#and i think its largely better bc it cuts a lot of the worst things in the book lmao

[dashiellqvverty]

sorry for writing 900 words about rwrb. as if i can help it.

[karoochui]

What im hearing is:

Little crow feet outside my window bcs im feeding them- that’s besides the point!

Is there magic??? His shovel looks magic and they look magic

And do give me every detail you are thinking of for the series even if its in the distant future or not that relevant but you want to share

Crows!! Cute!! Also sorry i didnt get to this sooner my laptop BROKE (still broken but usable) and my mom and i have been looking for someone to fix it. Ive been drawing with it sparingly to be careful.

YES there is magic. Of course im still working on this storywise but im getting characters designs n whatnot done right now. Dynamics n stuff. BUT i do have some refs i made before my laptop broke.

I like to draw out certain stuff so that it helps with descriptions in the future; i have the worst memory so it helps to be able to do so. (More beneath cut)

Im so excited for moon's shadow form. Oh my god. Its probably my favorite thing right now.

Fun thing about it is that in this form he can touch you but you cant touch him. Something something you can be cast in shadow but you cant take it off yk? He's still light sensitive like this though, so if the area hes in isn't dark enough or he's hit with anything too bright he just reverts back. At that point he'd just have to rely on normal hand to hand stuff and his sand lol. The shadow form is just better for sneaking and speed. Really, he's some amalgamative idea of the sandman and boogieman. I thought it fit well with his whole "naptime attendant gone wrong" thing.

Sun's design, however, is more like if you mixed a cowboy, wizard, and gravedigger together. I made it a while ago on a whim with no intention behind it but then i ended up thinking "ykw would be so awesome".

The hat dips to cover the crescent side of his face (not intentional on his part) to symbolize his resentment towards moon and how he basically damned him to an hourglass. His eyes are easier to see bc of this which could seem more trusting (eyes are the window to the soul or whatever), but the thing is thats not normal for him (as we know) so it's meant to make him look suspicious and looming to 4th wall viewers. There's also the fact that i just thought it was cool too.

He also doesn't get a second form. Moon's sneaky and weird so i thought it would fit to give him some freaky thing iykwim. Sun, however, is a pretty "in your face" kinda guy, so his look and fight style is more extravagant and boisterous. Lots of swinging amd yelling and boom bang zap! Despite the showiness he's actually a longer range fighter. Mainly because unlike moon, thousands of years ago, he wasn't often one to get violent with his hands. His weapon is just obnoxiously large too though.

They are still one animatronic and their transformation is still triggered by light. Instead of an AI chip though (which is still in there but long dead), they live through the work of a soul. They're still physically inorganic but as far as spiritually they're as close as they're gonna get to being human. Their life and functionailty is derived from the magic itself, not the machinery. Like if for some reason they lost all their magic they'd just drop dead from a battery life long since drained.

The hourglass has a carousel-like design to it purely as reference to moon's level in Help Wanted 2.

Sorry for rambling so much but this is what i've got for you so far! I have a general idea for the plot but im tryna to make it more than what it is rn, so i dont wanna share too much of that just yet in case i change or completely toss away an idea.

[fleetwood-cheese]

Phantom Thief Outfit Breakdown

Okay so exactly one (1) person asked me abt my opinions on the phantom thief's metaverse costumes (thank you @waywardsalt) bc I mentioned them in the tags of a poll so now you are all locked into my insane rant abt this topic. Originally this was a power point i made to vent but i realized its too long to post in its entirety (its more than 20 slides long) so you get this monstrosity of a post. I'm going to split this into multiple posts discussing each thief's designs bc there's a lot and it'd be too long; will link each post at top.

Ann - Makoto - Sumire - Futaba - Yusuke - Akechi 2

DISCLAIMER: I am not a designer, have relatively poor fashion sense, and these are largely just my opinions on the matter, obviously people are going to disagree. I'd love to discuss this and get feedback on it but if you're an asshole im not going to entertain you.

Starting with the worst (imo), let's begin with Akechi's black mask costume.

This is, from a purely design and visual standpoint, the worst to me because it simply has too much going on, and all of it gets lost in its attempts to be cool or intimidating. This attempt at being menacing, presumably, is lost in translation and mostly just makes it look uncomfortable, edgy, and sort of goofy.

It seems to be pulling on ideas of knight armor, birds of prey, straight jackets, and the general idea of being trapped or isolated, but very few of these things actually come across in the final design. (It also might have some bondage/bdsm inspiration, but I'm not sure how intentional that is.)

Firstly, the bodysuit isn't well executed here, and is complicated by the fact that it appears to also be booty shorts with matching leggings?? but they're all the same thickness?? This is confusing and goofy, and would look much better split into an actual top/pants combo. Additionally, the stripes add further confusion and lack the appeal of Loki's stripes, who I presume they're trying to tie-in/invoke with them; their diagonal direction certainly doesn't help. To fix this, I would keep the stripes on the top, but have them run up and down, and simplify the pants to solid black with blue piping along the sides. I think this separate top with the straight stripes would also do a better job of communicating a straight jacket than the current costume does.

Another major gripe I have with this outfit is the hems, but especially the pant hems. They're what I can only describe as boot cut and its awful; I grew up with the 2000s boot-cut obsession, and they don't look good on anyone except horsegirls who wear actual cowboy boots underneath them. I understand the frayed pant and sleeve hems are supposed to look unkempt and villainous, but it mostly just looks like he's walked on them. To solve this, I would effectively cover them up by adding armor; extend the boots and claws and give him actual grieves and arm guards to make him look more dangerous, sharp, and combat oriented, and invoke the knight aesthetic to clash with the detective prince persona and its white, ornamental style.

Adding additional armor also helps solve the problem of him looking so top heavy. This costume's huge neck guard and mask are super bulky and make you feel like he's about to break his neck; by adding weight to the legs, its no long all concentrated at his head. If you compare it to actual helmets, I think its roughly based off of the frogmouth helmet, which has one, continuous neck piece like the black masks. I would adapt it to look more like a closed helmet or a armet, which have a similar shape but much clearer plating and hinges and thus appear less stiff and might have better mobility.

My last major gripe is the cape, because it is SUCH a wasted opportunity. The torn fabric, while matching his frayed hems, is so boring; a cape made out of feathers would convey the crow idea so much better, and give him a sort of dark knight fantasy vibe that would look wonderful imo. You could even show the iridescence of the feathers, which would tie well into the black-grey-blue palette excellently. Im thinking something like the cape below, or possibly like the crowfeather set from bloodborne if you want some extra drama.

As for the belt, I'm fairly neutral on them; I could take or leave them really. You could remove them if you wanted to simplify the design, or keep them if you wanted an edgier look or to incorporate more bdsm elements, but in that case I would change them to look more like actual bondage belts and not, you know, normal pants belts.

Overall, when ranking these outfits for my powerpoint, I gave this one dead last placement and a solid 2/10 personal ranking.

[wolfisland]

hey do you have any first time concert tips

YES!

just as a disclaimer, im physically disabled, australian, and i live in a large city, and those can definitely make a difference here

but heres some tips or things i generally try to follow for myself, under the cut!

⭐ always carry portable chargers. multiple if possible

⭐ stay hydrated. enclosed venues get hot and sweaty and gross and if youre moving around a lot you WILL get dehydrated. some venues offer free water, take advantage of it. also stay masked bc i cannot stress enough what a perfect breeding ground for illness venues can be

⭐ protect your ears. there are loads of noise reduction earbuds marketed towards concerts and loud environments in particular, and honestly in my experience theyre kind of overpricer, but protection is absolutely vital, ESPECIALLY in smaller venues in my experience. noise over 70db over prolonged periods of time will start to damage your hearing and ive seen 90db as the LOWER end for concerts ive been to.

��� if you have any headphones or earbuds with active noise cancellation these are also great options, i actually prefer wearing my headphones just with anc on than i do my silly little specialized loop earbuds.

⭐ try not to go to these events alone if you can help it. most concerts are at night and most concerts are at licensed venues and whether youre drinking or not, there will likely be people acting like fools around you. it goes without saying to NEVER accept a drink you didnt watch be mixed or opened yourself.

⭐ make sure people know where you are and make sure you always have enough money easily accessible to you (either in cash, or in your bank account) to pay for an uber or cab or whatever. if its a big concert theres a decent chance itll fuck up public transport. ive left shows at 11 pm and not gotten home til 3 am just because of how crowded shit is and how fucked public transport is after like 10-11 pm

⭐ get your concert merch before the show starts. like every time i am so serious if you wait til after the show 7 times out of 10 whatever you want will be gone.

⭐ if theres an opener i can almost promise you you will not see your headliner for like half an hour after the opener finishes. go pee now

⭐ in some areas if youre disabled just call the venue and ask for accommodations. i can usually make sure i get seated (for free) because im disabled and it makes such a huge difference its not even funny. like just ask. theres no harm in asking, worst case scenario is they say they cant help when you were gonna to to the show anyways. some venues will also make sure security keeps an eye on you so you can exit safely after the show too.

⭐ if youre trying to get close to the front at a show, barricade for example, youre almost always gonna need to show up way earlier than you think you are. an hour? try three. get there early and make yourself comfortable. itll suck and you might not even get close but when you do it fucking rules

⭐ dont be that person who has to get told to shut up. dont be rude or heckle the artists if they arent taking the piss themselves. dont throw shit at them. dont try and climb up on the stage. dont keep yelling while theyre talking. dont interrupt them while theyre talking by showing requests for stuff that isnt on the setlist. if youre close to the stage you might be able to see the setlist (and you might even get the setlist after the show if youre close enough or linger around) OR you can probably search up sets the artists have played recently to get a better idea. dont be a tool.

⭐ pit etiquette sucks rn. covid has made people forgot how to fucking behave and if the artist themselves doesnt set some boundaries dont trust that the venues rules around pits will be respected either. i am so serious. people die in pits so be careful. also tbh almost always unless youre like BIG VENUE big, if you call for a pit and wont get in it yourself youre nothing to me sorry

⭐ if you can, support the openers too! if youre lucky theyll be at the merch stands themselves after if the stand is selling their merch too. definitely go say hi and grab like a shirt or sticker or poster or cd or whatever if you can.

⭐ you will get charged like $20 for a vodka redbull. dont let them charge you $20 for a vodka redbull. pre game elsewhere if youre gonna drink.

⭐ if i think of anything else ill come back here and drop it, feel free to dm me about any of this

[wherethegravelsthin]

now that the dust has largely settled on the conversation (and I've gotten my Taylor Swift eras tour tickets) I wanna briefly touch on the "fat" scene in anti hero as a 250lb+ woman who is a huge Swiftie and has been since literally the debut era. I'm gonna put this under a cut bc it's long but it's important to me as a fattie and a swiftie to say something on this

So the word "fat" has two uses, right, in our decrepit society. The first use is just a descriptor, and it's one I'd use to describe myself. I am a fat woman. That is just a descriptive fact about my body. Buuuut.... because we live in a society that idealizes thinness even to health-complicating extremes, being fat is often considered a derogatory thing. I'd say to my coworkers that I'm fat and they'd always respond, "Oh, you're not fat!" because they think I'm using the "insult" version of fat, instead of just, saying that I'm fat, because I am.

All this to say is that there is a lot of touchiness about the word fat and its uses, and so you need to take that into consideration when looking at Taylor's original use of it in the Anti-Hero music video -- and I also wanna say when I watched the original version I wasn't even thinking of fatphobia and it honestly brought me to tears because, believe it or not, I've struggled myself with disordered eating and restrictive patterns.

But I have finally decided I too have/had an issue with her using the word "Fat" on the scale, and I'm glad she changed it, and let me explain why: because the word "fat" on the scale, since it was obviously not referring to physical size or description (not to be controversial, but Being Fat isn't exactly a struggle Taylor Swift can claim), it had to be referring to the derogatory usage of the word 'fat', and, yeah, it kinda makes sense for us fatties to be sick to death of thin people being like "the worst thing that we could ever envision happening to us is that our bodies will look like yours!". like. C'mon.

I saw a lot of "this isn't fatphobia this is ridiculous activists are going too far" when the drama was happening which made me unhappy because I think we've come pretty far on most micro aggressions and discriminations against marginalized groups in our society, but fat people does continue to be a sticking point for many. C'mon. I literally have two shops at my local gigantic mall that I can shop at for clothes, and I'm not even that big of a fat person. There are fat people bigger than me. I have not faced years of medical discrimination and bullying at the hands of my peers for thin people to decide what is, and isn't, fatphobia.

It's just really sad, ultimately, because disordered eating comes from, at its heart of hearts, a fear of being fat. That statement, "the worst thing that we could ever envision happening to us is that our bodies will look like yours", how many times in my career as a barista did I ask thin people if they wanted whipped cream and they'd laugh and say "ohh nooo I shouldn't" when I am literally the size I am standing in front of them. Why shouldn't you, Susan? What are you so scared will happen if you dare to have whipped cream on your stupid fucking latte. Do you think one latte and that's it, you'll look like me for the rest of your existence? Being fat is the most common fear among thin people in our society, and it's so normalized, and it shouldn't be. The diet industry is worth $8 billion annually, and that price rises every year we don't scream about how when fat people are given gastric bypass surgeries their suicide rate JUMPS up.

You see this a little in Miss Americana, when she's talking about her disordered eating habits, which again I relate to, but she says, "it's better for people to think you look fat than to look sick", as though being fat is, again, a bad thing. It's not. Like... I'm hardly ever cold. I have so much room for all the tattoos I want. My titties are enormous. My double chin and my big belly are not character flaws, they're body parts. It would make me happy to see more fat acceptance in the Swiftie community. The first step towards getting over our fear of being fat has to come from real acceptance of fat bodies. That is the only way we take on disordered eating, the diet industry, all of it.

[c-chickens]

Good morning/afternoon/evening my fellow jjk fans. With the release of chapter 136 of the manga, i can now say with absolute confidence that

We're fucked.

So i say yes we're most definitely fucked, but how about we explore why were fucked and why everyone in jjk is fucked and get super sad about it? Because thats fun. Obviously big big big spoilers for all of the jjk manga ahead.

Neither can any of us, kusakabe

So lets start off with talking about what the hell getwo just did: my mans is essentially awakening hundreds of ppl with newfound cursed abilities and power, one half of which got their hidden abilities activated like junpei and the other that got theirs from a cursed object like Itadori. Now, this by itself would still be an issue, but by itself its not too awful right? Well when you combine that with 1) the damages and deaths of shibuya 2) Itadori's execution bc we KNOW this shit is coming, and 3) the inbalance created by Gojo's sealing,((assuming that getwo successfully escapes with the prison)), it makes things much much more hectic.

And, on top of that, getwo activated this shit immediately, and from the pan-over to tsumiki, it can be assumed that these people are waking up at the exact same time as these events in shibuya are playing out currently, which is even more of a problem bc now the question is: what are the higher ups of the jujutsu world going to prioritize? Killing itadori yuuji bc of sukuna's actions or  taking care of the new curse users?

And i say this because they're going to need sorcerers out in the field to find and apprehend these people asap, especially now that Gojo's gone. Sorcerers that they don't really have atm. It was established early on that jujutsu sorcerers are always understaffed, and so with many in the area being either dead, out of commission, and/or disabled, they're going to need as much help as they can get. So i think its possible that they just put more restrictions on itadori for now at least. This also means that the time for rest is likely going to be cut short, and we’ll unfortunately have to see these characters work their asses off and risk their lives some more.

But that aside, thinking about the large scale implications of what happened at shibuya is also going to have to come into play here. Thousands of people are dead. How is the government supposed to explain this? In fact, how do they explain events like these in general? What relationship does the jujutsu world have with the government and how much do they know? Besides itadori, who will have to answer for this damage? And how will regular people take these events? Their families and friends are dead, will they get the truth? You also have to wonder how sorcerers overseas will view these events. Given that Japan seems to be a hotspot for cursed spirits and things of that nature, will they come to help out? The costs to fix these damages come into play as well, and we've seen a crumb of how this will affect the economy from Mei Mei so it will be interesting to see if we get any more answers to that too.

But these are just the more massive events that will be happening at once. We'll also see fushiguro having to find out that his sister is awake in the worst fucking way possible, finding out who's actually alive, seeing characters cope with having disabilities, seeing everyone's reaction to what sukuna/itadori did, reactions to gojo being sealed, and how everyone's going to cope with the deaths of their comrades. So uh. We got a lot of shit here, don't we?

Will anyone actually be able to rest? It really just depends on how akutami wants this to play out. And that goes for all of what I've talked abt here, which is why each chapter continues to get so fucking hype. The stakes keep rising and the events that unfold continue to best my expectations ever single time. I am truly excited to go through the hell that akutami is crafting for us, bc i think this next arc has the potential to be even better than this one.

[hello-imasalesman]

Better late than never! Forgot to post these earlier. Chapter 4 notes behind the cut, in chronological order:

-““I won’t be a crone at thirty,” she says, though sounds thoroughly unconvinced as soon as such a large, decrepit number leaves her sixteen year old mouth.” = self dunk. the years start coming and they don’t stop coming

-derby has surprise passed Pinky off numerous times and most of the time bif is just surprised pikachu face that Derby’s voluntold him what to do.

-I love Gord so much. gord is literally defcon five trying to get out of this fucking room before pinky eats his ass alive. I think only Bif and Derby can really withstand her tantrums

-“Does this random ass jock even know who Derby, Derby Harrington, does he even KNOW who DERBY HARRINGTON IS!” Bif baby girl the only person who cares about Derby is like, you. And the preps. And maybe a few others. You are so obtuse YOU ARE SO IN LOVE AHHH

-I LOVE Kirby and I also love the fact that he has the weirdest fucking voicelines. The feet shit is canon. Or maybe one of the rumors that gets passed around by the non-clique kids. Either way. poor Trent :’)

- bif “huh, none of these straight romance stories appeal to me. is it because I’m not a girl? That’s it :)” taylor-tremblay

-piiiiinnnkkkkkky

-PIIIIIIIIINNNNNKKKKKKKYYYY

-it was really important to me that Pinky doesn’t get fridged in any way for this, because she’s very much set up for it and it’s the easy way out. Her and Bif share a lot of camaraderie dealing with Derby; they’re friends, not enemies. And even separate from Derby, I think Bif’s also a boy she feels safe around (namely, because he’s very, very gay, not that he realizes it yet) and Pinky is a girl which he doesn’t have to pretend to be straight around because she’s “derby’s girl”, and that dynamic is kind of rare at Bullworth, really.

-bully is hilarious bc every dog always wants to jump your ass, which has translated into me immediately honing in on dogs and curb stomping them, lest he comes over to bite my ankle and make me go hunt someone kissable down to refill the health meter. When people who dont play bully watch you just run up to a dog who just looks like he has the zoomies and plant your foot straight into its head you definitely get some looks

-so lets start my most indulgent scene ever with a mean girls reference.

-aquaberry smells like holister/ Abercrombie but specifically the way it smelt when you were 13 roaming the mall unsupervised and feral and yearning.

-random but a thing that is weirdly dear to me about bully is that EVERY character has a name. mr Carmichael is the aquaberry store associate. There are no unnamed mooks. they dont make em like that anymore…. golden age of free roam third person rpgs…. :’)

-*head in hands* they’re so in love and they’re so fucking stupid

-this line makes me want to cry. the intimacy of it. every morning starts w him.

-So. The nanny line. It’s canon, but I hesitated counting this line to mean anything other than the joke it was intended to be back in 07, when a few years earlier Mary Kay Letournou got married and South Park had a kindergartener date their female teacher. there was a weird cultural period in the 00s i distinctly remember where real life instances of male children being prayed on by female caretakers was in the forefront and openly? ridiculed? when it’s not a joke. (And it goes hand in hand w the misogyny of the 00s, the thrashing gasps of gender roles pushing back w mocking of ‘metrosexuals’ and etc etc. you know. if someone hasn’t written a thesis on this yet for their modern American pop culture history class or whatever someone needs to. ) if you want to count R* line as satire, it’s hamfisted at best, poor taste at worst. but I’ll take it seriously; i’ll eat the onion, so to speak. for intensely personal reasons, but also because I do think it explains a lot about Derby in both canon and my interpretation of him, and im confident enough that I can do it justice :)

- an amaryllis kind of looks like a daffodil (bulb flower), and means pride in flower language

- gords interest in bif this chapter (and not that they’re not friends, but Bif is only an ok conversationalist and not a gossip, so he’s not always Gord’s first choice to hang) was spurned on by Bif’s outburst in the last. The anger and all. Except, Gord doesn’t realize the defensiveness comes from the shared being poor thing w Bryce but the other secret bif keeps close to his chest :’)

-derby as meat Carrie…..

-for being a fighting game I can’t believe it took this long for a fighting scene. And I really wanted one scuffle as opposed to boxing, which is similar but has its own set of rules and terms

-the next (sigh) two chapters are mostly gut wrenching and pulse ratcheting but I want to end this on a high note w my favorite thing ever:

getting to write the word “fart knocker” in a story that will also hopefully make you tear up at least once

[ratplagues]

🔥 any dishonored thing of ur choosing -deathoftheoutsider

wah okay!! i will talk a bit about the outsider and void then..i dont really wanna frame it as a Hot Take bc i have no interest in starting shit or whatever like ill interact with whatever i want to in this fandom and ignore the rest and everyone else is free to do the same but.

I do not think The Outsider is a “character” in the conventional sense, much less that it does his character or the allegory he wields any justice to be shipped with anyone in the series (at least without seriously considering the implications and framing it in a way that completes the allegory. more on this later)

the outsider and his void are an allegory for Otherness; i’m namely gonna frame it as queerness and neurodiversity, but really anything could fit as long as it’s about you feeling seen as a marginalized and othered person. he is written to represent this allegory, not to be a person with a satisfying narrative arc or dimensions. this is why some people feel that he lacks depth-- he’s not supposed to have depth compared to others in the series, he’s mostly a vehicle for what he represents, and is supposed to be easy to identify with or recognize.

he was born to a life of hardship, suffered at the hands of the rich and powerful, was ignored, cast out, etc. etc. a familiar story. poor, queer, nd, really whatever you wanna frame it as. he was a nobody outcast. in comes the envisioned, they pick him to serve as their martyr and idol without his permission. he then had his name cut away and forgotten, and was thrust onto a pedestal to spend the rest of eternity being worshipped by other outcasts who had suffered at the same hands he had. he has something greatly in common with those who worship him, including the very people who stripped his mortality from him in the first place, but because of this shared hardship (and nothing else), his own autonomous personhood was disregarded completely in favor of The Community needing someone Just Like Them to idolize. if this sounds familiar, that’s because it should!!

his humanity was taken from him, and in his place, an idol was created. his human body is frozen in stone in the center of the void-- retired. out of commission. no longer needed. he was immortalized, transcended. this is traditionally desired, although dishonored is trying to convince you that it is not actually desirable. in the age of internet content creation, you can be immortalized without even being present, without knowing about it. you become what you can do for other people, and what you cannot. people fall in love with an idea of you, the idea of you being like them, and other people come to hate you deeply without even knowing you. people came to hate the outsider more deeply than he ever had been when he was human-- he wasn’t seen when he was human. a pedestal only helps you to be seen. the outsider had the choice made for him to achieve immortality in exchange for the simple joys of being un-known.

he spends all of doto trying to convey this idea to billie through the hollows:

"There is freedom in being hated. There is license in being cast out. Some learn this lesson a little too well."  "These people lay their thoughts, their petty wants, their murderous desires in front of me to witness. I cannot turn away." "We carry what was done to us through the rest of our endless days. No one asked if we wanted it." (i like this one. he speaks for the community-- this is a shared experience, one everyone can recognize. however, as a Queer Figure, he never asked for this. he never asked to be immortalized. i like the double meaning here)

not to mention, the entire extent of the outsider’s Sole ability and influence on the real world is to “choose” people and give them untold power over others. this is a fun ironic twist on what marginalized groups endure from powerful people, (dishonored is largely about power imbalances and socioeconomic hierarchies) but it’s also fun to think about in the context of the role model/fan framing-- so many worshippers give their lives to be “chosen” by him. it’s easily framed as an exaggeration of otherwise very real power imbalances and often the flagrant breaching of boundaries existing between creators and fans.

and on the subject of the VOID...ohht he void.....

the void should be a haven for queer folks. for nd folks. it’s wanted by so many to be a safe space, it should be, it’s the Other World! it’s renounced by the abbey, crusaded against, even. but it isn’t. it’s just this limitless, eons-old horizon that hungers and starves for something to fill it. if the outsider is the lament of queer idolatry, the void is the lament of queer Hunger. it is roaming, and restless. it does not belong to the outsider; the outsider cannot survive without it. it’s the desire to belong, not a place of belonging.

the void craves this idol, this outsider-- i, for one, have often experienced hunger for a truly moral and just role model, someone to make the world Right, and i know this is another shared feeling. those who worship the outsider, who drive themselves mad trying to see him or be chosen by him, are suffering from this idol hunger. you see this in a lot of queer and nd kids and young adults. i grew up just having my life and interests like, punctuated by different fixations on different people that i didn’t know at all, only fell in love with the idea of. it happens a lot.

there’s a couple more doto quotes that really highlight this for me:

"They carve my mark into the old bones bleached by the sun. They carve my mark into their skin. They learn true hunger in the Void." "All these charms, these runes and fetid offerings on shrines made for me, will be nothing more than objects worn of meaning. Bones and dead things, thrown into the dirt."

“They learn true hunger in the Void.” is something that i wanna touch on real quick. people can spend their lives obsessing over the idea of what they think the void will cure for them, will fix in their lives, only to find out that it’s just a hollow manifestation of the emptiness they’ve felt all their lives. it’s not the needs met, but the need itself. you have to make the home, it doesn’t already exist and you can’t fucking run to it. it is heartbreaking, frustrating, one of the bleakest messages i’ve ever encountered in a game, but i’ve never felt more seen. by submitting to these ideas, the idea of a perfect unhuman human and the idea of a perfect otherworldly home, you are surrendering your humanity. you’re not only being transformed by the powers gained (if they are gained), you’re essentially dissolving with hunger after never having these needs met. you see so many people in these games whittling themselves down to nothing but base need. empty apartments occupied only by shrines, sometimes containing their corpses. journals of people dedicating their lives to the worship of the outsider, always ending darkly.  "I will find this empty place. Somehow the key to open the Void will fall into my hands. In time, I will learn the secret and he will call to me as he called to her."

not to mention The New Envisioned-- prolonged exposure to the void will always, without fail, turn a human into silver void stone. these creatures can no longer interact with or acknowledge the mortal world. they have surrendered themselves to hunger, and cannot be saved. this is celebrated by the cult, honored by them, even. i honestly like....i pity them, and i hate them, and i recognize that i’ve been those people, lmao. when i was at my worst as a teenager, i wasnt so much a person as i was just a shell full of hunger and heartbreak. my personality was defined by who i was a fan of. i think i definitely was Less Human then. the cult of the outsider is a universal experience!!

dishonored, at its core, is a celebration of humanity. it asks you to celebrate human emotion and weakness despite greed and bigotry. the powers are not to be wanted, they are to be ignored, refused. it is human to hunger, but it is Queer and Divergent to make hunger your life’s meaning, to need to learn the secret, find the key, be chosen and loved and cherished, to be made whole by some perfect thing. to find your humanity in something un-human. dishonored sees all that, mourns it with you, and then asks you to find humanity in each other !! love the spine of your lover, the blood draining down the docks, the pause to stretch languidly in the sun of a work day.

and finally...on the topic of outsider shipping....i dont think that, in his god form, it does him much justice to be shipped with anyone. he’s not much of a person, just a projection of his former self and a vehicle for his allegory as discussed-- im sure he could be shipped like this, but it just isn’t satisfying to me in any way. however, let’s talk a bit about his lethal and nonlethal ending. DOTO asks you to make a choice. is it better to give him an abrupt and merciful ending, after deciding that the fury he’s endured at the hands of others’ famine is too much trauma for any mortal to live with? or will you decide that it’s only fair to give him a chance to live the life he never got to, to return his humanity that was taken without his consent? if you choose to free him from the void, i think you can very very easily make the argument that he can be shipped with corvo, or anyone else that can easily be shipped w/ ppl. he’s finally free to live his life as a queer man, can explore the simple and complex joys of being human with other people, navigate the hills and valleys he never got to before. corvo’s just a nice pick bc 1) experienced human/inexperienced human is good, 2) they know each other, but they don’t. this is a good setup. 3) corvo is an older queer man and uhh you cant convince me otherwise lol! and older queer/younger queer is a self indulgence for me. also corvo is just nice. i think he would enjoy helping the outsider navigate his new humanity.

just some thoughts i have running through my head all hours of the day :) this is really long cuz its a combination of a lot of infodumps from discord lmfao

[standarrow]

abbacchio essay under the cut because he’s so important to me (god this is so long im sorry i have adhd i hope this is readable<3)

tl;dr being on how i think he healed and handled up until part 5 :”) + thoughts on his relationship to the team

tw!!! for all of the usual things that pertain to his backstory including: [death, alcohol abuse, police, ptsd/depression, etc]

i may be projecting<3 its fine

to start:

im not a fan of the way a lot of people handle handle abbas trauma and illness. the "entering a relationship fixes your problems<3" shit. or the romanticization of depression...i see both a lot, along with utilizing his substance issues as like a catalyst. i dont have to say why that shit isnt ok or healthy.

getting into it (because i want it to be this deep):

there is ... a lot of guilt that he shoulders around the death of his partner. someone he was friends with (and relied on him as a literal partner) died because He fucked up. that person wanted to protect him and died selflessly while he'd broken his own morals and he feels like it should have been him to pay for it. 

but he wasnt. and now he suddenly has two mistakes and blood on his hands. getting fired doesnt even Begin to fix that, so he withdraws because he cant trust himself, cant trust the institution he was already disillusioned from, and imo hes angry that he didnt get punished worse for his own crimes (but cops always get off easy)

bruno finds him in the worst place of his life and gives him a chance to put schedule in his life, to protect even if its not in the way he originally thought he would. he still doesnt trust himself, i do not think he takes to working with a partner easily (what if he fucks up again. he'll get bruno/narancia/fugo killed.) and i think that reflects in why moody blues isnt meant for combat. combat = danger. 

obligatory moody blues being an allegory for his trauma and ptsd surrounding the death of his partner.. constantly haunted by his own mistake and reliving that moment. heavily referencing his wish to redo, to know every detail of that prick he let bribe him that killed his partner, to have Control. because abbacchio isnt really about The Moment -- he's making sure the Moment doesnt have a chance to come to fruition. its nipping it in the bud before the weed can kill. he wants to make sure he can figure out whats going on First and protect. to figure out past events and prevent future danger.

starting to heal:

i’ve done a timeline previously: he graduates high school in 1998, six months for the police academy, 6 months before hes out again.. joins passione in december (rainy season) of 1999, and by december of 2000 (~4 months before part 5) hes like.... well. doing better in terms of his alcoholism. we see abbacchio by part 5 occasionally and seemingly comfortably enjoying a glass or two, which speaks that after some time working hes sort gained some..... confidence in his ability to keep his intake low. 

working for bruno means he cant drink as often or binge as much, hes needed and that structure keeps him in check, its not easy and yes he slips but its about and overall upwards climb because any progress is good progress... he builds a rapport with the team, comes to appreciate brunos role in giving him a chance and some peace of mind, sees himself in fugo, treats narancia like a little brother. relationships with others cant Fix your problems but friendship and structure can help, they can be there when you need it.

hes starting to trust himself more. and his relationship to fugo and nara were as crucial as his one with bruno is.

in purple haze feedback we see that he's been teamed up with fugo, and he knows fugos stand ability very well (see mirror man fight)... they Get each other and abbacchio sees a lot of his anger and distrust at himself in fugo, and easily calms fugo down when he gets upset (see mirror man episode in the car) 

fugo helped him trust himself and others more .. that other people arent Fragile and arent going to die on him every time they get into danger and its not His fault. he relies on fugo and vice versa. the kid is powerful but also a smart tactician and extremely capable. they Get each other and it helps abbacchio trust himself in combat situations and helps calm his paranoia about getting someone killed while working ... and nara is just sunshine. hes an annoying little brother but it helps him retain normalcy. some sense of like. not everything is doom and gloom

his depression and general self? depreciation perhaps doesnt leave him because those kinds of thoughts mould your brain a certain way.. they dont just go away without some work. but perhaps time with bruno helps him start to realise his worth, the way the team appreciates him and his ability. his self consciousness can start to fall away a little bit. i think by the time december of 2000 (a year after his recruitment by my timeline) hes like... a lot more comfortable with the schedule of his life, it helps him get out of bed, gives his brain a structure to latch onto. the responsibility of overseeing the younger ones and helping bruno gives him the sort of hope for this original goal of wanting to protect

@ bruno (in a more romantic sense perhaps + why i think he distrusts giorno so much)

his relationship to bruno isnt fucking “godlike savior<3″ because thats.... needless to say Very unhealthy. 

their relationship doesnt reach a point by where i think Either would even want to enter a relationship until about a year in (~4 months before part 5 begins)... theres a certain uncertainty i think bruno has with wanting to help abbacchio, he respects and cares about the other man and canonically sees him as his senior.. and i think theres a certain wall there that bruno isnt sure he wants to try to knock down, meanwhile abbacchio isnt sure when he built those walls but theyre safe (and what happens if you try to reach out?)

i think they sort of fall into it and its not... planned. its a little impulsive but it feels natural and they help each other because bruno is this comfort to abba, is the reason he has this structure and has made this progress himself and hes not....crediting it all to bruno obviously but bruno did play a Large Role. and bruno is all about little white lies, appearances. Yes hes fine. Dont worry, he has things under control. 

and i think to an extent abbacchio knows of brunos softer spots (as does fugo, bc of the reason he and fugo team up as described in phf is to protect him) but abba doesnt realise to the extent that bruno is .... hiding his real fears. brunos a lot about compartmentalization (hi zippers) and being let into brunos internal... thoughts beyond the occasional worries he mightve shared is a big step for them. bruno buries a lot of his internal problems and worries. he has to. hes got to keep moving, keep working; people rely on him... but abbacchio is the person he doesnt feel like he needs to protect because theyre equals and maybe he can let someone in to shoulder his worries and vice versa. theyre partners.

which is why i think abbacchio initially distrusts giorno so much... its not tht he doesnt trust bruno, but bruno doesnt Tell him about this. he realizes he might not know all brunos fears (specifically @ his distate and hate towards the mafia i made the point about in the bruno isnt evil post where its like.. he Couldntve shared that information, otherwise he would endanger abbacchio)

and it scares him. it freaks him the fuck out because he doesnt understand who this kid is or why bruno trusts him so much but he trusts bruno so he goes with it, even if he doesnt Understand.

anyways thts my TEDtalk ty i love you for reading this if you got here<3

[scripttorture]

1/? I have a character who has been caught up in a war between planets ever since he was a child. He was out into hiding from the age of 10 to 16, before watching his younger brother killed by the person prosecuting them and elder sister sell her planet (she's heir basically) to save his life and swore herself loyal to the person to save herself.

2/? (She isn't loyal, but she'd be killed otherwise.) The character is then sent to grow up on a different planet, with his mother who figureheads a resistance against the people who took the characters sister and killed his brother. That's basic backstory continuing the character eventually gets captured again, and it taken to a prison. The character is tortured in the prison bc he killed several very important people and cut off the hands of another. 3/? Its seen (by the torturers i suppose, or at least the woman ordering them to do so) as rightful punishment. I havnt quite hashed out exactly what the torture is other than he definitely by the end has rather severe nerve damage in his hands from the shackles and chronic pain/weakness in one of his legs from something or another. Anyway the characters sister was put in charge of this prison, 4/5 and has no choice but to stand by and watch as the character is tortured. She does her best to make sure he isn't killed and the character knows she has no choice but to let them hurt her bc she is just as much of a prisoner as him, albeit in an entirely seperate way. She could stop the torture, and she could get him out, but she would be killed for it and he knows it. Im just wondering if he would blame her, 5/5 because she is in charge and could stop it. But she would be killed and it would likely end with them both dead. She cares for him when she can which isn't often bc she isn't exactly allowed too. Would he blame her I suppose? She has never hurt him, but lets it happen.

-

Alright I understand what you’re going for here.

 It’s not the kind of situation that’s common enough for there to be systematic studies. Most of the time torturers and their victims don’t have a close relationship. It’s much more common to find cases where they were strangers or acquaintances prior to torture then close family or friends.

 This doesn’t make this a bad idea. It just means that there aren’t definitive answers. I’m working from a handful of anecdotes and extrapolating from other things.

 Even if this was a more common situation I don’t think you’d find many definite answers because individual variation would probably play a huge role.

 Torture changes things for survivors in a lot of unpredictable ways. While we know the possible symptoms what any individual ends up experiencing is unpredictable. And how well people cope with mental health problems, and how that in turn impacts their relationships is dependant on the person. Someone’s personal experience, friends, support network, work, general knowledge and a host of other things can effect these sorts of outcomes.

 Having that person also be tangentially involved in the survivor’s torture complicates things even further.

 What I’m trying to say is that there are a lot of plausible outcomes here and I think that makes this a writing question rather then a realism question. So the real focus is: what works best with the character?

 Blame is definitely possible in the scenario you’ve created but it doesn’t have to be straight-forward or simple.

 For instance the character might blame her while knowing logically that there’s nothing else she could do without putting both of them in more danger. And that could make him feel conflicted about blaming her, possibly feeding into self-blame as well. He could openly blame her, or he could hide his feelings for a variety of reasons.

 He might feel angry, that she’s ‘safer’ or that she can’t protect him. Or just because she ‘stands by’ and watches him at his worst. He might even come to hate her.

 But it’s also possible that he wouldn’t associate her with the torturers or guards and would view her more as a fellow (though perhaps favoured) prisoner. He might pity her. He might feel sympathetic towards her plight.

 He could plausibly have no strong feelings towards her at all.

 Whatever emotional response you think is best it’s important to tie it to what’s come before in the story.

 However you look at things he’s been away from his sister for a long time. It’s not clear to me how much time they spent together growing up (they could have been apart since he was 10 from the sounds of things).

 If they spent a lot of their childhood apart they may not have a close relationship to begin with. I don’t think that would make a particular response more likely but it could mean he has a less intense response to her presence generally. If they weren’t close before then he might not feel her presence is particular significant.

 If they were close then I think it’s a good idea to look back over the story. Read their interactions again and try to get a clear picture in your mind of what their relationship was before.

 Whatever happens you’re writing the process of how that relationship changes. And it’s really helpful to have a clear idea of where you’re starting from first. I personally find it helpful to have a clear idea of where I want to end up as well but some people prefer a more exploratory style where they find out where the characters end up as they write.

 It doesn’t matter which approach works better for you, what matters is that the intervening steps, the process of the relationship changing, are clear and understandable to your readers. And preferably pack a heavy emotional punch as well.

 So if blame is the result you want (if it isn’t use this as an example and apply the same process to the emotional response you want) think about what aspects of their relationship could feed into that.

 If they had a competitive or slightly antagonistic relationship then it might feel natural for him to place some blame on her. After all it’s probably an established pattern from their relationship. If he saw her as a protector and relied on her to keep him safe then this might feel like a huge betrayal.

 If they had a really loving, tender relationship then you might want to lean in to the illogical nature of the response. It might even be a good idea to have the character acknowledge (internally or verbally) that this isn’t a sensible response. And yet this does not make the feeling go away.

 With a more distant relationship did he feel like she betrayed her people or her family by ‘giving up’, regardless of how desperate the situation was? Or did he (as a kid raised in the rebellion) mostly view her as a prisoner?

 If he saw her as a prisoner and felt pity for her would that vanish as she stands by while he suffers? Or would it seem to confirm what he already thought; that she’s helpless, powerless.

 Find some part of their previous relationship that you can tie to this new set of feelings. Or acknowledge that it’s not a sensible response and have the character deal with more complex feelings as a result.

 Mostly try to resist the idea that there’s a ‘right’ response for your character to have.

 Try not to suggest in the story that there is one ‘proper’ response for a survivor to have. Because they are a varied bunch. People can live through more or less the same thing and come out with very different attitudes or perspectives as well as symptoms.

 The response you write should be the one that works best with your characters and the story you want to tell. Don’t feel you must use blame. Instead think about whether it adds to your story: does it create interesting character moments, obstacles for the characters or feed into the plot?

 You’re the person who knows what’s best for the story and what will work best with the characters. Be open to multiple options. Take your time and think through what works best.

 For the character himself it’s possible (may be likely) that he’d already have some trauma symptoms before he’s captured.

 I get the impression you’ve probably already seen the Masterpost on common trauma symptoms, but here it is for the new readers. :)

 For the physical injury pattern you’ve got multiple options.

 I think that really severe nerve damage suggests something more then shackles. Unless something went wrong.

 The easiest way to get both injuries in your character would be a suspension torture that was more common historically. Victims had their hands tied together in front of them, were hoisted anywhere between a few feet and two meters in the air and then dropped.

 This causes nerve damage in both hands and could cause breaks or fractures in the legs. Either could lead to chronic pain.

 Suspension without the drop would still cause nerve damage in about 15-20 minutes.

 Nerve damage is less common with restraints but it is still possible. Ratcheting cuffs that can tighten are more likely to cause nerve damage, especially if they’re applied too tightly over a long period.

 Other dangerous things that can happen with those sorts of restraints being too tight- Broken wrists and reduced circulation leading to painful swelling in the hands (look up ‘finger milking’ in my tags for more information).

 Over longer periods (multiple hours with the cuffs tight enough to cause swelling in the hands) blood clots might form and that uh… really dangerous. Basically if large blood clots start forming in a limb due to reduced circulation then they either block the blood vessels (which kills the limb and leads to amputation) or the clot gets swept back into the body when the restraints are removed. The clot usually then lodges in the brain or the heart causing a stroke or a heart attack respectively.

 I’d say suspension probably works better for your purposes.

 Standing stress positions can lead to chronic pain in the legs. But it often also effects the back and usually effects both legs.

 Falaka might work. It’s beating the soles of the feet with an implement. Depending on the implement it can be clean, scarring or even lethal. With a harder implement like a wooden stick it can lead to fractured or broken bones in the feet.

 But even when falaka is performed in a ‘clean’ manner it can lead to chronic pain. It causes a thickening of the tendons in the soles and also causes tiny bone fragments to detach inside the feet. It’s unclear how long these bone fragments stick around but they’re detectable by MRI for a few months with the right method.

 You could also just go with the idea of the leg injury being the result of a specific attack or accident. A broken knee perhaps, after a beating or a fall. Not all injuries in torture scenarios are ‘deliberate’, in the sense that they weren’t necessarily intentional. Because torturers are not as in control of the situation as they’d like people to believe.

 I think I’ll leave it at that for now, but if you have any further questions don’t hesitate to come by when the askbox is open. :)

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[sweets-r-cool]

Not the Right Birthday Present

Bakugo Katsuki x Reader

so- I think this would’ve been better if I didn’t get played by google bc when I clicked off of full screen all my work got reset at some point so it’s not as good bc I forgot what it said but yeah-

Warning: Angst

A birthday is supposed to be a happy day filled with presents, laughter, friends, sweets, and fun.

It took a certain kind of person to hate birthdays, and as much as Bakugo would say he hated how you and the extras that followed him around would make a huge deal out of his birthday, he couldn’t shake that stupid light and warm feeling that captured his chest.

The same one he would get every bright smile you’d send his way. The same one he got when you kissed his face more times than he could count, bouncing up and down as you gushed with excitement when he got down on one knee, asking you to be his for life. That same feeling he got when he pushed that gold ring onto your finger as you did the same to him. 

Looking back on it, you were generally the cause for that damn feeling that invaded his chest. Even Bakugo couldn’t stop himself from genuinely laughing as you wiped cake crumbs off your face after tripping as you tried and failed to cake him on the two of you’s wedding day. 

Birthdays were supposed to be filled with happiness, not grief, regret, confusion, and hurt. God, did it hurt.

All Bakugo felt now was the opposite. Heavy, like gravity had betrayed him as his footsteps were heavier than ever before. His whole body was fatigued from fighting against the strong pull that made him feel like he was going to fall into the ground. Hopeless and unmotivated, the ash blonde didn’t even want to get out of bed.

 Was there a point? 

You weren’t there to complain at him to make breakfast. You weren’t there to make breakfast yourself, not standing the kitchen in one of his shirts that covered your entire torso as well as a good part of your thighs. He wouldn’t be able to sneak up on you and hug you from behind, burying his nose in the crook of your neck, feeling your warmth and the stove.

Things were just cold. And empty.

Bakugo laid in bed, exhausted for so many reasons.

...

Things were so calm, so dark it was nearly impossible to see anything, even if you squinted. Part of the perks of a house just barely on the edge of the city, away from the blinding lights and the loud noises of bustling night life.

Things were quiet, save for your rhythmic breathing as your chest moved up and down.

Out of nowhere, you shot up, and so did Bakugo who was unable to sleep already due to a weird feeling in his chest. Not the warm one, but rather one that told him it wouldn’t be good to sleep right now, a sort of anxiety. 

You had shot up due to the fact things had changed in the matter of one (1) second. There was an explosion, followed by two (2) more and now things weren’t calm, or dark, or peaceful. 

Peeks of a dim orange light shone through the blinds that were previously closed. A groan naturally came from you as you moved to reach for the blue light shining from your phone as Bakugo looked through the window.

You sighed with a slightly laugh, “Hm, we really can’t rest. Huh, Bub?”

In a matter of ten (10) or even less minutes, you and Bakugo were suited up and in your cars.

Out of all the times, 3 am was when the villains chose to launch a large attack on the better part of the city. But, of course, because that was what villains were. Nothing but inconveniences until Bakugo beat the shit out of them and got them to a jail cell.

“So, what exactly is going on?” you asked Deku on a call connected to the Bluetooth of the car as Bakugo sped- definitely going over the speed limit, but it wasn’t like it mattered at the moment.

The green-haired hero had barely managed to explain before more explosions went off and the line went dead. You were worried, but there was no choice but to push it down, as you were already at the scene. 

It looked like the apocalypse. 

Fire was everywhere, cars crashed, building crumbled, there wasn’t a bit of glass in sight left unshattered. 

The causes were at the center of it all, all the chaos. Countless heroes were already injured, but those who weren’t passed out stood as best as they could against the villains.

You and Bakugo had your work cutout for you.

That didn’t stop from an animalistic grin working its way onto Bakugo’s face as he warmed up with a few smaller explosions. 

~

It was now late into the morning. No one was entirely sure what time it was, but the sun was visible making things a lot easier. The known villains had finally been apprehended, but the damage was done.

It was time to check for survivors, the worst part in most heroes opinion. It always left a sad feeling inside of them, knowing how many lives were not saved. There was still fire everywhere, and of course, there was still a chance of villains roaming around that hadn’t been discovered yet, no one was letting their guards down. 

You had been able to keep a relatively neutral expression this entire time, not an ounce of fear evident. Though, you knew it was simply because there Katsuki was beside you. 

Bakugo had felt the same way, only before he noticed one of the attacks getting way too close to taking your life, had you not narrowly dodged it.

The aura around you always made him feel like everything was gonna be okay, at least eventually. In his eyes, you were the meaning of resilience, always bouncing back from any situation. The ash blonde was trying to keep that in mind.

Being a hero was tough, everyone knew. 

After more deaths of those close to you than should have been normal, you were still fine. Still able to proceed with life as normal.

It was different at this moment.

You had flinched significantly when you realized there was a little girl trapped in a burning building. There was no doubt, the building was extremely unstable, and would crumble any minute. The gash going from your collarbone to your shoulder didn’t look good, so Bakugo immediately stepped up.

“I’ll go,” he stated, already on the way before you stopped him.

Time was running out quick, “No, I’ll go,” you said, pushing both hands on his chest as you looked directly in his eyes pleadingly.

“You’re injured, dumbass,” he scoffed, continuing despite you still trying to block him.

You sighed, pushing him harder, “I’m going, Katsuki,” you pressed, “You know that you’re sweating like hell right now, it’s not worth that risk.”

You moved off him when he stopped. He hated that you were right, he didn’t like this. Not at all. He wanted to do it.

You smiled, about to run off before Bakugo had caught your wrist in his larger hand. You turned, “Katsuki-”

He cut you off, “Just come back to me, alright?”

You nodded, “Of course, I have things planned for your birthday next week, but I can give you one of the presents early later,” you teased, smiling even as you parted, getting closer to the girl and farther from him as you entered the building immediately working on getting to her.

There was far too many things the both of you noticed that went unsaid. However, there were reasons they went unsaid. 

The reality of the situation was far from good, or even okay. It was worse than ever. You’d both known from the start a lot of people had died, and were going to die. But it was also that Bakugo had noticed the way you shook, as if you had been freezing.

It was fear.

You had noticed Bakugo’s quirk was overused, as well as the fact his arm was definitely broken.

Bakugo couldn’t have gone. It was simple as that. If he’d gone it would just be stupid, putting everyone at risk. He might not have been able to carry the girl, or his quirk- which again, was overused- could’ve gone haywire, setting off explosions. Though the latter wasn’t likely, it was still a risk that shouldn’t be taken.

Bakugo didn’t like the unsureness in your smile, and definitely not the way it completely faded from your face the moment you turned. 

It was because you knew that the building might not just crumble. 

It had been one minute since you had gone into the building, Bakugo knew because he was subconsciously counting. It had been one minute, and he was being dragged away from the building by three (3) other heroes.

Something felt feral in him, he snapped, “What- What the fuck are you bastards doing?!” 

“It’s not safe, Ground Zero Sir!” one of them shouted, struggling against Bakugo’s thrashing. 

“Of- fucking- course, it’s not, but I’ll be fine outside!” the blonde hero screamed, the heroes- despite outnumbering him- could only hold him down on the spot that was far enough they wouldn’t be fatally injured, but still too close to the range of which they could be hit by flying debris and injured pretty bad.

“What do you mean, Sir?” another one questioned, “that building could blow up, it’s an apartment building so there’s a chance of one of the water heaters exploding. That could kill anyone.”

The rest of the world seemed to numb for Bakugo. Everything always went quiet before the storm.

Bakugo had to watch as the building exploded just like the other heroes had said. 

Bakugo had to watch as the event that most likely costed him the love of his live’s life unfolded in front of him.

He had to watch as all his light in the world shrived to nothing but ash and debris. A part of him still had hope despite the burning hole in his being. 

Bakugo tugged himself out of the heroes’ grasps, running towards the pile of broken concrete. Your quirk should’ve saved you somehow. In some way, it did something. That was probably what happened, right?

Bakugo’s being was shaking as he dug, pushing chunks of broken walls off. He had no idea where you were, but he’d find you. Finally, the blonde saw a piece of your costume, he moved more debris until he was able to uncover your limp body.

You were already gone.

Bakugo hand quivered as he moved hair out of your face. “Y-Y/n...” things were getting blurry, “Y/n, wake up,” the blonde pleaded. 

This couldn’t be happening. This was some cruel joke you were pulling to get back at him for something he did, probably. 

Bakugo’s breath was quickening in an unhealthy fashion, “W-Wake up, you damn-” it was like bitter weights filled Bakugo’s mouth as he lacked the ability to think about anything other than your name. “Y/n?!” he began to shake you a little.

You had so much more stuff left to do. So much to do together. Bakugo’s jaw clenched as he held you closer to him. His breath hitched, it felt like he was being stabbed in the stomach repeatedly. 

This couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be.

This was some cruel joke. Maybe even a dream. He really wanted it to be.

...

Bakugo woke up. He was sweating and his lungs hurt, he was breathing quick but he refused to open his eyes.

He didn’t want to take in reality. He might’ve been forced to do that if he did open his eyes.

A feathery touch to his cheek made him flinch. Prying his eyes open as he was unable to understand what was going on this very moment. “Hey, Bub,” your soft, just over a whisper voice cooed, “It’s your birthday!” you giggled, sitting upright on the bed besides him.

Bakugo felt the warmth invade his chest, only slightly this time as you continued, “I know you don’t want to wake up right now, but Mina, and the boys will be over later in the morning.” You glowed, your cheeks slightly flushed from how happy you were for a birthday that wasn’t even yours as you continued to rake your hands through Bakugo’s ash blonde locks.

Bakugo grunted when he felt his lips turn upwards. Not wanting you to see, he moved to bury his head in your lap, eliciting a giggle from you, as you continued to stroke his hair.

When he wrapped his arms around you somehow despite the position your were in, you scoffed playfully. “I woke you up for a reason, silly,” you admitted, ignoring Bakugo’s grunt of protest when you began to move to get up, “Please, Bub? I wanted to show you something before I go,” you pleaded.

Begrudgingly, Bakugo let you go and only after a second or two that you got up, he did too, following you to the piano. He scoffed with a smirk, crossing his arms as he leaned on the wall nearby. That piano was something you bought completely out of impulse, promising you’d learn, but the only thing you did learn was Hot Cross Buns. It was more like furniture to look at, only there for the aesthetic but never actually played.

You tucked a piece of hair behind your ear as you positioned yourself to play.

Bakugo thought you looked angelic at that moment, but he was sure that the sounds you were about to make weren’t.

However, the ash blonde stood corrected as you played ‘Happy Birthday’ in a tune that wasn’t simple, but rather more than just the basic keys involved. Some of the noted dragged in to each other in a nice harmony, while some of the others were short and quick but worked perfectly nonetheless. The sound was actually elegant, light, and beautiful, some more words Bakugo would be able to describe you with, even if he didn’t say it.

Your voice- also light and airy- worked well with the piano, maybe you could’ve been a singer if you tried that route instead of becoming a hero.

It was now that Bakugo realized, you simply were his light. You didn’t just cause him to feel that light and warm feeling, it was that you lit his life up and gave it warmth.

It was when the song came to a close, Bakugo felt something was off.

“Happy Birthday, my love,” was all he heard before everything went dark. Bakugo, was most definitely awake. So, why did it go dark?

An overwhelming feeling of dread filled Bakugo to the core.

It was freezing, as he had already broken into a cold sweat. He was nauseous.

Bakugo reached around for a light switch, his pupils dilating smaller when he was blinded by the artificial lights in the ceiling.

He caught sight of the clock on the wall.

3 am.

It mocked him, being awake at this hour for no reason at all.

Bakugo dragged himself to bed, dropping onto it without bothering to pull the blankets up despite his cold body.

He shut his eyes.

...

This time the ash blonde was woken up by a series of loud knocks. Strangely, the knocks were not from his front door, but rather right outside his bedroom door. Bakugo groaned, reaching around the bed for warmth, the blanket had fallen somewhere too far for him to find without opening his eyes, so his next source of warmth would be you.

Sleep weighed down his eyes just as much as his mind. He reached so far across the bed he only reached the other edge of it. You weren’t there.

Not anymore.

The thought sent Bakugo’s eyes opening in panic. Where were you? Why weren’t you there?

Another pang of pain went through his chest at the realization. 

You weren’t ever gonna be there, never again. You were cold, flashes of your lifeless e/c eyes appeared in Bakugo’s brain, hitting him with a wave of nausea. A strangled sob came from the ash blonde’s throat as fresh tears began to fall from his crimson eyes. 

He was never going to hold you in his arms, he was never going to eat your sometimes shitty food, he was never going to see you again. Bakugo would never feel that same warm and light feeling again.

He couldn’t breath. It felt like bile was scratching up the inside of his throat. The knocks had stopped, most likely after the loud sobs filled the room. Instead, it slowly opened, revealing Kirishima with a deep frown on his face. 

He got inside the house with a spare key you’d given him, but he tried to give Bakugo at least a little bit of space by knocking. It was clear he wouldn’t be able to do that.

The words that left Kirishima’s mouth in a sad attempt to get his usually standoffish best friend to stop crying went unheard by the blond who had his face buried in his face.

The rest of the Bakusquad- now turned into the ‘take care of Bakugo squad,’ was waiting in the living room, a solemn atmosphere weighed down on them as they were forced to listen to yet another round of sobs from their normally angry dead friend.

It had been a full week since you died, and Bakugo still felt in denial when he dreamed of you. It was his only peaceful time. He had barely eaten any of the food the Bakusquad had brought him, but it was enough to keep him alive.

They all knew in the back of their minds that Bakugo hadn’t known it’d been a week. He was on an emotionless autopilot when he was crying. Not only did your death hurt the Bakusquad horribly, but the state it left on of their other friends in. He wasn’t even himself anymore without you, just a mere shell.

Kirishima sighed, he was gonna save his birthday surprise until he felt a little bit better, or at least until Bakugo stopped sobbing, but the redhead couldn’t see when that would be.

He unlocked Bakugo’s phone, knowing the password because of you, and pulled up a video from a hidden file. Bakugo didn’t spend enough time on his phone for him to notice a file he never made.

Bakugo was still crying when he heard your voice, the fact he’d never hear it again made him confused. Then he realized it was the video on his phone.

Bakugo shut himself up upon hearing you, still crying, just quiet.

“Okay!” you grinned at the camera, a smirk on your face. “It’s currently... March 29...?” you questioned, checking your phone for confirmation and nodding when you knew you were correct.

You continued, looking back up, “Today is day one (1) of learning piano for my dear Katsu!” you grinned, a ghost of a smile prodded at Bakugo’s mouth, but it never showed, “He got mad when i bought the piano out of impulse- so I’m learning so he’ll owe me like a million kisses!” you proudly proclaimed, eyes sparkling, so different from the last image of them, forever burned in Bakugo’s brain. 

You stretched, “I guess I should be talking to the camera like I talk to you, so- uh- I’ll do that?” you giggled, “Okay! Back to the task at hand! I want to learn a bunch of songs eventually but for now I’ll focus on Happy Birthday and maybe your favorite song?”

Watching you do all this made the tears run dry, you really wanted Bakugo to be happy on his Birthday. 

Bakugo’s red eyes remained glued to the screen before the last part, “I know it’s not your birthday right now, but that’s when you’ll be seeing this. So, Happy Birthday, my love!” you beamed. 

You’d done all this, spent all that time learning piano for him and yet you never got to play it for him in real life.

Flashes of last night came pouring back in. Was it a dream? That same single phrase echoed in his mind like a mantra, “Happy Birthday, my love.” That was what you said to him in the dream- or was it real life?

Bakugo couldn’t tell.

He as much as he wanted to be happy on his birthday like you’d wanted, he just couldn’t do it. Not when the only thing he really wanted was for you to be alive. Not when he just wanted you to be okay. Now you weren’t, Bakugo wasn’t okay.

He wasn’t sure he ever would be.

Was it so much to ask for you to be with him on his birthday? He didn’t even want cake or present. Everything would’ve meant nothing to him if you were here. You were his world, his everything. Now without you, there was nothing but gray.

You were gone, and that left Bakugo broken, empty, and cold.

[calocera]

SPOILERS FOR CATS 2019, here’s my hot takes and opinions

be warned, THIS IS LOOOONG

First off my overall opinion, i LITERALLY cannot say whether it was good or bad, like lots of critics say it just...is beyond that. It’s VERY fun and that’s all I can bring myself to say, I have LOTS of problems with it but I can’t even say that they make the movie bad. It is definitely worth watching

OPINIONS ON CHARACTERS:

Victoria: she’s good! I appreciate that they kinda left her personality blank other than her innocence since that’s pretty much how she always was, still not super thrilled with her as a main character but franchesca did the best she could

Munkustrap: I loved him! he was more of a main character than I would have expected, but they STILL cut all the charm from his lines... why do I love him then? Robbie fairchild did AMAZING background acting, whenever he was in frame he was always doing something SUPER munkustrap-y and making cute dad faces. he was dealt bad lines but he worked around it best he could. Also his legs were normal so...epic fail

Mistoffelees: 😒😒😒😒😒🤢🤢🤮 disappointed but not at all surprised...he was just a Woobie, a softboy uwu nice guy. I felt like I was seeing fanon 2013 loki in cat form. THEY MADE HIS SONG A SADBOY PITY PARTY SONG...WHY WOULD YOU MAKE THE 11 O’CLOCK NUMBER SLOW AND SAD???? Where is the smug little shit who’s vague and aloof yet confident and joyous? He was murdered by his evil homophobic shadow clone. I’m not even gunna indulge the fact that him and Victoria were a thing, I’ll go over that later. He also just constantly looked like the crying cat meme his eyes were so red and watery it was horrifying, yet somehow he wasn’t the worst character , that leads us too.....

tugger: what.the.fuck.did.you.do.to.this.boy. HE GOT THE TREATMENT I EXPECTED FOR MUNKUSTRAP! HE WAS DEMOTED TO BACKGROUND CHARACTER! not only did he not sing mr. mistoffelees, he literally did nothing other than his song, he never interacted with ANY characters besides jenny in 1 scene. I know cats has no set main characters but he’s undoubtedly one of the most important characters and he’s like...the least important named character in the movie. ALSO Jason Derulo was not sexy at all. There was NO hip thrusting NO sexy meowing NO glamrock, he was just an asshole and if I hadn’t already seen the original I would have either completely forgotten about his character or though he was the worst character. I’m so fucking angy I cannot express.

Girzzabella: ngl I expected better. Her acting was great but with the horrible effects I couldnt get invested but I’ll touch on the effects later. Her singing was good, but I expected it to carry the movie and it wasn’t at all the best song in the movie, I’d say she’s about as good as I expected she’d be but the movie itself was more enjoyable than I expected so she was less significant

Old d: she was fine, she LOOKED the part definitely, she didn’t have as large a presence as ken page but I wouldnt expect that of her. Her singing wasn’t the greatest though, her voice is fine by it’s just NOT suited to old d’s songs. I would have preferred she play a female gus bc her voice is very sweet and frail, not at all built for belting like her songs required.

Macavity: he’s just...eh. He’s basically a comic relief villain which sucks. He does practically nothing besides kidnap people, say a cheesy line, and act like a caricature of a 90s cartoon villain (and not one of the fun ones) like theres a scene where he poofs away and when he does it he goes, MACAvityyyyyyy and fades away its so unintentionally funny but it just makes him so lame as a villain. not to mention he doesnt even die at the end or get any satisfying conclusion he just gets stuck on top of a statue and his powers suddenly stop working (for some reason??)

Bombalurina: fuck that, I am simultaneously glad she only was in the macavity number bc fuck off Taylor Swift but also disappointed bc she deserved so much better.

Bustopher: 😟 never in my darkest nightmares did I think I’d see bustopher Jones deepthroat multiple crayfish but here we are. Somehow THIS was the most sexual song, I cannot begin to name the fetishes checked off by this performance bc itd hit word limit. Let me just say that I said multiple times out loud, “damn bustopher kinda a freak with it 😏😏” like I CANNOT stress how weirdly sexual it gets. And ofc its all otherwise just haha funney fat guy eat food and burp and fall down. He also breaks the fourth wall a few times which like, fuck you

Jenny: exactly what was shown in the trailer. Unfunny fat jokes and slapstick humor. Also they focused WAY too many shots on her cat pussy and I wish I was making that up. Also of note is that the cgi on the rats and cockroaches are drastically worse than the rest of the movie, like not just bad designs the effects are BAD. also they translated they whole gumbie cat fur-shedding as her wearing fake skin over her outfit which would be fine but UHH the fake fur is skin tight??? so it literally looks like shes ripping off her skin and she does it multiple times its fucking terrifying

Mungojerrie and rumpelteazer: meh, they are fine as characters, not quite as energetic as I would have liked but they didn’t massively fuck anything up? The song was horrible, they went against the beat for...some reason? Like it’s a song with a very distinct rhythm and they split up the lyrics so weirdly. I liked that they followed through with the lore of them working for macavity

Skimbleshanks: YES YESSSSSSSSSS HOLY FUCKING SHIT 💗💕💖💞💜😳😳😳😳😳😳😳💜💛🧡💚💖❤️💗 i absolutely CANNOT express how good skimbleshanks made me feel. He looks like a leather daddy with his chains and suspenders and hat and stache, I hate that I’m saying this but uh...mr skimbleshanks sir😳 we were actually screaming it was so fucking good. Watching this movie was worth it just for skimble. Unironically. I’m listening to the song as we speak. It was kinda weird that they moved the tap dancing to this song but that’s more of a detractor from Jennie’s and a plus side to skimbles since it’s good tap

Gus: good! Ian did a good job of course, no one doubted that he would.

Growltiger and griddlebone: not racist but still absolutely horrifying. One of the worst parts of the movie, I actually got squeamish looking at griddlebone a few times that’s how bad she looks

Everyone else: not that good. I couldn’t tell who was who, all their personalities were annoying, I’m on imdb as we speak trying to figure out who even was supposed to be who. Demeter is completely butchered and jemima just isn’t there, doesn’t sing her part, it all sucked man.

Tech talk:

CGI: okay so here’s the thing, the effects are good. GREAT even, the issue is how fucking horrible the designs are. The lack of cat nose, mouth, and hairy cheeks makes them all look disgusting. Also the feet. Holy fuck why do they have feet. THERES A FUCKING SCENE WHERE TUGGER GRABS VICTORIAS FOOT AND SNIFFS IT. IT LASTS LIKE 5 SECONDS. Old Deuteronomy, Gus, and Cassandra (bc she was already bald) are the only characters I’d say look anywhere close to decent, grizabella looks okay in profile but head on it’s all horrible again. its really such a shame bc the sets are gorgeous! i really hope this movie gets some form of recognition for its sets.

the editing and directing was DOGSHITTTTTTT there are SO many scenes where characters just teleport or parts where people are singing and no ones mouths are moving its really distracting

Other things:

it’s OBVIOUS that the critics calling this movie horny have never seen the original. I’d definitely say the movie is LESS HORNY than the play. It IS however waaaaaaay more uncomfortable with its hornieness, so I’d say in that regard YES, the horny stuff is much more gratuitous and off putting despite there being an overall smaller amount than the play. ie everything bustopher jones does

They changed a BUNCH of lyrics for some reason?? Like they cut verses which I understand but there are like a handful of lyrics in almost every song they just...change. like...okay? All changing lyrics is gunna do is make people who knew the songs frustrated when they can’t sing along

the dancing was incredible! shame the cg just fucking invalidates all of it bc your mind doesnt register it as real people doing real moves

OKAY THE FUCKING CATNIP SCENE so when taylor swift showers everyone in catnip they all just fucking start moaning and go FULL HORNY its TOO MUCH like misto full on does an o face like eyes rolled back mouth open  and munkustrap is like ass up panting i still havent processed it im fucking terrified to encounter it again. they cut the orgy? yet added THIS??? k

WHY did they take 2 of the most iconic characters who FREQUENTLY interact and just

a. Never even have them make eye contact

b. Make 1 a background character

c. Completely change the personality of the other one

On the topic of Victoria/misto: I am just still at a loss as to why they thought it’d be a good idea? They completely removed Plato and for what? This? Pathetic. It’s worth noting the weirdly munkustrap has WAYYY more chemistry with both Victoria AND mistoffelees then they did with each other (there’s a part where it looks like misto and munk are about to kiss for some reason?? munk ALSO gets all touchy feely with skimbleshanks???) anyways munkustrap king moments

tldr; its worth watching, the best parts were the sets, the dancing, skimbleshanks, and munkustrp fucking CARRIES the weight of the world with his face acting. the worst things were a big fat tie between bustopher, tugger,misto,jenny,growltiger and griddlebone, and the godawful design choices

[clannfearrunt]

I don’t rly know much about evolution or spec bio and such, so I was wondering, do you have any ideas of what kinda pets Squid Kids might have? And if you do + feel like sharing them, do you mind if other people work off those ideas? Thank you for your time!!

See I’ve only Vaguely thought about the Other Animals that live in the era, so this is a super hazy area for me! I only know super surface level stuff I think so this is a lot of work in Approximate Bullshit and coming across just enough specific questions to look up lol... 

So this post will be an overview of Animals I Know About and whether making it a pet is a good idea or not! And people are welcome to work off of these ideas, absolutely! Thank u for asking, hopefully this is actually useful to u! 

Ok, under the cut bc it was getting Slightly Long: 

Quail Thing (possibly not actually a quail, but definitely a similar bird. I do not care enough to go into its actual evolutionary history so It Is A Mystery). Quails are one of the main domesticated animals on [Splat Japan], having been domesticated during the early stages of the Inklings’ civilization for their meat and eggs (later gaining more focus on feathers as well). There’s a lot of breeds with varying sizes and colors and shapes, similar to modern chickens and pigeons. They make excellent pets, and probably are one of the most common pets in the region. 

Small Terrestrial Crocogator. Just what it says on the tin, a small, terrestrial crocodilian. I’m thinking like, japanese spitz height on average (10 to 16 inches at the shoulders. Sorry I was thinking of size refs and my own dog is the best thing I have lol). They are slightly omnivorous but definitely need a meat focused diet to thrive. I’m weak and I like crocors, so they have been domesticated mainly for use in hunting by... Not Inklings, I have not decided on who yet, but they’re from one of the continents. While they are domesticated they’re definitely more demanding in terms of food, proper training, and exercise needs, so they’re not a very common pet especially in Splat Japan. If you’ve got a lot of space, money, and time to dedicate to caring for god’s perfect animal, then a Littol Croc is not a bad pet at all. 

Large Marine Crocodile, or Seal Croc. Also just what it says on the tin; a large nearly fully aquatic crocodile. They’re kinda mosasaur-ifying right now, with their legs becoming more like flippers. They spend most of their time in the ocean and only occasionally come up on land mostly for breeding purposes or just to sit in the sun for a little bit. These are decidedly not pet material. Untamable Apex predator. Also you’d need, like, a fuckoff huge tank for them.

Sea Hare (Probably will figure out a different name for them). They’re a closeish relative of the Sea Slug ppl. Not actually descended from actual sea hares at all, but looks like a lot like them but with short, stubby leggies. They’re fairly lazy, herbivorous slugs, usually the size of, say, a french lop rabbit. They were used as livestock by the Sea Slugs for mainly their meat. These are also a common pet these days among mollusk folks, since they do well in similar humidity/temperatures, and are also very conveniently lazy. Sea Hare breeds aren’t quite as varied as Quail Things, but there’s still a nice number of Options, and people are breeding more varieties these days. Overall, a very good pet, especially if u are a fellow Damp Animal. 

Hedge Urchin (names are the worst part of animals!). This is basically a sea urchin that has become a hedgehog. Except they are herbivorous! There’s different species of these things with slightly different diets and therefore mouths, but the one I have drawn likes to scrape moss and lichen and such off of rocks. Probably. They have very primitive eyes that really only detect the direction of where light is coming from. Their spines are venomous, like all urchins; while you wouldn’t need serious medical attention unless you were allergic, it’s very painful and usually causes a lot of swelling around the wound. People have recently started keeping these as a Cool Exotic Pet, but it’s not advisable to handle them due to their spines. Definitely a hands-off pet, if you’re gonna keep one.

Various Lizards and Snakes. Nothing that different from things u might see today, though probably different species. There’s a lot less stigma around them than there is today, though, so they’re more common. 

Various Buges and other Arthropods. You know... beetles, spiders, terrestrial isopods, etc... People keep some. “Bugs” are considered a little more unusual/creepy than reptiles, except for by arthropod folks. Crabs are also Not Creepy as pets. 

Fish. We keep fishies. They also keep fishies. There are also a handful of smaller amphibious fish nowadays that ppl try to keep, but not all species are suitable for private keepers just because they can be pretty Sensitive. To Note: actual “amphibians” like frogs and salamanders are like 90% extinct, and remaining species tend to be Highly Protected and illegal to keep.

Horse Bird, basically a Cool Ostrich Thing that is larger and better suited for riding than modern ostriches. These are definitely Large Livestock. I guess they are the same degree of Pet Material as a horse. 

Small Whales. Not very many of them, and nothing much bigger than a beluga. They are whales. As you can imagine, they do not make good pets, as they are whales.

Side Note: Dolphins. These are not really animals. They are pretty much recognized to be sapient, however, many of them enjoy the challenge of hunting other sapients for food and kinda voluntarily uninvited from the Cool Sapient People Table. Salmonids and Dolphins clash the most because they both live in the sea. International legal protocol is to drive them away from inhabited coastlines and ships and otherwise leave them the fuck alone. They are not pets.

There are Other Animals, most of them unsuitable for pets, some of them probably alright pet material, but they are unknown to me at the moment (or I’m forgetting). A huge chunk of animals are birds and reptiles though, with Formerly Aquatic Animals being more of a minority. Also, Bugs are still king. It’s hard to come out of the water dude. Thanks for readin’ 

[mooosicaldreamz]

please do a song by song review of lover i beg u

oh......u didn’t have to beg!!!! i’ll give it to you 4 FREE.

I FORGOT THAT YOU EXISTED: what i enjoy about this song is that it is fun and not especially mean, just like, shrug emoji. i think sometimes when ur in a relationship that is not especially amazing and you reach the point where you forget that you dated someone is the funniest thing and its such a strange moment. it’s a good tonesetter for the album, bc its so fun and chill and like, whatever. it has the same energy that i think we are never getting back together wanted to have. i LOVE the “i just forget what they were” breakdown. what a fun, bouncy song. easy listening to start the album. calvin harris rip.

CRUEL SUMMER: i love jack antanoff vERY much and have liked his work with fun. and as bleachers, and i think his production on lorde and taylor’s albums has been so wonderful. this song just reeks of him and it’s so like, ascendent, how it builds up and up into the chorus. i think it’s interesting that she reaches so high on the chorus. “summer’s a knife/i’m always waiting for you to cut to the bone/devils roll the dice/angels roll their eyes.” the breakdown is once again wonderful abt crying in the back of the cab on the way back from the bar - i feel like this album and its concept brings a much more natural version of taylor that i think has largely (and perhaps rightfully, considering the evolution of her fame and craft) been in hiding since probably red but maybe even since speak now. “I LOVE YOU AIN’T THAT THE WORST THING YOU EVER HEARD // HE LOOKS SO PRETTY LIKE A DEVIL” while she’s screaming it is more exuberant than ANYTHING on 1989 or rep (and i love both of those albums). 

LOVER: i love how sleepy soft this song is, i love how simple it is, and it’s made me cry like, six times. the wedding band sound is just, so fun and beautiful. it really makes me feel like i’m drunk, happy, and dancing really slow on an emptying dancefloor. i’m going to assume that was the vibe. it’s so soft. god it feels like a cloud. i enjoy how simple the lyrics are in this song, and how the words get to breathe and simmer. they take on a lot of meaning bc of how much space they’re given by the echo and by pacing. it’s so nice. i’ve gone back and forth on whether i like the wedding vows thing, but i think it might be nice. i love “swear to be overdramatic AND TRUE! to my lover”

THE MAN: the bumpy sound of the bass beat is really fun, and i think the song is a good bop, but it doesn’t say anything i don’t already know - but i think taylor bringing up the back end on the Woke train, trying to reach all those people who still aren’t totally sure about the gays or feminism but also think trump is terrible and are now reconsidering their life choices is a fine enough goal for her social justice initiatives. also i just realized she says “getting bitches and models” which she already does, you don’t have to pretend taylor

THE ARCHER: this song is sonic perfection the rolling synths the dreamy voice, the awful awful breakdown at the end of “they see right thru me / can you see right thru me / i see right thru me” “help me hold onto you” i just ... can’t handle this song. it’s perfect. i like the implication throughout this album that taylor is in Love, the big real kind, and i support her and joe bc i think it’s obvious their relationship has totally like, taken her to a new and good emotional space. anyway i like the implication that taylor fell in real, big Love and realized that love is still a fucking mess, like it doesn’t solve all the problems. “ALL OF MY HEROES DIE ALL ALONE” i mean come on. i hate her

I THINK HE KNOWS: this song is a bop “i think he knows his hands around a cold glass make me wanna know that body like it’s mine” is a stn move. the rumbly noise in the chorus and the synthy breakdown is a beast, it owns itself. there’s a real comfortable self-confidence that i, once again, maintain has been missing from taylor’s music up until now. also that moaning noise distracts me every time. “hand on my thigh/we can follow the sparks/i’ll drive” tAYLOR! inappropriate. i’ve seen some takes on this song that it’s not a fave, but it’s a fun song and people are wrong. there’s not one song on this album that i’m like this is bad in the way that i DO NOT like some songs on rep

MISS AMERICANA AND THE HEARTBREAK PRINCE: the first thing i thought when i heard this song is that it sounds like lana del rey. give it a re-listen, it does. sounds just like idk, “high by the beach” but it also rings a bell for me of electra heart era marina and the diamonds (like “teen idle”). i like this song a lot, even though it’s relatively oblique in my opinion on what it’s.....actually about. “you play stupid games / you win stupid prizes” is a great lyric in masterful taylor swift fashion bc it looks stupid when u write it on paper. i like the shouting breakdown thing that happens on the back end of the song with go/fight/win (OH I JUST GOT that, it’s like cheerleaders shouting). i’m a fan of it, but it’s an oddball on the tracklist.

PAPER RINGS: this song rings with a lot of red’s chaotic energies but with the adult sensibilities that she’s rolling with on this album. i love the sort of down-home shouty stuff happening on the verses, and the “kiss me once / kiss me twice / three times” bridge. it’s a good one. “i hate accidents/except when we went from friends to this” is a fun and good lyric. i LOVE the key change i LOVE the “wrap your arms around me baby boy” for some reason very much. 

CORNELIA STREET: i mean obviously this song is wonderful. i’ve seen much Discourse about this song being related to Kaylor which seems plausible. it’s clear that taylor wrote some of these songs in the present tense when they’re in the past, which i think is really interesting. i LOVE “jacket ‘round my shoulder is yours” what a good inversion of the phrase. i love the way that the phrase cornelia street breaks up the lines in a really weird way, because of how its syllables run. it’s a good song. it’s a soft boi

DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS: early frontrunner for my fave song!!!!! love the opening repeating noise, and the simple guitar plucks initially. taylor’s voice takes up front and center bc it isn’t especially altered/layered/echoed like it is in some other spots on the album. it has an amazing rolling pace on its verses that’s followed by the slower pace on the chorus. “i ask the traffic lights if it’ll be okay and they say i don’t know” i am certain that this song is about karlie kloss and i will not accept any other possibilities i know she said it was about a movie but i don’t care. “my hips my heart my body my love / tryna find a part of me you didn’t touch” wow taylor god what a gifted lyricist i hate her

LONDON BOY: this song is fun. “i saw the dimples first / then i heard the accent” i love the rising effect on “walking on the afternoon” resetting with the horns. it’s just a song that makes you bob your head. she does sound like she’s throwing out as many english references as she possibly can which is amusing and i don’t know what the legs are on this song bc of that - it could come across as somewhat kitschy. but! also i’d like to start some discourse bc i think it’s CLEAR that taylor isn’t afraid of using pronouns or even very direct references to who she’s with (this song is basically an I LOVE JOE ALWYN shirt), and it makes it even more clear when she’s avoiding using pronouns or direct description. the two songs before this don’t do that in the same way that this song does. 1989 barely uses pronouns at all. i’m just saying. taylor is bi is what i’m saying.

SOON YOU’LL GET BETTER: obviously this song is sad and it makes me cry i have no further commentary except that it’s a wonderful, simple song that has an excessively odd placement on this album following after london boy

FALSE GOD: this song is sexy! and interesting. the horns come back again, which is good and her voice is lower. honestly the line “the altar is my hips” is just..........a lot for me to compute. “i’m golden when you touch me / hell is when i fight with you” the bridges are really fun, sexy, soft. this song is like when lover ends and a song with a little more of a sultry feel comes on but ur still drunk so its a little sloppy.

YOU NEED TO CALM DOWN: obviously this song ruined my life. it sent me to the heights of elation and then i sort of had a hangover on it but i’m back around on it guys! it’s a fun, fun, summery song. that chorus with the oh-oh is just .... pop perfection. the bumpy synth noise that goes ba-duh-duh-duh like it’s reverberating is absolutely perfect for the pacing of the song. it’s excessively well-crafted to the point of slickness. it should have been the lead single but what do i know about anything

AFTERGLOW: i know that i wasn’t supposed to be into i pinned your hands behind your back but i was so. this is a continuation of the theme of like, i’m in love but i’m still a mess!!! sorry :) i like this song but it does not inspire me. 

ME!: i don’t know why the exclamation point is there and it sounds much more like a brendon urie song than a taylor song, but it’s fun! i don’t hate it! i can see why it was picked as a lead single - to really illustrate the tonal change from rep to here, but still. spelling is fun, tho.

IT’S NICE TO HAVE A FRIEND: this song is simple and so, so so sweet. i love the childhood friends to lovers narrative, and i just. like it. so much. it’s so sweet. and then obviously the horns come back for this one, but don’t overwhelm. this song is a good palette cleanser after the bombast of me!

DAYLIGHT: i tweeted about this but this song reminds me of clean and long live (particularly long live, it for some reason really sounds like that in my head). but i like that it really relates a feeling that i feel sometimes of like, my life was a mess and sometimes still is a mess but bc i’m in a stable and good relationship, things feel approachable, like, if everything goes wrong again, i’ll at least know for sure i have this, and i think this song sort of shows that off with the  ���I don’t want to think about anything else.” it’s nice. it’s calm. i read an oral history today about the kanye storming the stage moment at the vma’s because it’s been 10 years since it happened - and i feel like this album and this song, in many ways, are a plateau on the meteoric catapult of taylor’s relationship with fame that really had started to run before that moment but certainly started rolling after that. i think this song is a demonstration of the growth that she’s gone through over the last ten years that we’ve all watched with such close attention. it makes me feel happy for her. i hope she gets to keep this the way it is. i’ve read that she thought for the longest time that this album would be called daylight and i’m honestly? not sure it shouldn’t be. but the vocal note at the end sort of draws it back thru.

it’s a good album. i think the back half of it doesn’t hang as tough all the way thru as the first half, but overall, i think it’s overall quality is better than reputation even though i think reputation, as a concept album, works very well. it’s a great evolution and a real, authentic thing. very impressive that she’s managed to produce four very different albums successively where as many artists don’t change that much from album to album. but i think that’s evidence of the work that’s gone into them, to be honest. death by a thousand cuts is my early fave. 

[michaelmyersmalewife]

LEVIATHAN | 13. The Longest Night | MASTERLIST

words: 12k+

A/N: lemme just say beforehand that im so sorry for writing this absolute behemoth of a chapter so get yourself comfy and make a snack bc this is a doozy

you can also support this fic on wattpad & ao3

Madison was paralyzed, trapped in Ghidorah's gaze.

He smelled like fried wires and the sky just before a thunderstorm. Something like batteries gathered in her throat. His entire presence was suffocating. She wondered how Elena could handle it.

It couldn't end here. Not now, not when she had come so far. Their only chance at survival was to get rid of the ORCA - for good. If she held onto the machine, the dragon would crush her - all of them. Maybe if they gave it up to him, they'd have a chance to escape. But there was also a chance it would cause the rest of the titans to fall back under his spell once more, but it was a chance she felt she was forced to take. The hope that Monarch had made good use of the time they'd try to buy them was the only thing reassuring her.

"Elena," she said, not breaking eye contact with the monster. "Throw it."

Elena hadn't moved. Looking over at her, she looked paralyzed, eyes wide with terror and glued directly at Ghidorah. She wasn't sure if it was due to the rain or fear, but she was shaking. Madison shook her arm.

"Snap out of it, you need to get rid of the ORCA!"

Elena could barely feel the girl's attempts at rousing her from her daze. All the woman could see was a sprawling yellow void, suspended among nothing but golden clouds. Ghidorah hovered before her, lightning crackling around his body as all heads zeroed in on her.

We tried not to hold it against you, -

                                                       - but you really are a nuisance.

                                                                           You were a waste of a Speaker

You think I asked to be connected to a giant egomaniac?

Oh, cry me a river.

                     This would be much easier for us if you stopped fighting.

                                                       It's not like there's anyone that can help you

What's the point of all this anyway? What could you possibly gain from any of this?

A tiny thing like you couldn't understand

Try me

Not seeing any response from Elena, Madison's face scrunched together in frustration, tugging the ORCA from her hands. That seemed to snap her out of it, but at that same moment, the crackling of Ghidorah's internal light sparked above them, and immediately she tossed it as far as she could. The ORCA landed in a pile of rubble right in front of his massive talons. One of his heads broke their fixed gaze, looking down and considering it for a moment with an irritated glare before bringing his foot down. The ORCA stopped its hum.

She hoped that was good enough, that that would sate his anger.

But it didn't. Signal or no signal, he knew Elena. He knew them all now, their faces burned into his collective memory. Hell, he probably knew who she and the Regulator were since Antarctica. If Madison's connection to Godzilla wasn't enough for him to deal with, Elena had pestered him one time too many. All three heads focused on their forms, lazily moving forward on serpentine necks like they were in no rush to destroy them. He was studying them, trying to figure out how they had done it, how such tiny creatures could have caused the collapse of his whole kingdom.

Madison wanted to run, but there was nowhere else for her to go. This was it. The lightning rippled up his body, splitting into three different pathways as it traveled up his necks and he began opening his mouths. The crackling energy was nearly spilling through his teeth.

Bracing for the end, she felt a hand grasp hers.

It was Elena. And for the first time being around the three-headed dragon - rain whipping around her, thunder and lightning splitting the sky open - she did not look afraid. Ghidorah didn't seem too happy about that, and each of his heads shrieked like three banshees.

But standing with Elena, Godzilla's presence somewhere in the back of her mind, Madison did not feel small. Something gathered in her heart, something defiant - primal. And staring straight into the Golden Demise's eyes, she screamed with all the fury of a titan.

Madison knew that that was likely her last action as a not-pile-of-ashes, and she didn't feel a shred of regret over it. Hands curling into fists, she braced for the end. Until suddenly, from behind them, a beam of blue energy knocked Ghidorah back and through the stadium wall, the force sending him skidding across the street and into a building.

They all stood there for a moment, staring at the fallen monster, confused and awestruck of the power that had sent him tumbling. Then the ground began to shake beneath their feet, rhythmic footsteps coming ever closer.

And then there was the roar.

Am I late? Godzilla's thoughts rippled through her mind.

Madison turned around, eyes blinking through the rain and hair that now plastered her face. She grinned, feeling a sudden, savage glee.

Go kick his ass, she thought.

Don't need to tell me twice, little titan, he replied.

And better yet, he wasn't alone. As he waded through the harbor and past the buildings around him, he was accompanied by a cavalry of jets and ships whizzing past him in droves. Only they weren't shooting at him. It almost looked like he was leading them, like they had all come together for a common purpose: fighting the Golden Demise.

She felt something tug at her heart, something exciting. It was the best part of her mother's vision come to life, humans and titans working together.

Only - out of pure bad luck - they had been caught right in the middle of the oncoming chaos. A battleground straight out of some ancient apocalypse. And the only thing that filled her mind was a single thought.

Run.

_____

The Argo, guided by an onslaught of Ospreys, followed Godzilla as he stomped his way through Boston, flattening cars and crashing through buildings as if they were nothing but cardboard boxes.

Jodie peered out of the large window and at the city, or what she could see of it. Most of it was blanketed in a dense fog that spilled over the tops of buildings and through the streets. Toward the front of the control room, she saw Graham pull Serizawa's notebook out of her pocket, flipping it open. She had already lost count of how many times the doctor had run through that same motion during the flight. She couldn't blame her. Looking at the old and worn notebook, it felt like Serizawa was with them too. She wished with all her heart that he had lived to see this, the vindication of his vision: Godzilla and humanity coming together to fight against a common enemy, trying to make things right. To know that his sacrifice had not been in vain.

And thanks to Mark's discovery, they had managed to track the ORCA's signal to Fenway Park. Emma must have been using its loudspeakers to boost the signal. Evidently, it had worked. Maybe a little too well, as it had brought Ghidorah straight to Boston. The signal had cut out just moments ago, and Jodie could only think of the worst. Ghidorah must have reached the stadium. Were Emma and Madison still there? Or did they have the common sense to cut it off and get the hell out of there before it was too late? But that also begged another question. Were the extremists with them?

But they were just the start of her worries. Through the seething clouds and lightning, Godzilla and Ghidorah were nothing but black silhouettes against a background of destruction. Ghidorah stood his ground as Godzilla charged toward him, roaring so loudly windows on nearby buildings shattered from its intensity. Ghidorah responded, all three of his heads trilling with anger as they smoothly galloped toward the lizard, quickly gaining speed. This was about to get brutal, and if San Francisco had been of any indication, not much of Boston was likely to survive it.

"Okay, we've zeroed in on the last ping from the ORCA. Fenway park, dead ahead. We'll lay cover fire to keep Ghidorah distracted." he turned to Jodie. "Good luck out there."

She nodded. Jodie, Mark and the rest of G-Team headed to the Argo's hangar for one of the few remaining Ospreys. Graham closed the notebook.

This is it, Jodie thought. The last stand. If Ghidorah won, this time they were done for sure. There weren't enough ships and aircraft in the world that could challenge him. And to make matters worse, seconds after the ORCA signal cut out, the titans they still had tracking information on began moving again. Moving toward Boston. They had to put Ghidorah down before his reinforcements arrived. Just five years ago, Godzilla had managed to take down two MUTOs, but he had nearly died doing so. But up against twelve, thirteen, maybe more titans all at once?

His chances were looking slim.

Godzilla was already closing in on his ancient rival, and what remained of their aircraft were about to engage, and the ships were readying their long-range canons. And Godzilla, he seemed..brighter. In every sense of the word. The pulses from his scutes grew more radiant every second, shining up and down in a similar manner to his intimidation display. And his skin was shining in the moonlight too. He looked more powerful than the last time she had seen him. A lot more powerful.

"Well he's looking lively." she commented.

"Is it just me," Sam asked. "Or has he been working out?"

"You kidding me?" Stanton replied. "Serizawa got that lizard juiced."

"Damn right." Foster said.

"Colonel," one of the bridge officers said. "All squadrons are locked on target."

Foster, Chen and Graham exchanged glances, and then turned their collective gazes out at Ghidorah. Jodie knew exactly how they felt. It was hard to get her to hate any creature, but she felt nothing but contempt for that three-headed monstrosity. Her mind flashed back to the sea full of wreckage, the hundreds - thousands - of people that had already died trying to stop this unholy thing.

With an austere gaze, Graham stared at the oncoming battle. "For Serizawa."

A hundred trails of fire scorched across the sky.

_____

Nearly every missile that had been dropped was a direct hit.

Ghidorah shrieked in irritation, shielding himself from the oncoming fire with one of his wings. Elena's neck strained from looking up at the sky, rain still pelting her face and gluing long strands of hair across her face. At least a dozen jets were whizzing right above them, dropping all they had on the golden dragon right in front of them.

Each of his three heads broke through the smoke and fog, zeroing in on the mountainous lizard as they charged at each other. As the titans collided, the resulting shock wave of their massive bodies slamming together shook the ground.

Taking Madison's hand and pulling at the Regulator's shoulder, they ran.

That quiet moment in the stadium's booth, looking out the window into an abandoned city, seemed an eternity ago. Boston had turned into a warzone, a battle between the gods.

Everything around her was burning - bricks and steel rained from the sky. Even running as fast as she could, they still hadn't managed to get out of the combat zone. The titans were just too big. She felt like an insect scrambling to get out from underfoot of a couple of wrestlers. For every hundred feet they covered, the titans could cover that distance in a single step. She was afraid that they would, but they didn't even notice her anymore, but that didn't matter. The missiles and jets didn't know they were there either, all of those rounds they were shooting at Ghidorah were also raining down all around her.

One of the dragon's tails sliced through a skyscraper as he stumbled backward, ripping through its steel-beam skeleton as if it were paper, spraying a curtain of debris down at them. They desperately weaved their way through it, Madison shrieking as a piece of rubble connected with her arm. It was quickly becoming harder to dodge it all - frantically falling, rolling, springing back to their feet as the earth beneath them shook with each footstep from the titans not too far away.

Every direction around them seemed closed off by either the titans themselves or mountains of ruin, and the fight was about to roll right over them. Again.

Suddenly, there was a roar from something that wasn't a giant monster. Elena's gaze was drawn to the sky. A giant aircraft broke through the clouds, and for a moment she thought it was the Controller, until she saw that it was a flat craft rather than spherical, complete with a Monarch logo emblazoned on its side. She chuckled in disbelief. As the craft shot by, it spattered Ghidorah with missiles, driving him away from them.

That seemed like a good thing to her at first, but she could feel a panic setting in, and looking down at the girl trembling in her arms she could tell that it had taken over her as well. They had made it out of too many near misses, and luck couldn't keep them safe for long. At any second they could be under falling chunks of building, or a missile that missed its mark. Not even the Speaker's Connection could keep them from accidentally getting squashed like a bug.

Madison could feel herself starting to hyperventilate, despite trying to control her breathing. She was shivering, the cold from the rain and the adrenaline running through her veins taking hold of the most primitive part of her mind. Run. Hide. Keep running. Don't stop moving until you're out of the crossfire. But there was no safe zone, not for miles. As she let herself be pushed and pulled by Elena and the Regulator, she kept remembering Andrew, how he had looked when they found him. They needed to get somewhere safe. Fast.

Fighting to keep the air from running out of her lungs, she tugged on Elena's arm.

"O-Over - Over here." she struggled to push the words out of her mouth, but hopefully the woman had been able to hear her.

Together, the trio ran on.

_____

Mere yards outside of the Osprey, Godzilla wrestled with the three-headed monster.

Jodie watched as Ghidorah crackled with energy, charging up for another shot of yellow lightning. Countless missiles speared past them, their warheads opening on the dragon like flowers. He flinched back, Godzilla slamming into him head-on once again. Ghidorah was getting pummeled, wings splaying out to keep his balance. Their roars mixed together in one loud cry as Godzilla took one of his heads in his claws, ruthlessly tugging it down and slamming it into the ground below them.

"Hang on!" the pilot yelled as she weaved past Ghidorah's flailing tails, banking hard to avoid the flaming remains of missiles and fallen aircraft.

Blood rushed to Jodie's head, and every organ in her body did somersaults. The Osprey was almost on its side, and the window she had found herself pressed against was facing the flaming city below. She swallowed a scream as Griffin got them clear from the titan and righted the vessel, bringing them back around to a view of the fight as Godzilla impaled Ghidorah's tails with his dorsal spines. All three heads shrieked in pain. Griffin circled the Osprey around the brawl, dropping toward what was left of the stadium.

"Whoa," Jodie observed, catching her breath. "Dude's lit up like a Christmas tree."

Through the smoke, Mark followed her gaze. Godzilla was pulsing with a fiery orange light, the air around him distorting with heat waves. It was faint, and every now and then it would be drained out by his regular blue light, but something about the colorful display put a jolt of dread in her heart. That was definitely new. To Jodie's knowledge, nothing like this had ever been observed.

Jodie turned on the handheld radio at her side.

"Stanton, are you guys seeing this?"

"Oh we're seeing it," Stanton said. "But definitely not liking it."

There was a pause. Jodie could almost see him going over the readings on his screen. Suddenly, the Osprey's speakers crackled and Stanton's voice sounded through the whole craft.

"Godzilla's radiation levels are going through the roof. We've got about twelve minutes before he goes thermonuclear."

"What do you mean?" Jodie called over the noise outside.

The Osprey shook as thunder and lightning sounded around them.

"I'm sayin' in about twelve minutes it's gonna be a bad day to be a Red Sox fan."

Coleman's voice took over the radio. "Okay guys, you need to find the ORCA, grab Madison and get the hell out of there. Whatever Serizawa did to Godzilla worked a little too well, because he's about to explode like an atom bomb."

As if their time wasn't already limited enough. Mark looked around the Osprey with furrowed brows. Outside, the Boston skyline was burning, and the two titans were still going at it as hard as their bodies could allow. Jodie took in a deep breath.

"Roger that," Barnes answered. "Prepare for landing."

Mark moved to the front of the Osprey, Jodie following. The red glow around them made everything feel even more hellish than it already was, what with Ghidorah and Godzilla's roars bellowing just outside like heralds of doom. Her heart was hammering in her chest as the craft dropped down. Behind her, Martinez crossed himself, Barnes closing his eyes in a silent prayer. The others - men and women she didn't even know the names of - were steeling themselves as they prepared to run out in a prehistoric battleground. Preparing to die, if that's what was coming. And looking around at the chaos surrounding them, it seemed a fair guess that some or all of them would. Jodie felt a lump gather in her throat.

"You didn't have to come with me, y'know." Mark said.

"And what, miss out on all the fun?" she said sardonically.

Truthfully, she knew that she could've stayed aboard the Argo without a problem. And a part of her wanted to go back, even if it was too late for second thoughts. But after all this time, she had survived the impossible. Maybe she could share some of that luck with the people around her, as ridiculous as that sounded. Jodie had always been just a little superstitious.

In that moment the Osprey bumped down onto the ruined field at Fenway Park, and one by one the soldiers marched out. But Ghidorah's golden lightning struck, and the first two out the door were incinerated, their lives cut short in less than a heartbeat. Jodie swallowed a shriek. It was beyond horrifying, but the others ahead of her piled out anyway, Jodie were right behind them. Mark leaped out of the Osprey, nearly tripping over the rubble that covered the field.

Jodie had only been to Boston once or twice, but even now Fenway Park was near unrecognizable. Much of the stadium was torn to shreds, walls caving in and benches hanging on by steel threads. Next to her, Mark was staring at what was most likely the broadcasting booth, or at least where it should have been. Emma and Madison must've found a way to patch the ORCA into its sound system, but it seemed that Ghidorah had figured that out too.

The solider's flashlights barely cut through the fog and floating debris, but even then she still saw one of Ghidorah's talons land right ahead of her with an earth-shaking thud. Her gaze trailed upward, and right next to them Godzilla was swatting away the heads that lurched forward, jaws persistently snapping at the lizard. With a sneer, Godzilla spun around, tail roughly slamming into Ghidorah's side as the dragon stumbled off balance. Yet another building went down with them.

Mark and Jodie both called out Madison and Emma's names, but the sound barely carried over the fight just yards away. Behind them, one of Ghidorah's heads became trapped underneath Godzilla's clawed foot, jaws snapping desperately as his windpipe was being crushed with every second the lizard stood firm.

Jodie stopped to cough something nasty, the smoke in the air stinging her lungs. There had been nothing resembling an answer thus far, only G-Team moving around them, searching the debris. Other than themselves, Jodie didn't see anyone else - living or dead.

As they fanned their search, Godzilla and Ghidorah's fight was just getting started. Jagged streaks of lightning surged all around them, along with a flaming meteor storm of fallen aircraft. The smell of burning jet fuel filled the air.

They're not here, she thought. What if they were never here? Emma might've come by herself, maybe she left the kid somewhere safe.

But they couldn't stop looking now. If they weren't here, where else could they look? Their options were slim, and this was the best - the only lead they had. There was a chance they had made it to a nearby bunker but Monarch had already sent a squad to scope that out.

Her train of thought stopped when she suddenly felt an odd, mechanical crunch under her shoes. She looked down, eyes widening when she saw what it was.

The ORCA lay inches beyond the edge of the field of debris, crushed into the contours of a giant foot. And it wasn't looking too hot.

"Over here!" she shouted from across the stadium.

Mark and one of the soldiers rushed over to his side, fearing the worst. But as they got closer, just ahead of them was an explosion, sending Mark flying to the ground. Jodie pulled the ORCA from the rubble, running toward them the rest of the way. Mark looked confused as she approached them, head tilting just slightly when he saw the jumbled piece of something in her arms.

"It's not your daughter, but.." Jodie said, voice trailing off as she handed the machine over to Mark.

He turned it over in his hands, studying it. Attached to its side by a frayed wire was what looked like a headpiece. And while the whole thing was pretty banged up and singed, it wasn't completely destroyed.

Jodie's eyes narrowed as she looked at it, questioning. If Emma had hooked it up to the stadium and taken off, what was it doing down here? If anything, it should've been in the smoking hole where the broadcast booth was. Something wasn't adding up, and it made her uneasy.

But there was no time to think further when the ground rumbled again, smoke suddenly surging up from beneath them. Godzilla and Ghidorah were above them, still locked in battle. The lizard swatted the dragon's incessant necks as they tried gaining any purchase on the titan. With a push, Ghidorah stumbled back, but then the middle head reared backward, springing forth like a coiled snake and sinking his jaws into Godzilla's neck. As Godzilla was about to rip the center head from his throat, the other two heads at his side sprung forward as well. The right head followed, pinning Godzilla's left shoulder, and then the left head, pinning his right arm. The titan let out of a groan of pain as Ghidorah pushed down with all his strength.

"We gotta go!" Barnes yelled, suddenly coming up from behind them as he pushed them away from the brawl.

The titans were stumbling their way, fast.

Jodie felt one of the soldiers grab her, hustling her toward the Osprey. But before they could get any more than a few feet, one of Ghidorah's talons stomped down on the aircraft. It exploded, sending them all reeling back and adding to the mass of flames that already surrounded them. Jodie felt a piece of debris cut across her cheek.

Squinting, trying to push herself up from the ground, she saw Ghidorah hover a few meters above the ground, wings flapping slowly as Godzilla continued to struggle, jaws twisted open in a continuous cry of pain. Then the dragon slammed him back to the ground, pushing him forward into another street, the pavement below them shooting up like crumbs. The titan's cries stopped, Godzilla rearing up and blasting Ghidorah with his atomic breath, knocking the dragon right back toward them.

So much for luck, she thought.

But in that moment, Ghidorah skidded to a stop, the center head drawing away from the fire that poured over his chest and toward the sky. The right head followed his gaze. And then the left.

There was a light in the sky, breaking through the thick cover of clouds. It looked like a sun, but amidst the chaos Jodie heard a familiar song.

Bursting down from above was an unmistakable blue radiance, followed by broad oval-shaped wings that swept back. A pair of amber eye markings glowed at its ends, and for a brief moment Jodie was reminded of Godzilla's eyes.

With a sonic boom of melodious cries, Mothra dove into Ghidorah like a hawk diving down on a snake. As she swung past the dragon, webbing jetted from her jaws, stopping Ghidorah mid-fall and sticking all three of his heads to a skyscraper.

As Mothra gathered speed, what sounded like a teasing laugh chittered from her mandibles as she watched Ghidorah's right head break free. He glared at her with hatred in his eyes as he tried desperately to tear through the webbing that still trapped his struggling brothers. But suddenly, he stopped, seeing Godzilla's reflection rapidly approaching through the building's glass windows. He turned around and trilled in defiance as Godzilla plowed into him, knocking them both clean through the building. Godzilla looked down at the fallen dragon with a reptilian smirk, cheekily huffing out a hot puff of hair. Mothra joined him, swooping back in for the finishing blow.

Ghidorah trilled, not in defeat, but something just as desperate. He was calling for something.

Pulling her wings close together as she dove, she reared up her pointed limbs, preparing to attack. But before she could get any closer, a low roar came out of seemingly nowhere - it was Rodan, bursting from the clouds as a trail of fire sprinkled from the tips of his wings. Mothra cried out in shock, having no time to counter the surprise jump. Like some ancient, vengeful god, he speared straight for her, abruptly tearing her from her flight path. Half-molten wings folded back, he struck her like a meteor, wrapping her in the furnace of his wings. She shrilled in agony as the soft down on her body caught fire. They were a tangle of limbs before Mothra tore at him with her claws, the two of them soaring into buildings. With a push, she broke free, dodging Rodan's beak as he snapped at her.

Glancing back at Godzilla, still trying to keep Ghidorah on the ground, Mothra steeled herself. Once again, she slammed into Rodan, the two spiraling downward. Ghidorah was already a handful, and she had to keep the fiery bird distracted, whatever it took.

Finally, Jodie, Mark and the G-Team were alone on the field. Or what was left of them. Still reeling from the sudden spike in action, Jodie took a head count. Besides Mark, there wasn't much left of G-Team besides Barnes, Martinez and Griffin. And Griffin looked hurt. The rest of the team was just gone without a trace.

And with the Osprey gone, she didn't have a lot of hope that they would fare any better. Flames and steam jetted from the ground, as if the rain of debris wasn't enough. Barnes and Martinez helped Griffin to her feet with gritted teeth, eyes wrenched shut in pain. They had no choice but to walk. But where? The stadium was an inferno with them in the middle, columns of fire licking at the sky. Any direction they went would end with them in torches, but they had to do something. Fast. Maybe there was a weak point in the wall of fire, they could run through it. But Griffin's leg..

But then, out of nowhere, something burst from through the other side of the flames.

It was a banged up jeep that had definitely seen better days, and at the wheel was Emma Russell.

"Get in!" she yelled.

No one moved. Jodie and the others exchanged suspicious glances. She didn't blame them. As much as she wanted to trust her, to believe that she had a change of heart, she was the one that caused all this. Just as Mark was about to open his mouth to say something in response until Mothra and Rodan - whos limbs were still locked together as they rolled through the air - knocked a jet out of the sky. It crashed directly behind them, the resulting explosion sending a hail of debris their way.

"GET IN!" she repeated.

That definitely ended their hesitation in an instant, as all of them jumbled into the car, Mark taking the passenger's seat with the ORCA still in his hand. Jodie folded herself into the trunk as the remnants of G-Team packed together in the back seat. It was an uncomfortable fit, but now wasn't the time to be picky.

In the muffled shelter the car provided, Jodie felt her heart hammering in her ears. She was still unsure that this was all happening, and not the last hallucination of someone currently dying in the rubble. But dream or reality, they still had a mission to carry out.

"Where's Madison?" Mark asked.

"I don't know, I thought she was there!" Emma replied. Jodie's heart sunk.

Above them, a chunk of aircraft crashed into a building, sending another wave of debris hurtling their way. Emma swerved sharply to avoid it, the side of Jodie's head roughly connecting with the back of the car. She grit her teeth, rubbing away the dull pain. That was gonna bruise.

"Well, she's not there!" Mark yelled.

Emma swerved again, avoiding a chunk of building blocking more than half of the road. Griffin held in a scream as her injured leg hit the back of the driver's seat.

"Jesus, take it easy!" Barnes shouted as he tried to put as much pressure on the bleeding wound as he could.

"Here -" Jodie unbuckled the thin belt from her pants, shoving it into Martinez's hands. With a silent nod of thanks, he wrapped it around her leg, fashioning a makeshift tourniquet.

"Look out!" Mark shouted.

In that same moment, Mothra and Rodan came barreling between the buildings that framed the street, knocking a helicopter out of the air as it spun out of control, exploding on the ground. Emma took a sharp turn, wheels skidding over a sidewalk.

"I hope you're as good at finding her as you are losing her." Mark continued.

"I didn't lose her - she ran away!"

"Gee, I wonder why -"

"Oh, don't even start."

"Don't start? You tried to kill me!"

As they continued bickering, Jodie exhaled, pushing the still damp curls away from her face in frustration.

"Can't blame the kid, if I had these two for parents I'd run away from home too." she said to herself.

Emma slammed on the breaks.

"What did you say?" she demanded.

Jodie bristled.

"She said, if I had the two of you for parents I'd run away from home too!" Barnes shouted. "And she's right." he muttered.

Peeking over the backseat, Jodie saw Emma turn to Mark, a look of revelation growing on their faces.

"Home." they both said at once.

Emma stepped on the gas.

_____

Madison couldn't stop crying.

With every step she took, hand wrenched around Elena's, her panic threatened to strangle off her composure. While Mothra's entrance had caused a wave of relief to wash over her, they had both seldom spoken to her during the fight. She could feel that they didn't want her to worry, but that was just the problem.

She could feel them.

Their worry, their relief, their anger, their hurt - Madison could feel it all coursing through her mind. And it was too much.

She had felt brave when she left the Controller's ship, and she'd felt brave when she brought Ghidorah to Fenway. Determination ran through her blood when Godzilla breached ashore, beginning the battle to end all battles. But now it was all too much. Too much death, anger, fear, betrayal. Too many titans.

Nothing lasts, she thought, as her shoes slapped against the puddles filling the pavement, her heart thudding loud in her ears. Nothing. Not mom and dad, not Andrew. Not me. Not Boston. The world is falling apart.

Not all is lost young Spe- , Mothra spoke before being attacked from above by Rodan once more.

Madison continued to sob.

Boston had always been her happy place, the quiet point in her memory untouched by titans. Where she and her family played bocce on the Common, making up their own rules as they went along. Where her favorite climbing tree had been in her backyard, pretending she was in the middle of an isolated jungle. Even the sushi place around the corner where Andrew always wanted to go to, where he tricked her into eating wasabi by telling her it was green frosting. The zoo, the museums, the boats on the harbor, the library where she had checked out her first book. Boston was where everything had been good.

But that place only existed in her memory now. And looking back on it, the damage had begun when they returned from San Francisco. After the funeral, the fights between her parents started. And even after her father left, it was still her home, a place that they could all come back to. But now, as she and the others fled along Beacon Street, everything around her was being torn down.

She paused. Beacon Street.

Elena skidded to a stop, and for the first time since running from the stadium she let go of her hand. The Regulator doubled back to them after having ran ahead of them.

"Why are we stopping?" Elena called over the chaos.

Madison panted, trying desperately to catch her breath. Miraculously, in the midst of the hellish destruction all around her, her old house was still there. That same little townhouse where she had spent the majority of her short life, just on the edge of the Common. If she could just reach it, despite everything, maybe they'd be okay.

"Home," she sputtered through tired lungs. "It's home."

Walking closer, they all shouted when they heard Ghidorah's shrill cry from behind them. Glancing quickly, she saw him pounce from above on top of Godzilla, a flash of blue travelling up his spine.

Don't stop running, the titan reminded her.

I'll be okay, she repeated in her mind. We'll all be okay.

As they finally reached the steps, Madison shrieked as something huge crashed behind them just yards away. An inferno with something writhing within it - wings, claws, insectile legs. It wasn't Godzilla or Ghidorah. Mothra was dragged across the ground with a flurry of embers flying up around her as she chittered in pain.

This isn't like you, Mothra said. She sounded faint, distant. As though the statement wasn't directed towards her.

Madison couldn't watch anymore. She couldn't stand to see more destruction. More death.

Elena ushered her inside, feeling the singe of flames licking at her back. Once all of them were inside, she slammed the door shut. Madison found that she couldn't move any further, all the strength draining from her legs. Madison slid down to the floor as the house began to shake.

"Madison?" Elena's voice sounded so far away.

She covered her ears, drawing her knees up to her elbows as she began to feel herself hyperventilate.

C'mon kid, don't lose your strength, Godzilla's voice echoed at the back of her mind.

But all she could hear were the titan's cries all melding together in a scream that could shatter the heavens. Madison screamed with them.

She felt a pair of hands on her shoulders.

"Hey - Hey, stay with me!"

Who was she kidding, this place was no safer than anywhere else. It was nothing more than a straw house surrounded by very big wolves. Across the room, old family photos rattled on their shelves. That family in those pictures - like her memories of Boston - only existed in her memory.

Madison could feel her vision start to black out around the edges, the only thing filling her sight were blue and yellow flashing lights filtering from the windows around her.

_____

Elena gathered Madison in her arms.

"Madison - chingada madre - if you can hear me you have to wake up!"

She didn't respond, instead, a thin trail of blood leaked from her nose. This wasn't good.

With the titans all around them, she remembered the girl mentioning hearing a voice - one that wasn't Godzilla - speaking to her back on the ship. If she was still connected to both all at once, her mind could collapse from the strain. And she wouldn't let that happen, not to someone so young.

Speed-walking toward the Regulator, she motioned to follow her. Without question, she trailed after them.

Elena weaved her way through the house, passing by a wall of family photos. Seeing a younger, happier Madison, she pressed her lips together in a thin line.

"What are you doing?" the Regulator finally spoke up.

"She's stuck." Elena said. "I don't know how she managed to stay like this for so long but she's connected herself to two different titans. Simultaneously."

Finally reaching what she was looking for, she kicked open the door to the bathroom with her leg. The trio poured in as Elena set the girl down into the tub, climbing in after her and she folded her legs close to her body.

"But what about Ghidorah?"

Elena paused, thoughts running through her mind before coming to a determined conclusion. "I have to try."

The Regulator said nothing, only nodding sharply before folding her arms. "I'd say don't do anything stupid, but it's a bit late for that now, is it?"

Elena smiled sadly, letting out a chuff of a chuckle. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes.

_____

Jodie watched from the back of the car as Godzilla slammed Ghidorah through another building. Between their missiles and a supercharged Godzilla, and Ghidorah not being able to heal as fast as he was being wounded, it looked like they were winning. The dragon looked like he was trying to fight free from Godzilla's wrath and escape again, trying to find some break in the onslaught for him to fly away. But Godzilla stayed one step ahead of him.

Silently, Jodie cheered the big lizard on.

So far, their losses were unthinkable. The fleet, all those pilots, Serizawa - all sacrificed themselves to bring them to this. A single moment that would decide the fate of humanity.

Sure there were other titans out there, but with Godzilla in charge instead of that golden maniac, if things didn't get better, maybe they would at least not get worse.

But Jodie's thoughts were interrupted when just a few streets away, Mothra and Rodan were still battling it out. Locked together in a death spiral, the winged titans crashed into a bridge. It crumpled on impact like cardboard, and fire splashed all around them, setting everything it touched ablaze.

Oh no, Jodie thought, flinching. Mothra had definitely been ready for a fight, but that had to hurt.

But then she sprang up, finding purchase on Rodan's back and slashed her claws deep into him. The firebird screeched, leaping into the air and slamming his wings down so that both of them careened through another skyscraper and vanished from her line of sight. Flames exploded from inside the building and began to rapidly hail from above. Emma dodged as much as she could, but Jodie could still hear it hammering against the roof of the car.

Behind them, Godzilla continued beating Ghidorah. He seemed to be doing alright even without Mothra's assistance. As he slammed his tail into his side once again, it sent the dragon reeling into an already crumbling building. Ghidorah flapped his wings frantically, managing to pull himself away before Godzilla snapped his jaws shut on a wing, twisting his head like a crocodile as he sent the dragon back to the ground. The resulting shock wave carried smoke and debris for a mile or two, and the car Jodie had folded herself into rattled from the impact.

Come on, finish the bastard off, big guy, she thought frantically.

Godzilla seemed to have the same thought, roaring out a beam of blue fire against the dragon's back. Ghidorah shrieked in agony. All the while, the dull orange pulsing grew brighter and brighter, mixing with his signature blue glow. As Godzilla's brilliance shone through the smoke, Ghidorah's own golden light had dimmed to a sickly intermittent yellow. He almost looked a little pathetic, flailing against the lizard with nowhere to go.

As Godzilla continued hammering his powerful shoulders against the dragon, Ghidorah was just trying to escape, not even trying to fire a beam of lightning his way. Suddenly, with a hiss, Ghidorah's right head sneered before snaking out, struggling away from his tormenter. For a second Jodie thought that he was trying to separate himself from his body, striking out on his own. And maybe he could. If the dragon could regrow an entire head, then who knew what was possible.

But it quickly became evident to Jodie that that wasn't the dragon's intention.

There was no way to warn Godzilla as Ghidorah's right head zeroed in on a sputtering power plant, showering sparks down onto the street. His maw gaping wide, he bit down on the wires. Godzilla let out a puzzled rumble.

Despite all of the damage, most of Boston and its suburbs still had power. But now, every light around them and as far as her eyes could see strobed, going dark, lighting back up for a brief second, and then dimming again as the power grid struggled to handle the sudden massive drain on the system. Jodie's eyes widened in shock.

Ghidorah blazed back to a full charge, and something like the smell of batteries filled the air. Rising to his full height, wings and heads outspread, his eldritch light began to build in his throats. Then, golden lightning gathered around him and blasted from all three heads. The bolts went wild, branching into the sky as they went from three concentrated beams of energy to a thousand fractal streams of lightning, creating a web of destruction across the sky. Even though they were on the ground, Jodie could smell the burnt air around them.

As the hundreds of branching bolts spread through the sky, jagging through and around the aircraft still somehow intact, the chain reaction continued even after Ghidorah had already subsided, leaping to every possible object in the air. As the energy arced through the sky, pilots were electrocuted and engines were fried, burning down into the city below. Dozens of aircraft were gone in seconds.

There was a flash of gold in front of the car, but at least they were spared of being struck. Jodie took slow, deliberate breaths as she tried to get her pulse to ease up. Toward the front of the car, she could hear a cacophony of curses.

Even Godzilla was knocked from his feet, letting out a cry of shock and pain as he was hurled through the harbor and into a shipyard, stopping himself with a clawed arm that had dug deep into a skyscraper.

Jodie could feel the hair standing on end as she saw the titan catch his breath, looking as tired as she felt. A pang of empathy struck her as she saw a streak smoke off of the side of his face. Though he seemed mostly intact, a long band of raw skin streaked across his left eye.

Get up, Godzilla, she thought. Come on, you can't quit now.

As if hearing her words, Godzilla clambered back to his feet, almost seeming to sigh as he balanced himself on the remains of buildings next to him. Ghidorah remained standing at his full height, wings outstretched as his heads snapped at Godzilla, taunting him. The worst and largest of gashes across his chest from the lizard was already starting to close up, the holes that had been burned through his wings stitching together. The dragon seemed to celebrate his victorious comeback with another earth-shattering trill, stretching out his wings and taking to the air. He was headed right toward where Godzilla stood, still winded from the electrocution.

The radio still at Jodie's side crackled. She grabbed it, desperately trying to get the connection to hold.

"Are you guys alright up there?" she shouted.

"Wouldn't speak too soon if I were you." Stanton replied. "But you guys definitely won't be if you stay down there for long - Godzilla's radiation's reaching critical mass," he warned. "Six minutes 'till he blows!"

Before the feed on the radio cut off, Jodie could hear Foster's frantic voice. "Order all remaining craft to retre -"

That's if there's any left to retreat, she thought gravely. She had lost count of all the fallen a while ago. Turning off the radio, she leaned over the back seat.

"Shit, you guys catch that?" she yelled to the front of the car.

"Kinda wish I didn't." Barnes replied.

As Godzilla struggled to catch his second wind, Mothra didn't seem to be faring any better.

Locked in midair, she and Rodan tore at each other viciously as they bowled through the city, smashing through buildings and leaving a trail of fire in their wake.

The car suddenly came to a stop as Mothra was thrown into the building directly in front of them. Her back hit it hard, and with a pained chitter she stayed there for a moment, stunned. And like a flaming arrow, Rodan appeared shortly afterward, pinning her to the building with his wings as his talons sunk deep into its steel foundations. Mothra was badly burned, and she was desperately flailing against the flying reptile's grasp to no avail. Like a ravenous vulture, Rodan began tearing into her wings with his beak. She swiped at his face with her smaller forelimbs, and suddenly Rodan broke off the attack, flying off.

But not far. He was building his speed, and with a strong flap of his wings he dove. Mothra climbed to the top of the skyscraper, weakly trying to move herself out of the way. But Rodan was far faster. Smashing into her once more, he snapped at her head. Mothra braced against the building, trying her best to squirm out of the way. Again and again, he tried but to no avail. Until, finally, he seemed to find his aim - until he suddenly froze in place, a frail screech spilling from his beak.

Groaning in agony, he glanced down, looking at the stinger lodged in his shoulder. He reared back, trying to fight free of Mothra's grasp but he couldn't. Her stinger was buried deep, all the way up to her thorax.

They both hung there for a moment, Mothra's eyes seeming to search Rodan's for something - if that were even possible. But then his thrashing weakened, and his flames dimmed. Retracting her stinger, the open wound glowed like cooling lava as the flying reptile slipped away. He fell, vanishing into the smoke he'd ignited with an agonizing screech. As he landed to the ground with a thud, lifting the car a foot into the air for a brief moment, his eyes rolled back. He was still breathing, but he wasn't about to rejoin the fight anytime soon.

Back ahead of them, Jodie saw Mothra clinging to the toppled building, trembling as her bioluminescence started to fade. She took a weak step, trying to push herself back into the air only to slip. She let out a frail cry. She sounded like she was in pain, like she was afraid. Instead of taking to the air, she sat there, gathering what little strength she had left. She had defeated Rodan, but it didn't look like she had much longer herself.

After what felt like an eternity, the jeep roared up Beacon Street, swerving around the burning carcasses of aircraft and piles of buildings. Through the chaos, Jodie caught occasional glimpses of places that had survived the fight. A small corner store was untouched, and a coffee shop was somehow still recognizable, even though the fire caused by Rodan and Mothra's fight would likely soon consume it just like the trees that had now become torches.

"It's just up ahead!" Mark called.

Through the smoke, he and Emma searched for their old home. Finally, she slammed on the breaks, Jodie having to brace herself before she slammed against the back seat again. Looking out the window, all relief that Jodie had drained from her body.

What was probably a house in the recent past had now collapsed into a smoking pile of rubble. Off in the distance, the white noise of titans fighting, planes crashing, and ships sinking made her ears ring as she exited the car with the others. If the kid had really been in there..she stopped her mind from going any farther.

"Madison!" Mark shouted, leaping from the car and diving straight into the ruins of his old home, tossing aside bricks and smoldering planks.

"Maddie!" Emma joined him, a ragged desperation evident in every movement in her body.

Jodie and the rest of G-Team filed out into the ruins, calling after the lost child as they pushed aside the wreckage. Jodie hands began to sting, coughing as sweat and smoke stung every inch of her body. A weird, acrid scent drifted on the breeze, and off in the distance something exploded.

Suddenly, like a cicada bursting from the ground after its long sleep, a pale arm sprouted from underneath a pile of rubble.

There was a weak coughing and what sounded like a voice calling for help. The arm limply tried to push the wall of debris away but not finding the strength to do so. Mark called after Emma as everyone converged on the spot. Lifting away the broken off piece of a wall, they uncovered a body alright.

But it wasn't Madison.

I thought they evacuated the city, Jodie thought in confusion, staring at the blonde woman that struggled to stand. Emma helped her up, roughly grabbing her arm.

"Where are they?" she said, anger evident in her voice.

They?

Coughing, the blonde woman pointed behind her. It was a broken bathtub, and beneath the pile of rubble that covered it was a small, pallid hand. On the count of three, they all lifted the wall from the tub's rim. Jodie's arms ached from the strain, but eventually they tossed it to the side.

Within the tub was Madison and another strange woman - though her name alluded her, she recognized her as the same one from the footage in Antarctica. They were folded together, and they both weren't moving.

Neither of them reacted as they were pulled from the tub, their limbs swinging limp as they dragged them out and lay flat on the ground. Their skin was pale and cold to the touch. Jodie glanced up, and for the briefest of moments she saw a look of raw despair painted on Mark and Emma's faces.

"Are they breathing?" Emma whimpered.

Mark cradled Madison in his arms, brushing her hair from her face. "Don't go," he whispered. "Please don't go."

Emma collapsed at his side, clutching the child's hand between her own.

The blonde woman staggered to the ground, taking the dark-haired one that had been found in the tub into her arms. She framed her face.

"Fight it, Elena." she whispered with conviction. "You're stronger than this. Fight him."

_____

Elena woke.

She was in the headspace, the same one she shared with Ghidorah. Bruised yellow clouds curled around her feet as she tread through the storm in her mind. A thick bolt of lightning flash just a few feet ahead of her.

If you haven't noticed already,

                      We're a bit busy at the moment.

                                    We aren't really in need of insects scrambling at our feet

Or do you just like us that much?

I'm not here for you

Then do us a favor and get crushed under some rubble

There was another flash of lightning, and this time Elena was knocked off of her feet, tumbling through a cloud. Ghidorah became nothing more than a black silhouette as she was pushed farther away from the dragon. She stopped herself, arms aching as she tried to push herself back on her feet. Her hands clenched into fists.

All you do, her voice trembled, but she didn't care. Is take. And take. And take. But do you even want it?

Ghidorah paused, his middle head snaking down toward her.

Excuse us?

You think you're some god, Elena stood back up, firmly planting her feet on the nonexistent ground beneath her. But you're just acting like a greedy brat

The clouds began to kick up, swirling into something that wanted to be a storm. Thunder shook the headspace as Ghidorah's heads all came within mere yards of where she stood, surrounding her in a circle of bared teeth.

We have bled countless worlds dry.

                        We have been here long before your kind was even a concept in the universe's mind.

                             And we'll be here long after

I almost feel sorry for you, Elena stepped closer to Ghidorah. Outstretching a hand and placing it on the tip of his snout, she took a deep breath.

You're just an animal, Ghidorah. And you'll die like one

Before the dragon had a chance to respond, the headspace began to collapse all around them. The last thing she heard before being sent back to the pitch black void was Ghidorah's trilling roar.

It felt weird, being all by herself. But she couldn't allow that to continue for another second. She had a girl to find.

_____

Madison woke.

Remembering the fear, the tumult that still raged outside, how everything was coming undone right before her eyes, how everything sort of shut off and faded to black. She sucked in a breath, but she found that she could not breathe.

She was still aware, there just wasn't anything to see, feel, or hear. It was like she was underwater, in the dark, all of her senses turned inward. The headspace.

Madison wondered for a moment if she was dead. She tried to move but her limbs just weren't there. Her panic had faded, but now it began to set in once again. What happened to her? If this was the headspace could Elena be here too? Was she even still okay? And where was the Regulator? Were they all dead?

She tried to shout for help, but found that she didn't have a voice either. She tried sending out a wave of thought, but found that it didn't travel far enough.

Maybe this was it. In her terror to escape the fight, she hadn't been able to see the big picture, unable to sort out who was winning. She flashed back to when they had entered the Common, back to Mothra and Rodan - the giant insect's beautiful, delicate-looking wings caught between the sharp hook of Rodan's beak, both engulfed in flame. Maybe Madison had lead them all to their demise.

She tried again to wiggle her arms and legs, but still nothing happened. It was as if she was suspended in midair. She wondered if she was even in her body anymore. Elena mentioned about bad things happening to those that stayed in the headspace for too long. And in that moment Madison had realized that she had been connected to Mothra and Godzilla when she blacked out. She messed up. Bad.

She wanted to cry. Mom's probably wondering where I am, she thought. Did she even make it to Fenway?

In that moment, the void all around her grew just a little lighter.

A faint blue illumination appeared, warm and familiar. It was just a spot at first, but then it began to expand, like she was nearing the end of a tunnel. Maybe she really was dying.

But then the glow took on a form as it grew nearer, and like that time on the roof of the stadium, other shapes began to form around her. Familiar shapes. She knew this place. The sounds of a rainforest began to fill her ears as the void opened up into a monochromatic blue-green forest, complete with birdsong and mist.

Madison found herself back in Yunnan. Everything was there - the containment facility's control room, the bas-reliefs on the temple walls - only it was all illuminated by the same teal light that emanated from Mothra. Madison found that she could move again, and as she walked through its familiar halls. And in the heart of the temple, where she and her mother had been taken from their relatively routine lives, was Mothra. But this time she was no longer just an oversized larva, it was her in her imago form. All slender limbs and downy fuzz complete with brilliant markings on gossamer wings. She was the most beautiful thing Madison had ever seen.

Like before, she felt her connection to the titan. And like before, she reached out to touch her. Only this time, she let her in.

As her fingers brushed against her soft down, Mothra's wings unfolded, splaying out before her. All of her fear was gone now, and for the first time in a long time, she felt at peace. The titan chittered a strange, lovely song. Although there were no words, Madison could understand. It felt as if she was telling her that everything would be alright. Feeling Mothra's heartbeat beneath her hand, for a moment, it harmonized with her own.

As her gaze trailed upward, she noticed something off about the titan. Upon closer inspection, Mothra looked hurt, her wings singed with holes burned through its tips. Madison's brows furrowed with worry.

Mothra..your wings, she thought. Are you gonna be okay?

The titan laughed wistfully. I think I should be asking you that question, young Speaker. But I'm alright, just a little tired is all

Something about that sent a shiver of dread down her spine. You can still get out of here, before Ghidorah -

It's not over yet, she interrupted. Godzilla..he is strong, but he needs me in ways you may not understand

I wish I could help you, she said through a silent sob. You don't deserve to die

I won't die, Speaker, Mothra lifted her chin with her smaller forelimbs. For creatures like me, that's just how it is. We're born, we live, and we die, repeating the cycle. This isn't my first time, you know

Mothra withdrew her claw. But if you stay here with me, you just might

...I don't understand

I've already helped you as much as I can, but if you're here when I...Mothra considered her words for a moment. This is something I was born to do, and you were not

It's not fair

I'm sure to something like you, it wouldn't be

In a heartbeat, Mothra's light began to fade, the titan's shape beginning to drift apart. Madison tried desperately to hold onto the vision, but found that it only continued to come apart.

But don't feel sad for me, young Speaker. Our connection will always exist, and you will live, but now there is something important I have to do. Or else none of us will

As the titan's shape began to unravel into a million strands of silk, carried off by the nonexistent wind, Mothra was gone, and so was her light.

Don't go, not yet -!

We'll meet again, Speaker. I believe that

In an instant the headspace reverted back to its blank state, the all-encompassing void. Stretching out endlessly all around her in utter silence.

Mothra? Madison called out, feeling the connection beginning to fade. Mothra?!

Silence.

Though she could move again, she didn't see the point. Madison was alone. There was no sign of Mothra or Elena. And there definitely was no sign of her mother. And unlike last time, Mothra hadn't thrown her out like Godzilla had. But she couldn't blame her. Even in the headspace Madison could feel that the titan had grown weak.

Madison curled into herself.

She didn't ask for any of this, didn't ask to be thrown into a world of monsters, to have these strange powers awakened without having any say - no matter how whimsical her mother had made it sound. She didn't hate the titans, even after this she didn't think she ever could. They were just animals after all. But in that moment Madison wished she could go back to that time in Boston, when she was only 6 years old with her brother and her parents. When everything was simple, when she was happy.

And now she was stuck in her own head with no way out.

Madison sniffled to herself, not hearing the muffled shout far in the back of her mind.

But the second time the muffled sound echoed, she did hear it. She couldn't make out what it was specifically, but it kept getting closer. And closer. And closer still until she could clearly hear a person's voice calling out her name.

Elena.

Madison didn't have enough time to register what was happening before her eyes when the woman all but tackled her, wrapping her arms around her in a hug. It was so surreal that she found herself frozen in place. Elena pulled away.

Are you alright? Are you hurt?

Y-Yeah. I think I'm fine, but how are you -?

I..I had to clear something up first. But it wasn't hard to find you

Elena placed a hand on her shoulder.

Now we have to wake up

In that same moment, Madison saw a new, harsher light. It wasn't like Mothra's warm, comforting light. Or Godzilla's strong, blue light. And along with this new vision, she heard familiar voices murmuring their names. And crying. She closed her hand and felt her fingers move. Her real ones. Taking a deep breath, smoky air filled her lungs.

Madison coughed as she sprung forward, lungs stinging from the burning air that surrounded her. Not too far away, she heard Elena take in a deep gasp.

And Mom and dad were there, both of them hugging her as they sobbed over her.

Maybe I did die, she thought. This can't be real.

But her body said otherwise. Every inch of it ached, but whatever Mothra had done seemed to work. Although she was nowhere near back to 100%, she felt just a little better.

"Mom?" she spoke with an audible rasp. "Dad?"

Through the rain that pelted her face, she felt her father pull her into a hug so strong she could barely move. Her mother joined him, wrapping her arms around them both. They said nothing, as all they could do was hold each other while the world raged in the background.

Andrew was gone, and Boston would soon be too. But sitting in the ruins of her old house as fire rained around them, she felt that they were home enough.

But before they could have the chance to release each other, Godzilla's roar bellowed not too far away. And she found that everyone else was staring off into the distance, so Madison wrenched her gaze from her parents to look at the source of the sound as well. She wished she hadn't.

Ghidorah was killing Godzilla.

She didn't understand, couldn't wrap her mind around the sudden switch in circumstances. They had been winning, right? Was this what Mothra was talking about?

As the dots connected within her mind, Madison found herself quickly becoming consumed by fear.

Madison watched helplessly as Ghidorah stalked toward the titan, who looked to be propping himself with a collapsed building. The scutes on his back glowed with a weak blue light that was hardly noticeable above the burning skyline. Godzilla didn't have the chance to get out of the way before Ghidorah pushed himself into the air, springing onto the lizard talons-first like a bird of prey.

The dragon's claws dug into Godzilla's neck, and as his arms weakly grabbed at Ghidorah's legs, he was pushed back with ease.

Ghidorah's tails wrapped around his body, crushing what life remained from him. Madison flinched as Godzilla's dorsal spines cracked from the stress. And then the dragon's wings started to beat, stronger, harder until - impossibly - the two began to ascend. It was slow at first, but the more he flapped his wings the more momentum he built as the titans rose hundreds of feet in the air.

No, Madison thought. No no no no no.

She felt the world fall apart from beneath her feet. Everything was starting to go away again. She couldn't even feel her parent's arms around her. All she could hear was the beat of Ghidorah's wings and Godzilla's cries of agony.

No you too. Not you.

One of the dragon's necks wrapped around Godzilla's, coiling like a boa constrictor. Godzilla struggled to breathe, uselessly clawing at the head until his cries died out with a pathetic, high-pitched whine. His body slackened, head lolling to the side, his arm falling away limply. Ghidorah continued to rise.

Wake up, Godzilla! Wake up!

There was no response.

They had risen so high she could hardly see them anymore. If Ghidorah was from space like the Regulator had said, had he left the atmosphere? Was he going to leave the titan in its vast expanse to die?

Madison soon got her answer, and she felt her stomach drop to the floor.

Mercilessly, Ghidorah's claws unhinged themselves from their grasp, and Godzilla slipped away.

Like an angel cast from the heavens, he fell. And as he fell, he began to burn, and as the flames surrounded him he hardly resembled the titan that she knew. He looked like a meteor plunging to earth. Godzilla's roar was lost over the sound of his impact, and Madison could only stand there, slack-jawed. Nobody around her made a sound or moved an inch.

The titan struck the ground like a bomb, a plume of smoke and debris flying into the air. And when the dust settled, Madison saw him lying motionless in the crater his body had carved into Boston.

Get up, get up, please get up, she sent out her thoughts in waves, hoping they would reach him.

The response was far away, and it was hardly audible - so far away from the powerful voice she had grown used to. But it was him.

I'm sorry. I just gotta rest my eyes for a little while

You can't, you'll die!

Godzilla chuckled weakly. But before he could respond, Ghidorah landed in front of him, bolts of lightning accenting his arrival. He rose above the fallen titan, his electrical charge building, preparing to end their duel.

This couldn't be it. Everyone that had died, everything that had led up to this moment, it couldn't have been all for nothing. With Godzilla dead and the ORCA destroyed, what chances did they have? Not even Elena could control him, and with nothing to keep Ghidorah in check, he would remake the world as he saw fit. And there was nothing any of them could do but watch as the dragon's charge increased, the bottled lightning of a hundred storms building in their throats. Ghidorah's fury was spilling from his mouths, and soon enough he would no longer be able to keep it in.

But like Ghidorah, Madison had been so focused on Godzilla, that she hadn't noticed the small, sharp claw rising from behind the titan's back.

Godzilla seemed to notice it too, a low pained rumble sounding from his throat as he feebly turned his head to watch the torn and battered Mothra pull herself onto him.

But you just got back, she heard Godzilla whisper.

She could barely stand, but with all the strength she could muster, she stood tall, smoke emanating off of her burning wings as she chittered at Ghidorah. No matter how hard she tried, Madison couldn't understand what she was saying. But her actions had painted a glimmer of an idea in her mind.

Ghidorah hissed, tails rattling as Mothra spread her wings out like a shield, her fading blue light bathing Godzilla in a faint glow.

With one strong push and a defiant screech, she launched herself at the dragon. She could hardly get airborne, and she didn't get far. The lightning in Ghidorah's mouths burst forth, striking through and around her.

With a bright flash of yellow and blue light, Mothra vanished. All that remained was a cloud of glowing particles that refracted every color of the rainbow. Like snow in the moonlight, they began to fall gently upon Godzilla, his body pulsing with a faint orange light.

Godzilla let out a mournful groan, letting his head fall back to the ground.

Madison screamed, suddenly feeling nauseous as she collapsed in her father's arms. A few of the people around her couldn't bare to watch - Elena among them - while others looked on in shock or horror. Everyone was silent.

The dragon's eyes sparkled with dark, insidious glee as he regarded the ethereal cloud that was all that remained of Mothra. Her sacrifice didn't seem to sway him in the slightest as all three heads slithered toward Godzilla. His forked tongues flickered in and out as he hissed, mocking. It wasn't the expression of an animal that had bested another, or of a predator regarding its prey. Ghidorah enjoyed killing. He lived for it, for the pain it caused, the power it gave.

Godzilla had said something in response, something so consumed with hatred and grief that Madison couldn't quite catch it. Her ears began to ring. Every sound around her had become drowned out by her hiccuping sobs.

But through her tears, she saw something..weird.

At this distance, it was hard to tell, but it looked like that faint orange light was turning into a dull, reddish-orange sheen, as if lava was welling up from beneath his skin.

Despite everything, she could feel that he wasn't dying. He was growing stronger.

"He's not dead." she muttered.

"What was that?" her dad responded.

"He's not - dead!" she repeated, struggling to free herself from his grasp as she ran toward Elena.

"We have to distract him, are you still connected?"

"Hold on, distract who?" she said, utterly confused.

"Ghidorah - Godzilla's not dead but he will be if we just stand here!"

Elena struggled to find a response. "I-I can't, I'm not - I had to cut him off to find you. I'm sorry."

Her father turned toward her mother, a sudden look of realization growing on his face. "We have to work fast."

"To do what?" she asked.

He nodded to someone behind her. Suddenly, a woman ran to the jeep behind them and came back holding a battered piece of equipment - the ORCA. Up close, she realized that the woman was Gill's wife. She handed it to her mother.

"You can't be serious." her mother said, looking incredulously at her father.

But he was, and everyone saw it. So they got to work.

"Sam," Jodie spoke into a handheld radio. "We're gonna need a ride."

[queeranarchist]

uhhh every 5th q for the ask meme?

:O

5) What was the first time you suspected you were transgender?

uhhh first time i remember was when I cut my hair off - for an SPN Lucifer cosplay of all things - and was like hell yeah I look like a dude! Radical! and then was like oh that is not a very CisThought™️

10) What have your experiences with packing or wearing breast forms been?

you know i bought a pretty expensive packer and it was waaay too large despite being one of the smaller ones of that model - this was apparently a problem a lot of guys had and their were videos on how to cut it to make it fit but it cost a lot and i was too worried about ruining it - anyway i moved house three and a half times in six months and my stuff is currently in between two houses and I have No Idea where it is and in the back of my mind there is the constant fear that someone will find that dick 

15) What labels have you used before you’ve settled on your current set?

i’ve used pretty much every label sexuality wise bc attraction is weird. gender wise i ided as a trans man until last yearish and now im just like im queer in all senses

20) What do you wish you could have shared with your younger self about being trans?

prooobably a lot of gender abolitionist stuff like meets past self and just holds a reading group of Nobody Passes by Matt Sycamore - like i hate the transmed/truscum view point but i see that a lot of it is pushed by 15 year old trans guys and the whole wanting to be cis/as close to cis as possible and you can have pride in being LGB but not in being trans thing is pretty much how i experienced gender until last year where i was like time to make the Conscious effort to rework my thoughts, i didnt end up in the dysphoria discourse largely bc it wasnt a big thing when i first realised i was trans (lmao no trans issues were big things at that point) - in general i’d want to get myself to work on a more intersectional approach in terms of understanding that the gender binary is a western colonialist construct and that capitalism pushes queerphobia by wanting to minamalise community reliance and further their profit by pushing a nuclear child producing way of structuring relationships - basically get little me to turn all that angst and anger @ the system

25) What do you wish cis people understood?

that they arent the end goal, i detest the view they have that trans people should be glad to be told that they look like a “”””real”””” women/man - also that they dont need to understand, i dont give a flying fuck if they dont get how someone can identify differently to their assigned gender/be nonbinary/have a gender that changes, just use the right pronouns and name and be ya’know a decent person - and! that they dont need to know what “makes” someone trans and that that line of thinking veers dangerously towards eugenics

30) Who is the transgender person who has influenced you the most?

ahhh good question - i realised i was trans in a pre Caitlyn Jenner pre Orange is the New Black era so a lot of it was just me figuring out shit on my own - which gotta say wasnt necessarily a bad thing bc more visibility has also lead to more bulshit

I would probably say Matt Sycamore - the first book i read that was edited by her was Why are Faggots so Afraid of Faggots and like the queer radicalism and like anarchy from that helped me figure out and voice some of my disquiet with queer assimilation stuff and also the big We Won the marriage campaign queer stuff is Done mood that was 2017 after Australia’s same sex marriage plebiscite. her book Nobody Passes which focuses purely on gender stuff also follows a similar vein and its very very good

35) How do you feel your gender interacts with your race, disability, class, weight, etc. from the perspective of intersectionality?

outside of queer stuff i fit into a pretty privileged life, defs gonna say class played a major noticeable role in being able to get hormones despite having to go through a whole court process (pretty sure the government being the Worst to baby me is what made me an anarchist) and get top surgery pretty quickly once out of high school, my whiteness also provides a certain protection when you see the much higher rates of violence at trans POC, and I'm also able to access queer events and spaces without having to consider accessibility etc

40) How did/do you manage waiting to transition?

mmmm honestly at the time it was the worst and looking back on it i am still very angry and bitter at both my school and, you know, the government in general

i did the whole im trans use the right name and pronouns @ the school people (with my parents there so they couldnt use that as an excuse) about nine months before they started doing so AND this was also after my parents flat out ignoring that I was trans for months before that and i did not uuhhh deal well with any of that mentally At All. my school was pretty much like yll be bullied we cant as if every kid i interacted with didnt already know - and when they eventually did it wasnt a big deal with kids - i only heard second hand about some shit that was said about me which gotta admit was kinda laughable bc i had people i barely knew tell me what people in my grade had said and i was like….dont know who that is but Okay - i was too out of the gossip loop to have anything to be upset about 😂 also i had two (2) teachers in the entire school that used the correct pronouns despite me fully out for near three years by the time i left school tho i didnt actually recognise how bad that was for me until i left high school and was like ???? dont want to die all the time ?? what is this

medically was also bulshit bc the australian system used to have anyone under 18 have to go through court to get HRT, it took me nearly three years and was incredibly fucked and even tho the laws been changed now i am still ready to throw down with whoever implemented it in the first place even tho their probably old and close to death themselves

ANYWAY in terms of providing a better answer than i didnt and was v sad and angry for a v long time - i surrounded myself with queer people, i ventured into the city for some youth queer groups, went to a camp purely for young queer people, read a lot of books about trans people etc 

Ask me questions ~

http://queeranarchist.tumblr.com/post/183686207345/datgenderqueerboi-trans-ask-game-what-has