#he hasnt even lived two decades.

[reineyday]

this is kind of a long, long, loooooong wandering rant lol soz. i promise it's not mean, it's mostly just critical thinking brain vomit/actual essay and the fatigue that comes from being a billy fan, bc like, no. not end of story. yes, his abuse doesnt justify his violent actions and racism, but his being racist doesnt make his other layers less valid or worth exploring--and it's not a moral failure to like billy anyways.

maybe this will just be a tangential reply bc op's post mostly just proves he's racist and then pronounces him "not a good guy", and their post is just generally saying "hey billy has layers but remember that he's racist," which is a good reminder. but, though this probably wasnt on purpose, the post kind of ends with a subtle implication that his being racist and not a good guy means there's something to watch out for in his character, and it is therefore morally questionable if not downright unethical to like him, and that implication would be wrong.

most of what im about to talk about is the same thing op is saying but from the pro-billy side of the fence, and like the previous reblog, but more explicitly and with more favour to billy, im also re-affirming that you can acknowledge he's terrible/has done bad things and still like him. besides, they didnt write him to be an outright villain, as much as they might insist it now. like op said, he's not a good guy--but he's not all bad either. (the ST fandom should look more into the concept of anti-heroes.)

i do appreciate your good faith take on billy, even if you landed on not liking him. nowadays i land on just the writing in general being bad, bc not only did they handle billy's racism badly but throughout the show, racism in general has just kind of been indicated and implied before eventually being completely looked over/ignored and lucas doesnt deserve that. honestly the way they had jason pull a gun on lucas and erica tackled to the ground in the latest season was horrifying, and it didnt get addressed at all.

they also, however, handle the fact that billy was abused badly.

abuse is never cut and dry. they wanted billy to be the human villain, and he antagonizes and torments our main characters, but they also give us an explanation for why he might be that way, and then they give him a completely sympathetic role in s3. he was controlled against his will, had no power, got possessed; we find out he's been abused by his father since he was a child, left in an abusive household by his father... eventually he breaks the possession to save el's life. we see him completely break down in the sauna. he dies apologizing to max.

does this "redeem" him? narratively the pieces are there (as in, usually, dying for the main character is a redemption trope), but it doesnt address where his faults were (being aggressive, tormenting max, his racist actions toward lucas, beating up steve) and we dont see him doing any work to rectify all that, so he doesnt feel redeemed.

but they dont really explore his background enough for viewers to really feel bad for him, unless theyre viewers that relate to his upbringing personally. they just give us these two pieces: 1) billy is an asshole, and 2) his home life sucks, and then we as viewers are just supposed to do something more with that. the show doesnt actually land anywhere regarding his abuse and his assholery, we just see that it happens, and then we see him get overpowered and controlled by an interdimensional monster, instead of just by his father. and then he dies saving el's life. it doesnt say anything about his character arc and nothing billy does as himself, good or bad, actually gets addressed.

the thing is, they put him into a villain role, made him sympathetic, and then everyone started treating his character like you can only view him in black and white when they didnt even write him that way. dacre approached billy with his own personal experience and knowledge that people arent bad for no reason, and it shows. caleb says billy's actions were racially motivated and it sure seems that way, and that's valid too bc if someone seems to target you specifically then you defend yourself. both of these things can be true.

in fandom spaces it always seems like defending billy automatically conflates you with being racist, but if you say "billy was racist and violent so he's a bad person" then it feels like you're just coldly ignoring the fact that he is a newly graduated teenager that still lives with his abuser. but you can have them both. they are not mutually exclusive! and it doesnt make you a bad person, or racist, to understand this and sympathize with billy anyways.

you say "we HAVE to think critically about the characters we like" and yes, yes i have. he isnt a good guy. his abuse doesnt excuse his bigotry and violence. it doesnt change the fact that he has been abused and there will be viewers who see themselves in him, who remember being like him--or mb they just like him without any personal relatable reasons at all. yet they get harrassed online for liking him just because of the other shit he's done.

im not excusing him by saying that. im just liking him anyways, and it doesnt make me a bad person--the way so many antis seem to believe--because at the end of the day, billy is a fictional character. he's not some racist guy i know that harrasses middle schoolers, he's a character that i like in a show, for one reason or another, and i have examined his character motivations back to front (which shouldnt have to be mandatory for a piece of media that serves as escapism btw) and decided i like digging into who he is.

as much as yall wanna believe it, he isnt a flat, racist villain. thinking critically about him means having to acknowledge all the stuff that makes him a more dimensional character.

okay, now im gonna digress a little more.

if we're talking about critical thinking, im also gonna point out that a kid that grows up under the fist of a bigoted man is going to turn out bigoted too, unless he has other major influences in his life (which billy doesnt). again, he still lives with his abuser. you think he's had any space at all to learn differently? you think he was safe at home if he was seen associating with people his dad deemed the "wrong" sort? this is why that passage from runaway max includes billy, but in em dashes. she says, "and billy, i guess", because billy has inherited those views. max attaches him to this passage as an afterthought, she says "i guess", bc she recognizes, living in that household with them, that it's in his best interest, and safety, to have those kinds of opinions. does he really believe them though, or is it just part of the persona he takes up to feel in control, to have power, to feel safer? is there even a difference anymore? that's up to you as a viewer, as a fic-writer, to dig into that (if youd like to).

also: i personally have made racist assumptions all by myself just bc of the society that surrounds me, the lack of representation on my screens, the views my parents had that they got from their parents that they never realized were a little bigoted. i inherited that all by accident, but i was in a safe space and in a culture that encouraged education and acceptance, so i know better now. imagine having a different opinion from your father and getting beaten up for it. of course he's bigoted, but does he know better not to be? does he get a good opportunity not to be, a safe place to explore different opinions from his dad, even though he has no other important adult figures in his life? (i dont count susan bc she married neil. sure max has differing opinions, but clearly susan doesnt care enough to not marry neil, and she stands by while billy gets pushed around, so any opinions she might have wouldnt influence billy.)

this is actually the reason i disagree that 17-18 is old enough to recognize how not to perpetuate abuse. it's hard to learn something if you have no good examples in front of you and no place to practice, and it's definitely the same with abuse. even worse because he still lives with neil, so it's still happening. it doesnt seem like billy's had any good opportunities to practice being kinder, and any opportunity he had with max was squandered the second she started being a method of control for billy. to neil, max is a tool to get billy in line, a way to ensure he's being respectful and responsible. it's fucked up, but why would you try to reach out to someone who has so much power over you, even if she doesnt realize it? why would he believe he'd be anything other than abandoned by her, or that she wouldnt use her power over him with neil to manipulate him, with the parents he has? 17-18 is young and so very malleable, in a way you cant comprehend until you're in your later twenties, and your shoulders will not loosen up enough to learn something different until you get away from your abuser, even if you do have outside support.

also i think the people who argue that billy could have reached out to max and forge a relationship the same way jonathan has will misunderstands the difference between growing up with a kid sibling, under at least one parent who treats you kindly and probably encourages your relationship, versus having a kid sibling forced upon you, in a household (neil) that already hates you, and then seeing that sibling be used as the stick in your already shitty relationship with your father. jonathan and will are built-in brothers, already and automatically united (with joyce) under lonnie's harsh treatment; billy was stuck, alone, under a father that forced him to "man up", and then introduced a little sister into their dynamic and used her to leash his freedom. the solidarity culture within their houses is wildly different, so it's absolutely not the same. also, after suffering at his father's hand, i dont think billy would want to earnestly reach out without wondering/fearing if it would make him look like less of a man for doing it.

but anyways, sure, you can argue that he honestly just is racist, no ands, ifs or buts. except that's just one take, and you cant actually prove that he's maliciously and consistently bigoted, that it's what he would be inclined to believe and act on away from his father, based off one instance of a racially charged assault & comments. 100p not okay, but with his upbringing, id say there's more leeway than you think (leeway in the degree to which billy would be inclined to change/whether or not he's genuinely bigoted; obviously there shouldnt be any leeway in holding him accountable for his actions). id even argue, with the way he stepped in front of el and apologized to max, that there's something there that would lead him to be a better person, if given the safe space and education to explore that.

you're allowed to view him as a racist character, to see his violence and stop at that. god, in real life, you should--safety first, protect yourself. but since he's fictional, you dont need to, and im just real tired of people acting like billy stans are bad people or that theyre "excusing" racism by liking him.

and may i point out that that screenshot of caleb has him saying "his character billy is amazing, but billy isnt really a great guy." everyone points to caleb saying "billy's racist" as some sort of be-all end-all argument for how this confirms billy's racism and therefore you're bad for liking him, but even caleb has said billy's character is a good one (amazing, even). as in, he's interesting narratively. he has things to dig into. billy may be racist--at the very best, he's done and said racist things--but he's not a racist caricature and that makes a difference.

lastly, just to continue on with the other stuff caleb said in that screenshot: maybe jason himself wasnt racist (tho i feel like it's totally possible for him to be one of those racists that are accepting of poc but only if they're "the good kind" ie. middle-class or higher, plays team sports, doesnt play satanic games like dnd... 🤷🏻‍♀️ we dont see him w enough other people to really know imo), but it doesnt change the fact that we as viewers were pulled out of a supernatural conflict to see a black kid facing down a gun, which is a very real conflict. this is something ive seen, multiple times, in the news. this is what i meant by the writing being bad. caleb's right, people havent acknowledged the racism in s1, and the writers made billy sympathetic in s3 without addressing the way he treated lucas in s2, and now in s4, we see him at the end of a gun. no one talks about this! the show doesnt do anything about it! racism isnt a proper conflict in the show, but they keep trying to hint at it anyways and as a result, it doesnt land anywhere productive.

they do that with billy's abuse too: we see the pieces of billy getting abused by his father, but then in s4, max just says "he couldnt do it without you so he left hawkins." no acknowledgement that his dad was shitty (and actually a pretty big implication that she truly didnt see and/or understand the depth and length of control neil had over billy). max gets tormented by billy and then she threatens him back with the nail bat after sedating him, like that isnt contributing to the power dynamics in their household. yes, billy tormented her, but her retaliation means she's now become someone else that's used violence to control billy--it was a valid reaction to the way she and her friends have been treated, but that doesnt take away from the fact that she's been (perhaps unknowingly) a part of the hargrove cycle of abuse as a victim, and now she's fought back and gained some power. that would have changed things between billy and max, but we dont see the result, aside from the way max seems to approach billy with a lighter heart in s3 and is genuinely concerned about him at the sauna and when he dies.

not to mention lucas opening up about patrick's domestic abuse and max sitting by totally silently even though she's lived with neil and billy (which could be another implication she was underinformed/left out of the loop in the overarching power dynamics of her household), or the way chrissy's implied to have an emotionally manipulative mother and they just kill her off without exploring that further. the writers are just bad at writing it, but fans of billy are the ones getting flack for liking him because his fans choose to focus on and explore other aspects of his character instead of letting his racism make him a flat villain.

you say "billy is racist, end of story" but no, it isnt. that's like saying "steve is homophobic" based on that one time he called jonathan a queer derogatorily, and then overlooking his four seasons of character growth and his best friendship with robin. yeah, it was written badly, but billy saved el's life, he's tried to protect his mother from neil's abuse in his past, and he has reasons for being the way he is. antis are valid for just seeing the racism and moving on, but his fans are also completely valid for liking him, for whatever reason, and it's short-sighted and narrow-minded to assume that they havent thought critically about his character and just decided to like him anyways. furthermore, your fictional preferences shouldnt have to reflect your personal real-life morals anyways, bc otherwise we should all be really worried about the amount of people who love serial killing characters.

anyways, this wasnt the initial point of op's post but it always feels like it boils down to this when it comes to billy discourse so im just gonna say it: i dont like billy because he's racist, and it doesnt make me racist to like him. i like him because he's an interesting character with a lot of different story beats to explore. yeah, that includes his racism, mostly because i like reading about him learning not to be. it's also important to remember that while racist actions are reprehensible, unfortunately they dont always come from malicious racists (micro-aggressions, anyone? subconscious racial bias? yeah). bc of billy's abuse, i feel like an argument can be made that he can fall into that category (see: this entire post lmao).

anyways, sorry for going off. i hope this doesnt come off rude bc i wasnt trying to be, and if you feel insulted then im sorry bc im writing this as a genuine response, as rambling as it is. i really do appreciate your good faith take and im glad you landed where you landed. you dont need to like him. but at the end of the day, "proving" his racism doesnt take away from the fact that he's been abused. theyre connected issues. from that passage in runaway max, it's apparently clearer in the book than in the show. like i said, caleb's right in saying billy was racist toward him, but dacre's right too in approaching billy from the angle that bad people arent bad for no reason, and i applaud him for trying to show us with billy that cycles of abuse are messy, that victims of abuse can abuse other people and it will never be clear-cut because they are still victims themselves.

yes, you cant ignore that billy's actions toward lucas are racist and that he's abusive toward max, but you also cant ignore that even as he torments others, he is still a victim. both these things are true. that's not excusing anything, that's just seeing the bigger picture. that's thinking critically. after understanding this, you can individually decide how that lands for you. (for me and other billy fans, we land on empathy toward billy; for antis they land on empathy toward lucas and max, but we're both right yall.) billy's racism doesnt make his character any less dimensional or interesting--it only gives fic writers more meat to work with when they make him scream and cry about how difficult it is to make things square with his sister and her friends (and steve).

to be clear: im not saying he wasnt racist in the way he treated lucas, bc he was. im saying that i think there's a good chance he would want to be better and to rectify his actions, if he had a support system and safety, because he might not actually want to be racist--he just might think that he, and everyone else under neil's roof, has to be. or, given some distance, he might be able to realize how like neil he's become and want to separate himself from that. we'll never know bc he died, but the possibilities are there bc of the sympathetic aspects of his character that we see in canon, and that's enough for me to want to explore that further, alongside how he treated lucas. im not excusing that racism or ignoring it, im just looking at his other layers and including his racism as part of the whole package. that's how you treat him dimensionally.

you dont have to make that argument though. it is very easy to just see his racist actions, call him racist, and move on--and you would be right to do so as well. it's just that i like reading about him finding support, understanding his wrongs, and then apologizing to lucas and making good with max (and steve lol). billy is a character that isnt kind, but there's enough evidence in canon to say that this might be because he's never seen any kindness in his life from people he can trust; so what if i like to read about him getting some kindness for once? furthermore, we've seen him try to protect someone as a child, and he died protecting someone else; is it truly so farfetched that he wouldnt want to be better, if given a proper chance?

I’m going to give you my very best attempt at a nuanced take of Billy Hargrove because I have seen a lot of posts recently and I think it’s important to talk about. TL/DR at the end

I’ll agree with the pro Billy blogs on this—the Billy and Karen thing was gross. That was uncomfortable, and you know a lot of people that are cool with it would react very differently if Billy was a teenage girl and Karen was an older man

I also think the attempt at a redemption arc was bullshit—and I think it could have been done better. The whole marauder thing where a character sacrifices themselves in a split second decision isn’t redemption. It’s a cop out choice to make you feel sympathy for characters that are frankly pretty shitty. However, had Billy put in the work and effort to treat Max, Lucas, and everyone else with even a modicum more kindness, I do think he could have been a more likable character.

Now onto narratives of abuse

I’ve seen arguments that Billy and Jonathan differ because Billy had no support system—but I think it’s not quite that black and white. Consider for a moment that yes, Jonathan has a support system, but it is weaker than y’all like to admit. It’s clear Joyce will do anything for her kids—however, the Byers family is poor, and Joyce is obviously working a lot, in at least the first three seasons. The fact that Joyce isn’t around is half the reason Will goes missing in the first place. A semi “absent” (for lack of a better word) mother is not much of a support system. Neither is an eleven year old child. Billy does lack for a support system, but that is not entirely from outside forces. Billy could have made the decision to be kind to Max, who is old enough to understand abuse and be somewhat supportive, and the two could have been a support system for each other. Billy also could have attempted to make friends, and in turn, create a support system for himself. In fact, in the show, Billy is shown being semi-friendly to the basketball team and at the party. It’s unclear whether he made any actual friends, but he had the ability to do so

That said, it’s understandable why Billy was angry, when he had little support and was being abused

HOWEVER, Billy being a victim of abuse does not justify the way he turns his anger on others. Saying that he’s just angry and aggressive because of his abuse, and that people “just don’t like it when abuse victims adopt unhealthy coping mechanisms” is just not correct. Sometimes victims adopt unhealthy mechanisms, that’s true—BUT that in no way excuses turning anger and violence onto other people. It’s an argument that to me is very reminiscent of “well I have a bad past and so I’m mean and I don’t have to change.” (For lack of better wording.) It does not matter how bad your past is, you don’t get to use that as justification for your own violence against others. And Billy is violent to others. The way he grabs Max’s wrist, the way he constantly talks down to her and tries to control her, these are abusive. Even clearer is when he almost hits Max’s friends with his car. The ONLY reason he did not was because Max turned the wheel at the last moment. Consider also the way he tried to harm Lucas—which is something else entirely

I’ve also seen arguments that Billy is, in essence, a child. I would argue that he is not. Yes, he’s 17-18 in the show, but that is an age at which he is old enough to be intelligent about his behavior and to learn coping mechanisms that would not harm Max and perpetuate the cycle of abuse. He is old enough to react maturely—and not hitting or verbally abusing his little sister isn’t even a choice I think we should have to call mature in the first place.

In regards to Lucas, I have seen very few Billy blogs acknowledge Billy’s racism. Those that do tend to cite Dacre Montgomery himself, in this interview

But again, HOWEVER, Dacre is one actor. Actors’ takes on their characters are important, yes, but one man’s argument does not outweigh several other people, including the Duffer Brothers themselves and Caleb McLaughlin. In the very same interview, Dacre admits that the script originally contained a slur, and was removed because he would not say it. That is Dacre—not Billy

The Stranger Things fandom at large has beef with the Duffers—this much is true. We like to pick and choose aspects of what they say. However, they are still the creators of the show, and with contextual evidence AND their word, it’s hard to argue against Billy’s racism. From an interview with The Vulture

I will also add a side note about Runaway Max. While not 100% canon, the book is official and does take context from the show itself. This is a weaker piece of evidence, but it adds up. In particular, I think it’s important to acknowledge the “people like that” line, given how Billy responds to Lucas in the show

The most important opinion of all, however, is that of Caleb McLaughlin. In matters of racism, the opinions and voices that matter most are those of actual POC. Caleb himself calls Billy’s behavior racially motivated

If you really “read between the lines” in the show, the evidence is there too. Lucas is not the only one of the boys that hangs out with Max. Billy does see Max’s other friends. The only boy he has a problem with is Lucas—and the one defining trait that Billy would notice is Lucas’s skin color. See also the fight at the Byers house. The very first person Billy even thinks to target is again Lucas Sinclair

Billy is also canonically misogynist. Calling women cows is not indicative of a leftist feminist icon. He is shown to have an attitude that women are inferior. There’s more to say on this, but this has gotten quite long already, and I think I’ve made my point

TL/DR: Billy is justified in his anger, and his quote “redemption” could have been done better. Yes, the Karen and Billy thing was gross. HOWEVER, contextual evidence and interviews with the Duffers and Caleb prove that Billy is racist. Analysis of the show proves his abusive behavior and misogyny. No character is a monolith, and characters have layers—but we HAVE to think critically about the characters we like. You can’t just erase cornerstone aspects of characters like Billy. He isn’t a good guy. His abuse doesn’t excuse his bigotry and violence. End of story.

[odinsblog]

You jew haters love a good token. Norm F or Masha or any white passing ashkie american jew who hasnt been to shul or a secular even in a decade... brb gonna cite thomas sowell and clarence thomas any time you bring up the hotep hasbara about "systemic racism" or ignore black on black crime is more prevalent then cops shooting unarmed trayvons. One day you might feel shame about going all in on jew hate. Probably not.

[re: this series of posts, or this one, or maybe this one?]

I don’t hate Jewish people. So jot that down and let’s get that straight, okay? I dO, however, hate what the state of Israel, Likud and Benjamin Netanyahu are doing (and have been doing for decades) to Palestinians

Note: Jewish people are Jewish whether they’re religious Jews who have been to a synagogue, or not. Non-religious, non-observant Jewish people are still Jewish people. Intentionally conflating “religious Jews” with all Jewish people is antisemitic

And another note: conflating Israel with all Jewish people is also antisemitic, so let’s not do that either, cool?

We could quibble about “white passing” Jewish people, but there most definitely are Jewish people who self-identify as white (just as there are Jewish people who self-identify as Black), but ultimately, I believe that this “argument” is a red-herring, and ultimately, secondary or even tertiary to what’s happening in Palestine

I know you think you’ve made some kind of “gotcha” point, but you really haven’t

We can easily dismantle Clarence Thomas and his hypocritical conservative, anti-Black SCOTUS rulings without ever once mentioning his race. We can prove that structural racism is a real thing simply by looking at lived reality and history. We can show that Black-on-Black crime is roughly the same as white-on-white crime, and is only invoked as a derailment tactic to take the focus away from anti-Black racism. Simple statistics and observations prove that the police routinely Stop-and-Frisk and execute more Black and Brown people than white people, usually without the same consequences that would occur if their victims were white

And we can very easily do the same thing with everything that Israel has been doing to Palestinians for decades; we can look at the definition of war crimes and objectively understand that Israel has been committing war crimes against Palestinians since before October 7th, and we can see that Israel’s reaction to October 7th has been the definition of “disproportionate,” and has been since 1948

And before I continue, I really want to make something clear: you can agree with someone on 80% of what they believe, and vehemently disagree with them in other areas that are not their area of expertise. No one is right about everything, and no one is wrong about everything—even broken clocks are accurate two times a day, right?

Moving on…

Look, there was a time when I used to think as simplistically as you do, anon. As you’ve correctly noted, I am Black, and there was a time when I used to believe that anyone who criticized Barack Obama, for example, was a racist, and if they were Black, then they were a Black person who had internalized anti-Blackness. It was a very insular way of thinking, but it kept me safe in a mental bubble of my own making. A bubble where, as long as I called people racists or self hating Black people, I was always right in my thinking and never had to challenge myself

But then, eventually, something wonderful happened. This thing called nuance happened and I learned that many things could simultaneously be true: yes, there absolutely positively are self-hating Black people like Clarence Thomas; and yes, there are people like Trump who only criticized Obama simply because he was Black and because they were racist white people (or frequently, NBPoC); but the existence of those racists do not magically invalidate all legitimate criticisms of Obama

So I learned how to do two things that proved invaluable: 1) look at the specific critiques, and separate the critiques, and evaluate the critiques on their own, 2) look at the source of the critiques, and their history of criticisms, and evaluate how fairly they applied those exact same critiques to others who were doing the same or similar things. Talk about cutting through all the bullshit!

So I learned that it was possible to be living in the real world that simultaneously had: white supremacists + self-hating Black people + people with legitimate grievances against Obama

You can (and should) apply this same line of reasoning with Hillary Clinton; yes, there definitely are misogynistic people who hate her simply because she is a woman, but that doesn’t nullify the criticisms of those people who have problems with her strictly because of her deeply conservative values

Anon, is Bernie Sanders a token self-hating Jew if he doesn’t side with YOU? (hint: he isn’t and he doesn’t)

Think about what you’re implying anon. You’re saying that Israel has never been wrong? About anything? And consequently, all Zionist Jewish people are right and anyone who disagrees with them is automatically antisemitic and hates all Jewish people?

Does that even sound right to you anon?

That’s a very comforting, if not somewhat mentally lazy, self-serving view of the world. One that doesn’t require any additional thought or self-reflection (or growth, tbh) on your part. It’s an adolescent version of reality

What we are talking about here, anon, is weaponized identity politics

anyone who disagrees with my good Black person is racist

anyone who disagrees with my good female is misogynistic

anyone who disagrees with my good Jew is antisemitic

This type of logic really makes “winning” arguments super easy, for people who don’t have any real arguments to defend their ideology

[crguang]

I like paying Genshin…🫣 but I suppose you and I can’t have all the same opinions. Speaking of which, I don’t understand why people like Natasha…I’m sorry in advance. I can understand liking most of the others, like I get the appeal but idk….can u explain? now that I’ve told you all my bad opinions…I still haven’t gotten all the messages from Kafka, very upset, I got yanqing from standard the same day AND HE KEEPS MESSAGING ME, I need him to stfu. I was rewatching kafkas story quest and umm, I haven’t looked at that photo in a bit….ngl I kinda want to rip open that slit in her shirt and—yk I need to sleep, ik when I start being less shy I need more sleep I haven’t sleep for like two days. also my friend just said that I probably don’t like nat bc she’s a doctor…my mommy issues strike again.

-🌠

i loved genshin i played it for over 3 years but by sumeru their characters stopped appealing to me, arlecchino saved me from boredom in fontaine and that archon quest was also really good but character wise she’s the only one i care about. with natlan and those white ass characters i just cant like logging in and seeing white people with latin indigenous/african inspired clothing, names and history pisses me off to no end, they lost me forever with that one bc yelan reran and i still didn’t log in consistently to get her cons… shes c3 forever now. i get mad seeing any natlan character atp like im so over this stupid game

not liking natasha is insane… if you like himeko theres no reason to not be as crazy about nat because they’re so similar personality wise and we actually know more about nat than we do about hsr himeko rn😭 i don’t see why you don’t see the appeal honestly, she’s a sweetheart who’s upheld an entire city basically on her own. not to diminish wildfire members but she literally created that too. only doctor in an impoverished and disorganized city, runs an orphanage, leader of the sole organization meant to keep the peace… she’s willingly taking on all of that responsibility because she can and wants to help. shes not even from the underworld, she was adopted by a couple in the overworld and did her studies there. not to mention that before she was a doctor in the underworld she went on expeditions to heal those fighting against/researching the fragmentum…she’s literally the most “morally good” aligned person ever. disliking her is kinda unimaginable to me bc all shes done is save people’s lives and be pretty. kafka’s nothing compared to my natty. i get it if she’s just not your kind of character but disliking her is insane to me when himeko is the same kind of kind-hearted, diplomatic, intelligent, courageous, ruthless-when-need-be person😭 natasha stepped up and saw people dying all around her for over a decade, she gave kids like Seele a future and a purpose in life and has spent every day fighting for them, she’s even condemned her own brother because the methods he was using for his research/goals were hurting others. hasnt talked to her parents in years and didnt know her dad had died because of it so she wasn’t allowed a moment to grieve like im sorry shes a hero of the people, no one has worked harder than she has— i’ll die defending natasha she’s incredibly admirable and inspiring to me. she thanks her patients for surviving gruesome surgeries, imagine the amount of people she’s lost because of the underworld’s lack of supplies yet she CARRIES ON! the strongest person ever. and she’s so gorgeous like that’s my baby fr. plus her voice is really nice. she’s the whole package, i take her so seriously if theres only one natasha fan in the galaxy its me!!! thee only healer for months before lynx came out, let’s all remember our roots (i wasn’t there but wtv) for a second. everyone’s used natty she’s an OG!

i thought kafka had only 2 messages and was getting moze/jiaoqiu’s for days then saw that anonymous “hi, nyx” and lost my mind at 6am on tuesday. hope u get them soon theyre so pathetic… she cares so bad. like soooo bad i cant believe she exposes herself like this do we think it’s because texting is easier or bc she’s intrinsically linked to the tb or both?… because those texts (+ the fact that it’s her reaching out) are just insane.

i love how yall never go all the way with thirsting when i literally write smut like i promise you can say you wanna fuck her 😭😭 everyone’s gonna agree. the things i’d do to her would have me in the hospital for dislocated joints like it’s okay theres no shame in being horny

and you definitely need to go to bed!!!!!!!! now!!!! try taking some melatonin/tea if you can or getting off your phone an hour before going to sleep, it might help a little. but you should be sleeping it’s dangerous to go too long without it, how are you even functioning right now

[glsneeg-enthusiast]

anyway. youve spent 20 something years getting killed over and over and over again. you know exactly what holding your organs and bones feels like and you know how your blood tastes because its always running down the back of your throat. maybe 2% of the time you can tell whats real and what isnt but you stopped caring 17 years ago and face everything like its the realest thing. and maybe when you stopped caring about that is when you forgot that humans typically dont eat other human beings regularly. maybe that was when you forgot that this hasnt been your entire life and there were people that cared about you beforehand. youve been in this place longer than you know where acting like a rabid animal guarantees not survival but that you dont get thrown away and even before all this youve been trying to claw yourself out of that grave in the dirt because youve never wanted to be thrown away. and it worked. you didnt make something good of yourself but you didnt get thrown away and thats all you wanted. dying is a good thing and you know exactly how it feels to have half your face torn off or a knife in your throat or a bullet in your brain or your guts hanging out of your stomach or having your face bashed into the ground until all the bones are broken and you cant breathe anymore. and half unwillingly you get taken out of this place that part of you loved and youre thrown into the Real World where nobody even knows whats been happening to you for the last two decades. and now instead of this large open mall where you knew exactly where everything was you live in this nauseatingly small house with your sister you barely remember and her wife and their kid who have been living without even knowing that the mall existed. the only people that know about the greatness of how youve been living is your husband who pretends he hated it and his two kids that were born and raised there. and what do you do about it? you snort cocaine thats what

[k1ku0l3vr]

a silly theory ig, a FILM THEORY-

okay so in tdi23, we only see one character come back. this is, ofc, owen. bc of this some ppl think other contestants’ll come back, but i don’t think that’ll ever happen for kinda a sad reason.

i believe owen is the only contestant from gen.one to not move on from their lives after the series canonically took a break (tdpi released in 2014 so it would’ve been a DECADE since td was a hot new show in their universe).

i mainly think this bc, as much as i love the silly dude, owen isn’t smart, so i don’t think he would be able to hold down a professional job. he also still seems pretty immature and HE LITERALLY DRESSES THE SAME IT SHOWS HE HASNT GROWN UP. he may still be running the reality show gig in general and only came back to td bc it was his roots but i still think the fact he didn’t remember ANYTHING significant abt his life could show how repetitive his life has become bc of appearing on all these shows.

i’m also gonna make this even sadder bc there could be a possibility noah and owen grew apart over the years. there’s absolutely no way noah kept doing the reality show gig for another year or two bc i feel like after he would’ve won one, he probably spent it responsibly and didn’t need the constant appearances on reality tv. besides, he doesn’t even like people that much and is smart enough to hold down a job after his young adult period.

now back to owen, i think noah will eventually stop getting along with owen bc, as we see in tdrr, noah didn’t rly treat him as a friend and more like a nuisance for the most part. ofc they could’ve (and hopefully) stayed close but it doesn’t rly make sense for noah to try keep in constant touch with owen with new opportunities at learning or jobs, thus them growing apart

i’ve been thinking abt this theory for a long time so yh!! i would love to hear ur opinions on the theory in the comments bc i like to hear others takes so plz, if u feel different abt this theory, comment anything!

[romulanfucker]

its 1:45 am post unhinged and extremely convoluted garashir spies au I thought of in the shower and will probably never write bc it's too complicated

[unlimitedhorsepower]

molly is a green iguana which means shes probably wild caught (messed up) and also was tiny when ryan got her. like this. look.

iguanas are also really hard to keep and live pretty long (over a decade if you take care of it well!) so it means that ryan somehow acquired an iguana and has kept it alive all by himself.

since molly crawls all over him she clearly isnt afraid of him, and considering that ryan hasnt contracted a million diseases she also hasnt tried to bite the shit out of him (their mouths are nasty)

anyway my lore is that ryan didnt even get an iguana for himself it was just from his parents or someone getting him an iguana like one would buy a goldfish from a pet store as a temporary funny gift like oh they die pretty quickly anyhow, and he was an older teen at the time.

nobody cared about the iguana too much and ryans the one who got concerned that it was fucking dying (a deep metaphor for him advancing his career and being in the industry from a young age rotting his brain and thats why hes like That now). he read up on iguanas online when he didnt have anything else to do and shouldve been sleeping.

then, enlightened by knowledge acquired by browsing the net, ryan age 17 or something walked into the pet store and picked out all kinds of expensive animal care things and the cashier laughed uncomfortably like great. need to tell a weird teen his total is about two thousand dollars. but ryan just handed over that much in cash (his latest birthday money. its normal isnt it) and went home with his haul.

he sat on the floor trying to figure out how to do anything with them and put together some essential things like hook up temperature & humidity sensors etc. then he kept doing it better and better bc molly obviously kept growing in size and demanding more care. which is why he deserves this

he bought that thing for himself and wore it, and told everyone its a gift from molly:) and someone like kotetsu thought he has an actual step-child which would be so messed up but no... it was just his iguana he talks about as if she was a person who can buy him gifts. but he wasnt full of shit this time since to keep an iguana alive and well he mustve done some things right 

also, caring for molly is the only reason ryan knows how to efficiently cut up vegetables, which is his only cooking-related skill (he has never cooked in his life. why else would he walk to a restaurant and order an entire menu and only eat raw eggs for breakfast.)

[spinaroos-47]

Big need for daffodil au Cain, Darius and Ever meet up. How would that even go?

Lots of tears, for sure

And confusion on Eber and Darius' side. Like, how would you explain your mentor you were pretty sure were dead (and got confirmation of it some years ago by belos - gonna make a post about it later), now appears looking like he hasnt aged a day?

If they ever ended up stumbling into eachother, maybe it would be on the night market near where hollow mind happens. Would make sense for anyone on the house to go there if they ever did need something instead of going out in broad daylight

Cain would try to pretend that he doesnt regonize them but Darius would not let him get away. He's not letting his mentor and one of his best friends dissapear again. Very distressing for our guy, he REALLY doesnt want to put them in danger (but they already are, being the CATTs and all, though its not like cain would know about it), not a happy reunion actually.

And even though in theory he knew that they were on their forties now, even after seeing pictures of them, it wasn't until then that it hit him that they were two decades older than him now, he lost twenty three years of their lives. Its a lot to deal with

I don't have much more decided on this but its fun to think about it

[abombihoney]

I think a fix it could would in the case of everyone jumping back to way before the events of the game, as in like before kabbu left for bugaria, vi was probably still in the hive, leif still stuck in snakemouth den. (jump back in this case meaning them being back in their younger selves' bodies, rather them being separate, ig.) either vi does some hefty legwork in reaching out to communicate w kabbu back in his home and frees leif by herself, then coordinate going into the wild grasslands at the same time kabbu's family is heading out to beat the Beast's ass, or kabbu just tries to be extra careful on the trek to bugaria (which might not actually work with a creature like the Beast... 😵). either way it'd also give vi a chance to leave the hive and go about the whole being talked down thing better (try.... she makes bets with EVERYONE in the hive that she'll be the top explorer within the year and makes BANK) and leif just gets to hang out. maybe reconnect with his family and parent vi until the time comes to form an exploration team with kabbu. and they just do everything IN game pretty much the same, but less surprised and maybe more prepared for the wasp king's fake outs

IVE BEEN THINKING SO MUCH ABOUT THIS SINCE YOU SENT IT HELLO????? HERE CONTENT!!!

bro i am such a slut for teen/grown character gets sent back to their childhood and tries to fix things but also they are like 6. like. that is my jam. all the memories and ptsd that a six year old who at this point has lived a reasonably nice life shouldnt have.

okay okay so vi is baby, just freshly pupated into having real legs and shit.

takes a look around and is like. why am i baby. and after a few days she realizes that she is in fact in the past and not in a weird dream.

So then she's like. Well, i refuse to relive my childhood i will die of boredom. but i cant just leave. except she totally does.

she steals a needle, which is way too big bc she just pupated like, last week. and a small bag to carry food. AND SHE JUST FUCKING TRUCKS IT TO SNAKEMOUTH

like, shes a lil roughed up, but the bandits haven't settled in defiant root. and she hasnt outgrown her wings yet, so she can actually fly for long periods of time, and flies over most of the enemies. really the greatest danger is an adult realizing shes all alone lol.

but she makes it! she sneaks through and gets to leif!

she quickly and well, mostly stealthily breaks leif out of the web.

Leif is understandably super fucking confused. But he catches on fairly quickly. He is very fucking surprised by how fucking minuscule vi is.

spuder also shows up but leif freezes him and they get the hell out of dodge.

Vi: Leif is like. where kabbu. and vi has to explain that she came here all by herself all the way from the hive and kabbu is likely still in the north. Vi is promptly grounded for reckless endangerment of herself.

Leif: how even old are you anyway ur so tiny.

Vi: five.

Leif: YOURE FIVE????? Oh god we're so old. ur five years old fuck.

Vi: Aren't you like, the same age as Kabbu?

Leif: Vi, We're 34 years old. We have an entire decade on Kabbu.

Vi: WHAT I THOUGHT U WERE BOTH OLD

Leif: YOU THOUGH KABBU WAS OLD?? HE'S BARELY OLDER THAN YOU??? Oh god kabbu is only like, thirteen oh god.

-

Anyway Leif gives Vi a bath in the fucking river bc shes super nasty from traveling on the road all by herself for weeks.

Leif: We are not going to be seen with a dirty bee that is way too young to be outside the hive. That just screams "kidnapping."

Vi: well they didnt send anyone to look for me when i ran away last time

Leif: One. thats super sad. Two. You are five years old. We think they'll be a little more concerned. We are going to be so mad if we get arrested for kidnapping.

-

Leif: So nice lisp you got there. How long is that going to last?

Vi: Two more molts. :(

Leif: OH good this is adorable. You are never going to live this down.

Vi: I'll stab you!

Leif: Do it. We won't carry you anymore.

Vi: You wouldn't! I'm too cute to walk!

Leif: Better behave or you'll be walking back on those teeny little legs.

Vi: I should have waited for Kabbu and then got you. Kabbu wouldn't treat me like this.

-

Anyway, they get back to the hive. And Leif explains that no he did not kidnap Vi but he brought her back. And Vi is like. This man is my dad/friend i'm keeping him so you either better let him into the hive or let me live with him.

And the hive is like. No? ur five u dont know what u want. But vi keeps escaping the hive. and going to find leif (who got a house in desert root.)

so they just fucking. let her spend her free time outside the hive. even though she shouldn be outside for another five years. shes supposed to sleep in the hive but she sleeps at Leif's a lot. She also becomes sisters with Jaune a lot earlier. (leif also lowkey adopts jaune lol.)

after about two or three years, guess who comes through desert root!!!

Vi does careen into Kabbu at the speed of light. they did that whole little thing where kabbu spins vi around in a circle while they hug

leif can't run as fast as vi can fly but dont worry he also got a hug.

and kabbu got to introduce his families to each other.

Kabbu: Master, Bit, this is Leif and Vi, the ones I've spoken with you about. Leif, Vi, this is, this is Master and Bit. We all made it. We all made it we're all here! :,)

[dragonfruitsoup]

on sasori the local cryptid

see, the joke about this is everyone thinks he's a cryptid just because his hut is so hard to find. and like, yeah, true, you're right. but also, even if you find his hut, there's an 87% chance he's not even there.

he got his sketchy spooky reputation because he went and joined a fucking mercenary group. even little puppet gremlins need to make a living somehow.

you hike all that way out there, manage to find the actual building and avoid his traps and he's not even home. no note on the door saying when he'll be back. no water source to even get you back home. nothing. will he be gone for three days or three months? who knows! when did he even leave??

most people don't even think he's real at this point. or think he must've died years back, and his ghost is just haunting the sands out there. it hasnt even been two full decades, and he's already the warning tale mothers tell their children to keep them from leaving the walls. (how no one's claimed him a missing nin yet is anyone's guess. the fourth clearly has his hands full...)

[zontiky]

au where the apocalypse was never a threat or a concept to begin with

*cracks knuckles* now i could make this a decent upbringing au OR i could make it EXTREMELY COMPLICATED and you know me you know exactly what im about to do ;)

reginald THINKS he’s prepping them all for the apocalypse but reginald is a child-abusing FOOL and an alien BASTARD and there’s no apocalypse there never was there never will be. the world is safe and sound but the hargreeves children aren’t.

five runs away from home and gets thrown into april 1st, 2019. the world is thriving. he did it. he tries to get home but he can’t because he’s stuck and im now realizing that everyone reading this post has seen a million fics with this exact concept but FUCK YOU THIS IS MY CITY NOWWW

so he’s stuck in 2019 and he’s like ah fuck ah SHIT what now! and goes to the academy and it’s not like he was super far away from it in the first place. he didn’t even make it a mile away it’s like a 5 minute walk back home lmao

now because reggie thinks there IS an apocalypse he still killed himself and i hate him a lot so cough ahem anyway

five shows up on the mansion and expects dad to be sitting there in his office, doing his evil dad evil villain thing yk the drill

but instead he comes in to an empty house. mom is unresponsive. he cant find pogo (dont ask where pogo is. hes doing monkey butler things ok). and diego is climbing in through the window

five freaks out because WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU THIS IS MY HOUSE and jumps diego and diego goes down HARD because WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT MY DEAD BROTHER?? MY BROTHER WHO DISAPPEARED 17 YEARS AGO?? WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCKKKK

so they try to beat the shit out of each other for a second and by that i mean five tries to beat the shit out of diego whos gained his senses by now and is trying to convince his brother (his BROTHER) that technically he lives here too please stop punching me

luther comes downstairs.

“IS THAT FIVE???”

“SHUT UP AND HELP ME THIS LITTLE FUCKER CAN PUNCH”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA”

they manage to calm him down when five catches sight of diegos tattoo

WAIT I FORGOT THAT THE FUNERAL WAS BEFORE APRIL FUCK NEVERMIND SCRAP THE PAST 13 BULLETS ABORT MISSION

so five lands in april, goes to the house, and by then the hargreeves have cleared out and are back to doing their own thing more or less. he comes up to the door and grace (pogo has fixed her by now because i said so) welcomes her son back home like he never even left

she gives him a hug

reginald is gone and she hasnt seen her sun in years and dammit, he deserves that hug okay? she gives him a hug.

five pulls away. mom hasnt hugged him for years because he stopped letting her and he’s not about to change his mind now

“where’s everyone?” he asks. he doesn’t even consider that everybody is gone, because where would they go? or maybe it just hasn’t hit him exactly which time he jumped into, maybe he still hasn’t made the connection exactly what age his siblings are now, maybe he has but he still hopes he can deny it for a little while longer

grace wants to hug him again but she refrains. she calls his siblings

one by one, in the span of the next week, she gets ahold of them and calls them back to the academy. “important news,” she says. “you’ll want to -- you’ll need to be here,” she says. “your brother,” she says, and her children listen and come back home

luther is at the academy when five gets here. because, where would he go? he can’t go back to the moon, and dad is gone, and he’s never even been on a bus alone before, where would he go?

when five sees him for the first time he almost cries, because he’s so much bigger and taller and older and what happened to him??

this is his new reality. this is the new luther

but it isn’t, it can’t be, because five is going to get back home and he’s going to fix it, he’s going to fix this and he’s going to grow up just like his siblings did, and it won’t even be long before he’s back home almost two decades ago.

vanya is next to arrive, and five almost -- almost -- smiles at her and gives her a hug and teases her how she’s still shorter than him, but she has such a blank expression on her face and the way she looks between the portrait of him (he hated that portrait from the beginning, he wanted to burn it because hes back now, isnt he? and he’ll go back home and not leave again, but pogo didnt let him) stops him. it will only be a couple of days and he’ll be going home already, he tells grace, so maybe the others dont even have to come here. she nods and smiles and says nothing

diego comes a day or so later, dragging klaus along, and five is stunned by how they look once again. diego looks battle-hardened and angry like he never did just last week, five’s last week, but now he scowls and doesn’t stutter and dresses himself in black and he lives alone and diego looks so lonely but five doesnt think about it because its not his business and he knows better and its diegos own damn fault for cutting contact, isnt it? and even if it weren’t five will go back and fix it all

five knows klaus has been doing things for a good year or so know, but this -- living on the streets, giggling even as diego forces him inside, making lewd jokes with his eyes out of focus -- he couldn’t have even imagined. he stamps down the feeling of i should have been there to help stop him and doesn’t think how sad and angry at their father seeing klaus like this makes him feel, instead he forces thoughts of it’s his own fault he ended up this way and i’m going to get back and fix this (but that’s not a thought he has to force. he will. he has to. it won’t even be another week before he figures out how to get home)

allison gets there next. she took the first plane she could get on to get home and pushed off all her appointments but she had a family emergency just last week and it was hard to get away and she looks so sad even when she opens her arms for a hug and five cant help but relent and give her one. diego scoffs and allison lets loose a dig thats more of a barb thats more of a sharp sentence splitting the air and hitting her brother square in the chest. five doesnt say anything but his stomach twists. just a week or so and he’ll fix it because even as children they never said things like that to each other

he waits for ben to come last. he must be the most adjusted of them all, right? ben read a lot last five saw of him, and hes one of the smartest of them, and secretly five always thought that ben deserves to have friends that he doesnt live with

ben doesnt come

he asks mom and she smiles and he asks the others and they look away and he asks again and someone -- and it doesnt matter who because his ears are ringing and hes stumbling back and falling onto the couch -- says that ben died. ben died years ago.

ben died four years after five left

fives head is spinning and he needs to get back, he needs to stop it he needs to fix it he needs to make it all better because it was never supposed to be this way

(you thought this would be a happy au didnt you?? haha bitch think again)

(it is but they have to get there smhhh)

klaus laughs and elbows the air next to him and five asks, he doesnt beg, he asks him if he can summon ben

everyone scoffs. rolls their eyes. klaus is high as a kite and hes holding a bottle of whiskey and he looks like he hasnt been sober in days. weeks. years. and he’s a liar and ben is gone for real, im sorry, five. i know this must be hard for you

that can’t be right. five wasnt there for all of klaus’ lies and stealing and drunken sobbing. five remembers klaus rolling a joint at the breakfast table like it was last week -- and it was, it was, he’ll fix it still, but to five klaus is still just his brother. just klaus

he asks, not begs, five doesnt beg but he comes damn close in this moment, to tell him the truth

and klaus looks around and ben whispers please, klaus, just try and five is looking at him with wet eyes and he’s thirteen he’s so young and -- he can’t say innocent. none of them have ever been innocent, not since reginald hargreeves adopted them all those years ago. but five...

he tells the truth. and five believes him

so anyway five cant get back and then they decide well ok five while youre staying here we might as well buy you some clothes. ones that arent literally 20 years old. jesus these uniforms are ugly

my jaw is clenching so hard and im cold asdflksdh so im gonna end this here and maybe rb it and continue lated idk 😳😳

WHOOP this is getting away from me i know u didnt come here for quote poetic unquote bullshit but weihfsdkjdhskf THATS WHAT UR GETTING I GUESS XX <3

[jentlemahae]

why do people keep dragging taylor for the backlash her ex boyfriend is receiving tho... like this reeks misogyny fr. everyone keeps saying "oh they dated for 3 months 10 years ago she should move on" she literally did???? the worst of it all is that i know damn well taylor herself had those kind of thoughts too. "just get over it, it was 3 months, it isn't a big deal..." except it is and she should speak her truth, which she did. beautifully! that man gaslight her so hard so she decided to write a 10 minute song about every single moment she lived with him, every feeling she felt while being with him. because it DID happened and SHE was there and SHE remembers it all too well. now people are trying to tell her she's overreacting but she already made everything clear. she was there. this song is an ode to her memory.

the only thing i dislike about this era is swifties going around claiming this man gr00med taylor. she was 21, already an adult. was it weird, questionable and was he a terrible person for everything he did to her? absolutely. but he didn't gr00m her. saying this is actually very dangerous to real victims and isn't something to take lightly. he does deserve to get called out for being a weirdo though, that i support!

nah nah exactly 😐 like she has mentioned him in any way (she hasnt even said red is about him, its all the public putting two and two together) so absolutely none of the backlash he receives is on her…. like do i think some ppl are taking it too far? absolutely! but its not her fault, nor is it her place to babysit anyone. and yeah some ppl really don’t understand that these are songs she has written a decade ago like i promise u she is well over it (also im fairly sure the rs lasted way more than 3 months in one way or another, so its even more annoying when ppl say that)

and mmmh idk bcs i dont think its grooming in the same way it would be if she had been like 17, but still 21/30 is a big difference in terms of mindset…. idk i think this is something very nuanced and that only people who actually were in the rs can say……tho i can say that the real enemy in this is john mayer

[anakinskywalkher]

Palpatine raises the twins and accidentally activates Anakin’s dadmodus - An alternative Star Wars plot.

@jasontoddiefor: Palpatine raises the twins & angst w/ Vader not knowing who the two are @dlegohargreeves: im gonna fuck shit up

written together on WhatsApp while listen to crack music.

------

(Barbara) Palpatine has long before he declared himself emperor abandoned the ways of the Sith. He uses them to create utmost loyalty to himself but he will not abide to the rules of his predecessor, one Palpatine would’ve defeated had he been around at that time.  People, be they sith, jedi, or other are all moldable to whatever he wants them to be.

He tricks Padme with sugar and soothed spun words, manipulates Anakin with spice and presses on his rage ("the jedi forbid you from loving your mother thats why you couldnt save her. i would never")  -- Palpatine is aware of the long game, but he has eternity. He’s a god, no one will be able to withstand him.

What Anakin never realised was that he wasnt the actual chosen one, Palpatine had seen in his vision that Anakin's children were in fact the chosen ones, and so when confronted with the soft boy he molded him into this shell to avoid his vision from happening,.... and yet these damnable children are still born. Palpatine is terrified that he wasn’t the only one with the true vision and firmly believes that owning the twins would be the least risky choice. (like he owned anakin, who long ago posed a risk)

He hunts them down, -- while anakin/Vader is completely crippled by his mental breakdown about "murdering" Padme and his child. Palpatine smiles and lets him wallow, for what Vader doesnt know is that Palpatine the God poisoned padme once he found out about her pregnancy.

Palpatine finds them, born hours ago and already pulsing brightly with the power of the force. Obi-Wan puts up a fight but Palpatine strikes him. He gloats to Obi-wan, brags about killing Padme, about manipulating Anakin (”I have taken everything from you, and now I will take your life) and takes the children. He leaves Obi-wan to bleed out by his stomach wound a faraway galaxy          (Palpatine reasons that Obiwan deserves it for this is how he left Vader to die. )

And so Palpatine at the rise of his galactic empire ends up with a crippled sith boy (not a man no matter what anakin thought), and with two babies who are most powerful force users in history. (now were shifting to meta instead of story telling lmao)

Palpatine has a god complex, he doesnt actually believe he would ever die, such petty thing is only for the unfortunate. even if his body would succumb to age, his mind through the force would rule forever -- he is unstoppable. To rule however even a godlike emperor needs tools, and while Vader is to be his guarddog the twins he believe can be shaped and molded into his personal hands, amplify his reach across galaxies.

So to mold them into his tools, Palpatine believes in starving them for love, only ever receiving ounces of recognition and pride. always craving his acknowledgment -- and it works, the twins once old enough to have actual brains (according to palpatine) he removes their wetnurses and gives them teachers, makes their training cruel and harsh and make them compete for his gaze. And it works till a certain extent, but Palpatine’s god-complex makes him blind to things he deems unneccessary, And thus he misses how the mourning of Vader for his family, turns him into a guilt-ridden man who believes giving these children some form of attention and care as penance for his own misgivings. And thus without meaning to Vader gives the children the love Palpatine tries to deny them (accidentally shifting their loyalty on the long run)

Elias: Vader hates the kids at first, with them reminding him of everything he lost and could have had, but at the end of the day, after some aggressive introspection, he gets that they’re just kids and probably starts projecting a lot the longer he’s exposed to them -- Vader, guilty, sneaks them candy and gives them stuff that’s kinda useless (like books that are not about politics or war or economics and and and) and he doesn’t think it’s much but the two would kill a man for him and probably have done so. ((Palpatine tries to break apart the codependent twins, forcing them apart for weeks, but the Force, unlike anything is a tool in hands of desperate children with a bond so strong it connected their mind)) This is not healthy, Vader thought, recalling decade old lessons from the Jedi. The twins rarely spoke, never mind both at the same time. They’re asked for their opinions, echoes of the Emperor’s wishes, and only one of them replies. They always moved at the same time, terrifying weapons of perfect synchrony, constantly aware of the other’s presence. They were living at least half in each other’s mind, even when the Emperor depraved them of contact for weeks. They were clingy afterwards, holding each other’s hands and wrists until they bruised, but Vader knew their minds were never separated. Luke slammed their teacher’s (victim’s) head to the ground as Leia kicked away his feet. They didn’t need any call signs, or training in coordination, one moved and the other followed. During battles, the twins’ dependence was a huge advantage. “Again,” Vader called out and the two of them fell back into the first Kata, the bleeding teacher still lying on the ground.

Barbara: However once the twins are older they need to learn through missions, so Vader has to take them along for missions  (once Palpatine believes they wont connect with Vader) - it starts normal but Vader slowly starts to make the missions longer, gives the kids downtime, lets them free and just engages small talk with them, he can’t face himself if he doesn't let them be actual children. But the twins are suspicious believing theres a catch but Leia, the master mind realises that theres none and so they accept reluctantly, and slowly but surely they learn how to be children under Vader’s tutelage. It takes time and dulling a sharpened blade, but the moment, that first time when the twins laugh and seem actually happy, its that moment that Vader decides, he has to become Anakin again, because these children are his second chance - And so he starts planning.

(insert a bit of crack:

Elias: Firmus: Lord Vader, are we to expect you and the Operatives back tomorrow? Vader: we haven’t finished the mission yet -Leia and Luke like 12 or so, in the background yelling in excitement bc idk they got a game, neither are in uniform- Firmus: Of course )

Barbara: Anakin: "i made sand castles when I was young" Leia: “that structure seems awfully unstable for a house”

But ever since Vader mentions the sand castle, the usually more mature one Leia clings to the idea and while he wishes he could show her, but his suit and wounds cant handle the sand. And when he explains Luke goes " well lets get u a proper suit then" and vader goes " im a moron" (leia in the back: yes duh) So Anakin looks into the treatment he’s still receiving to see if he can make it so that his breathing machine could withstand the sand and realises that Palpatine is actually keeping his body weak, he has no need of the breathing machine because its that actual machine thats poisoning his lungs. So of course Vader does a lowrisk experiment and turns off the machine and he can actually breath fresh air in 12 years (the rage controlling Anakin is one different than those before, for it is ice in his veins instead of fire. And it makes him tactical instead of foolish for once). Soon after that Vader catches some rebel transmission and  finds out that Obi-wan is alive and looking for the twins and its that moment that Anakin 'kills' Vader, believing that Obi-wan can save the twins in a way he can't.

Anakin takes the kids to fight the rebels on Palpatines order but he seizes the chance and instead he shows them his face without the mask (lets ignore the idea that hed be bald bc i hate the uglification of ani) and Leia goes: You look an awful lot like luke Anakin who hasnt actually seen his own image for 12 years, realises that luke is a spitting image of himself as a child, and leia who is glaring at him, he realises, is a carbon copy of Padme. BUT anakin thinks hes projecting and doesnt follow up with it.

Instead he asks them (and for leia this will always be the most important part), he asks them if they wish to stay with Palpatine and do his bidding or to dissapear with him -- and well the choice is easy right, Luke&Leia don’t actually like Palpatine, because despite everything, the force made them sensitive and they feel so much (the despair of the people, the sadness of Vader, the greed of Palpatine)

So they leave for Tattooine, the one place where Palpatine would never look because he never found out that Anakin realised his suit was a boobytrap. The wanted pictures of the twins (both bald shaven and in uniform) nor the one of Anakin (known as Vader, with the helmet)  soon dont match the long haired white dress wearing twins and the blond haired bronzed man.

and so Anakin and the twins go into hiding, but guess whose on Tatooine? Thats right -- ObiWan

[mrbingley]

Dnd Circus Campaign session two recap:

spotty the rainbow dalmation blink dog from the circus follows theren (the circus runaway) home b/c the animal caretaker is dead and spotty only feels safe with theren. spotty has theren follow him back to seesaw the fortune teller’s tent where seesaw tenderly cups his face before giving him the fortune “what you seek is also seeking you. to find your answers, first find the anarchist and the living trophy”. he goes home with spotty and successfully lies to his gnome parents that this is not the same dog from the circus even though it looks pretty identical.

the next day:

theren spends the morning with his family and spotty. his mom and dad tell him theyre going to go to work soon building the new coal factory. he plays with spotty in the backyard after they leave.

the mayor is meeting with Thorne the ringmaster again later today before the next circus performance to discuss the future of the circus in humdrum heights. he has a meeting with coal benefactors after the circus and he wants tallulah the trophy wife to be there with him.

tallulah the trophy wife wakes up early and goes to starbucks where sinclar the anarchist works. a funny passive aggressive interaction b/w the two ensues. sinclair has a history of intentionally getting tallulah’s order wrong. tallulah brings in her own metal starbucks cup b/c sinclair kept intentionally giving her a size smaller than she asked for. tallulah briefly sarcastically thanks sinclair for literally leaving her hanging last night (when tallulah got caught in the ringmaster’s snare and was hanging upside down and sinclair didn’t help).

tallulah goes to get another fortune from seesaw even though seesaw told her she only gets one. seesaw tells her “remember:” and taps her nose four times and her right cheek once.

theren the circus runaway tentatively walks the outskirts of the circus grounds to investigate further (by this point he is silently certain this is the circus he grew up in). he finds a copper dragon in a circus carriage cage that wasnt apart of raffles the beast tamer’s act. it’s friendly and looks like it hasnt been let out for awhile. theren goes to the local bar and buys two steaks and gives that to the copper dragon.

the circus performs again. there is a crowd of kids wearing clown noses to this performance who sit in the front. theyve been wearing the clown noses all day. the performance is relatively the same. except for two differences: the blink dog doesn’t appear in raffles the beast tamer’s act. and la capony the king of clowns asks the mayor to join him in his act. the mayor was sitting with his wife tallulah and has been wearing a clown nose since earlier in the day when he met with thorne. he isn’t apprehensive about volunteering like he was last night and he joins la capony. la capony does some stuff and then makes the mayor disappear. the mayor does not reappear and the performance ends.

tallulah is immediately suspicious and worried and messages him. he responds “i don’t know where i am! tallulah, honey, i don’t know where i am!” tallulah searches all around for him but the player kept rolling comically low investigation rolls so she wasn’t able to find anything.

tallulah realizes she and her husband are late for the coal meeting and she calls the inept bro-y receptionist to try to tell him to tell them theyre going to be late and to call her if they leave.

finally, sinclair reluctantly tries to help but tallulah asks her why she’s here and sinclair says she’s here to help. sinclair helps investigate and she rolls well enough to lead them to the old train tunnel. she waits outside the tunnel and warns tallulah not to go in b/c people have died in there, it’s a dangerous tunnel. tallulah says she’s going to go in b/c her husband’s in there.

sinclair takes one step in and the stones curving along the entrance of the tunnel start to glow a firey orange with old magical runes. she steps backwards and doesnt go in. tallulah sees this and asks why that didn’t happen when she stepped in and sinclar says i don’t know why.

tallulah runs into the old train tunnel and finds la capony standing over the mayor who has been tied to the train tracks. la capony is yelling at him asking him what he did with his son’s body and accusing him of killing his son. the mayor is denying it all. tallulah saves him and convinces la capony the mayor had nothing to do with his son’s death (she knows this b/c she investigated the body last night). she says she thinks the ringmaster knows something. la capony leaves to go confront the ringmaster.

tallulah takes a picture inside the cave with her magical film camera to see if any magic is picked up.

sinclair confronts the mayor when he and tallulah exit the tunnel asking why he doesn’t seem to be looking into the death of la capony’s son. while briskly walking away from sinclair (and her keeping up) he says going public about a murder would scare everyone and wouldn’t look good for him as a mayor (as there hasn’t been a murder in this town for decades). sinclair doesn’t take that well and asks what he’s going to do about the murder. he says he’ll look into it but he has an important coal meeting to get to that he’s already late for. she says the murder is more important and he says this meeting has been penciled in for awhile now and the boy’s already dead isn’t he it can come later.

the mayor and tallulah miss the meeting and the coal benefactors have left. they say they’ll be waiting in town until they come across the mayor. the receptionist said “i told them ‘take it easy’ but they did not take it easy” (his whole thing is that he just says “take it easy” he’s a very bad receptionist).

tallulah develops the photo she took earlier and sees there are magical arcane train tracks going off the main normal train tracks in all kinds of wild directions. they look like they go into the walls of the tunnel.

before bed, the mayor tells tallulah he has some exciting news for tomorrow.

the next day:

the mayor, still wearing the clown nose, has a ceremony b/c it’s the day the town is meant to vote on what to change the town’s name to: coalton heights, coalgood heights, or a write-in. he says there will be no vote and the town will be renamed to thorne heights (after the ringmaster).

at this point, the players frantically looked back at all the graphics i made of the circus performers and noticed that all the performers are wearing clown noses except the ringmaster. tallulah tries to yank the clown nose off of her husband’s face, but his arm reflexively (like it’s moved of its own accord) grabs her wrist and she’s unable to take it off. she tries to cast charm person on him to see if he’s being controlled and learns he’s incapable of being charmed. she rolls a good enough insight that tells her for certain this means he’s incapable of being charmed because he is already being charmed. she sees all the kids in the crowd wearing clown noses and messages sinclair--the only person she can think to trust in this moment--that the clown noses are controlling everyone. and we ended the session there!

[spellnbone]

December’s focus was on keeping the Order united and stopping people from blaming each other and themselves for their mistakes. Edgar also received news about the heritage situation at home. While he is developing more tics due to the stress he’s under, he keeps telling people to continue believing in a brighter future -- fearing that if they lose hope, the war will already be lost.

1. standing still -> edgar and isla are watching the enchanted map to see what the other teams on their mission are doing. edgar is taking the minutes in his notebook. upon seeing alaric, sirius and fabian appearing on the map and staying on the same spot, unmoving, he internally panics. 2. home -> edgar spends the day at the potter estate, helping out where he can and debriefing what happened. at night he goes home where fabian shows up. they get drunk together and talk about what happened with alaric. he also offers fabian to stay in his apartment. while he doesn’t care when and if fabian leaves, he doesn’t give him an official pair of second keys either. 3. the sun -> upon seeing the map again, edgar isn’t feeling well at all, adopting yet another tic. caradoc takes him to their habitual costa coffee where they debrief what “the sun” wrote about “the club”. they decide that they need to prepare people for being brought in by the ministry as well as beginning a collaboration with amelia. furthermore, they play with the idea of ‘suicide pills’ for each member of the order in case someone gets taken into interrogation. edgar dislikes the idea -- or rather that he was capable of suggesting something like that. 4. x -> while caradoc is in town, edgar is at the estate listening in on people’s feelings to see if they are blaming each other for what happened or if a sense of hope is still there. he orders all temporary nurses who take care of the patients (mostly sirius, alaric, remus and other injured npcs) to make them coffee and tea manually, as “a body heals faster if the heart is healthy, too.” 5. judgement day -> lily invites edgar to her and james’ private place so he can take the minutes on her side of the events. he never suspected her of having killed mrs nott on purpose, but after guiding her through an elaborated illusion spell retracing the events of the mission, and lily attacks her own image, he’s convinced she didn’t want anything like that to happen. he does, however, come to the conclusion that lily needs time for herself to heal her trauma. he begins calling her lily, not miss evans. 6. x 7. x 8. defenses -> edgar takes james’ retelling of the events as well, quickly concluding that the drama around lily is affecting him negatively. he tells him that truly believing in a truth also means to not be hurt by other people’s lies. 9. x 10. avoiding attention -> edgar and his old school friend artem are having a friendly conversation over some tea and pasta. 11. x -> FULL MOON as semi-jokingly instructed by remus, edgar wrote down the dates for the next full moons down in his calendar. he hasn’t told anyone but he is expecting another outbreak of the illness and has gathered all ingredients for the cure already. when nothing happens, he barrs this theory and sends caradoc an owl that they have once again to start over with their theories. he does however notice that remus returns once again badly injured, and finds himself developing a new theory. 12. on making your future -> nilam reads edgar’s future, and while nilam is one of the few people edgar doesn’t trust in the order, he’s intrigued as to what makes her want to connect to other people on such a deep level. 13. x -> edgar receives a letter from his brother rigby. he refuses to open it, guessing what it could be. 14. distraction ->  edgar snatches his twin amelia at work and brings her to go see a play. it’s mostly a light-hearted distraction but he also talks order with her. she needs to help them figure out what to do in case people are brought to the ministry for questioning. he hates the idea of getting her involved more, but it seems better than working on the ‘suicide pill’ and asking people to just take it if needed. 15. x -> edgar opens the letter from his brother rigby. in it he’s told, rigby is now officially rejecting the bones heritage. 16. x 17. x -> edgar goes to see cats in the westend. this is entire irrelevant but very important to me that you all know. 18. x  19. house of good -> after having previously shown donnie carrow the house of bones which seems to be struggling with a multitude of contradicting charms and wards, and of which at least the east wing needs to be fixed for many decades now, donnie and edgar meet again. it is the first time edgar is in the house while imagining it as his very own, that is, himself as the master of it... it’s not official yet, but he wonders what he’d do with the house if donnie were to manage fixing the place. 20. soothing the injured pride -> after edgar disappears for a few hours at the order’s christmas party (he was following a moth), fabian is looking for him. they dance together while most people prepare to go home. the dance stops almost abruptly when edgar says that he’s not going home with fabian tonight but actually going with amelia. he gives fabian his own keys as he still hasnt gotten a second pair prepared for him, almost as though fearing to make fabian moving into his place official. x -> as amelia and edgar are leaving the estate, they find caradoc outside on the fountain, still high. after making sure he’s okay, they seize the opportunity of him being soft and happy, and give him a kiss each before quickly apparating away. at home, they stay up all night eating cake. no one knows but it’s their 28th birthday. 21 . x -> edgar returns home to his flat to catch fabian before the holidays, who said he has a present for edgar, which he takes as an excuse for being excited to get home to someone waiting there for him. they spend the day enjoying themselves. at the end at least edgar is very happy about fabian living at his place while still somewhat scared to make it official due to past relationships that all followed the same pattern of moving in -> self-sabotage -> break up. 22. x -> the inner circle decides lily needs to take some time off missions, and take over nurse duties instead. some consider it a punishment for what she did, others want to protect her. except for mary and james no one thinks lily should just continue without taking a break. edgar does believe it at first, but reading caradoc’s unspoken opinions about it, he sides with them instead. he mostly wants to protect lily and make sure that those who’d want an even more radical punishment for her are satisfied, as the last thing he wants is inner friction within the order, when they should all stand together. a possible betrayal -> after the inner circle meeting, james stops caradoc and edgar to have a word with them. he’s learnt from ainsley that frank might be the reason they got cursed with the illness last month. 23. at the apothecary -> feeling tense because of the decision made on lily’s future, he goes to an apothecary to buy some relaxing potions, meeting peter outside of the order for the first time. paper flowers -> afterwards, he can’t bring himself to go home, perhaps because he missed his train anyway, and decides to just go apologise to lily instead. he does so in the most silly way he can: performing muggle magic, and afterwards kidnaps her to go on an adventure in muggle london. 24. x -> yule at the house of bones. the whole family comes home and they celebrate. 25. x -> christmas morning spent in bed. at first only amelia and edgar who spent the night together in the same bed anyway, but then dell joins, then colter, then their mother who was looking why everyone was late for breakfast, and after a while their father even convinces rigby’s husband to join -- rigby being the only one to think this all terribly childish and uncomfortable and remaining on an armchair at the other side of the room. 26. x -> rigby asks edgar if he read his letter but edgar doesn’t reply. for the rest of the stay, the tension between them is high, though no one quite seems to figure out why... 27. x 28. x 29. x -> ...even when amelia asks about it, edgar refuses to answer. that night he sleeps alone in his bed and writes caradoc and fabian a letter, saying he’ll come home for new years eve. mostly to evade rigby but also to hand in an article for the daily prophet he wrote. 30. x 31. no more cakes and ale? -> as the bones celebrate christmas with their mexican side of the family on the 6th of january, edgar decides to make a quick trip to london. when he arrives at home, he finds his letter to fabian unopened however, and more than a couple of empty bottles of firewhisky. so he goes to look for fabian -- entirely forgetting about caradoc -- and finding him in hogsmeade, drunk, outside in the snow. he spends the night taking care of him, missing the breaking news entirely. they stay at the pub for two days.

[ardcntlamia]

TW: death, drugs, prostitution, disease, aids, homophobia, and child abuse are mentioned

( richard harmon, vampire, he/him & cismale ) is that ( comfortably numb ) by ( pink floyd ) playing? ( ALEXANDER “XANDER” CHAPELL ) must be nearby! heard folks say the ( thirty six ) year old ( drug runner ) was not at the letum falls thanksgiving fair because ( he was caught up with work ). as a result, they weren’t present during the glitch but ( his boyfriend was killed ).

born a few towns over from letum falls in the great year of ‘48, alexander chapell was supposed to be the golden boy. his parents, two retired military technicians, thought they would never get pregnant, that they’d spent far too long in the service to start a family now.

soon enough two months out of the military, fourty-nine year old holly chapell was confirmed pregnant. they took their savings and refurbished their entire home, hoping to make it the perfect place to raise a child

unfortunately, alexander wasn’t exactly the child they had expected. he was a fairly quiet baby, but wavering into his toddler years the young chapell began to act out

his first offence; biting. he started taking chunks out of others in fits of rage, temper tantrums like you wouldn’t believe. the chapells tried everything --- time outs, spankings, off to bed without dinner, nothing could break the child of his rage. It wasn’t long before the gentle punishments turned violent

years passed and trouble just kept coming. xander would often be sent home from school for fights, cursing, disobedience, you name it. but nothing, nothing prepared them for his final offence.

xander’s father caught him red-handed in his room, lips on another boy. his parents despised gays, called them a repertoire of hideous slurs, and xander knew there was no coming back from this. by the end of the day, xander was on the streets, his first boyfriend had been scared so far into the closet there was no hope of anything more, and he was left completely alone to fend for himself

by 15, xander was turning tricks in the dark for money, catering to the deceptive husbands of his hometown. he had fallen low, but surviving by your own means meant scraping tooth and nail to get back on your feet

five years of jumping from temporary job to temporary job, dealing a bit and rolling under the radar, xander ventured off to find the promise of better jobs. leaving everything behind, not that he had much to begin with, he set off to the mysterious letum falls

his luck seemed to change at just twenty when he found a decent paying job, one where he could afford a roof over his head and food in his stomach. a small house on the edge of town, one bedroom, one bathroom, enough for him to be comfortable.

a couple more years flew by like this, work consuming xander’s life. he kept to himself and hadn’t made a single friend outside of work. his life ran in a never ending cycle, repeating the same schedule over and over every day. wake up, eat, work, eat, sleep, wake up. truly a lone wolf, the man with just a name and nothing more.

it was 1972 when xander noticed changes in himself. he skipped lunch twice in three days, and slept through his alarm more than a handful of times before work started asking questions. his memory was strung, teetering back and forth with pieces of information, none of it added up.

one visit to the doctor and xander regretted it all. AIDS. it was something he’d read in the paper a time or two, the disease notoriously infecting gay men across the country, and it was known to be deadly. the papers didn’t give out all the facts, but one thing he knew, the disease was tied too close to homosexuality for his comfort. his dirty laundry wasn’t the world’s to see

the next two years were a living hell. it all blurred together--- work, sleep, blank, blank, music, work, blank. the days were passing by before xander could even live them. by the end of 1973, xander was laid off, and his disease was taking a tighter hold on him.

xander doesn’t remember much about the night of his death. the flickering scenes add up to him in an alleyway, strung out in a daze of delusion as he collapses to the concrete. his final moments blur together, but locks of golden brown curls lay him to rest.

that is, until he woke back up with a hunger inside, sat in a home he wasn’t familiar with. he didn’t hurt, he didn’t ache, but he was hungrier than hell. in that home, he finally came face to face with his savior, manny, a man he vowed to be loyal to until his final breath

soon, manny explained that the final breath thing may be a bit further away than he thought. the gift of immortality and a life of loyalty, all paid by the price of blood. it wasn’t such a terrible deal in xander’s eyes

xander became a close confidant of manny, working as a drug runner in his business and declaring himself manny’s own personal bodyguard and it’s been that way for a little less than a decade

he’s a bit silent for such a rugged man, but underneath that icy exterior is a mile-long list of knock knock jokes he’s been waiting to tell since the 50’s

he did not attend the fair but he lost someone close within the chaos. his boyfriend, bez, was killed in the disaster, and he’s been bottling up his emotions ever since, refusing to shatter his ghost boyfriend’s heart just for his own sanity, so he’s kept his mouth shut and acted like nothing has changed. it was the first relationship he’s had in half a decade. in all truth, he’s not sure how to deal with grief, so he chooses to ignore it instead.

aesthetics : half-smoked cigarettes, ripped jeans paired with converse, rugged stubble on a steel-hard jaw, white knuckles, dripping red from sharp white, a smile seen as often as halley’s comet, crimson tides, the smell of death in the morning.

wanted connections :

regular customers : xander works for manny and does a lot of dealing face to face, he’d rather get the job done himself than send a fool to do it for him. that’s how mistakes are made. so it’s not uncommon for xander to sell to the same people. these could be new regular customers, or some oldies who have been buyin’ since ‘74, i’m down for anything

enemies : this is pretty self explanatory, but i’d love any sort of enemy plot. xander is a hard nut to crack, and can often let his sarcasm run loose, ending in a lot of bad encounters. this guy is probably on handful of hit lists by now

past encounters : this could be from his time on the streets when he was selling his body just to survive, or even from his early days in manny’s employment, someone who might be able to recognize that he hasnt aged a day, or someone who’s helping him keep that secret. honestly this could go a million ways and i’m down for all of them

once again i suck at making connections but hit me up if you’re down for any of these or if you’d like to brainstorm !