#as well as moments of fear (because it's really revealing about what her genuine triggers are) and sadness

[magaprima]

Okay, so I was going to do a list of all the moment where Lilith was soft and emotionally vulnerable etc, but the list was surprisingly long, so I’m having to divide them into basically sub-genres. 

So behold, all the moments Lilith shows pure softness. 

1. When she creates a secret book club for the girls of Baxter High. She had so many ways she could have solved this problem with Roz, including just compelling the school to allow the books to be read. But instead she creates a Book Club that she leads, allowing girls to have a safe place to go, and to read and grow and develop their minds, and despite Lilith claiming she’s doing it to tear their souls apart, she never does, and she just has these flashes of delight at all the girls around her. Lilith is in her element in leading women to enlightenment.

2. When she was thanked for the first time ever. The woman has clearly never been genuinely thanked for her work/actions in her entire existence, or at least not for thousands of years, and Sabrina genuinely thanking her for her help really seems to effect Lilith, it stuns her and we see she is emotionally effected by it. And I think it’s the first time we see her physically soften. 

3. When she helps Dezmelda tell her story. Lilith takes the girls there to make a point about corruption within High Priests, but when Dezmelda finds it hard to tell her story, Lilith instinctively reaches out to put her hand on Dezmelda’s knee supportively and helps her tell the tale. There’s a lot of falseness going on in this scene, but her interactions with Dezmelda seem entirely genuiine and they are very soft.  She may be using it to her advantage, but Lilith clearly has genuine solidarity with a witch chased out by an abusive man, choosing to live in the woods rather than submit.

4. When she admits they’ve all done unspeakable things to help the ones we love. There is something very genuine in this moment, she avoids Sabrina’s eye and doesn’t have the same manipulative expression she usually does when encouraging Sabrina to do something. There’s an honesty here, Lilith recounting what she has done for love, and though it might not seem a typical example, this is a very soft moment, because we’re seeing how Lilith can be motivated by love in regards to the Dark Lord, as much as by ambition. 

5. Attending Theo’s try-outs and being genuinely interested. So she ensures Theo is allowed to try-out as part of her determination to have no gender bias at Baxter High under her rule, but there is absolutely no reason for her to attend the try-outs. She’s not required there as Principal, she has no idea Sabrina is going to be there, and whether Theo gets on the team doesn’t effect her...and yet she goes, and we see her actively look for Theo, following where he is. Lilith got invested in a student’s life and that is so freaking soft. 

6. When she’s watching the passion play. Seeing her past played out on stage, even if with Blackwood’s biased re-write, has Lilith revisiting her own memories and she gets so very emotional about her. We see her entranced, remorseful, broken-hearted, upset, she is near to tears the entire time, and if that’s not softness I don’t know what is. We see here that despite everything, despite what she does, what she’s been through or how old she is, she has not been as completely hardened as she likes people to think. 

7. When she loves Adam’s gift. She was not expecting to like what he had, she probably expected something twee, and yet with a gift that was not only thoughtful but was something that appealed to Lilith’s rage, he wipes away all her murderous intent. She was planning to stab him with a knitting needle two minutes previously and then with this gift and this action, she’s suddenly going to him and smiling. It shows us how the smallest action of kindness has such an effect on Lilith. 

8. After Adam tells her he loves her for the first time. He openly says I love you, admittedly he believes he’s saying it to Mary, but the declaration alongside the kiss just makes Lilith utterly speechless. She’s thrown by it which is just so incredibly soft; how is it that an ancient witch, the mother of demons, future Queen of Hell can be so thrown by a simple declaration of love and a kiss?

9. When she dances with him. At first she’s reluctant and slow to accept what she has to do right now, but the more the song carries on, we see in the background as Lilith lets him twirl her nad even bobs with the music herself. She starts loosening up, but I think it’s partly because amongst the crowd she feels no one is seeing her. 

10. The foot rub. When Adam is giving her a foot rub after the dance, Lilith is so relaxed, she’s so comfortable and at home with him and it’s so starkly different to how she was when she first met him only a few hours ago. And she openly admits ‘a girl could get used to this’ which is a very telling thing to say and is probably why Stolas squawked so angrily. 

11. When she admits Adam 1.0 was cruel to her. We never hear her talk about Adam at all, or the Garden, but she genuinely shares here (it seems to be taken that it’s Adam in the Garden she talks about since she speaks of him in the past tense and she says he was only ever cruel, yet she tells Sabrina that Lucifer used to be kind), she feels safe enough to share, and she’s so broken and upset as she does, showing us just how much of an effect her experience in the Garden has had on her. 

12. Touch Starved. When she leans willingly and so eagerly into Adam’s touch, so she can feel his hand on her cheek. She leans and rests against it and just shows how much Lilith does long for intimacy and love and security. Something she probably had with the Dark Lord originally but hasn’t for centuries. This is where we see that Lilith not only can be soft, but she knows she is, when she admits it to herself.

13. When she initiates the kiss herself for the first time. This is the very time we see Lilith be the one to initiate the kiss, when Adam silently asks permission and she grants it. But the way she leans in, what it means for her to grant consent, how different it is to when she’s being sexual in order to trap someone (such as Hawthorne or the Pizza Boy) and we see that when Lilith is being genuine, she is very soft and gentle. Surprisingly so. 

14. When she realises she doesn’t want to lose him. This is a key post-kiss moment, when he has his eyes closed and she doesn't so we the audience see how she’s looking at him, how she’s studying him, and we see the dawn of realisation in her eyes that she does not want to lose him, and there’s that soft intimacy of their foreheads touching, the comfortable closeness of it. 

15. When she gives Adam the ring and he agrees to set a date. She’s so enthusiastic here. Yes, there’s a need to get that ring on his finger to protect him from the Dark Lord, but she’s genuinely eager to do it. We see her being so open here. Wide-eyed and open. 

16. When he agrees. When he says yes to the ring and they kiss, she is just so excited to keep him, she is biting her lip barely able to contain her delight and she is at one of her softest moments here. Adam is seeing a side of Lilith no one else has ever gotten to so far. 

17. Engaged. When she’s basically engaged now and she recognises this, she just looks so full on fucking happy. She’s utterly delighted and she’s looking at him with actual adoration and that’s so freaking, freaking soft. 

18. When she’s being all domestic with Adam. This quiet morning when she’s doing all her Principal admin work and he’s sat with her and there’s tea and jam bread. It’s just so softly domestic and shows how easily Lilith does slip into that. 

19. When she agrees to skip work and spend the day with him. Firstly, the fact she actually debates being able to skip work, and then when she does it’s while looking at how tempting she finds Adam, she wants to spend the day the with him

20. When she laughs at him for suggesting Tibet then realises he’s serious. This is just so sweet and cute but also shows how comfortable and relaxed she is with Adam, and also how much she thinks about his feelings, enough to feel bad when she laughs at him when he was being serious

21. When she says she’ll think about it. She agrees to genuinely debate giving up the throne and crown to go to Tibet to live a life with a mortal. If that isn’t soft I don’t know what is. 

22. The pebble wish. When she makes a fucking wish on a fucking pebble like a fucking princess and smiles while she fucking does it and then fucking launches it while leanign against Adam with his arm around her waste like the fucking Queen she is. Sotfness Squared. 

23. The look of love. When she studies Adam when he’s not looking like you do when you’re in love, where you watch them when they’re not watching you, and she seems to realise herself in this moment just how much she loves him. SOFT. 

24. Romantic Meal. If you forget for the moment that it’s really the Dark Lord, if this was really Adam, Lilith is being so domestic yet again having a meal with him, smiling, complimenting his cooking...

25. Agreeing to go to Tibet. If anything is soft it’s Lilith smiling while she officially decides to give up her claim to the throne and instead run away for a life with a mortal. 

26. The Widow. Despite the sadness attached to this scene, I still think it’s very soft that Lilith chooses to take Adam’s ring and put it on her wedding finger. She marries him in death essentially. She chooses to consider herself his widow. And despite the tragedy of that it is also very soft. 

27. Keeping the ring on. Even when she crowns herself, she’s wearing the ring still, the fact she doesn’t take it off even to meet the Dark Lord or to attend the coronation, ah, so very soft. 

28. The prayer. When she’s being prayed to, Lilith is so emotionally effected by that. She is so touched by the sound of a coven of witches praying to her, considering her to be worthy of worship and seeing her reaction here shows just how much Lilith needs to hear she’s worthy and how much that prayer meant to her

29. Looking after Lucy. Lilith is very instinctive here, she reaches out for Lucy so naturally and holds onto her so naturally and doesn’t even blink at the fact the girl holds onto her and does, in fact, hug her back, holding onto her. She only stops when she consciously realises she’s doing it. And then there’s the fact she erases the horrible things Lucy went through so she only remembers being rescued. 

30.Ambrose’s enthusiasm. She gets genuinely and quietly amused at Ambrose geeking out rather than being annoyed, and it shows a softness that she appreciates and accepts his excitement over being in Hell. 

31. Being sympathtic to Sabrina’s loss. When Sabrina breaks up with Nick, Lilith offers sympathy but it’s when Sabrina isn’t looking at her that we see her genuine softness as she remembers what it is to lose someone you love and how ‘Queens aren’t allowed to cry’

32. When she fully commits to ruling beside Sabrina. This moment is so brief, and it’s when Lilith has come to totally accept Sabrina as Queen, which is a big fucking deal for Lilith, and even bigger deal? She’s happy about it. She talks about she and Sabrina ruling side by side for eternity, a glorious eternity, and she doesn’t hide how happy she is about that, she lets Sabrina see her happiness. This is just showing not only that Lilith can adapt her ambitions, but when she works with someone, if she believes there’s equality and respect she’s happy. And that’s why it made the next moment such a betrayal to her. But that’s a different post I already made ages ago.  

[baku-bowl]

broke 1,000 followers (the fuck? I don't even make content people), so decided to write up a list of some (but not all, I'll make other lists later) of my favorite Bakugou-centric fic recs. my tastes run towards hurt/comfort, as you'll probably figure from the list. if there are some Baku-centric fics that you've enjoyed that aren't on here, please add them - this is definitely not a complete list of the ones I've read and love, but I'm always up for some recs. <3

fair warning, most of these are wips.

------------------------------------------------

Social Media 101 by WindsChild8178

Part 1: Survival Guide to Fucking Up

[Solely Bakugou’s point of view]

Katsuki Bakugou doesn’t have a gentle bone in his body. He’s aggressive in everything he does and does everything with 100% of his heart in it. After the Sport’s Festival, Katsuki starts to get harassed by strangers for his unheroic demeanor. It starts with letters but it doesn’t end there. The moment Katsuki realizes the harassment has entered dangerous territory and he needs to tell someone, it’s already too late.

Part 2: Post Traumatic Life Disorder

[Point of View opens up to Bakugou, teachers and classmates]

When the Dorms are finally built, everyone is settling in well, but things become tense as people begin to realize something isn’t right with the recently rescued Bakugou.

[Cannon compliant right up to after the License Exam]

hands down my favorite fic in the fandom right now. it’s the one that converted me into a Bakugou lover. if you have any fondness for Bakugou as a character then it’s likely you’ve read this one already, but if not, I can’t recommend it enough. incredibly depressing, but with the hope that comfort is coming soon in the next few chapters.

The Kids Will Be Alright, Eventually by NotWithThatAttitude

Bakugou is spiraling in the aftermath of Kamino and his friends are starting to notice. He's stubborn, aggressively independent, and less than willing to dig into his past, but after a breakdown that ends with a painful secret revealed, he starts to get help.

Whether he likes it or not.

Meanwhile, a new kind of villain threatens an uneasy peace following the loss of Allmight. Whispers build as a new narrative slowly takes shape:

Hero society needs to change.

Feat. Therapy, Dadzawa, best boy Kirishima, dysfunctional families, healing, growing up, and the mortifying ordeal of being known

guys.. the medical accuracy of this fic is just... *chef’s kiss*

I rarely see mental health genuinely handled well in fics, but this one goes above and beyond. kudos to the author for doing such excellent research into psychology, and making the application of it in here not-boring. also, while this one does have abusive!Mitsuki, it’s done in a way that feels realistic, and how I usually will see it occur in real life, rather than just for the hurt/comfort feels.

fair warning, the fic can be incredibly triggering (themes of severe depression, PTSD, panic attacks, rape survival, abuse survival, suicidal ideation/attempted suicide, among other things), so be safe and heed the tw’s if you decide to read. legitimately one of my Top Favorite fics in this fandom.

Lock and Key by autochorystalize

Bakugou made a choked, gravelly noise before croaking out a low, “You can’t be serious.” His fingers ached to blow up everything in the room.

“I’m sorry, young man, but you can’t change reality! This sometimes happens.” Recovery Girl clicked through his file, adding a new symbol in a previously empty slot.

- - -

A pair of eyes discreetly locked on to an explosive blond plowing his way forward, parting people in his path. He recognized the kid, of course. Anyone in the underbelly of society would recognize him, after the publicity of both UA’s Sports Festival and the events leading up to All Might’s fall. The uniform he was wearing cast away any doubts about the young man’s identity.

It was a bit of a surprise that the little firecracker presented as an omega.

- - - - - - - - -

Or: there are certain types of evil that seemed too distant, archaic violations and perversions that would never actually threaten bright-eyed heroes-in-training in the clean, modern world...but sometimes those evils aren't as distant as one might think.

remember when I said that I love a/b/o fics that are full of plot and world-building and gender-induced tension? that’s this one. the OC’s are fabulous and you love to hate ‘em. also, it’s the fic that made me fall head-over-heels for the TodoBaku dynamic, so it’s got a special place in my cold, dead heart. 

be warned, there are rather explicit non-con scenes between an adult (OC) and a minor (Bakugou) in this one, but the author warns for them in advance, and you could likely skip those parts without missing too much if you need to.

Never and Always, Eventually by Wawa_Boonliang

"Katsuki can remember the exact moment that he and Deku…that he and Midoriya Izuku became friends. He can also remember the moment he and Izuku became fierce rivals, a time when they were almost enemies.

However, what he remembers most clearly about their relationship is the moment that they moved passed rivals and became something more close than mere friends. Something more like brotherhood, something forged in fire and secured in the middle of a battlefield or in the midst of natural disaster where the number of the dead was climbing ever higher. And then it was torn from him."

Katsuki is given a second chance. A chance to save everyone. A chance to change everything.

But should he?

y’all. I’m a slutty, slutty whore for time travel fics. a time travel fic with autistic!coded Bakugou? it was love at first read.

Lessons Learned by Sif (Rosae)

Rather than the police station, Katsuki's friends bring him to a hospital after rescuing him from the villains. His wounds were minor, but it didn't make having them treated any less important. As it would so happen, Best Jeanist was also brought to this hospital after the attack.

Sometimes, small choices have a big impact on how a story plays out.

classic Bakugou hurt/comfort. this fic opened me up to the potential that could be a genuinely good Best Jeanist & Katsuki mentor-mentee relationship, and I kind of dig it and search ravenously for it in other fics now. I’m also a huge fan of the behind-the-scences Pro Hero Chat group.

Slope by sunfleurmoon

“I’m not a hero. Or a good person,” Katsuki says, giving Aizawa a pointed look, “So leave me alone. I don’t care about the League or UA, or you—” The two years he’s been away have been fine, more than fine, fucking fantastic actually if you ignore the bi-monthly near-death experiences. He doesn’t need this place. He doesn’t miss this place.

And yet, longing, a childish desire to tear up, or maybe blow something to bits, they all twist in his chest like a band of traitors regardless. “—I just want to go home.”

Or: the one where Katsuki and Izuku fail the first term exam, Aizawa discovers their pasts, and Katsuki is booted from UA. Featuring questionable descriptions of villain organizations, a slightly illegal moving shop, and your favorite emotionally constipated badass in distress with a newly discovered penchant for collecting strays.

paaaaaaiiiiiiiin. the hurt is ALIVE in this one. lots of tortured, angsty exploding child goodness. the OC’s are excellently crafted, and the Bakugou & Eri relationship? beautiful. definitely deserves a read.

Ground Zero by WindsChild8178

In the wake of Kamino, Katsuki is tested more than anyone could imagine. Bound by a villain’s quirk to keep his silence or die, he lives each day knowing it might very well be his last. He continues to work towards becoming a hero, keeping his secret from his classmates and teachers, focusing on making it through each day and trying not to allow the panic or depression to get the best of him. When the villain finally corners him with demands in exchange for his life, there is really only one answer Katsuki Bakugou can give.

honestly don't know which I want updated more - social media 101 or ground zero. this author's fics are amazing, and I really wasn't expecting the twist in this one. can't wait for windschild to come back to this fic some day.

The Defect by LadyGreenFrisbee

"Why do you want to win the Sports Festival so badly?" 

Because I want to see if the defect could usurp the masterpiece.

(In which Endeavor holds a terrible secret and Bakugo has to suffer since childhood for it.)

a great concept, and I adore the shouto and Katsuki sibling interaction here. hoping the author will come back to this one some day.

A Name That You'll Remember by Heronfem

Kirishima Eijirou is a Hero. Bakugou Katsuki... is not. Trapped in his toxic workplace and increasingly desperate to get out, Red Riot's days are only brightened by a new villain known as Caution, who's not exactly villainous and keeps accidentally doing good deeds. But when a real villain appears, a threat from the past that demands that Red Riot make the ultimate sacrifice to keep the public safe, Bakugou is forced into saving the day... and eventually, Red Riot himself.

sob story good guy villains are my weakness, this fic is a gem, and I'd kill for the sequel.

Our Hero by AnonymousTwit

He felt everything jerk to the side and throw his balance off before he saw anything, dust clouding his vision and irritating his lungs as the earth itself opened up to swallow them whole. For a single moment, in a millisecond's time, his wild eyes locked with Raccoon Eyes', hers alight with fear and adrenaline-fueled desperation. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he realized that it was the first time she'd looked at him with something other than long-deserved hatred in days.

And then he was free falling.

Or

After a particularly nasty encounter between childhood friends, the class learns about Bakugou and Midoriya's dark history and practically ostracizes Bakugou while trying to defend Midoriya. An earthquake during an outing has all sides regretting their decisions.

just fucking tear apart my self-sacrificing faves in every way imaginable while their loved ones watch on in terror. 💖🥰💖 this one is heavy on the Bakusquad and Class-1A feels, and VERY heavy on the Mina & Bakugou relationship (platonic).

Running back the tape, watching it replay by Faralyne

For someone ripped from their time, ripped from the few but strong relationships built by time and personal development, by self-reflection and swallowed pride, ripped from the one thing that made him feel worthwhile and needed and put-together, and forced to forge everything over again—Katsuki thinks he is handling it pretty fucking well.

Or

A villain’s quirk sends a 29-year-old Bakugou back in time to his middle school days.

am I a sucker for time travel? yes. am I a sucker for vigilante!bakugou? also yes. am I a sucker for this fic? literally refreshing the page in wait for an update as we speak.

Liability by sandelf

After All-Might dies rescuing Bakugou from the League, Bakugou is determined to prove it wasn't for nothing.

But the world is against him, his grief is overwhelming, and his stability is splitting at the edges.

very self-indulgent bakugou angst. tw for harassment, severe depression, and suicidality.

Special Mentions:

How To Win The Sport Festival: A Step By Step Guide by mhwright

Short re-imagining of the Sports Festival Arc if Shinso had planned a little better and worked a little harder to win the Sports Festival and if the match-ups had been slightly different. Self-indulgent fic of watching him succeed.

this is completely Shinsou-centric, not Bakugou-centric, but I love and adore it and am dying for a sequel. Shinsou is Best Boy here and you'll be rooting for him the whole time.

[shihalyfie]

A meta and analysis on Takaishi Takeru

Of all of the Tokyo Chosen Children, Takeru is lucky enough to get significant attention for two full series from beginning to end, and his character also goes through some drastic changes in the process, especially through Adventure and 02. There’s so much going on with him that it makes it hard to give a short answer to the question “what is Takeru like?” because there’s so much you could say about him at so many different times.

Fortunately, that’s what we’re here to talk about today!

Takeru in Adventure

At first glance, Takeru seems to be the “tagalong kid” -- the obligatory “little kid character” you have whenever you have a party in a fantasy story. Generally, these “obligatory kid characters” are the kind constantly struggling to catch up with the older ones. Adventure being a series that loves to play with tropes and expectations, though, very quickly says no to that.

Seki: ...We also mixed up the children’s ages, for a bit of variety. Kakudou: The oldest one would be the most unreliable, and the smartest one would be one of the third youngest. Just a little to throw you off the usual, conventional track. Seki: The youngest one would feel too much like a burden to everyone else, and conversely would actually have himself together.

Takeru “doesn’t want to be a burden” -- meaning his feelings on this issue are actually rather much like Hikari’s. Unlike Hikari, though, Takeru reacts to this compulsion differently -- instead of simply repressing things and pretending the problem doesn’t exist, Takeru’s reaction to his own negative feelings is to “have himself together” and act as if he’s got everything under control.

Or, more accurately, pretend he has it together and has everything under control.

Takeru, for all intents and purposes, was not supposed to be on the camping trip the others were on, not having gone to everyone’s school -- he had to get special permission to go. Takeru’s family is very, very split harshly at this time, with his mother not even able to treat Yamato comfortably. Yamato deals with the familial estrangement badly -- alternating between approaching everyone awkwardly and exploding like an emotional fuse bomb -- but Takeru tries to take it as a sign  that he needs to be “responsible”. A lot of his actions in Adventure are him basically exuding this aura of “I can take care of myself!”, and in fact he works very hard to “assert” himself as if he were yet another peer. We even see him make the complaint directly in Adventure episode 43 -- while he is correct in calling out Yamato for coddling him and him only while recklessly disregarding the others, the fact he specifically complains about Yamato approaching him as someone holding them back if he’s not protected reveals a lot about his own mentality regarding the situation.

One of his first major scenes in episode 2 is him offering his own food for the pile of supplies everyone has, even though it’s just snacks. Which is, probably, a pretty accurate summary of Takeru’s character at this point: on the surface he’s responsible, well-behaved, and capable...but, in fact, he’s still about as immature as an average eight-year-old child would predictably be.

Yamato spends his Adventure character arc pretty openly angsting about his relationship to Takeru and how his family’s split has affected them, but throughout the entirety of Adventure (and, eventually, 02 as well), not only does Takeru rarely if ever touch on it, there are indications that Takeru deliberately tries to dodge the subject or not dwell on it too much. In Adventure episode 12, he actually outright lies to Patamon about his younger childhood memories, claiming he “probably doesn’t remember” anything about it despite the audience very clearly being shown that he very much did, and in episode 26 he comes very close to leaking his actual feelings about the group being separated being tied to what happened to his family, before quickly covering it up and trying to move on with the topic.

In other words, unlike Hikari, who knows exactly what she’s feeling but is compulsively unable to vocalize them, Takeru actively suppresses his negative feelings and tries not to dwell on them too much. Again, this comes from his desire to “not be a burden” on others -- he’s got this situation under control! Everything is fine!

And this has a very, very nasty payoff. While Yamato clearly deals with his emotional issues badly, tending to get very explosive about it, Takeru’s way of coping isn’t actually all that much better in the long run, because Yamato’s frustration and openness about his emotions at least lead him to being very straightforward about his feelings, incredibly self-aware and sometimes even self-conscious, and ultimately able to get at least some degree of catharsis from the situation. Takeru...not so much.

Takeru is a child, no matter how much he tries not to act like one, and it ultimately results in him reacting disastrously whenever something hits him too emotionally hard -- which results in Takeru suddenly becoming irrationally stubborn and even angry. We later see what it takes to actually break through Takeru’s facade of “totally having this together” in Adventure episode 22, which is also the first time he openly breaks down wailing in front of anyone besides Patamon -- and it’s, of course, when PicoDevimon convinces him that Yamato hates him. The interesting part is that this is so blatantly a lie that even Tokomon is able to quickly call bullshit on it, but Takeru, previously having worked so hard to maintain this facade of being responsible, falls for it completely with utter irrationality -- and it really does suggest that Takeru’s fear of losing yet another member of his family, and being a burden to Yamato, runs so deep that it causes that entire facade to shatter in one blow.

Which is where the problem lies: Takeru’s habit of suppression is so bad that once one of his triggers is hit, he completely loses all sense of rationality and blows up, and it becomes nearly impossible to reason with him because he locks down on becoming stubborn. It’s also dangerous because even he isn’t particularly self-aware of what he’s doing when he blows up like this; at least Hikari was very consciously aware of her suppression problem, but Takeru never really seems to have any awareness of the fact that his covering up of his feelings is directly related to some of his worst moments. We see it cause problems between him and Patamon again in Adventure episode 33, when Patamon asks a rather innocuous question about the brothers, and it hits Takeru’s trigger so badly that he snaps at him, resulting in the fight that kicks off the plot of the episode.

Adventure episode 52 is basically a major test for Takeru as to whether he really can hold himself together in a situation where everyone else older than him is gone, and “having himself together” is something he has to actually do instead of just have the surface facade of. He does, ultimately, pass, and this is why the Crest of Hope glows this episode -- but it’s also made clear that it wasn’t quite as easy for him as he would normally pretend it is. Of course, it also helps that Piemon is genuinely the scariest threat they’d faced during that time, but it also reveals that, yeah, ultimately, Takeru is an eight-year-old child who still has to struggle to put on a brave face so that Hikari doesn’t get impacted by his own fear.

For all it’s worth, although we get a ton of depth into his background and mentality, Takeru does not actually change that much as a character over the course of Adventure. This incident is probably what changes him the most in terms of him gaining a more solid core, and he also learns to accept the inevitability of fighting after his stubborn refusal to engage in it all the way back in Adventure episode 12 -- but for the most part he still does remain a bit naive about the world at large, and, more importantly, his issue with trying to cover up his problems with a confident smile never really gets addressed. At most, he’s willing to admit his grief over being separated from Patamon in Adventure episode 54, but even that is something Takeru tries to bounce back from quickly, much like with the first time he cried with Patamon in Adventure episode 12. But there’s nothing to indicate that his problem with emotional management isn’t going to continue being a problem from here on out if left unchecked.

That problem ends up taking another three more years to get addressed.

Takeru in 02

Takeru is one of the first people we meet in 02 (for reasons that end up revealed in the final episode), and right off the bat we learn that he’s a bit...evasive. He leaves a cryptic line to Daisuke about his goggles without coming even close to what we all know is the full extent of what’s on his mind (that the goggles specifically remind him of someone important to him), and later just...deflects Daisuke throwing accusations at him with a mild dismissal. In fact, even though Takeru pretty clearly understands very quickly what’s going on with Daisuke and how touchy he gets with the Hikari issue, he keeps dodging the question and constantly saying things that are evasive about it and therefore never truly helps his case until episode 17, when the circumstances between why Hikari and Takeru knew each other are finally properly clarified to Daisuke and he stops getting on their case about it on his own.

There were multiple points in time before this -- especially in episode 7, when Daisuke is practically at his worst in regards to approaching Takeru -- when Takeru could have easily said something to at least attempt to get Daisuke to stop bothering him, but Takeru never even asks him to cut it out! He simply continues to handle everything with a “yeah, okay, sure! :)” attitude, which of course confuses Daisuke (who’s rather allergic to people not being straightforward) rather thoroughly, and you wonder if he’s practically enjoying seeing Daisuke’s antics to the point he’s just enabling it further.

As a point of aside trivia, the official 02 website adds the fun detail that apparently he's popular with the girls at school but doesn't show much interest in them himself, and the Animedia audio commentary CD for Armor Evolution to the Unknown had his voice actor even express the opinion that he saw Takeru as someone who wasn’t really the type to think about romance at this age (adding in a separate interview for the 02 DVDs that he felt Takeru was respectful of girls primarily due to having been taught by his single mother to be such). The latter part of course isn’t something that comes from the writing, but given the website trivia I’m inclined to personally agree with it -- and, more importantly, the implication is that Takeru is at least aware of these kinds of things, but actively chooses to not think about it and deal with it when the time comes.

So in other words: That part about how Takeru actively suppresses things that are negative or inconvenient to think about, all for the sake of keeping a smile plastered on his face? Yup, still there.

In fact, a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment from 02 episode 17 implies heavily that, even with their parents having developed a more cordial relationship after the events of Adventure, Takeru is now emotionally dealing with the aftermath of his parents’ divorce worse than Yamato is, since Yamato is at least able to speak about it casually and even joke about it openly, whereas Takeru keeps his mouth shut and the framing of the shot heavily implies he’s still extremely sensitive and unable to vocalize his feelings on it. Takeru never brings this up as something eating away at him for the entire series -- but BelialVamdemon uses it against him in episode 49, revealing that, yes, this is a problem that’s still tearing away at him, and yet he’s refusing to be open to anyone about it, even to Yamato himself. (Especially since, again, Yamato seems to be doing a great job trying to move forward; why kill his mood and thus be a “burden” to him?)

Even so, Takeru is very different in 02 partially because his circumstances are completely different. Adventure had him as the youngest in a group of older kids, so in terms of “being a responsible child”, that naturally meant being deferential and polite to everyone due to standards of propriety. 02 is where we learn a lot more about how Takeru interacts with peers his own age and people who are outright younger than him, when he has a bit more leeway to be more assertive.

On top of that, back in Adventure, Takeru was a young child who had a very small “range of periphery” -- as a young child still rather naive about the world, his emotional investment in things primarily pertained to loved ones and the people around him. But now that he’s a bit older, he’s gained a certain degree of strong feelings about “what’s the right thing to do”, and now has very strong opinions on it.

These things ultimately manifest in, unfortunately, Takeru losing his composure much more often than he did in Adventure, and for reasons that pertain to much wider things than just his brother. Still not having recovered from the trauma of losing Patamon back in Adventure episode 13, Takeru starts physically fighting Daisuke in 02 episode 11 because he perceives Daisuke as not doing enough to prevent Patamon from potentially becoming a slave to the Kaiser, and in 02 episode 13 he lashes out at Hikari in frustration about her refusal to do anything about her situation (which he of course ends up deeply regretting later in the episode).

Takeru’s infamous scene of suddenly switching modes on the Kaiser and punching him out in 02 episode 19 is basically the pinnacle of this -- because, yes, the Kaiser really did deserve it, but this really is not a good thing for Takeru either. This is Takeru getting the closest we ever see him to being a genuine sadist, and it’s basically everything to do with his emotional stuntedness coming out at once -- blowing up in anger out of nowhere with a passive-aggressive demeanor, succumbing to the weight of his trauma in the worst way possible, and mixing the ^^ front he puts on with his tendency to blow up angrily at anything that cuts him a little too emotionally close.

And for the first time, we see someone actually acknowledge how bad this is. Iori, one of the most consciously perceptive of the group, witnesses, for himself, the sheer jarringness of Takeru seeming to only really have two modes between “all smiles” and “unreasonably angry”. Sure, Takeru had shown a penchant for getting active as soon as there was something he needed to protect, but the moment it got personal, Takeru suddenly blew up in front of his eyes and almost turned into a completely different person. (Perhaps he’s not that different from Yamato after all...)

This is a very important moment because it sets up the base for what ultimately becomes the Jogress arc between Iori and Takeru. Daisuke ended up reaching out to Ken because Ken was someone who needed someone to accept him and teach him to move forward instead of drowning in the past; Miyako ended up reaching out to Hikari because Hikari knew herself to have a suppression problem but had difficulty doing anything about it, so the extremely in-your-face and aggressive Miyako could go in deep. But with Takeru, since his personality is genuinely volatile, and because Takeru goes out of his way to hide the fact he’s having emotional problems, personalities like Daisuke and Miyako wouldn’t help much because they’re too straightforward for someone like this who’s a bit unpredictable -- whereas Iori, who’s assertive but also methodical and thinks through everything consciously, is eventually much better able to reach out to him.

Once the relevant arc kicks in, in 02 episode 34, Iori continues to observe Takeru, and quietly notes the many “contradictions” in Takeru’s behavior -- since, after all, Takeru starts to sometimes violate what you’d think would be common sense whenever he gets too emotionally compromised. The fact that ostensibly one of the outwardly “nicest” kids in this group suddenly blows up in certain circumstances and basically goes “absolutely nope, needs to be killed!” in the midst of a few moral debates over killing sentient Digimon disturbs him deeply, and really, it’s not even about the killing part (after all, it’s later established in 02 episode 43 and after that Takeru and Hikari have a certain degree of acceptance of the inevitability that the others don’t) as much as Takeru’s being pretty gung-ho about it. Not “I don’t like it, but we have to” like he said earlier, but NOPE, GOTTA DO IT.

Iori refers directly to the duality of Takeru that he doesn’t quite understand multiple times in this episode (including in regards to the incident back in 02 episode 19), and it continues to torment him until the end, when Takeru only gives a very cryptic “clarification” that he doesn’t necessarily hate the darkness per se.

Iori, too intimidated to ask Takeru about it directly, goes to ask Yamato in 02 episode 35, and Yamato finally clarifies the background that we as the audience knew but Iori didn't: the story behind Takeru's trauma regarding the loss of Angemon back in Adventure episode 13. Yamato also makes a conjecture about why Takeru has been acting so ambivalent towards Ken -- you'd think he'd still be under Takeru's scorn after the events of 02 episode 19, but in fact Takeru's judgment of him in episode 25 was simply that he was certain something had changed, yet he couldn't tell what he was thinking (really rich coming from someone who refuses to tell anyone else what he's thinking himself!). Yamato guesses that Takeru is inclined to be a bit more forgiving of Ken due to understanding the feeling of losing a partner -- and the ultimate conclusion here is, basically, that Takeru's behavior is contradictory because he's acting based on what's personal to him, not necessarily via principles that make sense. After all, back in Adventure, it was clearly demonstrated that Takeru isn’t exactly rational when things hit too close to home.

The other important thing that happens this episode is that Takeru learns that Iori is actively trying to reach out to him, when Yamato drops him a line informing him that Iori asked. Despite complaining that Iori could have just asked him directly, after Takeru witnesses the face-off between Iori and BlackWarGreymon and a demonstration that Iori is clearly trying his best to make sense out of this entire mess, Takeru actively reaches out to Iori and says something to comfort him -- “a life is beautiful simply by existing.” It’s still cryptic as hell, but it’s not something he would have said in the midst of his anger in prior episodes.

It would be one thing if it were simply that by itself, but the following episodes further push the idea that Takeru really is starting to change after witnessing all of this. 02 episode 36 has him explicitly acknowledge what Iori’s been doing this whole time in trying to understand him for the sake of their Jogress, and, finally, during their meal later that episode, he says, very openly and honestly, that he thinks they’ll be able to do it now. After two instances of Jogress, these kids are very aware of what that entails -- so this is basically Takeru consciously acknowledging to Iori “yes, I understand that you’re trying to reach out to me, and I accept it and want to understand you.” Because Takeru is such a convoluted sort of person, this “understanding” ended up being something that didn’t span a single magical moment as much as it took several episodes and a diplomatic, conscious affirmation on both ends -- but it’s a fitting way to go for someone who had always indicated some pretty poor conscious awareness of where his feelings were taking him.

This is especially because, in 02 episode 37, his statements to comfort Ken are in pretty significant opposition to the sort of anger he’d displayed in earlier episodes, and are now a more pragmatic view of the issue in light of Iori’s efforts and everything he’d just witnessed with BlackWarGreymon -- and to drive the point home, the episode has, at the very end of it, Takeru making his first true explicit show of goodwill towards Ken after having been a bit touchy with him for so many episodes.

Iori himself, being the youngest of the 02 group, still has a lot to learn, and so Takeru, who had previously been one of the youngest in the Adventure group himself, now has his role inverted to effectively be a guiding mentor to Iori as he finds his own way. Basically, Takeru becomes responsible for the welfare of this young child, and so his way of treating Iori is markedly different from the more detached and playful way he would treat others from here on out. This is especially because, earlier, Yamato had informed him that Iori had taken a very roundabout way to help understand him better, and so Takeru probably understands that he scared the hell out of Iori earlier and needs to do better. While the Takeru of 02 episodes 38-50 still has a way of being playful, and while he still isn’t completely straightforward about his intentions, he is definitely much better about being open with the others, especially Iori, instead of doubling down on his “everything-is-fine” mode.

And perhaps this is what the other meaning of “hope” thus became in this situation -- learning to be forward-facing even in the midst of truly knowing and understanding everything that’s wrong with the situation.

Post-02

Although Takeru’s Spring 2003 track is addressed to no one in particular, meaning that it’s the most likely reason he’s so willing to be open about it, Takeru outright admits he’s having problems with his emotions -- especially those pertaining to Angemon’s death. We do, however, learn that Takeru’s started writing the early, early drafts of what’ll eventually end up becoming the novels he writes as a future career.

This being only a year after the events of 02, Takeru’s position is interesting. His decision to start writing is that he wants to have a record of everything before it’s forgotten -- because these things are very personal to him -- but he’s not emotionally ready for the huge task of finalizing everything in words, to the point he still hasn’t told his mother he’s started writing yet. After all, this is a book we eventually find out takes upwards of twenty years, and so this is the presumable reason why -- being able to get this down in a rational way that’s not emotionally compromising is going to be an upwards battle for him.

Even come Kizuna, there’s still a long way for him to go, because an actual line (in a very fast-paced movie) is dedicated to establishing that he’s still uncomfortable with his novel progress to the point he won’t even let Yamato see it. His official character profile and background details are revealing, too -- although he’s currently taking language classes in university and is even part of a children’s literature club, he still hasn’t actually decided on what to do with his future, meaning that he hasn’t determined that he’s going to be a full-time novelist with these yet. That means that even though he’s clearly still clacking away at his novel (multiple indications in the movie are given as such), his memoirs are still at the level of being so deeply personal, and not something he feels comfortable telling well, just yet.

I’ve pointed out before that despite not appearing directly with them in the movie, Takeru and Hikari have more in common with the others in the 02 group than they do with their Adventure seniors, and this is fully codified in the drama CD when Takeru is content to basically just “do whatever” with the rest of his friends instead of having any particular concerns about his future. And as someone who has a tendency to kind of just let his emotions take him wherever they’re going, this isn’t too surprising. Although he approximates as the closest to level-headed during most of the group’s antics during the CD, he’s still completely guilty of enabling them full-force, after all...

So, with the 02 epilogue, we get the massive meta reveal that the entire series was Takeru’s novels the whole time. This was planned to be the ending for Adventure before recording for the first episode had even started, but was postponed to the end of 02 when the second series was greenlit -- and if you’d followed the Japanese version, there are a ton of meta hints scattered around from day one:

The narrator of the series is Hirata Hiroaki, who played Takeru and Yamato’s father, and is revealed in this episode to voice him as an adult as well;

Episode 12 of Adventure is named “Adventure! Patamon and Me” and is the only episode title in Adventure or 02 to use a first-person pronoun -- and it’s of course a Takeru-centric episode, with the episode title using Takeru’s boku;

02′s first episode kicks off narrated by young Takeru opening the story, with Takeru himself suspiciously omitted from the opening vignettes;

02 episode 18 suddenly has the narration cut in when discussing Takeru’s trauma from Adventure episode 13, with the younger Takeru even filling in part of it himself;

02 episode 49′s “next episode” preview for 50 suddenly also starts using “we”, which also includes Takeru’s boku;

Finally, Takeru starts narrating right after Oikawa’s death, which fades into what’s revealed to be his adult voice.

In the context of Adventure, Takeru was “the youngest child”, so the idea makes sense that “the littlest one” would be the one to grow up and reflect on all of the adventures they had as kids -- and once 02 was added, it practically made sense that Takeru would be the one to recap both adventures, being the one person who was there to completely witness both (it also explains why Takeru and Hikari’s character arcs remain somewhat unresolved by the end of Adventure compared to others, since by this time it was apparent their story would be continued in the second series). So on a meta level, Takeru is, in a certain way, one of the most important characters in both groups.

On a level relevant to his personal character arc, on the other hand, the point here is that Takeru finally managed to put together his book and story in a way that he was comfortable telling the entire world about, to the point of choosing to make his entire career into it. That’s something that requires a lot of coming to terms with what happened, how he feels about it, how others feel about it, and everything about the whole ordeal in general, without compromise or (too much) bias.

And in the end, that’s really a lot!

[animepopheart]

Wonder Egg Priority, Episode 11: “The Temptation of Death”?

Wonder Egg Priority is a beautiful, uncomfortable, moving and confusing series that starts out engaging all the things we don’t talk about—self-harm, abuse, rape, bullying, gender dysmorphia, and homosexuality, to name a few. Our silence and blindness to these issues have a weight and pressure to them, and WEP shows how this reinforces the isolation and hopelessness of the young women of the “eggs” who turn to suicide for relief. The first ten episodes have been exhilarating and exhausting alike.

And then there is Episode 11. This past week, the series took a bit of a turn, leaning hard into the sci-fi-philosophical, with appearances from Greek gods, a murderous artificial intelligence, and really, really disturbing insect girls, one of whom, despite being a brutal killer, is apparently a vegetarian. Has the show gone off the rails? Has it lost its way in departing from the familiar procedural approach of engaging a differing social or mental health issue with each episode?

Such a critique is perfectly legit, but before you write off the penultimate episode of WEP, just hear me out on why the abstract, meta turn in episode 11 may just be the most valuable thing this series has to offer so far.

Before we begin though, a little recap of what we learned this week. In episode 10, we hear the eggheads, Acca and Ura-Acca, discuss the need for warriors of Eros to battle Thanatos. This is our first hint that things are about to get lore-full and maybe a bit weird. Eros and Thanatos are of course gods in the ancient Greek pantheon, Eros being the god of love, and Thanatos, of non-violent death. Within the first minute or so of episode 11, it’s clear that the eggheads’ hope is now focused on Ai becoming the long-awaited warrior. At this point though, rather than continuing with Ai’s story, the episode shifts into flashback mode and we are finally introduced to the villain, an artificial intelligence created by the eggheads back when they were still human. Their lives gradually come to revolve around her: She is the fulfillment of their obsession to create life, and she is good.

Frill is associated with hydrangeas, which symbolise heartlessness and pride in Japanese flower language. But is it her heartlessness and pride, or that of her makers?

(Atelier Emily has done an outstanding series of posts on the flowers in WEP. Check it out!)

Only, it turns out she doesn’t play so nice when others join the happy family. After killing Acca’s wife, and putting the life of the unborn baby at risk, the AI—who named herself Frill—is unrepentant, all traces of her seeming humanity now revealed to be illusory, a mere affectation. Acca locks her away in a hole in the cellar. Years pass. The baby, Himari, grows up and is a ray of sunshine. But after effectively confessing to her ‘uncle’ (why does anime always do this?), she commits suicide. Ura-Acca discovers that Frill is still very much alive and active from her hole in the cellar, having powered up all the discarded monitors and laid down reams of electrical cables—to what end, we do not yet know. Though Ura-Acca surmises that she has somehow influenced Himari to take her own life. How else would the girl have known about Ura-Acca’s admiration for her mother? Where else would she have learned to make what will forever be to me now that uncannily sinister popping sound?

Here’s where it gets weirder. Unlike the suicides of subsequent egg girls, there is no indication that Himari, Frill’s apparent first victim, struggled with any mental health or other issues that would motivate her to take her own life. Indeed, her ‘uncle’ did not even reject her confession. (Again anime, why you do this thing?) Instead, the eggheads explain Himari’s suicide as being on account of the “temptation of death.” What now?

This is implying that death is somehow attractive, not just to someone facing overwhelming brokenness, trauma or pain, like the egg girls we’ve met so far, but to someone on the verge of stepping from a (relatively) happy childhood into young adulthood, with the promise of potential love to look forward to; someone who has not known suffering, but rather only smiles and cake. (To be fair, it is always possible that she experienced trauma in the womb, or was more deeply affected by her father’s sadness than Ura-Acca’s memories belie.)

That’s my question too, Ai.

The notion of death as somehow attractive or even beautiful is rather alien to Western culture. Certainly, there will always be some who romanticize death, à la star-crossed lovers (Shakespeare, I’m looking at you). But in general, Western culture views death as something ugly and frightening, something to avoid until it is staring you directly in the face, and even then, closing your eyes in denial is a perfectly reasonable response. Death is one of those things we don’t talk about. In my experience, Anglo-American culture is not very good at even mourning death. We lack the grieving rituals and observances of other cultures, and instead seek to confine death to the sealed, sanitized spaces of hospitals, care homes, and funeral parlors. We keep it shrouded tightly in silence. How could there ever be anything like the “temptation of death”? How could we ever consider death to be something desirable? Are the eggheads or CloverWorks simply aestheticising suicide and death here to make it sound deep and philosophical?

No, I don’t think that’s it. Instead, Acca and Ura-Acca are doing what all good researchers do—and indeed what all Christians, as believers in an unseen spiritual reality, are also called to do: They are looking more deeply into phenomena that seem, on the surface, to already be explained. The two idol fans were consumed with their obsession, so when their idol killed herself, they followed suit. The young woman whose identity was wrapped up in her own appearance ended her life to preserve her beauty. The abused gymnast saw no way out, no hope in ever living free from torment. Some explanations may be more sympathetic than others, but they all possess their own internal logic. Contemporary society is full of a vast array of pressures and stresses and each one, taken to breaking point, can result in death. Case closed. This might very well be our conclusion from the first ten episodes.

Only the case isn’t closed. Because there is a question that has pervaded every episode until now, but has remained unspoken: How is it that death could even become an option for the egg girls? Why does reaching a breaking point trigger suicide? What made death seem like a savior to these girls? This is the question that episode 11 tackles, in its own admittedly obscure way. The eggheads are focused on the underlying, deeper reality that unites all the eggs’ stories, as disparate as they are—the common thread, which is the idea that death is a release, a rescue, a beautiful ending, and as a result, it is tempting.

“But we wondered if there could be another push that drove them to suicide,” explains Ura-Acca.

This is a really important question for us to be asking. Because it’s not just these traumatized, vulnerable girls who fall for the seduction of death. We do, too.

Just ponder for a moment: Have you ever anticipated how wonderful it will be when, in heaven, you no longer struggle with that particular temptation? When your temper is no longer so short, when you’re not afraid of being hurt anymore? Or maybe you think about how one day, on those gold-paved streets, you won’t have to worry anymore. All your hard work coping and just keeping it together will finally pay off and you’ll cross that finish line and heave a sigh of relief, knowing that you made it in the end. Have you ever contemplated these kinds of things? I know I have.

But here’s the thing: When I expect my liberation to come only after I die and not right here, right now, then it is not Jesus who is my savior, but death. I am waiting for death to free me from temptation and sin and fear and brokenness, and usher me into eternal life. I make Thanatos my god.

The temptation of death is not limited to the drastic act of suicide, but also permeates all the accusations and fears that inspire us to put off living the fullness of life in Christ here and now. It’s the temptation to believe that it is death that will ultimately solve the more difficult and painful problems in life.

Acca and Ura-Acca seek to create a love that suits their ideals, just to relieve their stress.

The source of this “temptation of death” in Wonder Egg Priority is Frill, the AI. That is, a man-made, artificial version of love—with ai meaning “love” in Japanese. According to Ura-Acca, they made her “just for fun,” as a way of dealing with the stress of their enclosed lives. They designed her to suit their preferences, to make it easier to love her and forget that she was artificial. In this sense, Frill is the fruit of their self-centeredness, her every characteristic designed to satisfy their own ideals of how a daughter and woman should be. And this artificial love born of selfishness brings death into their midst and beyond, spreading it through the horrendous deformities of girlhood that she in turn creates, in imitation of her fathers. (Only perhaps her creations are less deceptive than theirs, wearing their monstrosity plainly on the outside…)

Frill’s creations. We’ve met Dash (right) and Dot (center), but who is that on the left? And is her name Morse??

To counter her destructive influence, Acca and Ura-Acca need true love, a genuine love. They need Ai, a messy, at times very weak human being, but one who nevertheless is willing to fight to live up to her name and maybe, just maybe, become a warrior of Eros.

There is also a deep, underlying force at work in our world, one that connects all despair and the actions born of it. A wide range of social issues, traumas and mental health challenges can and do trigger suicide, but they do not explain it fully. The deeper reality is the existence of an enemy who seeks to manipulate us into believing our true savior can only be death, whether it is right away by our own hand, or more subtly, decades from now by natural causes. But this is a lie, and it is one that we can combat. Just as I’m sure we’ll see in the final episode that Ai is equipped to wage the coming battle in WEP, so too are we armed, here and now, with the power to overwhelm the enemy’s “temptation of death”—we possess already the words of life, given to us by our true savior.

Jesus began his ministry with a public announcement that he had come to heal heart wounds, comfort those in pain, fill broken lives with beauty, and wrap those in despair with reasons to praise like a warm protective blanket, so that they might celebrate with joy once again. He came to bring freedom to prisoners and captives alike, giving a fresh new life to those locked up because of deeds done wrong, and those punished and injured at the hands of others. He came to take the outcasts, the weak, the traumatized and broken and transform them into mighty oaks, clean and strong; into people with the vision and skill and compassion and fortitude to rebuild a broken world (Isaiah 61:1-4, Luke 4:18),

He came to rewrite and restore our experience of life here on earth, and through us, to redeem our communities, cities, nations, and the world. God does not withhold the fullness of life from us until we finally make it to him in heaven. No, instead he moved heaven and earth to get right up close so that he could pour his own life out into us, even going so far as to breathe his very spirit into our hearts and bodies and minds. We don’t need to wait for death’s rescue—our hero has already come. But we do need to remind each other and ourselves of this truth pretty often, and let it work down deep into all the cracks and bruises in our souls until it strengthens all our weak spots.

In Deuteronomy 30:19, God tells the Israelites that he has given them the authority to choose between life and death. But he also tips the balances in their favor, urging them to choose life. In Jesus, he comes to tip the balances even further, making it possible for us to step into eternal life here and now, immediately and forever. So let’s do it. Each day, through each struggle we face. Let’s choose life and not death.

Warrior of love? And is Ai’s himawari (sunflower) related to Himari somehow?

Join me (in spirit) for the final episode on Tuesday to see Ai’s love triumph! (At least, I really really hope that’s what happens!)

[spices-and-cherries]

Rampage (Chapter 2)

JAMES BOND X READER

I do have to say that I’m kind of trying to mirror this after the flow of a normal Bond movie, so there is a Bond girl here (the relationship is completely platonic). Of course, I have no idea how well it’s all going to work out, but hey, it’ll be fine (right?).

I did not reference race, gender, sexuality, or physical appearance. If I missed something, please let me know so I can change it!

Warnings: violence, death, breaking and entering

Chapter 2: Magic

It's three in the morning.

James had been waiting in Slane's dingy apartment since the previous night. If he was on a normal mission, he'd have left hours ago, but this wasn't a normal mission. Technically, it wasn't a mission at all. Therefore, no matter how impatient he became, he had to sit and wait. He simply had no other option. 

Besides, Slane didn't own anything of any significance to him. No receipts, letters, banknotes, phone numbers... Nothing. 

So this was how he found himself spinning a pencil for hours. The plus side was that Slane had some good leftovers - chicken wings and pasta. It wasn't until eleven o'clock that the door knob jiggled. James watched as a man walked in whistling.

"Sit down, right there." James motioned to a seat with his gun, realizing a moment too late that the man hadn't even locked the door. 

"Shit!" Slane jumped for the door. James, pocketing the gun, started to run after him down the winding stairwell, through the front door and out on the street. The man dashed into an alleyway and was already climbing up a fire escape by the time James caught up to him. With a running start, he leaped up onto a closed dumpster and scrambled his way up. It seemed that Slane didn't expect to be followed all the way up, so James watched as the man clumsily jumped to another rooftop. 

And thus the chase began. They hopped from rooftop to rooftop. At one point Slane managed to get himself in a tree and started his way down. James took the shortcut by jumping on a mini-van, leaving a sizeable dent. He followed Slane down alleyways, jumped over toppled trashcans, and narrowly avoided being hit by a car. 

James finally managed to tackle Slane in a dead end. After a few punches, the man gave up struggling. He drags Slane to the wall and sits him up, crouching down beside him just inches away. 

"Now," James, without breaking eye-contact with Slane, pulls out his wallet and opens it.  "Where did you take them?"

"I've never seen that person in my life." Slane's voice slurred a little at the end. 

"Is that so," He tosses his wallet on the man's lap. "Because a little bird told me that you were seen in the station by Chelsea, pulling them along with you. I won't ask again. Where. Are. They."

"I really don't know! All I was told to do was take them to a spot - an alley a block away from the station - and hand them over."

"Hand them over to who."

"Shit, man! I don't know!"

"Hmm." James pulls his gun out and turns off the safety. "How about now?" 

"I got the job from an envelope with cash! I didn't see nobody!"

"Then who was it that stepped out of the car to greet you?"

"Some henchman? A gun-for-hire like me? I don't know!"

"What did he look like?"

"Burly. Uh-shaved head? Neck tattoo of a bird. Three rings on one hand and a scar on his eyebrow. Sounded American..."

"Thank you for your time." James stood up with a smile. With a simple pull of the trigger, Slane was dead. Bending back down, he rifled through Slanes pockets. There wasn't much of interest except for a pocket knife and a business card with The End Club written on it.

-----

"Q" James was making his way back to Slane's flat. 

"What is it now, Bond?"

"I need your help finding someone." James found that he didn't need to tell him why he couldn't do it himself. Q would just have to trust him

"...Give me a moment." A minute passes by. "Alright, who is it?"

"What do you have on American guns-for-hire currently in London?" He could hear him tapping away on a keyboard. 

"There are currently 23 in the area. I have their files up."

"How up to date are they?"

"Very."

"Are there any bald men with neck tattoos?"

"...Yes. Three of them." He bit back a groan of frustration. 

"Are any of the tattoos of a bird? Or is there a scar on the eyebrow?"

"Ah. Finn Stone. He's from Brooklyn, New York... He's currently employed by a meat packaging company. There's a warehouse located in Hackney." 

"Who owns it?"

"The End Club. In fact, I think-"

"Q." He hung up. The End Club... James started to run.

-----

James burst through Slane's door and was met with a shriek and a gun pointed at his head. 

"...You're not Slane." It was a woman.

"Neither are you."

"Are you his friend?"

"Not that I know of."

"Then why are you here?"

"I'm looking for something, now if you'll-"

"What are you looking for?"

"...Papers." 

"You won't find anything - I've already looked."

"Maybe not, but what's the harm in trying?" With a smile, he passes by her to get to the desk. There really weren't any papers to be seen or in the drawers. He pulled the top drawer out again and started to feel around the underside. Nothing. The second and third were the same, but the fourth was a success. He grabbed a pencil and poked it through the little hole. Sure enough, the wood that looked to be like the bottom pushed up to reveal a stack of papers. He pulls them out.

"Huh. Seems like someone's done this before..."

"...Comes with the job." He began flipping through the pile. He finally comes across what looks like a receipt with The End Club written on it, the girl gasps and snatches it out of his hand. "Hey-!"

"Thank you for helping me - I'll leave you to it." She turned around to leave.

"Can I look at that?"

"Huh?"

"Can I please look at that paper?"

"Why?" James grit his teeth in frustration. 

"I just do."

"Uh..." She looked at him with confusion. "Why would I show you? I don't even know who you are?"

"I'm looking for someone and I have a reason to believe that The End Club has to do something with it." He pointed to the page in her hand. "That paper is the only lead I have!"

"...I..."

"Please?" After hesitating, she shook her head. "Look, I need-" His immense frustration at his situation was sliced away with fear as a realization came to him.

-----

"You kill me, then what? Your case is closed and you get to go home happy, is that what you think?" The man jeered. For a man inches from certain death, he was very sure of himself. The man waved his hand around, as if to showcase the building. "This organization doesn't end here with me! I have subordinates all over the world!"

"I wouldn't count on that. Johnson was was drowned two days ago in Brazil. Harrison committed suicide to escape debts a day before that in Russia. Reiss was stabbed in an alleyway in Italy yesterday morning..." James watched as Keery's face morphed into surprise then anger then mild amusement.         

"So a few of my men die - so what? Killing someone doesn't always mean killing the idea - the mission - Mr. Bond." Keery shrugged nonchalantly. "I still have a trick or two up my sleeve. A magic rabbit, if you will." 

"Too bad I was never one for magic tricks." And, without a second thought, James pushed the man off the roof, watching as Keery fell to his death with a thud. 

-----

How could he have forgotten so easily?

The last man of any importance, Keery's husband who went by the name of End, had reportedly committed suicide just days later. James had been too preoccupied to bother following the movements of the remaining men, but he had heard whispers a year ago about a club being formed with some very similar faces affiliated with it...

What if Keery's husband hadn't died after all? And this was some sort of sick and twisted revenge plan? 

For the first time in a long while, James had genuinely no idea what to do.

I might go back and edit this again... I made some big changes just before I posted it, so if there are any issues, that’s why.

- Simpy

[lilana163]

Reunited: Chapter 3

Cygnus Black definitely had a favorite, he wasn't the best father but he was certainly better than Druella when it came to parenting, for the most part. Bellatrix was seen as a disappointment because all Cygnus ever wanted was a boy to call his own, even though the poor girl did everything to please her father and mother. Andromeda was always quiet and kept to herself, Cygnus never thought of his second as a disappointment or disgrace because quite frankly she never gave him a reason to. Narcissa was much like Andromeda, the blonde had a liking to being invisible so it was rare that the angel of the Black sisters would have to face the wrath of Cygnus or Druella. Aurora on the other hand always had a goofy and kind persona, she never felt the need to go invisible and not be herself or beg for the attention of either of her parents, which is why Cygnus Black adored the raven-haired girl the most.

So when he overheard Walburga speak to Orion about Druella almost torturing his daughter into insanity all he could see was red, he loved his wife and would sometimes agree to the punishments she gave their children, but the only person Cygnus loved more than Druella Black was Aurora his precious little star, or so he called.

The black-haired man furiously slammed the door to both his and Druella's bedroom open, his wife sat on the couch with a cigarette between her fingers as she stared into nothingness.

" You almost tortured her into insanity!" Cygnus screamed slamming the door behind him, a bitterness crept on Druellas face as she glanced at her husband.

" That girl needs to learn how to behave," Druella spoke letting a tear fall from her eye, Cygnus rushed up to the blonde lifting her up from where she sat, pinning her up aggressively on the dark green walls grasping onto her neck tightly making the blonde gasp for air.

" You don't torture her to an extent where she could be driven to insanity, if I lose Aurora because of you I'll kill do you hear me?!" Cygnus screamed into the blondes face tightening his grip around her neck, his grey eyes watery as they stared into Druellas green ones.

" You wouldn't d- dare," Druella managed to respond her words barely audible from the tight grip on her neck, Cygnus let on an amused laugh that disturbed the blonde who slowly started to let fear consume her.

" What makes you say that?" Cygnus asked his wife who stared into his cold watery eyes, she then figured out that the man who stood in front of her isn't the man she married but just someone who looked like the shy man who said I do many years ago.

" Because you love me," Druella muttered her words making Cygnus expression soften, he let her go dropping the blonde on the floor, Druella held onto her neck taking as much air she could, Cygnus walked over to the door opening it but before Cygnus left he glanced one last time at his wife.

" Don't count on love, it can get you killed," Cygnus last said leaving the blonde alone in the room. Druella curled up into a ball laying on the floor allowing her tears to fall, she looked at her reflection on the wall desperately crawling to the mirror. Druella winced as she touched the marking of her husband's hand on her neck, she stared into her eyes crying with uneven breathes Druella Black a protective mother, loving wife, a broken woman, she was slowly falling apart, her perfect picture life getting harder to maintain by the day. She was lost, the woman who stared back was unrecognizable she had no idea what her life was to become, and that fearless woman who wasn't afraid of no one was now fearing for her life in many ways.

Cygnus walked across the manor to find his daughter, he reached Aurora's room finding Walburga pacing back and forth in front of the closed white door. His loud footsteps caught the attention of his sister who looked back at him with worried eyes.

" Walburga?" Cygnus whispered loudly slowly approaching the black-haired woman, her grey eyes held concern and nothing more, she was a vile lady but that didn't stop her from caring which was an emotion all Blacks learned to hide, at moments like these maybe it was appropriate to show feelings, yet that's showing weakness, and Blacks are far from weak.

" I'm to assume that you're here to check on Aurora?" Walburga asked Cygnus not bothering to cover the worry which laced in her words.

" Yes," Cygnus replied not quite sure what to make of the situation, his sister never showed anything but coldness, so it would be an understatement to say that he was surprised.

" I would like to know of my niece's well-being, so if you could find me after you see Aurora, that would be much appreciated," Walburga quickly stated rushing off to the direction Cygnus came from with her long black dress flowing behind from the quick movement.

A gentle knock was heard behind the white door alerting all the young Blacks of someone wanting to enter, they all shifted their gaze to the young black-haired girl who put on her brightest smile in an attempt of easing the tension.

" Come in," Aurora announced watching as the door opened revealing her father, the man seemed tense but once he locked eyes with his daughter's green ones he felt his body relax letting out a loud breath he hadn't known he held.

" How's my little star?" Cygnus approached the young girl standing on her bedside, Bellatrix loudly scoffed at the nickname earning a hard glare from Andromeda.

" I'm doing just fine Papa, I could outrun you in a race if I really wanted to," Aurora teased her father nudging him lightly with her elbow, he let out a low laugh playfully shaking his head.

" Rubbish, I always win when we race!" Cygnus boasted puffing out his chest and fixing his posture, looking down at the girl who held amusement in her eyes.

" Because I'm nice enough to let you win old man," Aurora revealed laughing as his facial expression dropped at the word old, the group around them awkwardly stood around the pair feeling nothing but envy at the interaction, though a certain blonde smiled brightly at her father and sister she was certainly happy that they had the relationship they did.

" How about we go and paint, what do you think little star?" Cygnus asked Aurora who nodded excitedly jumping out of her bed, she stumbled a bit from the effects of the cruciatus curse but the little girl managed to hide her weakness and masked it with an energy she didn't have, at a young age Aurora Black learned how to mask and hide things away, not for her but the benefit of those around her, all she ever wants is for good energy to surround those around her which meant that she would have to learn how to hide her true self, but everyone always has that one person who could see through their fake happiness and Auroras person was Narcissa Black.

Cygnus and Aurora left the room not before saying one last goodbye to the others, the father and daughter duo walked across the dark corridor into an art studio, when Aurora was younger she found Cygnus painting and from there, Aurora took interest in her father's hobby which soon became hers.

The studio was surrounded by painted canvases all that belonged to both Aurora and Cygnus, the artwork around them always had a deeper meaning than what caught the naked eye. Cygnus taught his daughter that Art should always have a deeper meaning than just art drawings of an apple and so on, the black-haired man believed that art is one way to express feelings, thoughts, a story, and observations. He always made sure that his daughter's art held a bigger purpose and each canvas the little girl painted always did.

" I'm going to start a new painting Papa," Aurora hummed making her way over to a blank canvas taking it to her easel and paint.

" Fine by me little star, may I ask what you plan to paint this time?" Cygnus told his daughter while he prepared himself to finish his own painting he started two weeks ago.

" You'll find out," she glanced at her father with a small smile before sketching her face on the blank canvas occasionally looking into the mirror she set up beside her.

" Papa, do you love mum?" Aurora mumbled not moving her eyes from her work, Cygnus stared at the girl in shock she had always been so upfront with him on many occasions but this particular question set him off.

" Of course I love your mum Aurora, why wouldn't I?" Cygnus answered going back to his painting not without sparing a few glances at the girl who took a while to respond.

" You two argue a lot, are you sure you love, mum?"  Aurora stated glancing into the mirror analyzing her mouth and each detail that came with her plumped pink lips.

" Do you love mum?" Cygnus returned with a question watching how Auroras let out a genuine smile that reached her eyes.

" Of course I love mum," Aurora turned to met his gaze smiling lightly before turning back to the canvas which stood in front of her.

" But don't you two argue a lot?" Cygnus sent a cheeky grin to his daughter who playfully stuck her tongue out at the grey-eyed man.

" Touché, Mr. Black," Aurora said nodding her head in amusement, Cygnus chuckled at his daughter's reaction before resuming back to his half-done painting.

" I heard you singing to Sirius a few weeks ago, I must admit I'm oddly curious where you heard such a song," Cygnus let out changing the subject unknowingly triggering something inside the little girl.

" You heard that?" Aurora dropped her attention from her painting instead focusing on her father, he rose a brow at the girl her confidence no longer lingering in her tone.

" It was quite a beautiful song, I'd love to listen to it, who's it by again?" Cygnus questioned glancing at his green-eyed daughter who blushed by his comment.

" I actually wrote the song," she shyly whispered Cygnus looked at his daughter not knowing how to feel, he had only heard a few sentences as he passed the corridor though it was enough for him to realize the song was made because of dark thinking.

" I only ever wrote it for Sirius and me, it brings peace to us," Aurora added trying her best to hint that he wasn't meant to hear the song, Cygnus had a worried expression covering his face recalling each word he managed to hear.

" And you relate to the song?" the grey-eyed man queried hoping he was wrong, Aurora simply nodded moving her uncomfortable gaze to her canvas.

" The shadows in your head, they've got you down again, got you feeling low," Cygnus softly spoke staring deep into his daughter's side, Aurora felt his burning gaze but instead kept her focus on the canvas before her.

" It's just words," Aurora remarked fiddling with the hem of her white dress, Cygnus didn't know what to make of the idea of his daughter or nephew feeling such away, so he sat there on his stool letting the silence linger once more.

" Songs are considered art, and art is not meaningless it always tells a story," Cygnus responded under his breath loud enough for the black-haired girl who sat across the room to hear.

" I'm aware Papa," Aurora said with tears brewing in her eyes which she quickly blinked away before they could get noticed and attract unwanted attention.

[songsofacagedbird]

you’re something out of a dream

a love letter to luxor’s balo driskell

While I think tissues are needed at this point for all three of these playlists, can I just say with Balo’s I think they’re especially needed? Maybe I’m just extra soft for Balo in general but hers personally made me the most emotional, she definitely went hard with this one. Anyway, it covers the entire Luxor timeline for her just about, major plot points and stuff, but a bit less so the reveal of her main secret that occurred during graduation honestly - as this playlist was made before that and given it took me ages to perfect the end, I’m just going to leave it be. 

Again, there’s references to other muses / plot points littered throughout, as well as references to eating disorders and a couple nicer things like her love for art. I’d also like to thank Lex for her help during these playlists, from the idea itself to helping me test listen yet again, this is going to be a pattern in these descriptions and I’m sorry for anyone who like “Katie stfu” already but genuinely it’s really thanks to her that these even exist and honestly they’re actually some of the playlists I am most proud of to date.

Please keep in mind that the standard Balo triggers apply (mental health, eating disorders, abuse / child abuse). Any additional tws will be noted on their sections if they apply.

in dreams you will lose your heartaches. whatever you wish for, you keep | pre-luxor (aka pre-rp):

balo before luxor, navigating her life

Song of the Caged Bird (Lindsey Stirling) [ instrumental ] // Castle On A Cloud (Isabelle Allen) [ I know a place where no ones lost. I know a place where no one cries. Crying at all is not allowed, not in my castle on a cloud. ] // Paint the Pictures (of Verona) [ I paint the picture of the oceans I'll never see. I hold a candle through the darkness so I believe. ] // almost home (mxmtoon) [ No one ever says all the love you give might not be enough. Broke my heart in two a couple times before it hurt too much. ] // A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes (Lily James) [ Have faith in your dreams and someday your rainbow will come smiling through. No matter how your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing the dream that you wish will come true. ]

does it hurt to see how our smiles have changed, my friend? | summer & fall 2019:

the period of time I was playing Balo in Luxor originally, from June 2019 right up until her intervention in October

Friends In The Corner (Foxes) [ Do you need someone? Everybody's looking like they need someone. All of my friends in the corner, everybody's looking like they need someone. Pretending we don't fear the morning. ] // Scars To Your Beautiful (Alessia Cara) [ She says, “beauty is pain and there's beauty in everything. What's a little bit of hunger? I could go a little while longer,” she fades away. ] // Never Gonna Let You Down (Colbie Caillat) [ I'm never gonna let you down, I'm always gonna build you up. When you're feeling lost, I will always find you, love. ] // Running with the Wolves (AURORA) [ There's blood on your lies, the scars open wide. There is nowhere for you to hide, the hunter's moon is shinin'. ] // She Is the Sunlight (Trading Yesterday) [ And it will take this life of regret for my heart to learn to forget. Tomorrow will be as it always has been, and I will fall to her again. ]

you keep trying to get inside my head while i keep trying to lose the words you said | winter 2019 & early Spring 2020:

Balo’s hospitalization, and the time at home following it.

All the King's Horses (Karmina) [ Is it still a home when you're all alone? All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put me back together again. ] // Safe (Britt Nicole) [ Oh no, my walls are gonna break. So close, it's more than I can take. I'm so tired of turning and running away. ] // Lost Boy (Ruth B.) [ There was a time when I was alone, no where to go and no place to call home. My only friend was the man in the moon, and even sometimes he would go away too. ] // Keep Your Head Up (Ben Howard) [ 'Cause I'll always remember you the same, eyes like wild flowers with your demons of change. ] // Wake Me Up (Madilyn Bailey) [ They tell me I'm too young to understand. They say I'm caught up in a dream. My life will pass me by if I don't open up my eyes, well that's fine by me. ] // Dance (Foxes) [ I want you, got no shame. This therapy's gone to waste; when the midnight hour comes in vain, you're in my head, you say my name. ]

what the fuck are perfect places anyway? | spring 2020:

Balo’s return to Luxor, leading up to her breakdown at prom additional tws: drugs and alcohol (perfect places)

Good Day for Dreaming (Ruelle) [ There's a hope, there's a spark, there's a fire. There's a light in the dark burning brighter. It's a good day for dreaming. ] // Perfect Places (Lorde) [ All of our heroes fading, now I can't stand to be alone. Let's go to perfect places! ] // prom dress (mxmtoon) [ I'm sitting here, crying in my prom dress. I'd be the prom queen if crying was a contest. Makeup is running down, feelings are all around. How did I get here? I need to know... ]

i would sell my sorry soul if i could have it all | summer 2020:

summer camp adventures, and the starts of questioning who she is

Live Life (Zayde Wølf) [ Sometimes I think that I'm the dreamer, the one that's standing all alone. Sometimes it feels like it's forever since I've truly felt at home. ] // Celeste (Ezra Vine) [ You're something out of a dream, messing with my head and I've been looking for you. Are you hiding? ] // The State of Dreaming (MARINA) [ If only you knew my dear, how I live my life in fear. ] // If Only (Dove Cameron) [ If only I knew what my heart was telling me. Don't know what I'm feeling; is this just a dream? If only I could read the signs in front of me, I could find the way to who I'm meant to be. ]

my heart can't possibly break when it wasn't even whole to start with | fall & winter 2020:

balo’s disownment, her breakup with kitty, and coming to terms with them

raindrops {an angel cried} (Ariana Grande) [ The day you left me, an angel cried. ] // Because of You (Kelly Clarkson) [ I was so young, you should have known better than to lean on me. You never thought of anyone else, you just saw your pain, and now I cry in the middle of the night for the same damn thing. ] // human (Christina Perri) [ Your words in my head, knives in my heart, you build me up and then I fall apart 'cause I'm only human. ] // Illusion (Zedd feat. Echosmith) [ It feels like the fairytale is over. I really wanted these pages to begin with once upon a time like all those lullabies. I should've known better. ] // Cry (Kelly Clarkson) [ Is this as hard as it gets? Is this what it feels like to really cry? ] // drivers license (Olivia Rodrigo) [ Sidewalks we crossed. I still hear your voice in the traffic, we're laughing over all the noise. God, I'm so blue, know we're through, but I still fuckin' love you. ] // Until The Sun Comes Up (Gabrielle Aplin) [ Do you want to get lost? Go waste our time, lose this city skyline. Be so much better if you're by my side, find myself and lose my mind; think I need a moment to re-align. ] // Part Of Me (Katy Perry) [ Throw your sticks and your stones, throw your bombs and your blows but you're not gonna break my soul. ] // Love Not Loving You (Foxes) [ You were always giving me all of your insecurities. How could you do it? You knew what you were doing to me. ] // no tears left to cry (Ariana Grande) [ Right now, I'm in a state of mind I wanna be in like all the time, ain't got no tears left to cry. ]

you forgive, you forget, but you never let it go | spring 2021:

her classmates choice in the gym, and it’s aftermath additional tws: drowning (When the Storm is Over)

Bad Blood (Taylor Swift feat. Kendrick Lamar) [ Remember when you thought I'd take a loss? Don't you remember? You thought that I would need ya, follow procedure, remember? Oh, wait, you got amnesia. ] // Talking to Ghosts (Foxes) [ And I can be your guiding light if you just let me, but I can’t be your guiding light if you have left me. ] // When The Storm Is Over (Sofia Karlberg) [ But when it comes down something in the air says we're 'bout to drown. Baby, we wеren't meant for closure, tеll me when the storm is over. ] // Try (Colbie Caillat) [ You don't have to try so hard, you don't have to give it all away. You just have to get up, get up, get up, get up, you don't have to change a single thing ] // Still Have Me (Demi Lovato) [ So take my faith but 'least I still believe (I still believe, in me), and that's all I need. I don't have much but 'least I still have me. ]

and i don't really care if nobody else believes ‘cause i've still got a lot of fight left in me | early summer 2021:

the story of therapy, the start of recovery, learning to love oneself, and a little bit of romance.

Daisies - Acoustic (Katy Perry) [ They told me I was out there, tried to knock me down. Took those sticks and stones, showed 'em I could build a house. They tell me that I'm crazy, but I'll never let 'em change me 'til they cover me in daisies. ] // Home (Gabrielle Aplin) [ I'm a phoenix in the water, a fish that's learnt to fly. And I've always been a daughter but feathers are meant for the sky. ] // Change (Taylor Swift) [ ’Cause these things will change, can you feel it now? These walls that they put up to hold us back will fall down. ] // Dear Happy (Gabrielle Aplin) [ Don't you worry, oh no, don't be alarmed. I'm just working it out here, working it out here. I'm somebody with a recovering heart, you've waited there for me, keep waiting there for me. ] // Fight Song (Rachel Platten) [ And all those things I didn't say, wrecking balls inside my brain. I will scream them loud tonight, can you hear my voice this time? ] // Catch My Breath (Kelly Clarkson) [ Catching my breath, letting it go, turning my cheek for the sake of the show. Now that you know, this is my life, I won't be told what's supposed to be right. ] // Wildflowers (Elle Fanning) [ Wildflowers you brought me are crumbled in my hands. This love that you taught me, I still don't understand. ] // Begin Again (Taylor Swift) [ And for the first time, what's past is past. 'Cause you throw your head back laughing like a little kid, I think it's strange that you think I'm funny 'cause he never did. ] // Let's Sort The Whole Thing Out (Carly Rae Jepsen) [ I love you, this is a new thing. One more drink, let's get to the bottom of it. I love you, let's sort the whole thing out. ] // Youth (Foxes) [ And as we cross the line, these fading beats have all been severed. Don't tell me our youth is running out, it's only just begun. ] // Soft to Be Strong (MARINA) [ I took my bitterness and made it sweet, I took a broken heart and made it beat. ] // Way Less Sad (AJR) [ Don't you love it? Don't you lovе it? No, I ain't happy yet, but I'm way less sad. ]

[ssaalexblake]

I actually do think 13 has serious trust issues? I know there are a million and one reasons for her behaviour in s12, her confusion at who she is and the massive identity crisis she’s having, the left over trauma from what happened to Bill etc etc

But there’s also an angle where she might just not Trust the fam, to be honest. Or more precisely, not trust Anybody. 

Think about it, she meets them in the time it takes for her to fall from the tardis to the train, which cannot have been a long time lbr, she runs into them mere minutes after regeneration, and the last few days of twelve’s life, and a great deal of trauma incurred, entirely revolved around being betrayed by a friend. 

I know, and we know that Missy wanted to go back to twelve, but the doctor doesn’t. According to 13, the going got tough and it proved the whole 75ish years the doctor spent staying (mostly) still trying to help them were pointless. And 12 wanted So Badly to trust Missy, wanted her to be good more than anything. But he was going to die... And she left him. The going got tough and that was that. 

So the fam are the first people the doctor has let anywhere near them since a great betrayal. And she didn’t even want to let them close, she only accepted them as part of a unit in episode 4 and They asked Her to stick around, she didn’t invite them. 

But it’s fine in season 11, the stakes aren’t high, she’s not come across any terrible situations she can’t handle, she’s not come across anything she can’t explain away and isn’t making herself look badly in their eyes. She hasn’t had to face a situation where her friends, whom she Is very much attached to even thought she didn’t want to be, are put in a place where they may judge or betray her because she’s managed to only show them her positive attributes. 

Then, of course, the root of her trust issues flounces gleefully back on screen, betraying her in the process of revealing himself, compounding the previous trauma some more as well and in that she’d pretty much given O the companion invite, it invites more distrust to the Other companions in her mind. And in the process of the betrayal, he manipulates one of the fam into truly wondering what she isn’t telling them and then all Three of them decide they need to know things. 

The master delivered the Ultimate blows to her in spyfall, he destroyed every good thing she had going in s11 in one fell swoop, he delivered the news about what he’d done to Gallifrey and gave her just enough information to torture her through not knowing, he made the fam Question her and her question her own judgement over human friends. 

And at the end of the episode, by the time they get the chance to demand answers, she’s already been severely traumatized... Things have gotten Hard again. 

13 had to explain to them her and the master were old friends, she couldn’t really get around that, and she knows now that Gallifrey is in ruins, she’s been brutally reminded why trusting even the closest of friends is a bad idea... So why would she want to tell the fam her best friend destroyed their planet and risk their judgement? The doctor’s not stupid, they know the humans justifiably judge the hell out of them for their feelings and actions towards the master, it’s happened time and time again (another Bill reminder, in fact).

So... The fam want to know all these things, but all the things they want to know are Hard. And she doesn’t trust well. And she’s just been reminded of Why she doesn’t trust well. 

Of course she’s not going to tell them anything. 

She’s scared out of her mind they’re gonna run off and leave her when she needs them the most, and she Needs them right now. 

And she gets Low in fugitive of the judoon, she starts snapping at them and she gets so out of it and confused she Actually Tells them things. And she’s also a massive asshole jerk to them, incidentally. 

But they don’t go. 

They won’t take her crap, but they don’t abandon her when she needs them the most, either. They affirm her, they soothe the pain she’s in when she admits part of what is wrong, they make it clear they’re Worried about her and want to help her, not hurt her. 

And her Face when she realises despite that she’s been a jerk, despite everything in that moment and what’s happened to her, her face is so innocently and genuinely happy for such a short moment it’s kind of heartwrenching, actually;

And after this moment, she’s actually a lot less notably traumatized and angry for a few episodes, her behaviour in can you hear me? is dejected, but because they’re Gone. That moment up there, to me, is the moment she starts to put her trust issues behind her, and her feeling more comfortable around them lets her be more at ease, maybe even to heal a little bit. 

Then of course the cyberman shows up and triggers a reaction in her that is so strikingly vivid because that then reminds her of Bill, and that these humans who she Does trust now, could suffer the same fate as her. She’s very far gone for these three at that point, the idea of that happening is something she cannot psychologically deal with. 

She starts to spiral again from the moment Ashad shows up, but it’s not because she doesn’t trust them. It’s more like she is suffering the consequences of having not trusted them before, they don’t know the stakes or the score, they’re not aware what travelling with the doctor can Mean and she ends up with so much on her own shoulders because of that previous lack of trust, and across the end arc of episodes this very much almost gets all of them killed in the most horrific way she can conceptualize. 

I guess what i’m saying is, i think trauma has informed All of her interactions with the fam, even back in season eleven. What happened with Bill and Missy and the master Really did a number on 13 in so many different ways, and because of her reaction to that, history almost repeated. 

Her victory, of course, was that she learnt to trust them despite her trauma, and that she kept the promise that she made to them way back when, she Would get them home safe. And she did, she managed what twelve did not Despite her added fear, she trusted and was made better and happier for it. She managed to get her friends home safe. 

And really, that’s all she wanted. 

[bibbykins]

Heliophilic Rain and His Pluviophile (M)

Yikes, it’s been a hot minute. That’s my bad. I have been having it a little rough with my job and so I’m in the process of finding another one and that among a billion other things is slowing me down. Which makes me wonder if I were to open commissions if anyone would be interested? I also would like to add there is a scene that could be triggering so proceed with caution, please. Either way, thank you for your patience as always, and I hope you enjoy!

Pairing: (Soft) Yandere! Yoongi x Reader Genre: Smut/Fluff

Word Count: 8.5k

Warnings: possessiveness, yandere tendencies, anxiety, unspoken threat of sexual assault, slight violence, oral, penetrative sex, cock warming, toxic relationship (he's yandere ya kno)

Summary: He was the rain just as you were the sun, both too transfixed with watching each other to get any closer. Few things feel more refreshing than drops of fresh rain on heated skin or the warmth of the sun on a gloomy day. It would be a shame to not indulge in the natural wonders of the world before you.

“Her voice was like the wind. I could listen until it was all that filled me. I could listen until she swept me away into the vast ocean of her presence. I would drown if it meant I would drift back to her. Her voice was like the wind. No matter how much I tried to catch it, I would get carried away. Suddenly, I wasn’t in Kansas anymore. Suddenly, home was wherever she said it was, so long as she did so with that voice of hers.”

“His voice was like the tap of rain against a window. He was asking me to go out to see him, but there was something beautiful about the way I knew he wasn’t referring to me specifically. I was a mere onlooker to his presence. Even so, I would catch a cold if it meant I could reach him, even for a moment. I thought this, knowing I would never have the guts to go outside. I made peace with this until the taps on my window turned into knocks on my door.”

——-

The office had an industrial-chic style about it, filled with neutral tones and the clanging of chains for no other purpose except fashion donned upon its employees. The color palette was gloomy and soothing, just how Yoongi liked it, an aesthetic that his employees gleefully shared with him as well. Each morning, Yoongi would look out his office and admire his growing business, eyes never lingering on one place too long, he loved all of the office equally. This much rang true until he couldn’t tear his eyes away from your form.

“She’s like a breath of fresh air, isn’t she?” Hoseok placed his hand on Yoongi’s soldier as he watched you through the glass doors of the conference room you were currently introducing yourself in, “Don’t be too hard on her, she’s competent and hardworking, okay?” 

Yoongi could barely hear his friend as he lost himself in the way your eyes crinkled from a genuine smile adorning your face. You were his new host to one of the podcasts his company picked up. From the merger with Hoseok’s company full of his college friends, Yoongi went from popular podcast host and semi-popular producer to a CEO of Min Productions, famous music artists in production and performance,  who oversaw the production of music and several podcasts on several topics, and you were what he had initially dreaded.

From the merger, came money, but what also came with it was Namjoon, the PR head of the company Hoseok was a part of, being able to choose one of every five talents for Yoongi to build up, hopefully into fame. Yoongi had just reached his fifth host, the podcasts he chose mostly consisting of music commentary or general life talks from people with aesthetics aligned with his own. However, from the sea of neutral colors and low voices partaking in casual conversation came you.

You were a perky college senior with some light in your eyes still. You were a rare find and had no set style ranging anywhere from pastels to the grunge he was used to seeing, but what never changed was your smile. Your teeth made an appearance at least 10 times a day, judging by the third smile you had just flashed the crew in a two-minute time frame.

Your podcast, however, oddly betrayed your attitude. You ran a sex and lifestyle podcast where you asked questions most people were too shy to throw out into the world pertaining to the unspoken social rules of casual dating and sex. It was interesting, yes, but it didn’t align with the brand Yoongi had been building judging by the synopsis. 

The fuss he made to Namjoon ended as soon as he sat down and listened to a podcast of yours. 

—–

“I have a formal complaint I would like to file!” You proclaimed as Yoongi found himself listening to your most recent podcast, “Why the fuck can’t I get a sugar daddy my age? It’s almost like… like my age demographic consists mostly of broke-ass college kids living with their parents, in a dorm, or like ya girl, an overpriced apartment and not rich as fuck for no reason. Fucking whack, I’ll say it.” He unwittingly cracked a smile at your charm and sarcasm, “I spent one day on sugarbaby.com and had to watch vanilla straight porn at the number of wrinkly dicks I saw instead of profile pictures. That’s like the most boring porn. So here comes a Patreon plug for the brainwashing I will conduct on myself in case I saw anyone’s grandfather’s penis.” You had an unabashed charm about you that urged him to listen more, maybe just one more episode.

Yoongi found himself listening to your entire discography, even the less promoted music you released once every blue moon, which wasn’t half-bad. However, he couldn’t find a picture of you, most likely because you posted under the alias Sugar Sun. The only pictures of yourself being from behind.

“On this episode of men are trash: men are fucking trash. Hello all, Sugar Sun here, and let’s talk about my day,” Yoongi could feel his intrigue grow, as you kept releasing, your delivery became less forced and more natural, “I don’t talk much in class, believe it or not. I’m a stuttering mess and like two people know my name at my big ass university, so when I do talk and my shit hole of a lab partner yells at me in the middle of a presentation to speak up, I cry, in front of the class. But do I stop the presentation? No, I’m fucking frozen with fear, so I just continue with my tears and the presentation. Bitch, what the fuck I looked like a middle school drama kid doing a monologue in front of her math class for no fucking reason.” You took a deep breath, “In conclusion, I’m sensitive and men are trash. Now, to the podcast.”

You had gained more traction with your commentary on romantic life and general comedy, catching Namjoon’s attention, “Hello again, double S here, with a special announcement. I got like, an actual company to sign me! Wild, I know! I’ll get paid and have meet-ups and stuff, which means you lovely listeners will get to soak in my face and talk to me in person and really experience why the only orgasms I’ve had are self-made!”

—–

“Yoongi!” Hoseok tapped his shoulder, snapping him out of his trance you put him in.

“Sorry, she’s just-”

“Be nice,” Hoseok warned.

“Like sunshine.” Yoongi could feel the air enter his lungs as you sat down with a smile, “Like, what the fuck, Hobi?” 

His friend blinked, “Woah, shit, what?” He stifled a laugh, “You know, there isn’t a no-dating policy, right?”

“I’m well aware.” Yoongi rolled his eyes, “But there will be if anyone tries anything.” He spoke nonchalantly and Hoseok choked on air at his friend’s obliviousness while the glass doors of the conference rooms were opened, you pouring out from it, waltzing to Yoongi and Hoseok.

“Hello, Mr. Min and Ho-Mr. Jung, I’m Y/n, or Sugar Sun, thank you for this amazing opportunity.” You bowed as Hoseok shook off his bewilderment for just a moment to give you a small bow with Yoongi.

“I look forward to spending more time with you.” Yoongi spoke in his regular gruff voice, the same one that proclaimed to have your hand in marriage just moments before, “I find you’ll be a breath of fresh air to the company.”

“I also look forward to seeing how your podcasts go, you have a photoshoot in a couple weeks, right?” Hoseok smiled warmly at you as you beamed back to him. Yoongi swore the whole exchange was blinding.

“I do! I’m a little nervous, since it’ll be my big face reveal, and I don’t know how well I model.” You giggled and Yoongi found his new favorite song the moment you did.

Yoongi had a tendency to do this, whether or not he wanted to. He was a passionate man. He craved love and could see it coming from a mile away. Despite being one of the seven main heartthrobs of his college campus, he almost exclusively stuck to serious relationships, and he meant it when he said serious. Yoongi was a little, to put it lightly, obsessive. He was a jealous boyfriend, but he did his best to try not to be too overbearing. He was also excessively protective, and the women he dated were grungy free spirits who enjoyed the chase when all Yoongi wanted was to catch them then hold them for the rest of his life. Despite being blinded by his own passion, he could still see when it wasn’t going to last, having accepted to never find a girl to accommodate and sedate him when needed. However, when you looked his way, or he heard your voice, it was something more than a need being filled.

You felt your heart leap out of his chest, trying not to fall into Yoongi’s hands when you first saw him, and here he was, nonchalantly giving you an inkling of a smile. Maybe it was the lack of a solid fuck or a relationship, but you were definitely breaking some HR rules in your mind.

Suddenly, you became aware of the content you dished out. You talked about your sex life often, and he knows you’re inexperienced and terribly horny. You internally punched yourself in the face. He probably thinks you’re so weird. Yet, here you were, a huge fan of Agust D and now Min Yoongi was staring at you.

Yoongi smiled, “Don’t worry, I’ve had my experience with a face reveal or two.”

You returned his smile, remembering the day Agust D revealed his face. The whole world stopped, and you only fell deeper when you looked at his eyes, “I-I remember, I’m a fan.” You looked down shyly before facing him again.

“Funny, I am a fan of yours.” He spoke lowly as Hoseok had long walked away unnoticed.

You giggled stupidly, “A fan?” Your sunny smile beamed at him. He had always preferred rainy days, but if this was what the sun looked like, he could get used to being a little warm here and there, “I can hardly believe it.”

“I’m gone a lot and yet, your voice has a certain factor to it that draws people in. ” He mused as his eyes trapped you, “I wonder where you’ve been all my life.”

Just like that, the bubble popped. The chimes came to a screeching halt. The rose-tinted glasses were abruptly ripped off of your face. The magic cleared, and you were left with the realization that while you had damn near counted every interaction, no matter how minuscule, and he hadn’t cared to remember you until now.

“Here’s my personal cell,” He hands you a pristine card with silver numbers, “Call me if you need anything, and I mean it.” You take the card with a quaint smile that deflates

He’s never noticed you until now, of course. The answer to his thoughts was that you’ve been right here.

Before Yoongi could register the chill in the air without your smile, Hoseok came back, “Hey Yoongs, let’s go, we got a flight in a few hours.“ 

“Right.” Yoongi breaks eye contact with you.

“Have a good flight!” You smile, not as wide as before, and Yoongi sees it.

“See you Tuesday, y/n!” Hoseok waves.

“Don’t be late!” You giggle and as soon as they both are out of earshot, Yoongi grills him.

“You know her?!” Yoongi snaps as he enters the town car.

Hoseok blinks at him, confused, “Duh? I thought that was a given.” Upon seeing his friend’s puzzled face remain, Hoseok’s eyes went wide, “Holy shit, you don’t remember her?!”

The older male blinked in confusion, “I’ve never met her before?”

The younger businessman threw his head back as he placed his hands over his face in frustration, “She was in our forensics class and our history class last year’s fall semester and the year before!” He was exasperated, “Remember the super genius sophomore?”

Yoongi racked his brain. Last year? He had been dating some angsty theology major. How could he have let himself be blinded by a temporary fling when the love of his life was right there? He could kick himself at this moment. No wonder your smile faltered, you had remembered him, “Liar, you can’t be serious.”

“Dude, she tutors me to this day in history.” Hoseok deadpanned, “All she requires is I buy her meals that day.”

“How often do you guys have study dates?” Yoongi grits out as his friend snorts at the notion of it being a date.

“Your possessive is showing,” He snickered, “My girl is all I can see these days, no matter how cute y/n is.”

“I will end you if you touch her,” Yoongi doesn’t hesitate, “Especially with the way you treat girls,” His face scrunches in disgust before he grumbled, “But how often?”

“Every other Tuesday.” Hoseok smirked, “And you mean used to treat girls.” 

Yoongi huffed in agreeance.

—-

“Hello, party people.” Your voice entered Yoongi’s headphones as he leaned back on his hotel bed, “Sugar Sun here, in my bedroom. We’re calm, we’re casual, it is a Friday night and this one goes out to my fellow homebodies.” You switched off to play a song. Part of the contract you signed was that you are allowed to go live whenever you liked to encourage and tend to fans. You explained it was almost a tradition for you to set aside a Friday night in once a month for your fans and Yoongi found in comforting as he lay alone. 

Your taste in music was so unbelievably cute, he couldn’t help but smile at the lo-fi song, “And we’re back, hello all here and all who are joining as I speak. Today I took a tour of the studio my actual podcasts will be recorded in and holy shit, they seem to actually take me seriously as a personality and even artist, so expect some tunes soon.” Yoongi smiled at this, you don’t even know your potential, “I’m looking at the chat now to see if there are any questions, and- oh, yes, I did meet my boss. Yes, the iconic Min Yoongi. He is as dreamy as they say, but I have actually met him before.” Yoongi sunk a little further in shame, “Did he remember me?” You read from the chat, “No, of course not. I’m a voice, but no one will know me if I don’t use it.” You sighed out and he felt his heart clench. He was such a fucking idiot. “Which I don’t much beyond this mic. Am I scared to say this now that he’s my boss?” He held his breath a bit, “No, I doubt he’s listening. He said he was my fan, but he could just have said that to be a nice guy.” You laughed, a hint of sadness evident, “What a fucking disaster I must seem like if he were to, huh?” The sadness in your voice more prominent, “If he is, hi Mr. Min, please erase this from your memory, as well as my sophomore haircut.” 

The live went on as normal and Yoongi drifted to sleep to the melodious sound of your voice for the remainder of the flight. However, even in his dreams, you were just out of reach, and he couldn’t begin to put into words how much it killed him.

—-

You don’t know how you got here. You looked around at the shabby setup. This "photography studio” looked a lot, and you mean a lot, like it was a half-assed school set not long ago. You scoffed, throwing your hands up incredulously when you caught sight of a black couch. You really hated your manager.

The jackass was assigned to you and you were too scared to say how uncomfortable he made you. He treated you like a child, but the way he looked at you was too adult for your taste. He was constantly texting you and asking for photos of your face, which you were constantly rejecting. To top it all off, he wants you to call him Big Brother, not Oppa, Big Brother. You opted for Big Bro instead, since he won’t give you his name. No, to top it all off, he booked your photo shoot with a “friend” of his to “save the company money”. He asked you to show up in a dress no longer than your knees and you felt dumber and dumber as time went on for doing so. 

You stood in the middle of this studio-warehouse apartment waiting for this great photographer to show up. As you stood here, your initial thought was “how fucking ridiculous is that” but the longer you were there and the more you studied the ropes that were no longer as well hid, something in your stomach began to turn.

You were in actual fucking danger. This situation could not be a funny story if you didn’t live to tell it. Your eyes darted from different red flags in the room. A spot of dried blood scratches on the cheap wallpaper, bare plaster marks against the beige wall, a poorly-concealed camera you hadn’t noticed until now. Your chest squeezed when your phone vibrated. 

You could get out of here! All you had to do was send an SOS.

Hoseok: Good luck in the photoshoot from my other half and I! 

You smiled lovingly at the snapchat from the male, the more permanent girl in his life with a smile on her face and an encouraging thumbs-up. They were evidently on a date, finally, so there was no way you could call them to come get you. You would hate to bother them.

Mr. Min: Let me know how the shoot goes. 

You faltered over the message. He was professional as ever. Would he think less of you if you abandoned a shoot like this?

Yoongi agonized over the three dots that stared him down. He had to remind himself to blink as he watched the minutes tick by that felt like hours. What the hell were you typing?

It had been about a couple of weeks since you’ve been under Yoongi’s company and all had been normal. Your routine was the same, and so was his. Except for this time, you two would exchange polite texts on what the other would do.

Sugar Sun: Great song as always!

You would always send exclamation points or some sparkle emojis, even a sun here and there. Yoongi found himself unable to shield his cheesy grin at the texts you sent him. You were always the first person to praise his new work. He found himself craving your praise more and more, but he forced himself to remain professional.

Mr. Min: Loved your live.

He always used punctuation despite using fragments which somehow added an aura of professionalism that he effortlessly radiated in person. Nevertheless, you would always send back a sparkly thank you which made Yoongi melt. He prided himself on not overstepping boundaries by attempting to control your professional life. His self-restraint proved quite strong as he held himself back from taking you out to lunch or giving you special treatment. This restraint was put to the ultimate test when he found out you were assigned Hyungin as your manager. He was an unfortunate employee with constant reports that would ultimately be rescinded by the female employees.

He was a disgusting piece of shit, Yoongi deduced. Hyungin was the brother of the management agency contracted by his company, per Namjoon’s damn insistence,  and he was itching for that contract to end, and soon. Yoongi had to physically hold himself back when he found this information out, trying to respect you by not meddling or keeping tabs on you.

His resolve was a very thin string that was tugged and tugged as the days went on with Hyungin having total control over your schedule and an excuse to contact you 24/7. You were a strong girl and had not made a report. He had to respect that. 

Your lip began to twitch, a movement you quickly halted as you shook the fear off. Maybe you were overreacting. Maybe you were being stuck up. You weren’t like Yoongi, maybe you had to photoshoot in shabby places.

You: I’m kind of scared…

You shook your head, erasing the message and locking your phone. You huffed, it was 30 minutes past the scheduled time. Surely you had the right to leave? You heard the back door open and could feel the bile lurch in your throat.

Something was very wrong. You were not overreacting. There were several heavy footsteps and as they thudded through the warehouse, nearing your reaching form, you could not deny the quaking fear that traveled through your veins like electricity.

One? Two? No, four sets of steps. The uneven rhythm proved as much, too many for a measly photoshoot. Too many for you to take on all at once. The correct amount to hold you down. The correct amount to-

“Little sis, are you here?” A sickening voice called out and you realized the steps stopped with only his continuing. 

He was trying to surprise you. 

“Come on, dear, let’s get to know each other.” You could hear the predatory smirk on his face and you choked on a horrified breath as the fear pricked your skin and pierced your lungs.

You were choking on your own horror.

“Come out, come out,” He called and you were frozen, absolutely fucking frozen. 

Run.

You stood up, breaking into a sprint that was a hair too slow. You felt a calloused, obscenely rough handgrip your forearm with a vigorous force and you screamed. He was squeezing, and at this rate, your bones would surely snap, “Not so fast, little girl.” He stood next to you, breath pungent with halitosis. From peripheral vision, you could see his five o'clock shadow and you realized the size difference and the lack of camera. You couldn’t stop screaming, mimicking every cell in your body that seemed to yell,

RUN.

Just like lightning, you struck him with your head, harder than you knew you could stand. His nose gave you an all too satisfying crack and his grip loosened enough for you sprint again, this time more than quick enough to keep going. You heard the clamoring of footsteps and eventually, all you could hear was the sound of the wind as you turned corners you had no familiarity with, running until your legs could no longer carry you. 

Your legs finally shook you down to your knees in a part of town you barely recognized. You had passed through here once before as a freshman in college sight-seeing. It was a tourist spot and you exhaled on the sidewall as people stepped around you.

You heaved a breath that you swore you had been holding for hours with a small victorious smile. Your eyes scanned the area of regular people and your hands shaking brought attention to the purse you thankfully still had.

Without thought, you ripped it open, using your phone to call the first person you could.

“Y/n?” His voice was gruff, as if he was whispering whilst trying to talk normally, “Is everything okay?” He seemed confused, you had never called him before.

“Can you… uh…” You faltered after realizing the strangled sound you made, voice raw from the screams you let out, “…please come get me.” You nearly whispered.

“Send me your location, I’m on my way.” Yoongi didn’t miss a beat before adding, “Stay where you are, don’t go near anyone.” He ended the phone call and you followed his directions, dropping your pin. You sighed in relief as you took refuge on the sidewalk, draping the cardigan in your bag over your shoulder, securing it around yourself.

Yoongi shot up from his office chair, looking at his employees mid-powerpoint. His marketing team turned into ice at his gaze. His eyes were much darker than a moment ago, and his jaw was like stone, “I have an emergency to attend to, we will proceed at a later date.” The room nodded stiffly as their boss walked out, all of them unaware why, having been too scared to even try to listen to his phone call.

Never in Yoongi’s life had he sped so recklessly. You were 10 minutes away and something was wrong. Your voice had never sounded so vulnerable. He had never heard it that quiet before. You were in a plaza of popular building, and if you had a photo shoot today, this would not be near any studio at all. His blood boiled at the thought of anyone taking away your light.

He slammed on the brakes when he caught sight of your shrunken form on the sidewalk, your head jerked up at the sound as your entire body jumped. Why were you so scared? Your face had a small streak of makeup on the side of your face and his skin only flared as you scurried into the car and Yoongi began driving to a more familiar side of town.

“Please don’t take me home.” You pleaded, unable to face him due to the shame.

Yoongi chose not to prod, for the time being, only nodding in response as he drove. He could see you stare out the window at the passing building and he watched your shaking for curl into the car seat. He settled on this resolve of leaving you alone all the way up to the inside of his apartment until your lip quivered as you plopped down on the couch, eyes unwavering from its spot at your feet. Then, you began to cry. No, not cry, sob, sob your hardest and just like that, a single tear snapped the ever-thinning string of restraint he had left.

You were pulled into Yoongi’s chest as sobs racked through your body, you clutched his shirt as you soaked it with tears of fear, relief, joy, and you couldn’t stop. Hell, you could barely breathe. Even so, Yoongi held you as his expensive dress shirt crumbled under your grip and stained with your mascara and eyeliner proving not to be as water-resistant as you hoped. His grip was unwavering and when a hand went to stroke your hair, you could feel oxygen reach your lungs again. 

“It’s okay.” He breathed, “You’re safe now.” He fought the urge to clench his jaw again as you gripped his shirt harder.

Your breathing began to even as he whispered soft words into your ear until your eyes couldn’t cry anymore. The both of you stood there for what felt like an eternity, clinging onto one another as he felt the softness of your cardigan against his hands. You eventually broke the silence with a meek, “I’m so sorry." 

"Why is that?” He spoke softly, his last intent was to scare you.

“I ran away from the shoot, and I know it’s not professional but…” You shivered, “ He didn’t have a camera.” Yoongi could kill somebody, “He had three other guys with him.” Someone, no, all of them are going to have to pay, he concluded. Nobody involved would leave the ordeal with their lives intact. They would lose everything for trying to take his sunshine away, for making your light falter, for even a moment.

He ripped himself from you, to sternly meet your eyes, “Do not apologize for the swine you encountered.” Your eyes only reflected sorrow, “You’re alive, and that is what matters most, okay?” You nodded.

“You’re not mad at me?” Your voice cracked against your will as you looked up at Yoongi, eyes glassy and begging for reassurance.

He visibly softened, “No, Sunshine, I could never be mad at you.” You nodded in understanding, “But will you let me fix this for you?”

Maybe you should have known from the beginning. You looked at Yoongi, so eager to be your saving grace, eyes intense with intent, and yet his touch was so soft. A man in love was a dangerous man, you once read in a book. Yet, never in your life have you craved such a man before, and if Yoongi’s rage mixed with infatuation could measure close to love, you would take it. He was powerful, he was kind, and he was pleasing to the eye. He was offering you the world in that one question.

“Please.” You cast your pride aside, “They don’t deserve mercy.” An angry tear went down your cheek, “I’m so tired of trying to brave it, doubting myself, denying myself any chance of help.” You could feel the tear trickle with hot fury, “I’m so fucking sick of relying on myself.”

Yoongi was quick to catch the tear with the softest hand you’ve ever felt, “I’m here now.” He spoke with the utmost confidence.

Your relationship with Yoongi from that point for the next couple of months was interesting, to say the least. You had somehow moved in upon his request, him rationalizing it by saying they knew where you lived. Granted, he wasn’t wrong. Hyungin knew where you lived, but within two weeks he and the monsters you encountered were promptly locked in a very dangerous maximum-security prison. You decided not to dwell on how they took such a shitty deal with a well-deserved long sentence. 

Some things were above your pay grade, and you made peace with it.

Even so, he didn’t stop there. He could no longer stand on the sidelines anymore. That line blurred beyond recognition the moment he held you in his arms. He was essentially your new manager, stating he owed you at least that much after letting you fall into the hands of such a monster. Thankfully, the releasing of official statements and press conferences were received well. The victim-blaming for the nature of your podcast kept to an obsolete minimum. Your face still had not been released upon your request and you were able to move on, the media no longer covering the story as the sentencing was sealed.

The months passed in a flurry of Yoongi being awfully vague each time you asked about his personal life. He was constantly home outside of work, which you didn’t mind, but you didn’t want him to put his social life on your accord. You also had much less confidence in his infatuation for you then you did a couple months ago. Every time you tried to make a move, which meant a small brush of physical contact, he was not responding. The last time he gave you affection was the hug during your breakdown. The most you got out of him were a couple of head pats.

Like that did anything for you.

For crying out loud, you ran a sex and lifestyle podcast with no sex from the hot man you lived in the same home as.

Hell, the most emotion you see from him is the purest politeness you have ever encountered.

“Hello my listeners, welcome to the obligatory virginity talk.” Your voice was crisp in the mic as Yoongi laid in his bed, headphones in, listening to the newly released podcast. He was still a loyal listener, despite you living in his guest bedroom. He still could not get enough of your voice. If anything, he craved you more and desperately held himself back. He loved having you with him, but never did he think he would have to turn to rubbing one out during your more racy episodes or when he heard you pleasuring yourself in the dead of night. 

Not even his thoughts could satiate him with you right there, and yet, out of reach.

“It has come to my attention that many of you think I’m a virgin, not that it’s an insult..” He could hear the smile in your voice, “Alas, I am not, but that doesn’t change my hand being the most impressive thing my pussy has seen, I’ll tell you what.” You giggled at this, “No, I take that back, my magic wand is my BFF.” Yoongi shifted, wondering if you had your toys in your room. He had sent for all of your things after all. God, he could already feel his dick hardening. How pathetic you make him at the very thought of you fucking yourself silly, eyes rolled back, vibrator against your clit. He huffed, shaking away the thoughts, “ Anyhow, let’s talk trends I am late to, rare, I know, but what’s this whole spelling coconut with your hips riding someone business?” You pondered, “I haven’t ridden someone in a good while, and my dildo can’t tell me if it feels good, so I’m at a loss here.” You sighed almost longingly, “God, I miss getting fucked, but also romanced,” You groaned, “It’s been a rough as fuck dry couple of months, which didn’t bother me for a while considering… you know, but the world keeps turning and I stay alone but moving on…” You droned and Yoongi went into overdrive.

Did you seriously want to fuck someone? Like someone else? You were living with him now, why would you feel the need to have relations with anyone else? His fists clenched at the very concept. You couldn’t be talking for show, you were say too genuine. Before he could even stop himself, he marched over to his bedroom door, ripping it open.

Only when he did had did he realize that you were in front of him, hand raised to knock on the door, “Oh, hey.” You gave him a smile as you slowly retreated your raised arm, “I was just gonna see if you wanted to watch a movie with me?” Every so often you both would have a movie night in which you would try to understand his feelings with small touches and ultimately fail. Nevertheless, you enjoyed his company. Today, you were buying into an article’s advice and watching a scary one. Not that you were terrified, but you were a jumpy person. 

At this rate, you couldn’t tell if you were horny or just wanted affection.

Both, probably.

Your crush on Yoongi had only worsened throughout this whole experience to top it off. He was hot and kind who could blame you? And yet, he never made a single move as if he had no interest. God, what if he didn’t have any interest?

Your heart sank for a moment, “If not, I think I was gonna try to go out-”

“No!” Your eyes widened at Yoongi’s panicked tone when he cleared his throat, “I mean, I want to watch a movie, so you don’t have to go out.” He muttered and you nodded slowly. He could not have you going out, not after what he heard. You were craving other people. He couldn’t bear the thought.

“O…kay…” You smiled a bit, “Well, I picked a scary one if you think you can hang.” You gave him a sly smile before going to make popcorn. 

He smiled as he watched you prance to the kitchen. You were so beautiful and fun and everything he’s ever needed. All that was left was for you to be his, but he didn’t want to scare you away. He had to be a gentleman. He had to wait for the right time. That’s what Jin, Jimin, Jungkook, and Taehyung said. The only issue was that he had no idea what the hell that meant.

“You know, Mr. Min-”

“Yoongi.” He was quick as ever to correct you, “Please.” He sounded more desperate than usual and you nodded.

“Right, well I was just going to say that you have absurd taste in snacks.” You said with a chuckle, “All I ever see in you cupboards are coffee.” You wistfully sigh, “I need to go grocery shopping.”

The sound of you being so domestic-made Yoongi break into an ill-concealed smile as he settled onto the sofa, setting the oddly scary movie you chose up, “I can take you on Saturday.” You nodded when you finally found a bag of chips and sat next to the man of your affection with a cushion between the two of you.

You really couldn’t say what the movie was about, you had only seen it between the gaps in your fingers all while Yoongi watched it with a straight face. When it ended he said a short goodnight as always, except something in you, lurched out. 

“Actually, I think I may go out after all.” You swore you followed your mouth’s lead as opposed to the opposite. You just said shit and had to go along with it. Fuck, you didn’t want to go out. You wanted to stay home and be scared that there was a ghost in the closet, but now you had to get ready and shit.

“Why?” Yoongi stopped, hand gripping his door handle much harder than usual. 

You were taken aback by the question. It was valid, you supposed. But was it? How do you even answer that question? “Well, it’s been a while since I've… ya know…” You clicked your tongue, suddenly too shy to say,

“Had sex?” It was so blunt, and his eyes pierced through you and yet, you could feel your core tingle.

You were nothing but a sputtering mess, “W-W, I-I, Mr. Min-”

“Yoongi, y/n.” He spoke through gritted teeth as he stalked over to you. Despite the unconscious steps back you were taking, the couch brought you to an abrupt stop.

“R-Right, anyways, I-” You shut your mouth when Yoongi hovered over you with his presence alone.

“Say it,” He glared daggers into your form, “Say my name.” Before you could even open your mouth Yoongi groaned, slamming his hands on the couch on either side of you in frustration, “God, why do you want other people when I’m right fucking here?” Your mouth was agape at this, “I’m so sick of holding myself back.” He cursed, body pressing against yours.

“What do you mean? Other people?” You mustered and Yoongi let out a chuckle void of humor.

“I listened to your podcast about wanting to be with someone and getting romance and…” Yoongi seriously thought you had been referring to anyone but him? Him? Seriously? The hot man in the place you live? You couldn’t stifle your laugh which caused his rant to falter, “How is this a laughing matter I am-”

“So fucking dense.” You giggled, “I’ve wanted you to at least look my way for the past three years, and you seriously think I want to be with other people?!” You sighed, “I live with you for fuck’s sake, and you won’t touch me!” Now, you were letting your frustrations out, “I brush your hand, I touch thighs with you, I-I  scare the shit out of myself hoping you’ll at least hold me!” You heaved a breath, “And all you do is stay still!” You let out a frustrated yell, “The most attention I got from you was when I was almost attacked, is that what I need to do to draw sap from a fucking rock?!”

Yoongi flared at this, “Don’t ever think about putting yourself in danger.” He pointed at you, “I couldn’t take it, and I can’t take you not being honest with me, I thought you never noticed-” He was being a hypocrite, but he didn’t care.

“How could you say I don’t notice you when you straight up forgot I existed until this year?!” Yoongi was the one dumbfounded this time, and you took your chance to push past him, “I will go out tonight because I deserve-”

You couldn’t even breathe the next syllable before your back hit Yoongi’s bedroom door, his hands pinning your wrists above your own, the man breathing heavy. The air was thick with frustration as he gave you a stern look, “You deserve the world, I know,” The anger in you began to dissipate at his sincerity in his words, “And I am so in love with you, that I don’t think I’m worthy of giving it to you,” Your breath hitched at this, “But I don’t care anymore, because I would sooner kill someone before they put their hands on you, I’m sure you know I mean business, Sunshine?” You nodded, every cell in your body springing to life as Yoongi drew his lips closer to you, “So?”

You blew out a shaky breath with an equally shaky smile, “L-Love me? I-" 

"Say you love me, and I’ll do it.” He was more rushed this time, urgent almost, “I’ll stop holding back, and I will give you all that you deserve and so, so much more.” He was almost pleading.

What the fuck do you know about love? What does it look like? Sound like? Is it the way Yoongi smiles at your dumb jokes in the morning? Is it the way his voice sounds through the walls as he practices newly-written lyrics? He was a good man to you. He was an attractive man. He could give you the world, and all he wanted in return was your love. Could all of this be love? Could it be the way he’s made you feel the past couple of years, especially the last couple of months? 

Well, why the hell wouldn’t it be?

“I love you, Yoongi.” You breathed against his lips and he didn’t miss a beat in closing the gap so not even air could come between the two of you.

Electrifying all over again, but so, so different. This wasn’t fear. This was lust lighting a fire within you that Yoongi only stoked further as his silky tongue tangled with yours in a flurry of repressed emotions and endless unspoken confessions. His mouth attached to your neck and you let out a moan, quickly going to cover your mouth. 

He ripped your hand away almost instantly, “You’re rarely this shy when you’re in your room, why deny me your sounds now?” He growled against your ear and the pure sex in his voice only made you moan louder. He was the rain you had admired from afar, but now he was pressed against you, and holy shit, were you getting wet.

“Yoongi, I don’t know if I can wait, I want to cum so fucking ba-ah!” You yelped when his hand went to cup your sex under the long shirt you always wore. You were on your tippy-toes, too sensitive to press your full weight onto him.

“Such an innocent-looking girl with such a nasty mouth.” He squeezed you in his hand and watched in glory as your eyes rolled back, “Since you’re a fan, I’ll be nice.” He teased as he got onto his knees, dragging your panties down with him to the floor.

“Oh shit.” You let out a breath that was quickly stolen when his tongue pressed against your entry. He lifted your leg, placing it over his shoulder as his mouth lapped at your clit and you lost yourself in the feeling, moaning mindlessly.

“You taste like deliverance.” He mumbled against your pussy and this only made your eyes roll back at the eroticism in his words. You couldn’t even keep track of what he was doing anymore.

All you could do was feel. His tongue fucked you into oblivion as he held your hips still, determined to make you come with his mouth, and his mouth alone. He let out a lewd suck and you quivered at the sensation and action. He knew how to play you and please you that you did. His tongue entered you again and he let out a delicious moan which vibrated against your folds, “Fuck, you sound and feel so fucking good!” You cried out as his tongue made thick strokes against you that only sped up expertly as he moaned into you, “Can I cum, Yoongi?” You asked, a smart girl, he concluded. He smirked against you, full intention to deny your request until, “Please, my love, I want to cum in your mouth like a good girl.” You begged pathetically and he couldn’t refuse you. You had him wrapped around your finger and hardly knew it. He got to work quickly, tongue entering you again only to flick upwards and you groaned at this. Groans were quickly replaced by increased screaming as he stiffened his tongue and licked all around your sex. You began to scream his name like a mantra as you tighten around the muscle and came the hardest you ever had.

You slumped against the door, chest heaving, “You okay, baby?” The nickname from him elicited a tired smile. You looked down at the man, lips glossy as he licked them. He sat back on his calves and you wasted no time in diving at him on the floor.

Before he could react, you gripped him through his sweatpants and smiled when you realized he was rock hard, “Can I please ride you?” You looked up at him through your eyelashes and he knew he couldn’t possibly say no.

“Your wish is my command, sunshine.” He growled when you straddle him as he sat, legs spread and back against the back of the couch now. You gave a less than innocent smile as you reached for his member, delicate hands wrapping around him, only to pull it free and closer to your entrance, “Condom?” He questioned.

“Pill, I need to feel you, fuck.” You panted, against logical judgment, but it was lost when you pressed the head against your own entrance, “Shit.” You ground against Yoongi as his head lolled back.

He could hardly handle it as your hips twirled, the tip just outside your entrance. Finally, he had enough, and with strong hands pulled your hips to fill you to the hilt. Your mouth popped open in shock and pure masochistic delight as the pain only added to the high of lust Yoongi gave you, “Sorry, baby girl, I knew you would feel so fucking good.” He emphasized this with a thrust up, “Plus, I could hardly resist being deep inside you immediately.” He growled in sadistic pride as your face twisted in pain and pleasure.

“Hurts so good.” Your hips moved spastically, chasing another high with Yoongi deep inside you. Not once did you lift your hips. You wanted to stay full, and Yoongi was more than happy to oblige, “So good, I wanna stay like this.” You moaned out as he sucked on your neck, hands going under your shirt to grip your breasts with a fevor you craved.

“You feel like heaven.” He grunted against your neck as he littered it with hickey after hickey. You were his and the way you squeezed around him and clawed at his shoulder only spurred him further. 

Yoongi could feel himself twitching inside you and this only made you gasp as you gleefully squeezed around him, “Yes, yes,” You sounded like a prayer to him, “Cum inside me, I need it.” You were nearly screaming as he began to thrust into you at a rapid pace.

“Yeah? You want me to paint those pretty walls white, hm?” He teased you despite the strain in his voice, “Fuck it right into that pretty pussy of yours, no mine.” He grabbed your hips, working your body for his own high, “This is my pussy, isn’t it?" 

"Yes, it’s all yours, Yoongi!” You yelled and with that, he groaned as he came, ropes of cum that you could feel as his hips made good of his promise to fuck it into you. You milked him as you squeezed tighter before coming undone as you came with a scream that sounded like the next symphonic masterpiece to the fucked out man inside you.

You huffed a small chuckle against his neck as your curled your form around his, “So needy.” He teased as he went to remove himself inside of you only to be met with a squeeze from you that made him curse, “You’re gonna kill me, I swear.”

You giggled, “I like how you feel inside of me.” You shrugged before shivering at the empty feeling only to gasp when three fingers were shoved into you. You wiggled in glee, “Fuck.” Your breath hot against his neck.

 "You just like to be full, huh baby?“ You nodded shyly, "You’re perfect.” He chuckled as he used his other hand to stroke your back.

—-

“Announcement time, my dear listeners” You spoke in the studio, trying not to sound like it was through gritted teeth. You counted your blessings that you were alone, “As you know, your dear old Sugar Sun has promised a face reveal and I-Min Yoongi!” Well, mostly alone. You heaved a breath as you came against his mouth for the third time.

The man between your legs looked up at you, eyes way too innocent, “What? I’m waiting for my part.” He spoke nonchalantly despite the wetness on his lips.

“I’ll never get there if you keep making me cum and start over.” You glared and the man shrugged, “I got far enough, right, babe?” You pouted and watched his resolve crack, “Honeypie?” You pleaded and he faltered, “Love of my life?�� He grumbled as he sat up next to you in front of the mic.

“Fine, go ahead.” He licked his lips.

“…and I decided to go a step further.” You smiled as the man next to you held your hand, “I will be doing a photoshoot to reveal my face and my collab partner to an upcoming song and my boyfriend…”

You looked to him, eyes twinkling, “That would be my cue.” He placed a quiet kiss on your head, “My name is Min Yoongi or Agust D as some of you may know, and I look forward to my career and life with this little piece of sunshine.” You giggled at this.

“So cheesy.” You gave him a bright smile nonetheless, “Crazy news, I know, but I secured the fucking bag, my dear listeners, he’s never getting rid of me." 

You were joking for the most part, but you didn’t know how right you were. You would not be away from him any longer. You were his sunshine, his little songbird, and his world all at the same time. He needed you like he needed to breathe. Now, you were his. You were his sunshine despite the rain he embodied. The rainbow between the two of you was too intoxicating to even bear the idea of giving it up. Even for a fraction of second. You were his. Every moment, minute, second, everything would be together. He was yours now and forever just as you were his. Blissfully and eternally in love.

"I’m too crazy to let go now.” You laughed as he kissed your temple affectionately.

So was he.

Buy me a ko-fi (it would make my day) 

Masterlist

[marvellouslymadmim]

Hi. Omg i just read your response to that anon about Calanthe’s grief and the comment about Calanthe’s death was soooo painful to read but I’d never considered that element of her su*cide. When I originally watched the series I just that her choice was just to avoid being violated and killed by Nilfgaardian soldiers; but I wonder now if she knew that they might keep her alive to get to Ciri. Maybe she knew she could do no more and just desperately needed to get back to Eist. The scenes following his death show a desperate and lost part of her that we don’t see at any other point in the series. I think it differs from the banquet scene because she actually is lashing out then, but after Eist dies she just accepts that she can no longer fight, Can no longer live. Ughhhhh I have a lot of feelings about this 🥺

Listen.

I have Feelings™ about Calanthe's final scene and what her motivations were/might have been. Once again, unending blessings upon the head of Jodhi May for giving us such fucking depth 🙌🙌🙌

So originally I saw it as her finally just giving up. Eist's death wrecks her and she's also badly injured when she returns (I mean you know she went full on murder gremlin beserker trying to get to Cahir once Eist was shot). She knows she can't fight, and she can't run. She tried to save her city but failed. So...as she's told Ciri before, she knows it's time to stop. Now she survives long enough to ensure she's ended the pain of as many of her citizens as possible, and that Cirilla and Mousesack have escaped. 

Over time (and yes several rewatches later) I started putting in bits of other parts of Calanthe's story and her sense of the world, as seen through the few glimpses we have of her before her death. And...it got a little more complex than that. Mainly because until this moment, we see that Calanthe isn’t someone who just rolls over and accepts her fate. She very much will give the gods themselves the middle finger while yelling out in explicit detail exactly what they can go do with their fate and destiny.

Calanthe's fatal flaw, like every Greek tragic hero, is hubris. And in tragedies, there is almost always only one price to be paid for it: your life. Obviously Greek tragedies don't exist in their world, but the concept of hubris and downfall obviously do. She's aware of her faults, even if she refuses to correct them, and I think she genuinely believes her spirit and determination to be greater than any consequence her faults might create, to be honest.

We see it at the betrothal feast: Calanthe hubristically refuses to bow to destiny and "any law made by men who have never borne a child" (fucking icon, we stan). She nearly loses her life because of it--as well as Eist's, potentially, and possibly destroying any chance of reconciling with her daughter. Even when Pavetta insists on making her own choice, Calanthe pushes against it, because she just can't let Destiny fucking win, even on a technicality. She believes, right up until Pavetta's power is revealed, that she can trick her way around it and murder Duny to prevent the marriage (granted, there’s more at play here--I think she genuinely believes she’s making the right choice for Pavetta).

Now, she gets knocked onto her arse, quite literally, and sees sense, somewhat (I theorize that she now knows that Pavetta can defend herself and doesn't need a powerful marriage alliance to help her hold onto the crown, which is the only reason she doesn't simply try to murder Duny again). 

But she gets thrown for another loop minutes later as she helplessly watches history repeat with Duny giving away her unborn grandchild to the Witcher. In the book, we learn that Calanthe was so fucking set on breaking Destiny’s hold that she commanded Mousesack to kill Cirilla before she was even born. However, once the child is born, Calanthe suddenly rescinds her order (I think perhaps actually holding the baby and realizing the full extent of what she was asking finally kicked in...plus Ciri obviously looks like her mother and I think it triggered some nostalgia for Cal). 

Calanthe learns a lesson of sorts (one she won’t fully learn/accept until the sacking of Cintra, though): when you push against Destiny, it always pushes back harder and takes more than it originally asked for. For every refusal, there is an added cost.

When Geralt comes back to claim Ciri (granted, to save her), Calanthe once again wages war against Destiny with her “will Destiny carry a banner into battle?” speech. Even when she most likely sees the logic of Geralt’s argument (and maybe even believes that he would bring her back), she simply cannot let go of this fight against a fucking supernatural divine concept. She let it go once, and in her mind, it is ultimately what cost her Pavetta’s life.

And so, when her city is burning around her, and her lover is dead and abandoned on a field of war, and her own life is slowly bleeding away as her granddaughter’s life enters a new and dangerous phase--Calanthe finally tries to bargain with Destiny. 

I genuinely think that is partially what Calanthe’s death is, in her mind: she made a foolish choice, and lost, and now fears losing Ciri in the bargain as well--because remember: Destiny will push back harder and take more now, in Calanthe’s mind. So in an effort to appease Destiny, she accepts her fate and stops fighting, and gives her own life, hoping that it is enough of a defeat/apology to ensure that Destiny does not punish Cirilla for Calanthe’s prideful and arrogant choices.

Because as disdainful as Calanthe is about it, I think she genuinely does believe in Destiny as a supernatural force. She just thinks she can overcome it, right until the very last moments of her life. And in the very last moments of her life, she thinks she can bargain with it, in order to save her granddaughter.

There is also this to consider: Calanthe’s discussions with Mousesack and some of her final comments to Cirilla imply that she’s well-aware of why Nilfgaard is coming here, and what they’re really after. Which means she might know the truth about Duny, somehow. If she does, then her death is one last “ha, fuck you, you can’t kill me because I kill myself!”

It also aligns with a phrase I feel like she genuinely lives by (and I have had her utter in a few fics): death before dishonor. It is interesting to note that two potential reasons for choosing death over capture (degradation/mutilation of her body, and potentially being used to find/lure Ciri) are still enacted, even after her death: her body is mutilated by the mage who eats the bit of her arm to track Ciri. Once again, Calanthe’s attempts to prevent a situation are met with Destiny choosing its own way, regardless.

I know Sapkowski was influenced by a LOT of various countries and cultures, but I feel like Calanthe and Eist’s story in particular is extremely reminiscent of Greek tragedies (I mean, Eist sees his fate in the stars and still chooses to pursue it? Calanthe is hubris personified, on steriods?). While obviously I get super emosh thinking about how their story ended, I do have to applaud the original storyteller for how well he crafted it, and how fitting it was, in the grand scheme.

[bitsofmybrothersdxxix]

Suicidal Session

Summary: Unable to face the events following the reveal of his anxieties, Ichimatsu decides to flee from home and end everything before his life can get worse for him and everyone he loves.

⚠️Trigger Warnings: Suicide, cutting, depression, anxiety. Proceed reading with caution.⚠️

~~~

Encapsulated by the shadows of the night, he ran. He ran with his lungs hitching and empty, struggling for air. That mask that was pinched against the lower half of his face forbade him from consuming more than the hollow pants he managed, but he allowed himself the struggle a little longer as he darted through the empty Akatsuka streets. The moonlight crested against the road, overlapping it with a faint, blue-white wash. Leaves crunched as the wind fazed through them on the trees, detaching some and rendering them soaring into the open night.

But the shadows were still havens for safety, from eyes. Ichimatsu Matsuno took his chance to let them tug him, and in their protection he shimmied away from the household worth twenty-plus years of his life. At the kilometer or so he had ran, he was very aware that there was someone calling his name...At least, perhaps that was what he wanted to think. He didn’t think there was anything more to hatred anymore that was aimed at him, and so there was no point hoping for the impossible.

Intersections were occupied with limited, roaring engines as they zoomed past the green lights. City lights were bright, but activity was heavily minimal. Everyone was drowned by the stars lingering under their eyelids, and in this time of their tranquility there was nobody to notice the dirty creature running past them. Ichimatsu waited a moment before the lights flashed red before he let the moonlight strike against him momentarily. Then in an instant he was in the darkness again, each pound of his sandals on the ground a reminder of his journey and how far he was getting from the place he once called home.

Only a few more and he was going to reach the beach. Only a few more and he was going to reach the cliff. He had heard his brother’s story about that cliff, and as much as it was less than ideal, he supposed he was now hexed to follow in someone’s footsteps. Only unlike her, he wasn’t going to survive. There wasn’t going to be anyone waiting by the seashore to lock him into silent conversation over the choice he was going to make. No. He didn’t have that. And so, he was as safe as he was endangered.

Ichimatsu gritted his teeth. In his own anger, he clutched his knife. If his skin was pale then, it was albino now.

They had called his name, some furious, others horrified. The floor in which they had trekked on for the entirety of their lives was never that drenched in Ichimatsu’s red before. But the circumstances that had led to that single moment had been swift and unexpected, and their lives had forever been changed due to that. His sleeves were rolled low, grief opposing his brother’s genuine joy. The intentions were far from similar.

But now Ichimatsu was exposed, and those intentions were easily revealed for all to compare.

Their oldest brother was appalled, disbelieved, heartbroken. “Why...?” he had croaked.

The second oldest wanted to get close then, their third at his heels and their youngest with his upcoming waterworks at their side.

The fifth had just stared.

“Sorry.” Then Ichimatsu had fled the room, all the shouts rising and slamming his back as he quickly stomped down the stairs and passed through their mother’s kitchen, swiping the sharpest blade from its drawer. And finally with a mask secure over his nose, his mouth, the door was thrown off its hinges and Ichimatsu was lost in the shadows of Akatsuka Ward. His brothers yelled his name—was that really them, or his imagination? No, it didn’t matter anymore. They were his past—his future was now shrouded with their freedom from him.

Never to see them again.

Ichimatsu’s heart suddenly hurt, and his eyes burned. He wasn’t sure why—he was certain that his choice was going to save him from his misery. But somehow, just thinking about his past was making a part of him want to retreat from its mission, and his pace almost slowed. The knife went numb where his fingers went limp. The shadows, for their comfort, suddenly felt menacing. It swelled in his chest and rocked his body, and Ichimatsu was weak, wanting to just curl up in his own guilt and run back with...something.

No.

End it.

Almost involuntarily like muscle memory, Ichimatsu raised the knife and dragged it over his sleeve. It marked faintly through the fabric, and caressed a scar buried underneath, formerly in the process of mending itself again. But for now...It was a tap, but it was agony. Ichimatsu muffled a whimper behind his mask, but in the instance that he was returned to reality, he continued to blend in the black and make his way through the ward. The only difference now was that the darkness had managed to look hazy, and that his cheeks felt wet.

It wasn’t raining. At least, the skies weren’t unleashing any storm over the town. It was just Ichimatsu unleashing the storm upon himself.

And all he wanted now was for the storm to stop.

And there wasn’t any other way of permanently ridding something other than killing it.

The knife in his hand knew this solution. The cliff, surrounded by crashing waves, knew this solution. It was only few though, who decided upon this route. It was a wonder why—for sure, didn’t answering math problems in school always have students relying on shortcuts than elongated solutions? Ichimatsu and his brothers had been in this clan, but lately, it was more of Ichimatsu’s mindset now. For the duration of his life as an adult, he had been shackled to problems that had solutions that stretched further and further away, wanting no pencil to scrape the answer.

The other way? Yielding.

Yielding was always so much more easier than dragging yourself into hopeless desperation. It was such a simple solution, ending everything so easily and smoothly and wiping off all of someone’s issues with the speed of a flicking finger. Its only parallel was dying too much inside, with sorrow over joy, and the fearlessness of a coward. It was because of the acceptance of a weakness that someone chose wielding, and for someone like Ichimatsu...

Heh, Choromatsu wasn’t the only one self-aware sometimes.

Dim, the establishment of Sutabaa promised memories of their youngest brother’s humiliation. The bridge, that held the memories of romantic rejection underneath the rain. The small, rentable idol center, where one of them had often visited to support the stars that would never love him the same way. The waters, which was painful for being the spot where being tied to be eaten by the waves symbolized the lack of family appreciation. And the horse races, a place of cash, and the habitat for happiness that was outside the happiness created by family.

Family, except Ichimatsu?

Well, they didn’t need to worry about him anymore.

Even if Ichimatsu, for the longest time, always worried about them.

No more worrying.

The beach arrived.

At night, the waters were black, like ink, only they weren’t as blobby. They were extremely smooth, and collided against the sand, their sound whole as they swallowed tidbits of the particles that colored like dust. Dangerous and dark, they were literally the passageway to hell, aware of the intent of visit at this time of night in opposition to the joy brought by the day when couples splashed around, and women lay under their sun to let their skin burn in the heat. Children made castles made of sand, and played pretend as princes and princesses, mermaids and witches. Pictures were taken to capture moments that needed more than the mind’s efforts to remember.

The beach was supposed to be a peaceful, joyous setting.

Still, at night, the beach showed a different side of itself. It was as double-faced as the rest of them.

Ichimatsu stopped running the moment he reached the first transition of soil to sand. He was panting, and as he lowered his mask he smelled the scent of the waves as they wafted in the air. They were fresh, natural, and welcoming for a swim. But their color, their appearances...The waves were loud, gobbling beasts. For all the goodness they presented, they were still as evil as the knife in his hand, the scars on his wrists, the cracks in his fragile heart.

The wind tore at him, ruffling his messy hair, whipping the loose parts of his purple hoodie, embedded with the same green pine that he shared with them all. Was it worth it that he take off his hoodie and leave it behind, leave it in life instead of taking it with him to death? Or was this one thing that gave a reason to smile before worth bringing with him, so that there was still a mingling spark of goodness to take to his afterlife?

Ichimatsu choked, and the wind felt cold on his face. Or, the wind made his tears feel like ice. And with that, the chills that were shuddering through his body; Ichimatsu wanted to just drop down and release all of it, all of the thoughts and emotions bubbling in his chest and stealing his heart. Except he didn’t drop down. He dropped the knife which thudded and marked on the sand, and while his shoulders were quaking and his heart was pounding like a rhythmless drum, his mouth peeled open and the first sounds of his utmost sorrow mixed with the sounds of the waves.

When at home, Ichimatsu didn’t want to cry. When he did, it was when he was sure that he was walking out of the front doors of another day, to play with cats in the alleyway, where he would unveil the silver that was hidden in his pockets and slide it over what was exposed of his rolled sleeves. No one asked why he was pale upon returning home, why he was anguished in silence, nor why he refused to join them in days at the oden stand, the bathhouse, the horse races, pachinko. They held discretion over him because they feared his promise to kill them. They didn’t ever think the day would come when he held a promise to kill himself.

Now they knew. They knew, and there was no turning back.

Fear was grappling Ichimatsu’s system, and the thought if facing them before he succeeded in his hopes for a suicide was equivalent to confessing his sins and living longer in shame. It was unbearable, to wake up another day more tired than ever, wanting nothing more than to feast his eyes into a void where the promise of freedom vowed and vowed. Not this, to know that his secret was out for his brothers to take in, and for them to bear with this piece of trash much longer as long as he continued to live. They didn’t need him. He deserved to die.

His pain was everywhere: his arms, with all the wounds; his heart, from all its agony; his chest, from all his shame; his eyes, with all his crying; and his heart, with all his happy moments that would be reduced to smoke. Memories.

By the time Ichimatsu slipped his feet away from his sandals and faced the ocean, his whimpers turned into sobs. His tears were waterfalls that poured heavily down his face, droplets blotching his clothes and smacking the sand under him. But he didn’t stop any of them—it was better to cry over happy memories than sad ones. He loved his brothers too much to dwell on all the times he had let them down. It was better to think of the times that he had lifted them up.

...

When had he done that?

...

Oh god...

I’m sorry.

Ichimatsu’s hands clenched, nails biting into his skin. Shutting his eyes and releasing a sorrowful growl, Ichimatsu used the last of his stamina to race towards the cliff, threading across the sand and letting the sight of the tall mount of rock increase in size. Ichimatsu felt his own body incline as he stepped on the surface that rose off the ground, and the wind got stronger, whipping at him like an immortal force, and the sounds of the waves grew into bellowing. The edge of the cliff then became his starting point, and at the same time, his finish line.

Ichimatsu stopped running, peering down below. The ocean was dark, gloomy, serious in its granting of death. All Ichimatsu needed to do was let it do its task.

...He couldn’t.

Why?

...He couldn’t.

Ichimatsu continued looking down, saw his own tears drip from his eyes and get lost in the vastness of the water. Was it really worth it to get lost as well in there, to never come back?

He had five brothers, three older than him, two younger. He had parents who were willing to raise them despite the difficulty of six sons, and friends who willingly acted to their mischief the same way they acted to their friends’ mischief. They had a house where their lives were safely kept for the entirety of growing up, building and breaking their personalities. In all his life, there were so many happy thoughts. In his life, there were so many sad scenes. And yet in spite of all the smiles that had glued themselves for dominance inside him, why was the temptation of worthlessness so much stronger?

It didn’t make sense—so many things in life didn’t make sense.

And this choice of his, was it sensible at all?

No. But nothing in life made sense anymore. Therefore, it was worthless.

Ichimatsu let loose a sob, closed his overly-moist eyes, and let his bare feet go over the edge.

But then there was something that tugged him from above when it was supposed to be gravity pulling him down, and a bone creaked when it wasn’t required to. Ichimatsu cried out, his voice thick and hoarse, but in the next moment he realized he wasn’t falling anymore. He was hanging, and the water below him wasn’t swallowing him. It was still waiting for him. Death was close, but he had stopped before he could reach it.

Ichimatsu snapped his head up.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to break your shoulder. My bad,” Osomatsu apologized, his smile watery as he looked down at Ichimatsu. His hand was wrapped around Ichimatsu’s bicep with security, as if letting go was betraying an oath made with Akatsuka-sensei himself. But Osomatsu too, had eyes catching the hints of light peeping behind the clouds, silver that threatened to spill down his face. “It’s just better to have that broken than my brother’s whole life,” he added.

Behind him, the others were less than effective in containing their emotions. Openly weeping, Karamatsu had a hand to the lower half of his features, the other one carrying Ichimatsu’s purple sandals tightly and defensively. At his side, there were Choromatsu and Todomatsu, the former having a tight hand over Todomatsu’s shoulder in consolation as the youngest gawked at his older brother with big, horrified eyes. Choromatsu had his chest puffed, collecting the control he was struggling for. Todomatsu had collapsed in his emotional stability.

And Jyushimatsu...

“Ichimatsu-niisan...” Jyushimatsu was next to their oldest brother, and he too was like Todomatsu and Karamatsu in controlling the sway of his feelings. Except, he looked worse than all of them, his eyes overflowing almost as much as Ichimatsu’s were. And again, the stab of pain struck Ichimatsu like a bullet, and the dislocation of his shoulder was nothing but a pat on his anatomy in comparison. “Please...We don’t want to lose you...” Jyushimatsu whispered.

Hearing the words, Ichimatsu didn’t expect much from himself. Maybe he expected to just look down below and untangle himself from Osomatsu’s hold to resume his fall. Maybe he was to just die then and there, because the heavens pitied him enough and had finally decided to take him before he could grow more pathetic. But none of that happened. It was just Ichimatsu giving in to weightlessness, dipping his head, and sobbing as his features contorted entirely.

Sniffing, Jyushimatsu accompanied Osomatsu and with their combined strength they hoisted Ichimatsu off the edge, the oldest man lowering Ichimatsu down on the ground after. Immediately, Ichimatsu clutched his face and bawled, ashamed and shameless on his show of emotion, but it didn’t matter anymore. He didn’t know what to do. He was stuck now with his brothers surrounding him, piling around him, and there was no escape from the Matsuno brothers when they were certain of their goals.

Even one brother can’t surpass the strength of the remaining five.

So Ichimatsu just cried.

“Wh-Where’s the knife?” Choromatsu stammered, kneeling next to Osomatsu and Ichimatsu, Karamatsu occupying the other side with Todomatsu. Choromatsu swept a glance through the blue monotones of the beach before landing his attention back to the task at hand. His face fell, and he hugged his arms as he defeatedly locked his lips again.

“I shucked it into the ocean earlier,” Jyushimatsu reported to him nonetheless, dropping to the ground and placing a sleeved hand over Ichimatsu’s shoulder, rubbing it tenderly in tiny ovals. Cautious of the pain of the dislocation, and the pain that has iced Ichimatsu’s soul. “No one’s gonna find it anymore. My throwing skills are to beat, especially when I have determination set on something. Right, niisan?” He didn’t need to be viewed by eye for Ichimatsu to tell he was smiling faintly.

Oh. So they’d really do that just to get rid of evidence of Ichimatsu’s sorrows, huh? Well, wasn’t that just a tiny bit heartwarming?

Ichimatsu didn’t reply.

A sigh. “We won’t pry,” Karamatsu said, maintaining strength in his voice as he spoke, despite being so close to cracking. “But please. Stay with us, Ichimatsu.”

“Be our Darkmatsu-Kittymatsu a little longer,” Todomatsu pleaded, his hands trembling against Karamatsu.

“No,” Osomatsu stated, capturing the rare, stern tonality of his role in their family. “Be our Ichimatsu forever. Promise me that, okay, Ichimatsu-chan?” Osomatsu made for a small chuckle that rattled both their frames, and he rubbed the bottom of his nose like he always did.

Ichimatsu halted and looked up at him. And eye contact, Osomatsu’s serenity, his begging that reflected in his gaze, that made Ichimatsu crumble into more than just his own body like he had always used to for the longest time, but against Osomatsu’s. And immediately, everyone was tightly supporting him, trying to keep him intact in their love and support, in fear for another deadly session from him, and losing the fourth man that bonded their title as Matsuno sextuplets.

Yes, Ichimatsu broke down. But that’s why the others were there to build him up again.

~~~

Author’s Note: I remember first getting into Osomatsu-san and seeing all these depressed Matsu fanfics, and I wanted to make one myself. It wasn’t a mood. It was a feeling of lowness in my life and I wanted to further incorporate depth to it into this oneshot story of my favorite Matsuno.

So sorry if I butcher the feeling of sorrow and depression. I don’t wish to offend.

[peaceoutofthepieces]

Title: Love Me Still

Square Filled: Fear

Ship: Lucas x Jens

Trigger Warnings (if applicable): None 

Created for @skamevents

This is just a really short thing inspired by an ask I got which I tried to meld to this prompt.

~^~

Jens is a little confused—and a tiny bit scared—when he gets a text from Kes. It isn’t entirely unusual for them to talk, he supposes, but it’s slightly unusual. He thinks it’s worse because he’s already a little bit on edge. Because he hasn’t heard much from Lucas today. 

kes_senova hey, are you busy? like, not just right now, but this weekend? 

jensrolt no? why?

kes_senova Luc’s mom isn’t doing well

jensrolt is typing…

kes_senova he’s okay  but he doesn’t let me help him when it’s like this  I’m worried about him dealing with it on his own he spirals. worries himself too much I hate having to ask you but...could you come down?

jensrolt yeah, of course  you think it’s that bad? I haven’t heard much from him today

kes_senova I’m guessing it’s bad, then

Kes doesn’t have to say anymore. Jens is already getting ready to go. 

~^~

It takes him no time to pack up, and his parents don’t put up any protest about him suddenly going for the weekend. He only has to say ‘Lucas isn’t doing great’, and they let him go. 

The train ride seems to last forever, but he’s soon at Lucas’s door. He hasn’t bothered texting him; he knew Lucas would only tell him not to come. That he’s fine, there’s no need, he doesn’t need Jens. Lucas will probably be even more mad at him, for showing up without warning, but it’s worth it. It won’t take him long to give in. 

It takes him ringing the bell twice, though, before he comes to the door. It swings open to reveal Lucas in a red hoodie and sweats, looking tense and exhausted. His expression is frustrated, pissed off even, before his eyes land on Jens. Then his shoulders drop instantly and his face slackens in surprise. He looks small, and young, and fragile. Jens’s heart throbs. 

Lucas asks, “What are you doing here?”

Instead of answering, Jens steps forward and wraps him up in a hug. Lucas is still for a few seconds, then he sags against him, arms winding around his waist. Jens walks them further inside and shuts the door, sliding his bag off his shoulder before tucking Lucas’s head into the vacated space. Lucas clutches at the back of his coat and lets out a shaky breath. 

“Why didn’t you talk to me?” Jens asks, soft but reprimanding. 

Lucas sniffs. “I didn’t think there was anything you could do. I didn’t think it would make any difference. You’d just be worried then too, and I didn’t want that.”

“You’re an idiot, you know that?” Jens pulls away and cradles his face in his hands, thumbs stroking over his cheekbones as he presses a kiss to his forehead. Lucas’s lips tilt up in a smile. This close Jens can see how tired he really is, the dimness of his usually bright eyes, the dark circles around them. His lips are dry, his shoulders hunched up around his neck. His hoodie—Jens’s hoodie—swallows him. 

“How’d you know to come?” Lucas asks, quiet. Embarrassed. 

“Kes texted me,” Jens admits. Lucas sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. “And I’m glad, because you being the tiniest bit silent worries me. You’re always double texting.”

“Ha ha,” Lucas says dryly. “I’m sorry. I’ve just been…”

“Having a bit of a breakdown?”

“Busy,” Lucas corrects. 

Jens kisses his cheek. “How is she?”

Lucas shrugs, blowing out a breath. “I don’t know. She hasn’t come out of her room much today. I’ve been trying to get her to eat, and I tried to tidy up a little bit, but I have this assignment due for Monday that I haven’t even started and I’m so tired—“ 

He draws in a sharp breath, cutting himself off, and Jens pulls him back into his arms, holding him close to his chest. He rubs a hand over his back and waits until his breaths are calm again. “Okay. How about this. I make you a coffee and you try to get a start on that assignment. While you’re doing that, I’ll clean up a bit. Then we can make dinner and check in on your mom, and then I’m taking you to bed early and making sure you sleep. Okay?”

Lucas smiles against his collarbone and then kisses it, nodding. “Okay.” He kisses his way up Jens’s neck to his ear, down his jaw, just butterfly presses of his lips. Then he gives him a soft smile. “I don’t deserve you.”

“No,” Jens agrees. “Better.” Instead of arguing, Lucas just shakes his head, leaning up for a kiss. Jens meets him halfway, lips finding each other and melding together easily, familiar. Jens indulges him, lets him melt into the kiss and deepen it until most of the tension seeps out of him. Then he takes him gently by the shoulders and pushes him back an inch, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Okay, distraction comes after your work. Go. I’ll take care of stuff out here. Okay?”

Lucas closes his eyes, laying his head on Jens’s shoulder. Jens wraps him up and gives him another squeeze and he says, “Okay.”

He sneaks one more kiss before disappearing to his room, taking Jens’s duffel with him. Jens sighs and hangs up his coat before heading to the kitchen.

~^~ 

He spends an hour and a half tidying minor things, putting on a load of washing and filling the dishwasher. He doesn’t want to turn on the vacuum and disturb the actual members of the house, so he gives the floors a quick brush and leaves it at that. 

Lucas seems a little less stressed when he emerges from his room. He and Jens make dinner together, and Lucas takes some to his mother, who comes out of her room briefly to say hello to Jens. Jens sits at the table with her, making idle chit chat and teasing Lucas in an attempt to bring a smile to her face. It turns from tired to genuine as she looks at her son while he laughs, and Jens is relieved, his heart warming. 

She doesn’t stay with them long, but she plants a kiss on both their heads before she goes. Soon after, Jens pulls Lucas up and drags him to bed. 

He lies with his back to Jens’s chest, Jens’s hand clasped in his over his heart, but he doesn’t sleep. Jens can feel the knots of tension throughout his body, his fast heartbeat under his hand. His breath hitches every so often, coming out harshly. Jens pulls him tighter against him and kisses the back of his neck. “Luc,” he says, “you can talk to me if you want to.” Lucas takes another shaky breath, turning his face into the pillow. “Lucas.”

After a moment of silence, Lucas turns around in Jens’s hold, lying flat on his back and staring up at the ceiling. Jens leaves him arm across his torso but shifts his head back a bit. “I hate seeing her like this.” Jens nods, rubbing his arm, but Lucas catches his hand and stops the movement. “No, but not the way I should. I mean of course that way too, it kills me to see her upset, but it’s not just that.”

Jens’s brow furrows. “What else?” Lucas closes his eyes. “Luc. It’s not going to go away if you don’t talk about it, and I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.”

Lucas licks his lips, and there’s a tremble in his voice Jens doesn’t quite understand when he says, “It can be genetic.”

Jens considers this. “So...what? You’re afraid you’re gonna...become bipolar? I’m pretty sure it’s not that simple. Wouldn’t you have already, I don’t know, showed symptoms or something?”

Lucas shrugs. “Mom wasn’t diagnosed until she was in her thirties. I know, I know it sounds stupid. It’s just...I see myself in her sometimes. When she’s like this. When she’s not doing well.” His voice drops to a whisper. “And it’s stupid, but it freaks me out. The days I feel like I can’t get out of bed, or I feel like I’m going to snap at the smallest thing, or…” He trails off, shaking his head with a rough swallow. Jens finally realizes what the odd tremble had been, what’s causing Lucas’s hitched breaths and tense shoulders. 

Fear. 

Jens moves his hand up to the side of his face, using the touch to gently turn Lucas towards him, to brush their noses together. “Hey. I have those days, too. That’s normal. And even if it is something...more, there’s no reason we can’t deal with that. The people who love you wouldn’t disappear because of that,” Jens reminds him, knowing this is the root of the problem. “You don’t love your mom any less when she’s like this. You know she’d always be there for you, too. Kes and Jayden would never go anywhere. You have Isa and Liv, and Ralph. And that’s just here. The boys love you, too. Robbe and Sander especially. And you know they wouldn’t even bat an eye.”

Lucas swallows again, but his eyes meet Jens’s. “And you?”

“And you know me. You’re my boyfriend, and I love you. Nothing would ever change that. I get the fear, Luc. I do. But you can’t let it eat away at you. If there’s ever anything, then we’ll deal with it. We’ll manage. No one’s going anywhere. You’re the strongest person I know, and you’d have all the support in the world. It’s okay to be scared. But you don’t have to be,” Jens shrugs. 

Lucas gives a tiny huff, but smiles. “That simple, huh?”

Jens shakes his head, smiling when it just makes their noses rub again. “I know it’s not. But it might be easier, at least, if you talk to me.”

Lucas turns onto his side and rests an arm over Jens’s waist, shifting closer. “Sorry. I don’t know why I didn’t. It just felt dumb.”

“Nothing’s dumb. Not if it’s bothering you. You can always tell me these things. Before you get stressed enough to have eyebags.”

Lucas pinches his side, but he snuggles into Jens’s chest, arms wrapping tightly around his waist. He’s soft and mellow now, a comforting weight, and Jens holds him close and kisses his head. “Thank you,” Lucas mumbles, finally sounding sleepy. “You’re a pretty good boyfriend.”

Jens grins. “I try. Besides, you’re not too bad yourself.”

Lucas hums, and the sound ends on a tiny laugh. It fills the last crevice in Jens’s chest with relief. He thinks of Lucas lying here on his own, spending the night struggling to sleep, the same worries spinning around and around in his head. He makes a mental note to thank Kes, as he places another kiss in Lucas’s hair. He whispers a quiet, “I love you,” as Lucas’s breathing begins to even out. 

“I love you, too,” Lucas murmurs in return, seconds before he falls asleep, unbothered and unafraid. 

[the-lightning-strikes-again]

Hey Lightning, I was wondering if I could get your thoughts on something. One take that seems to keep returning every once in a while is the "Allura fell for Lotor only after he revealed his Altean heritage," but I know u and others have disproven this many times, which does reassure me. While I love Allura, I definitely think one of her weaknesses was her devotion to Altea and singing Alfor's praises, which sometimes became too much. At the same time, it bothers me when I see some ppl (1/?)

Continuing anon message: “ say that she thought Alteans were superior to all other races, and that when the colony plot twist happened, she became repulsed by Lotor's Galra side, which is why she rejected him. For them, that's why she forced violent memories onto an uncorrupted Zarkon, but somehow "saw the good/redeemed" Honerva, the Altean. I can kind of understand where they're coming from, but for me, it just didn't make sense that Allura suddenly had a change of heart considering for most of s8, she was angry and dead set on going after Honerva. Even with that, I think to a lot of her fans, s8 made Allura so ooc that she became unrecognizable, which hurt to watch. I guess for me it's hard seeing antis and people who don't like her claim that that's just how she is and has always been. Haha sorry for rambling, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, since your arguments ease my mind on a lot of things when it comes to Allura :)”

Hi, anon. Wow, thanks for your extended note! I don’t know anywhere in canon that Allura champions Alteans as a superior race. The definition of racial supremacy is a belief that inherent genetic differences between races determine cultural or individual achievement, with social/governmental policies championing intolerance of other races. To get Allura to fit into such a label:

1.      A viewer has to ignore or undermine all the evidence available about who the main-universe Alteans really were before main-universe Zarkon’s massacre of them.

2.      A viewer has to ignore or undermine how Allura actually responds to a variety of different races in the show, including her own.  

So let’s start with issue one. To support an “Allura was a racial supremacist” opinion, a lot of antis (and even non-militant, average viewers) are favorable to the opinion that Alteans as a group, including Alfor, were actually evil and violent colonizer elitists before Galrans killed them off. In other words, they question Altean victimhood, and this allows the militant antis to poison and undermine scenes of a woman mourning her home and her beloved family. And it just gets to be a really unsettling conversation, to listen to someone actually try to justify genocide. They’ll also have suspicions that all of our foundational backstory in the s3 finale was just “cleansed” propaganda from Coran. So if antis can undermine Allura’s entire race and family as corrupt, then they can intentionally undermine any of her canonical statements about or efforts toward peace. Which is hilarious, because this racist tactic applied to Allura is actually what a lot of antis accuse Allura of doing with Lotor.

For the record, I don’t think the show production team actually intended the subliminal messaging/cognitive dissonance that I’m about to discuss. The people who designed and developed this show are fans of robot kitties and aren’t PhDs in social issues. But I think there is a very serious issue about the portrayal of genocide victims that feeds into some very real problems in our world, especially regarding the concept of racial supremacy and conspiracy theories about genocide victims.

VLD tried to play with both genocide politics for edge™ points while ALSO playing with shatterglass theory (shatterglass meaning an AU where the heroes are villains and villains are heroes). Combining these two concepts into the same universe creates some incredibly disturbing subliminal messaging about Alteans that very closely mimics ongoing neo-Nazi propaganda against Jews. Nazis and other anti-Semitists justify their hatred of Jews by equating them as terrible villains out for world domination via some underhanded shadow control of the mass populace. It’s an incredibly malicious form of propaganda, because it works so terribly well. And what do you know, VLD plays right into this kind of propaganda. In the season 3 episode, Hole in the Sky, we’re faced with team Voltron confronting an Altean Empire that was actually evil and out for multiverse domination. And oh by the way, they’re using malicious shadow tech to control a mass populace.

It’s like someone on the production team read the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and then just copied/pasted that incredibly damaging and widely accepted conspiracy theory right onto Alteans for s3 funsies because edge content.

This is incredibly punishing, for the narrative to wave the carrot stick in front of genocide survivors that maybe some others survived—and then to suggest that Alteans were the evil ones all along. A shatterglass twist worked very well in Captain Marvel (2019) for a lot of reasons, for example, but it just doesn’t work well in the VLD universe given that the show explicitly portrays the genocide victims as evil and validates this concept. And this episode unfortunately feeds ongoing cognitive dissonance in antis that if AU Alteans could be so evil…how certain are you that they aren’t in the main universe too? On the reverse side, the main-universe goes out of its way to portray that not all Galrans are evil, and even that Galrans were the primary resistance (BOM). But in this singular episode, we see a united Altean empire. And the only Altean who moves to stand against it once the shine wears off…is Allura. There is no AU Altean actually shown in the Guns of Gamara. So Allura stands alone as an Altean against her own people.

For this reason, this episode doesn’t function very well as a shatterglass AU either, because the moral “flip” isn’t a mirror balance to main universe. The Alteans of the AU world appear as fully united in their evil plans. And then, no doubt, anti-alluras point out other quirky things about main-universe Alteans throughout the show—the violent language-learning system that scares Pidge, and the ancient Altean terraforming technology that Haggar activates, and the fact that Oriande is a hidden place that keeps out the less magical with a violent guardian. These details, when removed from main-universe world building, create a cognitive dissonance about whether main-universe Allura and Alteans were actually genuine in how they depicted respectful “peace and diplomacy.” So anti alluras who believe Allura was a racial supremacist really rely on this s3 episode and these details to uphold their conspiracy theory.

So let’s focus on Allura in this episode, because it says a lot about who she ultimately is as a person, and people have forgotten how she actually responded in this episode. Allura is unquestionably hopeful at the thought that her and Coran might not be the last Alteans alive. Pretty understandable. If I were the last human, I’d be darn excited to find out there’s more of me left, lol. So her experience as a genocide victim initially blinds her to the evilness of these Alteans. You can even see the ache on her face, of how badly she wants to believe their narrative of peace.

So Allura is initially star-struck that she and Coran are not the last Alteans, yes, and that somehow they’ve achieved a “peace.” She is also not afraid to admit that they would be valuable allies in the war:

And she’s not wrong there, considering that they have what appears to be extensive military resources and a robot force of their own. But she makes a critical mistake in assuming that “these are my people” means that they share main-universe cultural sentiments. The instant Allura hears Slav (so not someone of her own race) call these Alteans out as actually evil colonizers turning people into slaves, she begins to question the narrative she’s received.

In this instance, she actually affords the Alteans the same courtesy she afforded Lotor—the opportunity to deny the accusations.

But in the AU Altean’s case, they try to turn blame back on other parties. Allura listens to Keith when he grows increasingly fearful of what the Alteans might do to the others, and she tries to plead for actual peace:

And actually, this is a pretty interesting moment for Allura. She tries to salvage an alliance…until she realizes that their differences are irreconcilable, and that their definition of peace is inherently different from her own. This probably sets the stage for why Allura was so triggered by Lotor talking about peace while also killing people—because she’s seen people misappropriate that term before. And also probably informs why she trusts the information of both Keith and Krolia (both of whom have Galran blood, btw).

Ultimately, Allura turns against her own people. Violently:

When they get angry about her wanting actual peace, Allura draws a weapon against them and rejects them from her people. This mimics how she spends several seasons fighting an Altean Haggar/Honerva for her crimes, and how she turns against Lotor too.

So case in point here, Allura loves her people, obviously—but she also is holding them to moral standards regarding their behavior, which is something that a genuine racist doesn’t do. As a matter of fact, Lotor is the only person of Altean blood that Allura genuinely bonds with ever again in the series. She’s distant with Romelle, she’s distant with the s8 Alteans… In s8, Allura even says this about Luca, which refers back to her own mistakes she made with initially being star-struck by the s3 AU Alteans who came in “peace”:

Allura herself had been manipulated in s3, wanting so desperately to not be the last Altean alive that it initially blinded her to how Commander Hira was manipulating her. The plight of the s8 Alteans who are deceived by Honerva is inherently frustrating to her, because she can see herself in them.

Absolutely none of this correlates with Allura seeing or perpetuating Alteans as a superior race. At every turn, her own people continue to disappoint her, and she increasingly and progressively separates herself from them in hopelessness, because they’re so brainwashed that they can’t see they’re just cannon fodder for someone else’s military agendas. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for a superior race, lol.

So let’s think about anti accusations here. Allura is a racial supremacist…but she’s arguing against her people who believe unquestionably in Honerva, another full Altean like herself? Nothing about that accusation makes sense with her actions.

The fact is, consistently from season 3 and onward, Allura is faced with her own people morally disappointing her.

The good news for the s8 Alteans like Tavo is that Allura is able to remove the dark entity Honerva is using to control him. Which allows other Alteans to “wake up” from being manipulated and try to make amends.

Regardless, Allura makes a very clear line that simply being Altean doesn’t make someone “right.” She sees herself fully at odds with her own people who are drawn in by Honerva’s lies. And she experienced well back in s2 (revealing Haggar as Honerva) and s3 (evil AU Alteans) that any given race, including her own, can house people who do bad things.

The fact is, she’s consistently and willingly drawn weapons against even her own people when they didn’t meet her moral expectations. So her response to Lotor isn’t particularly out of line there. She’s repulsed by a moral flaw.

And actually, Lotor himself wouldn’t have known this, but he very oddly echoed the AU Alteans by getting angry that Allura was angry over the means through which he was trying to get peace:

So Lotor actually reverts to the same logic of the AU Alteans—peace at any cost, just look at the results—

And keep in mind that the AU Alteans also manipulated Allura’s excitement about them, to get her to make the transreality comet usable so they could go into other realities. So Allura has felt betrayed and used before, by her own people.

So when she says this:

Yes, it’s a reference back to how Zarkon manipulated his friends in order to get access to the quintessence field, at the explicit cost of potentially killing his own people. But it’s not without understanding that yes, Alteans can be just as manipulative and betraying as Zarkon. Because she’s experienced it, again and again.  

As a matter of fact, six out of the eight seasons of Voltron: Legendary Defender feature villainous Alteans/Alteans on the wrong side of the war, and we continuously see Allura punished again and again for wishing that Alteans still lived.

No wonder she wanted to die.

This is something that I find uncomfortable about the narrative of the show. Previous iterations of Voltron did in fact have a “blood on everyone’s hands” perspective, such as within the ages 16+ Dynamic Comics. However, Arusians/Alteans in those old Voltron narratives were not victims of genocide. VLD turns Alteans into victims of the worst racial crime possible and then also consistently portrays them as inherently antagonistic to genuine peace efforts in some way, instead of focusing on the evil of the oppressors.

And this is such a double whammy for Lotor’s characters as well, given that he was abused by his parents and threatened with slavery via his Galran culture, and that he was half-Altean too trying to connect to his lost culture.

As a matter of fact, the larger show’s narrative interest in “victims as antagonists” makes it such that when we see victims try to enact actual justice, it feels almost jarring. Let’s look at that s8 Zarkon moment you brought up as an example, where Allura destroys his innocent perspective by showing him his evil deeds.

The s8 Zarkon is a weird topic because 1) This Zarkon actually doesn’t exist outside of Honerva’s mind, so how he has any kind of actual free-will is beyond me, unless someone wants to argue that Honerva actually cursed his true soul just as she cursed the other paladins. It’s hilarious too, because Honerva-mind-Zarkon also calls Honerva a psychopath, so I guess now Honerva is psychoanalyzing herself using her dead husband as the vehicle, while also discreetly helping the paladins to stop herself—

ANYWAY, using this Zarkon as a “proof” of Allura’s “racism” is also cherry picking in the weirdest of ways. Is she angry about his horrific and incalculable crimes, including even how he betrayed the OG paladins and ruined his own planet? Absolutely. Does she want him to be aware of his crimes instead of having to pretend like nothing’s wrong? Yes.

But notice here, this Zarkon actually shows remorse. He is actually crying over those memories and recognizing that he had done something wrong. And Allura can work with that. In fact, out of everyone standing around and doing nothing, it’s Allura who gives him a second chance and offers an alliance with Zarkon in order to stop a crazy Altean: 

Keep in mind too, Honerva didn’t have memory loss at the end of s8. She knew exactly what she’d done and had given up and had to actually be convinced to do anything halfway constructive. That’s a very different circumstance than mind-Zarkon had, who jumped at the chance to do something to fix what all had happened, and gets even morally righteous about it, calling his own wife a psychopath, lol.

So generally, antis who believe Allura was a racial supremacist haven’t watched the show holistically. We see her hold the same standards to her own people as she expects out of others. This show would look incredibly different if Allura were a true racial supremacist.

Ah, you ask. Okay, so we’ve refuted the big pieces of “evidence” used to incriminate Allura. But what about all of those weird details about ancient Altean history? The violent language-learning program that scared Pidge? The violent terraforming tech that almost kills Voltron? The concept that Alfor tried to play “police” over the Galra and actually blew up their planet? The Alteans’ ongoing discussions of “peace and diplomacy” and spreading it throughout the universe while they happen to sit on a massive load of ancient power?

The s3 finale and other facts throughout the series very heavily smash the claim that our canon, in-universe Alteans were evil colonizers like the AU Alteans. The biggest piece of evidence to the contrary is that the Altea we know was one (1) planet. You counted right. One planet. Not an empire, but a singular planet. The s3 finale corroborates this, showing Altea as being largely isolationist from a military perspective while Daibazaal and Nalquod warred "for generations," right in front of their salad.

So some viewers would have you believe that Alteans were these big bad, intergalactic police state colonizers. But for all of its great power and knowledge, the singular planet of Altea didn't even canonically interfere in the wars of its own galaxy for actual millennia? And looking at the screenshots upon the stabilization of the alliance, Alfor is revealed to not have had experience with a neighboring culture. His face while exploring Gyrgan’s homeworld is an indication that it’s all rather new for him too. So again, we have evidence showing that Alteans were not colonizing or even functioning as a police state.

Note here that in the s3 flashbacks, the show confirms that it actually wasn’t just Alfor who suggested an alliance. All five leaders had common interests in protecting their galaxy from even worse threats, so all five came together at the same time. This is actually the first piece of evidence we have of Altea entering into some kind of intergalactic military agreement to stave off said worse threats.

And all of this is on top of a history where in s6, the Galran Archivist confirms that the Galran Empire had existed before Zarkon for 3,000 years, with times of “expansion.” It’s very easy to see that Blaytz’s people were actively fighting off Galran occupation of their homeworld within this past.

And that’s actually what I think makes Alfor and the OG paladins some pretty interesting characters. Here, we had colonizing Galran empire setting down its sword and accepting the value and space of its neighbors. Here, we had master alchemist Alfor giving up military power within their group by acknowledging Zarkon as the superior strategist. Here, we had Blaytz who had previously been battling Galran occupation…fully accepting the Galra?   

So the OG Paladin backstory represents a pretty incredible alliance that removed a lot of intergalactic toxicity and helped heal broken bonds. But it required all five leaders to agree to that. Alfor did not throw his weight or power around within this. There were several checks and balances here.

But this backstory also helps to explain some of the quirky details about Alteans. Their planet existed within an active war zone, and it’s very likely that they’d had to fight off Galran occupation just as Blaytz’s people did. So the violent robot trainers and fear-based language learning systems start to make sense. Alteans weren’t just simpering people playing harps all day and eating grapes. They were actively prepared to defend their planet and their culture.

So when Allura says in season 1 that Alteans were “spreading diplomacy” across the universe, the only pieces of evidence we have of that is the OG paladins themselves, in which Alfor was a big part in creating that alliance—and then possibly the Alteans with the Balmerans, given their deep collective rituals with that planet while the Galra literally just came in and ripped the planet nearly to death. Allura tries to mimic what it means to accept and interact with a culture without changing it well in season 1, when she stumbles through trying to respect Arusian culture and its demands on its people. Also, there is a big fact that antis like to overlook:

The fact is, despite the untold numbers of civilizations we interact with across 76 episodes, no outside race remembers Alteans as evil colonizers. If they were really so big and bad, we would have heard it, like, “Man, yeah the Galrans are bad. Just as bad as those Alteans, back in the day.” Or something. But nope, nothing.

So I heavily question the history of Altea as an ancient colonizing race. If they were, then Altea wouldn't have just been a single planet with limited resources to fight wars in even its own galaxy. All of this supports the idea of Altean children being raised to fight--because they were preparing to defend themselves when/if diplomacy fails.... But the fact that the Balmerans see Alteans fondly and that literally every other race we run into is explicitly suspicious of Galrans and not at all of Alteans says something.

I think the only piece of evidence there might be for a genuinely colonizing ancient Altea is the use of terraforming technology, as mentioned in s4. Haggar discovers it and activates it to try and kill Voltron--and she nearly succeeds, because said tech destroys the entire crust of the planet to reform it. But you have to step back for a second and wonder--if ancient Alteans were so powerful, why was Alfor struggling so hard to even hold his own planet together in the midst of all these other cultures warring and larger threats? If they had this technology--and they did know about it because Allura recognized it right away as ancient technology--why the heck wouldn't they use it? Or were they using it, and it was to reform uninhabited planets to help sustain displaced peoples? Why is it, if Alteans were so terribly bad, we have no record across ANY of the many alien races being cautious of them? Even Galran Lieutenant Lahn snapped at Allura only because he was jealous of the general security she had back on, you guessed it, explicitly Altea. There's a lot of potential explanations for a positive use of terraforming technology, and the evidence against colonization and Altea committing omnicide against other races is incredibly more aligned with the other details in the canon.

And even Alfor’s creation of Voltron and the blowing up of Daibazaal—that’s something that antis like to position as evidence of his police-state ways to underhandedly control other cultures.

So let’s tackle those too while we’re at it.

Honestly, I know people like to hate on Alfor, and I do think his character picks up some misogynism just from the writers....But I don't think he was as much of a controller as people think he was. He was already in an alliance with four other leaders to try and stop bad things from happening in their galaxy. That meant they were expending incredible amounts of time and resources to accomplish that end—resources that were not renewable and may have been straining various planets. We know that he started building Voltron with Zarkon and everyone else's blessing because he called them "clean ships," but it's only after the rift creatures attack that suddenly Alfor's perception of Voltron moves from "clean energy" to "omg we need a more powerful weapon against this unknown enemy.”

So these are his intentions BEFORE he discovers rift creatures are a threat to the universe. While Zarkon states that these new ships are to be endlessly powerful for the Galra Empire, Alfor shames him by offering what his desire is for them:

  After the rift creatures nearly destroy Daibazaal, intentions change.

So here, we see the game change in a BIG way. Voltron is not just about offering a more renewable way of sustaining peace-keeping efforts. Alfor is now adjusting and finishing these ships with the explicit knowledge that if they are not powerful enough, then Daibazaal and the Galran people will die. Alfor’s got a LOT of pressure on him now to deliver a mighty and powerful weapon to stop this new threat. So even his creation of Voltron as a superweapon involved using it to protect people from imminent death—not to police them.

And about Alfor blowing up Daibazaal—once again, it’s Alfor trying to clean up Honerva and Zarkon’s mess. Honerva had convinced Zarkon that the rift needed to be wider, and so Zarkon deceived the paladins into widening it.

So keep in mind here, at this point in time—the rift was destabilizing and eating an entire planet. The entire universe was now at stake. Alfor had to choose between a bad fix and an even worse option of allowing everyone to die, but he very clearly evacuated people before destroying Daibazaal, as part of his promise to keep Galrans safe. So that no one would have to die.

And as a matter of fact—about that terraforming technology. How sure are you that Alfor didn’t intend to use it to build Galrans a new home? It’s entirely within the realm of acceptable conjecture that he allowed for the existence of that technology because it could restore what had been lost.

And here’s where the story gets really screwy and feeds into some anti hate. Because when Zarkon wakes up as a zombie, he desires more quintessence as zombies do.

So he’s pissed that Alfor just cut off his gateway, and he manipulates his people:

And it’s here where we get the idea that Alfor was an evil controller. The idea came from Zarkon, who—we can look around pretty easily and see that he was not a man of honor, ultimately. Even if you chose to not believe the s3 finale flashbacks as being objective, there’s something wrong with Zarkon. (It’s clear that the show thought using Coran was a smart way to shell off massive amounts of info, because clearly if this were truly in Coran’s perspective, we would NOT have had intimate looks into Zarkon and Honerva’s bedroom as Zarkon is tending to her, like omg.) Numerous sources, histories, and cultures outside of Coran confirm that Zarkon hit a point of no return on the evil scale, and that he projected his own blame for Daibazaal’s destabilization onto Alfor in order to raise up his new regime in the name of Quintessence™.

So at the end of the day, even Alfor was a victim. But yet somehow, various antis choose to believe Zarkon’s victim-punishing narrative because said antis can’t or else refuse to connect one scene to another since it undermines their justifications for why they can hate on Allura. And that’s not so much an issue with the story itself as it is just poor critical analysis or malicious weaponization of content against other fans.

Now, at this point, we’ve talked about Allura and we’ve talked about Altean history. I have numerous other posts about Allura’s interactions with other races and Galrans and overcoming trauma to give the entire universe a second chance. So if there is anything in this show that suggests Alteans were in any way a superior race, then it’s probably within the show’s own worldbuilding. The show contradicts its own definitions of what quintessence even is by suggesting Alteans have “bluer/purer quintessence” in order to justify why Lotor would even be trying to sacrifice them for anything. The show-championed concept that Alteans have a bluer, purer life force above all other people, and that only Altean energy could interface with the fabric of space-time. Now, this is a problem in the later seasons’ world building itself. And you know who wrote that in? The production team. So once again, we do have racial issues in this show, in ways that shows like Star Wars desperately try avoid by showing racial diversity in who has Midi-chlorians.

That said, I’m not a perfectly woke storyteller either. I think every story and show is going to have something problematic™, but with VLD it’s very clear that its disrespectful handling of genocide politics and shatterglass conspiracy theories, on top of its weird master race angle created the perfect storm. These mishandled and quirky details have created a cognitive dissonance with the provided narrative, resulting in some people in the anti fandoms to champion what aligns very closely to actual neo-Nazi propaganda against Jews, who according to them are not victims but instead the true perpetrators of all bad things. For the sake of the antis, I’m pretty sure they’re not intentionally looking at VLD this way and are probably just looking for any easily graspable reason to hate on Allura for interfering with their ship or something.

But this kind of subliminal propaganda that undermines victims, and the effect it has had on fandom morality politics, is deeply concerning to me. I really wish that we’d had an opportunity to respectfully and critically discuss this with the production team of the show, because a Y7-FV show about “strength in unity” should NOT result in us needing to have a conversation about people walking away with neo-Nazi-ish propaganda sentiments against genocide survivors. Like. Clearly, VLD is fictional, but it’s feeding into a real-life beast that it does NOT need to feed. And it’s keeping alive ongoing conspiracy narratives against some of our most vulnerable populations on the planet.

So, we need better stories. We need a production team that, if they’re going to get paid to do something involving portrayals of genocide and politics, that they need to do their research on those topics. Nobody is going to be perfect with a creation, but VLD validated some very damaging things—and it ALL is something that could have been fixable. I think it would have been incredibly validating to hear the production talk about and accept that these were issues that cropped up unintentionally, and to hear them confirm that these issues are not the sorts of things that VLD was supposed to champion.

The greatest tragedy of all of this is the potential that this show had to really champion some great and validating messages, and the potential that we as a fandom had to come together and do something that fandom was meant to do—which was celebrate the things we love. Because that’s why we’re all here. That’s why this crazy tumblr of mine even exists. It was supposed to celebrate things.

For that reason, I’m going to end this here. I’ve written several responses now as to my thoughts on the inappropriate narrative lens of the show, its contradictory and damaging worldbuilding about the purest race, and how it champions demonizing or punishing genocide survivors again and again. Within all of that, I’ve talked at length about Allura’s character and behavior over 8 seasons and how she built even empathetic connections with militant Galrans like Commander Lahn. In fact even her own homesickness is how she emotionally connects with Lahn, because she understands that desire to call something one’s own. To have a home. A family.

I now really would like to get back to writing stories that I find meaningful to me using these characters and these worlds—and trying to find the hope in all of this darkness, haha. And maybe with any luck, I can hope to do VLD some justice, knowing that I am still on a learning journey as well.

But I appreciate your note, and I hope this very extensive response helps to settle your questions and concerns once and for all regarding VLD Allura. If you should have any remaining questions, please feel free to reach out via a private message to discuss. Thank you!

[crusherthedoctor]

The Lutrudis Hadeer Characterization Masterpost

A while back, I made a big post about the thought process that went into the design for Lutrudis, as well as her name, species, and choice of weapons. In the midst of doing a bunch of other stuff (like the Eggman Sweet or Shite review, which is definitely still coming guys I swear, please don't leave me D':), I recently figured I could do the same for the character's... well, character, and provide some further insight into how her personality was shaped together. Cause why not, right?

Obviously, we won't be covering literally every single personality trait that Trudy has, like her hobbies and whatnot. If we went over all of that, we'd be so far into the future that Tumblr's search system might actually start working again. No, we'll just be keeping it to the central ingredients that make up the overall package.

1. A cool head? In my Sonic OC?

The recurring cast in the Sonic universe is filled with fiery, hot-blooded sorts in one way or another. Sonic might as well be the love child of Mentos and Diet Coke with how full of energy he is, Knuckles and Amy are both prone to letting their temper do the talking, Eggman... is Eggman, and the list goes on. And while there are a number of characters who are more low-key or even outright introverted by comparison, they still tend to exhibit a trait or two that makes them more in-line with the rest of the crowd, be it youthful excitement (Tails, Cream), a fiery temper (Blaze), or the odd bit of cockiness (Shadow).

So what better way to help make Trudy stand out... than by not really having anything like that at all? Contrary to most of the hot-blooded cast, it takes a lot to truly enrage her, and even then, you'll be lucky to get anything past tranquil fury. She's not particularly hammy either - flowery with her language at times, certainly, but not hammy - nor is she a cocky type, even against the weakest or most ridiculous of opponents, and although she does grow as a person over the course of the story she's involved in, all of this remains fairly consistent.

That's not to say that Trudy is not a passionate person. Far from it, in fact. She has a lot of passion. She just shows it in a different way than the average Sonic character.

2. Lutrudis? More like Unsureofdis.

Uncertain characters are also somewhat rare in Sonic's recurring cast (at least in the game universe), and just like with the previous point, even when they're there, they'll usually have something to counter it. Blaze may have been a bit insecure before meeting and befriending Sonic and Co, but as mentioned, she’s got a fierce temper, and even when she started off on her own, she felt that only she could take care of the threat of Eggman and Inferior Eggman Nega. Likewise, while Silver may have doubted himself about Leslie the Crack Dealer’s Iblis Trigger ruse cruise, he still got cocky when he had Sonic on the ropes, and he could be quite full of himself in the Rivals duology as well.

The point being, they still tend to show some semblance of the same “yep, I'm the one for the job, no questions asked” confidence and swagger that nearly everyone else has, no matter the flavor. Trudy, suffice to say, does not have this mentality. Trudy accepting Sonic and Co's help in dealing with sinister affairs in Viridonia without any haughty protest on her part isn't just because she knows they can handle it, or because they're Sonic Heroes and they'll show 'em the real superpower of teamwork... it's also because she's genuinely not sure if she would be able to take care of the matter on her own.

When she saved Cream from the wrath of the Wraith for example, she wasn't thinking “This looks like a job for Miss Hadeer!”

She was thinking “This could very well get me killed, but I have to help the poor bunny somehow...”

In other words, Trudy doesn't consider herself to be some sort of destined protector who has to do this herself. She constantly second guesses herself, and frequently believes her friends are more qualified and competent than she is. Her only reason for doing her best and helping out regardless is simply because she wants to.

3. A light at the end of the tunnel.

For the sake of tact, it's not shoved in your face relentlessly, but reading between the lines, it can be easy to get a sense of melancholy from Trudy. Particularly due to past experiences, she does indeed have an element of depression within her, and this can occasionally show in her body language and facial expressions, even if she's currently feeling positive emotions.

And yet, notice how she continues being a friendly pony. Notice how regardless of her experiences, and her thoughts on said experiences, her actual behaviour is (mostly) free of bitterness or cynicism, and that she doesn't hide the joy that her new friends make her feel. She's not outright ignoring her experiences or pretending they don’t affect her, because they clearly have affected her, and she's never ignored her scars (metaphorically and literally, the latter being a permanent side-effect of her condition), but she knows better than to let it consume her, so she tries her best to look at the bright side of life even during the darkest days.

It's Sonic's opinion that Trudy's inner spirit is a lot stronger than she thinks, with or without his help. Her refusal to give into misery and lash out at the world foreshadows that he's not unjustified in that belief. That, and it ties into the franchise’s usual taste for optimism and idealism against the odds.

4. Hadeer? More like Hadork.

So, everything thus far helps set Trudy up as a mellow, down-to-earth sort of personality. So far, so good. However, it's still the Sonic the Hedgehog universe we're talking about, filled with many colorful characters of all shapes, sizes, and eccentricities. When a franchise has a larger than life cast in a larger than life world, the characters who are meant to be grounded often risk coming off as boring and could end up easily overshadowed, because the creators or writers often neglect to give them any quirks of their own, usually out of fear that it'll disgrace the character's gracefulness. In fact, I personally feel this was a common problem with Sally, in both SatAM and Archie (mostly pre-reboot admittedly).

IMO, these writers are just being plain old silly. Just because a character is quirky doesn't mean they forfeit all their dignity altogether. Like a lot of things in life, you just have to balance it out, and that's what I did (or tried to do...) with the green equine.

So yes, Trudy is elegant, but she's also a really goofy dancer. Yes, she's gentle and motherly, but she also goes back and forth between being a heavy sleeper and being an insomniac. Yes, she serves as a warmhearted auntie figure for Cream (and a big sister figure for Amy), but she also spends a quarter of her time looking like a ninja with the way her bandana covers her face (whether it be due to cold weather, strong scents triggering her sensitive nose, or doing it in the presence of villains as a mildly theatrical way of visually conveying her disdain for them).

And of course, in the right situation, she can be just as much of a dork as the titular blue hedgehog is.

Which leads me to my next point...

5. “You might know everything I'm going to do...”

Trudy was created with the intention of having a character who is actually like Sonic himself in a lot of ways, but it's not apparent initially.

This sort of yin-yang contrasting routine has been done before a few times in the series, with Knuckles, Shadow and Blaze being the most obvious examples. But with them, their similarities are easier to spot from a distance. Knuckles is more earth than wind, but you can tell he's as stubborn as Sonic is. Shadow's methods and outlook differ, but you can tell he's still a mirror of Sonic (cause you know, he looks like him). Blaze is more distant, but you can tell how she can easily be just as worked up and angered as Sonic.

With Trudy however, if you take her at face value, you would think she's the exact opposite of Sonic. She's an introvert, he's an extrovert. She's got a calm temperament, he can get impatient even at the best of times. She's quite fancy, he's more rough and tumble. She takes things slowly, he leaps ahead without a care in the world... You would think that, outside of them both fighting for good, they would have nothing in common, and that their dynamic would be more akin to Sonic's relationship with Sally, which although they were friends, their relationship could often be somewhat rocky due to their differences in... basically every area and opinion imaginable.

But then you get to know Trudy, and the unfolding of the adventure reveals the rest of what she has to offer. The aforementioned soldiering on in spite of any depressed moments is in itself a small hint that Trudy shares Sonic's philosophy of never giving up. She believes that most people are good at their core, and while she won't excuse especially evil people or actions and will punish them appropriately (albeit with regret that it had to come to that), she's willing to give a chance to those who are willing to take it, just like with the Blue Blur. Not only does she NOT find Sonic's jokes and hijinks annoying, she actually has a similar sense of humor herself. And while reasonable people generally tend to loathe injustice and oppression, Trudy shares Sonic's uniquely intense contempt for it, and believes in one's own personal freedom just as much as the hedgehog does, let alone freedom in general.

In short, Trudy is what you get when you take Sonic's deeper qualities and general outlook on life, and apply them to a more introverted and taciturn personality. The exact same beliefs, but from a different perspective, so to speak.

6. A different kind of intelligence.

Tails and Eggman are the resident kings of scientific prowess in Sonic's world, and it goes without saying that I wouldn't want to do them a disservice by having Trudy one-up them in that department. But that doesn't mean your character can’t be talented in other areas, right? Contrary to what all those Mary Sue tests dictate, your character can in fact have a high IQ without intruding on an official character’s territory.

Therefore, Trudy is pretty good at innovation and craftsmanship in her own right, but whereas Tails and Eggman do it through technology, her field of expertise is more to do with arts and crafts, and to a lesser extent geology. For example, both her bow and her whip were crafted by the lady herself, using nothing but her decorative knowledge and flair.

Outside of that, she tends to know a fair bit about a lot of things in the world, largely attributed to her photographic memory, meaning she's bound to have a few answers no matter the subject of discussion. Granted, she's unlikely to be the absolute number one expert on any of those things, but she's at least a useful jack of all trades in that regard.

7. Feeling a little horse.

I very much approve and flat out adore the idea of Sonic characters having characteristics that remind the audience of what species they're supposed to be, so I made sure that Trudy had a wide selection of little mannerisms that would reveal her for the little horsie that she is. These include, but aren't limited to...

- When she’s fascinated or concerned by something, she’ll lean a little forward with her hands close to her chest, which subtly mimics the act of prancing.

- When she wakes up, she briefly stretches her arms and legs (albeit not too recklessly so as to risk straining her sensitive limbs).

- Her tail has a number of quirks. If she's happy, it might slowly swish to and fro. If she's REALLY happy, it might flick...

- And if she doesn't approve of someone or something, it might stiffen and raise a little bit, as if to helpfully inform the bad guys where they can kiss, if ya know what I'm saying.

- When she's being affectionate with her friends, she might give them the ol' nuzzle.

- When she's in a playful mood, there might be a little skip in her walk, the anthro equivalent of trotting.

- When she's annoyed, she might humorously let out a snort that sounds identical to a real life horse snort. And while she certainly doesn't neigh in the traditional sense, when she finds something hilarious or Sonic's making her laugh with his antics, her laughter can't help but take on a neigh-like touch to it. (The latter was actually a headcanon suggested by @darklightheart​, and I immediately agreed with it because it's cute and funny in equal measures.)

Naturally, she gets all shy and embarrassed when the neigh-laugh comes out, thinking it sounds silly. At least Sonic finds it endearing.

Note that I'm well aware that some of this differs from how real life horses react to certain things. (Eg: tail swishing tends to happen when a horse is agitated rather than happy.) But I freely admit that it's more for the sake of giving the character that extra bit of soul than it is for utmost accuracy. That's the way it goes with fiction sometimes. :P

Interestingly, Trudy tends to get Sonic indulging in a funny hedgehog characteristic of his own. That being, he might curl into a ball if Trudy's being particularly... ~complimentary~ towards him.

And there we are! These are the core elements that make up Trudy’s characterization. If you ever wanted a general list of what makes her tick, then hopefully this post will help in scratching that itch. And if it doesn’t, then hopefully it still proves that more thought was put into her than Scourge. :]

[wolfpawn]

I Hate You, I Love You, Chapter 159

Chapter Summary - Tom and Danielle tell Luke their news before it is declared to the world.

Previous Chapter

Rating - Mature (some chapters contain smut)

Triggers - references to Tom Hiddleston’s work with the #MeToo Movement. That chapter will be tagged accordingly.

authors Note - I have been working on this for the last 3 years, it is currently 180+ chapters long.  This will be updated daily, so long as I can get time to do so, obviously.

Copyright for the photo is the owners, not mine. All image rights belong to their owners

tags: @sweetkingdomstarlight-blog @jessibelle-nerdy-mum @nonsensicalobsessions @damalseer @hiddlesbitch1 @winterisakiller @fairlightswiftly @salempoe @wolfsmom1 @black-ninja-blade

Luke stretched his neck and cursed falling asleep sitting up the night before. Tabloids had caught wind of Tom being at Wimbledon and every last one to see it made note that Danielle was not there with him and assumed they had been the first to realise that she had left him or him her without any shred of proof or indication of such. It was hardly the most taxing or bothersome of stories but it covered more of the internet than Tom's recent outings so he had to keep an eye on it all the same. He found himself rolling his eyes at the analysis of some people declaring that Tom was depressed looking, or elated to be rid of Danielle, depending on their own personal thoughts of her. To be honest, Luke could never understand what would make a woman willing to endure the sheer madness of Tom's life outside of genuine love of him.

He looked at his watch and noted that Tom would be arriving at his office supposedly in the next fifteen minutes. He shook his head. Tom tried to be punctual, he really did, but he would get caught talking to someone or get overly interested in a book and genuinely be too polite to excuse himself or forget the time before being delayed and turning up late and apologising profusely. He was unsure why Tom asked to see him with no situation that he could think of to warrant an official enough meeting between them. He knew of Tom and Danielle's trip to the seaside with his family, he worried that perhaps something had gone awry there and the pair had seen fit to part ways, but his tone on the phone was pleasant, something he knew with confidence that Tom would not be inclined to be should his friend and his partner had broken up.

Only five minutes later, he received a call from his secretary informing him that his clients were waiting outside. He chuckled and he gave his assistant the go-ahead to let them in before waiting to see what it was he was dealing with, the plural giving him an indication it was not an impending breakup.

Tom and Danielle came in smiling, Tom embracing his friend and Danielle giving him a small peck on the cheek as they entered. “Hello, I was worried about this meeting at first, I see that was a terrible assumption on my behalf.” He indicated for them to sit across from him at his desk. “I assume that this is an official visit?” Tom smirked and handed a sheet of paper to his friend. Luke looked at him sceptically before taking the piece of paper and opening it. For a moment, he looked at the paper before looking up at the pair across from him. “Really?”

Tom smirk turned and lifted Danielle's hand, showing her ring to him. “Mum is having it put in tomorrow's paper because Danielle is working in London for a fortnight and she will be spotted wearing it, so we thought it best to inform you so to prepare for whatever madness arises.”

Luke reread the piece again before smiling brightly. “Well, after the claims from yesterday, this will be hilarious, congratulations to you both,” he looked at Danielle's hand. “Antique and classy, as though I could expect anything else.”

“What's this of yesterday's claims?” Tom asked worriedly.

“You, going to the tennis final by yourself is somehow a declaration that you two have gone your separate ways.” Luke informed them. “Danielle’s absence is nothing short of a formal break up announcement in their opinion.”

'Wow, this will be awkward for them,” Danielle scoffed. “Are we allowed any time apart? I dare say it is tiring being attached to one's significant other all the time. I was too busy stealing our niece for a few hours to boil myself in the unusually warm weather.”

“Yes, I cannot believe it had lasted this long.” Luke looked to the air conditioning vent in his office. “If that fails, I will be relocating to a freezer.” Tom and Danielle gave a laugh. “So, this is official? When are you thinking about a wedding? There's nothing rushing this is there?”

“No, nothing of the sort, we are talking about next summer, most likely. Nothing is planned yet, though Mum very much has plans to change that soon for fear we delay.” Tom informed him.

“Well, I appreciate the consideration. We can ensure everything is covered on this side of things,” Luke smiled before chuckling. “For a time, I genuinely never thought I'd see the day. You finding someone and settling down. Danielle, you made him see sense.”

“And this is my penance apparently,” she joked in return. “I’m sorry for the bother that this will cause you.”

Luke shook his head slightly. “Please, this is what I do as my living, I am just grateful that this is a good and pleasant situation to be overseeing as opposed to what others have to deal with. I will have this place ready for it, all I can say is like with the announcement that you two are together, there will be positive and negative reactions.”

“We know.” Tom gently rubbed Danielle's hand. “As Elle said, you will have to bear the brunt of this, so long as Elle stays offline,” he gave her a small pleading look.

“What, some people are ridiculous and hilarious?” She shrugged.

“And cruel and spiteful and some outright sick in the head,” Luke added, which Tom nodded to.

“They're the minority and the immature. People with odd notions of somehow finding Prince Charming and him ignoring obvious issues such as age, geography and other aspects and running away with them to live happily ever after into the sunset together. And I will admit, I enjoy their tantrums when I'm in the right mood.”

Tom shook his head and sighed. “You are mad.”

“You knew this anyway.” She laughed with a slight shrug as they all rose from their chairs.

“Elle, I need to speak to Tom for a moment, if that's alright?” Luke requested.

Danielle did not even blink before smiling brightly. “Of course.” She stepped out of the room and went to sit on one of the comfortable chairs outside Luke's office.

“A little warning?” Luke chuckled. “I know you said soon but you never mentioned it being this swift.”

“The last time I tried to plan around her, she overheard part of the conversation and thought there was something to worry about. I hadn't a time and place planned, I just went with what felt right and thankfully, she said yes.”

“Against her better judgement, no doubt.” Luke joked. “I am thrilled for you, Tom, I really am. How was your family's reaction?”

“You need to ask?” Tom beamed. “Mum is anxious to start planning.”

“So, it really is going to be a long engagement, as they do?”

“I don't think you could force her forward. Apparently, her cousin is getting married in the Spring of next year, which is already being noted as being too soon and to go ahead of that is a social faux-pas like nothing before by Irish standards.”

“I'll take your word for it. But being honest Tom, I am not sure Elle should allow herself read what some people are going to say, this will get a vitriolic reaction from some, in the same way Ben Cumberbatch and his wife suffered. I am not joking when I say that there may be reason to alert the authorities should they threaten her physically.”

Tom's eyes widened slightly. “They are just vocal online because of anonymity, they surely wouldn't….”

“They don't tend to, no but considering the abuse I physically witnessed her receive the time it was revealed she and Emma were friends before you began seeing one another, people seem to forget that they cannot say and do what they like without consequence. You too have noted how things have changed, Elle's safety from fanatics, and indeed yours is paramount. I think some may not take this well and get angered at you also.”

Tom studied Luke's expression. “What do you not tell me about what you see online with regards me and Elle?”

“You would lose sleep if I told you everything,” Luke confessed. “But with even YouTube stars being shot dead by supposed fans these days, no PR person can take any threat too lightly.”

“Alright, we'll be smart,” Tom swore, not certain as to whether or not he would say too much to Danielle for fear of scaring her when it was more than likely not necessary.

Luke made towards the door and opened it. When they stepped out, Danielle was looking astutely at her phone. She did not notice the two men standing beside her as she focused on the work plan in front of her.

“More changes?” Tom asked, knowing that she had been given two altered sets already.

She looked up at them and put her phone on standby. “No, just studying the street plan to see where are dangerous positions for large machinery.” She explained as she sighed. “I really should do more on my laptop or invest in a tablet, I am going bleary-eyed from looking at a small screen.”

“Business expenses, it's a great excuse,” Luke suggested with a grin. “I will alert everyone here to the imminent news so don't worry about that. You two have a pleasant day before your faces hit every celebrity news site and no doubt a tonne of papers and don't allow it to bother you.” He shook Tom's hand but Tom pulled him in for a hug. “You did better than you should have.” Luke jested.

“There's no need to tell me I am punching above my weight.” Tom acknowledged.

“Elle, congratulations, or commiserations, I'm not sure which is more suitable, it's debatable.” He moved forward and embraced her.

Danielle laughed at his words. “Well, you've had to endure him for enough of a period of time to know the truth in that.” She gave him a peck on the cheek. “Thank you for this and I really am sorry for any bother this creates for you.”

“If I did not wish to deal with public relations, I think it is safe to say I am in the wrong job.” He laughed as they walked to the office door. “I will be contactable if either or both of you want me and of course, I will be keeping you both posted on everything here.” After giving their thanks, Tom and Danielle left. Luke smiled at his friend's news and happiness as they did so before looking to the piece of paper in his hand and turning to his secretary. “Could you call everyone to my office please?” He requested, causing his secretary to go and do as requested. “We're in for a busy day tomorrow.”

*

The engagement is announced between Tom, only son of Dr James Hiddleston, of Oxford and Mrs Diana Hiddleston, of Aldeburgh and Danielle, the only child of the late Dr Matthew Hughes and the late Mrs Bridget Hughes, of Connemara, Co. Galway, Ireland.

The next morning, The Telegraph declared to the world in its engagement section that Tom and Elle were engaged. To them, bar the texts of congratulations from those they had not told by text themselves, nothing was any different. Tom kept Danielle offline by strategically requesting that she assist him with a long overdue clearing of his wardrobe, as it was becoming cluttered. Before he said anything, she had a black bag readied, her sleeves rolled up, and a terrifying look of determination on her face, Tom felt allowing her online would be less painful at that moment.

“I don't want to dump anything.”

“There are clothes here with holes that are not supposed to have holes,” she pointed specifically to a pair of socks that Tom was certain he wore training for the London marathon over a decade previous with large holes in any seam it had. “Do you need these?”

“No.” A moment later, they were in the bag. She then held up a t-shirt with a hole in the armpit. “No, not that,” he pleaded.

“Have you worn it in the last year?”

“I haven't worn it in over a decade.”

“Then why keep it?”

“It means a lot to me, I have a lot of fond memories in this.” He smiled at the t-shirt before taking it from her. “In RADA, I always wore this before a performance that mattered, for grades and such.” He watched as she took it from him and folded it neatly and placed it on the bed with a loving smile before holding up something else. “Don't bother dumping that, burn it,” he declared, physically wincing at the shirt she was holding up. “What the fuck was I thinking?”

Danielle assessed the shirt and shook her head. “I think it's safe to say you weren't thinking. I take it you bought this when you were shitfaced someday and thought it a good idea?”

“No.” Tom growled before looking at her sheepishly. “I was hungover and my shirt was covered in...well not pleasant things and my lift back from Cambridge was due and there was no way I would be allowed in the car otherwise and it was the best of a bad lot.” Danielle laughed. “So burn it.”

She glanced over the shirt. “It hasn't been worn since has it?”

Tom shook his head. “I'm still trying to figure out how it got here, I'm fairly sure I dumped it years ago before moving here.” He watched as Danielle placed it in a smaller empty bag she took out. “What are you doing?”

“Donating it. That could be something someone else needs.” She smiled.

Tom could only smile at her, elated at the knowledge that the world would now know she saw him as worthy of something she held in such high regard like marriage.

[theonceoverthinker]

Why Clover Isn’t Going to be a Traitor

So, @fairgame-is-endgame made a great post this last night debunking some of the more ludicrous pieces of evidence as to why Clover’s is not a traitor. It’s an awesome post and if you’re a Clover or Fair Game fan, you’re gonna want to check it out.

This is a continuation of sorts because as opposed to taking down the minute details being honed in on as evidence of why Clover might be a traitor, I want to compile the evidence presented by the show and secondary material (Ex. Amity Arena) that show strong signs that whatever Clover’s character direction will ultimately be, it won’t be as a traitor to the larger group fighting against Salem (And possibly not even against Ironwood).

So, what is my goal here? To reassure my fellow Fair Game friends that we’re not headed straight for a pitfall? To give the haters a piece of my mind? To speak into the bottomless chasm that is the Internet as a means of dealing with my fandom-based RWBY loneliness? ...A little bit of all of that, if I’m being honest. In any event, I don’t post a ton of analysis pieces, but this is something I feel strongly enough about to give voice to, so let’s see how it goes!

Everything’s under the cut because this is fairly long!

1. The Clover/Robyn scene from 7X5

If Clover was ever going to be set up as a surprise antagonist, it was going to start to show itself in this scene -- a scene that pits Clover against a character he views in an antagonistic light that didn’t end up being a misunderstanding -- more than any place else. 

And it did the exact opposite.

I mean...it did a little, even with the context of Clover and Ironwood’s true goals. Clover is pretty cold to her under his veneer of carefreeness and stops Ruby as she even tries to relate to Robyn (Perhaps that’s out of a fear of Ruby telling her too much, or perhaps it’s just a sense of distrust, but that will probably be revealed soon enough). I’ll walk with you that far and admit to some slight shadiness. But I’m going to argue that that only goes to a certain point, and a small point at that by highlighting the biggest takeaways of that scene. 

The scene between Clover and Robyn tells us a few things.

-Clover and Robyn’s opening dialogue, tone, and animation make it very clear that they’ve met before, but are not on good terms with each other. This is further communicated by Clover’s adamant refusal to disclose information to Robyn about the supplies. Now, I’m going to argue that in Clover’s defense, it just makes sense that when faced with a frenemy (That’s being kind) who is looking for information he has no desire or order to give to her (As we’ll learn later, Clover is a by-the-book guy), that he be in no hurry to tell her what’s going on. Additionally, while he lies to her face about his intentions, he’s very clearly speaking in a way that communicates that something IS going on that he cant speak of (His vocal inflections show that he clearly doesn’t expect Robyn to believe that the tower is getting a checkup, but hopes that it will be enough to shut her down for a bit), giving her that much information to work with at least until she gets elected. 

-Clover’s not especially excited about the prospect of Robyn being elected onto the council, but he still wishes Robyn good luck in the election. Not only that, but the facial expressions he gives her, the tone in which his words are said, and the fact that he delayed his return to the van just to do so heavily imply that it’s a genuine wish. Granted, we later learn that this may only be for reasons amounting to the fact that she’s not Jacques Schnee, but still, he knows she wants to help, and while they don’t get along, he’s receptive to that desire.

-Robyn trusts Clover enough that she reasons that asking for him to disclose information is a worthy pursuit (She does so twice) before attempting to attack the group. Otherwise, she’d have gone after them the moment they stepped out of the van. Since Robyn’s a character we’re supposed to end the scene having trust in, the fact that she does have lingering trust in Clover leaves the impression that we should as well.

All in all, while we don’t know a lot of tangible information pertaining to what they are to each other at this point in the story, we do get a surprisingly large emotional understanding here of their complicated dynamic. We know Robyn is correct in how the people of Mantle deserve to be informed of these goings on, but also why Clover is right to keep his mouth shut until the time comes to reveal all, and I think the attention to this dynamic paid here shows that both of these characters have their hearts in the right place.

2. Amity Arena Card (And Its Follow Up Twitter Post/Introductory Loot Drop)

There are two things I want to point out about this description that I want to touch upon here.

First, “there’s nothing subtle about what the Ace Ops leader Clover is about.” Now, that’s not to say he has no hidden depths to his character (It would really suck if there wasn’t any more to him), but I feel like these few words communicate a lack of secrecy as to his values, personality, and alignments. Can having all three of these things be positive still amount to a villain? Sure -- you can kind of say that makes him like Hazel in that regard -- but I think my next point will solidify that’s not the case.

Second, I’m gonna make this one short and sweet. There is no way to basically say that ‘this new character (Clover) is going to kick a beloved protagonist’s butt (Qrow’s butt) and that will be a good thing for said protagonist,’ and then have that new character end up being a baddie. While my knowledge of the game is a limited since I don’t actually play it, I did do some research today, looking at various cards for both protagonists and antagonists, and they overwhelmingly geared the framing of these card descriptions towards a more hero-focused outlook on the characters. Basically, this game is not about to cheer for a hero like Qrow to be defeated by someone who will turn out to be a villain, if for no other reason than it’s a poor choice for the game’s long term posterity.

But just in case that card’s second-to-last line left anyone with lingering doubts about its intentions, the RWBY Amity Arena Twitter page was kind enough to elaborate on it!

 I feel like that wink emoji should be doing my work for me here. If there was ever a doubt as to the intention of the wording, this tweet should clear it up. Clover is so clearly being shown by the Amity Arena card as a positive influence on Qrow’s life, and in a way that implies that that’s not about to change anytime soon. 

Like, if they wanted to convey ambiguity as to Clover’s moral alignment, they could’ve just said something along the lines of “Who knows,” or “Guess you’ll just have to wait and see.” In the world of Remnant, ambiguity is a force more powerful than the Light and Dark Gods combined, and one that knows no shortage of uses! But no, they literally spelled out that line’s intended meaning, with inflections and a winky face to boot!

I’m not going to try to go into detail about all of the little intricacies of this reward card, because someone already did it for me! I direct you to this AMAZING analysis by @scathing-eyes​ where she highlights both what this single message has to say about Clover and Fair Game at large.

3. Introductory Card on Twitter

Thank you so much to @homokinetic for linking me to this card!

If you’re trying to depict a shady character or even one who you have twisted intentions for, this is not the description you use for them. Here, we’re not given soft and vague allusions to Clover’s allegiances that could imply sinister motives. We’re told flat out that Clover acts in the best interests of Atlas and does things by the book. I mean honestly, that second point should de-trigger any alarm bells because Salem...doesn’t really have a book. I mean, she has goals, but as to how they get done? She doesn’t care! But Clover and Ironwood care about doing things by the book because they feel like those rules, for as flawed as they are, are what will keep the world from succumbing to chaos (Whether they’re right or wrong...look, I love these two, but they are flawed -- not evil, but flawed). Salem, on the other hand, worships the idea of chaos since it makes her goals that much easier to fulfill.

I think the line “tries to bring out the best in people” is also important. Salem’s forces gain strength by exploiting the worst qualities in people, and Clover stands in stark contrast to that philosophy by focusing on nurturing their best qualities. This is well communicated in the series with his actions towards Qrow and the introduction to the routines and options that the new Huntsmen now have access to. Not only that, but those means of nurturing come down to themes of unity and order (Showing Qrow the benefits of working with others and taking pride in his accomplishments, showing the new Huntsmen the positive ways they can impact Atlas, encouraging them to take a night to refresh their spirits), literally the very outlooks on life that Salem seeks to obliterate in order to ensure that humanity will be destroyed again. Just in terms of philosophies, Salem’s team and Clover are so fundamentally different in ways that just aren’t compatible. It’s not like Clover and Qrow where their differences complement each other and can mutually benefit the other. There is no way that Salem can benefit from posing a figure that inspires the endurance of the better qualities of the human spirit in a position of power.

4. The Overall Lack of Narrative Sense in Making Clover a Baddie

Clover is a character meant to foil and relate to Qrow. That’s not even an opinion. Everything from their contrasting semblances to their scenes together cement that as an absolute fact, and whether you ship it or not, their connection just can’t be ignored. 

All that said, while Clover is an important part of this duo (Duh), it’s Qrow who is the focal point. Qrow is the character we’ve spent four seasons with and watched him struggle and develop through his journeys. So it’s fair to say that the impact of Clover and Fair Game on his character (Again, whether romantic or platonic) will be something that will significantly impact the direction of Qrow’s character going forward.

The next logical question, of course, is as follows: What’s the narrative point of Clover being a baddie for Qrow’s character? @skybird13​ wrote a fantastic post about the overwhelming benefits of a genuine Clover as opposed to the redundancy of a Hans-esque traitor Clover storyline. You should absolutely read this post, but I’m going to quote the segment that spoke to me the most.

“I think the most surprising thing RT could do with Clover’s character at this point is to let him be exactly who he seems to be. Should he have his backstory and his secrets and his own demons to deal with? Absolutely. I would love to see that. But when it comes to Qrow’s trust in others, I think that has been pulverized enough throughout the series. Putting him through it again serves no narrative purpose except to send him right back into the tailspin that he’s currently digging himself out of which, in all honesty, isn’t great writing.“

And yeah, I have to ask: What point would another stab at Qrow’s trust do? If Qrow was meant to be a character who would face a tragic end, then why didn’t he back in Volume 6, when it would’ve been infinitely more appropriate? He literally lost faith in the person he dedicated his very life to. Why show Qrow recovering from his low point and building him up in Volume 7 just to tear him down? Unlike a character like Ruby, someone young and idealistic who watches the conventions of trust and goodness in her life crumble before her eyes over and over again and grows from it as she discovers new things about herself and others, Qrow has already had a lifetime’s worth of those ideals crashing and burning, and we’ve already seen the results of that growth, both on the high and low ends of his viewpoints on life, but especially the low points. What is the point of returning him there that couldn’t have been more naturally done but one volume earlier?  

The Conclusion

...I’m bad at ending things. But I know I’ve made my case, and I’ve made it about as well as a case like this can be made.

Rooster Teeth, through both its primary and secondary means of storytelling, have made a strong case for a Clover who will remain loyal to the betterment of Remnant, regardless of the path he personally chooses to get there (Joining Robyn vs. Staying with Ironwood). For them to change gears after all this setup and make Clover an ally of Salem would be frankly nonsensical after all of this careful buildup.

Could it turn out that I’m wrong? Of course, but despite the suspense in my heart, I can’t help but trust RT here. Maybe that’t the result of that bop of an intro. Maybe it’s the prospect of my new ship becoming canon. But I don’t think that trust -- while based in emotion -- is baseless, and if RWBY has a theme, isn’t it to have a perspective like that?

So here’s hoping the Clover is just another instance of the payoff of trusting love!