#here getting any better in any meaningful way and its also about going a bit scorchedearth

[iamthescalesofjustice]

working on an au in which, due to isoldes pettiness and cruelty being cranked up by 40ish percent, alistair will run away and eventually grow up to be a rogue

[wintersoldiersoul]

hey dear ❤️ I maybe thought of an imagine with Bucky where you're on a mission in the mountains but due to the weather you need to stay in a little cabin for the night but it's terribly cold. He lights a fire but then he offers you his sweater. You're both getting closer (you have a crush as well on each other), so you kinda forget about the mission and just enjoy the time together as you also share a meaningful kiss?

Keep Me Warm

A/N: I changed up the timeline of this a tiny bit but the main idea is still there! I hope you enjoy!!

The mission had been long and grueling. You and Bucky have spent nearly a week in the mountains trying to take down the enemy. You were exhausted, both physically and mentally. Finally, you had gotten the call that you could come home. You were so excited to be back home in the compound, sleeping in your own comfy bed.

“Excited to go home, Y/N?” Bucky asked. 

You rubbed your hands together, trying to keep warm while you waited for the jet. “Can’t wait. I’m looking forward to a nice hot shower and sleeping in my bed.”

He smiled. There was no better thing in the world than him smiling. You tried to keep your crush on him at bay, knowing he’d never feel the same way about you, but damn was it hard. His blue eyes were so mesmerizing and his smile could wake a goddamn army. He was just so perfect.

You smiled back, hoping that he assumed that the blush on your cheeks was from the cold and not from him.

His phone rang and he answered, hoping it would be an update on how far the jet was. “Hey Steve,” Bucky said into the device. “Shit, really? Yeah, yeah, that’s fine,” he sighed. “Yup. I’ll check back when we’re there. Bye.” He hung up and looked at you. “Bad news. There’s a bad storm coming and the jet can’t fly. We’re gonna have to stay here another night.”

“Fuckk,” you threw your head back in frustration. You had spent the entire mission hiding in safe house to safe house, all of them in secluded areas where you couldn’t be found. Sometimes if you were lucky, you got to stay in nicer places with actual beds and furniture. But due to the sensitive nature of this mission, that hadn't been the case. The thought of spending another night in one of those places nearly made you cry. 

“Good news is that Steve said there’s a cabin not too far. It’s still nothing fancy, but he said its an upgrade to what we’ve been in. We should be safe now that we’ve, you know, taken down the enemy,” he smiled warmly, trying to get you to stay positive. 

“Oh, that's good,” you responded. “Let’s go, then.” 

The two of you had to trudge through the snow to get there. The walk ended up being nearly 2 hours and you couldn’t feel your body by the time you arrived. The cabin was small, with only one bedroom, a living room, a small kitchen, and a bathroom.

“Shit, you’re shivering,” Bucky noted when you got inside.

“Yeah, how are you not?” 

He shrugged. “It’s the serum. I’m still cold, don’t get me wrong, but it makes it a lot harder for me to be cold. Even in freezing weather.”

“Must be n-nice,” you mumbled through chattering teeth. “I get cold so easily. Any time it’s below 50 degrees I can’t f-feel my t-toes.”

“Go take a hot shower, okay? I’ll try to see if there’s any food I can make for us.” 

You nodded, going to the bathroom to take a shower. You took your time, rejoicing in the hot water as you washed all of the dirt off of your skin. When you got out, you rummaged through your bag trying to find a sweatshirt but it seemed to have disappeared. “Fuck,” you whispered. You must have left it at the last safe house. You threw on a t-shirt and sweats, still shivering as you made your way into the kitchen.

“Is the heat on?” You asked Bucky.

“I think it’s broken. I was playing around with it but it doesn’t seem to be doing anything.”

You rubbed your hands over your arms, trying to get warm. “Shit, I think I left my sweatshirt at the last safe house.” 

 “Doll, you’re gonna freeze,” he said sympathetically. “Here.” In one fell-swoop he ripped off the gray cable knit sweater that he had on. “I just put it on when we got here so it’s clean.”

“Buck, I don’t want you to be cold, though,” you protested, despite how cozy the sweater looked. 

He swatted a hand. “Remember, I don’t get too cold. Don’t worry about me. You’re gonna turn into an ice block soon.”

You smiled, graciously. “Thanks.” You pulled the sweater over your head, immediately enthralled by his scent. The fabric smelled like musky vanilla and pine, the scent that you had come to associate with him. It smelled like home. 

“I was able to find some soup,” he said, holding out a bowl for you. “Maybe it will help warm you up.” 

“Thank you, Buck.” You sat down and began to eat.

“Lemme see if I can get a fire started,” he got up and walked over to the fireplace. You watched him as he threw wood into a pile, entranced by his muscles flexing each time he picked up another piece. Between the serum, the metal arm, and the fact that he was just so in shape, he did it all with ease, not even flinching at the weight. How could you not fall for the guy just a little bit? 

“You alright over there?” He smirked at you, noticing your eyes on him.

Shit, get it together, Y/N, you thought. “Oh, sorry, just zoning out,” you tried to cover. 

Within a few minutes, he had a roaring fire emanating heat throughout the room. But it still wasn’t enough to keep you warm over by the table you were still sitting at. 

“Come over here,” he encouraged. “It's nice and warm by the fire.”

You stood up and made your way over to the couch so that you could feel the heat of the fire better. “Oh, that’s nice,” you hummed, feeling the embers warming your body. Bucky crept up beside you sitting down and rubbing his flesh arm over yours.

“You’re fucking freezing. I can feel how cold you are through the sweater,” he whispered. He was so close to you. “Lemme hold you. Warm you up a bit.”

“Um,” you cleared your throat, heart rate speeding up. “O-okay. Yeah, sure.” 

He laughed quietly before pulling you so you were laying back against him. “Damn, I feel bad that you’re so cold,” he said, voice holding sympathy and care.

“It’s not your fault, Buck. You’re already doing a lot to try to help.”

The next words he said were something you never thought you’d hear. “Maybe I should never let you go. Just keep holding you like this forever.”

“What?” Did you hear him right? Did he really just say that? He laughed lightly. “Would you like that?”

“Bucky, I-um…” you felt so flustered. Was he just messing with you?

“Come on, Doll,” he smiled. “I don’t know how much more obvious I can make it that I’m kinda in love with you. And I think…” he said, putting his mouth close to your ear. “You might feel the same way about me.”

“Bucky,” you whispered, the feeling of him speaking into your ear sending chills through your body. 

“If I’m reading it totally wrong that’s okay. But I can’t hide how I feel anymore, Y/N. You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. I couldn’t even talk to you for like 3 months because I got so flustered around you. Then we did start talking and I found out that you were also the most interesting, intelligent, kind person I’ve ever met. So tell me, please. Do you feel the same way?”

Your heart pounded. How was this happening? “Yes, Bucky. I-I feel the same way.”

He pressed a kiss to the top of your head. “Can you turn around so I can kiss you?”

You quickly flipped your body so you were lying on him, face to face. He pulled your mouth to his, quickly inserting his tongue into your mouth. It was so much better than you had imagined, and you had spent a lot of time fantasizing about kissing him. 

“Y/N,” he said, resting his forehead against yours. “You have no idea how long I’ve been wanting to do that.” He ran his hand up and down your back as he spoke. “You’re so amazing.”

“I’ve been dreaming about that for a while too, Buck,” you laughed, enjoying his embrace. “You know,” you spoke, voice in a teasing tone. “There’s only one bed in here. We might have to put it to good use.”

Within a second, Bucky picked you up and carried you to the bedroom.

[holmesxwatson]

The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes dir: Billy Wilder, 1970

I only watched The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes for the first time a few days ago but it lights my brain up in that special way that I know I’ll revisit it a lot. Don’t get me wrong, it’s far from perfect, for one thing Colin Blakely’s Watson is a little too shouty for me, but it’s very worthwhile to check out despite its shortcomings, which I think mostly come from the fact that so much was cut from the intended script.

I absolutely love Robert Stephens as Holmes. His face is so good, he has a way of looking at Watson when he doesn’t know he’s being observed that is very soft. I thought I was hallucinating the beginning of this movie with Holmes telling the ballet dancer he’s gay and in a relationship with Watson. I thought it was going to be played for a joke, and it was a bit, but it didn’t just end there. Holmes and Watson have a conversation about the repercussions in a lengthy scene that turns very serious by the end. I can’t believe this was 1970 and no one has since tried to build on this specific dynamic in a more meaningful way. Someone needs to remake this into a mini-series exactly how Billy Wilder intended it to be, here’s hoping public domain can make it so.

[above: script page from the cut story The Curious Case of the Upside Down Room, where Watson creates a fake case to make Holmes feel better]

Also, the backstory of the making of this film is so out of control: Robert Stephens’s nervous breakdown and suicide attempt during the production, the amount of years Billy Wilder was trying to write it and get it made, the interference of ACD’s son, the Loch Ness monster prop that the crew lost in actual Loch Ness, the immense scope of the episodic story they were going for, the way it got cut down from its original 3 hour 45 minute runtime and how that cut footage was lost forever! (this is crazy! everyone go check your attics and storage lockers right now).

In one of the interviews I found, Robert Stephens says “if something is boring — if it’s three minutes long it’s too long, but if it’s interesting it’s never long enough…you don’t want it to end.” Big same Toby Stephens’ dad, big SAME. I didn’t want it to end. I read the uncut script and I am just floored at what we missed out on. Thankfully some footage and audio remain of some of the cut scenes (but still! check your basements too).

Just fully let it settle into your brain that they filmed all of these stories in the script, and then cut most of it away. Like that is mind-blowing to me, it existed at one point as it was fully intended to be. If this was made now during home entertainment times, they would have no problem releasing an almost four-hour movie, but at the very least there would be a big director’s cut dvd release and we would be enjoying all the small Holmes x Watson moments we deserve.

Anyway, in pretty short order I found a bunch of interesting links to stuff, details below. I also consulted my very well-thumbed Conversations with Wilder book by Cameron Crowe, but there wasn’t that much more information in there. I have Robert Stephens’ memoir Knight Errant and the TPLOSH blu-ray on order so I’ll add to this post if I find any more good resources. Let me know if I’m missing anything, and enjoy!

Full movie on YouTube (x) <-update: this link went private, but it's also streaming for free on Tubi and Freevee, and available to rent on YouTube, Google Play, and Apple TV

Original roadshow draft of script on Internet Archive (x)

Missing footage: Prologue [sound only plus stills] (x), The Curious Case of the Upside Down Room [sound only plus stills] (x), The Dreadful Business of the Naked Honeymooners [footage and soundtrack only, no sound dialogue] (x), alternate ending [sound only] (x)

Making of documentary that includes behind-the-scenes snippets of some of the cut scenes [this doc is in German, but you can turn on the auto-translate to English in the YouTube settings] (x)

Interview with Ernst Walter, film editor of TPLOSH (x)

Interview with Christopher Lee “Mr. Holmes, Mr. Wilder” 2003 (x)

My YouTube playlist with all of the above links in one place plus an excellent fan vid by Just Bee that I added to the list because it’s just so good (x)

Missing Movies: A Case for Sherlock Holmes from 1994 BBC Radio 2 on Soundcloud [includes interview with Robert Stephens and folks involved in the production] (x)

Articles about the lost Loch Ness monster prop (x) (x)

The soundtrack by Miklós Rózsa (x)

[theninth09]

Something that I love that is basically canon is how in tune Theo and Liam are. Like post season 6 I imagine the pack find it so startling to the point where it’s almost creepy.

I like to imagine that sometims when theres a break or intermission after/during a meeting or get together one of the pack will be like, “where’s Liam/or Theo?” And the other will know the exact location just immediately before any other supernatural has picked up the other’s scent or hearing. There are also totally times where someone will ask them both a question or for their opinion and Thiams eyes will just meet and everyone else watches as the two have a whole conversation without any direct communication. You could argue others in the pack can also do this like Stiles and Scott or Derek and Stiles or even Mason and Corey. BUT Liam and Theo are on a whole other level. What’s the best about this concept though is the absolutely hilarious faces the pack makes when they do anything like this in front of them-Liam the angry beta and Theo the chimera of death are so universally understood by one another that no words are needed between the two, and that is just shocking to everyone else. Both boys have so much trouble verbally communicating how they’re feeling/thinking with everyone, and so for both of them to find someone that can literally just tell with a look is so meaningful.

No one even knows how to describe the two of them separately anymore, including each other, because they are just so unanimously ONE. One soul, one brain, one heart. They love each other but it’s also just SO MUCH MORE than that!

oh absolutely and as you said, i love that this is canon. there's so many instances of this in s6 and while liam constantly tries to deny it, hes always looking for theo. and its so lovely how they just get each other. even in s6a when theo hasnt been back yet for long, they effortlessly fight next to each other. obviously s6ep20 is an even better example of this because they're so in tune, they easily work off of each other cues, and they even get so physical with it??? they stay right by each others side, liam literally rolls himself over theos back and theo gives him a little boost to further his momentum. like its actually so cute of them how well they understand each other.

and that's not even getting into their whole eye contact thing... them wordlessly communicating during the confrontation with gabe in the locker room and liam turning to look at theo when peter complains about his car getting destroyed are two moments that immediately come to mind for me. also, theo turning to look at liam after they leave the police station, when the pack fakes leaving beacon hills. they have so many moments where they look at each other and literally just. stare. they dont say anything, the pack doesnt fucking address this either??? its just them looking into each other's eyes and it makes me crazy. like that scene in s6ep16 where mason asks liam "should i come with you guys?" and instead of answering, liam looks to theo. theo looks back at liam and THEN answers mason. like. ok. just liam expecting his bf to answer his best friend and said boyfriend immediately reacting. whatever.

scott, at least, actually canonically sometimes looks at them a bit suspiciously (heres a lovely compilation of that by my dear oomf on twt) and its absolutely hilarious to me. i dont doubt that the pack would side-eye them occasionally but i feel like they'd accept thiam being thiam relatively quick, because they're already so used to their gay antics in canon. like when theo dragged liam into the bathroom at the police station in front of the entire pack?? and no one stopped him? liam didnt try to fight back either??? like, alright. their surprise wouldnt stay for long because even before they're in an actual relationship, they already act that way with each other.

going away from canon, i totally agree with them knowing where the other one is. i think they become obsessed with keeping track of each other's scent and heartbeat, but in a very sweet way. they find it calming and reassuring. theo unconsciously listening to liams heartbeat as a background noise. just in the back of his mind, because it makes him feel more comfortable. and being able to pick out liams scent literally always bc hes spent so much time looking out for it. i feel like for theo its more of a soft indulgence. he loves liam and automatically does these things. it makes him happy, even if he wouldnt admit it.

for liam, it stems more from insecurity and fear. liams abandonment issues ("hayden left me. scott's leaving, too." his reaction when he hears that morey are planning to go to the same college (possibly "leaving liam behind") and as a hc: his bio dad leaving him and his mom) and the way theo throws himself into danger for liam. liam would keep track of theos scent and heartbeat to make sure that he's still around, that he's still alive. liam feeling relieved everytime he has proof that theo hasnt left. that theo hasnt gotten himself killed. as you said, they kinda suck at verbally communicating so liam wouldnt be able to articulate this to theo. that liam has this anxiety of theo leaving, in whatever way, like everybody else. thankfully, theos actions would be enough to calm liam. he himself would never think this of himself, but hes incredibly reliable when it comes to liam.

i love this concept of them going from being liam and theo to liam and theo. in s6ep16 there's two scenes where characters refer to them as a pair (nolan talking to the hunters about them and scott mentioning them to malia, lydia & argent) and its something so simple but it makes me so giddy. they're a pair. they belong to each other. they're liam and theo. and they fit each other so well. they mirror each other in a lot of things, but they also complete each other. theo is the calm to liams anger and vice-versa. they make each other angry, they make each other happy, they suck at verbally communicating but they effortlessly understand each other. they each think of themselves as a monster and help each other learn that thats not the case. they're liam and theo and im insane about them.

like yeah them as a ship is obviously something i love. but its not just them in a relationship that i find interesting about them. even if you dont ship them, their dynamic is so fascinating and their interactions are really fun. the way liam goes from "hating" theo to trusting him but still being in denial about that so he keeps lashing out at theo (threatening to kill him, saying scott will never trust him, etc) and the way theo goes from only being interested in his own survival to deeply caring about liam, saving his life and staying for him. all this is extremely romantic and homoerotic to me, but even if, for some weird reason, you do not read it that way, you still cannot deny that theres a bond between those two. they're linked to each other, no matter how you view their relationship.

[goamu-blog]

Needed to get my thoughts in ordering about SY and LBH relationship, so I did this. Starting this off with, I don't understand why they are together or even have a romantic relationship. Their entire romantic relationship never really developed. To me, LBH and SY romantic relationship does not feel real or convincing in any way.

Everytime I see something about their love for each other, I'm always like, what love is there between them. How can they love each other when they don't even know the others' true personality and thoughts. They don't really know each other in any deep and meaningful way.

SY entire outer personality and actions are a complete front he puts on. He acts the part of a composed, elegant, lofty, immortal scholar. But that is not who he remotely is on the inside, his actual inner personality and thoughts are that of an internet hater, an anti fan, conceited, self centered, narrow minded, homophobic/transphobic(just because he is in a gay relationship doesn't make him any less homophobic/transphobic), and a bit sexist. Any time he meets a woman, the first thing he does is comment on their appearance and that they belong to LBH. He even treats NYY that way, someone he has known since she was a young teen, and seeing him commenting on her appearance and breast didn't endear him to me.

So yeah, SY never shows LBH or anyone else his real personality. He just puts up a front that is not even close to his actual inner personality. Actually, that is not quite right, the only one he does show some of his real self to is SQH. And SY treats SQH terribly. He is always demeaning and disregarding SQH. SY thinks he is better than SQH and that he knows the world and characters better than SQH, the author. Even when SQH tells SY that not all women wanted LBH, SY doesn't believe him because he believes he knows better than SQH. SY also fully expected SQH to die at some point and was fine with it since he was surprised that SQH was still alive when they met after the time skip.

I can honestly go on and on about how SY is actually not even a remotely good person like the fandom believe and likes to portray him as, I actually already did something like that in a past post, but I can definitely add plenty more to it. I think I could do an essay on it if I had the time, energy, and motivation, but I don't so I will just leave it here before it turns into a SY is actually not a good person at all rant.

SY's entire outer personality is a complete front he puts on for the world. He is acting the part of a composed, elegant, lofty, immortal scholar. But that is not who he really is. SY only shows his inner and actual personality to SQH and no one else, not even LBH gets to see SY'S real personality.

As for LBH, to me, LBH seems like he only shows SY that parts of him that he knows SY will be fine with, won't make SY uncomfortable, and will get him attention and affection. LBH will only act in a way that he knows SY will approve of. In that way, he also doesn't completely show his real personality in its entirety.

While I'm on LBH'S personality, to me, it seems like the novels really never developed LBH. For being a main love interest, the books never spend much time with him or give him enough dialog. It's like LBH was a side character instead. The novels also never gave LBH anything outside of SY. LBH doesn't have any ambitions, goals, friends, or interests. Everything about LBH is tied to SY, LBH doesn't have anything outside of SY. To me, that really dulled LBH character. The novels didn't treat LBH like a main love interest, it treated him like a side character.

Now on to how they are as a couple. They have nothing in common nor any interest together. SY has more in common with LQG, and they have the same interests in monsters. SY and LBH don't have that, they don't have anything in common or have any shared interests. To me, SY and LQG make more sense as a couple then SY and LBH do, because at least I can say that LQG and SY actually have things in common and shared interests, unlike LBH and SY.

I remember seeing a post about how the reason SY and LBH are a good couple is because SY accepts LBH as he is, with all his jealousy and insecurities, and that it is romantic and that's why they like them. I do not think they realize that jealousy and insecurities do not in fact, make for a long and healthy romantic relationship at all. It just shows how insecure LBH is in the relationship.

On to their communication, they do not have any. SY is completely incapable of communicating in any deep, truthful, and meaningful way. Anytime that SY had any insight or even a little deeper understanding of LBH happened because SY was going through LBH'S mind. Not because they actually talked to each other. And even then, SY's understanding was only surface, and even afterward, he never actually talked to LBH about anything important. SY never ever tries to communicate in any meaningful way.

Also, SY never once apologized to LBH for everything he put him through. He never even thought of it.

As for LBH, like I said before, LBH only acts in ways he knows SY will approve off, and that will get him some affection. Unless LBH is at a breaking point, he will not open up about anything deeper because it could upset SY and make him uncomfortable. So LBH will not open up to SY about anything deeper. He will keep it to himself even if it is bothering him. LBH will not bring up the past and question SY's actions, even if he needs to. To me, that shows that LBH is not comfortable with communicating and opening up to SY in any deep and meaningful way. It shows that LBH is not comfortable showing SY his authentic self.

He only expresses a little of his deeper self when he is at a breaking point, SY does anything he can to placate him, and they never again dring it up, which is very not good or healthy in a relationship.

The way I see it, as a couple, neither LBH nor SY show each other their true selves or communicate properly. SY because his entire outer personality is a total front(a lie) he puts on and never shows anyone(expect SQH) his real self, and he is incapable of any deeper communication or even thoughts, he only ever gets a slightly deeper understanding of LBH when he goes through his mind, and even then if understanding is surface only. SY never tries to have any deeper understanding or communication with LBH.

And LBH because he does not want to upset SY or make him uncomfortable. LBH will act in the ways he knows SY will approve off and get him affection. Add that on top of his jealousy and insecurities, and it makes me think that LBH is insecure about the relationship.

The part that cemented my feelings on them as a couple, that it did not feel real or convincing in any way, is in the extras, the 100 questions chapter. Usually those type of questionnaires are supposed to be fun little things for a couple to do together, so that they can reminisce about their relationship, show how well they know and appreciate each other, and have a fun back and forth conversation with banter. But that was not the case for LBH and SY.

As far as I remember, SY never once said anything that I would consider to be genuinely positive or romantic about LBH. SY was always brushing LBH off throughout the whole thing. And LBH was just like, I like everything about shizun, without going into specifics.

When asked what their partner is like, SY only said little negative things about LBH. And what got to me about this whole thing and made me feel the way that I do about them is, when LBH heard SY comments he got watery eyes, and SY was like better think of something positive and nice to say about LBH so that he does not cry, and the only thing SY could think off was that LBH was a good listener and very obedient.

The only good thing SY had to say about LBH is that he is obedient. In real life, if someone said all of these little negative things about their partner and then went on to say, well the good thing about them is that they are obedient, they would be rightfully criticized to hell and back by others. If someone I was in a relationship with said that about me, there would not be a relationship between us anymore.

When their sex life came up in the questionnaire, SY just laughed at it. His reaction to their sex life was to laugh in what I would assume to be in a mocking way because LBH once again got watery eyes if I remember that right. And SY makes absolutely no attempt to improve their sex life. He is not invested in their relationship or has any want to improve it.

The entire 100 questions chapter, along with plenty of other things in the novels, just made me feel that SY is not at all enthusiastic about his romantic or sexual relationship with LBH. Also, just because someone can appreciate someone else's looks and have sex with them does not necessarily mean they have romantic or sexual feelings towards that other person. People can and do have sex with others without feeling sexual or romantic feelings.

There was not one moment in all of the novels where I could think that SY was ever enthusiastic about his relationship with LBH or even had a romantic thought about LBH. I never felt that SY was at all excited about their relationship. It felt more like it was just something that happened to SY, so he went along with it without being truly invested in it.

Another thing about their relationship, their entire relationship only happened because of the very specific circumstances they are in. In any other situation they would not be in a romantic relationship. The only reason they are in a romantic relationship is because SY is controlling SJ's body. The fandom goes on about how SY's kindness saved the world, but it only worked because he was specifically controlling SJ's body.

If the only thing LBH needed to not ruin the world was for someone to show him kindness, then the kindness NYY's always showed to LBH would have worked, but it did not. Because it is specifically SJ's kindness, approval, and acceptance that LBH needed. LBH fell for SJ at first sight and had spent a few years with him, and as soon as the one who LBH thought was SJ showed him acceptance and kindness LBH was all for him. If SY had somehow transmigrated as himself in his own body or if he had taken over and replaced anyone else, if he had been a regular person, a disciple, some other peak lord or cultivator, or anyone else that was not SJ, LBH and SY would not have had a romantic relationship.

LBH and SY are only in a romantic relationship because it is specifically SJ's body that SY is controlling. LBH believes he is in a relationship with SJ. In any other circumstances where SY is not controlling SJ's body, LBH and SY would not have a romantic relationship.

Also, I will like to point out that anytime I see someone complementing SY looks and saying how beautiful he is, it seems that everyone forgets that that is not actually SY's looks and body right, that is SJ's looks and body. Anytime anyone says how beautiful SY is, it is actually SJ. We never ever saw SY actual looks and body, it has always been SJ. SJ is the one that is beautiful, not SY.

A few other things about their relationship, SY does not treat LBH like a romantic partner. He treats LBH the same way he did when LBH was a teen. And his relationship with LBH when LBH was a teen was very inappropriate and manipulative on SY's part, which SY being a modern person should have known, but I'm not going to get into that here. SY still calls LBH child and treats him as a live in maid, the same way he treated LBH as a teen, only now they are married and have bad sex.

Also, SY never really sees LBH as anything else other than the protagonist. Even after he had his little surface level realization. To SY, LBH will always be the protagonist first and foremost. And that shows to me that SY's care for LBH is surface level only. Sure SY cares about LBH, but SY cares about LBH the way one would care about their favorite characters, that is why to SY LBH will always be the protagonist first and foremost, anything else is secondary and unimportant.

SY and LBH entire romantic relationship, BingQiu, feels like a lie. Neither of them, but especially SY, show the other their true selves. Neither of them have anything in common or shared interests. Neither of them can communicate in any affective and deeper way, and in SY's case, it is a complete inability to communicate or even have any deeper thoughts.

SY was never enthusiastic about his romance or sexual relationship with LBH or even had a truly romantic thought about LBH. SY makes absolutely no effort to improve his relationship(romantic/sexual) with LBH because he is not invested in it. SY treats the relationship like it was just something that happened to him and is going along with it. Probably because that is what happened, SY only decided to be with LBH right after LBH tried to destroy the world and that just made it seem and feel like SY was placating LBH for his survival by being with him and not because SY actually wanted to be in a relationship with LBH. It is like SY is trying to keep LBH content and under control by being with him. Also, just appreciating someone's looks does not make for romantic or sexual feelings. SY does not treat LBH like a romantic partner, he treats LBH the same way he did when LBH was a teen and like a live in maid. If LBH and SY were not in the very specific situation where SY is controlling SJ's body, they would not have a romantic relationship. If SY was himself or controlling anyone else's body other than SJ body, LBH and SY would not be in a relationship.

So yeah, those are my thoughts on them. The entirety of BingQiu's relationship is based on a lie, so it feels like a lie. Their relationship does not feel real, and it is the least convincing romantic relationship I have ever read. And once again, SY absolutely refuses to make any sort of effort to improve their relationship in any way because he is not invested in it. SY treats their relationship like an obligation, just something he has to do. Calling their(bq) relationship romantic is a little insulting to actual romantic relationships in fiction. Their relationship does not have what it takes to be a long and healthy relationship.

[foxufortunes]

So like I was actually having this discussion in the comments of one of my fics at stupid in the morning, but like having thought it through for the day I'm here to messily rant my thoughts on the complicated relationship between the upperclassmen, mainly Dan, and the monsters, mainly Andrew, and Wymack. How Dan is terribly self righteous and hypocritical and lets her emotions get in the way of her captaincy at times. How Andrew doesn't care for the discomfort and fear he causes others and even revels in it, even without provocation. And how Wymack, for better or for worse, is a hands off coach who can't/won't inflict meaningful punishments on his team, even enabling their worst qualities and habits, as part of his ideal of giving people more chances and how that can create a hostile team environment.

Aka, I'm about to throw slander in every direction, because these are flawed, messy characters and trying to make any of them perfectly innocent or always right does a disservice to the well sketched, messy, imperfect, flawed characters Nora created. Blame goes everywhere and no one is innocent. Trauma is a reason, not an excuse.

Buckle up, guys, this is about to get long and messy.

So, let's start with Wymack, who's a bit trickier to explain than Dan and Andrew, but is also the reason they've been brought togethers. Wymack, as we see him on page, is a massively hands off coach, especially when you compare him to Coach Rhemann. Now, it's very possible that this is actually because Nora either wasn't confident/good enough to write him coaching vs where she is now ten years later, or because she didn't want to focus there (although logically for exy junkie Neil's pov that would be weird, but whatever, that's not what we're talking about) but whatever the reason out of universe, it leaves us with Wymack as hands off as possible in universe. (Also, sidebar, some people in this fandom need to learn that out of universe reasons still need to have an in universe reason, "it needed to happen for the plot" is an out of universe reason, but I still need to know why the characters did it beyond "for the plot" or it's bad writing, stop using that for an answer about "why did character X do Y?")

Anyway, Wymack lets the team basically run amuck and sort themselves out, and even enables their worst habits. I think its canon that Abby gets a tip when "random" drug tests are happening, and they certainly don't do anything to enforce the no drugs policies the school and NCAA and probably ERC would have. Wymack brought a bunch of troubled kids together and seems to have no plan beyond letting themselves work it out and Betsy's here if there's trouble. This is why the Matt situation happens. You let a struggling to stay sober drug addict be around other not even trying drug addicts, of course Matt was going to get worse. This is actively bad for him. And in turn then actively bad for Aaron.

His relationship with Andrew is a bit more complicated. Now, I need you to forget everything you know about Andrew through Neil and his backstory for a moment, and just look at Andrew through Wymack's eyes as he first met him. Andrew has been to juvie, and is currently on parole for another violent crime that Wymack may or may not know the actual details about and on medication that Wymack may or may not know what they actually are and do. Andrew asks to come off of them. Wymack says yes. Now, even putting aside the legality of this, Wymack took the unilateral decision that Andrew knows best about his meds and can come off of them. Now, we can talk plenty about how Andrew's medication is portrayed in canon, but plenty of people don't like meds that are actually good for them and try/do stop taking them, often without telling a doctor they're doing so. There's also the fact that, again irrelevant of what we know as the story goes, Andrew regularly drinks, smokes and misses doses, things that can all make medication not work as it should. Wymack is not a doctor, for all he knows he could actively making Andrew worse by allowing this, but does anyway, for a good defence line.

(Also another side note, where does canon get off calling the Foxes a laughing stock? They're five years old. Seth was part of the first batch, right? So they're five years old and made the championships in their fourth year of existing as a team, fuck off are they dead last laughing stocks.)

And this is part of what I don't get about Wymack. He both wants to win above what's good for his team and doesn't at the same time. For example, he's so hands off and enables their bad habits, things that could kill them and actively harm them. He puts Andrew on the bench because he doesn't need a third goalie despite him being better and seemingly rolls with the hierarchy of age over skill, which implies team feel goods over victory but is so invested in staying Class I he semi-regularly lets (and yeah, it's lets not makes but still) Andrew harm himself playing full games on withdrawals (again, as far as he knows potentially stopping his meds working right). And while it could be argued his situation with Andrew is more not wanting to give up on Andrew, that is an the expense of his other players. Anyone who's ever been in a situation where one or two people are hostile/seemingly unpunishable knows how bad that makes everyone else feel.

Because, let's be real, Andrew is unpunishable and they all know it. Cardio is one thing, but he doesn't go through with marathons and nothing else will work. Andrew doesn't care for his own contract, and even if we actually believed Wymack would go through with any threat again Kevin, Nicky or Aaron's contracts (and we all know he wouldn't) Andrew would probably sabotage the game in protest or just outright quit. Andrew gets away with everything and everyone knows it and that can quickly see your team stop respecting/trusting you or feeling safe when you say they are. It's a very dangerous line.

And this is where we finally get to Dan. Because yes, Dan hates Andrew, and is unprofessional in her bias against him. But I think we often forget where this comes from. You often see people talk about Columbia, and Andrew drugging Neil, and should Neil have been angrier, how his trauma impacted him moving on so quickly and whether Andrew's reasons were valid or not because he thought Neil was a threat. And sometimes you see people talk about what he did "to" Matt. Which, yes, wasn't great, and yes, Matt took the drugs himself, but really it wasn't a great move from Andrew. But how often do you see people talk about what he did to Dan?

I mean, let's get some context here. Andrew and Dan barely knew each other. Dan is already getting shit from every angle for daring to be a woman playing and captaining an exy team (and if you hc her as a woman of colour, double this) in a period of time where colleges did (and still do) have a terrible reputation for covering up the horrific assaults committed by their best NCAA athletes. And Andrew, with no provocation, or reason, invites her out, to his home turf, with his family, to a bar he worked out, without anyone to support her and look after her, and drugged her. To find out if she was a women worth following. Not because she was a threat. Because he wanted to find out what type of person she was. He wanted her tragic backstory and he wanted it now (something people criticise Dan for demanding a lot, by the way). Andrew and his group show no remorse and face no real repercussions and then go on to enable Matt getting falling off the wagon and taking potentially lethal mix of drugs, because his mom said it was fine so it's ok and it all worked out, ends justify the means, and is allowed to just carry on with again, no meaningful punishment. Because no harm, no foul, right? (funny how you'll apply that to Andrew but hate when Thea said it, huh?)

Is it any wonder Dan doesn't like or trust Andrew?

And lets be clear, Andrew does nothing to discourage this. Andrew doesn't want to be understood, he doesn't want to share. Andrew is not here angsting because no one understands his attempts to making friends (except maybe, big maybe, Aaron not understanding his attempts at brothering). Andrew is fine if the team doesn't trust him. He encourages it, because trust means friends means feelings means weakness and that's ew. It's not hard to see how, from Dan's pov, Wymack can't/won't punish Andrew and is more interested in winning so won't kick him off the team.

At the same time, Dan is just as complicit in Andrew's breaking the law and hurting himself by missing meds as Wymack. Again, for all she knows, his meds help him, and skipping could actively harm the help they're giving him. Again, she's putting winning, because they have this amazing goalkeeper, above both Andrew and the team's health, and then complains when he lashes out. Some meds need a consistent balance to work, and maybe if he wasn't skipping every Friday to help you win he'd be more stable (we know this isn't the case, but they don't). There's barely any resistance put up to the idea that Andrew plays entire games, because she also wants to win more than she cares about Andrew's health, while at the same time not caring about winning more than her pride, like the rest of the team who are more interested in fighting than winning.

Now, of course, Andrew doesn't care. I think Nicky has it right early on when he says Andrew doesn't care about your boundaries, just his. Andrew is here mostly because he wants to keep Nicky and Aaron close and sees providing value for them (protection, scholarships, controlling protection ect) as the only way to really do it. Andrew sees life as exchanges. But, for all we act like Andrew lives on fair exchanges, he doesn't. As I said, he drugged Dan because he wanted to know about her, what did he give her in return? Nothing. He violated her autonomy and gave her nothing in return. Not even his own backstory. Arguably not even respect. (please, take a minute to imagine how pissed you would be if someone in fanfic wrote Andrew being drugged just to get him to spill his trauma without him even being a threat to anything, or look at how people react to Neil's Columbia scene).

The upperclassmen constantly ignore and violate Andrew's boundaries in very clear ways, and any normal team would have backed off ages ago (or called the cops the first time he pulled a knife) but because they're Foxes they keep pushing. (Also, for all fandom likes to make him a knife nut, look at how often he actually pulls a knife vs punches, it's either rape jokes, or him/someone under his protection being cornered, day to day he goes without). Now, of course, Andrew is a lot of the problem of keeping the team in two halves (again, something any decent coach shouldn't allow to get that extreme) as we see with how well the team works when Andrew is at Easthaven, but we don't know how much effort the upperclassmen actually make (excluding Renee of course).

The upperclassmen are often the first to lash out, and Andrew is often only retaliating, and then the monsters will be blamed. And yes, this is complete hypocrisy. But from the more general day to day treatment, not in the moment when a punch is thrown but attitudes in general, Andrew has proven himself a threat over and over, without provocation. If you can excuse Andrew drugging Neil because he's a potential threat, then why is Dan being hostile to Andrew because he's proven himself a threat different? Is it professional? Probably not, but what else can Dan do? She can't punish Andrew and Wymack seemingly can't/won't either. In Dan's mind, she is being hypervigilant and watching Andrew and taking his actions for the worst possible scenario, because Andrew has given her reason to. A simple drink to get to know each other turned into drugging her and Matt being in awful condition. Why should she give him the benefit of the doubt? Andrew wouldn't return the favour.

In many ways, Andrew and Dan are mirrors of each other. The leaders of their respective groups, both constantly trying to watch out for threats, but while Dan sees the threat she's already experienced with Andrew, Andrew considers her nothing. He's already got all her secrets and cast her aside, not caring for the damage he's done, because she and her friends are nothing to, and he doesn't feel a hint of remorse. He did what he had to, the ends justify the means, and Wymack's gone through too much to get him to risk losing him. He's on a team that doesn't care about his boundaries any more than he cares about theirs and is more than happy to play the monster if it gets the job done.

This came off a little harsh on Andrew, despite that I love him and Dan actually grates on me, but honestly the start of the series he is kind of awful and Dan I can see where she's coming from. Like, I think sometimes we also forget even Neil hates Andrew at the start of the series. Everything he did with Neil, he did with the others, it's just that Neil had the persistence, and the trauma related need to compartmentalise and move on quickly rather than hold a grudge, and a usefulness to Andrew (and yeah, let's not forget the breakthrough is Kathy's show and Andrew realising Neil is useful to him) to let him get in with Andrew so he can start to see the real him, while Andrew keeps the upperclassmen at arm's length.

And wow, congrats and thanks to anyone who read all the way through this monster ramble.

[gacha-incels]

Been boycotting limbus but it's a bit disheartening seeing everyone continue around me with this passing intl women's day. I don't know how to convince my friends to stop without getting into an argument because they're all knee deep into these games. But my real question was.. why? These people are boycotting other products for other things, why are they so adamant with sticking on this when it's proven to have harmed so many people in the small team that made it?

Had a discussion with one who is boycotting and I feel like that "political correctness" seeps into the themes of the game, actually, despite how people tout it as the ultimate anti capitalist game; The City is suffering, workers gruel and die at the whims of corporate overlords, people struggle to find housing, and whatever the fuck Carmen's doing in the light, while it could help people survive longer, is just giving everyone guns ignoring the power structures underneath. It's very strange to me now there's.. no suggestion of uprooting the system at all in the games. No true strikes or protests or even any mentions of unions as far as I know. There's no effort to change what is given

[outside of the seed of light project, which 1. famously Didn't Work and 2. having everyone manifest ego is still just giving everyone guns and going "now don't shoot each other!"],

which is very strange and kind of sad? Like sure maybe an arbiter or something would come and tear it down but surely people would come up with countermeasures? People are really good at adapting around things out of desperation, and surely at least an effort would be mentioned

And then my friend, she suggested something; without project moon's suffering, there would be no project moon. Without the city, project moon can't make games. To end the hell that the characters are in and truly resolve the city's hypercapitalist dystopia, they must stop making money off of them. But they don't want to. They definitely DO want to make more games, noted by the interviews which mention future game concepts such as the distortion detective visual novel. But in order to do so, they must keep the current games "clean" and consistent in their suffering to perpetuate conflict. There is some commentary about capitalism to be had; but it feels more like a "oh, look, people are dying, this is so sad" layer of paint on it at this point rather than something more in depth and meaningful. And I think in enforcing this sort of "we can't fix the system in any meaningful way, let's just live our lives instead and hope something better happens" mindset, it reflects into the players. Kind of ironic how the anti capitalism game must sustain its own horrible systems internally so the owners of the series can: make more money through a very predatory money making system, no less!

Limbus fans don't give a fuck about feminism in kr, they think its a system they cant help fixing so they just play the game as they please and any attempt to disuade them is met with a "stop ruining my fun!!" And "who cares?" The worst ones are the ones who KNOW their money is being funneled into stupid misogynistic shit but don't care! It's insane! I've never seen this level of apathy towards a serious issue before!

Sigh. I hope this ramble is coherent. If I missed talking about something or if you want me to talk more I'm game. Project moon's characters are some of my favorites but you have to admit the themes are surface level shit at some point, especially in later installments of their games. So tired but I'd figure I'd share my thoughts somehow. Take care account admin, youre doing gods work

yeah regarding your first point about fans that keep playing, back in August there was a discussion on this blog here regarding contemporary fandom “culture”- how it makes dropping a piece of media hard for some people and why they feel so quick to defend it. the nature of gacha is also that it gets you into the habit of doing “dailies” which makes them harder to drop, this is not even mentioning sunk cost fallacy. I’ve seen a recent post on the FGO subreddit asking why people still play the game and the top posts by a longshot were ones saying only because they spent so much time and money on it. For a lot of people (even people who think themselves progressives) misogyny is a non-issue as well so they will not take the situation in South Korea that seriously to begin with. This is in addition to it happening to “other” or “foreign” women in the eyes of the western fan. There is also an aggressive “fuck you, I’ve got mine” attitude some of the fans who want to keep playing have in regards to these women. It’s disturbing to watch happen but unfortunately not uncommon. I find some of the worst of it, in this situation specifically, is when westerners try to tell Korean women (who are boycotting and spreading information) that they are the ones spreading misinfo, or there’s no reason for them to boycott, how it’s not that bad for them, how PM actually didn’t do anything wrong, “both sides” are crazy and wrong, “let people enjoy things”, shit like that. like doesn’t it raise any flags for you that the people most affected by PM’s actions, Korean women, deleted entire accounts of fanart, took back fanmade items from PM’s cafe, started a boycott of LC and made posts in english to try and get the word out to international fans? you must think they’re idiots if you believe this is all some misunderstanding and vellmori quit of her own free will. Come on. imo it’s impossible to make any meaningful statement critiquing capitalism when you’re writing it in a game that uses one of the most exploitive types of gambling mechanics. I hope I don’t have to explain to anyone why this is absurd. You don’t need to expose young people to gambling addictions in order to fund new games. At the same time, things an author writes (or things that the reader infers from the writing) do not always reflect their ideologies or actions in real life and they can sometimes seemingly be at odds with one another. This is something fans have to reckon with, and not just by saying “actually hatsune miku made limbus company” or whatever. Personally, I can’t take PM’s “anti capitalist” or “feminist” or “revolutionary” work seriously when in reality they have mistreated employees, sued labor unions, acquiesced to incel demands and then later added a meme into the game from that incel community. On the other hand people struggle to believe Project Moon could do anything wrong like this because of the stories in their games so they vehemently defend PM, which at some point just feels naïve. well hopefully this is the type of answer/discussion you were looking for lol thanks for writing 👍

[set-phasers-to-whump]

A&E

prompt: stitches

whumpee: river cartwright

fandom: slow horses, slough house

hi here's the follow up to this fic. i hope you enjoy!

He ends up, eventually, in the crowded waiting room of an A&E, a bloody towel pressed against the wound in his shoulder and Louisa sitting beside him, looking equal parts peeved and concerned. 

He hadn’t even asked her to come—he’d found himself at Slough House, it being the nearest building to where he’d been, and he’d intended on making use of its first-aid kit and letting that be that. Except she’d been there, and she’d taken one look at him and insisted upon emergency medical help. 

And, to be fair, he’s not exactly against it. His arm really fucking hurts. 

They sit there in silence (well, silence between the two of them. The rest of the room is horribly noisy) until, at long last, River’s name is called. 

Louisa follows him—he’s not sure whether that’s allowed, but she flashes her Service ID and no one asks any questions.

Or, not any detailed questions. He’s able to explain that it was a knife which did this, that he has no idea who or where his assailant is, but when the nurse starts pressuring him for more information, Louisa says, “MI5. He can’t answer that,” and the questions stop. 

Though, honestly, he doesn’t have much else to say. He doesn’t know anything. Lamb had asked him to go poking around this abandoned office building for some unknown reason, and for lack of anything better to do, he’d gone. It’s not even his fault this time. He had hardly gone running headfirst into trouble. It had found him, all on its own. 

He’s thinking about these things to distract himself from what he knows is coming. This being the removal of his coat and shirt and the tending-to of the gash on his arm with sutures. 

The nurse cleans the skin first, which could be worse. It stings, but not terribly. And then she goes in with a syringe of local anesthetic and River turns his head squarely away from the action. He does not want to see this. 

It’s a very strange sensation when the nurse begins stitching. He can sort of sense it, but there’s no pain. This emboldens him to take a look, but as soon as he catches sight of the needle poking its way in and out of his own skin, he very quickly turns away again. 

Louisa catches his eye, raises her eyebrows in a silent question. He shakes his head slightly, I’m fine, and she sort of smiles. 

The nurse finishes the stitches and tells him about how to properly care for them. River tries his best to pay attention, but notes Louisa typing something on her phone. She’ll remember, if he doesn’t. 

The nurse also cleans up the blood from his face and his hand, places adhesive strips across the gashes there, gives him more instructions. 

And just like that they’re done. He’s given a prescription for painkillers, hardly stronger than the ones he’s got at home, and the next thing he knows they’re out in the parking lot and Louisa is looking at him. 

“Thanks for coming,” he says, feeling like she’s expecting him to say something.

“I’m glad you’re alright,” she replies, a little stiffly. “C’mon, let’s get to a chemist.”

“You don’t have to come with me. I’m—I’ll be fine.”

“Tough shit, I’m coming with.”

River shrugs lopsidedly. He doesn’t mind Louisa coming, actually. He doesn’t want her to come with him if she doesn’t want to, but if she does—

Well, he’s hardly going to turn down her company. 

“Alright, let’s go, then.”

They set off, and Louisa lightly bumps his uninjured shoulder with her own. The brief contact is nonetheless meaningful, and River returns it, leans into her perhaps a bit too heavily so that she has to push him back up. 

“Thanks,” he says, again.

“You already said that.”

“I know, but I really mean it.”

Louisa looks at him in a way that makes him feel, despite everything that’s just happened to him, quite content. “You’re welcome,” she replies, and they continue on.

thanks for reading! i am once again doing my best to sound british with not a clue as to whether it's successful lmao.

[mamawasatesttube]

Hello, I'm pretty new to the Superboy fandom. Can I ask you this question:

This part on his Wikipedia page caught my attention.

Do you know the instances (issues, panels, lines, etc) where Kon-el expresses that he doesn't want to be considered Superman's sidekick or similar sentiments?

I would really like to understand more about his feelings regarding his role in relation to Superman and his feelings toward the big man himself.

Thank you, and I apologize if any part of my ask sounds rude to you.

hoookay this is probably gonna be a bit of a doozy but i'll try and keep it concise!!!

first of all, rec-wise, you're probably gonna wanna read the entirety of "reign of the supermen" and "the return of superman". which is a lot, i know, but there's so much going on there that it's honestly hard for me to pick and choose any single issue out of it that would make sense as a standalone.

so at first, before clark himself comes back on the scene, we get things like the classic "don't ever call me 'superboy!'" panel as well as things like this:

where it's clear that kon sees himself as superman, the "real" superman. he does also acknowledge that he's young and he needs to learn to be and do better, as when john henry irons tells him he needs to accept responsibility for his showboating causing frank the helicopter pilot's death, so it's not like he's a full-on arrogant jackass about being the best already, but at this point "superman" is his entire identity. he's not shy about the fact that he's a clone, either; he tells lois, and later, everyone in metropolis via tv, that he is a kryptonian clone and obviously not the og superman himself, but he's still insistent that he is superman.

a fun side note here: this is actually before the retcon that kon was a human with a metagene, so he is actually a full clone of superman!

in fact that's part of why lois knows something is up with cyborg superman in the wake of the destruction of coast city. it's not entirely relevant to the question of their relationship except that it IS my favorite interpretation and also i think it adds a particular flavor to kon's relationship to superman as the gold standard he was made to achieve, the model he was made to emulate.

"Superman... the first Superman... didn't let Doomsday trash his town... and I won't let these creeps rip it down!"

superman is his role model in every way. he respects him a lot even in death and wants to be as much like him as he can. at this point kon's definitely a hotheaded and easily-distracted kid, but he's also all of three weeks old, so...

"Ripping free of this trap would be child's play for Superman... but I'm his clone, aren't I?"

so we can see from early on kon definitely ties his sense of self and his sense of self-worth to "how am i measuring up to superman?" that's a recurring theme we'll see with him over and over.

by the end of the fight with hank henshaw, kon has fully accepted that superman's back and is The OG:

"Check that, Blondie. I'm not Superman. That guy's Superman! The one and only!"

after this we get the "actually a human clone with a ttk metagene" retcon and kon's departure for hawaii:

he leaves for two primary reasons: a) to make a name for himself because he wants to be worthy of the superboy/superman mantle and the s-shield, and b) because editorial wanted superboy to be its own separate title. he thinks the world of superman and wants to make him proud, essentially, while also maintaining his independence.

(clark is also around and interacting him during that retcon arc but i'm a little tired and don't wanna go hunt down any more panels right now, so ... that's for another day.)

and then of course there's superboy (1994) #59, where kon actually gets the name kon-el, something incredibly meaningful to both him and clark:

in summary: kon really, really looks up to clark. he wants to be worthy of his trust and often berates himself when he feels like he's not being enough like superman. his strong drive for independence is part of that: he wants to be totally independent and capable on his own, just like superman.

[worshipper-status]

Literally so happy because my God is actually excepting of my obsession, but I’d kinda like to know how to worship him better less directly? (Ie. tips on digital alters/general worship tips?)

An excuse to ramble! Thank you :D

Worshipper's Guide to Indirect Worship

This is going to be my sfw guide for less direct methods of contact and digital altars, I may make an nsfw guide at some point on my own as a counterpart to this but for now...

(long post below)

Digital Shrines

Digital shrines are a good format for indirect worship, because you can curate it from anywhere, and no one will know. Technically I have two digital altars but one is more a back up of the other. One is I have a folder on my computer that contains all the media of the shrine, and the shrine itself is on my personal discord server. Usually I separate the shrine itself into media, devotionals, personal devotionals, writings, and links by using different discord channels. The channels breakdown like this for me:

Media: photos and videos of solely them

Devotionals: images I find on the internet that I feel embody our relationship, media created by someone else. Also picrews usually

Personal Devotionals: Visual media I have personally made to embody our relationship and can take full credit for creating. (This is a specific folder I made just to keep my art and others art separate)

Writings: Poems, songs, rambles, gushing, fantasies, etc. Any thought you have about them that's important enough to write down, put it here.

Links: I use this as a dumping ground for ideas I got from articles, purchases I want to make, or anything that requires a link to something else but directly relates to my worship of My Goddess.

Tumblr can also be a general dumping grounds kind of shrine, where I would not be too honest tbh, but it's a start. I prefer keeping my shrines private for the most part. My general advice is to stay away from tumblr for everything because you're not going to feel 1000% comfortable expressing your worship to its full extent because of the possibility of it being found by strangers. Also some things are just tmi to be honest. I have writings in my folder documenting times me and My Goddess have banged in detail so I don't forget. Tumblr doesn't need that kind of detail on here. So try and keep shrines at least somewhat private for your own sake. People are dicks.

As for advice for things to do to worship indirectly (and this goes hand in hand with the shrine a little bit) here's a list with general advice and ideas:

Scrapbook/Junk Journal about them (I'm biased this is a personal favorite of mine). Get a notebook, some scrapbook supplies, and either dedicate it to photos of your beloved or journal about any time you guys interact in ways that feel meaningful to you! I keep one physical scrapbook that I use for collages for My Goddess's photos, and am planning to start a junk journal for more writing purposes. I'll probably solely be using it to write about personal interactions with My Goddess, and on slower days, things I love about Her in general. It's both kinda a traditional journal and a part of my obsessive behaviors. You can also do stuff like this digitally with moodboard and collage makers like Canva which have free options.

Document about them. This is kinda vague so I'll explain. As part of my shrine, I have a document I'm building dedicated to bullet note points about My Goddess. If She randomly drops a fact on me about Her childhood, or Her interests. I write it down there so I don't forget. I want to be a good worshipper so I want to be an expert in everything about Her. I usually use a note taking app for this that I can organize into subgroups. Notion is a favorite of mine (despite them selling their soul to the AI overlords sigh) because it allows a lot of creative freedom in organizing the documents AND it's linked to my email so I can't lose it. Obviously, a google doc will accomplish the exact same thing, however my entire personality type is best described as extra, so I have to do things with extra effort at all times.

Write for them. This is where my pagan background kicks in a little bit, but in certain pagan traditions, especially stuff like Hellenic Polytheism, writing hymns or poems or songs for the gods was very important to their practices. So why not write those things for your God? It doesn't need to be shared, it can be bad, it can be whatever it wants to be. What I usually do, is I write poems for My Goddess, and keep them in my junk journal or digital shrine, depending on if I'm working physically or digitally, and if I'm feeling brave I'll share it with Her, but most times, they stay hidden in the depths of my shrine stuff.

Biggest overall piece of advice, create for them. Nothing shows devotion, quite like the personal experience of making something for someone else even if they never see it. Honor the Gods with the act of Creation, ya know?? It doesn't even have to require you to be good at drawing or whatever. Are you someone who gardens? Name a plant after them. Like makeup? Figure out what makeup styles they prefer on your chosen gender and wear those all the time, even if they're not there to see. Sewing? Make a stuffed animal of them. Speed runs? Dedicate every run to them, create a record for them. It can be as big or as mundane as you want and none of it has to be outwardly expressed to the other person. Just dedicate whatever hobby you have to them, and suddenly you'll have tons of shrine material.

Now for the quick part, of this!

General Worship Tips! (These are more indirect tho)

When getting dressed, pick outfits you know they'll appreciate. (Just please don't sacrifice your personal style for this)

Capitalize their name/title no matter what. They deserve the respect of one extra button push.

Write letters, even if you live close, even if you see them everyday, and even if you never send them. Use this as a format to express your emotions unbarred.

Save every photo they send you of themselves. If you need to edit people out of the photo do it, but you better be saving every instance of themselves they give you.

Fill your space with things that express yourself yes, but also have stuff that reminds you of them. Do they have a favorite animal? Buy those kinds of stuffed animals. They say they like certain types of aesthetics? Put some of that decor in your space.

I don't paint my nails, but if you do, paint them their favorite color.

Have dedicated jewelry pieces for them. While My Goddess did not give it to me, I have a memory of them associated with a bracelet I wear every single day. You can just buy a piece of jewelry and assign it as a symbol to them. They don't have to know.

Interact with their interests, with passion. Do your best to care about everything they care about. It'll give you guys tons of stuff to do, and help you understand them better.

Make pinterest boards dedicated to certain moments you want i.e. first date, wedding, future house/apartment dreams, pets you want with them, nursery room ideas, etc.

Make playlists dedicated to them.

Alright that's all I really have for right now! I hope some of this advice has been helpful and at the very least legible lol. I hope everything with you and your God goes well! If you want any more advice do not be afraid to ask me more questions :)

[honeyhotteoks]

in the spirit of the writers' game (except its not actually a question so no presh) do you have any tips on getting integrated into fandom community? i have like 12 bajillion fic ideas bumping around in my head that i wanna gab to someone about but i dont know how i'd like.. get someone's attention without it being.. weird? or like manufactured... i'm reticent to post because so much attention spooks me Out of writing which is like, not the end goal lol

tldr how do i make friends please and thanks but in the least pathetic way possible

this is a great question!! i'll be honest with you, i'm not sure if i'm the best person to answer this, but i'll do my best.

for some context, i'm actually very introverted. i really struggle to make friends both online and in real life. while most of my meaningful friendships are fandom based, typically it's because a pretty extroverted person snapped me up and then i got comfy talking, not really from me doing the outreach first.

when it comes to writing and a writing community, i'm also pretty insulated. i would love to be friends with some of my favorite writers on here too, but honestly i just can never bring myself to reach out, and my adhd is really intense so i tend to miss messages/notifications/engagement when other people reach out to me.

all of that being said, if you're interested in creating a writing space for yourself in this fandom, i do have some advice, and maybe you'll be better at grabbing onto the potential friendships that do come from that, which is the part i struggle with.

to start, i'd recommend becoming an active participant in the reading community if you aren't already. i'd create a fandom blog for yourself here and/or on twitter and use that to just start engaging with fic you like - reblog stuff and add fun tags, compliment the authors you're loving, drop messages off anon from that account if that's something you're comfortable doing. just start getting your username and your pfp on people's pages more and more. (this is one of those reasons i'll never change my username or my pfp btw, people know this as me and they've known that for a long time so in a small way it's kind of my writer's brand)

then think about what you're writing or want to write. is it big multichaptered work? smutty oneshots? romantic imagines? list-style stuff / scenario stuff like "hyung line headcanons" etc? figure out what you feel compelled to write, not just ideas, and start to write them. write them for yourself even if they're "bad" or unpolished and just enjoy that process a little bit while you're engaging as a reader / casually making fandom connections.

once you feel like you might have ideas to share, i think it's completely fine to make a post asking if anyone would want to beta read or if anyone else would want to talk about fics/headcanons etc. if you really want someone to connect with before you ever post your fic, i think this is the best way. i personally don't love messages asking me if i would be willing to read or edit someone's fic because to be honest that's a huge undertaking and i always find i'm too critical / take it too seriously. i also think when it's done this way it kind of makes the relationship a little awkward overall.... some people might be okay with it and i might be overthinking it, but that's just how i feel in general. BUT if you find people by asking the community and people are reaching out to you, that's completely different imo and i've done that in the past in other fandoms.

then once you're ready to throw a hail mary and post something, whether it's beta read or not, i'd recommend taking some time to do the following:

consider the look of your post and the aesthetic. people are so much more likely to click on it if it's formatted well and has some kind of a header image. go look at what other people do, what you like, and what you want your fic 'look' to be.

edit, and edit again. i know it's exciting to want to post asap, but if you're nervous, read it again. in my opinion, fic that you post should be fic that you want to read. if you're struggling to read your own work because something is a little clunky or you find yourself skimming it...... someone else might feel the same

post it at the right time. you don't need to be a marketing major and try to like drive engagement, but if you post it at 3am on a sunday i promise you people will miss it, and then you'll be struggling with the feeling of why did no one like my fic that i spent hours on etc.

your first fics aren't going to get much attention. that is totally okay! keep going, keep trying, and over time you will find your audience.

reblog reblogs.... if you get a reblog of someone adding tons of tags / fun comments / a review of your work etc., reblog their reblog and thank them! answer questions! engage! opening that door in this way as a writer will help build a little community of your own.

i would say that over the last three years here i've gained a little community of my own. i have consistent readers, anons and mutuals i recognize, people that i look forward to engaging with every time i post something even if they don't realize it. that means SO much to me as a writer, but truly it took a long time to create that space for myself here. admittedly though, even with that being true, i really struggle with connection but that might not be apparent to people just following my blog. i guess this is all to say, comparison is the thief of joy. as you start to create your own space here, reader or writer, don't spend time looking at other people and other blogs and wishing you could have xyz too. focus on what you truly want, what makes you happy, and do it for the love of writing. the rest will surely follow in time. 💛

[bestworstcase]

do you have any thoughts on The Hunter’s Children? when i read it my immediate reaction was “this has to mean strq reunion” (and i have been banging that drum for years now) but i’m curious what you think about it

in general i read fairytales of remnant as an ozpin character study so i tend not to have STRQ at the forefront of my mind (see also: ‘the warrior in the woods’ was not originally about a silver-eyed warrior), and my immediate reaction to the hunter’s children was to look at this:

“No,” said the younger sister. “We need to study the Grimm, so we can figure out better ways to protect against them.” […] The younger sister ventured into the woods near her village and built a structure high on a tree branch from which she could observe Grimm safely. Whenever one came near, she calmed herself enough to avoid its attention while she made careful notes and sketches. But studying the Grimm in this passive state did not provide useful information about their strength and abilities in combat. […] “I was wrong. The best way to learn about the Grimm is by fighting them,” said the younger sister.

and then this:

This is one of my favorite fairy tales, and I include it here not only because its messages still resonate today—perhaps more than ever—but also because the hunter’s four children bear a striking resemblance to the four-student teams at each of our Huntsmen academies. One wonders if the king of Vale had this story in mind when he established them after the Great War.

and then exchange a meaningful glance with the corner of my brain where i just replay WOR: grimm on a continual loop and crack the fuck up. ozma modeled the curriculum of his academies on a story whose overt moral includes "scientific study of the grimm is a waste of time and useless, the right way to learn about them is killing them." and in the end killing is all that matters………

OUR marvelous capacity to learn from the experience of fighting grimm; THEIR perverse form of self-preservation making them more effective killers. salem is the funniest fucking person alive

also considering ozpin says it’s his "favorite fairytale" (and thus probably one he either made up in the first place or has retold often enough to have shaped the traditional narrative) and his CONSTANT PROJECTION,

“Because I hate the Grimm for killing your mother,” the hunter might answer. “And I hate myself for not being there when she died.” Dinner conversation was silent on those nights until one child would ask softly, “Tell us about Mother again.” And soon they would be sharing their favorite memories of her, such as her sharp sense of humor, her beautiful singing voice, and her gentle but firm hand in guiding their combat training.

<- this is about salem. or more specifically, it’s ozma’s grief and remembrance of salem refracted through an allegorical story about a man who couldn’t save his beloved wife from the grimm. (which. lmao.) and well. the lost fable begins with salem humming, and her way of teaching and training cinder is not far off from a twisted "gentle but firm" approach. that’s 2 of 3, and 3 of 3 taking into account her occasional moments of WITHERING DEADPAN SARCASM esp in narration and the "your mother said those words to me"/"hm! her again? :)" attitude she has adopted about these girls’ mother being her general and the "hm! you certainly do enjoy collecting assets!" gently ribbing cinder and the nasty "she thinks… she wants…" bit when she uses her sarcasm for evil. and "perhaps you and i can have a better working relationship :)" LISTEN TO ME. SALEM IS FUNNY. HUMOR IS HOW SHE COPES. OZMA MISSES HER JOKES…

ahem.

that said, rereading the story again i do see where you’re getting the STRQ parallels / reunion foreshadowing because yeah it’s.

younger sister: her semblance suppresses or banishes emotion with waves of "overwhelming calm," she uses it to go… live among the grimm…

younger brother: his semblance lets him hide in plain sight by closing his eyes, but grimm can still sense his presence; he stumbles around "safe" but blind until the younger sister rescues him.

older sister: her semblance leads her toward whatever she needs most, which in the story this turns out to be her younger siblings. she pledges her service to protect the village, but the grimm are so numerous and the villagers so upset that they’re forced to adopt a nomadic lifestyle to stay safe.

older brother: his semblance allows him to create a shared pool of aura between large groups of people connected by a rope; he travels around until he finds a surviving village and becomes their champion until they, too, are overwhelmed and forced to flee.

if summer willingly joined salem, then… yeah all four of these characters map very neatly onto team STRQ.

summer joined salem and learned from her how to tame / command / ally with / otherwise live safely among grimm; she’s the younger sister.

"bravado" is a description that suits tai’s character quite well, and when he’s "alone in the forest"—left by raven and summer and qrow—he winds up lost and blind, depressed, and he’s (emotionally) trapped there still, surrounded by grimm that have overrun vale and patch.

raven’s semblance links her to her family so she can always get to them; there’s some resonance too between the older sister’s leadership of the village and the branwen tribe in that the branwens need to stay on the move because, as bandits, they’re walking grimm bait. and the older sister is left behind, which is… pretty clearly how raven feels toward the rest of her team.

qrow as the older brother on the surface seems like he’s the odd one out but…considered metaphorically, the older brother’s semblance makes him weak when he is alone and strong with the support of a community, which is qrow’s emotional arc exactly; and the older brother also travels the world and (literally) binds people together, which, gestures at qrow telling yang where to find raven and bringing RNJR into the loop and so forth. also the clover pin semblance key change in v8.

…gonna put this one down as another tally in the "tai’s 'assignment' keeping him away from vacuo is summer" column.

[gengor]

So I like bcs and brb a lot but it’s kind of been bothering me that I haven’t seen much talk about this in regards to either show bcs or brb and I’m not the best person to elaborate on this but I do wanna talk about the way the show writes it’s Latino characters and follows up on them in bcs. 

I’m not gonna get into all the ways breaking bad uses Mexican culture in offensive ways to show Walter’s dissent into dangerous territory bc im hoping that this is obvious to most people. What I am gonna talk about is the way bcs fails to respond to this criticism in a meaningful way. 

So better call saul is a show thats essentially about exploring nature, nurture, and one’s own free will over the person they choose to become. It’s about humanizing Saul into someone we can understand and empathize with. In the time in Jimmy’s life when he was trying to improve as a person he had his brother bait him and manipulate him into committing felonies bc he wanted to feel superior. People in his life drilled it into his brain that he was incapable of being honest so why even bother? The phrase ‘he was born like this’ gets used more than a few times. The show also gives a lot of character work to Mike as well. And although Mike was never painted as malicious he can be incredibly indifferent to the pain of other characters. Bcs let us see emotionally heavy scenes with him where he’s more vulnerable than he ever was in breaking bad. So theres an established pattern of adding more complexity to one of the one-dimensional ‘bad guys’ of breaking bad by making them act differently than how they would in breaking bad. Can you see where I’m going with this?

Rewatching the show after I’d already seen it gave this weird thematic dissonance to way the show reintroduced any Salamanca character. Like as soon as we see Tuco we as the audience are supposed to be in on the joke. Like…Oh, we know that guy already. And of course, the show plays with the audience already knowing Tuco while Saul doesnt to dangle the high stakes of the situation in front of us for drama. Because we as the audience know that Tuco is and probably always was hot-headed and violent to satirical degrees. Other characters even chime in to reiterate that Tuco was always like this. Every single Salamanca family member is treated this way.

 And bc of the way bcs is trying to redeem and humanize it’s previously established white characters just makes this kind of even worse than breaking bad to me. Bc people were vocal about how breaking bad employed a lot of anti-Latino tropes within its writing so you'd think that bcs would try and take this opportunity to amend the writing a bit right? 

You could argue that this is what Ignacio’s character is supposed to do for the show. He’s a Jessie parallel. He’s not really a bad person he’s just incredibly in over his head. And while I do appreciate his presence in the show and like him I feel like it should have been more than just him. 

By far the biggest missed opportunity here to me was the lack of humanization that Lalo got. And I get he’s popular, I feel like that mostly due to how Tony Dalton played him in a very charismatic way. But god he was such a missed opportunity for a thematic follow-through. The way other characters talk about the Salamancas is exactly the kind of predetermination the show is trying to critique with jimmy. When Ignacio is roped into spying on Lalo to aid Gus in killing him he goes in already being incredibly suspicious of Lalo due to his family. He has reason to want this guy to be evil since he’s got to help kill him to save his own skin and his father's. He not only assumes this guy is evil based on his family, he /needs/ Lalo to be irredeemable. Then you're telling me that against all themes and narrative storytelling devices Lalo is just conveniently the guy he assumed he would be. Like, imagine if Lalo got to be a Jimmy parallel, a guy who’s acting out the role people assume he's supposed to fill bc no one thinks he can be anything else. Not humanizing Lalo and ignoring the potential to explore and humanize any other previously established or mentioned latino characters…its like the show is breaking its own thematic statements in order to keep the racism. 

[iratusmus]

so bizarre to me when people give fiona a redemption arc like making her evil wasnt literally like the fundamental core of making her an actually interesting character. like . ok actually i was mostly planning on just leaving the post as this but im going to make a proper post whining about this because ive seen it far too often for my liking.

it appears to me that a lot of people do this because they dislike fiona/scourge which is like. sure i get it. but you could literally just... break them up . and have her continue being awful on her own. like scourge is not the reason she switched sides and i find the idea. 1) a bit misogynistic frankly but thats more of a personal gripe than anything else like god forbid a woman make bad choices of her own volition and not because a man forced her hand into doing it (YES i am aware that abuse makes this more complicated than that but also we .... already have a relationship in archie sonic that fits this exact bill. yes it wasnt written well but the wonder of fan works is that you can always make it better. so why are we repeating it again 1:1) and 2) demeaning to the point of her character.

like. ok. lets go over the facts real quick. as a kid fiona got put in robotnik's salt mines and got accidentally left behind bc sonic & co couldnt find her. she realized that nobody was going make the effort to go save her, so she dug herself out and started life on the run as a treasure hunter/thief. she didnt ever really accept the fact that sonic and mighty not saving her wasnt really their fault, and even after becoming a freedom fighter, nobody ever said anything or apologized or said "hey wow that kind of sucks you went through all that". she never really made any actual friends within the ff or formed any meaningful bonds. she starts dating sonic, but its pretty clear that the only reason they're dating is that she's his rebound post The Slap. the moment her history with bean & bark came up - after she used that knowledge to save everybody - sally immediately turns on her and sonic is the only person to try to stick up for her. as bark and bean leave, bean also insinuates that fiona isnt really a freedom fighter, and that she's still basically one of them.

fiona is a "bad" trauma survivor. when i say "bad" i mean in opposition to the ideal tumblr trauma survivor - the sad poor uwu bean whose trauma only inclines them hurt themselves and they become more sympathetic kind etc. as a result. fiona, on the other hand, blames sonic (whose fault this is, frankly, not) for her experiences, and becomes more jaded and mean. she has no real support system and people repeatedly tell her that she hasnt changed and that she wont change and she cant change. shes already got all this baggage by the time her relationship with scourge starts carrying actual weight - he's offering her a way out. if none of them are ever going to really accept her being "good", then she might as well just give into her worst impulses and join hands with scourge, who, notably, has no stake in this - he doesnt have any obligation to be her friend like the freedom fighters, and more than that he likes her specifically because of the part of her that everybody else hates. the important part here is that he encouraged her to switch sides, he didnt make her switch sides.

id say fiona's character in a writing sense is an exploration of the failings of the freedom fighters to support a trauma victim, and how those failings, while unintentional, lead that victim to specifically turn against them. she says "ok actually screw all of you guys" and gives up on trying to be good because nobody ever gave her any real encouragement and decides to put herself on a path of self-destructive revenge and inflicting her misery onto the general population. we can also recall at this point that this motivation is entirely removed from scourge and you can literally break them up and still keep her evil.

the other important point here is that she purposefully chose that path of turning evil as opposed to leaving the freedom fighters or going somewhere else or like literally doing anything else. she literally could have just left but she did not and thats what makes her Interesting. prompted by her unhealed trauma and personal baggage she made those bad choices for herself, and frankly i cannot for the life of me understand why people think that walking back that character development (and yes i mean character development. character development can also mean getting worse) for ..... what. snarky but with a heart of gold generic protagonist girl? come on guys

[loftylockjaw]

TIMING: Shortly after Anita’s birthday party LOCATION: Mansión Mexicana PARTIES: Wyatt (@loftylockjaw) & Anita (@gossipsnake) SUMMARY: While sitting and chatting about their lives, Wyatt opens up to his friend about his nightmare problems, and Anita supports his decision to handle it with violence. CONTENT WARNINGS: very very brief drug mention

—

There were a lot of little ways that Anita had made Wicked’s Rest feel comfortable to her, made it feel as close to home as it could. Her house was the most significant part of that. Isolated from a lot of the town and out of place in terms of its Spanish architectural style, it was truly her sanctuary. Much to her dismay, the house did little in the way of giving her any sense of real community. That wasn’t to say she hadn’t built meaningful connections over the years in town but Anita missed the comfort of being surrounded by lamia. Practically she understood why her fellow reptilian beings didn’t seem to flock to the cold shores of Maine which only increased her desire to seek out the others who braved the colder weather. 

It had been no surprise that, eventually, a lamia had found their way into the Grit Pit. Anita could still recall the first time she saw Wyatt rip the limbs from his opponent in a fight - a beautifully bloody work of art. It didn’t take long for the pair to realize they had a lot more in common than just stunning scales and exceptional bone structure. They also shared a love for the miscellaneous excitements that life had to offer, which allowed for a budding friendship to take root. Anita not only enjoyed the evenings they would spend together but found herself actively looking forward to them. 

“No, no, no,” Anita corrected with a soft laugh, “I meant, like, what’s the weirdest thing that’s happened in town to you that ended up being just … normal run of the mill stupid human shit? For me, it was probably when I thought that the professor I shared an office with during my first year at the University had become some kind of undead being. I mean, the man looked and smelled like death. He kept complaining about losing time and one time I came in early and there was a strange blood trail throughout the office.” She paused, partially for dramatic effect and partially to take another swig of tequila. “Turns out his wife caught him cheating, kicked him out,  and he was sleeping in the office. I guess a science lab and sleepwalking can make for a dangerous combination.” 

—

Laughing at her story, Wyatt shrugged his shoulders. “Well damn, woman, I don’t know! There’s so much weird shit that happens around here on the daily, I can’t keep track! Sucks big time for that guy, though. You know, that’s probably as good an incentive against marriage as I’ve ever heard.” He chuckled again, trying to think of something specific. Odds were he was too ignorant of the supernatural beyond some shifters and some undead to ever peg anyone as supernatural for their weird habits, but… “I mean every really intense horror fan I meet I assume, at least at first, is a bugbear. They’re kinda hard to suss out anyway, you know? But I guess usually they’re just… weird.” He snorted, shaking his head and lapsing into silence as he sipped on the tequila they were sharing. A thought struck him then and he straightened up in his seat a bit, cocking his head at Anita. 

“Oh, by the by… I met this girl recently, another lamia. But like… freshly a lamia, you know? First one in her family. She seemed… less than happy about it.” He scoffed. “Go figure. Anyway, was thinkin’ you might have better luck talkin’ to her… I know I ain’t the most, ahh, what’s the word…” Sensitive. Tactful. Compassionate. “... well, I’m not good at talkin’, is what I’m sayin’. Anyway, sounds like she’s hopin’ for a way to reverse it, which’ll likely just get her killed.”

—

“Oh, don’t you know? All the weird shit is just part of the local, coastal charm! That’s how everyone around here seems to wanna justify it all, anyway.”  As much as Anita thought people were foolish to write off the strange happenings that happened in this town, ultimately their foolishness only benefited her. They were so willing to accept banal explanations for almost anything, so willing to justify an alarming amount of unusual deaths. “You know, now that you mention it, I haven’t come across a bugbear in town since I’ve been here. Not knowingly, anyway. I’ve had a few students who were just weird enough that I wouldn’t have been surprised though…” 

Anita smirked when Wyatt had mentioned meeting a girl, not sure of where this next story was going. And unsure she certainly was. Her left eyebrow raised at the mention of another lamia and she reached for the chilled bottle of tequila out on the table to refill her glass. “First one? That’s…well, I’ve never actually met the first in a lineage before.” The idea of meeting this woman flushed her with excitement and an odd sense of duty. The lamia before her had taught her all she knew about survival but there would be nobody around to teach the first of a bloodline. “Reverse it?” Anita scoffed, shaking her head. “No, no, she just needs someone to talk to, I’m sure. And unlike you I am very good at talking. How did you meet her?” 

The next thought made her smirk softly, always hopeful for more serpentine companions, “What kind of lamia was she?” 

—

“Yeah… that clawed foot that sprang up outta the ground like an eager tulip is real fuckin’ charming,” Wyatt argued under his breath, rolling his eyes. “I guess,” he added in a louder voice for Anita to hear, letting out a huff of breath. “Whatever keeps ‘em from askin’ questions…” 

Anita’s curiosity was good, because that meant that the responsibility of guiding this young lamia was slowly slipping from his shoulders like water off a duck’s back. “Out in the woods, huntin’. We was after the same buck, go figure.” And he’d ripped it in half to share with her, like the gentleman that he was… despite what others might say. There was the question of her reptilian form, to which Wyatt laughed softly and rubbed the back of his neck. “Oh… y’know… snake-y…” he answered dumbly, offering an apologetic shrug a few beats after. “Sorry, can’t say I’m real familiar with snake types. Didn’t know none growin’ up, was never really taught about ‘em. But. She was… pretty.” He coughed. That said literally nothing about her type. Stupid. Shut up. 

Silencing himself with a sip of tequila, the shifter pulled out his phone and started tapping through some menus before pulling up a phone number. He set the device on the table and pushed it closer to Anita, nodding at it at the same time. “That’s her number. I told her I had another lamia friend in town, so you reachin’ out won’t be totally unexpected.” The man sighed and sat back again, dragging a hand across his face. The uninterrupted hours of wakefulness were catching up with him again, and the tequila wasn’t making it any easier to not sink into his seat and have a little siesta… 

—

The fact that it was another snake that Wyatt had encountered made Anita grin. Anyone who got her talking about shifters of any kind for more than a couple of minutes were bound to hear her thoughts on the hierarchy of the species. While she hadn’t (knowingly, soberly, seriously) said so to Wyatt, Anita undoubtedly considered snake lamia to be the superior among the lamia subtypes. “Oh, come on, mi caimán. Just because you may not have known any snake lamia doesn’t mean you don’t know snakes, no? Down that way, I bet you grew up near king snakes, cottonmouths, racers,” Anita paused for a moment, the tequila straining her geographical knowledge ever so slightly, “and a bunch more, I’m sure.” 

Pulling out her own phone, Anita copied the number into her contacts, “What? You didn’t get a name?” As she put her phone away, Anita noticed that Wyatt seemed more muted than usual. Nudging him playfully as he leaned back in the chair, she quickly sought to fill the silence. “Ay, someone special been keeping you up late? Making you too tired to enjoy this incredible tequila and even more fantastic company?” It wasn’t that Anita couldn’t handle a lul in the conversation, or silence, for that matter. It was just that it made her uncomfortable. Especially lately, she didn’t want to be left in a circumstance where she wasn’t distracted from her own thoughts. “Spill.” She prompted with a smirk.

—

Sometimes he forgot how smart Anita was, by no fault of her own. He’d just grown up around rather…. uneducated types, so he wasn’t exactly used to the effortless way she rattled off different snake species that he had undoubtedly encountered down in the bayou, but never knew the names of. It did manage to make him feel stupid at times, which he couldn’t really hold against her. It was good that she was intelligent, imagine if all lamia were brutes like him? They’d probably go extinct within a decade, if no new ones were made. Sighing, Wyatt shrugged his shoulders. “Sure, Anita, sure I did. But I was more interested in eatin’ ‘em than I was studyin’ ‘em,” he explained, exasperated. “Anyway, she didn’t look like any I’d seen before. Kinda had a… a curved snout. Y’know, like a… um…” He had to think hard about it for a moment before the name came to him, “Like a hognose. But the colors were darker.” Wyatt then gave a mock-offended huff. “Course I did. Isa. Isa Caceres. Good snake name, eh? You know, what with all the hissin’. Weird she wasn’t born into it.”  

He felt Anita nudge him and couldn’t help the smile that slipped across his face, closing his eyes for a moment. “Someone special? Don’t think that’s the right word.” No one had ever been special to him like that, at least not as far as he’d let himself explore the feeling. His mind did wander to a few people, but of course they were not the cause of his exhaustion. Not… directly, anyway. “No, it’s just…” He debated how much he wanted to say to her. They were friends, and they were bonded by something different than he had with anyone else… but god, was it weak of him to admit that he was afraid of sleeping? I’ve been having these nightmares the last few months. Real bad ones. I wake up in a panic, and I’ve been waking up shifted. And it wasn’t just that. I’m having a harder and harder time telling what’s real. The birds are everywhere, and that leg in the woods… that can’t be real, right? But I see it on the horizon all the time. I don’t even know if I’m awake right now. 

“... trouble sleepin’, I guess.”

—

Anita was never the type to let people make her feel bad for who she was, and she was a lot. She didn’t know exactly what the source of the apparent exasperation that came from Wyatt’s response was, but she took no offense. “I get it. A regular snake is fair game, I suppose. Certainly below lamia on the food chain.” She knew that her curiosity, her constant desire to learn about the things she saw in the world was not something that everyone shared. After all it was the thing that drove such a wedge between herself and the rest of her family, it was something they never could understand. “Isa Caceres,” Anita responded, drawing out all of the s sounds dramatically. “I like it. She may not have been born with it, but seems as though she was destined for it.” 

The smile that came after her question was so intriguing. The question had mostly been in jest considering how the pair had often bonded over their lack of any singular special someone, and a bit of a lack of desire to be tied down to one person. Or at least that was how Anita had perceived it. For a moment it seemed as though he was going to give her some sort of real response, and Anita refilled both of their glasses with more tequila in anticipation. But instead, she got a rather lame generic answer. 

“Oh,” she nodded, lifting up her glass to take a sip. “Yeah, that happens sometimes I suppose.” Anita tried to figure out why she felt a bit strange. Sometimes she wondered if she spent so much time studying the behavior of insects and of others that she saw things that weren’t really there. Was his extended pause because he was tired? Or had he considered telling her more before deciding not to? If it had been the latter, she couldn’t help but wonder what it was about her that made him hold back. “Sometimes when I need a good night's sleep, I go to sleep without being shifted out of the mojave. I have a room with several industrial heat lamps. It reminds me of sleeping out in the desert. If you want, you could borrow the room for a night sometime.” 

—

He could sense the shift in her demeanor. His answer, vague as it was, hadn’t been what she wanted to hear. Even her generous offer, one that he was very inclined to take her up on, didn’t hide her disappointment. There he went again, disappointing the people he cared about. 

“Ahh, it’s just… it’s more than that. Obviously.” He sighed, rubbing his neck with his free hand. “Sorry. I’m… my shit has been… pretty fucked, lately.” He laughed. “Your party was a bright spot, actually.” Sucking in a long breath, Wyatt started to list things aloud. “Let’s see… I fucked up one of my friend’s lives more than it was already fucked up because I was trying to help them and I’m shit at that… I got a boyfriend, found out someone I was messing around with stabbed said boyfriend, then got dumped two days later for someone else… I accidentally killed a friend of mine during a fight because hey! Turns out I’m actually losing my mind! Which is just the cherry on top of all of this. I can’t sleep because when I sleep I have these awful fucking nightmares, so bad that I sometimes shift without meaning to. And now I’m starting to lose it even when I’m awake, or when I think I’m awake, because honestly, girl? I can’t fuckin’ tell anymore.” He huffed out another breath and gave Anita a shrug. “So… that’s the short of it. I’m probably forgetting some other terrible thing that happened, but it’s all startin’ to run together now anyway.” He raised his brows, looking at her like is that truthful enough? as he knocked back the tequila she’d poured him.

—

Despite her disappointment in Wyatt’s very non-response response, Anita didn’t really expect that her subtly was going to push him to open up. So when it did she almost didn’t know how to respond. Almost, until he complimented the elaborate surprise party she had thrown herself.  “Ay, si, the party was a bright spot for a lot of people I think. We all need a release sometimes.” But she could only beam with pride for a few short moments, as the floodgates had seemed to open and his pause wasn’t the end of his comments but merely the preamble. 

Several times, Anita opened her mouth to say something, to comment - at the mention of a boyfriend, someone getting stabbed, getting dumped, an accidental death - but the hits kept coming. For a split second, when he mentioned killing someone in a fight, there was a flash of panic in her eyes as she thought of Felix. But she had just spoken to them that morning, there wouldn’t have been any fights since that conversation, and she’d like to think Wyatt would know better than to bury the lead with that. “Mierda, that honestly sounds like someone trying to summarize a bad arc of a telenovela.” She poured herself another shot, then slid the bottle across the bar towards him. 

“Sorry, amor, I didn’t mean that in any kind of way. Just… fuck, I had no idea.” Anita was never very good at catastrophic problem solving. None of these things really seemed fixable by offering to kill someone. “Any of these friends the one you hooked up with in my guest room at the party?” That wasn’t the right thing to say and she knew it, but it was what came out. 

—

“It’s fine. It is a bad arc. It’s the shittiest arc! I’d really like to have a fuckin’ word with my writer,” Wyatt complained, smirking in spite of the shithole that was his life at present. At least someone in his life knew how to make it less grave. Maybe he’d look back on this some day and laugh. Maybe. He reached for the bottle, pouring himself some more while she asked a follow up question. One that had his brows raising and a grin appearing on his face, an actual grin, not one that felt forced. 

“Oh, that?” He clicked his tongue, deciding in that moment that he wasn’t going to be a sad piece of shit for one night, regardless of whatever waited for him outside the safety and comfort of Anita’s home. “No, no… that’s a new friend. Totally detached from all of that other shit, thank god. I don’t, ah… damn, I don’t even remember how we met.” He was really digging for it, but coming up short. “All I remember is him showin’ up at my place in a cab, givin’ me a pill, takin’ me to a club, and fuckin’ me in… a coat closet? Hell if I can recall.” The man laughed, giving Anita a shrug. “I guess he and I kinda have a pattern that we follow. Sorry to your guest room specifically.” 

—

Anita tilted her head slightly, but smiled and laughed along with her friend. For all of their distinct differences and obvious similarities, one thing that was more subtle she had noticed was that they both seemed to resort to humor and distraction when things were complicated. In a way it was nice to have someone who she could reasonably rely on to “yes, and” her delusions but she also couldn’t help but wonder if this was the kind of support that he needed. Was she being a good friend or a bad influence? 

But the story of this new ‘friend,’ was far too intriguing, pulling her mind out of more philosophical questions and back down into the reality of the evening. Her grin grew wider as he kept adding onto the story, to a more level headed person there may have been some red flags picked up upon, but Anita didn’t see any. “Now that sounds like one hell of a friend.” Having some easy, light, exceptionally enjoyable fun seemed like a good thing. How could it be anything else? “My guest room has seen far worse, it’s alright.” 

Anita pulled the bottle back across the table, not bothering with a glass and taking a shot out of it directly before pushing it back towards Wyatt. She scratched her head slightly, sighing softly as a few thoughts began to settle into place in the midst of the tequila haze. She’d been around a few mares long enough to wonder if someone might be targeting her friend.  “These nightmares. When’d they start?” 

—

See? He knew she'd forgive him. Not that that had needed proving, but it felt nice to be right about something regardless. He'd been wrong about a lot of things lately. 

Then she was asking about the nightmares. “Funny story, that,” Wyatt began, scoffing to himself. It didn't matter that he now had a lead on why they were happening, it didn't immediately fix his insomnia or deeply rooted fear of birds, of all fucking things. “A few months ago. Came out of nowhere, really. Just started having freaky dreams that were all bird-themed, you know. And they just kept escalating. Then I started seeing someone in my dreams a lot.” He paused. “Saw her when I was awake too, I think.” He threw Anita a knowing glance. “Turns out, she might be real. Might be the one giving me nightmares.” He shook his head, reaching for the bottle and taking a pull directly from it like Anita had. “Gonna try and get that sorted, yanno, quick as I can. Still don't mean I'm gettin’ restful sleep though.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes tightly shut. “Might… take you up on those heating lamps. Can't remember the last time I was able to get a proper sunnin’ nap in. Bet that's not helping.” He'd been running cold for months now. 

—

Anita frowned as Wyatt talked about these nightmares being what she felt fairly certain to be the description of a mare targeting him, feeding from him. “Poor, sweet, baby boy. Yes. It sounds like you have a silly witch giving you nightmares. Not a real witch,” she clarified, “but you should find this woman and you should eat her. That will stop the bird dreams.” There was part of her that wondered whether or not one of the mares she knew was the one feeding from her friend. It would not have changed her advice, though. That was survival of the fittest. If you disturb a species higher up than you, you can’t be surprised when you find your neck crushed between the teeth of a lamia. 

“It’s almost impossible in this town. Set aside the fact that it’s not even warm enough outside for more than half the year to get a good sun nap, all the good secluded spots in the forest have too much shade and the spots with nice sunlight feel… too exposed sometimes.” Anita thought about how easy it was back home, when the temperatures spiked so high that most humans stayed indoors, to head out into the desert and bask in the sun. “You can stay here tonight, if you want, and enjoy the heat. I don’t mind.” 

—

Wyatt smiled. They really were of similar minds, and while it hardly came as a surprise, it was always a comforting thing to experience. It made him feel just a little bit less alone. Anita understood him, and she didn’t judge him, far as he could tell. She was perhaps the closest thing he had to actual family around here, which meant she was filling in a rather sizable hole in Wyatt’s heart. He was glad to have found her, and glad that they’d become such fast, fierce friends. The man nodded in agreement, shaking a finger at her. “My thoughts exactly,” he answered with a grin. 

“Yeah… it’s tragic, is what it is. Came too damn far north.” Sometimes he had half a mind to go back to the swamps, but now he couldn’t, could he? He was trapped here. In that context, her offer was even more welcome than it would’ve been otherwise, and his situation left very little room for pride. Well, at least when it came to Anita. He’d bury his problems with most other people, just like he’d tried to bury them here, with her, just before opening up. It was his default setting, and he had to actively fight against it to accept charity. “That’d be amazing, actually. Thanks, my little Mojave aster,” he chuckled, knowing the exasperated glare that might be coming his way for that one. “I owe you.”

[sarka-stically]

im mad enough to make 2nd post and I barely post ever. this show was never high tv but this ep rly spat in the face of everything i liked about it. usually i try to be positive but here you got random list of all things terrible in no particular order (vaguelly chronologic who knows)

ALSO I dont take them probably assuming they would have more eps and then scrambling to fit the story in one episode as decent excuse... the stakes they set up in ep7 werent impossible to fix with one ep, they just wrote terrible episode

ed's entire character arc of 2 seasons being rolled into tiny ball and thrown in the trash. and no he isnt slipping or spiralling again, it isnt him being hot protective husband, this is him, character who spent 2 seasons trying and failing to be better and finally decided that the healthiest thing to do is to just drop the lifestyle that brings out the worst in him and pursue simple life THROWING IT OUT after finding out its not as easy as he assumed and he would have to work for it??? incredible fucking message david jenkins, if being better version of yourself is just lil bit inconvenient its not worth it go back to your crappy ways.

and NO its not him slipping, the tone of this whole thing is very distinctly victorious. and also NO the path he took now is not in any way different or better than the one he left. there is even fun triumphant vibe to him KILLING PEOPLE which was always treated as sth BAD for him??? literally absolute nonsense

what the fuck was that plot?? why are all pirates arrested?? when all they did was sink those ships?? i know this show tends to be cooky and silly and cartoony, but this was just absolutely random unexplained jump of stakes.

WHERE THE FUCK are all the other husbands of jackie. this is barely valid complaint but this stupid ep rly makes it look like swede is her only husband and I dont appreciate it

why the unholly hell did they spend entire season actually setting up crew as important, give them their own opinions and relationships to their captains, have izzy even mention that THE CREW is what its all about.... and then have them barely have any speaking roles in this episode and 0 plot relevance

that fucking PLAN??? WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT??? im sorry why the fuck did their plan include walking through the biggest swarm of brits while having mr noseless richie UNSECURED amongst them??? why even BRING HIM other than to have him there specifically so he can be the one to shoot izzy for future drama???

izzy. death.

i genuinely could be FINE with izzy dying if they wrote it decently. and id even be fine with it in this episode. if they made it fucking meaningful... but they had my man, mr famously skilled pirate catch random bullet because he is incompetent actually... bullet into the side of the body that ofmd physics say is survivable easily??? and then give 0 attention to it??

ed being there while he dies??? this truly makes me just feel like they killed him only so in hypoteticky s3 they can woobify poor ed some more... or even give him excuse to be narrativelly clean of any atrocities he does in name of revenge

but it makes no. fucking. sense. ed shluldnt be there saying ur my only family, ed has not treated izzy as family ONCE in this entire show, ed barely talked to izzy after first 3 episodes, he is NOT the person on that ship who cares about izzy the most of all. if anyone should be there while he fucking DIES its the crew. who has shown constantly through this season that they care about him, who he made whole speech about in THIS SAME EPISODE. im sorry frenchie did NOT carry izzy back on the ship to drop him on the floor and have ed who I REPEAT HAS NOT SHOWN HE CARES ABOUT HIM AS MORE THAN AQUITANCE SINCE LIKE EARLY S1 be the one to be there in his last moment.

I get izzy wanting to make amends but BOTH OF THEM SHOULD BE APOLOGISING, HE SHOULDNT VE BEGGING FOR FORGIVENESS and ed shouldnt be framed as blameless in their relationship in izzy's last moment.

and what made me genuinely laugh was izzy saying that the crew is ed's family. they are literally NOT. everyone who was aboard the revenge either hates him or is scared of him, and I dont think they had enough reason to change their minds as ed hasnt rly spent any time with the crew and shown only care for stede. they are NOT ed's found family and this payoff and this found family line is so ridiculously not set up and not narrativelly deserved it makes me laugh.

overall absolutely ridiculizs episode it made me laugh and it made me angry and it also made me angry how quickly we move past that