#and that's honestly So clever i've always wanted to do it lmao

[damnation-if]

1500 Followers!

wow! i can safely say that i never expected to gain this many followers... it’s a little intimidating but i hope you’re all having fun! like last time, i’m not really in a position to do any giveaways or anything but. if you have asks you’d like to send or... questions for any of the characters, feel free to send them in! and thank you all so much <3 i appreciate you all!

[zhuoyichenpretty]

aww yeah ep 20 GOOD

I guess I do (very casual, broadstroke) episode commentaries now, halfway through the show lmao. Spoilers below!!

Bai Jiu BETRAYAL?

Wen Xiao WANTED?

Zhuo Yichen DETECTIVE-ING?

Ying Lei BACK?

*crowd cheers*

The dots are connecting like crazy with the big bad's whole inner core crusade and also with the simultaneous demon case like I did not recognize Ao Yin as the demon Li Lun first released eight years ago but oooh do I enjoy that minor payoff.

Love the repeated use of the demonic-spell-restraining sigils now that we've been introduced to them though I wonder why the Bureau doesn't ever seem to make use of them. Maybe they don't deal with enough powerful demons to need to paint those in their own (very empty) dungeon? Or perhaps just plot convenience. (edit: someone has pointed out the Bureau indeed uses them!! I'm just blind <3)

Anyway I kind of wish in the Chongwu Camp dungeon PSJ fought a little bc she's so cool in action and their bailing was a little abrupt, but it makes sense that they'd have an immediate getaway plan. Also this is an ep 19 comment but that line Mr. 3-Face Mask delivered about PSJ being fated to always be betrayed by her little brother(s) HURT. So good.

Back to the Bureau, I do love me a good framing, and I'm also happy to get a tiny bit of the episodic demon-murder-case style back. WX was v clever to hide out in Situ Mansion, and (small detail but) I appreciate that the others catch her up on the Bai Jiu thing onscreen. As an aside, I also like that the actress for WX got to be double-casted even just briefly. Seeing some of the actors get to play around with portraying various extremes in characterization and costuming is a ton of fun.

And then yay Bai Jiu backstory at last~! It's crazy how much that blood moon fucked up everyone's lives eight years ago huh.

Everything ZYC says to him is on point (and honestly, ZYC is really quite adept at comforting others, he just sucks utter ass at it when it's his fault and he has to apologize lmaooo) but of course my favorite scene in the whole episode is as follows:

The very slight shine in the waterline, the bittersweet smile/grimace as, deliberately or not, ZYC's words indirectly echo everything about the circumstances between the two of them right now??? Whew. They did that for me specifically.

Anyway, this was a good one to chew on for me, packed with plot movement enough that I didn't feel unsatisfied with just one episode. I'm glad that so far it seems like the release schedule bears in mind what episodes should be watched in pairs for maximum effect (eps 16/17, 18/19 specifically) and which ones are okay to stand alone for the day, but I also don't want to speak too soon haha. We'll see how ep 21 fares.

Also since this is a ZYC stan account (lmao) I have some obligatory ZYC thoughts that I haven't managed to fit anywhere else. I've been meaning to comment on this for a while now and was reminded by this episode: I love the fact that ZYC actually smiles quite often. I think it's a bit surprising every time he does because he so easily fits the archetype of stoic broody action hero, but it really is just an archetype he's fit himself into, and it's never clearer than when they flash back to smiley baby!ZYC (how freely and purely he used to give those smiles away...).

On the other side of this is also how caustic and biting he can be with his words, whether sarcastically or otherwise, and how clearly his face telegraphs his emotions in general. I love that he actually emotes quite a lot and isn't cold and unaffected in the least, just pouty frowny and awkward.

The last piece to this for me is probably his age (which I very much appreciated being established super early on) and how convincingly TJR portrays him as young and inexperienced and extremely earnest. He's so sincere in everything he does that it really doesn't take much to move him, which also (imo) makes his arc less overdone.

We all know from the start what direction his development will likely go, how he'll learn he's mistaken about ZYZ and how he'll grow to have a more nuanced view of the world as he creates more bonds with others. But he's so emotional and emotionally aware that it doesn't really take much push and pull to get him there. And actually, it's not untread ground to him—he is moreso thawing, in part returning to the open-hearted nature that he had to very abruptly shutter away rather than fundamentally changing as a person. I think to me, that makes his character more compelling to watch because his cynicism about the world is perhaps the least sincere thing about him. It's entirely learned, and not by choice. Relatable.

[madara-fate]

Hey this is gonna be a bit of a long explaination so I apologize, well for starters I'm a former heavy NS shipper and fan and now that I've reread the series overtime the whole SS is toxic or abusive allegations are way blown out of proportion if not unfounded maybe because I also watched the anime and lots of fillers gave me the wrong impression of both characters and the ship. So as I've reread the series I can honestly say that while NS had development it was always clearly platonic and started off one sided and eventually became no sided, Kishi was actually quite clever with his use of red herrings because they do bait you and do exactly what he wants you to do, analyze the most superficial aspects of a relationship and bond and think that they are going to be endgame but when you realize they lack depth as you reread and the interactions lack romantic chemistry it starts to be obvious they were never gonna end up together matter fact it feels awkward and weird it's a baseless ship which at first made me sad but now I have actually come around to SS and understand Sakura's character better and Sasuke whom I have grown to love really a deep character arc, the obvious chemistry and connection between them throughout both part 1 and 2 is crazy and they feel natural. I used to believe Sakura crying was because of Sasuke but after my rereading and better translations I understand that she cried for Sasuke not because of him she loves him so much that she hurts because he hurts and he realizes this and doesn't necessarily actively do what he does to hurt her it was the unintended effect of his actions that hurt her his apology to her at the end of the manga was so heartfelt and sincere and I realized that he really is so caring especially towards her the more I reread so I actually became an SS fan ironically who would've thought lmao but many of your Pro SS arguments were so spot on and helped me realize what I chose to ignore initially that SS really is such a beautiful ship and tremendous chemistry like beginning to end it's got so many layers and emotions from both sides. While NS is a good friendship now I find it hard to ship them romantically and feel like they really are more like siblings.

💯

[eemamminy-art]

Extremely difficult top 5: Top 5 butches

I've sat on this for a long time because I wasn't sure how I wanted to approach it! Do I pick real life butches, butches that are expressly called as such in their medias, or characters that I interpret as butch?

Ultimately, I opted for the last option, because I think that will be the most fun in terms of me trying to argue my case lol

Faris Scherwiz — Final Fantasy V

"James Kidd" / Mary Read — Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

Agrias Oaks — Final Fantasy Tactics

Vi — Arcane

Zero — Final Fantasy XIV

Further rambling and pictures under the read more cut because oh my goodness this is. Long.

Faris Scherwiz — Final Fantasy V

This character awoke things in a young me, playing a fan translated ROM of FFV. Faris is this pirate captain, initially presented as a beautiful man, later revealed to be the lost princess who made a new life for herself after being lost at sea.

She thinks of herself in masculine terms, and has an honor among thieves sort of outlook. She does put herself, her crew, and her friends first, but she's not so cowardly as to run away when she sees the world is at stake and there is a higher calling for her as a warrior of light. She's very loyal and brave, but lacks the chivalry of a knight.

She's fearful to go back to the life she had before as a princess, because she loves the person she is now. The only thing that really gives her pause is that her sister very deeply wants a relationship with her, and she has reservations about growing close to her and thus to the life she left behind.

"James Kidd" / Mary Read — Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

I know Mary Read was a real person but stick with me here. We all know AC plays fast and loose with portrayals of real life figures so I'll be proceeding as if talking about the fictional character, not the real life pirate.

When in her persona as James Kidd, he is as smarmy as can be on the outside, but hints that there is a deeper complexity to him. He's deeply enigmatic and flirtatious. He's clever, and drips juuust enough temptation to guide Edward onto the path of the assassins.

When she reveals herself to be a woman, she keeps the same demeanor as always. It's a secret she keeps close to her chest, and reveals it only to use her body to her advantage to create a distraction. Her dedication to her friends and to her freedom matters far more to her than her presentation.

I'm grateful that even despite the era in which this game came out, there's not a total personality switch after the reveal. She's still so much herself, regardless of how she physically appears or which names or pronouns she uses. She makes it clear that she considers herself a woman, in spite of how she normally presents, and she's just bursting with so much confidence. Goals, honestly. She's a hugely inspirational character to me.

Plus I mean. Oh my gosh. She has this rumbling, sultry voice with a Yorkshire accent. Swoon.

Agrias Oaks — Final Fantasy Tactics

I want to first preface with an anecdote, that the lesbian subtext between Agrias and Ovelia is so overt that while growing up, my brother's best friend refused to believe Agrias was a woman and headcanoned her as a male knight to justify it in his head (he also headcanoned Ramza as being a woman to justify the gay subtext between him and Delita.. 😂 lmao FFT is extremely gay please play it)

But onto Agrias herself: she is really the textbook definition of a knight. She would give everything for her kingdom and her princess. She is lawful good to a fault, which is not an easy feat in the world of Ivalice. Chivalrous, devoted, stern but kind when it comes to Her Highness... 🥺

So normal about them... they are like THE yuri ship in final fantasy, but not a lot of people played FFT!! 😭

They even mention it in FFXIV in Orbonne Monastery... love wins......

Vi — Arcane

Going to first say I don't play league of legends, mobas give me hives lol but Vi was phenomenal in Arcane. I am missing a lot of context for the character because of that though, so my take on her is purely based on her portrayal in Arcane.

She's headstrong, she lets her emotions get the better of her, she gets into fights, she's scrappy as hell, she's protective and devoted. What stands out sooo much is that, these are traits you might find in a male protagonist in other media, but the way Vi goes about it is just so in touch with her womanhood. Just a more masculine womanhood.

All of the characters in Arcane are written so well, but I found it very very refreshing for there to be so many well written women with all sorts of personalities and archetypes, and not just the usual tropes you see for female characters.

Zero — Final Fantasy XIV

I waffled a little bit on this pick, because the butch identity is very much about demeanor as much as it is appearance-- if not more so.

Zero is a little bit of an odd duck in that way. She has some very vulnerable, sensitive moments. She's sometimes downright meek. Overall she is cool, confident, business-like, and has her own sense of morality forged by her losses, her time spent bound in contract as a voidsent, and the harsh world of the Thirteenth.

I admit, I initially found her softer moments a little off-putting. Putting it into perspective though, butches do have these moments of vulnerability and softness. It's something really key in the dynamic of butch and femme, that where butches are strong and protective, they need stability and soothing from femmes. A feminine strength to heal the damage that the world has inflicted on the butch while she stands as a shield to herself and other women.

I don't think it was the writers' intentions for her to read that way, I'm pretty sure this is me seeing what I want to see lol. But I think it's still nice! I only didn't notice at first because I play as a gay male wol so her being vulnerable with him activated my fight or flight response. But outside the context of my own OC as the warrior of light, in the context of maybe a female wol (or better yet an experienced and no-nonsense femme like Y'shtola 👀) it's really nice to think about. I think also the pacing of the Endwalker patches didn't do her many favors, but when given time to reflect on her character arc, I think there's a lot of room there, especially when interpreting her in the context of a butch/femme relationship.

She is also pretty new to the whole human thing. She's like a baby butch, still very soft. She can bite and hit hard, but when things break through her shell, they cut deep. Which makes her worthwhile adding to this list, in contrast to the others who are much more experienced and able to protect themselves and others.

[littlepetbee]

i've had the house to myself this weekend so i decided to marathon a bunch of movies that have been on my watchlist for aaages. here they are ranked bc i love making lists lmao:

Game Night: this one was far and away my favorite...it's a fun, clever mystery that's also funny as shit. rachel mcadams is the queen of comedy and also waving a loaded gun around like a crazy person. fuckin 10/10, you guys

I Love You Phillip Morris: listen. i avoid jim carrey like the plague - it's nothing personal, his face just irritates the shit out of me. but i'm SO glad i gave this one a try anyway...it was so cute and touching and gay little ewan mcgregor with his gay little earring is genuinely the softest, sweetest thing to ever exist. it makes complete sense that someone would become a conman for him lmao. 10/10

Bullet Train: thee action comedy lbr!! shoutout to @seeinhindsight for reccing this one to me. it was so well done...with all the winding storylines and running gags it easily could have been a tonal mess, but i feel like they knocked it outta the park. also the steady stream of "oh shit this guy's in it too???" was fun as hell. 9/10 just bc some parts made me sad and my movie ratings are based solely on how they Make Me Feel, not any objectivity lol

Attack The Block: my brain the whole time: YEAH BOY(EGA)!!!! an alien invasion movie with a Message and pre-star wars john boyega?? that was always gonna be a slam dunk for me. though i do gotta say watching british movies as an american is always jarring as hell bc there's no guns. it feels like the weirdest kind of unreality. anyways 8/10

This Is Where I Leave You: slowing things down and getting way more Serious here but i was surprised by how much i liked this one (though maybe i shouldn't have been, since dysfunctional families/siblings are kinda my bread and butter lmao). the surprise lesbianism-slash-lowkey-polyamory definitely elevated it, too! 7/10

Shattered Glass: 100% the movie you gotta show people when they try to say hayden christensen sucks at his job bc uhhh he ate that shit up. not to be #me about it, but if that dude can be that fucking cute the whole time and still make me wanna throttle him within an inch of his life, you know he was doing something right. 6/10

As Above, So Below: i was bummed at first when i realized it was one of those found footage horror dealios, but i actually ended up really liking it. and honestly for the setting, i think found footage really was the only way to go. the concept was super interesting and the horror aspects were sufficiently creepy without being enough to give me nightmares, which is about all my babyass can handle. 6/10

Everybody Wants Some!!: yeah the hoechlin 80's movie lol. it was fun! the characters were likable for the most part! the vibes were good! but B's cannot live on vibes alone (that's a bible verse, i'm p sure) so i was left wondering what the Point was. i am not the target audience for hangout movies, i'll tell you that lmao. 3.5/10

so that's the list!!! all in all a very great way to spend a weekend <3

[marvus-xoloto]

Hi, it kind of came out of nowhere but do you think that Marvus's music would be actually good ? Like I can't imagine some 14-15 yo kid, supported and working for other kids, being professional (not that teenagers can't be great artists, but in the context of Alternia it's just different). It just kind of cracks me up if IRL he really made shitty mixtapes that hypes everyone up lmao and Teals would just work as some weird ambassador for purples/artists that resolve teenage drama haha

What do you think ? Do they have enough cultural background to compose things for themselves or Condy gave them just enough space but not quite so things can't evolve?

great blog btw i like tour writing :)

Hi!

This ask got me deep diving haha. I'll get to some more, long, rambling headcanons under the cut, but here's the short of it:

Canon tells us he has a huge, cult like following, so his music is likely "good" (which is subjective, but we'll get to that later).

He already had a background (loosely speaking) in entertainement before he got famous by being a contestent on Slam or Get Culled (which keeps him relevant; most contestant series bing back previous winners, so he's very present in the entertainment sphere). In my opinion (and this is entering headcanon territory), this means he's had plenty of relevant training regarding... hmm how to put this. Finding and keeping an audience? Putting on the entertainer's face and saying the right words? Public relations stuff, you know? Does that makes sense? This does imply that his music is somewhat commercial and easy to sell, however (although I choose not to headcanon that. Popular fanon and I agree on one thing: I like the idea that his music is kinda silly yet clever with excellent samples a la young gravy).

The idea of teals being the auspictices between the music/ entertainment industry and like, just the general population is a super fun world building element haha! I love that. I've always seen certain castes being culturally predisposed towards certain quadrants, and teals have always read as ashen-predisposed to me. Might be the neurodivergence speaking, though, haha.

That being said, the entertainment industry- both on earth in real life so likely on Alternia- is the forefront of propaganda. And while Marvus styles himself as a musician, he's actually somewhat more of a politician.

Before I deep dive under the cut, the TL;DR is: imagine if Hatsune Miku worked for, idk, the CIA. That's... kind of how I see Marvus lmfao (although not a super literal parallel obviously; I don't think Marvus works for anyone beside himself). I'm at work so this post is pretty rushed, but hopefully you can get my jist.

So here's the thing that has always stuck out to me: Marvus and the music industry are kind of one in the same, you know? Made to get stuck in your head haha.

This puts him in a very powerful political position. It's noted in his friendsim that his music is "super woke and definitely not casteist at all." As MSPAR attended that concert with Zebruh, it's important to note that weirdo castists were on their mind. To me, this says that Marvus's music is so open for interpretation that people will always hear exactly what they want.

(I know the popular opinion is just that he's psychic pulling psychic fuckery, but honestly that's no fun for me. Marvus is very intelligent and conniving, and I'd prefer to deep dive into that.)

You know what Marvus has that most seadwellers don't? An audience, an opinion, and the means to make it all happen.

I think it's worth noting that when I say "politician" on Alternia, it's honestly more like an influencer? Cridea, for instance, strikes me as someone with a political agenda and political pull (and I don't think it's a coincidence at all that they're linked in act 2). They are, after all, young adults at best (I see Marvus as 19 on Alternia).

Do I think Marvus went into the inustry with politics on his mind? No, not at all. He was- in my headcanon- just a sixteen year old kid with no delusions of grandeur at all. He simply was that good.

The only problem is that he doesn't really hve anyone he's working for. He's religious (canonically, and imo to an extent), so it's very possible all of his power plays and messages have a subtle religious tie-in. Mostly, though, I think he's in it for himself. Mirthful Idolotry: he's an idol. This isn't sustainable in the long run, though, so I always wonder about what might cause his downfall in the future.

I think he's intelligent enough to come up with clever word play, and frankly there's the caste element as well.

Anyway. Because politics are involved, I'd be shocked if off-world trolls (trolls who are like Tirona for instance) aren't involved in the effort.

So do I think his music is good? No.

I think it is evil :o)

Anyway, random headcanon: I think music on Alternia has a slight buzzng sound to it that only trolls can pick up the subtlties of. For humans, it sounds like that cicada buzz sounds of flourscent lighting.

Hope that was anything haha.

[rainsoughtflowers]

GAH just finished my reread and have so many thoughts (like i always have) and i've decided who better to receive them than the author that has made the mistake of acknowledging me? ;) everytime i walk away from this fic i feel so content. a lot of fics leave more to be desired or they leave questions that will inevitably be left unanswered, but never once have i ever felt like that with your work. every interaction with the characters feels so true to their characters, which is hard to do especially with the complex emtionally stunted dick that is chishiya lol (i read that in a comment and it has stuck with me since). never once did i ever question your portrayal of his character. and the mc is one of the best i've ever read. they have nuance, perspective, personality, and DEVELOPMENT! overall are the best character imo.

i also want to expand a bit more on why i chose aces on the cover! in the show the ace was the lowest card, but aces really have the power you as the player give them. they can be the least powerful card or the most powerful. the mc really is the personification of all of that. they could have let their past trauma and current conflict tear them down, and i honestly felt they did in the beginning a bit, but they turned it all around and gave themself the power to be the most powerful ace in the deck. its a beautiful story of not just romance but of growth and change. thank you for the time and effort you clearly put into your work

now im on to read the tangled au LMAO sorry for the rant <3

me hysterically crying rn cuz YOU ARE SO SWEET 😭😭 i’ve reread this message so many times and every time i feel so happy. you have truly touched my heart with your words. i am always happy to hear a reader’s thoughts on the story, especially when it comes to easter eggs i’ve hidden throughout! so, if you ever have questions or theories, don’t be afraid to reach out i’d LOVE to confirm or deny 🤭

also hearing that i was able to give a good portrayal of the characters makes me SOSOS proud cause i remember spending hours analyzing each characters interactions throughout the show and manga ESPECIALLY chishiya. he was definitely the hardest character to write for, especially that entire chapter in his pov, but ironically enough it’s also one of my favorite pieces of writing :D IM ALSO SO HAPPY YOU LOVE MC!! i always hated reader inserts who don’t have any personality or growth and i really tried to do my best to create a character that people could relate to or root for :D (and is she a little bit like me? yeah,,,,)

AND THE ACES SYMBOLISM IS SO AAAHHHH I LOVE IT!! aces really does have the power to either be the best or worst card!! very clever !!

thank you again for the kind words, it really means the world to me. i hope you enjoy the tangled au (it’s my favorite so far HAHAHA) MWAH I LOVE YOU

[writinandcrying]

I'd like a Match Up if you wanna! .o. Preferably for Rise but I'm familiar with every TMNT verse starting at '03 and forward if u thought of any others.

I'm just a gay/demisexual (a guy match plz!) demiguy (he/they) who's kinda short(?) I'm 5'5" at most but I haven't checked in a few years ngl. Appearance wise I shift between pastel or alt stuff is all.

I'm an ENTP and 9w1! I have a lot of trouble properly expressing or understanding emotions due to my Autism but I try to battle that by being blunt and asking questions! I'm also constantly stuck battling between people pleasing and my anger issues that make me wanna snap. To kinda combat that my anger is now p much pointed at myself so I don't hurt anyone or their feelings. But I'm trying to better myself with the "Do No Harm but Take No Shit" mindset. I generally make myself do my usual "im the funny friend" routine, but that lead to a lot of ppl assuming I'm stupid, so I'm trying to find a balance between that and showing other sides of myself :') I show my love through Physical Touch and Acts of Service! And I think I respond well to all Love Languages? Except I can be bad at accepting gifts bc of a dumb inner voice going "Oh so u manipulated them I to giving u smth" ...oop. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Ahh I really like Animation, Horror, and Comedy shows/movies, especially analyzing them. I kind of want kids in the future? I'd be more willing if I trusted my partner with my Lows (hopefully they trust me with theirs too ofc) or if I could skip the baby part tbh. I really enjoy baking, reading, and video games, but I like physical activities when there's a sort of clear goal? Like playing Volleyball or Soccer, but not just a general run or jog. But I'd love to travel the world in moderation too, I just want to make sure there's always a great place to come back to.

In my platonic and romantic relationships I can be frustrating bc I tend to bottle stuff up so I don't bother anyone. If I felt comfy enough and knew I didn't have to worry about my Big Fear(tm) of Abandonment then I would slowly get better at talking about things. I'm also really forgetful when it comes to my own things, like forgetting to eat, drink, or sleep or if there was anything I needed/wanted to do.. I think the only pet peeves I have is if I feel Not Heard or listened to? Or just Disregarded? I've been told with how I analyze situations but focus on emotions help others when they're in their worst moments? Like helping calm my little brother down from when angry or helping my mom or friends out of their depressive moments.

Thank you for your time! <3

hi there! sure thing <3 ill go towards rottmnt cuz it has literally consumed 70% of my brain lately lmao i match you with...

Mikey!

Honestly i can see both of you helping each other out into maturing and personal growth, Mikey knows he's clever and also still learning along the way, don't even consider yourself a bother into asking him questions cuz he loves to answer them, and if he doesn't know something, he can just asks his brothers!

Dr. Feelings make frequent visits in your hangouts, he constantly reminds you to unwind and has relaxing exercises if he notices you are bottling too much, and if someone ever tries to take advantage of your "people pleasing taste" Doctor Delicate Touch will also show up to yell tell the person to bug off

he understands the feeling of only being seen in "one light"- all mikey's (i mean in any version) suffer from youngest sibling syndrome - struggling with not being taken seriously, so he does gives you extra attention in everything you say, do, your feelings, thoughts, and if you mean business, so does he.

Honestly for Rottmnt Mikey i think he enjoys all love languages as well lmao, his top 3 are def words of affirmation, physical touch and quality time, he loves gifting you stuff as well, but if you ever mention those "oh i manipulated them into giving me these" thoughts he will fight /argue with you, like, every-time. He doesn't really get it, he tries to be as gentle as possible with your feelings, but on this topic things might escalate, he really likes you and wants to show it as well!

he ADORES that you like animation and horror too!! i headcanon that later on Mikey becomes a fan of horror/thriller movies and video games, everyone @ the lair gets scared to watch/play with him so he's more than thrilled to play and hangout with you, Mikey never really thought much about volley or soccer, but after meeting you he gets so addicted to it, even start to watch volleyball matches (specially woman league cuz they are the best mwah mwah chef kiss)

Mikey knows its hard for you to open up, so when you finally feel comfortable to, all eyes and ears on you, you are the main priority at the moment. He begins to notice you sometimes go non-verbal lke his brother Donnie (Canonically diagnosed with autism) so he knows how what to do to make you feel better or more comfortable depending on the situation

overall: your relationship is compassionate, full with hugs, kisses, snuggles (he loves to shower you with affection fr fr) and loads of fun dates! lucky you!

hope you liked it! match ups are closed for now

[dirtpie39]

Oshi no ko episode 1

15 mins in thoughts:

- I'd be lying through my teeth if I said I wasn't uncomfortable... That doctor has a major issue ngl.

- Ai being 16 and pregnant is so f**king heartbreaking and I know it's supposed to be but still... 🙁

- The doctor dying like that was painfully avoidable... He just had to play hero huh?

- Also thanks to spoilers I already know what happens to Ai eventually so there's a higher chance I won't end up crying at her you know what scene

30 mins in thoughts:

- I’m still creeped out by the doctor now baby’s thoughts but whatever cause the twin sister is now just as bad if not worse then him.

- I knew the stalker would still be around but sweet Jesus... He's proven to be even worse with his talk of “having been tricked”. 🤢

- The twins pretending to be gods is priceless lol... And the producer's wife is a f**king nutcase tbh. I get her point I really do but still... VERY icky.

45 mins in thoughts:

- “After all, Sarina’s not my name anymore” OOF... I feel like that's gonna cause something yucky later tbh

- Oooooo the shot at 35:55 matches the pic I used for this post. And I used it exactly because it's so damn cool looking!!!

- The director really gave his business card to a kid... lol. But I suppose that will come in handy in the future.

- Also that's kinda clever of Ai ngl... To pretend the work she was doing for that minor role is something like being in a music video.

60 mins in thoughts:

- the twins reaction to what the other child actor said (50:35) had me ROLLING ya’ll... lmao

- “Even without any acting, you're plenty creepy already” damnnnnn that's a little harsh LOL

- Awww now I feel bad for that other child actor... 🥺 (52:54)

- I must say... Excluding some of the girl twins' creepiness towards Ai... I do feel a lot of sympathy for her now after seeing a bit more of her as Sarina.

81 mins in thoughts:

- the small bit with Ruby basically accepting that she can move/dance freely now as Ruby and is NOT Sarina anymore was very sweet ngl... (1:00:17)

- “On a whim, I decided to contact the guy I’d broken up with” FAMOUS LAST WORDS YA’ll

- “I have no memory of ever loving someone or being loved” ummm OWWW?? (1:04:49)

- “You went and had kids even though you're an idol” oh my f**king God ya’ll... Someone, please tell me spoilers that this loser dies too (1:08:16)

- (1:12:43) I didn't cry like I said and I didn't tear up either... But I wanted to so much ya’ll. That scene was so well done... When the little stars she always had in her eyes faded out (cause symbolism and all) I felt my heart sink. Such a tragedy ngl... But hey at least she got to see adulthood I guess 😓

- that evil f**king stalker committed suicide cause of the guilt he felt (1:13:28)... Honestly, I don't know what I would've done if I were him in that instance where Ai was talking to him directly about the truth. He had a kill count of 2 and all... Both-ish of which didn't deserve to die... Not at all.

- the art at 1:18:21 looks so damn cool... And I'm excited to maybe see “dark ruby” as tiktok is calling it anyways

- “Would you consider raising me?” LOL what a question (1:18:51)

One final thought for episode one of Oshi no Ko:

I really love this series so far even after just the first (long) episode. Series that come off as happy, fluffy things then turn out to be dark are so f**king awesome ya’ll. This is my first idol anime with that kinda thing going on. I've seen it with sports anime (ex: stars align-ish and Hanebado) and a couple other types of anime.

[chappell-roans]

I dont always skip those songs except maybe cowboy like me. I like sad songs or even slow ones, but it just feels like a slog to get through that one in particular. I dont really love the chorus of happiness so I think that might be it lol. I do like evermore, I just dont love bon iver's verse. I liked the background vocals but I didnt like the switch up between her part and his, it takes me out of the song so I think I got used to skipping it. my most listened to rn I think is no body no crime, it's just such a vibe and has that narrative element that I like and could just picture it being a movie.

yeah I was hoping for gothic romance, or dark academia vibes just based off of the name of the album so I think thats why I was a little ehhhh. I would have loved her indie style applied to those aesthetics and subject matters, especially because evermore and folklore had more interconnected storytelling aspects and you can do so much with that applied those aesthetics. Focusing on something like dead poets society or a secret history would have also been something new for her and if it veered more into gothic romance I think something crimson peak/horror like would have been interesting.

OOooh okay interesting and tbh I've heard that complaint too so I get it. I skip various ones really just depending on my mood, if I don't want something slow I definitely don't listen to "cowboy like me" but that song just hits when I'm in the mood, phew. That's all fair critique tbh and interesting. I'm realizing I don't listen to evermore all that often but most recently I've mostly been listening to "dorothea," "tis the damn season," "cowboy like me," and "coney island." omg "no body no crime" is seriously great and I've definitely had it on repeat before, it definitely has that narrative element and such an idk attitude that I love. It's very fun and clever. I also adore "right where you left me," can't remember if I mentioned it before, but that's an all-timer for me. I had it on repeat a LOT in the past it's... I love it.

Mmmm oh yes absolutely! I honestly didn't expect this toooo much because I knew it was gonna be like, well, a breakup album, but also you can have hope because I know she freaking loves Crimson Peak and Guillermo Del Toro's movies generally. So I could see her leaning into that at some point, but I also feel like there's a chance that reputation is as "intense" (or however you wanna put it lmao) she's gonna get in that sense. But you never know? But I do definitely hope she continues that type of writing style from folklore and evermore. I really wonder whether Justin Vernon (of Bon Iver) or Aarson Dessner (of The National) are involved in the production, because they were both pretty heavily involved in both folklore and evermore. She gets the credit, of course, but their influence is undeniable. (And you can tell from her collabs w them on their other projects -- Big Red Machine is Bon Iver x The National and co, essentially. "Renegade" and "Birch" by BRM and "The Alcott" on The National's recent album.) SO there's that. There's hope? Lmao. She's also gonna have a song on Poets with Post Malone who's apparently making country/rock now (I haven't listened ngl) and Florence and the Machine which... love. There's hope for your dreams! Maybe isfdlkmsifdnlk

[rose-tinted-juls]

WHOA i expected this to be good but not THIS GOOD OMG i'm so invested already and screaming crying giggling at my screen like the crazy person i am. this definitely deserves some stupid commentary.

1. first of all, already the first paragraph/two lines are just INSANE. such a clever way to jump into the story while at the same time giving background info on the main character. i'm in awe, in love, and it's been only a few words. damn. + also, ever since i started reading this, i've been singing "it's nine o'clock on a saturday" in my head non stop, not even going further in the full song lmao

2. charles not understanding the southern drawl is just too funny, i can so imagine him struggle to focus on driving and understanding at the same time lmao

3. also him thinking chris is a man at first - same here, charles, same here - i loved that way too much for how simple of a line it may be

4. "she's horrendously his type." WHY do i love this sentence as much as i do??? anyway i nearly screamed when i read it, to be truly honest here.

5. "she tucks her hair again. he wonders if she's growing it out or if she always keeps it at such a length that it's just too short to stay where she wants it to." AGAIN. GORGEOUS WRITING. such a tiny detail but it makes it all the more real and human and i just ADORE these details in stories.

6. "she loves the heat, and the heat loves her." this simple sentence just made chris SO RELATABLE. finally someone who's the same as me in this lmao

7. "you think i'm going to crash?" + "i would never crash with chris elliott in the car." AAHHHHH the way i'm screaming at this!!!! i can hear charles' voice in my head saying these words and it's not helping

8. THE ROLLER COASTER METAPHOR!!! so good, so creative, so perfectly executed. wow. that whole paragraph was just wow.

9. LETSGO CHARLES YOU GO BOY ASK IF SHE'S SINGLE!!!! hehe i'm not insane i swear. + also, his fingers starting to shake a bit asking her number AHHH

10. "what on god's green earth" made me chuckle, i love that line so much.

11. "nobody should be allowed to make her name sound like that." i'm honestly shaking and screaming rn but also relatable! + "you are a very beautiful girl and when a guy sees a beautiful girl, they act like an idiot and ask for her number" I'M GRINNING SO WIDE!! charles leclerc the man you are

12. OMG CHARLES BEING THE GENTLEMAN WHEN THEIR PHOTO GETS TAKEN I CAN'T he just pulled a tom hiddleston to his emma watson i'm crying

13. charles struggling with his first text is also so human and so real and so relatable omg it's such an important detail to me 😭 + "someone should just stop him from speaking to women all together" i cackled lmao

14. "joris says slowly, struggling to multi-task" AGAIN LIKE COME ON WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE SO REAL MACK these are the purest little details a writer can include but they make such a huge difference!!!! and i feel seen with the way i also speak terribly slow (and sometimes creating nonsense sentences and/or words) when i'm texting, i love it 🥺

15. the writing style in itself deserves its own point over here because it's just so good, so professional!! honestly this is just way too good to be fanfic. this belongs on the shelves of bookstores. i'm not exaggerating.

wow. this was a rollercoaster (hehe like the metaphor) from the start to the end and i enjoyed every second of it way too much. Mack i already knew you're talented af but now you've just given proof of how much it's true. GOD I LOVE YOU M!!!

miss americana & the heartbreak prince

—01. all american girl —word count: 6.4k —warnings: none :) —a/n: this is queued so I'm sound asleep right now but trust when I wake... I will be throwing up about having posted this

It’s nine in the morning on Friday, and the kindergarteners at Robinson Elementary are getting picked up from the gymnasium and taken to their classroom to start their day. It’s nine in the morning on Friday, and their teacher, Chris Elliott, is running four minutes late to the first day of the U.S Grand Prix. Her fingers flatten down stray flyaways, working in tandem with the extra strength hairspray she found in the back of the Walgreens beauty aisle last night. Her makeup is strewn about in chaos atop the stark white marble countertops, a single folded piece of toilet paper in the trash can, remnants of her lipstick kissed onto the fibers. 

She played it safe on the outfit today, still hasn’t been able to pinpoint exactly what the dress code for this race is supposed to be. Her Dad has been no help–he can get away with wearing jeans and a short-sleeve button-up just about anywhere he goes. More is expected from her, though. Three days, three outfits, always walking the line between casual streetwear and Kentucky Derby without a fascinator. She settled for something painfully classic and American, figured a European sport would be eating up the concept of everything being bigger in Texas. Levi’s, a white tank top, and a beat up pair of cowboy boots should do a good enough job at letting anyone curious know she’s authentically American, without screaming out for attention. That’s the goal for the weekend; blend in and keep Dad company. 

Dad, who is not-so patiently tapping his foot against the floor, watching pre-race coverage of the Dixie Vodka 400 on his iPhone 7,  is a guest of honor for Ferrari this weekend. It was a classic Bill Elliott commitment, one he makes and then forgets about until he’s getting sent an email a month ago to remind him. One he makes when he forgets his son is racing the same weekend. That’s how Chris ended up here with him, instead of her Mom or instead of Chase or Chandler. They’re all in Florida for the Cup Series. Well–Chandler isn’t. Chandler’s at her hot-shot job in the big city living her life blissfully away from racing. 

She can count on a single hand the amount of times her dad has missed a Cup Series race in the years since his retirement. Even if he’s moved on from driving the track, racing is in Elliott blood. It comes easier to them than breathing does. Chris won’t be the first to admit it, but she's the NASCAR nepotism equivalent of a Baldwin baby. She’s no Kennedy, the first-families of NASCAR are closer to the Petty’s and the Earnhardt’s, but, you ask a NASCAR fan about the Elliott Clan and you’re sure to get an earful. Champion, Hall-of-Fame inductee father, supergenius transmission and engine mechanic uncles, and a superstar fan-favorite older brother, the Elliott family racing history spans generations of fans.

Never the Danica Patrick-type, Chris has always preferred to watch the races rather than compete in them, but she still grew up at the track and was always up for a trip to visit her dad at the auto-shop. 

“Mums,” her dad says, peeking his head around the corner into the hotel bathroom. It’s a stupid nickname, Mums, Chrysanthemum. She’d roll her eyes if it was anyone but Bill still calling her by it. “We gotta go, darlin’.” Chris nods at him in the mirror, flattens her hands along her thigh and tucks one final strand of her bang behind her ear, and then they’re finally leaving the hotel for the track. 

It’s a strange kind of first for Chris, in that it’s not really a first at all. She’s been to COTA before, multiple times. Hell, she watched in the garage when Chase won the inaugural Cup Series race here in May last season. She’s even been to the U.S Grand Prix before, back when it was still in Indianapolis, when Chris was too young to remember if it was big or if she was just little. She’s used to the crowds, spends almost every weekend with upwards of fifty-thousand people, but this? This is the kind of crowd she can’t fathom being among, and it’s only Friday. If it takes them an hour and a half to get through traffic on a practice day, she can only imagine what the next two mornings have in store for her. 

“No antics today,” Bill tells her in the car. “They’re not like us. Trust me, I know.”

Last time you went to one of these races, you were still a driver, she wants to tell him, but doesn’t. He doesn’t take well to the implication he’s an old man. Walking into the paddock with a yellow pass hung around her neck, FERRARI-GUEST-17 and a picture of the team logo popping up on the screens at the turnstiles, she’s beyond taken back by the pomp and circumstance of it all. She’s barely through the entrance and she’s already spotted half a dozen people who could buy her without it making a dent in their pockets. It’s nothing like walking around a NASCAR track. There isn’t a single Bud Light knight or backs sunburnt into American flags or t-shirts turned muscle tanks. It’s just… rich people. Lots and lots of rich people. 

In the Paddock Club tent, Bill manages to find a couple of his old buddies. Guys he raced with back in the day who’ve turned up for whatever with whoever this weekend. It’s unsurprising, stock car racing is nowhere near as exclusive a club as Formula One. They aren’t any of the guys Chris remembers being a part of her childhood, none of them pseudo-uncles in the way some other drivers were. You’re all grown up, they tell her, note her height and her features and one of them even asks if she’s in college yet. She plays along, pretends she remembers them fondly and that they haven’t been on the recipient list for the annual Elliott family Christmas newsletter for the past thirty or so years. His buddies are much more comfortable talking about Chase, anyways, about his racing and his fiancee and his little boy than they’ve ever been talking about Chris or Chandler. The concept of a quote-en-quote girl dad wasn’t such a thing in the nineties.

Chris makes small talk with one of the wives. They can’t be that far apart in age, she’s definitely of a different generation than her husband. Gross. Chris lets the woman lead the conversation; she talks about the polka dots on her skirt and Chris’ cowboy boots that are, apparently, perfectly authentic. 

They separate from the group of former NASCAR drivers and their child brides within the hour. Bill has to be in Ferrari hospitality by one o’clock for a special meeting. He’s still not sure what he did to get selected for this specific group of people who get to do a hot lap with one of the Ferrari drivers, but he isn’t about to ask any questions that might get him out of it. He sets off to hospitality and Chris sneaks out of the paddock and into the rest of the track. 

There’s only so much to see inside the paddock. Hospitality after hospitality after hospitality, just in different colors with different modern structures with pictures of different cars. She wants to experience the event, not just the rich people who can pay their way into the upper echelon of the pinnacle of motorsport. If she’s going to be on her own for an hour and a half, she might as well be fully and truly on her own. 

She ends up in the beer garden. More specifically, the bar tent. You can’t separate a NASCAR fan from the Natty Light. The pass around her neck gets her into the VIP area of the tent, which… feels like an antithesis of itself.  Her phone buzzes in her back pocket when she’s waiting on her bottle from the bartender. It’s her dad. 

Brad Pitt is here. Crazy. 

She makes quick acquaintances with a couple who looks about her age. She compliments the girl’s denim jacket and then she’s in. The DJ is playing country music with a techno backtrack at the other side of the tent and they all three spend a good fifteen minutes trying to decide if they love or hate the set. “It’s not the worst thing I’ve ever heard,” the guy says. 

“It’s definitely not the best, though,” Chris winces, spots a Ferrari pass hanging with the VIP one around the girlfriend’s neck. “Are you guys here with Ferrari?” She asks. 

“Oh, “ she says, looks down at the pass and fiddles with it for a moment. “Yeah, Will’s a golfer and they invited him for a tour and to do this golf event with ESPN.”

“Oh, that’s sick!” Chris nods. “Have you guys ever been here, or is this your first time?”

“We’ve come every year for…” Will starts, looks to his girlfriend for the rest of his sentence. 

“Four years,” she nods. “What about you?”

“This is my first time,” Chris explains, leaves out the technicalities because she barely cares about them, doesn’t expect a stranger to even half-care. “My dad’s here with Ferrari, and I’m here to babysit my dad.” She laughs. 

The woman nods, makes a quiet ah sound. Will asks for clarification. “You guys lose each other, or something?”

Chris nods. “Or something.”

Charles sees her before he hears her. She appears in his peripheral on the top floor of Ferrari Hospitality, moving swiftly through the groups of strangers with a confidence that makes you think she owns the place. He half-prepares to excuse himself from his current conversation–not that he’s understanding more than forty-percent of the words coming out of this guy’s mouth–to take a photo with the short brunette bee-lining it over to him. 

“Excu–”

“I think I saw Brad Pitt on my way here,” she says, and the man he’s been talking to for fifteen minutes laughs. Oh, he thinks, that’s mortifying. She’s not here to intrude on his conversation and ask for a picture. She’s here with this guy. 

“This is my Chris,” Bill says. 

“Hi,” Chris says. Chris. Chris. Chris is a woman. A woman extending her hand, thin and well manicured with a single ruby ring, for him to shake. “Chris.”

“Charles,” he says, hesitates. “You are not what I was expecting.” 

There wasn’t much he understood from Bill Elliott during their hot lap, not that Bill didn’t talk. Charles just didn’t have the focusing capabilities to drive the car in an entertaining way while also deciphering the thick southern drawl of the man sat in the passenger seat. It was thick, heavy, and sounded like maybe he’d smoked a pack a day for a few years. That, or he was straight-up making up words in a bit that only he was in on. One thing he did understand, though, was the kids’ names. I have three, he’d said, Chandler, Chase, and Chris. He’d assumed all boys. Chandler, Chase, and Christopher. Christian. Cristiano. The last thing he was expecting was a beautiful girl with a firm handshake. 

“You were expecting me?” She asks, and her voice is a million times easier to understand than her father’s. 

“No, no. He just,” He gestures absently to Bill. Chris doesn’t break eye contact. She has wonderful eyes. “I thought Chandler, Chase, and Chris are three brothers.”

“Oh,” She laughs like it’s not even close to the first time she’s had to follow behind her dad and correct the miscommunication, and a piece of her bangs falls loose from its tucked position behind her ear. She fixes it without thought. “Well, you’re one for three.” 

She asks Bill about the hot lap, asks if he had fun and he laughs. They’re very laugh-oriented people, he’s noticed. Laughy and almost intimidatingly good at holding eye contact. He’d always heard Americans had an issue with eye contact, and if that really is the case, these two practice their active-listening skills enough for the rest of the country. Their kindness is in their expressions, soft eyes and small smiles that keep you from feeling like an intrusion on the conversation. He notes all of his findings internally, categorizes them together as if he’s spent the last ten minutes looking at anyone but her. 

She’s horrendously his type. It’s painfully apparent with every passing moment. The hair and the face and the build and the smile. Just, God.

“Why didn’t you do one?” He asks, “A lap?”

“The need-for-speed bug skipped the women in my family, unfortunately.” She tucks her hair again. He wonders if she’s growing it out or if she always keeps it at such a length that it’s just too short to stay where she wants it to. 

“We could go slow,” he offers and she chuckles, closing her eyes long enough to roll them without him actually seeing them roll. 

“I don’t believe you.”

“It’ll be fun, I promise.” He’s never been good at flirting, always found it off-putting in the beginning, trying to walk the line between what one person finds fun and another person finds horribly uncomfortable. Once the dust settles, he can manage, but making those first few moves? He might as well be a deer in headlights. Semi-truck headlights. 

“I don’t know,” she says, drags out the vowel sounds and he’s oblivious to whether or not she can tell he’s only making this offer as a chance to spend more time with her. He’ll get an earful for it, no doubt, but if she agrees it’ll be worth it. Bill chimes in, eggs her on with a guilt trip. You should do it, don’t be a party-pooper. Charles wonders if Bill can tell he’s flirting with his daughter. Probably not, he’d bet. “Okay,” she says, and his stomach does a celebratory flip. Before he can say anything more, Mia is pulling him off somewhere. He hadn’t even seen her coming, but he fills her in on the walk.

“Domani c'è un'aggiunta al programma dei giri veloci.” There’s an addition to the hot laps schedule tomorrow, he says. Mia glares at him and he pretends not to notice, flashes her a toothy-grin as an unapologetic apology. 

When she’d agreed to do a hot lap with the gorgeous racing driver standing a foot away from her, she assumed it would be forgotten the moment he stepped away from the conversation. She never would have agreed to it if she actually thought it was going to happen. Chris was sorely mistaken though, when later that afternoon, a man dressed head-to-toe in Ferrari red finds her to gather her information. 1:10, he tells her through a thick Italian accent, be in hospitality at 1:10. 

It was wonderful, really. Perfect, fantastic, great, legendary. This is an amazing opportunity. She isn’t going to regret agreeing to this, no chance. Even for the queen of optimism, this one is hard to put a positive spin on. 

There is no underestimating just how much Chris hates going fast. She’s never liked it, spent the majority of her childhood getting carsick in a vehicle maxing out at forty miles an hour. Her sister and brother used to think she was faking it just so she could always ride shotgun. She’s not even allowed to drive the car if she’s with her dad or her brother because they can’t bear it. To her, a speed limit is just that, a limit. To everyone else, it’s a minimum. 

Her only hope is that she doesn’t vomit all over an expensive supercar at 1:10 tomorrow afternoon, or worse–the cute guy driving the car. 

In the meantime, she can distract herself with the Green Day performance and remind herself that only so much can happen in five minutes. Anyone can survive five minutes. 

– – –

They eat the continental breakfast at the hotel the next morning. Bill has pancakes and Chris has cereal because, as she’ll tell anyone, there’s just something about cereal from a plastic container. She’s also three coffees ahead of where she was this time the day before, all of her nerves personifying themselves as desperation for caffeine. She’s responding to a work email on her phone while Bill has a call with Chase. 

Somewhere on a race track in Florida, Chase is calling between practice and qualifying sessions. They talk every day during a race weekend–Bill and Chase–and it’s almost never about racing. Her dad might drop an occasional that’s not what I would’ve done or a well, that looked like fun, but that’s usually the end of race-talk. They used to fight like cats and dogs about driving when Chase was younger, so much so that Chris’ mom banned them from talking about racing inside the house for three straight years. The who of them are better now, now that Bill’s been able to let Chase find his own way and go through his own racing journey. 

“Your sister is doing a Hot Lap today,” Bill says, and Chris can hear Chase’s laughter from the muffled speaker. 

Bill and Chris are driven to the track on Saturday because traffic is so bad. It’s hot and windy and Chris has her window rolled down the entire drive, her fingers dancing through the dry air. She’s always loved the heat, the sun shining down on her skin, kissing her in a million different places all at the same time. She loves the heat, and the heat loves her. 

The morning flies by. They start the day with a tour of the Ferrari garage, where they’re introduced, or re-introduced, to their drivers. They end up with a couple other very important people hunched over Charles’ car while he explains how much pressure needs to be applied to the brake pedal for the car to actually brake. Bill eats the semantics up, cars and their mechanics run thick in his blood, braided deeply into his DNA. Chris, however, has always enjoyed the more delicate things in life; the pink hair bows and the dollar store makeup kits and spinning herself dizzy in a flowy summer dress. She never spent exorbitant amounts of time at Dad’s engine shop or Grandpa’s Ford Dealership, it just wasn’t in her lane of interests. She sips another coffee–her fifth of the day–and listens attentively to Charles talk, bites her smile at his wild gesticulations. He’d make a good kindergarten teacher, she thinks, with his huge personality. 

When the whole tour group is being shuffled out of the garage to be replaced by a new set of prying eyes, Charles makes a passing comment. See you later for the world’s slowest hot lap, he remarked, put his hand on her shoulder and gave it a soft squeeze as he moved past her. 

She doesn’t know why, but she’d convinced herself that it wouldn’t actually be him she would be doing the lap with. It was qualifying day, after all. Surely, he had about a million and one better things to be doing than driving a random girl around a track a few times. She figured it would be a driver, but not one of the drivers. 

After lunch, she makes her way back to Ferrari hospitality, to where she was told to be waiting at 1:10. She’s the only person who looks like they’re here on instruction. Nobody else is nervously picking at their cuticles or vibrating in place as a reaction to their seven coffees that morning.

She spent the night before grilling her dad about his experience, forcing him to give her a moment-by-moment breakdown of everything he remembered happening, from the safety briefing to the conversation afterwards. But, when it came time for Chris to actually do hers, there was no safety briefing warning her about the million different ways she could die. Instead, the same man who’d tracked her down the day before escorted her from the top floor of hospitality to the bottom, out the back into what she can best compare to an alleyway, and then to a red supercharged Ferrari. 

Charles is there, talking to what appears to be a personal photographer and another man dressed in Ferrari garb. She re-introduces herself for a third time in twenty four hours. “I know your name, Chris,” Charles says, smiles and shakes her hand anyway. She doesn’t like the way her brain reacts to him saying her name like it belongs on his lips. 

“Duh,” she laughs, “sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

“Right,” she nods. “Yeah, sorry.” Charles laughs out a sigh, cocks his head and smiles. Chris bites her tongue not to apologize again. It’s a reflex. She puffs out her laugh and shrugs. 

If she manages to make it out of these couple laps with her life and the contents of her stomach still intact, she’s sure to still look like a clown–a fact she realizes as she pulls the tight helmet over her head. She’s worn racing helmets a handful of times, but it’s not muscle memory to her in the way it is to him. It takes her a minute to tighten the chin strap just right and despite his genuine offer to help her, Chris turns him down and blindly works her fingers under her neck until it’s just right. 

“Why don’t you get a fun Hot Laps helmet?” She asks while she fights with the strap. 

Charles knocks on the side of his helmet with his knuckle. “Custom fit. Safety reasons.”

Chris knows, she was just messing with him. She nods like she never could’ve guessed that was the reason. “My safety doesn’t matter?” She comments, pulls the strap tight for the final time. 

“You think I’m going to crash?”

She shrugs. “Maybe.”

“I would never crash with Chris Elliott in the car.” There he goes again, saying her name all annoyingly French and nice and easy. 

“Whatever,” she says, turns away so he can’t see her squished cheeks flush pink against the polyester. He opens the passenger side door for her, knocks his knuckle on her helmet this time, and horribly mocks both her words and accent before shutting the door behind her. 

Chris has her seatbelt buckled before he can get around the front of the car and into his seat. Her leg bounces anxiously against the floor mat. Charles starts the car and moves to shift into drive, but stops short. “Are you scared?” he asks, and in a moment of vulnerable honesty, she nods. She’s more than scared. She’s terrified, and despite his brief attempt to reassure her that it’s going to be fun, her leg is still bouncing when they peel off from the group already awaiting his return. 

A hot lap, she’d come to learn in the last day or so, would be more accurately referred to as hot laps–plural, multiple, several. Three, to be exact. One out lap, one push lap, and one cool down lap. Three laps. Hot laps. They should really start referring to it as a plural. 

The best thing she can compare it to is a roller coaster. The turns share the feeling you get at the tipping point, right before your body thinks you’re free falling. Her stomach is left behind three turns back and it never really catches up to the car once they start. The straights are like that first hill, fast and crazy in a way that pulls from her lips screams she hears before she consciously chooses to release. It’s like a roller coaster, if the person sitting next to you is completely unaffected by the ride and spends the entire time trying to carry out a conversation with you between your screams and their giggles. It’s like a roller coaster, if the cart never leaves the ground. 

On the cool down lap, when they’re going at a speed that allows Chris to pick up her soul when they drive through turn four, he asks her if she’s single. It comes at her from left field. 

“Are you flirting with me?”

He laughs, takes a hand off the wheel and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Yes!”

“Oh,” she says softly. If he notices the surprise in her tone, he doesn’t mention it. “I am.” 

“Can I get your number?” She swears that his fingers are shakier than before as they hover over the paddle shift. They were sure-footed just minutes earlier, she’s sure of it. She’s sure of it, but there’s no way it’s a genuine observation. There’s no way she’s making him nervous. 

She laughs, because what on God’s green Earth is a European Formula One driver going to do with a small town American girl’s phone number? 

“I’m not abandoning my dad for a hookup,” she says, and he rolls his eyes, repeats the question. “Why do you want it?”

“Because, Chris Elliott,” she wants to scrape the way he says her name out of his voice box and pin it in a scrapbook. It’s like a tick, the way it burrows into her skin. Nobody should be allowed to make her name sound like that. “You are a very beautiful girl, and when a guy sees a beautiful girl, they act like an idiot and ask for her number.” 

“Oh, my God,” she giggles, shakes her head and looks out the window like it might ground her, or like it might reveal that she really is in some fever dream state and none of this is real. She’s not even in Texas, maybe. That’s how insane this whole conversation is to her. 

“Too cheesy?” He asks, grimaces. She shakes her head, holds her hand out for his phone. 

“Just cheesy enough.”

When they get back to where they started, someone asks Chris if she’d had a good time. She nods, flattens down the static-electricity charged flyaways on her head and tells them yes, even if she’ll be just a little bit nauseous for the rest of the day. It’s not a lie, either, she did have fun. She was scared out of her mind, but in a way that makes her happy she did it. 

They pose for a photo together in front of the car, the picture snapped by the only guy with a camera around his neck, the only one besides Chris not covered head to toe in Ferrari branding. When they pose, Charles’ arm wraps around her lower back and, almost like he remembers himself in the middle of the action, his hand doesn’t close around her side. Instead, it hovers just beyond her body, open and stiff and flat. How gentlemanly. “Good luck tomorrow,” she says.

He nods his thanks, “I hope I see you around this weekend,” he adds, and then they go their separate ways. Good thing, too, because she’s still blushing over it when she gets back to her dad in the Champion’s club. Bill is too distracted by the live feed on Chase’s qualifying laps on his tiny phone screen to notice Chris’ presence, much less the coloring of her cheeks. He qualifies third and they celebrate quietly with drinks from the bar and FP3 on the big screens. 

They stumble into more NASCAR old-timers while in the Champion’s Club and Chris spends the time fifth-wheeling their conversations about Chase and watching the second half of qualifying on one of the TVs. 

She doesn’t really understand the format of the weekend. In theory, she understands the basics, didn’t have to read Formula One for Dummies on the plane ride over, but the intricacies of it are beyond her. In NASCAR, drivers are split into two groups and then are only given, at max, two laps to set their qualifying times. It varies depending on the track that weekend, but it always hits some of the same points. From what she can gather from the low-volume televisions mounted on every surface around her, F1 is definitely different. 

They head back to the hotel directly after qualifying to ‘beat the traffic’ which is code for Chris is still nauseous and they’re both feeling a little too heat exhausted. They stop for dinner on the way back, at a barbeque place right by their hotel. Bill orders the chopped brisket with potato salad and Chris gets the pulled pork sandwich with a tomato zucchini salad. 

Chris has been really busy with work, with settling into the new routine with her new group of students, and Bill wants to hear all about it. She always struggles in September and October, feels inadequate every time the other teachers find their footing with their new class weeks before she does. It’s the first time alotta ‘em have been in a school, Bill reminds her and she shrugs it off, tries to find something more upbeat to talk about. 

Chris and Bill have really gotten close over the past couple years. Growing up, she and her sister Chandler were massive daddy’s girls, had him wrapped around their little fingers from the moment they came into the world. But, when Chase started to really take racing seriously, the girls lost a lot of their dad to their brother and spent the majority, if not all, of their time with their Mom. As a teenager, Chris did what all sixteen year old girls do and rebelled against any and every rule in the book. While Chandler was touring colleges and getting 1550s on her SAT and singing in the church choir, Chris had other plans. Whether it was stubbornly refusing to clean her half of the shared room with her big sister, ratting Chase out for coming home at 2am drunk, or sneaking out of the second-story window to go out with her all-too-old boyfriend, she tested all of the waters. It wasn’t until college, until she moved away to Athens and was out of the house for the first time in her life that she realized just how important family was to her. She’s been attempting to make up for lost time since. 

That night when she plugs her phone into the charger and shuts it off for the night, she realizes she’d been half expecting a late night text from Charles. It didn’t come, and disappointed isn’t the right word for the tiny little pit in her stomach because she wasn’t really expecting anything to come from typing her number into his contacts.  It’s not disappointment, it’s something closer to acceptance or rejection, maybe. It’s not like he would’ve been searching out anything but a hookup, anyways, and Chris made it perfectly clear that she wasn’t into that idea. 

She would never hear from him again, and that’s how it should be. The whole interaction turning into anything but a story she can tell in a couple months when she’s drunk would be entirely too complicated of an outcome. 

She doesn’t let herself think about it any longer, leaves her phone face down on the side table and tucks herself into bed. 

– – –

Traffic on race day is true-crime inducing. They’re driven, again, escorted and still spend an hour and a half in the backseat of an SUV. Bill and Chris watch from the VIP stands and Chris has never seen anything like this, especially not at COTA. Even Talladega and Daytona barely hold a candle to this spectacle. 

If she has one critique, it’s that F1 should really hire some B-List at best celebrity to scream drivers, start your engines! At the start of the race like they do in NASCAR. It would really add some flare, she thinks. 

She and Bill share Chris’ airpods, one in each of their ears listening to the NASCAR broadcast. Charles starts twelfth, for whatever reason. She can’t be bothered to look into it, knows it’ll probably be a penalty she doesn’t understand and she’ll be tumbling down a rabbit hole before she knows what’s happened to her. 

While it’s not Chase’s best race–he finishes fourteenth with a single sigh from Bill–Charles puts on a show, fights his tires all the way up into third. 

They watch the podium celebrations on the TV screens and nobody looks happy to be up there. They look miserable, almost, and she understands it to an extent. It’s hard to have energy after a race, she’s witnessed it first hand more times than she can count. It’s hard, especially at the end of the season. Burn-out is real, but still. They look bored. She didn’t know spraying champagne could look so tired. 

Bill grumpily flies them home to Georgia late Sunday night. He’d wanted to wait until Monday morning, after all the billionaires and their super-jets take off right after the race, but Chris refused to miss another day of work this early in the school year, not when she was already going to be missing time in December for her brother’s wedding. 

Bill’s been flying planes since before any of his kids were born. His most recent purchase is a Cessna Conquest II that he uses to fly the family around for short distances. In another gene that skipped the females in the family, Chandler, Chris, and their mom all prefer to be passengers. Chase, however, followed in Dad’s footsteps once more in becoming an avid aviation fan. 

By the time they take off, any thought Chris had of getting a text from Charles has faded far into obscurity. He’d probably gotten dozens of numbers from girls this weekend. He was probably at a club somewhere right now still pulling women. Women more his type, probably. He seems like he’d be more into the refined type, the girls without the ‘cheap’ accents who were all worldly and spoke seventeen languages fluently and had long legs that carried them down runways across Europe every other weekend. 

Little southern girls get texts from little southern boys, that’s how it goes. That's how it’s always gone, and Chris is beyond naive to think anything different for even a moment. 

She grades papers on the flight home. Purple pen, because she thinks that color is fun and red is too cruel to grade with. Puffy stickers for everyone, even the kids who aren’t anywhere near the right track because she doesn’t want anyone to feel less than just because they struggle a bit more. Chris has always been a firm believer that the student is never the problem. If someone isn’t learning what she’s teaching, she needs to adjust the way she teaches it to cater to their learning style. 

It’s her job to teach them, not their job to learn. 

Joris has been laughing at Charles from the hotel room armchair for fifteen minutes now, beyond entertained by his best friend’s restless pacing, providing absolutely zero aid to his current predicament. This act has been going on for some time now. Charles, pacing for five minutes before pulling out his phone and typing up an opening message to Chris. Each time, he starts to read it out to Joris and then stops himself short, deletes it, and paces for five more minutes. 

Hey, Chris. This is Ch–no, that’s stupid. 

Sorry it took me a minute to text–absolutely not. 

What’s up? It’s Charles, how–someone should just stop him from speaking to women all together. 

There’s half a dozen renditions before Joris breaks. “Mate? What is your problem?” He finally asks. “It’s just a girl.”

“I know,” Charles sighs, “I know.”

“Then why can’t you send her a text?”

“Because.” He doesn’t really know why he can’t land on a message, why everything he types sounds entirely too casual or formal or nothing at all like what he would say to another human being. This isn’t a problem that he’s used to having. It’s the in-person flirting that fucks him up, not the texts and DMs and comments. She was just… he doesn’t know what she was. She was just. End of sentence. 

It’s no help that he doesn’t know American texting culture, unfamiliar with how long he’s supposed to wait to send a message or what he’s supposed to say in the opening text. 

“Here,” Joris says, holds his hand out for the phone. “I’ve got the perfect text.”

“Don’t send it,” Charles warns, but passes the phone to his friend. 

“I… won’t,” Joris says slowly, struggling to multi-task. He doesn’t type for more than a few seconds and then hands the phone back to Charles, with the message already sent. Charles’ look of sheer panic is met with a smile and a chef’s kiss from Joris. 

She turns her phone off while Bill is shutting the plane engine down in the hangar. Because of his love of aviation, Bill had bought some land out in the woods a couple decades ago and turned it into the family’s private airstrip for their planes.  Elliott Field, they coined it, stored all their extra vehicles out on the property. She slips it into her back pocket as her and Bill disembark and lock up the place, and the entire time she can feel it vibrating, the notifications from the hour and a half flight catching up now that she’s on the ground again. 

It’s not until she’s in her car that she checks them, pulls her phone out to plug it into the aux and play some music for the drive back to her house. Right at the top of the dozens of notifications is a message from an unknown number with an unfamiliar area code. 

[one unread message] the notification reads. She unlocks her phone to check the message. 

She closes the messages app on her phone and opens up Spotify, shuffles her favorite playlist. She doesn’t reply to his text, doesn’t know if she wants to or even what she might say back. She’s sleepy, more than ready for bed after a long weekend in the sun, excited to be back with her students bright and early tomorrow morning. 

The text from the cute race car driver can wait for another day. An issue for tomorrow, maybe. 

[jeevaschrist]

i was hoping to ask for a bad matchup if your still open!!! if not it’s fine:>

you can call me m!

some things about me include^^

im 5’5, she/her, scorpio/infj, i struggle a lot with my sexuality:(( i also have bpd if that helps<3

i tend to be quite a quiet person if you don’t know me and it takes me a while to warm up to people. i like physical contact but only when i initiate it bc it scares me so much:(( but then im also a pussy LMAO

i have a sarcastic personality and ive always been told im a bubbly girl. i do have bad trust issues and have had quite the rough upbringing, due to that i have quite low self esteem and body image. i would also say im quite a compulsive liar, it sounds bad but it’s something i can help.

some things i actually enjoy would be reading, baking/cooking, health/biology, psychology, orthodoxy/catholicism and i am taking law in college which could be a good pointer!!! i have quite a morally grey stand on things and criminology has always interested my morbid curiosity.

look wise!!! i have short black dyed hair, brown/blue eyes (i hv heterochromia), a bumpy nose!!!, very pale skin, im rather slim but i am honestly built like an airpod😭 further on both my arms and legs r a quite scarred, ive learned to live with it but they never go unnoticed yk:( i also tend to dress rather modestly? long dresses/skirts. sometimes ill wear jeans or baggy trousers though!!!

THANKYOU SO MUCH^^

I HOPE THIS ISNT 2 MUCH😭😭😭🫶🏻

hi m! i am still open! here's that matchup :)

tbh i think yosano and you would be cute together

i've actually seen people not liking her and tbh i love her and think she's an icon, and i think you two would be so iconic together! she would take such an interest in your hobbies/interests and tbh i think you both would be up into SUCH late hours of the night discovering all you can about them. she'd understabnd the trust issues and tbh she has them too, so nothing owuld be pushed or rushed unless you both were cool with it and had talkjed about it beforehand. she'd think you're cute and would ast first struggle with the physical contact, wanting to hug you and kiss you and all that, but as soon as you state you aren't comfortable with it and she understands, she'd be the type to be super respectful and scream at ppl who get too close but don't touch you. yosano can see through lies like she can see through windows so lying to her and getting away with it would be hard. and she'd be the type to hype you up a bunch so she would definitely support you there as well! i think you two would be cute together <3

a/n: BUILT LIKE AN AIRPOD PLS THAT'S SO CLEVER- njsnnf i love this sm

[ezdotjpg]

New Links!

Can you tell us a bit about Prism and Ash?

I love their designs

thank u !! First, have these doodles I just did of them

lore stuff under the cut!

Prism

as promised, the colors each have a preferred hairstyle lol see above

I like to think of the colors working according to SU gem fusion rules lmao. That is to say, when they're combined into Prism, Prism is the single sum of all of them, rather than 4 minds sharing one body. But they have to be in harmony to manage it, so when he gets overly emotional in any direction, or wars with himself about something, he splits. Unlike SU gem fusions tho, they were originally one person. They naturally want to exist as Prism, because being split is akin to like, constantly feeling the mental equivalent of phantom limb syndrome.

At this point, they spend quite a bit of time split, because their quest is very recent and they're still struggling to stay harmonious long enough to maintain Prism. They'll get the hang of it eventually.

As a consequence, Prism overcompensates by trying not to feel any strong emotion in particular, in fear that it'll trigger a split. He's level-headed to the point of complete indifference. Honestly, this is probably why they can't stay together very long. Because who can maintain that? That's not really what he's like. But he hasn't realized that yet.

I don't mean to make this, like, all angst tho. This isn't even that angsty in practice. It's a transition period they're still getting used to. they'll either learn to be one person or they'll decide to live with being separate people, or strike some sort of balance in-between.

if it's not already obvious, I'm basing them heavily on the manga.

i actually did do a color pass for Shadow lol, but honestly I haven't figured out how he fits into all this yet. For now, he's dormant.

Ash

I've played very little of LOZ I and only seen bits of AoL gameplay, so bear with me here.

He's a wanderer, sort of perpetually on the run from those who would like to use his blood to awaken ganon. If i'm recalling correctly, there's a prophecy that he's meant to become king of hyrule? he really doesn't want that, so he's also running from that.

he spends a lot of time in caves lol. he's fond of them. he avoids towns if he can manage it, but he always lends a hand when people need help.

probably has the most magical ability of all the links, second only to Mage

he's been alone for so long he has little interest in joining a group

Extremely Tired. He's consistently paranoid and on high alert.

Despite all of this, he's actually mostly content? If it weren't for the threat of the world ending again if he slips up, he'd be pretty much at peace. He's settled on a "this is just how things are" mentality, and he's okay with it. His circumstances haven't made him bitter, if anything they've made him kinder to everyone he comes across.

has the energy of those Kind Guy Who Lives In the Woods youtube channels lol where all they do is post video of themselves foraging and building shelters with no talking and no music, only Nature Sounds. there's always dirt underneath his fingernails. he knows what every plant is and whether or not it's edible. he's clever in fights, using improvised tools and every bit of his surroundings. he's a survivor.

[justakennyoshi]

So I'm going to do the work myself, welcome to Yuki overanalyzing their fav characters, emoji edition c:

Kenny

😒: The side eye emoji mhm, this was probably the hardest one to think about because Kenny is not usually a guy who gets mad and you could associate it with getting angry. However, I think he would use it when he accepts to be part of smth he might not like but he's not a guy to let down others

Cartman: omg kinny don't be a pussy, let's sneak at Token's party it'll be fun Kenny: 's a bad idea Cartman: I'll give you 10 bucks Kenny: 😒 fine I'll go Kyle: It's Tolkien* fatass and Kenny you don't have to agree to everything for money for god's sake Cartman is typing...

🌮: I actually didn't know the meaning of this so I had to google it! And well...

Self explanatory am I right?

Butters: Kenny, why is your status just "🌮🌮🌮🌮🌮"? Kenny: . Butters: Ken? Kenny: ...I was high Butters: That didn't answer my question :( Kenny: There are some things you don't need to know Buttercup Butters: Ok! Kenny: Good Butters: I'm googling it Kenny: wait no- Butters: Oh now I know, that's clever mister! Butters: Me too!! (based on me being 19 yo and not knowing the meaning before this)

☝️: Ok so this was obvious for me but it's because I use a similar emoji for the same purpose. If I could put it in simple words, it means "this" tho I thought of the nerd emoji LMAO (🤓☝️). It could be used in a message but its clearly more effective if used as a reaction emoji like the following

Kenny is a guy of few words and I think it would also apply when texting so he'd react with this whenever he agrees on someone's statement instead of actually replying

EDIT:

Thanks to a comment I've seen there's another interpretation for 2 of Kenny's emojis, being 😏 and✌️so I'd like to briefly cover them too!

😏: "horny" Self explanatory, goes well with 🌮

Kenny: guys Stan: wassup kenny Kenny: nothin just thinkin in 🌮😏 Kyle: GROSS

✌️: I can feel this one is more of a mood than anything. It literally means "peace" which makes sense bc he's a peaceful guy but I also think he'd be using it when feeling silly lmao

Craig: Ok, so who of you fuckers broke it? I'm not mad I just want to know Tweek: I DID IT I BROKE IT Craig: No, no you didn't. Clyde? Clyde: Don't look at me, look at Tolkien Tolkien: What? I didn't break it Clyde: Huh how weird, how did you even know it was even broken? Tolkien: Because it's sitting right in front of us and it's BROKEN Clyde: Suspicious... Tolkien: No it's not (I hope you know this iconic audio bc I'm skipping it) Kenny: I broke it. I kindly smashed it because it scared the shit outta me Kenny: Now I'm going to watch them all fight for hours Kenny: ✌️peace

Butters:

🍁: The maple emoji. I'm not quite sure about this one tbh. According to urban dictionary it could mean weed bc of the shape but honestly Butters wouldn't use it with that purpose lmao. So where does maple come from? Welp from Canada, oh right! Butters had a canadian girlfriend during that time (they broke up eventually but Heidi's investigation pretty much included all the past logs so yeah) so the meaning is probably a shortcut to mean his (ex)girlfriend, showing how of a visual guy he is

Cartman: Hey I need you right now Butters: Nuh uh I'm in a vc with🍁🍁🍁 Cartman: You're "talking" with weed???? That kinny bastard invited you and not me???!!! Butters: What?!! Nononono I meant my girlfriend! Cartman: Oh dats lame

🍆: I'm not innocent enough to not know the meaning of this one. I mean, this one is universal knowledge me thinks. So it means "penis" or how Butters would call it: a weiner LMAO

So if you don't know our fella Butters, in the show he talks about these quite often, watch the black friday trilogy, wieners out and the one episode with cartman for reference. This is not surprising at all and also a reason why Cartman (he's one to talk) always says Butters is gay lol

Butters: YOU GUYS, THE NEW GAME OF THRONES REBOOT WAS HORRIBLE Cartman: Ugh not again Butters: I'm telling yall!!!! his 🍆🍆🍆 WAS SO BIG AND EXPLICIT, WHY did they have to show the guys 🍆🍆🍆 so much Kyle: We know that movie sucked ass Stan: Yeah dude, get over it Butters: But I don't get it!!! What's the appeal of it? Why so much 🍆🍆🍆?????? Kenny: maybe the author was just gay Butters: Mhm that could make sense why else would they expose so much 🍆🍆🍆 am I right? Kenny: yeah so much 🍆🍆🍆 Butters: Ikr 🍆🍆🍆 >:( Kenny: hehe 🍆🍆🍆 Cartman: YOU FUCKTARDS USE THAT DAMN EMOJI ONE MORE TIME AND YOU'LL SEE Kyle: 🍆 Cartman is typing...

👫: An emoji of a couple, I think this is likely to be used when Butters is either 1) being visual again and showing his relationship with his gf (Charlotte in this case) or 2) when he's single and is complaining about how much he wants a girlfriend, showing how much of a daydreamer he is www

Butters: Aw gee Ken, I'd love to get a girlfriend and do 👫 things :( Kenny: nws it'll happen eventually :) Butters: Are you sure? I'm not really popular at school and everyone makes fun of me Kenny: they know shit ur a good guy Leo Butters: c: thanks Ken Kenny: that's what friends are for Butters: Yeah!!! I love you so much Kenny thank you so much for being my friend!!! I hope it never changes :D Kenny: ... me too buttercup (context Kenny in this convo has a crush on Butters wahaha)

🍍: So another fruit huh, I again googled it to find THIS meaning

tho I found it has more meanings... I want to think Butters just likes pineapples and uses these a lot 😭😭😭 there's also the meaning of swinging but Butters is not this type of guy www

But also "complicated relationship status" really reminded me of his parents so what if he tells his closest friends that whenever he sends that emoji it means his parents are there/near?

Kenny: hey buttercup hows it going Butters: 🍍🍍🍍ffsafsdfasdfdsvjkvnjn Kenny: got it (Butters was already being yelled at and typed that without seeing but the pineapples are one of his most used emojis so it works)

UNLESS??? (and prepare Marjorine believers)

:))) not sure about this one but if it's correct how nice

Welp that's it folks I did this instead of my sptober entries otsu

So

Kenny uses 😒🌮☝️

Butters uses 🍁🍆👫🍍

Ahem bunny nation can we just super overanalyze this please?

[celestialholz]

Celestial Live-Reacts: STP 2.2, 'Penance'

Well I've already seen at least twenty very interesting gifs of this episode, let's fucking goooo

The red grid's everywhere?

"How 'Yesterday's Enterprise' of you." This man's been on the screen for three seconds and he's already breaking the fourth wall, I fucking adore him 😍

"You're the very board upon which this game is played." Q into roleplaying confirmed? Entities You Don't Want As Your DM include 😂

"Old, yes! How unfair time is... so many wrinkles. So many disappointments." Ah well, good to see that three decades hasn't harmed de Lancie's ability to sell the absolute shit out of a scene, my god. The bitterness is almost tangible 😭

That almost face-touch was him stopping himself because he doesn't want to actually confirm his own words and touch the wrinkles, I'm fucking done

"The chase is cut, Picard; the chase is bleeding, the chase is dying in your arms, and I am but a suture in the wound." Jesus H. Christ John, your acting sir? Honestly, you don't just come along and be a perfect foil to the brilliance that is Patrick Stewart, and this man's always managed it effortlessly ❤❤

This whole scene is so gay, I adore it to tiny pieces 😍😍

Today on 'Celestial Hazards a Guess': this situation is putting Q under considerable mental strain to amend because it's so widespread. I don't actually think it's a physical health issue? I'm going with PTSD. 🤔

... He didn't want to tell him that did he, oh dear

He's saving his fucking life and entire timeline because he loves him and Picard still won't look twice at him, I am dead my dudes 😣😭

We're in an AU fanfic boys, get hype

"You see, I thought to myself, I thought - I really must see Jean-Luc." This whole exchange is ice-cold, but this? Yeah no, this is the only honest thing here

"So I simply sought out the nearest explosion." 😂😂 Valid

"Oh I could tell you, but you're far too clever to listen." Very Tapestry...

"We're never too old to be students of our own behaviour, Jean-Luc..."

... And then he hits him? Actually fucking PHYSICALLY?! Brooo, there is DEFINITELY something wrong with this entity's psyche, as if he would ever 👀

"And I've had enough of your obstinance, your stubbornness, your insistence in changing in all ways but the one that matters!" You, erm... way to show a guy your heart there, good lords above ❤

'Penance'... a punishment laid upon oneself for their transgressions. This man has not done his homework and Mr Q is angry 😶

I'm kinda loving these clicks where nothing much seems to happen until it does - I'd say it was lazy, but I'm thinking it's indicative of the mental state now. No flashiness, all substance - his usual opposite 🤔

Mirrorverse? Are we really mirrorversing right now

"Through a mirror, darkly - and here, the man who holds the glass is darker still." I get that this is Picard's horror story, but the 'man who holds the glass' here is Q in showing him all this, and I love that dichotomy

... That's Gul Dukat? Oh shi -

Martok and Sarek? Mirror!Picard is pantomime levels of evil, damn sir

A girl needs to write a Qcard mirror fic, clearly

"This is the only life you understand"????? What

"But don't worry - I won't let you do this alone." My heart. 😍😍

"Do you wish for me to respond to the designation 'Q', sir?" Look what your nonsense has wrought Picard 😒

This really do be Tapestry 2 my dudes, fuck

This is still a James Bond intro sequence

The roses, though, murder me personally - rose-tinting, Tapestry roses, symbol of general love, and courage...

... Hang on, all of that was just the cold open? Fucking damn son, this series goes hard lmao

Picard is space Hitler now. Okey-doke 🙃

"Colombian roast, black." "... This really is the circle that Dante overlooked." 😂😂

... I mean this timeline's garbage, buuuut Picard also doesn't suddenly have a random romantic interest from nowhere, so...

'Eradication Day'. Oh fuck

Oh hello Seven, you beautiful lady you 😍😍

Is she married?

Where do I get me an electronic candle that realistic

If they had to give Seven a husband, it should have been Robert Beltrane for full and complete levels of sitcom nonsense

General Sisko, god fucking help us all 👀

Love this bloody friendship between Rios and Seven, it's so wholesome ❤

What did you do to my son's girlfriend

The matriarchal love 😍😍

"I want this one kept alive - for questioning!" "I don't know anything!" 😂 Precious child, bless him ❤

Even in the mirrorverse, Agnes is operating on -100% and I feel that spiritually

Spot-73 is an icon. He's giving me absolutely nothing and I love him 😍

... Are they about to finish exterminating the Borg? Oh, very good - I await Picard's split opinion with great interest 👀

Even the Queen thinks Agnes is too quirky, damn 🤣

'The Borg Queen has a kind of trans-temporal awareness' - ahhhhhh, intriguing

That is a spectacular villain HQ

These little interlinks to how they reconnect are wondrous

"Say what now?" Oh Raffi ❤

Ohhh, so she has 'commitment issues'? Well, that explains something in this show, for once

... It's not an AU?

'Mr Alphabet' 😂😂

"This morning, even for Q, he seemed... unstable. Not quite sane." Is that concern I detect Jean-Luc, good lord - a writer might think you care... 👁👄👁

Elnor completely missing sarcasm gives me life

"A friend, a foe, and now..." Now what exactly

Spirk mention, hurrah!

Jeri is on fire here, this Queen chemistry's glorious

Annika 'Seven Shots'? Up your game sweetie, you'd never have survived my university 😂

Noooo Elnor 😣

So many relationship issues in this show, so little build-up

YES ELNOR 😘

"Time travel is not a way to make me feel better, about anything" - me during 95% of Trek time travel storylines

I'm with Rios here, fuck connecting that to my ship

NOOO ELNOR 😭😭

"Killed whilst rescuing a Borg." I, Borg Picard would never

... Wow, guys.

Celestial Rating: 8/10.

Whatever the fuck the space husband's up to, it's hugely compelling - and this new, dystopian alternative future's beautifully realised. Even Agnes didn't irritate me this week. Very promising.

[ihaveafandom-problem554]

12 Kizuki group chat: Kokushibo's missing sword pt 1

•◇•◇•◇•◇•◇•◇•◇•

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Ok who did it?

Catboy: Did what?

👁Spider👁eyes👁: My sword. It's missing.

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Why are your names "Catboy" and "👁Spider👁eyes👁"

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: AND WHY IS MY NAME "💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼"!???

👁Spider👁eyes👁: I do not care for the names. I want to know what happened to my sword

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Like I don't mind the Girlboss part and the nails. BUT WHO NAMED ME A MAKEUP WHORE

Catboy: Honestly I don't even care anymore about my name... I've been called it so many times I might as well respond to it

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Wow- are you accepting defeat-

Catboy: HELL NO

👁Spider👁eyes👁: I am very close to coming into everyone's room and hurting all of you

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Jeez Kokushibo.. why are you so mad?

Catboy: Cause someone took his sword right?

Catboy: Wait-

Catboy: How did anyone manage to take it away from you isn't always on your belt thing..

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: Are you not a samurai? Shouldn't you know what the belt thing is?

Catboy: STFU

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: "Fish Vase" 😭

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: Who changed the names?? IT does not fit my style whatsoever 😒

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Your appearance says otherwise-

Catboy: 🤣🤣

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: And no I have not see your sword Kokushibo... Terribly sorry

👁Spider👁eyes👁: And yet you have absolutely no proof that you touched my sword..

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: If it makes you feel any better I made a pot dedicated to you!

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Hiiii!!!! What are we talking about???

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: Our dear comrade Kokushibo has misplaced his sword

👁Spider👁eyes👁: I have not "misplaced" it. Someone took it without my consent.

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Oh dear...

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Maybe Akaza-Dono knows where it is!!

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: BRO IM JUST NOW GETTING DOUMA'S CHAT NAME 💀💀

Catboy: HOW ARE YOU JUST NOW GETTING IT I'VE BEEN LAUGHING MY ASS OFF THE SECOND IT SHOWED UP

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: LMAO

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: His name is my favorite so far

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃:Heyyy! Who Changed my name!!

👁Spider👁eyes👁: My sword

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Actually..

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Douma, Daki, Gyokko and Kaigaku. Get everyone else I'll just interagate everyone here

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: ooookkkk

Catboy: For a hot second I thought Kokushibo was saying his sword changes the names 💀

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Omg!! Same🤣

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: Why is Douma in my room telling me to join the fucking gc

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Ok nevermind Akaza's my favorite

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: WHY AM I NAMED "🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀"!!?

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: WHY DOES EVERYONE THINK IM A GAY BASKETBALL?!!

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Guys!! I got Akaza-Dono!!

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: Ok the names are clever

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Ikr! Except mine though

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: Who changed the names?

😁🙂😡🤬😓Most Dysfunctional😁🙂😡🤬😓: Hantengu refused to type so I'm doing it for him

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: We don't know.. We're trying to figure that out now

👁Spider👁eyes👁: which emotion is typing for Hantengu?

😁🙂😡🤬😓Most Dysfunctional😁🙂😡🤬😓: Aizetsu

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Okay then

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: Oh? I thought we were trying to figure out what happened to Kokushibo's sword?

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: Kokushibo lost his sword? How did someone manage to take it off of his belt thingy?

Catboy: That's what I said!

👁Spider👁eyes👁: No one took it while I had it on

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: No shit you would Kill us on the spot

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Without a second thought about it too...

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: So did someone take it whole you were sleeping?

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Obviously it had to be when he was most vulnerable...Which is a rare occurrence..

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Especially from Kokushibo-dono

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Oh! OH! Maybe when he was in the shower!

👁Spider👁eyes👁: I was in the shower when it was stolen

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Yay!! I was right!!

💃💃Doumbass Cultleader💃💃: Oh that was such a good guess!!

Catboy: Doesn't that make you a suspect now?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: oh.. Well I didn't do it!!

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: Yeah! Why would Daki even want to take his sword?!

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Yeah! No offense Kokushibo but your sword is really ugly. I wouldn't want even I'd you promise me some Marechi blood!

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: I love the fact your sword being ugly is her reasoning for not stealing it

Catboy: Hey! His sword isn't ugly!

👁Spider👁eyes👁: My sword being pretty or not is not the problem here

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃: So when did you take a shower?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Oh no wonder Kokushibo always smells really nice

👁Spider👁eyes👁: A little after sunset. I put it down in my room and headed off to the shower

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Excuse me Daki, what?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Yeah! Sometimes you smell really good. Like, a fresh body or a new body shampoo

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Um..Thank you?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: 😁 Your Welcome!

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: He's going to think about that for the whole week now

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃: Ooo! What do I smell like?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: ....

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: ... Not good

Catboy: Terrible

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Half the time you smell really rotten

🏀💅🏼Possibly gay basketball💅🏼🏀: I swear to Muzan, if you say rotten women..

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Like a rotten woman

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: oh shit..

Catboy: DAKI FUCKED UP!

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: IM SORRY

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: KAIGAKU STFU

Catboy: NAH WHORE NOW YOUR GETTING AKAZA IN TROUBLE

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: NO AKAZA STOP IM SORRY

🎼🎶Musical transportation🎼🎶: Akaza I don't recommend beating up Douma at this exact moment. Muzan wouldn't want to be greeted with blood on the walls and another broken part of the fortress

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: Musical transportation?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼:Oh my goodness that is not Nakime-

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: Nakime?

🎼🎶Musical transportation🎼🎶: Yes it is Nakime.. who took the liberty of changing my name?

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: We were trying to figure that out, but apparently Kokushibo's sword is way more important

🎼🎶Musical transportation🎼🎶: ahh ok

😁🙂😡🤬😓Most Dysfunctional😁🙂😡🤬😓: Going back to the topic about Kokushibo leaving his sword out a little after sunset

😁🙂😡🤬😓Most Dysfunctional😁🙂😡🤬😓: Akaza and Hantengu both went out to finish a mission. Nakime can confirm that

🎼🎶Musical transportation🎼🎶: This is true. They informed me about it just earlier

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Wait does that mean, Kokushibo doesn't have to question them?

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃: Yeah I believe so!

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Lucky!

Catboy: And your still a huge suspect! HA

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: She's not a suspect! It was just a really good guess!

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: Yeah! Plus I was busy finding my new outfit I was going back to the red light district tmr! There's no way you can blame me

Catboy: Oh Douma's back

Catboy: Damn it

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃: Yep!

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃: Heyyy☹

👅👁👅Fish vase👅👁👅: Wait then where's Akaza?

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃: He said something about not wanting to see me, so I tried following him but then I lost him so... I went back to his room!

✊🏼Sister lives matter✊🏼: Why would you go back to his room?

💃💃Doumass Cultleader💃💃:Why wouldn't I?

👁Spider👁eyes👁: I should've just done this the easier way

💅🏼💅🏼Makeup Whore Girlboss💅🏼💅🏼: What was the easier way?

👁Spider👁eyes👁: ....

👁Spider👁eyes👁: Don't question it. Just tell me where my sword is?

◇•◇•◇•◇•◇•◇•◇•

I'm just going to end it here for now and put this into multiple parts-

Imma start doing chat story things with both the demons and the Hashira-

Anyway byeeeee

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