#any kind of real experience that is coming to you directly from circumstances. from so to say the hand of God directly

[itspileofgoodthings]

in my coming to terms with things era

[lostwords-found]

Oh god. Okay. SO. The Protocol red string board is going places and I am chewing drywall.

Note: I've been working on this post for a few days and nothing in here involves episode 27--I don't talk about episodes before they're out for everyone, so no worries about patreon spoilers.

Quick recap of some suspicions about Protocolverse I've written about previously:

1. I think this universe runs on a kind of balance of good & bad luck (or suffering and happiness), and that it's possible--under certain circumstances--to pawn the bad stuff off on other people and keep the good that arises to balance it out. I suspect a big piece of Protocol's overarching plot is going to be about the different ways people go about trying to come out ahead in that bargain.

2. I think some alchemists figured out how to attach bad luck and/or other similarly abstract ills into physical form.

3. I think they were trying to use this to cast out bad luck to other worlds (including that of Archives) and get good luck back. I think this is how the Fears got to Archives in the first place.

4. I think the books and coin in the tomb from MAG 23 got there this way, probably with the involvement of Protocolverse Albertus Magnus. The year on the coin -- 1279 -- is the year before Albertus Magnus died.

We'll come back to that stuff in a bit.

There's an apparently minor detail that was nagging at me recently: in TMAGP 22 Hans Berger specifically mentions having switched to silver wires in his experiments, and this change enabling his breakthroughs. It's through these silver wires, implanted directly into Herr Schmidt's brain, that he later receives the desperate telegraph signals that appear to be from a previously unheard part of Schmidt's brain.

By itself, that wouldn't ping any alarms. Silver wires are in fact what Berger used in real life; silver's highly conductive so if you're trying to read electrical impulses from the brain, probably a good choice of material. But the writing is very deliberate about mentioning them, and coming only three episodes after another historical letter about a scientist also working with silver -- Newton's tree in TMAGP 19 was a fantastical variant of a Tree of Diana, dendritic silver -- Berger's wires start feeling like maybe they're not just there for accuracy.

If, as it appears from Newton's work, consuming silver in certain forms can cause a new kind of consciousness to arise--and also, uh, turn you into a tree--what might implanting silver wires in a human brain do? Is the silver contacting or awakening something that was already there, or is it putting something there? Was that desperate OUT OUT OUT message really from half of Herr Schmidt's mind--or from something in the wire itself that was trying to get out?

That would be weird though. I mean--what, Protocolverse silver's inherently evil or something? But then I got back to thinking about alchemists trying to transmute things into precious metals. Gold's the one we mostly think of, but silver was also of interest. Which in real life is where you got stuff like the tree of Diana--alchemists thought that was a precursor to the philosopher's stone.

So... then I start thinking, if I was right in my other post that alchemists were figuring out how to put evil / misfortune / suffering into a physical form that could be used to transfer it somewhere else, what if silver was involved in that? What if they were either turning misfortune into silver, or trapping it in silver that already existed?

What if they did that, meaning to send it away, and some of that silver made its way into use?

Then I started looking some stuff up.

Did you know silver used to be mined in the Black Forest, in Germany? One mine there had a name meaning "Blessing of God." That mine dates back to the 1200s--Albertus Magnus's lifetime.

Did you know that starting in the 1600s, the G strings on high quality violins were typically wrapped in silver wire?

Do you know why movies are called the silver screen? In the 1920s, literal silver was used to make cinema screens. This fell out of favor as other cheaper designs were worked out, BUT in the 2000s silver has come back into use a bit because it works well for 3D movies. I would not be surprised at all if the screen that Tom went to see Voyeur on had silver in it.

Did you know that in the early 90s there was a specific plant in the UK that manufactured CDs covered with a layer of silver? This later turned out to cause some problems as the silver reacted with sulfur (oh hai, another alchemically significant substance!) and slowly degraded the discs. In real life these CDs were manufactured up through 1993. Per TMAGP 10, Mr Bonzo made his debut in '96 (the interview is from 2021 and is the 25th anniversary of Mr Bonzo's first appearance). The two times Mr Bonzo has appeared in person he's been summoned by playing a CD of his theme song. I wonder where and when those CDs were manufactured...

Did you notice the caterer Lady Mowbray hired in TMAGP 15 mentions that his company did silver service events? Betcha that particular feast was served on literal silver platters.

...I'm starting to think it's a really good thing ink5oul didn't end up tattooing Gwen with that silver spoon.

Okay. This all seems like there's maybe a theme here, but let's take a step back. Some materials have just been used for a lot of things throughout history; it could be coincidence. IF the above is actually on the mark--IF these were all intentional majorly-plot-relevant inclusions of Things Wot Involve Silver--where else would we expect to see this cropping up in the story? Because the topic of silver has barely been raised directly at all; I'm extrapolating wildly here, mostly on the basis of a couple episodes.

Well, here's a thought: silver was used in everyday currency for a long, long time. If there was a bunch of Evil Silver floating around surely someone would have stuck it into some money at some point. "Ill fortune" in the most literal possible sense, or whole new meaning to the phrase "bad penny" -- there are various bad jokes there that more or less write themselves. Though whoever was doing this would have had to to mark the bad money somehow so that they could avoid it...

Hey, um, remember how the OIAR's offices are in the building that housed the Royal Mint for like 150 years?

Actually, while we're on that subject, here's a funny little tidbit: Before it moved to Royal Mint Court, the Royal Mint was in the Tower of London for several centuries--its first home after being centralized. Wanna guess what year the Royal Mint was established in the Tower of London? Go on. Guess.

1279.

The same. Fucking. Year. As was on that coin waaaaaay back in MAG 23. Which was a thing I had noticed a while back when looking at the Germany eps, but I hadn't been considering a "what if some metals can be Bad" angle at that point and had just written it off as an odd coincidence.

Which I mean, it's probably still just a weird coincidence, I'm building this entire elaborate framework out of assumptions on top of assumptions on top of -- hang the fuck on, let me look something up real quick, I've gotta be misremembering--

I'm not misremembering! Isaac Newton was the Master of the Royal Mint for the last 30 years of his life.

Cool. Okay. So that's--hm. I think I'm genuinely starting to convince myself none of this is a coincidence.

Then I start poking through Wikipedia, and you wanna know some other interesting things? One, Newton himself apparently saw his work in economics as a continuation of his alchemical work. And two, during his tenure at the Royal Mint, he put limits on how much gold people were allowed to exchange for silver, and this led to a silver shortage. Because apparently, when other countries imported goods to them, the British paid for those goods in silver coins. When they exported goods to other countries, though?

They would only take payment in gold.

And there it is--there's the exact outsourcing scheme I was looking for. Stick all your suffering and pain and misfortune into your money, use that money to pay other countries, and get only the good stuff back. That... sounds really believable for the British Empire, honestly.

So I really think I might have some decent guesses on the historical stuff at play here. That only goes just so far though, because these days, silver doesn't really get used in coinage much.

Know where it does get used? Circuits. Electronics.

Computers.

If I'm right, whatever machinery the Mint used to store the intangible evils of the world in physical coinage for exportation, I would guess the OIAR is now using to instill all of those evils into FR3-D1 instead. One all-containing artifact of misfortune.

What the endgame is there, what the government gets out of it, I'm still not 100% sure--but I can't help thinking about Jonah's line in MAG 160 that Jon is not the Archivist but the Archive. That he is the record of fear, the physical embodiment of it.

There's people wanting to outsource absolutely fucking everything to AI these days, I guess.

SO THAT'S BEEN MY WEEK this is what my brain does when I have to drive all the way across the US alone, apparently. How are you all?

[adiluv-moved]

✦ : ❝ 𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦𝐬 ꒰𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐦𝐞꒱ !

꒰synopsis—wc꒱ in which your bed is taken and you try to get your roommate to share; 872 words.

꒰warnings꒱ akademiya roommate wanderer, lumine as traveler, reader is not traveler/is from sumeru, barely edited.

꒰adi moment꒱ i cannot stop being haunted by ideas right before i'm about to go to sleep, please send help!! also, doing a bit more experimenting with the titles, so let me know what y'all think! super short drabble, but hope you enjoy! ໒꒰ྀི*ˊ ᵕ ˋ꒱ྀི১

"Need I remind you," comes the chiding of an ever familiar voice, staring you down with dull eyes. "You were the one that oh, so 'graciously' insisted upon giving up your room to the Traveler." A reminder, the Wanderer you've come to call your roommate poking you in the shoulder as those words leave his lips.

He's unimpressed, that much is clear, gaze focused upon the pillow held beneath the crook of your arm. The spare blanket tugged over your body sags, sliding off one of your shoulders, as if cowering away from the figure in front of you. Contrary to his usual tone, there's no sense of mockery inside of his voice, and he looks fully ready to close the door in your face as resign you to your fate.

In fact, he even attempts to do so, only stopping when you quickly jab your foot in the door—despite known fully well that he possesses the strength necessary to simply crush your foot and end the conversation. He doesn't, of course, because you had threatened to tell Lesser Lord Kusanali in retaliation, instead choosing to shoot you a deadpanned glare as you're given another chance to make your case.

You flash an innocent smile. He rolls his eyes, and yours crinkle.

"Well..." You muse, humming as you grip the doorknob and attempt to push further into the space. A gust of wind that would have no natural place being inside of the dorm gently pushes you back, the Vision hanging on his chest providing further confirmation of his manipulation. "The couch is uncomfortable. And cramped. I couldn't possibly have a good rest there."

"I don't see what that has to do with me." And, perhaps the low light is simply playing tricks on your eyes, but you can almost see the ghost of a smile pulling up at the corner of the Wanderer's lips, a barely noticeable glint in his eye as you pout at your misfortune.

"You do realize that she's a hero, right? One that's—quite literally—saved several nations within Teyvat? Including Sumeru? Aren't you Vahumana scholars supposed to care about that?" You decide to ignore the convenient fact that she turned up on the Wanderer's doorstep, acting like old acquaintances, because he'd refused to answer any of your questions on that matter and you were certain that he actually would slam the door on your foot if you decided to bring it up.

Considering the fact that he works beneath the Dendro Archon herself, though, perhaps you should've just come to expect all sorts of mysterious circumstances following him around.

"And yet, a hero of legend couldn't even bring herself to book a hotel room. How kind of you, to be providing such charity to the needy."

Your lips thin as he snickers at the situation, shoulders slumping as you look away. At this point, you wouldn't have been shocked if both the traveler and her companion—Paimon, was it?—had heard your discussion, spoken in hardly hushed whispers with walls thinner than the paper you wrote your reports on.

How they could put up with the man's attitude was still something that eluded you, though you supposed you'd have to ask yourself that question, too.

Whatever. At least you weren't the one being uncourteous.

"Just shut up and let me in already."

Finally, the door swings open, allowing you a direct line of sight into his bedroom. Neat, and sparsely decorated, to the point where one might've assumed it uninhabited at first glance. The ever growing stack of papers and doll sitting directly in front of his pillow were the only real indications of his presence, the only things that convinced you he was real after all.

That, and the insolent personality of his that had absolutely no business staying stuck in your mind all the time.

"Just make sure that you stay on your side of the bed." He mumbles, sharp edge prevailing despite the low volume. You quickly scurry in, closing the door behind you before he has the opportunity to change his mind.

Turns out that you didn't actually follow his orders, if the photos that Paimon snapped of the both of you sleeping together—bodies curled around each other to the point where it was near impossible to decipher who was holding who—were any sort of evidence.

She proudly bragged about them, slamming them on the table with a smug expression as she teased the red-faced 'Hat Guy' sitting right in front of her. Whether or not he was upset or embarrassed, you remained clueless about, though the near white-knuckled grip he held on his butterknife seemed to promise answers. Based on the awkward look on the traveler's face, cold-blooded murder seemed the most likely possibility.

Against your own nosy nature, the role of an innocent bystander seemed far more appealing. At least, with the cup of warm chai in your hands, you could pass off your blush as a reaction to the beverage's heat.

On the bright side, considering the softened look within your dearest roommate's eyes when you'd awoken—before the traveler's companion had burst in asking for breakfast… he might just allow you back into his room the next time your find your bed unavailable.

i have a taglist, which you can sign up for here!

[auroblaze]

Here we go!

[GENERAL RULES AND TERMS OF SERVICE]

I START WITH 6 COMMISSION SLOTS. First come first serve, by the time they are full I’ll open them again only once I’m finished with them all.

If you want a slot and you know what to ask me to do please send me an email at aurodrawsforyou@gmail.com subject titled "Auro commission". In the email, include your selected commission type and any other details about your commission. Visual reference must be included, and if it’s a comic you want, please include your storyboard.

🚨🚨 EDIT of the 5/10/2023: SECOND SESSION IS OFFICIALLY PAUSED. I’ll be working on the 6 slots commissions that made it before the technical difficulties with Paypal (mentioned in the last reblog). If something changes I’ll be reopening the remaining 4 slots!💪🎨 If not, I’ll be seeing you at the next session directly :’>

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My limit of characters to draw in one picture/comic is 1, you will be charged for every additional character in the drawing. For an illustration, the price will be multiplied by the number of total characters. The backgrounds will remain one charge. For a comic, every additional complex character is $30 for a pencil page, $40 for an inked page, and $50 for a coloured page.

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[ILLUSTRATION PRICING]

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Half body: $15

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            -> With Abstract Background: +$30

            -> With Detailed Background: +$50

INK (or DIGITAL LINEART):

Head: $20

Half body: $25

Full body: $50

FULL BODY FLAT COLOURED (with pencils, markers, or digital): $75 (+$15 for shading)

With Abstract Background: +$35

With Detailed Background: +$100

FULL BODY COLOURED WITH WATERCOLOURS: $100

With Abstract Background (watercolours): +$80

With Detailed Background (watercolours): +$150

NSFW*:

Half Body Pencils: $40

Full Body Pencils: $80

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          ->With Shading: +$15

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[COMIC PRICING]

The client has to show me the storyboard or script of the scene that I’m meant to follow in the desired commission.

SHORT COMICS:

1 Page Comic, Pencils: $100

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NSFW COMIC PAGE**:

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1 Page Comic, Inks: $350

1 Page Comic, Inks + Colours (with pencils, markers, or digital): $400

**As it is a new and delicate subject for me, we’ll discuss beforehand what kind of scenarios I will be comfortable enough to draw.

[rweoutofthewoods]

can you talk more about your own experience with bpd in relation to james and regulus in the fics you write? sorry if that was confusing i can’t figure out how to word the question better

Okay I THINK (and you can correct me if I'm wrong) that you mean like how similar they are to real life/if any of it is directly my experience? (plus how it might differ?)

I try to be careful in not making my characters me, so generally the things I pull directly from my own experience are the emotions and thoughts behind it all, which I think are the important part because that's the one thing someone without BPD might have a harder time replicating. You know, the thing you might not be able to nail by doing research or googling symptoms is how it actually feels to live with BPD.

So some of it is pretty universal in borderline, and I know it because I've lived it, but I'm also not writing my own life. THOUGH I am trying to write a realistic depiction, if that makes sense. I follow a lot of creators with BPD, I have friends with BPD, and have spent a lot of time on BPD subreddits so I try to take my experiences as well as those around me and things I've learned from others to paint a better picture of BPD. For example, the one BPD symptom I've rarely experienced is dissociation but I've still tried my best to include it in owcm because other people do experience it, even if I don't. Because the thing is you need 5 out of 9 symptoms to be diagnosed which means not everyone with BPD will experience all of them. So everyone's experience is unique, and my depiction is furthered by what I know, but I try not to LIMIT it to that. Some tiktok accounts I think do a good job on BPD are this and this one if anyone wants to learn more outside of me.

Since it develops as you get older, this is why in my depiction of BPD I write my characters as adults. I personally, noticed my life was being detrimentally affected around 18-19, but I've struggled with mental health since I was 12. And since BPD is largely caused by trauma, it's not like it's smooth sailing your entire life and then suddenly you turn 18 and boom, you have BPD. There are distinct environments and feelings you might have as a child that lead to it becoming BPD. So like in ppp, James always felt like there was something wrong with him as long as he could remember, but it didn't REALLY come to a head until he was an adult. And there were a few parts in Monty's POV in ppp about James' mental health as an adolescent that were similar to my experience, but not exactly the same. Here's a video I think does a really good job of explaining the possible kind of childhood circumstances and how it manifests later in life.

Something of my own experience I've never put in my fics (because I'm very sensitive and careful with this topic) is that BPD can be comorbid with other disorders/illnesses. I don't bring up my other stuff here bc I think it's more likely to be harmful and triggering than helpful or educational, BUT a lot of people with BPD have other burdens as well whether this is another disorder or substance abuse, etc. And that's something I haven't really touched on before, because of course, I am aware that my writing is being consumed by people and as honest as I want to be, I also want to limit potential harm. So my depiction is a little affected by that awareness.

I have a short oneshot (and pretty shitty, sorry.... it was a vent I wrote in like an hour) about BPD james from spring. That one, just because it was just a one-time, throw-it-out-there kind of fic, does come from a lot of my own experiences. There's a few scenes that actually happened to me in there, but I don't/haven't done that in ppp or owcm.

So I guess in short, everything I write about BPD James and Reg are real, but it's not always necessarily my personal experience. The feelings, thoughts, and reactions however, are pretty universal, and even if the events may not be real, they mirror the kind of things that WOULD cause those emotions and reactions. I HOPE this answers your question and I'm understanding it correctly <33

Much love xx

[cryptidsurveys]

Monday, September 16th, 2024.

When you get married what do you think you’ll put most of your focus and money into? I can't really answer or predict this now because so much would depend on our life circumstances.

Would you freak out if you were to get pregnant by the last person you hooked up with? Uh yeah. For more than one reason, lmao.

Who in your life causes you the most stress or negative feelings? Even though there are people in my life who cause me stress (one or two in particular), I think a lot of it has to do with my mindset. I've come a long way, but I'm still learning how to put things into proper perspective, be secure in myself and my own abilities, brush things off, etc.

How many chances do you tend to give people before enough is enough? It just depends - on what they've done, how much they mean to me, whether or not they're genuinely trying to change... Also, speaking of "enough is enough," following my blow-up over Diane, she basically won't even look at me. Pretty sure she even went so far as to intentionally turn her back to me when I brought a kitty up to the office the other day (he chills up there during work hours). Like giiiirl, I only have so many olive branches, especially when you consider the fact that I shouldn't have to be the one extending them in the first place.

Have you ever had a teacher that also taught your parents? No.

What’s the most you’d be willing to spend on a pair of shoes? I retired a pair of hiking shoes last year that cost around 120 dollars, but they also lasted for about a decade. I'd be willing to spend that kind of money again for a good quality shoe.

What’s something you complain about frequently? Work drama and feeling burned out. Welcome to the real world, I guess…? It still beats rotting in bed while slowly sinking further and further into insanity, but…maybe not by much. :P No, but on a serious note - it's better. Truly. I might feel frustrated, upset, confused, and exhausted at times, but at least I don't feel utterly hopeless and suicidal. I'd rather endure the chaos of life and human interaction than go back to what I was doing before. It's just hard to adjust to social dynamics after spending so many years in isolation and missing out on so much development and experience. People don't really care about your past, your mental health, your explanations - they just want you to act right.

Have you had any confrontations with anyone lately? Not directly, but indirectly. The Diane situation. The Alex situation.

Do you have anything planned for the summer? Summer is nearly over. My autumn plans mainly consist of trips to the Mountain Park to enjoy the changing leaves, attending the Chili Festival, and eating as many fun holiday foods as I can.

Do you walk fast or slow? Fast.

What form of public transport do you use most often? I've only used public transportation a few times in my life.

Is there any alcohol in the fridge? I don't think there's any in the entire house.

Is any part of you sad at all? Yeah, but it's not a predominant part. The last few days have been better. Little annoyances here and there, but nothing terrible. Plus, I only have to get through one half day (Tues) and one full day (Sat) of working with Alex and then she's GONE.

Are you someone who worries too often? Most definitely. It probably wouldn't be inaccurate to say that 90% of my problems come from worrying/overthinking. If I could just shut my stupid brain OFF…well, then I would be too powerful. ;D

Have you ever been completely alone with a boy in his room? Yeah.

Is the last person you kissed older than you? Yeah.

Are you the type of person who seeks out revenge? Not really. I even try to refrain from taking pleasure in someone else's negative karma. Not because I'm such a wonderful person, but because I don't want to face my own karmic backlash.

Do you like falling asleep listening to the rain? Yes. <3

Do you honestly have feelings for someone at the moment? I don't.

Are there things in your life that you’ll never be able to get over? Probably.

Are you afraid of falling in love? Yeah.

If you had to choose between a million bucks or to be able to fly what would it be? A million bucks.

Did you ever build furniture forts as a child? I loved doing that! We'd even make forts out on the back deck and sleep in them when the weather was nice.

Are there any songs that inspire you? You could say that. Mainly classical songs. Sometimes they give my life this movie-esque vibe.

Is there anything on television worth watching at the moment? I wouldn't know.

Have you ever had an online meet-up? Like a meet-up group type of thing? No. But I've met people in person after originally meeting them online.

What is bothering you as of now? Nothing serious. Even my headache from earlier feels a lot better.

How does your hair currently look? Short and brown.

Are you close to any of your aunts/uncles? I'm not.

Do you plan on losing weight any time soon? There's almost always a desire, but I tend to maintain within a range.

When was the last time you used a disposable camera? Years and years ago.

What should you be doing right now, besides this survey? I should probably do some housecleaning, but…eh. I just want to relax.

Who did you last say goodnight to? My dad and my kitties.

Do people gripe about your work ethic often? That was the last thing Diane said before I flipped out; something like, "It looks like nobody does any work back here." Maybe it wasn't meant for me specifically, but oooh boy. I give too much of my time (for free!!!) to be muttered about like that.

Do you tend to wear a lot of make up? I don't wear makeup.

Is it still possible to kiss the last person you kissed? I am waaay overthinking the "possible" bit because yeah, I suppose it's technically possible, but would I want to? No.

Why aren’t you texting the last person you kissed? Because.

Where were you last night? I was at the animal shelter until 5:30pm and then I was at home.

Do you own any jeans from American Eagle? I think I have a light blue pair somewhere.

Do you hate it when people smoke around you? No. I smoke as well, so.

Have you ever been to Florida? No.

When’s the last time you screamed really loud? Idk.

What will you be doing tomorrow? I'll be at the shelter from 7:30am(ish)-12:00pm.

Are you friends with the people you were friends with 2 years ago? Yeah.

Do you honestly have feelings for someone at the moment? No.

Where did you buy the shirt you’re wearing right now? My dad got it from me from a store in the mall.

Are you wearing jeans? I'm wearing dark blue sweats.

Have you ever kissed the last person you texted? Yeah.

Has anyone ever called you a whore? Yeah.

Who were you last in a car with? My dad. I went to lunch with my parents at Fuel & Iron last Thursday.

Are you in a good mood right now? I'm in a pretty decent mood.

Has anyone ever told you that you have pretty eyes? Yeah.

Have you ever played the guitar? Not very well, but yes.

Could you handle living with the last person you talked to on the phone? I think it's best that my mom and I live apart.

Do you ever take your anger out on others? I try not to, but there are times when it happens.

What grade is the last person you texted in? My mom hasn't been in school for a long, long time.

Has anyone seen you in your underwear lately? No.

Where’s your phone right now? On my dresser, charging.

Have you ever liked someone older than you? Yeah.

Are you the oldest child? The youngest? In the middle? Only child? I'm the oldest child of two.

Would you rather be called ‘honey’ or ‘baby’? Honey.

[object-obsession]

| NLRP #14 | Random thought

It's been a while since I posted a Not List-Related Post that was neither related to the functioning of this blog, nor related to media that is on this list. In fact, I believe the only Not List-Related Post like that was the first one. However, this one will be like that as well.

If by now you still didn't get it, I like objects as characters. So it probably won't come as a surprise that I have pondered about the most random "what if" questions and more if it concerns objects.

One of those questions was:

"If I were to be an object, what object would I want to be?"

Now before I'm answering for myself, I'm just wondering, what would you, the reader, choose to be?

My final (way too long) answer is down below, at the bottom of this post. Please put yours in the comment section. I'M CURIOUS.

Four conditions:

Assume that you would not suffer by living as an object by default, so not being able to move your "body" would at most be equivalent to you as a human laying/sitting/standing still. It would not be like being paralysed. Because I fully agree that that would be atrocious.

However, being able to move or experience things could help making life more fun, just like the way it does for you in real life.

Assume you would have to be the object for a longer period of time, as long as the objects continues to exist. So not just for a single day. That is, unless you would survive for one day only.

You can't choose a specific object. Where you end up would be random. So you can't say: I want to be the [...] that belongs to [...].

--

***MY ANSWER***

Firstly, I thought which kind of objects I wouldn't want to be. Neither small objects (e.g. keys), nor big objects (e.g. wind turbines) would be optimal, since one can be hidden away forever (stuck in closets, purses, etcetera), whereas the other one would observe everything from a distance - all living creatures would be too small to see and co-experiencing life would be near impossible. You would be living on the sidelines completely and your own life would be passing you by.

First requirement: SIZE > being something about as big humans

Secondly, some objects get used, then thrown away (e.g. shampoo bottles) or replaced (e.g. mobile phones). Both utensils and cutting edge technological objects are not ideal choices. Other objects break easily (e.g. objects made of glass). In other words: you'd die quickly in both scenarios (although with devices, you might get sold and live a second-hand life, but that doesn't sound appealing to me).

Simply put, there should be no reason to be replaced. There should be neither a wish to, nor a need to. Either case could lead to demise.

Second requirement: LIFE EXPECTANCY > the longer, the better

Thirdly, like with big objects, I wouldn't want to be in a position were I don't experience anything at all. I would want to be something that's part of people's life as directly as possible. Preferably on a daily basis.

Even better would be to live within a household, since you would be able to get to know certain people better and deeper understand the conversations and events you'd witness. You could regard yourself as part of a "family" and see a story unfold, much like watching a movie.

Third requirement: POSITION > where are you located, who interacts with you and how often (your surroundings and circumstances)

Fourthly, and I think this is quite self-explanatory, but I wouldn't want to be used for any gross or repulsing activities.

Fourth requirement: PURPOSE > it better be of a pure, useful nature

So these are the four main criteria which I could come up with:

Size: similar to human beings

Life expectancy: long

Position: as close to "life" as possible

Purpose: clean in all ways

It was then that I realized a lot of the object-horror movies revolved around objects that would be close to perfection as an answer!

Evaluating the ones I (partly) saw:

Cars (Christine) are a good size and sees different places - therefore, you would "experience" different things. It often survives for years, too, since people take the effort of fixing broken parts instead of instantly replaces the whole car (due to the high price of a car). And if lucky, you'd end up being a popular old-timer.

Chairs (Sofa Killer), refrigerators (The Refrigerator) and beds (Death Bed) also could have a relatively high life expectancy. In my house, the chairs have only been replaced a couple of times (and I believe they were sold, not disgarded), our refrigerator only once (merely because it stopped working) and our beds never - not even once.

Elevators (The Lift and its remake Down/The Shaft) perhaps have the longest life expectancy out of all of the previously mentioned. They don't just get replaced with a snap in the fingers, because the whole building was structured around them in a specific way. Elevators also get used on a regular basis and are part of some people's daily life.

However...

A car could be stuck in a garage for months and is only used for traveling. Therefore, you would miss out on many parts of "life". Chairs get sitted on by whoever would sit down, which I can't imagine liking and let's not even start about the things a bed would witness.

The best options to me would be objects big as humans, rarely replaced, part of life and not involved in too weird activities, which counts for various investments that are placed in school and offices: elevators, vending machines, expensive desks... you get my point.

But still, you would be part of life - or better said: someone's life - uf you were in a house. After all, at school/work, you would only see a couple of minutes of people's life. Maybe multiple times a month, week or even a day, but still, by far, you wouldn't pick up much of what is going on in everyone's life. Not more than what you would in a home, that is. Things usually stay superficial, I feel like, making your own experiences less exciting. Little to no secrets and only specific sides of people (school- or work-attitude).

That being said, I thought a dinner table would be a neat choice (located in a living room/kitchen, so you could listen to a family's dinner-time stories and getting to know them from a figurative distance), but my last preference is being some sort of electronic appliance, so therefore, I would choose to be...!

🎆 A REFRIGERATOR 🎆

Obviously I'm too kind to be the ones from the horror movies (lmao), maybe the other media refrigerators are better examples, but yeah.

That's my choice.

Sorry if you don't like a simplistic, anti-climatic answer like this that was right in front of you all along, but it just is my answer.

Refrigerators are the perfect size, have alright life duration for an object and most of the times, a good positioning! One more thing that I haven't mentioned yet, is that some objects, are objects people can really love. Cars were a better example of this (since some people literally get attached to a car itself), but I mean, people love food, right? So I'd be happy to help! A great purpose, indeed. The only disadvantage would be not being able to move (as opposed to cars and elevators), but the indirect interaction with people - being able to co-experience lives and be part of it - makes up the lack of motion.

Still, my second choice would probably an elevator. Now if the conditions were different and I would be an object for a short time only, I would probably go for a bus (seems fun) or tower crane (seems cool). If I could choose a very specific object, I would probably choose to be the violin of a magnificent violinist (being able to make humans feel things, making them emotional, as an object would be impressive and lovable). These choices are mostly based on the same criteria, so I will spare you from an immense explanation again.

So that's that. I literally wrote an essay-long explanation. Wow.

Truth be told, most of this, I had already written somewhere when I spoke about this jokingly with a friend. It was in Dutch, though, so I did have to translate it all. Luckily, I can type and translate pretty fast.

Well, then. Byeeeeee.

[acorrespondence]

A continuation of my answer to @love-leah’s ask here.

This little bit of backstory is pretty much ripped directly from a reply to @universewoman’s recent comment on Chapter 5, because I tired myself out writing that seven paragraph essay, ha. It’s about Boyd’s decision to get his tattoo covered up.

The whole story kind of evolved from the question of what would have to happen to get Boyd to cover up his tattoo. When I first wrote out the bit where Boyd has his crisis of conscience on the bathroom floor, it was in present tense and there was a lot more context to the scene, including Boyd resisting getting the cover-up for days until he walked in on Raylan just lying on the couch, talking to baby Pem where she’s propped on his chest—like, a completely normal thing to do with babies that Boyd’s gonna walk in on countless times for as long as he and his kid are living in Raylan’s apartment—and he’s like oh my god fuck it, I will literally die if I have to watch this man being adorable with my baby every day of my life and I don’t get to fuck him. And he comes in with the raven on his shoulder the next day. Because Boyd wasn’t going to cover that shit up unless he gets something out of it. And then, of course, you have this scene three years later where the meaning of the bird changes and he actually experiences real regret.

And here’s a little bonus excerpt from the junk pile since there’s no way I can fit it into the fic:

Boyd calls the Marshals in East Texas, where Raylan last told his mama he was living before she died, and they transfer him over to the Miami office. He says it’s about Raylan’s uncle, which it’s not, because Raylan’s uncle is already dead.

It’s not long before Raylan picks up the line transfer. “Who the hell’s this?” he asks suspiciously.

“Raylan?”

“Boyd?” The suspicion twists into concern. “What’s the matter? Why you callin?”

“Tell you the truth, Raylan, I had no earthly idea what else to do.”

“Well that’s new. Why’s your voice sound like that?”

“I’d imagine it’s because I been cryin.”

“What you doin that for?”

Boyd looks down at Pemberley, her miserable little face all scrunched up and red, blubbering her little heart out all over his nice corduroy jacket. “I am lost, Raylan.” He pauses. “Well, not in any literal sense, I’m in Louisville.” He moves the receiver down by his chin so he can shush Pemberley, who’s wailing directly into his opposite ear. He bounces her around on his hip, trying to quiet her. “Shh. Shh, darlin.”

“Wait,” says Raylan, “that’s your baby?”

“Yeah.” Boyd remembers to put the phone back to his mouth. “My little girl, Pemberley.”

“Jesus.”

“I know,” Boyd says wryly, still sniffling himself.

“Guess I’ve heard worse. You try feedin her?”

“I mashed up a banana for her in a plastic bag, so there’s no true way to ascertain if she ain’t hungry or if she just has standards.”

Raylan laughs. Boyd watches a woman in a blazer cross the whole bank of phones, to the one furthest removed from Pemberley’s dulcet tones. “So,” Raylan says, and his voice is hushed now, like he’s crowded in close to the phone. “You lit out of there for good?”

“‘Less I get dragged back, I suppose.” Boyd takes a shaky breath. “I don’t know anyone else outside Kentucky, Raylan. I was hopin...”

He lets the question hang unasked, and Raylan doesn’t bother to answer. “You got money? Enough to get you to Florida?”

“I believe so, excepting extraordinary circumstances.”

“All right, you got a pen?” Boyd doesn’t, but he finds one, on the little shelf screwed to the wall under the phone box. Raylan reels off a number different to the one the Texas Marshals gave him. Juggling Pemberley and the bag he packed, Boyd copies it carefully onto the back of his own hand. “That goes straight to my desk at the courthouse. Call me when you get to the station.”

[herearedragons]

More Kyana moments (and general thoughts) from Broken Circle and the resolution of Connor's quest:

You don't really get to hang out with your companions in the Fade during Lost In Dreams (they just disappear one you free them), but I think it'd be fun if there was one final stretch of the Fade the party had to brave together. You know, as a bonding experience.

Speaking of bonding experiences: the 'saving your companions from their nightmares' sequence is pretty intense for Kyana. She's barely keeping it together herself, but she still makes it her priority to get the others out. She's not exactly graceful about it, she's grabbing them by the shoulders and yelling at them that this isn't real, but her intensity is what makes them listen. It's a moment of sincerity that shows she really does care, and it's important for Wynne and Alistair, who know her well at this point, but it's probably wild for Zevran, who, again, has known her for two days. If giving him a pair of gloves to replace his ruined ones was a big deal, I can't imagine what goes through his head as the same person fights literal demons for his sake.

After the Fade sequence, there was the encounter with Cullen, which I didn't expect to be meaningful in any way, but... it kind of was? First of all, I'm pretty sure he only ever had a crush on Kyana because he never directly interacted with her. That's literally the only possible explanation. Kyana herself probably would have had... some sort of reaction to finding this out under any other circumstances, but there's just too much other stuff going on for her to care. Weirdly, though, I think this is the first and last moment when she's able to sympathize with Cullen. She just made it out of another demon's prison, and she almost lost it in there. She looks at Cullen and knows that this could have been her. She's not taking his ravings seriously, though.

I know that most of Kyana's and Irving's close relationship exists in my headcanon, but still, saving him and hearing him immediately go "Wynne, so that was your doing" was... interesting. I decided that I'm not retconning it, that's exactly what happens. Irving barely says anything to Kyana, except for saying that it's good she was there, and... it makes sense. She's no longer his project, he's no longer invested in her as a student, and if he still has any lingering attachment to her, he's not showing it. And I thought that maybe she'd show some vulnerability and be glad to see him, or she'd be angry at him, but she's just surprised and kind of numb at barely being acknowledged. She's been through literal hell and that's all she gets. Irving doesn't even ask if she's alright, not even after everything is over, just goes straight to business, discussing the treaties.

You know who does ask how she is? Wynne. You know who does show her some actual compassion? WYNNE. Part of it is definitely the fact that Wynne was in Ostagar and in the Fade with Kyana, and thus has a better idea of what she's been through, but also, she's just nicer than Irving, I guess. And in the first conversation Kyana has with her after they leave the Tower, Wynne: a) supports her decision to help Jowan escape, b) says that the Circle is proud of her for coming back to help. Not only is she praising Kyana, but she's praising her choices instead of her skills. That means a lot, and Kyana's voice probably gets a little choked up when she replies to Wynne, and she doesn't understand why. Their relationship just became a lot more meaningful and I am here for it.

Connor's exorcism went pretty smoothly, all things considered. I used persuasion to make the demon leave without a fight, because in my mind, Desire just sees this mage who just tore apart another demon's domain, harrowed and changed by the experience but absolutely ready to throw down again, and decides that the boy just isn't worth it.

The fun thing is, I saw the option to extort the demon for an extra skill point and I really wanted it. So I did it. That does not line up with Kyana's previous characterization, but I think it does fit into the narrative of her being different now. Pre-Fade imprisonment Kyana would never accept anything from a demon, but.. maybe she's just not that afraid of demons anymore. She still thinks that blood magic is a bad idea, but maybe being stranded in the Fade with a bunch of demons and single-handedly killing all of them left her kind of desensitized, and also absolutely terrifying to other demons, who can probably still smell Sloth's (and its lackeys') guts on her. So she sees Desire trying to politely excuse itself and goes "oh, you want to leave? sure, what will you give me?". It's their turn to be afraid and make deals for their freedom.

[froshele]

reblogging again to add a take: we belong here.

Benefitting from the cycle of life and death involves a tremendous amount of learned skill, particular cultural values and most importantly work and the capacity for taking things on the nose if you screw up.

A lot of people who obsess about harm to animals and plants don't obsess about or think about the wider ecology they exist in, because they're not actually morally invested in a philosophy of nonharm for the practical sake of reducing suffering in concrete animals with whom they have a bond. They don't have a bond with any animals, or any plants, or any streams or rivers or other important ecological participants; they have a Fear. They have a Fear of Death, sure, but the core of the Fear of Death is the fear of No Longer Being, of Being Forgotten, of being Unwanted. Of being an Interloper, of Causing Inherent Harm By Existing, of Deserving the Erasure of their Name. They cannot imagine that they, considering what they or their loved ones have done, belong here.

This is why so many of them are angry antinatalists who expect other people to agree that ceasing to exist as a species would be a net benefit and a noble sacrifice for the Earth - they know everyone else sacrifices, and they never have themselves, and more importantly they believe in the fallacy of Nature.

Let me explain : Nature, the Wilderness that Would Be Pristine Without Us, is not real. Not in the sense people in the West discuss it. It is not something separate from human existence or experience, it is not interrupted (how hubristic to assume!) by cities, it is not something unchanged by those who live in it. It is not something any animal, any plant avoids changing. There needs to be a radically new reframing of ecology (ecos - home, logia - knowledge) that includes cities without guilt, or else instead of actionably uniting with others with a view to ecologically improving cities, making them less of a strain on our shared home with other nonhuman people, this sort of person will keep crusading for some sort of anprim "return" to eating granola and dying at 20, to belonging. They will keep aping the people they imagine belong here more than they do, all while contributing to those people's continued crisis, because someone (not them) has to make all the stuff that they waste.

Under these circumstances nothing will get done, because everyone knows this kind of head in the sand displacement of done harm into the third world (it wasn't us! it's them doing it!) is stupid.

And capitalists, and industrialists more generally, are afraid of change at all for moral reasons (the reckoning, the reckoning!). They glom on to that very extreme as justification for retaliatory action. I understand the rage and hopelessness that fuels it but I genuinely think everyone with these sorts of unactionable positions whose goal is to absolve them of their guilt and shame rather than see the big picture and do something, do anything, help anyone who is another person needs to shut up and come back to Earth, to the place where the rest of us are trying to make it somehow still possible to live. If everyone human disappeared tomorrow the damage of industrialization would still have been done, and eventually something somewhere left behind - reactor, oil rig - would fail and break and kill. The harm would still be there, just with no one to do anything about it.

Nature is not some sort of theistic arbiter of the moral worth of a species (so where does that put all those people g-dhonest pure foaming about koalas?) and it is not, especially, hateful to humans inherently. We belong here. That's my thesis. We belong here, and that entails responsibility that many people are not stepping up to, but we belong here. We do belong here. We belong here.

Belief in anyone's unbelonging here directly leads to racism, to justifications for war and genocide, to the displacement of native peoples from their lands by persons who sincerely believe that they are doing something good and noble. It leads to plastics choking the world because immediate ancestors had the monumental hubris to imagine they had - or should have - "beaten" Death, and Time, and the Ends and Beginnings of Things. It is a fundamentally bad starting point; everybody belongs somewhere, and sometimes they move, and they cannot go back, and we must find out how to go on from there.

Humans are theosophizing creatures because gods and angels and the like are, besides their other natures, manifestations of the awe we feel about our world. It is impossible for us not to think of a Mother Nature or a Father in Heaven or the full complement of a Bear and Tortoise and a Grandmother Spider, or for that matter a Papa Darwin or Abstract Prime Mover, Natural Selection, though the latter kinds of understanding for some reason are never conceptually connected with the former. But it is possible not to begin from the position that from the moment we are born, they hate us for the imagined sins of our and not-our ancestors.

Then there might not be a fear of them anymore. And you can work with someone you are not afraid of, who you know is not afraid of you. You can make things better for yourself and others together with them.

vegans would rather wear plastic head to toe than benefit from symbiotic relationships we've had with animals for thousands of years

[uomo-accattivante]

Excellent article about bringing a re-make of Ingmar Bergman’s Scenes from a Marriage to fruition, and the twenty-year friendship that Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain share:

There were days on the shoot for “Scenes From a Marriage,” a five-episode limited series that premieres Sept. 12 on HBO, when Oscar Isaac resented the crew.

The problem wasn’t the crew members themselves, he told me on a video call in March. But the work required of him and his co-star, Jessica Chastain, was so unsparingly intimate — “And difficult!” Chastain added from a neighboring Zoom window — that every time a camera operator or a makeup artist appeared, it felt like an intrusion.

On his other projects, Isaac had felt comfortably distant from the characters and their circumstances — interplanetary intrigue, rogue A.I. But “Scenes” surveys monogamy and parenthood, familiar territory. Sometimes Isaac would film a bedtime scene with his onscreen child (Lily Jane) and then go home and tuck his own child into the same model of bed as the one used onset, accessorized with the same bunny lamp, and not know exactly where art ended and life began.

“It was just a lot,” he said.

Chastain agreed, though she put it more strongly. “I mean, I cried every day for four months,” she said.

Isaac, 42, and Chastain, 44, have known each other since their days at the Juilliard School. And they have channeled two decades of friendship, admiration and a shared and obsessional devotion to craft into what Michael Ellenberg, one of the series’s executive producers, called “five hours of naked, raw performance.” (That nudity is metaphorical, mostly.)

“For me it definitely felt incredibly personal,” Chastain said on the call in the spring, about a month after filming had ended. “That’s why I don’t know if I have another one like this in me. Yeah, I can’t decide that. I can’t even talk about it without. …” She turned away from the screen. (It was one of several times during the call that I felt as if I were intruding, too.)

The original “Scenes From a Marriage,” created by Ingmar Bergman, debuted on Swedish television in 1973. Bergman’s first television series, its six episodes trace the dissolution of a middle-class marriage. Starring Liv Ullmann, Bergman’s ex, it drew on his own past relationships, though not always directly.

“When it comes to Bergman, the relationship between autobiography and fiction is extremely complicated,” said Jan Holmberg, the chief executive of the Ingmar Bergman Foundation.

A sensation in Sweden, it was seen by most of the adult population. And yes, sure, correlation does not imply causation, but after its debut, Swedish divorce were rumored to have doubled. Holmberg remembers watching a rerun as a 10-year-old.

“It was a rude awakening to adult life,” he said.

The writer and director Hagai Levi saw it as a teenager, on Israeli public television, during a stint on a kibbutz. “I was shocked,” he said. The series taught him that a television series could be radical, that it could be art. When he created “BeTipul,” the Israeli precursor to “In Treatment,” he used “Scenes” as proof of the concept “that two people can talk for an hour and it can work,” Levi said. (Strangely, “Scenes” also inspired the prime-time soap “Dallas.”)

So when Daniel Bergman, Ingmar Bergman’s youngest son, approached Levi about a remake, he was immediately interested.

But the project languished, in part because loving a show isn’t reason enough to adapt it. Divorce is common now — in Sweden, and elsewhere — and the relationship politics of the original series, in which the male character deserts his wife and young children for an academic post, haven’t aged particularly well.

Then about two years ago, Levi had a revelation. He would swap the gender roles. A woman who leaves her marriage and child in pursuit of freedom (with a very hot Israeli entrepreneur in place of a visiting professorship) might still provoke conversation and interest.

So the Marianne and Johan of the original became Mira and Jonathan, with a Boston suburb (re-created in a warehouse just north of New York City), stepping in for the Stockholm of the original. Jonathan remains an academic though Mira, a lawyer in the original, is now a businesswoman who out-earns him.

Casting began in early 2020. After Isaac met with Levi, he wrote to Chastain to tell her about the project. She wasn’t available. The producers cast Michelle Williams. But the pandemic reshuffled everyone’s schedules. When production was ready to resume, Williams was no longer free. Chastain was. “That was for me the most amazing miracle,” Levi said.

Isaac and Chastain met in the early 2000s at Juilliard. He was in his first year; she, in her third. He first saw her in a scene from a classical tragedy, slapping men in the face as Helen of Troy. He was friendly with her then-boyfriend, and they soon became friends themselves, bonding through the shared trauma of an acting curriculum designed to break its students down and then build them back up again. Isaac remembered her as “a real force of nature and solid, completely solid, with an incredible amount of integrity,” he said.

In the next window, Chastain blushed. “He was super talented,” she said. “But talented in a way that wasn’t expected, that’s challenging and pushing against constructs and ideas.” She introduced him to her manager, and they celebrated each other’s early successes and went to each other’s premieres. (A few of those photos are used in “Scenes From a Marriage” as set dressing.)

In 2013, Chastain was cast in J.C. Chandor’s “A Most Violent Year,”opposite Javier Bardem. When Bardem dropped out, Chastain campaigned for Isaac to have the role. Weeks before shooting, they began to meet, fleshing out the back story of their characters — a husband and wife trying to corner the heating oil market in 1981 New York — the details of the marriage, business, life.

It was their first time working together, and each felt a bond that went deeper than a parallel education and approach. “Something connects us that’s stronger than any ideas of character or story or any of that,” Isaac said. “There’s something else that’s more about like, a shared existence.”

Chandor noticed how they would support each other on set, and challenge each other, too, giving each other the freedom to take the characters’ relationship to dark and dangerous places. “They have this innate trust with each other,” Chandor said.

That trust eliminated the need for actorly tricks or shortcuts, in part because they know each other’s tricks too well. Their motto, Isaac said, was, “Let’s figure this [expletive] out together and see what’s the most honest thing we can do.”

Moni Yakim, Juilliard’s celebrated movement instructor, has followed their careers closely and he noted what he called the “magnetism and spiritual connection” that they suggested onscreen in the film.

“It’s a kind of chemistry,” Yakim said. “They can read each other’s mind and you as an audience, you can sense it.”

Telepathy takes work. When they knew that shooting “Scenes From a Marriage” could begin, Chastain bought a copy of “All About Us,” a guided journal for couples, and filled in her sections in character as Mira. Isaac brought it home and showed it to his wife, the filmmaker Elvira Lind.

“She was like, ‘You finally found your match,’” Isaac recalled. “’Someone that is as big of a nerd as you are.’”

The actors rehearsed, with Levi and on their own, talking their way through each long scene, helping each other through the anguished parts. When production had to halt for two weeks, they rehearsed then, too.

Watching these actors work reminded Amy Herzog, a writer and executive producer on the series, of race horses in full gallop. “These are two people who have so much training and skill,” she said. “Because it’s an athletic feat, what they were being asked to do.”

But training and skill and the “All About Us” book hadn’t really prepared them for the emotional impact of actually shooting “Scenes From a Marriage.” Both actors normally compartmentalize when they work, putting up psychic partitions between their roles and themselves. But this time, the partitions weren’t up to code.

“I knew I was in trouble the very first week,” Chastain said.

She couldn’t hide how the scripts affected her, especially from someone who knows her as well as Isaac does. “I just felt so exposed,” she said. “This to me, more than anything I’ve ever worked on, was definitely the most open I’ve ever been.”

“It felt so dangerous,” she said.

I visited the set in February (after multiple Covid-19 tests and health screenings) during a final day of filming. It was the quietest set I had ever seen: The atmosphere was subdued, reverent almost, a crew and a studio space stripped down to only what two actors would need to do the most passionate and demanding work of their careers.

Isaac didn’t know if he would watch the completed series. “It really is the first time ever, where I’ve done something where I’m totally fine never seeing this thing,” he said. “Because I’ve really lived through it. And in some ways I don’t want whatever they decide to put together to change my experience of it, which was just so intense.”

The cameras captured that intensity. Though Chastain isn’t Mira and Isaac isn’t Jonathan, each drew on personal experience — their parents’ marriages, past relationships — in ways they never had. Sometimes work on the show felt like acting, and sometimes the work wasn’t even conscious. There’s a scene in the harrowing fourth episode in which they both lie crumpled on the floor, an identical stress vein bulging in each forehead.

“It’s my go-to move, the throbbing forehead vein,” Isaac said on a follow-up video call last month. Chastain riffed on the joke: “That was our third year at Juilliard, the throb.”

By then, it had been five months since the shoot wrapped. Life had returned to something like normal. Jokes were possible again. Both of them seemed looser, more relaxed. (Isaac had already poured himself one tequila shot and was ready for another.) No one cried.

Chastain had watched the show with her husband. And Isaac, despite his initial reluctance, had watched it, too. It didn’t seem to have changed his experience.

“I’ve never done anything like it,” he said. “And I can’t imagine doing anything like it again.”

###

[bbq-hawks-wings]

Not as mad with the Seteth crumbs in Three Hopes as I could be, actually.

Spoilers below.

Still working my way through Azure Gleam after finishing Scarlet Blaze (and getting the bad ending, I guess, so that's good to know about now) and I find myself scratching my head now that I've begun to compare writing for Seteth from the first game to the second.

Now, while I love all the fanservice-y stuff Three Hopes gave us, especially the crumbs of expedition dialogue and flavor text like the Tome of Comely Saints entries - not to mention the consideration that I haven't gone through it all yet, this game seems to focus considerably more on the world building of Fodlan than continuing to highlight the characters.

This doesn't typically bother me, but in Seteth's special case, he really seems to incidentally be getting left behind where some other characters clearly got to shine. Yet, even though I'm a little disappointed I also kind of get it and may even be applauding the writers who handled him for it.

The reason for that is between the two games, Seteth is run out of Garreg Mach with the rest of the church in Three Hopes and that's the only major development for him so far.

In Three Houses (SS specific):

Flayn gets kidnapped for *BLOOD MAGIC EXPERIMENTS* and then is later returned to him.

The weird new teacher he said not to hire not only can wield The Sword of the Creator, but now their hair and eyes have changed they definitely have Goddess Powers™ now.

"Rhea, WTF did I read in Jeralt's super secret journal?!"

Edelgard's antagonism catches them all off guard again, but this time stealing real crest stones and holy relics with manufactured demonic beasts while Flayn and Rhea are still *IN* the holy tomb,

Five long years of war with no Rhea and no Byleth while he roams the continent, avoiding capture the whole time, to look for them and hold the faithful together until Byleth pops back on his doorstep.

They make it and win the war, but not before all three lords destroy themselves at the Final Battle of Gronder Field and the church is left to pick up the pieces.

If you don't get a high enough support level with Rhea, you can't save her and he has to help put her down himself.

My man goes through a lot, ok?

Byleth is integral to Seteth's character development. There's not many other characters who can actually reach him and cause such a change in him to where at the beginning of the story he's doing everything in his power to hide the existence of Nabateans and then by the end of it tell Rhea that they should just tell the people *everything*. Three Hopes expeditions with Seteth where he derisively comments on man marring the natural landscape reveals very plainly that he simply sees himself as something other than human. He's right to - he is by just about every metric out there a larger than life person - but he's also "just" a person and a very lonely one at that. His circumstances make it difficult for him to get close to others the way he misses being able to and wishes he could again. Byleth is a rare kind of friend in whom he could confide everything to and, marriage or not, share a deep, personal bond with.

If anything, Three Hopes is really giving me an even deeper appreciation for how they utilized Byleth specifically for Seteth in Silver Snow. It's an active, steady change that can be sneaky if you're not looking for it; but it becomes very obvious when you pay attention how Byleth's journey directly translates into Seteth's.

Three Hopes just doesn't have any of that (-that I know of). It's "just" war - and even then two years of it post timeskip instead of five. Seteth hasn't been put through the wringer in Three Hopes the way he was in Three Houses, and though the stakes are just as high as before, he especially doesn't get the same build-up; and based on my ending in Scarlet Blaze where I didn't face Flayn and Seteth in the final battle but did fight Rhea in her Seiros war outfit - Seteth and Flayn definitely ran to the hills to stay safe and keep living which is exactly in line where he was in Crimson Flower, just without Byleth.

I'm still curious to see how Shez's relationship with him will change over the plot (still no answer as to what they or Arval are so far in my playthrough), and I'm DYING to watch Seteth and Yuri's support to learn what I can from that, but I'm not expecting much so far. I just don't think Three Hopes has anything to specifically offer Seteth the way Three Houses did; and if anything, I'm just using what I learn about him in Three Hopes to inform me of who he is in Three Houses before Byleth came along.

Anyway, TL;DR, Setleth fans keep winning even when we "lose."

[thedreadvampy]

honestly what really annoys me is how much transphobia strips us of very useful language by making it be commonly understood in Very Weird Ways

take 'female socialisation' as an example. it's a common TERF dogwhistle which makes it really hard to talk about but also. the way that it's used to undermine trans people betrays that some people are working really hard to twist concepts to suit a trans exclusive worldview.

like. nothing about the concept of gendered socialisation implies it's exclusive of trans people or directly connected to passing, or that it's reliant on childhood experience, or that it's static.

female socialisation just means people interact with you as if you're a woman. male socialisation just means people interact with you as if you're a man. it doesn't say anything about who you are as a person but it does affect how you behave and react.

the way it's often framed by TERFs is like. you were understood as a boy at 4 so you're Male Socialised Forever. but that's a weird fucking way to understand social development. like it kind of implies that you just Stop Socially Developing after a certain point. you are who you were when you were 10 and after that you never learnt or changed at all? that's weird. what's that about, guys, are you unchanged by any social interactions you've had in adulthood? that's not. good.

like I think anyone who's watched anyone they know transition can probably recognise that gendered socialisation Is A Thing. it takes a wee while to adjust to the expectations and norms and experience of being reacted to as a man when you're used to being treated as a woman, or vice versa. and knowing what it looks like from outside isn't the same as experiencing it from inside.

but like. that's a process all of us go through throughout our lives, adjusting to different ways of being received socially. there's a difference between being perceived as a child and as an adult and as an older person. you socialise differently in different spaces, with or without your intent. if people treat you differently you react differently and if people hold you to different expectations it changes how you understand yourself.

(also. changing from 'being treated as a man' to 'being treated as a woman' doesn't start when/if you start being read as a cis woman. it happens in any circumstance where someone knows that you're a woman or thinks of you as a woman.)

(they may treat you as a trans woman rather than the way they treat cis women, and that may be in a really shitty way, but although people might think that they think trans women and men are the same thing, they don't act like it - they hold trans women to different standards and react to them in different ways than they react to people they think of as men. being met and understood to be a trans woman is no longer male socialisation. being met and understood as a trans man is no longer female socialisation. even if everyone around you is a transphobic shitheel, that's not Continued Socialisation As Your AGAB bc the subtle and obvious ways people treat you and think about you change when you come out)

like. gendered socialisation is not really about you. it's about the people around you and the conscious and unconscious ways our reactions are shaped by what we know or assume about people. it doesn't say anything about your internal reality, your future or who you are, but it does affect your experience and behaviour in minor and major ways.

but like. it takes some real commitment to misunderstanding social existence to think that a trans woman who's been out for 30 years and is exclusively known as a woman has more male socialisation than a butch woman who's read as a man and rarely bothers to correct people, let alone a trans guy who's been out as long.

gendered socialisation is, very objectively, A Thing That Happens. people who are mostly being treated as women tend to have different social behaviour, expectations, neuroses and blind spots than people who are mostly being treated as men.

but to take that concept and understand it as a reason why Trans Women Will Always Be Men requires:

thinking that social and psychological development stops dead at an arbitrary point, which is fucking depressing

thinking that cis men and trans women are treated identically, which is very provably untrue

ignoring the observable ways that non face-to-face interactions (eg email or online chat) are very visibly altered by informed or assumed gender

thinking that gendered socialisation is a binary m/f switch rather than a cumulative pattern with a lot of variance

ignoring the VERY OBVIOUS FACT that people's behaviour, reactions and self-image changes a lot in the early years of social transition in response to differences in social pressures and expectation

and then like. the fact that people are so determined to misunderstand ALL THESE VERY OBVIOUS ASPECTS OF GENDERED SOCIALISATION in order to prop up their own transphobia

kind of cuts us off from readily being able to talk about the ways that masculine and feminine socialisation materially affect all of us and particularly affect the safety of women and people being treated as women. like how the fuck are we meant to do a feminism when every time we bring up one of the foundational bases of gendered operation we end up having to spend our energies trying to correct these Extremely Basic Misreadings of the ideas involved like no Joanne we're not talking about how Anyone With A Dick Is Dangerous we're talking about how misogyny is invested in every part of how people are socialised. we're not litigating whether being given a toy truck means you'll never understand the Struggle Of Womanhood we're talking about how people percieved as men are incentives to perform violence and people percieved as women are incentivised to manage emotions. get your fucking brain in gear we are literally talking about incredibly basic foundational feminist ideas and you can't even grasp those because you're trying to fit every peg into the square hole of Trans Women Are Oppressing Me Personally By Existing? Trans Women Are The Sole Face Of Misogyny?

like shut up or catch up ladies. gendered socialisation isn't an argument against transness. the existence of attacks on bodily autonomy isn't an argument that misogyny is purely biologically based. the existence of female sex offenders, trans or cis, isn't an argument against heavily gendered patterns of abuse. Bigotry wearing the house of feminist theory genuinely prevents us from discussing or tackling the issues that Actually Exist by poisoning or diluting words and concepts that reflect actual realities into hollow weapons against trans and nonbinary people and I am sick to fucking death of it.

[chamerionwrites]

The analogy presents itself pretty readily so I do get where people are coming from when they're like "tragedy/horror/other dark fiction are like bdsm, it's all good so long as they're properly labeled and the audience can consent to the experience," but for all the surface similarities (intense/painful/scary sensations and/or emotions that many people thoroughly enjoy experiencing in controlled circumstances), these are profoundly different things in a number of extremely consequential ways.

(1) When you're talking about bdsm - or for that matter any other kind of sexual consent - you're talking about scenarios that can be tailored very closely to specific individual needs and desires, as well as continuously adjusted in real time by the (usually fairly limited number of) people directly involved. This is not how storytelling typically works! Most of the time you're talking about finished narratives, created by a single author or a small group of collaborators, and then flung out into the world to be read/watched/experienced by an unknown and potentially vast audience who had no direct input on the story's creation, whose needs and desires the author(s) had no way of knowing, whose specific individual needs and desires may in fact directly conflict with those of other audience members.

(2) Will anybody who can give me an objective definition of "properly labeled" please stand up. You can't! That's an inherently subjective judgment call! There is literally no amount of tagging and warning that can account for the specific personal triggers (let alone general discomforts) of every potential audience member - some of which, again, might directly conflict with each other because competing access needs are a thing! - or for the inherently metaphorical and representational and open-to-subjective-interpretation nature of storytelling itself. Art by definition is FREQUENTLY About A Thing without directly being about the thing. Every horror story about possession is also a story about bodily autonomy is thus also a story about sexual violence, even if there's absolutely nothing sexual in it and even if - here's the real kicker - the author never consciously intended to put that there. This is just one example among many.

Meanwhile there are plenty of people who are triggered by innocuous or even normatively positive things, as opposed to the straightforwardly sad/dark/violent stuff that everybody frets and fingerwags about plastering with content warnings. Meanwhile there are plenty of people like me who are triggered by Vibes. In my case, what I sometimes refer to as anglerfish vibes: softly glowing light in the foreground, mouthful of sharp teeth in the background. The upshot is that I typically do pretty well with in-your-face depictions of violence but can occasionally get mentally and emotionally sledgehammered by stories that most people consider very soft and safe and comforting, specifically because they gloss over their own darker elements in a way that raises every hair on the back of my neck. GOOD FUCKING LUCK finding a way to warn for something this nebulous when even I can't reliably predict it. This is just one example among many!

Long story short...I'm genuinely not opposed to warnings but if we're going to be serious about their uses and shortcomings I'm gonna need people to stop and think for 2.5 seconds about how they function in the real world, and recognize that Objective Proper Labeling which reliably prevents anyone from having a bad time does not exist. I'm sorry but it's fake. That's not how trauma works, that's not how fiction works, and that's not how the intersection between those things works. And imo it does more harm than good to pretend it does work that way.

(3) Even in kinky sex that can be tailored to the specific needs of a handful of individuals, somebody discovering that actually they're not having a good time and calling things off is not a consent violation, it's safeguards working as intended! So if somebody picks up some dark fiction that was not and could not be tailored to their individual needs, gets surprised by bad feelings they weren't expecting, and closes the book/tab/movie...sorry but framing that as a consent violation due to lack of "proper labeling" (subjective and impossible) is BONKERS.

(4) In my experience a lot of the people who think darker fiction is inherently harmful think the same thing about kink, so while this doesn't mean your argument is bad per se, from a practical perspective I think it's unlikely to reach people having a moral panic because some folks like their hot sauce extra spicy.

Like I said I do think these comparisons are largely well-meaning! And maybe I'm hairsplitting, maybe the metaphor isn't meant to be extended this way - but the problem is I frequently see people extend it in exactly this way, and I find it a really troubling way to talk about consent and maybe an even more troubling way to talk about fiction. Asking a storyteller to predict and accommodate the subjective emotional responses of every hypothetical member of their audience is asking for well beyond what's fair or even feasible, and if we actually want to talk about consent in this context it's very simple: you have the choice to pick the story up and you have the choice to put it down. End of.

Maybe I'm just terminally prone to hairsplitting but while most of those doing it seem to mean well, personally I often find it really troubling the way people use the language of consent to discuss labels and warnings on fiction

[zodiakuroo]

Envy

EreMika is the villa’s top couple. Reader is hoping to turn one of their heads.

Pairing: Eren Jaeger x Mikasa Ackerman x Fem!Reader

Contains: 18+ characters, a good ol' fashioned love triangle, possessive behaviour, dom/sub dynamics, lil angst + lotsa pining, threesome, the sex is kinda messy but so is everything else

Word count: 10.5k (yes it's proofread but it's also kinda not)

Notes: For @doinmybesthere’s love island collab! happy pride month 🏳️‍🌈

Lush, mediterranean forests, thick with leaves and the wonder of adventure hidden inside.

Snow white, sandy beaches

Cerulean waters that sparkle in the sunlight and stretch to the edge of the horizon

The view from the infinity pool really is magnificent.

“You and Armin look good together.”

“You think so?” You murmur nonchalantly. The dark shades that cover your eyes dim your surroundings, making it all the more easy for you to see the brilliant figure in front of you.

“You don’t?” Mikasa cocks her head to the side, jet black bangs sweeping across her forehead.

“Armin’s a great guy. He’s my type on paper but… I dunno… I guess I wanna keep my options open.” You chew on your bottom lip, hoping she’ll change the subject. You can’t help the guilt that sits heavy on your heart.

The ‘you’ on the outside would never do something like this. Lead on some poor, innocent soul so you can stay close to the true object of your affections, biding your time until you can confess. Only when you’re certain that said love interest is free to be yours.

“Well, I still think you should lock him down before the recoupling. I don’t want you to get sent home.” Her gentle voice chases away any shame, kind eyes reminding you how you ended up in this situation in the first place.

“Oh you’d miss me?” You adjust your sunglasses, propping them atop your head, slowly wading towards her

“Of course you idiot.” She deadpans, kicking at the water, splashing in your face a little. You squeak in surprise and retreat a little. “You’re my best friend in the villa.”

If guilt is gnawing at you from one end, on the other end is bitterness, frustration slowly building towards a fever pitch.

Still, you don’t want to think about that now. You’ll only sour this moment for yourself. It’s rare that you get her full attention like this these days.

In the beginning, you two were inseparable almost from the jump. Both of you were a little more on the reserved side, especially stepping into such unusual circumstances. Naturally, you gravitated toward each other. Simply being in each other’s presence was enough to bring both of you out of your respective shells. That was the chemistry between you and Mikasa.

But when he dug his claws into her, your crush became one half of the strongest couple in the villa, leaving you behind to bury your own feelings.

Normally he’s stuck to her like a leech with his arms hanging around her like chains as if he’s afraid she’ll make a break for it any second. Like he’s afraid she’ll realise she’s too good to be catering to his every whim, too good to put up with his moodiness and too smart to fall for his charming front.

“Are you hoping someone new will come into the villa?” Someone ‘more your type’?” She uses air quotations to copy your words.

“Not exactly.” You start, distracted by the way she adjusts her bikini top, the soft flesh bouncing ever so slightly underneath her red bikini. The skin on her nose and on the apples of her cheeks are branded a similar shade thanks to the summer sun.

Your heart thrums against the ungiving wall of your chest, as you drift slowly towards her again, this time until you’re so close you feel her feet, drifting underwater at your waist. “I already have my eye on someone.” You answer as truthfully as possible.

“Are you gonna tell me who?” She furrows her brows curiously as you wrap your fingers around her ankles, slowly moving them up to rest on her calves. You use the position to pull yourself closer to her, until your chin rests on her knees. She leans down, as though she expects you to whisper the name of your crush into her ear.

You press yourself on to tip toes, to meet her halfway. Time seems to slow as you try to figure out what to do.

Lie? Confess? Kiss her?

But time doesn’t slow and-

SPLASH

You don’t get a chance to respond after your moment is ruined with an icy splash from behind you.

“Fucking hell!” You scream swatting water in his direction.

Right on cue.

“Eren what the fuck!” Mikasa scowls at him, clearly not amused either.

“I was just messing with you guys.” The sound of his cheery laugh may as well be nails on a chalkboard to you. “Sorry babe.” He pouts.

He takes up your spot by nudging you out of the way ever so subtly. Except it’s not really subtle. Not to you anyways. It’s pretty reminiscent of when he pushed you to the side when the two of them got together. He’s telling you to remember your place.

“Grow up Jaeger.” You roll your eyes.

With his arrival, discomfort sets into your bones. She accepts his apology almost instantly as always, easily placated with simple kisses. Innocent enough at first, starting over her knees but bit by bit his lips move further and further up her thigh, until she’s pushing him away murmuring “Not here.” As if he cared…

Watching them together, the picture of lovestruck, from a distance is nauseating enough, today you don’t have the willpower to experience it firsthand as a third wheel.

You’re about to excuse yourself when you hear Sasha yell from the opposite end of the pool. “Hey guys! I’ve got a text!”

Everyone shuffles closer, awaiting the message with quiet apprehension. When Sasha opens the message she gasps before reading it, making everyone’s anxiety grow tenfold.

“You don’t have to be a math genius to know that 1+1+1 = a crowd. It’s time to simplify the equation. Eren and ______ , get ready for a date! #LoveTriangle”

All eyes are on you in an instant and you resist the urge to duck down under the water to hide from the cameras. You wonder briefly if it would be easier to breathe down there, rather than up here where the tension is suffocating. Your fellow islanders are murmuring amongst each other but the words are indiscernible, muffled by the blood rushing to your head, face burning hot with embarrassment.

Everyone around you is wearing variations of the same expression; confusion. Sure they all had theories about you and Mikasa. Not that you were exactly subtle about it. Often touches that would linger for just a little bit too long, you would always lean in just a little too close when helping her with her makeup and many a time you’d been caught staring at her from afar. It’s just a little too intimate to be completely platonic but not intimate enough to be considered anything but a friendship. Then again, you never even had a chance to take it further because the only person who didn’t seem to notice was the ever oblivious Mikasa, not when she couldn’t see past the brunette boy with the striking jade eyes.

Now, looking at those very eyes you notice how they’ve lost their usual playfulness. As the exception to the bewildered expressions around you, he looks cold and unreadable. Then the corners of his lips twitch up into a small smile, one that doesn’t reach his eyes but big enough for him to flash his sharp white canines at you.

Mikasa has her eyes fixed to her hands in her lap, picking at her nails (a nervous habit she once told you). She refuses to look at neither you nor Eren.

You want to explain but the right words are nowhere to be found. Right here and now, in front of everyone (including the person she’s currently coupled up with) is not how you wanted her to find out. But you have to say something, anything to take away the melancholy that is so obviously weighing her down, but the words are stuck in your throat and before you can swallow that lump, he interjects.

“I wanna talk to Mikasa real quick.” He addresses you directly. “Why don’t you go ahead and get ready?” He phrases it as a suggestion but it’s more of an order. And just like that, your emotions flip to irritation. Who is he to tell you what to do? Even now, he wants a monopoly of her time and attention. As if your relationship (even just as a friend) might not also be damaged because of this.

And it’s not fair. You have to speak to her as well. You need to tell her that-

“It’s fine.” Her mouth pulls into a tight smile, being mindful of the cameras. It’s obviously not genuine, you can tell but you also know that she’s not one to show her true feelings, especially not publicly like this. But this feels too much for her and that brave face has never been more transparent.

Still, her slate gray irises meet yours. “I’ll be inside to help you get ready in a minute.”

You give an equally artificial smile and then swim across to the other side of the pool, where Sasha lends you her hand to pull you out of the water.

_

The car ride was awkward at best, insufferable at worst. You and Eren weren’t on friendly terms to begin with. Aside from the fact that he was coupled up with your crush, it was safe to say that being alone with him is not something you would ever have done willingly.

Where you found him loud and obnoxious, Mikasa found him excitable and bubbly. Where you saw him as stubborn, Mikasa saw him as driven and headstrong. Where you thought him impulsive and reckless, Mikasa thought him brave and spontaneous. When you said that he was rude and crass, Mikasa would say he was opinionated and outspoken.

It wasn’t as though she couldn’t see the bad sides of Eren but it was that she cared for him in spite of those things. Loyal to a fault she was. You let out a heavy sigh, thinking how much worse that makes all this. She must feel as though the loyalty she felt towards both you and Eren had been spat back into her face.

Silently you stare out the window, head turned away from him. A rare moment when you don’t feel the presence of camera lenses watching your every move.

Your brain is constantly replaying the last conversation you had with Mikasa. True to her word, she did help you choose an outfit and style your hair. But that natural comfort was gone.

No. That’s not true. The bond may be strained but it’s not broken. You can still do something to fix it. But neither of you were willing to address the elephant in the room.

Well, that's not exactly it.

It’s that neither of you knew how to.

Stood in front of the full length mirror, you took one last look at yourself, smoothing out the front of your sundress, but caught her sad gaze in the reflection behind you.

“Hey ____. Earlier, when you said you had your eye on someone. Were you talking about Eren?” Her voice was hushed but you feel it in your viscera, like a sharp kick that leaves you winded

You know what she’s thinking. What everyone is thinking. That you were going to swoop in and steal your best friend’s partner. And you can’t blame her because that’s exactly what it looks like.

But you didn’t betray her, you would never.

You want her. Not him.

It’s almost as though you’ll never get a chance to set the record straight. Before you could even try you were being shooed out the door.

Now at the table, you fiddle with the stem of your glass, resisting your body’s command to down the whole thing. Sitting here in silence with him for 2 hours may as well be torture if you were completely sober but it sure as hell would be better than talking to him.

Eren doesn’t seem to share your sentiments and is the first to break the silence.

“I know you don’t like me.” He says before taking a sip of his drink. “All this bullshit about a love triangle is ‘cause you like my girlfriend. Right?”

He flashes you his signature cocky smirk, one of the many things about Eren Jaeger that seem to irk you to no end.

“I mean she’s technically not your girlfriend.” You say as a feeble retort.

You are right. She’s not his girlfriend because he’s never asked her. Life in the villa was harsh like that. If your relationship wasn’t official, anyone was fair game. Really the only thing that had stopped you from making your move was the painful gnaw of your insecurity. The deep-rooted belief that she would never choose you over him. Just the idea of public rejection, in front of your friends, family and god-knows how many other people, puts the bitter taste of bile in your mouth.

“Like that fucking matters.” He leans back in his chair, long legs spread wide. At least you didn’t bother denying it, he thinks. But why would you, Eren is many things but he isn’t stupid. The way you stare at Mikasa all dreamy eyed, following her around like a stray puppy. When you two are together, he doesn’t like how you sit so close, always whispering and giggling at god knows what. You’re entirely too comfortable, letting her lay her head in your lap while you play with her hair. Small things like that add up, it’s not hard to fingers out what you true intentions are.

He’s not jealous. He’s not. Why would he be jealous of someone who doesn’t even have the balls to go after what they want? You just… bother him. You could have your pick of literally anyone in the villa but no. Instead, you’re always hovering around, waiting for him to fuck up so you can play the role of comforting best friend.

“What’s wrong?” Extra bravado backs your voice. You know this act. He’s trying to intimidate you. You always thought Eren saw himself as untouchable but the way his jaw ticks makes you wonder for a brief moment, is he threatened by you?

“Scared of a little competition? I think you’re on the wrong show.”

“Oh please.” He scoffs before picking up his glass again. “You’re no competition sweetheart.”

“Famous last words.” You hum condescendingly, before bringing your fork to your mouth, letting the food pass your lips.

He clenches his jaw tighter. Being able to push his buttons in this way is something you’re very proud of right now.

He lets out a deep exhale through his nose and says. “You know. I actually had my eye on you in the beginning.”

The bite of food seems to lodge itself in your throat, eyes bugging out of your head. You cough and sputter, quickly gulping down your drink to try and move the lump into your stomach.

“Surprised?” His voice takes on a much deeper tone.

You don’t reply, too busy fumbling for a napkin to wipe down the edges of your mouth so he continues. “Yeah. You’re hot, obviously. But also real feisty. Fun to tease and ease to get a rise out of. My type. But Mikasa…. I could tell she wanted me from the start and if I wanted to stay in this competition, I couldn’t waste any time grafting on someone who was playing so hard to get.”

“So this is all a game to you then?” You say through gritted teeth, both hands squeezing tightly around the cutlery you’re holding. All your anger is bundled up by a thin thread, ready to snap at a moment’s notice.

“I think you’re a little confused. Isn’t that exactly what this is?” He rests his chin on his palm, wearing that same chilling smile from earlier.

“You’re a real piece of shit. You know that?” You don’t want to lose your temper. Doing that means that you’ve given the upper hand back to him. Too bad you’re doing a terrible job of keeping it under control.

“Oh come on.” He laughs as if any of this is funny. “Its not like I’m leading her on.” Sharp as a dagger, those words jab themselves right in your gut. They’re a painful reminder that you don’t deserve to take the moral high ground. Thinking about what you’ve done to Armin, you may even be worse than he is.

“If I didn’t like her, I wouldn’t be bringing her tea in the morning, or making sure she ate.” Eren leans across the table, voice low and gravely. “Or making her cream all over my fingers every night while you and everyone else are fast asleep.”

You pick up the wine glass with the intention of covering his smarmy face in the blood red liquid.

Eren quirks brow at you, watching and waiting to see if you have the nerve. Because he knows that you don’t. If you did, you would have told Mikasa how you feel already. If you did, you would haven’t have latched on to the sweetest person in the villa as a fail safe. If you did, his pristine white shirt would have been stained burgundy by now.

Eren thinks you’re a coward and there’s nothing he hates more than that.

“Could have been you.” He sits back again. “Sorry I beat you to it.”

-

Your reception upon return to the villa is fairly mixed. Everyone is already dolled up with a drink in hand, the party in full swing.

Some people are glad to see you guys back, eagerly asking questions about the date. They might be genuinely curious as to how it went, interested in the development of new relationships or the survival of the villa’s power couple in the face of this challenge

Or they might just be in it for the drama, looking for gossip fodder. Wanting to know the details so they can go to the confessional booth and talk about how terrible of a person you are and how they would “never do anything like that to a friend”.

Other people greet you with disdain, people who would have been friendly with you mere hours ago. Armin is well liked in the villa, boyishly handsome with a kind heart. He’s a bit of a flirt at times but has never done anything with bad intentions. Of course everyone is fond of him. It’s only natural that you would look like the villain for stringing him along all this time, while he was developing genuine feelings for you.

Armin himself was angry of course, but it’s nothing if not deserved. You thought he would rage at you, call you selfish and cruel but he didn’t. Because Armin is a better person than you. You wanted to explain to him that you never meant to hurt him, but that wouldn’t mean anything because you did. In fact it would probably upset him more to hear that he was just an accidental casualty. A meek “I’m sorry” was the best you could offer. A nod and an impassive expression is all he offered in return, walking away to join Jean and some others on the daybed.

As for your date, you can feel his glare from all the way behind you as you make your way across the lawn to the bar. Mikasa is sitting on one of the stools with Sasha.

“Hey.” You interrupt Sasha’s animated chatter.

“Oh hey.” She turns to face you. While you’ve been gone she’s had time to build her defences up again, appearing stunningly neutral, not a hint of listlessness she couldn’t hide earlier. “How was the date?”

The first thing you think is She looks gorgeous tonight. But she always does.

The second thing you think is It’s time to grow a pair. Now or never.

You can still remember the sad look in her eyes from this afternoon. The thought still has your heart sitting in the pit of your stomach. The idea that it was a hurt you caused makes you want to throw it back up.

“It was…” You pause to find the right word. “Fine.” you decide on. You could have lied and said it was good but that’s probably not what she wants to hear. You could have been honest and said you would have had a better time removing your own wisdom teeth with a butter knife but that’s not the point. The date was irrelevant anyways, simple misunderstanding that you need to clear up right now. “But actually, I was wondering if I could pull you for a chat?”

Sasha hops off her chair, wobbling a bit as she lands. “Why don’t you guys stay here? I'm gonna go find Connie.” She places her hand on your shoulder, her own way of giving you a little courage.

You mouth a thank you that she meets with a wink before leaving.

You wipe your sweaty palms on the front of your dress, taking the seat across from her. Your mouth is dry and once again you can’t find the words to tell her how you feel.

Why can’t you just say it?

“So Armin is pretty mad at me. I’ll probably crash on the daybed tonight.”

You colossal idiot! You scream internally.

Once again you’re dancing around what you truly want to say.

Mikasa digs her clipped fingernails into her palm, struggling to keep her emotions at bay, dam threatening to break at any second. After everything, that’s what you came here to say? She knows it’s not your fault that you two didn’t get to talk before you left but you don’t think she deserves an explanation now?

At least Eren had the decency to come to her after. He didn’t say much except reassured her that nothing happened and he wasn’t interested in coupling up with anyone else.

Still, it didn’t quell Mikasa’s insecurity.

She’s never been jealous before in her life but this must be it. It feels like someone has dug into her chest and is squeezing, squeezing, squeezing until her poor heart is nothing but a crumpled mess.

If it had been anyone else, maybe it would have hurt less. Now she’s so afraid that she's losing you to Eren and she's losing Eren to you and in the end, she’s the one left with nothing.

“Yeah he was pretty upset when you left.” With her elbow on the counter top, she rests her chin in her palm. You’re used to her stoic expression because you know if you look long enough, carefully enough you’ll see how soft she is. But this is different. There is nothing but cold, hard steel behind her eyes.

“I deserve it though. I shouldn’t have strung him along like that.”

“Yeah I’d be mad too.” The bitter edge to her voice is one that you’ve never heard her use towards you. You try hard not to take it personally, she’s only mad because she doesn’t understand. You have to set the record straight.

Now or never right?

“Mikasa look. I have to tell you something. I-”

“I’VE GOT A TEXT!” Jean announces, getting in the way of your confession.

“For fuck’s sake.” You mutter under your breath.

It’s pretty obvious at this point that the producers have you on their hit list but as Jean reads aloud the message, it only becomes clearer that they must have some personal vendetta against you.

“Eren, you get to spend the night in the hideaway with the islander of your choice. #DecisionsDecisons”

It’s an easy decision so Eren doesn’t give it much deliberation.

But his choice shocks everyone.

“_____. It’s you and me tonight.”

Even after what transpired this afternoon, your relationship with Mikasa was salvageable but this… you don’t think it will survive

Without a word, she hops off her seat, storming into the villa without sparing a glance at anyone else.

It might have been the final nail in the coffin for his relationship with her as well.

-

Alone in the hideaway, you nervously tug at the silk sheets, bunching the fabric between your fingers.

You’ve been waiting here for 15 minutes, sat in your pyjamas, a simple t-shirt and cotton shorts. The possibility that Eren would stand you up becomes more and more likely. Why he would do all this instead of just choosing Mikasa is beyond you but you know better than to waste precious brain cells trying to figure out Eren Jaeger. If he did plan on leaving you alone here for the night, it was probably for the best. At least you could sleep in a room by yourself for the first time in ages. A small consolation.

Just as you start to contemplate turning off the lights and calling it a night, you hear the door of the room creak open.

Eren walks in still dressed in his jeans and white linen shirt and kicks off his shoes.

“Look Jaeger. I don’t know what you want from me but I’m not interested in playing your games. I-“

The rest of your sentence evaporates when Mikasa appears from behind him. You jump to your feet, fully prepared to leave. Did he bring you here just to humiliate you? If that’s the case then he’s had more than his fill, you won’t let him have any more fun at your expense.

“Not interested you say?” Eren raises his eyebrow, as he gently nudges Mikasa forward.

You should go but your feet just won’t move when she stands square with you. “What’s going on?” You ask, as your chest grows tighter, with every second that ticks by.

“Do you-” she pauses, after a silence that dragged on for much too long. “Do you like me?”

Everything about it is innocent; question, the tone, the way she looks at you. But now your heart is beating so ridiculously loud that you can’t think straight. She asks you so bluntly that you feel stupid for how long you’ve spent agonising over how you would confess. Unlike you, she’s never struggled to get to the point.

Behind her, Eren wears a poorly concealed smile and that’s confirmation of the obvious. You don’t know what he told her but it’s obvious she knows this much. There’s no reason to deny it now.

“Yeah.”

You had rehearsed it countless times, thought about all the flowery words you would use to tell her how you feel. Yeah is not as eloquent as what you had in mind but it would have to do.

“Oh.” Her blush deepens, blending perfectly with the red and pink hues of the dimly lit room.

Mikasa is still shocked, she didn’t really believe Eren when he told her. Granted, at the time she wasn’t really interested in what he had to say seeing as he had just publicly humiliated her. Hearing you say it now makes her rethink everything, from those early days up until now.

She’s seen people chop and change partners with every new face that comes in and out of the villa but that was never her. To her, she already had Eren so there was no need to consider anyone else. But now that she knows how you feel, things are different.

“Hmm. Oh.” You mimic followed by a dry chuckle.

It’s not the response you had dreamed about but what did you expect? Yes you’ve confessed but this wasn’t your moment. It wasn’t the one you’d been waiting weeks for. Ultimately, that moment never came and maybe that was a sign that you and Mikasa just weren’t meant to be.

The big room now feels too small for three people. There's not enough space. There’s not enough air. You need to leave. You need to-

“Well, why didn’t you say anything?” She steps closer to you. There is no malice in her tone. A simple question with a simple answer but you can’t pick up if this is a rejection or not.

“I didn’t know if you liked girls.” You mumble, taking a step back.

It’s not the reason. Maybe it’s one of them but you just needed the space to think. To breathe. But the back of your legs hit the bed and once again your backside is on the soft cushion of the mattress.

She moves even closer until her knees knock against yours.

“That doesn’t matter to me.” She shakes her head and cups your face with both hands so you look at her face, her smile (even though it’s only slight) alleviates the tension in your chest. “If I like someone, I like them and… I think I like you.

The relief that you feel meets an untimely demise when Eren approaches the bed. He pulls her body flush against his chest.

You truly were something. Here he was making it easy for you but you still can’t say what you want. A coward.

He whispers something inaudible into her ear and now you have both of them looking down at you. This is the smallest you’ve ever felt, wanting to shrink even further under their scrutinising gaze. Still, you feel a familiar tingle just buzzing in your lower belly as they size you up.

She tilts her head to the side, granting Eren access to her neck which he accepts. He plants soft wet kisses across the expanse of pale skin. Pink tongue and white teeth appear every now and then as he leaves bruises and bite marks on the, once flawless, canvas. Her eyes fall closed as she writhes in his hold, grinding her rear on to his crotch. His hands wander, underneath the hem of her short dress, exposing more of her milky thighs, black lace panties just barely visible. She hums, finally opening her eyes, to look at you, her thumbs rub circles onto your cheeks.

You can’t imagine how you look right now but you know how you feel. Your head is spinning from the erotic scene in front of you, clenching your thighs to alleviate some of the heat you feel, breathing heavily even though all you’re doing is watch, sitting there in your cartoon pajamas.

Mikasa gasps as he digs his teeth into her neck especially hard, leaving behind the dents of his incisors.

“Focus.” He murmurs into the crook of her neck.

You don’t know what he means but you can’t exactly blame her. If there were hands squeezing and clawing up your thighs, never reaching where you actually need them. If there was a tongue sliding over the sensitive skin of your neck, teeth raking over the same sore spots over and over again before soothing them with featherlight kisses and kitten licks. If you were in her place, you wouldn’t be able to focus either.

“I- I’ve never been with a girl though.”

Your mouth dries up at the promise of her words. There’s no way she means….

“But Eren said he’d help.”

Help?

There’s no chance for you to stop and question once he unzips her dress, letting it fall off her body, leaving her in her underwear in front of you. You can’t stop yourself from shamelessly raking your eyes over her body.

Yes, you’ve spent days with her, lounging around in swimsuits but this feels new. Maybe it’s the way the black lace cups the curves of her breasts, budding nipples just barely visible through the sheer fabric. Or maybe it’s the way the matching fabric only just covers her pussy, that’s just mere inches from your face. She’s so close you can practically smell her. Your tongue dips out to moisten your lips, practically dying to taste her.

Perhaps the biggest difference comes in the smouldering way she looks down at you, it’s the same desire you’ve had in your eyes for weeks, finally being reflected back at you.

Your hands twitch atop your thighs, itching to do something.

Touch her.

Touch yourself.

Anything.

She tugs at the sleeve of your shirt and that's all the instruction you need. You pull your shirt over your head, perhaps with a little more eagerness than necessary. While Eren unhooks the other woman’s bra, flinging it across the room. You feel your nipples harden instantly but you can’t be sure if it’s because it’s due to the cold air of the room or the heat of her stare on your chest.

Mikasa straddles you, stepping free from Eren’s hold. From the corner of your eye you see him unbutton his shirt but you can’t focus on him for too long. Not when your bare chests are pressed together. Both of you shudder as your nipples graze against each other and you feel the heat of her cunt radiate onto yours. You hear the sound of heavy breathing, you can’t tell if it’s hers or yours. You can smell her perfume, intoxicatingly sweet jasmine and amber. Her pupils are already blown wide, only a thin grey ring that lines the pitch black of her iris. You see your reflection of yourself in them and you can only imagine that she is seeing something similar. Mikasa has literally taken over all of your senses, all except for one.

She’s so close to you, she must be able to tell that your heart is racing. Her nose bumps against yours ever so softly. You’re almost too scared to even move. Everything about this moment feels like a dream, what if you close that millimeter gap and it ends?

But you know it's real when her petal soft lips press against yours. It can’t be anything but real when she kisses you, gently as though you might break. You can’t help but want more, slipping your tongue past her lips. And finally you taste her and you don’t think you’ll ever get enough.

You swallow all the sounds she makes as you lick the inside of her mouth, lips sliding against each other. Every whimper makes you hungry for more so you kiss her deeper, massaging her tongue with yours.

Puffs of air escape through your nose, but both of you are much too desperate to stop the kiss for something as trivial as breathing. It’s not worth losing the feeling of her mouth on yours.

Before long, your hands are wandering, trailing over the curve of her ass, rubbing over thin fabric that moulds to her body, tracing the intricate patterns of the lace. Her hand glides up your torso gripping the soft breast in her palms, making you moan into her mouth. She smiles into the kiss, rolling your nipple between her fingertips, sending small shocks of pleasure straight to your pussy.

You maneuver her body, rocking her back and forth on your lap. It’s not nearly enough friction. You’re dying to get rid of the fabric that separates you. You want to feel skin to skin how wet she is for you. You want her to know how unbelievably wet you are for her. You fiddle around trying to adjust the position, trying to get her closer to where you need her.

“Baby.” A deep voice cuts through the tension in the room. For a moment you’d forgotten he was there at all.

Much to your chagrin, Mikasa pulls away from the kiss. You’re both left panting with your lips swollen. Your heart sinks as you come to the realisation that this is as far as everything would go. One searingly passionate kiss and nothing more. You couldn’t imagine a crueler fate.

Mikasa looks over her shoulder for Eren’s instruction.

He crosses his arms over his bare chest, toned muscles rippling with the motion, and stalks over to the bed. “On your knees.”

Obediently, she sinks to the floor, kneeling in front of you with Eren directly behind her. Yes, you just made out with his girlfriend right in front of him but suddenly you’re self-conscious being half naked in front of him.

He’s staring at you and not in the ‘ogling your tits kind of way’. It’s like he’s sizing you up, breaking you down with just his eyes.

“Can I take these off?”

You blink down Mikasa, not believing your ears but you heard the words yourself, clear as day. Eren does nothing but stare, expression unreadable. The room is quiet as they wait for you to answer.

Chewing on your bottom lip, you nod hesitantly.

Mikasa helps you shuffle out of your shorts and panties in one go, leaving you fully naked. Your legs are already shaking, resisting the urge to snap shut out of embarrassment. You can’t hide anything, not when she holds your legs apart, exposing your bare pussy to herself and Eren.

“Look how pretty she is, Eren.” Her voice is breathy. You’ve never heard her sound like this.

It’s because she’s in awe. Day in, day out you two would lounge around in swimsuits and not once did she picture this is how you would underneath them. Perhaps it’s better that she didn’t, because the thought would drive her crazy.

“Real pretty.” He hums in agreement. He can admit, your little display had him rock solid already. But god seeing you puffy cunt, lips already shiny and slick just from making out has him aching.

Mikasa slips two fingers between your folds, barely grazing your clit.

She pulls her fingers away admiring the way your slick webs between them. She holds her hand up for Eren to see. “Real wet too.”

It proves too tempting for him to resist. Eren leans down to suck on her fingers, cleaning them of your arousal.

You wish you could deny how much it turns you on when you hear him moan at the taste of you on her fingers. But it does and you can only hope they didn't notice how you flinched at the sound.

“You wanna taste her?” He teases when he notices her pout. He’s speaking to her but looking directly at you, pinning you under his gaze. “Then ask.”

“Can I eat you out?” She doesn’t miss a beat.

That tilts your whole world. Are you really sure you’re not dreaming? You nod, not trusting your own voice right now. Mikasa spreads your legs even wider but Eren stops her, firmly grasping the back of her neck.

“Nah. Don’t make it so easy on her. She has to use her big girl words.”

If you weren’t willing to take what you wanted, then he would give it to you. Eren is a nice guy like that. But he’s not that nice. If you wanted it, you were gonna have to say so.

“Right.” She agrees. “I’ll ask again. You gonna let me taste this pretty cunt?”

Eren’s throbbing behind his zipper. He doesn’t think he’s ever heard her talk like that. It’s not a monster, more of a little green pest that buzzes around his brain asking him why she’s never said those kinds of things to him.

“Yes… please.” you answer hastily but neither of the two seem to share your urgency.

Mikasa’s touch returns, spreading your lips apart, only for her gawk at your dripping entrance, so close you feel her exhales on your skin.

The buzz in his head goes quiet because she’s waiting for his permission. She’s still his.

“Go on. Taste.” Eren whispers in her ear.

With one broad stroke, she drags her tongue across your cunt making your hips cant up towards her face, both of you searching for what the other has to give.

You will your eyes to stay open, hoping to brand the image of her between your thighs like this into the recesses of your brain. You don’t know if this will ever happen again and in case it doesn’t, you’ll have this memory.

Her tongue laps at your hole with the kind of excitement you can only hope to reciprocate by grabbing on to her silky hair, pushing her tongue further inside you. Not too hard, just enough to guide her in the direction.

She’s close. Right ther-

“Oi.” A smack echoes throughout the room. Eren is now knelt behind Mikasa, massaging the now sore flesh that was reddened by his hand.

Eren hated that you were a coward and he wanted you to take what you wanted but he’d forgotten that what you wanted was his.

Her attention is on him once again and the familiar jealousy starts to crackle in your belly. When Mikasa said that Eren would “help out” you didn’t think it meant him interrupting you two everytime you were starting to enjoy yourself. Of course it was naive of you to think that Eren would let you enjoy anything tonight. Maybe he did bring you here just to mess with you.

You hoist up your upper body to rest on your elbows just in time to see Eren take out his cock. Or rather he makes sure you see it. Gives you an excellent view in fact. It’s fully erect, bobbing against his abdomen while he gropes the flesh of her ass, giving her one more spank for good measure.

“You said you wanted to top right? Stop bein’ a fucking pushover.” He growls.

Her panties are pulled to the side, letting him press the fat, drooling head past her lips. You feel her breath come out in quick puffs against your thighs as she tries to accommodate his impressive girth. Inch by inch he’s filling her up until his hips press up right against her plush cheeks where he rests for a moment .

You look down to where her head rests on your thigh. Her face is scrunched up in either pleasure or pain, you can’t discern which.

Then Eren starts moving, slow and shallow at first and finally her eyelids flutter open. “I’m not done.” She digs her nails into your skin, making you wince. “Put that pussy back on my face.”

Eren lets out a satisfied noise. He really doesn’t know where she learned to talk like that. Even though she’s talking to you, he still feels it so he rewards her by snapping his hips faster, pulling out almost completely before ramming himself back in.

You don’t need to be told twice. Soon you’re back where you were a minute ago, Mikasa hopes to do the same, dipping her head low, already missing the taste of you on her tongue.

Sure she knows her way around her own body but she’s never eaten anyone out. She wonders if everyone tastes this sweet. Doubtful. She’s so eager for more wanting her tongue as close to the source as possible.

But before she can get there Eren chimes in.

“Nuh-uh baby. Go for the clit.”

Mikasa doesn’t argue because she knows that he’s helping her in the right direction. She can’t vouch for his skills, having had first hand experience. If she could learn to eat pussy half as good as Eren that would be enough to brag about.

She parts your slippery folds ever so delicately until she finds the swollen bud, that’s just throbbing for attention.

Her tongue hangs out of her mouth, tentatively flicking against it. She watches your face intently, taking careful note of your reaction. And what a reaction it is. Your thighs twitch beside her head, threatening to trap her between your thighs while you moan something that definitely sounds like her name.

She wants to hear it again to be sure.

“Spit on it.” He instructs her again.

You don’t think she will. The Mikasa you know would never do something so-

She doesn’t question his orders, cheeks hollowing out to collect her saliva that she allows to mix with your juices.

“See how messy she is? Fuckin’ sloppy.”

“So sexy.” She murmurs before diving for your clit again. Her tongue flicks at it haphazardly, she can’t get a good reach because of the way Eren’s thrusts shake her body. It feels good but you need more, shuffling down the bed until she can wrap her lips around the bundle of nerves. Everytime Eren hits just the right spot inside of her she moans against you, and you can feel the vibrations radiate from your pelvis up your spine.

While you’re so entranced by your own pleasure you don’t notice Eren’s lascivious stare. Mikasa being so eager to make you feel good should enrage him. He shouldn’t be this turned on, watching his girlfriend get on her knees for someone else, especially not you. But seeing the way, you’re so desperately trying to keep yourself from rutting against her face, nearly drawing blood from your bottom lip to try and keep yourself quiet. It’s adorable. But Mikasa has been too easy on you in his opinion and he doesn’t think you deserve ‘easy’. He wants to see your attitude breakdown bit by bit.

“Fingers. Use your fingers baby.” He prompts while slowing his thrusts, giving Mikasa more room to work.

One slender finger slides into your dripping cunt, feeling near no resistance on its way. Noticing how easily you take her, she’s quick to add a second, scissoring her fingers to stretch you out. High pitched ah ah ahs fall from your lips matching the rhythm of the drag of her fingers against your walls, the rhythm of Eren’s thrusts into her. It’s agonisingly slow, so she can enjoy the sight of you sucking her back in every time her fingers attempt to leave and admire the way your sticky arousal drips down her knuckles, onto the satin sheets.

Once Eren decides he’s had enough of that he picks up the pace again, meaning Mikasa has no choice but to follow suit. While her fingers pump in and out of you, she crooks them ever so slightly to try and find your g-spot.

When she prods at the spongy spot you go limp for just a second “Mikasa. Oh my god!” You squeal.

“Oho. She likes it.” Eren remarks, leaning over to whisper in her ear. “Keep doing that.”

Mikasa is nothing if not diligent. She consistently aims for that spot while her tongue stimulates your clit, stroking it over and over again. You’re practically rushing towards an orgasm, stomach muscles already tightening up and white spots already clouding your vision.

“G-gonna. Fuck. ‘M gonna cum.” You stammer, teetering on the edge.

“You hear that baby?” Eren asks. “She wants to come for you.”

Eren tugs on her hair, pulling up her head so she can answer him, but all she can manage is a string of needy whimpers.

“What do you say? Hm?” He pulls harder, not satisfied with her response.

“Mm-ah. No.” She slips her fingers out, leaving you empty and clenching around nothings.

“Atta girl.” He praises her, beginning to fuck her in earnest now.

All you can do is watch as Eren fucks her stupid on his cock, driving her closer and closer to her peak while you feel your own pleasure dissapate into nothing.

A hazy fog has descended over her eyes, she’s looking at you but she’s so far gone that she may as well be looking past you.

Eren’s hair is messy, chocolatey strands framing his face, skin dewy with sweat. The heavy plap plap plap of his hips ramming into her ass is deafening. He catches you staring and you can’t even find it in you to be embarrassed although you do regret inflating his already sizeable ego.

“Tell her how it feels.” He hooks his middle finger into her cheek “Tell her how good my cock feels inside you.”

He has no issue with admitting he’s being petty but he wants you to see what he does to her.

No, scratch that.

He wants you to feel it. That deep hunger you have for Mikasa? He wants a share in it too. He wants you hungry like that for him too.

“Feelsh shhho good. Eren’shh cock feelsh sshoo good.” Her words are barely coherent, drool seeping from the corners of her mouth.

“Hmm. Ask her if she wants it.” He grunts.

“You want him to fuck you?” She slurs, words distorted by the obstructing force of his finger.

Do you?

Before you would swear up and down that you hated Eren. You still do. But Mikasa has gone delirious on his cock, mouth hanging open with her tongue lolling out, whining muffled “Eren Eren Eren”s even with him fish hooking her, and you can’t deny that it has you curious. It doesn’t help that you’re still desperate, from being left high and dry, poor empty pussy just begging for attention.

You shake your head yes and Mikasa’s hand comes down hard on your sore puffy clit. “Words.”

“Yes please.” You mewl. Tears prickle at your eyes from the sting between your legs. “Please. I want Eren to fuck me.”

“So well behaved.” Eren mocks you. “Hm?” He stops moving, still balls deep inside her.

“Good girl.” Mikasa practically purrs, lifting her head up once more. The small praise makes you feel flustered, desperate for more.

“Yeah?” His palm comes down hard on her ass. She almost sounds delighted at the pain. “What are you gonna do for your good girl?”

“I’m gonna make her cum on my tongue.” With that she’s back into your pussy, face first, suckling on your clit with quick pulses and pumping into you with three of her fingers.

It doesn’t take long for her to bring you back to that peak. Maybe because she left you on the edge just a moment ago only to let you watch her get fucked within an inch of her life. Maybe it’s you’ve been wanting this, fantasizing about this for weeks. Or maybe it’s because (as per usual), Eren Jaeger doesn’t know when to shut the fuck up, a string of filthy words falling from his lips.

“You're doing so well baby.” He still hasn’t moved, more focused watching Mikasa fuck you open on her fingers. She’s so focused on making you cum, he wonders if she’s even listening but he knows that you are. “Gonna make that sloppy pussy cum so good. Let her make a mess all over your face.”

That’s the catalyst. It’s then that you’re falling into the abyss of pleasure, legs shaking as you writhe on the bed, while Mikasa’s fingers ride you through your high, gradually coming to halt as everything subsides.

When you finally feel grounded again, you open your eyes in time to see Eren pull Mikasa’s face towards him. Tonguing at her mouth, licking inside and around it to clean off the remnants of your orgasm. You watch longly from the bed as their tongues tangle together, tasting the mixture of you and each other.

When Eren has had enough, Mikasa turns to you, spit-slicked face gleaming under the dim lights. “My turn right?” She asks you, still slightly breathless.

Eren answers in your stead. “Yeah, take these off.” He stretches the elastic of her underwear so it can flick back against her skin. He’s trying very hard to sound indifferent because he’d be mortified if you knew how eager he was to see Mikasa rut against your face until she cums.

“Move up.” The instruction is for you this time, Eren patting your knees that still dangle over the edge of the bed. You clamber up until your head lands on the soft, downy pillows, body sprawled on the length of the mattress now. Eren crawls on top of you, slotting himself between your thighs. Mikasa sits next to your head, now sans panties.

He nudges against your tender pussy with the bulbous head of his cock, spreading your lips apart ever so slightly.

You don’t expect a ceremony, closing your eyes in anticipation for the burn you know is coming. It never does.

“Beg for it.”

Your eyes fly open, face immediately moulding into a scowl. He looks down at you with unabashed cockiness, clearly amused at your frustration.

“You fucking bastard! I-“

“_____. “ Mikasa trails her hand down your neck, grazing over your sternum and tracing the underside of your breast and circling your areola. Your nipples stiffen under the light touch. “He said ‘beg’.”

“But I already said it, didn’t I!?” Your irritation simmers when you address her, still deep down you cringe at how petulant you sound.

Eren’s hand comes down hard against your pussy and you let out a loud cry on impact. His hands are bigger, stronger and harder than Mikasa’s and that one spank leaves your whole pussy aching.

“Told you babe. You were being too soft.” He slides his tip through your folds while you twitch underneath the two of them, spreading is pre-cum around, mixing it with your juices. “Now she thinks she can get whatever she wants.”

She takes your nipple between her fingers, tugging on it gently. “Is that true?” She twists it hard, making you wince. “ I thought you were a good girl.”

She soothes the sore nipple by laving her tongue across it but the reprieve doesn’t last long as she sinks her teeth into the hardened nub.

“I’ll be good!” You whimper.

You're dizzy from the teasing; Mikasa playing with your tits, mouth around one nipple while her hand gropes the other one and the torturous drag of the full length of Eren’s cock up and down your pussy. It’s slow enough for you to feel every ridge and vein around him, always stopping to tease your entrance, but never giving you the stretch you’re craving.

“P-please.” Your voice is hoarse. “Please Eren fuck me. Pleasepleaseplease.”

He’s content with that; hearing you beg for him. He would never admit out loud that he’s jealous but there is a certain envy that sits heavy in his bones knowing that you want his girlfriend and she wants you just as bad. That's why it helps to know that, at the same time, you want him and he wants you too, just in a different way. It's messy and twisted, perhaps a little too complicated to unravel now. Because right now he wants to fuck you until you cry.

Yeah, that’s the way he wants you

In one quick, smooth motion he enters. You let silent scream and just as you feel full enough to burst, he reaches his hilt.

Mikasa lets go of your nipple with a pop and murmurs, “There’s my good girl.” Against the shell of your ear.

Without warning, Eren starts to move, impossibly deep thrusts, moulding your walls to the shape of him. He prods against a spot inside you that has your back bowing off the bed but he holds you down by planting one of his large hands firmly on your stomach.

Soon, he’s fucking you hard and fast. He can’t help it. The loud sound of your sopping wet cunt squelching every time he slides home, dripping down his hefty balls as they slap against your ass with each brutal thrust, was just egging him on.

That, combined with the sweet-sounding quiet moans of his girlfriend with her hand between her thighs, rubbing quick, quick circles while she’s seemingly unable to take her eyes off of the both of you.

She perches up on her knees to get a better look. Wanting to see exactly where he enters you, wanting to see your pussy stretched out way more than her slim fingers could do.

The creamy ring that encircles the base of Eren’s cock makes her shudder. She feels a sense of pride, knowing that translucent strands of your cum was because of her. Part of why you’re so sex-drunk right now is because of her.

“Eren.” She purrs. “You’re fucking her so good. Making her feel so good.” She uses her free hand to tweak at her nipples, eyes flitting frantically between you and him.

“F-fuck!” You cry out as Eren bottoms out and stays there. He leans over you, face hovering just above yours, the strands of his hair brushing over your cheeks. His pelvis is against your clit, providing delicious pressure but not much else.

“Open.”

It takes a moment for you to process that he’s giving you an instruction. But then, you slacken your jaw, lips parting.

“Looks like you can listen huh?” He sneers. “Stick out your tongue.”

And you do.

It’s all so Eren can drop a glob of spit from his mouth into yours. He makes sure he does it slowly, so that the string of saliva can stretch and stretch and stretch until it plops unceremoniously on your waiting tongue.

“Don’t swallow. Keep it there.”

He gives you another one, coating your tongue in his spit while your own begins to pool in your mouth.

“Hey babe. You didn’t get to cum.” He addresses Mikasa. He gives you one shallow thrust of his hips, the tip of his cock nudging against your cervix.

“Yeah?” She perks up, catching the meaning behind his words.

“Yeah.” He grunts, one more of those thrusts that puts him so deep you feel like he’s fucking the air out of your lungs.

She leans over you too now. Two pairs of eyes, look down on you from above. You blink your eyes shut, trying to escape their scrutiny.

“Open your eyes, sweet girl.” Mikasa coaxes you out of your sheepishness. She purses her baby pink lips, as if considering her next words. “Make me cum. Can you do that for me?”

For the third time that night, you have to question if you’re dreaming or not.

You nod your head a yes, feeling your own saliva pool in your mouth.

“So, so good.” Mikasa tells you.

“Shit.” Eren’s hips jerk against you, when. you squeeze tight around him when she tells you that. “Say that again.” He grits out.

Mikasa is positioning herself, facing Eren with her knees next to your ears, soaking wet pussy just an inch or so above your face.

“What?”

Their conversation is nothing but a faint buzz in the back of your mind, how could you focus on anything except what was right in front of you. Her pretty pink pussy, all wet just for you. The smell of her is heady, rich and sweet. The kind of thing you would get addicted to. God if she would only….

“——, you're such a good girl.” She sighs as she finally sinks down, resting directly on your face.

You moan involuntarily, finally getting to taste what your mouth has been watering for. You let your tongue stay still, letting her grind herself down on it. She tries to roll her hips in fluid motions but they stutter every time her clit rolls over your tongue as she lets out the most melodic moans.

You know that you’re being greedy now, but you can’t help it, the more she gives you, the more you want. Your hands fly up to her thighs and hold her in place. The tip of your tongue catches the rim of her leaking hole, trying to draw more of the sweet honey.

Eren clicks his tongue behind his teeth. “There you go again, letting her do whatever she wants.”

She pays him no mind, slipping her hand between her thighs to play with her clit, while your tongue massages the inside of her walls. “You’re just mean. She just wants to make me feel g-good r- ah right?” She rubs Her other hand tweaks one of your nipples, signalling to you that she wants an answer.

You moan a yes, muffled by the weight of her. You’re darting your tongue in and out of her pussy, unintentionally matching the pace of Eren’s unyielding thrusts.

She rolls the pulsing numb under her fingers, round and round. Her breathing quickens as she tries to bounces on your face; shallow up and down movements.

You can tell she’s close and briefly lament the fact that you won’t be able to see her face when she cums. You wish you could see what she looks like when that wave of pleasure finally crests. But when her knees dig into the mattress beneath her and rooting her firmly against your face, moaning your name as the waves of an orgasm rock her body, you can’t bring yourself to regret a thing. You’d let Eren have that. Getting to swallow down every drop that spills from her is more than a fair trade-off.

You clamp down on Eren’s cock, quickly approaching another orgasm of your own. Mikasa rides out hers by rutting against your tongue, her moans gradually fading into gasps.

“Make her real cum real hard okay ‘Ren?” She still hasn’t fully regained her bearings before she climbs off your face, (much to your dismay). “She really earned it.” She sighs giddy with bliss, plopping down beside you, turning her body to face you.

Eren huffs. “Your wish is my command.” His reaches your raw clit, rubbing it in harsh circles, setting your nerves alight like a livewire. There’s no way you could have held off your orgasm. Your muscles pull taut as you cum around his cock while he pummels your g-spot throughout your climax. As soon as you’ve come down, he pulls out of you. You whine, despite yourself, disappointed at the abrupt emptiness.

Eren mutters various expletives as he strokes himself over you. He’s coated in your cum and it makes the most obscene noise with every flick of his wrist. He releases onto your stomach hot, white ropes of cum shooting out, streaking from your belly button right down to the mound of your pussy. He milks his cock, desperate to get out every last drop, jolting his hips with the aftershocks of his orgasm.

He collapses on your other side, leaving you sandwiched between the couple.

For a moment the room is filled just with heavy breathing, the three of you recovering from your recent activities.

Mikasa drags her fingers across your torso, smearing Eren’s cum over your skin.

Your body is sticky all over, a mess of sweat and sex. All of you are. But you’re not able to get your muscles to move, just yet.

As the lust that fogs your brain clears, nagging questions start to rear their head.

‘What does this mean for us now?’ being the most pertinent.

You roll over, to face Mikasa.

Perhaps now isn’t the time to ask, but you��ve learned your lesson about waiting until the right time. It’s in everyone’s best interest to clear it all up as soon as possible.

“So um- agh!” you choke around a sudden intrusion and a salty taste spreads across your taste buds.

“Not now.” Mikasa gags you with two of her digits that are coated in Eren’s cum.

“Yeah.” Eren jostles behind you. His sinewy arm snakes around your waist pulling you into his chest. At the small of your back you can feel his dick pressed up against you, already at half mast. “We’ll talk later.”

[liquidstar]

I feel as if many people, myself included, have been having problems with the way “critical thinking” is conducted in fandom circles more and more. Which I’d say is a good thing, because it means we’re thinking critically. But still the issues with the faux-critical mentality and with the way we consume media through that fandom group mentality are incredibly widespread at this point, despite being very flawed, and there are still plenty of people who follow it blindly, ironically.

I sort of felt like I had to examine my personal feelings on it and I ended up writing a whole novel, which I’ll put under the cut, and I do welcome other people’s voices in the matter, because while I’m being as nuanced as I can here I obviously am still writing from personal experience and may overlook some things from my limited perspective. But by and large I think I’ve dissected the phenomena as best I can from what I’ve been seeing going on in fandom circles from a safe but observable distance.

Right off the bat I want to say, I think it's incredibly good and necessary to be critical of media and understand when you should stop consuming it, but that line can be a bit circumstantial sometimes for different people. There are a lot of anime that I used to watch as a teenager that I can’t enjoy anymore, because I got more and more uncomfortable overtime with the sexualization of young characters, partly because as I was getting older I was really starting to realize how big of an issue it was, and I certainly think more critically now than I did when I was 14. Of course I don’t assume everyone who still watches certain series is a pedophile, and I do think there are plenty of fans that understand this. However I still stay away from those circles and that’s a personal choice.

I don’t think a person is morally superior based on where they draw the line and their own boundaries with this type of stuff, what’s more important is your understanding of the problem and response to it. There are series I watch that have a lot of the same issues around sexualization of the young characters in the cast, but they’re relatively toned down and I can still enjoy the aspects of the series I actually like without it feeling as uncomfortable and extreme. Others will not be able to, and their issues with it are legitimate and ones that I still ultimately agree with, but they’re still free to dislike the series for it, after all our stance on the issue itself is the same so why would I resent them for it?

Different people are bound to have different lines they draw for how far certain things can go in media before they’re uncomfortable watching it and it doesn’t make it a moral failing of the person who can put up with more if they’re still capable of understanding why it’s bad to begin with and able to not let it effect them. But I don’t think that sentiment necessarily contradicts the idea that some things really are too far gone for this to apply, the above examples aren’t the same thing as a series centered solely around lolicon ecchi and it doesn’t take a lot of deep analysis to understand why. It’s not about a personal line anymore when it comes to things that are outright propaganda or predatory with harmful ideals woven into the message of the story itself. Critical thinking means knowing the difference between these, and no one can hold your hand through it. And simply slapping “I’m critical of my interests” on your bio isn’t a get out of jail free card, it’s always evident when someone isn’t truly thinking about the impact of the media they consume through the way they consume it.

I think the issue is that when people apply “Critical thinking” they don’t actually analyze the story and its intent, messages, themes, morals, and all that. Instead they approach it completely diegetically, it’s basically the thermian argument, the issue stems from thinking about the story and characters as if they’re real people and judging their actions through that perspective, rather than something from a writer trying to deliver a narrative by using the story and characters as tools. Like how people get upset about characters behaving “problematically” without realizing that it’s an intentional aspect of the story, that the character needs to cause problems for there to be conflict. What they should be looking at instead is what their behavior represents in the real world.

You do not need to apply real-world morals to fictional characters, you need to apply them to the narrative. The story exists in the real world, the characters and events within it do not. Fictional murderers themselves do not hurt anyone, no one is actually dying at their hands, but their actions hold weight in the narrative which itself can harm real people. If the character only murders gay people then it reflects on whatever the themes and messages of the story are, and it’s a major issue if it's framed as if they’re morally justified, or as if this is a noble action. And it’s a huge red flag if people stan this character, even if the story itself actually presents their actions as reprehensible. Or cases where the murderers themselves are some kind of awful stereotype, like Buffalo Bill who presents a violent and dangerous stereotype of trans women, making the character a transmisogynistic caricature (Intentional or otherwise) that has caused a lot of harm to the perception of trans women. When people say “Fiction affects reality” this is what they mean. They do not mean “People will see a pretend bad guy and become bad” they mean “Ideals represented in fiction will be pulled from the real world and reflected back onto it.”

However, stories shouldn’t have to spoon-feed you the lesson as if you’re watching a children’s cartoon, stories often have nuances and you have to actively analyze the themes of it all to understand it’s core messages. Oftentimes it can be intentionally murky and hard to parse especially if the subject matter itself is complicated. But you can’t simply read things on the surface and think you understand everything about them, without understanding the symbolism or subtext you can leave a series like Revolutionary Girl Utena thinking the titular Utena is heterosexual and was only ever in love with her prince. Things won’t always be face-value or clear-cut and you will be forced to come to your own conclusions sometimes too.

That’s why the whole fandom-based groupthink mentality about “critical thinking” doesn’t work, because it’s not critical. It’s simply looking into the crowd, seeing people say a show is problematic, and then dropping it without truly understanding why. It’s performative, consuming the best media isn’t activism and it doesn’t make you a better person. Listening to the voices of people whom the issues directly concerns will help you form an opinion, and to understand the issues from a more knowledgeable perspective beyond your own. All that means nothing if you just sweep it under the rug because you want to look infallible in your morality. That’s not being critical, it’s just being scared to analyze yourself, as well as what you engage with. You just don’t want to think about those things and you’re afraid of being less than perfect so you pretend it never happened.

And though I’m making this post, it’s not mine or anyone else’s job to hold your hand through all this and tell you “Oh this show is okay, but this show isn't, and this book is bad etc etc etc”. Because you actually have to think for yourself, you know, critically. Examples I’ve listed aren’t rules of thumb, they’re just examples and things will vary depending on the story and circumstance. You have to look at shit on a case-by-case basis instead of relying on spotting tropes without thinking about how they’re implemented and what they mean. That’s why it’s analysis, you have to use it to understand what the narrative is communicating to its audience, explicitly or implicitly, intentionally or incidentally, and understand how this reflects the real world and what kind of impact it can have on it. 

A big problem with fandom is it has made interests synonymous with personality traits, as if every series we consume is a core part of our being, and everything we see in it reflects our viewpoints as well. So when people are told that a show they watched is problematic, they react very extremely, because they see it as basically the same thing as saying they themselves are problematic (It’s not). Everyone sees themselves as good people, they don’t want to be bad people, so this scares them and they either start hiding any evidence that they ever liked it, or they double down and start defending it despite all its flaws, often providing those aforementioned thermian arguments (“She dresses that way because of her powers!”).

That’s how you get people who call children’s cartoons “irredeemable media” and people who plaster “fiction=/= reality!” all over their blogs, both are basically trying to save face either by denying that they could ever consume anything problematic or denying that the problematic aspects exist all together. And absolutely no one is actually addressing the core issues anymore, save for those affected by them who pointed them out to begin with, only for their original point to become muffled in the discourse. No one is thinking critically because they’re more concerned with us-vs-them group mentality, both sides try to out-perform the other while the actual issue gets ignored or is used as nothing more than a gacha with no true understanding or sympathy behind it.

One of the other issues that comes from this is the fact that pretty much everyone thinks they’re the only person capable of being critical of their interests. That’s how you get those interactions where one person goes “OK [Media] fan” and another person replies “Bro you literally like [Other Media]”, because both parties think they’re the only ones capable of consuming a problematic piece of media and not becoming problematic themselves, anyone else who enjoys it is clearly incapable of being as big brained as them. It’s understandable because we know ourselves and trust ourselves more than strangers, and I’m not saying there can’t be certain fandoms who’s fans you don’t wanna interact with, but when we presume that we know better than everyone else we stop listening to other people all together. It’s good to trust your own judgement, it’s bad to assume no one else has the capacity to think for themselves either though.

The insistence that all media that you personally like is without moral failing and completely pure comes with the belief that all media that you personally dislike has to be morally bad in some way. As if you can’t just dislike a series because you find it annoying or it just doesn’t appeal to you, it has to be problematic, and you have to justify your dislike of it through that perspective. You have to believe that your view on whatever media it is is the objectively correct one, so you’ll likely pick apart all it’s flaws to prove you’re on the right side, but there’s no analysis of context or intent. Keep in mind this doesn’t necessarily mean those critiques are unfounded or invalid, but in cases like this they’re often skewed in one direction based on personal opinion. It’s just as flawed as ignoring all the faults in the stuff you like, it’s biased and subjective analysis that misses a lot of context in both cases, it’s not a good mindset to have about consuming media. It’s just another result of tying media consumption with identity and personal morals. The faux-critical mentality is an attempt to separate the two in a way that implies they’re a packaged deal to begin with, making it sort of impossible to truly do so in any meaningful way.

As far as I know this whole phenomena started with “Steven Universe Critical” in, like, 2016, and that’s where this mentality around “critical thinking” originated. It started out with just a few people correctly pointing out very legitimate issues with the series, but over time it grew into just a trend where people would make cutesy kin blogs with urls like critical-[character] or [character]crit to go with the fad as it divulged into Nostalgia Critic level critique. Of course there was backlash to this and criticism of the criticism, but no actual conversation to be had. Just people trying to out-do each other by acting as the most virtuous one in the room, and soon enough the fad became a huge echo-chamber that encouraged more and more outrageous takes for every little thing. The series itself was a children’s cartoon so it stands to reason that a lot of the fans were young teens, so this behavior isn’t too surprising and I do believe a lot of them did think they were doing the right thing, especially since it was encouraged. But that doesn’t erase the fact that there were actual real issues and concerns brought up about the series that got treated with very little sympathy and were instead drowning out people’s voices. Though those from a few years back may have grown up since and know better (Hopefully), the mentality stuck around and influenced the norm for how fandoms and fandom people conduct any sort of critique on media. 

That’s a shame to me, because the pedestal people place fandom onto has completely disrupted our perception on how to engage with media in a normal way. Not everything should be consumed with fandom in mind, not everything is a coffee-shop au with no conflict, not everything is a children’s cartoon with the morals spoon-fed to you. Fandom has grown past the years of uncritical praise of a series, it’s much more mainstream now with a lot more voices in it beyond your small community on some forum, and people are allowed to use those voices. Just because it may not be as pleasant for you now because you don’t get to just turn your brain off and ignore all the flaws doesn’t mean you can put on your rose-tinted nostalgia goggles and pretend that fandom is actually all that is good in the world, to the point where you place it above the comfort and safety of others (Oftentimes children). Being uncritical of fandom itself is just as bad as being uncritical of what you consume to begin with. 

At the end of the day it all just boils down to the ability to truly think for yourself but with sympathy and compassion for other people in mind, while also understanding that not everyone will come to the same conclusion as you and people are allowed to resent your interests. That doesn’t necessarily mean they hate you personally, you should be acknowledging the same issues after all. You can’t ignore aspects of it that aren’t convenient to your conclusion, you have to actually be critical and understand the issues to be able to form it. 

I think that all we need is to not rely on fandom to tell us what to do, but still listen to the voices of others, take them into account to form our opinion too, boost their voices instead of drowning them out in the minutiae of internet discourse about which character is too much of an asshole to like. Think about what the characters and story represent non-diegetically instead of treating them like real people and events, rather a story with an intent and message to share through its story and characters, and whatever those reflect from the real world. That’s how fiction affects reality, because it exists in reality and reflects reality through its own lens. The story itself is real, with a real impact on you and many others, so think about the impact and why it all matters. Just… Think. Listen to others but think for yourself, that’s all.