#but I also remember feeling so much responsibility for his happiness for some reason (prob well explained by my personal history)

[loumauve]

sometimes I think about the kid that used to be me once upon a time and I wonder what was going on inside her head, and then I look up and see this picture and go: yeah, alright!

[bunycube]

!!! hi again (sorry in advance for the very long message ,_,)

wait so do you mean that there is not english translation of Lamento ? so like if i were to download it I'd need to play it in Japanese ? o.o and like find a translation and read from there at the same time !? heck :")

ominous yes!! but there's something really nice about it ??!!

💀💀 not me imagining Tetsuo as a cardboard box now ksndjdjdj i see what you mean tho still i love him nonetheless :') i think he's just a lil bit shy and quiet, keeps to himself alot.. i feel like he's never really had any close friends,, maybe any friends at all i liked seeing glimp of soft and gentle Tetsuo :') there were some really cute and tender moment with Youji too (well as cute and tender as it can be given the circumstances lolol) it's fun to imagine what they all could have been like without all this innerbeings stuff fuckin them all up

it's ok to feel so close to Youji even if you don't know why 😊♡ and YEAAAS i felt the same same same about Z!!!! :"))) very interested to hear more of your thoughts about him if you ever feel like writing them down 👀👀

skdjdjdj entire cities apart made me laugh but true :^) tho even if he left his dad and all that the hell within would still follow him,,, he can't help that he been dragged into all this by his dad and he literally has no escape ,_,

hahajjsjsjsjs i know now there are no sweet endings lmao i can't say i didnt know at first because i had been warned but STILLLLLL i wasnt expecting that from Makoto!!!!! for that end to be so unhinged x') i thought he'd be the less bad difjfjdj

i do like to also imagine something where they someone all get free from the nonsense and just get to have normal lives and happiness ;_;

LOL i dont remember the ugly outfit :"))) i wasn't sure about Rin at first like ,,,, what's his angle,,, he is just pretending to be nice,,, why so mysterious,,,, he did grow on me but idk idk

aw im sorry Nano's made you feel that way :'( i love him very much :'):

aaaa i wasn't sure what to think of Motomi in all the other routes i was very mmm🤔🤔🤔🤔mmm but when i did his route i was like !!!!😍😍😍!!!!!

yeah Akira was alright but Aoba probably remains my fav protagonist(is that the right word??) and and i loved Takeru alot too , before he died when he sees like his sister and his parents and ;_; made me cry lowkey wish he had a route too ~ aND IT'S OK I LOVE GUNJI TOO WOAA

i like Arbitro too a little for some reason there's just something about him ,,,,, but his route was really underwhelming to me ??? idk i was expecting more from him

NO NEED TO APOLOGIZE!! RAMBLE AWAY very interesting to read someone being excited about what they are talking about !! :)))))))

never apologize for long messages!!! i love em! response under cut

there IS an eng translation for lamento! its just a pretty long process to download it haha. i was saying that i had to download some dvd mounting thing to get it to work snfbsb the game itself is fully translated, no worriesbthere!!

yesyes its like kimda ominous but still calming w all rhe quiet sunset empty classroom vibez...you know....

😭😭 oh yeah i get u, i think tetsuo is just a reserved kid plus he prob felt like he didnt fit in very well? thats just me guessing but he seems like that kind of guy...i think hes the same as youji in that respect, both of them kimd of quiet n awkward n not teh type to easily make friends :) he does some pretty bad things but im like sigh well its this kind of game so ofc that happens...besides that i think hes just an awkward quiet kid who looks rly intimidating like hes not bad once u start talking to him. i lovednsome of his gentler scenes w youji, my favs when they were eating ramen and tetsuo picks out the bamboo shoots from youjis bowl bc he doesnt like them...it made me so 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 i also loved when youji was showing him pics of his nephew ...idk idk sp is so dark but i loveee gentler scenes like this its so 💔 to me that they manage to find moments of peace despite everything around them...

oh true i thought abt this too...no matter how far zenya runs away he can never escape bc the thing thats causimg all his problems is his own body, so he just cant run away from it or do anything abt it ;___; poor boy he never asked for this n his whole life is just doomed from tjebstart bc of his shitty father...

if i started talking abt why i like zenya we would be here ALLL LDAY and rhis post would literslly never end lol i just like analysing him and how everythign hes been through shapes his actions and behaviour n all hmmmm

OH YES...sweetnpool normal au :))) i lvoe to imagine it i feel like tetsuo youji n makoto would hang our together n zenya is that one guy no one invited but he jsut joined in anyway n the others dont rlycwant him there but well. hes there now

lmaoo this is the ugly outfit

ohh yeah i was thinking abt this yesterday too and aoba is hands-down my fav chiral protag!,$& i jusr love him sm his personality design everything is chef kiss hes so fun and lovely and means sm to me. hes very comforting to me personally as well and hes just a special boy...tho i love the other protags as well haha

OH YEAH i loved takeru too wtfff i wasnso sad when he died bc he had never had antthing good ivhis life n thenche dies SO BRUTALLY...and he jsut wantednto help his family it made me v sad :( they spent sm time on him i fully expected him to atleast have an ending so when he died i was like huh, wiat what 😭😭😭😭

ngl, arbitro makes me sick 2 my stomach for reasons u prob already know but he surprisingly isnt relevant ti the plot st all? so i keep forgetting abt him. i liked how campy his design was but thats it. hecmakes me sick !!! yeah jdbfbd

same for u! i lovenreading lomg responses haha i always ramble a lot so i feel less guilty if the person also writes a long reoly, beside its very fun to read and respond to!

[tinyjeanmarco]

Helloooo 🥺🥺 idk if ur into writing hurt+comfort but I’m in such a big fat mood to cry rn and there’s not a lot Porco angst out here... I was thinking along the lines of modern au and ur already in a relationship but ur incredibly insecure about urself and the relationship, but Porco reassures u in the end that he really does love u and goes out of his way to prove it <3

(I realize u likely won’t get this done tonight and I’ll probs be in a better mood tomorrow BUT it’s still true there isn’t a lot of Porco angst out there!!)

Also if u don’t write angst pls ignore this!! Thank you 💖💖

teddy (a hurt/comfort fic)

hello my darling!! i hope that you’re in a better mood now and don’t want to cry anymore! （＞д＜） remember that it’s okay to cry and to take care of yourself. your body loves you and you should show it just as much love. i do really love hurt/comfort fics! they always make me feel so soft in the comfort part. 🥺 i’ll do my best to write this! i think porco can be a real comforting boyfie that just cares so much about you. ♡ also sorry this was so late after your request, love. (｡ ́︿ ̀｡) i listened to idontwannabeyouanymore by billie eilish, and emotional anorexic by svavar knutur while i wrote this so you kinda get the vibe i was feeling while writing!

wc: 1,818

modern!porco x gn!reader

warnings: some angst, hurt/comfort, happy ending, i swear.

he’s just busy, you thought as you exited the coffee shop. you clutched the cup in your hand tighter as you checked your phone for what must have been the twentieth time that hour.

you texted your boyfriend, asking if he wanted to do something that day, but alas, it’s been a few hours and no response. you knew he had classes, but they should be done by now, meaning he was just ignoring you at this point.

no, he’s busy. you reminded yourself. yet, you weren’t sure how much longer you could buy that thought. you couldn’t tell if that was true anymore, or if it was just a way to keep your bad thoughts at bay.

you debated texting him again, but were worried that you would annoy him. maybe that was the issue in the first place; he saw your text and wanted a break from you, thus making him ignore you. it had already been nine months since you started dating, maybe he was annoyed with you.

you picked up your pace as you walked back to your apartment, no longer wanting to be around people, in case you broke down in some way. you knew it wasn’t the best to be alone when you felt like this, your friends telling you that getting out and doing things would take your mind off your anxious thoughts.

you couldn’t seem to text anyone to tell them you felt trapped.

stepping inside your apartment, you locked the door behind you and toed off your shoes before making your way to the bedroom. you tossed your keys on a table as you walked by.

your mind just kept racing faster the more you were alone with the silence that was suffocating you. the best course of action was to take a nap, you decided. so, you changed, and put on one of porco’s hoodies that he gave you.

yet, when you settled under the covers, sleep wouldn’t find you. your insecurities picked you apart down to the bone. at this point, you had felt like you were being drowned. it was so hard to swim in the fog that was your head.

your brain had managed to convince you that porco was tired of you, and it was on its way to make you think he would break up with you. in the back of your head, you knew this was false, yet it kept persisting. it wouldn’t leave you alone.

instead of ruminating about things you didn’t want to, you thought maybe putting on one of your sad music playlists would help quiet the thoughts, which, in hindsight was an okay idea at most. it really only served to upset you even more.

you didn’t even notice tears were leaking from your eyes until you found your nose was beginning to clog. you wiped at your eyes, and just cried harder.

you were trying so hard to be okay, but your insecurities would not leave you alone. you hated it so much. you just wished they would leave you alone. tired,  you were so tired of always feeling like not enough.

normally, you would communicate to porco about how you were feeling because communication and telling the other how you feel in a relationship is rule number one. yet, you were so convinced he didn’t want anything to do with you at the moment, so you refrained.

the only option left was to just keep crying until sleep somehow made its way to you.

a few hours later is when you woke up, thanks to the constant buzzing of your phone. why couldn’t everyone just leave you alone?

sighing, you did your best to wipe the sleep from your eyes before you squinted at your phone screen to see who was calling.

your heart dropped to the pit of your stomach. it was porco. what would he want? was he finally going to break it off? would he tell you that your texts got on his nerves so he needed space?

you decided you didn’t feel like answering it, not wanting to deal with whatever it is he had to tell you. you weren’t mad at him, you just didn’t want to be even more hurt than you were already. that means ignoring everything completely.

after the phone finally stopped ringing, you kept getting texts from him but you just put your phone on do not disturb and shut your eyes again.

you had fallen alseep again, but it didn’t last as long as earlier, because you happened to hear a soft knocking on your bedroom door. shooting up into a sitting position, you scanned your room for a nearby weapon. who the fuck was in your apartment?

the answer came when a gentle voice, which you didn’t want to hear, followed the knocks.

“baby? are you in there?” and ever so slowly, the door pushed open. your body felt like it was made of lead as he stepped into the room. you forgot you had given him the spare key.

“oh, were you asleep? i’m sorry if i woke you, sweetheart.” he made his way over to your bed and sat himself on the side of it.

“yeah, i was asleep. it’s fine though, i needed to wake up anyways.” you mumbled out. he nodded before speaking again.

“what’s got you down? and don’t tell me nothing because i know you only take naps when you’re upset or it’s exam week.” he reached a hand out to take yours, gently stroking the top of it with his thumb.

“are you tired of me?” you blurred out, not quite answering his question, but to porco, that was enough of an answer that he got what was going on.

“no, no, no, baby. why do you think that? talk to me, honey.” his other hand that was not in yours, reached up to gently cup your face, encouraging you to speak.

“i dunno, you had to be not answering my texts for a reason.” you sniffled, tears coming to your eyes again today. when would they just stop and let you be happy?

“i’m so sorry, baby. my phone died today after i got called in for an emergency shift at work, and i didn’t have a charger at work. i promise you, i’m not tired of you. i was thinking of you the whole time i was working. i’d rather be with you then at that dump.” he gave a small squeeze to your hand. you squeezed back.

you had felt a little of the weight lift off your heart at his words, but you had spent so long today just overthinking and assuming you were right. the sadness wasn’t going to go away immediately.

“i’m sorry i overthink so much and always make you deal with it.” he just tutted and crawled on the bed to plant himself right beside you, pulling you into his chest.

“don’t you dare apologize. you know i care about you and have no problem making you feel more comfortable.” you felt yourself melt at his words and sink into his embrace. with every word he spoke, the thoughts in your head got quieter and quieter.

you closed your eyes and just listened to his heartbeat for a second before saying anything else. one of his hands reached up to your face and wiped the last of the tears away.

“thank you, porco.” you sighed and snuggled in even closer.

“you don’t need to thank me, this is what i’m here for.” a kiss is pressed to the top of your head, and you feel him shift. “now, how about i run to get stuff to cook for you and we can spend the rest of the night in?”

“you don’t have to, pock. i’m okay with just ordering a pizza or something.” you turned to him and pressed a kiss onto his nose before connecting your lips together.

“but i wanna.” he mumbled into your lips, not wanting to break the kiss.

you eventually reluctantly agreed, and decided to hop in the shower to melt away the rest of the day’s stress as you waited for him to return. he promised it would only be fifteen minutes max that he’d be gone.

the hot water running down your back felt like heaven. you could feel the knots in your neck and shoulders just dissolve under the heat. you were okay, not like earlier when you were wrapped up in despair.

you still felt tired and a little numb from the thoughts that polluted your head that day, but at least you no longer felt the need to cry. now you just craved the touch and comfort of your boyfriend, whenever he returned.

as you were getting dressed after your shower, you heard porco call out that he had returned from his shopping adventure. pulling his hoodie back over your head, you shuffled out to where he was unloading the groceries he had purchased.

when he saw you, he hurried to grab something he set aside and made his way over to you.

he got you a giant, cuddly teddy bear and some of your favorite chocolate bars.

“what’s all this for?” you inquired.

“i got it for you, to help cheer you up and kind of apologize for being irresponsible.” he scratched the back of his neck, a light red dusting his cheeks.

“pock.. i don’t know what to say. you really didn’t have to do this.” you took the bear from his hands and hugged it close to you.

“but i really wanted to, and it’s to make up for you being sad. whenever i’m not around, you can just hug the bear and pretend it’s me.” he set the chocolate aside on the counter and went to pull you into a hug, effectively squishing the stuffed bear between your bodies.

“this bear will never live up to the expectations of cuddling with you, pock.” you let out a small chuckle.

“well, then i guess i’ll just have to be sure to cuddle you as much as i can.” he pressed a kiss to your cheek.

“you won’t hear me complaining.” you leaned into him and pressed your lips together, craving his affection. “now, please cook for me, baby. i’m really hungry.”

you tried to give him the best puppy eyes you could muster. he laughed and gave you another quick kiss before pulling away and turning to the rest of the things he bought.

“of course, just make sure you sit there looking pretty and i’ll get right to it.” you finally felt a big grin form on your face, finally relaxed.

you hated that you could get so sad and insecure sometimes, but porco understood you, he didn’t judge you. you could always trust him to pick up the broken pieces when you didn’t feel okay.

[omegawolverine]

I love it when people talk about things they're passionate about, tell me something cool!! Anything you want, just something you find interesting or want to talk about :D

hello anon my beloved, I am in a bad mood so you will be receiving a passionate, yet lowkey of pissy rant about why villainizing bakugou makes me wanna vomit and its NOT just because I'm a dumbass kinnie :)

tws: child abuse (emotional and physical), near death expierences, bullying, kidnapping, suffocation, lots of trauma in general tbh. if you've seen bnha then basically just keep all the general triggering plot stuff in mind incase i missed any warnings

also, note: I havent caught up on bnha in a minute, I'm at like the start of the war arc but I barely remember shit there tbh so like. probs missing new stuff. also bnha spoiler warnings lol

so, for starters, the homie bakugou has like,, a good handful of issues that come from his childhood that explain why he's an ass. he was always praised and never actually reprimanded for being a twat which led to him having a huge ego that ended up fucking him over majorly. this ego was something that his mother acknowledged him having, but literally didnt try to fix it with anything other than violence. see here:

like, instead of trying to help him, she hits and insults him, which is probably what led to his weird inferiority/superiority complex. being constantly told by others that you're outstanding and one day you'll be a top hero because you're rude and aggressive and then going home and being hit by your mother for those exact same behaviors is bound to fucking confuse a child.

so like, now that we've established that its definetly canon that his mother (parents? I think he said parents at some point but masaru doesn't seem like the type so 🤷) hits him though we don't know how much or how often (though if bakugou was as much of a little shit back then ((which as far as we've seen- he was)) then it was probably often), lets talk about how regardless of all that 1) hitting your kids as "discipline" not only doesn't work but is abusive lol like idc if it's spanking/popping them on the mouth for talking shit, slapping them across the face "on occasion", etc. shits not okay 2) hitting your kids!!!! does not work!!!!!!!! it is literally PROVEN not to work!!!!!!!! hitting a child who has done something wrong doesnt teach them to stop doing something it teaches them to be scared of you, which will cause the child to withdraw, removing part of their support system (assuming said abusive parents would even offer that up) and will most likely lead to them thinking they're a bad person, not that their actions were bad, which are two different things. so, ya know, that would clearly have an effect on a kid. like, as someone with a mother who reminds me all too much of mitsuki: I have acted like a complete shitbag and taken my anger out on people to feel better in the past because of the way my mother treated me. though it was nowhere near what bakugou did, I still know first fucking hand what a mother hitting and insulting her child will do, especially if they have no proper outlet for that (friends, a safe place to vent) which bakugou never fucking had.

theres also the fact that just talking to your kid the way mitsuki does (saying it's his fault he was kidnapped because he's weak, all while hitting him) is not??? okay?????? ive seen people arguing that this was just a joke in poor taste but like her son was KIDNAPPED and even if it was a "joke" there's literally NO WAY that would EVER?? BE FUNNY??????? she just sounds like the kind of parent who at the very least says shit without thinking that would traumatize bakugou (because being told right after being kidnapped it's your fucking fault by your mother is absolutely traumatizing) but it comes across as her being emotionally abusive.

mitsukis character as a whole comes across as a shitty mom who doesn't realize she's a shitty mom and thinks bakugou being an ass isn't at least partially her fault even though she's admitted to realizing he has always had an ego problem and doing nothing to fix it except for hitting and yelling which obviously did nothing but make him just as loud and violent as she is.

this is obviously not the entire reason why he's a dick but he was never properly taught that the shit he was doing wasn't okay and people not stopping it and/or praising him endlessly even tho he was a bully is basically the same as encouraging it, thank you very much.

moving on from that, let's talk about bakugous other traumas and how he naturally responds to them. hint: it's with either full blown panic or a fight response (verbal or physical, though usually physical. also sometimes it's the panic followed by the fight response.)

so far in bnha (keep in mind that I am not caught up, I've only read up to the beginning of the war arc and i barely remember those bits so) bakugou has...

nearly died via sludge villain (he was unable to move and was being suffocated to death- keep this in mind)

lost for the first time ever and against deku of all people (this nearly sent him into a full blown panic attack, likely because of that sexy little inferiority/superiority complex combo. think of this as like. gifted kid burnout lite. he has always been the best of the best and now suddenly he is being beaten by somebody who has always been weaker than him, which immediately makes him start thinking he was never actually that good, he's actually a fucking failure, a goddamn fraud)

won the sports festival by default (bakugou counts this as yet another failure because todoroki didnt try his best. had bakugou lost to todoroki full strength, he would've taken 2nd place with a bit of bitching, but he still wouldve taken it rather than refuse the medal as it would be a reminder that he failed. instead of accepting that like UA shouldve, the staff chained and muzzled him on live television and then had all might, his fucking idol, force the medal into his mouth. remember the sludge villain incident and how he couldnt move and was suffocating to death? yeah.)

been kidnapped because of the way he reacted to winning during the sports festival (he was aggressive and tried to refuse the medal because he felt he didnt deserve it and was then retraumatized by being chained up and muzzled. his "villainous attitude" was a fucking trauma response, do not tell me otherwise)

was then chained up once again by the LOV after being kidnapped,,, do we see the "retraumatize bkg" theme yet?

"ended all might" (he literally blames himself for all mights retirement because had he just not have been weak, all might wouldve had more time, right?)

my point with all of these is that bakugou has been severely traumatized and has then had his trauma responses (aggression, fight) used to further demonize him. not all people with trauma react the fucking same and the way the fandom just refuses to acknowledge anger as a valid form of trauma response is gross as hell.

moving away from that topic, bakugou has literally never had any actual friends, they all just used him and didn't care about him which absolutely will fuck up a kid, especially one who already has all that other shit going on. bakugou deadass never had a support system or people to help him grow as a person, let alone properly work through his fucking emotions so it's not surprising that he would take out his bullshit on the one person who tried to help him especially considering he saw dekus actions as him thinking he was weak. bakugou was raised to not seek help, he thought somebody strong shouldnt ever need it, so for somebody like deku (who bakugou percieved as weak and helpless already) to offer up help? deku must obviously think bakugou is even weaker than him, what other explanation could their possibly be!

speaking of which, there's his heaps of insecurities that he basically hid by being a twat and bullying others for most of his life. kid was so insecure he bullied deku for fucking years cause he thought deku looked down on him, thought he was better than him, etc. and that only got worse bc his idol then decided to take deku in, train him and even give him his quirk. there's probably some shit im missing but still he's got issues and always has had issues. that being said, he's actually improving and working them out now which is what makes him a really good, interesting character. it's also nice to see a character who is a dick without some tragic backstory (like his backstory is sad but its not the classic "my family was fucking slaughtered and i turned into a raging bitch who murders people" type shit) bc that rarely happens and it's like most assholes don't actually have a story like that they're just assholes lol

now lets talk improvement! lil bitch has been getting better since he got into UA and im so happy abt it!! he had a rough start what with deku suddenly having a quirk and all but like he is really improving now and it highkey shows that bakugou just mostly needed people who 1) didn't constantly praise him and actually criticized him instead 2) actually fucking punished him doing stupid shit and 3) some motherfucking friends

Since going to UA he's gotten actually feedback from teachers about his weaknesses and how to get stronger, he's lost against others, hes been told he has a shit attitude and is a dick, told he should be nicer and leave deku alone, etc etc. He hasn't gotten in trouble too much with teachers but others give him shit for what he does and aizawa has punished him too, while still acknowledging that bakugou is an amazing and dedicated student, something which no one else had done up til that point. and uh???? homie actually has friends who like,,, don't use him and also call him out when he's a dick. like specifically kirishima has done this shit and him and bakugous relationship is clearly very healthy and beneficial for the both of them. makes me feel all happy n shit, ya know

bottom line is: while it is absolutely valid to dislike or even hate bakugou because he is a massively flawed person who has been very cruel to others, villainizing him for the way he acts which in large part seems to be from a lack of guidance, a shitty mother and heavy amounts of trauma, is fucking awful. his actions cannot be fucking excused, he needs to apologize and continue to grow, but he is also a fucking teenager, who is just now being told that the way he acts is unacceptable by people who dont fucking abuse him (and I swear to god if any people who think mitsuki isnt abusive interact with this fucking post I will fullstop hardblock you, I do not fucking care) and actually treat him like a normal person instead of some prodigy child or someone who needs to be fixed.

people are free to debate my points or whatever bc I know some of this stuff is up to interpretation but like. dni if you're just here to say you hate bakugou for xyz reason or that he's irredeemable. also especially dni if you compare him to fucking endeavor yall bitches make me gag.

anyways thxs for the ask anon <33 sorry this is a kinda messy info dump lol

[kaypeace21]

Stranger things is about mental health & trauma- deal with it!

I’ve seen a lot of people claim anyone who mentioned this topic immediately be gaslit and told they’re “just crazy” and “rudely projecting their own issues on to the characters.’ Like- no you don’t have to believe my  Will DID/Lonnie theory ( I could be wrong). But to claim one of the show’s central themes isn’t about mental health/trauma (screams either complete lack of lit comprehension or denial cause you have your own negative biases towards such people). So let’s just go into what’s literal text-not subtext/symbolism. Just the super blatant stuff.  RIGHT IN THE SHOW!

S1

-We have El when she first appears on screen  asked by Benny if her parents starved and hurt her and if that’s why she ran away. Benny then calls CPS to say El “may have been ab*sed or something.” After this Lucas says there is “seriously something wrong with her-wrong in the head. She’s probably from the NUT-HOUSE in curly county.penthurst” We also see El  cannonically has PTSD-all of s1 she’ll see something benign (a cat, a coke commercial, a closet) and is triggered to see a traumatic flashback. That’s literally ptsd.  There’s also hints throughout the seasons she’s developmentally behind in both language, telling time etc (neglect like El’s irl can cause an intellectual disability-analysis on El/that subject here).The real pethurst in pensylvannia (not the one in stranger things/ Curly county)  closed in 1986-  it was a facility for people and mostly  kids with intellectual disabilities (it wasn’t technically a psych facility like the one in st)-but it was infamous for it’s abuse of these intellectually disabled patients kept there. We also have Brenner be a ab*sive psychiatrist.

- Hopper after suffering from the loss of his daughter. Is popping pills like candy, drinking and smoking constantly. He later says he used to hallucinate and forgot what was real -seeing and hearing sarah and says if he didn’t confront the pain he’d “fall down a black hole he couldn’t get out of.” NO... subtext here about what the void represents nope.

- Both mothers (Terry & Joyce) are dismissed as being mentally ill and simply grieving the loss of their kids . But both end up being right about the supernatural.

- “Terry pretends Jane is real. i mean it’s all make believe. you know the doctors all say it’s a coping mechanism.”

- While with Joyce the whole town pre s1 already questioned her mental health. Jonathan says “She used to have anxiety problems (pre s1).” And Jonathan, Hopper, and Lonnie all assume she’s hallucinating: talking to Will via lights, seeing a man without a face, saying Will’s body is fake -due to grief. Plus Lonnie mentions the fact Joyce’s aunt Darlene also used to hallucinate as a possible reason  (terry’s aunt also had mental health issues mentioned in s2 by Becky). Lonnie even says everything Joyce is seeing  is “all in her head.”  Hopper and Jon both say she needs to sleep and accept reality and Lonnie says she needs to see a “shrink”.  Hopper “i’m not saying that you’re crazy”. Joyce : “no, you are.” Joyce also says to Lonnie “Stop looking at me like that... like everyone else like i’m out of my damn mind.” Hopper also says about Joyce she’s “on the edge”. Callahan says in response , “she’s been on the edge for a while now” (referring to her mental health- even before Will’s dissappearance)”. While Lonnie says Jonathan is “feeding into her hallucinations ... you’re going to push her right over the edge.” In s2 Hopper says “ I think everyone is on edge- you, me, Will most of all. (when talking about Will’s ptsd/trauma)” 

- in s1 They claim Will just “fell” over the edge of the quarry’s cliff. Later the only other queer coded character (Mike) jumps off the quarry cliff (where Will’s body was found) cause the homophobic troy forced him too jump. Troy even says earlier dead-Will is “flying with all the other fairies all happy and gay” (to Mike). And Troy says to Hopper El made Mike “fly” after jumping off the cliff. Friendship saved him from jumping off the edge metaphorically ( and he’ll prob eventually be happy and gay too).

s2/3

-Will is seeing a therapist . And we are told he has ptsd and will experience the anniversary effect, personality changes,nightmares, having episodes, etc. And things “will get worse before they get better”.  Mike also asks if what Will is seeing is “real or like the doctors say all in your head?” And Will continues to see hallucinations of the mf/upsidedown that only he can see initially.

-Hopper also agrees with owens mentioning how he knew guys with ptsd . joyce : “it’s not like he’s describing a nightmare. He talks about them like they’re real.” Hopper: “Yeah, because they’re not nightmares they’re flashbacks.I think he’s right about trauma.I think everyone is on edge (bringing that s1 ref back), Me you, Will, most of all.Nothing’s gonna go back to the way that it was. But it’ll get better.In time.”

-Nancy suffers from survivor’s guilt and drunkingly says she killed Barb. Jonathan says like Nancy he has “a weight that you that carry all the time . i feel it too.” (cough depression). He also says he tries to be there for Will but says about Will “he’s not the same. maybe things can’t go back to the way they were. (mirroring Hopper’s words earlier that season)”

-Jonathan said in s1 Joyce had “anxiety issues” than Nancy says in s3 “you really are your mother’s son... you worry too much.” Then we see him look worried after the comment.

- in s2, Axel & a scientist both call El and Will “schizos” because of their powers. In s3 mrs driscoll isn’t believed about the supernatural cause she’s schizophrenic-but like Joyce/Terry was right.

- Kali saves a woman named Dottie (a british slang term for crazy)  from a mental hospital and then compares herself and El to dottie. saying her non-powered gang is “Like us ...outsiders... society discarded them.”  In graphitti we even see the title “obedlam” a british poem about discarding the mentally ill and leaving them homeless.  El before this sees a mentally ill man screaming “we’re all dead!” Kali’s friend says to El, after this encounter they were “dead all of us” until kali “saved them here” (points to head) “and here” (points to heart). Pointing to the theme of love and friendship helping those with such issues. Similar to the cliff analogy.

-The cycle of ab*se. Max in s2 says she’s afraid of becoming like Billy (her ab*ser). We see Billy mimic his ab*ser neil and inflict pain on max. In s3 we see the roots of his behavior are linked to mimicking Neil- Neil in a flashback says  about baseball “what are you scared?”  “ did i raise a p*ssy for a son”. So young Billy later in a fight says to a boy “ what are you scared to fight me? fight me p*ssy. (as he beats the boy)” Deflecting his anger of his father on to someone else. In s3, We see as a kid he used to say to Neil “don’t hurt her” (his mom)-specifically after  Neil backhand slaps her -but we later see possessed Billy backhand slap Max (just like neil).  The resentment to his mother leaving - festered into how he views women and max negatively . And his attraction to mrs wheeler prob is linked to him subconsciously missing his mother. Max in s2 even says  he can’t take it out on her mother so he does so to her instead (we even have Billy hallucinate hurting mrs wheeler).We see in s2 the cycle of abuse is there- Billy mimics Neil, and then Max mimics Billy. Billy harrasses Max and yells “SAY IT!” (mimicking Neil).  Max like Billy later  yells “SAY IT” and uses a bat /violence to stand up for herself against Billy- which earlier she said she was trying to combat … explaining she can be angry like Billy sometimes but she never wants to be like him (her nickname symbolizing this: aka ‘mad max’).  Billy’s last dying words were an apology to Max- for becoming her neil. And we hopefully will see Max break this cycle.

- Will says his now memories (that he describes like dreams) are “growing “, “spreading “,and “killing”. While Kali says they need to face their father and (as Brenner) says El has to confront her “wound” or else it’ll “grow”, “spread” and “eventually it’ll kill her.” Kali says she used to be like El . She used to bottle her pain away and it “spread.” But she then says  “I confronted my pain and I finally began to heal (from those wounds).” We also see with jonathan and nancy when describing “shared trauma” zoom in onto the scars on their hands. The wound heeled into a scar so to speak.

S2 & 3 ENDINGS

both have Hopper do a speech that delves into dealing with trauma/depression but still finding good along the way.

-s2 Hopper outside the snowball: “how are you holding up? Yeah, that feeling never goes away. It is true what they say, you know. Everyday it does get easier.”

-s3 Hopper monolouge : “ Feelings jesus. For so long, i’d forgotten what those even were. I’ve been stuck in one place,in a cave you might say , a deep dark cave (cough s2 supernatural cave). For the first time in a long time, i started to feel things again. I started to feel happy. Life... yeah sometimes it’s painful .sometimes it’s sad, and sometimes it’s suprising... happy.. And when life hurts you, because it will .remember the hurt . The hurt is good. It means you’re out of that cave.”

BUT YES- St has nothing to do with mental health/trauma, we’re just “crazy” and “projecting”. It’s not like some of ya’ll  act pompous when you just have a bias and get pissy at the idea of relating to characters you “other” as “crazy” or “damaged” irl or anything (so attack people for pointing it out). Or (benefit of the doubt) you are just like.... oblivious... or just a kid who doesn’t know better XD

[spicycreativity]

Intertwined - Chapter 4

Chapter: 4/8

Additional Notes: My AO3, WizardGlick, is 3 chapters ahead on this. Critical thinking exercise: Read the following Twin Peaks quote and consider how it related to Intertwined and to post-PoF as a whole:

WINDOM EARLE: What do you fear most in the world?

MAJOR BRIGGS: The possibility that love is not enough.

Chapter Content Warnings: Again, it's a hanahaki fic.

Excerpt: "Here's what I want you to do," Janus said, and his voice was surprisingly tender given the hard look on his face. "Cook for yourself. Don't make something you can take to the others later. Don't make something to share with me. I'm giving you a free pass to be selfish."

Yesterday, Patton supposed, could have gone worse. He had haunted the kitchen after his departure from Janus, begging the mindscape for some sort of hint. Like the answer to all their troubles was lurking in Thomas’ subconscious, just out of reach.

When morning came, he returned to Roman and Logan's rooms, was again rebuffed, and so floated back to the kitchen, made himself some coffee, and sat down at the counter. Again, he reached out with his mind for some kind of reassurance. He had to fix this. There had to be something he could do.

A 5,000 piece puzzle appeared in front of Patton. The image on the box was that of dogs playing poker, captioned A Friend in Need. The subconscious was funny sometimes, in a way that made Patton feel kind of sick and hollow. He opened the box and shook the puzzle pieces put onto the counter. It was a way to pass the time, at least.

A few hours crawled by. Patton’s hands began to shake from the caffeine, and he knew he should eat something, but… It almost didn’t seem worth the effort. He was happy to cook for his fam-ILY, but, when it was just him, what was the point? He put down another edge piece and flinched at the sudden appearance of Virgil in front of the coffee pot. Virgil had made himself scarce after yesterday’s meeting, only reappearing to turn down Patton’s offer of dinner. Patton couldn’t even blame him. How terrible, to wake up after a bad day and find your friends inconsolable and enemies at your door.

“Hi,” Patton said. Finding faux-happiness out of reach, he settled for ‘not completely miserable’ instead.

“Did you eat?” Virgil asked, pouring coffee into a purple mug decorated with this logo.

Patton saw no reason to lie, not about this. “Not yet. I got a little distracted.”

“Mm-hm,” said Virgil.

“Listen,” Patton said, already getting up to make toast. “Are you okay?”

Virgil shrugged and opened up another cabinet. “Want some orange juice?”

"Um, sure." Patton got out the bread and popped a few slices into the toaster. "Thank you."

"No prob." Virgil stood on his toes and got down two glasses, pivoted to the fridge for the orange juice.

"It's just," Patton said, "You don’t seem very upset?" It wasn't that Virgil was necessarily acting upbeat , but… Well, Patton had been expecting something more intense than Virgil's baseline levels of casualty.

"I am," Virgil said. "But I also want orange juice."

"Oh." Patton fell silent. His own feelings were so big and loud in his head they didn't really leave room for anything else. In the light of everything that had happened, Virgil's response felt cold. Patton had half a mind to tell him so, except that… Well, he had no room to talk about 'proper' emotional responses to things. If this was how Virgil wanted to navigate the situation, that was his right. "Did you talk to Roman yesterday?"

"Sorta." Virgil put the orange juice back, scooted a glass to Patton, and took a seat on the counter. "He said he wasn't ready to talk, but might be soon."

"To you?"

"Yeah." Virgil's expression was cloudy. "To me."

"That's a lot," Patton said, treading cautiously. "Is there anything you want to talk about?"

Virgil's knuckles went white around his glass, so much that Patton was worried he might break it. "Oh, there's plenty I want to say," he said darkly. "To you and to-- to him."

"Janus," Patton said, feeling it important, somehow, to say his name.

"Yeah. To Janus."

"You can," Patton said. "To me. I won't get mad."

"I just don't understand!" Virgil said, the words exploding from his chest. "What did he say to you to make you trust him? After everything he did to Roman, to you, to Thomas! What did he say?" It was almost a plea, "What did he say?"

"I already told you, kiddo," Patton said, poking at the water droplets collecting on the side of his glass, unable to remember that they were called. Logan would know. "I made a choice to trust him."

"But why ?"

"I don't know, I just-- I felt something. I don't know if I can explain it in a way you can understand. I just got it. I understood what it was all for. "

"So, what, he just gets a free pass for treating us all like crap? Just gets to talk his way out of consequences?"

"Well, no." Patton kicked the toes of his loafers against the molding under the counter. "But I don't know that it would do any good to… punish him? Be cold, be mean, yell at him. What's done is done. I'm not asking you to forgive him."

"Good, 'cause I don't."

"But I also need you to understand that I made my choice and I'm committing to it. I…" Patton smiled sadly, gazing at the countertop without really seeing it. "I gave my word, in a way."

"Fine," Virgil growled. "But if he hurts you, if he does what he did to Roman and Logan, I swear, I swear--" Patton covered his ears briefly and Virgil seemed to get the message. "Well. I'll avenge you."

"Thanks, Virgil." Patton smiled again, happier this time, and looked Virgil in the face. It really wasn't all that long ago that he had thought of Virgil as an enemy. And now look at them. "I'm proud of you, you know."

"You are?"

"Of course I am! You've been a really good friend to, to all of us. And I'm so happy--"

"Stop," Virgil said, pulling up his hood. "Stop, stop, stop."

"Aw, did I make you blush?" Patton teased.

"Yeah," Virgil said, his voice breaking on that one syllable. He cleared his throat. "Let's not-- I'm gonna--"

"Is something wrong?" Patton asked, already reaching out for a hug. Virgil couldn't see him with his face buried in his hood, so Patton stopped short and let his arms fall to his sides.

"I just, uh." Virgil took a deep breath and let it out in a huff, swept his hood back with a jerky motion. "Sometimes I don't feel like I deserve all this."

"Oh, kiddo, of course you do!" Patton said, again holding out his arms for a hug. Virgil instead held out his hand, and Patton took it in his own, determined to communicate all the love and devotion he could through that simple contact. He smiled at the matching weave of their friendship bracelets, smiled at the memory of sitting side-by-side with Virgil as they both struggled with five-strand braids.

Virgil nodded, and his breathing was still shaky and spastic when he said, "I'm gonna go-- I'm not going off to cry all by myself, if, uh, if you're worried about that. I just need… Uh. Yeah."

Patton nodded, hurriedly snatching the half-cooked toast from the toaster and imagining it smeared with Crofter’s and butter, arranged neatly on a plate. "Okay!" He said with false cheer, passing the plate to Virgil. "Come get me if you need anything! Maybe we can watch Ghost Adventures tonight."

"Sounds good," Virgil said, slightly muffled around his hand, as he was chewing at his thumbnail. "Later." He sank out.

Patton sighed and stared at their untouched orange juice glasses. Even when he was trying to fix things, he made people upset.

A drop of water slid down the side of Virgil's glass, pooled on the countertop. Patton stared at it as another followed.

What did it truly mean to deserve something, anyway? It was something Janus would probably have an opinion on. He seemed to have opinions on most things. Maybe Patton could ask him in a bit.

“Did you need me for something?

Oh, okay, or Patton could ask him now. He turned, unsmiling to Janus. It wasn’t that he wasn’t cheered by Janus’ presence, but that he had no reason to lie. Janus had made it abundantly clear that he wasn't depending on Patton for anything. “Sorry,” he said, embarrassed. “I didn’t mean to steal you.”

“No harm, no foul,” Janus said, and sighed so heavily his breath displaced a few puzzle pieces. “As you can see, I was hard at work.” Despite this claim, he wore a hard, annoyed expression and Patton remembered with a sinking feeling in his stomach that he was dealing with a liar. "Did you need help with your puzzle?" Janus asked.

Just like that, Patton's heart leapt. "You'll stay?"

Janus shrugged. "I suppose I can clear a space in my schedule."

Patton stood to get him some coffee. The pot was empty, but it was simple enough to imagine it full again. Ordinarily, he disliked the laziness of misusing Thomas' imagination, but he couldn't deny that it was convenient sometimes. He could tell he was on the brink of annoying Janus (somehow) and didn't want to risk pushing him over the edge. "Have you eaten?"

"Have you?" Janus asked, side-eyeing the remaining slices of toast sitting in the toaster. Patton had forgotten all about them.

"I guess it slipped my mind," Patton turned around and set a coffee mug on the counter in front of Janus, then rounded it to sit down again. He tried not to notice that Janus had scooted his chair away from Patton's, that he leaned on his elbow so they were even farther apart.

"Hm," said Janus, making a face. He didn't push it, and Patton was grateful for that. "Oh, and thank you."

"Of course," Patton said.

He watched Janus for a moment. He handled the puzzle pieces with difficulty, his gloves impeding his ability to pick them up. When he realized he was staring, he turned away and started fitting more edge pieces into place.

He couldn't decide if the quiet was pleasant or awkward. It was kind of nice, kind of domestic, sitting here with Janus, but he couldn't help but feel a kind of tension in the air.

Then Janus turned away and started coughing. Patton reached out to put a hand on his back, caught himself, pulled away. The deep, jagged sound made him cringe. He was no stranger to coughing fits, none of them were, brought on by Thomas' cat allergy. But this had come out of nowhere.

"You okay?" Patton asked when Janus resurfaced. Maybe he was just projecting, but he thought Janus looked a little pale on his human side.

"It's warmer today, isn't it?" Janus said, not looking at Patton.

"Huh?"

"It's not as cold. Roman seems to have gotten ahold of himself somewhat."

"Um, yeah, I guess." Patton furrowed his brow, trying to get a good look at Janus. "But Janus, are you okay?"

"Fine," said Janus. "Just inhaled some coffee, that's all."

But his hands shook as he slid a blue puzzle piece down the counter, and Patton was already halfway out of his seat before he even realized what he was doing. "You know, I think I will make breakfast."

"A little late now," Janus said. "By the way, did you really call me all the way down here just to work on a puzzle?"

"So brunch, then," Patton said. "And to be honest, no."

"Oh, do be honest," Janus said, leaning against the counter and resting his chin in his palm.

But Patton's priorities had shifted beyond philosophical debate. He had to take care of Janus now, get him comfortable, get him honest. He had to. "It's not important anymore."

"Hm," said Janus. He cleared his throat quietly, winced. "Well, now I'm not curious at all."

"It's okay," Patton said, trying for a reassuring smile. "We can talk about it later." He spun around, trying to decide what to make. Toast sounded wholly unappealing now, and he should choose something that would be easy on Janus' throat--

"Don't think I don't know what you're doing, by the way," Janus said.

"Making brunch?" Patton said with faux-innocence.

"Mm-hm. And what did you have in mind?"

"Soup."

"Patton," Janus said in a chastising tone. "I don't need you to take care of me. I need you to take care of you."

"That cough sounded like it hurt," Patton said, defeated.

Janus sat back and spread his arms out as though to show himself to Patton. "It did. It went away on its own. I'm fine."

Patton wasn't sure what to say to that. He scratched at his friendship bracelets, embarrassed. "Oh."

"Here's what I want you to do," Janus said, and his voice was surprisingly tender given the hard look on his face. "Cook for yourself. Don't make something you can take to the others later. Don't make something to share with me. I'm giving you a free pass to be selfish."

"But that's wrong!" Patton said reflexively. He regretted it as soon as the words were out of his mouth, but it wasn't like he could take them back. "Not for you," he hastened to explain. "That's your job. But me?"

"I can't very well be selfish for you," Janus said. He seemed annoyed, digging his fingers into both sides of his midriff in a way that looked decidedly painful. "Just try it. It won't be the end of the world."

And Patton wanted to. He didn't want to let Janus down, but… Where did it end? Where did it stop?

"Patton," Janus said. "I can see you catastrophizing."

"Sorry," said Patton, feeling close to tears. "Sorry, sorry, sorry. I just… I don't know who I am or what I want or if I'm even allowed to want."

"Breakfast, Patton. That's all. One little thing."

"Okay," Patton took a deep breath. Calm down. Make food. He could do that.

"There's nothing else," Janus said. "Just us, right now. Just this room. No consequences."

"Okay," Patton said. Cinnamon rolls. He wanted mini cinnamon rolls.

"Good," said Janus. "You're okay." He cleared his throat again, coughed a little behind closed lips. Patton forced himself not to notice, knowing that it would make Janus annoyed if he pointed it out or tried to help.

"I hope so," Patton muttered, half to himself, as he got his ingredients together. A phrase popped into his head and he shouted it out impulsively, "Mise en place!"

"Bless you?" Janus said, raising an eyebrow.

"No, no." Patton smiled. "Getting all your ingredients together. Mise en place."

"Ah," said Janus. He smiled too, his human eye crinkling at the corner. Patton almost sighed at the sight. Janus seemed to hold himself above human standards sometimes. He presented himself as something cold and pure, unbreakable and untouchable and utterly perfect. There was something so beautiful about seeing him step down from the pedestal. Janus seemed to notice Patton staring and turned away, surprisingly demure. "How about some music?"

A turntable appeared on the counter, spinning something inoffensive and charmingly lo-fi. "That's nice," Patton said. He didn't recognize the artist, but it didn't really matter. The music seemed to slide into the cracks of their conversation, filling out the empty spaces and projecting calm throughout the kitchen.

So Patton made cinnamon rolls and Janus worked on the puzzle while he sipped his coffee, and they both pretended not to notice the ragged coughs that Janus couldn't bury under the music no matter how hard he tried.

[jaskiersvalley]

My life has been absolute shit lately, and your blog has been the one constant, an anchor if you will; for me. I've probably blown up your notifications and are prob sick of seeing my little icon and I apologize but you have kept me sane. I just love you so much😭❤

I’m so sorry to hear life has been absolute shit lately! Whatever it is that’s going on for you, I really hope it gets better soon. I’m there in your corner and rooting for you. On a side note, please never feel you have to apologise for blowing up notifications. As a writer, it is one of the loveliest things to see, to have someone enjoy works so much, they make their way through multiple stories. Generally, those usernames are the ones that I’ll remember and grin at going “it’s you again” and be really happy to see. Even if we never talk, regulars in notifications bring a special kind of warmth with them. So all the thanks and love should be given to you for being such a wonderful soul.

As thanks, and as a little something to take your mind off whatever’s been going on, have a strange modern AU.

The shelter where Jaskier worked was a relatively quiet one. They tended to specialise in last hope strays and those that needed a home that wasn’t expecting the animals to be cute, convenient and snuggly. Usually, Jaskier’s role was more to sit with the animals, sing to them and get them used to human presence. Sometimes it took weeks before one of the animals dared approach him or stopped growling at his mere presence. But each time it happened, Jaskier’s heart almost burst with love. He adored every single animal that came to the shelter, broken and hurting as they were. In part, Jaskier felt responsible for them and wanted to make sure that no matter what had happened in the past, their future was as bright as possible.

As well as the animals, there was another reason Jaskier loved the shelter. The people he worked with. Namely, one particular volunteer who came in at least once a week and often more when there was a particularly difficult case. Geralt had a reputation as a take no shit gentle giant. He’d had his fair share of bites, scratches and incidents but not once did he ever blame the animal in question. No matter how many times he got attacked, he returned, worked with the animal and tried his best to win them over. As far as Jaskier knew, he had yet to fail.

Some animals needed more attention than others. They were usually referred to as ‘Geralt specials’ because most of the time, it was Geralt who managed to start working with the animal in question. At that moment in time, there was only one such dog at the shelter, a mastiff cross of some description. She had come in half starved and petrified of any human contact. Even Jaskier sitting quietly on the other side of the door to her kennel had her snarling and snapping, throwing herself at the cage door. Any dog doing that would have been scary, when it was a dog Roach’s size, it was downright terrifying. But Geralt had come in and worked his magic. The first time Jaskier saw him slip out of the kennel, he hd expected to see copious amounts of blood. Instead, he got to see Geralt turn back to the kennel and offer a soft smile before acknowledging Jaskier with a nod.

Over time, Jaskier and Geralt started getting on better and better. While Geralt never stayed around when Jaskier played, claiming he wasn’t fond of the racket, he still seemed to linger nearby enough to catch the softly drifting music without being obvious about it. Their nods to each other had become a few exchanged pleasantries. Then it was chats int he staff room. Or even walking the dogs together, Geralt always taking Roach if possible.

“I’m moving,” Geralt announced out of the blue, Roach sitting next to him, tongue lolling happily.

“Does that mean we’ll lose you?” Jaskier’s heart actually hurt at the idea.

Thankfully, Geralt shook his head. “I wanted somewhere bigger, with a garden.” He looked down at Roach and patted her head. She growled, obviously not in the mood for gentle attention.

It was no secret that Geralt was absolutely doting on Roach. He’d even turned a few potential adopters towards other dogs, claiming she was still a work in progress. Though Jaskier had suspected that, with the right person, Roach would have been ready to leave the kennel. Maybe now, with Geralt getting a more appropriate place for a dog, he could actually adopt her himself.

“Will you not be lonely in a bigger place?” Jaskier teased, hoping to get Geralt to admit to his plans.

“No.” Geralt looked at Jaskier with a frown. “Are you asking if I need a housemate?”

Laughter bubbled up in Jaskier’s throat at that and he shook his head. However, he didn’t push the matter any further.

Days went by and Jaskier was called to the front desk. Two men, built like small mountains were standing there. While they looked nothing like Geralt, there were enough shared mannerisms that Jaskier had to wonder whether they knew each other.

“We’re here to adopt a dog called Roach,” the smaller one said.

Priscilla at the desk looked quite stricken. They all had been hoping Geralt would adopt her soon. But, as Geralt had said, moving was expensive and disruptive. He couldn’t bring a dog into the home if he couldn’t safely provide for them.

“I’m afraid Roach isn’t up for adoption just yet,” Jaskier tried to worm his way out of it. “I would be more than happy to show you a few other dogs though.”

“It has to be Roach,” the man insisted.

The other guy finally spoke up. “Sorry, to clarify, we’re Geralt’s brothers. I’m Eskel, this is Lambert. He’s been working with that dog for so long and hasn’t shut up about her. At first we thought it was two dogs, but we’re not sure who would name a dog Jaskier.”

Snickering, Jaskier nodded. “I’m Jaskier. Geralt won’t shut up about me?”

In testament to all of Geralt’s hard work with Roach, she greeted Lambert and Eskel in a civilised fashion. Which made more sense when Eskel admitted he was wearing a hoodie he stole from Geralt.

“She can spend the night at mine. Geralt’s got tomorrow off, his house is as ready as it’s ever going to be. Want to help bring her over?”

The plan was quickly hatched. Jaskier would pick Roach up from Eskel’s the next afternoon. Lambert and Eskel would be at Geralt’s and keep him from getting stuck in on some chore so when Jaskier arrived with Roach, he wouldn’t be interrupted.

There was only one hiccough to their plan. The following morning, Geralt turned up at the shelter even though he wasn’t on the rota. He walked to the back and Jaskier saw the moment he realised Roach’s kennel was empty.

“What’s happened to her?” Geralt’s eyes were wide, face stoically set into something vaguely neutral to hide a breaking heart upon learning she had been adopted.

Jaskier felt awful, realising Geralt had been hoping to finally adopt her. Instead, Geralt gritted his teeth and nodded.

“Did she go to a good home?”

“The best,” Jaskier nodded. “Guy with a house and a garden. She loved him and even tolerated the guy’s maybe boyfriend.”

That was a bit of a cheeky thing to add but Jaskier couldn’t help himself. He had hopes. What he wasn’t braced for was the way Geralt nodded once and made his excuses to leave. On the way out, he dropped a roll of money into the fundraising jar on the reception desk. Jaskier didn’t need to count it to know it was exactly the same amount as an adoption fee. There was a defeated slope to Geralt’s shoulders and Jaskier was reaching for his phone, calling Eskel.

“We need to move up the timeline. He just came by to try and adopt Roach.”

A quick jiggling of lunch breaks and cover later, Jaskier was taking an early lunch and on his way to Eskel’s. He smiled at the dog, loving the big old bow Eskel had managed to attach to her collar.

“Come on girl,” Jaskier coaxed her into the car. “Time to go home.”

He pulled up outside Geralt’s driveway. Somehow, Eskel and Lambert had already managed to coax Geralt onto the porch and Jaskier got to see the annoyed scowl before recognition smoothed Geralt’s features into something confused.

“Sorry to bother,” Jaskier said as he opened up the boot of his car. “But I’ve got something of yours that needed delivering.”

Roach hopped out with a huff and looked around.

“Roach?” Geralt’s voice was full of hope. His dog heard and Jaskier had no chance of holding her leash as she bounded towards Geralt.

Lambert and Eskel took a step back as Roach collided with Geralt and they went sprawling on the ground. They both looked so happy, Jaskier wanted to take a photo and treasure it forever. Thankfully, it seemed that Lambert had the same idea as he’d already whipped his phone out to take pictures. Meanwhile, Eskel pulled out the adoption papers from him pocket.

Finally a little calmer, Geralt sat up and stared at the three of them. “I thought she got adopted.”

“She did. By a guy with a house and a garden. The best home she could hope for,” Jaskier replied.

“Didn’t the guy also have a maybe boyfriend?” Off to the side, Eskel snorted and made no attempt to even hide it. Jaskier had the grace to blush lightly even as he shrugged. “Could we make it a definite boyfriend?” Geralt asked softly.

It was Jaskier’s turn to grin but he didn’t step closer. “While I’m very happy, I think I would prefer not to tackle you to the floor and lick you all over to express it. The bed however,” he trailed off suggestively.

Lambert barked out a laugh and punched him in the shoulder merrily. “We’ll leave you three to figure out who is allowed on the bed and who wears a collar. See you around.”

“Stay,” Jaskier replied. “I need to get back to work. But, maybe, when I’m done, I could come by and see how Roach is settling into her new home?”

He looked at Geralt hopefully. “I could even bring some wine and doggy treats.”

“Deal.”

That was how Jaskier found himself with a date for that evening.

[lumilasi]

I saw this in my feed and since I was pretty bored and FINALLY free from the said boredom, figured I could do this one. I generally enjoy question based tags, especially if they relate to art/writing/fandom/are some general things about favorite colors, music, foods, things about your home country etc.

(basically, you can tag me in stuff similar to listed above things and I’ll probably do them if I see them/have time lmao)

Fic Writer Questions!

How many works do you have on AO3? 

44 total. I used to have more but I’ve deleted an old Bleach one I knew I’d never continue to write, and two bnha ones for the same reason (those two were also at the very beginning stages so nobody missed a lot anyway)

What's your total AO3 wordcount? 

4 269 068......wow. It’s even MORE than I even imagined. Over 4 million words. 

....Someone take my writing tools away from me lmao

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

 Three. I started with MCU, moved on to Bleach and now I’ve done most ofr BNHA

What are your top 5 fics by kudos? 

Crossroads - 3069 

Family Secrets - 3015 

Reanimate - 1534 

The neighbor - 809 

Espada and Fraccion - 782

.....Admittedly this list surprised me. Not the first three but the last two. The fifth is an one shot for Bleach that I wrote AGES ago. I also for some reason expected this list to match the bookmark list more lmao

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I always try to respond to every comment I get, but often times when it’s just one word or a heart emoji I don’t really know what to say, so I might not reply to those. I do appreciate every comment I get, and read every single one, even if I don’t respond

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending? 

I don’t do angst endings typically, but Family Secrets is probs the most obvious choice, given what happens at the end. 

- and its not even the real end, because I couldn’t help myself and made two more stories for the AU that was like “hey! this character I made you all love so much actually DIDN’T die, he just had unfinished business back home” lmao

Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you've ever written? 

Rarely, typically they’re between my own fics (the story that crosses the paths of Crossroads and Family Secrets AU’s, literally titled Crossover, creative name I know OTL I was out of ideas) 

Or between me and other people’s fics. Currently there’s two, both with Crossroads: one with Theteapotofdoom’s fic Something Good, and another with leontheneon’s fic Here with you. Both stories are basically a two part series that is non canon to actual Crossroads. The first story is finished, second one has two chapters left...that...I uh...struggle to write it seems OTL

(not tagging either person into this because Tea is very busy IRL right now so I don’t want to bother her, and Leon hasn’t been around in ages, IDK if they even use tumblr anymore)

Have you ever received hate on a fic? 

Not really no? I can only remember one time with somebody kind of demanding me to completely rewrite one fic in the past. It wasn’t really hate, more just...kinda unreasonable in my eyes? This was years ago by now.

While I did understand their side and the particular struggle they had (once they actually explained it, the first comment at the time came off pretty rude and demanding), I still feel them wanting me to re-write an entire multi-chapter fic just for them is a bit unreasonable, like said.

Like it wasn’t just couple of grammatical errors that was their issue, we’re talking weeks and even months long process of completely reworking multi-chapter story, because the grammar wasn’t tip top perfect. (I’m not a native speaker so there’s bound to be some mistakes; pointing out small occasional things is one thing - asking me to rewrite an entire multi-chapter story is another)

You can imagine that is not exactly high on my priorities list with IRL responsibilities and being more focused on the actual content of what I write, the ongoing stories I’m updating. This fic isn’t even finished yet either, so...yeah. Like after they explained their side of the story I was a bit more understanding, but its still....a bit ridiculous and unreasonable in my eyes to ask somebody to do such a massive overhaul when the story isn’t even finished yet?? Like maybe once its done and I have time I can go and edit it, but not when I haven’t even finished it lmao

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

Nah. I don’t care about smut a whole lot personally. I much more enjoy writing emotional scenes, character interactions and mystery. Plot over porn basically lmao 

Have you ever had a fic stolen? 

I don’t...do people actually do this? It feels like such a weird and pointless thing to do. It’s fanfic. stuff you write for fun and for free, for people to read for free. I’d also imagine its pretty easy to get caught given AO3 shows when you first posted your story. 

Have you ever had a fic translated?

 Yes, a couple of times. In Russian and I think other one was Chinese?

Have you ever co-written a fic before? 

Writing the crossovers was kinda that? Like I asked feedback from Tea and Leon on how to write them. there was also actually third crossover story that was supposed to happen (only I wasn’t going to be the one to write it) but this project has been shelved as the other person had to drop majority of online activity due to some IRL health related things. (I’m just glad they recently contacted me to inform they were doing better)

What’s your all time favorite ship? 

Right now it’s..probably pretty obvious its Shigadabi, but I can never really say any ship is my all time fave, as it always changes depending on the fandom lmao. 

I guess my favorite character x proper sleep/emotional stability/happiness will always be the OTP

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Oof. I always try to finish every single one, and if I absolutely know I won’t, I tend to just delete them. Thankfully I’ve only done it thrice. Which I guess is still a lot, but compared to how much I write, in context not really? 

What are your writing strengths?

From what I’ve gathered of feedback, its typically emotional moments/character dialogue and interaction/character arcs and so. Mystery plots too. Or maybe that last one is just me lmao

What are your writing weakness?

Personally, while I tend to get positive feedback on both, sometimes I feel like I struggle to choose a good pacing for a fic, and fight scenes are always a pain. Namely, I might struggle with making the pace too long-winded and slow sometimes. Ironically, my IRL update pacing is probs a bit too fast in turn. (To add another layer of irony, I got an update ready for Unravel that I’ll post after making this tag)

Also writing shorter stories. I’ve been trying to write one-shots more (like the Spinaraki series thing) to kinda try and get myself to pack up my stories better and not let them always spiral out of control haha

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I did try to do that once with a fic I deleted, I had a native speaker help me with the canadian french bits. This person is no longer active on tumblr, and I deleted that fic because I realized I’d never finish it. 

Technically tho, as a non-native English speaker, EVERY word is in other language to me lmao. I could only add Finnish as an extra one easily, and it rarely makes sense to do so anyway.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for? 

MCU. It’s what I originally made my AO3 for, as I felt brave enough to post things. I also can’t remember writing fandom related stuff before that, it was typically more oc related. Writing fics has helped me learn a lot about world-building, character consistency and all that stuff, without having to make everything from scratch (tho I do enjoy doing that as well of course). I feel like my original work writing has improved too thanks to my fic writing shenanigans in a way lmao. Tho that might just be me, IDK

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written? 

Oooof. This changes a lot depending on the time. I can never really pick just one either: my current favorites are Stringmaster, The neighbor and Family Secrets

Stringmaster because I love building the Steampunk AU, and Tomura’s relationship with Dabi and his Sensei, The neighbor because I personally think the romance build up in that one is probably one of the best I’ve done so far (the character dialogue in that is among my favorites I’ve written as well) and FS, because it taught me a lot about character building through writing a character like Hisashi.

 Plus I just really like Hisashi. 

And baby Izuku and little Tenko are super adorable. 

And Inko is the best mum.

 Also the fact the whole story is so ironic in a sense its still kinda funny to me. 

The only writer I know that might be around rn is @nightlilly0110 soo...I guess I’ll tag them if they want to do this! Anybody who’s a writer can snatch this too of course ;)

[trensu]

Episode 44: The One where Su She Gets Rekt

we’re outside of mianmian’s house and omg wwx's face is so cute when he recognizes mianmian. his little pleased grin makes me melt every time

also omg, i just realized that wwx is still wearing lwj’s white inner robes here???

you can see them where you usually see his (sinfully) red inner robes!!!!! 

which means as far as i’m concerned this ENTIRE EPISODE is a wangxiantic in and of itself lolol

mr. mianmian is like, why are you calling my daughter's name??

(i keep forgetting that mianmian's name isn't actually mianmian lol)

i'd be concerned too if some strange guy who was hiding behind our hay bale or whatever the heck that is, knew my kid's name...

wwx is so amused by this turn of events! he's like, awww, mianmian and little mianmian!

which was basically my response too

but ofc lwj is much more formal and does his little bow and addresses her as Lady Luo

wwx: now i know your true name!!

wait, did he really never learn it before?? or did he just forget? both are plausible, tbh

and here mianmian introduces her husband

wwx: may i ask what clan you're from?

mm: oh, he's not from any clan. he's a merchant!

bc mm knew getting tangled up with another clan was just not a good life decision, probs

and she's all he comes with me on night hunts tho and wwx is like, oh is that what you were doing?

little mm: we were looking for the yiling patriarch!

and wwx perks up and gets all playful bc WWX LOVES CHILDREN SO MUCH

wwx: oh, but i heard he eats children. aren't you afraid?

little mm gets all shy and stutter-y and it's ADORABLE

wwx is all like, oh she's so cute! she looks just like you when you were her age

and mm is all, don't you feel bad saying that?? how would you know what i looked like at that age???

we get a shot of lwj and he looks at ease and is simply taking joy in watching wwx interact with these people

same, lwj, same

wwx: how old is she? i'd like to give her some lucky money!

and ofc mr. and mrs. mianmian immediately try to stop him for politeness sake BUT LOL LWJ IS ALREADY REACHING INTO HIS SLEEVE TO GET MONEY FOR THE KID

wwx: don't be so humble. it's not my money anyway~

and he laughs bc he'S SHAMELESS

lwj just hands wwx his purse and lets him take whatever he wants from it. 

what a doting husband-to-be he is!

and then mm does that thing all parents do with small children "what do you say to hanguang jun and master wei?"

little mm: thank you, hanguang jun

SHE'S SO FREAKING CUTE

lwj must agree with me bc he SMILES. it's his little smile, the one that just barely curls up at the corner of his lips, but it's a sincere smile

he's probably remembering lsz when lsz was that age

he's probably thinking about how he wants more children, esp now that wwx is here to raise them with him

Give me all the Dadji fic!

wwx: little mm, i gave you the money. why don't you say thank you to me?

and he puts on this cute little pout but little mm just glares ADORABLY at him bc she SAW who's money it was and she's a clever girl lololol

lwj is amused by that exchange too, we get another one of his little smiles

now they're asking for info on anything unusual around but they get interrupted by some screaming!! mm was all ready to go attack, but lwj said they'd handle it

after they leave, mr. and mrs. mm have a little convo which i wouldn't bother mentioning except she ends it with a very sincere "master wei...is a good man"

BC WWX IS A GOOD MAN AND APPARENTLY SHE'S THE ONLY ONE SENSIBLE ENOUGH TO SEE THAT

turns out the screaming was wen ning!! being adorable!!

he's all covered in mud and grass, and had been trying to scare people off for Reasons

wwx starts cleaning his face 

I LOVE WHEN WWX DOES THAT

HE’S SO LOVING AND NURTURING

lwj watches this go down but there's no smile on his face like there was before with little mm even tho wwx being all sweet and nurturing is always cute

DON'T BE JEALOUS LWJ, DON'T BE THAT GUY

oh, wwx just noticed wn's injured hand and is like, what happened? and wn ofc says 'NOthing!!!" bc he doesn't want to worry wwx

lwj: it's blood.

wn: not blood1! well, it is but it's not human blood!!

he says this so nervously and flustered bc lwj is very intimidating actually 

Or at least I wouldn’t want to get on his bad side...

now we find out that wn has secretly been taking down puppets while following wwx and lwj around this whole time

bc wn is a good friend

then it gets kinda sad bc wwx is like, wn i told you to hide out somewhere! and wn is all, but where would i hide?

bc wn has nowhere and no one aside from wwx rn 😔

so wwx is like, okay, the three of us can travel together instead

Lol, lwj looks down at this and starts stalking off

lwj: lets go

i don't think he's happy to have a third wheel lololol

he wanted alone time with wwx!

WHAT DID I SAY, LWJ?? NO ONE LIKES A GREEN-EYED MONSTER.

now they're in town!

wwx: lan zhan, do you remember this town?

lwj: yes

BC LWJ REMEMBERS ALL OF HIS TIME WITH WWX

BC WWX IS HIS SOULMATE AND HE LOVES HIM

wwx is like, remember that time i said i'd treat you to a meal here?

they're in front of the teahouse in yiling and lwj is looking at it, like, FONDLY bc he DOES remember and it's probably one of his happiest memories tbh

wwx isn't looking at the teahouse, he's looking at lwj here and he gets this soft little smile on his face AND IT'S SO SWEET AND BEAUTIFUL 

ooh flashback to their first time in yiling together! And ~Their Song~ starts playing!!

it's a quick little flashback bc we're back in the present with wwx saying something about how he's embarrassed that lwj ended up paying that time or smth

at wwx's words, lwj turns around and just looks at him. 

Omg, how does he always pack in SO MUCH LOVE in the way he looks at wwx??

another quick flashback of them sharing a meal at the teahouse with cute little a-yuan darting around lwj with his toys

wwx: but that happened a long time ago

and lwj gives a stilted nod bc HE DOESN'T WANT TO THINK ABOUT HOW LONG AGO THAT WAS AND THE FACT THAT WWX WAS GONE ALL THIS TIME

wwx turns and sees the toy stall and he SMILES

OH GOD HOW DOES THIS MAN HAVE SUCH BEAUTIFUL SMILES

but then he gets sad as he remembers a-yuan

wwx: if that boy were still alive, he would be a teenager now

Bc wwx still thinks all the wens died. He thinks little a-yuan was BRUTALLY MURDERED with the rest of his clan

MY POOR DARLING SUNSHINE BOY

then we get a bit of slo-mo as lwj turns to look at wwx, who's still lost in thought

AND HE DOESN'T MENTION THAT LSZ IS ALIVE AND WELL???

WHAT HECK LWJ

THAT WAS A PERFECT OPENING

ALL YOU HAD TO SAY WAS "YEAH, FUNNY STORY, HE'S ACTUALLY NOT DEAD. SURPRISE!! I RESCUED HIM AND RAISED HIM AS MY OWN SON AND GAVE HIM ALL THE LOVE I COULD POSSIBLY GIVE BC HE WAS YOUR SON AND ALL I HAD LEFT OF YOU AND HE SAVED MY LIFE AS MUCH AS I SAVED HIS"

DAMN IT, LWJ. USE YOUR WORDS!!

cut to somewhere outside the town and wn is beating up a whole bunch of puppets all by himself like a badass

oh, here's lwj with the assist! he guqin's the heck out of those puppets

he looks so cool doing that, omg

Also, i love how he whooshes away his instrument whenever he's done with it

we're at the burial mounds!!

which is looking just as bright and cheery as ever!!

meaning everything is gray and looks dead

wwx gets really sad, and he's remembering the voices of all the wens he failed

IT HURTS TO SEE HIM THIS MELANCHOLY

MY SUNSHINE BOY SHOULD ONLY EVER BE HAPPY AND SMILEY, DAMN IT 

wn snaps him out of it, thankfully

lwj explains how everything was destroyed during the siege back then

he doesn't mention at all how he defended this place until he physically couldn't anymore

wwx: it doesn't matter that this place was destroyed. for me, wq, and wn, it represents the hardest time in our lives. there's no need to return to this place

wwx says this all soberly and i just wanna wrap him up in blankets and hide him from the world

BC THE WORLD DOESN'T DESERVE MY PRECIOUS SUNSHINE BOY. 

LOOK WHAT THEY DID TO  HIM!!

THEY BROKE HIS HEART!!! THEY’RE NOT ALLOWED TO HAVE HIM ANYMORE.

lwj looks like he feels the same way, lol

wwx: wen ning, stop looking. let's go

wn: yes, young master. i just wanted to check if there's anything left

which was ANOTHER PERFECT OPENING for lwj to cut in and say "ACTUALLY, ABOUT THAT, a-yuan is totally alive and well, guys!!"

but nooooo, ofc lwj doesn't say anything bc god forbid he use his words every once in awhile

oh, evil puppets just appeared and started attacking 

But wn is like NOT TODAY SATAN and starts pummeling the lot of them

ooooh, and lwj does this thing here where he summons up a guqin string and, like, magically attaches it to a couple of trees 

Then wwx tells wn to watch out and wn does this cool backflip to join wwx as lwj TWIRLS forward to take wn's place

and then he magically plucks the guqin string which lets out this big blue blast of energy 

the whole move looks SO DAMN COOL

HE EVEN DOES LIKE, A FINISHING POSE LIKE ALL GOOD SUPERHEROES DO LOL

After, he whooshes away his string like nbd, just being effortlessly awesome like ALWAYS

now they're making their way to wwx's demon palace cave thing, and lwj stops to freaking MATERIALIZE suibian out of thin air and give it to wwx

it looks SO cool

lwj: for defense

wwx: thank you

wwx unsheathes it just enough so we can see the inscription on the blade before re-sheathing it and keeping it at his side

lwj gives him a Questioning Look and wwx gets a little awkward

wwx: ah, i haven't used a sword in so long, i'm not used to it

his eyes are all big and guileless and gorgeous

GOD HOW IS HE SO BEAUTIFUL

lwj is not as easily distracted as i am, apparently, and he very obviously is not buying with wwx is selling

wwx: fine, i'll tell you. it's bc this body of mine lacks spiritual power, so even the best sword can't show it's true power in my hand

lol, he raises up suibian when he says "the best sword"

i am so distracted by wwx's gorgeous cheekbones here, 

omg, paired with those big brown eyes, I CAN'T HANDLE IT I'M ONLY HUMAN

wwx: therefore, hanguang jun, please protect this fragile, feeble man~

he says it with a thin smile which looks as adorable as all his other smiles

Tbh i get the impression that he's a little embarrassed to have to ask for help

NOT THAT HE EVEN NEEDED TO ASK BC LWJ IS ALREADY WILLING TO PROTECT HIM FROM ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING ALL THE TIME

wwx walks around past lwj and we see lwj aim one of his signature Longing Glances at wwx's back

now we're in wwx's old demon palace cave thing!!

AND WE SEE THE JUNIORS ARE ALL TIED UP AND TRAPPED THERE

HELLO, JUNIORS!! WE'VE MISSED YOUR PRECIOUS BABY FACES

lol, lsz and jl are tied to one another, my sweet little baby ship

you know what, this isn't wangxian at all but the juniors have some choice lines here and we should take the time to appreciate them

ljy: what do they even want? whether it's to torture or kill us, they should just do it! i'd rather be eaten by monsters during night hunting than starve to death in this shithole

LOLOL SAME LJY SAME

death by starvation has got to be one of the WORST ways to go

rando jin junior starts running his mouth again and we see jin ling close his eyes and attempt to do a breathing exercise or smth and IT'S HILARIOUS LOLOLOLOL

LOOK AT MY BRATTY SON TRYING TO CONTROL HIS TEMPER

it lasts like, two seconds before he's yelling at the other kid and telling him to shut up

rando jin junior is all offended and is like, what do you mean shut up??

so my precious bratty son is like, "what do i mean? are you deaf or stupid? can't you understand? shut up means STOP TALKING"

I LOVE JIN LING SO MUCH

MY DARLING BRAT OF A SON

they bicker for a bit and lsz cuts in trying to make them stop by pointing out that, hello, they're trapped in here by evil puppets who could decide to come in and tear them to pieces literally any minute now

the distraction tactic didn't work. the boys are trying to beat each other up whilst being tied up and it's HILARIOUS

THAT'S THE MOST PATHETIC FIGHT I'VE EVER SEEN, BOYS.

meanwhile lsz is like: guys, calm down, calm down!!

bc he's tied to jl so he's getting all jostled around, poor sweetie-pie lsz 

and this is when wwx decides to step in, with a long suffering sigh and a very unamused: hey, look here.

THE WAY LSZ AND LJY'S FACES LIGHT UP WHEN THEY SEE LWJ NEVER GETS OLD

also it cracks me up how there's a breeze elegantly rustling through wwx's and wn's hair. 

it's so obviously for the Aesthetic bc literally nobody else's hair is doing that 😆😆😆 

ALSO ALSO, OMG WWX IS SO FREAKING HILARIOUS HERE

Wwx unsheathes suibian and hands it to wn KNOWING THAT ALL THESE KIDS ARE TERRIFIED OF THE FEARSOME GHOST GENERAL

AND THE KIDS ALL START PANICKING AS WN TAKES THE SWORD AND STALKS TOWARDS THEM

and wn ning totally plays along bc he slices through those ropes in the most menacing way possible AND ALL THE KIDS SLAM THEIR EYES CLOSED AND HAVE A FULL-BODY FLINCH AND IT'S HILARIOUS

wwx gets sulky that the kids seem more scared of wn than him lol

we see the dumber kids make a break for it but oyzz, with his big kind heart, stops them bc hey, remember there's a horde of evil puppets outside??

lol, wwx smirks at the dumb kids.

lsz: master wei, you're here to save us! you didn't send people to capture us right?

and wwx is like, do i LOOK like i have that kind of money?

lsz is like, ah, yes, i remember that you are TRAGICALLY POOR.

kid doesn't pull punches, does he lol. and he says it so mildly too

wwx's whole reaction here is like, yeah okay, i deserved that one lol

wwx starts grilling the kids for info, which ljy gladly provides, and lwj gives him and lsz a "well done" for their efforts

oooh, now jin ling is approaching wwx

lwj sees him out of the corner of his eye and IMMEDIATELY places himself in front of wwx

which cracks me up bc this is a full grown man here squaring up against a kid who's like, twelve (okay, 16 but still!)

ofc lsz and ljy follow lwj's lead and put themselves between jl and wwx too

wwx thinks they're all being ridiculous

wwx: what are you guys doing? you're surrounding him.

so he nudges the lan kids away and then grabs lwj's upper arm and literally tugs him away from where he was about to throw hands with a child

ljy: you want to stab him again?

lsz: jingyi!

thank you, lsz, tell him to leave my bratty son alone ☹️

wwx essentially waves it all off and is like, hey guys lets focus on getting out of here first, yeah?

jin ling looks ashamed, my poor boy. he feels all guilty for stabbing wwx 😞

now they're plot talking about how they're gonna get out of the cave, what with the horde of evil puppets and all

they make it to the entrance of the cave and we see a whole bunch of cultivators drop in for a party, i guess

oyzz: dad! *runs off to be with dad*

jc: jin ling what are you waiting for? your death?

I LOVE WATCHING JC BE AN UNCLE TO JL

HE'S SO ANGRY WITH HIS AFFECTION LOLOL

oh hey, one of the rando juniors called out "mom!"

that's so cool actually??? we don't really get a lot of lady cultivators but apparently one of them is there to save her kid!!

uh oh, Uncle Lan does not look happy to be here

lwj leads all the lan juniors to lqr and he bows politely to him 

the lan juniors all join lqr and stand behind him but lwj very pointedly stands before lqr and makes no move to get closer to him as wwx joins him at his side

lqr: wangji, come here

lwj looks at him briefly, like he wants to say something, before looking down 

bc no, he's not leaving wwx's side ever again lqr, so you better get used to it

now some rando lady cultivator is shouting at lwj. she's all "you're undeserving of your reputation!!"

and i'm sitting here like, HEY LADY, WATCH YOUR MOUTH OR COME FIGHT ME

YOU KNOW NOTHING, LADY, NOTHING AT ALL

wwx interrupts her rant 

wwx: here you go again!

he probs would've said more but then jc interrupts

jc: we have to do this

and he probs wouldve said more but FUCKING SU SHE INTERRUPTS AS IF HE HAS ANY VALUE AT ALL

LOL JC’s eyes slide over from wwx to su she and he looks at su she WITH SUCH CONTEMPT AND IRRITATION, IT'S GREAT

THAT'S HOW I LOOK AT SU SHE ALL THE TIME LOLOLOL

ss: blah blah we found you cuz you stole kids blah blah 

and wwx is like, EXCUSE YOU, I JUST SAVED THOSE KIDS' LIVES. HOW ABOUT SAYING THANK YOU???

now wwx is gonna get clever and start talking circles around this crew of idiot cultivators

wwx: your party seems a bit weak, guys. shouldn't jgy and lxc be here with you?

ss: blah blah assassination attempt against jgy blah blah lxc is tenderly nursing him back to health blah blah

then su she implies that wwx was the one who tried to kill jgy

STFU SU SHE

wwx snorts

ss: why are you laughing??

wwx: oh, nothing. i was just surprised that jgy could get hurt so easily

and here we get some oyzz time

oyzz: dad, i don't think he really did it. last time, he saved us in coffin town. this time, he rescued us too!

oyzz's dad: don't speak nonsense, you silly child

YOU WANNA GO, OYZZ'S DAD? DON'T TALK TO THE BOY THAT WAY, I WILL FIGHT YOU.

wwx: why didn't the nie clan come?

Nhs pops in from where he was hiding: oh, pardon me! master wei, i don't know anything about this. i'm just here to make up the numbers

ILU NHS, I'M PERSONALLY GONNA GIVE YOU AN ANCIENT FANTASY CHINA OSCAR

LOL i love how after popping up to say that, he just scoots himself away and behind the other cultivators again

now the idiot cultivators are airing their grievances against wwx

ugh, sect leader yao is talking again and we get to see mob mentality in action

GOD THEY ALL NEED TO STFU

BUNCH OF LOSER NOBODIES

they're still hurling accusations at my sunshine boy and it's making me angry

wwx: I won't admit to what i didn't do

YOU TELL ‘EM, WWX!!

Fucking su she chimes in with some bullshit and so wwx decides to do a public service and try to teach these losers some critical thinking skills by laying out Valid Points for Plot Reasons

Lesson gets cut short bc oops, here come more evil zombie puppets with a strong gust of wind for ambience

LOOK AT JC GO WITH THAT ZIDIAN

LOVE LOVE LOVE IT

but it fails on it's second strike!! jc looks at it in shock, like what's going on??

wwx must've seen that happen bc suddenly we see his flute boomerang the puppet that was headed for jc

and wwx places himself in front of him BC THAT'S HIS BROTHER, THE BROTHER HE LOVES

AND HE'S SO WORRIED FOR HIM WHEN HE SEES JC SPIT UP BLOOD

YUNMENG BROOOOOSSSSSSS *SOB*

oh, now we see lqr spit up blood and lwj, being the good nephew that he is, swoops in to fight off the puppets that had been attacking his uncle

god, lwj is such a good person  bc he just blocked a hit aimed for sect leader yao

Sect leader yao

LWJ PROTECTED SECT LEADER YAO

LWJ TRULY IS AN HONORABLE MAN BC I WOULD'VE LET THAT HIT KILL HIM AND BEEN LIKE, OOPS, TOTALLY MISSED THAT, MY BAD

i mean, c'mon, is ANYONE gonna miss him if he dies??? no, nobody would be torn up over sect leader yao dying

his wake would have been a party, like ding dong the witch is dead sort of party

lol, lwj probs regrets this later on when he’s chief cultivator and has to listen to that loser rant endlessly about nothing, like, damn, i should’ve let him die back then

you know, i'm just gonna enjoy lwj fighting. he's got the best fight scenes tbh

we find out that everyone's spiritual energy has been blocked and they're defenseless against those puppets

lsz tells them all that they need to get into the cave where there's a protective circle they can fix and activate

then fucking su she is all like no don't go in there, it's probs a trap to kill us!!

SHUT UP SU SHE

wwx: staying outside will get you killed. going inside will also get you killed. either way, you're dead. but at least going inside will stall them.

wwx: su she, why are you in such a hurry to ask everyone to die with you? What’s your intent?

GET REKT SU SHE

Lol nhs is like are you guys going in or not? i'll just go inside myself if you won't and all his cultivators are like, yeah yeah, let's do that 

everyone's fleeing to the cave now except for su she and his crew

wwx: su she, you'll stay here? fine, stay here. You sure are brave!

THE WAY WWX SAYS THAT THO, THICK WITH MOCKERY AND SARCASM

I LOVE HIM SO MUCH

while all the cultivators go into the cave lwj and wn are still fighting until everyone's gone

wwx: lan zhan, come on!

BC EVERYONE'S MADE IT INSIDE NOW AND LWJ NEEDS TO COME WITH HIM AND STAY SAFE!!

lwj slices down two more puppets and then zooms to wwx's side

lqr activates the protective circle and then holds wwx (and by extension lwj) at sword point

lwj: grand master

lwj looks at him like he wants him to understand, but he sees the lqr is not having it so he lowers his gaze

poor lwj 😔

lqr: what do you want?

wwx: nothing. but since you're all here let's have a chat!

lol, wwx sits down and makes himself comfortable even tho he's surrounded by cultivators that want him dead

The cultivators are all like, we don't wanna talk with you!!

wwx: aren't you interested in the reason you got poisoned? i swear, i'm not that capable of poisoning you all without being discovered

nhs: that's right. i think what he says makes sense

nhs is really good at what he does, isn't he? 

he knows exactly when he should interject to get the crowd to do as he wants

wwx starts to walk them through the basic critical thinking process, and lsz adds in his clever insights as well

then there's a bunch of plot talk that idc about

nhs: master wei, what should we do now?

NHS IS SO GOOD AT WHAT HE DOES OMG

Wwx is like, there's only two groups with spiritual power. me and lwj are onE group, and the juniors are the other group.

wwx: as for the rest, i don't think it's inappropriate to describe you as week and useless

I DON'T THINK IT'S INAPPROPRIATE TO DESCRIBE YOU AS WEAK AND USELESS

LOLOLOL LOVING THIS

wwx: if i really wanted to do something, could these young men stop me?

then fucking su she starts talking again

ss: blah blah blah kill me if you want blah blah we aint scared blah blah

Man, you have NO IDEA how much i want you dead, su she

wwx: may i ask who you are?

GET REKT SU SHE

wwx starts teaching them critical thinking again and we're again shown how the juniors are way more clever that these full-fledged cultivators

wwx looks so proud whenever the juniors chime in

su she starts talking again

ss: blah blah you're being fooled by the enemy blah blah bl--

AND THEN HE STOPS MID-SENTENCE

wwx: continue. why'd you stop?

some rando cultivator accuses wwx of doing that to su she and wwx is ADORABLE about it

his eyes get all wide and he frowns with a "well, don't look at me!" expression

HE'S SO CUTE, I LOVE HIM

and lsz and ljy tell us that it's a lan clan specialty - THE SILENCE SPELL

AND WE CUT TO A SHOT OF LWJ COMPLETELY BLANK FACED AS HE TELLS WWX TO CONTINUE

LIKE A BOSS

GET REKT SU SHE

so wwx continues and is like, isn't it weird how fucking su she wanted you all to die out there with him and now he wants to stop me from figuring out who poisoned you? now, why would an ally do that, hm?

I LOVE YOU WWX

IT'S SO FUN WATCHING SU SHE GET UTTERLY DESTROYED THAT I NEED TO RECORD THIS NEXT PART FOR POSTERITY

wwx: it seems that the su clan doesn't get along with the lan clan

ljy: indeed (he says with a disgusted look at su she LOL)

lwj: the su clan is a branch of the lan clan

and here, nhs gets ljy's attention

nhs: what's the story?

LOLOL, NHS YOU GOSSIP YOU

AND THE WAY LJY EAGERLY IS LIKE, HELL YEAH LEMME TELL YOU

lsz interrupts tho so he can give a more tactful explanation

lsz: master nie, you may not know but ss built his own clan after departing from the lan clan

lsz: their techniques are similar to the lan clan's, they're also good at music. even ss's spiritual tool is modeled after hanguang jun's 7-string guqin

ljy: not "departed from." they were expelled for betraying the lan clan. and it's not only that! there are funnier reasons too!

TELL ME MORE LJY. I WANT TO KNOW ALL THE FUNNY REASONS WHY SS WAS KICKED OUT

lsz tries to stop ljy but LJY IS NOT GONNA KEEP HIS OPINIONS TO HIMSELF

ljy: ss not only imitates everything from us, he also forbids ppl from discussing how he imitates hanguang jun

LOL, ATTA BOY LJY

ha, you can hear lsz scolding him in the background

unfortunately ss gets the ability to speak back and immediately gets everyone to start bickering

we see wwx roll his eyes and get this "I am so Done" expression on his face

i feel ya bro

more bickering, ljy giving as good as he gets, which is awesome, and then ljy says something that gives wwx an "aha!" moment

ljy: who are you calling arrogant? which clan's demon-subdue melody was played badly without even noticing?

and with that, wwx figures out how the other cultivators lost their spiritual power. but he's gonna make a show out of explaining it bc Drama.

wwx: lqr, may i ask you a question?

lqr: hmph. if you have a question, why not ask lwj?

wow, very mature of you lqr. what kind of example are you setting for your juniors?

we get a shot of lwj here and he looks at his uncle and then looks away with his mouth pinched

i think that hurt him. he still loves his uncle, after all.

wwx: then i'll ask him

wwx: lan zhan, even tho the su clan departed from the lan clan, they imitated the lan clan exclusive technique, right?

lwj: yes

wwx: one of the techniques is magic music that can exorcise evil with a guqin. since the su clan copied you, lots of their disciples use the guqin too, right?

lwj: yes

wwx: ss left the clan after learning the technique but since he didn't learn it to perfection, his disciples play with many mistakes, right?

GET REKT SU SHE

TODAY IS DRAG SU SHE DAY AND I AM LIVING FOR IT

lwj: yes

wwx: so even if they played music badly during battle, the lan clan wouldn't mind at all. they'd just assume it's careless mistakes. they'd assume someone confuse the score rather than thinking they did it on purpose

then he poses very confidently and says "isn't that right, clan leader su?"

su she goes to pluck the guqin strings and wwx reminds him that he has no spiritual power rn

ss: what are you insinuating by saying all that?

wwx: did i not say it clear enough that you feel like i'm just insinuating?

WWX IS FULL OF ZINGERS TODAY, IT'S AMAZING

and then wwx spells it all out for them bc as all know, these cultivators are all idiots. 

and the episode ends there!

not a lot of wangxiantics aside from the bit at the beginning BUT SO MANY QUALITY LINES FROM WWX AND THE JUNIORS

AND WE GET TO WATCH SU SHE GET DRAGGED FOR HALF AN EPISODE

NOT A BAD WAY TO PASS THE TIME, TBH

Return to Masterpost

[iwillsithereandtrytocontribute]

Lost in the Wrong Story

Uh-oh It's the Trash Man

Masterlist Last Next Ao3

~ A collaboration with @hitmewiththatfanart33 ~

Summary: Roman can’t run from his problems forever.

Roman hit the ground running. Surely if he ran with no particular direction they couldn’t find him, right? He dashed between trees and jumped over roots, taking some small comfort in the repetition of the sound of his boots hitting the ground. He wasn’t entirely sure where he was, for he didn’t remember consciously making this world, and most of the Disney movies he grew up watching had trees in them. Though not many trees looked like this: all twisted and curled, ferns and other various jungle-looking flora littering the floor. No, these woods were far from something out of a Disney movie. They had an eerie feeling to them, and the chirps and calls of unfamiliar bugs and night creatures set him on edge.

     “Why are you being so difficult?” a nasaly voice droned. Roman flinched, whipping around in a circle to find the source, and his heart only beat faster when some sort of wispy green fog menacingly circled him. It was so cold; colder than the already-freezing night-time air. However, that wasn’t why he trembled.

     The fog curled and condensed right before his face to form the disembodied head of a large green cat-looking thing, smiling at him crookedly with large, sharp fangs… The Cheshire Cat from Tim Burton’s adaptation of Alice in Wonderland… 

     Remus.

     He should’ve known from the second he stepped foot in this world that this wasn’t his creation like all the other places had been. “It’s none of your business,” he snarled, “Go away.” He tried to get around him so that he could leave, but the floating head only followed his movement.

     “Oh, but it is.” A set of paws took shape, and Remus rested his chin on them with an aggravating look of amusement. “You’re in my world if you couldn’t tell. And I had one hell of a time creating it.” He tilted his head side to side with each word for emphasis. “Whatever happened to making room for new stuff by getting rid of the old?” Remus complained.

     The last thing Roman needed right now was to play cat-and-mouse with his brother, so he turned around and began running, hoping to get enough momentum to hop worlds again, though it would be challenging considering this wasn’t his world and was thus less easy to manipulate. He barely got ten feet before a fully-formed cat was suddenly pouncing on him, pinning his back to the ground. “My world,” Remus repeated with a viscous hiss. “Meaning you’re going to listen.” He could feel Remus’ rancid breath against his face, and the terror that he would bite his head off at any given minute overwhelmed him.

     Roman said nothing, too busy teetering on the verge of hyperventilation. “Now… What is your fucking problem?”

     And in response to the exhaustion, the heartache, the stress, and the fear… Roman’s wide eyes welled up with stinging tears, and he began to cry. Remus looked incredibly uncomfortable. Great. Even his own brother didn’t know what to do with him. The new addition of Roman’s pitiful blubbering noises and the way he squeezed his eyes shut tight to make the world go away seemed to shake Remus out of his surprise, and the heavy weight on his chest suddenly felt less concentrated and more… human. “Hey, hey, hey… I’m sorry I scared you, I just thought you were going for a Disney theme, so I added my own twist to it… Good old Tim Burton, you know? It’s pretty much the only thing we can both sit through without killing each other.” Remus sounded like someone who had no experience with children trying to comfort a screaming baby.

     Roman slowly blinked his eyes open. Remus was still sitting on his stomach, which wasn’t the most comfortable— cat or human— and he looked down at his face worriedly. “Get off me. I can hardly breathe,” he complained. Remus quickly complied, sitting back on his heels to the side of him, offering a hand to help him sit up.

     Once he was upright, he stayed quiet a moment, resting his elbows on his knees. Then he spoke. “I’m a handful, okay? They don’t deserve to have to deal with that, so I just thought that maybe coming to the place where I’m in control and people will still love me even when I make a mistake was what was best for everyone. Nobody was supposed to come after me. None of this was supposed to happen.” He sniffled and angrily wiped at his tears.

     “Everyone with a brain is a handful, you blood clot. They obviously love you anyways, or else they would’ve ditched you a long time ago,” Remus said, trying to cheer him up.

     “They have,” Roman said quietly.

     “What? No, I was just with them.” 

     “That’s not what I meant… Patton just disappeared for several months one time after Christmas. He didn’t even say goodbye, and I needed him. Then I almost caused Virgil to leave completely, Logan left when I was upset over that one breakup, and… Janus hasn’t left me yet. He hasn’t been around long, but I think I just gave him a pretty good reason to.” This felt cathartic. Like he’d been in an uneasy or heightened state for so long that he forgot what it felt like to just be empty. 

     Remus chewed on his lip, cocking his head, and his next words sounded forced, but he meant well. “They need you too…” Roman barely caught him muttering ‘those useless infants’ under his breath, and he almost snorted. “Did you ever try to go after Patton?”

     “No,” he admitted, guilt stirring up in his stomach. 

     “Weren’t you also the reason Virgil came back? And isn’t Janus still looking for you somewhere in this jumbled mess of yours? Sounds to me like you’re just being an idiot,” Remus said with a shrug. Somehow his careless, goofy way of going about things calmed Roman down more than anything else could. 

     “I guess.”

     “I’m really not the one you should be talking to. All I’m good for is butt jokes,” he said, not entirely incorrectly. Roman chuckled a little. 

     Remus sighed. “Virgil’s no stranger to running away to brood; he’d be way better at this than me.” Then he turned his head, eyes wide with sudden thought. “He needs a nickname for that specifically. Hmm…” 

    He snapped. “Got it: Forest Whump,” he announced proudly, “Contains running and angst.”

     Then Roman was truly cracking up. It was pretty funny, and the thought of late night Tim Burton movie marathons and stealing each other’s clothes suddenly made Roman miss his stormcloud more than words could describe, so maybe Remus was right. “Yeah,” he said fondly. “I guess I really messed up.”

     “Yep!” Remus trilled gleefully.

     Roman nodded. “Thank you, brother.”

     “No prob, Bob!” Remus faded away, leaving just his deranged, but somewhat well-meaning smile before even that disappeared.

     When Roman hopped worlds he landed in yet another forest. Free from Remus’ influence, it felt a lot more familiar, like an old friend. He was fairly sure what fairytale he was in, (he had to be, he’d created the world after all), he just didn’t know where in it he was. He ran until he reached the cottage, exactly where he had instinctually known it would be. Then he walked upstairs, pushing two of the undersized beds together in the corner to form one large enough to sit comfortably on, wondering what to do while he waited on Virgil to inevitably show up. After all, the others seemed to find him no matter what he did. They practically fell into his lap. 

     So he waited. 

     And he waited…

     The isolated silence began to weigh on his mental state. 

     Suddenly, where he had originally felt calmed by his conversation with Remus, all sorts of conflicted feelings began to arise. Roman knew Remus was trying to help, and for a while his words did make him feel better... until he started really thinking about what he’d said, that was. When Patton disappeared for months, he did nothing. When Logan felt ostracized during the courtroom trial, he had said nothing. Hell, he had been happy to have Virgil gone… at first. 

     Patton must still resent him for never coming for him. Is that why he never paid any mind to Roman’s absences? Was it payback? Did Logan still loathe him for abandoning their college diploma to be a YouTuber? What about Virgil? He couldn’t count how many times he’d been flat-out cruel to him. And with Janus, when he had first told them his name, he’d laughed at him just like he had with Virgil and treated him like a villain just because of his own conflicting emotions. 

     Now he’d left them who knows where in the Imagination. 

     “Roman, just come home with me.”

     “I just missed you so much it hurt.”

     “You need to come home.”

     “Roman, this isn’t funny. Come out.”

     “Where is Patton?”

     “Roman!”

     “Why are you being so difficult?”

     “Roman!”

     “Now… What is your fucking problem?”

     “Roman!”

     He gasped brokenly, pressing a hand to his mouth as the tears began freely falling one after the other onto his lap, and it felt as if every atom making him up trembled. His prince uniform slowly phased into black sweatpants and his favorite red hoodie so that they could hold him together when he couldn’t. He curled into himself. 

     Would they even want him back given everything he’d done and continued to do? If they found him would they just try to let him down easy? This and more swirled around Roman’s head relentlessly, and no matter how many times he wiped his eyes, they were quickly replenished. 

***

     Virgil walked straight into a tree as he entered the Imagination. He stumbled back, expecting Janus to catch him, and instead fell to the ground. Right as he was about to shoot a teasing remark at Janus, Virgil realized he wasn’t there. Neither were Logan and Remus. He stood up and turned in a frantic circle. “Very funny guys. Come out Remus, you bitch.” No response other than the wind rustling through the leaves. Virgil laughed nervously. “You’ve had your fun. Come on.” Nothing.

     He was in the middle of the woods with no way of knowing how to get out or find help, and they weren’t here with him. 

     He fumbled around to find his hoodie to calm his rapidly increasing panic and felt nothing. A glance down at himself had him on the verge of laughing hysterically, for he was wearing a rich purple dress that nearly reached the ground. He felt behind his back and found, to his relief, a hood, so at least Roman wasn’t completely cruel. Sure the tight laces were hell, as were the sleeves that reached down to his legs, but as long as he could smoother himself in fabric, he could calm down. He tried to remember the exercises Logan had taught him: 4-7-8 and counting with all of his senses. Eventually, his breathing slowed and he removed his hood.

     The world seemed a little less scary now. He’d noticed birds chirping amongst the treetops, the sun filtered down nicely, and he was sure that whatever reason he had been brought here was important. 

    He was sitting on the ground, back pressed up against a tree, though he couldn’t quite remember doing that. He stood up, trying to get a sense of his surroundings. For one, he was in a forest— wow great job, Virgil. Figure that one out all by yourself?— and secondly… Well, he had nothing. Just trees. Looks like he was picking a direction and going with it in the hopes he’d find Roman… somehow.

     He hadn’t been walking very long when he spotted a vaguely familiar cottage. It wasn’t big enough to be from Sleeping Beauty, so… Really? Snow White? Was this because I said I liked the Evil Queen’s aesthetic once? He shrugged and pushed the door open. That was when he heard someone upstairs, and for a moment he felt relieved to not have to be alone, but that quickly changed when he realized whoever it was was crying. His eyes went wide. 

     Roman.

     Virgil dashed up the stairs as fast as his gown would let him, practically throwing open the door, and he nearly cried upon seeing the person he’d been looking for. “Roman!” Virgil called out. Roman looked up from where he was bunched up on the bed. Virgil moved over to the bed to try and hug him, but Roman shrugged him off. “Roman?”

     This wasn’t like him. This was bad. 

     “Why won’t you leave me alone?” Roman whimpered quietly, fresh tears running down his face. “I just want to be left alone.”

     “Roman, what are you talking about?” Virgil sat next to him, but Roman scooted away and put his face back down to his knees. 

     “I get it!” Roman said loudly out of nowhere. “You’re all just the nicest people in the fucking world and you’re just trying to let me down easy. Just leave me alone!” The window next to them shattered.

     “Roman. Roman, listen to me.” Virgil tried to keep his voice steady. As much as he wanted to hug Roman, he knew that when he was feeling this way he hated being touched, so he kept his distance. “This is all in your head. Trust me, as the literal personification of anxiety, I should know. You’re lying to yourself.” 

     Roman turned his back to him, facing the headboard that rested against the wall to the left of the window, his breath coming in heavier and more panicked. 

     “You don’t know that!”

     “I do. I swear I do.” Virgil was crying now. Roman was scaring him, and everything in Virgil cried out to ease the insurmountable amount of pain he was in. The wind roared through the broken window, sending pillows and sheets flying. He longed to run and hide until this was all over, but that other, stronger part of him prevailed. He was essentially Thomas’ fight or flight instinct, and he was determined to fight for Roman.

     “I… do.” Everything in the room became crystal clear to Virgil in that moment. His eyes settled on a single shiny red apple just past the bedpost, still among the spinning wreckage that threatened to cut his skin to ribbons. Not a thing touched him when he stood, walking a path to the fruit, and when he reached it there was no going back. 

     He had to have it. 

     As if in a trance, his lithe, pale fingers wrapped around its round form. 

     He pressed his mouth against it.

     “Virgil?”

     Then its sweet juice was filling his mouth. 

***

     Roman’s brow furrowed against his knees as he heard Virgil trail off then fall silent. He brought his head up with a soft, “Virgil?” and when there was no response he turned around on the bed out of curiosity, only to freeze in horror at what he saw. He swore all the breath left his lungs. 

     It was too late. 

     Virgil’s teeth were already sinking into it, and Roman felt helpless as he watched in shock, the bedding and glass crashing down around them. 

      The next thing to hit the ground was the apple, a sort of dull thud against the wooden floor, then Virgil came down with it, and with a sickening gasp, Roman lunged. Yet again, it was too late. The sound of Virgil’s head hitting the ground echoed throughout the cottage.

     “No. No, no, no, no, no.” Roman repeated that single word over and over again, dropping to his knees and scooping Virgil’s limp form up into his lap. 

     This was his fault. His fault, his fault, his fault. He was supposed to be the hero. But he wasn’t a hero. He was a coward, running away, always making the wrong choice and hurting the people he loved, and it wasn’t like Virgil was the first victim of his recklessness. How could they love someone like that?

     The truth was… they couldn’t, but he had to try. 

     Hurriedly, he kissed Virgil, begging for that true love’s kiss he always believed in to break the curse that he’d unwittingly set in motion through his anger. Nothing happened. He tried again and again, but Virgil didn’t wake up. Didn’t breathe. “Virgil! Virgil please wake up!” Roman shook him, but his head only lolled. “Virgil, wake up. Please. Please.” Roman dissolved into tears, hugging Virgil close, rocking back and forth. He’d known all along that he wasn’t Virgil’s true love, but finding out by putting Virgil into a curse he couldn’t break was by far the worst way to have done so.

     Minutes passed by with Roman desperately clinging to the one he loved. 

     In those eternal minutes, Virgil didn’t move, and where Roman had once been able to warm him up, his skin stayed as cold as porcelain. The only thing that kept Roman from giving up entirely was the fact that there was still a steady pulse to be felt in his neck beneath the cold, lifeless guise the curse blanketed him in. He gave him one last squeeze and firmly pressed their foreheads together. 

     Roman carefully lifted Virgil onto the bed, only now noticing how breathtaking he would have been in the long, draping fabric and rich purple were he still awake, and he crossed his arms before wiping the tears from his face. He even conjured a bouquet of white poppies to place in Virgil’s clasped hands. The simple conjuring took every ounce of his willpower and energy, and he sobbed his heart out all the while. Then he pressed one final kiss to Virgil’s forehead with a vain hope that this kiss would somehow work. 

     “I’ll make this right. I swear.” 

     He had to find Janus.

Fun fact! White poppies symbolize eternal sleep, oblivion, imagination, consolation, dreams, and peace. Yes, I did in fact spend 10 minutes looking up the meanings of various plants.

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@cuter-on-the-inside @abbyisconfused @n4o5r7a9 @omni-hamiltrash   @fandomsofrandom @t0astyt0es @withspaces @anyelram841 @yep-another-fander @strangecreatureyoucantidentify @fandom-trash-304 @chelsvans @nomejodasb @iampengwing @neonb-fly @analogical-mess @midnight-tragedyy @idosanderssidespromptssometimes @athenashipsthings @thgjclw @littleladynightshade @casuallyimpossibledream @hekking-happy-nonsense @comicsimpson @slutforketchup @sandersidess @i-need-you-buddy @witchyvirgil @ghosttb0y @pixelatedrose @emilightniing @csi-baker-street-babes @iwillsithereandtrytocontribute @spooky-scary-virgil @justanothernerdyfandomblog @phantomfantasize @panicattheeveywhere @hedgiehoggles @i-really-like-dragons @youre-lazy-and-youre-gay0-0 @crabsncrabs @gattonero17 @dragonleesupporter @lokiamorstuffs @emo--nightmaree @anotherbisexualbooklover @7-slights-at-virgil @romanvirgil @croftersjam15 @underthesea73

[seyaryminamoto]

I feel like i'm gonna regret asking this but what is hiby

Oh. Ohohoho, oh. I recently answered this to someone else (not on this blog), I suppose there are so many newcomers in this fandom lately that HIBY has become slightly less known than it used to be.

HIBY stands for How I Became Yours, the most polemic and catastrophic fancomic in the history of the Avatar franchise. If you thought any of the official comics were problematic in any sense, woah boy, they’re goddamn flawless masterpieces compared to this thing.

Every possible angle of HIBY is problematic. Spot-on accusations of tracing were the main reason why Deviantart took down Jackie Diaz’s profile and comic from their platform. I heard Nickelodeon also got involved legally, not 100% sure on that front, but if true, they cracked down on her because she attempted to profit off this clunky mess of an inconsistent story by claiming it was somehow an official sequel to ATLA. To clarify, this last thing is something I was told, I can’t find actual sources to confirm it… so maybe I heard an exaggerated account of the tale of HIBY and it never went that far. Nevertheless, this comic didn’t need to escalate into a legal problem to be absolutely abhorrent.

In regards of art, HIBY somehow keeps discarding the asian-inspired setting seen throughout ATLA and instead favors showing the characters in European castles and outfits that don’t fit anywhere within ATLA’s world at all:

Katara is basically wearing a red version of Belle’s dress from Beauty and the Beast, if I’m not mistaken. The architecture of the place they’re at is so European it’s baffling (if I’m not mistaken, this is supposed to be Toph’s family’s house :’D). Also, it’s blatantly obvious that the background is a photograph, so she could’ve just as easily looked for photos of asian locations instead, but she picked european architecture because yes. Yet more blows against the possible artistic merits someone could offer this comic (if there’s any).

Now, though, the BIGGEST problem in HIBY is, of course, the story:

To recap: ATLA ends with Aang and Katara kissing at Ba Sing Se. Whatever problems someone may have with their relationship, or Mai and Zuko’s, or Sokka and Suki’s, it’s unquestionable that those three ships were canon by the end of the show.

Jackie Diaz’s SEQUEL COMIC doesn’t acknowledge this finale: somehow, Aang is in love with Toph but they’re not together despite there’s literally NOTHING in their way, since Aang and Katara weren’t together at all, according to Diaz. And Katara? Oh, she’s pining endlessly over Zuko, who somehow married Mai…

… Despite wanting Katara too.

… Despite he literally knocked up Katara back when the war was ending, which resulted in a miscarriage because of Mai’s wicked schemes~~!!

Can someone please explain to me in what world does it make sense for Zuko, FIRE LORD ZUKO, to be in a relationship with someone he doesn’t want, when the person he does want is RIGHT THERE, AVAILABLE, when there’s no real political consequences to ANYTHING that happens in this comic? You could say “oh no the Fire Nation people wouldn’t accept a Water Tribe woman…” … but then Zuko ends up with Katara anyways and the only problem is that Mai wants to kill them for that :’) so… no excuse works.

Basically there’s no real plot, the whole thing boils down to “I want these ships to happen and I need them to face hardships even if they don’t make sense”. The main hardship is that Mai doesn’t want her HUSBAND to carry out an affair with Katara. Zuko’s response to Mai’s obvious and reasonable complaint about their illicit relationship is to TURN VIOLENT WITH HER. And he’s the good guy :’)

Mai has a non-existent older brother Sho, who looks like a BLEACH character with Ozai’s hairstyle, and together they will try to kill Katara because, welp, someone has to give them trouble, I guess. In all fairness, the only character with a relatively logical flow of thought in this damn trainwreck is Mai. I mean, “my piece of shit husband married me for political clout, got his mistress pregnant, I didn’t want the kid to be a problem for me so I induced a miscarriage in Katara by poisoning her, probs just wanted Katara dead altogether but whatever, I only got the kid. Then Zuko threw me away despite I’m his legal wife and I’m really pissed about it so I want Katara dead” is the smartest writing in this entire comic. And no, that’s not a compliment, it’s still stupid as fuck but that’s how much more stupid everything else is. 

So, the happy couples are, like I said, Zuko and Katara, who get together despite Zuko is married to Mai, Aang and Toph, who somehow weren’t together despite there’s nothing in the way, AAAND… 

… Sokka and fake!Azula. Because I refuse to acknowledge that thing as the Princess we all love and adore.

Frankly, I consider it a miracle that HIBY didn’t destroy our ship completely when it was posted online, seeing as it was amongst the most talked-about fanmade content in Avatar’s fandom at the time. If people no longer associate Sokkla with HIBY immediately, we’ve definitely done a good job saving our poor ship’s face and showing it’s got a fuckton of potential compared to the shitfest that comic portrayed.

Why is Sokkla so problematic in HIBY? Because of fake!Azula, of course. Why is she fake!Azula? Because she’s got plot-convenient amnesia! Turns out that, for some reason, Azula forgot all the events from ATLA (let’s be real, so did Jackie Diaz so it’s not just her) and she shows up in this comic as a completely different character, so much that, upon hearing about the TERRIBLE THINGS SHE DID AND WAS, her reaction is…:

Fascinating, am I right? :’D She’s nice, sweet, shy and as good as brain-dead. And as she’s so sweet and cute now, somehow that becomes absolutely appealing for Sokka. And he falls for her, she falls for him, they bang dramatically, and so on and so forth…

Eventually Azula sacrifices herself in the final battle when Mai and her brother try to kill everyone and oh no! Sokka’s love interest dies again! Such a shocker, however, that Sokka goes to the Spirit World to save her, and unlike Iroh he succeeds… but what does Azula look like post-Spirit World shenanigans?

… Yeah, okay, fake!Azula calling anyone her “little angels” is just proof of how IC she is, if you had any doubts still.

But isn’t it FUNNY. Isn’t it HILARIOUS. That Azula not only undergoes an atom-deep brainwipe that turns her into a flat non-character, but that after dying she’s revived with WHITE HAIR, dressed in blue clothes and whatnot…?

My interpretation, and honestly, I don’t know if there’s any other possible interpretation… Jackie Diaz wanted Sokka to be with Yue :’) She fucking wrecked Azula’s character to turn her into a fake!Azula, who would eventually turn into fake!Yue after being resurrected because oh that’s just perfect to close off Sokka’s storyline, isn’t it? Only, he’s not with Yue nor with Azula because it’s neither of them. Just as it isn’t really Sokka either, or Katara, or Zuko or Aang or Toph.

Now, revisiting this trainwreck, there is a throwaway line where Ty Lee, in her (I think) only appearance in the story tells Katara that Suki and Sokka broke up. So um, Suki does exist, officially, in this comic, and she did date Sokka but it ended, and she’s back in Kyoshi Island with her team. 

Which elicits the question… why the fuck is she Mai’s maid?

I assure you, if you decide to delve deeper into this mess, you’ll absolutely find a lot more things to laugh about, to be outraged about, and to facepalm about while you wonder how on earth would someone, ANYONE, create something like this and not die of cringe looking at the finished product. It’s baffling to me.

At any rate, if you’d like to torture your own eyeballs reading this comic for yourself, there’s a Tumblr blog that gathered HIBY perfectly neatly for all curious eyes eager to torture themselves with this OOC fest. If you want more details than I care to remember about this catastrophic mess of a story, there’s always the TV Tropes page, which I think illustrates everything rather well. 

So… that’s HIBY. While I don’t think it should be sentenced to oblivion (we had best never forget the lowest lows the fandom has reached, else someone might be tempted to outdo them), this particular fanwork is quite the trainwreck in just about every regard. I really don’t think there’s anything worth salvaging in it. So, if you wanna read the whole thing (I’d be surprised if you would xD), knock yourself out in the blog link I posted up there. Otherwise, have a nice day if you still can after reading my answer to your ask :’D

[angel-deux-writes]

Now that Honor Compels Me is finally done, I wanted to do a round-up of all the things I remember that made me say “I feel like I need to tell someone what almost happened here” or “I should probably explain this later lol”, along with my reasons for cutting the last few chapters/what would have happened in them. It’s prob going to be very long, which I apologize for, but I’ll bold the headings so that you can skip to the parts you’re interested in!

I’ll reblog it and add more as I think of them, but for now: 

Dark Dany: VERY originally, like way back in the OG plotline from 2017, Dany was an antagonist, and Margaery Tyrell was Robb’s queen. Dany would have died fighting Cersei in Kings Landing, with the same result (Cersei was ALWAYS going to go out by wildfire lmao). I changed it both because a) it seemed like too many Conveniently Alive people for one story and b) after the shitty ending Dany got, I decided I would try my hand at writing a Dany I could actually root for! For years I’ve been a big proponent/fan of the idea that Dany is eventually going to be an antagonist in the books, but the way it was handled in the show was so irredeemably stupid (gassing her up and gaslighting/scolding her fans later who didn’t see it coming, making her switch at the drop of a hat for the majority of the general audience just for the sake of a twist, etc). I ended up really loving the version of Dany I created. I tried not to soften her TOO much, which is why I had her wrestle with herself even up to the very end (like thinking “I won” after the explosion in Kings Landing and hating herself for it). I didn’t want all the flaws that make me not support canon Dany to disappear just because I started to like her! I do think that writing this story made me like Dany more overall. I still don’t support her canon actions, and I also probably won’t in the books, but I came to find her more compelling as I wrote her. I’m a lot less afraid to write her now than I have been in the past, though I’ll continue to add warnings to all my stories that feature Dark Dany, bc yall Dany stans have been through enough. 

More Death: At various points Dany, Theon, Bran, and Arya were going to die. 

Dany was already pointed out. 

I had Theon die in the Long Night in the plot outline just out of laziness/in keeping with canon, until I remembered that Redemption = Death is stupid and I wasn’t gonna do it. 

Bran was going to die after warging into Drogon and being caught in the explosion of the Red Keep. That actually stayed in until a few weeks ago! I told a bunch of people that Bran was going to die! It was the plan all along! And then I realized that “somebody has to die” was a shitty way of looking at it, and I changed it. I think a lot of this process of changing things was me trying to write what I thought people wanted vs what story I actually wanted to tell. Sure it’s a little fairy tale ending this way, but it’s my story, and who cares? Happy endings are nice. Fuck off. 

Arya...I probably wouldn’t have ever actually gone through with it, because I am a coward, but there was an idea of a VERY heavy-handed “revenge is bad” message with Arya where Arya was much more savage and instead of turning back into Arya, she was turning farther and farther away from her. She couldn’t reconcile with the Lannisters, she rejected her bonds with her family. In the end she would be unable to let go of her list, would refuse to grow and change and realize that she had other things to live for, and she would have set off one of Qyburn’s traps in the Red Keep, igniting the whole thing, killing Drogon and Rhaegal (and Bran) and leading to the deaths of thousands. AGAIN I was like “that’s too dark” and scrapped the idea, but it was definitely toyed with. I love Arya as a character, so this plotline for her would have definitely been more a reaction to fans of her who seem to want her to hold on to that vengeful seed inside of her. 

Prophecies: Listen, I do not give a fuck about any prophecies. I really don’t. Every fantasy universe has some kind of involved backstory that some fans love to get mired in, but I am not one of those fans. Still, I tried to deliver on two of them lmao. 

Azor Ahai ended up being Jaime, with Ice/Oathkeeper and Maiden’s Heart being Lightbringer. Originally, I had Brienne killing the Night King, without any thought to the prophecy at all, but that was another case of “people will like it if Brienne kills the Night King” and I realized that I would like it better if it was Jaime. I’m not sure how it checks out literally, but I figured it worked with a) tempering in water = splitting Ice. b) heart of a lion = Jaime’s change of heart after the Highgarden Battle. c) Nissa Nissa = Brienne’s “maiden’s heart” breaking during the Highgarden Battle. It was Brienne who did the stabbing, but it was Jaime who made it happen, so I figured that made sense. I made sure to mention Brienne’s tears and all the smoke when Jaime was wounded, so he could be “reborn amidst salt and smoke” or whatever, and I had Bran mention a rebirth for him in the next chapter. Which was maybe a little on the nose, but IDK GUYS I FEEL LIKE IT CHECKS OUT! 

I know the show never dove into the Valonqar prophecy at all, and I think we all know that I absolutely HATE the idea of Jaime being the Valonqar, so I would rather not think about it AT ALL. But Bran AND Rhaegal were both kind of responsible for Cersei’s death in the end, so take your pick of which Little Brother actually did the deed! 

Deleted Chapters: I promise you, you are not missing anything with these deleted chapters. They were always messy, and no matter how many times I edited them, they felt too forced and “now let me explain the ending”. 

Sansa: Sansa’s chapter followed Jaime’s and was primarily about her going to Robb and Dany and the three of them talking about the future of Westeros. The Dany/Robb conversation about it was originally absent--the last Robb chapter was added to fill in the gaps when I deleted this and the other chapters--so this would have been the first time it was discussed. It then would have had a time jump and a wedding scene, which I could never make work! It was such a jarring time jump in the middle of a chapter, and I didn’t think the wedding was particularly exciting to write about lmao. 

Tyrion: Tyrion’s chapter would have been Dany being crowned and announcing to everyone that she and her people are going to be dismantling the monarchy and setting up a new government. I think I had her give a period of a few years in which she and Robb would rule, but they were going to be transitioning governments in that time. Kind of the same idea as in What a King Should Look Like. Bronn also showed up, DID in fact get a minor holdfast, and was mocked by both Lannisters for bowing out before he could have earned himself a better one. Olenna found some bastard daughter to legitimize and continue her house.

Brienne: Brienne’s arc was a lot more drawn out in the original draft, and I ended up editing it a few times and making it shorter. VERY originally, this chapter would have been her wedding with Jaime, at which she has the “wow he actually loves me, huh?” realization. Which I thought was funny as I plotted it out, but in execution it wasn’t as good as I wanted it to be, so I moved the realization to an earlier chapter. The original was also going to be Jaime giving up his name entirely, and Brienne cloaking him, but as we have discussed before, I am in fact a coward, so I just deleted the whole chapter lmao. In all seriousness, at this point the endings just felt like Return of the King, and Into the West was actually the chosen song for this chapter, because I knew even as I was writing it that I was doing Too Much lmao. 

Robb: Robb’s last chapter was essentially just a total wrap up chapter. Just Robb and Dany being sappy, Robb being happy he was still alive, and the two of them planning the future. They were at Riverrun for this part, i’m pretty sure, or it might have been Dragonstone? I had trouble even filling this chapter with enough words for it to be a full chapter, because it was basically just an epilogue. As the story progressed, this chapter felt more and more like I was just performing to the “Robb’s Alive” crowd, which I didn’t particularly want to do, because Robb being alive was always a feature, not the focus, of this story. 

That’s all the stuff I can think of for now! If anyone has any particular questions you can message me or inbox me about them and I’d be happy to talk about it! 

[phoebehalliwell]

Yo imagine Wyatt being raised by the cleaners and coming back as an adult but time moves differently in the void (idk where they live) and it’s only been a few minutes. THE DRAMA tm I mean imagine Piper’s outrage! It could encompass a whole freaking season!! And then just because I’m a sucker for Phoebe’s baby living, like they could have stolen this child too! Twice!Blessed Wyatt & Source!Touched Dency as Cleaner siblings 👀

i feel like this would be like the Quintessential like network tv drama move tho like bc like. child actors? who wants em? they’re not that good, there are a whole bunch of rules about how long they can be on set for, you gotta bend over backwards trying to film a scene of theme fighting a demon w/o actually having them be in the room with said demon bc they get scared. bc they’re a child. when instead of having a child actors,,, you could have a grown human actor. amirite lads? i feel like this is definitely like a thing i swear they did this on ouat with belle and rumplestiltskin’s baby bc like. who wants a baby as a character when you can get the abc equivalent of kylo ren i guess? like who wants a baby wyatt when you could have a full grown adult wyatt who is still trying to get a hang of being in a human world bc he’s grown up in like. a void. and i Love the idea of dency being with him too especially bc i think they would form this sibling bond without ever actually know that they’re cousins (bc i don’t think the cleaners would like tell them of their lineage) and i also think powers are like augmented in the void i think both of these kids powers would be dampened probs like to that or a normal witch (and the cleaners would know any better bc uhh quite frankly they don’t host witches very often) so once dency and wyatt go out into the real world and find out they have like powers like a god that’s also gonna be a trip. i also think it’d be like inch resting bc i think obvi dency and wyatt would be drawn to the manor in one fashion or another bc well a) the plot needs it but b) it’s like their ancestral home it’s the nexus they feel the pull and the charmed ones would like equally feel this connection to wyatt and dency bc like you know That’s Their Children but they don’t know that. bc like piper’s been wiped of the idea of wyatt but it’s still something that you know she always mulls over that feeling when you lose a tooth and you can’t help but poke and prod at the lil vacancy where it once was and i think she feels like this really strong connection to wyatt bc she’s like if i had a son i would want him to be like you and i think like the more time she and wyatt spend around each other the more she’d really get echoes of y’know having wyatt but she just thinks they’re like he mind constructing fantasies of what it would have been like to have a kid besides wyatt’s like twentysomething so clearly like they can’t be related but like They Feel Related but it’s probs just the fact that she regrets never having kids latching onto her. leo will occasionally pop in but he doesn’t like spending time around wyatt something about him like puts leo in pain and he can’t figure out why so he thinks it’s just like Instincts and he goes to do some like digging into exactly who this dude is meanwhile piper’s been having this whole crisis about the fact that she never had kids blah blah blah which is specifically dredging up memories for phoebe about her own pregnancy that only last like two months but was still like a very formative time for her (the cleaners got a hold of dency when the source/seer/whatever was vanquished and the found the essence of the sources heir left still imbued with the power of the source of all evil and a charmed one and then went zoinks shouldn’t leave that just lying around that’s way too much power and it’s definitely not be used responsible we’re gonna take this back to The Void™ just to make sure it doesn’t go haywire well much to their surprise within a couple months that essence has now taken the form of a Human Child and they’re like a child but y’know they can’t Kill It because then it’s just release the essence in a less tangible form (also it’s a baby) so they’re like word well okay what if like we raised the kids and another cleaner is like what and the first cleaner is like okay well the whole reason we brought the essence back was so that it didn’t go haywire and destroy everything and make our jobs all a lot more difficult so like what if we raised the kids and taught them the ways of the cleaners! and cleaner two is like what ew no let’s just trap it in a giant ice cube and call it a day and the eldest cleaner is like no cleaner one is onto something so blah blah blah by the time they have to vanish wyatt and entire baby they’re like hey we’ve got another one now we can give dency a sibling!) so like blah blah blah (oh also fun fact in this au dency has the same haircut as the cleaners) and phoebe’s just sorta like she feels like the has this connection to dency but she thinks it’s just cuz she’s like a young witch who like loves her powers and like has a close bond with her sibling and phoebe just thinks she sees herself in dency blah blah blah oh cole’s spirit who is like fuckin creepin around the house or whatever in a very disturbing manner Also Sees Dency and is like hey. hey what’s up with that. blah blah blah leo has done his digging and confronts wyatt like why don’t you exist and wyatt’s like what and leo’s all like aggressive & upset bc he’s trying to protect his family and wyatt’s just like really confused like i was raised in a void with my sister?? like normal people???? and blah blah blah dency gets involved which gets phoebe involved and then piper’s showing up like what’s all this then and leo’s like accusing wyatt of lying and saying like the two of them are trying to infiltrate the family and get closed to the charmed ones to like you know learn magic straight out of the book of shadows something or others and then the cleaners themselves actually show up like okay kids this was fun and all but like it’s time to pack it up like let’s go home and like dency and wyatt are both like hey no we like being like here we like being out in the real world and the cleaners are like okay but you have to think of what’s best the real world just isn’t safe for you you’re too powerful to ever fit it you’ll always be ostracized and made out to be villains it’s better with us it’s safe with us just come home and like you know now paige has also shown up and the charmed ones are like who the hell are you and leo’s like what the actual fuck is going on right now Are Those Cleaners and wyatt and dency are like standing strong with each other and they’re like we can live here we can be safe here like please just give us another chance and the cleaners are like i’m sorry we can’t it’s just too dangerous and wyatt’s like i’m not letting you take me away again! and dency’s like again? and piper’s like yeah again? and phoebe and paige are like what does that mean? and like the gears are turning in leo’s head and like for once he really leans into the emotions that sorta y’know know double double toil and trouble underneath the surface whenever he’s around wyatt bc he always ran from them, they were painful and he figured it was because wyatt was well like evil but now he’s not running and he’s leaning into it and really trying to figure out what he feels and it’s this insane loss and fear and longing but underneath that is like joy and elation and absolute happiness and unconditional love and he remember the time wyatt was born meanwhile phoebe the empath has basically been knocked off her feet with the tidal wave of raw emotion that just shot out from leo and she has the same realization and leo’s like I’m Not Letting You Take My Son Again. and wyatt’s like what and piper’s like what and phoebe like also takes a stand and she’s like dency and wyatt are our family. and you can’t take them. and wyatt and dency are looking at each other like ????? but they’re like game they don’t want to leave and the cleaners are like you know what no No absolutely not and they take dency and wyatt and they wipe the halliwells’ memories and fuck off back into the void but now the ball is rolling and dency and wyatt are like no who are we who were they that was our family and the cleaners are like you don’t have family and dency and wyatt are like that’s not true and you know it and wyatt like piper’s my mother isn’t she and the cleaners are like don’t ask stupid questions and wyatt’s like she is!! i knew it! i fucking knew it!!! and dency sorta sitting there and she’ll totally you know go to bat for wyatt and she believes the halliwells are her family but she just doesn’t feel this connection wyatt has like wyatt Knows piper’s his mother but dency doesn’t feel the same way. she doesn’t have the same connection that like wyatt has. but blah blah blah they aren’t able to argue long bc they’ve sense a shift in the void meaning someone’s out there exposing magic and they go and it’s the charmed ones fucking up things and the cleaners are like word we can get rid of you too and wyatt’s like if you do i’ll go & destroy everything and paige is like yeah love the energy not actually necessary bc you guys aren’t allowed to get rid of us bc well not to flex but we’re the charmed ones and the cleaners are like yeah big whoop and phoebe’s like how familiar are you with the cosmic balance and the cleaners are like . and phoebe’s like yeah though so and paige is like you can’t kill us without drastically tipping the scales. and the cleaners are like fine what do you want and they’re like we want dency and wyatt and the cleaners are like well shouldn’t it be their choice whether or not they want to go with you and the charmed ones are like fine ask them i’m not worried and wyatt’s like i’m going with the halliwells period end statement but then like cleaner one the initial cleaner who was like let’s care and raise dency is like talking to her like please. it’s safer with you here. wyatt feels his connection with them. what do you feel? we raised you, we care for you, we love you, we want to see you safe. we’re your family. and dency’s just like who am i. and the cleaner’s like nothing they would like. and dency’s like that doesn’t answer my question. and the cleaners are like you’re the source’s heir. and the charmed ones are like She’s The What. and dency’s like i’m what. and the cleaners are like you are the daughter of the source of all evil. you are the epitome of power and destruction. but we can keep you safe, we can keep you from hurting anyone. and phoebe’s like are you gonna tell her the rest. and dency’s like tell me what. and phoebe’s like you may be the daughter of the source of all evil. you’re also the daughter of a charmed one. you’re my daughter. and dency’s like What. The Fuck. and the cleaners are like oh don’t be so generous you carried her for all of two months she is not your daughter and dency’s like What. The Fuck. and like paige and piper and in the background and like the gears are turning in their heads like cole’s kid??? and the cleaners are like when we found you you were barely an essence all that was left over from a brutal vanquish and dency’s like WHAT. THE FUCK. and phoebe’s like you took my kid from me! and the cleaners are like you vanquished her! and phoebe’s like we vanquished the seer! we stopped the source of all evil! and it cost me my child don’t you dare say i did this to her and dency’s like you know what actually no and she flames out and piper’s like well i guess you have your decision feel free to get the fuck out of my attic now and the cleaners are like like you guys are assholes and there’s a reason we let prue die 😗✌ and dip and piper’s like if a see another cleaner ever again i’m gonna vanquish that motherfucker So Quick he won’t even have time to ruin yet another one of my family photos. blah blah blah wyatt’s like At Home he’s reunited with his family and they’re so happy to have him back and piper’s like let me cook you a really nice dinner the last time i cooked for you it was just pureed carrots i’m hoping you’re palate’s gotten a little more refined and wyatt’s like thanks mom that really means a lot but i can’t stay here i can’t turn my back on dency she was my family before i even knew i had one i have to go find her so of course the let him go blah blah blah he finds dency blah blah blah heart to heart blah blah blah they all reunite blah blah blah happy ending : )

[jjkfire]

i miss writing so much! read through some of my yet to be finished updates and i just want to have the time to finish them ): anyway tldr is life has been crazy but uhh happy early lunar new year! here’s a short preview of navy... a rather big scene which i think is funny in its own way lol. there’s no context because it’s a snippet but imagine this fight actually playing out... as in have you ever fought with someone and when it’s all over you’re like that was stupidly hilarious! yes, that’s the mood for this one aha. also will probs delete this later because i am posting on impulse lmao

“Huh, so that’s why they went unanswered?” Jungkook asks, but he isn’t exactly expecting a reply because the whole situation was just insanely ridiculous to him. There’s a beat of silence, maybe two and then he just bursts out into sudden laughter. Nobody says anything as he guffaws to himself with his eyes shut because for some reason, his laughter is terrifying. It’s loud, almost forced and quite honestly, you’re scared.

“This is just too funny,” He shakes his head before he cards his fingers through his hair in frustration. “So, all this time my letters were— a-and all these years— I mean all of this is just too funny.”

He’s not completing his sentences and you don’t understand why. He says it’s funny but he’s quite obviously angry. No, not just angry but furious. You’ve never seen him like this in all the years you’ve known him.

“What… what letters?” You manage to ask, and at that Jungkook just laughs through his nose, once again shaking his head.

The room is silent and it feels like you’re the only one who isn’t in on the joke. Though, the joke seems to be a very terrible one considering everyone has some sort of uncomfortable look on their face.

“I sent you letters when I moved to Seoul. If I remember correctly, five of them—”

“Six, actually,” Your mother mumbles but Jungkook’s piercing gaze tells her she shouldn’t speak anymore.

“I sent you six letters,” He emphasizes the number. “You didn’t send me any emails so I sent you letters hoping you would—"

“What are you talking about? I sent you emails! You didn’t reply to any of them.”

“Come on, Y/N. You never sent me anything.” He says it rather nonchalantly, but it sounds like an accusation to you. Oh, now you were furious too.

“I did! I sent it to kookster and you never replied!” You grumble, the anger you’ve been holding in all these years spilling out. “k-o-o-k-s-t-e-r was your email and I sent you dozens of them and you never replied!” You shout, hands balled into fists as you spelled out his childhood email account.

“That isn’t my email and you know it!” He shouts in return. “You sent that song to my email so don’t even try to weasel your way out of this one.”

“Yeah, I sent that song to the kookster email so what are you—”

“There’s a z! kooksterz, with a z!” He interrupts, now his hands busy with his phone as he furiously scrolls through his email. “Y/N, you know this. Look, if you want to lie at least try to be convincing, won’t you?” He asks, while he slams his phone on the table, his finger shaking with anger as he points to the email address on the top.

You hear a muffled laugh from one of the ladies and although you were angry, you almost felt like laughing too. This whole situation seemed ridiculous.

“This isn’t… I mean I— I swear,” You squint at the email with eyebrows pinched together in confusion. It’s the one you sent with the busanbeats account you had made on a whim. It was addressed to kooksterz, that is with a z as Jungkook has reiterated and you didn’t understand how because— oh wait. You bolt upright the moment it hits you. It was all coming back to you, the shattered pieces of your drunken memory.

That night you had downed multiple bottles of soju and when you finished up the song you deliberated if there was a z in Jungkook’s email. At the time, you couldn’t quite remember what his email was but it just seemed very likely that Jungkook would’ve added the z given that it had been in trend to do that when the two of you were kids, and so that’s what you went with.

Why then were you so adamant back when you were a teen that his email was— oh, you remember now.

“Y-your mother. I asked her back then if I had your email right. She said it was right. K-o-o-k-s-t-e-r, no z…”

“Wait—” His mother panics, hands flailing in the air. “Don’t drag me into this I… I wouldn’t have lied! I had no reason to! I just reiterated to you what he told me on the phone. I must have it written down somewhere in our old phone book.”

“But Jungkook I—”

The chair screeches when Jungkook rises to his feet. The arguing ceases as he pockets his phone and smooths down the front of his shirt.

“This is just— I mean, this is hilarious!” He exclaims, shaking his head. It was all he seemed to be able to do in response to all that he had heard. “I need to take a walk,” He finally says after he takes a final look around the room.

Just like that, he was gone and you were left sitting there, dumbfounded. It was just so much to take in and all you could do was laugh to yourself. Your mother, Jungkook’s mother and all the ladies were talking over each other, trying to explain it all to you but, you couldn’t seem to process any of it.

“I’m uhh, I’m going to go check on Jungkook,” You say suddenly before you got out of your seat, in a quieter manner compared to Jungkook and with a few steps, you were out the front door.

//

and before you think it’s like cliche just you wait lol. this next part, it ends before it gets there but if you’re asian... do you know typical aunty behaviour? that’s what happened. like all the aunties will gather and they will all share one braincell.

//

The first time your mother saw the letter in the mailbox, she thought it had come from her rather eccentric cousin from Seoul. When you were young, you were the only one who would listen to his weird stories. Uncle Fancy, was the nickname you had decided on and he loved it. It was some sort of bond the two of you had and who was your mother to stop that. Every once in a while, he would send lengthy letters from Seoul with a few pictures attached. They were never regular photos, they were rather avant-garde. Some of them bordered on nudity, other times drug use was involved. He wanted to tell real stories through pictures he had said. Your mother obviously wasn’t pleased with this. He also had godawful handwriting. She was not quite sure how the mailman could ever decipher the address he wrote on the front. So, when she saw that rather thick envelope in the mail addressed to you with rather terrible handwriting on the front, she just called out saying “Uncle Fancy sent you a letter.” You grimaced upon hearing that. The last letter he sent quite honestly scared you a little. The pictures were weird, the stories he wrote even weirder. You weren’t quite sure you wanted to subject yourself to that again. “Umm, you can throw it out…” You mumble. “If he asks, just tell him we never got it… please?” Your mother agrees to that, simply placing it in the drawer for the time being before she threw it out.

But, then came another, and a week later, another. It was weird. He never usually sent so many. He said his photography was a work of art, that it took time. It was so odd that he was sending letters so frequently. When the fifth one came in, curiosity got the better of her and she finds herself opening up the letter.

Dear Y/N,

It’s Jungkook! Maybe my other letters got lost in the mail—

 Dear Y/N,

 Oh my god. Your mother panics. Pulling the drawer open with such force that it almost comes out. She opens one of the old letters.

Jungkook here! I —

Your mother gasps, quickly ripping the next letter open

Dear Y/N,

Hello! This is Jungkook

Oh god, oh god, oh god. This next letter, it can’t—

Dear Y/N,

Jungkook ag—

 She stuffs all the letters into the drawer at the sound of someone coming down the stairs. Oh my god, is all she can think.

By now, you’ve openly ranted about how much you hated the boy. You didn’t even want your mother to say his name in the house. So, when she tried to bring up the letters, you wouldn’t even let her complete the sentence. She started the sentence with Jungkook and that’s as far as she got. It seemed like you had a separate fight with him. You were shouting on the phone just the other day and she pretty much thought it was Jungkook you were talking to. Nobody else ever got to your emotions the way the boy did. Perhaps you had a crush on him or that he was your best friend and you felt abandoned, your mother couldn’t really tell. All she knew was that you really hated him now. So, she keeps those letters in the drawer, unsure what to do with them. Perhaps, she’ll bring them up again once you’ve calmed down.

[feisty-fae]

If you still do the flower ask thingys.. 👉👈 𝘼𝙡𝙡 𝙤𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙢 𝙜𝙤 :)

HoooH boY hEre we gO-

Alisons: Sexuality?

I sexually identify as a can of beans

Amaranth: Pronouns/Gender?

Cis female she/her

Amaryllis: Birthday?

27 September

Anemone: Favorite flower?

All flowers pretty,, but stargazer lily, rose, dahlia and cherry blossoms

Angelonia: Favorite t.v. show?

I don't watch tv but I'll list some other stuff i like to watch:mha, beastars and aggretsuko

Arum-Lily: What’s the farthest you’d go for a stranger?

Idk depends on scenario??

Aster: What’s one of your favorite quotes?

"Kanye West he likes, fingers in his ass."

Aubrieta: Favorite drink?

Any Milkshakes or smoothies (mostly banana and strawberry for milkshake and p much anything for smoothie)

Baby’s Breath: Would you kiss the last person you kissed again?

I've never had kith

Balsam Fir: Have you ever been in love?

Well you see yes but actually no

Baneberries: Favorite song?

I listen to a lot but to keep it short:baby in the kitchen, in my mouth and friends slowed (chase atlantic)

Basket of Gold: Describe your family.

We p chill fam

Beebalm: Do you have a best friend? Who is it?

Irl bestie,, shes not on tumblr lol

Begonia: Favorite color?

PinKKK

But i like most colours

Bellflower: Favorite animal?

Cats,,,,

FoxES,

ANYTHING CUDDLY AND CUTE

Bergenia: Are you a morning or night person?

Night

Black-Eyed Susan: If you could be any animal for a day, what would it be?

I'd be like a doggo bc it would be the most fun i think-

Bloodroots: When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I wanted to be a vet but then when my granny asked me "but whos gonna clean up the animal poop?" I was like "eWW pO0pP!" and then decided that mayb i shouldn't be a vet

Bluemink: What are your thoughts on children?

They're either really kind and sweet

Or literal demons from hell

Legit no inbetween

Blazing Stars: What are you afraid of? Is there a reason why?

I'm afraid of lot of things-

Borage: Give a random fact about your childhood.

I was one dumbass bitcg-

Bugleherb: How would you spend your last day on Earth?

Idk eat pizza and cry or smth ajakamkw

Buttercup: Relationship Status?

Single

Camelia: If you could visit anywhere, where would you want to go?

NEW YORKKK, CONCRETE JUNGLE WHERE DREAMS ARE MADE OFFF THERE'S NOTHING YOU CAN'T DO NOW YOU'RE IN NEW YOOORKKK

Candytufts: When do you feel most loved?

When someone hugs me or just generally spends time with me

Canna: Do you have any tattoos?

Nop

Canterbury Bells: Do you have any piercings?

I used to have piercings when i was a bab but eHh haven't worn them since and i dont think my ear holes are big enough now-

California Poppy: Height?

4'10 grrr I'm the omega midget and I'll devour ur ankles

Cardinal Flower: Do you believe in ghosts?

Nop

Carnation: What are you currently wearing?

Pant, pink top and black hoodie

Catnip: Have you ever slept with a nightlight?

I think i have??

Chives: Who was the last person you hugged?

My mom and my dad

Chrysanthemum: Who’s the last person you kissed?

I never kith

Cock’s Comb: Favorite font?

I dont have one so imma say sans bc it always looks out of place and makes me laugh-

Columbine: Are you tired?

No

I feel like screaming and jumping around my room like a crackhead

Common Boneset: What are you looking forward to?

Nothing in particular ig

Coneflower: Dream job?

Smth kinda fun and art or design related hopefully,,,,

Crane’s-Bill: Introvert or extrovert?

Introvert but i also get lonley easily

Crocus: Have you ever been in love?

Nop,,,,

Crown Imperial: What’s the farthest you would go for someone you care about?

I would get run over by 5 monster trucks, jump off a plane, get mauled by 10 bears, get trampled on by a stampede, get brutally tortured for 12 hours straight, yeet myself into the Grand Canyon and then break all my bones with my bare hands if they weren't broken already

Ok basically i care a lot

Cyclamen: Did you have a favorite stuffed animal as a child? What was it?

I had this st bernard plush called Sparky and this lion named Sammy,,

Daffodil: What’s your zodiac sign?

Libra

Dahlia: Have you done anything worth remembering?

My memory is legit so bad it's probably concerning uHHH

Daisy: What do you feel is your greatest accomplishment?

Mayb art??

Daylily: What would you do if your parents didn’t like your partner(s)?

Ehhh i might reason with them and then if they still disagreed I'd just keep the relationship a secret

Dendrobium: Who is the last person that you said “I love you” to?

My parents

False Goat’s Beard: What is something you are good at?

Ehhh arT

Foxgloves: What’s something you’re bad at?

EhhHh everything that isn't art-

Freesia: What are three good things that have happened in the past month?

Oh boy here comes my shitty memory-

Hmmm

Idk but I'm mostly happy that I've been more social and stuff and i feel like im kinda coming out of my shell a bit

Not sure what to say for other 2 bc nothing in particular has really happend?

Garden Cosmos: How was your day today?

Ehhh oK??

Gardenia: Are you happy with where you’re at in your life?

Mayhapsn't

Gladiolus: What is something you hope to do in the next year or two?

I hope to pass all my exams and get an okish job mayb

Glory-of-the-Snow: What are ten things that make you happy/you’re grateful to have in your life?

1.fRIENBS ILY MY HABIBIS

2. Fammm

3. eHhh yummy food,,

4. Drawing and uhhh art

5. EPIC MUTUALS

6. Ok idk what else aside from like serious stuff like house and etc.-

Heliotropium: What helps you calm down when you feel stressed?

Drawing, crying, venting to a friend/parent

Hellebore: How do you show affection?

Hugssss,kith,cuddle, *draws u stuff*

Hoary Stock: What are you proudest of?

MmmmmMy aRRt?

Hollyhock: Describe your ideal day.

Wake up

Don't go to school

Vibe with friends

Sleeb

Hyacinth: What do you like to do in your free time?

MmMmMM aRT-

Hydrangea: How long have you known your best friend? How did you meet them?

Ehh 8yrs? We met in hell school

Irises: Who can you talk to about (almost) everything?

Friendos

Mom

Laceleaf: How many friends do you have?

6..?? Aa idk theres some people that idk if they'd consider me a friend or not,,

Lantanas: What’s the best compliment you’ve ever received?

Idk any compliment is best compliment for me,,

Larkspur: What do you think of yourself?

Ew yucky gröss

Lavender: What’s your favorite thing about yourself?

m y a r t

Also my hair bc its soft and wavy,,

Leather Flower: What’s your least favorite thing about yourself?

Everything else-

Lilac: What’s something you liked to do as a child?

Climb trees and do dumb shit

Lily: Who was your best friend when you were a kid?

Same irl bestie i mentioned before

Lily of the Incas: What is something you still feel guilty for?

MmmmmmMMM,,,

Lily of the Nile: What is something you feel guilty for that you shouldn’t feel guilty about?

MMMmMMmMMMMmmmMMm,,,,,,

Lupine: What does your name mean? Why is that your name?

Well I chose Fae bc i thought it sounded pretty

Marigold: Where did you grow up? Tell us about it.

Idk what to rlly say lmao

Morning Glory: What was your bedroom like growing up?

Kinda the same but i had toys everywhere-

Also when i was like 5 i had this legit fucking cursed thomas the tank engine shaped bed that i actually found a pic of but it's FUCKING HORRIFYING SO I PROBS WONT SHOW HERE-

Mugworts: What was it like for you as a teenager? Did you enjoy your teenage years?

EW BEING A TEENAGER SUCKS ASS HOW DO I UNDO????

Norwegian Angelica: Tell us about your mom.

Hi mom ily ur epic

Onions: Tell about your dad.

Hi dad ily ur epic

Orchid: Tell about your grandparents.

Omg i miss my grannies sm bc i couldn't see em this year bc nasty pandemic

Pansy: What was your most memorable birthday? What made it be so memorable?

Haha shit memory gor brrRR-

I don't really remember too many specific parties but when i was like 7-10 i had these epic parties in those birthday places with the giant play areas

I kinda wish i wasn't too old to go to them sobs

Peony: What was your first job?

I haven't had a job yet

Petunia: If you’re in a relationship, how did you meet your partner(s)? If you’re not in a relationship, how did you meet your crush/how do you hope to meet your future partner(s), if you want any?

Hmmmm idk? I haven't really thought abt that but i don't really mind i just wanna find someone to vibe with,,

Pincushion: How do you deal with pain?

I cri

Pink: Where is home?

Home is home home

Plantain Lilies: If you could go back in time, what is one thing you would stop/change?

Now where do i start...

Prairie Gentian: Who is someone you look up to? Describe them.

I look up to people that are kind, caring, brave, funny, cool or stronger than me ig?

Primrose: Describe your ideal life.

Basically my current life minus school, stress,pandemic and responsibilities lmao

Rhodendron: What is something you used to believe in as a child?

I used to believe in ghosts after i thought i encountered one

Ricinus: Who’s the most important in your life?

Hermmmst

Rose: What’s your favorite sound?

Peoples laughsss also music

Rosemallows: What’s your favorite memory?

Bro i dont have one,, my aphantasia makes it hard for me to remember stuff-

Sage: What’s your least favorite memory?

A

Snapdragon: At this moment, what do you want?

I wantttt better chargersss thattt donttt telll meee thatt myyy tablett will finishh chargingg innn 1 dayy andd 7 hoursss

St. John’s Wort: Is it easy or difficult for you to express how you feel about things?

Kinda difficult but im opening up more

Sunflower: What is something you don’t want to imagine life without?

fRIENDS,,,,,wAh

Sweet Pea: How much sleep did you get last night?

8 hrs

Tickseed: What’s your main reason to get up every morning?

Idk ig i kinda have to go to school and do stuff

Touch-Me-Not: How do you feel about your current job?

Non existant

Transvaal Daisy: What’s your favorite item of clothing?

My black and white stripy top, and all my hoodiess

Tropical White Morning Glory: Describe your aesthetic.

I don't think i have just one aesthetic bc im drawn to so many different aesthetics at the same time-

Like vintage, neon, dark, spoopy, pastel, cute, etc etc

Tulip: What would be the best present to get you?

OMG I LEGIT JUST SCREAM AT ANYTHING ANYONE GIVES ME-

IF SOMEONE GOES OUT OF THEIR WAY TO MAKE ME SMTH I CRY,,

Vervain: What’s stressing you out most right now?

🤏

Wisteria: How many books have you read in the past few months? What were they called?

I haven't been reading anythinggg

But i should really finish reading Percy Jackson bc it do be picking up dust-

Wolf’s Bane: Where do you want to be in life this time next year?

Everywhere

Yarrow: Do you know what vore is?

Mmm yummy 👅

Zinnia: Give a random fact about yourself.

I am currently living and breathing yes

[sincerelytruly]

Reasons for Why I Believe Obiyuki could be the “Romance that Cuts through Fate” referenced in the Manga:

In college, I took two amazing courses--scratch that I took one amazing course and one semi-disappointing sub-par course--Fairytales and Graphic Narratives, respectively. And until right this very minute, I believed them to be an utterly, though fascinating, waste of my time and tuition though they made me smile. Okay, it was college so they didn’t always make me smile because finals are the worst but I digress the point I am trying to make is this: 

I HAVE AN EPIPHANY CONCERNING MY BELOVED SHIP OBIYUKI DUE TO MY TEACHINGS!!   

So, first and foremost the birth of my epiphany came from thinking back to my class on Fairytales when we studied Snow White! (Graphic Narratives didn’t really teach me much other than how to think more critically about...Graphic Narratives, so I guess it really doesn’t deserve any cred for this post TBH, lol.)

But like I said we studied Snow White. 

Not this one:

Or whatever this one was supposed to be (sorry not sorry):

But, the original one. There are two versions (maybe there are more but I forgot them if there are) of the Grimm’s version of Snow White. In the very most original version, everything pretty much happens as we all remember it minus the singing: Snow White makes Queen step-trash jealous by her beauty, Queen step-trash tries to have her killed, due to her amazing beauty Hunstman is a wuss and lets her live because he’s weak to a beautiful damsel, Snow White plays Goldilocks and breaks into a dwarven settlement, the dwarves also wuss out and take pity on her because she is pretty and can cook/clean for them, then step-trash gets angry realizing she is, in fact, alive and goes out to kill her herself. Now, this is where everything diverges from what we know. In the original version step-trash has to try several times to kill her. Once with a bodice/corset torture device that basically suffocates her until the dwarves get home and cut her out of it, twice with an evil hair comb that kills her until the dwarves pull it out of her hair, and then thrice with the age-old apple trick. The poisoned magic apple gets lodged in her throat and she becomes a stone statue for all intents and purposes, so what do the dwarves do? What any logical group of men would do with a beautiful woman who isn’t decaying but still dead in their eyes, lock her in a gorgeous crystal casket so that they can still gaze upon her beauty on the daily! From here on there are two different endings to the Snow White saga. The very, very, first one published states that the Prince comes along says, “ooooooooh pretty, let me take her home with me and put her on display” and sits around gazing at her all the time until someone in the castle gets pissed off and hits Snow White’s corpse which dislodges the apple finally and wakes her up. What an awkward way to wake up yeah? And then the poor girl gets married to the Prince--ta-da! The second version makes it a lot better ending for poor Snow White. Someone trips while hauling the casket to the palace and dislodges the apple and then the Prince sweeps Snow White off her feet and yay happy ending they get married and now the Prince doesn’t seem as creepy just staring at a dead person all day long pissing off his staff. 

(Whooo that was a lot of background info, sorry, and also I know that I could also do a huge comparison post on the tales of Snow White versus our Shirayuki tale, but that is for another day!!!)

Depending on what you want to go with there are so many ways you can analyze the story of Snow White--all of them, old, less old, new, even our beloved Shirayuki’s story--but one of the things that stick out in my mind is how in every single version of Snow White she is always a trophy of some sort. The Prince is always going to get his trophy wife in the end. Even in Shirayuki’s case, if she does end up with Zen (which I’ll die if she does) she will be nothing but a trophy wife. Even though Zen is precious and certainly not a bad guy by any means, he is a  Prince, therefore their relationship will not be the same as normal couples have. She won’t be allowed to be an Herbalist and tend to the sick who may infect her and kill her before she can provide an heir. And poor Zen will still be stuck behind a pile of paperwork and responsibility to his Kingdom that he dearly loves.  

But, hey who knows, maybe Sorata will go against the entire universe she has built in her storytelling and let Shirayuki be wild and free and a Prince’s wife...

I think this is where “A Romance that Cuts through Fate” comes in to play. Hopefully, if you’ve made it this far in my post (bless you if you have) you’re thinking what I’m thinking. Or maybe you’re thinking I’m a lunatic.

ANYWHO, IF EVERY SINGLE SNOW WHITE ENDS UP WITH THE PRINCE THEN REALLY HOW IS ZENYUKI A ROMANCE THAT CUTS THROUGH FATE?

It's not. It absolutely is not a story of a romance that cuts through fate. In fact, there are far too many stories out there where a beautiful, nice, happy, girl gets with a Prince way beyond her social status for this to be something un-fateful. Or unheard of or whatever. Every fairytale and most romantic comedies out in the world follow the same old rhyme. 

Which is why I am proposing that Obiyuki is the endgame for real. 

***WARNING IF YOU’RE NOT CAUGHT UP WITH THE MANGA AND DON’T WANT SPOILED THEN YOU PROBS DON’T WANT TO READ ANY FURTHER!!!***

I feel as though since the moment Obi and Shirayuki were separated by the Bergat house situation, Shirayuki has been more aware of what Obi means to her. 

Look at her reaction and even Obi says later on:

That she seemed to be concerned even for him. Now don’t get me wrong I am completely aware that Shirayuki has been plenty concerned for Obi in a platonic sort of way! I’m not a completely foolish fangirl here. 

But then that happens. That is something new with Shirayuki. Never is she shown to react that way about what anyone says. Sure she blushes over her lovey-dovey stuff with Zen all the time, but that is something else. 

And then that is too. She sees Obi’s reaction--possibly the first time she’s seen him this way (or at least I can’t remember another time) and there’s a look on her face that says, was he being serious maybe? YES SHIRAYUKI HE WAS DAMMIT IN HIS PLAYFUL STUPID BOY WAY YES. 

And then this happens--look at that face--I don’t need to say a damn thing on that one. I mean I know she doesn’t love-love him yet (or maybe she does but doesn’t know it) but this is definitely progress, right?

And then the boys get in a tie showing off their masculinity--which I feel really does foreshadow their inevitable head-to-head. I mean ever since the festival with the play of the Knight fighting the Prince for the Princess, I’ve felt that way, but then there is their slight competition for her attention all the time and this arm wrestling and even the fight they had when Obi wanted to be her bodyguard! 

These faces, well, I feel as though she is kind of realizing Obi’s worth. I don’t know how else to put it. She is obviously affected by Obi’s marriage meeting and later on when Obi is saying how he is rejecting people even though he knows he attracts people, her face is so loving! Of course that may just be because her friends are there and she is about to pledge her loyalty to everyone or whatever, but I’d like to think it still has a bit to do with what Obi is saying as his statement that he was with her during the dinner party, therefore not flirting with other girls, is in the same panel as the face she is making. Hopefully, that makes sense. 

This was a big moment because again I feel as though this is foreshadowing, why else would the author do this?

Then I noticed that Shirayuki starts noticing Obi! Above she notices how his eyes have rounded recently, which to my understanding is an idea that a person is happier. (Idk my Dad has a book on Oriental health practices and whatnot and it talks about eye shape in it and basically how its a window to the state of your being/soul/chi, etc. so this is why I believe this I may be completely off base but the context seems to suggest I’m right!) However, on a side note on Obi’s part I think he is going through the motions of accepting that his fate when it comes to Shirayuki when he says, “I’m seeing more clearly.” 

This looks like some flirtation to me on Shirayuki’s part, but also I find it an interesting conversation especially since in the next chapter (below panels) she talks about how she needs to be able to speak about how she wants to live in the future. And also, I feel as though the author loves giving us these panels where they’re reaching for each other but not quite willing or able to touch one another yet, its sweet torture isn’t it?

The panels above show again how she has finally taken notice of Obi and thanked him for all he has done for her. I know it’s not a declaration of love, and she probably plans on talking to Izana about living her future with Zen, but I think this is a step in the right direction because in what world is this conversation with Izana going to go well? I mean, Izana, though I believe he likes Shirayuki, is not going to change the rules for her as it comes to the Royal family. So, I think we may soon see some development in Shirayuki’s relationships with both Zen and Obi. I tend to think that she has really put some thought into how she wants to live her life now, and I also think that she is strong enough of a person now to reject anything other than what she deserves. 

I also find it interesting how Obi keeps his cool when Shirayuki compliments him on his looks and then awkwardly says:

What does interesting mean, Obi?! 

But anyway, that brings us up to date with the manga and my reasons for believing that the “Romance that Cuts through Fate” applies to Obiyuki NOT Zenyuki. I hope I was able to coherently share my thoughts and feelings on this and not completely bore whoever may have been strong enough to make it to the end of my rambles.