#and it feels so... shallow. so artificial. idk

[thegreatyin]

does anyone else not like the fact that therapist youtube ads are a thing now. like it feels like a weirdly corporate way of monetizing mental health. like yeah you should go to therapy if you need it but it feels like companies are trying to extend america's weird "advertising pharmaceutical drugs in ads" movement to mental wellness and it's icky

[verosikastrikerstellaexcuser]

this might be a lil mean, but tbh, i just think viv is back pedaling on making stella a complete monster because she wasnt anticipating the critical response the circus would get. that episode did everything it possibly could to potray her as an insane mega bitch with no depth or anything she feels towards stolas besides anger. that, and the fact that now, because of that episode, stella is objectively a victim like stolas is, because of their arranged child marriage, no matter how much the narrative favors That fucking blue Bird that i Hate.

but by doing so, it honestly seems like a double edged sword for the writing no matter what.

like, if it was written that their marriage and relationship was a consensual one they developed as adults, it would make stolases actions ten times worse. it would imply at some point, he cared about stella, even if he did fall out of love and stay with stella for via. but that still wouldnt matter, since later on, he would cheat on stella for an imp he just sleeps with once a month, effectively running his relationship with his wife AND daughter. at that point, everything would be his fault.

having them forced together at such a young age means theyll have to make octavia no matter what, and be together no matter what, absolving stolas from a lot of the of the accountability of cheating. because if stella never really loved him at all, then it doesnt matter!

but then that also means that stella is undeniably a child bride, who didnt want this just as much as stolas didnt. it means she had no autonomy like him, no independence to make her own choices like he couldnt, and no way to escape her life. he got an out through blitz, an imp who he projects his own feelings of wanting to be wanted by someone, anyone, onto him, and the most stella is allowed to do is throw parties.

and i mean, hes still doing just fine during all of this too. stella has to move back in with her family after he announces the divorce, the last place any adult, let alone a royal goetia would want to go back to, while stolas gets to day drink and read royal smut in his giant backyard with a pool. we dont even know what his actual important job for hell is 2 seasons and 16 episodes into this show, besides.. idk, blessing vegetables in wrath?

i just wish stella had had her backstory teased or even acknowledged in s1, because judging by the way viv tried to give millie depth by suddenly having her say she doesnt feel important, when shes almost always was regarded as a competent and deadly assassin by everyone around her, (even by striker!) before the episode that is unhappy sibling fuckers- i have my doubts on how stellas backstory could be executed.

apology tour, to me at least, was just an episode where the creators pet is gifted a random boyfriend after sexual coercing, harassing, and assaulting the main character for almost a full season, while the main character gets merch sold of him being hung and told to literally kill himself. so my standards for what to expect from this series are considerably more low then before.

i dont think stella will instantly become a more compelling character if its shown that she was abused like stolas was, but honestly, what i do think, is that what viv herself thinks. why else would that leaked scene in ghost fucker with millie be so dark and out of nowhere for her character? its a pattern of giving her women artificial depth that sometimes can be explored every once in awhile in a surface level, shallow way, but never more then stolas or stoliz fucking is. i think thats part of the reason why the writing for the women is so lacking in hazbin hotel too, to be honest. it feels like a first draft meant to tie fans over, rather then a conflict or arc being set up to be actually explored through any of these womens characters in the same meaningful way the mens characters are explored thoroughly with both shows.

Whether it’s mean or not I do think you’re right. Viv looks at peoples takes including criticisms of the show on the reg. Which I really don’t think is a good idea personally, in the sense it could allow an original vision to get watered down. I think it may have contributed to the show becoming all about Stolitz ad a kind of feedback loop lol, especially when you consider how fandom is so heavily shipping interested.

I remember when Viv responded to crit about Millie’s neglect like “Helluva is a male lead show while Hazbins the female lead one!” Or whatever as if that magically fixed the wasted potential of the shows female characters. Like, if you’re gonna look at crit then at least think about it instead of feeling the need to immediately deny and argue against it. ofc it’s okay for a creator to disagree, they have that right. But I don’t think responding publicly is the right way to go, like it just feels like too much, it’s not necessary.

I try to keep things non personal as people rarely hold other writers for HB accountable and sometimes people go after Viv in a way that isn’t just criticising the sexism in her writing or how she treats employees and rather is simply unhinged hatred of her - like trying to diagnose that she has X Or Y mental disorders, it’s creepy and inappropriate to me that kind of thing. But this time since the topics here I do have to say I’m just not a fan of the publicly responding to criticism thing, especially while a show is ongoing. I don’t think it’s good for a creators head and you run the risk of getting a small account that simply had an opinion on a show bombarded with hate if you respond directly or even not if it sets off rabid fans and then they go looking for criticsl posts. There will always be critics, stubbornly denying that their criticism isn’t right isn’t productive for anyone involved.

[gillianthecat]

I have got to get over my grudge against face filters or face-tuning or whatever it's called when they blur the actor's face so their skin is completely smooth and texture free and very pale and has no dimensionality.

I'm watching Light On Me, and I'm charmed by all the characters, but I keep getting distracted by the fact that none of them look like human beings. grrr. Like, it kind of fits the comic book tropey-ness of the story, but I still would prefer to see their god danged faces.

(Fun fact: Shin Woo's actor's face is the reason I started watching Light On Me in the first place. Kang Yoo Soek has a small part in Beyond Evil, and within a minute of his appearance on screen I was like, who is THAT???👀, and immediately went to MDL to see what else he was in. Turns out he was in a BL! so I decided it was finally time to check this one out. Maybe I'm just resentful about them hiding his face from me. On the other hand, Beyond Evil and Light On Me are from the same year, and he looks a decade younger in the latter, so I guess the filtering helps with that? idk, I'd prefer everyone's real faces. But I realize that with this, as in many things, I am not the target audience.)

My thoughts on Light On Me so far (im on episode 3 oops, actually it was 4): It feels like a high school romance comic book aimed at 12 year olds come to life. Which is not at all a criticism! But the aesthetic—bright, flat lighting, wide open spaces, saturated pastels and primary colors, the aforementioned face filtering—along with the trope filled, bare bones nature of the story give it this artificial feel. I don't read comic books, manga or manwha of any genre, so I could be wrong in this comparison, but it does tell like it exists outside of the real world in the same way that Disney Channel kids shows do (though not in the same world.) The characters, so far, don't feel like they exist outside of the story, not shallow, exactly, just that the rest of their lives and relationships are a vague blur, and the initial conflict—Shin Woo doesn't want Tae Kyung to join the student council!—feels like the sort of artificially induced high stakes of a kid's show. The—gasp—pratfall with a dildo.

I probably sound judgmental, but that's partly because super fluffy shows aren't my thing in general, and partly because I'm in a weird mood right now where even the real world doesn't feel all that real to me, but I reiterate, this is not a criticism. The show is creating a certain feel to tell a certain story, and (so far at least) it's doing it effectively.

And I am intrigued by the story, and the characters! Tae Kyung who has been convinced by the wise teacher to try making friends. Da On, the student president who is so kind and can't say no to anyone. Shiwoon, the class clown who can see what's happening but won't get involved. So Hee, the girl from the sister school, persistent in her three year (!) crush. And of course tsundere Shin Woo, possibly with some internalized homophobia, and who we know, based on Shiwoon's hints and the laws of Romance Tropes, must have a crush on the new boy and can't handle it.

The taundere seme is a trope I love when it works well, and loathe when it's bad, and I think it's working here for me because Tae Kyung is such a weirdo. He's no blushing maiden uke, he's blunt and doesn't care that's he's awkward, and still not sure if he wants to even bother with other human beings. It makes Shin Woo's attraction to him more specific and real, and makes me curious to see how their dynamic develops.

So even though the character don't feel anchored to any reality outside of what we see on screen, in the small slice of a tv world they do exist in they seem complex and worth getting to know.

(They also intrigue me enough that part of me wants to see these same characters and conflicts, but framed in more gritty realism style, like that of Weak Hero Class One. I think there's enough there to make it work! But that's more about my personal taste than anything else.)

edit: not that Weak Hero Class One is exactly realistic. But it's a different kind of fairy tale atmosphere. One that sometimes gets called "gritty realism."

[broken-clover]

Day 10- Enemies-to-allies

See, one of the nice things about doing prompt collections like this is that it offers an opportunity to use/repurpose unfinished concepts that I hadn't gotten around to or wasn't sure if I could've made an entire standalone thing for it. There'll be a few of them down the line.

This one was taken from a half-finished concept originally drafted back when I was doing a Digimon Frontier rewatch with Rex. Outside of the obvious rationale with Duskmon, I find that Ranamon has a surprising amount of depth, at least compared to the other corrupted warriors. Even if it's a little one-note, her implied themes of needing attention and feeling worthless when not 'beautiful' was at least a little interesting (if absolutely riddled with some pretty misogynistic overtones throughout the whole thing. Then again, it was an early 00's shonen, don't know why I'd expect any different)

So I sorta wanted to do a fic that at least gave it a little more depth. Weird as it seems, I feel like given the opportunity, her and J.P might've been able to find a sense of kinship, both being people who try to get others' attention through shallow means and struggle with a sense of low self-image and isolation without external validation. Idk. This ended up almost being 4k words somehow. It's past midnight. I get carried away easily

[andtheyreonfire]

ev'ry mem'ry i'll keep - 2

2 - that i could die

ao3 Part 1

Wc - 5481

AN: Happy hug a tiny day! Idk why I'm mentioning this. No one gets hugged in this chapter. Kind of the opposite tbh

~

Sumire was captured, Amamiya tells Goro, looming over him like the sword of Damocles.

Goro remembers the stadium, the palace, Maruki gazing at them with an expression of pure pity. He grits his teeth, forces himself to stop shaking where he’s cornered in the subway alley. He asks the giant what happened after, how badly they lost.

An ultimatum, Maruki gave them. Spend winter break watching Amamiya’s friends in pure, artificial bliss. Tell him, in a week, how they’d like to see that happiness shatter.

And, of course, Goro's situation. Amamiya recounts Goro going unconscious next to him, some muttered comment from Maruki about “forgetting a wish.” He recounts Maruki disappearing, just as Goro's newfound curse was bestowed upon him. He recounts walking out of Maruki's palace, the tiny form of a serial killer in his hands.

A wish. That was lead to this, hm? Goro having to clutch his ears every time a train enters the station; having to crane his neck back just to see a glimpse of Amamiya's eyes; having to steady himself every time Amamiya moves, because even the slightest shift jostles Goro like an earthquake. Being powerless, completely at the world’s—at Amamiya's mercy. All because of a single, fucking wish.

Amamiya’s voices faces into a dull roar. Goro’s hands ball into fists. If he thinks Goro will sit there and be a good little instrument to their savior complexes, he's dead fucking wrong.

Goro will make sure of that.

~

Akechi Goro stumbles off Ren’s palm, knees slamming against the wood of his desk.

Ren winces, hand twitching forward him—but, no, he's the reason Akechi flung himself off so quickly, isn’t it? Akechi doesn’t seem to mind the bruises. His tiny arms brace under him, and he blows a microscopic—to Ren, anyways—strand of hair out of his eyes. In one fluid motion, he stands, shuffling back so Ren’s completely in his vision.

Akechi cranes his head back, and Ren schools his face into something resembling indifference. It’s still—a lot, to see Akechi look up at him with visible fear.

Ren hunches down, trying to put himself near Akechi's eye-level. All it succeeds in making the boy jerk back like he’s been burned.

Ren opens his mouth. Nothing slips out. Akechi only looks at him, impossibly tiny eyes narrowed in distrust. Not even a comment about catching flies escapes him. It’s too quiet, without his stream of comments.

Ren sighs. He stands, ignoring the violent flinch Akechi gives at the motion, and walks over to his shelf of nick-nacks. He calls over his shoulder, “What do you want to sleep on?”

A beat passes. Two. Ren looks back towards the desk. When their eyes meet, Akechi calls out, “I don’t care.”

Ren bites his lip. He doesn’t know the right thing to say, or what would stop Akechi from looking at him like Ren’s some kind of predator. And yet, it’s still easier to fil the silence. “In the event this doesn’t wear off, we should probably set something up.”

Akechi's eyes harden. “In the event this doesn’t wear off, sleeping arrangements are the last fucking thing I care about, Joker.”

Ren’s fingers drum against his shelf. “Alright,” he says. “Hang tight for a minute, I'll be right back.”

Ren hears a huff behind him, almost lost to the wind. Akechi's still there when he returns from the bathroom, carrying the fluffiest washcloth LeBlanc owns. It’s just—odd, for Akechi to be stagnant, to do nothing but stare. Ren expected him to be halfway off his desk, sliding down a makeshift rope, by the time he came back.

Akechi only watches him, watches as Ren dumps some bracelet from a shallow box. Watches as he rummages around for a blanket and pads it inside. Watches as he sets it down on the desk, inches away —but what must feel like the length of a room—and folds a makeshift pillow, laying the washcloth flat. For lack of a finisher, Ren gives a pair of jazz hands.

Akechi flinches away from the movement, and jolts like he’s been electrocuted when Ren’s phone—resting on the edge of the desk—vibrates.

“Shit—sorry.” It’s Ryuji, tone weirdly—artificially—fake as he offers Ren an invite to hang out with his track team. Guess Ren’s found a target to try to break through to, but...

“I need to get my friends back,” Ren says. Akechi's gaze snaps up from where he’d been considering the box. “I don’t know if...No, what do you want to do?”

He expects Akechi to put his foot down and take the reins that Ren’s giving him, as he’s always, always done. Akechi only gives a brittle smile, and his voice turns sour. “It’s up to you, is it not? Whatever’s in your best judgement, Joker.”

Ren sits down, not particularly feeling like crouching. His floor’s too hard for him to kneel comfortably on. Maybe it would’ve been easier for Maruki to have shrunk them both. “I want to hear your opinion, too. I'm not the deciding factor in this scenario. We’re still a team.”

“Are we? Are we really?” Akechi backs up further, his steps barely putting a few inches between them. He bares his teeth in a grin. “Excuse me for not seeing the level playing field here, Joker. Or did you forget which one of us is the size of the other’s finger?”

“Just because you’re—“ He gestures at Akechi's reduced scale. The boy’s sneer sharpens into a snarl. Ren can’t find the energy to do more than sigh. “It doesn’t mean your autonomy’s been thrown out the window.”

Ren thinks he can see Akechi's hands fist at his sides—it’s, admittedly, a little hard to tell. Akechi licks his lips. “So, if I wanted to walk out of LeBlanc right now, find my way through the streets of Tokyo on my own, you would let me?”

He winces. “I...don’t know if that would be the best idea—“

Akechi raises a hand, cutting him off with a laugh. “And there you have it. Don’t fucking lie to me next time, Joker. You’re better than that.”

Of all the things to respond to, that’s the easiest. “Why do you keep calling me that?”

Akechi doesn’t answer him, hands moving to untie his scarf. His movements are jerky, at least one eye still trained on Ren. Ren leans back, exhaustion washing over him like a cold shower, and mutters a warning before standing up and leaving for the bathroom to change.

He’s messed up—he knows that. This situation is messed up, but he needs some sleep before he can begin to unravel his thoughts. He’s tired. They both are.

When he comes back, Akechi's already sitting in the makeshift bed, curled into the corner with his back facing the wall. His tiny hands clutch his knees. He flinches, just like he always does, when Ren approaches.

This time, Ren kneels.

“I'm sorry,” he murmurs, “We’ll talk about this more in the morning. I just...” Don’t want to lose you again. “I don’t want to see you hurt.”

Akechi shakes his head. He seems to subconsciously huddle into the fabric, as if shielding himself from the world. Ren’s heart tightens. “What did I tell you about lying to me, Joker?”

His eyes drop to his knees, and that’s the end of that. Ren’s brow crinkles, but he stands, turning off the light and draping the covers over himself. Even with exhaustion clouding his thoughts, he finds it difficult to fall asleep.

For once, the blare of Tokyo is silent, absent of even the sounds of another body. Akechi’s breathing is too tiny for him to hear. Unlike with sleepovers with his friends, he can’t tell if the other party is unconscious. There’s nothing to fill Ren’s ears.

It’s awhile before Ren drifts off, but when as does, he wonders if Akechi’s still capable of dreaming.

~

Ren pulls himself out of bed to meet a pair of tiny, narrowed eyes, scrutinizing him from his desk.

He blinks. The memories of yesterday flood back to him—trying to get through to Makoto, Akechi finally waking up, watching the boy flinch every time Ren so much as breathed. Akechi didn’t run, which is great, because the thought of him trying to brave Tokyo's foot traffic makes Ren’s stomach churn. Hell, Ren doubts the boy would even end up a smear—

“Are you going to keep staring at me all fucking morning?” Akechi snaps, voice barely reaching Ren’s ears.

Ren reaches for his glasses, if only to prevent Akechi from noticing the next time he spaces out. Although, it’d be...fairer, in a sense, to take his mask off. Akechi never thought of his gaze as intense, right?

He stands up, stretches his back, and caches the perfect glimpse of Akechi flinching away from him, as far back as his make-shift bed would allow. His expression oozes with fear. Ren schools a grimace, and slides his glasses on in one fluid motion.

He crouches next to the desk. Akechi's neck probably hurts from staring up at—god, Ren’s probably the equivalent of a skyscraper to him, isn’t he? He’s so small. Ren hesitates, and Akechi growls, “What?”

Is this real? Ren doesn’t say. Is your reaction? Do you hate me? Ren doesn’t say. I'm sorry. Ren doesn’t say.

Instead, he murmurs, “We need to talk.”

Akechi bears his teeth, like a Pomeranian attempting to be territorial. “About what?”

“A battle plan,” he says, in lieu of something Akechi'd scoff at. “Maruki gave us a week.”

Akechi mutters something under his breath, voice too quiet for Ren to make out anything but a mocking tone. “In case you haven’t noticed, this is a public restaurant. There are people here.”

“I'll deal with them.”

Akechi stares at him. His body is still, but tense, like a bird poised to flight. Ren’s not stupid enough to think he wouldn’t run the second he could.

Akechi was the best at acting, out of all of them. He wonders where his masks have gone, now.

Ren counts the seconds in his head. After 20, Akechi says, “Fine.”

It takes him longer to climb onto his hand, and even longer to slide into the breast pocket of Ren’s shirt.

Ren keeps his steps steady as he descends the stairs, one hand clinging to the rail like a lifeline. He can’t help but watch his feet, wish for the lithe grace of Joker to carry through. He almost runs straight into Morgana, his too-blue, human eyes sparkling. He blinks when their eyes meet.

“Futaba missed you last night,” Morgana purrs. Ren schools a wince. It’s like looking at the mid-way point between a shadow’s human form and transformation. Ren keeps having to slide his eyes off him, wanting to look but struck by a visceral wrongness every time he does.

And yet—this was still his wish. Tall; broad; handsome; with opposable thumbs, and a rich baritone instead of a meow. To stand on eye-level with the rest of the Thieves, to be every bit the human they didn’t care he wasn’t.

He’ll buy Morgana so much fatty tuna once this is over.

But, first— “I think Haru's been missing your presence,” Ren says.

The-thing-that’s-kind-of-Morgana perks up. “Oh?”

“Yeah. You were the first one she knew. I know she’s been spending a lot of time with her dad—“ Ren steps forward to hide the violent flinch from his pocket. “—But she probably misses you, too.”

“Yeah, you’re right! I should hang out with her. Ren, you should—“

“What about a sleepover?” Ren searches for a mask. Joker? No. Wingman? Uh. Helpful, logical friend, who only wants what’s best for his other friends? It’s something. “Winter break’s almost over. Why don’t you take the week to stay at her place?”

“I mean,” Morgana responds, uncharacteristically hesitant, ”I wouldn’t want to impose...”

“I think she liked your help with gardening more than she liked mine.” He yawns, stretches, switches masks as he assesses the former cat before him. “‘Sides, it’s winter break, there's so much time. A guy needs his privacy, y’know?”

“Gross.” Morgana wrinkles his nose, but it seems to do the job. “Alright. I'll talk to her about it. No funny business while I’m gone, lil’ bro, alright?”

Ren stifles another grimace. “Aye, aye.”

Morgana pads out, the door jingling behind him. Soiro, thankfully, is an easier job. All it takes is putting on an apron, a wistful mention of Futaba and her mother, before he’s out the door, his keys in Ren’s hand.

There’s no customers. Ren flicks off the stove, the TV, and the kettle. Subconsciously, his free hand drifts to his pocket, over the tiny, curled form against his chest, moving—

Moving?

Moving. Vibrating, really, against his fingers. It’s a small action, repetitive, existing even as Akechi stays still. It gains in intensity as Ren’s hand stays.

Akechi’s trembling.

Ren snaps his hand away like it’s been burned.

After flipping the sign to ‘closed’, shuttering the blinds, and locking the door, Ren bites his lip. His hand hovers over the pocket. He’d let Akechi climb out on his own—but, with what? It’s faster to bite the bullet. Ren approaches the counter.

“Brace yourself,” he mutters, before plunging in and sliding his fingers around Akechi's form. Akechi goes rigid in his grasp.

Slowly, he sets him down on the counter. He tries to put Akechi’s feet under him, but he stumbles to his knees the second Ren’s hand leaves. Ren winces, hand twitching forward to help him up, but stops when Akechi shoots him a withering glare.

He takes his own seat, adjacent to Akechi, leaving him the long, wooden expanse of nowhere to run.

“I'm not going to hurt you.” Ren exhales through his nose. He’s starting this, if Akechi's unwavering glower is any indicator. “I just want to fix this, please.”

A beat. Two. Akechi's glare burns more intense. Eventually, he grounds out, “Why should I believe you?”

”We’re trapped in this together. You’re the only ally I have right now. I—“ Ren’s brow furrows. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Akechi scoffs a laugh. “Try again. Why the fuck should I believe you?”

Ren’s fingers clench around his seat. He stuffs his building frustration in the same place he shoves his doubts on the front line, leading a group of high schoolers to the one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. “I want to help you.”

“Of course you do.”

Ren waits for more. Akechi picks at the skin around his nails, his glare never leaving Ren. When his gaze slides towards the near-microscopic digits, they still. Ren feels like he’s having this conversation halfway underwater, “What does that mean?”

Akechi stares at him in disbelief. “Are you really too much of a coward to even admit it?”

Going a million miles at once, and absolutely nowhere. “Goro, please.”

“Don’t fucking—! Maruki granted everyone’s pipe-dreams.” He grounds the words out, as if speaking to a toddler. “He could defy reality, the very laws of nature to do so. Everyone’s dreams, Joker.”

Ren finally picks up the damn cue. His stomach drops.

He rasps, “Are you saying my wish was to shrink you?”

“Don’t deny you wouldn’t like it.” Akechi prowls forward, eyes absolutely livid. His four-inch tall form seems to shake with either anger or fear—no, both. “Me, tiny and helpless in the palm of your hand. You could do anything you wanted. No one’s watching us, correct? No one cares, if you keep me as a pet, or take out the trash, or use me as some kind of—“

“Akechi.” Ren interrupts him, stomach churning. “Do you really think so little of me?”

Akechi looks away, silent. His body trembles as it did in Ren’s pocket.

He takes in the terrified, livid form in front of him, starting to curl in on himself. Before Ren can think twice, he stands up—ignoring Akechi's flinch—and runs up the stairs.

He returns with a tiny, thin piece of metal. One end wicked-sharp, the other dull and smooth. It's about half the length of Ren’s thumb. He was lucky to find it, almost tempted to use a shard of glass before he looked in his forgotten pile of infiltration-tool failures. He holds it out to Akechi, who stares at it with unrestrained suspicion.

“If you ride on my shoulder, under my collar,” Ren blurts out, “You’ll have the perfect access to my vital veins. You’ll be hidden, too.”

Akechi continues to stare.

“If you feel like I'm about to do something to you, take this and kill me before I can get the chance.”

It takes 10 seconds, this time, before Akechi wraps his hands around the makeshift weapon. He scurries back the second he’s done, away from Ren’s hand. He strains to hear Akechi's mutter. “I'd hardly be able to kill you without getting killed, myself.”

Ren forces a grin. “Well, I don’t think Iwai sells tiny guns. You can’t shoot me in the head, again. You’ll have to do it the old-fashioned way.”

Akechi looks away, running his hands over the piece of metal. Ren begins, “Akechi, I don’t know how to convince you that this isn’t my wish. I just want to figure out what’s going on and fix it—But, to do that, I'll need your help. You’re my only ally. You’re smarter than me, your deduction skills are unparalleled, and you know the Metaverse far better than I do. You were a star detective. I need you.”

“My work was largely fabricated,” Akechi points out. He shines a little at the praise, either way.

“The second this is over, we never have to see each other again. I don’t want you to live like this.” Ren hunches down, keeping his distance from Akechi, but contorting his body so he's eye level. “Can you help me?”

Akechi runs his fingers over the point of the weapon. He stares at it, at his hands, at Ren.

His gaze hardens. He holds the weapon at his side, and nods. “Fine. deal.”

Ren bites back a grin, and the inane, instinctual urge to hold out his hand to shake.

~

Ren had just finished talking with Makoto when Akechi awoke, he tells him. Akechi hesitantly perches on his shoulder as he leaves, Ryuji decided as their next target. Ren removes his scarf so he has room to hide under his collar. He prays Akechi doesn’t decide to stab him on a whim, and sets off.

They do Ann next, then Morgana, then Yusuke.

Morgana takes a little more convincing, both for his memories to shine through, and to convince him to stay at Haru’s for as long as possible. After Yusuke, he treats Goro and him to oden. He bought Goro his own, separate bowl, and offered to help him, so he didn’t have to struggle with picking up his chopsticks. Goro looked sick at the idea. It wasn’t until Ren turned away from him, keeping his eyes trained on his phone, that he heard the boy begin to eat.

Reluctantly, Akechi teaches him how to comb government databases. Ren’s learned a few tricks from Futaba, which means he doesn’t need to go breaking into Akechi’s apartment just to access his computer. The police database is theirs, too. He manages to find Maruki’s past, his research, and his failings. Most of which he already knew, but Akechi’s questions leave Ren with a half-dozen floating around in his own head.

They also discover that, by all accounts, Okumura and Wakaba are completely alive. This and then some is why they save the conversation with their children until the end.

Wakaba is every bit the person Ren imagined her as, and Goro shudders against Ren’s neck every time she speaks. Akechi clams up when their group walks away, remaining silent and stiff for the rest of the night. It hurts, to see Futaba fighting against giving up her own happiness, to have to move on once again. Ren can’t help but feel sympathy for Wakaba’s murderer, having to process the blood re-appearing on his hands.

Today’s target was their last: Haru.

Ren thinks it went well.

Ren’s greatest skill is lying to himself, and it certainly hasn’t failed him yet.

~

Ren winces as Goro, again, slides off his hand like he’s been burned.

But it’s—progress, in a way, how Goro doesn’t immediately back himself into a corner. It might be their negotiation, or the aftermath of the week they’ve spent together, or a sign that Goro's becoming less terrified.

Goro flinches when Ren sits at his desk, his hands spasming from where they were untying his scarf, and that hope is thrown out the window and right in front the oncoming train that is this situation.

Ren turns away. It feels weird to talk about Haru, but even stranger to deflect and pretend that he didn’t just show a murderer the still-breathing corpse of their victim—Hey, Ryuji isn’t here, someone’s gotta be blunt. For lack of anything to distract himself, Ren drums his fingers against the wood of his desk.

He realizes his mistake when he looks back to see Goro frozen, watching Ren’s fingers—inches away from him—like they’re made of the same dynamite in a Showtime attack.

Ren pauses. “Sorry. I—forgot you’re still getting used to things.”

Goro’s face settles into a sneer. “Oh, forgive me for not using the adjustment period that you’ve so graciously blessed me with.”

Ren blinks. Okay—he deserves that. He leans in, only to freeze when Goro backs up a few steps. Ren sighs, and asks, voice low, “What can I do to make things easier?”

Goro’s hands tighten from where they’re wrapped around his sides. “Stay at least 50 yards away from me—you’re awfully good at distance, aren’t you, Joker?”

Ren takes a breath. Don’t rise to his bullshit—it’d be a distraction, at least, to ask him what the hell he meant by that, but no shut up—and keep calm. Ren wills his voice to stay level. “I'm sorry, you’re stuck with me until we fix this. Is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable, at least?”

Goro snarls up at him, “For as self-centered as you are, I would’ve thought you’d take the goddamn bait.”

Ren’s fists clench in his lap. “What bait?”

Goro throws his arms up. If he were normal-sized, the action might’ve been wild enough to clock Ren in the face. Ren can see the slightest tremble in his hands. “No, you know what? Use your fucking brain, Joker. Stop lying to me.”

Ren sighs, taking the silence Goro offers him as the smaller boy picks at his nails. He’s tired—something about the artificial sunlight, about seeing his friends so happy, of facing a terrified face every time he checks his shoulder is getting to him—

And that’s it, isn’t it? This isn’t about their day, or Okumura, or even Maruki. Goro spat out the word bait like it was—

Personal.

Ren looks at Goro, at a frame barely the size of his finger, and shoves away his frustration to murmur, “I'm not going to take advantage of this, Akechi.”

Goro cranes his head higher, fists clenching at his sides. He seems to grasp at whatever regal composure remains. “Do you honestly expect me to believe that?”

“Akechi—“

“No, tell me exactly what’s stopping you.” His eyes are burning, body tensed, taut like a drawn bow. It’s painfully easy to imagine how he would snap the second Ren tries to approach. “I don’t want to play this game anymore, Joker. Stop lying to me.”

Ren stays still, makes his voice level, keeps his hands secured in his lap. “I'm not lying to you. I'm benefitting from this as much as you are.”

“Bullshit!” Goro snarls, stumbling back a few steps. There’s the black mask, the traces of Loki hovering behind him. “You know what this is, don’t you? Don’t say things like that with a straight fucking face! You know how this world works as much as I. Tell me—“

Goro unsheathes his weapon, pointing the tiny piece of metal at Ren. The fire in his eyes is on full display, the heat of a distant supernova. He growls more than speaks, “Tell me what you fucking want from me!”

He doesn’t even fill a fraction of Ren’s desk.

“I want you to co-operate with me.” Ren steels his voice. Maybe that’ll make things easier, for one of them. He’s so tired. “I've said this already. I want to fix things, with you. I don’t want to see you—I don’t know, dead in a ditch somewhere.”

“Why me?” His teeth are still bared, as if they were even capable of breaking flesh. With how violently his makeshift weapon shakes in his grip, he doesn’t think that would fare any better. “After all the things I've done to you, why the hell would you waste a single tear over my well-being?”

“Because I don’t want you to go through that,” Ren pleads.

“Aren’t you a harbinger of justice?” He’s grasping at straws, even if he doesn’t realize it. The best actor out of all of them, but hardly the most composed. “Believer in a grand world where everyone gets their just desserts? You’re a noble Phantom thief, a hero. I—I don’t see how you could possibly ignore the monster before y—“

Ren closes his eyes, bites the bullet, and cuts Goro off with a soft, “I wanted to kill Kamoshida.”

Goro makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat, the disposal of whatever he was going to say. Ren creaks an eye open to see him staring back with tiny, wide eyes. He doesn’t open his mouth, so Ren continues, “He was a piece of shit. He hurt Ryuji, Ann, Shiho. We found Morgana trapped in the dungeon of his palace. He made people’s lives a living hell.”

Ren smiles, an echo of the mask he wore when he awoken Arsène. He mutters, staring at nothing, “I wanted to kill him.

“But it wasn’t my choice to make, so we changed his heart. Now, thanks to us, he’ll suffer for the rest of his life under the weight of his guilt. Every day he’ll wake up in agony and every night his deeds will haunt him until he falls asleep. Heroic, isn’t it?”

Goro doesn’t interject, so Ren continues. “You never asked me if I cared. You asked if I thought we were just, and I said yes. You never defined your terms.”

Ren takes a breath. Something wiggles past the depths of his heart, slips past his lips. “I never said I didn’t want our targets to suffer.”

A beat passes. Two. Goro asks, voice barely drifting to Ren’s ears, “How does that make you any better than me, in your eyes?”

Ren shakes his head. “It doesn’t.” A brittle smiles splits his lips. “There was just—nothing stopping you, from pulling the trigger. I got lucky.”

“...And why didn’t you? Pull it, I mean.” Goro shifts, interest replacing the heat in his eyes. If he wasn’t so obviously apprehensive, he might’ve taken a step closer. “When it came down to it, why didn’t you finish the job? Kamoshida was yours.”

“It wasn’t my choice to make.”

Ren slides off his chair and shifts into a crouch, back against his desk and head resting on the surface. He looks straight up at his ceiling, deciding to ignore Goro's presence beside him. He can’t see Goro's tiny, fearful eyes like this. It's an adequate bonus.

Ren continues, “Ann was the deciding factor, but everyone was on board with just changing his heart. I’m their leader, not their dictator. You’re the first person I've met who wanted—planned for the person who wronged you to die.”

Ren can hear the mirth in Akechi's voice, even with how quiet it is. “You’ve met him. I don’t think I was entirely in the wrong.”

“No,” Ren whispers. “You weren’t.”

It’s painfully calm, in Maruki's reality. Any other time, the streets would be filled with the blaring of horns, with shouting, with the rush and chaos of Tokyo nighttime. There’s nothing to fill the air between them but the hum of Ren’s heater. It’s far from enough to drown out Ren’s thoughts.

When Goro speaks, his voice is closer, as if he decided to take a few steps forward to the boy twenty times his size. “So, underneath that honest, pure-hearted exterior, you’re just as rotten as me. Is that right?”

“Did you expect me to be better?” Ren asks.

Goro huffs a mirthless laugh. He shuffles, and a flash of tan appears at the corner of Ren’s vision. “I guess not. So, then, do you think I deserve to suffer as much as the people I've wronged?”

Ren closes his eyes. Honesty’s worked so far, so he snaps the bullet between his teeth. “In my opinion, you deserve to suffer far more. More than I could give you, whether you were willing or not.”

There’s the faint, small sound of shoes against wood. Ren allows Goro a second to catch his balance, before he asks, “Were you willing, Akechi?”

Goro's voice is steel. He’s lived with his crimes longer than Ren’s even been aware of them. He knows his answer. “I was.”

“And there you have it.” Ren opens his eyes, but keeps them trained on the ceiling. “Whatever your circumstance, it doesn’t change what you’ve done.”

Even after everything, the air is, somehow, more bearable. Ren resists the urge to jolt when Goro walks completely into his line of vision. He asks, a tiny eyebrow raised, “So, why aren’t we having a conversation with me in a jar? Why aren’t I a smear on the pavement, if my just desserts are long overdue?”

“Because, that’s...that’s not for me to decide. That’s Haru's decision, and Futaba's, and yours’.” Ren gives a strained smile. “We only ever responded to explicit requests, y’know.”

Hesitantly, Goro steps forward. “Even so, there’s...no one here but us. No one’s been present to stop you since I shrunk.”

“You’re right.”

When Ren doesn’t continue, Goro huffs a laugh. “So?”

Ren takes a breath. Slowly, he swings his gaze over to Akechi. The boys stands—more than close enough to touch. It’s...

It’s the face of when Goro was recognized on their first meeting. It’s the face of Futaba as she stares into a crowd, of Ryuji after their confrontation with the track team, of Haru every time she recalled how her company’s treated her. It’s the face of a kid—of a boy that didn’t deserve anything that happened to him—staring into the darkness of their closet and trying to be brave.

“You killed dozens. You hurt countless individuals. You hurt my friends, but...” Ren’s eyes crinkle. “You were my friend, too. If things had been different, you could’ve been one of us. The game was rigged from the start.”

Goro's hands flex at his sides, minuscule skin twitching. Eventually, he rasps, “I tried to kill you, too.”

Ren can feel the bags under his eyes deepen. He tilts his head up towards the ceiling. “Yeah. You did. So listen to me when I say I don’t want to see you hurt, alright?”

Ren knows he is fucked up. He can’t put a name to all the complexes he’s seen this year, but he knows one of them is dampening his feelings towards Goro. Ren’s tired, he’s a dead man walking, but the idea of doing anything to the tiny, fragile form of the boy who killed him sends nausea shooting up his throat.

Goro gives something that could be a nod—it’s hard to tell, with him still barely in the corner of his vision. Ren doesn’t hear him move until a head of chestnut-brown hair appears next to him, and a tiny, warm weight rests against his temple.

Is he—sitting against Ren? He doesn’t dare shift to check, not when Goro's slowly relaxing against him, not when it’s the closest he’s willingly, freely been since he woke up in Ren’s palms.

They sit there, while Ren tries to get his heart rate back under control. Goro murmurs, the sound almost at normal-sized volume with how close he is. “Nothing about this is fair.”

“‘Course not,” Ren breathes, “What better pawns to play the game than us, huh?”

Goro snorts. He’s fully relaxed against the side of Ren’s head. After a beat, he asks, “You said you wanted to know what you could do to, ah, accommodate me, Amamiya?”

Ren whispers, “Yeah?”

“I—“ He struggles to imagine Goro's face crumpling, of him losing his composure. After a moment, that tiny voice gains its steel. Ren lets the ghost of a smile split his face. “If you truly don’t want to hurt me, there are a few things you could keep in mind...”

~

[signalhill-if]

bro when i tell you i am still thinking about this game in quiet moments....tbh i play ifs for romance nearly to the exclusion of all else, it's just what i look for when i'm in that mood! and while other games have def ended up getting me interested for other reasons as i follow, this is the first one that pretty much right off the bat activated my Gamer Brain and i was like Oh I'm playing a video game and i have a completely different mindset and priorities than i expected going in. which, idk, just kind of surprising in a fun way i think! :) oh also, i wanted to say i CANNOT express enough how much i appreciate your approach of 'mc is Just Some Guy'. it really brought into focus how much player-centered gameplay kind of rubs me the wrong way, in pretty much any context! it makes everything seem so much more artificial and shallow. big thoughts about pathologic, if you're at all familiar lol. anyways bye

This is, like, everything to me thank you 😭 That kind of gamey energy (and the Some Guy thing haha) is exactly what I was trying to capture and I'm glad to hear it's doing that for you 😊

I feel you on how long it takes to develop a new blorbo haha, it's hard to solidify it and I usually just wind up making multiple too! I will say, I think having your Signal maxed out is going to be a really fun way to play even if you don't side with the cult! (You might have caught this if you played a Devotee during Waveform, but Yasmin's "questline" is going to be very special for Devotees 😉)

[irepookie]

Am I the only one pissed and worried about the whole “joining forces with Disney“ thing? I’m scared the show will eventually have the same fate as the MCU and become some part of a big machine. I hope I’m wrong and Disney will just act as Distributor outside the UK (which sick’s anyway because I had it on Prime Video and they’ll snatch it away like many other shows). I hope they don’t touch my favorite show and ruin it for the sake of money. It would destroy me.

I don’t mean to be a hater I grew up with Disney like most did, I enjoy some of their content (which I pirate mostly). But I feel like everything they do right means they’ve done two things wrong. They overwork underpaid VFX artists, nothing they do feels genuine anymore, it’s all so artificial and profit seeking. I know it’s a multinational company and franchise and that’s the point but it’s gone so shallow lately.

Idk if any of this makes sense I’m ranting instead of sleeping because I read about it and it’s terrified me

[mxuki]

Is encanto really as good as everyone thinks?

-SPOILERS FOR ENCANTO AND UP-

i know it may seem like im a bit late to the party but the truth is when i saw encanto first getting popular it felt strange.

it felt like i watched a completely different movie ngl and i kept my mouth shut back then because i didnt wanna ruin the fun for everyone else lol

but tbh im pissed off at disney and i cant keep my mouth shut for any longer now.

let me just, get to the point-

Encanto is a terrible movie that fails at the fundamentals of story telling

you see, if u manage to see through the tears and actually pay attention to the plot of the film, it is so b a d

now i'll give them credit where credit is due, they had a really interesting concept and very good ideas

but they executed it so poorly its laughable.

you see, this film isnt a film

its a cash grab on the name of nostalgia and emotions

idk abt other peope but to me, encanto felt very empty. From the way i see it, disney just wanted to make the next frozen with touchy feely themes about family and love and healing and runions but it sort of failed.

the characters in encanto seem extremely shallow. the "development" they get (.i.e. isabella, luisa, abuela etc) dosn't really feel like true development. it seemed extremely artificial and almost felt like an act disney was putting on to fool everyone else into thinking that they're actually good in writing characters. i mean sure, they have distinct personality traits, trauma, backstories and everything a character needs to have depth but what undermines this imo is the plot.

now idk if i just have a taste for suspenseful thriller movies or something but i enjoy a nice touchy feely movie alright (for instance Up) but encanto really lacked the substance it needed for it to truely shine.

Im gonna use Up as an example to explain what i mean

in the beginning of up, in the very first few minutes carl and ellie's characters have light years more personality then mirabel or luisa for example. The plot itself enhances it.

In the beginning of up, its very clear that carl is intorverted and uncertain, he wants more from life. he wants to go on adventures but he needs someone to be there for him. he needs someone to provide certainty and comfort even in chaos.

and ellie does exactly that. Her very first impression on carl and the audience makes it clear that she's very much into adventure and is the sun to carl's moon.

now what about isabella and mirabel?

they uh

have sister....problems...

and...

......

isabellla is a people pleaser i guess?

and what does the plot do to enchance this?

they make the dinner go wrong becuase of bruno's rats and mirabel gets blamed for it so isabella doubles down on her inner flaws???

like i get what they were trying to do with mira and isa's characters and what theme they were going for but it just fell really flat. the writing really failed in making me care about them or their issues. they seem like caricatures of real people who probably exist but they seem very one dimensional and flat.

honestly i think encanto would've been a lot better if it was a show as that would give the writers more time to flesh out these characters and make them loveable.

And this brings me to the most saddening part of this whole thing....

Disney dosn't care

they dont care that their ip would've benefited from being a show instead of a film, or that the final product is trash. All the care about is make touchy feely movies with the same theme and the same messed up message about love and boundaries over and over again with the same highly merchandisable characters that'll have the dolls and dresses flying off of the shelves because that's what it ultimately comes down to.

They don't care because they don't have to

Its simple really. they dont care because they're so absurdly big that it dosnt matter if they keep making terrible movie after terrible movie, uninspired sequel after uninspired sequel (lookin at u, frozen 2) because so many people are attached to the walt disney brand that they'll watch it regardless and buy the terrible quality merch without a second thought for their kids to play with so they can grow up and do the same thing to their kids.

Its tragic that this is what the beautiful medium of animation and film has come down to.

[ohbuckie]

bassist!bucky barnes setlist

setlist here. masterlist here.

beachboy — mccafferty

silly little song about his high school girlfriend. juvenile and fast-paced and sort of chaotic. tales the rise and fall of their relationship—he loved her so bad and she dumped him before they left for college because she didn't want to do long distance. the shouting and the harsh words are absolutely him exaggerating and being dramatic and he likes to play it always because he just. loves it. and it's fun to perform.

spidersong — say anything

just horny. song about fucking but in a weird bucky way. he just needs everyone to know he is horny in a tasteful but still nasty way. def written in early college when he was having lots of casual sex.

pollyanna — northstar

just a popular one that he sort of has to play but wouldn't choose to if it were up to him, as it's most definitely about your breakup. sort of like a commercialized version of the pain he was feeling—something to make it appealing to other people. most of the other songs he wrote when you left were way too depressing to officially release.

my own worst enemy — lit

a shallow song that he just likes and threw onto an album and performs bc fans like it. definitely written when his career started taking off and he was pretty young and irresponsible.

i forgot to take my meds today — prince daddy & the hyenas

i think he's sort of reliant on antidepressants but often forgets to take them, especially when he's touring and doesn't have a very solid routine and it really frustrates him to feel so shitty and have it be his own fault.

a detailed and poetic physical threat to the person who intentionally vandalized my 1994 dodge intrepid behind kate's apartment — pet symmetry

another sort of silly song but also not that silly because bucky loves his car and it's the only thing he would ever spend lots of money on before he had a lot of money to spend. written in college when he was struggling hard financially and somebody...did exactly what the title says.

80 — green day

bucky simply writing about how much he loves you and how much he misses you when he isn't with you—especially when he's on tour or drunk or both.

she's the prettiest girl at the party, and she can prove it with a solid right hook — frnkiero and the cellabration

once again, he's just obsessed with you. so in love with everything you do. totally enamored of you.

coming clean — green day

written when he's ready to admit his bisexuality to himself (and steve, probably freshman year of college) but not to his parents (mostly because of his dad).

total revenge — say anything

also about being in love with you, as well as his struggles with himself and his insecurities about not being good enough for you.

near death fail comp. (must watch til end) — mom jeans

about his insecurities/mental health again. pushing you and his friends away when he sort of starts to lose his grip and is going through periods of being really down.

father — the front bottoms

pretty obvious, but this one is addressed to his high school girlfriend (i'm thinking he probably wrote this in 11th or 12th grade and only really still performs it because it's really popular) and is about his relationship with his abusive dad. there are a lot of sort of "ugly" confessions and implications in this one that i think he was probably ashamed or nervous to say out loud when he first wrote it and would perform it, especially when his dad was still alive, but it kind of feels good to shout it to a giant room full of people now (and to have them shout it back).

five beer plan — joyce manor

more upsetting, in a way, about his dad and his mental health, because it details an artificial relationship between them that his dad liked to pretend they had when he wasn't being violent. idk. just bucky telling his dad to his face about what he's feeling (and of course only doing it because he wants him to know it's his fault).

of all the gin joints in all the world — fall out boy

when your relationship is starting to fall off because you're both so busy and you're struggling to communicate but making up for it with sex. he's sort of flip-flopping between talking about loving you and talking about ways in which your relationship is hurting him. definitely isn't released (and probably isn't written/finished) until after you break up.

death cup — mom jeans

desperate and gut-wrenching breakup song. he feels sorry for himself and is so gentle in his delivery with the lyrics because he feels so fucking hopeless. he is just totally defeated because he can't see things getting better for him since he knows that the breakup will only make all of his nasty habits (the ones that you broke up with him because of) worse. i think that the only reason he still performs it after you get back together is because it sort of reminds him of how badly he fucked up and how lucky he is to have you back.

blonde hair, black lungs — sorority noise

also a breakup song, but more angry. the feelings have had time to develop and he's just so upset (sad, angry, frustrated, etc.) and he doesn't know how to deal with it. this one is different for him to perform because he doesn't really want to, it's just popular and he doesn't want to disappoint people; it sometimes makes him really emotional and he just stops singing because he gets choked up and lets the crowd keep going for him.

i've got a dark alley and a bad idea that says you should shut your mouth (summer song) — fall out boy

just him being supremely depressed at the height of his addiction and knowing he needs more serious help than he's getting and feeling like giving up because he knows if he gets the help that he needs (addiction rehab/psych ward care) the entire world will know and he's just so sick of everything about his life being so public bc it's all ruining him.

the futile — say anything

at the point that bucky writes this, he's accepted the breakup and it's just whatever to him, but he's just bitter at everyone and frustrated with himself because he's still in a rough spot mentally. this one isn't really painful for him to perform like the post-breakup songs because it isn't so emotional and also it bangs.

a little less sixteen candles, a little more "touch me" — fall out boy

i don't really think this is about a certain person, but rather him reflecting on the habits that he forms in relationships that hurt the people he's with. he just gets too comfortable fucking up and he hates himself for it because he really loves you and really cares for the girl that he dates while you and him are broken up (and all of the people before that) and he doesn't really have a good reason for his missteps.

laugh till i cry — the front bottoms

100% about somebody he was seeing while you were broken up (i don't think his ex that he dated before you and then got with again once you were separated, but this could def be up for debate). he isn't really compatible with anyone the way that he's compatible with you and while it's sad, it's not a huge loss for him.

a walk through hell — say anything

he writes this, like...three days after you get back together. it's like he's falling in love with you all over again (except he never fell out of love with you, so it's far deeper this time). after all he's been through, he would go through even more to keep you now that he has you again.

my love — modern baseball

before he performs this one he always says 'this one's about my girlfriend. she's somewhere in here but i don't know where. after i finish it cheer really loud for her. and then get home safely.' <3

[arianajbb]

FIC RECS - 2

💕 stay by @you-are-my-sanctuary

A road trip to Arizona goes wrong when you catch the attention of a familiar looking dark haired man with steely blue eyes.

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💕 Tell Him, Not Me by @zsiopao

here y/n l/n lands a role in a new television series that will put her relationship to the test.

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💕Stalker by @you-are-my-sanctuary

In which Bucky has a crush on the new PR manager and is being an adorable stalker.

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💕 What Could’ve Been by @you-are-my-sanctuary

Steve stays in the past when returning the stones, leaving you behind and erasing everything you two were to each other. Decades pass and he wonders if he made the right decision. Especially since the memories of you still lingers in his mind years after.

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💕  Let Your Spirit Fly by @starlightcrystalline

At the end of a long week, all you want is to get home. Fate has other ideas.

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💕 painted with bruises by @harryspet

In which Bucky kidnaps you in order to get close to his enemy, Steve, but realizes that Steve isn’t the hero he used to be.

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💕 Wolf, Partner, Gloves... by @revengingbarnes

HYDRA’s words make Bucky go into Winter Soldier mode. Then he meets you, and you make for him words that will bring him back to normal.

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💕 Sleeping With A Friend by @wkemeup

You wake up in Bucky’s bed after a night you’re certain will only break your heart.

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💕 An Unpredictable Reunion by @head-always-up-in-a-dreamworld

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💕 American Boy by @quarantined-with-bucky

Request: So basically buckyxreader where she is a super successful businesswomen and awfully confident but when she’s with bucky she feels insecure as many women want him and she’s insecure of nat. Based on “American Boy” by little mix where bucky is her american boy and the other girl in the song is nat. So like angst with a happy ending (maybe smut if you’re comfortable idk idk).

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💕 Uptown Girl by @brooklyns-boys

You’re a spoiled, shallow party girl who enjoys pushing any button you can find. When your parents put their foot down, giving you the choice between marrying a suitor of their choosing, or being cut off from your money, you’ll have to decide between luxury and the only person who’s ever given a damn about you.

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💕 pictures of girls by @subtlebucky

you’re prepared for a fun-filled weekend with a friend you haven’t seen in a while. instead, you get a weekend with the guy who sort of rejected you and a camera. what could go wrong?

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💕 don’t forget to sing by @sunmoonandbucky

You meet someone new in the most unlikely of ways during the quarantine in New York City.  An alley is six feet apart, right?

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💕 bloody by @buckycuddlebuddy

he looked feral; his eyes black, face contorted in something devilish, lips blood red and shiny and the smirk on his face was promising more than he already had given.

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💕 Home by @softlybarnes

Bucky comes home from his second tour overseas, after a long time away from the reader.

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💕 Kiss Me Better by @blissfullylostinarabbithole

Bucky has your heart, but he seems to despise you. Loki comes up with a plan to make him realize just what he’s missing.

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💕 x by @blissfullylostinarabbithole

Bucky receiving his first piece of fan-mail.

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💕 My Roommate’s Boyfriend by @angstysebfan

Your roommate’s boyfriend and you do not get along. You don’t even know why anymore. When your roommate has to move unexpectedly across the country, you both begrudgingly drive her car to her new home. Adventure, angst, and secrets come alive.

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💕 life with tiny and beefy by @wiensrsoldier

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💕 Safe Place To Land by @sunlightdances

You and Bucky are both standing up for Steve and Peggy’s wedding. Checking in at the hotel for the weekend, you’re horrified to realize there’s been a problem. A big problem.

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💕 A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes by @green-eyeddragonfanfiction

Female!Reader is an Omega. Alphas and Omegas are rare, and Reader’s been able to avoid alphas through sheer force of will and luck in equal parts.

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💕 we’re up all night to get lucky by  @nsfwsebbie

Your soldier comes home after his prevailing victory.

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💕 Jealousy Looks Good On You by @tinymalscoffee

You go to your favorite coffee shop after your date from the morning before never shows up.

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💕 x by @sinner-as-saint

uni!seb having a thing for boobies.

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💕 Everything by @mariessecretfantasies

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💕 Stardust And Starfish by @i-am-a-closet-fanfic-fiend

“Hey we kissed once in kindergarten but I haven’t seen you since and I couldn’t remember why you were so familiar.”

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💕 The Flaw Of Belief by @winterdaybreak

Y/N and Bucky fight over who can be more spiteful, who hates who more. Neither really mean it, but Bucky might just win.

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💕 dear... whoever by @whistlingwillows

a mandated series of long and short diary entries from the new head of R&D for Stark Industries.

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💕 starring role by @baezen

in which Hollywood’s former hottest movie star faces his biggest challenge yet – proving that he’s still worth the starring role

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💕 Mr. and Mrs. Barnes by @cherrypickertheory

You and your husband, Bucky, live a normal life in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Or you did, that is, until you both realize that the other is a spy.

.

💕 kitten by @buckycuddlebuddy

“you know,” bucky started, voice low and raspy. “i think i have spoiled you too much lately.”

.

💕 Summer Days by @sleepypanda27

You meet a handsome stranger at the beach.

.

💕 Power Over Me by @sinner-as-saint

CEO James Buchanan Barnes is a dominant. And he’s spent the last 5 years searching for his perfect submissive. Then one night, he finds you. He thinks everything will fall perfectly into place now; but he thought wrong. Turns out your unfortunate past which still haunts you to this day, and some of his enemies are, well, connected. Things go wrong. And your bond with your dom is tested in many ways…

.

💕 Bucky & the Beast by @thejamesoldier

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💕 House Pride by @delusionalwriterr

After encountering Bucky during a Quidditch game, both of you grow attached to each other. But is the attraction enough to overcome the disapproval of your brother, Tony, and the messy past between your families?

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💕 Meet Me In The Hallway by @yikeswtfmate

Y/N and Bucky have hated each other since they were children and now they’re forced to live together, whether they like it or not.

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💕 Postcards by @sebbytrash

Takes place after Civil War. Bucky is your best friend but of course you’re in love with him. He goes off to travel the world and rediscover himself, sending you Postcards along the way, whilst you struggle with your feelings.

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💕 x by @moteldwelling

(this isn’t a fic but it’s amazing omg)

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💕 Helpless by @prongsies

Sirius loved you. Loved you enough to let you go. Loved you enough to selflessly step back, allowing you to love someone he knows could give you the love you deserved - even if it hurts.

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💕 What Is, And What Should Never Be by @whoisbxcky

You wake up one morning to find yourself in an alternate reality, in which the Avengers never came to be, and your friends are living perfect civilian lives. However, things are not all they appear to be, and you find yourself facing the worst fear you never knew you had.

.

💕 Impaled by @revengingbarnes

You’ve been pining after Bucky for months. A compromising situation during a mission brings you a lot closer to him than you expected.

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💕 Helpless For You by @sgtjbuccky

A blind date has lead you and Bucky to the fourth date. Each one proving that you’ve got it bad more than prior and it doesn’t quite matter what will happen - you will keep on falling for that handsome devil and you don’t even mind.

. 

💕 Flowers by @bucky-the-thigh-slayer

Love can take a while, but the right love is always worth time, and some old fashioned gestures.

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💕 The (not naked) pin-up calendar by @bitsandbobsandstuff

When you ask for a favor, Bucky (very) grudgingly agrees. What can you do to thank him? Return the favor, of course.

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💕 Rogue Angel by @harryspet

Bucky tasks himself with deprogramming you, a former hydra soldier. Will he be able to show he cares for you as his Daddy or will your training stop you from seeing the truth.

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💕 Saving The Day by @jbbmoved

On your way back home, you are being followed by a couple of creeps. When your eyes fall on the most impressive and handsome Avengers, you don’t think twice and find yourself a fake boyfriend and savior.

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💕 Hidden Lagoons and Seashells by @after-avenging-hours

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💕 my heart, my angel by @paintedface

valentine’s day candy grams basically show how popular you are in the school, so you expect to get none, however, one, extremely sweet one, turns up on your desk. except you have no clue who it’s from.

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💕 Like Silver Glass by @thejamesoldier

Out of all the things you have seen so far in your life – a colorful plethora of alien species, artificial intelligence, an imaginative array of mutants and their abilities, cyborgs, superhumans, assassins, geniuses, etc. – merpeople fell actually pretty low on your ‘Shocking Things That Exist’ list.

.

💕 Holiday Heist by @avengerofyourheart

When the art gallery you manage is robbed on Christmas Eve, you suspect the handsome stranger who flirted with you earlier in the day, but instead of involving the authorities, you take matters into your own hands with surprising consequences.

[lauraluna98]

Diana’s mothers fanfic

Have you ever think about Diana’s parents?

Have you think how did Daryl become so mean with Diana?

Why only Daryl, the twins and Diana are the only Cavendish remaining?

Where’s Diana’s grandparents?

Who’s Diana’s grandparents?

Why they aren’t there?

Why Bernadette was dead?

Who’s Diana dad?

How’s Bernadette Luna Nova years? If she really studied there

What happened in the Cavendish manor?

I’m going here to ask all these question with this fanfiction I wrote that is going to give a proper and a writing you guys never seen about Bernadette Cavendish the mother of Diana and her wife

Things here are going to change from the canon a little but well this is fanfiction and this is what fanfiction stand for

“Wait Wife? How? Why?”

Yeah Wife, by magic they made their kid and I’m going to explain why I choose a woman to be Bernadette’s wife rather than a dad

Simply, because feels generic and shallow to just simply give Bernadette a generic husband, this wouldn’t give a better writing to Bernadette as if was with another girl, Bernadette would simply marry or just have Diana with a generic man #1 and then one day he will die, leave her, or even plan to kill her

Plus the great majority of the fandom shipps Diakko, and they never think about the whole dilemma around Diana, by Akko’s side is easier she just need to fell in love with Diana and then yay they are together. But What about Diana’s side? Have you guys ever think that she’s an aristocrat (I’m not assumpting that aristocrats are LGBTphobes), she needs to keep a reputation there, a image and even she needs to have kids in order to keep her lineage being the one who will keep the head. So by Diana’s side things are harder, the reputation side she just can be simply strong and say openly that she’s a lesbian and everyone needs to accept that because we are in modern days but things get complicated about having kids

And pretty much the fanarts about a Diakko kid the children is always 100% biological daughter of Diana and Akko, so an artificial insemination by a donator is out of question (unless the donator is someone from the family who looks like them). Trans headcanon? That’s a pretty cool concept I think, tbh I love it, but to that work Diana or Akko wherever is gonna be Trans need to froze their sperm before the HRT if they want to have kids in the future, because the HRT make person infertile after a while. So magic? Well this is a another cool concept if both are cis so a fertility spell enters here, but how this is going to work? Leave that to the writers to do it. This is the idea I pick up with the fertility stone

This is why I come into the idea of giving Diana two mothers rather than a generic dad, because with that possibility Diana would get into the conclusion that a fertility spell is real with her at the first not actually believing it, until she finds out that her father was actually an another mother and she used the fertility stone with Bernadette

See how cool is that? And I’m not even starting to tell about Diana’s mom deeply, because this isn’t a story that takes place in the modern days but in the past

This is going to focus on Diana’s mothers

Bernadette Cavendish (the one everyone knows) and Laura McLaren (better than the generic Diana’s father OC)

Just to enter into the context of this story, the Cavendish family was into a time where they are even more close minded than today, on a time where Diana’s grandmother was alive and she’s a very conservative person, she was LGBTphobe AF not allowing their two daughters being other sexuality rather than straight, she controlled a lot of Bernadette’s life and even pressure her to be perfect

So times there was even worse for her than what is today. Bernadette’s mother was someone who preserve for the traditions and the image of the Cavendish family and this is where Daryl’s hatred among Diana enters

“What? But Diana wasn’t even born”

Because the hate wasn’t with Diana, but at Bernadette, Daryl hated Bernadette

“But in the anime has shown that Daryl had some feelings with her sister”

Really? I’ve only seen her screwing up with Bernadette will to keep the traditions of the family and she simply sell everything, I’ve seen her pretty much being very mean to Diana, not even taking care of her niece, plus when Bernadette was alive she pretty much was bullying Diana for liking Shiny Chariot

Come on the twins are less worse because they are kids but Daryl was a grown ass mother with two kids, she was simply bullying her niece for nothing when Bernadette was still alive in the canon

So this is how I come that Daryl is envy of Bernadette and she in reality hates her and I pretty much think that she’s even responsible for her sister death

Because of power, money and the wish to be the head of the family, Daryl pretty much has shown that in the anime and even her redemption was more like “Yeah you didn’t leave me to die so I’m in debt with you” (If LWA was going to have a season 2 she could pretty much fit into a villain and even if LWA didn’t have, Daryl was more Villainous than Croix ever was)

This envy among Daryl was something that started since she and Bernadette were kids, because their mother prioritize all the attention to the eldest daughter, the eldest daughter should be the one who will deserve to be the head and all the attention, but this is how their mother think is right to do and because of that Daryl starts to hate Bernadette’s side, plus that she was educated into a different way, she got more “evil” and greedy with the influence of her great aunts that think like that, while Bernadette was educated to be someone more “nice” and preserve the traditions of the family, she was even a little influenced by her grandma that actually believes into the fertility stone legend, where all the family think that’s bullshit

Bernadette needs to improve herself as a person to overcome all that weight over her, to have her own personality and freedom, because she didn’t have any freedom on her residence, until she enters on Luna Nova and meet someone called Laura McLaren

Laura is the complete opposite of Bernadette with her family, the McLaren family was like the Cavendish but from Ireland, they are rich too, but they prefer to live on a more simple big house, rather than a big ass castle because is more cheaper to maintain, Laura’s family is open minded AF they already knew about the fertility stone because the matriarch of the family is a 88 years old trans lesbian who used the fertility stone back then, so they are pretty much very fine with LGBT thing. Laura is openly a lesbian and she’s free to be herself, even tho she was most of the time trained with magic to become a powerful witch, so that makes her a strong ass witch that she didn’t even need to study in Luna Nova, but she’s there just for the grade

Laura was going to show to Bernadette how’s the freedom to be herself and not accept everything, that she needs to impose herself when someone is making her feeling down and Bernadette was going to make Laura being more mature with herself, since Laura was a little teen rebel, since she didn’t care that much about the authority of older persons rather than the family, so she really feels like she’s an adult and wanted to be respected like one. She’s the kind of badass tomboy girl who don’t care about authority and thing that she knows how the system works, so she obeys only who she really want

The time was going to be set around 1987 on the very first chapter which could fit very well into the canon since the anime canon takes place 30 years later, plus the time they make into adulthood and when the couple finally have their kids

The 15/16 years students on that time are going to be born on July 1971 to June 1972 and their birthdates will actually fit into the school year

Daryl is 3 years younger in this story she will be born in 1975 just like Laura’s sister Chelsea

The main differs with the canon

Since the time is changed in this AU with the anime being set on 2014 the 16 years old characters of the anime are born in 1998 in this AU.

Another thing I’m going to fix from the canon is the School year, since Luna Nova is a British school I’m going to change the school year from the canon which use the Japanese school year starting on May, but here I’m going to make the year starting in September to June next year with three vacation, December on Winter, two weeks after the easter on a spring break and the 3 months vacations from June to September when the year ends

And the whole magic limitation of them need to be near the sorcerer stone in order to use magic, in this AU they can use magic wherever they want, the most powerful the witch the most capable she is with the magic to point some of them can use their own body as wands

The dates are going to differ from the canon on the AU only when Diana is born and Chariot/Croix age since this is a part of the whole AU where the “anime” is set on 2014 and I make them both on the 30s when I didn’t know their canon ages there, so Chariot will be born on 1984, this will make her a kid when she meets Laura McLaren when she come to the Du Nord family residence to research for the fertility stone this presence of Laura is what made Chariot enchanted with magic

Bernadette have olive green eyes, idk if this differs a lot since we didn’t have proper canon information of her eyes and we didn’t even see her eyes in the anime, the main information is that the Cavendish has mostly blue eyes and I put her with greenish ones just because I want to make her unique, being the only Cavendish with a different eye color in her family

Diana is Irish/Scottish here, since Laura is Irish and Bernadette Scottish this makes Diana half of each (making her more Irish than Amanda lol)

Bernadette didn’t die, but that part could be also the one with Bernadette die and the whole canon anime happen with Laura didn’t come back to see her daughter

The Claiomh Solais didn’t appear for Chariot neither Croix and the main reason is because wasn’t needed at that time, the magic was pretty good, so both girls still become rivals but into another thing that is Broom Racing, just like on the real life we have Formula 1, so why not a championship with broom racing like Formula 1? This is what I bring into the AU in the next story which takes place after this one

Akko still idolize chariot but into her dream to become a Broom Racer and you can see here

Diana also like’s Chariot career but her main Broom Racing icon is her own mother Laura McLaren which become a excellent Broom Racer on the 1990s decade, without actually know that broom racer is her mother

The fic

It’s a remake of The mysterious mother, a lot of things are gonna be like the original but I’m also going to do a lot of changes to give more development to the characters, give more reasons to them to do what they did and also I wanted to do a story to fit in my whole AU

Well I talked a lot but not about the story, but this is because I don’t want to give a lot of spoilers on what happened and the whole answers to all these questions, even the one where Laura leaves Diana, since she’s a nice person, something happened that Laura leaves her lovely wife and her daughter and how did Diana never knew about who’s her dad actually is

Take a read into the very first chapter and have fun because this is going to be a very looong story with some familiar faces around there and some of them that are OC’s but they are needed to appear since most of the cast isn’t born at all despite the teachers at Luna Nova or Chariot and Croix that are still pretty young

This story is also the 3rd part of the whole AU of the fertility stone which you can check out all the parts I’ve wrote just to be more clearer with this whole story

Part 1: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26913469

Part 2: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27899341

Part 3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/31098311

Part 4: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23807575

Also not only we are going to know about Diana’s mothers but a lot of things that will play on the part 5 story read it to find out, since the story is going to take place 50 years after this one, also is going to be a very very long story with them I’m already with 30+ chapters wrote and I’m gonna write even more, plus I’m gonna do daily updates so stay all the days on Ao3 for updates on the same time if you got interested on this story (I’m also very sorry with bad English and Grammar since I just put the story into Deepl translator and I change a word or another into the translation, when things get confused, since English is not my language)

Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/31098311

Fanfiction: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13875351/1/Laura-McLaren-The-mother-of-Diana-Cavendish-IV

Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/1065632225-laura-mclaren-the-mother-of-diana-cavendish-iv-so

[cherries-n-rocknroll]

if you don't mind my asking, why do you hate Instagram so much?? your posts are always beautiful & aesthetic & your profile is honestly such a great vibe, i mean, if anyone here is "winning" at Insta it's you 😆

i mean for me personally the only grievance i have with it is the DMs from people i'd rather not talk to but that's mostly a me problem because 99% are ppl i know irl and i just have trouble saying no 💀 also i'm terrible at actually posting- unlike you- so there's not much motivation for me to be there anyways

💛

Because I just seem to lose followers every time I do anything and I just feel looked at and judged in a weird way and idk the vibe on insta is just kinds eh it’s so artificial and shallow. And so much people i know irl and me no like because again i feel judged which is mainly a me problem but it stops me from doing the things I actually want? Also change comparison. Anyways it’s kind of a love hate relationship because I love beautiful pictures and taking them but it’s a mentally draining platform sometimes

[autoplaysdigimon]

Top Five Main Character List

#5 Gatomon

Idk man, if I’ve got any sort of Buttons in good characters it’s ones who defect to the Good Guys, and Gatomon filled that role pretty nicely. (also oh man am I excited for 02 for reasons that may or may not be related to this) Not only is there the whole thing about introducing a new character (or pair of characters!) into the group, therefore having a fresh pair of eyes on the situation and new inter-character interactions; there’s something fantastic about a character who gets to show both antagonist and protagonist shades to them.

Unfortunately, Gatomon didn’t really have time for much development after this all went down - she went from being a cool and interesting villain, to the star of an arc, to yet another Digimon in the pile of protagonists. Just another symptom of the large cast, I guess, but it was still disappointing. Even her voice acting was better as a villain - she had this kinda silky, purring inflection to it that she kinda lost as a main character.

Still, though, kitty cute :3

#4 Tentomon

Alright so I may or may not be cribbing off my favourite Digimon list for this buuuut

and also to be fair the Digimon who make this list might be some of my favourites because they were the best characters in the show but ANYWAY

Tentomon! I mean, come on, he’s an electric ladybug who’s also some kind of robotic insect thing??? He’s the perfect foil to Izzy, he gets some of the best lines that are just stupid jokes but they’re so dumb they’re hilarious, he’s got an interesting voice that seems to be somewhere between a stereotypical “insect voice” and a goofy robot but also without being artificially synthesised, Medabots style (which is also cool, but it’s neat that they didn’t for Tentomon, I think).

Also, his VA Jeff Nimoy was on the writing team for the dub, which is neat but also he’s one of the ones to blame for the Everything about the dub.

#3 Joe Kido

Man, I never expected to empathise with this dude as much as I ended up doing in this rewatch, but hey! Dude’s got a good head on his shoulders, he’s got that Anxiety Relatable Feels, he’s a nervous wreck and he’s also got a surprising amount of great lines. I never appreciated him as a kid, but as an adult... hoo boy. Also his partner is a little seal man and that’s just :3

I’ve come to the conclusion that, if I were to go to the Digital World myself like these kids did, I’d react somewhere between Joe and Mimi. Nooo nothing’s clean enough and I’m tired and hungry and shouldn’t we at least have some cover while we sleep in case we’re attacked and it’s too hot here and we’re all gonna die and and and...

And then I’m booted off the island.

#2 Mimi Tachikawa

Oh hey, speaking of which!

Despite the dub team’s tendency to give her the most shallow, stereotypical lines in the show, Mimi’s fantastic. She’s kind of a boss-ass bitch and I can’t help but respect that, and also pink cowboy aesthetic??? YES PLEASE.

There was also that phase I went through as a kid where I rejected traditional femininity, and being a Sora fan over Mimi was definitely part of that. Nowadays I don’t really have any strong feelings about Sora one way or another, but I’ve really grown to like Mimi. Is this just me over-correcting from my kid views? Who knows! She’s got a pink cowboy hat!

#1 Palmon

SHE’S A LITTLE FLOWER LADY AND SHE’S PRECIOUS.

Her voice acting was some of my favourite in the series so far, having little voice cracks and just generally being so full of character. She’s an amazing foil to Mimi, not only in occasionally challenging her views and ideals but going along with them at the same time, when they’re not actively harmful. And then that one time when they were. Plus her in that little dress that one time! And wearing Mimi’s hat??? Truly the fashion icon we need in these trying times.

Honourable Mentions

Gabumon and Matt Ishida - They were pretty cool, I liked their whole Friendship thing (especially the Inspiring Crest Emotion being inspired by the Digimon partner and not one of the other kids for once!) but I couldn’t really get behind their reasoning for attacking Tai and going off on their own.

Gomamon - his face goes :3 and that makes me go :3

TK Takaishi - For a little kid, he sure steps the fuck up when nobody else will, huh? There’s something endearing and naive about the youngest one, knowing the least about the situation and the world at large, adapting the best because he’s just not as experienced in the Real World as the other kids, so he’s got less of a frame of reference to place it in. Actually, this all applies to Kari Kamiya as well.

Dishonourable Mentions

Hoo boy, this is gonna be controversial.

Tai Kamiya.

I don’t hate the guy, really. I’ve got his Funko Pop* and everything! But he’s got that Anime Protagonist Syndrome down pat, including centering his own problems over all others, taking the lead when nobody really asked him to, and being kind of a dick. I’ve definitely touched on that before, but come on, Tai, punching is not the solution to all your problems. At least he (sometimes) learns his lesson about it, like with the Skullgreymon thing.

I’ve really got nothing against Agumon either, I like his voice acting as well. But he just wasn’t as interesting to me as the others were, or as much as some of his expies in the future will be.

Hint. Hint.

*I’ve also got Spyro and Sparx, Gay Batman, and Tiabeanie in a wedding dress :)

[i-got-these-words]

Hi Zack, idk if this is too weird to ask...(you can ignore this if you dont want to answer ofc) Perhaps you are still into your ex bf? because i've seen you mention him a lot. I am asking this because i also cant seem to move on from my ex too and i just want to say out loud this secret somewhere i act normal but actually i dont feel fine at all around him and it sucks seriously when i know i should stop but my heart still lingers these feelings for him :(

Hey, sweetie. I’m sorry you’re going through such a rough time.

Did you guys end things recently?

Breakups suck, but, more often than not, the reason(s) why a relationship has come to an end is valid. And, for me, it helps a lot to remember that. Maybe it would for you, too.

I’ve never tried to ‘get over’ my ex, but I don’t think I need to in order to move on. Towards the end of our relationship, I came to accept that what we had was beautiful but broken. It wasn’t healthy or fair to either of us to keep trying to revive something that, frankly, had died a long time ago.

He was my first everything and that first-love syndrome makes every feeling a million times more intense and also makes a person (me, in this case) more naive than they normally would be. I let a lot of crazy shit slide.

When I see him now, I still feel a certain way. I don’t see an acquaintance or a friend or an ex. I see a man who I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with. Grow old with. Have a family with.

And, it used to hurt so much. I can’t tell you how many times I’d have to hold myself back from doing something stupid like turning up at his doorstep and asking to be his again. So I think it’s completely natural for you to still feel cut up and all messed up about someone that you cared deeply for. Sadly, though, there is no off switch. No tie that you can cut. You can’t force yourself to feel or not feel, either. I’m very pragmatic and an utterly unsentimental little shit but, even for me, I don’t think it’ll ever stop hurting. That doesn’t mean I can’t move on, though, or live my life, or meet someone new. And that’s the same for you, babe. Don’t let your feelings for your ex bring you down or put a hold on your life.

This might sound weird, but I don’t want to get over him. What we had wasn’t so fragile or shallow or artificial that I could just build a bridge and get over it. But that’s a choice I’ve chosen to make and it won’t be right for everyone.

I know that I’m not ‘into’ him, anymore. Yes, I still find him insanely attractive, but I don’t want a relationship with him. Because I’ve been there. Done that. We used up all our second chances and ‘sorrys’ and never came out on top. I know that it would never work. Sure, I still love him. I’m just not in love with him, anymore. And there’s a big fucking difference.

I guess if I was trying to be objective, I’d say my relationship with my ex was a rollercoaster of a lesson. What I learned will not only stay with me for life, but has helped me grow in so many ways; I’ve learned that it’s actually really fucking hard to love someone without losing yourself :)

I sometimes feel like anon asks are kinda impersonal so, if you’re up for it and would like to talk about this more, DM me or send me an ask off anon. I’ll reply privately and we can rant about exes and shoot the shit x

[gloxinian]

Hmm I have mixed feelings abt the Pokémon direct, mostly bc there’s still not a lot of info imo. I’m actually fine with paid dlcs so long as they’re done right (octoexpansion for splatoon was amazing and well worth the money for example) and I’m not sure if the dlc is worth it yet or not. It also looks like more older Pokémon are being brought in and I really hope those aren’t locked behind a paywall bc that should be free content. Paid DLC should be new content not artificially gated content. Or if it is gated, I’d hope that they can still be traded to those who don’t pay? Idk i don’t feel like I know enough yet bc we’ve mostly just seen some teasers and that doesn’t necessarily cover the depth of dlc unless... it’s shallow and that’s it. Shrugs. Curious but also a little nervous. Also kind of hopeful these kind of dlcs will mean workers won’t be forced to churn out a full mainline games as quick but that’s probably wishful thinking.

[feroxcia]

RULES: REPOST, DON’T REBLOG. JUST PICK A MUSE OF YOURS AND FILL IT OUT.

MUSE: Gary Oak

BASICS

▸ IS YOUR MUSE TALL/SHORT/AVERAGE?   I mean he’s almost 6 feet. Tall but not super tall.

▸ ARE THEY OKAY WITH THEIR HEIGHT?   Yeah, Gary doesn’t give much thought to his height, mostly because he’s pretty average and fits in with the crowd.

▸ WHAT’S THEIR HAIR LIKE?   Brown color. Shoulder length when down. Pretty thick and softer than you’d think. Though you wouldn’t really notice with all the gel he uses. It can get pretty gnarly if he doesn’t comb it. 

▸ DO THEY SPEND A LOT OF TIME ON THEIR HAIR/WITH THEIR GROOMING?   He does, especially as he’s gotten older. He meets with a lot of important people, so he’s always gotta be in his best. Never know who your gonna meet. As stated before he takes very good care of his hair (he doesn’t want to start balding at 40). But he takes good care of his face too. Even plucking his eyebrows and wear a little cover up if he has a blemish. If he’s going on a date, a tiny dab of lip gloss is sure to stop some hearts. ▸ DOES YOUR MUSE CARE ABOUT THEIR APPEARANCE?   Absolutely. His looks are everything to him. If he doesn’t look good he doesn’t feel ready for the day. 

▸ DOES YOUR MUSE CARE ABOUT WHAT OTHERS THINK ABOUT THEM?   Kinda. He likes to think he doesn’t, but he does. Honestly he just likes the attention, positive or negative. He really doesn’t care if you love him or hate his guts, so long as you remember him, that’s all that matters.

PREFERENCES

▸ INDOORS OR OUTDOORS?   Outdoors. I mean, he likes both in their own separate ways. But outside is more freeing. 

▸ RAIN OR SUNSHINE?   Honestly he appreciates both. The sun is warm and bright. It warms his skin and gives him and he pokemon of the world energy. But the rain is calming. It provides the water for everything to grow and the sound helps him focus. There needs to be a balance though. Long hot stretches of days drain him, and many days of overcast rain can make him mopey. 

▸ FOREST OR BEACH?   He doesn’t mind a nice day on the beach, but the forest is where he thrives. Exploring, hunting, learning, observing. There’s so much to see and find in a forest. Even if you’ve been through it a hundred times you’ll still discover something new. 

▸ PRECIOUS METALS OR GEMS?   Both are cool? He’s an archaeologist at heart, so if he’s digging and comes across something shiny, well that’s a bonus find! Obviously gems are more sparkly and eye catching. But natural metals are fascinating and he owns a few chunks of raw ore he’s dug up.  

▸ FLOWERS OR PERFUMES?   Flowers. Strong perfumes make him stuffy and can give him headaches. You know those ladies. You walk past em and it’s like walking into a wall of artificial scents. Probably used to cover up some sort of insecurity, their nose blind, or the fact that they haven’t showered in a week. Yeah that’s gross. But flowers are nice. A good scent and something pretty to look at.

▸ PERSONALITY OR APPEARANCE?   Gary would be shallow and say appearance. And of course, appearance is important. He won’t boogie with someone he’s not physically attracted to. But that’s just a surface level. If you really wanna get to him you gotta have the right personality too.

▸ BEING ALONE OR BEING IN A CROWD?   Honestly it depends on what he’s doing. Is he out for a night on the town? Then he’s going to be part of the crowd, living up the limelight. Is he working or studying? The he’d much rather be left alone, or maybe with one other person there to bounce ideas around. He’ll always prefer being the center of attention. But he’s learned to enjoy the quiet moments when he’s the only one there.

▸ ORDER OR ANARCHY?   You obviously need both to have any sort of functioning society, but Gary tends to lean more towards anarchy. Order is fine when the situation calls, but he thrives on going against the grain and challenging what people think. If there’s a cause he wants to fight for he’ll start a riot.

▸ PAINFUL TRUTHS OR WHITE LIES?   Gary tends to be very blunt and to the point, so painful truths are his game. He’s not one to pussy foot around, and he’ll speak his mind when he feels it needed. Plus, he’d much rather hear a painful truth himself than to keep him going with a white lie. There are some white lies he’s okay with. Santa Clause, the Tooth Fairy, stuff like that. But if it’s important, you bet your bippy he’ll come out and say whatever needs to be said.

▸ SCIENCE OR MAGIC?   Obviously being the grandson of a professor and an aspiring one himself, science comes first. Magic is only found in fiction. Though one could argue that pokemon themselves are magic, Gary likes t believe there’s always a scientific reason for something happening. 

▸ PEACE OR CONFLICT?   He’d rather there be peace, but if peace isn’t an option Gary’s probably one of the first people to jump to conflict to solve an issue.

▸ NIGHT OR DAY?   Both are beautiful in their own right, but night is where Gary really comes alive (it’s no wonder he owns an Umbreon). Dark city streets, neon lights, loud music and social drinking are all in his aesthetic wheelhouse. He loves the atmosphere. 

▸ DUSK OR DAWN?   Dawn. Contrary to the above dawn has some of the most beautiful vistas. Colors dancing in the sky, pokemon waking up from their nights slumber to prepare for the day. It’s wonderful. Too bad he doesn’t see it often. 

▸ WARMTH OR COLD?   Once again, both are nice. Warmth is obviously more comfortable, but the cold doesn’t bother him (I mean, he lived in Snowpoint City for a while).

▸ MANY ACQUAINTANCES OR A FEW CLOSE FRIENDS?   Many acquaintances are where Gary thrives. Having loads of people he knows on the street. Being able to walk past and have a short conversation and wave. The attention is great. But he does cherish his few close friends. 

▸ READING OR PLAYING A GAME?   He’d much rather spend his time reading a book or researching something than playing a game. Honestly he’s not much for games to begin with. He’d rather watch a movie.

QUESTIONNAIRE

▸ WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR MUSE’S BAD HABITS?   Being a jackass? Like, he just says shit sometimes that he probably shouldn’t say and it gets him into shit with a lot of people. He also tends to overwork himself. 

▸ HAS YOUR MUSE LOST ANYONE CLOSE TO THEM? HOW HAS IT AFFECTED THEM?  You could say his parents, but honestly he really didn’t know his parents before they were gone. 

▸ WHAT ARE SOME FOND MEMORIES YOUR MUSE HAS?   Despite the outcome the Silver Conference is an oddly fond memory in hindsight. Remembering how much he’d grown to get to that point was invigorating.

▸ IS IT EASY FOR YOUR MUSE TO KILL?   Absolutely not. He might be a jackass but he’s not a killer.

▸ WHAT’S IT LIKE WHEN YOUR MUSE BREAKS DOWN?   Quiet. Scarily quiet. He tends to lock himself up and is unable to function properly. Choosing to cave in on himself. He doesn’t like people seeing him like this and he’ll do whatever he can to get the fuck out. He doesn’t normally cry and usually channels his sadness into anger, but on the rare occasion he does it’s a pretty gross sob. 

▸ IS YOUR MUSE CAPABLE OF TRUSTING SOMEONE WITH THEIR LIFE?   It depends on the person? He can, but he usually won’t. If he trusts anyone with his life it’s his pokemon. People are fleeting, his partners are forever. 

▸ WHAT’S YOUR MUSE LIKE WHEN THEY’RE IN LOVE?   Once again...oddly quiet. He gets soft. His eyes loose their sharp edge. He moves slower and more deliberate. Protective. He gets very protective. He’s the person to wake up in for morning spooning his partner, burring his face into the back of their neck and mumbling good mornings and I love yous. He likes hand holding and quiet hugs. Soft cheek smooches and passionate kisses. He just really wants to prove to you how much he cares about you. 

tagged by: @aquaffensive​

tagging: idk man take it from me?