#he was born to make history

[cryptocism]

"just as I did, in 1983."

you'd never know my favourite parts of the show are the fucked up insane bits when my first instinct is to draw the cheesiest thing imaginable

[whetstonefires]

Also the thing is, Jiang Cheng can't share how he threw himself out there as chum to cover Wei Wuxian, because it isn't a usefully reciprocal confession to the revelation about Wei Wuxian's core.

All it says is: there was a moment on the worst day of my life (up to that point) where I valued your life more than my own.

That's all. Arguably it says not even that, because Jiang Cheng is established as insecure enough that he very much cannot prove that this was an act driven primarily by affection and the will to protect, rather than guilt and shame and grief, and the desire to make a gesture that would prove his worth to himself, and let him opt out of the pain of having outlived the world he knew and almost everything he loved.

(after all, this self-sacrifice fairly directly followed an episode of 'strangling wei wuxian while blaming him for everything' and then being taken care of by wei wuxian like this hadn't even happened.

normally, jiang cheng is not someone who is physically violent. he is verbally violent all the time, but his physical violence is typically reserved for mortal enemies. that first time he came within throwing distance of murdering wei wuxian in a fit of grief-rage was almost certainly more traumatic for him than it was for wei wuxian, who is really good at compartmentalizing that kind of shit.

interesting element of mirroring there though, in that jiang cheng allowed wei wuxian to know about the murderous rage but not the self-destructive love, leading wei wuxian to misunderstand the exact shape of his place in jiang cheng's life and act on the basis of the rejection, in a way that encouraged relationship decay, just as wei wuxian's own secret-keeping would later lead jiang cheng to do in reply. vicious cycle!)

But the important thing is that this truth doesn't really explain anything.

Wei Wuxian's mute self-mutilation for Jiang Cheng's sake explained everything. All the withdrawal, the betrayal, what he thought was the rejection; the previously inexplicable decisions to abandon the teachings and home and allegiances that bound them in favor of death and the children of their enemies. Wen Ning's revelation explained it all, and recast it utterly.

It made the story different in a way that mattered a lot to the people in it.

What Jiang Cheng did...it shows he wasn't unworthy of that sacrifice in the way everything else about the narrative paints him. It's a grace note to his character.

It's not meaningless, exactly. It's just also not enough to actually change the weight of debt between them; it doesn't restructure the narrative.

It's not even, truly, new information.

Wei Wuxian knows Jiang Cheng loved him. Wanted to protect and keep him. He knows Jiang Cheng understood his abandonment as a betrayal, that Jiang Cheng felt he was owed better, and that this sense of being-entitled was a major impetus behind his increasing hostility.

Adding this little scrap of context for those reactions, for that rage--it's not enough. It gives Jiang Cheng a little more reason to have felt hard done by, validates a little of that wild resentment and makes it less of a spoiled young master reaction, lends it more dignity.

But your feelings being valid doesn't really go that far to justifying actions taken because of them. The hurt was already sympathetic; the choices aren't really changed by the context making it more so.

After all, he knew he'd lost his core protecting Wei Wuxian, but he also knew that Wei Wuxian risked his own life almost as foolishly extracting him again afterward, and 'knew' that Wei Wuxian freely gave away his only connection with his own dead mother and access to the help of an immortal for his sake; they were already square by rights in the world as he understood it, and he still acted the way he did.

And after all, Wei Wuxian's actions in his first life were always taking Jiang Cheng and Jiang Cheng's feelings into consideration, even when it didn't look like it; even when he fucked up, and Jiang Cheng paid for it. Right up until he lost his mind, and to an extent afterward.

'Consciously, on purpose choosing against someone out of spite' is something Wei Wuxian did not ever do to him, which he did do to Wei Wuxian. A lot. Escalating.

That doesn't become any less happened because at a prior time he did the opposite.

All the while not putting a lot of effort into worrying about Wei Wuxian's feelings, or how to spare them, because one of the norms of their relationship was that Jiang Cheng's feelings deserved to be privileged and handled gently, but Wei Wuxian was too tough to need that kind of consideration. Except about dogs.

That's a norm Jiang Cheng accepted and took for granted; it turned out to be the norm that broke their relationship, because Wei Wuxian treated 'protecting Jiang Cheng's delicate feelings' as such a mandatory task that he put it over things that logic would call much more important.

And so there's no way Jiang Cheng can talk about how he lost his core trying to die for Wei Wuxian without sounding like he's trying to justify himself, to wipe his deliberate-choice-to-harm off the record with a single act of goodness.

When Wei Wuxian has never once for a second tried to argue that his own goodness cancels out his crimes.

(He doesn't even argue that other people's crimes cancel out his crimes; the furthest he's gone is that since everyone involved did or abetted evil shit, it's inappropriate and bullshit to construct him as uniquely villainous and structure a concept of justice around that falsehood.)

So the only meaning that truth can carry now, after everything, coming from Jiang Cheng, is his saying: Please. I'm a better person than you think I am. I loved you more than you believe.

I was just as good as you, no matter what everyone always thought. I deserve for you to love me like you did before, in spite of everything, and I deserve not to have to say I'm sorry, and I deserve your respect, and and and--

And he is not gonna fucking say that.

[cryingalexanders]

Source: Smallville s2e17 "Rosetta" & s2e18 "Visitor"

Source: Superman: Birthright #6, #8

Source: Action Comics #1000

Source: Last Days of Lex Luthor #1

[john-laurens]

Francis Kinloch & Smallpox

While reading through the Francis Kinloch-Johannes von Müller letters, I came across the following lines (Kinloch to Müller, September 22, 1804):

We are all Well_ & my little one has been just vaccinated_ excepting the French Revolution this discovery was is the most Wonderful circumstance I know of_

The "little one" was Kinloch's daughter Caroline, who was only 3 months old at the time. She would have been vaccinated against smallpox. The smallpox vaccine had recently been developed by Edward Jenner in 1796 - he used the similar cowpox virus to confer immunity against the smallpox virus. Prior to the development of this vaccine, inoculation/variolation was practiced to protect people against smallpox. This involved exposing people to scabs or secretions from a smallpox patient, typically delivered into cuts in the skin. Vaccination had fewer risks compared to inoculation/variolation, as the patient was not actually exposed to the smallpox virus.

At first glance, I appreciated Kinloch's opinions from a public health perspective and appreciated that he was invested in the health and well-being of his newborn daughter.

As I continued to read through the letters, I then came across these brief lines at the closing of a letter (Kinloch to Müller, June 5, 1787):

I now bid you adieu_ for my only son has the Small Pox, & I am with his Mother a joint Nurse_

I knew Kinloch had one son named Frederick, but the date of the letter confused me. Frederick's birth year is reported as 1790-1791 - several years after the writing of this letter. I then realized the somber truth. Francis and his wife Martha had a son that died of smallpox. Francis and Martha married December 9, 1785, so the son was likely born in 1786-1787, making him but an infant when he contracted smallpox and passed away. This son was likely their only child until their daughter Anne was born in 1789.

I do find it interesting that Francis and Martha seem to have shared in the care for their ill son. It again speaks to the level of interest and involvement Francis had in his children's well-being (certainly it speaks to Martha's care as well, but the image of a wealthy 18th century man being his child's nurse is surprising). Given that Francis and Martha were directly interacting with their ill son, they were presumably both incoulated against smallpox (or had survived a previous case of smallpox). Inoculation would have been riskier in young children given their developing immune systems.

This discovery adds so much more meaning to the first quote. Kinloch was not simply a man interested in the scientific advances of the day - he was a grieving father who was grateful for the ability to protect his newborn daughter against the same disease that had taken the life of his first son.

[silvermeww]

okay, when was someone going to tell me that

oh, idk, steven started at 19, burgh has a younger sister, clay actually isn't born american, skyla's whole fam thing and ELESA IS 15???? (even younger than skyla like wtf???)

(also the 'alder' at the bottom is supposed to be drayden lol)

and that's not all

say hello to:

viola being 18??? 'black whirlwind' korrina, RAMOS MEETING AZ'S FLOETTE AS A KID, genderfluid and apparently also age-fluid olympia, CLEMONT?? AND HIS WHOLE THING DOWN TO BEING 12 OF ALL AGES???

(you know what, marlon being 30 definitely makes sense with the hippie vibes)

wikstrom SAYING that he only wears that suit in pokemon battles but i've never seen his casual wear, malva being pr for flare lol, drasna selling dragon merch + great family lore if you want to know, siebold having to third-wheel lysandre and sycamore while eating (move aside malva, you're not the only elite 4 dealing with this) and 20?? YEARS OLD?? DIANTHA????????????

(way too many men in kalos are getting ladies, c'mon)

ethan being into history is such a neat detail hmmm, idk much of the frontier brains ngl, and we've finally got the region for looker and it's... hoenn??? you know what, makes sense with his chaotic vibes so i'll take it (throws away unova taped to a rock behind my back). also he's abolsutely cheating we all see that he's just relying on knowing us as protags, should've known smh

(um i think someone said that 'caitlin' should've been anabel but idk)

oh and the last one is charon, if we care about how much of a loser he really is. forget about birch and the poochyena, this guy is the lowest heh. imagine being charon (please don't).

(when the protags of johto are the same age as clemont lol) (yeah i know there are years between those events just let me have this)

and last but not least:

aaron 🤝 valerie: wanting to be pokemon (and ig gotta toss in shauntal with the ao3 writer gift heh, don't know if they would commission her or stay away), bertha's description???? i love flint just saying, cynthia 👀👀 is absolutely doing something illegal 👀👀, roark is WHAT??? (child labour laws in sinnoh must be lax ngl), maylene as well???? fantina watching scary movies is something i'll have to incorporate into my worldview and bryon?? are you okay??

so yeah. credit goes to @/KuroBlitz96 on the twitter/x for having this up, i'm just here to project sheer surprise at this massive dump of ages... my thoughts on pokemon have completely turned on its head once more lol (this is fine)

[luthnethril]

📓

Put "📓" or some other version of a book emojii into my inbox and i'll explain the plot of a fanfiction that I haven't written but I daydream about

one that's recurring and lives rent-free in my head even though it has barely any plot is a setting where the elves go to Valinor, but the Valar do not wage war on Melkor and imprison him into the Void, so he's just kind of. free out there because he ran off to hide and create Angband. Which is worse for the elves who remain in Beleriand and the Girdle of Melian is probably put up earlier. Anyway.

The main part of this fic idea is that we have Fëanor in Valinor with Nerdanel and his (so far) three kids with another one on the way living in the equivalent of an one-family caravan moving around every so often to explore more of Valinor's lands. They don't check in too often with Finwë and the palace due to a lack of a postal service in the middle of nowhere and anyway at some point in the early noontide of Valinor baby Maedhros is like. 40 years old, baby Maglor is like 20 while Celegorm is the equivalent of a very excited toddler and Caranthir is still an idea in the womb.

They've settled just outside this forest up North and one day Maedhros and Maglor are out playing/exploring the forest (bc, yk, this was the land where they were all going to be perfectly safe forever) when Maedhros picks up that there's something Wrong™; like perhaps a chill, or some more darkness than is usual in the North so far away from the Two Trees.

Now, at this point they do live in a Melkor-free Valinor, but because Melkor hasn't been imprisoned there are more thoughts spared for the elves who remained in Beleriand (and thought to be all dead) and Fëanor as well as Maedhros and Maglor have grown up with stories of the Dark Rider and the Journey West from Cuiviénen, so Maedhros feels the air shift and thinks. I've heard of this happening before.

So, he makes Maglor hide inside a tree trunk and tells him they're going to 'play a game' where he has to stay hidden in the tree humming the "don't notice me" song enchantment he's perfected for hiding from Nerdanel when she wants to make them do chores and make no sound at all or get out no matter what until Maedhros tells him it's okay to come out.

(Maglor has not picked up that anything's wrong with the forest, but he's picked up that his brother is worried and he's getting more scared every time Maedhros refuses to tell him what's going on).

Anyway, point is, Maglor does as he's told and hides and Maedhros goes as far away from the tree as he can trying to make sense of what's going on and then. Melkor shows up. He appears as an extension of the darkness, more solid and bottomless eating up the forest that existed behind him before he showed up, with sharp, visible teeth and glowing red eyes. No body, just solid clouds of light-blocking darkness surrounding small Maedhros.

Small Maedhros, with all the bravery that knowing Maglor is hiding behind him gives him, looks up at Melkor and lies. He plays dumb, he asks to know who he is, why he's here and lets Melkor underestimate him to make sure the Vala never suspects Maglor is also there and as vulnerable as Maedhros himself is. He tells Melkor that he has to get back to his father because he promised his brother he's take him out to play in the forest. That he's alone here and he needs to get back.

Melkor finds baby Maedhros very entertaining and does not suspect that he's being lied to by a child of Valinor and tries to trick/convince Maedhros to go with him, that he'll take him back to his family when 'we'll play a game' does not work. Maedhros insists that he knows the way back and doesn't need any help, thank you. Eventually Melkor runs out of patience and when Maedhros runs away from him reaches out with more darkness and shrouds Maedhros with it, taking him away.

The darkness goes away and the forest returns to normal. Fëanor, pregnant Nerdanel and baby Celegorm go out to find Maedhros and Maglor; they only find Maglor inside the tree when he passes out and stops singing the enchantment. They don't find Maedhros.

They pack up everything and ride back to Valinor to tell Finwë what's going on. Maglor wakes up on the way but he's in no state to say anything; his eyes are wide and he's shaking and he starts crying silently and humming the enchantment again and it takes Nerdanel hours to convince him he's safe now, at which point Maglor slumps against her, catatonic, and does not say anything else.

(Needless to say that Fëanor, scared shitless, is having an absolutely horrible time).

Finwë sends an army of search parties out North with Fëanor, but they never find a trace of Maedhros except the little copper eight-pointed star brooch with the red ruby in the middle Fëanor made for Maedhros when he was born and Maedhros dropped on the ground on purpose. They send people to Mahanaxar to ask the Valar for help. Maglor, scared and not talking, barely moving, tells Celegorm enough about the 'darkness' that took Maedhros that when Celegorm relays it to his parents and Finwë and Indis, everyone knows what exactly it was that took Maedhros.

They never find him. The Valar are all very sorry, but they can't do anything about it. Melkor shouldn't have been able to come into Valinor, just don't go up so far from the Trees again. It should be fine. It will never happen again.

Not really much plot after that actually. I've been thinking a lot about Fëanor's sons and their cousins growing up and Maglor being the only one who remembers Maedhros because he was the only one old enough to, Celegorm remembers him vaguely. None of their cousins have met Maedhros; Caranthir and the rest of the brothers are born and grow up with the knowledge that they have a brother Maedhros who's gone which their parents don't talk about (Nerdanel starts crying even as she tries to tell them about Maedhros so they'll know and Fëanor's face goes terrifyingly blank and the air sizzles around him so they never dare to ask). Maglor is always sad and melancholy and prone to shouting when people choose to forget Maedhros ever existed and his brothers minus Celegorm don't really connect with him because Maglor is making minimal effort to communicate in turn.

Eventually Maglor puts up a play/musical that's just what happened that day when Maedhros disappeared and that's the first time anyone really finds out how that went down and why Maglor feels so guilty and responsible about it in a way everyone thought up to then that made no sense/was just the trauma of meeting the Dark Rider. Maglor makes sure the costume for Melkor does justice to the terrifying embodiment of darkness with teeth and glowing eyes he saw as a child, which disturbs everyone greatly.

It makes the Valar very uncomfortable.

I had an idea of Fëanor obsessing over the idea of saving his son, never letting go or admitting that Maedhros is probably dead like Míriel and holding on to his grief and anger like it's the only thing keeping him from fading. Perhaps even going to Angband in secret to rescue Maedhros.

Another idea involves Maedhros being Melkor's personal favourite prisoner and being kept alive, meeting some of Mahtan's of Finwë's relatives in Angband, perhaps even escaping by himself when Melkor and Sauron are not there? Like I said, there's not much concrete plot besides the main idea here.

[strawbfairyy]

yuri on ice fucks btw. hey. did we all know about yuri on ice. can i tell u about this cool show called yuri on ice.

[lemongogo]

why do i love the conflict more than anything else . the misery . the incompatibility that spreads like oil slick . wanting so desperately for resolution that never comes . hmmm

[queenlucythevaliant]

We see him come and know him ours

Russia: "Carol of the Russian Children," traditional // Kenya: The Nativity, Elima Njau // France: "Bring a Torch, Jeanette Isabella," Nicolas Saboly // Haiti: Madonna and Child, Ismael Saincilus // Australia: "The Three Drovers," William James // China: Tryptic by Lu Hongnian // Canadian/Algonquian: "Huron Carol," Jean de Brébeuf

[the-faultofdaedalus]

shadowheart is a werewolf you CANT change my mind

[thedrotter]

look i know this month has been crazy already in what has been going on for me BUT IT GETS CRAZIER... I got to finally have my constant pain I've had for two years diagnosed... I have fibromyalgia lol i have a chronic illness??😭😭

tbf it doesn't change anything i was already coping with these pains because I've been sitting with em for 2 years i just have anti depressants now but you know what has changed... my character lore GOT SICK AS FUCK!!!!!!!🦅🦅🦅🦅 (lighthearted)

[randomnameless]

My husband came up with this idea that made me see Ionius in a slightly different way: Edelgard mentions that the Empire "demands many heirs" in her Goddess Tower support w/ Byleth, hence why Ionius had a load of kids by different women. Normally I'd think "wow that's stupid, way to invite a power struggle after you're dead" but what if it's actually an Empire tradition? Like, Ionius maybe is the first Emperor in a while to try to consolidate power but maybe only one of many to have a ton of kids, AND the reason is not only to have a kid with a Crest, but that the Slitherers practice Crest experimentation on each generation of heirs with the hope of creating a two-crested Nemesis clone to help them kill off the Nabateans. Ionius just happened to be the survivor of his batch of siblings. Maybe having 10-11 kids is to make sure that some of them will live long enough to be the next Emperor, and that's why the "Empire demands many heirs."

Oh!

FWIW, the Index of Imperial Nobility mentions how House Vestra is supposed to "coordinate things such as Imperial Consorts", adding to that how House Vestra has been at the Hresevelgs' back since the danw of the Empire, yeah, we can make a pretty good case that Adrestia has a long standing tradition of, uh, imperial consorts and all.

It can be seen as dumb because it invites power struggles, but it avoids the issue that could very well have happened with the Kingdom, aka Dimitri ded = the King's direct line is dead and it's chaos because one of the first duties of a King/Emperor/Leader under those kinds of hereditary systems is, well, to secure a heir - the lineage cannot be broken!

(that's where we usually have sekrit heirs popping up from nowhere in some kinds of stories, or bastard children !)

Having multiple Consorts - thus a large number of heirs - makes it sure that the line will not be broken as easily as, idk, a baby choking on a pretzel or a serious flu.

However, as Hanneman mentions in Hubert's support, having dozens of consorts means creating dozens of families who suddenly have to get some privileges bcs the Emperor is figging their daughters - and depending on how powerful those families are, if the Emperor obviously favors one kid over the others (or pisses on one over the others) one of those families might not be happy and start shit in the Empire - taking more and more consorts means shaving little by little the power of the Emperor in Adrestia!

(and guesses who spearheads the insurrection? Arundel, one of those "consort kin"!)

The topic of Ionius' 11 children is sadly forgotten by the plot - but iirc Word of God said the Ordelias (Lysithea) were experimented upon as a test, and when the Agarthans had, uhhh, conclusive results, they experimented on the Hresvelgs.

Given who was in charge when Ordelia was ran over by Adrestia - even if no character mentions the consequences or make a link because you have tea bags to sell - imo it would totally make sense that Ionius killed two birds with one stone : flexing his underdeveloped muscles at peons who helped people who dared to betray him, and getting guinea pigs for his plans to get the strongest Emperor ever.

Bear in mind that the Ordelia fuckery was done before the Insurrection aka, Ionius had this plan before Ludwig'n'co decided to depose him!

(Was Vestra aware of what was going on? Who were the Agarthans working with Ionius? Is it a situation à la Manfroy'n'Arvis, people disapproving of the Emperor listening at shady people?)

The Ordelia experiments leads me to believe the plan to become "super strong with dual crests" was hatched and developed during the Ionius era, but again, the game is so crappy at lore building that we don't even know if Ionius had 10 (legitimate) sibs, or only 5, and what they are doing when Supreme Leader is running the show, or did when Ionius was defanged.

Granted, we don't know since when Agarthans are slithering in Adrestia - if we believe the "Willy's sekrit history" was tampered with and assume Supreme Leader was telling the truth, that it was passed down in generations, maybe Agarthans were slowly manipulating Adrestian Emperor to get their revenge on Nabateans (in Nopes, a book about the rebellion of the Southern Church mentions how the Emperor wanted to cut ties with the Central Church anyways since a long time, but doesn't explain why).

And so, maybe Agarthans devised several plans, that all failed, to make the Hresvelgs turn against the Church and be strong enough to be flattened in 5 seconds, and it only worked during Ionius' era ?

We will never know, but it's still fun to think and headcanon about!

To bounce back on the "Adrestia demands many heirs" thing, given how I am fond of a certain AU, what if

This came up as a reaction to the entire Lycaon debacle?

Wilhelm 1 picked a heir, his heir died "to a mysterious illness" and instead of assuming rulership or helping another heir to rule - like he did for Lycaon - Wilhelm bailed out of Adrestia.

It could be explained by Lycaon being the golden child and favourite kid of his dad, so if he's not the one ruling, Dad doesn't give a fuck anymore about his Empire... or -

What if Lycaon was Willy's only child, and the subsequent Hresvelgs are "cousins" or members of a branch family?

In that case, it wouldn't be Willy playing favourites, but bailing out because his own son "suddenly fell ill and died" and he wouldn't be as involved as he was in helping his own kid, if now we're talking about helping a great grand-nephew or someone else.

(Rhea would have had to give a transfusion to the subsequent Emperor - i name her by convenience Hildegarde bcs no imagination and it's faster to type than "the female emperor who succeeded Lycaon and dueled against Ferdie's ancestor who wanted the throne" - to make people believe there is a direct continuity between Wilhelm, Lycaon, Hildegarde and her future heirs).

In that "only kid" scenario, it would also justify why House Hresvelg became so obsessed with taking Consorts and having a lot of heirs - Adrestia was nearly left Emperor-less after Lycaon's death because they had no other heirs to pick a successor from...

[jtl-fics]

You said you had something queued for the non-specific reality show AU?

WIP WEDNESDAY

"Welcome to Ugh." Andrew says while sitting in a perfectly white room on a simple black chair.

"We're your hosts, I can't believe I'm still alive to suffer through this, it's Jean Moreau." Jean says pouring half of a bottle of wine into a wine glass and handing the rest of the bottle to Andrew before taking a sip.

Andrew accepts the bottle, "And Contractually obligated by the Real House-spouses of Exy to say I'm happy to be here, Andrew Minyard." Andrew says.

"Today's segments include, 'No Kevin just because it has Exy in the title doesn't mean any of us want to hear about changes in player stats'" Jean says tiredly.

"And ,of course, 'Is it fashion or is Neil just hot enough to pull it off?' The answer may surprise you."

****

Thanks @ittyybittybaker for goofing around with me in messages about this yesterday lol

[fourfoldfires]

"greystone, eh? that's a name that wouldn't sound amiss belonging to one of my people." "it's not as glorious as you might think, master belanger."

(clementain belanger, wandering duskwight bard // aveline greystone, knight of house haillenarte)

[acorrespondence]

@freekicks Oh man I have lots; so many that I’m making this a new post so I don’t clog up that poor person’s replies with 50 messages, haha! Basically, it’s an expansion on the idea that everyone has headcanons/canon details that are absolutely integral to their enjoyment of the story and any transformative works based on it (hard), and headcanons/canon details that they’re fond of but could still get pretty much unaltered enjoyment out of a fic that contradicts them (soft). Obviously all these are just opinions and what I get out of the story isn’t and shouldn’t have to be the same as what anyone else gets out of it.

One thing that sort of falls in the middle of the headcanon/canon divide is Raylan’s age when his mother died. The show contradicts itself on this point several times, and so it’s sort of fungible. I personally find the idea that Raylan’s mother died when he was very young, like younger than Loretta, while it may serve the parallels between them, to be much less compelling than the idea that she died later. It’s just so much more… boring for a character whose mother died when he was ten or so to have a gross misrepresentation of who she was as a person in his mental image of her. It’s much more compelling to me if he held onto that despite direct evidence to the contrary that he was old enough to understand. Of course he’d forget the hatchet story if it happened when he was eight. If it happened when he was eighteen, that opens up a much realer possibility that he just straight up repressed it, which is fascinating. Also, I don’t think it makes sense if he grew up with Helen in the house for the second half of his life there. To me that doesn’t really jive with their current relationship. (And on a less story-driven note, I am fascinated by the idea that, if Raylan’s mother died when he was thirty, he might not have attended her funeral. Because part of him knew it would challenge the version of her he had to remember in order to maintain his black and white perception of the world.)

Obviously, the mine and what it represents is a necessary component (though the time and place less so—my Old Guard au places them in the miners’ strikes of the 30s, and I’ve read a wonderful fic where the mine in question was on a different planet entirely. However, it does have to be placed in Harlan, or whatever approximation of Harlan fits the broader setting). The boys and their relationships with their daddies is another nonnegotiable for me. Specifically, the way they grew up; different times and causes of death for Bo and Arlo can work just as well. If Raylan and Boyd don’t meet until they’re established adults, that immediately kills my interest. Their rich history is so integral to why I’m drawn to the ship in the first place. It’s a hard sell for me to have Boyd leave or Raylan stay directly after the mine, but I’ve been known to make an exception if the story is compelling enough and doesn’t sacrifice characterization.

I think Boyd’s criminal history is important, though the nature of it less so. And even more important is the fact that Boyd never really makes it big as a criminal—making him some kind of fief lord of crime makes him much less interesting to me. His plans only succeed inasmuch as he always manages to survive their unraveling. I think it’s important that he’s spent time incarcerated. I’m not a huge fan of stories where they meet again outside of Harlan and never go back, it takes away the central tension between them and the place that made them that Raylan so struggles with and Boyd embraces so wholly, which for me is a really interesting part of their relationship, this dichotomy. I also don’t care for stories that give them a ton of good friends outside each other, or casual friends who actually know them and hang out with them—they’re too big of assholes for that. Of course, this doesn’t include the characters they’re close with in canon; I love Raylan and Rachel’s friendship, in particular, and their understanding of each other despite their vast superficial differences is fascinating. I guess I should say instead that I don’t buy either of them having typical friendships, period. They’re just too weird and fucked up for that. They trauma bonded at nineteen and it continues to be one of the most important relationships in either of their lives. Winona puts up with Raylan’s relational weirdness for love; no one is doing that for their drinking buddy. So they may have close friendships, but they don’t look the way you’d expect.

I’d never make their relationship uncomplicatedly sweet and unfraught, or sand down the kind of feral edges of it, and I don’t think they’d be much for traditional PDA—I just love the way in canon the physical (and otherwise) manifestations of their intimacy are so outside of what’s expected from buddies OR lovers. In the same vein, I don’t love it when Raylan goes crazy with the terms of endearment, because he doesn’t use them much with his love interests in canon. I have him use them with the girls in heavy heart more as verbal tics he picked up after spending too much time around Boyd, who LOVES to use them, plus I think he models at least some of his displays of parental affection after Helen, who canonically calls him “honey”. I’m fine with Boyd throwing endearments around liberally; I just don’t do it in my own fics because I love the way in canon he twists Raylan’s name itself into almost an endearment. He just can’t stop saying it every other sentence, so why would he give up the chance to say it by replacing it with another word? Plus, it fits in with how weird they are about each other in general.

More broadly, I have never really enjoyed full aus (based on any story) that don’t try to approximate at least the broader beats of place and history from canon, but I really really love stories that manage it. I respect authors who can sort of map canon onto a completely different stage, like the space au mentioned above, so much. I hope that I manage that at least somewhat with catching bullets.

That’s all the big ones I can think of at the moment, though I’m sure there’s more I’ve forgotten (most of the rest fall more under ic-ness vs ooc-ness, which is harder to articulate; “what makes them themselves?” is a much more difficult question). Ultimately, I think probably a lot of these come across through cross-referencing both of my WIPs—basically, if it shows up in both, there’s a very good chance it’s a nonnegotiable for me, and if it changes between the two, then I can obviously live without it.

[wall-eye]

grown man coworker keeps talking about how homework shouldnt exist and "they have me for 8 hours, and they didnt manage to teach me? they failed" which like. first off you told me you failed math three times cause you couldnt understand negatives. second off, in highschool you have 7 classes. and a lunch. and passing periods. teachers have less than an hour with you. if youre resistant to learning from them in the first place, an hour isnt going to do shit for you. i dont like homework as a concept either but you are not in school anymore and your arguement for it is flawed anyway