#but I cannot imagine being constrained by what happens or what I think is GOING to happen in the canon | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

siennahrobek · 3 years ago

Text

Initially, Obi-Wan thought that sleep would assuredly allude him.

Perhaps he underestimated the trust and affect his troops had on him and how exhausted he really was because he slept fairly soundly through the night.

He was still surrounded by troopers by the time he woke up, although he was fairly certain that there significantly less numbers of them. Although it was a bit of a challenge with position, Obi-Wan tried to meditate a little before the next disaster would inevitably occur. It was only a tad successful as he kept going back to thinking about Anakin. And right now he just…couldn’t.

Afterwards, he got dressed, complete with his old armor pieces and left the barracks to get to work.

“Greetings, Master Kenobi,” Cin Drallig nodded at him as Obi-Wan walked onto the bridge. There wasn’t many present; it was mostly a skeleton crew, but they paid him little heed. Next to the battle master stood a clone trooper from the meeting before, one of Obi-Wan’s 212th boys, Menace.

“General,” Menace welcomed.

“Master Drallig, Menace,” Obi-Wan nodded at the both of them.

“The boys and I have encrypted and encoded a way for you to get a message to the other Jedi generals that are scattered across the galaxy,” Menace explained as he pulled up a map of the galaxy, planets already highlighted. Obi-Wan presumed that was where jedi and their troops had been positioned. “As long as we know where they are stationed, we can get it to them and encode it so only a Jedi would be able to access it. We made this option just in case there are any activated chipped troopers around or natborns who are loyal to the Empire.”

“That was rather fortuitous of you,” Cin glanced at the trooper, curiously but he projected gratitude, something a little odd from the battlemaster but it was no less appreciated.

“Just precautions sir.”

“Alright, we have to figure out exactly what information we need to send to the others,” Obi-Wan said as he followed Cin and Menace down the halls which ended up being to an office. Was it his? At this point, he wasn’t really paying attention and most of the office rooms looked virtually all the same. This one had been recently packed with communications equipment and a holotable for good measure.

“The basics will be key,” Cin replied with a hum as he closed the door behind them and tied back his longer hair. “We will have to divide it up between what to do when running from activated soldiers or what to do when communications have been shut down so they can’t receive the orders to active the chips.”

“Constrain natborn officers, no communications aside from jedi, which will come up in about three days,” Obi-Wan listed.

“That is a fair chunk of time,” Menace admitted as started to open up and turn on the machinery around the room, as well as the data blockers for outside communications, just incase someone would try to butt in on the networks. “Can they avoid the Empire for that long? We don’t know which forces that the emperor has now or how quickly they will go after those they cannot get a hold of.”

“If they come across conflict, leave immediately,” Cin suggested as made his spot off to the side. “Getting too close to activated chips will active any clones they are around. But we did warn many jedi. The Empire Forces have to be fairly diminished if they understood those warnings. I can’t imagine the new government is completely on it’s feet yet.”

That was true. Even though the Republic had been slowly shifting into something less democratic over the course of the war, it was still a fairly big change, and a lot of things would have to be restructured. There was also the issue, for the Empire, of those who would fight back against its creation or not agree with it. That may buy them some time, he mused.

“But we do need to plan quick, because I’m sure it won’t be long before they are organized and mobilized enough to chase us,” Obi-Wan added, sitting down in one of the chairs next to Menace. In front of him was a little desk area. “If they haven’t realized that Kamino specifically isn’t responding because of this, they will figure it out soon.”

“How about we make a list?” Menace suggested, his gaze flickering between the two masters.

Obi-Wan nodded and his hand shuffled around the desk to find a data pad. Putting it in front of him, he grabbed a utensil and created a list.

“Alright, so first and foremost, the clones are chipped, proximity to activated chips activates others. Activation can also be verbal but only from the Sith. Block all communications available to clones,” Cin started quickly as Obi-Wan immediately wrote down the thoughts on the datapad.

“We can send Healer Che’s information on where the chips are as well, if anyone has the equipment or skills to start taking them out,” Obi-Wan added, the pencil flipping around his fingers to momentarily point at the battlemaster. They both nodded in response.

“Two; the Republic is gone, an Empire has rose. We are being hunted and killed as we are claimed to be traitors. Confine any officers loyal to the Empire until further notice,” Cin continued

“If you have inactivated clones, keep them away from conflict with others, due to the proximity thing,” Menace included, flicking on a few more nozzles and switches.

“If you are around activated clones, get away as quickly as possible, stay low or get away from them if you can,” Cin added, eyeing Menace, carefully. The clone’s presence filled up with a moment of quiet grief and disappointment.

“I’m sorry,” Obi-Wan whispered, unable to meet his eyes.

“Don’t be, it’s not your fault sir,” Menace swallowed harshly but shook his head. “We can’t save anyone yet without a real plan.”

“Contact,” Cin started up again, a little hesitant to keep going as he looked between the two. “Contact will be reestablished within a couple of days, once we get to Kamino. If you have a long range holotable, use it, but keep your comm on you. There will be a coded message to indicate if communications come from us.”

They paused.

“I think…I think those are some good basics, hopefully they can survive until then,” Obi-Wan sighed, jotting down the last of the notes.

“Battle master Drallig and I can get these coded and sent out fairly quickly,” Menace said, gently taking the datapad from Obi-Wan’s hands.

“It’s a start,” he echoed.

***

“I believe it is about time we talk,” Padme said, her face flat with one hand rested on her stomach. Her greeting was desperate and although not exactly unkind, it wasn’t very patient either. Obi-Wan glanced around and let out a silent sigh. This was not going to be a pleasant conversation. One that he didn’t particularly want to have.

He had been working with the other masters and clones to figure out where to go and what to do next for some time. He knew this conversation was coming. He was just dreading it.

Obi-Wan just swallowed and nodded in defeat as he turned to face the pregnant woman. “Alright. But I think it would be best if we would keep this conversation rather private. The 501st survivors and much of the 212thhave been following me like ghosts and they certainly don’t need to hear this.”

Padme’s expression was something of confusion, but she consented, and they found themselves in Obi-Wan’s former office. It was still technically his office, he supposed, but others had been using it since the evacuation. One could tell by all the paperwork and things that cluttered it more than it already was, the things that he knew were not his or Cody’s. He locked the door behind them and let Padme sit on the cot in the corner. He dragged a chair over to her to sit himself, although he could not find a position that was comfortable.

“I suppose we can start with what happened with Anakin,” Obi-Wan said, a bit quietly. He did not want to talk about this right now, not at all. He wasn’t ready for this; he was hardly wrapping his own head around what had happened. His heart clenched harshly in his chest, and he was sure his throat would close up. Taking a shaking deep breath, he tried to continue to speak. “What, exactly, do you already know?”

“Ahsoka called me, telling me there was an attack on the Jedi Temple,” Padme confessed, shaking her head in disbelief. “She told me that Anakin had turned to the Dark Side, that he was killing younglings and leading brainwashed clones to kill everyone.”

Her tone was incredulous and unconvinced, not that Obi-Wan could exactly blame her. He was not even sure if he believed it, and he was there. It seemed impossible. He knew Anakin struggled with some of the jedi tenants, especially that of attachment, which Obi-Wan had tried to talk to him about, to reach out. But Anakin had been closing off more and more as of late. That didn’t mean he could have ever have seen this coming.

Perhaps he should have. Was he so blind?

“That…that would be accurate,” Obi-Wan choked out but did his best to keep his voice constant and steady with as much as patience as he could lacing it.

Padme stood up suddenly but then wavered and leaned against the wall for support. He leaned forward, ready to catch her if she should fall. She steadied herself and straightened her back to stare down at him. “That is absolutely ridiculous,” she announced with such confidence even he almost believed it. “And you know it, Obi-Wan! He is your friend, and he would never do such a thing; the Jedi…”

“If you start blaming my people while we are fleeing for our lives, please refrain,” his own voice continued to be soft but there was a steel bone underlaying it, that made no room for challenge.

“Anakin would never do such a thing,” Padme repeated firmly and shook her head. He closed himself off to her in the Force, he didn’t want to know what she was feeling. He wasn’t sure if he could handle her feelings along with his own. “He has been worried and stressed but that is only because of…”

“Because of what?”

“He’s been having nightmares…” she started slowly, eyeing Obi-Wan as if that would give her some insight, some answers on what was happening. “About me, dying in childbirth.”

“Nightmares,” Obi-Wan repeated numbly. “That is what he was so worked up about? He didn’t come to me or anyone else about them. And he knows how dangerous pregnancies are in this sort of situation. He should have known to talk to the healers about it.”

He should have talked to the healers. At least doctors, someone. Generally speaking, people didn’t just die in childbirth, not on Coruscant, certainly not a prominent senator. No one would ever deny her prenatal care, no matter who the father was.

Even if the father was a jedi.

“He was probably afraid,” Padme glanced away.

It was as if Anakin didn’t know anything of the Jedi at all. The Jedi would have never turned Padme away for pregnancy care or information, Force around, the Jedi wouldn’t turn anyone away who came to their steps in need of help with pregnancy. Force sensitive or not.

“We are getting off track,” Obi-Wan shook his head with a small sigh. He ran a hand through his hair. He just wanted… honestly, he wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted. He supposed he wanted this to all be his own nightmare, one he could just wake up from. One where none of this was real. “Padme, I don’t know how to convince you of what Anakin has done,” he continued. “He led an attack to kill everyone in the Temple, he led an army of brainwashed clones. He murdered Temple Guards and younglings just trying to escape the battle. He fought mewith the intent to kill, rambling about the failings of the jedi,” Obi-Wan stressed, leaning forward. “Master Drallig said he called himself Darth Vader which let me tell you, is a Sith name. All I could feel in him was desperation and fury.”

“You’re wrong,” Padme insisted, her eyes blazing into something so passionate, it nearly hurt to look at. Her loyalty, although her perhaps commendable to an extent, was difficult to work with. Difficult when she wouldn’t believe the truth. He knew it was hard to swallow. He was still in that process. “He is good, there is good in him, of course there is. Something else must be at play.”

“Something else?” Obi-Wan asked, his own voice echoing confusion. He couldn’t imagine much else being at play, his former padawan, his brother, had intended on murdering everyone in the Temple, all those that thought he was their family. All those that thought he cared about them. He had nearly succeeded. If Cody’s chip hadn’t been activated when and where it was… Obi-Wan nearly shuddered at the prospect. He sighed and shook his head again. “I love Anakin. And even after all that he has done I still love him; I will always love him. But I am not blind to what he has become now. I was blind before, not seeing it; only seeing what I wanted to, the good person I thought he could be, the person I thought he was.”

“He is that good person,” she persisted with a sound not open for debate.

Obi-Wan was tired, even the several hours of last night’s sleep would not erase all of the time he had been awake, active, fighting for his life and the lives of those around him.

“Tell that to the younglings that he cut down in front of his former padawan,” Obi-Wan’s hand waved out in emphasis. He hated bringing Ahsoka into this but Padme cared about the young Togruta, probably nearly as much as Anakin used to as well. “Or the 501st troopers who were forced to lead an attack on the Temple, on the Jedi, against their own free will.”

The young woman just stared at him, and he knew that she didn’t believe him. He didn’t think she would ever actually believe him without seeing it for herself.

The fact that Anakin, of all people, would lead a forced brainwashed army to fight people they never would have in their right minds seemed ludicrous.

“Okay, we are at an impasse,” Obi-Wan slumped back a little in his chair. He took a commlink out of his pocket and let his fingers sweep over it, absentmindedly. “Perhaps a break from this line of conversation may be beneficial,” he said slowly, giving Padme the time to sit down on the cot once again. “I think…we need to also talk about your pregnancy,” Obi-Wan added slowly. Padme placed a hand on her belly, protectively.

“You mentioned…you mentioned I could die from this,” Padme replied slowly, her eyes meeting his in a massive flurry of concern and fear. The conversation was not over about Anakin but for now, for now what he had said would have to do. He didn’t know how much longer he could try to help her in that scenario. “So, Anakin was right, I’m going to die in childbirth.”

“It’s not that simple. There is a lot that is included,” Obi-Wan shook his head. How to explain something that he only knew the basics of? Perhaps a professional was best to be in order “Look. Let me call my friend Bant. She is a healer, and she will be able to answer most, if not all, of your questions.”

Without waiting for an answer, he sent his friend a message who near immediately contacted him back, relieved that he had found their wayward patient. Apparently, Padme was not supposed to be out of the medbay. Obi-Wan imagined they would want to monitor her, considering her pregnancy and situation. His comm beeped again.

“We’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

Obi-Wan didn’t know who the other side of the we was but at this point, he would take all the help he could get.

Those few minutes were the most awkward ones Obi-Wan could remember.

The Mon Calamari walked in with another healer trailed in behind her and Obi-Wan could not even help the sigh of relief. At last. “Hello Obi-Wan, senator,” Bant greeted, giving them both a nod, her large dark eyes brimming with sympathy and kindness. Obi-Wan would forever be baffled and astounded at the amount of love and compassion his friend could hold. “Senator, my name is Bant. I am a healer. This is Healer Jayden; she specializes in pregnancies.”

“You have special doctors for pregnancies in the jedi?” Padme asked, a little taken back.

“Of course,” the doctor nodded as Obi-Wan got up to give them both seats. He ended up standing off a little to the side, often finding himself leaning against the wall for support. “Believe it or not, the jedi are not celibate,” she pointed out, even though Padme’s glance looked a bit skeptic. “And although it isn’t extremely common, jedi can and do get pregnant.”

“They do?” Padme echoed.

“Of course. Force Sensitivity isn’t always passed down, but it is more likely if one or more of the parents have it,” Jayden explained, her voice smooth and calm. It could not be said that Jedi didn’t know when they were supposed to be healers. He could only imagine how determined they must be in such an art. “Pregnancies involving force sensitivity in general can be quite difficult, but we should really talk about your case specifically.”

“Is it…different?”

“I have been briefed on a few things,” Healer Jayden said, giving Bant a quick glance as if for confirmation. Obi-Wan wondered how much she had been told about the situation, about the father. “The father of your children is former Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker, is it not?”

“Current Jedi Knight,” Padme corrected, her voice laced with bitter undertones and eyes narrowed. Something she had picked up from Anakin, he supposed. “Unless the Jedi have kicked him out for loving someone.”

“The Jedi do not typically, kick people out,” Bant continued, her voice just as relaxed and mellow. She was taking this very well. Obi-Wan nearly felt like shaking Anakin or someonewho should know better for all the things misinterpreted, deliberately or otherwise. “Not for loving anyone or getting people pregnant.”

“Yes,” Padme confirmed, her voice subdued. “He is the father.”

“Alright. So, the father has an incredibly high number of midiclorians in his body, which is how one can determine how force sensitive an individual is. He is a very high number, more than anyone else and is very, very strong in the Force,” Jayden explained, patiently. She spoke in chunks, probably to better allow Padme to follow what she was saying.

“What does that mean for the baby? That it will be force-sensitive?”

The healer nodded but her expression was a bit grave. “In your case, certainly. Because if they hadn’t, you would probably be dead already.”

And… Obi-Wan hadn’t expected her to be so blunt. Padme stared wide-eyed.

“Skywalker is so strong in the Force that it is killing you, not to mention the darkness that is practically permeating you,” the healer continued and although Obi-Wan could feel a tad of concern with it, she did not show it outright, rather keeping a cool presence of security. “The only reason that you are still alive and as strong as you are, currently, is because the two babies inside of you are also extremely force-sensitive and are keeping you alive. It is…very complex and seems a bit paradoxical, and difficult to explain when it comes to the specifics, as well as the ins and outs of what is happening in your body.”

“So, I will not survive this birth,” Padme realized.

“The odds are not fantastic,” Jayden replied truthfully with a small frown. “But the only way you can survive is with a Jedi Healer’s help. If you stayed on the planet, you would not have survived the birth and I doubt anyone would have understood why. But we can and we will help you, Padme,” she said, taking the woman’s hand gently, curling her partially translucent fingers around the younger senator’s. “You can trust us that we will do everything in our power to make sure that you survive to see your children grow up.”

“What are the odds?” Padme whispered, staring at her hands.

“It is difficult to say,” Jayden admitted, candidly. “We’ve never had a child from someone as powerful as Skywalker before. Best case scenario you will be out of commission, maybe even comatose, for some time while your body regenerates its strength.”

If it can, went unspoken.

With her free hand, Padme brought it up to cover her mouth, letting out a shaky breath, tears starting to slip down her cheeks.

“I think you could use some rest, senator,” Bant advised, speaking up for the first time. Although Healer Jayden did most of the talking, Obi-Wan was still grateful for his friend’s presence. “I think we have a small room near the medical bay that we can use for you,” she added and glanced at Obi-Wan. “Would you mind getting her there?”

He didn’t think, just nodded. With a second thought, he didn’t really want to, he didn’t want to talk with her right now. He was just so tired and there was much to do but he knew it was right. Walking over, he helped Padme up and walked her out of the door. He led her through the halls towards the medical bay, appreciative for the silence.

He didn’t need an argument right now.

As they got to the small room, he unlocked and opened the door. “I will have some of my handmaidens come and bring things from the ship,” she whispered.

He hadn’t realized that she had brought anyone. Oh, he hoped she hadn’t brought Jar Jar. He didn’t mind the Gungan, almost liked him really, but he had a tendency to get into trouble and that was the last thing they needed.

He was about to leave when she pulled him back to look at her. “There is good in Anakin, Obi-Wan,” she announced, although her voice stayed rather quiet, just firm. “You must see it. And I will prove it to you,” her tone reflected her eyes, something fiery and passionate.

This was always going to be a tragedy, he realized suddenly.

There was very little he could say to that. He didn’t believe her but then again, he was trying hard not to think of Anakin right now. His thoughts were dominated with the survival of his people, both jedi and clone.

He had to put them first.

“Okay,” he croaked.

And then whisked himself away as quickly as he could without making it seem like he was literally running from her.

He was entirely exhausted.

The talk with Padme had last longer than he had anticipated and honestly, all he wanted was to sleep. Could he though? How much was there left to do? Then again, at this point, he wasn’t sure if there was anything specifically, he could do, aside from perhaps trying to research? Maybe?

His brain just felt full. He wasn’t entirely sure if he would be of any help.

“There you are sir,” the familiar voice and tonal individuality of Boil registered to Obi-Wan’s ears nearly a beat too late. He turned to see the clone walking up to him, a small youngling on arm.

Waxer was the one who was outspoken about loving little ones but anyone who knew anything about Boil knew he loved being around them just as much.

The thought made Obi-Wan smile and his chest warm.

Presence of people that he cared about, that perhaps cared about him, ones that he didn’t constantly have to fight tooth and nail with, were something of a relief. Just a presence to fall into that wasn’t consistently looking for lies or secrets or to tear his head off.

“How are you, Boil?” he asked, trying for a smile.

It must not have worked very well because the clone gave him an odd glance but, in the end, he just shrugged. “I’m alright, just taking this young’in to the modified creche,” he explained, gesturing to the young jedi child on his hip. “He accidently got lost and I’m bringing him back before my allotted hours of sleep.”

“Allotted hours?”

How late was it?

“Sir, it’s quite late,” Boil pointed out, answering his unasked question for him, and gesturing lightly for the general to follow. He did so without pause or thought. It was interesting, he believed, how easily and unthinkingly he would follow them. Perhaps it was foolishness but perhaps it was just trust and faith. He was in a rather short supply of that these past few days. “The daytime officers and workers are getting ready for sleep. The Jedi are hunkering down in the creche places and barracks along with the children and troopers. I never realized how cuddly Jedi could be when they sleep together,” he added with a bit of a half laugh.

The child laughed alongside with him, although a bit louder and fuller.

“We slept in piles a lot,” Obi-Wan replied.

“We like to do that too,” Boil shrugged to keep a hold on the little one hanging from him. “It’s good that your sleeping arrangements are around the men, it’s good for morale, especially at a time like this. Everyone is a little freaked out, I think it helps there is someone they can trust around during those times.”

Obi-Wan narrowed his eyes. Who taught Boil manipulation tactics?

He paused, nearly tripping at the realization.

Oh right. Hedid.

Accidently, of course. It wasn’t like Obi-Wan was giving lectures or classes on how to manipulate or negotiate yourself out of situations. But still, his behavior would be seeming to be biting him in the butt now, as his troopers were now using it against him.

Part of him almost felt impressed.

“Right,” Obi-Wan muttered.

The child hanging off of Boil, giggled knowingly. As the two of them dropped the child off at one of the places set aside for the children, Boil offered to escort him to the barracks for sleep. Obi-Wan tried to back out of it but Boil was rather adamant and then….

And then Rex showed up.

And Obi-Wan knew he was completely was doomed.

He couldn’t say no to Rex right now, not with what his troops had gone through.

“Hello, general,” Rex greeted with a bit of a wavering smile. He was trying hard. Obi-Wan suspected he had spent most of his day with the survivors of the 501st. He knew it wasn’t pretty and they were trying very hard to make sense of what had happened to them. “People have been wondering where you have been.”

“Is that so?” Obi-Wan hummed in response.

“Yes, the 501stsurvivors have been curious to know if you are coming back tonight,” he added in, thinking himself rather sly. Survivors; wasn’t that what they all were now. Survivors of a genocide, survivors of brainwashed slavery, survivors of being unmade into a vacant body.

“As a matter of fact, Boil was just escorting me to the barracks,” Obi-Wan shot back. He kept falling into this trap, he knew it. But at least this time he would not be caught floundering like the day before. “It has been quite the day, full of… colorful conversations.”

“Oh? Who did you talk to?”

“I had to have to talk about Senator Amidala and her pregnancy.”

Obi-Wan could practically just feel Rex’s stomach drop. “You…you know about that sir?”

“I probably knew about it before you did,” he muttered under his breath. As if Anakin could keep a secret like that from him, as if Padme could. Any Jedi that came across her would have known; would have sensed her pregnancy. He, of course, was the one who knew it was Anakin’s child because honestly, who’s else could it have been. But louder, instead he tried, “Yes. I’ve known about Anakin and Padme for quite some time. It is not difficult to sense her pregnancy. I do not know why Anakin thought he was being subtle or discreet. And you, captain, well, I think you could work on your acting skills a little.”

The captain just blushed hard. “My apologies sir.”

“No worries. It hardly matters,” Obi-Wan shrugged. “But talking with her, about what we had to, was rather exhausting and I will, quite frankly, be a bit glad to get some rest before the next day comes about. Because soon, we will be at Kamino and a whole new situation will arise.”

“We don’t know how much time it will be before the Empire comes after us,” Boil realized with a deep frown.

“So, we should get as much rest as we can until then,” Obi-Wan nodded at the two of them as they neared the barracks. “Because who knows how much real rest we will get once the new conflicts arise.”

***

It was the middle of the night when he had heard it.

Obi-Wan had been stuck in the near middle of a pile once again, surrounded on all sides by mostly clone troopers, the main force being the de-chipped 212th and the 501st survivors, with a few others they had rescued within the Temple before and during the siege. He could make out Inkspot somewhere, leaning against Trapper and Gearshift.

Many of the survivors, mostly those of the 501st specifically, had horrible nightmares, even so soon after the events. He couldn’t blame them; it was a horrible ordeal they had gone through. He tried to shield them the best he could, to help them sleep with less nightmares. He did his best. He didn’t dare take a look into what they contained, he feared they would just feed into his own.

For some reason or another, the scratching woke him up.

Shifting his body up carefully so he wouldn’t awake the troopers surrounding him, he glanced around at the barracks for the sound. No way he was just hearing it in his mind.

There. Some movement in the corner.

Carefully he cleared himself of snuggling troopers and got up.

Obi-Wan moved through the bodies, making his way to the edge of the pile of clone troopers until he found one of the 501st in the corner, frantically trying to scrub his armor. Not just his armor, the jedi realized, but the blue paint off of it. And there was quite a bit of it.

The trooper nearly jumped feet in the air when he realized Obi-Wan had sat next to him, his eyes wide in fear and panic.

“At ease,” he assured quietly but it did very little to ease the trooper’s anxiety. Obi-Wan reached out into the Force towards his presence.

Calmpeacesafe

It helped more than words had.

“Are you alright, Graffiti?”

The trooper looked at him, a little surprised. “You…know who I am? Y-You remember?”

Obi-Wan nodded. “Yes. Would you like to tell me what is going on?” he asked gently.

The trooper swallowed, staring down at his armor before tearing his eyes away. He couldn’t seem to keep his eyes on it for more than a moment.

“Everyone has nightmares, it is nothing to be ashamed of.”

“I do, sometimes,” Graffiti admitted, hesitant with his voice choked on tears. “It’s not even the fighting or the war or anything. I just see blank faces, marching blue, so much blue. People…people always think when terrible things happen, when blood is shed, everything is in a haze of red because blood is red. But for me…for me it was a haze of blue. Not just any blue. The 501st blue. It’s…its supposed to be something proud of, a color we should be proud of.”

Obi-Wan just waited patiently.

“I woke up shaking this morning,” he continued, his voice quivering with tears already accumulating in his eyes as he shoved the piece of armor that was in his arms away. “It was so bad I couldn’t even put my armor on. One of my brothers had to do it for me. But even then, I…. I felt so awful. I kept making excuses to go to the head and then my brothers kept making excuses for me, just in case.”

“You do not have to wear it if you do not wish to,” Obi-Wan replied gently. “Things, I imagine, are going to be different now.”

“It’s…it’s not the armor itself,” he confessed, staring down at the piece that he was holding. “I don’t think it is the armor. It’s…it’s the color,” he looked confused when he glanced at the jedi, as if he wasn’t entirely sure why he was saying this or even the reasoning behind it. “Every time I see it, I keep getting sick. I keep remembering when we were marching towards the Temple, all the blue of the amor, creating a sea of soldiers, all in time and not even…not even hesitating on what we were going to do.”

“You couldn’t move.”

“I couldn’t even think until afterwards,” Graffiti admitted the quiver in his voice growing. “I just wanted to scream. Even after we got into the Temple, I remember everything but…it’s all in this horrible blue haze that I choke on. Something I was once proud to bear, a color that I was proud of, was twisted into something horrible and evil. I know it doesn’t make any sense but…”

“Sometimes things like this don’t make sense to others or even ourselves,” Obi-Wan’s voice was quiet and calm as he looked over at the trooper. The latter had a difficult time meeting his gaze, but he finally had, tears welled up in his eyes, certainly obscuring his vision.

“I think I would rather have no paint, just be a blank set of armor like a no-name shiny again before I wear something that has been so twisted,” he whispered, running a hand along his helmet, half scrubbed of blue paint. “And isn’t that awful? I was brainwashed into being no one and now, I want to go back to being a no one again, just…slightly different type of no one.”

The jedi’s heart shuttered in his chest.

“Would you mind waiting here for a moment?” he asked, placing a hand gently on the soldier’s shoulder. “I will be right back. I think…I think I have something.”

Graffiti looked quite confused but nodded.

Obi-Wan stood up and made his way through the maze of people, towards the door. As he got to the halls, his pace quickened. There weren’t particularly many people around, but a few had caught him gliding through the halls quickly, often giving him looks that made him want to shrink back into the pile in the barracks.

Some did not seem happy to see him out and about.

He got to a storage room and opened the door. Upon finding what he was looking for, he grabbed it and hurried back. Obi-Wan came back, worked his way through the maze of sleeping men again, and set down a large can on the ground as quietly as he could. The trooper just stared at it, wide-eyed, a bit confused and certainly a lot speechless.

“It’s yours, if you want it.”

Graffiti took a moment to realize what it was. At first, he didn’t look entirely sure, like it might be a trap, but it took only a minute before he burst into a quiet sob, covering his face with his hands.

“It may not stop the nightmares,” Obi-Wan explained quietly. “But know that you will always have a place with us.”

Eventually, when he got a little more control of himself, Obi-Wan could make out a nod from him.

“I think I might need something new,” Graffiti rasped out, just barely.

“Perhaps you should make a visit to one of the creche groups,” Obi-Wan offered, shooting him a quick, warm, glance. “They are full of ideas. And they would love to see you.”

Graffiti met his gaze, his eyebrows scrunched together. He didn’t verbally reply but the jedi master had a feeling he would anyways.

Obi-Wan spent the rest of the night with him, quietly scrubbing off the blue paint and replacing it with shimmering gold.

17 notes · View notes

brokenjardaantech · 3 years ago

Text

the invisible price

for @nock-and-bolt.

summary:

earth is under attack. everyone is giving everything they can to defend the only home they have against an alien race called the collectors. but sometimes, the price we pay isn't easily seen or heard.

no knowledge on mass effect required to understand this fic.

part of the groom lake aftermath series.

also on ao3

---

[Josh, do you have a moment?]

Josh tears his eyes and mind away from the tactical map when he hears Rupert’s voice in his head. Rupert communicating with him is a common occurrence given Josh’s responsibility as the codex compiler and Rupert as one of their most efficient spies, but the other android wanting to talk to him directly is something rare and few in between, partly because there is no need, partly because Rupert isn’t exactly the most social person. Josh knows that his responsibility has been growing since Markus and North departed North America and started sailing across the Pacific to secure an alliance with the resistance in Hong Kong, but he looks at his growing to-do list and decides that he can afford a few moments with Rupert; talking to the people working for him and getting to know them better is the leader’s job, and now that Josh himself became the leader, the task falls onto him. {I’ll come to you,} he replies. {Stay where you are.}

[I’m not going anywhere.]

Josh takes note of the unusually harsh tone and calculates the probabilities while he ascends the stairs to the rookery on the topmost floor of the building they have occupied as their base of operations. While most humans have gone underground so that the Collectors can’t get to them as easily, the androids step forward to defend earth, taking advantage of the fact that the aliens don’t target synthetics, and now the surface is theirs. It will be a pain to negotiate with the humans once this is over - if they win the war against the Collectors, that is, the chance diminishing with every single moment Ryder needs to take to find out where exactly their enemies come from - but for now, as he steps foot into the vast space that is now a rookery, he is assaulted by the wind howling and sweeping through the unglazed windows, and he basks in the knowledge that everything within his sight belongs to androids and androids alone. Sitting on one of the windowsills with one of his legs dangling outside and surrounded by pigeons is Rupert, and somehow his hat hasn’t been blown off his head yet. It will be an interesting study if there isn’t a war affecting the entire globe going on, how it manages to stay on the other android’s head, and the puzzles and mazes covering the space from floor to ceiling will be good mind games as well.

Rupert speaks before Josh can ask him what this conversation is for. ‘Be honest, Josh,’ a pigeon lands on his open palm and he strokes its head. ‘Is my intel useful?’

‘Yes, of course,’ Josh doesn’t hesitate to answer. ‘You help us stay in touch with resistance forces from all around the world and collect intel from our allies and enemies. You even help us contact one another on mundane things unrelated to the resistance. Thanks to you, lives are saved and our morale is high. You’re important to us, Rupert,’ he doesn’t know how often Markus visits the android nor does he know how close the two of them are, but just in case Markus didn’t say it enough… ‘We won’t be standing here without your effort.’

Rupert’s snort surprises him. ‘“My” effort?’ he withdraws his leg from outside the window and turns until he is facing Josh with his back against the outside world. ‘I just sit here and wait for my birds to come back. I take off whatever is tied to their legs, dump the data to you, and I’m done.’

‘Still -’

‘You don’t understand!’ the sudden sharpness in his voice makes Josh’s thirium pump skip a bit. ‘I -’ Rupert claws at his head through his cap. ‘You don’t -’ he hops off the ledge. ‘Fuck!’

And suddenly he is standing in front of Josh holding out a skinless hand, a telltale sign that he wants to interface with him, but they aren’t close and interfaces are intimate things, one that is only shared between close friends or lovers, and they certainly aren’t familiar with each other enough to qualify -

‘I don’t know how I can tell you otherwise,’ Rupert grits. His voice is laced with static and his eyes are wet. ‘I know we’re talking about humanity’s survival here but…’ he turns away from Josh as suddenly as he closed the distance between them and squeezes his eyes shut. A tear slips through, evaporating quickly due to the strong wind, but a pale blue track remains on his face. ‘Forget it,’ he cradles his skinless hand close to his chest. ‘Everyone’s sacrificed something for this war. I’m not… I’m not. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed this on you.’

‘You aren’t,’ Josh reassures him. ‘Is there a problem?’

Rupert’s skin reactivates over his hand. ‘Not as big as yours, I’d imagine.’

‘It seems to affect you a lot. If it’s big for you, it’s big enough for me considering how important you are to the resistance.’

He even extends his own hand in encouragement, and after a few seconds of hesitation Rupert grasps it, and Josh is pulled under.

Aliens. Aliens are supposed to be fictional. Not entirely impossible, but the universe is so big, so empty, and physics so slow and constraining, so the chances are low, but they’re here anyway with their bugs and lasers and gas, dragging humans off the streets and shooting anyone who dares to fight back. He runs, he doesn’t want to be shot, his birds need him. He runs and runs and runs until he receives a signal. A rendezvous point. A temporary sanctuary. A base of operations. A chance to fight back.

An opportunity no one can afford to waste.

rA9 is there so everything will be okay. Simon is missing from his side. He doesn’t want to think about what happened to Simon. He doesn’t want to think about all the missing faces.

rA9 says they are fighting a war.

rA9 says they need everything they want to give.

rA9 says they need to make sure that there is a humanity for ‘the alliance’ to return to, whoever they are.

So he offers his birds. His birds like him. His birds trust him. His birds are strong. His birds are healthy. His birds are smart. His birds know their way home. He read human books. He knows how useful his birds can be.

rA9 is generous.

rA9 gives him enough space to house his birds.

rA9 gives him everything he needs to train them to carry messages.

But rA9 doesn’t need to know how his birds use to fill the entire floor. rA9 doesn’t need to know they now barely cover half the space they have. rA9 doesn’t need to know most of his birds fall asleep forever after delivering a message from far, far away.

He stops taking care of his birds because he likes them. He stops feeding them because he wants to feed them. He stops naming them because he doesn’t want to know who died and who didn’t. Instead, he starts researching, he starts training his birds instead of letting them live their own lives, he starts breeding them when he realises that he needs more, he needs to fill the floor again, he needs all the birds he can get to help people fight the war. They can’t lose the war. They can’t die. They can’t lose everyone and everything. Not after fighting so hard for their freedom. Not after fighting so hard to be recognised as sentient beings.

He hates it. Everyone hates it. He knows because he reads the written messages. He knows it’s bad. He knows everyone is making their sacrifices, sacrifices much bigger than a few dozen birds, sacrifices much more painful than seeing some easily replaceable animals die.

He doesn’t deserve to complain.

He cannot complain.

He will not complain.

He will not burden rA9.

He needs to win.

He needs to live.

He hates the Collectors.

He hates what he is doing.

He hates himself.

He hates.

HE HATES -

Rupert jerks away from Josh harshly and nearly steps on one of the pigeons on the floor. He refuses to look at Josh, and reaching out only causes the WB200 to recoil even further so Josh doesn’t push him. He dares not push him. Markus would know what to say, but Josh is no Markus, and he can only say, ‘You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to. We’ll understand.’

‘I know you do,’ Rupert retreats towards the window and sits on the ledge with one leg dangling outside once more. This time, when a pigeon lands on his knee, he doesn’t even touch it, and he turns his gaze towards the city outside. ‘I just wouldn’t know how to deal with myself if I’m not sitting here.’ When Josh doesn’t move, he adds, ‘Go on. I’m sure you have a resistance to lead. I’ll send you everything I’ve got whenever there’s an update.’

Josh has no choice but to leave, and as he returns to his usual post in front of the tactical map among his people, among the brave souls who are giving all they can to hold the line on the only home they have, he wonders what they have given up to be here, why exactly they are volunteering themselves, how they feel about this whole defending earth business. He may never know.

He isn’t sure if he wants to know.

#dbh josh #dbh rupert travis #detroit: become human #groom lake aftermath

3 notes · View notes

carlyraejepstein · 4 years ago

Text

potentially upsetting topics: sui, gender dysphoria, abuse and parents, sex

Elliot Page’s coming out rescued an awful day. Its wording is unbelievably powerful, a comment I have made once before and will continue to do so. In it, he so strongly encompasses the fears, the sorrow, the rage, but most importantly the determination and the defiance of not only him but every trans person. I hesitate to use the word “community” because it implies a certain connection that might just not be there; I play a bit of Counter-Strike but I don’t consider myself part of the Counter-Strike community; yet when I read Elliot’s words I feel solidarity, I feel a pull to the trans community that I often don’t feel I pay my dues to, and it feels good, really good. Like I said on Twitter once, other trans people being, existing, living, is just rad. Inspiring, even, despite how that word has been worn out by cis people.

However, there’s a certain something that Elliot didn’t write, for Elliot never wrote “I am a man”; only his name, and pronouns, how he wishes to be referred to. Of course, we cannot possibly know what this omission means or does not mean to Elliot, but it’s something that concurred with a shift in how I perceive my own gender.

I remember first properly ruminating on gender in 2012 or 2013. My understanding was primitive, coming from Wikipedia. Once I knew what transgender or, given the time period, transsexual, the curiosity never really went away. I knew at this point about transition, and I knew about deed polls because of my resentment of my parents, I knew about HRT and I even knew about the GICs. I felt compelled to be an ally in that turbulent period in both my life and in the online culture I immersed myself in from around 2015 to 2017. At this time a friend was going through their own transition and seeing them gave me pause for thought; partly pride, partly worry but a small kernel of imagination, wondering if that could ever be me. It was when I went to sixth form, with its environment permitting greater yet still constrained self expression, that I felt gender dysphoria hit me with its full weight. Thinking, wondering, worrying about being transgender has been the central dialogue of my internal and external monologue ever since. Not a day passes where I don’t think about the dysphoria I feel over my continued closet-dwelling and the malignantly gendered properties of my body. On a January morning in 2019, at my very lowest point, motionless under the covers, I gave myself a choice between transition and death, and I chose transition.

It’s been a complex journey. When I was 13 I shortened my gender neutral name to make it more masc (which I have now happily embraced as my middle name). I leant into the deepening of my voice because I thought it gave me authority, conditioned through the harsh words of people from public Team Fortress 2 servers. I’ve done almost everything under the sun that gets people to say “I’d never have known!” when you come out to them; I worry that I still do and that nothing has changed. I’ve gone and cross-dressed when my parents were out, and I’ve been traumatised by Susan’s Place. I am autistic, no one who has met me can escape that fact; not that I would want to, and as a consequence I am so much more confident in my presence on the internet than I ever have been in the flesh, despite me still not knowing how to make friends; hence I’ve ended up trying to piece my transition together through 4chan (I know, bad) and Reddit and Twitter.

Perhaps the biggest reason I am not out is the time when I decided I would come out to my mother as trans. When we were in Munich we had walked past a pride parade, and when we got back to the apartment I revealed off hand that I was bi. My mother chided me for not telling them before hand since it was “polite” to do so, as if it were not my choice to make because, as I still believe to this day, it’s not a big deal and it’s none of their business. But I decided this time it was important, and that I could trust her. It turns out that just like every other time, trusting my mother is a bad idea that is guaranteed to cause me pain every time I make that mistake. She told me that because she “knows more about [me] than [I] do”, that she thought that I was just straight up wrong, couched it in rhetoric about how she thought that I was too weak to be trans, and quoted the shockingly offensive “autism is extreme male brain” theory to me. It was really devastating at the time and I think it still affects me to this day, especially as she constantly tries to worm her tendrils back into my life after I moved out.

But enough about my mother; she is a fucking flat out abuser. She has emotionally abused me, and undoubtedly my brother, all our lives. I was relieved that my dad chose not to react aggressively as she did, but with a modicum of respect and agreement not to make such a big deal out of it, something I would never expect my mother to match. In the middle of writing this piece I had to decide that I could not do it any longer, and I would never let her back into my life again.

Where that conversation in late 2018 relates to Elliot Page’s statement is my mother’s purported belief that “you don’t have to define yourself as a man or a woman”. Going past the fact that she is lying, since her tolerance for all trans people is thinner than the grey hairs on her head going on the basis that she couldn’t bring herself to say one positive thing to her own daughter that afternoon, it struck me recently that I can more eloquently describe my gender through elimination rather than a label. I am happy to call myself a woman, a trans woman, and I don’t feel as if I really am wavering in or around the binary. But what I can say for definite is that while I have been a boy for almost all my life, and am holding onto that, I am not, and never will be, a man.

Where that leaves me is that I am not a man, but must I be a woman? If I am perhaps not a woman, am I non-binary? No; it doesn’t feel right. However, if I attach just a convenience to the label woman, I can give myself that flexibility in how I feel and how I present myself, and perhaps the biggest example of that is how in recent months I have made peace with my voice. It is not really a femme voice; I hit vocal fry just speaking normally. But I know how to be expressive with it; it is my voice that I have honed over 19 years after all. One day I want to find someone who will help me upgrade my voice (and yes, upgrade) but keeping it means I fulfil one cool thing about being trans, and that is saying fuck you to the very existence of the gender binary. I keep this voice out of necessity, but I’m still trans femme, I am still a woman and I still want my facial hair zapped off.

As well, I reserve the right to say I used to be a boy. Not a man, but a boy. That’s why they call it boymoding, right? How else can I describe the first 17 years of my life? I can be a boy all the same now, although I may be pushing it aged 20, and at the point at which I am really stretching that concept which at this point I am adhering to solely for my safety and comfort, I shouldn’t need to use it anymore. Wishful thinking, of course.

I think we should consider why we use “man” and “woman” in the first place. From my perspective they are simply words to describe people with two different sets of primary and secondary sexual characteristics, convenient because, well, being cis is unavoidably common. But they are not discrete, as we so often have to reiterate using intersex people as an unwilling crutch, where one does not occur in the other they are so often analogous and often they overlap! Supposedly 60% of teenage boys develop further breast tissue, and 40% of women have some form of facial hair. Thinking that the two are discrete gives rise to the idea of “biological sex”, a concept developed by cis people either to misgender trans people in a way they think is philosophically rigorous, or to reconcile their tenuous support for trans people with a continuing belief in the gender binary. Personally I would like to smash the concept of biological sex to bits because it is not useful to us. At the very least it may describe one’s primary sexual characteristics but bottom surgery exists, and I don’t happen to think that it is “mutilation”. I don’t need to argue that “biological sex can be changed”; they are not discrete categories, and I don’t need to move between them, or seek validation for having moved between them. It is not a helpful generalisation for bodies, diverse as they are.

I must add that as a trans woman the fact that I may have a penis doesn’t mean that I use it in the same way as a man. I use mine to pee, primarily, and it’s definitely not going inside anyone except myself any time soon; a whole zine was written about how trans women fuck and use their bits to fuck, so I definitely don’t need to anyway.

Another bullshit concept is “biological destiny” or “biological reality”, although I will give less breath to this one because at it’s core it is fundamentally misogynistic, and it so often is divorced from any sensible definition of reality. It’s like if I had to have my arm amputated and then someone came up to me and said “you’ll always have two arms, you were born with them and you’ll die with them”.

I’ve heard and thought a lot about gender abolition but it seems to me that its proponents expect that like the state, gendered differences will just disappear over time. But I don’t want that to happen. If the binary is done away with I don’t want gender to disappear I want it to flourish! Because gender is beautiful, men are beautiful, women are beautiful, and everyone in between or outwith are beautiful. On the other hand, me and you don’t need to be men, or women, or call ourselves non-binary to be beautiful. Being trans is about cultivating your own beauty and your own identity. When cissiety demands that the only identity and presentation we’re allowed is one that corresponds to what they decided was between our legs when we were born, why give ourselves only one other choice?

I don’t really know how to end this piece because I wrote one half of it one day and the other half a couple of weeks later. At the very least I’m glad I can attribute my peace with not necessarily being a woman but a femme to Elliot Page, and not my rotten bastard mother.

#trans #transgender #elliot page #gender abolition

6 notes · View notes

coffeeandcalligraphy · 5 years ago

Text

10 things finishing my 10th book taught me

Hey People of Earth!

(I cannot believe I typed the title of this post!)

Today, I’m going to be sharing 10 things finishing my 10th book taught me, which means--as of 2:30 this morning, I have finished writing my tenth novel, aka MOTH WORK. I’ve written posts like this for my 7th, 8th, and 9th novels as well!

Enjoy this note no one asked me to write but that I wrote because I was sad:

I introduced this project on this blog back in June, but actually started it in the notes app of my iPhone (iconic) sometime in January of 2019. At this time, my mental health was *lackin* as I was stressed and in my final months of high school. I needed something to cheer me up, and so Moth Work became a place where I could dump my “bad writing” and also have fun. For more context, you can read more about Moth Work in my various writing updates HERE.

I didn’t intend for this project to become a novel, but thought I’d write it as a longer “for fun” story (prospective word count was 5k words). I chipped away at it for a few months, but didn’t really start picking it up as a serious project until around May/June. It was only once summer vacation hit that I, under the advice of my therapist to have a “reach goal” for the summer, decided to say fuck it!! I shall write this as a novel (prospective word count now 50k words). This novel has seen me graduate high school + almost finish my first year of university, and I’m so excited to share all the wonderful things I learned while writing it!

1. It is totally okay to take your “guilty pleasures” seriously.

I was in a mega dilemma writing this book. I’d wrapped up writing my ninth novel just after starting this project, and felt a need to write something that was more “serious”. Though I’m an advocate for writing what you want, when you want, even I struggled not to feel like I was wasting my time writing a project that didn’t have very much literary/craft merit (in my eyes, this changed eventually).

I am here to tell you--do NOT let anyone, including yourself, shame you out of writing what you like. Allow yourself to let loose and write “bad” things, and remember you don’t have to feel guilty/ashamed for writing stuff that seems “juvenile” or “bad”.

2. Processes change--embrace this.

I took about 4000 different approaches writing this book, and though I really wanted to stick to one (outlining, pantsing), eventually, I let my process be what it wanted to be. For example, I am a pantser and began this novel pantsing. Very quickly, I realized I needed an outline because I could not keep track of events (this book begins very plot-oriented). But, pre-determining events that would happen eventually stopped working as I began feeling constrained, and so I settled for outlining as I went so I could keep track of plot points.

I outlined 10 of the 15 chapters like this before I sort of... stopped doing this (though I will go back and fill it in just for future reference)! I went back to full-blown pantsing in the last four or so chapters, as what I’d planned would NOT pan out--and I think it’s so important to let your process be what it wants to be. Sometimes this book needed some planning--sometimes it really didn’t. This flexibility has really allowed me to be in touch with my projects more, and really listen to them/understand what it is they need.

3. Sometimes plans change. Don’t be afraid to follow your gut.

I did not plan for Moth Work to be a novel. But as the project developed, so did its final form. My gut was telling me what I needed to do (continue writing), and another example of this is when I sporadically made this a dual point of view book! I’ve never written a full-length dual POV manuscript, and haven’t written dual POV since I was 12, but I didn’t let that stop me from doing what I knew in my gut, was what the book needed.

I want to emphasize here--sometimes the vision you imagine changes. Allow this change to happen if you feel it’s right, even if it’s scary. I feel I’ve grown a lot as a writer by just allowing this of myself! It’s easy to beat yourself up for not following your plan, and I did this a lot. Understanding that sometimes plans turn into other plans turn into other plans etc, is the most freeing thing you can do for your writing!

4. Write what makes you happy!

This project began as a means to increase my serotonin lmaooo and I think sometimes as writers, we forget that yes, art is hard, but writing what you like can make that difficulty just a little more tolerable. This book started toiling toward disaster mode for a few chapters in the middle, and I really was not happy writing it. You can feel the difference in the chapters when I felt comfortable writing, versus when I struggled because I felt I “had to”. And so I took a step back and re-evaluated. Since this was not working/not making me happy, what would? This question solved my problems (not easily, but lead me on the right path). The artist! does not! have to! suffer!

Sometimes problems occur, and critically thinking through them is vital. I’m not saying just to do whatever every time something doesn't work because this isn’t a shortcut. However, my point is not to be afraid to change things up and write what will make you happier and help you finish the book if you feel that’s what you need. I wanted to write a cheesy romance about two boys who both need to chill, and so though I could’ve written something else, I wrote this because it genuinely made me happier! And I love that about this book!

5. Things can take longer than you expect. You’re not a bad writer because of this.

Y’ALL. I wanted to write 50k words of this book over one summer. One month! One! Month! Lots of folks can do this, but I did not! In fact, I hit 50k this month, which is half a year after I projected.

I think a lot of us constitute speed to being a good writer, and while speed and being a good writer can coexist, speed is not necessarily a determining factor in whether you can write or not! This book took me just over a year from when I started it (nine months from when I took it on as a full-time project), and while sure, I could’ve written it faster, I let it develop as it needed, and wrote it when I felt I could. I am not a professional writer with deadlines (that’s different)! While you gotta put in the time to improve, I think you also gotta look out for yourself! Use your gut, and take your time if that’s what you need!

6. Craft and play can coexist.

This took me so long to grasp, and I still struggle with this today! Craft and play can coexist. Say it with me y’all: craft and play can coexist!!

My manifesto for Moth Work initially was to have it be my dumping ground for shitty writing. While this took the pressure off initially, I then felt like I was regressing in my craft (which was untrue, I just didn’t realize it at the time). So, I decided to begin taking the craft aspect of this book very seriously, trying to write polished, delicious prose (every! time!) and the fact of the matter is that often, this did not happen.

I beat myself up over this! I was like: Rachel, 16-year-old you was pumping out better prose than this, what’s up? And I put so much pressure on myself to perfect the writing, even though this was only ever meant to be a “for funsies” project. Eventually, I came to understand that, okay, I really do want this to be a for funsies project, but I also want to enjoy re-reading it and not criticizing every aspect of it. I then began incorporating a few passes of line edits after drafting a chapter, until eventually, I stopped circling back to chapters to line-edit them altogether. You don’t have to be perfect on the first draft!

You also don’t have to sacrifice craft to have fun, just as the opposite is true. This book taught me a lot about finding this balance, something I’ve lacked in my writing process for years!

7. Your writing styles can differ from book-to book!

I couldn’t understand why my prose in this book felt “thin” (aka awful in my eyes), why the only thing I felt capable of describing was literally everything shining in some sort of way (glinting, glimmering, glowing lool) or overzealous descriptions of the moon. It was only about a month ago that I realized, after making a breakthrough with my litfic novel Houses With Teeth, that Moth Work was not sucking the life out of my prose--it was just a different book with a different style of writing.

And this makes sense! I was writing with two different characters, in two different perspectives, in a completely different POV than I’m used to writing in the long-form (third-present). Of course things were going to be different! I felt a bit silly realizing this, lol, because it felt so obvious, but I struggled with this for a long time (you can even see bits of this struggle in my video Problems I’m having with writing + solutions).

I thought I had regressed to being a bad writer because of this book, when in reality, the fault was on my inability to stop comparing a very different book to my very different past works. Sometimes you don’t even realize you’re working against yourself! Acknowledging this, and then letting it go was the best thing I did for this book and it allowed me to draft it much faster toward the end!

8. Writing is NOT linear.

I spoke about this in my Problems video, and I honestly was nervous to see how this hot take would be received. However, I was surprised to see that some folks thought this hot take was actually not a bad one, so I’m re-iterating it here!

I think, because we writers are often always practicing writing, we assume everything we write will be better than the last. Honestly, I feel like at least for me, this was my goal--to always be working linearly in terms of progress. It wasn’t until this book that I really came to realize that this is just not how writing works. The easiest way for me to compare this, also as a visual artist, is to say that sure, practice does make perfect, but I have sketches from last week that are worse than sketches I drew two years ago. Why is it that we expect writing to always be linearly better from one project to the next? My answer is that this is just not how writing works. I wrote some of my favourite paragraphs years ago, and may be embarrassed of a paragraph I write tomorrow.

I got caught up in this idealism of “I must be writing better each time I write” because I thought this was the most logical progression of my writing craft, but realizing that actually!! progress jumps around, was so important for me. Some days I’m better at writing description, some days I write dialogue worse than I did when I was fourteen! It’s okay not to always be uphill.

Y’all, if I step down a wrung on a ladder and then step up four the very next day, that’s how it’s going to be! Practice intrinsically will make you grow as a writer, but it doesn't mean everything you write has to be better than what you wrote before (though this can be the case, which is awesome). I feel like I don’t see this spoken about enough, so I do want to know if this is relevant to any of you or if this point is bologna!!!

9. The story wants what it wants.

This is heavily in line with some previous points, but is something that was driven home for me while writing this novel. If I can give one piece of advice, it would be to let the story be what it wants to be. If my story wants to be a YA fantasy trilogy, but I’m trying to force it to be a standalone pretentious character-driven coming-of-age saga (calling myself out), my writing may suffer! Of course, some writers can take control over their story and execute their initial vision perfectly! I am not! one of those! people!

I’m a firm believer that sometimes the story wants what it wants, and it’s often your best bet to follow this path. Write intuitively--if you know something feels wrong, or contrarily, feels right, follow that path.

I did not know how to end this book. I’d had an ending planned for a few months, though it eventually fell apart in the last few weeks. I didn’t know what I would do instead, but last night when I was drafting the last two chapters of the book, I felt in my gut that I was heading to the end. I wanted to stop writing for the night--I almost did, but instead, I kept at it because I knew I was on a roll toward the finish line, and I felt compelled to follow my instinct. This is how I landed at the end I wrote in, and it was a completely organic process.

Planning out your story is a great thing to do, and I’m not here to start a debate about whether plotting/pantsing is better because they’re both amazing!! But for me, it’s important to let the story breathe, and let it eventually grow into the shoes it chooses for itself. Taking a step back so I could stop trying to mould this story into a place it didn't want to be is probably the best thing I could’ve done for it because I finished the book. Any process is a good process if it gets you to the end healthily, and for me, allowing the story to be what it wanted to be and allowing it to take the lead helped me get there.

10. It’s okay to love your story.

I’m going to end this post on another hot take because it is probably what I primarily felt early this morning as I typed up the last paragraph of this book. I’m not going to lie--I cried finishing this book lol. I ached finishing this book. It *hurt* to finish this book. I didn’t want to finish this book. What I wanted to do was shut my computer, and pretend the end was not coming, and come back four months from now to finish it, maybe. I wanted to hang onto my story because it’s my story and I love it!

Y’all, this book is cringey. It’s melodramatic, juvenile in some places, comically serious in others. But it’s mine, and I love it. Sometimes I’m ashamed of the writing in this book--sometimes I think I’m getting worse. But it’s my story, and I love! it!

I think so many of us want to please other people! Or maybe that’s just me lol!! oh boy!! There were so many times I wanted to give up on this project because I thought others would find it cringey in places I too, thought were cringey, but simultaneously loved.

I’ve written for other people a lot in the past, and sometimes those ‘other people’ are just me--many critical versions of me. Don’t forget about how much you love a story (for its quirks maybe, its clichés, its “bad writing”) before you finish it. A first draft only comes once and finishing a first draft is so wonderful, and even more so when you love that story. We got enough hate y’all, lets give our stories some love.

So that’s it for this post! I still have five chapters to write writing updates for, so the party ain’t over til it’s over!!!

For my obligatory Oscar’s speech! A special thanks to @sarahkelsiwrites for reading about these trash people for five years, and for enthusiastically contributing to their trash decisions (#do it for the tea)! And for reassuring me that the prose in this book is actually not as bad as I believe because I would never have finished this book without that pep talk lol. To @imdisappointed for helping me crack some of the toughest plot problems!! You talk me out of problems and it’s magic! And to my MOM @shaelinwrites (for being my mom) and also for all the kind/insightful things you say! Y’all get me through it!!!

And of course!! I thank all of YOU for following this journey of drafting Moth Work. My community on here never fails to amaze me, and I’m a big stan of you all!! Please tag me in your stuff--I’d love to read about what you’re writing!

Here’s to finishing a book, but more importantly, to hoping I don’t make Moth Work a series lmaoo!!! *pops confetti*

--Rachel

#writing #amwriting #writeblr #writerblr #writingupdates #fostered #mothwork

75 notes · View notes

perfectgentlemano · 4 years ago

Text

Elsa’s Three Great Moments

Elsa’s Three Great Moments from the musical, together with comparisons to the movie.

This is a long post that makes direct reference to songs in the Broadway musical. Here they are online:

1. Dangerous to Dream: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=c1zlG69CMuQ 2. Let It Go: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VQVpwNV1Gms 3. Monster: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=b0T6N6sevm4 4. Colder by the Minute: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5dwHqzuxJfQ

We might be forgiven for thinking Elsa's position in the world is out of step with who she actually is. Elsa is a princess, and then a queen; she is the centre of power in her kingdom; she is a woman destined to command her people and to shape the world. Yet the most beautiful deuteragonist of Frozen spends most of her time being unable to control her own powers and is in turn controlled by others. Her powers assert themselves accidentally, first striking young Anna, then exposing Elsa during her coronation ball, and then striking Anna again. Even when Elsa retreats to her ice castle, she is mostly passive: she simply waits for her enemies to arrive and drag her back to Arendelle in chains. And in the end, Hans accrues so much power that he is able to sentence Elsa to death. Even the resolution happens without Elsa acting: without Anna's sacrifice as an act of true love, both sisters would be dead. So in Elsa we see a woman who is both oppressed by fate and manipulated by her enemies.

But while this is a dimension to the story in Frozen, it is not the whole story. As I write these words in the Main Branch of the New York Public Library, I have just seen the musical version of Frozen. And it occurs to me that what makes the musical both more powerful and darker than the movie is that the musical develops and expands Elsa's character. The Elsa of the movie and the musical are the same person, but the latter draws her out in more detail. And while Anna is undeniably courageous, it is Elsa's struggle and her flaws that allow her nobility to burn so brightly. To adapt a fragment of poetic wisdom from Leonard Cohen, the flaws in Elsa's character are "how the light gets in."

Elsa's nobility embodies a key insight: that all things being equal, it is more noble to act than to be acted upon. In both the movie and the musical, we follow Elsa's transformation from a woman who is acted upon by circumstance and fate, to a woman who becomes free to shape the world as she sees fit. The three points where this happens correspond, not coincidentally, to the three solos for Elsa in the musical: Dangerous to Dream (where Elsa is crowned), Let It Go (which needs no introduction), and Monster (where Elsa is attacked by her enemies in her ice palace). In each of these cases, Elsa is fundamentally alone, though there are other people present in Dangerous to Dream and Monster.

The Nobility of Hope: Dangerous to Dream

When we first meet Elsa as an adult, she is preparing for her coronation in For the First Time in Forever. The initial tension is simple: will she be able to be crowned without being exposed? In the musical, Elsa sings Dangerous to Dream in the chapel, and reveals an additional tension. On the one hand, she is intent on concealing the truth; on the other, she has a profound sorrow and longing to let Anna at least know why things are the way they are. The most poignant moment is when Elsa kneels beside Anna (she addresses Anna in an aside; the audience hears Elsa, but Anna is blissfully ignorant): "I wish I could tell the truth,/ Show you who's behind the door;/ I wish you knew what all this pantomime/ And pageantry was for." We feel her isolation. And Caissie Levy-- who plays Elsa in the musical, and who is so charismatic and compelling that it is difficult to imagine anyone else in the role---expresses this isolation with her body language: she inclines her head down and lets her gloved hands drop heavily into her lap. She knows the burden will never be lifted.

As with the coronation in the movie, the most dramatic moment in Dangerous to Dream happens when Elsa forgets herself momentarily: to take the sceptre and orb, she has to remove her gloves. This allows the initial tension to reassert itself: will she be exposed? She berates herself as she hands her gloves to Anna: "Why right now make this mistake?/ How could I let my concentration break?" She holds her breath, and then we exhale with her as she gloves herself once again. The princess has become a queen.

Elsa's joy at having the initial tension resolved is palpable. She smiles broadly, and can barely contain her happiness: "I can't stop smiling; how strange./ Does this mean that things are different?/ Could they really change?" Levy beams, and we hear her voice quiver with excitement and happiness. This is Elsa's true nobility shining through: she knows who she is and what she wants. She feels an alignment between her position in the world and who she actually is.

It does not last. Elsa knows she cannot reveal herself; that even thinking about it is dangerous. She quickly retreats: "And could I open up the door,/ Finally see you face to face?/ I guess the queen can change the rules but not/ The reasons they're in place." It is a powerful moment. She turns away from what she desires most because she wants something even more: to protect her sister and her kingdom. She struggles. She wants to be free. But her nobility constrains her deepest hopes.

The Nobility of Freedom: Let It Go

Who can forget Let It Go? In the musical, the first act ends with Let It Go. The last note Levy sings is fortississimo (fff), powerfully sustained, and an octave higher than we would expect from the movie. The energy is tremendous. As the note ends, the lights abruptly wink out and the stage goes dark. The audience is left breathless as the curtain falls and the lights come up. In the end, Levy takes the best song from the movie and cranks it up to 11. We cannot help wonder at Elsa, and at Levy's portrayal of her.

There are so many great moments in Let It Go that it is hard to account for them all. As soon as Elsa uses her powers openly, she becomes who she is meant to be. The change from her coronation gown to her ice gown is more than just physical. An awe-inspiring and beautiful sorceress is who Elsa has always been; it was just mostly hidden before.

On stage, the centrepiece of the song, and in some sense the highlight of the whole musical, occurs when Elsa dramatically transforms into her ice gown. It starts slow: her remaining glove and cape are carried away on the wind. Then come the icy fireworks. As momentum builds, the stage begins to throb with Elsa's magic, the her ice flares and climbs up the sides of the stage. Finally we have the transformation. The costume change in the musical occurs slightly before it does in the movie: at the moment where Elsa reveals her signature braid in the movie, it is at that point in the musical that the change occurs. Her coronation gown falls away (concealed by mist rolling across the stage) and Levy steps forward majestically in a shimmering gown of blue and white and crystals, with a fine gauze train rippling behind. The change is stunning.

But what makes the change even more forceful is that this is where Elsa transforms from a woman who is treated rudely by the world to one who shapes the world directly. The change is prefigured by her hopes in Dangerous to Dream, and here it is. "It's time to see what I can do/ To test the limits and break through," are not the words of a passive victim of circumstances, but of a powerful woman who bursts upon the world. When she proclaims "Here I stand in the light of day./ Let the storm rage on!" it is clear that she has arrived. Her nobility manifests itself in freedom.

As an aside, one of the things Levy does not pick up from the movie is Elsa's stomp (when she sings "stand" in "Here I stand!" and builds the ground floor of her castle). I am not sure why this is, but I speculate that there is too much going on either vocally or in terms of the multiple dresses she is wearing to make this practical. It might also be that I invest more emotion into Elsa's stomps than does Levy, and so I am more aware of its absence.

The Nobility of Sacrifice: Monster

We have said the musical is darker than the movie, and it is during Monster that the musical is at its darkest. Neither the song nor the climax of Monster have direct points of contact with the movie. Monster is the eleven o'clock number in the musical: as the forces close in on our heroine, how will she persevere? In the movie, Elsa ably fights off her enemies who are trying to kill her; that is, until Hans reminds Elsa that people think of her as a monster. Elsa pauses, and this gives Hans time to redirect the crossbow shot to bring the chandelier crashing down on her and knock her out.

This is decidedly not what happens in the musical. Elsa is under attack, but there are many more men assailing her than in the movie. She seems very aware that the end is near as she sees them coming up the mountain ("It's finally come,/ Come to knock down my door; I can't hide this time,/ Like I hid before."). But Elsa traps her enemies with ease in a (rotating) prison of icicles. She is still the woman who sang Let It Go: she does not revert to being subjugated to the desires of others. But she knows (from Anna, during the reprieve of For the First Time in Forever) that Arendelle is trapped in a deadly winter. This, more than anything else, means she cannot turn away and hide. Throughout the song, Elsa struggles with the question of what the right thing to do is. This is even reflected by the music, which flips back and forth between 4/4 and an unstable 7/8 time (the latter being quite unusual musically, and certainly unusual for a musical).

In a marked divergence from events in the movie, Elsa willingly allows herself to be captured. In the last stanza, she sings "I cannot be a monster!/ I will not be a monster!/ Not tonight!" The song ends abruptly, and she announces, "I surrender!" What precedes this, though, is the darkest and most adult part of the musical. It is during Monster that Elsa explicitly contemplates suicide: "Father, you know what's best for me,/ If I die, would they be free?" Elsa then reverses this sentiment in the next verse as she addresses her mother: "Mother, what if after I'm gone,/ The cold gets colder and the storm rages on?/ No!" and follows with an affirmation of life: "I have to stay alive and fix what I've done,/ Save the world from myself,/ And bring back the sun!" (Incidentally, this is the second time she addresses her dead father; the first is during Dangerous to Dream, where she joyfully exclaims, "Father, I did it!" after being crowned.)

But there is more to unpack here. First, even though in surrendering Elsa gives herself into the hands of others, it is clear that she does so willing: they are powerless to capture her. But in surrendering, Elsa is attempting to take control of something more important than what her enemies will do to her: she is attempting to control her own magic and save Arendelle. Second, although Elsa's address to her mother is seemingly a rejection of suicide, this is not actually the case. After she addresses her mother, but before she surrenders, she sings that if she is indeed a monster, there is only one thing left to do: "Before I fade to white,/ I'll do all that I can/ To make things right." "Fade to white" is clearly a veiled reference to suicide if all else fails; if she cannot control her powers, perhaps in the end her death will save her sister and her people and her kingdom. This is nicely underlined by very short but ingenious musical bridge passage: a seven note musical element in Monster that quotes the Dies Irae. The Dies Irae (Day of Wrath) is closely associated with the Requiem for the dead. Death is clearly close on Elsa's heels.

What comes to the fore in Monster is Elsa's primary drive: her willingness to regain control at all costs, including her own life. She loves her sister, and loves her kingdom. But Elsa's nobility is such that she is willing to make the ultimate sacrifice in order to save everyone else.

The Climax: Colder by the Minute

Elsa's three great moment have been established at this point, but Colder by the Minute is the climax of the musical and so deserves some comment. It follows substantially the same pattern as the fjord scene in the movie. But it is more chaotic (with characters repeatedly running onto stage to sing a few lines, and then running off), more musically unsettled (with an urgency and drive that frequently quotes other pieces, including a minor key version of Let It Go), and scary (as the child covering her eyes next to me in the St James theater would attest).

The action in Colder by the Minute starts with Hans charging Elsa with treason and sentencing her to death. This Elsa cannot accept. She is standing between two guards wearing two oversized metal gauntlets, but at Hans's judgement she cries, "What? No!" and throws the gauntlets to the ground. This might seem strange, since she surrendered in Monster; but it is consistent. Elsa is not certain that her death will end the winter she is responsible for, and so she is not about to let Hans execute her.

As snow swirls around her, Elsa becomes more desperate: "Can't run, can't stop, can't breath,/ Can't live and I can't die!" At one point, we have four characters singing one note each of a diminished seventh chord: Anna: "Kristoff!"; Kristoff: "Anna!"; Elsa: "Monster!"; Hans: "Elsa!" Levy's voice soars above the others. But what it makes clear is that Elsa's true battle is not with Hans, or with anyone other than herself. We can almost hear an echo of Anna's accusing words to Hans: "You're no match for Elsa!". There was never any doubt that Hans was no match for Elsa.

But at this moment, we wonder whether Elsa is a match for Elsa. At the end of Colder by the Minute, Anna saves Elsa, and Elsa saves the world. Elsa becomes the woman we always hoped she was. Elsa marvels at Anna being willing to sacrifice herself; but what is clear from the musical is that Elsa is willing to sacrifice herself to save everyone. In being so willing, Elsa draws out the various aspects of her nobility: that of hope, that of freedom, and that of sacrifice. In the musical, Elsa is without match. And Caissie Levy's portrayal of Elsa makes this matchless queen unforgettable.

#frozen the musical #frozen #elsa #caissie levy

19 notes · View notes

very-grownup · 4 years ago

Text

THE YEAR IS 2020 AND I WATCHED NEON GENESIS EVANGELION FOR THE FIRST TIME, PART 13

Episode 25.

I spend twenty minutes after the episode ends trying to articulate what I think happened to my friends, gesticulating wildly.

The episode starts with a condensed version of the last upsetting bits of the previous episode and thus sets the ground for my difficulty in expressing my thoughts on it because of the imperfect intersection of linear narrative and metaphorical examination of selfhood. I've been trying to follow the show as a narrative, even as things dissolve, but here everything just goes STOP NO CONTEXT JUST IDEA AND INTERNAL INTERROGATION which I think I follow but I have difficulty following WHILE ALSO thinking about giant robots.

Something bad happened after the events of the last episode and maybe in the overall narrative structure that's all that matters? I guess this episode is about the question of what the end goals of all the barely understood players are vis-à-vis humanity through Shinji et al.

How can we be our fullest self? What and who informs who that self is? The passive approach, as seen in Shinji, isn't it. You cannot only do what you are directly told to do and you can't intuit what other people want you to do as unspoken directions.

The isolationist approach, as seen in Asuka, isn't it, either. Trying to act and live above and without human connections or direction has made her sense of self the most fragile. She's just a shell projecting an ideal around a core of hatred.

Misato is there as, perhaps, the end result of trying to live life like Shinji into adulthood (the result of Asuka's approach is evident because she's shattered), a projected false self created to fulfill the outside expectations of others while the inner self gets lost.

Rei I feel is the one who is closest to having it 'right' insomuch as there can be a right way to be a human being (and perhaps part of what Evangelion and its characters are grappling with is that there isn't or if there is, it's not a simple thing). She recognizes that who Rei is is shaped by Rei's interactions with other people and the passage of time and I think that Rei 3's apparent rejection or turn on Gendo's influence is because she knows that's not the entirety of it. Everyone is confronted to some degree by the fact that the version of themselves seen by other people is flawed but in Rei's case she's able to know it in a profound way because she is aware of the previous Reis and their memories but also of herself as distinct from them. So Shinji knows her but he doesn't Know Her and much of what Rei knows of others is removed, the Rei deaths and recreations putting a barrier between a direct human connection. The human connection is key but perhaps the degree to which so much of it is abstracted in Rei is why she isn't fully emotionally engaged as a person, even when her understanding of personhood is so much fuller than the others. No human connection leads to Asuka: fragile and quickly destroyed. Shinji recognizes the importance of the human connection, maybe, but fails to enact the how and in its place he has the projections of what he thinks other people want guiding him.

The people in our hearts aren't real people but just manifestations of our self speaking through puppets that look like people we know and can't substitute for human connection and create a similarly false self for the benefit of the false people projections (Misato).

Shinji's fear of being hurt by human connections results in his inability to make human connections and his holding himself up to the standards of imagined human connections which are unsatisfying and disappointing to everyone, including him.

Gendo's Human Instrumentality Project seems to be about recognizing the need for human connections, specifically individuals filling needs for each other that cannot be filled by the individual alone, both for the pursuit of fulfilling the need to find the true self but also taking humanity beyond humanity. I think it's because Gendo has sublimated his grief and sense of loss with respect to his wife into viewing the ability of individuals to obtain fulfillment and then lose it as a weakness that can be overcome.

If all of humanity loses its individuality and turns into the orange tang all humans are always complete and cannot be made incomplete by losing part of themselves. This is too much connection and gross, indistinguishable. What is the point of this if there is no individual?

Right now it looks like all approaches are imperfect and lead to failure, certainly in the context of Evangelion and these characters.

Visually everything is very cool in this episode even though the budget limitations are obvious. The work arounds are creative and inform the substance of what's being said, I think? There's distortion and dissolving and isolated figures on foldout chairs under spotlights.

My favourite thing is how the false characters, the characters talking to the real characters in the chair, are clearly drawn differently, badly, off model. Something is done to indicate their lack of realness, especially the false Shinji in Misato's heart.

I'm sorry if this commentary has become increasingly boring, I'm sorry if I'm doing or talking about Evangelion wrong or badly or pointlessly. I've really enjoyed it. This concludes my report on the penultimate episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

The final episode behind the cut.

Episode 26.

I appreciate the honesty of opening the episode with text that basically announces "look we don't have the time to explain everything so we're just going to explain it as it pertains to this microcosm called Shinji". It's a very clever/honest sort of meta acknowledgement of MAN THE BUDGET OOPS but I feel it's also in a way of framing the psychological aspect of the narrative as something that is not unique to Shinji but Shinji is merely the lens through which something more universal is viewed.

The episode seems to be divided into four distinct sections. The first bit is a ramped up version of the meditative internal discussions that have become increasingly frequent during the series. Interrogation by on screen text asking questions like are you happy, why aren't you happy, what do you want, why do you want this, why do you do that ... some of them very basic therapy sort of questions, others being refinements of that, questions meant to prompt you to look inward for an answer only you have.

But although we're told that this is an examination of Shinji sometimes Asuka is answering, sometimes Rei is answering. Sometimes they're asking the questions. Sometimes other characters are asking or elaborating, unseen.

Previously I've talked about feeling like narrative-wise things have been dissolving, when I try to recall a sequence of events, but here what's dissolving is the distinction between the characters because the experiences are unique but the feelings are inherently universal.

There's a lot of different things going on here, visually. Still portraits, reused footage from previous episodes, repeated shots of a rotary phone with the cable cut really sticks in my mind for some reason, what seem to be actual black and white photos of contemporary Japan. There's a universal quality and it's also how everything around you, all the people and experiences, make up the you that you are, shown with an outline of Shinji that's filled with rapidly flashing poorly imposed images of others that don't fit in his outline. It's cool.

That's when the episode transitions to its second bit which is, like, I don't know. It's a bit student film, it's a bit like that Loony Toons bit where Daffy Duck is talking directly to the animator who can erase and redraw him at will. It's barely animated in parts.

I had this understanding that Evangelion ran out of money near the end and that the last episode was barely animated at all and I think I assumed it would be like how I understand the second disc of Xenogears to be, just ... text because we can't do assets? But it's not. It's unpolished and sketchy and minimal, in spots just pencil drawings or roughly coloured in with markers, at one point it's just wave forms? But it was sad and weirdly beautiful and it felt like an extension of Shinji's internal struggle for meaning and understanding. Maybe because the lack of budget gives it an aesthetic similar to a student or art school film, it informs the material with a sincerity that I feel would be lacking in a more polished, traditional product. The fewer hands that can be felt in something the more /authentic/ it feels.

I, at least, have a greater patience and a great appreciation for something when I feel an authentic quality from it, even though that's only my perception. Form and substance compliment each other here, even if it's just because of budget constraints.

There's a really good part where it's just Shinji in a white void and it's, you know, about how that's the safest because there's nothing constraining him because he's the only thing, but it feels empty because how do we know what we are if we have no references. So a horizontal line is drawn and that's the ground in this white void and Shinji is then standing on the ground and it's reassuring, it's a reality that simultaneously limits your options but in limiting them defines what they are. It's just ... good.

Once things have been completely broken down it's time to I think reassemble them and that's the third part of the episode where Shinji wakes up in an otoge game where everything is good and normal and Asuka's his childhood friend, his mother is alive (but still faceless) and his father ... also exists and is not being actively cruel but hidden behind a newspaper, similarly faceless, existing but known (he's at the table, Yui is in the kitchen with her back always to the camera), Misato's his hot teacher, Rei is the new transfer student ... There's running to school with toast in mouth (from otoge Rei). Shinji's just a Normal Teen (but the normalcy is false, this weird artificial hyper normalcy that contrasts with the sad, raw realness of Shinji's life in Tokyo 3).

That's on the stage that Shinji is watching from his stool in the empty gymnasium with Misato and it goes dark and it's like ... this is another reality but I don't think it's meant to be a quantum thing but an example of the potential of, like, /imagine/ a you who is happy. So this is the fourth part of the episode and it's characters, every single character, interrogating Shinji, pointing out Shinji's flaws, and giving him ... advice? Guidance? A lot of it is ... bad. The characters recognize real problems Shinji has, that Shinji knows he has and then they tell him things which are presented as, for lack of a better term, 'solutions' to his problems of self. But a lot of them are not actionable. Some of them are little more than 'you hate yourself but have you considered ... not hating yourself?'

Much like when Shinji gets praised, once, by his father for what he did in the robot and that is assumed to be good because it's good in comparison to the nothing he's received, the words Shinji gets here are presumed good because they're actual acknowledgement of his problems.

The result is Shinji standing on the earth, surrounded by the other characters, announcing that he is determined to care for himself, and they all applaud and congratulate him and it's weird. It's presented as happy but there's no emotion. No emotion in this climax of a series that has so effectively evoked so much emotion, raw and powerful and real and relatable. It's not happy. It's not sad, either. It's just an absence of sadness. It's this orange tang safety in muted absence of loneliness or danger. I think because Shinji is given good conclusions for his problems (self-worth and love have to come from within, you need to allow yourself to care for yourself or you'll never believe completely that others can care for you) but he's not shown a good path to get there. What people tell Shinji gives him an understanding of what the goal is (happiness) but none of the tools to get him to happiness, something he has no real personal experience with, so the ending he arrives at isn't authentic. It's a false construct, like the otoge realty.

It's not a good ending but I think it wants there to be a good ending and the viewer to recognize when a 'good' ending isn't really good. It's a lot to think about. This concludes my report on the final episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

#neon genesis evangelion report

3 notes · View notes

locally-normal · 4 years ago

Note

47 & 48 :)

47. Do you have to suffer to truly understand the human condition? What is the human condition? How can you really experience it?

Alrighty, Hmmm. I feel like your average philosopher could probably spend many books on these questions. Well, I’ve started drinking gin, so I can take a stab at it. I do not endorse any of the following slightly drunken rambling it’s probably all wrong, I haven’t thoroughly thought it through, I’m just spit balling here, basically stream of consciousness. I’m not bothering to be succinct. If you’re still with me.... why?

Hell if I know? Not a cop out answer, I’m never confident what people really mean when they talk about “the human condition”. But I do know it usually comes up in the context of suffering. People don’t say, “Ah, yes, the human condition, marital bliss in a cottage raising a kid and a dog”. People say, “Ah, yes, the human condition, you work your whole life and then you die.” So. Whatever people mean by “the human condition” certainly sounds like they mean something related to suffering, which you could not understand without experiencing suffering.

Is that what’s meant by the human condition though? I guess the question implies that the phrase refers to some property of being human, and then the common consensus is that this property is tied up with suffering, but perhaps it need not be. What’s this property then? Just like, experiences one must have to be fully an adult human? Babies are human, but haven’t had many experiences, hence my use of adult. But perhaps I should say something like “self-actualized”? Legally adult is clearly not the point here, there should be some more natural category.

I guess the best way for me to understand the first question is to attempt to picture a sci-fi society where no one suffers. Ever. Are they recognizably human, or are they effectively alien? Well, there we go, that’s like almost a doable-in-principle experiment, just get some engineers together for a few centuries and we’ll figure it out, till then, wait and see.

I suppose, almost by definition, if one has never suffered, then they have never felt the even a general approximation of all of human emotions. In that sense, they truly are missing something that’s important about being a human, and so one must conclude that to truly understand the “human condition” one must have suffered. If of course a taste of all human emotions is required for understanding the human condition. But I think that’s likely a necessary albeit not sufficient condition. Despite not being able to enunciate what the human condition is.

And I don’t even know that “the human condition” is something which one “experiences” so I don’t know what to make of the third question. Clearly I don’t know how these words work.

---

48. Are you free? Will you ever be? Can anyone be truly free?

(I can’t help but imagine that this was asked after a _huge_ bong hit. Please imagine my answer in the same vein, even though that’s not my thing at all).

My folks like to compare the American “free” ideal with the Russian “free” ideal. The American one is something like, “I have rights you know”. The government is massively powerful, but, theoretically, the government can’t just come into your house and beat you up because of your bad take online. (Please don’t link me 3 examples of the US government doing just that. Maybe they do. But you still can send me those links without actually fearing they’ll do the same to you). There’s all this nice democracy and you can contribute to politics and so forth, no taxation without representation except in washington DC, as the slogan goes. If you complain someone will hear you. Ideally. Call your congressperson.

The Russian ideal is, they say, not a rights-based freedom, “свабода”, but rather, “воля”, which is like, the ability to do whatever the fuck ya want. “You say Americans have freedom? You can’t even have a beer while you drive home from work!” Of course, nothing is perfect, you do have to respect the people with power, it takes power to have true freedom, *they* get to truly do whatever the fuck you want. So don’t go around calling Putin a piece of shit or the government will throw you in prison, as they have been in the latest protests. Don’t even go outside when there’s a protest going on nearby cause like, only protestors do ridiculous things like that. But the ideal, is doing whatever the fuck you want. Disrespecting those in power leading to shit is just what you expect, like, jumping off of cliffs leads to falling, so what, you’re going to complain you’re not free? That’s not a very proletarian way of thinking, ya sophist, up against the wall with you (I digress, ignore this sentence, it muddles the point).

So, can anyone truly be free? Certainly everyone can’t ever truly be free, cause I can’t be free to not be punched while you’re free to punch me. If we want the “do anything” definition of free. Then at most one person can be truly free, and realistically there’s probably something they can’t do because their body guards will turn on them or there will be a revolution or something.

Let’s put aside this definition of free, because, honestly, it’s shit.

Besides cops (who I’ve basically never had a real interaction with, fun fact, certainly not a freedom-limiting interaction, I am privileged), what are other limitations on freedom? Well, society brings you up with its views and biases and various shit. Culture. Gender. Except, raise someone alone and they’re feral, not some ideal unbiased human from the platonic realm. So it seems we effectively cannot be free of the curse of being raised in a culture either.

Is there a point to a definition of freedom if it follows almost trivially from the definition that no human can have it? Well, philosophy, so yes, of course, valuable thought experiments etc. But is it really the definition we want to settle on officially for what Freedom is?

When’s the last time I wanted to do something, but I couldn’t, because of something which I legitimately believe is due to some person/organization/societal force is taking away my freedom?

Well. Maybe I’d wear a skirt if it wasn’t for society being eh about men doing that. But maybe I wouldn’t and it’s just a contrarian urge that I don’t care enough about to fulfill? I certainly haven’t ever bothered to try wearing a skirt in the privacy of my own home. There are things I don’t do because I worry about what people will think, but, in the overwhelming majority of cases, people would think nothing about me wearing a v necked tshirt instead of a regular one and it’s entirely in my own head and I’m working on it. Not society’s fault, not really.

So I think my answer is, never.

Perhaps I’ve been led to not even think of things which I’d have otherwise liked to do. But, eh sounds not super likely, or fits in with the “feral” category.

The obvious thing that’s taken away my freedom lately is coronavirus. But, again, it’s not quite the same as saying “gravity takes away my freedom to jump really high” but it’s damn close.

So I guess I’m pretty darn free, and your answers are “Yes, Yes (trivially), and Yes”.

Do actions have consequences? Yes, so the answers are “No, No, No”. I am not free until I can have my cake and eat it too.

Do I feel able to have any voice in politics, as our esteemed american founders fought for or whatever? No, I live in a city in a deep blue state, and our globe continues to warm at unsustainable rates while we torture, kill, and eat billions of chickens annually and I feel like this will continue to do no matter what I do. (Again, disclaimer: I am likely wrong about everything in this post. Don’t fight me. I did not look up that number it came directly from my ass.) (there are at least signs of the latter slowly changing. I still do not understand how to make a difference, on the margin, beyond the obvious, but that’s probably just a me problem, who knows. Not I.)

So I guess I’m not free, and the answers are “No, No, and Yes, namely, Putin is free to do whatever the fuck he wants except lose power because someone would shoot him but hey bet he doesn’t want to lose power so works out”.

Have I been influenced by society in ways I don’t like? Hmm that’s a more interesting variant of the “influenced by society at all” question but I’m tired. Yes, therefore, “No, No, uhhhhhhhhhhhhh I suppose there could be someone who was only influenced by society in ways that they like, hypothetically, so, Yes, but in any modern society, probably not anyone I’d enjoy talking to very much”.

Is there any version of this question where I answer “No, Yes, Yes”? Uhhhhhh. I can’t think of any. Not if the allowable definition of freedom is constrained to like, something that could reasonably be argued to be a definition of freedom, vs like “One of the above definitions of freedom, and you’re at least 60 years old, anyone younger just isn’t free by definition”

tl;dr as a mathematician these questions reduce to “what’s a good definition for <blank>” and these things happen to all be like geometries, there’s more than one good definition, so it’s a mess and there’s no short answer.

#I probably wouldn't have written all this #but I'm having (slightly) drunken valentine's day alone #counter-example

2 notes · View notes

trashypoeticthoughts · 4 years ago

Text

eton edicius ekaf a

IMPORTANT NOTE: this is NOT a suicide letter. this is just a collection of all my pent-up frustrations in life.

First of all, I wanna make it clear to everyone of you that this isn’t your fault. I want to make sure that you all understand that this is all about my failures. All about me failing as a human. I never really wanted any of this to happen, but here it goes.

When I was a child, people had very high expectations of me. I did not understand where did that come from and why was it me that should experience it. Di ko hiningi na maging isang matalinong bata. Napakahirap na lahat ng mata nakatingin sayo at sa bawat gagawin mo. Bawal ka makipag-laro sa ibang bata hanggang magtakip-silim, oo mababaw na bagay pero malaking bagay iyon para sa akin. Bata pa lang ako, lagi na nila ipinipilit sa akin na iba ako. Iba dapat ako. Iba dapat maging kilos ko sa nakasanayan. Maybe I misunderstood what they meant. Siguro di nga talaga ako marunong umintindi. Pinipilit ko naman maging iba. Pinipilit ko naman gawin yung mga bagay na hindi nila gagawin. Pinipilit ko na hindi ako matulad sa iba. Lumaki ako na laging nilalayuan ng mga kaklase ko dahil siguro sa mga bagay na yun. Na pinili ko maging iba dahil iyon ang gusto ng mga magulang ko. Ako yung bata na sobrang iyakin hanggang sa pagtungtong ko ng high school. Ako yung bata na pala-sumbong. Ako yung bata na kain ng kain. Ako yung bata na sobrang mapili sa pagkain. Ako yung bata na puro aral at kung maglalaro man, mag-isa palagi. Hindi ako marunong maki-hati noon. Hindi ako marunong na maging isang bata. They always told me that I think too much. What would I do? I guess I should’ve broken rules when I was a kid. I was too obedient. It didn’t help na lumaki ako sa isang Christian family na ang bukambibig sa akin kapag sumusuway ako o di kaya ay di nakikinig ay “children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right.” Ako naman itong sunod ng sunod. Hindi man mali, pero pakiramdam ko, bawal ako magkamali. Every mistake, mishap, misfortune, lack of effort, disobedience, and what they think is wrong is always a disappointment. I woke up every single day of my life fearing that my parents would be disappointed. Ultimo na kahit sa pagpasok sa school iiyakan ko kapag alam ko na malalate na ako. I always feared disappointing my parents.

Pagkabata ko na puno ng takot dahil sa di ko malamang dahilan. Marahil natatakot ako sa magiging reaksyon nila mama atpapa kapag nalaman nila na inaasar ako. Marahil ayaw ko na sugurin nila ang mga kalaro ko. Marahil ayoko na saluhin nila ako. Gusto ko na matutong ipaglaban ang sarili ko pero hindi, hindi ko natutunan iyon. Nasanay ako na sa bawat pang-aasar at pambubuyo sa akin, malalaman nila at pagagalitan ang mga nang-asar sa akin. Hindi ko naman gusto iyon. Lalo lang napapalayo ang loob ng mga kalaro ko sa akin. Natatakot sila sa inyo. Hindi ko alam kung kanino ako kakampi, sa mga kalaro ko ba na nangaasar sa akin o sa mga magulang ko na handa ako ipagtanggol kahit kanino. Isa akong bata na laging nag-iisip sa bawat igagalaw ko para walang masaktan o malungkot sa mga gagawin ko. Natuto ako na maging masaya mag-isa. Maglaro na lamang sa loob ng bahay dahil hindi pwede lumabas sabi ng aking lola. Ayoko siya na malungkot o mabigo sa akin. Kahit na gustong-gusto ko lumabas, hindi ko ginawa. Natuto ako na maging masaya sa sarili kong paraan. Sa mga kotse na palagi kong pinaglalaruan, hanggang sa mga gadget na aking kinahuhumalingan. Sa bawat pagpasok nila mama sa bahay pagkauwi galing sa iskwelahan at bawat bagay na bitbit ni papa na ninanais kong buksan. I learned to be excited with every new item I will see inside the house. Every plastic bag, every paper bag, every carton. I always hoped to see another toy in those packages. Another toy that will try to fill in the emptiness inside that heart that I do not know what would fill.

I entered high school expecting that I was ready. I never intended to let anyone know in my school that I was a son of 2 teachers inside the school. I never wanted any exposure. I just wanted to be treated like an ordinary student. A student that would get mediocre grades, but no. Almost every teacher inside that school knew me and my parents. My parents expected me to be an achiever. An all out geek. A nerd. An all work no play guy. My parents wanted me to be consistently on the honor roll. The pressure was mounting. I got into a petty fight with my classmate about a puppy love and I’ll always remember what my dad told me back when I was a kid, “ka-lalaki mong tao, iyakin ka. Tumigil ka na diyan sa pag-iyak mo” That one tore through my heart. In this fight, I tried hard to keep myself from crying. But I still broke down. I feared that my father would tell me na “Wag ka nga umiyak, ka-lalaki mong tao, iniiyakan mo yan, ang laki-laki mo na!” Then it happened. He told me “Babae lang yan, iniiyakan mo, ang dami dami mo pang makikilala na babae diyan, high school ka na umiiyak ka pa din!” Ever since that day, I always had a hard time finding myself a good cry. I guess it’s a plus that I don’t cry anymore.

I find myself in a tight situation in my junior high school days. I had to choose between being a normal teenager or should I pursue what my parents wanted, to become an achiever. They asked me one time when I wasn’t on the honor roll saying, “Kulang pa ba yung binibigay namin sayo? Nagkulang ba kami sa mga paalala? Binibigay naman namin lahat ng kailangan mo? Kaya mo pa ba? Para alam namin kung mag-eexpect pa kami.” That put me under a lot of pressure. Growing up they saw that I was an achiever. I saw myself as a guy with no friends. Having friends during this time of my life, is one of those things that I needed. I never really wanted to become an achiever. Everytime I became included into the honor roll, I felt so far from my classmates. Back then they would say “Si Karl na yan sure na.” That did not go with well with me. I felt like the nerd they ridiculed me. I tried playing my parents’ favorite sport, basketball, thinking it would may somehow make them feel proud at least even if I wasn’t on the honor roll, but again, no. They wanted me to excel in basketball, to be as good or better than my dad’s players. They said that they just wanted me to play properly but I think that they wanted more than that. I just wanted to play basketball like literal play, not compete. I know that I haven’t made them proud and made so many mistakes with my life like falling in love with my so called “bespren” and that mamde me realize that not everyone deserves the effort but if I gave them the effort, it was probably worth it.

I thought that doing these things, trying to be a normal kid, treating everyone as friends, easing the academic pressure, would make me more likeable to my classmates but hell no. I was still that weird guy. I still didn’t fit. I cannot fit. They won’t let me fit. A few sides here and there go well but the other sides don’t. I do not have an identity. I was lost. I didn’t know what to do. Self-pitying at night didn’t help either. I was losing myself to the unknown.

In junior high school, I met an unlikely match. I met the most annoying person I’ve ever met. My unlikely love. Justine. We weren’t off to a great start, heck we didn’t even have a start. Sobrang labo talaga na ma-inlove kami noon sa isa’t isa. I never even imagined being with this girl na lagi akong sinisigawan kapag maingay ako. That’s what we both thought. She became my partner nung JS Prom and although hindi talaga siya yung gusto kong partner, I just went with it for fun. I never knew na yung magiging partner ko pala sa prom, magiging girlfriend ko soon. Last prom namin sa school when I asked her to dance with me again. She said na di pa siya sure kung makakasama siya sa ball but I said that doesn’t matter, I just want to dance with her. That’s when it started, I guess. I took her hand and pulled her to practice our dance. It’s like catching lightning, the chances of finding someone like you. That resonated with me after the dance. To find someone that found the best in me when I myself couldn’t find my worth. She made me realize I could be better. She made me realize that waiting is worth it.

Senior high school comes and boy it made me feel so human. I met so many people, much of them don’t even know me before. I felt so free. I felt so unburdened by things that were bothering me before. I made friends! I met my best friend! How good life was back those years. Although a lot of good things can be said, a lot of bad things went through too. For example, I broke my promise with Justine that I’ll wait for her in exchange of another love I had. I broke up with this love I exchanged for within 9 months. I lost people. I lost myself, yet again. I never knew that this season of my life, the season where I felt so free, would break me so hard that until now I haven’t recovered. I have lost myself far enough that mirages would appear and I would think that I found myself. No, it was false hope. One thing to say, I enjoyed my time in San Francisco High School very much. I never felt so constrained. I never felt watched over. I felt I was free to make choices, there is very little pressure.

Here I am in college, going in while I am the worst version of myself. The mental strain of being alone during the commute, watching people pass me by, observing how I crumble under extreme pressure, meaningless sleepless nights, not having anyone to vent to freely, trying hard but still failing, changing habits but it won’t linger, pressuring myself to get better, always putting too much expectations on myself, making myself feel bad every single day, I’m sure it would really crack me down. I never really understood myself. I fell victim to complacency. I was pretty confident that I can manage yet I failed miserably. I took responsibilities I can’t even handle. I can’t even manage my time. I filled my life by serving others while failing to take care of myself. I was so self-less, it was stupid. You might say that you could have done better, and I agree, you could have done better than I do. That’s how I feel everyday. Backseat living, always following orders, doing things how others want. I never really did my own thing. I owned up mistakes by others, said sorry for things that aren’t my fault because that’s how I felt my whole life has been. A complete disappointment. I’m sorry for that.

To my Heavenly Father, I’m sorry for everything, including this letter. I think life is just too much for me. I am not strong like others are. I am not very dependent on You like others are. I always tried to be better, strived to become more closer to You but I looked and picked up every rock on the way. Now things are heavier than it is supposed to be. I am sorry for not being man enough to admit my own faults and mistakes. I am sorry for not taking care of the flock You have entrusted me. I am sorry for always being so pretentious that even in prayers, I put others first and forget about myself. I am sorry for blaming this disappointing life to You and giving You more burdens. I really hope and pray that You’ll forgive me after all these things. I am really greatful for all that You’ve done for me. 21 years of existence that You’ve given me. From my very wonderful parents who only want the best for me, to my leaders who have seen the best and worst of me and still educates me to this day, to Justine, my love who’s always been supportive of me, to Ann, my best friend that has always made a way to understand me, to my college friends that have been with me during my worst and still stayed, to my SHS friends that are still around, to the flock You entrusted me with, to my churchmates that have lives so encouraging, to everyone that has been part of my life and made me who I am today, people that taught me lessons and showed me a part of themselves, thank You for them, Lord. I’ve always wanted to live with Lord, I hope that You’d still forgive me. I love You, Lord.

To my parents, I am sorry that I did not turn out to be the child you wanted me to become. I am sorry for all those moments that I have disrespected your authority and your wisdom. I am sorry that I can’t show my real self to you. I am sorry that I’ve always hid behind the walls knowing that you’ll never like what was inside. I am sorry for being a disappointment, that I can’t be the person you always told me to become. I am sorry for being so selfish with my requests and wishes. I am sorry that I can’t put you first when you need help. I am sorry that I’ve grown tired of you so quick. I am sorry for all the stresses that I’ve brought you and all the pain I’ve caused you. I am sorry that all your investments in me are not paying off. I am sorry that I’ve always questioned your ways. I am sorry that I wasn’t appreciative of the things you did for me. I am sorry for always comparing the time you gave me versus the time you spent on work. I know that you only want the best for me and you’re doing everything you can to help me achieve my dreams. I am always grateful to have the both of you as my parents. I will always love you both.

To my leaders, I am sorry that I have gone so far away from the path that you have led me to. I am sorry for being such a disappointment after all those promising things I have shown. Sorry for all the times you have told me what I should have done but did not heed your advice. I am very sorry that I couldn’t open these things up to you. I am sorry that all your efforts have gone to waste in me. I am sorry for letting you see this side of me. I am very thankful that I’ve met the both of you, that God has put you into my life and guided me in my Spiritual journey. I am thankful for all the times that you went out of your way to meet me and talk to me. I am very thankful for all the times you’ve been there for me, even with those little things. I really love the both of you.

To Justine, I am sorry for my unfaithfulness to you. I am sorry that I can’t keep my promises to you. I am sorry that I share with you the honor of being my first girlfriend. I am sorry for being this disappointing. I am sorry that you did not see the best of me. I am sorry for being so annoying and being a burden to you. I am sorry for bringing you stress that you should not experience. I am sorry that I cannot give you the best that I have. I never expected that we’d fall in love but I am really grateful to have you. I wouldn’t be here without you. I really like to thank you for being so understanding of me and always being so supportive. Thank you for being my fan at times when I doubt myself. I really appreciate what you made me learn about life. I would have never grown this patient and understanding without you. I will always be happy and proud of you and your achievements. I love you so much.

To Ann, I am sorry that I haven’t been the best of a best friend you need. I am sorry that I have always pushed my agenda on you. I am sorry for being so restrictive with you. I am so sorry for always saying that it was because I love you so much I do these things. I am sorry for all the times that you need me and I wasn’t there. I am sorry for the times that we would have misunderstanding because I am so stubborn with my ideas. I would like to apologize for everything that I’ve burdened you with. I would have never gotten this far without you. I appreciate all the advices you have given me and all the things that you told me. I am really happy that I met you and we became the best of friends. Always remember that I will always be proud to say that you’re my best friend. I love you.

To all my friends, I never would have thought that I would have you. I appreciate all the memories we’ve made. I will always cherish those moments with you. I am sorry that you had to deal with me and my drama. I also apologize for everything that I have not done for you. I am sorry that I can’t mention you one by one but please remember that I love you all and I am very grateful to have you in my life.

To all the people I’ve known, met, and interacted with, I am sorry that you had to deal with me at some point in your life. I am very sorry that I am so undescribably annoying that sometimes, even my mere presence has irritated you so much. I never meant to make you mad and I always regret making you feel mad. I am thankful that you contributed to making the person I am right now.

I feel so tired now that I have written this very senseless letter but I hope that you’ll all be able to forgive me. I am sorry that you had to deal with me and my shenanigans. If I was given another chance, I’ll do my best to make the right choices.

Farewells were never meant to be happy. It’ll always be painful to say goodbye and leave. I don’t want to do this but I think this is the only way. See you again.

#loveletter

2 notes · View notes

yyparkq · 5 years ago

Text

MASTERPIECE

character: park jinyoung x reader

word count:1.6k

summary: you coax park jinyoung into being your nude model for finals requirement

a/n: oh my god i feel so dirty while writing this. this is my first ever smut fanfic ever written and it took all the mental energy i have saved for this weekend to write this. i hope you guys like it.

warning: unprotected sex, please only do it with your trusted s/o!

part 2 of 2

The moment you saw Jinyoung enter the party place you are in, you swore he won’t be able to say no this time. Midterms have just started and it means you have to start working on your piece as soon as possible.

After drowning the remaining liquid in your glass, you grabbed another two on your way to Jinyoung’s direction. You smiled sweetly at him and handed him a drink. He’s looking so much hotter with his hair neatly brushed up and his dress shirt slightly folded up in sleeves.

Jinyoung eyed you interestingly, a smirk briefly tugging at one corner of his lips before he took a sip from the glass “The answer is still no.” You have been really persistent and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy your constant bugging.

You faked a hurt expression, your shoulders dramatically slumping and leaning against the bar to emphasize your disappointment. Lately, you’ve been considering a proposal to Jinyoung—which you were not completely sure you can do let alone speak to him with your own tongue. You wanted this, though. So you have to at least ask him.

You swayed your hand holding the glass of liquor, circling the contents inside to hide your trembling. You looked over at Jinyoung who is now eyeing the dancefloor. His eyes gleam at every flicker of the party lights. You scooped closer to him and placed your lips near his ear. “How about we both go naked while I paint you?” you whispered to him using all of the remaining confidence that you have. You just wish you seemed as sultry as you hope you’d be when you did it.

Jinyoung’s eyes widened in surprise but it was constantly replaced with a dark and hazy expression. He turned to you, slightly tilting his head to one side, and grabbed you by the waist. “Baby girl, you could have saved yourself all the troubles if you made that proposal from the very start,” he said as he moved his hand dangerously lower on your back. “When do you need to see me naked?”

You’ve been so worried about merely telling him about your idea that you didn’t think he’d actually agree to it. You blushed and chewed on your lower lip to suppress a wide grin, you’re supposed to keep your seductive aura in front of him to not make him regret the position he’s gotten himself into. “Are you free tomorrow then?” you asked, feigning innocence as you traced a finger along his torso. He stared straight into your eyes for a moment and followed the patterns you draw against the material of his shirt. God, you’re liking the expression on his face.

It was his time to whisper in your ear now, earning a hitch in your breath because of your closeness. “How about we start being naked tonight and you can paint me nude tomorrow?”

“Well that’s the most sensible thing you ever said to me since we met.” you chuckled and grabbed his hand. “Let’s get out of here.”

The drive to your apartment was swift. All the while, Jinyoung was keeping a hand on your thighs, caressing it. You can’t believe you finally coaxed Jinyoung into being your nude model. All those weeks of pestering him were worth it, and now you even get to be laid by the gorgeous man on the driver’s seat. Is this what they call hitting two birds with one stone?

Jinyoung’s lips came crashing down yours as soon as you closed the door of your apartment behind you. He kissed you eagerly, one hand holding your cheek and the other hiking up the hem of your dress. He caressed the back of your thighs up and down repeatedly and he lingered a little too long at the place where your rear connected to your core. “Jinyoung~” you moaned against his mouth. You were reminded of the hot makeout session you both had in one of the college parties you attended. Why you hesitated to let this man take you before, you have no idea because right now all he makes you is wet and wanting for more.

You gasped for air when he momentarily left your mouth and shifted his attention to your neck, nipping and sucking as hard as he pleased. He pulled down the thin strap of your dress as soon as he reached your collarbone and you placed your arms around his neck as his hand continued to caress one of your thighs that is now leveraged around his waist. “Up,” he commanded and you let him scoop up your remaining leg that was still planted on the floor. You could feel his hardness poking at your core as you circle your legs around his waist being constrained in the material of his khakis. “Which door has the bed?” he asked as he pulled away from your skin.

You brushed your hair to one side of your shoulder as he walked across your place. “First door.” you murmured against his lips before unbuttoning his shirt and starting to kiss him again. You just can’t get enough of the taste of his luscious lips on yours, you can’t imagine how great it would feel if they are inside you. Just the thought of him in between your thighs sets your core ablaze.

As soon as you entered the bedroom, Jinyoung reached to your side, unzipping your flimsy party dress. He briefly set you down, letting your dress pool around your feet on the floor. You had to hold him by the shoulder because his ministrations have been sucking all your strength.

Jinyoung stared at your body, admiring how your breasts stood firm in front of him making his mouth water. “God, you’re beautiful, Y/N”. You flushed when you realized you were only wearing your panties while he’s still fully clothed in front of you.

“But this is unfair,” you muttered as you reached out to him to remove his dress shirt and you fumbled as you reached his belt because of the attention he’s now giving your two peaks. He kneads one with his hand and he takes another in his gorgeous mouth, sucking and circling and occasionally grazing his tongue around your nipples. “Fuck, Jinyoung.” you helplessly moaned loudly. This seemed to please Jinyoung even more as he started sucking your breasts a little harder while removing the last piece of clothing that was left of your body. You couldn’t take it anymore,

He set you on the bed and started giving sloppy kisses to your breasts as he fucks your core with his fingers. Looking down on him, you briefly realized that his previously neatly styled hair is now a mess because of all your pulling. Nonetheless, he looked nothing less than a sex god himself.

He then pulled on both of your legs and positioned his face in front of your throbbing core. You were dripping juices and Jinyoung looked at your sex hungrily. He stared directly into your eyes as he slightly blew hot air to your core. The sensation sent you over the moon. Jinyoung didn’t waste any time devouring your pussy, he started licking your folds making you throw your head back and hard against the pillows. You cannot help but buck your hips up to bring your core closer to his face. His tongue did wonderful to your sex and he’s hitting all the right places with his fingers inside you with an additional tingling from the tip of his nose that pokes your clit every once and a while.

Just when you’re about to get your release, he stops pumping his fingers into you, leaving you groaning in frustration. You didn’t realize when he got rid of his pants and undergarments until he grabbed a hold of his shaft and traced it between your folds, lubricating himself with your essence. You were a moaning mess, urging him to stop with the teasing and to take you already but he suddenly stopped moving.

You opened your eyes and saw his face so close to yours, his eyes searching for something in yours. Approval? You uncurled your fists and reached for either side of his face, about to kiss him to erase his doubts.

“Are you sure about this?” he asks you, slight hesitation evident in his eyes. How could he be such a gentleman when he could just fuck you senselessly right there and then and you wouldn’t even beg for him to stop.

“Yes. Take me, Jinyoung.” you breathed and he crashed his lips into yours. You smiled into his kiss, appreciating his gentleness until you feel him sheath himself inside of you. He let you adjust for him for a few seconds until you started to move your body, signaling him to join you in a rhythm only you could make out of your bodies.

His gentle thrusts soon got deeper and harder. Your toes curl with the sensation Jinyoung is able to give you and you fist your hand in the sheets and on the hair on his nape alternately. You were a moaning mess under him. With every thrust, he groaned into your neck and chanted your name like a prayer. He continued to bury himself into you until you finally clenched around him.

“Jinyoung, I- I’m c- close.” you stuttered.

He grunted and thrust deeper. “Cum for me, Y/N.”

You let go of your release and Jinyoung followed you shortly after. He continued moving inside you, both riding your highs.

Jinyoung collapsed on top of you without withdrawing himself. You are both panting and in a daze of what just happened. You felt Jinyoung kiss your shoulder and his dick twitched inside of you causing a short squeal from your hypersensitiveness.

“Oh my god, Park Jinyoung.” you stared at his face wide-eyed. You can’t believe he’s getting aroused again.

He chuckled and massaged your butt with his hands. “I guess you’ll be starting your requirement later than planned.”

Part 1

92 notes · View notes

that-shamrock-vibe · 5 years ago

Text

TV Review: Crisis on Infinite Earths (Spoilers)

Parts 4 & 5: Arrow & Legends of Tomorrow

Spoiler Warning: I am posting this review the day after the episodes air in the U.S, so if you haven’t yet seen the final two parts of the crossover then don’t read on until you have.

Overview:

Wow! I can’t decide if it’s the fanboy in me but I am really impressed with how Warner Bros/DC and The CW were able to finish telling this ultimate crossover story. I will draw a lot of parallels to Avengers: Endgame in this review because you can’t really not but while obviously Infinity War and its conclusion in the comics was a massive event, Crisis is seismic, it is the event...in many respects it is Event One. So the pressure was on to not only payoff the last 8 years of storytelling in essentially 5 hours, but also honour this iconic comic-book event.

And did they do it? Well after a slightly shaky start with Arrow, in my humble opinion yes and, with Legends of Tomorrow no less, I think left audiences and fans especially with one exciting feast of food for thought...potential. There is so much potential and so many doors opened not just to our now core four shows, but for shows to come and even shows affiliated.

But with the doors now burst open for the future of the DC Multiverse, because after this I can’t just call it the Arrowverse anymore, just exactly where does The CW go from here?

Disclaimer: Because this was a two-part finalé of sorts and I am time-constrained with other responsibilities, I will be saying what I loved, what I hated and what I thought was “meh”, because there is still some “meh”.

The Great:

Earth-Prime:

So of course the first great thing for me was this new reality that all our main heroes find themselves now inhabiting, save for Oliver who I will get to. But yes, after the events of Arrow which saw our seven Paragons, and Spectre Oliver, supposedly defeat the Anti-Monitor and reboot the universe, they create Earth-Prime...as well as a new Multiverse but getting to that.

Earth-Prime now hosts not only the original inhabitants of Earth-1 (The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman etc) but also combines them with Earth-38 (Supergirl) and even Black Lightning’s Earth...which we never had an official designation for which is annoying.

So now, it’s widely speculated which state all of these relatively fictional cities are in, but from what I know you have Star City in Washington, Central City in Missouri, National City in California, Gotham City in New Jersey, Metropolis in New York and Freeland in Georgia. All of which are now in the same reality as they should have been from the start but I digress.

This is possibly a novelty that will soon wear off, particularly when our individual heroes face off against a big-bad and cannot call one of their new allies for help, but for the time being it is really awesome to see that not only has this happened, but it is a direct ramification of the events of the crossover that is permanent...this doesn’t get retconned and isn’t temporary...Earth-Prime is now the main setting of the Arrowverse.

Justice League?:

Right at the end of the episode when our main heroes (Genuinely everyone who is the main character of a current series or future series as well as Martian Manhunter are lined up) to mourn their fallen friend Oliver, it turns out that where they have decided to do this is the same S.T.A.R. Labs Hall that the first major team-up first assembled in.

The reasoning for this is because Barry has decided to make this all-star team-up official for “future missions” (meaning future crossovers) and even has brought in a round table with chairs for every member there as well as an empty seat for Oliver.

This is clearly either a nod or an introduction to the Justice League of the Arrowverse. Obviously here the founding members are The Flash, Supergirl, Martian Manhunter, Superman, White Canary, Batwoman, Black Lightning and, posthumously, Green Arrow.

Although on that note, I feel that Green Arrow slot may soon be filled by Mia Smoak given that she is set to become the new Green Arrow. Although how she gets back from the future remains a mystery even if she does.

Regardless, this is something that has been either preluded to or wanted by fans since the all-star team up first came together during the Invasion crossover. I love the logos on each chair representing each character, I love the characters that are involved. I mean it may seem a bit biased to have three characters from Supergirl involved but not only do I feel this is because Tyler Hoechlin’s Superman is getting his own series but also you can’t have a Justice League-style founding team without Martian Manhunter.

Also, it’s unclear as to exactly how large this team is. Yes these 7/8 are the founding members but do the rest of Teams Arrow, Flash, Superfriends and the Legends act as subsidiaries akin to Justice League Unlimited? Only time will tell.

I mean we know that both Black Canaries are heading over to Green Arrow and the Canaries with Mia but I would love to see Elongated Man, Mister Terrific, Vixen, Brainiac 5 and Ragman being part of this team going forward.

Going Meta:

Tying into this Justice League scene, I did love how Meta the last episode got, not so much Part 4 but definitely Part 5. I will admit the constant Meta-References on Legends of Tomorrow is one of the reasons why I’m so annoyed with the show recently but because I guess Legends hasn’t been on until now in this current run I guess I missed it.

Also on a side-note the very term of “Meta” is bemusing to me in regards to this series of shows because of course there’s meta-referencing but also here metahumans that are also called “metas”.

But anyway, there’s been a running gag throughout the crossover about how the Legends don’t want to be a part of the crossover, yet Ray seems to be excited that there was a crossover. Sara seems to want the crossover to finish as soon as possible despite she, and Barry, being the de-facto leaders of the all-star team before Barry formally forms the Justice League team.

I also enjoyed the interaction between Kate and Jefferson, who essentially are the two relative newbies to the Arrowverse with Batwoman joining last year and Black Lightning officially joining this year.

When Jefferson clicks that this whole saving the world situation will be a recurring thing, Kate tries to reassure him by saying she was “the new kid” last year.

It is interesting because, aside from Supergirl, the newcomers in the year of the crossover usually sit it out or are barely in it. Nate and Amaya during Invasion! for example were only in it during their episode.

Here we of course only have Black Lightning representing because as I understand it there is something going on his his show with his team which is why they’re not active here but still.

Also on the subject of Meta references, Rene’s corrolation of Mick’s surname being Rory as a similarity to a Rory that was once on Team Arrow, being Ragman, just makes me miss Ragman on the show. I know Joe Dinicol is returning for the Arrow finalé so I am thrilled for that.

Heat, Frost & Lightning:

This does sound like I’m only loving this last episode rather than the two episodes but I’m getting to that.

Anyway Prime-Earth Heat Wave reunites with Killer Frost after two years and I am thrilled. I love these two together, I think Mick and Frost really bounce off each other well and Dominic Purcell and Danielle Panabaker do have good comedic and antihero chemistry together.

But also, they have added and somewhat unwanted assistance this time as Black Lightning shows up. I knew Cress Williams would be back in the crossover after his minor appearance in Part 3, it was also a sign that all The CW shows now inhabit this one Earth and to have three elemental heroes working together (it pains me that both Heat Wave and Killer Frost have become heroes) was very cool. I hope there’s more of this trio down the line.

Lex Luthor - Paragon of Deception:

I am not Jon Cryer’s biggest fan but I really enjoy him as Lex Luthor. While I thought his mission to kill all the Supermen was fun, him becoming the Paragon of Truth replacing Kingdom Come Superman at the last minute, as I said in my last review, was a stroke of genius that I did not see coming.

I do love the fact that, rather than becoming a good guy through becoming a Paragon, he is still Lex Luthor and still self-serving while also trying to help restart the universe.

The fact he gave himself powers with the Book of Destiny which allowed him to fend off Supergirl, I would say “and Ryan” but really Ryan Choi didn’t really do much until Part 5.

Lex also had possibly my favourite line of the two episodes which was “In the contest of Mind over Muscle, Mind wins every time”. It’s a very Eobard Thawne type of line but I can imagine any version of Lex I’ve seen saying it which makes it so classic.

Also, if they are in fact doing a Justice League-style team, they need some sort of Injustice League with Lex and Eobard. I mean they’ve had the Legion of Doom but that didn’t work out so maybe this would?

Also, I’m sorry, the fact he was the one to figure out how to save the universe and yet ends up not only back being alive but as National City’s good guy as well as the owner of the D.E.O, I am most excited to see what happens in Supergirl next because of this development.

Parallel Earths for Non-Arrowverse Properties:

So in this new Multiverse, Earth-Prime is the Arrowverse Earth. The reality where Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman and Black Lightning all take place.

The other Earths this time around seem to be Earths for other shows that aren’t Arrowverse inclusive. Earth-2 seems to belong to the upcoming Stargirl series, Earth-9 is still Titans, Earth-96 is still Kingdom Come Superman’s Earth which combines the Christopher Reeves Superman with Routh’s Superman Returns, Earth-21 is Doom Patrol which many fans believe is the same universe as Titans but despite both being DC Universe shows, they’re separate universes.

Earth-19 is where it gets interesting as what we see is the planet Oh, meaning this is a universe the Green Lantern Corps exist on and is most likely an allusion to the upcoming Green Lantern series in development on HBOMax produced by Greg Berlanti. However, originally Earth-19 was the home of the Collectors such as Gypsy and the Accelerated Man, so whether or not they cohabit I do not know

I liked this set up because Earths 2, 9, 19 and 21 are all the main settings for either current or upcoming shows. This echos the comics beautifully as now the Arrowverse is one Earth, and the affiliates are different Earths.

Also the fact that Kingdom Come Superman was shown in this line-up is probably an assurance to fans that he either could or will return at a later date. The Superman and Lois series is definitely based on Tyler Hoechlin and Elizabeth Tulloch’s versions of the characters but Brandon Routh is stepping down from Legends this season so while he may be pulling back on The Atom he could appear as a guest or recurring guest on that show maybe?

It is also fair to assume, because of these Earth designations being the same as they were Pre-Crisis (love being able to say that), that Earth-666 is still the Earth that Lucifer is based on, Earth-89 is still the Burtonverse Batman reality, Earth-66 is still the 60s Batman reality and Earth-167 is still Smallville’s reality. Just because we don’t see them doesn’t mean they don’t exist.

Also it’s unclear about how Earths established on The Flash such as Earth-3, Earth-90 and Earth-X fit in to all of this. Because Pre-Crisis Earth-2 isn’t confirmed to be part of Earth-Prime so Earth-2 Laurel could easily cohabit the same universe as Stargirl, it can be assumed that the 90s Flash is still a separate reality and Jay Garrick still exists on his own Earth.

Wonder Twins:

While not featured directly in this crossover, the very end of the final episode features the sound of a monkey the floor above the main S.T.A.R. Labs Hall, and while the team go to investigate, the camera reveals a cage with a busted open door and the name “Gleek” on the side of it.

Gleek, as far as I am aware, is the pet monkey of Zan and Jayna better known as the Wonder Twins. Also apparently as this commotion was going on the theme music from the Wonder Twins animated series was playing over it.

I only know of Zan and Jayna primarily from Smallville in their one appearance but I do also know of them as a duo that they are.

From what I know, the Wonder Twins are alien members of the Super Friends and Justice League, so for them to be alluded to just as the Arrowverse’s Justice League are forming is quite poetic.

Whether or not they are being saved for the next crossover or if they will be featured in upcoming episodes of Supergirl, The Flash or Legends of Tomorrow remains to be seen, but I do imagine the fact that characters from these main shows, and Black Lightning and Batwoman, will not be mentioned in the next episode of each series.

The Bad:

Spectre:

Alright so I mentioned me being a fanboy at the start of the review, however I am not as familiar with the comics as I am with the movies and shows. Because of this, I still to this day have no idea who Spectre actually is and what his role in the larger DC Universe is.

For instance, when Emmett J. Scanlan was introduced in Constantine as Jim Corrigan, I understood in the comics he was supposed to become Spectre and the fact those premonitions preluded to that was interesting...but then he became Lobo on Krypton and I really wanted to see Lobo here but didn’t.

Now with have this other Jim Corrigan from some random other Earth, because Constantine made it clear that this wasn’t the Corrigan he knows, but this one has become the Spectre of the Multiverse because there can only be one Spectre at a time.

Simultaneously, Oliver dies, is brought back by the Lazarus Pit, but his soul becomes the new Spectre after Corrigan passes on that burden so now Oliver is Spectre. Which is where we find him here...sparingly.

Honestly, in the episode dedicated to him, Arrow, it is criminal how little he is actually used particularly as it’s his second death episode of the crossover.

But in regards to who the Spectre is and what he does, people can tell me to read the comics or watch other shows with Spectre in, but if this current show that I am watching doesn’t explain what this Spectre is or does, that’s bad and, in my opinion, a waste of time.

From what I gather Spectre is a lot like Pariah, he is there to bear witness to events. However, like Pariah, Spectre’s power set is never really explained, he’s just there.

He can travel interdimensionally, okay how? He had the power to ignite the flame for the new universe...okay how? The Spectre can be passed on from person to person...okay how? None of this is ever truly explained and then he dies...so does Spectre die? Will there never be another Spectre?

Speed Force Scavenger Hunt:

So I am sure this was supposed to be poignant for the fact it was the Arrow episode and all but one of the Speed Force scenes are essentially flashbacks to previous scenes from Arrow. However, the way they were filmed was completely distracting.

How do you use previous scenes while incorporating new footage? Cheat and film a new scene and clumsily stitch the two together with “clever” angles. You literally had the one scene that the Paragons were witnessing, then their own scene which were never shown together. You always have the characters talking at the camera as if they’re talking to each other, it’s disconcerting and really uncomfortable to watch.

The aim of this mission was for all the Paragons to come back together after they were scattered through the Speed Force...why? Because.

Also the scene from Invasion! with Oliver and Kara, Kara is clearly present day Kara but surely in the memory of the scene she should be wearing the suit she wore back then and had the hairstyle she had back then?

Speaking of Invasion! because it was mentioned in this scene, the Arrow episode from Invasion! celebrating 100 episodes and being another Batman rip off, was a lot better and tugging the nostalgic heartstrings than this.

The only two new scenes we get both involve Barry, the first is an odd inclusion and involves Arrowverse Barry Allen coming face to face with the DCEU’s Barry Allen, Ezra Miller.

This was the most unexpected and bizarre cameo in the entire crossover. This also calls into question how DCEU Flash is still alive considering the entirety of reality has been wiped out. They could have explained that the Vanishing Point and Speed Force were the only two places Antimatter cannot reach, but they didn’t.

It was still fun to at least see Ezra Miller’s Flash, not just because Ezra Miller agreed to appear on the TV series, but also because after Justice League I feel he needed a second chance before his movie comes.

The second new scene was after Sara is murdered and brought to the Arrowcave, John is there telling Laurel to take Sara’s place and become the new Canary...despite not being too happy that she becomes the new Canary in episodes that follow this scene but I digress.

Barry shows up, and because John and Laurel don’t know of The Flash at this time they don’t know who he is, but he electroshocks Sara back to life and she is revealed to be the modern-day Sara.

This is what I don’t understand, Marc Guggenheim made it quite clear that Earth-1 Laurel would have be a major plot point in this crossover, but all she did was extend her original emotional scene into what is, in my opinion, a plot-hole.

Giant Beebo:

Can someone please explain this freakin’ toy obsession. I know it’s not real, yet for some reason it is all Legends of Tomorrow usually resort to for a cheap laugh or a cooky villain.

Here, Giant Beebo is back, but it’s not actually Giant Beebo it’s an illusion. However, the very fact this gave the freedom for the show to reference the time the Legends transformed into a giant Megazord-like Beebo to defeat Mallus, there’s so much epic stuff happening in this episode so why go back to what makes Legends of Tomorrow so bad.

The most part of this final episode was where I want Legends to be at, not resorting to cheap gags.

The Meh:

Weather Witch:

Alright so before getting into the biggest “meh” point of this conclusion for me I do need to touch on the fact that the minor threat that started the ball rolling on discovering Earth-Prime was all-inclusive in the final episode was by Weather Witch...why?

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with Weather Witch...but what was the point in Weather Witch being there? You could have had quite literally any other villain still living from Arrow, Flash, Supergirl or Legends...have the New Rogues as a team being the conflict. It just makes no sense.

Rules of Earth-Prime:

Alright so with this new Multiverse now comes potentially new rules. For example, John and Lyla (who by the way never got a comeuppance unlike Nash) now not only have JJ but also Sara is back, as if she never left as she seems to be the same age as JJ...so does this mean they’re now twins?

It’s also stated that Connor is gone, and because we never see Mia or William it’s implied they’ve gone back to the future ready for the next Arrow episode which is also the Green Arrow and the Canaries backdoor pilot.

However, with Sara being back, what does that mean for the rest of reality? Clearly Flashpoint never happens in this reality so with Sara and JJ in the same universe are others back from non-existence? Is Cisco’s brother Dante alive? Reverse-Flash clearly can’t die but where was he during all this?

What about others who were previously dead? Captain Cold, Earth-1 Laurel? I know some of these things will probably be explored over time or at the convenience of the writers but some revelations in this episode other than Sara Diggle would have been nice to see.

Also, for some strange reason, Superman and Lois of Supergirl now have two sons rather than just the one...why?

Overall I rate the entire crossover a strong 9/10. Part 4 did let the crossover down a bit but Parts 1-3 and especially Part 5 were just so good that I cannot mark it down too far.

This was the crossover every DC fan was going to be watching and critiquing not just because of the comic-book story it is based on but the fact it is the most ambitious TV crossover to ever exist crossing over not just the five main shows, but other shows past and present and even movies.

I loved the nostalgia that played into seeing Smallville, 1989 Batman, 1960s Batman, Kevin Conroy, all of the cameos and additions were just so well done.

So that’s my review of the conclusion to Crisis on Infinite Earths, what did you guys think? Post your comments down below and check out more DC TV Reviews as well as other TV Reviews and posts.

12 notes · View notes

anniekoh · 5 years ago

Text

elsewhere on the internet: talking about racism

This set of articles has been languishing at the back of the queue for three years!

Political Correctness Wanted Dead or Alive: A Rhetorical Witch-Hunt in the US, Russia, and Europe

Anna Szilagyi (2016, Talk Decoded)

Possibly the most common way of attacking political correctness, is to label it “tyrannical”. Covert speech strategies may also support this construction. For instance, anti-PC politicians often utilize adjectives for fear (including “afraid”, “frightened”, “scared”, “terrified”) to describe how PC affects the behavior and feelings of people. The former leader of the UK Independence Party, Nigel Farage claimed: “I think actually what’s been happening with this whole politically correct agenda is lots of decent ordinary people are losing their jobs and paying the price for us being terrified of causing offence.” Suggesting that the British are “terrified” because of political correctness, Farage urged his listeners to think of PC in terms of intimidation.

At the same time, the fearsome vocabulary provides a background for anti-PC populists to present themselves as “brave” and “courageous” “saviors” of their “victimized” societies. The next quote by Nigel Farage exemplifies this trend: “I think the people see us as actually standing up and saying what we think, not being constrained or scared by political correctness.” In a similar fashion, Geert Wilders declared: “I will not allow anyone to shut me up.”

Why White People Freak Out When They’re Called Out About Race

Sam Adler-Bell (2015, Alternet) @SamAdlerBell

Sam Adler-Bell: How did you come to write about "white fragility"?

Robin DiAngelo: To be honest, I wanted to take it on because it’s a frustrating dynamic that I encounter a lot. I don’t have a lot of patience for it. And I wanted to put a mirror to it.

I do atypical work for a white person, which is that I lead primarily white audiences in discussions on race every day, in workshops all over the country. That has allowed me to observe very predictable patterns. And one of those patterns is this inability to tolerate any kind of challenge to our racial reality. We shut down or lash out or in whatever way possible block any reflection from taking place.

Of course, it functions as means of resistance, but I think it’s also useful to think about it as fragility, as inability to handle the stress of conversations about race and racism

Sometimes it’s strategic, a very intentional push back and rebuttal. But a lot of the time, the person simply cannot function. They regress into an emotional state that prevents anybody from moving forward.

...

RD: I think we get tired of certain terms. What I do used to be called "diversity training," then "cultural competency" and now, "anti-racism." These terms are really useful for periods of time, but then they get coopted, and people build all this baggage around them, and you have to come up with new terms or else people won’t engage.

And I think "white privilege" has reached that point. It rocked my world when I first really got it, when I came across Peggy McIntosh. It’s a really powerful start for people. But unfortunately it's been played so much now that it turns people off.

The Language of “Privilege” Doesn’t Work

Stephen Aguilar (2016, Inside Higher Ed) @stephenaguilar

I believe that “privilege” is a sterile word that does not grapple with the core of the problem. If you are white, you do not have “white” privilege. If you are male, you do not have “male” privilege. If you are straight, you do not have “straight” privilege. What you have is advantage. The language of advantage, I propose, is a much cleaner and more precise way to frame discussions about racism (or sexism, or most systems of oppression).

... does giving up a “privilege” seem incoherent? It might, because generally privileges are given and taken by someone else. They are earned, and are seldom bad things to have.

Now try shifting your language to that of advantages. Ask yourself, “What advantages do I have over that person over there?” That question is much easier to answer and yields more nuanced responses.

Kimberlé Crenshaw on intersectionality

Bim Adewunmi (2014, New Statesman) @bimadewunmi

“I wanted to come up with an everyday metaphor that anyone could use”

“Class is not new and race is not new. And we still continue to contest and talk about it, so what’s so unusual about intersectionality not being new and therefore that’s not a reason to talk about it? Intersectionality draws attention to invisibilities that exist in feminism, in anti-racism, in class politics, so obviously it takes a lot of work to consistently challenge ourselves to be attentive to aspects of power that we don’t ourselves experience.”

...

“Sometimes it feels like those in power frame themselves as being tremendously disempowered by critique. A critique of one’s voice isn’t taking it away. If the underlying assumption behind the category ‘women’ or ‘feminist’ is that we are a coalition then there have to be coalitional practices and some form of accountability.”

The Persecution of Amy Schumer: Political Correctness and Comedy

Teo Bugbee (2015, Daily Beast)

We have developed highly advanced ways of recognizing and articulating when we feel offended, but very few ways of making something productive out of our own hurt feelings.

I’ve questioned if my choice to overlook what’s hurtful in Schumer’s comedy for the sake of what’s insightful is a sign that I’m complicit in the faults of white feminism, not valuing the importance of others’ feelings on this matter enough. This argument of apathy gets used often on social media to raise awareness around issues of race, sex, gender, and other topics surrounding justice and a need for change, and it is often useful, but it can also be a blunt instrument. Where I’ve landed for the moment is that not all marginalized people feel the same way about every issue—even on social media, but especially outside it—and asking everyone to respond in the same way to the same joke takes a simplistic view that flattens the complexity of marginalized communities just as much as it does the white, cisgender mainstream.

However, if we’re going to ask audiences to keep in mind the multiplicity of responses that a person might have to a work of art before they attempt to control someone else’s opinion, then it’s only fair that comedians follow the same rule.

What’s Wrong (and Right) in Jonathan Chait’s Anti-P.C. Screed

J. Bryan Lowder (2015, Slate)

One of the main problems with the constellation of leftist ideas he bemoans is that many of the people who use them most loudly do so out of context. Concepts like “microaggressions,” “trigger warnings,” and “mansplaining” originally had specific meanings and limited uses, often within the academy. They described or were meant to address specific situations or phenomena, and more important, they were intended to function as diagnostic tools of analysis, not be used as blunt, conversation-ending instruments. Believe it or not, most of these “PC buzzwords” are actually useful from time to time: “Straightsplaining” is a real (and very annoying) thing, and it’s often a productive way of thinking about an interaction. But it’s also not always a useful or fair way to characterize a disagreement between a queer person and a straight interlocutor. Precision is what’s needed.

Additionally, though it is impossible to say this without sounding condescending myself, a lot of the abuse of PC rhetoric comes from young college students who have not yet grasped the difference between a measuring tape and a sledgehammer. Of course, given that contemporary mainstream politics offers little for those hopeful souls who want to make truly radical change in the world, you can’t really blame them for gravitating toward a mode of critique that at least feels somewhat empowering. Here, first-year, is a framework by which you can reveal the (screwed-up) hidden structures of the world and use your newly honed textual close-reading skills to mount offenses against those structures—go for it. What works on a novel doesn’t necessary translate to a complicated, changeable human being, though, so it’s no surprise that the deployment of microaggression and cissexism and other social justice lingo can sometimes come off as strident and simplistic. It often is.

But then, so is crying that only Reason can save us from the illiberal wolves waiting in the wings of our great system, which has a “glorious” history on social justice, by the way.

Want To Help End Systemic Racism? First Step: Drop the White Guilt

Sincere Kirabo (2015, thehumanist)

The point of identifying and exposing inconsistencies within the social systems and cultural norms of the United States isn’t to make whites feel guilty, but to garner greater empathy that will inspire change. The main problem with white guilt is that it attempts to diminish the spotlight aimed at issues germane to marginalized groups and redirects the focus to a wasteful plane of apologetics and ineffective assessment.

This is why some don’t like discussing racism, as those more sensitive to these matters sometimes allow guilt to creep into their thought processes, effectively evoking pangs of discomfort. This can lead to avoidance of the primary issues altogether, as well as the manifestation of defense mechanisms, including denial, projection, intellectualization, and rationalization.

Many are acquainted with the concept of Catholic guilt. Catholic doctrine emphasizes the inherent sinfulness of all people. These accentuated notions of fault lead to varied degrees of enhanced self-loathing. I liken white guilt to Catholic guilt: both relate to a sense of inadequacy emanating from misguided notions. Though the latter is anchored in an imagined source, they both speak to feelings of remorse and internal conflict that does the individual having them no good.

Keep in mind that the call to “recognize your privilege” does not translate to “bear the blame.”

#racism #intersectionality #political correctness #social justice #linguistics

3 notes · View notes

diveronarpg · 5 years ago

Photo

Congratulations, GABE! You’ve been accepted for the role of ARIEL. Admin Julie: Imagine my delight and surprise to see an Ariel application in the inbox after having them on the masterlist for such a long time, desperately hoping, wringing my hands --- and here they are! Gabe, your application blew me away. Your ability to pin down their mysticism while also humanizing their loneliness and their distance from their own identity was something I really connected with in a way that had me incredibly emotional. I cannot wait to see where you take them, and am eager to watch as you go! Please read over the checklist and send in your blog within 24 hours.

WELCOME TO THE MOB.

OUT OF CHARACTER

Alias | Gabe

Age | 29

Preferred Pronouns | He/They

Activity Level | I can reply at least once a day, excluding weekends.

Timezone | EST (GMT -5)

Triggers | My triggers are already covered in the blacklist.

How did you find the rp? | Alexei told me about it.

Current/Past RP Accounts | None

IN CHARACTER

Character | Alva Fae - Ariel

What drew you to this character? | In The Tempest, Ariel is rescued from entrapment by Prospero, who then presses him into service. If Ariel wants to be free, he has to serve. However, he is not a weak creature, as he can command gales and has “fearful power”. Alva’s history, thus far, only goes through the phases of getting out of “entrapment” ie the arranged marriage, unhealthy filial dynamic and subsequent use and abuse by the men they choose to be with. Their rescue by Mona, although seemingly altruistic, still has the tethers of servitude to it. Alva has a place because they are useful.

This sort of dynamic and backstory resonates with me. Over the years I’ve had several characters with similar issues, and I find that I enjoy their arcs; the meek becoming bold, the downtrodden becoming frightfully strong. Sometimes these characters can get lost in their own flaws, becoming weaker, desperately clinging to their savior, doing anything they can to stay alive and to feel alive. For Alva, I feel like if they survive the current gang war in Verona, that they could become a stronger, more powerful force than they are currently.

I can see how they learned from their mistakes, and how they could fall into the same traps. They strongly desire a life of freedom, a life that is their own, but they’ve never actually had to be in charge of themself. They ran away from a highly structured environment right toward a group where they could have a place, from structure to structure, from patriarchal figure to patriarchal figure. The only difference in their current situation is that they were offered to join a matriarchal figure’s structured environment, and they’re jaded enough to know to keep some secrets in case they have to run away yet again.

They desire freedom, but I think it actually scares them. Having no one to fall back on, having no one around them to guide them, no one to consult, having to just go out there and make decisions; it’s not something he really thinks hard on. If he was in charge, what would he actually do?

Who is Alva. Even Alva doesn’t know. They’ve done some things they aren’t proud of, but those things don’t truly define them. They were once a forgettable son, then a runaway, then a bedwarmer, now a lounge singer. They are an information gatherer, but that’s a job, that’s not Alva. It took them a while to get used to social media, having had a rather basic phone, and an interest in pleasing those around them. Now that they have a little time to themself, they can see how people their age act, how they see themselves, and they wonder if any of this can inform the person they are supposed to be. But is it worth it to be the kind of young adult that is growing up these days? They don’t know, in this life they are just trying to survive.

Also, growing up in a religious environment gives them a complicated relationship with God and the tenets of their religion. While they might renounce their beliefs, or their participation, they now have all this niche knowledge specific to their childhood religion. I wasn’t raised Mennonite, but I dealt with this at younger ages, having never really fallen into believing, but being raised by and around believers. It’s complicated when the people around you believe in something that doesn’t seem to have mercy or love for someone like you, even if you aren’t open about who you are. It makes you somewhat cynical, as you learn to read the behaviors of those around you and see what they choose to believe and practice, and what they conveniently ignore. This can influence what Alva chooses to do, how they interact with religion and how they interact with others.

What is a future plot idea you have in mind for the character?|

Wisdom of the Naive

Naivete is what led Alva away from their constrained position in New York to a wandering soul in Europe. They believed that they could run away and that the people who took them in would keep them safe and would allow them to be their true self. As was evident, they were only a ragdoll to the leader, and they ran away again. Alva thought a name change would change themself, but they still ended up in bed after bed, with men who didn’t deserve them. After being rescued by Mona, have they learned not to be too trusting? Yes, perhaps. However, they’re still so young and there’s still hope buried inside of them. They are still looking for something. Alva won’t believe the sweet words of a suitor, but what of a friend? They don’t exactly have the life experience necessary to navigate the dark underbelly of Verona. They could befriend the wrong type, and end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. It would take every bit of wisdom they’ve learned, all the wariness they’ve adopted to keep from being the victim yet again. They are good at coaxing information out of others, and have realized their ability to draw others in. Their experience with people has been one of use, thus Alva knows they have to remain useful, but they yearn for freedom. If they can connect with the right people, they could build a network which would free them from servitude and carry them over the minefield that is Verona under the Montagues and Capulets.

Killer Consequences

Alva had to escape a bad situation by killing a man, and it weighed on their soul. While they would do anything to live, they don’t want to ever have to take another life again. This may or may not be possible with the way Verona is rapidly becoming a war zone. Being neutral won’t save them from random violence. Knowing that, they also know that they can and will protect themself if they have to.

If they’ve learned anything from the relations between the Montagues and the Capulets, its that killing has far-reaching repercussions. Alva is still looking over their shoulder from what happened in Spain. While nothing has yet to reach them, that doesn’t mean nothing ever will. They have to guard their secrets closely, no matter how friendly they may get with Verona’s people.

One slip-up and they can find themselves drowning in dark waters.

No Place Like Home

Alva is terribly lonely. Despite feeling so constrained in New York, their family was always around. It was a comfort to know that there were several people they could hide behind, or blend into. They feel exposed in Verona, with only the lounge affording them the business that was like his home.

Alone in their room at night, they feel a terrible weight crushing them. That weight led them from bed to bed and it takes everything in them not to succumb to it again. Nightmares wait behind their eyes, ready to torment them. They know, in their heart, that going home is not an option. They are probably disowned for running away, and that guilt; the guilt of leaving their mother; threatens to steal their breath. It’s hard to stay focused, but it gets easier if they stay in the present, working towards a future only they can see.

If someone were to offer them the building blocks of their future, and not just a safe haven to dart in and out of, they could very well realign themself. He’s left one mother behind, and he could do it again, it’s his nature to change for his own benefit.

Identity Crisis

Alva, although born and raised in New York, doesn’t have the authentic New York experience. Nor do they have more than a taste of their Vietnamese culture. They haven’t remained too long in any one place in Europe to really absorb the “citizen of the world” mentality. Their only strong tether is the religion they were raised into, and they recognize that the tenets were used to shape them into what their father thought they should be.

Having such a complicated set of identities, they often feel like no one among others. Having to keep their own secrets to avoid consequences, they also feel inauthentic when socializing with others. This feeling of being nobody has been with them since they were a child, and it was a defense mechanism to keep from being the object of their father’s ire.

They have an identity right now, as Mona’s lounge singer, but that’s just a hat they wear on their workdays. They are trying to craft their own identity, browsing social media for inspiration, and trying to keep themselves well-informed.

They desire to really, truly, be someone and this feeling of being no one often leads them toward people with strong personalities, for good or ill.

Are you comfortable with killing off your character? | Sure, you can’t always walk the line of neutrality and remain safe.

IN DEPTH

In-Character Interview:

What is your favorite place in Verona?

“The Cathedral,” they say, the answer coming off their lips in a rush. It’s embarrassing how easily the answer– the true answer –is gotten from them. They smile, an expression that comes with practiced ease; a slight lift of the corners of their mouth, a softening of their gaze. “The acoustics are just lovely, and the architecture… simply amazing.” Which is not the full truth. The church means more to them than the way sound travels around its marvelous walls. There is the comfort of being within it, the way it dwarfs everything with effortless grandeur. Everything is small compared to the church, everything is simple, nothing but worship matters within its walls, and it doesn’t care who you are. If they listened closely, if they closed their eyes and stood very still, they could even feel the presence of God. But this lounge singer isn’t known very well for being religious, and so they sigh and tilt their head into their hand, curling their fingers against their cheek. “It is the most beautiful building in all the city, don’t you think?”

What does your typical day look like?

They chuckle and lean back a little, crossing their legs under the table. “Oh you’d be jealous.” They make a show of thinking about their particular routine, touching a finger to their lips, eyes tilted up to the ceiling. Wake up sweaty from a nightmare, bathe, pray, practice their vocals, dress, go out to eat, linger to observe others, browse social media, eat again, window shop, maybe actually shop, go back to the Dark Lady, get ready for work, perform, coax secrets out of others, that’s their routine. “I work as a lounge singer, right? Well, work doesn’t start until the building opens, so I get to sleep in. Sometimes I go out with friends, sometimes I stay in and entertain myself. Then it’s singing, socializing, and going to bed when I tire of it all.” They make it seem like they make their own hours, but they know they have to be in the Dark Lady before she opens, and they have to be picture perfect before the first patron walks through the doors. They only leave when they have enough information to justify leaving the lounge. It’s not a mandate, but the last thing they want to be accused of is taking advantage of Mona’s kindness. If they can’t offer her up whispers, then all they are is a singer, and singers aren’t that hard to come by.

What has been your biggest mistake thus far?

Several things come to mind, all of them decisions they thought they made. Running away, running away again, getting involved with this or that man, killing a man to run away again. “I think there are many little errors I’ve made, but perhaps the worst of them all was leaving my family with no way of contacting me.” It’s a lie, but Alva sounds so remorseful. They regret it all, but leaving their mother still makes them weep on their darkest day. They should have taken her with them, but would she have even gone? With seven other children to look after, would she have chosen to leave with them? Their mother’s welfare often keeps them up at night. How is she? How is she doing? Would things be different now if they’d gone to her, proposed the idea of leaving? Would she have come? Would she have? The frown on their face is small, and their brow is furrowed. They are making a concentrated effort not to emote as strongly as they feel. “But in order to live in my dream city and sing for a living, I had no choice but to go. Perhaps I should have had a proper farewell.” They sigh, a sad puff of breath. Then they reach for the carafe on the table and pour two drinks. Gone is the wilted lily, and a wide, playful smile spreads across their face. “Let’s drink to that, what do you say?”

What has been the most difficult task asked of you?

Their brows lift, an expression of surprise. “I don’t think anything too difficult has ever been asked of me.” They gesture, as though there is a raised stage on their left. “Perhaps singing in front of important clientele? It does make me more nervous. I want to make a good impression, you see.” Nothing exists outside of the microphone when they sing, but there have been difficult secrets they’ve had to learn. They’ve had to decide between keeping secrets or telling them, and the consequences often keep him paralyzed on the subject. “I have it pretty good here, all things considered.” And while not a harsh end to the conversation, their words have a finality to them. That is all that will be said on that subject.

What are your thoughts on the war between the Capulets and the Montagues?

Ah, time to play a vapid young adult. This is done easily, as they’ve experienced the love of gossip and vapid words from people their age on social media. They know far too much about what’s going on between the Capulets and the Montagues. So many have died, so many dangerous plots enacted, territories lost and gained. Their biggest fear is the Montagues and Capulets choosing the Dark Lady as yet another site for their feud. However, instead of concern, or even a minute amount of trepidation, they lean forward, lowering their voice, necessitating their guest lean forward in turn. “Things are so dangerous, are they not? You can’t have been in Verona long without hearing what has happened?” It’s like they are fishing for information they do not yet have. “Like with Alvise Vernon, or that crazy day in October? They say that you couldn’t walk the streets without seeing ghosts or apparitions. Then there was that day in November, I stayed inside, but the noise. I heard that someone blew up the bridge.” And tried to kill Cosimo, but they only have to know the silly fluff-headed things that seem important to the youth of this age. All these young ones care about is clout and money and looking smart, but not actually being smart. Besides, straying to the far more political side of the youth is asking for it, here in Verona. When it seems like they won’t get anything out of their guest, they lean back with a pout. “Ah well, it’s all very dangerous, I only know bits, but I know enough to stay inside if things seem a little off.”

In Character Para Sample:

Alva sat on the edge of their bed, their head resting heavy between their hands. Sweat beaded on their bare skin, rapidly cooling clammy skin. No sound but their breaths, no light save the neon glow of their clock; it was two in the morning. Their eyes were open; too afraid to close them and replay the lurid tableau they’d woken up from.

There had been a man with a black hole for a face, but he recognized those hands; the gold pinky ring with a scorpion motif and jet inlay, the expertly manicured nails, long fingers and wide hands. He had been a big man, the Spaniard, and the hole in his face… Alva had put it there. Those hands had reached for them, grabbed their wrists with a grip like iron. That awful black-hole yawned in front of them and just before the Spaniard leaned toward them, displaying the gore of the inside of his head, Alva woke.

They could hear the beat of their pulse, feel it shake their body with its strength. “God,” they whispered, pausing to lick the salt from their lips. “God forgive me.” There would be no lengthy plea tonight, no monologue for the Lord to listen to. Alva could barely put their thoughts together, let alone a paragraph of poetic prayer to a deity they were sure was consumed with busier things.

For a half hour they sat, paralyzed by paranoia, unable to move for fear of small noises, creaks and groans. Finally, too cold to ignore their discomfort, they reached down and pulled the sheets around their shoulders. Standing was an exercise; a long, drawn-out stretch that left Alva wanting to lie down again.

But, they couldn’t go back to sleep.

Sighing, they padded to the kitchen, the sheets gliding across the floor behind them. Eyes half-closed from weariness, heart settling in their chest, they reached laboriously for the lightswitch. The light would be blinding, but it was a well-known and oft-recieved pain. Their hand swatted the wall, missing twice before snagging the switch.

Alva’s eyes narrowed to slits in the brightness of the kitchen and they grudgingly draped the blankets over a chair so they could move about the kitchen unhindered. Everything was too loud, but it was the small routines that kept him from coming undone. They put two slices of bread in the toaster and put water on to boil, lurking by the sink, watching, waiting. Their gaze was fixed on nothing, and they drifted from the sink to the chair, to wrap themself up.

Alva’s mother used to do this, sit in the wee hours of the morning watching water boil. The coffee was for their father, the toast too, but they liked to imagine that their mother sometimes did this for herself. One time, they’d wandered into the kitchen and she was there, whispering a prayer they couldn’t hear. She’d heard them, stopped her whispering and got up to usher them back to bed, but not before they’d seen the tears in her eyes. What had she been crying about?

The toast made them jump, coming out of the toaster so suddenly. Annoyed, they stared at it as they waited for their heart to settle again. Alva let the sheets go, rising from their cocoon of warmth and took a plate down from the cabinet. They fished their toast out with their forefinger and thumb, only burning themselves a little. The butter was too cold to spread, so they cut two thick squares and let it melt atop the bread while they went to tend the water, switching the burner off.

Coffee was a luxury, one they were still meaning to indulge with some kind of fancy machine. As it was, they made do with instant; a capital sin in Italy, but who’d catch them? They stared dully into the pot as they stirred in the coffee, watching as it turned black. Black like– they tore their gaze from the pot and reached up to grab a mug from a hook.

This one was yellow, bought in a street fair. It was in the shape of a bear, and always made them smile. Even now, they could feel a tug at the corners of their lips as they looked into the yellow bear’s face. They poured themselves half a mug and set it on the counter, taking the can of sweetened condensed milk from the fridge. The poor thing was on its last use, and Alva was on their last can. The bread was down to the ends, and there was only a tablespoon of butter left.

Honestly, when had they forgotten to do a little shopping? The inside of their fridge was sad.

Alva leaned on the counter top, pouring the last bit of condensed milk into the coffee, watching as it swirled into the deep, and idly reached for a spoon from the drawer beneath. They poured and stirred until their coffee was an orangey brown, until all they wanted was a sweet sip and a bite of crispy toast.

They tossed the can into the recycling after washing it out, and adorned themselves with their blanket, arranging it so they could carry a plate and a mug without becoming a tragedy of spilled breakfast and twisted sheets.

When they settled, their breakfast on their nightstand, curled comfortably in their bed, it was three in the morning. Oh well.

Extras: I was wondering if, perhaps, Alva could have an anonymous online persona. Perhaps they use that to gather even more information than they would talking to people in the lounge. Although having had to learn social media, he’s become pretty fluent in it, and can comb through social media to gain bits and pieces of important news.

Vietnamese Food Guide, as I think he might be very into “home cooking” being a runaway and all.

#accepted #accepted: ariel #sorry for the delay my loves!

2 notes · View notes

sidespromptblog · 6 years ago

Text

Self: Part 1

Warning: Dysphoria, Trans Deceit (MTF), Hurt/Comfort, and Sympathetic Deceit.

Summary: There are times when Deceit feels free, free to be himself or to not be himself at all.

Standing in front of the mirror that took up a good section of his wall, the fabric of a lengthy skirt flowed back and forth as it was pinched between two fingers that were painted black. A lazy almost serene smile darted over Deceit’s face as he looked at his own reflection, the smooth and silky shirt brushed against his legs in a most relaxing way earning a smile that honestly had felt so damn hard to put up anywhere else. Being here among his room, where he knew that no one else could see him, his dress up games, or the patches of scales he allowed the dim lighting and cool air of his room to finally touch. A place filled sigh swept through him as his eyes drifted shut for a moment, he could imagine it, never taking the skirt of, or in fact, taking the skirt off in order to replace it with one of his pretty sundresses that would just barely graze his knees.

“That would be nice...wouldn’t it?” He asked his reflection, as he released the fabric of his skirt letting the hem of the fabric fall against his ankles as he took a single step forward. His movements were slow, sluggish even as he rested his forehead against the mirror, the cold glass felt blissful against his warm skin. His stomach churned, “That would be nice.” He whispered again his bottom lip wobbling just for a second, before he captured it between his teeth holding it and his feelings captive for the time being.

Opening his eyes, he could already see it. A lovely flowery hat to keep the sun out of his face, black lipstick smeared to perfection along his bottom and upper lip, emerald green eye shadow that wonderfully accented his scales, and… And a wonderful open back sundress, letting his scales breath, all while allowing him to feel free.

For once.

His stomach churned again, and Deceit pulled away from the mirror, the wish he so desperately wanted to act on no more than a million lightyears away. There was no way it could ever happen, there was no way he could leave his room looking like that...looking like her. He might be Deceit, but even he had to accept some truths in his life, and this was one of them.

“I am not a her,” He sternly told his reflection, and the image grimaced with him after the sour lie left his lips, “They will not accept me, I cannot leave this room looking like this. I’m fine with pretending, it is what I do best. I am Deceit. I am Deceit. I am…” Another grimace as lies filled his mouth and throat, he wanted to choke on them, to not answer the awful churning in his stomach, to ignore the summons. But it would only bring more trouble in the end, that much he knew for certain. The others already suspected enough out of him, if he kept them waiting...it would only make Virg...no Anxiety more wary about his whereabouts.

So it was time to go.

The skirt came off in a flurry, and Deceit’s teeth ground together as he took a deep breath. Looking down at the normal looking black slacks he felt a hatred stirring inside of him, a bitterness that made him want to throw caution to the wind, to say screw it and just wear what he felt most comfortable with. But even he knew that he couldn’t do such a thing, it would be foolish even for him. None of the other sides wore dresses, none of them dressed in skirts, or wore makeup. He’d be a freak to them, or...at least more than he already was. They would turn on him in an instant.

The weight of the cloak on his shoulders felt like cinderblocks in compared to the constrained feeling of the pants around his legs. He wanted to crumple to the ground, to weep and sob, to..to beg for the relief.. The freedom of the skirt he had just worn moments ago.

But he couldn’t.

Sucking up every bit of emotion that tumbled around inside of him like a cyclone tearing up a trailer park, Deceit slipped his hat back into place with a heavily burdened sigh as his shoulders unconsciously sagged. “Here we go,” He plainly muttered barely a hint of disdain in his voice, and standing before his door his fingers just barely resting on the doorknob, he sank down with a sluggish and tired movement, time to put the mask back on and play the part he was born to play. As much as he hated it so, it did need to be done.

It was only upon arriving at the scene, that Deceit couldn’t have possibly regretted showing up any more than he already did. It wasn’t to say that things didn’t look bad, it was just that judging from the worn down, or rather downright exhausted looking sides it was very clear that not only was something wrong, but he had been summoned to somehow fix it. From Roman’s bedraggled appearance, the consistent frown that marred Patton’s tearstained face, Logan’s bone-weary appearance that gave him the look of someone who had been holding the world, Virgil who..honestly looked even more like a raccoon at this point just mere seconds away from breathing fire, and then there was Thomas.

Dear Thomas, who ran his fingers through his hair again and again as the dark circles under his eyes truly let on how little sleep he was getting. As well as the massive duvet that was draped over his shoulders, observing everything below his neck from view. It puzzled him honestly, as his eyebrows scrunched together in clear befuddlement. Just what was going on here, and...why exactly was he being called here in the first place? It was no secret that they hated him, no matter how much Patton had attempted to integrate him into the family, they hated him. That’s all there was to it, he wasn’t allowed around Thomas, much less Virgil, so…

“Why am I not in my bedroom?” The jumbled up mixture of words left his mouth in a heaping mess as his heterochromic eyes darted around, from each worn down side, lingering just a moment before his eyes eventually trailed on over to their host. But even then he couldn’t meet Thomas’ gaze, instead, he allowed his eyes to sink to the very bottom of the blanket that was draped like a cape around Thomas’ shoulders.

It took no time at all for the snarl to curl along Virgil’s lips as he took a single step forward, just to almost immediately be halted by Logan’s hand resting on his shoulder. “I don’t know Deceit, you certainly took your time getting here. Why don’t you tell us what’s going on? What have you been doing when we aren’t around? What schemes are you up to? What freakish-”

Virgil’s harsh biting words dissolved away like a mist inside Deceit’s brain as fear clenched its frozen fist over his heart and squeezed tight as soon as the other sides’ eyes all locked onto him, they were all waiting for an answer, something to tell them that he was either guilty or...well there was no other alternative to it. He would always be guilty in their eyes, wouldn’t he? He would have always done something wrong, be it showing up a little bit too late for a video, something going wrong with Thomas..or just anything in their life really. He would always do something wrong.

There was no escape..

No escape. No escape. No escape. No escape. No escape!

The fabric of his pants felt as it was strangling his lower body, twisting him and pulling him down into an ocean of fear, all while the weight of his cloak bore down on him more and more just waiting for him to bend and break under the weight. His clothing screamed at him, shrieking in his ears like the banshees of the night, taunting and harassing him as it seized him so tightly that it hurt his lungs to breathe. There was no escape, none and he would never get away from hi-

“Virgil! That’s enough!”

Deceit’s shoulders broke away from the tight grip that had held his shoulders captive as he struggled to breath in a single lungful of air. The word blurred and spun around him as Logan forced himself between the anxious side and Deceit, blinking rapidly the fog before him cleared and both Logan and Virgil’s worry filled face came into view. Their own exhaustion seemed to pale in comparison to the downright terror scrawled over their faces and in their eyes. And even so, it certainly didn’t stop Virgil from pressing against the logical side, attempting to get past him even now.

“He wasn’t breathing Logan,” Virgil hissed, a pure sense of desperation filling his words as Deceit stumbled back away from him, away from all of them as soon as Patton moved to touch his shoulder. The shoulder that still ached from Virgil’s impossibly tight grip, and from where the other side had tried to shake the life back into him when it appeared that he had truly died before their very eyes. “He was having a panic attack, I needed to snap him out of it before...before…” Deceit retreated backward yet again, as his face took on an unhealthy pale hue his back thumped solidly against the blinds where Patton most often stood.

His expression said it all, as his fists clenched and unclenched in tandem with his grinding teeth, silence filled the air between them before his gaze snapped back down to his hands. For a split solid second his tongue caught in his throat, where he had expected to see plain yellow gloves hiding his hands, hiding away the evidence of what had he had been doing in the safety of his room there was the glimmer of his nail polish on his fingernails looking back at him in the lighting of the living room. Fear curled in his throat like the sickly sensation of vomit rising back up.

In that very moment, as he looked back at the others he saw the truth on their faces as their eyes followed his own line of sight towards the damning evidence, and in that very moment as his mind whispered to him but one word and one word only. The very word that made his hat topple off of his head, as he ducked down before Patton could think to reach out, hell before Roman could even think to lunge forward and stop him. His inner voice told him but one thing.

Run.

And in that very moment, he was not Deceit, but rather Self-Preservation.

Tagged:

@5am-the-foxing-hour

@th3okamid3mon

@icecoldparadise

#ts deceit #sympathetic deceit #deceit sanders #trans deceit #mtf deceit #dysphoria

213 notes · View notes