#as long as i can get the poetry readings done in a reasonable amount of time i SHOULD be able to bs a poem before class. should. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

spgothkidsheadcanons · 2 years

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I was thinking that it’d be interesting if the goth kids have that one childhood friend that’s different from their group that they have a soft spot for. I made a yandere Michael fanfic and an OC based on that particular headcanon. My Michael’s a demisexual type of guy and he’ll get really close to the person he’s known for a long time other than his friends. Like his childhood friend was really close to him before he was goth and they were there for him when his parents divorced.

Goth Kids With A “Different” Friend

Warnings: mentions of violence, mentions of divorce, mentions of bullying, cigarette smoking

Michael:

- Michael had always been a lone wolf.

- He had a fair amount of people who would talk to him, but he mostly spent his time with his nose stuck in some poetry or occult book his parents had gotten him

- His tendency to ignore people in favor of reading was massive

- Pre-goth days, he was still cold and off putting from the world

- But when his parents split and his dad forced him to move in with him and away from his mother, he became colder.

- Then, Michael became goth, and his lone wolf life came upon him tenfold

- If it was up to him, he would have never made friends with any normie

- That was, until you had taken an interest in the curly haired boy, and then it had become your life mission to befriend him

Two weeks after graduation, Michael had started packing up to leave town. You sat on his bed, watching as he paced around his childhood bedroom, throwing stuff into one of his multiple suitcases. You were upset he was leaving, but you knew the time would come where he would leave to go spend a few years with his mom in Korea. She had left to go back to her home country after her and his dad split while Michael was still young. You pouted, watching as he zipped up his bags and set them off to the side.

His bed had been stripped bare, as were his walls and shelves. “I get why you’re leaving, but I didn’t think it would be so soon.” you said, looking up to your tall friend. Michael was tall when you had met him, but he seemed to grow even taller over the years you two had been friends. He looked to you, then back to his bags before he shrugged. He came and sat by you on the bed, resting his back. Being so tall was a blessing and a curse. “Well, the sooner the better. If I have to stay in this hell hole of a place for much longer, I might go crazy.” he explained.

You continued to pout at the loss of your friend. You two had known each other since you were little, you had done everything together. You even helped him through his parent’s divorce, being there to listen to him and letting him cry or react however he saw he needed to. “It still sucks…” you muttered, taking another sweeping glance around the room. “We used to spend so much time up here.” he reminisced. This was a softer side of Michael that you don’t think even the other goth kids he hung out with knew. “Playing with the ouija board, trying to summon demons, hours and hours of horror movie marathons…” he trailed off.

You leaned your head against his shoulder, his arm coming up to rest around your shoulders. “It’ll only be a couple of years. Then I’ll be back, get a place and we can always get together and do the same thing.” he reassured you. He was amazing at making you feel better. That’s part of the reason you guys had stayed such steadfast friends. “I know, I know. It’s just gonna feel weird starting college without my best friend being there.” you said, looking up at him. Michael looked back to you, an indiscernible look on his face. He sighed, looking at the time and unwrapping his arm and standing up.

“I know. But it’s just what’s gotta happen. I haven’t seen my mom in God knows how long, I’d like to go and reestablish a relationship with her. Even if that means leaving Colorado for a little bit.” he explained. “Speaking of, it’s about time I leave. My flight’s in 4 hours and I’d like to get through security with enough time to get to my gate.” he finished. “I’ll drive you there.” you offered with a soft smile. With that, the two of you packed everything into your car, starting on your last car ride together for a while. It was going to be a long few years without your best friend.

Henrietta:

- Henrietta was at one time a very sociable person

- Before becoming goth, she was a social chameleon, trying to be friends with anyone and everyone because it was viewed as the norm

- But she had 1 friend who no matter what, always stayed by her side and never judged her for her looks or for her thoughts

- And that one friend was You!

- Even after she met Michael and joined the goth clique for good, you were always her most trusted friend and confidant

- She tried to get you into her group, but you didn’t like to be pinned to one group

- And she understood that. You were like a wild animal, and she had business trying to get you to finally settle into a group

- But even though you were “different”, you still made a point everyday to go say hello and chat with her before class

It was another cold and snowy morning before class. Henrietta and the other goths were perched in the back of the school steps, just to give the illusion that they were at school to their parents. They had already planned on skipping, and were just waiting for school to start before leaving the campus for the rest of the day. It was Henrietta’s 18th birthday, and Michael had come and snuck back to the highschool even though he had already graduated to hang out with her and Pete. Firkle was sick, so he didn’t leave his house that morning.

Henrietta had just finished her 3rd cigarette, stomping it out on the snow covered ground. She hugged her jacket closer around her, shielding her skin from the wind. “Fuck this fucking weather.” she griped, her anger directed at no one in general. Behind her, Pete was huddled in on himself, his legs tucked up into his oversized hoodie. Michael was leaning against the building, seemingly unphased by the weather, but if you looked close enough, small tremors shook through his body.

“Henrietta, you back here?” a familiar voice shouted out. Michael and Pete turned their heads to look at where the voice was coming from. “Yeah!” Henrietta shouted back, questioning if she should light up her 4th cigarette of the morning. Michael and Pete turned their heads now to look at Henrietta, then each other, questioning looks on their faces. Moments later, a person the boys had never seen before came walking up, in their hands a small container.

“Hey Hen! Happy Birthday! I made you something!” the person chirped, their positivity practically melting off of them. They quickly passed off the container they were carrying to the goth girl, shoving their hands in their pockets. “Thanks, (Y/n).” Henrietta responded, looking down at the box. She could see that it was a cake, crudely decorated in black frosting with red and black spiderwebs scrawled all over it. The words ‘Happy Birthday’ were written out in purple frosting, and there were bat and spider sprinkles haphazardly thrown onto it.

“I was in a rush with decorating, sorry it looks bad, but I wanted to make sure you had something for your birthday!” (Y/n) explained, smiling warmly at her lifelong friend. “It doesn’t have to look good, I really do appreciate the sentiment.” Henrietta smiled. “Hey, why don’t you come to Benny’s with us?” she offered. (Y/n) pondered for a second before shruggin their shoulders. “Sure! Anything for you, my friend.” they smiled.

Pete:

- Unlike Henrietta, Pete was definitely not a social butterly

- He had always been “different” than the other kids, so before joining the goths, he stuck to himself most of the time

- That was until you noticed this little kid all on his lonesome

- You decided from that day, to make that kid your absolute best friend

- Even after he started hanging out with the goths, he’d still invite you over to his home to play video games or just to talk about life

- He’d even skip out on hanging out with the others just so you and him could hang out

The both of you were sitting on the floor infront of his living room TV, playing another game of Mario Kart. You had beaten him a few times already, and he was trying his hardest to at least get 1 win on you. It was senior skip day, so the both of you had elected to just hang out and play video games, watch movies, and to just fuck around and do jack shit. Michael and Henrietta had asked if Pete would go to the diner with them, but he shrugged them off pretty quickly.

Even Firkle had tried to get him to go do something with him, but Pete had other plans, and those plans were to do nothing but hang out with you all day. After finishing the last race, and being beaten once again, he sat his controller down and stretched his back. Sitting on the floor was definitely not the best idea, but it was a tradition that the two of you had held for multiple years. You looked over at your friend, setting your own controller down.

“Hey, I’m hungry. I’m gonna go raid your cabinets.” you told him, standing up from your position, limping slightly from your leg having fallen asleep. “Bring me something.” he called, standing up himself and making his way to the couch. He pulled up Netflix on his phone, finding a movie that looked interesting enough to keep on as background noise. Coming back from the kitchen with an armful of assorted junk food and cans of soda, you laid out your items on the table, settling onto the opposite side of the couch.

“This is the life.” you sighed, popping open a can of soda and grabbing a bag of chips from the pile on the table. Pete silently agreed, grabbing his own snack as his eyes fixated on the movie that was playing. “I’m not going to school tomorrow, either. It was dumb as fuck for them to have skip day on a Thursday.” he complained. “Shit, if you aren’t, I’m not either.” you laughed. “But to be fair, you hardly ever actually go to school.” you picked at him and his tendency to skip with his other friends.

He cut his eyes at you, rolling them playfully before settling back into his snack. “It’s cause I’m not a conformist like you.” he quipped back. It was your turn to roll your eyes. “Yeah, that’s why you’re hanging out with me and not the other ‘nonconformists’.” you chuckled, eliciting a smile from the goth beside you. “Eh, I gotta have a piece of boring in my life sometimes. You’re the only option I’d actually choose.” he said. You smacked his arm playfully, choosing the ignore the fact he called you boring as you two sat in silence for the movie.

Firkle:

- Firkle once had many friends. When he was in preschool, everyone pretty much was friends with each other

- Then, he went and had his little accident, and he found out that all preschoolers were just kids who didn’t understand that being one finger short didn’t make you any different

- Well, almost all preschoolers.

- One decided to stick with him despite the fact he had a missing finger

- And that one was you

- In fact, you thought it made him cool that he had was what he assumed was “different”

- And the bond that you two had grew with you right through elementary school, middle school, and so far, into the 9th grade of highschool

“Cool finger today, Firkle!” you complimented. Firkle had been known to make his own prosthetic fingers from carved pieces of wood, opting for different and unique designs that were anything far from a normal prosthesis. Today, he had chosen to wear a neatly decorated purple one, with black lace details carefully painted on it. The young goth looked at it, then back to you and hummed in acknowledgment. “I’ve had it for years. I just found it 2 days ago, so I wore it cause why the hell not.” he stated flatly.

You laughed at his delivery, staring ahead as you two walked down the crouded hallways. People stared at you, judging the fact that you were hanging out with someone who was so unlike you. You were a social butterfly, a part of any clique that would take you. You wouldn’t say you were popular, but you did indeed know quite a few people.

Firkle glared at anyone who dared to look at you guys liked you were a circus. He was mentally crushing all of the idiots who tried to judge you. “Hey, Firkle. Don’t let them get to you. If I don’t care, then you shouldn’t care either.” you reassured him, patting his back gently. He sucked his teeth in disgust, his brows furrowing. “Besides, if they don’t understand we’ve literally been friends since the sandbox, then they’ll never understand now.” you shrugged.

You both turned into your shared classroom, automatically taking your seats at the back. Opting to ignore the teacher at the front, the two of you chatted quietly amongst the yelling and tomfoolery of the other students. “Hey, (y/n)!” your other friend, Jenny, called from the a few rows over. You looked from your goth friend to her. She pulled a book out of her bag and tossed it to you. “Thanks for letting me borrow that!” she chirped happily, turning back to her boyfriend, Filmore.

Firkle gave you a look of disgust, which you caught when you looked to him. “Chillax, Firk. She just needed it for science homework.” you laughed. Firkle was a little protective over you, but that was only because you were the only person who has stuck with him since preschool. “If you ever decide to get a different close friend, I’ll cut you.” he threatened. You laughed, rolling your eyes at his possessiveness. “Firkle, you know that doesn’t scare me.” you retorted, turning your full attention back to him. “It won’t scare you until it actually happens.” he stated. You rolled your eyes again. You knew he wouldn’t actually do it.

At least, you didn’t think he would. That little motherfucker is kinda spooky.

#sp goth kids #south park goth kids #sp fanfiction #sp michael #sp henrietta #sp firkle #sp pete #south park michael #south park henrietta #south park pete #south park firkle #south park headcanons #sp headcanons

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baeddel · 2 years

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oh yeah, since i like, if i'm talking about things, talking about how i'm learning things: (long and extremely boring if you don't care about me)

at the moment i've been trying out some new stuff. as you know i typically just read whatever interested me without very much discipline. then for the last year or so i tried kind of a flexible schedule that involved setting weekly goals for myself, mostly 1ch of my OE book every week. i also started doing 15m of anki every day. well 2022 was a fucking nightmare for me so i wasn't as good at it as i think i coulda been, but when i was 'on' it was pretty good. but i've been trying something new again, which is to work on small daily goals instead.

because i divide my days by meals (cuz my weird diabetes leaves me with an inflexible meal schedule, it's very reliable), i must eat 4 hours apart and must have a snack in the middle. so my day naturally comes in 2hr chunks. so my ideal schedule is something like this:

breakfast meditate 7m [心斋法 'heart purification method'] (building it up) LANGUAGES BLOCK do my daily language chores snack break TEXTBOOK BLOCK pick 2-4 books & study 15m of each lunch LITERATURES BLOCK just read something i picked snack CORRESPONDENCE BLOCK reply to emails & IMs i have to reply to dinner free time snack free time supper brush teeth meditate 7m [心斋法 again] sleep

currently the language chores are:

15m Chinese Assimil book/tapes 10m Old English reading 15m Anki (both OE and Chinese)

the textbooks i'm using are

the OE grammar book still Hock & Joseph Intro to Historical and Comparative Linguistics Hayes Phonology a Lacan essay i'm reading cuz a friend's reading it

the literature part is currently Dante's Divine Comedy

the reason i'm doing it this way is three reasons:

1. learning two languages means i have to do a certain amount of stuff every day no matter what. plus grinding OE every day for over a year really trained my discipline in that respect so it's a lot easier for me now than it used to be.

2. i'm at a point in my learning where i'm kind of starting all over again at something new, re: studying linguistics, so i need to get through a bunch of textbooks and stuff. i needed something more consistent for going through a ton of material.

3. going by chapters or page numbers has a disadvantage, which is that you don't feel like you can skip pages or else you're cheating, and you also don't want to 'read around the subject' and dig into things you find that are interesting because it doesn't help your page number goal. and that's the opposite of what you want, because you want to skip around and do different levels of reading, and you want to follow up on things you're curious about. so going by time rather than page numbers is much better.

the reason for the literatures & emails portions was that i felt so good about the scheduling that i realized i could use it to work on other stuff too. so i'm hoping it helps me reply to stuff on a better schedule and also actually get to read poetry & fiction and stuff more often.

the only one i actually have to do daily is the lanɡuaɡes one. everythinɡ else can be skipped or swapped around dependinɡ on my enerɡy level / interest.

the languages component i've been faithful to for about three weeks, except this weekend when i had a huge fatigue crash & skipped two days. the other stuff i've added later. i've only managed to meet this ideal schedule twice in the week or so i've had it in mind. my hope is that i can work up to being more consistent with it, but it's also not that important that i really do it all every day. it's just an orientation thing. i've still been doing way more, way better than i have done for a long time, so i think it's been helpful. but i'll check back in on it later.

the meditation is interesting. my only reason for it is curiosity. it's part of what i'm studying, so i wanted to try it for myself. 心斋法 is based on a passage of Zhuangzi. i'm following the explanation of it in Wu Jyh Cherng's 'Daoist Meditation.' i've done the best with it out of any technique i ever tried. my problem with meditation is the opposite of most beginners; it tends to produce in me extremely intense experiences extremely quickly. this was also true this time, but starting with a short timer (5m) and being able to focus on the sound of the breath, as is part of this method, was helpful in getting through it. once i got through the initial hurdle i would get very intense blissful feeling and a tingling sensation all over. it's crazy that it really works... but now after a about a week i'm not getting it, and i'm getting distracted by thoughts and fidgeting like a normal person! who knows where it's going...

anyway for linguistics i'm working through those textbooks (which i nabbed from a Harvard historical linguistics class, and constitute my 'intro to historical linguistics block'), then i'm going to do a Writing Systems workout: Rogers' Writing Systems, Page's Intro to English Runes, and Boltz' Chinese Writing System. when i finish my introductory OE grammar i have a kind of 'bridge' text called Old English Historical Linguistic Companion by Roger Lass which is supposed to take you from the introductory grammars to Campbell &c. then Campbell's Grammar > Mitchell's Syntax > Hogg's Grammar. i have a general morphosyntax workout to pair with them at various stages: Payne Morphosyntax, Akajemi & Heny Intro to Transformational Grammar, Haegaman Intro to Government & Binding. at that point i think i can be done with textbooks. obviously i'm not bound to stick to this plan exactly, it's just orientation.

the historical linguistics & phonology textbook are a ton of fucking fun btw. the phonetics chapter of the phonology textbook is amazing because you can make all the sounds yourself, & its like doing a bunch of little experiments on your own body. now i know what i'm doing when i'm making all those sounds. and i inflict this knowledge on my girlfriend who thankfully loves me.

sometime before 2024 i'll start on Latin and work it into the language dailies part. the plan is to ideally get to where i can drop the textbooks & anki vocab grinding & just get where i need w/ extensive reading (and, in the case of Chinese, listening). then i'll change my schedule to have something like: 40m OE reading, 40m ZH reading, 40m Lat reading. and once i work that up enough i can fill that time with the kind of stuff that i'm learning the languages to read, so that my language practice is also actually study/research, and i'm starting to consolidate the different branches a bit and actually freeinɡ up time for other areas. that's the lonɡ term ɡoal, like, 'up to when i'm 35' kind of timeframe. thanks for reading!

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simon-x-billy · 1 year

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Simon x Billy

The Year of OTP: January

Chapter 1: Where’s Giuseppe WTF?

January prompt: Historical au (because 2015 counts as the past)

Note: Simon x Billy is a slow-burn m/m fic; turns NSFW (male/male, consensual) beginning tamely at Chapter 7.

Meet the OTP: Simon Lewis, author and star of The Mortal Instruments, who keeps writing himself into his novels; and Billy Delaney, Irish handsome devil and international chef of mystery; and also Italy. It’s sort of like a threesome. TMI AU: Instead of Simon Lewis being only a character in the best-selling YA series, he is now also the author of that series. TW: References to having been cheated on, bad language, bad humor, Irish-isms, calling young people criminals, making fun of Americans, LGBTQIA+ themes, having to wait for the NSFW chapters to show up.

Masterlist || ao3 || Next

Chapter 1: Where’s Giuseppe WTF?

———/Simon/———

OK, fine, baggage claim was a little rough. Finding baggage claim was a little rough. Finding Customs was a little rough. Customs was Customs. I mean, what’s to know, they look at you suspiciously, and if you smile excitedly cuz you’re in a new country, they look at you suspiciously some more, and you start wondering if they’ve noticed something you haven’t.

At least that’s how I felt. Like, maybe I have a single very long nose hair or something horrifying like that. I don’t know? They’re Customs. They notice shit like that.

On a positive note, they’re just fine communicating with people who only “have” one language. They asked me if I had Italian, and I kept waiting for them to finish their sentence. You know? Like, do I have Italian… Food? Relatives? Then they were like, “Do you have any other languages?” And I’m thinking, maybe I caught one in-flight. Planes are well known for making people ill. Or I could’ve caught something cool, like Norwegian! In fact, I could’ve had it my whole life and it’s just never had any symptoms. You never know.

Meanwhile, the train ran on time. And the Red Sea parted. Two impossibilities amounting to miracles.

So yeah, sure, I’d done some prepping for the trip. I refuse to reveal my sources as they are completely mortifying. OK fine, it wasn’t even an app. It was a book. With pictures in it. More specifically, the one my parents used when they planned their trip to the Amalfi Coast.

I used it to plan Our Trip. The one that became My Trip. Flying solo. In so, so many ways.

Believe me, and you need to trust me on this one: Never propose to a girl you met in costume. And if you did and it turned out great, shut up. And mazel tov. May all your children have bar and bat mitzvahs with a good dj. And puppies.

Just remember, your first impression of her is while she’s cosplaying someone else. You might find you’re falling for a personality that isn’t really her on the inside. The whole thing is exhausting. Because my beautiful but cruel shiki found somebody else to cosplay with.

She revealed this shortly after breaking up with me.

No, Simon. I do not choose you. No, Simon. I never choose you. Said every girl ever.

She gave me lots of reasons why. Constructive observations for my next relationship, she said. So at least I had something to think about on the plane to Naples that made me feel really good about myself. For 22 hours including two layovers and a bonus train ride from the airport to downtown Naples. (Trust me, just fly into Rome. Why didn’t it occur to me to fly into Rome?)

I once read a book where the most flamboyant, exciting character said something of extreme poetry and wisdom. (Because poetry and wisdom can both be extreme. Whatever.) It went a little something like this: “Unsolicited advice is just criticism.” Ok fine, I’ve read it more like 25-30 times. Alright look, I can’t be coy. I wrote it. And 25-30 is how many revisions my editor tried to convince me to take it out. (I won.)

I like stories that stretch out over like 20 books in a series. You get to stay with the characters you love until you finally stop re-starting the series the minute you close the last page of the last book. Again.

I think I’d be a vampire irl. And I have thought a lot about it. I mean a lot of thinking on this topic. And you can’t convince me that fairies and werewolves are even in the running for best paranormal destiny.

I like stories where choosing to be a vampire is one of the safer bets. Because you’re already dead.

Don’t start. I’ve fought table top duels over this and I refuse to go over that ground again. Take my word for it. You want to be a vamp.

She was a vamp. I was a vamp. (D, because who else?) We thought we were made for each other. Until she didn’t. Think that anymore. I guess she’d been not-thinking that anymore for months and months. And here I am, presenting her with a trip to Italy where I was going to propose. I had it all planned out. I mean I had it all planned out. Because that’s how I roll. (A 20-sided die, obviously.) Ugh. So when she says she doesn’t want to leave the city, I’m like, “But it’s Italy! And me!”

Turns out the trip wasn’t the only thing she didn’t want.

Turns out she was also being quite literal about not leaving the city. And so, like the heartless traitor she is, she abandoned Brooklyn for the Upper West Side and a yoga instructor with a man bun and half a million followers on Twitter.

Half a million? What even is that? I mean, I get 100 followers -- wow, friend, you are on fire! I get a million followers -- wow, somewhat famous person, you are on fire! But, like, what’s halfway between the two?

So the “hot yoga instructor” -- her words, not mine -- is a person that exists. I told her that she didn’t have to be mean about another, hotter guy. And you know what’s coming next. You totally do.

The hot yoga instructor is an instructor of hot yoga.

But since I mentioned it, she laughed and said he is also a hot instructor, of yoga.

Thanks. I don’t feel angry tears at all when I think about that.

Anyways, I was talking about trains in Italy running on time, and somehow I land on vamps. Welcome to the brain of Simon Lewis, enjoy your stay.

Oh my god. There’s a McDonalds here. It’s like a crime against Italian humanity. “That should be illegal,” I announce to no one in particular. Followed by “Shut up, Lewis, that guy over there is staring.” And yes, I do use my last name when I scold myself out loud in public. Because people find that attractive and charismatic.

So the train in Italy running on time is actually my problem. “My driver” isn’t due for another 30 minutes. Which means I get to spend an additional 30 minutes enjoying my own company some more. And also avoiding talking to any strangers. Which is particularly difficult in the Naples train station. And even more unlikely when you’re standing in the same spot forever and ever.

I’m full of my mother’s dire predictions of criminal young people offering their services to help you find your way around the train station. And when that fails, they’re supposed to start begging for money. And when that fails, Oliver and the Artful Dodger pick your pocket. So put your money and your passport down the back of your underwear or something equally unworkable when you’re dealing with Customs.

That little gem was actually written in the margins of the travel book. By my mother. So I wouldn’t forget to keep it in my pants. “Simon, don’t forget about the criminal young people. Keep it all in your underpants.”

So standing here looking like I’m waiting (and waiting and waiting), I’m an easy target. But as my t-shirt says, I’m from Brooklyn. We do not pay people to tell us where we are and which line to stand in. It’s a matter of pride. Unbelievable. Being from Brooklyn, I understand trains. I can find my way around any train station in the world. Hubris! But it’s true. Even in foreign alphabets. It’s in my blood, it’s in the East River, it’s in the soot-flecked air we New Yorkers are born breathing.

So here I am in the Naples train station with my underwear full of credit cards, IDs, and my emergency contacts laminated in both English and Italian. And now I also have that hot tingling in my eyes and the slight burn in my sinuses that threaten angry tears again.

I’m supposed to see a little old man with a big old mercedes, holding up a sign saying “Simon Lewis.” His name is Giuseppe and he came very highly rated on travelbookie.com. Very highly rated.

So, ok, ummm- This guy is definitely not Giuseppe. He doesn’t look that much older than I am. He’s an awfully chatty Irishman named Billy. So I’m like, “What’s Billy in Italian?”

“Fuck if I know,” he laughs. “They just say Beelee. Which puts me off every time, if I’m honest. God bless ‘em, they’re beautiful people, right, but Beelee is so wrong.”

“What’s your last name?”

“Delaney.”

“So in Italian, you’re Beelee Day-la-nay.”

“Y’speak Italian then, do yeh?” he laughs.

“Fluently. This app taught me how to say ‘dog’ and ‘blouse’ and I leveled up really fast — one of my great talents, by the way.”

“Leveling up, is it? Or Italian?”

“Italian. Certo. That means ‘certainly,’ but you use it kind of like you would use ‘obviously.’ Why is it pronounced ‘chair toe?’ No seriously, I’m asking.”

“Obviously,” he snorts, ignoring my lingual curiosity. “Are you mansplainin the language of the place I live to me?”

“Certo.”

Billy rewards me with a low chuckle. It may have been low and just a chuckle, but it was real. Being a connoisseur and collector of bad puns and dad jokes, I have a finely tuned ear for real laughter, as opposed to the usual laughing-just-to-be-nice.

“So I’m better off with Beelee Daylanay. I’ll have a talk with my boss and ask him to use my full name or nothin at all.” That at least gets a snort out of me. Until he says, “What about you? Are you lookin forward to bein Seemon? Sorry, mate. I think yours might be worse than mine.”

———/-/———

We’ve been talking all this time and I forgot to look out the window. As if I’m not on my dream vacation. Runner-up, actually. I’m holding my best dream vacation (Venice) for when Ms. I Do Lewis actually says, “I do.” And I will not book the rooms til after she does.

“Sorry, what was that?” I’ve been staring into space and ignoring Mr. Daylanay, who is now looking at me funny in the rear view mirror.

“Nothin important. Where’d you go, mate?”

“New York to Frankfurt to Milan to Naples. I flew out of JFK.”

“I’ll pretend to know where that is. No,” he says, “I meant just now. You disappeared behind your face.”

Um… “I did what?”

“I’ve been the only one enjoyin the sound of my voice, apparently, since you went quiet about five minutes ago. So where’d you go? Back behind your face,” he prompts.

“That’s an awfully private question, Mr. Daylanay. I’m not sure we’re good enough friends for letting you behind my face.” I kinda stumble on the word friends, cuz, well, we’re not.

“What. Is that like bein let in to visit the little man behind the curtain? That sounds a bit-”

“Yeah, yeah, I know how it sounds.” I make sure to roll my eyes loudly so he can hear. My mother always says she can hear my eyes rolling from the next room.

“Cagey one, aren’t ya?”

“Nosey, intrusive one, aren’t ya?” I counter.

He bobs his head and gives me a simple, “Ok.”

And now it’s gone quiet. I decide to disappear behind my face again for a while. I quite like it there. Maybe one day the whole world will join me. (Obscure movie reference, don’t bother.)

“Does she have a name?” he breaks into my sinking mood.

“What- Why?”

“Well, Seemon, because every story worth tellin about people generally has a name or two in it. Unless yer feelin all avant-garde while you're busy behind your face, contemplatin. Things.”

Ok, now I’m starting to get tired of his persistence. “I like to think of her as She Who Shall Not Be Named.”

“Like Voldemort. In a nighty.”

The bark of a laugh just erupts out of me before I can stop it from encouraging him. “That is the most disturbing image I’ve ever had.” My dull ache of a mood evaporates as quickly as it came, uninvited and unwelcome on this trip.

“You’re off the hook for now, but if I see you again, I’ll want to hear more about Ms. She Who Shall Not Be Named.”

And just like that, I’m annoyed again. “No.”

“Ok,” he says again.

———/-/———

While apparently spending more time behind my face, I realize I’ve ignored over 45 minutes of the view in a foreign country. Again I’m annoyed. Isn’t he supposed to be narrating the countryside or something? Giuseppe would be narrating the countryside. I frickin paid for that narration.

“So what am I looking at?” I lob at him.

“Naples.”

“Funny.” I hope he can hear my eyes rolling.

“Hold up, I haven’t finished! That great U-shape, right, that’s the Bay of Naples. The city herself is over there in the distance, all the way at the far end of the bay. All the wee towns strung out and all bunched up against the sea as tight as can be sketch out the shape of the bay and on along to the Sorrentine Peninsula -- where we’re goin. The big blue bit beyond the bay-”

“Is the Mediterranean. Yeah, I got that much.”

“Nah, mate. You don’t. See, it’s the Tyrrhenian Sea, which is just the part of the Mediterranean between the boot of Italy and Spain.”

“Thanks so much for the oceanography lesson.”

“Bit tetchy, aren’t yeh?” he says, eyeing me in the rearview mirror. “Look, mate. I’m sorry if I rubbed ye up the wrong way with makin conversation. I’m just not used to fillin in on the guest delivery service. That’s a specific kind of hospitality. Mine might be a bit more suited to conversatin across a bar. In that situation, all of this would have been charming.”

I can see him smiling at me in the rearview, trying to reset the mood.

“So you’re a bartender, not a driver. But you do work at the hotel. Right? Or…”

“Yeah sure’n I’ve been known to fill in at the bar when I’m needed.” He clarifies, “Acourse it’s the height of the high season, and all the staff are absolutely inundated with guests. It’s a busy kitchen, and no mistake.”

“So you’re not a bar-”

“Aaaaand, here we are,” he declares, pulling off the road going way too fast into what appears to be open air. But when I don’t feel us driving off a cliff, I open my eyes to see an ornate iron gate, a tile roof, a million flowering bushes, and more than one fountain.

“Allow me to be the first to welcome yeh to the Hotel Terrazze di Limoni. I’ll just fetch your bags, shall I?”

———/Read More/———

Masterlist || ao3 || Next

———/Disclaimer/———

I’ve stolen liberally from Cassandra Clare, TJKlune, and all m|m authors I’ve ever read.

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moldygreenblue · 2 years

Text

'The Chaperone'

I once began writing a fic in late 2020, and completed it in late 2021. I planned on posting it, but never did. The fic is about Widdershins and his chaperone. Said chaperone is an OC, and making an OC original schism generation member made sense because it's pre-canon and it's a sandbox to play with. I called the fic, uh, 'The Chaperone', because I couldn't think of a better name.

Some point last year (late-mid 2022), I re-read The End. Due to what Ishmael said in passing, it had me going, "Hm, considering this canon detail, could he work as a chaperone?" And I ended up deciding to rewrite 'The Chaperone' with Ishmael replacing the OC. The rewrite is still a WIP, with the first section done. If I never get around to finishing the rest, I'm glad to share what I have finished.

Widdershins flattens his shirt, and sighs as he looks upward, letting the raindrops hit his face directly. He has been waiting on the bench for his chaperone to pick him up in the Beverage District for a few hours. Widdershins isn’t sure why the Beverage District is the location, but that what he was told this morning by Montgomery —Monty’s father— after picking his chaperone from a list of seven names: K.W. Anderson, I. Basehart, Alexander ‘Alex’ Denouement, Dorothea S. Markson, Y. Ichihara, Charlotte Haze, and William ‘Billy’ Shears-Campbell.

It was list that had him doom from the start. No captains of a submarine are listed. Six of the seven names Widdershins is familiar with he knows aren’t in any fields of his other interests, like mythology or poetry. Picking I. Basehart was because he had no other choice.

Widdershins continues to wait on the bench. He moves the balls of his feet up, and then moves the heel back down. Widdershins soon stares at the small suitcase resting beside him.

Widdershins doesn’t have an umbrella, because he thought the weather would be wrong. But he doesn’t mind waiting in the rain. He’s used to getting drench in the rain. However, he can only handle the rain for so long. What also doesn’t help is that underneath his shirt is an envelope. Inside it, is a letter meant for Basehart. Montgomery told him that Basehart must read it, and under no circumstances should Widdershins read, as well as get ruin.

“I hope the letter isn’t ruin by the rain. I don’t want to get in trouble with my chaperone before meeting him. Or her.” Widdershins gives out a sigh and leans back against the bench.

“It depends on the letter’s content,” answers a male voice. It’s a male voice that Widdershins unfortunately, know all too well. “Would you kindly give me the letter? I’m curious to know what my associate wrote.”

Widdershins slowly turns his head towards the direction of the voice. Standing several inches away in front of him is an old man with a beard. The beard isn’t what he would call a full-grown beard though. It’s smaller, as well as more neatly trim. Not a rogue hair in sight.

The man is wearing a grey rollneck sweater and white slacks, cover up by an old blue bridge coat that goes down to his knees. The man is frowning, and a ‘tch’ escape from his lips as he stays dry underneath the black umbrella he’s holding. Widdershins isn’t shock to hear the man’s disgust upon seeing him. Ishmael never like him for being an ‘outsider’, as well as other things.

Widdershins had hopes he wouldn’t see Ishmael again. Ishmael months ago, moved back to his home of New England for reasons no amount of eavesdropping could discover. To think he was free of Ishmael, only to once again be back in Ishmael’s care again.

He keeps his mouth set as he stands up, and pulls the letter from underneath his shirt. Widdershins hands the letter to Ishmael. He hates how the man’s hands are still the same. Warm and rough. Warm and rough that hurt when getting slap across the face.

Ishmael takes the letter, and then gives Widdershins the umbrella to hold. Widdershins watches the old man tears open the envelope, stuffing into his right pocket. Widdershins swallows the suddenly form lump in his throat as Ishmael reads Montgomery’s letter. Ishmael gives a scoff and shakes his head, folding the letter carefully, placing it into his left pocket.

“I thought you were a chemistry teacher, Ishmael,” says Widdershins, handing the umbrella back to the man. “Why are you on the list of chaperones? When did you even came back?”

The corner of Ishmael’s mouth twitches; Widdershins suspects he’s fighting the urge to say, “Call me Ish.”, or some variation. Ishmael keeps quiet as he holds the umbrella over himself, allowing Widdershins to get soak in the rain again. “Montgomery sent out a dispatch saying he needed volunteers to be potential chaperones to an unexpected group of neophytes a week ago. As my time in New England is now done, I responded, and came back. I never thought you’ll be part of that expected group, considering your background and circumstances.”

“And I never thought I’ll be force to learn about chemistry against my free will again.” Widdershins quickly slaps his hands over his mouth. He shouldn’t have said that at all.

“Believe it or not, I have other interests,” says Ishmael, narrowing his eyes. “I have a minor degree in oceanology, and have experience out on open-waters on ships such as the Pericles, the Penelope, and the Persuasion. Most importantly, I’ve done numerous deep-sea missions in the bathyscaphe Starbuck. I’m no stranger to the ocean. My experience at sea is greater than you think, Widdershins.”

Widdershins slowly removes his hands from his mouth, and briefly curls a lock of his wet hair upward. “I doubt it’s more than a submarine captain could experience. How will you be being my chaperone work if you only ever controlled a bathyscaphe? It’s a deep-sea submersible, yes. But it’s not a submarine.”

Ishmael keeps quiet as he outreaches a hand, and tucks the same wet lock of hair behind Widdershins’ ear. The man then gently pats Widdershins’ face, before turning around, and walk away. “All in due time. Now, would you kindly grab your belongings and follow me? I asked you to meet me in the Beverage District because my lodging is here. I don’t want you getting lost and in trouble in such a place like this.”

Widdershins rubs the patted spot on his face, and quickly grabs his suitcase. As he runs after Ishmael, Widdershins hates how unlucky he got with picking his chaperone. But he figures, having survived the man’s care once before, he can do it again. He endured much more and worse before Ishmael. Yes, Widdershins can endure it all over again.

#asoue #a series of unfortunate events #fanfic #fan fiction

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zvdvdlvr · 2 years

Note

⭐ -> star! ships. send your sexuality, gender, and a description of yourself and what fandoms you're in. ( as long as i'm in said fandom lol ) ill ship you with 1 or 2 characters!

I'm a straight female and my pronouns are she/her. I'm in the Harry Potter, marvel and stranger things fandoms!

I'm fairly introverted and it takes me a while to warm up to people. I love reading, my room is filled with stacks of books. I especially enjoy mysteries, poetry and Russian literature!I adore adventures, witty and playful banter, pulling harmless pranks, joking around and having indepth discussions on anything and everything. I love helping out and people come to me to vent or for advice and comfort. I'd consider myself really smart and I'm very ambitious; I love being the best at everything I do. I daydream a lot and I'm a hopeless romantic! I enjoy all forms of art and I have quite a few creative hobbies! I'm 5'9 and I have long and curly dark brown hair and brown eyes. I dress mostly in relaxed suits, blazers and coats and I love the occasional dress or sweaters layered over a white button down! I'm a taurus and a ravenclaw

Thank you very much!! Congrats on the milestone, here's to so many more followers ❤️

Thank you so much :((( <333

I do apologize though if this is bad, as i have never done this before. I love seeing those posts witg like people requesting ships with themselves and other characters and i thought it was cool so i wanted to try and im rambling but you get the point

From the MCU, i ship you with:

Loki Laufeyson

and

Peter Parker/Spiderman

𝐋𝐨𝐤𝐢 would definately have you read to him on a lazy morning/midday! Loki would love hearing about any random thoughts/daydreams you have. Would 100 percent help you decide on outfits and collaborate with you every once in awhile. When you and Loki inevitably find yourselves in Avenger's tower, you both would definately pull a couple pranks ( loki would probably take the fall for you lol ). Any drawing or sketch you gift Loki would be kept in a special spot and would never be crinkled, lost, or torn. I feel like you and loki would probably banter quite a bit ( nothing harmful! ) just to hear your smart remarks- Loki loves what your brain can come up with in the heat of the moment!!

𝐏𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐫 would fanboy over the way you dress since he isnt one to dress up unless theres a really good reason and overall you just look good🤷. If its tom holland spidey you like, peter would tell you about his spiderman thang when you started dating or whatvs idk. WORSHIPS the advice you give him- and probably says some 'damn thats pretty smart why didn't i think about that?' when you put in your two cents about his issues. OKAYOKAYOKAYOKAY I HAVE AN IDEA THAT I MIGHT WRITE A BLIRB OR SMTH ABOUT: when you paint realistic portraits and you need like a change of scenery or just something natural to take inspiration from, peter would have you pack up some water bottles, cups, snacks, your canvases, and paints in a drawstring and swing to a relatively natural environemnt ( i.e: a minimal amount of buildings, yada yada yada) and talk to you or listen to music while you painted

From the Stranger Things universe I ship you with...

Steve Harrington

i <3 my babyboy

𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞 ( season 2+ ) would looooove taking it slow and letting you warm up to him- trust is important. His rich ass would probably buy you blazers/suit jackets/ basically anything you want. Would probably ask you to draw random things he thinks about during the day. Such a worrywart tbh- especially when you drive to that one diner in town without telling anyone so you could get a shake and basket-o-fries and brush up on your Russian readings. Super protective as well. If you were with him and Robin during their little Scoops Troops thing: expect him to hold on to you while hugging just a little longer.

From Marauders era Harry potter universei ship you with

Remus Lupin

loml tbh

𝐑𝐞𝐦𝐮𝐬 is lowkey a quiet guy with people he doesn't know. Understands social cues ( specifically yours ) and can easily calm you down if you have anxiety about something. Would probably tell you about Moony on accident, but would be happy that you knew so he didn't have to keep lying to you. Would rant and vent about all the dumb shit James n Sirius do and how Remus gets frustrated thaf Peter just follows them instead of saying what he needs to say. Compliments your dressing style and admires from afar. Would watch over your shoulder as you sketch/draw, loving watching the way your hand moves in a way that could create such a pretty thing. Please climb a tree and hang out with him

Golden trio era:

George Weasley

silly billy georgey porgey

𝐆𝐞𝐨𝐫𝐠𝐞 would be a big fan of pulling pranks with you, even if you don't want to do take the blame for it. Could sit and watch you make art for hours <3. Sorry not sorry would call you his little arm rest. Absentmindedly braids your hair when he's bored ( he knows how to braid because Ginny went through a phase when she was a kid when she wanted her hair braided 25/8). Loves hearing you talk about your ambitions and goals, and helping you when you're indescisive. You'd get a sweater from Molly and thats when you knew you were part if the family

𝐭𝐲 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐫𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐧 𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐨 𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 <33

#jules's 800 follower celebration #jules's celebrations 🥳#ships #fandom ships

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kappatater · 2 years

Text

WARNING:

A Ramble About Why I Draw, I Guess?

Thinking about my art this year, and something's kinda adding up, so I'm gonna ramble a bit. It's a jumbled mess, but I think it'll make more sense near the end?

This could be boring and long-winded, so let's draw a nice li'l bunny throughout, m'kay? :)

My social capabilities are stunted, mostly due to trying to develop a personality based on entertaining people, with no regard to my self, at a very early age. Think "a poor attempt at becoming a comic relief character IRL". At some point, I became more self-aware, realized I was unfunny and VERY unhappy, and the people-pleasing part sorta traded places with retreat/silence. These days I fall back more on politeness than anything, but the way I talk, if I'm not spouting trivia or a joke, is fairly messy and sparse.

Despite how much I type these days, and despite my weird vernacular due to literally growing up reading a dictionary, I don't consider myself a writer. I've definitely learned how to be more succinct with writing (admittedly this could stem from using Twitter, what with its typing limits), but any form of creative writing that isn't a form of poetry with structure/pattern will falter from me. Definitely more an arithmetic guy. A puzzle guy. A nerd.

I started drawing because it was and still is the most vivid way I can get my thoughts out. I had a LOT of thoughts, so I drew constantly. For the longest time, almost all I'd draw was original stuff, I didn't get into fan art much until... high school? Even then, when I became more driven to make characters... as characters, I'd pretty much just have a doodle or two and my thoughts.

I never really thought about sharing my stuff back then, mostly cuz I was too thin-skinned to take light-hearted thoughts about the things I made then, but also because... I think I was satisfied with them being just drawings? I actually dunno. I did try to go to school for animation, but due to a MYRIAD of reasons, both personal and not personal, I had to stop. Still satisfied with creation for the sake of creation; I exist, so I just create. That's the bread and butter of my life! Hits different now than then, though.

When I learned how to draw and post online, the amount of fan art I did skyrocketed. I'm unsure if it's because of change in subject desire, desperation, or just reading the zeitgeist. Prolly all three.

Recently, I've been delving into these OCs that sorta came outta nowhere. Ada, Eclair, some others that I have yet to introduce here that I hope y'all'll like. Actually got to make friends thanks to my characters.

I think I've gotten to the meat of this ramble: The fan art I've made is sorta like trying to tell people about games I think about or can talk about, stuff like that. I've made characters that I now actively have to expand upon and convey that to pretty much talk about them. I'm making art to holster my socialness (I don't care if that's not in the dictionary). And due to that stunted socialness being the roots of that, rather than vice versa, the art slows if I find it hard to talk about. I don't think it's a BAD thing, per se, but it's definitely notable. My attempts at getting better at socializing fall and rise, but more often they rise.

This year, I've been trying to get back into drawing in sketchbooks, mostly doodling and planning. Trying to loosen up a bit. But also, I've been trying to create things without telling people about them. No advertisement. This feels like the purest form of self-expression for me; to create for absolutely no one but myself. Who knows when people will learn about these hidden things? Maybe when I'm done with them, maybe on my deathbed.

I have my social characters and my personal characters. And I do a lot of doodles between all of that. I've done a lot, I do a lot.

now dats a bnuuy

#ramblings #self reflection #wasp #wait what wasp #thats a bun right there

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mariyekos · 2 months

Note

- the most interesting topic you’ve researched for a fic

- pick three keywords that describe your writing

- share a fic you’re especially proud of

Link to the ask meme here.

the most interesting topic you've researched for a fic

Oh boy, this is a hard one when you have nearly 10 years of fic writing under your belt (and if you're thinking wait, 10 years, what did you write before 2016? the answer to that is many, many unpublished ffvii and ffviii fics among other things). And nearly 70 published works, ohhh boy. I enjoyed looking up some sapphic poetry for inspiration for a F/F piece I wrote. I just used it as a title in the end, but despite loving poetry I don't really go looking for it very often, so it was lovely to go through some for inspiration. Oh! And I was part of a Mini Bang (like Big Bang) where I read a bunch of folklore and fairy tales for inspiration for my own fic. I put a lot of effort into figuring the kind of language and patterns were used in fics to guide some of my own, and even if I didn't write all of my fic in those styles, I took sooooo many screenshots and spent a good amount of time identifying what it was that gave the things a "folklore-y" feel. The vast majority of my fic research goes into making sure I'm aligned with series canon. I've definitely done some research to make sure things align with their real life counterparts, but when I say I've put hours into researching just canon materials for fics, I mean it. For my most recent one I went through two game scripts, two extra novels, and then as much information as I could scrape from the wiki... I love being canon compliant as much as a story will allow, so I always do it when I can (and when it's reasonable)! Sometimes I do it to include it, while other times I do it so I can at least know what the canon thing that I'm not aligned with is, for the purposes of assessing what's necessary to include in the story to explain or "earn" the difference.

pick three words to describe your writing

Long, bittersweet, contemplative

share a fic you're especially proud of

Forevermore is, I think, the fic I was most proud of upon publishing, and am still proud of today. It captured a certain feeling I absolutely adore but struggle to produce, and it exists in a sort of high I try to capture time and time again. The writing style is great imo, I like that I was able to do shorter scenes, and it still gets me teary eyed. Same for my readers. I haven't read it in a year or so, but it's very dear to my heart and I think it will always remain that way.

Thank you for the ask! This was fun :) For anyone that might be interested in hearing me ramble more, check out the link at the top (or here) to see the rest of the prompts.

#erurandomness #eruanswers #erubabbles

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nella09archive · 1 year

Text

Marriage. 5

Chapter 5: Year 1. Part 2

If I could land 3 kicks and 3 punches, before lunch, I’ll count that as a success. And so, it began.

By the time lunch time came around I was surprised at myself. For the fact I landed more hits than excepted. I was so proud of myself that I thought I should have made training a game from the start. At least, put a challenge on myself. I was so happy that I didn’t notice the looks Kami and Mr. Popo gave me. “Goku, are you ok?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Just that you’re eating more than your usual amount.”

“Is that a bad thing? I just used up a lot of energy, is all.” Kami nodded and walked out the room. Once lunch was done, I follow Mr. Popo to the steps in front of the temple. Today’s lesson was about nature.

…

“Good Chichi. Let’s take a break.”

“I’m ok dad. I would like to get a few more in before we return for lunch.”

“Chichi, you sure you haven’t done enough sit-ups?” Dad is right. After one more, I sat up and crossed my legs. I decided to meditate before I got up fully. Today already felt like a long day, yet it wasn’t over. After meditating for half an hour, me and dad went into our capsule home. It’s been two months since he promised to train me.

At first, it was just like it was when I was a kid. But then, dad forced me to stop wearing my armor. By now I already understood why. Doesn’t make any less sad. I had to except I was no longer a child, with a child body. So, I adopted more of a tai-chi uniform. I like how it flows with my movements, and it looks nice. Instead of a traditions gi, I wear a cheongsam on top. Even though dad trains me, I still try to practice my katas on my own, when he’s not looking.

Once inside the home, I started up cooking our lunch. Also, since starting training, I started teaching myself other things. Since my dream was still to be a simple house wife, I had to learn how to be one. Whenever we made it a new town or city, along our training path, I always made sure to buy plenty of books. Once I sat lunch on the table, I called out to dad to join me.

As we sat down to eat, I couldn’t help myself to read a book. I made sure it wasn’t a book I recently bought. It was a simple book filled with romantic poetry. It’s actually one of my favorite things to read. It was not until I finished one of the poems that I noticed dad looking my way. “Is something wrong, dad?”

“I’ve noticed you been buying a lot of books lately. Is there a reason why?”

“Because I want to learn so much. And if, at the end, I was to become queen, shouldn’t I know as much as possible to help others?” This answer seemed to pleased dad, even though it wasn’t a lie either. I do want to help other, and I want to learn so much.

“Are any of them new cook books?”

At this I got excited and ran to my temporary room, to get my latest book. I came back and went on a rant how I want to try cooking all these foods. Once or twice I mention how I hoped Goku would like my cooking. Without me knowing, daddy frown every time I mention Goku. I was just too excited to notice.

Once lunch was over it was time for my ‘proper lady’ lessons. I didn’t really like this part of the day. I had to learn to hide any emotions. I had to learn to stay calm, no matter how angry something got me. But can you blame me? I after all, have my dad’s famous temper. I remembered one time I punched a boy for bullying a smaller girl. The group with him called me names, but I ignored them. They weren’t worth my time.

Soon after that girl and I became friends. She was the only friend I had in our village. I didn’t understand why nobody liked me. But it didn’t bother me, cause at least I had one friend. And there was always Goku.

After our two-months training away home, dad was ready to go home. I was a different story. I wanted to train more. Once back at our village we were greeted by one of our eldest maid. With her was her grandson, Li. He was a weird boy. Whenever his grandma brought him over, he would always follow me. It bugged me a lot. Whenever I was in the garden, trying to get a workout going, he would show up and watch. At the beginning, I didn’t mind. After a few times, he tried talking to me, that what annoyed me.

Li would go on and on about how cute I looked. He would then question why did I even want to be strong. “It’s not like it matter. Grandma says it’s a waste, and it’s not proper.” Whenever he said that I left and went to my room to finish my work out. There were times he would even try to get into my room, while I’m trying to change.

I told dad this, but he insist that Li is just trying to be my friend. It sure didn’t feel that way. How would my Goku react to this? Would he be like daddy? Or would he be on my side? Whatever the answer might be, I just hope Li never touches me. If he did to damn what daddy says.

We stood home for a month. During that month daddy threw parties, and invited everyone who had a son my age. During these parties I had to dance which of the boys. While dancing with one of them, he tried grabbing my butt. I reactivity punched him. I did so hard he flew to the back wall. I was so angry I failed to notice how disappointed my father looked at me. After taking shallow breaths to calm down, I left the ball room.

Halfway to my room I noticed Li was following me. “So what now princess?” The way he said that pissed me off. I had every mind to punch him too, but I ignored him and went to my room. I had enough! I changed out of this big stuffy dress, and put on my uniform.

I packed up, and left a note for dad. In the note I stated I was going off training to cool off. And for him to not worry about me. I then took my bookbag, made sure I had capsules and left. I aimless traveled to the ocean. I was chased by dinosaurs and other monsters. Times like this I wish I had my helmet, but I can’t rely on that anymore. I had to find my own strengths.

3 days had passed and I have finally returned home. I was greeted by a very worried daddy. He was sobbing as he picked me up, in a tight hug. He said we should throw a party to celebrate my return. I kindly asked that we didn’t do that. I don’t need parties and being surrounded by people. At first it seemed my father understood. While, until 4 months later, he threw another party when we returned for a training mission. At this rate I will never be strong as Goku.

I confronted my dad about this and told me how everyone needs rest. Rest? “You call this rest!” I was so mad. I could understand if we came home and all we did was relax, and catch our strength. But nope, we come home and he plans a huge party. Parties are nice, but I don’t even get a chance to relax for a few days. Well time to put up my perfect princess attitude and get on with it.

…

Two months into these lessons and I swear I was getting more and more bored. The math stuff was helpful when putting it into my training. The reading and writing I didn’t get but I tried reasoning with Mr. Popo about it. Surprised he agreed to end those. But he did teach me other stuff, like health and biology. It made sense, since I could imply it into my training.

I was getting better each day with understanding living energy. I was even able to officially beat that damn doll. So today Mr. Popo was going to spar with me. I still couldn’t beat him, but I was getting close. Sometimes he would mention something about a temper. I asked him once what that was. He answered by simply punching and I got mad and was going to try to punch him. He then said, “That’s a temper.”

So guess it’s another word for mad. So, another word added to the list of things I need to control. Lately living up here I been making a lot of list. Like things I had to get a better hand of, things I wanted to ask my friends, and stuff I would never tell a soul.

It was almost a year into this training and Kami stated it was time I trained with weighted clothes.

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kaladinstormsblessed · 1 year

Text

sigh we r really in it folks! i feel good about tomorrow, but i am getting increasingly stressed about next week for the following reasons:

deep-seated need to impress my dissertation advisor

stressed about how all three of my current exams will be over 7k and that one. very much probably won't be lmao.

having so much trouble getting myself to focus and memorize information

i know one question i am likely to see. and it's a phenomenal question. so phenomenal, in fact, that i feel like i could write for TWO hours on it bc it hits every single one of my themes. and i am preemptively stressing myself out bc i am now trying to guess at what other questions i might get (a fruitless endeavor) and worrying that i won't have enough material to cover both my essays (and don't even get me started on the commentary).

no clue how long the commentary passage is going to be which makes it hard to pick practice passages. everyone else i know has done poetry with her and gotten between 30 and 35 lines. unfortunately i feel like you need WAY more prose to make up for that amount of poetry (esp since jerome LOVES to quote huge chunks of biblical texts or say something and then provide fifty different examples).

i am stressed about timing on this exam bc i will actually have to think rather that just regurgitate rote memorization and i am preemptively stressing myself out about hitting the unofficial "word limit"

so i am going to try and calm myself down

i know a lot of information. i do. i looked at some of my friend's exams and they spent a lot of time explaining what was going on in the text - and i can do that.

i need to remember that the best thing i can do is put this information in my head and go from there

i will plan to spend saturday reading the ep. 22 commentary and the beginning of the ep. 57 commentary (he devolves into examples after that so i don't think i need to do the last chunk of it). after that, i will read the rest of the letters in translation, pick out some practice passages, and then allow myself to outline the teaching essay. i want to focus on being brief and concise - 1500 words. that's all i need.

after that, i need to just stop worrying about the overlap. there's only so much i can talk about for this prelim and i feel like my themes overlap so much. i will simply show up and put information down in the stupid document and we will call it a day. i may just have to commit to writing out a bunch of incoherent information and then committing time at the end to organizing it all.

#deep breaths it'll be okay #daily processing

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charkyzombicorn · 3 years

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More One Piece HCs because I dropped my brain cells when I was busy crying over Noland and Calgara

-Sanji is bothered by Garp's introduction in Water 7, especially the 'Luffy you act like I abused you' before describing a third of the ways he was abused by him. That shit makes Sanji's skin itch.

-Luffy is actually far from an ugly person, it's just something people don't pick up right away because of his presence and personality take up a lot of space. This makes people that know him by his wanted poster slightly off-balance at first

-Nami was very dubious and hostile of Zoro when she first learned that it was just creepy intense guy traveling with a boy who Nami firmly dubbed a child in their first interaction.

-Luffy doesn't particularly like pickpocketing because it avoids confrontation, but he can do it well when he needs to

-Usopp always tells stories to the people recovering in the medbay (Even Zoro and Nami, they appreciate the effort)

-Zoro actually isn't the prettiest peach. His forehead's too big and his jaw and teeth are slightly misaligned because they were broken more than once in his training days(seriously lifting boulders with your jaw is a bad idea kids), pre timeskip people said his laugh was too loud and post TS people were off-put by his early frown lines. He doesn't give two shits though, being nice to look at isn't a requirement of being the greatest swordsman and his personality put people off long before his looks did. (Maybe he gets a little hurt sometimes, when people don't call him ugly but walk up to Luffy not knowing who he is and asking what a pretty little thing like him is doing with the green-haired troll. He doesn't acknowledge argue, neither does Luffy, they just leave when the nobody's are done, they're not worth it.)

-Nami and Robin have learned the hard way to never compliment Sanji back. Doesn't matter if he spent the last half hour reading them poetry about his undying love, Do Not, not even with a 'those were very kind words', Don't. First he freezes for about 9 seconds just long enough that he's actually stopped breathing and not just paused, then his entire body goes rigid and beat red, then he somehow catches fire, then he falls to his knees and sobs at their feet with the amount of thank yous that are only reasonable when that person has saved/freed their entire island (and the Strawhats know that number well), then he passes out into a 'Love coma' until the next meal he needs to cook.

-Robin is the most comfortable in her sexuality, her being 30 and having much different things about herself she's not okay with. This means she subtly flirts with Nami because were Robin a younger woman, Nami would have been her type.

-Nami gets a lil giddy because getting a flirt from hot guys and getting a flirt from hot women hits vastly different (neither are actually interested in a relationship, it's just nice)

#one piece #Half of these are kinda long sorry #Zolu #I mean it can be taken platonic if you squint but I mean #Also controversial opinion not everyone on Sunny should be hot #And not just the not-quite-human ones

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majwrites · 3 years

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Captain Tuttle reloaded, Part 1

M*A*S*H x reader (platonic)

Summary: Reader gets injured, their recovery takes a complicated turn when they start hallucinating

Warnings: mentions of injury and surgery, hallucinations, cursing, fever, mentions of war and violence, mentions of throwing up

Notes: probably none of this is medically accurate, got the idea after rewatching Tuttle and it kind of got out of hand so I had to make it multiple chapters

The first thing you saw when you woke up was nothing. The second thing you saw after waking up and blinking a few times was Hawkeye which was weird because you couldn't remember spending the night at the swamp and Hawkeye had no reason to be in your tent this early in the morning. "How's it going?", Hawkeye sat down on the edge of your bed. You looked up and realization hit you.

"How's my patient?", you really wanted to know. "Your patient is alright, he just developed a nasty little fever throughout the night, which is what you both have in common". "I wasn't done with fixing him up out there", you looked around the room some more and relaxed when you saw the boy on one of the other beds. "You fixed him up alright, there's no chance of perfection out there", Hawkeye turned around to your patient. "We were under heavy fire", you closed your eyes, trying hard not to remember it too vividly. "I figured, judging by the amount of shrapnel we took out of your leg". "How long til I can work again?". "How do you already know that it's not enough to send you home?", Hawkeye pulled a blanket over you and it dawned on you that he had changed a bandage without you even noticing. You sure were out of it. "I'm a surgeon too, remember? I know the procedure", you suddenly grew very tired again. "How could I ever forget that...now go back to sleep, I'll visit you later", he got up. "Keep me updated on my patient", you called after him. "Sure thing", and he walked away.

"How are you doing?", you looked around to see who was speaking. "Who are you?". "Don't worry, I know you didn't forget me. It's like Hawkeye said, you all had already forgotten about the sound of my voice very shortly afterward", the person sat down on the floor, "it's alright, I could never be mad at you". "Wait, this can't be happening. This is ridiculous", you really needed to wake up right now. "So you remember me?". " Of course I do. Who could ever forget Captain Tuttle?"

You woke up very confused. You still had a fever, but it didn't feel like it was bad enough to make you delirious. You looked around the room. It seemed pretty normal. At least as normal as it could get here. "Oh, fuck", you turned your head to the other side, you blinked a few times, you turned back and looked at the floor. Tuttle was still there. "This is probably not good", you mumbled to yourself. As an unlucky side effect you had now caught Frank's attention, apparently it was his shift. "Shit", you tried to focus on anything else than Frank or your hallucinations and the only other direction you could look was the ceiling. Frank made his way over to you, every step adding to your annoying headache that almost overshadowed all the other pain. He looked at you in the same condescending way as always: "Captain (L/N), I won't allow this kind of language in here". "Could you please stay quiet", you decided to just close your eyes again, "I'm suffering". "Well, you can keep suffering in silence for now. I just know that once Pierce or McIntyre show back up you will cause chaos once again", he finally stepped away. "Whatever you say, Major", and you went to sleep once again.

You didn't sleep for long though because someone kept reciting poetry and you had a strong feeling that it would be someone imaginary. "Tuttle, I love your poetry, but I'm trying to sleep here", you interacted with him just out of politeness. "I thought you might need some distraction", he kept reading in silence. "I'd appreciate it if you kept out of my field of vision. You're dead and never existed in the first place". "(Y/N), are you okay? I thought I heard some noise from you", Trapper approached you in the same way Hawkeye did earlier. "I'm alright, just a bit foggy", you focused on Trapper in hopes of getting some kind of distraction out of it. "Don't lie to me, just a few hours ago you looked like you've been through the meat grinder", Trapper started poking around on your leg and you hissed in pain, "now be honest (Y/N)". "I haven't been in that much physical pain since I caught pneumonia when I was twelve". "Sounds about right. Your patient might feel the same way, but someday he'll walk again", Trapper read through your paperwork. "I didn't damage his spinal cord?". "You didn't". "I'm sorry for making all of you work extra shifts", it just dawned on you that the 4077th was lacking a surgeon now. "We don't mind, we're just glad you didn't die on our table", Trapper still looked a bit concerned. "I could take my shift, I'm here anyways", you didn't sound very convincing. "Just relax, we'll take care of everything else", he turned to leave, "and don't move too much, you'll regret it later". "If you say so", falling back asleep seemed impossible right now, but there wasn't anything in sight that promised distraction so you decided to just relax like Trapper told you. A few hours went by without incident, but as soon as the next shift began you let out a frustrated groan.

Henry Blake wasn't the only person entering the room. Captain Tuttle followed right after. It seemed like he had remembered that you wanted him to stay silent though. He was now watching over your patient while Henry was checking the boy's bandage. It grew increasingly louder and you weren't sure if it was caused by people having actual conversations or because you had gotten more noise sensitive after last night's incident.

Your mood changed for the better when you saw your best friend approaching: "Klinger, over here!". You didn't consider how much the movement that came with getting his attention would actually hurt so you let out a rather pathetic sounding whimper right afterwards. "There you are, I worried about you the whole night through", he looked at you, concern still showing in his eyes. "I told you not to worry about me when I went out there", you didn't sound very convincing. Klinger would be fussing over you like a mother hen for the next few weeks, you could already see it coming. "Klinger, I have to ask you a favor". "What is it?". "Would you help me take a walk outside", you hoped a change in environment would make Tuttle go away, who right now made his rounds, checking on every single patient. "I'm not sure about this, your leg is heavily injured and Hawkeye sewed it up not even a whole day ago". "No, I'm ready. Just trust me on this one", you really needed to try this. "Should I trust you as my friend or as a doctor", he didn't look very convinced. "Probably both. I'll just have to convince Henry to clear this", you didn't even need to call out for Henry. He wasn't that far away.

Soon he reached your bed: "How are you doing?". "Like Hawkeye butchered my leg". "That is because he did", Henry read through your papers that hadn't really changed throughout the past few hours. "Henry, I have to ask you a question". "Go ahead". "Could I make a trip outside? I think I'll go insane if I spend another minute in here", you glanced at Tuttle who was now standing right next to Henry. "If this is another try of you getting a section 8 and trading with Klinger it won't work", stated Henry. Captain Tuttle nodded in agreement. "It isn't, I promise. I just really need some fresh air". "The fact that you're a doctor doesn't mean you get out of being watched after surgery", he stated. "Klinger will go with me", Klinger nodded in agreement to back you up. "Alright. Corporal, you'll make sure that (Y/N) doesn't try to take a step on their own. They're glued to a wheelchair", Henry gestured around. "Yes, sir", Klinger already got up to get a wheelchair, "I'll make sure they don't try anything". So Klinger took you to the mess tent. You sat down at a table. "Do you want to eat anything?", Klinger asked in the same worried tone as earlier. "I don't think so, I'd throw up", you already felt it coming, food wouldn't do any good right now. "Then we'll just keep sitting here and the second it gets too much I'm taking you back to post op", he retrieved a set of cards from out of his pockets. "Thanks for getting me out of there", you started a game of go fish. "Anything for you". "I think you did everyone else a favor too". "What do you mean?". "I might be a decent doctor, but I'm a very bad patient", you remembered all the previous times you had been sick. Cooperating has never been your strength. You spent almost an hour in the mess tent before you were ready to fall asleep right on the spot. You let your head drop onto the table when someone sat down heavily next to you: "I think you should go back to bed". "Yeah, probably", you answered to the air next to you. "(Y/N), do you need a break", Klinger's hand rested on your shoulder. "Please", you had already shut your eyes again. So Klinger took you back and tucked you in. The next few hours went by in a haze, but at least Tuttle had stayed at the mess tent.

#reader insert fanfiction #gender neutral reader #m*a*s*h #m*a*s*h x reader #mash 4077 #mash imagine #hawkeye pierce #trapper john mcintyre #captain tuttle #max klinger

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airlock · 3 years

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airlock grades the villain archetypes: Three Houses edition

(so, this post is going to be, in fact, long as fuck -- which is a good opportunity to once again plug my dreamwidth, where you can read this post with more tidily organzed sections, as well as individual spoiler warnings on each one!)

you know, it's an interesting coincidence, it really is. when I originally started making those villain grading posts, we were just a few months away from a long-anticipated new Fire Emblem release, and that moment gave me the idea to take on that little exercise for a number of reasons. and then, here we are, about three months shy of three years later. for a number of different reasons, I started to think about finally making a follow-up post, seeing how I'd compare the antagonists from Three Houses to their predecessors. freshly boosted on new meds, I whip out a very long draft for a post in just a few days. and then, the day after I was done, a long-anticipated new Fire Emblem release is announced. and so, just on a whim of fate, I'm technically returning to this text post series under the same conditions as I started it! isn't it poetic? maybe it is, but perhaps the poetry of the situation isn't all that important when it's being blasted into dust beneath the bad guy's iron boots. so let's go to war; let's see how Three Houses measures up on this front. ... at least, that's what I would be throwing us straight into, but, there's a little snag. when I started this analysis, I noticed that Three Houses has a relatively unique relationship to the archetypes of Fire Emblem, and it didn't sit right with me to just leave the classificatory endeavors at "this character is a Gharnef", "this character is a Camus", etc. so I'm going to be leading here with a foreword on that topic, a much longer foreword than the other ones I've written in this series -- one that's going to be less for getting technicalities out of the way and more an analysis in its own right. (and of course, just like the other times, I have to note: there will be spoilers. spoilers for every route and every moment of Three Houses itself, naturally, but there's more than that; discussing where the one title fits in with the rest of the whole franchise naturally comes with spoilers for the rest of the whole franchise as well. the Dreamwidth version of this post, again, has individual spoiler tags on each section, but if you're reading on here, just be warned that there may be spoilers for any game in the Fire Emblem series!)

(plus there's the other thing I always warn about: I will criticize and/or blam some characters, possibly including the ones that you like, in this post. there will not be a small amount of that, frankly. I will have a lot of spicy opinions to share here and you'd best not be caught off guard if we disagree strongly on some point or another. but if you're now fully well aware of what you're about to trip into, well... amazon espionage device, play Paths That Will Never Cross.)

FIRE EMBLEM: THREE HOUSES AND FE ARCHETYPES

to understand how Three Houses's relationship to Fire Emblem archetypes is different from the norm, we'd have to start by understanding what the norm is, precisely. which begs these questions: why are there archetypes? what purpose have they served in the series up to this point? in the early stages of the franchise, this is not exactly a great mystery. from Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light up to Thracia 775, our ever-controversial former director Shouzou Kaga was pretty much the reason why archetypes existed; he was, and is, a man of habit, one who's often innovating but is also resolved not to fix what ain't broke. he just really thought that having a red cavalier guy and a green cavalier guy was a neat enough concept that it should be done three times. eventually, he would part ways with Intelligent Systems in an equally controversial move, but at first brush, not much seemed to have changed -- Binding Blade also had a red cavalier guy and a green cavalier guy. and it also had an assload of tropes that it got clean off earlier titles, especially Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light. perhaps something about a freshly decapitated series returning to its roots in order to figure out where it could even go from then onwards... or perhaps they just needed to keep it quick and simple as they moved from the SNES to the GBA. just looking at this inertia doesn't quite answer our question, however; we've had roughly another entire half of a franchise since those times. not every Kaga-ism survived after Binding Blade. but archetypes persisted, and arguably became even more entrenched than before. not a single main series title since Blazing Blade has failed to include a red cavalier guy and a green cavalier guy, even if some titles tinkered with the idea more than others (and yeah, the ninja guys from Fates: Birthright count). when I try thinking about why archetypes have stuck around for so long, I strike upon a few reasons that I feel that I can point to. archetypes are usually at least one of these three things: a good game design element; a language that communicates with veteran Fire Emblem players; and/or a story element that resonates with the themes that are common to the whole franchise. as for good game design elements... I couldn't in good conscience praise the Fire Emblem series on that front for very long; the games are often chock-full of information and tricks that would be useful to know and that you're really not likely to attain just by playing through. it can be tough to get new crowds into the game, and although certain significantly lower-difficulty modes in recent titles have somewhat alleviated this, the player still has to be dedicated in their own right if they want to improve enough to really be able to play on a tactically engaging level, or if they want to improve enough that they could take on older and more challenging titles as well. all of that said, though! some of the archetypes are actually pretty handy for developing a new player's skills, and this would have pretty much been the best they could do on this front way back in the NES. when you meet those perpetual red and green cavalier guys from the first time, you get a visually vivid hint to the fact that two characters can have the same class and still have wildly different statlines. the powerful veteran paladin without much room for further improvement forces players to start pondering early on when to send in the most powerful unit to solve a situation quickly, and when to leave an opportunity for the weaker units to grow. and if you want to introduce these players to the idea that enemy units can sometimes be recruited to your side, it's not a bad idea to deliver it in the form of a visually striking character, unusually dangerous to fight head-on, but who can easily be overcome by a player who has been attentive enough to the writing that they figured out what sort of person could bloodlessly bring that scary sword down. but of course, if this were just about the new players, there would be no need for the archetypes to be so internally consistent; if you're meeting your very first pair of red and green cavalier guys, then things wouldn't be all that different if they were, I dunno, yellow and purple instead. here's where that "language" thing come in -- veterans of the series often know what to expect from a unit at a glance, absent a better mechanism for setting those expectations. that surly fellow with the Killing Edge that you just recruited off the enemy? their Skill and Speed are likely to grow at a frenzy pace, but you'd best cross your fingers that they'll also manage to get enough Strength to make the cut. however, if you meet another swordfighter who is musclebound, scarred, and giant-weapon-wielding enough that they could substitute for Guts from Berserk, that's one who won't have any problems with Strength! in fact, they're probably great at ever stat and will just break the game silly-- so far, all of this conversation has been about game mechanics, and the way they integrate with the writing and aesthetics. some of the archetypes have everything to do with the story and nothing to do with the gameplay, though. in fact, all of the archetypes I covered in this post series are exactly that way. the enduring presence of such character types is, I believe, a way that each title can discuss, connect to, and/or reinforce certain themes that the broader franchise holds close to heart. for one thing, if you think about it, a lot of the villainous archetypes are ultimately about Fire Emblem's strongly anti-war messages. the Camus and the Michalis are talented people who would have thrived and done good deeds in a peaceful world, but war culls the innocent and the brave without a second thought. the Conqueror always believes that they have good reasons to go to war, but their platitudes blind them to the disaster and injustice that they create. the Gharnef desires war for their own individual benefit, and their willingness to manipulate others in service of that goal is what makes them a grave danger to the world. now, not every individual instance of the archetypes fit cleanly into these descriptions -- and indeed, even the more mechanically-focused archetypes have also been known to lob the occasional curveball at people -- but broadly speaking, bringing those types of character back constantly is a way to continue meditating on themes that span the whole series, bringing them in contact with each individual title's specific themes in order to say something new each time. boy, that took us seven entire paragraphs just to kinda get started, huh? we're just now going to talk about Three Houses. starting with how it throws everything we've just discussed off the window. in most other Fire Emblem games, you have a large cast of playable characters, of which you're only able to ever field a handful at a time; it's sensible, then, that newcomers and veterans alike should have a wealth of clues to help them quickly determine who's who. however, the cast of Three Houses is smaller and more concentrated -- and most importantly, they're not meant to be figured out quickly. they have hidden talents, they have certain skills and combat arts that they can learn along the way without you knowing upfront what it'll all turn out to be, they sometimes come out at you at the beginning of the month with an unexpected idea as to what their lesson plan should be moving forward. characters in Three Houses were meant to be explored; it's part of the game's very core loop. designing these characters in a way that would make them obvious at a glance would run directly anathema to that. on the story side of things, it also gets a little more complicated than usual. see, as you might just very well know, Three Houses is Intelligent Systems's latest take on attempting to run multiple possible storylines within the same setting. there's a lot of debate that can be had on whether it was a success this time (tip: I do not think so-), but I think it's definitely fair to say that the concept has been deepened quite a bit here since Fates. it's no longer an arrangement where every character is basically either with you or against you. instead, each route has the potential to give characters entirely different roles and arcs. you've got characters like Felix, who has an entirely different development track in Azure Moon than if you recruit him in other routes -- therefore, him being playable or not at a given run isn't the sole determinant of how his story plays out. and you've also got characters like Dedue, who plays dramatically different roles in Crimson Flower and Verdant Wind despite being an unplayable character in both. Claude has a different role in each of all four routes (even if his role in Silver Snow is... offscreen casualty,). all put together, most characters in Three Houses are polyvalent, so trying to lock them down as singular storyline archetypes is an exercise in futility. and yet, despite all of this, when you take a look at the cast of Three Houses... it wouldn't be right to say that it's absolutely done away with the traditional archetypes. on the contrary, veterans were quick to notice how the Blue Lions in particular field a cast full of characters who allude to the archetypes in some way or another. Felix may not be a recruitable enemy -- he's not even one of the characters you might have to re-recruit after the timeskip -- but he is a surly raven-haired twunk who favours the sword, so he has the Navarre aesthetic down pat. Sylvain and Ingrid have the color schemes and clashing personalities of your usual red and green cavalier duo, even though they don't have the same class "canonically". even outside of the Lions, Edelgard's post-timeskip design alone was enough for a lot of veterans to accurately suss out some of the story roles that she plays. all put together, I'd conclude that characters in Three Houses don't truly belong to archetypes, but they do sometimes evoke archetypes. having thusly distilled the dynamic, I'd say that there are two ways I'll be making this list different from others prior. the first is that I will not be evaluating entire characters, for the most part; I will, instead, evaluate them specifically under the circumstances where they evoke a villainous archetype. for example, Claude is going to be on the list somewhere, but I'm going to be looking exclusively to the route where he dons the antagonist's mantle -- everything else will be considered to be out of this post's scope. and then, the other necessary provision is that I won't be concerning myself too strictly with whether the characters I'm evaluating do at any point fit exactly into a certain archetype -- it will have to be more about the extent to which they embody the trappings of a given archetype really. and now, at long last...!

EVOKERS OF GHARNEFICENCE

nuclear gharnef

Gharnef in Azure Moon, Verdant Wind, Silver Snow

(0/10)

we're starting off pretty straightforward, really; the surface trappings are all obviously here. there's a dark magic user, with an unique class and a spell that playable characters can't learn, and who also shares in the barely-human looks. although, reversing the trend, his skin is unnaturally pale -- diversity win? in any case, he is also certainly the shadowy figure secretly instigating the conflict on all routes... although Crimson Flower relegates actually facing him to the distant offscreen epilogue future, so, I don't know that we can quite name him as an antagonist at all on that route. plus, there's someone else who actually plays the Gharnef in Crimson Flower, and you'd best be looking forward to finding out who, it's going to be a hot take and a doozy- now see, though, there is one little sad thing about starting out simple, and it's that, as you may have gathered from the score, we're also starting off on a negative note. this guy is pretty much Validar all over again. his schemes are confusing, inconsistent, and don't all pay off. he does a number of things that impact the story, but it always feels like just an awful thing that happened and that he was technically involved with, and not anything that really feels like it has his fingerprints on it. when you look at the scene where he takes Byleth out of commission for 5 years to come, does it feel like he trumped the hero, or does it feel like the writers just needed an excuse to skip forward? Thales is a walking, gloating plot device who barely even makes anything interesting happen in the plot. he's Behind It All, but he never feels like a real threat. especially not on Azure Moon where he just dies in the stupidest possible way short of dying offscreen. (but hey, at least his design isn't super racially charged; doesn't that entitle him to that one mercy point? and the answer is... not this time. the guy may be white as a bleached sheet, but what the character design lacks in Problematique, the storytelling delivers. see, riddle me this: does any character ever entertain the idea of peaceful coexistance with the Agarthans for more than a brief passing moment? not that I recall; most everyone just quickly concludes that killing every last Agarthan is good and necessary. this may not even be necessarily incorrect on the facts of the story -- the Agarthans themselves are openly genocidal, after all -- but I just don't think it's right to tell a story where wiping out an entire civilization is unambiguously good. plus, I can't help but think of the Loptyrians that the Agarthans were clearly inspired by, and well... the idea of genociding Loptyrians was so thorougly opposed by the text of Genealogy of the Holy War, it was literally one of the things that incited the entire plot. so, in what's unfortunately not the first time, we're seeing a new title manage to be less progressive than a SNES game from the 90s. good show! by which I mean, really bad show.)

milf gharnef

Gharnef in Crimson Flower

(3.5/10)

hot take and a doozy, I said! ... okay, yeah, you may be staring at me like I just transformed into The Immaculate One in front of you. unlike Thales above, Rhea sure doesn't look like any Gharnef we know; she does have a decidedly inhuman form that she can take on, but it's not inhuman in the way that a Gharnef is normally inhuman. and factually speaking, it'd be a pretty controversial statement to claim that Rhea is the secret instigator of the conflict in Crimson Flower. you might remember, first of all, that I told you to put the strict facts back inside the box before we ever got started here. I would state very confidently that Rhea is portrayed as a Gharnef-like figure in Crimson Flower. she's involved in all sorts of secret schemes that the protagonists in this route are tasked with unraveling -- both as far as the shadier side of Church of Seiros's history goes, and inasmuch as she subtly-unsubtly takes over the Kingdom after losing Garreg Mach. and hell, she wouldn't even really be the first take on a Gharnef who looks beautiful, but also looks increasingly unhinged as time goes, up until their most monstruous possible form appears as the final boss. Lyon did that stuff first. ... but also, actually, let's take those facts back out from the box, because they may not be so useful as far as classifying this particular segment of Rhea's character goes, but we will need them in order to evaluate the quality of that segment. because there's the most fundamental problem with having Rhea evoke the Gharnef here: it is baffling. see, Rhea is pinned to the center of the conflict in Crimson Flower by this sillogism: Rhea is responsible for the culture surrounding crests, and that culture is responsible for Edelgard's suffering. A -> B is correct. B->C is blatantly false. as a matter of fact, you spend the entirety of Crimson Flower doing the bidding of the people who actually ARE responsible for Edelgard's suffering!! and see, I do think that one could possibly tell a story that contains those contradictions but still makes sense; I bet you could even do it without changing the facts given here at all. but that's just not what happened in this case. the story was not told logically, plain and simple. Crimson Flower's Rhea screams, burns cities, kicks puppies, and wants you dead -- but never ever are we given an actual meaningful reason to think of her as a villain. and I think that holds true no matter if you only played Crimson Flower or if you've played other routes and are made less inclined to see all of her roaring and insanity as anything truly character-defining. in fact, if the writing were working here, you could easily be exposed to a more sympathetic side of Rhea in other routes and still go through this one seeing yourself face-to-face with a character who is a villain still, just one who also has depth. with all this blamming, it might seem like Rhea was supposed to be getting a 0/10 for no effort, but there's the thing: I do not think that she's a nothingburger villain on the level of like, Veld or Validar (or iunno, Thales). I think that she would actually have made for a phenomenal villain if the writing were not so goddamn wonky. she could have been a compelling, complex antagonist. and see, Gharnefs often play at instigating conflict actively -- here, we could have had someone who is villainous for passively creating an unjust environment that breeds conflict on its own. that's a type of villainy that I'm far more interested in seeing in stories, so I would have loved to see something like that actually materialize here. alas, it has not, and little more than the disappointment remains. still, though, an interesting idea that failed to execute lands more score at the end of the day than a total non-idea. (however, this whole interesting idea is still getting docked by one point, because, well. I hardly have to explain how the narrative around Rhea also contains unquestioningly genocidal elements. you know things are going very not good when your plot is reminiscent of antisemitic conspiracy theories.)

gharnef who is technically in smash

Gharnef in White Clouds

(0/10)

surprise, surprise! I'm covering White Clouds as its own individual narrative unit as well. I'm mostly doing it that way because it'll give us more stuff to talk about, really. if you were to sweat the specifics, Solon wouldn't quite be a Gharnef, at least no more than, say, Ephidel is. but surely you remember why we're not, in fact, sweating the specifics here. we can just take this wrinkly barely-human dark-magic-using scheming figure here for the ostensible Gharnefness that it portrays. hell, I remember thinking "oh, that's our Gharnef" when he was first briefly shown on a trailer! (Thales was shown too, but his slice of a cutscene is so visually noisy, I don't think I even discerned that there was a person in the middle of the lightshow.) see though, there is one problem with covering White Clouds in-depth, and it's that White Clouds is... easily the worst written part of the game plotwise. it's all this bunch of weird little mysteries, "the blood of that girl" this and "the darkness of Zaharas" that, nothing that gets raised has an important conclusion, nothing that happens is built up properly. you can play this part of the game four times over and still have no fucking idea what was actually supposed to be going on the entire time. Solon is the "mastermind" of all this nonsense, and just as flat of a character as his superior. if the ~twist~ that Tomas is actually this dude was supposed to be a player punch, in Golden Deer it's more like a light fingerpoke, and in the other versions of White Clouds, it's more like standing 6ft apart and avoiding physical contact. so, woe, 0/10, that was about as surprising as any of the twists that this dude went for.

EVOKERS OF CAMUSITUDE

upside-down camus

Camus in Crimson Flower

(7/10)

boy, this whole thing has been pretty negative so far. how about I start talking about my favorite character now? ... well, bias or no bias, I still find that I have a lot of criticisms to lobby about how well the game has done this fave of mine. but let's not stray off the scope here. for now, I'll only be talking about Claude's appearance as an antagonist in Crimson Flower. so, how did he fare in that capacity? well, Crimson Flower has this persistent problem where they continuously fail to establish the motivations and stakes for the protagonists' faction. so far we've already gone over how this makes conflicts muddy and illogial with one villain, and things aren't all that different here. it's rather difficult to sustain the pathos from a tragically inevitable battle if you fail to establish that it is inevitable; the narrative never really reveals its hand on why exactly the invasion of the Alliance is happenning at all. it just lobs that at you fresh off your 5-year nap as if it's a natural step forward. now, one could argue that the reason for it is to break the deadlock at the Roundtable and secure Leicester support of the Empire, lest the anti-Imperial faction should turn the tables at a troublesome time; you could also argue that there's no good reason, and it's nothing more than naked Adrestian imperialism. the problem, ultimately, is that there's a need to argue at all. there would be no real argument if the narrative had just managed to establish this properly, and this failure in turn makes it harder to sell the tragedy of the conflict with Claude. fortunately, though, everything else works out brillantly actually. this might be my bias showing, but I think the pathos throughout the Alliance invasion segment is one of the strongest emotional beats in the entire game. everytime a known face falls before your blades, someone else openly grieves; it's usually very touching. and when we get as far as Claude, well, he may not have any associates left to mourn him, but what he does have is... chatter from your units at the monastery. if that sounds dismissive, then allow me to clarify. I loved playing Three Houses, it's up there with the other titles I adore, and this is despite the fact that the game's central plotlines are, largely, a hot mess barely held together by duct tape. the best writing in the game often comes from other places, and dialogue from roaming the monastery often does more for the story's current events than their actual presentation does. it's something like the natural evolution of Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn's base conversations and Shadows of Valentia's town conversations, which are two other favorites of mine. it's through this elegant, phenomenal, probably-handled-by-Koei-not-IS instrument that Claude's departure is given its poignancy. you see a lot of mixed feelings, admiration and regret and the sense that it was unfortunate but inevitable, and it's so compelling it manages to distract you from the sentiment that this wasn't really all that inevitable actually. (in fact, while I'm singing the praises for monastery chatter, permit me a quick tangent that has absolutely nothing to do with any part of this post. you know what my favorite chapter is for monastery chatter? the one right after Jeralt dies. like, Jeralt's death itself is nothing, just so excessively telegraphed that the residents of the city have taken to stealing copper wire from the lines; that sequence afterwards, though... it's bittersweet, intimate, in a way that I feel few scenes in the entire franchise have come close to matching. I legitimately cried in real life seeing Bernadetta out of her room (a significant feat as you may well know) to place flowers on Jeralt's grave. and I don't cry all that easily at media! I only cry easily at arguments and other situations where crying would inconvenience me severely.) as nice as this all is, though, you all know how much I hate it when this series does that thing where you only get the depths of an antagonist after they're already out of the picture, and this does run the risk of landing in that zone. fortunately, though, I believe that Claude was spared from that treatment. I still feel they could have done a little more with him, but Crimson Flower does well enough at making his character nice and established even to people who only played that route. his wits and the good intentions in his heart of hearts manage to come across and make some difference. I don't think it's for no reason that many of the folks who are exclusively into Crimson Flower like to imagine scenarios where Claude joins the team; it's common even beyond the simple fact that many of us saw "these three protagonists can never walk the same path!" and went "but... what if they did" (and now it seems like they will, even!). this ardent wish that you wouldn't have to fight the Camus is a feeling that usually comes from the best of 'em, and while Claude's tenure as an antagonist is marred by some errors of execution, it could have been on par with the Eldigan standard.

dilf camus

Camus in Crimson Flower

(2.5/10)

we're not done talking about camus characteres (I did it again!!! I AM INVINCIBLE!!!!) in Crimson Flower just yet! although... it might be surprising to hear that we're almost done talking about this archetype overall. the other routes seem to aim for more of a longitudinal way of camus, so to say; there are many tragic deaths but seldom do we linger very long on any single one. anyways, with the schematics out of the way, let's talk about murdering our priest daddy. if Crimson Flower's problems with unclear motivations and stakes were forgivable when it came to Claude, here they just about reach their nadir. see, by all rights, Seteth is such an easy character to write as a Camus that it's astonishing to me that they managed to screw it up. you're fighting Rhea, Seteth is strongly loyal to Rhea, therefore there's no way around fighting Seteth, right? if they'd put in the writing to establish that angle, it would have worked effortlessly. so, how come they didn't go with that? fighting Seteth feels pointless despite the fact that it does have a point if you think about it. fighting Seteth feels like it's not happenning for the reasons you'd more readily assume, but rather kinda just because Edelgard doesn't like lizards. and see, I've complained a lot up to this about unquestioningly genocidal writing angles in this game, but this here was the absolute worst of it, I'd say. writing that justifies a genocide is one thing; writing where engaging in genocide is just something that's done, not even a big deal? that's even worse. much of the pathos of a Camus comes from having to take an innocent life, ostensibly in the name of a greater good. here, an innocent life is taken in the name of nothing in particular that's named, besides that it sounds like it might be for evil purposes. just casually coming from characters who are not otherwise written as evil exactly, on this route or others. I still won't bring it down all the way to 0/10, though, on account of how ridiculously easy it would have been to write this in a way that actually works; unlike what goes for a truly nothingburger antagonist, the materials were all there, it was just the execution that was an unspeakable catastrophe.

EVOKERS OF MICHALISOUSNESS

michalis on ghostface's phone

Michalis in White Clouds and Azure Moon

(0/10)

he's called the Death Knight, he's bristling with scary dark armor covering his physique from head to toe, his true identity is a mystery (if a hilariously brief one), he was clearly angled to have a rivalry with a protagonist where part of the thrust is a competition between two skilled and passionate warriors... yeah, there's something a little more than archetypal resonance going on there, obviously. this is a rehash, and we can't really talk about the Death Knight without bringing up the Black Knight. so, how do the old and the new compare against each other? the Black Knight was a 4/10 in my book. the Death Knight... is worse. you might be wondering, first of all, why I've pitched the Death Knight in with the Michalis archetype despite that he's rehashing a character that I considered a Camus. I might as well get into the weeds of that spot of organizational trivia because at least it's an entry point; there are so many writing failures to belabor here that I wasn't sure where to start. see, the Black Knight had a great deal of his individual personal motivations on the table, but when it comes down to it, he was taking orders from his master and that was always the #1 reason for him to be up to the shit that he got up to. this is, ostensibly, not quite how the Death Knight operates. the idea was that the tragedy would be lurking in how he was once a caring young man, but trauma and extreme circumstances turned him into a maniac. he rushes into warzones intent on pure murder, no matter what his orders are. ... this is not at all how he comes across. instead, what we see in practice is this dude who keeps going "i DoN't TaKe OrDeRs" and then does exactly what he was being told to do anyway. that's not an unhinged motherfucker, that's a teenager. and the whole tragic angle falls flat on its ass when it's basically told just like some sort of supervillain backstory; he found himself forced to kill one guy, and then he snapped and became an incoherent plot device. how touching. but at least Azure Moon even bothers to go there; in Verdant Wind and Silver Snow, the Death Knight is really just a plot device that behaves incoherently, nothing that even attempts at being interesting happens with him, and the only emotion he ever inspires is a resounding "this guy again??". so far, though, the Death Knight's not running all that unfavorably compared to the Black Knight, who also struggled with execution problems on the part of the story that was supposed to humanize him, who also struggled with being relegated to a plot device a lot of the time instead of taking actions that suit his established motivations better. what's putting that 4-point gulf between them, then? well, for one thing, it's that the Black Knight is an actually intimidating colossus of iron while the Death Knight is strutting around in this goofy ass armor that only really makes him look like he belongs in a Halloween shitpost, but besides that, there is one thing that the Black Knight actually did right most of the time, and which also fell through here: the rivalry angle. at least half of the Black Knight's enduring success with fans -- to the tune of being the antagonist to get the most votes in nearly all installments of the Choose Your Legends poll -- comes from how epic his rivalry with Ike can be at times, further amplified by Ike's status as having been the de facto most popular character in the entire franchise until the release of Three Houses (and hell, technically we can't possibly know how Ike would perform in a new popularity contest vs Edelgard, even if she did get more votes than him by a good margin). I do feel that there was a lot about that whole rivalry that could have been written better -- including NOT THROWING ON AN EPIC FINAL CONFRONTATION AND THEN JUST WALKING IT BACK IN THE SEQUEL -- but I still can't deny that the pull is there. what I can deny, trivially, is that the Death Knight's antagonization of Byleth lands anywhere near that standard. he just kinda goes "YOU HAVE A COOL SWORD. MEET ME AT THE DENNYS PARKING LOT SO THAT WE MAY KILL EACH OTHER" and that's the end of it. Byleth doesn't much respond to it -- and yeah, I know, mute audience-surrogate character, but the writers sure do give Byleth opinions when they actually want to. plus, I'm not sure that even a fully-realized character would necessarily have had an actual reaction to all that nonsense beyond "okay, cool, this certainly is happenning to me right now". there isn't any sort of personal dynamic happenning between Byleth and the Death Knight at all, whereas the Black Knight's rivalry to Ike is very deeply personal. the only connection that fans see between Byleth and the Death Knight is that it'd be kind of kinky if they had a hot gay fuck, and even this seems to come almost exclusively from Crimson Flower where the Death Knight is not an antagonist. (and this is where I'd poke fun at how abruptly Crimson Flower drops the Death Knight as an antagonist, but that'd be out of scope. and you've seen a million jokes to this tune by now anyway, probably) after such a thorough lambasting, the only saving grace that the Death Knight might have is that at least he's not also written offensively, right...? oh, nevermind, the DLC introduced a shitty ass stereotype-DID angle here. this technically doesn't come up in White Clouds or Azure Moon, so ordinarily it'd be out of scope for this post, but there's not much of a point isolating the shitty-to-real-people writing where it can still retroactively color our view of the stuff that does fall within the scope. and so! forget about the 1 mercy point, have a flat 0 for the perfectly complete disaster.

muahahahahahahachalis

Michalis in Verdant Wind, Silver Snow

(6/10)

perhaps you remember how I unleashed this whole tirade on the relationship between Three Houses and classic Fire Emblem archetypes before I would deign to launch off into this whole post about using those archetypes as a framing device to evaluate characters. I've got to tell the truth by now: one thing that made me really feel the need for that is that I've seen people try to classify the Three Houses cast as archetypes before, without sparing much thought for the methodology of it. that seems to work fine if you're just claiming that Felix is a Navarre because he obviously has the aesthetic, even though he's not a recruitable enemy myrmidon who wields a Killing Edge. this exercise has a tendency to unravel spectacularly as you get deeper into it, though. eventually, you might find yourself boldly stating that Hubert is a Camus, and if that thought made you burst out laughing when you read it, then yeah, we had the same reaction. it's not that I can't even imagine how someone would argue for that stance. Hubert may not be an innocent exactly, but Verdant Wind and Silver Snow do give him the kind of mournful "why must we fight" sentiment that we often see with the Camus; and the reason why we must fight is because Hubert is utterly devoted to his master, like many Camus characters (WOOP WOOP DAB DAB) are. still, taking the more loose approach I've generally taken to classification around here, I find that Hubert has very little in common with the Camus crop despite these resemblances on the definitional level. for one thing, he's got that style of self-aware villainy that I don't think the Camus goes for, but that is reasonably common with the Michalis (and also, you might have seen it in my Michalis post but I'll reiterate anyway, that I fucken adore that style actually). stiil, I think the most crucial part of it is that your average Camus is typically found going "well, I don't agree with my master's plan here, but who cares what I think, I'm just a Camus, following orders". Hubert is not quite so obliged, and not quite so obedient either. Edelgard tells him constantly that he's free to, and probably should, leave her to walk her bloody path on her own. he's willing to go behind her back, he's willing to contradict her openly, he's not on any level just following orders. but there's one aspect of him that has him prisoner for good and all: he simply does not want to live any life other than one where he is at Edelgard's side, changing the world. any other possibility can never be more than a contingency plan to him. this is all really interesting, but there's a snag: the buildup to it leaves one wanting. Silver Snow at least shows you Hubert's dedication to Edelgard through all of his playable character dialogue; there's an advantage to the whole traitorous party member setup after all. that alone doesn't suffice to fully illustrate the tragedy at hand when you fight him, and even this much is absent from Verdant Wind altogether. no, the part that really comes out to smack you with the whole scope of the sad yet fascinating turn of events is the reveal of Hubert's letter, instructing your party to go after the Agarthans if they should claim victory over him and Edelgard. the presence of that thing makes it plain to see, Hubert definitely believed that the protagonists would be inclined to help him go after the real threat if he just told them what the situation is, and still he never deigned to seek common cause, because it just wasn't in his DNA to do that. Claude even makes a rather unsubtle, rather meta-feeling comment on it in Verdant Wind, just directly lamenting that Hubert should have sent in the letter from the start. there's a problem with unveiling the tragedy that way, though. perhaps you'll see it coming if you've read enough of my posts in this series, because this is a problem that we just keep on having lately with this hell franchise. let me then throw my hands up to the sky, scream out this plea, and hope against hope that it's the last time I ever have to. please, Intelligent Systems. please, Koei, if you have a say on this one. for the love of all that is right, just, benevolent, or generally Eliwood in this world. STOP PUTTING UP THIS STUFF AFTER THE SHOWDOWN!! YOU ARE WASTING YOUR TIME IF YOU WANT ME TO FEEL WORSE ABOUT THE DEAD GUY AFTER I JUST KILLED HIM!! THE CONFRONTATION ITSELF IS MEANT TO BE THE APEX OF THE PATHOS!! THE TRAGEDY SHOULD BE ALL CLEAR TO ME BEFORE THE WEAPONS ARE DRAWING!! I SHOULD BE CHEWING ON IT AS THE FIGHT TAKES PLACE!! STOP DOING THIS THING WHERE YOU WANT TO HAVE AN EVIL VILLAIN BUT YOU ALSO WANT TO EULOGIZE HIM AFTER THE FUN EVIL VILLAIN SHIT IS DONE!! EVEN IF YOU WERE READY TO TACKLE THE CHALLENGE OF WRITING IT BOTH WAYS, YOU'D HAVE TO WRITE IT BOTH WAYS AT ALL TIMES, NOT ONE WAY AND THEN THE OTHER!! PLEASE JUST DECIDE HOW YOU'RE GOING TO WRITE A GIVEN ANTAGONIST AND THEN DO IT, WRITE IT, CONSISTENTLY, WITHOUT CHANGING YOUR TUNE AT THE SINGLE MOST INOPPORTUNE TIME POSSIBLE FOR IT!!! whew, okay, sorry you had to see that, but it's out of my system now. if we're lucky, I won't have to go there again for the rest of this post. anyway, there are glaring execution flaws, but in the end, I don't think you can possibly not enjoy duking it out with Hubert. if the conflict against him doesn't always succeed at being deep, at least it never fails at being entertaining. here's something you should do, as a gift for yourself, if you have not before: have Claude battle Hubert in Verdant Wind and bear ye witness to the most fucking hilariously dorky exchange in the entire game (not something I'd say lightly). Hubert is one of the most fun characters in all of Three Houses, and while his role in Azure Moon is much too small, he's a star whether you're with him or against him. if Hubert had a little more narrative space to himself, I feel that he'd have been an evolution on Gangrel! and Gangrel was a 6/10, so, I'd say that's as well as Hubert fared.

michalis with two eyes actually

Michalis in Crimson Flower

(7.5/10)

but airlock, how could you claim that Dimitri is a Michalis, against whom conflict is inevitable because of his personal flaws, when it's hardly a personal flaw of his that we went and invaded his country? trick question, I've made no such a claim, I'm only stating that Dimitri evokes the Michalis as antagonist in Crimson Flower! you've understood the process by now, right? so even if the facts of it aren't exactly lining up, it's more about the nature of the portrayal. Crimson Flower's Dimitri is quite a bit different from the versions of him that we meet in other war phase routes; he is kinder, stabler, and has twice as many eyes. and yet, there is no mistaking it: he still 100% wants to hang Edelgard's head from the gates of Enbarr. that vengeful violence is the truly established reason why conflict with him is inevitable. if it's either him or Edelgard, then Edelgard chooses Edelgard, even if the choice can't be made quite so lightly. and see, here's the breath of fresh air that I've been waiting for this whole post: Dimitri's death IS tragic. there are no gaping flaws of execution to be seen around here. the conflict that I described above is intended and delivered by the narrative. for once in all of Crimson Flower, you know exactly why you're doing the tragic thing that must be done. I don't think it's for no reason that there's a number of Azure Moon fans out there, who otherwise hate every micron of Crimson Flower, but who still deeply appreciate Dimitri's scenes on that route and are willing to take them uncut into interpretations of the character. the sorrow of Dimitri and Dedue on that route is very solidly written, and its mark is plain to see on the fans. ... still, I feel that I must beg to differ a little from that popular opinion, becuase personally I don't find it that compelling. maybe it's just such a short and dilluted affair, that also has to split screentime with Rhea all along the way, and also, when it's over, you're thrust straight into the final confrontation. some of the monastery dialogue that I praised to high heaven might have come in clutch here. now, even if it hasn't viscerally made me feel all that much, I appreciate solid writing for what it is, and especially for how much less easy to accomplish it is than it might seem -- and even moreso because boy, you know if you've been reading these posts, solid writing is not something we get everyday with Fire Emblem- so yeah, flawlessness alone counts for a lot in my scale, even if you'd also need some qualities on top of it to reach the highest echelons of Fire Emblem antagonists.

EVOKERS OF PUNCHABILITY

fuck bodysnatching

Punchable in White Clouds

(0/10)

another White Clouds antagonist, another 0/10; there's a pattern here, no four ways around it. surely by now you can see what I meant when I opined that White Clouds is the worst part of the game plotwise. let's recap for a little bit, from my previous post on this Punchable archetype. it speaks to characters who aren't designed for appeal, but instead, to draw negative attention. and I made the further stipulation that they must be recurring antagonists who impact the plot beyond just the map that they're fought on, because otherwise I'd be tearing through every unlikeable miniboss around. most importantly, I noted that I couldn't quite evaluate these characters based on how well I liked them -- they weren't meant to be liked in the first place -- so instead, I set down two standards, of which at least one must be fulfilled: the Punchable character should be entertaining, and/or the Punchable character should feel good to finally take down. a character who can do both of those is great, but just doing one of those particularly well is enough to score a 10/10. (still the highest score any of the Punchables have gotten from me so far was 9/10, but I digress) now, the question is, are we doing this all the same way as usual, or are we tinkering with this formula in any way to go along with the whole different methodology that I've been using so far? well... the thing with the Punchable archetype is that, to be frank, it may have been a bit of a stretch for me to consider it an archetype at all. there's one of those people in just about every game, but there's not a common library of character traits and design cues that they draw from. it's not even something that I could claim to be a Fire Emblem thing when it's very much common for stories of any sort to have characters like these. so... just for this section, there's nothing really to change about how I classify and evaluate. it feels like a waste to explain all this before going on to examine Kronya. she's not entertaining, she's not particularly fun to take down, and she's not much of anything at all. she's a major villain alright -- major enough that they revealed her in Three Houses's pre-release season and added her to Heroes pretty early on. but she also just stands there, taking up narrative space and not doing anything at all with it. first, she spends a bunch of her time in the storyline just going "heeeeeheeehee they don't know that Monica is actually really me", and at no point does this infiltration of hers seem to trigger any effect on the plot. then she kills Jeralt! that should've been very significant, but she pulled it off as just another arm of her villainous group -- another one of them could have easily done it instead. hell, maybe if the Death Knight had done, he'd have succeeded just a touch more in being a Black Knight pastiche. we then go to take revenge on her for the murder, but that affair feels just as impersonal, least of all with the emotional weight being carried by the mute audience-surrogate protagonist. and finally, Solon sacrifices her to unleash Zaharas, and not a single part of that is established previously or makes sense despite how much the whole sequence wants to be Byleth's big moment; therefore, Kronya dies a death just as nonsensical and pointless as everything else about her character. (also, the scene of the death wants to be grotesque and terrifying, but it also wants to do a bunch of weird boob shots, badly enough to utterly sacrifice visual clarity. so that's just great) along this post series, I've put a lot of characters on blast for being nothing more than plot devices with a face, but Kronya is probably the epitome of it. she's just as much of a nothingburger character as her fellow Agarthans, with the further issue that it's hard to affirm that she even technically does anything important at all. it doesn't seem as if she was brought in for anything besides putting an additional booba villain design in the game. if she really was meant to be The One Who Kills Jeralt, that alone could have served to provide a little direction on how to write anything at all into her. something like, say, if Kronya and Jeralt were to build some rapport between each other, providing a real reason as to why he'd let his guard down around her. then, when the knife plunges in, Kronya could have eschewed the generic villain dialogue (really, all the Agarthans could have eschewed the generic villain dialogue in general--) to say something about that connection, perhaps to spit on their friendship and state clearly that ever second of it was false and annoying to her, something like when Sonia let down her mask and let Nino have it. that's just one idea, but also, it's one idea that I came up with effortless off the top of my head; how hard could it possibly be to actually write one thing, anything? (... you take those eyes of yours off my WIPs this instant--) I don't really go into negative scores around here, but boy, Kronya would have needed more character just to accomplish as little as being 0/10 on the same level as her fellow Agarthans. (also, yadda yadda, unquestioningly genocidal story element, I'm not getting into it for the third time.)

fucking backpain

Punchable in Azure Moon

(7.5/10)

there's a curious contrast, though, isn't it? our next character is also an Agarthan villain with a booba design, but so much has been done differently that she's hitting one of the highest marks in this entire post. I'm not here to try to convince you that Cornelia is any sort of exceptionally deep or compelling character. she does have a surprisingly detailed backstory, but it's just details, without much of anything that enhances her sense of character. still, the Punchable folk need not be deep characters. there's just one of two things they need to do well, and Cornelia nails the part about being great to take down. she's a smooth operator -- the only Agarthan whose machinations make sense actually. she makes Dimitri's life a living hell and loves every second of it. she's the very face of Faerghus's fall before the Empire, and her defeat is crucial for the country to ever begin healing. when the protagonists overcome this imposing challenge, Cornelia comes down with a mighty crash, taunting Dimitri one last time. and then, this defeat heralds in one of the true highest points of all of Azure Moon -- a moment that may not have been quite as momentuous if Cornelia were a lower quality of villain. (there's still one thing she has in common with all the other Agarthans, though, and it's that -1 point for being a vector for an unquestioningly genocidal narrative. thankfully, this is the last time I have to do this for this post.)

EVOKERS OF CONQUERORISM

the scourge of garreg mach

Conqueror in White Clouds

(3/10)

right, so, I'm not here about to try to convince you that the Flame Emperor is not the same character as her true identity. I realize what a "you can vote for the Flame Emperor in CYL5"-ass choice this is. I would argue, though, that the Flame Emperor plays a different role in the story than her unmasked self does -- I'd even say that the moment of the unmasking is the real point where White Clouds ends and the war phase begins. but, most importantly, splitting this up gives me more to talk about, and the more post, the better, right? woefully for the Flame Emperor, though, having her role in White Clouds isolated means that she's not getting graded for a better-written part of the game. pretty lucky for her, then, to be the only antagonist in White Clouds to earn more than a 0/10. (of course, 1 point of this is just the mercy point that the others were denied. that still leaves us 2 whole points to discuss!) there's not that vast of a difference for the most part. the Flame Emperor is another anonumous entity among masked or practically-faceless villains, appearing in a bunch of curscenes that consist of nothing more than Vague Villain Chatter that doesn't make any sense in the first playthrough and doesn't matter on subsequent playthroughs. plus, the Flame Emperor in particular has all these lines that feel like they're trying to be cool and mysterious but are just stilted and bizarre ("halt. you're having too much fun", anyone?). still, there are a couple of scenes where an actual character almost starts to shine through the robes and helmet. ... and it's not good, but it's better than the absolute non-characterization that we otherwise get from White Clouds's villains. it starts in the aftermath of the disaster in Remire, with the Flame Emperor appearing before Byleth and Jeralt, dropping this limp-wristed disclaimer of responsibility followed by a limp-wristed proposal to join forces. then, in the aftermath of Jeralt's death, we see a villain chatter cutscene where this picks up more steam: Thales launches on a non-sequitur about his people's salvation, at which point the Flame Emperor openly contradicts him, putting him on blast for his group's gruesome deeds and saying that no, they will not be saved. in those moments, we see the Flame Emperor right on the edge of actually doing something interesting and self-motivated instead of acting exclusively as another one of the live plot devices. this cuts through the spoooooky vagueness otherwise permeating these pointless cutscenes, telling us something discrete and clear about the characters involved: that they're not in agreement. that there's even an outright conflict between them. ... and then that angle goes nowhere. you'd think that the Flame Emperor's words right there would be fighting words, but Thales just ignores the open defiance, spouting one line in response to the accusation that he's responsible for some atrocities, after which the scene just ends. he doesn't seem pressed to address the fact that his subordinate just said directly to his face that she opposes his ultimate goal. and neither does said subordinate follow up on those words from there; the net time we see her, it's back to working with the group as usual, without any indication that something happened to pull her back in line like this. (there's a tangent to get into that I feel might be clarifying as to what that whole thing was all about. the Flame Emperor, as well as her true identity, draws a lot from our here Conqueror archetype, and especially from a certain fiery justice-bringer in particular. so, a scene like that one, featuring the Flame Emperor talking back to the shadowy cabal, strikes me as having been inspired by the scene where Arvis does the very same thing. it's a very iconic scene! it's a brillant double feint -- it first misleads us into thinking that Arvis may be ditching the villains to throw his lot in with the protagonists, only for it to surface that nope, he is betraying everyone. it then misleads us into thinking that Arvis has beaten back his shady associates and is taking charge, when truthfully, the lurkers are playing the long game, knowing that Arvis's ascension will make him more vulnerable, not less. of course, that would not have been such a fantastic scene without having both everything that built up to it and every way in which it paid off later, and that's where the Flame Emperor's take on it becomes a pale imitation.) now, before we're done here, there's just one more particular moment of the Flame Emperor's that we can dig our claws into: the reveal of her true identity. the thing is, I played the Golden Deer version of White Clouds first, and so, I can only speak with absolute confidence as to how effective the twist was on that version. and I'd say that, under that specific circumstance, it was... actually very effective. it caught me off guard without coming out of absolutely nowhere, as any good plot twist should do, and it even fired off with more than enough time left in the clock for the story to follow through on the reveal. ... but see, as best as I can tell, I was pretty lucky to have experienced the twist that way first in Golden Deer, because boy, it seems like Black Eagles and Blue Lions both telegraph this one directly to death, what with the respective unsubtle hints of Edelgard's wink-wink-wink dialogue and the business with Dimitri's gift dagger. and see, I can't totally discount that the twist still works in one version of the story, least of all when twists well done seem to be such a dying breed these days, but on the other hand... if the storyline for which this twist is the least important, the one that does less to build up to it, is the one where it works best, that sure is an indictment, isn't it? so I think we can conclude on this: the Flame Emperor has a little more substance than the other White Clouds antagonists, but she doesn't quite make a more compelling character than the rest of them. more fixable, but not less broken, so to say. and with that done... what say you folks we finally let that mask fall?

the scourge of fódlan

Conqueror in Azure Moon, Verdant Wind, Silver Snow

(5.5/10)

I can't very well stall it any longer, now can I? I imagine that there might be people out there who would check this post out just for the sake of this particular section here. it's not remotely an analysis that I'd be the first or last internet rando to partake in, but the hunger for meta is neverending, especially among the people who really love or really hate this character. I suppose all I can do in this scenario is step into the arena, and hopefully contribute something worthwhile to the greater debate. at least, if the analysis might be challenging, the classification is perhaps the easiest in this entire post. Edgelord here isn't any sort of rehash, but she has plunged deeply and thorougly into the pool that Conquerors past have drawn from. even further than just happily adopting the Big Red aesthetic, she has some things in common with just about all of her predecessors. like Hardin, she is (in Silver Snow) a character who journeys by your side at first, but eventually becomes an enemy. like Arvis, she manipulates the powerful to secure herself as a mighty emperor, with continental ambitions -- and yet, she's also chafing under the dominion of a creepy secret cabal. like Rudolf and Walhart, she believes that the people of her world are overreliant on religion and challenges them to take destiny into their own hands instead. like Ashnard, she hopes also to upend her society's rigid structures of birthright, giving rise to a more meritocratic system (or, well, Ashnard would call it power instead of merit, but the principle is similar enough). and like with Zephiel, all of this rationally held philosophy ultimately belies a broken, suffering, and vengeful heart, lashing out against the world with a military aplomb. this bevy of send-ups doesn't only make it very easy for me to connect Edelgard to the archetype, though; it also carries a metatextual message. if Edelgard is so much like all of these villains past, then the intent was likely for us to see her the same way we did them: as a complex villain. ... instead, though, we find ourselves endlessly hurtling our digital saliva at each other, arguing over whether Edelgard is even a villain at all. there may be an impulse there to assume that this disconnect exists because not everyone in the audience would know enough about Fire Emblem to see the metatext clearly; Three Houses did draw many newcomers into the series, after all. still, I don't think this can be summarized as something like "woe, people have opinions on Edelgard and yet they don't know about Red Blorbo from my old ass untranslated games"; my personal, anedoctal experience is that many new players do see Edelgard as a villain, and many veterans of the fandom do see Edelgard as an antihero. and I wouldn't say that the latter isn't a sensible reading of the character, either. the thing there is, that abundant metatext is definitely not the only message that Three Houses puts forth about Edelgard. in fact, how about we go over a somewhat infamous example of another such message? in the intro to Chapter 12, Seteth says that Edelgard has a wicked heart, at which point you're prompted to respond -- and your choices are to either contradict him, or change the subject. to agree with him, and acknowledge Edelgard as a villain, simply isn't an option. and I know, it may not be as if the dialogue choices you're given in this game normally mean very much, but this is also exactly what I meant when I said this earlier: the mute audience-surrogate protagonist sure does have opinions when the writers want them to. all throughout the game, you'll keep finding a similar assortment of mixed messages. the story wants to say that Edelgard is a villain, but the story also wants to say that Edelgard is just a parallel hero that we shouldn't really have been fighting against. the story wants to say that Edelgard personally made the decision to go war, being propelled along the path by one of her central character flaws -- but the text also doesn't want to

ascribe agency and responsibility to her for it. she's just so so so sorry that it had to be this way, you see. perhaps it's really no wonder that the fandom can't reach any sort of agreement on how to judge Edelgard's moral character -- even the game disagrees with itself there. now, don't take that as me claiming that a character can only be good if everyone walks out of the story feeling the exact same way about them. I've praised other villains in this post series highly for containing multitudes. but there's a line somewhere between ambiguity and plain self-contradictory nonsense. now, hopefully, within those six paragraphs, I'll have managed to sufficiently address that hot-button issue of Edelgard's morality -- because it's not the only thing I want to talk about here. moral complexity is great and all, but it's the last thing in your mind when you see Ashnard's wicked grin spread open. when you hear Zephiel's theme song, you forget all about who's right and who's wrong; you just run for the hills. Conquerors are very often the ones most directly in charge of the enemy's armies, the ones who are out in the front making the plot happen with their fists. and so, I believe we also have to talk about whether Edelgard fits in with this legacy of badass motherfuckers. and I'd say, she certainly manages a strong start on that one. that last stretch of non-CF White Clouds is an absolutely phenomenal show of force. she belts out a bombastic speech and galvanizes the people, drives them to energetic war cries. she outplays Garreg Mach's defenders completely, to the extent that it's even hard to grasp just how thorougly outplayed you are at first, and it has to sink in gradually. she proves herself a formidable enemy. she has a keen mind for strategy, and she applies it through the continent's most powerful military force. once Garreg Mach falls and Byleth gets taken out of commission, it seems for a moment that all hope is nearly gone; that you'll be awakening five years later to a world that's being completely ground under Edelgard's iron boots. I still remember being on my first playthrough, and feeling incredibly pumped to start that hopeless battle from the brink. especially if that battle was going to be set to Chasing Daybreak. oh, but how unfortunate! it was my great disappointment to then discover that the Edelgard who pulled off all this awesome shit was left five years behind. after the timeskip, it feels like any clash between you an Edelgard is at most a show of token resistance. Azure Moon lets Dimitri dither back and forth about which front of the war he wants to push, and somehow, the ground that he abandons each time isn't being swiftly retaken by Imperial forces. five years of war and denounciation against the church, including the conquest of their central temple, seems to do precious little against your prospects for rallying people to a religious cause in Silver Snow and Verdant Wind -- the latter route even puts this forth as a pragmatic motion. and in all three of those routes, your nabbing of Garreg Mach as a base goes barely opposed. Edelgard does notice it and throws some soldiers at it one little time, but then, for the rest of the game, you're somehow not in danger of being attacked on your base, that your enemy knows the exact location of, that your enemy once successfully conquered, and that your enemy is still sitting on all of the priceless intel that she used to pull that off the first time. (and I mean, I'm not saying I wanted every second chapter to be Defending Garreg Mach all over again, but god, at least let us have done something clever to earn such security, y'know?) perhaps it's a reflection of the game keeping the brisk and relaxed pace from the Academy Phase in the War Phase, instead of playing it a little more like the near-breathless succession of chapters that's normally seen in Fire Emblem -- but the long and narrow of it is that Edelgard seems to just spend that whole stretch of the story waiting for you to come take the fight to her, like she's some sort of Pokémon Champion. (which brings me to my second tangent on how Arvis Did This Too And It Was Better! Arvis isn't a very active villain anymore by the second generation of Genealogy of the Holy War, either -- but there are two reasons why that works much better for him. the one reason is that he's not in the middle of a war; he WON the war, he conquered the world! Seliph has to start a new war to take him down! the other is that this angle is played intentionally by the story -- Arvis has, indeed, become little ore than a pale shadow of the glorious conqueror that he was 20-odd years in the past, and there's a striking tragedy there regardless of whether it was ever a good thing that he took over in the first place.) over the course of all the discourse, I've seen many fans settle on this moderate-seeming stance: Edelgard is a good villain, but not a good character, they say. let me then be dangerously bold... and claim the exact opposite stance, actually. I think Edelgard, removed from the context of Three Houses's plotlines, is a fantastic character. she has an amazing personality, one that makes her both compelling and just fun to watch. she's deep, interesting, and richly connected to the world that she lives in. but the stories where she plays the antagonist fail to draw out these good qualities; they just trip all over themselves instead of making use of the amazing thing they have at hand. Edelgard is something like what I'm told many of the better Fates characters are -- pretty cool and interesting in any other context. that may frankly be something that goes for a lot of Fire Emblem characters out there with small roles, but it's naturally not a sufficiently high mark to be hitting with your de facto main antagonist. so, y'know, don't get it twisted. on the one hand, I'm evaluating each character's performance in antagonistic roles, and on that front, I don't have much good to say of Edelgard. on the other hand -- she's awesome, okay. and hopefully, these last two sentences, if not the entire tenor of this analysis, are just right to piss off extremists on both sides of The Edeldiscourse. thanks for making it this far without throwing bottles at me -- and for giving me enough time to find cover. you'll never get me alive!

CONCLUSION

with the high score sitting at 7.5 -- no 10/10s, and certainly no hope of unseating the one 11/10 -- it would seem that I didn't have much good -- and plenty of bad -- to say about Three Houses in this post. despite that, Three Houses is a title that I greatly enjoyed, one that I could easily place up there with my favorites (but not above the favorite -- Blazing Blade is still bae!). it's pretty much the exact same thing that I said about blamming almost every Awakening villain and a majority of the Thracia 776 ones too: sometimes, antagonist writing is just not the strong suit of a given title, and it may still be very solid on other fronts. it's certainly sensible to me that Three Houses falls short on writing the villains, when it falls so short on writing the core plot. I'd probably have much greater praises to sing for the game if I were to talk some more about that monastery chatter that I adore, or about the worldbuilding... maybe that'd be a pretty fun idea for another post series. but I'd probably have to blam Blazing Blade's very own Elibe on that front, so, I am hesitant-- but, I picked the post series that I picked and I'll probably go on to keep on adding to it as we proceed with this series, so... what are we looking forward to seeing in the upcoming Three Hopes's antagonists? if everything else I've gone into here hasn't given you a reason to drop a reply or reblog with some comments, then at least, that's a question to bite into

#airlock grades the villain archetypes #Fire Emblem is tagged in this post #Fódlan FE is tagged in this post

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