#begins ≠ youth analysis

[jamrroolloo]

It’s so interesting to compare Haru’s and Jooan’s characters as someone who hears things that aren’t really there vs. someone who can’t hear things that are (out of one ear albeit).

It makes for such an interesting comparison between their characters. Haru who believes things that aren’t real vs. Jooan who (symbolically) turns a deaf ear to what’s real but he doesn’t want to believe. Haru who cannot decipher hallucination from reality vs. Jooan who won’t accept reality.

And although they are contrasted in such a way, they both have a fabricated reality which is less painful.

You have Haru who has no outlet for his trauma, isn’t allowed to talk about it, and has to constantly lie to his best friends. Then, you have Jooan who wants to believe things will be okay with his father, things will get better and he won’t have to leave. Jooan who wants so desperately to believe it is just bad luck he’s deaf in his left ear and it isn’t his father’s fault.

Reality for Haru is twisted so he has someone he can talk to, someone he finally does not have to lie to. Jooan twists his own reality by ignoring the truth for something less painful.

This is only makes Jooan’s outrage at Haru’s believing in a friend that doesn’t exist all the more interesting to me since he essentially does the same thing. They both believe in lies.

[violetrainbow412-blog]

Decoy [S. R.]

Spencer Reid x fem!reader

word count: 6.9k

summary: when you go after an unsub who catches students making out, the unit is called upon to resort to desperate measures. Or in other words, where you and Spencer become the decoy to catch a voyeur.

warnings: +16. Making out, mentions of alcohol, mentions of violence, insinuation of smut, sexual tension

Do yourself a favor and imagine Spencer in these clothes during the case

You sighed, completely frustrated, while you looked for the thousandth time at the blackboard with some information from the profile that you had made for the criminal in this case.

You believed that the unsub was a Caucasian man between 30 and 35 years old, whose motive was to spy on and photograph university students who were escaping in their cars to make out at night, then force them to have sex in front of him and finally kill them cold-blooded. You imagined that he was a person with a mediocre job, that he felt insufficient, and that his voyeuristic behavior probably came from sexual frustration, something that could be corroborated by the violence that he inflicted on the genital area of the students whom he stalked using a knife, his mark on all homicides. You also believed that perhaps the rejection or abandonment of his last partner (preceded by a bad streak from his youth) due to his impotence had been the triggering event for all his repressed impulses to come to light.

All the psychological analysis was fine, it wasn't something you hadn't seen before, but the hard part of all this? Because he only threatened and killed people, he didn't rape them, at first it was almost impossible to tell who it was. He already had 20 victims in total and you weren't even close to catching him. In the last scene he had made the mistake of leaving a fingerprint and Garcia had been able to trace his true identity: Oliver Davis, a guy who fits the description perfectly. Unfortunately, this turned out to be useless because beyond the accusations of being a pervert, the man didn’t have much information that would give a clue to his whereabouts, you had even called the job that he had registered and all you had obtained was that he had several months without working there, which coincided with the beginning of the murders. After that Rossi suggested that he probably lived in a trailer (old, due to his lack of employment) where he developed the photographs and kept his trophies. That only made more sense when you thought that it would make it easier to transport or escape in case things got messy.

But words on paper and intelligent conclusions were of absolutely no use to you. You needed a plan to catch him.

"Do you have something, Reid?" Hotch had asked. You had already interviewed some students, you had set up guard duty to look for any suspicious behavior and you had even shared the photograph of the suspect in the media, but nothing had worked; The only thing left was to carry out the geographical profile to know the area in which he was attacking and thus be able to search for possible targets.

“I triangulated the locations we have of his previous homicides and I'm guessing he hits in this specific area,” he muttered, pointing to a space on the map he had on his blackboard with his middle finger. “Considering it's an area frequented by the age group due to its proximity to the universities and that it has several parks that the students told us they use to drink or go out as a couple”

"So what?" Morgan said from his spot. "We just wait until he kills someone else and hopefully we're near the scene to hear the screams?"

“Maybe we can ask the cops to patrol the area for the unsub's car,” JJ suggested.

“He's smart, there's a trailer park right here. It wouldn't be strange to find one on the streets as well.” Reid was visibly frustrated like everyone else and he ran a hand through his hair with some despair.

Your options were running out and frankly you couldn't think of anything else.

“And if we give him a target?” Emily murmured. Noticing that none of you said anything, she went on to explain her plan, “We ask police officers to send any young people they see around to home so we force our unsub to get close to who we want”

"And what are we going to do? Hire a couple of college kids to stalk them?”

“We can use our own team”

"Not to offend you, Prentiss, but we are no longer in the prime of youth"

"We don't, but Y/L/N and Reid do" when you heard your last name you were surprised, but when you heard your friend's you practically froze. First you looked at her and then at the doctor, whose gaze reflected the same stupefaction as you "You two are young, you might look like students"

"Are you saying you want to send us straight into the hands of a sexual predator?" you couldn't be offended, after all, those risks were part of the job, but you did feel somewhat reluctant about the idea.

“Do you have a better suggestion?”

“It doesn't sound so bad” Rossi murmured “It's a smart move”

“Besides, we would be watching around and we would intervene before that madman got close to you. Once we catch him, the photographs and personal items that he probably has in his trailer will be enough evidence, in addition to the fingerprint from the last crime scene” to your surprise, Derek was also pretty convinced of the plan that Emily had just devised.

"Reid, Y/L/N, would you guys be up for it?" Hotch exclaimed with his usual serious tone, looking at you and then at your partner.

Thinking objectively, the suggestion was very good. But thinking about it personally, you felt worried about the danger you two would be running into… oh, God. It wasn't until then that you realized that the plan to catch the suspect involved the two of you making out like a couple of hormonal college kids. 

You knew that the options that remained wouldn’t be as opportune as that and taking into account the temporary nature with which Oliver operated, in addition to the fact that he was already deteriorating as a murderer, it was most likely that he was already looking for new victims, so if you did that same night the chances of success were quite high. You were between a rock and a hard place and all you could do was look at him while the gazes of the rest of the room were divided between the two of you.

“I… I'll only do it if you say yes” you exclaimed in his direction, with a cautious voice and a fearful look. You knew your friend and you didn't want to make him feel uncomfortable in any way, even though you knew that both you and he knew that your personal interests would take precedence against the possibility that another couple of victims would lose their lives if you refused. It was your job, you had to do it. 

"Are you sure you guys are going to catch him before something happens?" Spencer asked your boss. You thought that with his background the last thing he wanted was to end up kidnapped or seriously injured again, even though the truth was that he was caring just as much about himself as he was about you. He had seen the photographs and knew that women were the most affected by the murder weapon… he didn't even want to imagine something like this happening to you.

"Of course. You will have communication with us and if something goes wrong we will get you out of there immediately" Aaron answered and your friend sighed nervously and then looked for your approval. You nodded slightly and he delivered the verdict, to which everyone agreed.

He was still standing, but after that he slumped into the nearest chair as he listened to everyone brainstorming ideas for setting up the scene, distributing the crew, and what they would tell the local police to do to make the decoy effective.

At some point you lost the whole point of the conversation, to start thinking about what was implied by what you were about to do.

The feeling of attraction for your co-worker had been latent in you for a couple of years, but you had never confessed it to anyone to avoid creating tension in the team or suffering the humiliation of certain rejection. Also, you knew that a crush meant distractions from what was truly important and you had tried, in vain, to eliminate it completely. But even if it hadn't completely gone, you had known how to control it, only allowing yourself to look at him with loving eyes from time to time and avoiding being too confident with him during group drinking outings. You even limited physical contact, not because you didn't like it but because you knew your greed would demand more and more of you until it became inevitable to beg for his touch. But now all that good work holding you back was screwed because in a few hours you would have to be passionately making out with him.

Still with the internal crisis, you raised your head to look at him and realized that he too had been submerged in his own tide of thoughts, which you hoped would be more positive than yours. At some point Spencer felt you watching him and when his eyes met yours he gave you that tight-lipped smile that was strangely comforting, to which you responded with the same gesture. After that it didn't take long for everyone to leave the room to fulfill their respective tasks, but you stayed seated because you honestly didn't feel enough energy to move. Besides, you had nothing entrusted to you, you were the bait.

"Hey, are you sure you're okay with this?" Spencer asked you, once everyone else had left. He looked so tired of everything, but at the same time there was a kind tone in his voice about him that made you smile.

“It's just kissing, Spence. I think we'll be fine" you assured him, trying to swallow all your embarrassment and nerves "And you?"

"I agree. I just hope we get lucky today or we'll just have to keep trying” 

"Reid, I need you to tell the cops what area we'll be in," Hotch interrupted you from the door. "You still have time to regret it," he added, looking at the two of you.

You immediately denied and after that Spencer withdrew from there in the company of Aaron. When you were about to drop you exhaled, completely concerned about the last thing your partner had said.

We will just have to keep trying. You didn't know if the idea excited you, or terrified you.

As night fell, Spencer drove the old pickup truck the unit had managed to rent for the two of you to drive into the park, with you in the passenger seat and a six-pack of beer in the backseat.

Although you were sure that it would be cold, you had decided to wear shorts and a button-down shirt that you normally wore for work, but that you had adjusted to make it look more youthful. Spencer was wearing an outfit that Morgan had gotten for him from a department store, simple jeans with a rather baggy cotton shirt and some nice boots that you didn't know where he got from, since in Quantico you had never seen him wear anything like that.

Both of you had showered at the hotel (separately of course) and you had made sure to brush your teeth and put on a good amount of deodorant and perfume before getting in the car. You had paid special attention to your appearance, not because it was necessary, but because you wanted to look perfect for him. Even with all this, you were a nervous wreck next to him, not saying a word along the way and only soft music from the radio filling the air.

When you stopped, the two of you put your headphones on to the channel the team was supposed to be on, and Morgan answered in the affirmative.

"Remember, he doesn't have to see the communicator or your weapon," Rossi spoke, who was also in the van, along with Prentiss and Hotch. "García will be watching with the security cameras and he will warn us if the trailer is coming"

"And meanwhile what do we do?"

"Pretend to be a couple, sit on the tailgate and drink beer, laugh, I don't know"

“Did you ever run away like that in college?” you asked, directly at Reid.

“Do you remember that I was like 16 when I studied at the university, right? I wasn't even old enough to drive, much less a car" he muttered and you gave a short laugh "I guess you did"

“I was too busy being the best in the institution to even think about going out and making out with idiots,” you replied, proud of yourself for that. “I mean, it's not like you're an idiot, but they were. You're very smart," you rambled, still twiddling your fingers, "Hotch, you guys will tell us when we're going to start kissing, will you?"

“When the suspect approaches, yes”

"Okay, well... then we have to go out, huh?" you muttered to him as you reached for the beers and tried to open the door to get out. You turned, expecting to see Spencer do the same as you, but noticed that he had lingered in the car for a moment, checking himself in the mirror and applying his lips with chapstick.

My God, could that man make you more nervous?

When he finally caught up with you, you went to the back of the pickup, where you opened the tailgate to sit down with a little hop. Spencer was tall enough to keep up with you just by leaning over the edge, where you watched him cross his arms. You were silent for a few moments, listening to the sound of crickets and cars in the distance.

"Do you think it's a good idea to drink?"

"Only a little. I'm having a hard time thinking while sober, I don't want to ruin the little reasoning I have left” you exclaimed as a joke. Or maybe you weren't joking so much "Just empty a couple of cans and leave them on the floor so he'll think we're really drunk." Spencer was about to do what you said when you noticed an important detail and called him over to look at you "Come here, let me fix your hair."

"What's wrong with my hair?"

"You're very well combed, it's not the image we expect" you carefully took his hand until it was close enough to pass the other through all his golden locks, messing them up enough to give him that relaxed touch that he should have. He looked so handsome, but not in the style of a fancy FBI agent but just like a young intellectual who went to parties and smoked weed “Like this. Perfect"

“Do you think we have to think of some backstory?” he asked and you looked at him with a frown. “You know, something about us. What degree are we studying, what are our names…”

"This is not a play"

"It's rude to eavesdrop on conversations, Prentiss," you said visibly annoyed, although looking at your partner that expression softened "As you wish, Spencer. Although being honest, I would say that you study… literature”

"Really?" he exclaimed with slight enthusiasm. You knew that his mother had been a teacher in the subject and you wondered if he had ever considered it.

“Morgan wasn’t wrong to choose those clothes for you. It suits you” you complimented him and Morgan whistled from the other end of the line. You felt like you were having too much fun for the situation you were in, but you needed to talk about something else to put off the reminder of what you had come to do for as long as possible. “I think you would have that hopeless philosopher/romantic vibe who flirts by whispering memorized poetry in your ear.”

“I actually know some good ones”

"Sure you do" you smiled gently, suppressing the thought of him sighing close to your neck at Bécquer "I'd probably study science or something."

"The unattainable scientist with whom the captain of the soccer team has a secret crush, but she is completely unaware"

"Where did you get that? From a 90s movie?

Spencer's laugh was one of your favorite sounds and today that was precisely not helping your situation. You felt intoxicated by how handsome he looked, like you'd discovered a side to him that no one else had, and the thought of kissing him made you tremble a little with anticipation.

“Do you want to share a beer?” he murmured, carefully opening the can and offering it to you first. You knew your partner wasn't the most enthusiastic about doing anything that involved germs, so it made you feel good that he took the lead. You took a big gulp of the drink to gather something of value and when it was his turn to drink he kept looking at you intently, you would even say that he seemed entranced.

You had made sure you were in a strategic position, with enough light for the unsub to see you and quite lonely, except for the patrol cars and the van that had been positioned at a safe distance.

“How does voyeurism develop?” you asked quietly, with genuine interest, as you shifted a bit to get closer to him.

“Voyeurism usually begins in adolescence and since during that age it is usually seen with greater tolerance, there are people who continue with these behaviors until adulthood. When voyeurism is pathological, they spend considerable time looking for opportunities to watch, often at the expense of not fulfilling important responsibilities in their lives, and people reach orgasm by masturbating during or after watching. Although if you think about it a bit, everyone is a bit of a voyeur."

"Why you said so?"

“Many men and women enjoy viewing pornography, which can be classified as voyeuristic behavior. It's not a worrying thing, but it's interesting to think about it” he explained, with those expressions on his face that he had every time he shared knowledge with you. He liked that about you, that you were always willing to listen to his data and statistics even at the most inopportune moments.

"I'm still a little scared that Oliver is trying to do something to us."

“I have my gun. If he tries to do something to you, I'll use it" you knew that killing the unsub was always the last option Reid considered, so you widened your eyes a little to show your surprise "All lives are worth, but when that life has already taken so many and it puts you at risk, I would not doubt it. You have nothing to worry about” he assured you and your heart warmed a little at feeling so protected.

"Do you know if Oliver attacks at a specific time?"

"No, he doesn’t. Just as we can be here for ten minutes, we can also be here all night."

You exhaled loudly, before taking another gulp of beer.

“Drink some, boy. I feel kind of selfish around here."

"I am nervous"

"And why do you think I'm drinking?" you exclaimed wryly, still holding out the can to him, and when he finally agreed he drank a little more than you expected “Have you ever…” you started to say, but suddenly remembered that literally the whole team was listening to you. If the answer was embarrassing, you didn't want to hear Morgan and Emily taunting you all week, so you covered your microphone for a moment and spoke again, but so quietly that only he could hear you. "I suppose you kissed someone, did you?"

"Yes," he said quickly and you sighed with relief. It comforted you a little to know that it wasn't his first kiss, because you didn't want him to have such a bad memory “Do I look so inexperienced?"

"No, that's not what I meant" you smiled "You're handsome, I know you've probably kissed a couple of girls"

"You don't need to tell lies, you know I'll kiss you anyway"

"But it's not a lie. I really think you're handsome" you confessed, gathering all the courage in you, while you smiled at him in the most serene way possible "And if we weren't literally waiting for a murderer, you know I'd be happy to do this with you"

"Smooch me?"

"Having this bad date attempt, Reid," you hissed, flushing red, as you slammed your palm into his forehead with just a little bit of force. Spencer seemed quite pleased that he made you nervous, rather than the other way around, so he grinned, “Though I think we should have brought food. I'm starving,” you pouted, swinging your dangling legs back and forth.

"That's not a picnic, Y/N"

You hated for a second that everyone was so intent on the conversation. A part of you wanted a moment alone with the brunette, even if it was in the midst of such a strange situation.

You began to talk pleasantly about things completely unrelated to the case for a couple of minutes, staying where you were, until Hotch's interruption made you jump a bit in place.

"Garcia intercepted an approaching trailer, get ready” your heart immediately sped up and you noticed him tense beside you, too, probably with the same thought flooding his head.

"Okay, come closer," you exclaimed, trying not to panic, as you spread your legs a little to allow the man to step into the space between. He wasted no time and just as you wrapped your hands around his shoulders you heard the sound of another car pulling up.

"Is that our unsub?"

"It is"

You were about to turn your head to peek when Reid grabbed your cheek and stopped you.

"He's smart. If you look at him, he'll realize it” he reminded you with a serious voice. You were so worried about everything that you were forgetting about your training “Okay, so I… Is it okay if I put my hands here?” he asked with a different tone, nervously placing both hands on your waist. You had always admired the size and anatomy of those hands, but until now you had not had the pleasure of feeling them on your body in this way.

“Tonight everything you do is fine. I promise"

"It would be a good time to start, he'll see you" Emily reminded you and you could only sigh shakily.

You two were adults, why were you so scared about kissing?

"Close your eyes" Spencer whispered to you, masking his nerves better than you "I'll kiss you, just close them," he asked you and you did.

You felt his body lean against you a little until his chest almost touched yours and then his lips shakily pressed against yours. You would always remember your first kiss, which in essence was such a brief caress that you didn't even know if it could be counted as one, the one where he wordlessly asked your permission to explore your mouth. Still with your eyes closed, you pulled him by the neck towards you and started a new kiss, a little more confident and deep this time, allowing you to savor the beer mixed with strawberries and that strange flavor that each person has.

“We…” you started to say, once you separated “you have to do it slowly, what he wants is a show” you exclaimed. Spencer felt unable to say any words and your hands caressing him so deliciously wasn't helping at all “Slow,” you repeated.

You arched your back a little to get even closer and when you finally looked up you met his caramel eyes. You needed a moment to recover and you unconsciously licked your lips, as if you needed to pick up and savor his presence in your mouth again, something that didn’t go unnoticed by his attentive look at your movements. 

It didn't take long for you to give up, as beginning the third kiss you felt that you no longer had any control over your body, your heart, or your mind. And while it was true that neither of you were experts on the subject, you guys managed pretty well as the seconds ticked by. Spencer gasped as he simultaneously felt you pull the hair from his neck and caress his lips with the tip of your tongue, while you were taken by surprise when his hands left your waist and lowered to the height of your hip, where his thumbs gripped firmly on the clip of your shorts.

There was a kiss, then another and another; they became too many to count. You didn't want to touch him anywhere and at the same time you wanted to touch him completely, in the grip of the fantasy that this was real and not just a performance. And even if you were aware that it was all fake, that would probably only have encouraged you to enjoy something to the fullest that you knew would never come back. Amid everything you didn’t know which of the two situations would be worse.

The sound of your lips colliding became so obscene that you were embarrassed, but you had no plan to stop. Your hands slid gently down the length of his neck until you reached his chest and cupped the soft cotton of his garment in your fists to make sure he didn't move away from you. The heat of the moment just went up and up, but a voice on the intercom brought you back with a jolt.

“He started the trailer. He's going to go"

Spencer closed his eyes in frustration, and you sighed. From the position he was in it wasn’t possible to get around him without being seen, so keeping all his attention was on you and him.

Maybe you weren't doing it right? You wondered what the hell this man wanted to see if you were practically eating each other, but suddenly you remembered that his motivation was even more sexual than a couple of wet kisses. Maybe he was getting bored because he needed to see that you were about to… well, do it.

"Take off my shirt," you said immediately, still too close to his swollen lips and looking right into eyes that seemed to be pitch black.

"Take... what?"

"Take off my shirt" you repeated, with a tone that made the man shudder completely. With the hands that were still holding his shirt you pulled him to you and he held his breath “And kiss me better. Like you really want me"

But Spencer didn't need to pretend that he wanted you. 

He made you completely dizzy when he began to kiss you so hungrily and you managed to keep enough composure when you felt one of his warm hands travel under your blouse, limiting yourself to letting out sighs that were drowned against his lips. But what finally caused you to let out an indiscreet and unwelcome moan was when he pulled you by the hip until you were on the edge of the tailgate and you could feel the growing bulge in his pants pressing against you. Spencer had almost managed to suppress his, but in the end, you having your own situation down there didn't help one bit. 

His trembling fingers fussed with the buttons on your shirt until it ended up somewhere on the floor at incredible speed, leaving you half-naked before him and the collection of FBI agents standing around. You might have been embarrassed if your brain could connect two coherent thoughts, but you'd lost that from the moment Dr. Reid first dared to kiss you.

You carefully guided his hands to the beginning of the curve of your breasts and now you both sighed in unison, feeling goosebumps on every inch of your skin. You pushed yourself forward just for the satisfaction of hearing that guttural sound again and your prayers were immediately answered, for it was enough for him to feel the slightest friction and he would go crazy. It was inappropriate to need him like that, but you couldn't help it.

Holding your lower back, he leaned over you and at the same time pulled you towards him until your breasts collided with his chest. In that position, your neck was exposed and your partner’s hot lips didn't hesitate to go down there, while you sighed agitated just at the height of his ear. Spencer asked you, between each kiss, to look in the direction of the trailer to see if he was still there and as you could you answered yes, which was victory enough for both of you.

As he could, he maneuvered to lay you down carefully on the cold metal of the truck without stopping kissing your neck, and by inertia you wrapped both legs over his hip. When you were hidden by the panels of the pickup he finally looked at you.

"I hope it's enough to get his attention," he said, sounding as agitated as expected, and although the circumstances meant that you two would be taking a break you flatly refused, pulling him back to kiss him.

That kiss did take Spencer by surprise and it was perhaps the sincerest of the night. It wasn’t as passionate as the previous ones, but rather it was loaded with softness and you would even say that a hint of supplication. You were begging for him not to stop, for the night to get stuck in an infinite loop where the two of you could kiss for eternity. And suddenly you felt how he, who had been so tense the whole time, completely relaxed against you, as if he understood exactly what you wanted to say. His hands came to rest on the sides of your head to be able to kiss you more comfortably and you dared to take him by the waist with the same care that you were kissing him, feeling even above the cloth the softness of his skin. 

And then he broke up with you. You feared you had done something wrong due to the suddenness of the movement and your frightened eyes searched his gaze for a sign of the reason, without finding anything. He just looked at you with something you couldn't describe, but that made you feel butterflies fluttering all over your stomach... and he stayed like that for a few seconds: just looking at you, as if he wanted to memorize all your features.

You opened your mouth to say something, but your words were drowned in a new kiss, totally different from the previous ones. Spencer was taking time with him, trapping your lower lip between his and sucking on it gently, pressing himself a little more against your body, sighing heavily into your mouth.

Your hand was already running up his side to make its way to his cheek just as screams filled the silence and you hugged him reflexively. The screams had come from Morgan, who had already moved across the park to take down the unsub and was now wrestling with him to get the knife out of his hand. Spencer hesitated for a moment if he should come over to help, but he preferred to hold you better against his body to protect you and wait for Emily to place the handcuffs on the man under her partner's knee.

From a distance you saw that he only brought with him, in addition to the knife, his camera, and a small backpack with some other murderous instruments that they managed to confiscate without any problem.

"All clear, we've got him," Hotch spoke over the radio. As you exhaled in relief too many emotions washed over you, combined with the adrenaline coursing through your body and the arousal still flowing into your crotch.

"Are you okay?" Reid's gentle voice called to you, as he pulled away to check with his eyes that everything was in order. His hair was messy and his lips were so swollen that it was almost painful to look at the image without launching yourself to kiss him again "My God, your shirt..." he said, completely embarrassed, as he bent down to pick up the garment. You looked him up and down and blushed when you noticed how tight his pants were, feeling your stomach turn a little. When he got up, he took the opportunity to look at your chest covered only by the black lace bra and a big gulp of saliva went down his throat.

You thanked him quietly and put your shirt back on, feeling the sneaky glances Spencer was giving you, just before Hotch walked up to you.

"How are you?"

"Very good, excellent" you stammered.

You could perfectly feel your swollen lips, the light sheen of sweat on your face, the heat flowing from all the places Reid's fingers had been, and the abundant moisture between your crossed legs.

After Hotch congratulated you on your performance, the two of you walked as best you could toward the rest of the agents, who were already placing Oliver on patrol. Another group was analyzing the trailer and they managed to pull out enough evidence about the murders that would be very useful in prosecuting the man.

"All good?" Emily asked in your direction, once things had settled down and the rest of the team had gathered in a circle by the van. You and Spencer just nodded at the question.

“I honestly think I'm going to need therapy after what I heard,” Dave murmured, so serious that you couldn't help but burst out laughing.

"Don't you even dare make fun of this"

“No, we won't. I'm just saying you guys seemed to be enjoying it there."

"That's supposed to be the plan, right?" Spencer said nervously, finally daring to look at you and looking away almost immediately as he smoothed his hair back.

Once your boss said you could retire you escaped in a patrol car as fast as you could, wanting to get home so you could take a cold shower and soothe what wasn’t satisfied by the man. You could hardly sleep that night, still haunted by the ghost of the kisses you received from your gorgeous coworker, and the next morning you hoped that double coffee would do the trick. But apparently you weren't the only one who thought so, because at the same time that you arrived Spencer Reid crossed your path.

"Hey," he said, in that high-pitched voice that came out when someone caught him off guard, "How are you?" 

"Fine, and you?"

"Fine too"

You knew that the two of you wanted to talk about what happened, but it only took one of you to have the courage to speak first. At the same time your phones rang indicating a message and you mistakenly assumed that it was JJ contacting you to announce a case. What was your surprise when you opened the file and found a collection of photos from the night before. You knew from Spencer's face that he had received the same thing.

"Garcia did you… did she send you the same evidence?"

"That's right," he said nervously. You had to admit that if Oliver had one quality it was that of a photographer: you were sensual and perfectly captured the desire that had existed between you. Well, the one you had pretended to feel… right?

Spencer held his breath as he came to a picture of you topless in which his hand was practically on your breast, immediately remembering how that had felt. He just hoped his memories didn't affect him too much or it would be embarrassing enough to walk into the boardroom with a boner.

"They're good," you said to the air and he suppressed a laugh "But I can delete them if that makes you feel uncomfortable"

“No, no, I… I think I want to keep them too. After all, the bureau will have them in the files as evidence of the case, I prefer to have access too”

"I just hope she doesn't send them to anyone else, I wouldn't want to see my bra photos going around."

“I'll tell Garcia, don't worry,” Spencer murmured, rushing to type something on his phone.

While you waited for him to type you took another look, feeling your whole body heating up again at the memories. A part of you was grateful to have such material in your custody.

"I never thought of being the protagonist of an erotic photo session and here we are," you said ironically.

“Speaking of which…” Spencer started to say, “Not the erotic sessions by any means, don't think I'm planning on inviting you to one or that, because it would be super weird and inappropriate, but I was thinking if… huh…”

“Sell them online? I thought so too, but it depends on how much profit there is. Garcia can help us find the highest bidder and not get charged for tampering with evidence."

"What? No!" he said, completely shocked, and you laughed because you got the reaction you expected with your joke "Why would we do that?"

“Just kidding, Reid. Those photos are something I prefer to keep to myself" you clarified and your smile made him feel shy "Seriously, sorry for interrupting you. What did you want to tell me?"

"What…? huh, yes, right. It's just that this morning I was thinking about what you said yesterday, about how under normal circumstances you would have liked to have a bad date with me, right? and it just kept spinning in my head, so I was asking if you wanted to go for a drink sometime. Not like a date, of course, I'm not saying it is if you don't want to. I can just be like… well, go get a drink. As friends"

Yesterday Spencer had practically eaten your mouth and now he was nervous about asking you out. So adorable.

“You're not doing this just as compensation, are you? because you know that it is not necessary…”

“I do it because I want to. And I want to believe that… that I didn't misunderstand what happened yesterday."

You no longer even cared that it was unethical to date team members, or that if things went wrong, you would probably go into the worst of depressions. What mattered to you was that Spencer was interested in you, even if he had implied it, and that he was asking you out alone with him. Just the two of you, with fun and alcohol involved, without gossipy colleagues or mortal danger.

"Then I'd love to, Reid."

“Wow, excellent then” he smiled, feeling lucky that you agreed “I know a great bar near here, the atmosphere is generally calm, I like it because they don't play loud music. What day is right for you?"

“I'm available any day you want” you responded genuinely, grinning from ear to ear just being around him. That was the effect Reid had on you.

It was stupid to try to deny that you were still attracted to him, especially since now you had a taste of what he could do with you. You wanted to kiss him again, of course, but you were also anxious to earn that completely adoring look you'd received the night before.

“Today?”

"Yeah, why wait?" you responded, more excited than you wanted.

“Hey, I didn't ask you, but I wanted to know if I didn't go overboard with you last night. I mean… did something bother you?”

It was a smart move, you could see it clearly. It was obvious that Spencer cared about you, but you also picked up on his intentions to find out if you were interested in him too. Well, that's how it was from your perspective, because that probably would have been your motivation being in his place.

Even if it wasn't the case, you weren't going to miss the opportunity to take a little advantage of the situation.

"The kisses on the neck were something he definitely didn't expect, but they weren't unpleasant at all," you assured him, feeling your cheeks heat up again. "Did it feel good to you?"

"It did"

"So everything's perfect," you murmured, shrugging off the matter. But you both knew you couldn't see each other in the office and acted as if nothing had happened.

Something had happened. Those kisses had only fueled the tension that had always existed between you but that you wanted to ignore.

"Do you want to go after work, then?"

“Sounds good to me”

Spencer gave you one last smile and then went to prepare his usual cup of sugar with a dash of coffee. All day you were thinking about him and more than once he caught you looking at him, but you didn't even care.

So, at nightfall, with a few drinks on you and more courage in your body, you finally confessed that kissing was something you had wanted to do for a long time. You almost didn't believe it at first, coming from him, but when you finally accepted it, it wasn't hard at all to rush at him and kiss him feverishly. And this time there did not impede for you to give free rein to your desires, which led you to the soft mattress in your friend's house and kept you awake until a few hours before dawn.

[getoed5725]

Maybe you already know: how SatoSugu gain a whole new word for their relationship

- brought to you by JJK's production team (including Gege Akutami)

The tweet above is a QRT from one of the video producers for Gojo's 11-hour long tribute video, streamed on 3rd April till midnight to celebrate the release of JJK volume 26, "Heading South", on 4th April 2024. The video title is 孤高、廻想、融独 (Solitary, remagine, [fusion/melting]), revising Gojo's nice moments in his life with his friends and students.

The tweet says:

"We were involved in the planning stage. A "best friend" (「親友」/shinyuu) is a "toxic" (「有毒」/yuudoku [1]) and "melting" (「融独」/yuudoku [2]) existence. This is just our interpretation, but with everyone's thoughts, we have the final answer. We hope to able to encourage you to get Volume 26 even just a bit." (this is rough translation)

What is really the center of attention is this word 「融独」/yuudoku [2]. This is the 3rd word of the video title, but surprisingly, this word doesn't exist in the Japanese dictionary.

It is a completely new word created by the production team to describe part of Gojo's life. At the beginning, even Japanese fans had a hard time understanding what this word means. However, after Vigneravan's (the video producer) tweet, it is confirmed that 「融独」 is related to 「親友」/shinyuu/bestfriend. Gojo only has one and only one bestfriend, so this new term points to Geto.

The producer says "a bestfriend is a 'toxic' and 'melting' existence" when talking about Gojo's bestfriend, Geto. There is a wordplay here: both "toxic" 「有毒」[1] and "melting" 「融独」 spell the same way, "yuudoku". This fact is actually realized by fans in the way they assume how these characters are spelled when parts of them are used within other more common terms (especially when the referred term doesn't exist). 「融独」 is a combination of 融 (fusion/melting) and 独 (loneliness) - in literal sense, it means "melting the loneliness". In other words, the video producer's interpretation is "Geto, Gojo's best friend, is like toxin to him, but at the same time he melts away Gojo's loneliness".

Let's go back to Gojo's tribute video. This video starts with Gojo's birth, his youth, then his days as a teacher, and ends with him joining the battle with Sukuna, and finally going to the airport in the afterlife. Out of 11 hours, Geto appears in nearly 5 of them. The common vibe of the video is Gojo's happy moments with his friends, colleagues, and students. If you notice, there are NO scenes where he is fighting or in danger. The only distressing moments in the video are: when Geto becomes depressed, when Geto leaves Gojo, and when Gojo is left mulling in his own thoughts afterwards, sitting right where his bestfriend used to:

This means that the saddest and most depressing thing that ever happened to Gojo's life is when Geto left. And we all know how Gojo never forgets about him, and in fact, delays the time to execute Geto by order, only going down on him when Geto declares war 10 years later. This can be interpreted as part of the video producer's view, "toxic".

Yet, Gojo doesn't let Geto out of his mind. At the start of the video, after the images of him as a baby, Geto is the first person to appear in Gojo's life:

The above image gradually adds Yaga and Shoko afterwards. You can say that Gojo had no significant memories as a child, because he was born with powers and expectation, and thus, as a lonely kid. Meeting Geto, he has the first ever friend, an equal, someone who can understand him. So the memories when he first had Geto in his life, also indicating the start of his 3-year treasured bluespring, is when he finally turns from a lonely child to no longer lonely.

Yet when he loses Geto, he's become lonely again. Note that, Gojo has never been "alone", but he has been "lonely" (there has been many analysis for this, from Shoko's thoughts about him right before he gets released from Prison Realm, and in c236 when he confesses). Which turns out, Geto's existence is too big for him. Isn't it unhealthy to give so much leeway to an enemy, "the worst curse user of the jujutsu society", when he's supposed to execute Geto as soon as possible before he becomes a big threat? Yet, whatever Gojo has for Geto is too much and enough for him to give Geto freedom until he can't anymore; and after that, Gojo still wishes Geto had been there to pat him on the back before the fight with Sukuna, in order to fully feel satisfied. To wish for something impossible as an existence of the dead, who was supposed to be an enemy but wasn't.

It is "toxic", but Geto is exactly the only thing that can "melt his loneliness". That is why Gojo, who's been lonely all his life being the strongest, cannot let go of Geto in his mind. Geto has been the first one to make him change for the better, to stand by his side despite his status and origin, and even though he left, he's still Gojo's main source of inspiration to build his dream of changing the jujutsu system for the better, and to not let children fall for the same fate as his best friend once did, preserving their youth. Despite all the unfortunate events, Geto still stays as the special "toxin" to Gojo, the only one that can melt away his loneliness, the only person whose existence brings him satisfaction. (there's a whole topic on how the word "satisfaction" Gojo uses to describe his feelings when fighting Toji or Sukuna and the one used when describing Geto below are 2 similar terms with different connotations, but I'll leave that for another time)

For our own assumption, it is also likely that Gege Akutami is the one to come up with this word 「融独」. As the author who created Gojo and Geto as a contrasting pair, he is the one who understands their relationship the most. But mostly because he's one of the few people (involved in the series) who has deep understanding of Japanese language and often plays around with words. JJK very often includes highly complicated Japanese words and terms (even for Japanese readers), so for him to come up with a completely new word to pay tribute to Gojo is not out of possibilities.

And it leaves you in awe again how important Geto is to Gojo.

Watch the 11-hour tribute video:

P/s. by coincidence (or not), Tatsuya Kitani, the singer/songwriter for JJK Hi/pd arc's OP "Ao no Sumika", includes "Love Song" in the album Ao no Sumika. And this song is... well. A bit familiar.

Would the song somehow reminds you of how the video producer perceives Gojo & Geto's relationship? It's up to you.

Funfact: in "Love Song", there is an interesting term: 眩しい常闇 (mabushii tokoyami) - "eternal dazzling darkness". This term is also the title of JJK volume 0 chapter 4.

[lossisyours]

@taylortruther broke my brain a little with hoax analysis, and it got me thinking of how sweet nothing reminds me a lot of lavender haze in that both of those songs, in retrospect, reframe drastic switches in originally stated plans/intentions and romanticise it.

taylor’s always sung about a desire for marriage: from mary’s song (debut), “take me back to the time when we walked down the aisle / our whole town came and our mamas cried / you said, ‘i do,’ and i did too” to love story (fearless), “he knelt to the ground and pulled out a ring, and said / ‘marry me, juliet, you’ll never have to be alone, i love you and that’s all i really know / i talked to your dad, go pick out a white dress / it’s a love story, baby, just say ‘yes’” to speak now the whole damn song to starlight (red), “we could get married, have ten kids and teach ’em how to dream” to how you get the girl (1989), “i want you for worse or for better” to lover’s (title song) bridge’s mimicry of wedding vows to paper rings’ thesis to it’s nice to have a friend (lover), “church bells ring, carry me home / rice on the ground, looks like snow”. only to drop midnights with lavender haze as the first single, the start to the album; an album that bargains a LOT with her discography (and herself). and that doesn’t make lavender haze a lie, necessarily... but it does make it an immensely thought-provoking narrative to switch to.

sweet nothing’s not that different! it was all over fearless (2008) from that initial, youthful romanticism of fearless (title song), “you know i wanna ask you to dance right there / in the middle of the parking lot”, to the spectacular dramatism of love story’s entire genesis/lyric-story, to the cheeky flamboyance of hey stephen and you belong with me. she’s known that she wants fireworks & grand gestures. actions & proof! she missed “screamin’ and fightin’ and kissin’ in the rain” and being “so in love that you act insane”. she herself loves in huge ways, and to cite examples for that would be to quote most of her discography. and she cares about the showing up – that’s why she wrote the moment i knew (red). and that narrative started to morph a little when she met joe; she said as much in miss americana, “i was falling in love with someone who had a wonderfully normal, balanced life. we decided together we wanted our relationship to be private. i was happy. but i wasn’t happy in the way i was trained to be happy. it was happiness without anyone else’s input.” their new beginnings weren’t secret to her, they were sacred. and then she sang, “we still worship this love / even if it’s a false god” and called their love “faithless” in hoax. she took over the role of being the fire to keep his brittle heart warm. she took ownership of being “the liquor in [their] cocktails”. she took the dreaminess & fated-soulmateism of invisible strong (folklore) and made it mastermind (midnights) — which everyone joked about at that time, but now hurts to think about.

there is a pipeline from “all that you ever wanted from me was... nothing” to “and i’m fadin’, thinkin’ 'do something, babe, risk something, babe, say something / 'lose something, babe, risk something / choose something, babe, i got nothing' / 'to believe, unless you’re choosing me” that makes my tummy hurt. how long could they be a sad song? (hoax. the sad song is hoax.)

[itshermocrates]

Some thoughts on Vander and Silco's relationship

I already talked about this when Arcane S1 first came out, but now that the show is over and we got to see a different reality where everyone has a good ending (except for Vi I guess) I want to bring back my Silco x Vander thoughts

So yeah, vanco ?? silder ??? post

Even if in Arcane S1 there’s some sort of parallel between Jinx/Powder and Silco + Vi and Vander, in my eyes those two were made for an old man yaoi story

Now that we have seen Jayvik’s evolution and that glimpse of them together in a “better future”, I realized that Vander and Silco (+ Felicia) could have something similar to what was happening initially with Jayce and Viktor (+ Mel)

Two best friends working together for a common cause, one hopelessly in love with the other while his partner can’t see ―or doesn’t want to recognize― his own feelings. Since I already have a Jayvik analysis in my drafts, I’m going to focus on Silco and Vander

This will be half a theory - half a fic + I also posted this on BlueSky so yeah, if you see it there it was also me lol

[Pinning, Unrequited love and love confessions that go wrong ahead]

I think Silco and Vander were the perfect duo back in their youth, together they had the brains and the strength, using both charm and cold logic to make people eager to follow them. What Silco lacked, Vander was able to provide and vice versa. Together they were the greatest leaders Zaun could ever ask for.

They not only completed each other like two puzzle pieces, but also shared a bond that had been nurtured since childhood. They had been facing hardships and Piltover’s aggressions since they were little kids, so it was natural that the years of friendship brought them impossibly close.

Some even said that they could have entire conversations without exchanging a single word.

At some point Silco developed a crush on Vander, how could he not? Despite his strength and sometimes scary appearance, Vander had always been the big sunshine boy who was looking after him. That urge to protect and take care of others seemed to be part of his very essence, and if someone benefited from this, it was his best friend.

Of course, they needed to fight and get dirty in the deepest hellholes of Zaun, but even when Vander got his knuckles drenched in blood, Silco could only see the kind man with bright eyes and a dream for a better life that Vander truly was.

Silco really thought that this new beginning for them was only possible because Vander was there with him, since when hope seemed completely lost, when the circumstances took another member of their little family, Vander always remained firm in his stance. They would find a way, they would fight back, they would keep pushing forward and they wouldn’t stop until they finally had the future they deserved.

Oh, wasn’t he convincing? Always the beacon in their times of need, who else could lead them out of their misery?

Vander’s kindness was disarming, and his light was so bright that Silco couldn’t help but fall in love with him. He loved him so deeply it made him feel sick, but he could do nothing about it. Vander had been in love with Felicia for almost as long as Silco had loved him, and even if she wasn’t really interested in him, there was no way that man could get over his emotions.

Just like Silco himself couldn’t make his own feelings go away. He pinned for years, forcing himself to hide how he felt so nothing changed between them and he didn’t lose his best friend. He had to protect their friendship, but, above everything else, he had to protect their dream of a free nation for Zaun.

Silco pinned and suffered in silence until he couldn’t take it anymore, until his unrequited love felt like an open wound badly infected, moments away from killing him. Then, and only then, he confessed.

Vander didn’t make a huge deal out of it, he was understanding and visibly confused. It was an awkward situation, but he could be nothing but kind, even as he broke Silco’s heart. Of course, he didn’t feel the same.

Or maybe he did, but he was too blind to see it, too infatuated by the idea of a future with Felicia to give a shot to a real future with him.

Vander had used a very familiar word to excuse his lack of introspection, one that served him as a shield while unknowingly harming Silco as if it had used the sharpest of blades.

“Silco, you’re my brother…”

They used brotherhood a lot to describe their relationship. Their found family, their friends, their allies in the Zaun revolution and even the fucking pilts, they all could see how deeply they cared for each other. And every time that was the reason they assumed to be behind their bond.

No one could ever deny the love in their eyes, the protective gestures, the smiles... It was obvious, but everyone assumed that what they shared was a blood bond. For Silco it was much more than some stupid liquid running through their veins, what they shared had been built over years of companionship, years of pain and struggle, blood was fucking nothing in comparison. Their souls were connected in a way no one could ever imagine or understand.

And Vander knew this. He knew how strong their bond was, but he hadn't really asked himself if what he felt for Silco was something more than brotherhood. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do if it wasn’t the case either, but he didn’t go as far as to truly consider it.

Vander didn't know how to react to Silco's confession, he didn’t want to hurt him or change their world forever. He was happy as they currently were, it was easy to live with Silco as a brother, but he didn’t know what was waiting for them if he ever allowed himself to analyze his own feelings.

Because of this, and completely unaware of the pain he was causing, Vander uttered that seemingly harmless word that Silco couldn’t stand anymore.

Brother.

The softness in his tone didn’t make it any less devastating. The pain in his eyes, as he knew how badly he was breaking Silco's heart, didn’t make it easier to hear.

The countless "I love you"s he pronounced after that, reassuring that even if it was not the same feeling, Silco was still one of the most important people in his life didn’t soothe the agony of his reopened wound.

None of that mattered.

Because he didn't feel the same as Silco.

The same word that once had been forced on them was now stronger than anything he had built together.

Silco didn't want to feel that pain, he couldn't allow it to stay inside his chest, not when it was so profound.

So he decided to leave The Last Drop. It would be only for a couple of days, to distance himself a little from the source of his pain and try to stitch close that damned cut.

During that time, alone and completely heartbroken, he focused on thinking of ways to achieve the goal they had been fighting for since they were teenagers. The Zaunite revolution and Zaun’s independence. He ignored his pain and used all his anger to plan their next move in their fight against Piltover, thinking of new ways to finally defeat their enemy.

It was during those days, blinded by the pain of his aching heart, that he understood they could only win against Piltover if they showed their true nature to the world. He knew by then that they needed to be more aggressive in their methods and destabilize, not only their government, but also their peace.

Let their own people know what monsters they had for leaders.

Let the people of Piltover suffer the same pain they had suffered since the very moment the City of Progress came to be.

The fight had turned into a way for him to forget his own suffering, and in his anguish, provoking pain to others stopped feeling wrong at all if that meant they could get closer to their goal of freedom.

It was at this point where the conflict with Vander started. Suddenly, the word "brothers" didn't quite fit them anymore, it seemed too caring for them. Now it was a word pronounced in a low voice, and when it was Silco the one saying it, his tone could only express disgust. He rolls his eyes as if the word was some sort of sick joke he hated to voice out loud, a reminder of what could never be.

Silco’s pain is a heavy weight preventing them both from going back to what they once had, and seeing this wounded Vander every single time his friend reminded him of his rejection. This, and how differently they started to approach their fight, made them step further and further away from the other.

And when they saw each other during important meetings, Silco threw the word “brother” extremely carelessly, always with the intention to wound Vander instead of calming him and expressing how much he still loved him.

It had turned into a word that neither of them could ever forget, and that would hunt Silco until the end of his days.

It had turned into a word that neither of them could ever forget, and that would hunt Silco until the end of his days.

[There's still a lot of resentment in Silco's expression, and in this scene before saying brother, Silco rolls his eyes. The man was PISSED]

In conclusion, I think "brother" was Silco and Vander's equivalent of Jayvik's "partner" and I bet Viktor was pissed as hell everytime he heard someone reffering to him as Jayce's partner AND JUST THAT, for both scientific pride and his hopeless crush on Jayce Talis.

[mapoeggplant]

skip to loafer chapter 63 analysis // spoilers

school trips and sunsets: how the beauty of today can be the beginning of a farewell. chapter 63 not only marks the start of a new arc, but also the arrival of the future.

it’s always so funny the chapters of skip to loafer seem so harmless at first, until we stop to really analyze all the small pockets of change that begin to emerge. what may seem like just another moment to enjoy youth with such beloved characters ends up hiding the pain of understanding that, one day, they will no longer be together. well, maybe it's better to buckle up because i believe a buzz is just beginning.

i like how the chapter opens directly with the difficulty between yasaka and mitsumi in understanding each other and starting to deepen their relationship. on mitsumi's side, i can see more anxiety in strengthening ties, in trying to bring this new friend much closer to her. in yasaka's case, i believe that this new opportunity to start getting more involved with someone who truly sees her as a friend and not a threat, could be the trigger for her to open up more and seek support not only from mitsumi, but from the other girls as well.

in addition to this, i was happy with yasaka's small appearances throughout the chapter, demonstrating how she is very observant of everyone around her. not only in relation to the boys' feelings about her, as she herself told us and later noticed the same in ujiie, but also two other moments: when she notices shima's change in behavior in not accepting being touched by one of the girls and showing discomfort with the approach, and later when she sees mitsumi going to meet the girls to watch the sunset.

i'm curious about this second look. i wonder if she noticed something in mitsumi's expression that made her curious, or if she didn't feel a little melancholic, a new desire to be with a group of girls njoying the trip together. it's quite noticeable how much she enjoys observing and studying mitsumi and the way she interacts with the others around her, so i wonder if she noticed something that we couldn't capture, or if this desire for an opening has started to emerge. this is the first mini arc that i noticed starting.

the second, of course, intertwines a little with what i just said: shima's change in behavior. before, it was clear how much he tended to be more peaceful and give in to anything that was asked of him, always with a great fear of upsetting people or being judged in some way. now, even if it was a very subtle and small move, dodging a touch that he would have accepted out of politeness before, shows how much this peacefulness is bothering him — and it also leads me to believe that he is also trying to keep his distance from people that mitsumi has shown some discomfort with (as shown when he didn't defend her, previously) or that he himself has heard them making ironic comments about her. anyway, this is the second mini arc (which i believe will start to evolve more and more and will clash with mitsumi's arc once they finally have their "encounter") that is starting to emerge, showing another step in shima's change that we have been following until now.

and finally, of course, the most important arc in this whole chapter: the beginning of the discussion of what the girls' lives will be like from now on. it's a bit bittersweet to finally have to face the fact that they're growing up. it's so nice to be able to follow each one's

development, see how they become adults and find their own individualities. but it also hurts to know that they won't be teenagers forever and that, soon, each one will go their separate ways. i know it's still a little early to start worrying about this, but how can i not feel a pang in my heart when i see their little faces so full of anguish? how can i not want to stop time and make them live their whole lives side by side? the future always arrives, just like every sunset. a new challenge begins in the lives of each one of them: their third and final year, in addition to choosing colleges.

i adore how sensei implemented this little detour in the middle of a chapter so full of happiness and lightness. i think this balance is ideal for the development of the story of skip to loafer and even how it has been developing up to this point. there is beauty in pain, and there is also sadness in happiness. living is knowing how to balance the mix of feelings and make the most of today, even with all the fear that the future brings.

well, let's enjoy our current chapter and wait for what the future holds 💛 thank you so much for reading and, as always, support the author if you can!!! see you next month

[guxciestone]

✧ CELEBRITY BIRTH CHART ANALYSIS ✧

— ariana grande.

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hii !! today, i am going to analyze ariana grande’s birth chart. this was recommended by an ask, and i’ve spent a long while making this post. so, i hope you enjoy and have a nice day !! 🌿✨‎ ‎ ‎

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Ariana Grande-Butera was born on June 26, 1993 in Boca Raton, Florida. She is an influential figure in contemporary popular music and has established herself as an ultimate pop icon, mostly known for her four-octave vocal range and whistle register. Ariana started as a theater kid, making her debut on Broadway in 2008 in Jason Robert Brown’s ‘13’. Over time, she begins to make her way as a Nickelodeon actor, primarily known for ‘Victorious’ (from 2010-13) and ‘Sam and Cat’ (2013-14)--a spin-off of the popular characters Cat Valentine and Sam Puckett from ‘iCarly’. Grande’s acting career gets put to a halt during the run of ‘Sam and Cat’ when she begins to focus on her music career and establishes herself as a certified music artist. Ariana’s first album “Yours Truly” came out on August 30, 2013. Ariana Grande’s most popular songs include “7 Rings”, “Thank U, Next”, “Side to Side”, “Dangerous Woman”, “Into You”, and “Positions”. She has achieved seven number one’s on the billboards and two grammy’s along with several other awards thus far.

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she identifies as:

⋆ ˚｡⋆୨୧˚ a cancer sun, libra moon, and capricorn rising.

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❀ her personality ❀

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Sun square Moon indicates that Ariana has an internal struggle between her core values and emotional values. With her Sun in Cancer in the 6th, Grande is an individual who seeks comfortability and homeliness in her daily routines, responsibilities, and sense of duty. She has a nurturing, sweet, and soft-hearted nature. She could be particularly invested in family and friends and is more than likely always making efforts to be there for them at all times; however, with her Moon in Libra in the 9th house, Ariana also desires to achieve balance, tranquility, and pleasure in her life through learning new things, intaking more knowledge, and seeking new things in the world. She may be particularly spiritual and could be invested in the religious aspects in life more than others. Ariana Grande is always mentioning the law of attraction, and she even has multiple songs singing about he manifested her fame and fortune. Nonetheless, it seems like she seems to be struggling with integrating one of the two. This could particularly be about religious factors; perhaps she grew up in a religious family and she broke away from those doctrines and created her own sense of spirituality. Or perhaps she struggles to keep family close while also striving for spiritual and intellectual abundance and experiences. This aspect is also prominent in natives whose parents have separated.

Her ascendant ruler in the 2nd house immediately shows that Grande has a strong sense of self-worth and adequacy. She could hold herself to a high regard and have the ability to attract anything she wants with just a snap of a finger, because she easily attracts nice things when she begins to value herself just as much. Her capricorn ascendant shows she appears to have a mature, responsible, and respectable personality on the first impression. She has a petite figure, and she looks amazingly youthful for her age which is common amongst capricorn ascendants. Not to mention, she has a sarcastic yet humorous and charismatic nature that others seem to love about her with her venus trine ascendant. It is easier for Ariana to dress herself in a dominating yet attractive way to which others are pulled towards her, but also in awe of her glamor and prestige–she is able to maintain a signature while keeping it alluring, which I have also noticed in capricorn ascendant celebrities.

With her Venus in Taurus in the 4th house, this indicates that Grande had a pleasurable, practical, and secure childhood. She did grow up with money. Her mother, Joan Grande, was a CEO of a manufacturing company; and her father, Edward Grande, owned a graphic design firm. With this placement correlating to her ascendant, it seems that anyone would take notice of this luxurious air about her even without the fame.

Sun square Jupiter gives Ms. Grande a flamboyant, humorous, and entertaining personality. She is a delight to be around and has a distinctive charm that attracts people from different corners. She is magnetic and not afraid to take up space in any room she lands in. This aspect often promises a great sense of confidence and self-assurance. She has a comforting yet fair personality that others are attracted by with the Libra and Cancer influence in this aspect. However, this aspect could indicate arrogance and an overly spontaneous character. Grande has a decent confidence in herself, but there may be times in which she takes quick risks due to her nature of knowing that things always go right for her. This could also point to an inflated ego and entitlement.

With Neptune conjunct ascendant, Ariana appears as a compassionate, kind, and giving individual on the first impression. Others are often mystified by her, and this aspect could also indicate glamorization and idolization from others. In extreme cases, individuals with strong Neptunian placement could attract copycats. Ariana Grande has endured many conveniences up to this day of multiple fans replicating her style, mannerisms, and singing. Additionally, Grande has undergone many subtle changes in her physical appearance and style over the years–and Uranus conjunct ascendant only magnifies that. Ariana has a unique style (such as the iconic signature ponytail, long sweaters that she wears over her hands, and the long boots) She has gone under the needle before, and she has abruptly changed her fashion many times over the years. In my opinion, she looks far different from when she first came into the limelight; that is the definition of neptune and uranus-ascendant energy.

Sun sextile Mars indicates that Grande has an unshakable determination, ambition, and courage. Considering that her sun is in cancer in the 6th house, she dedicates her core values to serving her duties, working, and being disciplined in her routine and obligations. She could dedicate her work to providing for her family or making her loved ones happy. Along with her mars in virgo in the 8th house, she also dedicates herself to her deepest and vulnerable desires. She strives for material possessions and merging herself with her earnings. This aspect could make her fairly materialistic, but that is what motivates her. Not to mention, Ariana has immense sex appeal, and her partners may find it attractive how hardworking and driven she is.

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❀ her relationships ❀

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With Chiron in Leo in the 7th house, Ariana could have a personal wound or trauma surrounding expressing her creativity, inner child, and authentic self in her interpersonal relationships. This placement is also prominent in individuals who are either entirely uncomfortable or unapologetic in bringing their personal connections to light or public attention–we are literally talking about a girl who made an extremely popular song about her roster of exes. However, Grande, when younger, may have struggled with finding herself in her romantic connections with her partners; over time, she may find that with each lover she figures out a new aspect of herself and her personal identity. She seems to be the type of individual who truly transforms and grows after being in a connection with someone, and we can see that in her relationships with other celebrities such as Mac Miller or Big Sean.

With Venus square Chiron, there is a deep wound surrounding love, self-esteem, and pleasure. With Venus in Taurus in the 4th house, the wound specifically indicates that Grande struggles with feeling secure or stable in her interpersonal connections. It may be that she is not entirely sure what she hopes to find in a long-term partner, someone who she feels comfortable being with for the long run. This could be due to the feeling as if she is not allowed to express herself properly or be her individualistic self. Considering that Grande has been in several relationships–on top of that, there are speculations that she has partaken in infidelity multiple times and left her ex-husband Dalton for another man–this isn’t surprising personally. Furthermore, there is also this itching feeling that nothing or no one is ever enough, or she isn’t enough.

Ariana is an imaginative, idealistic, compassionate, and creative lover with Venus trine Neptune. She seeks the magical and elusive side of romance, beauty, and art. With Neptune in her 1st house, Grande adores incorporating bedazzling, whimsical, and shimmering designs in her fashion and aesthetic. Furthermore, she is obviously musically and artistically talented as well. She may even like decorating her home in a dream-like and adorable way too because it makes her feel safe and sound with Venus in Taurus the 4th. She could more than likely attract musicians, artists, and friendly individuals (like herself) and for the worst, she may attract addicts or victimizing partners.

Grande is an electrifying, exciting, and spontaneous partner with Venus trine Uranus. She seeks thrill and unpredictability in her love life and in her partners too. She may be particularly interested in partners who are somewhat different from her or partners no one would expect her to be with. Uranus is the planet of the futuristic aesthetic, and I noticed that Ariana is fixated with planets, space, sleep, and that galactic type of style–especially in her songs such as NASA, R.E.M, and etc. Her makeup line also has a futuristic vibe to it as well; most of her makeup products are all very bright, metallic, and glittery colors.

Chiron square Pluto indicates that Grande has suffered major and long-term traumas and wounds, especially in regards to her interpersonal relationships and experiencing them in the public eye with Chiron in the 7th and Pluto in Scorpio in the 10th. She dealt with the death of her grandpa, her ex-boyfriend, and several fans in the Manchester bombing. These wounds are truly embellished in her image as a figure, but also in her identity because these events are integral to her and her character. This aspect could indicate someone who deals with extreme paranoia, anxiety, or depression. She allegedly suffered PTSD and anxiety from everything that happened; she also mentioned she has been put through therapy for years, and it saved her life multiple times.

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❀ her talents ❀

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With Ariana’s 5th house ruler trine Pluto, she has the ability to determine when people are genuine or superficial, especially when it comes to her career status and success with her Mercury in Cancer in the 7th house. She holds her loved ones and personal relationships close, and often has a small group of friends whom she can trust. She could stick to a certain group of people for an extremely long time. Her intuition is heightened, and it is easy for her to see who is good or bad for her, especially since she has already experienced several traumatic circumstances in her career such as stalkers, copycats, etc.

North node in Sagittarius in the 11th house indicates that Grande has been given the special ability to expand her horizons, learn more knowledge, and live life full of excitement through connecting and building with her community, pursuing her hopes and dreams, and advocating for liberation of her desires. Ariana may be particularly popular in this lifetime–easily being able to gain friendships, develop professional relationships, and meet unique kinds of people. Ariana needs to learn how to be open towards meeting different people than her usual circle and be willing to learn and expand her experiences through traveling, indulging in cultures, and much more.

Ariana has a water grand trine, occurring in her sun, midheaven, and saturn. This indicates that she has a notable ability in tuning into her emotions, inner world, and vulnerable spots to transform them into a creative talent and express them successfully to an audience and gain professional success and build a significant legacy throughout her life.

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❀ her legacy and image ❀

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With Pluto in Scorpio in the 10th house, Ariana is a powerful, intense, and ambitious individual. She would mostly find her transforming and changing abruptly through her public image, how she moves through her professional life, and her legacy/success. Furthermore, she could be particularly secretive, paranoid, and observant in the matters of the people and what she puts out there for others to see. This placement often indicates that her traumas and wounds could derive from her public image and career. With Venus in Taurus in the 4th opposition Pluto, Grande, at some point, may have felt as though her sense of comfort and security may have been threatened due to the harsh events surrounding her endeavors. Perhaps she may have thought her family or loved one’s safety may have been at risk. It makes complete sense because Grande had a long-time stalker that would break into her home; anyone would feel unsafe if that happened to them.

Ariana Grande appears to be a hardworking, assertive, and dominant individual in the public eye with her Mars in Virgo in the 8th house square Pluto. She is persistent and always will strive to work towards her goals and achievement despite anyone or anything that gets in her way. It is possible that at some point, or maybe even now, she is a huge workaholic. However, her strong desire to achieve could make her someone who is also incredibly domineering–wiping out anyone or anything that threatens her chance for success. She may even be this way with her partners, becoming clingy or possessive, struggling with letting them go. She has an entire song called “needy”. Additionally, her sexual image is quite unique. She is viewed as fairly sexually expressive, but she has a delicate and sweet way of expressing it–we can see that in her songs such as “34 + 35” and “nasty”.

Ariana is partially known for her interesting, yet tragic and well-publicized love life and relationships with her Chiron in Leo in the 7th house square Pluto. Others view her as someone who has endured the worst in losing a loved one through addiction, experiencing the horrible deaths of her fans firsthand, and dealing with the loss of a family member.

Saturn trine Midheaven indicates that Grande has a solid, secure, and successful career due to her persistent, ambitious work ethic and her creative and imaginative character with her Saturn in Pisces at the 0 degree. It shows that she truly used manifestation, her vision, spirituality, and her artistic nature to get to where she is today. Furthermore, there wouldn’t be a surprise if she was interested in meditation and journaling.

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❀ ariana’s fame degrees ❀

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— basing off of my fame degrees post

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Grande has multiple 20th degrees in her chart, placed in her uranus, neptune, and venus; the 20th degree is the degree of fame that is extremely unbelievable that the public eye may consider the native to be apart of witchcraft, the occult, illuminati, or any other spiritual practices to get their amount of fame and fortune.

She also has the 11th degree in her north node in sagittarius; the 11th degree is the degree of fame that is earned through humanitarianism, giving back, and doing selfless acts. Grande is huge on women empowerment, body positivity, and LGBTQ rights. Additionally, she has contributed to multiple charities and organizations in the past.

Ariana has a couple of 5th degrees in her chart, placed in her sun and jupiter; the 5th degree is the degree of viral or short-term fame, fame that lasts only for a hot minute.

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[tiredsunrisesmeta]

Dead Dove and Dark Heir: An Analysis

TW// incest, age gap relationships

I do think Dark Heir is a bit more subversive than most other YA titles. Obviously, we have the BDSM coded relationship between Will/Sarcean & James/Anharion. But I think it goes further than that because the books don't shy away from more taboo things in the way a lot of recent YA titles tend to. Namely, incest and age gap relations. Furthermore, I think its willingness to engage with these topics with nuance adds to the depth of its chatacters.

For example, Will and Katherine. We need to talk about them, lol. I think whether they're actually blood related or not is ultimately irrelevant because of one detail. Katherine looks a lot like the Lady, and the Lady looks a lot like Will's mother, Eleanor. So, from the very beginning, Will pursues someone who looks like his mother, or the woman who raised him at the very least (albeit abusively). He has ulterior motives for doing so, but there's no doubt he felt an attraction to Katherine, and Katherine definitely felt attraction for him. It's all very Freudian. And I think how Dark Heir handles this complicated blend of romantic attraction & familial connection is what sets it apart from some other YA works. It refuses to draw definitive lines between these two feelings within Will. Will doesn't even feel especially disgusted or anguished by his flirtation of someone who turned out to be his sister. He probably suspected it as he was flirting with her. It's weird, but one can say it's the natural consequence of Will being his own person but also being Sarcean at the same time. Will doesn't feel or react normally to these tangled up feelings because he's not normal.

Now for age gaps. There's a lot of examples, but the main ones are Tom & Devon, James & Simon, Will & Howell, Cyprian & Ettore, Visander & Sarcean. The books frame James and Simon very negatively. It was abuse, period even though Simon was never able to have James become his lover. But the way characters like Jannick and Cyprian, following his father's example, and some other Stewards frame it doesn't acknowledge the abuse & instead blames & shames James for the supposed "relationship." This is horrible in this case, of course, but I think it speaks to a relatively blasé, maybe even period typical view of relationships between teens/young men & older men that goes on to affect & complicate every relationship/interaction listed above, some in ways different than to how it affects James & Simon. But I will come back to James at the end of this, so put a pin in that.

With Tom & Devon, I don't think the book has especially condemned it or portrayed it as inherently abusive. Tom is an adult for one. But Devon is undoubtedly thousands of years older than him. There's an element of Devon not telling Tom everything that I think is hinted at. At the end of Dark Heir, Violet thinks that Tom is strangely ignorant about the bigger picture of what's going on. He only knows what he learned from his Dad & Sinclair. At least Violet thinks so. It makes one wonder why he doesn't seem to know more even though he's dating someone who knows so much more than even Sinclair. Perhaps this is a consequence of the age gap between Tom and Devon. I don't particularly think this must mean Devon is abusive for dating Tom. And he's not, imo, comparable to the Regent from Captive Prince. But I think Devon's walls are up, and it maybe benefits him to keep Tom in the dark about all that Devon knows. This is part of a pattern that these books follow when it comes to most of their age gap relationships. They're not summarily condemned, but rather they're complicated, and their dubious, more negative qualities are subtly hinted at.

Visander and Sarcean is one such complicated age gap relationship. Upon hearing about Will from Elizabeth, Visander thinks, "This time I am the man and you are the youth." Near the end of the book when Visander confronts Will he says, "You're the same age now as I was when you killed my family." So it appears that when Sarcean slept with Visander, Sarcean was an adult, and Visander was a young man of about 17. When Visander is first introduced in the story, Sarcean thinks of him as a "young man" and a "young guard" and a possible "dalliance, to pass the time." This imbalance is only enhanced when Sarcean later thinks of Visander as "a trifling, easy to fool." Visander was a youth in love, and Sarcean was a man looking for easy amusement. Visander later feels betrayed by Sarcean for apparently killing his family. He emphasizes that he had trusted Sarcean. Their age gap adds an uncomfortable layer to Sarcean's treatment of Visander and how it might have contributed to Visander's lasting hatred of him. A hatred that, in turn, has Visander trying to kill Will, or the Dark King as a youth, as Visander sees it. Their age gap has now been reversed, and taking advantage of Will's youth, much like Sarcean took advantage of Visander's youth, he will take this opportunity to kill Will. It's like a cycle. Again, the book does not explicitly go out of its way to condemn Sarcean sleeping with a young Visander. It simply adds complications and nuance to the characters & their relationship that the reader must interpret themselves.

Will and Captain Howell's interactions are similarly ambivalent and complicated. Will knowingly initiates the flirting between them, and he doesn't seem particularly afraid of Captain Howell's advances. But their power dynamic is switched when Will uses his power to control Howell. The scene plays out like a scene of sexual exploration and discovery. Will tells Howell "No, don't fight it, just let me", he says "you're mine already", and when Howell calls him Master will thinks "Yes" as "with a lurch, he was inside Captain Howell." In many ways, it mirrors the scene where James pushes his magic into Will to release Will's magic. The sexual subtext is inescapable. But Will taking control of Howell is framed as feeling empowering to Will. Will effectively flips the power script of a young man and an older man in a sexual encounter, which brings awareness to the fact that the script usually doesn't play out like this. Their interaction is further complicated when James sees Howell and Will and freaks out. I'll come back to this...

The last significant age gap "relationship" is Cyprian with Ettore. This relationship is more subtle with its sexual subtext, but it's there. Ettore teases & pokes at Cyprian. We later learn this is because Ettore is himself a Steward, and he sees himself and his past flaws in Cyprian. But some of Ettore's teasing takes on a sexual nature. First, when his men ask Cyprian for a kiss and Ettore himself says, "Rethinking that kiss?" Then, when Ettore invites Cyprian to watch him have sex with a prostitute, who he has dressed in a Steward's tunic. After, Ettore emerging from the bedroom soon after Cyprian, "ostentatiously tucking in his shirt" makes Cyprian flush because of the implications Ettore undoubtedly wanted to illicit. This teasing and mockery come to head when Ettore asks Cyprian to kneel and beg him for help. Cyprian acquiesces despite the burning humiliation of it. This is when James goes to Cyprian and tells him he didn't like watching Cyprian kneeling for Ettore.

James says it's because he doesn't like being reminded that Stewards can be selfless, but I think it goes deeper than that and connects with James's reaction to Will and Howell. James freaks out when he sees Will and Howell holding on to each other. He asks Will if Howell hurt him. James's fear here can easily be interpreted as a remnant of his experiences with Simon. James has been hurt & taken advantage of (nearly sexually) by an older man. So when he sees Will and Howell, his mind goes to the worst possibility first. Similarly, I would argue that James's discomfort with watching Cyprian kneeling for Ettore is similarly connected to his trauma with Simon & Sinclair. This connection is supported when, later in the book, as Sinclair tries to collar James, Sinclair orders James to kneel.

These are some of the ways Dark Heir uses more subversive and taboo subjects to add depth and subtext to its world and chatacters, without forcing the readers to see these subjects in only one way. The series, much like Pacat's other work, doesn't shy away from so-called Dead Dove subject matter. And I think that's a strength of the series.

[gentlebeardsbarngrill]

01/13/2024 Daily Recap

So lovelies, we come again to the end of another day for some and the beginning of one for others. I am once again baffled and humbled by the turn out of our beautiful crew and all they’ve accomplished over the last 24 hrs.

Did you know that as of this moment, the #RenewAsACrew petition is over 44,000 signatures?

Were you aware the #HoistTheAds initiative/fundraiser is over $21,000?

Or that the Renew As A Crew Fundraiser for Rainbow Youth is over $15,000?

Oh, and not to mention, Our Flag For Palestine’s Our Flag Makes a Difference Fundaiser met it’s goal of $2500

Oh and might I add that Twitter is trending #SaveOFMD at 41.7K posts

I wish I knew how to check IG and Tumblr stats, so if you do please add to this!

And that’s only a fraction of how much everyone has contributed to the community with kindness, solidarity, creativity, support, humor, analysis, ingenuity and so much more!

You all are making ripples that are cascading across the whole damn planet and your voices are being heard.

Special thanks as always to @renewasacrew who are some of the many captains (and certainly most influential) of this mighty fandom battle freighter. Please send them all the love because they are leading the charge everywhere.

Every single last one of you should be proud of yourself. Please remember to drink some water, have a shower or a bath and get some sleep. We’ve all said it before, but I’ll say it again; no matter what happens with the renewal, you have made such an immense impact on so many people’s lives in a positive way and we are all so damn proud of this community.

Rest and recoup lovelies, we all have a big day tomorrow.

[jamrroolloo]

Two big motifs kept constantly popping up as I was watching Begins ≠ Youth...

Lies

Adults are bad (like seriously, I dare someone to name one good adult in this show)

What's more interesting than these motifs on their own is the correlation between the two: most of said adults lie. Whether it's just a plain lie, a half-lie, a half-truth, a personal lie, etc., they just lie lie lie.

Let me make this more interesting by reminding you that all of the seven boys lie. (Call back to Mingook saying, "Pretending to be okay for each other, I can't stand it!") Whether it's to themselves or to each other - which for most of them it's both - all seven lie. If these "bad" adults are all liars, does that in turn mean all of the boys, also liars, are bad?

Maybe, it's the lies that are the true evil. Funnily enough though, sometimes the truth is worse than the lie. I mean look where Cein ended up when he learned how his father truly felt toward him.

Anyway, this whole show is a complicated jumble of lies and truth and lies and lies and... more lies..? Also good vs. bad and whatever... and idk, I just like to analyze stuff, don't mind me.

[nemuro-incinerator]

I had a longer analysis post idea but I desperately need to sleep and I may not remember my ideas correctly when I wake up, so I’m posting a kind of TLDR of what I mulled over while my phone was dead and I was getting ready for bed. TW: Utena-typical trigger warnings, discussion of suicide/suicidal tendencies

The finale of Shoujo Kakumei Utena as compared to the finale of Adolescence of Utena, as well as their general portrayal of Akio Ohtori and Dios Himemiya, is a showcase of the difference in how Utena and Anthy perceive him and the obstacles that they have to overcome to break free from Ohtori Academy.

In episodes 38 and 39 of SKU, Akio shows no real threat. Sure, he duels Utena and can at least handle a sword, but Utena would’ve won the duel by technique had it not been for Anthy’s interference. After that, Utena manages to shove him off of her while having a literal (or metaphorical) stab wound. Dios is even less of an issue, taunting Utena and riding around his carousel but ultimately being entirely powerless to stop her. The only one with the power to even hurt Utena in the finale is Anthy. Because that’s what it’s always been about for Utena. Dios was never supposed to be the important one - only her memory being locked away and warped as a method of dealing with her trauma kept him as relevant as he was - and Akio, though he wormed his way into a place of importance, could never hold a candle to Anthy. Anthy is the reason why Utena decided to keep living, Anthy is the reason why Utena is at Ohtori, and Anthy is why Utena marches on and shoves Akio away to offer her hand to the girl who, in a way, saved her life.

In Adolescence of Utena, on the other hand, Akio is a pathetic dandy who does his car trick on a taxi and commits suicide by falling over a railing. He’s a husk of what he used to be, someone who needs to be held up by Anthy to stand a chance in hell. But Anthy holds him up the same way she holds the entire academy up, and the reason makes itself clear during the finale. The massive figure of Dios, the dead prince in Anthy’s mind, stands at the exit and begins to crush Utena and Anthy with the intent of making them living dead just like him. Utena knew Dios for all of a few minutes, but Anthy knew him from the beginning of her life to his “death” and “transformation” into Akio. He is the fear of moving forward, the past manifest in one final attempt to crush Anthy into stasis like a pressed flower on paper. It fails, of course, but not before it is “killed” - though I believe the more accurate term would be laid to rest. He is dead. He was dead long ago. He never really existed. But now the version of Anthy’s brother with short hair and bright green eyes and boyish youthfulness is given his last rites as Anthy leaves the dead where they lie.

[homestuckreplay]

hey so what sort of insane loot did you rake in today: A Conversation Analysis of Pesterlogs in Acts 1 & 2 of Homestuck

This essay contains spoilers for pages 1-386 of Homestuck. Wordcount 6,700. If you prefer, you can read this on google docs. 

Love and thanks to @rudebreadrolls for being my very cool editor. They did not reduce the wordcount, but did provide some extremely helpful feedback. <3

Introduction

‘In watching our participants deftly manage multiple messages, and then interweave these messages into the larger storylines of their lives, we became aware that the drama, the story, and, indeed, the enjoyment of [instant messaging] comes from the entire session itself: its flow, its arc, and various aspects of narrative tension across messages.’ - Lewis & Fabos (2005)

In 2009, internet use is approaching universality among American teenagers. Around 93% of teenagers use the internet, compared to around 10% just ten years earlier, and academic research about the effects of internet use is beginning to catch up. There is huge variation in findings, with some studies reporting that internet use, social media use, and instant messaging with friends can decrease depression and social anxiety, while other studies find that online activities are harmful to mental health. Similarly, some papers show that friendships formed or maintained online are more surface level, less honest and less emotionally fulfilling than friendships maintained in person, while other papers suggest that young people are more vulnerable and uninhibited online, leading to deeper friendships. 

‘The internet’ and ‘teenagers’ are extremely broad categories, so it’s no surprise that findings are so varied. Two particularly interesting individual findings are that ‘Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth were more likely than non-LGBT youth to have online friends and to appraise these friends as better than their in-person friends at providing emotional support’ (Ybarra et al.), and that ‘online communities illustrate these tenets [belongingness, social connectedness, and political connectedness] of the autistic cultural identity, as well as how these communities, by the basis of being online, enable autistic social connectedness to occur more readily and smoothly then within everyday life in the “real” world’ (Le Vine-Miller). 

Two common hypotheses discussed in online friendship research are the rich-get-richer hypothesis, which posits that popular individuals with good offline social skills can use those same skills to achieve similar popularity online, and the social compensation hypothesis, which argues that people who struggle to form social connections offline often find it far easier to form friendships in online spaces. These hypotheses are not mutually exclusive, and both are supported by research. When discussing Homestuck, I make the assumption that the main characters are friends exclusively online and have never met in person, due to their geographical distance from one another, and that they are socially isolated with few if any in person friends, due to none of the characters mentioning a social life outside of their families and online messaging group. I also believe that whether or not this is intended by the author, it is easy to read these characters as queer and/or neurodivergent, which further positions them as socially marginalized. Therefore, these characters would best fit within the framework of the social compensation hypothesis.

Research on instant messaging (IM) typically discusses IM as a hybrid communication form, incorporating elements of both spoken and written communication, and further suggests that IM is a third form of communication that cannot fully be analyzed by either or both of these frameworks. Significant variation is seen between participants in their use of language and paralanguage, and there is a strong research focus on the capabilities and constraints of IM platforms. Researchers also discuss the varying prevalence of features unique to IM or other computer mediated communication (CMC), such as emojis, acronyms, gestures, and message spacing and timestamps.

However, this research is often limited by researchers’ needs to compare IM to in person communication and judge which is ‘better’. They typically conclude that IM is a lesser form of communication, and that participants in their studies have a preference for talking face to face. This may be because these studies primarily use participants who began using IM as teenagers or college students once they already have strong real life friendships. General studies on IM are less likely to study those who grew up with IM from a young age and who use the medium more akin to a first or native language - an increasingly common phenomenon - which limits the conclusions these studies can draw.

In instant messaging research, most authors rhetorically distance themselves from the topic, with some explicitly stating that they do not use instant messaging services themselves and none (that I found) discussing their own personal experiences. I personally have been a regular user of instant messaging services since the mid 2000s, including both one-on-one and group chats with both online only and in person friends, using primarily MSN Messenger, Skype, Facebook Messenger and Discord, and these experiences inform my discussion of this topic.

In this essay I will explore how Homestuck’s online teenage social group - John Egbert, Rose Lalonde, Dave Strider, and gardenGnostic (GG) - communicate with each other and manage friendship via the in-universe instant messaging service Pesterchum. I will discuss what these friendships mean for the characters within the story itself, as well as what the use of instant messaging does for the author and audience who are reading this story. 

I used five Pesterchum conversations to conduct this analysis: John-Rose (p.256 - 332 words), John-Dave (p.386 - 542 words), John-GG (p.293 - 412 words), Rose-Dave (p.333 - 402 words) and Dave-GG (p.382 - 424 words). For each pair of chums, I chose the longest Pesterlog by wordcount between the two characters, with a pesterlog defined as a conversation occurring on a single page of Homestuck. In the end, all these conversations came from the first 140 pages of Act 2. 

I selected eight possible characteristics of instant messages to analyze in these conversations, inspired by, but not identical to, those explored in Kelley’s work ‘The Hybrid Structure of Instant Messaging’ (2008). My categories are as follows.

Grammar - includes punctuation, capitalization, and similarities to formal written language

Conversationality - includes exclamations, filler words, and similarities to informal spoken language

Internet Language - includes internet specific features such as emojis, abbreviations, and methods to emphasize words

Structure - includes length of messages and numbers of consecutive messages

Informativity - how effectively information is conveyed and interpreted

Vulnerability - emotional honesty and openness 

Agency - control over topics and flow of conversation

Color - cultural associations with chosen text color

I was unable to analyze two additional features. Pesterlogs do not include timestamps, so I could not discuss time between messages. However, overlap between messages and events in the narrative suggest that conversations take place in near-real time and are the primary activity holding characters’ attention. Interjections like ‘EB: um… hello?’ suggest that waiting for a response is the exception between these characters and not the norm. Additionally, errors and repair, where one participant makes a typo and corrects it in a subsequent message, do not appear in Homestuck. I assume that this is artistic license on the part of the author to improve readability of the text.

John Egbert

John’s typing style is the most conversational of the four main characters, with the greatest similarities to spoken dialog. He appears to be fairly unfiltered, and it’s easy to imagine that he would talk very similarly if he were hanging out with his friends in person. Grammatically, John does not capitalize proper nouns or the start of sentences, but he does use correct punctuation including commas, periods, and apostrophes. This is his main concession to written language, as correct punctuation makes his messages very readable even for people who are not familiar with instant messaging dialects, and means his statements are clearly delineated from each other. 

John uses contractions such as ‘can’t’ and ‘don’t’ whenever it makes sense to do so. His text contains a lot of filler words, such as ‘well ok,’ ‘like,’ and ‘er…’ which demonstrate his unfiltered, stream of consciousness style. He also uses exclamations such as ‘oh jeez’ and ‘ok ok stop!’ which would also be common to spoken language, but not written. 

John occasionally uses Internet-typical acronyms such as ‘brb,’ but they don’t form a major part of his typing, and he doesn’t make use of emojis or special characters that could indicate paralanguage cues. Once in a while, he uses all caps for emphasis, such as ‘haha I WISH.’ and ‘SO LAME.’ As this is the only capitalization he uses, it’s effective when present. John doesn’t elongate letters in words for emphasis, but he regularly uses question marks and exclamation points, and sometimes elongates these to two question marks or three exclamation points when he wants to indicate that something is particularly important.

John’s messages tend to be short and sweet, mostly containing a single clause or sentence, but there are outliers. When he has particularly strong feelings about something, for example his near-death meteor experience or the idea of a white ventriloquist rapper, he can get caught up in a run-on sentence confined to a single message. In instant messaging, it’s common to split a thought across multiple messages and take several conversational ‘turns’ in a row. John does this sometimes, especially when each message contains separate thoughts or when he needs some time to think, indicated by ‘hmm…’ or ‘see…’ as a single message, followed by a longer response. However, when he is having a singular thought, he doesn’t always take the time to hit the enter key, and instead constructs the whole story at once, as in the example below.

EB: but now i'm trapped here and it's weird and dark and i can't find my dad and i just lost the car and my copy of the game in the pit and i think i have to save the world from the apocalypse!!!

He could have chosen to split this message into multiple parts, as demonstrated below, but is either too caught up in the emotions of what he’s typing to do this, or sees this as a singular thought that should be kept together without line and punctuation breaks.

EB: but now i'm trapped here.EB: and it's weird and dark.EB: and i can't find my dad!EB: and i just lost the car and my copy of the game in the pit!EB: and i think i have to save the world from the apocalypse!!!

John can be vague with information, using ‘i think’ and ‘i guess,’ but he seems to be aware of that fact - possibly from communicating with the same people for an extended time. He sometimes self corrects to add more information when he realizes he’s being confusing. In general, he doesn’t seem to have perfect control over language, and can use awkward and clunky phrasing - ‘yeah, more like the opposite of all those things is the thing that is true!’ - which ties back to the social compensation hypothesis of online friendships. John isn’t a smooth talker, but it’s easier for him to talk through IM, because it provides more opportunities to self correct, and his conversation partner can read back over what he’s said and take more time to interpret it than they could in a spoken conversation.

John is honest with his friends about the situations he’s in, and the unfiltered way he talks carries a lot of implicit emotion, but it’s rare for him to outright state how he feels. When he does, it’s always more neutral emotions - ‘ok i don’t really care.’ or ‘but i’m ok!’ - never strong emotions, either positive or negative. However, it’s easy for someone who knows him to interpret how he feels through messages like ‘you never even wished me a happy birthday!’ It seems that John isn’t making an attempt to hide his emotions, but also doesn’t explicitly acknowledge them, whether that’s just to his conversation partners or also to himself.

John’s conversational agency is highly variable. He seems to naturally take the lead in conversations when he has strong opinions about the topic under discussion, like when he tells Dave to stop an extended monologue, or changes the topic away from Dave’s criticism of his sylladex. In his conversations with both Dave and GG, he seems to be guiding the flow of topics, even though Dave is sending far more and longer messages. In contrast, in his conversation with Rose, John is taking a backseat. He recognizes that he has less information than she does, although he sometimes pushes back against her with emotional interjections. He still attempts to exert agency in the conversation by asking questions, but she overall appears in control.

John’s chosen color for his messages is #0715cd, which is described as ‘medium blue’ or ‘strong blue.’ Blue in its entire spectrum is currently seen as a masculine color, and is associated with oceans, sky, open spaces, introspection, sadness, wisdom and serenity. This particular shade of blue is closely linked to computers - the standard HTML code for hyperlinks, including the ‘next page’ links in Homestuck, is #0000ee, ‘blue’ or ‘pure blue.’ John’s text evokes his status as a ‘digital native’ who predominantly spends his time using technology. Blue is also a standard color for ink pens, and a color most people are accustomed to reading in. John may have chosen blue for his text because it is unobtrusive and doesn’t stand out in any particular way.

Rose Lalonde

Rose’s typing style stands out because of the four main characters, she is the only one whose messages reflect formal written writing. Outside of messages she is both a creative writer and an informative writer (via GameFAQs), and unlike some writers, she doesn’t draw a strong distinction between this and her instant messaging. Without exception, her messages are complete sentences with correct punctuation and grammar. She also obeys some stylistic guidelines for writing, such as varying her word choice, mixing complex, multi-clause sentences with shorter ones, and occasionally using metaphor and simile. 

Rose does not use filler words, and each word she chooses appears purposefully placed to add something to her message. She does make use of contractions such as ‘I’ve’ and ‘didn’t,’ as her one concession to spoken language, although she uses the full ‘cannot.’ She also makes some use of exclamations, although in the sample studied here this still appear to be carefully considered full sentences, such as ‘Baseless accusation!’

Rose appears to have no interest in tailoring her writing to the Internet. Some users of IM believe that using internet language and paralanguage makes them appear younger and less intelligent, which could motivate Rose to avoid these. The one acronym she uses is ‘PDA,’ which is an accepted acronym outside of IM, and the closest she comes to slang is the phrase ‘skyward asses.’ This phrase is more likely an example of mimicry, where somebody uses a phrase they would not normally use to (whether intentionally or unintentionally)  imitate their conversation partner, in this case Dave.

Rose does make use of message spacing and multiple turns, the one clear difference between her instant messages and other forms of writing. She averages around 10 words per message, the highest of the four characters, and sends strings of two to three messages more often than single messages. Each message can be as many as three full sentences, which are always directly related. Her message strings can be due to topic changes, but can be directly related thoughts separated for stylistic effect or to create tension by making her conversation partner wait for the next message.

Rose clearly pays great attention to precision in her writing, conveying all necessary information without shortcuts. She uses a wide vocabulary for her age, with sentences typically readable at a high school level, and expects her conversation partners to be able to understand her. She is also excessively verbose, choosing words to showcase her personality and intelligence, instead of trying to send the quickest messages possible, as in the example below.

TT: Navigating the urban landscape I'm sure is difficult enough without an obstacle course of deferential flesh and skyward asses.TT: Perhaps adapting the art of parkour to your unique environment would help?

Rose could instead write the following, which is significantly quicker to type and easier to read, but she does not.

TT: Being in the city must be hard enough without people falling at your feet.TT: Have you tried parkour?

Many researchers hypothesize that response speed is a big factor in people’s IM word usage, but this is not true for Rose - even when her life is in imminent danger, her typing style does not change. This is probably uncommon, but no ethics board has yet approved a research study investigating this.

Rose’s messages typically stick to the facts, with occasional speculation. She prefers to discuss the specifics of her situation and goals, and avoids obvious cues to her emotions. In both conversations analyzed, she offers one emotion-based statement at the end of the conversation, which could suggest one of two things - either she needs to take some time to warm up to a conversation before she’s comfortable expressing an emotion, or she’s so uncomfortable expressing an emotion that she needs to leave immediately afterwards. In both cases, the emotions remain somewhat buried within intentionally complex language.

Rose naturally takes charge in conversations, and prefers to discuss topics she feels knowledgeable on. When talking to John, she employs subtle topic shifts to focus on what she knows for certain and what is directly actionable. She also explicitly refers to doing outside research to be better informed in this conversation. When talking to Dave, Rose engages in conversational sparring where neither party is in charge of the flow, and is thrown off when Dave is able to take control over the conversation by seeing through her surface words to the motives beneath.

Rose’s message color is #b536da, described as ‘bright magenta’ or ‘dark orchid.’ Purple is broadly associated with royalty, power, magic, night, creativity, and enlightenment. It is also a feminine color, and surveys suggest it is a more popular color for women than the archetypically feminine pink. In Rose’s case I would highlight purple as a spooky and mysterious color, distinct from black (which is most likely the Pesterchum default color), which she may have chosen due to her interest in horror and her desire to appear mysterious. ‘Purple prose’ is also a common term for unnecessarily extravagant and fanciful writing, which on the meta level of the story, could be a good description of Rose’s typing overall.

Dave Strider

Dave’s typing style is extremely minimalist, stripped of most signifiers of spoken, written, and internet language. He very rarely uses capitalization or punctuation - he sometimes uses question marks when relevant, but not always. ‘what do you want with john’ leaves the question mark implied. Dave does however make extensive use of quotation marks, which he uses to roleplay with himself and create hypothetical characters on the fly. He is a writer like Rose, creating blogs and webcomics, and this shows in his extensive instant message monologues. However, as all of his writing intentionally breaks the formal rules of written language, his messages share very few similarities with standard writing and are mostly incomplete sentence fragments.

Dave uses filler words and conversational slang, and contractions without an apostrophe. He regularly uses ‘yeah,’ ‘what,’ ‘look,’ ‘ok,’ ‘damn,’ and ‘shit,’ which are written out even though they don’t add additional meaning to his messages. Despite this, his typing overall reads as less conversational than John, partly because the lack of punctuation means his words don’t have the clear cadence of speech. 

Dave does not use emojis or laughter, which connects to the overall lack of emotion in his messages. He occasionally uses acronyms such as ‘FU’ and ‘nm’ which are exclusive to internet language. In his case, this might indicate that he has no interest in the topic under discussion and doesn’t think it’s worth the attention of a full message, as he has no issue writing far longer messages when he has the inspiration. His other hobbies indicate that Dave is familiar with Internet culture overall, so not using internet language is a conscious choice he makes - perhaps he thinks this style of messaging is no longer cool.

According to my editor who is cool for real, being taciturn (untalkative and reserved) is a classic trait of “cool guys,” suggesting that Dave uses acronyms when he is focused on his cool persona, and writes longer messages when he gets swept away in his thoughts and forgets to put on this act.

Dave averages around seven words per message, although the sample taken did not include any of his raps, which could potentially raise this number. In his conversations with Rose and John, he sends significantly more messages than his conversation partner. With GG he sends a similar number of messages, but in all three conversations, Dave has a much higher total wordcount. He clearly has a lot to say and has no qualms about saying it as often as he likes. There are also only two occasions where he includes two separate sentences in the same message, and he regularly splits up a sentence across multiple messages, such as when he sends ‘cal is dope’ ‘puppets are awesome’ ‘john egbert blows’ as three separate entries. Dave’s general lack of punctuation means that the enter key is the closest thing he has to a comma or period, which could explain his greater tendency to split messages. Alternatively, the fact that he is generally extroverted and enjoys talking could mean that he sends one message at a time and then continues to add additional thoughts until his conversation partner responds.

Dave is fairly vague with information as it pertains to his own life, saying that he ‘took [his] awesome katana’ to the living room ‘in case things get too hot to handle’ without elaboration. It is possible that he is working on the assumption that his friends already know about his life. Alternatively, he may not want his friends to know these details, or he may simply want to appear cool and mysterious. When talking about a hypothetical scenario, Dave gets a lot more specific and highly detailed. This shows that he has a strong and active imagination and has no trouble conveying information when he chooses to do so.

Dave is highly defensive when criticized by his friends, even on things that do not particularly matter. He is also extremely opinionated and expresses this often, using a lot of language that is strongly positively or negatively charged. This definitely gives a sense of his personality, and could perhaps be mistaken for emotion, but it’s very hard to get a sense of how he actually feels from his messages. The only emotion he expresses is frustration – despite his desire to talk to his friends often and extensively, he interjects often with ‘oh for fucks sake,’ ‘ok whatever’ or ‘whenever we talk about your goofy modusses i get a migrane [sic]’. It is uncertain if this frustration is how he genuinely feels, or if this is part of an overall affectation crafted to hide more vulnerable feelings.

Dave tries to maintain agency in conversations primarily by holding the floor. In his conversation with John he sends nine consecutive messages, by far the most of any character in the samples taken. When taking these multiple turns, there is less of a chance for his conversation partner to change topics or disrupt the flow. When his friends get a word in edgewise, Dave does accede to topic changes and will stop talking if instructed. He often doesn’t have as much control over his conversations as he’d like, and with both John and Rose, he regularly plays defense against their differing opinions, such as when Rose suggests he might be gay due to refusing to play a game with her, and he tries to assert that he’s just busy.

Interestingly, Dave is just as wrongfooted in his conversation with GG as he is with John and Rose, but he does not act anywhere near as defensive. This may be because John and Rose are intentionally trying to throw him off balance, while GG is simply stating their greater knowledge without a motivation.

Dave’s chosen text color is #e00707, described as ‘vivid red’ or ‘electric red.’ Red is overall associated with heat, fire, passion, danger, blood, anger, love, and courage. It is thought of as a highly emotional color and is eye-catching and difficult to miss on the page. Dave could have chosen to type in red because it gives his messages a sense of urgency, meaning his friends might respond to him more quickly, like when a red flag or exclamation point is added to an email to indicate high priority. A red flag is also a metaphor used to indicate a problem requiring attention – Dave’s red text could mean he either has a problem that isn’t being addressed, or will go on to cause problems for others. Red text is also used in schools to correct errors, and Dave talking in red feels like he is always correcting his friends on their opinions and beliefs.

gardenGnostic

GG has adapted their typing style to the instant messaging medium more than any other character. An online typing style seeks to replicate not only spoken and written dialog, but also paralanguage cues, and adapts itself to the specific medium where the conversation is happening – in this case Pesterchum. In some programs, this could include adding images or external files to a message, or changing font style and size, although we have seen no indication of these being supported on Pesterchum. One of GG’s concessions to the medium is primarily using punctuation for emphasis and effect, not grammar. GG also varies on whether or not they use contractions, sometimes using ‘im’ and ‘dont’ but sometimes using the extended form ‘it is’ – this lack of consistency could again suggest that this is done for effect. 

GG s does not always use full sentences, for example using ‘mr cool guy?’ as a sentence when it’s really just a fragment. As such, GG’s messages don’t resemble written language in any meaningful way besides being technically written down.

GG uses filler words such as ‘well,’ ‘anyway,’ ‘so,’ and ‘oh!!!!’ as a way of changing the topic while acknowledging that they are doing so. This is their main concession to spoken language, softening their messages and indicating that they are paying attention to their conversation partner and the overall flow of topics.

GG is the only character to make regular use of emojis, and uses a variety of them. :), :O, :D, ._., O_O and <3 all appear in their text at some point, either as responses in their own right or at the end of another message. They also sometimes use long and drawn out words for emphasis or sarcasm, such as ‘sooooo cooooooool!!!’ As indicated in the same phrase, they are prone to using long strings of exclamation points and ellipses – up to seven exclamation points at once and an eight-period ellipses, both when talking to Dave. They use both ‘lol’ and ‘hehehe’ to indicate laughter. 

These adaptations could suggest that GG is accustomed to talking to people on the internet – perhaps they have grown up regularly using chatrooms and have adopted internet communication from here. The opposite could also be true. GG could be accustomed to conversations in real life, and could be making use of these features as they are the only way to convey facial expressions, tone and body language that would come across automatically in person.

GG averages around five words per message, the lowest of the four characters. Their average is brought down by their single-emoji messages (each counted as one word) and their extensive use of message splitting. There are only a few occasions where they include two sentence clauses in a single message, and sometimes they even break up a single clause, seemingly for anticipation – for example ‘it is usually……..’ ‘intense!!!’ as two separate messages. Overall, GG sends fewer words than their conversation partners, but sends a similar number of messages. They don’t appear to be mimicking the number of messages sent, as in their conversation with John, each of them gets a chance to hold the floor and tell a longer story. 

GG conveys information clearly, but obscures its source. Their sentences are easy to interpret linguistically, but content wise can appear nonsensical, as they make wild claims that cannot be backed up by available evidence and expect their conversation partners to take this on faith. When questioned how they know these things, GG states ‘i don’t know’ ‘i just know that i know!’ Interestingly, GG does not offer this same faith to their friends, asking John ‘how did you know??’ when he correctly guesses that a meteor explosion happened near her house.

GG’s messages contain almost exclusively positive emotions, and these tend to be exaggerated. Even when discussing restrictions on their own life, they soften more negatively charged messages with a brighter tone and liberal use of exclamation points - ‘i dont think i could if i tried!!!’ GG might be uncomfortable discussing their own negative emotions and any problems in their life, but they’re happy to discuss and even speculate on other people’s feelings. They commiserate with John when he’s upset about losing his neighborhood and potentially his dad to the meteor collision, and they suggest that their pet Bec thinks their own local meteor is dangerous and is trying to protect GG from it. It’s possible that focusing on other people in this way serves to divert attention from GG’s own emotions, allowing them to maintain that positivity whether or not it is true.

GG appears fairly savvy regarding social dynamics and conversational practice, more so than any of the other characters. They seem to maintain agency in conversations whether or not they are actually taking the lead. When talking to Dave, they dispense information slowly and on their own terms, taking advantage of their own superior knowledge. This technique for maintaining tension in a conversation has also been noted in research. GG also utilizes more subtle techniques to manipulate the affect of others, gently poking fun at Dave’s coolness and telling John that all the bad things happening to him might actually be his destiny. This understanding of their friends’ feelings is a unique skill within the friend group.

GG’s text color is #4ac925, also known as ‘strong lime green’ or ‘harlequin green’ - ‘harlequin’ specifically linking them with John, whose house is covered in harlequins. Green in all its variations is associated with nature and plants, growth, life, envy, money, and both health and sickness. Somebody being ‘green’ can mean they are naive or new to something, and GG certainly seems to have a bright and idealistic worldview. Bright green is a fairly gender neutral color and could be used by someone who doesn’t want to associate with either masculinity or femininity. More generally, GG may have selected a bright color to indicate a fun-loving person who doesn’t take themselves too seriously. GG is also the only character whose screen name – gardenGnostic – directly relates to their text color, with the phrase ‘green thumb’ referring to somebody with a talent for gardening. Lime specifically is a type of fruit, potentially one GG could grow if they live in a hot climate.

Analysis (in universe)

When Homestuck begins, John, Rose, Dave and GG already have an established friendship. We don’t see their early interactions or learn how long they’ve been friends, but they know each other well enough to exchange real full names and home addresses, and send each other expensive birthday gifts. As online communities in this era focus on anonymity and internet safety, with many users exclusively going by their screen names, this indicates a close and long term friendship.

Furthermore, these characters have a deep involvement in each other’s day to day lives. One criticism of online friendships in research is that they will always be more surface level than in person friendships, as online friends cannot exist in each other’s space, with their interactions limited to an online setting and sometimes a specific online activity, such as gaming. The rise of smartphones may see this change in the real world, and it’s reflected in Homestuck – John has adopted his dad’s PDA while Dave owns an iPhone, a top of the line technology first released in 2007. Both of them can now talk to their friends from anywhere with internet signal.

Even without portable devices, these characters’ conversations deal with the minutiae of their movements. Dave mentions moving from his bedroom to the living room, John discusses looking for his dad, GG talks about having to go feed a pet, and Dave and GG even consider whether John has checked his mail today. They are about as involved in other people’s lives as geographically distant friends can possibly be, even without accounting for Sburb. They do not exclusively talk about shared interests or focus on the most exciting things happening to them. 

In some ways, their relationship is closer to roommates or colleagues – people who spend enough time together every single day that they don’t always enjoy each other’s company, but they continue to navigate how to share space. This is even indicated by the application name ‘Pesterchum,’ with ‘chum’ being a colloquial term for a friend, and ‘pester’ meaning to trouble, disturb, or annoy persistently.

In Homestuck, this shared space is a digital space and all four of them are free to disconnect at any point. Leaving a house or a job is complex, but online there are infinite chatrooms and forums these kids could explore to find new friends, and Pesterchum almost certainly has a ‘blocked users’ function if any of them wanted to cut the others out of their lives. Online friends are friends who continually make the choice to be in each other’s lives without circumstances dictating this, and it is a sign of a strong bond, maturity, and the acceptance of others’ quirks that four thirteen year olds are making this choice despite personality differences and sometimes visible annoyance with each other. 

All four characters have strong and well established typing styles that they don’t significantly modify based on their conversation partner. While they might use an individual turn of phrase borrowed from a friend, they keep the same stylistic features, which is not always the case for IM users. Some real world users may be inclined to, for example, use capitalization if their conversation partner does this also, for fear of standing out negatively.

It’s certainly possible that they would change styles when talking to somebody outside their social group, and the biggest limitation of this analysis is that we only have Pesterlogs between these existing close friends. It would be very interesting to see these characters talk with strangers or acquaintances, and compare these with their in-group chats. It would also be interesting, if any of these characters ever meet in person – as John and Rose may if she is able to enter the Sburb universe – to compare their spoken dialog to their Pesterlogs.

One research group noted that young people did not subscribe to ‘an artificial distinction between the corruption of online space and the sanctuary of the home’ (Valentine et al.), as their participants broadly believed that harmful content online could also be found offline. I believe that on both its in-universe and meta levels, Homestuck begins by drawing this boundary in the opposite direction. The work presents Pesterchum as a sanctuary from the troubles of the offline world, and the home as the corrupt space where unpleasant entities invade on the characters’ lives and minds. 

Homestuck may go on to interrogate this dichotomy via Sburb, but its early position does reflect a reality. Many young people don’t view the home as a sanctuary, and are forced to find community and collective identity elsewhere. These characters’ geographical isolation is not their only problem; all four have tense relationships with their families due to a disconnect in identities or expectations. And due to their differences in personality and hobbies, there is likely a common factor linking these four kids together. 

Queer communities and neurodivergent communities have been found to flourish online, and these communities often more easily understand the communication styles of others within the group, while those outside the group may struggle. I believe that the characters all belonging to one of these groups could explain the strength of their friendship, and the reason they feel most comfortable in online spaces.

Analysis (out of universe)

Zooming out one layer further, I’ll consider the implications that Pesterchum has on Homestuck as a work and its audience.

So far, Homestuck only has one line of spoken dialog – the word “Stop!” used by Dave on page 354. As such, Pesterlogs are not a supplement to spoken conversations, they are a substitute. Pesterlogs are effective in that they can make use of the stylistic features discussed in this essay to add characterization. These features show how the author views their characters, as well as how the characters view themselves, given their control (in universe) over their messages. In a story where the narrator appears to be a character, with their own perspectives filtering the thoughts of John, Rose, Dave and GG, it is valuable to give these characters a chance to make themselves heard directly through their messages.

A webcomic is an exclusively online medium, and while some aspects of the Internet (such as social media) are becoming mainstream, webcomics still attract niche audiences of people who spend a lot of time online. While a few have broken from their confines, such as xkcd, these tend to be single-strip serialized comics like those found in newspapers, not longform stories like Homestuck. As such, it’s a reasonable assumption that Homestuck readers are probably also instant messenger users – and that they likely have online friends and acquaintances, read other webcomics, look at memes, read or maintain blogs, play video games, and may even have a basic knowledge of coding. The average audience member has already experienced the different multimedia formats that Homestuck plays with, and can relate these to their own experiences online.

Instant messaging chatlogs are just one of many formats that slot perfectly into a webcomic, not only because the medium allows for them on a technological level, but because of this assumed familiarity that would not be present in other groups. A Pesterlog could appear in a different form of fiction, such as a novel or even a poem, but novel and poetry readers skew to an older and less online demographic. They may struggle to interpret Dave’s coolguy slang, GG’s emojis, or the significance of Rose’s perfect grammar, while reading messages and gaining an implicit sense of character comes naturally to IM users.

John, Rose, Dave and GG’s typing styles are all different enough that, even without chumhandles or colors, it would be easy to determine who was speaking just from their messages - something much easier for an author to achieve in IM versus spoken dialog. It also reflects the reality that, far from being the homogenous wall of acronyms expected by writers and researchers who don’t use IM, people do type in a wide range of styles that reflect their actual and assumed personalities. IM users exercise a certain amount of control over how to present themselves, but their choices here reveal many clues to their underlying selves.

Finally, Homestuck successfully and sympathetically portrays a different lifestyle to what’s commonly found in fiction about teenagers. Television shows commonly explore the social and popularity dynamics of high schoolers forced into the same building, and while unpopular characters may well be protagonists, giving them friends and love interests at school is necessary to tell the story. Characters who are entirely socially isolated in real life need to have this factor changed before they can be three dimensional and participate in the narrative. This means that a character who lives online is typically a caricature, shown either as an unfortunate and inept loser who needs to be ‘fixed’ (or is beyond help), or a naive and uneducated child who will learn a lesson about internet safety when someone they talk to online turns out to not be who they claim. 

In Homestuck, in person social dynamics are nonexistent or irrelevant. Online friendships are allowed to meet characters’ social needs with peers of their own age, and are never shown as lesser than other kids for having these online social lives. While the narrator gently pokes fun at characters for their mishaps, these jabs aren’t based on their popularity or ‘weird’ status. To an online audience, many of whom are or were in the same position as these main characters, Homestuck earnestly validates how fulfilling and meaningful an online, instant messenger based friendship can be. In my opinion, this is one of its greatest strengths as a work.

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Here is a list of sources used in this essay 

Thanks so much to anyone who read all this! :D

[mikuni14]

The On1y One is now on and unfortunately, lately (of course it's happening now of all times), I have a lot of work and I am very busy, and this series is simply made for deep analysis of each episode 😭 I feel how much I am losing because I miss many things, I don't analize and think about my own reflections that come to me while watching, and writing always organizes my thoughts. I also don't have time to read other people's reviews, which I always appreciate very much, because it allows me to see what I missed, to get to know new perspectives.. I see how much I am losing and it makes me sad 🥺

This series is actually perfect and because of this I feel growing anxiety whether the series will deliver, whether it will end with the same high quality as it started. There have already been a few series this year that I liked very much at the beginning, at the level of 9-10/10, and in the end I could barely look at them. The On1y One is now such a series for me, it's a 💯, and hence my concerns.

I like pretty much everything about it: the way it's filmed, the story, the many details, the way the school, family, neighborhood, group of friends are shown. It's a very youth-style series in the best sense of the word.

I like that both characters are equal, both are very charismatic, interesting, both are very intelligent (academically and in general) and are good students. Both have their own problems and their own demons. Their interactions are always interesting and sparkle with emotions, even when one of them is calm and quiet - but the actor plays in such a way that sparks really fly between them lol. I really like how Tian knows his feelings from the beginning and acts on them in an interesting way, and how Wang acts on his own, although I don't think he fully understands them (yet). I was worried of their fight and I'm super happy that they resolved it right away. And what's more, Tian addressed it and pointed out to Wang that he noticed that he kept him at a distance. It's absolutely insane how Wang stares at Sheng. All. The. Time. 💯💯💯 And how protective he is of him. I'm losing my mind.

Despite the slow burn and calm direction of this series, SO MUCH IS HAPPENING IN IT. I'm delighted. The only thing I lack is time to write paeans in its honor after each episode lol

Them.

[cardboardheartss]

NEWJEANS D1 Chart Analysis

NEWJEANS! In their D1 Chart these girls have a Bharani (Aries) stelium in their 1H. Rahu, Mars, Uranus and Moon. This major stellium obviously makes the girls nakshatra be in Bharani aka Venus Nakshatra. This all makes sense because all of the member have their own unique beauty, they don’t need a visual hole in the group!

Bharani’s are known to represent “breakthrough” and in musical terms we can reword it as “breakthrough artist.” NEWJEANS honestly had one unique debut and the achievements they’ve been having ever since… it’s honestly mind-boggling.

Mars in astrology represents dancing as well, and mars is in Aries. Aries represents intensity/energy and I believe we have all seen NEWJEANS choreography. I noticed that people with Aries stelliums, Rahu/MC, and Vertex are also good dancers, and I picked up on this by looking at Jam Republic members' D1 and D10 Charts.

Back to NEWJEANS, i checked out all their charts and what actually shocked me was how they all have major aries placements in their personal D1 charts! I won’t share too much because i don’t want to spoil their charts yet lol!!!

NEWJEANS have an aries moon at 16 degrees, which is a cancer degree. The girls may seem very firey and bold on stage, and when they’re on stage they truly look like they want to be there and are present in their moments. The cancer degree really showed out this month with the whole Min Hee Jin vs HYBE fiasco. The sunbaenims of the industry really went out and showed their support to NEWJEANS, majority of the idols/celebs supporting NEWJEANS were females too!

NEWJEANS Aries Uranus also makes sense, the girls had an unconventional way of debuting as i had mentioned in the beginning. We did not know one member or actually the group overall! NEWJEANS concepts are also what make them stand out the most, we’ve seen every era, they bring out something different that sets them apart from this industry. The collaborations, merchandise, dancing, music material and etc.

NEWJEANS have Ardra and Punaravasu (Gemini) placements in their 3H. The planets/placements consist of Venus, Lilith, and POF! The 3H represents the VOICE (singing), texting, social media, coworkers and etc. On the one hand, I will have to mention that people, in general, enjoy NEWJEANS music, the girls are really talented vocalists and they all individually get praised for their live vocals as well! Thanks to ador, we actually get to see the members sing live on By Jeans!

and NEWJEANS are also quite active on an app called Phoning, and doesn’t phoning require you to talk to someone/people and they have luck with that app because they have structured rules and regulations you follow to avoid chaos on that app.

Gemini also represents the youth, and remember majority of us who are young enjoy texting… Gemini also represents a connection, and that is how NEWJEANS connect with Bunnies, through “calling” or “texting” them.

Since Gemini represents two sides, now I have to go onto the negative part. Lilith, the Lilith placement here makes sense. The cyberbullying these girls will have to go through will surely be difficult to deal with. Remember how I mentioned how Gemini represents youth, guess what people always bring up in NEWJEANS fan-wars? Their ages… every single time. What is also so ironic is how today, there is more drama surrounding NEWJEANS again…

Their Sun and Mercury are in Pushya (Cancer), and it is in their 4H. One thing i would like to mention is how much Hanni and Danielle always talk about their life back in Australia.

The girls all share their childhood memories to a certain extent and one thing i would also like to bring up is how the members always thank Min Hee Jin, who in this case was their mother figure for a while, and also not to mention how NEWJEANS biological mothers also fought and protected their daughters while their debut was being delayed.

The 4H represents home/native land/country, and the Sun and Mercury emphasizes how much NEWJEANS are loved and cherished in South Korea. Which is why they’re called the “Nations Daughters” “Nations Princesses” “Nations Granddaughters” and etc.

Have you also not noticed how much the rest of the industry has shown love to NEWJEANS for the past month too?! Once again… majority of the celebrities who spoke up about NEWJEANS and shows love to them were female celebs!

6H Hasta Virgo, these girlies know how to work practically and are also very hard workers. They know how to stick to the routines, and this makes sense because they share schedules and had/have to still spend at least half of their lives together. Since they are also dancers, Virgos always look to make something perfect, hence why their moves may be different in one choreography they still have really good synchronization.

Now for their Dhashnitha Saturn in their 10H, astrologers always say saturn is in a good place here and they’re right… in a way lol! We all finally know the truth about NEWJEANS delayed debut, and i guess that delay gave them the upper hand to plan and train together, because i mean look at the end result of that situation. They are talented and are also great performers and i truly applaud all the members for that, i believe it was not easy for them to almost not acheive their dreams and to see how much they have a achieved despite that obstacle makes me proud!!

Now for their last planets in Pisces Neptune, Purva Bhadra, Jupiter Uttara Bhadra, and Chiron Revati. The girls could go through a lot behind the scenes, in terms of their bond as a group and the overworking in the industry.

Some members could get injured a few times during their career, like Hyein with her foot.

Luckily, for NEWJEANS, they have Jupiter in their 12H, and 12H in Vedic represents abroad travel/faraway lands, and its ruler, Sagittarius is in the 9H of foreign land, higher courts, and media. I almost forgot to mention how much love NEWJEANS receive internationally!!

Welp! That was A LOT of writing… looking foward to posting more analysis soon!!!

[jillflame]

It kind of sucks that after 8 years, the best thing that Izuku could think to do with his life and experience studying to be a hero is teaching.

This is NOT a diss at teachers- they are literally the backbone of our society. And we all love Aizawa and everything he brings to the series, but Izuku's character isn't written like Aizawa's. He's never really shown to be someone drawn to teaching. There isn't any foreshadowing for this in his character.

Some might say "but 'children are our future' is a huge theme of mha", and it is, but not for Izuku. The point of Izuku's character is one of a student, not a teacher. It's literally called My Hero ACADEMIA. He is the youth. He is the future. We even see him walk into the school as an adult with a backpack, not a briefcase, because he's always going to be a student. He's a lifelong learner.

He's our walking, muttering, quirk-encyklopedia boy. And while being knowledgeable and studious are certainly qualities that could be found in a good teacher, Izuku has shown to have these behaviors less for a "having the knowledge to pass it on" sake, but more for his own desire to expand on them. Izuku is a natural researcher.

Teachers look backwards so their students can look to the future. As a quirk researcher, Izuku could have been working directly with his friends in the field, constantly recording stats and finding new and safe ways to push his friends' powers further than ever before. He could have been applying his talents in quirk analysis while addressing the quirk-singularity theory, actively finding solutions to help the future generations and the up-and-coming heros of now. And if for some reason he HAD to get a job working with kids, he could have been working as a quirk councler alongside Uraraka in one of her programs (where he could have been an amazing role model to younger children who might not know many quirkless individuals!). And I'm not a shipper, but that could have at least been a nod at how his and Uraraka's relationship developed beyond school.

He could have been working with his friends. He didn't have to be lonely, caged in the walls of UA. It kind of feels like he gave up, and that sucks knowing that that's not the Izuku we met at the start of the series (in a sad regression of character kind of way).

When All Might told Izuku he couldn't be a hero because he was quirkless, he walked home crying to himself because he wanted to follow the advice of his idol, but couldn't. He begged and tried to reason with himself to face reality, and struggled because he couldn't go against his own heart. This Izuku feels broken, like he gave up that unreasonable part of his heart, and it feels wrong to end the series on that note when that part of him was what was emphasized as what made him a hero to begin with.

Granted, it's already established that teaching was not the end-all-be-all for Izuku, and he gets to be a hero in the end, but as sweet as it is that Bakugou and his friends pitched in to help make that dream come true, it could have been all the more meaningful if he played a role in continuing to chase that dream by working in the field any way he could too, instead of waiting around to literally be handed the opportunity again.

[thedecadenceofwar]

Elle Argent as Jesus Christ: Heartstopper art analysis.

Yesterday, I made this post where I wordlessly compared Elle's art piece for the Lambert School to the painting that draws her attention at the Louvre, Caravaggio's Supper at Emmaus, a depiction of Jesus breaking bread for his disciples after his crucifixion and subsequent rising.

Elle's perspective on the painting / a full view of the painting (source)

The first thing I noticed that helped me draw the connection between these two paintings was their composition, the basic triangular lines that guide the eye in each painting; from Jesus and Elle in the center to the innkeeper and Tao at the top.

Heartstopper also clearly wanted us to make some connection between Elle and this Caravaggio: they focus on her face before they show us the painting, so we wonder what exactly it is she's seeing, which increases its narrative importance. I assumed she recognized herself in a painting; she did, but not in the way I expected.

The National Gallery (see above source) has this to say about the Caravaggio:

On the third day after the Crucifixion two of Jesus’s disciples were walking to Emmaus when they met the resurrected Christ. They failed to recognise him, but that evening at supper he ‘... took bread, and blessed it, and brake and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him; and he vanished out of their sight’ (Luke 24: 30–31). Painted at the height of Caravaggio’s fame, this is among his most impressive domestic religious pictures. He brilliantly captures the dramatic climax of the story, the moment when the disciples suddenly see what has been in front of them all along. Their actions convey their astonishment: one is about to leap out of his chair while the other throws out his arms in a gesture of disbelief. The stark lighting underlines the dramatic intensity of the scene. Typically for Caravaggio, he has shown the disciples as ordinary working men, with bearded, lined faces and ragged clothes, in contrast to the youthful beardless Christ, who seems to have come from a different world.

Jesus, in the story, opens the eyes of his disciples in more ways than one (I pulled my Bible out for this!). First, in the scene depicted in the painting, the disciples do not know that this man is Jesus until he blesses the bread and breaks it for them, revealing himself as Christ. Second is the context in which Jesus comes to share dinner with his disciples: they meet him on the road during the day before, and he interprets the Old Testament for them: (stay with me I promise we'll leave the Biblical stuff and get back to the gay stuff soon)

Luke 24:13-16 Now on that same day two of [the disciples] were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. Luke 24:25-27 Then he said to them, "Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?" Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

If Safe Space is an exact analogue to Supper at Emmaus, then Elle takes the position of Jesus, and she draws from the story of Christ's crucifixion and rising a trans metaphor.

Death does not always mean death. For example, in the world of tarot, the card of Death does not signify literal Death, but a transformation: that the idea of death is a catalyst for change. If you're trans or non-binary, you understand the idea of the person you were being dead; that's why they call it a deadname. For me, the girl I was is dead. The person I am now, a living, breathing, non-binary person, is alive.

Jesus died and lived again; the boy Elle was died and the girl Elle is lived. Elle takes the spot of Jesus. Elle is risen.

There's another half to this metaphor: of the disciples that don't recognize Jesus. See where I'm going with this? At first, after Jesus had undergone his transformation, the disciples do not recognize him; literally "Their eyes were kept from recognizing him." The fault is not on them – it is another stronger force that maintains their blindness. But Jesus stays with them, despite the fact that they don't know who he is, and he talks to them about the scriptures.

We don't know much about Elle, pre-transition. But we know that Elle, Tao, and Charlie, at least, were friends before Elle's transition, and she had to come out to them at some point. So, in essence, she is Jesus on the road to Emmaus; unrecognized, a stranger, until she reveals herself for who she is.

She takes the moment Jesus tells his disciples who he is and shows what happens when Elle stays. We don't all have the luxury of being the Son of God, who can just pop away at a moment's notice after coming back from the dead (which is what he does, in the story: once the disciples have their eyes opened, he leaves). But this is Elle, out, resurrected, staying.

"So. There've been a lot of changes in my life over the last couple years. But with this piece I guess I wanted to capture a place that holds a lot of happy memories. Even in the darker times. Somewhere I always felt safe."

Safe Space comes after the moment of realization, after Elle comes out, after her friends' eyes are opened. But implied in its source and its inspiration is the moment of truth, the moment of coming out. There's been a lot of that, this season, coming out. There's people that want to and are scared, and people that refuse to and walk away. We never had to go on that journey with Elle. But she's telling us about it, now. She's telling us that it was glorious, that it was godly, that it was religious, that she died and was resurrected.

Before I leave, I want to touch on Tao's importance in this piece. The disciples in Supper are the two men that are seated; the man standing is the innkeeper, who is not quite a part of Jesus' world. Interesting, that Charlie and Isaac, the two people of Elle's group who are part of the queer community, take the place of the two disciples, and Tao, the token straight friend, is standing in the place of the innkeeper; not a follower of Jesus but a witness to the miracle of his resurrection anyway. They are all different people in this painting; different identities, different lives, different loves. But they were all there to witness Elle revealing herself in her resurrection. Tao, afraid of being left alone, is brought into this inner sanctum of Elle's world. Into her safe space.