#god it's so fucking satisfying to have a solo system to play that actually feels engaging to me yessssss

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

slogging back through my downloads folder for a TTRPG that's probably the best single-player one i've ever found, because i'm fiddling with my own system that builds on a lot of concepts for mechanics that came from that one, and i want very much to give credit and rec it if i ever like. post about it anywhere. but i don't remember what it's called so downloads folder archaeology it is

[knifeonmars]

Capsule Reviews - May 2020 - The Cape Stuff

I read a lot of comics in May. Here’s what I thought of some of the superhero and superhero-adjacent comics I read.

Arms of the Octopus

A nostalgia pick, the collection of several annual issues containing a crossover between Superior Spider-Man, The Invincible Hulk, and the All-New X-Men. It is an artifact of a very specific and bizarre time in Marvel Comics, when Doc Ock was Spider-Man, the Hulk worked for SHIELD, and the original five teen X-Men were stranded in their own future. For a pure, relatively straightforward crossover romp, it's quite enjoyable. Spider-Man is a jerk, the Hulk fights a robot, the X-Men are befuddled by the present, all of the major beats for that particular moment in the Marvel Universe are there, and it's got some really great art. Jake Wyatt, during his regrettably short-lived stint with Marvel and the great Kris Anka unfortunately overshadow the other contributors, but it's all very good, if not the most accessible comic.

Maxwell's Demons

I came to Maxwell's Demons having heard a lot of critical buzz and with my expectations set rather high. I did not care for this book at all. Ambitious is the best word for this series, and that's not a bad thing. It's got ideas, about the craft, about the genre, about philosophy in general. It never quite manages to carry things off though; it's not as smart as it wants to be, and the high-minded ideas are never incorporated in particularly elegant ways. Three of the story's five chapters are essentially extended monologues in which the main character rambles on about some glorified shower thought for 20-plus pages. The first and second chapters are the exceptions to this pattern, and are quite solid as far as pointedly derivative superhero riffs go, even if the second chapter's riff on "What if Miracleman #17 was significantly less intelligent" is more than a little shameless in its lack of originality. The fourth chapter, by contrast, is the nadir of the series, easily the most embarrassing Manic Pixie Dream Girl tripe I've seen played straight in literal years. I'm reminded a lot of Translucid, another superhero pastiche, which essentially sought to do for Batman what Maxwell's Demons seeks to do for Lex Luthor. I warmed to Translucid significantly on my second read and I wonder if the same will end up being true for Maxwell's Demons, but I find that Translucid simply did a better job of incorporating original ideas and stating its themes in ways less stupefyingly clunky than Maxwell's Demon's ever manages. I hate to call a book pretentious, especially an ambitious one, but at present that's how I feel about this book.

Twilight

Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Howard Chaykin's Watchmen-for-mid-century-space-heroes epic. It's good. Fabulous art, some really interesting ideas and a great premise. It's also more than a little Chaykin-y, with most of the male characters having fraught but amiable relationships with their much-too-good-for-them-and-they-both-know-it ex-wives. It has this particular brand of low grade misogyny that idealizes women but in doing so denies them interiority and, ultimately, humanity. Leaving that aside, though it is a major point to leave aside, it’s story of humanity rotting over eons of immortality, mad space gods, and humanity’s proclivity towards colonialism and genocide, it's great. It’s not an altogether pleasant book, it can be nasty and strange, in ways both intentional and unintentional, but it’s original and engaging and decidedly well made. Something of an overlooked classic of that era’s DC output.    

Green Lantern: Earth One

Literally the only one of DC's Earth One graphic novels that's worth a damn. Where most of the other Earth One books choose to start things off in a world resembling our own, Green Lantern starts off in a scifi future resembling something along the lines of Ad Astra or The Expanse, with Earth controlled by an only alluded to totalitarian government, humanity colonizing and mining the solar system, and Hal Jordan as a spacefaring roughneck who dreads the prospect of returning to Earth. Earth One is the rare Green Lantern story that manages to make Earth as interesting as the rest of the universe. The bulk of the action leaves this behind to focus on unearth the lost legacy of the Green Lanterns and refits their mythology in a clean way which will be unsurprising for anyone with a passing familiarity with the original comics but is still satisfying ad fresh. Fabulous art, fun take on the mythology, I'm left both wanting more and being satisfied with what we got.

Spider-Man: Life Story

In a just world, Chip Zdarksy, one of Marvel’s best writers these days, would be writing both Spider-Man and Fantastic Four, instead of having been relegated to shortlived spinoffs. Because life just isn’t fair sometimes, instead he was given this admittedly ambitious project, his all-encompassing take on the Spider-Man story as played out in real time. In the end it’s bold and engaging, but more than a little clipped in execution. Each issue is a snippet of Peter Parker's life as we catch up to him in a new decade so readers only get a quick glimpse of the action and are left to fill in the substantial gaps by drawing on our knowledge of continuity. The obvious comparison is John Byrne's Superman/Batman: Generations, but where that story really only took the broad strokes of those characters' continuity into account in writing its decades spanning story, Spider-Man: Life Story is dedicated to the remixing of Spider-Man's publishing canon. So it can’t just take an archetypal view of Spider-Man and play that out to its logical conclusion, instead it’s stuck trying to incorporate version of prominent Spider-Man stories like Kraven's Last Hunt, Venom, and Civil War. The result means that there’s a ton of exposition in each issue, and frequent use of shorthand to gloss over things which have happened since the previous issue, and it never manages to explore the series’ original ideas in detail. Also, I'll die mad that Michel Fiffe, the genius behind COPRA and one of my favorite cartoonists, public pitched basically this exact story a year or so before this project was announced, and even if Marvel didn't actually steal the idea, I'll forever pine for Fiffe's take on this premise.

Star Wars: The Crimson Empire Saga

Long before the Disney's take on Star Wars, with their codified takes on the mythology and careful curation of the franchise, there was the old Star Wars Expanded Universe, where seemingly anyone could tell any story they wanted using the mythology of Star Wars. While it resulted in some good stuff, like Timothy Zahn's fondly remembered Thrawn books, the vast majority of it was workmanlike or even bad. Crimson Empire falls firmly into the category of bad, a dumber than dirt story about an extremely cool space guy and his code of honor. It's the kind of story where multiple characters say "He's just one man!" right before or right after seeing their legion of anonymous flunkies getting demolished by the hero. It's got an inexplicable and bad love story. In the three miniseries collected here it spends about two pages total dealing with the idea that maybe, just maybe, the fact that it's main character is dedicated to the lost honor of Emperor Palpatine, a space fascist, maybe his code of honor is completely fucked. Of those three miniseries, only the first story is anywhere near something that could be called good. I wouldn’t called Crimson Empire utterly abysmal, but it’s not unironically good. If the name Kyle Katarn means anything to you, you might get something out of this as a nostalgia trip, but otherwise it has no redeeming qualities.

Deathstroke: Legacy

The first of the New 52 Deathstroke stories, which was never well regarded until Christopher Priest took it over with Deathstroke: Rebirth, I was driven to read this by a conceptual fondness for this era's Deathstroke basically looking and acting like an action figure. Through that lens, it's quite enjoyable. It's not as obviously in on the joke in the way that the classic Taskmaster: Unthinkable is, but it's over the top, has fun designs and baddies, and Joe Bennett (years before his career best heights in Immortal Hulk) provides consistently good art. As a pure action comic, it's good.

Wolverine MAX: Permanent Rage

Here's the thing about Wolverine: There are very few good Wolverine solo stories. Wolverine is a genuinely good character, but most of his solo stories are dumb action affairs, and there's literally never been a Wolverine comic that's even halfway as good as the Logan movie. Permanent Rage, the first storyline from the Wolverine MAX series though, is actually pretty decent. It plays out a lot like you might imagine a Wolverine movie made around 2004, with no superheroes, a Japanese setting that allows for some distracting orientalism, unrelenting violence, and a noir-inspired storyline. The present day storyline is all well and good, not great, but solid and relatively low-key, but what makes the book is the presence of Sabretooth as the main villain. His relationship with Wolverine, fleshed out through flashbacks drawn by some really talented artists, is probably one of the best takes on that relationship that Marvel has ever put out. The casting of Wolverine and Sabretooth as two lonely immortals, bound together by hate and the knowledge that they are each other's only true companions, absolutely makes this book. Is it great? No, but it's got enough interesting things going on that fans of dark superheroes stories would probably find something to enjoy. Subsequent volumes of Wolverine MAX moved even further from the character’s superhero trappings and supporting characters, which is a pity, but this one remains readable and enjoyable on its own.

Marshal Law Omnibus

A collection all of the non-licensed and non-text-only Marshal Law stories. It's weird, it's punk, it's violent, it's sick of superheroes but self-aware about it own silliness in a way that Garth Ennis' work like The Boys has never been (Incidentally, the fifth story contained here, Super Babylon, is just every self-righteous complaint Ennis made about superheroes in The Boys but presented with a modicum of good humor). It's quite fun as a mean-spirited anti-superhero romp, but anyone who is particularly invested in the moral rectitude of, like, the Flash, might find it an unpleasant read so I would advise avoiding it if that's you. It's also not perfect, even for what it is: it's approach to sex work and kink is very dated, it relies on sexual violence a little too much, and by the time you get to the final story, Secret Tribunal, it's come to revel in its previously ironic fascist and misogynist imagery and characters just a little too much. The third installment, Kingdom of the Blind, is for my money, the strongest of the lot, featuring both the most straightforward premise and the most incisive satire the collection has to offer.

[ehstarwar]

a poor prisoner in his twisted gyves (3/8)

He would be just gentle enough that nothing hurt, but firm enough that she felt it. Every touch, every stroke; he would make her feel it all, make her delirious with it.

Yes, letting herself fantasize about Ben is all too easy.

-

Rey tries not to think about what's making her so frustrated and irritable. Ben knows exactly why. Also, Leia meddles.

-

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 4K

Read on AO3

Notes: our space babies are back at it again with their BIE. (Big Idiot Energy). enjoy

 (´∀｀)

Chapter 3: this tiger-footed rage

-

It’s as easy as breathing, Rey thinks. Imagining him, large and imposing, all hard plains and thick muscle, nudged between her thighs. All around her. Consuming her. She imagine what his hands would feel like. Would the trace her, lightly and teasingly, or ding into her skin and mar her for all the world to see. And his legs; strong enough to hold her up, to carry her around without so much as a strain. 

He would be just gentle enough that nothing hurt, but firm enough that she felt it. Every touch, every stroke; he would make her feel it all, make her delirious with it. 

Yes, letting herself fantasize about Ben is all too easy. Made even easier by her fingers currently pushing into her sopping wet cunt. 

It should be embarrassing, how many times over the last few days that Rey has gotten off to imagining Ben. She’d had to stop herself from going into the employee bathroom and shoving a hand between her thighs the day he scented her; the smell of an omega that just came would outweigh the scent of an alpha and she’d be in an even worse situation. Rey had dutifully waited until after work, after the inspection, after she took two trains back home, before collapsing in a heap on her bed and getting herself off to Bens’ scent within two minutes.

And that was only the start of the evening. 

Rey had refused to shower that night, trying to keep a hold of every molecule of scent Ben had given her, but come morning, she had to wash herself. She totally didn’t cry in the shower, rubbing one out to the last remanence of Ben washing down her drain. The wetness coming down her face was only from the shower. 

She though that when his scent was no longer clinging to her person that she may finally get some relief from the near constant arousal, but it only made it worse. Now, the comforting scent of a big, virile alpha wasn’t consuming her, it made her desperate. 

Which is the state Rey was in right now; hand pushing in and out of her, wanting to find a release that is never quite satisfying enough. 

Twenty minutes of trying to get herself off before the evening was proving frustrating instead of relieving, causing Rey to scream into her pillow before removing her hand from her cunt and getting into the shower. She definitely did not sneak a smell at her overalls from the other day, just to see if there was anything left. 

Rose was hurrying around the apartment when Rey walked out of the bathroom, still unsatisfied and a little more than irritable. 

“What the hell, Rose?” Nearly every kitchen cabinet was opened, and a small pile of different kitchen items were being shoved into reusable plastic bags. 

“Finn wants to bake a pie for tonight, but like, has nothing that he needs if he wants to make a pie,” Rose explains, stuffing multiple pans that were decidedly unnecessary to make a pie. 

“Is he making a pie for a small third world county?” Rey huffs. Rose stills, a box of graham crackers falling to the counter below her.

“Are you feeling okay?” Rose asks, giving Rey a once-over.

“Yes… why?”

“You sounded a little upset that we’re making pie. Pie, Rey. You once said you’d give your left tit just to eat pie every day.”

Rey bristles, feeling much more defensive than a statement like this should make her.

“Its just… You’re taking quite a bit of stuff from our kitchen to make this. What if we don’t get it all back?” This only makes Roses’ gaze harden.

“It’s for Finn. We basically share everything with him. And I know for a fact that you two shared a toothbrush for four months in college because neither of you could be bothered to buy a new one. What’s going on?”

Rey is still wrapped up in a towel, dripping onto the linoleum floor. Her fist is clenched, holding her towel so tight to her person that she knows there will be red marks on her skin. She tries to figure out why she’s feeling this way, why she cares at all. Rey doesn’t get territorial like this, ever, especially with Finn. She’s just as curious as Rose is to figure out why she’s acting like this, but is too proud to concede. 

“Nothing is going on. I don’t care if you take that stuff to Finn’s, just… make sure we get it back. That’s the only strainer that I’ve ever liked and I just want to make sure its near if I need it. Rose has her eyes narrowed at Rey, and looks like she wants to prod further, but Rey doesn’t give her the opportunity.

“I’ll see you at Luke’s!” She shouts over her shoulder on her way back to her room.

-

The commute to Luke’s isn’t too bad. Rey has to take two trains and walk four blocks to get there, but his part of town isn’t too bad. Rey’s side is a different story, but that’s a worry for later tonight. Her irritability hasn’t completely worn off when she leaves her apartment, but she figures some fresh air will do her good. 

Or, it would be good if she could actually enjoy it. Problem is, she’s itchy. 

Not in the ‘I’m covered in poison ivy’ or ‘I have a bad case of the chicken pox’ way, but in the ‘my skin feels too tight and I’m ready to peel it off my body’ kind of way. It doesn’t help that her glands are throbbing. Any brush of material over them sends a shiver down her spine, but it’s too cold and impolite to go out in public naked with pulsing, red glands. 

It’s the suppressants working their way out of her system, probably. In her limited research on what to expect when detoxing, Rey discovered gland discomfort was fairly common, but it usually happened within a few days of stopping. It’d been a few weeks for her. But it was probably nothing.

Probably. 

All this discomfort was unpleasant, to say the least, but it was at least distracting Rey from the worrying-session she would be having about seeing Ben tonight. Rey had texted him when she’d gotten home the other night. A quick ‘hi i’m alive. thanks for today. see you around.’ before promptly blocking his number so that she wouldn’t be tempted to call him and ask him to fuck her nine ways to Sunday. 

Maybe it was too far, but Rey was still a little jaded from the experience and didn’t trust herself to fuck it up even further. Best to just forget the whole thing ever happened and move on with their respective lives and try very hard to think of literally anything else but Ben when she masturbates. Totally fine. 

It’s a good plan… well, it’s at least a plan. And one that seems to be totally fine and likely to work, until she opens the door to Luke’s townhouse. 

On their normal trivia night, it’s just her small group of friends playing trivia games being moderated by Luke who seems to know the answer to every question. Theres a few drinks, some snacks, and maybe a joint or two.

There is not the entirety of the Organa-Solo-Skywalker clan and a buffet table that looks like something out of a Thanksgiving issue of Better Homes & Garden. 

This will not be their normal trivia night, Rey realizes with a deep sigh.

“Oh Rey! You came! I’m so happy to see you!” Senator Organa grasps Rey in a bear hug before she can even make it entirely through the threshold. Rey is shocked, but leans into the hug once she realizes what’s happening. 

“Senator, it’s been so long.” The older woman tuts while pulling back, arms still holding onto Rey’s shoulder. 

“Oh please, Rey, what will it take for you to call me Leia instead of stuffy ‘Senator Organa’?” She asks. 

“It’s… what’s proper?” Rey raises her shoulders in a shrug.

“My wife? Proper? Ha!” Han shouts, over-exaggeratedly slapping his knee. “That’s a good one, kid.” Rey smiles sheepishly as the Senator slaps her husband’s chest. From the corner of her eye, she sees a seated figure, with perfect posture and even more perfect clothes.

“Grandma Padmé!” Rey says, before moving between them to hug her. Grandam Padmé opens her arms wide as Rey leans down to hug her. Even in old age, she feels strong beneath Rey’s body. It’s comforting in a way that Rey isn’t used to, but loves all the same. When she pulls back, Padmé cups her cheek with a thin hand. 

“My goodness, Rey, you look lovelier every time I see you,” She says, making Rey grin even harder. 

“Thank you. How is Naboo?” She asks.

“Well, I think it’s beautiful this time of year, but I think it’s beautiful there any time of year, really,” She laughs. “You’ll have to come visit me this winter. Maybe you can drag my wayward grandson along with you.” Padmé gestures her head to the corner, where Ben is standing.

When Rey sees him, leaning on the bookshelf, shoulders hunched like he’s trying to make himself smaller, she has the urge to run to him and shove her face into his broad chest. While Rey could never forget just how big Ben is, it’s still shocking every time she sees him.

“Rey doesn’t like the cold, Grandma.” God. His voice.  

Rey wants to say that she would literally follow Ben to the ends of the galaxy if he asked her to follow, so going to his grandmothers estate wouldn’t be an imposition whatsoever. But that’s not conducive to the situation they’re in, so Rey goes for something a little more vague. 

“I’d love to come and visit you, someday, hopefully,” Rey says, turning back to Padmé.

“Very soon, hopefully,” Rey doesn’t miss the glint in Padmé’s eyes, “Not many years left in these old bones.”

“Geez, Mom,” Luke says, walking to the living room from the kitchen, “Don’t talk like that. Hey, Rey, will you help me with the sink; it’s all leaky again.” Luke was a brilliant man, with many wonderful qualities, but his ability to break a house like it was a china plate was unprecedented. 

“Of course, do you have a wrench-” “She’s a guest here. She shouldn’t be put to work.” Bens’ voice is practically a growl and Rey can feel the displeasure radiating off of him. The rest of his family stays silent, all looking towards a glowering Ben. His glare is firmly set on Luke, and she thinks she might see literal fire coming out of his eyes.

“It’s really no problem, it’s an easy fix. Won’t take very long at all.” Rey tries to cut the tension, but Ben doesn’t seem eased by this. “It’s really no problem, Ben,” She says to him. Only then does he look at her, mouth still pressed in a thin line. 

“Why don’t you go get her the wrench, Ben. I think Luke’s got one in the cellar. We can look together.” Senator Organa is not at all who Rey thinks is going to step up to the plate, but she does it anyways. Ben mumbles a few terse ‘fines’ before following his mother down the hallway. 

Ben looks at Rey the whole way.

-

“How do you know where a wrench is in Luke’s house?” Ben asks his mother as they go down the stairs.

“I don’t,” She calls back. Ben stops at the bottom step, giving his mother a confused look.

“Then why did you-”

“I figured you’d need a minute. I mean, I’m mated and all that but geez, Rey’s scent was strong. I’m honestly surprised you’re even able to stand upright with that walking around. The betas can probably smell her from-“”

“Mom, can we please… not do this right now?” Ben pleads, letting his face drop into his hands. 

“That was a pretty big display of ‘alpha prowess’ you showed back there. I don’t think we can not do this and make it through the rest of the night.”

“You didn’t tell me what you’re doing here tonight. Maybe we should discuss that first.” Leia shrugs.

“Mom wanted to see you, and I know you all have trivia every other Wednesday, so I figured we’d drop by.”

“Uh-huh. And the catered meal that you managed to have delivered two whole hours before anyone showed up; that was easy to get on short notice?” They’re in a glaring match now, both too stubborn to back down.

“I work quickly, Ben. Clearly unlike you, who can’t even tell a girl how he feels after years. Do you honestly think this is healthy? For you? For your friendship? You can’t go all alpha on people every time they suggest your omega goes to a different room.”

“She’s not my omega.” Each word feels like ash coming from his mouth. 

“And who’s fault is that? Luke and his leaky sink?” For such a short woman, Leia is able to show a disturbing amount of confidence and control, something Ben has yet to master. It makes the words even harder to hear sometimes, like right now. Ben winces before running a hand through his already disheveled hair. 

“I’m working on it. It’s just… difficult.”

Leia softens at this, and seems to remember that she’s fighting her son and not another political enemy. She walks towards him, brushing the hair out of his eyes. 

“I know it is, honey. But I promise you, you’ll feel better once you tell her how you feel, no matter the outcome.” Leia’s voice is soft and gentle, and Ben is reminded of being a teenager and his mother comforting him when he was too scared to ask a girl to prom.

“I don’t know that that’s true,” he chuckles humorlessly.

-

By the time Ben and Leia rejoin the group upstairs, Rey has already fixed the sink with her bare hands (because of course she’s stronger than any measly tool) and is currently stuffing her face with pigs in a blanket. Ben wishes that he didn't find the pastry puff crumbs already lining her shirt so stinking cute. 

“I just don’t see how you can go from making a pie to making beanie weenies,” She says, mouth half full. When she realizes that Leia is in the room with her, she snaps her jaw just and brushes off the crumbs. “Do you want some?” Rey extends the plate towards them, even though Ben knows that she will be more than able to eat the whole thing herself.

“No, we’re good,” Ben says before Leia can speak and take one away from Rey. They lock eyes for a moment, and Ben gets caught up in the flecks of gold around her irises. It’s better that they’re around other people right now, because if they were alone Ben wouldn’t trust himself not to cross over to her and hold her face so he can get a better look at them. 

Leia elbows his stomach and mutters ‘get a grip.’

-

“What is Scotts?”

Buzzer.

“Poe.”

“What is Tudor?”

“Yes. Pick a category.”

“Ugh, 1990’s for 600.”

“A 1990-91 war in the Middle East was fought in Iraq and this oil-rich nation.”

“Iran?”

Luke gave a pointed stare at Rose.

“… What is Iran?”

Buzzer.

This had been much the same interaction for the last hour. Everyone participating, even Grandma Padmé. The questions were hard, which wasn’t wholly unusual for Luke, but it made Ben struggle that much more to actually pay attention. Ben easily dominated the board most trivia nights, but his heart wasn’t in it tonight.

No, tonight, Bens’ heart was in an entirely different place all together.

Said place was picking at her fingernails, not even bothering to pick up the handheld device. Rey was just behind him in winnings, but it seemed that even the second champion was struggling to keep up. 

Ben knew that he wasn’t being inconspicuous like this; staring at Rey so hard that he’s surprised his eyes still worked. His whole body was inclined towards her, not the center podium everyone else was facing. Ben could swivel around, actually use he device handed out earlier and answer the damn question everyone seemed to be avoiding, but he just didn’t have it in him. Not when Rey was there, barely six feet away from him, smelling like that. 

Like cinnamon rolls and clean linen and sunshine and sex and daisies and babies and home and-

Oh shit.

Heat. Ben realized. Rey was going into heat and she was sitting six feet away from him. In a house with many other people. People who would not appreciate a Sasquatch jumping across the living room couch to sweep Rey into his arms and take her to the guest room and fuck her very loudly for a whole week. 

This whole charade got that much harder to endure. 

Ben doesn’t realize he’s standing until he feels the gaze of everyone on him, looking confused as to his dramatic rise.

“I’m… going to the bathroom,” Ben announces to the group, before stalking off towards the kitchen. Ben made route to the furthers part of the townhouse, where Luke’s master bedroom was and very spacious master bath. Ben honestly didn’t care if he was waling into a room filled with creepy porcelain dolls, he just needed to get away for a minute and try not to think about Rey.

Rey. 

Who he had scented exactly 76 hours ago. 

Who he had jerked off to probably more times than that in the following days.

Who he was probably in love with.

Who he wanted to marry and mate and fill with his pups and build a house for and live happily ever after with. 

Rey, who was going into heat. 

Ben defiantly didn’t need to be thinking about that. 

He stood at the vanity, knuckles white against the marble countertop as he stared at himself. If it weren’t for his distinguishable ears, that stuck out despite his best attempts at covering them with his hair, Ben wouldn’t have recognized himself. 

His eyes were bloodshot. Skin flushed. Lips bitten so roughly the were swollen. In short, a mess.

A light tap on the door, brought him out of his self-deprecation as he dropped his head and sighed. 

“Ben?” He hears Rey ask. Ben resist the urge to punch the mirror or the countertop, knowing that it could only end with him being more battered. When he didn’t respond, Rey spoke again. “Can I come in.”

No, he should say. No, get as far away from me as humanly possible because there is no way I can control myself around you without restraints of some sort. 

After another minute of silence, Rey opens the door. Ben looks back up into the mirror, seeing Rey over his shoulder.

 “Are you alright?” She asks, voice quiet. It breaks his heart a little to hear her so timid. 

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not.” Her voice is a little more sure this time. Ben quickly turns around to face Rey. It is a horrible time for him to be made acutely aware of just how small she is compared to him. But he is aware of it, all the same. 

When Ben opens his mouth to speak, he’s met with a thick cloud of pheromones entering his body. It’s like getting body slammed by a sumo wrestler without knowing what the fuck is going on.

“You’re not fine. Please, tell me what’s going on, Ben.” The whine he emits when she says his name is involuntary and embarrassing, but Ben can’t think about that right now.

“You’re going into heat.” He says it through clenched teeth, eyes clamped shut.

“What?” She asks in disbelief. “I’m not going into heat. I’d know if I was going into heat.”

“Rey,” Her name feels heavy in his mouth, “You are going into heat. You don’t know how you smell.” Ben dares to open his eyes to look at her. Reys’ face goes from confusion to sadness and it makes Ben ache. 

“Oh… I’m sorry. I didn’t realize how bad I smelled.”

Bens’ jaw drops.

“What?” She asks, seeing his expression.

“You think you smell bad?” Ben sees a flash of anger across her features.

“Well, I’m sorry for however awful I smell! I can’t tell, ya know. You could’ve been a little nicer about it, instead of running off because you couldn’t stand the smell of me!”

Ben is frozen in shock for a minute before Rey turns to leave, but snaps out of it when she reaches the door. 

“Rey.” She stills, hand on the doorknob. “You don’t smell bad. You very much do not smell bad. Rey, I’ve never met anyone who smelled as amazing as you. It’s like.. like the most delicious smell I’ve ever encountered. Like warmth and love and babies and home and… I can’t handle it well. You smell so fucking good, Rey. Letting you go that day was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life, and if you asked me to do that again, I honestly think I would loose my mind. If I can smell you and be as close to you as I was then without being able to keep you next to me, I wouldn’t survive. You don’t smell bad, Rey. You smell like everything I’ve ever loved.”

Her back is still turned to Ben, but she’s made no movement. Ben wants to spin her around and force her to say something, just so he can know what she’s thinking, but that turns out to be unnecessary. When she finally does turn around, there are tears just staring to spill over the corners of her eyes and her lips are quivering.

“You think I smell like home?” Her voice is shaky with emotion, and Ben can’t hold back anymore. Not when he sees his omega like this.

Ben closes the distance between them, enveloping Rey with his body. One hand goes to cradle the back of her head while the other snakes its way around her waist. He tucks his head into her neck, making him squat down. He feels Rey’s knees give out, and he guides her down to the floor, gently, resting between his legs. Her hands are tightly wrapped around his torso, holding not him just as he holds onto her.

“Yes, Rey. So good, it hurts,” he whispers into her ear. She holds onto his chest, quietly crying against him. His hindbrain is going awol trying to figure out how best to comfort her while his realistic brain was trying to figure out how far she would be okay with him going. He figures kisses to her hair won’t be a stretch, so he peppers kisses along her hairline, holding her head between his hands.

They stay like that for god knows how long, until his butt aches from he hard tile on the floor. Not that he would dare tell Rey that. He’s sit his bony ass on concrete for days if it meant being next to her. When the sniffling subsides and Rey uses his shirt to dry her eyes, she looks up at him.

Ben wishes he could map the constellation of freckles across her nose with his tongue. He barely refrains from doing so.

“I’m sorry… I don’t know what’s wrong with me. My emotions are all over the place.”

“It’s the heat,” Ben reminds her.

“How do you know, though? I didn’t even know, and normally I’m pretty good about guessing that kind of thing.”

“Have you ever had a heat while not on suppressants?” He asks her. Her silence is all the answer he needs. “That’s probably why.”

Her head drops agains his chest, groaning against the fabric coated in her snot. Ben rubs his hands along her back, trying to soothe her. When his hand gets a little too high and gently brushes against the edge of her gland, a tremor runs through her body. They both still at that.

“Ben,” He feels her say against his chest. When she looks up at him, her eyes are glassy but determined. He wants to tell her he loves her. “Lets get out of here.”

Ben can only manage to nod. 

-

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[gaylordepicboy]

Mark and Jack Join the Fake AH Crew (for a little while, at least).

Geoff had gathered the crew together in his spare apartment to wait for the new arrivals that would be helping them on their next heist. These men were in the same business as the crew but worked primarily solo. Both were revered in the worst ways for their chaotic yet brutally effective style. They were loose canons: trigger happy, overwhelmingly destructive, apathetic and reckless: precisely the added edge the crew needed for this mission. Due to their individual successes, the duo came at a steep price and arrived on their own terms. Geoff thought it only appropriate that the men be properly introduced (whenever it was that they arrived) and that the crew should come off as intimidatingly well organized as possible. 

 This was the infamous Fake AH Crew.

 And they had a reputation to uphold. 

There was just one problem- Geoff had forgotten that the crew members weren't accustomed to sitting in one place for long periods of time. Barely an hour had passed and Gavin was already daring Michael to fence against Jeremy: one with the fire poker and the other with the ember shovel. "Hey, why does he get the pointy one!?" Michael protested, "And I get the shovel thing!? This is fucking bullshit..."  Ryan was trying to diffuse the situation, patting the air and cooing "Boys, boys, leave the fencing to the professionals. Let's not kill each other before giving someone else the satisfaction of trying first, alright?" Jeremy crouched, posturing in a clumsily mimicked fencing position, "Think you could do better, huh?" He was eying Ryan like a mischievous puppy that wanted to play. "I could fence you with my switchblade right now, even if you actually knew the proper fire-poker wielding technique," Ryan flicked out his blade, a playful gleam in his calculating eyes, and settled into a fighting stance. Jack was making bets with Gavin on who was going to win until Michael wrestled the Brit to the ground. Geoff watched disdainfully, warning "If one of you fuckers knocks over my expensive whiskey someone is actually gonna die!"  

Suddenly there was a knock at the door. 

 Everyone stopped- Jeremy standing on the table with the poker poised above his head and Ryan below, daring a glance at the door with his open switchblade held defensively before him. Michael dropped the ember shovel, releasing a gasping Gavin from an iron choke hold, and Jack hopped down from the bar where she'd been cheering to creep up behind Geoff. "Is that them?" She whispered. "How the hell should I know, I haven't opened the goddamn door!" Geoff hissed back. "Then quit whisper-yelling at me and go open the goddamn door!" "FINE!” Geoff’s volume had graduated to a stern yell, “But when I open that door this room better be presentable as dicks!" "Yes, sir!..... Colby!" Jeremy saluted, turned, and launched the fire poker in hopes of arcing it into the rack by the fire place. The flying iron spear chipped against the surrounding brick with shriek and clattered to the ground. "Oops." Geoff heaved an exasperated sigh and muttered his way to the door, half expecting whoever was there to have left by now. The visitor certainly hadn't left, as Geoff quickly discovered; instead, he had reclined lengthwise along the railing of the stairwell's landing with one leg hanging off the side and the other firmly planted on the rail for balance. The man unclasped his hands from behind his head and turned to look at Geoff, repositioning himself like a French model on a balance beam with a self-satisfied smirk. "I figured I'd let myself in, but I didn't want to be rude and interrupt whatever you guys had going on in there. Sounded like it was getting pretty heated," The man spoke calmly, his voice like the rumble of thunder on a warm night. It was almost enough to make one forget that he had just bypassed an advanced security system and six strategically placed door locks. Geoff was already starting to feel like he'd made a monumental mistake, but it was too late to turn back now. This kid better not be more trouble than he's worth... "Well, gee, I can’t imagine what we could’ve done to deserve so much of your discretion. Or is this just how you kiss up to all your employers?" The man smiled again, "Only the ones I like." In one fluid motion, he grabbed the duffel bag lying next to him with one hand and held the railing with the other, swinging his feet over onto the ground and landing squarely in front of Geoff. "So, where's this 'crew' I've heard so much about? Rumor has it you're the most formidable gang in Los Santos, I'd hate to think you'd take all that credit for yourself." "You obviously underestimate just how much of an egomaniac I am,” Geoff retorted, “ And it's not a rumor, kid, we're the real deal. You'd better learn that pretty damn fast or this job is gonna suck, I'll tell you right now." "Heh. I think I'll be the judge of that." Geoff grimaced at the man’s flagrant arrogance, if only because it rivaled his own, "Wipe that dumbass smile off your face and follow me." Inside he was frantically praying to every deity he denied the existence of that the crew had gotten their act together. He wasn't about to be made a mockery of, especially by this pretentious delinquent.

Was he? 

Apparently, the Gods were feeling generous towards the nonbelievers that day, because waiting for him in the other room was nothing short of a miracle. The lights had been dimmed and the electric shades on the surrounding windows were closed, allowing the burning logs in the fire place to cast an eerie glow across the faces of the crew members. Gavin was reclining in the arm chair with his feet propped up on the coffee table, lazily shuffling and reshuffling his deck of gold-laced playing cards; Jeremy used the windowsill like a bench, resting his elbows on his knees and slouching so that the brim of his cowboy hat just barely covered his eyes; Ryan had thrown on his mask was now leaning against the brick of the fire place with his arms crossed; Michael took over the couch, his arms splayed out along the back cushions on either side of him, a burning cigarette hanging loosely from his mouth; Jack sat at the adjacent bar and took a long swig of the beer she had been nursing, brining it down on the marble counter with a decisive clonk when Geoff and the visitor walked in. This is just too goddamn beautiful, Geoff thought, surveying the scene, Man, I'm gonna have to do something special for this one. Maybe buy 'em some fireworks or, no, you know what? I'll get 'em the whole goddamn store!... "Well, if no one's gonna introduce themselves I guess I'll start," the man, who had for the last few seconds been impatiently shifting from foot to foot, cleared his throat, "Hello everybody, my name is Markiplier." 

 The crew members looked him up and down: from his pink- laced running sneakers to his pink and black leather jacket to his dark hair that fell to one side in a stylishly messy quiff. "Bloody well took your damn time gettin'ere din't you?" Gavin chided. "He sure did," responded Michael through smokey puffs. "Hey, hold on a second here," Jeremy held out his hand as if the Force was telling him something was off, "We aren't paying for just one ridiculously expensive criminal, so where's your friend, huh?" "Oh, don't worry, he'll be here. Honestly, I wouldn't worry about it if I were you," the smirk that had reemerged on Mark's face faded slightly when he noticed Ryan by the fire place. He turned to the bar, where Geoff had poured himself a glass of whiskey and motioned to Ryan with a nod of his head, "What's up with Skeletor over there? Not much of a talker, is he?" "He's probably still deciding whether or not he's going to kill you," Jack replied. "How will I know?" "You won't. But honestly, I wouldn't worry about it if I were you,” with that Jack shot Mark a pointed glance and took a disinterested swig of beer. "Riiiiiight...." Mark looked back at Ryan, who had turned his head slightly and stared back- his mask creating two endless pits of black void where his eyes would be. Mark felt an involuntary shiver creep up his spine and tried to look anywhere else. Luckily, a distracting crash followed by the sound of splintering wood and crumbling plaster erupted from the entryway. "See? What'd I tell you?" Mark's smile returned full force as he and the rest of the crew rushed out to check the damage. 

 "ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME!?" Geoff was ranting, "I DISH OUT THE MONEY TO PAY YOU TWO SCHMUCKS AND NOW I GOTTA GET A NEW DOOR!? C'MON!" "Sorry, man, but you had this placed locked up like a high security prison'r somethin'!" A figure appeared from the wreckage, batting the dust off his torn-up denim vest with one gloved hand, and dragging his own duffel bag with the other. The crew could make out a sprig of green hair escaping from beneath his gray ivy cap. "You couldn't have just KNOCKED?" Geoff cried. "Oh... Yea coulda done that, couldn't I? the man said with a chuckle, “But you knew I was here didn't ya?!" He took a second to take in the astonished faces surrounding him, "Well, ain't this a fine group a'people ya got here? Top of the mornin' to ya laddies, my name is JackSepticeye! At your service!" He bowed dramatically low and nearly tripped on the shattered remains of the door, chuckling again, "Oh dear, this is gonna be a problem now in’it?”  "No shit Sherlock!" Michael snapped. Geoff pinched the bridge of his nose, he was still seething but took a breath, coming to terms with the absolute mess in front of him. The door was the least of his problems. "You know, I'm not getting paid enough to deal with shit like this right now, and neither are any of you until we get our hands on a whole shit load of money. So, here's what we're gonna do: we're gonna go in there, sit our asses down, and have a cozy fucking chat about what we need to do to make sure this heist goes fine and dandy and that we all go home alive and, more importantly, rich. Now who's coming with me?" The tensity in the room practically created sparks in the air, but as each person remembered their shared purpose the electricity dissipated into unsettled contentment. Glances passed between the crew members, to Mark and Jack, then back again. "JackSepticeye, huh?” Jeremy stepped forward, “I'd call you Jack, but as it happens that position’s already been filled." “Hey, no worries, man, you can just call me Sam if gets confusin' for ya." "Or we could just start calling Jack 'Mum'," Gavin chimed in. "Oooh, you got yourselves a Britt, I see. We aren’t gonna have a problem now are we, bro?" "Depends,” Gavin considered, “If you'll show me how to do that little door bit I think we'll get along excellently." "Man, I like this dude!" Jack offered a high-five which Gavin accepted, and the two began chatting excitedly. 

Mark felt a tap on his shoulder and wheeled around to see a black skull in a leather jacket standing uncomfortably close behind him. "Oh, uh, hey there buddy. Sorry about the whole... "Skeletor" thing earlier. Y’know I’ll bet you're actually a really nice guy under there." In response, Ryan carefully removed his mask, exposing piercing blue eyes, dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, and meticulously applied face paint. He fixed Mark with a cold stare, then looked down at the mask in his hands and scoffed, "I wouldn't go so far as to call myself nice, but I wouldn't kill you for no reason if that's any consolation." "I'll take the consolation prize if it means your less likely to kill me dead," "Yea, right. Besides, having a reason makes killing much more fun, really gets the blood pumping, you know?" "Haha... Yea uh... Totally." "Hey Ryan, quit harassing the new guy and give someone else a turn, will ya!" Michael cut in. "I wasn't harassing anyone!,” Ryan insisted, putting his hands up as if to plead innocence, “We were just having a pleasant conversation, weren't we Mark?" "Yep, no harassing going on over here! Just talking about killing...stuff,” he explained with a stiff thumbs up and a forced grin. "Well, while we're on the subject let me tell you about this one asshole I had to deal with the other day. Oh my god this guy was fucking annoying as shit!..." Eventually, the whole crew began mingling with their temporary additions rather successfully. The only fight that broke out was between Mark and Jeremy, but even that was fueled by friendly competition over who was the strongest proportionate to their height. Geoff and Jack watched like proud parents from the sidelines, marveling at the fact that the situation had deescalated without any broken bones. Somehow, the crew had found it within themselves to welcome these two into their ranks, if only for a few days. 

 And maybe, just maybe, there was a tiny sliver of a possibility that this whole thing would work out.

[serenagaywaterford]

I see some parallels between stateless and handmaid’s tale. Gordon/Pat/Sofie are the Aussie cult version of the Waterfords. Sofie is powerless just like June; Pat is complicit, but we see a glimpse of maybe regret or unease; and Gordon is basically a commander. Dominic West could’ve easily played someone like Winslow. We’ll probably see some more flashbacks, but he for sure raped her, or at the very least attempted it, might as well be the Jezebel’s.

Cut for content and length

I’m not sure I saw regret in Pat tbh. Unease, yes, but how much of that was because of public embarrassment that Sofie broke down cos her husband raped her, I’m not sure. She seems unhappy yes. But more cos she knows her husband fucked up and her big fancy party is ruined. Not because she cares about Sofie in any way whatsoever. Without the facade of perfection and exceptionalism, the cult can’t attract and keep members. Which is also why Gordon humiliated Sofie so savagely. Other cult members needed to be scared into conformity and acceptance. Pat and Gordon can’t risk any others slipping out of line. Gordon’s just a fucking dumbass. Who rapes a vulnerable woman RIGHT before her big dance? That was just idiocy. Of course, she’s gonna be fucked up. So, not only is he predatory, rapist scum, but he’s STUPID predatory, rapist scum. There’s no “attempt” here. He did it. There is literally no reason he wouldn’t. Again, having researched and watched a lot about cults, this is like textbook cult abuse. I think I can only think of ONE cult ever that didn’t involve the rape of women by the male leader. Even modern psuedo-cults like the yoga one by Bikram C., rape, sexual assault, and coercive sexual encounters are the norm. There is literally no reason for Gordon to attempt it and then stop. He’s not suddenly going to develop empathy for Sofie lol. He’s getting off on his complete power over her and getting what he believes he deserves. He would follow through. They feel it’s their right. These cults are all about the leaders satisfying their own desires at the expense of everyone else.And it’s not the same as Jezebels at all. Jezebels is full of literal forced prostitution in a society that condones/turns a blind eye to it because the most powerful men enjoy it. Furthermore, it’s in a society that traffics other women for sex slavery and forced surrogacy, and even others for forced labour. And even the most “powerful” of women aren’t allowed to read or write (except Aunts, but only to maintain the subjugation of other women). They literally have no true freedom no matter what woman at whatever social status she’s in. Jezebels is pure sex slavery and trafficking. This cult is not sex slavery. It is not a sex trafficking ring. These women (and men) in Stateless, psychological issues aside, are technically free to leave whenever they like. It’s Australia in the mid-2000s and these are predominately middle-class white women and men with sufficient financial stability (they have to be in order to pay, like Scientology). Not Gilead, where no women have any money or resources. Sofie COULD just walk out the doors and not come back. It is only her psychological vulnerabilities/mental illness that prevents that. It’s not a physical or financial thing. 

Anyway... 

I mean, Pat knows very well what is happening in those “sessions”, hence her putting on the music to cover the sound and ignore it. Like Serena, she knows. And she does nothing to stop it. However, unlike Serena, she’s not in some highly misogynistic religiofascist regime where she must obey her husband. Whatever influences Gordon may have is out of the legal sphere, whereas Fred had everything in his favour in Gilead, including having the law support him. I have to disagree that Gordon is akin to a Commander. He does NOT have the law in his favour. He doesn’t get to rape Sofie with no threat of the law. Hence why it’s so secret. If Australian authorities caught him, he would be jailed. Fred is allowed to rape with impunity as long as it’s under the guise of the Ceremony. Even Jezebels is far more open and accepted than Gordon doing this in secret “therapy” sessions in a closed cult community where he is the ONLY person doing it. I really, really would hesitate to give Pat any benefit of the doubt because ANY coercion she may feel (and I don’t believe she does) is purely of her own making. She could leave, she would have the resources, even if Gordon controls all the cult’s money. She could go to the authorities and turn on Gordon and expose it all. Serena cannot do that. The authorities are just extensions of her husband and the entire society KNOWS and APPROVES of Fred’s actions. Hell, they’re sanctioned by “God” and law. The only authorities Serena can run to are outside her country, which is very difficult to escape when it’s a religious military dictatorship. I don’t consider Pat a victim of the cult in ANY way whatsoever, whereas Serena is clearly both a perpetrator and victim, which is what makes her situation so complex. It would be too simplistic to say Serena=Pat and Fred=Gordon. It’s very different and the power dynamics in Pat/Gordon in 2000′s Australia are WAY different than those of any Wife in Gilead vs their husband.So, she’s pretty much doing this with no threat to herself. But, I mean, people who are crazy enough to run a cult probably don’t really care much about any other people at all. (I don’t really want to get into the psychology of the women closest to male cult leaders, female co-leaders, or even solo female cult leaders.)There are obviously similarities but also very stark differences. And as crazy as this is to say, I actually see more empathy in Serena than Pat. (Serena appears to genuinely have concern, well, for children at least. She has an arguably “good” purpose behind her fanaticism; it’s her methods and philosophy that are completely wrong. And while it is intertwined with herself and her personal greed, I saw nothing in Pat that made me believe she genuinely cares about anybody but herself and Gordon. She doesn’t honestly care about the cult members in the least. She doesn’t care about Sofie or actually improving anyone’s lives except hers and Gordon’s. But I mean, Serena is so much more developed than Pat, and I have seen waaaaaayyyy too many cult docs to give these people any credit of humanity.) Pat is the accomplice, not some innocent bystander with regrets. She procures the victims, she grooms them, and then passes them to her husband for his abuse. But yeah, like Serena, she is the superficial facade that gives legitimacy to the operation. Unlike Serena, she’s an active participant in arranging which individual women (and men) are victimised. Serena does none of the grooming. There is no grooming at all. It’s strict psychological torture by the Aunts and threat of death from the “police” that builds Handmaids, and Wives maintain that rather than do it themselves. I know you can argue Serena did in this in Gilead’s infancy but from all we’ve seen, she really didn’t have that much say in much once the men really started developing the concept of Gilead. The method Gilead uses for brainwashing are so much more violent and brutal. There are many women in true crime and cults that are the “nonthreatening, nice face” to assist their boyfriends/husbands in sourcing, kidnapping, grooming, torturing, etc. the victims. Pat is one of them. Serena was the face of the movement at the beginning to lend legitimacy to anti-feminism and female biological imperatives. (I don’t really want to go into what Serena thought or didn’t think, or expected back then cos we don’t really know. She doesn’t seem like she expected Gilead though when she was giving those speeches. But when she was in favour of blowing up Washington, lol, what else could she have expected with a violent coup?)Honestly, there’s no way not to see similarities between ANY cult and THT because it’s the same basic idea. And often the power imbalances exist in the same sort of way. THT didn’t just come out of nowhere and cults and so-called “religions” are often reliant on the same techniques as fascist systems. But I don’t think what they’ve shown in Stateless is particularly close to THT cos they are vastly different scenarios.