#but it could also be a “we're used to people dying” kind of thing which is sad

[louisferrignojr]

gotta say that i disagree that nobody fights for buck. in s5 taylor said it best: buck's life is full of meaningful relationships, actually. every person of the firefam would fight for and support buck. he is and will never be alone again in his life, especially during the hard times (which they reiterated in 8x05). meanwhile, we see thus being contrasted with tommy not having any kind if support system like that. the same seemed to be the case for taylor. i know people want tommy to fight for this, and i agree that i definitely need him to check his trauma and fears to work this out with buck. but buck is the main character that has had seasons of alleged development. he died and came back, got clarity, was supposed to finally feel good in his own skin, worked out his childhood trauma with his parents in therapy, formed a support system, now discovered he is bisexual and felt free with it. and now tommy is the only one who should grovel? i get the idea but. evan buckley is the character we have seen grow and learn. i want him to put in the work as well. look at how he fought for his job when he thought he would lose it forever. THAT is what i need from him rn. if he is just giving this up with a shrug, then i don't want bucktommy in canon. we have seen tommy taking care of buck and supporting him in all his shenanigans. i need to see that buck is absolutely serious about this and ready to fight for it. if he doesn't, he still hasn't found his true love or still doesn't know what he wants in life. i am bored by this. we have been here multiple times already. do something else with evan buckley finally or just allow him to be a bachelor forever.

okay yes buck has meaningful platonic and familial relationships.

no romantic partner has fought for him. abby ghosted him because of her own issues even though she's a fucking grown ass woman, ali got a reality check and broke up with him when he was in recovery after nearly dying, which okay, fair enough. and while i believe taylor did nothing wrong in reporting the jonah story, the narrative wants us to think she prioritised her work, and she did betray buck's trust which, again, buck wanted to protect his firehouse (which is his family) so he wasn't being objective. reporters exposing scandals within govt orgs that are supposed to protect the public is not a bad thing, actually. the only time he's broken up with someone first is natalia and we were told it's because she was obsessed with his died-and-came-back experience.

and listen. i love tommy more than anything. but buck is still the main character. we're going to see buck going through the breakup, not tommy. we're not going to get much about tommy's past. we're not going to get any scenes with tommy and another character if buck isn't also there. you remember karen going to chimney and them day drinking together because they thought hen was being unfaithful (again)? i wish we could see tommy and chimney talking about their buckleys. but the way the show got rid of all minor characters and consistently treats LIs as nothing more than LIs... i'm not hopeful. we'll get one scene with tommy's Explanation and i'm not even hopeful it's gonna be well written (but i'm sure lou will be serving. god. they wrote such a shitty break up scene and he fucking ATE.)

yeah, buck fucked up by jumping the gun and asking tommy to move in with him when he couldn't even say the i love you, and i hope this will be addressed in future eps. but tommy immediately ended the relationship because he Knows Better and left buck heartbroken. this is what happened on the show. the average viewer isn't doing ten layers of analysis to understand tommy's perspective, nor should they have to. i love the metas, i'm digging into tommy's headspace in my next fix it fic, but this is still the dumb weewoo show.

i don't think tommy needs to grovel, i don't think he's the Bad Guy in this story, i have a lot of empathy for tommy and so does the GA! they're not mad at tommy, they want him back! they want bucktommy back! and i want them both to fight for each other, to apologise and admit to their fuck ups and admit how much they care about each other and that they want to be each other's forever love! i want them to say i love you!

but buck is still the protagonist in this story and i don't want to see him running back to someone who broke up with him in such a way that had him asking "wait, did you just break up with me?" because again, this is what happened on our screens. i want tommy making the first move, opening the door for reconciliation, showing that he knows he made a mistake out of fear from his past trauma, for buck to then know he is wanted, that tommy came back for him, and then put in the effort to fight for them.

hope this makes sense. and as always, for people reading this - this is not the space for you to bash on buck's previous LIs, please take it elsewhere.

[barissoffee]

We've had more scenes of the bad batch talking about Crosshair leaving in S1/S2 than of them talking about Tech's "death" in S3.

[myfandomrealitea]

I know there's a lot of advice for handling things like depression and its so fucking easy for people to say "just do this and you'll feel better!" and I hate that, I fucking despise it, but I'm also gonna throw in my two cents about what is personally helping me get out of bed some days and genuinely, not kill myself.

Its taking care of nature.

Seriously. It sounds stupid and some days it feels stupid, but I put up bird feeders because I live in a semi-rural area where human activity is decimating the local bird population and options for safe feeding. So I put up bird feeders. And now I have like 83 different birds flocking to my garden on the daily and screaming at my window if the feeders are empty. And I've seen generations of baby birds brought to my garden by their parents because this is where the food is.

And I researched what plants and flowers were native to my area and I spent like $5 on a few different seed packets and sprinkled them around the grass and the sad empty flowerbeds and the lawn because the bees have nothing to eat and that's awful and it turns out wildflowers will fucking GROW the moment you look away, but now every spring and summer my lawn is a pretty little multi-colored bug haven.

And I've even gotten the chance to save a few little bug lives because of it. I've taken in cold-shocked bees and given them a warm little tupperware to recover in. I've fed bugs sugar water to get their energy back to take their food home. I've given dying bugs a sheltered, safe place to spend their last moments.

I planted a veggie garden. And I know I'm very lucky in that I have the space to do that, but also, you can grow a lot of things indoors. My friend has literally the smallest apartment you can imagine but she grows chives in her bathroom and grows five radishes at a time in a pot in the kitchen. Literally five. But it makes her so happy every single time she pulls them up or trots off to the bathroom to snip some chives.

I pick trash up every two weeks. The pick stick was like $4 online and I just put the bag out with my bi-weekly trash pick-up and its disgusting but but nobody else is gonna do it and I've only got finite time on this earth. If nobody else is going to pick up that can, I will. Because some innocent wild animal doesn't deserve to get hurt by human ignorance, and I deserve to walk home and see pretty flourishing nature instead of depressing discarded trash like I feel like most days.

I've left water out for the wildlife and watched hedgehogs, local dogs on their walks, squirrels and all sorts stop by to take a drink, because humans are fucking selfish and we're making something as basic as water so hard to access for anyone but ourselves, but I can fix a little bit of that just by putting out a bowl. Sometimes I don't even have to remember to fill it because the rain will fill it for me, and its kind of like nature's way of saying "you're helping me so I'm going to help you out too." Which is neat.

Like most days I do not want to be living on this earth but my god earth did not get a choice about us living here, and we're ruining it, and it actually feels so good to help stop and un-do a little bit of that destruction.

And you don't even have to try everything I do. If the only thing you've got the spoons to do is buy one bird feeder and you only remember to fill it once a month, its still something. That once a month could mean the difference between starvation and a full belly to a bird.

Again, none of this is obligatory and I'm not saying at all this is some magical cure for depression, but personally these things are things which are helping me slowly find things to keep getting out of bed for and things to feel a sense of self worth and satisfaction over. I feel better both in and about myself when I feed the birds, when I see the bugs in the garden, when I pick up the trash.

If its something you haven't considered yet, it might be worth a try.

[bigfatbreak]

Something I've been wondering for a while in the ML fandom. But after Season 5 ended, I saw a lot of authors coming to the consensus that Emilie is a "bad parent".

Where did that come from? Did I miss a fandom meeting where that consensus was reached? Or is that a consequence of Gabriel being a bad parent, having her as a bad parent by proxy?

I am mostly curious about where this headcanon came from, for some many different authors following the same path.

the series tries really hard to make Emelie seem like an angelic woman, but the problem is, it constantly steps on its own toes doing so.

even before her death, Adrien didn't go to school, wasn't socialized around others, never had a "real birthday gift," was only socialized around Chloe and his "cousin" sometimes, and though he yearned for school, was still denied that. The show says "oh she's a good person," but doesn't SHOW her being a good person.

the show contradicts itself. Emelie has to be good, because she's a dead mother who sacrificed her life for her child, but the show reveals the quality of life for that child was basically zilch, like owning a dog. The general idea of her being a bad parent is because being self-sacrificing doesn't make someone inherently good, in fact in Emelie's case, it made her all the more selfish.

if she knew she was dying and still had the audacity to keep her son from making connections with other people, all she was doing was saddling him with an immense amount of grief he would have no real way of processing, making her death the only thing he could ever revolve around for the rest of his existence.

Not only that, Gabriel seemed to follow the mindset of "oh she's just gone, not dead," which would only make things worse - and if Emelie suspected Gabriel might act the part of the fool, why didn't she ensure there was a support system for the both of them? To be fair, she doesn't have Gabriel on strings, but she literally has complete control over Adrien and just... decided to make him her emotional support child? a crutch through her death? an accessory to show what a good person she was???

maybe we really are missing parts. maybe she actually was an exceptional woman - but that SAME woman could be cattled and convinced to keep Adrien alone for his developmental years??? if we're following the idea that she was actually super good and kind, then we have to accept that she's also immensely stupid for allowing her husband to convince her that Adrien should be a bird in a cage.

Either she's loving but overall selfish, keeping Adrien for herself in spite of the damage it would cause, OR loving and stupid, letting Gabriel convince her to keep Adrien in the dark in spite of the damage it could cause.

the show may WANT us to route emelie down the path of overall "good," but considering her husband was such a miserable excuse for a parent who's attitude really hasn't changed that much from the past, like draws to like and we can only draw our own conclusions.

honestly i think Zoe put it better here, but there's my two cents on the matter.

[foone]

You know what I hate about modern mice? how pointlessly anti-repair they are. I have had plenty of mice break over time, and often it's just that some fluff or skin-flakes got wedged in the mouse wheel or under the buttons. You just need to open them up and clean them. Except.. where are the screws?

OH THERE THEY ARE. under the little skid-pads, which cannot be put back on once you take them off, because the adhesive has been ruined! You have to buy replacement pads, if they're available, and maybe cut them down to size, as well as clean off the residue of the previous pads.

You know how this problem could be fixed? JUST DON'T PUT THE PADS ON TOP OF THE SCREWS!

Then you'd have no problem. Easy to disassemble and clean.

But then it'd look 5% uglier because apparently people are scared of seeing screws, and also people might not just throw it out and buy a new one!

It's the terrible sort of weird planned obsolescence that happens as an almost accidental side effect of improving the product. Like, ball mice? They were designed to be disassembled. You didn't even need a screwdriver! Because you had to clean them regularly, or they'd gunk up too fast. Modern optical mice? They still get gunked up, the buttons and wheel still die eventually. They can be cleaned and repaired. But now that it's not required for all of them to be cleaned regularly, that function has been removed. they're designed to be disposable.

The same thing happened with TVs way back when. If you open up a TV from the 50s (or just look at the back, honestly, many of them were designed to be always-open), you'll find a schematic showing where all the tubes are and what models they are. Was this because the 1950s was a golden era of reparability? NO! it's because they burnt out all the time and you had to replace them! As soon as TVs got reliable enough that replacing tubes was no longer needed, the schematics became hidden behind paywalls and for authorized-service-personnel-only.

It would be only a minor change in aesthetics to make your mouse repairable/cleanable. Hell, most of the time when it's not simply fixed by cleaning it, it's because one of these broke:

This is an Omron D2FC-F-7N microswitch, used in a bunch of mice. It's designed to last about a million clicks. With a soldering iron and some solder (like 25$ on amazon) you can trivially replace it. New switches cost between like 10 cents and 2 dollars, depending where you buy it and how many you want. A couple bucks of parts and half an hour's worth of work, you can repair a 40$ mouse that's "died".

But they make it unnecessarily hard with the slide-pads being unreplacable. You have to find ones that match, you have to carefully clean off the old residue with IPA, or the new ones you just bought will fall off. All to make it look SLIGHTLY better (how often are you looking at the aesthetics of the bottom of your mouse, exactly? (no furries are allowed to answer this question!)) and maybe, just maybe, to push it over into "not worth it". You could do all that, but you have to buy new switches, new slide-pads/mouse-feet (SHUT UP FURRIES), and can you remember where your solder even is? you last used it when you were trying to fix that keyboard...

Basically one thing that is maddening to anyone with the very basics of electronic knowledge (seriously: the amount of skill you need for this is the kind you can get in less than an hour from watching a youtube tutorial) that we're surrounded by all this electrical nonsense that will break and have to be thrown out, but is mostly breaking in ways that could be fixed in a very short amount of time with relatively little work.

It's infuriating to go on amazon to buy another damn mouse and it pop up "hey you last bought this in 2021, you fool" and you're like I KNOW, IT SHOULD STILL BE WORKING TODAY!

I have computer parts from the 80s in my room right now that are still working when stuff made in the last 5 years is already dying! There's no reason it should be this way. It's an endless waste of time and money and resources and it's just to make some logitech or whoever executives slightly richer.

It's deeply bullshit. The modern day is going to be identifiable as the geological layer where most of the trash was generated. We're living in the middle of the quisquiliarumferous period: the layer of garbage.

[pwippy]

on another collar detail note ivans emotions are real suppressed/nonexistent like REALLY. weve seen in his past that hes mimicked others facial expressions to blend in more which leads to either completely neutral faces in some situations or faces that don't quite fit in. just a little bit off.

the first example is during his auction. ivans clothes are tattered, not correctly sized, and he's restrained, but his collar is green. he doesn't care. it's not that this isn't a stressful situation, considering another kid has a red collar next to him. hes just... neutral.

also in any situations directly with till, hes smiling. maybe hes happy and lovesick and desperate to be in his presence, so anything with till is happy, but this could also be because he thinks hes *supposed to smile.*

in scenes like these im reminded of 2 things: tills smile, which is actively under *stressful* situations. i think round 2 is one of the only times he smiles in the series. if ivan saw till smile any other time in anakt, this is the kind of smile he would see. this is the kind he would mimic around till to say "we're the same."

the second would be any cliche scene in a love story when a protagonist has to leave by train, and the other lead runs after them. this is what ivan thinks love is. something to be chased, and something that is endlessly sanguine. thats how he pursues till, using a literal entertainment industry strategy of shock value (licking his blood and violence) to get his attention.

here's a few screenshots of these moments:

i think the ony genuine smile we have is when hes literally dying. he isnt putting on a show or being monitored (as how tf would the alien stage production team get a shot of his smile when hes so close to till and yk. they dont want him to kill another contestant so theyd be more focused on stopping him at that point), hes just there with till. his last moment with till. and once again hes smiling because hes being acknowledged by till but its genuine.

you cant even write this smile off as a "woohoo" smile because of the comic that came out later- "thank you for being a victim of my shallow emotions." hes discounting himself. maybe he hasnt actively enjoyed any of these moments. but now its over, and tills safe.

also have people talked about the design of his shirt?? for the most part the kids in anakt either have open or saggy turtleneck necklines but his is straight up and down. it even has a sort of fabric collar thing (i dont mean it being a turtleneck i mean the fold on it lol)- this mightve been to conceal his collar? just something to note

[catladyhere]

Humans Are Space Orcs

Right?

Okay, so, what if aliens were to see what our kind had developed merely for entertainment purposes, which is a completely baseless IDEA of what we expect aliens to be like.

This is the one that got me thinking. Alien Isolation. The absolute horror that we have spent time and effort to create, to scare ourselves. Because a Deathworld wasn't fucking enough. It's enough to send a human screaming and whimpering. An (apparently) apex predator species.

It was a random day in the space station where sentient beings of all kinds worked at. One of the more adventurous Jlorps, against their good judgement, decided to ask human Oliver about his favourite horror 'entertainment'. Horror was a fairly new concept being slowly understood by the other beings, but how an instinctive reaction in the face of imminent doom, was a pastime, or even a FAVOURITE pastime, was beyond them. However, Oliver could not resist showing them what a Xenomorph is.

Jlorp Ilof watched, frozen in sheer terror, as they saw what the human mind considered terrifying, suddenly remembering all the serious advice that others of his kind, and other aliens too, gave them regarding this particular killer species. What's worse, was that Human Oliver was e x c i t e d to show them their kind's work, which was meant to scare them, which has stopped being scary on account of Oliver not accepting defeat.

"Well.... what do you think?" Oliver asked carefully, as he had observed the previously confident Ilof, slowly start to change their colour from a bright yellow to a dull purple, their kind's indication of feeling fear. He could not help but cringe a little internally, as he really should have thought things through before introducing a prey species to something that scares a good number of his own people.

Ilof spoke after a while, trying to think how they will forget what they saw a minute ago. It was downright traumatising for them. Humans alone were capable of terrifying most of the beings in their galaxy, what were they even thinking, asking their human friend what they were scared of?

"But... why? Why is simulated terror entertaining??" Ilof asked, as they did the Jlorp equivalent of wiping one's cold sweat.

"Because." Olive protested, "It gets our adrenaline flowing. It's a 'flight or fight' response from our brain, when we're in danger. If you subtract the danger from a situation, and add the comfort of knowing you yourself will be safe, it only leaves behind a racing pulse, which... well, it makes us feel alive."

Ilof was at a loss for words.

Human beings liked being in danger, but not dying. But they'd also heard stories about how some humans had readily jumped in the face of danger, where death was certain, to save their comrades. There were too much information in their head, all of them either connected or contradictory.

"Okay, Oliver, so let me get this straight, your kind feels dead at times, somehow, and you simulate death and destruction, to soothe said 'deadness'?"

"Precisely." Oliver beamed, which made the Jlorp further uncomfortable.

"I think I will retire to my work station now."

Ilof never asked another human being, what 'horror' they liked best, choosing to religiously follow the advice from other aliens who have experienced humans and their bizarre rituals and pastimes.

#EarthIsSpaceAustralia

#humansarespaceorcs

[mswyrr]

They presented the possibility of older women--who were repeatedly described as "covenless witches" in a story that also repeatedly told us a witch needs a coven--finding community again and a new reason to live in each other and their own power and then "subverted our expectations" with these women dying to serve a male character's story.

That was the point of their stories. Him.

It isn't common for older women in US pop culture to get depicted as people who are capable of rebirth. Of lives, desires, hopes and dreams that matter beyond solely being a mother. It rarely happens, and it didn't happen here.

It's rare for stories to deal metaphorically with real things - like women who get clean or make positive change in their 40s or 50s. Women who find each other and aren't alone and "forgotten" anymore. These things happen -- yes, sisterhood is sometimes a lie and sometimes "people never change." Sure, those things happen. But sometimes sisterhood isn't a lie; sometimes people make change in their lives.

You don't see these stories when they're women though, especially not older women, especially not gay women.

I'm glad for Jen. She doesn't have a community, though. A witch needs a coven they told us, over and over again. They showed us them getting one small taste of the joy they could share together, in their scene of flight. But that was just for Billy too. And now everyone else is dead. To serve the male character's journey, give him some angst.

Agatha is forever spiritually dead--not experiencing any kind of emotional breakthrough or change--because she's not the lead, so she's static so she can serve as a device within the true lead's journey.

She can't even be allowed the growth I pictured as the worst case scenario - where she dies for *the coven*--so they can live and have community and spiritual rebirth together--and makes enough peace to go with Rio. She doesn't even get that much, to get to have a real death that matters and has a sense of completion to it, where we can imagine her reunited with her child and/or at peace with Rio. She can't have that because she has to be Billy's amusing sidekick, his Jarvis, his moral warning lesson about his powers and the witches he got killed and his angst. Because his story matters and theirs didn't.

I was talking to a friend the other day about how love stories often have a "point of symbolic death, when all hope seems lost" (concept from Pamela Regis's study of romance novel structure) and with mf couples they get to rise again from that, into rebirth, into new life. Ff canon couples in stories often, due to a bunch of reasons, aren't allowed that narrative power. They remain trapped in tragedy and despair. I thought surely Agatha herself though, as the lead character, would get to have some kind of change or rebirth as part of a community of women, given that her core wound is betrayal by community -- but she, as a character, doesn't get to go into the symbolic underworld and change and be reborn, because she was never the lead character to begin with.

Sapphic love remains broken once it breaks, the "point of symbolic death" is literal death or a shattering end, there is no rebirth. We, I guess, lack the symbolic potency to come back, in the eyes of the world? We are not generative. "Which one's the man?" "How do they even have sex?" "Your marriage isn't real because you can't make babies." (Kudos for subverting that one, though, show! Except... a child born of women, without a man, cannot live a full life I guess?) And specifically, as a 30something queer woman, people who call my wife, after I've described her as my wife, my "girlfriend" and are shocked by how long we've been together. That we're grown women and our commitment is right down to the bone, that it has blood in its veins. We are not little girls playing dress up. But that is how a ton of nice people see us; we exist but we are spiritually empty, lacking potency. And the stories reflect that. That energy, that core belief that we are the juvenile, non-generative form of love and relationships. And this woman too, she remains in a kind of eternal spiritual death.

That's why people are mentioning the Hayes Code, they're feeling how that aligns with larger cultural prejudice against us and our humanity and capacity to have the kind of power of living and loving that is ascribed to mf love and that more (though not always, misogyny is a hell of a thing) straight women get in stories.

The idea that it's GOOD for a story to do this, because "sometimes sisterhood is a lie" and "sometimes people don't change" ignores that context of who precisely this narrative "subversion," this spiritual aridity is given to. And who gets to live and grow and be reborn and strive and learn and become in stories, to be allowed to connect with the transformative potential inside themselves and each other.

The show did give us a lot -- I think it's important to recognize that. The canon ff love; I would have never expected that. The canon kiss. They put a lot into that and I honor that. This wasn't a classic "bury your gays" and I'm not mad at them. They did their best. A lot of the issues I have are probably due to the problems of the mcu overall and how static it is. But the deeper themes are also just incredibly disappointing to me, and I wanted to outline why.

It's entirely possible to be disappointed but appreciate context and not be unkind to creatives who did their best within overall industry/cultural limitations, which is where I am at and what I mean with this.

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

Do you have any thoughts on the friendship between Hermione and Ginny?

I haven’t read the books in a while and don’t remember how canon it is 😄🙈

What Happens in Canon

We don't see it on screen much mostly because Harry... doesn't care (and to be fair also doesn't hang out much when those two are together, Harry in fact suddenly notices in the beginning of sixth year after several weeks at the Burrow that "huh, I guess I... don't hang out with Ginny and she's not actually my friend. This is awkward."

However, we learn in HBP that Hemione both a) knew Ginny had a HUGE crush on Harry for years that had been going nowhere b) that Hermione advised Ginny that maybe it was time to move on/maybe Harry would only notice she was now a sexy lady if she had romantic partners (which prompted Ginny to start dating other people and... actually worked in that Harry did notice and they ended the year dating for a few weeks).

What this shows us is that Hermione and Ginny were comfortable enough with each other that Ginny went to ask her about this problem and Hermione gave her an answer without saying "oof, we're not... that close..."

Now, since Hermione pretty much solely hangs out with Harry and Ron, it's hard to say if/when she and Ginny are hanging out beyond various weeks during the summer (where Hermione's at the Burrow but Harry isn't) but they have to be decently close at least.

Though it's telling Hermione always chooses Harry and Ron's company over anyone else's (save Viktor for that fourth year dance, but mostly because Harry and Ron offended her greatly). Ginny, for her own part, has offscreen friends Harry's so bored by he has no idea who they are or else Luna. So, if they're friends they're the kind of friends who vastly prefer their other friend groups.

Other Thoughts?

Not really, I think it's what I put above, they're on good terms, Ginny at least felt she could go to Hermione about the Harry thing, but they aren't dying to spend time with one another.

They probably get along well enough when they're sharing a house over summers and holidays.

They're not BFFs

[thesupernaturalhouse]

This started out as a funny snipper. How tf did it turn into a fanfic?? Also this took me so long anyways, pt3 of the accidental overlord vaggie fic

Alastor: shoves Vaggie between him and Rosie and drops Frank onto her lap

Vaggie: trying to process how tf a giant dragon got through an elevator among many other things

Carmilla: thank you for coming today. I've gathered you all here to talk about the millions of souls-

Vaggie squeaks so quiet no one hears her: I'm sorry fucking how many??....How- How do you check that?? Gets ignored

She's just squeezing poor frank like a stress toy

Carmilla ignores her: You own. And how their at risk with the new extermination schedule. And how we minimize the damage going to be caused by it.

Finally looking aorund the room

Carmilla: Zestial, so god to see you- ....Alastor?? And- eyes narrow the protective overlord

Alastor, leaning over to block vaggie form view because he's petty as fuck: hello! Yes yes, I know, I've been absent for a longgg time and I'm sure youre all DYING to knwo where I've been~

Carmilla:...no. not really, shrugs but welcome back anyways I suppose....I am interested about who you've brought though....

Vaggie: just staring out into space, regretting her life choices and trying to count how many people owe her 'favors'

Carmilla slgihtly concerned/unnerved: In any case, this year's extermination was brutadal. A good 16% of the population was killed off. With them coming back in only 6 months I think it prudent that we-

Velvette: just fucking kicks the door open Yeah, I've got it handled Vox? Are you doubting me? ME might I remind you? Yeah, no. That's what I thought. Yes, yes, I know, thank you V, see you later Okay, bye, kisses darling!

Carmilla: nice of you to finally join us, Velvette. Will you.....colleges? be joining us?

Velvette: What? No way. They have better shit to do than to listen to some old windbag who think she's tough shit! Haha, no. Immm here to represent!

Carmilla:...charming. now, back to what I was saying, we need to-

Velvette: waves her arm frantically

Camilla feeling like a preschool teacher: yes??

Velvette: well, on the topic of discussssss throws exorcists head down let's discuss

Alastor: oooo tasty!!

Vaggie: ohhhhh my god....whispering to herself is that Tuff?? Wtf- how??

Carmilla:......where...did you get this?

Velvette: doesn't matter. We found it, though. And if these angle fuckers can be killed, then the game of cat and mouse has changed, the boys and I have-

Vaggies distressed squeaking as Velvette continues, Zestial jsut slumps his tea

Velvette:....the fuck is wrong with you two?? Looks at vaggie leans downs to get closer....also you're new

Vaggie: uhhhhh......thank?? You??

Velvette: narrows eyes before her head snaps ti zestial

Zestial: we shouldn't go to war with such meger proof.

Velvette:...meger- MEGER PROOF!? ITS a dead fucking Exorcist!!! What more do you WANT!? A video of it being killed?? No- this is definitive proof- if you can't see that, maybe you're going blind old man.

Zestial: it may be dead but how? It could be by a demon, but mayhaps it died due to unrelated reasons

Vaggie: Well, angles have hurt their own kind. Wouldn't be suprised if killing was another option for them

Everyone's heads snap to her

Vaggie:.....did....I say that out loud?

Carmillas narrows her eyes: how do you know that.

Vaggie: I um...I....I saw it happening?

Velvette:....wait aren't you the princesses whore? What are you doing out if your bird cage hm?

Vaggie: I....what??

Carmilla shaking her head: we're getting off topic.

Zestial: Carmilla is right. If we rush to war the angles would purge all of the sinners for daring to even TRY an uprising

Overlords: muttering

Alastor: why don't we put it to a vote?

Vaggie: depends is one of the options 'can we all just go home pelase?'

Alastor: hmmm no!

Vaggie grumbling: I hate you.

Velvette narrows eyes: ohhh okay I see. Grandpa's to scared to make a move! So then there's no point in it huh?

*the respect less song which I am not writing*

Zeezi: pft, what the hell? we literally JUST got here!

odette:....mom??

Carmille:....meeting dismissed.

Vaggie: uh, does this mean we can go home?- gets glared at .....okay sits back down like a scolded kid as she thinks about wtf jsut happened

Vaggie to herself in a defeated tone:.....she never told me how to see how many souls I own.....how many people owe me favors?

Proceeds to try and calculate and count on her fingers and Alastor watches in amusement, after sending off frank, and Rosie watches slightly concerned as to wtf her friend did to this teenage child....and maybe also finding it a bit funny

Part 2 | Part 3(here!) | Part 4

[serialadoptersbracket]

Round 3, Match 3: Inspector Barnes vs. August

Submitted kids:

Inspector Barnes: Anthony Lockwood, Lucy Carlyle, George Cubbins/George Karim, Holly Munro, Quill Kipps

August: Hisoka Mikage, Chikage Utsuki

Propaganda under the cut!

Inspector Barnes:

1. “Mustn't be easy keeping those three (Lockwood, George, Lucy) alive”

2. “Serial adopter of waifs and strays, carefully hidden behind the guise of strict enforcer. He's a softie and we all know it.”

3. “Even though he'd never admit this be of his grumpy character Barnes really became a father for all members of Lockwood & Co. He was the only adult who cared about their lives and he tried to keep them safe and sound, but like all teenagers they didn't listen to him. But they always knew that if they had some prolems (which they actually often had) they could always ask Barnes for help, advice or support”

4. “Barnes adopted a smiling giraffe with a death wish and a blinding smile, a 5 foot Northern bitch who can and will fight god on a Tuesday, a researcher who likes sticking his nose where he shouldn’t and three people max, and a secretary who shot at least a dozen people and is way more badass than she seems”

August:

1. “august is the adoptive older brother of hisoka mikage and chikage utsuki. for context, these characters are all spies, and were invited into the organisation by august. (also known as misha sometimes). hisoka is december, and chikage is april! their collective group name in fanon is "gekkagumi."

the first interaction we see of him in game is him adopting hisoka off the street. he was a dying homeless child, and august invited him to join the organisation. at first he declined, but august kept coming back to him until he followed (despite chikage's protests about it) he fed fed hisoka gingerbread, and declared "we're a family now."

chikage was adopted before hisoka, but we only learned more about it later in the story. chikage was living in a "facility" when he runs into august who lives in the organisation.

despite their very harsh life, august really did everything he could to give hisoka and chikage the best life he could. he loved the idea of family, and always encouraged them to celebrate christmas and birthdays, and play games!

august had a cover job where he owned a candy store. despite it just being a cover, august loved it and had a genuine care for the children. he used to give away free sweets to the point his shop was actively going out of business, and whenever he saw a sad kid he'd try his best to cheer them up. people around the town came in just to talk to him, to the point where hisoka said when he was covering the shop for him, the first thing people would ask was "where's misha?"

in his shop, he also used to have a myth that if you wrote a wish on a certain brand of cookie's wrapper, the wish would come true. august spoke excitedly of the wishes kids would wish for.

events in the story lead up to august's untimely death. years later, hisoka runs into a kid who used to go to his shop. this child had wished to be a painter, and was now painting. he actually ended up in possession of a wrapper august wrote on which said ""a happy family."" however, the boy couldn't read japanese and didn't know what it said. despite that, he held onto the wrapper for years after august's disappearance. he also manages to draw a picture of him from memory. :((“

2. “he's so . gwahh he just wants to give them a nice family”

3. “please vote for august!! he is such a kind soul who shows so much generosity and selflessness despite the cruel circumstances he was stuck in.”

[crimeronan]

Thinking about "Amity and Hunter being deranged and causing immense bodily harm to one another" Just how aware is Luz of the extent of the harm because they're obviously both keeping it from her for obvious reasons.

I can see Hunter straight up being "Well I can't let Luz know Amity did this because if she were to get mad at Amity or concerned for my safety and worried she might do it again... and that would seriously bum her out given the whole 'weirdly massive crush she can't articulate' thing going on." (and also general 'Can't let Luz worry about my injuries/nearly dying' based thoughts )

Amity is just convinced that if Luz knew about 'the time she sent half of Hunter's ribcage into his lungs she would be out of the castle or worse and knows that people posing a threat to Hunter's life have a habit of peacefully having heart attacks in their sleep. And in truth if she were anyone else that might not be a silly fear.

(I love the genuinely terrified with good reason of, to seeing you're safe with them to lover pipeline)

For a while she doesn't get that she isn't 'anyone else' and that a) Hunter genuinely likes her company, and b) Luz both likes her and respects Hunter's autonomy to not throw out his murder bestie even if she didn't... (even if she'd prefer he not be nearly dying all the time)

So for a while she is convinced Hunter is holding onto it as perfect blackmail material for whenever. I do think it's funny if they just... never tell her just how brutal their fights could be, or only tell her when they're all in their fourties or smthn

luz ABSOLUTELY does not know about the Matchstick Bones incident. and neither hunter nor amity are willing to tell her. i do like the idea of amity worrying about blackmail.... but i'm ALSO really fond of the thought that, like. the possibility of luz-related blackmail evaporates Really Fucking Fast. because hunter is so aggressively and edgily insistent that amity not mention this to luz.

so like. it seems like HE might be in trouble with her if he tells. mutually assured destruction!

amity Does have a vested interest in lilith not finding out, though. darius is not a snitch so no worries there, but hunter is a bitch. ultimately i don't think he Actually would tell her, because he doesn't actually expect lilith to give a fuck. but amity clearly believes lilith would give a fuck. hunter can use this

^worst boy In The World.

as for amity fearing luz finding out... i don't think she'd be Super afraid of luz exiling her or killing her for it. unless it's maybe in those first very fraught days after belos dies. she'd be way more scared if hunter had ended up with permanent injuries, but he's fine, so no harm no foul, right??

she IS worried luz will think less of her. and worried luz won't trust her / will think she's dangerous.

the thing about hunter and amity's fights -- both the physical and verbal ones -- are that they're mutually, equally vicious. both of them are really Going For It. amity accidentally hurt hunter but he could Just As Easily have snapped her spine or cracked her skull by accident.

it's less "luz is gonna think i'm torturing hunter" and more "luz is gonna think we're irresponsible and stupid." which. THEY ARE.

meanwhile on hunter's end, as usual he doesn't want to stress luz out. and more importantly, he doesn't want her to tell him to stop, and she Absolutely Fucking Would if she knew how dangerous things were getting. luz being like "can't you guys spar with some ground rules and cushions????" and hunter like "actually we're both so filled with formless aimless rage that if we don't do this we're probably gonna go on some kind of serial killing spree instead. i don't expect you to understand tho 💕" and luz like "You Are Right. I Do Not."

anyway. they've pulled the worst of their punches since darius yelled at them, at least. if luz ever finds out it'll 100% be when they're in their forties and amity or hunter references it as a fond adolescent memory, forgetting luz was out of the loop.

and luz is like. h. Hello. Excuse Me??

[balkanradfem]

I was thinking the other day about how often biblical stories imply that any sort of species can be started with just one and one female of the species, and sells this as the correct (maybe only correct) way to start things. Like Adam and Eve, they're supposed to be the starters of humanity, one (presumably young) male and one again, presumably young woman.

It repeats again with Noah's ark, where two animals of each species are collected, one male and one female, so they could all 'start their species anew'. Noah's family also is presumed to be the regular, one male + one woman, enough to re-start the humanity.

I understand that these stories were written to establish and force the idea of nuclear family being necessary, good and the start of everything, and if you don't think further than 'oh yeah one male and one woman are capable of making a baby' and you stop thinking there, you might be sold with these stories. But if you think about it for a second further, the implications of this are absolutely atrocious.

One young male and a young woman, are never accompanied by their parents or their grandparents in the stories. They're purposely isolated from their families, or are presumed to not even have family, which means none of them has any support, anyone to go to for advice or help, nobody to rely on to do the massive amount of labour of having and raising even one child. This is already where it falls apart, two young people do not have the knowledge, experience or wisdom to raise a small child, alone. They need their mothers, they need their grandmothers, they need elders and community in order to be able to function - first of all tell me who is delivering that baby they're having? Where is her midwife? It's never mentioned how she gets through childbirth in those stories, apparently she just 'figures it out', while in reality birth is dangerous, and women need both emotional and physical support during labour. There's nobody in this story who knows how to deliver the child safely, or how to save one or both of them should the things go wrong. They both have a chance of dying and then the species is dead. This is all ignored and pretended not to be an issue.

So next in the story we're led to believe that these two young people have made a (mistake) baby and are raising it alone and this is fine. Even funnier is that they often first have a male baby, as an effort to repopulate their species, I mean yeah thats gonna do you a lot of good for sure. Two young people of the opposite sex, without any elders, community, family or support, have one significant power imbalance - the male will usually be physically more powerful, while the woman will be more intelligent, resourceful, adaptive, thoughtful, resilient, and infinitely more vulnerable during the times of labour. It has been shown again and again, that in these circumstances, males do not find it appropriate to protect and treasure the women, but they use their physical advantage to overpower and control her, and her reproductive abilities. But in the stories this is 'fine' because she should 'listen' to this dumber, bigger, less intelligent, more aggressive, more demanding, more exploitative, more dangerous, less useful creature who is completely parasitic and depending on her kindness, intelligence, ability to make food, reproductive abilities and sense of forgiveness of his crimes towards her, to survive. Women are apparently just supposed to be hosts for parasitic males, while isolated, not given a way to overpower him except poison, which is then again depicted as 'bad' because she should just resign to live in servitude to the creature if she wants to prove that she is 'good'. This is bullshit.

Let's look at the next stage, where even more disasters await us. So they raised their child, or children, who have only had these two people to look up to, so they've likely picked up the patterns of 'male is to be served or violence happens, women need to keep their head down and obey or the violence happens', and now the children are supposed to repopulate the species. With? whom? This concept relies entirely on incest? With children who have been raised on learning the massive power imbalance? We're supposed to have sisters accept sexual slavery from their brothers at this point, if we want to have a species of humans? The bible is promoting this?

The bible at this point realizes they've fucked up and write down 'well the sons just went to the nearest village to find girlfriends' OH YOU NEED A VILLAGE NOW DON'T YOU? Now you remembered that actually no, you will now rebuild a species without just one male and one woman and in fact, villages are necessary, and your story leads straight into incest and sexual slavery of women. Presumably the women in the village have whole families and not just two people put in this unnatural position of parasitism and power imbalance. But we don't know, we're supposed to remember 'one male + one woman is correct and nothing else is okay', when the concept is fucked up from the starts and they eventually cave and introduce a village, but do it casually like it doesn't really matter and the story totally wouldn't end up in forced incestuous pregnancies and making a mess of human gene pool.

It was so important for the bible to establish, and re-establish this concept because that is the only way for males to be able to isolate, use and control young women. The concept where women don't have their own mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunts, families, friends, and villages to protect them from abuse, that is the only scenario where one male can sit on his butt, call himself the 'provider' and then raise his voice and his hand whenever she doesn't do exactly as he says. It's disgusting, and there's nowhere else this can go except abuse. Males will never be unwilling to use their physical advantage to hurt and control women, and we've watched it for centuries, they were more willing to kill women than to accept that we have the right to vote,, the right to divorce them, the right to abort at will (they're still more willing to kill us than to accept this right). No woman is safe in an union with one male, without her family, friends, and a network of support. To live her entire life normally, she needs to rely on the knowledge, experience and wisdom of her elders, so she wouldn't have to do everything alone, and learn everything alone. Male, in return, usually learns all the tactics of manipulating and isolating a woman and will use those, so she needs to be ready and have strategies to defend herself, to be able to escape if it comes to that.

And sometimes, even when the woman has all the support in the world, the male still ends up killing her, because he gets a chance to do it, and it's always at the distraught and horror of everyone who loved her.

Thinking back, the concept of nuclear family had to be invented because males didn't feel like they were able to control the women enough. They likely needed to establish this because they noticed that women were able to go on uncontrolled, they were too 'free', too supported, too resourceful to just trap and control. They needed to convince women that the right thing to do was be alone with one male person who just happens to be stronger and that in fact, not doing so is dangerous and wrong. The concept of nuclear family put the control right in their hands where they wanted it, and it's still ongoing, and we're sick of it. It's a trap.

If you don't believe these stories have influenced our views, think about how males sometimes dream up concepts where they're the 'only male left on the planet', in company of the woman who they're interested in. They relish in these fantasies because they believe in that scenario, they're entitled to rape her. She isn't entitled to resist because then she's responsible for the downfall of humanity, for not repopulating the species, and they feel that this responsibility has to fall so heavy on the woman's shoulders that she will not possibly try to resist him. Women still do, women say right away that if they were the last one, they'd kill themselves instantly. Because we know and understand there's no repopulating the planet with just male and one female. There's just female sexual slavery and incest.

Possibly even the story of Adam and Eve is just a fantasy concept of one male who looked at a woman who was able to say no to him, and thought 'well, what if we were the only humans existing. How would she be able to refuse me then'. And he realized she couldn't. So he wrote it down and sold it as the ideal utopia created by god himself. And we've all been hearing his fetish fantasy like it's gospel. And then the rest of the story is focused on how wrong Eve is for resisting the rules of the male, and the even more powerful male god, how she'll be punished for eating a piece of fruit. We should have never fallen for it.

[buffkitties]

"their actual dynamic is very interesting and actually pretty similar to regular Komahina"

What do you mean by that?

It means exactly what it looks like.

There are many timelines and scenarios in which Hinata and Komaeda stick together as remnants that would fit their characters and would honestly make more sense than them being apart or barely interacting.

Anyway, first, you have to look at their actual characters and what they're like. They're both observers, in a way. As remnants, neither of them truly caused that much harm, and they both most likely just found themselves in the wrong places at the wrong times.

Komaeda was definitely docile, unlike the other remnants, and he wouldn't kill or harm anybody unless he really needed to. Any real damage would be done by his luck or indirectly brought by him pulling the strings for something. Acting otherwise would be against his character, anyway, since everything he does is for a reason.

Kamukura was in a similar boat, living during the tragedy as nothing more than an observer. He wouldn't harm or kill anybody unless it was necessary, either, and most likely avoided pointless things like that to carry out what he was meant to do and survive since the world wasn't safe for anybody.

Anyway, as servant, Komaeda would rather stay alive than die, which was definitely why he searched safety in Towa City in the first place. If you take a good look at his character, he yearns for self-sacrifice, not out of desire to die, but rather to die a death that means something. As a whole, Komaeda constantly talks about death in a really important way (people say that he talks about it like it's nothing, but that's simply not true), because he, himself, can not avoid death. As many of us know, Komaeda is sick. His life was always going to end sooner than it should ever have since he enrolled in the academy.

Realistically speaking, dying from a disease is a meaningless death:

1. His death will be for nothing; a hopeless outcome, holding nothing but grief and suffering.

2. He will die alone because he has nobody. No family, friends, you get it.

That is a scenario he would rather avoid, which is why he was okay with dying by getting murdered and honestly, much preferred. In the stimulation, he started the killing game because at least ONE person getting to leave would be better than all of them being stuck there, which was hopeless because if we're being honest, one is better than zero. In that scenario, if he was murdered, his death would not only mean something and serve hope—at least one person getting to leave—but he wouldn't be alone in his last moments because he would work with the killer and get murdered by them. Another is chapter 4, when everybody suggested they would rather starve than kill, he was uncomfortable with that fact because at least one of them living would be better. If you approached him for a free time, he even suggested that they could cannibalise him if they needed to, because again, logically, the good his death would bring severely outweighs the fact he'd die, and his death would serve something good (they wouldn't starve to death).

During the tragedy, there was no way he could die without it being meaningless, and despite being brainwashed and his beliefs getting messed up by despair, they are still rooting very deep and he would rather stay alive because his death, just like everybody else's, would be for nothing, but to simply die. Horrible scenario. Also, I believe that in UDG, he hasn't mentioned self-sacrifice once (correct me if I'm wrong).

I believe that this is a case in which he would talk about talent, despair, and hope often. He wouldn't mention it in every sentence, but any conversation COULD turn into that with a wrong turn. Komaeda only talks about them when he's stressed or nervous, and the more disturbed he feels, the more he talks about them. The tragedy was a very traumatic time, and he would undoubtedly spiral into this kind of talk often. In fact, I think nobody would be able to tell that he was a remnant until he started speaking or he was recognised by somebody, because he was really disturbed at the time, and Komaeda is unfiltered and he would voice what goes through his mind. He would most likely speak non-sense a lot, too, often contradicting himself or saying things he would never say, and he would lack self-awareness unless somebody pointed out that he was incoherent and he got confused and began questioning his own words (good example for that is actually chapter 0 of Sdr2, when he talks to Kamukura on the ship)

Kamukura, or rather Hinata, was a wanderer and observer who didn't do anything during the tragedy except for when Junko Enoshima was using him for her plans. Cursed with frustrating understimulation and lack of interest and entertainment in things around him, he allowed himself to be manipulated to get out of an empty room that was basically a cell for him, to feel something. Even if he knew he was being manipulated, he would be used one way or another, if not by her, then by the school or someone entirelt else, and Enoshima's offer seemed much better, at least at the time.

People constantly portray Hinata during those times as emotionless, but he has emotions. They're just severely stunted, and any time he feels something, it passes very fast because he already knows what to expect and can predict almost everything.

I'm too lazy to dig deeper into their characters AGAIN because it should be obvious at this point, but all I'm saying is if you look into them, it'll make sense. These are just small summaries to kinda give you an idea I suppose

Moving on, when it comes to them together, people always give them a bedroom dynamic, and it really annoys me. In reality, they're more likely to simply travel together because it would benefit both of them and give them a better chance at survival or reaching their goals, whatever they would be. They would still feel a draw and trust, and that's because they're connected as characters in general, and one could not exist without the other, so they could never avoid each other, not even then.

Their traits are also very similar. For example, both of them are blunt and docile, and both of them serve a purpose only when it comes to other people. They have other very interesting traits, too, such as that Komaeda would be overly expressive and emotional. Meanwhile, Kamukura would be the complete opposite. Both of them are pretty stubborn, etc.

I think they would find each other's company pleasant, and they wouldn't mind staying together since they wouldn't be bothersome to each other at all. I think there are many cases where Kamukura would keep him safe, too, for many reasons.

Anyway... Hinata and Komaeda are still two sides of the same coin, and they wouldn't be able to stay away from each other, despair or no despair. That part of their dynamic will always remain. When I say that it's pretty similar to regular Komahina, I mean exactly that.

Their dynamic is interesting because their original characters kind of get thrown out, I guess, and they're forced into an environment where they can not act like they usually would because the world doomed them, yet they still mirror each other and have these weirds things linking them and stand out from the rest.

It's honestly more surprising that they were separated in the canon timeline or that they didn't meet before the Kamukura thing, rather than if they were together during the tragedy. I feel like they got seriously lazy writing the anime and UDG

[raayllum]

Hello! One thing I’ve been excited about by Runaan’s return is that he clearly knows something of Aaravos- which may or may not mean Ethari does. It could due to a number of factors, so narrowing down a why is difficult: dragon guard friends; working as the assassin leader directly reporting to the dragon monarchs; some kind of work related he must have seen places when out killing people experience (dark mages having Aaravos links is rather established); or else Xadian specific trivia/cultural lore Rayla either hasn’t heard to to interest, obscurity or being somewhat othered over her parents post the dragon guard’s failure so tales about Aaravos were suddenly taboo with his artefacts possibly missing. But, irregardless of how to a degree, in consideration of texts blurring out Aaravos’ name in Katolis in earlier seasons I’m really hoping we get something more in expansion of how Xaadia tells what went down (hopefully paralleled with what Aaravos is saying to Claudia!) and think there’s a possibility to make Runaan’s revival pull extra narrative weight efficiently!

Also Runaan calls the mirror a fate worse than death before then sort of dying in season one and that’s sort of answered as it’s Aaravos’ way to access the living world from his prison a bit sure but that is still a thing that expansion on would be delightful to see.

But the reason I thought to use an ask format is your beloved cube- it was taken at the same time as the mirror and is a magical artefact. So, I must ask if your forensic following of it’s every screenshot has you thinking Runaan may give insight into the key in any way or at least recognise it too! There’s no pressure intended, of course, but I thought it may be up your alley oohing and aahing to at least read and it could do no harm to direct your way enthusiastically.

I think realistically Runaan didn't/doesn't know more than what Lain and Tiadrin presumably did (hence trying to get one of the Dragonguard to take the egg, but they were still going to stay behind; in my mind, this was because of the mirror). They knew the mirror held something dangerous and awful ('worse than death') and possibly that it was a Startouch elf, but I'm not banking on them knowing his name considering that even Janai—a queen and descendant of Aditi (which makes me think that Aaravos wasn't even suspect in her death at the time) with the resources of the Great Bookery—didn't know him by name.

In my mind we've largely gotten Xadia's take on things (Zubeia) from someone who would have context. I think if we're going to get another lore drop that's not from Aaravos himself (as he'll have to explain some things to Claudia and Terry in S7), it'd reasonably be tied to Kpp'Ar given that he was participating in "ancient" magics / knows something about the Staff of Ziard (Aaravos' gift) that Viren never has. There's also other clues in supplementary material (book 2 novelization, Puzzle House graphic novel) that Kpp'Ar knows more about stuff related to Aaravos and deep magic than we've seen so far.

I think Runaan is out of the coin for 3 main reasons beyond just "Runaan gets to reunite and be happy with Ethari" (which is, to be fair, a decently good reason all on its own):

Xadia has to prove that it's not like the Cosmic Council. And they can do so, because Runaan changing will likely reflect the Silvergrove changing, and moving away from a place where they're willing to literally and/or metaphorically murder children (hi Ezran and Rayla respectively)

Runaan coming back is going to challenge Ezran and his efforts towards peace / breaking the cycle in a way that it is unlikely another character could.

Runaan is there to provide either a contrast or guidance to Rayla when it comes to love vs duty. He put duty above all else and seemingly regrets it, believing that it turned him into a monster, and this may help Rayla put love over duty next season (and thereby save Callum + humanity's hopes for primal magic by extension).

By being here he's absolutely going to further / already has furthered certain themes or ideas (father-daughter relationships, parent-child reconciliation, knowledge of the Moon arcanum and life/death which may be very important next season) but I don't think any of him as a character is particularly tied to knowledge about Aaravos more than what the main cast currently knows. I think Callum (and maybe Kpp'Ar) with help from Ezran (bc Orphan Queen royal lineage) or Zubeia could know or discover something about the cube going forward; I expect Callum to have fully solved That Mystery by the end of S7.

[sarahreesbrennan]

Hi Sarah, I'm so excited to see your upcoming release. (Villainess deserve representation too!) I was rereading Love From Both Sides for the dozenth time - as one does - and I was wondering if you had any plans for a spin off with Adara and Natalie? Their story has so many uncharted possibilities, I'm dying to know more. And relatedly, we're gasping out here for more sapphic media that goes as hard as your work does 🥺

I'm sorry if this has been asked and answered before, I couldn't find anything in your archives. Thanks again for writing In Other Lands, a precious and rare delight. I hope you're having the bestest day with at least one friendly nuzzle from a puppy

Hey my love, Never be sorry for asking anything! This world is bettered by the questioners, and it’s a great compliment to me that you care.

As regards Adara and Natalie specifically, I couldn’t tell you. I’d love to write more in the In Other Lands world (about which more later) - but whether I could do a short story or a series of books would obviously change my answer. It’s not entirely up to me, but I definitely do have plans for Adara. She’s a foil for Elliot, and the kind of character I really like - one who I see treated shallowly in other media, when few people really are shallow. If there’s too much skimming the surface, I long to explore the depths. And with the depths come adventures. Thank you for your care!

I also thank you for being excited for Long Live Evil. Villains and villainesses do definitely deserve representation, and have long been beloved by me because they’re often complicated, witty because they see the world differently, and queer-coded. I was also thinking when writing it about the different ways audiences can come to a story, and using the same evidence how different people presume characters are (for example) straight or bisexual. And often the ending will be very uniformly heterosexual. But if you go into the story, and change its direction… Are the things you presumed true? Are the things characters presumed about themselves true? Would certain subtexts surface, and certain texts submerge? How do we influence art by engaging with it? Anyway, I am categorically not making any promises because that’s got me in trouble before. But it’s an ensemble story (I was inspired by the group dynamics and relationships, all given weight, of Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows) and these are some of my preoccupations when writing it. I hope you shall find much to enjoy.

In the meantime, if you seek sapphic media that goes hard, and Sappho knows we all do… The Jasmine Throne and the Oleander Sword by Tasha Suri - this series is a huge favourite of mine - and not just mine, it won the World Fantasy award. Its central f/f pairing features one party holding the other at knifepoint for fine reasons and they have a brilliant dynamic based on understandably conflicting ideologies and complicated family situations! I love it.

Thank you for a delight of a letter and your kind words. I write this being yelled at by a cat for skritches, which is pleasant as puppies. I wish you a beauteous day with animal companions of choice, with apologies I couldn’t answer more definitively!