#he is the worst kind of person you could possibly conceive of

[coochiekrab]

is there a canon design of kuri's dad? i wanna see this bitch

Jumpscare

[artdcnaldson]

and when Olympics reader somehow ends up at an event art and tashi are at and seeing them together - art giving her heart eyes, tashi barely looking at him at all - you end up texting him that if he doesn't meet you somewhere private you'll make a scene - tell tashi everything. art is sweating bullets the poor man </////3 ends up having to feed you his cock in the coat closet - he shouldn't be hard when you're literally blackmailing him, but fuck he is. he shouldn't be hard when his wife is just outside somewhere and he's balls deep, fucking you raw - fingers down your throat to shut you up - but he is.

GODDDD you literally get it <3

You’re having to do all of the ass-kissing and schmoozing that industry events demand, but your attention is divided because Art is right over there and his tie matches Tashi’s dress, and he hasn’t even looked at you once since he and Tashi stopped by your table to greet everyone.

It was cold and formal, like he doesn’t know you, like he hasn’t staked his claim on your body in every conceivable way. It had been a week since he’d last seen you, maybe he was slipping. Maybe he wanted her more than you. Which is crazy. You care about him, you love him in ways she refuses to. She’s ignoring him, brushing him off. She’s too busy to take care of him the way you can. He just needs to remember, is all.

It’s not your finest moment, but you’re desperate. You just need to get him alone, away from her. So you just… remind him that you could tell Tashi about it all… if you wanted to. If he keeps ignoring you.

He knows it’s unhealthy, the obsession you have with him. How you can go from crying big, pretty tears about him not wanting you anymore, or wanting her more than you, or how guilty and insane he’s making you feel to sinking onto your knees, smiling pretty and happy, unwrapping him like a gift.

Because Art is sweet, and conflicted, and riddled with guilt about the entire thing. You’re so infuriating and gorgeous and so willing to fucking worship the ground he walks on. All it took was one bathroom fuck and now he’s a liar, the worst kind of man in the world.

So why does he tell you he cares about you? That he promises he wants you, that he wishes he was at this event with you instead. Surely it’s not just because he wants your lips wrapped around his cock, because you’re willing to let him have you in ways that he hasn’t ever even considered asking Tashi for. That would make him a horrible person.

But you sink onto your knees, believing every word. And he’s pulsing against your tongue, feeding himself into the hot, wet sheath of your mouth. You look like you belong there, like you’d happily spend the rest of your life swallowing him down, cockwarming him with your throat.

You could’ve spent hours like that, but he pulls you off— he’s already been gone long enough, Tashi would notice. You knew it was about her, but you were perfectly content for the moment. He had said he cared about you, and he was with you then, wasn’t he? It’s your skirt he’s lifting up, your cunt he’s filling up with rough, needy thrusts. Not hers.

You’re whining, begging for more, pressed against real fur coats, leather jackets, luxury brand shit. Panting against them, drooling and smearing your makeup against them. Someone would get fired for it, after the fact. Art’s big hand slaps over your mouth, muffling your cries into pathetic mewls behind his hand.

He’s fucking his guilt out with your body, using you like an outlet for everything he knows he’s doing wrong. Pace punishing, unforgiving. You should feel bad about this, for bringing him to this point, but you’re smiling and relishing in it. You’re too young, you don’t care that you’re ruining him.

He shouldn’t be cumming inside of you, anything could happen and it would only fuck things up worse, but you’re so tight and wet and warm and you’re squeezing around him, begging for it practically. He spills into you, buried as deep as he can possibly get. Kisses your shoulder a few times, then tugs up the fragile lingerie you’d worn for him to see, embroidered at the waistband with the letters AD. Jesus Christ.

“I’m sorry for what I said about telling Tashi,” you say, kissing his cheek. “I would never do anything to hurt you, Art. You know that.” He gives a weak smile, nods, fixes your hair with tender brushes of his hand.

He looks at you and hates that he cares about you. He hates a lot of things at that moment.

[lookiamnotshameless]

You know, I usually hate the 'really pretty person doesn't realize they're pretty' trope, but there's something about it that works when it happens with Roderich Edelstein, aka the man who spent half a millennium being The Catch of Europe, and knew it. He knew, and despite making rather full use of that and despite looking like that, he vehemently believes that he is plain and uninteresting without his glasses (his music), that he'd instantly become the worst looking person in Europe when you ask him to put on a relatively harmless costume (so, without his veneer of aristocracy).

This isn't your standard garden variety oblivious insecurity; this is some next level denial of self. This man actively, categorically and thoroughly denies any idea that he can possibly be attractive/wanted/needed by himself, as a person, rather than by what he is, the power he can offer, the cultural refinement he possesses. While he isn't repressed about who he is and has no qualms about showing his slovenly/lazy sides, he simply denies that it has any value. It goes beyond ‘I'm worthless', it's more like, ‘there's no value in getting to know any of this, don't bother' matter-of-factly. (I remember that meta that he doesn't even take his glasses off if there's even one person with him, even someone he's more comfortable around like Erzsebet.) There are cases of other characters telling him that he looks just fine or showing him rather personal affection, and he just seems to…shrug it off, like you'd shrug off someone who just stated that the world is flat and lizardmen live on the moon. He's not angsty about it. This is how he prefers it. He prefers that there's nothing to Roderich Edelstein the entity-who-could-conceivably-be-seen-as-a-person, only what Austria the Nation has built over the years.

Couple that with how he embraces his lack of agency and complacency to a degree that nobody else does and is just kind of shrug emoji about it, and he became this sort of undying cockroachlike intrigue that won't leave my brain even after so many years.

At the end of the day this is probably why my endgame Roderich ship in the Year of Our Lord 2024 is still Gilbert, after all this time. Reams of text have been written about how they've been such perfect foils to each other across the centuries, and what could be a more perfect modern-day foil to all that than the character who literally has nothing left but being a person? Someone who lost everything built in his name as an immortal earth-god-parasite-spirit-thing, whose legacy is being slowly forgotten? Someone who, despite shining as bright as Roderich back in his prime, had never defined or presented himself as anything but who he is as a person and expected the same from others? (Gilbert has his own tanks of worms yes but this is a Roderich stan post.)

When you take in the fact that Gilbert was weirdly obsessed with stalking and antagonizing Roderich this entire time, it creates a really nice juicy conflict point for my shipping tastes lol.

[mysticalprincesskitten]

Aegon II Targaryen x OC // House of the Dragon fanfic

Yandere!Aegon, Dark!Aegon

Trigger warnings: NON-CON, DUB-CON, mdni, dark themes, bondage, kidnapping, yandere?? Targcest, OC is Viserys and Aemma's daughter, OC is named Daenerys, OC looks like Elizabeth Olsen

Part Three

The crown had changed Aegon.

No longer was he merely a youth craving his mother’s kindness, his father's attention, forever in the shadow of who he was supposed to be. Now he was King of the Seven Kingdoms, at war with his half-sister for the throne on which he sat.

Fate had forced this on him, but Aegon had embraced it. For the sake of his family, for Mother and Aemond and Helaena and their little twins, Rhaenyra could not ascend the Iron Throne. She would kill them all.

Besides. Aegon was the rightful king. Father had agreed as much finally on his deathbed; as the firstborn son, Viserys’ crown passed to Aegon. The Great Council had reinforced tradition by seating his father on the throne instead of Rhaenys, but Father, in his arrogance, opposed tradition by naming his favourite child heir. Mother said so.

If only his wife could see the truth.

Daenerys was a hellcat. A she-dragon. Since Aemond had ambushed her at Storm’s End, forcing her to dismount Grey Ghost and return to King’s Landing lest Vhagar rip her beloved dragon to shreds, Daenerys had refused to touch Aegon, to speak a kind word to him. It made him whine and whimper, a kicked dog. Daenerys loved him. She always had. She was the only one who knew him, who didn’t expect him to be something he wasn’t.

And now she wouldn’t be close to him unless he bound her to their bed.

His grandfather was a fool, but he was right about one thing — the king needed an heir. Daenerys and Aegon had been wed for a couple of years and they had yet to conceive. It had never bothered Aegon before — one less person to steal her attention from him, truth be told — but that was when he'd been Prince Aegon.

King Aegon needed a trueborn heir from his queen.

And Aegon had missed her so, so much.

“How dare you?” His she-dragon thrashed anew in her bonds. “I am not your broodmare, Usurper!”

Aegon flinched. Then the fire within his own blood met to meet hers.

“How dare I? How dare you, sweet sister. My beloved bride. We are married, whether you like it not. You are mine. Do you think I could bear for you to leave me again? I let you slip from me once and they forced a crown on my head.” His lip wobbled, even as he held her wrists tight enough to bruise. He wanted his marks on her. His his his.

She was all he had, his only good thing. Daenerys had been by his side all his life, a playmate and partner. Sometimes she insisted they include Helaena and Aemond in their play, and Jace and Luke, but most of the time, if he pouted just so, he could get her to play just the two of them, chasing each other through the Red Keep, bumping into servants and high lords alike, playing monsters and maidens and come-into-my-castle.

And when childhood faded to adulthood, his sister’s soft curves and smooth skin made him stiffen in his breeches at the worst possible moments. He found himself transfixed by the dimple of her cleavage, a faint line peeking from the silver and cream gown she wore.

His Nerys refused to wear green, but rarely donned their House colours — Rhaenyra’s colours — either. Her heraldry honoured her dragon instead, the wild Grey Ghost. She liked silver Myrish lace and ivory Lyseni silks the most, beaded with opals and moonstone. Aegon liked how her gowns looked scattered across the floor of their bedchamber.

“It’s not too late,” she breathed, violet eyes wide and watery. “We could leave, Aeg. We could leave King’s Landing. Leave the Seven Kingdoms. Fly to the Free Cities with me. We could explore new lands, taste new cuisine, where nobody from this dreary kingdom would ever find us. We could see the Dothraki Sea, the old lands of Valyria's empire. Please, Aeg. Please.”

He could see her vision clearly: clouds covering exotic lands, blades of emerald grass below. Both of them, together. How they had always been. Wasn’t that what he’d wanted before his mother marched him to his coronation?

But another path lay open to him now. What if they didn’t have to flee? The crown was heavy, but Aegon found his liked it’s weight.

He was King. Nerys was his queen. She would give him trueborn princes and princesses that would fill the Red Keep, enough to lay his claim so deep inside her she could never claw it out.

A frenzy overtook him. He crashed their lips together, and she kissed him back, Seven Hells she was finally kissing him back, finally, she loved him again, she did she did…

His tongue tasted the sweetness of her mouth, overwhelmed with the need to possess. “I love you,” he gasped, “I love you so much, Nerys…”

“Untie me.”

He stilled. Stroked silver curls from her forehead, gazing at her with pain in his chest.

“No.”

Her face grew cold. “You won’t leave. Not now. You’ve supped from the king’s cup and now you mean to gorge yourself, like you always do.”

“Enough,” he snapped. “Stop spoiling everything.” His lips returned to her throat.

“Aegon, no! Stop!”

He didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop.

Grandfather had spoke sense that morning during the Small Council meeting. Without an heir, Aegon’s grasp on the throne was tentative. Rhaenyra had six sons to succeed her. Should anything happen to Aegon before he sired a son, the throne would pass to Aemond.

Aegon often wondered whether his brother would be happy if he died. Aemond lusted for kingship, for Helaena and a dragon to call his own. He had two of those things already.

“Get off me!”

“Hush.” His right hand clenched her throat, the other trailing beneath her nightgown where her legs were bound together, seeking the wetness between her thighs.

“Aegon…” Nerys moaned.

“I know how to touch you, Nerys. Your body might as well be my own.”

She started to curse him but another moan strangled her words. “You disgust me.”

Don’t say that. “Do I? This tells a different story.” His fingers thrust into her.

She cried out.

“That’s it, darling. Let me take care of you."

[shipping-isnt-morality]

I was frankly shocked the first time I discussed the Shoah with Israelis (rather than American Jews). There was a level of… I don’t know what to call it but victim-blaming, that I wasn’t sure how to handle. That’s of course not universal but the very fact that that’s an accepted viewpoint in Israel is kind of telling I think. For example there was even some scandal on the right in America when Ben Shapiro suggested that arming the Jews (more) would have prevented the Holocaust. In Israel that viewpoint is quite common.

There’s a kind of scorn among some Zionists for victims of the Holocaust, and if you really understand their point of view it’s easy to see why. If anti-Semitism is inevitable and incurable, if the very presence of Jews brings it about, then they should have fought harder, or at least left sooner. They should have known better than to ever think they could be welcome or safe in their home. It’s almost an exoneration of the anti-Semite; like a force of nature, he is inevitable and inexhaustible.

Not to always bring everything back to what I know, but it reminds me of how we talk about abusers and victims. These posts about protecting yourself from attackers in your car, in a parking lot, in your home, on a boat, whatever: They take for granted that you can not and should not feel safe in these places. They treat the danger of sexual predators the same as the danger of wildlife. Zionists talk about anti-Semites in a similar way, I’ve noticed.

Lord knows in many cases these are born from trauma. It’s no surprise that victims of serious violations would like to know how to protect themselves from it ever happening again and would want to protect others from the same.

The problem is that this trauma-informed response cannot actually fix the root of the problem. Neither anti-Semitism nor male sexual violence are forces of nature. They are byproducts of exploitative and imperfect systems run and populated by highly imperfect humans. Different systems have had different outcomes, though, some better than others, and recently some quite well indeed. Systemic solutions to these problems - at the least, to greatly reduce them, and to make justice more accessible - do exist. Humans can and have built them.

A systemic solution to the problem cannot start with the victim, though. It has to start with the perpetrator. It has to ask why the system keeps producing people who can and would do this. It has to ask what the perpetrator wants, why they want that, and why they think harming someone else will get them what they want. Simplistic, spiteful, or dehumanizing answers to these questions aren’t helpful; neither are trite or fatalistic ones. Only truthful, consistent, verifiable, rational answers will allow us to change the circumstances which lead to these crimes.

The victim is rarely in a position to change that system, or even to change the circumstances of a single abuser; on a personal level it makes sense to treat the threats as inevitable. On a societal level, though, it is essential that we recognize the perpetrators as rational actors who are fully responsible for their actions and whose excuses must be challenged.

Ideologically it is completely backwards to start from an assumption that it is up to the actions of a victim to avoid victimization. It is infinitely easier for perpetrators, who are after all themselves rational actors and members of our society, to choose a different action which does not victimize someone else. And where possible it is our role as a community to make better choices more accessible, and to punish exploitative behavior.

Because a victim-led initiative, at worst, would result in avoiding victimization through in turn becoming victimizers of a different, even more marginalized group. It recreates the problem: the victim cannot feel safe because the only defense they can conceive is one which never puts them in the position to be victimized ever again, but there is no battle to be won against the entire system. So a smaller battle is chosen, and a weaker opponent singled out (and rhetorically aligned with the systemic danger and hostility), and the exploitation dance happens again, one level down.

I’m hardly the first to observe this. This is probably a clumsy rephrasing of common philosophy examining human exploitation.

But the point is: all of that makes sense as a protective coping mechanism for the victim, but as a society it must not be where our analysis begins or ends. On a societal level this exploitation is not omnipresent, inevitable, or inexhaustible. The perpetrators are in our society as much as the victims are; an uncomfortable fact that I think people need to grow up about.

Our solutions can, should, and must look at why this happens and what we can do about it. The answer is not “nothing”. We have accomplished extraordinary things as a species. We have concepts of justice, of empathy. We have written documents of shared humanity, we have demonstrated shared humanity - for better and for worse. It is possible for us to find answers to these brutally difficult questions.

Palestine must be free, and Jews must be safe. These imperatives are not mutually exclusive. Those who tell you otherwise have something to gain from your fear.

[thegeminisage]

I have to know about the dead beat ghost of George Kirk, that lit my brain up. Also Spock on Spock violence either/or. both even?

BOTH IS GOOD. tysm. this got so long don't worry about reading this entire answer lol <3

ok, so, spock on spock violence is a fanfic i conceived when i was deep in the throes of trek last autumn. but i had to wait until i had watched EVERYTHING with nimoy's spock in it before i could begin working on it, and by the time i got there, the steam sort of ran out of my engines. so i'm not sure if it'll ever get done at this point, especially considering i sort of veered back into working on something else. anyway, to general concept of this is - while it's very sweet that in the movies and in real life quinto spock and nimoy spock are friends, it's also. love and light. a little boring. i think that really, spock is an individual who is in many ways at war with himself, and when asked the age-old question "would you fight your clone or fuck him?" would unequivocally choose FIGHT every time

the very basic plot of the fic (which is really just a flimsy excuse for spock and spock to be petty cut-throat bitches at each other) is that post stid quinto spock has been traumatized by 1. the death of his mother 2. the death of his planet 3. the death of his boyfriend (hi, jim) and he's decided to break up with jim and do a kohlinahr so he doesn't have to feel grief anymore (and, with his longer vulcan lifespan, never has to watch jim die) because this shit is killing him. jim thinks this is stupid and nimoy spock also thinks this is stupid so nimoy spock and quinto spock spend a great deal of time hurling insults at one another about it.

there is also a side plot that very vaguely cribs from the tos episode "what are little girls made of?" wherein people are getting replaced by androids, and at one point, quinto spock is tempted by a jim android, because, after all:

an android jim never has to suffer! he never has to die! spock could have and love his boyfriend FOREVER AND EVER and never have to fear the pain of loss ever again! that will totally work and fix everything with absolutely zero problems, right?

since i don't actually have any prose written for this yet, i will provide an excerpt from my notes, edited slightly for clarity:

to quinto spock, nimoy spock is a living example of his every failure and his worst fears. he gave up the good fight against his own internal humanity, he TOOK A HUMAN MATE (gross!), and he allowed/indirectly caused vulcan to be destroyed. nimoy spock, old and at the end of his life, has no one. he's been mourning his jim for longer than they were ever together. the only thing he knows is the unbearable pain of grief. quinto spock fears this kind of pain more than anything. he thinks he is seeing his own future and he is desperate to prevent it via any means possible, even the kolinahr - this timeline can be different, right?

to nimoy spock, quinto spock is a living example of the very worst and most cowardly parts of himself, and wastes all the precious opportunities he has - he makes nimoy spock sick with envy. quinto spock has SO many years left to spend with jim and he's going to WASTE them just because he's afraid of what life will be like without him. worse, he's hurting the person nimoy spock loved most by pushing him away, and it's all his own (nimoy spock's) fault because vulcan was kind of his bad. by allowing vulcan to be destroyed he has ruined not only his future, but also his past. quinto spock is destroying himself from the inside over his misguided prejudice over his own humanity, and his internalized xenophobia or whatever, and he's too young and too stupid to see that the only way to get through it is to GO through it, and he won't listen to the one person he should trust above all others (himself) because he HATES HIMSELF, that's his/their whole problem

like, imagine your entire deal is self-loathing and an abject refusal to accept both halves of your extremely internally conflicted being. and then suddenly there's another version of yourself who can stand next to you, who can be blamed and yelled at (possibly punched?), who is somehow doing an EVEN WORSE JOB at being you than you already are!!!!! you have to watch this other you make mistakes so massive even YOU wouldn't do them and you guys are supposed to NOT fight somehow??

ultimately, this is a fic about confronting grief and pain rather than running away from it, but it also morphed into a kind of fix-it for generations (the movie where kirk bites it in the most underwhelming death scene ever) which turned it into a very full project because those two things are a bit at odds with each other, so i had to reoutline it, but the outline IS all ready to go, i just...haven't gotten around to it yet because i'm working on the other project. i haven't given up on it though!!!

deadbeat ghost of george kirk is essentially a story about how completely useless it is to have a ghost for a dad. not a literal ghost, it's not that kind of story, but despite how affecting the opening of the 2009 movie is, we have to contend with the sad reality that if you grow up without a dad there is a high risk of simply becoming chris pine's kirk. like, that's why he's like that, right? hard truths. i only have about 800 words of this and it's quite likely it will never be finished or posted, but every time someone says something horrible to me in real life about my dead dad (happens more often than you think) i add another rage-fueled paragraph. an excerpt (content warning for child abuse and suicidal ideation):

What's so heroic about it, anyway? Jim's dad didn't die to save eight hundred lives; he died to save two, and counted the other seven hundred ninety-eight as a happy bonus. And what became of those two people? His mother a chronically offworld functional alcoholic, married to a chronically on-world nonfunctional alcoholic, whose favorite hobby is hitting his wife's sons with his belt and whose second favorite hobby is seeing which bones he can break with his steel-toed boots. Jim himself, sent to the hell that was Tarsus IV for driving a car off a cliff, who at eleven years old had already been jaded enough to consider just going off the cliff with it. Would George Kirk do it again the same way, if he could somehow know how the world turned without him in it? Would he think it was a fair trade? Either the answer is no and he was an idiot who threw away his life for nothing, or the answer is yes and he was an asshole. Either way, it hardly amounts to heroism. What good is a dead father to anybody? They can't turn up at the school play or the track meets. They can't teach you to tie a tie or throw a punch at bullies or slip you your first beer or bring you birthday gifts. You can't give a Father's Day card to an empty grave, not if you're saying anything true. All the cards say things like Thanks for being there for me, Dad!, and all Jim knows about his father is that there is the one place he wasn't. See, Jim has been in space, which is quite literally the absence of everything. He's also been on Tarsus IV, a planet where people got so hungry they started hacking limbs off of corpses to soothe the absolute absence of food in their stomach. And yet, for all that, the absence of George Kirk is the keenest absence he's ever known.

let people send you an ask with the WIP title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it!

[caffeinat3]

me yapping about Jax and theories and why he acts the way he acts blah blah blah i like to yap

read if u dare ig, just wanted to share

Okay so the thing is about Jax is that he holds his reputation to his HEART his goddamn SOUL [if he has one jkjk] like ong he is so serious about it. and yeah we're on episode 3 in november and the 4th episode could quite possibly release in december and because of that obviously we do NOT know anything about him. hardly anything. was he close to kaufmo? was he always a jerk? does he exclusively think that he's weak if he isn't a jerk? that was a bit deep OBVIOUSLY we wouldn't know that but even still! something. something about this man kills me like a train derailing bro

so, about that reputation, i think the reputation might just be like not being concluded as weak and just the “oh it's his way of coping” NO he does not want to be seen as weak! he wants them to think he's just generally a bad person or a flat out, plain dipshit that has nothing to do in life besides make others miserable. that's what he wants them to think! probably. but like dude, i feel like he secretly might just want to get close with them but jdhd! who the hell knows!? he is most definitely NOT dumb [he somehow knew Ragatha was afraid of centipedes??? ??how did? SMARTASS] and uses that very much to his advantage but that's hardly even the point

what im trying to say here is that he is not dumb if he wants to be close with someone but then ultimately not know how to and/or feel the need to push them away because of your social reputation. i get that a lot though personally because who the hell wants to be seen as the guy who is actually really fuckin desperate? and the whole thing that goes like “that's his coping mechanism, act like you care” would be goddamn FRUSTRATING if i were him! so obviously why would he even dare open up? well, honestly, maybe at some point he will but he HAS to go like “bitch, you better keep this a goddamn secret, they don't need to know anything about me”

personally, i feel like Pomni is going to see the actually genuinely kinda emotional side of him at some point AT SOME POINT like at his episode in particular perhaps but. actually that's more than likely, to be honest. i kinda highkey want this guy to rain absolute hell upon everyone else and simultaneously have the worst mental breakdown i have ever seen in my life and media. im kind of. hungry for it, conceivably. but yes, since Pomni is the main character of the show i certainly believe that they'll get close in some kind of way. very clearly not in a romantic way, it's been stated so many times that there will not be any canon romance.

another thing is of another theory i have seen before…

does he believe that the other people are actually people? or does he entirely think that they're npcs and simply do not have a real conscience? maybe, maybe not. because it'd explain a bit about why he doesn't really care if he hurts them physically and/or mentally. it could just be denial, honestly.

CAN WE TALK ABOUT HOW YOUNG HE AND ZOOBLE ARE?! NO COLLEGE FOR YOU TWO😭😭

[meara-eldestofthemall]

Hello again bat-gran 👋

I appreciated your answer on the Robins situation, it intrigued me.

How would you have written Damian/where would you like his writing to go?

Poor Damian is simultaneously the Batfamily character with the most potential and the worst possible character development. If you go all the way back to his introduction it was fairly clear that readers were supposed to loathe him. He was an arrogant and rude little princeling with a chip on his shoulder the size of Cleveland.

Damian was such a brat that he even managed to exhaust Alfred's patience, which is a real feat considering the man raised Bruce.

Everyone knows that in his later interaction with Tim in this issue (Batman #657) Damian proves what a superior person he is by killing the first criminal he came across. He then tossed the decapitated head, (with a grenade in it's mouth) at Tim to make a point.

The most important thing to take away from this is that Damian has been raised in a cult that operates on the same upward mobility scheme as the Klingon Empire. In order to get ahead, you kill the person in your way. That' s exactly what Damian tried to do.

Damian was originally conceived as an anti-hero at least and a full blown villain at worst. He was supposed to be a great source of angst for Batman to darkly brood over for years. The only problem was that about half of the fandom loved hyper-violent, rude and nasty Damian. DC now had to figure out how to redeem him enough to work with Batman.

They actually did come up with a method that worked. During Battle For The Cowl Damian saved Tim's life in a very Damian way.

This was the moment that could have changed everything. This is where I would have had Damian reluctantly (very reluctantly) allow the idea that maybe his father's way of doing things had a tiny bit of merit after all. To be honest, I wouldn't have changed much of the Dick Grayson Batman and Damian Wayne Robin arc. You had a much sunnier Batman with Robin as the grim dark little gremlin a lot of people loved. Damian actually showed some positive character development without losing the edge that made him popular.

What would I have changed? This...

All the progress Damian made was unceremoniously tossed onto the garbage heap. The moment the kid got angry with Tim he went right into assassin mode and tried to kill him - again. Worst of all, there were no real consequences for his actions. Instead we're supposed to sympathize with the fact that Damian's feelings were hurt.

The impression left with the reader is that Damian maybe got a stern to talking to from Dick but that was about it. It does not help the conversation above seems to lay the blame on Tim for not having a stronger password.

This is the crux of the problem that followed Damian for years. DC seemed to actively undo any positive character development to keep him static. Damian was not allowed to be anything other than rude, arrogant and hyper-violent. He worked abysmally with Bruce's Batman, so much so that it set in stone the idea that Bruce was incapable of being a good Dad to Damian. Damian's character waffled between hero, anti-hero and kind-of-sort-of villain repeatedly. Not too long ago they were setting him up to be a bad guy yet again. Remember when Damian had his own private prison and then resigned from being Robin?

Why would DC continually do that to a character with so much potential?

What I would do with Damian is what we're now seeing. He went off and had his obligatory Robin-right-of-passage adventure on a mysterious island. Damian came back a better character. His relationship with Tim is improved enough that they still bicker dreadfully but are actually more like brothers.

I really like what I'm seeing in Batman and Robin. This is how Damian should be written. He's still got his edge and doesn't suffer fools well but he's working towards a positive future.

So, if you'll forgive this pedantic old Bat-Gran, my point is that what I want to see, what I as a writer would do, is keep him more on the path of the current Batman and Robin series and less of what we see in the current Batman series.

Most of all I would write Damian consistently, not vary the basics of his personality from book to book. That is the cardinal flaw that has always plagued DC.

Who I want Damian to be is a young man who is just beginning to discover that he can choose his own future. My version of Damian can honor his heritage but still move forward into the best version of himself. He can be someone who, perhaps like many teens, has no idea what he'll be in ten years but does know that it's a path he chooses for himself, not one forced on him by either the Waynes or the Al Ghuls.

I just hope I live long enough to see that. I'm already 67 so I hope DC stops messing around gets to it, please.

So, are you sorry you asked?

[too-many-blorbos]

Abandoned Homeland AU: The King's Judgement

The king and council of Blingdenstone were not pleased that a drow stood before them, even in chains. A member of the party who slew nearly all of their mining team, leaving only a handful to escape with the tale. Why bring him here alive instead of leaving his corpse with the rest of his foul kin? 

Judgment, Belwar said. The burrow warden insisted that the drow get a chance to defend himself. That was the law of Blindgestone, and it applied to all equally, friend and foe alike. So the king reluctantly allowed the prisoner to speak, Belwar translating between them. 

“Speak your name.”

“Drizzt, second son of House Do'urden, ninth house of Menzoberranzan.” The drow spoke softly, keeping his eyes low. 

“And how many of my kin did you slay?”

“None.”

The king snorted in disbelief.

“He speaks true,” Belwar insisted. “His swords had no blood on them. Only rock dust– he slew the elemental I summoned, but none of our miners.”

The king's eyes widened, impressed despite himself. “Few warriors can defeat an elemental, much less with blades. With such skills, he must be a person of note among drow. Perhaps we could trade him back to his people and get some measure of recompense for our spilled blood.”

Drizzt let out a humorless laugh when Belwar translated. “My family will give nothing for my return,” he said with bitterness. “More than one of them would be glad for my death.”

Belwar frowned. He leaned closer, lowering his voice. “This could be your only chance to stay alive, drow.”

“For how long? Until my family confirms what I've already said? At best, a ransom demand will give my matron a good laugh. At worst, she would agree–and then massacre whomever you sent to make the exchange, and decorate our compound fence with their mutilated bodies.” The drow looked sick at the thought. He looked the king in the eye and deliberately shook his head. 

The king got the message even without Belwar's translation. It intrigued and perturbed him that the drow was so candid. Drow as he knew them were proud, sly, arrogant. This one was none of those things. This drow was hardly making an effort to save himself. It was… odd. 

“Tell me,” the king said, a bit more gently, “why should this council show you mercy? Why should I allow you to go free?”

“...you have no reason to.” Drizzt murmured, talking as much to himself as to his audience. “I don't understand why that's even a question. Why would you let your enemy go unscathed, after what my people did? Why didn't you kill me in the tunnels and be done with it? Why did you promise a quick death when I deserve so much worse?! I don't–” 

His voice broke, a sob escaping before he caught himself. He looked down at his chained hands, blinking back tears. “...I don't understand,” he whispered. 

The drow fell silent. The council exchanged looks as Belwar translated the outburst. It was… uncomfortable to hear such words coming from a prisoner. For the first time, they took note of how young the drow was. For the first time, they saw what Belwar had seen all along: a young man, so used to cruel treatment that he could not conceive of any other kind. 

The king steepled his fingers, brow furrowed. It was possible the drow's distress was an act, a ploy to gain sympathy. If so, it was a masterful one, for the king had lost any desire to order an execution. Letting the drow free was foolishness, of course– an insult to everyone they had lost in the attack. But the thought of killing the drow did not sit well with him either. Not anymore. 

“By the stones, this is a mess,” he muttered. He turned his gaze to the cause of this conundrum. “Burrow Warden Dissengulp– what do you suggest be done?”

An excellent question, Belwar thought. He'd thought the best outcome would be the drow getting tossed out of the city and left to find his way home. But now that felt…callous. He looked to Drizzt, second son of House Do’urden. “Do you want to go back home, boy?”

“...” Drizzt looked away. “There's nothing worth going back to.”

That settled it. Belwar faced his king once more. “We have hosted a drow guest in our city before. If you will allow it again, I will take responsibility for him.”

“That’s a weighty promise, Belwar.”

“I am aware.”

The king looked between his trusted burrow warden and the pitiful drow. “...Guards, take the prisoner to a holding cell while we decide his accommodations.”

The gnome soldiers ushered Drizzt away at spearpoint. Belwar watched them leave, hoping fervently that he would not come to regret this choice.

Part I

Part III: Malice's Revelation

[sugarpsalms]

sugar's ocs, one piece edition! Do you have time to talk about Donquixote Rosaline ("uuuh, it's Roz, don't call me that") today? GREAT! basic info sheets above the cut; a more detailed discussion of how her parents got around to conceiving her below~

I could talk about Roz all day, and definitely will if someone gets me going, but the usual first thing that comes up is how did Law comfy enough with Doflamingo to get pregnant in the first place? I'll go ahead and tackle that here (while trying to be as brief as possible aksjdf)!

In the Roz-iverse, Law and Doflamingo's relationship is canon compliant up to the point of him going to prison. It diverges there, with him only spending about 2 years in lock-up before a massive riot breaks out, which he exploits (along with a few fortuitous connections inside) to escape.

His luck runs dry again there, though, as on the outside he has nothing left now; not even really anywhere to go. Cue him spending the next 10 months or so actively on the run, having just the worst time; bad turn after increasingly and debilitatingly bad turn, all which eventually lead to him going to track Law down.

In the time before this reunion (so, approximately three years) Law is going through the motions of working towards new goals but feeling...less accomplished than he'd hoped. Ever since the events at Dressrosa, a cloud of what now has been looming over him, and while he'd expected that, he also expected it to dissipate. He figured that after the dust settled and he got used to the idea of Doflamingo being (presumably) out of his life for good, he'd be reinvigorated, have this new zest for life and a drive to accomplish whatever half-baked desire popped into his brain. But that hasn't happened yet, and while he's fine (really, yes, totally fine) he's also feeling quite strange. No matter where he goes or what he does, he can't stop himself from thinking about Doffy. It's like he's sitting on this massive goose egg of unresolved something, and also (mortifyingly) a kind of guilt that he just can't place the source of.

Once he finds out that Doflamingo escaped, however, all of this gets pushed temporarily to the back burner. Assuming he's going to get wrecked in return soon, he switches to evasive maneuvers and keeps his crew on the move near constantly after the news hits. He also gets a bit obsessive over tracking sightings of Doflamingo, which he tells himself is just practical for avoiding him; but honestly, this little scavenger hunt/cat-and-mouse chase has him feeling like his life has direction again, and while of course he'd rather keep avoiding him, he finds that after a while the idea of a confrontation isn't so off-putting. He finds himself fantasizing about it, actually; maybe even hoping for it.

When they do eventually cross paths again, though, it doesn't go how Law expects. Doflamingo surprises him with his arrival, proving that Law was right about the guy tracking him down, but the reason for it wasn't what he assumed it'd be. Doflamingo isn't at all interested in a rematch. He's dead tired, beat to hell, and desperate want of a bit of cover - even just for a few weeks! He isn't picky, he'll take what he gets; and he's entirely convinced that the person he should get it from is Law. He's paid some blood back, Law got his revenge arc, so they should be good, right? This clears the board. And if the board is clear... well, actually, that means Law owes him. Doflamingo did care for him as a child, after all, and if they aren't beefing, Law is in his debt for that.

And this is. Well. Law can't entirely argue with it. They're similar in a lot of respects, but particularly in how they conceive of transactional relationships. Much as Law doesn't care for it, he can't deny that he owes Doflamingo something - at least, in this very particular sense. So, despite the tense reunion with feelings and nastiness all over the place, he does eventually agree to put Doflamingo up for a while. Partially because, as said, he feels obligated; partially because kicking Doflamingo in this weakened state would be ultimately unsatisfying; partially because he's never been entirely comfortable with harming Doflamingo with his own hands. Partially because, he can privately admit, Doflamingo is the last connection he has to Cora; partially because, he hesitates to admit even to himself, this is the most he's felt in a while and it's all a bit thrilling.

From there, things progress slowly and awkwardly, but quite naturally. True to form, Doflamingo gets his hooks in and overstays his welcome. He takes full advantage of Law's hospitality and worms his way expertly into the crew's daily life, and in doing so, forces Law to acclimate. Doflamingo is useful to have around, actually, Law admits to himself after a while; he's not opposed to pulling his own weight when directly asked, and all that extra muscle (once he's in good health) and experience with navigation and scheming is actually beneficial. Not to mention, he's a charmer. It doesn't take long for Doflamingo to make friends. He develops a good rapport with a number of Law's crew, somehow manages to claim his own room, wrangles a say in (very) minor internal matters. And Law...he knows he should put an end to it. He knows it's dragging out. He knows it's getting too comfortable. But honestly, he's getting used to it. He's letting is guard down a bit, and every time he does, he finds it easier to get along with Doflamingo than he remembers. Annoying as the man is in most cases, Law is reluctant (for reasons he refuses to look directly into they eyes of) to make him go.

After a few years of this - Doflamingo on and off the ship at this point, because he does get back on his feet and get cabin fever and want to go off on his own now and then - their relationship has improved enough for them to start. Hm. Getting cozy. Law doesn't plan on it happening at all, but he likes the push and pull they have going; he likes how he can be mean and catty and nip and Doffy and get a little bite back. He likes that he has someone around who reads the same weird books he does, and who negates his worry about being the most off-putting bitch in the room. He also likes having someone around he can talk to about Cora, though that takes some work. Early experiments with that go...badly.

Overall, once Law gets used to the set up and allows himself to think of Doflamingo as himself, without the burden of The Everything Else, he finds him...not that bad. Actually, he kind of enjoys him. Enough to get drunk with and catfight their way into bed, at least.

It's not a relationship; Law insists on that, as does Doflamingo. They see other people, particularly when Doffy's away, but they enjoy each other's company when they're in the same place. So much so, in fact, that Law gets comfortable enough to forget to be careful now and then. Which is, um, incidentally how little Rosaline gets conceived.

[blackbutler-readerinsertsandjunk]

May a request Headcanons Hurt/Comfort about family relationship with: Doll, Maurice, Ciel and Joanne :3

I hope this is what you wanted!! <3

Hm, well… family relationships can be tricky, no doubt. After all, look at him and his twin. What’s more complicated than that? It’s something he understands, but, unfortunately, not something he really knows how to be a comfort with. He’s not good at that simply because he’s had so little comfort for his own issues, he doesn’t know how to help someone else with theirs.

Though, for all his imperfection in comforting, and for all his own attachment to his brother, he does have one gem of advice: “So what if they’re your blood? If they don’t treat you well, what makes them different than a cruel stranger?” Even though he doesn’t always take his own advice, he does believe that you shouldn’t tolerate bad treatment on the sole grounds that it’s coming from a family member. Hold them to the same standard you’d hold anyone else, and if they don’t meet that standard, do something about it. Or he will.

He’s so busy, he doesn’t often have the time to be with you. When he does, he… wants you to be happy. He doesn’t want anyone to steal your smile. If there’s anything that can be done without causing friction with your family, he’ll do it for you as long as he’s able. Don’t be afraid to tell him if there’s anything he can do, alright?

Eh… God… sorry to say, relationships with family are probably the one thing that Doll doesn’t have to worry about. She loves her family and they love her, very much, so it’s unbelievable to her that you’d be having problems. Don’t everyone’s families love and support them? It’s… sad to her, to think that your family isn’t like her family.

She really, truly, fully thinks that if she can only get herself into your family and talk to them, maybe something might change. The unfortunate fact is that some people just don’t understand the impact their treatment of others has, so surely, if your family knew how they were affecting you, then they’d be nicer. They’d take your feelings and thoughts and words into consideration. Right? She’s desperate to believe that; she can’t conceive of a family not caring about one of their members.

She’s here for you regardless, though. No matter what happens, she’ll be a steady source of stability for you. If your family aren’t treating you well? She’ll treat you twice as well, over the top, to make up for it. You don’t deserve to be hurt, so regardless of everything else, she’ll make sure you’re taken care of.

In the same vein as Doll, Joanne is… not to say useless, but he struggles to figure out how to best comfort you. His own family is incredibly supportive and loving; his parents rarely pressure him toward or away from anything, and his sister is the best older sibling anyone could ask for. That’s what’s normal for him, so he’s surprised that your family isn’t like that.

It hurts him to see you hurting! Perhaps if your families came together and saw how Joanne’s family treat him, it would be a sort of… learning experience? Your family would see how much someone flourishes when treated well, how happy and kind a person it makes them. He arranges some kind of dinner or afternoon tea or something like that, to try and win your family’s support. If it doesn’t work, (and it might not), he’s going to be devastated that his idea didn’t help you.

He’ll treat you right, even if he’s not technically ‘family’. The thought that he treats you better than your own family is sad; if he’s the only place you’ll get such treatment, though, he’ll give you all the comfort you could ever want. If nothing else, he’s very good at making you feel like your voice is heard and that you’re worthy of being treated kindly.

Is quite possibly the worst person to come to if you’re dealing with family problems. Not because he’s unsympathetic, but because he’s normalized bad family dynamics. Or, rather, his father has. He grew up watching his father criticize and hurt his mother, and gradually he’s become a victim too. He thinks that whatever you’re going through, it’s probably… normal.

… That doesn’t mean he has to like it, of course. He just takes the approach of thinking perhaps you didn’t try hard enough to ‘avoid’ your family’s punishments or whatever it happens to be… because that’s the view he takes himself. It still doesn’t mean he likes seeing you hurt, so he tries quite hard to teach you techniques that have helped him in the past. Trying to tiptoe around conflict, doing your best to do what’s expected of you, pleasing your family? He doesn’t want you hurt, so he passes on what’s worked for him.

He knows deep inside him that something has to give. While he’s terrible at standing up to his own family for himself, the strength suddenly snaps together when it comes to defending you from your family. He can’t just stand by forever, watching you be hurt and putting a tiny bandage on it. When the time comes, he’ll probably sweep you away entirely, making damn sure you’re safe from your family.

[allthingswenvier]

Xavier allowed his darling some time to settle in and unpack while he pretended to have something to do in the living room.

Truthfully, he sat, fidgeted, and waited for Wednesday to join him there.

Eventually, her curiosity forced her to leave her room and find her friend.

“........It is very quiet here.” She said as she walked into the living room.

Xavier blinked as he glanced up at her.

She had changed clothes.

Her original dark outfit had been traded in for a gothic black and white dress.

Xavier silently wondered if that held any meaning before he shrugged and said, “Told you……You can hide from the entire world out here if you want to……No one will know.”

Usually not fond of socializing, Wednesday didn’t mind spending a bit of time with Xavier.

As she cautiously approached and sat across from him on the sofa, the two continued to chat.

“I’m surprised you came.” Xavier smiled.

“..........Why?” Wednesday asked.

“I never imagined you were a……..beach person.” He chuckled.

“I wasn’t aware you had to be a ‘beach person’ to visit the ocean.” Wednesday quipped.

“You don’t, it’s just…….It doesn’t seem like something you’d be interested in.” He shrugged.

“Mother and Father brought me and Pugsley to the seaside many times when we were children.” Wednesday revealed.

Xavier listened as he studied her beautiful, dark eyes.

“...........It’s not the worst place.” Wednesday determined with a shrug as memories of stomping around the sand in her frilly black and white striped swimsuit while Pugsley ran squealing along the rolling tide faded.

The room quieted until she asked, “I assume your parents spent time here with you?”

“Dad didn’t build this house until I was already at Nevermore.” Xavier shrugged, “But I guess you could say I was at this beach with them, yeah.”

“What do you mean you ‘guess’?” Wednesday scowled.

“Dad’s told me a hundred times I was conceived here.” Xavier chuckled.

“........Here?” Wednesday blinked as her dark eyes widened, “Right here?........On this beach?”

An awkward tension filled the room before Xavier broke it with a laugh, “Yeah, that’s why he built this house. It seemed kind of cringe at first, but the more I think about it, the more I think he did it as a sort of memorial to my mother……Which is probably why he never bothers to come out here. I think he doesn’t want to face her memory, even though he tries to preserve it.”

“That invokes more tragic romance than ‘cringe’.” Wednesday said flatly.

“I mean…..” Xavier shrugged as he laughed at the facts he had presented.

“Why are you embarrassed?.....Everyone’s conceived somewhere.” Wednesday replied, “My parents claim I was made on top of my grandfather’s grave.”

Xavier’s eyes widened as his eyebrows raised, “Oh, that’s um……that’s interesting.”

“It’s an old family tradition, but I’m not inclined to believe them.” Wednesday went on.

“And why is that?” Xavier asked, eager to purge his mind from the image of Gomez and Morticia defiling someone’s final resting place.

“Have you ever seen my parents?.....When they’re around each other?” Wednesday asked.

“Uh, I don’t think I have, no.” Xavier shrugged.

Wednesday scowled.

“They’re always…….affectionate.” She slowly explained with a nod of her head.

“Yeah, actually, now that you mention it, that kind of makes sense.” Xavie nodded as he thought back to the school functions Gomez and Morticia had attended.

It had always broken his heart to see them.

If only his mother could have lived, maybe his father would have been that way with her.

Maybe his father wouldn’t have stayed gone all the time……..

“It becomes disgusting when you have to spend your life seeing and hearing them together.” Wednesday grouched, “That’s why I don’t believe them.”

“About where you were conceived?” Xavier asked.

“How could they possibly pinpoint the place?” Wednesday asked.

Xavier smiled for a moment before he let a chuckle escape his lips.

That chuckle turned into a full blown laugh and although Wednesday abhorred the sound of others’ laughter, a small smirk graced her lips as she listened to Xavier’s amusement.

———————————————————————

New chapter!

[something-pithy]

Notes and an Update: What's in a Name?

Chapter 16 of an echo, a stain features Astarion doing what he does best -- feeling terror, spiraling and at the very least contemplating terrible choices as a result. lol.

SPOILERS FOR ACT 2 OF BG3 BELOW

Those of you who are mostly caught up on an echo, a stain know I love me a flashback (and now the rest of y'all know, too lol). There are two in this new chapter, one of which is set in the Shadow-Cursed lands after Astarion has confessed his initial intentions toward and current feelings/desires for Tav to Tav (post-Orthon confession). As a result of that conversation, they've put a pin in the sexual aspects of their relationship, but are still together romantically. Then, the Araj Moment happens (spoiler alert: nobody bit that heifer), Thaniel is reunited with Oliver, Halsin's... admiration of Tav is becoming more apparent, and Astarion is... yes! Spiraling!

I think that flashback speaks for itself, and I'll let y'all get what you will from when / where in the story it appears.

The OTHER flashback, which is much more brief, is about this Tav's name. Now, I'm not trying to make any secret of the fact that the Tav in this story and I have a lot in common in terms of ethnic backgrounds when you remove the high fantasy fake world element from Tav's lol. FIRST I want to say, I don't give a fuck. There is no shame in my game. Nobody comes for George R.R. Martin or Robert Jordan or J.R.R. (the Rs are for REALLY RACIST) Tolkein (don't @ me -- or do, go ahead and send me an ask if you really want to know my feels on that one looool) for writing about characters whose ethnic and cultural backgrounds are Western European / British.

Second of all, maybe I'm being unnecessarily defensive because I'm an old head who came up in a time when writing a self-insert character was like THE VERY WORST POSSIBLE THING YOU COULD DO AS A WRITER, but once again I don't give a fuck.

The lived experiences of ethnic minorities, people of mixed ethnic and cultural heritage (not fucking half-elves who most of the time are just people of the Caucasian persuasion with pointy ears and shorter lifespans than regular elves), first generation children of immigrants, and all manner of permutations of non-white, non-Western "others" are in extremely short supply in all forms of media / popular narratives in the Western world (shit honestly, it ain't just the West but that's another struggle for another day). This is especially true, from what I've experienced as a lifelong nerdalerd, in speculative fiction.

So yeah, I conceived my Tav as a mixed-race (kind of, she's all high elf, but mixed sun, moon, and sea because she's a motherfucking unicorn, come at me bro looool -- no, there are other reasons too but also she's a unicorn lol), mixed-ethnic-and-cultural-heritage person whose life choices are NOT aligned with a lot of the conventions and values of the cultures in which she was raised.

Because that story and perspective is wildly underrepresented in literature, mass media, speculative fiction, and fan fiction.

So here we are. loooool

Having said all that, I got a comment from my fucking delightful beta and queen of my soul, Komo, asking about the naming conventions I reference in this chapter (or their real-world analogues).

So for the notes part of this episode of "Notes and an Update," I'm going to quote part of the comment she left on AO3 about the story and my response, which adheres to my policy of "why say it in five words if you can say it in EIGHT MILLION." Let me know what you think!

NAMING CONVENTIONS IN AEAS

(FROM THE COMMENTS SECTION OF AN ECHO, A STAIN CHAPTER 16:)

Komo wrote:

I have so many questions about naming conventions, both from the corner of the world that Tav’s family hails from and BG proper. Like, in American and Japanese culture, women take their husband’s last names when heterosexual couples get married. In the States, there are exceptions to this rule, of course, with some women hyphenating. In China, women do not change their last names, but kids are almost always named after the father’s side (the old one child policy may have affected this, but the top 100 most common surnames make up 85% of the population anyways). If Tav and Astarion do end up together, would names be a thing they’d have to navigate? Astarion is such a possessive little yandere after all.

I wrote:

OK so this Tav's ethnic and cultural background, as we know, is mixed

(I'm not even getting into her racial background I just can't with fucking elvish loool and her families on both sides are far-enough removed from immersion in elven culture where I'm like LOOOOOOOOOOOOOL SEE YOU LATER TOLKEIN).

On her father's side, she's Zakharan / DnD-analogue MENA (Middle Eastern North African, with apologies to Said for the orientalism of the term Middle Eastern).

On her mother's side, Amnian / New Amnian / DnD-analogue Latina but -- oh lordt OK without getting into the complexities of codified colonial Spanish racism and colorism, that identity is complicated. Through a combination of executive decision-making about elves and race and how they interact with culture on the material plane (aka not in the Feywild) AND really leaning into the idea of cultural analogues in Toril / the Forgotten Realms, her Latina-analogue ethnicity comprises a mix of indigenous and colonizer racial/ethnic heritage.

(I also can't with how fucking convoluted figuring this out was, is, has been, will forever be looool.)

SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, for the sake of brevity (looooooooooooooooool), we'll say Tav's full name results from the combination of her parents' names using Amnian/New Amnian (Spanish) naming conventions, BUT that means her full name (which is not even as long as it could be but is LONG) incorporates both Arabic naming conventions AND Spanish naming conventions that result in impressively / annoyingly long names loool.

In modern Spain, at least, when women marry, some don't even take their husband's name. But the kids' names are composites of parents' family names.

A Spanish child takes the surnames of both their father and mother. The structure is usually [father's surname] y [mother's surname] (though in modern Spain and Spanish-speaking countries a lot of people no longer use the "y"), but the main surname would be the father's surname. So for example, someone's full last name might be Juana Garcia y Martinez or Juana Garcia Martinez, but she might just go by Juana Garcia.

ALSO, especially for children of families of some kind of note / nobility when the dad's family was not as well-known as the mother's, this would include the composite names of both parents.

So Juana's name might be Juana [Garcia de Manzanilla (dad's composite surname)] y [Martinez de Hierro (mom's composite surname)].

So Juana Garcia de Manzanilla y Martinez de Hierro. And like, when people get real into it this can go back generations. Like, I don't even remember my mom's whole-ass name. looool.

NOW, Arabic names are composites, too, but incorporate the father's first name, the grandfather's first name, then the family name -- back in the day, they'd link these things with words that indicated the relationships. So for example, if Yemina's dad is Yusuf and HIS dad is Muhammad and their family name is Rashid, Yemina's name would then be Yemina bint/bin (daughter of) Yusuf ibn (son of) Muhammad al-(of the family) Rashid.

So Yemina bin Yusuf ibn Muhammad al-Rashid.

OK SO THERE'S ANOTHER COMPLICATION (aren't you glad you asked this question loooooooooooooooooooool): with regard to Spanish naming conventions, apparently this patrilineal thing hasn't always been the case and only came to be the norm around the mid-1700s. Before that, surname transmission was often matrilineal.

(This comes into play here because the year in BG3 is like, idk, 1492-98 or something? I forget whatever who cares it's before the mid-1700s and I'm just making it vaguely and very much not perfectly analogous with the time / calendar of the Western world because I don't have the bandwidth for anything else loooooooooool).

In this Tav's case, her mom ditched her dad and the kids were young enough at the time that she was able to, as a sign of DEEP FUCKING DISRESPECT TO HIM loooool, change their names to MATRILINEAL AMNIAN-STYLE COMPOSITE SURNAMES LOOOOOOOOOOOOL

(So for a while Tav's government name was Zeneida Nqa Tavares de la Torre de López Jimenez y bin Harun ibn Ishaq al-Jazairi loooool)

I mean this was like looooooooooooooool FUCKING PROFOUNDLY SCANDALOUSLY DISRESPECTFUL FOR HER TO DO TO A ZAKHARAN MAN especially one of SOME NOTE WHO WAS SELF-MADE

That shit was mad personal and a level of petty that mere mortals can only aspire to it was so deep

But TAV'S MOM DOES NOT PLAY

(Now, could she have just cut Tav's father's name out entirely? Sure, but 1) THAT MOTHERFUCKER IS NOT GETTING OUT OF CLAIMING THESE KIDS / PAYING CHILD SUPPORT esp if he ever got married again HER KIDS ARE THE FUCKING HEIRS AND HE AIN'T GON FORGET IT and 2) (possibly more importantly) FUCK HIS COUCH, PEOPLE ARE GONNA KNOW HE FUCKED AROUND AND FOUND OUT)

Even though he's deadass like "lol wtfever I don't give a fuck, I know what their real legal names are" and also this resulted in a protracted, multinational legal battle that was never actually resolved until each kid reached the age of majority and decided what their own legal name would be.

Ahem, anyway as a consequence of all this, Tav's full-ass, whole-ass, government name is:

Zeneida (first given name)

Nqa (middle given name)

bin Harun ibn Ishaq al-Jazairi (full Arabic/"Midani" patrilineal surname)

y (conjunction [means 'and'])

Tavares de la Torre de López Jimenez (mother's full surname)

So: Zeneida Nqa bin Harun ibn Ishaq al-Jazairi y Tavares de la Torre de López Jimenez

But as we know, she just goes by Zeneida Tavares, and she wasn't lying when she said on most docs it's just "Zeneida Nqa Jazairi Tavares."

Second...

tl;dr: Tavvy for short. Ms. Tavares if you nasty.

ALSO LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL

If Tav and Astarion do end up together, Astarion better adjust them expectations, bc after all the drama that's existed around her name, he gonna have a hard time getting her to change it looool

Not to mention, she has a career based in part on people knowing who she is so... loooool

SOMETHING TO LOOK FORWARD TO IF THE STARS AND PLANETS EVER ALIGN FOR THEM / THEY EVER GET THEIR HEADS OUT OF ASSES

[mamahersh]

Time for Tim's perspective from that AU I mentioned earlier:

Tim had heard in passing through some of the pre-Eyepocalypse avatars he had fallen in with after his Becoming that there was a way to get some of their aggression out in a legally acceptable way. It didn’t surprise him that they were looking for that, as having all the power in the world suddenly removed and turned mortal in a moment would of course aggrieve the kind of people who were brought under the auspices of the Lightless Flame. Tim himself, after the Reversal, had been making due through a gym membership and reconnecting with Sasha. However, that part of him that he had tried to bury after the apocalypse reared its ugly head and whispered how nice it would be to properly cause someone pain again.

Well, he ignored the voice. Of course he did, he wasn’t a monster (not anymore at least). But the curiosity that drew him to the Institute in search of answers still wanted more info. After all, it wasn’t everyday you’d hear that the government had legalised something horrific. Not to say it hadn’t turned a blind eye to what happened to avatars after the Reversal (part of the reason Tim kept to himself and Sasha as much as he could nowadays), but more to say it hadn’t actively discriminated against people for what they did during the end of the world. It was very much, “don’t ask, don’t tell” on that front, and so long as you didn’t go around trying to be a sick freak while people were pulling their lives together, then no one made assumptions. Now, if you had had a large domain with plenty of people suffering in it who knew who you were and what kind of person you were, then there was always the possibility you’d find yourself battling off an angry mob ready to tear you apart. However, since Tim’s domain had been relatively small, and taken to tormenting anyone with fears related to losing their vast assets and reputation, he hadn’t seen anyone afterwards and he would assume that being placed in a world where their worst fears were a reality but not nearly as bad as they had feared, maybe they were content to just live and let live. Afterall, it wasn’t his fault the world ended. He just happened to personally know the guy who did.

Which brought him back around to this secret way of stress relief, which he finally got off a former Slaughter avatar he could never remember the name of. Apparently, within a month of the Reversal, it had gotten out that Jonathan Sims was the one who ended the world, and it was the combined effort of Martin, Basira, Melanie, and Georgie who stopped him from doing “worse” and instead kicked off the Reversal. What “worse” was, no one seemed to know, but it was the consensus amongst anyone who did know Jon’s fate that the government had done its job right for once. Apparently, Jon had been sentenced to “jail” for 3 years. While it had been hotly debated whether he should be given the death penalty or life-time behind bars; Martin had stepped in and made a convincing case for Jon’s innocence. Thus, between Martin and the judge, it had been decided that Jon would serve 3 years in prison. There was a caveat to the deal though, that in basically any other circumstance would have infringed on every humanitarian effort conceivable and caused a massive outcry, and that Martin was apparently uninformed on. This caveat was that Jon would be legally allowed to be tortured by the general public and the prison guards during his stay behind bars. So long as he didn’t die, the rumour went, you could basically do anything you wanted as long as you told the guards ahead of time.

Tim wasn’t sure how he felt about that, all he knew was that he would not breathe a word of it to Sasha. Besides, it wasn’t technically public knowledge and most people that knew about it were people who would be more likely to act on it. He would have suspected the Web was involved if he wasn’t already certain that the Fears were no longer tied to their reality. As it stood, all he knew was that whatever his coworker had done, ending the world might just justify 3 years of torture. (Many years later, Jon would later tell Tim in that soft voice he had taken to speaking in, and with a thoughtful frown he so often wore even before they were estranged, that even the Fears themselves could not have set up so perfect a punishment for ending the world. Tim would ask if it was the torture, and Jon would merely shake his head, allow himself a wry grin, and silently stare into the middle distance. (What Jon never told anyone but his therapist, was that living free after the fact, to learn how to be a person again, was more painful than a lifetime of torture before an ignominious end, and far more mercy than he had deserved.))

-

The first thing Tim noticed about Jon was that his hair was shorter than he remembered. Not that it really surprised him, seeing as he was in jail, but more that a part of him had been expecting it to have been even longer than before his Becoming. The second thing he noticed threw him off completely. Carved into Jon’s forehead, and seemingly almost on display, was a scarification tattoo in the shape of an eye that had been X’d out. He wanted to ask, but he had promised to be silent till Martin re-introduced them, and he had a feeling this too was a part of the infamous deal that was keeping Jon alive and not buried 2 metres down via angry mob.

[loopy777]

Whats your thoughts on the way aang, zuko and the earth king who's name i can never recall handled the former fire nation colonies? Cause frankly speaking looking at it objectively, it really does seem like the compromise route and let them become sorta independant was the worst of both sides.

Culturally speaking, like it or not the area had become fire nation dominant, which would be a very strong argument for them remaining part of the fire nation.

On the other hand, the earth kingdom is right that they took the land by right of force, with no casus beli, no marriage ties that bound the fire nation royalty and whoever was the lords of the land together. It was as clear cut a right by conquest and nothing more as you can get.

Finally the independent route seems to have just been a compromise to not allow either side to truly "win", rather than an actual, good solution.

And in the end it ended up with Aang's republic project(good job on being a neutral party aang ;D) ending up as an abyssmal failure, both during his own time as robber barons consolidated power during his reign, and then falling completely off the wayside after he died, then replaced with a just as bad successor after the first election.

While things does seem to kinda be looking up after the last election in the comics, it does seem like aang should have just taken a side, or if he was going to compromise, it should probably have been something along the lines of demilitarize the entire zone on a permanent basis, but allow the Fire nation to keep it. Or allow fire nation citizens to remain but let the Earth Kingdom retake political control(This is what I would have done by the way) over the colonies, with those who remained legally becoming earth kingdom citizens.

Yeah, there were no good solutions, but I feel like there were better compromises possible than what 'The Promise' claimed were the only possibilities. To summarize, here's what those options were:

The colonies go back to the Earth Kingdom and everyone either from the Fire Nation or of at least partial Fire Nation descent is deported back to the Fire Nation forcibly.

The colonies remain under full Fire Nation control and the ruling Fire Nation social class gets to stay on top.

The colonies all become independent, and on a case-by-case basis some of them might choose to hold elections and of those some of them might elect at least one person of Earth Kingdom descent to participate in the local government.

I like your radical and hard-to-conceive-of idea of putting the Earth Kingdom in charge and then not deporting people. Perhaps, in that scenario, we can even reduce the influence of the rich Fire Nation upper class types with taxes on wartime family/clan gains, or something like that. The money would be used to fund local stuff rather than merely inflating Ba Sing Se's coffers.

Or, the colonies could have been made independent, but the Fire Nation is given some kind of corresponding punishment so that it's not perfectly positioned to profit from the situation. Perhaps all Fire Nation residents can be banned from trading with any of the colonies for a century or something, giving the Earth Kingdom a chance to make practical and cultural in-roads. Or, just have the ban last for Aang's lifetime, and now he's the one dodging all the Fire Nation assassins! It would give Zuko a chance to sleep, at least.

Of course, both of those leave plenty of opportunities for cheats and corruption, which is where I presume Aang would have to keep an eye on things and fight the people making a mess of things. That sounds like something more out of one of F.C. Yee's novels, which I would be quite happy with. It's certainly a lot more interesting than having Aang deal with the same Bender Vs NonBender conflict that even LoK couldn't make plausible with twelve episodes and the best voice-acting in the business.

However, I'm not against the idea that the United Republic still eventually becomes a corrupt land where capitalism runs wild, no one believes in spirits, and organized crime is a more effective government than the actual ruling council. But I'd like the steps that lead to that to be framed as the gAang's failures. As it is, all of Aang's adventures in the former colonies conclude with what are presented as happy endings, and things only go wrong when bad people slip in while he's not looking. If Republic City is supposed to be so bad that LoK's happy ending is most of the city being rendered a wasteland, then why can't we see Aang losing when something about the former colonies is at stake? I mean, yeah, the 8-year-olds the comics are aimed at probably would be confused and stop reading, but they probably didn't like 'The Puppetmaster' either, so who cares about them? Give me the 12-year-olds starving for some tragedy in their family-friendly media.

Those are probably the kids destined for careers in politics, anyway, so they might enjoy taxation as a plot element.

[infinitelycomplexpuzzles]

One thing I've been thinking about in terms of Dionysus' characterization is that he's got three different sides to him? Because his characterization over several hundred years changes radically, and as the god of madness, I can only think to make him three separate gods in one body.

There's Zagreus, which was probably the original version of him before he god A. incinerated inside his mother's womb and B. torn apart by titans. He's logical and rational and cold, as fitting as the god that 'died' and was reborn. He's the most 'sane' of the personalities. He's also the part of Dionysus that is the god of revelation and discovered wisdom; the one that guys like Plato worshipped while trying to discover new ideas.

Then there's Dionysus himself. The 'main' identity so to speak. The reason for this is that, after he was torn apart by the titans, it was Dionysus, the distillation of pure will, that pulled himself back together again, something that should have been impossible. Dionysus is the god of metamorphosis, the god of change and passion, the god of desire and wine and intoxication. He's the god of healing through discovery, the god of ecstasy and self actualization. More than anything, he IS. Dionysus is whatever Dionysus wishes to be; he does not conceive of himself as a concrete thing, which is why he can break so many 'rules' in Greek mythology. It's why he could raise his wife and mother to godhood (something only Zeus should be able to do), and doesn't follow the whims of fate (which should not be possible). But it's also why he does thing like take souls out of the underworld on a whim (again, Hades should have stopped him?).

But that's not all he is. Dionysus has another incarnation in later mythology: Bacchus. And the cult of Bacchus, as attended by guys like Caligula and Nero. And they got dark. I mean it was a cult devoted to breaking taboos and going as far as one could possibly go, a cult devoted to debauchery and madness and doing the worst shit that you could possible imagine and more. There's a reason why it was banned, and if you understand the way the romans viewed gods, you'll know that's it was very hard for any faith to get banned in ancient Rome.

Bacchus is the part of Dionysus that was cursed with madness by Hera; rather than ever become cured of the madness, Dionysus made it a part of himself, and thus Bacchus was born. Bacchus is twisted, psychotic, and in some cases entirely uncomfortable. The reason is that if Dionysus is the part of the night that feels good, Bacchus is the part of the night where you're too far out and everything goes sideways. Dionysus is revelry, Bacchus is debauchery.

Unsurprisingly, Bacchus doesn't get let off the leash much. Except when Dionysus is pissed. Stories like the Bacchae, or the story of Lycurgus, or other stories where Dionysus goes apeshit and punishes mortals in the most brutal ways? Yeah that's Bacchus. Bacchus is the Joker of Ancient Greece basically, mixed with a kind of lust and depravity that would make most supervillains blush. He is bad news.

But that's the kind of thing with the twice-born god. He wears different masks. Theoretically, it should be Zagreus wearing Dionysus and Bacchus as the comedy and tragedy masks, but in practice it's Dionysus wearing the other two. And while all three have their strengths and weaknesses, when they're all in agreement they're on par with nearly any other divinity.

Which is why it's usually a good thing they are usually not on the same page.