#consider this being posted as a sign of me healing

[torchwood-99]

Howdy! I’ve been re-reading a lot in the appendices lately and noticed that the first time Aragorn sees Arwen and falls head over heels immediately, she’s described as wearing a “mantle of silver and blue.” 🤔

When you went back through your recent deep dives on Arwen (forgive me, I think I read them all but sometimes my brain is a sieve!), did you come across that and have thoughts about what ol’ JRR might have been thinking in his use of the silver and blue mantle visual for the (eventual) wives of both Aragorn and Faramir? Or, if not, do you have any such thoughts now? Intentional and meant to convey specific meaning, or he just liked that color palette/image and it popped up again organically?

@from-the-coffee-shop-in-edoras

My first thought is that they both wear silver and blue for the same reasons it feels like everyone in Tolkien has grey eyes. It's an aesthetic Tolkien likes.

On a more theological level, blue is a colour strongly associated with the Virgin Mary. Lord of the Rings is filled with biblical imagery and inspirations, and arguments have been made for quite a few of Tolkien's heroines being inspired by the Virgin Mary.

In Arwen's case, it's been argued she represents Mary the mother figure, and Mary who united the divine and immortal with the mortal, as Arwen does when she marries Aragorn.

In Eowyn's case, her slaying of the Fell Beast is reminiscent of the tradition of Mary being depicted of standing on a serpent's head in art, inspired by this quote, interpreted to be about Mary

I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel. (Genesis 3:15)

in reference to Mary giving birth to Jesus, who then died for the sins of humanity. Mary giving birth to Jesus allowed for Satan to be overcome, and she reversed Eve's sin.

It's also been suggested that Eowyn's referring to herself as a shieldmaiden nods towards Mary referring to herself as a handmaiden

And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word. 

With Mary, the most popular colour combination is usually red and blue, instead of silver and blue (although in both cases it's blue worn over red, so the mantle remains fitting). But Varda/Elbereth, Queen of the Valar and creator of the stars, is the most beloved of the Valar by the elves, just as Mary is traditionally the most beloved saint, so the silver and the stars on Eowyn's mantle is perhaps a reference to Varda, and her own Marian imagery.

Thanks for the ask! It's a really interesting parallel I hadn't considered before.

Writing this post, it's interesting that Eowyn slaying the Fell Beast was an act of disobedience, whereas Mary agreeing to carry Jesus was an act of obedience to God. Some fans I think have really struggled with Eowyn achieving something objectively great through an act of disobedience, yet her great deed was a result of her disobedience.

Eowyn's act was an act of disobedience against Theoden, who doesn't take on a Godlike or Christlike role in the narrative. Eowyn also defied Aragorn's own orders, who told her to stay and that she had no business in the South, and Aragorn does have Christlike imagery, what with his healing abilities. However, Aragorn has to grow into his role as King of Men, and he proves himself as the true King of Gondor when he heals Eowyn and Faramir and Merry in the Houses of Healing. Aragorn says in the Houses of Healing that Eowyn's deeds put her on equal standing with the queens of old, so perhaps Aragorn's blinkeredness towards Eowyn earlier on is a sign that he has yet to reach his place as King of Men.

Gandalf, who is a Maiar or angel, is very empathetic towards Eowyn's circumstances. He's the only other character who speaks of the effect that sexism and being confined to the domestic sphere had on Eowyn. Even Aragorn focusses more on Eowyn's heartbreak over him rejecting her (although he acknowledges that was the straw that broke the camel's back). Gandalf is the one to put into words the cause of Eowyn's suffering.

Whereas Tolkien's personal and fictional writings suggest he had a conservative attitude towards the nature of women, it seems that he believed that most women were inherently domestic, not that they had to be, and if they weren't they were failures of womanhood. He expressed admiration for women who made achievements in science and literature, and described Eowyn as being a "brave woman capable of great military gallantry". So you get the idea that although Tolkien had conservative ideas about the abilities and nature of women in general, he did not oppose women who proved themselves to be the "exception". And in Eowyn's case, her exceptionality was foretold, prophesised by Glorfindel many, many years before she was born, just as Mary's was.

Ironically enough, Tolkien keeping most of the women firmly in the domestic sphere, resulting in them having a very small role the narrative, with only the "exceptional woman" being granted much focus, resulted in Eowyn being the singular female character who receives a on-page, active role in the narrative, the singular female character who joins the heroes and grows and develops. A consequence of this is that she shoulders almost all the female representation within the narrative.

Arwen and Galdriel are significant characters, but most of their actions take place off page, with their on page presence revolving mostly around facilitating the actions of the male heroes (although Galadriel does get up to her own cool stuff away from the main narrative, but that story we don't get to follow.) Arwen and Galadriel are also divine beings, ancient elves, the most beautiful, the fairest, both of them visions of perfection, and mostly static. (At least, in the main narrative. Arwen shows more flaws and nuances in the appendices, and Galadriel we know went on a whole journey before becoming Lady of Lothlorien.)

In contrast, Eowyn, human, mortal, messy Eowyn, is flawed. She has struggles and weaknesses and lessons to learn. This makes her the most "human" woman in the narrative, for reasons that go beyond her race. In being the most complex, flawed and dynamic female character of the book, the "exceptional woman" inadvertently becomes the "every woman".

And I've gone on a bit of a tangent, but I had a lot of fun doing it.

[laur-rants]

Fic Update: Blood Wolf

Chapter 6

Fandom: Dishonored Relationships: Daud and the Whalers, some Daud/Outsider on the side

Rated: Mature to Explicit, Strong Violence and Gore Ahead!!

Synopsis: Werewolf!AU :: Daud-Centric Prequel to Wolfbann. Origin Story, pre-canon. Centers on how Daud turned, and his subsequent marking by the Outsider and his formulation of the Whalers. Content Warnings for this chapter: body consumption, decapitation.

Notes: He isn't a like them, he's still sane. He's sure of it.

AO3 Link Previous :: First :: Next

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Dunwall, The Sewers Month of Songs, 1820

  The sewers stretched onwards, a winding maze if the one traversing them didn't know all the proper twists and turns. Jordan gripped her crossbow too tight, letting the pain in her palm distract from the sweat on her brow, the prickle at the back of her neck. At any moment she still expected Daud or Rulfio to lead her down a tunnel that was sightless and quiet, cornering her and ending her right then and there. It was a legitimate fear, she told herself, considering what she had just seen, had just tried to do…��

She looked warily to Daud, eyes trained on his broad shoulders, watched the tension bunching the muscles under his assassin suit, and swallowed. She had seen what he could do with her own eyes, had seen his fully furred head, ears, teeth… and yet, her brain was still trying to process what the actual fuck it was that she had seen. 

She scrutinized everything, her eyes tracing his lines, looking for anything beastial, anything irregular, anything… inhuman. 

In flickering moments, her eyes would meet with Rulfio's. Those stern Tyvian pupils would look back, saying more with a glance than words ever could, before they went back to following Daud. Rulfio had always been closer with Daud than with her but that didn’t stop Rulfio from being something of a father figure to her. When she was still green in the assassin business, taking bounties that didn't always involve killing, he was there to steady her hand and make true her aim. Void, he wasn't even that much older than Jordan but the experience he carried in his hands was worth decades. 

To see him backing Daud up on this, however, did little to assuage her (she won't call it fear, she can't be afraid, she will miss the shot if she ever needs to—) trepidation over the current situation. If she had known that Daud could move faster than she could see, that he could disappear, could grow claws and fur and turn into a monster… 

She bit down on her cheek until she tasted blood. Brimsley owed her for this. She was not experienced enough for this. Nobody in Dunwall had the experience to deal with whatever Daud was now. 

They walked together in relative silence, just hearing the errant drip of water, the splash of a hagfish on its way in from the river. She watched the water ripple with unseen movement and her fanciful ideas wandered until her head was filled with sea serpents and massive swimming rats, with crocodiles and sharp-toothed merfolk. So many thoughts swam in her head that she didn't realize when Daud had stopped, nearly running into him. 

“Hey, what—” 

A hand came up to silence her and she obeyed, jaw working hard enough she could hear her teeth grinding into dust. Another glance to Rulfio, looking for some sort of answer. He met her eye and just nudged his head forward; they had stopped outside of a large door, probably to a maintenance room.

“It's in there,” Daud said, his voice filled with an unknown emotion. For whatever reason, Jordan watched him… hesitate? Daud didn't hesitate for anything; hesitation for an assassin was death. The sweat on her neck rolled down into her shirt and she blamed only the summer heat for how much the world closed in on her.

It was suffocating to stand still. When Daud didn't move fast enough, her impatience moved instead. Growling, she pushed past both of the men and rushed the door until it shifted. 

It was heavy and slippery but that didn't matter; Jordan threw her whole back into it.  After a moment’s resistance, the door shuddered and relented, scraping against the concrete before fully swinging open. 

Inside, a large amphitheatre with a huge domed cage showed itself to the trio, the seating lined in such a way that anyone in the audience could look down and into the center arena. On the walls and floor lay the evidence of what last happened here; Jordan’s eyes lingered on the gouged stone, the banged cage walls, the massive amount of splattered blood, and, upon further inspection, the half-eaten body of a man on the floor. 

It's not like it's her first dead body, but it's clearly been here a while and there's a difference between a fresh kill and advanced decay. Bones and mummified skin sat inside scraps of clothing while angry flies buzzed around, leaving their maggots to finish the job other bigger animals couldn't. The smell wasn't in the putrid stage anymore, but it was still awful and stale, like it had been left to mold rather than rot. 

“A lovely place to enjoy some drinks,” she groused, nose wrinkling. She turned back to the men; Rulfio looked pale while Daud was busy investigating the huge claw marks on the stone, the depth and width of their size. She frowned, tossing her hair out of her face. “What's with that face, Rulf? You ain't never seen a dead body before?” 

It was a friendly tease but Rulfio just averted his gaze anyway, watching Daud, addressing him first. 

“So, is this… is this where…” It was like he couldn't finish the sentence but he motioned to the ruined side of Daud’s face. 

Daud shook his head, brow furrowed and sharp. “No, this isn't where Jerome attacked me, this is the hound pit itself. He was chained up, blinded, forced to fight dogs for the money and the entertainment of disgusting people. I watched a pit hound split his neck wide open,” he pointed to the huge blood stain on the floor, more blood than a human could spill. “Bled him until he died, and then the bastard just— came back. That sorry sack of meat was already trying to collect his dog when Jerome came back to life. Too close, got sliced to ribbons.” 

Rulfio nodded, his face paling further as he studied the mummified remains, but Jordan's frown only deepened. 

“Hey, you guys want to clue me in here? Are you talking about the same Jerome who went missing a few months back? What's he got to do with this?” 

Daud's sharp blue eyes found her and she had to fight the urge to step back. 

“He's got everything to do with this. Fink and his brother have a sick experiment happening down here, leading chumps to get killed by a monster, or worse, become a monster themselves.” 

“What? You're telling me Jerome—” she pointed to his face, but the steely face looking back told her the answer. She whistled, hands going to her hips. An awkward moment while her foot twitched in a tune only she can hear. 

“So, what, he still down here?” 

“No.”

“You know for sure?” 

“I killed him.” 

“Even though you just said he came back from a ripped throat?”

“I saw the body.”

“Oh.” A pause. “And any others?” 

Daud blinked. Had the audacity to look confused for half a second. 

“Others?” He repeated, his harsh voice breaking. Jordan searched for something else to look at than his unnerving (inhuman) gaze. 

“Yeah, you know…” her arm waved. “Others. Other monsters. You said people come down here and get killed or become monsters. Which means Jerome couldn't have been the only victim, right? Someone had to-to change him too.” 

The horror was plain on his face; he hadn't considered this. Rulfio looked even more hardened, more concerned. 

“You brought me down here without thinking there might be more of these monsters running around?” Rulfio's voice was scarily even and deadly sharp. Jordan sensed the storm brewing, the return of the argument the men were having earlier. “I’m not about to let you lead me to an early grave, Daud!” 

Daud, to his credit, managed to look hurt, but it was hidden too quickly under a rising tide of anger. 

“I didn't know, Rulf, because when I crawled out of this pit half-dead, nothing was here. I don't know if there's anything else but—” Then, he took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and stalked away from both of them. 

“You asked me to trust you, Daud, and I do, but I don't want to be what you are, I didn't sign up for black magic and voices in my head and whatever other evils you're still hiding!” 

Jordan chewed on her cheek more, getting the creeping feeling she's privy to a conversation she was never meant to hear. Her eyes remained on Daud, watching as his hand waved, glowing and smoking. Then, his eyes were looking somewhere else, watching something else, through the walls and floor. The prickle at the back of her neck returned and her eyes widened as she realized, belatedly, that he was doing something magical again. 

Eventually his breath returned to normal and he looked back to Rulfio, his clawed (Outsider's ass when did that happen?) hand shaking out and back to normal (Is human normal for him now? Or is the beast normal?). Her head swirled with questions she couldn't ask, both awed and horrified that her fellow assassin had come across something so wondrous and terrifying. Rulfio still seethed; she worked to pick her jaw up off the ground. 

“From what I can sense, if there is anything here, it isn't just openly roaming around. But there… there are others, it looks like. Nobody fully changed but there were bodies in what looked like cages, maybe…” He squinted at the wall, as if being able to see through it with his naked eye. 

Rulfio sighed, ragged and annoyed. 

“And we're going to go and find them, aren't we?” Daud gave him a look: something apologetic, something imploring. Rulfio groaned loudly, rolling his eyes. 

“You're an Outsider's bastard for this, literally,” he complained, checking the sword at his side and his pistol at the other. “You promise me right now, Daud, that I'm walking out of here in one piece.” 

“I won't let them hurt you,” he affirmed, a deep conviction in his words. He looked to Jordan as well. “Both of you. I killed one already, I'll do it again, if I must.” 

Jordan's heart leapt to her throat, prompting her to clear it. “Well, what are we waiting for, then?” Her voice squeaked painfully. “Onwards, wolfman.” 

------

The Void thundered in his ears like a sour pulse, urging him towards a destination where he didn't know what awaited him. The Outsider had given him this power to hear and listen correctly, but whatever this noise was, it was repulsive as much as it was magnetic. Surely it wasn't supposed to make his head throb and his ears ring and set his teeth on edge. His hand itched and burned so much he was tempted to chew it off right then and there. The call to leap through the Void, to leave his companions behind was intense beyond measure; he swallowed it down, staying apace as best he could. 

The problem, however, was that he could hardly focus on anything they were saying behind him. 

“So, can I know exactly what we should be expecting when we get there?” Jordan asked, no doubt trying to wrap her head around everything. Rulfio had been filling her in on any other details Daud had neglected to recount, but still, neither of them had any idea what to expect going forward.

And to be honest, Daud didn't know either. What he saw in his Sight didn't make any sense and had only disturbed him; strange bodies had lit up for him like candles, bright yellow against a desaturated world. Sporting long limbs and too-thin bodies, they didn't look like monsters… At least, not yet. 

“Wolfbanner are gigantic, with claws and teeth and huge bodies that heal wounds,” Daud explained, his voice sounding as if his vocal cords didn't heal right after being slashed apart. “But they can also just as easily look like me. They could be weak from being down here so long. Won't know until we get there.” 

Jordan said nothing else; what else was there to say? They were along for his ride, trusting him with an unknown factor, putting their lives in his hands. 

From the amphitheatre, Daud led them down a long, hidden hallway. From there, they entered a room filled from head to ceiling with large, wired hound cages. Daud had not gone this direction when he was first here, but it's clear Jermone did; the cages were busted as if something massive had run into them and a few blood splatters coated the floor and walls. Nothing was fresh, not even the water left over in forgotten bowls. Daud could hear Jordan exclaim behind him. 

“How big did you say these things get, Daud?” She asked, trying to hide the waver in her voice as her eyes trailed the damage above her head height. 

“Whale sized,” he growled and his sensitive ears picked up the gulp in her throat. His jaw worked and he turned forward, another gaze into the Void telling him they were close. “Come on; nothing ahead of us is close to that big.” And certainly not as big as he could get, not that the idea of what he was capable of brought him any comfort. 

Truth be told, he hadn't fully transformed since that first night. Something about exuding such power, being so massive, so noticeable, didn't sit well with him yet. Maybe it would one day, but not now, not when he still had a shred of humanity left.  

The destruction only continued. Jerome, in the blinded state that he had been in, had spared no time destroying whatever his body could touch once he was freed. Splintered wood, tossed tables, a body under rocky rubble. And yet… 

Daud stopped to inspect a room filled with bookshelves and tables. Papers were scattered across the floor while delicate instruments sat behind broken glass. In places rubble was swept aside, pulled into piles of dust and dirt. Daud frowned, brows knitting together while the other two looted on their own time. The soft clink of coin reached his ear before he heard Rulfio grunt. 

“You might wanna take a look at this, Daud,” he rumbled out, pointing to a flipped board. Daud did as he was told, coming to inspect the scribbled writing in chalk. 

Drawings of a whale-wolf, of its size and properties. Dates of when test subjects were attacked, who lived and who died. The length of time between attack and transformation… something about an “incubation period.” And amongst it all, a paper with the crude scribble of the Outsider's Mark, the same as his, on the back of a clawed hand. 

His insides twisted unpleasantly as he turned from the board, cursing. He sat somewhere between ill and angered, of the thought of those innocent people who asked for nothing getting dragged into this for entertainment. How many died? How many were like Jerome, scarred and blinded and starved in chains? 

“This is so fucked up,” Jordan breathed and his gut clenched even more. Something prickled down his neck and he turned to see both of them looking at him, their faces holding too much concern, too much worry. He breathed out through his nose, hard and angry, all of his features turning severe. 

“I didn't bring you here to throw pity at me, you know.” His teeth felt heavy in his mouth and he willed them to stay normal as his fist opened and closed in agitation. “I'm not like those sorry sacks; I'm alive and I'm not locked up. Those individuals are all dead and gone, and I don't plan on joining them.” 

“And the madness?” Rulfio asks, softly. “What is going to stop that, Daud?” 

He snarled, teeth flashing as he brought his hand up. Jordan flinched, but all he did was let the Mark hidden under his glove burn hot enough even they could see it. His claws grew long and he was tempted to stop time, to jump through the Void, to get away from those scared eyes and those judgemental frowns. Instead, he yanked his hand back down, letting the smoke and ash fade away. 

“Do you think me so weak? You think I crawled out of this pit, with my face looking the way I did, to let madness take me? The god of the Void himself decided he wanted me to live, and that magic keeps me here and as myself. I don't intend for that to change any time soon.” 

He stalked out, ignoring their glances and willing away the fur trailing down his neck and over his shoulders. He didn't need to lose control here, in front of them, not when it wasn't their fault. But also he needed the space, needed some place where he could burn off energy and not be looked at like a freak for it. 

As soon as they were out of earshot, he clenched his clawed fist, rushing through the Void. The sensation was cooling against his angry-hot skin, the icy plunge a balm on his emotions, moving the humid air around his body. He jumped again, breathing in the smoke and ash and letting it settle in his chest like the draw from a cigarette. One more, and then another—

Suddenly, he found himself hanging in midair.

He had transversed out of the sewer pipe and above a lower room, sunlight bursting down allowing the whole circular area to be illuminated. It only took a moment of his suspension to realize where he was and why, perhaps, he was unconsciously drawn here. Beneath him were the cages, and through the Void, he could see their sleeping bodies. 

His fist clenched and in an instant he was rushing to them, appearing in front of them in a blink. As the world returned and air rushed back in, he could hear the echoing calls of Rulfio and Jordan. Looking for him, no doubt, as if he would answer their calls like a dog off a leash. If anything he wished now more than ever they would quiet down and act like Void-damned assassins. 

The irony in that, of course, being he was the only assassin in the Isles who actually was Void-damned.

They called for Daud. Daud didn't call back to them. Instead, his attention was pulled fully to the cages and their inhabitants. 

Inside, humans groaned and stirred, but they were only human in passing. Their eyes glowed in the gloom, their limbs long and their chests deep. Strange, heavy breathing escaped mouths thick with mismatched teeth, and broken and brittle nails grew from skinny fingers. Their clothes, if they had any at all, were ripped through, their feet deformed into strange shapes. As one of them locked eyes with Daud, he felt the trickle of a poisoned mind reach his and he recoiled, locking his emotions down and stepping away. 

The rippling growl he heard was his own, escaping out of his chest. 

“Ugly Turned.” 

Heavy footfalls approach from behind him, followed by a metallic scraping. Daud whipped around, his teeth lengthening of their own accord as his lip curled back into a snarl. He crouched into a fight stance, hand hovering over his blade. 

A man approached him, tall and hugely muscled. His head was hairless but only because it was shaved down, his prominent ears sticking out all the more for it. His severe face didn't hold much intelligence, but that was less worrying than the thick heated crowbar he held in his gloved hand. 

“Come to save them, filthy dog? They won't listen.” The man dwarfed Daud by at least two heads: as soon as he was close enough he swung hard for Daud's shoulder, but Daud was leaping away far before the blow landed. The swings were slow, uncoordinated; this man didn't know how to fight outside of brute force. Easy enough to deal with. 

Daud sneered, eyes flashing, and he called on the Void to stop time fully around him. All noise and all movement ceased, giving him full permission to rush his attacker, his sword unsheathing, shining and angry. 

“Won't work,” the man rumbled out, side-stepping Daud's sword swing and countering him easily. The hot metal rod hit Daud squarely in the ribs and his grasp on time dropped. His breath rushed out even as air and sound rushed in; his body toppled, rolling from the force of impact. Black, oily claws grab at his side, assessing if the rib was broken or not. His attacker stalked slowly over, unbothered. 

“You think you're special? I'm special too. Master makes me stronger than you ever will be.” The man brought the crowbar back over his head, looking to smash it into Daud's head. That was, if Daud hadn't already transversed through the Void; the metal clanged loudly onto the wet concrete, sending water droplets flying on impact. He reappeared, ending up behind the Brute, inching closer instead to the holding cages.

Too close, apparently, for the inhabitants behind bars. Wet, wild snarling started up and long, now-sharp claws swiped at his ankles from wherever they could reach. His teeth snapped at them in a bid to intimidate them away but nothing swayed them; their wide eyes held no self-preservation anymore. 

“See? Won't listen,” the Brute reminded him, voice deep and slow. “They’ll only listen to me. Wanna see?” 

He raised a gleaming hand, his smile broken and nasty. Behind Daud, the snarling grew deeper; bones snapped and whines dripping in whalesong ripped out of their throats. In horror, he turned to see their bodies lurching, heaving, changing… 

Metal groaned and claws pushed against bars, bending them like rubber. Their cages were far too small for the monsters those poor souls were destined to become. It was mere seconds before all of them would be bursting forth, rushing him, or worse…

A quick thwip and a heavy thud reached his ears and the man yowled, grabbing at his magical hand. A crossbow bolt had pierced his palm and he bent over, clutching his wrist, but not before another bolt was loosed and buried deep into his thickened thigh. The smell of blood filled his nose and drove the caged wolves into a frenzy as they pressed against their bars. His heart thudded too fast, whales singing in his ears so loud he almost missed the three pistol shots, the gun unloaded. The Brute definitely ate at least one of those bullets but Daud knew better; if that man was exactly like him, then he'd survive. He'd live. 

Through yowls of pain the attacker disappeared, and Daud knew he had fled. However, his absence didn't stymie the chain reaction already in place behind him.  He leapt away, gaining distance; soon those captives would no longer be captives. Blood and fur and screeching came from the cages and he could feel his body lurch and heave in response. 

Fur rippled across his neck and back. He brought his searing hand up to his face, as it stretched and grew and lost its humanity, and he laughed. 

“Fine, you mangy dogs, come to me! Fight! We will see who among us is truly mad!”

His thoughts thundered outward, not caring what minds he touched, and he had the satisfaction of watching at least one of those dogs stop and whine. But then the hinges broke, those mangled bodies poured forth, and his cackling, sharp-toothed smile was all that was there waiting for them. 

------

That wasn't Daud. 

There was no way. Everything in Rulfio's senses was rejecting what he was experiencing, what he was seeing, like a horror story becoming reality. Despite everything he had learned in the last few hours of his life, seeing it, bearing witness— that was another thing entirely.

And what he was bearing witness to, was the form of Daud heaving, smoking, growing, all while four amalgamations of fur and flesh bore down on him. 

Thinking fast, Rulfio grabbed Jordan and pushed her away from the ledge of the sewer pipe, keeping her as far away from this new pit as possible. She naturally protested but he gripped her arm tight, his eyes serious as they searched her face. 

“Get out of here. Now.” 

Her eyes were wide and terrified, darting from him to the commotion down below them. Rulfio shook her again, pulling her in, dominating her visual space so all she looked at was him. 

“But, but I heard him? Daud, in my head…” 

“Jordan listen to me! If you stay here, you will die, and I'm not about to have that on my conscience.” 

“But what about you?” She gasped. A sound like screaming whales reverberated through the room, shaking Rulfio's whole chest and limbs. He pushed her away again as she winced, whimpering from the noise. 

A huge thud. A cry of pain followed by a wet, squelching noise and the snapping of bone. Rulfio refused to turn and look. Jordan paled as the sounds worsened. 

He urged her harder, shoving against her until she was in the other rooms, further away. 

“Go back the way we came,” his voice shook but his hands were still steady. “Once you get to the ampitheatre, go to the right of the doors. There is a sewer outlet three clicks down, it should drop you into Rudshore—” 

Something shuddered the concrete they were standing on and Rulfio's head was filled with a dark, wild laughter. The giddiness of the other mind was enough to overwhelm his own feelings of fear, but he shook it off. Jordan still gaped, too terrified to move. 

Rulfio growled, his teeth gritting together as he pushed her as hard as he could. 

“GO!” He yelled, and that seemed to wake her up. She picked herself up, turned, and ran back into the sewer, leaving Rulfio alone. 

But he wasn't really alone. His breath was ragged, filled with the tumultuous thoughts of another, of someone in the throes of a killing spree. His limbs shook and he closed his fists, steeling himself to turn around and witness the carnage. 

It was more than even he expected. 

A huge wolf monster, black fur glistening with wet-red blood, towered in the center of the room, biting down on the neck of one of the last remaining test subjects. Its dying screeches were unearthly and nothing like what the wolves of Tyvia sounded like during the winters of his youth. It thrashed against the vice of his teeth but then he shook and it's neck snapped, blood gushing out and pooling on the floor in dripping rivers. His head raised up, pulling the neck with his jaws until it was snapping, rending, pulling away from the main body. Twitching, tongue lolling from a lifeless mouth, the prize was pried fully away, tendons giving way in a gorey mess. Daud’s huge hand grabbed it from his mouth and tossed it aside, where it wetly hit the ground, bouncing until it splashed into a puddle, contaminating it. Then, as if an afterthought, his head bent and bit into the creature's shoulder, popping the arm out with a tug, as if he was simply spatchcocking a chicken. 

The other bodies were sprawled out in similar fashion; in the minutes it took for Rulfio to convince Jordan to run, the monster that had once been Daud had completed his wet and gruesome work.

 And now, he was feasting on his kill, teeth crushing bone and tearing flesh. 

It was too much. Rulfio made a strangled noise before his feet gave out and he fell to his knees at the sight and smell of it all. He couldn't have run after Jordan, even if he had wanted to.

A long ear twitched, an eye opened, and suddenly a huge head was turning towards him. This was it; Rulfio’s once-friend brought him to the place he was killed, to be killed in turn. Or maybe worse, maybe he'd wake up tomorrow just as scarred and cursed as the man he once knew, the man who no longer existed, because Daud would never, he wouldn't—

When the curious tendril of emotion extended towards Rulfio, he could feel nothing but nauseated as a response. Concern, worry a small amount of fear. Rulfio shut his eyes, pushing that mind out, feeling it recoil apologetically. When it was gone, he expected to feel claws against his body, white hot and burning, teeth at his neck as he became the next meal—

The seconds passed and Rulfio counted each one. No blow came. No noise of breaking bone or squelching blood reached his ears. Just the drip of water, steady and infuriating. 

“Rulfio.” 

Daud's voice was so close it nearly gave him a heart attack. Eyes flying open, he gasped, seeing Daud standing in front of him. He fell backwards, crawling away before standing back up. 

“Get away from me,” he blabbered, trying to get his breath back, to steady his hammering heart. “Get the fuck—” 

He caught a glimpse of Daud's face, of the expression that would haunt him for weeks and months to come. The hurt hanging on those shoulders, the damaged look in his eyes, silent agony even under that layer of blood and grime and gristle. Rulfio tried to rescind, tried to reach out but it was too late. 

The whisper of Void tickled at his ear. He blinked and in that moment, Daud was gone, vanished, and not a trace of his emotions lingered behind in his wake. 

[dorothylarouge]

US Presidents as Dril Tweets

George Washington: another day volunteering at the betsy ross museum. everyone keeps asking me if they can fuck the flag. buddy, they wont even let me fuck it

John Adams: "ah boo hoo hoo i want to post Foul comments to content leaders" Fat Chance, Dimwit. I will annihilate you under bulwark of the Law and God.

Thomas Jefferson: Q: If your post was proven by a counsil of wise men to be racist, or bullshit, would you bar it from the record? A: I do not delete my posts

James Madison: (sniffing a crumpled up one dollar bill i found on the floor of a dog kennel) ah.. thats greenbacks baby

James Monroe: for decades i have traversed the unforgiving mountains and rivers of south america, hoping to catch a glimpse of the fabled "ass downloader"

John Quincy Adams: "This Whole Thing Smacks Of Gender," i holler as i overturn my uncle's barbeque grill and turn the 4th of July into the 4th of Shit

Andrew Jackson: handing Faves over to my enemies is FRAUD !! base, contemptible FRAUD!

Martin Van Buren: Food $200

Data $150

Rent $800

Candles $3,600

Utility $150

someone who is good at the economy please help me budget this. my family is dying

William Henry Harrison: (spends all of 7 seconds skimming some blog posts) yep. just as i knew all along. having pnuamonia is good

John Tyler: fuck "jokes". everything i tweet is real. raw insight without the horse shit. no, i will NOT follow trolls. twitter dot com. i live for this

James K. Polk: thhere is no such thing as charisma, and art is fake. the only metrics by which we must determine the worth of a man are Strength and Wisdom

Zachary Taylor: the doctor reveals my blood pressure is 420 over 69. i hoot & holler outta the building while a bunch of losers tell me that im dying

Millard Fillmore: trying to heal..... please donate to my go fund me... $10 will make me less racist... $100 will make me extremely less racist...thank you...

Franklin Pierce: blocked. blocked. blocked. youre all blocked. none of you are free of sin

James Buchanan: #NationalGirlfriendDay please cherish your gal's.. in honor of us, the single Boys who must sacrifice all companionship to #CarryTheBrand...

Abraham Lincoln: unloading an entire belt of ammo at me with a minigun or some such device will now get you "Blocked"

Andrew Johnson: who the fuck is scraeming "LOG OFF" at my house. show yourself, coward. i will never log off

Ulysses S. Grant: i regret being tasked the emotional burden of maintaining the final bastion of morality and Nice manners in this endless ocean of human SHIT

Rutherford B. Hayes: using the toilet when i hear Our national anthem start to play. i do what i must. i stand tall in complete agony; as shit runs down my leg,

James A. Garfield: too much truth in such little time. feeling the heat cominh down to silence me... signing off........ for now

Chester A. Arthur: i WILL wise the fuck up. i WILL super charge my content for 2017. i WILL get blue check mark

Grover Cleveland: the way i see it, people who come on here and submit content that is not up to par, could possibly be considered the "Villains" of this site

Benjamin Harrison: i help every body, im not racist, i keep myself nice, and when i ask for a single re-tweet in return i am told to fuck off, fuck myself, etc

William McKinley: boy oh boy do i love purchasing large amounnts of Fool's Gold. wait a minute... fools gold fucking sucks. this stuff is no good..!! Fuck !!!

Theodore Roosevelt: IF THE ZOO BANS ME FOR HOLLERING AT THE ANIMALS I WILL FACE GOD AND WALK BACKWARDS INTO HELL

William H. Taft: ah.. the perfect Souffle! cant wait to dig in to t(*EVERY PIPE IN MY HOUSE EXPLODES AT THE SAME TIME, COVERING ME IN SHIT AND BOILING WATER*

Woodrow Wilson: the conflicted supersoldier stares over the horizon as he smokes a cigarette. "war is the most fucked up thing ever." he takes a sip of beer

Warren G. Harding: somebody please Bribe me

Calvin Coolidge: aggressively joyless oaf hhere. painfully obnoxious respect demander checkign in. extremely dim witted frowning man looking for pals

Herbert Hoover: it is really quite astonishing that I have yet to win The Lottery, given how good I am at selecting six numbers and saying them out loud

Franklin D. Roosevelt: ive never heard of this “europe” but it sounds like a big bunch of shit to me

Harry Truman: everybody wants to be the guy to write the tweet that solves racism once and for all because it would look good as hell on a resume

Dwight D. Eisenhower: my "F*&k It!! Let's Go Golfin" t-shirt maintains a tenacious stranglehold on my life. after 1,125 days of Golf my body is twisted, deformed

John F. Kennedy: when you do sutuff like... shoot my jaw clean off of my face with a sniper rifle, it mostly reflects poorly on your self

Lyndon B. Johnson: incredibly handsome , charismatic famous boy credited with ending income inequality after saying that slumlords should be called "dumblords"

Richard Nixon: i attribute the complete failure of my brand to the actions of detractors, oor my “trolls”, as it were, as well as my own constant fuckups

Gerald Ford: shutting computer down until the shitty moods & attitudes can fuck off., if you need me ill be on my other computer, sititng 60° to my right

Jimmy Carter: i warnned you all that bad things would happen if you kept letting your wives wear jeans. AND NOW LOOK! the damn gas prices are up again

Ronald Reagan: spend a lot of time thinking about how sometimes even war criminals can be heroes sometimes... Dont like it? Click the unfollow buttobn

George H.W. Bush: just thought off an idea i believe to be bad ass. lets find the address of the leader of isis, and mail him/ her pieces of our SHIT

Bill Clinton: were at the point now, that when i offer to impregnate my girl followers, people assume my motives are sexual. disgusting, grow the fuck up,

George W. Bush: friday night gathering up together a big pile of things i like to respect (flags, crucifixes ,etc) and just roll around in it ,give kisses,

Barack Obama: my IQ has increased 10 points ever since i stopped tollerating people mucking about, on the time line

Donald Trump: THERAPIST: your problem is, that youre perfect, and everyone is jealous of your good posts, and that makes you rightfully upset.

ME: I agree

Joe Biden: I will shut the fuck up , IF , it will restore the Harmony. I will get on my knees like a dog and make that sacrifice, for the sake of Calm

[seventhemaverick]

Astro Observations 2 🪽

Thank you for 120+ followers!! <3 this post has opinions and personal observations. Don’t take it too serious my babies. I love ur feedback. Please be kind, inform me otherwise!

☁️ I love how many people in the Astrology community are Scorpio risings, have dominant scorpio/8H placements/degrees, strong pluto influence like we’re all trying to find the meaning to all the f*ck shit that happens in our lives

☁️ Another dominance that I see in a natal chart that is really into these practices is Uranus and Neptune.

☁️ Lilith dominance in a natal chart can be rough especially when they make conjunctions to mars or Pluto. Men can sometimes be so mean to you especially when you both are around other people and you’re just like what just happened 😃? You were just telling me your deepest secrets and desires?? Odd… Á la poubelle 🚮

☁️ Speaking of Lilith, I get annoyed hearing that certain asteroids like Lilith and Chiron aren’t considered a part of a stellium 🙄 because if you can have Lilith dominance in your chart you should be able to consider it a part of your stellium as well? Same with Chiron. If there’s many aspects to those signs as well and if everything is energetically interconnected like astrology tries to show us, you would think those two asteroids at most would be considered. Especially because these asteroids play significant roles in HEALING *cough Chiron cough* and stepping into your power (Lilith). Both asteroids take a shorter amount of time to orbit the sun than most outer planets and some inner planets likeee cmon y’all.. me complaining because I’d technically have a Sagittarius stellium if Chiron and Lilith was included

☁️ Whatever quadrant(s) the majority of your placements fall in is what you are meant to focus on in this life. In the last quadrant, your focus could be on the world around you, humanitarian causes. A lot of planets in your first quadrant your mission in this lifetime is to be more self focused.

☁️ Intercepted houses are interesting... I’m very thankful I don’t have them because my chart is already 😀😗 .. yea. But I realized I’ve come across a lot of people with them and those houses if you don’t know already have a lot of focus on the house it pertains to. Example: intercepted houses in the 1st and 7th house means one of your life’s mission is learning how to assert yourself, set boundaries, find balance in relationships and your free time.

☁️ People that have intercepted houses usually attract people that has signs that rule those houses to teach them significant life lessons. So if you have 1st and 7th intercepted you’ll have someone who probably has Aries/libra in big three or within their chart , if you have 2nd and 8th you’ll attract someone with Taurus/Scorpio in big three or in their chart etc etc

☁️ If you’re feeling unstable it’s best to connect with the element you have most dominant in your chart. Whether it’s literally connecting to that element by physically interacting with it or you are doing the themes in relation to that element. This also applies to whatever sign your mars is in. Surrounding yourself with the element associated with your mars can allow you to release and ground yourself.

☁️ For instance, if you have a lot of water in your chart/water mars, swimming or being by the water and journaling, drawing, whatever creative outlet feels most healing to you by the water can bring you some peace. Talking to the ocean, lake, etc. can be grounding and if you’re really into esoteric practices you can give the water an offering in exchange for peace of mind. Earth, going on a hike, feeling the earth (not concrete yuck) with your bare soles/palms can be helpful, hugging and talking to trees. (Side note fun fact, removing vines that are wrapping a tree is also like an offering because vines growing around trees are invasive and preventing it from receiving sunlight, ultimately killing it. Save your local trees!! I see this as a form of an offering as well) Mother trees will help you most. Fire, first and foremost please be careful. Secondly, working with candles can be very healing and watching the light, taking walks when it’s really sunny, sun bathing, solar plexus yoga could bring much peace. Sun bathing your yoni when the sun is at its peak :) it really works. Air, burning incense whilst having good air ventilation, journaling, stimulating activities like running or jogging while simultaneously working on the breath. Breath work, mental workouts like chess. I might do a post about all Mars signs and specific activity outlets. Lmk in the comments if you guys would be interested :)

☁️ To break out of your comfort zone, to attract newness into your life, connect with the element you have least in your chart!

☁️ The element you have least of is what you tend to attract in others

☁️ People that connect more to sidereal astrology usually have some old soul-ness to them. I’ve observed it’s usually modern Astrology earth placements, mostly Taurus placements that tend to value that system more from what I’ve seen

☁️ I’ve noticed water sign placements/dominance like anime and k-pop a lot. Honorary mention is Aquarius but more towards anime.

☁️ I saw @harmoonix say this in one of their posts recently but this has been sitting in my drafts for over a month so I’m gonna agree and add on lol (love ur posts fr— trendsetter 💐) Aquarius placements, especially in the big 3, love video games. Love playing games on their phone and on a console. Love technology, it’s their safe space— a way to get away from the world. Aquarius does rule over technology! They’re the most tech savvy in the family. Their elders in their home relied on them for that stuff lol.

☁️ Sagittarius placements, esp mercury usually have different genres and languages of music in their catalog

☁️ For Sagittarius to be in detriment in Mercury that placement has many fantastic writers, poets, lyricists etc.

☁️ Earth placements, especially Capricorns can out smoke you. Out-any-substance you fr it’s actually crazy to witness 😂😂.

☁️ Your Groom (5129) or Briede (19029) in your natal chart can not only show the actual sign or house placements that your partner may have but the synastry overlays you both may have as well. For example you may have your groom asteroid in the sign virgo. Your spouses natal placements especially big 3 could have those planets fall into your sixth house. Virgo rules the sixth house.

☁️ This picture above is all Libra placements during this south node in Libra transit. The area Libra resides will show up and out! Villain era fr. Big 3 Libra placements will feel this way the most! This transit has me not giving ANY f*cks!

☁️ Your solar return rising sign is very important. It will tell you the themes that will take place in the new year ahead. For example: Virgo rising in your solar return has you more work and health focused. Should I make a post about solar return risings lmk in the comments!

☁️ It’s also interesting that your rising and moon sign in your solar return chart can pertain who you most come into contact with during. So if your rising is Leo that year you’ll probably befriend, get closer to, date many Leo’s or people that have Leo placements/degrees in their chart :). I can confirm that within each ascendant I have had in my returns since studying astrology the people I was closer to/in contact more with during the time period had those placements in big three especially.

☁️ not an observation but a statement of a dilemma of mine because I cannot choose between placidus and whole sign system. I deeply relate to both. I thankfully don’t have intercepted houses but I can see both sides to the placements in my chart and the different houses they reside in with both systems 😂 ok moving on

☁️ I use placidus house system mostly when I’m reading other people’s chart and whole sign when I’m reading compatibility charts

☁️ placidus is a better system to use for most people because we live in different hemispheres and that system caters to that imo

☁️ I realize most Pisces and Sagittarius placements loveeee green. It’s that Jupiter calling in that abundance!

☁️ Scorpio and Aries are ruled by mars and I have realized people with these placements like purple a lot. Capricorn placements tend to like purple too and cap is exalted in mars! Purple and black are associated with satur(n)day!

☁️ Saw an observation about sag mercuries always interrupt you and it’s true LMAO but they’re very passionate people and I think they just wanna get what they have to say off their chest

☁️ Sagittarius mercuries are the smartest Mercury sign imo.

☁️ Pisces placements especially in the big three are very crafty when it comes to talking their way out of being held accountable

☁️ Being around people that have the signs in your 2nd and 8th house can easily trigger you if you’re not actively working on healing your wounds

☁️ I haven’t met an air sign that doesn’t speak with their face and hands especially Gemini chile

☁️ Mars rules celibacy, Venus rules lust. I realize that people with strong Aries/Scorpio/Capricorn are not into having sex with multiple people simultaneously or can go long periods without having sex. They view sex as a very intimate activity.

☁️ hate to come down on my Venusians but Taurus and Libras and let’s not forget about my girl is exalted in Pisces! People with strong placements in these signs can be loyal but sometimes there can be wandering eyes. Like an itch they want to scratch so bad. Even if they’re very loyal in nature it’s more possible for them to flirt for fun or get into affairs more because they’re hedonistic in nature

☁️ when a Capricorn loves you they will always have your back and put into you financially to help your dreams come true. One of the most attentive , supportive people to have in your corner!

🪽 I wanted to post this sooner but I’m currently grieving the loss of my Capricorn dominant grandmother who was my closest confidant and greatest inspiration, about a month ago. She passed during her Saturn return and Uranus return. She lived an incredible life. Strongest, most fearless person I know. An entrepreneur who knew how to get it! Some people didn’t make it into the new year with us and I hope you know that you have now gained an angel. I’m grateful to the Tumblr astrology community for sharing their knowledge. Astrology really helps me make sense of the world and I’m happy that we all find peace in that. Sending my love and best wishes to you all. Thank you for reading and tuning in xoxo 🪽

[deathbxnny]

Hi I would like to request a part 2 of my previous request for the jinx x fem reader with abandonment issues

"I'm sorry you lost your way home." | Jinx x Reader

(Previous part)

I decided to combine these two, so thank you to the anons and their requests!! I hope you'll like this!<33

(I'm sorry in advance-)

Content: Heavy angst, abandonment issues, heavy spoilers for season 2 act 3, hurt/no comfort, established romantic relationships, death, sfw

Reader was asked to be afab in one of the requests. However, no pronouns are mentioned in the post!

((Not proofread))

The first person to visit you after her disappearance was Vi. The sister you had heard so much about, yet never anything good. But it all melted away at her words.

Your ears were ringing, and for a moment, you wondered if you had perhaps heard her wrong. "... Jinx said that she was going to help someone out before she left with Isha. And... And she swore they'd be back. So don't you lie to me-" You took a deep breath when you stumbled back against the doorway, nearly sliding down the rough wood in terror. Oh, how you wished the ground would open up to swallow you whole.

Vi gave you an unreadable look, her hand hesitantly reaching out to grab you, but she refrained at the last second. You meant the world to Jinx. She had asked her to find you just before... "I'm sorry. But what I'm saying is the truth, I-... They are both dead. There is no doubt about it. I saw it with my own eyes both times and... I can't get the images out of my head." Sweat dripped down your forehead as you only barely heard Vi speak to you.

Life was just becoming good for you... so why did this have to happen?

You both had just recently taken in Isha a while ago and were basically treating her as your child. You saw the way she healed Jinx and made her feel more alive. It meant the world to you to see her that way. And for a while, you perhaps even foolishly believed that things would go well now.

You thought about running away together before, in the darkness of your room, as Isha napped in your arms. You remembered turning to her and whispering, "Let's run away. Let's leave on one of the skyship and go somewhere far away... just the three of us." And you saw it in her gentle gaze, the way she considered it... but it meant nothing in the face of a war she had to fight in.

Looking back on it, you should've maybe seen the signs and listened to the uneasy feeling in your gut when the both of them left for a special mission she refused to tell you about. It was for your own safety she'd say and who were you to intervene or deny her orders? She was always so much more intelligent and stronger than you. You just blindly trusted her. You believed she'd return soon just as she's promised... but she never did.

Neither of them did.

It was radio silence for the longest time. And you hadn't moved an inch from the small apartment Jinx considered to be her second hideout with you and your kid. Not when the war broke out, not when there was a call for arms, not when you peeked out for the barricaded windows at the creepy, white machines that slinked right past your hiding space.

And now you wonder, in the haze of uncertainty and panic, if the balloon you had momentarily seen soar through the sky was her after all. Had the denial misled you into a false sense of foolish security? Did you really, fully believe she'd be back for you? That she'd bring Isha home safely and run away at last? Yes. Yes, you did. You believed it... but received a charred part of one of her bombs in return. A confirmation that it was truly over for the family and future you had built together for the shortest amount of time.

"... leave. Please leave. I can't bare looking at you." You gasped out in-between heaving breaths, unable to stand Vi's presence any longer. Everyone was making you feel sick. What's the point of being a savior if you die? What's the point of seeing a hero if you leave behind what you love the most to suffer in agony?

You had waited so long at this wooden door to your once warm home for their return. For her return. Yet all you were greeted with was the one thing that was left of her. A sister she did still love deep down more than life itself. You, however, could only feel rage.

"Wait. She told me to loom out for you. I can't-" "-I said leave! If it wasn't for you, then we could have left and been happy!" You yelled out, suddenly not caring about hurting anyone's feelings anymore. And god did it hurt. It hurt so much. Because Vi still had a piece of her in her. But it wasn't enough. Nothing would be enough in her and Isha's absence.

Slamming the door into Vi's face and locking it for good measure, you finally fall to your knees and clutch the last, charred thing you had of her to your chest, sobbing. You drowned out Vi's yells and bangs against the door whilst you did so, deciding that if you were in agony, then she didn't deserve any consolation either.

Your worst nightmare had come to fruition, just as the last skyship of the day flew into the sky and left its past behind.

[beifong-brainrot]

I do find it annoying how a lot of Zutara fans tweak the character's stories, personalities and even the timelines to suit their own needs.

Once again, there's nothing wrong with fanon and headcanons, however if looking through the lense of canon, you're objectively wrong.

I ended up stumbling on a post from a Zutara shipper. (At this point I'm regretfully considering not following the tags for Zuko or Katara because I get way too much Zutara content lol) I'm not replying directly to her because I don't want this to turn into an argument, and I know she doesn't take criticism very well.

Ok, So let's break this down.

The character who was first out of the group to trust Zuko?

I'm quite sure this is referring to the scene in Ba Sing Se's caves. And yes, that is a very important scene. I think it's a very important scene preceeding Zuko's 'relapse'. It shows how he's matured during his time in Ba Sing Se and therefore it serves to add to our dismay when he joins Azula. I adore the fact that Zuko's journey to redemption is not linear, it certainly adds a lot to the character and shows us how his trauma affected him.

It's also a horrific moment for Katara. To have her worldview on Zuko and firebenders as a whole challenged, and then for it to go blowing up in her face. It rips open old wounds of her childhood. It refreshes her resentment of Zuko and the Fire Nation as a whole. It parallels the death of her mother when Aang dies due to Azula's lighting and she is unable to do anything about it. It places her back in that spot of helplessness. Even though she's grown up, even though she's a master waterbender, she still comes a hair's breadth to losing one of the most important people in her life.

No wonder she hated Zuko so much after this.

It's an important moment for both characters, but I wouldn't say it is that in a romantic sense. It's a sweet, hopeful moment that then turns absolutely horrific and visceral for both parties.

I could argue that there are other characters who could be given the title of 'first to trust Zuko'. Funnily, Appa being one of them lol.

But other characters trusting Zuko dovetails nicely into the next point.

The character who emotionally connects to Zuko?

Well, technically, I'd argue that most members of the Gaang connect emotionally on one level or another with him?

But I'd argue that Aang is the person Zuko connected with the most. Aang is Zuko's parallel. Aang is the first person to reach out to Zuko. Aang is the person who showed mercy to Zuko, multiple times. Aang is the person who valued Zuko's life, the life of someone whose whole life goal is to capture him.

This was also an incredibly important moment to Zuko. This is the thing he brings up when trying to convince the Gaang to let him join.

Zuko: Why aren't you saying anything? You once said you thought we could be friends. You know I have good in me.

The character Zuko feels safest letting his guard down around?

It's Mai. Love her or hate her, her relationship with Zuko is incredibly important to him. Maiko isn't my favourite Zuko ship, in full honesty. But even platonically, Mai and Zuko are one another's reprieve from their respective shitty lives.

People often talk about Katara touching Zuko's scar while discussing healing his scar, however one could argue that she did so as a medical examination. Mai touching Zuko's scar is a casual thing, neither of them really make a big deal of it and that's the beauty of it.

I'm mainly talking out of my own personal experience, as someone with a huge amount of burn scars, but there is a world of difference between someone inspecting my scars like Katara did and simply accepting them as a part of me, like Mai does for Zuko.

With Mai, Zuko isn't the scarred banished prince, Ozai's son or Azula's brother. He's just Zuko. And they speak freely with one another, arguing like real people do. Often, being comfortable having arguments is actually a sign of being comfortable with one another.

The character who helps Zuko heal from his trauma?

Once again, this is a bit of a flawed question. By the end of the show, Zuko isn't even fully healed, in my opinion. He has made leaps and bounds on the road to recovery, but when he will truly heal if ever is yet to be seen.

Zuko's journey to recovery includes plenty of people. This includes Iroh, Aang, Song and Jin. People who show him the error of his coping mechanism. Who challenge his worldview, who coax him out of the his shell of pain and anger.

The character known for showing most compassion to others?

Yes, Katara's compassion is a huge part of her character. Her need to help and protect those who cannot do that for themselves cannot be understated.

But Aang's compassion for others and all beings is just as great, if not greater than Katara's. Compassion and nonviolence are huge parts of his culture and his own philosophy.

Aang: Wait, we can't just leave him here. Sokka: Sure we can. Let's go. Aang :No, if we leave him he'll die. Aang airbends himself off Appa and retrieves Zuko, bringing him to Appa. Sokka: [Sarcastically.] Yeah, this makes a lot of sense. Let's bring the guy who's constantly trying to kill us.

Friendly reminder that Aang could've absolutely wrecked Ozai, but held back because his own moral compass was so powerful. Hell, he was friendly and nice to Azula, the woman who literally killed him.

This is why Aang and Katara work so well together. They're both incredibly compassionate people who will immediately jump in to help others in need. Like they did during the Painted Lady, destroying the factiry together.

The character who primarily bears the burden of having to step up into a parental role?

I think "parental role" is an incredibly vague term. There's a lot of things that go into a "parental role". Katara plays a stereotypically "maternal" role, while someone who plays a "paternal" one would probably be Sokka.

Katara deals with very "homemaking" tasks like sewing and cooking, etc. And Sokka often takes on the role of leader, hunter, gatherer and also protector, despite being a nonbender.

This coincides nicely with their core childhood traumas. The loss of Katara's mother impacted her greatly, leading her to have to step up into a motherly role. While Sokka was clearly heavily traumatised by his father departing and the crushing responsibility of having to care for his entire village.

Sexism also probably played a part in this dichotomy.

The character who represses their emotions to be strong for others?

I'd argue that this could apply to all the members of the Gaang in some capacity.

Aang's pain is something most of us will never experience and cannot hope to understand. The complete horrific destruction of his culture and home followed him through the entire show. He was entitled to his grief and rage, yet he supressed it. We see during Appa's kidnapping, how easy it would be for Aang to rage, to let himself be destructive. And yet, he wakes up every day and chooses to smile and goof off, because his friends need someone to remind them how to be children.

Sokka puts on a very impressive bravado, despite having a lot of insecurities. However, as the oldest member of the Gaang (pre Zuko) he puts on a facade of the confident and unbothered older brother. Even if he's the butt of almost every joke, he still keeps that demeanour up, letting it slip only a few times.

I'd actually argue that Toph is the person whom this label fits best. While we know Toph as witty, callous and strong, we have to remember that she kept up the facade of her parents' good, helpless little blind girl for no reason other than her mother and father's comfort. She actually hides a lot of her hurt, covering it up with a prickly exterior.

I want to do longer think pieces about Toph and Katara so apologies if this isn't complete.

I'm actually baffled by the idea of Katara repressing her emotions. She's actually quite straightforward and open about her feelings. She yells and feels a lot of emotions and lets them be heard. She gets angry and sad. She's actually kinda bitchy sometimes and that's honestly why I love her so much.

The whole inciting incident of the show was her getting so pissed off she somehow pulls a giant iceberg from the bottom of the sea.

She is anything but repressed.

She is angry.

She's angry at the fire nation, at Sokka, at her father, at men, and with good right to be so.

This is what makes her an amazing character and one who broke the mould of a lot of female characters at the time. Her anger and unrestrained emotions rang true with a lot of watchers at the time. I'm not sure why this is being taken away from her rather than celebrated.

I reiterate the point I made at the beginning of this post: there is nothing wrong with headcanons and fanon interpretations for one's enjoyment. I do find it a bit odd when it changes a character too much (because then, why not just create an oc?) but it's all in good fun. However, you shouldn't push that onto other people and how they perceive canon and you certainly shouldn't use it to take away from other characters. It's a very unfair way of entering discourse.

[allbark-no-bite]

Ignorance is Bliss || Coriolanus Snow x reader

summary: there’s something to love about the simplicity of boyhood. or in which there’s still good in Coriolanus and you love him

warnings: none really. this is just self-indulgent fluff. maybe slight mention of smut

word count: 1.3k

authors note: okay first of all ik everyone here spells it Coryo, but i much prefer Corio. the Hunger Games was the first ever fandom that i wrote for nearly 8 years ago (please don’t read my wattpad) and i’m so excited to have an up to date fic posted on here! the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes revived my love for the series and i hope you all enjoy :)

The sky shifts from a faint blue to yellow with the approaching evening light. In just a few minutes the swarms of awakening insects will be almost too much to bear. He swallows, and the combination of his dry mouth and the lack of humidity makes it feel as though his throat sticks together with the action. Being so deep in the forest, away from the rest of civilization, the air out here is so fresh that just breathing it is dizzying.

By now he's so used to the polluted air of District 12 that this sort of clarity is a startling but welcomed reprieve. In the Capitol, he'd grown up hearing stories of the miners in 12 who would eventually succumb to the horrific fate of suffocation, their lungs black from years of inhaling coal dust. Even after just a few months of being assigned as a peacekeeper to the district, the undersides of his fingernails had turned permanently black with the dust.

The games are far from his mind these days—at least most of the time they are. He has done his best to put those horrors in the past. He is no longer a Capitol student, fighting to prove that he belongs there in his hand me down shoes and shirts with buttons made of bathroom tile. Those days now seem like an entirely different lifetime.

His heart rate slows to the point that his chest hardly rises, and his only sign of consciousness is the occasional flicker of his eyes as he fights to keep from dozing off. He lies there watching the sky and counts the hours until the sun is swallowed by the horizon.

It's considerably quiet save for the breeze moving through the leaves of the trees overhead and the occasional snap of a twig underfoot of a forest animal. Five more minutes and he'll get up.

Movement at his side makes him grunt. It's not much, just a shifting of weight, but it still forces a puff of air out of him. Underneath the cream undershirt of his uniform is a mess of slowly healing, raw pink flesh. His body still hurts from weeks ago.

The district boy's spear had stabbed straight through  the muscle of his shoulder and was rapidly on the mend thanks to Dr. Gaul. The burns on his back were healing on their own accord, albeit slower than he would have liked. All things considering, his wounds had been relatively insignificant.

He had seen tributes sustain much worse things in the games before. He'd take a couple of burns over a severed head any day.

This time the weight lifts almost completely from crevice of his side and his attention shifts to the body beside him. You'd been curled up, asleep at his side the the better part of an hour.

"Where are you—" His question is cut off as your weight returns, this time into the pit of his stomach, curling up against the curve of his lean body. It half knocks the breath out of him. You have the tendency to do that to him.

With your cheek pressed into his gut, your hand reaches out for his own and he willingly complies, linking his slender fingers with your own. Perhaps you don't realize it but this is the same way he first touched you, hand in hand back in the zoo, and it will always mean more than anything to him. It is this thought that causes him to bring your wrist to his mouth and press his lips against it.

His mouth is warm against your skin, and even if you don't know exactly where the gesture of affection came from, you reciprocate it with the same tenderness.

"What are you thinking about?" You finally ask, breaking a long hour of comfortable silence.

You.

Rather than answering, Coriolanus hums in acknowledgment of your question. "Corio—" At the same time, he swings his leg over your hip, switching positions so that his body is hovering above your own.

"Hi."

You grin, fingers grabbing hold of the cool metal of his dog tags that hang down from his neck.

"Hi."

Looking pleased with himself, he dips his head down, capturing your lips with his own. You were his, and he was constantly refiguring that out.

The kiss is sweet, tamer than what you're used to from him. Not that he's ever been unpleasant, you adored Coriolanus and just about everything about him. But he was a man. A boy growing into a man and that came it, its own boyish tendencies. Regardless, rarely ever did you discourage his wandering hands.

You can't help but smile at the feel of his lean, brawny body pressed against yours. He'd been thin with hunger back at the Capitol. His time in District 12 training as a peacekeeper had done him well. Not only had he become sturdier with muscle, but somehow taller too. One of his legs is wedged between your own, and through his trousers you can feel him, half hard with interest.

Coriolanus pulls away from the kiss at the feel of your lips pulled into a smile. His brows furrow together in confusion, but your smile is infectious and soon enough his own frown is tilted upwards. "What? What are you smiling about?"

You attempt to subdue your grin at his inquiry, but it's to little avail, and that only drives his insistence. "(Y/n). What've I done?"

"Nothing," you laugh, a palm coming up to cup the side of his jaw so that your thumb can smooth over the sharp protrusion of his cheekbone. Normally the action would be enough to distract him, but he's persistent.

"(Y/n)."

“Really, it's nothing," you insist. "I just... I love you." That is what you settle on. I love you.

You love the naivety in which he is able to love. Pure and untainted by heartbreak. Too young to know much at all. Even too inexperienced to realize that there were more ways to satisfy his desire for you than just kissing. His body wanted you in the way that a man wanted a woman, and while he surely felt the effects of that attraction, his pure intentions had yet to stray.

Coriolanus' clear blue eyes narrow in slight skepticism but he doesn't press you any further. "I love you too," he says, lifting his hand to slip his fingers into your hair and massage at the base of your scalp. At the same time, his thumb presses up into your jaw, tilting your chin upwards so that he can kiss you again.

This time you indulge him further and kiss him back a bit more forcefully than before. Your hand finds the short crop of his blonde hair, and like a cat preening under the attention, his body reacts in tandem. He half snorts in amusement at your reciprocation but doesn't comment, too pleased to pull away long enough to taunt you.

Coriolanus takes it upon himself to deepen the kiss, the force of his lips upon yours not yet bruising but certainly heading there. His tongue slips past your lips, exploring the taste of your mouth. At the same time, one of his slender hands slides down your side, his fingers grasping at the curve of your hip.

The day will come that his desires get the best of him, and he’ll want more of you. Frivolous things such as the wrestling and the making out that the two of you do now won’t satisfy him later. And while the thought doesn’t bother you, it’s nice what you have with him now. It’s so simple and so easy to love him and his still boyish self now. The time will come eventually, and that’s okay. You’ve got a lifetime together after all.

[ironunderstands]

Topaz appreciation post because she’s been rotating around my brain like a rotisserie chicken and I need y’all to get her like I do 

Genuinely, I believe her to be the most underrated limited 5 star in the game everything wise, because she is so damn interesting and nobody talks about it ever and it drives me nuts.

So, I’m going to make you understand why exactly I love her and what makes her so amazing in the first place.

Her lore 

Topaz’s lore is rather simple, at least compared to other characters in the game, but simple ≠ bad and her story serves her perfectly.

Long before Topaz was Topaz, she was a girl named Jelena, living in a desolate planet at the edge of the galaxy. The economy of this planet was based around mining and industry, which resulted in her home becoming more and more polluted as time went on. The wildlife almost completely disappeared, people had to wear masks to breathe, and it seemed like her planet was reaching a hopeless, dismal end.

Until the IPC came. They promised to fix everything, and heal her planet of its environment problems, in exchange for every person on the planet signing a contract of indentured servitude to the IPC. Seeing no other way out, Topaz’s home accepted, forever tying her and the rest of the planet to the IPC.

Topaz is was (and still is) incredibly talented and competent, excelling in science, economics, finances, math, etc. Her exceptional talents caused her mentor  and parental figure Dvorski, who works in the Strategic Investment Department to recommend her to Jade, one of his superiors. Presumably, this is how she started her climb up the corporate latter, eventually becoming the Topaz we know and love today. 

Throughout this, she maintained her friendly and headstrong attitude, and never abandoned her love for animals or the people in her life like Dvorski, a trait which will be important for later. 

So, I’ve established the basics, so what makes this interesting?

Topaz’s trauma and how it affects her character 

I feel like a lot of people ignore just how much trauma she really has, and how it affects the way she behaves in the present.

For starters, her love of animals. Sure, Numby is adorable and in general this is a rather fun trait for a character to have, it’s not something you would consider to be a sign of something darker. 

However, remember that Topaz’s planet almost lost all of the life on it, and she witnessed firsthand almost every creature she knew and loved either go extinct or become severely endangered. 

So, when you view her love for animals through this lense, it’s easy to see that she’s so attached to animals because Topaz almost lost them forever, and this trait manifests in a lot of the behavior she exhibits.

According to Topaz herself, her efficiency goes up 27% when Numby is with her, and it seems to be blatantly obvious that being around animals give her at the very least a peace of mind/sense of comfort. I mean in game she is Topaz and Numby for a reason, and her relationship with them is a core part of the way she behaves. When Topaz can’t ground herself, she has Numby to help her with that, which hurts even more considering she is likely going on these missions alone 90% of the time, meaning her literal only friend is a pet/animal. 

Considering Topaz’s biological parents never get mentioned, it’s not hard to assume she is orphaned or at the very least estranged from them, likely due to the disaster on her planet, leaving her only loved ones to be her pets and Dvorski. Losing one half of the only support system she has would be devastating for Topaz, which is likely why she brings Numby everywhere (also considering I don’t think she has mentioned him in the present, her pets might literally be the only things she has left). 

In her own home, Topaz collects a myriad of species from across the galaxy, as if to preserve them so at least even if they disappear on their home planets like hers did, they won’t go extinct entirely. 

Personally, I think her fixation around them cooperating and coexisting also reflects on how she feels about other people. If animals from completely different planets can get along, so can people. If she can convince creatures lacking in intellect work together, then she can do the same for ones that possess it, as ultimately Topaz is a massive people person, and believes what she’s doing is best for the galaxy. 

It’s almost like an experiment, with every little change to their ecosystems, every new organism added, every new abiotic feature taken or removed, Topaz can simulate what that might be like in reality. In a way she wants to take care of humans  like she does her pets, however instead of doing it through her own means, she uses the IPC and her power as a Stoneheart as a vector for that.

But why is she so confident? What makes Topaz wholeheartedly believe that what she’s doing really is the best for the galaxy, even if we know it isn’t perfect, even if only ~80% of the planets she works on are “saved”?

Well, like always, it’s her trauma again.

Imagine you’re living on a planet slowly dying due to its people’s greed and ignorance, in which everything you know and love is falling apart, and absolutely nothing can be done about it. But you don’t need to imagine this, I mean this is a situation we are all going through, as it’s already what’s happening to our planet right now, so perhaps instead picture what it might be like to live here in a few decades if nothing changes. How miserable that would be, how upset you would be at those in power, how disappointed you would be in humanity for doing Nothing when we had so much time and already knew the consequences almost a century in advance (seriously we have known about climate change since like the 50s). 

So you give up hope and accept your fate, accept that everything is going down in flames and the humanity, the planet you know and love is going to be snuffed out forever.

Only to get saved when an outside influence comes to your assistance. Sure, they make everyone sign a contract binding their lives to them, but you wouldn’t have a life to give had they not helped. Besides, you owe it to every other thing that shares your planet with you, every plant, every animal, every organism has been utterly wiped out by human greed, so it’s only fair to pay them back, right? 

I mean it’s your whole world at stake, so how could you say no? How could you deem their terms unreasonable if clearly your own people didn’t deserve the responsibility they had over their own lives? If their situations could only be fixed by giving it to others who could guide them? By giving it to the IPC? The Preservation ?

This is the mindset Topaz grew up on and has known for her entire life. She has seen humanity utterly fail itself and is unwilling to allow that fate to befall others. She doesn’t trust other people to make the right decisions, she doesn’t think they know what’s best for them, because the people she was closest to, her very own people couldn’t do that, so how could she ever expect strangers to do the same? 

How could she ever give the leaders of these planets the benefit of the doubt, knowing that doing that for her own almost caused it to be wiped out completely? How could she see them as anything more than the selfish bastards who ruined everything? How could her heart not ache thinking there were people on the planets she helps who would be doomed to experience the fate that almost fell upon her had Topaz not stepped in. 

How could Topaz feel guilty over the planets that don’t succeed? The ones she can’t save? As after all, she thinks they were lost from the get go? Does it eat her up at night knowing she failed them? That she couldn’t prevent the folly of humanity this time, so the next planet she must work harder, be more stubborn, push back even more, so nobody ever experiences what she did instead?

I mean being an indentured servant hasn’t been that bad for her, she’s succeeded in every endeavor she’s set her mind to after all. Sure, she’s entirely alone, and sure, if the IPC no longer deems her or her people useful, they could cast them aside once again. 

But Topaz is smart, she climbed to the top of the latter, she’s been praised to hell and back, she’s known far and wide through the department for her efficiency and drive, surely she hasn’t done anything wrong?

Sure she’s heard whispers, rumors and projects of other departments, of the deep dark secrets of the company she owes her life too. Inwardly she wonders how those who follow the Preservation would even be willing to commit such atrocities, inwardly she hopes they are just rumors. The IPC saved her planet, so how could they destroy others? 

The Preservation’s power will protect all, will save them from their miserable existences. Nothing else matters in the process, no dissenter understands this as like Topaz does. She will save them, she will protect them, even if it means she is detested by everyone she encounters, it must be done. All for the Amber Lord.

I find it very compelling how despite the fact that Topaz has become a Stoneheart, she is still dressed in the fashion of an average IPC worker. As if she is an equal part of the puzzle as them. Equally useful, equally disposable, equally biased, equally ignorant, and equally foolish. 

I mean, how could she be anyway else?

Her future

Belabog was just as important for Topaz’s development as she was to it.

She was wrong. 

As stubborn as Topaz is, she is not arrogant, and when Bronya proved to her that the people of Belabog can and would fight for their future, Topaz did everything in her power to help them.

As that’s what she really cares about, people. 

I think Topaz the determination she has in Bronya and it shook her to her core. 

Because so far, the only way Topaz has seen real progress is from the hands of the IPC.

But Bronya doesn’t give into them, and she puts everything she has into saving her people. Moreover, Jarilo-VI follows the Preservation as well, but they don’t agree with the IPC’s method of it. 

Is the IPC wrong?

That is the question Topaz is faced with, what is the thing she has to grapple with once she leaves the planet. When they demote her for not getting the debt back immediately, does Topaz wonder why they were so concerned about that in the first place? Shouldn’t they be happy that a world blessed by their very own deity managed to pick itself up without their help? Isn’t that the point?

Does she think back to her previous projects, the planets she saved and the planets she failed, and wonder how it would have worked out without the IPCs involvement? 

Did Aventurine teasing her about “failing” the Jarilo-VI project confuse her, because they were still saved like Topaz wanted them to be in the first place? How could they ever be considered a failure?

She believes debts and payback are what holds planets together, but it only ever seemed to cause Belabog to fall apart.

This is the first time Topaz really is forced to reevaluate her priorities, to question if her methods are justifiable, if she’s really doing the right thing.

Belabog didn’t break her, it didn’t topple her worldview and turn everything on its head, but it did plant some seeds of doubt in her brain, seeds of doubt that will grow into a new mindset. 

HOYOVERSE IF YOU ARE LISTENING HOYOVERSE, GIVE HER THE MENTAL BREAKDOWN + PRIORITY REEVALUATION ARC SHE DESERVES!!! DO THAT AND MY LIFE IS YOURS PLEASE.

Like you don’t get it you don’t get it what do you mean they set all this up and they might not go anywhere with it. Please hoyo please please please let her break away from the IPC’s condition and warped perspective, please let her truly follow the Preservation, please make her turn away from them, please make her an emanator of Preservation after she does this. Topaz stoneheart form, Topaz emanator form. Please please please let her save the crew let her save her subordinates let her save the people she failed previously let her save Aventurine and Ratio let her save Numby let her save herself.

Her instability 

I have already somewhat touched on this in point #3, but Topaz just cannot exist in the state she is now permanently.

Like a radioactive element she’s going to slowly decay over time until she ends up in a more stable form, and who that will hurt in the process, and how long that will take, we will have to see.

Hypocrisy is not something that can exist for long within characters, as due to its inherent contradictions, it messes with the way they are characterized until they are eventually forced to either eliminate it themselves or have the story do it for them.

Topaz is a hypocrite, desiring to do good and help people, but she ends up hurting them in the process. 

However, she has only just begun to realize this, and as more and more of the IPC’s atrocities get revealed, it gets harder and harder for both the audience and her herself to justify her behavior as we witness the extent of their crimes.

So how has she remained this stable for so long?

Well, the IPC has done everything in their power to keep her that way. From a young age she was involved with them, as they not only saved her planet, but her only known parental figure worked in the Strategic Investment Department. Soon, he recommended her to Jade due to Topaz’s exceptional talent, and presumably the other Stoneheart quickly picked her up and took her under her wing, causing Jelena to rise fast within the ranks and become one herself.

The IPC has been Topaz’s only frame of reference for how things should be done, her only perspective on write and wrong for so long. The only hints she gets of other points of view are that of the people who destroyed her planet, her own people. Unintentional or not, Topaz has been made to feel her whole life like the IPC are heroes and the common people are foolish and greedy and evil, and only now has that worldview started to crumble piece by piece.

Sure, we have always known how terrible the IPC was, a perception that has only gotten more and more true over time. However, Topaz is not the audience, and in universe the IPC presents themselves in a very positive light.

Think of the Myriad Celestia trailer and how it portrays the IPC; that’s quite literally how they want to be viewed in game, how they market themselves to other people. If Topaz has only ever known them to be that great, shining, progressive company who vows to follow the Preservation and improve the universe, how could even begin to criticize them? After all, she had never known any other perspective. Even when she did fail in the past, Topaz viewed it as a strike on her own record and an unfortunate situation in general, not as a demonstration of the IPC’s misdeeds. 

The IPC is good, the IPC saves people, the IPC follows the Preservation, Topaz is a good person, Topaz does good things, Topaz helps people, Topaz saves people, there is nothing wrong, there won’t ever be anything wrong.

Until Belabog

They don’t want to cooperate with the IPC. To roll over and let themselves be gutted for all they are worth. 

Well that’s fine, that’s happened before, at least that’s how Topaz justifies it to herself. She thinks of their massive debt, it must be paid after all, otherwise how could the galaxy remain stable?

But the weapons the IPC gave Jarilo-VI were never used in its defense. The thing they owe the IPC for never ended up being valuable. Belabog stood on its own, without the help of IPC in its defense.

They saved themselves.

As if it couldn’t get worse, they did it with the power of the Preservation.

And it didn’t come from the IPC, it came from them.

The Interastral Peace Corporation, who claim to be followers of the Preservation, standing against people who really do have their blessing and being proved wrong.

Do you know how that would feel to Topaz.

She’s wrong, and she’s proven wrong by the very deity she claims to follow, she believes she follows.

So Topaz makes her choice.

Stick with the IPC’s plan, or stand with the people of Belabog 

And she stands with them.

Topaz’s character never changes. I hate when people act like she switched up on them and changed her whole worldview, but in reality that was the most in character thing Topaz has ever done in her entire life.

Because she cares about people, so when the opportunity presents itself, she will always stand with them. 

This is the first time Topaz goes against the IPC’s wishes, and it won’t be the last.

She made her choice, she demonstrated who and what she truly cares about, and that will only drive a wedge between her and the IPC further and further until she snaps.

I find it funny how Topaz is a fire type character, when the song core to Belabog’s themes is “Wildfire” 

However, maybe it isn’t just about them. I think it’s about the Preservation, about what the game in general is trying to tell its players.

How fighting for your right to exist will hurt, but it is not impossible, and that pain will be the only way to enact change.

Well, Topaz,

you made your choice

go fight against your fate 

Thank you so much for reading! I really enjoyed making this and I hope you at least understand why I think Topaz is such a compelling character. I need an arc centered on her in the future and if I don’t get one then trust me things will be dealt with. She will get her just desserts.

[letters-to-lgbt-kids]

My dear lgbt+ kids, 

If you are online a lot, especially in spaces or bubbles where people often share their experiences „for awareness“, you may feel like it’s your obligation to share your own life experiences as well. 

This can be a subconscious thing. You would likely never sign your name on „Every gay person who had a traumatic encounter with a homophobic person needs to make a TikTok about it or else they fail their community“ or „If you’re disabled and trans you need to post about your specific struggles or else you don’t even care about visibility for your own communities“. But you may come across people who did make a video or post about their struggles - and feel some guilt or shame when you realize you experienced the same but don’t talk about it. You may feel like they’re using their voice to do something and you just sit around. Or alternatively, you may see those things and feel „inspired“ to share your own story, so you rush to do it.. and later on you realize you actually didn’t feel inspired, you just felt uncomfortable. You didn’t actually want to share your story with strangers and you kinda feel worse now, but you had to do it for awareness, right?

If you relate to any of that, here’s some things I want you to know: 

You don’t owe anyone a list of all labels you identify with. You don’t owe anybody a list of your medical diagnoses. You don’t owe anyone a list of all traumatic events in your life. Asking you for that would be considered wildly inappropriate in almost all circumstances offline… so it definitely can’t be the measure for how „good“ or „brave“ you are online, either. 

Most people who share their stories online don’t really only do it for awareness. They also do it because they want to receive sympathy, comfort, praise, the feeling of community, the unbiased confirmation that what happened to them was wrong etc… or even just the relief of getting it out of their system. And there’s nothing wrong with that! We are all human beings who need each other. But it may take some pressure of you to remember that those posts are not always some selfless, heroic deed purely done for activism. 

Sharing your story online doesn’t necessarily do that much. Don’t get me wrong, it can be really brave and it can definitely start conversations! I don’t mean to discredit anyone who decides to share something deeply personal. But: not every post gets viral or reaches anyone besides the people who already agree with it. So if you don’t really want to talk about being bullied in school, you certainly don’t need to feel like you have to. Who says that it would be YOUR post, out of all the posts about bullying, that’d end up super viral and start some big conversation about bullying and end up in the news? Maybe it’d just get 15 likes and two bot comments. No need to feel guilty on missing out on that. 

Talking about a traumatic experience can bring relief and that’s valid.. but it can also be counterproductive to your healing process. Sharing it „for awareness“ will not be worth it if it makes you feel overwhelmed, unlocks memories you’re not ready to confront in detail, comes with the risk of putting you into a depression spiral, re-traumatizes you by bringing back feelings you felt in that situation etc. Put your healing first. 

People can be real mean, especially when they can hide behind the anonymity the internet offers. Sharing something vulnerable can spread awareness but it can also make you a target of hate, ridicule, disbelief and bullying. This is especially important to consider if it’s something you’re still struggling with or healing from. Not wanting to get mean comments is a valid reason to not share something. Again: Put your healing first. 

You know all that and still want to share your story? All the more power to you! My point here is not to silence your voice. If you WANT to share your story, it can be a really great thing to do. 

I just want to remind you that you should only do it if you truly want to. Never do it out of pressure or obligation - there is none. Your story is yours. You have the right and power to keep it or share it as you wish. 

With all my love, 

Your Tumblr Dad 

[brucewaynehater101]

Apologies if I'm remembering wrong but I recall you posting/reblogging a post of Tim being afraid for Damian after he became Robin, thinking Red Hood would redirect his ire to him

Let's expand on that, Damian finding out about all the horrible shit Tim went through and put himself through and beginning to dread being Robin more and more but not wanting to take it back because he doesn't want to add onto Tim's pain

((and also because giving up robin would make him look week, but that's just an excuse))

So Damian is wrecked with anxiety because when is the hammer gonna drop and he'll receive what Tim did?

And if Tim's inheritance is going to be his, that means inheriting all the labor he is endures when running Wayne Enterprises, and etc

And Damian—wrong as he is—thinking himself selfish for hoping Tim stays in the family just so the day he inherits his duties comes later

Damian bonding with Tim over pain the latter experienced and the former is certain he will as well

((and also imagine what will go through Damian's head if he were to find out Tim doesn't even consider himself an actual Wayne member and just a Placeholder to keep the family from crumbling to pieces like that other post, a Placeholder until Jason and Damian came))

((and suddenly his assassination attempts seem like all for nothing and even self-sabotage, woof))

Hello! It seems that there are two of my posts you're referring to here (which is super super cool). This is going to be a long post cause it inspired me to really look at their dynamic and explore it.

One post talks about how Tim became Red Robin and didn't choose another mantle. There's a few reasons for this (like not being able to step down from his role of helping Bruce), but the reason you're referring to is another theory of mine. Tim may be Red Robin to share the burden and pain being Robin entails. He doesn't want Damian to face it alone. By being Red Robin, he can shoulder some of the ire from Batman.

The other post has Tim, who signed himself up to being Jason's placeholder both in an out of the mask, seeing himself as worthless and temporary. Both of his roles, being Jason and being Robin, got filled by Jason and Damian later.

Now that we've got the background, I absolutely love your take on this. I will add a few fics that expand on this view, but I do want to talk about it more first.

Unfortunately, Damian is used to a lot of abuse before coming to live with the Waynes (I love good mom Talia, but training to be an assassin is still abuse. She could have good reasons, but it still hurt Damian). He probably felt that he needed to earn his place and fulfill his familial role as Robin. Even as he matures and heals a bit, he may be reluctant to let Robin go. That type of training and enforced dedication to family is not simple to let go (even from a purely emotional abuse standpoint without any of the physical abuse he likely endured [This can be another thing he shares with Tim and his reluctantance to let Red Robin go]).

Kids, like Damian, will see others in similar situations and try to avoid their fate.

What is more likely? Tim is just special in being a target of isolation and abuse, or that Damian could one day be treated the same?

There's a ton of interesting theories about roles within abusive families (my family was emotionally abusive fyi). The sad part is that some of the kids will follow the example of their parents and abuse their siblings. This is both because parents model behavior and as a survival technique to not become the scapegoat like that one sibling. Damian may have joined in on being verbally abusive for both of these reasons (as well as being an extremely traumatized kid lashing out).

As he grows older and gains perspective (as well as distance from his LoA days), he may reflect on his behavior and the treatment of Tim. Tim is also the closest in age to Damian. He might be around physically more than the other siblings (besides Duke). Perhaps Duke even points out the differential treatment. There's a lot of ways that the metaphorical ball could get rolling.

This could be where Damian starts to regret his actions toward Tim. It may start from a selfish place (which, survival is not selfish and being selfish isn't always bad) of Damian realizing the assassination attempts are self-sabotage (and I love this idea and reflection on Damian). This would then morph into a genuine relationship and reliance on Tim.

I imagine, with these circumstances, that Tim becomes an anchor and safe point for Damian. All of the siblings have varying effects on the others, but this would be separate from that. While Dick is Damian's harbor, Tim would be closer to a lighthouse protecting Damian from the rocky shoreline. Dick is a place to rest and heal. Tim is a warning and guide (feel free to reblog with how the other batkids would be with Damian or each other).

Continually, Damian wanting Tim to stick around the family for his own safety hurts like hell. This casts the older sibling guilt (of leaving your siblings behind in that damn house) in a younger sibling's shame. Depending on the age, the younger sibling might be angry the older left or ashamed they want to ask in the first place. As a middle child, that fucking hurts (my situation is a bit more nuanced than that, but fuck. Ow).

Anyways, tons of angst to explore there on both of their parts.

I sincerely hope that Damian gets a life outside of WE. I hope he at least has time to explore himself (and maybe get a different career) before ever taking up WE. Depending on Tim's role in WE, this may fuck him over. I would be down to read some fics that explore Tim struggling under WE (cause he was meant for the research labs and not meeting rooms) and his refusal to step down due to the pressure that would put on Damian's shoulders (I know Tim isn't actually CEO in canon, but it's good to explore how the expectation of taking up the family business affects sibling dynamics).

Fic rec time! All are on AO3

"Exit Strategy" by smilebackwards (Tim's plan to leave the Waynes creates the ability for Damian and Tim to bond [not that Damian knows this is the plan]. Hurt ensues).

"Taming a Baby Assassin" by nighttmr (Tim, after being notified that he's getting a younger sibling with Damian, decides he'll be a big brother regardless of the effort required).

"Some Common Ground" by Do_wa_diddy (Both Damian and Tim are used to cruel standards of training. The others do not understand this and try to limit how they train. This causes Tim and Damian to bond).

"Just Like the Movies" by faithms (Damian finds a flash drive of all the times Bruce has been horrible to Tim).

"The Study of Birds" by MaskoftheRay (Tim and Damian find a common interest in bird watching. It shows them slowly becoming closer despite the obstacles).

Last one:

"You'll Change Your Name or Change Your Mind (previous title: Tim Drake Learns to Set Boundaries)" series by samsamiam.

I wholeheartedly recommend this series. Basically, Tim sets boundaries for himself while offering Damian sanctuary (should the kid need). It becomes Tim protecting Damian even from Bruce. Very very very good.

[archduchessgortash]

Let's talk about the Prayer for Forgiveness:

I personally never care too much about spoilers. Thus, I knew about this document long before I ever found it in-game. Many fans laud it as irrefutable proof of Durgetash being canon. Whether it is or isn't holds no relevance on what I wish to discuss.

Spoilers below the cut.

The only proof of Durgetash that I need is the look on Gortash's face when Durge strolls into the coronation alone. How Durge truly felt is never fully remembered, allowing players to blissfully headcanon the past relationship to our hearts' content.

For my part, I was always more perturbed by how utterly foolish it seemed for Durge to have been carrying evidence of their intended betrayal on their person during Orin's attack than I was concerned about dissecting every word in the Prayer for Forgiveness for the sake of my favorite ship.

When I did find it, I thought it was interesting that certain information about the document was and wasn't on the Baldur's Gate 3 wiki.

On my most recent playthrough, I decided it was time to take some screenshots and make a post about it.

First off, Durge doesn't know yet that Orin is their sibling when they find it, and it is neither signed nor does the in-game item description offer any indication that Durge wrote it. There's also no narrator response or journal update when we read or pick it up.

While it is correct that the Dark Urge wrote this document, it's worth noting that when it is found, an unspoilered player would not yet be privy to that information.

We find it in the Mind Flayer colony beneath Moonrise Towers, on a workbench that is clearly NOT Gortash's, in spite of the ill-informed assertions of some fans.

See evidence below, located on the very same workbench:

Gortash designed the Mind-Archive Interface and certainly used it, but the workspace in which we find the document is, in fact, Balthazar's.

The Prayer For Forgiveness is located here, on Balthazar's workbench:

In close proximity to this item:

More on that in a bit. 😉

Depending on which doors our party chose to explore first in the colony, we either just met or will soon meet this piece of work:

Kressa confirms that Durge could not or at the very least did not communicate verbally while she was doing her experiments on them.

Obviously, that's changed between the time of their departure and waking up on the Nautiloid, as Durge complains aloud about their headache upon waking. They also communicate with Us, Lae'zel, and Shadowheart via both their tadpole and their voice.

Kressa also informs us that Durge was not like other thralls.

Durge fought like the Hells against their captivity.

Kressa's Mistress of Souls' Research Log also informs us that Durge was tadpoled differently than all the others.

We don't learn until much later that the unusual method that Kressa noted was Orin prying open a hole she'd stabbed in Durge's skull to let the tadpole in.

Now... a small tangent that I personally use to explain this scene for a Durge playthrough:

Since this happens before we choose our origin, and in the course of the story, Durge finds out they weren't originally tadpoled on the ship like the rest of the party, this scene starts to feel incongruent with the reality of playing as Durge. When they come across the pod they broke out of near where we find Mizora, I like to think that why both memories exist is that Durge's healing brain might have continued to retain greater control, or at least a rebellious streak, even without the Artefact protecting them.

If they were thrashing and fighting in their pod or resisting in any way, it wouldn't surprise me if the Emperor forced them to take a second tadpole via the proper route of insertion, especially since Empy wants all characters to be teeming with tadpoles anyhow.

When one considers that the more tadpoles consumed, the harder it is both to refuse the Astral Tadpole and resist the forced mind flayer transformation that can happen in one of the evil endings, it makes even more sense that Durge already has more than one tadpole.

It was required just to keep them leashed.

Now, about the Resonance Stone...

'Seized by great joy, affected entity is more energized and also more mentally compliant.'

The Steeped in Bliss condition provided the explanation that I needed for why the Prayer for Forgiveness even exists as a document we can find. Durge wasn't carrying it around with them. Balthazar used the Resonance Stone to make them write it, most likely as a confession about their intended betrayal. I feel pretty confident in this interpretation as making the most logical sense.

In my opinion, Balthazar's post-script doesn't have any Durgetash connotations. It's there in order for Dark Urge players to connect the dots and realize that their character wrote it after they find out Orin is their sibling.

My own post-script:

Does the Prayer for Forgiveness also offer evidence that Durge might have had emotions about Enver Gortash?

I think so, but it can be interpreted in too many different ways for me to use it as some kind of Durgetash Holy Grail.

As I've said before, Gortash's face is the Holy Grail of Durgetash.

The only other character that can get anything close to the kind of visible affection from his expression is Karlach, on an Origin run, when she chooses to ally with him. He's pleased as punch that his old bodyguard isn't holding a grudge, but he's a total dick if she gives up the stones, revealing his true opinions about her in his comments.

He doesn't say spiteful lines to Durge even when they've freed the prisoners at the Iron Throne and blown up the Steel Watch Foundry, destroying everything he's built.

For Durge... Gortash hesitates.

If you made it here, thanks for reading! 🙂

[woofs-silly-ships]

Oh boy, it’s that time again

(Haven’t done it much here but when a big piece of media comes out, you usually get a hyperfixated ramble post right after I finish it and a deep dive a day later. This is the deep dive lol)

Warnings: discussion of abuse and neglect, solitary confinement, and ptsd/childhood trauma. And ofc spoilers for WOTFI 2024 and just smg4 in general

Oh yeah and since I’m tagging this as selfship, the selfship stuff is at the bottom of yall want to just skip to that lol

I think I need to preface this by saying I still loved literally all of the WOTFI besides the ending. The song was freaking awesome (I’ll get into that later), the challenges were perfect, the clown designs for the main cast were amazing, etc. I’m just trying to get the negativity out first lol

But yeah ok, gotta get the elephant in the room out of the way first: what the trio chose to do with Puzzles was absolutely awful.

I was mostly shocked that Meggy seemed just totally ok with it considering SHE JUST SAW FIRSTHAND HOW ABUSED PUZZLES WAS??? She literally met his child self and saw how weary he was, how he flinched away from her touch like those are clear signs of abuse and it seems like Meggy should’ve known that

So why the frick didn’t she object? Mario is always doing stupid crap so that makes sense, but you would think Meggy or even SMG4 would do something???

But why is it abuse, you ask? Well, Puzzles has one major issue, and that’s that he has no friends. And then Meggy became friends with his child self, therefore logically setting him on the path to redemption. But obviously Puzzles has done some awful crap and should’ve been punished in some way, maybe something like having to stay exclusively in the showgrounds for a while until he shows improvement, with the gang there to support him (just came up with that off the top of my head lol). But you know what they decided was the best possible punishment for this man? Solitary freaking confinement. The punishment notorious for literally causing prisoners to go insane due to lack of interaction. And you just had to give that specific punishment to a man WHO LOST HIS FREAKING MIND AS A CHILD DUE TO LACK OF INTERACTION?? DO YALL SEE THE PROBLEM WITH THIS???

I’m not even mad that they did that, obviously it’s wrong but these are fictional characters making that decision, and characters can be misguided. You can have characters that literally violate everything on a basic dni list or something, characters can be evil. My issue is when it is glorified or romanticized. And that’s pretty much exactly what they’re doing here

Another line that came out of Meggy’s mouth that really hurt me was when she said that maybe he’d get better in there, stop being so obsessed with ratings…. is she stupid? The whole reason why this all started is because Puzzles was an abused child with no friends who basically hyperfixated on wanting to fulfill his dream of running a park (and later tv production as well) but was shut down by his father and isolated himself with a tv all day. Meggy had just managed to heal his inner child and see the good in him. And then they act like finally giving him what he needs to heal and then VIOLENTLY RIPPING IT AWAY FROM HIM AND LOCKING HIM IN A ROOM (MIGHT I ADD, LIKE HE DID AS A CHILD DUE TO TRUAMA, THERE IS NO WAY THIS ISNT BRINGING UP SOME GENUINE PTSD FROM HIM) IS GOING TO JUST MAGICALLY FIX HIM??? NO! AND THERE IS ZERO INDICATION IN THE MOVIE, NOT EVEN A HINT, THAT THE TRIO MIGHT BE IN THE WRONG.

I’m sorry, but this is abuse and also extreme neglect of what Puzzles needed to change.

And also, Puzzles being a villain doesn’t make any of this ok. Didn’t we already learn that with SMG3?? Villains that have clear issues like this can be reformed over time, it just takes work. But no, apparently they’re not gonna do that

Genuinely speaking: if they wanted betrayal via Mario, they should’ve had him just straight up kill Puzzles or something right then and there. Or keep the original story but have the others seem horrified of what Mario did.

Also that scene really should’ve been given more time to breathe, I know this is the haha funny Mario spaghetti show but that doesn’t excuse going from villain being likely reformed to villain being arrested and the park exploding in a matter of 5 god dang seconds. Sure that would’ve been funny if this was some random side character or minor reoccurring villain, but this was literally the man behind 3-4 arcs and the star of 2 more, and a clear fan favorite character. Even if he wasn’t gonna die, they should’ve treated it like Axol or One Shot Wren, where both the audience and characters are given time to mourn and see what was happening, see character reactions, all of that. Even a stupid line from a couple of the police officers would’ve worked perfectly. Just time to process what the frick just happened.

My only other issue besides, well, all that lmao, is that the actual movie was just nothing like the trailer, like there were scenes exclusively in the trailer and that felt really weird to me

Ok, negativity out of the way now :D

The song!!! I was kinda hoping for a rap but yeah this fit way better lol, haven’t seen anybody talk about it but the puzzles design with just the head and hands is freaking epic omgggg

Also I loved how the parts sung by the trio are kinda more akin to children’s movie songs (describing exactly what’s happening on screen, the sad “I know there’s good in you” part, etc) and then Puzzle’s parts are just hahaha I’m gonna freaking turn your corpses into gushing mounds of blood-

Also GGRRRR I WANT TO DRAW THE CLOWN DESIGNS SO BADDDD!!! THEYRE SO DANG COOL!!!

And also UGHHH THE MERCHHH I WANT IT SO BAD BUT IM B R O K E 😭

The challenges were also really fitting, didn’t see any users I recognized but those that got in were perfect

And no SMG34 fuel sadly :(, eh can’t always get the gay old men lol, maybe next time

And yeah this is my selfship blog so gotta let a few of the demons out:

THE FREAKING FACE HE MADE BEFORE ALL HELL BROKE LOOSE!! IGNORING WHAT HAPPEN AFTER HE WAS SO GOD DANG CUTE AND I JUST WANTED TO HUG HIM AND CUDDLE HIM GRGGRGRGR HES SO DANG SILLY-

Anddd that’s about it! This post will probably get like, 2 notes but who tf cares!! I just needed to ramble a lot lol

[taweretsdagger]

"he walks among us, but is not one of us:" lost's tragic, (probably) autistic doctors

have been thinking about jack, juliet, and their relationship so much lately, inspired by so much good jack analysis from @eponine119 and @lost-inanotherlife, as well as @youmovedthenachos' discussion of viewing jack as autistic. the more i think about it the more i see this for both him and juliet.

i also think there are some specific differences in how the two behave which can be (at least partially) explained by how autism manifests/is interpreted depending on gender presentation and socialization, but in this post i'll stay focused on their similarities since i can already tell it's gonna be a long one!

both characters similarly display the following signs of autism: strong internal sense of justice (and disregard for social/institutional norms in favor of this), hyperfocus/competence in areas of interest, and a persistent sense of social isolation.

one of the reasons jack and juliet's relationship is so intriguing to me is that they project these traits onto each other, turning the other into a receptacle for the things they want for themselves but cannot bring about on their own. it's a tense, often unpleasant dynamic to watch--somewhat like two mirrors eerily reflecting back and forth into infinity. but the mutual understanding and mutual desire to heal beneath the surface of this tension keeps me hooked and rooting for them.

i'll start off by discussing two of these traits together (hyper-focus/competence and sense of justice/disregard for norms), since i think these are shown most clearly through their lives pre-island, while their social isolation is primarily shown to us on-island.

jack and juliet are doctors who are miraculously gifted in their respective fields, accomplishing medical feats which should be impossible. both sarah and rachel are in seemingly unrecoverable physical conditions which are reversed through jack and juliet's interventions, against all odds. ben and richard also become aware of juliet's prowess as a doctor/researcher due to her success impregnating a male field mouse.

we learn from juliet that jack graduated med school a year early, and i tend to believe that juliet might have done the same (or graduated college early/skipped a grade/etc.), considering that finishing med school at age 26 would leave her only 4 years before being recruited to the island in 2001.

so, we have two people who are near-prodigal in one specific area, but whose lives outside their work are something of a mess. they struggle with personal relationships, struggle to feel confident and secure in their abilities, and are easily influenced by nefarious actors (christian for jack, ed for juliet) who take advantage of their skill and their trusting nature. these dynamics definitely contribute to their sense of isolation/lack of belonging, which i'll come back to in a bit.

both of them also blur (at minimum) the doctor-patient relationship with personal relationships and interact with institutional rules as an afterthought, prioritizing what they personally feel is the right thing to do. juliet steals lab supplies on rachel's behalf (likely for months on end), while jack waffles on whether to turn in his father for operating while drunk, only deciding to do so once he learns that the patient who died as a result was pregnant.

it's a common misconception that the "autistic sense of justice" is part and parcel with a universally-keen moral compass, but in reality this "justice" gets doled out based on whatever specific biases the person possesses. jack's case illustrates this especially clearly; rather than turning in christian right away (because operating under the influence = immoral), he needs a reason to act which aligns with his personal moral code, which certainly has a good bit of misogyny baked into it.

ok, let's move to on-island, and discuss jack and juliet's social isolation and desire to belong, which relates to the title of this post (the translation of jack's tattoos, though n.b. that he does say this is "not what they mean").

it's common for autistic people to feel "alien" in the presence of other humans, and there's research showing that allistic people experience an uncanny valley effect within seconds of meeting an autistic person, due to micro-differences in behavior which are not picked up on consciously. this effect can also contribute to autistic people being susceptible to abuse, since abusers will quickly clock these traits and seek to use them to their advantage.

we are shown the relevance of jack's tattoo translation largely in the context of his (often reluctant) leadership position among the survivors, but it's interesting that juliet also describes in a therapy session with harper that the attention she receives from their society makes her feel isolated. it's significant to me as well that harper immediately interprets this discomfort as juliet being self-important/arrogant. this sort of misunderstanding is a common experience in autistic women in particular, and distinguishes her position among the others from jack's position among the survivors (again, more on this another time).

formation of societies/communities and what makes someone "one of them" vs. "one of us" is a recurring theme throughout the show, and i think that part of why jack defends juliet so adamantly to the survivors is due to the kinship he feels in their shared desire to belong and their incapability of experiencing this belonging. of course, this is tied up with the affection he feels for juliet due to her resemblance to sarah, as well as his stubborn (again, largely misogynistic) desire to "fix" or "save" her like he did sarah.

really, these motivations go hand in hand, and i'd argue that much of jack's compulsion to save juliet is a sign of the projection i described earlier. jack grew up lonely and abused, seemingly without any allies around the way juliet had an ally in rachel. correctly or not, he sees himself in juliet, and yearns to save her the way he wishes he himself had been saved.

jack's plan a = him and juliet escaping the island (and the forces oppressing them both) on the galaga, which is... ahem... foiled by locke (who--you guessed it! serves as a foil to both characters... in disparate ways... that can be viewed as a, uhh... foil-within-a-foil... buuuut that's another post for another day).

a tough break to be sure, but jack's hero complex perseveres. plan b = bringing juliet back to the beach camp, the place where jack kind-of-sort-of belongs, but not quite. this poses a new challenge, a new opportunity for projection. if jack can successfully integrate juliet--an other--into the survivors' camp and bring about belonging for her, then maybe he himself can finally feel that belonging, too.

another plot point worth mentioning here is the "pre-plan a" plan, or juliet's plea for jack to kill ben during surgery. i honestly have a tough time parsing out her exact motivations here (GOD i love juliet's villain era <3), but this can be read as a type of projection as well. juliet cannot save herself from ben, but she can project her desire to be saved onto jack, who has the specific skills needed to botch a complicated spinal surgery without anyone being the wiser.

to close out, we'll discuss the dynamic present in the survivors' camp at the end of season 3. this is one of my favorite stretches of episodes in the show, in part due to the brief gasp we get of jack's positive character growth before things begin to devolve for him at the start of season 4. i think the success he finds in his quest to secure belonging for juliet is a huge part of this growth being possible.

after juliet comes clean about ben's plot, the camaraderie jack waxed poetic about in his "live together, die alone" speech is finally realized. the survivors have managed to correctly assess an outsider as a threat and win her over into defecting from her previous loyalties. (in classic LOST fashion this all happens pretty messily, but regardless, it shows that the survivors have established a true, functional community.) as a result, jack feels more comfortable than ever stepping into the leadership role he's been grappling with for months.

with juliet at his side, he leads the group in mounting a defense against the others and evacuating the beach. we even see him willing to let go of his possessiveness over kate while still expressing his love for her, as he literally ascends to the radio tower. his people--his society, the place where he finally belongs, and, significantly, where juliet belongs--are right beside him.

from there, two things happen which topple us into the next phase of jack and juliet's relationship: first, juliet lies to jack about a gun cache so jack will let her and sawyer return to the beach (a descent, if you will, and i think it's significant that this is the first time we see sawyer and juliet interact amicably), and second, our old foil-friend locke comes out of the woodwork yet again--this time to kill naomi.

at this point, the differences between jack and juliet start to manifest, and from here on out their relationship will be dominated by these differences. they will continue to project their traits onto each other the way they did their similarities; however, rather than this projection culminating in a sense of shared belonging and communal purpose like it did in season 3, it turns more adversarial/destructive and contributes in part to both characters' tragic ends.

so, apart from their initial difficulty experiencing belonging, what do jack and juliet's relationship and on-island experiences have to do with autism? well, another hallmark of autism is a weak internal sense of self. many autistic people struggle to name their emotions, physical sensations, desires, etc., and instead rely on external inputs to identify these. in my view, this is the purpose jack and juliet's relationship serves for them--it beings about a "necessary other," through whom they can identify their own wants and needs.

when jack and juliet meet, they are both locked (LOCKED?) into roles they want out of (jack, literally, as a prisoner, with juliet as a captor trapped under ben's influence). both are desperate for someone to save, or for someone to save them. maybe a little of both. i wouldn't say they find healing in each other, exactly, but i think their relationship is a catalyst for what healing and growth they are able to find elsewhere, despite it also catalyzing their demise.

[mygirllll]

RANT/ VENT

‼️‼️‼️SPOILER WARNING FOR NOSFERATU (2025) ‼️‼️‼️

So i watched nosferatu earlier today and i have some THOUGHTS. (unedited, lack of coherent sentences and passages)

Count Orlok and Ellen's dynamic is widely misunderstood as a result of some dark romance girlies twisting the story to fit their narrative.

Orlok was an abuser and nothing changes that

he clearly took advantage of her vulnerability and it's this "toxic, abusive ex" dynamic more than anything else

Yes, Thomas WAS sort of dismissive of her concerns but to act like he's a bad person is actually insane. People have forgotten how to watch movies and it shows.

i mean come ON, ur wife's having ominous dreams while u kinda wanna get that cash money for u guys to have a better life and so that you can provide her with the life she deserves??? i mean yeah if i was in his place i would've probably believed her, but i also understand why he left.

+++ i've seen a few posts using thomas signing the marriage nullifying document as proof that Orlok loved her more??? my guy was scared asf and was literally tricked into doing it considering that he was under the impression that it was a property related document, tf was he supposed to do😭 learn an ancient language in 10 mins??? be so fr rn

Thomas was also very quick to recognise where he went wrong and he APOLOGISED ‼️‼️‼️ He also did everything in his power to protect ellen and idc what people have to say, being a loving, devoted husband does not make someone a cuck; genuinely re evaluate ur priorities if you think like this. My dude was not healed at all and still came back to wisborg to warn/ (attempt to) protect ellen from Orlok.

Another thing, Ellen "consenting " to her and orlok's marriage isn't really consent if she was forced and coerced into doing it btw. Orlok is a power-hungry, sexual predator and ellen and her powers are something he wants and actively lusts for.

thomas and ellen hutter you both deserved sm better, count orlok you're an interesting character for me to think about after the film, but idgaf about u otherwise.

[alltheboysandgirlsiloved]

So I've been trying to get a gist of post-time skip Ben based on Chaos Theory trailer (obsessed again? wrong, I never stopped being obsessed), and I feel like I can optimistically assume that his personality will make sense for his character development that we've seen in Camp Cretaceous.

I made a post about it once but to sum it up shortly:

season 1 Ben is a boy who was clearly raised in some sort of bubble (a different bubble than Kenji) - he is scared and anxious (not just regarding dinosaurs); at the same time we get hints that he can be very passionate and has a sense of an adventure (he's just scared to cross the line). Season 2 Ben experienced a massive traumatic event, to put it nicely, his personality was put into a blender which was then turned on and left unsupervised for several days. His season 2 jungle boy persona, while still consistent with the traits showed prior (as mentioned - Ben was both passionate and adventurous before - he was just too shy to act on it), is mostly a result of a severe trauma; meaning his personality feels more extreme because he had to rely on extremes to survive. Season 3 Ben is one of the most interesting "forms of evolution". The trauma is still fresh but at the same time Ben tries to think beyond it – wants to make decisions based not on "fight or flight" response but on his own feelings on the matter, it's very interesting but in this season - though not visibly - he slightly reconnects with season 1 personality (slightly) for example by considering advantages and disadvantages of his actions (leaving Nublar or staying) (it doesn't apply to every situation which is actually quite perfect because at this point he is still pretty damn traumatized). Then we have season 4 which is actually very important for Ben's character arc because, for the second time, he loses his footing - Nublar was wild but familiar, Nublar was 'never without Bumpy'. Mantah Corp Island is completely new and Ben is forced to reestablish what actions and behaviors are going to pay off in this environment; ironically enough, I think that the distance from Nublar is good for him - Nublar was also the environment where he got traumatized, personally I think that the island could, to some extent, prevent him from healing. And ofc, season 5 - Ben shows clear signs that he is going to evolve as a person; he mellows down not because he gets soft in a bad way but because he recognizes that he doesn't always have to be a knife. At the same time, he is not hesitant to strike if the situation calls.

So, now let's take a quick look at Ben in the Chaos Theory trailer. I noticed four traits that we can spot in that short clip:

He has that sort of shy-silly boy charm to him. A subtle mixture of bashfulness ("hey Darius," his voice is amused but he also sounds a bit apologetic). That is something that especially shines through his character in season 1

When he needs to be serious - he is ("Someone is hunting us"). This is such Ben-thing to do, especially in season 4 and season 5 Ben – when he is learning how to distinguish between a real danger and something that doesn't require setting the world on fire.

He gets slightly panicky sometimes ("before it's too late!") which is a fantastic news because trauma really messed up Ben's sense of danger and it's just good to knows that he feels fear like a normal person (yes, when someone is hunting you for sport, I guess everyone would be a little bit panicky)

From what I can tell - when the situation calls he does display signs of recklessness - notice how he's driving the car. Notice how Darius is visibly not impressed with Ben behind the wheel. Now, sure we can't tell whether someone (something?) is chasing them at that exact moment but either way - it seems that Ben is in a hurry and, excuse me but, he does not give a flying fck about safety on the road (which is! funny considering how he was driving the gyrosphere in season 1)

So yeah, overall, I think that we are going to get a nice continuation of Ben's character arc in Chaos Theory. I certainly hope so because watching Ben grow as a person was one of my favorite aspects of Camp Cretaceous!

Ah, and also... I really hope that at some point in Chaos Theory Ben will do something unhinged out of nowhere and the rest of the campers (because we will see all of them - I don't doubt that) will look at each other, nod, and say "ah, yes, that's our Ben"

[blossoms-phan]

I have been watching old videos in tour preparation and was staggered by how much happier and healthier Dan and Phil both look now. You can see how suffocated by the whole thing they were back for a period pre hiatus. Those years where the enjoyment and fun had gone is a tough watch.

I dipped out for a while and missed this period, and so looking back now you literally see the lights dim in Dan's eyes over a year or so, and how fed up of forcing an act he was.

The absolute chaos and fun and joy that has been post hiatus really emphasises just how tired and over hiding and lying and being yes men they must have been. It makes me appreciate this new era of content so much more. I would watch them watching grass grow, if it kept them smiling and happy and fulfilled, rather than making content for us, that made them that miserable.

oh :(( anon this really broke me and i have a lot of thoughts about this tbh.

as someone who's been lucky enough to watch them change and grow over 10 years, i think something we all know is how it's nothing compared to now, but like there was a clear shift around 2018 with tour and just the way that they presented themselves publicly. in part, they started to become a little bit more comfortable with each other and carefree about sharing certain things. again, looking back this sounds strange to say but im talking purely compared to the years before then- it was absolutely different. of course, we all know that this time was extremely difficult for dan, struggling with authenticity and "living his truth". i love ii, this is in no way dogging on it bc i think there's room to be proud of it and what they did but also the entire concept of "giving the people what they want" is almost poetic considering dan's internal turmoil during this time, like with what he said during one of those reaction videos- "c'mon dan, give the people what they want and then you can disappear forever." multiple people on here have put it like this before but there are certain points like in ii era liveshows where you can tell dan is just buzzing with this restless, frustrated energy, like he's stuck inside his own skin and can't crawl out of it.

i will say that i think just on some practical level, i like to tell myself that it wasn't all doom and gloom pre-hiatus and that there were obviously moments of happiness or comfort or things that they genuinely enjoyed doing, like travelling the world or something as small as playing a fun game. but i would be lying to myself if i denied the fact that they absolutely struggled at points, and that dan was fed up of struggling with the pain of wanting to be his true, authentic self, but being scared. again though, it's not all bad. this was the first time that dan started to accept and at least think about coming out, and all those moments where they signed pride flags and he would say things like "hopefully one day" to people who told them their stories really cements his point that the acceptance and support his audience gave helped him. the hiatus was so important for their personal growth, to heal their relationship with us, and like you pointed out they really were "yes men"- phil constantly pointing out how learning how to say no has helped a ton.

there are no words to describe this new era other than pure fun, joy, and whimsy. it's been an absolute privilege to see their personal growth, to watch them allow themselves to focus on themselves and be happy and open and watch them have the time of their lives and reassure us that they're enjoying it and not going anywhere anytime soon. i'm right there with you, i just feel so happy and appreciative of being here experiencing this new era with you all and them, and i just want them to do whatever makes them happy and fulfilled. which is what i think they're doing right now with the tour, and they knew it mere months after the comeback which they had no real long term plans for, but we showed up for them, and they know that which is why it makes the idea of our mutual "healing" and entering this new era together so exciting <3