#borderlands Mercy

[overwatchfanskinarchive]

Borderlands Mercy by sarcastic_siren_ (instagram)

[xley]

My gaming setup. Still needs a few more adjustments, but it’s better than before. Last pic is more recent because I swapped the mouse pad for a bigger desk mat and added a few new desk pieces from my collection.

(🩷Please give credit if photos are posted anywhere else, thank you.🩷)

My Pinterest can be found here.

[fern-thee-otter]

NAH LOOK AT THEM 💔

the beach dads are alive 🫶

[dreamwavesexploringreality]

SHADOWS OF THE PAST:

NIGHT IN THE LIBRARY PT2

Niragi x reader

TW: Violence, physical harm, abuse of power… Niragi on his own can be a trigger warning…

The cold air of Borderlands burned in her lungs with every breath she took. Her heart raced frantically in her chest, and she could feel the adrenaline coursing through her body, still fresh from the last game she had faced.

In moments like these, wandering aimlessly looking for a place to spend the night, her mind traveled to her most inhospitable memories. She often thought of Niragi Suguru, the boy she had met in the library. Secretly, she had been fascinated by the bespectacled boy since the first time she saw him. It was almost a miracle that he had also felt some curiosity about her and had agreed to go on a simple coffee date. She remembered it as if it were yesterday, almost able to taste the cappuccino on her tongue. But that had been a long time ago. After that unexpected date came others, and then some more, and eventually, the inevitable happened: he kissed her. Y/N wouldn’t consider it the best kiss of her life, but without a doubt, it was the most special, the most real...

Now, all of that remained as vague memories hidden in her mind, casting light on an uncertain future. Sometimes she wondered if he was also in this world, trapped as she was. Then she dismissed the thought as if it were toxic; she didn’t want him to be in a place like this, her innocent and naive Niragi… no, he shouldn’t be in such a place.

Her thoughts were pushed to the background when she heard a scream not far from her position. Her heart raced once again as she tried to decide whether it was worth investigating. Y/N knew it would probably be foolish to approach the place where the screams were growing more and more desperate, but on the other hand, you never knew what the place had to offer... maybe she could get a weapon, or an ally in the best case. She decided to follow the sound of the voice.

She did so cautiously, moving through the shadows and hiding among buildings. She wasn’t willing to face whatever the situation was head-on, so when she got close enough to observe the scene, Y/N remained hidden behind the rubble of some huge building that had succumbed to that hostile land.

The screams and cries clearly came from a man on the ground who was being kicked mercilessly by a group of striking characters. Five, Y/N counted. "Five against one..." she thought.

"Do I have to repeat myself? Give me all your cards!" said one, who seemed to be the leader. He wore a printed t-shirt, and although Y/N couldn’t see his face from her position, it was evident that he emanated a dangerous and intimidating aura. “I would never want to have someone like that as an ally…” she thought, discarding the idea of seeking out a companion, the reason she had approached the scene.

"I told you! I don’t have anything, please, a group attacked me yesterday and took all my cards, maybe they were yours, your friends, definitely. Please don’t hurt me!" the man sobbed from the ground.

Y/N’s heart broke at the sound of that boy's plea for mercy; he couldn’t be much older than her and was just trying to survive, like anyone in that place. Y/N watched in panic as the man she had designated as the leader aimed a large shotgun directly at the man on the ground without hesitation.

"If you have nothing, you’re of no interest to us... Maybe we should get rid of a potential rival... What do you say?" His voice sounded maniacal and disturbing as he laughed along with his three companions.

“Wait… three companions?”

Y/N had no time to think much more when a rough yank on her arm pulled her out of her hiding place.

"Hey, look what I found! We have a little spy among us!" Y/N felt all attention shift to her, and her body froze as she realized the gravity of the situation she had gotten herself into.

The man continued to yank her arm until they reached the rest of the group and forced her to kneel violently beside the man still lying on the ground. She took a quick glance at the man, seeing his bloodied face and imagining the rest of the injuries he might have all over his body, and it was at that moment that she understood she wasn’t going to make it out alive.

“Well, well… what do we have here? What were you doing hiding there, sweetheart? Too shy to join the party?” said the leader, with a sweet and deceptively concerned voice as he crouched down to face her.

It was at that precise moment that two hearts stopped for an instant. There, kneeling before her, with more piercings and predatory eyes she could never have imagined, was Niragi. For a moment, she thought her mind was playing a cruel trick on her in what she considered one of the last moments of her life, but no, it was him. She recognized his facial features, his eyes, even his voice… he was Niragi, her Niragi… Although he might never be “her Niragi” again.

The man wasn’t much better off than her; he recognized her the moment she knelt before him and, for the first time in all the time he had been in Borderlands, his mask fell, and he didn’t know how to act. It was her… “What is she doing here? No, she can’t be here, no… Please, no…”

Neither of them noticed as one of the men rummaged through the girl’s pockets and pulled out a considerable stack of cards.

"Look, Niragi! She has tons of cards, she must be a good player. Maybe we should take her to the beach!"

Neither of them flinched, still lost in their own thoughts.

"Leave us" Niragi broke the silence with a dangerously low voice.

If the men accompanying him were surprised, they didn’t show it; they left, disappearing among the buildings, leaving the pair alone with the man still lying on the ground.

"Are you deaf? Get out!" Niragi barked aggressively, delivering a final kick, full of frustration, to the battered body of the man, who ran away as fast as he could, falling repeatedly.

Silence settled like an unwelcome intruder. Y/N remained kneeling on the ground, staring intently at the man’s face, trying to discern if all of this was real. Niragi, on his part, moved nervously, trying to look anywhere but at the woman still on the ground.

"Get up," he ordered, his voice slightly trembling, trying to regain some of the confidence he seemed to have in abundance until that moment.

Y/N did not obey; perhaps she didn’t even hear him. She was in shock. She couldn’t believe that the man standing before her, with a shotgun in hand, was the same shy, insecure, and withdrawn boy she had come to love. The last kiss they had shared at the doorway came to her mind suddenly, when he had walked her home shortly before the fireworks lit up the Tokyo sky. It had been a cautious, silent, and intimate kiss, sharing the promise of their love. “I couldn’t kiss this man,” she thought, immediately regretting it as she felt a hollow space in her stomach, remembering that this man was Niragi.

The boy sighed impatiently and yanked on the girl's arm, ignoring the spark he felt when touching her skin. He loved seeing people kneel before him, fearing for their lives and begging for his forgiveness… but not her. Something in his body ached and hurt to see her like this before him.

The girl forced herself to stand, not breaking her gaze from his. She reached out tentatively, needing to touch him, needing to know if he was really him, if behind the character her eyes were seeing, there was still the boy from their library nights.

Niragi pulled her arm away with more force than necessary, immediately regretting it. He couldn’t let her touch him, didn’t want to feel her caresses… didn’t want to stain her soul.

"What are you doing here?" he asked harshly, almost growling.

"Niragi…" she whispered. Hearing her own words, she knew at that moment that everything was real.

Niragi’s mask fell a little more upon hearing her voice, and he felt his walls threatening to collapse. No. He couldn’t cry. He wouldn’t.

"This place isn’t for you," he said, stepping brusquely away from her, picking up the cards from the ground that his companion had left. He examined them one by one.

"This isn’t a place for anyone. Not for you," Y/N countered, slowly returning to reality. She felt as though she was waking from a long dream. Niragi, her Niragi… that memory that had allowed her to survive in that place… it had all crumbled.

A sarcastic laugh escaped the man’s lips.

"What do you know? This is exactly my place, the place I’m meant to be…" A thousand unspoken words were left behind. He wanted to tell her how much he missed her, how many times he had thought about her and wished they were together. He wanted to tell her he loved her… But he couldn’t. Not there, not now.

Niragi watched as the girl’s gaze fell, those expectant eyes that had just collided with reality, and he put the deck of cards in his shirt pocket.

"You’re not like this…" Y/N began to say.

"And what do you know?" The words came out harsher than he intended. "This is who I am," he said with feigned pride.

"You’re a monster," she whispered. She wouldn’t have wanted to say it, but the words came out on their own; it was what she had been thinking since she saw him mistreat the man on the ground while hiding among the rubble.

That word pierced Niragi’s heart like a thousand burning daggers. It wasn’t the first time he had been referred to like that, but he never would have imagined Y/N calling him that, and he never would have imagined the pain it would bring.

"Get out. I’ll tell them you escaped," he said, making a heart-wrenching effort and facing the girl with false indifference. "Oh, but I’m taking this with me," he added, touching the pocket of his shirt where he had stored the girl’s cards.

Y/N looked at him, her eyes showing pain and disappointment.

"If that’s what you want," she spoke firmly, ignoring the pain in her heart. She looked at him one last time, trying to find in his gaze traces of the Niragi she knew, the one she loved. She didn’t find them. She turned away, leaving and disappearing into the darkness of the night.

Niragi watched her turn that last time, sharing that final glance. Maybe he would never see her again; Borderlands was not a safe place. He was left alone, watching the place where the girl had vanished, as if hoping she would turn around and run into his arms, as she had done so many times in the past… He remained trembling under the stars, watching as the only light in his life disappeared once more before his eyes, this time because of his own fault. He could previously blame the fireworks that had deprived him of a happy future together… but not now. This was his fault, and he knew it.

© 2024 [@dreamwavesexploringreality]

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Should I continue it?

I've taken some time to write the second part of the Niragi x reader story, and I really hope you enjoy it!

If there's enough interest and feedback, I might consider writing a 3rd PART or even turning it into a series. Your thoughts and comments are greatly appreciated!

[vumming]

alice in borderland — ryohei arisu “apology"

contents : suggestive themes, smut

a/n: before the year 2023 ends, i am ending it with a bang

His hands always work like magic, thin yet calloused from the hours he always spent on playing are so gentle and hesitant whenever they'd touch you. Featherlight and soft like a gentle whisper.

You've known him as someone who is always beneath you, eager to please with his whole being. It's sweet really, appreciation and love always emits from you whenever you see him—it is simply his charm that's why you fell in love.

And yet, you know for a fact that he isn't a push over.

"Hmm.. like that.." Arisu hums, watching your reaction with that observant gaze that seemingly calculates and take into mind your every actions.

Rough and calloused fingers tremble a rhythm that only the both of you are familiar with—drawing that sweet and melodious sound that airs from the back of your throat as he pulls another chord of pleasure from within.

The slick shwop shwop fills the air between you two, his long fingers deep within and reaching the depths that you don't know you have. Aided by the smooth jell that now lays on the other side of the bed, Arisu faced no difficulty.

One.

Two.

"Think you can take another, angel?" He breathes from the crook of your neck, eyes watching as his fingers enter and exit. His voice is tender and patient but the way he fills you up so good is rather rough and fast.

His words are murmured on your skin, damp and sweaty because of him.

Please please please— you couldn't count how much you've come already, how many times he has taken from you.

Damn Arisu. Your thighs are parted, body arching from the mattress and mind blurred like a foggy night that you could see stars in your vision. For how long will he keep at it?

You couldn't even close your thighs shut because of his body in between and the way his arm is kept on your abdomen prevents you from escaping. "I think.. yeah.." He decides for you, pressing a sweet chaste kiss on your neck.

Three.

There is no space left for him. It's too much. You could feel the smile that breaks through his face against your skin. "It's too much?" He echoes—you have been too far gone to think that you said it aloud.

Purple, pink and red, you are like a canvas painted with melodies of colours and he is the artist responsible for it.

"After teasing me while I was playing.. this is an act of mercy." He whispers, lifting his head to kiss your cheek.

Arisu couldn't help it, the way you look so dazed and drunk under him, your fingers finding purchase into whatever you have in your arsenal—clenching on the sheets of his bed, it looks so lovable.

"Won't you say you're sorry?" His tone is so sweet, he's so kind that you would've never guessed how he can also be rough with you.

"Anh..!" Arisu. Arisu. Arisu, the name that falls from your lips repeatedly like a mantra. "Say you're sorry, angel." He repeats, curling those fingers to press against that spot that has your knees trembling and hips gyrating against his palm.

There's so much power and control that he has over you. You've been going on for seemingly an eternity that your carnal desires beg for him already.

You stutter as you felt your knot builds up, "P-please.. 'm sor- mhmm..!" But how could you continue when he dived in to lick your chest—warm and wet muscle hitting the pert bud.

There's a grin on his face now, smug and proud. "Go on." He encourages you, if you just look down, you'd see how desperate he is for you too.

Hips humping at the bed, there's a puddle of stain on his boxers that indicates how much he needs you. He couldn't help it, not when his pretty angel is all parted for him, like a present.

"I-mm .. 'm sorry..!"

Then the dam breaks once again for the nth time. Eyes hitting the back of your head as you part from the mattress but he holds you down with his arms as you squirm and chase that high that insistently pulls you.

Your sensitivity reaches its peak but those damn motions just won't stop. Arisu still continues to finger you through your high as high pitched moans fall from your lips.

Your head is thrown back, chest panting and legs turning numb as Arisu continues to hold you down. Eyeing how much you enjoyed yourself and how pretty you are.

"It's not enough, you need to be more sincere."

He brings you to a new height, allowing you to be able to feel more of him from the erotic position. He lifted one of your legs to his broad shoulder, pressing a light and chaste kiss on your ankle before taking out his fingers to grant you the mercy you deserve from the long time he has been inside and fiddling within your walls that has kept his lithe fingers warm and aching for more.

"Now then.." Arisu breathes, now eagerly pulling the band of his boxers down, "Let's try again."

[planetariumwriting]

𝗜𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗲 - 𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗮 𝗦𝘂𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗼 (𝗛𝗖)

Since Banda was the winner on my last poll, here we are with headcanons about him being your partner. 𝗦𝗙𝗪, 𝗡𝗦𝗙𝗪

Before being actually a couple, it would have been Banda to speak to you first. Shy or not, he has to be in control of the entire situation, so let him make the first move. He thought about manipulating the sitatuion to make you talking to him, but again: who's in control?

Expect his eyes watching every move you make, together or not. He wants to watch every expression you make, every breath you take.

He's into stalking, let's be honest. Even if you don't tell him where you're going, who you're meeting, he simply knows everything.

He's possessive. If when he's stalking you, he sees you getting too friendly with somebody, that somebody will be dead. Crying however you want, you belong to him. Only him.

He's gonna pretend to be in the same place you are accidentally. But, again, he was stalking you.

God Complex. He knows he's better than everyone, especially smarter than everyone. Prepare yourself to get degraded to an extreme. "You're so stupid, I should mind-fuck to make you smarter."

During sex, you have absolutely no rights. He can do whatever he wants with you. He doesn't want to hear any "no", only begging or moaning.

His way to say "love you" is when he's fingering you with three fingers inside you and pointing a blade against your throat, whispering into your ear.

He loves tearing your clothes his blade. If you get scared, it's even better.

If you're with him, you can't escape. He's writing your life, you have no rights to leave him - you simply can't. You're a forever prisoner in his games.

Every your sensitive spot is going to be tortured on purpose by him.

In the Borderlands, in every game you both play together, you'll be teased to the maximum. You're going to beg him to fuck you in a corner because you can't wait anymore.

He doesn't think twice about protecting you. Nobody can break his own toy. Make sure that whoever tries to hurt you, it'll be tortured in front of you.

You have to see how much he cares for you, how much he would do everything for you.

He will manipulate you to think that everything cruel he does, he does it for you. He's not a bad person and you'll believe to his lies.

Very much into putting on you a collar and a leash. He just loves to pull you as a way to make you behave.

Let's not forget about blood-play. He wants to lick every drop of your blood with his tongue, slowly. He wants to make you feel the burning sensation devouring your body.

Raw, rough, primal. He's going to fuck you with no mercy. More pain you feel, more satisfied he will be.

His soft side will show up in your most vulnerable moments, forcing in his way the idea of him being literally an angel.

You'll be spoiled. Whatever you see and like, consider it as already yours.

You'll be completely dependent from him. You won't be able to think properly unless Banda is with you.

[honeyydrunk]

niragi suguru a-z don't judge me for this sakurada dori was hawt as hell in that role

a: aftercare oh be SO real rn. 🧍

b: body bro has 3 good qualities and his body is one of them. but aside from everything let's talk about the main attraction, that damn mf absolutely ridiculously crazy tongue piercing of his. man i wanted to JUMP through the screen for that. it had me blushing and shi

c: cum hm. well he just nuts all up in your guts. consequences are not something he's thought about. but this is the borderlands what's going to happen be fr. you'll probably die before anything bad occurs from the raw nut.

d: dirty secrets  he has no secrets and everything about him is dirty.

e: experience before the borderland? nothing now? everything

f: favourite position it's a tie between you tied up and like 'at his mercy' or whatever that means, and you riding him. actually he likes anything. bros a freak. a high stamina constantly horny ahh freak.

g: goofy that all depends on if you consider him insulting you 'goofy'. it also depends on whether you considered him goofy in the show, because that's exactly how he is in bed. ngl i thought he was kinda goofy, so this one is all up to personal interpretation.

h: hair untamed and unruly bush of hair. (before the borderlands he actually did trim it)

i: intimacy  do you consider him eating you out with a tongue piercing intimate? because BE FOR REAL 🧍

j: jacking off why jack off when he can just fuck you.

k: kinks everything (sort of) licking, biting, cnc, hair pulling, just plain raw animalistic fucking going at it like crazy people. how can i explain extreme desperation and looking like you're attacking each other during sex as a kink?

l: location anywhere everywhere. though he prefers semi public sex as a way of kind of getting adrenaline and showing off. surprisingly, he wouldn't fully fuck you publicly, but totally kissing fingering cockwarming, that kind of stuff in like broad daylight. funnily enough, he doesn't actually like fully private sex anything. it feels too intimate and we can't have that.

m: motivation  everything. if he sees you, he'll try and pull you to a hallway. bros ALWAYS motivated.

n: no no no  him bottoming is an absolute no for him. he will not put himself at the liberty of another person. that or you trying anything he didn't ask you to. basically he wants to feel power, so anything that doesn't give him that feeling is a no.

o: oral oh he loves oral. you crying on his dick is like crazy hot to him. and you'll love oral too LIKE ngl i want that tongue piercing in me or whatever like my imagination is getting so crazy i can actually visualise him eating me out like lowkey can even feel it.

p: pace fast fast fast crazy fast extremely fast no breath no breaks no air constantly going at it you need ridiculous stamina for this crazy attacking sex

q: quick fucks one of his favourite games is you fucking during the games. that's a real time limit isn't it. i just thought of something HORRID ngl. imagine he makes you wait until your visa ends you're outside the game arena and bro says make me cum before the game registration ends or uh you'll die.

r: risk take a wild guess. what do you think? this is niragi suguru. be for real. what do you THINK.

s: stamina crazy high. hope you were one of those cardio pilates people before borderlanding otherwise you might be fainting on him. (actually i think bros realistically isn't high at all i just want it to be)

t: toys bro we're in the borderlands tf is there  (i consider that tongue piercing of his a toy)

u: unfair unfair boy oh god he's horrible. this is NIRAGI. brother isn't going to be sunshine and rainbows he is going to be in it for himself and him only. sorry babygirls he is going to be the most unfair person in bed you'll ever be with

v: volume surprisingly very normal in volume.

w: wild card he IS wild. what else is there? (he likes you wanting him and taking him, but this is only in VERY specific moods. otherwise he'll just kill you for being an annoying slut or whatever)

x ray: slightly above average in length, massive in width.

y: yearning  all the time.

z: zzzzzzzz he never sleeps with someone else in the room. and when he sleeps, it's holding a loaded automatic.

if he gets bored, you're annoying, or he realises he's falling for you, you're getting shot with that mf rifle of his. sorry 😔 for that guys. can't win in this society. i'm praying you live fr because now you got not only the borderlands that is a death wish (i wanna kiss him so bad when he got his face burnt off bros hotter like that. that's not a pun btw)

[anonymouschishiyaimaginesandmore]

The hard kind of Games

Minors, do not read! Contains mentions of smutty behavior!

MASTERLIST (up-to-date)

This is Part 2 !!Here!! is Part 1

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Alice in Borderland/Imawa no Kuni no Alice characters or original stories, only the plot of this fanfic. Alice in Borderland/Imawa no Kuni no Alice characters and original storyline belong to Haro Aso, who made the Manga the Series is based on.

Trigger Warning: Explicit Smut, Toxic Behavior, Drug Use, Gory, Written Madness, Complicated Consensual/Not-Consensual Behavior Summery: Chishiya x female OC that I gave a Name for this Story

Chishiya didn’t know how Ivy found the willpower, but her clumsy self made it onto her feet, robbing on all fours at first and when she reached the door, he pulled the glass out and went after her, ready to kill her with it. His pants laid casual around his hips, showing half his ass and if he didn’t know that the chances of seeing any of this mentally gone people again were low to non-existent, he would have felt at least slightly embarrassed, while running after a girl with his dick out, jumping at every step and hitting his abdomen.

The door closed behind Ivy just as Chishiya reached it. Fists bumped aggressive against it, before he opened it, almost ripping it out of its frame. He felt like an animal on a hunt, but wishing his prey was out of reach for him.

Sadly, that wasn’t the case as his eyes landed on Ivy’s figure, wobbling away slowly. Her shoulder hitting the wall from time to time, leaving bloodstains all over it.

He clenched his hand around the piece of glass. The pain cutting into his palm was enough to make him stop dashing forward for a moment, but he knew at this rate, he would get her. She was too slow.

The drug in her body was affecting her the same way it did him, but unlike Chishiya, Ivy had taken in most of the pain. She had gotten her body violated so awful, bleeding from different parts of her limbs that he either bit or scratched or digged in, that the blond man was still surprised she hasn’t given up yet and succumbed to her fate.

Chishiya’s steps were the ones of a men on a mission and when he reached her, grabbing her wounded shoulder and turned her around, he saw no surprise in her eyes. She saw it coming. It probably took her all the willpower she still had, to fight the urge to stay in the club, but she did. Unlike so many others inside this hellhole, she made it out. And he followed her outside. At least this part worked as planned. Now, he could only hope the drug died out before she did in his hands.

Sadly, Chishiya knew just too well how Ivy’s chances were standing. He was a med student after all. At least before the Borderlands became his new home. Chishiya knew where to stab and how deep to slice each place, to not only cause her more pain but also kill in the fastest and most harmful way. And the drug? It was using his knowledge for its advantage.

Unless…Chishiya hoped that the girl in front of him, hasn’t given up now that he caught up to her and had her at his mercy. He hoped that even tho she saw what was about to happen, this girl that made it that far and lived thru countless deadly games and mad human acts, would getter her guts anew and try to follow her survival instincts.

He didn’t want to kill her. Not because he was a good person. Not because something she did or he did or he saw, changed his perspective of humankind and definitely not because he suddenly discovered his humanity. No. Chishiya didn’t want to be someone who killed an innocent live with his own hands.

It was different to let someone succumb to their fate. Different to blame the terrible harsh world for another worthless life going extinct or when they just didn’t have the guts to look further and fight stronger to live and exist. But this? This was his own hands. The hands of a man that saved lives that he has framed as pointless. Lives that had done him no harm in any way. Lives he saved because it was his job, not because he cared. But that didn’t mean that he would have taken those lives if he had the power to do so with a snap of his fingers.

No, Chishiya wasn’t like this. Didn’t want to be like that. Killing to survive was one thing but this? This was not surviving. This was murder. Plain cold murder. And he was the murderer. About to be.

Chishiya had done his best to not only get himself but also Ivy out of the club. Not because he cared for her, but because she was the bait that he knew his drugged self would follow if it would run away from him. Sure, it was maybe a little farfetched, but it had worked. Until now.

Chishiya pushed Ivy to the ground, and she fell like a potato sack. As he kneeled, hovering over her, the glass shard in his hand, ready to stab, she spread her legs around him, giving him space to lean on her and he did. His hand with the glass shard was shaking midair, fighting against what inevitably was going to come.

Ivy’s hands were on his waist pulling him towards her, their hips meeting, his member still going strong touching her most private area and nudging against her fucked loose entrance “It’s okay” she whispered, kissing him almost lovingly. Her jaw trembled against his face while he only pressed himself harder on her.

“It’s okay” Ivy assured him again “It will be over soon.”

“No” he whispered back, his voice breaking as their foreheads touched.

Chishiya clenched the glass harder in his palm, the stinging pain keeping him from doing the unspoken, but he knew his body would soon get used to its level and the shard would become useless.

Just a little longer he thought. They were out of the club, away from the drug. He felt it wearing off slowly. If he could just resist a little longer, she would be fine. They would be fine.

“Fight me” he said, a beg in his words.

“I can’t anymore” Ivy answered, and a sob escaped her mouth, as their lips touched again.

“Please” Chishiya whispered against her whimpering lips. She closed her eyes, trying to push this moment as far away as possible, so she wouldn’t feel like giving up, tho she was and Chishiya saw it in the way her head turned to the side and away from him, accepting defeat.

“Please” Chishiya begged again. I don’t want to be a murderer, was the silent unspoken message “Just a little longer…almost…just please.”

Ivy’s head shook lightly against his own and Chishiya knew the girl has lost all hope of getting out of this situation alive. It was too much for her. The fear, the assault and seeing strangers around her doing such mad acts. Her poor brain was probably not able to withstand and broke right under the blond man’s hand, but Chishiya wasn’t in the mood to accept her defeat.

A low deep growl left itself out of his chest, as he tapped his forehead once then twice and then thrice against the broken piece of a human below him, trying his best not to let the urge take over that advised him to knock himself so hard against her, until her scull would break or his would first. It didn’t matter, both possibilities seemed so alluring.

“Fight me” Chishiya half groaned half begged “Please…just one more time.”

She didn’t want to. All Ivy wanted was for things to end. To close her eyes and drown out the male above her. For it to be over fast and as painless as possible so she wouldn’t need to struggle with staying alive and watching others die anymore. Ivy wanted nothing more than to ignore the ex-beach member, but his words hit her deeper than she wished.

Chishiya.

The same guy everyone had told her to stay away from as far as possible and to hope she never catches his attention. This guy begged her to stay alive. Someone who had visibly given less than a birds shit if someone died, no matter how close this person has been to him. This guy…This asshole and poor excuse of a human being begged her to not die.

Ivy heaved her hips off the floor to meet Chishiya’s again, the tip of his dick pushing at her entrance as her hand reached for his with the glass inside, making her whine instantly. She squeezed it, nodding slowly against him “Okay.”

Chishiya opened his hand, not enough to let go of the stinging piece, but enough for Ivy’s hand to press against it, now also cutting into her palm and further wounding her body. Their fingers intertwined as she put more and more pressure against his hand, pushing the shard deeper into his palm.

Chishiya opened his mouth, giving out a silent pained “Ah” as the increasing pain became more and more prominent. He moved his hips down, entering her slowly this time. Nonetheless, it hurt. All the time he rattled into her forceful and uncaring, wounding her insides with each stroke. It took its toll on her body and Ivy winced as she felt the red angry tip painfully going deeper until he bottomed out and she could feel his pelvis nudging her clit. Each time it touched her, even for a millisecond, her body jolted upwards. The small bud too sensitive from all the actions and the drugs effect.

Ivy pressed harder against Chishiya, as he pulled out, only to enter her again, this time just a little faster. Their lips grazed at eachother as they shared the same breath, him rocking his hips on hers while she did her best hurting him with her hand, so he would stay somewhat sane.

Chishiya picked a slow pace. This time he could control himself better, fucking her in a decent way he assumed she did enjoy. He smiled as he felt the urge to strangle her slipping away and him gaining control of his hand back.

The ex-doctor didn’t know how long they were lying there, on the floor, outside of the game venue in a deserted ally with the chilly night surrounding them and stars behind his back, fucking, but it was long enough. Chishiya realized it when he felt the familiar build up in his groin and his body that basically blue balled itself begged him for release.

He was about to come, finally, but it felt like this was the least good time. Still, he couldn’t help but feel relieved when he did. Splurging inside the younger one, his hips rocked a few more times, riding out his orgasm. This was the first time Chishiya fucked during a game, tho he had his fair share since he arrived in the borderlands. No matter what, it was also the first time he had an orgasm but his female counterpart not.

Chishiya was no saint but at least gentlemen enough to be not a total selfish asshole when it came to sex. Maybe he could make it up to her. Later. If she wanted of course. He could understand, if she wouldn’t want him to fuck her or even touch her for the rest of her life. What they did. What he did, tho he was under the influence of a drug…he wouldn’t hold it against her.

His palm opened enough for the glass shard to fall thru their hands to the ground, making a shattering tone.

Chishiya intertwined their hands more, their blood mixing. He felt pain and he knew she felt the same in hers. He laid their hands down next to her head, hair pooling around it like a puddle. When Ivy opened her lids, Chishiya realized her orbs had turned back to their normal color.

Chishiya locked his eyes with her, starring while the quiet black night of the ally swallowed their bodies “You did it” he said praising her “Good Girl.” He did his best to give her an uplifting smile, but he saw her lips trembling, tears coming to her eyes.

“It’s okay”, he said shushing her, planting pepper kisses on bruised flesh, unsure if this was the best idea, but Ivy didn’t turn away from him, so Chishiya went on, making sure that each one was placed as careful and softly as possible, almost sweet on each part of her face “You are alive” he whispered, “You made it out alive.”

To emphasize his word, he took her intertwined hand and placed it over his pulse, hoping to calm her down with his own beating heart. Ivy watched him doing it with a hitching breath, ready to erupt into another tearjerking fit, but his pulse did calm her down.

It was a slow pulse almost impalpable, but it was there, and its lazy rhythm forced her own heart to follow. As her chest heaved in a rhythmic but normal way, Ivy shifted, trying to get into a more comfortable lying position, tho the feeling of short trimmed but stiff hair tickling the abused bud of her clit, send her into another jolt, moaning while pulling her legs.

Ivy’s toes curled, and she couldn’t help it, when she felt Chishiya’s body trying to lift off of hers. Her heels laid over his exposed ass, pushing him back down and with that back inside, forcing a groan out of the grown man that still had his slowly softening dick inside his teammate’s cunt.

The mushroom-like tip was overly sensitive thru the long abuse, tho it had finally gotten what it wanted, by painting Ivy’s walls with his fluid, filling every possible oh so small slit between his dick and her insides. It was so much, he already felt parts of it running down his baggy balls, dropping down in small beads.

If he had the strength, he would lift her legs up and take a proud look, stroking his ego, but the bit he still had, tried its best to lift himself off, tho he was put back in his previous place almost immediately.

“Sorry” Ivy whined, pushing her head onto her neck, as Chishiya’s abdomen flexed, his happy trail grazing her clit again, sending yet another lightning thru her body “Just…if you could…”

“I know I know, apologies” Chishiya mumbled hastily and made preparations to rise again, but Ivy’s heels remained on his behind, unwilling to let go.

“No, I mean…if you can…” another moan escaped her, this time she bit down hard on the poor abused bottom lip “Your hand…can you use your…hand?”

“Yeah” Chishiya said confused, not understanding Ivy’s train of thoughts. As he watched her mewl under him, her legs pulling him even closer while her back arched to meet his chest. Chishiya got a glimpse of what the girl under him could mean, but there was no way right? Not here, not now, not after all that happened.

“Hand…gimme” Ivy’s unwounded hand reached for his and Chishiya gave it to her, letting her do whatever she wanted, and Ivy did. As soon as the pad of his fingers reached between their bodies most sacred places, Ivy whined deliciously, tho the corner of her lips pulled upwards into a delighted smile. Her fingers guided his in a circular motion, while her intertwined hand griped his painfully, making him hiss.

Chishiya catched quickly on what obviously bothered Ivy so much. She hasn’t cum even once and her body was begging for some kind of way to release the overstimulation Chishiya had caused. The small prideless “More” she pleaded him with, tho he wasn’t sure she even knew what she was begging for, were enough signs to know what she needed now more than anything else.

As Ivy pulled their intertwined hands to her face, still bleeding between each digit, she bit down on one of his fingers making him hiss another time but that turned quickly into a groan when her lips wrapped around said finger sucking and licking while her hips rocked furiously against his working hand.

“You can’t be serious” Chishiya whisper-yelled into the younger one’s ear, her walls clenching hard around his length, what got his own hips rocking against Ivy’s in an uncomfortable way. His body hated him for his reaction. Too close was his last orgasm that took so long to achieve and here he was snapping his pelvis against the smaller one’s body, caging her hand with his lower abdomen and overstimulating himself in an almost painful way.

But they were alone. No one else has made it out of the game yet. Maybe no one else even will. It was luck Chishiya got a glimpse of the door leading out of the venue. Chances were high, even if anyone else would find the Latin words, translate them and get the meaning, they still wouldn’t know where to stand when the next room closes up, dooming everyone inside to an almost certain death.

“Fine” Chishiya mumbled watching blood spreading over the tearstained face, completely unbothered “If that’s what you want” Ivy nodded against his finger. She felt the older pressing his forehead against hers, breathing audibly, as his fingers started to move on their own, after what she tried to make them do.

Chishiya’s hips rocked slowly. His thighs shivered whenever his tip grazed her cervix sending her into another moaning fit.

“You like sucking things hm?” he asked, noticing surprised how his flaccid dick grew hard again, pumping precious blood into his groin “I bet that’s all you did at the beach. Sucking your way thru life”

Chishiya watched how Ivy pulled another one of his wounded fingers into her mouth, wrapping her tongue around two at the same time. Was this a silent confession?

“You wish you could have had me sooner, right? That those fingers were something else?”

Ivy pulled the salvia coated digits out of her mouth. Her lips, swollen and plum trembled with yet another exciting moan, making her even more an exquisite and enjoyable sight “But I have you now, don’t I?”

Chishiya grinned. His bloody hand reached for the girls nape, grabbing it harshly and titling her head to the side. He pushed his cock as deep as he could, remaining in this agonizing upfilling state until Ivy whined with luscious eyes fixed on him. Her heels hit his lower back again and again, trying to make him stop, but Chishiya only leaned further. His mouth crashed puffy lips, giving in a deep and throaty kiss, as his hips went back into a bouncing motion. Balls slapping saggy against her cunt with each trust, ready to fill it up again.

Maybe he has lost his mind, Chishiya thought. Perhaps that was the game that broke him after all, or why else was he screwing a girl he barely knew and that didn’t even tell him her real name, right after trying to kill her in a drug-stained state. He couldn’t rule that possibility out. It was just too likely.

Whatever it was, he didn’t care. Parting from his new favorite toy to mumble sultry words “Yeah you got me, now deal with it.”

[woodcries]

PERMANENT STARTER CALL MASTERLIST

please like these if you are interested in writing with a muse, it's easier for me to track than an interest tracker. feel free to unlike later.

SHIP CALL EDITION: coming soon

A

aahana (dungeons and dragons)

ada wong

aerith gainsborough

albert fink

alcryst (fire emblem: engage)

alex stern

alice (cam)

alice (rune factory 5)

alice wake

amber (fandomless oc)

amelie pearlcrest

ami mizuno

amita (far cry 4)

anais lavellan

andy molina

anne-marie / rogue (marvel)

angela ziegler / mercy

ann takamaki

annie edison

anya / kamui (fire emblem: fates)

ara fusilli

archie (borderlands)

arwen grimsdottir

arri trevelyan

ashley seaver

ashlyn (barbie and the 12 dancing princesses)

atlas neredras

atsuko / paprika (paprika)

audrey windsor

austin (criminal minds)

aya drevis

TUMBLR HATES ME, FIND THE REST HERE.

[shinakazami1]

Timothy breakdown pwease 🙏

HI KRO HI HI I JUMP OFC ONE TIMOTHY BUD FOR U

How I feel about this character

BRO. One of my favs. The fact he was the first character I played as for Borderlands games was a great choice.

I adore this guy. He's funny, anxious, a bit of an asshole. He had to learn to play Jack but he absolutely sucks at it but I think it works since nobody knows jack well, only his image. LIKE it's hilarious we play as doppelganger and everybody knows in the game we are one instead of him. Like BRO you LITERALLY HAVE ONE SINGLE JOB AND U SUCK AT IT! and then you learn he's great with guns. And you learn that doppelganger is just there to kill. Esp since in bl2 the doppelganger there also sucked ass (I loved the guy a lot. I wish we could have met one more for comparisment).

It's interesting how he sucks so bad at his job and not only that, he presents himself. He's not into doing additional work. He gets grumpy and childish sometimes with wanting to back off or run. But in the end, he continues and keeps on going.

And God. The one soldier that asks you for mercy and you can keep him alive.

'I'm not you, Jack.'

Then, in the bl3 dlc, he had to kill doppelganger and hides away to survive. And somehow?? Still made friends???? That he abandoned cus he felt ashamed prob and just. God. I love this guy a lot. Top 3 for me Fr Fr

All the people I ship romantically with this character

(ATP i should prob change the romantic thing jshshshs)

Moxxi and Timothy are similar to how I see Sasha and Rhys. Not something that would work out but, they can grow with one another.

I also think him and Rhys could be an interesting thing. They both are asshole with some softness inside and mutual trauma. They bit lost a lot due to Jack.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Give me some of that Loader Bot Timothy action. They would understand each other. I also think his relationship with Jack is very nuanced. Jack is his boss but Timothy from the first moment he gets to finally meet him talks back. He states his opinions clearly. And Jack respects the man's work enough not to jump to kill him. There is a lot to explore about how they influenced each other.

My unpopular opinion about this character

THIS MAN IS SEEN OFTEN AS LITTLE SOFT MEOW MEOW. And like he can be but PLEASE please guys. Play pre-sequel. Idk if the mischsracterisation is still a big issue and hope not but dear lort.

This man like most characters in the series IS AN ASSHOLE. He talks back, he kills for a living, and he can get nervous around folks but he also lies, just does his job and gets around. And I love him for it! You go girl <3 and as I asked you for the comparison - while he hides himself away and holds a lot of anger for misjust he had to suffer he still can get so shy around Moxxi. It doesn't make him weak, it doesn't make him a soft character. It's a part of him and i love it. The fact this man cuts his hand off to save the place too. He's used to making sacrifices. One way or another.

AND SECONDLY. I discussed it with @kitkat578 and I took their headcanon that Timothy, in fact wasn't marked under the mask, since you can't see the mark in the crack. I feel he was only told that happened, to resent Lilith. And that headcanon changed something in me.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

Meet. With. Rhys. Please.

And don't change to Jack. Stay your own. Be free

[snappedsky]

Borderlands: Skies the Ultimate Treasure Hunter

Skies, Timothy, and Ava learn some history.

--

The Dimension Debacle Part 4

“Get away from me, you freak!” Ava scrambles backwards on the floor until she hits a wall. She tries to use her Phaselock, but her powers aren’t working, no doubt because of the metal collar wrapped around her neck.

An older man stands before her in front of the open door of the cell she woke up in. He appears to be some kind of scientist, with a lab coat and glasses. He’s also balding on the top of his head, has a grey beard, a SMG grafted to his left shoulder, and a very crazed look in his eyes as he creeps closer and closer to Ava.

“A Siren,” he wheezes breathlessly. “A real Siren. When Handsome Jack finds out I captured a Siren just for him, he’ll love me! He’ll adore me! He’ll never get my name wrong again!”

“Get away from me!” Ava shrieks again and kicks the scientist in the face, knocking him back.

He just chuckles as he straightens his glasses and turns back to her. “Silly, little girl. There’s no point in fighting. That collar on your neck nullifies your Siren powers. You’re completely at my mercy. And I’m gonna serve you up to Handsome Jack on a silver platter.”

Unbeknownst to the scientist, the door to the room opens up and a man walks in and looks around. He sees the scientist standing in the open cell and rushes over.

Ava squeezes as far back against the wall as she can as the scientist closes in on her, snickering and giggling. She closes her eyes as he starts to reach for her.

Then a gunshot rings out.

Ava’s eyes open to find the scientist collapsing to the floor, a bullet hole in the side of his head, and a handsome man standing behind him.

“Ava!” he gasps.

“Tim?” she exclaims.

“Yeah,” he smiles with relief. “Are you-oh!”

He’s cut off when Ava suddenly rushes into him and hugs him tightly. “Oh, okay...”

[butterflydm]

wot reread: towers of midnight (chap 50-end)

spoilers for towers of midnight (suicide cw; body horror cw)

Oh, this Elayne PoV opens with an interesting echo of a Rand scene. Here, Elayne strips lands and titles from her former rivals to the throne, knowing that the shame of it would likely lead them to commit suicide rather than live as commoners. Back in ACoS, Rand stripped the lands and title from Colaveare in an attempt to NOT kill her, because he was unaware that her own pride almost certainly lead to her killing herself rather than living with being a commoner. It illustrates some key similarities between Rand and Elayne but also a key difference, in that Elayne is aware of the consequences of her political choices in a way that Rand was not always aware. And she's doing so knowing that one of the people most affected by Colaveare's loss of power (a Cairhienin noble named Bertome) would arrive just in time to witness this.

2. She is using all this as a political lead-in to making her claim to the Sun Throne by giving Cairhienin nobles some power in Caemlyn, by offering the estates that she just stripped from her previous rivals. And... she then offers mercy to the nobles that she just stripped of lands here in Caemlyn, by mentioning that new lands and titles can be found for them in Cairhien. Basically binding the two nations closer together even before she officially takes the Sun Throne.

idk how much we needed the scene afterwards explaining Elayne's brilliance to the reader (but maybe it was helpful to the readers who were inclined to dislike Elayne?). Birgitte does still feel somewhat 'off' here from the character that she used to be.

3. It remains so baffling to me that Min is the central 'researcher' into all things Callandor. Makes no sense. But Elayne and Aviendha (both more logical choices) are off actually having their own independent storylines that aren't related to Rand so... Min it is, I guess.

Min warns him that the sword is more dangerous than they'd believed before and he's basically like, "nah, I know, it's chill." lol, despite the book's efforts to convince me that Min's role here is super-vital, it just... really is not.

4. Instead of going himself, Rand sends an Asha'man off to infiltrate and investigate the Black Tower. I really hate that such an important plotline got relegated to tertiary characters!

5. lol, I do like the scene here with Rand and Cadsuane; now that she's too baffled by him to keep bullying him, their interactions are kinda funny most of the time. He also, relatively casually, reveals here how far back his own memories go. Once again though... I really wish this were in Rand's PoV and not Min's.

Because here, Min is 'troubled' by Rand casually sharing his memories from four hundred years ago and Rand is like, "pat pat, calm down, silly mortal girlfriend, I am not a scary monster anymore, I promise" but like... what is going on in his brain? One of the main reasons that Rand's descent into madness worked so well for the reader is because we got to see it internally, and it feels like we're being cheated when we don't get to see how he deals with realizing that LTT's memories were not all due to madness, and this is part of him and he needs to process it. Getting it all second-hand through Min is just... not enough.

I am glad that Rand doesn't give all the credit of making it through to this point to Min (like so much of the fandom likes to do) but credits many of the people who have cared for him: his father, Mat, Perrin, Elayne, Aviendha, Nynaeve, Moiraine (He doesn't mention Egwene here, though, and he should). It is really frustrating how parts of fandom like to act as if Min is the only person who cares about Rand. Circumstances have pulled away most of the people he cares about and who care about him, but that doesn't make the affection disappear and it doesn't make the help they've given him meaningless.

6. Thousands of Borderlander soldiers down here, even as the Blightborder collapses and their people are overrun in the north. Such a frustrating plotline! Anyway, they slap Rand and ask him a question about a death during the Age of Legends and now things are good and they'll actually fight in the Last Battle.

lol, Min's viewings that she has here are so useless to Rand -- 'they'll probably be in a fight soon but whether that means the Last Battle or fighting against you right now, idk'. Thanks for that complete lack of information, Min.

I feel like this entire thing could have easily been used to show the folly of trusting prophecy over your own good sense? The Borderlanders acted as they did because they believed "better a dead Dragon than a Dragon who will destroy the world" but... they didn't really have any way to fix that problem anyway, lol, so their secret prophecy was just as useless as most of Min's viewings are and the only thing it accomplished was leaving their borders less guarded than they should be. Rand points out to them that, while he may have given them his original ultimatum in an asshole way, it remains the truth -- given how far they are from their own lands, he is the only path remaining to them if they want to fight in the Last Battle.

But, yeah, this is just a subplot that felt like it went on way too long and then died with a whimper and not a bang.

7. Hmm, Elayne points out that Birgitte has been getting more and more irritable, which implies that her change in characterization was deliberate (meant to illustrate how her emotional stability is slipping alongside her memory loss maybe?). Elayne basically calls Birgitte the Fun Police here, saying, "You don't like anything, lately." Anyway, Elayne is making her move for Cairhien here. I would have much rather spent this book on Elayne Secures Cairhien than Perrin's Whitecloak Trial. Instead, we mostly just skim over it, and Cairhien accepts Elayne fairly quickly. After she's claimed Cairhien, she sets in motion: a. sending the current army to Merrilor to meet Rand; b. mobilizing any additional men and women who want to fight in the Last Battle and training them; and c. getting all the city's bellfounders to start working on more dragons.

8. The first paragraph of being back in Mat's PoV and he is wistfully thinking of serving girls sitting on his knee. Strike twelve-point-three.

We also, here, have Mat choosing a red scarf to ~dedicate~ to the memory of Tylin and the others who died to the gholam, briefly considering making it pink (he does emphasis that he considered this very briefly). Ew, gross.

I was just talking in my last post, during the Aviendha's vision section, about how easy it is to make saints of the dead. It really feels like this is a perfect illustration of this: Tylin is dead and can't physically hurt Mat anymore, so it's 'safe' to consider honoring her, in a way that it wouldn't be if she were still alive. Dead sainted Tylin happening so soon after dead sainted Tuon in Aviendha's Rhuidean vision definitely makes me go ~hmm.

9. Mat thinks here that he believes that ~the new empress~ is going to surprise the Seanchan. Not sure what he's basing that belief on, lol. But, just like Fortuona was Making Lies Up In Her Head to justify her decisions, so is Mat, I guess. He wants to believe that Tuon is Different From The Other Seanchan, so he's convinced himself that she is, despite having literally zero favorable evidence (and the reader was just recently in her head, so we know for a fact that Mat is absolutely incorrect that Tuon has surprised the Seanchan in any way -- she has done exactly as expected of her, because she's just a bog-standard High Blood Seanchan)

(side note: I actually do not have any objection to Tuon just being another Seanchan, in terms of her moral code. The weird part about the way it is written in the books is the way that some Westlands characters behave as if she's better in some way, when we've never seen her do anything exceptional, in terms of ethics or morality. I get that the Seanchan are brainwashed to think the Imperial family & the Empress are special, but when Westlands characters act that way, it makes me raise my eyebrows. I talked about this back in CoT & KoD too -- how sometimes Mat behaved as if Tuon had undergone an entire character arc despite that... you know, not happening and her being just as awful (in terms of ethics) at the end of KoD as she was in her intro in WH. It's not Tuon being awful that I object to -- it makes sense that she's awful, given what we know of her culture and that she's the top dog in that culture -- it's Westlands characters inexplicably behaving as if she's A Special One Who Isn't Like Other Nobles that triggers my bullshit meter, like Mat thinking in KoD that's it's ~right and good~ for Olver to bow to her and make much of her despite that going completely against the way Mat normally approaches nobility; hits my bs meter hard).

The reports on the Seanchan that he's reading come from Elayne, btw. Also, he HAS officially signed the Band over to Elayne's employment. So, again, we have this tension where Mat has been set up as the tug o'war rope between ~Fortuona~ and Elayne. Or, more accurately, Mat is setting himself up as the rope. And setting himself up to eventually have his nose rubbed into the crimes of the Seanchan (including Tuon) in a way that he won't be able to deny (post-canon, I assume). Elayne did not give him any reports on the Seanchan attacking the White Tower, it sounds like, which makes sense -- the official White Tower position on weakness is: we don't have any. He notes that there are rumors of the Sea Folk allied with the Seanchan and dismisses THOSE as nonsense started by the Seanchan capturing Sea Folk vessels. Hey. Hey, Mat. What do they do to the people on the vessels? I know that you know the answer.

10. One of the spy reports makes him think of Rand, and we are reminded that Mat has to banish those colors "over and over". Funny how Perrin doesn't have that problem. Perrin finds dismissing the colors super easy. Mat also thinks about how "at least Rand was wearing clothes this time", which is a reminder of how frequently Mat apparently thinks about Rand around bedtime. Again, not a problem that Perrin has ever had.

11. Hmm, a conversation between the two people who seemed to most desperately want to believe that Tuon can learn to be a better person, and the two people who had the biggest changes in characterization between Winter's Heart and Crossroads of Twilight: Setalle Anan has come over to talk to Mat.

Strike twelve-point-four, as Mat tries to pretend he isn't thinking about Setalle Anan's 'ample bosom' (it's the second time he's had thoughts of attraction towards her since his marriage, so I'm not double-counting her as a full point, just like I'm not double-counting Elayne).

When Setalle Anan wonders if he truly knows the Andoran queen, Mat says that she's a "nice enough girl", because (at least in this part of the storyline) Mat has grown enough to see that his original assumptions about Elayne were incorrect.

12. Setalle Anan says that she's trying to work out the puzzle of Mat, and Mat being so close to the queen (who is Aes Sedai) is another piece of the puzzle. She mentions getting a letter from Joline, who has arrived safely at the White Tower and who has asked after Mat, to check in that he's okay, which completely baffled Mat. I wonder if Joline and Teslyn have had some long conversations off-screen about Mat, because Mat has been such an asshole to Joline on-screen that her respecting him so much really is somewhat baffling. But, yeah, the whole "friendly with some Aes Sedai but married to a slaver who wanted to enslave all Aes Sedai" is definitely... well, 'puzzle' is a kind way of wording what Mat currently is (especially to anyone who doesn't know about the prophecy... which is everyone).

Mat asks Setalle Anan what it was like to lose the One Power and no longer be Aes Sedai. She explains that she's happy for those who can still channel but is envious and misses it. The way she talks about it really reminds me of the way how Mat seems to feel his marriage has locked him away from acting on his attraction to other women and it's an interesting comparison to think about, now that it comes to mind. She burnt herself out, she wasn't stilled, so she accidentally did this to herself (just like Mat accidentally married Tuon). She is envious of those who can still channel but happy for them that they have the ability (and Mat keeps checking out women 'for' other men around him... though he never actually tells those other men about the women). She also kept herself in contact with the Kin all those years, essentially punishing herself by reminding herself over and over what she no longer had. Hmm.

Then she asks Mat why he hates Aes Sedai. And Mat essentially... completely sidesteps the question, though he does say that he doesn't hate Aes Sedai. But he immediately changes the question to "what bothers me about WOMEN" and away from "what bothers me about Aes Sedai" and then almost as swiftly, the conversation turns to "what bothers me about NOBLES". I wonder if his mental conflation of Aes Sedai=all women=all nobles is part of what causes some of his odd thinking.

13. This is where we get his ~boots~ argument against nobility, which comes across to me like he's saying that, nobles have so much excess that it makes him uncomfortable, though Setalle Anan believed that he's talking about the complexity of leadership. Mat denies that the conversation is a metaphor in any possible way, which is very Mat of him. I will note that he says that your 'best' pair of shoes should be your walking/working shoes, which are your most important pair.

If you were wondering: no, Setalle Anan doesn't tell him that she betrayed him and told Tuon about his protective medallion. Tuon actually doesn't openly come up a single time in the conversation, which is somewhat interesting, considering how much of the discussion feels like it's half a step away from Tuon.

After Anan leaves, Mat tosses aside Verin's letter, deciding that he will never know what's in it.

14. I genuinely like Pevara but... yeah, sucks that Nynaeve isn't the one headlining the Black Tower story arc. Apparently the White Tower 'embassy' to the Black Tower has just been chilling inside for... weeks? And now they are trapped inside, and gateways don't work. (another dreamspike? I do not recall)

15. Perrin gets to say a special goodbye to Mat. The buffing up of the Mat-Perrin friendship definitely feels like the biggest marker so far of Check Out Sanderson's Bestest Favorite Boy, yeah, lol. Thom twits Mat about his marriage by poking at the sore spot of how it makes Mat a noble now. Grady opens a Gateway to send them to the Tower of Ghenjei, and will open a return Gateway every day at the same time. They leave from Perrin's camp, which is just outside Whitebridge. Then Perrin & co all head to Merrilor.

16. Noal has managed to acquire a fancy outfit and a fancy new walking staff. ...? I hope again that plot device Noal gets replaced by someone more interesting in the show version (if they should get this far). My dream team is, of course, Mat with Siuan (as Moiraine's love interest) and Birgitte (for historical knowledge and to fill Noal's, ah, other role and, much like Noal wants to redeem himself for his failures, Birgitte may want to succeed at saving someone from the Tower where she has failed before).

17. They are able to open a doorway into the Tower by etching the opening symbol for the game of snakes & foxes into the Tower with a bronze knife. The inside of the Tower itself doesn't look like either the Aelfinn or the Eelfinn's bargaining places, Mat notes in dismay. Whatever script is used on the walls here, it isn't the Old Tongue, because Mat doesn't recognize it. Mat realizes this time, as he didn't fully realize before, that the world of the 'finn is a completely different world to their own. Interesting that even now, after Mat has ~gotten hitched~ to his prophecy girl, he still feels like the snakes gave him "no useful answers".

18. One of the Eelfinn appears, to try to tempt them into leaving their tools of protection behind and when Mat realizes that he's feeling swayed by the argument, he asks Thom to play music to break the spell. And the music puts the Eelfinn to sleep. Mat realizes that trying to make a map of the place is useless -- they need to rely on his luck. So he starts rolling dice to decide which direction to go. After another confrontation with multiple Eelfinn where he loses his dice, he begins spinning around to dizzy himself and then picking a direction at random. He then follows that direction no matter how many side corridors appear to tempt them, and he leads them to the room where Moiraine is waiting.

19. Seeing Moiraine again brings up a lot of complicated emotions in Mat: frustration and anger, but also gratitude and awe. He feels like he understands her motivations for her choices now, but still dislikes some of the actions that she took. Thom yanks her out of her prison, even after they find that whatever she's being held in is hot to the touch, and Mat marvels over how tiny she is, compared to his larger-than-life memory of her.

20. After Moiraine is pulled from her prison, eight of the Eelfinn are in the room, on the tall pedestals, dressed in white. Mat warns everyone against saying anything that sounds like a bargain. So Mat is the one to make the bargain, with the terms that the Aelfinn had already given him -- his price would be "half the light of the world" (aka his eye). Mat wonders if being willing to pay this price to save the world makes him "a hero, after all". One of the Eelfinn rips Mat's eye out of his socket with his bare hand.

21. Mat thinks here that he had assumed that Thom was here for the same reason as Mat -- because it was something that needed to be done (aka it was the right thing to do) -- but the way that Thom is clutching onto Moiraine's unconscious body is making him wonder. Noal realizes a hole in the bargain that Mat had made -- he'd said that the foxes weren't allowed to attack them, but had said nothing about the snakes. And so now the chase is on.

22. After a tense chase, where Mat is throwing around fireworks to keep the Aelfinn at bay, and they've long since strayed from the direct path that would lead to their exit, Noal sacrifices himself so that the others can continue escaping, serving his plot device duty and 'dying clean' (does Mat ever actually tell any of the Malkieri about this? I will try to remember to keep a watch out in AMoL). Mat thinks that once he would have thought dying with honor was pointless, but honor has mattered to too many of the memories in his head for him to dismiss it.

23. Hmm, when Thom mentions the idea of maybe getting some Aelfinn answers for himself, Mat tells him that he doesn't want them. "They aren't answers. They're threats. Promises." Talking about what just happened with his eye, or talking about Tuon? (I mean, likely both. It's definitely been something that I've noticed that Mat does not at all seem happy or grateful to the Aelfinn for shackling him to Fortuona, despite how he keeps desperately trying to convince himself that he trusts her and that he finds her super-attractive)

24. Mat thinks back to his time with the Eelfinn, his exact words, and realizes that he asked for a way back and that his ashandarei is the one thing he has that is not explained by them answering his other boons. That it's his key to leaving. He didn't ask them for a weapon, he asked them for a way out. And he is able to cut it to cut their way out of the Tower and back into their own world.

25. My narration here doesn't really cover how much I enjoyed this sequence but it was a lot of fun! I do think that this moment, like some others, would probably feel more impactful if it happened before Rand had his epiphany. Rand having his big moment at the end of TGS kinda... trivializes almost everything in ToM, honestly. Because... well, we already know that Rand has decided not to destroy time and the universe. So, if I had been structuring the last three books, I would have placed Rand's epiphany right here, after Mat & co. make their successful escape from the Tower of Ghenjei (and after Perrin and Egwene have helped each other in TAR). That way, even before they all go to Merrilor, it feels like Moiraine's return is symbolic of Rand's turning point, if they're paired in the narrative like that.

26. We get the counterpart of Gawyn's relief at having Egwene's emotions in his head by learning here that Egwene also finds it a comfort to have his emotions in her head and feel his devotion first-hard in a way that makes her unable to doubt it. So, yeah, Egwene and Gawyn are really on the same page in a way that the majority of romantic relationships in the series never manage. They want the same things out of life and neither of them is forcing themselves to live a life that makes them unhappy for the sake of catering to the other person (examples of this kind of relationship: Rand & Min, where Min forces herself into a poly relationship that makes her feel possessive and jealous all the time; Perrin & Faile, where they both have vastly different ideas about their 'ideal life' and the solution was for Perrin to give up his own ideas and pick Faile's; Mat and Fortuona, who both want to fundamentally change their partner into someone unrecognizable from who they currently are)

27. Mat is thrilled that he managed to survive the Tower of Ghenjei, now that they are safely out (and Moiraine is slowly regaining consciousness). Mat also realizes here that Thom knew all along (or at least for a while) that Noal was Jain Farstrider but never told Mat. It's in a semi-joking way that he wonders what kind of friend Thom is, but, yeah, I've been wondering about Mat and Thom's 'friendship' for a bit now, and this is another interesting piece of evidence about how Thom is not particularly open with Mat.

28. Um, strike thirteen-point-four as Mat thinks about how fetching Moiraine looks, with her flushed cheeks and her hair tumbling about her face. haha, he does feel kinda awkward about finding her attractive, much as Rand felt awkward about finding Caraline Damodred attractive even realizing how much she looked like Moiraine.

29. Mat refusing to let Moiraine heal his eye (not even just to take the pain away, which is all she believes she can manage now) does feel weirdly symbolic of his self-destructive behavior as of late -- he risks his life to save Moiraine, gives up his eye to save her, and then shies away at the idea of her healing him. Much as I once wondered if the Aelfinn devised Tuon as a punishment for Mat, I now have to wonder... is Mat punishing himself? Because that is wildly self-destructive. He could get an infection in his FACE. I'm sure he has countless memories of battle wounds going bad and killing soldiers post-battle. Passing up being healed just seems like he's actively self-harming here.

(I guess the question I'm asking is: how much does Mat subconsciously hate himself right now, that he would do this to himself? Again, we have the contrast in this same book of Galad realizing how nonsensical it is to have Aes Sedai as your allies and then refuse to allow them to heal you, which feels like a direct and deliberate reference point to show us that Mat is not acting rationally here -- either punishing himself or feeling like he doesn't deserve healing? Kinda amounts to the same thing, I suppose)

30. lol, Mat tries to downplay his affection for Rand, yet again, but Thom calls him out on it by mentioning how Mat 'keeps saying' that Rand deserves a festival in his honor for cleansing saidin. Honestly, the case of Rand vs Fortuona does feel so illustrative at this point re: Mat's constant lying to himself -- Mat tries so hard to force himself NOT to feel loyal and affectionate towards Rand and TO feel loyal towards Fortuona, but then his mind keeps betraying him (he keeps thinking of Rand, over and over, in much greater detail than Perrin does; and, conversely, he keeps thinking of all the attractive women in the world that he's Not Allowed to think about due to his marriage to Fortuona).

31. Thom tells Moiraine that Mat married "the Empress of the Seanchan" and Mat cringes at the info being shared (he hunches down and tries to cover his face with his hat and 'forces a chuckle'). Moiraine is startled, but when Mat says it was 'accidentally' because the Seanchan have 'odd customs', she goes, "ah, ta'veren". Mat doesn't think of his reaction here as 'shame' but, yeah, it vibes hard as shame. Moiraine says she needs to go seek out Rand, and Mat agrees that she should, but says he has things that he needs to do in Caemlyn. And then he thinks of Rand (again) and blushes.

32. While I've seen Sanderson get blamed for it -- the Thom & Moiraine engagement scene was written by Jordan, as confirmed by Sanderson's retrospective (Sanderson is one of the fans who did not at all pick up on Jordan's murder-mystery style way of setting up Thom and Moiraine's 'romance' in the earlier books which, you know. Me too, lol). And 'abruptly making a life commitment out of nowhere with barely any lead-up' is also classic Jordan romance writing, lol.

Direct quote from Sanderson: "I will note, by the way, that Verin’s interaction with Egwene in The Gathering Storm was my biggest surprise from the notes. My second biggest was the Thom/Moiraine engagement. Robert Jordan wrote that scene, and I was surprised to read it."

So, yeah, the whole "I would give up being Aes Sedai for you" offer was all Jordan.

That being said, knowing that this scene was written by Jordan also makes me wonder how much of the previous scene that leads into it (Mat blushing over how much he's thinking about Rand and his clear shame over being married to the Empress of the Seanchan) was also written by Jordan. Moiraine actually IS one of the few characters in the Jordan books who occasionally slung around the name 'Matrim', so her using it here isn't a Sanderson 'tell' the way that it is for many other characters. I also wonder if the paragraph of admiration and Mat thinking of Moiraine as 'fetching' was written by Jordan because, if so, that might be the germ of the idea that led to all of the other moments when Mat has been distracted by how pretty all the women he's Not Allowed to admire are Because Wife.

33. When Mat reacts like a cat fallen into a bath at the idea of being bonded (though, hilariously, he does specify that he doesn't want to be bonded to a woman), Thom points out that "your Tuon" is capable of channeling, which is information that Mat has been trying to actively suppress from his memory (and he almost immediately does so again here, very quickly after Thom reminds him of it), another example of Thom bringing up Mat's marriage to specifically twit him about the parts of it that will make him unhappy (like how earlier, he brought up how it makes Mat a noble). But this conversation is kinda the first time that Mat has confirmed to other people that his marriage was 'accidental' due to 'Seanchan customs', I think? Which is information that Moiraine & Thom could theoretically share with other people (like, for example, Elayne, who is already aware that Mat is willing to self-destructively make himself miserable in order to keep a promise, from her experiences with him in Ebou Dar). Also, Moiraine now knows that the Empress of the Seanchan is capable of learning to channel.

34. Mat's missing eye is still throbbing in pain, but he doesn't give a thought to asking Moiraine to heal him. Either deep fear, like Moiraine suggested, or deep hate... for himself, I think (certainly not for Moiraine, as he's surprised himself in this scene with how much affection he's been feeling for her). I'm leaning towards 'self-hate' because Mat doesn't even consider asking THOM to help him clean and dress the wound using normal non-Power means, so it feels very much like Mat has given himself a painful punishment.

He also wonders what Tuon might think of a husband 'unable to defend himself', so, yeah, I think he's also very aware that she is not a supportive and caring life partner. He actually comes across as genuinely scared of her reaction here (he describes himself as 'trembling' at the thought). You're in an abusive relationship, buddy.

35. Olver opens the letter from Verin and gives it to Talmanes -- Verin was trying to warn Mat about the Waygate in Caemlyn being left unguarded and a huge force of Shadowspawn coming through the Ways to attack the city. Talmanes curses and heads off to defend the city, but then we see that it's already under attack. Congrats, Mat! Your stubborn determination not to ever listen to Aes Sedai has helped lead to an attack on Caemlyn.

36. For the first time in this entire book, we get a Rand PoV. In the epilogue. And it's only two pages long. *sigh*

Rand sits in a dream and thinks about what will come in the morning, when he speaks to Egwene and the monarchs of the world. We don't get ANY reflection on the events of the past book or any of his feelings about anything.

He hears distant screams of pain and follows them, and he sees 'Mierin' aka Lanfear, who tells him that she is being tortured by the Dark One and needs his help.

I'm so frustrated that this is the only Rand PoV that we got in this entire book! Why would you do that! What a terrible narrative choice!

37. Lan arrives at Tarwin's Gap -- "he was home again. For the last time." And he and his forces charge towards the Shadowspawn.

38. The very ending of the book is a quote from the 'prophecies of the Shadow' (the ones that Moridin is relying on but have already failed Graendal). We get a mention of "Midnight Towers" here but I have NO clue what it's meant to refer to, since it clearly isn't talking about the Seanchan Towers of Midnight. So, yeah, ????

The title of this book remains such a baffling choice.

How ready are we for the Last Battle?

Rand: organizing; basically ready

Egwene: organizing; basically ready

Mat: finally got his ass in gear. Managed to be the fault point for the Caemlyn invasion, so he was accidentally helping the Shadow there by being stubborn for no good reason. Kinda mirrors him helping the Seanchan by protecting Tuon during CoT & KoD. First he fails his friends through action (protecting a slaver) and then he fails them through inaction (not reading Verin's letter). But he also helps his friends (bringing Aludra to Caemlyn; rescuing Moiraine) so Mat has been a double-edged sword recently, useful and harmful at the same time.

In terms of his marriage: shame, repression, and denial seem to be the main emotions that Mat is bringing to the table. That's a ticking time bomb waiting to go off. The clash of values between Mat and Fortuona feels inevitable, once the immediate stress of the Last Battle and its aftermath has passed.

I am interested (this may or may not be the correct word, lol) on if Mat will become pod!person Mat from CoT & KoD once he's actually in Fortuona's orbit again. So far he's done his best to maintain the illusion in his head that "Tuon" and "the Seanchan Empire" are separate entities and he can help one of them while being opposed to the other one, but obviously that illusion will take a pretty hard hit once he's around Actual (Westlands Territories Only) Seanchan Empress Fortuona 'Slavery Is My Game' Paendrag again. I've genuinely enjoyed a lot of the Mat scenes in ToM but how much of that is because I haven't been forced to endure Mat & Tuon interacting? I guess I'm about to find out!

Elayne: she’s BEEN ready.

Perrin: went through wolf boot camp; basically ready. The wolf-related plotline Perrin does in these two books should have been in his plot during The Slog; Sanderson basically rewinds us to LoC!Perrin and goes from there, giving Perrin character development that should have been happening all along.

The Whitecloak-related plotline was... meh? The most I can give it is 'meh'. It solved a problem that I didn't care about and ignored the problems that I did care about, essentially.

Nynaeve: We don't get enough Nynaeve but what we do get is good, except for her massive communication issues, lol. She should have done the Black Tower plotline in this book rather than it being given to tertiary characters. It's an important enough plotline that it should have happened within the main cast.

Series ranking:

Hmm, this one was somewhat tough to rank because I mostly loved all the Mat & Elayne related scenes, and the Egwene and Nynaeve scenes were also good but I was very frustrated with almost all the Rand-related scenes being someone else's PoV and Perrin was. Not interesting to me unless he was in the wolfdream. So. Better than WH but not as good as EotW. Too Much Perrin, lol (you wouldn't necessarily know this from my reread posts because I was zooming through the Perrin chapters and then spending ages on the other ones, but trust me. There was A Lot of Perrin).

The Fires of Heaven (😍)

The Shadow Rising (😘)

The Dragon Reborn (😘)

The Path of Daggers (😘)

New Spring (😘)

The Great Hunt (😄)

The Gathering Storm (😄)

Lord of Chaos (😄)

...

A Crown of Swords (🙂)

The Eye of the World (🙂)

Towers of Midnight (🙂)

Winter’s Heart (🙂)

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

Crossroads of Twilight (😒)

Knife of Dreams (😒)

[plethoraworldatlas]

Basics of WoT: 4th Age

This is the starting information/overview of the state of the world in the grand scale for the Fourth Age project I worked on.

The setting takes place 25-35 years after the very end of the series (Most likely 1035 NE; A new Calendar has been proposed amongst all Dragon Peace nations, but only some have decided to start phasing it in, using two calendars until 1100 NE/65 PD "Post Dragon Reborn")

The Industrial Revolution has taken swing, the new Printing Press in particular igniting a thousand different fires of revolution and repression

Powers and abilities from Ages past creep back into the world, and new Powers never seen appear as well

The "Peace" of the Lands

The Dragon Peace unites all of the Westlands (also called Marhol) not occupied by the Seanchan, as well as the Aiel Three-fold Lands under a order of peace, with the Aiel taking the role of the primary Peacekeepers

The Griffin Truce, named for the Seanchan Raven and the Lion of Andor as the signing took place in Caemlyn, has formalized non-aggression between the Dragon Peace United nations and the Seanchan occupation and its Imperial Dominions

The Seanchan Empire under Empress Fortuona rules its Dominions, yet under the the Viewings of the Doomseer, they have yet to return in force to their fractured home Continent to reform the Empire as a whole

Republicanism has become a fire sweeping through a world of Monarchies, splitting the young Empire of the Sun and the founding member of the Republic's League, the Rivers Republic

The White Tower is rocked by scandal after the greatest journalistic reporting of the century reveals to the world a major secret of the Hall, as well as the different directions the Ajahs move

The Black Tower raises in prominence, yet the world still distrusts male channelers

The great Empire of Shara has collapsed to the joy of those they subjugated for centuries, only for the "Restoration Peacekeeping" to lead to strife as outsiders try to decide the fates of entire peoples

the Aiel balance their role as peacekeepers with the reckoning coming towards them; Fueds with the Seanchan, the uncertain future of the Three-fold Lands, New visions of possible futures guiding their choices as peacekeepers yet still each choice made to prevent one dark future seems to cause another. The Clans united under the Dragon Reborn, but what of the new holds in the Wetlands? What of the remnant Free Shaido? What of the Warrior society's without wars?

The Atha'an Meire have formed their Empire of All Seas in reaction to the new age of imperialism, Traveling and Gateways, and industrial trading

The Shadow's Corruption has diminished from the Blight, yet monsters and Trollocs and Darkfriends and Turned remain; With the Dark One sealed away, however, the now Free Trolloc are said to have turned from the chains their old master put on their minds, and collaboration between the White and Black Towers lead many to believe those forcibly Turned to the Shadow may yet be saved. Ancient hate does not die easily, and the Broderlanders and the world at large itch to take the new frontiers of the Wild North, to Crusade against what is seen as the last vestiges of the Dark

The Borderland Bloc has formed to unite the weary borderlanders among the Dragon Peace and rebuild greater and with more prominence; In 2 years, the First Premier Imperator's 12 year term shall end and a new ruler of the Bloc must be elected, with nearly every choice leading the Bloc into one grand conflict or another

Everloyal Darkfriends scheme still, and those forced to serve the Dark fight to survive a world where there is little mercy for those so much as touched once by the Shadow. Dreadlords attempt to carve out realms of their own

This and more is the state of the world.

Will the peace hard fought for stand strong, or is such a thing a fantasy during the rising Age of Empires and Industry? Will the world become one where all peoples and perhaps even all species exist together, or is domination inevitable? In a new age, called the Fourth Age by some, will the times to come be known as a Great Ending, or a Great Beginning?

Notes:

I ramped up on some of the poetical wordings for this. Also, my notes are harder to read than I remember. Marhol is directly from @highladyluck from Tumblr, I was working on this long enough to see them post their idea for the name of the Continent and I always liked it better than Westlands. Obviously, Rand wanted the Dragon Peace to bring, well, peace, but it's still basically just a Renaissance version of the EU; These are nations that have fought since their founding, facing a changing world, an empire occupying their Continent's western coast, and strung together under an agreement they were forced to sign with peacekeepers they don't understand as a culture who also aren't honestly the best option. The Aiel got flanderized in the last books by Sanderson, but there are serious issues with them being last minute made into basically the nationality of Peacekeepers. The Seafolk Empire is interesting in that it forms to protect their trading culture as well as the ports they were granted yet remains a brutal empire. The Borderland Bloc is similar, the borderlanders basically thanklessly fighting the Shadow for centuries while many thought the Trollocs they fought fairy-tales, being the most devastated nations after the Last Battle, unifying to rebuild each other and make sure the rest of the Dragon Peace remembers them; Still, every choice for the future leader is an iffy one. Don't worry, Malkier has been reformed, it has an interesting place in this mess. Everyone admits Shara was a mess, so I decided to try and fix it; Shara is the name of the Continent, but also the Empire that ruled it, and the other nations they oppressed and erased are "free" with its fall. This being the beginning of the age of imperialism, though, how "free" they are under "reconstruction" is soon to be decided. That's it for this one, go ahead and ask questions about the summary, keep in mind I will be doing posts for basically every nation and faction I have so asking things like "what's up in Andor?" will be answered later or have a special post to ask under. Please share if you like, this is basically my first big attempt at a project like this.

[beardedmrbean]

As Israel and Hezbollah settled into an uneasy ceasefire last week, armed Islamist opposition forces stormed out of Syria’s northwest, seizing the nation’s second city Aleppo over the weekend before advancing south on the road to Damascus. 

While the forces of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) – an offshoot of al Qaeda’s former Syria branch Jabhat al-Nusra – surged inwards from Idlib, another assault came pouring down from the northern borderlands with Turkey. These groups – backed by Ankara and calling themselves the Syrian National Army – began to seize territory northeast of Aleppo, including the town of Tal Rifaat and surrounding villages on December 1. 

But Tal Rifaat was not being held by Assad’s loyalists. Instead, the Syrian National Army has once again set its sights on territory held by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), the iron core of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – a key Western ally in the fight against the Islamic State (IS) group. 

The fighting has been fierce. Already, tens of thousands of Kurds have begun the long winter march east across the Euphrates River, where the Kurdish-led SDF still holds sway. In Aleppo, where SDF troops have held the Kurdish neighbourhoods of Ashrafiyeh and Sheikh Maqsoud throughout the civil war, the triumphant HTS negotiated the Kurdish troops' withdrawal from the city, weapons still in hand. Hours after Aleppo fell, footage emerged of convoys of Kurdish fighters filing out of the city under the watchful gaze of HTS troops.

Worse may await them beyond the city limits. Having seized a hard-won autonomy in the early days of the Syrian Civil War, the country’s Kurds have for the past few years come under heavy assault by Turkey and the Syrian armed groups that it backs. Ankara views the autonomous Kurdish regions in Syria as a creation and extension of the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK), a group that has for years fought for Kurdish self-rule and is banned in Turkey as a terrorist organisation. 

Now, with Assad's global allies exhausted by wars of attrition in Ukraine and Lebanon, Ankara seems once again set on strangling the Kurdish dream of self-governance in the crib.

Surrender or die

Fawaz Gerges, professor of international relations at the London School of Economics, said that the militants' lightning assault could cost the Kurds dearly. 

“The Kurds stand to lose the most,” he said. “Their very autonomy, the security of their communities. I think Turkey has been biding its time and waiting for the right moment to strike, and the pro-Turkish opposition forces have really launched a shock attack, not only against the Assad government, but even against the Kurds. In Aleppo, the Kurds were told either to surrender or to die – and they decided to surrender.”

While HTS appears to be trying to avoid direct clashes with Kurdish forces, Kurdish civilians now living under the banners of the SNA have reported having their homes seized by Turkish-backed troops. As many as half a million Kurds are believed to live in Aleppo and surrounding towns and villages west of the Euphrates. Just what their lives are likely to be like under the new dispensation remains a question that few are keen to learn the answer to. 

Dara Salam, a teaching fellow at SOAS University of London's department of politics and international studies, said that Kurdish communities in Syria's northwest were now once again at the mercy of Ankara's ambitions.

“The sole aim of Turkey-backed SNA is to implement Turkey's Syria policy, that is, destroying the Kurdish entity and having the upper hand over Assad's regime in Syria,” he said. “As the conflict in the past days unravels, Kurds once again face displacement, massacres and persecution at the hands of these jihadi-Islamist groups in many places like Aleppo, Tal Rifaat and Shahba.”

For years now, that policy has been put into increasingly bloody practice. In 2018, Turkish air strikes heralded the seizure of Afrin, the western-most canton of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria – more commonly known as Rojava. The occupying SNA has been accused of leading campaigns of mass violence against the Kurdish civilian population. 

Dastan Jasim, a research fellow at the GIGA Institute for Middle East Studies, said Syria's Kurds had good reason to be fearful given what she described as years of abuses against Kurdish communities in parts of the country's northwest held by the SNA and Islamist opposition groups.

"The only basis on which Kurds can judge that question is their own experience," she said. "We’re heading towards six years of occupation of Afrin, for example, and Kurdish life in Afrin is a living hell – it’s basically impossible. Sexual violence is rampant, there have been kidnappings of people – just ordinary Kurdish people that are accused out of the blue of being PKK sympathisers are being abducted and killed."

‘In the eye of the storm’

Jasim said that the country's Kurdish communities had long struggled to find a place within the broader array of opposition forces that rose up against Assad more than a decade ago. 

“In 2011 when the opposition came up, let’s remember that especially in Aleppo the Kurdish neighbourhoods were very active when it was about protesting against Assad,” she said. “People were obviously not happy with the situation – there have been many Kurdish uprisings that were attacked very violently. But at the same time, the Kurds saw there was no space for them, there was no space for a discussion of Kurdish autonomy, Kurdish self-rule. A lot of the elements are very nationalist, and that’s what we’re seeing right now.”

Having proved themselves to be a fierce and disciplined force against the emerging Islamic State group, the Kurds soon found themselves leading the US-backed SDF. Despite frictions between Washington and Ankara over US support for what Turkey considered to be violent separatist groups, the SDF played a crucial role in reclaiming territory from the Islamic State group. 

Since then, though, the Kurds have been increasingly isolated. In 2019, then US president Donald Trump announced his plans to pull the last remaining American troops from Syria, leaving the Kurds undefended in the face of Turkey's advance. 

Although Trump's generals managed to convince the president to keep a contingent of troops in the region to secure oil fields, guard against Islamic State group remnants and maintain pressure on Iran, it was a bitter blow for a community already under assault by a US ally and NATO member. Now, with Israel hammering Iran-backed groups across Syria and Trump set to return to the White House in January, Gerges said that forces across the Middle East were anxious to strengthen their hands before inauguration day. 

“This is just the beginning – I think what Turkey and its Syrian allies are trying to do is to really basically change the current balance of power on the Turkish-Syrian borders before Trump enters the White House,” he said. “They’re using the retreat of the Assad forces as a means to weaken and degrade the pro-American Kurdish forces. All in all it’s not just that the Assad government is losing territories, but I think the Kurds are also in the eye of the storm. And I think by the end of the current round, their areas will shrink, their power will be degraded and they will be facing bitter choices.”

Gerges said that the next days and weeks of fighting could determine the very survival of the Kurds' long-held dream of self-governance. 

“This is what’s going on in the Kurds’ minds – that’s why they called a general mobilisation,” he said. “This is one of the few times that they’re facing in their view a threat of this dimension. It’s no longer really a military threat, it goes to the very heart of what they’ve been trying to achieve since 2011 – full autonomy and a pathway to statehood.”

[charlies-a-ghost]

hi nerds intro posts

im a strange man from the woods here to partake in some henious activity and make bad art

witchcraft practitioner

based in northern california

certified cryptid

I like writing (poetry, short stories, music, novellas), reading (dystopian, horror, graphic novels, comic books, victorian gothic, sci-fi), acting, fencing, archery, art (mixed medias, i do a bit of literally everything), foraging, punk diy, taxidermy, dissection, astrophysics, jewlery making, crochet, I speak french and ASL, i have 5 cats and a dog and a lot of shiny rocks i collect, I play mainly electric and acoustic guitar, but also bass, piano, cello, ukulele and kalimba. I have synesthesia as well as a plethora of issues like severe anxiety disorder, depressive disorder, autism, adhd, POTs, PCOS and hashimotos disease I can NOT catch a break. puppy punk but i like to involve myself in a plethora of subcultures so also goth and emo

bands: my chemical romance, beastie boys, maneskin, ghost, nirvana, ac/dc, fall out boy, pencey prep, green day, peirce the veil, the ramones, the smashing pumpkins, the smiths, the talking heads, the linda lindas, the strokes, car seat headrest, pixies, the front bottoms, sir chloe, leathermouth, gerard way, the cure, david bowie, opal in sky, freddie mercury, queen, frank iero, siouxsie and the banshees, nine inch nails, sisters of mercy, bauhaus, mindless self indulgence, lemon demon, will wood, gorillaz, ayesha erotica, mitski, jazz emu, tom cardy, joan jett and the black hearts, jack stauber, dead kennedys, christian death, black flag, weezer, black sabbath, metallica, blink-182, iggy pop, i set my friends on fire, she wants revenge, like moths to flames, misfits, ozzy ozbourne, the cramps, skindred, social distortion, dresden dolls, the killers, the peggie's, the runaways, the taxpayers, the used, yaelokre

books: the ash house, scythe, Frankenstein, edgar Allen Poe, ready player one, do androids dream of electric sheep, carry on, 1984, the hobbit, lord of the rings, James herriot, renegades, lockdown, diary of Anne Frank, the true lives of the fabulous killjoys, umbrella academy, paranoid gardens, animal farm, handmaidens tale, the right stuff, maze runner, the giver, fahrenheit 451, brace new world, hatchet, the poison thread, the ruins, the watchers, nimona, dracula, interview with a vampire

musicals: beetlejuice, mean girls, hamilton, heathers, ride the cyclone, six, le mis, little shop of horrors, phantom of the opera, newsies

tv shows, movies and video games: saw, silence of the lambs, a quiet place, midsommar, nimona, the owl house, the umbrella academy, young royals, little nightmares, omori, detention, room of old sins, mechanarium, cozy grove, animal crossing, inside, squid game, the platform, bird box, Alice in borderland, girl from nowhere, breaking bad, demon slayer, death note, black butler, don’t hug me I’m scared, seven deadly sins, the promised neverland, the amazing world of gumball, adventure time, Minecraft, legends of Zelda, fnaf, Fiona and cake, gravity falls, more I’m forgetting

[staringdownabarrel]

hey, where do I start with star trek?

It really depends on whether you want to watch all of it or if you're mostly hoping to do a bare bones viewing of the older shows before you see the shows currently in production. There's a lot of viewing guides out there if you want to do a completionist viewing, so I'm going to answer this with the assumption you want to do the latter.

Before I begin, I'm not really sure if there's such a thing as a non-contentious version of this list, so keep in mind there's going to be different people with different opinions and some are going to take some pretty big issues with this one.

The Original Series: The Cage, Where No Man Has Gone Before, Mudd's Women, Balance of Terror, Arena, The Menagerie Pts. I and II, Errand of Mercy, Amok Time, Mirror Mirror, I Mudd, The Trouble With Tribbles, Journey to Babel, The Enterprise Incident, Spock's Brain

The Animated Series: Honestly, I'm probably going to get some flack for this one, but you can safely skip it entirely

The Next Generation (the best series): Encounter At Farpoint, The Battle, Hide and Q, Datalore, Skin of Evil, Conspiracy, The Neutral Zone, Elementary Dear Data, The Measure of a Man (I have issues with this episode but it is very popular regardless), Q Who, The Emissary, Peak Performance, Who Watches the Watchers, Yesterday's Enterprise, The Offspring, Sins of the Father, Tin Man, Transfigurations, The Best of Both Worlds Pts. I and II, Family, Brothers, Reunion, The Drumhead, The Mind's Eye, Redemption Pts. I and II, Ensign Ro, Reunification Pts. I and II, I Borg, Chain of Command Pts. I and II, Tapestry, Birthright Pts. I and II, Rightful Heir, Descent Pts. I and II, The Pegasus, All Good Things

Deep Space Nine: Honestly, just watch the entire thing. A lot of the episodes, even the earlier ones, end up tying into ongoing arcs in this show. If you want just one episode to sell you on it, go see Duet or the Past Tense two parter.

Voyager: Caretaker, Jetrel, Threshold (c'mon, it's one of the holidays), Death Wish, Tuvix (notoriously one of the most contentious episodes of any Star Trek show ever made), The Q and the Grey, Worst Case Scenario, Scorpion Pts. I and II, The Gift, Year of Hell Pts I and II, Message In A Bottle, The Killing Game Pts. I and II, Living Witness, Drone, Equinox Pts. I and II, Q2, Author Author (aka what TNG's The Measure of a Man could have been like if it was good), Endgame.

Enterprise: Broken Bow, The Andorian Incident, Shadows of P'Jem, Shockwave Pts. I and II, Carbon Creek, Minefield, Cease Fire, The Expanse, all of season three because it's a season long arc and honestly one of the better seasons, Storm Front Pts. I and II, Borderland, Cold Station 12, The Augments, Babel One, United, The Aenar, Affliction, Divergence, In A Mirror Darkly Pts. I and II, Demons, Terra Prime, These Are the Voyages (also a contentious episode)