#but if he had access he might show up for a lot of different reasons

[black--sun]

He grins, and then he notices Shiro said doomed romantic subplot, and the expression wavers. Then he’s kind of impressed Shiro knows what a doomed romantic subplot is, and Ichigo’s not sure if he wants to finish that grin or not. He doesn’t actually know which direction to let his emotions go. Shiro is an unnerving person. Not that Ichigo is unnerved so much as his pulse is tripping a quicker beat. It’s the instant realization that he’s walking beside someone that might’ve been world changing in a different life or a different time or if his circumstances hadn’t been such shit. Shiro's already got a grip on the entire city. He didn’t even have a good start in life. He has so much potential. It’s kind of horrible that it was never fostered— or maybe they’re all better off. Ichigo’s not quite sure why all it took was that small phrase to give him such an epiphany. Maybe because he knows Shiro doesn’t have any interest in books, but Ichigo’s betting he could change his clothes and walk into a room of Ichigo’s colleagues and fake belonging there well enough to be believable. Like a chameleon. That's a very specific talent. Then again, Ichigo is so in love with the asshole, he’s probably playing it up in his head. “You’re kind of scary sometimes.” In a way that makes Ichigo itch to get his hands on him and follow him down that rabbit hole, because he’s obviously also not quite typical. He mirrors Shiro’s scoff though and backtracks. “I’ve seen you embarrassed so many times. I’ve seen you embarrassed twice in the last hour.”

That offer tugs his guts up into his throat and then heats them as they settle back into place. He’s never stopped wanting Shiro for a second. Not even back when he was trying to convince himself it was hate. “If it were that easy, I’d let you.” He gives Shiro a flat look at those words just because Shiro can be willfully oblivious when he doesn’t want to face something head on. But Ichigo is nothing if not blunt enough to cut through bullshit. “Shiro, he thinks you turned on him the last time he needed you. Do you really think he’s going to come ask for help? Do you think he would’ve anyway?” Getting Grimmjow to admit he needs anything from anyone is like pulling teeth. Actually, he thinks Grimmjow would rather lose teeth. But Shiro and Grimmjow were close once, so who even knows. “I don’t know if it’s even that personal. Do you have any idea how much of a song and dance I had to do to get him and Urahara hooked up? He still doesn’t know I had anything to do with it. If he did, he probably would’ve come after me.” Grimmjow, damn him, can still kick him around pretty good when he has it in mind. “But I’ll be sure to let him know you want to help. He can be your problem for a while.” 

He really does care about Grimmjow, but fucking hell is the guy high maintenance. Just thinking about it has Ichigo in a bad mood. But the last Ichigo heard, he was working for someone else on the side though, so this is probably old information.

Shiro’s tone leaves him feeling like he took a cheap shot. He probably did, but he also means it. He’s not always a great friend, but he doesn’t do it halfway. He sure as hell doesn’t leave them to die alone. 

Ichigo doesn’t comment, he just nods while his brain chews on that. Shiro has a lot of people’s dirty underwear in his pocket. 

Ichigo pulls into a parking space, scanning the street as he exits his car. It locks behind him as he walks toward Shiro and tries all over again to ignore that skin Shiro has on display. He’s never been here. Never even noticed this place, though he’s familiar enough with most of the city. He glances in through the window and thinks it looks exactly like the kind of place these clothes came from.

At first it was kind of difficult to imagine Ichigo sitting at a desk, writing into the early hours of the morning, hours he's usually out roaming the streets or working a very different kind of job. But the more they talk about it, the more easily the image comes to him. He never really saw Ichigo bent over his studies when they were together, but he knows that's because he was too much of a distraction. Without himself in the picture, it's a lot easier to imagine.

He scoffs, "I never do anything embarrassing." Very very not true. Ichigo makes himself so punchable sometimes. Shiro struggles not to roll his eyes, and plays along instead. "Oh, don't downplay that. It'll be the most interesting part of the whole story. Who doesn't love a doomed romantic subplot attached to the misunderstood character? Most of the criminal population probably doesn't read anyway."

Ichigo's not wrong, but damn that's kind of harsh. "Yeah but I'd say no to all of them real fuckin' fast to say yes to you instead." He'd drop everything and everyone for Ichigo. Obsessed, like Ichigo's going to write in his book. And he's glad for the confirmation that he's the hottest guy Ichigo knows, but he didn't really want to hear about whatever complicated thing is going on between Grimmjow and Ichigo. Except it shifts gears into something. Shiro blinks, then heaves an exasperated sigh. "I understand he's mad at me, but I'm literally so loaded I don't know what to do with it. All he has to do is say something. Hell he could'a just sent me his rent bill or something." What an asshole. He doubts Grimmjow wants handouts from him, "Or I could find work for him. Doesn't even have to be illegal shit. I have a lot of connections."

That scowl makes Shiro's hackles raise, but the words take most of the fight out of him. He's so twisted up about Ichigo. He sighs. "I do. I do wanna be friends." The problem is that he doesn't know how to be just friends with Ichigo. He's going to settle for it, because it's all he's going to get, but it's going to hurt.

He shrugs. "Not all of it. I move the important stuff. Politicians, celebrities. People who think they're being discrete. Only reason I never moved my own product before was because I didn't trust myself around it often." He offers up a sort of self deprecating smile. "That's not an issue anymore. But it's a lot of product, a lot of money and a lot of networking to trust to someone else, so it works out."

He watches Ichigo check his own vehicle from the driver seat, and starts rolling down the drive when he sees Ichigo climb into the car and start it. He takes them into the city, to a hole in the wall alt fashion shop that has too many items crammed into a too small of a space. It's his favorite place for clothes though.

[bunnypeew]

Hey sweetie, just read that you're taking requests, so I thought I might toss one your way.

How about an Female reader x Alastor x Lucifer, both demons sorta fighting for her, but she doesn't decide for either of them. Alastor was a friend of hers when she was alive, and Luci is a real charm xD so they agree to share 😏 if ya know what I mean hehe please NSFW if you can. Lots of shadow play since Alastor doesn't like sex too much.

Thank you 🥰

HELL YEAH I CAN IM A SUCKER FOR LUCI X READER X ALASTOR LETS GOOO

Sharing is caring - Lucifer x fem!reader x Alastor NSFW

warnings: NSFW, MDNI pls thank you, cunnilingus, shadow play, voyeurism, cumming inside

''you are just being a prick!,,

Lucifer shouted at Alastor while they were both waiting for Y/n to come out for them all to hang out. It had been a while since both of them kinda courted her and were always around her in some way, whether it was physically or just Alastor's shadows following her around making sure she was safe. She loved it, without any lies, one of the most powerful overlords in his time and the literal king of hell, like come on!

''And you are being an annoyance,,

Alastor scoffs at his nails, not interested in what Short Stack is saying. It wasn't until she came out of the door, that sleepiness on her face, her hair all messed up and her shirt hanging barely on her shoulders. She was a sight to be seen for both of them

''sorry guys I completely forgot about our outing today so I slept in,,

she says yawning and stretching he arms upwards, letting the fabric get lifted up by her boobs, exposing her panties and belly. At this, both men were petrified, both for different reasons. Alastor composed himself gripping his cane and giving her a warm smile

''why hello there darling! you seem to be a bit exposed there, care for me to help you out?,,

he says walking towards Y/n and putting a hand on the nook of her back, now looking at Lucifer with a challenging smile, this makes his blood boil making him get near her as well trying to pull her away from Alastor only for him to grab her waist stopping Lucifer from moving her at all. Y/n notices this and sighs

''you guys need to come to some sort of understanding because I'm not making that choice for you,,

she speaks, making them both turn their attention to her instead of their bickering. This makes them think for a little while, they did think of something but both of them didn't really like that outcome, but at this point, they really had no choice but to agree with one another. They look at each other, giving a nod then turn their attention fully to Y/n

''how about, we go back to your room darling, the three of us,,

Lucifer says putting a hand on her waist and getting closer to her face all at once, this time not to make Alastor jealous but to just grab her attention while Al works behind her. From the nod they had before they both agreed that they wanted her, maybe in different ways but they both wanted to make her feel good. Alastor shadow was put underneath her, moving away her panties, this made her gasp making her close her legs in an instant and turn around to look at the culprit. All Alastor had to show was a wide smirk and the bulge from his pants prominent, all three of them knew that he wasn't one for sex but to please his sweetheart he would do all he could without being touched, even if just standing and watching Lucifer take the lead, so that's what happened. They went to the bed in her bedroom, Luci smacking her onto it and getting on top of her, while Al sat down in a chair near them stroking his pants.

This took Y/n by surprise because they never did something for all three of them, it was mostly Lucifer with whom she had sex, Alastor usually didn't opt for this kinda of stuff but today was a first. Lucifer got in between her legs, the panties already moved off her cunt so this gave ease of access to his tongue to slip in, this made her gasp and grab the sheets on the bed. In the meantime, Alastor had pulled his cock out and started jerking it slowly with one hand while the other hand was controlling the shadows to which he made go to Y/n body to play with her, mostly her boobs. Whimpers could be heard from her, suffocated a little since she was getting shy by Alastor looking at her with a lustful look in his eyes, his permanent smile still there, just softer. One of his tentacles with into her mouth making her gasp and moan out loud

''I think both of us want to hear you dearest,,

Alastor speaks and chuckles when he can finally hear his sweetheart in all her glory, in the meantime, lucifer on sucking and licking on her cunt making her whimper and moan even more. He knew exactly what he was doing, eating her out was one of his specialities, after all, he loved to make her feel good. Soon after he stopped, letting his cock come out of his pants to then slam into her right away with one thrust, the tentacle out of her mouth and now around her neck giving her the possibility to speak

''Luci.. holy shit,,

she is able to mutter in between moans, with Lucifer picking up his pace, and Alastor does as well. They both went on until they reached their climax, Alastor finishing in his hand while Lucifer finished inside of Y/n, her legs quivering the same as her cum filled cunt.

They could say they were gonna share you like this more often from now on.

a/n: GOD I LOVE THEM SO MUCH IM SO GLAD I GOT TO WRITE THIS!!!! I hope it satisfied your request and thank you so much for the ask :3c @christineblood

[sadhornydemons]

You gotta wonder..What are the events that lead to Via and Blitz having each other as contacts on their phones?

Blitz had Stolas in his phone as early as the first episode, probably out of Stolas' persistence in the aftermath of stealing his book. One might assume, maybe one day Stolas grabbed his phone; "Blitzy, let me add my daughter to your contacts!" which could be slightly odd, but not completely ooc in his mannerisms.

Having it labled: "Via (Stolas Bird Daughter)"..(how many different species of daughters do you think Stolas has, Blitz?!) seems like Blitz added it, or at least edited it later.

I could see, during the events of Seeing Stars, Blitz would have a good reason to add her as a contact. (assuming Stolas was already trying to call Via's phone prior to everyone trying to find her. I'm assuming a lot of stuff that isn't shown just so everything will make sense) By why Via?

And circling back to Seeing Stars, how or why does Via know where the IMP office is, or that her dad's book is there?

Obviously Stolas knows the location, he shows up at the office next. Did he have to explain to her one day, "Oh no, I don't have the book...uh, you remember our Loo Loo Land bodyguard? Well, he's borrowing it for his business..Oh say, why don't we pay him a surprise visit?"

Back to the original phone issue at hand, I can't see Stolas grabbing Via's phone to add anything (Stolas: "Oh, there's a message on your phone saying to click this link for a 'Mal-icious surprise!" Via: "Dad, no."). Going back to headcanon land, even if Blitz attempted to call her during the events of Seeing Stars and she answered, I'd see her blocking the number after finding out who it was instead of saving.

And Via already had the contact labeled "Dad (Calling From Shitty Bodyfriend's Phone)," (note the use of parentheses in both cases) complete with picture of Stolas in his This-Is-As-Dressed-I'm-Getting-Robe. If she hadn't blocked Blitz's number before, maybe she did find the number and edited it after her father was banished, knowing he didn't have access to his phone and that would be the only way he could contact her.

That's probably the most likely option I can find. Unless Stolas did manage to call her from Blitz's phone one day (prior to the events of Ozzie's). Again, I'm struggling to find a reason for that. "Via, it's daddy! Did you remember to take the reading materials for that history assignment to your mothers?", Via: "Where are you calling from?!" Stolas: "Oh, I just had to borrow Blitzy's phone while mine is...unavailable." Blitz: "I really didn't think it would fit up there."

There just seems to be a lot of character development or events unseen. Which makes sense, the show doesn't have time to show every stinkin' detail, while focusing on all the main cast. But some of these missing pieces might give more reason to why Blitz already feels bonded to Via, in addition to his relationship with her father, but despite them only sharing scenes in two prior episodes.

[saucerfulofsins]

I haven’t seen any posts comparing Buck’s coming out to Eddie and Tommy breaking up with Buck, which is a shame because the similarities drive me insane.

Or well. I say similarities, but that’s wrong. What I should be saying is: these scenes mirror each other. This post is more about the highlights than shot by shot comparisons – for that, I’d recommend you watch them side by side yourself.

Let’s start with the first and most obvious structural parallel: both scenes happen around 32 minutes into their respective episodes/between two-thirds to three-quarters in.

Now, for the scenes themselves. They follow the same basic outline, which I’ll discuss one by one. I’m following the same structure throughout: I discuss the coming out scene, then the breakup, and then give some analysis. At the end, I’ve included a section on further things of note that I couldn’t neatly fit into this structure and my final thoughts. Is this the first time I’m using the media analysis I was taught during my minor in Arts, Culture and Media with a focus on film in 2019? Yes, yes it is.

Buckle up, because this meta/essay is nearly 3k. For that reason (i.e. accessibility/readability and the amount of work I put in), this entire piece has been cross-post to AO3 (CLICK FOR LINK).

Opening shots

Seating 1.0

Buck in the kitchen

Seating 2.0

POV shots (both perspectives)

Eddie and Tommy leaving

Miscellany

Final thoughts

Analysis under the cut:

1. Opening shots

This part includes some of the most noticeable differences between the scenes, which explains why they feel different – at least at first.

CO: Eddie’s phone comes into view first – this is his chat conversation with Marisol, which the first part of the CO scene is about (note how this mirrors the gym scene, where Buck intended to come out before the conversation lingered on Eddie and Marisol). Eddie is also closest to the door during this part of the scene – which is where he will remain throughout.

BU: The first shot is of a closed door, which Buck opens for Tommy, i.e. Tommy certainly has no keys to Buck’s place, and this might well be a callback to doors as a recurrent theme. They greet with the briefest kiss possible. I rewatched this several times to make sure it really happened – it happens immediately after a cut and it’s filmed in such a way this could easily have been an air kiss lmao. (No seriously, I had to watch this screen by screen to properly catch it, and the audio is a lot more obvious than the visual). They make small talk about the movies and Tommy having ordered an uber (clearly a throwback to 7x05), and they switch positions so Buck is actually closest to the door.

As for clear similarities: Eddie and Tommy are standing up and remain mostly in the same place; Buck is moving around the loft – it’s an expression of his nervous energy, and the major changes in these scenes are about Buck, not Eddie or Tommy.

2. Sitting down

I made this a separate point for one reason, and one reason only: In CO, Eddie takes his own initiative to sit down, while saying he should go home and Buck offering him a beer, so clearly he won’t be leaving to go home any time soon(ilu Eddie but I’m begging you, stop putting yourself and also us through this 😭). In BU, Buck tells Tommy to sit down... which is in part to signal they need a more serious talk than can be done on the way to the cinema, but also shows a massive contrast in terms of familiarity and comfort, regardless of what Buck tries to tell Tommy later.

Both Eddie and Tommy sit down on the leftmost stool (closest to the door, i.e. it’s easiest for them to leave and Buck can’t get between them).

3. Buck in the kitchen

Fun fact! Before writing this post, I checked the scene where Buck confesses to Taylor that he kissed Lucy. During that scene, Buck is sitting down at the kitchen island, while Taylor lingers in the kitchen proper (i.e. with the island between them). She has moved in at that point – kitchens represent ‘being at home’ – but there’s a physical barrier between her and Buck, and it doesn’t actually keep from her leaving (even while saying she has nowhere to go).

CO: The camera uses a dolly shot to follow Buck throughout the kitchen – to the fridge and then back to the head of the kitchen island. He’s attentively listening to Eddie complain about Marisol and God watching him have sex (cursing God while sluttily drinking his beer).

BU: Buck walks out of view of the camera, through the kitchen, and there’s a dolly shot to the right to focus on Buck finding his place on the head of the kitchen island. He leans on the counter at this point. He does have a pretty open posture (identical to CO); Tommy sits with his hands/fingers folded together but he’s turned to Buck i.e. paying attention.

This is the position Buck has when he comes clear to Tommy about having dated Abby in the past; it’s also when his phone comes into the picture. Well. Pictures. Of Buck and Abby.

4. Seating 2.0

This is the longest section of analysis, and contains the part that makes me SCREAM but let’s start at the beginning. From the moment Buck sits down, the conversation turns serious in both scenes. This dialogue consists of mostly POV shots (which I will discuss next), and these medium shots that show Buck and Eddie, and Buck and Tommy.

CO: Buck sits down while Eddie says, “You and Tommy have the right idea, stay single.” This very clearly introduces a new section of the scene. Overall, the lighting of the loft is muted besides the yellow for visual interest and gay Eddie, thank you for your hard work Buddie colour theorists. Buck’s dining table is unlit and barely visible, so the space really takes a back seat and allows us to focus on Buck and Eddie. Please take note of the chair between them – this serves as a physical barrier, where someone is getting between them (a place for Marisol and Tommy, respectively).

BU: Here, the segway happens right after Buck’s come clear about being Abby’s ex 2.0. He sits down on the middle chair, but it’s quite obvious he’s shoved it away from Tommy. In fact, compared to CO, Buck is almost at the same distance from Tommy as he is from Eddie. There’s a barrier between Buck and Eddie, but there’s space between him and Tommy. This is emphasized by the lit dining table, which draws even more attention because of the white decorations: the loft is a space to be distracted by, focus on or even flee into.

Now. This is what kickstarted my obsession with these scenes, especially the coming out scene. The chair between them? Buck reaches out to Eddie, leans his arm onto it and in the process drawing attention to it. He actually leaves his arm there for an extended period, throughout several of the following shots, and only seems to pull back when he says he and Tommy were on a date.

The following shots – of Buck’s coming out and Eddie’s initial response – are back and forth POV shots. The first shot from medium distance, is this:

Do you see it. DO YOU SEE IT. Do you see what drives me crazy! Eddie is mirroring Buck’s earlier posture – also this is immediately after Buck says Tommy left him on the curb (i.e. Eddie realizes there’s no Tommy getting between them). Eddie’s not just opened up, he’s reaching out, extending his arm back onto that empty chair between them. And again, like Buck, he leaves it there for several shots. It’s still there when he tells Buck to call Tommy, although he briefly vaguely gestures to himself during the “He’ll love you! We all do!” It’s not clear when he takes his arm away; no shots show it and then he’s getting up.

This just. This drives me insane.

For comparison, Buck doesn’t reach out to Tommy during the BU scene. And, compare Tommy to Eddie:

5. POV shots

Okay, the section header is a bit of a misnomer because the scene consists mostly of dialogue and therefore has POV shots. Like I said, there’s also overlap between the POV shots and the wider establishing shots I used in section 4. The bulk of this part of the scene, however, shows a lot of over the shoulder close ups with quick POV switches. In both cases, this is where the subject at the heart of the scene is discussed.

Now, these differences are pretty small and they could be a consequence of these episodes having different directors. However, there’s zero doubt in my mind that Chad Lowe closely studied the CO scene for its sheer number of cinematographic parallels and therefore it might be entirely on purpose too YAY.

There’s some variation in the distance of these shots, but the most intimate ones look like this:

(Still not over that face he’s pulling here, dear Lord). Buck takes up most of the screen – his shoulders are visible, but the top of his head isn’t. I guess this is technically still an over the shoulder shot, but barely. Eddie is out of focus, just enough there to be a blurry ear. These shots are intimate. This is almost what Eddie is seeing – and actually these shots make it feel like they’re sitting a lot closer than they actually are.

"Until now.” Buck’s entire face (including hair) is in the shot, and we can see Tommy’s shirt. This is the closest/most intimate we get to see him (and Tommy, in reverse). For both sides, they’re very clear over the shoulder shots. Yes, this is intimate – but it is not intimate. A quarter to a third of the screen (esp as the conversation moves on) is dedicated to the other person. Buck is more visually interesting too. He has more colour in his face and his background is more clearly white than in CO, whereas Tommy blends in more with the brown coat rack background (shout-out to @sparklespiff for pointing out that difference while I was trying to figure out why Buck felt more noticeable, btw).

SIDENOTE: I know some posts have already been made about the pictures on Buck’s fridge and Eddie’s mantelpiece, like they seem thematically relevant (or perhaps not yet, but soon). Buck’s walls in general have more pictures on them in S8, which is evident both in Buck’s background and Tommy’s. I am nowhere near talented enough to identify them, but going by their general colour and composition, I believe all of Buck’s wall art pieces are that, art, not family photos.

6. Eddie and Tommy leaving

These scenes have some of the clearest parallels, and of course an incredibly clear difference in how Eddie and Tommy are leaving Buck.

CO: Eddie leaves not because of Buck (well, not technically), but because he has to go do something: “I gotta go talk to Marisol.” Buck is smiling while Eddie gets up and is on his way out. Of course, this is when Eddie stops, turns around, and Buck looks up. In fact, Eddie says “Come here” but he’s the one to walk up to Buck to give him a hug. Buck just stands up from the chair. During the hug, we get shots of both Eddie’s and Buck’s faces, and of course Eddie holding Buck’s shoulder. When Eddie leaves, we hear the door open and shut – the focus stays on Buck.

Again, when Tommy leaves, we only hear the door while the camera cuts to Buck. The show then picks up his response (with the same expression) during his arrival at Eddie’s, where Eddie lets him into his home.

BU: Of course, Tommy has nowhere he needs to go to (hello, return of the failed cinema date) – when he says “I should go” it is because of his conversation with Buck. There’s a medium wide shot of him getting up while Buck looks confused, looking like he’s about to reach out for Tommy – the first time during their conversation. The camera uses a slow dolly to the left, which is when Buck calls back Tommy to ask for clarification: “Did you just break up with me?” Tommy says, “Yeah, I guess I just did.” This has been pointed out before, but they’re clearly not sure. Tommy also says, “Believe me, I didn’t see it coming either.” (Was LFJ speaking from Tommy’s perspective in that interview?). That line is fascinating, actually, because only moments ago, he was incredibly adamant about being Buck’s first, not his last. This feels like a throwback to “Enjoy it while it lasts,” leaving them both overwhelmed/confused.

Look at how similar these shots are! Also, the reason I was adamant about calling these scenes mirrors and not parallels is because Buck and Tommy greet each other with a moment of physical affection (which, as I mentioned before, is incredibly short and barely visible). Eddie wouldn’t have ordinarily but feels it’s important to hug Buck to show him nothing has changed. In terms of meaning and cinematography, their interaction is a lot more substantial and reciprocal. They’re also making sure to leave on good terms – whereas Buck and Tommy meet on good terms, but part essentially as strangers. Buck and Tommy ending the scene like truly feels like an end. Buck and Eddie’s scene feels like a significant shift in their relationship, and for me part of that is a result of Eddie hugging Buck, and shaking up their routine.

7. Miscellany

Just some bits and bobs I couldn’t fit elsewhere in the analysis!

“I like him too. Just not the same way as you.” 7x05 was truly out there foreshadowing 8x06’s “I am not gay.” (I want to do a full 7x04 + 7x05 parallels post at some point, but that’s going to be a fuckload of work and possibly even larger than this post).

Like I pointed out, Buck and Eddie drink beer during their scene (which they often do during their conversations). Buck and Tommy are breaking up without accoutrements. Of course, we know Buck brings over beer to Eddie after the breakup. Because the scenes mirror each other so closely in every other aspect, it feels incredibly poignant: Eddie again fills a role in Buck’s life Tommy should have had. I also figured I’d check their fake brands, and they are different labels. I would assume Buck brought a new flavour, considering Eddie’s looks.

Speaking of continuity, Buck opening the door to Tommy in a sense mirrors Eddie opening the door to Buck at the end of 8x06. The key differences in their cinematography is that during BU, the establishing shot of the entire scene is of the closed door without a peephole shot. When Eddie opens the door, it follows his Risky Business tribute so the door takes up less presence, and even when it’s closed, Buck is clearly visible through the peephole.

Phones clearly are connected to (past) female love interests; Eddie is interacting with Marisol but it’s through text and impersonal – we don’t see the messages, we just hear Eddie complain. On the other hand, Buck is out of contact with Abby but he still treasures that relationship – otherwise he wouldn’t still have those pictures on his phone after 7 years. I guess that’s kind of cute? Idk, I never really liked Abby or how she treated Buck, but Tommy’s speech has turned me into an Abby defender lol

Like Buck, Maddie also stands at the head of the kitchen island during her conversation with Chimney. Chimney’s in the kitchen proper, though, and Maddie walks up to him so they can actually stand face to face and be happy about the new pregnancy together! (I genuinely missed that scene the first time I watched the episode, I was so caught up in the bones of it all SORRY MADNEY I LOVE YOU FOREVER).

8. Final thoughts

I mean. Are we really surprised? I’m not! Actually that’s a lie. I saw the similarities but was shocked at just how close these scenes are in full. However,I do think this scene in particular does a lot to show just how deliberate these parallels between S7 and S8 are (and between S8 and previous seasons in general – we’ve seen similar/near identical cinematography a couple of times now), and how deliberate the parallels are between Eddie and Tommy (who are literally taking up the same position in these two scenes).

And just. The fact it’s the coming out scene between Buck and Eddie, which was about opening up & telling the truth, and it doesn’t change anything (allegedly), versus Buck and Tommy, which is about opening up & telling the truth, which changes everything... it reaffirms how I feel about the coming out scene – this is a major moment of change, and that change is deeply entwined with their respective romantic relationships. AAAAAAAAAAHHH!!

[olderthannetfic]

I don't get my fandom. They want more queer rep. The main cast is a bisexual femme woman with a preference for women, an aroace gender-indifferent AMAB man, a genderfluid all-pronouns using AMAB person with a beard who wears a dress, and a biromantic asexual bigender AMAB man who is agender + male. The supporting cast has a lesbian girl, a middle-aged ace het woman living semi-romantically with another woman who is the main cast's (emotional) adoptive mom, and a ambiguously queer character whose gender is never really confirmed or discussed.

A big criticism I also see is "the writing team is all cishet". One, we don't know that, someone could be closeted. Two, why is that a problem? I think it's great that they went, "this makes sense for who this character is. We don't have to force them to be cishetallo just because that's what you normally see in animation. Web animation can be different. This is who this person is and that's fine."

I'm 19. I talked to my half brother, who is 38, about this and he actually choked on his coffee. He said when he was my age, nothing like this was easily accessible for him. It would have been jaw-dropping representation for him. I asked about the writers being cishetallo and he said, "who fucking cares? I would've moved Heaven and Earth to see these characters hanging out and just fucking existing back then!"

I know you get a metric fuckton of asks, but I'd love to hear your take on this. You've been in the queer community way longer than I have (I've barely started interacting with queer people IRL; I grew up in rural Wyoming) and I do wonder what this debacle looks like to people in other age groups. I'd also be curious to know what older people would've thought if they'd seen this friend group in media when they were younger. I know it means a lot to me. But I feel like I don't get what it would have meant back then.

--

Well, written up like this, it might get an eye-roll for sounding like Captain Planet casting. (You know "One of A and one of B and one of C" in a way that feels kind of forced.)

But yes, I think most older queer people when looking at the actual canon would be like "Sweet! A cast full of queer characters!"

I grew up somewhere shockingly liberal for the 90s next door to some old, married lesbians (who still live there, as it happens). It still sucked for teenagers. I had an okay time, but I was always hearing about other teens having an awful time even as the adults in the same communities did okay. And that's a very, very good version of what it was like in the 90s.

I did have access to queer media, vastly more access than most teens had. It was still mostly art films, boring coming out memoir, and The Pain of Being a Minority serious literature. What I wanted was genre fiction with a romance b-plot between queer characters I found hot. There was a bit of that, but not much.

I don't know that I personally would have killed for the exact set of queer rep in a modern show, but that makes sense. There are plenty of identities that present about the same but where people have internal reasons for choosing one or another. There are different forces making one queer identity or another more embattled at a given point in time. So while broadly similar queer people have always existed, there actually are fads in identity to an extent. (This is different from "wharrgarbl, the blue hairs with their pronouns!!!", which is just people being ahistorical assholes.) Modern media does and should reflect these differences. It might be for me, but it's going to be for 40-something me, not teenage me if it's coming out right now. If it's for current teens, it's not for teen me.

But yeah, in a general sense, I agree with your brother: "Damn, we have so much today! That's cool!"

The kvetching is usually people being angry that it's not representing their exact slice of queerness instead of someone else's. Or, let's be honest, a lot of it is "You didn't make my ship happen! How dare?!" dressed up as activism.

...

One thing I will say is that teenagers were extremely dramatic in my day too, and black-and-white thinking was just as common. Looking a gift horse in the mouth is not new. Yes, your fandom is full of idiots, but I wouldn't read too much into it.

[comfortless]

to the anon who was talking about konig and the rule following intention thing: i love you. he seems cheeky like that. BUT i will also climb that big man and start strangling him if he entertained or led on the recruit.

idk, maybe its my rabies, but i would start whacking him grgrgrgrg. wrangle him till he acts right!!!!! (whatever that means)

i also love that anon! 🤭

Being instructed to “act right” for König is more or less the same as following any order at work. “Shoot that target.” is the very same as “Don’t glare at a stranger.” The differences between the König at home and the König on the field are subtle things. No bloodshed and rewards in the form of tenderness and orgasms instead. He’s less rigid, less focused, but still a soldier, the strangest one at that.

Everything is taken as directly as possible, because he’s not going to question any hidden meaning behind words. That’s silly. He always says just what he means, so shouldn’t everyone else?

There’s a lot he just doesn’t get, and your jealousy happens to be one of those things.

He would kill for you, lets you graze your fingertips over his favorite weapons, allows you to hold his face and even pretends that your staring doesn’t make his fingers twitch and sweat bead at his temples. König is loyal and so trusting with you… how dare you accuse him of worshipping some other woman in the same way? How could you even believe that?

Say you, his beloved, put together the pieces, realize that surely this woman is messaging your König during his leave for a reason. There’s an argument to be had, one that’s less of a screaming fit and more of a break down from both sides. You tell him through gritted teeth and tears that you know your intuition isn’t wrong: he’s done something, you just aren’t certain what that something is. There’s no outright accusation spoken, but his face immediately grows red and his eyes narrow.

It’s not that he even cares to question why you would think that way. He just wants to know where he’s failed. What is it that you need that he’s not already providing? He takes an awful picture of his cock each time he’s hard and away from you, even follows it up with one of the aftermath of thinking of you. No other woman makes him feel so starved.

He knows he isn’t very romantic; you would probably prefer actual dates instead of watching him train or following along like a cute accessory at the gym. But he brings you flowers, licks your cunt without hesitation, buys you feminine products and chocolate any time that you’re in need of them. Sure, each picnic date ends with your chest pressed against a sturdy tree or your thighs spread atop the patterned blanket, but the confessions hissed into your hair are true. It’s never just been sex, not to him. It’s love, and that’s one word he never seems to shy away from saying. He’s greedy, wouldn’t want something so simple, not after every moment you’ve spent together.

König might not get why you’re so into some new trend or show, but he listens when you talk about them. Or tries, at least. Really, he had no idea why you would bother explaining to him why you prefer a dress with wiry straps over something cozier when he arrives home, but he’s happy to just listen to your voice and shush you with kisses when he doesn’t know how else to respond.

You’re allowed access to his phone any time you like, even shows you his bank account to prove he hasn’t taken some lady a world away off on some expensive shopping trip or spent a curious amount at a pharmacy. In fact…. He’s barely spent anything while away, all of the transactions are from the last time he was on leave or at that cute little shop he had told you about and brought you home some shiny new gift from. There’s nothing suspicious to be found… except for those messages from the woman he tells you is just a recruit.

So… what if you’re just projecting?

To him, his own jealousy is righteous.

König almost looks scary when he’s upset, not that he would ever lay a hand on you. Maybe the coffee table will be in disarray, cleared entirely when the thought of you leaving proves to be far too much. His shirt suffers a few massive tears when he grips at his chest to show you just where you’re hurting him.

You may not have outright accused him, but König can’t hold his tongue when he asks you about this imaginary other man. Is he handsome? Does he buy you nice things? Does he make you come hard? How did you meet and just where does he live? Do you love him…?

König would try his utmost to hold back tears. He feels weak when he cries, and the last thing he wants is for you to view him as fragile. He’s supposed to protect you.

But it’s all gone in a flash. His entire being seems to relax when you explain to him that there is no other man. The unshed tears are wiped away, a heavy sigh leaves him when he rubs at his face. He feels like the worst idiot just stood there blinking in surprise while you’re still pissed, but at least that scenario proves to be untrue.

You just want to understand why he’s entertaining some other woman’s flirtations. Is that what telling some recruit she’s got sharp aim and allowing her to grasp at his arm and admire his muscles is..? He will admit that maybe he’s allowed her too much closeness, even if he never has and never will return her affections.

It baffles him entirely for a moment, slows his tongue enough to have a grin curl at his lips. It’s the most flattering thing in the entire world to think that you desire him so much that the thought of sharing makes you like this. The realization that maybe you’re just as territorial as he is is impossibly cute, makes him twice as obnoxious and overbearing when you’re pulled into his arms.

His voice takes an amused lilt when he asks you just what you want him to do about it. Cut her off? He’ll avoid her entirely if it appeases you. He doesn’t want to hurt a woman that isn’t an actual enemy, so killing her is certainly out of the question, but he can be scary if you would like that. She wouldn’t like him as much if she saw his face. He would remind you that only a silly thing like yourself could ever be keen on it. Your orders are absolute, so long as he still gets a treat in the end.

[gaytrash-back-in-a-paperbag]

Just One Reason (Chapter 2)

Just One Reason 

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2

Natasha Romanoff x Wanda Maximoff x GN!Reader  

Summary: Y/N has been working hard as a criminal investigator and always comes home to their lover Nat. When they come home tonight, however, something is different. 

Chapter summary: Y/N definitely wasn’t expecting to end up in between an investigation and the Avengers’ issues, but yet. Suddenly secrets are uncovered and you can’t keep everything the same anymore. 

Warnings: Cheating, implied sexual interactions, swearing, lots of implications to abuse, murder, blood/gore, PTSD, anxiety attacks, alcohol , self-harm, kidnapping, (stay safe loves <3) 

A/N: Chapter 2 hits the site :)) See you guys soon for the next chapter!

AVENGER’S COMPOUND

SUNDAY, 7:47 AM

14 HOURS SINCE THE TEXT

“This, Director Fury, was not a funny hoax,” You growled at him from the back of your throat. The text had come from him, and he didn’t even know their location. It had taken everything in you not to punch his good eye until he didn’t have one. 

“Officer Y/L/N, you must understand that we knew it was the only way to get you in here,” He insisted in his usual cool and calm voice. You frowned, your entire face just one big scowl. 

“Because your efforts are beyond the laws and completely reckless and unethical! If you weren’t a group of powerful people, you’d all be in jail for life. And I’d enjoy being the one to do it.” Crossing your arms, the rest of the elevator ride was in complete, and utterly blissful might you add, silence. Entering the actual compound for the first time had you fuming from the very beginning. You had been taught by the NYPD that the Avengers were ruthless with the law and they never abided by the government-placed laws. You glared at everyone in front of you, scanning the area for any signs of the redhead or the witch, but nothing seemed to show they were there. You knew you shouldn’t care, but it couldn’t be helped at this point, you were still way too caught up in everything work related that you hadn’t really flushed out the remaining emotions towards the women. 

“What is it you want, Fury? I don’t have all day, you fucker. If you’re here to fix something, you aren’t going to succeed, so you can just let me leave.” Your words were so bitter, even Thor himself looked mildly taken back. Clearly, they knew about what had happened a week ago, but they hadn’t expected a reaction like that. 

“We have no intention of getting into that side of the business, but as you are likely aware, both Wanda and Agent Romanoff haven’t been on the scene since Wednesday.” He paused, waiting for your reaction. You just gave a solemn nod and waited for him to continue. “We have no ideas on their whereabouts as they left on their own accord without our knowledge. We did not send them out on a mission of any sorts, and thus, they have been put as MIA.”

The Avengers around you looked sorrowful. You hadn’t seen any of them this way since the war against Thanos, in which Bruce Banner and Clint Barton had sacrificed themselves for the better half of the population that had been snapped away. They were acting like the two women had died or something, and that made you slightly uncomfortable. 

“Give me access to their rooms. I’ll begin an investigation,” You said at last, turning to face Director Fury. He gave a nod, and began to guide you into the dormitory area of the compound. It was just you and him at that point, and he decided this would be a great time to push you around a bit.

“I’m aware of your secret, Y/N. It never went under my radar.”

You turned to look at him, a look of distaste on your face. “If this is a ploy to get me to join your little mismatched group of heroes, it’s an automatic failure.” 

 “No ploy, no trickery. I am just stating I know about you. I know your secret, your little power of yours.” He gestured towards your back, causing your face to heat slightly, out of both anger and embarrassment. He knew about your power, sure, but he shouldn’t know about the scars. 

“Will you explain it in more detail, Officer Y/L/N? Or must I continue?” He pushed further, taking note of the way you gritted your teeth together and clenched them in anger.

“My ability to see into the multiverse is none of your concern, Director Fury. Nor are the things I do within it. It has only happened twice, and I have no intention of doing it again.”

 He smiled now, only slightly, because this is Fury we’re talking about. You were so furious that you thought you might punch a hole in the wall, until you reached the door of Natasha’s room. Opening the door, you slammed it in his face. You turned your attention to the room you were in. It reminded you of her too much, the way it even held the same smell of her hair, that smell of poppies and vodka, and somehow that smell was good. You bit your lip, holding back a flood of emotions. It pained you to see all the things that you had seen her wearing on dates, all lined neatly on her bed as if she had just unpacked. You noticed a few of the things you had bought her were in an organized chest by her bed, but when you opened the chest more, you found some of the most important items missing. The picture you took on your first date, the one she carried in her pocket at all times, wasn’t in there, and neither was the pair of matching converse you had gotten custom designed with the black widow logo on them. Had she taken them with her, or did she just throw them out? You swallowed down the thoughts, thinking, Come on Y/N, you have a job to do. Don’t be moping over a girl who spent her entire relationship cheating on you. 

You slapped your face a couple times, lightly, and went back to checking for any clues on where she had disappeared to. When you entered the bathroom, you were surprised to find many of the photos the two of you had taken taped to her mirror, and you had to suppress your soft smile. Maybe she did care, just maybe you took things the wrong way, maybe you should have let her talk. Then, you had that urge, that sting on your back, and you sighed deeply. Lifting up your shirt, you turned your head as you glanced at your back through the mirror. Hundreds, probably, of scars littered it, with most old, but a beat red one on your lower right side meant only one thing to you. 

“There goes another one…” you muttered to yourself, wincing as it stung once more before fading into just another old scar, like any other on your back. Rolling your shirt back down, you noticed a note out of the corner of your eye. It was in such an odd spot, as if whoever wrote it knew only you would be able to find it. Pulling it out from its odd position behind a tile in the bathtub, you unfolded it and began reading its contents. 

“Well, I guess Director Fury will probably send Y/N to find you, don’t you think Natasha? It’s okay though, I think that’s what we both want. They’ll come running to save you, won’t they? Like a dog on a leash, eh? You really had them fooled, you did Ms. Romanoff. You didn’t mean to, but you put them right into your grasp and maybe now you can wring them dry. Unless you’re actually in love with them. Oh, that would make things so much more fun, yeah? Take your little witchy girl too, she’ll be fun! And to think you could have both, oh dear Natasha, you can’t have either.” 

You must have read it four or five times for it to really stick in your head. What the fuck was that? Didn’t mean to have you fooled? Was Natasha up to something and dragging Wanda into it? You frowned so deeply that it physically hurt your face. Something wasn’t adding up. It was a type note, god damn it, so there was no way of identifying anyone through means of handwriting, and there wasn’t enough for someone to depict anyone’s writing style for a hit. You gripped the side of your head with your free hand in an act of frustration, before standing. Turning to leave the room and report back to Fury, you paused by the mirror again. Your eyes found one photo in particular, it was about three months after your first night with Nat. She had taken it while you weren’t looking, you were shoving a hamburger down your throat at your favorite dinner. She was grinning and trying not to laugh, and the way her cheeks squished into her eyes, you couldn’t help but feel like she was actually happy there. You hesitated, then grabbed the photo and shoved it into your pocket. Exiting the room, you almost crashed into the playboy himself. 

“Woah, watch where you’re standing, robot!” You hissed as you collided into him. He was just as surprised as you were, and you both hit the ground with a thud. You stood first, and did not offer him a hand, so he pushed himself to his feet, grumbling something about you being a bitch. It took all your mental power to not just grab at his weirdass heart thing and pull it out. Stuck up asshole. You said to yourself in your head, for once mildly sad Wanda wasn’t there to giggle at it. You cursed at Fury mentally for not being there and making you walk around the compound looking for him. Finally, after one or two more awkward conversations with the Avengers, you sighed with relief when you saw the eyepatched man. 

“Director Fury?” You asked, trying to pull his attention to you. He turned to face you, raising an eyebrow at what you wanted. You silently showed him the note, and after he read it, asked, “Do you know who wrote this?”

“No. I have no idea. This is… not something I’ve heard about from her.” His response made you a bit upset, now you felt yourself getting slightly worried. 

“That’s alright, I’ll just take this back to the station and have the NYPD deal with i-”

“I’m afraid you can’t do that, Mx. Y/L/N. This investigation stays here,” Fury warned, rewarding him with one of your meanest glares. “I apologize but the police have a way of putting things into the public eye and we cannot have that. We told the press they were on an official hiatus. If it gets out that they are actually MIA, it will send the public into a panic.”

“The public will panic over anything, this is no exception. If anything, it’ll get your little squad of random heroes a bit more of public excitement as this investigation will keep everyone on their toes. Isn’t that what you guys love? You guys seem to really enjoy the attention. Why is this different? Because they’re missing and you’ll be seen as failures for your lack of protection over a former Russian assassin  and an unstable witch who can’t always control her damn powers. I’ve seen this before Fury, and in that universe, that witch ripped through your world like it was paper,” you retorted. You weren’t lying, you had seen this in a different universe, but the circumstances were different. It was obvious though, whatever was going on, this could go horribly wrong if either of them got seriously hurt enough for Wanda to lash out.

He had no response for that, and so you left the building. You drove yourself back to your old apartment. You knew if Nat had left, she left something behind here for you to find. You felt like you were playing a mix of hide and seek and a scavenger hunt, and by God you hated it. Glancing around, you knew not much had changed since the last time you had come, other than the tons upon tons of vodka bottles scattered around the rooms. Apparently you weren’t the only one drowning your problems with alcohol that was for sure. That same old Nat smell filled every part of the apartment, but it also had the smell of Wanda, the cherry cola and the scent of lavender. Somehow, the scents together still made you feel comforted, despite the circumstances. You just wanted to curl up with Wanda and Nat and have them hold you and let you relieve yourself of all these pent up emotions. You missed them both, and you loved them both. You didn’t understand how Nat could be so distraught by what happened if it meant nothing to her. Because it had to have meant nothing to her, if she never even told you about Wanda. 

You hit the wall with your fist, and you hit it again. Before you even knew it, there was blood trickling down your hand and around your wrists and your knuckles were gashed open. Tears streaked your face, you tried to wipe them away but the stains were already there. Heaving a hefty sigh, you felt a strong urge to go into your living room. Following your gut, you entered to find that same gut feeling pulling at the couch. No, not at the couch. Under it. You knelt down, getting on your knees and leaning down to see another note. Expecting to find the second note to be written by the same person as the first, you were utterly surprised to find Wanda’s handwriting. Well, partially. It was shaky, much shakier than hers was even on the worst nights of drinking or, well, anything. It had you nervous as you read the lines of what was Wanda’s true worst nightmare. It didn’t make sense, she had written, that somehow it was like seeing double. How were they here when they had just left my life, for a second time? It’s like the multiverse is playing some cruel joke on me. 

You pouted at the word “multiverse”. You were hoping that what you thought it was, that it couldn’t be that. It shouldn’t be possible, you had rid yourself of that ability, had you not? No, Y/N. Don’t second guess yourself, you did it right. It had worked, you saw it. You assured yourself that it was just a trickery of Wanda’s eyes, that this was just a mistake in her head. You stood, folding the note carefully, and placed it securely in your jacket pocket. Making your way into the bedroom, you began looking through drawers, searching for anything else they had left behind. Opening one drawer, however, left you with a malfunctioning brain. There lay the two hoodies you had been missing, messly tossed back in there like they had just been worn but not enough to be washed, or maybe, they didn’t want to wash them. One had Nat’s unique smell, and the other smelled of the witch herself, and you found yourself surprised to still find the faint smell of your favorite beer still on them, probably from a spill or something. You choked back even more tears, before picking one up and putting it up to your nose. You ended up burying your face into it, this one smells like Wanda, and allowed yourself to curl up on the bed and cry once more. The tears fell, and you just let them. You hated that you still loved them, they had broken your heart, both of them, and yet, you wanted nothing more than to be with them. You wanted their love, their words and their kisses, their affection, you wanted their issues and their problems, you wanted their drunken asses and their emotional breakdowns. You wanted it all, just once more. You had left behind this feeling of longer in the old universe, and you made the deal with yourself to switch, to be free from that. This universe was supposed to be different. Then why wasn’t it?

The sting on your back brought you back to reality. There went yet another one, you groaned at the thought. Why did this have to be you? You didn’t ask for any of this, and you definitely didn’t think anything like this would happen when it started. Everyone always talked about Wanda and Strange and how brilliant their powers were, and even America Chavez, who you hated with all your guts. Oh their powers are revolutionary! Brilliant even! Never before been seen! Yeah, well, never before been seen in this universe. You knew that they weren’t that special, that everyone has them in some universe. An endless multiverse, who were they to think they were unique? You, now, you were unique. You weren’t like them, you were special. Multiverse after multiverse, and you never found anyone else with this ability. This… was it an ability or a damned curse? You felt like it was both a gift and a curse. You got to jump multiverses and live your lives whenever you pleased! But you had to trade with the you from that multiverse, and once they switched, their destinies changed and their fates could leave them dead. It’s not like you knew their fates before you swapped, but it always hurt to find out they died. Even when you don’t swap with them, you still get those fucking scars on your back at their deaths. You could only blame yourself, your single upset in your original universe sent you spiraling and you did anything you could to get away. 

You laughed hollowly at the thought, remembering in one universe where the Avengers were just a made up story, the movie they had released that showed Wanda tearing the multiverse apart. You remembered the universe where that actually happened and you could only roll your eyes through the movie as this version of Wanda stated a couple of very Wanda comments and it almost felt like that actor could have been Wanda. Probably because in every other universe, she is. But you still got a laugh out of it. You sighed, pulling yourself back together as you set down the hoodie. You smiled at the thought that they had kept them. You definitely had this whole thing wrong. Looking at your watch, you hadn’t even realized that the day was basically over and you had gone the whole day without a single thing to eat. On top of that, you could hear your phone ringing for what was probably the ninth time in that hour. Kate and Yelena were definitely worried, especially when you never came home for dinner that night, and didn’t show up the next morning, not to mention you ignored all their texts for the entire day today. Yeah, they were going to be pissed. Huffing, you got to your feet and grabbed at your phone in the living room. 

“Hello?” You said into the phone, bracing yourself. 

You needed that bracing because Kate came at you with full force, “Where the fuck have you been, Y/N? We have been worried sick, you asshole! Yelena, come here, you don’t have to call the police anymore, this dipshit finally picked up.”

You muttered some sort of an apology, but Kate grumbled that you needed more than an apology to save you. You tried to defend yourself, to explain, “Look, Kate. I wanted to go home last night, I did,  but I got caught up in something.”

“Caught up in what? What could it have been that made you not even answer any of our texts?” You could hear Yelena shout from probably five feet away, trying to make sure she was heard. She didn’t seem angry as much worried, she was never one for lack of communication. You and her had gotten extremely close when you became a friend of Kate’s. You had similar personalities, though she was much better at controlling her anger than you. Probably all those years of the Red Room, which had been taken down long ago, but she was always the one keeping you from throwing the first punch. 

After a moment, you grunted, “The Avengers.”

Silence rang for way too long before Kate spoke, “What the fuck do they want? Can’t they see you don’t want anything to do with them? You literally just broke up with Nat, you dated Wanda, and you’re a part of the NYPD, who are basically their biggest enemy. They’re practically asking you to punch Fury in his one-eyed face!” 

The sigh you let out was enough for Kate to soften her voice, choosing to let that go. “Where are you right now, Y/N? We’ll meet up with you for dinner tonight. Have you eaten?”

“At my old apartment, grabbing some last things that Nat had forgotten,” It wasn’t entirely a lie, you were at your apartment and you were going to take the hoodies. “No. I haven’t eaten. It’s been a hell of a day, I completely forgot about it.”

You heard shuffling from the other line, before you heard Yelena take the phone from Kate. Her voice made you feel better in an instant, the blonde Russian had a way of doing that to you. “Meet us at Mel’s Pizza. We’ll pay, you just eat, дурак (stupid).” 

This gave you a slight smile and you nodded, “Alright. See you there, пончик (donut).” You could hear her smirk at your nickname for her. It was one of the few words you could remember in Russian, and it stuck with her. 

“Yeah, yeah, sure, Умник (nerd).” 

The call ended. You could breathe again, thank goodness. You were so thankful for some pizza that you almost left the apartment without the hoodies. Grabbing them and rushing out the door, you couldn’t help but feel like you’d need to come back. Like you were missing something. You ignored the feeling, happily driving to Mel’s Pizza. You made it there about five minutes before Kate and Yelena, so you grabbed a table and sat down, scrolling through your phone. Then a message popped up at the top of your phone from your head officer. 

“We found something in the Bronx Zoo case. Surveillance footage shows that based on the autopsy report of death at 15:09 pm on Sunday, July 16th of 2023, our prime suspect was on 21st Street, meaning there was no way he could have been there during the time of the murder. We’re back at square one.” 

A frustrated sigh left your lips and Kate pulled the phone from your hands, turning it for her to read. Wait, Kate? Oh shit, they must have gotten here while you were busy in your thoughts. Yelena slid next to you, sharing that side of the booth, she threw an arm over your shoulder and squeezed lightly, her silent sign that she was there. You took your hat off and plopped it on her head, giving her your best grin. She gave you a smile in return, before flagging down the waitress, who you might add, was very hot. She ordered a beer for you, a vodka for me, and a water for Kate, who just rolled her eyes as she watched the two of you debate over the best alcohol types. For a moment, it all felt normal, like your life was returning to normal for just a moment. You could feel at peace without worrying about your ex-girlfriends or any curses, or powers whatever someone would phrase it, and just enjoy the time you’re having with the two best friends in the world. Deep down, you knew the three of you could never fully like the Avengers, with Nat leaving Yelena in the Red room, Clint giving himself up to save the world and in return, leaving his wife, kids, and Kate all alone, making Kate’s dream of becoming the next Hawkeye an empty goal, and yourself, who had your heart torn apart twice by two Avengers. 

The pizza came and, within twenty minutes, had been absolutely devoured by the three of you. You felt full, thankfully because God, you had been so hungry. Grinning from ear to ear now, probably because you had drank at least 4 more beers than Yelena and thus you had won your little drinking game, you let out a chuckle. In your head, you felt in that moment, free from all the guilt that had been building up in your consciousness for so long now. The guilt of all of your deaths, the guilt of the pain you had caused by switching lives with them, because you knew it was all over now. You wouldn’t switch again, you couldn’t! You were happy here, for the first time in who knew how long, you were happy with this life, happy with this universe. The haunting trauma of your original universe slipped away in that moment, you couldn’t even remember it. You didn’t have to envision the look in your father’s eyes, the pooled blood, you could just look in your friends eyes and their smiles could make everything okay. Because everything was okay, wasn’t it?

Well, if you ignore that both your exes are currently listed as MIA and you still had a murder case on your hands. That you still had to fix all the problems that were piling up, and that other than Kate’s apartment, you were borderline homeless. Okay, so maybe things weren’t entirely okay, but in your drunk state, you couldn’t really care too much. Yelena, who had stopped drinking before she got too drunk, decided to drive home in Kate’s car and Kate would drive you home in your own car. You sat in the passenger seat, hugging the two hoodies and sniffing into them occasionally. 

“What are you doing, Y/N?” She asked you, to which you responded in a slurred tone, “Smelling them…” You hiccupped. “They still smell like them.”

“Smell like who?”

“They smell like Natty and Wans.”

Kate visibly cringed at the nicknames and rolled her eyes. “I thought you hated them.”

“I doooo.” You insisted, grumbling and lolling your head back. “I hate them so much, but I miss them, Katey!” You bit your lip, trying not to start crying like a loser. “What if they didn’t actually mean to hurt me?” 

“They both cheated on you with each other, Y/N. How could they not mean to?”

“Well, I mean,” you hiccupped, “If they wanted to hurt me, why would Nat keep my hoodies? Why would there be vodka bottles scattered around,” you felt another hiccup slip out. “That doesn’t seem like someone who wants to break a heart does.” 

Kate couldn’t entirely argue with that logic, and thus, the rest of the car ride was filled with music. The lyrics to the song Yelena had taught you floated through the car. 

“Bye, bye, Miss American Pie. Drove the Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry, them good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye, Singing, ‘This'll be the day that I die’. This will be the day that I die”. 

When you got home that night, you were exhausted and very, very drunk. You didn’t really care though, as you flopped down on your bed. You didn’t feel the blood on your arm at first. You didn’t notice until the morning. You had gone to take a shower, and you were examining your back, completely ignoring your arm until you felt a sharp pain on your forearm. Glancing at it, you found that there on your arm, carving into your forearm’s skin, was the black widow’s symbol. 

And a message, of sorts. There were no words, but the symbol said it all. It said only one thing,

You. Deserve. This.

[lightofraye]

The reason(s) I’m anti-Danneel

Hello all!

This is actually my first official anti-Danneel post as opposed to reblogging an anti post or responding to anons who somehow found me.

First, a note: some of what I'm posting are reposts from other now defunct/deactivated Tumblrs that I was able--thanks to the Wayback Machine and/or Tumblr preserving the reblogs with information--so whenever possible, I will credit the original authors. It's because of them that I was able to find out all the crap Danneel had done and the evidence.

If it's a "Jensen said this", don't ask me where precisely, because there are way too many cons, panels, interviews. Just trust that Jensen did say it, okay?

Now... to begin with the biggest crime to lay at Danneel's feet: Abuse.

So I'm going to preface this with a content warning/trigger warning. If you are bothered by description of abuse, even emotional abuse, I advise you to skip. I will not be held responsible for how upsetting this might get. You've been warned.

Now to begin! Here's the issues I've noticed (and others). Hat tip to @taraslittlecorner (now defunct/deactivated) for the original post that I was thankfully able to find on the Wayback Machine.

I'll add a cut here because it's going to get long!

Public Humiliation:

Jensen eating gummy bears. This post was made as a public stab at Jensen for the amount of gummy bears he was eating. It was a stab at not only his eating habits/weight, but it was also a stab at him being greedy or gluttonous.

Jensen on the carousel. Another stab at Jensen about his weight.

The whole AD house tour is full of stabs at Jensen. She takes a swipe at everything from him not wanting to change the children’s diapers, not cleaning the toilets, not cooking, and not being able to organize or clean behind himself. (There’s a lot of sketchy things in that video as well.) She even made fun of him for being proud of his side of the closet for being tidy.

Jensen didn't cry at the birth of his children. Yet another attempt at making an important, emotional moment in Jensen’s life about her, as well making Jensen seem as if he is emotionless and detached from his family and children, and she’s the one that’s so sensitive.

The FBBC interview. Now, that interviewer sucked ass too, let’s not kid ourselves, that was one of the worst interviews I’ve ever seen in my life. Elta continually trying to make Jensen look lazy, saying that he didn’t smell good, saying that she was pregnant knowing it made him uncomfortable. All of this was with one goal, to humiliate him.

The gaslighting hairdresser. You will never convince me Elta put this woman up to posting this photoshopped, off guard, horrible pic of Jensen and herself, as well as disclosing the location of his family in order to make it look as if she’s been there the whole time when really she’s not. Jensen is very self conscious about his appearance, and this showed him in a bad light, again to humiliate him and make him look like a slob. (That seems to be her MO.)

(These are just the ones we’re all familiar with, but if you guys send more receipts you want to add to this I’d be glad to add them to it as a receipt collection.)

2. Controlling: This is another all day topic. Seriously, we could talk all day about how one can be considered controlling in a relationship, and Elta is no different. The biggest and most public thing that we can see is her constant control over his Social Media.

Now, we know good and damn well that she’s also doing this to hold up to her facade of a “happily married couple”, but it’s also a way of controlling his interactions with other women, (originally he was never allowed to follow women on Social Media; something that has recently changed since The Boys and Big Sky has happened), and to keep track of who he’s talking to and what he’s doing.

Access to one’s cellphone, email address, and other social media is almost as good as attaching a GPS onto a person. If she access his cloud, she can access everything from text messages he’s sent to his most recent emails to his employers.

I have some proof but it will take time to document all of them.

**For those SPN buffs out there. You will also notice that Dean got a whole lot less action between the sheets and with female guest stars after his wedding to Elta, and that’s not a coincidence.**

Jealousy, or extreme jealousy in Elta’s case, can also be the mark of an abuser. The NEED to maintain that state of control, and if he get’s attached to another woman that is paying him better attention, he may try and break things off with her.

3. Isolation: If you’ve noticed Jensen hardly sees his family anymore. He used to speak of his family often, now it’s rare that he’s ever seen with them. They usually have to come to Dallas Con just to see him, and the only actual evidence we have of Elta being there with them all in years is a sketchy ass post on Instagram of Thanksgiving a few years back. Jensen did take his dad, brother, and brother-in law to the Nascar event he recently attended. Other than that, there has been little to no evidence of contact with his family at all as the years progressed, and it’s gotten worse as the years pass of that “marriage.”

He also seems to have shorted his circle of friends to people she gets along with. Marcus, Steve, etc. And even on “vacations” it’s surrounded by her little group of mooching family members and friends: New Orleans, she brought her brother and mother, as well as Steve Carlson and Marcus. Marcus even attended the trip to Cali when they went to the Golden Globes after party.

If you really take time and look, he’s rarely seen with anyone that ELTA doesn’t get along with, or are friends with. He doesn’t even hang out with Jared outside of Canada like he used too, and that should raise suspicious eyebrows alone.

4. Hypersensitivity:

We’ve seen this in the countless attacks Elta, as well as her friends, feel the need to do to SPN fans, or anyone that questions the legitimacy of anything she does or post. I don’t have all of these anymore on hand, but will add the links if I can find them. She’s called fans “fat whores”, anti joker face used to have the receipts, they went on for a while. You don’t have to dig very deep to find this stuff people.

She’s even had Clif write long ass post in order to make it looks as if she’s been so targeted when she just really brings all this shit on herself. She feels threatened because somewhere deep down, she knows she’s doing wrong. You know how the old saying goes, the guilty dog barks? Well, Elta barks a lot.

Even Jensen can get a little defensive when they attack her at cons and to his face. He knows that if he doesn’t defend her, or trys to stand up for himself there will be repercussions. “I don’t tell my wife what to do. I’m not stupid, or suicidal.”

5. Unexplained injury, or weight-loss: Since about 2018, Jensen has progressively lost weight. To the point that the FBBC instagram page even removed the photo I used in this example because people were commenting on Jensen’s weightloss. They try to explain it away in marathon training, but we all know that’s not the case. The constant attacks she’s made against his weight are starting to show.

Every time Jensen has to quarantine with her he starts to look like death warmed over, weight drop, sickly looking skin color, (which is also a sign of malnutrition), and that dead look we can’t get seem to forget. Then we get him back to work, and it’s almost an immediate improvement.

Then there is the chunk that’s missing out of his nose now because of a nose injury that kept being explained in different instances at the same event as to how he even got it. It first appeared a day after the FBBC family reunion event that took place in May of 2018 in a post made by Elta of Jensen playing with the kids, and people thought it was just a breathe right strip.

If you look closely, you can even see that his eyes looked to be blacked, as if he’d somehow broken his nose.Once he got ot an event for Elta’s Limbo Jewelry line launch in NYC, he kept changing the story as to how he got said injury. First he told fans that he’d hurt it by hitting a pool wall while playing with his kids. Then he said he’d dropped a keg on it. Well, if you’ve ever worked for a bar or been around kegs you know those things are heavy, and that story is a blatant lie.

CONSTANTLY SHIFTING STORIES OF HOW AN INJURY OCCURRED ARE ONE HELL OF A RED FLAG PEOPLE!!

If it were Elta with the injury, and she kept changing the story as to how she got it, there would have been questions asked; but since Jensen is a man it was never looked into.

Take all these for what you will guys! It’s only my observations and opinions! You may not agree, but I know you all can agree that if Jensen were female, this conversation would have happened a LONG time ago.

Men can be victims of domestic abuse/violence, and the evidence is there! I’m sure there is more, and if you send it to me via submission, even if you want to keep quiet and not put your handle on there I will add the evidence to this post.

THIS MAN DESERVES BETTER!!

[cripplecharacters]

1/3 Hi, my question is about shaving as an amputee. My character is a soldier in the 1940s whose left arm was amputated. After a few months, he's learned to do most things one-handed, but I thought shaving his face might be something he'd have trouble with, since there are areas where you have to stretch the skin with the non-razor hand for a close shave. (The resources I found on shaving one-handed said to use an electric razor; my character would likely only have access to a safety razor.)

2/3 I thought it might be sweet to have his lover help him with shaving, and I wrote a scene where he reflects on how, although he prefers to be independent, he really enjoys the intimacy of having his partner do this for him, and it’s something they both look forward to. My questions are: A. Is it realistic that my character would not be able to shave his face well with a safety razor? (I mention him getting nicks and uneven spots in hard-to-get areas).

3/3 B. Does the scenario I described, with him enjoying having his partner shave him, seem unrealistic or offensive in any way? C. If it’s not realistic for him to still struggle with shaving about 4 months out from shaving, would it still make sense to have the partner shave him sometimes because they discovered how much they both liked it when he did need help? Thank you so much! I’ve learned a lot from following this blog, and I really appreciate all that you do.

As a disclaimer, currently none of us mods are amputees.

To answer your questions:

A. Yes, this does seem fairly realistic. It can be pretty difficult to shave many parts of your body without a second hand to stabilize, and the face especially has a lot of different planes that can make it even more difficult. If he had a remaining stump that he could bring up to his face to stretch the skin with, it would likely make it easier. But of course this depends on where his arm was amputated and how much mobility he has remaining in it.

B. This scenario doesn't seem unrealistic or offensive to me. It seems pretty sweet – your character has a lot of independence, but needs extra help for some things, ans his partner does it because he loves him. This is pretty common when it comes to a lot of disabilities, including amputation. Sometimes the extra help comes from a person, sometimes from assistive devices.

C. Again, it can definitely be realistic, but it also can make sense to have the partner shave his face sometimes (or all the time, or almost all the time) because they have discovered they both enjoy this as a form of love, care, and/or intimacy. Helping your partner with grooming or personal care things is something even non-disabled people do for each other. My partner and I like to brush each other's hair, and neither of us have any conditions that make it hard for us to do it ourselves. It's just a nice moment of togetherness and we're helping each other.

In summary: it makes sense for your character's partner to help him with something that is more difficult for him, even if your character is capable of doing it. It can be sweet and intimate for the both of them, and it is reasonable for the partner of your disabled character to do something for him as long as they're both okay with it. It can definitely be a way of showing that they both love each other and are okay with being vulnerable with each other.

Hope this helps!

– mod sparrow

[ticklishraspberries]

hi

I read your post about your courage to talk about tickling in therapy. And that you are thinking about sharing bits of it with us. ❤️‍🩹 If you feel comfortable? Please, do so. I started therapy a while ago, but haven’t had the courage or mental unloading level to talk about this chapter, tbh.

Hello!! I'm gonna use your ask as the place to talk about this, so yes, I really hope this can possibly be helpful to you and others!! This is mostly going to be about dealing with shame surrounding tickling and sort of...why I think it became a kink for me? Trigger warnings for mentions of grooming, sexual abuse, and pornography.

So, I grew up with unrestricted internet access as a child. My parents had no idea how to deal with growing technology, and they really didn't understand how to put child safety features on or how to even check the history, so I could pretty much do whatever I wanted.

From a very young age, I started experiencing the feeling that I thought about tickling differently than other people, but there wasn't really shame about it, I just knew that it...mattered more to me than others? I would describe it as more of a fixation, and now as an adult who has been diagnosed with autism, I'd say it might have something to do with that.

As a very young child, I would look up things about tickling, and I was immediately met with fetish content. Back in the early 2000's, even fanfiction was mostly sexual. Harry Potter ticklefics were all, like, an underage Hermione being non-consensually tickled by magical plants, or Voldemort or Snape using it to torture Harry.

As an impressionable child, I began to internalize the idea that this likely innocent interest in tickling was a dark, perverted sexual deviance and developed a debilitating sense of shame towards it. It's why the word would make me cringe, why I stopped letting my family do it to me, why I would feel disgusted and embarrassed when it happened in shows and movies.

Recently, my partner, our mutual best friend, and I had this very deep talk about fetishes. We all have one that we are deeply ashamed of (obviously I'm not going to share theirs) and both of them have never judged me for a single second about tickling. Whenever it happened in media we were watching, my friend expressed not knowing how to handle it for my sake, because I would very clearly get uncomfortable.

He encouraged me to really think about why it made me uncomfortable, especially in a room with 2 of the only people in my life who would never judge me for it, and I decided to take his advice and really dwell on it.

There had been a reason that I had to bring it up in therapy previously, it's a long and frankly far too personal story to share, but I had really danced around what it was and my therapist ended up asking if she could guess what I was talking about, and she correctly guessed that it was tickling. My therapist is super chill and comfortable talking about literally anything with me, and she didn't make me feel judged at all. In fact, she was like, "I think a lot of people find that hot as like, foreplay at least!" and fully promised me that it was normal and nothing to be ashamed of.

Basically, with a mixture of self-reflection, discussing it in therapy, and talking about it with my partner and our friend, I have come to this conclusion: Being exposed to tickling as a sexual fetish at such a young age, as a child with no prior concept of what sex was or consent or anything, I was conditioned by pornography and inappropiate fanfiction/fanart the believe that there is something perverted and predatory about me liking tickling.

As someone with sexual trauma that was occurring around the same age that I discovered these things online, seeing the constant non-consensual and underage elements in these things made me see myself in the same light as people who were abusing me.

The ironic thing about this is, tickling is not inherently sexual to me, but I never let myself experience it platonically until very recently, because I was convinced I could not separate the sexual aspect from the innocent fixation. Tickling between myself and my platonic friends, or just playful/romantic tickling with my partner is also fun for me, and it doesn't turn me on. But I really struggled to acknowledge that these things could coexist, because I only ever saw the sexual side of it at the most impressionable age.

I have really bad intrusive thoughts, and a lot of self-esteem issues that make it very hard for me to trust myself and view myself in a positive way, so my mentally ill brain essentially convinced me that I was perverted, that I was a predator, etc. for simply...liking tickling. Even though logically I can understand that I am not a bad person, I don't want to non-consensually tickle people, I value consent, all of those important things, I felt like there was just something inherently wrong about liking it, and so, while I have preached being comfortable with it on this blog, I didn't even realize how deeply I have hated myself for years for it.

That is one reason why I think this blog and this community have been therapeutic for me, and why I still rarely write NSFW fanfiction. Tickling is a kink for me, yes, but I can fully separate when a situation is sexual or not. Recently, I have been able to start healing this. The friend I mentioned earlier knows how I feel about tickling and is still comfortable with it happening between us, which has really helped me begin to view it as a fun/safe/platonic thing again, and I'm getting way better at not getting uncomfortable when it happens in media.

My therapist has suggested doing some deeper work on this, but I kind of feel like I got to the bottom of the problem and am already feeling a lot better about it. However, I'm sure it will come up again.

I just wanted to share this because I always said talking about tickling in therapy would be my worst nightmare, that I would never do it, etc. and it ended up being a really positive experience that has made me so much more comfortable in myself and liking tickling.

I hope this could be insightful or helpful to some of you!! Thanks if you read this far.

[sufferu]

Your fantastic writing skills gave me angst I demand compensation. Lol. You gave me a lot to think about and I have to say, in my nearly 9 years of being an avid fanfic reader. A writer never made me THIS invested.

After being abandoned by everyone, do you think subaru will go to Priscilla? She was the only one who saw his side.

I have to say tho I get Subaru's side more. He can't control RBD. If anyone had the power to bring back loved ones they would. I'm sure Ferris wouldn't hesitate to save crush. I think everybody is so upset that they tunnel visioned and didn't do right by him. Everything is outside of his control. He doesn't choose to come back. But he is, so he tries to save more people everytime.

Subaru obviously has issues. And I don't like the way the re zero narrative punishes him for using RBD. Meanwhile, Al is over here spaming reset with no consequences.

The world hates Subaru and the rest of the cast blame him. He is trying harder then ANYONE to LIVE, but they call him a suicidal monster.

I’m so glad that you’re enjoying my fic! That is some high praise right there, lol: I do hope to meet those expectations going forward ;)

Though I will say…I am approaching this from a slightly different angle. For starters — this will be a lot clearer in the actual chapter than it was in this ficlet, but Arc 5 does not go the same way it does in canon, hence how Subaru managed to save EVERYONE and capture/kill literally every attacking Archbishop in Priestella. This is the main reason why everyone is so angry and devastated. If it were canon Arc 5, things might have gone differently. …Then again, Arc 8 DOES exist. So maybe we would have ended up in this situation someday regardless.

But also…well.

Return By Death isn’t JUST a powerful ability that Subaru has access to: it is the epitome of weaponized self-destruction, in which he can literally sacrifice himself over and over again for the sake of those around him whether they like it or not. He is fully capable of taking all their pain on himself, of placing himself in unimaginably horrible situations on other people’s behalf, and doing it for…maybe even all of eternity, depending on how things go. If you’ve ever read The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas by Ursula K Le Guin — Subaru has the potential to basically become That for the entirety of Lugunica. And even worse: if he’s employed as a knight, it is arguably his sworn duty to do exactly that, because a knight is a profession in which one lays down their life for the people they want to protect. What does that turn into when the knight can do that again and again, indefinitely?

The cast of Re:Zero shows every sign that they would absolutely fucking hate the idea of being reliant on something that disgusting. Julius sacrifices his reputation to try and keep Subaru alive, Tivey and Hetaro declare that throwing away one’s life for a cause is a fucking joke, Ferris has this whole thing about valuing life to the point where just a hint of Subaru being suicidal sends him into an actual nervous breakdown, Vincent is raked through the coals for his attempt to sacrifice himself for his country just that one time by both the narrative and the people around him, Arc 4 exists — there’s A Lot that points to most of these characters finding the idea of this cycle of repeated sacrifice bring just AWFUL, and even to the idea that they’d actively take offense to someone attempting to do such a thing on their behalf.

There is one exception to this rule, however, and that is Priscilla Barielle — who actively praises subjects that sacrifice themselves for her, who forces Aldebaran to reset whenever he does something she doesn’t like, who praised Subaru as a brilliant knight when he was (narratively speaking) at his very worst, who symbolizes the mechanisms of fate itself, who’s final moment involved her sacrificing herself for her homeland, and who is in every way the pinnacle of the Sword Wolf that Vollachia praises as the ideal subject (VOLLACHIA, mind you, which is a nation that has the whole Muspel contract going on). Priscilla is an actual monster, an awful personality, and the antithesis of the themes of Re:Zero. So her siding with Subaru in this instance is — completely in character, but it’s one of the most damning things I feel I could have done.

(I am glad that someone was able to actually connect with her though — was afraid that I made her too cartoonishly evil lmao)

As for what’s happening to Subaru now…well, you’re right about the end of that duel being the rock bottom of his character’s state in this fic. But — just because he was fired from his post doesn’t mean he’s being ABANDONED. They can’t afford to abandon a time traveler to be left to his own devices, first of all. But also, even in they’re all Very Angry with him right now…all these people still love him an awful lot. There’s a reason Wilhelm decided to duel him for the position and take the blame for his removal all upon himself, instead of doing something that would leave Subaru more at the mercy of public opinion. And there’s a reason Crusch’s idea of “suicide watch” was basically, “Hey, Wilhelm, do you want a new grandchild?” instead of something like “Let’s imprison him in the catacombs of the Kingdom.” They DO care about him. That’s the problem.

[tryanmybest]

whatever's supposed to happen in season 3 aside, i'm delusional

please enjoy silly ideas about what muriel, crowley, maggie, and nina get up to while aziraphale's gone :)

maggie and nina RUSH to crowley once they find out aziraphale left

both of them know the feeling of rejection and they support him as much as they can

they give him helpful breakup advice and check up on him periodically

over time, the three become good friends

maggie and nina are endlessly curious about the whole heaven/hell/angel/demon/universe thing and crowley answers what questions he can

since crowley's still not bound to hell, the three of them just vibe most of the time

muriel joins them on occasion, when they're not reading a new book

crowley, despite maggie and nina telling him it might be better to keep his distance from the shop for a bit, checks in on muriel and teaches them how to properly take care of the bookshop

as in, don't sell any of the books, don't rearrange any of the books, close and open whenever you want, etc.

occasionally, muriel, maggie, and nina will organize sort of "storytimes" where crowley shares some stories from his past

it starts with the ones without aziraphale. it's still a bit too raw to tell those.

but, eventually, he tells the story of elspeth in edinburgh. or the lost unicorn on noah's arc (which maggie swears she knew were real this whole time)

maggie and nina also teach muriel how to properly blend in with humans

they're not the BEST at it, but they're good enough that they can go get hot cocoa from nina's shop without people staring at them

crowley teaches muriel how to perform miracles. although, angelic miracles are just a bit different than demonic ones. so they both kind of figure it out together

muriel ends up miracling aziraphale's wardrobe to fit them. those are the human clothes they have access to, afterall.

and, besides, the style suits them.

crowley smiles at the look and doesn't comment on it. and nina gives him a reassuring pat on the shoulder.

muriel shares the stories they've read with maggie, who listens enthusiastically

nina suggests muriel write a story of their own

regular customers at give me coffee or give me death now recognize the bookshop owner often in the corner pondering a laptop

nina taught them how to use it. crowley whispers to them that if they tell the laptop what to do with a bit of miraculous energy, it's a lot easier

maggie shows muriel some music. it's so much better than the celestial harmonies that they've had to hear for all these years

they end up liking everything they're shown. from aziraphale's old classical records they found in the bookshop to the queen that plays from crowley's car

muriel adores the bentley. and the bentley eventually warms up to them.

crowley takes muriel to see more of earth, once

well, more of england anyway

there's one time during the drive that the queen melts into an unfamiliar song. something about angels and nightingales.

crowley puts a fist to the dash and it switches back to queen before muriel can grasp what it is

while they're far from the city, the stars are much brighter

muriel hasn't had the chance to see them until then

and crowley tells them another story. about nebulas and galaxies and how they're made. and how gorgeous they really are up close.

muriel doesn't understand why crowley gets so sad talking about something he loves

sometimes residents of the street ask where mr. fell went

maggie and nina will respond that maybe you should mind your own business and they're sure he has his reasons

muriel will smile and say that he's gone on to heaven. then get confused when people offer their condolences

crowley doesn't say anything.

ms sandwich can put together that aziraphale and crowley were an item, though.

and she can certainly see that they aren't anymore

eventually, after a few months, maggie and nina start officially dating

muriel happens to be reading some of aziraphale's romance novels, and they find nina and maggie's relationship utterly adorable

if they ever mention as much tho, nina will tell them to piss off while maggie gets flustered

once, muriel asks maggie and nina when they figured out that they had feelings for each other

crowley is around at that time

muriel, excited by maggie and nina's answers turns to crowley and starts to ask him when he realized he was in love with aziraphale. but they trail off

nina had told them that crowley's not great at talking about aziraphale all the time

they have to wait until he brings it up, okay?

muriel apologizes, but crowley waves a hand

he explains the experience of the first rain

and maggie GASPS

"the rain! back when you were trying to get me and nina together! that was YOU."

crowley just offers a half-smirk and a thumbs-up

that's all ive got for now.

[taffycandyqt]

Hiya! I rlly like your writing :D and I saw you wrote for my pookies 03 Casey and April so can I ask for hcs in how they would would react if during a fight with the purple dragons or shredder their s/o just pulled out like a gun or some random weapon and said “I’m usually a healer but!”

Thank youuuuuu I'm so glad you like my writing! Can I just say this request made me laugh 😂

Oh! She was Armed!

fluff, crack

03' April & Casey

Walking home from a lovely date night you ended up having a not so lovely encounter with the purple dragons. Of course your going to do your part to protect your partner.

April:

April was the best girlfriend you could've asked for. That's why you decided to treat her to the best dinner out you could afford.

Deciding to end the perfect date with a romantic walk home, you did NOT expect to meet up with the purple dragons.

Obviously not wanting to end the night in a gang fight you would both attempt to walk the other direction.

Key word 'attempt'

Because of course they would see you

And of course they would stop you

and OF COURSE they would recognize April as an ally of the turtles

BECAUSE OF COURSE

so now you and April are cornered by the purple dragons in a different alleyway that might as well be the same one with how nasty it was.

and you know what, could April handle herself? Yes, yes she could.

But you'd swallow gasoline before you'd let the purple dragons get all up in her face

So now you are standing between April and the purple dragons with crowbars, bats, and pocket knives pointed at your face.

you decided to stall, maybe they would get bored of you, or maybe the turtles would show up in time to get the off your backs.

That was wishful thinking though and any of those thoughts evaporated the second one of them struck April.

Oh HECK NAH

"Normally I'm the medic, but-"

So you did what any rational and clear minded person would do.

You pulled out a taser and went to town on the thick headed freaks.

Safe to say April was surprised. Not that she was complaining, your the reason you both got home safe after all.

You were just usually more of a pacifist.

You'll feel bad for letting her get hurt but honestly, she's too surprised by your 180 flip in personality to care.

After the initial shock wears off she'll assure you that everything's fine and that she's had worse injuries.

She'll still let you take care of there until you feel better though.❤️

Casey:

Normally you'd be in the armored car during fights with the med kit.

That way you could patch up any serious injuries the others would get.

Not to mention your not much of a fighter.

However, the armored car wasn't really an option anymore seeing as during a fight with the Shredder it was promptly flipped on its back.

Not being able to really leave the fight you assured Casey from the side lines that you were okay.

He acknowledged you and you went to hide while you watched the fight unfold.

That was until Foot soldiers found you and took you right to the Shredders side.

The turtles, Casey, and Splinter were all *panik*😰

One thing the soldiers didn't do however, was block you off from your access to your gun.

Sometimes it payed to look like someone who wouldn't conceal carry.

as the others tried to negotiate with Shredder for your life you slowly and carefully grabbed and clicked your gun.

Then you shot one of the soldiers in the foot. (Foot got shot in the foot, hehe. I'm funny)

The second the one let go you shot the other in the arm and that gave the others enough of an opening to get Shredder away from you and continue the fight.

All but Casey.

Bro was FLABBERGASTED

YOU HAD A GUN!?

since when?

From where?

Honestly, he thinks its hot.

Is a lot less worried about you being on you own in New York.

Don't get me wrong, he still gets worried. He's just glad you have a means of protection on you.

[theamityelf]

ignore this if you’ve already said something like this, but do you have any headcannons on Danganronpa characters with Percy Jackson godly parents.

Oooh, so like the inverse of my PJO Danganronpa AU! I haven't done that yet. I'm torn between just giving a straightforward, in-a-vacuum answer for this, and fully migrating the characters into the Percy Jackson universe and letting that inform my answer. I'm doing the latter now, but you can send another ask if you want "in a vacuum". Also, I might have a different answer if I think about it longer.

THH

Makoto- I think I want him to be a mortal, for this. I think I want it to be a Rachel situation, where he accidentally ends up involved in a quest with some of the demigods, and then he gains godly powers of some kind as a reward or consequence of helping them. I see him interning for a god, after everything is over. Maybe he's an operator for Iris. Very humble beginnings, is what I'm saying. It's wild that he keeps having a pivotal role in saving the world, and showing up in prophecies, and being approached by the gods themselves. He's not innately powerful; they just think he's neat. If I had to give him a godly parent, though, it'd probably be Hestia. Even as a mortal, I might say he has the blessing of Hestia...which is a thing I just made up, btw. If Hestia has any equivalent for Artemis's Hunters, he's one. Just a person who hangs out with Hestia and doing hero stuff with the blessings of Hestia. Instead of Artemis's values of wilderness, archery, etc., he champions Hestia's values of home, hearth, family, and safety. I feel like he's been offered immortality but turned it down. (Side option: he's a satyr. Not what I'm going with, but it's an option.)

Sayaka- My first thought is Apollo, for the arts and music, but I'm also feeling her as an Aphrodite kid who can charmspeak. Yeah, I think Aphrodite for her. Her skills as a singer and dancer are her own.

Leon- Oh gosh. Gotta be Apollo, I guess. Baseball = archery. He does both. And he thinks he can tap into his dad's musical gifts without any respect for them, which is why he fails.

Mukuro- Ares. And she has the same mortal mother as Junko. (An argument could be made for Athena, but I'm going with Ares.)

Junko- I like Dionysus's association with madness and frivolity, for her, and I do want to go with a god or goddess who very much isn't about what Junko is about, just to keep from letting her unique vibe be lost to some hand-wave about godly inheritance. I don't want to go with one of the scary-sounding ones. (Plus, if this were taking place in Camp Half-Blood, which I doubt it actually is, being the daughter of the camp director would allow her to avoid scrutiny in a lot of ways.) That's my in-a-vacuum answer. But...I think the not-in-a-vacuum answer has to be Apollo. First of all, he's Apollo in both Greek and Roman form; she has access to both "camps" in a way many don't. Second of all, I like the idea that she has a twisted version of Apollo's gifts. The gift of prophecy is the tedium of foresight. The gift of sunrise is the curse of waking– the inevitable end of comfort. The gift of art is a deadly creativity. No one thinks to pay that much attention to another Apollo kid; Apollo has lots of kids! But she's secretly very dangerous.

Chihiro- Ooh! Ooh! Hecate. Besides being the goddess of magic, she's also the goddess of crossroads, which fits Chihiro's personality and talent. (Like, imagine a computer program as a set of crossroads. Each branch of an if statement, etc.) Also, it would be cool if Chihiro can do magic.

Mondo- That has to be Hermes, right? He looks like an Ares kid, but travel and outcasts are way more in Hermes' domain. Mondo would love to have winged shoes.

Taka- For some reason I'm really getting Demeter vibes. If pressed to defend it, I can imagine someone wondering how someone so "uptight" could have a nature goddess as a mom, since nature is so chaotic, and Taka responding that animals are chaotic, but argiculture and crops are very orderly and precise. There is a right and wrong time to sow anything, a right and wrong time to reap anything. Oh, I think I'm getting Demeter from his "staple food source" line. That's it.

Hifumi- Another Apollo.

Celeste- So many ways to go about this. First of all, do I want one she would be proud of and lean into, or one she would be embarrassed by and overcompensate for? Right away, I'm feeling Dionysus for her. I even said in one of my "Kamukura Wrangler AU" posts that her eyes are wine-colored, and her self-indulgence just seems so great for Dionysus. But Nike would also be a cool one, both for her Ultimate and for how much she would hate being associated with the sports shoe brand. I can imagine a gag where Celeste proudly says "I am a daughter of Nike," and Aoi cheerfully replies, "Oooh, I love Nike's!" Celeste would be so annoyed. I genuinely can't choose; they're both so great.

Sakura- I'm not feeling Ares at all. I can see Athena, but...Sakura's strength isn't really for war. She works hard and strives for excellence, but she's a practitioner of martial arts for their own sake, not to exert them over people outside the constraints of sanctioned contest. I'm not feeling a war god for her. If I were going to put her anywhere, she'd be partway between the strategy/wisdom aspect of Athena (so, more Minerva) and the arts aspect of Apollo. I think what I'll say is that she's a daughter of Deimos, god of fear and dread, which manifests in the way others react to her. The effect wears off if someone takes the time to try to feel anything for her but fear, but a lot of people don't. She herself is very peaceable and kind, and she values her friendship with anyone who doesn't fear her.

Aoi- I think Nike makes maybe the most sense, but I'm going to give her Poseidon because I want to. Despite being able to breathe underwater, she usually holds her breath while swimming, because she likes to. She finds the challenge thrilling. If she's breathing underwater, it's usually for social reasons like talking to fish or sea nymphs. And having her intelligence underestimated is very Percy Jackson of her.

Byakuya- Oh, I'm torn. My first thought was Hades, specifically because he would be insufferable if he was a child of the Big Three (though Pluto would be more apt, because riches), but in keeping with his mortal family's whole deal, and my aim for the THH group to all be in the Greek pantheon, I think Athena is the fit for him. His father is still a Togami; Byakuya was given to his father by Athena, born from her head. That's part of his justification for his inflated sense of his own competency. Not only is he the Togami heir; he's also a son of Athena. Imagine canon Byakuya if his mother was also a goddess. He's going to be insufferable, and I'm fine with that.

Kyoko- She...So the thing is, she...She said she can hear the footsteps of the god of death, and...Once again, I'm tempted to say Hades, or perhaps Thanatos. I'll go a different way with it, though; I feel like making her dad a god feels too close to outsourcing her feelings of abandonment from Jin onto the inherent premise of the Percy Jackson universe, and I don't want to do that. Jin has to just be a mortal absentee father. (Although daughter-of-the-god-of-death Kyoko would be so, so cool in a vacuum. And her gloves could be partially because her touch can kill. AHHH!) I'm going to say Nyx. Goddess of night. Helpful for a detective (like, she can probably see in the dark and stuff), but not fully making her detective skills a direct byproduct of her godly parentage. Plus, Nyx is the mother of Thanatos, meaning her hearing the footsteps of the god of death can still be relevant. The real question is how Jin had a kid with night itself.

Toko- It's either gonna be Apollo or Aphrodite, and I'm going with Aphrodite. Toko would have a field day with "What? You've never seen such an ugly daughter of Aphrodite?!" But also exposure therapy for her deep resentment of attractive people. They're her siblings, and they care about her and defend her, even if she's kind of sour.

Hiro- Gotta be Apollo. He's great at random day-to-day prophecy.

SDR2

Hajime- I'm thinking he's also a mortal who something supernatural happened to. Maybe he was chosen as the Oracle of Delphi, or maybe he was abducted and given trace amounts of ambrosia until something weird happened to him (to create Izuru). Maybe both. Whatever the case, the answer is none, lol. I'm feeling "bored Oracle" for him.

Imposter- Um, Janus. God of beginnings, gates/doorways/transitions, time, duality, and endings. Initially, I said this because Janus is depicted with two faces and that seemed fitting for an imposter, but I think the focus on choices and transitions also suits someone whose sense of self is so fluid.

Teruteru- I think it's gotta be Bacchus for him.

Mahiru- I wish I could give her Iris, but I want this cast (except Hajime) to be Roman! So I'll say Minerva.

Peko- Bellona. Same/similar backstory with Fuyuhiko, though; she's just a demigod who got abandoned and left with a well-known family of demigods.

Hiyoko- I'm giving her Apollo for now, but I'm open to changing that.

Ibuki- Discordia, goddess of discord and troublemaking. (As you can see, I like giving the most dangerous people benign ones and vice versa.) Ibuki likes noise, she values her own uniqueness, and just generally I think this one works for her.

Mikan- Gotta be Apollo, for the healing. This means she and Hiyoko would be half-siblings, which certainly paints their relationship in an interesting way.

Nekomaru- You know what? I'll give him Jupiter. His eyebrows are lightning, and I never give him attention in my other AUs, so he can have Jupiter.

Gundham- I am feeling Diana for him. Yes, I know, but still. It's cool. The wilderness, the moon, it all just suits his vibe so well. The impact this would have on his backstory is manageable. Everything said to be the case about his mother can just be about a human step-mother.

Nagito- I kind of want to make him the Octavian equivalent. Like, a legacy of Apollo who serves as the Roman augur. Parallels with Hajime being the Oracle on the Greek side. He has a unique relationship with Fortuna that parallels Makoto's unique relationship with Hestia.

Chiaki- Going with Somnus, god of sleep. She has the ability to make others tired, but she chooses not to use it like that. Mostly, she exercises her power over herself so that she can power nap frequently and stay up all night playing video games.

Akane- I feel complicated feelings about saying this, but I really think Venus for her. The reason I feel complicated about it is that it feels too close to giving the people who mistreated her in her life a magical excuse, but I feel like even ignoring that whole aspect of her backstory, she doesn't read to me as a daughter of a war god or goddess; she reads as a passionately emotional person who is inured to hardship/loss and values strength as a result of the environment in which she was brought up.

Fuyuhiko- I'm going to say he's a distant legacy of Pluto and a direct son of Minerva. This would make him half-siblings with Mahiru.

Sonia- Daughter of Pluto. It would be cool if she could summon gems and precious metals. And she would also enjoy speaking with the dead.

Kazuichi- Gotta be Vulcan.

V3

Kaede- I almost didn't go with Apollo just because I said it so many times, but then I remembered that moment in Chapter 6 where the in-universe lore suddenly decided that Kaede had a twin, just to service a bait-and-switch about her being another Junko, and with that in mind, her also being a daughter of Apollo is just more of a connection to Junko.

Shuichi- I am feeling Nemesis for Shuichi. Goddess of retribution, evening the scales. It fits his kind of...simple? Way of viewing the world, where punitive justice isn't something that he enjoys, but rather something that he finds inevitable.

Rantaro- Hermes, certainly. The travel aspect, the social aspect.

Ryoma- He's a Nike, I think. He is burdened by victory and excellence.

Kirumi- If anyone gets Hera or Juno, it would be her. I think I will say Vesta, though. The Roman form of Hestia. She is less blessed by Vesta than burdened with the compulsion to satisfy everyone.

Angie- Ooooh, despite the obvious connections between Apollo and art, I'm feeling Morpheus for her: she knows everyone's dreams. Her art skills are just a separate thing where she practiced and got good at a genuine hobby of hers. Her demigod abilities are her insights into the minds, wants, and fears of others. Also, I'm going to say she has frequent waking dreams and waking nightmares, because it feels right for her whole vibe.

Tenko- I wanted to go Athena or Bellona, but I think I'm actually feeling Mars for her. She probably becomes a Huntress of Artemis, or works under Circe.

Korekiyo- I checked to make sure the Muses count as goddesses, and it seems they do. Therefore, I'm going with Clio, Muse of history.

Miu- Gotta go Hephaestus.

Gonta- I feel like it's got to be either Apollo or Athena for him. I'll say Athena, since his devotion to a particular study reads as an Athena kid trait to me.

Kokichi- There is a part of me that really wants to say Hermes. But I think I'll say Dionysus. Dionysus is the god of wine, parties, madness, chaos, and the theater. I think a lot of that energy is what Kokichi both thrives on and languishes in– especially theater.

Kaito- Is Astraios too obvious? He's getting Astraios. He feels drawn to the stars, and I don't think he loses anything if that feeling becomes supernatural.

Maki- Okay, she'll be a daughter of Thanatos. But she lies about it at first. And she can kill someone with a touch, but only if she chooses to, so touching her is an act of trust. (Cue sentimental moment where one of her friends, probably Kaito, touches her arm or something and she's surprised.)

Himiko- I kind of want to be subversive and not say Hecate, but I will actually give her Hecate. She would be really proud of it.

Kiibo- Well, he's a robot. Maybe an automaton made by a child of Hephaestus or Vulcan.

Tsumugi- She gets Janus, too.

[bluedalahorse]

Morning commute thoughts about Sara and Wilhelm

Well, okay. Maybe you can have a little meta, as a treat.

I pretty firmly believe that we’re supposed to see connections/parallels between how Sara treats Simon and how Wilhelm treats Simon, especially by the end of season 1 and then moving into season 2.

Consider how:

Sara and Wilhelm both betray Simon at the end of season 1. Wilhelm by denying his involvement in the video, Sara by letting August buy her silence.

Both Sara and Wilhelm think they can hold August accountable by acting alone. They do this without asking Simon what he thinks is best or enlisting the support of trustworthy adults. Sara attempts to emotionally support August enough that he holds himself accountable, while Wilhelm goes on a classic revenge spree. Neither approach is 100% effective because they’re working alone and because both of them are up against untrustworthy adults working behind the scenes (the royal court) who make situations worse.

Even when things are fraught for the reasons mentioned above, we still see evidence that they care for Simon and that their relationship with him is worth preserving. Wilhelm and Simon’s moment where they take a running shortcut at rowing practice is one of them. Sara hugging Simon after he sings his song is another. There’s more, too! I will let y’all find those things as I’m late for work.

Both of them have their poor decisions clouded by first love. Sara gives August more space than she probably should to change because they’re in love with one another (something that’s been brewing even before the video, so even if August never released the video, they still might have had some kind of relationship even though it may have looked very different.) She also assumes Simon’s scars from the video have faded somewhat so it’s okay to keep pursuing her relationship. (How many of us have assumed something affected someone less than we thought it did only to later find out we were wrong? Certainly I did, when I was a teenager.) Wilhelm, meanwhile, is in love with Simon, but at the beginning he is far from being a Model Boyfriend. He initially attempts to pressure Simon into a secret relationship and does stuff like read Simon’s texts. This is frightening enough when it comes from someone the same social class as you, but Wilhelm is a prince with a lot more access to wealth and people who can like… request your phone records and stuff. He never uses his power that way and I don’t think it occurred to him to, but I think we’re supposed to understand that this could have gone south if he didn’t have people like Boris helping him. (Meanwhile, Sara’s romance with August feels like a more dramatic betrayal in some ways than Wilhelm reading Simon’s texts and Wilhelm denying he was with Simon on live TV, but Wilhelm also has a lot more institutional power behind him while Sara is in a relationship when she lacks institutional power and her intimate partner has a lot to hold over her if their relationship sours.) The show is very clear that falling in love is a morally neutral thing—falling in love, whether it’s with a “generally good” or a “generally bad” person, is something you can’t control, but the choices you make as a result of being in love are what defines your moral stance. By the end of season 2, Wilhelm has grown and made the choice to express his love for Simon in more conscientious ways. He becomes aware of the role his status plays. Meanwhile, Sara has chosen to give up her first love—even with the possibility that she could face brutal retaliation from her partner—to try and achieve justice for Simon’s sake.

I feel like we’re 100% meant to see these parallels and feel equal amounts of sympathy for Wilhelm and Sara as they grow and work out who they are in the world and what they can do next. Which is why if I had to guess, Wilhelm and Sara having a bonding moment will play some role in Simon’s reconciliation with Sara. And even if it doesn’t, I guarantee you that the writers were thinking of them as having parallel arcs.

Anyway, I love both Wilhelm and Sara so much. They both have amazing growth! That’s why I want to see them interact and become friends.

[jayz4dayz]

RWBY Volume 9 Was A Total Missed Opportunity:

Putting this out there right now. Volume 9 is by far my favorite volume of RWBY for many reasons which I will not be addressing in this post, but there are a few things that have been on my mind since it's been released where I feel the storyline went wrong and could have been something so much more meaningful for the character's story arcs and development.

Starting off with our main man or should I say our old man Jaune Arc. His presence throughout Vol. 9 felt out of place not just for his character, but also the way his development was handled didn't feel right in the slightest. Becoming a crazy old crackpot because he foolishly made bad decision after bad decision, completely altering and undoing a lot of his character's timeline, and turning into this sort of secondary antagonist for Team RWBY made no sense to me. The way he said so many out of pocket things throughout the different episodes, including completely crossing a line with Ruby and being insensitive towards her mental and emotional condition instead of showing genuine concern like he normally would have, made me cringe to where I wasn't enjoying what I was watching anymore. Not in a good way!

Here's how I would have done it:

Going back to the very end of volume 8 where we see Jaune running towards the portal and barely missing it by mere inches, followed by seeing him fall into the dark abyss and joining the same fate as Team RWBY and Neo. Instead of that, we see him jumping through the portal at the very last second and making it to Vacuo by the skin of his teeth. The others see him and question why he's alone and where Team RWBY was, only for him to go "Uh..." and then the screen cuts to black and the credits start rolling.

We're gonna skip the three year hiatus and jump right into the beginning of Vol. 9 where only Team RWBY and Neo have fallen into the Ever After. For the first few episodes leading up to the reveal of the Rusted Knight, I don't think much needs to change except for the fact that they won't ever encounter Jaune, but they will still encounter the Rusted Knight who, in this version, is someone that would have had the entire fandom shook to their core when the big reveal of the Rusted Knight's identity happened: Pyrrha.

Now, how would she get to this point, you might ask? Well, remember when she got pierced by Cinder's Arrow and her body seemed to disintegrate? This scene:

This death compared to all the other characters who were killed off was unique in the fact that there was no body left behind and it almost appeared her energy was transported to another place. Hmm, perhaps another realm such as the In Between or the Ever After? Why this happened, in my opinion, was because of the use of someone else's semblance. We know very little about Pyrrha's family and have only seen her mother on screen once, so we don't know much about her backstory or semblance either. However, if her semblance worked anything like Raven's to where she needed to be attached to someone in order for her semblance to work and transfer her loved ones to a safer location to escape a deadly threat, now we have something. What if her mom's semblance transported the body to another realm of her choice right before the moment of death? (I like to call it a "divine intervention" semblance.) If that's the case, then why wouldn't it make sense for a mother's love to send her daughter somewhere familiar and (relatively) safe and still accessible to Remnant? The Ever After was based on a children's tale that everyone knew growing up and Pyrrha being as smart as she is would instantly recognize where she was transported to. Maybe she had knowledge of her mother's semblance and knew this might have happened one day, or maybe not. I find the one scene her mother is in to be very interesting because while she was talking to Jaune, she had a very bitter-sweet attitude about it and almost talked as if she knew more than she let on, but I digress.

In the story's timeline, when Team RWBY arrives in the Ever After, Pyrrha would have been there already for a couple of years. That would have given her enough time to establish herself and explore the different acres because let's be real here, Pyrrha wouldn't have stumbled upon the time travel fruit and messed around with it like Jaune did, nor would she have focused all her energy into the people of the land even though she would protect them with her life if she had to, but at the end of the day, she was just trying to figure out a way home. Once she stumbles across Team RWBY, it would all make sense why the Tree didn't let her return to Remnant yet. By this point, I'm sure she would have encountered Alyx, Lewis, and the Curious cat, probably handled the situation a lot better than Jaune did, and give Team RWBY a cautionary tale about the Curious Cat in a way that wasn't bitter or vengeful. The bee's having their special moment still would have happened, the team's fallout with the Curious Cat still would have gone down, and then we get to the scene with Neo's Jabber Walker clones and Ruby has her mental breakdown and identity crisis. I don't see Pyrrha blaming Ruby for what happened to the Paper Pleasers despite her immense sorrow for the loss of her only friends she had during her time in the Ever After. Her experiences with the Paper Pleasers would have been way different too because there's no way she'd be a gold-hearted tyrant like Jaune was painted out to be. I do see Ruby blaming herself and still running off anyway because she feels like a burden and a failure as a leader. I didn't enjoy the way Jaune was the center of focus when Ruby was very clearly in a dangerous state of mind and I'm positive Pyrrha would have picked up on it right away and address it to Ruby's team after the fact and not go off on her for not doing enough.

Team RWPY would go on the search for Ruby and still find her in Neo's torture dungeon, which would have been just as painful to watch, especially from Pyrrha's point of view. Ruby having to watch Pyrrha die in Vol.3 and now she had to witness Ruby "die" in Vol. 9 is kind of a trippy coincidence that fits so well. The only difference being Pyrrha immediately taking the initiative to find Ruby before the cat does and the final battle being way more epic. Jaune certainly gained a lot of battle experience throughout the series, but Pyrrha was always ahead of him in that respect and without a doubt would have sharpened her skills to perfection while she was on her own in the Ever After. Ruby emerges as a new version of herself, they defeat the Curious Cat, Neo ascends, and all of the girls finally get to go home together, hand in hand.

I can even go as far as to say this would have made Vol. 9 Beyond so much better too. Picture it, Team RWBY and Pyrrha leaving the portal and the first person to see them is Jaune. The potential for Arkos here is so strong it kills me inside! They'd have a raw moment between each other, there'd be lots of crying on Jaune and maybe even Pyrrha's part too, a long hug, and most definitely a romantic kiss that would have tied their relationship arc together in such a perfect way. It would have brought Pyrrha back and that's honestly all I want.

Of course, this is all just for shits and giggles, but I'd love to hear what y'all think or if you have something else to add! ^-^