you covered your face and heard a dono for $50 from quackity, how about we go on a date ;). “i’d like that quackity.” you said in the vc call. “you can call me alex.” he said, smiling and blushing, and his chat teasing him.

-------

after hearing you and dream flirt in the meeting, quackity was determined to kill dream out of jealousy. once he did he heard you and corpse in electrical, staying a distance away and following you both but close enough to hear you and see you with his impostor vision. he called lights and made sure you wouldn’t be able to see him once he killed corpse.

[tennessoui]

40 or 43 if you’re still taking prompts! i love ur AUs they’re so beautiful and contain so much brilliance within a short snippet!

it's been so long, anon, you probably forgot you sent this but here is prompt 40, exes meeting after not seeing each other for a long time. in true tennessoui fashion, they don't. actually. meet and/or see each other in this snippet. also in true tennessoui fashion, all tennessoui needs to decide to continue this is one (1) validation.

the backstory here is something i have been thinking about for days after a discord convo, where during the fight on mustafar, obi-wan hits anakin hard enough in the head that he loses all of his memories. obi-wan takes him with him for a few months but the wounds of Order 66 and vaderkin's role in what happened is too fresh for obi-wan to (understandably) get over, even if this anakin doesn't remember doing it, so they separate. this is set 8 years after Mustafar.

(1.7k)

“Kenobi won’t come,” the fighter pilot says immediately upon disembarking from his craft.

One commander lets out a groan. Someone else hits the durasteel side of the closest x-wing with a closed fist.

“Do we really need him?” Anakin demands, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s been eight years since the rise of the Empire. Surely a washed-up Jedi General from the Clone Wars won’t have people jumping to join the Rebellion!”

No one meets his eye. In fact, the air room suddenly feels very, very uncomfortable.

Organa exhales heavily and turns to look at Anakin, which is rare because the man never voluntarily looks at Anakin. “There are few names from that time that still carry an untainted weight in the eyes of the galaxy. Obi-Wan Kenobi is one of them.”

“I grew up hearing about The Team!” A teenager says eagerly. “I’d join any resistance movement if I knew both of ‘em were fighting with me!”

“You’re already a part of a resistance movement,” a girl next to him pointed out waspishly.

The boy waves her off. “Skywalker and Kenobi, saving the galaxy! It’d be wizard to be a part of that, and you know it, Aasha!”

Anakin’s throat tightens at that name. Skywalker. His name. Or, his old name. He has no more connection to it now than he does to the name Kenobi or Organa. They’re just letters.

He catches Organa’s eye. The man is looking at him with a mix of curiosity and wariness. Anakin knows instinctively that this is another one of the man’s tests. Will this time be the time that whatever injury has kept his memories suppressed for eight years is undone, and his previous life comes thundering through his mind?

He’s sick of these tests. He’s never failed one, but Organa never comes closer to trusting him afterward. He can only assume that whatever Anakin Skywalker had done in his last few days alive had been so terrible that only a few people knew the truth, and those who did would never forgive any version of him for it.

Organa certainly knew, though he had never shared that information with Anakin. And.

And Kenobi did as well. That was clear. They’d only been together for five standard months, sharing a small spacecraft made smaller by the fear, agony, grief, fury, and hurt radiating off of his companion into the space around them.

It had been hard to tell at the time if one of the things Obi-Wan Kenobi had been grieving was the loss of Anakin Skywalker. Anakin isn’t sure Kenobi would have been able to answer that either.

Some part of him that usually rests dormant in the back of his mind stirs and hisses that it had to have been. That Skywalker’s loss had torn Kenobi’s soul to shreds.

This doesn’t necessarily feel like his own thought, but it’s quite hard to ignore. He wants to rub a hand against his aching head, but that surely would tip off Organa that something’s--what? That he’s having thoughts?

Perish the very idea.

One would think Anakin hadn’t joined the Rebellion of his own free will. That Anakin hadn’t spent three standard months on the planet Kenobi had left him on before catching wind of the existence of the Rebel Alliance, that he hadn’t risked life and limb (more limb, apparently, given his missing flesh hand) to find them afterwards. He hadn’t known much anything about himself, but he had known that he hadn’t liked what the Imperial troops were doing, how much destruction they were causing, how the people they were supposed to be protecting hid in fear of their white armor.

Something in Anakin had rebelled at that, had thought it wrong and twisted. Someone needs to stop them, he’d thought. So he had found the people that were trying to.

And yes, a small part of him had thought--perhaps hoped--that Obi-Wan Kenobi would be a part of the Rebel Alliance by the time Anakin made his way to their biggest base. He had thought--perhaps hoped--that he would be able to prove himself to the other man. Look, he had wanted to scream at Kenobi, I’m not like that other Anakin, I would never do what he did. You can trust me. You can look me in the eye, I won’t stab you in the back.

Because something in him had yearned, still yearns, for Kenobi’s approval. For the weight of his gaze settling warmly around his shoulders. For his small smiles, his calloused hand clasping the back of Anakin’s head to bring their foreheads together in a gentle tap hello.

These are things Anakin knows he’s never experienced. But he must have in his past life, because his whole body will ache for them like a phantom limb. It’s been seven years and a few months since he last saw Kenobi.

“I’ll go,” Anakin says, which is what he said the last time they were standing like this, huddled around a fighter pilot delivering the same message of failure.

Organa’s mouth tightens in displeasure, and Mothma places a hand on his arm in warning.

Everyone else falls silent around them, as if recognizing the fact that they’re in the middle of a brewing storm, and they’re lucky to be in its eye right now.

“I do not think--” Organa starts, but Anakin cuts him off, crossing his arms even tighter over his chest, as if to hold himself back. The force suppression collar around his neck grows warmer, but it holds. It always holds.

“You’re already sending men who look like me to him!” Anakin points out irately. “The last four men could have been related to me!” It’s something Anakin’s thought about in the past but never said out loud. He’s glad to say it now though, especially because Organa flushes a bit which means Anakin’s right. “Just send me! If it doesn’t work, nothing in the galaxy will!”

Now, Anakin isn’t sure that’s true at all. He’s taking a huge leap with this, but it’s been seven years and a few months since he saw Obi-Wan Kenobi in person, and every part of him is aching with the desire to lay eyes on the man again. Will he hate him still? Will he see all the differences Anakin’s made to his appearance? Will he like them? He fights the urge to run a hand over his shorn hair.

Will Obi-Wan even let him through the door?

The people around them are murmuring now. They don’t know what Organa knows, what Anakin has guessed at: that Skywalker died a traitor to the Republic, that he had tried to strike down Obi-Wan like the Emperor struck down the rest of the Jedi. To them, these fortunate outsiders, they’re wondering why Anakin Skywalker hasn’t already been sent to locate and bring back their errant General.

Before, Anakin’s offer had been quiet, easily ignored over someone else’s. Now he’s loud and confident. Impossible to turn away without making a public scene, without explaining why. And Organa has tried very hard not to do that. For whatever reason, Anakin doesn’t know. All he knows is that after he’d been examined by a battalion of med droids and interrogated by all three leaders of the Rebellion, Organa had given him a list of rules he had to follow in order to join the Rebel Alliance. Firstly, never remove his cuffs and collar.

It’s not a slave collar and it won’t electrocute you if you touch it or try to take it off, Organa had told him when he’d blanched away at the sight. But I have been informed by a trusted ally that the Chance--the Emperor knows your Force Signature intimately. We cannot risk being found. It would kill all hope for us.

Secondly, never confirm his identity. Never talk about who he used to be.

People will know, Organa had grudgingly admitted. Skywalker was one of the faces of the Clone Wars. But you cannot confirm it. In fact.

Thirdly, give up the name Skywalker. Pick another last name, if not first as well.

But Anakin had been attached to his first name for some reason he didn’t know how to begin to question, so even after he toyed with the idea of changing it completely, he couldn’t go through with it. Weeks later he had shown up in Organa’s makeshift office.

I had a mother, didn’t I? He had asked, causing Organa to stiffen immediately.

Do you remember? Organa had interrogated immediately, his standard greeting for Anakin. Anakin had gotten the feeling, especially in those early days, that Organa was waiting with baited breath for Anakin to remember so he could try him for war crimes or treason or whatever it was that Skywalker had done.

No, he had responded honestly. Just a feeling. If I am to take a new last name, I want her name.

A few days later, Anakin had stumbled into his bunk, tired from a day of hard training, to see a packet of documents on his pillow.

Anakin Shmison was written at the top of the first page.

The list of rules goes on and on.

But nowhere does it say that Anakin Shmison isn’t allowed to mention Obi-Wan Kenobi in public. He just never has, because even the sound of the man’s name makes him feel very nauseous, a combination of butterflies and adder snakes wrestling around inside his stomach.

Bail Organa is looking like he’s regretting that oversight right now, but Anakin has backed him quite solidly into a proverbial corner. Either finally tell everyone what happened between Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi in the last few hours of the Republic, or give Anakin Shmison leave to retrieve Kenobi.

“Fine,” Organa gets out, jaw locked and vein throbbing in his temple. Anakin has the distinct feeling he’se spent a lot of his life on the receiving end of that expression. “Have this X-Wing refueled, and leave tonight.”

“No sir,” Anakin says, enjoying the way one of the man’s eyebrows shoot up in angry incredulity.

“No?” Organa asks. “Would you like more beauty rest, perhaps, Shmison?”

“No sir, I don’t need it,” this time he doesn’t resist running a hand through his hair, messing with its part so his longer bangs fall to one side and balance out the mysterious scar that bisects his eyebrow. He grins. “But I will need a craft that sits two. For the return trip.”

[princessofprocrastination]

Just A Bet (GeorgeNotFound)

MASTERLIST

pairing : georgenotfound / george x reader - dreamwastaken/dream / clay x reader

summary : you’re just a bet to him. that is, until he realizes that you’re someone with a title. he scrambles to pick up your broken pieces, but he doesn’t realise that he’s too late. (angst) (trigger warning) (happy ending)

a/n : here’s sorta a little AU for you guys, don’t take any of this seriously, some things in this are clearly made up. side note ; holy shit i have more than a 100 followers right now. thank you so so much. 

everyone has probably dreamt of being a princess, a real one. for example, when the movie ‘the princess diaries’ came out, people wanted to be mia thermopolis and rule genovia. 

sounds like a dream, that is, to be going to high school and have plenty of paparazzi’s chasing you, or to be able to be recognized everywhere. 

in reality, it is the complete opposite of living the dream. you could barely walk out without being recognized if you didn’t cover up your face in some way. you were restricted to do many things, even to just hang out with your friends to grab lunch. 

to other people, they might just tell you to suck it up, that in the end of the day, you’re royalty, and that these are only tiny problems. 

you agreed, sure. but you did want to smell the fresh flowers outside. you wanted to be able to get food from wherever, with whoever without people’s prying eyes. 

you just wanted freedom. 

to whom might be reading this might be confused. you’re a princess. just like the movie, yes. princess of saudi arabia, you are. 

you are fairly young, still in your twenties. most people your age are out having fun going on a girls night, or still studying for their degrees, or even working right now. 

but you were prohibited to leave the castle. you were told to leave on the queen’s orders, only during meal times.

some days, you really liked it, being a princess. if you weren’t being egoistical, you would say that your face really did suit the royal title. 

you didn’t have to leave your room to make stacks of money. but the problem with that was, what would you do with the money if you couldn’t leave the house?

so you went on the internet. you settled on the internet. with the queen’s permission, of course. 

sure, she can be strict like all the time, but she tried her best to give you your freedom. so she let you have social media accounts. you being you, the public immediately found your accounts. 

you couldn’t find new friends, they were too scared to come across you. so you just entertained yourself. 

this isn’t bragging, but a lot of people knew who you were, but that doesn’t mean everyone does.

since you barely had a childhood, with being born and raised royal, you entertained yourself watching minecraft youtubers. for some reason, it calmed you. 

dream team, as you called the group, caught your eye. you watched all of their videos, caught up with every single live streams of theirs, even followed their instagrams and twitters. 

one morning, when you woke up, you found your instagram notifications fuller than other days. you were fairly confused. that is, until you realised that the whole of dream team had followed you back. 

they definitely know who you are and what you do now, right? they have a large fanbase, surely, they would’ve told the boys. 

your followers, since seeing the boys follow you, have told you to start playing games. you didn’t disappoint them. you asked your parents if you could and they granted you permission to do whatever you wanted. 

they told you “this would entertain the public and love you even more.” and smiled at you. you thought maybe they hit themselves in the head today with the leniency they gave you. but you pushed that thought. maybe they thought you have grown old enough. 

valkyrae, a streamer on twitch had reached out to you after knowing about your gaming desires. she asked if you wanted to join her and her group to play among us together. 

you almost immediately agreed and the rest of her friends welcomed you in with opened arms. 

your mum gave you one condition, that you had to follow in order to film yourself playing games. that is, if you kept yourself poised and respectable. you agreed to her shenanigans and started to play with rae. 

playing with her meant that you met countless different content creators, such as corpse husband and pokimane. they all were super nice to you, even when you had told them that they didn’t have to be nice to you because of your title. 

soon you had found yourself in an amazing group of friends and you felt great about yourself. 

you and rae had sustained such amazing friendship that she had came over to your house multiple times for meals. 

you’d text her “come over to my house, let’s eat lunch.” 

and she’d reply with “your castle you mean?” she jokes around. 

your friendship was loved by many people out there. 

one thing you didn’t say was that not everyone was obligated to know who you are, which then happens to be funny to see when they did end up finding out who you are. 

just the fact that they show such shock to their faces, and the tone in their voice changes. 

“holy fuck, she’s royal.” toast says as he came back from googling your name to know more about how you came about in a game of among us. 

“i’m so sorry for the past rounds.” he apologizes for the time he accuses you for no reason.

“please treat me the same way you used to, i’m just y/n when i’m playing games, definitely not a princess.” you told him. 

you didn’t have a big ego, although your parents did. “they need to know that you’re important.” they told you, but it never stuck to you. you wanted to be respected as a person, for your personalities, not because of a stupid title you were born in. 

sykkuno, rae and you had decided to make an smp, where you three would start building things for fun and stream it. 

you three had enough fun until it got boring, for you to start asking your other friends to join. the first person you offered to tour your little world was corpse since you and him had clicked so well. 

because you started playing minecraft and streaming it, it got the attention of minecraft youtubers. and for some reason, the seventeen year old, tommyinnit had found you interesting enough to talk to you. 

with tommy being that close to you, you attracted tubbo and wilbur soot, as well.

“i am in a vc with a princess.” tommy had said on stream when you two decided to play minecraft along with tubbo and wilbur. 

sure, the teenage boy got a little annoying at times, but you found it entertaining and funny. of course, tommy being tommy, he’d ask slightly personal questions about how royalty works in saudi arabia. 

not that he knew how royalty works in general, anyways. 

“the queen is still my favourite woman, but you come in close second.” he told you once. you laughed at that. 

no big title could stop you from fangirling the moment the man, dream itself had sent you a donation, and then later sending you a direct message. 

“let’s play minecraft together soon, seen me your discord.” he dmed you one day. of course you complied. 

for some reason, you never had the chance to play with george, and you played minecraft with sapnap and dream separately, never together. not that you were complaining. 

you decided on a more chill and laid back stream on that specific day, not really feeling like going on a minecraft server or play among us with your bestfriends when you got a text from an unknown number. 

hey. they sent

who’s this? you sent a text back.

my bad, this is george. they sent a text back to you.

holy shit. why would george text you. sure, you have played minecraft and among us with him sometimes but he isn’t one to give out his number so this was weird to you. 

although you consider to be close to the entirety to the dream team, you often tried to avoid texting them, especially outside of streaming. you didn’t want it to be awkward or tense. 

surprisingly, as your conversation with george lengthened, it became less and less awkward. the more you two texted, the more you felt like you and him had been friends for the longest time. 

being the princess, raised in a castle meant that you didn’t really have a social life. other than being put together with some prince of another country in hopes you’ll fall in love with them or marry them, you haven’t really had a legitimate boyfriend. not even a crush. 

to you, the princes in the world can be arrogant, snobby. they act like they are the most important thing in the world, that if they walk in a restaurant, everyone was to drop all their work for other people to entertain them. 

sure, this could just be the way that they were raised, but you didn’t want that in a man, a husband. it wouldn’t kill to be a little humble. 

princes are also a bore. they live practically the same lifestyle as you. conversations were never interesting, always the usual. 

to summarise this, since you and george have been talking and texting, you had fallen for him. hard. and it seems like he’s feeling the same way, just that the both of you hadn’t really said anything. 

-

DREAM’S POV

being really close friends with someone, more than one person, bestfriends, that is, meant that we had a group chat together. 

nothing constructive was ever said, only boys being boys. 

nick was the one to bring it up. and since he is the youngest, he sure does say some stupid things. 

dude, you should try to get in y/n’s pants. nick asked george in the groupchat.

there was a running joke between the nick and i. george lives under a rock, basically. when everyone was walking on eggshells around you, trying not to offend a princess, he never really cared. 

and that was when nick and i found out that george had no clue you held such a title on your pretty little head. 

you are a beautiful girl, no doubting that. i was sure that many people, even before you started streaming had a major crush on you. george definitely fits right in. he was practically vomiting hearts when he first saw you. 

it was meant to be funny. it was never meant to go this far. nick didn’t mean for his little bet to break a heart, let alone a princess. 

but he did. well, technically george did. he was so brutal with it. he toyed with your feelings, like he had no care in this world. 

no one would’ve guessed that the little cute, short george would do something as bad as he did. 

and now, no one can find you. no one. 

you were there, smiling in front of your camera one day and you were gone the other. just gone. no one knew where you went. 

granted, you are royal. it must not be hard to get people to hide you. but at the same time, you had major reporters trying to find you. and they couldn’t. what does that leave us? 

where did you go? 

come back. 

and although i know you want to hear this from george instead of his friends, you won’t. because he probably doesn’t.

we miss you. 

please just text us, we need to know you’re safe. 

-

YOUR POV

you left. you had to. it had been extremely humiliating. 

you didn’t think someone as sweet as george would do that, it all happened so quick. 

you had flown to england to meet him. he encouraged you to. it felt amazing to leave your hometown, you’ve lived there all your life. you definitely needed to fresh air. 

it took a lot of convincing your parents to let you fly to england. without a doubt, you knew that the only way you’ll get to leave is if you had a guard with you. 

this isn’t that kind of cliche story, your guard could literally be your dad, get your head out of the gutter, you are utterly in love with george, and you were sure george knew that and that’s why he encouraged you to fly to him. 

the first couple of days were fun. he brought you to all over brighton for you to experience what it’s like in england. he told you he wanted you to get your first real experience as a tourist, and that was what he did. 

winding down for the night, you brought him to relax in your hotel suite. frankly, george was surprised that you could afford such a place. but he didn’t want to ask where you got the money from, he didn’t really care. 

all he wanted to do was to complete his dare. his ego was too big to lose this time. 

that night was when you decided to tell him about your feelings about him. you were pretty confident that it was going to go smooth sailing. just the way he treated you showed so much about his feelings. 

so you did, you told him. while you told him that you love him, more than friends love each other, he looked you in the eyes. you weren’t sure what that meant. 

but he smiled. or smirked, you weren’t sure. 

and he kissed you. and the night didn’t end with you just kissing. 

so you thought the night was amazing, that it couldn’t get any better than that. 

that was, until you woke up the next morning. 

-

you woke up, sun shining straight into your suite, curtains wide open. 

although you didn’t really feel the presence of another person in the room with you, you brushed it off. you felt like something was off, that something was missing. 

you rolled over in your hotel bed, to see if the british man was laying next to you. 

he wasn’t. in fact, he was not in the hotel room at all. you checked the bathroom, the small little living room in your suite. he was found nowhere. 

you tried to see if he had left traces of himself in your hotel room, a sign that he was indeed there and that you hadn’t been dreaming it all. 

but the pain between your legs caused by the brit told you that it was all not a dream. 

so you did what a logical person would, text him. maybe he left to get food. 

but you knew that wasn’t the case the moment you had unlocked your phone. 

texts flood in, your social media notifications seemed to not be stopping anytime soon. 

you opened your texts messages. a couple from your parents, a lot from rae, multiple from some minecraft youtubers who you called friends. 

besides your parents, they were asking if you were okay. they were telling you to stay safe and to lay off social media for a while. 

your parents were practically screaming at you through texts. they called you a disgrace, not an honour to the family. you didn’t understand where this was coming from. 

you opened twitter, knowing that it was going to be the easiest way for you to find out what had happened, and why were you involved in it. 

you were trending. number one worldwide. you clicked on your name. your phone left your hand, falling hard to your hotel floor with a loud thud as you covered your mouth with both your hands, crying. 

two pictures. two photos that said it all. 

first photo was of you in bed, obviously naked under the hotel duvet. you were still sleeping. there was light coming from the windows, that showed that it had barely been sunrise when it was taken. 

second photo was what hit you the hardest. you wanted the earth to swallow you from below. it was a photo of your back, very naked back. it was clear that it was a photo that had been taken during sex. 

and it was obvious who you had it with, because he was the one who posted it all over twitter. 

george. 

that was why he left, with no traces of him ever being in the hotel room. 

you weren’t sure what was his motive. but you sure did know that he had completely broke you. 

crying, you picked up your phone from the floor, calling rae. 

“oh my god, tell me you’re okay.” she was panicking on the phone.

“i need to leave.” you told her. you knew that she would immediately understand the severity of the four words you told her. 

since then, you never came back. to the eyes of public, it was as if you never even existed. you were gone. 

-

you moved with rae. 

she had to leave her roommates to settle in with you. her roommates weren’t mad at her for leaving them. they completely understood, you needed the help.

although her roommates wanted to help you, they couldn’t. you needed to have the least amount of people to be with you. 

it didn’t help that they were all content creators, too. 

rae told people that she moved because she wanted her own space, so that she can make better videos. when she announced she was moving, not one person speculated that you had been the reason of her move. 

you paid for the house, you needed to. you owed her. no matter the amount of times she told you that you owed her nothing, that she was just doing it because she loves you, you couldn’t let her pay for a single thing. 

you needed to up your security, too. so you two had decided to get a house that was pretty big, somewhere in the mountains, with top security, away from other people. 

your parents soon calmed down after that day. they told you to come back, the begged you to come back. but you told them that you needed the time alone at that moment, and assured them that you would be okay. 

so they did what parents would. they made sure you were well taken care of. they sent you massive amounts of money, sent your their trusted guards to stay around the house. 

they did this all for you without the knowledge of the public. 

your parents told reporters that you were well safe, and would not be in the public eye, not until you were ready. 

you helped rae film certain videos. well, not like there was anything good to do in the massive mansion, anyways. 

all your social media pages were still up, just not updated. you left everything. you had created a more private one, for your close and trusted friends to follow. 

and you thought that nothing could really top that eventful day in england. 

but it did. 

you’re sat on toilet in on of the bathrooms, rae rubbing your back.

pregnant. it was clearly written on the test.

no fucking way. 

-

in no ways were you ready to be a mother. 

as a little kid, you had dreamt of being a mum, alongside a successful man who took responsibility. 

you never would have seen yourself to be a mother alone, with the help of your bestfriend. 

you never thought that you would be a mother, whose dad is someone who clearly doesn’t want anything to do with you. 

rae stayed with you all the time. even through the gross vomit sessions in the morning, or all the time, in your case. 

but you were in no way shape or form ready for a child. you had to raise a child on your own. even the thought of that had emotionally drained you. 

weeks after you found out you were pregnant, you were significantly getting more moody, and rae knew that. 

she made sure you ate well, slept well and kept up with eating vitamins each day. that was until, you couldn’t take it all anymore. 

maybe it was the stress. well, it was the stress. 

you blamed it all on the emotional toll the pregnancy took on you. your body was practically screaming for help. help that you need, but you weren’t in the right head space to offer the help to yourself. 

it was a typically normal day for rae and you. besides rae screaming in her gaming room while streaming, it had been pretty quiet. 

you felt queasy, but you pushed it off. it was normal for you nowadays. everything almost made you throw up. the look of something, the smell. 

but on that day, it was a different type of feeling in your stomach.

one second, you were walking into the kitchen, trying to get some water, and the other, you were on the floor, in pain. 

you screamed. this was the worst type of pain you’ve felt in your life. you screamed for anyone who could hear you. you were sure that even rae’s stream could hear you, but you didn’t care. 

soon you heard multiple footsteps. one of your guards came to your aid before rae did. he supported your head on his lap, him sitting on the floor. 

he told the other guard who came soon after he did to call the ambulance. 

that was when you finally found out what was happening. 

“holy shit, she’s bleeding.” rae repeated to herself. 

you were bleeding? that wasn’t good, right? that meant bad things, doesn’t it?

you felt like you were floating, like your limbs were as light as a feather. that was because you were losing consciousness. 

you lost it. you lost it and found out it was a boy. 

now the two boys you love more than your life aren’t here with you, forever. 

you cried for weeks, rae next to you, making sure you were still alive and eating. she was the only one that stayed by your side in real life. sure, your online friends did care about you, but they just couldn’t be there with you. 

clay and nick had always been texting you, sometimes calling to try their luck, clay mostly. you knew they cared about you, and they wanted to make sure that you’re okay. but you felt embarrassed. you didn’t want to face anyone, even if people kept saying that you did nothing wrong. 

apparently rae’s stream heard your scream, and that was how rae found out that you were in danger. she couldn’t hear through her headphones, but her chat kept spamming her about it, and that raised alarms. 

they kept asking about the ‘mysterious girl screaming’ in rae’s stream. it was short lived, though. rae told them that she had a friend over and that they were injured, and that rested the chaos for a little. 

you were sure that some people knew you were living with her. most of them were almost like detectives, after all. 

you didn’t blame the stans. it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out that you would live with her, anyways. 

since the awful day at the hospital, you have texted clay and nick. you wanted to tell them that you were okay, that you aren’t hurt, at least not physically anymore. 

it didn’t take you long to start calling clay daily again. other than rae, you didn’t really have anyone. so you told clay. 

it felt weird talking about a baby that used to be in you to someone whose bestfriend was the dad of. but he completely understood you. sure, he couldn’t say for experience, seeing as he clearly can’t get pregnant, but he supported you, made sure you let it all out to him. 

you and clay grew close, almost bestfriends. although you and nick were close, he’s still in college, and that meant that he usually didn’t have time to talk to you as much as clay did, and you didn’t blame him. school can be a pain in the ass.

but you still made sure to never keep nick in the dark. as much as clay is one of your bestfriends, so is nick. 

clay made sure never to talk about george to you, which deemed to be difficult since they had been friends for years. he had accidentally slipped his name out to you a couple times, but you were sure he didn’t meant to do that. 

other than the usual “george has been sleeping like a log” and “he slept through the smp war.” you hadn’t heard anything else about him, but it seemed like he was doing well. 

clay had told you about the bet. 

“nick brought it up, but we didn’t think he was actually going to go through with it.” the floridian said. 

you aren’t the type to hold grudges, not even if they did you really dirty, so you told clay that you were on the path of being fully healthy and that he didn’t need to apologise for his friend’s behaviour. 

“are you ever going to come back?” he asks you in a facetime call. you knew exactly what he was talking about. he wanted to know if you’d ever come back on the internet. 

you didn’t even know the answer yourself. you weren’t sure. so you told him that. 

“maybe, maybe not. who knows.” and that was months ago. 

you had plenty of time to heal, to get back on track. but nothing could top your pain of losing your child, that you never got to hold, to kiss, to spoil. 

telling your mother about the loss of your baby was the hardest. she is a traditional woman, always telling you to get married before bearing children, but that didn’t mean she didn’t love the baby you were carrying in you. 

she cried on the phone, sobbing, hiccupping. you wanted to hug her so bad, she even asked you when you’d come back, but you told her you needed time, but you’d be there soon. 

for some reason, although you got maximum hours of sleep each day, you still felt exhausted. you consulted a doctor, but he told you that it was normal since your body is still fragile, but the exhaustion never really went away as months go by. 

being bored at home, and hearing rae having fun made you feel lonely, it made you feel like you were left out. so you made the decision to come back. not to stream, but to appear in rae’s videos.

rae and the rest of the group welcomed you with open arms. they were caring and made sure you felt comfortable again, not stepping any boundaries. not that you cared, the public was bound to know everything soon enough. 

so you did that. 

you were playing proximity chat among us, with the usual people. at that point, you and the other nine people were still in the lobby, chatting, until corpse sounded out. 

“what have you been doing nowadays?” harmless question, in your opinion. 

you didn’t want to hide anything anymore, and rae knew what was about to happen.

“been having a lot of rest. doctor said that i’m still fragile.” you told corpse. 

“are you sick?” toast asks. some people would’ve been offended at that question, or take it the wrong way, but you didn’t. 

“actually, i suffered a miscarriage recently.” you told them honestly. 

there was no awkward silence. immediately, everyone started apologising, saying “sorry for your loss.” 

you brushed them off, telling them that it’s okay, that they didn’t offend you at all for asking that question. 

“feels good to get it out my chest.” you told them, laughing at the end of that sentence. 

“she hasn’t slept well at all, she really wanted to tell you guys.” rae told her

one by one, they all spoke to you, asked you if it was even okay that you all talked about it on streams. you told them that it had been your choice to tell people this way, and they had nothing to worry about. 

on the other hand, it was tough for george. not at first, though. he thought it was going to be easy, having sex with a pretty, virgin girl and ditch her alone in a country she she hasn’t personally been to.

but that changed the moment she disappeared. the guilt never really hit george until people started bashing him on the internet. 

at first, people were too focused on the girl. people discriminated you, called you a slut. they didn’t think that george was wrong at all, although he was the one who took the explicit photos and posted it. 

but then, people, mostly woman had started to realise indeed how messed up it was. 

george really couldn’t care that you “left.” but then people kept on commenting on his posts. specifically, they often left a comment saying “really bold of you to do that to a princess.”

at the start, he thought the comments meant that they couldn’t believe he did such terrible things to their princess, someone wholesome they cherished. he didn’t realise that his comments literally meant that you are a princess. 

so he googled it. he wanted to know why people kept calling you ‘princess’ or ‘next on the throne’. he was curious, and he wasn’t expecting it all to be real. 

when he googled your name, a huge google tab came out. 

princess of saudi arabia. 

this must be a typo, right? he couldn’t deny that you are indeed a pretty girl, he just couldn’t believe that he had done such things to someone so royal. 

he never even thought that one day, he would score to talk to celebrities, let alone be able to be in bed with an actual princess. 

so he doubted it. 

but then he kept looking. 

he looked at images of you. photos of you with a small tiara, next to what seemed to be the queen of saudi arabia, wearing a long, modest emerald gown. the photo was taken when the king had a birthday. 

picture after picture, he started to doubt his thoughts even more. 

he couldn’t lie, your face really fit the title. if he really thought about it, your existence screamed royalty. the way you spoke, your poise, the way you strut in a hallway and was able to wow a crowd without trying. 

george always assumed that people only stared at you in public because of how beautiful you are. he never really realised it all until now. 

usually, guys can be insecure when they hear rude comments about how a lanky man is able to get a beautiful, confident woman. but to george, he felt even more egoistical. he used you, truly like a trophy wife. 

that was until he really realised. 

now, he thinks that everything he did was just a plain asshole move, not saying it isn’t if he did it to any other normal girl.

“i fucking messed up” he thought to himself, reading press conferences about your princess title.

if he thought he messed up then, wait till he found out you were pregnant, and then later losing it. 

he felt like he was in a fever dream. it felt like a written book, not real life. 

he kept slapping himself, pinching himself to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. it all felt unreal. so many things were happening. 

now, he’s more concerned than guilty. he wanted to know if you’re okay. even he felt like he can’t cope with the information he was given, how would you feel?

furthermore, he kept reading theories that the scream in the background of valkyrae’s stream was yours. had you lost the baby there? had you lost his baby there?

-

he called clay and nick. he wanted to double check. it was all a lot to handle, knowing you’re a princess and a mother in the same week. 

nick screamed at him on discord for hours, literally. george knew clay was just as mad, just as disappointed. he just didn’t have the energy to say it all, even though all he wanted to do was fly to england and beat george up. 

although it took george a while to realise everything he did was messed up, he came to. and he really did want to contact you. but really, anyone in your position wouldn’t even glance at his name twice after what he did. 

he was happy that you were looking healthy on rae’s stream. although you weren’t really ready to stream on your own again and many people understood that, and never pushed you. 

but whenever he saw you sometimes on rae’s facecam, he could see that pain, deeply hidden in your eyes. you were trying to cover up the fact that you were still trying to heal. 

-

CLAY’S POV

it was infuriating to see george not really giving a shit at first, and then changing to a new man. it took you to tell the world about your lost child for him to own up to his mistakes.

nick and i had been friends with him for years, it takes a lot to just dump a friend, a close one at that. so we did what we could, help him wake up from this “dream” he’s in. 

that didn’t mean we weren’t mad at him still. 

if he didn’t want to own up, i will. 

-

the subsequent years came by and went really quickly. people were starting to forget the drama that you and george were in. people soon became uninterested about it, but still stayed with you, encouraging you to heal slowly and take your time. 

that was what you liked about the internet. granted, some people can be mean, but the people who supported you were the ones that helped you keep going, helped you find a reason to wake up in the morning. 

no, you’d never forget that you lost a child, and you were reminded by the people on the internet who made it a pact to make sure george never forgot that too. 

george did end up talking to you a couple years ago. you accepted his apology, but not him. you were sure he only wanted to apologise after knowing that you were the next in the throne. 

speaking of throne, you were back in the castle. not permanently, but you visited often. you still lived with rae, and you had actually started streaming on your own again a few months before george reached out to you. 

clay and nick had been supportive of you since the start, still clearly apologetic even though you told him that you had forgotten about it and that it hadn’t even been their fault in the first place. 

but they were persistent, clay more than nick since nick was still very busy with college. you loved the two of them and considered them to be one of your best friends, aside from rae. 

-

GEORGE’S POV 

it was difficult. i felt like i had no shame to just text her one day after being gone for so long. but i actually felt bad. i know it was a rocky start. 

i had been so focused on winning the bet and not wanting to be called a pussy from my friends that i disregarded you, your feelings.

i knew from the start that you had been a great girl. you were just so sweet to everyone you meet, even strangers. it warmed my heart, it made me feel safe to be around you all the time. 

not that i can say that right now anyways, i didn’t have the right at all, after what i did to you. 

i don’t know what love is, given the fact that multiple girls had left me before this. i asked myself often if what i felt for my exes were actually love, or had i just been desperate. 

but i felt like when i was with you, it had been love, or close enough. 

but i couldn’t just burst it out one day that i love you, we weren’t really even dating. 

given that you had been pure, prior to me, it was shocking to see you so open, so welcoming to me. it was like you had known me forever, that you trusted me. 

and i took advantage of that, and later i got the consequences. 

i suffered the consequences. i see him with you. and i see that you’re happier with him. if it was any other guy, i think it would hurt less. 

but it was my own best friend. it was clay. 

all the instagram photos you post, his face blurred or covered, or when he posts a photo of you, it all hurt. 

i started the fall for you, for your genuine heart, and when i finally decide to do something about it, someone else had done it before me. 

deep down, i knew that clay would’ve been the better choice for you anyway. but it still hurt me. hearing his voice coming from behind you when you stream without your facecam. 

everyone was so supportive of you and clay, they’re obviously happy that you found someone who treats you better, even i knew that.

i wished i hadn’t taken you for granted, i wish i hadn’t listened to the stupid voice in my head reminding that you were all just a bet, that i wouldn’t love you like you think i would. 

i felt left out. 

a while ago, you were in florida with nick and your boyfriend, clay. it stung to see nick and you streaming so happily, not remembering me. 

but i deserved it. and i knew you deserve to be happy, after everything i did to you.

but that didn’t compare to the pain i felt now, a year later, seeing photos of clay and you, his face turned from the camera, facing you. he was down on one knee, proposing. 

and although you were crying and your hands covered the bottom half of your face, i could see how happy you are, i could see the amount of love you held for clay. 

how i wish i had done things a little more differently. 

[celestial-ringleader]

https://celestial-ringleader.tumblr.com/post/658246663116341248/mushroom-cookie-bears-send-me-a-character-and

Remy & Pietro??

@lucifers-favorite-child Buckle in y’all because this is gonna be a long one

Remy LeBeau:

favorite thing about them: So. Many. Things. I can’t decide on one so I’m just gonna list off my top three:

- His entire aesthetic is just so cool to me?? I love the idea of his character, just him being a thief (and an heir to an entire Guild on top of it) but I also like how he’s often seen as siren-like with how he can pull people in and smooth-talk his way out of almost anything. Also his eyes are so fucking cool idc what anyone else says. The black with red sclera is just so awesome.

- His powerset, omg people seriously underestimate what he’s capable of. Some think his power is just throwing explosive cards when it’s so much more than that. Like do you have any idea how useful it could be to manipulate energy?? He could literally make a moving object stop because he can just sap out the kinetic energy within it. On top of that he made a missile explode in Excalibur which I think was an interesting way of using his powers.  Also his goddamn reflexes are broken as all fuck, like he can sense a bullet coming even before anyone else notices it and dodge it perfectly. And if he’s quick enough he can hit it back at the person who shot at him. It’s fucking insane. And let’s not forget that in an alternate universe he was able to kill the Dark Phoenix and destroy his whole planet in a fit of his powers overloading. So.

- This is gonna be cheesy, but I love the way he talks. I like how no matter how much time has passed, he hasn’t changed how he speaks and is proud of it. Besides, his accent is just,,,so good.

least favorite thing about them: Aside from the moments where he’s characterized and portrayed poorly, I can’t think of anything.

favorite line: “I ain’t a thief, or an assassin. I’m an X-Man and I’m never comin’ back.” He said that to Belladonna in X-Men: The Animated Series and it stuck with me so much.

But also the line “You need ta get a life. Seriously.” is so good too. Just ANXF in general had a lot of good lines.

brOTP: Oh boy I have so many so I’m listing them off:

-Remy & Ororo Monroe

-Remy & Laura Kinney

-Remy & Anna-Marie (and before I get people asking, I personally don’t ship them romantically. Not saying no one else should, it’s just a personal preference.)

And some bonus crack brOTPs:

-Remy & Neena Thurman

-Remy & Felicia Hardy

OTP: There’s a lot here too,,,

-Remy/Pietro Maximoff (obviously)

-Remy/Fantomex

-Remy/Johnny Storm (this is more of a crack pairing, but I blame rping on discord for this)

-Remy/Kurt Wagner

-Remy/Warren Worthington III

nOTP: Honestly Remy is so shippable with a lot of people so I don’t really care all that much. Like,,sometimes I like people exploring him in toxic relationships (like with Sabertooth or Mister Sinister) so I really don’t care skjvbdkj

random headcanon: I like to headcanon that Remy has ADHD, which mostly shows itself through him having special interests, stimming, and having a bad case of RSD (Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria) because of past trauma associated with him being abandoned by those close to him. Also I like to imagine he uses playing cards to stim and his special interest is science fiction and space operas. Let him be a nerd.

Also he’s an Omega Level mutant. There I said it.

unpopular opinion: Okay, nobody get out the pitchforks and torches, but I don’t like this common headcanon that he’s a himbo and a narcissist. Usually a himbo is described as a character who is dumb while also being kind and beefy, but Remy just doesn’t tick all those boxes in my opinion. He’s incredibly clever and learns quickly, but he also doesn’t waste his time with knowledge that won’t help him. Like maybe he can’t do basic calculus but he understands how to get a lock to break based on it’s materials. Also because he was a physics teacher and I’d buy that he understands physics very well, especially since energy is such a big part of physics. So to me, he isn’t a himbo, he’s just a decent man. And as for the narcissism thing, he just doesn’t fit into the personality of someone with NPD. In fact, most of the time he talks down about himself and thinks himself less worthy....the exact opposite of a narcissist. Sometimes he’s just full of himself because he loves himself for once and that’s perfectly okay to me.  

song i associate with them: “Blood on my Name” by The Brother’s Bright, it has a southern gothic feel and it fits well into his backstory. Also “Poker Face” because why not. And also “Addict” by SilviaHound (yes it’s a Hazbin Hotel song but the vibes fit him so well)

favorite picture of them: I have,,,way too many I like. But these ones are just so good.

Also this one because it genuinely made me laugh

okay and now onto pietro

Pietro Maximoff:

favorite thing about them: There’s so much I love about Pietro so I’ll just list it off again ajkdbvkj

- His powers are actually really fucking cool. Like people think he can just run fast but forget that running fast is just one thing he can do. He can literally vibrate himself fast enough to go through walls, he has been shown to have some control over metal like Erik, he ran faster than the speed of sound (and possibly light), and he can leg press over 2,000 pounds. Also his superhero name is just so good, not even being ironic, the name Quicksilver is so badass.

- I love his relationship with Wanda, like sometimes it’s written really bad but other times it’s the cutest thing ever. Like he feels so protective over Wanda because of the environment they were raised in, but at the same time he learns when to let go of his own insecurities and let Wanda be her own person. Like,,their sibling dynamic is one of my favorites.

- His entire backstory is so tragic and I love it. He always feels like he isn’t good enough and tries to be as good as he can despite it all, but he’s also unabashedly pissed off about the circumstance he’s in. Like Pietro has every right to be bitter and I love seeing him call people out on their bullshit (especially in Quicksilver: No Surrender when he calls out people for marketing and appropriating Romani culture) 

least favorite thing about them: ...I literally can’t think of anything akjdbvkj

favorite line: Oops it’s all gamquick

Remy: Are you being difficult on purpose?

Pietro: What other reason is there to be difficult?

And also-

Pietro: Well, that’s a step up from a blow-up doll, isn’t it?

Remy: Did anyone ask you?

(Yes these are both from ANXF)

brOTP:

-Pietro & Wanda

-Pietro & Lorna Dane

-Pietro & Clint Barton (not MCU)

OTP: Okay I really only have two but I’m gonna gush about gamquick for a minute-

-Pietro/Remy LeBeau: I don’t even know where to begin with these two, I guess to start out with they both just look so good next to one another. They also bounce off one another banter-wise very well and while neither of them take bullshit from anyone, they still don’t mind messing with one another because it’s strictly playful. Also both their backstories are similar and lends itself to them finding solace in one another, they both recognize each other’s pain and will try their best to alleviate it as best as they can. They both understand what it feels like to be abandoned and abused and would never inflict that on each other, they both came from poverty and find it hard to fit into the “normal world”, but also Pietro usually never shows his softer side to anyone, but with Remy he’d make the exception because Remy wouldn’t hurt him like that. It’s also cute to explore them being able to settle down and get away from the superhero life for a while, but also them being a battle couple is A++

There’s just so much to say about them ajbdvkj

-Pietro/Namor Mckenzie: This became one of my favorite Pietro ships mostly because of @imperiuswrecked​ but also because apparently they were gonna be a couple in House of M?? Like that sounds so good to read about! Like Pietro is more carefree than Namor in some instances and it would be nice to see Namor relax a little bit more around Pietro. But also because I love imagining them being That royal couple and it’s so good.

nOTP: Pietro/Crystal. Just no. That ship is a garbage fire and it should’ve burned out ages ago.

random headcanon: Pietro has darker roots because his hair used to be the same color as Wanda’s before his powers manifested themselves. Also I like to headcanon/draw Pietro with darker skin.

unpopular opinion: Sometimes Pietro is seen as being misogynistic towards Wanda and I hate that interpretation of him. He’s protective over her, but he still allows her to make decisions on her own. Also people need to stop blaming Pietro for the events of House of M. For the love of god stop that shit.

song i associate with them: “Dollhouse” by Melanie Martinez

favorite picture of them: Need I say more? Pietro carrying his Cajun bf goes without saying

This was a lot of fun to write out and there’s so much more I can say but for now I’ll leave it here ajdbvkj

Ask Meme

[scarletarosa]

Set

Egyptian god of chaos, mischief, storms, deserts, battle, danger, virility, and foreign lands  

Set (or Sutekh), though often called a “god of evil” was not always viewed that way and actually played quite a benevolent role despite his chaotic nature. He was one of the sons of Nuit and Geb and was thought to have several wives, including the goddesses Nephthys, Neith, Taweret, Anat, and Astarte (with the latter two being taken from Canaan). Set was usually depicted as a man with the head of an unidentified jackal-like animal with square ears. Although there are many theories of what the animal could possibly be, it is also likely that the animal is meant to be unknown, as Set’s domain includes aspects of the strange and terrifying.  

Associations: Some of Set’s associated animals include: the hippopotamus, crocodiles, scorpions, snapping turtles, wild pigs, and donkeys – all of which were considered dangerous. In his hands, he holds an ankh (symbol of life) and his scepter. He may also be portrayed as a man with red hair and wearing a red mantle. The colour red is significant due to it representing some of the many qualities of Set. In Ancient Egypt, red was the colour of life, strength, victory, hostility, and chaos. He was said to reside in the Great Bear constellation in the northern sky – an area which symbolized death and darkness. Despite his benevolence, he is a very complex god who can be terrifying, especially to those who anger him. He represents the chaotic sides of nature that brings change, including storms (as well as sandstorms), drought, battle, and the unknown. 

Epithets: Set was known to be a fierce protector, especially in battle where he was often invoked as a vanguard. Some of this god’s known epithets include: “Great of Strength”, “The Inebriated One”, “Lord of the Northern Sky”, “The Red Lord”, “He Before Whom the Sky Trembles”, “The Defender”, and “Lord of the Desert”.  

Set’s Roles: Among the roles of Set besides protecting his people in battle was an even greater role: the protection of Ra and all of humanity. As the Sun god Ra would sail his course across the sky on his golden ship, Set would accompany him and was the one to fight off Apep, the serpent of evil. Apep was shown as a spirit in the form of a giant red snake and was the embodiment of all corruption. According to myth, Apep would hypnotize Ra and all of his followers, except for Set, who was chaotic and powerful enough to combat him. In order to defend all of creation and ma’at (order), Set would vanquish Apep each day. Set was also known to be a friend of the dead, helping their souls to ascend the ladder to the heavens. He even held the role of preserving the oases in the desert, which were essential for life in Egypt. So not only would Set represent the chaotic forces of the desert, but he would also protect people and their oases from them; holding back the sandstorms and droughts from civilization. From this, we can see that Set was a powerful ally to all, including the gods.  

Myths: Despite Set being a protective god, political battles in Ancient Egypt caused him to eventually be portrayed differently. When a war broke out between Upper and Lower Egypt, the two patrons of the lands (Horus and Set) were depicted in a myth which represented the battle. This was the myth of Horus and Set both fighting for the throne. With Lower Egypt being the victor, Set was gradually cast away and held in contempt; many relics of his benevolence were eventually destroyed. Set also plays a role in the well-known myth of tricking and slaying his brother Osiris, in order to usurp his throne. However, Isis managed to resurrect Osiris and conceived a child with him, the god Horus. While in most versions of the myth, the story follows that Horus grows up to be a mighty warrior and defeats Set in battle, after which he banishes him to the desert. But in another version, the majority of the nine gods (the Ennead) decided that Horus was the rightful King due to being the son of Osiris. But Ra believed that Horus was too inexperienced to rule, and claimed that Set would make a more capable King. This trial went on for nearly one hundred years while the people of Egypt suffered under Set's chaotic reign.  

Isis was worried for the well-being of Egypt’s people, and so came up with a plan. She took on the guise of a young woman and sat down outside of Set's palace, where she wept terribly. Eventually Set passed by and stopped to ask her what was wrong. The disguised Isis told him of a cruel man, her husband’s own brother, who had murdered him and stolen away her family’s land and cattle, taken away her son’s inheritance, and that now the man sought to kill her son. Not knowing that the man described was himself, Set became deeply moved by the story and was furious. He swore to the young woman that he would seek out the cruel man who had done such things and would kill him, allowing her to regain her land. With this promise, Isis revealed herself to Set before the gods who were secretly listening, and so Set was cast away into the desert, allowing Horus to reign as King.  

In a separate myth describing a battle between Horus and Set, the two gods are wrestling naked in a swamp, where Set eventually appears to have a “mighty erection”. This causes Horus to fall face forward into the waters, causing Set to begin having intercourse with him, which they both greatly seem to enjoy. In another attempt to seduce Horus, Set invites him over to his place to eat and sleep together. The two gods get drunk on wine late that night and caress one another, then have sex once again. Horus manages to catch Set’s seed in his hands, which he keeps until he is able to throw it into the Nile. Unaware of this, the drunken Set falls asleep. Horus lets Isis know of what had happened and she is furious, she then has Horus hide his own seed within the lettuce that Set grows so that he will consume it. Due to this, Horus gains the upper-hand over Set.  

Personality: Set is a very ancient god who can be called upon for things such as granting strength, courage, protection, vengeance, victory, and confidence. In my experiences with Set, he is very outgoing, flamboyant, generous, protective, and fun-loving. He loves high-energy environments, pranks, and sex (especially sex). Though in times of battle, Set is a very powerful warrior and wields a mace made of meteorites. He is not cruel like how his later myths portrayed him, for in truth, Set is a very strong and loyal ally. Especially when fighting against Apep, the god of evil. Set is also one of the close allies to Lucifer, and fights alongside him to defend others and end corruptions. Though other than battling, Set usually can be found seducing women or just enjoying himself in general. He has a wonderful sense of humour and is a great amount of fun to be around. As he is a ruler of discord, he is able to calm such matters in your life as well and help you to confront them. In my experiences, Set appears as a young man with red hair and green eyes. He also states that the animal he is depicted as in Egypt is indeed an otherworldly creature, as that suits him best.

Every god has a Shadow aspect, which portrays all of their darker natures. For Set, this aspect is named Sutekh, and it is his chaotic destructive side. While Set is normally friendly with others, he as Sutekh is more intimidating and unpredictable. When angered, Set becomes as Sutekh, and is capable of creating great turmoil and madness in the lives of those who offend him.

| Offerings | 

Stout beer, whiskey, frothing wine, champagne, sweet red wine, spicy foods, red meats, lettuce wraps, burgers, tacos, lobsters, crabs, shrimp, arrowheads, maces (his favourite weapons), knives and daggers, red rust, spinach, courgetti, cucumbers, coyote pelts, red carnelian, rubies, dried scorpions, star anise, black peppercorns, black silk, bird eggs, red thorns, sour cherries, red grapefruits, red grapes, dark chocolate, sweets, and brightly-coloured sex toys. He also tends to loves shiny and obnoxious sorts of things. 

[blasphemous-tiefling]

I think part of the reason why there’s so much discord in the MCU fandom has something to do with the varying directors for TFA, The Avengers, Winter Soldier, AOU, Civil War, Infinity War, and Endgame. And really, the backbone of the issue is how the different directors and how the audience interprets Steve’s character. Strap in. Because this is a long rant on a topic that normal people really don’t care about.

Joe Johnston created a Steve Rogers that was eager, begging to go to war. I absolutely adored the line in AOU when Steve says, “What kind of monster would let a German scientist experiment on them to protect their country?” Because I feel that sums up Steve in TFA pretty well. He’s anti-bully. He wants to fight. But his whole life he’s been put down, stomped on. Steve repeatedly enlisting is both selfish and selfless. His conversation with Bucky in TFA is a great example of this. Steve says, “There are men laying down their lives. I got no right to do any less than them. That’s what you don’t understand. This isn’t about me.” And Bucky says, “Right. Because you’ve got nothing to prove.” And that’s it. Yes, Steve wants to fight because he’s always been bullied and doesn’t want anyone else to feel that way. Yes, Steve wants to fight because he wants to defend his country. But also Steve wants to fight because no one has ever given him a chance. Steve wants to fight because he wants his life to mean something. Steve wants to die in battle because he thinks it’s honorable. He wants to prove himself. Steve wants it so desperately for both selfless and selfish reasons, which is why he was so willing to take the serum despite the fact that Erskine told him about past failures. There’s even a certain selfishness to his sacrifice at the end of TFA. Many stories that involve sacrifice ride the line of selfishness and selflessness. By sacrificing himself, you could argue Steve is taking “the easy way out.” He’s distraught over Bucky’s death. He’s won the battle he’s been fighting since getting the super soldier serum. By sacrificing himself, Steve can effectively end the troubles caused by the Tesseract and leave without dealing with the consequences of his sacrifice. This point is a bit of a stretch, and not something that I personally agree with, but the thought it there.

Joss Whedon takes that selflessness and turns it into irrefutable righteousness, and it’s disgusting. Steve has a few goofy lines in The Avengers and AOU that I’ll laugh at, but ultimately, everything he does seems so out of character for him. His constant nagging and arguing with Tony is so unnecessary and doesn’t build friendship. His desire to do everything S.H.I.E.L.D. tells him to do is completely incorrect because Steve went against the military and broke the 107th out of the Hydra facility without permission and repeatedly did whatever he wanted without asking. His incessant need to have all the Avengers do as he says is totalitarian and unbearable to watch. Truthfully, this is where I think people misunderstand Steve the most because not everyone watches every solo movie. The Avengers movies are the biggies that most people won’t miss. So general audiences only see this righteous, dictator Steve Rogers and that really pisses me off.

This is one of the only times you’ll hear me praise the Russos, so get ready- Thank goodness Winter Soldier and Civil War follow Joe Johnston’s characterization of Steve. They even dig into his selfishness and rebellious streak, which I adore. Steve isn’t one to just blindly follow orders. Hello? Does “not a perfect solider but a good man” ring any bells? Perfect soldiers follow orders. Good men fight for what’s right even when the world is telling them not to. That’s who Steve Rogers is. What I adore about Winter Soldier so much is that we see Steve attempting to be this perfect soldier, but it’s just not sitting well with him. Something is fishy and weird. He talks to Peggy about her life. She says her only regret is that Steve didn’t get to live his. Steve talks to Sam about possibly getting out of government work. Sam is that representation for Steve- having a hard time finding out why he’s really in it to begin with. The entire film is about Steve going against the government, military, and S.H.I.E.L.D. with both selfish and selfless desires. He knows he needs to do something because Hydra is growing in S.H.I.E.L.D. but he also doesn’t want anything to do with it anyway, so why not tear it all down? Once Bucky is revealed as the Winter Soldier, Steve puts his life on the line to try to get him back. It’s selfish really. When Steve takes off his helmet and drops his shield, he made the decision to die because he wasn’t gonna continue to live without Bucky. Despite the fact that Steve made friends with Natasha and Sam, he didn’t care. All that mattered to him in that moment was James Bucky Barnes. This is very reminiscent of TFA when Steve breaks Bucky out of the Hydra lab. As the world’s only successful super soldier, Steve could’ve been very valuable to the American government and military. He was even doing mild good by helping sell bonds. But that didn’t matter. His country and his military was no longer priority number one. When it comes to Steve Rogers, nothing and no one means more to him than Bucky. Steve and Sam’s conversation that I previously mentioned also parallels this. After Sam lost Riley, he didn’t want to be in the military anymore. He said he felt like he was up there just to watch, nothing he could do. This is a direct parallel to how Steve feels about Bucky.

Civil War, while a trash movie, sticks with Steve’s selfish yet selfless motivations. “What if this panel sends us somewhere we don’t think we should go? What if there is somewhere we need to go and they don’t let us?” Not wanting to surrender his right to choose is Steve Rogers. He just put down S.H.I.E.L.D.- an organization that was giving him demands. Why would he sign his life away to the American government again? Corporations can be run by greed and corruption- something Steve doesn’t want the world to be full of but also something he doesn’t want his world to be ruled by. When Bucky is framed for killing King T’Chaka, Steve knows the Accords will bring Bucky in and possibly execute him. He can’t let that happen. And he asks Natasha not to get in his way because he doesn’t want anyone else to get hurt. He knows how dangerous Bucky can be, but he doesn’t want Bucky or anyone else getting hurt or in trouble due to this sticky Accords situation. Both selfish and selfless. I don’t even want to get into later in the film, but I guess I will. Guys, there’s no world, no universe, no place in time that Steve wouldn’t try to stop Zemo. Tony never even gave him the chance to explain himself. It was either, “Come with us or we fight.” Steve gathered that team together- not to fight Tony but to fight Zemo. It was never his intention to fight with Tony. He was just trying to stop Zemo. Now, when Tony learns about his parents’ death, anger is a valid emotion. Physically fighting and attacking Steve and Bucky to the point of death? Not valid or even remotely reasonable. It makes no sense as to why Tony would be that angry at Bucky- someone who was tortured and brainwashed to do what he did. Steve had his reasons for not telling Tony considering that when it comes to Steve Rogers, nothing and no one means more to him than Bucky. Of course, Steve was going to hide the truth from Tony in an effort to protect Tony, Bucky, and himself. Selfish yet selfless.

Infinity War gives us the glorious lines of “I’m not looking for forgiveness. And I’m way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender. So we’re here to fight. And if you wanna stand in our way, we’ll fight you too.” and “We don’t trade lives.” These lines beautifully sum up Steve’s rebelliousness and need to fight while also not risking others’ lives. He’ll always risk himself first. There’s not much to say about this film considering it’s mostly action and Steve shares the screen with just about every other superhero, so we’re not given a lot of time. But overall, the Russos kept that same Steve Rogers.

And then Endgame does a complete 180 and decides to serve us Joss Whedon’s Steve with a conservative, pro-military, unbelievably illogical twist. Steve’s obsession with Peggy in this film is so out of place. She would’ve died seven years prior in the MCU. Steve’s been living in the present with Natasha, Sam, Bucky, Wanda, Vision, and T’Challa. That was his family. He lost Sam, Bucky, Wanda, Vision, and T’Challa in the Infinity War. It only makes sense that he would be fighting for them in Endgame. Yet he’s not. We’re beat over the head about how much he misses Peggy and it’s so unbelievably weird. Steve is never allowed to mourn Sam and Bucky specifically despite the fact that they were his number one companions. He never mentions them. Never has a touching reunion with Bucky. Barely has any reaction to Natasha’s death. It’s disgusting honestly. This is not “I will fight to my death for the people I love” Steve Rogers. And the ending is the most pathetic of all. There’s no world, no universe, no place in time that Steve would willingly go almost a hundred years away from Bucky and Sam, somewhere he wouldn’t fight for others. “Pretending you could live without a war.” I mean, come on. He’s Steven Grant Rogers. It’s disgusting to paint him as this man who would throw away his friendships and a world that is being bullied all for some girl he kissed once and barely knew. No. No, no. Not my Steve Rogers.

I give the directors a little too much crap. I’m fully aware that a whole team of people make these movies, but you can’t deny that Steve changes from movie to movie depending on the director. Endgame is the exception in which the directors were the same, yet they diverged completely from their original interpretation of the character. I’ve heard people say that it had to be an anti-gay agenda- that ending Steve’s story with Bucky would’ve been too gay even if they weren’t romantically involved, but I still think that’s pathetic. Honestly, I would’ve rather seen Steve die than have his character trashed and pooped on like this. From a narrative perspective, what happened in Endgame is not okay. Marvel Studios’ treatment towards “sideline” characters like Natasha, Rhodey, Sam, and Bucky- particularly in Infinity War and Endgame- is not okay. Yeah, I’m aware I get too heated over this fictional universe. But the characters are the only reason I stick around. The stories are lackluster for me. I’ve never been one to watch movies for action sequences. But I’ve always been in love with Steve Rogers as a character- complicatedly riding the line of selflessness and selfishness, dedicating himself wholeheartedly to a cause and to the people he loves. When in the end that character was completely scrapped and shredded in the garbage disposal like crust on bread or the skin of an apple, I’m gonna be angry for a long time.

[movedkagen]

hey so before i get to working on replies again i do want to analyze gojo  ( what’s new )  and discuss some aspects of his healing process.     tbh i could never properly analyze the stages of thinking that gojo underwent during geto’s defection and afterwards in one post,   but i ranted about it a bit on discord and I’m hoping to get it to make sense here.

what namely sparked this analysis was me finding two different translations of the same panel,   which is a flashback from when gojo approaches megumi and takes him in.     at one point, megumi asks if he’ll have to become a sorcerer  ( in order to keep tsumiki happy ), and gojo said yes,   but the translation is wildly different depending on which you read.

GIGANTIC  ANALYSIS  OF  GOJO’S  GRIEF  POST  STAR  VESSEL  ARC / GETO’S  DEFECTION  UNDER  THE  CUT.

the first is close to the gojo we've been seeing all throughout this past arc,   the gojo that doesn't really care for people weaker than him:   it continues to frame gojo as this unreachable glass sealing,   this limitless individual who believes only the strongest will survive.

however,   the second has a far  different  meaning,   and is closer to the gojo we met initially:

the second is close to the gojo we see now,   who is faithful and even  hopeful  in the next generation's ability to surpass him.      the second translation is also really important not just to how gojo in general is characterized,   but also in the way that i perceive gojo's healing process and what him seeking out megumi meant to his character.

in order to take that apart,   i first have to address how i view the famous kfc breakup scene:   i  don’t  think  it  was  the  moment  gojo  and  geto  realized  they  had  opposing  ideals.      i  think,   purely  because  geto  didn’t  clue  him  into  why  he  felt  the  way  he  did,   gojo  was  forced  to  get  ideals  of  his  own.

gojo was in ethical limbo after geto left.     geto was,   according to gege,   gojo's moral compass.   and geto just walked off a ledge that he himself pulled gojo back from just the year before.   in essence,   it's not an opposition of ideals at all,   because honestly,   at that point, gojo doesn't  have  any ideals of his own.      call it coping,   call it neurodivergency,   call it the fact that this is the only type of life he ever expected to live having come from a powerful sorcerer clan,   but gojo never seemed to  care  much about the purpose in his work or what it meant to himself or others.     it was just something he did because he had the ability to,    and because at that point in time it was simply what sorcerers like him  did.

there's a BIT of delinquency before the star vessel arc,   but it's more in him wanting to do things HIS way because he's been under his family's control all his life before coming to tokyo tech.   however,   at the end of the day,   gojo completes his jobs and his tasks without much second thought to it.     he doesn’t question why he does jobs,   and almost treats them like a game to show his own strength.     geto even tries to convince him there's purpose in what they do and gojo laughs it off and says that sort of philosophy is for the weak and that he thinks it’s a load of self - righteous  crap.

fast forward to when geto leaves.     he's been following either the school or geto's lead in terms of  intent  for years now and he's been comfortable that way.   so when geto leaves,   gojo can’t understand why.   he says things like "you can't" and "that's crazy talk" but he has no other reasoning to support that:

he just says it because what geto is doing is so  outside  of what the normal duties are,   which is why geto pretty easily argues against it and gojo has no rebuttal.   geto very easily turns that entire argument upside down,   and shakes gojo’s  entire  sense  of  self  with  a  single  counter:

and gojo can’t understand it.     he can’t argue it.     gojo is less arguing because he opposes his ideals and more arguing that he can't break away from the system because  he's  never  thought  to  himself.     it's like a child refusing to accept something simply because they don't understand it,    like if they deny it entirely then it isn't real and can't bother them.

this is  also  why i think he made the motion to attack him;   he was never  going  to fight him,   it was more about doing whatever was possible / in his power to try and force geto to stay because he didn't want to accept he was leaving.   and if geto  had  stayed, gojo would have found a way to absolve him of his crimes because at the end of the day,   it  wasn't  that  he  was  opposed  to  geto's  mindset.      he  was  opposed  to  geto  leaving.

geto was the single person who  ever  made him think about his motives and stopped him from doing things he knew he was capable of.     with geto gone,    gojo is totally lost and he is not coping effectively.      he wouldn't empty out geto's room at all because that would mean he really left,   so he didn't. not for weeks, or months, or even a  year  after it happened.     he refused to do it and he threw a tantrum if anyone else tried to go near the room at all.     there was a surplus of rooms,   so that room was left alone almost like a grave for a long time.

during that intermediate period,   gojo wasn't even sure where he stood anymore.     he really questioned if he even  wanted  to be a sorcerer because if geto didn't do it anymore,   why  should  he?     he's never had compassion for non - shamans like geto did.     what was he doing it for at all,    then?    

gojo was at a crossroads where he was between being a weapon for the higher ups that he didn't even like to begin with or following someone he  did  care about and respect,   down a path that he knew to be wrong but realized he'd never once asked himself why.     

gojo was moody.     sometimes he'd be too reckless on jobs,   and other times he would rebel and outright refuse to go on missions because he was lashing out at the control he let them have over him.     he was a loose cannon and while he had yet to start actively being an enemy to the higher ups  ( at this time i hc he never really threatened them or demanded to know their every move ),   he was still powerful enough where they knew if they  couldn’t  get him under their control, they might lose everything  ------  and frankly, if geto  and  gojo defected,   they'd never be able to recover from that.   at that point if they had a way to kill him, i truly believe they would have and i'm sure there was at least an attempt,   which i have a separate headcanon for.

but healing has to start somewhere.     he clearly  does  have a shift in mentality where he  does  care about protecting those weaker than him,   and that's the first step.     it's gojo accepting he can't go geto's route because he doesn't hate the world like geto does.     he hates the people who oppress it.     the next step is accepting geto left,   which is hard.   after about 2 years he and shouko clean out geto's room and it's really hard on him,   it's a very emotional event and it's a very delayed acceptance that he is gone.

the final step in his decision to heal   ( heal being a strong word since the man never gets therapy and is clearly still traumatized )   is investigating those final words toji left him with,   that  "do what you want"  regarding his child.

i have said that i don't hc he went there to get megumi,   but he just went there to see him and see what the big deal was.      but then he found out about the deal and something compelled him to go and investigate,    and when he met megumi,    he didn't find toji's  "trump card"  or some secret weapon.     he found a child.     a child that was abandoned and destined to turn out like himself or geto or toji and he  very  impulsively decided to take him and tsumiki in and stop the deal entirely.

that  was the first time he opposed the higher ups for real.     that  was the first time he said  "i'm getting in the way of this and if you try and stop me i WILL attack you and kill you all"  and while he's an outsider with seemingly  nothing  to gain from that,   they have no choice but to let him because no one can stop him.    

that second translation of  "become strong enough to leave me behind"  speaks volumes about the way i perceive gojo's shift in perception over one of the hardest segments of his life ... how i view the process in which he went from not caring about the weak at all to becoming a man who "won't forgive anyone who takes another person's youth",    which would have happened to megumi and tsumiki if toji's deal went through.   

maybe he didn't understand protecting the weak out of a sense of nobility,   but protecting one's youth?     one's right to be happy?     he DOES get that.     and that is what guides him towards compassion.     it's a really good line in what i saw as the  "final step"  in him moving on from the events of the star vessel arc and moving towards becoming the person and teacher he is now, and of course his road there is neither linear nor perfect,   but this is his turning point.

[pebblysand]

[the thoughts on canon-compliance you did not ask for.]

last night between 2 and 3 in the morning (look, i couldn’t sleep, got up to write, then got caught up, okay? don’t judge me for my terrible sleeping patterns please) i had a super interesting discussion with a few people on the hinny discord channel about the definition of canon-compliant-ness. i think this is fascinating because to be honest, before getting into the hp fandom, i didn’t even think this was something one could disagree about. to me there was what was canon, and what wasn’t. a very black-and-white sort of system. i’m finding that it’s not.

through the discussions that i’ve had both on my fics and other people’s fics, it seems that i can narrow down - in the hp fandom - three elements of canon.

i. the events of the books/films

now, as a general disclaimer, you can obviously argue about whether the films are ‘canon.’ you can also argue whether cursed child is canon. there’s a lot of elements which differ between those and lots of opinions about how to look at them. personally, i tend to ignore cursed child. as to the books v. films, i pick and choose what suits my story more. generally, that’ll be the books. but for instance, i’m writing a harry&hermione friendship one shot right now, and there are a lot of movie-isms in that story because that is an aspect that was more explored in the films. however, for the purposes of this post, i’m mainly considering the source material to be the seven books. nothing more or less.

having said that, to me personally, that’s what ‘canon’ is: the events of the story and the characters that gravitate around those events, as described in the source material. things like: tom riddle killing lily and james, or harry, ron and hermione rescuing the philosopher’s stone. anything departing from that is, de facto, an ���au.’ the whole world of what-if scenarios: what if Harry was sorted into slytherin, what if dudley was a wizard, all of those, to me, are aus.

generally, both as a reader and a writer, those are not scenarios i’m particularly drawn to. my default answer to those what-if scenarios is: ‘well, if harry is sorted into slytherin, there’s no story.’ or at the very least, there’s no story as i know it, and if there’s no story as i know it, then i’d rather read/write original fiction. it’s obviously a very personal preference and there are exceptions to this preference. i loved the changeling [1] for instance, and love the self-aware style of dirgewithoutmusic’s aus [2]. but as a general rule, that is not my preferred genre.

now, aside from the what-if scenarios, there’s also the question of filling in the gaps of the story itself. like, i find it interesting that we only make tsunamis [3] is labelled as ‘canon-compliant’ because i get the feeling that a lot of people would disagree that a fic in which hermione is harry’s first kiss is canon compliant. but, by exploiting the silence sometimes left by the author and turning it to your advantage, are you writing an au? is a negative space canon? is silence canon?

again, as a matter of personal opinion, i would not push my definition of canon-compliance as including blank spaces. to me, as long as it does not contradict the letter of the text, adding in events to the books to suit your story (i’ll address character in point ii) does not make your fic an au. to give another example that was brought up to me regarding my own work, i don’t believe that the events described in chapter nine of castles [4] are au because they exist in a blank space of the books. the fact that harry didn’t notice the 1:1s between ginny and amycus doesn’t mean they didn’t happen, it just means that they’re not in the positive space described by the books.

ii. the characters/characterisation

(as a quick vocab note, please note that below, i’m using the terms ‘ooc’ to mean that the characterisation of a character in a fic is not canon-compliant. they’re synonyms to me.)

now, while the above was pretty straight forward, i believe that this is where i perhaps differ from the masses in my interpretation of what “canon-compliance” means. more i discuss with people, the more i realise that i don’t really think there’s a real ‘canon’ characterisation. or at least not in the big things. like, yeah, it’s canon that harry likes treacle tart, because that’s a fact. but anything that is down to psychology or perspective of the character is, to me, generally up for grabs.

as a human, i believe that there’s things that people do, events that they go through, that condition them to act a certain way. while there is a core to every human being, i personally believe that in life, anyone would basically be capable of doing anything, given the right circumstances. i’ve recently - rightfully - been told my writing is all about the power of choice in our life, the reasons why we make those choices and the people those choices lead us to be. for example, do i think i might murder someone tomorrow? probably not. do i think i might be capable of murdering someone in wartime? perhaps? i don’t know, that’s not the world i live in and my life choices have not lead me to find out the answer to that. however, my point is: to me, good ‘characterisation’ is down to the circumstances and choices outlined in any work of fiction. hence, good characterisation is essentially, to me, equal to good writing.

i often say that good writing could make me believe anything and i mean it. i don’t tend to gravitate towards these fics because these ships are not my personal taste but i genuinely believe that good writing could make me believe in drarry or rarry if it tried. it’s funny because over the course of the discussion yesterday on discord, this was brought up ‘well, no one tags drarry as canon compliant,’ and i’m kind of like, i don’t know whether or not they do because i don’t read it but if they did and none of it contradicted the events as detailed in the books, perhaps it could be? like, that would take really good writing (imo), but good writing has - on occasion - made me believe in dramione a couple of times, so why not? in ‘til the sirens come calling [5], good writing made me 100% believe that harry and hermione would have an affair together. in we only make tsunamis [3], it makes me believe that they had this quiet little relationship building throughout hogwarts that we never knew about.

now, though, i suppose the question isn’t: do i believe it? the question is: is it canon? and, i think that’s where i differ from most people because to me, it is. to take ‘til the sirens come calling [5] as an example, i believe the fic is an au because hermione marries victor krum in the end. that’s going against the hard fact presented by the epilogue, and thus makes it an au. but i don’t believe the concept of a harmony affair is inherently au, because nothing is inherently au, character-wise. it’s about how you write it. how those people get to that place. that’s what makes canon-compliantness, in my opinion.

for example, for that fic, truth be told, we don’t know what those nineteen years include per canon, so they could very much include an h/hr affair. and whilst i don’t believe that the characters as they are in the books would have an affair together, i believe that the characters as they are presented in the fic, with the events and hardships that they go through, definitely would. good writing, to me, is - in part - recognising that characters are moving on a spectrum and that whilst their decisions/actions might not make sense in book-verse, they make sense in fic-verse. good writing is convincingly moving your characters from book-verse to fic-verse, and it not feeling ‘off.’

if it does feel off, that is bad writing to me, and that is also ooc-ness/non-canon compliant. it means that for whatever reason, the writer has not successfully transitioned and explained said transition through the events outlined in the story. with the right prose, you could make me believe draco decided to take on a career as a ballerina dancer after the war, and it would still be ‘canon-compliant’ to me. on the other hand, i have read fics (i won’t name them because that would be shit and also i don’t keep track of my ‘bad’ reads) where harry, ginny, hermione, or ron all act according to book canon and yet, their motivations felt off to me and completely ooc because the writing didn’t successfully lure me in. specifically, there was a lack of character evolution that i found uninteresting. i read mostly post-war stuff because i want to see my characters grow up [6].

as a last, additional note on characters, i also think that the characters in a story only exist within the prism of how we view them. this means that to me, locking my own understanding of a character's personality as 'canon' is particularly difficult because my understanding of a character is unique. i believe there are as many harry-s or ginny-s or hermione-s as there are readers. so i think saying someone's interpretation of a character isn't canon-compliant is odd because i don't actually believe there's any wrong or right answer. as i said, do i believe it likely that draco would become a professional ballerina? no. but if that works within your understanding of his character as described in the books, who am i to say that is or isn't canon compliant? i'll admit, the idea makes me sort of lol though.

iii. tone

lastly, i’ve come to find (in potter particularly) that canon-compliance might include tone. as in: hp is a story that is a) written in a certain style and b) written for children/young adults.

regarding style at a), this is honestly the main reason why it took me 15 years to write potter fic, despite the fact that i’ve been a fan for even longer than that. i genuinely thought you had to write like jkr. and i, well, don’t write like jkr. i love the books, but i don’t even particularly like her style. i like: camus, and sorj chalandon, and sally rooney, and dirgewithoutmusic and copper_dust [7]. i have zero ambition to write like jkr and don’t particularly want to read stuff that is written like her stuff either. it’s a style that imo works for her, but it doesn’t work for me as written by other people. i don’t particularly think you need to stick to her style to be canon-compliant.

which brings me onto my actual point: b) hp is a story written for children. young adults perhaps, for the later books. it sometimes explores dark themes but the writing style, the tone, etc. is lighthearted enough that it appeals to a younger audience. there’s snogging but there’s no sex, there’s violence but the torture is mostly off-screen, etc. issues like sexual assault, substance abuse, etc. aren’t explicitely brought up in the books, although they would one hundred percent fit in a book about a war that wasn’t necessarily aimed at children. the question is whether this setting and tone is part of what we call ‘canon-compliance.’

honestly, i don’t know. i didn’t think so until it was brought up to me that castles might be a dark!au and i was like: maybe? like, if you want it to be? i know what i like to read in fanfic: i love the exploration of serious themes that were not explored in the books, or explored differently due to the fact that they were written for children. one thing i will say and insist on is that i don’t think castles is all dark. i actually make a point of having lighthearted moments in each and every chapter, even just a notch, because i am attached to the fact that life as a concept is a mixture of good and bad, and you could laugh at the funeral of someone you loved, again in the right circumstances. but yeah, to me the post-war world is dark. so if tone is part of canon-compliance, then yeah in that way castles (as well as most of the stuff i read, to be honest), is a dark!au.

as a last side note, i’m not sure what that means for my other, lighter stuff though. like are the wolf’s just a puppy [8] or slipped [9] more canon-compliant than castles? i never thought about it in those terms but perhaps? it really opens up a world of questions in my mind and i don’t really have the answers to them.

conclusion:

so in sum, as a reader, what i mean as ‘canon compliant’ is basically a) the events as described in the source material and b) the characterisation of characters as they are at the start of the fic. if character evolution is sufficiently justified and well-written in the following thousands of words that the fic has, then said characterisation can still be canon-compliant, even if the characters act different than they would have in the source material itself. i’m a fan of good writing and good writing can make me buy into literally anything. it takes me places that i've never been before and convinces me that those places are the ones i should be in.

as a writer, i hope that regardless of 'compliance,' whatever i write at least makes ‘sense’ to people within the universe, even if they don’t consider it canon-compliant, per se. i feel like i can’t really be the judge of that. from the discussions we had last night, i feel like there are as many versions of what is and isn't canon-compliant as there are people.

.

.

---

[1] the changeling by annerb

[2] the boy with a scar series by dirgewithoutmusic

[3] we only make tsunamis by disOrdely

[4] castles by yours truly

[5] ‘til the sirens come calling by vexmybones

[6] as a side note and to take my own stuff as an another example, i totally agree that harry in castles isn’t harry in the books. i don’t think there’s much debate to be had in that assertion. i wrote him like this frankly because every other fic i’d read didn’t. they often had him sort of continue to be perfectly himself after the war, which i felt wasn’t speaking to me on a deeper level. imo, i think the war’s done a lot of scarring and the fic is about him growing into a new version of himself. so, to me, if i get a comment that says ‘i don’t think harry would act this way but i really love your writing’ it’s somewhat flattering but also confusing because i don’t really understand how one can enjoy the writing but not the characterisation. to me, they’re so intrinsically linked. what the comment tells me is: i think you did a very poor job at explaining character evolution and justifying character x’s [harry’s] choices but i still like your writing, somehow? i suppose that’s nice, but it doesn’t particularly compute in my brain. like, if the character feels off, it means the writing feels off and thus, why are you still reading? i appreciate all and every comment that i get but it doesn’t mean they always make sense in my own brain. if i’m honest, these comments often send me into an ocean of self-doubt about how shit my writing must be.

[7] copper_dust’s work and profile.

[8] the wolf’s just a puppy (and the door’s double locked), again by yours truly

[9] slipped (and said something sort of like your name), same.

[blackcloverdatabase]

English Translation of Novel 3: Chapter 2 – The Man Known as Julius (Part 1 of 2)

Here’s the first half of the last untranslated chapter from Book of Yuno! This one features Julius, Yuno, and Bell taking care of an orphaned baby boar. It’s adorable and also a little heartbreaking! Charlotte and Jack also get to meet the lil’ guy!

Also, aside from a few tweaks at the beginning, this translation is appended to the translation of the first few pages that the Black Clover discord was kind enough to supply to me. I didn’t see any translation errors when I scanned through it and I liked the writing style of whoever did those first few pages, so a part of this translation also comes from the generous soul who had started this translation before me. 

--- The Man Known as Julius (Part 1) ---

Julius Novachrono.

He is a man who needs no introduction, reigning over the Order of Magic Knights as the Wizard King. The entire Order moves at his command, protecting the peace of Clover Kingdom both day and night.

He himself possesses no small degree of combat ability, stationed at the top of the Order as he is, and he has led his troops to victory through countless battles. Even after ascending to his current position as the Wizard King, he continues to find his way to the battlefield, demonstrating impressive skills in all areas.

He is the hero of the Clover Kingdom, a source of inspiration for all Magic Knights – No, for all the Kingdom’s citizens.

That's just the sort of person Julius is.

And yet, despite all of that......

"All right, all right!! Sorry I'm late~ I brought plenty of feed for you!"

At this very moment, that inspirational figurehead to all the Kingdom was – Julius was…..

"C'mon, you gotta eat up! I got lotsa food for you! A ha ha! Now now, no shoving! Take your time!"

......grinning from ear to ear and speaking in baby-talk with a soft, sweet tone......

"Oh gosh, you're TOO cute! Seriously, you're way too cute, Graham! I feel like when I'm talking to you, my manner of speaking just becomes shamefully bad...... Well, whatever! Not like there's anyone else around to hear, huh?"

…….to a baby boar as he delivered its feed.

Staying hidden as he watched, Yuno managed to keep a straight face on the outside, but internally, he was shaking. Bell, clearly shaken as well, was thinking exactly the same thing as him: They weren’t quite sure what they were looking at, but they knew they had just witnessed something pretty damn crazy.

How did they stumble across such a crazy sight? Fret not, it won't take long to explain.

 That day, Yuno and Bell had been on patrol near the outskirts of Tonan, a town in the Common Realm. A group of bandits had been staging raids in the area as of late, and it was rumored that one of the bandits possessed an "Original Sin" grimoire. Thus, Magic Knights were being sent out in pairs to patrol the area in shifts.

Yuno and Bell found themselves on duty that day, and after finishing up their patrol with a Knight from another squad, they traded off with the pair who had come to relieve them and slipped away into a forest just a short walk from the town's borders.

They were here to train in preparation for the Royal Knights Selection Exam, which would be held a few days from now.

After the "hot springs training camp" put on by Mereoleona Vermillion (which was one heck of a euphemism for forced mountain climbing and attempted murder), Yuno had mastered "Mana Skin", the technique wherein the user continuously channels a fixed amount of magical energy and uses it to protect their body or increase their physical ability.

However, if he wanted to pass the Selection Exam, if he wanted to demonstrate his skill over Asta, he needed to take his abilities up another notch... no, another two notches if he could manage it.

And so, at every opportunity he could find between missions, Yuno slipped away in search of a secluded little enclave to train.

On this particular day, while on the hunt for a bit of privacy, he came across a hut standing beside a small pond. From the outside, it looked like a long-abandoned cabin, but the footprints he found near the entrance were fresh. Was this the bandits' hideout......? Only one way to find out. Taking care not to be noticed, Yuno silently approached the cabin.

However, it was then that he noticed a young boar with its body and legs wrapped in gauze. This, he found quite suspicious, but before he could move any closer to inspect, he caught sight of someone heading straight for the cabin using Flight Magic.

Panicking, Yuno dove into the bushes to hide, peeking out to see just who had arrived…...

"Gra~~~ham~~~ Were you a good little boy? Were you? Were you??"

Speaking in the most babyish voice Yuno had ever heard, it was none other than Julius Novachrono who came descending from the heavens. Upon landing, he approached the cabin, bearing feed for the boar, and removed his dirty bandages while stroking him gently......

 Which brings us back to the present.

 "Theeeeere there there! Now, let's get your bandages changed!"

Tearing their gazes from the sight of Julius letting loose with even more heinous baby talk, Yuno and Bell glanced at one another. Evidently, Julius was out here taking care of this boar. That much was obvious, but......

Bell dropped her voice, whispering softly to Yuno,

"…...Wh-what do we do, Yuno?"

"There's nothing for us to do," he returned shortly. "Because we didn't see anything, got it? Let's just head back."

That was best for all parties involved. Yuno had absolutely no desire to see Julius acting like that, and Julius probably wouldn't have wanted anyone to spot him out here either. Thankfully, Julius didn't seem to have noticed he was being watched, probably as much to do with the fact that Yuno had disguised their presence as the fact that Julius was absolutely enthralled with playing with the little boar and was paying little attention to his surroundings.

If he was going to make a break for it, it needed to be now. However, Bell leered with squinted eyes,

"...But, you know, that poor little thing really doesn't seem like he's enjoying the attention..."

This much Yuno could see. Actually, it was impossible not to notice. The little boar was squirming and squealing up a storm as Julius attempted to change his bandages, desperately attempting to flee. There was no mistaking that attitude as one of a fond pet.

"…...Neither one of us knows what's going on here. It's not our place to say anything."

"Yeah, I guess you're right…..."

"Plus......"

Yuno glanced back to Julius, who, despite the boar's fierce attempts to escape, was doing his best to see to its needs, and even looked happy doing so. Julius looked like he was having the time of his life, eyes bright with elation - just as he seemed to when he was talking about magic or chatting with the squad Captains he trusted so much. It was true that Yuno didn't want to get involved in whatever was going on here, but he also didn’t want to interrupt Julius when he was so utterly enthralled.

"Plus what?"

"Forget it. Let's go." With that, Yuno was about to stand up, but then......

"SQUEEEEEEAAAAAL!!"

The boar let out a particularly shrill scream, and Julius instantly drew back just as the boar released a huge burst of flame.

"W-what the heck is THAT?!"

"That boar...it must be a Flame Boar! They're a special breed that can use Fire Magic!"

A normal boar was one thing, but keeping an animal of this nature as a pet was forbidden…… though, that hardly mattered right now.

Yuno leapt from the bush, rushing to Julius's side. "Your Majesty! Are you all right?"

In retrospect, that had been rather stupid of him. After all, what could a Flame Boar possibly do that could in any way harm the Wizard King? It was patently clear he didn’t have a single scratch on him, no burns of any sort, and even the cabin itself remained safe from any flying sparks.

"......Yu-Yuno-kun........!?"

Julius's face was so red, he could have started spitting fire himself.

"H-h-how...how long--how long h-h-have you...been w-watching...me...?"

"I didn't see anything I didn't hear anything PLEASE EXCUSE ME, SIR!"

Yuno sputtered before promptly turning on his heel and darting off. It was a rather forcible retreat, admittedly, but he was convinced it was the best course of action. What had just transpired would only reflect badly on the both of them, so pretending it had never happened at all was for the best.

“W-wait! P-please hear me out!”

However, Julius chased after him, his expression desperate.

"W-wait! Please wait! There's something I'd like your help with!"

……And when the Wizard King said that to you...well, you really had to stop, didn't you?

 “……So, this little one’s parents died, which is why you decided to take care of it here for the time being?”

After all that, Yuno and Bell were invited to sit on the bench in front of the cabin as Julius served them some tea and snacks. Both the tea and snacks looked rather extravagant, so Yuno couldn’t help but wonder if they were meant to bribe him to keep quiet. At the same time, Julius explained his circumstances to them.

“Yes. Well, in short, that is correct.”

As he watched Graham run around chasing butterflies, Julius continued,

“Not too long ago, I was passing by this area when I found two flame boars being attacked by bandits. Those were Graham’s parents.”

Bell grabbed a macaroon with both hands and stuffed it into her mouth as she asked Julius,

“Why did those bandits attack them? Were they hungry or something?”

“Flame boar fur has excellent heat resistance, so it’s sometimes used to make magic tools and the like. Because of that, it can be sold for a high price. Of course, that doesn’t make it right to kill them indiscriminately, so I rushed in to save them. I managed to capture the bandits, but…… it was already too late for Graham’s parents.”

On the outside, Yuno was expressionless as he nodded in agreement, but on the inside, he felt bitter. This was not an uncommon occurrence in areas that have been plagued by bandits. They indiscriminately kill, eat, and sell any animals unfortunate enough to live in their territory.

“Although he was injured, I at least managed to save Graham. However, I couldn’t just leave him, so I was going to drop him off at an animal shelter…... but no matter which shelter I tried, they all refused to take him.”

“Because it’s forbidden to keep a dangerous animal like a flame boar as a pet.”

Technically, if he made full use of his authority as the Wizard King, he would be able to force any facility to keep Graham. However, that would surely cause trouble for the breeders and the other animals they kept at the facility. As Yuno knew, Julius was not the sort of man who would do that. Julius shrugged lightly before replying,

“Right. That’s why I started taking care of him in secret. I’d like to keep him until he recovers from his injuries, at least.”  

Julius replied as if to substantiate the explanation that Yuno reached.

“I see…...”

Yuno said as he nodded. Although Yuno came to agree with him, Julius felt a small pang of guilt. His story wasn’t a lie, but it was not the whole truth, either. That’s because if Julius had used his time magic, he could have cured Graham’s injuries in an instant. However, if he did that, then Graham would grow up with the mistaken assumption that injuries can be cured easily. Julius wanted to avoid clouding Graham’s worldview for the convenience of humans any more than it already has.

Coming back from that tangent, Julius continued,

“That’s why I was wondering if you could keep this a secret for me? If it became known that the leader of the Magic Knights broke the rules, there would be a lot of trouble.”

Particularly from Marx. If Marx found out, there was no telling what Marx might say to him. It was easy to imagine what awaited in his future……

“You were raising an unusual pet, huh……? That’s the kind of thing an extravagant bachelor with too much time and money on his hands would do! Stop playing around and get back to work!”

……And he would continue on and on like that.

Yuno lightly tilted his head, completely unaware of Julius’s troubles.

“Of course. It was never my intention to tell anyone, but…… wouldn’t it be better to take care of Graham somewhere else? Bandits might go after him again, and Magic Knights take turns coming here almost every day, so you might get spotted again.”

“……That’s true, but……”

Julius pointed to a large rock a short distance from the cabin. Placed in front of that rock were two bouquets of flowers. Sometimes, Graham would sit at that rock and squeal in a very particular way. Yuno has heard these squeals before. It was the sound flame boars make when they are trying to get their parents’ attention. In other words, that was where……

Julius saw that Yuno understood and nodded.

“That was where Graham’s parents were killed. I think that’s why…... Graham refuses to leave this place.”

For the second time that day, Yuno felt a bitterness in his heart.

“…...I was raised in a village, so I’ve seen animals like that before. Some baby animals won’t leave their parents’ side, even after their parents have died. That’s probably happening here, too.”

Even if you pull that baby animal away from its parents’ bodies by force, it will likely return. In the end, it will probably die, either from being targeted by other animals or from illness caused by being near a corpse. If Julius wasn’t protecting him, that’s probably what would have happened to Graham.

“I thought about using magic to move his parents’ corpses, but…… it would be a problem if Graham thought I was playing with them. In the end, I decided to bury them here.”

“……I see.”

Bell said, looking sorrowfully at Graham. She then clenched her hand into a little fist and said,

“Wizard King! You’re really something! It’s really cool that you’re willing to go so far for a single wild boar!”

“……Hey, Bell. You’re being rude.”

“Ha ha, I don’t mind, Yuno-kun. Miss Wind Spirit, I’m happy to hear you say that. By the way, can I try mixing your magic with mine? Just for a bit?”

“I’m Yuno’s, so no way! However, I kinda like you, so you’re allowed to call me Bell!”

Bell was being incredibly impertinent as she said this, but Julius’s response was simply to smile gently and say,

“That’s too bad. Well, I’m happy that I can call you by your name!”

He possesses great power, he shows tolerance toward anyone, and he holds compassion even for animals. That’s the kind of person Julius is. The kind of person Yuno - and Asta - were aiming to become was as grand as ever. Moreover, Yuno was only looking at a small part of the Wizard King. Despite this, he understood that the Wizard King was a grand existence. If he could see everything, just how grand would he be……? Even trying to imagine it made him feel overwhelmed.

‘Even so, someday I’ll…..!’

As such thoughts reignited in Yuno’s chest, Julius cleared his throat as if to move on to a new subject.

“This brings me to what I wanted to ask you…… Just as you said, this is not a good place to be raising an animal, and I’m also too busy to take care of Graham by myself……”

He appeared rather uncomfortable as he looked at Yuno and Bell.

“That is…… I know this is a selfish request, but you seem like you wouldn’t spill a secret, so…… could you maybe…… help me take care of Graham?”

‘I knew this was coming……,’ Yuno thought as he weighed his options. For Julius, it would make things quicker and easier if Yuno and Bell cooperate now that they’ve seen this place. However, keeping it a secret from the Order of Magic Knights was definitely going to be troublesome.

“Of course, I’m not asking you this as the Wizard King. I’m asking you as a person, so there’s nothing wrong with saying no. You’ll end up breaking the rules, too…… it would be troublesome for you if you get discovered, and you could run into trouble here, too.”

That’s right. If something were to happen here, he wouldn’t be able to get here in time to help Yuno. This was not a task one should carelessly take on.

“Of course. If you’re alright with us helping you, we would love to.”

“Right, of course you’d say no…… the Royal Knights Selection Exam is coming up and you have your own duties to…... WAIT, REALLY!?”

Julius had crestfallenly lowered his head, but then he raised his head back up in surprise and sputtered,

“Huh, a-are you sure!? You’re going to take on this task, just like that……?”

“Yes. I can do my duties as a Magic Knight here…... Plus, if I let a thought like “something bad might happen” stop me, then I’d never get anything done.”

The second half of what he said came from his own experiences as a child. In life, if you don’t do anything, then nothing will happen. He didn’t want that. If you find yourself unable to move because of all your negative thoughts, it’s sometimes necessary to just try doing whatever you want before thinking about what you should do. This was something he learned from watching that guy live his life. He wasn’t sure if this was one of those times, but, at the very least…...

“Also, you said that I would be breaking the rules, but I’m just helping you because I think that’s the right thing to do. I think that for most people, doing what they think is right would be the correct thing to do.”

……Yuno knew that he liked what Julius was doing. That’s why he was going to help him without worrying about problems that may or may not happen later. Wanting to support that idea, Bell whirled around Julius and said,

“That’s right! That’s absolutely right! Actually, it’s weird that you’re doing something so cool so sneakily by yourself! At the very least, you should let us help you!”

“You guys……”

Julius appeared a little surprised as he said this, but then,

“……I see. William truly is blessed with some good kids.”

He nodded as if he came to understand something before calmly smiling once more.

“Thank you, really! Well then, I’ll be counting on you two!”

Yuno bowed his head with a smile before looking around at his surroundings.

“Even so, it really is dangerous to be raising an animal here. If we don’t take measures soon, then……”

“Y-yeah…… You really are a good kid. You’re able to look at things pragmatically so quickly……”

Julius wanted to bask in the warm, snug atmosphere they just created for a little longer, but…… now wasn’t really the time for that. Julius grabbed a large sack that was left at a corner of the cabin and brought it to Yuno and Bell.

“I’ve already done something about that. I bought all sorts of magic tools for dealing with bandits or other Magic Knights.”

Julius pulled out one expensive-looking magic tool after another from the bag.

“Umm, this one is a jewel that keeps evil away. I’m pretty sure this one is a collar that seals away magical power. And this one is a magic tool that keeps others from being able to sense your mana, even if they use mana perception. Also, this one is…...”

As he pulled each tool out, he explained in detail what each one of them did with a huge grin on his face. Yuno and Bell, who felt nothing but respect for Julius just moments ago, started to think ‘This guy is kind of scary…….’. Just how much money and effort is he sinking into one wild boar? Bell whispered into Yuno’s ear,

“……Hey, Yuno. Is he one of those? He gave us all those reasons earlier, but…... maybe he’s just an old guy who wants to secretly raise a pet……?”

“Please don’t say that……. Just don’t.”

He may have sounded a little unconfident in his reply, but that’s not because he was starting to think the same thing Bell was thinking. Absolutely not.

“I read this in a book once, but unmarried bachelors in their 40’s tend to have a lot of money, and they want something to spend their money on, so they buy a pet. Then, that causes their paternal instincts to explode forth, so they end up spending even more money on it.”

“You’re talking about a normal unmarried bachelor in his 40’s. This man is the Wizard King. Don’t lump them together.”

“Hm? Yuno-kun, did you say something?”

“Nothing.”

And so, despite all his doubts and unease, his days taking care of Graham with Julius began.

 ----- The following morning -----

“Oh, Yuno-kun! Bell-kun! Thank you for taking care of him so early in the morning~”

Julius swooped down from the sky toward Yuno and Bell, who were training near the lake.

“Good morning. You’re up early too, your highness.”

“Yeah, I have a meeting to attend just before noon today, so I figured I’d stay here until then. What about you?”

“We have the day off today, so I’ve been training my magic by reinforcing the cabin and changing Graham’s bedding. Also, I think he’s still fine for now, but I was thinking that we should make a fence in preparation for when Graham becomes independent from his parents. It would be troublesome if he accidently wandered into one of the villages.

“……Y-yeah. You sure work fast. Adaptable, too.”

Julius said in surprise. From the start, Yuno was meticulous and diligent. He wanted to do as much as he could while he was here.

“Look, Graham! Your Daddy’s here!”

Bell said as she flew toward Graham, who was eating his feed in front of the hut. Julius had a questioning, but also happy expression on his face as he asked,

“……D-daddy?”

“Bell. Don’t call him weird names. It’s rude.”

“It’s fine, right? He’s practically acting like a surrogate dad!”

“Even so, calling him ‘Daddy’ is a little…...”

As Yuno and Bell continued, Julius’s face steadily became redder until he cleared his throat and interrupted,

“W-well, it’s fine, isn’t it? It feels a little uncomfortable to be called that, but it might be good for Graham. I’m not sure how I feel about it, though…..”

“Oh, well then I won’t call you that. I’m not going to force you to-

“Ah, no! Never mind! Let’s go with that!”

Julius interrupted before crouching down in front of Graham.

“Even so, you two are amazing for being able to feed Graham already. It took a lot of struggling on my part to get him to trust me enough to do that……”

Julius sounded a bit woeful as he said this. Yuno responded as he walked toward the hut,

“I’m not sure why, but animals have always liked me. Also, Bell is a wind spirit, so it might be easier for Graham to trust her over a human being. Actually……”

Yuno glanced at the tombstone for Graham’s parents as he continued,

“You began taking care of Graham right after his parents were killed. That would be the time when Graham would hate humans the most. The fact you managed to feed him and tend to his wounds despite that makes you even more amazing.”

It looked like Graham was putting up a lot of resistance yesterday when the Wizard King was changing his bandages, but that was probably just because his wounds still hurt. It’s not like Graham hasn’t opened his heart to him.

“The reason we’re able to get along with Graham right now is because of you, your highness. Isn’t the fact that Graham knows that not all humans are bad because you poured so much love into him?”

“Y-you think so? That would make me very happy, but……”

Julius sounded embarrassed as he replied before extending his hand toward Graham’s head.

“Graham~ It’s……. It’s Daddy. Daddy’s he-

“SQEEEA, SQEAAAL!”

CRUNCH

With full force, Graham chomped down on Julius’s fingers.

“……………”

A terribly awkward atmosphere arose between Julius and Yuno. In the meantime, Bell, who is incabable of reading the mood, tried her best to open Graham’s mouth as she reprimanded him.

“Hey, Graham! Stop that! You wouldn’t do that to me or Yuno, right!? It’s almost as if you don’t trust the Wizard King after all!”

Yuno went pale when he heard Bell utter the worst thing she could have possibly said, but Julius chided Bell with a stiff smile on his face.

“Ah, Ah ha ha! It’s fine, Bell-kun! I’m sure Graham’s just hungry!”

“What are you talking about!? Graham literally just ate!”

“Then, he’s probably just trying to play! Yeah! I’m sure he just wants to play with me!”

“Even so, he looks serious! It’s like he’s trying to bite your fingers off!”

“Bell! BELL! Just stop talking! Just stop!”

Unusually for him, Yuno raised his voice as he interrupted Bell, stopping her from uttering another word and gently pulling Julius’s fingers away from Graham. After that, Graham trotted away toward the lake to drink some water. Those hellish couple of seconds were finally over, but tears started to pool in Julius’s eyes.

‘Should I say something…..?’ Yuno thought, maybe about how Bell has a tendency to air-headedly stab people in the heart…… No, it was too late to say anything about that now, so he decided to change the subject as quickly as he could.  

“……Could you explain to me what all the magic tools you bought do again?”

Yuno truly did want to hear his explanation again. Julius explained everything so quickly yesterday that he didn’t get all the details.

“S-sure…… There’s a lot of them, but I think this one’s the most important one.”

Julius said, returning back to his usual self as he led Yuno inside the cabin. There, a sparkling red jewel was hidden under Graham’s bedding.

“This is a high-grade magic tool that wards away evil. It creates a barrier with this jewel at the center, and people with evil souls can’t cross through its barrier. That’s the only thing I bought the first day I decided to raise Graham, and I’ve kept this tool active this whole time.”

Bell, who returned to Yuno’s shoulder, gasped in admiration as she looked at the jewel and said,

“That’s a high-grade magic tool for ya! It would be great if every household…… or at least every village had one of these!”

“Ha ha, if we could do that, it would make our jobs as Magic Knights a lot easier. However, this jewel’s range is not very large, and this isn’t widely distributed. Moreover, one strong attack is enough to break this jewel’s barrier, so it’s not so omnipotent as one might think.”

“However, it’s more than enough to protect Graham from those bandits, right?”

Julius nodded at Yuno’s words and turned toward Graham, who was currently bathing in the lake. Around Graham’s neck was a collar with a nameplate attached.

“The next important tool is the collar I bought yesterday. That collar seals away magic. As long as he wears that, Graham won’t be able to use magic, so even if another Magic Knight finds us, they would think that he’s just an ordinary boar.”

Julius’s expression stiffened a bit before continuing.

“Well, not being found at all would be the best outcome, and hardly anyone would have any reason to come here, but…... just like you did, it’s possible that somebody could wander here by chance.”

After the three of them reflected on the “major accident” that happened yesterday, Yuno swiftly returned to the main subject and asked,

“……I see. What about the other tools?”

Following Yuno’s train of thought, Julius quickly began to explain the other tools.

“The other ones are magic tools which conceal our presence, make our mana less perceptible, and other things of that nature. Well, I’ll go ahead and explain what they all do in detail, and…… hm?”

Before he could finish talking, his expression suddenly became grim, and his gaze sharpened as he looked toward the direction of the village. Yuno looked in the same direction.

“……Somebody’s coming.”

“Yeah. I feel two sources of mana heading towards us. For now, let’s hide in the cabin.”

The two swiftly moved toward the cabin, but Bell looked at Graham and exclaimed,

“Wait! Is it alright to leave Graham like this!? We should all hide together!”

“No. We wouldn’t be able to make it in time. For the time being, let’s observe the situation. If something happens, we’ll all leave.”

Julius countered as they slipped into the cabin. Before long, two figures emerged from the forest……

“Kah kah! Look~ There’s nothing here. There’s nobody!”

The Captain of the Green Mantis, Jack the Ripper……

“How strange. I definitely felt powerful mana coming from here earlier……”

……And the Captain of the Blue Roses, Charlotte Roselei.

Two Magic Knights…... two Magic Knight Captains, no less, set foot on the lake shore. Judging by what they were saying, they must have sensed either Yuno’s or Julius’s presence. They probably noticed Julius’s mana when he flew here.

‘To think two bigshots like these would show up,’ Yuno thought, cold sweat dripping from his forehead.

“Why are Captains doing a mundane task like patrolling……?”

“…….Because the Royal Knights Selection Exam will be held soon. Even if it only helps a bit, Captains and Vice-Captains have been handling some of the routine tasks so that their squad members can focus on training for it.”

Julius explained calmly, but internally, his heart was pounding. It would be bad if they were found out by ordinary Magic Knights, but there was no mistaking that being found out by a Captain would be even worse. They nervously held their breaths in the cabin as they heard Charlotte say in a commanding tone of voice,

“Just in case, let’s split up and search the area.”

“Are you kidding me~ Damn, I was planning to get wasted at a bar until our shift ended.”

After that brief exchange, Charlotte began to trace the perimeter of the lake while Jack began investigating inside the forest, appearing very bored as he did so. Seeing this, Yuno frowned as he turned toward Julius.

“……What should we do? At this rate, we’ll be found any moment now.”

“We’re okay. Like I was saying earlier, I have a magic tool running that dulls other people’s mana perception abilities, so they won’t be able to sense our mana. I also have another tool running right now that inhibits other people’s ability to notice our presence. In other words, right now, they won’t be able to sense our presence nor our mana.”

‘If you have that much money to spend on magic tools, maybe you should put some of that money toward the Magic Knights,’ Yuno thought. In any case, if that’s all true, then their presence probably won’t be discovered. The problem was……

“……Hm? What’s this? A baby boar? What is it doing in a place like this……?”

Just as Yuno feared, Charlotte spotted Graham, and began to slowly make her way toward him. Surprised by her presence, Graham froze stiff. While he remained frozen, Charlotte crouched down to meet Graham at eye level.

“……So, you’re getting your wounds treated? You have a collar, too. Is someone feeding you here…..?”

She said as she extended her hand toward Graham’s collar.

‘Please don’t take his collar off…….!’ all three of them prayed as they watched her from inside the cabin.

“……..Graham? That’s what is carved here…… I see. So, your name is Graham?”

She muttered before looking around at her surroundings. It looked like she made particular note of whether Jack was still deep in the forest. After confirming that nobody else was around, she turned toward Graham once more, and……

“……Graham, come here. I won’t hurt you, so go ahead and sit on my lap~”

With great difficulty, but also great tenderness, she raised Graham up and placed him on her lap. Then with an innocent smile, much like the smile of a young girl, she hugged Graham’s body.

“Wow…… this is amazing. I though boar fur would be rough and scratchy, but it’s actually really fluffy. I wonder if it’s because you’re a baby. Tee hee, this feels nice. You’re so cute……”

“…………”

“You’re so small. Are you eating properly? I know, I’ll find something good for you to eat! What would you like to eat? Hm? I’ll buy anything you want~”

“…………”

The three inside the cabin continued to watch Charlotte dote on Graham, stiffly turning their heads toward each other. It was a different outcome then what they were expecting, but it was a crazy sight indeed.

“H-hey…… Yuno-kun……?”

This wasn’t the time to be asking this, but Julius couldn’t help but ask.

“……D-did I…… look like that when you found me……?”

“Quiet, your highness. It looks like Captain Jack has returned.”

Yuno brushed off Julius’s question and turned his gaze toward the forest. There, Jack was lumbering his way back. Charlotte noticed his presence, putting Graham down and standing back up on her feet. Her face was a bit red, so she tried to hide this with her hand as she asked him,

“……H-how was it, Jack? Did you find anyone?”

“Nope~ Not a single soul. Kah kah. It must’ve been your imagination.”

“……Maybe. It’s possible that Grah……. No, it’s possible that this injured boar’s owner came to check on him, and then headed home soon after.”

Charlotte left it at that and promptly started back toward the village.

“Anyway, we now know that no one else is here. Let’s return to the village and buy some feed…… no, let’s just go back to the village.”

“Huh? Ah, hey!”

She didn’t respond to Jack’s voice, opting instead to hurry into the forest as if she had some great mission to fulfill.

“Damn, what’s with her……? Anyway, I feel tired just being here. I feel like my physical strength and magical power is withering away. I wonder if some weird magic was cast here.”

Hearing Jack talk to himself, Yuno tilted his head in confusion.

‘What is he talking about? At the very least, I don’t feel any symptoms like that…...”

He turned toward Julius, searching for an answer from him. Julius’s reply was a little awkward as he explained,

“It’s probably the jewel that repels people with evil souls. Maybe that’s what happens when it only affects you halfway……?”

‘……I see. That Magic Knights Captain is recognized as a “halfway evil soul” by the jewel.’

Not knowing that this was the cause, Jack looked around as he muttered,

“Come to think of it, she mentioned there was a boar, but I don’t see it…… Ah, there it is.”

His eyes sharpened with a glint as they lowered toward Graham. Graham jumped in surprise as the three in the cabin watched the situation closely, feeling very different from when they were watching Charlotte. They were pretty sure that Jack wouldn’t get violent with Graham, but he might treat him roughly. That would be unpardonable. If it came to that, they would have no choice but to come out of hiding and stop him. They tensely watched over the situation to see which way it would go, but…...

“……What is he doing? Neither of them have moved an inch……”

Just as Yuno said, Jack was looking Graham in the eye with what seemed like no intention to move whatsoever. Because he was afraid, Graham also didn’t move, so it looked as if time had stopped for them both.

Bell hummed as she pretended to push up imaginary glasses,

“…...It’s just like when a bad wolf happens upon an abandoned puppy and the two come to a mutual understanding. Like, “So, you’re on your own, too…..?”, or something.”

“But he’s not on his own. He has a collar and bandages, so that much should be obvious.”

Yuno’s rebuttal was immediate, but Bell continued to dub over the other two with a hushed voice.

“I could save you, take you in as my henchman, but that would be too easy. If I do that, you’re gonna think that life is easy for as long as you live. It ain’t easy. Life is…… never easy.”

“That’s the kind of conversation two human beings would have. Also, don’t you think your image of Captain Jack is a little off?”

Yuno shot Bell down again, but then Jack headed toward the shoals of the lake and caught a fish using his Slash Magic. After that, he threw it next to Graham. Without skipping a beat, Bell continued,

“Whoops, my mistake…… I accidentally caught too many fish. Throwing them away would surely anger the gods, so I’ll give some to you. Now, young lad…… live, and grow up to be strong…….”

“Okay, that whole “gods” thing is really out of character for him. Just stop……”

“Well, I don’t know if he’d say it quite like that, but it looks like she more or less got it right…... At the very least, it appears that he won’t get rough with Graham.”

While the three of them were talking, Jack left the vicinity. After watching Jack’s figure disappear into the forest, Julius let out a huge sigh of relief.

“Whew, that scared me….. From now on, we should use magic tools that hide our magic power when we come here.”

“……You’re right. Actually, if you could find a magic tool that makes us invisible, that would be great.”

‘If we had that, we would’ve been able to escape before seeing all that,’ Yuno thought to himself as he came out of the hut with Julius.

“Are you okay, Graham? You must’ve been so scared!”

Bell said as he flew toward Graham. Graham squealed happily and started skipping about. Watching Graham behave so cheerfully, Julius had a wry smile on his face.

“Ah ha ha. I thought he’d be afraid, but he’s surprisingly okay. Have you gotten used to being around humans?”

“He might be able to relax around people who seem to hold good intentions.”

……Of course, those two seemed a little too interested in Graham, so there was another problem they had to worry about – the possibility that they may return. However, there was nothing for them to do about that other than take appropriate measures when the time comes. As Yuno came to this conclusion, Julius squatted in front of Graham and extended his hand toward the fish Jack caught.

“Isn’t this great, Graham? You have a fish! Daddy will cut it into pieces to make it easier for you to-

“SQUEAL! SQUEAAAL!”

CRUNCH!

At that moment, Graham chomped down on Julius’s fingers with all his might.

“………….”

 — To be continued in Part 2 —

Julius is such a softie and I love every minute of it. Spoil that baby boar!

Charlotte’s reaction was expected (and perfectly understandable as I would love to hug Graham too), but I can’t say I saw Jack’s coming. It was…... interesting. It’s funny that his soul is considered half-evil, though.

I’m glad to be back to translating Book of Yuno again. The Black Bulls are fun, but there’s something refreshing about having the focus on a character outside of their group. Maybe it’s because he’s so introverted, but Yuno feels very natural as a book protagonist. It’s also funny to see how often the novel essentially says “he had a neutral expression on the outside, but inside he felt *insert intense emotion here*”.  

[duraxxor]

Character Sheet: That Damn Trio

Uh oh, it would seem Duraxxor has gotten himself in a lot of trouble this time around! He’s been split into three pieces of his former self! Oh the humanity! Well there’s only one thing to do. What’s that? Well, we go on a wild adventure to put him back together, of course! That’s why I have decided to create character sheet to explain and every one of the fragments and their traits. So without further interruptions, let’s get down to the material! 

Character No. 1

Name: Daev  ( Pronounced just like Dave ) 

Race: Sin’dorei?

Height: 5′ 8″ ( down from the 6′ 4″ that he once stood at. )

Hair Color: Silver Blonde

Eye Color: None, his eyes are as clear as glass

Age:  “ I was only born not that long ago... I jest though... “ 

Physical Traits: When a person comes in contact with Daev, the first thing they may notice as his youthful appearance. Unlike Duraxxor as a whole, Daev has the physical body of a young adult that has suffered from lack of muscle. Despite this, he seems able to stand straight and maintain himself but is unable to physically apply the strength and running speed he once had. The scar that once dominated his features is now shrunken down and appears to have lining that almost reminds some of a stitching, so to speak. Perhaps even mending? The same can be said about the majority of his black attire that decorates his body other than the sleeve that appears to have torn on the right side. A thin trench coat and a pair of black leather britches that are only matched by a pair of boots below. One can also notice the pair of snake bites piercing on his lower lip that seem to have appeared as he no longer bears even a semblance of the elven fangs gene. 

Personality: Quiet and probably the most balanced of his former self. Daev seems to be given the nickname of being the Heart of the Trio. And with good reason considering he is probably the very being that keeps the other two in existence. He is never to quickly jump to violence and seeks to see how people function and feel. Selfless thought and under normal circumstances, kind to those that share a mutual respect for him and his space. Although he is the most attuned to multiple emotions, he has a hard time properly expressing them and it may even come out in a series of riddles. However, he does seem to have something to say for every type of person. 

Abilities: Lack of physical strength, Daev has to rely on his mind and quick thinking if he hopes to manage avoiding being killed off with the help of his familiars. It isn’t known whether he retains much of his weaponry training, other than having a dagger tucked away under his coat that appears to have a significance, or perhaps even symbolic value. Despite his familiars having their own personalities, he seems able to maintain control of them in certain moments and can even call them or dismiss them at will. Daev’s greatest ability is that he has so much untapped potential that is it unpredicted what he may learn in his stay within the Shadowlands. 

Character No. 2 

Name: Randdu ( Ron-doo ) 

Race: Familiar ( Bat ) 

Height: Unspecified, look to his Abilities for details

Hair Color: White

Eye Color: A mixture of Red and Yellow

Age: “ Look, man, give me a break. I only look old. “ 

Physical Traits: You feel a piercing gaze always watching you when you approach Daev with his avian shadow, Randdu. He takes on the appearance of most bats native to Azeroth aside from some defined features that make him appear more like a Fruit Bat from our world, bearing a canine-like snout beneath the leathery wraps that are his lengthy wings. Jagged claws appear to be on both the back legs and wing joints, giving him almost the look a humanoid if not for the fact he lacks thumbs. He is the definition of wild animal with personality. 

Personality: The reckless familiar that is highly regarded ( and prideful of himself ) as the symbol of Duraxxor. Randdu is also the loudest and most immature of the trio. He would rather pick a fight and see who is the strongest than listen to negotiations. He also possesses quite the appetite match this need for combat. However, this doesn’t mean he isn’t self aware when he is in over his head, being the quickest to also panic when he feels outmatched, that is until something goes right, then he will simply mock his foe. Warning: He may curse a lot. 

Abilities: Despite his reckless personality, Randdu is actually quite the powerhouse. He is physically strong and can easily pick up something that is three times his own size, which is only matched by the fact that he is able to grow and shrink his form based on the energy reserves he has obtained through his vampiric aura. The more he fights and succeeds, the stronger Randdu gets. Claws, teeth, and even a mind piercing screech are at his disposal. However, the magical affinity seems to lie more so in the fact he is able to cast a blaze of shadows about his form, giving him enough speed to perform a Wraith Flight, an ability that projects his vampiric aura outward and making mere contact results in the sapping of one’s raw energies. 

Character No. 3 

Name: Sphula ( Sph-ooluh ) 

Race: Familiar ( Serpent ) 

Height: 15′ 07″ in length 

Hair Color: “ Crimson Scales, you uneducated pig. “ 

Eye Color: Onyx 

Age: “ To old for you to know. “ 

Physical Traits: While Randdu is regarded to be the visible lurker, Sphula sticks to remaining hidden into his time is most appropriate. The lengthy serpent bears a strange familiarity to the Arcane Serpents of Northrend, but with many more rows of teeth and definitive fangs. He also lacks the ethereal skin until certain abilities are applied. Scales, bladed fings, and circular markings that are akin to chains, this crimson familiar seems to be the most colorful of the trio. 

Personality: Calm until provoked, Sphula recognizes his own intellect and will exercise it when it is most necessary. More often than naught, he is seen wrapped around Daev, whispering into his ear while chastising Randdu. For once to gain conference with Sphula would mean that you either have earned his respect or there is something of worth about you or upon you that he would sooner have you align yourself to their cause. Unlike the other trio, Sphula is not above breaking the rules in his favor. For he believes logic is more important in the case of survivability in the cruel world of a snake. There is one he deems the most worthy of his time: The Lady in the Red @sanguinesorceress​ . 

Abilities:  Not as physically strong as Randdu, Sphula is also a constrictor and has no issue wrapping his long tail around his foes or even applying it in a flailing motion to dispatch someone from approaching Daev. And speaking of which, did you know that snakes can actually jump three times their length? Not just this one, but he can also slip his entire length through objects much like a pocket space just to come out in a near forty yard radius. Sphula is also the strongest when it comes to the use of magic and intellect. He is able to conjure geomancy, hemomancy, umbramancy, and in some cases, cryomancy and pyromancy. But what would a snake be without his bite? Twin fangs possess a potent cytotoxin, which is a toxin that induces tissue necrosis. Keep your hands away from this snakes mouth!

OOC Information Station 

Rp Style:  When interacting with this blog or even the in-game character, I cannot always guarantee that you will interact with all three of them, just as I also cannot guarantee that one of the other’s won’t squeeze themselves into the RP. Otherwise, I am generally laid back and always up to most themes, including the dark and twisted. I am an adult writer and in most cases, I am not so easily triggered and easy to speak with. Please, don’t hesitate to ask questions as I may have an actual answer for them. I also would like to remind everyone that I have been roleplaying in World of Warcraft for nearly ten years. All I ever ask is your undying patience and kindness in return. 

Platforms: Tumblr, Discord, and In-game (Planned) 

If you have made it this far, congratulations. Now to get to the nitty, gritty disclaimer warnings and rules.

1. Roleplaying with The Trio means you have agreed to not knowing the original character Duraxxor is the true identity of these characters without the proper knowledge or permission. Should you regard him as Duraxxor, Alphus, Lord Daevara, Myotis, or any other former alias, it will be ignored in-character. Should this become a continuing habit, I will ask you personally to please stop trying to ruin the mystery of the characters. Let’s make this a fun plot for all, old and new. 

2. If you are seeking to fix the problem as quick as possible, then you have come to the wrong player. I am wanting this particular plot device to go longer than a few weeks or even months as the Shadowlands is going to obviously take longer than a single year itself. There’s going to be hurdles to make evolve these characters over time. You are welcome to speak about being a part of the plot where he attempts to fix himself though!

3. When addressing particular character questions, please specify who you are addressing to unless it is all the above or the mun. This makes my life so much easier and more engaging. 

4. Do not god mod my characters as I would not god mod yours. All of them have their own individual strengths and weaknesses and should be considered only through natural interaction. 

5. More importantly, be respectful and patient. This is a brand new concept I am playing with and I really wish to see it through to the very end and want those involved to have fun. 

Thank you all for taking the time to read this and I do hope that everything is clear! I look forward to roleplaying with everyone and enjoying the Shadowlands storyline! Happy Writing everyone! 

And if you have not read Chapter 1 to the Shadowlands storyline, here is a link to the story is here

[ironwoman359]

Hello. I saw the post you reblogged about toxicity in the TS fandom. And as someone who is relatively new (Just over 2 months, heyo!), may I ask what kind of toxic behaviour do you see in the fandom? I hope this isn't too much for me to ask, I was just a bit curious and wanted some clarification on the matter. Please feel free to ignore this if it bothers you!

Well, welcome to the fandom, first of all! I hope you’re having fun so far. 

In regards to the post you’re talking about, I think @izzyfandoms said it best: “...most fandoms are okay but have a loud toxic minority, but for us the not-toxic people are often the loudest so we can come off as pure and perfect...” 

Most fandoms do have an amount of toxic behavior in them, it’s very rare (I’d say impossible, actually) to find one with zero problems, but it’s also usually more noticable in other communities than in this fandom, as we have been fortunate to have the non-toxic majority also be the louder voices most of the time (most often in fandoms, toxicity is a loud minority, though there are of course exceptions to this as well). 

The other thing I think is important to remember is that this fandom started out smaller than it is now. I’ve been a presence here since november 2017, and there are other who have been around even longer, and back then, the fandom was much smaller and therefore the toxic minority was even harder to notice. This led to us gaining a reputation of “purity,” which in turn made issues more complicated when they started to crop up. Every fandom is going to have issues, things that people in it disagree about, and people who try to stir up trouble. This is normal, and a fandom displaying those traits is not immediately a bad fandom. What can shift a fandom into an unhealthy one is when issues, disagreements, and drama become the focal point and people begin to treat each other poorly over these things. And I would say a majority of fanders are good at not falling into that type of thinking or acting. But it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, and it doesn’t mean that the fandom as a whole can just stick our heads in the sand and pretend everything is fine. 

So, you asked me what toxic behaviors I see. I’m going to talk about some examples I’ve seen in this fandom, and before I do I’d like to state first off that it is not my intention to attack anyone specific, or to shame people for their tastes in characterizations, ships, or their triggers or squicks. This is me trying to give my open and honest opinion about this community while being as respectful and tactful as possible. 

Also going forward, every time I say “the fandom” or “people” or refer to the community in some other all encompassing way, know that I do not mean every single person in it, or even a majority necessarily, just enough people to make it noticable. If you exhibit some of the behaviors I’m talking about, I’m not saying you’re a bad person or that you shouldn’t be here, far from it. But everyone has flaws, and these are just some common things that I see in this community. Maybe if you see yourself in this post, you can take a step back and consider your thoughts and actions to see how they may be harming you or others. 

Regardless of everything I’ve said and am about to say, I really love this fandom and the people in it, and I’m incredibly grateful for the impact it’s had on my life. Some bumps in the road aren’t going to change that. (Also I don’t engage with the fandom much outside of tumblr, things may be different on twitter, discord, or other places, this is just my experience with this platform specifically. Okay? Okay.)

So...here’s what I see in this fandom:

It is quick to judge. Anyone been here long enough to remember the week when Roman was “cancelled” between Accepting Anxiety part 1 and part 2? I came into the community later that year, but the fandom elders can tell you, there was a rally against Roman as a character, and a slew of people calling out prinxiety shippers for shipping such a “toxic ship.”  You’d think after that first time, the community would have learned to perhaps be not so quick in its judgements, but we’ve seen the same pattern over and over again.

People were quick to judge Deceit when his character was introduced, which was followed by a back and forth where people argued about what was and wasn’t “sympathetic” content, how things should be tagged, and 

People were quick to judge Virgil after Embarrassing Phases

People were quck to judge Patton after SvS and Patton AND Virgil after DWIT. 

People were quick to judge Remus after DWIT.

And here’s the thing, it’s fine if you have different interpretations of characters, or prefer certain versions. You see Patton’s character flaws and decide “you know what, this character isn’t for me now” or want to explore those flaws taken to their extremes? That is okay. What is not okay, and what this fandom does a lot, is insisting that YOUR interpretation and version of the character is the correct one and shaming people with different ideas. It’s fine if you don’t like Patton or take issue with his current flaws being displayed. It’s NOT fine to attack people who disagree and send anon hate to blogs who speak out in support of Patton. It’s fine if you don’t like unsympathetic sides content. It’s NOT fine to shame people who do or send anon hate to unsympathetic sides blogs. There are lots of different ways to interpret all SIX sides, and yet so often I see people go on some sort of crusade to defend their opinon and insist that it’s canon. 

But that’s all just the characters, this fandom also is very quick to judge the individuals in it. Real, breathing people with lives outside the internet are often shamed or attacked for their opinions about the characters, different ships, the way they’ve chosen to portray the characters in their art or stories, I could go on. Purity culture and cancel culture are prevalant in all areas of the internet, and this fandom is not exempt from it. Demonizing people for making small mistakes, or even for just disagreeing with you, is never okay, and yet it is something I’ve seen again and again in this fandom. Which leads me to my next point...

Anon hate. God, it makes me so angry, and this is the only one that I won’t try to portray both sides of or be diplomatic about, because it is flat out unacceptable no matter the circumstance. There are so many blogs in this fandom that have horrible anon hate problems, and I am sick of seeing it. I don’t care what a person has done or what opinions they have that you may disagree with, I don’t care if they’re the worst person in the world. It’s not okay to send anon hate, and it’s not okay to tell people to kill themselves. You find a blog in this fandom that you just Do Not like, either because of their content, their opinions, hell, just their personality? Unfollow them. Block them if you want. But sending anon hate over ships, characters, opinions and statements, it’s just childish and unacceptable. And it happens enough in this fandom that there are people who are afraid of making statements about things for fear of attracting more of that energy. Love always follows the hate and drowns it out in this fandom, for which I’m grateful, but the hate shouldn’t exist in the first place. Cut that shit out. 

In general, this fandom has not handled differing opinions well, be it opinions on how to tag content, disagreements over characterizations, or encountering an idea that you personally may not care for. It is ultimately up to individuals to curate their online experience, by unfollowing blogs they don’t like, blocking tags and blogs they don’t want to see, and reading summaries and content warnings before opening fics. Often in this fandom I think people get upset if something isn’t tagged the way they want it to be (and I’m not talking about not tagging triggers, I’m talking like, someone insisting a blogger tag deceit content as #ts deceit when they already tag it as #deceit sanders. In situations like that it is the responsibilty of that someone to either block the tags a blog is using or not follow blogs whose tagging system doesn’t work for them), or if someone disagrees with them and we forget that it is okay to just...unfollow people. You don’t have to follow every blog in this fandom to be a part of the community, and if a blog is making posts and content you don’t like, unfollow them, don’t attack them for it. Accept that they have as much a right to their opinions and their space in the fandom as you do, and adjust your block and follow list accordingly so that you can get the experience that YOU want out of this fandom. 

I hope this was helpful, and I hope it didn’t get too long for you. I’m not putting this under a cut because I think it’s important, but I will tag it as #longpost so my mobile users don’t suffer too much. If you want to discuss this in the notes, please keep it civil, and remember that we all are fans of Thomas here, and that we probably have more in common than we do differences. I love you guys, stay awesome

[dessarious]

Misconceptions, Miscommunication, and Misinformation Pt50

Inspired by @ozmav Maribat AU

AO3   Beginning   Previous   Next

The rest of the week was fairly uneventful until Friday. Adrien had grown sullen and quiet for the most part around the time that Discorde had shown up. Right after Damian had helped Ladybug break into the mansion the boy had been in a panic for days. Accusing everyone of stealing something from his room. He refused to say what but Damian had his suspicions. Giving that he’d stopped accusing Damian specifically as soon as the new black cat showed up was a rather obvious tell. Marinette refused to confirm his hunch.

Friday during lunch Damian actually stayed at the school for once. He’d been trying to avoid Luka and Marinette made sure he was always at her house when it was likely Damian would be there. When he brought it up she just gave him an innocent look and said she just wanted to have her friends around as much as possible because she had so few of them now. She wouldn’t admit to forcing them together, but he knew that was her goal.

That was how he ended up listening to a debate between his classmates, Adrien included, about which holder was better and why Ladybug had a new partner to begin with. The fact that any of them questioned the why made him once again want to stab people for their stupidity.

“That’s ridiculous! Of course Ladybug replaced him. All he was doing near the end was making her job harder. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn he was working with Hawkmoth to try and defeat her.” It was a good theory actually especially given who they were, but if the hurt and anger on Adrien’s face was any indication it wasn’t a correct one.

“That’s insane, Chat never would have sided with Hawkmoth. So what if he decided to have a little fun during attacks? It’s not like there’s any real damage once Ladybug casts her cure. Maybe if she’d just paid more attention to his feelings they’d have been more productive.” Just about everyone was looking at him like he’d lost his mind, and that included the ones her were defending the former hero.

“Being a hero is serious business and the last thing anyone needs is someone screwing around when they should be protecting people. What if one day Ladybug’s cure doesn’t work? What if the damage stays for some reason?” Damian really hadn’t meant to get into this debate but hearing this from someone that had fancied themselves and hero pissed him off to no end. “What if his playing at being a hero got one or both of them killed? Oh wait that’s right, he did get himself killed on a regular basis didn’t he? Or mind controlled, or trapped, the list goes on. Chat Noir was good at one thing and one thing only, and that was harassing girls that wanted nothing to do with him.”

“You take that back!” While not unexpected Adrien’s outburst sank Damian’s opinion of him even lower. He honestly hadn’t thought that was possible. “If Ladybug would have just admitted her feelings for him none of this would have happened. She’s the selfish one, turning him down over and over again instead of just giving him a chance and admitting she was wrong!”

Everyone in the room was either edging away from the boy or glaring at him. For his part Damian sent a text to Marinette and Chloe for good measure to let them know there was likely to be an Akuma very shortly, unless of course Gabriel had some reason not to Akumatize his son. It certainly wouldn’t be because he cared about him but perhaps it wouldn’t look good for his brand if the sunshine boy became a villain. Being targeted by them would gain sympathy but even knowing that Hawkmoths victims weren’t given a choice it wouldn’t play well with international buyers and there were a lot of them in town for the fashion show this weekend. It might also hurt his chances to recruit the Functional Fashion designer.

As they made it through lunch with out any purple butterflies showing up Damian took it as more proof that Hawkmoth and Gabriel Agreste were in fact the same person. Sure Hawkmoth didn’t Akumatize every person who got upset but this school was known as his favorite target and there were more students with bad feelings right now than just Adrien. For his part the boy just sat there and pouted for the rest of the break, but at least he wasn’t still spouting nonsense.

Talk in the cafeteria slowly came back to life with a different subject which was of course, the fashion show. Even people who generally had no opinion on the subject felt the need to chime in about one subject and that was the big reveal. Functional Fashion had been a huge hit with people who hated the fashion industry for making clothes that weren’t in any way practical not to mention cost more than most people made in a year. So naturally there was a running debate about which fashion house they would go to, if any.

“There’s no way they’ll end up working for one of the major brands. They’ve said multiple times they’re happy working on commission without a big name to bloat their prices.”

“Then why do a major reveal at all? They could just announce their identity on their website and be done with it. This seems like a ploy to get attention from the fashion community.”

“Well it is a show for amateur and up and coming designers so it is a bit of a shitty move to put that much attention on yourself rather than the people who need it.”

“What if they were going to put their pieces in the show but were afraid they’d be figured out anyway? Maybe this is just so they can do things on their own terms.”

It kept going on and on. Damian didn’t add to the conversation and neither did Adrien though he did look rather interested in it. Damian did wonder how Marinette had convinced someone so set on secrecy to show up in public like this. He remembered a specific post on their site that said they were worried some people in their life would try to steal her ideas or claim she stole them herself. They were dealing with a lot of people lying about them and… and he was such an idiot.

AO3   Beginning    Previous    Next

Kofi

Tag List

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[pollyannisms]

DISCORD HEADCANON DUMP

Ángela falls strictly into the Iceberg category, where promotion is off the table entirely because she is too valuable for the foundation where she is. Unless another version of her comes along, they would never find another person to do what she does with the same efficiency and fearlessness. It's like, how many forensic pathologists would be happy and willing to climb into the giant decomposing chest cavity of a potentially dangerous anomaly to get an insight on what it was that put them down? Not many besides Ángela, that's for sure! 

Okay, this is more of a general headcanon than one which applies to a Ángela alone. Still, I'm of the firm opinion that any researcher/doctor/security officer/etc. Who fits the profile of a 'team-leader (i.e. has assistant workers, trains future workers as a part of an apprenticeship program, etc.) has the additional duty of monitoring the workers under them, in addition to whatever job they are expected to perform, and reporting any concerning/dissenting/anti-social/overly-cruel or generally problem behaviour to the Ethical Enforcers before it becomes a more significant issue for the foundation at large. And it's from these reports that things like mandatory psych evaluations, increased surveillance, etc., are often borne. 

So, for example, let's say one of the forensic assistants under Ángela began vocally experiencing a higher degree of humanization of the individuals and anomalies they autopsy and expressing a great amount of guilt over it. Ángela would be obligated by her duty to report this to the ethics team, and they from there would schedule a psych evaluation for the individual in question, and advise Ángela to keep herself open if they need support in the mean time. From there though the ethics team and psych team would evaluate whether the employee was fit to continue their work or posed a danger to themselves, others or the foundation as a whole and consider taking steps from there.

A lot of the time when people in the foundation talk about O5 having ‘eyes’ everywhere, it’s in reference to these sorts of mandatory reporters. 

Ángela is in charge of choosing her team members (aka. forensic assistants to help her move bodies around, take measurements, etc.), and I think she is VERY VERY picky about who she takes and doesn’t. 

Though this is because she does a lot of the grosser, more gruesome and dangerous aspects of the job that no one else wants to do (and therefore gets pushed off onto her), and she doesn’t want to have anyone go with her, who she can’t rely on in a pinch and who can’t bear the emotional burden of her job. iii

Prompt: For researchers; What was their favorite SCP assigned to them and why? Do any stick out in their memory? Why? What did they do and what were they?

Ángela’s favourite SCP and also most heartbreaking assignment was SCP-8699 or The Living Dead. They were a humanoid anomaly that was inanimate most of the time but became animate during instances of a full moon. Which weird as it is, wasn’t their anomalous trait. It was the fact that they could not be killed by brute force, but could not regenerate themselves, actively decayed like a corpse but remained alive during full-moon periods, felt no pain and seemed to know nothing about itself other than that it existed, but seemed incapable of understanding that it should’ve been dead. 

They were given to Ángela during an entirely separate SCP investigation and were undergoing an examination to create a link between said aforementioned SCP and themselves - but regained animation and sentience on the exam table. Causing Ángela’s crew to evacuate the lab and Ángela to retreat into the observation room to trigger the breach in progress alarm. Though, to Ángela’s surprise, rather than attempting to break into the observation room to try and kill her, they ripped off their EKG and hid under the exam table and seemed terrified, crying and shaking and trying to cover themselves. 

Ángela, being Ángela and seeing this, turned on the speakers in the lab from the observation room and did her best to comfort the SCP, and directed them to some extra lab coats she kept in case of emergencies and talked with them, and between the jigs and the reels, managed to calm them down, explained they weren’t in trouble and that there had been a mistake, and played four games of tic-tac-toe before the security team finally got to the lab and secured 8699 and rescued Ángela. 

Though on their way to move 8699, dawn broke, and they reverted to an inanimate corpse once again. Ángela, with backing from her superiors, decided warranted further observation, and thus the pattern was detected, and they were classified!

Sadly though, Ángela and her team had to classify them as Khonsu, and due to their natural decay, 8699 was fully neutralized within two years of their discovery. Much to the heartbreak of the time assigned to them, as they were lovable in their way. Like, they were this 2.3 metre tall emaciated, rotting corpse that wouldn’t look out of place in a horror movie, with the mental maturity of a child and this sunshiny disposition and an apparent inability to understand the situation they were in entirely. I mean, how can you not love a shy, gentle giant that tries to hide behind its researcher that’s half its size.

What Ángela remembers about them the most though was when she was ordered to carry out a complete autopsy of them during one of their periods on apparent inactivity, as they were functionally dead and therefore able to be conducted without the possibility of excessive pain or cruelty. Before the dissection, though, Ángela, with backing from the Ethics committee, chose to have a meeting with 8699 and told them everything she was going to have to do and stressed that they were allowed to say no to anything ‘too invasive’ and the ethics committee would make sure she wouldn’t have to do it. But they didn’t care, they just shook their head and shrugged it off, saying ‘No, it’s fine, I won’t feel it anyways and I trust you, you’ll put me back together again,’ to which Ángela was like

Something unintentionally uncovered by the 8699, though, was that Ángela seems to have anosmia because, even when 8699 was falling into goo and bones and ‘reeked to the high heavens,’ so much so that they had to give it an airtight containment chamber. Ángela was able to remain in close contact with them and even eat in their presence.

Prompt: What was the scariest or most traumatic moment that your character has had to live through and how did they respond to the trauma in that moment?

For Ángela, there are four options for this question. There was the moment she found her older brother’s dead body bloated and disfigured and unrecognizable as him if it wasn’t for the crucifix necklace he always wore, which left her, well, non-functioning. She disconnected from her peers and family, developed depression, mentally regressed in terms of maturity, and developed muteness for the better part of 3 years following. In her defense, what she saw was horrifying for a child, and she wasn’t given trauma or therapy in the aftermath to help her cope.

- there was the incident that triggered her abduction hiring by the Foundation, which left her incredibly rattled and nervous about resuming her work for months following (though, with help from available counselling and therapy, she moved past that trauma and was able to return to work)- there was the first-ever containment breach she was a part of

 - where one of the patients she and her team were working on suddenly returned to life and sunk its teeth into her coworker’s throat—causing him to bleed out. She and her team members to have to leave him to it, which was the reason for her first promotion and was the incident that made it sink in that she wasn’t working for the government anymore and that the SCP Foundation was much more dangerous than she could have ever prepared for. Sometimes she still has nightmares about that assistant grasping at his neck desperately and trying to claw his way to the door to escape with them, only to be dragged back into the lab by the anomaly-infected corpse and the sound he made, oh god, the sound. Something between a wet rattle and a wheeze as he tried to cry for help despite his open wound.

And there was the lead up to 8699’s neutralization. See, before it’s death, it had requested Ángela visited them in the Foundation’s equivalent of a hospice center in Site 17, and she went. She used her vacation days and headed over, and things were going great! 8699 remembered Ángela and has perked up the moment it recognized her, and they chatted, about her team, the non-classified information about the site, how the flowers looked. The birds were coming home for spring, and things seemed, well, great, despite the ever-present vibe of forthcoming death. 

Then something happened- she couldn’t tell you what, but something clicked in 8699, like the gravity of the situation finally dawned on them, and they asked her to get closer. Given their history of non-violence and friendliness, was obliged by Ángela, and they spilled everything they knew about themselves and how they came to be what they were, which took Ángela by surprise and left her shocked. Never before had they lied. They were forthright, almost childishly so, so it seemed so strange. Then they said they had to give her something and began hacking and coughing violently. They seized and sputtered and Ángela, being a smart cookie, tried backing up. 

At this point, she was terrified. 8699 wasn’t acting like themselves. They didn’t seem like themselves, they were more erratic, agitated, and she didn’t know if they were going to try and attack her or not. But 8699, despite retching like it was trying to heave it’s organs through its mouth, grabbed her wrist and held her with a strength she couldn’t get out of. At that moment, her entire life flashed before her eyes. It was like every mistake she had ever made fit into one jigsaw puzzle, and she understood that she was going to die here with this SCP she underestimated. But, instead of attacking her, 8699 just produced this group of 6 polished gems and shoved them into her hand before letting go, and Ángie just fell to the ground.

She was in such a state of shock that it wasn’t until the security team put her into a quarantine that she understood what the fuck had even happened. Shortly after that, this apparent attack 8699 entered inactivity for the final time and never returned to an animated state.

Prompt: What is your character’s opinion on the armed guards buzzing around the facility? Are they intimidated by them? Do they enjoy them? Know them by name? Or do they pity them?

Regarding the guards, Ángela has divided emotions. On the one hand, she fears their guns but pities them as people. They’re often so young and unequipped to deal with these situations, promised this exciting, lucrative career, only to be treated as d-class with guns.

She, in equal measures, wants to hug them and tell them to run for the hills and mutter under their breath about their foolishness. But this is more so directed at what she sees in them that reminds her of her. In practice, she’s kind and a bit maternal to many of them - popping her head into the guard breakroom at the beginning of her shifts to say hi, before scampering off to do her thing and always remembering their names and birthdays.

EXCEPT in the case of the guards assigned to her. Those guys, good lord, she hates those guys. They always respond to her breach in progress alarms like five minutes late, they make scathing comments and insults, they think she can’t hear when she works late, take smoke breaks every ten minutes, even though she knows neither smoke. She loathes them, but she would never give them the satisfaction of knowing that, no, she chooses to kill them with kindness as ineffective as that is! 

Prompt: What’re your character’s opinions on anomalies? Most notably sentient, however can apply to all. Broad, but here’s something’s to detail: - Are they evil? Are they “out to get us”? - Should they be contained, or let free, or neutralised? Where’s the line between “possible staff”, “must be contained”, and “must be neutralised”? - Should they have the same rights as standard humans? - What’re their opinions on free-roaming passive SCPs, or anomalous personnel? - Where did they come from? Was it a “someone” or “something” that created them all? Do they simply just exist? - Do they believe any SCP-001 proposals? If they do, which? If they don’t, why not?

-Ángela subscribes to the Gears school of thought regarding anomalies, their nature and their inherent maliciousness. In that, she doesn’t believe they’re a part of some ‘conspiracy’ against humanity, some pawn in an unfathomable being’s game of chess, etc. Ángela is of the opinion that they simply are. In the same way, animals simply are. They exist because they exist, and their nature is what it is. 

She doesn’t believe that anomalies can choose to be the way they are and feels that expecting them to be different and conform to a human morality, behaviour, or culture is a waste of time applying human morality, behaviour, and culture to them. 

- Ángela feels they (the anomalies) should be contained for both the safety of humanity AND the anomaly themselves in equal measure. See, the world is harsh, and humanity can be cruel, and while many anomalies can defend themselves against this fact of life, or at least blend in well enough with civilization to go unnoticed. Many can’t and need the protection, stability, steady supply of sustenance, etc. The facilities provide them. 

Regarding the lines of neutralization, containment and staff treatment- it’s hard to say generally, as Ángie feels it should be handled on a case by case basis, which factors in all perspectives about the situation. From risk vs reward, the financial aspect, the human cost, the opinions and desires of the anomaly in question and whether or not it would cause undue suffering in the anomaly.

By and large, though, she thinks a lot more sentient, low-security risk anomalies (i.e. 073) should be given the option to seek a profession within the foundation and be allowed to strive for a semi-normal life with privileges such as forming relationships, having friendships, hanging out, taking sick/lazy days, etc. Because, while they are objects, they’re also people - and their anomaly shouldn’t invalidate their personhood. At least, not as far as she’s concerned.

- This is another case-by-case type of question. For humanoid and or sentient SCPs that have proven themselves to be the most baseline, minimal threat in Foundation Security and Staff safety - then yes. She feels they should be given civil liberties and human rights like any other person in the foundation. For anything beyond that, though? Hard pass. Though they should still be acknowledged as people, they should not be handed rights and liberties - ESPECIALLY In the case of entities that have proven themselves to be manipulative, repeat breachers, violent, etc. It’s playing with fire and, while certainly morally questionable, is a necessary evil. 

- Ángela honestly doesn’t care that much. In some cases, it can take her back a bit (like coming into contact with a humanoid pigeon that is at least a head taller than her), but she’ll get used to it. This all being said, though, there are some free-range SCP’s Ángela can’t help but feel nervous in the presence of. She tries to bite back the feeling and deny its existence, but it does exist. Have faith that it does. 

- In short, yes. To elaborate, though, Ángela believes every anomaly is made by something. Though whether that thing is another entity, nature itself, the universe, a paradox, rip in space-time, etc. Is all a matter of debate and a case by case basis. 

- Ángela has an SCP-001 proposal of her own, and I’ll leave it at that! Haha

[thisisthehardestthing]

wait r u fr? tumblr ate the ask? pls i’m so fuckin mad i literally typed paragraphs about how much i loved it so here we go i’m gonna try to be more coherent this time:

this mafia fic is my favorite haikyuu fic i’ve ever read and one of my fave fics in general. like the amount of hard work and research u put into it is so clear and it shows in the amazing quality of the fic. ur pacing, the flow of ur words, ur characterizations of tanaka and val, the way u pull off that last scene. everything is so well done and all of those things are super hard to pull off on their own so props to u for being able to do all of those. like wow i really am in awe of ur talent and i’m so thankful for ur hard work and the fact that u posted this like u rlly took me thru an emotional ride and gave me such a good piece of writing to enjoy and i love that.

okay so: details. i love the way u include the little things in the fic. stuff like the name of the designers and the names of organizations and stuff in the fic helps me picture the scenes so much and it just really adds to the extravagant feel of the fic.

with symbolism, i could literally write paragraphs about how well u included symbols in this fic. like i deadass gasped when the viper necklace was crushed in the final scene at the end right before tanaka did it. the parallels!!!! god ur so good at writing and obviously ur brain is huge to have thought of that and seamlessly included it into the fic.

okay so idk what the proper term for this is but like, the way that action happens in the fic is so well done and not predictable but still in line with what you’ve revealed to us about the characters. like ofc tanaka would pull the necklace out of his pocket at just that moment as a way to reveal to daichi what he felt. it’s just so perfect and so true to the person he is in the fic. about his characterization, god i love it so much. all of the pain and yearning and sheer want in his person were clearly conveyed thru his perspectives and his actions. like that boy just wants to be loved and that’s why it made such good narrative sense to have daichi ask him who he loves more in the scene right before the ending. like i saw the tag for death and expected a million things but u somehow managed to surprise me and yet still stay true to the world and characters u created and ugh, it’s all so perfect.

speaking of, the pacing of this fic is so good. like u manage to take us thru a whirlwind time period that doesn’t feel fast or drawn out or anything other than perfect. u have such a good awareness of pacing that it makes me so jealous and yet so pleased as a reader. like nothing about their love confessions or trysts felt rushed or forced. it felt so natural and true to the people they were and the world that they live in.

also i said before in the other ask how i love the way u utilize sex scenes in the fic. u sprinkle them in at just the right moment and they manage to be hot but they also reveal so much about the characters involved. like i’m specifically thinking of the scene in tanaka’s home where she asks why he won’t touch her and he says that she didn’t give him permission. like the love and devotion in that way of thinking felt so true and yet in the end he still did it and ugh that breaks my heart in the best way bc i know my pain as a reader is nothing next to his pain as a character. i would actually love to pick ur brain about how u decided on the ending. did it come to u in the moment or did u set out writing the fic knowing it would end up like that? so many questions rlly bc u created a world and a cast of characters that are so interesting like i would literally read books about them. (esp val. i loved how headstrong and proud she was but also how weak and emotional she could be. her ending made me sad but u kno, it made sense) and i’m especially curious to find out how tanaka copes after. like i can’t imagine that daichi would just accept his loyalty again but u do manage to surprise me in the best way so who knows. but i also mourn for him which is a little odd for me bc after finding out that he knew about daichi’s affair i felt betrayed and it hurt for some reason which is so interesting bc i trusted him and felt like i knew him, but u still managed to keep parts of him hidden, which is so cool.

oh and despite the tragic ending, u fed us so good with scenes of the two everywhere. like i love how we got to see tanaka and val in their own homes and at parties and we truly got to see how they act when they’re alone and when they’re comfortable and when they’re playing the part of loyal bodyguard or loyal wife. ugh it’s all so good and tbh i only finished it like maybe half an hour again but i already want to read it again bc it was so fucking good and the way u write emotions like yearning and heartbreak is so good like ugh. everything about the way u wrote this fic was so amazing and fuck tumblr for eating my ask but i hope i at least manage to repeat the majority of what was in the og ask lol.

hello anon <3

It is the weekend so I finally have enough brain power to reply.

I wanted to be selfish and keep this in my inbox forever, because this might be the kindest, most appreciative thing everyone has ever said to me about my writing. Toska is a piece of my heart and my soul in written word, and to have received something like this? It’s... indescribable. You have picked up on so many of the small details, symbols, and more that I littered throughout the fic, and you’ve called out the things that I was excited about people reading and reacting to.

Fic Spoilers below the cut.

everything is so well done and all of those things are super hard to pull off on their own so props to u for being able to do all of those.

Thank you so much. I constantly worried that it was too long, too boring, that there wasn’t enough smut in there to be sexy, or that the plot ultimately didn’t make sense. This means everything to me. Pacing is one of the most important things in a fic to me, because I am the kind of person that easily loses interest when I read. 

details. i love the way u include the little things in the fic.

ahhhhhhhhh!!!! I’m glad this helped you to picture everything! I actually used real life dresses, shoes, locations (google Villa La Vigie, it is STUNNING). I was a fashion student, and I now work in the fashion industry so small details to convery luxury is extremely important to me. I love that it made all the difference to you.

i could literally write paragraphs about how well u included symbols in this fic.

fuck, wow. this. This is what I was truly hoping for. I love figuring out foreshadowing in movies, in books, in tv series. I try to write things that foreshadowing what going to happen in the end throughout of every one of my fics, but this is the first time someone called it out, and I am truly grateful for it. The viper necklace thing is a moment I was very proud of. and when Tanaka tells Val to stop talking about Daichi when they’re alone on the bed together: that’s the first instance where we see his guilt that he knows. Also, when Tanaka says “why dont i finish what I started,” is another thing I linked to the ending.

the way that action happens in the fic is so well done and not predictable but still in line with what you’ve revealed to us about the characters.

kasjsdfhksjdfsd I always thought people could see right through me and how I was going to end it!!!!!!! This means so much thank you! I kept thinking, “fuck people know he’s going to kill her, this is so predictable, all these extra scenes are so boring, is it even worth it?” so AH thank you!

thank you again for the pacing comment <3

i love the way u utilize sex scenes in the fic. u sprinkle them in at just the right moment 

hehehehehehe this makes me very happy. tbh, I wasn’t expecting there to be SO MUCH PLOT when I wrote this fic. I had mapped everything out and planned for it to be about... 5k? words? It ended up being 21k all together lmao. I actually thought there wasn’t enough smuttiness in the entire thing, so thanks for letting me now that it was just the right amount. I was worried because the only time I actually describe them fucking with Tanaka’s dick inside her, is that measley one paragraph at the Monte Carlo Casino. When I realised that, I was in utter shock. I was texting @mindninjax in the discord server like “FUCK. I can’t believe I haven’t actually written sex sex.” Then I went into thinking how disappointed people were going to be and phew, it was a whirlwind of a night.

i would actually love to pick ur brain about how u decided on the ending. did it come to u in the moment or did u set out writing the fic knowing it would end up like that? so many questions rlly

ask away, send in questions. I built this world beyond what I’ve written. I have character layouts and plans for every person I introduced, and have ideas for fics on all of them.

To answer your question, I knew exactly how I wanted it to end before I began writing. That end scene is what I thought of first. Exactly like that, with it being cut off mid-sentence to represent her being shot. That sort of “boom” or feeling of shock where you just stare at the screen is the exact reaction I wanted to get when I finished writing, so I hope that is what happened.

So just, thank you so much anon. For everything, for taking the time to write out this ask a second time after Tumblr ate the first one. It has kept me going since the day you sent it. I really appreciate you, and please, chat to me anytime x

Thank you.

Spasiba x