#can i just say its Not Easy to write a conflict between characters that never even come close to fighting in canon lol

[artingstarvist]

Chapter 15 / 20 "Lies of Omission"

Summary: Xie Lian gets updated on some current events; Hua Cheng has a very bad evening.

Additional Tags: Coffin Rescue, Coffin AU, AU - Canon Divergence, AU - Different First Meeting, Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Identity Reveal, Revenge Plot, POV Alternating, Blood and Injury, Dream-Reality Confusion, Canon-Typical Violence, Hua Cheng AND Xie Lian have Self Esteem issues, Hua Cheng & Xie Lian Invented Love, Slow Burn, Mutual Pining, Hua Cheng bout to make it 34 gods

So um... this is it. The moment you've all been dreading for ✨. Unless you live for the drama, then get your popcorn.

Spoilery Illustration under the cut 💔

[divineei]

TOOTM  one. to keep a promise

! ko kyungjun x fem!reader

a/n. this shit took so long omfg. whoever said writing was easy can suck my nonexistent left nutsack.

"i don't get why this is even a discussion."

"oh, cmon! you don't think the conflict around it is interesting?"

"whether its interesting or not doesn't matter because this shouldn't be an existing argument. if your partner or someone you love commits a murder and there's serious evidence pointing back to them, how could you just act like it's not even there?"

"dude, you're missing the point entirely. the question is not about what you would do in that situation, it's about what you should believe."

"that's so stupid. the only factor you should need is evidence. it doesn't matter if the accused is a long time friend, your partner, or even your child. sure, your judgment on their character is still relevant, but if their fingerprints were found at the crime scene there's just no way you can objectively ignore their culpability. at that point, you should either believe your partner is guilty or at best remain undecided."

"in that case, would you say that following the evidence is morally required?"

"absolutely."

"you don't think there might be other ethical factors to consider?"

"for example?"

"even though the evidence is strong, there's still a chance they might not be guilty. imagine how it would feel like to be innocent and have no one believe you, not even your own partner! by not supporting them you run the risk of seriously hurting them on a crucial time of need. and consider what this lack of trust would do to your relationship. could you really go on after seriously suspecting–and believing–they're a murderer?"

"are you saying you'd rather ignore the crimes of your partner, even when the truth is staring you in the face, just for the sake of love?"

outside of the ethical dilemma resonating through yoon yn's headphones, the girl shifted around on her seat. her limbs felt numb from remaining unmoving for so long and, even though the only companion by her side was her bag, the compact space paid no mercy on her back. 

after finding a comfortable position she set her eyes on the view outside the window. sunlight hued over the fields of grass and the occasional farm, making the rural landscape imitate a painting in motion shaped by the most gentle brush strokes. the scene felt so engrossingly peaceful, she could almost feel the gale caressing her features despite the glass separating her from the world. 

yn couldn't help but thank the scene–and the long lasting battery of her headphones–for giving her something to focus on, seeing as the ride to the resort her class was directed towards had resulted to be such an otherwise tiresome one. 

"YES!"

an obnoxious voice popped yn's bubble in spite of the maximum volume she'd set for her podcast. distracted by the sound she turned to glance at the very back of the bus, where the students grouped up at the last row of leathered seats frowned in unison at heo yool–who mocked them with the cheekiest grin one could imagine. judging by their sullen looks, yn figured the citizens had lost yet another round of mafia, a game they'd been playing for who knows how long.

she recalled when her classmates had urged her to join the game the moment she stepped into the bus, which she declined, prioritizing her tranquility over the headache she knew they'd give her, yet promising she'd join in the next time. 

after figuring out the source of that ruckus yn set her focus back on her podcast, purposely missing the eyes of the guy she'd been avoiding to the best of her abilities for days now.

just a few rows behind her, kyung jun's eyes never left yn as she disappeared between the sea of heads flooding the bus, and his scheme of intentionally leaving the space by his side unoccupied for her came to mind, especially remembering how his grand plan backfired when that fucking basketball-star-wannabe gave up his seat for her.

that annoying prick just couldn't get the memmo, couldn't he? to him, hyun ho had always been a nuisance; a pest that treaded on yn's heels at every chance he got–even when she used to hang onto the feared delinquent's arm.

"they're so loud," kyung jun muttered. he'd been trying to settle down the bittersweet echoes of his mind since the start of that damned school trip, in vain, since the blaring voices behind him made the flare that was his temper even harder to quell than any of those memories.

luckily, he needn't lift a single finger to make the commotion stop, and he was able to get some peace of mind thanks to his lackeys acting as spokesmen for his aggravation. 

on the other side of the large vehicle, kim so mi sneakily took pictures of the class president. 

"hey look, isn't he gorgeous?" the vice president called, showing what was sure to be one of her new favorite pictures to her friends seated behind: park ji soo, cha yoo joon and park woo ram. "doesn't this belong in a magazine? how can he look so gorgeous?" so mi repeated with a dreamy sigh, looking at her screen.

"i will tell jun hee tomorrow that you took a photo of him," woo ram threatened with a playful smile.

"oh yeah? what if i tell yn about all the videos you have?" so mi replied, pointing at the camera that always hanged around the guy's neck. 

"please do, maybe i'll finally seduce her."

"oh my god," exclaimed yoo joon, "you are so delusional."

"why?" he lifted one of his hands in response to the very serious offense.

"dude, you barely talk to her."

"woo ram, you have the same chances of getting with yn as me and yoo joon of breaking up." ji soo stated.

the guy in mention glanced at his girlfriend, seemingly unaware of the joke. "that's zero, right?" question to which ji soo only rolled her eyes.

"i don't care what you say," woo ram brushed off. "i know she's the love of my life."

"ko kyung jun!" called out so mi.

like a tiny animal trying to save itself from a threatening predator, woo ram jumped to the empty seat by his side, hiding from the vandal's peripheral as much as possible while the rest of his companions laughed.

"fuck, kim so mi!" he cried out, "you trying to get me killed?"

"relax, he's not even looking," revealed the vice president with a cheeky smile.

as if they'd rehearsed it, the four students turned around to catch ko kyung jun's eyes still set on yoon yn, and by the looks of it, he didn't have any plans to cease his staring.

"not seeing them together is kinda weird," yoo joon pointed out.

"does anyone know why they broke up?" so mi asked to her peers, who all looked at each other expecting an answer none of them had.

"whatever," dismissed ji soo, "yn is better off without him anyway."

"yeah, she's been around us a lot more since then." agreed so mi.

"i bet kyung jun barely let her talk to us."

"right? he looks like the controlling type."

"i would never treat her like that." acknowledged woo ram, making his way back into the conversation only to get beaten back down by the three others.

the time inside the bus seemed to work differently than the rest of the world. minutes and hours mixed up in a disorienting spectacle that at least seemed to follow the sun setting over the horizon. 

when they finally arrived to the resort, the only source of light were the numerous lamps adorning the streets and the inviting shine of the building before them.

with the bus door finally opened, the students of class 2-3 thronged the exit with overwhelming excitement. the trip had been longer that the teacher had promised and everyone was ready to get comfortable on their temporary rooms. of course, that included yn, who unfortunately had to wait for the rest of her classmates to take their suitcases out of the loaded trunk since her luggage ended up dropping to the back during the ride.

after everyone collected their belongings, the girl was able to retrieve her case at last. it was somewhat heavy but the tiny wheels at the bottom made it easier for her to slide the valise out of the bus' compartment. taking out the retractable handle, yn rolled her suitcase for at most six steps before someone else got ahold of it.

"what are you doing?" she questioned, but the guy simply walked away while pulling her luggage along and up the stairs.

"kyung jun." 

at the sound of his name, he stopped. walking towards him, yn stood right between the entrance and the suitcase-stealer. 

"what do you think? i'm helping you."

"i can do it myself." yn chided, staring him down harshly.

kyung jun had received many looks like that one throughout his life. from parents, teachers, students... they were all identical, ranging from disappointment to resentment and back. he was used to it. it was his day to day, how could he not be? yet he never imagined the same eyes that used to watch him with so much endearment would scrutinize him so cruelly. 

"you used to love when i carried your stuff." he reminded her, scanning yn's face for a spec of something–anything–he hoped could save him from the pain her gaze struck him with.

the girl let out an exasperated sigh. why couldn't he leave her be? why was it that, no matter how much she wanted to distance herself, he always found a way to squeeze back into her life? 

yn grabbed the handle of her suitcase and pulled. she wanted to leave, to get away from his side and free herself of his piercing eyes. unfortunately his strength surpassed hers, and she was forced to stay as he kept his grip.

"can you let go?" 

"yn," he asked but the girl just focused on the luggage he kept hostage. "can we talk?"

"about what?" she sneered, speaking with as much disdain her troubled feelings allowed.

"you know what." 

once again, she sighed. his antics were so infuriating; always pushing down the barrier she tried to put between the two. 

"not now."

"then when?" he instantly snapped back, then took a deep breath to stop his grating tone. "you always say that but then you ignore me for days."

"look, i don't have time for this." for the second time, she attempted to retrieve her case. "i promised i'd help with the preparations for the class picture, so–"

"oh, c'mon," and still, he pulled back. "since when do you care about this school-spirit-bullshit?"

he was right, yn never involved herself with whatever activities the school came up with. time and time again, they'd skipped so many classes as to not get involved with all those school projects they both deemed as meaningless, deciding to spend their mornings strolling around parks and nearby shopping districts instead. but that wasn't an option anymore, and yn needed some way to blurr the images that kept torturing her with the agonizing nostalgia of a broken relationship.

"promise me we'll talk. tonight." 

"sure," for the third time, she attempted to take back her luggage. but his answer was the same.

"no, yn. promise me."

with every fiber of her being, yn summoned the last shreds of her patience and met his gaze. his eyes held her captive, beseeching her in silence to unravel the troubles he was willing to share with no one but her, and the hypnotic pull of his gaze weakened her willpower to resist.

"i promise." she reluctantly gave in.

as kyung jun finally released the carry-on, yn didn't even bat an eye before snatching it up and walking away. however, as she made her way into the resort center, she couldn't help but feel frustrated with herself for falling for his tricks. all the effort she had put into avoiding him seemed to have gone down the drain so quickly, leaving her feeling defeated.

not wanting kyung jun to catch up to her, yn rushed inside the building. 

warm lights illuminated the vast entrance, composed by a lounge area with leathered sofas that accentuated the beige walls with brighter colors and a water dispenser conveniently placed next to the cushioned seats. at the center, a beautiful statue engulfed by faint blue lighting towered over everything below. the perfectly crafted marble giant was impossible to miss, looking like a still guardian watching over the resort's grounds. yet that didn't stop yn from overlooking the sign with the qr code needed for the resort's wifi and facility app.

following the arrows pointing out the way towards the elevator, yn got in and pressed the button labeled dormitories. the heavy doors slid and shut before the steel cage trembled, signaling its vertical movement. suddenly, the girl felt the air tighten inside her chest, twisting her lungs in a way that seemed to strangle them. oxygen got caught up in her throat as images of cables snapping and an imminent fall to her death plagued her mind. in, out, in, out. yn's breath increased as rapidly as tidal waves when the lights malfunctioned and in between flickers, she saw a dark figure out of the corner of her eye. 

the moment she snapped her head back to take a look, a faint bell announced the door sliding open. taking in the air as steadily as she could, yn grabbed her suitcase and escaped the cage of death. frightened and disoriented, she questioned if what just concurred has been a quick fever dream or reality. and if it wasn't, why did her mind torture her like that? as far as she knew, never in her life had she experienced something that'd cause this crippling fear of high spaces.��so why...?

she shook her head and brushed off the uncanny feeling, dismissing it as a consequence from the tiresome trip and forcing herself to focus on finding the room she shared with ahn na hee and kim so mi, who'd invited her with overwhelming coercion. compared to the elevator ride, figuring out her way to her dormitory was a piece of cake. the girl left her stuff in an empty corner and took the stairs down towards the gymnasium. there, instead of getting scolded by the teacher like she expected, what greeted her was a plethora of different activities performed by her classmates. 

in the middle of the room, a group of students flawlessly danced to the rhythm of the songs reverberating from a large speaker, followed by lee joo young and choi mi na silently fighting for the spotlight, and being interrupted by ko kyung jun, who apparently had nothing better to do than to mess with their practice by turning off the music while his two loyal followers, shin seung bin and kim jin ha, played a very dedicated match of ping-pong.

on opposite corners of the gym, jin da bum, choi joo won, lee yoon seo and oh jung won were consecutively separated in two pairs, all conversing with their respective best friends. up on the second floor, cha yoo joon and park ji soo, who never seemed to stay away from each other, watched from above. on the stage, band members im eun chan, nam yeon woo and baek eun ha dabbled with their instruments to make sure everything was perfectly in tune. lastly, jang hyun ho and kim dong hyun busied themselves by organizing all the sport equipment laying around.

"yoon yn!" called kim jun hee from a large set of tables surrounded by the other members of the student council which, of course, included kim so mi and her friend ahn na hee.

with no sight of their teacher around yn walked stress-free to said table, although not before catching park woo ram pointing his camera right at her, which made the guy hastily turning to film someone else. 

"you're here," the class president stated. "we thought you got lost or something."

"sorry, i got caught up with something." yn replied. she didn't really care about these preparations, but she did promise to help, and yn wasn't the type to use that word lightly.

"yeah! i was going to text you but we've been so busy preparing everything." so mi ranted, sprinkling salt into the wound.

"i can see that," yn commented, deciding to ignore so mi's backhanded scolding.

"what happened, though? did you really get lost?" na hee asked. 

"no, i got stopped by kyung jun."

"oh, right. he was a bit late too now that I think about it."

"is that jackass bothering you again?" hyun ho, who'd come closer to the table just as yn approached, joined in and put a hand on her shoulder.

"no," yes. "everything's fine."

truth be told, yn would rather drop dead than having to deal with kyung jun. however, she knew that telling her classmates about it wouldn't lead to a positive outcome. after all, the only person who had the courage to confront the delinquent was hyun ho, and, given their history, yn was certain his involvement would only make matters worse.

in another area of the bustling gym, the noticeable trio of vandals were causing a ruckus in the corner. as they tossed a basketball back and forth, jin ha hurled the ball at kyung jun, who was too busy gawking at yn's arrival to notice. the ball smacked him right in the chest–a painful reminder of how his focus seemed to always follow after her. 

"shit, my bad!" jin ha exclaimed.

their leader squatted to grab the ball at his feet and got back up only for his gaze to fix back towards the girl who constantly distracted him and, of-fucking-course, hyun ho standing right next to her, as always. the sight made his blood boil and his knuckles turn white as he clenched the basketball in his hands, while his rapid heartbeats deafened any coherent thought telling him to settle down.

seeing this, jin ha and seung bin looked at each other before the latter sighed and came closer to his friend. throwing one arm around his shoulders, he spoke:

"why don't we go outside, man? get your head out the gutter."

"yeah," kyung jun agreed, seeing seung bin was clearly trying his best to support him. perhaps he was right, some air would probably do him good right now. "let's go." was the last thing he said before disappearing through the gymnasium's exit, just in time to miss the teacher entering from the other side.

after informing the class presidents about a problem regarding the other bus full of students set to accompany them on this field trip, he left, clearly in a panic because of the unexpected turn of events.

in the meantime, most of class 2-3 remained in the gymnasium. no more than a few minutes went by before the dancing group, who now were fixing their hair and makeup while sitting on the floor, called yn over. ever since they found out about her break up, the girls had been offered her to go out again and again, an opportunity they took to invite her to join their club with not-so-subtle comments. 

"oh yn, you should hang out with us more!" were the kind of utterances she always received from the class' cheerleaders.

mi na had insisted on brushing yn's hair. taking the empty stop in front of her classmate, she felt the bristles effortlessly flowing through the roots of her hair to its ends. the conversation was an amicable one. the girls often taking their time to butter up yn and saying how cool it'd be to have her in their club–until the self proclaimed hairdresser decided to dive into something she'd been curious about.

"hey yn."

"yeah?" she answered, eyes closed while enjoying the soothing sensation of the hairbrush.

"why did you and kyung jun brake up?"

mi na found herself at a loss for words when she faced the disapproving and critical stares of the entire group. why would you ask that? their glares yelled in silence, making her feel like she just made a terrible mistake.

"that's between him and i, mi na." yn abruptly ended the change of topic.

why did they break up? that's a question she'd been asked countless times ever since her classmates took note of their separation. a query yn remembered avoiding like a plague, long before this trip. only this time, a strange, guttural discomfort buried into every corner of her brain as she noticed a spec of something missing, unable to put together if the same evasion came as a reflex or because she couldn't answer it herself.

"right," mi na's shame, reinforced by the brutal glares of the other girls, took over her face as her cheeks flushed. "sorry."

luckily for her, just as her face morphed into a cherry tomato, a painful ringing roared through the speakers before the absence of light engulfed the high schoolers in deep darkness.

"c'mon! what is this?" one said.

"what's going on?" asked another.

"hey, turn the lights on!" resonated a voice from above.

a loud clang similar to a metal pipe hitting a hard surface echoed over the four walls, followed by the piercing shrieks of several people. helping themselves with the flashlights provided by their phones, the students revealed a white figure in the middle of the room.

"quit joking around." before any more screeches could be heard, hyun ho launched a basketball to the sheeted ghost, making it fall to the ground just as pathetically as your average cartoon villain.

with the precision of a well-rehearsed act, the room was suddenly lit up, revealing the mischievous culprit behind the childish prank. and lo and behold, it was none other than heo yool.

the collection of complaints from everybody present synced in a perfect expression of annoyance and the occasional insult. 

"guys, listen carefully." the class clown™ gathered his classmates' attention as he stood from the ground. "i've heard that, a long time ago, a high school girl killed herself here," he explained, playing the role of a surprisingly talented storyteller. "so there's a few things you should never do: don't look at the mirror and turn around at midnight. and if someone grabs your ankle when you're sleeping, don't look down. if you break these rules," he turned to the group of dancers. "a ghost will pop up!" dashing towards them with the form of a rogish halloween scare actor, he was met with the frightened squeals of the girls.

yn, whose interest in the paranormal had never been deep enough to scare her, grabbed mi na's hairbrush and hurled it towards heo yool. an action that encouraged the rest of the class to throw everything they had at hand, along with some despicable remarks and the teasing laugh of the insufferable rascal.

defeated by heo yool's stunts, the students decided they've had enough as one by one they exited the gym. 

"are you coming, yn?" so mi asked.

the girl nodded before answering, "i'll be there in a minute. i want to get some water first."

at the entrance, so mi and yn parted ways. she approached the water dispenser and took one of the cardboard cups provided by the machine. ever since the lights of the gymnasium had turned off, the girl noticed an unusual taste in her mouth that reminded her of her frightening fever dream at the elevator. she felt it at the back of her neck: something eerily creeping behind her at every given moment. was it possible that heo yool's story actually got under her skin? trying to brush off the uncanny sensation, yn took a sip from the refreshment in her hand.

"yn!" 

the call startled her, making the water get caught up in her throat. she coughed and patted her own chest as the liquid scraped its way down her larynx, like a tiny bug trying to escape a spider's web. once able to compose herself, yn glanced towards the voice.

"im so sorry!" joo won panicked in a stutter, "i didn't mean to do that, are you ok?"

"im fine." she wiped the water from her lips with her long sleeve. 

joo won and his companion standing behind, da bum, stared at her in silence.

"do you want anything or...?" 

a simultaneous no and a yes echoed trough the entrance, followed by a confused frown from the girl and whatever silent conversation the two guys were displaying with their eyes. 

"do you think maybe you could," joo won took his sweet time to mutter his next words, as if scared. "talk with kyung jun?"

"excuse me?"

what the fuck...? did kyung jun put them up to this?

"we just, well," the spokesman of the duo halted. "we gave some money to his friends a few days ago and we just don't want to bother them."

oh.

"so you bother me?" 

"no, no!" da bum spoke promptly and grabbed his friend's arm, pulling him along as he took a few steps to leave. "it's ok, yn. we won't bother you."

joo won released himself from da bum's grasp and walked towards yn. "please," he pleaded, holding one of her hands tightly with both of his. "he'll listen to you."

right as her heart started beating with enough sympathy to care for their situation, the front door opened. seung bin, jin ha and kyung jun walked into the building, the latter playing around with a basketball.

the three delinquents would've kept their saunter if it weren't for yn's presence, which made the group's top dog stop in his tracks. his companions did the same and all stared at the situation unfolding right in front of them. kyung jun's eyes stayed on the hands holding yn and after noticing his threatening glare, joo won leaped away from her.

"what's going on?" asked the fearful leader.

"you owe them money?" yn countered, her eyes flickering between the trio.

"what?" the blonde one laughed, brushing off the accusation. 

"they do!" joo won blamed, but instantly went back to his helpless self when met with the bullies' threatening scowls. "please, i just need it for my tuition."

the firm glare of the girl pierced through the tough act of the tamer vandal, making him drop his facade as he approached the feeble boy, closed fist in the air.

"fuck, man! we're on retreat, why are you asking us for money now?"

"yeah," seung bin joined in, defending his friend. "what are you, a loan shark? we told you we'd give you interests. give us some time, dipshit!"

kyung jun, who'd only taken the role of observer until that moment, put down the basketball he held and intervened to slap both of his lackeys' heads. "did you do sports betting again? huh?"

like scolded puppies, seung bin and jin ha faced the floor as they stepped aside.

"da bum," he called, and the guy lifted his head to stare at the bully. "did you lend them money too?"

"huh?" as kyung jun stalked closer, da bum's heart raced faster with every step. his eyes frantically scanned the room, desperately seeking any distraction from the intimidating figure slowly closing in on him. "yes. but i can wait for my money. there's no rush." with a lump in his throat, da bum braced himself for whatever was coming next.

"how much?" kyung jun's open hand grabbed the side of da bum's face, forcing the terrified boy to look right at him. "ill pay you back."

"you will?" da bum stuttered.

"of course," his grin turned into something sinister, which allowed only da bum to see because of their proximity. "in return play basketball with me, yeah?"

he faintly smacked his victim's face twice before coming up to yn. "everything's alright here, yn. see? no need for this." kyung jun reached out to hold her hand but she pulled away before any contact could be made. 

was she really so revolted by him she wouldn't even let him touch her? accepting his defeat, kyung jun hid his hands inside his jacket's pockets. 

"right," yn looked at da bum and joo won, who were currently being pushed around by the other two, before turning back to kyung jun. "in that case, i'll get going." 

"you're not coming with me?" just as yn started to walk away, his words pulled her back in.

"i'd rather not."

"are you sure?"

with a swift nod, kyung jun signaled seung bin and jin ha to go ahead and, bringing along the poor students they were about to torment, they disappeared down the hallway.

they were left alone, just like kyung jun liked it. only them, with nothing and no one around to interrupt their precious time together.

not a single second did he stop looking into her fiery eyes, which only seemed to hold a hostility that antagonized his own devoted regard.

"it's almost midnight."

both held each other's gaze, which kyung jun took as an invitation to step towards the girl. he stopped right in front of her and, unfortunately, yn's heart betrayed her mind as she internally screamed for it to cease its raising beats. 

kyung jun's hands raised to yn's face, completely forgetting her previous rejection. for a second, he thought of apologizing, since she'd made it clear time and time again how much she now despised his presence. but how could he apologize for something he was barely conscious of? he couldn't help himself, not when she was merely inches away, not with her. maybe if he insisted–if he didn't give up–she'd finally understand why staying apart was never the world's plan. 

"you promised me. remember?"

his hands were close. so close he could feel his fingertips grace her cheeks, a touch so minuscule, yet enough to make his skin crawl with anticipation. 

he was too close. 

yn stepped back just as she felt the fleeting spark. she would be dammed if she ever allowed him to touch her again, in more ways than one. or at least that's what she told herself as she fell right into another one of his tricks. kyung jun knew her well; too well for her liking. and with such measly words she found herself helplessly cornered by her own self-discipline and morals.

fucking bastard.

up in the vast dormitory area of the resort center, different groups of people were each caught up in their own conversations, without a single care in the world or the impending sinister feeling hanging over their heads like an invisible wrecking ball about to crash and destroy every single thing they ever cared for.

in her room, lee yoon seo was finally able to lose herself in her novel when her phone pinged. slightly annoyed by the distraction she took a closer look to her home screen, which displayed an app in process of downloading.

"i told you i didn't need this." she showed the screen to her roommate.

"it wasn't me." jung won answered, just as astounded.

our perspective changes and now we observe a group of various students, all gathered in one room. the class couple, the cheerleaders and members of the student council all sharing snacks and stories between them in perfect harmony until a knock interrupted. 

"come in!" allowed the vice president.

"hey guys," the door opened, reavealing hyun ho accompanied by his best friend, dong hyun, who stayed on the hallway behind him. "has anyone seen yn?"

"how come you don't know? you're always following her." mocked woo ram before taking a handful of chips from one of the various bags scattered around the room.

"you're one to talk." ji soo muttered, which provoked woo ram to throw a scrambled napkin her way.

"i'm serious." hyun ho replied, "i've tried texting her but this wifi doesn't even work."

"she told me she was going to get some water, isn't she downstairs?" just as so mi finished her sentence, one by one every phone in the room chimed.

notifications spread throughout the resort like a 14th century pandemic, resonating around every room as if imitating the never ending bells that announced the beginning of the end.

back in the gymnasium, joo won stood shaking below the basketball hoop with his friend by his side, eyes shut tight as neither dared watch the nearing hit from the ball.

"joo won, stay right there." kyung jun sneered as he prepared himself to throw. he looked up, targeting the net as he bent his knees, faked a jump, and sent the ball right into the boy's stomach.

joo won kneeled in pain, groaning and grasping his abdomen with both hands in his best attempt to soothe the aching sensation puncturing his body.

yn watched the situation unfold as she sat on the rubber gym flooring, otherwise cold if it weren't for seung bin's zip-up laid out below her. it had been kyung jun who'd instructed the blondie to give up his hoodie, since yn declined on taking his own. not a single word was heard from the girl ever since stepping into the gym as the trio took turns tormenting their two victims, until now.

"i didn't come here for this, kyung jun."

almost ten minutes had passed and she was still waiting for kyung jun to approach her and start the conversation he so adamantly pushed onto her.

"c'mon yn, let me give it one more shot."

he must've lost his fucking mind, thinking he had her wrapped around his finger to waste her time in such a way. fed up, yn got up and snatched the basketball out of his hands before throwing it away. it rolled towards jin ha, who immediately picked it up to quite the sound of the bouncing that only seemed to raise the tension of the ex-lovers' quarrel.

yn opened her mouth to give kyung jun an ultimatum, a last opportunity out of her remaining patience, when a sudden ding emitted out of her skirt's pocket. she would've payed no mind to it if it weren't for the other five identical sounds that propagated right after.

each person in the room took out their phones and faced their screens, which displayed a virtual envelope eagerly waiting to be opened. 

TAP TO VIEW YOU ROLE, read the text below.

"wasn't this the resort's app?" asked jin ha, to nobody in particular.

resort's app? 

she never knew about any app.

"mafia?" seung bin laughed from his spot at the floor and showed his screen. "what's this about?"

"what the fuck is this?" kyung jun mumbled with a frown, clearly confused.

yn brought one hand to the back of her neck as the abnormal sensation from minutes ago reappeared. goosebumps started breaking out throughout her skin and every cell on her body seemed to tremble uncontrollably while she stared at the little black mirror on her hand. which, as she would soon find out, reflected the last version of herself with any shred of purity.

🏷️ @flaneurpastel - @jwijii - @watamotee33

© to @divineei on tumblr; do not repost or steal

[warsamongthestars]

I became curious about something; how different do you think things would go if someone else but Crosshair had a 'functioning chip'? Say Hunter was the one 'loyal' to the Empire. Because then the rest of the Batch would suddenly stand leaderless for instance. Ignoring the bad writing of the show of course. (Sorry if you've covered this somewhere already.)

I prolly have covered it? I don't think so, but I also don't remember, and I am doomed to inevitably repeat things as all who forget their history are will to do...

I think that the situation is an interesting story to explore.

But if it followed TBB's logic, it would be one that, unfortunately, would inevitably done the same things that occur in TBB, without fail and maybe with only minor to insignificant one-line differences.

( Almost word per word, exactly like a fanfiction rewrite that spends a majority of its time just copy pasting lines word per word without taking it stories into new directions... just merely adding scenes that get a Mature Rating slapped on )

Because TBB is not, in fact, written to tell stories but sell you something for attention and subscription money. It was never going to be deep, it was only going to bank on hype, rush and attention-of-the-moment; and it was never going to follow any kind of character or character arc beyond how it affects their OC and the OC's rival character.

So to follow the lines of this logic, to follow TBB, is to place Hunter as Omega's anime rival... and it would be just like Crosshair's arc, if not exactly. Maybe a change of planet, maybe a change from sniper rifle to combat knife, exchange the energy bow for a vibrosword, but the result wouldn't be any different.

BUT.

If we were to follow the line of thinking, with the idea that unique characters make the plot, they are not made by the plot... And that means following the character as they are introduced and presented, with all implications in mind, with the world build of Star Wars and the set up of the Clone Wars...

And of course, adding the best parts-- human experience and human imagination in a beautifully gruesome mesh-like disaster...

It starts with the fact that the Bad Batch are killers first and foremost. They brag about putting down insurrections and killing the people involved [the Yalbec story from the Bad Batch arc of season 7. The implications behind their bragging are horrifying, so I grabbed popcorn.], as well as the fun additional information that suggests why there was an insurrection [ I'd be pretty pissed too if my giant bug mother was hunted down and killed because her stinger was delicious to some cultures, and even more so if the Republic we're apart of does nothing about it. ]

They all follow the Empire, because its easy. Even better, they're highly regarded for their skills, probably finally get a paycheck with benefits. To the bad batchers, there really isn't much difference between the Empire and the Republic, the Empire is just the Republic with the shackles off anyway, and they're just continuing what they've been doing since deployment.

But because the chip runs on regular clone genome, not their mutant modified brains, that's when conflict would begin arise.

That's the sciencey-bullshit explanation.

The narrative-bullshit explanation, is that the strongest parts of each character can break through the evil-artifact's influence, provided that what is strong about them isn't what the evil-artifact attaches / attacks.

That's a general set up. So let's add your suggestion as a spark point to get stories going moving forward. Setting up the setting is all nice and dandy, but we need Ideas now.

So let's add in the idea that while everyone knows something is probably wrong, but can't quite put their finger on it, they know that there is obviously up with Hunter.

He's colder, he's more vicious, he's not the anxious compulsive snarker now, he's seemingly more a perfect soldier than any reg. Orders are absolute and be damned to anyone in the way.

( It was already noticed that the regs are acting like that too, regardless if they were like that before, and this on the backburner of the minds of the Bad Batch. But because most of the Bad Batchers are "special" (save Echo, who is freaking out) they don't consider themselves to be as knee deep in the cacky as they actually are. )

Echo is the very first one to call it out. He knows something is wrong. His brothers aren't acting right, the Bad batch have been getting these odd headaches, and Hunter has done a total 180. But given that Echo is new, the rest of the Batch try to confront Hunter.

( The jedi are dead. Echo saw the massacre reports and recordings via his new built-in hacking skills. Rex is dead, Jesse is dead, Kix is dead--everyone he has ever known, is gone. And if they're not gone, they are certainly not them anymore. Echo wants desperately to trust his squad--they're the only ones left... )

They send Wrecker first, because its hard to do anything to Wrecker. Wrecker's general warmhearted rough housing, results in being yelled at and given a vicious cold shoulder. Wrecker leaves Hunter alone, and becomes depressed.

Then its Tech, who isn't a socialite by any means, and tries to break the ice, so to speak, with fun information facts he's learned. When Hunter ignores him, Tech skips right into direct confrontation, breaking down that there is something wrong going on and they're in the middle of it, Hunter shuts him down. Tech leaves Hunter alone, and copes by putting his mind to a nearby droid project, and never saying a word to anyone.

Then the big one, Crosshair. Second in command, confident and in control, and the biggest asshole when he has had it with someone. He straight up confronts Hunter, no preamble, though unlike the avoidant Wrecker or the bullheaded Tech in confrontations, Crosshair hits his marks.

"You weren't like this before." "You're acting like a Reg." "Since when did we care about Orders?" "Since when did we care about missions beyond surviving them and the GAR?" "You notice how the Empire is killing regs enmass?" "You're going to led us to our death with that attitude."

( It should be noted, that Hunter's original self, has just enough capacity over his chipped brainwashing to not report his brothers, nor to execute them for defying Order 66. )

( This is not enough, however, to stop him from retaliating with the full force of a wild animal. )

Hunter and Crosshair end up in a fight. Hunter, at his worst, is a vicious dirty fighter who uses his environment and flexibility and stealth, to take down an opponent. He is wicked wiht a knife and small arms, Crosshair's absolute weakness as a primarily long ranged fighter. Hunter, chip or no chip, does not attack to kill his brothers, but Crosshair is dragged to medical afterwards for an "incident with a training droid".

Echo has had enough. Lines have been crossed, he has been told to sit back and wait for the team to handle it, his own feelings are a chaotic mess, and now his alarms are going off.

Whatever is going on with the clone army and with Hunter, its not something that can be reasoned with, and its certainly not something that can be done about when under the scrutiny of these natborn officers.... These new officers who would order public staff executions, and gods knows what else they do to the planets they occupy...

The only decision is to run and maybe, find a way to help from the outside, because they're not doing shit here.

( with dragging of feet and looming disaster in their minds ("We're just, leaving Hunter behind!?"), it doesn't take much for Echo to convince the remaining squad that they can't handle Hunter right now, but maybe, just maybe, they can find help and get him later. )

( "He'll be fine, he has to be fine, they aren't going to kill him because of our failure, that'd just be a... waste of resource," says Echo, "We just need to sell it like its a mutiny." )

They do. Hunter is hard to deal with one on one, but collectively (well, minus a wounded Crosshair) its easy to cause a scene and punch his lights out in front of cameras.

The tricky bit is running to the Havoc Marauder. They are, of course, successful, but not without some strange, unseen, outside help from a blond haired clone cadet we haven't seen up onto this point. To CF99, it just seems like coincidence that the blast doors reopen as they're closing, and that training droids are suddenly flooding hallways.

They fly off.

And that would be... well, at least the first five episodes maybe? No TV show movie or 1 hour episode start, just, full on first quarter of season 1.

This is just my idea of it... but it starts with setting Echo up as the leader of the Bad Batch, and it does not involve Omega having center stage, but merely being an implied part of plot to be revealed later.

As for what happens going forward, that depends on what we want them to face. Do we want them inevidably heading to Wayland? Does Wayland even exist as it does in TBB or is it something else? Does Pabu exist or maybe are we canonizing old media planets into the Disney verse? Does Cid exist or is someone else around?

The best thing about a over arching episodic story... is that you can literally do anything, as long as you know the world build and the rules of the "game". There's a lot more that can be done in the STar Wars sandbox than just rehashing familiar shit for kudos and likes.

But we can set up a few things from what we know prior and from what this set up already has.

Rex is out there, starting the Rebellion, and he's working to free clones--which is perfect in order to get Hunter back. This also sets up the reveal of the chips as well as the fact that it was Fives who discovered them, and it was only by slim chance, that Rex ever escaped in the first place.

Crosshair would understand the logic of leaving Hunter, but the emotional impact of leaving a brother for potential dead, would immediately make him a rival challenging character to Echo. The writing rules of this situation, however, is to make him merely a rival, not a saboteur. Just because someone is a dick, doesn't mean they're going to unscrew the ship engine and tell the enemy where you're at. This is very important to keep in mind.

Each Bad Batcher would have an episode to come to terms with leaving Hunter, facing what their relationship with him meant to them, and dealing with the possibility that he may or may not come back. Part of this is returning to a post-battle Kamino and finding 99 was killed, which would play into why each Batcher is anxious.

Just as well, for emotional character scores that doesn't involve the plot or grief, each Batcher gets an episode to face the galaxy on their own merits, potentially leading them to a finale arc later on for when this initial over-arching plot is over, as a way to either allow the next over-arching plot or to retire the character for now. Rule of writing? It has to bee on their merits alone, not detailing their relationship with their team.

Of course we're going to have team episodes that help define to the audience what kind of relationship with batcher has with one another.

And we're gonna need episodes where the Bad Batchers butt heads with Echo as Echo leads a team that he wasn't a vital part of, and didn't share much history with.

Obviously we have to save Hunter. None of this 3 years separation-dangle-him-in-your-face shit. And Just as the other batchers get their own character episodes, both for their histories and themselves facing the world--Hunter needs those too without the looming threat of the chip. But before we get there, we're going to have fun with his chip episodes but allowing him to have an evil arc with obvious internal conflict--as his true self fights with the evil outside forces controlling his life.

I know I don't like her as she's treated in TBB, but Omega would be an interesting character to use without putting her in the spotlight. We do need someone around who knows their medical. Just maybe she's integral to freeing Hunter...

Because I love a dose of self indulgence, and every writers needs that in their stories, each Batcher gets a Chip episode or Chip Arc in some fashion. Enough to ensure character conflict and growth, and also to inspire fans to create their own Chip AUs. Could be that, because of how CF99 was made, removing their chips are a lot more complicated than just a brain operation on a derelict ship.

New Clones introduced of course. Perhaps those who would've filled in for clones who died in TCWs--like, since Commander Ponds die, who was Windu's new Commander for the rest of the war? And those from TBB, cos let's face it, thems were awesome too. Mayday might just survive this time!

No Guest Characters. If there are, they need to have a serious connection to clones, other wise, someone is robbing story and character for cameo rights, and that's not how you make a story. This is a clone story.

If we're gonna have Rex, we need Cody. Cody needs to be totally chipped as a foremost example of how bad the chip gets. He's meant to serve exactly as he's intended, as he's done in all his appearances, and in this case, he needs to additionally be Rex's rival and antagonist character.

And the final writing rule, the most important one...

Clone stories need to have an element of tragedy and finality. You don't have to kill a main character to get it, but there is no happy ending here.

The happy ending is performed by Luke Skywalker in "Return of the Jedi".

We can only achieve Bittersweet, at best. Everyone can live, and still lose.

Its by this rule, that Order 66 really is the tragedy its born to be and not just an excuse for the plot to get rid of all the Jedi characters.

We should see its direct effects as a clone story, and not just some one handed episode that never becomes relevant again. When this story ends, the loose ends should be on purpose as a message of "Because of the events leading to this story, this rope is permanently cut and can never be tied again. This is not a place of honor, we are survivors of the worst and the world cannot be fixed."

...

I wasn't expecting to write a full episode with a concept board attached, but damn, here you go, a full novel for your question.

[oddygaul]

Chain Gang All-Stars

Great book.

I sort of hope Chain Gang All-Stars is never adapted into a show or movie. It’s certainly possible that it could be done with proper deference to the tone and message of the book, but I think it’s far more likely that it would end up essentially being what Chain Gang is in the story itself - a hyper-violent spectacle that people tune into because they think it’s cool and action-packed. I think Chain Gang All-Stars is very successful at walking the tightrope line of drawing the reader into the story and letting them flirt with what it must feel like to be a viewer of the program, while presenting enough reminders of its grim reality to prevent you from being totally sucked in. While there were times during the LinkLyfe segments where I was drawn in the way a viewer absorbed in a reality show would be, the battles themselves never give in to ‘just’ being badass. They were tense, certainly, and I was on pins & needles reading them, worried about the characters, but there’s a certain utilitarian brutality to the writing in those sections that keeps them grounded. I’d be worried any adaptation would make everything too stylish and exciting, thoroughly missing the point*.

*To say nothing of any potential dilution of the politics to appeal to a wider audience.

— “All other sport was just a metaphor for this.” —

Chain Gang All-Stars is incredibly good at giving every single character a depth and fullness, even ‘antagonists’, so that even the characters who infuriate us, we understand to a degree. The book doesn't justify evil deeds - there’s no excusing Wil’s dumb ass self - but it shows how easy it is for someone to placate themselves, to keep themselves on a surface level and not dig too deep into their own morality, to convince themselves that they’ve done what they could and that all those who have wrong done to them deserve what they get. The fluid perspective switches it accomplishes this with are fascinating, too. We get chapters dedicated to different characters, of course, be it our leads, our deuteragonists, and plenty of one-off side stories - standard stuff. But Adjei-Brenyah also rapidly switches between multiple perspectives within the same page, hell, the same paragraph at times, which gives us insight into a much wider breadth of viewpoints than we normally would.

By getting to see into the inner thoughts of quite a few Links, we get to see how, while their individual experiences are different, their imprisonment has broken them all in tragically similar ways. From Bishop to Sunset to Thurwar to Staxxx, we see a consistent, crippling lack of self-worth. The A-Hamm chain is unique in preaching a vision of solidarity, accepting one’s past mistakes, and focusing on how they’ve grown and changed as people. Despite this, at their core, none of them can truly find it in themselves to be forgiven, because Chain Gang grinds their lack of perceived value into them unceasingly - ultimately resulting in what is essentially suicide. The carceral system does not allow for or encourage rehabilitation, only suffering and self-hatred.

I thought it was a compelling decision to make the majority of the imprisoned characters we follow legitimate violent offenders. A lot of the abolitionist / prison-critical literature I’ve read often focuses on, or at least begins with, incarceration that is plainly, nakedly unjust, like long-serving non-violent offenders and mandatory minimum sentencing. Conversations about the treatment of murderers, rapists, etc., are naturally more fraught - it’s harder to get someone to imagine an entirely different system, rather than just adjustments to the current system.

Chain Gang All-Stars does not shy away from it one bit. We get self-reflection from multiple different Links, both those who regret what they’ve done and those who don’t; we get conflicted thoughts from family members who recognize that their lives have been fundamentally changed by the imprisonment of their kin, but are still ambivalent about forgiveness; and we get, of course, the fearmongering and appeals to pathos used by government and the media to try and stop any ideas of abolition from even beginning to take root in the minds of the public. The book understands that there’s no easy answers, and instead brings all of these perspectives to the reader, demanding they grapple with the issues themselves.

It does, however, make clear the absurdity of pretending that taking someone whose life has been indelibly touched by violence and putting them into a system that encourages and requires additional violence, by the state, by their peers, is somehow rehabilitation. It’s brought to an extreme in the novel, of course - Thurwar’s overriding instinct that every problem can potentially be solved by violence due to the constant killing she’s done is more reminiscent of a soldier returning to peacetime than anything else - but the message stands.

Some of the most powerful parallels shine through as-is, though. Even when you put aside the horror the Links are put through on a daily basis and the rampant normalization of state-sanctioned violence, the base lack of freedom and personal autonomy is what breaks people. Both during Chain Gang and our looks at other prisons, the regimented days, planned schedule, and inability to spend time or talk with the people they care about are basic human rights that are removed from prisoners every day. Hendrix’s silent prison (an idea I was horrified to find has been enacted before) shows this in one extreme - after being robbed of something as simple as his own voice for so long, Hendrix is willing to risk everything just to be able to reclaim that part of himself. Most heartbreakingly, the morning of the final doubles match, Thurwar’s only desire is to stay in bed longer with Staxxx. Leisure time with your loved ones, one of the most basic luxuries a person ought to have, seen as an unobtainable prize. Don’t need a dystopian near-future novel to see that happening.

Speaking of Hendrix Young, the voice Adjei-Brenyah uses for his sections was absolutely beautiful and oozing with character and I loved it. The way he speaks is simultaneously poetic yet so pragmatic - there’s an idiosyncratic turn of phrase in nearly every paragraph, and his love for the world and its beauty is never eclipsed by his cynicism and the horrible things happening around him. His sections were handily my favorites, despite the looming dramatic irony that overshadows them all.

— “I thought of how the world can be anything and how sad it is that it’s this.” —

As a literary device, the interspersing of worldbuilding notes and Actual Fucked-Up Prison Facts was a genius touch. By priming your brain to expect something more fantastical, the more grounded notes become something of a sucker punch. The first few are all in-universe lore explanations - they’re not entirely necessary, you could’ve pretty much got the gist through context, but the thorough explanation written almost as an ad read pulls you into the mentality of this world… so then, when it drops, say, the net worth and founding members of the Corrections Corporation of America and you get the inkling that this tidbit feels a little too specific to be made up, the lines between the book’s world and our own start to blur.

In addition to the unique cognitive dissonance it invokes, I think it’s a pretty effective strategy to convince or teach a reader who perhaps hasn’t done as much digging about the nightmare that is the American prison-industrial complex. Especially given that the main conceit of the book is a little outlandish, it’s very easy for me to imagine such a reader enjoying the story for its plot, but deflecting or doubting the themes with the classic “Oh, but this is an exaggeration - it would never happen like this! It would never be that sadistic”. In some way, the footnotes feel like the author directly responding with a “Yes, it would, and in fact has already happened this way previously”.

I do wish the footnotes stayed as dense throughout the entire book as they were at the start. In the beginning, they come hard and fast, blending the real and the fictional, keeping the reader on their toes. About a third of the way through, though, they slow to a trickle, becoming a rarity. Adjei-Brenyah keeps experimenting with what the footnotes can convey (“Don’t look down. Help me.” was particularly chilling), but the infrequency starts to make them feel like an afterthought.

— “Just jump.” —

The closer I got to the end of Chain Gang All-Stars, as fewer and fewer pages remained, I was increasingly desperate for something to break. Even as the story continued towards the inevitable, even as it showed me there could be no other way for things to go, I hoped for something else. Anything but what happened.

And yet… the ending gives this book’s message a lot of its power. It’s not a story where things always work out and the good guys always win - it’s a reflection of real problems, and those real problems don’t have such a simple solution. Chain Gang All-Stars is about people living in an unfair world, working within a cruel, unjust, system, and still finding the strength and conviction to believe that there can be positive change. It’s about knowing that progress can be slow, and that the system can feel daunting, and feeling powerless to enact change, and still imagining and pushing for the world to be better anyway. And somehow, that it faces that hopelessness head-on makes it more uplifting than a safer story with an easier ending.

[halogenwarrior]

I feel like the large amount of capital-r Rationalist Worm fans has really negatively influenced some people’s interpretations of Taylor and her motivations. I sometimes see people treating her as this sort of platonic idea of utilitarianism or whatever moral philosophy you think she subscribes to, whose strengths and flaws are entirely the strengths and flaws of that philosophy in its ideal form. And having read the “rational fic writing advice of Eliezer “famous Harry Potter fic writer and comparer of Taylor to Hillary Clinton” Yudkowsky I can see where this idea comes from, because this is exactly how he says characters should ideally be written. He says he dislikes “gray and gray morality” where everyone is shown to have their flaws and hypocrisy, instead he likes conflicts where both sides are truly good rather than gray and the conflict is that they are completely true to different philosophies of what good is. To some extent, he has a point in this; there are works that use the existence of hypocrisy and self-serving as a “cheat” out of and easy answer to a conflict that really is supposed to be a clash between two pure “good” philosophical ideas (Pokemon Black and White my beloathed...). But in the end, characters who are just platonic ideas of philosophies are for philosophical essays and tracts; literature is for portraying humans in all of their psychological complexity, sometimes self-serving motives, and ways that, due to their individual humanity, they aren’t just walking philosophical mouthpieces and don’t match up completely with an ideology.

That being said, Taylor is actually quite human (and a human teenager at that, with all the expected immaturity) in this way and from author comments it seems that this is completely intentional. She doesn’t simply state her belief that Benevolent Warlordism is Better than the Corrupt Current Authority throughout the story and spend the whole time as the embodiment of that ideal. Instead, she starts out wanting to be a hero, and then she has a complete failure of her typically paranoid mindset with regards to Coil (taking him at face value of wanting to improve the city even though every politician says that and look how that usually turns out) because it’s what she WANTS to believe, so she can keep her new friends after feeling isolated while morally sanctioning her actions, and then does a surprise Pikachu face when it turns out Coil actually does bad things and her support is helping him do bad things, then spends the next few arcs running around trying to fix the one bad thing she feels particularly guilty of. It’s only after already setting herself up as a warlord to fix said guilt, solely caring about Dinah with the people she saves being incidental, that she justifies herself as the lesser of two evils compared to the corrupt status quo, a lot of the corruption of which she didn’t even KNOW ABOUT before already going ahead and deciding she was going to be a criminal. I’m saying this with genuine love for her character and acknowledgement that she isn’t a horrible monster and does some pretty admirable stuff, especially given her age and situation, and she certainly was always cynical, paranoid and judgmental with a determination for justice even if she didn’t know all the details of what was wrong with her world at the beginning, but it’s ridiculous and detracts from understanding of her character as a character and not a rationalist talking point to see her as some pure philosophical ideal from start to finish who is never making up her ideology as she goes along.

[autismcatboy]

a series is not bad just because its pace, themes or focus isnt what you expected. it might not be the show for you.

i love fluffy, tooth rotting romance as much as the next guy. but i dont expect that from i hear the sunspot, because thats not what the story is about.

not every show is going to check every box and ive had plenty of series i stopped after dozens or even hundreds of chapters because as much as i wanted to like it, it just wasnt for me. that doesn't make them bad, because i can understand why people like them.

continued below, spoiler free but addressing specific themes in i hear the sunspot

i love the slow pace i hear the sunspot has. it feels more realistic to how some relationships develop in real life. i love the focus on personal growth, realizing your past biases and where you couldve been a better person but were selfish, presumptuous or inauthentic. this applies to every character in one way or another.

i love seeing the internal conflict, struggling to get your feelings across and wanting to throw in the towel. it isnt easy maintaining relationships as an adult. i have friends i wish i could spend time chatting with every day but it just isnt realistic to expect when we're all working adults with responsibilities we cant get around. ive gone days without talking to people i consider some of my best friends. it doesn't mean we dont care. it isnt always easy to find the time to actually talk, meet up or sometimes even just send a text.

its extra hard to communicate when you have a history of trauma. wether thats an isolated trauma or something prolonged that you havent been able to actually process and come to terms with, it makes it hard to think. sometimes youre stressed and pulled so many different directions by life that things slip away. it doesnt mean you dont care or it wasnt higher on your priorities. we all forget. we all fumble. we all make mistakes. we learn from them.

disability is much more than physical. kohei and maya have obvious physical disabilities but i think the series addresses more than that. trauma can be disabling. many of us dont have great childhoods or relationships with someone who helped us learn how to be decent people. many of us have deep insecurities, that we try to hide. and sometimes the things we do to try and protect ourself hurt us more. we run, we push others away, we get mean. because its easier to say on your terms when someone leaves your life.

it doesnt mean we dont care, when our fears get the better of us. it just means we make mistakes. and making mistakes means we can grow, be kinder to ourselves and others.

i hear the sunspot is about all of these things. a story about overcoming hardship, things that we didnt get to have a say in and cant fix, making hard decisions for yourself for once instead of considering others before you, chosing the unconventional path because it makes you happier, unlearning the things that no longer help us, and pushing through obstacles we dont even realize are keeping us from makes us flourosh. all of this, before being a story about romance.

both of taichi and kohei have a 20+ years of baggage in some form. romance isnt that easy when you have things you carry with you that youve subconsciously pushed so far away that you dont know its not part of you and you can let it go, and that those things make you behave rash, impulsively or like a doormat who just tolerates what people give you.

i understand peoples frustration with the pacing of the relationship in the drama specifically but want to gently point out- we knew how much of the series was going to be adapted and at the very least, it wasnt the whole thing. its fine to be disappointed but to say the series sucks, or has bad writing and direction, or all these other things that just dont line up with what the story is actually for, is just unfair. the story has never had romance as the main focus. does it have a relationship between two men? yes, so it is a bl. by definition, thats all it has. you can criticize the showrunners, directors, executive members for the way they chose to advertise the series setting up your expectations wrongly but it is not the fault of the series for telling the story it exactly set out to do.

its okay to not like a show or drop it because its not meeting your expectations. its not okay to keep coming back every week, when people have been saying what to expect, and then being mad when its exactly that. youre wasting your time and setting a tone that the things people love about the series are wrong. you can let it go.

why would you order soup and then be mad when you get soup?

[starlightkun]

sorry if you've gotten this ask before aljrksjd

you don't have to answer this, but I just wanted to know how you write longform fics or just long pieces in general. it's one of the things I've struggled with as a writer, and I'm having a hard time trying to figure out how I could go about it or do it.

I'd be so grateful if you could provide some advice or suggestions 🥹🥹

i want u to know that i saw this ask when u sent it, but i had a 5hr drive today and wanted to make sure i had time to answer this!! it's under the cut bc i yapped a bit <33

so one thing that i feel the need to say up top is that i never go into pieces with a "goal" length/word count (often times my fics end up being longer than i expected/intended). because i never really write with the goal of a specific length in mind, these are things that i think have helped me write more cohesive and narratively fulfilling pieces in general, which tends to make my fics longer

my first thing is planning/outlining!! i used to just write my fics start to finish in one go with little to no planning, and since i've started slowing down and taking my time outlining/planning beforehand (and even during the drafting process i continue adding to my outline), i've seen the average lengths of my fics go up a lot. you don't have to have every single scene, moment, and piece of dialogue planned out before start writing (lord knows i never do), but you should have a pretty good idea of the major story beats, character dynamics, and any important conflicts, and make sure it's written down in a way that's easy for you to refer back to while you write. never think you're gonna keep it all in your head

build out your characters' lives!! i love introducing a good b-plot involving the main character's friends (see: strawberry sunday) that doesn't take too much attention away from the main plot that it seems out of place, but instead complements the main plot and allows there to be space in between those major plot beats for the readers and the characters to breathe. it also helps make your characters feel more well-rounded and real to the readers if you throw in a scene of their daily life at school or work or with their friends/family both to add texture to them but also to your world. it can also be good to use an establishing scene towards the beginning of their daily life, then a similar one towards to the end that shows any character development, or some other impactful change that happened during your story. instead of just telling us that everything in your character's life changed, show us how it did (or didn't! or maybe it only changed a little, but the little change was important, too)

in a similar vein, build out your world!! im not saying to spend ten pages describing an intricate magic system to us that has little bearing on the plot itself, but feel free to weave in extra details about where/when we are and how the characters interact (or dont!) with the world around them (even if its our normal old world in the modern day)

and i mean i guess my last thing that's really helped me is just sort of getting out my head when it comes to writing? like, not forcing myself to write everyday, not having any sort of word count goals, no posting schedule, etc. just letting myself sit with my ideas for a while and really play around and have fun with them. it's made writing fic something that i look forward to doing when i come from work, or when the weekend is approaching, and i genuinely am making probably my favorite things that i've ever made right now. and they happen to be pretty long!!

i've talked some more about my writing process in some other asks (x, x, x, x, x, x) and i have a writing tag where i post about more general writing stuff if you want to hear me yap some more

[thecurioustale]

After The Hero: A Curious Tale Turns 25 Today! (Plus: Story Excerpt!)

Today, 25 years ago, in the light before dawn, I published the first piece of After The Hero: A Curious Tale. Namely, the Prelude, which I called a prelude even then because it was on a community roleplaying board and I was aiming to do something like a cold open prior to starting the game proper.

In just a few short pages, there passed the final confrontation between Rennem, the eponymous Hero, and Galavar, seemingly a villain bent on ruling the world, who defeated Rennem and with that victory threw all the hackneyed fantasy formulae of the 20th century away. It was my reaction to what I saw as stagnation and degeneracy in the fantasy supergenre, especially in epic high fantasy. And it was also my reaction to the artificiality and wastefulness of the imposition of a boring good vs. evil paradigm onto the narrative, and the corresponding squandering of interesting characters—the villains, who are inevitably the most dynamic, proactive, and ambitious ones in most fantasy stories.

I had just played The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time a couple weeks prior, and it had blown my mind and crystallized something I had been wanting to say for years. Galavar was my Ganondorf, and at first the story as I conceived it was all about him and his Guard of Galavar, and their forces, versus the emergent international Resistance against them, and the key difference was that Galavar was saddled with none of the petty, tacked-on traits of cruelty, vanity, etc. that artificially hobble villains because some storytellers do too good of a job and have to bring their villains down a few pegs, and other storytellers lack a sophisticated ethical faculty and don't know how to do it any other way.

That bold premise is still the main axis of the plot in ATH today, if no longer the thematic core of the narrative. And, in the years since 1999, we have seen the fantasy supergenre change somewhat. Not in a way that I'm particularly satisfied with: There was a broad backlash to the formulaic good vs. evil paradigm, but the way most contemporary storytellers have moved beyond it is to make all the central characters evil, i.e. unlikeable, wrong, "gritty," self-interested, petty. If I may be uncharitable, they came up with the only thing less interesting than black-and-white: pure gray.

And the villains are still villains, and are still treated as such.

After The Hero is nothing like that. My conceit was that it was a story with no villains, except for all of two side characters who weren't even central to the story. I always wanted all of the characters to be likeable, not necessarily in the sunshine-and-rainbows sense, but rather in the sense that a hypothetical reader could theoretically root for any character, any side of a conflict, and be justified in so doing by the text. Characters you can believe in! Characters you're not embarrassed to be unironically proud of. The Galans, the Resistance...everyone! Even the Gods. It's easy to be against a character or a faction, and that is of course also possible, or at least that was always my hope. But to be for them...now that's special.

But I never arrogantly pretended to be above it all. I have my favorites too, and always did. As far as factions go I am with the Galans 100 percent. As for the individual characters...I'm not exaggerating to say that I like the vast majority of my characters. Not just the fat ones. Not just the left-handed ones. Not just the redheads. The vast majority! I have to go out of my way to write characters I don't like. It doesn't come naturally to me, and I decided long ago not to put too much of that sort in the novel.

Of course, it wasn't always a novel. As I mentioned, it began as an RPG. (And if you've an old-timer, you've heard this story a million times.) I will forever be grateful to the other core cast members who got ATH the RPG off the ground and saw it through to its triumphant conclusion. We made a great story together. And even though the RPG era lasted only a little more than one year, and even though the story today is very different from what it originally began as, in substance, tone, and style, I'll always be grateful for their participation, because that's what got the novelization era going.

I have a couple of things in the pipeline in addition to the novel itself, and I had hoped to be able to announce at least one of them today. Sadly, nothing was ready in time—but stay tuned in the months ahead. The ATH 25th Anniversary lasts for a whole year, after all!

In lieu of any of that, I thought about sharing an excerpt from the book itself, but, as I was looking over the candidates, I realized that I didn't want to spoil the carefully-curated experience I'm working to build. So that's a no-go.

Yet I had a thought: If not After The Hero itself, then one of its satellites. One of the Interludes. Something whose publication is so far away in the future that it doesn't really matter who reads it today.

I have just the passage in mind!

Long-timers will remember The Great Galavar, one of the Interludes that I actually began publishing on my website as a weekly serial during the Year of 32. Mostly, I wrote it each week in order, but occasionally I would write scenes that would occur later in the story, and those got saved for later. Even when The Great Galavar went on hiatus when the Troubles began, I still occasionally wrote down scenes as they came to me.

And one of these is a pair of scenes dealing with the splash that Silence Terlais makes in her first year in the City of Sele, the seat of Gala, as a fledgling adult. This is in the past relative to the events of ATH, so In these scenes Silence is roughly 18 years old by our years, or 25 by Relancii years (and Galavar is roughly 36 / 50). Silence has spent most of the year confined to her sickbed recovering from terrible injuries, and now she has recovered to the point where she is "coming alive" as it were.

The first of these two scenes features Silence directly onscreen, and is one of my favorite Silence scenes that I've ever written because it delivers on the premise. It's possibly the favorite Silence scene that I've ever written, at least among those I have put to paper. For my entire adult life I have been wanting to write scenes like this for her, but they are very, very hard, in the same way that trying to describe a paradise is hard. When Silence isn't present onscreen doing stuff, it's a little easier to get away with building up her legend. But to actually, explicitly illustrate the behavior that makes her such a big deal is not easy, and is one of my chief cap-feathers as an author.

And on top of that, because it's in the past, I have to write a Silence who's much younger than the one we see at the start of ATH, and is living in a different era of her life.

I first conceived these scenes in April 2021, and what I am going to share with you today is in a relatively stable, near-finished form. Together they form a mostly self-contained short story.

It's..."a lot." It's ten thousand words of talking about Silence, and there is a certain monotony to such a singular focus on anything. I understand that, and in fact there's supposed to be another scene in between them, in part to help break that up a bit. But that scene isn't written yet. Maybe, when you see the three asterisks (***) in the text at the scene transition, get up and take a break, and come back to read the second scene later.

I hope you enjoy this excerpt! I hope these characters come a little bit more alive. And if you read this and come away feeling like you understand my fascination with Silence a little bit better, that will be the ultimate compliment.

Please do feel free to reshare this post, and I would love to hear any feedback you have. Even the harsh stuff, if it comes to that.

They say you should believe in what you write. You have to commit. You can't get embarrassed or back out, because it ruins the whole thing. And I really believe in Silence in these scenes, and it shows, hopefully it does so in a way that redounds to your interest in future Curious Tale publications. But, either way, I'm proud of it, and there's no better way to celebrate my life's work than to share one of the most sterling and stirring pieces of it.

~ ~ ~

The Secretary

Their fortuitous left-handed arrival stirred a commotion throughout Sele almost immediately.

During the early days of her convalescence, Silence had been downright passive in her manners. It didn’t fit with the fire that Galavar had met in her mind, and he wasn’t sure what to expect from her moving forward. Conation could be deeply confusing for him sometimes, with the appearance of a person’s mind not closely resembling their outward style. Was there something he had failed to comprehend about her?

As it turned out, no. At least not in this regard. Silence had merely been observing, getting a sense of this new society and finding her footing in it. Waiting. And once she was on her feet again, she sprang.

Her first command came over brunch (va variv) one sunny morning at the end of winter. Galavar had joined her in their private little tearoom, where she could carnivorously devour her copious cuts of flesh in peace, free from the distractions of seeing or being seen. Galavar had grown quite fond of these meals with her, and on this morning he noticed there was no wheelchair.

“You walked?”

“I walked.”

“Not two days ago you hadn’t walked under your own power in three seasons gone by. What muscles were left to walk with?”

“The deep ones, of course, that don’t so easily die back from a little neglect. Zeal, and guile.”

“Those are not motor muscles.”

“Oh, I think they are. That’s where the real lifting happened.”

“But—”

“These Galan healers of yours gave me plenty of exercise in bed. More than enough to physically carry me, now that the moment is right for it.” She thrust out her arms to glorify her recovering form, and smiled proudly in her seat. “Here we are.”

The traces of her accent were almost completely gone now. There was no hesitation in her grammatical constructions. It almost scared him how fast she learned things. And now came her command, the first of many:

“I’d like to ask if I could have a secretary.”

Galavar noticed the question and turned it over in his mind. She had a way with her words, he’d learned. She hadn’t actually asked him. She’d said she’d like to ask him. What would have been a flowery turn of respectful phrasing from most people was something altogether different from her.

“A secretary? You want a staff?”

“A desk. An escritoire.”

“Oh! A secretary.” He’d forgotten that usage. “Y-you…I…where did you learn that term?”

“I couldn’t tell you the book that gave me the Galan word for it, but we have them where I come from, and I’ve seen them here.”

“Secretaries, as I recall, are a repository for secrets.”

“Hence the word.”

“What sorts of sinister secrets do you wish to keep?”

This was his first question of the morning that made her think. She darted her eyes off into space a few different ways, and fumbled her hands around a bit, thinking unseen thoughts.

“My power to conceive of things,” she eventually said, “outstrips my power to remember things. I need a place to write down my creations.” She looked up at him, her eyes and narrow lips revealing the only traces of any pleading that might have been mixed in with her otherwise confident imperative, along with these words: “There’s more than enough space in my room.”

And that was true enough. Having come to Sele with no belongings but her sword and the filthy, disintegrated clothes on her back, Silence’s room was quite bare. There was her bed, an armchair for visitors or Silence herself, an armoire for her small allotment of provided clothing, a mess of books whose covers changed by the day, a window, a wall painting of orchids, and little else.

“What would you say to a new accommodation?” he asked. “If you’re walking this well in just a couple of days, I think you’ll be ready to be discharged soon.”

“I’d like that,” she said. “But I’d like the secretary in the meantime.”

“I’ve learned how particular you are—a trait we share. How about I take you to my favorite furniture shop and let you pick out the one you like most? The owner is an old friend of mine. She keeps stock on hand, but you can also commission a piece if you don’t find anything you like.”

She thought it over and grinned at him. “A probing question, Galavar! I like it.” She wagged a playful finger in his face, the left index—the one through which she projected the center of her essence and all her will. “You want to know how hard I’m willing to work. How much I’m willing to do my own lifting to get what I want, versus barking at others to do my bidding. How far I’m actually able to walk, and how much of this confidence is just a façade. Very well! I accept your challenge. I’d love to go furniture shopping with you. Give me three days.”

“Three days?!” He peered at her, then roared a laugh. “Three days till you’re ready to walk halfway across the city! I meant to take you there by carriage and merely have you walk around in the shop.”

The fact that his question had not been the masterpiece of hidden swordplay that she had taken it for weirded her in the face, and the very notion of that incongruity seemed to fall off her consciousness. She replied, “You are graced with an uncommonly powerful, resilient body.”

“Yes,” he said.

“If you were in my position…how long would it take you?”

“Point taken, but…three days? Even with all my willpower, I couldn’t do it in three days. Muscle doesn’t grow like that.”

“You haven’t met my body yet. Only my mind.” She looked down at her dishes of food. “But you will.”

She picked up a long piece of fish in her left hand, held it up at him. The juices ran down her hand and wrist, and forearm, dripping down onto the plate. “This stuff isn’t just to give me something to do, you know.”

And she chomped an enormous bite of it.

“Physician Ieganan mentioned that to me. Your appetite is through the roof recently.”

“Much of me was lost, destroyed.”

“Like a house fire… First, clear and repair the damage. Then, rebuild.”

“You understand.” Her thoughts shifted. “Do they have fires out here? Your aedes are all metal and stone.”

“If not the walls, other things do still catch fire, sometimes.”

She nodded, in a way that told Galavar her thought: In Junction City it would not be so.

“I wouldn’t need the physicians to tell me that my heart was damaged,” she said. “I know it. I could feel it. A heart takes time to heal—and one shouldn’t gain weight with a damaged heart. So time I have paid. Now, I’m going to replenish the flesh I lost. The day will come soon when walking across the half the city is nothing. I walked across half the world to get here. Well, mostly walked. Flew a bit.”

He wondered, briefly, what she would do if he denied her idea of walking to the furniture shop with him. The fact that she had felt confident enough to agree to attempt it, even if he hadn’t meant it that way, implied that she would offer a response to any effort to deny her. Silence Terlais was not the sort of mate who would put herself at the mercy of others if she could help it. The passive, wounded observer lying frail in her sickbed was gone. Yet what sat before Galavar was not exactly a match for her lofty view of herself. What would she do? But he chose not to ask.

*

By the time the three days had elapsed, Silence was running—running!—up and down the stairs at the Academy. She’d tripped and fallen countless times, and was covered in bruises. She didn’t care. “Supple bones,” she’d explained to him. They met for aleo that morning instead of the later variv. For the outing she wore a gold-embroidered shirt and a handsome pair of slacks loaned to her by one of the teachers, and didn’t eat as much as usual—didn’t eat much at all. Before too long, they set out under a fine morning sun.

And she walked with him to the furniture shop.

It wasn’t actually halfway across the city, like he had told her. In fact the Workshops were quite close to the Academy. Silence was terrifically dismayed at this, telling Galavar that she’d prepared herself for the full measure. So he led them on a detour, up Swan Ridge and around, performing a spiral around the Workshops District. And she was assuaged somewhat, though her spark still missed the idea of walking the Selish radius.

Their exceedingly circuitous route led them by one of Galavar’s favorite cafés, and they popped in for drinks. For its caffeine Silence eschewed the tea which Galavar so highly commended to her, though she did take a sip of it and agree it was delicious. But the caffeine, she said, bothered her heart—and she much preferred milk or lollywater besides. There was only a little new flesh on her bones as yet, and he wondered where all the food went before realizing the obvious: Her energy was unflagging! The piercing winter cold, the mercilessly thin air, the exertion of a body that had barely moved in nearly a year…none of this was evident in Silence Terlais today. She matched Galavar’s pace, so competitively that for her own sake he set a more leisurely one than he would have otherwise—until she called him out on it:

“Don’t go easy on me,” she told him. “I’m prepared to die today, if that’s what my body has in store for me.” And he believed her. This was her test, not his guardianship. She had something to prove to herself today, and he had no right to take that from her. So he walked at his customary clip.

[Verbiage about seeing the city.]Sele was an incredible city: wildly young yet already sprawling. Everything was new and had the shine of dynamism to it. There was zip!; that old-time get-up-and-go. Everyone shared in the spirit of their city. No one was here because the generations had deposited them here mindlessly. They were here because they had come hearkening to Galavar’s call of Galance, or were the children of the same. Everyone here had said yes. And it was extraordinary—to Galavar’s eyes, to Silence’s, and to anyone’s—just how much faith and spirit and loyalty and industry dwelt in the sparks of the people.

And everything here had evolved into a new strain from its ancestors—a new culture. The Halrowns Dumpling House with its stone porches and outdoor heated stone tables that seared a crisp underbelly into the already-boiled dumplings, a restaurant that in some other land would have told some other story, here told a story of dreams pressed into enterprise and hot food at the top of the world. The Hapidanger Belly Theater, which brought the traditions of Imperial belly-dancing to Galavar’s land, was not the pulsating seat of seduction it would have been in Panathar; here it was an electric laughterhouse where they made of their bellies art and sport and humor, and maybe a little seduction too, but only in between the belly laughs. And Findul’s Emporium could not have existed anywhere else in the world, for where else in the world could Findul exist?

It was a very Silence kind of a town, and Galavar listened to her read all the signs out loud with excitement and delight, watched her fall in love with it in real-time…and felt the kind of pride that one would be lucky to encounter twice by the end of their years.

At some length they finally came to a workshop with a beautiful wooden frontage—rare in the city. The wood was heavily varnished to protect it against the growling winds and insufferably dry air, all cut by the carpenter herself to show off her talents. The sign, painted in rich yellow against dark red arjor, read Javelin in Wood.

They walked into a wonderfully lavish showroom. Silence sighed a great breath of romance and inspiration, took in heaps of the fragrant woody air; Galavar was all but forgotten to her as she instantly set her mind upon exploring what she saw. Ravenous, was the word that came to him. He was coming to appreciate that Silence was a ravenous sort of person. Sure enough, it dribbled out in her speech now, directed at no one:

“So much to see. … Every line deliberate, every cut. Every shelf and drawer placed with knowing, with intent. And so well done. … It’s like a city, Galavar. Just in this one aede. My sight has been so bare of late! I love the flowers on the wall in my room but surely they would forgive me for wanting something more. … … Hand-tied coil springs … Yes, this is where it should go. … They knew. They knew!”

There were no other customers or visitors, and no sign of Javelin. Galavar walked into the back to look for her. Her workshop was messy, strewn with projects in various states of construction or repair. He finally found her in a tiny room in the far back, boring pilot holes in an assemblage that looked like it might become a cabinet someday.

She looked up at him, leaving her work behind.

“Galavar.”

It was a strange expression she wore. She wasn’t happy to see him. She wasn’t sad or angry. She wasn’t indifferent either. It was unmistakable: the look of someone who’d loved him, and been rejected and kept at a distance by him, but couldn’t bring herself to let go of how much she cared for him.

“I got your note.”

“I didn’t want to drop in on you unannounced.”

“This new friend of yours, she’s in the front?”

“Yes. Quite approving of your work, if I may say so.”

“And…?”

“It’s complicated.”

“It always is with you. Never simplicity. Let me guess: You dig her, and you screw her, but you’re not ‘with’ her.”

“Javelin, she’s a kid.”

“She’s older than we were when you turned me down.”

“That’s…well…to answer your question, Silence and I shared a conation together in the spring.”

“Ah, a Galavar groupie, then.”

“No. At least, not like anyone else. She kept herself, most of herself. More than a match for me. I think I changed more than she did. No groupie. We’re very close. Resh and I found her in a sorry state. She’s been too weak even to walk until very recently. But she seems to be on the mend.” He chuckled. “She asked for a desk. I figured it would be the perfect excuse to step away from ruling the Universe for a few hours, and come visit you.”

“In my little woodshop. It’s been three years.”

“I know. I just…wanted to give you your space.”

Javelin seemed to be on the cusp of a quick retort, but she stopped herself and closed her eyes, and breathed. When she opened them, there was something different.

“Part of me is very happy to see you,” she said. “If you can overlook the rest, I’m going to try to give that part of me the speaking role today.”

“How have you been?”

“The shop’s doing well. I can’t get enough wood in to keep up with demand, so I’m focusing on high-end pieces that take longer. As for me personally…what would you expect? Same as always.” She found the words pouring out of her. “I’m lonely. I don’t feel pleasure the way I used to. Not in my friends, not in my work. I miss Ieik. I miss being young. Better times. I miss home. I don’t know where I am anymore.” She looked around at the tiny room, tools hanging everywhere. “I’ve lost something. Lost myself. Not quite sure what part.” Her face turned to his, eyes locked. “I have everything I said I wanted…everything but you…but as I get older I realize that I don’t know if you could have made me happy in the long run. Maybe nothing could. But you definitely succeeded in making me sad. I’ve tried to reclaim that power from you, for many years now…but I never could.”

“Sometimes,” he said, “I dream of that simpler world, where I married you and we lived out our lives in peace and quiet in the Village of Ieik. You’d have your shop, much like this. Maybe I’d be the River or something.”

“Wouldn’t that have been good enough? To be the River of Ignorance, with a loving mate to share your life with, in the paradise that God made for us?”

“Sometimes I dream of it,” he repeated. “But my spark could never have fit in Ieik. I had to go.”

“And take all of us with you.”

“We’ve had this talk before.”

“I just…I just…I’ll never understand. That’s all. I’ll never understand. But!” She clapped her hands, forcing energy and a smile that were neither false nor true. “I’m partly happy to see you. Let’s go meet your friend, shall we?”

They walked back to the showroom, where Silence was nowhere to be seen.

“Silence?” he called.

“Over here!”

They found her underneath a sofa, her head hidden beneath the front skirt, beyond which she was presumably studying the joints—but with her hands only, since the skirts blocked out all the light. Javelin shot him a quick look that said something to the effect of you always find the weirdos, and Galavar laughed.

Silence had enough social tact to pull herself out rather than waiting to be summoned, and was on her feet surprisingly quickly, shooting Galavar a quick grin before immediately turning her full gaze on the shopkeep.

“Silence, this is Javelin, the owner of this shop, and a childhood friend of mine from Ieik. Once an incredible athlete, now an incredible carpenter and furniture wright. Javelin, this is Silence Terlais, a new citizen of Gala and a consummate would-be knower-of-everything.”

“‘Everything,’ eh?” asked Javelin. “What’s five times three?”

Silence laughed, and gave Javelin a small salute. “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” she said. And then, still smiling, she added: “I didn’t realize what I was stepping into. Are you okay with me being here?”

Javelin seemed pleased by that, but it took Galavar completely by surprise. Silence by his own experiences was stunted, even borderline deficient in her social skills, almost childlike, yet…in this moment she was smooth as butter. What was this devilry?

“I’m okay,” Javelin said. “I’m guessing he didn’t tell you about us.”

“No, he didn’t even mention your name. Now I see why. I apologize if I’ve brought you any discomfort today. But he does have good taste in furniture!”

“Hah! Yes he does! Where are you from? Galavar says there was a conation—and that he came out short for a change..”

“I’m from the Middemesne,” Silence replied, “including several years in Junction City.”

“Inside the city?”

“Yes.”

“Inside-inside?”

“Yes.”

“Can you do that? Just…move to Junction City?”

“It worked out that way for me.”

“How old are you?”

“[AGE ~ 25].”

“You really are, aren’t you! Galavar, this borders on indecency!”

Galavar began to fumble something about conation, but Silence saved him:

“We’re not actually having sex. It’s that the joining of minds is even more intimate than sex. So to say that we’re not having sex is one of those things that’s factually correct but diametrically opposite the deeper truth of intimacy.”

“I see,” she said, with a visible sign of relief in the upward turn of her lips. “I thought he’d found another mate he couldn’t commit to.”

“Maybe it’ll come to that someday,” said Silence, “but I prefer fat males who know everything there is to know about me—and, though he’s been a good friend so far, he fails on both counts. And, what’s more, there’s an old flame of mine whom I’m not truly ready to move on from yet.”

“Fat, eh? Not many of those around here. It’s not really an Ieikili fashion.”

“Give it time!” Silence merrily exclaimed. “I will teach this whole society how to grow fat.”

Galavar, for his part, found himself quite disoriented. Old flame? Who was this flame of hers? It was a glaring, glaring thing for Silence to say: Their conation had shown him no “flame” at all. When had she had the opportunity? Was she lying to Javelin now, or had there been parts of her life that he really hadn’t seen when their minds touched? He instantly realized it had to be the latter: She’d just said as much: males who know everything there is to know about me.

Silence, all while talking to Javelin, was telling Galavar that he didn’t know her as well as he’d thought.

Galavar began to appreciate DeLatia’s disdain for Silence a little bit better. Silence was…what was this? Not passive-aggression. More like…what?

Silence, for her part, continued talking as though all were level and blithe:

“But in the meantime I’ve asked—and Galavar has charitably agreed—for a secretary. I plan to begin keeping a lot of papers in the very near future, and I am viciously scatterbrained when it comes to remembering objective details. I’m also building up my worldly possessions almost from scratch, and a secretary would help me with small-item storage in the coming year.”

“A good piece of furniture is a real wealth,” replied Javelin, seemingly oblivious to the subtext. “It can stand you in good stead should times ever turn lean. At your age, it’s an excellent gift. You should see [NAME] on [STREET] for the best ink pens, [ETC.] for brushes, [ETC.] for stationery…”

Then Galavar figured it out: Silence was resetting the terms of their relationship. Up till this point she had been docile, and almost completely helpless. But that had only been a survival mechanism for a bedridden wreck of viutari ruin. The real Silence was beginning to emerge, and she didn’t intend to be subservient to Galavar in any way.

She was declaring her independence from him, and it hurt like ripping off a piece of sticky bandage. It was a strange way for her to explain it to him, yet it had worked: It got his attention, and left him with no doubt as to where they stood. That was the disorientation he was feeling: He had painted a mental image of her, and she was ripping it up—deliberately, as though they were still conating now.

And one thing more: She was embarrassed; embarrassed that their minds had touched at the darkest moment of her life. And their conation, contrary to what he’d thought, hadn’t resolved that humiliation.

“I’ll be sure to visit them all,” Silence told Javelin gladly. “You clearly know your stuff. Just from the look of your showroom I can tell you’re busy.”

“I sure am!” Curiosity got the better of Javelin. “How can you tell I’m busy just from the showroom? There’s no one else here!”

“Most of these sticks have sale tags on them; they’re already sold. If I had to guess, you’re holding most of them pending delivery while people’s homes and businesses are still under construction—with maybe a few more on deferred delivery so that your showroom doesn’t go too empty.”

“…That’s exactly right.”

“You’re also prospering enough to have more than a bare staff. I take it as a given that you have one or two striplings to handle the worst of the drudgery. They’re not here right now because they’re on deliveries, but I can smell what’s left of their scent. Blends into the oils here.”

Javelin stared at her wide-eyed.

“On top of that, you have at least three proper employees besides yourself: the one who writes the stickers and whom I presume is your bookkeeper, whose handwriting is different from yours; and two more people implied by the presence of two different carpentry styles in addition to your own. At least one is a full journeymate, and maybe both.”

“That’s also exactly right. All of it. To the letter. Yes, two journeymates. Second one is new.”

Galavar could tell that Silence was underlining her point for him. Whatever he had previously estimated her powers of perception to be, they would need to be revised upward. And she would have known his next thought: She had possessed these powers all along, and had assuredly been using them right from the beginning, on her sickbed. This was more than a display of independence. It bordered on the sociopathic. She was using Javelin as a toy to play with Galavar.

For a moment Galavar felt the world fall away beneath his feet. Had her kindness and kindred spirit been insincere? No…surely not. She was too pleasant, too wonderful. But what…what was she doing?

Silence continued:

“I recognize the provenance of most of your materials, but”—Silence walked over to a large table in very pink wood—“I don’t recognize where this came from. The wood is stove hawk, but I only know them to grow in the western hills of [NAME], and none of those have the kinds of annual rings I’m seeing here. They don’t live that long; they don’t get this big.”

“Ah, because it’s not stove hawk! It’s pink stove. They grow in the high altitudes of the Howl Riada, and nowhere else.”

“I don’t remember seeing any when I was there!” Silence seemed genuinely surprised.

“You weren’t yourself at the time,” said Galavar, whose voice reminded the other two of his presence.

“I suppose I wasn’t,” she said. Then, back to Javelin: “I’ve seen more than enough to know I’d love to have you build my secretary. Would you be willing to do it?”

“For a friend of Galavar’s, I’ll put you at the front of the line. I take it you have something different in mind from the two in here that aren’t already sold?”

“Quite. Since you’re busy, what would the timetable be on a delivery?”

“It depends on your specifications, but I would anticipate the Equinox, or midway through spring at the latest.”

It must have ached at Silence to face such a delay in the realization of her first, imperious declaration of arrival and self in this new Galan city of hers. But she gave no sign of it.

“Very good! Shall we get into the technical details now?”

“Let’s step into my drafting office. You want to tag along, Galavar?”

“I think I’m going to make my rounds up and down the block; talk to people. See how things are going. It’ll give you two a chance to talk without me getting in the way. How long do you think you’ll need?”

“Come back in four hours,” said Silence.

“Four hours?!” Galavar’s jaw dropped. Even Javelin raised an eyebrow.

“I have very specific technical requirements.”

“You do, don’t you?” said Javelin. “I’m beginning to get a sense of that.”

Galavar peered at Silence, not sure what to make of it all.

“Four hours, then.”

He turned around to leave. The last words he heard as he stepped out into the street were Javelin’s: “I think you scare him a little…”

* * *

Back at his home late that evening, there came a knock at the door.

Galavar was in his element: dressed in his most comfortable robe, sitting on his living room sofa, reading the evening paper. The work of day never ended, but day itself did end, and Galavar had grown better over the years at giving the evenings—his most beloved hours—back to himself. There was nothing so uniquely relaxing for him as being done with the day’s work and meetings, done with any errands or chores, done eating, done with everything and free to go to bed at any time, and free till then simply to recline upon the sofa’s softness and read about the day’s comings and goings in his cherished city.

A proud luminary, Galavar paid a special attention to the lighting in his living room at this quiet wind-down hour. Most of the main lamps were not in use, but a few well-placed ones created spots of splendid brightness, while the space as a whole bathed in their pleasant, dim glow. The drapes were all still drawn open, creating black pools of darkness into the outdoors upon his windows, and in the living room there were many windows, including a whole bank of them on the main face. Galavar loved the contrast, and he didn’t mind that others could, from the modest distance of the street, turn their gaze up the gentle slope toward his house and look in on him. His whole life was a fishbowl anyway, and he rather fancied a passerby looking in through those windows and saying “Ah, now there’s Galavar in his robe, reading the paper before bed; all’s right with the world!”

At the sound of the unexpected knocking at his door, Galavar’s eyes and brows rose first. The knock was a gentle one, clear but unhurried. Someone authoritative, someone decisive, stood on the other side of that door. This pleased him.

Generally speaking, it was a well-known faux pas in Sele to call upon folks unexpectedly at a late hour for any matter that wasn’t both urgent and important, but it happened sometimes anyway, and Galavar got a sense this was one of those, which led to the good humor in his comment, proffered to himself:

“I had better answer it, then!”

He picked himself up out of the softness and went to the foyer, opening the door with genuinely no idea who it might be. As it turned out, it was Javelin.

“Javelin! Come in.”

“Thank you.” She availed herself.

“Take your coat?”

“Please.”

Javelin had a strange look on her face, an echo of that old competitive ferocity of hers. It took him back many years.

“Some tea?”

“You know it.”

He led her to the kitchen, pouring fresh water into the kettle. The rays of light fell softly from the living room upon them as Javelin sat at a stool along the bar.

“Did the design work with Silence go well?”

“You never came back to pick her up.”

“I don’t think she wants a chaperone.”

“Yes, but…” Javelin chuckled softly. “You don’t know, do you?”

“Know what?”

“She’s only a child, Galavar.”

“I told you that! Remember? Besides, had you said that to us when we were her age, I don’t think either of us would have taken kindly to it.”

“True, but we know better now. Demonstration and majority confer autonomy, not experience. Not wisdom.” She rapped his counter and pointed a finger at him. “And apparently experience doesn’t confer wisdom either. You should know better by now.”

“What did I do?”

“She couldn’t walk five days ago. She told me all about how hard she worked to be able to go out today. You shouldn’t have left her to walk home by herself. Let her deny your escort if she wants; don’t deny it on her behalf.”

Galavar set out a pair of teacups and saucers.

“She misjudged her energy, I take it?”

“Yes. I took her home in a carriage. We spent so many hours working on the secretary. You know how exhausting matters of the brain are! Back in school I could run any race, but sitting down with books and paper…that really takes it out of you. Silence didn’t leave herself enough strength to get back to the Academy.”

“Did she admit it? Or did she collapse first?”

“Of course she admitted it. She’s proud, not stupid. We both thought you’d be coming back, but you never did and we lost track of time. Talked for hours. By the time it became clear you weren’t coming, she was tuckered out. Walked as far as the front of the shop, turned around, and asked me for help. Poor thing had a wide look in her eyes, like the world had run out of matter ahead of her and she was staring at the void.”

As he shuffled some tea into the teapot, Galavar cracked a smile. That was a very un-Javelin way to have put that idea. But her Galavar mask always picked up such mannerisms.

“I know that place,” he mused. “I’ve been there. That moment when you realize you’re not in control.”

“Yes.”

“Those are good, balancing moments,” he said. “Humbling moments. I think she needs them.”

“You’re probably right about that. But, still.”

“What?”

“Context.”

“She’s an adult, Javelin. And what she needs from me is not a mother hen but a peer. She needs peers. A kindred intellect. Someone who’ll push her, upward and forward. If she wants supporters, she’ll seek them out.”

He sat down on a raised stool in the kitchen to wait for the water, and found Javelin’s fierce gaze meeting him.

“I don’t think so,” she said. “I think she’ll neglect that whole dimension of life if it isn’t foisted on her. Children need parenting.”

“She’s an adult.”

“You’re lost in her intellect…her ambition. You’re not seeing the viutar who contains it. Yes, she is an ‘adult.’ What does that even mean? I’m saying she needs mentors, guiding figures, helpers, even a matrix. She’s stunted. She doesn’t know how to interact with people. She only knows how to mimic it. She doesn’t know what she needs. Doesn’t know how to go about getting it. She’s trying to interpolate a whole new Universe into this one, but what she really needs is someone to tell her how to put her pants on forward.”

The kettle began to boil. Galavar got up to pour the water into the teapot.

“I think you make a fair point,” said Galavar. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

“Thank you.”

“Are you going to be able to build her secretary?”

“Yes!” Javelin sucked in some air and smiled. “She was so deliberate. We drew blueprints down I swear to a hair’s width. Every grain of wood in the whole design is put to her purpose. Ideas that I’ve never seen before. The actual blueprint we drew is a complete mess; no one but she or I could read it.”

“Grand,” he grinned. “Most pleasing.”

“You’ve found a special one, Galavar. She is the smartest person I have ever met.”

“Yeah?”

“I learned things about carpentry from her, today. And she’s never done carpentry.”

“She did some woodworking in Junction City.”

“A little. But she picks up things instantly. You only have to explain something once—usually not even once! She’ll pick it up before you finish talking. And it’s not just the concepts. It’s the work. I let her do a little practice work in the shop. Everything she did…there was summary competency to it. A few strokes of the hammer, and she knows the hammer. A few turns of the lathe, and she knows the lathe. A mixture of absolute proprioception, rapid comprehension, transfer of knowledge from other applications, and deduction from first principles. It was brilliant…” Javelin looked up at him “…and frightening.”

“Frightening? Ah, so that’s why you’re here. I couldn’t believe that you’d come here at this hour just to scold me.”

“I’m concerned.”

“What better place for a precocious young mind is there than the City of Sele?”

“That’s only the smallest part of what I mean. Yes, the raw potential of her intelligence should be scary to anyone in their right mind. She’s not one of us. Not even you. She’s on her own echelon. That is scary, yes, but it’s the kind of scariness I can set aside. But…Galavar: You said you found her wandering through the desert?”

“Yes.”

“Doesn’t that strike you as an extraordinary coincidence?”

That caught his attention.

“What do you mean?”

“There she is, this brilliant young thing from Junction City—from the Forbidden City—who shows up just in time for you to encounter her. Any other day, any other hillside…and she’d have died.”

“You think she was supposed to die?”

“The other way around. What if she was meant to be found? What if she’s an agent of the Sorcerers?”

“She’s not.”

“Not consciously, no—I take you at your word on that. But what if she doesn’t realize that she’s serving their will?”

“How?”

“We’ve kept Gala a secret from the world, but the Sorcerers are not of this world. They have eyes in far places. Here’s this newcomer, this child, who instantaneously has unfettered access to the mind and daily agenda of the Great Galavar. How do you think the Sorcerers enforce their balance on the world? Subtly. Never with armies of might.”

Galavar rose again to pour the tea.

“This smells wonderful,” she told him. “Thank you.”

“It has a blend of lesca hips. I know caffeine doesn’t always agree with you. You share that in common with Silence.”

“It’s amazing how thoughtful you can be when you put your mind to it. And how easily it goes away the rest of the time.”

He sat down again, this time pulling up the stool to the other side of the bar straight across from Javelin.

“It’s a dire accusation to call Silence a spy.”

“No…not a spy.” Javelin gave a sort of frustrated sigh as she tried to find her words. “I don’t think she’s knowingly working for them. But they may be using her in some way. Her intellect is obviously real. If the Sorcerers wanted to shape the direction of Gala, how would they do it?”

“Are you asking?”

“What about taking a bona fide genius—like Silence—and subtly shaping the direction of her growth as a person? And then she shapes our growth as a society. You’re going to come to rely on her, Galavar, and soon. The fruits of her mind are going to be irresistible. She’s going to become one of the controllers of Gala. And…”

“And if the Sorcerers control her…”

“You see my worry. This secretary I’m building could be the first component of a dreadful weapon. A sorcerous weapon. Not steel, not fire…but something…more.”

Galavar sipped his tea in silence for a long time. Finally, he blinked heavily and shook his head.

“It’s not fair to Silence to act on that kind of an accusation, or even to harbor it in our thoughts. She deserves a chance.”

“I agree with you on that,” Javelin said. “I just think it’s worth acknowledging the possibility.”

Galavar stared out into the distance of worlds, patiently finding his words:

“When our minds were together, in the conation, I saw the reasons she left Junction City. I don’t think the Sorcerers could have designed those events. She…it wasn’t pretty. She’s very much her own, strong-willed self. I didn’t see anything in her whole psyche to suggest that she’s a puppet of a concealed plot.”

“Are you sure of that? Are you sure that this power of Sourros to join minds as one, which you have only of late begun to wield, is so clear in its vision?”

“Actually, now that you mention it, Silence spoke of an old flame of hers today.”

“I remember.”

“I didn’t see any person like that in her memory. I didn’t feel any lingering love in her for him.”

“So either she was lying, or you don’t know her as well as you think.”

“Exactly.”

Javelin frowned thoughtfully. “Supposing it’s a lie, do you know, from your intimate knowledge of her, what might cause her to tell it?”

“She might have just been saying things to be sociable. You had implied that she and I were having sex. Maybe she was uncomfortable.”

“That’s certainly possible,” Javelin conceded. “I shouldn’t have said that. When you mentioned her in your note, I assumed she was older. So! At least we do have a plausible alternative to my scary idea. But still: I’d think twice before assuming that you know the full measure of her thoughts and history.”

Galavar wasn’t about to tell Javelin the details that might have explained his judgment. He wasn’t going to tell her that he’d put a gesh on Silence. He wasn’t going to sink Silence’s reputation and trustworthiness with that terrible onus. The dark regions of her mind, the gaping tear in her psyche that he hadn’t been able to repair…they were a secret between Silence and himself, and no one else. But…he couldn’t deny Javelin’s point.

“I’ll agree, there is at least the possibility that there is something more to Silence than is apparent to me,” said Galavar. “But I maintain that she deserves a fair chance.”

“That’s all I would ask of you.”

“Tell me…if you’re so suspicious, why build the desk?”

Javelin laughed, not entirely charitably.

“I’m not going to stop her, Galavar. She’ll get her secretary regardless of what I do. The fate of all Gala and the Galance Ideal and bick it let’s add the world! does not hinge on me building a piece of furniture. I’m nothing to her, do you understand? Nothing. Do you see it? I don’t mean she doesn’t care about me, though for all I know she doesn’t. I mean I have no power that could possibly interdict her. Short of murdering her in her sleep. She’s bigger than me.”

“Not that much bigger.”

“Not physically. God, you’re obtuse sometimes. She’s bigger than me in the spark.”

That gave Galavar a sudden, unexpected chill, as he thought back to what he had seen in her mind…

Javelin continued: “She’s going to become bigger than all of your friends and everyone else in your government. She’s a polestar. And I didn’t say that I am ‘so’ suspicious of her. I just think it warrants a mention. She’s going to become exquisitely dangerous. You’re the only one who could possibly hope to check her power. With Sourros at your side, you alone can check her.”

“There’s that sadness in your voice again.”

Javelin agreed with a sigh, and drank tea, and a long silence passed between them. It was good to be with Javelin again, yet aching. Happy and sad. Familiar and guarded. He had loved her back. He’d just…he’d been too young…and he’d never had enough spark to wrap it all around everything he wanted.

Javelin eventually turned her eyes onto his face. Studied him. There was a new melancholy on her scent as she said:

“This isn’t easy for me to say, and I don’t want you to take it as an attack on her. This ‘Daughter from Illar’ you’ve given us represents the living incarnation of the antithesis of everything I lost when the Ieikili became the Galans. I wanted a simple life. I wanted to die out there, in Ieik, at a ripe old age, having lived a humble, peaceful journey under the Sheer. This new friend of yours is the opposite of that. She’s going to complicate everything. You’ve already ripped my world away from me and replaced it with something unbearably grander. Now I fear she’ll do the same. One day.”

He sipped his tea; it was getting down to the bottom of the cup and had cooled off.

“You’re so certain,” he said.

“Yeah.”

“What all did you two talk about today—besides the desk? What makes you think so?”

“Many things. Our personal lives, for sure. But mostly other topics. Weather. Culture. Philosophy. Food. Art. There’s a common theme in all of it.”

“Oh?”

“Power. She’s obsessed with power. Not…political power. Not physical power. But you know what I mean.”

“Yes.”

“Power complicates life.”

“It does indeed.” He raised his brows. “That’s a good thing.”

“I…guess we disagree.” She smacked her lips and tilted her head, tried to explain it to him: “She’s especially interested in rare forms of power that have been forgotten in time or that no one has mastered or discovered or invented yet. Subtle powers. Forbidden powers. Knowledge that shapes the Kindred behavior. Data and science that describe the world. Old books. New books. And it all comes down to control. She wants to control…everything: people, society, technology, nature, Junction…and most of all herself. I didn’t go into her head like you did, and she was kind of evasive talking about her past, but I’ve met plenty of newcomers to Sele who’ve walked that same road. Silence was powerless when she was young, and now she wants to never endure that again. She wants to become.”

“Well spotted,” Galavar replied. “Yes, she has a lifetime of helplessness that she wants to make up for.”

“Perhaps to our communal peril, is all I’m saying. Everything we talked about led to her ambition.”

“Everything?”

“Well…no. It’s not like her ambitions are the only things she can think about. Like I was saying earlier, she’s a viutar like us. And she’s young. She sees the world with young eyes. She’s filled with young emotions. There’s a lot that goes on in a young mind. But there’s just about nothing she talked about that didn’t at least tangentially regress to some passionate desire for control.”

“Give me an example.”

“Like…well…food, for instance.”

“Food?”

“She loves food, but not purely for its own sake the way I might love biting into a tookalook soup dumpling. It’s about control. She loves all things flesh. Meat and sex and corpulence and athleticism…. She’s a very carnal person. A very…I guess I would call it lust. Not for sex per se. A lust for life, and the power that comes from living. Like a predator who knows she’s the predator, and loves everything about being a predator. Food makes her powerful; that’s why she wants it.”

“Okay, yeah. That’s fair.”

“And she wants…everything. Always the wanting with her.” Javelin laughed. “Not an easy person to chitchat with! But I won’t say it wasn’t a gratifying talk! She’s very interesting.”

“I’m aware,” Galavar replied. “She really made an impression on you, hasn’t she?”

“We talked about something else, too.”

“Oh?”

“She wanted to know all about me, my life, my desires…and my history with you.”

“She never struck me as the jealous type.”

“No, not jealousy. Not like that at all. She looks for greatness in others. I think she was expecting to find a plentitude of it in me, because of my long friendship with you. Greatness by association. You impress her. But I think I disappointed her. She wasn’t impressed by my lack of ambition and desire for simplicity.”

“Who at that age is?”

“I was. Don’t you remember?”

“Well…I suppose I do. I guess it’s harder for me to see back to it, given that I look at your past self through my eyes. My vision of you.”

“And you’re like Silence in that you notice the greatness and not so much the humbler bits.”

“Aye. More tea?”

“Ah…” he could see her wanting to say yes “…I should probably go.”

Then she gave him a strange look. There was part of a smile, but also frustration…and something else. Her next words gave it away:

“God, you’re handsome. All this talk of power and flesh. Twenty years later and you’re more attractive than ever.”

Galavar gave a distant sigh.

“I wish I could show you that a peaceful, unassuming life inside Gala is entirely possible,” he said. “It’s what I want for most people! I wish I could make you happy here. But…my body’s not going to make up for that.”

“I know. I’m not propositioning you. I’m just…just imagining. ‘What if?’ What if things had turned out differently.”

“The road not taken. We’ll never know.”

Suddenly a dark thought occurred to him. Javelin’s comment about Silence’s interest in forbidden powers stirred in him. He saw in his mind the image of Silence, and something she had said to him last year:

I know all twelve Powers. Not from the Sorcerers. I know them like the hours of the day.

And there was, in fact, an answer to Javelin’s question. Out there, beyond all that was natural and proper, there was an answer.

The road not taken…the world that could have been…

“Did you tell Silence that?” he asked her.

“Tell her what?”

“That you wish things had turned out differently? Your life? Our lives?”

“I did, in fact. She has a way of cutting to the center of things. There’s no point concealing information from someone like her.”

“What did she say?”

“I don’t recall exactly. I think she said it was an interesting thought. We didn’t dwell on it.”

“Good.”

“Good?”

He let it go, and smiled a honeyed sort of thing:

“Well, I for one think we’re already living in the best possible world.”

“Hah, the old Galavarian optimism!” she laughed, then finished the dregs of her tea. “Never change.”

The two of them rose in unison.

“Thank you for hearing me out,” she told him.

“Thank you for coming by. You’re always welcome, you know.”

“I wouldn’t feel right, calling on the Meretange Individual just to chitchat. But you are always welcome down at the shop. I’ll build you a secretary, too. Even if it’s hard for us…please don’t be a stranger.”

They returned to the foyer, where they exchanged valedictions. Galavar gave Javelin her coat and showed her out into the frigid night.

She walked away into the darkness, with little puffs of mist for breath.

Galavar’s eyes followed her for a bit, indulging, just for a moment, the “What if?”

The life he’d given up to have this one.

Then he closed the door, gave a long sigh, and returned to his sofa. The cushions were still just as nice, and the lamps just as warm, but on the whole his posh little living room seemed a lot less peaceful and comfy in that moment.

Sourros, he spoke in his mind, if I could give Javelin a measure of my own happiness, I would.

To his mild surprise there came a reply:

No, Galavar, you would not—for you did not. You have walked the path I opened for you. Happiness has never been your intent. For now, it accompanies you even so; you would be wise to enjoy it while you can.

This Silence Terlais…is she an agent of the Sorcerers?

That question assumes a great many things. You must first seek to understand what you are truly asking. Then you may pursue your query as a luminous being of logical knowing.

How about a straight answer for once?

To Galavar’s even greater surprise, Sourros actually gave a pretty straight one:

She is no minion of the Desolate Forsaken by their doing, though one supposes their interests could be served by her all the same.

How?

Read your newspaper.

And then the God’s presence was gone, nearly as suddenly as it had appeared.

Galavar shook his head, redid his robe’s belt, and sat down at the sofa.

With a curmudgeonly harrumph, Galavar picked up his newspaper, rustled it for effect, and returned to the article he’d left...

[cios-correct-opinions]

post here

DISCLAIMER BEFORE ANYONE SAYS OR ASSUMES ANYTHING ABOUT ME: i am not a proshipper. i am not an anti. i do not use any shipping discourse labels because i've been actively traumatized by both communities and have no desire to put that label on myself. i am just a person capable of critical thinking who enjoys analyzing media sometimes. i do not condone harassment over fiction, and i also do not believe any form of media is free from critical analysis or criticism, especially if it includes harmful propaganda and/or portrayals of marginalized peoples/societies which serve to perpetuate or legitimatize a pre-existing societal bias. do not call me an anti. do not call me a proshipper. do not assume things about me in bad faith. ive got no time for that and ill block you if you do this.

i actually think i kinda have a grasp on what's being said here so lemme explain this bc this is kinda how i feel? i'm gonna explain as best i can since its nearing 3 am and im a lil tired. forgive me if i dont explore every angle of nuance here btw again im tired but the adderall is in my blood so.

ahem.

my main talking point is this: there is a difference between exploration of something, which can include varying depictions and portrayals of a subject, vs propaganda for something, which has the intent of swaying you towards one side or away from one side or blah blah blah you know what propaganda wants to do i'm sure

exploration of dark and taboo subjects such as CSA/SA/abuse in general, paraphilias, mental illness, incest, so on and so forth - especially when done by survivors of those things - are almost never propaganda, no matter how they're being portrayed. someone using fictional characters within a fictional context to cope with their own trauma is, 99.9% of the time, not trying to endorse that behavior in real life. they also often assume the people reading it will understand that they the creator are not trying to endorse that behavior in real life.

example: most people who create fiction based off the mafia do not actually want to be mobsters, nor do they think others should be, nor do they endorse the real life mob, even if their portrayals can sometimes be problematic in other ways and/or contribute to certain problematic societal ideas about gang violence esp when committed by white people, but that's an entirely different issue than the one at hand and has more factors in play.

a deeper example: while a work of fiction can definitely reveal certain creator biases and/or how the creator feels about certain topics, it doesn't mean that every detail in the fiction is weighted the same way. someone may have clear biases towards, for example, women, in their work based on how they write their female characters, but not condone murder in that same work just because murder is part of the plot and/or is framed as a net positive in the storyline. you can have a work which clearly shows a creator's true feelings or thoughts or philosophies or what-have-you on one topic, but not on another, within the same work. learning which of these is true and when is a learned skill. i can't tell ya to do it myself as i am not a teacher

despite it seeming like it should be easy, on the other hand, spotting propaganda can actually be really fucking hard. i am not here to talk about how to spot propaganda, and perhaps will reblog this at a later date with links on how to do that as i am too tired to both write this and look for reliable resources on doing that, so if you want that for now, sorry, you gotta search elsewhere. however, this difficulty often leads to the main conflict i see online:

people believe that an exploration or portrayal of a dark/taboo subject or a subject which contains something that is immoral or illegal in real life, which does not outright condemn that thing, and/or appears on a surface level to be a "positive" portrayal (air quotes bc what counts as positive changes depending on who you ask) even when made by real-life survivors of the thing being explored, is the exact same as propaganda meant to push the emulation of that thing or behavior in real life, by real people, to real people/others/whatever.

this is the issue i and others keep running into online, over and over and over again. people are unable to tell the difference, they are unable to tell the target audience of a work, they are unable to understand why someone would make something a certain way, and ultimately the material upsets/triggers/disgusts/bothers/etc them, and all of this leads to them treating the first group of media like the second. because of that, they assume those creating that content are encouraging its real-world application and that the creators think these actions are okay, or that they will/want to/have perpetrated those acts in real life as well. once they've decided this, it's essentially impossible to convince them otherwise

ignoring the fact that you cannot make these assumptions about a stranger online in good faith literally ever, this is a huge problem. a nazi creating propaganda indoctrination white supremacist fantasy fiction material is nowhere near the same as a CSA & SA survivor creating works of dark fiction/art to cope with their trauma, but a lot of people consider it one and the same because they literally are incapable of seeing the difference. they can't analyze either work by either creator, and are unable to see how the nazi's fiction is different from the survivor's. even if the subjects portrayed in the works are different, too

these people will also insist that any humanization of a villain they deem "bad" or "problematic" enough - which, again, is dependent on who's making those decisions and not any kind of clear standard - means that the creator condones/believes/enjoys those things the villain does, and people who enjoy that character also condone/believe/enjoy those things the villain does. the ultimate irony of it all, of course, is that these people are consuming the exact same media with the exact same characters and exact same story and exact same plotline as the people they are attacking, and many of those people also enjoyed that media. they just seem to think because they enjoy blorbo blingus The Good Guy(tm) instead of zorbo zingle The Bad Guy(tm), that makes them morally superior instead of, yknow, just someone with a different opinion who is reading/watching with a different lens than someone else

obsession with moral purity, moral superiority, and in general an abstract concept of morality, is what has ultimately led us here. in an attempt to be seen as "acceptable" by the masses of the world - regardless of whether they participate in fandom or not - for whatever reason one has, has led some of us to turn on each other within fandom spaces

fear of predatory abusers lurking in the shadows, as well as an inability to actually identify the signs of a predatory abuser caused by a society whose goal is largely to protect those same predatory abusers, as well as a sadly large and growing number of victims of abuse growing up online and sometimes being abused and/or preyed on online (as i myself was) who thus are hypervigilant for this sort of thing due to their own trauma, has all led to a willingness to attack and destroy anyone we think might possibly maybe sorta kinda be a little suspicious without a second thought to the actual probability of that person's guilt, as well as the inability to stop and ask ourselves what we're really doing when we attack people over fictional portrayals of things as well as whether or not these fictional hypothetical transgressions are truly worth destroying someone's livelihood and life over or whether they're something we can simply block and ignore and not worry about

simply liking or disliking something in media has become a source of literal panic attacks for a lot of people because they drive themselves mad looking for a "good, moral, logical reason" to like or dislike something rather than just accepting it for what it is

our lack of understanding combined with an unwillingness to be open to the possibility of alternative interpretations for anything has driven people to commit atrocities. someone is literally dying right now because of it. actively dying. will die soon. because of antis deciding their creations meant it was okay to lie about them being a pedophile (they weren't), get them fired from their job due to these false claims, resulting in them losing their health care, which has 4 years down the road, resulted in their eventual death.

we. must. do. better.

[sous-le-signe-de-la-lune]

MARCH WRAP UP ☆

Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri

4.75 ☆

How to put into words how much I loved this book? I couldn't put it down, and I spend hours just thinking about it, thinking of Mehr and Amun and all they had to go through just to be free. Empire of Sand is a beautifully written book inspired by the Mughal empire and Bharatanatyam for its magic system.

When Mehr uses her powers, she's found by the Emperor's mystics and forced to accept an arranged marriage with Amun, one of the mystics. And here's lie the beauty of Empire of Sand: it's a story of coercion, of the importance of vows and promises, and the fight for freedom and free will. It's also a story of slavery.

Empire of Sand may not be perfect but it was everything I wanted and more. It was also satisfying to read a standalone fantasy book that succeeded in exploring many themes and tropes in a new way.

The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang

3.75 ☆

The Poppy War is a well crafted story inspired by the Second Sino-Japanese war during the 20th century. The book is separated into three parts that are very distinct from each other, and each part has its own atmosphere and narrative arc. Together, they offer a good introduction to the world building, the conflicts with and within Nikan, as well as Rin's pursuit of power and freedom.

The world building is very rich, and truly it's the best part of the book: there isn't a line that doesn't add something to it, and it creates a very engaging story. The writing is very good and I was immediately sucked into it. It was hard to put the book down.

I really liked Rin as a main character: she may not be likeable sometimes, but you can really understand where she comes from and why she's so desperate for power. She's always moving back and forth between being a hero or a villain, and to be honest, she can be her worst enemy. So, even though I couldn't always agree with her actions, it made sense, and I was rooting for her.

But one of my critics would be that, as a main character, she kind of "disappeared" from the story during the second part of the book in profit of the plot

The Wicker King by K. Ancrum

4 ☆

I've never written a proper review for this book because even now, I'm still haunted by the story and its characters. Told from August's pov, we follow him and his best friend Jack as Jack starts to experience hallucinations of a strange world superposed onto reality. Desperate to save Jack, August accompanies him on a quest to save Jack's fantasy world. It's a story of abuse, neglect and codependency but it's really well done and I couldn't put the book down (I read it from 1am to 4:40am).

Matcha Made in Heaven - vol.5 by Umebachi Yamanaka

4 ☆

I don't really have anything to say, it's still cute and I can't wait for the next update.

Never Seduces a Scot by Maya Banks

3 ☆ - reread

I was in the mood for an arranged marriage story and I thought of this book. It was as good as the first time. Eveline and Graeme are so soft, and I liked their respective families. It's not something I mentioned in my initial review, but I liked the way deafness was explored, especially because it's a historical romance.

L'Atelier des Sorciers - vol.1 by Kamone Shirahama

3 ☆

I've seen a lot of post on tumblr about this series, so I was intrigued and picked up at the library. I loved the magic system: it's very easy to understand while being unique. And I can't wait to read the next volume.

my goodreads 🪐

[warsamongthestars]

FREEDOM VS SERVICE

In the Bad Batch show, and I didn't even notice until the Finale, there is this odd idea.

"You are free to follow your own path" vs "This is our purpose, Good Soldiers follower Orders."

And, its there...?

... but you can't see it.

Because the show does, nothing with it.

The main proprietor of the Freedom is Hunter. He's the one who says "You are free to follow your own path" and shows this by uh... leaving people to the Empire, letting Echo is just go out of the blue, and saying "Omega wants to be with us, thus she is one of us".

... And then generally not getting involved in anything.

Like uh... yeah, that uh, that Freedom argument is, err, Solid, I fucking guess.

Meanwhile on otherside, you have the minor arguer, Cid, who keeps the Batch in blackmailed employment, or the Empire, who serves as the greater overarching villian, with Service and Higher Purpose.

And the villains make their case pretty well. Serve us, or Else. Its easy for a villain to do that, especially if you can make the excuse that they can be as bad as they want.

With the ultimate challenge being the Chip. Can you really say you can do what you want, if something else has a grasp on your mind and sense of reality, and can psychologically and fundamentally change you as a person?

And you can see, immediately, how this falls on its face so hard, that you can't even notice its there, its head is so deep in the sand.

That its attempt to push "Oh now we can chose what we want!", falls short, doesn't even ring.

This argument does not work, inspite of TBBshow's attempts, because it never shows any real conflict. The heroes get argued with by the villains, and the villains bring up points, but the heroes never do.

And when it comes to the heroes to show off why their idea of Freedom and Choice is better--its... either taken for granted, or they come off as assholes.

The idea of freedom instead becomes the idea of guiltless abandonment. Cody leaves without say so. Echo leaves without say so. Crosshair is repeatedly left behind, and says left behind.

The idea of choice becomes "We can leave and hurt as many people as we want because we're choosing this, and not someone else!"

And those aren't morals for heroes. It might be for protagonists, as a way to explore that idea of thinking.

... But they didn't explore anything. TBBshow explicitly avoids writing conversation or exploration of thought, refuses to develop the characters to that point.

(and banks on us, the audience to impress on the characters our own ideas... and that's not story telling, that's commercialization. )

To make the Freedom and Choice vs Service and Purpose work, you have to explore both sides of the equation, good and bad. That means showing it to the audience, that means Conversation, that means having Character.

( That doesn't mean "Oh throw Omegawd at it" )

Even in tough situations, freedom and choice can be found. Small things in conflicts. This can be shown in finding Mantella Mix.

But you also need real conversation, showing that the characters actually enjoy each others company, even in hardship. You see characters consider each other's desires and goals, and even in small ways, work to accomplish them. Talk to each other and work through internal conflict to mitigate suffering.

Freedom and Choice... only works with Support. Which is perfect for clone troopers, who are characters written to be a naturally support system. Vode An.

In this sense, freedom and choice only work if when all are capable of supporting, or servicing, each other.

Choosing purpose and the freedom to serve.

On the flipside, the antagonistic Service and Purpose, deals in those who would use you to their own ends and make you believe you are serving higher purpose.

Culminating the Chip, which is a cross between a tumor and a perma-roofy.

( Someone also brought up Cult Mentality, or the BITE system, and that works perfectly too. )

Both the Empire and the Republic are guilty of this.

But there are positive aspects.

While there are purposes that affect a greater whole to serve, such as facing down the Empire--there is the positive side of greater purpose: like the Rebellion.

Yes, you are sacrificing yourself, your comfort and even your choices for a Higher Purpose, but you are ensuring that others can have those capabilities, and that's the higher purpose.

( Its the barest most positive definition of what military service is intended to be. Which makes Rex being the head of the Rebellion work that much better. )

There are positive and negative definitions to both arguments. And while this battle is seemingly in TBBshow... its never shown, its never explored, and the message it tries to push in the Finales, the first episode and the last episode...

... falls flat, because they didn't work to make it matter, and in fact, actively refuse to dedicate time to it, and even removed pieces from it.

( Hell, they cannot even write a character conversation that doesn't involve authoritarian conflict, or a monster popping in. )

So when the " They are free to choose their own path" comes up...

... I can't take it seriously, and I want to deck Hunter in the face, because he's Never Written to try anything, he falls flat on his face in conversation, and he's a character written with cowardly intentions.

Which is a far cry from the man in TCWshow, who while gets antsy and shy, still follows through with the mission and succeeds.

[airctrl]

Been reading webcomics on Webtoon and tapas! Here are some thoughts :

- Tripp by KotaBlickie

I found this comic through the Parasomnia OCT! When I figured out that one of the judges has an original comic of their own I had to check it out.. and it does not disappoint HOHOO I love me some space adventures. The characters are so fresh and lively! With a non-binary mc!!! :D

- The Weekly Roll by CME-T

I’m trying to get into DND at some point and this comic really brings into perspective how being in a campaign is! Its humor is so snarky and the helmet Beckett guy is hilarious. the comments had people referencing Monty Python. It feels at home…

- Love Advice from the Great Duke of Hell by unfins

I remember reading this years ago and I just finished it… the serious plot that’s right there with the overpowering comedy is something I fall for because the expressions/jokes in it made me audibly laugh so many times. Plus I love demons and the designs are sick.

- Don’t Worry Teri Blokhin by Bioatomic

I gotta say this is that one webcomic that made me motivated to create my own. I’ve been following this comic for a long time and seeing new updates come in makes my day! The object heads are S-tier. I love EVERYONE in this comic wtf, especially Sputnik. Also Gram. he’s a scummy asshole but I can’t not love a believable character. The depth put in the characters is so cool to see because learning how things are connected is the most satisfying part of stories for me. I can tell there’s so much in store for this world and it’s inspiring.

- Sparks by Revel

This is such a cute comic I just started to read! (despite its mature themes lol) the banquet scene near the beginning is so warm and the dynamic between the humans and satyrs is so interesting. The world-building is so easy to follow and the little chibi pages explaining how magic worked are so cute and informative!! Plus the royalty and fruitiness going on is 10/10. When I realized that the comic was only starting after reading deep into it made me so excited!

- TRINITY by stillindigo

Characters are SOO cool…. dystopian class conflict stories are the best because you can have that Sleek and seemingly Perfect but controlling government setting and that more chaotic and rough underground setting that creates that SCRUMPTIOUS contrast between characters. So awesome…. & I love Frannie and her dad they are so adorable!

~~~~~~

I think from all the inspiration here I’ve gathered I’m going to finally write out a structure of what my webcomic is going to be like since I recently changed up a plot point. It's called plantverse!

I’ll probably never find a stable upload schedule in the next few years but the leisure in it is the best part :) doing something of my own will… crazy.. My art below!

I might follow up on this with other webcomics I've read!

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

Do you have a favorite character from the Teen Girl Squad?

There are probably plenty of people reading this who could answer this question better than me, but I can at least offer my own two cents:

I actually got into Homestuck because it looked like it was fun (which is, I gather, kind of unusual). I think I was drawn to it by the "I-AM-A-NANOMITE-I-AM-A-NANOMITE-" aspect of Hussie's work, along with various descriptions that sounded like they might be funny. I was never a "fan" in any actual sense -- like, I didn't read Homestuck in any regular way -- but at the end of all that I was excited to see what was going to happen in the comic.

Anyway, I feel like most readers are like me: Homestuck was interesting to us because it was hilarious, but we were just trying to be entertained by a story -- or not even that. I don't know that there was a singular "character" I latched on to as the main figure of my favorite character, because there were so many and none of them ever stood out to me as the "main character." (A lot of this is because there were a bunch of characters who stood out as potential main characters, only to be killed off as soon as they emerged, so my experience was like "huh, this character died? I should have paid attention to them in the first place." The two characters that made an impression on me in the end were "Vriska" and "Kanaya.")

Some specific instances of "hilarious" characterization are, in order:

1) Andrew Hussie likes to make fun of himself. So does every other person who writes any kind of fanfic of Homestuck. A lot of this humor is kind of mean and it isn't always easy to tell if it's meant as some kind of mean-spirited attempt at lampooning other people, but it's funny, and in the end you have to laugh at it anyway, because Andrew Hussie wrote this thing.

2) The character most analogous to myself in the comic is Dave, the guy with glasses who doesn't know how to fight but is trying his best. His characterization does not involve him being a jerk. There are many reasons why I would consider Dave's character "the best in the comic," but some of the most important ones might be:

1) Dave is very good at picking up on other people's social cues, and when he doesn't know a given thing he wants to learn about, he works hard to get it from someone who does know. He has a lot of scenes that are just dialogue between him and one of the other characters -- he does a lot of the "talking without saying much" thing -- and these scenes are often very good and funny.

2) Dave is really funny. I'm not sure I can really say anything more specific than that. Dave's characters have a lot of moments that are funny by virtue of being the kind of thing Dave would be likely to say.

3) Dave's characters get into situations where they really shouldn't have the capability to win, but they still keep going and winning, and that's kind of cool. The most common example of this is something called "Game Over," which involves a very good character called Vriska who, for some reason, "wins" a lot of these confrontations by doing really stupid things. I don't understand all the details of her powers, but the way I remember it, they allow her to make people who are on opposite sides of the conflict into enemies so that she can fight them directly and kill them (something that, of course, is against the rules and thus makes people go to jail). She is also a really, really mean, aggressive person, so things always come out in her favor.

4) Homestuck as a whole has a kind of very, very broad narrative that covers a lot of characters and their respective stories. And the broadness of this narrative does a lot to convey the sense of humor. The more specific a scene is, the more specific its "clothing," if you will.

Dave is the most general character in Homestuck, which is part of why he gets so many good interactions and so much comic relief. In a broader sense, most of Dave's dialogue with most of the other characters is really funny, because there's a large amount of comedic potential, both in the way he talks to them and in the way they talk to him. When he talks to people, we know exactly what's going on. When they talk to him, you can't tell if it's going to be funny or not, you just have to trust the author.

----

All this is a roundabout way of saying that Dave and his friendship with Andrew Hussie is what I like to think of as the "best" thing in Homestuck. This is the aspect of the comic I would give an award to. But, as I said in the beginning, this is probably just a bunch of nitpicking (and it's worth noting that even Dave is a lot of nitpicking). There are characters I like a lot after Dave, even if Dave is kind of important. And characters I like a lot before Dave, although they are sometimes (sometimes) made kind of important by the comic's broader structure. So the real answer to this question is "I don't know" -- the people who actually like Homestuck are a bunch of nitpickers who are willing to say that, when they're right, they're right.

And if you say this, you can have some fun by thinking of an example of the character you would most like to have been the "main character." I have no idea who is this character for me, but it must be one of the many characters who is important but not necessarily well-defined.

[micamicster]

You've watched tbs&tdh?! Yay! What's your favourite part, what would you change, and do you have any headcanons for the characters' future? 👀

hi babe! Yes i did--and I wouldn't have if it wasn't for you posting it, so thank you for that! The book series it was based on looked terrible, tbh, so i was surprised by how good the show looked in the gifs you were posting. I really enjoyed it!

I think the best parts of the show were a) the cast. The main three have great chemistry and the lead is charismatic enough to pull off being a tragic chosen one without being a drag, which is hard to find in ya! I also think it was a good decision to cast a black lead. I know opinions and execution varies on this, but I tend to prefer a racial allegory in fiction to be backed up by actually casting a non-white actor in the role. Even though this casting isn't strict throughout the show (its not like all blood witches are black and all fairborns are white), having him be the biracial child of a black father felt like a deliberate choice on the part of the showmakers, not something incidental or shoehorned in.

Love a fantasy road trip. Not much else to say there, just a personal fave of mine <3

The other big thing I really liked about it was the unique style the show had! It felt distinct from other fantasy ya shows, from the costuming to the set design to the mundane, muddy, tramping through the woods scenes. And some of the magic was genuinely very creepy and unique--the scene with mercury possessing his grandmother in particular scared the crap out of me!

And lastly, I loved the decisions made with the relationships. I liked that each of the three central characters has their own arcs and their own relationships with each other--it made the group convincing and balanced. While I wouldn't really have minded a bisexual love triangle (as long as the girl doesn't get sidelined), I really enjoyed where they ended up as something pretty explicitly poly! I was surprised to see that play out so purposefully on screen--i guess id assumed it was mostly fan interpretation, but no, it really seems like what the showrunners were going for!

Now for the negatives lol. (And tbh im inclined to blame most of these on the book series.) Firstly, I think that the magic system is unclear. The idea that each person has a power, fine. But then some of those powers (like gabriels) seem to be just, can do witchcraft and potions? Okay. Also there's no clear distinction between what blood witches and fairborn witches can do. Which is fine if that's the point they're making thematically, but it really seems like there were supposed to be differences in abilities in these two different groups that are just... never shown clearly on screen?

My other criticism would be that I think they've written themselves into a conflict they can't write a satisfying solution to. Which is the problem with discrimination-based fictional conflict--there isn't an easy solution in real life, so it's hard to find one that's satisfying in fiction, unless you have plenty of time and very skilled writers. (Which, lets be real, most ya netflix shows do not have.)

Where would I want them to go from here? I'm rarely of this opinion, but honestly I think they'd be well within their rights to say fuck it, and hop a boat to america or something, leave this all behind. I think the most likely outcome is that they try to use their combined power to force a truce on the adults, initially fail because they're young and easily manipulated, but eventually gain something more equal and lasting. But what I would really enjoy seeing is them all, like, going to the beach. Waiting tables. Getting terrible hobbies. Continuing the fantasy roadtrip but, like, not dying this time. You know?

[mashbrainrot]

hawkeye/bj, hawkeye. If you got those already, hawk/trap and klinger.

Ask game

002 | Give me a character & I will tell you | Klinger

This is coming off the back of a LOT of Klinger thoughts this week so an especially big thank you for asking me about him

• One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

It can be summed up with this: keep him in the damn dresses.

• my OTP:

Klinger/Soon-Lee is pretty much as perfect as a last minute pairing could be tbh.

• my cross over ship:

My imagination is failing hard with these ones, Jesus. Someone else who fucks with gender presentation.

• a headcanon fact:

He becomes a tailor. What the fuck is an AfterMASH? Oh I also think he is one of the few of the main cast who doesn't have a thing for Hawkeye.

• How I feel about this character:

It's about his unrelenting and uncomplicated kindness. It's about his defiance in the face of the army that manages to stay mostly devoid of anger. Its about the way he plays with gender in ways the text intended and didn't intend. It's his steadiness that is important to the characters within the story, and to the audience

• All the people I ship romantically with this character:

If it isn't Soon-Lee, I think honestly him and Kellye would have been absolutely incredible as a pairing. Unlike the rest of the characters, however, who I could generally buy having at least partly romantic or sexual relationships with any of the others, I think that's the extent of Klinger's pairing options I'm interested in. I think Henry was FASCINATED with him bit I don't think Klinger would have gone there.

• My non-romantic OTP for this character:

Him and Mulcahy and him and Charles make very funny double acts.

• My unpopular opinion about this character:

I've really dug deep for this one and I got NOTHING. Maybe not seeing the romantic sides to him with the other characters, I know him and Mulcahy are a big(?) ship. I don't get him with Charles either, romantically or sexually.

001 | send me a ship and I will tell you:

Traphawk edition

• when I started shipping it if I did:

The first episode I REMEMBER really really shipping them was Yankee Doodle Doctor. Who could resist that dancing scene?

• my thoughts:

I'm mostly into Traphawk as a melancholic 'missed connections' type affair. I love the angst, and the juxtaposition of the nature of Trapper's departure vs the generally easygoing and very happy relationship we saw on screen. I also love their relationship for what it adds to Hawkeye's overarching narrative.

• What makes me happy about them:

The way they make each other laugh, their physical comedy, Trapper's dogged loyalty and support in most things, how goddamned pretty and cute and sexy they are.

• What makes me sad about them:

Trapper's relative lack of character outside of their dynamic, the fact we never got to see how he would have handled a more troubled Hawkeye.

• things done in fanfic that annoys me:

Any hand-waving of the nature of Trapper's departure. That's like, the sole conflict between them, and I don't like it being excused so easy in a fic where they are meant to be endgame. A common way of doing this seems to be to make out that Trapper thought Hawkeye is dead, but then that's just ACCEPTED and they don't examine why Trapper didn't... demand answers beyond that, which seems very out of character. He didn't write the 4077th at all to find out what happened? He didn't send condolences to Daniel?

• things I look for in fanfic:

Something I like in Traphawk fics is EITHER fun sexy times set in Korea, or big reunions post-war where Trapper makes amends and generally looks after a Hawkeye who is a very different and much more delicate creature than the man he left behind.

• Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other:

For Hawkeye I think it's obvious I'm gonna say Beej... for Trapper? Idk man, I think Louise and him should get divorced and him just live very happily as a single man.

• My happily ever after for them:

Honestly, that they reconnect and stay in each others lives. They meet up regularly, and send each other life updates and the occasional stupid present that made them think of the other, or pranks by mail. I struggle to believe a til-death-do-them-part style romance, but a long lasting one? Sure. And staying in each others lives as an important part of their stories? Definitely.

• who is the big spoon/little spoon:

I have really thought about this, and have come to the conclusion that I think Hawkeye trained Trapper into accepting being the little spoon sometimes by making him do it as a bit first. 

• what is their favorite non-sexual activity:

Making each other laugh, and dancing. Providing each other with small acts of love, like good food, that record they know the other has had their eye on, a scarf they make the other wear when it's cold.

[lavendersiic]

thoughts on persona 5 bc if I didn't write them down i'd explode

After 250+ hours I feel such a mix of emotions, the ending was bittersweet, inspiring, and heartbreaking. I’ve been feeling it especially today, almost an emptiness and sadness knowing that I’ll never experience the game for the first time again. I have to say goodbye to the characters and story I’ve spent time with almost daily since November. I’m feeling especially reflective and tender with all of the thoughts and questions that the game has left me with, from thoughts about how I can be a better friend and community member, to Big Thoughts™ about free will, happiness, and the nature of reality - this game has left a lasting impression and is something I’ll carry with me for a long time.

The Experience: 

Persona 5 Royal is incredibly successful in delivering a captivating and emotionally resonant story. I felt immersed in the world, empowered with meaningful choices, and continuously engaged through its meticulously crafted game loop. The narrative was so engaging and evocative, through the combination of art, music, writing made for a special first-time experience. There is room for improvement in accessibility, but overall this game is kind of a masterpiece. 

On my second playthrough, I did feel a bit of repetitiveness in some of the palaces. Many of the palace rulers were painted as purely evil villains. Madarame gains some nuance as we go through Yusuke’s confidant, see him grappling with the conflict between the truth of Madarame’s vanity and the fact that he did care for him. This clear cut moral view of the first few antagonists is an indication of the way the Thieves’ view the world. As teenagers, it is understandable that they would have a more simple view of morality, but you can see that evolving throughout the game. By the time we get to Maruki's palace, we are given a deeper exploration of his character and the morality of his motivations and actions are treated with more nuance. I think a big part of this is the fact that Maruki is more of an antagonist than a villain, though I think it also hints at the Phantom Thieves' maturing perspective on morality.

Friendship and Forgiveness:

There’s something about the nature of a social sim that really brings into focus how straightforward it can be to show up for those I care about. It can be as simple as investing time, listening and validating their experiences, and making memories together. It can be easy for me to overcomplicate things, to feel like I need to be doing more for the people in my life - but in reality just making time and space for people can be enough. 

I couldn’t talk about this game without talking about Akechi (best boy). He was instantly one of my favorite characters. It was just nice to hear someone with a different opinion at first, up until that point it felt like we were in a bit of a Phantom Thieves echo chamber. I believe that it’s important to have people around you who support you, but there is also value in having people who challenge the way you think. Before the reveal, he really is a breath of fresh air, he’s charming and goofy and even though you can tell he’s not being 100% honest, there’s something really special in the growth of your relationship as he slowly lets his mask go. 

After the reveal, I felt so heartbroken and confused - and mostly I just wanted to hug him. I just wanted him to be free and happy. In the moments where we reach rank 9 and 10, I remember just wanting him to join us - I was quick (maybe too quick) to forgive all he had done. I spent two in-game days mourning his death, revisiting the places we spent time together, and reflecting on our relationship. 

At the beginning of Third Semester, I was overjoyed to see him alive, even if it meant he would be in prison for his crimes. I was so happy that he was alive and that we had a chance (even outside of the game world) to continue growing our relationship. As third semester continued I just enjoyed having him around, his chaotic one-liners made me smile and it was nice to see him being authentic to his darker side. His evil laugh brought me so much joy. 

When we meet with Maruki and it’s revealed that Akechi actually did die in Shido’s palace, and that he was brought back by Maruki because we essentially wished it to be, I lost my marbles. Akechi’s willingness to die in order to be the master of his own fate was equally heartbreaking and inspiring. I wanted to accept Maruki’s deal in that moment just to have a happy life with Akechi, but I wanted even more to respect his wishes. 

When I think about what drew me to Akechi’s character, I definitely related to his experience of feeling like he always had to present a pleasant mask to the world, otherwise risking rejection. I related to his desire to feel needed, something I still struggle with now. I think that believing what I do now - that everyone deserves to be loved in their wholeness, their dark along with their light - I felt compelled to offer that same love and forgiveness both as Joker and as myself. 

Seeing Akechi’s struggles to find acceptance, and hopefully giving him at least a small sense of that in the time we spent with him was one of the biggest emotional payoffs of the game for me. 

Free Will

The question of free will was a throughline throughout the story, and we are challenged to consider the morality of taking desires, even with good intentions. With many of the other themes and moral questions raised in the game, there isn’t a right or wrong answer. As the player, taking on the role of Joker - unwavering in his view of justice - is exciting, but the game encourages us to still consider the moral implications of their actions, especially with the addition of Maruki’s palace.

The third semester brings up this conflict between the allure of a pain-free, comfortable reality and the chaotic freedom of choice in the real world. Ultimately, I agree with the decision to fight for reality - for personal agency and free will even with the guarantee of chaos and pain. It is a tempting test, even more so than Yaldaboath’s offer to return the world to it’s previous state. It was a easy to decline Yaldaboath, but sitting across from Maruki in Leblanc, I felt truly conflicted for a few moments. I knew in my heart that the right choice was to stop him, but at the same time - it was tempting to accept that world free from pain and suffering.

After watching both endings, I ached for Maruki’s reality. I wish that life could be that simple, but there was an underlying sense of unease at the almost sickly sweetness of it all. It felt like everything we had struggled through was empty. The true ending was bittersweet and heartwarming, and seeing all of the characters moving forward towards the lives they wanted held so much more meaning.

Conclusion

While my sleep schedule might be temporarily wrecked, I don’t regret the hours I invested into this game. It was a really beautiful and thought provoking story, and what I want now is to apply what I felt and learned to my reality, so that I can live a full, free, and connected life. While I'm reluctant to let the world and characters go, I'm excited to turn my focus towards my goals, nurturing connections with my friends and family, and prioritizing self-care and rest.