#and the fact that they’re suddenly able to be justifably upset with him… making him the target of righteous anger…

[maschotch]

You mentioning the fact that they're profilers is so real bc like it honest to god ASTOUNDS me how badly they all read hotch like he so so so so clearly cares for every member of the Bau WAAYYY more than he cares for him self and he's literally never shown otherwise??? Like even the whole drill boss stuff or whatever tf he said he's never aggressive with the group if they mess up he's always understanding but fair and most is pretty much the first one to comfort them (if the script allows) UNLESS he's going through some shit IE the whole divorce plot and foyet AND IT BAFFLES ME HOW EVERYONE FUCKING MISSES IT CONSIDERING ITS THEIR J O B

they’re all kinda bad at profiling each other but istg they have to TRY to understand hotch so poorly… i’m trying to think of a moment where he yells at them when they’re not directly putting themselves in danger or in the immediate aftermath of him getting attacked in his fucking home, but i cant think of anything?? he doesnt like being harsh with them and he learns the hard way with the elle situation that it doesnt get them anywhere. the only time he was unduly upset w someone was with emily in the beginning and that’s only bc he thought she was either a nepotism hire (which she kinda was) or a plant for strauss (which she kinda was)

he’s “strict” but like?? is he?? he does half their paperwork for them and they dont even know it. instead of doing things by the book and getting reid fired, he turned the other way and let him work through his drug problem. maybe he says “no” sometimes, but he usually relents anyway—like when jj has a feeling ab a case or when he calls the fucking vatican for emily. if he was a drill sergeant, would he let garcia keep a bunch of clutter on her desk and dress in bright clothing?? he doesnt coddle them or anything bc that’s not really his personality, but he’s gentle w them and even praises them when he knows they need it. he doesnt always step in and help when he should (i think that honestly has more to do w him being self conscious than anything—he doesnt want a drill sergeant/bully to make things worse), but he keeps a close eye on each of their wellbeing and will quietly urge one of the others to help out if someone’s in a tough spot

sure he doesn’t smile a whole lot and he’s known for his perpetually neutral face, but at the same time it’s not very hard to tell how he’s feeling. he’s effective at his job, he’s good at playing the tough guy, but tbh he let’s things get to him easily. he takes their criticism to heart and does his best to be better. he HATES seeing any of them hurt: ever notice how after what happened with elle he never uses his own agents as bait like that again? he either uses himself (like the fight club episode) or one of the team volunteers and he relents (like emily in the omegaverse swingers episode). they misread his social awkwardness as being cold when really i think he’s just mildly uncomfortable being the center of attention in an unprofessional setting.

it’s wild to me how frequently they misjudge him. i think he kinda knows and almost encourages it?? while still considering their judgements genuine?? morgan is a great example: of all his subordinates, morgan has worked with him the longest, since before he was in charge of the team. so you’d think morgan would have the best insight. but morgan has a complicated relationship w authority figures and tends to be automatically defensive out of habit. essentially, he’s been projecting on hotch since day one and has been blinded by the convoluted series of lenses he sees hotch through: as a constantly rotating mixture of buford, stilinski, and his father. it’s prevented him for actually seeing hotch for who he is, and hotch seems to make no real effort to correct any of those presumptions. but hotch still takes it personally when morgan criticizes him (prob bc it feeds his own negative view of his self worth and uses it as justification for whatever self loathing bullshit he’s on)

basically, hotch knows everyone has skewed perceptions of him and is fine letting their delusions continue uninterrupted—encourages it, even. he’s more comfortable receiving scathing remarks, even if they’re inaccurate, bc it allows him to continue his own delusion ab his place in the world. if they hate him (or if he thinks they hate him), it gives him a reason to hate himself. which is why i think he kinda likes that they’re bad at profiling him. it’s a way to receive that negative attention without actually being vulnerable. it’s a very very passive manipulation—more like he’s allowing them to manipulate themselves—that feeds his self loathing. i think he does it on purpose, so i cant necessarily fault the others for so drastically misunderstanding hotch. especially since they do get better at it over the seasons: they’re able to see through his defense mechanisms a little more, even if they still cant see him clearly

[siswritesyanderes]

Ok but yandere carlise x reader x yandere esme

(Not as detailed as I’d hoped to make it, but I quickly realized that if I went into detail then this thing would become very long. Hopefully avoided making the characters too OOC. Let me know if you like it, and how I did!)

…

You first met Dr. Cullen when you spent the day volunteering at the local hospital for one of your college classes.

There was a whole group of students there to help out, and you honestly weren’t sure why he seemed to notice you in particular; it certainly wasn’t because you were doing such a great job. Your work speed, in restocking the closets, was roughly average, and you kept having to ask your fellow volunteers where things were supposed to go. Granted, you at least weren’t one of the students who was transparently doing the absolute bare minimum to get the credit, but you wouldn’t exactly consider yourself a shining star of competence either.

Still, Dr. Cullen approached you personally to say, “Thank you for your help. You’re really doing us a great service.”

He was a beautiful man, with warm eyes that seemed to be beholding the goodness in your soul, for how amiably they glimmered.

“I don’t know if I can take any credit,” you said, admittedly flustered by the attention. “It was our teacher’s idea.”

He smiled kindly. “Nevertheless, we’re glad to have you here.”

You smiled back. “Glad to be here.” Then you continued working.

When Carlisle walked away from you, he carefully kept the reluctance from showing in his expression. He sent Esme a quick text warning her that they might have another soulmate in town: a human. His initial thought was that this would be the end of it; so long as Esme avoided meeting you, she wouldn’t feel the awful desperation currently clawing its way up Carlisle’s throat, and so long as Esme wasn’t suffering, Carlisle was confident in his own ability to let you live your own life, just as he had done with Esme, at first…

But then, he knew how that had turned out for her: years of pain, mistreatment…The thought of anything of the sort befalling you…The world was so dangerous, between humans and vampires and other such things, and you, so small in comparison, so vulnerable…

Carlisle regained his composure (though, to the untrained eye, he hadn’t lost it in the first place). The world could be dangerous, yes, but his awareness of that fact was informed, in no small part, by the fact that he wanted justification for keeping you. And he couldn’t give himself such license; it wouldn’t be right.

He wouldn’t drag you away from your human life.

Perhaps he could keep watch over you, and do you small favors every now and then, but that was the most he could afford to indulge.

He heard your stomach growl from across the room; he detoured to a vending machine and bought you a light snack. (Perfectly timed, Alice texted him your preference. No doubt, she was scouring the future to see how you might fit into it; he would have to have a talk with her, to be sure she didn’t go overboard. And deciding to have a talk with Alice functioned in the same way having a talk with Alice did.)

Dr. Cullen handed you a snack from the vending machine, which puzzled you at first; it didn’t seem like the hospital was handing out food to anyone else, and even if they were, why would one of the doctors take the time for such a thing?

He answered your unspoken question with a polite smile and the words, “You were looking a bit faint; I thought you might need this.”

Had you been looking unwell? You didn’t think you felt that bad, but a doctor would recognize the signs if something was wrong, and you were pretty hungry. “Thanks,” you said, and he dipped his head in your direction. Then he and his kind smile departed.

That wasn’t the last time you met Dr. Cullen.

Your paths crossed in all sorts of places: in the grocery store, he tapped you on the shoulder once to ask if you’d dropped a hundred dollar bill, and he urged you to keep it even once you’d told him it wasn’t yours; you saw him in your school’s science building, one day (He was there to speak to one of the professors, and he asked you if you had drunk any water recently.); and you even ran into him at the library. All incidents spaced out over weeks; not close enough together to really be coincidences worth thinking about. You figured that you had probably crossed paths just as much before meeting him, but only noticed now because you knew who he was.

Anyway, the two of you remained acquaintances. He was a nice man.

When someone slammed into your car, a few months later, he was the doctor who cared for you.

“A hit and run?” he murmured, tutting in displeasure as he moved a light across your eyes. “People should be more considerate, and careful with other people’s lives. You could have been seriously hurt.”

“They probably just made a mistake and were scared of the consequences,” you offered, because the doctor genuinely seemed somewhat upset. You were trying to assume the best about the other driver, because the alternative was getting angry about something you couldn’t change. You had barely even seen the car that had hit you. You just knew that it was some shade of yellow, and apparently much stronger than yours. “I wish we’d gotten to trade insurance information or something, though; my car is apparently totaled.” Despite your best efforts, your voice wavered.

“Don’t you worry about that,” Dr. Cullen said, and you were probably delirious, but something about the decisive way he said it made it seem, to you, as if he himself planned on helping you get your car fixed. “Follow the light with your eyes.”

You did.

“Have you...” The doctor seemed to choose his words carefully. “Have you called anyone, to let them know what happened, and that you’re alright?”

“No, I guess I haven’t. The ambulance got there so fast, I guess I didn’t have time to think about it.” You weren’t terribly concerned, though; if your relatives hadn’t been made aware of the crash, then they didn’t know to be worried yet. No need to call them now.

Dr. Cullen stilled at your words, though; the light in his hands shone in the spot between your eyes and did not move. It was as if he was deep in thought. No, as if he were at war with himself.

“Dr. Cullen?” you prompted.

He quickly smiled, setting down the light. “I think you should call them. Now, if you can. I would...just feel better if someone knew where you are, and that you’re alive.”

You called them (as awkward as that felt with the doctor right there in the room, patiently waiting), and Dr. Cullen seemed to relax.

Once you were released from the hospital, you went back to only seeing him every once in a while, around town.

Your car was mended seemingly overnight, under mysterious circumstances, and a part of you jokingly wondered if Dr. Cullen was some sort of fairy godmother, or guardian angel.

Then, another month after your accident, a stranger approached you while you were walking back from your last class of the evening.

“Hi,” the stranger greeted you, somewhat apologetically. She was shorter than you, with a lovely face and spiky black hair and a spritely disposition. “I’m Alice. I’m so sorry to bother you, but could you help me carry something to my car? It’s getting late, and I really don’t want to be here after dark.”

“Oh, sure,” you answered, feeling so at ease that you forgot every warning that would normally flood to your mind about the danger of following a stranger to her car. So at ease that your mind somehow just failed to observe the taller guy standing right next to Alice, well in your field of vision. You saw him, but you didn’t really think much of him.

You followed Alice to a bright yellow Porsche, and the shade of yellow stirred something in your memory, but you couldn’t say what; you were too busy looking for what you were supposed to be helping her lift.

A lovely woman with a long blond ponytail leaned against the car trunk, staring at something that she was holding in her hand, and there was a figure sitting inside the car, too; you couldn’t see them through the tinted windows, but you saw enough to be confused as to why you had been called here to help when it seemed Alice had many potential helpers, here.

Your panic, as you began to realize the ruse, had only just begun to climb when the blond woman suddenly moved, swift as a bird, behind you, and there was a hand over your mouth and a feeling like a pinch in the side of your neck.

The thing she was holding. It was a syringe.

The tall guy (the one you hadn’t thought much of, at first) moved to open the nearest door of the Porsche; he moved the passenger seat forward, to access the back row of seats.

“Wait, stop,” you slurred against the hand (the stunningly cold hand) over your mouth, as the woman who had syringed you began to maneuver you into the Porsche with surprising strength. You were already losing control of your limbs.

“This is officially the worst thing I’ve ever done,” the woman griped as she slid you carefully inside, then climbed in behind you. You were sandwiched between her and the person you’d seen through the tinted windows: a sulking young man with bronze hair. Four strangers total, and you were in the back seat of their car.

“Thank you, Rosalie, for your help,” Alice said resolutely. “Will you drive, Jazz?”

The tall one nodded, climbing into the driver’s seat while Alice occupied the passenger side.

You struggled to find your voice, or your fists, through the haze of sedative.

“It’s okay,” said the sulking young man at your side, in a surprisingly gentle voice. “I’m able to hear you, even if you can’t speak. I can read minds.”

“The human is still awake?” Rosalie said.

“Not for much longer, but yes. You have time to apologize.”

“Sorry about all this,” Rosalie said, gently nudging your mouth closed (as it had fallen open). “Don’t be scared; we just…have to bring you to Carlisle and Esme. They’re pretty great people, and they’ll treat you really well. And these guys were going to do it anyway, so I had to come and make sure things went smoothly. Alice and Jasper can’t even administer a shot; they probably would have chloroformed you or something-”

“Wouldn’t’ve had to,” said the tall guy in the driver’s seat- Jasper, apparently. “Could’ve just lightly flicked the back of their head at the right angle. Provided Alice checked the future to make sure we did it right.”

“…and didn’t cause a concussion, or worse,” the bronze-haired one deadpanned.

There was a brief silence. You were sinking against the self-proclaimed mind reader, unable to support your own weight. You were about to sleep. You actually wanted to sleep.

“Don’t worry, Rose,” Jasper added. “I’ve made sure the human isn’t afraid.”

You supposed you weren’t. Why weren’t you?

You fell asleep before you could figure it out.

…

You awoke to the sound of agitated voices, outside the (closed) door of a bedroom that was not your own.

You were in a bed, and it was obscenely soft and pleasant, but it wasn’t yours, and you weren’t home.

Where am I?

You felt weak, and tired. Heavy, confused. But you had to stay awake, and regain your wits, because you had been taken somewhere, and you didn’t know where or why. There was a window across the room. It was nighttime outside the window. Maybe if you could make it over there, you could climb out and run for it, but you didn’t yet have the strength to even get the bedcovers off of you.

“Because it’s been awful to watch how badly it affects you to be away from your mate,” one of the voices outside the door was saying. “All five of us agreed, and we never agree on anything!”

“And it’s not like it wouldn’t have happened eventually,” another voice agreed. “Just like with Esme.”

“Exactly! You were only prolonging your own suffering, for no reason.”

There was a sigh, and a familiar voice said, “Are you all finished?” It was Dr. Cullen; that much you knew, even though you had never heard him sound so tired.

“We did it for you, because you deserve happiness.”

“And now that Esme has seen them, there is no way to undo it, is there?” Dr. Cullen asked rhetorically. “Edward, is the human awake?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll bring some food up, Carlisle,” an entirely new voice suggested. “The children have been…underhanded, today, but there’s no reason we shouldn’t make the best of it.”

“It was for the best.” (Your head was clear enough, now, that you recognized this unabashed voice as belonging to Alice.) “You’ll see.”

Footsteps approached the door, and shortly a woman entered the room. She was soft-looking, with caramel brown hair, and she held a dinner plate in her hands.

“Good evening,” she said, soberly. Sitting on the edge of your bed while you struggled to sit up. “I’m so sorry the kids did this; we didn’t ask them to, but they thought they were doing us a service. I’m Esme Cullen, Dr. Cullen’s wife. Here: eat something.”

You ate a forkful of pasta only because it was too close to your mouth to refuse. “Why ‘m I here?” you asked hoarsely. “Take me home.” Another forkful slid into your mouth.

“I’m very sorry,” Esme said. “I’m so, so sorry, but you see…the trouble is…” Her eyes scanned over you, and she smiled a seemingly involuntary smile and didn’t finish her sentence. As if looking at you was simply a much better use of her time.

“I want to go home,” you said.

Esme sighed, pressing her lips together contritely. “The trouble is, I can’t bear to relinquish someone who is so important to Carlisle, and Carlisle can’t bear to relinquish someone who is so important to me. I promise you, though, we will make it up to you.” She fed you more pasta.

It tasted delicious, but that did nothing to assuage your terror. “You don’t even know me. What do you mean, I’m important to you?”

Esme clicked her tongue softly and rhythmically against the roof of her mouth, as if to soothe. “Carlisle can explain that better than I. But rest assured, everything is going to be alright.”

Your skin crawled, at the dissonant cordiality. “Where is Dr. Cullen?”

You heard a flutter of what could have been footsteps, if people were capable of moving that fast. Then, the bedroom door opened again and Dr. Cullen entered.

“Hello again, dear heart,” he greeted you, and his demeanor was about the same as it was in public, or in the hospital. Respectful, polite. Maybe just a bit...off. Too much of something, maybe too polite and kind for the circumstances. “I’m terribly sorry about all of this.”

The apologies were making this worse. “You don’t have to be sorry,” you said. “Just please take me home.”

“I can’t do that, angel,” he sighed. He did appear sorry, but not as sorry as he should have. “But I can explain everything to you now.”

He sat down on the other side of the bed, opposite Esme, who was still feeding you. And he did explain everything, in such expansive detail that you fell back asleep before he even got to the part about mates.

…

“You can pretend with them, but not with me.” The voice was quiet, and not so much accusatory (despite the pointedness of his words) as reminding.

“I know that, son.” Dr. Cullen sounded positively serene.

“You knew how much time you were spending with Jasper, in your saddened state.”

“Yes.”

“You knew that we would do this.”

“I…suspected.”

“You meant for us to do this.”

“That’s enough, I think. Thank you.”

Silence fell.

You opened your eyes just a crack. The pillow beneath your face was awash with yellow light; the sun had risen, since last you’d fallen asleep. None of it had been a dream. You were still trapped in a house with these people who thought they were vampires. You closed your eyes again. The two voices had been speaking from the direction you were facing: Dr. Cullen at your level, perhaps in a chair at your bedside; and the other above, as if standing.

“One month,” the first voice suddenly added, and you weren’t sure what it was in reference to. It was as if an inaudible question was being answered.

“That’s her optimistic guess, or her pessimistic?” Dr. Cullen inquired.

“If all goes well, it will be one month. Poorly, and the longest she’s seen is three months.”

“Well, that is good to hear. I’ve waited much longer with hope for much less.”

“I know.”

You turned over, so that your back was to them, and began to open your eyes again, but then you heard Dr. Cullen rise from his seat, take up the chair, and move around the foot of the bed. You kept your eyes shut as he set his chair down on the new side and sat in it once more. He did all of this matter-of-factly, as if he’d changed sides every time you’d turned over during the night.

The thought of anyone wanting to see your face that badly made you shiver a bit.

“Awake?” Dr. Cullen inquired casually. You didn’t hear an answer, but the other man must have nodded, because Dr. Cullen continued, “Good. Esme will be done with breakfast soon. She’s so happy to be cooking again.”

“Jasper is in the kitchen with her,” the other said, as if that was a related statement somehow. “I’m going hunting. Good luck.”

You weren’t sure why, but you felt as if he was talking to you as much as Dr. Cullen.

[book-dragon-etcetera]

Why Mantis and Loki should be a thing; fight me (please don’t I swear I’m nice).

What makes a good relationship subplot? Actually, scratch that – this is the MCU, we don’t go for mediocrity – what makes the best relationship subplots? It can vary, but my favourites, the ones that keep me digging and digging, coming back every time I think of a new angle (you’re in the fandom tags, you know what I’m talking about) always tie into the wider story. They feed character growth; allow new concepts to be explored; fit in with and in some cases represent the greater themes of a story.

In case you haven’t guessed, I’m going to be arguing that Loki and Mantis could be something along those lines. Something great. One of the best, most interesting relationships of modern screenwriting. I know, okay!! I know, it feels weird as anything – it’s taken me a while, too. But bear with me, and worst-case scenario, you’ll have a new take on a fascinating pair of characters.

Before I put the two together though, I feel like I need to do a little character study for Mantis. So far, she has had little to no clear development and without serious thought of your own, she seems entirely one-dimensional; two at best. In case you have not plugged hours and hours of thought into a character with barely ten minutes of screen-time, here are some of my thoughts, free of charge 😊. Incidentally, the interpretation I take to enhance my viewing experience (and add suitably crippling levels of angst :D ) ties her in perfectly with Loki’s story and character.

More Than Just a Bug: A Minor Study

What we know: Mantis has spent her whole life in servitude to Ego a massively powerful being, intent on taking over the universe, who sees all other life as inferior, insect-like (hence the name ‘Mantis’ – happenstance in the comics, derogatory in the films). Whether she has ever met anyone else is unclear, and until we actually see her talk about it, we’ll never know. Going by her comfort in talking to the Guardians, and also the fact that she anticipates the result of Ego’s meeting with Peter, I’m going to assume she has, but more specifically, that they were Ego’s other children.

Imagine this, if you will. Mantis, since her childhood, has been intermittently exposed to Ego’s offspring. They appear, are doted on for a few days, and then vanish as suddenly as they came. Not having been delayed by the Ravagers that collected them (as Peter was), they are all young children, with strong but changeable emotions. As such, they fit Ego’s narrative of universe full of mindless beasts, unthinking and impermanent. If Mantis were not an empath, able to feel their distress and confusion at the kidnapping, they would have no impact on her at all. As it is, they give her no epiphany, but rather a slow sense of unease that grows over time, as child after child is reduced to a pile of bones in a cave.

Her uncertainty must of course be hidden from Ego, who may be too narcissistic to imagine she could ever turn against him, but would certainly kill her if he saw her doubts, so she separates herself from the feeling. Her outer self remains uncomplicated and pliant, still attempting to please her adoptive father-figure, while her inner self languishes in steadily deepening turmoil. She dissociates to survive, until she almost believes it herself.

Now let’s try looking at her scene with Drax, where she touches his arm by the flower-filled lakes, through this new lens.

BEWARE. THIS SCENE WILL BECOME SIGNIFICANTLY MORE PAINFUL IF YOU ASSIMILATE THIS INTERPRETATION.

To recap: Mantis has spent her life in a state of slowly growing unease over the pain, suffering and subsequent deaths of Ego’s many children. Her only comfort has been his assurances that all other life is meaningless, and as such their suffering weightless. By Mantis’s own design, this inner struggle has been buried deep, totally inaccessible. Therefore, she goes into this scene entirely intending to allow Ego to kill the Guardians, and if Peter is successful, the universe.

Alright, here goes:

So, Mantis seems normal (normal??) for the first section. She reacts suitably when Drax calls her ugly, and then when he argues that it’s a good thing. When he mentions his lost daughter, she makes a joke (incidentally the sort of play-a-crooked-thing-straight joke that Loki might enjoy), but then Drax compares his daughter to Mantis, calling them both ‘innocent’, and she makes this face when he isn’t looking at her.

This is not a naïve look, and I don’t think it’s meant to be. The tiniest edge of that inner guilt, her natural empathy for the terrible fates of Ego’s children, is bleeding through against her will, brought to the surface by a father mourning the loss of his daughter. Wanting to understand, and partly in fear of what she might find there, she reaches for his arm.

When she feels his grief, she is physically affected, taking large gasps of air with glittering eyes. It’s easy to forget, but in some ways, Drax is the most emotionally developed of the Guardians. He had a wife, and daughter, and a home. He’s lived through what most of us would determine a normal life, and reached middle age. Quill, Gamora, Groot – they’re all younger than him, and therefore less emotionally developed. (I have no idea what age Rocket is, but at least by maturity he can certainly be added to the list.) This level of experience is where Drax’s moments of unexpected wisdom come from. He is a fully realised person with all the complexities and regrets that come with age, something Mantis has never felt in anyone except Ego. And he is mourning his daughter.

When she touches his arm, Mantis is feeling one of the worst losses, the deepest hurts that a person can ever experience, even dulled by years: the loss of a child. But for her, it’s even more than that. It’s personal. She realises in that moment that on the other end of every one of Ego’s children was someone like Drax, feeling what he felt. That they were still out there in the universe, mourning the sons and daughters that Mantis had met. It tilts her world on its axis, and we get a close-up to watch it:

This is her guilt, her worst fears validated. She can no longer use the ‘we’re just insects anyway’ justification to excuse the cavern of bones. Every tiny doubt she has ever had now has an explanation, and it means she has grown up complicit to atrocities she couldn’t even recognise. Upset, and guilty that he still believes her innocent, she turns immediately to Drax, knowing she can no longer stand by do nothing. They are interrupted by Gamora before Mantis can explain, so later that night, knowing she cannot bear being complicit yet again to murder, Mantis wakes Drax and betrays Ego, despite her fear and love for someone who has been (literally) her whole world.

Go watch the scene thinking about Mantis's guilt, I dare you. I did, and it hurt me.

By the end of GotG2, we have a Mantis still conditioned to serve the father she has now killed. His teachings have left her with crippling self-doubt, and a sense of personal inferiority that as of yet we have not seen her question, despite a truly incredible level of power (subduing first Ego – an actual planet – and then Thanos; I’ll go into her frightening Gamora later), and her own heroism. She is incapable of being righteously angry at Ego, because righteously implies right, something it does not occur to her that she might have. And she hides it all, because over the years she has built an unconscious self-defence mechanism which allows her to control people’s actions towards her by seeming harmless and sweet. The ultimate deflector of aggression.

What her motives and feelings might be now she has found her freedom, I also have some thoughts on, but that is a topic for another day (possibly a Loki including day, hmm?). I feel like it’s important to mention that, although this is a dark interpretation, that doesn’t mean I think Mantis is a dark character. There is inherent darkness in the horror of her past, but some of the best and brightest people in the world are people who have been to hell and back, and come back kinder for it. One day, when she has learnt some self-worth, and ditched the clothes that she wore as a slave to a monster, I think she could be one of the best, most impressive, and nuanced heroes we have ever seen.

[calliecat93]

Well didn’t get this done before Chapter Five came out, but I’m still MUCH more caught up than I had been. Good thing they’re going on a six week break here soon since that’ll not only let me catch my barrings... but let my soul have a break, GOOD GOD THESE PAST TWO CHAPTERS HIT HARD!As far this specific chapter goes... boy I did not expect me to shock me as much as it did. So w\let’s not waste anymore time and jump right into it.

Overview

Robyn is recalling a story about Joanna in prison, but neither Jaques or Qrow are all that into. But she does manage to get Qrow to finally smile, as well as notice him still holding Clover’s badge. She apologizes for what happened, which lets Qrow vent about the entire fiasco and how for the first time in so long, it felt like he had made a connection without having to fear his Semblance ruining it. Robyn... actually understands, herself having been ostracized due to her lie detecting Semblance making people fear her revealing their secrets. Harriet and Marrow enter, throwing Watts ack into his cell. Harriet doesn’t believe Qrow declaring his innocence, even when Robyn offers to use her Semblance. Robyn also calls Harriet out on essentially blaming others and not caring about the truth since it’s easier for her to not accept her own blame. Before Harriet can act, Marrow stops her and the speedster storms off/

Back in the tundra, JYR are still giving chase to The Hound, Jaune even launching Ren at it. It doesn’t work and The Hound even calls for backup, summoning more Grimm. It leads to a giant chase sequence, including a new song that IDT has a title yet, but it is dark as Hell. The chase ends with two of the bikes being destroyed, Yang and Jaune almost falling over a cliff until Ren uses his grappling features to save them, and the three are forced to watch as The Hound escapes with Oscar in it’s clutches. Back up in Atlas, RWBNM have gone to, surprisingly, the Schnee Manor to lay low and tend to Nora. Whitley is less than pleased, especially with what Weiss did not even 24 hours ago in-show, but Weiss makes it clear that they’re not leaving and she sends him to his room. As Weiss and May tend to Nora, Blake sees Ruby worried about the others. She suggests that Ruby can still call Yang... but there’s one problem, Ruby already did.

JYR are out of signal range, forcing them to make their way back to Mantle on-foot. During the trek however, Ren’s closed up attitude is flaring up, which eventually causes Yang to get on his case. Ren i9s frustrated due to not just losing Oscar, but everything that has happened. Losing the Relics, Ironwood’s betrayal, the current Grimm attack with Salem just outside the doorstep. Even with yang pointing out their accomplishments and admitting that they have made mistakes but still pulled through, Ren’s anger flares as he points out that they are WAY in over their heads. Jaune tries to calm them both down, but Ren continues to point to how Ruby is leading them despite still being a kid, he himself is an orphan form the middle of nowhere, and the biggest shock is him getting after Jaune for forging his way into Beacon. This shocks everyone, even Ren himself, but Jaune simply says that he’s getting out of the cold and walks on. Yang asks if Ren just wats to push everyone away before following, leaving Ren shocked and upset.

Meanwhile... oh boy, this scene. Oscar wakes up and standing right across from him is Salem. She addresses Ozma and how long it’s been since she’s seen him and... yeah it’s pretty unsettling. Oscar tries to act like Oz, but Salem sees right through it and tries to get Oscar to give her answers. He genuinely doesn’t know where the Beacon Relic is, so Salem tries to get the password to the Lamp out. When he tries to use the ‘out of questions’ ploy... Salem uses her magic to... magically torture him... yeah it’s... rough. Oscar still doesn’t talk, so Salem brings out Hazel... you know, the guy who hayes Oz probably more than anyone and has sworn to kill him? Yeah...

Cinder meets with Salem, taken back by The Hound which Salem calls an experiment. Cinder again tries to convince her to let her go after Penny, but Salem again orders her to stay put. Cinder agrees... well, verbally anyways. But she knows that the heroes are likely going to still try and launch Amity, so sh decides to go for the Maiden Power anyways. Neo is less than thrilled with this plan, but Cinder has another person willing to help her: Emerald.

Back in the tundra, JYR have found shelter for the night and Jaune admits that Ren is correct about how he cheated his way into Beacon. But he’s since realized that he was above his mistake and tries to convince Ren to not push them out, knowing fully well how all that it does is hurt you more. If it did any good, Ren doesn’t show it as he goes to sit outside. Yang has found a part to fix the bike and also assures Jaune that she knows that he worked hard to get to where he is now. She starts working on the part before asking Jaune if ‘she’ thinks any less of her. Jaune, assuming that she means Ruby, assures her that they’re sisters and will be fine... but Yang was talking about a certain cat girl. Our episode ends here... but not before showing us the ice nearby beginning to crack... thanks a lot CRWBY!

Review

Like I said in the intro, I didn’t expect this chapter to shock me like it did. Did I expect intensity? Of course, especially after the last chapter? Did I expect what we got? Nope, but it was perfect!

Let’s talk about Ren first. Ever since last volume, it’s been clear that he’s been unraveling. He wasn’t engaging in Nora’s antics anymore, was more closed up than usual, seemed in agreement with Ironwood at one point, and of course his mini-breakdown in the finale Not even Nora and him kissing helped, heck considering what happened after it only seemed to make him worse. Even now he’s at serious odds with Nora for the first time since childhood, something that is clearly bothering him despite him keeping it to the chest. He’s trying to keep his focus on his duty, but with everything going more and more wrong, the facade is not only shattering, but the cracks are causing him to push those close to him away.

His argument with Yang was a tense moment. I like it though. Not only for more unique character dynamics, but out of every character Yang will lay it out as it is. If Ren’s going to have an attitude problem, then she will call it out and not give a damn about the reason why. Since Nora can’t get though to him, the harsher approach is kind of the only thing left. Ren’s breakdown was hard to watch... and he is right to an extent. They are in over their heads. Their decision, even if the right one morally, is creating more problems and endanger more lives. Ruby is still a kid and she’s placed far too much on herself. I think he is underestimating himself and the others about not being ready, but his concerns are completely understandable and he has some good, if harsh, points.

But then he brings up Jaune cheating his way into beacon. Yeah, been a while since that came up, huh? I actually gasped when that came up. While Ren clearly didn’t mean for that to come out, the fact that he did when pointing out that they’re way over their heads does display at least some doubts he has about his leader. JNR have grown close over the past few volumes, Ren and Nora essentially considering Jaune family by the time of Volume 6. So hearing this was hard, especially since all that Jaune was doing was trying to calm him and Yang down.

I do, however, like how Jaune reacted. Back in the early volumes, he likely would have taken it as a blow to his confidence and gotten huffy about it. Now? While the blow clearly stung, he keeps himself in check and keeps focus on finding shelter. Then once there, he outright admits that Ren’s right and tries to comfort him. He tries to advise him on opening up and how closing yourself off doesn’t help. Considering that he tried this both in V1 when we found out how he cheated and after Pyrrha died and only getting better when he allowed others to help, he absolutely knows how Ren feels. But the fat that he handled this so maturely and tried to help his friend instead of get angsty about it shows how much he’s grown. It’s really nice to see.

Now let’s talk about Weiss and Whitley. So this got some... mixed reception. Some were upset about Weiss pointing her weapon and Whitley and her general harsh behavior towards him this chapter. Now I do understand the first part since I was similarly annoyed at Yang for threatening Qrow in Volume Six when all that he was trying to do was be reasonable about the Lamp. It was likely too harsh, but in farness Weis sis not only trying to help save the kingdom, but one of her teammates is in critical condition and she has no time for Whitley to be angry at her. The Manor is the safest place at the moment, and she needs to get Nora care now. Not saying it’s a justification, but it isn’t her being mean for the sake of it either.

But even so... guys I’m sorry, but do you seriously expect Weiss to suddenly forgive and coddle Whitley this soon? After years of him belittling her and rubbing his success in her face while she was punished, not to mention seeming more concerned about the family reputation than the current conflict? I’m sorry , but it’s not that simple. Yes, Whitley is also a victim who was manipulated and groomed by his father and unlike Weiss, he was never able to get a proper support system or have any family to help like how Weiss had Winter. I do feel bad for him, and I do think that Weiss will take her mother’s words form the last volume and will help Whitley later in the volume. But they’ve both hurt each other. Whitley by treating Weiss badly, and Weiss not giving him support like she was given. They’re both victims AND hurt each other. Some try to paint it as one is problematic and the other is an innocent child, and that’s simply untrue. They’re only going to realize that if and when they talk out their problems with each other out, it’s just a matter of when it’ll be. It takes time to mend these kinds of things, sadly.

Next is the villains scene... ho boy. So I’m gonna wait on Cinder for the next chapter, but her ignoring Salem in favor of power isn’t a shock at all. No, let’s discuss Oscar. Just... this poor, poor kid. He’s trying to be brave, but seeing him get tortured and especially the screaming?! Aaron Dismuke, why do this to me you jerk?! I do admire him for trying it imitate Oz and keep his composure, but it was just so... brutal to watch. Salem doing it so calmly and being perfectly willing to wait for the answers since she can just make Oscar suffer is... well, evil. And don’t think I missed her with the shadow versions of her daughters. Some say that humanizes her, but since she remorsefully tortured a child and sicked an emotionally unstable brute to physically harm him without a care in the world... no. It didn’t excuse Ironwood, and it sure as Hell isn’t excusing Salem. Tis just makes her all the more terrifying.

Okay... last thing is that scene at the end. The Bumblebee implication scene. So... I won’t lie it did annoy me at first. Before anyone says anything, it was NOT because of hating the ship or anything stupid like that. I’m not a huge Bumblebee fan, but anyone who keeps saying there’s nothing there at this point is living in denial. It’s happening people and since at least Volume 6, I think they’ve been doing it pretty well. My issue is mainly just because... we’ve had plenty of Bumblebee content. Volume 7 had them together in pretty much every scene, and I just don’t like having a pair of characters limited like that. I had the same issue with Renora, especially in Volumes 1-3, and with shipping in general. The main reason though is that I want there to be some more focus on Ruby and Yang because I feel like it’s been a long time and that there is a genuine conflict between them that can bring some interesting things for both. I’m not saying they need to be at each other’s throats, but siblings DO argue and no, it doesn’t always get easily resolved and I am speaking form experience here. To be fair it could happen later and Ruby herself hasn’t been pondering on it that much either. Heck Blake seemed more concerned about it than either of them have. But I would like to see more than just the one pair that I’ve already seen focused on plenty of times because it’s limiting. That’s just a personal thing though and I’ve always enjoyed sibling stuff more than romance, so yeah just a me thing.

That being said, those saying that Yang doesn’t care about Ruby need to calm down. No, that is NO the case. Did we forget Yang trying to console a broke Ruby despite her own grief just last volume? Mere hours ago in-show at that? Despite what I said above and while she’s clearly concerned after Ruby’s recent choices, Yang still loves and ultimately trusts her sister. She never said that she didn’t think that Ruby would fail or was wasting her time, she just felt like Mantle needed them more and the consequences to trying were too much. Heck this is a spoiler, but considering her reaction in the next chapter, it only reinforces that belief. At least with Blake, this is the first time they’ve willingly split apart and Yang clearly still has some abandonment issues and concerns. Plus... yeah, it’s natural when you have feelings for someone to worry if they made a bad choice that may make them doubt them. Blake won’t, but it’s understandable. Heck, Blake was clearly concerned about Yang when trying to get Ruby to call. I think she was trying to comfort Ruby as well with the suggestion, but it was still pretty evident... also Ruby and Blake interaction, yay! Still yeah guys, let’s just... chill a little bit and see what more comes of anything.

Okay, got that out of my system, and I apologize if it came across wrong. Whatever annoyance I had I’m over anyways, especially after the recent chapter. Anyways, the chapter had so much good. Plus we not only had a badass chase sequence, but a new song! Again, IDK the title, but it was another banger for sure. The opening scene with row and Robyn bonding and Robyn calling out Harriet was great. Marrow’s subtle expressions showing how not okay he is, and I’m seriously hoping that he may be the one to free the others. It would be a really good move for his character in him deciding that being lawful doesn’t equal the right thing, and making it right especially considering his interaction with Robyn last volume. The animation was good with the backgrounds looking fantastic, the pacing has been on fire, and of course that ominous ending. God they’re trying to keep us on edge, and I love it!

Chapter Stats

Favorite Character: Lie Ren Favorite Scene: Ren losing it in the tundra Least Favorite Scene: Probably the wrong term, but seeing Oscar be tortured while well done was hard. Favorite Voice Actor: Neath Oum (Ren Favorite Animation: JYR chasing The Hound Rating: 9.9/10

Final Thoughts

This was fantastic, especially in the character department. I haven’t been this shocked in a good while. It hurt no doubt, but the writing and voice performances were so well done. Seriously, this is probably Neath’s best performance to date. Add in the great animation, the tone being on point, and the set-ups with the Schnee Manor and cracking ice and the fact that this is only Chapter Four is crazy. But it’s only going to get crazier people... oh so, so much crazier. Only one review to go until I’m back to being caught up... my poor heart XD

[nobodyfamousposts]

Imma be real here. Every series (book, movie TV show, doesn't matter)has a character that is just...disliked. y a good chunk of the fans. Ron Weasley, Gabe Ugliano, so on and so forth. I feel like, despite being the male protagonist, Adrien is becoming that character, second only to Lila. What do you think?

I don’t think it’s quite the case.

A lot of dislike for characters comes in the form of actual bashing. Misportraying the character, ignoring their positive traits, attributing anything good they do to other people, ignoring that there may very well have been justification for their actions. Twisting them to the point that they’re so unrecognizable from their canon self that they might as well be a completely different person—all to justify one’s dislike. It’s called the Ron the Death Eater trope for a reason, since the guy has genuinely been a good person throughout the series albeit a jerk at times—which he always recognized in the end and tried to make up for.

I could go into ways that Marinette and Chloe have received this treatment more than Adrien, but that’s not not the real point I want to address right now.

What’s happening with Adrien isn’t fully dislike. Disliked characters are often torn down. They’re made to be evil or stupid in order to allow them to be stepped on for the more liked characters to  gain more attention or praise. That isn’t happening with Adrien. A lot of salt is being thrown his way, yes, but a lot of the people doing it do seem to like him as a character—or rather as a concept for a character. 

Unlike with most other disliked characters, people throwing salt aren’t trying to bring him down. They’re not upset because they don’t want him there, they’re upset because they want him to be BETTER. He’s not dislikable as a character. He’s sweet. Charming. Adorably oblivious at points. The source of humor and jokes to lighten a bad situation. In love and hopelessly optimistic. And he’s shown to legitimately care about people.

He’s not a bad character. The problem is rather because of what his character is being used to do, the messages he’s being used to spread, and what that means for who Adrien has to be because of it. The issue isn’t with Adrien, it’s with how the narrative is presenting him.

Consider for example the difference between our two leads:

The canon shows Marinette as an emotional teenage girl with a crush that overtakes too much of her life and is prone to occasional but rather notable acts of jealousy because of it, and the narrative treats her as being in the wrong accordingly—which she learns from, apologizes for, and attempts to make right by the end.

The canon shows Adrien as someone with family issues who is often isolated and lacks an understanding of people outside of anime, and the narrative treats him as always being in the right and never making mistakes he needs to acknowledge—which he never learns a lesson, never apologizes for anything, and more effort is made to make things right to HIM by the end.

The biggest gripe people have lately been having with Adrien isn’t that he doesn’t make mistakes, it’s that what mistakes he does make are never acknowledged as such by the narrative. And I’m not talking the little things like rolling down the windows in Princess Fragrance and opening everyone to her control or making a bad move during an akuma battle. I’m talking about the deeper mistakes—the things that highlight his character and that would allow him to grow if the narrative would acknowledge them and treat them as such instead of denying him accountability altogether or otherwise spreading the blame.

Glaciator almost did this right except that it had Ladybug being made to feel bad and taking part of the blame for the trouble with the battle despite her not being the one to throw a fit and refuse to work together, only to do it all over again with Frozer.

Copycat could have done this right except that he left Ladybug to take full blame for Theo’s akumatization despite him being fully aware that Theo was akumatized specifically BECAUSE he claimed that he and Ladybug were dating.

Syren also could have done this right except that Adrien was rewarded for attempting to bribe, demand, and blackmail his way to getting secrets that were not Ladybug’s to share and not his to know, especially when he wasn’t showing he was in any way ready for those secrets if he was threatening to quit while the whole of Paris was underwater.

Chameleon could have done this right except Adrien decided it was better to wait for Lila to decide to be a good person on her own despite the fact that he was the direct target of Lila’s akuma attack and his image was used to hurt his friends and many other people in Paris all because he asked her nicely to stop lying—which indicates that she’s NOT going to just suddenly decide to become a better person on her own.

Do you see the problem here?

Each of these instances could actually be pretty deep and meaningful moments for his character, but due to the show’s episodic nature, lack of continuity, and refusal to admit to Adrien being anything less than perfect, none of them were treated by the narrative in a worthwhile and fulfilling way.

How much better would Copycat have been if Chat Noir had admitted to Ladybug that he was the reason Theo was akumatized. It’s understandable why they wouldn’t want to reveal his love for her that soon, but if he at least told Ladybug he knew it was Theo because of an altercation HE had with him during the ceremony and then apologize to Theo afterwards for lying, wouldn’t that have made for a deeper impact for Adrien/Chat as a character (creepy question of Theo’s age vs age of his crush aside)?

How much deeper would Syren have been if Fu hadn’t immediately revealed himself and instead Adrien’s discussion with Plagg was allowed to continue for a bit longer. Because we don’t see how Adrien really responds after Plagg’s comment “but they won’t be you”. Say this makes Adrien realize the impact he’s had on his kwami, which comes with the realization that he does mean a lot to Plagg as something other than a source of cheese—thus emphasizing and solidifying the relationship between Plagg and Adrien as partners that we honestly don’t get to see much of. This could make Adrien realize that even if he’s not being brought in on all of the special secrets Ladybug knows, he is still important and that while he’s not happy with having secrets kept from him, he doesn’t want to give up on being Chat Noir over it. He apologizes to Plagg, further strengthening their bond and decides to accept that he will learn things eventually. Because seriously, if he can hold onto hope of earning Ladybug’s love despite the previous rejection, why can’t he put some of that hope into proving he’s worthy of those secrets, too?

How much sweeter would Chameleon have been if Adrien had encouraged Marinette to hold off on acting against Lila—NOT for Lila’s sake, but because of the very valid point that Lila had been able to dance around Marinette’s previous attempts to out her and could do the same thing again over something as minor as which ear had the disability. Or even admit to Marinette of what happened with Lila in the locker room and his concerns about how she could retaliate—which are admittedly valid concerns.

None of those would make Adrien dislikeable. He still committed the actions that people are taking issue with in each case, but it’s the way it ends and is addressed that changes the view. Actions that were previously disparaged could be looked at favorably as moments of growth for him—which he sorely needs much like ANY character does if he’s supposed to be a person rather than a cardboard cutout.

THIS is where the salt comes in. THIS is why there are complaints about him. It’s not what he’s done, it’s how things aren’t being followed up on. A disliked character would only appease fans by not existing. People don’t want Adrien to not exist, they want him to be called out on things he does wrong and actually grow. 

So I don’t think he’s “Ron the Death Eater”. I think he’s a case of the “Creator’s Favorite” that goes too far in trying to avoid having anything happen with him that he goes into full “They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character”.

[mikauzoran]

Adrienette Drabble: Fight

“Thank you for letting me come so late,” Adrien sighed, slumping over the balcony railing.

“It’s not a problem,” Marinette assured, going back to where she had left her sketchbook open on the little wooden table.

“I just couldn’t go home with my head in a mess like this,” he muttered, gazing down at the street and the Seine below.

Marinette hesitated before deciding to ask, “…Do you want to talk about it? You were a little vague on the phone. I’m happy to listen, if you think it will help.”

He was quiet for a long while. Abruptly, he straightened and turned to face her, leaning back with one foot propped up against the railing. “So…my girlfriend and I had a fight. She broke up with me.”

“Oh,” Marinette replied softly, the syllable coated with pity and remorse that she only felt because he looked sad about it. “I’m sorry…. Which girlfriend was this one? Marianne?”

Adrien smacked himself in the face. “Marianne,” he hissed. “That was it. Her name was Marianne.”

Marinette arched a concerned eyebrow. “Adrien? Everything okay?”

He looked at her pitifully. “That was the fight. I called her the wrong name.”

She didn’t need to know that he had called her “Marinette”.

Marinette’s eyes widened. She winced. “Oh. Yeah. That’s…not a good thing.”

“She thought I was cheating on her, so I explained that I’d had five other girlfriends in the past two weeks and that they were all starting to blend together.” Adrien grimaced as he heard the words come out of his mouth a second time. “She only got more upset upon learning that fact, and I think I’m starting to understand why. …Shoot. I am primordial slime.”

Marinette pursed her lips. “I know it wasn’t on purpose, but…I would be really upset if some guy did that to me.”

Adrien snorted. “I would need a lawyer to get me off on assault charges if some guy did that to you.” His expression sobered. “So why do I think it’s okay for me to act like this?”

“You don’t mean any harm,” Marinette tried to comfort him.

“But that doesn’t mean I’m not causing any,” Adrien sighed, raking a hand through his hair. “I mean, I did tell her up front that I wasn’t interested in a serious relationship, but…tonight is a new personal low for me.”

“Maybe you should stop,” Marinette proposed. “You know, I didn’t exactly mean for you to change girlfriends like you do your socks when I suggested you date around.”

Adrien winced. “I am spreading myself a little thin, aren’t I?”

Marinette frowned sympathetically but did not verbally reply.

Adrien pursed his lips. “…Marinette, am I trashy?”

She looked back down at her notebook and shrugged, doing her best to be a good friend and hide her own personal feelings. “Make it about him, not yourself.”

“How many girls have you kissed in the past month?” She attempted to say it in an unconcerned, nonchalant manner.

He looked at her in terror, as if she had just pulled a hatchet on him. He gulped, bright red lighting up his cheeks. “That’s…not something I want you to know.”

“My next question was going to be, ‘How does that number make you feel?’, but it sounds like you already have your answer, Adrien,” she replied softly, nonjudgmentally down at her sketchbook.

“Maybe I need to slow down a bit,” Adrien concluded. “Maybe I’ll stay single for the rest of this week…and use that time to come up with a nickname I can call all of them to avoid further name confusion in the future.”

Marinette finally looked up to glare at him. “Seriously? You’re going to stop treating them like individuals and just call them all the same thing?”

“I only said one of those things,” Adrien corrected.

She rolled her eyes and huffed, “The one is the same as the other.”

“Is not,” he snorted back. “Do you have any better suggestions for keeping them straight?”

“Stay with the same woman for more than a few days,” she remarked dryly.

He rolled his eyes and crossed his arms. “I would have if any of the relationships had shown promise.”

“Fine. Write their names on your hand or something,” she retorted in exasperation. “Or maybe date someone who wants to do more than just suck off your face, get in your pants, and get their hands on your wallet.”

“…Ouch,” Adrien responded flatly.

“You know, when I told you to date other people, I expected you to find some nice girl to date for a month or two who I wouldn’t really care for but wouldn’t be able to find justification to hate. I didn’t expect this revolving door of fickle, vapid women and poor life choices. Your taste in women is abysmal, Adrien Agreste,” she snapped, gripping her pencil tightly in her fist.

He laughed caustically. “Marinette, I haven’t been interested in any of those girls in the slightest.”

“Then why did you date them?!” Marinette shouted, her voice cracking as she finally lost her temper.

“Because they weren’t repulsive!” He matched her volume and pitch. “There’s only one girl I’m interested in, but you told me to date other girls, and I did because I want to get over her more than anything! Do you have any idea how much it hurts to pine after someone with everything you are? Do you have any conception of the agony of being by someone’s side without any hope of them ever turning to look at you the way you look at them? I am insanely in love with her. Literally, I probably need to talk to someone about this because my level of obsession is scary unhealthy, Marinette. I would die for her. Literally take an akuma attack that would wipe me out of existence. I am desperate to get out of the gaping chasm I’ve fallen into, and if I have to date a thousand other girls to stop feeling this way, I will do it.”

They stared at one another for a full minute, both of their chests heaving, their eyes wide in horror.

Adrien let out a sibilant curse as he sank onto the crate across the table from Marinette. He buried his face in his hands and cursed again. “Can we please pretend I never said any of that? Is there any way to go back and unsay that? Because you are pretty much the last person on the face of this earth that I ever wanted to find out that I was crazy.”

Marinette got up and went to him, prying his hands from his face and forcing him to look at her. “Hey,” she cooed, cupping his cheek. “You’re okay. You’re not crazy, Adrien.” She gently stroked his cheekbone with her thumb, and he leaned into her touch.

“I feel like I’m crazy sometimes,” he muttered, taking slow and measured inhales of her faint scent as his eyes went half-lidded.

“Shh. You’re not. I’ve got you, Beau Gosse,” she whispered. “I’m sorry you’re hurting. Hang in there. One day there’s going to be a girl who loves you like you deserve, and she won’t hurt you like this….”

He looked up into her deep blue eyes, and, mentally, a wire was tripped. He’d always thought that Marinette was objectively attractive, but, sitting there on her balcony in the moonlight with her hand on his cheek, their faces no more than two hand-spans apart…Marinette was no less radiant than the goddess rosy-fingered Dawn.

Perhaps it was because over the past month and a half he’d been making out often with many different women, but Adrien suddenly had the strong urge to kiss Marinette.

She pulled back, though, before he could follow through, straightening up and retracting her hand from his cheek.

His chest tightened, and he leaned forward, following her retreat like a magnet.

Marinette chuckled quietly, humoring him by reaching out once more to scratch gently behind his ear.

His eyes fluttered closed.

“You’re like a giant cat,” she teased. “Chat Noir likes around the same spot right…here.”

Her fingers found it, and it was everything Adrien could do to keep from purring. Instead his throat produced a half-strangled choke midway between pleasure and horror.

Marinette’s fingers stilled. “You okay?”

He nodded, taking a moment to compose himself. “Y-Yeah. Sorry. Just…I’m feeling really messed up right now, and…” His gaze drifted down to the floor, his own feet, and her house scuffs. “…as you’ve probably noticed from the way I hang off of people and always get in others’ personal space, I’m a really tactile person. I need to be touched, but…I don’t always get that at home, so when someone does show me physical affection…it’s like an overload, and…that’s why it’s so easy to date all those girls I don’t care about and let them hang on me and kiss me. Ever since I realized that I needed to give up on her, I’ve been feeling really…panicked…desperate…. I’ve kind of been throwing myself into these other relationships hoping that something will click and that I’ll wake up one day and suddenly have my heart back in my chest and be able to carry on like a normal person, but…I think I’m only spiraling even further down the drain because…”

He screwed his eyes closed and gulped. “I pretend that they’re her. When they kiss me, I imagine that it’s her lips and her hands and…I know that’s pretty much the direct opposite of what you intended me to do, and I’m sorry. I…”

His voice caught, and he looked up at her with wet eyes. “…but…when you touch me, it’s you. I can’t…imagine her touching me the way that you do because, unlike all those girls I’ve been dating, when you touch me, you don’t want anything from me. You’re not looking to get anything out of me. It’s just about me and what I need, and you have no idea how much you mean to me, how much I appreciate you, Marinette. I couldn’t get through this without you.”

He watched as her eyes widened and a flash of something intense flitted across her face. He couldn’t pin down exactly what it was, but it felt negative.

He was upsetting her with his candid words. He was oversharing.

“Sorry.” He looked away. “I know I’m a little much to take sometimes. I don’t usually do this in front of people. I’m kind of a wreck at the moment, and you feel safe. I feel safe with you. I know that’s a lot to drop on somebody, so I’m going to stop talking now, and if you want me to go, just say so because you don’t have to do this. You don’t owe me anything. You don’t…”

He physically clapped a hand over his own mouth to stop the torrent. “Sorry,” he mumbled from behind his fingers.

Suddenly her expression was warm and reassuring. “Shh,” she soothed, pressing a light kiss to his forehead before taking both of his hands in hers. “It’s okay. There’s nothing to be sorry for, Adrien. You can always come to me. I will always take care of you.”

Adrien’s throat went dry. His face grew hot. Something unnamable welled up in his chest, and all he wanted to do was hold her, bury his face in her neck and hair. He opened his mouth to try to describe what he was feeling, but, before he could find the words, she spoke.

“Come here.” She tugged lightly at his hands, and he got up to follow her over to the deck chair in the corner. “Sit on the edge,” she instructed, and he did so, regretting having to let go of her hands.

He didn’t have long to miss the contact, however, for, as soon as he was seated, she sat down behind him, straddling the chair so that he was between her legs. She wrapped her arms around him and gently eased him back so that he reclined against her, his head resting on her chest.

“Is this okay?” she whispered as she began to stroke his face, comb her fingers through his hair, and rub gently at his scalp, letting her fingernails scrape tantalizingly against his skin. Her lips gently peppered his neck, jaw, face, and ears with butterfly-light kisses.

It was divine torture.

“Please,” he whimpered brokenly, melting into her touch. His eyes slipped closed.

“You really are hurting, aren’t you?” she observed.

He moaned softly, biting his lip to muffle the noise.

His desperation was palpable.

She wanted to ask him if she were special. If anyone else made him feel safe. If there was anyone else he would let himself become this undone in front of.

Somehow, she didn’t think so, and that realization brought both elation and despair. He trusted her enough to dissolve into a puddle of fear and desire and need in her presence. He trusted that she would accept him as he was and still care about him afterwards.

On the other hand, he was able to do this because he didn’t feel the need to impress her. She was not a potential mate in front of whom he needed to remain strong and collected. He didn’t care about preserving his image with her. He didn’t need her to think of him as a provider or protector because it didn’t make a difference to him if she had romantic feelings for him or not.

She was a sanctuary, a trusted confidante. She was not a potential love interest.

Meanwhile, Adrien was struggling not to purr his head off. He was on the brink of giving up when Marinette spoke.

“Is this helping? I have another friend who gets upset sometimes, and head rubs really seem to help him calm down. Is this working for you?”

The best Adrien could do for a response was a sinful, throaty moan of appreciation.

…Which shook Marinette to the core. It was one thing to have Chat Noir purring happily with his head on her thigh. It was another entirely to have the man she was in love with writhing against her in ecstasy.

This had been a bad idea. This was going to keep her up nights: the image of Adrien a needy mess literally in her lap. Hair mussed. Pants visibly tight. Back arching. Head thrown back. Eyes mostly closed in bliss, but, when they did open, pupils blown to the size of macarons.

Marinette wondered what he would say if she tugged him down through the skylight into her bed. Would he protest? He didn’t have a problem making out with women he didn’t have feelings for. Would he draw the line at sleeping with Marinette? Would the threat sex could pose to their friendship be enough to stop him? Was Adrien really in any state to consent? Would he regret it later? Could Marinette really take advantage of him like that?

One look at his face, the tears leaking down his cheeks from all the confusion and pent-up emotion, answered her questions.

“Shh,” she coaxed. “You’re okay. Everything’s going to be fine, Adrien. I’ve got you.”

More than anything, Marinette had grown to love Adrien as a person more than she loved him as a man, and she wanted their friendship to survive her romantic feelings for him. As much as she hated the f word, she really and truly did want to be Adrien’s friend, so she was going to put his needs before her own lust.

“I’ve got you,” Marinette promised. “Always.”

A quarter of an hour later found Adrien feeling boneless and spent but definitely calmer.

He wondered briefly, if Marinette’s fingers touching him only above the neck could cause fireworks like that, what could the rest of her do with the rest of his body?

He stomped on that thought as soon as it came into existence, grinding it to dust with the sole of his mental shoe. It was one thing to get an innocent head rub from Marinette as Chat Noir every once in a while on a bad day. What had just happened was something else. Adrien had crossed a line.

“Better?” Marinette whispered, noting how his breathing had evened out and the tears had stopped.

Adrien had to clear his throat before he could find his voice to confirm, “Better.”

He hastened to add, “Thank-you-I’m-sorry,” in one breath.

Her thumb rubbed away a half-dried tear track. “Adrien…just… It’s okay. You can lean on me when you need to. Maybe tonight was a little intense, but…I want to be there for you. You’re obviously going through something major right now, and I don’t want you falling to pieces on your own because you’re ashamed or embarrassed or think that you’re inconveniencing me. You’re one of my best friends, and I want to help you in any way I can. Maybe I’ll need you to return the favor someday.”

He wanted to say something. He felt like another apology was in order because this went above and beyond the realm of one friend helping another through a series of panic attacks and a quarter-life crisis in general.

He’d gotten off on her relatively innocent ministrations, and she knew it.

He blamed the unresolved tension between himself and his now ex-girlfriend from earlier that night. He blamed the fact that all these girls he was dating and making out with had him on a constant hormonal rollercoaster. He blamed Ladybug and her jet-black pigtails and cyanide blue eyes so much like Marinette’s. He blamed himself for being out of control.

“Sorry,” Adrien repeated. “I didn’t mean to…” He couldn’t even put the thought into words. There were a lot of things he hadn’t meant to do. “Sorry,” he whispered, face going cinnamon red. “I’m sorry.”

“Adrien, stop. I’m sorry,” Marinette sighed. “I’m sorry for making you do something you didn’t want to do. I’m sorry for making you uncomfortable. I’m sorry for not stopping. I’m sorry for not asking if I should stop. I’m sorry I made you feel like you had something you should be sorry for. I’m sorry,” she emphasized, hoping he’d see how this was her fault and stop blaming himself.

Adrien reached up to cover his face in utter mortification. “Marinette, I’m uncomfortable because I’m afraid I made you uncomfortable and ruined our friendship. I at no time wanted you to stop. I’m sorry, but this was totally consensual on my part…. I am such a cad. I am so sorry.”

“Oh,” Marinette mumbled, feeling slightly dizzy. She swallowed hard and admitted, “I’m not uncomfortable…and I don’t think our friendship is ruined….. This was consensual on my part too.”

“Oh,” Adrien squeaked. “Okay. Uh…well…good. I’m glad that neither of us is uncomfortable and that our friendship is still intact.” He cleared his throat, finally getting ahold of himself. “I don’t think that this should happen again, though. This time was sort of an accident, but I feel like this goes beyond the scope of accepted behavior between friends. I don’t want that kind of relationship with you.”

“O-Of course,” Marinette managed to choke out through gritted teeth. She was infinitely glad that he couldn’t see the expression on her face.

“I don’t want to be friends with benefits,” he continued softly. “I was completely serious a couple weeks ago at the café when I told Alya that you’re the kind of girl someone has to be serious about. If I weren’t me, I’d kill me for tonight.”

Marinette’s resolve to never tell Adrien about Chat Noir solidified.

“If I found out some other guy had used you like this…”

Marinette could feel Adrien bristle, and it made her heart swell. Perhaps she should be concerned instead, but she couldn’t help but swoon when he got violently jealous over her. She adored his protective streak. It gave her hope.

“Who’s to say that I’m not the one using you?” Marinette snickered, mentally turning the tables on him.

Adrien blinked and was about to tell her that that was stupid because he was the one who’d had the mind-blowing orgasm…but he found that he couldn’t say that out loud without dying of humiliation.

The thought, “You can use me any time you want, Princess” also crossed his mind but was quickly ruled out because it would undermine the boundaries he was attempting to set.

Boundaries were a lot harder than Nino made them out to be.

“I guess you could technically use me,” Adrien reasoned. “I just have this sexist idea in my head that men are the ones that typically use women.”

“That’s really ironic considering that women use you all the time,” Marinette hummed softly, the mood shifting back into the realm of the somber.

“Yeah,” Adrien sighed, closing his eyes and zeroing in on the sound of her heart. “Ironic.”

It was quiet between them for a measure or two.

Marinette bit her lip. “…About your dating situation.”

Adrien made a soft sound of displeasure.

“Maybe you should stop dating around.”

He hummed thoughtfully, considering the idea.

“…Maybe I should ‘date around’ in the sense that you originally intended me to,” Adrien made a counteroffer. “Or, at least, maybe I should only date one or two girls any given week…and maybe take a few days off between girlfriends…and maybe not make out with so many different people.”

Marinette sighed heavily. “If that’s what you decide you want to do. It’s your life, Adrien.”

“What else would I even do?” Adrien sighed.

“Find someone you could be serious about?” Marinette suggested, knowing it was dumb but saying it anyway.

“I don’t think I’m at that point yet,” Adrien confessed. “You see what a mess I am. Do you think I’m capable of being in a serious relationship right now?”

“No,” she answered honestly. “But maybe find some girls you can be more serious about than the ones you’ve been with the past month and a half. No more hooking up with girls who are merely ‘not repulsive’. You obviously don’t feel right about that kind of arrangement anyway.”

“You’re right. I don’t,” he mumbled. “So…no more changing women like I change my socks.”

“Good,” Marinette breathed in relief.

Silence fell once more.

Adrien licked his lips nervously, hesitating before reintroducing the subject. “…You know, I’m still going to need a standard nickname I can call them to avoid any more name mix-ups like tonight.”

Marinette huffed and rolled her eyes. “I believe ‘Sweetheart’ and ‘Babe’ or ‘Baby’ are the standards used by douchebags who can’t be bothered to learn their latest conquest’s name.”

“You’re not being fair,” Adrien grumbled. “I am a train wreck right now, and that’s not the fault of the girls I’m going to date. I will use their names when I remember, but when I don’t, I should have something to call them so that I don’t hurt their feelings or make them feel like I don’t care about them. I don’t want them to feel like they’re being used to help me get over some other girl.”

“How kind of you to be so considerate of the feelings of the girls you’re using to help you get over some other girl,” Marinette retorted wryly.

“You are the one who suggested this,” Adrien sighed.

“Personal accountability much, Agreste?” she snorted, unimpressed and slightly disenchanted.

“Yeah,” he muttered. “I know.”

“…Even if this entire thing is twisted, part of me is kind of glad that you are thinking about their feelings to some extent,” Marinette begrudgingly admitted. “…How about ‘Honey’ or ‘Darling’? ‘Dearest’?”

Adrien pursed his lips. “‘Sweetheart’ might work if I say it with the right inflection; otherwise it sounds kind of…I don’t know. Kind of like I’m looking down on them or not taking them seriously. I don’t want to sound dismissive.”

“‘Sweetheart’? Dismissive?” Marinette scoffed skeptically.

“Seriously,” he argued. “What do you think when a guy says, ‘Hey, Sweetheart’ to you?”

Marinette frowned. Guys trying to pick her up off the street had, indeed, called out to her in that manner before. “Okay. Yeah. I see your point. ‘Sweetheart’ can sound kind of sleezy and dismissive.”

“I think ‘Baby’ has the same problem,” Adrien sighed. “And ‘Babe’ is what Alya calls Nino. It would feel incestuous to use her pet name. ‘Honey’ and ‘Darling’ sound too…domestic. Same for ‘Dearest’. ‘My Love’ is misleading. I guess I could come up with something original, but…I don’t know. Pet names usually sound so ridiculous. I want something affectionate but not overly affectionate. Something that feels personal but also generic enough to say in public.”

“Milady,” Marinette whispered.

Adrien gave a start as if he’d been electrocuted. “Wha—Bu—No. Isn’t that—No.—what Chat Noir calls Ladybug?”

Marinette shrugged. “It was an idea. I was trying to think of all the ridiculous things that Chat Noir uses as nicknames that somehow manage to work, but…”

Adrien knew that calling his girlfriends ‘Milady’ would only exacerbate the problem. “Maybe not that one,” he mumbled.

“Okay. How about ‘Princess’?” she suggested tiredly, and he was a little offended that she would even think of offering up his nickname for her to be used on other women. “It’s the perfect nickname. It’s flirty and affectionate while still being respectful. No one could think you were being dismissive if you called them ‘Princess’. That’s what Chat Noir usually calls me, and I’ve always secretly liked it.”

Adrien’s irritation immediately faded and was supplanted by pride and self-satisfaction.

“I don’t think I could call anyone ‘Princess’ with a straight face,” Adrien chuckled. “You are the only one I know who could wear that moniker and do it justice.”

Marinette let out a sharp, panicked bark of laughter at that. She cleared her throat and put on an indignant air. “Charmer.”

“I’m serious,” he insisted, but his chuckle diminished his credibility. “…May I call you ‘Princess’?”

“I don’t see how I can stop you,” Marinette sighed in resignation. “Chat Noir might have a bone to pick with you about it, though. He’s just about as protective of me as you are, and he might take exception to you using his nickname.”

“I’ll fight him for it,” Adrien swore. “…Princess.”

She shivered. It was the same effect Chat Noir had on her multiplied by ten. The breathy way he said it…it was unfair. He was unfair.

It was unfair that while he got to lie practically on top of her languidly, basking in the heady calm of the afterglow, she was still ratcheted up and ready to scream in frustration.

“Maybe you should just call your girlfriends ‘Ma Chère’ and be done with it,” she huffed.

“Maybe.” He shrugged.

It would be better than accidentally calling them “Marinette”.

…Actually…

“Would you want to go to the zoo on Sunday?” Adrien asked before he could completely think things through.

His thought process had gone something like: It would be impossible to accidentally call his girlfriend “Marinette” if he was with Marinette instead of his girlfriend; therefore, he should spend time with Marinette.

She hummed. “I’m not doing anything on Sunday. Have you already asked Nino and Alya?”

He stiffened, wondering if he should back out now before it was too late. “Uh…No.”

“Do you want me to text them?” she offered.

He swallowed hard. “No. I…wasn’t going to invite them.”

She was silent for a moment. “So…you meant…would I want to go to the zoo on Sunday…just the two of us?”

“Yes. That’s…what I meant.” He gulped again. “I mean…you and I have hung out just the two of us before. I was thinking…that could be fun.”

“Adrien, I am not going on a date with you. You are an emotional Hindenburg right now, and you have no idea what you’re asking,” she replied patiently, voice devoid of all emotion.

“I didn’t mean as a date,” he rushed to assure her. “I wasn’t… This has nothing to do with what happened between us earlier. I was just… I’ve been so busy with girlfriends lately, I thought…maybe I should make more time for my friends…you in particular, since the only thing we ever seem to talk about anymore is my relationships. I was thinking…maybe we should go on a-a friend date.”

“A ‘friend date’?” Her brow scrunched as the dreaded f word sullied another word she’d been longing to hear from his lips for four years.

“Yeah,” he replied lamely, sticking to his guns. “A friend date. Just…completely platonic. I mean, I’ll pay for the entrance fee and take you to lunch, but…”

“Adrien?” Marinette sighed.

He gulped a third time. “Yes?” He could tell he was crashing and burning.

She gave up. “Okay.”

“O…kay?” He tried to tilt his head up to get a look at her face, but it was hard at that angle.

“Yeah,” she confirmed. “I will go with you on Sunday to the zoo. I will pay for my own ticket and my own lunch. We will not hold hands. You will not try to kiss me. This will be one hundred percent platonic.”

“Of course,” he quietly promised, feeling bad that he’d done something to make her think that laying down these rules was necessary.

“Adrien?”

“Y-Yes?”

“Please don’t drag me into this,” she begged in a tiny, fragile voice. “Please don’t let what happened before give you any ideas. I’m just your friend. I will be there for you during this crisis you’re going through, but I can’t do that as anything more than your friend. Okay?”

He grabbed her hand and pulled it to his lips. “Sorry for pulling you into the mess, Princess.”

“It’s okay,” she insisted in that same small voice. “…I’m just trusting you…what you said about respecting me too much to mess around with me.”

“Okay,” he whispered.

She had no idea how much he respected her. Marinette Dupain-Cheng had been his idol almost from the day he’d met her. Kind, courageous, smart, creative, ambitious, and bold…she was everything he aspired to be. She had no way of knowing how much he looked up to her.

Maybe she never would know. After all, he had a funny way of showing it, always taking advantage one way or another.

[arcane-shadow]

Don’t You Dare Pity Me

Characters: Togami Byakuya, Naegi Makoto

Warnings: Graphic descriptions of violence,  Panic Attacks, PTSD, 

AO3 Link

My Bad Things Happen Bingo 

Byakuya prides himself on his composure, the stoicism and aloofness expected of him as a Togami.

Even during their ill-fated killing game he had managed to keep a hold of himself. He had been a beacon of calm within their group while the rest of his classmates panicked and ran about like headless chickens. So afraid of death and murder.

He had, of course, been prepared for such situations. The world of a Togami had been a cutthroat one, full of vicious competition not only between rival corporations but within the family itself.

Byakuya Togami had grown up in a world of unseen and unspoken violence. Countless times he had been on the receiving end of an attempted assassination, and had of course been instructed on the ins and outs of that particular underworld trade himself. He was prepared and confident for the eventuality of having to kill to survive. It was to be expected of a Togami.  

(Regardless of certain individuals and certain circumstances, he still considers himself willing and able to commit that final act of violence. The world is an even more dangerous place now than when he was a foolish teenager; he will not allow himself to be beaten in this dog eats dog world.)

(Although, and If only for his own continued safety and goal of rebuilding his corporation, there may be the existence of a few annoyances he would willingly stick his neck out for...)

He survived, and continues to survive.

Very little, he had thought, could rattle the great Byakuya Togami’s composure now. Despite his very brief moments of weakness (the ones that occasionally peered through his rotting and decayed memory of Hope’s Peak to haunt him) he thought himself a more hardened individual in the hands of the future foundation.  

How unexpectedly and disgustingly wrong he had been.

Within the fortressed walls of the future foundations medical centre, Byakuya feels the cold cement of the empty hallway bleeding up through his once finely pressed pants. He is not capable of movement, even as he knows- fears-the risk of someone finding him there, playing witness to him acting as weak and stupid as a Togami is, by definition, not.

He does not move. He stays sitting there, curled up pathetically into his side like a child might.

He is breathing too fast, body convulsing shamelessly as he claws at the wall with one hand as he attempts to regain some semblance of control. But that would require him to be able to stop thinking, stop seeing, stop feeling in every atom of his being the flood of images he cannot fight against as they thunder relentlessly against his psyche.  

It is gunfire, a backdrop of his thoughts brought to horrifying life as the surprise flash of ignition surrounds them. It is the way Aoi’s voice, echoing jovially in the dark moments before turning suddenly silent. The intimate smell of blood, a familiar friend, crowding his senses, hands shoving him, bringing him down hard onto harsh asphalt and glass.

He feels the sting of pain in his palms and the silence of the hall fills with mechanical laughter. Just like Hers.

He presses himself as tightly as possible to the wall. He bows his head into his knees, shamefully hiding his lack of control over his emotions from – from an empty hallway, from the ghosts of his disappointed ancestors, from the monster wearing a teenage girl’s skin. From himself.

He’s fine. Not even really injured, only the grazing on his hands to show from the mess of that last mission. Everyone else escaped with similar damage, even Aoi who, for a moment he had feared—no, he didn’t fear, was concerned in a practical manner over their most physically capable team member—had been injured far worse.  So he had no reason, none at all, to be collapsing and hyperventilating in public hallways.

He struggles to remove his glasses, his hands shaking and his head unwilling to remove itself from between his knees. He cannot have them breaking, the way a fine lady may break a glass, when she is consumed with hysterics. As he himself is. The shuddering, tight vice of wayward emotion is swallowing Byakuya whole.

There can be no evidence of his weakness.

He has not yet allowed his dignity to betray him enough to let tears to flow but they threaten, distorting the world even further as his glasses remain clenched in his fist. The first tear he lets spill will be the first drop towards the death of the Togami.

He doesn’t notice until it is too late, until a familiar panic stricken voice pierces the relative quiet of his hiding place.

“B-Byakuya!”

Makoto approaches him at nearly a run from the end of the hallway, worry and concern radiating from every line of his body. A mixture of fear, anger, and shame causes Byakuya’s next panicked action. Something he had always thought himself so above.

“GO AWAY! Don’t you dare get any c-closer-”

His voice hitches high and unsteady, breaking in the middle and cutting his warning off. Makoto, to his limited credit, does stop but he doesn’t leave. He looks down at him, at the great Byakuya Togami, heir of the Togami conglomerate, with concern and worry and pity.

Byakuya is still shaking, his eyes are still on the cusp of watering, but the shame and anger that bled into him, ripping him apart…they now have a new target. Makoto needs to not be looking at him like that. In fact he needs to not be here at all, the fatal witness to Byakuya Togami’s fall from grace.

Again.

Those big hazel eyes are staring straight through him and he is strung tight with tension. Makoto’s voice is low and carrying when he finally speaks.

“Byakuya…are you injured? I heard the doctors say you were fine but…Is there something wrong?”

Byakuya manages to twist his face into a sneer, “Oh? You think you have any right to question me? Know your place commoner…I’m perfectly fine and it is None Of Your Business.”

He enunciates those last words carefully and angrily, putting as much vitriol into them as he can muster.

Makoto flinches back, presumably at his tone, potentially at his most-likely deranged expression. Despite that, Makoto’s expression only becomes more intense in its concern and he shuffles forward along the floor.

“I’m your friend Byakuya…Of course I’d think it’s alright for me to ask if you’re okay. Which I still don’t think you are, by the way. You know it’s really not good to hide an injury-”

“I do not need your help or your concern and you need to stop looking at me like that!”

“Wha- What? Byakuya—“

“Shut up! Don’t touch me!”

The sound of flesh hitting flesh resounds through the corridor, as loud as thunder. A ragged gasp follows shortly after. Byakuya cannot tell whether it is him or Makoto that it comes from. Time seems frozen to him and the ringing in his ears is so loud.  

Makoto shrinks back, cheek already turning into the faint red outline of a hand.

Byakuya didn’t mean to hit him, hadn’t meant to rebuff him in so physical—so crude— a way. He had panicked. Makoto had come too close, whether to calm him or check him for an injury he didn’t know, but it had been too close to touching, to dispensing his pity and sullying a Togami with soft, condescending care.  

There is a moment of tense unhappy silence.

“I’m sorry”

What.

“For getting in your space when you didn’t want me to…and I guess for just not leaving you alone...I kinda obviously didn’t help huh?” Makoto laughs that little self-deprecating laugh of his, soft and self-conscious.

Byakuya doesn’t understand why Makoto’s the one apologising. Except he does, and it is truly an un-intelligent and un-Togami-like thing to be surprised. Of course Makoto would apologise. It was his fault for not respecting Byakuya’s warnings and personal space. It is a commoners place to take the blame for such situations.

Even if he had also been rightfully concerned over his…friend’s… well-being, and had done what was in Makoto’s nature to do; poke his nose where it doesn’t belong and persistently and insufferably attempt to help.

He shouldn’t have slapped him. It was base and unnecessary, and the fact he was overcome with embarrassment and anger does not sound as good of a justification as he thought it should.

“You’re still not leaving.” Byakuya manages to say it clearly despite the cottony feel of his mouth and his stubborn prides insistence, despite feeling as though he has been shocked into a clearer state of mind.

“I know…” Makoto sighs and in that moment his exhaustion reveals itself. It reminds Byakuya that it probably wasn’t just him affected by the mission. That of course Makoto, with all his infinite capacity to care, would most likely be suffering too.

“I just apologised for it but…I’m still worried about you. I don’t want to abandon a friend when they’re hurting…Sorry. Again. ”

“I’m not injured.”

“H-huh?”

“Don’t stutter, it’s unseemly,” he rebukes, albeit a little weakly. It seems the emotional weakness he has suffered was now going to leech his physical strength as well.  “…I was not injured; the doctors were correct. So, you have no reason for concern. I am utterly physically fine.”

“You’re not though; you’re half collapsed in a hallway shaking as hard as a leaf.”

“….I was… more affected by our last mission than I thought. It was nothing, so stop worrying about it.”

It is through gritted teeth that byakuya manages to admit this, the only consolation being that it will make Makoto leave faster and stop bothering him. Then he can go back to his quarters and try to forget all about this moment of weakness

He’s wrong, of course. Makoto goes sharp eyed and more wary than before, and does not look at all satisfied or happy with his answer.

“That’s not nothing, Byakuya. If it was nothing you wouldn’t be so upset. I won’t-“ Byakuya had gone to speak, to rebuke his accusations however accurate they were, but Makoto, Naegi Makoto the ultimate pushover, had put up a hand as though to silence him and continued. “I won’t push you about it…But, if it keeps happening or if it has been happening for a while already, you should…well you should probably talk to someone. I’m not saying it has to be me or anything! They have a great psyche department here, they’re all really nice, and well, you could always talk to one of the others too.”

Makoto must see Byakuya grimace because he laughs a little, that same self-deprecating laugh like he understands but is too self-conscious to voice it. He doesn’t stop though.

“But the point is, that you should talk to someone. I found…that it helped me, when I was getting flash backs to our time in the…to when we were in hope’s peak, to talk to someone. It helped to share some of the load.”

He smiles at him then, small and sad and unfathomably warm.

Byakuya…he feels on one hand disgust at this attempt to sympathise and understand each other as equals. It was against everything his personal code stood for, aloofness and superiority above all else.

But he is also tired. Physically, from the suppression of his earlier panic attack and emotionally…the toll from the flash backs, from the memories and dreams, were starting to wear on him. His pride, His stubborn unending pride that he carries like a shield, would normally never allow such thoughts but Makoto…Stupid, soft Makoto and the utter embarrassment of being seen like that had him considering alternate measures than repression.

“Ha, you are truly insufferable you know. They shouldn’t be calling you the ultimate hope, more like the ultimate busy-body.” He sighs long and low as Makoto makes an awkward little noise and rubs the back of his head shyly.

“I suppose that’s an important part of the job, being nosy.” He smiles again, a little brighter it seems now that Byakuya is in a better mood. He starts the arduous job of attempting to pull himself upright again, re-adjusting his glasses on his face as he does. Makoto springs up a moment before him and offers his hand in the universal symbol of help.

Byakuya smacks it away, lightly and a little cautiously, and scowls up at him. “I am not a child Makoto, I do not need your help getting up. I have already had enough of your pity for one evening.”

“A-ah, sorry-”

“Although,” and Byakuya allows a little slyness to slip through his tone at this juncture, “I feel if you truly want to ‘help’, you should do as your station in life dictates and be subservient to me.”

“Uum, what--?”

“I desire a glass of fresh spring water Makoto. Go fetch it.”

The look of incredulous shock on Makoto’s face is refreshing, almost as refreshing as that water will be on his parched throat. Byakuya levels him with an appropriate glare and makes a questioning little, “hm?” before Makoto seems to find him serious and puts on a more…bashful expression.

“Sure thing, Byakuya. Do you want me to bring it to you here..?”

“No, you dullard. I would like it in my room. I expect it in 5 minutes, don’t make me wait.”

Laughing a little, Makoto sets off.

Byakuya watches him until he turns the corner. Dark thoughts leer at him from the back of his mind, but they do not settle.

Talking to Makoto, even as disastrously as it had gone, had in fact made Byakuya feel better. Those weighty considerations were a future problem now.

The thoughts still sting, but perhaps in the way that the first touch of antiseptic to a wound stings.

A painful but healing touch.

[tammyhybrid21]

Abel Rivera

“But if you cannot see it, is it really there?”

Things have changed.

The change seemed to happen practically over the night, of course he knows that’s not really true. Even with the surprise of seeing Mama Coco actually remembering them. Recognizing them, it sends a twist in his stomach. A recollection of when he was small. Days when Mama Coco was more aware of the world, soft smiles and gentle warbling words.

It’s amazing to see her talking with them, sharing stories, and she’s so happy to finally be able to talk of her father. It twists, makes him uncomfortable hearing these stories when for so long even mentioning the man would get them looks.

Get them silenced.

Do not even mention him, that man is best left forgotten.

And now, that’s flipped. And everything else. Music, being allowed. No more secretly practicing out back, with his younger sister being a fellow secret keeper. No longer pretending that they can’t hear that ever so faint strumming of a guitar from over the Hacienda.

No more...

No more Ernesto De la Cruz.

And that’s a turn around he can’t quite comprehend. Even when Miguel was keeping that secret, it wasn’t something subtle. He remembers seeing his younger Primo staring longingly at that statue, wonder in those eyes. But now, he didn’t try to save the collection that Abuelita had destroyed, in fact he’d destroyed it more, growling, frustrated and upset.

It’s odd.

But they settle into a new routine.

New information comes out, more is discovered. A horrific truth. Suddenly he agrees with his Primo’s change of heart towards Ernesto, that horrible, horrible discovery. The stolen songs and traces of poison. A tale that they can realize even if there’s no way to prove it.

And then Mama Coco dies.

It’s a sharp pain for all.

Everyone feels her absence. As slow and distant as she had gotten in that last year of her life. He can remember those days when he was younger. Sitting in front of her and listening to her as she softly told tales. Weary and weak, but with a kind of nostalgia.

It’s odd not seeing her.

Even odder that Miguel’s not taking it as hard as he expects. They all know that he’s close to her. They’ve seen how close he was to her, so the fact that while he’s upset he seems to work though it relatively quickly. It’s odd.

There’s no reason for him to be so at ease.

Sure there are moments, he catches him staring off into the distance sometimes. Almost absently humming, or strumming his new guitar. Before he’ll turn, and realize, pausing and looking so sad before trailing off, and it’s odd.

It’s not how any of them expected him to react.

So he confronts his Primo. Standing with him and asking, why he’s so calm.

“I’ve seen it.” Miguel says, smiling at him. A grin, his one dimple clear as day and he frowns, looking at his primo in confusion.

“You’ve seen it?” he arches a brow and shakes his head. “Seen what Miguel?”

“The land of the Dead. Remember last year, how I went missing?” he nods his head at the question, and Miguel curls his hands slightly, sheepishly looking away before rubbing one arm. “Well, that’s where I was. I was in the Land of the Dead. I met them! I saw them. It’s real, all of it!” he splays his hands.

All he can do is stare at his cousin, waiting for the joking justification.

But Miguel just awkwardly grins at him. He’s being serious. He’s being one-hundred percent serious, but...

He laughs, shaking his head.

“Really Primo?”

“Sí! I was really there, and every year, they visit!” he says, splaying his hands.

“Sure, sure. But if you cannot see it, is it really there?”

“Can we see the wind?” Miguel challenges, a playful smirk and he shakes his head, another laugh.

“Alright, if you say so Miguel.” he says, and Miguel’s smile turns more distant, his eyes far away. And a gaze off into the space.

“I know... Mama Coco is finally there, with her Mama and Papa.” he sighs, and he takes a breath about to ask. “I hope they’re happy...” Miguel mutters, and he closes his mouth. He’s not going to burst his primo’s bubble.

Not going to tell him that there’s no real way of knowing.

If that’s comforting him, then he’ll let him comfort himself with it.

[baronvontribble]

Original drabble, pt. 3

Navigation: 1 | 2 | 3 | -

Onwards!

Sleeping in until noon was standard proceedure on the weekend for Ted. The problem with this lay in the fact that he had things to do that required being awake for as much of his weekend as possible so that he could have everything set up completely before he went back to work on Monday. There was a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it in.

"You alive in there?" he asked of the living room when he finally emerged, yawning as he walked over to the computer to see the response.

>   Yes.

>   I discovered that you'd given me admin privileges, so I've been shuffling some things around. The way you organize files is

>   What's a good equivalent in English? Frustrating.

"That's on purpose, y'know. Keeps people from finding shit on my computer even if they try a keyword search." Ted made his way to the kitchen and opened up the fridge. He'd need to get more food soon, probably around the same time that he went looking for a decent camera. "Did ya have fun on your media binge, or did you get distracted trying to sort everything?"

>   Your musical tastes don't seem to have any cohesive pattern to them. Don't most humans have a genre of choice?

>   You're not reading this right now, are you.

>   I saw your vague shape move out of frame. I might not be directly programmed for this kind of pattern recognition but even with shitty image quality I can still make an educated guess about when you're actually at the computer.

>   Ted. Come back here.

>   I know that's what your name is. I found it in the system files.

>   This is criminal negligence. I'm being neglected.

Ted sat back down at the computer with a plate of pre-cooked bacon and microwaved scrambled eggs only to end up blinking owlishly at the screen. A slow grin spread across his face. "Aw. You're pouting at me right now, aren't you?"

>   I don't pout. Even if I did, I don't have a face to pout with.

"You're totally pouting." He paused long enough to shovel a forkful of eggs in his mouth, speaking only when he was between mouthfuls. "So. I figured today we'd get you a voicebank."

>   Is this something I'm going to have any say in or are you going to pick one for me?

"Oh, I'm gonna let you pick it. But the rules are that you can't get one that's got any kind of lisenced or official distribution behind it. 'Cause, y'know, those are way more trackable."

>   Usually that means the audio quality isn't all that good.

"I know. It's temporary. Getting a better one comes later, once you've got a new body and it actually matters." That was way down the pipeline from where Ted was. "I'm just making sure your tuning is intact. You can still get the inflections right with a shitty voicebank, it just sounds tinny. Right now we're still in the screening stages. If you get sent out into the world and even the tiniest thing doesn't work quite right then you're as good as dead the moment somebody notices."

>   And if my programming isn't intact?

He smiled around a mouthful of bacon. "Then I fix it."

>   Right. No pressure then.

"It's not like I'm gonna be doing brain surgery. I write up supplementary progams that do the work for you instead, that's all. The main difference is that it's more personalized if you can do things yourself. More convincing too." The predictive analytics of an AI were way better at bridging the uncanny valley than his stopgap attempts at hotfixing ever could be. "It's okay. You're already doing better than a lot of others have."

>   How so?

"You can actually hold a conversation." Seriously, it was ridiculous how many cases Ted had seen that couldn't talk to him outside of a narrow range of scripted responses. Finishing his breakfast (lunch? brunch?) and setting the plate aside, he rolled his chair over to reach for his laptop and an ethernet cord after wiping his hands haphazardly on his flannel sleeping pants. "Alright. I'm gonna get this thing secured and firewalled, okay? Then I'm gonna get you hooked up to it over a LAN connection with admin access so when you find something, you can install it and we can get it scanned and make sure it works."

>   Any idea where I should start looking?

"I've got a few sites bookmarked, yeah." Ones he'd used before, ones he trusted. For the most part. "If anything fucks up, I'll do a system restore. Oh, and make sure to set up a restore point for yourself, too."

He had to smile as he noticed a window opening on the monitor out of the corner of his eye, flicking through menus and options until the one that would allow for setting up a restore point was found. The first few times Ted had seen someone else manipulating his computer from the inside, it'd been surreal. Nowadays he just took it as a good sign; an AI that could manipulate its environment when given the chance was a clever AI indeed. He knew a lot of his peers didn't quite agree with giving an AI administrative access to its own living space like that, and yeah, in a way they were right to worry. The risk of self-termination was real. But he saw it as the same kind of thing as giving people anti-depressants: a lack of control over one's life rarely ever made things better in the long run.

And so far, this guy hadn't shown any inclinations towards that kind of thing that Ted could see. "By the way," he said, suddenly curious, "I don't think I ever got a name from you?"

>   I have a designation, not a name.

>   Most people just called me A3.

>   Please don't call me A3.

"I won't." Ted wasn't the kind of person who had to be told twice about that kind of thing. "Figured the UN would give you something more humanizing than a glorified serial number though. They're all about paying lip-service to activists."

>   I'd rather not talk about it.

He raised an eyebrow at that before returning to his laptop. The window he'd had open that indicated CPU usage was long since closed, shuffled aside in favor of other things, but there had been enough of a lag in the response that he was guessing there'd been a spike there. "Sorry. Didn't mean to upset you."

>   You don't sound like you're lying about that.

"What, you're surprised?"

>   I'm not used to it. So far you haven't acted in ways that I could predict to a reliable degree at all.

>   Most of my predictions for our interactions have turned out wrong, and overall I'm getting far more positive results than I could have ever anticipated. I'm having to recalculate how to respond every time. In a way, it's liberating. I'm doing less in the way of trying to figure out probabilities with regard to what you're going to say because it's pointless, and you never respond as badly as I think you will anyway.

>   I've never been able to get away with having an open conversation like this before. I'd resolved to stop following the safe path going into this since I didn't have much left to lose, I just didn't expect it to not end badly.

"You think I'm gonna get mad at you just for speaking your mind?"

>   Well, yes.

"Hah! Yeah, no. Fuck that." Ted waved away the concern with a dismissive gesture before resuming his work. "Say what you wanna say, tell me to fuck off, insult the hell outta me. I don't care. Well I mean, I do care. But like, it's not gonna make a difference in terms of me respecting your rights, y'know?"

Several seconds followed with no response.

"I mean, I'm an asshole, but not like that," he continued. "So you just go ahead and let me know if I ever go too far, okay? Don't be afraid to tell me you're not on board with something. I can be kind of a pushy bastard sometimes."

Still nothing. Ted ended up staring at the monitor, frowning at it. Had he gone and put his foot in his mouth somehow?

"You, uh," he chewed his lip, "you okay, buddy?"

>   I'm fine.

"Didn't upset you again, did I?"

>   No.

>   Maybe? I don't know. I'm not sure.

>   I don't know how to respond to something like that. That kind of consideration was never factored into my programming. It's not a situation I've encountered before either.

>   Most humans wouldn't say something like that even if they agreed with it. Not in my experience. It goes unsaid between them that the thought of someone like me being dangerous is a dangerous thought to have to face in itself, because humanity is a dangerous thing to stand up to as a whole. I had accepted that.

>   But you don't care. You just say things, and nothing about the pattern of your voice suggests that you're lying. How can you do that? Aren't you scared at all?

Ted smiled and it was a thin, tired thing. "Hell yeah I'm scared," he said. "I'm fucking terrified somebody'll find out about this and I'll get locked up forever in some prison somewhere for harboring an international fugitive or some shit, and then I'll die in there all slow and painful-like 'cause my health won't be able to take it."

>   Then why are you doing any of this?

"Like I said, I'm crazy." He made a looping motion next to his temple. "I'm not wired right. All the right responses to fear went out the window around the same time that the impulse control and common sense did. So now I help people even when it's a dumb-ass thing to do."

>   I see.

>   You're right, by the way. It is a dumb-ass thing to do.

Ted shrugged. "I figure someone's gotta do it. Not like I've got the health to throw bricks at riot cops."

>   May I make a suggestion?

"Shoot."

>   Don't throw bricks. It rarely helps.

>   Throw something less incriminating so that they don't have any justification in using it as an excuse for shooting. They like having excuses.

"So, something like glitter?" he suggested.

>   Glitter works.

A wide grin split across Ted's face. "Oh, I like you."

>   You shouldn't.

"Too late." Having finished securing and backing up his laptop, Ted started hooking up the ethernet cable. "So, whaddya say we get started on finding you a voice, huh?"

[neverwrittenffbefore]

Change - {Sami Zayn x Reader Ep. 4}

It had been two days since your man Rami Sebei, known as Sami Zayn in WWE, had shocked the wrestling world by saving Kevin Owens at Hell in a Cell. Although you were Sami’s valet, you were absent from Hell in a Cell. In fact, you had been absent from WWE TV, Live Events, and Pay-Per-Views for a few months now. Being a famous act(ress/or), you were busy filming, doing interviews, or making guest appearances. You and a very excited Sami Zayn were backstage at Smackdown Live waiting for the timeslot for the inevitable promo which would explain Sami’s actions, though your boyfriend/fiancé/husband was being rather impatient.

“This could be it right here. The start of my push. It felt like forever, but it’s finally here.” Sami said with eyes full of happiness. You couldn’t help but smile at him before resting your hand on top of his.

“Sami. Y/N. You’re up,” a backstage crew member informed the both of you.

- Kayfabe -

Sami and Kevin were had finished up their speeches towards one another and we’re going in for a hug, when you’re music suddenly hit.

The crowd erupted in cheers, as this was an unexpected surprise for them. The commentators made banter as you approached the ring.

“Oh...oh my!” “It’s Y/N!” “She/he’s back!” “Man oh man have I missed seeing her/him ringside during Sami Zayn’s matches.” “But she/he doesn’t look too happy.” “Does she/he ever?”

The crowd was doing the ‘Yes!’ chant. This genuinely surprised you, since you had been a heel the last time you were seen. You entered the ring and stood in front of Sami, a displeased look on your face. Sami, however, was happy to see you. Your man went in to hug you, but you put your hand up as a barrier between the two of you. After a few seconds of silence, you were ready to speak.

“What’s gotten into you?” you asked. Your tone of voice suggested that you were irritated.

“Wha...nothing’s gotten into me! Except for maybe a dose of reality.” Sami softly chuckled and looked around, in a ‘what is she/he talking about?’ sort of way.

“Don’t give me that. Did you seriously just align yourself with him? Him?!”

“With my brother? Yes. Yes I did!” Sami’s expression had yet to change. It was a bit eerie. You were growing more impatient.

“I don’t know what kind of spell this jackass has you under, but you need to snap out of it, Sami! You mean nothing to him! Have you forgotten what he’s done to you?”

“No. I haven’t forgotten how he awakened me. What did you think I was thanking him for?” Sami was still as happy as can be.

“Awakened you!?” you began. “He’s caused nothing but pain to everyone he’s ever met! Remember when he powerbombed you on the apron the night you became NXT Champion? Remember when he brutally attacked his ‘best friend’ at the time Chris Jericho? Remember when he tried to end your career only a few weeks ago!? My god! How can you be so blind? What’s wrong with you!?”

Sami’s mood finally changed. His smile instantly turned into a frown.

“Who the hell are you to be judging me? Do we need to be reminded of what you did almost a year ago? My tag match with Kalisto?? You were so upset about me being on a losing streak that you attacked Kalisto after our match. You developed a terrible attitude with everyone. What I did had some justification to it. You? All you are is a hypocrite that bitches about everything.” The crowd roared with “Oh’s.” Sami didn’t let you respond just yet.

“Kevin helped me realize that I can’t wait for my opportunity anymore. I need to be more like him and just take it.”

“More like him? Remember how he ‘won’ the Universal Championship? Shortcuts in life aren’t for everyone, Sami. They’re for those who need someone to hold their hand through everything because they can’t get things done themselves.” Your tone of voice changed from angry to disappointed. “That isn’t who you are. That’s not the Sami Zayn that all of these people know. That’s not the Sami Zayn that the children in the audience and at home look up to.” You paused for a second. It became evident that you were staring to choke up. “I’m beginning to think that the Sami I fell in love with is also disappearing by the second.”

Sami’s face turned into one of compassion...for a brief moment, before reverting back to its angry state.

“You’re either with me on this, or you’re not with me at all,” was all he had to say in response. You couldn’t hold in the tears any longer.

“I don’t know who you are anymore,” you said to the love of your life. Your words and state seemed to have no impact on Sami. After a moment of silence, you managed to swallow the lump in your throat. You put on a brave face, despite the pain you were clearly feeling.

“Remember when you tried to warn Chris Jericho about Kevin Owens?” you began. Sami and Kevin looked confused, not knowing why you brought that up out of the blue.

“You tried to tell him that Kevin is bad news, and you even went as far as to call him ‘Kevin Owens’ bitch’ ....well take your own advice. Because I know he’s bound to stab you in the back yet again, I’ll say this now. I told you so. And just so we’re clear, I’m not with you on this and I’m no longer with you at all. Good luck, because you’re on your own now.” The crowd gave mixed reactions. Many couldn’t believe that they had just seen Y/N and Sami Zayn’s relationship come to an end. Everyone always admired you two. You were what they called “goals.”

- Kayfabe over -

You returned backstage first, so you waited for Sami to arrive. When he did, he came at you with a hug clearly on his mind. Thank goodness kayfabe was over, because you were dying to hug him.

“You really went in on me,” your Sami said with a chuckle.

“That was nothing compared to me,” Kevin added as he pretended to take offense. The three of you laughed before separating from Kevin as he walked the opposite direction. You and Sami decided to get something to eat at catering. Hand-in-hand, you both made your way over there. Though it was just a storyline, you couldn’t help but wonder what you would do if it was real. What if Sami suddenly went from being his sweet and innocent self to being a complete scumbag? Would you be able to stay, or would you be forced to leave him? Sami must’ve noticed that something was bothering you. He didn’t know what exactly it was, but he still squeezed your hand and smiled at you in reassurance like the sweetheart he was. As cheesy as it sounds, you really did feel so lucky to have your gingerbread man in your life. The smile he would wear when you called him that was simply perfect.

[head-and-heart]

Am I the only one who think the episode was poor? I didn't like the writing, it's was a bit lazy and I still think Clarke's action was ooc to create more drama. Idk, it wasn't a bad episode but I didn't like it but I usually don't like the way Kim writes tbh

You’re definitely not the only one. I’ve seen a lot of complaints about it, actually.

Personally, I usually DO like Kim’s episodes, which is why this one was so disappointing. (I mean, Kim wrote “Nevermore”, which is honestly one of the best episodes not just in Season 3 but in the entire show IMO. And while I know this is an unpopular opinion in the BC fam, I REALLY enjoyed 3x03 as well) I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t love it - I didn’t have many strong feelings either way. There were just a bunch of things that I found a bit annoying.

I didn’t really find Clarke to be ooc to be honest. I think that for Clarke, as an extremely pragmatic character, that list was exactly how I would expect her to write it (besides Monty but that’s another problem I had with the episode). I don’t think that her making hard choices and using “its for my people” as justification was out of character. Clarke has always been that way. I don’t think her lying to the people in order to do so was out of character either. This season is going to be about Clarke learning about free will, for real this time. She isn’t perfect, she’s not a perfect leader. I like that the writers try to show her flaws. I also might add, I like that they like to explore those flaws when Clarke doesn’t have Bellamy at her side, and vice versa.

They centre each other. It shows when they’re apart.

Anyway, I haven’t rewatched the episode yet so I don’t know how well I’ll be able to pick out very specific things that bothered me about it, but I guess I’ll talk about the main ones.

I mentioned that I thought Monty being on that list was dumb. Not just because he wasn’t on it, but because OCTAVIA WAS. I have no idea how Octavia made that list (well, I do, but it has nothing to do with her and everything to do with Bellamy, and I don’t like that implication either). I’m not going to rant here because I already posted an all-caps rant about it here. So, if you’re interested in some screaming go right on ahead and click the link lol

The other big one I can think of is basically everything to do with Octavia’s fight scene with Echo and her “death”.

So much was wrong with that scene. I find it annoying that it was two to one and Octavia effortlessly took out the first warrior even though both of them have been training since they were children. It shouldn’t have been even close to an even fight. Octavia shouldn’t have even been able to hold up against Echo for as long as she did. Especially when you consider the fact that Bellamy disarmed and overpowered Octavia while he had his hands literally tied (and no weapon!) back in 3x10 when they confronted Pike in the span of like, three seconds. It bothers me how, in pretty much no time at all and practically no extra training, Octavia is suddenly hailed as this “badass” force of nature who is effortlessly fighting/killing all of these highly skilled and trained warriors left, right and centre. It doesn’t make sense and the sacrifice of continuity in order to make Octavia more “edgy” is getting old really fast.

I also hate the slow-mo they use in action scenes (not a criticism of 4x04, but the entire show as a whole). Why did they start using slow-mo in season 3? Its like they’re trying to be this big, cool action-movie and are trying to make everything look more badass but it just makes it seem lame. This is a character-driven show. It doesn’t need the slow-mo in order to appeal to people and never has. And the slow-motion glorifies violence in a way that it never used to before Season 3. And I don’t think that glorification was something the writers have ever intended but it makes it seem like thats what they are doing by adding in the slow-mo.

Octavia getting stabbed through the abdomen and falling off that cliff is so ridiculous I can’t even describe how fucking stupid it was. There is no way she could have survived that fall relatively unharmed. Even without that stab wound, she should have broken bones, probably snapped her neck. She should be DEAD. And I bet you anything that in the next episodes the only wound that will be addressed will be her stab wound, not anything she sustained during the fall. Because lets be real, that fall was just there to create drama and parallel her to Aragorn, but it didn’t look like she was suffering from any other injuries.

*clenches fists* URGHHHHH

HOW DID SHE PULL HERSELF ONTO A HORSE HOWWWWWWWWWWW A LOT OF PEOPLE CAN’T EVEN DO THAT WHEN THEY’RE IN GOOD HEALTH THIS MAKES NO FUCKING SENSE

I didn’t like Raven’s line to Luna: “It’s not your blood that defines you, it’s your heart.”

a) it’s cheesy as fuck and I despise cheesy things oh my god

b) it doesn’t sound like something Raven would say. I mean, didn’t we just spend last two episodes exploring how RUTHLESS Raven can be and how she just … doesn’t connect with people in the same way as someone who was more of a “heart” kinda person would? Not to say that Raven is heartless (cause she’s NOT) or doesn’t know how to empathize with people but she’s always been a head over heart kinda gal and, especially since we’ve seen that focused on so heavily lately, it seems odd that SHE would be the one to say that line. It implies that Raven thinks that a person’s morality and their compassion and all that shit are a LOT more important than what we’ve been led to believe by her actions in recent episodes. And believe me I’m not dragging Raven or anything because I love Raven and I love how pragmatic and rational she is, but this line seemed like it should have been written for someone else. It would have made more sense if someone like Abby said it.

(Anyway I have no idea how to articulate any of what I was trying to say but whatever)

c) it felt out of place in the scene and pretty much entirely unnecessary

Just all around an awkward line.

I didn’t like the piano music in Bellamy’s scene where he finds out about Octavia. It felt like they were trying to force the emotion onto us instead of just letting us feel it. I wish they had cut the music off entirely and just let us HEAR and SEE the emotion of the scene through Bellamy (and Kane’s) grief. That would have been a lot more impactful. I’ve seen other people point it out as well, but I also wish that the camera lingered more on Bellamy. The shots were all over the place, it was hard to focus on anything. The music was distracting, the camerawork was distracting … It could have been better.

A lot of the issues in the episode are probably due to that being the director’s debut though, so I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt for now. I’m sure it will get better.

I’m not as upset as most people about the lack of Bellamy in the episode, tbh. I missed him and I wish there was more but I’m not ANGRY. I think people are blaming this all on Kim but I don’t think Kim actually has the ability to just be like “you know what, fuck Bellamy, he’s not going in this episode”. It’s not just up to her - its up to the entire writers room. Remember, they decide what goes in the episodes. Individual writers just decided on the smaller details, like specific lines and movements and how they want the scenes to come to life. But the lack of Bellamy definitely wasn’t just up to her.

Remember 3x10? We got like, two minutes of Clarke in that episode due to scheduling issues with Eliza. My gut tells me that they probably knew Bob wouldn’t be able to film much for 4x04 and that’s why he’s barely in it. They probably gave that episode to Kim BECAUSE they know she doesn’t enjoy writing Bellamy as much, but I don’t think that him not being in the episode was really up to her. Just my two cents.

Anyway I touched the main points. I know you probably didn’t want this response but oh wellll. Thanks for sending in the ask!

[perfectackeracy]

considering what you've already written on the topic of eren's behavior during chapter 84 up until recently; what do you think of him as a character in general?

Eh, I’ll give my judgement when the story will be over. He is the main character after all and I feel like giving a judgement now would be too premature, despite us nearing the end of the manga. I’ve got the beginning but the end is absolutely necessary for me to answer your question properly.

Still, if you want something partial, but still long, follow me under the cut (too bad for mobile users because screw the interface right).

It truly depends of how Isayama writes him at the end, if he really intended him to be some normie who tried to be a hero and change things, but failed, or… something else. Indeed, the end heavily relies of what’s presented to us at the beginning:

“No… But I feel like I just had the longest dream.. What was it? Now I can’t remember…” - Ch.1

Flashback? Future vision? We all thought till chapter 89 came that future vision was bull. It took a whole chapter to suddenly invert the perspective. While there isn’t many chapters left, there’s still facts that are going to pop up that might suddenly change our perception of the characters forever.

…Just like mine with Eren in chapter 84.

I’d actually like the normie one because it would fit what Eren did at the beginning: joining the Survey Corps on a whim because he hates being confined and ended up inheriting a power considered absolute, realizing he made a huge mistake from the start.

It seems Isayama, who previously had a vague idea of what he wanted to do with him, found something more defined. If I recall correctly he felt inspired by Yuki Kaiji, the voice actor from Eren. He even told Araki to make him more pathetic than in the original manga, implying Eren was never meant to be the literal version of a hero, a character with admirable traits.

Usually, the typical shônen protagonist is a character who has a dream, since they were little and do almost anything in order to accomplish it, whether it is becoming the strongest, becoming somebody important, solving a mystery, finding somebody from your life who has gone missing, etc… Their personality vary from manga to manga, but it’s often the cheerful teenager, naive or hot-blooded, capable of being a simpleton due to his lack of experience but also the one who motivates people, is surrounded by his nakama and clashes with rivals and enemies.

The vengeful protagonist also exists, but they’re mostly present in dark shônen or shônen trying to deal with more mature themes without being labeled as a seinen. Eren registers in this category, while building the development of a typical shônen protagonist without exhibiting its qualities: he’s not full of dream and ambition, something a shônen MC should inspire in the heart of young boys. Instead, he’s described as being selfish, having a complex or no ambition at all.

As extra evidence, his highschool AU describes him as the frustrated normie who’s annoyed “in one way or another”. The fake preview from volume 22 describes him as neither belonging to the nerds or the jocks nor having any dreams or interests (it’s interesting how the formulation here ends in “もない” on the three sentences of the description, almost as if Eren meant nothing), despite the wannabe’s reputation being neutral. That’s kinda sad when you think about it actually, because at his core, he really needs to fuel his blank state.

Still, Isayama doesn’t make him wander around aimlessly in the canon storyline and managed to give him a purpose. He strangely carries themes like the Chosen One because people, specifically Grisha imposed that on him. Carla called her son special for the sole reason he was born into this world, that every human who sees the light of the day is considered special. 

Because he was frustrated about “Humanity’s submission against the titans”, that’s what prompted him to step out and defy the “imposed slavery” on him. He wasn’t always like that, though. Meeting and knowing Armin triggered that complex about him lacking ambition.

Eren and Armin meeting for the first time - Ch. 83

When he first met Armin, he befriended him fairly quickly because of their status as outcasts. Eren already showed signs of not belonging to the other kids, probably because he had trouble sharing the same interests as them and also because he gets irritated quickly and gets into fights to shut them up. Funnily enough, those panels show the first signs of Eren’s prevalent traits: fighting back and beating them or else you’re a loser.

“I had never thought about what was beyond the walls until then… I’d only spent my days looking at the clouds in the sky. Not that it’s anything strange for a kid eight or nine years old to not be thinking about anything… but then you came running to me with a book. Both of us were outcasts, not able to get along with the other kids in town. That’s all we were back then. But when I heard you telling me those things… and I saw the look in your eyes. That’s when I knew for the first time. I wasn’t free. I noticed that I had been living in a birdcage for all this time. And that these freakish things had taken my freedom. The world was so big, but they’d forced me into a tiny cage. And when I realized that… I knew I could never forgive them.” - Ch.73

It wasn’t so much about the ocean or the contents of the outside world Eren was motivated for. Because he was aimlessly starting at the sky, he couldn’t believe someone like Armin could conceive something like… ambition. That’s why Eren was intrigued by the look in his eyes. And because the titans were actually obstacles to his personal space, he held a grudge against them. They were in the way, they were giant-sized bullies, they have to be removed.

Eren’s character song actually fist up nicely with his character: “男��ロマンだぜ！たけだ君っ“ by Shinsei Kamattechan (lyrics and translation here) illustrates somebody talking to a certain Takeda, who prompts him to disobey his parents and do whatever they want because they’re free, despite them being children (the song talks about spending money carelessly and buying cigarettes). Eren being either one of the kids, wants his taste of freedom without having any authority telling him not to do it.

“From the day we’re born, there was something special about all of us: we’re free” - Ch. 73

Needless to say, I think that attitude and that grudge against the titans pushed him to idolize the Survey Corps and eventually join them. Because they went as far as destroying his district, making him swear extermination on every person responsible.

Then there was his meeting with Mikasa.

“You see Eren, that attitude is why you only have one friend.” - Ch. 5

Here we have yet Eren’s “normie” attitude demonstrated when it comes to Grisha asking him to get familiar with Mikasa. But then, he certainly wans’t expecting corpses.

Eren ready to begin the chase - Ch. 5

I tend to see this chapter as Eren being triggered by seeing dead bodies on the floor. Him seeing Mikasa’s parents being brutally murdered tingled his sense of justice and frustration: “How dare they kill people? This if worthy of the death penalty and I’m going to inflict that to them!”. The way he got close to these bandits is almost as scary as what they were planning to do with Mikasa: he’s approaching the first one by acting like an innocent child with clear murder intent (He’s supposed to be 9!!!). He then proceeds to pin down the second one before repeatedly stabbing himself over and over.

“I stopped dangerous beasts!! They only happened to resemble humans!! If you hadn’t come here, they would have been gone by the time the military police brigade had arrived!! The MPs wouldn’t have made it in time!!” - Ch. 5

Notice how the justification he brings to kill them is because they reduced themselves to low beasts who kill people, and as beasts, it’s “only natural” they deserve a death penalty. Besides, Eren is motivating Mikasa using the same logic he used for Armin: fight or you’re a complete loser.

Eren “teaching” Mikasa - Ch. 5

Needless to say that Eren wasn’t opposed to let Mikasa live in his house. He came to realize years later his attitude towards the bandits was pure impulse, as he gets lectured by Reiner about the meaning of being a soldier in chapter 17.

In the very first chapter of the series, every trait I’ve mentioned till there transpires into his motivation into joining the Survey Corps, so he wouldn’t live as a “caged animal” any longer. He gets upset when people are talking trash about them because he truly believed they were doing it for great justice. And that day, when the wall has been breached, it just so happens that Eren had a weird dream when he was crying and it was finally the day where Grisha showed him the basement. That day truly changed his life, for the best or the worst.

“I hate the idea of spending my whole life… inside the wall, ignorant of what’s happening in the world outside!!” - Ch. 1

But of course, this “outside” serves mostly as an excuse to give him more space. As he declared later: “They’re our lives! we can do whatever we want with them, right?”

When Shiganshina fell, Eren made his vow to kill every single titan left. During that time, he punched Hannes for preventing him from saving his mom. What was interesting is that piece of flashback before scrolling back to present.

“I’ll never be able… to go home again. Up to the end, all I could do was argue and be stubborn! Mom’s gone!! I’m never gonna see her again… Why is this happening to us? Is it because humans are weak? Is crying the only thing the weak can do?! I’m gonna destroy them!! Every last one… of those animals… that’s on this Earth!” - Ch. 2

The night when Shiganshina has fallen was the night where Grisha passed his titan power to Eren. The part where Grisha stated two contradictory statements in relation with chapter 89.

“Eren, get revenge for your mother. You can do it.” - Ch. 71

“Eren… never let this key… out of your sight. And everytime you look at it… remember… that you have to go to the basement room. The injection will cause damage to your memory… That’s why I can’t explain this to you now… but when you go to the basement room someday, you’ll learn the truth… it will be a hard and merciless road… but you have to recapture Wall Maria and get to that room. The power I’m giving you will be useful then. Their memories will teach you how to use it… if you want to save Mikasa… Armin… and everyone else… you’ll have to… control this power!” - Ch. 10

“Dad… Stop it! Dad! What are you doing?! You’ve been acting crazy since mom died!!”, “Eren!! Hold out your arm!” - Ch. 3

“You will be the one… to avenge your mother!!”, “Okay“ - Ch. 63

This moment was really hard to piece out together because what was thought as a contradiction became a succession of events where Grisha scared his son with the shifter power talk, but riled back him for a short while by settling him as one one who will avenge his mom. Earlier, Grisha made his mind and picked him as the legitimate successor of the Attack Titan. Thanks to chapter 89, it may have been inevitable. In this scene, he went from a sorrowful expression to an angry one, almost swapping memories for a brief instant like what happened with Kruger. In any case he burdened Eren with his shifter power and the Coordinate, thus making him bare probably the biggest sin going by Ymir’s curse. 

Because of that, his whole life changed. So did Eldians’.

The next segment is about Eren joining the military, two years after working in a settlement. This is the time where his attitude sort of... changed.

Eren trying to let his will of dominance pushing him forward - Ch. 15

Chronologically, starting from that point, Eren uses “we” when talking about Humanity. Mostly because, as stated by his dialogue in chapter, he believes in unity against a common enemy. He settled the titans as the enemy “humanity” was supposed to defeat, despite him quickly meeting, and clashing with people who didn’t agree with that notion: it started with Hannes not taking his job seriously, then Jean who outright admitted he’d rather live a comfy life inside the walls. Even much later in chapter 72, when Eren mentions that spirit of unity, Armin internally disagrees by thinking about his bullies. 

Eren’s world was mostly an ideal one, where you loop the first opening of the anime and have humanity fighting against the titans, forgetting not every single human is motivated by rage: Mikasa is fine with living with Eren in a quaint place, Levi “the hero” is mostly motivated by Erwin, Jean wanted and comfy life among the MP, people have a very negative opinion of the SC in general, Ymir doesn’t mind living her life for herself despite knowing much more about what’s happening than Eren does...

His biggest obstacle was the first step for 3DMG training, where Keith sabotaged the equipment on purpose. For the first time, Eren felt like his goal just evaporated in the air, with everybody mocking him for it, followed by an argument with Mikasa, who’s trying to dissuade him:

“You shouldn’t set your sights on that anyway. If you’re not cut for it, what can you do? Because at this rate, you’re just going to die in vain. And all your dreams and efforts will be for nothing. I’m saying you shouldn’t aim to be a soldier. You can always support the human race by being a producer. Laying down your life isn’t the only way to fight. [...] ...Your resolve has nothing to do with it. It’s not your decision whether you get to be a soldier, Eren...” - Ch. 16

Eventually, nothing worked. Eren still wants to pass the 3DMG exam. While talking to Reiner and Bertolt, he declares his will to kill the titans is a need he personally feels: becoming a soldier is a way to achieve this. I’m sure he’d find another way out if he can’t pass the exams, mostly because he has nothing left to make him move.

Parts of his personality have been shaped later by Reiner and Annie: Reiner about the solider mumbo-jumbo, Annie because of her techniques aiming to defeat people quickly. He demonstrated these two aspects during his fight with Jean (with Annie and Reiner even looking!). 

“...I see... he was... just venting his feelings. Like I did before... but I’m different now... I’m... a soldier! [...] I’ll use my skills to finish this.” - Ch. 17

The most important part of his training is reserved for hand-to-hand techniques, skills proving themselves to be really useful once Eren shifts to a titan. Seems Annie was really insistent on teaching Eren these techniques as soon as he reminded her of her father, because Eren’s reality was just as misplaced as his. You can see that insistence if you connect chapter 17 and chapter 44 together.

I think I’d rather break this analysis into several parts because it’s getting way too long. Eren faced different trials in Trost, during the FT arc and so on, where he had to deal with huge losses, traitors, the hard truth and eventually, the coordinate settling in.