#and how even though there will be unkind and cruel people it is not wrong to be kind in the face of that

[orangeisthecolorofblood]

i love natsume yuujinchou so much but also reading it does feel like someone has carefully pried your heart out of your chest and cracked it open like a pomegranate, and is now gently, adoringly, cradling it in their hands in front of you

[r3starttt]

LET SILENCE SPEAK

PAIRING: Caitlyn Kiramman X reader

SUMMARY: Caitlyn comforting you after a depressive episode :(((( and kissing u a lot

CW: angsty but very comforting. Ren writing after months of not doing so.... yeah

TAGLIST: @lewd-alien @greysontheidiot @jolyne @sapphic-ovaries @tlouloser @prwttiestbunny @visobsession @thesevi0lentdelights @lvlymicha @stickycherritart @patronagrona @halle5s @usuck @thalchmy @lovelyy-moonlight @ss

It begins quietly, as it always does.

Not with a bang or breakdown, but a hush—a gradual softening of color, of voice, of presence. It doesn’t announce itself. It slips in through the cracks, makes a home of your silences, and settles beneath your skin like fog. It comes and it goes, weaving itself into your routine until you barely remember what life felt like without its weight. Too late to stop it, you’ve built a home out of it. A shell that mimics safety. A pause that pretends to be peace.

Your mind is a field of static—over-slept, overrun, far from anything resembling reality. The world moves in front of you, but it’s muffled, dulled. Words wedge in your throat like stones. Each vowel distorts, each consonant collapses into noise. You nod at every question out of habit, avoiding elaboration, rationing your energy for when you have to perform. You save your voice: for the smiles, the polite laughs, the act of presence.

Even food loses its color. The thought of eating fills you with a vague disinterest, like everything else. Even your bed—your supposed haven—feels suffocating now. The sheets too cold, the pillows too loud. You want to rest, but even the act of surrendering feels wrong. Minutes blur into hours. Hours into days. And soon, you don’t remember what it felt like to feel like yourself.

It always comes back like this. But no matter how many times, it still manages to catch you off-guard—sneaking in through routine, wrapping around your ribs. You don’t see the shift until the mirror doesn’t look like you anymore. The skin is yours, the hair, the eyes—but the soul inside doesn’t fit. You move, but from a distance, as though watching your body go through the motions from some quiet corner of your mind. Detached. Lost.

People speak, but their voices are foreign now. Not cruel, not unkind—just weighty, each word pressing in until the air thickens around you. Conversations become minefields. Smiles feel like lies. You don’t mean to drift away. You’re not trying to hurt anyone. But everything feels like too much. Every interaction demands more than you have to give. And the more they reach, the more you shrink back, terrified of being truly seen. Because when others have seen you like this before, they recoiled. They turned away. They asked for less, or worse, nothing at all.

You know Caitlyn isn’t like that. She never has been. But even she isn’t immune to the blade of your breaking. You love her fiercely. And precisely because of that, the idea of unraveling in her arms feels dangerous—like cutting both of you open at once.

So you do the only thing that feels safe. You hide.

Tonight, it’s the couch. You’re curled into yourself at the far end, knees drawn up tight, a shape too small to belong to a whole person. You sit like you’re trying to disappear. Rain whispers against the windows—soft and persistent, like the universe is trying to hum a lullaby just for you. It’s the only thing that doesn’t ask anything of you. The only sound that doesn’t hurt.

You don’t hear Caitlyn approach at first. Lately, she’s been more hesitant—watching you from the doorway with furrowed brows and clenched fingers. She used to rush to you at the first sign of quiet. Now she watches. Waits. She has learned that not every silence is an invitation. Not every tear means come closer. And so she honors it, as best she can. Until she can’t anymore.

She crosses the room slowly, her eyes scanning the outline of you. The way your body folds into itself. The way your breath comes shallow, like you’re afraid of being too loud, like even oxygen is borrowed. Her gaze lingers on your shoulders, on your face.

And she aches.

“Love,” her tone comes quieter than a breath.

You don’t look at her. But you feel the shift as the cushion beside you dips, her weight settling gently into the space you left open. She doesn’t touch you—not yet.

You stare at the floor. The words are there, somewhere inside you, trapped.

But then, after a moment, you lean—slowly. Not quite an embrace. Not quite an apology. Just the smallest plead for her to not leave.

Caitlyn exhales like she’s been holding her breath all week. She wraps an arm around your back, tentative, gentle, and you sink into her touch like a tide returning to shore.

And in that moment—though you know the silence will return, though you know this isn’t a cure, something inside you lets go. The tension in your spine eases. Your fingers unclench. Your breath deepens.

"You know that I love you, right?" The words you pronounce–each one of them, alongside your tone, too quiet and honest–it makes her cup at your cheeks. Her cold skin cradles yours almost in desperation. "Listen, I know you. I've seen you, all of you." She's insistent on her last words, leaning to press her lips against yours. It's brief, but gentle enough for your eyes to meet hers for once. "I don't mind staying like this if its what you want-" Her nails gently brushed some baby hairs away from your face, using it as an excuse to just stare and touch like she'd wanted.

“I hate feeling like this. It’s like my body’s here but I’m not.” You announced in a murmur, allowing yourself to be held by Caitlyn. To try your best and say what's been burning on your throat lately. “I want to be better. I just don’t know how to get there... anymore.”

"I think you are getting better." Her lips parted slightly into a smile, that cocky playful grin reserved to make you smile too. "Maybe you don't notice, but I do."

Even though her words and her smile and her touch and just her were supposed to make you feel lighter. It didn't work, it felt like a bench of excuses to make you grow out of this– it made you mad on yourself.

"I don't want to drag you with me."

Caitlyn stared in silence, pulling you closer to her chest until she could feel your heavyness herself. "I hate seeing you like this." Her perfume felt like it could satiate you alone, her arms and the soft fabric of her clothes hugged you with her tenderness. You really felt loved, even with all the sad blinding you, you felt loved. "Trust me, you won't drag me with you– and if you did, I wouldn't mind. As long as you stop dealing with this alone." She brushed your hair away from your neck, leaning in to press soft kisses all over the exposed skin. "I love you."

[megapteraurelia]

DUSKWATCH. — scroll #1.

𓐩 SUMMARY; — iwaizumi hajime promised himself he'd stop, lay down the sword and keep his head and feelings down, for after all, he was just a stable boy. but when your hand for courtship gets offered as the prize for this yearly's knight tournament — he can't help but pick up the buried helmet again.

𓐩 WARNINGS; — royalty! fem!reader; stable boy!iwaizumi; mention of injury; yearning!!; mention of alcohol; politicking; sexism;

𓐩 WORD COUNT; — 6062.

𓐩 AUTHOR'S NOTE; — a little sneak peak into seijoh 4's occupations! i had the most fun writing them all out!! ahh, i do love me some politicking. also, excuse if i have inconsistencies, i'm never too sure when a title gets capitalised and when not, so i'm still struggling with that a little. oops also, everbody say a big fat thank you to @sodaneko for soothing my anxiety and encouraging me to do as i like — which is posting this!! do let me know what you thought of this! <3

— back to masterlist.

you. — crown princess.

"Keep still, My Lady."

You could barely breathe, the strings of your dress digging into your skin mercilessly, and your hands shot out to keep a hold of your bed's poster lest you would fall from the force with which your lady-in-waiting pulled.

"Must I wear this, Masako? I'm sure no one will notice if the corset isn't bound as tightly," you wheezed, fingers digging into the intricate woodwork, "If anything, people will notice if my face turns blue from all the air I'm not getting."

"Shush, child, a Lady has to never stand out — unless it is by her grace, not by the unbecoming sound of her gasping for air like a fish on land," the elderly woman chided, giving a final tug to the bodice that made stars spark behind your eyes.

She stepped back, and you sank back on your heels, having tried to escape the torture by getting on your tip toes, but Masako was relentless, her experienced fingers quick and nimble as she tied the strings and hid them within the folds of your dress well. A sharp tug to smooth it down, adjusting the folds of your skirts and brushing a loose curl from your temple. No matter how many times she fixed something in your appearance, no matter how much time was given to her to get you ready, she could find little discrepancies in even the smallest of crevices of your dress.

She pivoted around you until you could see her face now, set in stern lines, but not unkind in the way she regarded you. Just tired; worn by years of lessons she tried to pass on to you over and over again.

"You think this discomfort is cruel?" she asked quietly, and her hands came to rest on your shoulders, voice low so it wouldn't carry through the air even though nobody else was in your chambers. "If only you knew how vicious the lords can be, My Lady. Their smiles are deceiving, their whispers like poison."

She wasn't wrong, you knew that.

Masako — with no last name, no land or title to her name, just your lady-in-waiting since you had been a child — had been telling you this ever since you learned how to walk. The way you had to present yourself, because to give anybody in the court a breath of weakness meant it would spread like rot, the way everybody would pounce on you, dissect it, feast on it, hand it to their spymasters like a dog bringing bloodied meat.

There were eyes in every tapestry, ears behind every column, after all.

Her hands travelled down your arms and she took your own hands, her calloused fingers, pin-pricked, smoothing over your softer knuckles, "You must give them nothing, child. Not a wince, not a sigh. You will stand tall and you will smile, sweet like we've always practised, alright? As if your breath is never short and your feet never hurt."

There was a knot in your throat that wouldn't dissolve no matter how many times you tried swallowing, and a slight pressure accompanying it in your chest, exceeding the one your corset inflicted on your torso.

A Lady did not falter. A Lady was to stand as calm as still water beside her king no matter how heinous or lecherous the looks and words were of the other lords. A Lady was to be the picture of grace. You had heard it again and again, the same words, the same concepts — you'd never be thanked for the pain it cost to keep up the charade, but you would be punished for if you were to show it.

You knew all of that, you knew that that was how the world worked, how you had been raised, how you had been taught, yet even understanding all of this, you still felt a certain flame lick your fingertips — like not taking action was going to be the death of you, like being stagnant and regarded as a porcelain doll would send you to hell. And it would, you knew it would. It already did.

So sometimes you thought that you'd rather be disowned and cast out, hunted by the very own king's guard that had protected you ever since you were a child than to continue on as the crown princess, only existing to be married off, to ensure that your lineage didn't die out. But then—

Masako's decolletage was covered, a high-strung neck piece laying on her skin like her very own personal armour, so you couldn't see it, but you knew the disfigured way her right collarbone was stitched together. The way she couldn't raise her arm for weeks when she was younger, and she couldn't fully raise it now decades later, either. Her range in motion cut short from when she had to endure the punishment of her parents trying to flee, a reminder that she was nothing but the king's subject, his to punish however he saw fit — your grandfather had been known to be especially cruel.

So you couldn't bring more pain to her.

You wouldn't, not when the only time you had ever seen her cry was when you had been missing for hours deep into the night, lost in the woods that she told you not to enter without supervision; your cheek still stinging from when her hand made contact before she broke down. Because she was the only woman who cared.

She gave your skirt one final adjustment and stepped back, "Now. Shoulders back and chin up, My Lady. They're waiting."

iwaizumi hajime. — stable boy.

Iwaizumi Hajime was diligent in the way he worked.

He never complained, never cut a grimace, never slacked off. His hands were calloused from years of pitchforks and reins, his shoulders broad from the weight of saddles and hay bales he hauled around, his back straight from years of standing up at the nobles walking past him with an air of arrogance and grandeur.

The dawn mist still clung to the ground and to the leaves gently hanging their heads when he arrived each morning, boots already damp from the dew, the hem of his tunic sticking to his legs. Most the horses were quiet in their stalls, familiar to his steady steps sounding out, his deep voice a calming murmur for the newer ones that were still a little nervous. The ones he already knew nickered softly, and his hands patted the space between their eyes in quiet greeting.

The stable smelt like always: leather, sweat, hay and earth. Hajime moved through it all like he was a part of it, like the wooden beams were an extension of his arms, the floorboards an appendix to his legs. He worked without direction for he didn't need it.

The feed was portioned by instinct, water checked without thought. He cleaned hooves as naturally as he breathed, listening for any quiet huffs of discomforts they might have or any sudden shifts of weight that told him there was something wrong.

"Careful with that one," came a voice behind him, gruff. Irihata, the senior groom, leaned on the stall's edge with an amused look on his face, "He kicked a boy straight into the trough last week."

Hajime grunted, "I'm not that boy."

"No, you're not. That boy cried," there was a light chuckle, "You'd probably apologise to the horse for getting in the way."

Hajime had no need for answering; instead, he patted the stallion's flank, speaking in a low voice to the horse. He was quiet with people most of the times, not because he didn't want to speak with them, but only because he had no use for the kinds of words that filled idle air. He spoke in action; in clean stalls, brushed coats, and clashing of swords—

No. That part of his life was done.

He had no need anymore for the buried memories of all that he had discarded, trapped under dirt and roots. He hadn't meant to fight. Truly, he hadn't. Not at first, at least. He had come to return a horse that had been borrowed for one of the midnight duels, hooves thundering and the clang of steel echoing from the abandoned tilt yard beyond the southern wall, where most royalty and nobility never tread.

He had meant to leave right after, but then one of the riders failed to show, drunk or maybe too bloodied from the last bout, someone laughing and calling for a replacement. He hadn't thought to participate; he was just a stable boy, after all.

But then he heard a sneering voice, thick with ale and the arrogance he hated so much: "Seen the princess lately? Gorgeous but—" hiccup, "— bet she's the kind of girl who cries if her tea's too hot. Bet she wouldn't— huh, wouldn't know steel from silver if it cut her."

Laughter had followed, ugly and cruel, the kind that wanted to hurt and Hajime hated that sound. He had stood there, hands balled into fists, staring at the drunken knights that were supposed to represent all the honour and dignity that he never saw within them, until the horse nickered next to him, softly, warm nose bumping his shoulder and he realised that he had been subconsciously pulling on its reins.

Something in him had snapped, because to him, you were like fire beneath velvet, thunder beneath every careful curtsy. He had seen it before — when you visited the stables, unafraid to stain your shoes or stroke the muzzle of the fiercest stallion. You spoke to him not like a servant but like someone who saw him, if only for a moment.

Because when you were lost as a child and he had found you trapped amidst the tree's roots, leg broken and bleeding and your stomach growling, you weren't crying.

So when they spat your name that time, he had tied the harness around the nearest pole and disappeared into the night, only for a stranger to appear an hour later. It was an old, dented helmet he had donned — plain, blackened steel with a narrow slit and no crest. Not one of those grand knight's ones with a brilliant feather. No, his' was a soldier's.

He had won the match that night.

"They're early," Irihata muttered, his eyes narrowing, and Hajime lifted his head slightly, eyes set over the wood to see the flag-bearer arrive on his own steed, in full ceremonial gear, a retinue of nobles following him. Iwaizumi Hajime disliked dealing with nobles: they had sharp eyes and an even sharper tongue; if they caught a missed strap or a speck of dirt on their polished saddles, they were known to exert punishment swift and fast.

One was lucky if it was only a verbal thrashing to anticipate, others had been flayed for something less, and stable boys didn't get second chances; not when they served under banners like that.

His stride was quiet but purposeful when he turned back to the tack room. There was work to do. There was always work to do, and the only reprieve he could hold in front of his eyes was that once he had served all the nobles, you would be escorted to the farmyard for your equestrian lessons.

Thinking of being able to see you, Hajime's hands got sweaty in a way they never did when he stood in front of opponents.

hanamaki takahiro. — court jester.

Hanamaki Takahiro leaned against one of the gilded columns that framed the throne halls. His bells were silent, though not by accident, and the smudge of wine on his cheek quite deliberate. His motley pooled around his boots, velvet and silk alike, and even though his head lolled like he was half-asleep — the meeting was boring— his eyes tracked everything.

The lords were circling.

Not literally, though he wouldn't put it past Lord Ippou to start sniffing for blood if it meant climbing any rank higher. The long table was busy, the lords of all the houses surrounding it like they were vultures, waiting for the lion to rest. Really, it was quite boring to listen to their talk, because it couldn't be any more glaringly obvious that whilst they were seemingly arguing about one matter — troop allocations and consolidating resources — there was an undercurrent of a topic they found far more interesting: whose band of soldiers got the shinier boots.

He popped a grape into his mouth and hummed just loud enough to irritate Lord Ippou, who had been loving hearing his own voice drone on and on about 'the strain on the treasury.'

"Surely," Hanamaki drawled, interrupting the foolhardy man; his foot coming up to rest on the table with a clank of his leathered pointy shoes, "If our good lord wishes to ease the weight on the king's purse, he could start by tightening his own belt."

The hall tensed for a heartbeat, but then the king chuckled, weak, his gravelly voice barely louder than a whisper as he rasped heaving breath after breath, and a murmur of low voices sounded out, the atmosphere mellowing out.

If it were up to Hanamaki, he would have liked the tension to stay simmering in the air. The jester knew he was not quite well-liked — in fact, he really did hope so, for in their dislike, he found his own shrewd version of enjoyment; in their uncomfortable, biting glances, he thought himself a fly that buzzed around their head.

Try as hard as they liked, a swat of their hand was hardly and obstacle for him.

Though, he had to concede, Hanamaki's tongue was sharp, and were it not to cut true so often, he was sure he would have been executed for his impudence already. But that was when his skin burned the most, when his pulse quickened, when he thought he was the most alive. He couldn't not try to kick those lords down a peg, and being quite literally tasked to do by the very crown was only side benefit.

Ippou's own chuckle was dry, like he didn't really think anyone would believe he found Hanamaki's comment as hilarious as he pretended to, "Still letting the jester speak during the council, Your Majesty? A charming tradition, I must say, though rare these days, to find room for…levity in such heavy matters."

Ippou thought he was slick, Hanamaki noted. The lord was lucky that the king barely had any mind left to put him in his spot, so he supposed, he would have to step up instead.

"Oh, to think I was moments away from writing you a stanza," he placed a hand to his chest with mock-offence, and his eyes found yours, a sly little wink stealing itself onto his face, "Alas, it's trickier to rhyme irrelevance with incompetence than it seems."

A biting retort, "Be sure not to confuse courage with permission, won't you?"

Hanamaki barely confused anything these days. Well, except maybe the names of the women he visited deep in the night, but even then they were far more memorable than Lord Ippou's generous abdominal…girth.

You were stifling a laugh into your sleeve, arm raised politely, covering the act behind a pretence of composed modesty, as though the conversation had taken a scandalous turn. By his standards, it sure hadn't yet, though he would love to see how far he can push it, how indelicate his comments could get before you sent a glare over to him to warn him to rein it in.

After all, there was only so much you could pretend to be indifferent over.

"Enough."

The word cut through the murmur, harsh, annoyed, old.

Your uncle, Lord Regent Washijo, had not raised his voice beyond necessary, but it had carried nonetheless, all iron and slow. His expression was like carved in stone, thick jaws furrowed, the lines of his face stern and disapproving, jaw clenched.

He didn't look at Hanamaki, for a jester was a jester. Instead, his gaze was fixed on the long table itself, as though the wood had personally offended him. He thought it might have been possible that it did.

Maybe it was too high for the Lord Regent to sit at comfortably.

"We have matters of the realm before us," Washijo grunted, "Bandits choke our borders, merchants keep demanding escorts, and the king's seal does nothing but gather dust. This council is not a stage for your witless antics."

A hush settled; the rattle in the king's breathing the only sound unabashedly travelling through the air. It wasn't shame that laid itself heavily onto the various nobles in the room, no, that would mean they had to give up their pride. It was rather a sense of cautiousness.

Hanamaki, unbothered and daring, stood up swiftly from his seat, bowing in a wide arc, "Apologies, My Lord, I do tend to lose track of time when the performance lacks an appreciative crowd."

A few lords shifted in their seats; one of them coughed into his hand, though whether out of discomfort or amusement, it was hard to say. Lady Hoyoshi pressed her lips together and picked up her goblet to drink from it, eyes dancing with delight at the jester's antics.

Hanamaki twirled and flopped down cross-legged on the floor beside your chair; the stairs were quite comfortable, he had to say. The sleeve of your dress brushed his shoulder when your hand found its rightful place back onto your lap, and your expression rearranged itself into something smoother, something more princess-like, even if your eyes still held the shine of laughter, barely-suppressed.

"Uncle," you said gently, nothing be dissected out of your tone of voice, "Your concern is noted. We shall return to the matter of the border garrisons."

True to your words, the next lord did begin to speak, a dull, almost bored voice talking about supply chains and tariffs for caravans. Hanamaki's eyes roamed the room, inspecting the engagement of the nobility in the room, the glint in their eyes, the veiled threats in their planning until—

There was the barest sound of a quiet shoe behind your chair, just a shuffle. Intended to be heard, Hanamaki was sure, because no noise escaped the spymaster if he didn't want it to exist in the world.

The jester tipped his head back without looking, "Lovely breeze today. Felt it down my back earlier."

Matsukawa Issei's voice was low, the deep register of his carrying only as far as he meant to, and they curled around Hanamaki's ear like a whisper of smoke, "Mhm. I hear some birds don't migrate anymore. Too comfortable."

"Strange birds," he mumbled back.

Then he did look back; a glance shared that lasted a second too long to be meaningless. Matsukawa Issei's cloak was a muted blue, his hands with their rings hidden behind his back, his curls falling onto his forehead in a precise manner. Even though you didn't turn to look at either of them, there was the slightest stiffening of your finger on your skirt before they quickly relaxed, your dress falling back into a wrinkle-less cover.

"I told you again and again to stop speaking in riddles around me."

Hanamaki blinked up at you, his little smile as sharply innocent as a cat with feathers on its tongue, "No riddles here, Your Royal Highness. Just discussing avian migratory patterns. Fascinating stuff, if you ask me."

From the table, Lord Yotsumata's voice rose, "We cannot commit more riders to the border while the south remains unpatrolled! Bandits grow bold with every moon because we are indecisive."

Boring.

you. — crown princess.

God, it had been stuffy inside there.

You hated these councils with a burning passion. Not only did it never feel like anybody walked out with any merit, it came close to a war zone inside there. With your father getting sick, it was only a matter of time before they threw themselves at each other, and even though your clothes stayed pristine, you could already feel the rips of the fabric trying to show through.

The carriage rocked gently over the rutted country road, its wheels softened only slightly by the damp spring earth. The window was curtained, the trees passing by idly, their branches decorated with beautiful greens. There was a light breeze indeed, as Hanamaki had mentioned, though it did nothing to move the curtains.

"If I hear Lord Ippou speak of the stability of the realm one more time, I may choke on my own tongue."

You turned your head from the window to Matsukawa in front of you, your discarded gloves folded neatly in your lap.

The man across you was everything shadows should envy — tall, composed, wrapped in layers of subdued colours, not a single strand of his dark hair out of place. He looked at ease, lounging on the plush velvet seats like a noble at court, though the spymaster was anything but lax. His eyes with the long lashes never rested in one place for too long. You knew that if you hadn't been in the carriage, he would have opted to not sit. He rarely ever did.

The silence was companionable for a moment and, of course, entirely false.

"The Master of Coin is pushing a bit hard," he said at last, his voice smooth as still water, "For all the stability he seeks, he is funding quite a lot of wine and weddings. Curious."

"And he still claims the treasury cannot afford more arms for the northern watch."

"He claims much," Matsukawa's fingers brushed the ring on his thumb idly, the blue hue of the stone twinkling mischievously, "He's good at that. But he forgets: coin leaves footprints, and I'm terribly fond of following those."

You gave a faint huff through the nose, part amusement, part doubt.

Your spymaster hadn't always been your spymaster, but he had always spoken that way: veiled and silken, clever enough to sound harmless, sharp enough to make you wonder where the edges were.

He had served your father first, loyal in the way smoke was loyal to fire, always rising with it, never straying far, but never quite within reach either. He had been quite polite to you in those years, even fond at times in the shrewd cold way that he talked, but it wasn't until the king grew weak and until the crown began to tilt toward your head that his whispers shifted from pleasantries to policy.

Even though you had come to rely on him, on his breezing through the kingdom like it was a puppet show and he was its puppeteer, you wondered if his loyalty was to the commonwealth or simply to whoever held the weight of it in their hands.

"I cry your mercy, Your Highness, but I fear this is where I must leave."

You were good at keeping your facial expressions neutral, years of lessons drilled into you coming to light subconsciously by keeping the furrowing of your brows in check. You were still on the road, the straw-thatched roofs not yet having appeared in the distance, the carriage still flanked by trees.

It was almost futile to wonder what Matsukawa was up to, but nonetheless, you waved your hand towards him, and his knuckles rapped against the carriage's wall. The wagon jolted as it rolled over a stone in the road and came to a stop, and he shifted smoothly, adjusting a crease in his sleeve as he rose to exit.

"Tell Hanamaki he'll need a new joke. Lord Ippou may not be the only one paying mercenaries."

Matsukawa inclined his head; shadow bowing to twilight.

"As you wish, Princess."

iwaizumi hajime. — stable boy.

You liked to ride in the mornings best, just after the mist had pulled back but before the sun started glaring down on you. Hajime had learned it early, knew it from when you were children, when you were teenagers and when you were a young woman before him. Always arriving with a quiet retinue, just two guards and sometimes a shadow in black, he thought it was probably the spymaster, but he never looked long enough to be sure.

He had a rule about that: eyes down, hands steady.

Hajime was good at following rules. he was; knew to interpret them well, knew to translate them well, too. Except his body disobeyed him so when he reminded himself that he was not to look at the crown princess, head lifting slightly to seek the curve of your cheek, the soft lines of your lips, the glint in your eyes. You were beautiful, and his eyes had to confirm over and over again that you weren't a figment of his imagination.

He stood close to your horse, his fingers holding the saddle steady as you heaved your body onto the horse, even though he had already checked the leather belts several times and knew that you didn't need him to watch out for you. He did, anyways, and just like each morning, he ended up kneeling next to you again.

Your stirrups were always too tight.

Not dangerously so, you could still ride, but tight enough that they bit at your boots, leaving slight imprints. Hajime suspected you didn't know, or maybe you didn't care, but he did. He always did, so every lesson, when you mounted your grey stallion with the moon-shaped blaze, he'd be there, on his knees next to the horse, his hand on the buckle, steadying the strap, letting his knuckles brush your boot if only for a second.

"Loosened them again," he muttered, his eyes only daring to look as far as your legs hugging the horse, "Unless you like walking funny the rest of the day."

Hajime added like a forgotten afterthought, "Your Highness."

Your toes moved, he knew that by the little squirm your shoes made and his heart dared to think for its own as it decided to stutter. He didn't know if you had smiled at his comment, and he almost checked, almost sought to know the way your mouth curled.

Instead, he stepped back, rising to his full height, his head in line with your hips. Your spine was straight on the horse's back like it had been carved in stone, but you weren't a statue.

Not to him.

You were the girl who used to sneak down to the tack room, and he'd find you after hearing the rummaging of an amateur. You had looked up at him with innocence in your eyes to ask which brush was the softest since your lady-in-waiting had compared your hair to a horse's mane.

He had looked into your nine-year-old face and laughed so hard, he had been punished by hauling heavy sacks of manure all the way to the farmers, even though they were miles away.

And today, almost two decades later, you brought him peaches.

Wrapped in a handkerchief, tucked in your sleeve like a secret, like a hidden show of affection that he didn't quite believe. You passed it to him when no one was looking, like always — eyes forward, face serene, the barest hint of mischief in your voice.

"The cooks swear they're going bad. I said I knew someone who could save them the trouble."

And just like always, he took them without a word. His hands were rough, stained with oil and pieces of hay clinging to his tanned skin, and he hated the way they looked next to your fingers, pristine and clean, but he held the fruit like it was something sacred, like it meant more than dessert.

In the stead of the fruit, like always, he left a little wooden carving in your hands, too, and your fingers closed around it to allow it to safely disappear in between the folds of your riding gear, and this time he did look up to you, and your eyes met his for a second.

"You'll make me soft, Your Highness."

"You're already soft," you said, mirth in your eyes, your heels digging into the horse's stomach, "You just pretend you're not."

The last half of your words got swallowed by the distance, yet his skin flushed all the same, ears heated and an almost sheepish grunt escaping him. He turned red, of course, he always did.

you. — crown princess.

You weren't a princess.

Not a title, not a symbol, not a soft voice in a room full of men who pretended not to hear.

You were motion, heavy wind and burning muscles. The moment your horse surged forward beneath you, hooves kicking up the earth in dust behind you, all the weight slipped. Because when you rode, nobody spoke, your own breathing and the huffing of the horse the only thing filling your ears like cotton.

Only the wind touched you, and it never asked anything of you at all.

iwaizumi hajime. — stable boy.

You rode for exactly forty-five minutes. Hajime knew because he timed you, because you asked for the numbers as soon as you came back. You always took your horse around the far ring twice before letting it graze, and you always paused a moment longer than necessary at the treeline like you were listening for something the woods hadn't told you yet.

You liked the horse balm that smelled like apples, hated the new leather gloves that were being issued.

Hajime almost felt embarrassed knowing your routine, but what stayed with him even after the sun had dried the sweat on his collar and the dust had settled on his boots was how you looked when you came back, a real smile on your face. The one he saw only here when you dismounted and passed your horse's reins to him. His hand brushed yours and he wasn't sure whether he meant to or not, but that minuscule moment inked itself on his skin against his will.

"Thank you, Hajime," you said today and his name sounded different on your tongue.

He swallowed and inclined his head, "Your Highness."

"You know that's not my name."

"Princess."

You gave a snort of a laugh, undignified in every way possible, perfect in every way impossible, and he wondered, heart full and aching, how long he could keep playing the fool. His muscles twitched and instead of a sword that belonged to none of his stature, it tightened around reins.

you. — crown princess.

"You can't do this, Uncle. I'm not a toy, I'm the crown princess."

"As long as I am Lord Regent, you will behave exactly how I command."

…

"You may get my obedience, Uncle, but not respect. Not from me."

He ignored your anger like he always did, "I expect you to wear your prettiest dress tonight, Niece."

oikawa tooru. — crown's watch.

The hall glittered with gold and firelight; lavish as jewel-toned silks swept the floor. Platters of various food were brought in — steamed venison, pears, sugared nuts, wine, lots of wine, dark and fragrant. It flowed as freely as the court lies; conversations sparking easily, civility cloaked in charm, ambition sharp underneath.

Oikawa Tooru stood two paces behind the crown princess and a few to the right, close enough to charm the people walking around with a brilliant smile that he perfected, but far enough to be overlooked. Well, almost.

There was hardly a day in which he hadn't been taken note of.

He caught Lady Akina's eye as she lingered near the dais, mourning her husband's most recent campaign losses, and it took him no more than thirty seconds, a wink and a charming boyish grin before her grief was forgotten, hand fluttering to her collarbone, chin tilted towards him. Her cheeks flushed like a virgin's, a mistake she didn't even notice she was making.

Oikawa didn't quite care for Lady Akina, make no mistake. He didn't need to. If it spurned her on to go back home to her husband to convince him to tilt his allegiance towards the Crown again, he would offer his words, his arm, maybe even his bed if she truly desired.

He was used to donning his beauty like a transaction, currency that he had in abundance; his compliments like a snake finding its prey, the tightening of his gloved hand on the warm hilt of his sword a continuous reminder that despite his sweetness, his duty was not for show.

Behind every flirtation, behind every smile, he kept his senses sharp, his blade sharper.

His eyes roamed the lively ballroom with all the quiet grace of a predator seizing up his prey.

The jester darted by, flicking a page's ear before sauntering away with a bow, his laughter trailing behind him like perfume. Several dukes and duchesses danced and twirled to the spirited strings, a dark wraith melting with the shadow behind the pillars to the side. He didn't bat an eye at the Spymaster, too familiar with his games.

Oikawa noted the laughter of a lady that was a bit too loud — he thought, there was no way a no-name duke's joke was that funny, but then her eyes darted to the corner where the newly appointed foreign ambassador stood. Ah. Of course. Seeking favour, so very obvious and desperate.

Across the room, Lord Ippou, the kingdom's Treasurer, stood with his loyal group of followers, posture so rigid that even two galleons of wine would not be able to loosen him up. Oikawa's lips curved up barely, dry.

He had to admit, there was something almost charming about how people thought they could hide things in plain sight. A lowly lord brushing a stray lock of hair from a lady's cheek too high in rank for him, his fingers too careful; the Lord Regent's adviser leaning a bit too close to a younger lady not yet twenty, her laugh tight as though she didn't want to have this conversation, unwelcome shuffling marring her frilly dress.

The rotation of the guards along the balcony. Subtle, but he saw it all.

His eyes wandered back to you, an almost poised look on your face, but the grimness shone through. You were not delighted, no matter how often the jester dragged any lords and ladies through the dirt, no matter how beautiful the music or how often he offered you his flirting as a reprieve. You would not smile. Oikawa's eyes narrowed; he knew this look. He knew it well for he wore the same look when he stood awaiting an enemy.

You were bracing for something.

Something that hadn't been shared with him as the Knight Commander. His jaw tightened imperceptibly — he served the Crown, it was his responsibility to know, to shield you, to keep you safe. If there was a shift coming, he wanted to see it before it struck, he wanted to anticipate.

His hand tightened around the hilt of his sword, his cloak heavy. Eyes straying from you to all the possible threats in the court, he noted every subtle movement, every hand raised in the direction of the royalty he had promised to protect, every word whispered just a bit too loudly.

The court would never stop playing games, and neither would he.

And then—

Clink. Clink. Clink.

The room quieted down within an instant and the Lord Regent rose from his seat on the throne; the King having been too sick to attend.

"In these uncertain times, when the strength of a kingdom lies not only in steel, but in the unity of its people, the Crown must look ahead."

Oikawa's expression didn't change.

The Lord Regent's voice spoke with a steadfastness that reverberated through the hall. Your face had became its mask of neutrality again, but he knew from the grimace before that you weren't looking forward to this announcement, that this was what you had braced yourself for, what you had bristled at.

"Her Royal Highness, the Crown Princess, stands as the future of this realm. In the spirit of alliance, and by the will of the King, it is hereby declared:

"The victor of this year's Grand Tournament shall be granted the right to petition for the hand of the Crown Princess."

A beat of silence, a quiet hum of tension.

"Let every knight who bears arms in service to this kingdom understand: this honour is not won by sword alone, but by valour, by strength of character, by duty and devotion to the kingdom.

"Let the worthy prove themselves. Let the unworthy fall."

Oikawa's mouth curled into a slow smile.

𓐩 ADDENDUM; — the crown princess' horse is called juno, and you have had him ever since you were a child. — matsukawa wears a kyanite gem stone on his thumb, and he cannot stop fiddling with it. — iwaizumi carved your favourite flower this time. — if makki had been an original character, i would have named him casper.

𓐩 TAGLIST; @sodaneko ; @ottocre ; @mellozhi ; @cr4yolaas ; @inszan1ty ; @sahrberrii ; @pomigranit ; @ghostjoohoney ; @biancaackerman ;

[vinbitism]

ehtan i need to know ur thoughts about the fairmount mt4 right now..... im mainly thinkin abt fairmount evan/habit but im curious if u have anythoughts about them

Okay so... my thoughts... if you want specific hcs for specific scenarios plz tell me bc this is just a big rant I'm sorry 😭😭😭

alot of people seem to have the idea that fairmount Evan/habit don't like Vinnie/ would bully him or be mean to him and I need to say that's literally so far from being close to canon. The only person that it's even slightly hinted at him being unkind to is steph (IF you wanna take maryanns word for it for awhile I thought this was James but rereading it again I was like ohh it's his wife. I genuinely don't think ev/habit was this malicious)

also if you're curious on why Fairmount Ev/habit are put together it's bc habit is something that Evans mom called him and was considered a "nick name"

As seen here aswell Vinnie takes Evan to go play which immediately gets him pinned as some sort of "deflector" like he doesn't care about Steph but in reality we know that Vinnie DOES care, this is just his form of coping.

Ev/Habit are best friends with Vinnie and even in his worst moments he only has good things to say about habit which just shows how close they are and how much Vinnie loves him. Vinnie is the only one in the letters besides Evans mother to call him habit. corenthal refuses to do it but Vinnie always refers to Evan as habit.

Habit and Vinnie are almost always playing together. they adore each other. I don't think you could separate them from each other honestly. I think Evan/habit would probably do something violent or snap and get a aggressive but never towards Vinnie it'd be towards the other kids and Vinnie would have to be the one to calm him down seeing that Vinnie is always the one trying to help people feel better.

I do think he could maybe accidentally do something mean to Vinnie but if Vinnie were to cry he'd panic and try and do anything he can to make him feel better.

I think Fairmount Evan/habit still have their massive sweet tooth and is basically a giant fiend for any type of candy. He just LOVES sugar. Give it to him NOW. don't even TRY to eat any candy near him he's gonna ask for some and you WILL have to give it to him or he WILL stab you.

Evan was given a camera in the letters and he goes around taking a bunch of pictures of everything and I think he probably sleeps with that camera near him at ALL TIMES and if one of the others were to break it or take it he would have a total meltdown.

He is just a big lovable goofball of a kid, he definitely is super affectionate and wants hugs all the time. Even though he is portrayed to be "cruel" to Steph, they're still best friends. Evan loves all of them so fucking much. That's his family and it'll always be his family since he was practically stolen from his other one. He probably misses his mom so much, he just wants to be with his mom and hug his mom and tell her he loves her and that he's never gonna do anything wrong again and he promises to be good, just please don't send him back to the home. But he's stuck with the corenthals who almost view him as this wicked boy. Yes they love him, but they're so quick to judge him.

Now onto Fairmont Vinnie I feel like I kinda need to give a bit of a tw? for talk of CSA? I promise to do it tastefully tho since I myself am a victim of it.

Alot of people almost view Vinnie as so prescious and innocent but they don't seem to understand he has his innocence stolen from him, he's simply just still a child. He was able to ignore his emotions and push them aside in order to be there for everyone else in his life. What happened to Vinnie was not a one time thing. It lasted over a year. Vinnie's parents kept dropping him off there and left him alone with the reverend and didn't care about it at all until the reverend was found DEAD. and instead of trying to take care of Vinnie themselves they sent him to a home where they had no doctors who specialized in his specific trauma. He must've felt so isolated and his only solace was the few friends, especially Evan/Habit and man. Always Man. Man is a protector to him, man doesn't want to share him and Vinnie KNEW this. Man TOLD him this. Vinnie was not "saved" by him however. What Slenderman did was not an act of kindness it was an act of jealousy.

Vinnie is said that he draws to get out his emotions and I feel like he definitely has drawn pictures of him and Captain habit and also slenderman together, his only true friends.

Vinnie is unfortunately a unsettling little boy, he doesn't interact as normally as he should and he just can't help it. It's probably alot easier for him to try and isolate himself than it is to ask for help or support. But he always perks up when he gets to talk about playing pirates, even after the trauma his love for it never went away. I like to think he got to keep his toy ship. I think alot of people would think he wouldn't wanna keep something from such a traumatic day but I think otherwise. The reverend was eviscerated, it must've been such a relief for him. It's said that he was calm and happy when he was found and I can only imagine that he was probably told to go into the next room and play or maybe habit was able to come over and he played with Vinnie for a bit until right before Vinnie's parents show up. That toy probably brings Vinnie so much comfort and a sense of safety.

I think both him and Steph are mute, but Vinnie is a selective mute. He talks when he wants to but if he doesn't feel like it. Steph however is completely mute. she doesn't talk at all maybe unless she really has to.

She would probably only ever talk to the other 3 of the group. This group functions together completely. They are almost like a hive mind sometimes. They're so deeply connected and so intertwined.

They act out together, and it drains them so much they can't help but just need to be alone. These are just babies who are suffering so much and they're unfortunately in a home that doesn't really know how to help them, and of course James wants to help but he can't help but judge them too.

When all the kids get killed, Vinnie is the only body not found. He was not there, he was taken away. It was probably so painful for him because he loved them so much, but he knows deep down his loyalties lie with habit and Slenderman..

these are my babies... I love them so much and they deserved to be taken care of and given the help they deserved and not just to be like a couple of lab rats to make a perfect family just bc James corenthal couldn't have his own children with his wife.... it's so UGH. I love James but man is he way too harsh on these kids. I think maybe if he were to love evan/habit more... if he was able to accept habit despite the violence he's committed... things could've been different... maybe if habit got shown love sooner.... idk.... maybe he wouldn't be as irredeemable as he is now. Habit just unfortunately has the biggest case of mommy and adoptive daddy issues he can't help that he's so evil 😔😔💔💔💔💔💔

The fact James only ever acknowledged Evan instead of Habit is probably another reason that habit hates James so much...

oh and I almost forgot... Jeff is definitely just as mopey and sad as he was on the series but when he's playing with the group he's got more energy than Evan. And by GOD!!! IS THIS BOY A SWEETHEART 😭😭😭😭 he is so fucking traumatized but he tries his best to be so sweet. He's honestly probably stuck feeling younger than he is because of what happened to him and it was the only way he could really cope. and he definitely adored his little army soldier... like Evan loves his camera.. like Vinnie loves his ship... and i think like Steph would love her art. She's always gonna be an artist and I love that for her. She expresses herself so beautifully.

ANYWAYS uh post over I'm so sorry this probably makes 0 sense.

have some songs for them tho

Evan:

Vinnie:

Steph:

Jeff:

okay bye

[innorality]

;; Break of Dawn — chap. 1

Natsu Dragneel x Oc/Reader Pov

an : this story is abt an oc but!!! it's written in an x reader pov so take that as u will 💔

wc : 2k words (😮‍💨)

Azura, the most notorious and powerful criminal in history, had finally been captured and sentenced to death. His family had a long legacy of crime, and many believed he would be the last of his bloodline—after all, who would ever see him as worthy enough to bear his child?

But the world was wrong.

Somewhere in the shadows of history, Azura had a daughter, Adora, born to a woman whose very existence had been erased. Though he never wanted her entangled in the chaos he had wrought, he still wished for her to be strong. And so, before surrendering himself, Azura gifted his daughter the entirety of his power.

Alone and afraid, Adora wandered the vast kingdom of Fiore, a child with no home, no purpose—until fate led her to a building.

A guild.

A new family.

— August, X777.

That was the last date you had seen, scribbled on a tattered calendar in a run-down bar. The ink was smudged, the paper yellowed with age, but the numbers had seared themselves into your mind. You felt lost. Exhausted. Angry—at the world for taking everything from you, at your father for leaving you behind, at yourself for reasons you couldn't even begin to understand, possibly a survivor's guilt of some sort. Your body ached, every step sending a fresh jolt of pain through your bare feet, the rough, unkind ground tearing into your skin. Hunger gnawed at you, a sharp, relentless ache that had become a constant companion, whispering cruel reminders of how little you had left.

It had been two months since your father, the infamous Azura, was executed before your very eyes. Two months since his agonized screams had echoed through the air, met not with sorrow, but with cheers, with laughter, with celebration. The people had rejoiced in his death, exulting in the pain that had twisted his face in his final moments. Women you had never met before clung to you as if they knew you, whispering empty words of comfort, while men—strangers, faceless and unfamiliar—cried tears of joy. Their relief was palpable, their hatred unyielding, their joy at his suffering absolute.

And you?

You hadn’t reacted.

Not because you didn't care, but because you didn’t know how.

It wasn’t your fault. None of it was.

And yet, the weight of it all clung to you, suffocating, pressing down like an invisible force that never relented. The memories replayed in your mind, an endless cycle of pain and confusion, offering no peace, no escape. You had stopped thinking about where you were going long ago; your feet simply carried you forward, step after step, down an empty, endless path. The world around you blurred together—twisted trees, distant voices, the faint hum of life in the kingdom of Fiore. But none of it mattered. You had nothing. You were no one.

You were so lost in thought that you hadn't noticed the building growing taller and taller before you as you approached it.

Then—cold.

A sudden, unexpected touch on your shoulder.

The world snapped into focus in an instant. The road, the aching in your limbs, the quiet desolation of your thoughts—all of it shattered by that single touch. Your breath hitched. Your muscles tensed.

For the first time in what felt like forever, you stopped walking.

And slowly, hesitantly, you turned around.

An old, small man—barely as tall as you—stood before you, his presence halting you in your tracks. He looked fragile, his hunched frame wrapped in a long, worn-out cloak, his face weathered with age. But his eyes, a warm and knowing shade, held a gentleness that felt almost foreign to you.

“What are you doing here, little one?”

His voice carried a softness that contrasted the weight of his words, making them feel less like a demand and more like an invitation.

You hesitated. You hadn't spoken to anyone in days—perhaps weeks. Your throat felt dry, and the words that formed in your mind felt too heavy to say. Still, you forced them out.

“I… I don’t know," you admitted, your voice weaker than you intended. "I would like a bit of food… if that’s alright.”

It was such a simple request, and yet, a strange guilt settled in your chest as soon as you said it. You had grown used to fending for yourself, to being met with suspicion or disdain rather than kindness. Asking for help felt unnatural.

But the old man didn’t scoff or turn you away. Instead, he smiled, a warm and knowing expression that softened the lines of his face. With a gentle push on your back, he urged you forward.

“Of course, my child,” he said, his tone carrying the weight of something deeper than mere kindness. “Come with me.”

And for the first time in months, you let someone lead the way.

He led you toward the building you had somehow failed to notice before. Now, standing before it, you couldn’t ignore its presence—it was grand yet inviting, its worn wooden walls radiating warmth. At its peak, a strange emblem stood proudly: a joyous fairy with majestic wings, almost dancing in the wind. Something about it felt… different. Alive.

With a push, the old man swung the door open, and suddenly—life.

Laughter filled the air, mingling with the clinking of glasses and the rhythmic stomp of dancing feet. Shouts of friendly banter and drunken singing reverberated off the walls. You hadn’t seen anything like it in years—perhaps ever. The sheer energy of the place crashed into you like a wave, knocking the breath from your lungs.

Before you could even process it, the old man beside you cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed, “Everyone! I’ve got a new girl here!”

In an instant, the entire room went silent. Every head turned toward you.

You froze.

A lump formed in your throat as dozens of eyes bore into you. For a fleeting moment, you considered bolting—until the silence shattered into chaos.

The room exploded with excitement.

People rushed toward you from all directions, their voices overlapping into an overwhelming cacophony. Questions flew at you faster than you could register: Who are you? Where are you from? How old are you? What’s your magic? Do you like meat? Hands clapped against your shoulders, ruffled your hair, pulled you into half-hugs before you could react. The overwhelming presence of so many people—so much warmth—sent your heart racing.

But in the midst of it all, you noticed one thing.

They all seemed to care.

A deep, commanding voice suddenly cut through the noise.

“Quiet, everybody!” The old man shouted.

The crowd immediately fell back as a tall, tanned man with white hair stepped forward. “She’s obviously tired and hungry—i'll get her some food!” Without hesitation, he turned and rushed toward what you assumed was the kitchen.

Before you could fully register what was happening, the old man guided you to a seat, his small stature belying the strength in his grip. He settled in across from you, his kind eyes studying your face.

“My name is Makarov,” he said, his tone gentle yet firm. “And you are?” you hesitated. You couldn't tell them your last name, as they would immediately recognize its origin.

And so, you opted to say only your name.

“I… I think my name is Adora,” you murmured, the words feeling strange on your tongue. “And I must be… eleven years old—”

“Just like me!”

A loud voice suddenly cut in, startling you. A boy with wild pink hair had plopped himself down right beside you, grinning like you were already old friends. His energy was contagious, his enthusiasm almost suffocating.

“Natsu, give her space,” the tanned, white-haired man scolded, gently shoving the boy away as he placed a steaming plate of food in front of you. The smell alone made your stomach tighten painfully.

You hesitated, glancing at Makarov for reassurance. He simply nodded, his eyes filled with quiet encouragement.

And so, you ate.

The first bite sent warmth flooding through your body. Then the second, then the third. You ate and ate, shoveling food into your mouth with a hunger you hadn’t even realized had taken root in you. Each bite melted on your tongue, rich with flavors you had long forgotten. Your hands trembled as you reached for more.

And before you even realized it—tears were streaming down your face.

Makarov’s voice was gentle but filled with concern. “My child, why are you crying?”

Beside you, Natsu laughed. “Is the food that bad?”

You shook your head quickly, swiping at your tears with the back of your hand. Despite everything, a small, almost foreign smile tugged at the corners of your lips. “No… that’s not it.” Your voice was barely above a whisper. “This is the best meal I’ve had in months…”

Makarov’s expression softened, his warm gaze holding yours. And then, with a quiet chuckle, he said,

“Well then, keep eating.”

And for the first time in what felt like forever, you did.

— 6th of June, X784.

That was the date you had carefully marked on the calendar hanging on the wall of your room. You weren’t sure why, but it felt special—like today would bring something new. Stretching your arms above your head, you stepped toward the window and pushed it open, letting the crisp morning breeze kiss your face. The air smelled of fresh earth and the faint scent of the bakery down the street.

"Another lovely day!" you thought to yourself, inhaling deeply.

Before you could fully enjoy the moment, a blur of blue suddenly appeared in front of your face.

"Rise and shine, Adora!"

A familiar voice chirped, and you found yourself nose-to-nose with a grinning, winged blue cat. You couldn’t help but smile warmly, reaching out to gently pat his head.

“Good morning, Happy!” you greeted, your voice still laced with sleep. But then, your eyes landed on something in his paws. “Oh? What’s that?”

Happy, ever-excitable, held up a slightly crumpled piece of paper—a photograph. You took it from him, studying the image closely. A blonde woman smiled back at you, confident and radiant, proudly showing off her Fairy Tail emblem on the back of her hand.

“Who is this?” you asked, tilting your head curiously.

“A new girl that me and Natsu found!” Happy beamed, flapping his wings excitedly. “She just joined the guild! Get ready and come meet her!”

Excitement sparked in your chest. A new member? You could hardly wait!

Without another word, you bolted from the window, rushing to get dressed. Today was going to be interesting.

You had barely managed to slip your shoes on before rushing outside, excitement buzzing through your veins as you sprinted toward the guild. The streets of Magnolia blurred past you, familiar faces offering quick waves as you dashed by, too eager to slow down.

As you reached the guild's entrance, your eyes immediately landed on the familiar sight of wild pink hair. Natsu stood with his back to you, clearly engaged in a conversation with someone—completely unaware of your arrival. A mischievous grin crept onto your face as you snuck up behind him and gave him a playful knock on the head.

"Ow!" he yelped, whipping around. But the moment his eyes landed on you, his expression lit up with joy. His wide, toothy grin sent warmth straight to your chest, as it always did.

"Adora! Finally, you're here!" he cheered, bouncing on his heels with excitement. "Meet Lucy! Our new teammate!"

He stepped aside, revealing the girl from the picture Happy had shown you earlier.

Lucy stood before you, just as radiant in person as she was in the photo. Her golden blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders, and her warm brown eyes held a mix of curiosity and friendliness. The Fairy Tail emblem was proudly displayed on the back of her hand, as if it had always belonged there.

For a moment, you simply took her in—this newcomer, this stranger who was now a part of your family.

And then, with a bright smile, you extended your hand.

"Welcome to Fairy Tail, Lucy!"

do not plagiarize, repost or translate without my permission. this story has only been posted on Archive of Our Own, Tumblr and Wattpad by me.

[podcastenthusiast]

Reflections on family (Or: I gave Astarion even more father issues which says nothing about me personally nope)

--

They are not unkind, the Ancunins, your still-living family. Stilted, formal, like you're strangers--which you suppose you are at this point, yes. But they invite you into their home knowing full well that you could not enter if they so wished it. A show of trust for which you are grateful.

If this were a bard's tale, they would lead you to a musty room unchanged for two centuries, a lovingly kept shrine to a past you barely recall, the promising young man you once were. You would unearth artifacts of yourself. They would embrace you as you are now, public reputation be dammed, because you were missed and you are valued.

But this is not that story, so instead you are taken to the parlor--with its faded carpet that reminds you unpleasantly of your former home--where you pretend to sip tea across from your aged father and younger brother. Conversation is awkward and strained. You can charm people almost effortlessly, but being here is like talking to a chasm; the silence fills an unbridgeable gap in time.

You're told your mother died fifty years ago of a weak heart. You saw her portrait in the foyer. Apparently you used to have her eyes. You get the sinking sense that they're relieved she did not live to see your monstrous return from the dead.

Your brother is the one to finally ask. How it happened. Where you were all those years you didn't come home.

You tell them about Cazador.

"This calls for something stronger than tea, I think," your father says.

"Please," you agree.

They struggle to look at you. Their expressions remain a careful mask of polite neutrality except for occasional flickers of sadness, fear, guilt, anger. Disgust.

Well, if they want to play it like that, fine. You can wear a mask better than anyone.

Your family are not warm. They are not outright cold toward you, either. Never cruel or pitying. You almost wish they were. The familiarity would at least make it sting less.

Two hundred years lost. How can there be so little to say to each other?

You don't blame them, of course. To lose a son or brother violently, to grieve him, must be an unspeakable tragedy. To gain a vampire spawn, well... that is nothing other than an ill omen to add to the family's already waning fortune.

It is exactly what you'd come to expect of the dark place Cazador showed you the world could be. All you thought possible before you saw the sun again and dared to hope for more.

You leave the manor feeling quite like an unwanted ghost exorcised from their lives. It's closure of a sort for them, you suppose. You are just an untended grave in their eyes. Never mind that you had been hoping for a new beginning.

You regret making this journey alone.

Soon, though, you return to the arms of your dearest love.

"How did it go?" she asks.

"It was..."

You think about your darling who saved you. You think about your handful of tadpole-forged friendships--Karlach, and Wyll, Lae'zel, even Gale. You think about your siblings, the other spawn, bonded through shared blood none of you chose.

"Astarion?"

"It doesn't matter," you say dismissively. "I didn't find my family there."

"Hmm."

She's writing something, a while later.

"Composing another ballad?" you wonder.

"No. I'm writing a letter to Dalyria."

"What? Why?"

You had no idea they even correspond.

"Because I think you need a hug from your sister."

Perhaps she isn't wrong, but still, it seems like a lot of effort to go through just for that. For you.

"She's very busy," you protest.

"Then she'll make time. That's what family does."

You don't know what to say. Something in your chest uncoils; you're filled with warmth like fresh blood, an emotion akin to gratitude. Something you haven't felt so strongly in a very long time.

You feel wanted. Loved.

[ochrearia]

I love that my synesthesia is something I get to apply to people and characters because of how I think make no mistake the type that I have is simply a hearing-sight blend that I can't control in my brain so I see shapes and colors from things I hear and mine works with music mainly though laughter and the wind also triggers it. It's just a quirk of my own way of thinking that lets me apply this to people and characters that I love. Music's already a big part of me and somewhere along the line I decided "You know what? Sound is like a second language to me already, instrumentals and music speaking in a way that vocal word can't, and who's to say I can't take in everything I've learned about a person, what makes them tick, what makes them who they are, their actions, thoughts, feelings, take all of those and create the concept of a soul by perceiving it all wrapped into one as a song that I have in my online libraries?" And that's what I do. Now let me go the fuck off about Pico Newgrounds because make no mistake I'm not an expert on this idiot but from what I personally see of him and what he can become with a nudge in the right or wrong direction is so. Wonderful to me

Now I have mentioned this before and I have even painted this and driven the point in that it's him but this is the song that Pico sounds like to me

And I think it's important for me to go into detail about something right off the bat. I am a firm believer in the idea that your trauma does NOT equal who you are. And by that I mean it can be a piece, or pieces, that help shape you and push you in directions that change yourself but it, to me, will never be You. There is ALWAYS more to a person than the shit they've gone through, more to a person than the shit they struggle with and have to live with as a result of a terrible event. Sorry to drop some wild Ochre lore here but My anxiety disorder, my past abusive relationship and subsequent SA encounter, those things aren't ME. They are parts, yes, and they are things that pushed me in the direction of what I am now but. That's not all I am, and I highly doubt anyone I've told about those things views me as just that. Pico is not just his trauma. They are pieces of him but they are not him. He's not the shooting, not the russian roulette, he's not any of it. Those are just things he lived through.

On the outside, he can be really explained by one word. Guarded. Because he is, guarding himself from the horrors of the world by being standoffish, and cruel at times, a damaged man with a gun not above killing people for his own benefit but that's just what he's learned to do to survive. The world's been nothing but unkind to him and he mirrors that outwardly, why should the world get to witness his vulnerability, his true self when all it's done is burn him? No, of course not. He can be a "bad" person but he isn't a bad person, not truly.

So who is Pico, then? At the end of everything he's been through, kind. Smart, and creative, knows a thing or two about survival and skilled with his guns and that's impressive. Cocky and still kind of an asshole, but at the same time loyal and willing to go over the edge and maybe too far for other people that aren't himself. I don't give a goddamn if PA or whoever the fuck says that Pico hates BF and GF, he was supposed to kill Boyfriend in FNF, TWICE, and he doesn't. I'd like to think that people don't just so casually disobey Daddy Dearest and all of his money. Pico does anyways. Loyalty. Even though it puts targets on his back from his own friends for a little bit. He does the right thing from a sense of kindness and morality that outwardly he'd have you believing he doesn't have. But it's there and I'm very much aware of it.

Yes, there will be days that he temporarily can become the "him" he shows outwardly as a defense mechanism. Bad days where he struggles mentally, days where everything seems hopeless and not worth it so why even bother being a real person? But that's still not fully *him* and he couldn't get rid of the aspects of his true personality even if he tried. Even if his head convinced him that he was a good for nothing murderer and lost cause of a man. He's not. Sometimes he believes it, and that's worrying, but he really just isn't. Though I suppose if you wanted to nudge his character in that direction, you still could. There is a clear darker path that he can be pushed to and that's something very audible in the song that I chose to encapsulate him if you listen close enough. But for the sake of where I like to see him, I don't fully go down that path because I believe in giving him a happier ending.

He is space blue, and a deep gray bordering on full black. He is jade green and an off-white/silver, hazy but strong and encircling back on himself like a spiral galaxy. Soft colors that move slowly, contrasting the idea that he can never slow down or stop because then he'd unravel and fall back to that vulnerable part of him he tries so hard to hide. He really is like a slow moving snowstorm, gentle moving flurries that envelop and capture instead. Crisp lines that move like arms curling out and back around to cover himself and all his vulnerabilities, though I can see past them anyway. A large, rounded central core to him. Rounded, not sharp, not spiky, because all he wants to do is be safe and maybe, if he doesn't have to hurt anyone, he may choose not to. It's an air of a scared and wounded animal. Make no mistake, Pico can take care of himself, but beyond the severe distrust of other people maybe there's a part of him that doesn't want to be so locked up within himself. And it's for those special few that his shell sometimes crumbles to where they can see his true colors, perhaps even drown in them.

Despite the space blue and deep gray being darker, like a cloud hanging around him, they contrast with the jade green and silver that pushes a sense of light in the midst of it all. Pico's layers are clear to me, at least from what I can see. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm not. Maybe I'm just saying what I want to see, but I'd like to think I've got a knack for nailing people and even characters by now. And no matter what song they may be, what vision I may see, they are all so very beautiful and important. Doesn't matter if it's a real person or not. I think it gives a sense of life to characters that I really adore. They're real on some other sense of reality, in those worlds shown on my eyes by my synesthesia that aren't truly there but are real to me. Kind of a little like hallucinations which might sound scary but I like these ones compared to the encounters I've had with. Other ones that aren't so nice lmao. Maybe they aren't really there but they're "fake" things that I absolutely don't mind having around

Pico is kind of someone I see a shocking amount of myself in. We have different traumas but it's sort of lead to some of the same outcomes regardless. And I don't want to consider him a lost cause personally. I don't like making him suffer for no reason so when I do write him suffering it's either me projecting my own experiences through him or tackling a bit of his mental health issues that he just seems to have. But besides that I like to write him with an air of hope and healing because I don't care what he struggles with he deserves a damn happy ending.

[scribeforchrist-blog]

Tested By Fire

MEMORY VERSE OF THE WEEK

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+ Proverbs 3:6 In all your ways, submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

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VERSE OF THE DAY

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+ James 1:12 Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him.

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** SAY THIS BEFORE YOU READ; HERE’S SOME CHRISTIAN TRUTHS **

I AM ENDURING WITH GOD

I AM A  SOLIDER

I AM BRAVE

I AM CONSTANTLY PRAYING

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READ TIME: 7 Minutes & 21 Seconds

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THOUGHTS:

======================

  Life has ups and downs, sometimes it’s hard to deal with. You’ll have people who are cruel to you and make you even more aggravated; sometimes, it adds to the pressure, so how much pressure can one person take? How much disappointment can one person take? God puts us through these difficult moments to build us up. It might sound backward or wrong, but this is also how diamonds are created from pressure, and this is how we are created and designed; when we allow situations to create pressure in us, it allows us to become different people; it allows those situations to make us better.

  1 Corinthians 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation, he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it

  A lot of things happen when we are under pressure; we can either fold under pressure or allow ourselves to tell the enemy no; telling him no is so easy; telling him no and following through are two different things it’s easy to say no, and it’s easy to ignore but when the pressure is on. We are faced with a situation that’s when we must pray; we have to pray not to allow the enemy to tempt us with what our flesh wants; maybe it’s to fuss and fight, maybe it’s to say an unkind word, maybe it’s doing something we know we shouldn’t, whatever it is ,ask God to help you and give you strength.

  James 1:12 Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him.

  It says blessed is the man that remains steadfast under trial; what’s steadfast? It means immovable, unwavering, faithful, blessed is the man that remains unmovable, unwavering under pressure, because when we do, we will receive the crown of life promised to them that love him. If we love him, we will obey him.

  Do you obey the Lord during the trials of life? Do you obey God when it’s tough to do? I know it’s hard to ignore an argument. I know it’s hard to ignore the temptation; I do because when our flesh wants something, it wants it, and it’s hard to tell our flesh no; it’s hard to tell our flesh to stop, but what we must do is subject our flesh to the mighty hand of God we must fast and pray to ask God to give us the strength to push through.

  Psalm 118:5-6 Out of my distress, I called on the Lord; the Lord answered me and set me free. The Lord is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me

   This is what we must do when we are under fire ,under pressure; we must call the Lord so that he can be on our side; he’s already there, but the Lord wants to be there with us through it all, so we must cry sometimes to him, we must shout sometimes the word says close the door behind you. When we close the door, we can stretch on the floor and say, Father, the temptation today is tough, Father. The pressure I feel is too much! Sometimes life can be so tough; he’s the only one we can confess things to because we can say it and not be judged by the Lord; we might be judged by everyone else but not him!

  1 Peter 1:7 These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So, when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise, glory, and honor on the day Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world.

  Trails show who we are under pressure, and when this happens, we are like gold that is tested with fire; when our faith stays strong through many circumstances, we can have praise and glory and honor when the day Christ is here. Many of us can’t go through one day and endure what God puts on us, but when we call ourselves children of God, we must endure because Jesus endured while he was here. He endured people calling him out his name, he had to endure his own family not supporting him, he had to endure people trying to kill him , he endured so much, but can we endure the small things of life? To ensure, we must do what Christ did: get away to pray. He knew prayer would strengthen him through the painful season; when he communicated with God, God would give us what he needed, which is more strength.

  ***Today, we talked about how temptation can be hard to endure and how prayer can give us strength when we need it. Sometimes, we might think we can make it through our trials ourselves but we can’t. God wants to endure everything with us, but we must want him there. I can tell you trials come and go, but doing it with God is much better. Many of us forget about how good God is, and we try to do everything in our strength but we can’t forget about God.

 James 5:16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working

  It says the prayers of the righteous are powerful. Some of us don’t understand that when we submit ourselves to God when we pray. It’s so powerful because when we submit ourselves to God, we are not only submitting but also surrendering our time and body to God. God doesn't want us to use prayer sometimes, but always, he wants us to do this; it’s not hard to surrender, but it’s hard to let go of the situation, but God wants you to know we don’t have to worry about the situation just let go and trust in him, do you trust him? If you do, let him handle your tough requests and situations.

©Seer~ Prophetess Lee

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PRAYER

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Heavenly Father, we thank you for today, thank you for life, health, and strength. Lord, we ask you to give us what we need, which is strength. Lord, we honor you and pray that you help us through our temptation. Father, we can’t do this on our own. We have tried and failed, but we know that when we give it to you, you’ll help us through it all. Lord, forgive us of our sins in help us to apply this devotion to our lives in Jesus’s Name. Amen

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REFERENCES

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+ Proverbs 24:10 If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small.

 

+ Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope

 

+ Romans 8:28 And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose

======================

FURTHER READINGS

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 Proverbs 19

Nehemiah 9

Psalm 56

Psalm 108

Exodus 38

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[episodicnostalgia]

Star Trek: The Next Generation, 123 (May 2, 1988) - “We'll Always Have Paris”

Written by: Deborah Dean Davis & Hanna Louise Shearer Directed by: Robert Becker

The Breakdown

The Enterprise crew are prepping for shore leave (gotta boost crew morale after Tasha’s death, y’know), when a bunch of time-travel-ish space-whimsy plagues the ship by causing people to slightly rewind-and-replay a few seconds of their current conversations/tasks.  It’s a fairly minor inconvenience as far as Galaxy class shenanigans go, but it’s enough for Picard to postpone shore leave for at least 45 minutes (plus commercials). And wouldn’t you just know it, shortly thereafter a distress signal comes in from one Paul Manheim, a renowned scientist whose whole deal involves professionally mucking around with time, so naturally Picard puts two-and-two together.  However, the mere mention of Manheim (a man Picard admits to knowing only by reputation) causes the otherwise stoic Captain to become so tense that even Data starts taking notice.

So what gives?

It just so happens that Paul Manheim is married to a woman (Janice) who used to be Picard’s flame back in the day.  Essentially, Jean Luc ghosted her on the same day they'd agreed to meet to say goodbye, before he shipped off to pursue his Starfleet career. You see, he was “afraid he would lose his resolve to leave," since he loved her so much. So, he did a really unkind (one might even say, casually cruel) thing and left without saying anything to, y'know spare HIMSELF the pain. Anyways, breezing-right-past-unpacking-any-of-that, they would tragically never speak again until this episode. But it all works out very amicably, which is nice I guess, and they finally say a farewell the way the way he ought to have the first fucking time. so it all works out*.

*[If I'm being honest though, Janice is a way better sport about the whole thing than I would have been.  Like, she pretty much just lets him off the hook; to my knowledge that’s the last we'll ever hear of it.]

While Picard’s drama plays out on the side, the rest of the episode deals with the weird time-loop phenomenon that Manheim caused via (surprise surprise) a radical experiment gone wrong.  Long-story-short, Manheim created a temporal rift-or-whatever that causes moments in time to replay in inconsistent ways [sometimes you redo a moment in time, and other times you end up running into an earlier version of yourself; basically whatever helps move the plot along].  Apparently Manheim was working on the theory that there are actually infinite dimensions, and that our perception of time is… yada yada yada.  Honestly, I can't remember the explanation, but I promise you it doesn't matter. All we need to know is that somehow Manheim has untethered his consciousness so that he can perceive multiple dimensions (presumably of the “multi-verse” variety) at once, and it’s driving him crazy.  Not only that, but somehow the affect of Manheim’s temporal rift also has cascading universe-ending consequences if left un-mended.

During one of his more lucid moments, Manheim gives the Enterprise gang the necessary codes to bypass his lab's security protocols, and Data beams down to do some obligatory emergency-space-science; in this instance, placing a canister of anti-matter into a time-rift-fixing machine (no time-lab should be without one).  There’s a brief complication where Data has to coordinate the application the anti-matter to a precise countdown (for unspecified plot reasons), but then he splits into three versions of himself (for unspecified temporal reasons) with no way to tell which one of him should insert the antimatter at the end of the countdown (why not all three, you ask? Also unspecified).  Anyways, the middle Data figures out he’s the right one (with no further explanation as to how he came to that conclusion), and he's correct, which is pretty handy.

With the rift patched up, Manheim’s mind is also conveniently restored, and spared from any residual side affects that one might expect from having one’s consciousness volleyed between dimensions.  Thankfully he’s learned his lesson and vows that things will be different between him and Janice, who he has apparently been neglecting (that woman sure can pick ‘em), and this time he’s going to… keep doing his experiments?  But… *checks notes* uh, yeah no, that’s somehow correct. He’s just going to be more careful, moving forward, and apparently that’s good enough for Janice! So the universe can rest easy knowing that Manheim’s work will continue to go unchecked, except he promises to avoid any more catastrophic mistakes!

I certainly wouldn’t have any concerns.

The Verdict

God, this was dull.  I actually had to watch the episode twice, because I was so bored the first time that I zoned out, and forgot what happened. A little digging on memory-alpha reveals production was temporarily halted by the writers strike of ’88, because the script hadn’t been completed, which honestly explains a lot. On the one hand we have Picard grappling with regret and doubt over a lost love from his past, and on the other hand you have Paul Manheim trying to control the flow of time while ignoring his present relationship with the same woman Picard has longed for. I’m not saying it would win awards, but I shouldn’t have to point out the obvious thematic potential between those two threads any more than I already have. But the end result ends up being… just nothing really.

For starters, the relationship between Janice and Picard was just so underwhelmingly civil.  Don’t get me wrong, I do appreciate it when adult characters behave like adults, but the point of this story was to address a regrettable choice from Picard’s past. And yet, when the two literally-star-crossed lovers finally meet for the first time in decades, the conflict between them amounts to little more than a quaint conversation, and an acknowledgment that mistakes were made. Janice offers almost immediate forgiveness, while barely (if all all) holding Picard accountable for his actions, or even addressing the longstanding emotional grief. 

Apparently the writers (Shearer and Davis) did want Picard and Janice to do the nasty, but that was kiboshed by the various powers-that-be. Now, I’m not saying that would have necessarily been the right way to go, but it certainly would have been more interesting than what we got.  Even a passionate kiss (or something to that effect) would have gone a long way to selling me on the idea that these two people had longed for each other, not to mention addressing Janice’s strained marriage to Manheim, and the internal conflict she ostensibly is meant to feel.  It’s not like the writers were being at all discreet about ripping off Casablanca, so why remove the one thing from that story to help make this narrative slog halfway interesting?

As for the time-dilation subplot, it just felt thematically disjointed, and ends up becoming kind of an afterthought.  Manheim also has virtually nothing in the way of a character arc.  You’re telling me he was SO obsessed with his work that he became an absent husband with a singular obsession, and in the end he’s still going to keep being obsessed, but he’s also somehow learned his lesson?  The script seems to genuinely back the idea that Manheim’s quest to control time shouldn’t be reevaluated at all (outside of avoiding of repeat the specific errors from his previous attempt), and that he and Janice will somehow be much happier (and safer) this time.  If I didn’t know better, I’d say there was some behind the scenes editorializing/censorship at work here.

But then again, who cares?

1 star (out of 5)

Additional Observations

You know, for a shining utopia that has rid itself of capitalism’s shackles, there’s still quite an emphasis on concepts like ‘careers’, and officers struggling to maintain steady relationships due to the demands of the job.  Kirk was an absentee father who never had time find a steady relationship, Spock’s betrothed dumped him via gladiatorial combat, Riker and Troi’s on-again-off-again romance was mainly off-again until the movies finally let them settle down, and Worf- …well Worf’s wives just get murdered, but that’s basically the Klingon equivalent of getting dumped. Now we have Picard, who evidently ran like a coward from the love of his life because of his crippling commitment issues. Speaking of the dear Captain…

Picard really IS an asshole: This episode establishes Picard as something of a heartbreaker, but the writing is so nonchalant about it, you almost wouldn’t notice.  This highlights one of the issues I’ve had with this season, generally speaking.  Apparently there was an intentional aversion to addressing character flaws/interpersonal conflicts amongst the crew, even when the story required it (because humanity had advanced beyond conflict and selfishness, you see), yet, Picard has spent much of the first season as a cranky, ill humoured, fuddy duddy (excuse my language). The thing is, I actually kind like how he starts off as cold and over-serious, and then begins to warm as the show progresses, but I have my doubts that the shift was executed with much thought or planning (maybe I’ll change my mind as I watch more episodes). Here especially, there was an opportunity to actually address some of his emotional short-comings, which is sadly overlooked.

Troi-SPIRACY: I have nothing concrete here, but this episode features a pretty classic example of Troi’s “I have abilities and can sense something is wrong with you” nonsense, when she approaches Picard about his emotional bagage. Like, oh really Deanna? Could you “sense” Picard was feeling “strong emotions”?  Surely it wasn’t the fact that he went as rigid as a lamp post at the mention of some random dude’s name, or the fact that he aggressively striking the palm of his hand with a tightly folded towel, did you?  No, I’m positive it must have been your magical powers picking up on the same thing the entire crew was also noticing. I’m telling you, Troi is a fraud who is so good at her job that she’s convinced everyone she has powers.

Holo-Horrors: So Picard loads up a holosuite program of some 24th century Paris Café, which comes fully staffed, and filled with customers (all holograms). Each of these holo-folk seem to have complex internal lives, with access to the full spectrum of human emotion, and relationships with histories. One of them (who is talking to a friend about her relationship woes) reminds Picard of Janice, even though she is otherwise entirely unique. So does that mean the ship computer is generating fully realized sentient background "programs" just for the sake of realism? I dunno man, the holosuite tech really does seem a lot more dystopian than I remember it being, growing up.

[mono-red-menace]

i think we should all be a lot nicer to each other, honestly

and i also think i should go through and find all the people who I feel are approaching things wrong and just like. unfollow them.

like all the time i see people who have opinions i find correct, but approaches i find wrong, and even bad, but i feel like their reasons are correct, and the fact that they can justify their reasons with cited sources makes me feel like they're more intelligent than me, so they Can Do No Wrong or whatever. and i feel like unfollowing is Bad because it means that i'm like, idk. giving up on getting a source i feel like i can trust because they can cite their fucking sources in ways that i just can't because of my adhd.

like i can't remember Shit. i tried to read and take notes and stuff and i just Can't remember shit. even if i go over the same thing over and over, it's just super hard. so when someone else can, i give them a LOT of room to be less-than-stellar towards others because I feel like they're Smarter so it's okay, so I just Bite My Tongue and follow along in the ways I'm comfortable.

but like i'm starting to think that maybe I should focus less on people who i feel are The Most Qualified (even though they're really not all that qualified honestly) if it means that I feel like i'm becoming cruel, and if it means that it is contributing towards my unkindness toward myself.

and like i know this sounds silly but it ties into my Obsessions. i'm Obsessed with Moral Purity. I'm Obsessed with Factual Accuracy, Especially When It Comes To Morality. so like, if people have the Right Opinions, they get more leeway, and like I mean I'm not that smart anyways, and they're smarter than me, so like i CANT unfollow them because then i'd be losing out of Factual Accuracy.

and it feels silly that i'm obsessed with stuff like this, but I feel like i'm a Bad Incompetent Person and i need to Become Better and the only way to do so is to like. make sure im listening to the Right people and avoiding the Wrong people, and if i Stop focusing on that, then that must mean I'm going back to being Bad, which is Bad.

but i mean like i don't have to be wholly knowledgeable about everything. like, main thing is, i need to survive. i need to be happy. and I'm not contributing as much as I want to in the ways I need to, and part of that is because I'm too busy being cruel to myself, lol.

so im gonna actually resolve to start unfollowing people who i feel like are being dicks instead of just like. ignoring it or, sometimes even laughing at it and participating.

just like. idk man.

i've learned in my time here that being cruel to people doesn't actually make them do better. it often makes them do worse.

and this doesn't just apply to being cruel to someone for "being lazy," or "being a faker," or any of that ableist stuff. it also applies to being cruel to someone for not knowing something. and it's being cruel to someone for believing something they didn't know was misinformation.

like i'm going to be honest. i'm Much more likely to accept what someone is saying to me, even if it's wrong, if it's told to me in a kind manner. this is just true of like. almost anyone. and like idk. i know kindness doesn't mean correctness, but like, i'm more likely to try to engage with information and learn more about someone told me kindly than if I was berated for not knowing it.

like. idk. sorry. kindness is the approach. i've learned this firsthand. kindness is the only approach.

abuse is what got me into a state of no self confidence, of needing to be constantly reminded how to do things to the point where people would do it for me, not always because i couldn't remember (though that was also common), but because I was scared i'd be wrong. abuse is what got me to the point of physically harming myself by trying to do way more than i was capable of for fear of being "lazy" or "worthless."

and the only way I was able to stop it was to learn to be kind to myself.

so like idk. i'm reevaluating the things I'm Letting Slide for the sake of Moral Justness. and I'm putting confidence in myself that I won't fall away from my morals just because I don't try to surround myself with just The Most Morally and Factually Correct people to compensate for my own disabilities.

and also i'm going to stop surrounding myself with people who are dicks to people about not knowing things or struggling to do things the "correct" way due to disability.

like idk man. i think you're just being ableist. i think you're just being ableist when you make fun of people for trying to learn things in the ways they can, instead of struggling to do it in a way that they can't because it's "correct."

and like. idk man. i think sometimes you're just being a dick. not necessarily like ableist or anything like that. not something you'd necessarily feel like you'd have to fix, because you feel morally justified to Be a dick Unless it's Problematic. i just think that you're being a dick. lol.

i'm not going to put up with it anymore. I STG. i keep saying it and then not following thru bc some of the ppl i see being mean and stuff are mutuals, and I have this weird like. unhealthy connection thing about mutuals. but like i swear like this isn't good for me and it isn't good for the people around me. :|

[purplesaline]

Sorry to see Katy was such a bitch to you, you didn't deserve that response for trying to be helpful.

I appreciate the support ❤️ she didn't do anything wrong though. Folks with a larger follower base can often get a lot of messages offering unsolicited advice and it can get really frustrating and tiring and as a result responses can sometimes get a little blunt. Especially when it comes to medical stuff, which is a pretty private issue for many folks, and can be a hard boundary.

While my comment wasn't meant as advice, just a "Hey in case you weren't aware here's some info. Do with it what you will", any comments regarding medical stuff can be a boundary for some folks and that's totally valid.

The communities I tend to hang out around have a culture where comments like the one I made are encouraged, and I forget that's not the case everywhere. That's on me for not being more aware of what was socially acceptable in the space I was in.

She made it clear this is a boundary for her and I'll be sure to respect it going forward.

It's important to remember that when we cross someone's boundaries we can cause them harm, even if we mean well, and people don't have to be gentle with us when we do that. Her response to me may have been a little sharp, but she wasn't mean or cruel at all. Any feelings I have about how she responded aren't her responsibility and they're certainly not her fault.

I won't lie and say her response didn't sting, but that's because I want to be seen as someone who is helpful, and I want to be liked and those are my issues to deal with, not hers to worry about.

I wanted to answer this publicly because I think it's really important for people to understand that it's okay for people to be blunt and even a little sharp, especially regarding boundaries, and that it's not the same thing as being rude. It's not even unkind!

She didn't do anything wrong just because she didn't sugar coat her response for my benefit.

I really do appreciate you reaching out though, it helped soothe my butthurt feelings which let me see it all a little more objectively, so thank you again.

[wefallforever]

Spoilers for episode 6 of the bear below!

The first thing I have to say after finishing this episode: 🗣️🗣️Natalie "Sugar" Berzatto has never done anything wrong in her life EVEN ONCE!! (Can you tell I'm an eldest "daughter" LMAO 🥲)

But for real though this episode was so fucking intense. I'm personally a christmas lover but ep. 6 is the perfect example of why people hate the holidays. All the family bunched up together in one space and the dynamics get so chaotic so fast.

Ugh the wounds in this family! You can see the horrors of addiction and toxic dysfunction reverberating in all their actions. Of course we try to cover it up, pretend things are normal, that things are comfortable. Meanwhile the air in the room feels too tight and the demons/scared inner children we hold within are screaming for attention. "I AM IN PAIN! I FEEL UNLOVED! I AM ANGRY! WHY DOESN'T ANYONE CARE! PAY ATTENTION TO ME NOTICE ME!"

The sibling pep talk at the beginning felt sooo familiar. "Make a plan to keep our unstable mom in check. It is doomed to fail, but we are trying anyways!" Desperately doing everything you can to help her while she screams that you don't care-threatens to die, to go away, because we are all so cruel to her. Ultimately we cannot actually stop her from going away and being closed off to us, no matter how much broken glass we sweep up off the floor. (No amount of bleeding and tears and begging and pleading can change her. As much as we would like).

OOF and that deep dissociation we see from Carmy and Sugar at the end?!!! Brutal as fuck! My consciousness damn near left my body too. Had to remind myself out loud I wasn't in actual danger. And poor Mikey screaming at his mom to open the door over and over, to let him help over and over, while she just laughed and laughed and laughed? Definitely the kind of thing you have to unpack in a 12 step meeting.

The last thing I will say is Uncle Lee deserved that third spoon!!! Obviously Mikey was being a dick with the first two but Lee kept provoking him when he should have just shut the fuck up and left. Then when he made that unkind comment about Donna who is clearly suffering from mental illness!!! I was like "do what you gotta do Mikey fuck him up!" That could be the aries rising talking but I'm not sure.

Very excited to finish the last three episodes over the weekend!

[quickdeaths]

Shinobu wasn't sure what had happened. Things had moved so quickly. By the time she could move, by the time she could speak, Sonia was already gone - out of sight even as Shinobu wished to reach out to her and tell her to wait. Instead, her hand went to the denim of Ji-yeon's jacket, bunching up the fabric of her sleeve and yanking her along as Shinobu marched around the side of building, out of sight of anyone who might have stopped to gawk at the interaction prior.

"What the hell was that, Miss Ji-yeon," Shinobu asked, more bewildered than angry, incapable as she was of truly summoning up her rage at someone she cared for so deeply. "Miss Nevermind was nothing but courteous to you, and she was excited to have the chance to talk. It isn't like you to be so hostile." Among the things she'd always admired about Ji-yeon Iida was her senses of inclusion and compassion - how she brought together people of all sorts of backgrounds and experiences.

Ji-yeon bristled as she pulled her arm back from Shinobu's grasp. "I should be asking you that, Shinobu-san. Why would you even bring her here?" Shinobu blinked, barely understanding the question. "You gave me two tickets, and she's my friend." That didn't seem to satisfy Ji-yeon, who wrinkled her nose and exhaled like she was deeply annoyed. "She's a literal princess. She's everything that's wrong with this world. People like her are the reason I'm here in the first place. I'm not going to feel bad for speaking truth to power, even if some imperialist didn't want to hear it."

She crossed her arms over her chest, looking to Shinobu with a discerning expression on her face that the archer couldn't quite understand. "Come on, you don't disagree with anything I said, do you?" Shinobu frowned. "Well, on a grand scale, not exactly, but-" "So then what's the problem!?" They winced. "Miss Nevermind isn't like that! She's not greedy, she's not two-faced, she's not self-martyring or arrogant or cruel or unconcerned with the suffering of others, or anything you've tried to paint her as."

There was some unfamiliar pain in Shinobu's chest, that persisted even after a deep, calming breath came as an attempt to banish it. "I understand that we're talking of systems, not of people, but then why be so needlessly unkind to a person who only wanted to befriend you?" Even Shinobu, someone who lacked for friends, could see that was too far. She sighed, hands upon her hips, shaking her head in disbelief as she failed to understand anything about why Ji-yeon had spoken as she did.

There was silence between them for a few moments, broken up by the quiet sound of rain upon the pavement as it began to rain. Shinobu shifted, about to move to a place beneath an alcove, or under some trees, only to see Ji-yeon rooted in place, unmoving. "You were so protective of me, Shinobu-san, when you found out what had happened, even though I wasn't good enough at protecting you. I wanted you to see me play again, like I used to, even if the circumstances were poor, and I thought we could talk, and maybe things would end up differently." She was looking at the ground, the rain flattening her hair against her forehead and dripping steadily down from her chin.

"So why would you bring someone here who you're in love with?" Shinobu recoiled, hands instinctively rising to wave off the accusation. "You're entirely mistaken, Miss Ji-yeon. Miss Nevermind and I are just friends." "You're lying to me." Ji-yeon lifted her head, and Shinobu could see how wet her face had become. "You look at her like she's the only person in the room." She lifted her hands to rub at her face, yet no matter how much rain she wiped off, there seemed to be more still. "You think that I, of all people, don't know what it looks like when you love someone?"

Shinobu sighed again, pushing their wet hair out of their eyes and moving to clean their glasses on their jacket. "You don't know what you're talking about," she said, a little more tersely than intended, "and this isn't about me." It was a topic that made her feel strangely uncomfortable, and she wanted to move away from it as fast as possible. "Miss Nevermind did nothing but take an interest in your life and empathize with your struggles and hardships. She was so kind, and you made her cry. That's not like you at all." Ji-yeon crossed her arms again, uncharacteristically standoffish as she looked down. "Aren't you the last person who should be lecturing me on making kind girls cry?"

Shinobu flinched as though she'd been struck across the face. Ji-yeon flinched herself, opening up her body language, looking as though she'd immediately regretted the words that had come from her mouth. But, she wasn't wrong, was she? "Ah... I see." Shinobu swallowed, forcing herself to nod. "That's a fair criticism. I just thought... or hoped, I suppose, that you didn't see me that way." Ji-yeon shuffled over, nearly losing her balance with how quickly she moved, hands going to Shinobu's shoulder and side. "Wait, Shinobu-san, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that, I-"

Shinobu gently, firmly, shrugged off the attention. "I need to go home," she mumbled. "I don't have a ride home anymore, and if I'm too late, my father will..." She shook her head. "I need to go. Goodbye, Miss Ji-yeon." They swallowed again, forcing up their face something that approximated an apologetic expression, before swiftly walking away from the campus.

If Sonia was looking at her messaging app, she would have seen the typing bubble appear, then disappear, then reappear again dozens of time once Shinobu returned home. It had been a long, cold, miserable walk home in the rain, which had only picked up after she'd left the Waseda University campus. Her father had only seen fit to yell at her about wasting her time on frivolous things, and had gone to bed early, which left Shinobu to her own devices - namely, sitting out on her balcony, trying to think of what to say. How did one even begin to broach such a topic.

It was late, of course. It had taken some time to walk home by herself, and her father's scolding, followed by her failed attempt to compose a message, had eaten well into the dark hours of the night. In the morning, if she slept well, surely Shinobu could think of something better to say. Yet, she had the sinking feeling that she wouldn't sleep well, and it felt awful to imagine even trying without speaking to Sonia. And so, rather uncharacteristically impulsive of her, Shinobu deleted whatever poor message draft she'd begun, and called Sonia instead, bringing the phone up to her ear and feeling her heart pounding as she waited for a response.

Each ring felt like an eternity, and for a moment, Shinobu wondered if Sonia would ignore the call altogether. She could be asleep, surely, but even if she wasn't, it would be entirely understandable if she had no desire to speak to Shinobu after what had happened. What would they do then? Chase her down at school once the small break was over, and they'd formally begun their third years? Go in the morning? She'd already began formulating plans, when Sonia finally picked up. "Ah, hello," Shinobu said, her voice soft beneath the flustered tone. "It's Shinobu. Yaguchi, I mean." As though there were other Shinobus Sonia might know, calling at this hour, and as though Sonia might not have seen her name on the display. "I regret that it's so late, but may I speak with you for a little while? Please?"

Her knee-jerk reaction was to interject that she didn't enjoy being called a princess when she didn't need to be. There was a clear separation, Sonia thought, between what she was and who she was. And even if her family tended to ignore it, it was something she held tight to. Maybe that was why her hobbies were deemed so bizarre, from her absurd collections to the fact that she didn't enjoy hemorrhaging taxpayer euros for things she thought were frivolous. Her mother's designer wardrobe, her uncle's yacht, even a few of her father's larger expenditures into his own collecting hobbies: she couldn't make sense of needing to dip into funds secured by taxes to fund personal whims and desires. It was why she made her own investments into businesses: royal run of course and certainly there were some tax loopholes, but she funneled that into anything she deemed was non-essential. It made her oddity, among many other things that did, with her aristocratic peers.

Instead, Sonia opened her mouth and closed it again. It made little sense to point that out, or even the fact that her parents had sold a smaller property to pay for Hope's Peak: it was why they couldn't afford to send real antiques to furnish her rooms. Sonia had found the prospect silly to begin with and that simpler furnishings would be more than suitable, but it was seemingly an offense against her family's heritage to think so.

She was, apparently, both terrible at being royalty and terrible because she was royalty. No matter how she looked at it, she couldn't win. And no matter where she looked, other than Ji-yeon's fury, there was concern. Apprehension. But most of all, stares: as much as she'd wanted to support Shinobu's friend undetected, the universe had other plans. Ones that now included a few glares in Ji-yeon's direction, out of support for Princess Sonia of Novoselic.

"I am not your enemy!" She wanted to shout right back. That they came from different backgrounds and had different struggles they surely wanted some of the same things. That they were both still learning how to make a difference in their futures. Sonia swallowed the lump in her throat, before glancing at Shinobu.

"But am I still your friend?"

She exhaled deeply, trying to ready her nerves as barrage after barrage of criticism and hatred spilled from Ji-yeon's mouth. Royals did not cry in public, whether it was Council meetings or in the face of heated anti-monarchists. No one ever saw them do so, barring family, which made it all the more distressing for her when her parents screamed, shouted, and wailed because they were unable to do so otherwise.

But Sonia couldn't help but sniffle at the last of Ji-yeon's critique of her life: she didn't deserve a place at Hope's Peak. Something she knew better than anyone. Something her family knew, too, with sizable donations to the school done to conceal it. It wasn't as if this girl could've known, but those words cut deeper into her soul than any seething rage towards the Novoselic Royal Family could.

"I..." She began, turning her attention back to Ji-yeon. Another deep breath, another smile, no matter how small. Together they could keep her lip from quivering, the tears from falling: they had to. "I feel that anyone who must put aside their dreams deserves compassion, no matter the circumstances." In her view, she never had the chance to even try for her dreams, not in the way Ji-yeon had. She only had one choice: take the throne or allow her country to be ruled by someone who only desired to make the rich richer and dismantle social rights in favor of Catholic values. Her conscience wouldn't let her choose the latter, nor would her father's.

There was no point in arguing. And she couldn't come out and agree with her, at least about her lack of belonging at the school. Out of everything Ji-yeon had said, it was the only thing Sonia had vehemently agreed with. But to engage her would only attract more attention, attention that would, almost certainly, villainize Ji-yeon, make Sonia a spectacle that would reach her family's ears, and most importantly, put Shinobu in an uncomfortable position. Out of all of those conclusions, Sonia thought as she gave Shinobu an apologetic look, it was making her uncomfortable that bothered Sonia the most. She'd only wanted to support her close friend, and Sonia's existence had ruined everything.

"I am sorry for having ruined your day, Iida-san, Yaguchi-san," Sonia told them. Her smile was hanging by a thread but she would keep it on even if it killed her, even as tears welled up in her eyes. "I very much enjoyed the concert, though. Your music was beautiful, I am sorry you cannot pursue it professionally."

"But," she continued, swallowing another large gulp of tears. "I do not wish to upset either of you further. So I shall take my leave. I apologize again and...goodnight."

There was no point, Sonia thought as she turned and began walking to the car, to mention about seeing them again. Either of them: Ji-yeon had clearly shown she never wanted to speak to Sonia again and with Shinobu being such a close friend to her, she doubted that Shinobu felt any different about the matter. They had a real connection, anyway: an ease in how they related to one another, dinners together, first names.

Sonia held her clutch bag a little tighter as two plainclothes members of her security detail split from the crowd to follow her, one opening the door to the backseat for her, closing it once she'd settled in before sliding into the passenger's seat. The other had entered the smaller car behind: after the debacle in the auditorium, they must have sent for an additional backup car of security, just in case.

"Is your friend not dining with you, Your Highness?" The driver asked, too innocently in her opinion. Just as well: he hadn't witnessed what had just happened.

"No," Sonia choked out as the car began to pull away from the curb. "And I would like that reservation canceled, please...I would like to be taken directly back to Hope's Peak instead. I will...see to my dinner on my own. But I need to return to school. Now."

She'd barely waited for the security guard in the passenger's seat to reply in the affirmative before pressing the button to raise the privacy barrier between the front and back seats. The wasted surprise was the least of her worries, and with tinted windows she could at least have a modicum of privacy before returning to her room.

[sophsicle]

UHM PLS DROP THE ORIGINAL JAMES BREAK DOWN SCENE PLSSS

mmmmmk

tw explicit sexual content

tw panic attack

alternative chap 20. James POV

James opens his eyes, a strangely powerful wave of desire burning through him. He looks up at Regulus, cheeks so pink, lips wet, he hasn’t taken his hand off of James, and doesn’t, even when James reaches out, wrapping his own fingers around Regulus’s. They’re moving together. Stroking him off together. Eyes locked. It’s the hottest most intense fucking thing James has ever experienced. His breath coming faster as every inch of his skin tingles and crackles under Regulus’s gaze. Under his weight. His touch. The feeling building and pushing. It’s unbearable. It’s taking him apart. 

Oh god.

Oh god.

I love you so much.

I wish you could love me back.

I wish you didn’t want to hide us. I wish I didn’t scare you—

“You’ve worked so hard for this, and it makes you so happy, and I’m scared. I’m scared that you could lose it all. I’m scared of what that’ll do to you. I’m scared of all the hatred I can’t protect you from. This world is so cruel and so unkind and I’m so fucking scared for you.” 

The shift in emotions is disorienting. And suddenly the overwhelmingly good is getting all tangled in the overwhelmingly bad. He’s never experienced anything like it before, this horrible sick feeling rocking through him. It’s wrong. Everything in him is wrong. Panic rising in his chest as the things him and Regulus aren’t talking about wrap around his neck. Squeezing. Squeezing. Squeezing. And he can’t breathe. He can’t breathe. Shit. He can’t breathe. 

“James?” 

He hears his name distantly. The world suddenly very blurry and hard to hold and it’s not that he can’t see but also he can’t. 

“James? James?” he feels Regulus’s hands cupping his face, the warmth of them, the tremble, and somehow that helps. He brings his own hands up, covering Regulus’s, holding them in place. 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” James’s voice is disjointed, cracked. He isn’t supposed to be like this. He’s supposed to make Regulus feel safe. He can’t crumble. He’ll never stay if you fall apart. You’re no good to anyone broken. James Potter is meant to be whole. Solid. He holds up the roof. 

“No don’t—it’s okay,” Regulus is saying. “It’s okay. It’s okay,” Regulus does not sound remotely okay though, and it’s James’s fault. 

“Sorry, fuck Reg I’m so—“ he can’t finish that sentence, squeezing his eyes shut. Regulus tries to pull his hands away put James holds them more tightly. “No please, please I’ll—I’ll be better. Sorry. Sorry just give me a second and I’ll—“ 

“James—“ 

“Please don’t be scared of me—“ 

“Scared of you?” 

“You said people care, about this, about…But do you care?”

“I can do this. Please believe me.” 

“James, I—I love you.”

“You need to take a deep breath—James? Can you—Are you listening to me? I need you to breathe okay?” 

“But do you care?”

“Don’t leave. Please don’t leave me again.” 

“It’s—I don’t…understand it.”

“Is this about the party? I shouldn’t have—James I shouldn’t have left you that night. Not like that. I—“ 

“Please, please. I’ll be okay. I’ll be better. Just believe in me.” 

“James—“ 

“I’ve never not understood you before.”

It’s all blurring together in his head. His father walking away from the table. Regulus leaving his bedroom. He doesn’t know why he’s thinking about any of it right now. Now that Regulus is finally here. But for how long? How long is he ever here for? Regulus finally manages to pull his hands out from under James’s grip, and James covers his face with his arms, still trying to breathe. He doesn’t want to be seen like this.

A second later he feels an arm sliding carefully under his back. He goes tense at first, until Regulus gives him a little tug, pulling James towards him. James buries his face in Regulus’s chest, Regulus squeezing him tight. “I got you,” he says, even though his voice shakes a little. “I’m here, I’ve got you.” 

But for how long?  

James pushes the thought aside. Breathing Regulus in, hands tangling in his shirt. He tries to listen to his heartbeat, tries to match his breathing to that. Tries not to think about how monumentally he has just screwed everything up. Ruined Regulus’s first time. He’d wanted to make this good. He’d wanted to make this so easy for Regulus. So comfortable. God, what the fuck is wrong with him? 

James’s breathing starts to settle, and Regulus shuffles so he can get the blankets around them, tucking James in, his hand moving up and down James’s back. It’s another few minutes before James is able to make himself speak, pulling away slightly so that they’re looking at one another, heads on the same pillow. 

“Reg, I’m so sorry.” 

Regulus shakes his head. “Don’t be,” and then, weak smile: “Honestly it’s kind of nice to know I’m not the only one.” 

James’s brow furrows. “The only one?” 

“Who loses it sometimes,” and then: “Who can’t handle all of this.” 

James’s chest squeezes at the idea that they’re something Regulus has to handle. But then, he supposes he has a point. “No, you’re not the only one,” he croaks. They lie like that for a little longer, quiet, still. Regulus’s eyes staring right at him in a way they so rarely do, so that James finds he’s the one looking away. 

“You wanna tell me what happened?” Regulus asks finally. “Did I—“ his voice cuts out and then, taking in a stuttering breath. “Did I do something?” 

James’s eyes go wide. “Woah no, Regulus no. I was—that was like, super hot.” 

Regulus smiles even as his cheeks fill with colour.  

[thethirdromana]

Until now, it seems like Dorian's misdeeds are mostly under the influence of Lord Henry, but finally we get to a point where Dorian's character comes to the fore.

Basil Hallward has what's essentially a good person's reaction to Sibyl Vane's poor acting: perhaps she was ill, and it doesn't matter anyway. It's wrong to be unkind about people you love.

Lord Henry has a dismissive and unkind, but not cruel reaction: he doesn't really see Sibyl as a real person, but he remains blandly positive, and seems to have a genuine reaction ("a strange tenderness in his voice") to seeing Dorian upset.

But Dorian's reaction is pure cruelty. We see just how shallow his feelings for Sibyl were all along; he makes no attempt to understand her, and responds to her breaking down on the floor sobbing with "exquisite disdain" and annoyance.

I can't imagine Henry, even at his worst, being quite so callous, though he might claim to be. I think this is where we see that far from being an innocent young thing caught in a bad influence, Dorian is a worse character than either of his friends, for all that he himself thinks that Henry's "subtle poisonous theories" are to blame.

[icaruspendragon]

As someone who was involved in a lot of this from May 2022-October 2022, I said a lot of mean and hurtful things to people who didn’t deserve it simply because I was told we were supposed to hate them. I thought I could trust my friends judgement on those folks and I didn’t do any further digging. And that was wrong of me. I had to own up to that. And I did. I reached out to the people I said unkind things about and apologized for things they didn’t even know I’d said.  And it was hard. And it sucked. And I felt like a shitty person. But I was a shitty person when I was involved with that in-group. But I got out, realized just how awful I had been, and took accountability for it. I have no problem admitting to how shitty I was to people who didn’t deserve it because it was the right thing to do.  I firmly believe everyone can change, and I sincerely hope everyone involved does change. I know I had to. 

I’m saying this not to pat myself off the back, but to say that even though I was in an abusive situation, it didn’t give me an excuse to be cruel to people back. And these were people who truly didn’t deserve the mean things I said about them. They were people who deserved for me to stand up for them when I didn’t. This is me taking ownership and accountability for my own role in the harm that was caused. Because I was truly sorry I did it. And those people I was so mean to? I owned up to my shitty behavior. They're some of my closest friends now because they’re genuinely good people. Because they forgave me when they didn’t have to. And I got to stand in support and solidarity with those people when they finally felt like they could come forward and share the abuse they had gone through. And they stood with me while I shared my own stories.  In situations like this, that’s literally all anyone wants. Ownership and true remorse. And it's hard and it sucks but everyone comes out the other side being a better person. 

Amends

I don't usually dip my toe in the drama pool. At least not too deeply. But what's going on in fandom this week, the revelations, were extreme. The people who have come forward... they were in a cult. I am not being overdramatic about this. Gamifying harassment, forcing disconnections like Scientology, needing everyone to observe the same talking points or risk ostracism, leadership using it for money, criminal behavior towards those The Guru has deemed the Out-Group including members who don't conform heavily enough... That's a cult. The internet has made cult behavior REALLY easy. Likes and engagement make you suddenly aware of which direction your circle is leaning. If you agree, YOU TOO GET POINTS. You too will experience that sense of belonging, and that's what it's all about. So if your circle is being outright mean... if you don't want to be cast off as "not one of them"... maybe you say the mean thing too, even if it's a lie, even if you're not really sure why you're saying it. That approval feels SUPER GOOD and is addictive. And your circle amps each other up, gets meaner and meaner. The only people who stay in the in-group are those who don't speak up about the bad behavior and are willing to keep going along with it. Those aren't friendships. It's a pack of hungry carnivores. It's the same behaviors police gangs use on cops who speak up. I do have some sympathy, especially for the younger people who were still forming their identities. They were victims of indoctrination and criminal harassment. That said, they have to own their own behavior. I hope they learn and grow. They're going to have to have some self-reflection on what they've done, the lies told, the hate, the virulent -isms that were expressed, and literal crimes that were performed in the name of fitting in and winning some points with the clique. They're also going to have to reassess who their out-group is, why they even NEED an out-group over fandom things, and if there are still people in their schema who they have an impulse to hate for no reason.... because of a ship or actor preference. They're going to have to question all the lies they were told and if they are still holding onto hate based on that. That's hard if they aren't even sure what the lies were. It's going to be a process for them. We should give people the space and grace to get better. To deprogram themselves. But this does not mean there needs to be automatic forgiveness. Nobody needs to like anyone. But nobody needs to hate anyone either. Maybe the middle ground is we can grow some indifference or the ability to say, "I'm letting it go, this person is in progress, I can't control their journey, the ball is in their court."

If you were behaving badly, you've earned the suspicion of the people you hurt. A few of you are expressing amends, which is wonderful. But part of the thing with making amends is that you don't get to control the outcome. You make a genuine apology for EXACTLY what you've done, you own your part in it, and you don't make excuses... and from there, people may accept what you've said and they may not. They may forgive you immediately, they may take time, they may never forgive you. You have to learn to be good with that. It can be uncomfortable, to feel disliked, ESPECIALLY if the reason you got into the cult was because of that sense of belonging. Your impulse may be to keep giving explanations of how the group influenced you, to distance yourself. You may tell yourself, "I'm not that person, this isn't really me, it was the group." You want to be seen as CHANGED - virginal and new because you made the hard choice to finally leave the cult. ...It isn't that easy. You want the space and grace and you should get that. But guess what? You need to give that to others, too. You need to understand that people have real reasons to distrust you if you were exhibiting cruelty. And part of doing the work to make amends is the actual work. If you're serious about it, it means a lot of difficult self-reflection. You need to take an unflinching look at WHY you could ignore or participate in racism and lord knows plenty of other -isms, why outright defamation and death threats to actors and other fans were okay, why doxing people and trying to get them fired was seen as fair game, why trying to make someone feel hated and terrible about themselves was your impulse, why you were giggling and congratulating yourself for leaning into your worst impulses...until the group turned on you. Because that's the truth of the situation. You now have that self-knowledge of what you're willing to participate in. The question now is what are you going to do with that? I hope it includes therapy and I don't mean that glibly. I think it's possible there are some internet addictions going on where people crave the rush of getting Likes and engagement... and ragefarming is the best way to get engagement. If that's true... it will be EXTREMELY easy to move from the space of performing FOR the cult to performing AGAINST them, so that you can maintain your hit of Likes. And that is just sitting in the same behaviors. But if you're serious about getting better, if you're serious about being honest with yourself, you're going to need to fight against those inclinations. Please ask yourselves if you truly feel your apologies and want to change...or if maybe some part of you is just posting your attempt at amends because you want to fit in with those leaving or because you're craving that approval. Leaving is great! But are you getting the same psychological hit from your posts now? Are you trying to collect a new group that will lovebomb you because you're seeking self-esteem and miss the people who used to give it to you? I'm not saying this in judgment, I'm saying it because many people go from one cult or MLM to another, seeking that same sense of belonging. That's not my wish for you.

To the people on the other side of this... I'm not saying not to speak up if you see people slipping or people whose apologies are revealed as false words. I'm not trying to tone police people getting angry. There have been real reasons to be angry. HOWEVER... please be aware that if we want people to actually learn and grow we need to give them room to do that. There's nothing wrong with a really direct "This is really shitty and unkind behavior." Going scorched earth every time isn't the way. Is it our responsibility to motivate them to change, is it on us? Absolutely not. But are our actions going to unintentionally make them more likely to try and find a gang again because they're feeling defensive? If we also truly want to make things better, we have to ask ourselves what our goal is. Do we just want to give a tongue-lashing because we're angry? We might. And that can be justified sometimes in life. But cornered people don't often make great decisions. If what we want out of this is for people to be less terrible - there are ways to call people in and out, firmly and not sugarcoated, while still not going on the attack.

To the people who finally spoke up, you should be proud of yourselves for that. You took the first step. I hope you keep walking forward.

If you actually read to here... holy crap, I apologize. Many, many words, but I wanted to put them all down somewhere instead of continuing to overthink it at 3:30am. I do want to say... this is just my perspective. If it came off as trying to tell you how to do or feel, or like I think I'm perfect? Nah, kids. I'm a fallible screw-up, too, who is often "cringe," as the children say. We can all work on ourselves. At least that's the hope. If we're open to it.

Anyway. Love y'all, TGC