#but it HURTS me. Meanwhile me and him are very similar in how we write stories and play the game so it's perfect.

[demonic0angel]

"If you give me a prompt I'll write it 😈" - Aight Bet.

Danny didn't expect his sister to have a pen pal, she said it's someone from nanda Parbat?? Danny doesn't know where the Fuck that is but everytime he sees the letter that was sent(those are some fancy lookin envelopes) he could feel rancid Ectoplasm lingering around them.

Jazz has already noticed but took no caution about it, Jazz said that she had a son, her name was Talia (No Mentioned Last name) and she was a very odd woman.

Danny listened to Jazz ramble on about her new "friend", Her son Damian which her pen pal had talked about and even sent a drawing of(how fancy). Danny WOULD investigate and dig deep into it since he's the ghost king and all but jazz explicitly told him not to.

....

Meanwhile, Jazz plans to meet her 'Penpal Friend' soon. She's very excited but still cautious, The way her friend talked about her situations was... Concerning to say the least and jazz shall use her psychiatrical expertise to help her!

[Danny is very concerned, Dan is Very Concerned 2.0, Dani says "Yuri."]

-A.E. 👻

(I’m gonna change the context of your ask a little so Jazz already knows Talia’s identity before she meets her again in person. Also, this got really long lmaooo)

Talia gave her a small nod when she saw her. She lifted her head to meet Jazz’s gaze as Jazz gave her a dazzling smile.

“Hello, Talia,” Jazz said, pushing her hair behind her ears. “You look lovely.”

Talia avoided her gaze and just hummed. She cleared her throat lightly and then said, gesturing to the hallway, “This way.”

Jazz followed her at a set pace and said, “It’s good seeing you again. How are you? Did you enjoy the candy I shipped over?”

Talia nodded. “Yes. I gave them to my son and he enjoyed them. Thank you very much.”

Jazz beamed. She did not ask the burning question in her heart. Was Talia alright? Her letters to her had become less and less frequent in the past year before the most recent message to her had been a barely disguised begging for Jazz to come see her.

Jazz didn’t mind; she loved seeing Talia, who was startlingly dangerous and hauntingly beautiful, but it still worried her. Talia was a strong woman, but she wasn’t invincible, even with that pool of rancid ectoplasmic bath water. (She shuddered just thinking about it. She needed to ask Danny to wipe them out before Talia could hurt herself again using them.)

“Where are we going?” Jazz asked, glancing around. They were inside of a nice, expensive looking condo in Spain.

Talia paused in front of a door. She hesitated before she said slowly, “Jazz… I have valued your friendship greatly. In the last few years, you have become someone very dear to me. However, as you are already aware, I am in a dangerous position in my home. I do not wish to endanger you, especially since you are a civilian. If you do not wish to take this journey with me, then… you should turn around now.”

Jazz chuckled. How cute that Talia thought that Jazz was a helpless civilian. However, it had been Jazz who had accidentally enforced that idea within Talia’s mind. It was a little too late to correct that notion though, so Jazz just shook her head softly and tried to look reassuring for Talia.

“It’s too late for that.” She reached out to hold Talia’s hand, scarred and weathered from fighting, squeezing slightly. “I will accompany you and help you however I can.”

Talia nodded again, looking away. “Thank you… beloved.”

Jazz tilted her head curiously at the title, but did not say a word. Talia then opened the door and Jazz’s eyebrows rose as she stared at a young boy with similar features to the woman beside her. He scowled at her, but it just looked cute with his round cheeks.

Jazz turned to Talia. She already had an inkling, but she wanted to confirm. “This is…?”

“My son,” Talia said, “His name is Damian. And I earnestly beg you to take him in for me.”

“What! But mother!” Damian stood up and shouted, while Jazz’s eyebrows shot up again.

Talia gave him a light glare. She turned back to Jazz and it was cute how she had to look up at her. “My father is increasing pressure on us, and he is training Damian even harder. If this continues, Damian’s life could be in danger. I would’ve left him with his father, but Bruce’s lifestyle is… not what I want for Damian. Please, could you take him in, beloved?”

Damian shut his mouth with a click and both Al Ghuls stared at Jazz with wide eyes, one beseeching and one shocked.

Jazz smiled and reached out to hold Talia’s hand again. It was really nice to hold, and warm too. “Of course. You don’t have to worry, Talia. Like I’ve said, you can depend on me.”

Talia beamed. “Thank you, beloved.” She flipped Jazz’s hand and kissed the back of it softly. Jazz blushed. It felt strangely… intimate? But who was Jazz to judge? Maybe it was a League of Assassins custom! Or something! She didn’t get to meet Talia often, usually just exchanging weekly letters, so how would she know?

Talia turned back to Damian, still holding Jazz’s hand and said, “She will be your new caretaker. She is very important to me and you can trust her with your life. Call her… mom.”

Jazz side eyed Talia, but did not dispute it. Maybe it was some sort of spy plan? Like a code name? It would make more sense when a woman and a young boy were together for them to be mother and son.

Jazz also turned to Damian and let go of Talia’s hand to walk over to him slowly, keeping an open posture and friendly smile on her face.

Damian eyed Jazz as she approached and then knelt down respectfully before him. She smiled. “Hello, Damian. I’m Jazz, and I hope we can get along.”

Damian looked at his mother. They had some sort of silent conversation that Jazz did not understand, before Damian turned back to her. “Yes… it’s nice to meet you too… mom.”

Jazz smiled. “I��ll take care of you.”

Damian sniffed. “I certainly hope so.” He tried to look haughty, but he was so short compared to Jazz that it once again looked adorable and pouty.

Yep. It was official. Her siblings were going to eat him alive.

Jazz looked back at Talia, who was staring at them both with a soft expression. Strangely, the gentle look made Jazz’s stomach flutter.

Weird. Was she growing sick?

Talia blinked, noticing her gaze. “Is there something wrong, beloved?”

Jazz coughed at the nickname again. Damian eyed her like she was a walking disease and Talia just looked more and more worried. “Nope! So, uh, what’s the official plan?”

She stared at Talia, who just blinked and hummed, pursing her red, kissable lips.

Yep. Definitely sick.

(Talia: Heh! Cool, calm, and collected, with a dash of vulnerability! I’m definitely showing my best side to my beloved, Jazz! She’s so much better than that emotionally constipated Bruce!

Jazz: *completely and utterly oblivious to any advances made by another woman* Wow, Talia is so pretty today too. Surely, it is normal to want to hold hands and kiss another girl because she’s so pretty 😃 I wonder why she wants her kid to call me mom? 😃

Damian: …. Two moms? Is this my birthday?)

[six-improbable-things]

Soooo.... we ended up not actually testing ship combat... We spent 2 hours talking about the rules and making sure we were both solid on them and on the same page, and then the DM asked me a very unrelated question and we talked for almost 4 more hours and never tested ship combat. [*sigh*] Nah, I'm not mad I genuinely had a ton of fun talking to him. (We're very similar in some ways and complete opposites in others. It makes for interesting conversations.) Plus it gives me time to actually make the Tide Breaker's map... Since I didn't have that done for this week.

The dnd ship combat doc I made for my DM is 2.5 pages long now... (but that might be in part because I do not know how to be concise.) I know dnd is not the system for sea combat or extensive sailing. But it's happening anyways (blame me, ofc), so I'm going to make it work. Me and the DM are doing a trial run of ship combat tonight, and since I wrote the rules and also will be playing the captains of the ships we'll be on, I'm basically becoming co-DM for these fights, which is gonna be great.

[belit0]

Madara and Indra tag-teaming the reader? Indra gets called back from the afterlife and takes offense that Madara is almost as good as he is. I love your writing! I binge read it all this afternoon! I'm so happy you write Indra, he's perfect!

Thank you very much for your words! Indra is absolutely my favorite, there is no one who can get to me like him!

I love that you like my work, and feel free to send as many requests as you want! Welcome to this beautiful corner of Uchiha perdition!

This was actually hard to picture, but bc I can't imagine both of them together lol.

I don't think both their egos would fit in the same room🤣.

Anyhow, sorry for taking so long to reply, but here we go!

Why would anyone call him from death, from eternal rest, to bring him to a present where his name is only a legend? Indra does not know, but such is the scene he encounters when opening his eyes for the first time in millions of years.

In his original body, but in his 24-year-old guise, the Otsutsuki awakens in the midst of a ritual. There is blood on his feet, a strange pattern drawn in peculiar intersections that don't seem to make sense, and four men he doesn't recognize looking at him expectantly.

His world spins as he tries to acknowledge the space, and understand he has been summoned to the world of the living again. "Very good... you did it, Tobirama. Now put him back where he came from." A man with long, black, prominent hair speaks with his arms crossed, looking at him with eyes he identifies as his own.

"Of course not. I just brought the most important piece of history we could get, adding I don't know how to release him either." Another jabbers angrily, with strange white hair and red marks on his skin.

"You brought my fucking grandfather and you have no fucking idea how to let him die again?!" A third man shouts in despair, very similar to the first guy, but smaller.

"He's not our grandfather, Izuna. He's our ancestor."

"We should bring our grandfather too, Tobi! It can be a great family reunion and-"

"Why would anyone rouse me from everlasting slumber without apparent reason... I'll get an immediate explanation right away, or else things will get bad." The Otsutsuki decides to interrupt the interaction impatiently, holding his head between both hands and trying to focus his gaze without his eyes hurting. He has no balance to get up from the ground, sitting up and trying to regain control of his body.

...

4 months have passed since Indra was forcibly brought back to life, and all he wants is to die again. People became progressively more stupid, having as idyllic proof this supposed descendant of his who goes by the name of Izuna. The young man keeps pestering him with uncomfortable questions about a life that no longer is, and the Otsutsuki does not know how to get rid of him.

The man who dared to bring him back, Tobirama, still can't find a way to reverse his jutsu, and works tirelessly every day to give him eternal rest again. Meanwhile, Indra decided to confine himself inside the current leader's house, and learn a bit of the current world through him.

Madara Uchiha, his supposed reincarnation, recounts an era of peace where his clan and his brother's became friends. The sole purpose of creating the Uchiha was an endless war against Ashura's family, and apparently, they had figured it out.

Outraged and dismayed, Indra constantly compares his power to that of the current leader and understands they opted for peace because power levels decreased over time. The only thing he and Madara have in common is the darkness of their thoughts, the shape of their hair, and their taste in women.

The Uchiha has a wife alarmingly similar to his own, both in attitude and appearance, and he ponders whether reincarnations are possible. (Y/N), he learns her name is, is both charming and submissive, perfect to his preference.

When the leader disappears for the day to attend to his work, Indra has convenient access to the woman and enjoys her quiet company. There is nothing like an obedient, non-fighting wife, and after seeing today's world, the Otsutsuki understands there isn't much of that anymore.

(Y/N) treats him like a king, attends to his every need, and genuinely respects him. Nothing gets his dick harder than a woman who knows her place.

Madara seems to notice his attraction to her, and after consulting with his wife, they decide to give him a gift of satisfaction before dying again. A night of passion, discreetly catalyzed and planned to perfection.

...

Indra walks through the corridors of the Uchiha house, trying to find a quiet place to meditate. His mind is a mess, he is tired, and all he wants is perpetual repose again. Overwhelmed by his situation, he wanders aimlessly, seeking release somehow.

He decides to try the first room he finds, and as he slides open the door, he comes across an image both provocative and scandalous. (Y/N) shamelessly touching herself while sucking Madara's cock. The Uchiha smirks, grabbing her roughly by the hair and pressing her against his pelvis, forcing her to swallow him completely as she masturbates.

Kneeling with her ass in the air, he has a perfect view of her wet pussy, and how her fingers slide in and out with need. "She looks like she needs help, doesn't she, Indra-Sama?" Madara asks sardonically, leading her to follow an overwhelming pace with her mouth.

"What is this... what are you implying-"

"A little parting gift. Tobirama figured out the formula, and you'll be going home tonight. One last indulgence is impossible to deny, isn't it?"

The Otsutsuki genuinely considers it, relieved for the torture to end and feeling a bulge growing between his pants. There's no denying the sight is beautiful, and that (Y/N) looks both inviting and predisposed to be fucked by whomever she's commanded.

He's never had a threesome, but as long as the Uchiha leader won't touch him, he'll have no problem abusing that beautiful cunt and claiming it as his own.

In a burst of arousal, he walks over to the bed, and with no words to say, makes quick work of his clothes. If the woman is anything like his wife used to be, she will accept being violently and angrily fucked, used as Indra sees fit and without complaining about it.

Positioning himself behind her, he penetrates her with a dry thrust, burying himself deep inside her and listening to her moan being muffled by the other man's cock. "Shit, (Y/N), no teeth, or there will be consequences."

A dark satisfaction runs through his mind at the thought of getting to punish her, to destroy her as he wishes, and his thrusts become brutal to the point of trying to make her lose control of her mouth. The woman cannot continue to move her head, and Madara grabs her by the hair to direct her to the pace he thinks necessary.

Both of them use her holes as they wish, taking her with abandon and making her scream all the way through. Indra will soon return home, and plans to take a good fucking before then.

[tideswept]

Hello!!! For the game, perhaps time travel? 👀

never have I ever

Technically no? I've had a few plots in mind, but nothing made it to the writing stage as the scope and potential of it has intimidated me. I feel like I need to have an intimate understanding of the characters and their relationship to successfully pull it off.

As well as a dang good reason for it. It feels like, I dunno, a forbidden indulgence to go into it without a Plan™.

Here's how I'd do it, using the Kingsman idea that probably got the closest to almost making it on paper.

A few months after the end of Kingsman, Eggsy is sent into the past. But far into the past--as in, when Chester was a young agent, perhaps even a trainee.

(I've given some consideration to Chester having held the title of Lancelot originally, which would have, I think, added some delicious flavoring to his rejection of a pleb coming along to possibly take up his title, but I really feel like they would have mentioned that little detail at some point if that were true. Same goes for him having been Galahad. Thus, I arbitrarily decided that it was Lamorak. Though Percival is a close second.)

So Eggsy finds himself weirded out by how much he and Chester have in common as he infiltrates Kingsman. We know from the original Kingsman script and a very clever accent slip-up during his death scene that Chester's background was likely more similar to Eggsy's than Chester ever wanted to admit.

Eggsy's goal may be to save Harry, but he doesn't want to fuck up time too badly, so he has no choice but to play along for a while, only, whoops, now he's being shoved X amount of years into the future (so from the 50s to the 60s) and Chester still remembers him, so he knows Something Is Up about Eggsy, but he cares about Eggsy (friendship? or more? who knows) so he doesn't turn him in. Cue another time jump to the 70s. Eggsy is still trying to evaluate what the best way to handle this is. Kill Chester? Tell him what's going to happen? Ask him to make sure a Harry Hart never gets chosen as a trainee?

But before he can decide, it's the 80s, and despite his best efforts to avoid them meeting, Harry is there. And Eggsy falls head over heels for this Harry, who is so different from the man he knows, but it's still Harry, after all.

Chester, now having left Lamorak behind and being made Arthur, notices and puts two and two together that this is the reason why Eggsy has been coming in and out of his life now for almost forty years. It was never about him, or Kingsman, or anything else that had occurred to him.

... but it still takes until the next time skip (hello 90s) for Eggsy to pull the trigger, so to speak. He has to make a decision now. What to change, and how, in a way that doesn't completely mess up the future? He might have trusted Chester a little the first couple of jumps, but now this is the Chester who was a callous fuck about Lee dying.

Meanwhile, Harry is hurt and furious and confused that Eggsy vanished and Arthur (nee whatever his original title was) seemed to know exactly what happened and only infuriatingly told him to be patient and wait.

(And that's another oof for Eggsy -- has he already changed things too much? Harry in the future will recognize him, won't he?)

Eggsy makes the difficult choice to kill Arthur, but Chester talks him down from that, and asks him the real story of what's been happening, pointing out that he's kept Eggsy's secret for fifty years; if that's not a sign that he can be trusted, well...

Eggsy decides to gamble it all on this Chester not being a complete bastard and tells him an edited version of the story (mostly withholding specific names and dates). Not just what happened in Kingsman, but also how fucking stupid Valentine's plan actually was, and the disasters that it caused even when it didn't fully go through. How close the world came to nuclear fallout.

Eggsy then is propped to 21st century, but he stays under the radar for this final visit to the past, not wanting to meddle further with time. At least as far as Kingsman is concerned.

(Dean, on the other hand, gets a very scary visit from a man that promises to slit his throat if he ever lays a finger on his wife and stepson again. )

When he's finally returned to the present, nothing has changed. Fuck. Fuck. He shouldn't have trusted Chester. Or maybe it was all futile to begin with. As far as he can check, everything played out almost the same way, which means that maybe time just can't truly be changed.

Some time passes. And then he receives a message. From an account named Lamorak, asking to meet in a location that only Eggsy and Chester knew about. Eggsy shows up armed to the teeth, not sure what to expect, but sure as hell not expecting to find Chester and Harry alive.

Both of them had put together what they'd both been told (intentionally or unintentionally) by Eggsy and come up with a plan. They'd play out events to the best of their ability, aware that the Eggsy they'd one day meet was not the same that they'd already met--with some insurance. There was never a poison in Eggsy's drink, it was always a drug so that Arthur could pretend to be dead. Harry didn't get shot in the head, he grabbed Valentine's hand and got shot in the heart instead.

You know. Supposedly.

They've both been lying in wait, unsure of exactly when Eggsy went back into the past, and taking the chance that enough time (ba dum tish) has passed and it's safe to come out. They've come up with an excuse for Harry to still be alive and have the trail of paperwork to back it up, but Chester is done. He's not coming back. He's fine with being known as a traitor. It was about time that Kingsman had a good shake up, anyway.

Low-key bittersweet parting, with lots of hugs (Eggsy insists because it's a long-running joke that Chester finds hugs insufferably twee and ridiculous) and Chester disappearing, and Harry and Eggsy getting their happily ever after.

we do not accept Kingsman 2 in this household, thank you.

[andrewhq]

(i wanted to write a conversation g'raha would have with my wol that i might turn into a comic someday)

- G'raha enters Ziero's cabin in Tuliyollal, after some idle chatter, he pauses before speaking again. -

G'raha: You know, I realized after our conversation on the gondola, that I do not know much about... you. The current you. Most of what I know about you, I gathered from various pieces of your legacy. I don't think I've ever sat down with you and gotten to know you.

Ziero: Hah! Aw, it's very sweet that you're asking, but truly there isn't really that much to me than my legacy. Most of my life was... this.

G'raha: What do you... mean?

Ziero: Well, before I became the Warrior of Light, I was just a simple tailor, like one of my fathers also is for my tribe. And on top of that... I was a child. Even when I began adventuring. I just so happened to be in Thanalan when I ended up helping Brendt fend off his camp, and he suggested I should talk to the Adventurer's Guild because he just had this strong feeling I'd be able to help.

G'raha: Wait, wait. You were a child?

Ziero: Yes, I only turned eighteen less than two months before my tribe arrived in Thanalan!

G'raha: Like... Viera years' eighteen?

Ziero: There's no such thing! We mature about the same Hyurs, so...

G'raha: So that means you're...

Ziero: Twenty-one, now? Yeah!

G'raha: I thought you were so much older...

Ziero: I suppose constantly being at war and saving people ages you. I suppose if we're being technical about it, I'm twenty-three, given that I was close to turning twenty-one when you called me to the first, and I spent about a year there.

G'raha: That's still so... young.

Ziero: I suppose it is!

G'raha: Does it bother you? That you never really got to live your childhood until the end?

Ziero: Not really, no. Maybe if I was forced to do it, I'd mourn what I never got the chance to live, but instead I see it as living as the folklore hero people tell to impress children!

G'raha: I cannot fathom how you can stay positive so easily... Did nothing ever break you?

Ziero: Ah...

- He instinctively reaches for the eye under his eyepatch. -

Ziero: I... ought to be thankful for my parents being positive beacons in my life as well. I know it hurt them to know I was risking my life out there, and my mother never did hide the fact that she was worried for me, and neither of my fathers would let me go back adventuring until they were as certain as possible I wasn't hurt. But the three of them loved me so much, and cared for me so deeply, so I could always go to them when things were too much. But there was, ah... two times when I was completely inconsolable, I suppose.

G'raha: I do not intend to pry, so you do not have to answer, but I must ask what got you to that point?

- Ziero pauses for a long time, clenching his fists. -

Ziero: It... it was Zenos.

- G'raha's ears perk up. -

G'raha: Zenos? Did he—

Ziero: I loved him in a way that words could not describe.

- G'raha goes quiet. -

Ziero: I cannot deny the fact that we were always meant to be mirrors of each other. I always wanted to understand him, and I struggled with it for a bit, when someone just so happened to tell me his age... And I quickly realized just how similar we are. We were both children when we got roped into the war. Our differences were also our similarities. I grew up in a peaceful, loving family that was always there for me when I needed them, he grew up in a family that was disgusted with his very existence and only saw him as a weapon of war. And yet... we were both outsiders, fighting for causes that weren't our own, but we had enough motives to push through them.

G'raha: I had heard he was a cruel man...

Ziero: Funny how people say that, yet I could count on my fingers how many people Zenos actually harmed, because he never fought or killed anyone that couldn't stand a chance against him. Meanwhile, the blood on my hands is endless, from people who were much weaker than I. Is that not ironic?

G'raha: I... I suppose, when you put it that way... And yet the calamity—

Ziero: Was Fandaniel's plan. And I do not blame Zenos for following him. After being only seen as a beast, a dog that should be beat and put in a cage, do you truly think he would not resent the world? He truly thought he was being merciful, just like Meteion.

G'raha: I never thought of Meteion and Zenos as similar, and yet, based on what you told me in the past, it all makes so much sense... It's like we were being foreshadowed of her existence.

Ziero: Hah, pretty much. Still, I've made my point, so to actually answer your question: When Zenos killed himself, it ruined me. Not only did I feel like I failed him, but I felt like I failed myself as well. We had secretly spent a lot together, because I so desperately wanted to get to know him, to understand him. And he'd always let me in, sometimes with the promise of a spar, sometimes... because we were both lonely. I was such a mess in love, and there was that air of forbidden romance like in stories I'd hear around Kugane. Since my tribe decided to follow me to Othard, I'd never miss a chance to go speak with my parents and tell them all about this wild romance I was having. Truly, I felt the most like a hero back then. And yet when I lost Zenos, it crushed me beyond words. I cried for days in my mother's lap and did not speak to anyone else. I had to keep strong and let the Ala Mihgans celebrate their victories. I almost began to resent Lyse for being so... content with his death, but it was just misplaced grief.

G'raha: I can certainly empathize with that... Then, was the second time still Zenos, I assume?

Ziero: Yup. Though the second time was... a little bit different. I realize now, in retrospect, that I could have just denied him that fight, and he'd have to keep living. Yet I was so... selfish. I held on to that last bit of grief for him and ended up taking it out on the exact person I was grieving. I was angry when I found out he was still alive, it felt like everything he did was to mock me, but... No, it never was.

G'raha: I'm sorry... You must miss him greatly, then.

Ziero: Well, about that— I didn't actually... let him go... I hold his soul, you see. And I can always channel him as my avatar.

G'raha: You what?!

Ziero: Hahah, oops!

G'raha: Why didn't you tell anyone!

Ziero: I didn't want to put anyone in a panic, given how many people despise him. Plus, it'd be insane to explain either way. Zero knows, though. It was because of her that I managed to figure out how to make him my avatar, and she certainly got some enjoyment knowing how he would feel being bound to someone like that. And now you know too.

G'raha: I'm starting to become less surprised that you are as young as you claim to be.

Ziero: I'm not lying! I never even learned how to read!

G'raha: YOU NEVER LEARNED WHAT?!?!

[the-heart-of-a-monster]

I'm still midnight-the-ultima, i just changed my blog name

OKAY SO THERE IS SO MUCH I WANNA DISCUSS ABOUT THESE LAST FEW PAGES. Since I know how to reblog (And I will be reblogging a ton of ur stuff) properly now, I was planning on talking about it via that, but you may not see it so I chose to do an ask instead.

---

First up: The contrast!

There is a clear distinction between the themes of what's currently going on with Shadow and Sonic compared to Amy and Rouge. While the boys are sitting down and drinking some soup with a lovely village full of wonderful people, the girls are stuck wondering what's going on with their friend. They have to deal with a group of agents trying to take their buddy away from them, something they obviously don't want! Meanwhile, the guys are just having the time of their lives with each other! (Well not really, but this is probably the best night Sonic's had in a while!)

The way these stories are being told, back to-back within the same issue, is just such a great writing technique! The contrast is stunningly good!

It- I don't really know what else to say about it. So... MOVING ON I GUESS!

Next: People being mean to Omega

I really like Omega just because he's fun and shares my sense of humor, so seeing him get confiscated like this hurts me. (But in a good way)

uhm

uh

thats it

Numero Tres: wtf is even going on with this robot like huh?????

Aight I honestly have no clue, but I'll try and piece it together as I go. Bare with me.

So, the first sign of Omega seemingly getting "Hacked" was all the way back in issue 6, when the girls went with Omega to scout for any dangerous Dark Gaia monsters. This was when Amy discovered they could be peaceful creatures if given the chance to be. Omega charged in though, and from then on it just gets even more interesting!

As shown in the third panel of page 16, Omega's bullets and bombs don't do anything to harm the monsters. Poor guy is absolutely useless against them. This is because someone needs Dark Gaia energy within them to do any damage to them and thus absorb their energy. This is, similar to this issue, a stark contrast to Sonic earlier on in that same issue. Sonic was able to kill a group of giant monsters with ease, and even started eating their corpses when he was done absorbing their energy. (Maybe I'll get to that in a reblog who knows) But this bit is about Omega so we'll mostly forget about Sonic for now-

The point when Omega gets hacked may take place in the first panel of the very next page, or in the fourth panel of page 16. Either way, I think I know how exactly he got hacked.

The Gaia Monsters could sense that Omega was a robot, and chose to absorb themselves into him by force. Since these creatures work best with organic beings, which I'm pretty sure they know, this action screwed up Omega's internal workings and made him self-destruct. His body, while up in flames, was still somehow intact, so the Gaia monsters were still okay within his body. Meaning that once Rouge and Amy fix him up, he's still messed up.

Also, something I noticed about Omega when he imploded, was within the explosion itself. We see the eyes of the Dark Gaia monsters surrounding Omega while they're all grabbing him as he explodes. If this isn't possession foreshadowing or a sign that he isn't himself anymore, then idk what is.

This scenario perfectly ties into his character, though! As an Eggman robot with free will, Omega has a mind of his own. He refuses to let anyone control him, not even his own friends, which is a very good mentality for a war machine! When he goes along with Rouge and Amy, his first thought when seeing the creatures is to kill them all and show no mercy! (He loves violence, making him one of my fave characters instantly) Of course, when he begins losing his autonomy to the very same creatures he wishes to destroy, Omega would rather sacrifice everything about himself, even his own body, just to be rid of them. He may not have a brain, but Omega still wants all these monsters out of his head! And if destroying himself will do the trick, (Even if it doesn't) then he will gladly take that risk, as long as he still has his free will intact.

What could this mean for Omega moving forward? Uhm... idk, he loses his personality? He goes apeshit?? Is he gonna remain peaceful, like how the Gaia monsters were with Amy before Omega attacked?? I really don't know, as the author-

Also I wanna mention that I forgot about Omega's obvious hatred and negativity that the Gaia Monsters were able to feed off of, like what Amy mentioned. Whoops! I guess that explains how they managed to get inside his head.

So about him getting confiscated and being called an 'It," really depends on his behavior after this. If he's still on their side, I don't see a point to it. If he's not, then get him tf outta here ig

i may agree with Amy about calling Omega a person, because as stated before he does have his own free will and autonomy, but I do love the added touch of the agents arguing that he's literally just a malfunctioning war machine and nothing else. Really shows how on the fence we are about G.U.N. being a force of good or not.

OKAY I KNOW THIS IS REALLY SUPER LONG BUT THERE IS ONE MORE THING I WANNA MENTION BECAUSE IT HAS TO DO WITH BOTH SONIC AND OMEGA HERE-

RIGHT! So since my theory is that Omega has basically a buncha dead Gaia monsters swimming around inside his head, I literally just realized that it has to do with the whole theme of this book. Some people may not notice it because I sure didn't for a very long time, but I recognize the theme as "Having and keeping your autonomy, and accepting yourself as a person." We see this in every time Sonic doubts his own worth and autonomy, we see it whenever someone steps up to him and goes "No u wrong," and we see it in Omega as a character.

Compared to Sonic, Omega is completely confident in himself and he's well past his character development arc in terms of his autonomy. Omega has been reminded time and time again that he isn't just a robot, but a friend and an adversary. While he may be fine with being just a tool of destruction since that's basically all he wants in life, he is very much aware that he also has a soul somewhere inside of himself, and that he isn't a heartless monster. He has friends, whether he likes it or not, and is very confident in who he is.

Sonic is the exact opposite right now, unsure of himself and questioning how far he'd go during a fight. He wants to keep himself intact, wants to be this selfless, brave hero that everyone knows him to be. However, in this dream to keep being the person everyone thinks he is, Sonic is losing his sense of self and autonomy. He has been slowly going through more and more character development as time goes on and is carefully putting himself back together, bit by bit, but he still has yet to fully accept himself for the hero he truly is. Sonic still sees himself as a monster, something to be ashamed and afraid of, and can't yet tell which half of him is real and which one is fake. He hides all his insecurities away, tucking them into a tiny box and not letting them see the light of day.

The poor little guy is afraid, while Omega is confident. It's a complete contrast, like I mentioned before, and it's great storytelling!

okokokokokok that's finally it kaythxbye-

I AM LOOKING

im so excited for you to see where this is going

i also want to thank you so much for those essays i appreciate them sooo much it makes me sooo happy to read through them

[aihoshiino]

You remember how there is a line in mephisto "this lie is love, this lie is a gift to the world"?

I think that's how Aqua wrote the script to potray Ai in the movie and that's how he generally see her. Idk how to say this but what if the plan to get revenge on Hikaru is by showing the difference between lies of Ai and Hikaru? Ai and Hikaru are very similar but at the same time they are different. For Aqua lies by Ai was to love others even though it destroyed her somehow. Hence this lie is gift to the world. Meanwhile Hikaru lies to be loved so his lies are in sense to hurt others. By showing this constrast Aqua indirectly wants to target Hikaru?

I think this is ascribing a level of understanding of Ai to Aqua that... I don't quite think he currently has?

Obviously this is complicated by the fact that we have no fucking clue what Ai said to him in her DVD(s) and he was there when she laid out some of her feelings on lies and love to Ryosuke but a huge part of Aqua's arc across OnK is his struggle to properly understand Ai and empathize with her as a human being, for a whole variety of reasons.

This sort of comes to a head in the movie arc where Ruby's portrayal of Ai, born out of love and empathy for her mom, differs from Aqua's who lies to himself that he never even saw her cry. Even now, he's still struggling to understand Ai's inner life even when he's trying to write a movie all about it.

We also have no idea what exactly he knows about Kamiki and how he found out what he does know. In general, the movie arc has been such a mess it's been hard for me to draw any solid conclusions about it but especially with regards to Aqua given that I don't think we've gotten any internal monologue from him since... fuck, man. 20 chapters ago? Free my boy, Akasaka!!!

[useless19]

I RETURN

Sorry if it's annoying but i got more megaknock ideas in particular how they both view love as a concept and how they approach it.

I think despite their many many differences they see love in a similar way that is, as a weakness. Not that love makes you weak but that to truly, deeply love someone is to expose the most vulnerable parts of yourself and for that person to become your weakness.

Where they differ is how they approach it. You've said yourself, megatron is a romantic who does everything with 100 percent intensity. Once he falls he falls hard and throws himself headlong into it. Nothing is done subtly or in halfs.

Meanwhile I think knockout is more cautious. He's careful in letting himself fall always ready to run the minute he starts to feel trapped. He's subtle and very specific in how he shows affection to the point where only someone extremely close to him would understand the full meaning of his gestures.

Do with these ramblings what you will.

Never annoying, always entertaining :D

To be picky about it, love can mean a lot of different things. Not to get too MegOP on a MegaKnock post, but some of Megatron's choices in TFP make more sense if you believe he considers himself in an epic (and tragic) romance with Optimus (eg Alpha/Omega). The softer kinds of romantic love are for people who aren't trying to destroy their most beloved enemy.

And Megatron hasn't ever had/felt that softer love. Which is why it's so easy (and fun!) to blindside him with this kind of thing. Actual true vulnerability is going to freak him out and he's going to do his best to avoid that.

It's tricky, Megatron is more likely to accept (and reciprocate) gentle feelings after he's realised he's on the wrong path, but given that needs to shake his foundation of self to the core, he's going to be less sure about things — including how over the top his displays of feelings are. The feelings will still be there, but he's more likely to second-guess his actions, which can make it seem like he doesn't care as much as he used to. War-time Megatron will burn down a city to write your name in lights; post-war Megatron... won't.

(Possibly, it's all just guesswork and vibes at this point!)

I think you're right and more of what we see from Knock Out is a front. He's still shallow and vain as a person behind the facade, but there's a certain amount of carelessness to his quips and the like that say to me that he's forced some distance between his feelings and what he presents to the world. He'll flirt forever, but until it's made explicitly clear several times that the other person is dead serious about wanting him, he'll assume they're being just as casual as him about everything.

He's loved and lost and moved on many times, it never gets easier so why be genuine if he can help it? Just enjoy the ride and make sure you can laugh it off if anyone takes what you say too seriously.

I doubt I'm ever going to write them starting a relationship with an honest attempt at it being long-term from the beginning (aside from anything else, I do personally love the we were dating?! trope). I don't know where I'd even start.

Love is a trap. If you let someone close then they will hurt you. Or they'll get hurt which is somehow even harder to contemplate. So why not have some fun with someone who thinks the same way? Surely there won't be any sticky feelings involved...

[m1ckeyb3rry]

I’m fucking crying the MOM PURSE SCENARIO ALREADY HAS ME ROLLINGGG I CANT HAAHAHHA had to pause to write this down the way he explains it like “my mom said your mom” etc etc has me reeling

Stop. I just passed out. THAT WAS SO GOOD??? UFHEJSKDJOSKSKS dude I don’t even know what to say ugh first of all Karasu characterization chefs kiss a million times I’m LIVING for the rival kinda feel with asshole but secret sweetheart Karasu plus the new insecurities we know about him from epinagi AHHHGHHJJ stop that was too good also FREAKY FRIDAY I LOVE IT SHSGSHSHS wait stop no I’m such a sucker for childhood friends type tropes too this just mixed everything together this was so targeted wtf the childhood friends the misunderstanding the reconciliation goodBYE also karasus such a sap I can’t him video calling his friends to rant and gush has me gone

I think it’s really interesting to see this time how it’s framed more as Karasu being in the wrong as opposed to y/n having had a moment where she outright disrespects him LMAO I love seeing the flip side and how y/n here feels betrayed and all also their fight…too good I really felt all the frustration coming from them like I can imagine them snarkily raising their voices at each other and you can FEEL the pain it’s great

I’m still not over Karasu being such a sap and so smitten like I can’t it was too good wdym this boy pines so much he makes all these excuses to try and see y/n??? Also the way he almost pedestals y/n was such a cute and interesting take like yes let’s see more of his mediocrity complex

I never know how to articulate my words well enough but basically DOES YOUR BACK HURT HARD CARRYING THE KARASU COMMUNITY??? SHSGSHDHSH THAT WAS SO GOOD JDSJDKOAK

Also STOPPP IS THIS WHAT YOU MEANT BY THE YUTA GOJO REFERENCE IM GONEEEE AHAHAHAHDG I bet that edit was FOULLL I remember the memes first coming out and I lost it fr

I’m also crying why’d I imagine baaya as the divination lady LMAO

Erm anyways off to reread that again! Another work to burn into my brain

-Karasu anon

HELPPPP he was giving such “mom i frew up ” vibes in that scene omg LMAOAO “y/n my mommy said your mommy left her purse at my house 🥺🥺🥺🥺” STFU bro (i love him)

OMG HAHAHA YAYYY I’M SO GLAD YOU LIKED IT!! kinda rival but secret sweetheart karasu is my BRAND i was worried this would be a bit too similar to fwtkac but i think the y/n was different enough + the childhood friends trope was a change so hopefully it was okay!! FREAKY FRIDAY TROPE RAHHH it was so random but i think it worked out so well tbh. karasu is such a sappy loser omg him calling all of his friends and just being like “i think…i miss my wife 😔😔😔” meanwhile his “wife” thinks he’s dumb as hell and wants nothing to do w him 😭

i wanted to hint at him being bullied into not beings friends w her anymore (like his backstory implies) but i didn’t think that he would spill that to y/n RIGHT after their reconciliation yk?? also i wanted to show that sometimes people just grow apart. i used to be best friends with a boy when we were like three but once we got to elementary school we just drifted apart naturally and now we don’t really talk 🤷🏻‍♀️ i think it happens and sometimes people reconnect, sometimes they don’t!! luckily karasu was super in love w y/n so it would eventually happen but psychic old lady sped things up quite a bit (without her they probably would’ve like reconnected at their high school reunion or smth very hallmark second chance romance vibes). but yes their fight was fun to write because they both did kinda have points!! like y/n was valid to be mad at him for ditching her and then expecting things to just be alright, but he was also valid to be like “ok look i was SIX” because people are pretty dumb when they’re kids 😭

his mediocrity complex was so cool to write!! i think him having to work super hard at balancing everything and being “perfect” contrasted really well with y/n just floating through life and effortlessly succeeding!! but also he just thinks so highly of her that she could be the most average person ever and he’d think he wasn’t good enough for. he just gives me such head over heels vibes as a character i can’t help but write him as such every time 🥹 and yeah HAHA he really will come up with anything just to see her or talk to her for even a minute 😕 my underrated green flag king…listen his bff is a red flag and he’s kind of a jerk but he would be so SMITTEN if he liked someone that i have to say realistically he’d be one of the best bfs out of all of the bllk characters

PLEASEEE omg doing everything i can to live up to my role as the number one karasu tabito blog fr…carrying the karasu community ain’t much but it’s honest work 😫 i love writing for him i’m glad his five fans enjoy reading my stuff 😭

YES AHAHAH THE YUTA/GOJO FREAKY FRIDAY EDITS WERE EVERYWHEREEE FOR A WHILE they were so funny too…truly vile though you’re right.

BAYAAA she’s working hard to pay the bills 😰 this is her side gig while reo’s at school…she’s gotta get that money somehow 😔

also bonus colorized image of karasu going up to y/n’s desk to tell her about the purse:

i love tik tok hehe

[tryingahandinholdingapen]

I'm flattered /gen

glad you like my silly little au fjbsjfh

okay. I mean I said I'd write more of this anyway, so...

let's add even more tropes into the mix actually

- The Senju clan's healing ability is ridiculously superior to the Uchiha clan's, which is actually pretty shit really. They're doing their best but they don't have nearly as much knowledge or inventions or justu relevent to healing and prevention as the Senju, meanwhile the Senju clan's ability to heal horrendous injuries+illnesses is absolutely unbelievable. Neither party is quite aware of the extent of this discrepancy tho,,,,the Uchiha are slightly more aware of it than the Senju are but. Yeah big knowledge gap

- Hashirama et al has lowkey been planning to Get Rid Of Butsuma and take over for like, ages. He's not old enough or experienced enough to take over the clan yet but he + Tobirama + others have quietly been working towards the eventuality in which Hashirama IS old enough to do so for. years

- Tobirama has leopard summons which okay yeah does make him act a teeny tiny bit like a cat sometimes. The instincts are there

okay now I need to backtrack to my original post because now that I've added these tropes in I wish to expand on the ending paragraph. the bit about the Uchiha clan at large attempting to befriend the young Blessed like he's a stray/feral cat, meanwhile Tobirama starts dropping metaphorical dead mice on their doorstep as he gradually warms up to them? that bit

okay so after that encounter that broke the stalemate, in which Tobirama was wounded and the Uchiha gave the young Blessed medical supplies to try and help, there's a few realisations. The Uchiha realise this Blessed is almost certainly a recognisable (and therefore probably important?) member of a neutral or, more likely, enemy shinobi clan. Tobirama realises, after a few similar encounters (Butsuma has a few months of beyond usual paranoia and keeps sending Tobirama on missions that are too difficult/dangerous for him really), that based on how bad the Uchiha seem to think his injuries are vs what supplies they give him....the state of the Uchiha's healing supplies is possibly a bit shit. hm

(Tobirama's also warming up to the concept of peace with the Uchiha due to these encounters. He already wanted the war to stop, because it was killing so many of their people and didn't make sense to continue when they didn't know why it STARTED and it almost got Itama killed (he survived, but now stays in the compound learning to be a healer and that's Tobirama's baby brother that nearly died!) buuuuttt now Tobirama's not only like "we should stop the war" but "we should start an era of peace", you know? Subtle but very important difference. He's willing to be more proactive now and maybe if he does nice things for the Uchiha then if/when he reveals his identity as Senju Tobirama it could help cement peace? He considers talking to Hashirama about the possibility but uhhhh then he'd have to admit he's been sneaking onto Uchiha lands sans disguise and he doesn't want to do that. Not because he doesn't love and trust his Anija, of course he does! But this is HIS thing he wants to keep it to himself,,,plus Hashirama would get so emotional about it he just KNOWS he would and he doesn't want to get sobbed all over again, thanks)

Anyway. After the Uchiha found him injured that first time and determined the Blessed was almost certainly from an enemy clan, they decided plausible deniability was the way to go, on the theory that if they pretended he wasn't an enemy or even that they hadn't noticed him, he would also pretend he wasn't from an enemy clan and therefore 'why would I spy/hurt/disadvantage the people who let me hide on their lands and give me free medical supplies? enemies? who? the Uchiha aren't my enemy don't be stupid'

This tactic is incredibly successful actually. Tobirama hadn't wanted them to know that he was from an enemy clan at all, if possible, but the moment he picked up on the fact that a) the Uchiha clan likely knew he wasn't exactly from a neutral/allied clan and b) they were pretending they didn't know in order to avoid conflict, Tobirama was very happy to play along. Thanks for solving the problem he had no idea what to do about! Plausible deniability is absolutely something he can do, he's great at that actually (fuck you Butsuma)

(Sighs of relief on the Uchiha side of things, when they realise the Blessed is happy to play along despite being discovered)

One of the ways this plausible deniability manifests is that the young Blessed is gradually demonstrating a number of preferred places to hang out/hide on their lands. The Uchiha steadfastly pretend not to be aware of this, sometimes walking by and COINCIDENTALLY not seeing the kid scrambling up the tree to his favourite perch for example, but by some happenstance a few of their patrol routes have altered ever so slightly so that the kid's preferred places are more strongly protected than they had been previously. Wow what a weird coincidence am I right

Anyway after that first encounter that broke the stalemate, subsequent encounters with the Blessed now routinely include giving the kid (11-14?? idk man I'm still undecided on ages) a shirt. Because for some reason whenever he's injured he's also absent proper clothing. They really aren't sure why this is the case? He wears proper clothing when he's not injured! Injuries and lost clothing do not normallt have such a strong corrlation as they seemingly do for this kid so like, what the hell is hapoening there?? But they're not gonna leave the kid to freeze when a shirt is one thing they have plenty of sooo shirt and medical supplies it is

The Uchiha have no way of knowing this, but the reason Tobirama keeps ending up needing a shirt whenever he's injured is because when Tobirama plans in advance to go hang out on Uchiha lands, he can ensure he's dressed appropriately with outer layers etc that don't have the Senju mon on. But if he hasn't planned it in advance, and is just trying to hide because he's injured and doesn't want to go home (partly conscious planning to avoid Butsuma and partially unconscious cat instincts to go hide somewhere nobody (that he really knows personally) can find him) then that usually means that his armour and outer layers etc all had the Senju mon on, since that's somewhat required for missions, and therefore he has to discard them before he can safely go on Uchiha lands. Thus any time he's injured on Uchiha lands he's also usually more or less just in his underclothing which...okay, honestly? He rarely cares at the time because yk injuries but looking back on it thinking about the sheer number of random Uchiha who have seen him in his under things is pretty embarrassing. Mm. Let's not dwell on that

Tobirama isn't so proud as to refuse the clothing they offer, because that would be stupid. It's fucking cold without his outer layers and yeah yeah he could stay warm using chakra circulation but that would use energy and chakra that he really ought to be dedicating to healing those injuries. So a shirt is better

However! He can't really keep the shirts? The younger and cockier/stupider Uchiha keep giving him shirts with the uchiwa fan on, which obviously Tobirama can't risk being spotted with back home because it would be impossible to explain, and depending on who found him with it he probably wouldn't even get a chance to try and explain himself. If it's one of the older/more experienced Uchiha who offer a shirt then he usually doesn't have to worry about them giving him something with the uchiwa emblazoned on it, but then it's also usually big enough on him that it's not reeeeally worth keeping since he can't exactly wear it regularly

So instead, he starts using the gifted shirts to wrap up medical supplies from the Senju healing halls (stuff that's better than what the Uchiha have been able to gift to Tobirama, but he's careful to ensure it's neither so good as to be obviously Senju nor marked in any identifying way) and occasionally also food, during times he has reason to believe the Uchiha clan (who do not have mokuton on their side) may be struggling a bit with that e.g. in the middle of a particularly harsh winter. So yeah he uses the gifted shirts to make little parcels of food + supplies

And then he starts sometimes leaving these little return parcels near any of the hangout/hiding places that he knows the Uchiha know of ('plausible deniability' does not mean 'so subtle Tobirama can't pick up on it' and it was never intended to be, and all parties know it). Only on times he's sure he hasn't been spotted though. Kami forbid he doesn't want to risk being spotted leaving them gifts or, even worse, having to explain himself. Let him have his own plausible deniability here, please, he's just returning the favour of the shirt+medical supplies gifts

Welcome to the 'Tobirama leaving the Uchiha clan gifts like a cat depositing dead mice on their doorstep' era

The Uchiha clan did NOT expect their gifts to be reciprocated but they're very excited about it! I mean the Uchiha patrol that were (un)lucky enough to find the gift were also somewhat embarrassed because now they have to admit the full goings-on with the Blessed to their higher-ups and the clan at large (the various shinobi routinely on patrol may not have yet confessed to smuggling the kid shirts and medical supplies. maybe. they also maybe weren't supposed to have some of those supplies and got in a fair amount of trouble for stealing from the limited healing halls surplus. oops) which was almost physically painful tbh,,,the disappointed stares for stealing from the healing halls,,,,but the return gifts the Blessed left pretty much redeemed them so like. It's fine it's all good. And hey, they even got the shirts back?

(Seriously what is going ON with that kid and his clothing. He clearly has clothes, so why isn't he always wearing them? Or if he doesn't have ENOUGH clothes to always wear them, or something [admittedly Tobirama does have a fairly limited number of outdoor clothing absent his clan mon so if any Uchiha was paying enough attention they may notice he was cycling through like, three shirts and two pairs of pants or something ridiculous like that], then why doesn't he keep the clothing they offer him?? What??)

Anyway they're very grateful for the medical supplies, and the food in mid-winter is a fucking BOON let them tell you that. Woo some actual fruit+veg instead of just fucking rice for the last stretch of winter! Some of their healers are sparing as much time as they can to try and reverse engineer the medication the kid left them, but it's really difficult and so far they haven't really had any success. The young Blessed helpfully used the same (knots? colour?) code as the medical supplies they left him used, for painkillers vs sedatives vs antibiotics and stuff, which is excellent

They try leaving him a thank you note near one of his hiding places once, but decide NOT to do that again because it fucking spooked the kid. He had been routinely hanging around about a third of the way between their outermost patrols and their compound, but after the Uchiha found disturbed ground by the note (which he notably did not take with him) the young Blessed a) vanished off the face of the fucking planet for like, two months and b) returned to lurking around the very very edges of their lands instead of coming further in

So outright straightforward communication is a bust, they guess.

Damn.

Somewhere in the distance Tobirama is quietly panicking because he can rationalise leaving them gifts as simply returning a favour/debt but writing to a clan his own are still enemies with? That's a bit too close to treason for him to deal with calmly

(Yes this is irrational when he is involved in actively planning much worse treason against their current shitstain of a clan head, but emotions are rarely rational, to Tobirama's eternal frustration)

So the Uchiha clan abandon direct communication as an avenue to winning this Blessed over, but they refuse to fall into ANOTHER stalemate with the quiet exchange of gifts and plausible deniability, they want to keep making some sort of progress towards winning the kid over

There's a lot of discussions back in the compound about this, throwing around various ideas. I think it should be someone from the main family (your choice who) who eventually suggests that making some of the young Blessed's hangout spots more hospitable may be a good move. After all, he's spent a fairly large amount of time on Uchiha lands, but considering he never comes inside the compound or outposts...he can't exactly be all that comfortable

(this is true he isn't, he just deems the discomfort worth it)

This is deemed a high risk, high reward idea. It might work really well! It may also just spook the kid again, probably badly enough to scare him off for good. They'll try it, but they'll only target one (1) of the kid's chosen places, in the hopes that even if he elects to forever abandon it once they actually acknowledge they know where it is and have even meddled with it, he might still use the other places. Also, whoever suggested the idea REALLY wants to help with making a cozy place for the Blessed, or tag along to see his reaction to it, or SOMETHING, but alas is strongly outvoted on the basis that altering one of the Blessed' safe spaces AND introducing a new Uchiha shinobi who doesn't routinely patrol and from the kid's perspective would have no reason to be there,,,could only end badly

There's a lot of whining about this, but they stand firm. No tagalongs. Yes even if it was your brilliant idea in the first place. Can't risk scaring him off. Eventually Tajima backs them up on this and the whining stops. Good

Time to go go spruce up a ridiculous hiding place for a young enemy Blessed shinobi

(how have their lives come to this)

let's combine some tropes

- red eyes are blessed (and therefore Tobirama has been hiding his face (and possibly generally his appearance via seal) bc they're not sure what Uchiha do with red-eyed people)

- Tobirama is a v strong sensor

- He finds Uchiha chakra in general and Madara's chakra in particular to be v pleasant

- He sometimes hides at the edge of Uchiha land borders when he's having a bad day, or just when he feels like it, in order to better immerse himself in chakra he finds comforting

- (and also Butsuma Sucks. he's abusive to his kids, esp Tobirama bc woe red eyes akin to sharingan and Butsuma's never been the most rational about his hatred. on a related note he's a passable clan head but he'd be a lot better if he didn't let said hatred guide his actions more than his reason)

...I don't think this post will get too long but I say that every time and then it does so maybe I should just preemptively stick a read more here??

basically au in which, from a p young age, Tobirama sneaks off to chakra bathe when he's sad or stressed. the Uchiha clan haven't actually found any red-eyed people in a while so the Senju aren't sure what they do with them but rumours still abound and all the rumours Tobirama have heard have generally been... well they've been bad. very bad. but they've also all had a common theme of 'the red-eyed person is not immediately killed on the spot', which is better than Tobirama could hope for from Uchiha as the Senju surety heir. so anytime he's hiding/skulking around the edges of Uchiha land, he makes sure that, unlike usual, his true appearance+eyes are on display as well as ensuring he doesn't have the Senju mon on him anywhere

he absolutely does not want to get caught by the Uchiha but also it's only sensible to take precautions so that if the worst case scenario happens and he IS caught trespassing, he should at least have a bit more time to try and escape, bare minimum, right?

so that's Tobirama's side of things

the Uchiha side of things is more like

okay they haven't found a Blessed in some time now and it's not like there's a strict manual what you should do if you find one. it's more like "these people are important, don't hurt them if at all possible, help and protect them if at all possible, bringing them into the clan and teaching them abt all things Uchiha including our religion would be a very good thing". so there's like some guidelines but it's fairly vague

this means the patrol predominantly made up of fairly new shinobi has absolutely no idea what to do when a while after sun-down they come across a Blessed child fast asleep, but slowly blinking awake, in the branches of a tree near the edge of their lands. like. hello?? small child?? why are you here how are you here do you want some soup

they're only standing around in confused and slightly awed shock for like, 3 minutes MAX but unfortunately that's long enough for the child to wake up properly, take one look at the patrol and then fucking bolt off Uchiha lands

cue surprised and self-recriminating cursing from the Uchiha shinobi. they can't just abandon their patrol route and they're somewhat wary of a potential trap for (relatively) newbie shinobi, so they don't all go after the child. but they do send their fastest after the kid because cmon that's a tiny Blessed!!

no luck, they return empty handed

apparently the Blessed child is unreasonably fast and tricky

damn

what now?

baby Tobirama returns home absolutely furious with himself. he can't believe he fell asleep!!! of all things! yeah he was exhausted and yeah he was snuggled up in warm comforting chakra but to fall asleep in enemy territory! he's so mad at himself. it was stupid and it was reckless and it was incredibly selfish of him to risk such a thing when his family, his clan, need him and- (continues telling himself off for like, 3 hours, until his brothers eventually manage to distract him from his horrible mood)

he doesn't return to Uchiha lands for ages after that. but he does, eventually, return

he isn't spotted every time he sneaks onto Uchiha lands, far from it, maybe one time in twenty or less, but it definitely happens enough times that they must know there's a little red-eyed child who keeps skulking around their territory and then bolting whenever he's spotted. oops. regardless he's very stressed and very sad because one of his little brothers is now gone (I kind of want this to be an au where his brother lives but is now stuck in an arranged marriage/learning to be a diplomat in the capital or smth, but regardless of how Kawamara is gone now and baby Tobirama is very sad abt it) and despite how many times they've spotted him, none of the Uchiha have actually managed to catch him yet, so he deems it worth the risk. (he maybe is not thinking incredibly rationally rn and just willfully disregarding anything against what he wants to do. give him a break his life sucks rn let him have this one thing)

meanwhile the Uchiha are like. where is this tiny Blessed child coming from/going to and why does he keep running away from us? like okay we know there's some horrendous rumours abt what we do with Blessed and we can't correct those rumours bc doing so risks others using Blessed against us but like....if that was the reason this kid was running from us then surely either he'd be trying to hide his features or he'd stop sneaking onto our land?

.....maybe he's not worried abt us noticing there's a Blessed child on our lands. he doesn't seem TOO bothered by us getting glimpses of him in the relative distance after all. so...he doesn't want us to see him close up? why?

..maybe he's like, really obviously from a neutral/enemy clan or something when you get a better look at him? hmmm

maybe he'll let us talk to him/catch him eventually if we keep trying. I mean it doesn't seem like he plans to stop sneaking onto our lands and WE'RE certainly not going to stop so surely its only a matter of time before he realises that if we wanted to actually hurt him we absolutely could have been throwing jutsu or weapons at him from this distance or senbons laced with sedatives or-

(should we do that instead actually? hit the kid with a sedative, deal with the rest later?

no, then we might permanently fuck over any chance of him ever trusting us and that would make helping/protecting/integrating him SO much harder

urgh. you're right I guess. okay)

anyway. maybe the little Blessed kid will relax eventually

(Tobirama does not relax eventually)

they've fallen into a frustrating stalemate in which Tobirama will fairly frequently lurk around Uchiha lands and occasionally an Uchiha will spot him and halfheartedly attempt to catch him, only to fail because Tobirama is unreasonably fast (....part of me wants to start spouting my mokuton secondary agenda again here to explain his Speed) and also they're trying not to hurt him in any way which makes it a lot harder

Tobirama has technically relaxed somewhat in that he's now significantly less worried about the prospect of the Uchiha hurting or catching him (as long as he's obviously red-eyed and absent any Senju mon, at least, all bets are off on missions/battlefields) and has as a result started to a) gradually creep further into Uchiha lands each time bc hey if the Uchiha aren't too much of a threat then it's better to be within the patrols who would stop any bandits or rogue shinobi right? and b) has started wandering off to Uchiha lands whenever he feels like it instead of just when he's near his breaking point. like now whenever he has a free moment he's like 'hmmmm do I want to spend time fucking about with research or with Touka/brothers or do I want to go chakra bathe' and they're all weighed up near equally in his mind

(assuming that said free moment would also give him the time/cover/distraction needed for him to reach Uchiha lands and back without Butsuma noticing, ofc. he isn't stupid nor does he have a death wish. That Man assuming he'd gone traitor would be.............bad.)

so I mean the Uchiha were sort of right in assuming he'd relax once he realised they weren't incredibly intent on hurting/catching him. they were just wrong in hoping he'd relax ENOUGH to let them catch/talk to him

they're very disappointed. however they're also cautiously pleased that the Blessed child has not stopped coming back over and over again, and also that he is gradually coming further into their lands and two months ago when some (significantly less welcome) trespasser turned up and tried to attack the kid he even ran to an Uchiha patrol for help! Admittedly he didn't say anything, or stick around after, but hey he at least trusts them a tiny bit to go to them for help against an enemy, right? Progress! It might take a billion years at this rate but they WILL win over the Blessed kid eventually!

at this point it's been like, at least two years since Tobirama was first spotted. probably significantly more. the stalemate truly is getting a bit ridiculous but neither party is willing to break it for fear it would end badly (and probably specifically end badly for Tobirama/little Blessed child, realistically. given he's a small child and they're an entire clan whose land he is trespassing on, there's v few ways they could break the stalemate which wouldn't risk - at best - the kid simply never returning again or at worst the the kid/Tobirama dying or living but hating+distrusting the Uchiha forever or Tobirama getting kidnapped and suffering [unspecified bad fate bc Tobirama doesnt know which rumours may be accurate but he hates them all])

eventually, fucking years later (I'm imagining Tobirama somewhere between 11 and 16 but truly can't pin it down further it depends if/what plot I include later in this theoretical fic) the stalemate does get broken, but not exactly by choice

Tobirama was on a mission and fairly badly injured. not enough that he's at risk of dying, unless he does something truly incredibly stupid + fucks up his own condition further, but he's in a lot of pain, his adrenaline is sky high, and he generally had a shitty time on the mission. he completed it successfully- barely - but it sucked and he's pretty miserable at the moment. he knows what he SHOULD do is go home and report to the healing hall to be fixed up and then go recount the mission (and his many failures/perceived failures on said mission) to Butsuma but.

but.

he doesn't want to do that

to put it mildly

anyway, the Uchiha is significantly closer than his own clan due to the direction the mission led him in, and he's exhausted and hurt, and his disguise is compromised..

(if it's something physical like a mask/contacts/dyed hair/etc then he lost it on mission or it got washed out due to how So Many Things Happened. if it's something chakra based like a jutsu or seal then he's too low on chakra and too hurt/distracted to maintain it)

...so trying to get all the way past the Uchiha, in his Senju armour but clearly a red-eyed child, when he's too exhausted and injured to guarantee he could succeed in doing so, would be a really bad idea, right? right. like they'd probably see him at best and then they'd know there was a red-eyed Senju kid and far more realistically they'd successfully catch or kill him in this state

so obviously it makes more sense for him to discard everything that marks him as a Senju, whilst he's still conscious+has the chakra to seal it away surreptitiously, and then go nap on Uchiha lands until he's recovered enough to make it home safely

yeah, that's a good idea. he'll do that

(tbf this is a fairly decent tactic but he's also trying to convince himself because when the options are 'soak up the most wonderful chakra he's ever felt and have a nap safely on territory he knows he probably won't be hurt on' or 'go home and get horribly mistreated by Butsuma for doing so badly on a mission before he even gets a chance to rest' he knows which one he wants to pick)

so Tobirama discards his armour and most of his equipment (urgh why is the Senju mon on EVERYTHING he complains to himself) and seals it away, making sure said seal also isn't at all obvious. all the moving he has to do to get this done really sucks because ow. injuries. most of them aren't that bad, a lot of surface wounds, and none of them are fatal, but OW moving so much aggravates almost all of them

this more or less just leaves him in pants, an undershirt, shoes and a kunai pouch. it's....Not A Lot and the paranoia and vulnerability is prickling at him even once he's within Uchiha patrols on their lands and he keeps trying to assure himself he's safe there but it's not working. he's hurt and exhausted and he barely has any chakra left and now he's not even wearing his armour or most of his weapons and he doesn't USUALLY wear his armour on Uchiha lands but he's also usually wearing more and NOT INJURED and more heavily armed and-

to appease his panic so he can actually rest like he'd intended to, instead of just kind of hanging around or scaling some branches/outcropping, he instead finds a tree that has a small burrow at the roots, just big enough for him to fit and evidently not currently in use by whatever animal made it, and curls up in there. he's careful of course not to let any open wounds meet the dirt, that's just asking for infection - thankfully his pants are long and his undershirt has long sleeves, so he just has to curl his hands up in his sleeves and ensure his head is cushioned on the lightweight cloak that thankfully had no clan mon on it - but he feels a lot safer when he's hidden away in an enclosed space

he reaches out to the warm-spice-passion chakra signatures within the Uchiha compound, shifts a bit for the comfiest position he can find in his little hiding place, and finally feels able to relax for the first time since that horrible mission started

there. safe

he falls asleep

meanwhile a Uchiha patrol has found spots of blood and a lot of scuffed up footsteps along their border, plus one spot that's just, a mess of leaf litter and kicked up moss (Tobirama tripped over a tree root when trying to take his chest plate off, immediately felt irrationally angry about it, and kicked at the stupid root to get it back. he then felt stupid himself and pretended it didn't happen. the rest of the mess is bc he was p carelessly dumping his shit on the floor before sealing it away) and they're concerned about it

is this from a fight?? no signs of jutsu tho, or discarded weaponry....hm. at the very least, someone was injured and (given that as far as this patrol knows, all their clan members are accounted for or shouldn't have returned from their missions yet) probably also trespassing

better go investigate

so they do and they find....that's a Blessed. that's the same Blessed that keeps wandering onto their lands, and he's asleep in a fucking hole and bleeding everywhere. oh shit. also where the hell is his shirt?? that is not a proper over-shirt that is underclothing what-

ah fuck what do they do

ah fuck

they know they're supposed to help this Blessed but they also know that a) he's scared of them for some reason. possibly bc he may technically be an enemy to their clan? they have no proof but its a persistent theory over the years and b) he's definitely a shinobi there's no way he could have outran that trespasser without training nor ended up in some of the ridiculous places he's been (hello?? tiny Blessed?? why are you 30 feet up a tree) without the ability to tree-walk

so like. they want to just take him back to their healing halls or something, but if they try that they'll probably just scare the shit out of him and he'd likely hurt them - and more crucially - himself in trying to get away

so they probably shouldn't do that. but they also can't just leave him injured in a hole. he's a Blessed! they can't leave him like this!

so

what do they do??

they have a quiet argument/discussion and ultimately determine that some of them will stay guarding the injured Blessed and some(one) will run back to the compound to firstly explain what's happened + that someone else needs to take over their patrol route and secondly gather what medical supplies they can spare and bring those back here

when the assigned shinobi returns with the supplies they end up accidentally waking the Blessed, which unfortunately immediately confirms their worries because he freaks the fuck out. he seems to want to run but swiftly determines he couldn't get out of the fucking hole + past them without them letting him, and instead twists with a pained hiss, bringing his hands up to hide his face and build as much as possible

which is interesting. he doesn't go to hide his hair, nor specifically to hide the red eyes that mark him as Blessed, no he goes to hide other potential identifiers....which kind of suggests he is indeed from an enemy clan. hm. damn. doesn't make him any less a Blessed but oh boy that may complicate things later on

(hc for the purposes of this fic that as a kid/early teen Tobirama looked fairly generically (mainline) Senju, apart from his colouring, and it wasn't until mid teens when he got a massive growth spurt and his face started changing more that he began to look more like his (outclan) mother and taller+slimmer+narrower than the average Senju, with pointer facial features, and just generally look a lot less like Butsuma+less obviously Senju)

the Uchiha silently and unanimously agree that this would go better if he DIDN'T feel like the wounded cornered animal he currently is, so they get the fuck out of the way. they don't go too far away, still within view, but they make sure the Blessed has a clear run out of the hole and off/away, if he wants. they also ensure that the medical supplies are very visible within that cleared space

a minute or so later they're rewarded when the Blessed stops cowering, and shoots past them faster than they would have believed possible. he takes the medical supplies on his dash past though - victory! woo!

they have a little discussion whilst they wait for him to get whatever he feels is a safe distance away, and decide that yeah that behaviour definitely indicates he thinks some sort of familial resemblance or something is a) noticable and b) gives him reason to fear the Uchiha's discovery of such. so. probably from an enemy clan

but...he's Blessed, and he hasn't tried to hurt any of them or actually get far enough into their territory to spy, or anything like that at all as far as they've noticed, so...?

plausible deniability, they decide. plausible deniability is going to be the name of the game, here

they'll just pretend not to notice he's present/a potential threat and hopefully he'll pretend right back

(also, interestingly, when they send someone to try and follow after the Blessed from a distance, they find that he hasn't bolted away from Uchiha lands as he has every time previously he was spotted. as they expected him to do now, when he's probably feeling cornered and threatened as well as being injured. no, instead he's stayed well within the area the Uchiha patrol (if anything he's actually gone further within Uchiha territory which, what?) and has found another substandard hiding place in which he's using the offered medical supplies to clean and tend to what injuries he can, and then he actually goes to sleep right there. he leaves when he wakes up a few hours later, and they don't try to stop him - REALLY not the time - but. hm. interesting)

anyway that whole encounter pretty thoroughly breaks the stalemate

after that, the Uchiha clan (specifically their patrols) and Tobirama somehow develop a whole new dynamic which honestly is almost identical to the Uchiha attempting to gradually befriend and lure a feral cat into their home, meanwhile Tobirama gradually starts leaving metaphorical dead mice on their doorstep

it's...yeah, it's really weird, actually, but. it's working?? so??

[pianostarinwonderland]

About that Vil and Leona slander-defense(? post

You are absolutely right.

I'm going to theory/analysis-dump here rn and I'm Sorry™ but I want your opinion sobs

Outside of fans (because honestly, any fan should at least roast their faves once) I feel like because Azul's plot delivery was made so it would take a more emotionally vulnerable turn (bullying, self-image issues) and the players would sympathize with his situation.

We haven't seen enough of Malleus yet, but I feel like they tried to do it like Azul's (not being invited, the tamagotchi scenario) and has mellowed their image.

Meanwhile, Vil's and Leona's situation are similar in between them but completely different from the other two.

Both of them have self image issues that steems not from their physical appearance (unlike what began Azul's self image issues, that he was chubby and then evolved) but more of feelings of worthlessness and not being enough (Leona's second prince situation & Vil's situation with Neige). They both had been made sure they would never be like those they compare, but the delivery of that has been completely different. Vil and Leona refuse to become vulnerable to the general public because they are proud and even more, their image cannot allow it! Leona and Vil are public figures that can't be vulnerable without their image being threatened (Malleus is also a public figure, but he doesn't have too much weigh on the plot, but he's in fact a position above Leona, with makes his inferiority complex, well, even more complex).

(This situation also works with Azul's fake confidence, but as I said, we could see Azul become very vulnerable pre, during and post overblot).

In fact, it's as if both of them don't want to appear vulnerable in any situation (with, for example, the haughtyness that is so common with them) so they don't really appeal to everyone, because everyone is seeing what both want to show.

I was not even invested on them before, but I think players give Vil's and Leona's characterization little credit ಥ‿ಥ

In this essay I will

[Reply to here!]

"This ask was sent on March, why are you only replying to it now? "Anytime someone sends me something smart sounding I have to think DEEP on how to respond to them insert pepecry emoji"

I like the way you explained it! The writing makes Azul and Malleus more vulnerable whereas Leona and Vil try not to be.

It's not to say that the former two don't try to keep up appearances. Azul very much built his image in such a way that he doesn't want to be stepped on again. He worked hard to improve himself and to never go back to that vulnerable self he once was. Malleus meanwhile is a crown prince. Dignity and poise are what he needs in his position. His position as one of the 5 strongest mages in the world make him all the more intimidating. But the way those two people are written, you get to see their vulnerabilities, even if they try to hide them. You can see their hurt (Azul with his tears, Malleus with his lamenting comments).

Like you said, Leona and Vil are hurt, but they don't show it. At least, not in the way Azul and Malleus do. If they do show their hurt, it's a little quieter, often in the form of mutterings or in grumbles. It's not as blatant. It's definitely not a bad thing at all because people do express their hurt similarly to how they do it. It just doesn't tug the heartstrings in the way that Azul, Malleus, and even Riddle do. But it doesn't invalidate their experiences.

Regardless of relatability, it doesn't justify the character hate nor does it justify allowing them to be insulted. In some ways, the way people talk about Leona and Vil makes you wonder what is society's view on people like them, people who aren't so willing to show their hurt in such vulnerable ways either because they struggle to or their circumstances don't allow it.

[dilemmaontwolegs]

Hey gorgeous! I was the one who asked before about tasm!peter and if you don’t mind, I have a request for you 💕 it’s really heavy, so I wanted to give you the heads up before I jump straight into it. Mentions of loss and a suic*de attempt Basically it would take place when he’s in the angry/grieving phase after losing Gwen that he talks about in NWH, but while all of that is happening, he’s on his patrol and he meets Reader standing at the edge of a rooftop. The first thing he notices is that she’s crying and he quickly gets a grasp on the situation. Long story short, he talks her down, and even goes as far as to take off his mask to level with her even more, but just as she’s about to climb back down, she slips and he dives to catch her. Similar to the way he caught MJ, it was sort of like closure for him and really emotional to be able to catch her after he couldn’t get to Gwen in time. Meanwhile she’s breaking down in his arms and realizing in that very close call that she doesn’t want to die. Peter just holds her even tighter and he offers to take her home, but she doesn’t want to be alone, so he takes her back to his instead and they find comfort in each other. I know that this is kind of a lot and not normally the kind of thing you usually write so I deeply apologize if you’re not comfortable with this but as somebody who’s struggled with things like this in the past, Peter has been my comfort character since I was a little kid and I’ve had this idea bouncing around my head since I saw the last Spider-Man movie.

This resonated deeply with me and I was worried I wouldn't be able to put it into words but I hope I did this justice for you. I hope if anyone is feeling stuck in a dark hole and reads this that they find some hope on the horizon and know that they can always pop into my inbox. Love Ollie xx

Slipping Through His Fingers || tasm!Peter Parker

Warnings: 18+ only, angst, suicide attempt, depression, happy ending WC: 1.7k

Masterlist

A strong wind was blowing over the city, taking away the dark clouds that had drenched the streets below. You couldn’t even feel the cold seeping into your bones from the soaked clothes that clung to you, you couldn’t feel anything. Maybe that was a lie, maybe you were feeling everything and it was too much for one person to feel that it left you numb to your senses.

As you stood at the precipice of the rooftop you tried to think of what had led you to this moment, the defining factor that forced your mind to fracture and you will to stop fighting the need to live. You couldn’t think of a single instance, there was nothing but an overwhelming compilation of hurt compounded by the relentless voice in the back of your head. You tried to ignore it but time had eroded your strength and you had started to believe the whispers, the feeling of worthlessness setting in.

“Hey.”

A gentle voice pulled your attention out of the internal roll call, where you had been listing off every mistake you had made in your life, and towards the shadows of the rooftop. You hurriedly brushed away the tears that streaked your face and blended with the raindrops that clung to your cheeks.

“Are you alright?” He asked, coming into view and revealing it was none other than Spider-Man, his hands spread wide as he took a tentative step closer. “Sorry, silly question. How about you hop off the ledge and we can talk huh?”

“I’m fine.” You muttered as you looked back at the traffic far below, the angry horns of the yellow cabs echoing between the skyscrapers. “Don’t waste your time on me, I’m not worth it.”

“I think you are.” He said, inching closer still. “What’s your name?”

“Do you think it’s true what they say? That you see your life flash before your eyes at the end?” You asked, turning to see the reflective panels that hid his eyes, your hopeless face staring back at you. “I hope it’s not. It was hard enough to live through the first time.”

“I know it’s hard, and right now you can’t see a way out of the pit you are in but I promise you, it gets better. I’ve been where you are.” He was almost within touching distance but instead of reaching for you, his gloved hand grabbed his mask and pulled it from his head to look up at the sky with tear filled eyes. “The clouds can’t hang around forever.”

You were crushed by the pain his eyes held and he reached out for you, your fingers being pulled like a magnet towards his touch. “I’m scared I’ll wake up tomorrow and nothing will have changed, I’ll still be alone.”

“You’re not alone.” He said with a small smile as his fingertips touched yours. “See. I’m here and I’ll still be here after we get down safely. What do you say?”

Your body had begun shivering and your teeth chattered as you nodded hesitantly. You desperately wanted to believe him, something in your soul telling you that he could be trusted despite the slander you read about him in the papers. He had shown you trust first, revealing his greatest secret to you, so you decided to extend it back and took a step closer.

You had been standing at the edge for so long you hadn’t noticed the surface water that had settled on the metal edging. The moment the sole of your shoe touched down you knew it was a mistake, your arms flailing as you lost your footing and slipped from the rooftop.

Time slowed while you helplessly watched the shock and fear spread across his face, his fingers snatching at the empty air above you as he cried out. You reached out but it was too late, the brick and mortar blurring as you fell to what you could only hope was a painless death, your chest aching as you realised this wasn’t what you wanted. You didn’t want to hurt the man stuck still staring at his empty hands, the trauma behind his eyes mirroring yours. You didn’t want to cause him anymore suffering and you no longer wanted to lose to the voice in your head. 

You screamed at the unfairness of it all, the last of your air whooshing from your lungs and the sound broke him from his trance. He dove head first off the building, his arms pointing to you as he cast his webs and the strong fibres wrapped around your waist but you weren’t slowing down. With a harsh tug that bruised your waist, he shot forward and slammed into you, cradling you as more webbing shot from his wrist and caught the streetlamp beside you. 

You could feel the cold sidewalk take the rubber from the bottom of your shoe as the streetlamp anchored Spider-Man, his arm around your waist the only thing stopping you from meeting your demise in the street. Swinging under the light you screamed and wrapped your legs around his waist as you held on for dear life, the swinging taking you further away from the rooftop. 

“Are you alright?” He asked as he found a quiet spot in a park and set you down, your legs giving out. “Woah, hey, I got you.”

You looked up from the chest you were cradled against and found his brown eyes warm, they were still haunted but not in the way they were before - as if saving you had somehow saved himself. The wind had blown his hair back in a fluffy brown mess and your lip twitched into an almost smile at the thought of him trying to stuff it all back in his mask.

“Can I know your name?” You asked quietly. 

“It’s um Peter.” He answered nervously, easing his grip to see if you were steady enough to stand. “And you?”

“Y/N.” 

He smiled as he softly repeated it under his breath and stepped back. “Can I walk you home, Y/N? Or maybe a friend's house?”

You shook your head and looked at your scuffed shoes, tears once stinging your eyes and your lips trembling. “I don’t want to go home and I don’t have anyone else.” 

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” He soothed as he rubbed your back. “I know what it’s like to feel completely alone. Why don’t you come stay with me for a little bit?”

You could’ve jumped at the opportunity, and you really did want to, but you needed to understand something first. “Why are you doing all this for me?” 

“Maybe because we are birds of feather?” He shrugged with a small smile. “Look, you need a safe place to stay and I have space in my apartment. Plus, I don’t think either of us should really be alone right now.”

Your arms locked around his waist before you knew what you were doing but he dropped his head to your shoulder before you could change your mind. It had been so long since you had received a proper hug that didn’t come with some sense of obligation or expectation. This was just two people clinging to some hope that together they could make it through the night and that was exactly what you were going to do.

“Okay.” You nodded as you pulled away to see him wiping his eyes. “But just for a few nights while I figure out what to do with my life.”

“Take as long as you need,” he grinned, happy to hear that you were thinking of your future, “I want to hear all about them.”

Ten Years Later

“PJ!” You called up the stairs. “You’re gonna be late!”

Feet slapped across the wooden floors and Peter Junior skidded to a stop at the top of the stairs before sliding down the handrail, his backpack hanging off one arm. The flash of a camera caught the action shot and you shook your head as your husband high fived his son after he stuck the landing in front of you.

“What have I told you two? At least I have one child who can keep their feet on the ground.” You sighed, knowing it was fighting an uphill battle trying to get them to use the stairs like civilised people. “Gwen, come on sweetheart, time for school. And remember, dad’s picking you up today.”

“That’s today?” Peter asked, running his fingers through his hair as he tried to tame it in the hall mirror. 

“Yes, today.” You chuckled, kissing his cheek and helping him with the dark nest of locks. “I’m speaking at the Mental Health Awareness conference and you are picking up the kids. I love you, don’t be late. Kids, come on - this train is leaving the station.”

Gwen raced down the stairs and barreled into PJ who was once again ignoring the house rules as he balanced on his skateboard. The board went flying towards the glass coffee table in the living room while he and his little sister went tumbling in the other direction. Twin webs shot out from Peter as he caught the wayward skateboard before it could smash anything and managed to stop the kids from hitting the floor too.

The temptation to growl at the children was squashed but the proud grin on Peter’s face and you bit your lip as you saw a piece of his younger self shining through his maturing exterior. Grabbing the webbing still hanging from his hand, you pulled him closer and kissed him with a fiery promise of what he could expect when the kids were fast asleep that night.

“Gross.” PJ complained as he pulled himself out of the web and grabbed his skateboard. 

“Gross.” Peter mocked quietly in your ear with a laugh, giving you one last kiss before steering you to the garage door before you really were late. “Don’t miss your conference, people need to hear your story.”

You unlocked the car as the kids climbed in and buckled their seats, oblivious to the weight of those words. “It’s our story.”

[archived-kin]

simeon with a himbo boyfriend

note from kin: once again i am writing for the boys because this fandom doesn’t have nearly enough content for them, especially for Big and Beefy Men. let them be in dating sim fandoms too!!!!!! give them more content!!!!!

anyway i’ve made you an angel since i don’t want to have to think about the deeper repercussions of what simeon dating a human would be (i mean we all know what happened to lilith when she tried it)

fandom: obey me!

character(s): male!reader, simeon, luke, belphegor, beelzebub, asmodeus, satan, leviathan, mammon, lucifer, barbatos, diavolo, solomon

pairing(s): simeon/reader but it accidentally becomes everyone/simeon’s boyfriend at some point whoops (this ended up as a pretty big block of text as a result so please let me know if you have difficulty reading it so that i can try to format it better!)

warning(s): nope!

genre: fluff!!!! fluff everywhere!!!!!!!!!

simeon thinks you’re the cutest goddamn thing in all three realms

you may be six foot four inches of muscle but to him that is six foot four inches of ADORABLE

you’re very strong so he likes to just run and jump up at you from behind and wrap his arms around your neck because he knows you won’t be fazed by it (physically anyways, emotionally is another story)

the other angels always gasp when he does this in public because it’s so far from his usual ‘poised and elegant’ thing but how is simeon NOT supposed to climb all over you like a koala when you’re so big and huggable???

simeon just really loves jumping at you like that okay

because every time he does you’ll just pause for a second and look very confused as to why your back has suddenly gotten heavier, and then you’ll turn your head, and your smile and excited little ‘simeon!!’ is to DIE for

he has to be incredibly upfront with you about what he wants because otherwise you will not understand

he has to say, word for word, “i want to sleep in the same bed as you every day” before you actually realise that that’s what he meant

the whole exchange kind of went like this:

simeon, being sappy at like seven in the morning: “i want to wake up like this all the time from now on”

you: “??? do you want me to come lie down next to you before you wake up tomorrow morning?”

simeon: “no, for the whole night”

you: “you want to wake up like this for the whole night??”

simeon: [sighs]

he also often has to be the one taking charge when it comes to physical affection  

like you’re always willing to give him hugs and carry him around and let him sleep sprawled out on your chest like a starfish and give him kisses but half the time simeon has to ask you because for some reason you just won’t do it on your own???

at one point simeon starts getting a little insecure that you don’t actually really like physical affection and are just going along with it for him

because he’s a sensible angel, he brings this up with you before jumping to conclusions

he was not prepared for you to reply that you always wait for him to confirm that he wants affection because you’re afraid that you’ll accidentally hurt him with your strength if you go for it by yourself

simeon doesn’t cry a lot but dear god did he come close that day

after that it’s just hand holding and hugs and forehead kisses galore from you and simeon couldn’t be happier

now, it’s time for a bit of backstory

you were created purely to fight during the big celestial war, which is why you are so Beefy and Stupid

the beefy is because they needed you to be both strong and intimidating, while the stupid is because they didn’t create you with anything but fist fighting in mind

during the war you were a force to be reckoned with because you could just run at and headbutt a demon and they’d immediately be flung straight out of the skies and back into the devildom

and, even better, this meant that you didn’t have to kill anyone! you could just punt them so hard that they’d be flung out of the realm where the battle’s taking place entirely

once the war was over though they didn’t really know what to do with you

you were basically just this giant baby who didn’t know how to do anything but war

so they just dumped you in a garden and told you to take care of the flowers

which was how simeon originally met you! he was taking a walk around the gardens and saw you crying over a tree that you accidentally snapped in half with your big clumsy hands

now, simeon wasn’t one to believe in love at first sight, but HOLY FUCK

if he hadn’t already been an angel in the celestial realm he’d have thought you were some divine being from the heavens

anyway long story short simeon consoled you and started helping you take care of the garden, taught you how to live a life in times of peace, spent entire nights just lying awake and thinking about your smile and your laugh and how warm your hands look to hold and how it would feel to hug you, and finally managed to confess to you without you misconstruing it as just a Friendly Act of Kindness, and now you two are the proud holders of the title Cutest Couple in The Universe

granted only asmo calls you two that but you’ll take it

speaking of asmo allow me to segue this to the rad exchange programme era

you get so sad when simeon tells you he’ll have to leave for a year

your face falls when he breaks the news and your voice is all lost and quiet when you ask, ‘does that mean i can’t see you?’

simeon is absolutely devastated

it’s like a thousand puppies and kittens are being murdered right in front of him

he nearly cries (when i say nearly i mean he does)

but he can’t back out of the exchange program now, and one year isn’t THAT much for beings that live for possibly forever, so in the end, giving you a giant hug and about a million kisses to make up for the ones you’ll miss over the coming year, simeon leaves for the devildom

he makes it about a month and a half without you before he starts getting all mopey

and you’re not doing much better up in the celestial realm

michael actually has to message simeon and ask him how to deal with you because you spend every day dejectedly shuffling around the gardens that you take care of and it’s making everyone sad just looking at you

simeon reads that message and immediately decides that either he’s going back to the celestial realm or you’re coming down to the devildom

the authorities are a little cautious about it because you’re one of the purest angels they have and they really don’t want you getting corrupted by demons

but simeon assures them that the few demons that you’ll actually be having contact with wouldn’t do that, and you’ll be under both his and lord diavolo’s protection

so you end up being allowed to join simeon in the devildom for his exchange year!!!

honestly with the way the two of you react when you see each other again you’d think you hadn’t seen each other in years

simeon runs up to you and jumps straight into your arms and you spin him around in a big hug and ahhhhhhhh it’s like a teen romance movie but with an actually compelling relationship

and so you move into his bedroom (because of course you’re still going to share one down here) and take up a temporary position as a gardener to take up time since you can’t really do school

pros: simeon now gets to see you every day again and you look very cute bustling around the devildom’s fancy gardens with a watering can and wheelbarrow. also he gets to watch you lift an entire shed and it’s the best thing he’s ever seen

cons: the others are all basically in love with you now as well

simeon’s torn between ‘why wouldn’t they be, he’s literally the most perfect being ever’ and ‘what the fuck, that’s MY boyfriend’

belphie likes you because you are similar to beel and you’re also warm and big and strong so he can take naps on you and you won’t be bothered in the slightest

one day simeon sees belphie just jump onto your back and start sleeping there while you’re crouched in the garden doing some weeding and he’s so stunned by the sheer audacity that he forgets to be mad about it

honestly you don’t really notice that belphie is sleeping on you until you go to get up and feel something move on your back

and then, being the dumb precious idiot you are, you just lie face first there on the lawn so that he can carry on sleeping without being disturbed

consequence: simeon nearly cries at your sweetness but is also incredibly jealous and belphie is now having Feelings that he didn’t sign up for

beel meanwhile isn’t sure how to feel about you at first because he kind of feels like you’re stealing his twin all the time, but then you make him your special candied fruits (from produce that you grew yourself) and he loves you from that point forward

also PLEASE share your workout routine with him he wants to know your secret

it turns out that you don’t really have a workout routine?? you were just made like that

though the constant exercise and heavy lifting and stuff you do as part of your daily garden-care routine (you take care of basically all of the gardens back in the celestial realm) helps as well

he’s a bit disappointed but he does like that you can pick him up without any effort

one time he asked if you were capable of it and without missing a beat you went ‘let’s find out!’ and straight up swept him off his feet

beel was fucking screaming on the inside but no can’t feel feelings that’s simeon’s boyfriend

meanwhile asmo… okay we all know the way asmo is

boy took one look at you and immediately started drooling (figuratively anyway. physically his jaw just dropped)

kudos to him though, he backs off with the flirting as soon as simeon informs everyone that you’re his partner

asmo may be the avatar of lust but he is no home wrecker (he still finds an excuse to hug you every time he sees you though because awooga, muscles)

(he does know his boundaries so simeon doesn’t mind too much)

asmo also very likes the fact that you have such a green thumb because it means you can grow the prettiest flowers and you’re always willing to trim him a few to use as accessories

at some point simeon accidentally eavesdrops in on a conversation between the two of you where you’re just gushing about what kind of flowers he likes and how you’re going to plant them everywhere in the devildom because you like it when he smiles when he sees them

CRITICAL HIT!!!!!

simeon is pretty sure he combusts on the spot, while asmo is just squealing

thus was the origin of the title ‘Cutest Couple in the Universe’

satan on the other hand is mostly disinterested in you at first

the two of you live in pretty different worlds even if you live within the a five minutes’ walk of each other. he prefers to stay locked up in his room or the library and just curl up with a good book or ten for hours on end, while you’re always outside, digging flower beds and pruning bushes and cleaning fences and walls and basically doing every other little bit of manual labour that none of the brothers could be bothered to do before

he does note that you’re pretty good at what you do but that’s about it

until one day

you’re just pottering about in the garden outside the house of lamentation doing your angelic gardener thing when the stray cat that satan’s secretly been feeding for the past month or so comes by for its usual afternoon meal

satan has the window overlooking the garden so he quickly spots its ginger fur as well as you staring directly at it, and he immediately panics because what if you scare it away with your intimidating stature???

(yes, part of the reason satan doesn’t acknowledge you before this is because he was kind of scared of you and your muscles that he heard could punt beings out of entire realms back in your hey-day)

so he quickly dumps his book (though not without carefully bookmarking his place first) and rushes down to the garden in hopes of salvaging the situation, only to find you lying face first on the grass once again, though this time it’s not his little brother on your back

it’s the cat, who is purring like a little motor and aggressively kneading its paws against your back

satan can’t even see your face in this moment but he still basically gets cupid-shot in the heart because this is the cutest thing he’s ever seen

he has to force himself to calm down for a bit before he approaches lest he get overexcited and accidentally incur simeon’s wrath in the process

anyway after that satan makes a beeline for you every time he sees you and learns that you are an Absolute Idiot, but it just makes him like you even more

if satan was intimidated by you at first though, levi is downright terrified

you look like you could snap him in half with a single punch

he doesn’t try to talk to you at all for the first few weeks because how could he possibly find common ground to talk to you about?? you probably hunt dragons and eat rocks or something in your spare time

it isn’t until satan brings you up one day and mentions that you are incredibly dumb of the ass and probably couldn’t hurt a fly even if you tried that levi even entertains the idea of befriending you

he’s still not making the first move though

but it turns out that he doesn’t have to! one day you just show up at his bedroom door holding a giant crate of his latest akuzon haul

turns it got dropped off at the local post office after traffic problems and you volunteered to go pick it up and bring it back

anyway levi thanks you and starts unpacking his stuff, expecting you to leave in silence, but then he looks over and sees you just standing in front of his tv and staring at it

he’d been playing some battle platformer to pass the time before you showed up, and while levi himself doesn’t consider it particularly remarkable, you’re absolutely fascinated

being a gardener in the celestial realm you’ve never really had experience with this kind of thing, and you’re even more tech-illiterate than simeon, so what you’re seeing is basically like magic to you

so levi takes it upon himself to teach you as much about the art of gaming as he can in the short span of the next four hours before simeon gets home from a meeting of some kind and you inevitably immediately run off to greet him

you learn the basics relatively quickly but you’re still pretty awful at it

levi loses count of the amount of times you’ve accidentally run right off the end of the platform and fallen to your death once it reaches thirty two

it’s pretty much the most he’s laughed in, like, forever

congratulations! you have gained a new member in your party! levi will now follow you to the ends of the earth because you are the first person he feels like he can just be totally at ease around without being judged at all and just have fun with

(once, after you leave another gaming session to go cuddle with your boyfriend in the garden, levi catches himself thinking that ‘it isn’t fair that simeon gets to date him’ and has to do some serious self assessment)

mammon meanwhile has none of the reverence for you that his brother does

the amount of times he’s tried to rope you into his money-making schemes (which never work because he fails to realise that you are incapable of doing anything malicious in the slightest) is honestly just embarrassing at this point

simeon has to step in more than a couple of times because honestly mammon could ask you for your wallet and you’d probably just give it to him without another thought

that being said your wallet wouldn’t be much use because you never have any money

you just don’t understand the concept of exchanging money for goods and/or services so you never see any need for it

that being said, simeon does give you some money every time you go out into town on your own because something will inevitably catch your eye and you’ll suddenly realise that you just cannot live without it

the thing is simeon spoils you ridiculously so he always gives you way more money than would be considered a reasonable allowance

which means all mammon has to do is tag along and ask you nicely and you’ll probably buy him anything he wants

he does this a couple of times but then stops because he actually starts feeling bad about it

something just doesn’t sit right with him when he’s walking around with a bunch of shiny new things you’ve bought him with money that was meant to be spent on you while the only thing you’ve bought of your own volition is a pack of chocolate lollipops shaped like rabbits to share with simeon and luke

he may be the demonic avatar of greed but even he has a line that he won’t cross

he makes up for it by buying you things instead

nothing too expensive (he’s still mammon after all), just little things like sweets or bulbs for flowers you haven’t tried planting yet or food colouring for you to use for your candied fruits

speaking of those candied fruits, guess who loves and would probably kill a man for them?

lucifer

man may not seem like it but he has a hell of a sweet tooth

there was a bit of tension between the two of you when you first met (well there was tension from lucifer anyway) because he’d never met you like he had simeon and luke and had no idea what you were like

plus he’d heard about how you’re everyone’s favourite now back in the celestial realm and the little piece of him that still misses his life as an angel is a little petty about it

but then he interacts with you more and he realises that that favouritism is absolutely deserved

he will not admit it but he has wondered what being carried by you would feel like on multiple occasions

figures out how to read you really well which isn’t much of an achievement when you wear every single feeling you have on your sleeve but it still brings him a bit of satisfaction when he notices something that simeon doesn’t

he may be a pridey mcprideface but he is willing to give up a bit of that pride by pretending he can’t carry something heavy so that he can watch you do it

simeon acts like he doesn’t notice this but he absolutely does and he doesn’t know if he should tease lucifer about it or whack him over the head with a newspaper for it

all that aside though, much like simeon,  lucifer also thinks you’re just the cutest

he comes across you building a pillow fortress in the middle of the house of lamentation’s living room one day and is understandably like “what are you doing in my house and what are you doing with those pillows”

you explain very seriously that satan asked you for help in an apparently pre-arranged pillow fight with mammon and that every warrior needs a well-protected base of operations and offer to show him all the optimised battle features somehow recreated from nothing but cushions and blankets and chairs 

lucifer’s heart goes d o k i  d o k i

he also has experience with Big and Dumb men from dealing with both beel and diavolo (when the three of you are together it’s just himbo3) so the stupid doesn’t bother him much

speaking of diavolo (wow i am nailing all of these transitions from character to character look at me go)

this man is basically just a grown up golden retriever boy and you are a big gentle st. bernard so the two of you get along like a house on fire

you’ve seen how much this man gushes about lucifer. now imagine that times a thousand

that is how he talks about you

honestly sometimes you’d think HE’S the one dating you

simeon would probably get defensive if he didn’t get so much whiplash from their conversations about you

diavolo: “i must say, i never would have pinned [name] as being your type”

simeon, ready to Fucking Brawl: “excuse me?”

diavolo: “though i don’t blame you, have you seen his page in that book about the celestial war? the illustration does his true beauty no justice, of course, but it’s enchanting in and of itself. to be honest i’d have loved to have seen him in action during the war, i imagine it would have been quite breath-taking to see”

simeon: “…what”

barbatos is usually just there in the background during half of these exchanges and he has to seriously stiffen up his poker face to resist just bursting into laughter

the other half of the time the conversation is just simeon and diavolo going back and forth gushing about you

barbatos honestly dislikes you a bit at first

not for any personal faults of your own! it’s just that all your garden work + your very forgetful mind means that you’re often tracking dirt everywhere

it doesn’t help that diavolo keeps inviting you over to the castle for tea and a chat and half the time you leave these big footprints on the floor and he wants to cry because he just spent four hours mopping that

he mentions it to diavolo in passing at one point, who then passes the message on to simeon

barbatos kind of gets concerned for himself because he knows simeon does not take well to you being insulted (one time a demon at the r.a.d. called you an ‘unintelligent buffoon’ and he was ready to start a fist fight right then and there)

not that it was an insult, but you never know how love can blind you to reason

but simeon just assures him not to worry and tells you to remember to clean your shoes as well as changing clothes after doing some gardening

normally you’d forget being told these things within a few hours but simeon offers to give you a kiss every time you remember to do this so now you remember every single time you’re about to enter a building after doing some gardening

after that barbatos holds no ill will to you at all

he teaches you how to bake and is honestly so endeared by how clumsy you get in the kitchen

you knock an entire container of salt into the cake mix by accident because your hands are too big and you moved too fast and barbatos is just like 🥺

he low-key babies you even though he’s like an entire two heads shorter than you

you don’t mind though because getting babied by barbatos means you get given all sorts of cakes and sweets all the time

simeon isn’t sure how to feel about it but it doesn’t seem to be the patronising kind of babying (it’s more of an affectionate doting) so he lets it happen

what he doesn’t let happen is solomon’s relentless attempts to feed you his food

you are both too dumb and too nice to realise just how bad his cooking is, but simeon knows you have a sensitive stomach and are actually a pretty fussy eater - you just tend to stay quiet when something isn’t to your liking because you don’t want to complain

having had a sample of solomon’s food himself in the past, he knows that you’ll probably get sick eating it, and he doesn’t want you to be uncomfy so he refuses to let you try even a bite

it’s like he has a radar in his head that goes off every time solomon approaches you will a bowl of ‘noodle soup’ that looks more like something he’s fished out of a nuclear waste tank

solomon, when he’s not trying to indirectly poison you, is probably the guy you spend the most time with apart from simeon and luke

he’ll just hang around nearby with a spell book while you do your gardening and show you some neat little magic tricks every now and then

he tries to help with the gardening but he’s not exactly physically strong and he nearly breaks his back trying to lift a giant bag of compost

so he decides it’s probably better for him to just watch from afar

kind of wants to conduct an experiment to see just how much weight you can lift before you start getting tired

one time he sees you cut down a whole tree with one hard swat of your hand and just walk off carrying it over your shoulder and he has to take several deep breaths

luke knew you already, so not much changes while you’re in the devildom

he really wants to learn to make candied fruits the same way you do but he can never get the hang of boiling the sugar mixture to the right heat and consistency (plus he’s kind of scared of how hot it gets)

you like to just carry him around on your shoulders and while luke would normally bristle at being treated like a child, you act like this with nearly everyone

(once he sees you running around the garden with diavolo of all people perched on your shoulders, arms raised in the air like he’s on a rollercoaster ride, and he nearly passes out on the spot)

he seriously adores you and acts like a guard dog whenever he feels like any of the others are trying to take advantage of your dim-witted naïveté because NO demons are allowed to harm his big brother like that

he will also chase them off with a stick if he has to if they get too close because no being is allowed to even remotely try to disrupt your relationship with simeon 

simeon himself is no fool, and he’s well aware of the effect you have on pretty much everyone you come across, but he trusts them because they’re his friends

besides (and he isn’t being cocky or anything), it’s not like the relationship you have with them even holds a candle to what you have with him

they’ve all known you for less than a year, he’s loved you for nearly two millennia

they might be allowed take naps on your back while you work or be carried about on your shoulders, but do they get to spend every night snuggled up in your arms, feeling your chest rise and fall with every breath you take? no, he doesn’t think so

in conclusion: one day himbos like you will probably take over the world with their big muscles and unwavering loyalty and clueless grins that could make anyone’s heart skip a beat, and simeon’s pretty sure he’d be okay with it

[cinnamontoastcroonch]

this is so refreshing xerith. thank you.

I feel that most complex arcs fall victim to this or a couple other fates. as you stated, this one was subject to the love triangle style, similar to episode 65. Both take such key and opportune moments where characters can become complex and they throw them DOWN THE DRAIN.

These deaths are: love triangle distraction, aaron, or purely bad writing/mischaracterization.

It makes no sense for garroth to inject himself into this moment of 77, given his very deep personality and style of interaction, and his character’s writing in general. This scene had SO much potential, as the literal first time that we can any insight to what being a Shadow Knight means.

It’s important to recognize that at this point, whatever writing the series had is only beginning to be more complex. It is only starting to become a story, rather than a gameplay. But the salt was THERE. In the dialogue with Laurance!!!! The writing was there, it was READY! But then. Agh. No. Why. Garroth’s character in his truthful personification (which is better shown later on) would NOT have barged in on them that way. We all know he has the ability to eavesdrop. So why, at this point, after knowing Laurance is not going to try anything, would he move in on such a deep and self-disclosing conversation?? The answer is: he wouldn’t. But jessons unrevised writing would.

We see this same style of plot death in episode 52 of season 2. Again, poor Laurance is trying so hard to explain himself. To put his struggles into words. It just so happens that they are in the same location as last time. Except now, the broken and closed nether portal is very much open, and very much a problem. The amount of dark energy that could be felt off of that thing must have been suffocating. Especially for Laurance. All the while he is there, to protect. But as he speaks with Aphmau, he is being dismissed by her. He tries to let her in, and she instead takes that time to tell him what not to do. that she understands him; when she is the furthest thing from understanding. “Do not transform, unless you need to. To learn to live with it”. Excuse me?! How can you say that to someone who went through hell and lost their humanity for you. How can you pretend to understand something you will never experience yourself? Meanwhile, Laurance had probably thought speaking with her in that moment would help him. He valued her above himself; and he cannot even gain solace from her. Respect from her.

With the calling beginning to sink its talons into him, the pain and stress of being near such a potent portal, let alone the one he lost himself to, must have been suffocating. He has to cut her off. To end her misguided commands, because he needs to make her aware of a key detail in where exactly they are. And this hurts to see, because arguably one of the most brave characters in the story is baring his wounds to her, and he’s being left unrecognized. Unacknowledged . He’s literally stumbling over his words when he reminds her, he’s physically moving in the opposite direction, he’s struggling in the most purest sense of the word. And it’s being ignored. What does this do to him? Mentally? The person he lost himself for cannot spare him the time to listen to the effects of his sacrifice on his life.

Is this bad writing? Is this just a character flaw of Aphmaus? Probably both. But yes. That is my spiel on both s1 episode 77, and s2 episode 52.

The second turning point

@cinnamontoastcroonch I hope you're happy.

I've been taking a critical eye to every episode of Minecraft Diaries as I rewatch it. And I mean writing upwards of entire essays about single episodes. As you saw with episode 65. Part of why I've been doing this is to see where things truly went wrong with this show. The early episodes were better than I remembered, but I know for a fact there was an entire falling apart that happened between the utter quality that is an episode like say episode 58, and well... Season 3.

Obviously episode 65 was the turning point, but that was just the inciting incident. All the problems in MCD ultimately come down to the love triangle and how poorly it was handled. And the next major step was in episode 77. Episode 77 is an episode that is mostly spent on minimal character interactions at the wolf tribe after the gang finally gets back there with Logan and everyone else. Aphmau spends most of the episode building a boat, and then getting distracted from building her boat.

Until she decides to go check on the Nether Portal. It's broken, like when she last saw it, but Laurance is standing in front of it. I need to emphasize something. Up until this point, we've gotten very few conversations where Laurance brings up being a Shadow Knight. He usually diverts these conversations, or they get diverted by others, so we've gotten very few personal insights into a Shadow Knights existence. This is one of the first real times that we get a deeper look at how this condition has effected Laurance.

And y'know what? I'm just gonna give you a quote from my video essay on this. A nice little teaser. As a treat :)

His mind has sort of been rewired to put himself before others, even if he’s naturally a very selfless person. Which is a real slap in the face when you remember most Shadow Knights are guards, who are encouraged to be selfless. His heart still loves dearly and he is still the same selfless fool who threw his life away to save Aphmau, but his mind is telling him to be more selfish, take what he wants without regard for others. Laurance is actively fighting these thoughts all the time, but he worries that one day he might give in and… He says he never wants his heart to forget Aphmau, even if his mind tells him otherwise.

This. This hurts me. It's quality Laurance content. It's a great moment of Laurance proving one of his greatest strengths and weaknesses. How emotionally vulnerable he is. It makes him easy to hurt. It means he'll actually express it. He's struggled to talk about being a Shadow Knight, but now he's able to.

Imagine if episode 65 let him see the fear of killing Aphmau before this.

And just as Laurance says that absolutely heartbreaking line, GUESS WHO HAS TO MOSEY HIS SORRY ASS INTO THE ROOM?! Garroth just waltzs in there and interrupts this incredibly private conversation that he just happened to be listening to. Now, I will say, there is a way to justify this that I will accept, but I know without a doubt the writers didn't intend this.

The only way this works is if Garroth is listening to this conversation because he's scared of leaving Aph and Laurance alone in case Laurance decides to just... Kill her. But then he feels bad. But that would probably make him walk away out of guilt.

So yeah this doesn't make sense. For Garroth. At all. Why is he so scared of Laurance and Aphmau literally having one conversation? Well, it's the answer it always is. The love triangle. They've shown before that they are willing to disregard basic logic, only to prove that they know the details of this logic in a later episode. In Episode 65 they disregard Garroth's fears around his family, and then center an entire conversation around it in Episode 68.

But wait, it gets worse. Because Garroth knows for a fact that Aphmau and Laurance having an emotional conversation won't likely lead to any romance.

BECAUSE HE SAW LAURANCE CONFESS TO APHMAU 24 EPISODES AND SAW HER REJECT HIM!!

There were seven weeks in between these episodes!! Idk how long it takes to make an episode of MCD, but I imagine episodes are written in major arcs at a time. How did they forget what happened IN THE LAST MAJOR ARC OF THE SHOW?! Because. Love triangle. Because Jesson don't care about the characters they previously wrote, they care about these characters fulfilling an already existing trope they liked in something before. They don't care how this dynamic might change because of their own characters, just that they go through the motions.

So Garroth interrupts this conversation. Laurance gets snippy and tells Garroth to fess up or else he might "sweep her off her feet first." And that's a red flag for Laurance. Good job writers. And let's be clear, I don't disagree with characters maybe being shitty, as long as it doesn't contradict previous characterization. Like this does.

The writers forgot that Garroth saw Laurance's confession. They forgot that Laurance took rejection on the chin. They forgot that Laurance literally said "I'm just happy to be in your life." Did they forget about Laurance's entire confession?! Do the writers think that went away when he stopped being blind?!

...

Oh fuck... Did... Did Laurance only accept rejection because he didn't think he was good enough to be with her when he was blind? Is that what they're trying to say? I... I really hope that isn't. And yet I wouldn't be surprised. Just completely and utterly disappointed.

That took a turn I didnt like. I don't know how to end this now.

[macchiatosdumptruck]

Lawrusso!

1. What made you ship it.

I was first introduced to the pairing when I was riding out the tail end of the IT fandom. I had never seen the show or the movies. I was intrigued because it was being sold as an enemies to lovers ship with a bit of angst and some playful banter.

This was by second hand fandom.

I watched the show, continued to ship it. Realized it wasn't as cute as it had been portrayed, but still had excellent meat to it because they foiled each other nicely.

Then I watched the movie and realized how bad and violent the bullying actually was and rather than making me ship it less, I shipped it more. Just in a different way.

Because that's PEAK ANGST.

That a queer coming of age tale that involves internalized homophobia and complicated views on masculinity.

Johnny is OBSESSED. Daniel literally haunts him in his mind. Meanwhile, Daniel is over here (seemingly) we'll adjusted. It's clear he doesn't dislike Johnny as a person, he only gets upset when he sees the name Cobra Kai on the dojo.

That dynamic is fascinating.

Plus the actors have a lot of chemistry that really does a lot of heavy lifting for the weaker moments tbh.

2. What are your favorite things about the ship?

Everything internalized!

It's all steeped in identity issues.

The way violence is romantic. The way they're angry. The way they can slowly change. The character growth. The way your youth haunts your life. The way your kids pay for your sins. The way we're never who we perform as. The way that if they were honest they'd have something so good.

It's the angst. But a different flavor of angst, like hurt/comfort.

There's a lot of good meat there to chew on.

The intimacy of sharing a very specific formative experience.

3. An unpopular opinion? (Girds My loins)

It's framed as a "rivalry" when it was clearly bullying. Yes the show is Johnny's pov, but that doesn't negate his actions. You can explain something without waving it away.

Similar to what I said about silverusso, there are au's and there are alternate character interpretations, but they shouldn't entirely blot out canon characterization.

Let them be messy little gremlins!

There's the fact that Johnny literally never takes responsibility for his actions whatsoever, which is the fault of bad writing, but is also ignored by most of fanon.

There's a lot of stuff that's clearly mainly influenced by fanon, and that creates a deep canon/fanon dichotomy wherein if you don't ascribe to popular fanon it can be seen as aggressive?

Which leads to a lot of strange moralizing behind shipping logic and characters being "bad" or "good" or shipping something the "right way" or "wrong way."

I've seen a lot of nasty Daniel hate by people who claim to ship it but seem to just be using him to project their thirst when self insert and OC fanfic is right there.

It honestly really stressed me out and drove me away from the ship. I still ship it. Like I said, the bones are there. It's a good ship! I just had to take a bit of a break, because when fanon becomes law, fandom gets messy and mean.

[mishasminions]

The Last Time I’ll Write a Long Post About Supernatural (15x18-15x20)

15 YEARS OF WATCHING THIS SHOW. 11 YEARS OF RUNNING A BLOG ABOUT IT. IT’S BEEN QUITE A RIDE.

[15x20 Speculation + evidence at the bottom]

First off, I just wanna come clean and say, after all these years, I still think they should’ve ended at Season 5.

If you’re going to come at me with “Then why’d you stick around to watch it if you didn’t like it?”, your question is immature, and the answer is simple: I just want to know what happens next (I also love the main characters and their actors too). You can watch a show and still think it’s shit.

Call me a clown, but despite all the disappointment and trust issues that this show has given me, I would still look forward to the day where it might just turn itself around and bring back the quality it once had, or realize the potential of each story it was trying to tell, or at the very least, do justice by my favorite ship.

Never happened.

They’ve had a few good episodes here and there. I can’t imagine the SPN Universe without The Man Who Would Be King, The French Mistake, and Scoobynatural. Seasons 6-10 were enjoyable at times. I blocked out most of 7 & 11-15. 

If you’ve been following this blog since its heydays in 2010-2014, you’d know I’d try my best to defend Destiel and this show’s decisions regarding it no matter what.

Because you know what, as a CONCEPT, this show is good. If you take a look at all the worlds its storylines have birthed in fanfiction/fanworks, you’d see how much Supernatural has wasted its own story arcs. The writing got shittier as each season progressed, and they’ve obviously given up in production as well because the quality in the execution has noticeably gone down too, but if you take a step back and take a look at the bigger picture, you’ll see that this show still tries to make sense of itself.

[If you’re still following this post, please bear with me, I know this is long, but I just want you to understand how jaded and pessimistic I am with regards to this show, so maybe you can buy into whatever hopeful thing I’m about to say later on.]

SO LET’S TALK ABOUT DESTIEL

Never in my wildest dreams did I think that they would give us Castiel’s “I love you” speech. To the point where, if I weren’t so desperate for it, I would argue that it was completely out of character for him to word vomit the way he did (but I’m not gonna diss on that right now because I’ll take what I can get).

I’ve valued every meaningful and obscure exchange that Dean and Cas have had in the earlier seasons, and I was willing to accept their relationship as just that--undefined, without any clear boundaries as to what they really are. And I think that was beautiful on its own.

But now, they’ve chosen to define it.

After they’ve driven every possible wedge between Dean and Castiel in seasons 11-15, to try to explain away their feelings as something they offer to a collective.

Dean can’t mourn and pray for JUST Cas, he has to mourn and pray for EVERYBODY--even Crowley, even some chick he just met, because god forbid he cries about just the guy who has given up everything for him--that would be “too homo”.

They’ve even set Cas on a path to abrupt fatherhood just so he can care about something other than Dean. Make it seem as if Dean wasn’t his purpose through and through.

And after all these years of this stupid show trying to deny it, they choose to acknowledge it at the worst possible circumstance, at a time where they’ve been so far apart, that it seems so foreign for them to suddenly come together.

But here we are. And they’ve chosen to tell us.

Chosen to tell us that everything that Castiel has done leading up to his death, he has done it because he was IN LOVE WITH DEAN WINCHESTER.

Chosen to tell us that the ONE THING THAT WOULD MAKE CAS HAPPY IS DEAN WINCHESTER.

Chosen to tell us that BEING WITH DEAN WINCHESTER is something that CAS WANTS BUT KNOWS HE CAN’T HAVE.

And they’ve also chosen to tell us nothing about how Dean feels.

Sure, finding out your angel made a deal, the stipulations of said deal, his newfound happiness philosophy, his long-winded monologue of why he loves you and why you’re worthy of his love, and to top it all off he tells you that being in love with you is enough to make him happy while he subtly hints that he’s always wanted to be WITH you romantically, was a lot to process in the 5 minutes after you’ve just had an existential crisis.

It’s whatever, right? Let’s culminate 11 years worth of tension and feelings in 5 minutes. Let’s waste the entire episode with cringey expository dialogue, and irrelevant sequences. The whole season was a waste anyway.

You know what Supernatural? FUCK YOU FOR THAT. They deserved better. WE deserve better.

And I would love nothing more than to hurl every possible insult your way,

But for the last time, I’m going to HOPE that you’re finally going to try to make it better for the fans that stuck by you all these years.

No more baiting new viewers, no more placating casual viewers, no more excuses. 15 years. Bring it home for the people who have actually been around.

SO HERE’S HOW I THINK 15x20 IS GONNA GO

There’s two ways this series is gonna end. Horribly or Spectacularly.

First let’s all take into consideration what Andrew Dabb says about it:

So, let’s start with

ENDING HORRIBLY

In this scenario, Misha is telling the truth about his last day of filming being 15x18. His “camping trip” during the last few days of filming 15x20, was actually a camping trip. He doesn’t go to Vancouver to shoot.

Jensen wasn’t “being careful” during the zoom interviews that it was just him and Jared quarantining for the shoot, it really was just him and Jared (althought most of these were done pre 15x19) Supernatural isn’t smart enough to do misleading PR, and they’re once again oblivious to the potential of their own story.

Misha hasn’t posted a “Goodbye Castiel” tweet because he’s probably saving it for last episode or he forgot because it was overshadowed by the Destiel trend that night.

So what we get is:

Sam and Dean are on the road again, up against the monster of the week. Only their world no longer has actual Supernatural beings anymore, so the monsters they’re fighting are humans.

Humans end up killing the Winchesters (despite having gone up against literally every powerful being imaginable INCLUDING God himself). Dean and Sam end up in heaven and relive their greatest hits.

Meanwhile, Castiel rots in The Empty because he died after realizing that he was happy and gay. Jack doesn’t bother rescuing him—his surrogate dad, the guy who made this specific deal to spare him—even though it was so easy for him get Cas in and out of The Empty when he had a fraction of the power that he has now.

Dean never speaks of Castiel’s confession because despite all the hints of a profound bond in the earlier seasons, and the fact that Dean has never cared for anyone (who isn’t his actual brother) as immensely as he does Cas, Supernatural just can’t have its main macho character be “suddenly bisexual” because that would hurt the male ego or some shit.

His heaven would probably be living happily ever after with his family. “Family” meaning Mary and John Winchester--two of the shittiest parents ever (but they’re not going to include them in this episode like they were supposed to because of Covid) and Sam.

Sam also gets a dog. As usual.

I wouldn’t put it past Supernatural to do this. After everything they’ve pulled, this would be right up their alley. I actually expect this ending.

Anyway, onto the next possible ending

ENDING SPECTACULARLY

In this scenario, Supernatural tries to stick the landing, and Jensen’s whole “It didn’t sit well with me at first, but then I took a step back after talking to Kripke, and realized that I had to view it from an audience perspective, I am now really excited about it” (DC Con 2019) anecdote about his thoughts on the final episodes, were actually about Dean potentially ending up with Cas. (Which would totally make sense because Jensen at first didn’t see Dean as anything but hetero, but as of late, he has been throwing in Destiel jokes of his own, so he seems to have warmed up to the idea)

Backed with Misha’s tidbit (DLConline 2020) that he and Jensen had conversations about Destiel, and that they wouldn’t have gone through with it if Jensen wasn’t onboard with it, but Jensen didn’t push back at all. (Why would they need to check with Jensen if it was just Cas going all in?)

Robert Berens (writer of 15x18) also wrote the script at the beginning of Season 15, but made Misha privy to the concept a year prior (Season 14), so they went into this season knowing about Destiel going canon.

This one’s a reach, but this scenario also supposes that Misha was lying about his whereabouts during the filming of the final episode, and him saying that 15x18 was his last episode is part of the diversion to avoid taking away from the weight of Castiel’s death.

And that Supernatural is actually self-aware of its own material (similar to how they have wrapped things up in the past—lots of expository dialogue, poor execution, but fulfills the story arc)

Since Season 15 is basically a Meta Season (Chuck/God as a writer, pretentiously calling out how he created the worlds, its characters, and basically invalidating the past 14 seasons), and 15x19 is supposedly the finale for Season 15, written by two of the worst Supernatural writers, Brad Buckner and Eugenie Ross-Leming (Bob Singer’s wife), then we can assume that 15x19 is where the shitty writers kill themselves--as Chuck, of course.

So we get a badly written episode that produces a bad ending, or as Becky put it, “All action, and no Cas”

So we get the bad writers season ending at 15x19.

And 15x20 is where Sam and Dean write their own stories, and where the cast had a hand in pitching ideas for it.

Dabb has mentioned that 15x20 (Act Two) is a SERIES finale, where they try to resolve the characters’ journeys.

Because as everyone has acknowledged, Supernatural isn’t about the story, it’s about the characters.

So here’s what we can get out of it:

With no more Supernatural beings left to fight, Sam and Dean are in a stalemate. They’ve resigned themselves to fighting to the bitter end, but the “end” has passed, and they’re still standing.

So they try to figure out who they are now, and what they want out of the life they still have.

Sam still wants a normal apple pie life. Before Dean dragged him out of college to go hunting with him, he had a whole life planned out for him. Become a lawyer, settle down with a nice girl, and get a dog. He gave all that up because they had work to do, but now the work is finished, he can finally go back to wanting that for himself again.

Dean finally realizes his self-worth after Cas saves him again. His prayer to Cas in purgatory may have helped him come to terms with his anger, but the whole “you’ve done everything you did for love” speech finally put him in his place, and he learns not to hate himself anymore.

But of course, he cannot fully reconcile with himself if he doesn’t get Cas back, and tell him how he feels.

Because Dean actually wants something for himself this time. Something he knows he can finally have if he can just salvage it.

So maybe this time around, with the help of Jack (off-screen), Dean saves Cas. Grips him tight and raises him from perdition.

They bypass The Empty deal by turning Cas human, and he lives the rest of his days with Dean.

Dean and Cas know they deserve to be saved, and they know that they deserve to be happy.

(Wishful thinking, maybe they kiss a little)

Anyway...

I’m just saying, there’s NO WAY that they’d have Cas go through that whole rushed speech, if they weren’t going to do anything about it later on.

But again, after 10 years of disappointment, I wouldn’t put it past Supernatural to pat themselves on the back and say, “Okay, we sort of gave them what they wanted. We’re good now”

If that’s the case, Supernatural, I’m sorry I wasted my time on you.

Here’s to hoping 🤡