#and people might take that as being like. inherently 'better' or something) but because

[eisthenameofme]

"you are not immune to propaganda/cult indoctrination" is largely useful and the sort of shit it's used to point out as not making you immune (being "smart" or a certain degree of educated, etc) is worth pointing out and it never feels like the appropriate place to mention it, but a lot of people seem to be conflating "the things people think make them immune to this kind of thing doesn't because it doesn't work that way" along with "the same conditions that make people more vulnerable to indoctrination/conspiritorial thinking/etc can happen to anyone" with "everyone in the world is equally vulnerable to every kind of indoctrination under the same conditions" and i just don't think that's objectively true.

It may be true that someone started out holding one belief and flipped to hold the apparently opposite belief, but does that actually mean everyone who holds that belief is equally liable to change their mind? Why did they hold that belief in the first place? Is it consistent with their values and what they care about more broadly, and do they specically go out of their way to combat the potential for misinformation and propaganda? Are they prone to making their decisions based on what the people around or closest to them think instead of thinking for themselves? To what extent do they base their values and decsions on kneejerk emotional reactions? (these aren't the only factors obviously, just examples of other potential contributing factors) It is not a given that everyone will answer these questions in the same way, and this is part of why different people respond differently in similar situations. Also not everyone will respond positively to techniques that often work to draw people in (eg lovebombing is a common tactic that works on a lot of people, but may be actively offputting or ring alarm bells for others; different people have different tolerances for attempts at social control and some might nope out the moment they see it attempted regardless of any other factors).

"You Yes Even You" can be an important tactic to get people who wouldn't otherwise to legitimately consider why these tactics work on people and what might work on them and keep in mind that the people it Does happen to usually aren't aware of it and it's not always their fault the way it's often presented, but that is not objectively the same thing as "anyone can fall down any pipeline not matter what forever"

like maybe no one is literally "immune to propaganda" but if a type of propoganda is something that necessarily hinges on X mechanism and a person is notorious for both intellectually and instinctively being violently opposed to X. then yeah I think the propoganda that hinges on X is probably going to be a Very Difficult to Impossible sell, even potentially under coercion, especially if that person has already demonstrated that they are willing to put themeslves at risk/resist that kind of coercion about it. unless your argument is that there is scp level literal mind control happening.

[the-one-and-only-elita]

One thing that I absolutely love about TFOne's writing is that it manages to avoid a lot of the heavier criticism I've seen regarding MegOp's hero/villain dynamic over the years (trust me, the mid-2010s TF discourse was crazy)

*Spoilers Below*

First of all, the narrative benefits so much from the main 4 cast members all being a part of the same exploited mining class. So many takes on MegOp have Orion being of a higher status (an archivist, a cop, etc) while Megatron is much lower down on the social latter (a miner, a gladiator, often in the context of being a slave).

I've seen many people be put off by this, because it feels as if Megs is being villianized for being rightfully angry at the system that deeply harmed and exploited him, while Orion/Optimus is praised for taking a more pacifistic stance despite him not suffering as much from or in some ways even benefiting from the system he claims to oppose. I don't find their dynamic to be as simple as that, and I do find these takes to be a bit reductive, but I do very much see where they are coming from.

I am definitely one of those people who's very frustrated with the way pacifism is hailed as the one true path of morality, and the inherent implication that taking any sort of revenge on the people who abused/exploited you makes you just as bad as them. Also, Marvel's particular brand of demonizing any form of radical political action, despite the system clearly being broken and corrupt, but being completely unwilling to offer any other alternatives to meaningfully change things for the better.

When looking at what I described above its pretty easy to see how a lot of versions of MegOp's hero/villain dynamic unfortunately fits into that trope. Bringing it back to TFOne, you can see how Op and Meg coming from the same political/social status subverts this. The existence of Elita and Bee only further illustrates that out of the 4 people of the mining class who were all deceived, exploited, and literally mutilated in the same way it is only D-16 that completely loses himself to his rage, even to the point where he loses compassion for his own companions and disregarding the safety of the other miners (when he decides to "tears everything down" and Elita exclaims he's going to "kill everyone").

What I think I love most about the characterization in TFOne is that Orion is the radical one. Not only that, but he is praised by Elita and by extension the narrative for it. He is constantly challenging authority, and is the first to have the suspicion that their society is structured in an unjust way.

Meanwhile D-16, to be frank, is kind of a bootlicker. He fully believed in the system and that Sentinal Prime, as someone with power, had the right to decided "what was best" for those who are weaker/lesser (I wish I had the specific quote from D-16 to support this, but the movie's still in theaters). It illustrate that D-16 already held certain fascistic ideals, and that he and Orion already have fundamentally opposing moral/political values, it simply hasn't been of any consequence yet. It shows that their eventual falling out was inevitable, even if they had decided to rebuild Cybertron together.

It should also be noted that D-16's feelings of anger and betrayal do not necessarily have anything to do with the unjust system itself, but that said unjust system was predicated on a lie. Hence his fixation on deception in the post-credits scene and him naming his faction the Decepticons. Meanwhile, when Orion learns the truth he's just sort of like "yeah, I always kinda knew something was up" because again, he understood on some level that their system was predicated on injustice.

Even D-16's obsession with Megatronus Prime, while initially an endearing aspect of his character, is also an indicator of the questionably large amount of value he puts on one's strength. It foreshadows the "might makes right" ideology that the decepticons follow, and is a key part of their ideological characterization across continuities.

Instead of the narrative we often see in Transformers media were Optimus is idolized by the narrative for being more moderate and Megatron is villiainized for being radical (or so people often claim), it is instead Optimus who is rewarded and praised by the narrative for being radical, and Megatron who is villainized and punished by the narrative for holding potentially fascistic values.

I do agree with some criticism I've seen that the whole thing with killing Sentinel and D-16's final turn into villainy felt a bit rushed and more than a little cliche, but I also understand it both had a limited runtime and that it is ultimately a family film meant to be accessible to children. More importantly though, I think the movie set the groundwork early on that, no matter how this final act played out, D-16 was always going to turn to darkness, and Orion would not have been able to stop him.

Its perfectly tragic, the way all MegOp should be, while also feeling really well thought out from a thematic standpoint. I love it.

[phntmeii]

⭐️ OPLA Characters and the “Only One Bed” Trope

[Suggestive + No Gendered Terms]

⭐️ Characters Featured: Luffy, Zoro, Nami, Sanji, Mihawk

⭐️ A/N: So... Maybe just the part one to this if people like it? I'll write the next part with the other characters if people want it :) Anyway, cranking out these compilation posts because I’m brain broken with just OPLA content.

Monkey D. Luffy

✖️ Luffy didn’t show any concern about there being one bed. He saw it as something to find fun in a way! To share a bed with one of his friends!

✖️ He’s immediately jumping into the bed and turning to you, holding out his arms, waiting for you.

✖️ “I promise not to take up too much space! Come on!”

✖️ Luffy is immediately wrapping himself around you like a little backpack, nuzzling his head into your neck.

✖️ “M’so soft…” while his hand gently caressed your belly, gently grabbing and massaging it.

✖️ When he felt himself half-asleep, he didn't notice how he was trailing small kisses at your shoulder and the back of your neck. It was like an unconscious habit shining through.

✖️His arms around you are tightly clung so it’s safe to say that you aren’t leaving the bed until he lets you. And he just might not all night.

Roronoa Zoro

✖️ Zoro is immediately refusing. The moment he saw one bed in the room, he spun on his heels and walked out to try and complain.

✖️ When there really was no other rooms, he entered back inside with an annoyed look.

✖️ “Just… *sigh*. Take the bed. I’ll be fine”

✖️ Maybe he could just lay on the floor instead in his mind. Even when you offered to share, he refused. But, he soon found that the discomfort wasn’t worth it.

✖️ He carefully climbed into the bed, taking up the minimum he could at the edge. When he was drifting asleep, he didn’t notice his hands reach out for you, pulling your body toward his.

✖️ As if you were a stuffed animal, he pressed your body to his and hugged you close.

✖️ His tired voice just hushed you when you tried to ask what he was doing as his hands moved toward your chest. “Shh… Jus’… You’re warm.”

✖️ After your restless night together, the next morning, he acts as if he has no idea what you’re talking about when you ask him about last night.

Nami

✖️ Nami is annoyed but won’t make a big deal out of it. She’ll roll her eyes and complain while setting her stuff down.

✖️ “Let’s just… do what we can. It’s only for one night. You take that side, I’ll take this side.”

✖️ She didn't want to make you uncomfortable or overstep boundaries. Keeping on her side, facing away from you.

✖️ She soon heard you rustling around in the bed, unable to keep still, she was annoyed but asked what was wrong. "Nami... I just- Sorry, I can't sleep."

✖️ Nami's face softened in realization. Sighing, she scooted closer and pulled you into her, holding you close. Her hands gently rubbed your back.

✖️ "It's okay. I can make you feel better." She let her hands lightly caress your sides, trailing up to your neck then cheek. "C'mon, I'll help tire you out."

Vinsmoke Sanji

✖️ Sanji immediately smirked at the sight of one bed but on the inside, was absolutely dying from embarrassment at the idea of being so close to you.

✖️ He immediately laid in bed, hands behind his head with a cocky look. "Already nervous, beautiful? It's only one night..."

✖️ You were used to Sanji's flirting and mainly ignored it since he was like that with everyone. You weren't inherently special in your head.

✖️ The moment you relaxed into the bed on your side, facing away from Sanji, Sanji was laid on his side, eyes to your back. He hesitated to do anything but stare, but he couldn't help it. A phantom touch of his fingers lightly traced your spine.

✖️ You were initially going to complain like you normally did until Sanji scooted closer, placing a kiss at your shoulder. His hand lightly rubbing your arm.

✖️ You heard that ever-familiar teasing, soft laugh behind you. He enjoyed your reactions to his simple touches.

✖️ "You're so stiff... It's just my hands, you know? I just want... I need to feel you."

Dracule Mihawk

✖️ Mihawk stared at the bed indifferently. It was an inconvenience but certainly not something he was going to fuss about. It's just a bed.

✖️ He placed his belongings aside, getting ready for bed and slipping under the covers. When he saw you looking to instead sleep on the floor with your bag as a makeshift pillow, he didn't say anything.

✖️ Laying in bed, Mihawk always found it difficult to drift to sleep, as though he was meant to be tormented by the mere idea of sleep.

✖️ Maybe an hour had gone by and he looked over to see you still on the floor, huddled into yourself. He sighed loudly. "Stop forcing yourself to freeze. Lay down here."

✖️ Seeing you carefully slip under the covers as well, he looked over at you, eyes scanning your face then raking down your body.

✖️ Mihawk reached out with his hand, pulling you closer to him until your face was inches away from his. His stare was critical still, as it always was.

✖️ His hand went to the back of your head, gently caressing you. “I can warm you up, if you’d like me to. Lay back.”

⤷ divider credits: @cafekitsune

[gremlinmodetweeker]

When König Freaks Out

I think that sometimes, people don't really know how to write König getting mad. I think a lot of people assume that because he's a soldier, he loses his shit all the time. Either that, or they assume he's nervous and scared. He's not either. He's a colonel (or, was), he is far too self disciplined to lose himself like that. However, König isn't always able to control himself. Under special circumstances, König loses his shit.

TWs: König yelling, teasing, childhood photos being used to embarrass König

Wordcount: 1.2k

Art from This Post

König is a very, very stable person. He almost never lets his true emotions show. It's extremely rare. Sure he has his sadistic belly laughs, but other than that, König doesn't express himself fully. He just doesn't.

König doesn't cry. He doesn't yell when he's around civvies. He doesn't even swear much when in casual conversation. He may seem relaxed and calm, but if you pay attention, he's extremely careful with what he says and how he says it. Part of it is social anxiety; he's extremely aware of how he's being perceived and takes care to curtail that image to his need. He needed to be careful to rise the ranks as quickly as he did. He's not colonel for nothing.

High ranking military personnel are not like your average soldiers, especially among special ops. Lower soldiers might be careless and rough and hardened, but to be a colonel you need to be the perfect soldier. You need to drink, but not too much. You need to be a gentleman, but you need to be dirty. You need to be kind in public, cruel on the field. It's a position of contradictions. Not many civvies understand how hard these people have their entire identities on lockdown. They often compartmentalize their lives to be able to function in different settings. They have to be, at the very least a little bit, sociopathic to succeed. Again, they're not inherently evil, I'm not saying König is evil. I am saying that if you pay attention to him in a civvie situation though, you'll notice that he is an unflappable gentleman. You'd never know he was out at the bar until 3am with his drinking buddies the night before and nursing a wicked hangover while he's sipping coffee at lunch with you.

Why am I being so careful to outline how calm and steady König is? It's because when he freaks out it's usually insanely funny, or terrifying. Sometimes both.

Now, I've told you all before in this post that König's instinctual reaction to being startled is to fight. He will punch first and ask questions second. But, sometimes, König doesn't get scared.

He gets mad.

König is normally hard to upset, but family reunions bring something special out of König. Something dark, something hidden, something murderous. It's not battlefield rage, it's worse. It's the hatred and fury of being the youngest brother in the family, and it all comes out when he brings you to a reunion and they bring out the baby photos.

"Nein, nein, nein," König will chant as he rips the photo album out of his sister's hands, "this is going back on the shelf."

You're already cackling because it's far too late to go back.

"But you looked so cute in the tub!" Lisa's grinning from ear to ear as her little brother loses his shit

"Why do we even have those pictures?" König huffs as he slumps back in his chair, "we don't need them. They can be burnt."

"You know, you grew a better beard as a kid than you do now," Friedrich mutters as he sips his beer.

"I grow a perfectly fine beard!" König snaps.

"You call that shit-stain on your face facial hair?" Stephen looks down his nose at the youngest Leichenberg.

"I can't help it!" König grumbles, "I try to shave but then it all grows back."

"Yeah," Friedrich rolls his eyes, "that's what happens, Kilgore. It's called biology."

"No!" König huffs, "it grows fast! Too fast! By the time I go to bed it's already making my face itch!"

"So you keep that on your face?" Lisa points and laughs.

"It's trimmed," König grumbles and rubs his chin before turning to you, "it looks nice. You think it looks nice, right?"

You look at his dark stubble, a stark contrast to his wheat blond hair. In truth, he looks rather handsome with the dark shadow on his jaw. He does his best to keep it nice and trimmed (always in regulation), but since you arrived in Austria five days ago, the stubble has grown into an unruly thing on his face.

"You haven't trimmed in a bit," you admit.

"See! Even your wife thinks it looks like a rat's nest," Klara snorts.

"I wouldn't go that far-"

"I look fine!" König's voice raises up a notch with indignation.

"Mama," Friedrich ducks around the door to the kitchen, "come tell Kilgore he needs to shave."

The little woman pops out of the kitchen to glare at her son. She looks him up and down and scoffs.

"You call yourself a colonel? Tch, you look like a mangy dog."

She ducks back around the corner to tend to the oven.

"I DO NOT LOOK LIKE A DOG!"

Everyone (except you) laughs as König's face turns a bright violent red as he squawks furiously. He huffs and puffs, just on the brink of a meltdown as his family taunts him further.

"And he looked so good with a full bubble beard!" Klara laughs.

"Oh but you looked better," Friedreich snaps another album off the shelf and flicks through the photos, but stops on another page, "oh wait, we'll look at that later. Look at this picture of Kilgore on his first birthday!"

Even you can't help but laugh as Friedrich brandishes the offending photo.

There, bordered in paper butterflies and tulips, is König sitting in a puddle of mud, gleefully shovelling a handful of the muck into his mouth. I the background, a young Friedrich has Stephen in a headlock while Lisa, the only presentable sibling, is eating a slice of König's cake.

"Mama worked for days on that cake, but Kilgore only wanted to eat the mud," Stephen explained as König bellowed slurs at his eldest brother.

Lisa was beside herself with laughter, nearly keeling over out of the chair as Klara pointed out how, in this photo as well, König was completely nude. Apparently, getting young König to wear clothes was quite the task.

"WE DO NOT NEED MORE PICTURES," König roared as Lisa pulled out another album.

König looked like he was about to burst a blood vessel at this rate. The only time you ever saw König this worked up was when he was dealing with subordinates. Never before had you seen König lose his temper quite like this. A part of you was horrified, another part amazed by how easily his siblings pressed all the right buttons to make him tick.

"Look how stoic our little soldier boy is!" Stephen remarked as König smacked his meaty fist against his thigh with a thick thud.

"I. AM. A. COLONEL!" König howled.

He was about to carry on before all the siblings went silent. Even König stilled, his mouth clamping shut with a click as he looked behind you. You turned to look at what stopped them to find the elder Fritz Leichenberg holding up a hand.

He uncrossed his long, long legs and adjusted his half-moon glasses on his hooked nose. Soft, watery blue eyes looked down at his youngest son. He gently pulled his tobacco pipe from beneath his salt and pepper moustache and rang a long, veiny hand through his bushy beard lightly. He blinked once, then said, "Kilgore. Go upstairs and shave. You look atrocious. I can't send out Christmas cards pictures when you look like this."

The room echoes with laughter as König slowly pulls himself to his feet and trudges up the creaking stairs, off to shave the unruly mess off his face.

Regular Fanfics

[harstyle]

pretty

Summary: Your good friend Harry Styles might just be the hottest, most gentleman-liest guy you‘ve ever laid eyes on, so it really is a shame that you‘re not his type. featuring lotsss of pining, insecurities on both sides and a hefty crying sesh (it‘s all a bit pathetic and cheesy really😭)

Pairing: uni-student!y/n + uni-student!harry

Word Count: 6.2k

—

“You’re beautiful, y’know that?”

He was impossibly close, nose mere inches away from hers, and held this expression that could easily make her cry if only she looked at it long enough. Y/N couldn’t handle the pressure of the moment, his intense eyes on hers. It was something out of a romance movie.

And she was left so speechless that all she could say to him was: “uh, t-thanks. Thanks. You too.” It wasn‘t like she disagreed with him, but the sheer intensity, the closeness with which he delivered his compliment made her weak at the knees.

He smiled at her like he’d known she would cower away and brushed some stray hairs away from her eyes. “James doesn’t deserve you. You know that, right?”

In full transparency, Y/N had forgotten all about James. She’d forgotten the reason for her tears the moment Harry had shown up at her flat to give her that long hug she’d been needing.

The only reason James had stumbled into her life at all was Harry anyway. Call it a distraction, a means to numb the jealousy she felt whenever she saw Harry out with another girl.

“I get it, though. I should’ve known he’d be that way, people warned me before going out with him. That he only takes out cheerleaders. Should’ve known he did it for a laugh.”

Harry was similar to James in that regard— he had a type and everyone knew it. Y/N didn’t fall under his category of ‘girls to date’. She often wondered why she always went for guys who would never even look in her direction— a bit of self hatred, maybe. A will to punish herself.

“Hey, stop that. You’re beautiful. Don’t find excuses for his behavior.”

“I’m not, I just… I should’ve seen it coming, is all.”

“No, what we’re not going to do is blame ourselves for other people’s mistakes. James fucked up. He did. And that’s it. You move on, you come back stronger and show him he didn’t leave even a tiny scratch.”

“You’re right. Of course.”

He smiled, “do you feel better?”

“A bit,” Y/N nodded with a sturdy exhale, “thanks for being there for me always. I really appreciate it.”

“What are best friend for, ey?”

It never felt less unnerving to hear those words coming out of his mouth. And really, she knew that realistically they were nothing more, but sometimes, especially late at night when no one was around and all of her uni stress had been shoved into a closet for the day, Y/N let herself believe it was real. That he liked her back. She needed to get a grip and open her eyes to the cold harsh truth; that a friend was all she would ever be in his eyes.

She swallowed a lump in her throat and averted her eyes towards her interlinked fingers. “Yeah.”

“You okay?”

Y/N had long mastered the art of feigning a smile, so it came easily for her to flash her teeth at Harry in this moment.

“Course. Let’s make some dinner, I’m hungry.”

—

“Hey, it’s Y/N right?”

Y/N had seen this girl around before. She remembered because every time she would pass by on campus, Y/N had to admire her beauty; how her makeup always seemed effortless and her clothes complimented her perfect figure in just the right way, how her hair was always in a wave that Y/N could never perfectly recreate and her walk never droopy or tired, perfected by an angelic touch.

Y/N didn’t know this girl, but she’d always wanted to be like her.

“Yeah, hi.” Despite the inherent intimidation, Y/N smiled at her, “can I help you?”

Y/N felt ugly standing in front of her. She’d had to rush out of bed this morning for her analysis class, forgotten mascara and her staple lip balm. She looked monstrously unwell.

“My name’s Iris, I was wondering… god, this is a bit embarrassing, but you’re good friends with Harry, right?”

Y/N saw where this was going off of the jump. It happened way too often for her not to.

And her heart broke just a little more then, because so far, it’d been random girls she’d known stood no chance with Harry. But Iris was just perfectly crafted for him, cookie cutter pretty and impressively confident. She had everything Y/N was still hastily working on.

“Uh, yeah.”

“I was wondering if you could give him my number? I saw him at the party last night and we chatted for a bit, but I forgot to write it down for him.”

Y/N had been at that party too, she just hadn’t seen that. Harry had barely even left her side. Must’ve been when she‘d gone to the bathroom.

“Oh, sure.”

“Great! Thank you so much.”

Iris handed her a little post it with her digits written along with a lovely note about having had a fun time.

Y/N walked to her 8am analysis class with a crucial feeling of hatred for the world and everything in it bubbling in her chest.

—

“Hi, babe.” Harry pressed a kiss to Y/N’s cheek like it was normal before finding his reserved seat next to her, surprising both her and their friends. If Kacy was all too shocked, though, she didn‘t show it, simply widening her grin in response to Harry‘s presence. “Hi, guys.”

“You finally showed up!” Kacy exclaimed, drawing the attention on him with her loud voice. Harry was so busy that he could be hard to track down, which made him an easy target for the occasional jab. In all fairness, he’d seen Y/N almost every day, just not his other friends— and in full honesty, that had been enough for him.

“Yeah, sorry, finals week.”

“Y/N found the time,” Sebastian chimed in, tone laced with a tinge of earnestness, although Y/N and Harry could tell he was only teasing.

Harry retorted fairly quickly, “cause she has no other social life.”

At Harry’s words Y/N turned her head at him, mouth dropping open in genuine offense. She couldn’t do anything other than laugh, but really she should’ve hit him for saying that. “So you’re a whore and a backstabber!”

Harry cackled, that beautiful laugh escaping his mouth and blessing her ears, pulling her into his side and hugging around her frame. “I’m only joking!”

“Whatever. I’m not speaking to you the rest of the night.”

“Sure. You try that and we’ll see how that works out for you, babe.”

Everyone but them saw what their future could look like if they both stopped being stubborn and admitted their feelings for one another. Even sitting here, Kacy could see the way Y/N’s lips molded into a smile at Harry’s touch and the way he beamed whenever she played into his antics. Their bond was effortless in the way many couples wished theirs to be— it looked so easy for them to mesh together. Their friends knew they could be happy together and it frustrated them to see no progress being done.

By the end of the night, Y/N and Harry were blubbering drunk messes leaving the bar together. Y/N had taken it upon herself to call the uber back to his for the night.

“God, that was sooo fun,” Harry slurred out, “shame they’re closing soon.”

“You should come more often, we do this every week!”

Both Y/N and Harry were all smiles, looking at each other with excitement radiating from their bodies. It’d been long since they’d really let go.

“I’m so happy you’re here with me, you know that?”

Her heart rate plummeted.

Sometimes Harry said things drunk that wouldn’t pass as ‘normal’ when sober. He was close, grinning at her like a puppy in love and spoke with such confidence that Y/N was sure he couldn’t have not meant it.

“I’m happy you’re here, too, H.”

“No, like seriously though. You’re the best person I know.”

Heat rushed to Y/N’s cheeks. He was really testing her waters here.

“Oi, shut it. What do you want from me? Why’re you buttering me up?”

Harry shrugged, “nothin’. You really are. Just accept the compliment.”

“Fine,” Y/N smiled in a bashful manner, “thank you.”

“You’re very welcome.”

Y/N stared at her boots, grinning to herself. Comfortable silence went on for a few short minutes, just the sound of the wind wafting by and quiet, calm breathing. Occasionally a car they looked up to to check it wasn’t their ride.

It was such a nice atmosphere.

Y/N was sure nothing could ruin this night for her. She was so happy, so careless in the way uni had long prohibited her from being. She wanted to exist in her little snug bubble forever, a place to hide from the real world with the person she admired most. She‘d sacrifice anything if she could keep this feeling for a bit longer.

And then, as if the universe disagreed with Y/N‘s pursuit of happiness, a needle set out to burst her bubble.

That needle was Harry, and outside of the bubble, it was cold.

“Can I kiss you?”

The ground beneath her shattered at his words.

Was he… serious?

Because this was her dream. If he‘d been serious, then her dreams had come true in exactly the worst way.

Y/N had wanted a kiss from Harry since they’d become friends all those years ago, but not like this. Not drunk. Not on some stupid impulse. Not when they would wake up and realize it had been a mistake in a few hours. If she’d been willing to risk their relationship because of one shortlived kiss, she would’ve done it a long time ago.

He couldn’t do this to her! He couldn’t do this because to her, this wasn’t just fun. It wasn’t a cute little memory to look back on. Oh remember when we got drunk and kissed? Wasn’t that so funny? No, to her this was more. It was her whole livelihood, the cruxes which her heart depended on. It sounded so ridiculous, but that was what love had done with her.

So although it hurt more than anything she’d ever had to do, Y/N shook her head. Her head barely moved, like her brain was plotting against it as well as her heart, but it did shake just enough to give him an inkling.

“Don’t think that’s a good idea.”

He was quiet for a few seconds (although she could feel his eyes burning a hole into her) before eventually retorting with a weakened, “why not?”.

“You’re drunk.”

“Been wanting to for a long time, Y/N.”

“Harry,” she stressed, voice quivering. Her next words came out in a whisper, “shut up.”

This time, he surrendered.

They waited for their uber in complete silence and when it came for them to sleep, Harry chose to stay on the couch instead of sharing the bed with her. Although Y/N was excruciatingly tired, she couldn’t for the life of her close her eyes.

She’d fucked up so badly.

—

Y/N felt slightly out of place as she slid into Harry’s kitchen in the morning. She looked at him already sat at the breakfast table with an array of pastries waiting.

“Hey.”

Harry nodded, “hi, help yourself. Went to the bakery on my run.”

“Thanks,” she murmured quietly, almost to herself. She was too scared to look at him.

“I don’t want it to be awkward between us, so I’ll just cut to the chase: I’m sorry about last night. I know I was drunk and weird and it won’t happen again. You were right.”

Y/N’s eyebrows shot up just slightly, the sheer surprise evident on her features. He was really bringing it up now!

“… right about…?”

“Bout it not being a good idea. I’ve never… I was really out of it, you know? Wouldn’t have asked you otherwise.”

Wow. Yes, obviously it would’ve been a mistake, Y/N knew that more than anyone. But his apology did more damage than good. It was like a knife was being pushed through her chest, agonizingly slow as to make it more painful. Harry had confirmed exactly how uninterested he was in trying anything more with her and it just about devastated her. And yes, in all fairness, it was unjust because she’d been the one to reject him last night but a tiny sliver of hope that he would reach out his arms and say ‘I still feel the same, I still want to kiss you!’ had still possessed her delusional mind all night.

“Oh, that. Yeah.”

Harry tried to catch her eyes, “so are we cool?”

“We’re cool.”

Y/N was barely floating now. She didn’t want to eat, didn’t want to be here, didn’t want to exist.

It hurt too much to exist sometimes.

“Y/N?”

She snapped out of it. “Hm? yeah?”

“You okay?”

“Yes, I’m fine. You just reminded me of this girl I met yesterday, Iris,“ her shaking hand slid into her pocket to find the little note she‘d kept stored and handed it to him without making eye contact. Her body was on fire.

“Oh.”

“She wanted me to give you her number, said something about a party where you lot met.”

Y/N watched as realization dawned on him, probably a fleeting memory of Iris now soberly imprinted on his mind. She could imagine all the ways in which he thought about somebody like Iris, somebody who would be so perfect for him.

“Right. Thank you.”

“No problem. I should probably head out to mine and get a few uni things done before I get too lazy.”

Unprompted, Harry ignored her statement. She had a feeling he didn’t even want to hear her. “I didn’t want to text her. Completely forgot about her, actually.”

Y/N couldn’t find the answer as to why.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, I didn’t… I don’t really like her like that.”

“Really? Iris was under the impression that… I mean, maybe she’s mistaken, but she told me about your little hangout sesh and it seemed nice, you know?” Harry’s eyes held something a little different— confusion, curiosity and a bit of sadness. It drove Y/N crazy deciphering him. “And Iris seems exactly like the type of girl you’d like.”

Then his eyebrows drew together, “what’s that supposed to mean?”

Y/N shrugged, body sinking and slowly becoming one with the chair, “just… pretty, is all.”

“A lot of girls are pretty, Y/N, doesn’t mean I automatically wanna date them when I talk to them once.”

“Yeah, but… Iris is your kind of pretty. She’s confident and I’m sure she’s funny.”

“My kind of pretty? What are you implying?”

“Nothing! Jesus, Harry, I just think Iris would be a good fit for you. She’s your type, is all.”

Harry scoffed like he took offense to Y/N’s reply, “and I’m sure you know exactly what my type is, huh? Cause I’m so surface level that I’m only into the same girl, yeah? What, blonde and tall?”

“Harry, that’s not—“

“Then what do you mean to say by that?”

“I just—“

“You’re boxing me together with that dickhead James!”

“No, Harry, I’m not— and if you would just listen to me, you’d understand that!” Y/N finally broke, raising her voice by a few notches so Harry would hear her over his loud accusations. “I’m not implying to you, by thinking you might be into her, that you’re surface level. I’m just saying, Iris seems like she would be your type because in the past, you’ve gone for girls like her. That isn’t bad, okay? I’m not criticizing, just pointing out. You’re into pretty girls.”

“Prettiness is subjective, Y/N, and what you’re doing right now is putting me in a box. What does that even mean, pretty girls? Clearly you’re implying I only date girls that are conventionally attractive because that’s my definition of pretty.”

“So what if it is? I didn’t say it’s anything bad,” Y/N leaned back in the chair, volume lowering as if she couldn’t argue with that statement. “Everybody’s allowed a type.”

“It’s just… you’re using the word type in a derogatory way.”

“How the fuck am I using the word type in a derogatory way?”

“Sounds like you’re saying I’m some dickhead who only goes off of looks. Only goes for tall blonde girls cause they’re tall blonde girls and not because they’re nice people.”

“When did I say that?!” Y/N was bewildered by this. She hadn’t meant anything bad by it! “I have a type too, you know that! And that’s okay!”

“Oh yeah fucking tell me about your type, Y/N, go on.”

“What is your problem?”

“My problem is that you were just crying about James only dating cheerleaders a week ago and now you’re here putting the same thing on me!” Y/N breathed out in distress, finding less ways of deescalating the situation. “Be honest, then, what do you really think of me?”

“What are you even… I love you, H, I’m your best friend, I would never dream of insulting you. I was just saying that you seem to have a type, which there is nothing with!”

“So then what does pretty mean?”

“Just… pretty, okay? Don’t read too much into it.”

“No, I want to hear it. Describe pretty to me.” The word pretty had been spoken out so many times in such vain, that its meaning had became trivial at best.

“I don’t know, H, Girls like Jess, Angelina, Diana, Elle… which, if you were to write out their characteristics; they’re all blonde, tall, skinny girls. I’m not saying that you go off of looks, but I do think you have preferences, and that’s fine. That’s healthy, even.”

Then he scoffed again, but significantly quieter this time around. “Right, you brought the fucking receipts to the table, didn’t you? Do you usually think so lowly of me everywhere you go?”

It hurt to have this distance between her and Harry. They’d always gotten along so well before, so why did this have to become what it had? It had all come out of nowhere and Y/N didn’t have the strength or the energy to lose the one thing she constantly depended on to be okay.

“I don’t… Harry, I don’t think lowly of you. I just thought that you might like Iris.”

“I’m sure you did then.”

“Harry,” she sighed, “please, I didn’t want you to get the wrong idea.”

“I didn’t, got it perfectly clear. So one question though, am I allowed to like brunettes? Or is that too daring?”

“Harry, stop. Why are you being such a dickhead?”

“I’m being a dickhead?”

“Yes, you are.”

“At least I have history with girls for you to come to that conclusion yourself, right? Maybe when you find the courage to actually talk to a guy I’ll be able to find out what your kind of pretty is.”

And it wasn’t meant to be a jab, surely, at least not a terribly painful one, but it hit Y/N stronger than she would have liked. Who was he, making fun of her dating life? This wasn’t the Harry who reassured her after every pathetic bad date, who convinced her that it would be okay if she didn’t find her man straight away as long as she was happy. She’d loved Harry for a year now and there was something so liberating in exploring unknown territory, in partaking in the so called ‘chase’ (maybe somewhat masochistic, liking the torment of the unknown) but that feeling came to a full stop now that it had become clear that Harry didn’t love her back. Before, it had been speculation— now, it was real. And although she’d expected pain, this was cold blooded torture.

Harry didn’t look regretful, but that was because he had no idea what his words actually meant for her. Sometimes she wondered how the people she loved most could hurt her so much as to kick her down to the ground and repeatedly stomp on her lifeless body.

Without a word, Y/N stiffened her shoulders in an attempt to seem stronger and stood up from the table with a low intake of breath.

“Y/N.”

“Fuck you, Harry,” she muttered quietly but defiantly as she slipped on her shoes and opened the door out.

She didn’t have anywhere to go, but she knew anywhere else would suffice better than here.

—

Y/N wasn’t even surprised when she saw Harry and Iris arriving at the party together with the biggest smiles on their faces. Kacy turned to her and widened her eyes, motioning to the couple by the door with a questioning stare. Y/N simply shrugged.

She’d been hurting by herself, cramped away in her flat with a bottle of wine and three boxes of tissues and hoping for a little break when Kacy had asked her out tonight— but here he was, ready to ruin her minute of relief.

“She gave him her number through me last week… guess he finally called her.” Y/N explained, lowering her voice. “We haven’t talked since that morning after the bar.”

Kacy’s eyes widened again, because the last time Y/N had spent so much time away from Harry had been Christmas— and even then, they’d called each other every day.

“Why?”

Y/N simply shook her head, unwilling to elaborate. All Kacy could do was pull her into a tight hug and ask her what she wanted to do next.

“I just…” Y/N’s breaths shook, “I’m so tired, Kace.”

And although Y/N had never brought up the topic of Harry, Kacy knew exactly what she was referring to and her heart broke for her friend.

“Let’s go to one of the bedrooms.”

Y/N gave a stuffy nod and followed as Kacy lead the way upstairs.

Once they sat down, Y/N began to open her mouth. Her arms hugged around her own frame and tears were building in her eyes.

“Talk to me, Y/N. What happened?”

“He… I don’t know, Kace, he just got so mad at me. I was giving him Iris’ number and he said that he didn’t like her. I told him he should probably call her because I think she’d be good for him— I think I said ‘she’s your type’ or something like that, which is a normal thing to say! And then he went ballistic on me.” Y/N sniffed her nose, “I was just trying to be nice. He started accusing me of finding him surface level even though I implied no such thing.“

“Oh, honey,” it was through Kacy’s pitiful expression that Y/N noticed the ugly tears cascading down her swollen cheeks. “I don’t wanna make you feel worse, babe, but that doesn’t sound like Harry. Maybe you worded something wrong? Or he just heard you wrong?”

“No, I tried multiple times to clear it up, but he kept the attitude.”

“What did he say?”

“Well, I said that he likes pretty girls and he said what do you mean pretty girls? and so I described what I thought his type was, which is tall blondes, you know? And I even said that having preferences is healthy and that I don’t mind but he thought I was boxing him in. But don’t you agree? Isn’t that his type?” Kacy took too long to answer, making Y/N grow insecure, “Come on, he only dates tall blondes!”

“That’s not even true, Y/N. What about Vanessa?”

She rolled her eyes, “fine, one tall redhead.”

“It’s not that, it’s just… I think he was offended because he thought you were calling him some kind of jerk who only goes off of looks.”

“But he’s… he’s great, Kace, really, and I love him, but he does always date attractive supermodel type girls. I mean, good for him, but you know? And I don’t at all think I’m ugly, I think I’m pretty, but not his kind of pretty.”

“Okay, but… okay, what were you talking about before the whole Iris thing?”

“It’s a long story,” Y/N groaned, head falling into her hands, “when we were drunk he asked me if he could kiss me. I said no.”

“What?! Why would you say no?”

“Because we were drunk! And then the next morning he said I was right, that it would’ve been a mistake and we would’ve regretted it.”

Kacy’s mouth was kind of wide open, “and then you brought up Iris?”

“Yes, because I needed a change of topic.”

“But right after that he said he didn’t like Iris.”

“Yes.”

“And then you accused him of being surface level and he got mad?”

“Kacy, I literally didn’t! I—“ Y/N stopped defending herself because she knew she couldn’t cheat her way out of it. “Yes, maybe, okay? So what?”

“So he totally loves you.”

At that point Y/N started laughing— a genuine laugh made its way out of her mouth and she started shaking her head. Her laugh simmered down to a little chuckle and then she got tears in her eyes again. It was taxing to have feelings sometimes.

“Right, sure. Hope you stretched before you took that fucking reach! He said right before that he’d never have asked if he was sober.”

“He was saving face because you refused to kiss him.”

“Kacy, no,” she sighed, “don’t feed me that bullshit. You’re going to give me hope and I can’t take any more of that, okay?”

“He got mad you think he only likes blondes because he loves you and you don’t even see it,” Kacy elaborated even further, which bothered Y/N on so many levels.

“I can’t, Kace,” Y/N cried, covering her eyes with her palms and letting the tears flow out, “I’m so fucking tired of feeling unwanted and like I’m not enough. Like whatever I do, there’s still some other girl who gets his attention. I can’t go on loving him and being his second girl every day. He goes on bad sex dates and comes home to me, goes to parties where he does body shots off of other girls, and then cuddles me in bed. I just can’t do it. One day he’ll get married and expect me to be his best man and that’s way more than I can take.”

“Look, I understand, but all you need to do is talk to him.”

“I can’t!”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to lose him.”

“Isn’t it better to lose him now than to feel like this every day and lose him in a few years when you’ve physically broken yourself down over it? Isn’t it better to know? I know you won’t lose him because I see the way he looks at you and I see how he treats you. And he’d be stupid not to like you back. But if I‘m wrong, wouldn‘t it still be better to know?“

“No. I can do without knowing. If he knows and he doesn’t feel the same it’ll be weird and I can’t lose him. I can’t, Kace, he’s the only thing holding me together. Look at me, I’m such a fucking mess.”

“Y/N, eyes up,” Kacy ordered, taking ahold of Y/N’s forearm and forcing her to look at her, “you’re allowed little moments of weakness. Love does crazy things sometimes. You need to tell him or you’ll regret it the rest of your life.”

Y/N’s eyes stung hard.

The door opened in that moment, forcing the sound of the music into the otherwise quiet room with a force. Both girls looked up to find Harry by the door, his eyebrows drawn together in concern at the sight of his teary eyed best friend. It didn’t matter what they were going through, their bond was strong enough for him to know something was seriously wrong.

“Are you okay?”

It was then that Kacy took her cue to leave, to Y/N’s dismay, and stood up from the chair to let Harry take her place. She closed the door behind her to give the two of them privacy.

“Y/N, you okay?”

“Yeah,” she tried to smile, though due to the tears it was clear as day that she was perpetually telling him lies whenever he asked her that question. “I’m okay.”

“Hey, come on,” he whispered into the quiet, inching closer to trap her chin between his fingers, “tell me what’s wrong. Did some asshole hurt you?”

“Yeah,” she nodded with a small sniffle. The asshole is you. “I’m just… having boy trouble. It’s okay. You should go back to the party.”

“Fuck the party. Who hurt you? Do you want me to go beat him up? Did he touch you?” He’d started raking over her body to check for bruises, a tick in his jaw.

“No! God, no, I’ll get over it.” I couldn’t ever get over you. “Isn’t Iris waiting for you? I saw you arrive together.”

“Oh,” his features hardened for a split second. Y/N blinked and it was gone. “No, we ran into each other outside and talked for a bit. She asked me out, so… I think I’m going to go.”

It was like he was testing her, staring into her eyes to capture the exact moment she crumbled. But she didn’t. She held her head high and gave a subtle nod. “Sounds good.”

He sighed. It was quiet and could almost be classified as a simple exhale, but she knew it wasn’t.

“So who’s the guy?”

Sometimes he could be so oblivious that Y/N wondered how he’d made it so far in life. Surely he was only playing the part, right?

“Doesn’t matter,” Y/N shrugged. She was starting to cry again. “He’s insignificant.” You could never be insignificant to me.

“Should I talk to him?”

Yeah, that would be good. “No, no, it’s fine. I’ll just… get over him.”

“Well I don’t like seeing you hurt, baby,” he tilted his head, cupping over her jaw and brushing over her skin delicately. The room was dimly lit to make it all the more romantic, but Y/N couldn’t fully be immersed in it. “No guy is worth your tears. You’re beautiful and brave and so so funny. I’m so lucky to have you in my life, Y/N. You’re the most perfect girl there ever was and if he can’t see that, then he doesn’t deserve you.”

He couldn’t do this to her. He couldn’t speak of her the way she always wished he would speak of her, but not mean it. It showed her what he was capable of— loving her, paying her attention the right way. She was left shattered.

“See, you say that, but you…” Y/N broke down in tears, “but nobody ever means it.”

He tilted her head up so he could stare deeply into her eyes and utter his next words in full honesty, “I mean it. I promise you, Y/N, I mean what I said with everything I have in my body. I mean it every time I say it when I’m drunk and I mean it when I’m sober. I mean it when you’ve just woken up and I mean it when we’re studying together at night. I mean it and I will always mean it.”

Instead of making her happy, his words made her cry even more.

“Harry,” she cried, bending her neck forward so the top of her head rested on his chin, “it hurts so much.”

“Come on, baby, it’s not worth it.” Then he started kissing the crown of her head, moving down to her temple and rubbing circles into her shoulders. “It’s not worth it.”

But he was worth it. He clouded her vision and made her feel lightheaded. He had the power to make her cry and the power to make her so unbelievably happy that she couldn’t imagine having ever been unhappy. He made her wonder how she could’ve lived such a mediocre, painful life before he’d entered it— that was the kind of power he possessed.

Y/N didn’t have to think twice about kissing him, she just did. She looked up at Harry and inched closer to rest her lips on his, and it caused emotions in her body she didn’t even know were possible. Harry seemed surprised but he caught on fairly quickly, letting her take the lead in the kiss until it’d been a few seconds and he felt her deepening it.

He pulled away, eyes finally opening.

She was startled. “Sorry, did I hurt you?”

He shook his head gently, letting a reassuring smile sit on his lips, “no, but I’m worried about you. I don’t think it’s a good idea to do this when you’re crying over another guy, you know? I don’t want to be your numbing medication.”

“You’re… not,” her eyebrows drew together.

“You didn’t want to kiss me last week. It’s seeming like an ‘I miss another guy so I’ll hook up with you to numb the pain’ situation and I just… I don’t want either of us to regret it.”

He was trying to be nice— and he was, really was, but the sinking feeling in Y/N’s stomach worsened.

“That’s because we were drunk last week.”

“You’re hurting over another person, Y/N.”

“He’s not important, I just want to kiss you. I want to mess around with you. Okay? Because I want to, not because I’m into some other dickhead.”

Harry seemed to have trouble believing her, “I can’t.”

“Okay, whatever. It’s fine.” Y/N stood up from her chair, creating some distance between her and Harry and started walking away from him. He held onto her hand though, preventing her from moving too far.

“Y/N, come on.”

“No, genuinely, I don’t want to coerce you into having sex with me, I don’t know what I was thinking.”

She was being honest. She didn’t want Harry to feel like she was using him under false pretenses.

But having him think that was still better than confessing.

“I didn’t think you were coercing me into doing anything, Y/N, I just don’t want you to regret it.”

“Yeah,” tears built in her eyes again and she bit her lip to hold them in, “you’re a really good guy, Harry.”

When he stood up to offer her comfort, she immediately took a step back and held her hand in front of her in an effort to force him away. “Please don’t.”

“Y/N…” He looked pained and thoroughly confused at her cold behavior. Harry knew she tended to close off whenever she felt bad about herself, but that had applied mostly to other people. Harry, on the other hand, had always been successful in finding a way to pull back her in.

“No, I’m embarrassed. Jesus, I’m such a mess! I was talking about this with Kacy, I‘m just… I‘m all over the place.”

“You’re not a mess. You’re hurting, that’s normal.”

“I just asked you to fuck me, that’s… who the fuck does that? Since when am I like this?”

“Since you’ve been hurt,” he countered, “love makes you do weird things. God knows I get a bit crazy too when I’m in love.”

“No you don’t,” she said to him, voice hoarse and uncomfortable, “you’re fucking Mr. Perfect. Everyone loves you and you’re hot and you’ve got the brilliant mind. You can’t do anything wrong.”

“Everyone doesn’t love me,” he replied with a leveled tone, “if everyone loved me, I’d be with the girl of my dreams right now. But I’m not, so… not everyone.”

“Can’t fucking imagine that,” Y/N muttered, wiping under her eyes. “You probably just communicate badly and she doesn’t know you love her.”

“Same with you.”

Y/N’s heart squeezed painfully in her chest.

“He’s way out of my league.”

“Who is this guy anyway? You’re gonna hype him up to me and not even let me know who it is?”

“He’s, uh…” Y/N walked further away from him and sat down at the edge of the bed, covering her face with her hands, “he’s from uni. Tall, dark brown hair, green eyes, sometimes glasses. He’s really nice but dates girls who are the complete opposite of me. And I just… whenever I look in the mirror, I’m reminded of just how… unattractive I am compared to them— and don’t get me wrong, I’m fine with me but they’re just better. I can’t keep up with it. And god, I feel so pathetic talking about myself like this but he’s just… he‘s so perfect and I love him and I don’t want to lose him. He makes me doubt myself sometimes, you know?“

At the latest he must’ve known now. Y/N could hear his brain professing that information, double and triple checking all possibilities until it dawned on him that she was talking about him.

He cleared his throat, stepping closer. “So he’s… where do you know him from again?”

A short pause before committing to the method, “we met at the fresher’s party three years ago.”

“And you see each other a lot, I assume.”

Y/N was still not looking at him, head buried in her hands.

“We… yeah. We hang out every day. He’s mad at me right now though.”

“So you… you love me.”

She didn’t answer, but she didn’t need to. She’d given up, left it all to fate; if he would turn her away and never talk to her again or ask to continue being friends. It all became obsolete.

“I’m sorry,” she muffled into the palms of her hands.

“D’you wanna hear about the girl I’m in love with? Have been in love with for a year now?” Y/N wanted to shake her head, but she didn’t, so he continued. “She’s from uni too, spends about three nights a week at my flat even though hers is bigger. She can be really distant, but when she gives you attention it’s like the whole world healed. She’s so sweet and considerate and brings me little gifts sometimes and even though she’s damn near perfect, she gets really insecure about things, especially when it comes to her looks and stupid dicks.” Y/N had started looking up at his words, spotting Harry closer to her but not sharing any of her own emotions. He was taking the piss, wasn‘t he? “Locks herself away in her room until she feels ready to leave the flat. She’s selfless, gives me other girls’ numbers even though she’s in love with me— even makes me go on dates even though I’m sure it hurts her feelings whenever I do.”

“You love me?” she sniffled, “I’m not joking about this.”

“I love you, Y/N. I do. S’why I got so mad last week, wanted you to realize that I’m more than some shallow asshole. Didn’t know you felt the same, though.”

“How could you not? I literally get so weird around you these days.”

“Thought it was just stress or something,” he cupped her cheek, thumbing away some tears, “I’m sorry you cried about me, should’ve just said it like a normal person. Just didn’t want to ruin us.”

“Me neither.”

“I’m going to kiss you, okay?”

This kiss was a thousand times better than the last one. Y/N felt giddy as his lips ghosted over hers, as he pulled her up from her seat and sat back down to have her climb over his lap. She breathed into his mouth, ground against his crotch like she was a horny 16 year old girl being touched for the first time. There was no heavy feeling weighing down on her chest, she could just be free of concerns.

After a few minutes of making out, Y/N laughed. She damn near cackled into his mouth and when he questioned her with a confused stare and a cute laugh of his own, she shook her head.

“Remind me to thank Kacy later.”

—

disclaimer: this is NOT meant to offend anyone based on their looks— it‘s just a depiction of a girl feeling insecure because she thinks the guy she loves doesn’t see her the way she wants him to. The description i used of his ‘type’ and the inevitable perception of what Y/N looks like in this story was completely random and is completely up to you. I hope it doesn’t come across as anything other than that!

[flashbangstars]

Doctors Appointment - L.J.N

This is a Prequel to Never a Martyr , they aren't really connected plot wise but the same au, if you are feeling funky and fun you can go and read that one as well!!!

Pairing: Jeno x Fem reader MDNI 18+ 2.6k +

Genre: Smut, like a whisper of plot building

Warnings: Oral f! receiving, Unprotected sex, a tiny bit of manhandling..? Jeno is a quiet freak

Summary: After being hired as the new doctor, one of the patients in your case file draws your attention. You try to ignore him staring at you through his window as you walk down the hallways until curiosity gets the best of you, and quite possibly might be one of your better decisions and the start of a very bad patient-doctor relationship.

Authors Note: hello friends : ) I started writing this because I wanted a bit more to the story from before, but I really liked the idea of this story starting before the first one. So I hope you guys enjoy, this isn't super proofread so bear with me lol - xoxo flashbangstars

☆★ ☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

It was day 173 when he heard the rhythmic tap of heels on the concrete floor, a hot contrast from the normal harsh slam of military boots on the cold floor. Going to his window he peered out and watched as a long white lab coat fluttered as you walked away, and a black pair of stilettos carried you swiftly throughout the hallway. Your hair bounced with each step, uniform dark curls contrasting against the pristine white of the coat. 

It was day 184 when you were back again, this time the heels were swapped for a red pair of stilettos. He caught you before you had passed, His movements stuttered back from the window when he saw your face, dark eyes framed with thick-framed glasses. Your eyes bounce around the hallways observing the row of doors and locks as you quickly try to make it to the end of the hallway. Your hair was down again in the same curls. 

Days 185-203 he began to paint the image of you into the inside of his brain. The hair, the way you bit your lips, and the way you would wear blouses that you thought weren’t see-through. The way where if he was discrete enough he could make out the outline of the bra you were wearing underneath the satin. The time when you grabbed something from your pocket and dropped a pen on the floor pulling it out, when you bent over the slit in the back of your skirt showed off the back of your legs, dangerously close to where it would be indecent. All of this was on repeat in his head.

It felt like a sunny day when you stopped directly in front of his room and stared in through the glass, he stepped back and tried to still himself as he was caught in your gaze. Hearing the door knob move, his eyes snapped to the lock and watched as It turned to pop open, disengaging the lock. Taking another step back he could tell he was almost flat against the concrete wall.

And then you walked in.

Today you were wearing a white blouse tucked into a grey pencil skirt, your hair down, and that same pair of glasses laid on the bridge of your nose. He was unable to think, his eyes scanned you all over at an alarming rate, taking in everything he could while there was no barrier between you two.

“Hi, I am Doctor Y/L/N, I am part of your healthcare team” you spoke, your voice constricting around everything in his body.  

You had been hired under the main doctors of the project, you weren’t technically an outsider, but with the little amount of what they had told you. It felt as if you were being kept with a veil over your eyes. Walking in the first day to rows of rooms filled with people, all in uniform order, and all looking as if they were inherently scared to not be in uniform order.

You had been assigned as a caregiver to 0423 in your third week there. You had known who 0423 was, he had a habit of staring at you each time you walked through the exhibit hallway. You would always feel his cold gaze as you passed. Being face to face with him felt like being in a cage with a scared animal, but you couldn’t quite tell who was what. 

You moved closer to 0423 and watched as his eyes widened again, You pulled your stethoscope from around your neck and gestured for him to come closer, resigning to let him choose when he wanted to allow you in. 

You pressed the cold stethoscope to his chest and avoided eye contact, as soon as his heartbeat filled your ears, your brows shot up, eyes snapping to meet his that had already been watching you. 

“Why Is your heart beating fast” your voice came out a bit more concerned than you had meant for it to be, but you couldn’t take it back now. 

“Because you are here” he answered, breathing out his words as if he had been holding his breath.

You felt your face heat and averted your gaze away again, pretending you were occupying yourself with moving the stethoscope around his chest. 

“I saw you the first time you came down this hallway” his heartbeat quickened as he started his sentence “Your shoes look very uncomfortable” he uttered. 

You couldn’t help the laugh that came out of you, dropping the stethoscope back around your neck and smiling. Your laugh was half agreeing with his sentiment, and the other half being amused that this tall six-foot-something super intimidating person just shared his opinions on your high heels. 

“Well, beauty is pain-“your sentence dropped off reminding you that you only knew him by a number, your eyes looked up in question.

“Jeno- My name is Jeno,” he said in response, his tone turning lighter than before. 

Out stretching your hand you smiled. 

“Well it is nice to meet you Jeno” he grasped your hand and shook it firmly, not breaking eye contact, the corner of his lips curling into a small smile. 

You knew this technically was not allowed between you two, but something about him negated the cold reviews from your supervisors. Labeling him as “dangerous” and “a risk” didn’t make sense to you. 

You had left his room that day confused as to what to think. As you walked further from the room, you became conscious of the eyes on you, specifically Jeno’s.

The next day, you were assigned to the night shift of patient checkups. Surprisingly Jeno was never on the list. He was always in top health and you were sure that was because of higher-ups wanting him to be in top health. 

As you made your way through the list, your eyes would linger on Jeno’s door each time you passed. The first time you passed he was sitting on his bed reading, and the second time an hour later he was out of view. Part of you was glad he hadn’t noticed you, but also felt partially disappointed. You knew that creating this bond with him wasn’t smart. But each time you were brought back to those dark eyes, it was hard to ignore the want for more. 

You had finished your last room and locked the room behind you, as soon as you heard the lock click your head slowly turned in the opposite direction of the hallway. Checking your watch the time read 3:54 am. 

Without thinking you let your feet carry you to right in front of the door you had been carefully observing all night. Inserting the key in into the lock and turning it, your hearting pounding against your chest, your hands shaking. 

Opening the door, you slowly looked up and were met with those same dark eyes staring back at you. He was standing back pressed against the wall with his shirt unbuttoned and nothing underneath, signs he had been attempting to sleep but still was wide awake. 

You breathed out heavily not knowing how to break the silence or staring contest you two were having. Squeezing your fists together you swallowed down the lump in your throat. 

“Hi,” you said in a breathy voice, being careful not to be loud to alert others.

He slowly sat up on his bed and the light from the hallway reflected off his chest, the dim lights illuminating the taut muscle that was usually behind thick navy uniforms. 

“I don’t usually have check-ups, I’m not on the list” He stated, phrasing it as a question, but you could tell he already knew the answer. His vocal pace is painstakingly slow, with each drag of consonant-vowel making your heart beat faster.

“You’re not” you confirmed, stepping closer and planting yourself at the end of his bed, leaving less than a couple of feet in between you both. 

Not breaking eye contact he began to walk towards you. 

“Why are you here” He whispered now standing directly in front of you, his breathing audible from how close he was, and his chest rising and falling in coordination. 

“ I don’t know..” You said exhaling, your shoulder tensing with how tight you were clenching your fists. You flinch when you feel his hand slide around your waist and his face angle closer to yours, his bangs now brushing against your face.

“I think you do know” his lips now grazing yours as he spoke, his nose nudging into yours. Completely invading your space and begging to be close, needing to be closer. 

“Yeah..” You breathed out, your reserve finally breaking and pushing closer to him closing the gap, slotting your lips with his, and beginning to move in sync with him. The kisses slowly grew sloppier and hungrier.  The grip on your waist was tight and he kept grabbing you harder. Beginning to move he directed you towards his bed and laid you down, blanketing himself down on top of you and resuming the kiss. Spit began collecting at the corner of your mouth as he pushed deeper exploring your mouth. Pulling away you felt his teeth graze your bottom lip and then snap down on the soft flesh. Pulling away from the kiss with your bottom lip between his teeth and letting it go, you tasted the familiar tinge of iron in your mouth, your breathing quickened. 

Jeno was straddling you at this point, both his knees framing your hips. Standing up on his knees over you he pulled the navy button up off his shoulder leaving him topless. Reaching down he made eye contact while he slowly untucked your blouse and began to unbutton it. Making sure to brush against your chest as he went. Taking the thin fabric and pushing it away to reveal your chest.

Ducking his head he took your nipple into his mouth and began to lave his tongue over the bundle of nerves, his other fingers occupied with pinching and rolling the other. Whiny breathy gasps kept leaving your mouth and you kept trying to arch off the mattress in response, but each time was met with a large hand pinning you back down. 

“You are so fucking pretty, You aren’t even supposed to be here. Why did you come here?” he kept questioning as he nipped along your chest, feeling his teeth against your collarbone before sucking on the skin.  His voice sounded drunk, and his actions growing more wild. 

Bucking up your hips, grabbing the pencil skirt he yanked it down your legs leaving you only in your underwear and tights contrasting the stark white lab coat beneath you. As if he was frustrated with there being another layer he grabbed your tights and ripped them down the middle, leaving a giant hole, the thread snapping and fabric ripping filling the silence beside both of you breathing heavily. His breath hitching when he was met with the black thong you were wearing.

“I watched you every day- in the hallway- your stupid skirts and their stupid slits-why would you wear that to work” Jeno spoke lowly as he lowered his face to be eye level with your pussy a smug smile painted his features as he scolded you for your clothing choices. A sharp gasp escaped you as he bit down on the thong and released it letting it snap back against where you were already extremely sensitive. Hooking two fingers in the piece of fabric and moving it away he dove into you, licking and sucking loudly, it sounded obscene in the echos of the room. The added pleasure of his nose continuously bumping your clit as he moved back and forth fucking you open on his tongue.

Jeno Pulls away and you grab blindly for him. Knowing that if you were too loud you risked someone catching on to you being in the wrong place, doing the wrong thing, with the wrong person.

“Please please Jeno” Your tone was watery and begging for him to continue to get you to that point you were craving. You were gasping for air borderline hiccuping at how bad you were needing the sensation again. Jeno stood up again and planted his knees on the bed, nudging your legs till the backs of your thighs were resting against the front of his. 

He unbuttoned his pants and pulled them down just enough to reveal a pair of black boxer briefs and a prominent outline of his hard cock. Your eyes rolled back into your head and you unconsciously pushed yourself closer to him. Feeling his hand push back down on your stomach stilling your movements.

“Be patient” he commanded, you looked back towards him and he was slowly stroking himself. Taking his hand off your stomach he brought it to his mouth and licked from palm to fingers, not breaking eye contact as he brought that hand down to your core.

Feeling his fingers ghost press around your entrance you felt yourself clamp down around nothing, it was almost painful at this point at how bad you need him in you. Feeling his tip bump at your entrance and slowly push in you bit down on your lip feeling the sting once more from when he had bitten you earlier. 

Falling forward he placed his hands on both sides of his your head and slowly pushed himself to be fully seated in you, his hips flush the back of your legs, sparks raking through your body as you clenched and unclenched around him, unable to calm your body. 

“Please move Jesus Christ” you said reaching to grab his waist to stimulate some sort of movement. pushing your heel into his side to urge him closer.

Upon hearing your request he slowly pulled out and slammed back into you, your back arching off the bed and bringing your hand to your mouth to try and stifle the scream that ripped from your throat. His pace stayed unforgiving and deep.  His eyes stayed focused on yours and watched as you struggled to be quiet as he unraveled you quickly. Tears began to collect and get caught where your glasses rested on your face.

In a quick move, he pushed your hips up further and folded you, pushing your thighs into your chest, your hand flying to grip the sheets as a sharp gasp echoed against the walls. His hand grabbing your face to muffle your sounds.

“You have to be quiet Doctor” he grunted through his teeth, the title almost feeling demeaning as you were literally pussy to the world at the moment.

From the new angle, you felt every single thrust in your stomach, racing fast toward your climax. On a particularly aggressive thrust you came, your back arched off the bed again and your legs shook from where they were being held your body jerking coming down from the sensation. Struggling to string words together you forced your eyes to look at him, to meet his gaze already focused on yours. His eyebrows were tightly knit together. 

He thrust a couple more times, and you felt the sting of overstimulation kick in with each extra drag in and out. Finally feeling that warmth in your core he collapsed down onto you pressing you deeper into the mattress, his body sweaty from the overexertion.

You felt his breath hot against your ear and felt your head return to somewhat normal-ness wrapping your hands around his back and stroking lightly against his spine. 

“I need to get back” you whispered into his ear, tracing your lips against the shell of his ear. pushing your glasses off your face and on top of your head.

Responding to your reminder her slowly lifted himself off you and stood up, He looked around and grabbed his t-shirt from off the floor, and looked at you apologetically, before flipping it inside out and wiping it in between your legs. You laughed and knew you were so utterly fucked. 

That night he watched you walk back down the corridor, stark lab coat, and those same uniform curls now ruined and thrown into a messy clip, Heels clicking a little bit slower as you exited from view.

☆★ ☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

[tiredandoptimistic]

I cannot stop thinking about the poem that comes up if you enter "Stanley" repeatedly and then click on "how he defeated me" a bunch (written out fully with analysis under the cut). I've never been a big Bill fan, but you can bet your ass I'm obsessed with Stan Pines, and I can't believe I never fully thought through the parallels between them.

"Stanley Pines, the common clown,

Always dragged his family down.

One mistake, disowned, denied.

Only thing to do was hide.

One way out: the open road.

Reinvent, retry, reload.

A girdle, eyepatch, father's fez,

'I'm a new man!' so he says.

Couldn't outrun life's regrets,

Just kept placing bigger bets.

Changed his haircut, switched hotels-

Truth is just whatever sells.

When you've lost track of your lies,

When the poison starts to rise,

When the walls are closing in,

When it's clear you cannot win,

When your actions make it worse,

When they see you as a curse,

Give the wheel one last spin,

Take your chips and go all in,

And Lucky Stan- the roll's on black,

He got his life and family back.

His big break, it finally came,

Redemption from a life of shame.

You really think you won the day.

You packed your bags and sailed away.

You think you left the past behind.

But trust me

I'm still on your mind"

Combine this with some of the other things Bill says in the pages leading up to the poem, (calling him "Bootleg Sixer," ranting about how Stan is useless and only defeated Bill by following Ford's plan, etc), and it makes me wonder if Bill ever really believed in his own schemes.

Bill clearly values and respects Ford while deriding Stan, and yet many of the things he criticizes about Stan are also true about himself ("always dragged his family down," "one mistake," "reinvent, retry, reload," "just kept placing bigger bets," hell, "truth is just whatever sells" feels like a direct parallel to "reality is an illusion). In my mind, this implies that on some level he believes that people like him and Stan are destined for misery, but he convinced himself that he'd be satisfied with power and chaos, something that Stan gave up for his family.

Stan is someone who functions like Bill on a surface level while being fundamentally different in ways Bill can't even comprehend. To Bill, it's unfair that Stan "got his life and family back" while he is still alone in the universe, because he can't get his head around the fact that Stan is just a better person who worked to make up for his failures and earn his redemption in a way Bill never did. It wasn't just "his big break," Stan didn't win a bet or something. He spent thirty years committing himself to being the protector of his family and rescuing his brother from the exile he caused, and all that love and effort paid off in the end. He genuinely gave a fuck while remaining goofy and brash. Stan didn't need to become like Ford in order to be worthy, and so he works as an example of how people like them can thrive. It's proof that Bill's chaos isn't inherently inferior, it's Bill himself who couldn't hack it. He can respect Ford as an ally or an adversary, that logic might be able to triumph over chaos; but Bill cannot stand that Stanley was able to beat him at his own game.

[redwineandtarot]

your talents

hi! today's pac is all about your talents! as people we are so diverse so not all of your talents may be in this reading. however i hope this helps you discover yourself more! take what resonates and leave what doesn’t. i would love to hear your feedbacks <3

🥀paid readings🥀

Disclaimer: My readings do NOT replace any professional advice. Use your own judgment while making decisions. You have your own free will. Take everything I say light-heartedly. All of my readings are for ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES.

pick a pile

piles 1-2

3-4

i do not own these pictures

pile 1

You are great at giving people honest and genuine advice. You make people see parts of themselves that they may have not seen before, good or bad. 

You may be great with finances. Or have the potential to be, if you learned more about it. You could study finances or economics. Don't have to, but you may still learn a bit about this topic. I think this will benefit you. (I am not a financial advisor or professional, this is just what cards are telling me!)

Being some sort of a teacher/advisor may suit you well too. Economics professor just came through but you could also be a dance teacher, therapist etc. Just something where you help people broaden their visions. 

You are great with new beginnings. You know how to make something blossom. You are also great with endings.

What I am seeing is you can materialize any interest of yours. Like maybe you want to learn guitar or learn how to cook, you can become quite good at them(to be more specific anything you want). Also this applies to material gains. The world is your oyster, I heard your guides say. 

Some of you may be talented at fashion. Whether it is designing or just making great outfits in daily life. 

You are also great at thinking ahead and planning. 

You are probably at peace with your shadow self or you are on the way to be. 

You have an earthy vibe to you. Your self confidence and calmness makes you a great manifestor. You could also be great at meditation, yoga etc. Anything that makes you connect with the universe and yourself more. 

Messages from spirit:

You still have full autonomy regarding ‘it’. “Nothing is yet set in stone.” You have a lot of potential.

You may need to release something. What is it? Think about this if you don’t know. Because deep down you know it.

thank you for reading <3

pile 2

I see a strong emphasis on your beauty. You could be / have the potential to be a model. Regardless, you are attractive and you may use this to your advantage. I am not saying you inherently have bad intentions. You are just good at charming people and getting what you want. You also probably would do great at things that require you to be in the spotlight. 

You are great at saving money.

You are a great fighter and a diligent person. You are persistent with what you want. Even if the situation seems hopeless. You find a way to make it work. And this usually gets you where you want to be (or even better places) in life. 

You know how to balance things in life. It just comes naturally to you. You know sometimes life does not evolve the way we want. And you trust the universe even in these times. You know you can get your ideas to real life even in the darkest times. 

Your words are powerful. You could use words to manifest. You could also be a writer of some sort (book writer, lyrics writer etc.). 

You may be great with plants, flowers or you may be good at biology. 

The numbers 8 and 6 might be significant.

You are good at dealing with emotions. You are an emotionally intelligent person.

You have natural talents to share your wisdom and your talents. You could benefit from being some sort of a teacher or a performer. Someone people watch.

You have a great understanding of life. The occult and history might be suitable fields of search for you. (I’m especially getting Egyptian mythology.)    

Messages from spirit:

You might be holding onto something out of pride. For most of you this is something from the past that you cannot let go of. 

Look at your situation from a different perspective. People who you deem wrong may be right.

thank you for reading <3

pile 3

You have a natural ability to lead and gather people. Whether for a cause or a project. In your work field or in a hobby that you do, you may pave the way for some sort of thing. For example you may start a new way of doing things, or you may be the first to do something in your hometown etc. 

You may have a talent for singing and/or public speaking. This also ties in with leadership because a good leader should also be good at speaking. Even if you lead a small group of people, good communication is key in my opinion.

You are also good at ending conflicts and finding the middle ground. 

You are also great at comforting people. You can transmute people’s worries. And you are also a great friend. You friends value you a lot.

You can tackle a lot at once. For example you can do modeling, studying, working at a part-time job all at once. Or if it’s just one job you can do different elements of it. Like youtubers; they film, edit and advertise their videos on their own. As a continuation of this, I see that you are a multi-talented person. 

I see you handling fast-paced life well. And this is because after all this running around you know how to come back to yourself and sit still. Maybe you do yoga, meditation, or any type of mindful activity.

When you love something, you also have a GREAT passion for it. This makes you also stand out at what you love. You can do the hard work for what you want.

By harnessing all of these talents of yours, you can achieve great success (whatever success is to you).

You have great spiritual protection around you. From your guides.

Messages from spirit:

You may meet a soulmate(platonic or romantic) or a romantic partner of yours soon. Or you may enter a phase of your life in which you’ll meet your romantic soulmate. For most of you it's the latter. And for this, spirit wants you to hold on to your visions.

thank you for reading <3

pile 4

You have a youthful energy to you. You spread happiness to those around you. You give them energy. While you have youthful energy, I see you as a wise person. You have an immense intellect. You could have gone through some hardships but you got to the other side with great strength and important lessons. Despite this you protected your child-like spirit. Your inner-child feels safe and heard with you.

You have a great imagination. Your dream world is probably pretty big. I get neptune-ish vibes from you. I heard that you may be a poet, if not I suggest you give it a shot. If you do not like poems, you can do other things that get you to use your imagination and emotions. Because I see a great potential in you. 

Some of you may be life path 22 or 7. Even if not, your life path is important for you.

You probably have a close bond with spirit. You are a great manifester. Despite your lighthearted energy, I see that you may have an interest in the occult. 

You have a talent for dancing.

You could also do well in areas where you need to have a quick wit. I hear politics for some of you. The term “crazy like a fox” applies to you. 

Despite appearing playful, you are pretty grounded. Even some of you may not realize this. You just need to work on it a bit more maybe.

You are graceful in the things you do.

Messages from spirit:

The thing you are asking for is within your reach! However while working towards it, you need both spiritual and practical effort for it. (Spiritual effort may be visualizing it for 5 minutes every day, etc.)

thank you for reading <3

[erinwantstowrite]

opinions on ai?

This is the perfect time to share something I wrote a few months ago when I was upset about it:

AI is the bane of my existence and I hate it so much. Not only because of the environmental impact that it has, but because of how it gives us absolutely nothing of value in creative spaces and is actually a detriment to our future, rather than being "innovative" like companies want us to believe.

If you're using AI to write notes for you, or to answer questions, to write your essays and your discussion posts, you are hurting yourself. But eventually you will hurt others with your willing ignorance. You are not learning, you are not taking the time to push yourself to new bounds. You are not absorbing the information you need, and for why? Because it's hard? Life is hard. Learning is hard. If learning was easy, you wouldn't be learning anything at all. And one day when you need to use these tools you put down and gave to a program in order to do your job, you are going to get someone hurt in some way. If you're going into teaching and you didn't bother to learn about childhood development because you let an AI take your notes because you couldn't be half-assed to sit through an hour long lecture, you will fail every student that comes your way. If you're an engineer and you had AI do the math for you, something that you make will break and it could kill someone. Because the AI can not even count how many times the letter 'r' is in strawberry, but you're trusting it to make bridges or design buildings?

And in a creative sense, you are not an artist if you use AI. I will scream it from the rooftops if I have to.

You are not an artist if you use AI.

Because to be an artist is to put your very soul into what you create. And an AI has no soul. To be an artist is to lay yourself bare for people to witness and interpret, and it's scary but it's freeing. To be an artist is to make a message with your art, to have people a thousand years from now sit in a museum and feel connected to who you were so far in the past. To think that humanity may be different but we are also inherently the same. To be an artist is to despair over the process of creating your art because it's difficult, and time consuming, and damn does it drive you crazy. But then you get that end result and you realize you learned something about yourself, you got better at something that brings you joy, you created and now you see what you are capable of, and what you will be capable of in the future. To be an artist is to connect with someone because of what you made, and that someone includes yourself.

We keep telling young artists that they need to be better now, they need to quit if they aren't good at it on the first try. We keep acting like we didn't start from somewhere ourselves, like we were born with the fine motor skills and the talent needed to create. It's because our attention spans can't handle over 20 seconds and we need multiple videos playing to drown out our own thoughts. We have to look at comment sections to see the court of public opinion before we make a judgement ourselves. If anything is out of the ordinary or doesn't look the way we expect or want, it must be shamed. And this existence is exhausting because at the end of the day, we have done nothing of value. When coming across a video of a young artist who took the time out of their day to create, we need to encourage them to continue going, tell them that their work is worthy. Because it is. It is worthy because they made it. If we shoot them down before they can go anywhere, we've just killed an artist that could have painted the next Starry Night, or created a sculpture that millions of people would try to visit. We've shot down someone who could teach others how to create one day in their future. We shot them down and killed their inspiration and motivation, and they might turn to someone else to do it for them because they will believe they are not worthy enough or talented enough to make it.

When I was still in school, my favorite part of the year was seeing the projects put up on the wall. The silly displays our teachers put up to show a holiday with slightly wonky paper snowflakes, the posters that the art students made with "too many lightning bolts around the guitar", the signs for school dances, the yearbooks that students spent all year making, the English class posters that depicted scenes from what they were reading and they were made with stick figures or they had someone draw out butterflies. I loved seeing the decorations for Homecoming Week, loved looking ta the booths that everyone made for our career and science fairs. I liked when we put on talent shows still, when we did pep rallies and fashion shows and we saw everyone get together to have fun and not care if it was "perfect." No one there was a professional artist, not yet, but that didn't make it any less entertaining or creative.

We dance because we want to feel how our bodies move and express ourselves in ways words cannot. We paint and we draw and make pottery and quilts and pictures because at one point, all we had were cave paintings of our hands, and we still look at them with reverence for where we started. We sing and we drum and we laugh because music is a universal language that anyone can understand, and isn't that breathtaking? We write so that people in the future can pour themselves over our words and learn from us, so that kids can hide their books underneath their covers with a little flashlight when their parents put them to bed hours ago but they just can't put our story down they have to know what comes next! We cook for our loved ones and have family recipes that mean we've been tasting the same food that our family we never got to meet were eating too.

We create because humans are meant to create. We put our love into the process, we put our dreams and our hopes and our hard earned lessons into these creations.

AI will never have that. AI has none of the process, and therefore, it is not art. We can gripe about how art has different meanings all we want, we can shout that art is only art if it invokes an opinion or a thought, but that is not what makes art. Because there is still effort put into placing a shoe on a pedestal, or painting a yellow square, or painting a mural on a wall, or writing poetry in a tiny notebook at school, or melting crayons together, or anything that requires you putting it together. If AI is doing all the work for you, then you've accomplished nothing. And you stole from the people that actually did accomplish something. You stole not only their effort, but you stole their process, their feelings, their hope and their dreams and their ideas of the future.

AI is nothing and will ultimately become obsolete. Because humans will not stop creating just because companies are pushing for us to stop and hand it over to them. They want us to stop creating, they want us to pay them for it, they want us to put blind trust into what they're doing, they want us to forget that they are stealing from us. I will not forget. I will never forget. Because I was born to sing and dance and write and draw and cook, and when I die, my body will go right back to the Earth and perhaps flowers will grow around my grave. I will still be creating even then. And even if AI is still around and still trying to steal from us, I will die knowing that it could never do the same.

[cinnamonest]

Something recently has me thinking about medium-fantasy settings (you know the type, blatantly dark-ages-euro-esque aesthetics, vague touches of fantasy and such), with of course the obligatory “village raided by foreign invaders” scenes practically inherent to the genre… how they always take trophies and spoils away, one way or another, and thinking about being one of said poor little war trophies…

You're just some little peasant wife in your tiny little village, that you've never even left in all your life. You were born there and you'll die there just like everyone else, you think, and any world beyond it might as well not exist.

You're only vaguely aware that there are other people in the world — every now and then, traders and travelers come through, sometimes people who look very different from you and wear very different clothes, even speak with a sort of different inflection to their voices. Sometimes you talk to them, listen to them talk about far-off places and people. Their tales and their goods and their very existence as outsiders is the only evidence of a world beyond the village you have.

One day, those traders and travelers start talking about some other group of far-away people. Merely invoking the name puts an unpleasant expression on their faces.

There are bad things that happen in the world. There are whole groups of people, populations beyond your ability to conceive, and sometimes the people of one population fight ones from another, over land or religion or greed or any number of things. This is called a war, and one of those, to your understanding, is taking place in the present, far away — or perhaps not so far after all, as anything beyond your range of sight might as well be another world — between people who are no more real to you than the figures in folk tales.

The other people, the not-your-people people, the bad guys in this particular war — they have to be bad, you think, they're not your people, and everyone else seems to think that that makes them bad, so they must be — are particularly strong. There's just too many of them, those travelers say, and they have better weapons and training and everything else, apparently. Moreover, they talk about them like they're some sort of monstrosities — some say they're so big and strong because they descended from gods or angels, others say their people are the product of humans breeding with monsters, and other such absurdities that you don't know any better than to believe must be true.

The more time goes on, the voices of townspeople and travelers alike begin to talk about the other people with an increasing tone of fear, more tense. The places you hear them talk of as having been attacked and destroyed are towns you’ve heard the names of spoken more frequently over the years, towns closer to your little home than the ones destroyed the month before.

They're going to take over the whole nation, people say — while you weren't aware your village even belonged to a “nation” to speak of — and a place like yours, well, they wouldn't bother subjugating the people for taxing or labor like they do big towns.

If they come here, they'll just take what they want and raze the rest to the ground…

The thought is scary, sure, but it doesn't really faze you. It feels like a fantasy, some story that you know will never actually happen. That's something that happens in other places, not here, not home, the roads and houses you know as if ingrained into your mind and heart. The idea of such a thing just has this inherent feeling of impossibility, the state of the place you know of as peaceful and quiet, immutably so.

But that day ends up coming sooner than later.

You're not actually there when it starts — having gone off to tend to something in the field, as has been your responsibility in your community each and every morning for as long as you can remember — only when you come stumbling back and see smoke in the near distance, do you drop your things and start running.

It's happened before, you think. A few years ago, someone's home caught fire and burned down. You helped put it out then, you can help now, too.

It's not until you come running right up to the little cluster of homes, bare feet pattering on the ground as you just start to think the fire is exceptionally big, that you turn your head and see bodies on the ground. See people running. Hear yelling.

Frozen stiff in panic, you can only stand still as you turn a corner and the picture comes together — there's people you don't recognize, standing over bodies and pools of blood. They look very different from you and any of your people, even down to the structure and shape of their faces. Identical clothes with crests you've never seen imprinted on them.

Everything is big. These people are bigger than yours, standing at least a few heads above the tallest people you've ever known. The horses are bigger than any you've ever seen. They hold big, shiny weapons splattered in blood, a far cry from the sharpened rocks you have for tools.

Most are too preoccupied with the mirth of the slaughter to even notice you. It's not until you see one — you feel as if your stomach inverts on itself as you see a man dragged across the ground and skewered, the weapon running straight through his body — that everything fully registers. You reach up and cover your mouth with your hands, trembling legs staggering backwards. Your eyes follow the trail, up the long weapon and the arm holding it until you can make out just the side of the face of the murderer, shadowed by the sheer brightness of such a massive fire, just in time to see him pull the sword out and plunge it back in a second time, hear the poor victim — you think you recognize his mutilated body, even in the shadow of the fire, such-and-such that lived a few houses away — gag and sputter and flail, again as the sword is pulled out and plunged in a third time, and he finally goes still.

The killer reaches up to wipe the blood off the side of his face with the back of his hand, but in doing so, turns his head just enough that you're in his peripheral vision — and then, his eyes widen and his whole head turns, eyes directly connected to yours. Only a few moments of stillness and pause pass, each of you staring at the other, before the instincts kick in. Yours — inherently aware of how much weaker you are — are, of course, not to stand your ground, but to run.

And you — poor dumb little thing, who has never known anything but the same routine and small little world every single day of your insignificant life, has never had to put any thought into much of anything, has never known what true fear and panic is before this very moment — have no better idea than to run right back to your home amidst the fires and chaos — thankfully the flames haven’t yet reached it — dive underneath your bed and cower. It occurs to you that you don’t know where your own husband is… but even if he were here, you don’t think he could offer you any protection from these monsters. The worst of possibilities is among the first to hit you, and you retch at the very thought, trying to perish the thought from your mind.

You have no other ideas — no other options, at this point — than to squeeze your eyes shut when footsteps hit the floor, boards creaking as they draw closer and closer, making a direct line for where you're very obviously curled up, heart beating out of your chest. You can only squeal and whimper when a hand grabs at your clothes and drags you out from under the bed, the other hand then grasping at your hair, roughly pulling you up to your feet.

You squeal and flail and kick. You keep your eyes closed, not able to bear even the thought of laying eyes on the long piece of metal that you're certain will run you through any second now.

But that doesn't happen. For a moment, he just holds you in place as you thrash and squirm. He says something — a voice so deep and rumbling that it makes your blood run cold — but it's not words, at least not to you, strings of sounds that have no meaning to you beyond the vague memory of once being told that other people in the world don't talk the same as you and your people.

You grunt and squeal when you're instead thrown up and over his shoulder, which harshly rams into your stomach, making you gag. Your eyes open, bewildered and afraid. You kick your feet and squirm with all your might, but a few harsh-sounding words and a smack to your thigh make you go stiff and still with fear.

It's like your weight is nothing, with how easily you're slung around and carried back out. As you hang over his back, coughing from the smoke, you're forced to see the little village street lined with unmoving bodies, some so familiar it hurts, a deep pain in your chest. Your eyes increasingly burn from the smoke, and even though you try to look for your own spouse and in-laws and neighbors, your vision blurs too much to tell.

You feel like you're going to fall, thus forced to cling onto your captor. You whimper as your fingers dig into his clothes, you hear other voices drawing closer as you make your way to the edge of the village — rapidly becoming nothing more than charred, smoldering wood and bodies and blood as the fire reaches its peak — where the others seem to be reconvening. The violence, you realize, has died down, as there is nothing left to kill, and all the things worth taking have been rounded up, and now they're going to leave. Leave the place that is, to you, the only place that truly exists, and go into the void of that which is unknown and unreal.

You say a few prayers in your mind to the guardian gods that were supposed to protect your people — even if they failed, it’s all you can think to do as you’re dragged onto some animal, pulled up and held pressed against his chest, and start moving, the tear-blurred sight of the mass of flames fully consuming the only world you've ever known, growing more and more distant with every second.

[pwippy]

i think the way other kids at anact see ivan/till va how ivan/till interact with and view others is really interesting. overall ivan + till seemed to be viewed as the "unapproachable duo" and i think thats hilarious lmfao

multiple people call ivan perfect and hard to approach, literally trying to interact with him through till (i assume the giver assumes ivan and till are besties lol- and it doesnt help that till has never actually refuted this) same with till, hes seen as cold and maybee arrogant to strangers. ("you were so loud at practice" etc etc)

neither of them are genuinely closed off- ivan seeks companionship with till and continues to even when till leaves him. he doesnt make an effort to connect with others though

till seems to have an odd complex going on in that he seeks for human company and warmth to offset the abuse and experimentation he undergoes. yes, the instinct to be in a group or not alone is inherently a survival based one, but it also reassures till that hes worth something. and even though ivans actions might be confusing to till it still means hes seen. acknowledged.

(that went off on a bit of a tangent) HOWEVER tills contrasting side is his belief thats hes better/superior. he calls other pethumans weak and that he will literally destroy them with his music (im paraphrasing and this is based off of memory someone correct me lol) this might come from the nature of his sitatuion- aka being one of the only humans to survive uraks experiments, so he believes hes physically and mentally stronger because well. no one else in anact has been confirmed to undergo the same treatment. in addition, anact systematically ranks humans. theyre trying to parce out the best of the best singers for alien stage and till is one of the top humans- hes called a genius multiple times and that likely adds to his ego

in the end till at least shows courtesy to his other classmates. when hes shown any kindness he tweaks out. his collar has some kind of disco party and when he smiles hes literally sweating.

his emotional flippancy(?) might be one of the reasons ivan likes him. till acts fundamnetally like a human and it shines through his actions and face. he has clear wants and needs, he acts in self interest and hes unapologetically expressive with his goals.

by following till obsessively ivam could mimic and eventually take on tills characteristics. he could "earn" a motive, a goal or a reason to live. a way to be human. and its till. and he devotes himself to him

[deusvervewrites]

I’ve been working my way through your stories and your lore posts. I’m also finally catching up to the end of the MHA manga. My thoughts on the endings of various character arcs is something you might vibe with. Sometimes, mercy to the guilty becomes cruelty to the innocent. It’s great writing when the villains are people you can sympathize with, but it’s weird that the heroes are this focused on saving the villains that are causing so much death and destruction. Your thoughts?

The entire point of My Hero Academia is saving people.

From the first page of the first chapter until now that has never changed.

I've seen people criticizing Midoriya for not going out onto the battlefield to personally and deliberately murder Shgiaraki and I wonder if they're the same people who think Aang should have killed Ozai.

The idea of mercy to the guilty leads to cruelty to the innocent is what caused the entire plot. Had the people at the Dawn of Quirks not immediately started murdering children for being born "wrong", All For One wouldn't have had to cope by doubling down on their propaganda to justify his own existence to himself. But those people were "guilty" of being born wrong, and if they showed mercy to them, then what? What if those people turned on them? No, no. Better to not take that chance.

If Kotaro had forgiven his mother, Shigaraki would never have happened.

If the Togas had accepted their daughter, Himiko would never have become a murderer.

Spinner never left the house because he was seen as "guilty" of the sin of being a mutant. People were massacred for that sin.

Civilians nearly murdered Ippan Josei, a civilian herself, because they believed that mercy to the guilty is cruelty to themselves.

The greatest flaw of the Hero System is that it dehumanized everyone under it. The Heroes were flawless paragons who could never live up to their own hype and swiftly abandoned for failing. The Villains were deemed to be inherently bad and punished for it.

Endeavor was allowed to abuse his wife and all four children and faced no repercussions. Because he's a Hero and Heroes are good. Touya wasn't born correctly enough and was punished over a one-sided feud a generation before him.

Nobody was seen as human. That's literally the point of the final battle. Midoriya, Uraraka, Todoroki, they all had to recognize the humanity of the people they were fighting and remind them of it.

The thesis of My Hero Academia, of every single arc of My Hero Academia, is that Heroes are not "good" and Villains are not "evil." That failing to recognize that fact leads to dark places, like a government that doesn't bat an eye at murdering its own citizens to maintain power. Laws that strip you of your own bodily autonomy.

During his battle against All For One at Kamino, All Might states the the reason Heroes never lose is because they have people to save. The chapter titled Bakugou Katsuki: Rising, his origin chapter, is about 300 chapters into the manga and the first time he saves someone.

All For One and the HPSC are both cruel relics of the past doing their best to manipulate their way to power, viewing everyone in their way as disposable pawns. They're the same. You could even make an argument that the laws against Quirk use means the HPSC is literally giving and taking away Quirks via licenses. And they both completely crumble in large part because of their refusal to see people when it is so much easier to see the enemy.

My Hero Academia is a story about extending your hand to those in need.

[southaway]

Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof and Tikkun Olam

Long post, buckle up. I have Feelings.

This concept is something I've been turning over in my head for awhile and trying to get the composition right. So I guess a quick history lesson for people who don't know yet (though I feel like it's becoming common knowledge) the comic book industry exists because of Jewish people. DC, Marvel, and everything that came after. Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Captain America, and SO many others came from Jewish writers and artists. And try as people might, it is impossible to separate that from these characters. My roommates and I (three Jews and a goy, but like a cool one) are specifically into DC and were talking a while back about the core ideas of Superman and Batman. And yeah, the first things that probably jump to most peoples' heads are maybe hope and fear, justice, maybe the American way or whatever is happening in New Jersey. And yeah, to an extent I think that's right but it's not the whole story. See, what seems clear to us is that Superman and Batman specifically embody two Jewish principles: Tikkun Olam and Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof. A quick-ish and simplified explanation:

Tikkun Olam (Superman) is at the heart of Judaism. It means repairing the world, and while there is a more complex religious and ritualistic meaning, the broad takeaway is that it is our job to make the world a better place. You can't save the world but you have to try. It's hope. While the light is shattered it can be repaired and it is our duty to do what we can, to put good out into the world no matter how large or small. What matters is that you try, you always try.

Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof: Justice, Justice you shall Pursue! (Batman) Another core of Judaism. Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof is not merely the pursuit of justice, but justice for those who need it most. The most vulnerable, the people at the greatest disadvantage, that continue to be hurt the most.

And when Superman and Batman are being written well, written correctly they embody these ideas. These characters and their stories where not created in a vacuum, nothing is. They where made by Jewish men, sons of immigrants. Their ideas of the world and concepts of justice would be inherently Jewish. Tikkun Olam and Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof are the definition of justice and making a better world for Jewish people. These characters and the stories they tell and the ideas they exemplify are and always have been at their heart Jewish. Try as some people might you can't take that away, it is sown into their creation whether you know it or not. We won't be removed from our own narratives.

[imaginespazzi]

First game of the season down (guys it's literally March Madness already) and as per usual I have thoughts for the three people who actually read my long ramblings tee hee :)

SARAH. STRONG.

JANA. EL. ALFY.

That's it those are my thoughts. MY POST DUO IS GONNA LEAD US TO THE FUCKING NATTY YOU GUYS.

But to expand a little more, I thought I was impressed by Sarah at the exhibition but oh my god I'm something more than impressed tonight. She just doesn't look like a freshman. Beyond just being naturally good at the sport, she's just so insanely smart, and watching her play is just beautiful.

My Egyptian queen, the 8th wonder of the world. A DOUBLE-DOUBLE OFF THE BENCH. And guess what, she's only gonna get better. Listen it's an exhibition and no one matched her size and so it'll be interesting to see what she does against real competition but like I always say hustle translate and Jana has plenty of it.

Paige Bueckers statsheet stuffer extraordinaire strikes again. As per usual she did a little bit of everything to lead this team to success. If I have to deal with the Passive P narrative every time (especially because it's an inherently flawed narrative that one day I will do a proper rant on) she doesn't score 40, I might lose my mind. And honestly expecting her to tire herself out with that aggression in games like this is simply not worth it.

Kaitlyn and Ashlynn both did what they were supposed to do. Again, the competition was mediocre and they played like good players on the better team. I do think Kaitlyn should have more than 3 shots in a game but again this game isn't a great indicator. Ash disappeared a little in the 2nd half but again not a great indicator and I really liked the 3 steals so hopefully that is an indication of steady growth on defense.

KK BLOCK!!! We love to see it. She looked really aggressive out there and I think she's going to be a really good spark off the bench for us.

Ice played okay but it's a really simple math thing here. 17 and 11 vs 4 and 2 like it's really just common sense. She also makes some really questionable decisions sometimes and the finishing wasn't great. Experience is a good thing but the numbers are what they are and I think it's pretty self-explanatory who should be starting.

Morgan and Allie are shooters and I love to see it. Girlies did what they were supposed to do and hopefully they get substantial minutes against real competition as well.

My more general thought about the game is that it was basically a tale of two halves. First half UConn was great and that team is a very complete team who has a very high ceiling. Second half UConn, but more specifically that third quarter UConn, well that was the same team we saw in the exhibition. Again, this is a new team and it will take time put a perfect 40 minutes together. But scoring droughts like that should not be happening against a team like BU and they absolutely cannot happen against better competition.

ALSO LAYUPS UCONN PLEASE

Azzi and Aubrey both participated in warmups and it's like sunshine and rainbows in my mind :)

[apartmentsmoke]

A Breakdown of BuckTommy's Storyline Going Into Season 8 - Part II (Their Relationship)

Part I here.

With part II, I want to dive into what we know about their relationship going into Season 8, how their relationship is going, and how it might affect the other characters in the show.

The first explicit mention of Buck and Tommy's relationship's was in TVLine's preview. Tim Minear mentioned that Buck and Tommy are "still getting to know each other a little better" and the article mentions they are "going strong." Their relationship is mentioned positively in contrast to Buck's relationship with Gerrard, which is a negative relationship for him.

The TVLine article also mentions that Buck will have someone to complain to. We've already seen that Buck feels comfortable with opening up to Tommy about his emotions (the coffee date in 7.05 and dinner scene in 7.10), and that Tommy knows Buck enough to tell when he is uncomfortable and might want to talk about something. While they are still learning about each other, they've both demonstrated that they're treating their relationship seriously, and, going into Season 8, they are "a couple."

Tim Minear also mentioned that they are comfortable with each other, which builds from a Season 7 interview where he stated that Buck "feels safe" with Tommy. While they have some minor troubles, the foundation of their relationship is strong going into Season 8.

In the EW article, Tim Minear mentions that they also feel comfortable hanging out with Eddie. Eddie is Buck's best friend and Tommy's friend. I suspect this means that we will see at least one scene, and possibly more, with all three of them. We haven't seen the three of them interacting without other people there before, so I look forward to what that dynamic will be like. I think the three of them will have an easy dynamic, since the emotions from 7.04 have been worked out - Buck realized the source of his jealousy, he and Tommy are now dating, and Eddie has no issue with his friends' sexualities. If there is any tension, I think it will be because Eddie is third wheeling on a new couple who are still learning about each other and there is an inherent awkwardness in that, especially when it's two of your friends and you're trying to figure out that new dynamic.

The next thing Tim Minear mentioned was that "when you couple up with somebody, it takes up some of your time...Buck doesn't have as much free time as he did before." The way I interpret this to mean is that Buck will be spending quite a bit of time with Tommy. We knew he already was - Bobby clocks that he's going to spend the night with him, and Buck goes home to have dinner with Tommy - but it's further confirmation that we will be getting more scenes of them as a couple in Season 8.

The part I elided said that Eddie will be "a little bit out in the cold," which I interpret to mean that we may see fewer Buck and Eddie scenes in Season 8. The two are best friends, so I am positive they will have some scenes together, but Eddie will have to find someone else for support. He usually leans heavily on Buck - something that Ryan Guzman has said is a pattern for Eddie that "doesn't offer maturity" and that Eddie should be "self-reflective" and realize that he has to deal with difficult conversations alone. Tim Minear also mentions that "everything was stripped away from Eddie" and it's "time for him to figure out who the hell he is."

A pre-occupied Buck also offers Eddie chances to interact more with other characters. Ryan Guzman has said that Eddie "might be seeking out Cap in a way that he never has before." He has also stated he wants scenes with Maddie, Karen, and Athena. Not being as tied to Buck allows Eddie a chance to grow as a character and develop new relationships.

I expect to see Buck and Tommy's relationship growing - and the audience seeing that through their scenes together. It also provides opportunities for the writers to explore new dynamics for other characters who often spend time with Buck. We saw in the deleted scene that Hen and Karen were curious about their relationship, and Hen comments on them when they walk into the hospital room together.

In short, their relationship adds new dimensions to the show. Buck enters a relationship with a man and navigates the 118's past. Tommy is recontextualized, and provides a support for Buck while also having his past with the 118 explored. Even though the season is just beginning, their relationship is already woven into the show, and isn't shoved off into its own space. It's ripe for exploration, and I am excited for what comes next for them.

[doberbutts]

Thank you for making the schindler post, it perfectly illustrates why I hate the way people will act like people who hurt others (like active nazis and racists) aren't capable of regular emotion and thought. Second chances are often seen as bad when it comes to violence and crime, but if you never give someone the chance to change, form different opinions, or see the damage they or their associates have caused, they'll just keep taking the path of least resistance, keep following orders. I just want people to take a serious look at a nazi who changed his mind. There is nothing inherently evil about anyone, there are only moral and immoral choices.

It helps, I think, to understand that he did not join the nazi party because he hated Jews. Even what research I did on the real man said that for the most part his reasons for siding with Hitler were purely economical. And, as I've said before, Hitler did not start with "I hate Jews let's kill them all" but with "look how bad the economy sucks! And who is doing well while the economy sucks? The Jews. That means they're the ones behind making the economy suck!" to get people on his side.

I think Schindler did have some internalized antisemitism. How could he not? He thought of the plan to use almost exclusively Jewish slave labor as good business sense. Cheaper than Poles, more desperate for the work and thus less likely to complain about conditions or quit, can't fuss about wanting wages or better hours, what's not to like? Supposedly his workers were treated well. I don't know if that makes it particularly better. I wonder how his workers felt, staring at the emblem proudly pinned to his jacket, knowing it stood for the extermination of their entire people.

I wonder if any of them ever considered it might be a trick. An elaborate long game to get them to trust and slip up. To get them to reveal the hiding places and secret messages and the others striving to find or make a way out.

I think the movie played with that concept a little bit, when the character of Stern (who apparently was 3 different real guys rolled into 1) is portrayed as always being a little standoffish and cold to Schindler until close to the very end. He was afraid of him. Schindler held not only his life but the lives of all of the people working there (plus more, irl) in his hands. He rubbed shoulders with high ranked officials and knew personally more than one known sadistic bastard that actively got off on murdering Jews. All it would take is a single word and it would be more than just those in the factory who died.

But then the ghetto was cleansed. In history, Schindler had advance warning and made his workers lock themselves in the factory overnight to spare them. In the movie, Schindler did not have warning, and saw the chaos from atop a vantage point as he'd meant to pass by.

Either way, both in life and in film, that was the line. He was, at minimum, willfully blind and passive to the evidence of what was happening up to that point. Once he couldn't deny it, he put his foot down and said, no more. I'm not doing this. I can't save everybody but you aren't getting your hands on anyone in my charge. Put me in jail if you have to. This is wrong.

He had everything to gain by continuing to look away. In the movie, Stern says something to the tune of "you'll have to hire Hungarians and Poles. They cost a little more but you'll still be rich" when they're both faced with Hitler's final solution. No more cheap Jewish labor when they're all dead, after all. It is at that point that they come up with the list- to get as many Jews as possible out of Germany before they're all sent to their deaths. He could have just said "yeah, sorry. I tried". Stern even more or less gave him permission to do so, like he was expecting it.

But he didn't. He said no fuck that, it's bullshit. It's not happening. I'm not letting it happen. They can arrest me or kill me if they want but if I'm alive for it I'm not just going to stand back and watch.

But I think it is difficult for people to grapple with that level of complexity. Not everyone he saved thinks he was overall a good person. His motives were not always pure. In fact many times his motives were just about lining his own pockets. But when he saw atrocities happen, he put his foot down and refused to participate. Even at his own cost- he had the equivalent amount of money back then as would be needed to retire early nowadays from his factory labor. He spent it on bribes and rations to keep them safe. He went to jail several times for refusing to back down. He risked his own neck by networking with other factory owners to get them to do the same. He could have been executed for this at any point. Nazis loved public spectacle executions for traitors and for collusion with Jews.

He wasn't a perfect ally. But I think I'd rather an imperfect ally do whatever they can to help, than no allies at all.