#had to respond IMMEDIATELY
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antiivarook Ā· 1 month ago
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@rosetintedgunman asked: ā› Ā hey, are you okay? don't fall apart on me.Ā  āœ (Wilford, rosetintedgunman. Given the changes, they can be reset to strangers if you want.)
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SPIRITED AWAY PROMPTS. / accepting
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It was hard for her to focus right now. So many lights. She was a little bit drunk and unsteady on her feet right now. She didn't know what time it was nor did she know where her so called friends were. She didn't feel right. Had she been spiked? Trying to focus herself. Breathe.
okay. she's definately been spiked.
A voice. A voice she didn't recognise. Kiran didn't feel too alarmed. He seemed...friendly. Different. Different to the usual sort she met in this new and strange town. She couldn't focus but it did provide some sort of grounding. She didn't respond for a second. Blinked like a camera trying to change focus. The music, the talking, and the vibrations of the room. Her head was spinning.
A dainty hand reached forward to hold his arm. She didn't know him and yet...
"I...I need to leave..." She managed to gasp out like she had been holding her breath this whole time. Maybe she had. She didn't know.
"Please...help me..." She leaned in, her voice almost pained. Adreniline pumped through her body. She was going to have a panic attack.
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unicornpopcorn14 Ā· 6 months ago
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Remember when Dazai being honest for 0.00001 sec had him tweaking so bad he needed to lie about lying?
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luxaofhesperides Ā· 1 year ago
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Soulmate AU: First Words + End of the World ; requested by @justwannabecat!
Duke has long since accepted that he doesnā€™t have great luck. Most things in his life tend to go wrong very quickly, or complicate situations he was already struggling in (see: being a meta and getting his powers in the middle of a fight). Having an incomprehensible soulmark is an unpleasant discovery on the morning of his nineteenth birthday, but not entirely unexpected.
He had been hoping for something simple, a common one like hi itā€™s nice to meet you or sorry, didnā€™t mean to bump into you.
What Duke gets instead isnā€™t even words.Ā 
Scrawled across his left hipbone is a string of symbols glowing a faint green. Theyā€™re not in a language he recognizes, and the symbols seem to move, shifting ever so slightly so they look different every time he blinks.
ā€œWell,ā€ he says after a solid five minutes of staring into the mirror, unable to rip his eyes off his soulmateā€™s words, ā€œI hope theirs looks nicer than mine.ā€
He spends his birthday in a bit of a daze, enjoying time spent with the Waynes and his friends. Itā€™s hard to be fully present when heā€™s all too aware of the soreness on his hipbone flaring up each time he moves. Itā€™s hard to keep his mind off of it, wanting nothing more than to search for answers, unravel the mystery of his soulmateā€™s first words.
ā€œSomething on your mind?ā€ Jason asks, as the attention shifts off of him for a brief moment as Harper and Cullen get ready to leave and everyone rushes to give their goodbyes,
Duke shrugs, carefully keeping his hands still so they donā€™t drift to where his soulmark is hidden beneath his clothes. ā€œYeah. Nothing you need to worry about, though.ā€
Jason looks him over critically, then nods.Ā 
Duke resigns himself to being investigated by the rest of the Bats. If heā€™s off enough that Jason had to comment on it, then that means everyoneā€™s noticed and are trying to figure out whatā€™s happened. Theyā€™re not going to ask him, because they think he needs space to work through whateverā€™s got him so distracted, but theyā€™re also not going to just do nothing.Ā 
This wonā€™t be the first time theyā€™ve done this. Duke expects it. Frankly, it would be stranger and much more concerning if they didnā€™t try to dig up all his secrets the moment they caught wind of him hiding something.
Heā€™ll tell them about getting his soulmark soon. Soulmarks can appear on any birthday between the ages of thirteen to twenty five; they might suspect he got his, but they wonā€™t be able to confirm.
For now, Duke can keep his soulmateā€™s first words (whatever that gibberish means) to himself.
He makes the decision then and there, as his birthday party winds down, to tell them in a week.
And because his luck is abysmal, a world ending threat hits five days later and suddenly there is no time for soulmarks and first words.
Duke is the last to arrive at the Fortress of Solitude, hitching a ride from Superboy to get there. The biting cold and the harsh winds keep the place far from the reaches of the rest of humanity, surrounded by nothing but deadly white.Ā 
Desolate as the landscape is, itā€™s still in better shape than the rest of the world.
Things would be better if it was alien invaders. It would be more bearable if some sort of cosmic colossus tried to eat their solar system. At least then there would be something physical that they could fight.
Instead, the world is breaking apart, the sky and earth both fracturing to reveal glowing green faultlines. Timelines are getting mixed up and muddled; just yesterday, Duke had to evacuate a building that had been demolished forty years ago, then stop a gang leader who wouldnā€™t be born for another eight years from taking over a neighborhood block and holding the residents hostage. Strange creatures are appearing out of nowhere, crawling out of shadows and tide pools and from beneath the roots of trees, all horrible, monstrous things that go after people with teeth and claws.Ā 
The Flashes and the rest of the speedsters are nowhere to be found. The last time anyone get communication from them, it had been Impulse sending Red Robin a glitchy, barely audible video chat saying something along the lines of ā€œtrying to fixā€”unstableā€”keep us hereā€”never been alive before.ā€ All things that are very concerning to hear, made worse by the fact that no one had been able to contact them at all.Ā 
The quiet loneliness of the Fortress of Solitude is a welcome change from the constant screaming, death, and destruction thatā€™s taken over Gotham as well as the rest of the world. Last he heard, even Justice League China was at the end of their rope.Ā 
ā€œIn here,ā€ Superboy instructs, guiding Duke through the halls. Thereā€™s no time to look around at Supermanā€™s secret base. All his focus is stuck on staying conscious for another few hours to see if this gathering of heroes is able to find a solution to the world breaking apart.
Batman stands besides Superman. Both nod at Duke when he enters the room. Wonder Woman is watching over John Constantine as he writes something on the floor, muttering under his breath. The rest of the Justice League lean against each other, visibly exhausted as they wait for Constantine to finish up what heā€™s doing. A few other heroes are here too, and Duke goes to join them where they lean against a wall, fighting to keep their eyes open.
ā€œHey,ā€ he greets, voice low. ā€œHanging in there?ā€
Wonder Girl sighs. ā€œSomehow. I donā€™t know how much longer we can do this. Thereā€™s just too muchā€¦ā€
ā€œWeā€™ll get through this. I mean, even without us out there, plenty of civilians have formed rescue and relief groups to help with keeping things under control,ā€ Speedy says, gently knocking her arm against Wonder Girlā€™s. ā€œWe just gotta keep going. No giving up.ā€
ā€œWhatā€™s this plan, anyways? I just heard that they needed me here to some attempt to fix things.ā€
ā€œWell, without the speedsters, youā€™re kind of the only one who can help with time and power related stuff,ā€ Speedy says.
ā€œThatā€™s definitely a stretch. My powers donā€™t really have anything to do with time. Itā€™s all just light and shadow.ā€
Speedy shrugs. ā€œWell, youā€™re here, arenā€™t you? Too late to complain about it now.ā€
Duke doesnā€™t get a chance to say anything else when a loud clap catches his attention. The entire room goes still and silent as Constantine stands up and surveys the circle and symbols heā€™s written, taking up an entire corner of the large room.Ā 
ā€œAlright,ā€ he says. ā€œTime to get started. Remember, let me do the talking. If you have to speak, itā€™s only to back me up or when a question is directed to you.ā€
Batman nods to the other Justice Leaguers, and suddenly everyone is falling into formation behind Constantine. Duke hurries to join them with Wonder Girl and Speedy, taking a place on the edge of the group where heā€™s a little closer to the circle than the others.Ā 
Constantine begins chanting. His voice is steady though none of the sounds make any sense, refusing to form themselves into recognizable words, and the air the in the room feels heavier. The chalk circle glows a blinding white and Duke can see magic swirling through the air, his power kicking in the let him watch as reality tears and a glowing star in the shape of a boy comes out of it.
Duke blinks, forcing his power down. The hypnotic swirls of magic fade from sight, but the boy still glows, bright and terrible as he floats above the circle and surveys them all. A crown engulfed in blue flame hovers above his head and the fabric of the cosmos is draped over his shoulders as a cape.Ā 
Just from presence alone, Duke can tell that this figure is now the strongest existence in this universe. He hopes this boy king is kind; no one, not even Superman, would be able to beat him in a fight.
The boy king opens his mouth and speaks, but itā€™s not words than comes out. A strange static like sound emerges, but light and almost melodic.Ā 
His left hipbone burns.
Duke gasps, hand flying down to it, and the boy kingā€™s gaze snaps to meet his.
The world stands still. No one moves. No one dares to breathe.
And then the boy king drops to the floor and walks out of the circle.
ā€œI thought you said that would hold him!ā€ Batman hisses at Constantine, who is looking more and more distressed.
ā€œIt was supposed to! I wrote it specifically to hold the King of the Infinite Realms!ā€
The boy king glances at Constantine. This time, when he speaks, itā€™s in smooth English. ā€œDid you name the king in your circle?ā€
ā€œYeah, I named Pariah Darkā€¦ Bloody hell, you ainā€™t him, are ya?ā€
ā€œNo,ā€ the boy king smiles, ā€œIā€™m Phantom.ā€
The cape and crown fade away, and suddenly itā€™s not an all powerful, terrifying king standing before them, but a young man with white hair and green eyes who looks Dukeā€™s age. Like he could be any other new generation hero in the room.Ā 
ā€œPhantom,ā€ Duke repeats lightly, just under his breath, but it makes Phantom look at him again.
He walks forward, ignoring the other heroesā€™ aborted attempts to stop him, coupled with Constantineā€™s frantic back off motion happening behind him. Phantom leaves the circle and the Justice Leaguers behind to stand before Duke, a soft smile on his face.
ā€œHi,ā€ he says softly, ā€œI dreamed of you.ā€
ā€œYouā€”what?ā€
ā€œI dreamed of you. I have for years now. To think that being summoned was what made us meetā€”ā€ Phantom breaks off into a breathless laugh.
Duke swallows, then drops his had from where it had been pressed against his hip. ā€œSo weā€™re reallyā€”? You have my first words too?ā€
In the corner of his eye, he sees Batman stiffen up. Maybe he should have just told them the day after his birthday, but in Dukeā€™s defense, this is the definition of extenuation circumstances.Ā 
ā€œFirst words?ā€ Phantom repeats, ā€œIs thatā€¦ Do we have different soulmate connections?ā€
ā€œI think so. Here, everyone gets the first words their soulmates say to them appearing somewhere on their body.ā€
Phantomā€™s gaze darts down to Dukeā€™s hip, then back up. ā€œOh. I get dreams. Where Iā€™m from, we dream of our soulmates, and the closer we get to meeting them, the more we remember the dreams.ā€
ā€œAnd you dreamed of me.ā€
ā€œI did.ā€
ā€œAs touching as this is,ā€ Constantine interrupts, and Duke gets to watch as Phantom rolls his eyes, ā€œWe summoned you here for a reason. Our world is falling apart at the seams and we need someone powerful, from the Realms, to help us fix it.ā€
ā€œOkay.ā€
ā€œ...What do you mean ā€˜okayā€™?ā€
ā€œIā€™ll help,ā€ Phantom says.
ā€œJust like that? No deal to be made, no price to be paid?ā€
ā€œJust like that. Iā€™m not one for deals anyways. If I can help, then I will. But I do want to see what the problem is with my soulmate by my side, if you donā€™t mind.ā€
Batman steps in, fixing Duke with a steady gaze, a barely noticeable tilt of his head. ā€œSignal?ā€
ā€œYeah Iā€™ll go with him. Of course I will. The sooner the better, in fact, because everythingā€™s gone to shit.ā€ Duke turns to Phantom, taking hold of one of his hands. ā€œIt is really bad out there,ā€ he warns, ā€œIf you need helpā€”ā€
ā€œIā€™ll ask for help from others in the Realms,ā€ Phantom says. ā€œNo offense or anything, but if itā€™s really that bad, I doubt living mortals will be able to do much to fix things. Itā€™s why I was summoned, right?ā€
ā€œRight. Letā€™s get to it, then.ā€
Thereā€™s a flash of mischief in Phantomā€™s eyes, and cheeky grin stealing across his face for a moment, before he says, ā€œAye aye, captain!ā€ and picks Duke up like he weighs nothing and flies up through the ceiling.
Duke is able to hear everyoneā€™s surprised, panicked shouts before theyā€™re outside the Fortress of Solitude and Phantom is flying them away. He only needs a few directions from Duke before he finds the first of the large fractures in the sky.
ā€œYikes,ā€ is all he says, which is not a great thing to hear. ā€œI think I know how to fix it, though. Weā€™ll need to do a little investigating as to who, exactly, started messing around with reality, but once we find the source, itā€™ll be an easy fix.ā€
ā€œThatā€™s the best news Iā€™ve heard all week.ā€
ā€œEven better than meeting your soulmate?ā€
ā€œI havenā€™t slept for more than four hours all week. Knowing thereā€™s an end in sight beats everything else.ā€
Phantom laughs, throwing his head back and Duke canā€™t help but drink in the sight of him, so ethereal and bright and full of life. ā€œFair enough! Got any ideas as to where we should start?ā€
ā€œIā€™ve got an entire crew of detective vigilantes,ā€ Duke replies. Heā€™s not taking any more chances. No more waiting to talk about important things; he messed up by keeping his soulmark to himself, so he needs to make sure everyone meets his soulmate before shit goes south again.Ā 
ā€œLetā€™s go find them, then!ā€
They take off again, soaring through the skies that are barely holding themselves together.Ā 
The world is still ending, and every hero is being stretched thin, but held carefully in Phantomā€™s arms, racing head first into a solution, Duke canā€™t help but feel that everythingā€™s going to be alright now.Ā 
Heā€™s had enough bad luck. Now, his soulmate with him, bearing the title of King with grace, things are finally starting to look up.
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parisoonic Ā· 1 year ago
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i'm just making myself laugh at this point im so sorry
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queenlucythevaliant Ā· 8 months ago
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Just to clarify my thoughts (since I've had a number of people ask me about it) re: Job and cursing God. There's a big difference between cursing God as used in Scripture and how we generally would think of cursing at God today.
Cursing someone, in the Bible, has a lot of depth to it. It's not just saying "screw you " in anger, it's got a sense of forsakenness to it. It's the opposite of a blessing, a removal of blessing. If the blessing is presence, your face shining on the person you're blessing, then a curse is absence. In some translations, Job's wife tells him to "renounce God and die," which I honestly think makes a lot more sense to modern ears.
Job says a lot of unpleasant things to and about God in his anger and grief. So do the Psalmists. A number of the Prophets. So can we. God can take it if we come to him with honest expressions of our emotion, including those not-so-nice ones directed at him. I don't think there's anything wrong with getting mad at God and saying, "How dare you, you bastard" when you suffer unjustly. You can say much worse, I think, without sinning, though I don't feel particularly inclined to give examples. But as long as it's an honest expression of your heart, I think you're doing exactly what prayer is for. You're presenting him your heart with an open hand. He can use that. Opposite of love is not hate but indifference, etc.
Job doesn't renounce God. Neither should we. But I think when you're truly suffering, you're gonna have those feelings toward God either way. He'd rather you address them with him directly than try to avoid them. Cursing at God in the modern sense is actually a great way to keep the relationship strong and not end up cursing/renouncing him in the Biblical sense.
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secriden Ā· 2 months ago
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ok OK HEAR ME OUT THO-- what if... because Liu Qingge was never meant to survive past the qi deviation in PIDM, he's the only non-transmigrator character who can see the influence of the system on the world?
i'm thinking it plays out something like this: lqg emerges from the Ling Xi caves to find he can see these... strings of what looks like energy flowing around. he can't really tell what it is, and at first he thinks its a new quirk of his latest breakthrough but when he rushes to help defend Qiong Ding Peak from the demon invasion, he realises that certain people have these auras of energy around that are especially pronounced. like he's mostly preoccupied with fighting off the demon invasion but distantly he notices that lbh has this golden glow (ie. protagonist golden halo) around him although its threaded through with dark red energy. curious. sqq also has this inexplicable dark energy around him that occasionally flashes bright blue when he seems to freeze and go absent minded. even stranger.
when mqf comes along, lqg asks about possession and mentions the strange energy but mqf assures him that they'd already tested it and that there's nothing wrong aside from the new poison in sqq's system. yqy also acts as if everything is normal even though everything is clearly NOT normal because sqq is acting very weird. but also all his weirdness happens around these pulses of blue and lqg starts wondering sqq's being forced into acting the way he is.
(yqy also has a dark aura about him although its different from sqq's. it's also very reactive towards sqq like they're tied together somehow and lqg finds it very disturbing.)
in this situation, i think sqq and lqg would have way more interactions because lqg's suspicious of sqq but also worried?? cuz he can tell that sqq is being manipulated/affected in some way. he starts hunting for monsters/beasts that help with fighting off possession or curing curses but none of them seem to have any effect. he notices the almost unnatural way sqq will act in contrary ways and how they're always attached to that same pulse of blue that only lqg can seem to see. he notices the weird way the aura's clash when sqq interacts with lbh or yqy and starts feeling protective because he can tell sqq is trying to cause as little harm as possible.
he starts wondering why no one else seems to care that something is clearly not alright with sqq. even if they can't see the aura and the energy bursts, surely its obvious just from what they know about sqq. he starts to become angry. then he becomes determined. because if no one else can see that some unknown entity is hurting sqq, then its just going to have to be lqg that saves him.
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goldkirk Ā· 2 months ago
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I donā€™t know how to explain any more clearly that it doesnā€™t MATTER if it seems legitimate to you. You have got to fact check every single headline and post and claim on the left just like you need to do on the right.
The left is NOT immune to misinformation and rushed reporting. And the more emotionally polarizing or shocking the talking points, sound bytes, and headlines are, the worse it is and more frequently it happens.
Learn to verify through multiple independent sources. If you canā€™t do that, you canā€™t trust it.
If you have to wait extra hours for the real information to come through vetted channelsā€”NOT just one individual somewhere everyone links to, and not just one single media source either, EVEN if itā€™s a major news networkā€”thats just how it has to be. What news outside of genuine local disasters near you TRULY needs your outrage and post-sharing in the next hour specifically?
Misinformation works best by not seeming like misinformation and by fitting in with the rest of what you already expect to see. It doesnā€™t help anyone to not be able to recognize and avoid the stuff.
#hey little star whatcha gonna queue?#and before I get any angry anons saying Iā€™m making the argument that both sides are the same#I am not. and nowhere did I say that#and if your immediate reaction to any amount of criticism of leftist spaces or communication#is knee jerk outrage and defensiveness#this is an invitation to explore why that is for you.#this isnā€™t about anyone on here this is from conversations Iā€™ve had with a few people IRL who have shared leftist misinformation a lot#so if youā€™re feeling attacked by this post and I havenā€™t directly spoken to you multiple times about misinformation with you responding bac#this isnā€™t. a vague post. about you. okay?#I cannot reiterate enough THIS IS AFTER IRL INTERACTIONS NOT A CAL OUT VAGUEPOST#and as one final note. IF YOU FOLLOW PEOPLE. WHO CONSTANTLY USE. THE MOST INFLAMMATORY WORDING CHOICES POSSIBLE.#YOU SHOULD NOT FOLLOW THOSE PEOPLE NO MATTER WHAT THEY TALK ABOUT.#no one communicating in true good faith to ALL PEOPLE about facts uses loaded language more than occasionally#the sooner you learn that the better. and that really starts narrowing down the pool of who you want to actually listen to (while still#verifying anything they tell you)#get higher standards!!!! and read some books or watch lectures about actual effective communication to broad groups without using tribalism#and also. anyone on the left trying to convince you of massive efforts and conspiracies that are anti everything#is also wrong 99% of the time and not a good source to listen to#never EVER assume conspiracy when it can be more simply explained through either#ignorance obliviousness incompetence financial greed or misunderstandings#the end. Iā€™m really done this time. Iā€™m just sick of seeing so many people fall prey to this#shh katie#cult escapee#politics and current events#donā€™t get swept up in the constant tsunami of performative online activism#election 2024#world events
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carameldansan Ā· 8 months ago
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Yā€™knowā€¦ I donā€™t think Laios is good at social cuesā€¦ I donā€™t blame other characters if they think heā€™s secretly evil šŸ˜­
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the-obnoxious-sibling Ā· 2 days ago
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the infuriating thing about star trek is that sometimes it really is as good as you dream it could be. sometimes it's sixties racist, yeah. sometimes it's nineties sexist. and sometimes it's an hour of traumatized people coming to terms with the fact that the face of their trauma belongs not to an anonymous enemy but to a person. sometimes it's about deciding to hope that showing a person kindness will destroy your enemy more effectively than any plague blanket you could throw at him.
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kingkatsuki Ā· 8 months ago
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Specifically thinking about long distance relationships today.
So tell me how you and your f/o would first meet online?
#I feel like Bakugou and I would meet in one of those online games heā€™s downloaded to mindlessly waste time between shifts#and heā€™s so foul at first because he thinks Iā€™m weak but we play and he realises that Iā€™m#actually whooping everyone and heā€™s like well damn okay#and now heā€™s messaging in the alliance chat and like getting excited when Iā€™m online even tho he tries to hide it#and gets annoyed when other creeps in his alliance try to flirt with me#and then heā€™s asking for my discord#me and Sanemi get into a fight on discord the first time we interact#in some stupid big server I only joined for the emojis#but heā€™s a jerk so I tell him to shut up and a message later I find a msg notification and itā€™s him trying to continue the conversationšŸ˜­#enjin slides into my dms on Instagram#he finds my post at a concert and hates the fuckboys that are commenting below#ends up messaging me to see if Iā€™m okay but then immediately worries heā€™s one of those guys#Tamsy I feel like is that mutual Iā€™ve had forever on twt and we like each others posts but weā€™ve NEVER talked to each other??#itā€™s not until Iā€™m feeling sad at 2am and I post something self-deprecating that he drops me a msgšŸ„ŗ#and we end up staying up until 5am just talking to each other#Kirishima is ALWAYS the guy that responds to my ā€˜morningā€™ with a morning back! every day without fail#and I slide into his DMs one day and ask how heā€™s ALWAYS awake when I am??? like to say it back so quick#and he admits heā€™s kinda learned my schedule and he tries to be online for it because itā€™s one of the best parts of his day#and he likes saying it backšŸ˜­šŸ˜­šŸ˜­ even if heā€™s off from a night shift and needs sleep he canā€™t without seeing me msg#Shindou blatantly flirts with me in a gaming discord and I think heā€™s an incel so I block him#he gets a friend to ping me to beg me to unblock him and I refuse#the friend then sends another message with a screenshot of Shindou basically begging me to unblock himšŸ˜­#Dot and I meet in one of those AITA Reddit threads#and we end up borderline arguing over whether op is TA#so much that we get told to take it elsewherešŸ˜­šŸ˜­šŸ˜­#enjo#bakujo#eijo#but also catch me sending Dynamight sassy banter on his official socialsšŸ˜­šŸ˜‚
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eliounora Ā· 1 month ago
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most of the time I'm sure I'll never find a relationship but then sometimes I get this idea in my head that maybe there is someone out there for me and it's like WHOA WHOA WHOA. where is this ounce of hope coming from. get it off me
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batsplat Ā· 6 months ago
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kind of recently clocked that marc took caseys honda seat coming into 2013 (not saying he didnā€™t deserve a factory seat immediately bc he obviously did, kid went and podiumed his first and won his second ever race on that bike but it somehow never crossed my mind and itā€™s kind of insane to imagine now that a rookie would get it) and i was wondering if there was something To Know about that mid to end 2012 season, about vale back to yamaha and casey retiring and casey and danis teammateship and how dani reacted to marc getting that seat etc i love love love your rambles so if you got thoughts please share?
y'know what. let's do this one with bullet points
at the start of 2012, retirement rumours were swirling around two riders. one was casey stoner.... the other was valentino rossi
valentino was entering year two of a miserable stint at ducati, trapped on a bike that was *checks notes* shit and that was still several years away from making the kinds of improvements that could make it championship-winning machinery in anyone's hands (remember, even casey wasn't anywhere close to fighting for the title in 2010). it had also been a rough couple of years injury-wise for valentino, with 2010 bringing the shoulder injury courtesy of a motocross accident, followed by him breaking the leg at mugello. the painful shoulder problems persisted even upon his return from the leg injury, not exactly helped by his decision to delay shoulder surgery until the end of the year, and he remained hampered in 2011 while he was trying to adapt to the new bike
probably the main reason for the retirement rumours, however, was the death of simoncelli in an accident valentino had been involved in. the rumours basically started the day after the accident, and did not stop even when he showed up at valencia and raced (for about one corner until he was caught up in an ugly multi-rider pile up... kinda set off by dovi but anyways)
the rumours persisted in 2012. valentino became increasingly irritable about them.... meant that both valentino and casey were going into round three at estoril having to address the retirement talk. casey denied that he was planning to retire in the estoril pre-event presser (and he'd already kinda hinted to honda he was ready to sign a new contract)
this all led to some pretty silly drama, where the journalists were less than impressed when casey did announce his retirement two weeks later at le mans and casey went 'well I hadn't decided to retire yet back then!'
anyway, more important is the retirement announcement itself. casey made a statement at the very start of the le mans presser. here's the text:
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he was the championship leader at this point, and the favourite to defend his title. of course he took a bunch of questions at the presser about the announcement, and cited several other reasons for his decision to retire, like people's reactions to his mystery illness in 2009, or too many people criticising the current racing being boring, or how they let CRT riders into parc fermƩ (let's not get into that)
now it's important to note that this was round four. which meant that the entire rider market was about to be spiced up... so let's backtrack a bit and talk silly season: historical edition!
okay, so marc could have feasibly moved up to motogp a year earlier, and for a large chunk of 2011 there was pretty frenzied speculation he was going to do exactly that. in october, between the phillip island and sepang rounds (where he had the crash that gave him diplopia and prematurely ended both his season and his championship bid), he finally announced he was going to stay in moto2
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so, in late 2011, speculation was already of course starting for what the grid would look like in 2013, with a lot of big name contracts expiring at the end of 2012. both factory yamahas, hondas, ducatis, amongst others... you know how it goes. the expectation was broadly that casey would stick with honda and dani would be protected for at least another year by the rookie rule (more on that in a second), that jorge would stick with yamaha and... well. at this point, it was plausible valentino might sign at least a one year contract extension with ducati, with just enough glimmers of progress and signs that things might be headed in the right direction for him to want to continue building that project up
early 2012, around the time of the first race, and actually it's looking plausible that none of the six big factory seats are going to be changing hands. jorge and casey seemed the most certain ones, valentino too committed to ducati, and dani likely to sign a one year deal until marc swoops in at the end of 2013 to take his place
then casey announces his retirement, and silly season properly kicks off
first order of priority is of course the vacant repsol honda seat. now, the main thing stopping marc from getting that repsol honda seat was never actually going to be a lack of space - it was the 'rookie rule'. in 2010, a rule was introduced to stop rookies from joining the factory team. the idea was basically to help out satellite teams by giving them the chance to house a young star rider, give them publicity and results and so on (face it, how much would any of us be talking about tech3 this year without the pedro acosta factor?)
this was likely never to really work like it was supposed to, because if you're one of the factories, you can basically set up... teams that are only very theoretically 'independent'. another factory team in all but name. remember how valentino technically won his first title at a satellite team? well, that was essentially a shell team set up as a way to have somewhere to put valentino for two years while repsol honda was full. not the same team (and indeed, valentino and jb did sometimes look over at the chaos at repsol and go. good lord. what's going on there) but full factory support
in spring 2012, dorna was still adamant this rule would remain in place:
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should also help explain why the general reaction to suzuki suddenly pulling out in 2022 was 'shocked but not that shocked' lol
but of course by mid-2012 this rule was facing another serious test: where do you put marc marquez, especially with this vacant repsol honda seat just sitting there? now, the valentino model did seem like a reasonable one in this situation, where you put him into an existing satellite team with heavy factory backing or even just create a new one to house him. which is something valentino himself talked about:
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except, it wasn't quite that straightforward, because from 2013 onward manufacturers were limited to supplying bikes for four riders, two in a factory team and two in satellites - so you'd have to take away one of the bikes from the existing two honda satellite teams, gresini or lcr
one of the reasons why putting him in one of the existing satellite teams was a bit of an issue was that he was already backed by repsol, which could have caused sponsorship conflicts if he'd been housed with one of those other teams. but also, by this point ezpeleta was sounding rather less committed to the whole thing. from june 2012:
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which.
my man
if you KNOW that the most prominent rookies can be put into shell satellites anyway and you are openly joking about it then WHAT was the POINT of any of this
by the end of the month, they gave up on the whole thing. as it happens, it wasn't even repsol honda who asked for the rule to be dropped - it was the satellite honda teams who were like 'yeah we don't actually want this kid for our team, way too stressful to make this all work for a single year before losing him anyway'
not a universally popular decision, it has to be said
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it's quite likely that if casey had stayed and the rookie rule had still been dropped that hrc would have immediately taken in marc and not renewed dani's contract, which would have been a wee bit awkward given dani's late season form, but. you know. so it goes. anyway honda didn't end up having to make any tough calls
about two weeks after the rookie rule is dropped, hrc announces the two year contract with marc
by this point, valentino has had another miserable start to the season with ducati, save for a fun little wet podium at le mans - you know, the race where casey announced his retirement... they had their last ever duel there, with valentino snatching second place from casey on the last lap
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photo abbove not representative of the general tone they used to discuss each other in that time period
anyhow, these rare bright spots weren't going to be enough for valentino
"There was a lot of expectation from me and from Ducati to win, but unfortunately I didn't have a good feeling with the bike, especially with the front," he said some years later. "When you are in that situation it's very difficult because you lose motivation and you lose the joy of going racing. When you start the weekend you are already in a negative way, so it's difficult, because if you don't have fun on the bike everything becomes heavier: leaving your home, all the travelling, speaking with journalists, everything. Also it becomes difficult to sleep. You are in a tunnel. When I was with Ducati I thought about stopping many times, but in the end it was a very good decision not to give up. Because if you stop and you don't have a bike then it's very easy to find yourself out of the business." - from Oxley's 'Valentino Rossi: All His Races'
he began openly talking about a return to yamaha in 2012 to replace the underperforming ben spies (though as late as july, publicly he was still talking up the chances of him sticking with ducati)... which was not a prospect welcomed by all in the factory - who saw his initial move to ducati as displaying a lack of loyalty. there was also of course the issue of yamaha wanting to avoid a repeat in the dramatics with jorge, which was certainly a topic in the negotiations. valentino's new deal with yamaha was eventually announced in august
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so yes, obviously pretty qualified enthusiasm from jorge's side. it helped that it was made clear that, at the start of 2013, this was very much jorge's team, something which valentino had to work to change as a result of his level of performance (after 2013)
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which left dovi to take the ducati factory seat. though he too maybe had to do a little bit of... smoothing over past comments in the negotiation process:
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and that's that! there was a brief period in which honda and valentino rumours were a thing... always unlikely, given the long-standing mutual animosity there, and valentino claims he was never in contact with them. dani's contract was signed when marc's was, so that put an end to that. there was also serious speculation jorge would take casey's seat at honda, which was ended by him signing for another two years at yamaha in june. everyone sorted
dani and casey had a pretty cordial teammate relationship - though of course by this point it was already no longer really a team organised around dani as it had been in the late noughties. from late 2011 (shortly before simoncelli's passing):
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and from the mind games post:
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he also says the following in that passage: "some days [dani] beat us but to be honest I always felt like I had the measure of him over the course of a season"
more to be said about that relationship, of course, but it was basically harmonious on both sides, and they parted on good terms. as for dani's response to marc's signing, it wasn't like he was in a place within the team to complain too much - though his position was strengthened by his late 2012 form, where he won six of the last eight races. both of them mostly just stick to saying the standard respectful pr stuff about each other
though this is pretty funny in retrospect:
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"I know nothing about pedrosa's goals" my man I think you can probably guess
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herbofgraceandpeace Ā· 4 months ago
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I was chilling, and now, alas! I am not.
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funscarypdr Ā· 1 year ago
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obsessed with ashton ā€œabandonment issuesā€ greymoore making a reckless decision without asking for help and finding someone at his back, at his hands, grasping to help anyway
obsessed with ashton ā€œwhat was it like to wake up and find them there, thatā€™s something you know that i donā€™tā€ greymoore knowing now
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brittlebutch Ā· 9 months ago
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actually it's kind of funny how people will say Alex's fatal flaw is that he 'doesn't ask for help' and that it's his determination to handle things on his own that leads to his deterioration and eventual death when his whole introduction to the present-day timeline was a very literal cry for help that simply went ignored
#N posts stuff#like even if you think alex was lying throughout the entirety of season 2 and he was waiting from the Moment jay showed up#JUST to kill him (Which again i don't think makes much sense when he could have killed Tim & Jay immediately instead of#breaking Tim's leg. anyway) EVEN IF alex spent that whole time lying it doesn't actually change the fact that he would have at least#been Pretending to Ask For Help and if he wasn't lying then he was Literally Asking For Help and it doesn't Actually matter#what intention Alex had because the text is Ambiguous about Alex's honesty during season two; what isn't ambiguous is the way#other characters (specifically Jay) respond to him; like yeah - S2 Brian/Tim were never in one million years going to help Alex with shit#so sort of any argument that brings up Tim as someone who asks for/offers help is borderline meaningless in this era of the series#Jay had the 'opportunity' to help Alex (and i'll get back to that in a sec) but DIDN'T - Jay wasn't Interested in actually offering Alex#'help' bc Jay is ultimately curious about Answers and 'Offering Help' and 'Getting Answers' are two Wildly conflicting goals#Jay thinks Alex has answers and when Alex doesn't Offer these 'Answers' to Jay on a silver platter Jay gets pissed off and paranoid#and starts Stalking Alex bc he thinks it's 'Suspicious' that Alex won't give him the Answers (that Alex probably doesn't Actually have)#ANYWAY. ultimately this post is about how it's absurd when people argue#that individual character choices could have made a difference in the way this series played out - specifically wrt Alex#because EVERYONE in this WHOLE series are being affected by influences outside of their control ; including Brian Tim and Jay#so it's silly when people are like 'if ALEX had just made a different choice For Himself this could have all been avoided' WRONG.#bc Ultimately there's not really a way to 'help' someone else out of this situation - Tim tried and failed Repeatedly#the comics proved he even failed with Jessica - like MH isn't a horror situation where you can kill the big bad#'getting help' is a meaningless argument - what would successfully helping or getting help even look like? anyway.#the sub argument of this post is that Alex's biggest 'sin' is that he doesn't perform emotions the way other people want him to#like Alex is a character with a kind of flat affect - instead of LOOKING scared or grieved he LOOKS bored or angry#and everyone judges him based on that - so Alex is 'Suspicious' he's 'Lying' he's 'Guilty' but all of these deductions are predicated#on the belief that Alex isn't reacting to his circumstances the way a 'Normal' person would - so it MUST all be an act and so he's guilty#so everyone treats him like he's guilty until the end of season two when he's like 'Fuck it FINE i'll be guilty then' and so it goes#not a self-fulfilled prophecy but being Cornered Into a prophecy and then Blamed for it - SAD. anyway
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tales-of-the-ghost-zone Ā· 2 years ago
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Dani in The Clone Wars
I just love the idea of Dani falling into the Star Wars universe (or alternatively the Star Wars universe is the same universe as the Danny Phantom universe they just happen to be in different parts of the universe) and meeting the clones. Cause like sheā€™s a clone too. And not just any clone but a (technically) ā€œdefectiveā€ clone that originally had unstable DNA.
Like she meets the clones and just basically unknowingly trauma dumps on them. Just like ā€œyeah Iā€™m a clone to. I was supposed to be a boy but somehow came out a girl. And my genetic structure was super unstable for the first year of my life and I almost melted into a puddle of ectoplasmic goo because of it. But then my original Danny was able to stabilize me. My creator Vlad tried to kill me multiple times too. And also Iā€™m the only surviving clone, all the other were to unstable and melted into goo!ā€
And the clones are all just horrified. Cause like A. Sheā€™s the only surviving clone of her batch and all her batch mates died. B. She was originally genetically unstable and for them something like that would have gotten them decommissioned, something her creator attempted to do to her but her original stopped it and saved her! And C. sheā€™s just this tiny little child whose only like two-ish years old and sheā€™s already been through so much!
The clones all make the executive decision to adopt her as their little sister! Sheā€™s now one of them! They will protect her with everything theyā€™ve got!! And Dani just adopts them back. And she is a tiny little feral gremlin child, spirits have mercy on the souls of anyone who fucks with her clone brothers because she sure as hell wonā€™t!!!
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