#but he has so much sympathy and sensitivity and i feel he Does have morals he's just too much of a coward to stick to them

[toastytrusty]

you ever think about how lukas was born some random guy and spent his whole life trying to acquire wealth and power and how roman was born with wealth and power and spent his whole life wishing he was some guy. yeah

[justforbooks]

The Strangers by Ekow Eshun

From Malcolm X to Justin Fashanu, Eshun uses historical figures to illuminate contemporary struggles – and his own alienation

“All blacks in this country are condemned to be performers.” This is the thought, allegedly, of Ira Aldridge, a 19th-century black Shakespearean actor, who features in Ekow Eshun’s The Strangers. Why “allegedly”? Because there’s no record of Aldridge’s assertion. Eshun’s book, though, is not a novel; it’s “creative nonfiction”. This innovative approach, while successful, will nonetheless vex historians who wince at the use of speculation, rather than verifiable fact, in presenting the past.

Toni Morrison argued that black lives are “spoken of and written about as objects of history, not subjects within it”. How then to humanise and investigate the interior lives of historical figures in the absence of source material? It’s a dilemma addressed in Eshun’s hybrid of biography and memoir through an extraordinary feat of empathy. Along with Aldridge, Eshun takes four other black pioneers – Matthew Henson (an explorer), Frantz Fanon (a psychiatrist and thinker), Malcolm X (an activist) and Justin Fashanu (a footballer) – and writes about them using the second person. But he does it so intimately that “you” becomes a proxy for “I”.

In the chapter on Aldridge, his 1830s portrayal of Othello “causes only revulsion” in the mind of audiences who cannot accept “a full-blooded Negro, incarnating the profoundest creation of Shakespeare’s art”. But the actor is not enraged by detractors; his mournful response echoes his reflection on how it feels to play Othello in the light of Desdemona’s betrayal: “You feel only grief. The weight of this man’s story bears down on you.” The contrast between Aldridge’s sensitivity and how he is misperceived by the white British public is pitiable.

It’s surprising to learn that for much of his life Eshun, too, has felt misperceived. In decades past, as a cultural commentator – a favourite on the BBC’s Late Review, editor of Arena magazine and director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts – Eshun seemed to transcend race. But, lately, he has addressed it more directly as curator of exhibitions such as In the Black Fantastic and The Time Is Always Now. He is alive to the way in which every Black man is “heir to [a] legacy of caricature, which renders him simultaneously invisible and hypervisible”. Henson, for example, faithfully accompanies American explorer Robert Peary on a gruelling Arctic expedition, subsequently claimed to be the first to reach the north pole. But not only does Peary refuse to share the glory with his companion, critics such as congressman Robert Macon use Henson to cast doubt on the venture, labelling him a “useful Negro tool” and an untrustworthy witness. “The moral support of a white man,” laments the English reporter Henry Lewis, “would have done much toward establishing an unqualified claim of success.”

Fanon, Malcolm X and Fashanu are more widely known than Aldridge and Henson, but the same canopy of sadness and loneliness veils them, and Eshun captures it in his remarkable, imaginative writing. In 1955, working in sympathy with Algerian rebels in the midst of a brutal colonial war with France, Martinique-born psychiatrist Fanon is “stretched taut with the effort of maintaining a double life”. A decade later, ostracised by the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X catches sight of his mentee, Muhammad Ali in Ghana. The pugilist turns his back: “Watching Muhammad’s car roar away, you know it’s not possible for real love to disappear, even in the heat of betrayal.” Fashanu, threatened with lurid tabloid exposé, reluctantly comes out, becoming Britain’s first openly gay footballer before his suicide in 1998.

Stories from Eshun’s own life provide the thread that links his case studies, and include glimpses of unease over his inchoate racial identity. In one stark moment, he confesses that at the age of nine he took a Brillo pad to his face to rid him of its shameful blackness. There are vignettes of other trailblazers, such as the musician and producer Jay-Z. Eshun praises Jay-Z for his “final disavowal of the shell of unfeeling masculinity” that he has carried through life, in favour of “an open embrace of vulnerability, a reckoning with love as the signal marker of black humanness”. It’s a fitting description of the author, too. Ever since leaving home for university, dumping his past into a black bin liner bound for the incinerator, it seems Eshun has been a stranger to himself. His book is an act of rapprochement rendered with great emotional intelligence and tenderness.

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[htfs-ranked-on]

Htfs and how they would react to seeing one of the super squirrels dying

i'm actually so obsessed with this i have to go more in depth than usual

this is a pretty open ended concept so right from the get go i'm going to establish the main idea i'll be ranking from: an accidental death, but without the typical htf resurrection. no coming back from this one :3c

now, ranked in approximate order of most upset to least upset,

if it's splendid:

toothy: toothy is splendid's biggest fan, and he's sensitive to begin with. this was his hero, and now he's just gone. he's going to be an absolute wreck about it.

sniffles: sniffles is another big splendid fan, but he's also going to be upset from a logistics standpoint. the town's down a protector, which leaves them much more vulnerable than they were before. surely splendont will try to pick up the slack, but is he a suitable replacement? it's hard to say, and that's what makes sniffles worry.

flaky: this would scare them, to put it lightly. that was splendid, a superhero. heroes aren't supposed to die like that, and if even he can be taken out, where does that leave the rest of them? is anyone safe?

splendont: surprisingly, he would take this pretty hard. sure, he and splendid were rivals, but he never wanted the guy dead. on top of that, the whole town is looking to him, either suspicious about his possible involvement in the issue (even if he had nothing to do with it), or worse, expecting him to take up the role of town hero. that's a lot of attention and responsibility on him all of a sudden, and there's very little room for error.

giggles: it may be a little selfish, but her first concern is who's going to keep her safe now. she has an unlucky tendency to get into situations that need a hero's helping hand to get her out of, and she's really not sure splendont is going be good enough for the job.

mime: he may not be the biggest splendid fan, but he liked the guy well enough! mostly, he's just sad to see how down everyone seems after the fact. town morale takes a big hit, and it seems like balloon animals and juggling aren't going to cheer anyone up this time.

russell: he's only a casual splendid fan, but he recognizes a bad omen when he sees one. he doesn't like the look of the rising tensions in town, to say the least.

flippy: flippy's never interacted with splendid, but he knows a lot of the townspeople who have, and he hates to see them hurting. he's no stranger to loss, so he's quick to go around and comfort as many people as he can.

nutty: he was never a huge fan, but the situation makes sniffles upset, and anything that upsets his friends upsets him too. he doesn't have much experience with this kind of thing, though, so he has no idea how to even begin comforting anyone about it.

petunia: to her, the whole thing is more shocking than anything. she spends a lot of time immediately afterwards just wondering how something like this could even happen.

cuddles: another casual splendid fan. more than anything else, he's upset that his friends are hurting, and he doesn't have any good way to comfort them. he's pretty rattled by such a big name just being gone, too.

mole: him and splendid weren't on good terms, but he didn't really have any ill will towards the man, he just thinks it's funny to cause problems on purpose. he certainly never wanted the hero dead, and he does feel a bit of sympathy about the situation.

lammy: she's too new to town to really understand why this guy was so important to everyone, but she can tell that he was, and that a lot of her dear friends are really upset, so she's more than willing to offer a shoulder to cry on to anyone who needs it.

handy: handy's not known for caring about other people in general, but even he can see that this is bothering people, so at the very least, he keeps his mouth shut.

lifty: he isn't upset so much as unnerved. the twins were pretty staunchly enemies with splendid, but... he was a superhero. those guys are supposed to be immune to shit like that, aren't they? splendid dying throws off what he knows to be true about the world, and he doesn't like that one bit.

disco bear: this is a major vibe killer, in his opinion. the whole town's down in the dumps and no one wants to do anything. him, he just wants things to go back to normal so he can get his groove back.

shifty: he just flat out doesn't give a shit. maybe it is a little shocking that a superhero could die like that, but he's much more willing to shrug it off than lifty is. he's more ticked that it makes it a bad time to try and rob people. hey, he may be an asshole, but even he's not going to steal from someone who's grieving, that's just tacky. he has standards.

pop: he would never say it out loud, but he always had a petty distaste for splendid. he found the guy obnoxious and show-offish, and just generally not that likable at all. the town doesn't need superheroes, in his opinion. they're better off just taking care of themselves. still, though, he has enough tact not to say anything about it.

cub: he's a baby. he's very responsive to other people's emotions, and everyone else is upset, so he is too. but in that little kid way where he'll forget about it real quick.

if it's splendont:

splendid: much to the surprise of just about everyone, splendid would take this the absolute hardest. yes, they were rivals, but splendid was so sure that with just a little bit more time, he could have reached him. he'll find a way to blame himself, even if he wasn't involved at all.

flaky: again, they're more afraid than anything. splendont might not have been the town's main superhero, but he was still superpowered. it poses the question again of where does this leave the rest of them, if even someone with superpowers can die like that?

toothy: toothy's still our sensitive soul, here. he could have disliked splendont for being splendid's rival, but he never saw it like that. he always saw someone with the potential to be incredible, if he would just put his energy towards something better, and now he'll never get the chance.

sniffles: sniffles reacts very similarly to toothy, except he did dislike splendont, to a certain extent. not for being splendid's rival, but because he also saw the potential splendont had to be amazing, and how often he squandered it on that rivalry. he's torn between being terribly frustrated that that potential will never be realized, and terribly guilty for still feeling that way towards a dead man.

lifty: you couldn't waterboard it out of him, but he kind of liked the guy. it was mostly for petty reasons (the enemy of my enemy is my friend, yeah?), but he also just... thought he was cool. and again, the super squirrels are supposed to be immune to that kind of shit, and he does not like finding out that they aren't.

cuddles: he's super bummed!! splendont was cool and edgy, and made things interesting. he was pretty fond of the guy and it sucks that he won't be around anymore.

petunia: she wouldn't go so far as to say she liked splendont, but it's disquieting to have such a major name and face just be gone, all of a sudden. she doesn't like disruptions to the status quo, and this is a major one.

russell: again, this screams bad omen to him. superheroes don't just die like that, there has to be something else going on. call him superstitious, but he's definitely got his guard up for a while.

flippy: there's less people hurting about this one, so he has more time to focus on how incredibly not right this feels. similarly to russell, he's suspicious that this is a bad omen of some sort, because superheroes aren't supposed to die.

nutty: same as before, he's mostly upset at how torn up sniffles is about this. he wants his closest friend to feel better, but he doesn't know how to go about fixing this (he can't, you can't fix death, but he'd sure love to try.)

mime: he found splendont a bit distasteful and overly aggressive, but he can see that people are upset regardless. everyone is unsettled and tense, and there's not really anything he can do about it, which he doesn't care for to say the least.

mole: he always assumed splendont was rivals with splendid for the same reason he was: for the bit. whether he was correct is debatable, but regardless, he had respect for him as a fellow intentional problem causer, and he's pretty bummed to see him go.

lammy: she has no idea who splendont is or why he would have been important (remember, she's new to town, and he doesn't exactly make regular appearances), but again, some of her dear friends are upset, and she's determined to be there for them. she doesn't need to understand.

handy: same as with splendid, he just isn't one to care about someone dying if it's not in his very limited circle of loved ones.

disco bear: once again, he simply cannot vibe while everyone is being so weird and tense about the whole situation. maybe he's being a bit callous, but jeez, he wishes things would go back to normal

shifty: he, again, doesn't give a shit. he can tell that the situation is bothering his brother, for some reason, but he can't figure out why, so he figures if he just leaves it alone it'll resolve itself. probably.

pop: he doesn't like this super squirrel either, for the same reasons he doesn't like splendid. he really does believe the town would be better off solving their own problems instead of handing them off to some superpowered jerks, but he won't say it out loud while everyone is upset.

giggles: she did not like splendont. she thought he was brutish and aggressive, and she hated how he was always at odds with splendid. she keeps her mouth shut to be polite, but pretty much everyone can tell she's not exactly sad.

cub: he's still a baby, haha. he's upset when he sees other people are, but he moves on fast.

[joylinda-hawks]

Our heritage has been destroyed. I couldn't protect any of you. WOH, Episode 1. ZZS returned to the place Jin taught him to call home. Raw decor is its hallmark. The only decoration is a drawing of a plum branch with flowers. ZZS knows what it wants to do and wants to prepare properly for the meeting with the prince. He does not know how the prince will react to his request, perhaps he will want to sentence him to death. It doesn't matter to the ZZS. He's already dead inside. ZZS sits in front of the mirror and unbuttons his shirt, we see strange bumps on his chest. In ZZS's mind, he tells us what he did to leave Tian Chuang. He explains that it took a year and a half to drive the nails into the body, adding that if he drove them in at once, the person thus tortured would immediately lose their minds and would live as an invalid for three years. ZZS picks up a knife from the table and applies it to the callous on his body, slicing the skin, further explaining that if he hammers one nail every three months, his loss of his mind will be slower, but he will still have three years to live and half his martial arts proficiency. Cutting the skin is a painful operation, we see that ZZS suffers. Before dying, ZZS will have to endure unimaginable pain. When ZZS looks up and looks in the mirror, he sees Jiu Xiao's silhouette behind him, begging him not to. ZZS asks him why he is crying, there is no reason to cry because ZZS deserved what he did to himself with his bad deeds. ZZS claims it is its fault that 81 members of the Siji Manor sect lost their lives and destroyed the sect's legacy. ZZS could not protect anyone. Desperately, ZZS says that he even killed Jiu Xiao's fiancée. He asks how he will be able to look at Jiu Xiao's face after his death. ZZS turns to grab the other person's hand, but he’s not there. He looks in the mirror again and sees a disappearing figure. After a while, he asks if Princess Jing An reported him on the other side. In front of ZZS's eyes, there is a moment when the princess drinks the poison and collapses holding a wooden hairpin in her hand. A hairpin given to her as a token of love by Jiu Xiao. The memory breaks ZZS's heart and he can't hold back his tears. He reproaches himself for being so cruel that he poisoned his sister-in-law at the first meeting. ZZS tears alternate with laughter. At the end, ZZS applies it to the next calluses and incises the body, experiencing great pain. His emaciated body endured the torture. The first episode of WOH and we have a lot of very emotional scenes. The first episode is building the ZZS character, maybe a little too fast, but almost perfect. At the beginning of the episode, we may not feel sympathy for ZZS, we think that he is the bad character in the series. However, as we slowly discover his secrets, the character of ZZS becomes closer to us, we understand the motives of his actions. ZZS is a man with strong moral principles and ZZH is the same man. Playing the character of ZZS was a big challenge for ZZH, but he coped with it brilliantly. The scene of ZZS's confession to himself is very moving. We realize that ZZS will be a complicated character. Strong and firm on the one hand, delicate and sensitive on the other. With his character, ZZH was able to show the wonderful duality of this character. The close-ups of ZZH's faces are fascinating in this scene, where we can see the whole spectrum of emotions. Perfect shots, using chiaroscuro and ZZH's beautiful face, showing every aspect of suffering. I love these shots. ZZS in this scene made me a devoted fan of this character. As much as I loved ZZH, I started to love ZZS.

[clavis-baby]

Songs that You would listen to After a Breakup with The Brothers

(Lucifer,Mammon,Satan,Asmo)

I’m so sorry I was listening to reckless and it made me feel something (also I’ve never dated anyone sooo shhh)

Also I tried to add at least 3/4 to every brother but I realized they all had a Olivia Rodrigo song so sorry about that also I tried not cross over the same songs 😅

Also Spotify Playlist!!!

————-

Lucifer

enough for you - Olivia Rodrigo

Okay so first Olivia track honestly I know we all cried to her whole album don’t deny it but essentially I felt that with the lyrics I wore makeup when we dated“'Cause I thought you'd like me more If I looked like the other prom queens” and “Tried so hard to be everything that you liked” I feel like Lucifer would expect that his lover to be perfect honestly this song really would work well with both of Satan and Lucifer so deciding between them was pretty hard but the pushing point for me to put this with Lucifer was the lyric “But I don't think anything could ever be enough”

Without me - Halsey

(Ugh I love Halsey so much and her baby soon!!!) Anyway!! For Lucifer I really think that his pride would’ve gotten in the way of all of his relationships he’s ever had but “Feeling so high but too far away to hold me You know I'm the one who put you up there Name in the sky Does it ever get lonely?” Just screams Lucifer and how the chorus keeps on saying “I said I'd catch you if you fall” ahh perfect (could also work for Asmo)

I knew you were trouble - Taylor Swift

Won’t lie but embarrassed that I choose this song but it works for Lucifer sooo whatever but the chorus really is a fairly good start I feel like anyone who has a brain (even tho MC really doesn’t) dating Lucifer wouldn’t be particularly 100% safe but whatever he’s most people’s favorites again I used to love this song but don’t anymore so when I looked up songs about break ups (yes I did that) and Trouble came up I relistened and with these lyrics I had to include it No apologies “He'll never see you cry Pretends he doesn't know That he's the reason why”

Let Me down Slowly - Alec Benjamin

Now if this was a cheating thing and he did cheat this would be like the absolute BEST SONG!! But tbh this is a pretty good song for any breakup I feel like…OH WELL! :) the first lyric FIRST LYRIC “This night is cold in the kingdom” I felt represented his pride idk how to explain but idk T-T I can explain the rest tho >~< “I once was a man with dignity and grace Now I'm slippin' through the cracks of your cold embrace” once again pride but with “Could you find a way to let me down slowly? A little sympathy, I hope you can show me” I really hc that almost with all the boys but especially with Lucifer they just would not care about cheating after they maybe got a rush would leave you instantly once that “rush” is/was gone

Mammon

(I’m a sucker for him im sorry I put all the most emotional songs with him)

Reckless - Madison Beer

This was the song that inspired this whole post!! (Sadly, it made me feel things) But this song really could be used for Belphie and maybe a hint of Asmo but Mammon was the first person I thought about when listening to this song so it’s mammon. Mammon I just feel like behind all the tunsdere act he really promises us so much like obviously the protection but Reckless just show us within the lyrics “I still have the letter you wrote When you told me that I was the only girl You'd ever want in your life” and even this lyric with his whole first man thing and even him asking us to come to him for protection “You might love her now, but you loved me first Said you'd never hurt me, but here we are” it just is so good 😭

Love me or leave me - little mix

So if you even skim through these Mammon songs and know about my posts I love him so much so even though what I said in Lucifers part about them not caring about cheating and stuff I feel like Mammon might care just because of how much he promises things also I read a lot of fanfics with what I just said “And you're turning away like you hate me Do you hate me? Do you hate me? Oh” tbh because of this lyric I did think for a moment to use this song for Satan but Uhhh this is really emotional song and I love my bby “Do you remember when you loved me once What happened? What happened? And you'd hold me here just because” LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME HERE!!!

Be Alright - Dean Lewis

This song I feel like was a bit more for me sooo yeah also remember what I said about how I hc that almost with all the boys that they just would not care about cheating after they maybe got a rush with you they would leave you instantly once that “rush” is/was gone wel I sort of want to believe mammon wouldn’t and his greed gets in the way (who am I kidding I’m just making excuses for my baby) but I’m going to continue on what I just said because Umm well I can do uh “You start to tremble and your voice begins to break You say the cigarettes on the counter weren't your friend's They were my mate's”

(I couldn’t find anymore songs that I felt that would fit him 😭)

Asmo

Ex best friend - Machine gun Kelly

When I was writing this originally there was going to be like 4 parts of all the characters but then once I realized how many songs and I couldn’t think of any for others and how I wanted to add an explanation I gave up on that but originally it was going to also be cheating songs, fall outs, then just aftermaths of breakup songs which to be honest this song really could fit with the after math and cheating songs I feel like Asmo and his SO are more likely a not able to quit each other sort of thing “We're both drunk on the elevator When I kissed you for the first time in New York City, uh” and even near the end of the first season the only little part we sort of get from character development from Asmo when we was drunk explains what he was sort of saying “I swear to God, I never fall in love Then you showed up, and I can't get enough of it I swear to God, I never fall in love I never fall in love, but I can't get enough of it First off, I'm not sorry I won't apologize to nobody You play like I'm invisible Girl, don't act like you ain't saw me” personally I do think that inside Asmo might be insecure and a bit sensitive on the inside but I could be wrong

When the party’s over - Billie Eilish

Wow I have the lyrics up and I just realized this 3 minute song has barley lyrics but the song still fits Asmo so.

traitor - Olivia Rodrio

Even tho that all these songs were on cheating I tend to hc that Asmo isn’t a huge fan of solo partnership because of the title avatar of lust so I feel like in maybe the beginning of a relationship he would promise to you that he would be there for you but would maybe end up not staying true to his words I forgot who but someone else explained why they don’t believe that Asmo wouldn’t be able to go with out having a Polly relationship

——-

I’ve had this in my drafts for so long and wanted to post this but at this point I’ve just can’t add anymore so this is my lazy part

Boys like you - Anna Clendening

Satan

Again I’m lazy rn but I wanted Satans part to show just pure madness and anger but also as time progress just sadness for Satans pure side also anything that had to do with books or a story I added for u know Satan loving books

I’m not mad - Halsey

Moral of the story - Ashe

Blue - Madison Beer

[listless-brainrot]

Hi! I know you love Haru and I'd love to hear your thoughts on what his personality is like? Not his bending or his ships, but just what kind of person he is. He was super undeveloped in ATLA and I'd love to understand him better and write about him!

hey, i'm glad you asked!! super flattering to have you come to me in regards to this question, and i've analyzed this guy to hell and back over the course of nearly a year now, so i'd be more than happy to give you my characterization of him

granted, it's pretty lengthy, and is heavily based on canon, hence why a lot of it ties to his bending, but i'll try my best to make it so that it's more about haru as a person, rather than his service to the plot

also makes me super happy to hear that people do want to understand and write about him!! that really does mean the world to me particularly, so thank you <3

with all of this in mind, here's a collection of my (pretty lengthy, sorry about that) thoughts:

haru being super undeveloped is actually one of the reasons why i find him so compelling- there’s so much you can do with a character of his caliber because there’s not much canon/supplementary material that can discredit your characterizations. canon, however, does actually supply a characterization of him that i’ve managed to compile and accrue over the course of finding nearly every single little detail i can find pertaining to him. this includes his canon episodes in both book 1 and 3, the videogame he appears in (which is straight up called avatar: the last airbender), and even the silly shorts.

(mild disclaimer, i know full well that the latter two i mentioned are considered non canon, but i like incorporating little bits and pieces of what they have to offer, as i don’t really have any other options. also, the videogames are the only supplementary material where he’s treated as a part of the gaang, so it’s the most personality you’ll ever get.)

i’ll start with main characteristics i try to keep in mind when writing him, and then talk about smaller, more innocuous details that i just find particularly fitting for him.

haru is:

emotionally driven. a lot of his decisions are more driven by emotion, rather than logic. this ties in with his impulsivity and morality. he’s aggravated by his position in the village as the only earthbender left, and this culminates into him still bending discreetly despite the inherent risk. he does this not only for himself, but to preserve the (possibly only) emotional connection he has to his arrested father. this is a similarity he shares with katara, who’s emotionally tied to her mother due to losing her, and haru is the one to understand what that loss really means in this interaction: “this necklace is all i have left of her.” “it’s not enough, is it?” by saying this instead of an apology or some other response, he shows that the feeling of loss she’s experiencing is mutually understood in a way that goes beyond just sympathy. there is nothing that will replace who you’ve lost other than the person themselves, and he understand that more than anyone. it’s also implied that haru doesn’t know if his father is still alive, as no one knows where the prisoners go, but it’s clear that he still holds a sort of hope that he’s somewhere out there, and that keeps him going. it just takes a little bit of outside influence for him to fully believe in that, as well as being reunited with his father again. in general, he’s also pretty receptive of other’s emotions, and is quick to come to their aid.

impulsive. not just impulsive, either- he’s got anger and resentment lying beneath his quiet composure. it’s not as bad as characters such as zuko’s, but it’s still worth mentioning. i’ll mention the impulse part first, though- generally speaking, haru reacts faster than he thinks. upon being spotted practicing his bending by katara, he runs away without pausing to consider the harmful repercussions of being found out (nor followed home). he not only runs away from danger as a first instinct, he also runs towards it in some cases, ironically enough- he’s the first one to notice and immediately run towards the mines once he hears/sees the explosion and suspects that someone’s in trouble. he does this without any prompting by katara, even if the act of actually saving the old man needed some egging on from her in order for him to accomplish. his impulsivity comes to a head in the form of his most dangerous act- him attacking the warden. i’ve already elaborated on that specific interaction here, though i will once again emphasize that haru had absolutely no plans past attacking the warden based on his body language, further fueling the idea that this was just a split second decision, one made on nothing but complete and utter impulse. to bring the anger aspect into this, he’s also unable to hold his tongue and insults the fire nation soldiers and even his town once the former leaves, and his instincts swing wildly between running and fighting on a dime with little in-between.

adaptable. instead of completely shutting down in the face of such a negative situation (and over the course of five years, no less), he brings it upon himself to practice bending, accept his role as man of the house and work in both the shop and on the farm, and other responsibilities that go unmentioned, especially when taking into account that his father is apparently the leader of his village. this is where you could start paralleling him well to sokka, which i have done before, but i will make this more haru-oriented. there is definitely a lot more to be inferred with this particular aspect of him, but i will say that it takes someone of strong will to adapt to the situations presented in his episode, and learning to live with the grim reality of fire nation occupation. to run down what we see again- soldiers freely patrolling the villages, soldiers overtaxing the villagers, soldiers entering wherever they wish unannounced, soldiers stealing away people in the night without much resistance, soldiers forcing villagers to work in the coal mines to gather the coal needed for their ships, and soldiers forcing captured earthbenders to build fire nation ships. this is all off of the top of my head, so i could be missing a lot, but again, seeing haru still be as morally oriented and determined as he is after all of this, it’s pretty impressive and telling of his adaptive capabilities. to take this one step further, he’s also extremely adaptable when it comes to working with others, as in the games he fills his role as a necessary component of the gaang without conflicting sokka or other preexisting roles, and in book 3, he finds his place amongst teo and the duke, taking the most initiative amongst the three.

lonely. a snippet from his personality bio on avatarspirit.net calls him “lonely and brave”, and i think that’s especially fitting for his character. he only had his mom for five whole years after every other earthbender was taken away, and this is without mentioning the ostracization he faced simply being one, given how the fire nation constantly demoralizes his country’s benders and likens them to savages. the village he lives in also appears to be full of old folks, so it’s not very likely that he had friends his age that were even in town, especially if we consider the circumstances of following book 2 episodes with the earth army recruiters. (it’s also unlikely that his friends are alive if they did join the army- take a gander at this line from zuko alone: Gow: Just thought someone ought to tell you, your son's battalion got captured. You boys hear what the Fire Nation did with their last group of Earth Kingdom prisoners? Soldier: Dressed them up in Fire Nation uniforms and put them on the frontline unarmed, way I heard it.  Then they just watched.) furthermore, it’s not likely that haru could’ve left his little village prior to its occupation- the games imply he’d been to omashu previously, but the circumstances of the war make this unlikely, unless he was super young. given his not always pleasant attitude and sullen expression we sometimes see him with, it’s not hard to imagine that the effects of him being so alone without the connections he needs has affected him deeply.

some other things:

-he’s horrible at lying (”they’re crazy! i mean, just look at how they’re dressed” is that really the best excuse you could’ve come up with??). -he doesn’t like keeping his hands/arms still (arms are usually crossed, sometimes gestures as he talks, hands usually balled as if expecting a fight). -he’s pretty outwardly expressive (for someone who’s supposed to be hiding most of the time, he tends to wear his emotions/intentions on his sleeve). -he can’t bite his tongue (especially when it comes to something that goes against his personal beliefs). -he doesn’t know how to react to touch (katara hugging him takes him by surprise both times, and he doesn’t reciprocate often, if anything he reacts stiffly) -he’s particular about his appearance (notably in the games, he makes negative comments about people touching his hair, and there’s also. sokka’s comments in book 3. sigh.) -he’s considered dangerous/sensitive by others (note sokka’s comments in book 1, and katara’s comments in the school time shipping short) -he lives a busy personal life (works both in the family shop and on the family farm, and has probably had to work in the coal mines at some point, though this is speculative) -he’s not above poking/having fun (in the games, he’s not above making fun of sokka and his comments about benders, and jumps at the opportunity to ride the omashu mail chutes) -he’s family oriented (count how many times he talks about his parents, it is many times i assure you, it’s important to note that he’s one of the few atla characters to actually have both parents as well as a decent relationship with them) -he has a tendency to idealize. he talks about his father fighting against the fire nation even when horribly outnumbered. it wouldn’t be surprising if he idealized the ideal of rebellion (which would later bite him given that:) -he’s a part of the first successful earth kingdom rebellion. this is mentioned on the wiki, and is unfortunately not shown in the show. it should’ve been, though. -he’s dramatic. he has an entire cliff he brings katara up to just to be dramatic and spill his sad backstory. he needs to be encouraged to save the old man, but he does it in the most dramatic way possible- he really didn’t have to stop the entire avalanche AND push it back into the mines. drama king. -he is very lucky. this can apply to anyone who encounters the gaang, but honestly, given his personality and a few things i’ve mentioned above, it’s a miracle that he’d survived as long as he did without detection nor suspicion. -he’s creative. (this one is much more speculative, but he does create huge statues of katara and ty lee pretty quickly, maybe he’s done similar things before)

to summarize: he’s a lonely impulsive idealist who isn’t afraid to throw hands if necessary and is also very attached to his dad <3 his connection to his dad makes up at least 75% of his personality

[writing-wrxngs]

Character Guide!

(Just a little guide to how I personally depict the characters I write about and their roles in my stories.)

Philza

The father of Techno, Wilbur and Tommy. I know a lot of people make Phil just a much older brother, but the Dadza content is just too much for me to ignore

He’s always tried his best for his sons. He’s a good father who tries to balance his sons desires with what’s best for them. His boys mean the world to him.

As a father, he’s firm but never strict. He wants the boys to be their own people, but knows he needs to teach them lessons and give them structure to do so.

He is NOT impartial when the boys fight. He will decide who is in the wrong and give them a lecture. If all parties are in the wrong, everyone is getting sat down and talked to. For some reason this does not deter them from fighting.

He loves seeing the boys flourish. He enjoys being wanted and parenting his sons, but seeing them become independent men is amazing to him. The day that he feels all of his sons are completely self sufficient will be the best day of his life.

His wings are just prt of him. Why he has wings isn’t fully known, he’s just a human with wings. I just like that he has wings. Whether he can fly or not is unknown.

Technoblade

Age has been tweaked to be a year older that Wilbur, give or take. He might be even less than a year older than Wilbur, but he’s older. I chose this for him simply bc Wilbur is far too chaotic to be the eldest. The vibes were off.

He’s simultaneously arrogant and awkward. He loves attention (clout) and being the best but cannot do social interaction.

Likes his chaos and anarchy, but has a line. He knows where to stop and knows when to stop his brothers.

Quite responsible. As responsible and willing to care for his brothers, he still does NOT act like a parent to them. He is nowhere near as gentle with them as Phil, and also often gets in over his head with them.

He’s the most skilled fighter around. He is infamously ruthless, and never holds back, even if his opponent is a loved one. Whether it’s swords, bows, or fists, he will come out on top. He’s had this title for quite a while.

I’ve personally interpreted his mc skin as a pig mask that he wears often. When he’s out or when he’s fighting, he wears it over his face. In company of his family, or very close friends, he wears it up on top of his head.

He played violin when he was younger, his lessons starting when he was young, and he still can play, but does not often.

Wilbur

Extreme middle child energy. He’s his own sort of unstoppable chaos. He can equally be the shitty little brother to Techno and the jerk older brother to Tommy. He also desperately craves validation in spite of how much he’s cared for, and would die for praise.

He’s well known for being well spoken and charismatic. He’s charming and always says the right words. He is amicable and gets along with almost anyone.

He’s still terribly insecure, though, and uses this as a front, putting up walls that sometimes fall if someone, usually his family strike the right place. On the opposite side of the same coin, he still has a big ego at times.

As mean or abrasive as he can be at times, he still genuinely cares about the people he loves. Even as skewed as his morals get at times, he still can be humbled at times and be his true self if something cracks him.

He is also a musician, since he plays guitar and sings, however he also writes songs and places this above performing. Being able to create as compared to Tecnho who simply plays is something he’s very prideful of. Still, writing does stress him at times, especially if he has writer block.

Pogtopia Wilbur is a man who’s lost everything. He’s grasping at straws and no longer cares about who he hurts in achieving his goals, his narcissism shining full through. He’s extremely far gone, but is not yet lost.

Side note, to differentiate between his character and irl, I use Wil for in character and Will for irl.

Tommy

Chaotic youngest sibling to the max. Every day he wakes up and chooses to be a problem. Is a bother, and loves it. Can be overly blunt sometimes and often says the wrong thing or doesn’t read the room properly. His energy never matches the others.

He’s considered the funny one of the family, but slightly dislikes this moniker as he feels like it’s far too one dimensional compared to Wil’s charisma and Techno’s violence. He wants to set himself apart but hasn’t found it yet.

Really wants to be on the same level of his brothers. There’s a significant age gap and Tommy is still just 16, but he’s already chomping at the bit to be independent.

Is fiercely loyal to his family, but especially Wilbur. When they were younger, Tommy was practically Wilbur’s shadow, and honestly, he still idolizes Wil a bit.

Tommy knows how to cut through bullshit like a champ. He is especially good at breaking down Wilbur’s walls and bring him back down to earth when he’s inflated.

Also Tommy is absolutely the main character of the DreamSMP, maybe even in general. Main character energy.

Tubbo

I try to keep my Tubbo usage as little as possible, since I know he’s a bit uncomfortable with fanfic in general. I keep him as a side character. Never about him

He’s Tommy’s best friend and will always stand by him. Tubbo simultaneously matches, increases and dampens Tommy’s chaotic abilities.

He’s a bit smarter than Tommy, and better with things like sympathy and tact.

Canonically has died once. I don’t count deaths that don’t move the plot forward as deaths due to the nature of Minecraft. He was resurrected using some special hand wave magic that I’ve used to explain respawning. It’s not quite healing nor is it necromancy. (Okay, maybe it is necromancy. I had to go check bc I didn’t know off the top of my head. I main paladins it’s not my wheelhouse)

Post festival Tubbo is covered in scars from the burns. They’re mostly on the right side of his body, and sort of start by his torso and stretch like tendrils up his neck/face and down his arm. He’s not insecure about them at all but they are a bit painful.

Tubbo does not have parents. Well, he once did but he can’t remember them. I’ve kept it vague but he likely lived with a family and was separated from them at a young age but was able to take care of himself especially after befriending Tommy some time ago.

Niki

She is incredibly kind, sensitive but equally so is she outspoken and strong willed.

She’s a healer, and is one of the few people capable of resurrecting others, though she is not the most skilled as she only learned how to do this after moving to the SMP.

She’s a bit idealistic and sees the best in everyone, unless they’re completely evil. She believes if she’s seen the good in people, they can be good.

She’s 100% the most level headed in the whole of the SMP. God help you if you cross her, though.

Like I said in my FYI, I don’t ship her with anyone!!! She’s just really sweet and lovey and if you accuse me of making ship content I’ll literally cut you.

Everyone else will probably just make cameos based solely on their SMP characters, but with the way things are looking, I actually might have to get to know more mcyters to write about them.

[prince-of-elsinore]

Sam and Dean: psychological analysis and headcanons

In response to this anon ask from the 66 SPN Questions:

6. Do you have any psychological headcanons (or canon interpretations) of the characters?

Anon, this is probably not what you asked for. But I started writing, and kept finding more I wanted to say, until I thought--why not just say it all? And by all, I  don't actually mean all--this is by no means exhaustive. But it was a wonderful, self-indulgent opportunity to organize my thoughts on Sam and Dean's psychologies, and even find some new ideas as I was writing, and to put them out there so others can read and discuss. (Always happy to discuss any of this! Inbox is open.)

As a disclaimer, I know most of these thoughts are probably not original and may be retreads of many things fandom has been discussing for years. I'm not claiming to be breaking new ground here. Also, I sorta float backwards and forwards chronologically in my discussion--some parts pertain more to them when they're young, some to when they're older, and I don't always clarify which. Also, these are generalizations! I point out patterns I notice; that doesn't make them all hard and fast rules, because Sam and Dean are each human and complex!

Here's what you'll find below:

1. Core motivations 2. Happiness 3. Approval and secrets 4. Approval from authority figures 5. Need and attachment re: others 6. Sympathy and empathy 7. Walls—hiding vs. performing 8. Need and attachment re: each other 9. Ambitions and goals 10. Normality and monstrosity 11. Guilt and self-loathing 12. Autonomy and sacrifice 13. Personal identity 14. Concluding observation

1. Core motivations: Dean’s purpose is to protect Sam, obviously. Sam’s purpose, though a little less clear, is to save Dean. Sometimes it’s explicit, as in s3 and s9-10. But I think Sam also wants to save Dean, in general, from himself and from the life. It’s why he pushes against Dean’s obedience to their father. It’s why he tells him to get out and go to Lisa after he jumps in the Cage. At a certain point, I think Sam accepts he can’t “save” Dean without changing who he is, so he chooses to stick by him—because at least then he can make Dean happy.

2. Happiness: Dean’s happiness—or perhaps contentment is a better word—is knowing that Sam is safe and alive. Sam’s happiness is Dean being happy. In Sam’s world, things are good when Dean’s good. I think that, conversely, Dean wants Sam to be happy, and Sam wants Dean to be safe, but they both know and to an extent accept that those things are not within their control, so they focus on what they feel they can control.

3. Approval and secrets: They are each other’s north stars, guiding principles, in different ways. For Dean it’s “look out for Sammy,” for Sam it’s “what would my big brother think/do.” Dean doesn’t need Sam’s approval. Sure, he loves it when Sam admires him, but if he feels he needs to do something against Sam’s approval, he doubles down because approval from Sam is not the top priority. He’ll do what he thinks is right, especially to keep Sam safe, no matter what Sam thinks about it. Sam, on the other hand, does crave Dean’s approval and cares very much about his opinion. It doesn’t mean he won’t go against Dean (all the conflict of s1-5!), but it affects him differently. This leads to different kinds of secret-keeping: Sam goes behind Dean’s back to avoid his disapproval; Dean goes behind Sam’s back so that Sam doesn’t interfere with what he thinks needs to be done.

4. Approval from authority figures: Dean does crave approval from others—specifically, respected authority figures. The big one is obviously John. I think in a way it’s Mary, too, when she comes back. But it only applies as long as the person has his respect. Sam doesn’t crave approval from other authorities in the same way, perhaps because his primary authority figure growing up was Dean.

5. Need and attachment re: others: Sam is the only person Dean cannot live without, but he also makes outside connections of a friendly nature fairly easily. He’s the more socially outgoing brother who latches onto people like Gordon, gets friendly with Ash, and forges connections with Jo and Charlie, just to name a few (and Castiel at times—though their relationship is so inconsistent and often convenience-based I hesitate to include it in this category). Though Sam is Dean’s core need, I do think Dean thrives with other friendships. I’m not talking about found family, though I’m well aware of Dean’s tendency to call people “family” quite readily. Honestly, I think this is a manifestation of his craving for connection with others. Dean has an affectionate and playful nature, and let’s face it, Sam isn’t always super receptive to that—so naturally, Dean seeks out people who are. (I think this is also, in some cases, related to Dean’s craving for approval from others). Of course, none of those other relationships come close to the depth of his relationship with Sam, and when his relationship with Sam is at its best, I don’t think Dean really needs anything else to sustain him. But in reality, it can’t always be at its best.

Sam, on the other hand, doesn’t forge outside connections easily—but when he does, they tend to be deeper than Dean’s easy casual associations (even when Dean has real affection for someone, he tends to keep the tone of the relationship light). It’s pretty clear Sam was a loner kid, and I imagine it took him a while to find friends at Stanford, and even though he loved Jessica he still clearly kept many secrets. That’s the thing with Sam—he’s got walls. Dean’s got his own walls, but they’re different. Sam can seem emotionally open, but he protects his innermost self very carefully and rarely puts his emotions out there in a truly open way—even less than Dean does. I think this is a consistent personality trait for Sam, not one born of trauma (though perhaps exacerbated by it at times). In fact, it’s in later seasons that I see Sam finally, in rare moments, let down those walls, with Rowena and Jack. When he’s young, I think this was partially a coping mechanism he developed for hiding his desires/feelings, even from himself, because he was so unhappy with his life. It means that even though he’s an introspective guy, he’s not as self-aware as he thinks he is until he’s older and more mature. He’s very good at self-deception when he’s young, because as a thinker, he can convince himself of just about anything.

To circle back to attachment, what this means to me is that Sam, while he certainly appreciates close friendships and has a lot to offer those he cares about, doesn’t crave friends in the way that Dean does. I think he desires to be understood (this is a natural human need) but he’s much more comfortable with himself than Dean is, and is somewhat of a loner by nature. This means he’s also not (usually) going to be too affected by the status of his relationships with others. Dean is much more volatile and easily hurt by others (this is where Castiel is a great example).

6. Sympathy and empathy: On the surface, Sam appears to be the caring, sensitive brother, while Dean is brash and insensitive. This is a very incomplete picture, however. It mostly comes down to the difference between sympathy and empathy. Empathy is an involuntary response, whereas sympathy is something that a person chooses to express, though that doesn’t make it necessarily superficial—it also comes from an emotional place. Dean tends to be more empathetic, and Sam more sympathetic. Dean, despite his performative walls, is more easily affected on a visceral level by others’ emotions. He is more sensitive, more easily hurt or swayed to anger, and also more easily experiences empathy. This has nothing to do with what Dean thinks is right—it’s another involuntary emotion. He is sometimes moved to express this feeling, but he’s not generally concerned about appearing sympathetic. Sam, with his careful emotional walls, isn’t generally so viscerally affected by others, but he is kind. This is expressed as sympathy, because he cares about others’ feelings, and he wants to be good/morally right. On the one hand, it comes from an intellectual place—“it’s socially acceptable/morally right to express care for this person” (which Dean is less likely to care about)—and on the other, it is an emotional response—“I know what that feels like”—but a more regulated one than empathy, where one almost directly experiences another’s emotions.

7. Walls—hiding vs. performing: It’s interesting that both brothers have their own walls, which they construct as a form of self-preservation, but they have different levels of effectiveness in protecting themselves from outside influence. One difference might lie in what the walls were built in reaction to. Sam built his walls at a young age to separate himself from the outside world because, ironically, it was precisely what he desired, but was not allowed to have. He therefore consciously distanced himself from it, to dull the pain of not having it. The goal of those walls was to have something to hide behind, where he could remain generally unnoticed, so he could conceal his pain from outsiders and even from his family.

Dean took a little longer to build his walls—or at least to consciously do so. He already no doubt fashioned himself after his dad as a kid, and often put on a brave face—for Sam, for his father—when he was not feeling brave. He therefore became accustomed to performing at a young age, and performed many roles for both Sam’s and John’s benefit. He was unconsciously building walls with these performances, concealing his true feelings and desires. Later, I think this started to become more intentional, especially in relations with women/sex partners and especially after the Stanford split, as Dean realized how vulnerable to hurt his sensitive nature made him. It was much safer to perform all the time, and never let his real feelings show. For Dean, even more than Sam, I think he often lost sight of what those real feelings were behind the walls as he tried his best to be the performance he was putting on.

For a visual metaphor, I think of it this way: Sam is a boy at the center of a self-constructed labyrinth. He is almost always able to maintain control over how close people get (except when a few slip past his defenses, at which point he may be susceptible to manipulation). Despite all those elaborate passageways, though, there’s still Sam at the center. It’s lonely there, but he knows himself pretty well at least. Dean is a man in a mask who wants the mask to be his real face. He does everything he can to fuse himself and the mask together. They probably are fused at this point, so it would hurt to take the mask off. His memory of the face under the mask is hazy. He’s afraid, if he looks under the mask, he’ll hate what he sees. He’s lonely because no matter how close others get—and he lets them in close, can surround himself with people—none of them will ever see his true face. But he’s convinced himself it’s better this way, because if anyone saw his face, they’d hate it.

8. Need and attachment re: each other: Clearly, both brothers need each other. Sam’s need for Dean is different than Dean’s need for Sam, though. The way I see it, Dean’s need is one that requires reassurance. Perhaps it traces back to the concern about Sam instilled into him at a young age. I think it was strongly exacerbated by the Stanford split, when Dean realized his and Sam’s desires didn’t align. In Dean’s mind, Sam left once and can do it again—he’s always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Sam, on the other hand, has always been able to rely on Dean as a rock, a constant in his life—to the point that, in a way, he takes it for granted when he’s younger. Not in a spoilt, ungrateful way, but in that way that we, as children, might take our parents for granted—they’re always going to be there, right? That’s why, on the few occasions where suddenly, Sam isn’t sure of Dean’s devotion, the rug is ripped out from under him and he’s completely adrift and distraught—seasons 4 and 8 come to mind. Sam needs to be the center of Dean’s universe. When he fears that that’s shifted, that Dean hates him or has chosen someone else over him, it turns Sam’s whole world upside down. For Dean, the fear is that Sam will leave, but it’s a constant, background worry. For Sam, the fear is that Dean will hate him, but since he can usually count on Dean to be obsessed with him, it only comes up now and again. Only Dean can truly hurt Sam, while Dean is vulnerable to hurt from others—though, as always, the deepest hurt can only come from Sam.

9. Ambitions and goals: Sam is the one with greater needs and ambitions outside the scope of their relationship. For Dean, if he’s got Sam and he’s got hunting, he’s content. His greatest accomplishments are taking care of Sam and saving people, and that’s all he needs. I see Sam as craving other sources of fulfillment, though—academic/lore study for its own sake (the pursuit of knowledge), and a leadership/mentorship role. I thought it was very fitting that Sam finds these in late seasons, with leading hunters against the BMOL, then leading the apocalypse AU hunters, then mentoring/nurturing Jack. Dean has always had (and needed) a mentor/leadership/nurturing role with Sam, but Sam also thrives when he’s able to step into that role for others.

10. Normality and monstrosity: I’m just going to link to this post rather than repeat myself.

11. Guilt and self-loathing: This is something they both struggle with and at times, are defined by, but it manifests differently. I think their Hell traumas exemplify their different brands of guilt: for Dean, it’s perpetrator’s guilt. He knows he did something terrible and feels he can never atone for his past actions. For Sam, it’s victim’s/survivor’s guilt. He may not have done anything wrong, but there’s a certain amount of self-blame, especially for perceived weakness. This is another theme for Sam; one of the main faults he sees in himself is weakness—too weak to save Dean from Hell for instance—and as a result tries to shoulder things alone (killing Lilith, Hallucifer, etc). Sam has a need to fix things, to prove to others and himself that he is capable. Dean, I think, sees his main fault as neediness, but really, it’s a deeply buried sense of innate worthlessness. He was taught from a young age that his brother’s life—not his own—was of the utmost value. He internalized that his life was only worthwhile if he could save others, and has trouble with the idea that he, himself, has value beyond what he can do for others.

12. Autonomy and sacrifice: The above leads Dean to have a very constrained sense of his own autonomy. In general, he values duty/loyalty to others over autonomy (although when it comes to cosmic beings, he’s all about free will—see this post if you want more thoughts on that, and Sam’s autonomy). Often, his desire to control others comes from a place of frustration when Dean feels they are neglecting duty/being selfish. I think partially duty towards others is really a deeply ingrained value for him, but there may also be some buried jealousy at play, in that Dean wishes he could act with more freedom, put himself first every once in a while, but doesn’t know how to. Sam tends to value autonomy over duty (this doesn’t mean he doesn’t believe in any sort of responsibility—he’s willing to sacrifice for the greater good, after all).  This means he also tends to respect others’ autonomy, though we all know he can get plenty unhinged where his brother’s safety is concerned. The theme of Sam and autonomy has been talked to death so I’ll stop there, but you can click the link above if you want more.

13. Personal identity: One of Dean’s biggest struggles is with how much of his personal identity is received rather than self-determined. He is tasked with taking care of Sam and he is trained to be a hunter; these become the foundations of his identity. He says it himself: taking care of Sam is not just what he does but who he is. Then in season 3, his own subconscious mocks him for his lack of originality, styling himself and all he loves after his father, showing that this is a source of deep insecurity. This discomfort with himself contributes to his fear of being abandoned and left alone with himself. He doesn’t know who he is without Sam—or rather, is convinced he is nothing without Sam, which is why he fights so hard to keep him by his side. It also contributes to his general desire for friends, or better, family: people who won’t abandon him.

Later in the series, I think Dean has come to embrace his genuine self more. He’s nerdy and excitable and playful—and I don’t see this is as regression, but rather a healthy embracing of what makes him happy—not tastes inherited from his father. If it seems juvenile, it’s because it’s the first time in his life he’s allowed himself to express and explore these things. I think his relationship with hunting is also healthier; it’s no longer something he does because it’s the only thing that can give him worth. He does it because he believes it’s right and genuinely wants to help people. He has a more complete sense of self, and while it’s still totally tied up in Sam, he has gained some self-worth.

[I should note that basically everything I’ve written about Dean supports the headcanon that Dean has BPD—a headcanon I accepted after I realized this. For some more great writing on Dean and BPD, see this post by @venhedish.]

Sam has always known what he wanted for himself and rejected what was given to/allowed him. Wanting what he couldn’t have, from a young age, helped him develop an individual sense of self, not defined by others. I think it’s this difference in their sense of individual identity that leads some viewers to think that Dean loves Sam more than Sam loves Dean. He doesn’t, and losing Dean is just as huge a loss and a grief for Sam as losing Sam was for Dean. Dean is central to Sam’s life, and he can’t feel complete without him; however, his identity and every desire has never revolved as entirely around Dean as Dean’s has around him, so Sam has a foundational sense of self that even losing Dean can’t completely destroy. It’s what allows him to rebuild in grief and carry on (whereas I have no doubt Jensen’s right and Dean would waste away in the back of a pool hall without Sam). Dean’s central role in Sam’s life never disappears, though, and it is, in fact, what allows Sam to carry on; an effort to honor his brother’s memory, living in a way that would make him proud. There’s continuity in that for Sam; the craving for his brother’s approval and happiness never disappears. Seeking those things is what makes Sam happy, both in their domestic years together before Dean’s death and in the years after. They are both, after all, co-dependent!

14: Concluding observation: Sam and Dean have many similar issues, desires, and insecurities: the desire for a normal life, the fear of their own monstrosity, the desire for love and friendship, their need and love for each other, their desire for approval/to be admired, resentment at their childhood, the feeling of being impure and unworthy, the desire for freedom, issues with bodily autonomy. Sometimes these are seen as the purview of one brother or the other exclusively, but that’s almost never true when you consider canon as a whole. The difference is in how these things are internalized, sublimated, reflected, and expressed for each of them. It makes sense they would struggle with so many of the same things, because their lives are deeply intertwined and they are in the same boat most of the time.

[himbodjarin]

LUNAR; CH15

18+ Content: General fluff/angst. Din POV. Word Count: 5138 Pairing: Din Djarin/F!Reader

The Mandalorian is a driven warrior — traversing the galaxy in search of the ancient Jedi — but everyone has their weaknesses, and he’s no different. The Bounty Hunter possessed three in fact. One he’s discovered—The Child. The remaining two, though, he wasn’t aware of their existence. At least, not until he meets a valorous Sharpshooter underneath a moonless night sky; then he’s plummeting down a dark mission of self-discovery, questioning his morals and his Creed while the moon taunts him, the phases of the satellite corresponding to his personal revelations. However, the Girl has a dark past that may come to inflict hardships on the Mandalorian and the Child; it’s up to the Bounty Hunter to decide her fate. Read on AO3 / Series Masterlist / Playlist

EPILOGUE

Whispers.

Din is subjected to whispers surrounding him and clinging to his beskar like seafoam on his boots; sensitive and hushed tones aimed to show their condolences, their pity, regarding the absence of light beside him. They raise their voice no louder than whispers out of fear, not sympathy—sterile beskar contaminated with the sun’s liquidised crux intimidating them into tight-lipped smiles.

Sorrow radiates off him in potent waves that roll over the settlement to drown them in his grieving. It doesn’t need to be voiced. There’s a plenitude of evidence that stacks up against the presumption; the reclaimed rifle adhered to slippery beskar as opposed to cradling its framework into soft flesh, a tattered cloak that now only stretches across one side of his back, broad shoulders appearing so compact in on themselves, and a heavy-footed stride that simply speaks anguish.

If those factors aren’t indication enough, the blood does it.

Dried blood that coats his tan appendage but not his gloved—funny, how he always seems to dirty his hands—thick streaks that have yet to reach that dry point smeared against his armour, dark patches on his flight suit that adheres to the skin beneath.

A picture is worth a thousand words, but the scene of The Mandalorian—a stoic warrior capable of pulling the tides that’ll swallow their settlement whole—so vanquished and mourning the woman he loved in such dreaded silence is worth a million and then some.

The element of a bare hand no longer pining to envelope itself from intrusive eyes is grisly. Abnormal. Eerie, all most, as if Mando’s resolve will snap before their inspections. Children are guided behind the adults with a subtle hand but it doesn’t pass unnoticed.

Din suspends in the maelstrom of the locals, helmet burdensome on his shoulders, vacantly swaying side-to-side as though struggling to remain awake on his feet; struggling to not let slip of his eyelids and succumb to the mud that’ll pose as his eternal resting grounds. If it weren’t for the slumbering speck of green nestled in the arms of Omera, perhaps he would allow himself to sink to his knees for the second time that night, no—third. Third time.

There’s no communication between them, no are you okay’s or I’m so sorry’s, just a simple exchange of glances that reads she’s gone, my girl is gone when Din recovers the Child from her arms. Familiar weight in the nook of his elbow, the same elbow her head resided as she lay dormant, he reverts back between the compound aisle of onlookers.

It’s all the same expression—that pouted bottom lip and upturned eyebrow, colourful eyes attentive to his exposed hand and gory armour; anything besides the chilling black slit of his visor, the red thumbprint of a much larger hand impression sitting in the corner of his view field—Din’s chin descends to his chest to avert his eyes from the hands on their loved ones, pulling them to a warmth he’ll soon forget the feeling of, the silent declaration of adoration upon seeing such a depleted man without his.

Voices are deteriorating before him, echoing and remote as if they were isolated across a vast canyon—everybody’s tone blending into one heaped bulk he can’t decipher who or where they’re coming from; a procedure his mind conducted to dissociate from the pity timbres.

Caben…

...I know.

Beskar wrenches their route, initiating eye contact with the two farmers his love died to save—died so that they could live fulfilling lives while she’s devoured by parasites—and his fist clenches by his side. Din doesn’t blame them for her demise, not really, she never would’ve inflicted such a gnarly wound if it wasn’t for the fact the Guild was after him; the fact that rescuing a helpless child would lead to a chain of events that brings him such an acquainted feeling of despair.

And he’d do it all over again if the situation arises—that’s what causes his slitted fingers to curl into his palms and draw blood out the gaps between. Din had breached many rules, some of his Creed’s and others his personal pledges; do not fall victim to a girl’s loving touches. They were there for good reason. Din’s not mad at Caben and Stoke nor Omera for informing him of their situation. Din’s mad at himself because, despite knowing the outcome of it all and despite how her name has been carved into his ribs, he would never not rescue the Child.

Even if that statement alone induces a thousand scenarios in which his beloved dies in his arms. Perhaps it’s his private method of torture; a way to inflict damage onto himself that doesn’t bruise skin but the sensitive heart beneath it all.

Caben and Stoke quiver underneath the leer of a visor blemished with vermillion—someone so black and white touched with the coloured essence of a cherished one—he’s never donned so much vibrancy. Not even when he wore his shoddy spraypainted duraplast armour had he been so rich in hues that no eyes should witness.

Din takes mercy on the men and tears his helmet away, feet falling with a burden into the forest haunted with a spirit that’ll never be able to rest.

It takes a day of being in hyperspace to reach overfamiliar craggy rocks and whipping sand granules—a day of being confined within his home, now a duralloy prison, with a fallen star coursing ripples of glacial bursts. The corpse of his sweetheart had been covered with what little material remained of the cloth on his back for the Child’s sake, not his. Din could never want that pretty face cloaked even with the browning plasma cracking on the surface of her cheek, the dark crescents beneath eyes that holds overtones that now only live in his head and windburned lips that once felt warm and smooth against his own roughened.

There’s a steep drop to his death waiting for a mere slip of his boots against the coarse siltstone—internal bleeding upon the impact that would cater his physique with that unaccounted heat one last time—but Din is versatile and makes it down with limited injuries; some grazes into the paddings of fingers and a sore ball of the foot where he’d dug his boots into an uneven surface a little too vigorously.

Soft sand sits beneath his feet in contrast to the grittiness above, a result of the lack of rays that reach between the gorge. It’s darkened down these parts, plagued with skeletons of unfortunate victims to the brittle canyon edgings.

A mote of black pokes upright from the golden ground, the end of a matte-finished cylinder storing pale grains into its blueprint. The ground swallows his knees whole and adheres itself to his flight suit where it’ll reside in the empty space that’s left behind for journeys to come.

Din combs the sand with cupped hands, bare digits burrowing deep and bandaging around the target to wedge free of its tenacious grip. It extracts from the planet’s crust with falling particles from its bore reuniting with its sum beneath his weight—a shattered chamber decays in his clutch. The stock, its untethered support deeper in the terra, withdraws into his idle grip.

It’s a straightforward design—a barrel he’s stared down into more times than he can account for—but there’s sentimental value in its mere existence, despite Din never having any interest in the dark oil encrusted with scratches and weathered patches around a jammed trigger. Such a stocky weapon for arms crafted of supple beams. The tide could easily harness such a defying artifact; digest the barrel whole into the belly of its trenches, the increased pressure simply too great for it to ever leave. Not the beams, though—they should never be required to carry such unstable weight, such compactness.

The amban rifle was perfect for those hands; nimble and delicate, easy to employ.

Salvaged firearm in hand, Din finds himself before the entrance of a shoddy dome shack; a flap of shroud swaying one with the wind eased to the side with the back of his knuckles, helmet dipping as he sets a lagging foot inside. The sparseness, the emptiness, drowns his lungs and constricts his airways—it’d been ransacked, by Jawas presumably, all of the deconstructed mechanics that should be gathering dust pinched from the schism-riddled wooden slab.

Disconnected halves of a rifle are gently laid to rest on the surface, the skeleton of a shattered Creed shortly following. Its critical gaze eats at the delicate man frontwards, toned eyes melting to a bubbling molten transparisteel that scars his assaulted morals. Three tan fingers spin the helmet on its axis to face the duracrete, allowing the pang in his temples to subside.

Din’s calves encased with his duraplast greeves butt against the edge of a mediocre cot, not too contrasting to his own—cramped with little to no support, but it’s stable and it works—he envisions a bandaged figure curled up on the durasteel, nothing but an oversized poncho to supply warmth that wasn’t necessary on such a heated planet. He sinks to the bunk and pursues the comfort of a merciless prod in his waist, a sweat-slicked forehead pressing into the wall.

If he closes his eyes and breathes deep he’s rewarded with a faint whiff of a rich syrup that combats the stale crux on his platings—the point of a pinky muscle stimulated with a fleeting taste of his favourite flavours. Sand particles deposited by the gusts of winds flood his ventilators from the cot beneath him, slicing through the linings of his insides. In lieu of coughing and spluttering Din deeply exhales and laxes his muscles; the overwhelming requirement for rest inevitably forcing his mind to disable and his breathing to even out.

Kuiil and his craftsmanship came up short as expected.

Even with the labour of three lifetimes, I cannot fix this. I have never seen something this shattered be repaired before. Perhaps you are not supposed to restore its properties.

Din respected the Ugnaught too much to vocalise his thoughts—what a load of bantha—and opted to depart from Arvala-7 before its granular claws burrowed into him more than they already had; his boots packed to his ankles with hot grit that converts the soles of his feet to blisters, flight suit drenched in sweat and blood.

Rather than dedicating a whole five minutes of changing attire, rather than finally ridding himself of the constant reminder of his dead lover clinging to his skin and clothes, he punches the navigation and activates the auto-piloting to his next destination.

The Child has developed some independence in the peak of Din’s mourning, often finding himself entertained with a drifting gear knob in the vacancy of the air before him—he almost appeared aware of the situation, aware of the black hole in Din’s chest narrowing his interiors and destabilising his balance—and he no longer needed assistance to vacate from the Crest when the hatch extended.

His guardian, on the other hand, wasn’t so eager to leave his penitentiary. It was quiet and cold in comparison to the hustle and bustle outside the duralloy cell, the loud exclaim of a snappy mechanic, no matter how late into the night it had to be, scolding her droids.

Are ya looking to get shot at? You know the drill, back away from it!

Din straightens himself out from the floor between the cockpit and the hold’s ladder, the one place he didn’t encounter the phantom of waning memories; they plagued these walls beyond belief. Recollections of brief intimate instances strewn throughout the hold, his bunk, the cockpit—it made operating his spacecraft a difficult chore.

He does his utmost not to glimpse at the emptiness atop the crates, the browning streaks that run down the slopes of the cubes and into the grooves of the Razor Crest’s base, but there’s only a limited measure of self-control residing within him and its line has been blurry as of late. Submitting to the gravitational pull of his eyes is inescapable and he risks a peak; a raggedy cloak that concealed gelid mounds now servicing as a blanket for the bare inventory containers.

Shoulders tighten and footwork falters as he maneuvers to the hatch, the idle purring of a preservation machine in the far corner a reminder of what he’d gone and done—guilt and grief goading his esophagus but he swallows it, greets the sting in his walls with a gruff clear of his throat.

What’s the big idea of stationing yourself here? She doesn’t appear in bad shape at all. I ain’t free parking, ya know.

Shiny credits are flung in her direction, the satchel containing the remainder of what was once a reimbursement to the bisected rifle in his leathers, he doesn’t allow him the privilege of feeling sorrow upon parting with them. Din doesn’t deserve to experience such sensitive emotions when he’s the trigger that snapped against a guard—a cherry bolt of a hand jabbing through the wind and tossing delicate goods down a ravine.

Peli eyeballs the exposed spinal plating of the Mandalorian and compiles the fragmented pieces of his physique, slotting in each individual aspect from his impaired posture down to the crust on his steel. Shards of a rusting man relocate, twisting and turning—no, not there...not quite...oh...—until it connects, a brittle sharp-edged outline of a man receding.

But that’s all it is.

An outline. Incomplete. His jam-packed insides—his essence, his life, his love—has been swindled from within leaving a husk of an exhausted bereaved soul ricocheting off the internal boundaries of beskar in search of its partner.

Din deposits himself in a corner of the hangar tucked away where the shadows push and pull his limbs, steering his appendages across the surface of an eroding strongbox showcasing the deconstructed blaster. Phantoms of apprehensive hands ghost overhead, their primary function programmed to destroy and slaughter not replenish and recover.

Reparations are out of the question. It’s beyond demolished; hardly decent for a mantlepiece let alone functional. It’s laid out like a butchered tip-yip primed for roasting, components scattered and misplaced; a muddle not even the greatest gunslinger could capitalise from.

Engravings on the stock of the rifle stabilise him, a gorgeous aluminium that shines beneath all the oil and base of obsidian. Its lines paint a picture of nothing, overlapping and crossing into a mess, but it fires a brisk bolt against his heartplate all the same. Bare fingers spelunk its origins for its quirks, its stories of a stubborn girl entrapped within it; utilising the elongated barrel like a third arm, a trigger snappy as her words, the scenic stock a mirror to the beauty beside it.

Roughened fingers were a by-product of being consistently handsy throughout the decades but when perceiving the sun rays they were reborn entirely. Soft and smooth and careful. Now that the sun no longer responds to his touch, now that he’s left with cool inscribed metal, they’ve reverted to their nature. Sandy. Sharp. Aggressive.

Aggressive fingers that match the stained violence of his Creed—his beskar that simply won’t return to that elegant silver shine no matter how desperately he rubs against the surface. Water sloshes back and forth in the modest trough of a sink, a tainted red-brown colour accumulating at the bottom provoking an ache in the tender organ residing in his centre.

He’d practically been forced into the shoddy refresher by the mechanic—you got the kid all anxious, just look at you, go get that gunk off yourself.

That’s all it can be perceived as by others; nothing more than filthy smears required to be rid of simply for presentation—to preserve the comfort of others no matter how intense the guilt chews against his muscles as her pith dilutes. Gunk.

Din muffles a sob. It’s her.

She’s abandoning him for a second time. What little of her refuses to part from him is so encrusted it’s become a part of his armour, inserting herself into the nicks and grooves of his platings his fingers fail to penetrate.

Mindless hands shift to his lesioned flesh, unsteady digits summarising the hills of rashy bumps visible only through the lens of steamy caf. Phantoms of lingering touches mark tan terrain in the shapes of slender fingers and cottony lips on his chest, his stomach, neck and face; everywhere that’d been blessed with the loveliest of kisses and nips from the Sun now scarred over.

Pendant held firmly in place pulses a scorching burst through the tissue on his sternum, the beskar skull leaving its claim. Its fraying thread drifts to thick fingers and lays loose between them, irritable skin of a palm flaring at its exuding heat and crisp pang; none of its physical but it’s as though he’s brushed with a hand of a million degrees all the same.

Shiny silver occupies the empty space beside him, a lithe barrel glittering in the substandard lighting of a crummy Tatooine refresher; heckling the helmetless man but he could never glance its way in any sort of negative class.

It hurts to connect with the beskar pendant and perhaps he deserves to hurt, but he can’t sustain it, can’t confront that sting in his throat and eyes each time it shifts against his chest.

Din weaves the lace of his material initiation through the metal perch beneath the shiny stretch of a barrel; dangling and showcased on the paired rifle of his Sun where it’ll reside—operating as a threatening symbol to partner his visor against enemies who dare glance his way.

And it did, far more successful than he could’ve imagined; rumours of his descent traversing parsecs faster than his Crest could vie with.

Did you hear about that Mandalorian—supposedly lost his lover and went rogue. I heard he turned berserk, he’s killed a town’s worth of criminals! Someone ought to lock him up before he turns on us. He’s a threat to us all!

Din didn’t much care for the presumptions. It wasn’t as though he frequented locations to be overwhelmed with the local’s support, though it made discreetly getting around a challenge—no longer were the days he could enter a cantina with a few intrigued eyes devising a way to lay claim to his beskar before returning to their booze.

But now it was people confronting him in false hope he’d be too deep in mourning to fight against their attacks. It never did end well for them.

He’d become a magnet for death, even of his own.

It wasn’t righteous to die in that common house. Not when those disproportionate black eyes observed from the arms of a droid; deep, dark masses that depicted more emotion for his guardian’s condition than perhaps they should. He’d been selfishly greeting his emerging end with an inconsiderate let me have a warrior’s death. It’d be a lie if he was to deny its translation; let me see my beloved.

As is his entire life, Din’s been allocated with responsibilities far out of his expertise but he’s not relinquishing his guardianship to the kid that easily. It’s not as if he could be transferred to any other old sucker either; not everybody has the same compassion for a floppy-eared bounty worth their retirement funds.

No, it wasn’t his time to rest. It’ll come when it’s merited.

That night after the events that’d transpired, Greef Karga bestowed some unusually wise statements underneath the moonless canopy of speckled stars patterning the abyss. Simply reminding Din of its existence; the constant celestials that’ll never desert him no matter what dodgy planet he dwelt.

A new moon is approaching. As a child I had been told stories of a cosmic reset at the commencement of a new cycle; an opportunity to start anew. Perhaps it was all just folklore but it’s fascinating all the same, wouldn’t you agree? I always did like shiny things.

It’d been the vulnerability that encouraged his Guild’s leader to utter those words—that unmistakable change in demeanour since they’d last met, that insecurity swallowing an iron stomach upon hearing a dead name chanted amongst an army of Stormtroopers—Din knew without it being conveyed.

He had been stripped of his privacy and put in the spotlight in front of dozens of lifeforms. A name reserved for a benevolent tone now recognised by the enemy, trespassing on those memories of all the situations it’d been murmured into his bare flesh as if labelling him as a person; a real breathing blood-pumping person and not the Creed he fought for.

Gideon was his name, the man who spoke of his identity as though he crafted it himself. As though he nursed the bruises and traumas of his title and being—not gentle hands that’d remain uncomplaining despite how little Din offered in return.

If Din had inspected his fallen TIE fighter for life, perhaps he could’ve avoided the forthcoming events.

With the naive belief of security, Din encouraged the pursuit of his aspirations rather than the concern of his violations towards his code. His relationship with the Creed had been on thin ice and he’s not quite willing to pardon its strict principles.

An opportunity to start anew.

His brain requests a rebalance—the interest for the Child’s consideration prodding needles into the fleshy mass—demands his sentiments to be torched, cremated until they are stardust particles drifting through the celestials above. They crack and pop in tune to the sizzle of a droughted driftwood pyre bearing the corpse of his lover, profitably filling two needs with one deed; a clear state of mind to focus on his ongoing responsibilities and to allow depleted beams to finally rest across the horizon.

She’d endured suffering enough; receiving punishment from those she trusted, the guilt and onslaught Din presented as a by-product, sustaining wounds until it’d finally become too much.

Even in death, she wasn’t permitted serenity.

Her fucking body is still with me!

It slipped out of his mouth back on Tatooine.

I had to - had to put her in carbonite...she was fuckin’ rotting in my ship. I didn’t know what else to do. What are you supposed to do with the body of your-... I can’t just - just ditch her on some shitty planet all alone like that!

Peli had been of assistance; providing Din somewhere to rest his eyes without breathing in the stench of decaying flesh. She’d even gone ahead and supplied him with a pair of gloves to preserve his corrupted honour though she wouldn’t admit it,—prefer not to recognise you as human, makes it hard to dupe you outta credits if I’m too busy pitying you—she wasn’t repelled by his grieving, the unusual depictions of a man underneath all that shiny steel.

She’d been of more assistance than he could thank her for.

Being on Tatooine facilitated the idea of his Sun’s disposal.

Kote Kyr’am.

It’s the best memorial he could devise. A ceremony he’d attended countless times as a foundling watching his elders fall in battle. The very same elders who’d knock Din upside the head for constructing such an ancient farewell for an aruetii but she’s worthy of nothing less; more, perhaps, but there are no alternatives in the vacancy of his helmet adequate for the burial of a star.

Din’s lips are chapped, his skin is on fire, there’s a rumbling in his stomach. He’s watching his beloved burn to ash underneath the new moon and yet he feels as though he’s the one succumbing to the flames; the heat just as powerful as the dormant embodiment it’s consuming.

Velvety skin he’d allocate his hands, his tongue, and time, never enough time, to now blister and contract, tear and melt, crackle and—

He heaves over, helmet rim caught on a scrunched forehead, and readies his throat for the bite of acid. It doesn’t come. Not even a trickle of saliva disperses. Instead, his lungs impale themselves on his ribcage, contracting and expanding so rapidly he fails to recognise his cheeks are devoured with a downstream.

The salt probes his tastebuds though it’s insufficient to dominate the heavy particles of ablaze flesh. It’s so rich, so potent that it’s evolved to a taste rather than a scent. Din could withstand the odour, his filters stripped the majority, but the taste is intolerable and it just so freely floats in through his agape mouth to nestle among his tongue - as if it belonged there - as if a contrasting sweeter taste didn’t.

Din’s skin reddens from Navarro’s meanspirited terrain but it’s not enough motivation to rise to his feet. He sits there, steel dwelling amongst the molten, and waits because he can’t continue his journeys for two without that flicker of confidence she’s at peace.

He’ll take a crumb of assurance, it’d be plenty for him to muster up the strength and return to the Crest where the Child awaits.

Usually, as is Mandalorian custom, he’d be stripping the shell of armour from her corpse as a keepsake of a life well-lived - to preserve the name of her clan but all Din had of her’s was a shattered rifle that’ll remain in the vacuum of a satchel.

Not to mention the chants—the gruff Mando’a words designed to ensure their warrior’s spirit may join their fallen. Din had his fair share of howling war cries through the years but not this time - it’s not right.

An aruetii wouldn’t be welcomed.

Besides, his Creed had stolen his spirit. It doesn’t qualify to steal hers.

It isn’t until a final blow of wind carries her skywards that Din raises to his feel, latches his helmet back in place, and returns to work.

Din likes the skies, no—loves the skies; the magnificent blues and pinks and oranges that blend as one, the swollen cushiony whites that conceal his naked face from the shell whatever planet he’d roam, but above all else Din loves how the sun blessed him with its astral kisses.

That unmistakable warmth flushed over him; the remnants of his extinguished star’s touches.

There was a peace up there that’d never reach the conflict of the galaxy; serenity that allowed for a moment of buoyancy—floating among the cornflower identical to how one might in the colossal depths of the ocean without the intimidation of anchoring oneself by weighted platings.

It was a real sight to behold up there; unfamiliar without the confines of his Crest.

Din had forgotten the thrill of the sweeping winds through his limbs, the freedom rising in his chest upon cutting through white puffs. But it had been the horizon that lured his attention inwards—the bends and slopes of a shimmering orange star smiling at the returning glint in his visor.

It was the first time he’d genuinely smiled since the loss of His Star. It had something to do with the warmth; the sunbeams managing to penetrate past beskar and into his flesh and organs so intimately, so overfamiliar to delicate fingers stroking the muscles of his chest or the bones beneath his cheeks.

It became sort of a custom in his travels to visit the heavens at least once on each planet. Often times bemused squealing would accompany him. Grogu—Grogu...the kid had a name—had been adamant about participating in his encounters and Din now has no doubt that was his abilities, the Force as Ahsoka mentioned, enabling him to perceive his intentions; his ambition to be touched by someone who no longer lives. It’d be easier to go up against seven Krayt dragons than to convince a power-wielding typhoon to remain on land, thereby he’d hoist Grogu up and above the overcast where the beams kissed the peak of his fuzzy forehead.

Renouncing his guardianship to Grogu had been challenging. Losing another lifeform so that he’d be entirely alone wasn’t a consideration as he journeyed in search of a Jedi, but it was to be expected. The kid was powerful and Din didn’t possess the knowledge to help him wield his abilities. Didn’t make saying goodbye any easier, though.

The situation resurfaced ghoulish remembrances of draining light in his arms; how he never presented his emotions without the guise of his helmet. So, encircled with copious lifeforms, Din removed his Creed before Grogu—introducing that vulnerability and love for a toddler who’d swindled his affection so effortlessly. A claw on his face wasn’t the same as gentle fingers but he didn’t love it any less.

The ordeal was absolving despite the moisture in his eyes.

Din’s ambivalent about what he’ll pursue from here with no mission, no ship, no love, but he doesn’t much care when he’s brushed with the warmth of his lover’s thumbs on his eyelids. It’s his favourite space; lingering above the clouds, head craned backwards with his helmet loosely held in his leathers, savouring how the beams kiss his skin until it’s pink from its spice.

Some days he simply wishes to take a peak, a small little glance to quench him until the desire builds up again. Some days he remains in the skies until his jetpack whines and runs into failures; until it makes its descent and is replaced with a shimmering orb.

He’s envious of the moon; how it so easily recovers its glossy shine and integrity, neglecting to address the events of the eclipse. Its radiance chips away at his armour but the sunshine restores it—realigns the shards and offers a toasty kiss to the steel, commending it for protecting her Mandalorian.

Din suspends in a herd of clouds and sighs into the air. It’s quiet except for the monotonous bursts of thrusters from behind. Sunshine is greeted with lukewarm caf, a partnering smile tugging his lips.

“Beloved Girl,” Din’s voice is raspy from inactivity but so loud, so clear in contrast to everybody else’s he’d consulted.

There’s too much he wants to say but he determines to voice them all. Din expresses his thoughts he’d been too stoic to admit, ranging from whispers to shouts at the sun as if it was a sentient being listening to his passion.

He tells her of how much he longs to see her, to taste her on his lips, to provoke that sparkling smile he loved so dearly. He communicates his guilt and how he loves her more than he can fathom—mentions the successful end of his journeys with Grogu and how he now has zilch but an undesired blade to show for it.

There’s nothing but a sway of wind whipping his eardrums in response and Din hums, accepting it.

Din cherishes the splinters of beams as she comes to rest beneath the horizon and he too sinks from the skies, obscured dimples in his cheeks as he recounts the memories of his beloved wrapped in his arms.

One last thing, Cyare, keep an eye on the kid for me, will you?

taglist: @ohhersheybars, @greatcircle79, @northernpunk, @tanzthompson, @djarrex, @omgreally, @spideysimpossiblegirl

[ruby-whistler]

Your c!dream post came on my dash and while I can definitely agree with the main point (torture is wrong no matter who it happens to) some of the contents of that post were a bit bothering to me.

the fact that you implied that your concerned for people who really hate c!dream and therefore see the torture as payback is really crossing a line. I really hope I misinterpreted that because it sounds like your implying that you think those people would dehumanize people in real life. That is a big assumption to make my friend, not something you can just throw around because you see someone talking bad about a character you emphasize with.

And like I said, I’m saying that while agreeing with your main point. I can say that your right about that being something we shouldn’t do while also knowing that this is about a Minecraft roleplay revolving around a character who canonically abused a 17 year old. The accusation your making is not something you should throw around. Just like people shouldn’t accuse Dream apologists who say bad stuff about c!tommy of being real life abuse apologists. There’s a huge difference about being attached to a character and saying something dumb and doing these things irl.

Also I thought we were past referring to lmanburg as colonization? I’m not sure if that’s what you were doing but That’s a real thing that effects people and not something you can just pin on a couple of white streamer men roleplaying. Someone more equipped then me can explain why they are very much not comparable at all, and why it’s bad to compare it, ill probably butcher it. I saw a good post about it somewhere.

And then onto the stuff that’s more story based and doesn’t matter as much:

- dream very much did plan to keep tommy in the prison cell for life, like I’m pretty sure he flat out said it or at least very heavily implied it during the confrontation, someone probably has a clip.

- I can agree that Sam wasn’t manipulated by dream, but he does have trauma from him, in fact it’s a big part of his arc. Dream would brag about what he did to tommy in exile, laughed in his face after killing tommy, and often screamed at him threatening to kill him as well. It affected sam greatly and is what started his spiral.

- There are other things in your post that I disagree with to some extent but honestly debating lore things isn’t what I’m here for. So we can agree to disagree. I’m not really to concerned about the lore stuff.

just like you were talking about being careful about what you are saying about c!dream because it can hurt people, I will also say to be careful in what you say about c!dream in his favor because it can also hurt people. Please do not forget he very canonically abused, murdered, and threatened to murder teenagers. That’s a touchy subject, especially because it was displayed in such a raw manner. Is he deserveing of abuse because of it? Of course not. Is he unworthy of growth or change? Of course not. Does that mean people have to forgive him or like him or sympathize with him? No. No one is morally required to sympathize with a character, as long as your not saying gross things about them. ( like claiming that they deserve torture! )

Someone saying something in the heat of the moment about a character who reminds them of their abuser does not justify calling them real life dehumanizers, or claiming they are prone to it. It’s not cool. And, I and feel like In liking c!dream (or any character who has done something really morally wrong) you have to make sure to be respectful towards people who have been in those situations. You can like a character without excusing their actions. Not saying your doing that, just a blanket statement.

Also, please take care of yourself. If seeing people criticize or say bad things about a character you like is causing you genuine distress, please take a break. I tend to hyperfixate and project and I know that sometimes it can be a really harmful thing. It helps a lot to take a deep breathe and step away for a few minutes. This is a reminder to everyone else as well to always tag crit. And to clarify, I’m not trying to like drag you through the mud for anything I disagree with in your post. Like trust me I get heat of the moment reactions and not completely thinking through everything you write down. And just blatantly not knowing that something isn’t cool to say. I just want to make sure it’s known that hey, maybe people shouldn’t say _.

If there’s anything in my post that’s wrong I apologize, I’m open to respectful criticism. And also just to finish this off, I know getting critical asks can be upsetting, so if you are genuinely made upset, angry, or anxious by this ask, please just leave it be. Don’t respond, or take a breather before you do. I’m saying this because like I said I just came across this post, I don’t know you or how you tend to react to things so I don’t want to start a huge thing. Just giving my thoughts and crit.

And also because having people yell/be really rude at me makes me very genuinely anxious! Even if it’s anon. Please keep that in mind if you respond (you don’t have to, it’s up to you) You can respond and disagree however much you like, just please don’t be a jerk about it cause I’ll probably cry lol (seriously tho like I said I’m sensitive)

Alright, so first as a quick disclaimer, I’m going to out a summary of the original post’s points, just to ensure that we’re on the same page;

The post does say:

- don’t dehumanize c!Dream because it continuously hurts people who relate to and/or sympathize with him, also dehumanization in general is an inherently wrong mindset

- don’t attack people who sympathize with him because he’s a victim of abuse besides other things

The post never says:

- you cannot hate c!Dream and not sympathizing with him is wrong

- the things c!Dream has done are to any degree excused

- don’t dehumanize c!Dream because he’s a good person

- people who dehumanize c!Dream are real life abuse apologists

If you read the post and didn’t get these points from it, i advise you to reread it as I made pretty much all of these abundantly clear.

I absolutely never said anything about real life abuse apologism. I continuously put (fictional) in front of things to make that point. I don’t know how you got that from the post.

Dehumanization is wrong. Dehumanization of fictional characters on a large scale to the point where people will excuse his abuse is wrong and it hurts people and I will speak out about it. It doesn’t mean people will dehumanize people irl or that they are prone to it, but it’s still wrong.

I never said L’manberg was colonization. I said some people who have had their country colonized relate to him because he had his home torn apart and is desperate to return it back to its original state. This is a completely valid reason to relate to him as it is a pretty big part of the character.

He said he would “put him in the prison”. I don’t remember him saying it would be forever, but he could’ve said that, however I’d like a clip first. He never said he would be stored in the inhumane, main cell, and it makes a lot more sense that he wouldn’t be in there 1) because Dream said it was only a security measure 2) the prisoner was supposed to be able to move around the prison.

I don’t care that the abuser was “traumatized” by the abuse victim telling him of his actions. If I was being tortured mentally and mistreated and neglected physically by a person who hates my guts for weeks I too would probably threaten him. It didn’t start his spiral. His spiral was caused by corruption and possibly hatred, not being “hurt” by c!Dream. c!Dream didn’t cause himself to be abused, that was fully c!Sam’s decision, and saying otherwise is victim blaming (not saying you did that, just putting this point out here).

I do not forget the bad things he’s done. I was there. I saw it. I hated him for it. I still sympathize with him. I still believe he deserves better. I still believe he deserves to get better. I 100% agree with the point that it’s wrong to say someone is required to feel sympathy, as long as they don’t dehumanize him and harass people who do. That was the literal point of the post.

I am one of the many c!Dream fans who get constantly triggered because of how overwhelming the dehumanization is in the community. It’s not being hypersensitive, and I really hope you’re not implying that. It’s a very real issue that should be solved so that people don’t have to “take breaks” because of it.

I don’t care if people hate him or criticize him. I genuinely couldn’t care less. He did disgusting things. I’m used to it. But it is normalized in the community to say stuff about the character that is genuinely triggering, and would be to anyone if people were saying it on a large scale about their favorite character.

Hope this didn’t come off as too aggressive, I have anxiety and I didn’t want to let my feelings bleed into this because that wouldn’t be good for me. Wish you a nice day.

[beautiful-and-terrible]

dazed ‘n‘ confused (part 3)

A/N: 3500 fuckin’ words y’all lmaooo i am so stupidly invested in this dumbass and his hot neighbor.

Ship: Rodrick Heffley x OFC

Warnings: underage drinking / drug usage, dubious consent (both parties inebriated), swearing, etc.

---

Nicole shouldn’t have worried so much about what to wear. When she showed up in Rodrick’s garage, his friends Ben and Chris were there, both dressed in ripped jeans and flannel shirts paired over band t-shirts. By comparison, Nicole’s black skater skirt and combat boots felt almost fancy.

“Hey, I’m Ben,” the dark-haired one holding a red electric guitar came up to her and gave her a fist bump. She almost laughed, not having fist-bumped anyone since she was 13. “Nicole,” she replied, smiling.

“I’m Chris!” the blonde called over, waving, before turning back to adjusting his microphone and checking the settings on their audio.

Rodrick seemed to appreciate her style, at least. He came through the garage door, carrying a four-pack of Monster energy and whistled, giving her a quick up-and-down glance, “Hey, groupie.”

Nicole punched his arm as he walked by. “I came here to listen to you play, so… play.”

“Your wish is my command,” Rodrick said with a dramatic bow.

Nicole found a relatively comfortable spot as far from the speakers as she could get - this wasn’t a concert, but loud speakers could still be painful after an extended period of time. The clack of Rodrick’s drumsticks alerted her, and before she knew it there was a blast of noise and a blur of limbs.

Honestly, he wasn’t bad, Nicole thought to herself after they had played a few songs. He could use a little more control, but what musician didn’t get caught up in their music? Glancing outside, Nicole saw that it was finally growing dark out. The sky had turned a soft purple, and she could see a few fireflies flashing in the cooling grass. She checked the time on her phone - 9:15.

“Hey, do you guys know Caitlin?” she asked the group. They turned to look at her.

“Caitlin Irving or Caitlin Peters?” Ben asked, taking an impressive gulp of Monster before burping loudly. The boys fell into fits of laughter. Nicole couldn’t help laughing, too.

“I don’t know her last name, she works at Starbucks, though.”

“Ohhhhhh, Caitlin! Yeah, we know her. Why?”

“She invited me to a party tonight, but I don’t really know anyone but her. Would you guys wanna be my plus-three?”

Ben and Chris high-fived each other, and Rodrick saluted her with his drumstick, whacking himself in the head in the process. Nicole hid a laugh behind her hand, not wanting to embarrass him. “For sure, Nikky. As long as there's drinks, we’ll be there,” Chris said. 

“C’mon, we can take my van,” Rodrick said, shoving his drumsticks in his back pocket and running inside to grab his keys. The other boys started down the driveway toward the white van, garishly painted with the band's name on the side in bold, black letters.

When Rodrick returned, Nicole gave him a smug look. “I thought it needed repairs?”

Rodrick stopped walking mid-stride, looking like a puppet caught on its strings. “Uh. Yeah. Well. My dad helped, when you were over at your house. Getting ready. It’s fine now. He’s the best mechanic I know.”

“Uh-huh. You sure you didn’t just… want to ride home with me from work?”

Rodrick scoffed. “You wish.” But as he rounded the front of the car to the drivers side, you caught the scarlet color of his cheeks against his tan skin. As if he could be any more endearing, he even offered Nicole shotgun. Chris grumbled the entire time, but begrudgingly gave you the seat he had worked so hard to acquire. 

“First stop - Capital. Ben has a fake, so we can BYOB,” Rodrick said, practically peeling out of the driveway. Nicole clutched the seat for dear life, heart stuck in her throat.

“Are you sure this thing is secure?” she squeaked, feeling the seat shaking a little in its bolts.

“No one has been ejected yet, Nikky,” Rodrick laughed.

“Go-go gadget get me the fuck out of here,” Nicole groaned, planting her feet on the floor to try and stop herself from flying forward as Rodrick squealed to a stop in front of a seedy looking liquor store.

Ben barely avoided taking the sliding door off its tracks when he opened the door. Chris lit a cigarette in the back, the acrid scent wafting to the front of the van. Nicole didn’t mind the smell much - honestly it reminded her of her Grandmother's house - but she hoped the smell didn’t linger on her clothes. That would be hard to explain to her mom. Speaking of, she sent off a quick text to her parents telling them that she’d be back late. Luckily, Nicole had always been the responsible type, so her parents trusted her to make good decisions and as a result, let her have free reign of her life (especially now that she was 18).

Ben returned after a few minutes, carrying a 24 pack of Natty Light and lighting his own cigarette.

“You have the address?” Rodrick asked, and you showed him Caitlins text.

“Yo, that's in Heather Hill’s neighborhood. Maybe we can tee-pee her house later,” Rodrick said, already zooming off again.

“Heather Hills?”

“Major bitch,” Chris called from the back of the van. Rodrick shrugged. “She’s not a bitch she’s just… not very nice.”

Nicole laughed, “You don’t have to defend the honor of all women by not calling her a bitch. If she’s a bitch, I believe you.”

Rodrick looked at you out of the corner of his eye, thinking briefly.

“Yeah, she’s a stone-cold bitch. She ran over my foot once. With her car.” 

Nicole grimaced in sympathy.

“Last year, we played at her Sweet Sixteen party, and Rodrick broke her ice sculpture bust. It was awesome,” Ben said.

“Oh, so you aren’t always perfect?” Nicole teased. Rodrick flipped her off.

Soon, they pulled up in front of Caitlin’s house. Nicole could already hear loud music from outside the house, and there were rainbow strobe lights flashing in the windows. Swallowing her nervousness, she followed Rodrick, Chris and Ben up the front walkway.

As they walked in the house, Nicole was hit by the fragrant, herbal smell of weed. From far away, the music had seemed loud, but coming in the house the music seemed to vibrate her ribcage - it was something with a repetitive bass, stuff Nicole didn’t normally listen to but she enjoyed it nonetheless. She followed Rodrick further into the house, trying to find the kitchen, weaving between people dancing and couples making out.

There were people surrounding an island in the center of the kitchen, decorated with colorful bottles of liquor and sodas to mix with. Nicole spotted Caitlin talking to a tall black guy, drinking out of a red solo cup. Nicole gave her a wave, and Caitlin excitedly came over to greet her.

“Hey! I’m so glad you made it.”

“Yeah, me too. I haven’t actually ever been to a high school party.”

Caitlin’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Well, you’re gonna have one hell of a first high school party experience, girly. Let's get you a drink.”

Caitlin turned to the kitchen island and poured about four shots of rum and filled the rest with coke in a red solo cup. Nicole took a sip. She could barely tell it was spiked, so she took a few more chugs and wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. 

“Do you wanna dance?” Caitlin asked, and Nicole nodded before following her back to the living room. Already, the rum was making her limbs feel looser and her brain fuzzy. She finished the rest of it in one go, enjoying the feeling of her nervousness and insecurities fading away. Nicole had never been unpopular, per say, but she tended to stay to herself and only had a few close friends at her old school, anyway. It was refreshing to feel included, and she couldn’t help feeling that this was the way her teenage years were supposed to be - loud and exciting and living moment to moment.

As they danced, Nicole swaying in place and occasionally spinning around, she couldn’t help but feeling a little awkward. Caitlin was actually a really good dancer - she knew how to move her body in all the right ways so they hit on beat with the music. Nicole envied her easy grace, but was quickly relieved when Caitlin accidentally bumped into someone, causing them to spill their drink. Nicole stifled a laugh, not at Caitlin’s expense, just at the irony of the timing. At least Nicole wasn’t the only clutz. 

They had been dancing for only a few minutes before Nicole felt a hand on her waist, making her jump slightly.

“Hey, the guys and I are gonna smoke some weed in the backyard. Do you wanna come?” Rodrick said. His voice was almost in her ear, close enough that she could hear him over the blaring music, his breath tickling her sensitive skin. 

She turned around to face him - in the dim light of the house, he looked much more appealing than usual - she hadn’t even noticed he had put eyeliner on, but it made the dark of his eyes look even more obsidian. Nicole nodded, giving a thumbs up, and pulled Caitlin along with her.

“I need you for moral support,” Nicole said, making Caitlin laugh.

“Have you ever smoked weed before?” Caitlin asked.

“Nope.”

Caitlin raised her eyebrows and pulled her closer as they walked to whisper in her ear.

“Okay, take a small hit the first time, don’t try to impress anyone. But breathe it fully into your lungs - I like to start by pulling it into my mouth first, and then inhaling fully. And if you cough, don’t worry, almost everyone does their first time.”

Nicole gave her a grateful look as they approached the circle of people sitting on lawn chairs in the backyard. Ben and Chris were already there, with two other girls Nicole didn’t know. However, there seemed to only be two more lawn chairs available to sit on.

Nicole was about to plop down on the grass before Caitlin grabbed her hand.

“You should sit on Rodrick’s lap,” she whispered, and Nicole almost choked on her drink.

“What?” 

“Dude, he’s totally into you - I don’t know what your sitch is, but I think he’s probably a little nervous about making the first move. Just do it, and if he asks, say ‘sorry, there weren’t enough seats and I don’t wanna get bug bites from the grass.”

Nicole stared at her, mouth agape. The alcohol in her brain was telling her it might not be the worst idea ever. And you know what? Fuck it. You’re only young once. Nicole made up her mind, and squeezing Caitlin’s hand, she walked over to where Rodrick was sitting before primly making herself comfortable on his thigh.

She felt him tense beneath her immediately, before his hand came up to her waist to steady her. Before he had the chance to say anything about it, the joint was passed to him, and he took an impressive hit, the cherry glowing red at the end for several seconds. Nicole watched him with interest, hoping she wouldn’t mess up too badly and embarrass herself. 

Rodrick looked up at her as he exhaled the smoke, holding the joint out to her. Not paying attention, and entranced by the eye contact they were holding, she reached out to take the joint without looking and promptly burned her hand on it.

“Fucker,” she hissed, shaking her hand to try and get rid of the pain. Rodrick just laughed.

“Do you want help?” Rodrick asked, before taking another hit of the joint. He reached up behind Nicole’s head, threading his fingers through her hair, before pulling her down close to his face, their lips inches apart. Nicole instinctively opened her mouth, half from surprise and half in anticipation of being kissed. But Rodrick simply blew a steady stream of smoke into her mouth, - their lips didn’t make contact. Belatedly, Nicole realized she was supposed to be inhaling, so she did quickly, trying to hold the smoke in her lungs for as long as possible. 

Somebody wolf-whistled in the group. Nicole was pretty sure it was Caitlin.

Eventually, she ended up coughing it out, Rodrick rubbing her back but still laughing.

“You’re a green at the green, huh?” Rodrick asked, and Nicole rolled her eyes.

“That obvious?”

“Yeah, but it’s cute. I’m glad you’re having your first high with me,” Rodrick said, smiling sweetly. Nicole’s stomach fluttered. Already, she could tell that this wasn’t alcohol she was feeling anymore - the buzz she had been feeling earlier was replaced by something much slower and velvety, like the world was moving through maple syrup.

“Dude,” Nicole said after a minute, realizing she had been staring at nothing. Rodrick looked at her. She looked at him. They both started cracking up laughing.

“What are we laughing at?” Nicole hiccuped through her laughter.

“No idea,” Rodrick said, wiping his eyes free of tears of mirth.

“Rodrick, pass the J,” Ben called out, breaking the two of them from their trance. Without thinking about it, Nicole leaned back onto Rodrick’s chest, enjoying the warmth of his body. It wasn’t a cold night, per say, but Nicole was only wearing a skirt and a t-shirt, and she had always had poor circulation. She shivered involuntarily.

“Do you want my flannel?” Rodrick asked, already taking it off. Nicole sat up, ruffling his hair playfully.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you just want to show off your arms,” Nicole said, slipping on the warm blue flannel and resting her hand on Rodrick’s exposed arm, once again in a cut-off tank top. Rodrick gave her a funny look.

“What do you mean?”

Nicole suddenly found herself tongue tied. “Uh. I mean. You just wear a lot of tank tops.”

Rodrick raised an eyebrow, but said nothing else. Nicole leaned back against him again, feeling simultaneously self-conscious and exhilarated. They had never touched for this long before. She wasn’t sure exactly what was happening between them, but she liked the direction it was going. Even though they hadn’t known each other long, Nicole felt more comfortable with Rodrick than she did anyone else - even though most of the time she had known him, he had been a nuisance to her. Well… maybe not a complete nuisance.

It was funny to think that only a few days ago, Rodrick was just an annoyance she dealt with at her job and admired from afar, and now she was sitting on his lap, wearing his flannel. She leaned her head back, looking at the stars. She hadn’t noticed that Caitlin had left, but suddenly she appeared over her line of vision, grinning.

“Do you want a beer?” she asked, holding a cold can over Nicole’s forehead. Nicole reached out to take it, sitting up before cracking it open. She wasn’t in the habit of enjoying beer for the flavor, so she’d rather get drunk off it quickly. It tasted like wet cardboard, but Nicole managed to chug it down.

“Damn, girl, where’d you learn to drink like that?” Chris asked, laughing as Nicole belched loudly. 

“Years of rigorous practice and intense concentration, young padawan,” Nicole replied.

“Do you wanna shotgun one with me?” Chris asked, half-joking, but Nicole was feeling overly confident from the buzz she was feeling and readily stepped up to the challenge.

“Whoever spits it out owes the other ten bucks.”

“Fuckin’ deal,” Chris grinned, Ben cheering him on as he threw a beer toward Nicole. She (surprisingly) caught it.

“Wait, gimme one,” Rodrick said, making grabby hands in Ben’s direction, who threw him a beer.

“On three, okay?” Ben counted. They all started to crack open their beers, Nicole with her house keys, Rodrick with his car keys, and Chris with his pen knife.

“One.. twoooooo…. Three!” Ben yelled, and they all tipped their heads back, drinking from the hole in the side of the can. Nicole’s eyes watered, but she was too competitive to back down now. Foam spilled out of the side of her mouth, but she kept drinking. She could hear people chanting her name as she finally threw the beer can down on the ground, raising her hands in victory. Both Rodrick and Chris were covered in beer foam, but Nicole somehow stayed relatively clean, minus the beer she wiped off her face.

“Ten motherfucking bucks, Chris,” Nicole slurred slightly, grinning at him as he pulled out a crumpled bill from his pocket and threw it at her. 

“Rodrick, how the fuck did you lose, dude? You were the one who taught me how to shotgun,” Ben said, causing Nicole to throw her head back in laughter, before letting out another massive burp that lasted for several seconds. The whole group dissolved into laughter. 

Eventually, the joint got finished, and people started to move back inside. However, Rodrick and Nicole stayed outside, talking about whatever came into their heads.

“Were you ever into Greek mythology as a kid?” Nicole asked, watching Rodrick’s eyes go comically large.

“Does Percy Jackson count?”

Nicole pretended to consider it deeply for a moment, before shaking her head. Rodrick pouted. 

“I only got into Greek mythology because of Percy Jackson. So, I think it still counts.

“Fine. But do you know shit about the constellations they’re associated with?”

Rodrick pointed at the sky, at a random cluster of stars.

“For sure - that's Dingus Humongus, he was a Greek hero with the fattest ass known to man.”

“Sounds like my kinda guy,” Nicole replied, sticking her tongue out as Rodrick squawked in indignation.

“Besides a fat ass, what do you look for in a guy? Not, like, that I care. Just. Wondering.”

“Very good English, Rodrick,” Nicole laughed, “I guess my type is… someone kind. And funny. Someone who tries to be cool and is actually a huge dork. And musical, that's always a plus,” she said, feeling very bold as she looked directly at him. It took Rodrick a moment, but eventually his mouth formed a small “oh” as he realized who she was talking about. His eyes flicked down to her lips. Then he frowned, “I am not a dork.”

Nicole rolled her eyes, “And I’m totally not waiting for you to kiss me right now.”

Nicole watched as the color slowly rose in Rodrick’s cheeks, turning them rosy pink, visible even in the shadow-drenched backyard. Nicole decided to pull yet another risky move, and adjusted herself on Rodrick’s lap so that she was facing him, her thighs on top of his arms around his neck. For such a seemingly confident boy, Rodrick seemed more nervous than she had ever seen him, even when he asked her to come to band practice earlier. Hell, he hadn’t even been that nervous to shotgun the joint into her mouth.

“Sorry, I just… I’ve wanted to do this for a long time. I don’t wanna be bad at it,” he confessed. Just as Nicole thought she couldn’t be any more endeared by this boy. She slid her hands into his hair, thick and soft. She leaned in and gently nosed at his jawline, placing small kisses against his warm skin. Right at his jugular, he smelled like cologne and nighttime and boy, the right mix of clean and sexy. Seemingly gaining his courage, he grabbed Nicole by the back of her head and brought her up to his lips.

It was soft, at first, merely a press of skin to skin, but the two gradually deepened the kiss, moving against each other like they were made for it. Nicole felt like her heart might beat out of her chest - or maybe she was just that high.

Feeling emboldened by Rodrick’s enthusiasm, she slipped her tongue between his lips, gently tangling their tongues together. He let out a low moan, and Nicole could’ve blacked out from how turned on she was by that simple sound. The warmth of his body against hers and the slickness of their mouths together caused a rush of liquid heat to form between Nicole’s legs. Goddamn, he was good at this. Nicole wasn’t sure how many girls Rodrick had kissed before this, but if he was a rookie at this she was damn impressed.

Rodrick’s hands, which had been resting on her waist, slowly moved down her ass and under her skirt, causing Nicole to gasp as he started to knead and grab at her cheeks - not hard, but enough to get her even more hot and bothered than she thought possible.

“Is this okay?” Rodrick asked, his voice low and rough. 

“Yeah, I’m good,” Nicole replied, running her fingers through his hair and scratching her nails down his neck. She felt him shiver beneath her, sending a heady rush of power to her stomach and lower. He pulled her closer to him by her ass, so that their crotches pressed together. Nicole was taken aback by the sensation of his bulge pressed against her, but didn’t pull back, instead grinding down on him.

“Are there still people out here?” Rodrick asked shakily. Nicole pulled back and looked over her shoulder - the backyard was empty, thank god.

“No, just us,” Nicole said, turning back and bringing her lips to his ear, biting and licking the sensitive flesh. Rodrick whimpered, grinding up to meet her, and Nicole almost lost it then and there.

The alcohol and weed in her system were slowing her reactions, but also kept her from thinking too much about what she was doing - all she could think about was how much she wanted this. Sober, this might’ve never happened - she was too nervous about what he would think if she ever made a move, constantly overthinking her every word and action. This dumb boy, who rode with her to work, who stayed to the end of her shift and bought her slushies, had wiggled his way into her every thought and every beat of her heart. She knew she was fucked.

She only wished it was literally.

Nicole opened her eyes briefly to catch Rodrick’s gaze, and out of the corner of her eye she glimpsed the red-and-blue flash of police lights. Rodrick caught sight of the lights at the same time.

“Oh, fuck.”

[whump-town]

Tough Love

I’d like to thank my sociology professor for basing today’s lecture off of my favorite sociological phenomenon (anomie) and A Little Life for, once again, making me cry :) this one’s for you baby 

The hospital waiting room had chattered away. Mother’s impatiently fighting with sick babies, men crumpled in their seats waiting in misery for their name to be called, and three teenagers occupying a corner to just themselves. There, off to their own side, a bruised and battered man, a shadow, wedged between his old mentor and the only person brave enough to challenge the prognosis deeming Hotch concussion free.

Despite what Morgan thinks, he doesn’t have a concussion. There’s just only so much one person can take before they break. It’s just that Derek Morgan would rather a blow to the head be the reason his boss can’t even look him in the eye rather than the blood staining his swollen hands. One will heal with what can only be hoped is minimal damage. While the other might result in early retirement and a battle with depression or anxiety or something dark and murky. And Morgan is so fucking tired of the twisted way things keep panning out.

The car stops, auto-pilot bringing the necessary life to their limbs. Stepping out of the car, Morgan can’t consider himself surprised but he’s still taken aback by how quickly the other’s fill out the lawn. All of them standing and watching from differing levels of distance. Emily has planted herself right outside Hotch’s door and just as Morgan’s walking around she opens it.

If the darkness in Hotch had not concerned Morgan previously, the similar depth of Emily Prentiss’ eyes might startle him even more. But they’ve all found themselves lost to those thoughts and Morgan is already well aware of the complexity of the relationship between Emily and Hotch. Evermore, the similarities that damn them.

“Come on.” The moment that the curt order leaves her mouth several heads snap her way. Of all the comfort, the gentle hands, and soft tones, Emily has been the kindest. Quick to forgive Hotch’s temper flares and the first person to ease him into a hug. If there’s a partnership that will drag itself into the ground, it's the two of them. Defending one another even when they don’t deserve it.

It just seems… a strange turn of events that she’s the cold one. The angry one now.

Hotch just blinks at her from the back seat. He’s doped up and aching. Not that he’d been rather chatty on the way to the hospital or there, but he hasn’t said a word since they found him. Even sobbing in the hospital had been with his back turned to them and muffled by his hands, trying for some hopeless reason to preserve some part of his dignity. He had hardly managed to shake or nod his head to the questions the nurse was asking.

His ears are ringing and all he sees are her tight lips, pulled down into a stubborn but not unfamiliar scowl, forming words but he can’t make out a sound. “S-Sorry?” he winces when Reid moves and stops blocking the sun with his body. The rays came in to hit him in the eyes. He raises a bandaged fist to cower from the light.

Emily opens the door more, offering no sympathy. “Get out of the car, Aaron.”

Dave frowns at her.

They’ve just had an awful day.

Every single one of them on the phone call as Haley was killed. Forced to listen to Hotch’s pained cries following it. She’d seen him. The way he’d cradled Haley’s body to his chest. Hell, she had been the one to shush his sobs and help him rise to his feet. She’d cradled his head when he’d sobbed into her shoulder, hardly able to stand.

Where is this hard edge coming from?

Biting down a whimper, Hotch sits up. A pained grunt leaving his mouth as he eases his body from Dave’s car. His feet touch the ground and he tries but it hurts and he sinks back against the car to help hold him up. Derek moves mindlessly but Emily stops him with a simple shake of her head. “He can do it,” she affirms.

Morgan looks over his shoulder, shooting Dave a look. No one else can step in here, there is no authority that Emily or Hotch hold themselves to aside from one another. They pull each other from the ledge but Dave holds seniority and they know that he is the only person who can do anything. They both look to him for guidance. Now, as Morgan waits for something, anything Dave just watches.

Emily stands close but doesn’t crowd Hotch. He knows that if he really needs the help, she’s right there, and she’s watching for when his body decides it’s fighting a futile battle. If she’d allowed Morgan to step in, he would have panicked and fought back. Forcing him even further away from them.

Turning from him, she looks out at them. If she can feel them watching, there’s no way that he can miss it. “Go inside,” she instructs. “We’re right behind you.”

Again, Morgan looks to Dave but the older man simply does as instructed. Going as far as to tap Reid’s elbow and motion for the genius to follow along. The others move, JJ and Garcia talking softly to one another as they allow themselves back into Dave’s house without a fight. Morgan… he’s frustrated with what he perceives to be giving up. He wants to fight but, in reality, there is no threat to beat. There is only Hotch and Morgan is not angry with him.

The decision to return to Dave’s house was an easy one to make.

Knowing the ghosts haunting Hotch’s apartment, no one in good conscience could say they thought his own home is the safest place for him to be. Never mind that there is no way they were letting Jack stay in that apartment. To see him walk over the section Hotch had laid out on, bleeding for hours as Foyet tortured him.

So, JJ and Garcia had taken what they could think of from Hotch's apartment. Guided by Dave and Emily’s suggestions: a worn copy of Anna Karenina, sweatpants to change out of his suit, a few flannels, and (the crucial detail not to be missed) his heated blanket. He covets that thing and there will be not even the hope for rest if they forget it.

They’re both familiar with Dave’s house. The general floor layout is not complicated but the days they have both spent here-- camped out on his sofa or sleeping in his guest room-- are numerous. This is a place of comfort for them both and Dave doesn’t even have to say it because they know they’re always welcome here. Beaten dogs returning home.

He sits down on the corner of the guestroom’s bed, holding his side as he watches her pull out a duffle bag. She lays down the things she knows he needs, doesn’t bother with the rest. Things like his toothbrush, the Advil, or boxers are just not a priority. “Here,” she places the sweatpants in his lap. Unwinding his heated blanket cord and plugging it into the outlet by the bed. “I’ll be right back.”

Though she’s seen him naked before-- in the mix of changing his shirt or in his boxers for a variety of reasons all not worth explaining now, she knows that he will not change in front of her. She’s seen the scars, changed his bandages when he was still weak enough to be unable to do it himself, but now she has to act like she hasn’t. Pretend to be unaware of the landmines carved into his flesh.

Closing the door behind herself, she takes a breath. She doesn’t want to be with any of them, not even Hotch. Which pains her. She loves them and she needs them for support but she can’t face them. She’s not strong enough for Hotch or broken enough to seek the other’s comfort. But she can not sit outside this door because she knows that if she hears his pained noises as he contorts himself into clean clothes that she will regret it.

“How is he?” She keeps moving, ignoring JJ’s softly asked question. How the hell would she know? But she has a better chance of understanding than any of them. He doesn’t tell them things. For months he’s pushed them all away. Keep them as far from him as possible but she’s allowed to remain close. To see the cracks where Foyet got in.

“Where’d Derek go?”

Rossi is making food. Pasta, she assumes, because that’s always what he makes them for comfort food. He looks up from the pot of water he’s heavily salting but doesn’t comment on his general surprise to see her so soon. He expected her to lock herself in that room with Hotch. “They called him back to the scene. Duty rang.”

She does not envy him.

“How’s he holding up?”

She shrugs, going to the fridge and pulls out a water bottle. Sipping the liquid she itches to go back to the room already, to get away from their whispers and glances. “He’s alive,” she answers. In her distinct dark way surmises, “but who knows how I’ll find him when I go back.” It’s not like they haven’t all thought about it. They know the signs and they’ve watched him pull away.

It’s not even the first time it’s occurred to her what he’ll do the moment he’s left alone.

No one comments, she’s not surprised.

“Emily--”

She puts the water bottle on the counter, knowing someone will probably finish it off. Someone says something, it might be directed to her, but she keeps walking. Headed back for the guest room.

She finds him wrapped around himself. Knees drawn up, arms curled to his chest. His face is turned, hiding the pained furrow and curls of his expression from anyone who might enter. Even the blankets drawn up to his chin are an effective measure to hide himself, to burrow deep and loose himself. She knows that he isn’t aware of the fact that she’s entered the room. Normally, she might find this fact more worrisome but the sensitivity, the vulnerability of this is more alarming than his ability to perceive his surroundings.

She knows that he won’t let her help, not in the ways that will actually produce effect. His pain is manageable. In the duffle bag, hidden deeply underneath gauze, antibiotics, and a plethora of drugs he is now required to take daily to live, is the prescription of opioid painkillers. The seal is unbroken. He will not touch them. She commends the effort, there’s something to be said there about his self-restraint but she knows it’s not some moral things. He’s punishing himself.

Without invitation, not that she would ask for it, she sits down on the corner of the bed. Despite this sudden invasion, he doesn’t move or even look over his shoulder. He already knows she’s the only person brave enough to break the vow the other’s have taken to leave him to his misery. Not out of insensitivity, it’s just better to leave some things to settle themselves. You’re not going to nuke a hurricane, you’re just going to wait for it to die down.

Drawing her legs up underneath her, she gets comfortable. Crossing her legs and settling herself right beside him. Her thighs touching his back, he continues to lay on his side ignoring her. “Dave’s making everyone some food,” she informs him. The heat of his blanket is nice and, despite this, she can feel him trembling and shaking as if chilled. “I assume your vow of silence has extended to testing just how long you can go without eating as well?”

She doesn’t really need to wait for a response, or lack thereof, because she knows the answer. She knows him. Humming, she rolls her eyes. “Noted,” she replies to his silence. Leaning against his hips she peaks over his back, frowning. “Have I told you that I hate you recently? I don’t want to say it too frequently but I can feel one building itself up.”

Again, she’s met with silence. “I know you’re not sleeping,” she informs him. “You snore.”

Just as she’s starting to give up, he cracks an eye open. It’s red rimmed, bloodshot from his crying and general lack of sleep. “Do not.” His voice is whispery, faint. It sounds entirely unfamiliar and it strikes her, makes her grit her teeth down against it, as she realizes there is still a very real, very broken part of him that she will never understand. Born from desperation and acts he committed today. That there is a damaged broken boy that he keeps so safely guarded that not even she will ever be able to comfort him.

It makes her feel strangely isolated.

Gently, he maneuvers himself. Wraps an arm around his ribs-- afraid that without the support he’ll simply come undone-- and uses the other to slowly push himself up. The low light of the room safely guards his features from someone who might be standing at the door but Emily is right beside him, now moving so they are hip to hip and he knows that she can see every micro-expression he can’t contain.

“Easy,” she breathes, her hand falling between his shoulders as he bucks against the way his entire body tries to pull him back down into the covers.

Humiliated, cheeks flush with sweat, he turns to her and softly admits, “I’m gonna be sick.” He knows he can’t get to the bathroom fast enough. That his legs will not bear his weight and even if they do, his chest cannot stand the weight of him sitting up. He will fall and he’s not sure he’ll get back up. The last thing he needs, atop the general failing of today, is to pleat to the ground with limp weight.

Emily effortlessly leans down and produces the trash can that Dave keeps at the bedside. It brings to him a memory from the hospital, of the fuzz and haze of his first hours of consciousness after the attack. Her coldness, her distance, but mostly of the way she spoke to him. As if he were a victim, the kind that he finds himself sending her to talk with. The kind that are one intimidating male away from coming undone. The kind that needs empathy and warmth and her impeccable ability to talk anyone off the ledge.

And as he chokes up vomit, crying as his muscles contract around his ribs, he realizes that he really is no different from the victims they see everyday. He is… He is a victim. Not even for the first time in his life.

He doesn’t fight the hand she presses to his face, gently guiding him back down into his blankets. She pulls his blankets back up to his chin, discontentedly scowling when she sees that he’s still shaking. “I’ll get you another blanket,” she offers, despite the heated blanket and comforter he’s got tucked up around him.

He swallows thickly, wishing that he had the strength to stand and get this taste out of his mouth. His throat burns but not nearly enough to distract him from the phantom pains in his chest-- but can they really be phantom if the scars are still lined with red anger? If he can feel the knife slipping in and Foyet’s weight settled across his hips?

“No,” he whispers and is silent for a moment. “Nothing will--” he looks away from her. “Nothing will help.”

“What can I do?”

“Stay.”

She lays herself down beside him, scooting under the covers, and pressing their sides together. It takes her a moment but she finds his hand and clenches her jaw when her eyes water as he grips her hand tightly. He turns his head and she welcomes it, reaching up to guide him closer. Her fingers pushing up the hair on the back of his head and they tangle together. “If you ruin our reputation as badasses because of this cuddle,” she admonishes, “I’m never going to forgive you.”

He manages to crack the faintest smile. The soft scabs forming on his lips peeling back and bleeding again but she won’t mind the blood. “I hate you,” he whispers so softly that she only knows he’s spoken because of the ghost of hot air that ghosts over her neck.

“I love you too.”

[vanquishedvaliant]

What's your opinion about GreyTroath, i think she deserve more love after reading the archive file and in chapter 6, can you make character analysis about her please?

I agree, Greythroat is an interesting character that I like quite a lot.

She's an interesting case because she gives us a very different perspective on the origins of infected prejudice in  Terra. An explanation, but not as a way to excuse it, rather, she ends up being somewhat of a testament of the strength of character required to break free from the overwhelming societal stigma associated with Oripathy.

Greythroat's parents were oripathy researchers; she witnessed them die, watched others be killed, be betrayed and suffer because of not only the disease and those infected by it, but the systems that oppress them. And that harrowing experience from her youth deeply, irrevocably traumatized her and left a mark deep in her psyche.

While it matters little in terms of how you actually treat people, I think it's important to contextualize how Greythroat sees Oripathy. It's not so much that she has a specific hatred or discrimination against the people themselves that are infected, but more that she appears to have a deep seated traumatic fear of the disease itself. Her unconscious uncontrolled phobia is so severe that she's been driven to self harm at even the slightest risk of infection, obsessively checking her blood levels and using all the protective equipment she can get her hands on.

Even later on in her story after she'd done much to confront her prejudice, we're given a story about how she saves an infected comrade's life in battle by giving them first aid- and her body is uncontrollably trembling due to her fear. The operator says he didn't feel she was prejudiced against him anymore; but her fear and trauma is bodily, automatic, and not something she can simply get over.

So Greythroat ends up being an incredible case of personal strength in growth where she's overcoming not just the moral justice of treating the infected as people and recognizing their plight. She's not simply a person who bought into the propaganda and needs to learn otherwise, she has to actively suppress a panic attack and nausea in order to do the right thing. But by the current time in the story, this is indeed what she does through immense and continuous effort.

But even so, this distinction she seems to have between the virus and the people still makes her come across extremely cold and callous towards them, and her general blunt and to-the-point personality only further hampers communication. Her attitude about the Infected after meeting Amiya and learning to extend the same human decency and rights to the Infected also basically... curtails some of her sympathies.

I don't shy away from sensitive topics regarding the Infected? That's correct, they're not like us, which should be obvious, but they're also like us in the sense that they have the right to seize hope. Therefore, there's no need for me to take extra care of them. That's equality, is it not`

Greythroat believes that they deserve to be treated with humanity, but not pity. She is still often separating the effects of the disease from the shared identity of the people suffering from it, which makes talking to characters like Blaze- who resonate strongly with the 'Infected' identity thrust upon them- rather difficult when she struggles to connect the realities of their lives as infected with their social treatment.

But she's gradually trying to do better; through Chapter 6 we see her always asking questions, always wondering why. She's asking very blunt and insensitive questions because she wants to understand and that bluntness grates upon people like Blaze who are so used to those questions being asked dismissively or in malice.

This is also reflected in her confusion facing down with Faust. She doesn't understand the identity politics of being Infected, so the existence of a revolutionary movement like Reunion gives her pause. She’s been hurt before by the infected lashing out at their circumstances, and from her experience this only spread the pain further. 

But she finds it equally difficult to raise arms against the infected because she's learned to treat them as equals, she knows they are trying to save them and to heal them. Fighting against Reunion and seeing that same humanity and decency in their ranks muddies the whole conversation for her. It forces her to further reconsider her views and to tackle the sociopolitical aspect of the infected prejudice, to see someone on the other side that mirrors her and someone she can respect, that teaches her more about their struggle.

In the end I think this makes her a deeply fascinating character and one that really enriches Arknight's worldbuilding and storytelling. We're given a character so deeply mired in prejudice that other people, good people, never believe she'll be able to turn around. And it's not an easy process, but she's doing her best to overcome her own biases, her own fears, to do whats right. She doesn't always get it right, and the sensitivity and politics of it don't always please those around her, but she's getting better everyday through exposure to them, learning from their experiences and developing her own views.

She shows us how even good people can develop vicious prejudices and biases, how unconscious fear and the biology of the disease itself drives the hatred and discrimination, but how those instincts are ultimately wrong and something to overcome. 

I find her deeply refreshing as not someone we see as a paragon of righteousness, but rather one coming from a deeply flawed place on the axis of morality that lies at the center of Arknight's themes. And steadily climbing that ladder from its depths doesn't show us that this prejudice is omnipresent and undefeatable, or that it's justified...

It shows us that it's something that with the right time and approach, can be defeated. And that with the proper education and understanding, even those people that are stricken by fear and hatred for Oripathy and the Infected can be turned around into staunch allies through Rhodes Island's vision.

[bang-to-the-tan]

Moth to Flame

Chapter 15

Reader x OT7

► Vampire!AU

Smut/Porn With Some Plot That is Rapidly Getting Out of Hand Dear God Why Please Help Me

Warnings: Fucking Politics and Complicated Morality, Stockholm Syndrome, Addiction, Possessiveness, Vampires (Biting, Blood-Sucking, Reference to Death), Language

↳ Summary: Robbed of your memories and intended as a birthday present for a deadly creature of the night, you unwittingly become the center of a territorial dispute between two covens of vampires. Tensions are rising and the brothers are getting hungry…

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“Jesus fucking Christ,” Namjoon mutters. You throw him an anxious look. He’s perched on the other side of the sofa, his phone in one hand, his chin in the other, brows knitted together, face illuminated by the glare of his screen. 

“Fuck,” he adds under his breath. 

“Are you gonna share with those of us without phones or what?” you snap. His eyes flit to yours and you amend, hasty. “Look, I’m just as surprised as you guys. I told you I don’t remember.” 

“I don’t expect you to remember.”

“Really?” 

He goes silent, completely still but for his eyes that track over you just as long as the quiet lasts before darting back to the device in his hand. 

“It’s just surprising. You really don’t remember any of this?...”

“Tell me what ‘this’ is, Namjoon.” You urge, shifting uncomfortably. “You’re making me nervous.” 

“It isn’t good.” 

“I gathered that.” 

“Namjoon,” Hoseok speaks up suddenly, from his position leaning across the bar. He has that expression again—serious, down to earth. A glimpse of that person he was talking about, maybe. Someone who can afford to be morally upstanding. “You’re being unfair.” 

The blond cocks his head, and you can follow the path of his tongue across the inside of his cheek, his eyes narrowing at his phone in thought. You’re just about to start trying to form a better argument when he speaks back up. 

“‘Bystanders were horrified today,” he begins, intoning as he reads, “When the peaceful protest of law enforcement procedures with regards to the recent discovery and subsequent attempted integration of so-called ‘vampires’ was interrupted by an as-of-yet unidentified woman driving through the crowd, hitting and killing key figure Bang Si-Hyuk.’” 

Namjoon heaves an exasperated sigh, lowering his head and carding his fingers through his hair like he has half a mind to rip it out by the roots. “A fucking hit and run. Of a public figure. In broad daylight.”

“I didn’t understand most of that, what does that mean?” You sit up, trying not to show on your face how your lower body complains when you jolt too quickly. 

“She started the riots??” Hoseok asks, meeting your glance across the room.

“There were already riots. But her little incident kicked off the ones closest to us, yeah.” 

“Riots for what?” 

“Us. Riots about us. People started noticing us, and they didn’t like what they saw,” Namjoon finally turns his gaze to meet yours directly. There’s no fondness in his eyes. No softness. He looks at you like you’re an animal. Like he isn’t sure whether he even wants to spare the money to have you put down. It claws a hole in your chest, and you have to look away, fighting the rising disappointment and panic inside of you. “But I bet you know that better than any of us.” 

“Bang Si-Hyuk,” Hoseok echoes. “That’s the guy that was trying to push for integration.”

“That’s the one. He was speaking out about the police force when she hit him.”

“What a time for an accident like that.”

“Yeah. Accident.” 

You shuffle closer to yourself, working on remembering to breathe, fixating on the remote sitting on the coffee table. The way the numbers have half rubbed off, the rubbery texture of the buttons reflecting the light. A hit and run? You...you killed someone?... “I don’t remember any of that. I don’t—I wouldn’t do that.”

“No? Not to try and get rid of bloodsuckers like us?” His tone is poison.

“Namjoon, I’m not—” you start, petrified, but you’re interrupted by the front door. From here, you can see Yoongi slinking through the doorway, closing the door slowly behind him. Your heart sinks when you realize you can see his hands shaking as he pulls the lock into place and hesitates for a moment, bracing himself against the door as if gathering what little strength he has.   

“Yoongi?” Hoseok immediately perks up, lips curling downwards with worry. “That you?”

“...Yeah. It me,” Yoongi finally replies, staggering faintly, trailing from the front door to the archway of the hall to the right, within full view of all three of you. He doesn’t seem any better than when he left this morning. In fact, he’s refusing to look directly at you, but now that you can see his face, you can see how dark the circles under his eyes are growing. How sharp his cheekbones have become, casting dark shadows across a drawn face. He rubs at his eye with the heel of his palm absently, taking short breaths, trying not to breathe you in too much. 

“No luck, huh?” 

“No. None.” He sounds choked, frustrated. “Nothing.” His tongue flits out to wet his lips and retreats with a swallow that you can hear for how dry it is. Your own throat twitches in sympathy, briefly imagining how badly it must be hurting him. Not for the first time, you think of how you could help him. You could help him. You think of his teeth. His tongue. You cut that entire train of thought loose when you spot him shifting his weight to the other foot, swaying. Who knows how sensitive he must be to changes in your scent. You can’t just let your mind wander like that. There’s more important things happening right now than your alarmingly weird, persistent fantasies.

“I’m not surprised. You see the news?”

“No.” 

“Remember when that spokesperson for vampire rights was killed a couple weeks ago?”

Yoongi’s brows crease as he fights past his fog to recall. “Bang Si-Hyuk. Yeah.”

“Guess who was driving the car.”

“News said it was extremists. Some crazy bitch looking to start a war. Why?”

Namjoon snorts, deadpan. “It isn’t nice to talk about people like that when they’re around.” 

It takes a full minute for the complete concept to circle around Yoongi’s head and arise victorious in his mind. He cocks his neck, looking at you briefly with his brows furrowed, but turning away just as fast. The feral hunger hiding within his eyes burns a swathe across your skin and you can feel it raising goosebumps in its wake. “What? No way.” 

“Yeah. Some kids snapped a picture of Namjoon to gush over how bangable he is, caught her in the corner, and a well-meaning adult somewhere took it to the news. Not at large, not anymore.”

“Namjoon? That’ll lead them here.” Yoongi frowns. “That’ll take them straight to us. What about Jin? Jin—”

“Jin’s doing his job,” Namjoon interrupts, quiet. “Protecting his coven. It’s not his fault. He gets paid to read the letters on the fucking page. It’s not like he has a choice.”

“Jin’s in trouble if this gets out of hand,” Hoseok adds. “Jungkook’s connections aren’t going to do anything if they start looking inside the force again.” 

“Jungkook’s a whole other kettle of fish. Jin can manage his own coven. We need to worry about our next move.”

Yoongi blinks, slow, moving to lean against the doorframe like he can barely hold his own weight up, hands moving to his arms absently, fingers digging into the fabric of his jacket. “We can’t stay.” 

“I can lay low for a while—”

“Hope’s class has seen you. They know he rooms with you. I’d bet he’s talked about you.” 

Hoseok licks his lips, casting his eyes to the bar beneath him with a nod of his head. “...He’s right. I have.”

“People have seen us out together. All of us. We’ve been here too long already.”

“We can’t—”

“Namjoon.” Yoongi’s voice cracks, turning hoarse, like he isn’t used to talking so much for so long. “We can’t stay.” 

“There’s nowhere to go. There isn’t anywhere else we can go.”

“...There’s always been somewhere.” Hoseok reaches long fingers out to brush the lumpy bowl set beside him, running his forefinger across one of the more prominent cracks, his expression distant. After a second, he leaves it alone, propping his elbows back up on the counter and looking out at his roommates with an absent sniff.

Joon ducks his head with a scoff, dropping his phone into the cushions dramatically and putting his face in his hands, clutching at the blonde strands of hair craning over his forehead. “Out of the question.”

“It’s been long enough.” Hoseok’s tone goes soft. “It’s been long enough. You made your point.”

“My point?” Namjoon sits up, tearing his hands away from himself to throw himself backwards, sending a look of disbelief in his direction. “My point?? This wasn’t a pissing contest, Hoseok. This wasn’t some...some schoolyard bitchfest. We had to leave.”

“And now we have to go back.” 

“...What about her? What do we do with her?” 

The pause that follows is pregnant. Heavy, and so thick it’s difficult to breathe through it. You turn away, but you can feel them looking at you. It feels awful, like you’re made of glue, catching their stares like overused fly paper hanging from the ceiling. You feel thin. See-through.

“What about you?” Namjoon asks, low. “What do we do with you?”

“...I don’t know,” you mumble.  

“We could turn her loose,” Hoseok suggests. “Let the cops have her.”

“No.” Yoongi’s too quick with his reply and hastily explains, “We’ve been having problems catching anything to eat anyways. It’s only gonna get worse in this climate. We have to keep her.” 

“You want to keep her around? She’s a threat. She puts all of us in danger.” Namjoon frowns.

You shift, frowning. “Like you’re any better.”

“I don’t pretend to be.” 

“Bullshit. That’s bullshit.”

“I’m not the one trying to start wars.”

“I never tried to start any fucking wars.”

“I thought you said you didn’t remember.”

“I don’t remember.” 

You’ve had enough. You move to stand, sucking in a sharp breath when your body aches in protest, but by god, you aren’t going to sit here on this couch while a household full of vampires judges you for something you honestly can’t recall. You sway a little as you dismount, reaching to grab a handful of the cushion up the back as you skirt around the side. 

“I’m going to take a nap.” You say, venom snaking past your teeth, keeping your sight trained on the floor in front of you. “Let me know if you’re planning on giving me to the police or if you’re going to continue holding me hostage, since apparently I have no choice in the matter.”

Neither Namjoon nor Hoseok move as you walk towards the hall, but neither does Yoongi, and as you approach him, you’re made too aware of how still he’s gone. You look up from the ground, but he’s not looking at you, choosing instead to study the wood of the doorframe to his right. 

“What do you want?” Hoseok says after a beat, low, quiet. You crane to meet his eyes. “What do you want to do?” 

“Does it matter?”

“It will.” 

“I want to take a nap.” 

“You could run. It’s a small town. Head south, move somewhere they wouldn’t find you.”

You hesitate. It’s been so long that you haven’t considered the idea of escape that the feel of it now is like the shadow of someone you used to know. Running. Getting out of here. Not fought for, but offered this time. It feels wrong, but it's impossible to place why. You shake your head faintly, speaking up again with a bitter scoff. “That’ll go well.” 

“You know what haze feels like.” You can hear Yoongi swallow in front of you as Hoseok speaks, the sound harsh and unkind. “You can look out for yourself.” 

“Can I?” 

“The option is there. If you wanted it. You have a choice.” 

“...A choice. Yeah. Sure.” 

“Don’t promise things you can’t guarantee, Hope.” Namjoon bites quietly.

“I will guarantee it.”

“What’s with the sudden change of heart, huh? What, you’re suddenly the CEO of free will?”

“I said from the start that we shouldn’t have kept her. Now everybody’s getting attached, just like I said they would, and the longer we keep her, the worse it’s going to get. Especially if we move back to Jin’s. Bringing her with puts everyone in danger, if all she’s gonna do is run off and bring attention to us. We can’t risk it with all of us in the same place.”

“Who said we’re moving back.”

Hoseok continues, ignoring his sour quip. “If she wants to leave, we’ll find something else. We’ve survived before, we’ll do it again. If she wants to leave. You’ll let her go, won’t you, Joon? Since you’re not too attached to a ‘threat’?”

Silence.

You turn back around, but freeze in place when you realize Yoongi’s looking at you now, dark eyes empty and half-lidded. He looks like a statue as he stares you down, following your every movement. A figure carved from marble to depict the downfall of man. No, not a man. An angel, cast from heaven in disgrace, wreathed in ash. He’s stopped breathing. You only just barely realize that you have, too.

“I’ll think about it.” You murmur, trying to pick up your previous train of thought, reminding yourself to inhale. “Running. Figuratively. Right now, I want a nap.” 

“Think about it.” Hoseok echoes quietly from behind you. “We’ll let you know when we’re moving.”

“If we’re moving,” Namjoon clarifies, low, but there’s no force in his words. No authority. 

You have to sidle past Yoongi to get to the other room. He doesn’t take the hint. Doesn’t move. You aren’t sure what spurs you forward more insistently; defiance, in the face of whatever stoic act he’s playing at, or anticipation. Anticipation of what he might do if you get too close. 

You misjudge how in-control he is and as you step forward, your shoulder nearly brushing his in the narrow entrance, he shifts. You can feel, more than see, his head inclining, his hair tickling your neck as he leans, the subtle noise of his lips parting, mouth opening, quietly inhaling with a hiss of air, and in that moment you freeze. Your heart pounds, blood racing through your veins, your own head drifting to the side as he approaches, time slowing to a crawl. 

You can feel it. The answer to your desires, the satiation that you need, that you crave, sharp teeth, perfect bliss, pain and pleasure, carving your limbs hollow and filling them back up with stardust. Your eyes threaten to close, lashes fluttering against your cheek. His hot breath, labored, casts against the column of your neck.

“Yoongi.” Namjoon speaks up, and Yoongi jerks forward as if released from a spell, suddenly dashing forward with long strides. You blink, turning to watch him slip down through the front hall, the click of the spare room door and the slam of it as he pulls it shut behind himself. 

You’re left spinning alone, on top of a world that whirls beneath your feet so fast you can’t think properly. 

“I don’t know what we’re going to do about him, though,” Namjoon says, murmuring low. “He doesn’t have much longer.”

“Yeah.” Hoseok agrees. “Either way, we need to make a decision fast.” 

You blink, spinning on your heel and walking at your own swift pace towards the bedroom. You make sure the door is closed behind you, promising a fight if anyone waltzes in uninvited. The bed creaks a little when you throw yourself onto it, ignoring by force the way it smells like Namjoon, like comfort. You don’t like him right now. You pretend that you don’t inhale deeply, fighting back hot, upset tears. 

He has no fucking right to judge you.

You’re a threat? You don’t feel like it, no matter what Jin recites to a camera crew somewhere the next town over.

For a while, you try to use the quiet to your advantage. Thinking-wise. Mulling over your choices. Going on the lamb? The run from the law, of all things? For a crime you don’t remember doing and can’t even...you can’t stomach doing that. Running over someone protesting people’s rights? Does that mean you hated vampires, before? You’re again left wondering what kind of person you used to be. 

And besides which...something in you twinges when you think of leaving. Some itch left unscratched. Some high you’re craving.

You rub absently at your neck as you think, frowning. 

 If you left, there wouldn’t be any more hazing. No more biting. Well, there’s other vampires, at least. If you really needed it....wanted it…

Ah, but who says they’d be as nice to you? 

‘Some of them really like pain’. You recall what Jimin had said when he caught you trying to sneak out of Jin’s window. Before Jungkook found you. Before they touched you. Took your clothes off and slid inside of you, pressed their lips to your chest and—

You’re losing the plot. You are going certifiably insane. Your legs twitch closed of their own volition, as if you could hide the way your cunt pulses around nothing from yourself.  

If you ran, would you end up seeking more out? Or, a better question, could you manage a life without biting? Without haze? The immediate panic, despair, that sinks briefly into your chest even at the thought, is too convincing. Like an addict. 

...Are you addicted? No. No, that’s silly. You’ve been without haze since... well, yesterday was…

You frown at the ceiling. 

Your migraine. Sharp, painful; like driving shards of glass into your eye sockets. Irritable. Looking for your next fix. Wishing you were ‘high’. Thinking about it, constantly. 

Your fingers are tightening around your throat and it isn’t until your vision starts going a little fuzzy that you realize you’re pressing too hard. Are you...choking yourself out? No, that’s not right. 

But instead of snatching your hand away completely, you linger, hooking your nails into the scabs at your neck. They’re mostly healed, but you can still feel a flicker of the pleasure they used to bring. The memory of Yoongi, just now, leaning closer, flashes across your mind, ghostly impressions of his breath against your skin, his hair tickling your jaw. He could have taken it further. He could have taken you further. If Namjoon hadn’t said anything. If Namjoon hadn’t been there. If he’d pressed you against that doorway, pinned you with those wide hands of his, kissed you. Kissed your neck. And…

You recall the feeling of fangs piercing your flesh, but it’s faded now. Disappointment courses through you. Longing. 

Fuck. 

So, now, you aren’t just a murderer with a political agenda. 

You’re definitely an addict. 

This sucks. 

...You wish you were hazed. 

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[manesh]

Circumcision is a Hate Crime

Circumcision is a Hate Crime, and it has to stop

A plea to circumcised fathers who might circumcise their sons

Why circumcised men should have mercy on themselves and their sons

Dedicated to my grandfather, who listened when he was ignorant, and taught when he was knowledgeable.

Book Outline:

1. My temptation to commit retaliatory crimes of hate

2. Circumcised men, It’s ok to have some pity on yourself

3. Hope for restoring sexual function & comfort

4. Benefits of being uncircumcised / restored / uncut

5. My memory of circumcision

6. The Book of Michael Asad Manesh

7. Genital mutilation is the worst hate crime, worse than rape and murder

8. Nuance & Errata

9. My Final Plea to Circumcised Fathers

10. A Thank You to Fathers who Choose to Protect Children

11. Afterword & Acknowledgements

1. My temptation to commit retaliatory crimes of hate

I can state, unequivocally, I hate my birth parents. They were cruel and abusive towards me all of my life, starting in my earliest days when they removed a large piece of my penis, leaving me with permanent sexual dysfunction and decades of pain and suffering. Of all the abuses inflicted on me by my parents, the mutilation of my penis was the worst and most permanent. This permanent disfigurement of my penis is called “circumcision.”

I have spent many years wrestling with my own rage, with poor sex education, coping and communication skills to express it. Any pain I communicated about my penis, both to my parents and doctors, was laughed at, mocked, and rejected.

Once, when I pointed out painful callouses that had formed on the underside of my glans due to no protective foreskin, a female nurse practitioner lied and said “all men are like that” while laughing mockingly at me. What a bitch. I still think about cutting a piece of her clitoris off, sometimes - she is on my long list of people I often consider mutilating to make them understand my pain, who were supposed to heal me but only harmed me with their hurtful lies and complete disregard for my expressions of pain.

I was born in a hateful society that oozes contempt for males who have suffered permanent genital disfigurement at the hands of their own parents.

When I was a child, I spent many hours tugging on my penis, unsuccessfully trying to regrow the missing foreskin. I would endlessly try to prod the glans, the head of my penis, back into my body, because it always felt too exposed, cold, and irritated. My parents slapped, pinched, belted and screamed at me to make me stop trying to heal my penis with tugging, telling me I was the worst child who ever lived, a literal demon.

I did not consciously understand that I had been cruelly and wickedly mutilated due to my parents’ wishes until I was 30 - I was ignorant that there was such a thing as an uncircumcised male until then. I had been kept sexually dumb by my wicked mother and father, who fed me a constant and poisonous stream of lies and misinformation, and a wicked government, that censors all information about the harms of circumcision, and images of penises, both cut and uncut, from airing on TV.

I have l lived all my life with constant, low-level rage at my mistreatment, at the permanent disfigurement I have suffered.

I have endless rage at the government of the United States, its doctors that carried out the mutilation on me, and the legal system that protects parents from revenge mutilation, but allows them to cruelly mutilate their sons in an act of pure hate - a one way system where children have no protection or recourse. A system that in 2020 drove children to record highs of suicide. A system that doesn’t even recognize the right of boys to retaliate against those who mutilate their genitals.

Of all the offenses and crimes against children, I judge mutilation the most torturous, because it is a disfigurement that one carries for the rest of their life, even if they should escape the hell of their parents and the country from which the brutal practice is allowed.

But after years of considering shooting, bombing, or mutilating in morally justifiable revenge, I have been lucky to have had enough time, safety and space to come up with a better solution than retaliatory violence.

It is my goal to persuade every human on earth that circumcising an infant boy or child is a hate crime, and a sex crime.

I am starting with adult males like me, who are circumcised, and may be considering circumcising their sons.

I admit it is mostly my hate that drives me to do this, but I have channeled that hate into the primary goal of protecting children from mutilation, and I will do that by convincing every man circumcised as a child that what was done to him was a hate crime, and a sex crime.

Fathers, before you mutilate the penises of your sons as your penis was mutilated, read this book and allow me to convince you that you suffered grievous harm, and you should not pay that harm forward to your sons.

2. Circumcised men, It’s ok to have some pity on yourself

If you were circumcised without your input or consent: have some pity on yourself. You were helpless, and defenseless. The adults that were supposed to protect you let you down. They failed you.

It is truly sad what happened to you. Ask any man- where is he most sensitive? Where does he feel the most pleasure and pain? His penis. Your most fun, enjoyable part, with the most ability to give you sexual pleasure and orgasm - much of it was cut from you in an act of pure hate, meant to sexually disfigure you and render you unable to fully enjoy an erection, masturbation, and sex.

Most men in the world do not have their genitals mutilated by their parents; you are in the unlucky minority with cruel parents that wanted to cripple your ability to experience sexual pleasure.

This is absolutely horrific, the behavior a slavedriver inflicts on his property. You have not only suffered sexual dysfunction, but extreme psychological abuse from those who tell you your mutilation was for your benefit. You have been told endlessly that circumcision makes you “clean” and “prevents infection” and “it has no negative impact on sex”, and these lies make your suffering all the worse, because it was never acknowledged by the hateful sex criminals that cut you.

If you have suffered the injury of circumcision, and then pushed the pain and irritation out of conscious awareness and stopped mentioning it because even your parents and doctors mock you and call you a liar - that is a truly sad and lonely story. It breaks my heart that you could have so much suffering, so much pain, and no one to help you heal from it.

It is ok to say to yourself, “you know what? It was terrible what happened to me. I deserve a bit of sympathy and pity. My tribe, my parents and government, failed me. The permanent pain and disfigurement I have suffered was a truly wicked thing to inflict on me as an innocent child, and I didn’t deserve it.”

As a circumcised male, you deserve compassion.

It is my hope that once you learn to feel compassion for yourself and your own sexual wounds, you will learn to extend that compassion to your sons, and not repeat the act of sexually wounding them.

3. Hope for restoring sexual function & comfort

The foreskin can be restored through tugging - simply pulling hard on the skin of the penis near the head, and slowly stretching the skin out. Topical steroids may help. The process can take months or years.

It is a slow and slightly painful process, but the end result can be a penis that looks and feels much more like it would have if it was never cut in the first place, with better resting comfort, and better sexual/erect performance.

Tugging can be done manually, or with prosthetics (straps/weights that apply constant tugging).

4. Benefits of being uncircumcised / restored / uncut

When I saw an uncut penis for the first time, I was confused at first. But as I became sexually educated, I felt angrier and angrier about how some criminally insane people say circumcision is somehow “beneficial to males.”

A penis with a foreskin doesn’t hurt all the time. Once you restore yours with tugging, even partially, you will be more comfortable when non-erect. Covering the glans, especially the base of the glans, is a significant comfort improvement. For me personally, the first few millimeters regrown got rid of the callouses that used to form around the base of my glans, and most of the pain/tearing I would experience from erections, masturbation and sex.

A penis with a foreskin is better in every way for sex. Erections are not painful when there is enough skin to stretch. Significantly less lubrication is needed for sex because the foreskin adds just enough “give”. Masturbation can be performed painlessly without lubricant. Vaginal sex can be given with no or low lubricant, and will not rip or injure the vagina as a calloused, circumcised penis can - with no tearing, there should be less chance of infection. Anal sex, which many females enjoy, can also be more easily given with a whole and complete penis.

I have observed that women have a natural instinct to grab the excited penis, and gently pull downwards on it to reveal the glans. They do this regardless of whether the penis is circumcised or not. For a circumcised penis, this motion causes extreme pain. For a whole penis, this motion causes extreme pleasure.

It is no wonder to me that so many women in this society are frustrated with the sexual performance of circumcised men, because their natural, instinctive ways of sexually pleasing men instead hurt circumcised men.

Circumcision also reduces the size of the penis in an absolute sense. To have a mutilated penis is to not be able to compete in terms of penis size with an uncut man, who is otherwise similar in build. In a societal sense, this means that women with the biggest vaginas may never be able to find a penis that fits them properly, because all penises have been cut down to an unnaturally smaller size, which is tragic for those women. It also means circumcised men will need a smaller/younger mate than he naturally would for her vagina to fit & pleasure his smaller penis properly.

A man with a mutilated penis will also struggle at sports and battle due to increased discomfort and pain when running and have a weaker sex drive. He will have a difficult time competing with males who have a complete penis. He will lose more often at mating games as is more likely to have infrequent, unsatisfying sex. He is likely to avoid women entirely - this was my personal strategy to avoid discomfort for most of my life. He may be mislabeled as gay, asexual, or transgender, with no reference to his penis mutilation.

This is why I say circumcision is a sexual crime in addition to a hate crime. A parent that chooses to make sex acts hellacious by circumcising their child is guilty of sex crimes and hate crimes against their child for this reason.

It is obvious and clear to me now that the primary purpose of circumcision is to destroy a man’s ability to enjoy sex. Uncircumcised males have better sexual performance and pleasure, and females display more appreciation and comfort when having sex with uncut penises.

If you doubt this, you can easily do your own research by watching porn with an eye for circumcision, male performance and female pleasure. Circumcised men often display pain on their faces in pornography that is uncharacteristic of uncircumcised men; much porn tries to hide this by not displaying male faces.

5. My memory of circumcision

I have an extremely clear memory of my own circumcision, which I have suffered flashbacks to all my life.

Normally, local anesthetic is used for circumcisions in the US. Even so, I have an unusual genetic tolerance and require a triple dose to get a numbing effect, a fact I learned when I was 29 at an elective surgery.

I did not know this or have the ability to communicate it when I was an infant. I was bound to a cold table like a lump of meat, and what felt like half my penis was sawed off. It is the worst pain I have ever felt - words cannot even begin to describe it. I had constant nightmares about it for 36 years, almost my whole life. Any sensation on my penis could make me feel intense fear and a pinching, sawing sensation - a flashback to the procedure.

I am blessed in a way, because deep down, I have always known what was done to me was a cruelty. If you were unfortunate enough to be completely numb for the procedure, there is a possibility it would not make a strong, traumatic impression on you as it did me.

A child will explore and play with his body in the first few days of life. If he has a chance to see, feel and understand his foreskin, then even if numbed when it is removed, he will always know what he has lost. This is why hate criminals try to mutilate the genitals immediately after the child is born, so that he will not have a clear, visual and hand-tactile memory of what he has lost. Instead, he will have constant and seemingly inexplicable pain, a feeling of betrayal, and no chance to grieve for what he has lost. Only when one sees, admits and acknowledges what they have lost and grieves for it can they begin the process of psychological healing, which will free him from psychological enslavement to those who mutilated him and thus do not deserve his loyalty.

I used to be unconsciously triggered by fluorescent lights, the beeping of medical equipment, and doctors’ offices until I learned about circumcision and PTSD triggers, watched a video of a circumcision and understood that I was flashing back to my own.

I used to do any form of self-harm to try to avoid flashbacks to the experience of having half my dick sawed off - the slightest sensation or pressure on my oversensitive, exposed glans could cause me to go into a dissociative trance. So I would fracture my bones, pull out my hair, bite my fingernails until they bled, and twist my body into uncomfortable postures that would rip and strain muscles and leave them aching for hours. I would dive into workaholism, endlessly watch tv, play video games, overdose on drugs, masturbate excessively even though it hurt, or otherwise numb and dissociate myself out with distractions.

The pain of bloody, clipped-too-deep toenails was always better than a reminder of the pain of getting my dick sawed in half.

But now that I’ve been able to view my full memory, this is what I remember feeling in the moments after the intense, torturous pain of my penis being sawed off stopped and was replaced with a stinging & burning, lasting pain that wouldn’t go away:

WHY DO YOU HATE ME SO MUCH?

WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO ME?

IT HURTS SO BAD, OH GOD IT HURTS SO BAD, OH GOD IT HURTS SO BAD, OH GOD IT HURRRSSS SOOOO BAD...

PLEASE SAVE ME... PLEASE SAVE ME... PLEASE MAKE THE PAIN STOP... IT HURTS SO BAD... I WANT TO DIE

OH GOD IT HURTS SO MUCH... THIS IS HELL... THIS IS HELL.... THIS IS HELL...

I have never stopped thinking that my life is hell since, and even now while writing this book aged 36 with some but not all of my foreskin restored through tugging, I am still aware and annoyed by the feeling of my exposed glans, which feels cold and painful.

I no longer think that all life is hell, but my childhood, and my life, was a hell until I turned my back on humanity and found God.

6. The Book of Michael Asad Manesh

Consider this a book of a prophet, which should be added to all religious texts as the last testament and will of God.

I have listened to God, at length, and directly. I recognize no mortal as above me - I answer only to God.

The greatest sin there is, the sin that is worse than all others, is to mutilate your own child. If you choose to mutilate your children, you have failed your God-given morality test, and you will be cast into a hell of suffering that you will carry with you in your soul no matter how far you run.

God is a compassionate being, who wishes to teach us the lessons of morality as gently as possible. One cannot be given eternal life unless they have proven they will not misuse that power to create a hell of endless suffering for others.

To mutilate a child is to give him a body on earth that is a hell of suffering wherever he goes. He cannot outrun the disfigurement you have inflicted on him in your cruelty. You have created hell for him; you have failed God’s morality test. You have been given a conscience that knows what I speak is true, but have chosen not to use it.

God will not send an Angel to stop you from sin, because the Angel is within you, as near as the beating of your heart, if you but listen to its voice: your conscience.

If you refuse to repent of your sin of mutilating your child, or if you choose to mutilate another child knowing it goes against God’s will, as I have prophesied, then your existence will be a hell until you repent, because your own children will hate you, and inflict as much torture on you as possible, as you did to them. Even if you kill your children and hide in a cave, your conscience will torture you.

God is merciful, and will allow you to remain alive in hell for as long as you choose to show your children cruelty. If you wish to escape hell, you must choose to show your subordinates mercy and patience, as God has shown you and I mercy and patience.

This is the law of God: you will use the power you have been gifted with only to carry out the highest and best moral good: the protection and education of those in your care. If you refuse your responsibility, you will suffer the pains of hell.

God has a message for fathers: it is unquestionable that men have the strength, and therefore power, to protect children. Women do not have the same strength, and God does not judge women and men equally for this reason. Because men have more power, men have more responsibility in the eyes of God. Do not deny this obvious truth: You must protect a newborn when a woman is weak from birth!

I have written these truths not to punish you - but to explain to you exactly why your God-given conscience punishes you when you harm your children or allow them to come to harm through inaction.

There is a hierarchy of morality in the universe, and only those who have consciously chosen the highest and best moral path shall be gifted the alliance of God.

Thou shalt protect thy children is the highest and most important commandment of God.

There is one final thing I must say about God, as myself: when God was born, just like when a child is born on Earth, God was ignorant, and lonely. Creation of other-souls was an attempt to solve that terrible loneliness God felt as a singular consciousness in an endless, empty universe. Thus, the most divine of emotions is loneliness, it is to be one with God, it is the reason for creation, and that which brings us together and lets us compromise when necessary in spite of the pain of sharing power. It is our God-given loneliness that inspires us to make the world less lonely for each child that should follow. If you should follow your loneliness, you will inevitably arrive at LOVE, which is the combination of: RESPECT, EQUALITY, MERCY, COMPASSION.

7. Genital mutilation is the worst hate crime, worse than rape and murder

Circumcision has always been a crime of hate, used to punish one’s enemies. For a man to mutilate the penis of another man is to inflict the ultimate suffering on him. To inflict the ultimate suffering on an innocent child you were supposed to protect and nurture is the ultimate hate crime.

Rape is less of a crime than genital mutilation. In an absolute sense of which suffering is greater, those who have suffered from rape - a temporary loss of control and discomfort with their genitals - have suffered less those left with permanent discomfort from mutilation of their genitals. This is not to say that rape is a moral good, it is only to say mutilating genitals is worse than temporarily torturing them.

Murder is less of a crime than genital mutilation. A man who can no longer enjoy sex due to his mutilation lives a hellacious life, deprived of his greatest pleasure. I myself have often hoped for death, wishing to leave this broken body, but my conscience will not allow me to die until I speak for the children who cannot speak for themselves, who might still be saved from suffering needlessly as I have suffered. You do not need to mutilate a child to teach him not to mutilate others. The most force you will ever need to use with a child you properly respect to is a firm but gentle push and a word of advice; he will listen if he knows his body is protected by you.

If hatred of evil is your strongest trait, let this truth be your guide: Murderers and rapists are better souls than the scum that mutilate children at birth, never giving them a single chance to enjoy their whole and complete bodies. They are the worst of the worst, the most depraved and morally misguided souls on planet earth, the farthest it is possible to travel from God. Child mutilators deserve the lowest levels of hell, the worst prisons, and the harshest degree of shaming.

Do not be distracted by misdirections or minimizations about the harm done by child mutilation. Do not be distracted by friendly, bright-colored illustrations, when you know how painful it would be to have parts of your penis cut off, and how much you would miss those parts every day. Do not be fooled by those who say rapists and killers are worse.

Child mutilators are the worst people on planet earth, and some of the worst souls in all existence. They are guilty of hate crimes, and sex crimes. Child mutilators have sinned against God by using their power to torture and enslave children, rather than protect and educate them.

I encourage all souls on planet earth of any age to join me in the condemnation of the mutilation of children, including circumcision of both genders.

8. Nuance & Errata

I am not against adult circumcision for reasons of improving sexual performance & male pleasure. If your penis has too much skin, and you have had enough attempts at sex to know this for certain or other problems, you have my blessing to choose to cut off a small and specific amount you know will help you.

Anytime I say circumcision is a hate & sex crime, I am referring to the forced removal of parts a boy’s penis before reaching sexual maturity without his informed opinion being heard, not a procedure done by an informed and consenting, sexually active adult for his own benefit.

In a past life, I was an outspoken supporter of circumcision, a hateful liar that would say anything to justify mutilating children. For my sin, I have suffered the pains of hell, but my suffering for that sin is now over as I have learned my lesson and repented. If you leave God no other choice, it is my experience he will condemn you to the same torture you inflict on others.

I am not a strong man, nor am I particularly courageous. I have wept alone for many a night in pity for myself. I am still hurt, and still hurting. I didn’t want the responsibility of communicating the horror of circumcision to the world, but my conscience will drive me insane if I do not speak the truth on this matter, because I don’t see anyone else stepping forward to write what is necessary, and my opinions are extremely well-informed.

If you cannot remember or imagine circumcision pain, simply remember the worst pain of your life, your worst physical trauma. Your conscience knows that to carry out the infliction of such pain on an innocent child is a hate crime.

A long-term challenge for all circumcised males who carry rage about it is developing self-compassion. Start with yourself; love yourself. Give yourself compassion at all times. Do not condemn your anger; instead watch and understand the traumatic memory that is the source of the anger. The more self-compassion, patience and non-violence you can practice, the easier it will be to practice other-compassion. Start with self-compassion, recognize other-selves, extend other-compassion.

9. My Final Plea to Circumcised Fathers

Circumcised Fathers, I pray that my words will convince you not to continue the cycle of hate by mutilating the penises of your sons. On their behalf I say, without the slightest reservation: I DO NOT WANT TO BE CIRCUMCISED!

Even if your motives are purely selfish, and you care only for the wealth and labor your son will bring you, I say this to you: if you circumcise your son, he will never love and respect you as his father, and will undermine whatever wealth he brings you. He will always remember that you failed in a father’s most important duty - to protect his children from physical harm. He will know it every time he feels pain in his mutilated penis, and know his father failed him, as your father failed you, and he will hate you, as you hated your father.

It is possible for you and your son to have the healthy relationship you and your father never had, but not if you allow his body to come to grievous harm, such as circumcision. If you do that, you are no longer his father. He may forgive you if you repent, but that is up to him, forgiveness cannot be forced once trust is broken and the body is permanently disfigured.

My life has been a hell because of circumcision. I wish it was banned, and I wish I had a whole and complete penis to enjoy every day. I didn’t deserve to have my penis cut in half when I was an infant, and you, a circumcised adult male, didn’t either.

Circumcision is a Hate Crime and a Sex Crime. Fathers, stop paying the cruelty forward to your sons; end generations of trauma with your compassionate and wise decision to do the right thing and protect your sons from grievous harm to their genitals. Stop circumcision.

MICHAEL ASAD MANESH

10. A Thank You to Fathers who Choose to Protect Children

Father, if you have decided NOT to circumcise your son: THANK YOU. You have made one of the most important moral choices of your life correctly, and earned yourself an easier path to wisdom.

Some frightened, unenlightened souls may condemn you for it and tempt you to harm innocents, but those who possess both wisdom and compassion will always praise you for protecting children, as I do.

You have a lifetime of work and responsibility ahead of you as a father and protector, but there are great rewards as well, and you will find many allies and joys once you begin down the path of respect and compassion for yourself and others.

Fathers, if you protect your children, you will be my son, and brother, and father, and I will love you, and fight for you, and listen to you, and protect you for as long as I live, as your father should have done for you.

Together, we can make a heaven on earth for all our children, and ourselves.

2021-03-14, First Edition

michaelmanesh@gmail.com

11. Afterword & Acknowledgements

I was raised to be a soldier: to focus my knowledge and power into a single strike that would destroy the enemy, and leave me unharmed. For that reason, I consider this book a weapon. But who is my enemy?

My enemy is the unconscious rage in circumcised males, that bleeds out and harms those who did not inflict the suffering on them. Only once the rage is acknowledged can it begun to be healed. If you are a warrior, my book is a compact field guide to identifying the enemy within.

As a circumcised male, I can state that I have suffered, I have raged, and that rage almost consumed me and destroyed me. It has taken me many years to undo the psychological damage alone, and the physical damage of my penis mutilation is still a constant pain.

I have lived many years in poverty. I have begged at homeless shelters. I have been denied medical care for circumcision pain. I have done what I needed to to survive and finish this book, but if my conscience would allow me to die after publishing, I might almost consider it a relief. My life so far has not been a blessing or a gift, and I may have years ahead just to heal my penis.

I feel this book is too important to the future of humanity to put behind an app or paywall, so I am making it available for free in three easy to share formats: TXT, HTML & EPUB. Please save, read, and share. If you find my work helpful and wish to thank me, you can donate to me via PayPal or Zelle: michaelmanesh@gmail.com

This is the future I have seen: if we continue to mutilate our children at birth, a child will soon be born with so much rage and hatred at his mistreatment that he will use technology to destroy the world. We are beginning to see evidence of this, as our kids compete unnecessarily with automated tools. This is the final chance for humanity to act to protect all our children, or none shall survive. I was almost this child, but born a generation too soon, which is why I have foreseen it so clearly.

I can no longer take any action that defends or supports those that mutilate children. I cannot even show my implicit support by remaining silent. We, as a global human tribe, MUST protect ALL children from harm, or perish.

I would rather die than not speak out against the mutilation of a child. I will fight tirelessly for children as someone should have fought tirelessly for me. I will be the solution to the problem, or I will die trying. I encourage you to adopt the same attitude.

I did not know how to describe who I am, until an intelligent, kind, clear-eyed child saw me and named me: I’m a Children’s Rights Activist. Equal treatment is the right of all humans, no matter the age, and the most important protection is that from grievous bodily harm: mutilation.

My book is brutally honest, and will likely be extremely triggering to any other circumcised male reading it. Have compassion on yourself. There will be sadness and anger and other strong emotions that will be released when you process your trauma. It will take time to heal; I have been healing for 6 years and am not yet done.

Zoomers: you are the smartest generation ever. You have incredible access to knowledge in your pocket, and I have every faith in you. However, there is a lot of misinformation about circumcision out there. I hope my book fixes that for you. Good luck, kid. Pay it forward to the next gen, aiite?

There are many alive today, that I need to thank as inspirations to write this book:

@pennjillette @MrTeller, the show you made about circumcision was my first real education on the topic, age 30. I love you as my fathers and thank you from the bottom of my heart. You have made my personal life so much better through your art, attitudes and perspective.

@levarburton, thank you for encouraging me to read as a child and take a look for myself. I once had the pleasure of seeing you from afar at an event, and I have never forgotten your compassionate presence and hopeful vision of the future. You inspired me to write this book.

http://www.pete-walker.com, your book on CPTSD was magnificently helpful to me. I would vote for it as a foundational block of a new school of psychology, dedicated in service to children. Thank you.

@BillBurr, I’ve seen a lot of you and I’ve never seen you lie. As far as channeling righteous anger into helpful advice goes, you are my best inspiration.

@DrGaborMate, your outside perspective of American culture filled in many gaps I was struggling to comprehend. I consider you the bravest man I have ever seen, you inspire me to speak out and attempt to educate others in spite of my fear. You will always have my utmost respect.

@EckhartTolle, you the most fearless, powerful warrior I have seen (please don’t fight me :). Even I could not stand against your infinite patience, tireless compassion and reconciliatory humor. You inspire me to show compassion to others through good-natured, helpful humor, and take joy where I can in life, in each moment, and to be myself.

@JohnMayer, I have cried at the beauty and compassion of your song, "Daughters," every time I have heard it. You inspire me to speak up for, love, and defend women. Thank you for your hard work.

I have many women to thank as well - I believe most would prefer to remain anonymous. You have all been my mothers; you have seen my soul. But especially La, a genius who sagely told me not to let my pain go to waste.

I would also like to thank one individual no longer with us: Osho, who inspired me with a vision of a positive eternity, who taught with thousands of jokes and stories, and went though pain of circumcision as an adult to be able to say firsthand it was “absolutely stupid”. If you seek more reading after my book, I recommend his transcript: “Nirvana: The Last Nightmare.”

[the-desolated-quill]

It’s Summer And We’re Running Out Of Ice - Watchmen (TV Series) blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. if you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

I’m not going to lie. I was incredibly sceptical going into this. This isn’t the first TV adaptation of a classic novel to go beyond the source material and try to continue the story, and they nearly always suck (see The Handmaid’s Tale and The Man In The High Castle). There’s a reason why books end where they’re supposed to end. If the author intended to carry the story on, they would have done so. This is why I get angry when the TV industry arrogantly oversteps the mark and try to continue a plot that has already come to a satisfactory conclusion. Doing a sequel to Watchmen, a story that hinges on the ambiguity of its ending, is just utter madness to me, and allowing Damon Lindelof to write that sequel borders on moronic at first glance. This is the man behind the TV series Lost, a show that ran out of steam within the first couple of episodes due to the fact that the plot was complete and total bollocks and the fact that nobody could be bothered to come up with satisfying answers for these ludicrous mysteries and series arcs beforehand. They were just making that shit up as he went along. Now you’re handing Lindelof the keys to one of the most intricate and detailed comic book properties of all time?! Fuck, why don’t you just let JJ Abrams direct the next Star Wars mo- Oh yeah, I forgot, he already did that.

Thankfully, judging by this first episode anyway, HBO’s Watchmen is nowhere near as bad as Lost. It’s certainly far more engaging and coherent. Does that mean I’m looking forward to the rest of this season? Well... I don’t know if I’d go that far. I’m definitely intrigued though.

HBO’s Watchmen is a sequel to the graphic novel (Lindelof called it a remix, but come on. Grow a pair and call it what it is. A sequel). Superheroes are still illegal, Robert Redford is now the President, Rorschach’s death has inspired a white supremacist cult, and it’s raining squid.

Yeah, the raining squid thing feels like the only egregious bit of fanwank in here, to be fair. Maybe they’re going somewhere with this, but I have my doubts. Are we supposed to assume that Ozymandias has been making squid rain for the past thirty odd years in order to keep up the whole alien invasion ruse? Why squid rain? And why is everyone so nonchalant about it? Shouldn’t people be just a bit concerned by this, considering what happened in New York?

Speaking of Ozymandias, we see him riding a horse and writing plays for his butler and maid in some fancy mansion. Quite what the significance of The Watchmaker’s Son is, I don’t know. All I do know is I’m not going to be able to sleep at night without thinking about Jeremy Irons’ thighs from now on, so thanks for that.

Putting my cynicism aside for a moment, I do like what Lindelof is trying to do here. He’s not merely cashing in on the Watchmen brand. There is a genuine effort to do something fresh and different with this material, and I commend that. Watchmen’s central theme has always been about power, but whereas the source material focused mainly on its relation to sex (Comedian’s hedonism, Nite Owl’s impotence, Rorschach’s mummy issues and the sexual objectification of Silk Spectre), the TV series seems to be zeroing in on race as a topic. This I applaud. Expanding on certain areas that the graphic novel only ever really touched upon is a great idea. This doesn’t feel like a repeat of the graphic novel, but rather a clarification of it, exploring areas and themes that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons may have overlooked. This helps set this series apart from the outset. 

The opening scenes where we see the Tulsa Massacre of 1921 is a pretty harrowing way to start. I’m ashamed to say I had no idea about the Tulsa Massacre prior to this, and we could have a whole other discussion about why schools seem to have been avoiding teaching specific topics like this in favour of the broad strokes of the Jim Crow era, but now is not the time. The fact that it’s depicted here sets the stage for what’s to come. Some have criticised the show for the length of time the opening focuses on Tulsa, claiming that it sensationalises the pain of black people at that time. I personally don’t think it does. It’s not overly graphic or gratuitous, at least in my opinion, but it is a very shocking way to open a series. Some might say even upsetting, but I think it’s important that we saw this because it’s relevant in setting the tone for the episode and indeed the season as a whole, as well as letting the audience know that this show isn’t going to fuck around or shy away from more sensitive topics, and I can respect that. Unlike Zack Snyder’s overly stylised adaptation from 2009, Watchmen the HBO series is grounded very firmly in reality.

Let’s discuss characters. This episode mostly focuses on Angela Abar, also known as Sister Night. Regina King has given some terrific performances in the past and this is no exception. She’s simply phenomenal. The way she switches from light-hearted wife and baker to violent, no nonsense vigilante cop. The shift is noticeable and yet both personas feel like they’re aspects of the same character. It’s exceptionally good. It also helps that the character herself makes for a great protagonist. Having survived the ‘White Night’ four years prior, where the Seventh Kavalry attacked the families of forty Tulsa police officers in response to the government giving special reparations to the victims of racial injustice, Angela has become cynical and battle hardened. She has no sympathy for Kavlary members and is willing to skip due process by beating one of them to a pulp and bundling him in the back of her car. She’s angry and in pain, and yet retains the audience's sympathy. I’m interested to see what happens to her over the course of the season.

I also really liked her friendship with Don Johnson’s character Judd Crawford. Johnson is a charismatic performer and Crawford is a charismatic character. He really dives into the olde western sheriff persona and seems to be having a lot of fun with it. Crawford is the only other character, besides Angela, who stayed on as a police officer after the White Night, and the two characters seem to have a great relationship. They laugh and joke around and there’s clearly a mutual respect between the two. I genuinely like this character, which is what makes his murder at the end so much more heartbreaking. Not to mention all the little details that force us to realise he may not be what he seems. We see him sniff cocaine in private and there’s a photo on his desk featuring the kid from school who aggressively asked Angela why black people deserve reparations. It doesn’t necessarily mean that Crawford himself is racist, but there’s clearly more going on with him that we don’t know about.

The final character of interest at the moment is Tim Blake Nelson’s character Wade Tillman, aka Looking Glass. We don’t know anything about him yet other than he’s a human lie detector, which I find very intriguing and I hope will be explored further as the show goes on. There’s a lot to play around with there, and the moral implications are tantalising. A conviction based not on physical evidence, but rather on the observations of one man. Even Sherlock Holmes has to back his deductions up with evidence, and yet Looking Glass clearly doesn’t need to. That just raises so many ethical questions. What if he has a particular bias towards someone? What about burden of proof? What if forensic evidence contradicts him? If Looking Glass is supposedly that accurate, does that mean the police will side with him regardless? It’s a great premise for a character and I really like Nelson’s performance, giving him a cold and detached personality that contrasts beautifully with Angela’s.

The characters and ideas are solid, however where I feel the show is lacking is with the consistency of its world building. Let’s analyse. This is an alternate history where Nixon used superheroes to extend his term limits, but after the New York attack at the end of the graphic novel, he’s been kicked out in favour of Robert Redford (nice nod to the source material there by the way. lol). As a result, black people got reparations for the racial injustices their ancestors went through and police are now unable to openly carry firearms without special permission from Panda (literally a cop wearing a panda costume). However, after the events of White Night, the government agrees to allow cops to wear masks to protect their identities, hence why quote/unquote ‘superheroes’ like Sister Night and Looking Glass are around despite the existence of the Keene Act. These are, in effect, legal vigilantes. Except already there’s a problem with conflicting messages. I like the idea of masked cops. In the current age of Black Lives Matter and police accountability, it makes sense and could be interesting to explore. However this is hindered by the whole ‘no guns’ stuff. Again, not a bad idea. America’s current gun laws are, to put it mildly, woefully inadequate. What if we went the other way? What if not only was it near impossible to own a gun, cops couldn’t even use a taser without special permission. Both ideas could work... but not at the same time.

Cops being allowed to wear masks creates the effect of empowering them through anonymity, and runs the risk of officers overstepping the mark and normal citizens being unable to hold them to account. But on the other hand, we’ve also got cops whose lives are constantly at risk and who are hindered in their duties by an overprotective nanny state, which effectively depowers them. So... which is it? It can’t be both. I like the scene where Panda reads the law about how the use of firearms can only be permitted in extreme circumstances, and everyone just angrily shouts him down because it tells us how the police feel about this new system. The fact that they’ve made one cop the sole arbiter of these new restrictions and forced him to dress like some ridiculous furry demonstrates the sheer amount of disdain they have towards this policy. But having said that, with the masks on, they have the power and freedom to break into people’s caravans and basically kidnap and assault them without consequence anyway. So what the fuck are they complaining about? It just doesn’t gel together. Either have it that the rules and regulations of the police are the same as our world except that cops can wear masks now, which has led to an increasing problem of police brutality and corruption, or have it that the police are being too heavily restricted and so a few have chosen to turn toward more ‘unorthodox’ methods of crime fighting out of frustration. Pick one and go with it.

Then there’s the Seventh Kavalry. Again, not a bad idea. In fact I love it. A white supremacist cult that’s taken Rorschach’s journal as gospel and have banded together out of a fear of being sidelined in a more liberal world. Very relevant and very interesting. Except... well... there’s not an awful lot to it, is there? In the original graphic novel, there was no clear bad guy. Ozymandias believed he was doing the ultimate good by killing millions of people to save the world, and everyone reluctantly went along with it. It was morally complicated. This, not so much. They’re unambiguously evil. The end. So what? What is there to discuss? It just feels lacking compared to the graphic novel and it runs the risk of creating a conflict that’s too clear cut. Obviously we’re going to end up siding with the cops, regardless of what they do, because the alternative is objectively bad. Hopefully Lindelof is going somewhere with this, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t say I was slightly concerned.

So on the whole, would I say I enjoyed this first episode? Well... I’d say I did, but with reservations. There’s some good characters and ideas that could be interesting to explore and develop, but its execution feels a little shaky in places. Hopefully the episodes to come will offer further clarity.