#do I mean the pain of the S2 ending or do I mean just how traumatised Aziraphale and Crowley both are

[accidentalseer2020]

If Good Omens series 3 doesn't have a scene with Queen's 'I want to Break Free' playing as Aziraphale comes to terms with how desperately he misses earth and Crowley and how Heaven just ain't worth it... well that'd be a bloody waste of a perfect song.

[ningvory]

secret — julie han

CW: noncon/dubcon, g!p julie, julie’s a perv, manipulation, corruption, naïve reader, unnie kink, creampie, mentions of natty in the end, not proofread, this is rushed so apologies in advance! 🙏

word count: 1.3k

anon ask? yes!

you’ve been a trainee for just over three years by now and you’ve been striving for your dream of becoming an idol for years.

you’ve been transferred to different companies in hopes of being able to debut with a few other girls but it never happened. so you joined S2 just after they debuted their most recent gg, kiss of life in hopes of debuting in their next group or even becoming a soloist. i mean, you’ve got the voice and and you can put on a show so yea, really could.

ever since you switched over to S2, you’ve gotten more sharper with your moves and worked on your dance technique. it was known to the other trainee’s that you were definitely going to debut sooner or later under S2, even you knew yourself. everyone knew you were the favorite trainee to the trainers. you caught everyone’s eye, rather it was your looks or your talent. you even managed to catch a special someone’s eye.

but what you didn’t expect was for the company to just add you in a already established group. especially since they were starting to get ready for their long anticipated comeback. S2 had long thought about adding a new member to the group and they decided that you were the only one that they picked to be the added member to the group. plus, the girls even agreed to it too, especially the eldest of the four, julie.

when it was time to meet, you all actually got along really wel! you were now the middle child in the group, being an 03 liner, you were younger than julie and natty but older than belle and haneul. it’s like you were ment to be in the group the whole time.

song recording went really good, you got plenty of compliments from the producers and composers. saying how great you sounded with just raw vocals and that you should’ve been debuted, making your cheeks hurt from all the cheesing you were doing in the studio.

now it was the time to learn the choreo itself, and let’s just say, they had you damn near breaking your back in a few moves to make it more visually pleasing to the eye. you decided to wear a crop top that barely did anything to cover you up with pink sweats. you didn’t wanna wear something that you’ll get hot in immediately, not thinking that it’ll be a bother to anyone.

but oh julie, all hot and bothered, trying to hide her boner from you all and the choreographer. it was so wrong she kept telling herself, watching how you were practicing the hip move in the chorus section of the song. so wrong and sick of her to just shamelessly stare at your tits and your ass, fantasizing about how your ass would smack against her tummy from her forceful thrusts to your cunt. but she just can’t help herself…you’re just so cute to her, and so…fuckable, how can she not? her daydreaming got too much for her she had to go excuse herself to the bathroom and relieve herself from her painful erection.

for the past few days you all had multiple group practices to make sure everything looked eye catching and synchronized. which of course, it did. but the more dance practices, the more confident you got with your moves, especially the more sexier moves, which did nothing to help julie’s raging boner.

she almost always was daydreaming, making you tap her and ask if everything was alright which seemed to break her out of the dream.

“julie unnie? is everything alright?” you asked her with a soft tone, looking directly in her eyes with doe eyes. fuck. she was caught, and she swears you’re doing it on purpose.

but what was she supposed to say to that? ‘yea i was just fantasizing about you riding me while i play with your tits.’ but she gained composure, “yea! don’t worry about me, got lost in my thoughts,” she gave a small smile, reassuring you as you nod your head and continued practicing. if only you knew you were the only thing on her mind.

since she was the leader, she had to monitor the four of you dancing. making sure there’s no mistakes, you all did amazing but julie payed the most attention to you. not because you were the newest member of the group, but because you were just so mesmerizing. each sway of your hips and bounce of your tits had julie left in a trance that she didn’t want to break out of, she had it bad for you and everyone could tell except for you.

you all lost track of time and it was far time to go. but you still wanted to practice, ignoring the fact your body was exhausted. which julie took for the perfect opportunity.

you wanted you moves to be basically flawless, being the newest member to an already established group meant there was a lot of eyes on you. julie took this opportunity and stayed with you.

“thanks for staying, unnie! you really didn’t have t—,”you went to say but was cut off by julie pushing you to the ground.

“see what you’ve done to unnie, baby? swear you’re doing this shit on purpose.” she groaned, getting ontop on your shocked body, pinning your arms beside your head with a tight grip.

“wh—wha? unnie, get off me!” you shouted a little to loud, making her remove a hand to cover your mouth.

“fuck..don’t cry baby. do this for unnie ‘kay? you’ll be good for unnie, right?” julie shushed you, pulling your sweats and panties down, before undoing her pants and her boxers.

she wasted no more time, plunging into you. head swinging back from the pleasure, biting her lip to conceal her moans.

“u-unnie—stop! d-don’ ‘wan it! please—!” your poor lil cunt s’not use to being filled all the way up! tears begin to fall down your face, trying to push her away and shoving at her with you hands.

“stupid slut, take all i give you—fuck!—you cryin’ f’me to stop but your cunt is suckin’ me all in.” she grunts, bullying her thick cock inside your lil cunt. she’s pounding into you anomalistically, she’s lost her composure to try and hold herself back.

she lifts your tight shirt up and pulls your bra down to play with your tits. she groped and pinched you nipples, making you squeak out. more tears falling down.

“all your damn crying isn’t gonna make me stop, baby.” she stays before moving her hands down to pinch your clit.

“don’t even think about telling the others, they won’t believe you, stupid whore.” she snarks, balls slapping against your ass from the quick pace she’s going.

“shit—g’na cum. and you’re gonna take it all!” her thrusts become sloppy, before she fills your cunt up with her thick spurts of cum.

when you feel her fill you up, you felt your body begin to shake. before letting out a loud whine, cumming aggressively on her cock still inside you!

she slowly pulls out, pressing down on your tummy to see her cum begin to spill out, making you whimper. the tingling sensation of her pulling out of your cum covered cunt has you quivering.

once you got home and took a long shower, you went to tell the second eldest, natty. telling her what your leader did to you but she just laughs in your face. telling you that you shouldn’t have been teasing her. but poor you, natty’s no better than julie! she waits till your sleeping and uses your tired body for her own pleasure! waking you up from your sleep and filling you up with her cock! before telling your sleepy self that you better get used to being their personal fucktoy cuz their gonna use you for their own pleasure, not caring if you cum or not! :((

[yournightmary]

Imagine reader spending lotsss of time with Jesse as of late, Ellie is like oh my goddd he gets all the girls I want (from when she used to like Dina) but actually reader is just head over heels for her best friend and she’s been confiding in Jesse over it ): oblivious cuties

content warning:: fem!reader, thats all I think idk

AN:: This feels kinda rushed sorry:(

⇢ ˗ˏˋ You and Ellie became best friends the moment she stepped into Jackson. You were the one that showed her all the spots, explained all the jobs and even introduced her to everyone.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Then after a little get together you became a bit distant and she was so confused. Like did she do something and doesn’t remember it or what??

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Truth was- you realized you had a crush on her and didn’t want to fuck it up or spill it on accident.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ But she’s not that stupid. She saw that you started talking to Jesse more. I mean- you even dropped patrol with her and went with him. What the hell!!

⇢ ˗ˏˋ She talked about it with Dina, who had to act oblivious because she promised Jesse she wouldn’t tell Ellie that she knows the reason why you’re so avoidant.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ So when you were spilling your guts to Jesse, Ellie was doing the same to Dina. The two of them would totally meet up after and talk about how stupid and oblivious you both are.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Ughhhh and the worst part is that you both started thinking that the other has feelings for the person they’re confiding in.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ But then you got assigned patrol together… It was a little awkward and quiet at first, but after some time you managed some small talk.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ She tried to pry a little and ask about you and Jesse but didn’t get an actual answer. You did the same about dina and the result was the same.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ After you both came back to Jackson it was somehow even more awkward than before. You didn’t even know why, it just was.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Dina and Jesse got fed up with it. Not about the fact that you both were confiding in them, but because you just were so oblivious to each other feelings that it actually pained them.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Jesse tricked you into meeting up together. he told you that it’ll be just you and him but surprise, surprise- it was just you and Ellie.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Honestly, the moment she saw you she wanted to turn around and run away. But she didn’t.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ She was not only angry at Dina for setting her up, sad from the thoughts of you and Jesse but also nervous just because it was you.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ You both decided that it’s time to finally talk things out and headed to her little cabin. She didn’t even let you speak (as she does) before yapping your ear off about how she’s totally fine with you liking Jesse and how she was confiding in Dina about you.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ You literally just stared at her deadpan until she stopped talking, her eyes already teary and her bottom lip trembling. It was hard for you to not laugh from the anxiety but also because of how oblivious you both were.

⇢ ˗ˏˋ Then you told her your part of the story, you both laughed it off and started dating. Good ending.

arcane s2 combined with school is making me want to cry

[ourflagmeansgayrights]

so part of me wants to blame this entirely on wbd, right? bloys said he was cool with the show getting shopped around, so assuming he was telling the truth (not that im abt to start blindly trusting anything a CEO says lol), that means it’s not an hbo problem. and we already know wbd has an awful track record with refusing to sell their properties—altho unlike coyote v acme, s3 of ofmd isn’t a completed work and therefore there isn’t the same tax writeoff incentive to bury the thing. i just can’t see any reason to hold on to ofmd except for worrying about image, bc it would be embarrassing if they let this show go with such a devoted fanbase and recognizable celebrities and it went somewhere else and did really well (which it would undoubtedly do really well, we’ve long since proven that). it feels kinda tinfoil hat of me to making assumptions abt what’s going on in wbd behind the scenes, but i also feel like there are hints that i’m onto something w my suspicions: suddenly cracking down on fan merch on etsy doesn’t seem like something a studio looking to sell their property would bother with, and we know someone was paying to track the viewing stats on ofmd’s bbc airing, which isn’t finished yet, so i’d expect whoever is monitoring that to not make a decision abt buying ofmd until the s2 finale dropped.

but also i think part of me just wants there to be a clear villain in the situation. it’s kinda comforting to have a face to blame, a clear target to shake my fist at. but the truth is that the entire streaming industry is in the shitter. streaming is not pulling in the kind of profit that investors were promised, and we’re seeing the bubble that was propped up w investor money finally start to pop. studios aren’t leaving much room in their budgets for acquiring new properties, and they’re whittling down what they already have. especially w the strikes last year, they’re all penny pinching like hell. and that’s much a much harder thing to rage against than just one studio or one CEO being shitty. that’s disheartening in a way that’s much bigger and more frightening than if there was just one guy to blame.

my guess is that the truth of the situation is probably somewhere in the middle. wbd is following the same shitty pattern they’ve been following since the merger, and it’s just a hard time for anyone trying to get their story picked up by any studio. ofmd is just one of many shows that are unlucky enough to exist at this very unstable time for the tv/streaming industry.

when i think abt it that way, tho, i’m struck by how lucky we are that ofmd even got to exist at all. if the wbd merger had happened a year earlier, or if djenks and tw tried to pitch this show a year later, there’s no way this show would’ve been made. s1 was given the runtime and the creative freedom needed to tell the story the way the showrunners wanted to, and the final product benefited from it so much that it became a huge hit from sheer gay word of mouth. and for all the imperfections with s2—the shorter episode order, the hard 30 minute per episode limit, the last-minute script changes, the finale a butchered mess of the intended creative vision—the team behind ofmd managed to tell a beautiful story despite the uphill battle they undoubtedly were up against. they ended the season with the main characters in a happy place. ed and stede are together, and our last shot of ed isn’t of him sobbing uncontrollably (like i rlly can’t stress enough how much i would have never been able to acknowledge the existence of this show again if s1 was all we got)

like. y’all. we were this close to a world where ofmd never got to exist. for me, at least, the pain of an undue cancellation is worth getting to have this story at all. so rather than taking my comfort in the form of righteous anger at david zaslav or at wbd or at the entire streaming industry as a whole, i’m trying to focus on how lucky i am to get to have the show in the first place.

bc really, even as i’m reeling in grief to know this is the end of the road for ofmd, a part of me still can’t quite wrap my head around that this show is real. a queer romcom about middle-aged men, a rejection of washboard abs and facetuned beauty standards, a masterful deconstruction and criticism of toxic masculinity, well-written female characters who get to shine despite being in a show that is primarily about manhood and masculinity, diverse characters whose stories never center around oppression and bigotry, a casually nonbinary character, violent revenge fantasies against oppressors that are cathartic but at the same time are not what brings the characters healing and joy, a queer found family, a strong theme of anti colonialism throughout the entire show. a diverse writers room that got to use their perspectives and experiences to inform the story. the fact that above all else, this show is about the love story between ed and stede, which means the character arcs, the thoughts, the feelings, the motivations, the backstories, and everything else that make up the characters of ed and stede are given the most focus and the most care.

bc there rlly aren’t a lot of shows where a character like stede—a flamboyant and overtly gay middle-aged man who abandoned his family to live his life authentically—gets to be the main character of a romcom, gets to be the hero who the show is rooting for.

and god, there definitely aren’t a lot of shows where a character like ed—a queer indigenous man who is famous, successful, hyper-competent, who feels trapped by rigid standards of toxic hypermasculinity, who yearns for softness and gentleness and genuine interpersonal connection and vulnerability, whose mental health struggles and suicidal intentions are given such a huge degree of attention and delicate care in their depiction, who messes up and hurts people when he’s in pain but who the show is still endlessly sympathetic towards—gets to exist at all, much less as the romantic lead and the second protagonist of the show.

so fuck the studios, fuck capitalism, fuck everything that brought the show to an end before the story was told all the way through. because the forces that are keeping s3 from being made are the same forces that would’ve seen the entire show canceled before it even began. s3 is canceled, and s2 suffered from studio meddling, but we still won. we got to have this show. we got to have these characters. there’s been so much working against this show from the very beginning but here we are, two years later, lives changed bc despite all odds, ofmd exists. they can’t take that away from us. they can’t make us stop talking abt or stop caring abt this show. i’m gonna be a fan of this show til the day i die, and the studios hate that. they hate that we care about things that don’t fit into their business strategy, they hate that not everyone will blindly consume endless IP reboots and spin-offs and cheap reality tv.

anyway i dont rlly have a neat way to end this post. sorta just rambling abt my feelings. idk, i know this sucks but im not rlly feeling like wallowing in it. i think my gratitude for the show is outweighing my grief and anger, at least for right now. most important thing tho is im not going anywhere. and my love for this show is certainly not fucking going anywhere.

[tizzyizzy]

Seen some talk around the interwebs about how Izzy is a totally different, or his arc happened too fast, whatever. He is my argument to the contrary.

There are three major factors driving the change in Izzy's behavior.

Default Pirate Culture → Gentleman Pirate Culture

Izzy spent his entire pirate career before Stede acting like, well, a pirate. There wasn't room for softness. Being tough was expected. Blackbeard's crew's culture in particular discouraged weakness to such an extent crew were expected to kill their pets before joining.

In S1, Izzy's relationship to the crews and captains was ambiguous. Was he training the Revenge crew to be proper pirates? Was he in charge when the captains weren't on board? Was Ed planning on killing Stede and everyone aboard, or not? So it's unsurprising Izzy held himself away from Stede's crew instead of becoming part of it, and tried without success to make the Revenge crew follow his lead.

In S2, Izzy ends up in Stede's crew, and Izzy isn't in a place emotionally or socially to try to push to change the culture of the ship. He's outnumbered. Izzy has to adapt. At the very least, all of the expectations he has been living up to his entire pirating career are gone.

Taking Care of Ed → No More Ed

Izzy said he'd been cleaning up Ed's messes his whole life. Scenes from S1 and S2 suggest that is the case. In S1, Izzy is dealing with Ed making strange choices on his search for meaning, which requires him to manage restless crew members and deal with the risky spots Ed puts them all in. Once Stede arrives on the scene, Ed is contradictory and non-communitive, leaving Izzy to wonder if the plan to kill Stede and the promised captaincy were bullshit (they were).

And because Izzy has no emotional intelligence, he thinks that Stede is seducing Ed into losing everything, and he desperately tries to pry the pair ppart.

I mean, we all know what happened in the early S2 episodes. Emotional, off-the-rails Ed trying to himself and everyone else while Izzy desperately tried to protect Ed and the crew, until he was forced to give up on Ed.

After breaking up with Ed via bullet, though, Ed is officially Not Izzy's Problem. Ed isn't a threat to the crew. Stede is incompetent, but was clever and brave enough to escape Zheng's ship and rescue them. Izzy is free to have a drunken breakdown. After, well, he gets to do whatever he wants.

What does Izzy want? Well, he's finding out.

No Trust → Trust

The major reason pirates put on such a tough facade is to protect themselves. Being tough keeps enemies from messing with you. It keeps your crew too afraid to mutiny. It's easy to recognize that Ed puts on a persona of Blackbeard, but Izzy put on a persona too. A weak link can be targeted and broken.

Just look at the scene where Izzy finally breaks down and is comforted by the crew. Izzy doesn't make the choice to be emotionally vulnerable. He is behaving the same way he always with crew who question his orders. He yells, he curses, he commands. It is only the level of his emotional distress and the crew's acknowledgement of it that make him incapable of hiding his pain.

I think it's safe to say that has been hiding grief, frustration, confusion, sadness, etc. behind the "Get back to work!" facade for years. It only crumbled under extreme pressure.

But when Izzy breaks, and is at his most pathetic and vulnerable, the crew have his back. Under Blackbeard, they comfort him, hide him away, and treat his injuries at the risk of the captain's wrath. Under Stede, when he's at his most pathetic, the crew make him a new leg and accept him into the crew without judgement.

There's almost nothing Izzy could do in front of the crew now that would make him look more weak than he was when he was crawling across the floor drunk and repeating "You're born alone, you die alone" over and over. He hit rock bottom and there was a pillow there to catch him.

So, Izzy is in the "talk it through" culture of Stede's Revenge. He is free from obsessing about Ed as a man and as a captain. He is surrounded by people who saw him at his worst and showed him compassion.

Izzy's worst behaviors in S1 were motivated by fear. Fear of the new, fear Ed was losing it, fear of what would happen if he showed weakness. In a "safe space", where he has nothing to worry about? Of course Izzy calms way down. This is the Izzy that swaggered up to Stede on the island and at Spanish Jackie's in S1. Dry, sarcastic, sassy. Some flair for the dramatic with the swordplay.

It is because Izzy feels so safe that he can put on that makeup and perform. Wee John is doing it, and Wee John wouldn't let him do anything embarrassing. He's clearly got confidence in his ability to sing.

He's still Izzy. He says fuck constantly. He's kind of a dick. He offers good advice. He's a dramatic, whether he's cutting his name into someone's shirt or singing in French from a balcony. He's just an Izzy that can be whatever he wants without fear.

[snowblack-charcoalwhite]

Could you do your own analysis abt what traits/behaviours Aegon and Aemond got from Alicent? They both took after her and it's insane

What a wonderful question! Thank you for it, and my apologies for the delay with answering - and for the direction the answer ended up taking (you might have meant some specific examples as opposed to the more general thing I`m about to offer).

I`d like to start with this:

It definitely doesn`t mean that I enjoy watching either of them suffer or wish torment upon them (especially given that Aegon and Aemond are my absolute faves and Alicent is among my top 5 HotD/F&B characters as well). What I do find fascinating is how all of them are enduring the pain: living it, transforming it and channelling it into the world with nothing but a look.

And I find just as interesting the way the mother and the sons express their feelings when their adversaries find themselves in a tight spot, in one way or another:

It`s definitely schadenfreude but one tinged with the sense of curiosity and slight disbelief, as in "Looks like you could have problems as well after all, huh?"

Сontinuing with this mother-children connection, it has to be said that Aegon and Aemond are absolutely self-sufficient characters with their own motivation and unique traits; but in some way they are also Alicent`s agents, the way she speaks with the world (just like in one sense or another sense all people are continuation of their parents - even if they never knew them its their absence that leaves an imprint on a person`s soul).

Aegon is the voice of her suffering.

(I`m all in for the theory according to which Aegon is a nail biter just as his mother is a nail picker - and these habits do not come from a happy place).

Aemond is the voice of her bitterness and rage.

It`s almost feels like emotion-wise Aegon resembles Alicent in static while Aemond represents her in dynamic.

And it`s heartbreaking to think that when both of them were dead Alicent once again had to lock all her pain and anger within herself - and those grew insurmountable over the course of the Dance and eventually drove her mad.

Additionally, it`s of interest to note that all three of them are driven by duty in one way or another - but they handle it differently.

Both Alicent and Aegon wear theirs like a royal chain around their neck (if S2 doesn`t show us Aegon embracing the burden of ruling, if only for the sake of his family, I`m ignoring it); but where Aegon doesn`t take his off because of being afraid something terrible will happen if he does, Alicent just can`t fathom doing it. This metaphorical chain has grown into her body and become an inalienable part of her.

And for Aemond duty is not a piece to wear but a weapon to wield. He is so aggressive about it (even if it`s passive aggression) that it almost feels like it`s a material object - and a quite sharp one, a worthy addition to the sword and the dagger.

I`m sorry if the answer`s turned out to be messy. I just have way too many feelings about this family:)

[echobx]

Timing - JJ Maybank × fem!reader

summary: reader is dealing with losing JJ after he went missing with the rest of the Pogues (end of s2! to start of s3!), leaving her and her heart behind

warnings: angst, visions of drowning (not detailed), delusions and visions because of malnutrition and depression

word count: 1.3k

author's note: I write angsty shit when I'm depressed. it's a theme.

You're curled up in your bed, eyes burning red, nose runny, mouth slightly agape. The alarm clock on your nightstand reads 2:48am and you watch the minutes run.

Your dream has destroyed your peace. Peace as much as anyone can call your state of being such. There is nothing peaceful about the depression you have fallen into, nothing quirky about the way your body trembles at every touch, always reminded of him.

2:49am.

You know you should drink something to regain a tiny bit of strength and maybe fall back asleep, but when you drink you'll just be able to cry even more. So you don't. Maybe if you refuse to, it will end faster.

2:50am.

The branch outside your window keeps knocking against the glass. The same dull noise that his knuckles made almost every night. But you know it's not him. You know he's gone.

2:51am.

Maybe a shower would help. But you'd have to get up for that, so it's a no for the shower. No one there to jokingly say, “you're gonna shower without me, princess?”

2:52am.

If you'd look out of the window you'd see his bike, parked in the same spot where he'd left it that day. Quickly stopping by to tell you about a new lead. Telling you to not worry. Telling you to stay home because it probably meant nothing, and after all, it's too dangerous, he'd kill himself if something happened to you.

2:53am.

And your mind drifts back to sleep, exhausted from the pain and malnutrition.

“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to leave you, my love,” JJ is standing in front of your house. He looks as pretty as ever. Cut off shirt, cargo shorts, boots, his favorite red cap on backwards and a sorry smile on his face. But when you jump forwards into his arms you fall and you fall and fall and fall. Drowning, really. Sinking to the bottom of the ocean. His lost treasure, truly.

Maybe that's what you had signed up for unknowingly. A life of pain because you fell in love with a boy who couldn't sit still for the life of him.

“Hey, shhh, it's okay. I'm right here,” JJ’s voice is like music to you and when you open your eyes he's holding you close in his arms.

“Is this real? Are you really here?” you ask, close to tears.

“Of course I'm here. Where else would I be but with my favorite girl,” he laughs softly and kisses your forehead, but you can't feel it.

“This is a dream,” you remind yourself and sit up.

“Does it matter? I'm here now. You have me. Isn't that enough?” JJ asks and you press your hands to your ears and cradle your body, swinging back and forth in your seat.

“Not real. Wake up. Wake up!” you tell yourself and after some time it finally works.

The alarm clock reads 4:21am.

The sun is coming up soon. You think about how real it had felt before he had kissed you. You think about how much more comfortable it had been to drown than to be alive.

4:22am.

Maybe it's the dumbest thing ever, love. It's just too painful. You could do good without love.

4:23am.

Your favorite shirt of his doesn't even smell like him anymore.

4:24am.

In ten minutes it'll be four weeks that your parents had woken you up in panic to make sure you hadn't vanished the same way your friends had.

4:25am.

Your feet carry you to your closet. Getting dressed is methodical.

4:26am.

He left his keys. “So I have no choice but to come back to you, princess.”

4:27am.

You know your parents will wake up when they hear the engine of the bike, so you decide to push it for a bit, down the road and then you can get on.

4:28am.

He didn't park in neutral. Stupid boy. Stupid stupid boy who stole your stupid stupid heart.

4:29am.

The engine is louder than you expected. You see the lights turn on inside your home, but you're already gone by the time your parents have realized what you are doing.

4:30am.

Cold air stings when it shoots right into your teary face.

4:31am.

The sun is coming up in the distance, it's beautiful. You remember doing this with JJ. Staying up all night and driving around to see the sunset and come up again.

4:32am.

You stop at a red light although no one is there. JJ had started touching your ankles on the pegs every time he had to stop.

4:33am.

The Shack is sitting lonely at the sound. The hammock’s empty, the porch lonely and the pick-up orphaned.

4:24am.

Breaking and Entering is illegal actually. Not that you care, you've done worse with JJ by your side. You need a new shirt, maybe the ones in the closet here still smell like him. You need it like a drug addict seeks the next kick.

4:25am.

One month and no life sign. You should stop hoping. Stop wishing. Stop. “JUST STOP” you scream and fall down on the bed.

4:26am.

“I'm not even doing anything,” JJ whispers from next to you.

“Leave me. I don't want to love you anymore. It hurts so much. Please,” you cry and curl up on the bed, holding onto the shirt.

“I can't. You know why,” he whispers, lying opposite of you.

“I don't want it,” you cry and screw your eyes shut.

“All you gotta do is let go,” JJ whispers.

“I don't know how to not love you,” you hush and reach out for him, but there's nothing there. You're alone.

6:34am.

Ghosts don't know how to make dishes clatter.

6:35am.

You pinch yourself before walking out of the bedroom, making sure it's not another dream.

6:36am.

It has to be a dream. Gotta be. No other explanation.

6:37am.

He hasn't turned around yet. It's a dream. It's a dream, has to be. 5.3% chance that he's real, maybe less.

6:38am.

You take the baseball bat that stands next to the bedroom door in your hand. Ghosts don't feel pain.

6:39am.

You don't know what hurts more, JJ's head or your heart.

6:40am.

“Jesus fucking Christ, who the fuck is trying to murder-” he spins around, one hand still holding onto the bat to stop it from hitting him again.

6:41am.

You can hear your head hitting the wooden floor as you go down.

11:57am.

Hospital beds are not comfortable. The lights are harsh. Your head is screaming.

11:58am.

Someone is holding your hand. Rings, familiar ones at that. You blink slowly. How is this real?

11:59am.

“My ghost keeps torturing me,” you whisper and he turns his blonde head around to you. Furrowed brows and blue eyes stare back at you.

12:00pm.

“You got ghosts? Can I get one too?” JJ smiles and you shake your head.

“You're my ghost, there's no ghost who needs ghosts.”

“Could a ghost do this?”

12:01pm.

His lips are pressed to yours and you can feel it. Hot and heavy and not a dream. Not a Dream. Not. A. Dream.

12:02pm.

“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to leave like that, and when we came back I wanted to clean up first. But you got to me quicker,” JJ whispers. “I wish I could turn back time and take you with me.”

12:03pm.

I love you's are underrated. You could hear him mumble it against your lips until you die. And when you say it back he smiles wider.

12:04pm.

Your parents yell at you for running out, but you don't care, you have your ghost. And this time, everyone else can see your ghost too. Everyone can see how much he loves you, and you him.

please don't copy and/or post my work onto other platforms! ~e©ho

taglist: @ijustwantttoread @spideysimpossiblegirl @redhead1180 @princessmaybank @kys4-20 @drwstarkeyy @immyowndefender @julczimozart

[hugmekenobi]

S3: The Bad Batch (1)

Chapter One: Confined

Gif by @ventresses

Hunter x femaleJedi!reader

Series Rating: 18+

Series Summary: Ever since Eriadu, Clone Force 99 had been a fractured squad. Months have passed but you're finally back with the Batch but Omega is still out there and you won't stop until you find her again.

Chapter Summary: Imprisoned on Tantiss, Omega finds herself needing to adjust to life there whilst the rest of you decide on your next mission to give you intel you desperately need.

Masterlist for S1 and S2

Genre: Friends (idiots) to Lovers (we're in the lovers stage now)

Chapter Warnings: Very mild canon-typical violence, one use of y/n, Hemlock, brief wound description, nightmares with emotional hurt/comfort, my interpretation of various people's headspaces, slight angst, me going off script/episode plot in the last part, and remember, italics represent silent Jedi communications

Word Count: 5K

Author's notes: And we're off! Happy Star Wars Day!! We are pretty much just following the plot of this episode, save for a bit at the end so it might feel like a bit of a slow start, but bear with me! Technically, this will also wind up being a 'fix-it' fic so just stick with me on that process too! Hope you enjoy! And I have already started working on the next chapter! Also, I am just going off my past taglist so anyone who wants added/removed, please let me know!

21 days since Eriadu

Water dripped from the faulty tap in the small cell as light crept through the bars on the window.

Omega stared out into the open space with a forlorn sigh as she envied the birds that sounded their freedom as they chirped their usual song. She stepped down from her bed and started pacing anxiously as she waited for Emerie to make her scheduled appearance.

Sure enough, a couple seconds later, the door opened, and Emerie stepped inside.

“Good morning, Omega. How are you feeling today?” Emerie asked.

“Like a prisoner.” Omega replied curtly. “I want to leave.”

“Prisoner?” Emerie repeated, surprised. “Omega, you are no such thing. It will take time to adjust, but you will acclimate. It is far safer in here than out there. Come. We have much to do.” With that Emerie turned to leave.

Omega reached under her bed and brought out her box before she followed Emerie out into the corridor. The grey colouring of her new clothes matched the other scientists and the non-descript design of the inside of the base.

They turned a corner to pass a squad of clone prisoners being escorted past and Omega let out a gasp as she recognised the figure at the front of the line but despite her effort to look at him, he only stared at the floor.

--

Omega entered the lab and watched in quiet upset as the clone was subjected to a blood sample being taken from the back of his hand. They all had similar expressions of pain and defeat written across their faces and she wished she knew how to stop it.

Emerie placed the test tube into one of the free slots in the tray that Omega was holding before she took the datapad out and created a record for Omega. “And now I need to take a blood sample from you.”

“From me?” Omega repeated. “Why?”

“The samples are used for various research projects. All of us serve a purpose here.” Emerie explained. “It won’t hurt.” She added as a means of reassurance before she readied the equipment to take the sample.

Omega sat up on the bench. “Can you at least tell me where my brothers are? Or my friend, (Y/N)?”

“I do not know.” Emerie replied simply.

Omega held her hand out and braced against the sting of the needle as her blood was drawn. “If you’re a clone like me, how come I never saw you on Kamino?”

“Because I was sent elsewhere until Dr. Hemlock took me under his wing. He saw potential in me, like Nala Se sees in you.”

“I never knew that I had a sister. It’s nice not being alone.” She offered Emerie a small smile, but it wasn’t quite returned.

“Head to the lab.” Emerie ordered as she took the device away and placed Omega’s sample in with the others. “Nala Se is expecting these.”

--

As the security scan was completed, Omega entered the lab and walked over to Nala Se who was busy placing more blood vials into a centrifuge.

“Thank you, Omega.” Nala Se said as she took the tray from her and started processing the data from the samples and it was through that that she saw the concerning sight that Omega was now a part of the system. “Omega, your sample was taken?”

“Mn-hmm. Emerie said it was routine.”

Nala Se deleted the record from the system before she destroyed the physical sample.

Omega watched this with curiosity. “Why are you discarding it?”

“Tell no one.” Nala Se replied before she took the other samples to the centrifuge. “It is safer this way.”

Omega knew the Kaminoian well enough to pick up on the worry in her voice. “This research, it’s not like what we did on Kamino, is it?”

“No, it is not.”

“I don’t understand. Why did they bring me here?” Omeag asked, hoping that if Emerie couldn’t give her the answers that she sought then Nala Se would have some idea.

“To ensure that I co-operate. The Empire seeks the reproduction of a genetic M-count, but the experiments on the specimens have yet to yield the desired result.”

The M-count was something she was aware of but nothing else Nala Se was saying made much sense to her. “What specimens? You mean the clones?”

“No. Not the clones.”

Any further elaboration was cut off as the lab doors opened and Omega turned to see who it was.

“How nice to see you reunited with your trusted assistant.” Hemlock commented to Nala Se. He massaged the palm of his gloved hand. “I’m sure Omega’s presence here will only strengthen your efforts. Shall we head to the vault?” He waved a hand in front of him towards the doors.

Omega went to leave but Nala Se’s hand on her shoulder stopped her from advancing.

“See to your remaining tasks.” Nala Se instructed before they left the lab.

Omega watched them from the window and wondered what was so special about this vault Hemlock had mentioned but she didn’t have the means to find that out yet. For now, she had little choice but to head to her next chore of the day.

--

She glared at the droid as he shocked one of the Lurca hounds and she irritably scooped some food up before sending it through the hatch into the bowl of the hound she was currently tending to. As the droid’s attention was focused on something else, she took the opportunity to gather more loose straw from the ground and hid it in the bottom compartment of her box.

She carried on to the last cage to see her favourite of the hounds. “Hi Batcher.” She whispered to the hound curled up at the far end of the cage but her only reply was a low growl. It was then she noticed the bowl was overflowing with uneaten food. “Hmm. Still won’t eat the food, huh? I don’t blame you.” She stole a quick glance back to the droid to see he was still paying her no attention and she took the chance to fish out her lunch from earlier. “Here, I saved you some of mine.”

Batcher got to her feet but snarled and pressed herself aggressively against the bars of the enclosure.

In the shock, Omega had dropped the nuggets inside the cage, but she watched as Batcher ate them and swiftly retreated to the back of the space. “Better? I’ll bring you more tomorrow.” She stood up and left to do what she had been wanting to do the entire day.

--

As she slowly walked down the corridor, she glanced between each of the cells, the sounds of teeth chattering and coughing made her concern grow as she saw the effects this place was having on all of the clones here.

She made her way to the cell she’d been searching for. “Crosshair.” She called quietly. “I tried to come earlier, but there were too many guards watching me.”

Crosshair sighed. “You shouldn’t be down here at all.”

“Well, how else are we gonna plan an escape?”

“There is no ‘we.’ And there is no escape.” Crosshair sat up. “I’ve already tried.”

“Every stronghold has a weak point.” Omega said. “Maybe I can convince Emerie to help. She’s one of us.”

She sounded just like them and that was the last thing he needed. “Not every clone is your ally. You trust too easily.”

“Maybe you don’t trust enough.” Omega countered but as she said that she noticed a tremor in his right hand which he tried to conceal with by holding it with his left. “Crosshair?”

“Just…” He sighed again. He didn’t need her pity or her concern. “Go, before you make things worse for both of us.”

Omega went to leave but she stopped herself. “There has to be a way out of here. I’ll find it.” She didn’t expect a reply, so she didn’t wait for one, instead she left now.

Crosshair watched her go. Even from that small interaction, he’d already seen so much of them in her and that would either make her or break her in this place and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be around to watch.

--

Darkness had fallen and it was that time again where she scratched the next tally into the wall. She brought the Lula hay doll out and held it close to her chest- it wasn’t much but it was the reminder of home she needed. If you truly weren’t here, then Omega knew you all would be looking for her, but she was going to do whatever it took to make that easier.

--

5 months later

The dripping water, the sunlight creeping in, the birds chirping, the concealing of her doll at the bottom of her box… the routine was all so familiar now. She was already standing at the ready for when Emerie opened the door and, like clockwork, it whirred open to reveal the older clone who had the same opening remark she always did.

“Good morning, Omega.”

“Good morning.”

“Let’s begin.” Emerie led the way out.

--

Yet again, they walked the same route to the testing centre and yet again she passed Crosshair in the corridor, but she had long since learned that trying for any sort of recognition from him in this environment was pointless, so she kept her gaze down too.

She let her blood be drawn, her hand was now numb to the sensation, and she took all the samples to the lab where Nala Se once again destroyed all traces of her sample. She hadn’t been able to learn anything more about the vault or the specimens but what she had gathered was that you, Hunter, and Wrecker definitely were not here and that made the thought of escape feel far more feasible and appealing.

--

The lurca hounds were the same as they always were but as she made her way to Batcher’s spot, she saw the hound tending to a nasty cut on her front right leg. “Batcher? K-9X1! Hurry!” She yelled to the droid.

“What is the issue?” The droid asked as he approached the girl.

“Batcher’s hurt.” Omega informed him.

“LH-201 sustained injures during the nightly patrol. If her wounds do not heal, the subject will be terminated.”

“Then do something to help her!” Omega demanded.

“I am not a medical droid. It is not part of my programming.”

Omega could only watch as the droid merely walked away, and she turned to the sound of Batcher’s whimpers of pain. She wouldn’t accept termination as Batcher’s fate, if the droid wouldn’t help Batcher, then she would.

She ran over to the medical kit on the wall and took the bacta out but when she reached into the kennel to try and tend to the wound, Batcher snapped at her. “Now look. I need to clean your wound for it to get better. It’ll only hurt for a second, so put those teeth away and behave.” She said sternly but it seemed to do the trick as Batcher let her do it. “See? That’s not so bad.”

Omega worked in silence for a few seconds before she spoke to the hound again, “You know, I have a friend that would’ve been able to help us get along a lot faster.” She said warmly as she continued to apply the bacta to the wound. “But I think we’re getting there now.” She smiled as Batcher gave her hand a tentative lick once she finished with the bacta.

--

“I dressed Batcher’s wounds as best as I could. At least she didn’t bite me. That’s progress, right?” she looked at Crosshair, but he gave her nothing, so she continued talking. “If she doesn’t get better soon…” She sighed. “Maybe I can steal a med kit from the lab and see if there’s anything I can use-”

“Stop.” Crosshair interrupted her with a frustrated sigh. Clearly the others hadn’t done a very good job of making her stay on course and now he needed to be the one to remind her. “What is your primary objective?”

“Escape.” Omega answered.

“Then stop wasting time on lost causes. Forget the hound, forget me, and complete the mission.”

“Not without you.”

“If I get the chance to escape, I wouldn’t think twice about leaving you behind.”

“You’re lying! You wouldn’t do that. You’re my brother.”

She had been insisting on that for months now, no matter how many times he tried to push her away and he didn’t know how much more of that he could tolerate hearing. “I’m not them.” Crosshair snapped.

Omega couldn’t accept that. “I’m not giving up, Crosshair. I won’t let you either.” She got up to leave.

Crosshair stood up with a heavy breath and called out to her retreating figure. “Omega.”

Omega stopped and turned back to face him.

“Don’t risk anything for me. I belong in here.” He said, meaning every word.

“None of us belong in here.” She replied before walking away.

--

Her door whirred open before the usual time, and she woke up with a gasp as two troopers entered her room. She got to her feet and concealed her doll behind her. “What’s going on?” She asked Emerie.

“Surprise inspection. Standard procedure.” Emerie informed her.

“Clear.” One of the commandos said.

However, the other noticed the doll hidden behind her back and he tore it from her grip and handed it to Emerie.

“We’ve been over this before, Omega. Personal items are forbidden.” Emerie chastised her. “I’ll dispose of it.”

“Don’t!” Omega protested. “Please, Emerie.”

“It is for your own good. Come, we have work to do.”

--

It was a welcome sight to see Batcher so happy to greet her this time around. “Hey, Batcher.” Omega said fondly and she saw the wound had nearly scarred over. “Look at you. You’re almost at a hundred percent.” She gave her a soft scratch on the jaw.

“Did you not read the standing order for the day?” The droid yanked her to her feet. “LH-201 has been slated for termination.”

“What? Why? She’s healed.” Omega argued.

“The creature’s recent domesticated disposition has been deemed a liability.”

“But that’s my fault, not hers.” Omega tried to resist being pulled away, with Batcher also barking in protest, but the droid’s grip was strong.

The droid groaned. “It is protocol.”

Omega finally managed to weasel her way out of his grasp and steal his datapad but the droid reacted swiftly and started to pull it away from her. She allowed herself to be tugged airborne and she braced her feet against the droid’s torso and leaned back, the momentum giving her the victory. She got away from the droid with the datapad in her hands and she quickly activated one of the large crates on the ceiling above and it fell on top of K-9X1. She grabbed his electro-staff and shocked him with it but not before he had the chance to call security so now, she had to act swiftly.

Omega used the datapad to open the exit hatch in Batcher’s kennel and deactivated her collar. “Batcher, come!” She ran over to the bars and reached in to take the collar off the hound. “Now you need to run away and not come back, okay?” It pained her to let her one close companion go but it needed to happen. She patted her snout. “And try not to bite anyone.”

Batcher hesitated and whined at her.

“I can’t go with you yet.” Omega explained. “I have to get Crosshair first. Batcher, go!” Omega watched her run down the tunnel with both relief and sadness, but she’d get out soon too, she knew she would.

“Breaking the rules, I see.”

Omega jumped and turned around to see Hemlock standing before her and Emerie standing behind him.

“And releasing a weak lurca hound into the wild? I didn’t know you were so cruel, Omega.”

“Me? You were gonna terminate her.” Omega said angrily.

“And you believe your actions changed that outcome?” When Omega faltered in her reply, he kept speaking, “Now some rotations ago, one of our shuttles crashed just beyond this mountain. But that is not what killed them. No, it was the creatures that roam the jungle. Even our strongest lurca hounds struggle against what’s beyond these walls. And your domestication of LH-201 only made her vulnerable.”

“You don’t know she won’t survive.” Omega disputed. “She deserves a chance.”

“Oh, the flawed logic of an idealistic child.” Hemlock’s tone fuelled with quiet mockery. “Emotion and sentiment have no place within these walls. You would do well to remember that.”

She wasn’t afraid of his threats anymore. “Or what?”

Seeing the way he turned to look at Omega again, Emerie hastily intervened. “Doctor, perhaps I should return Omega to her room.”

Hemlock held a hand up to stop her from going any further and kept his gaze on Omega. “You have more to say?”

“I know you brought me here to make Nala Se cooperate. You need her. She won’t work for you if you hurt me.” Omega said confidently.

Hemlock only laughed. “Of course I’m not gonna hurt you, Omega.” He inhaled deeply. “Your friend in the detention block, however, may not be as fortunate.”

“Don’t hurt Crosshair! He didn’t do anything.”

“I did have plans for CT-9904, despite his resistance to re-education, but I am willing to make a few sacrifices if your misbehaviour continues.” He bent from the waist and leaned down towards her. “Actions always have consequences. Sometimes not in the ways we imagine.”

Now that threat was one that she knew he would follow through on and she didn’t want to be responsible for Crosshair suffering even more than he was already.

“Take her back to her room and restrict her access.” Hemlock ordered Emerie as he exited.

Omega left with her a few seconds later.

--

Night had fallen and Omega sat huddled on the edge of her bed, but she heard the door open. “Go away.” She said with a sigh, not even bothering to look at Emerie this time.

“Omega…”

“Please… just go.” She requested, hoping the misery in her voice would be enough to convince Emerie to leave and she was grateful to hear her footsteps retreat and she angled herself towards the door to see that her hay Lula had been returned to her. She picked it up, but the sound of a lurca howling brought her back to the window.

She attempted in vain to peer through to bars to the outside for any sign of Batcher, but she couldn’t see anything. She then looked at the growing collection of tallies that represented the months that she’d been here. It may take more time, but now more than ever she knew she needed to get out and she needed to take Crosshair with her.

--

Hunter’s eyes snapped open, and his heart was pounding in his chest, but his surroundings told him it had been another dream. The ship was still steadily travelling through hyperspace towards Oba Diah, and the three of you had been using the long journey to catch up on some much-needed rest before the mission would begin.

Reaching out to Roland Durand of all people had felt like a long shot but when he said he could help if you only found the Pyke that had disgraced him and the Durand name, it had been an easy decision to accept but it had done nothing to quell the worry and fear that coursed through his veins. He sat up and began the usual routine of deep breathing.

Ever since you’d fully opened yourself up to him and the Force again, he didn’t need to wake you anymore when this happened, you would feel everything he felt and wake up a couple seconds after he did, and this time was no different. “Which one this time?” You whispered; your tone filled with tender understanding.

“I’m sorry.” Hunter rasped as he steadied his breathing. He hated that this was having a knock-on effect on you two, especially since your own sleep had only now started to get better. You were another person he was still finding a way to let down.

You shushed him softly as you sat up next to him. You have nothing to be sorry for. “Which one?” You prompted again. You knew his sleep had been haunted by more than just the reminders of what had happened in the recent months, it was these new nightmares that were plaguing him more and more.

Hunter released a heavy breath. “Same one as the nights before. I can see her, she’s right in front of me but no matter what I do, I can’t reach her and- and then she’s taken away.”

You pressed your lips to his shoulder, and you rubbed soothing circles on his back. “This mission for Durand is another step in the right direction. You’re doing all you can. We will find her, Hunter.”

Hunter shook his head and swung his legs out to the side of the bunk. “We took too long to find you, and you weren’t even really hiding.” Hunter countered without glancing back at you.

He didn’t need to look at you for you to feel his distress. You reached a hand out to his shoulder to try and get him to face you again. “Hunter-”

He gently but firmly pushed your hand away. “I’m going to go over what we’ve got again. Go back to sleep, I’ll be back soon.”

You sighed and watched him go to the cockpit. You’d seen the shift in him as had Wrecker. The relief of your reunion had long since passed and he, like the two of you, was getting more desperate to find Omega but it was affecting him far more than he was willing to talk about. His once calm and collected demeanour had vanished and he was taking on missions with little care for the risk or conditions they came with and this mission for Durand was no exception. Whilst you and Wrecker were happy to agree, there had been little discussion over the matter or the conditions of the deal. The two of you had done what you could, but you knew the only true thing that would bring him comfort would be finding Omega again.

Although a strong part of you wanted to follow him, you knew that right now, he needed the space, and you would give him that, but you couldn’t stand by and watch him drive himself into the ground for much longer.

--

You woke up again to find the space next to you ice cold and you knew that Hunter had not returned at all, and he wasn’t planning too. You tossed the blanket aside and silently walked towards the cockpit where you could hear the faint tapping of fingers against the keys of a datapad.

You leaned against the entryway to the cockpit and studied him for a moment as he kept his focus on Tech’s datapad. He looked utterly exhausted. His head drooped every few seconds, his shoulders were hunched, and weariness was written all across his face. It pained you to see him like this.

Aware that his brother was sleeping a few metres away, his words to you were quiet, “I said I’d be back soon.” He continued to tap through the intel that he’d been anxiously scanning for any detail he could’ve missed.

“You said that hours ago.” You matched his volume and straightened up. “You need to talk to me. Shutting down like this isn’t good for you.”

“I’m not shutting down. I’m doing what needs to be done to get Omega back.” He couldn’t stop. He’d let her down for long enough. The answer was there, and he kept missing it and he couldn’t stand it.

You fully came into the cockpit and kneeled in front of him. “You may be a leader, Hunter, but you’re not alone. This isn’t just the fear that we’re not going to get her back because you know we’re not going to stop until we do. There’s something else you’re afraid of.” You searched his face for a sign of what more it could be, but he wasn’t giving anything away. You kept your voice low but kind, “What is it?”

Hunter ignored you and kept his eyes fixed on the words on the screen in his possession, but he wasn’t reading them anymore.

“Hunter, put it down.” You attempted to take the datapad but his hold was too tight.

“I can’t stop. I can’t. She-” He cut himself off and swallowed thickly. “I can’t stop.” He repeated again, his voice barely above a whisper.

“You’re no good to anyone if you’re too exhausted to think straight.” You said with concern. “Talk to me, please.”

Hunter silently shook his head. The responsibility of all of this was on him, you shouldn’t be worrying about him now.

You knew how hard this was and he rarely allowed himself those moments of vulnerability, but he’d been there for you countless times, it was now your turn to be the one he could lean on. “You’ve helped me through so much, Hunter.” You placed one hand on his tattooed cheek and stroked your thumb along his cheekbone and whether he meant it or not, you felt him relax into your touch. “Let me help you now.” You whispered as your other hand fanned across the datapad and started to push it out of his grasp. “Put it down.”

“I-”

“Put it down.” You repeated again, applying more pressure now as you felt his resistance fade and relief coursed through you as he let you take it from him.

Hunter finally let the datapad slip from his grasp and he let the tiredness take over and his body sagged against the chair.

“What else is it that’s bothering you?” You came back from putting the datapad away and crouched again and laid your hands on his knees.

Hunter hesitated for a moment but for this first time since he woke up, he caught your eyes and he saw nothing but love and concern behind them and he swallowed thickly. “All she wanted was to not end up an experiment and that’s exactly what I’ve let happen.”

“Hunter…”

The words just tumbled from him now. “I let down Crosshair, I let down T- I let down Tech. I was too late to save them, but I still had you, I still had Wrecker and I still had Omega. Then you and Omega were ripped away from us and that was another thing I couldn’t stop. I relied too much on Wrecker when we were looking for you, I wasn’t who he needed me to be, and I can feel that happening again. I can’t be too late again. I can’t let another person down… I can’t let Omega down.” He turned away from you once more.

Your heart broke for him. “You have done no such thing.” You brought your hand back to his face to keep his eyes on you. “Listen to me, you didn’t let them down and you weren’t too late for them. At that time, Crosshair had made his choice, and you wouldn’t have been able to change his mind. Tech, he-” You felt the emotions rise up in your throat, choking the next words you were going to say. After pausing for a second, you cleared your throat and started again, “Tech made his choice. That wasn’t you being too late for them. As for Wrecker, he won’t and doesn’t think that. You’re his brother first, Hunter, he would never think that.” You paused for a moment to let that sink in before you added, “And you weren’t too late for me either. I’m right here with you and I’m not going anywhere.”

Hunter’s jaw tightened as he listened to the words you said but he couldn’t quite bring himself to fully believe them.

Still seeing the reluctance behind his eyes, you took his hand and placed it over your heart. “Feel that? I’m not worried, I’m not doubting you. We’re getting her back, you have not failed her, Hunter and she’ll know we’re looking for her. She’ll know that.”

Hunter closed his eyes and let the comfort of your steady heartbeat flood his senses.

After some time had passed, you decided it was time for him to get some proper rest before you arrived on Oba Dia. “Come on.” You took his hands, and a gentle tug encouraged him enough to get to his feet.

Hunter was so tired he could barely register his movements; all he knew was somehow you were getting his feet moving and leading him back to your bunk.

“Lie down.” You instructed gently as you reached the bed.

Hunter did as you said, and he felt you slide in next to him, he willed his weary body to turn and hold you like he usually did.

You shook your head and nudged him, so his back was facing you. You wrapped your arm around him and put your hand in his and placed it over his chest. “Just close your eyes and breathe with me.”

“This mission’s gonna help us somehow, right?” Hunter murmured with a tired voice.

You planted a soft kiss to the hinge of his jaw. Yes, it will. Drug syndicates were not high on your list on the people you were looking to stay on an even keel for. The Pykes weren’t going to stop you from doing whatever it took to get to her.

Next Chapter>

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[dadattebayo]

So today I bumped on this post and wanted to share some thoughts on the subject, but the account I reblogged it from seems to be off now so I lost my post and no one sees it. Still want to keep it, so...

Sorry, with all respect, but I just don’t get it. Like … WHY should we stop asking them about the thing they actually play? What exactly so bad happens to them if we do? By the thing I mean Haladriel as a ship. They play it. Literally.

Come one, it's obvious the show itself launched the ship. Intentionally, using all classic cinematic tools to make the exact romantic subtext visible to the audience (like gestures, poses, camera angles, looks eyes to eyes, sensual whisper) so we could definitely read it as romantic even if they refuse to confirm it openly. (Due to the possible unhinged reaction of the lorebros, I’m sure) So basically the show implied romance between them from the beginning, and now since they are stepping back, we just have to be ashamed to ask questions? Surely the actors give more interviews then the showrunners, because they are the faces of the characters, their representatives, they could give you the insight no one else could give since they play it and are the most involved in their personalities and emotions. They should be able to explain their motives and thoughts. This is how the acting craft works, they must FEEL the character. This is why for fans, hearing actors discuss a ship is like hearing the characters discuss their own feelings.

See what I mean? Typical romantic cinematic hint.

So again why shouldn't we ask them? why not let the actors talk about their interpretation? Miriel and Elendil's actors shouldn't be asked about them too, or it only concerns Morfydd and Charlie for some reason?

For god sake we all know the ship is doomed, there will be no future, but still the show revolves around them, even in the end of s2 he still mentioned she's his queen. But there was not enough interaction, mostly ambiguous one that we have to explain and develop ourselves, so why should we be deprived as well of their vision and of any extra detail we would like to know from the first hands? | don't feel like it.

And I think people just need to stop decide for the actors how they feel and being overprotective over literally nothing. Shipping is a part of any fan culture. And the actors are not made of glass, they actually are even supposed to speak out. Once again: the show presented and developed the ship. The actors play the characters of this ship. They play the feelings we all see. They are aware of the subtext. They do not feel ashamed to play it. They are not ashamed to play those characters. So we don't have to be ashamed to want to know more about what they play, what they mean and what is their vision on it. There is no harm being caused.

I actually miss good all days when the actors were not considered this sensitive. like for example during the promotion of the X-MEN both Mcavoy and Fassbender got unstoppably asked like million questions about their MAGNETO/XAVIER (Cherik) ship, they were shown fanarts and fanfics, even the explicit ones, they even had to read out loud some about themselves (yeah-yeah, not their characters, but specifically real-person ship aka FassAvoy). No one got offended. One can say they even encouraged it. Homosexual ship. McAvoy was married at that time. Still they were goofing around, touching each other and hugging all the time, talking about their character bromance and generally spreading fanservice all over the fandom. They were having fun alongside with the fans. This was gold.

By the way the same story with their characters: they are a protagonist and a villain , two opposites with sort of cosmic connection, they just won’t let each other go peacefully. There is love, hate, friendship, rivalry and pain. Some fans see them as a friends/foes, shippers like me see them as lovers. This ship is giant, and thank for the actors interaction and involvement into the fandom it just got deeper and much more exciting.

Highly recommended to explore.

Remind you of something? 🙃

[demonioenelespacio]

I really love how s2 of Good Omens is written, because you have so many clues about what is going to happen at the end, the offer, the motivations behind the choices of all the characters… You have everything on the plate to cook an amazing recipe.

You start the season with them as angels and end it with an offer to be both angels again (just like s1 started and ended with a Garden). You get a brief glimpse of The angel who became Crowley, we get to see how they were so passionate about their work, you can see their joy. I mean, look at them

Can you really blame Aziraphale for thinking that the offer is amazing? When that could mean that Crowley is this happy again.

But… The spark that our demon is missing is innocence, and that’s something Crowley can’t get back, ever (unless they delete his memory??).

Crowley is bitter and angry and anxious, but we know he can experience that joy from Before, because we can see that when he is making it rain for Maggie and Nina. We saw a real smile.

Aziraphale didn’t.

But the offer is not because he wants to change Crowley, because he knows who Crowley is now and loves him as he is. And because he knows that Crowley is still the same caring and kind being he was Before.

“I know you”

“You do not know me”

“I know the angel you were”

“The angel you knew is not me”

Yeah, it’s true, but that scene is to show Azira that he is still kind, he didn't kill the sheep, he is not going to kill the children. So, yes, Crowley isn’t that Angel, but the core is the same in the end.

There is also the fact that… Do you think Aziraphale ever thinks about how he planted the seeds of Crowley's Fall?

This is the face of an angel who is going to end the career of another angel WITHOUT REALISING IT.

That Angel didn’t know about Earth, about humans, about the Great Plan, they were busy making stars. If Aziraphale had never told them that, would Crowley have thought of asking questions?

First offence and all of that… How unfair. How could Aziraphale make it right again?

The “Exactly” scene is so important. They are so stupid (affectionary).

They mean the same thing (We can be together) but saying different things; a phrase (Nothing lasts forever) meaning different things for each of them. They don’t talk, they don’t really speak each other's language.

Also, the final scene is more painful, but we have the same argument in ep1:

“Oh, right, this is how you wanna do it?”

“No, I would love you to help me! I’m asking you to help me take care of (Heaven). But if you won’t, you won’t”

*Crowley leaves*

How can they have broken up so many times without ever being together (screams).

In ep1 we also have the two little mini half-miracles. And I have read some people take that as how powerful Crowley is, but come on. This Big Miracle is clearly because they are working together, the two of them together are more powerful than anything else. And boy, that rang an alarm in my head when I first watched the season, because… Crowley said in s1 that they will be waiting for the next Big Thing, this war "Heaven and Hell vs. Humanity". You want the best in your team, right?

Because if they are not… they can be against you.

So, yeah, I saw Metatron and was like “ok, here we go”. And look, his offer is to Aziraphale, because he is an angel, but Metatron doesn’t blink an eye before mentioning Crowley too. He wants both. But whatever, if Crowley doesn’t want to go to Heaven, if Heaven only gets Azirphale, well, success either way! Because if you separate the two of them, they are no longer a threat .

Also the fly, flying around very very noisy. You have Beelzebub saying they want Gabriel surrendered to them and acting a bit weird. All the clues there (I must confess I didn't expect the ship to be canon, I just thought they might be talking more lol. A nice win).

All this just thinking about episode 1.

The last thing I want to touch is Maggie and Nina talking to Crowley before the confession. Because… They told us what was going to happen.

They can’t be together, because Nina has to get over her previous toxic relationship before she is ready, and then, only then, they can try, if Maggie waits (she will wait).

Aziraphale has to get over his toxic relationship with Heaven before he is ready, and then, only then, they can try, if Crowley waits (he will wait).

[cringefailvox]

i hope that valentino doesn't die in s2, and not just because i like him and want to see more of him.

i actually think val is a really good opportunity for hazbin to dig into how it defines redemption. every character in the show has a different ethical outlook on hell and the idea of redemption, but the two main ones seem to be charlie (everyone is capable of changing for the better when offered support and safety, and everyone should be provided those things regardless of what they've done) and alastor/lucifer/adam (people are naturally inclined towards wrongdoing, there are no second chances, and hell is both a punishment and cosmic justice). val is the perfect character to exemplify the struggle between these two different outlooks. CAN someone as awful and abusive as val be redeemed? and if so, what would that look like? how would we ensure his victims are safe from him while also giving him space to grow and change? if he can't be redeemed, what's the threshold for irredeemability? can we agree on what makes someone so bad there's no hope? can we quantify which sins are worse than others, and how?

(and by the way, what even gets someone into heaven, and who decides? hazbin seems like this is the main question it's beginning to focus on, so i have a lot of hope for how this one will get resolved. because at the moment, it seems like self-sacrifice is what gets you there, and that is deeply unsatisfying to me—you shouldn't have to give up everything, up to and including your life, to be considered "good enough". it's a vehemently christian idea that martyrdom is righteous and i fucking hate it.)

and if charlie's ethics are universal, she'll have to commit to redeeming people like val, otherwise she undermines her entire mission by picking and choosing who gets to have support and who doesn't. if charlie's ethics aren't universal, we could start really digging more into how her personal attachments to angel dust could present a conflict of interest in her values, like we did with vaggie; are people only worthy of her unconditional encouragement if she loves them? what are the implications of THAT?

my personal value system believes that there's no such thing as someone being irredeemable. there's only people who actively choose not to try, even after they've been provided love, support and well-intended challenges from people who want to see them grow. there needs to be space for people to be safe from their abusers and space for abusers to reform themselves and participate in society, otherwise our options become banishment or execution and i doubt that's the ethical message hazbin wants us to walk away with. val's positioning in the narrative and his close connection to angel makes him the perfect candidate to really challenge charlie's commitment to her ideals, since she doesn't already love him (like vaggie) and he isn't actively trying to be better (like angel or pentious). killing him would be unsatisfying, as well as letting everybody off the hook too easy. i want these bitches neck-deep in painful ethical dilemmas.

ultimately, i hope that hazbin goes the teshuvah route regarding sin. in judaism, teshuvah is the process of repentance for sin, but it also means "return" because the hebrew word for sin, chet, means missing the mark. sin is when we don't quite hit the target how we should have. it's not something you're born with, it's something you do, and it's something you can choose not to do. teshuvah is slow and difficult and a lifelong process, not a one-time golden ticket to heaven. i hope hazbin ends up in the same vein as this, where reforming sinners becomes more about repairing broken relationships, crafting a better society, and harm reduction instead of the ultimate goal being entry to heaven. i think that would be far more interesting and cathartic to me than anything else

[sepublic]

In hindsight it’s funny how I speculated after S1 about King and Lilith having a friendship because of similarities, not just because that happened for Hooty instead (and he needed it a lot more, it was much more based to do it with Hooty who was also the outlier in the Owl House) but also because.

Remember when King was just being a kid (something established in S2) excited to meet his dad, and then Lilith shut him down unprompted to be bitter about her own mother and project that onto King, who is devastated by the possibility??? And he actually internalizes it, with Lilith dragging him down to her level; It leads four episodes later to King being bitter about his dad and crying and lashing out in loneliness.

Not to mention Lilith just making King feel worse about being a Titan with her discomforting worship, to the point King had to walk away to be alone despite that being a dangerous thing to do; Hell he even trusts Steve because he needs anyone besides Lilith, and Hooty is not accepting criticisms of her as Steve painfully finds out. Poor King had to stand up for himself there.

I love you Lilith but uh jeez imagine if Eda found out she’d have been dead. Because after Luz, her other child needed a bad encounter and unhealthy worship too… At the same time, we saw Lilith begin to get her act together in defending her nephew, because adults should be nice to kids in general, even if they aren’t expected to be parents. King had Lilith and Eda for two months, sneaking off to meet with them when he needed a reprieve from the Collector. Because as much as he grew to enjoy the Collector, it was also a very stressful dynamic for him.

Anyhow this brings me to another point that yeah, I can see how Lilith being a bad influence to King during a volatile recovery period, and how King and Luz shouldn’t be expected to tolerate and support that over their own health (esp with Luz’s own health on the subtle decline), paired with Lilith moving out; She also needed to address her pain from someone who actually owed it to her and had that caretaker responsibility from the start.

I do find it funny/ironic with zero judgment (speaking from my own experience obviously) that a lot of us looked forward to the idea of Lilith as a mom to Amity or others and then it turned out she was just. NOT good with kids a lot of the time, she’s bad even, Lilith’s more of an aunt anyway and it’s like. Fine for her?

Lilith had a lot to work on before she could begin supporting kids, it was not her arc’s priority, a big part of her arc is about needing her own mother to support her, who is an adult but needs it and isn’t judged for that! Lilith's happiness and healing is not contingent on taking care of a kid, which is a worthwhile stance to consider from a feminist lens. And eventually Lilith reaches that point, not necessarily as a parent but definitely a proper mentor for Amity, to bookend Lilith’s growth with a nice achievement; But that’s a nice ending bonus, not a prerequisite.

Plus the thing is that for all this, Lilith is not like… demonized for it. It’s still bad and wrong and she needed to give distance to King. But her road to recovery could be messy and she could be messy and mean about it. But there wasn’t an insistence on reactively punishing Lilith for it, moreso addressing the problem constructively, and sometimes Lilith having better things was synonymous with the kids having the same with her. Kinda like how Camila was pretty harsh and even taking it personally at the end of Yesterday’s Lie, but she also realizes what she did wrong and doesn’t have to be punished, just be supportive.

Support Women’s Wrongs, not just in the literal sense, some flaws are allowed to be passed off as not big enough to address. But also in the sense that women are allowed to be flawed and messy and work on it without needing to be hated or punished, because there’s a difference between others characters feeling that way towards them and the narrative, y’know? Think TOH arguing Restorative Justice instead of Retributive Justice, building people back up instead of tearing them down further.

Kikimora was knowingly complicit in genocide and then manipulated children afterwards, but the new state shouldn’t have the authority to execute, so the worst she gets is community service, and before that Kiki’s still entitled to successful revenge against her abuser. Warden Wrath ran a prison and oversaw inhumane experiments, but still gets to live with his son. Terra and Adrian are terrible people but outside of some minor comeuppance, are allowed to live their own lives.

[nerdflayer]

This is my opinion on why I believe the GA doesn’t see Byler.

Before I begin, I just want to say I’ve been a Byler fan since Season 1. Season 2 cemented my feelings about them. Season 3 crushed my soul. And season 4 at first watch made me feel pessimistic but eventually optimistic. As a gay boy myself I can’t help but see the whole show through Will eyes (he is me) and can’t help but fall in love with Mike. I mean he did so much for Will in the beginning, how could you not love Mike for that.

The relationship between the boys really does take a turn for the worse coming off S2 into S3 because Mikes character kind of does a 180 in terms of Bylers relationship.

Anyway. Talking about S4, we see A LOT of the CA plot line from Wills perspective. And I think this is key to people not seeing Byler. Wills feelings are made very clear. He’s depressed, traumatized, he doesn’t fit in, he is well aware of his homosexuality which brings stress and suffering and the tremendous disappointment that he has in Mikes character, yet he can’t help but love regardless. With that said, Wills POV is bleak, and coming off the back of S3 it’s easier and, I would say necessary, for his character to believe that Mike doesn’t love him. The pain of letting yourself believe they do love you only to be rejected, is very hurtful. And I don’t think that boy can handle more pain so it’s safer for him to deny the hope. Will even says “I’m not going to fall in love.”

Mikes actions also play into this. Will does not see Mikes love for him. He can’t hug him, is dismissive, he argues and blames Will at Rink O Mania, he wrote to El but didn’t seam to call Will, makes the whole trip about El, isn’t attentive to Will at all, and even when Mike apologizes for obsessing over El- every one of their conversations is still about her. Again this is Wills POV. I will say Mike does give him hints and mix messages for romantics feelings but like I said, how is Will suppose to trust? Is Will just reading into the flirting because he wants it so badly? It needs to be direct otherwise Will and the GA won’t see it or believe it.

Obviously there are a lot of hints for Byler, and I believe 100% it will happen. I’m choosing to trust the hope even though Will isn’t able to.

My point is I think Wills painful POV cannot be underestimated even if straight viewers dont like Will you can’t deny how powerful it is. Will literally helped Mike say I love you to El because he doesn’t have hope for himself. I think straight viewers use his hopeless as evidence for why Mike and El will end up together. It’s interesting that you hate Will but Will plays a role in convincing you of Milevens endgame. What they don’t understand, other than all the Byler evidence, is that Will is wrong! Mike does have romantic feelings for him and Mike will get there! Because Mike doesn’t need to find himself he needs to return to the person he’s always been. He showed us who he is and it’s the person he was in S1 & S2 and we see it when he’s with Will!

[incorrecttowerofgodquotes]

Tower of God S2 OP Analysis (Spoilers)

The opening starts with Bam sinking after being pushed down by Rachel, before eventually being overtaken by a red light, one in which we can see the Thorn hidden in.

In this Wangnan shot, there’s a number of items littered around, with the most important being the ring and crown, signifying his status as the self proclaimed “future king of the tower.” Nia shows up after Lurker bursts in, signifying his true allegiance. There’s also a banner to a ramen place behind him

Bam is wildly reaching for his old Test floor friends as they continue without him. As Bam rips the page, we see a singular star which breaks the rest of the image, showing how Bam’s happiness with his friends was sacrificed just for Rachel’s obsession with the stars. (The lyrics here are “Even if I reach out, I can’t touch it”)

Here we see Horyang, Cassano, and Sophia, as well as the tubes Horyang and Cassano were trapped in when becoming living Ignition weapons. The wings sit upon each’s respective shoulders. (The lyrics here are “getting hurt”)

This is the money shot, so many details. There’s a rip between Khun and Rachel while curtains act as a border, showcasing that everything between the two is an act. Ran, Nobic, Dann, and Gyetang sit on Khun’s side while Apple and Micheal sit on Rachel’s side, hinting at their betrayal. Khun’s side also has an eye watching Rachel, a crown to signify his desire to become the head of his family, and a masquerade mask to show that he’s putting on a mask in front of Rachel, but one she’s able to see through. Rachel’s side has mouths showing how she lies, and a bloody knife to represent her stabbing Khun in the back and Dan in the legs. (The lyrics here are “betrayal”)

Jinsung and Hwaryun stand before a bunch of faceless FUG followers, though we can see Karaka lurking in the background to the left.

Here we see all five princesses we’ve come to know. Yuri, Maschenny, and Repellista are within the boundaries created by Jahad while Anaak and Endorsi are passing the boundary. There’s also a lizard sticker on Anaak’s side and a butterfly on Endorsi’s. (The lyrics here are “it’s painful”)

We cycle through all the important test admins before eventually settling on Hansung and Augusgus as the colors shift and chains in the background disappear. This shows their allegiance to FUG.

This shot (Ehwa) isn’t important I just like it. But we do get to see some important settings such as Repellista’s palace, the 21st Floor Whie Cichlid, and a house (though I can’t quite tell whether it’s Khun’s or S&S’s). (The lyrics here are “Burning red fire, blazing emotions”)

Prince and Miseng pass by, each in monochrome up until they finally notice each other, both giving a small smile towards the other

These shots with Viole are pretty quick but there's a good amount of meaning, so I’ll number them off.

1. The two rings Wangnan and Karaka bear (The lyrics here are “Bonds and a wishing heart, they become the key”)

2. This is Rachel’s wheelchair (thank you @ylge-alt on Twitter). Yellow daisies represent friendship and positivity

3. The scratched off name sheet

4. Nia’s dead body

5. The treasure chest and key containing the sweets from the Floor 28 test

6. This shinsu test machine showing Viole’s number in first place

7. A plate of sweet and sour pork

8. Arkraptor’s earring

9. A bloody knife and an apple with a bite taken out of it, once again referencing Dann getting his feet stabbed

As we reach the chorus, we climb up a pair of stairs as Headon welcomes us and here we go through each arc Viole bears witness to before ending on Khun standing in the entrance to Arlene’s hand.

Finally, we end on Team Sweet and Sour standing together on the stairs that rise even higher, with Wangnan especially excited at continuing his climb.

[vidavalor]

Ah, I remembered!

My question was: what are your thoughts on Crowley saying ‘I lost my best friend’ when he’s directly talking to Aziraphale’s non-corporate ghost in season 1? I always thought that line was strange. Is it that he can’t say ‘I lost you directly’ because others might be listening?

Hi @procrastiel ooh, nice! I *love* this scene so I'm super happy to share an opinion on it. Thank you. :)

Meta on the meanings behind what they call each other, what they intentionally *don't* call each other, how they actually said they loved each other and came up with a shorthand for it in 1941, and why they still don't just use those damn words already...

This goes everywhere, just FYI lol. I think I started with "no nightingales" and took a scenic route through 1600, 1941 and bits of S2 before coming back to the scene you asked about but I've been told it makes sense. Thanks for indulging me. :)

There are certain things that Crowley & Aziraphale feel that they can't call one another and can't say to one another directly. It's not just because they could be overheard if they're in public, though that's always a concern. They don't say them when they're alone, either.

It's because it hurts too much.

They've always tried to be optimistic about surviving Armageddon and being able to be together somehow but they're terrified that they won't and the odds, in their minds, aren't great, being that it's the whole will of God and all. As a result, they've lived their whole relationship expecting it to end in tragedy. They could both live for all of time, forced apart by Heaven and Hell. One of them could die and leave the other alone for eternity with nothing but the memory of the other. Meanwhile, in the now? It's not a great situation, either.

They can't really be together. They are together but not openly and they can't promise each other everything and they absolutely would if they could. Heaven and Hell could literally murder them if they got caught together so they have to be careful and keep it a secret. This means that even as the human world they live in opens up and starts to change to a point that queer humans like them are living more open lives with one another, Crowley and Aziraphale still cannot at this stage in the story.

So, it all becomes then an unspoken question of: what would make this easier? (As if it could ever really be made easier?) They don't wish to cause each other any additional pain. What would make it easier, they think, is if they don't say certain things so that what they can't have now or what might be lost to them in the future is and will be easier to bear.

This is delusional but they're doing it anyway because it gives them some measure of control over things they can't totally control.

They think it is easier to deal with not being able to be together if they just never say directly aloud what they are in terms that are surface-level undeniable. They speak in a coded language with one another and they say all the things in those words. But the doublespeak gives them some cover. Not to ever deny any of it but it softens the edges of it.

It's also because they live with the fact that they can't fully be together but they also both are fundamentally optimists and want to think that maybe, someday, they could find a way to have what they want to have with one another. That's also why they don't say the things fully. A part of them thinks that if they just don't right now and they wait until some time comes when it seems like they could have a life together, then they still get to have those moments. They're almost saving some of it for a life they hope they get to have but aren't sure if they will.

As a result, they are romantic as all fuck towards one another but they don't use words like romance or love aloud. If they do find they have to talk about it, they've shorthanded it in a way that they both understand because it's based on their past together. We already can see bits of it uncoded-- nightingales, dining at the Ritz-- but there are more than that that we can see if we deep dive a bit here so let's do that...

What's evident in the scene in 2.06 wherein Crowley decides to try to abandon the doublespeak is how deeply ingrained this way of speaking is for both of them. Also, how they don't abandon it when they're alone (the 1967 scene also illustrates this.) Crowley actually reverts back to their doublespeak *three sentences* into his proposal. He doesn't get much further than establishing that they've both been on this planet for a long time before he starts evoking coded messaging. He flicks his hands between them during the "you and me" line in a way that is echoing how Aziraphale gestured at him to mean "couple" in 1941. He winds up using coded language all over the place, peaking with the "no nightingales" moment that is actually coded language twice over because of "nightingales" being their word for romance and the asking Aziraphale to listen for birds evoking the Job minisode and the moment in the courtyard when they came up with the doublespeak.

Part of why Crowley can't get through the proposal without it is because he doesn't want to do it like this. Both the doublespeak and the idea of someday loosening it a bit mean things to them. They like their private language. Maggie and Nina are not exactly correct in assuming that they never say how they really feel. They're not wrong, either, but they're not fully right. Crowley and Aziraphale do talk. They just do it in a way that hurts them less because they can't bear to hurt each other because they're batshit crazy in love with each other. Maggie and Nina are correct in saying that Crowley and Aziraphale don't say how they truly feel if saying how you truly feel means using traditional language but they are wrong to say that they don't express these feelings at all because we have literally been watching them do so this entire time.

Notice how Crowley, even risking more with breaking their code in 2.06, still doesn't say some things. Amazing how he said all of that and he didn't say I love you, isn't it? He could have. He is, in what else he's saying, but the words they don't say are still there on the table. Aziraphale, later in the scene, almost does. He almost does because he is a mess over the situation and he wants to give Crowley something but then he doesn't and he spits out a self-aware I forgive you instead. That horrid, complicated version of it that he's used before and is code they both kind of hate. He's angry that this is all happening the way it's happening because it's taking some of the things they leave unsaid for hopeful, better days and it's saying them in a less than ideal moment.

That they both leave out that I love you, though, is the most I love you thing they could have possibly done.

They think it will be easier to not be free to be together and unafraid in the present-- and to maybe lose one another in the future, if they eventually have to-- if they pretend they're not a team or a group of the two of them and one way to do that is to never say words like the one we were all silently screaming at Crowley to say in that scene in 2.06 lol: "couple."

Are they a couple? Yes. Are they lovers? Yes. Are they partners, the term Nina used? Yes. Do they refer to their relationship using any of the terms in this paragraph? Oh God no...

That is why Crowley freaks out when Nina tries to get him to use uncoded, normal, human person language to help her understand what Crowley and Aziraphale's relationship is. She calls them partners and this is Crowley:

We're in agreement with Nina then when she responds with:

Nina isn't wrong here. She's just from a different world than Crowley. Nina lives in a world like ours in the year 2023 and she's puzzling Crowley and Aziraphale out through that filter. She doesn't know at this point that they are an angel and a demon who could be murdered by Heaven/Hell for being together. Her best rationale for why she's never seen Crowley and Aziraphale in her cafe together and didn't know until this week that the bookseller has a fella is her theory that Crowley is married and that he and Aziraphale are having an affair. To her, it explains why they've got chemistry for days but they're secretive. Crowley denies that-- defending Aziraphale's honor like the good old fashioned lover boy he is :)-- but the reason why he quickly denied that he and Aziraphale are partners, even if they absolutely are, is twofold. They are used to hiding it, it's dangerous for them to get caught out, and he probably feels uncomfortable with the idea of telling someone what they are exactly without talking with Aziraphale about it first-- that's all one reason.

The other reason is that he and Aziraphale don't use that word. It's not that it's an inaccurate one; it's probably the most accurate one, actually. They have a word, as we'll see, but partners isn't it because partners is the same thing as a couple and these are embargoed words to them. They don't use those phrases, even if that's what this is, just as they don't say I love you because if they don't call it love directly, they'll never lose that love, in their minds. If they don't know what it's like to hear the other say it, they don't ever have to bear the pain of never hearing it again. Better to hold those words back and only use them if they ever can somehow really be fully, openly together without fear. If Crowley doesn't use those words with Aziraphale, then he's not about to use them with the Coffee Shop Human he's only just recently met.

Along these same lines, they refrain from traditionally romantic terms of endearment on the surface. No my love, no darling, no sweetheart. Angel was there at the start and it stays because while it's always really angel (romantic), it's also angel (species/occupational), so it works well enough with their code. But its equivalent in reverse is Crowley. It's intimate, in the sense that only Crowley and Aziraphale know what it means. Only they were there in Job's courtyard. That's the coded layer of it-- it's Crowley's name to everyone else on the surface but it's that and a pet name to Aziraphale. It's why Aziraphale just calls him that constantly. Crowley changed his name to something only Aziraphale also really understands, making the use of it by Aziraphale then a way of expressing affection. When Nina asks them both separately about their relationship, both Crowley and Aziraphale actually revert to using what they call one another in an effort to explain it, even though they know that it doesn't translate fully in human terms without more words. Crowley says Aziraphale is an angel he knows; Aziraphale says:

Ironically? They are actually making it all *more* intimate by speaking in their own, private, coded language. They can't give each other everything but this they can, right? The language is their own, little world and not being able to explain their relationship to humans that well in 2023 doesn't mean they don't know what they mean to one another, which is more important. Since they can't make each other promises of forever that they can't keep and they can't have a life in the present that they'd choose for themselves, something they can do is use their little language to be sweet towards one another and they do. By having to work a little harder at conveying meaning through doublespeak, they wind up with something ironically actually at least as romantic as the traditional words, if not more so.

Anyone can call a lover darling and it can be lovely but can just anyone make my dear fellow romantic? Aziraphale can. This one was all him. He loved standing there in front of a dozen deadly human soldiers in the Kingdom of Wessex in 597 A.D., getting away with a pet name under the guise of stealing the "old sport"-style of male, moneyed, British speak and turning it romantic. This scene is great with the pet names because it opens with Aziraphale being a bit of a tease with "is that you under there, Crawley?" which he only does so that Crowley will roll his eyes and correct him. Aziraphale loves that Crowley changed his name to something coded between them based off of the moment they started their doublespeak. It was very romantic and this scene shows that Aziraphale sometimes, in earlier days, would call Crowley the old name just to get Crowley to correct him, which is all just a coded way of getting Crowley to say that, yes, he still feels the same way and yes, he still wants Aziraphale to call him that. This same scene, a few sentences later, then has Aziraphale's my DEAR fellow-- heavy emphasis on the 'dear'-- which is then answering Crowley's admission by just skipping any and all of Crowley's names entirely lol and calling The Black Knight my dear in front of a bunch of bloodthirsty soldiers and mercenaries.

The my [] fellow is perfect in their little language because of how it sounds all "I say, old chap!" on the surface but contains words that are romantic to them in their doublespeak. It's intentional that it's *not* "old chap" or "old sport" that they appropriated for their own purposes, it's my [] fellow. Fellow as in human, which is how they see their relationship (because it is) and that's something that comes up when Crowley uses a variant of this in 1941, which we'll get to in a second. My adds an intimate element to it of admitting that they are each other's in whatever ways they can be.

Aziraphale, like we said a moment ago, will sometimes sauce Crowley with the pet names a little and he does in S1 when he calls Anathema my dear when reassuring her in a scene in which he and Crowley are having a playful coded argument over Crowley's driving. Aziraphale miracles a bike rack onto the back of The Bentley and unnecessarily codes the word "bicycle" ("a perfectly normal velocipede"), smirking when Crowley grumbles "bicycle" at him. It's joking with him a bit at the lunacy of their little language *in* their little language. (Crowley playing back during this sequence is also calling Aziraphale angel (romantic) in front of Anathema, which was also a strategic decision to signal to her that he might look like a murder hornet but he's really just long-suffering gone on the sunshine-y one. Very we're just an old gay married couple, hen. We won't hurt you. in tone.) Anyway, Aziraphale using my dear with Anathema-- and his little smirks towards Crowley around it-- was really just underlining the way he uses my DEAR fellow with Crowley by using the same core phrase with a human in normal, uncoded, human conversation.

Other than this and the big one we're going to get to, there are really only two other things we've seen them use to refer to one another. In S1's Eleven Years Ago/2008, there's the moment when Crowley and Aziraphale have arrived back at the bookshop and Aziraphale is flirting with Crowley and says this, tongue firmly in cheek:

I mentioned this in another post about the wall slam in Tadfield but this is a very much intentionally blasphemous specific sexual request that is more at home in the sex meta post you all have me working on lol but for the purposes of this conversation, "foul fiend" is Bible for "wicked demon", so this is Aziraphale just kind of flirtily, jokingly calling Crowley a wicked demon in the one area in life where Crowley would probably happily own that description lol. It also has the other layer of humor in it in that Crowley calls Aziraphale angel (romantic) all the time, more often than he uses Aziraphale's actual name, and you'd think he wouldn't want to because Heaven hasn't exactly done right by Crowley and he's not especially fond of it. By calling Aziraphale angel with love behind the meaning of it, he's calling Aziraphale a good angel. He's saying that Aziraphale is what an angel is *supposed*to be, something that Aziraphale struggles with. It's both sweet and reassuring at the same time. As a result, Aziraphale has never just started calling Crowley "demon" for the same reasons-- he thinks if being a demon is being demonic and truly evil, then Crowley is a terrible demon because he's a lovely person. He is, however, positively wicked in bed, and Aziraphale likes to mock their whole situation with blasphemous Bible innuendo when requesting a little hellfire.

The other thing to briefly mention before we get into the friend discussion is a scene not long after the one we just talked about, when they're both smashed in the bookshop in S1. When he's drunk and attempting to say "bouillabaisse", Crowley gets distracted staring at Aziraphale for a moment and calls him baby before going back to his attempts at saying a word (in French, their romance language, per S2) and we get the "fish stew-- anyway!" segue back into the rest of the scene. Aziraphale was too drunk to notice enough to react so this opens up the question of whether or not the rules can get slightly more lax in bed. Does Crowley call Aziraphale baby in more intimate moments or does he just want to and it slipped out when he was drunk? It's a fairly normal phrase so it both would and would not be a surprise either way but it's still something of a question mark by the end of S2.

But there's one thing that they use that pertains to your question from the Discorporated!Aziraphale scene (told you we'd start to get here eventually lol) and that's how they use the word friend.

The rules of their language apply-- what is said on the surface is what one of the meanings of what they are saying is. It has to be what it sounds like on the surface to also be a coded thing. Aziraphale is Aziraphale's name and angel is what he is and Crowley is the name Crowley chose for himself. That angel and Crowley have hidden meanings-- that angel is given a tone that turns it from referring to Aziraphale by his species and more into angel (romantic); that Crowley is the name everyone calls Crowley now-- from angels to demons to humans alike-- but only Aziraphale knows that it's an in-joke referencing Crowley having to playact at being demonic and evil to hide his truer, sweeter nature... this is what makes these terms acceptable in their mutual language. My [] fellow is then also meeting the rules of the language because of the humor of taking a non-romantic phrase and using it for this romance of theirs that they don't refer to as one. It sounds like a perfect common thing for British men of any kind of relationship to use in conversation on the surface but it's romantic to them underneath.

So when they say friend, by their own rules of this language, it has to first contain the surface meaning. It has to be true on that level to reoccur in their language. So 'friend' does mean 'friend' in a friendship sense. They are friends. They are good friends-- best friends. Using the word is an admittance that they are each other's closest friends, which is both lovely in its own right and healthy in a romantic relationship. You want to be friends with your romantic partner. It doesn't mean you can't have other friends, of course, but if you're not friends with your partner, it's not really going to be a terribly satisfying relationship and since that is what they are-- the longest-running of long-term relationships lol-- that they are friends is important and a good thing. It's also a big deal for them to admit to it, since they are actually *supposed* to be mortal enemies. Their whole enemies-to-lovers thing never really got off the ground because they adored each other on sight but that they're friends despite the danger and the conflicts is a big thing in its own right.

But that's not the *only* meaning of friend to them, so let's look at how they evolved that bit of their language.

From what we've seen so far, it started in 1600 in The Globe Theatre scene with this:

In 1600, Burbage drops some human, queer coding into the secret language. Friend, the way Burbage is using it, is something that's actually implying lover. The surface word is technically related to friendship but the tone changes the meaning of friendship in this context to be that of a sexual relationship. Burbage's tone implies that he thinks Crowley and Aziraphale are fucking (which Crowley, laughing, silently agrees with is obvious, since he's been ignoring Burbage in favor of buzzing around Aziraphale and clearly trying to flirt his way into his bed).

Burbage is pissed that these two-- who, as we know, are basically the entire audience-- have been ignoring his monologue in favor of flirting with each other so when Aziraphale tries at a modicum of politeness (that somehow is even bitchier subtly than Burbage lol-- "I love all the... talking" is the best he can come up with), Burbage slings back by trying to drag Crowley into it by calling him Aziraphale's friend, with that loaded tone that makes the question really: 'and what does your lover think?'

Aziraphale gets the innuendo-- he's not exactly a novice at this in 1600-- but his immediate response is just to panic at the idea of anyone noticing him and Crowley together and, as Aziraphale does when stressed, he lies in increasingly absurd levels of untruth. (See also: the scene with Shax in The Bentley in S2, when he spirals up into ludicrously claiming to *not even know who Gabriel is* in an effort to say that he has nothing to do with his disappearance.)

Crowley is bemused by Aziraphale's increasingly desperate attempts to deny what is abundantly obvious to everyone around them and by Burbage's attempt to make a thing out of them to try to assuage his bruised ego. He chooses a little violence with this particularly amusing bit of go fuck yourself, you insecure little twerp:

Anyway lol what this scene then does is give us a moment in the story wherein we see them in a situation where friend (loaded) is defined as friend used euphemistically for lover and they both know it. This isn't coding they came up with but that they will wind up appropriating from the humans around them and repurposing for themselves, though they won't for awhile still to come yet.

What's worth noting here is that friend (loaded) in this human code is euphemistic for a pretty wide array of loaded friend relationships. There's no separation in it for friends with benefits versus someone you're seeing but aren't comfortable admitting that versus someone you've been with for awhile versus the person that is basically your secret spouse, etc.. All of these things are friend (loaded) in human code because the main purpose of it is to identify a pair of people who are involved as such without directly saying so on the surface, even if it's implied heavily via tone.

So what happens when Crowley and Aziraphale eventually decide to repurpose it for themselves?

They've got to be clear on what it means. They'll need to define it more specifically amongst themselves in order to use it.

For awhile still after 1600, they just aren't defining their relationship. They don't need friend (loaded) because they have things they call each other, right? They've got angel and Crowley and my dear fellow and the like. They're not usually around a lot of other humans together that are going to do what Burbage did and try to force a definition of it. (This changes, as we know, in the modern era-- especially S2-- but back in the day, it was true for them.) As a result, they've never had to define this and that's absolutely fucking perfect, as far as they're concerned.

Not defining this? Lovely. Yes. More of that. Makes the fact that they can't just call each other my love hurt a lot less, they're convinced. It helps now for sure and it'll make it less painful if they lose each other. They totally will not at all continue to spend thousands of years wondering what it would sound like if they said the things. They don't each have fourteen million fantasies about being able to use the traditional words and how they'd do it-- absolutely not lol. *Not* using the traditional words isn't at all making both the allure of those words-- and the ones they *do* use-- hotter and more romantic or anything. Not in the slightest...

So then we eventually get the Holy Water Arc, right, and in the middle of that scene, we see them run into a definition problem. In 1862, what actually causes them to fight isn't the holy water request. It's Aziraphale giving it all a word and that word being "fraternizing." First rule of We Don't Say It Club is that we don't say it... but it's also that if you're going to say a word that means the two of you and what you have, maybe don't use the one that Heaven would-- the one that means 'socializing with the enemy.' In Aziraphale's defense, they're both a mess and half-broken up in this scene and there's more going on it than we're going to get into here but the point is that suddenly not having a word caused big drama and caused the whole holy water conversation to de-evolve into an argument that broke them up for the eleven or so minutes that they can stay broken up.

But they still hadn't really resolved the whole holy water argument debacle by 1941, even if there is evidence in the show that they saw one another between 1862 and 1941, and the reason why they haven't is because holy water is irretrievably linked to defining what they are.

Crowley asking for it meant they had to consider what they are to one another and talk about it and 1862 proved their language didn't have words for that at the time. There is a level of panic to it because the request contains a certain level of acknowledgement about how they feel about each other. Aziraphale jumps onto holy water being a suicide pill not just because he's terribly worried that that's why a visibly anxious and depressed Crowley wants it but because if it's not what Crowley wants it for, then Crowley is saying he wants it for defense and whose defense, right? Not just his own, potentially. It's very much saying that he wants it to protect not just himself but Aziraphale from Hell and now we're talking about Crowley being willing to risk the wrath of Hell and maybe get himself killed trying to protect Aziraphale from harm and now, we're closer than ever to that I love you under the surface and they panic and they avoid it for 80 some odd years entirely until World War II...

...and then we arrive at The Blitz in 1941. We are now a scant one hundred years or so until 6,000 years being up since the creation of Earth and Armageddon was always going to happen in "*about* 6,000 years" so, for all they know, this is it... and Crowley in 1600 told you how he feels about sad endings:

So while rescuing Aziraphale is nothing new, Crowley turned up in 1941 with the intent of making a better ending, in case they had now found themselves at the start of the end of the world. They were almost out of time either way and he didn't want it all to end without them having said the things but also they didn't know *for sure* if this was it... and they still can't be together if it isn't... so Crowley can't just show up and be like so, angel, I've been meaning to tell you in the actual words for the last six millennia-- I'm madly in love with you. He has to find a way to do it in their language of doublespeak. And so, here's Crowley using friend (loaded) in front of the Nazis in 1941:

By using my friend in the church, Crowley is then actually euphemistically calling Aziraphale my lover by calling back to The Globe Theatre and stealing the human coded term that Burbage used. Crowley does not care what the Nazis think. The comment isn't for them; it's for Aziraphale. So is letting Aziraphale find out about his first name, which is also calling back to The Globe Theatre. ("Anthony", pronounced "Antony", as in Shakespeare's 'Antony and Cleopatra', the play in which Shakespeare put the love poetry he stole that Crowley wrote for Aziraphale.) So is referencing the unguarded holy water in the church, which is then trying to talk about it a little by connecting it to this romantic grand gesture here and acknowledging why they panicked over it all those years ago. It's all saying I'm in love with you in their little language in the best way Crowley can in this moment.

But what did we say about friend (loaded)? We said they have to define it, right?

Because it can mean different things. Crowley isn't wrong to use it and Aziraphale understands it the way he does in the church. He understands it to euphemistically refer to them as lovers, which they are. It's just that all of this combined with Crowley saving the books then makes Aziraphale realize that it's one thing to say my friend (loaded) but if you say it and then there's holy water referencing and then there's more of the Shakespeare scene in there with Anthony and the little "you don't like it?" pout and then there's the entered a church for you and... you put all of that together with little demonic miracle of my own and saving the books...

...and Aziraphale realizes that Crowley is taking the thing that they always were-- my friend (loaded)-- and using it in the middle of saying that he's in love with him.

Crowley is trying to give it a word.

The word he's using meets all their language rules. It's from a moment in their past. It has a true surface meaning and a loaded undertone and subtext for days. He's not asking Aziraphale to use it. He's not saying the actual thing, as that would be breaking their rules, but he is absolutely saying it in their language.

He's not asking Aziraphale for it in return. He's just saying that this could all be over soon and he needed Aziraphale to know and in some ways, it's an apology of sorts. He's sorry they fought. He's sorry they lost years over it. He's sorry for the pain of it. He was in love, you see. The sex while pining got to be a lot. All of this got to be a lot. You get it now right, Aziraphale? Yes? Good. Lift home...

The phrase my friend (loaded) takes on a different meaning after Crowley saves the books and after their conversation inside and outside The Bentley. That's the point of the two "shut up"s-- the one from Part 1 and the one right after it where Part 2 picks up. Why have this conversation twice? Because it's actually two different conversations.

The first one outside The Bentley is Aziraphale in a love stupor, just telling Crowley that saving the books was a nice thing and Crowley responding with a half-effort "shut up" while he cleans his glasses. It's the only scene in the entire series to date in which Crowley is cleaning his glasses and he is in this moment to give Aziraphale his eyes for a moment. But The Blitz, Part 2 shows us this again... and then gives us the scene in The Bentley with what starts out sounding like the same conversation on the surface to start. It is, though, not the same conversation *under* the surface...

There's a reason why Aziraphale says a second time that saving the books was a nice thing. They're now in The Bentley, which is a little more private, and Aziraphale can't let this drop because he needs to know for sure what Crowley is saying with this and if Crowley's sure he wants to be saying what it seems like he's saying. This is basically Aziraphale's version of Crowley's "are you sure? are you sure you're sure?" in the magic shop later on. Aziraphale knows Crowley just said he's in love with him but Aziraphale also knows *Crowley*, right?

He's been with Crowley for a long time. He knows him very well. He knows that Crowley is anxious and emotional and hopelessly romantic and that the world is literally ending around them as they're driving through bombs raining down over London and part of Aziraphale is thinking of the fact that even in this seemingly apocalyptic Armageddon that could be starting here, Crowley was coded in what he just did. He left the traditional words on the table. He said the things in their language and that is, in some ways, even more romantic, but he's left them the things they leave out of hope for a better future, just in case. There's a caution to that and while Aziraphale appreciates the caution, he also can sense that Crowley was nervous about doing this. He is a little concerned that Crowley's going to have said he loved him and then regret it and pull away from him again and Aziraphale can't do the first bit of the Holy Water Arc all over again. He's really wanting to start to move into a lighter era here lol. He also really wants to be sure that he's understanding what Crowley is saying entirely.

And he wants to hear it again.

If Crowley isn't going to shut down on him entirely now, Aziraphale very much liked all of this and would like more of it but he first has to be sure he knows for sure what Crowley means and he can't just ask directly or he's both saying the things they leave unsaid and he'd be undoing Crowley's effort so he has to find a way to ask without directly asking and in such a way that an already sensitive about all of this Crowley won't take offense or be embarrassed and that gives them a way back from this if Crowley shows signs that he feels like he might have gone too far.

So Aziraphale offers Crowley an out.

He tells him again that it was such a nice thing Crowley did for him. He means this and it was a nice thing but this is also saying that he heard that I'm in love with you that Crowley was saying by saving his books and that he liked hearing it, that it was nice, that it was okay that Crowley did that, but that it's also okay if he feels like he made a mistake with it.

Crowley's response to again being told that it was nice is to again tell Aziraphale to "shut up", this one a bit more emphatically than he did outside The Bentley a few moments before. It's unclear to what extent this language, at this time, is sexualized, but by 2019/S1, this back and forth of Aziraphale calling Crowley "nice" and Crowley responding with some bite is a self-parodic sex game that they're playing in Tadfield.

Much of what happens in Tadfield is playing on other parts of their story-- think about the paintball bit with the gun but now with knowledge of The Bullet Catch in The Blitz, Part 2-- and there is a big difference in the ways Aziraphale calls Crowley "nice" in 1941 and in 2019. In Tadfield in 2019, Aziraphale is literally smirking in a way that implies that this is a little game they play and he's saying a series of things that he knows will prompt this intentionally outsized reaction from Crowley, who is playing it with him. The game is likely tied *to* this bit of 1941 that we see in The Blitz, Part 2 in S2, in that it's referencing it a bit (if very obviously going in a different direction lol), but also because Aziraphale's phrasing and tone in 1941 is not smirking. It's softer and quieter and not designed, through their language, to prompt a certain response out of Crowley. It's not yet a sex game, it's still a kind of conversation they've had in the past that will serve as inspiration for said sex game in the future.

While it's a bit unclear if a version of this already existed in 1941 or if 1941 is part of the evolution to what it becomes by 2019, there's a tone to it in The Bentley in 1941 that says that, at the least, Crowley suspects that Aziraphale is trying to lure him towards sex by calling him nice and that's reinforced by the next thing Aziraphale says, which continues it, but is also doing so to provide Crowley with an out to his confession of love, in case Crowley wants to take it.

Aziraphale's out comes in the form of offering him sex, which is absolutely what this is:

Oh, gee, Aziraphale, whatever could you do in this moment here in The Bentley? You aren't at all telling him you'd do literally anything he says he wants right now, right here, in his damn car, are you?

But while Aziraphale would so absolutely yes because lawd, 1941 Crowley is sldjwkejele... look at what he's *really* saying as well...

What he's saying here is we can pretend you just did all of that for sex, if you want to. I know you didn't and you know you didn't but we are good at pretending and if you're silently having an anxiety attack behind your glasses over there, we don't have do this...

Crowley's response?

The quiet "forget it, will you?"

Meaning: I don't want to take it back. I'm in love with you. I wanted to say it. I meant to say it. Everything might be going to go pear-shaped and I wanted to have said it somehow. I don't need you to say it. I don't know what I expected but I also maybe kinda didn't want the response to be 'aww, you're sweet... do you want a blowjob?' so maybe let's just drop this. We're going to never speak of this again now. Moving onto spreading the demon drink...

Crowley turns down Aziraphale's offer to make it about sex and, in doing so, Crowley says indisputably that it's about love. If he had taken up Aziraphale's offer in that moment, then it would have been agreeing to pretend that he's never said he's in love with Aziraphale and to instead pretend that the romantic-looking things were all an effort to get into Aziraphale's pants. When he turns down sex, Aziraphale smiles softly because, to him, *this* is then really the moment that Crowley said he loves him.

Aziraphale knows for sure now what Crowley was saying and my friend (loaded) now has a definition between them that means the whole deal. Since Crowley said the thing that meant lovers euphemistically as part of saying he's in love with him, then my friend (loaded) is now forever part of the night during The Blitz in 1941 when Crowley said he was in love with him, which means that they can't use any version of friend (loaded) with each other without that being part of it. Friend (loaded) always meant lovers (sexual partners) but now it also means lovers (romantic partners) as well. It's not that they just suddenly became romantic partners because it's been a romance all along but now they're acknowledging it in a way they can't go back from and they do so by giving what they are to one another a word in their secret language.

Aziraphale then wants to return the feeling. Crowley is saying that he doesn't need him to by telling him to forget it about it and wanting to move on from it but Aziraphale can't accept that. Crowley might be right-- this could be it-- and like Aziraphale's going to let Crowley potentially soon go to his grave without telling him he's not alone in how he feels. That's not happening. However you think the events happened to give Aziraphale the opportunity to rescue Crowley from the wrath of Mrs. H-- divine fate, Aziraphale miracling the bottles broken, The Bentley shipping it and helping Aziraphale, all of the above, etc..-- he gets the chance not ten minutes later and he takes it... and, of course, what does he use?

My good friend (loaded af lol).

They've already just redefined my friend (loaded) by this point, so to turn around and use it is to tell Crowley I feel the same way. I love you, too. This is Crowley's change in expression in reaction in that above gif. It's one thing when Aziraphale volunteers to help-- that is sweet and Crowley's all eyebrows raised in intrigued surprise. His whole expression then slips from that into being stunned when he hears my good friend and he realizes that Aziraphale is now grand gesturing *him*. He's realizing that the bit in the car really was just an offer of an out, not just that plus Aziraphale saying he was uncomfortable with what Crowley had said and needing it to stay a lot more hidden beneath a cover of sex. It was Aziraphale needing to be sure he understood and needing to be sure that Crowley was sure he wanted to make this change in how they are but now that he's sure on those things, Aziraphale is actually all in for it.

Worth mentioning that my good friend (loaded) is a mashup of my friend and my dear fellow, which makes it extra sweet. Just as Crowley started this by calling back to The Globe Theatre by using my friend (loaded), Aziraphale is calling back to the my dear fellow rhythm of what he's called Crowley for centuries. It says I love you and every 'my dear fellow' was not just fondness but an 'I love you', if you didn't already know. I've loved you forever.

It's also quite literally calling Crowley 'good', which is not something that he really believes about himself but is something Aziraphale believes about him. His good friend, as in close friend, but also his good friend, as in good person. He also does nothing to discourage Mrs. H's inevitable understanding that he and Crowley are a couple. He gestures between them to indicate it. He uses my good friend in such a way that it's just the same thing queer humans of the time would have said to someone low-risk (a theatre person) in London during WW2. It's completely inverted from his response to Burbage in a different theatre in 1600, in the moment this whole friend thing became a thing for them, which is also intentional. It's telling Crowley he understood all the things Crowley was saying in the church and he feels them, too.

Then, there's this, once they're back the bookshop:

Here, we're acknowledging what friends means now by pausing and emphasizing it. "That's what friends are for" is not a phrase that would require the pause and the tone on friends if friendship was all "friends" meant to them. It's not now and this is acknowledging that.

Note Crowley's little lip twitch/almost-sad-smile at what Aziraphale is saying. It's agreement. It's assent. This is them confirming that they understand what the other is saying and giving this new word a home in their language.

This is then what they call each other now when they need to talk about it and it's my friend on the surface and it's my love underneath.

There's a sadness to it. How nice it would be to just be able to say it... It's also a moment of realizing that they aren't sure they can use this word all the time. It's good to have a word and a shared understanding of what it means and they have no desire to take back these confessions of love here but while it's lovely to have said this now, it's also a bit heartbreaking.

Aziraphale's heartbreak, his little Crowley move of putting on his (transparent lol) glasses, his brave smile, and then how quickly they both transition from this conversation into The West End, The West End and I'm a lonely G.I... and The farthing *has vanished*! It shows you how accustomed they are to burying the pain under trying to live in the moment for one another.

A few moments after this, Aziraphale will be showing Crowley some of his human magic tricks in preparation for performing on stage and when they get to the point where Aziraphale is telling Crowley about Goldstone's Magic Shop, he then tells him that it's not for him because it's "for professional conjurers only."

This is somewhat unintentional metaphor on Aziraphale's part that Crowley then acknowledges and turns into coded language in his response. Aziraphale's love of human magic is metaphorical for his love of humanity and living in a way as to indulge his humanity in a way that angels have been taught not to do. The reason why Aziraphale's love of magic is this metaphor and not, say, his love of books or music or food, is because all of the other things that Aziraphale likes about the human experiences can be dismissed by him as relating to understanding the human experience *so as to be a better angel.* He's really not a student of humanity just to learn how to better guide them. He admits to Adam in front of Crowley in S1 that he thinks that humans are the ones who get it when he tells him that he hoped Adam would be good and worried he'd be evil but that he's something better than either of those-- he's human incarnate. Aziraphale can justify most of his indulgences as being related to learning human ways to relate to them to help them-- food, books (his home and his book collection can be justified as necessary cover for his angelic embassy), music, etc.... but the love of human magic?

Aziraphale just loves it. It's for him. It's his hobby. He thinks it's a little selfish and probably a lot unbecoming of an angel. He'd completely just want this for a job and he's not supposed to want a job other than to be an angel, which is supposed to be the bestest job imaginable lol. What kind of angel wants a silly human job? What kind of angel with actual magical powers is obsessed with human magic? Aziraphale is. He's endlessly fascinated. It makes him happy. It brings him joy. It's the part of living as a human that he's done in such a way that it's just for him and in such a way that it conflicts a bit with his role as an angel. The only other way Aziraphale loves like this, in this human way? The only other thing he studies at to be a better human over being a better angel?

Crowley.

So when Aziraphale says that he can't go to Goldstone's because it's "for professional conjurers only", Crowley knows that what Aziraphale is really saying is that the shop is "for actual humans only". He knows Aziraphale is admitting that he's sometimes insecure about his ability to be human because of how his humanity is tied to being an angel. Crowley knows that they're talking about Aziraphale and his human magic love on one level but that they're also talking about them and their relationship on another level. This is Aziraphale saying that he loves human magic with a passion but he's not sure he's as good as it as he could be or as he wants to be because maybe he doesn't know everything about being a human in the way that the "professional conjurers"-- humans-- know... and everything we just said he's unsure about with relation to human magic is also how he feels sometimes about loving Crowley.

This conversation is happening in an overlapping way with their friend confessions and Crowley hears that Aziraphale is saying in there that he loves Crowley with a passion but he's not always sure that he's studied enough, that he knows enough, about being human to be what Crowley deserves. He would love to go to this magic shop but he's afraid that it's not meant for him. He struggles, as Crowley already knows, with how he's not supposed to want it but oh he wants and he can't help but love magic and he can't help but love Crowley... all of which prompts Crowley to reassure him, using a now-familiar bit of their language:

"You, my Nefertiti-fooling fellow, are about to perform on the West End stage. If that doesn't make you a 'professional conjurer'... I don't know what does."

Meaning:

You, my human-passing man, are so good at this that you fooled the Ancient Egyptian Queen. You're about to perform your human magic on stage-- to make yourself vulnerable in a way that scares humans. You are always willing to take risks like that and try something new and learn more about being human and that makes you human. It's human to not totally know how to be human, I think. You're doing all of this tonight because you love me. It doesn't matter if you're a good magician or not. This love of ours is human and you're very good at it. You love me very well. If loving me doesn't make you a 'professional conjurer'... I don't know what does.

Crowley uses my [] fellow to emphasize my friend (loaded) by using the term of endearment that Aziraphale himself started that has human connotations to make the point that their love makes them human and to tell Aziraphale that he's very good at their love.

Aziraphale, understandably melting over that:

And then? They just keep using my friend. For decades. Through S2.

What makes it work for so long is the fact that it's human-coded in origin so if they run into a situation where they need to refer to one another like this, they can use it and it doesn't get a lot of questions. After the partners scene with Nina, Crowley uses my friend without thinking twice about it, telling her that she'll be safe in the bookshop because "my friend would never let anything happen to you." Nina already gets that they're friend (loaded) and she doesn't know what using friend means to them because only they know about 1941 but it's a phrase that they can use with the outside world if they need to but that mostly stays between them because only they know that, in their language, my friend = my love.

So when Crowley says I lost my best friend in the Discorporated!Aziraphale scene in S1, he means that he lost his best friend but he *also* really means I lost the love of my life.

The first thing my best friend means is just the actual, uncoded definition-- what the words really mean as they are. Aziraphale is Crowley's best friend. Whatever else they are to one another, they've always been that. The idea that he'd have to go through the end of the world and whatever came after without his best friend devastated him. In a lot of ways, it's sweeter than saying anything else, even if they weren't in a public space, because it's saying that what he'd miss the most is just having his partner in crime in life. The other layer of it is the coded layer. Since they are a couple that uses my friend in an euphemistic way for my love, then Crowley's my best friend in 2019 is the same thing as Aziraphale's my good friend was in 1941. It is my best friend on the surface and it is that but it's also my love beneath it.

This scene is also then the same thing in meaning:

And by S1's present of 2019, they're at a point of using it in an argument, which provides them the means to talk in a way they didn't have in 1862. Yeah, they have their dramatic little breakup spats but this is actually a marked improvement over where they were before the holy water mess. So now watch this bit of the bandstand again here below for the friend (loaded)...

Remember that Aziraphale lies increasing bits of absurdity when stressed and that Crowley knows that. He dismisses what Aziraphale says with that "you doooo" when Aziraphale tries the *utterly ridiculous* "I don't even like you" lol. They're both panicked about the end of the world here in Ineffable Divorce: Round One and Crowley's trying to get them to run away again, which is a terrible idea, but in the process of suggesting it, Crowley is calling them friends (now eternally loaded, as we just spent this meta proving lol) and...

...*how long* have they been friends does he say?

So, how long have they been in love, per their language, per Crowley in the bandstand scene?

Six thousand years.

Since the start.

Vavoom. Sorted. :)

[cryobabyy]

Realistic predictions/analysis for the dynamic between Syd and Carmy for s3 and what the writers will potentially do with Claire.

Pls keep in note that my sydcarmy brain was OFF and the Film/Television production student brain was ON when I wrote this. I am trying to imagine their potential romance in the most realistic and grounded way possible don't be mad at me please I'm sensitive sjhdsajdsjdhsfafafjskdlfh okay lets get into it

Carmy is back in a high-end kitchen environment, which means toxic ocd perfectionist Carmy is back because he has yet to deconstruct that part of himself

that being said, he wants that star, not only because it'll justify the pain of gutting his dead brother's restaurant and perhaps soothe his self-loathing, but also because Sydney wants it- and Carmy wants to keep Sydney. He wants to see her get what she wants.

Carmy still has the toxic mindset that success is defined by how much you suffered for it, and how much pain you've endured. He is back in an environment where he will forever be chasing perfection that doesn't exist. He has an incessant need for control that makes him difficult to work with.

Carmen holds the staff, especially Sydney, to impossible standards of perfection

IMPORTANT TO NOTE THAT CARMY IS A VERY EXTREME PERSON

HE WILL BE PLAGUED BY BLACK AND WHITE THINKING THIS ENTIRE SEASON (as opposed to the wishy-washy, one-foot-in-one-foot-out vibe we got last season)

Enter the partnership contract lol

To Carmy, the contract is a testament to his commitment to Sydney. He would have a professional and legal obligation to operate at the highest standard. You have my full focus, and I have yours. He's basically trying to correct his mistakes in s2 in the most extreme way.

The problem is that Sydney knows this means she would be legally and professionally bound to Carmen. It means she would have to subscribe to his toxic standards and warped ideas of success to uphold her end of the contract.

Sydney will be forced to reevaluate if the path to success Carmy has laid out will be worth the suffering. We saw last season that the stress literally made her vomit. She is asking herself: does it have to be like this? Is this really the only way?

Sydney will be presented with alternative opportunities because of the attention she's received from being professionally associated with Carmy.

They will become increasingly tempting as The Bear continues to bring out the worst in Carmy

Maybe Carmy catches wind of the attention Sydney has been getting, which he thinks explains why she has been stalling signing the contract.

Carmy feels rejected. Of course, he doesn't realize it's rejection that he's feeling. He confronts her from a professional angle. It devolves into a fight because he'll probably end up lashing out.

"This is what you wanted! I'm giving you what you want!"

It is, in fact, not what Sydney wants. LMFAO

Sydney, of course, wants Carmy. But she wants a version of Carmy that doesn't exist, and she's not sure he ever will.

Sydney's relationship with failure is important for her character. She initially wanted the success Carmen has.

At the end of s3 she realizes she just wants Carmy. As a friend and a creative partner (and in my most unhinged fantasies a lover :P). She wants the Carmy she gets when they're riffing off each other's ideas in his kitchen. She doesn't want the tunnel vision perfection machine version of himself when he's in his chef whites. She grows to resent that version.

s3 wraps up with their relationship on rocky terms

Best case scenario, Carmy tries to change

worst-case scenario, Sydney steps back from the bear

CLAIRE PREDICTIONS

Carmy operates at extremes. He either pursues a personal life or his professional life. In his mind, it is impossible to have both.

Claire and Sydney/The Bear are on opposite ends of the spectrum

If he commits to Claire, he can't commit to the restaurant

If he commits to Sydney/The Bear, he can't commit to Claire

Instead of trying to find balance, Carmy throws himself into Sydney/The Bear

Fak obviously observes that this makes Camry worse, and decides to talk to Claire to suggest some sort of contact between the two. He probably thinks this might keep Carmy from nosediving further. I don't have any guesses for the context of their conversation though. It could be anything. I think it would be hilarious if Fak hurts himself during dinner service and has to go to the ER and the convo unfolds that way lol.

Meanwhile, Carmy thinks he's doing the right thing by presenting his most extreme and professional self to Sydney because he thinks it's what she wants. He wants to give her his full focus.

What Sydney actually wants is fucking BALANCE. Which is exactly what Carmy NEEDS, but doesn't think is possible.

Sydney potentially walks away to find it elsewhere with someone else.

Carmy is angsty about it, obviously.

Carmy and Claire will probably reconcile, before or after his potential falling out with Sydney

If they do get back together, I don't think it's sustainable for Carmy. They both have very demanding careers, and Claire triggers trauma associated with his past. They might like each other, but they are incompatible, IMO.

I do think Sydney and Carmy will end up together eventually tho lol. Eventually, Carmy will realize that Sydney is his balance. The problem is that Carmy currently is incapable of providing Sydney balance. But if he learns that he can be that for her, he might realize that he wants her beyond professional partnership. Fingers crossed lol.