#how many time do you think he imagined that scene where he'd finally be able to tell neal

[aragarna]

You're free. You're free. - White Collar rewatch (148/?) 6x06 Au Revoir

[emeryhiro]

Who do you think will likely make the first move if/when Daryl and Carol get together? Is there a fantasy scenario in your head for the big confession scene?

I would be so psyched if AMC and TWD actually goes there.

Hi Anon,

Good question!! I've actually changed my mind so many times about how I think it would happen, even while writing this response. But there are a few details that I've stuck by.

I think Daryl would be the one to initiate a moment like that. And what I mean by a moment is a conversation where everything is finally put out into the open (more on this later). I also know that it would be full of hesitation and fear because, as Norman has said many times before, Daryl is inexperienced and insecure in that area. He doesn't have any "game" and isn't the type to confidently approach something like that.

However, the situations he has faced in France have put him in a position where he starts to feel that he has to initiate something like that, which he may never have been able to do on the main show. I also think that even though Daryl may initiate it, Carol would pick up on his hesitation and intentions, meet him halfway, and probably even take the lead from there.

In my mind, the moment would be full of reassurance and tenderness (both in words and actions) because they would both be overcoming so many insecurities, experiencing a moment they'd been dreaming about for over a decade, and might even be struggling to believe that they're actually in the moment and that it's actually real.

If I had to give you a visual of how I imagine the tone of the moment would play out, I'd say something along the lines of Daemon and Raeynera's confession on the beach in S1EP07 of House of the Dragon (Timestamp 19:47). Here's a part of that scene in case you can't access it through a streaming service.

This scene is full of built-up frustration, hesitation, and tenderness, which is precisely the tone that I imagine for Caryl. Some of the dialogue fits Caryl's circumstances really well as well, with perhaps the roles reversing at certain points (you just gotta ignore the parts about being a child 😅).

In order to explain what I mean a little better, I played around with some of the dialogue (below) from that scene so that it fit Carol and Daryl, and expanded on it a little bit because I think it's vital and necessary for Carol and Daryl to have a conversation like this where they're finally forced to be honest with themselves and each other before anything else can happen between them:

Carol: "I've been alone. You abandoned me."

I imagine this would be Carol confronting Daryl for leaving her behind in the commonwealth and putting his life (and ultimately her life) at risk, and possibly risking never being able to see each other again. This could also be built-up frustration from Daryl's seven years in the woods and how Carol kept asking him to return.

Daryl: "I spared you."

I think this would be Daryl starting to show Carol how he'd always felt that he wasn't good enough for her or that he could ever make her happy, so in his mind he spared her by staying away from her.

Carol: "And look at what my life became without you... Droll tragedy." Daryl: "Oh, and I wonder what you think of mine by comparison?"

This would be the moment they both finally understood that they were wrong to think the other person was better off without them and that, in the end, they'd both been living only half a life without the other.

Carol: "I know little of it..." Daryl: "Did you love him?" Carol: "We were happy enough." Daryl: "Well, that in itself is a great achievement... I am sorry."

These lines could really work for either of them. They're now finally sharing the things that were holding them back, like miscommunication and both thinking that the other was in love and happy with someone else (Carol with Ezekiel, and Daryl with Leah or even Isabelle).

~~~~

Thanks again for your question 🩵 and thank you to everyone who's been taking the time to read all my recent responses and posts. I really hope I've explained myself well here because I get so overwhelmed and excited every time I think about the possibility of Carol and Daryl finally being allowed to be together.

This has been the thing that I've wanted the most for them for over half my life, and to think that it may finally happen is a lot for me to process, so it has been really nice to be able to put some of my thoughts into words in this way.

[electricbathsalt]

(from kainagant) psst what are your extensive headcanons/thoughts on hero!overhaul au? i'd love to hear what you think he'd be like as a hero.

I AM SO GLAD YOU ASKED!! Idk why I didn’t talk about this sooner—it’s like I have to be prompted on a topic before I remember “oh yeah, I actually have thoughts on this matter, that I can speak out loud!!” 💀 also, I apologize in advance for how long this is. I’m basically summarizing the entirety of this AU in my mind, and it’s like. The longest-standing AU for Chisaki I have.

Anyway, first things first—he got taken away from the Hassaikai when he was young (like, maybe eleven or twelve?) and gets plopped in a Youth Recovery & Rehabilitation Center, which he was extremely pissed about at first, but his eyes kinda opened over the years as he learned more and more about how families and such are actually supposed to function, and how abnormal his entire life actually was up to that point.

Basically; he gets a stable, safe environment and therapy!! Yay!

By the time he reaches fifteen-sixteen, him going into hero school kinda just. Happened. He initially just wanted to shadow Recovery Girl, but they ended up making him take the entrance exam, and well… he passed with flying colors and all of a sudden he was a 1-A student. Luckily, that means instead of simply shadowing Recovery Girl, he gets to work as her official assistant! Cool, right.

And oh boy, does he learn a lot under her tutelage. Namely bedside manner. I imagine Chisaki who got away from the yakuza and had therapy wouldn’t be as blatant an asshole (obviously), but he would still be a bit lost on social norms and also honest/blunt to a fault. He doesn’t understand “putting things gently”, or “softening the blow”, and so Recovery Girl works to teach him when, where, and how he can be “nicer” to people/which situations require delicacy. She grows unexpectedly fond of him and actually finds his unwavering honesty refreshing because she knows he isn’t malicious and is simply stating exactly what he thinks. You just have to get used to his straightforwardness and he becomes rather endearing.

Recovery Girl also discovers that he’s actually capable of extreme kindness. Turns out when you coax him into telling you what’s on his mind, sometimes he’ll really surprise you with how much he cares, even if he himself doesn’t realize it, either (Without Pops and with therapy, Chisaki slowly grew back into caring about others. It took a lot of work, but without anyone weaponizing kindness against him, he felt he could allow himself to slowly feel it again (this is because doesn’t canon slightly imply Chisaki used to be kind like Eri with how he’s sort of like her if she never got saved? What if the way he escaped AFO’s facility was because he finally threw away caring about others and that was the difference between her and him? The fact Eri never got pushed to that point because she was rescued?))

Now, about his hero training. With his quirk-training, there’s not a lot to say/do. I’d say his quirk-training would involve a lot of “make this into this, as quickly as possible”. Basically, training him to be as precise and fast with his quirk usage as they can get him. I’d like to imagine that with training, they push him into being able to manipulate matter in all sorts of different ways, on the fly. He’s trained a lot in using environment to his advantage and whatnot. And maybe also one day, he ends up gaining the ability to use his quirk in areas other than his hands. Dunno.

For physical-training, I think they would heavily concentrate on making him extremely agile. Because hear me out—imagine Toga’s quirk awakening fight scene where she turns into Uraraka and sprints through all those people and takes them out. Imagine if Chisaki was able to move like that. He’d be fucking terrifying. They’d probably also want him to be extremely agile just on the front of being able to hit his hands against surfaces from as many positions as possible.

He absolutely would carry around things like painkillers and anesthesia like you said. Also hear me out, he’d carry around small bags of scraps that he’d then Overhaul to seal people’s wounds, since if the wound is big enough, he’d need some sort of substitute material to close it without sacrificing other parts of the person’s body.

He’d also sometimes work with the support course. He knows a lot about the human body and how quirks function, not to mention his quirk itself would be very useful in creating support items.

He’d get dragged into a lot of search-and-rescue missions because he’s literally perfect for those.

Pops eventually manages to get back into contact with Chisaki—to ask him to take a look at the girl he’s recently in possession of since her quirk is a dangerous mutation, and he’s such a fancy-pants doctor/support hero and quirk expert nowadays. Chisaki goes (he’s panicking internally from the moment he hears Pops’ voice over the phone to the moment he’s standing in front of the girl herself). He asks to take Eri for a couple days to run some tests. He never brings her back. He obtained full-custody of her via spilling every damn thing he’d ever learned and been through under the Shie Hassaikai.

(Seeing her sitting so lifelessly at that table, waiting to be prodded at like some sort of science experiment, reminded him of himself so much that it had been physically painful. The decision to ask to take her for only a while and then go back on his word was a rash one. It’s also one he doesn’t regret even slightly)

Huge advocate for quirkless people, and brings lots of awareness to quirk experimentation, since he’d been a victim of it himself.

And yes, becomes one of UA’s now multiple official on-site medical professionals. (They switch out as necessary)

So basically, he’s an extremely busy guy who never gets a moment’s rest thanks to the many… energetic people in his life (all the UA students give him migraines galore. Don’t even get him started on his coworkers), he’s slightly (very) terrifying, and SURPRISE! It’s good parent!chisaki AU as well, because I’m not leaving Eri to rot in Pops’ care.

I also play around with the idea of him never getting separated from his bio parents and becoming a hero from there, which mostly impacts his personality versus the actual stream of events that happen.

If there’s any further questions or if you wanted to know about anything specific, ask me and I’ll be happy to answer!! (Goes for anyone who may or may not be reading this)

[descendant-of-truth]

Consider... what if Sonic got attached to the custom character so fast because they were the first person he knew was real in months

Like, let's say that Infinite used his illusion powers to make Sonic think his friends had come to rescue him on multiple occasions, and let's also assume that he's only ever drawn on Sonic's memories for the illusions because I like it when magic powers have a limit

Sonic always takes the escape opportunity no matter how many times it's a trick because he's Sonic, he refuses to give up even after all this time - but his expectations are pretty low. He's "escaped" from prison a bunch of times, with and without his friends in tow, nothing about this time seems any different.

...Right up until he sees someone he doesn't recognize. Which has never happened before. Sonic's a smart cookie, he'd have figured out by now that Infinite only ever uses his past to taunt him, if he could've been including strangers this whole time he definitely would have.

But the custom character is completely unfamiliar to him, and that means that everything that's happening is real.

And they're even here to save him?? Hello??? New best friend?????

So of course he's going to want to do joint missions with them like they do in the tag team levels; they give him a sense of security that he hasn't had since the war started. Which isn't to say that they don't genuinely become buddies, of course - there's a reason their theme song is Fist Bump - but I think this would add a really interesting layer to their dynamic.

It could even open Sonic up to a type of arc he's never needed to have before: learning to be confident in himself and his own perceptions again, without needing the custom character by his side all the time. It makes the scene where they part ways just as much about the OC coming into their own without relying on Sonic as it is about Sonic finally being able to move forward without relying on them.

I don't even have any specific scenes in mind, but can you imagine how compelling that would be as a central part of the story?? Sonic would still give the OC his classic, inspirational pep talks, but this time they'd be able to return the favor and help Sonic take his own advice about believing in yourself despite your fears. It would be so sweet

Every day I'm haunted by a Sonic/Custom Character dynamic that doesn't exist and now you all get to join me

[krilati]

Is it worth it?

Dick hurried back to the cave where Damian and Tim were now.

Tim had stayed away from the estate since his triumphant return with the news that Bruce was alive.

But no matter how hard he tried to keep his distance, Dick couldn't help but notice the painful thinness, the extra layers of foundation that most likely hid new scars, and the fear of touch.

And finally, Dick was able to organize a joint patrol, and even united Damian and Tim together! And they barely resisted! Only to learn through the Oracle that Damian was trying to kill Tim again. Through the comm, he ordered them both to return to the cave and hurried to do the same.

Apparently his brothers decided to continue their argument in the Cave, although they took out their comms, probably hoping that he wouldn't hear anything and wouldn't be able to yell at them through the communication devices. He immediately asked Babs to turn on the audio feed from the scene for him.

- Stop lying that you don't understand! - Oh, Damian is furious, good thing he removed all the knives from easily accessible hidden places.

- I saw your hit list! Everyone you considered a threat! You have plans for confronting everyone! And I'm on that list! And Jason and even Father!

Oh, shit, he forgot to tell Baby Bat that this is standard practice. Shit.

- It's not my fault that Dickie tried so hard to paint your world pink and sprinkle everything with glitter that he didn't familiarize you with the standard procedures! - Tim..

- Don't you dare slander Grayson, you dirty liar! If everything was as you say, then there wouldn't be several names missing from your list!

- Everyone was there...

- Have the honor of stopping me in the face of the truth! I've exposed your vile lies! Your list is missing Grayson, at the very least!

- Because if Dick, in his right mind and memory, without being under anyone's control, goes to the dark side, then something is really wrong with the World!

Oh, Tim...

Dick couldn't even imagine that after everything that happened, his little brother still thought so highly of him.

-Screw it, I'm going home, you can tell Dick whatever you want. Dick picked up speed, he had to catch his brother in time.

-Grayson told us to wait. - Dick didn't think he'd ever heard Damian so confused.

-Dick is not my Batman.

No, but as a brother, I've made a lot of mistakes.

------------------------------------------------------- That night, Dick lay in the middle of the bed, he hadn't managed to intercept Tim, and he couldn't stop thinking: "if Dick, ..., goes to the dark side, then something is really wrong with the World!".

Were his brothers really so ready to blindly follow him? Even after all the failures? Being an avenger is an extremely dangerous job, and he argued a lot with B about not allowing children in the field at all. They couldn't help but hear their arguments. So why didn't they stop? Was it possible that the fact that he continues to support this system, even though he disagrees with many points, keeps them in this trap?

No, he shouldn't think so, with all their shortcomings, they have already saved this World many times. He can't be selfish.

"if Dick, ..., goes to the dark side, then something is really wrong with the World!"

Did other young heroes look up to him for approval? "You're Mr. Nightwing, right? I'm such a big fan!" "Were you the first Robin? When I found out you started out as a kid, I knew I could bring something bright to this world too!"

Dick lay there and remembered how many of those kids had been let down by adults. How the older kids had looked down on them, even despised them, how young, innocent souls had died because of it. How he had buried his brother himself. How they had all buried their friends.

Should he really support this obviously broken system?

No, he shouldn't think that, it's just fatigue, he's clearly overwhelmed by the role of Batman, Nightwing, and older brother. When B comes back, everything will be different, everything will be better.

"if Dick, ..., goes to the dark side, then something is really wrong with the World!"

[nevertheless-moving]

i very much enjoyed the eventual explanation for Vin's Whole Deal but i also spent a good chunk of book one and two, (and maybe also more than a few idle moments in book three) waiting for a reveal that she was also a feruchemist. Just. There were so many parallels between her and the lord ruler, you know??

just thinking about the au...

a nice alternate explanation to her unnatural-even-for-a-mistborn grace, strength and power, just a bit better than she should be, and has such wild swings of fortune during a few of her fights because she's unconsciously storing up than releasing corresponding powers in her internal flakes.

of course it's taking her so long to realize - no one wears actual amounts of metal, so she's constantly burning her stores before they get large enough to be noticeable.

she was able to sense sazed's feruchemical store when she burnt it why would that be an allomantic ability i'm still kindof mad we didn't see her even TRY feruchemy anyway au

sazed teaching her...bonding moments...family...

funny moments where sazed and kelsier get weirdly competitive over who's got dibs on the daughter-he-never-thought-he'd-have

I am a SUCKER for zero-dads to multiple dad's trope...

(and thinking about how there HAD to be some feruchemy in the ska population, since the terris people weren't always so separate from the general population)

in addition to noblewoman, thief, mistborn, ska urchin - here's ANOTHER burden, ANOTHER heritage, ANOTHER identity - some pressure to be a Keeper, at least store the books, even if you do nothing else -

imagining reen as a feruchemist, constantly running from town to town because for some reason him, totally ska him, he can do things, things like a misting, but even more obvious, and allomantic vials just make him sick

unconscious feruchemy leading to mental instability (her mother). What happens when you store memories or mental attributes , but never get them back? you're just losing time and strength and willpower to the metal in your groundwater...and it's gone, passed through your body unless you happen to be an allomancer who can burn it back...

duralium-esque shenanigans during book two trying out the lord ruler's youth combo and accidentally making herself into a child. it's resolved eventually but there should have been AT LEAST a few chapters of 11 year old Vin mowing down assassins

HULK PEWTER VIN! HULK PEWTER VIN! FINALLY SHE ACTUALLY LOOKS AS DANGEROUS AS SHE IS! FIVE FOOT NOTHING HULK PEWTER VIN FIGHTING HAMM!!!!

infinite free health combo (somehow? i don't quite understand the mechanic, perhaps it's revealed somewhere else in sanderson books. is it just storing up health? seems like getting flayed would fuck that up. look, we know the lord ruler figured it out, since it's part of his whole Canon that he can't die, a Lot of people have tried)

ANYWAY I am also a fan of "unkillable" character trope where person starts getting too reckless during fights while enemies panic and their loved one's look on in horror because they're still getting hurt

All of the above does NOT help with the whole worshiping thing

staying awake for WAY too long with bronze earring...come on sanderson i know my girl was double deity op but consider if she was even MORE

FERUCHEMY IS OF BOTH PRESERVATION AND RUIN COME ON Y'ALL THINK ABOUT IT

...if it turns out there's an annotation in one of these books that she was actually a feruchemist but it never came up i don't know if i'd be more angry or more vindicated...if there is...okay people can spoil this one (1) thing...

aaah alas - it could have been so sick - feruchemist mistborn fight scene my beloved who shall never be...unless...

[lostusagis]

@jiraipink asked: What if they kissed? (You know who 😈) AYOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! 👀 Maybe he's like... having a dream about them making out LMAO Oooooo I like to imagine Namida having the same dream as him heheheheh

Send "What if they kissed?"

and I'll write a scene where our muses kiss, even if they aren't shipped together. it is it's own thing and doesn't have to lead to an official ship. a "what if scenario"

It had been a rather impulsive decision. Kamui wasn't sure what came over him when he decided to push her down on the couch, so she'd be below him while he hovered above her.

Sapphire hues would stare down at her, taking in the features of her face.

She was... really cute. He knew this well, it was the first thing he'd always think when seeing her on any day.

Namida was so cute, so, so cute.

Those cute smiles she'd shine at him, those adorable laughs she'd let out whenever something amused her, or she teased him. Damnit, he wanted all of that all to himself. He didn't want to share something so valuable.

He wasn't even sure WHEN he exactly started valuing something like that, just the features of another person. Something he originally couldn't care less more. But, he's noticed so much about her over time. The more he did, the more he became obsessed with wanting more from her.

So many greedy thoughts. Especially knowing she probably shared those smiles when on her fake dates too.

''Hey... Namida....'' He leaned down closer to her, their faces just inches apart.

''When you smile at me the way you do, do you also smile that way for other people? Do they get to see the Namida that I always get to see?'' He questions, though not really expecting an answer.

''I hope you know by now... I hate sharing. I don't like sharing you.''

He inches a bit closer, gaze bearing into hers deeply. Intensely.

''I want the parts of you no one else gets to see. I want more from you. All of you. Namida....'' He'd kiss her finally, rather chaste given how he hasn't kissed since their first meeting.

It was brief before he'd pull back slightly, ''Can you let me have more...?'' He'd kiss her again, and again and again. Eventually getting lost in the feeling of her soft lips, quickly becoming obsessed.

.............

Eyes opened up wide, quickly sitting up as he recalls what he was just dreaming about. He takes a few deep breaths before fingers irritably run through disheveled hair.

''....Damnit, I shouldn't be wishing all of that actually happened.''

Now he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep, thinking about all of that.

[bookofmirth]

hi! sorry to come into your inbox with Gwynriel since I know they are not really your preferred ship, but I just love your insights!🙈

I really hope they will be endgame and I can't wait for their story to be told, but I am also anxious about it... What I mean is, since the series is transitioning into adult, there is a lot of pressure from the audience for the sex scenes (esp. with Sarah dropping the bomb of Az being a freak in bed) and I'm afraid the sex will be rushed between them, before they are (at least somewhat) healed and ready. Their interactions right now are just so healthy and wholesome. 🥺 and personally I would hate if they would go into a Nessian kind of "just sex" arrangement (honestly this was so annoying in acosf!! "Thanks for the ride Nes" ?? ouch Cassian... 😑).

I would love a friends to lovers plotline for them, they both have severe traumas and need healing first outside of a romantic relationship - especially Az! I'm not worried about how Gwyn's trauma will be handled bc I'm sure Az will be the most patient, understanding and attentive lover, I'm just worried that if the sex comes too early on it will mess up their overall dynamic if that makes sense 😅

I honestly can't handle another Nessian where it's painfully obvious they are head over heals for each other but they are in denial for half a book claiming "just sex" 😫 Also if Az pulls a "you are better off without me" I will scream 😑

I hope they will build a very solid friendship first that can transition into love, but I think that would take a bit of time. I wouldn't mind waiting for the sex scenes between them and them not jumping into it like Nessian. (I have this headcanon where Az goes to a pleasure hall in the beginning of the book to get his freak on to get it out of his system a bit 🤭)

Anyways, so I just wanted to hear your thoughts on this - do you think there will be pressure for the sex, since now the series is considered adult?

Many thanks and have a nice day!

Hello! Thanks for acknowledging that there at the beginning. It was very thoughtful of you.

I just can't see them having a friends with benefits situation! With Gwyn, she's interested in sex and reading romance books. As far as romance, I'm not sure what she wants. She comes to the world with such a different view of sex than the human characters had, like she took participation in one of the sexy rites for granted, she just happened to not be able to participate.

And with Az, from what we know, all he's had are secretive flings. I can't see his endgame starting that way, in the dark, behind closed doors, "casual". I just think he'd need something different, and it will probably make him a bit off-kilter to finally combine romance and sex, since his experience rarely (never?) had those two things together, with one person.

I don't think there will be pressure for sex, given that sjm has written fade-to-black (I'm thinking elorcan, by then the series was full on sexy) and there is zero sex (that I can remember) in hoeab. She says things in her interviews that don't make it into books, like the threesome scene in acosf that she wrote and left out, I think she wrote rowaelin smut for herself prior to them getting together in canon. But what happens in the books needs to make sense for the larger context of where the characters are at emotionally, and how the plot is pushing them together or driving them apart. And that includes sex.

I'm genuinely so curious how the romantic feelings will develop because it does seem right now that Gwyn is flirty, and Az totally seems like the type to be oblivious about it ("you're the new ribbon, Az") so IDK!!! I absolutely agree with you and would love a friends-to-lovers situation because I think it would give them emotional vulnerability and support followed by intense trust would lead to such a great moment of "OH." Imagine the "OH" if they are friends and fiercely competitive and working together and then idk, one day one of them looks at the other just a little bit differently.

Imagine he does go to the pleasure hall and finds himself thinking of Gwyn. :D "OH."

[mahoushoujotechsupport]

finally have time to continue my rewatch, so on to episode 9

again another one of my favorites and the grassley duel is probably my favorite fight of the series tbh

worth noting that miorine doesnt seem bothered that shaddiq comes to check up on her. gotta wonder how often he'd swing by, though i think it's safe to say absolutely not often enough that he would show he actually gives a shit

ok idk how i didnt notice it in the op after so many times but that fuckin door is there again.... i'm just going to hyperfixate on this dumb gold door that probably doesn't mean anything besides being another nod to utena

lol it honestly kills me that under difference circumstances (aka if shaddiq didnt have his head so far up his ass), they really could have been good friends. instead his decision to stay relatively distant and put up his cunning business front results in miorine (rightly) not trusting him at all.

right before miorine challenges shaddiq, there's a real fast cut to him tightening his fist on the table and i gotta wonder how in the world he thought he'd be able to just talk this out after basically screwing miorine over like this and then trying to extort her lol. yea he was ready to have to duel if it came down to it, but like cmon man just be normal for once

god i wish we could've seen secelia just dig into lauda more lmao

i love that miorine knows how to play the stupid game all these people play just as well as all of them but god am i glad that at the end of it all she doesnt have to deal with any of this shit anymore

lol i really wanna know how no one had noticed nika having secret meetings and sending secret messages for months tbh like chuchu even makes a comment asking where nika is in the scene before this one so she probably just disappared at random times but anime logic lol ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

up until this moment when miorine tells shaddiq that he's just like everyone else in the group, did this guy think that anything he's done (or really, hasn't done) would have made miorine think differently?

the look on his face here as miorine stops him from entering her most sacred of spaces just really says it all. like he can't fathom that miorine legitimately does not think positively of him

this is definitely one of my favorite scenes from the whole series. just showcasing how highly suletta thinks of miorine. whereas miorine was upset suletta agreed to a duel with elan a few episodes back, suletta just never questions miorine challenging shaddiq

this has gotta be the moment shaddiq realizes suletta is a "rival" for miorine's heart, yea?

i know what you are, sabina

lol these dorks

lmao miorine, you're so ruthless

on a serious note, someone please write a random student from asticassia pov fic because like imagine seeing all this going on from some rando's pov. the benerit group princess who hates everyone and has been trying to fuck off as far as possible suddenly forms a business and now she's challenging people to duels????

imagine if vim had sucessfully murdered delling and he just left guel as bob the builder for the rest of his life. why in the hell did he have to go by bob lmao

omg did we all collectively forget that the second school shooting episode wasn't the first time she's done this?!

so glad our little tanuki calls this bozo out on this shit. all you had to do was be a normal human being lol

the funny thing about shaddiq's little monologue here is that it's all his feelings under the assumption that miorine would forever be trapped within the confines of the benerit group and the stupid game her dad made up. and yeah, i suppose in that respect, he's partially right... but if he knew miorine well at all and not some idealized version of her, he'd know she wants nothing to do with any of that

bless you, gjm for making this loser seem more unhinged just by choosing to translate onna as bitch lmao

even secelia and rouji are just like uhhhhhhh

oh this is real nice juxtaposed with episode 24's "i'm a selfish person"

be selfish all you want, little tanuki, you deserve it

aerial hitting permet score six is such an iconic shot lmao this episode and this part specifically gave me goosebumps like a little loser the first time i saw it as the witch from mercury song starts playing

omg i am so excited that i preordered a permet score six aerial from p-bandai lmao look at her shes so cool all in blue

same, prospera, same

will never forget how happy i was when the till-chuchu headshot happens lmao, it still rules

i hope if gwitch ever gets a recap movie or movies that we get the moment miorine finds out about ericht and aerial. as aerial hits permet score six and suletta is talking to her, we see miorine visibly confused over suletta talking to her mobile suit... and i just really really want to see miorine's reaction to finding out about eri on top of her inner thoughts on suletta talking to aerial. like at first i'm sure she thought it was some quirky thing especially calling it her sister, but it's gotta be something she was like wtf about, right?

made it to image limit so no more pics but one thing that's respectable about shaddiq is him realizing at the end of this episode that there really is something special between miorine and suletta even if perhaps at this point the two of them haven't outright acknowledged it. we see him acknowledge in ep 7 that miorine is becoming a better version of herself from suletta's influence on her, but him bringing up dueling for her hand in marriage, to me at least, is him hanging up his towel when it comes to miorine because he realized suletta really won her heart over - he literally says "maybe you'd have let me in [to the greenhouse]"

lmao i really tried to not go overboard with screenshots but oh well

lets see if i can finish cour 1 tomorrow

[normal-is-a-raging-psychopath]

ok so I just saw this (@blobvis456) fanart of max with the caption "do you accept the risk?" which obviously is the quote lucas said to max when telling her about the up-side down.

and that threw my mind to this one analysis? or something that focused on how mike was against telling people about the supernatural shit, both as a way to keep the party safe, and also the person. I'll try to find it because I'm pretty sure I rb'd it and I'll link it when I do. EDIT : here (@darkquill98)

I am a sucker for time travel au's. specifically when the future is thrown into the past and reveals something not known (relationships -romantic or otherwise-, personal revelations etc) or when the past gets transported to the future and just see how they're future selfs are, whether it be in a fluffy way or angsty or something in between.

anyways. imagine this. it's the st season 2 finale after el closes the gates and everyone is back at the byer's house. they're planning the sleepover (the party not the older teens because it's awkward still). it's been a long night, and then suddenly there's a long bang or something and two people kinda just appear on the floor of the byers living room (where the party was planning on sleeping).

everyone's on edge, weapons are pointed and then they realize who it is.

mike and max considerably older (I see them as seniors but anytime post-s4 post-vecna defeat goes).

during this time, mike's gotten up to a sitting position on the floor, but max is still on her back.

a key point in this is that max is disabled.

so everyone (present) is surrounding m&m (it's much easier to type that max and mike every time) and they see as mike slowly helps max up and positions himself behind her so that she can lean against him.

this is odd for two reasons. a) max and mike are getting along? mike is helping her? which he'd obviously do either way (see skateboard scene) but still, it's the care and love he does it with. b) why does max need help? why didnt she get up her self?

before they can verbalise this one of the walkie talkies starts spewing static and first, which slowly clears into lucas's voice. future lucas.

there's talking about are they ok? do you know what happened? and so on so forth. it's not really planned out in my head but there are a few things revealed. 1) a reference is made to both el and will working together in order to create a signal between the present and future radios, 2) lucas asks how max is and she replies that it's a bad day and quips the whatever sent them here is abelist because it didn't even bother to send her wheelchair with her.

(max absolutely plays the abelism card wherever she can fight me on this. she also makes so many dark jokes related to it. i think lucas would kinda hate it but it makes her smile so it's fine with him. el also kinda hates it but she finds it funny as well so she conflicted.)

also the way I imagine things, most days max is in her wheelchair with limited mobility, on good days, she's able to walk with her crutches but on bad days (like the one she's having) she can barely move without pain and needs help a lot. (which the party+extended are always happy to give her)

so after the whole conversation, obviously the present have some questions, m&m just reveal that max is paralyzed due to some event with the up-side down but not how (because they're not sure how much they can reveal)

anyway onto why i wanted this. the angst. i want present max to cope with the fat fact that she can't walk, i want mike's guilt at not being able to keep her away, I want lucas's horror because he was the one that brought her into this. maybe will and el feel guilty because it was caused by the upside down. maybe the older members (teens +jopper) feel guilty because they're older they should have been able to protect her.

while i'd like the main focus to be how max has adapted to her disability (speaking of which, does anyone have any fics recs like that?) I also want little snippet into the future to show that despite things becoming worse for a while it's also gotten so much better. i see elumax and byler. or if elumax isnt your thing then elmax or lumax maybe with henderhop aswell. idk, it's kinda flexible ig (excepts for byler even though it's not a main-main focus i still want a reveal because mike to mike chat about their sexuality and relationship with will and el and will learning that theres hope (especially considering it's following the shed scene) and theres just a lot i think can be explored there)

it it was elumax, which is what i thought of, then it's lucas and max finding out they get together and finally act on their feelings, its lucas feeling odd because he's also dating el and he though that el and mike had their thing going on. its el's not sexuality crisis i would say but realising not everything is like in the movies. its el and max realising that they worked through their problems and became friends and then more.

for the older teens idk what but im either leaning towards established jancy whose worked through their issue with steve who is learning he's come to term with it and learning about robin (he definitely make more of an effort to befriend her while working at scoops ahoy) or stonathon. which might require alteration to the canon s2 or maybe not and they figure out how that complicated mess of relationships worked out (which i think would be hilarious cause at this point in time stancy have just had their nasty break-up and jancy are in that weird phase that's like we fucked and we lie each other a lot but haven't defined what we are yet only to find out apparently steve and jonathan are dating?? what?)

for jopper, if they find out they're established and married, I think there's a whole lot to work through, cause while joyce may have had some feelings for hop, that was far overshadowed by her love for bob who she is now grieving because he's dead because she dragged him into this supernatural bullshit and yeah she has a lot of shit to work through. not to mention I think hopper will also need time to come to terms especially since the last time he was married didnt go well.

this has drastically spiralled but whatever.

as a bonus to the previous, give me the byer-hopper clan realising they're becoming a family. jonathan had a new father figure and he doesn't know how to feel about that. hop suddenly has 2 sons. joyce has a daughter now jonathan and will have a sister now el has two brother now. apparently will and el who literally only just met are as close as twins in the future.

can you tell that i really love time travel au's. there's just so much potential.

this has spiraled way out of control so if the beginning and the end seem disjointed, its because I expected this to go in a very different direction.

[shrinkthisviolet]

25. What was your first impression of this character? How about now? Of Obi-Wan?

Well I ofc first saw him in Episode 1, because my dad insisted that we watch the movies in numerical order. So...my first impression of him was that he was kinda charming and sassy 😂 which...I guess I'm not totally wrong there, because he definitely didn't lose his sass (*cue the "Hello There" scene from ROTS and also every scene in TCW where he teases Ventress and Dooku, among others*). I knew he'd be important later in the story, though I didn't know exactly how yet (I didn't know much about Star Wars, just the very basics). Still, I was on board.

Now, I find him an interesting character because of his nuance and inherent tragedy. He takes on this apprentice that was never meant to be his, after Trials that were nothing like he expected*, and it's challenging. Of course it is. His apprentice is a former slave, and Obi-Wan is at a loss, because they don't exactly have much experience with training former slaves. They have records, and he probably reads those cover to cover, but that's still just words on a page, and Anakin is so unique anyway. A beacon in the Force, so strongly loving his mother who's still left on Tatooine as a slave...Anakin is so used to getting attached because he has so little, while Obi-Wan is used to detaching and doing what's required of him. It's why they have a contentious relationship at times—loving, there's no doubt, but also contentious.

Ahsoka helps. I haven't finished Clone Wars, so I don't know the full details of everything, but from what I can tell, she's a great addition to the trio and they're at their strongest when they're all together ("we'll be fine as long as we stay together" oh Obi-Wan, how right you were). But then Ahsoka leaves the Jedi Order after a messy trial, the details of which I ofc don't know yet (haven't gotten that far in TCW!).

Then the manipulations Palpatine has exercised for 13 years pay off when Anakin is 22-23—due to fear for his wife and fear to confide in any of the Jedi, he tries to save her life and instead falls to the Dark Side, betraying Obi-Wan and all the Jedi when he slaughters them (some of them escape into hiding, but not many). It must hit Obi-Wan especially hard, given that Anakin in essentially the closest thing to a child he's had up to this point, whom he'd come to see as a brother after Anakin's Knighting. It's a pain so deep...and we know from ROTS that Obi-Wan is horrified by the idea of killing him...and in the end, he can't do it. Arguably, he condemns Anakin/Vader to a worse fate...and Vader is born out of that pain, while Padmé dies giving birth to her twins (triplets, in my AU, but ofc twins in canon).

And then Obi-Wan loses hope, for 10 years, until a little Organa/Skywalker girl makes him smile—two, in my AU, and raising Lucy is yet another challenge for him because of how much like Anakin she is, and how he's really, really trying to raise her better, trying to be more open and communicative with her and not restrict her too much, but also wanting to keep her powers under wraps so that they won't be found. He doesn't want Vader to find her...especially not with Luke being so close. He can't bear to lose either of them, especially this girl he calls daughter. There's a reason the Lucy Kenobi angle is what finally got Lucy to stick as an OC—it adds so much depth to Obi-Wan to have to raise a child on Tatooine.

And then when he's training them, particuarly Luke, he says to be prepared to kill Vader if it comes down to that. His worldview is such that he sees no other option. You can almost imagine he's talking to himself, on Mustafar, telling himself to kill Vader before he can become more of a threat than he already has. Perhaps it's a regret he carries. Luke, of course, finds another way—he always does. I imagine Obi-Wan and Yoda are both proud of him for it. In that way, I think Obi-Wan is able to finally find peace.

I just really appreciate his nuance as a character, the "infinite sadness" he carries within him. He makes mistakes, but that's a human thing, and even his flaws make him compelling. No person is perfect...no character is either. But they don't need to be! He's the mentor character, twice over, and though he doesn't succeed the first time, he succeeds the second time. There's something so poignant in that, I think.

*I do believe he was ready for the Trials, no matter what some people say - he wouldn't have been allowed to take them otherwise. But to do them without Qui-Gon, and for the ceremony to happen so quickly that he can request to take on Anakin within a day or two...they were definitely rushed and probably disappointing to him tbh.

character ask game!

[rachaeljurassic]

I haven't been able to stop thinking about Phryne's dad today. And about how much he can fuck up 🙁

So, some speculation...

There's the very obvious fact that Phryne wants him nowhere near her. He's a piece of shit dad who locked her in a cupboard (and I don't know whether or not I want Jack to remember his rather flippant reply to that becasue yikes. I get that Phryne throws these things around like she's not serious about them but she wouldn't lie about that, argh many feels about that exchange).

So what age-old crap is going to be dragged up by him or just by him being near by. Am I ready for that (spoiler, I am not!) And is that going to actually be the catalyst for something. But I'm getting ahead of myself 😉

The things is, I don't see him being at all pleased when he realises quite who Jack is to Phryne. Aunt P isn't exactly keen on the idea but her untimely interuptions do at least seem to be accidental. I'm not sure that would be the case for Phryne's dad.

You see, thinking about it from a writing perspective it seems clear that these bastards in the writers' room want to keep Phryne and Jack away from each other until the final second of the final fecking episode (to torture ME, obviously 😡). So how do they do that? Aunt P can only do so much. She's been a trooper so far. Every time the writers accidentally got the two of them a bit too close they could always count on dear old Aunt P to come in and fuck it up for them. But they can't KEEP doing that! They needed to bring in a wingman for her tbh So, enter Phryne's dad. Except I don't think he's going to he half as benign as Aunt P (as much as I want to string her up I still love her 😊).

And sure, he could tell Jack he's not good enough for Phryne, which given their respective places in society is likely what he thinks no matter where they started out. But that would probably just make Jack angry and more likely to stick around to be contrary. And if Phryne ever found out she'd kick dad to the curb. No, I can see her dad being a lot cleverer than that. And I think the one thing he could use was that Jack can't provide for her. Not, at least, in the way that she's used to.

And no, I don't think Jack would think that Phryne would care about that, but I think HE would care. Even today there are plenty of men who are not comfortable with earning less than their gf's/wives. How much more so would it be in the 1920's. As much as Jack has come to accept/love that Phryne is daring and brave and won't ever be told what to do, I'm not sure he'd want to be seen as a kept man. The sort of men who hook up with wealthy women who pay all the bills are shiftless loosers. What would Phryne's friends think of him? What would he think of himself. He is something of a liberal man but he is also a product of his time and him upbringing. Jack has a lot of pride. How would he deal with sly and subtle comments from Phryne's dad about men who live off their wives money? Eventually I could see a crisis. But how angry Phryne would be when she finds out what it was all about. At her dad AND Jack I would imagine. How dare her dad, obviously. But how dare Jack think that she cared a jot about what anybody thought. Phryne is a thoroughly modern woman who enjoys flipping societies expectations and damn the consequences. I can see Jack saying something along the lines of 'but what do I bring to this?' And in the end, after some heartbreaking scenes where they're not talking to each other probably 🙄 I would just love Phryne to explain. She would say how Jack is the first man she has loved who loves her for who she is, the first man she has ever trusted, the first who did not want to control her/change her/use her for their ends. That he taught her what love was, and that it was OK to admit that you need help. Which brings me back to the comment at the beginning. Phryne NEVER needs help, or at least never admits it, but perhaps everything that her dad will drag up will mean that for once in her life she NEEDS somebody. And that somebody is Jack.

We'll see I guess 😁

[whipplefilter]

RE: the 'driver possession' idea, do you think that there's some form of crossover with the classic Clown Car gag, where a whole bunch of clowns emerge from a tiny car? Maybe that's why Lightning seems to have coulrophobia...

I haven't seen any of the new shorts, but I feel like that would fit in with the type of thing that tends to register as horror in the Cars universe: The headlight eyeball car in the parts bazaar back alley in Cars 2 is a different kind of mod, but not unrelated. And there's the Cars 1 steamroller bodyswap deleted scene. And the demolition derby folks occupy a "deviant" subculture that probably feels pretty counter to what cars are supposed to do (e.g. not wreck). I feel like this comes back to these fears of possession/multiple ghosts because of used parts, and what sorts of cognitive/ghostly dissonances might be part of having donor parts from a lot of different junkyard donors. Is there superstition around how much of another car's ghost can be passed along? Probably. There's no reason it should happen, it's just metal; but just like donor organs for people, I bet there have been some strange happenings documented.

The ironic part of this, tbh, is that in my headcanons, parts replacement is one of the reasons racing is such an extreme sport. Sure, you're not using junkyard parts, but as a racer you're going through intensive parts replacements all the time. If there exists a fear of ending up with too much ghost (or too many), it goes hand in hand with fear of losing hold of your own, too.

A normal car with have routine maintenance intervals, and will experience a transmission replacement or an engine rebuild in their lifetime maybe. It's a big life event. Meanwhile, racers are going through multiple engines a season, and all the other stuff (suspension, hoses, exhaust, etc.) is an every week thing. It's part of the job, and I imagine they think nothing of it most of the time, in the same way they don't think much of sending it into Turn 4 at a speed that does not even exist on most speedometers. But it surely takes a lot of mental fortitude to be able to do that week in and week out and not get weird.

It's an assumed risk, and one that is fairly remote in the scheme of things, but I think just like you can have a crash that's bad in just the wrong way, there's a random chance that this will catch up with you. (This is part of my theory on how car death works, re: Doc and Lynda. Wrecking hard and repeated race damage doesn't necessarily mean long-term or major effects down the road, but sometimes it does, and it's the unpredictability, the way these instances stay statistically insignificant, that makes them so dangerous.)

This comes up in my fanfic, Moonshine, and also in a fic called "Bug" I started in 2017 based on an ask I received, but never finished because it made me too sad, lol. Maybe one day. Sorry anon from 2017 whose ask I never answered! It's legit still in my askbox.

I opened up the Google Doc and actually really liked what was in there (even though I still think it's too sad), so here is one of the scenes:

--

If you were a lightning bug, flickering then vanishing in the thick of the South Carolina heat outside the race trailers, you might've heard this part. Lightning on the phone and Sally, thousands of miles away.

You're a lightning bug. You don't live long enough to know who Lightning is, or who he'd been. There aren't words for the lifetimes of cars in the language of insects. You don't know that he'd been moody as a newborn, or that he's just as moody now. Yes, even now--reformed and matured and finally, retired. He's just quieter about it. Usually.

You flicker.

Lightning bickers. 

"Well, I don't know," he responds, more emphatically than the situation requires. "I'm not a doctor. What do you want me to say?"

"I want you to say how you're feeling. A doctor can't do that part for you, Lightning," says Sally, without raising her voice to match his. Sally can raise hell with the best of them, but she's not trying to win this argument. She's trying to help.

"Not good! I dunno," says Lightning. And after that, he speaks only in variations on that theme. Not good. He doesn't know. He doesn't know.

It's a little odd. As a racer, Lightning's understanding of his body is significantly better than most.  Your average car couldn't reliably point out their own stub axle, but racecars are different, particularly when their crew chief was as mercilessly pedantic as Doc had been. They know when something's going.

"I don't know," says Lightning.

It's possible, little lightning bug, that there are no words for the lifetimes of cars in the language of cars, either.

A few weeks, as many races, multiple phone calls, and several dozen of Lightning's largely unnecessary apologies later, Sally and Lighting talk again. A new generation of lightning bugs--this time in Kentucky--flickers outside.

Lightning hasn't been sleeping. He looks like someone dragged him out of a pick and pull--albeit a very high-end one, Sally assures him.

"Are you in pain?" she asks him. Is that why?

No, he says, with a shake of his head. It's not very convincing, but he's also too tired to lie. He's really not in pain. Either that or--

"I don't know," he says.

He's annoyed when Sally asks him if he's talked to a doctor. Of course he has; he's not a baby. 

Well, sort of. He talked to an EMT at the infield care center, because actually he is a baby and he didn't know where else to go. The EMT could not advise, but started him up through a daisy chain of bureaucracy that got him an appointment with a specialist two months from now.

"Two months?" asks Sally. It seems like a long time. It is a long time. "Are you--"

"Yeah, whatever," says Lightning. "I'm fine, I guess." 

And race season summers always feel long, anyway. They won't see an off-weekend for months. This wait isn't gonna change anything.

"Get some sleep," Sally advises.

Lightning frowns. "I don't want to."

"See, you are a giant baby," Sally reminds him. "But you're my giant baby. Go to sleep! I love you."

Outside, you flicker. You're a lightning bug. In two months, you'll be dead.

[sl-walker]

⭐star⭐

Okay, so the whole chapter of Forty-Eight following this scene is one that I struggled incredibly hard to write, in part because it was the first one I'd penned since ten years earlier. Or just shy of ten. But we'll go with this specific scene because it's got so, so many layers:

"I'm twenty-five, I dinna need a babysitter."

The words were sharp, snapped off at their ends like branches frozen solid in the darkest part of winter.

Corry was a little surprised, in a dull fashion, by how unsurprised he was by them, as he regarded Scotty.

It reminded him, not of the aftermath of the dive into the North Atlantic, but of the aftermath of the fire in the shipyards.  And even then, it wasn't the way Scotty had tackled him to the ground and came a hair's breadth from punching him, but past that, when he stood there shaking, blood dripping off of his jaw from where his head had been sliced open, containment cracked right down the middle.

Then and now, he was angry and wounded.

Then and now, he was one of the toughest people Cor had ever known, and simultaneously also one of the most vulnerable.

They'd stayed in the skimmer for a good couple hours; Corry hadn’t wanted to wake Scotty up when he was finally sleeping well enough to do him some good, so instead he'd sat there and watched the snow start falling again that had chased them north from Baltimore, feeling dazed and exhausted and heartsore, so tired that he couldn’t seem to even think anymore.

And when Scotty did wake up again, he was a good bit more together mentally; enough, anyway, to start raising his metaphorical shields.

Which led to them now staring one another down across half the distance of a motel room; not the measured, graceful dance of give and take that they had learned over the past six years, but not so far from it that it didn't echo, at least.

“Twenty-six,” Corry said, after a moment, barely able to force his voice above a whisper. “As of yesterday.”

He said it mostly as a reminder that all of that missing time meant something, as a way of saying without saying just how close to dying his brother had gotten and how badly hurt he still was.  And it was also a way to offer Scotty some kind of grasp of where and when he was; Corry had told him the date before, right after they left the hospital, but he couldn't take it for granted that Scotty would have kept hold of it, especially given the circumstances.

He still didn't know what to make of the stricken look he got back, but it wrenched something in the base of his throat; it was such an expression of grief and disbelief and Corry could feel it in his own already-raw chest.

Still, Scotty didn’t answer that right away; instead, white-knuckling a crutch with one hand, left foot drawn up a little so he wasn’t putting his weight on it, he just covered his eyes with his other hand and, in the shadow of that gesture, breathed careful and measured.  Even as the muscles in his jaw knotted; even as his bottom lip twitched.

But when he did drop his hand again after a small eternity, face wet and hand shaking, he tipped his chin up anyway and looked Cor in the eyes.

“Move,” he said, quietly, voice ragged. “Please.”

Then and now, he was courage trying to find enough oxygen to survive, and so Corry moved.

--

Okay, so for those of you who only know me for Star Wars, some quick backstory: My first fandom love was Star Trek, the Original Series, and if you've known me for two minutes, you'd know that Scotty's been my favorite guy forever. Which is probably for the better, honestly, because I think I might be one of maybe-- I dunno, less than ten people since the 60s who has looked at that man and decided to imagine him as the main character of his own story. Like-- I am at least reasonably sure that there are less than five of us who not only did that, but then decided to actually write that story.

Which I've been working on now for half of my lifetime. And the tale this scene is from is him trying to piece together what happened to him half of his lifetime ago.

I've mentioned it in replies and chats and across time, but Scotty is easily the most complex character I've ever written. He's complicated. And Forty-Eight, the story that scene above is from, is the hardest story I've ever tried to tell. I posted the prologue in 2009. I'm almost to the end now only in 2023. Because it's fucking hard, it's wrenching to write, it means deconstructing a character I've loved all my life, it means getting way more real than TV ever let us get. I came back to it because I almost died myself last summer; I came back to it because Scotty got very close to it here, both back when he was thirteen and then again just shy of twenty-six.

So, that scene above kind of touches on a whole lot of his backstory before this: ONOW, where that scene of him bloody and angry came from (wearing the black from the smoke and the blood pouring down the right side of his face like warpaint), and also Corry recognizing the connection between that moment and this one--

Then and now, he was angry and wounded. Then and now, he was one of the toughest people Cor had ever known, and simultaneously also one of the most vulnerable.

--but especially the recognition that his brother is both of those things at the exact same time. Incredibly tough, but also very, very vulnerable, with vulnerable being more synonymous to fragile in this sense than open or unguarded.

So, beyond the past connection and the insight, there is the fact that Scotty -- who absolutely does love his brother, like every bit as much as Cor loves him -- still is falling back to self-defense, raising his shields, even against someone he knows would never hurt him, someone who just risked hugely to protect him, for that matter. And there is Corry kind of trying to gently tell him, hey, you were literally in surgery where they were putting you back together when your birthday passed, and Cor not knowing he's stumbled over a pretty nasty trigger or where it's from, but recognizing it once he does, and how much it hurts him to see that.

And finally:

Then and now, he was courage trying to find enough oxygen to survive, and so Corry moved.

Another callback to ONOW specifically, but also the whole storyline. But I guess what I love most about that line is echoed throughout the whole chapter. The whole story.

Corry's had a really, really good life, mostly. He has loving parents. He grew up in a beautiful place. He was never abused. He always knew he was loved, that if something happened, he had a home to retreat to and people who would protect him. Up until ONOW, nothing bad ever really happened to him or his family.

And yet, instead of just relying on that fine upbringing and that safety net, he instead not only risks everything to save Scotty, but tries incredibly hard to extend that safety net to include his brother, too, who never once had one of his own before and still doesn't quite know how to cope with it. Or accept it. Or feel worthy of it.

So, this story from Corry's side is, "I love you and I desperately want to help you and bring you safely home where we can just protect you and if I can do that, I'm fulfilling one of the major purposes in my life." And he does this despite how much he has to risk.

There is a lot more to this story than just this one scene. I can point to every story before it for a piece or more that gets called back to in this one, even if ONOW is the one most directly referenced. But this scene is a favorite because it's so telling. Because it also references Bookends, which is another of my favorites from AotW: That measured dance of give-and-take that these two have had to learn, and how fucking important it is that they did learn it before now, because now is when they need it the most.

Boiled down, it's basically just how deeply one brother loves the other, and all the deep work they had to do to reach this point, and the acknowledgment that even then they're in dark waters, and also the recognition that sometimes courage is just refusing to quit breathing.

Like I said, a lot going on.

[etherealtobio]

𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐚𝐧’𝐭 𝐬𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐩𝐭. 𝟏

part 2

— haikyuu characters and what they’d do to help you sleep ♡

— feat. akaashi, atsumu, bokuto, hinata, kageyama, kita, osamu, suna, and tsukishima

— contains: gn!reader, established relationships, food mentions, slight manga spoilers, & slight crack bc that's just how it is <3

— a/n: this is for my beloved insomniacs, and here's my first headcanon !! LETSGOOO <3 i hope u enjoy and pls reblog if u liked it !! part 2 is up now╰(*´︶`*)╯♡

⇨ 𝐀𝐊𝐀𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐈 reads you a book !! have you heard of his voice ?? SO soothing which will lull you to sleep <3 he asks you what book you want him to read but he sometimes insists on reading you stories you haven't heard before, just because he knows you'll love what he picks. sometimes would make fun of you and would search the web to read smut. he says it'll make you uncomfy and force you to sleep. you know the ones that are so explicit? yeah, we won't elaborate on that. don't ask me how he reads them with a straight face. "akaashi, please stop" "but this is really good" "yeah but i wouldn't be able to take you seriously" "then i'll read more passionately" "babe if you don't sTOP-"

⇨ 𝐀𝐓𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐔 is SO hyper. mans still has energy after volleyball practice and doesn't hesitate to ask you if you "wanna pillow fight?" ?? then proceeds to hit you before you even begin to talk. you gasp in shock as he hits your face so you try to hit him back, but the way he sways his pillow onto you is so strong which overpowers your will to do so. how strong is this man anyway ?? his last hit makes you fall back onto the bed, then he lays down beside you to trap you in his arms. "you tired?" "yes, 'tsumu, now let me go" "no" "you should've just asked if you wanted to cuddle so we can sleep" baby just wanted snuggies after all :')

⇨ 𝐁𝐎𝐊𝐔𝐓𝐎 asks "you can't sleep? mE TOO" then turns the TV on to watch a movie with you <3 he storms out the room before the movie starts and grabs a bowl of popcorn on the way back and you chose not to mind the ones that fell on the floor when he ran back to you. he likes cuddles and initiates to be the big spoon bc he wants you to be comfy. he'd pick a romcom so both of you would feel light-hearted before sleeping. but really, it's just an excuse for him to avoid watching horror movies with you, and you insist otherwise. "bo, why don't you want to watch a horror movie anyway?" "i'd be too scared to sleep" "but i'm here?" "i have you and me that i have to protect from ghosts ok" i can imagine him instantly standing up just when he hears a strange noise coming out of nowhere HFJSDGF A BIG BABY

⇨ 𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐀𝐓𝐀 is really excited to hear that you can't sleep because he was too hyper to do so. will ask you if you wanted to bike with him. bike ?? but he insists Miyagi's roads are safe to stroll around at night. he grabs the two bikes for you and both of you start to talk about life under the starry night <3 "what do you think of my spikes" "hinata, you ask me this literally everyday" "but you give me the best compliments!!" "fine, you're really good. but next time don't hit kageyama's head while serving" "you don't have to bring that up!!1!" all the cycling made you tired, so as you get back home, you feel drowsy and tired enough to fall asleep, and he is as well <3

⇨ 𝐊𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐘𝐀𝐌𝐀 tells you that it’s good to drink milk before sleeping. he actually does this and you notice that he’s fast asleep afterwards (when does he ever not drink milk anyways ??). whenever you tell him you can’t sleep, he makes sure that there’s a stock of milk cartons in the fridge just to make sure to never run out <3 “i can’t sleep” “how about you drink your milk” “but i'm gonna feel full” “well i’m not one who has a messed up sleep schedule, boke” he didn’t have to call you out like that 😔 but he got out of bed to pour you a glass of milk regardless <3

⇨ 𝐊𝐈𝐓𝐀 is really strict with you since he knows how sleep is important to you. he will NOT hesitate to wait for you to say that you can’t sleep. instead, he would give you lavender-scented candles and an eye mask before bedtime. he also cooks you boiled eggs since he says it helps with the melatonin, but will give you a tart cherry juice instead if you preferred not to eat <3 vERY responsible boyfriend, don't argue with me on this !! he'd also tell you to do the 4-7-8 breathing technique if you still can't sleep. "are you sure this will help?" "Obachan told me about this technique and it makes me fall asleep faster, try it" then proceeds to cuddle you whilst you do it. before you know it, you're already fast asleep !! although you'd have to ask him the next day about which helped you sleep faster <3

⇨ 𝐎𝐒𝐀𝐌𝐔 insists to cook you something. you told him you were too hungry to sleep, so he brings you to the kitchen so you can watch him cook :') he says ramen is too heavy to digest at night so he cooks you miso soup instead !! this soup contains a lot of benefits so he's more than glad to offer you something that will be good for you <3 you watch him prepare all the ingredients before putting it altogether like magic. even if you don't like miso, the way he cooks it will be a life-changer for you because this man not only cooks, he cooks with passion !! you both devour the carefully-made soup then head back to your room to prepare to sleep <3 "did you like it?" "i did, 'samu, it tasted really good" "don't make yourself hungry before bedtime next time" but really, you just can't resist his perfect food recipes <3

⇨ 𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐀 shows you his stolen pics of the team (especially atsumu LOL) which makes you both laugh so hard your cheeks and stomachs hurt !! he would also tell you the backstory of each picture so you would know the context. there are several questionable scenes, one of which is kita massaging his forehead in the background while atsumu flashes his butt to the team inside the locker room. another one is a blurred selfie with the team in the background dancing to tiktok songs. "and if you look closely, you'll see a disappointed aran" "i bet this was atsumu's idea" "yeah, especially this one song where you throw it back." both of you get exhausted with the laughing and cackling so you finally fall asleep afterwards, with his arm around your waist <3

⇨ 𝐓𝐒𝐔𝐊𝐈𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐌𝐀 gives you his giant dinosaur plushie. you’d be confused at first, because he doesn’t let anyone, not even yamaguchi, touch those plushies he cherishes very dearly. he actually has to choose since he has a ton of these in different dinosaur species. you know this, because he snuggles with different ones every night. you know that meme with the girlfriend sleeping with her 500 dollar four foot tall mareep? yep, that’s the sitch 😔 heart been broke so many times. BUT tsukishima is actually sweet enough to let you hold his plushies. “tsukki,, i can’t sleep” “here, have this T-rex” “but you don’t let anyone touch your plushies” “these help me sleep and it’s you anyways, take it” 🥺🥺🥺 then he insists to put the plushie between you both so he can cuddle it as well. tsukki said sharing is caring <3

©️ ETHEREALTOBIO - do not copy, translate, or repost

[noa-ciharu]

Analysis on Subaru's mental and emotional health (part 1):

I've been wondering when and how exactly did Subaru's self-destructive thoughs and maladaptive behavior patterns begin. It's clear that he had some issues in those aspects even before series finale, which only worsened significantly by all tragedies that struck him during manga's ending. Since post got quite long, this analysis only follows up to ending of Tokyo Babylon, not nine year time skip and X/1999.

First thing first, if Subaru had to be defined by character traits then he'd be so by two diametrically opposite points: kindness, selflessness and empathy on one side and self-blaming, self-reproach and low self-esteem on other. All of emotions in second category begin with prefix self, and are so called 'self-conscious emotions': ones where subject and object of emotional affect and response is the same person. These type of emotions are specific for humans, as they're not seen in other animals. Also they're primary learned by observation followed by internalization and then identification; especially during early stages of life.

Let's start with this seemingly random scene at first: Kuniko shares her experience of being bullied and suffering with Subaru. Just one of many instances where he listens to others' pain and hardships.

He can't help her in any realistic way (but kind words do help in their own way) so he offers empathetic approach: admits to not being able to understand her pain but accepts her suffering and hears her rather than dismisses. This is what true empathy is, since no two individuals are 'same', it's egoistical to assume you know what someone feels and what they've been through. She's a living person, not a ghost, he can't even help by making her spiritaly move on. This moment is just one of the many where Subaru ends up feeling guilty over not being able to help someone in what he perceives as adequate way.

When did it start?

While he doesn't have a big T traumatic event in childhood, comparing him to Hokuto because they're twins and grew up together doesn't seem right either. They're two separate individuals with different personalities. So rather than in childhood home or parental figure (their grandmother) which, of course could be an attributing factors, I do think primary roots of Subaru's maladaptive behavior patterns began due to two things: his hypersensitivity and being met with tragedies beyond his cognitive comprehension in his line of work at very young age. Main issue here is not that he observed and empathized with those tragedies, but that he then internalized not being to help and prevent them from happening as something that's his fault. So:

Emotional issue with conflicting and no clear solution arises -> Subaru empathises with ghost/people suffering (feels pain himself)-> he's not able to help in a way he perceives as adequate more often than not (as society's corruption and uncaring nature run deep, there's no answer as to why someone had to suffer) -> internalizes that as a self-guilt/self-blaming mechanism

If this happened ones or twice or even ten times over few years then it won't become a emotional response pattern, but Subaru dealt with that for years. Also those conflict are rather heavy for an adult to hear about, let alone a child/teen. After all, how do you offer comfort to a ghost that committed suicide due to overwhelming suffering in their lives? There's not a right way to approach those things let alone offer comfort. Subaru had no solution to those things (because realistically there aren't any grand solutions), and due to his age and empathy took that personally. It's one thing to be selfless and compasionate, but while being so you should treat yourself with the same kindness you treat anyone else. What's more, those actions shouldn't be self-destructive in any way. Imagine someone on street asks you for 2k money for necessaries, and you decide to be selfless and help. If your salary is 60k then that's kindness, if it's 5k then along with kindness it's self-destructiveness.

In some way, Subaru tried to play a therapist without shielding himself from others' emotions and he felt them as they were his own (while in reality he grew numb to his own personal emotions, ones regarding solely himself). Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with offering help and being kind, but not at the cost of your own wellbeing, both physically and mental. It's just that Subaru internalized agony his empathy picked up and resulting guilt as self-blame since he was met with it too often for a kid his age. That kindness/self-blaming dynamic is what I believe laid a foundation for vast majority of his mental and emotional issues later on. Because if it weren't for it, he might have reacted to some things quite differently.

That is a maladaptive thought/behavior pattern at one of earliest stadiums as it's regarding a sense of isolation (feeling of inferiority and low self-worth). Then it can progress into weak boundaries and intense focus on other people rather than oneself. This in Subaru's case comes out in two ways: submissiveness (giving up on own dreams and opinions for sake of others and their comfort) and self-sacrifice.

Here are few examples how his low self-esteem, self-blaming cognitive thoughts and subtle self-punishing tendencies (post series they get worse and are no longer repressed or subconscious) affect him during manga:

"While it's fine to worry about important things it shouldn't be at the cost of yourself" - while Subaru's emotional responses are mostly adequate in terms of what emotion is evoked, what's not adequate are length and intensity of those emotional responses, as well as sometimes his actions (for example, being so devastated over lying to that woman that he dissociated and wandered around in rain for some time; then cried again about it when he clealy hasn't done anything gravely wrong. Intensity of his guilt and self-doubt is over top). He feels everything to the bone. When it rains it pours for him. All those people forget Subaru, but he doesn't forget them as intense emotional responses and others' tragic stories tend to linger in both consciousness and subconsciousness for rather long time.

There also double standard going on: he's quick to blame himself but wouldn't blame others for same 'mistakes' ("You're kinder than anyone on others yet harsher than anyone on yourself"). Also working when sick due to magical backslash, neglecting or forgetting to take care of yourself, pushing yourself past reasonable limits and boundaries could be taken as subtle and still unconscious form of self-punishment or overall low self-worth. These are all tiny clues that by themselves shouldn't amount to anything significant, but they all do point toward same direction.

There's also a topic of isolation and 'loneliness', or more precisely, of not feeling understood or being seen by other people.

This is one of rare instances where Subaru shares his personal feelings and thoughts with strangers he meets. There's also blind man in vol6 but that conversation was more focused on blindness as a topic, Subaru feeling guilty and trying to find a way to help Seishirou somehow. Let's focus on 3 things here:

Feelings of not being understood by others: social isolation and loneliness are one of major themes in this manga. Note that loneliness doesn't necessarily mean being alone, rather feeling alone as you're not seen and understood by those around you. And even if occasionally Subaru forms some sort of emotional bonds with strangers he meets, those are not only mostly focus on them rather than Subaru, but also short in duration. Only person who understood Subaru and truly cared for him was Hokuto. And then Seishirou appeared. His motives behind trying to comprehend how Subaru thinks and what he feels did not come out of compassionate or sincere place at all, but his own personal interest. Still little by little, Subaru felt understood by him and I think that's the main reason why Subaru fell for him in the end. Falling in love with someone is all about emotional responses to them and how you feel in their company, as well as feeling understood by that person. If I were to analyze their relationship in depth I'd need a separate post along with DSM-5 as a guide manual so moving on.

Subaru wanting to stop being an omnyoji someday: this is an intresting one, because somewhere deep down even Subaru realized that he was hurting himself with his work both by doing something he actually doesn't want and being implicitly emotionally wounded every day due to it. Still obligation kept him working as a medium. And he did work to the bone in fact, even neglected his own wellbeing, dreams of helping animals and potential free time because of work. In a way, he can never have a 'normal' teenager life. Absurdly enough, why would he put his all into something he didn't truly care about? Most likely sense of obligation combined with guilt he'd feel by not helping someone who's in suffering and dire need of help and kind word.

Not being able to do anything regarding dog dying (something that's not his fault) -> "I couldn't do anything for him" (feeling of worthlessness). Now, don't get me wrong, there's nothing pathological or wrong about Subaru's line of thoughts; it's actually beyond kind and noble of him to want to help animals (although what he failed to realize, as that old man later pointed out, is that simply by being there until the end, Subaru, in a way, helped that dog). However, line of thought: "I'm unable to ease someone else's suffering or a conflict that is not solvable" -> self-guily, self-blame, low self-worth - did become a pattern for him.

On first look it's not so clear there's something amiss about Subaru's emotional responses, but on closer inspection it becomes evident. He felt such deep pain after meeting Yuya and being informed of his kidney failure that Subaru spent next 2-3 days solely thinking about that. What's more, he later decided to donate kidney to that boy, someone he loosely knew for 3 days. Not only that, but allowed his mother to take out her misery and despair on him by not moving out of knife's way. None of that are healthy reactions, but rather ill adjusted ones. Subaru can't stand seeing someone in misery as not only does he feel said misery himself, but also self-guilt at being met with it, then self-blame if he's not able to ease that suffering somehow, followed by feeling of worthlessness. That is what's pathological about his reactions and feelings, as guilt and self-blame became dominat personality traits.

"It's just that she said I was not normal" - I think that girl stuck a nerve when she said that. That's why Subaru remembered her, or rather her words, for so long. Subconsciously he felt different from others but not in superior way like Seishirou thought of himself, but more in an isolating one ("I'm not special", "just an ordinary medium"). He won't label himself as special even if there's a beyond appropriate reason for doing so (magical abilities) because he personally doesn't see himself as special, nor anything of clear value or worth.

Later on it was reviled she said that so she could stir an emotional response out of Subaru because she was unsatisfied how he treated everyone the same and made no exception for her, who liked him. What's intresting is that he denied feeling hurt. Now, it's debatable why Subaru did that, since he never shyed away from expressing emotions, let alone sadness. It's not ego dystonic for him to show strong emotions (like it is for Seishirou, for comparison) However, that sadness is solely his, meaning it's not an emotion his empathy picked up (like when he lied to that woman about her dead daughter's pleeds). So Subaru might think it's selfish for him to express it; almost like he has no right to potentially make someone else uncomfortable by saying their words did affect him, did hurt him (yet he admitted to Seishirou that he felt hurt).

On similar note, there are few occasions when we see Subaru angry or irritated during manga: with that cult leader and her false empathy (anger towards her since she trivialized and tried to justify girl's injury), after grandpa in park got ran over (irritation towards truck driver for blaming a victim) and when eye seeing dog got teased (irritation towards the bullies). And of course: moments after Hokuto's death. Anger is an emotion we feel when we think some of our basic life principles or rights are being unreasonably endangered or stepped over by another, their words or actions. In all those circumstances, Subaru felt anger because someone else was treated unfairly, never because he was treated unfairly. That would need a sense of self-value and "aha, I'm a worthy human being I won't let someone treat me like this". There's a one specific moment where it'd be expected of Subaru to feel anger in that previously said manner, but it doesn't happen for exact reasons. I'll mention it again later.

So, in a way, despite feeling others' pain, Subaru in numb to his own feelings and actually wants (as Hokuto said herself). Also what she says here describes Subaru's inner state perfectly. It does sound exhausting both mentally and emotionally.

"If that person were to betray him, Subaru would surely die" - that's without a doubt, considering everything stated above.

Also there's a parallel running between his worldview and Seishirou's: to Subaru, by design, all human lives are special and everyone deserves to be treated with kindness and as 'special' (meaning as individual of value and worth). Conotation of being 'special' loses its meaning since Subaru meant it as 'special in general' not 'special to me'. In the end, beside Hokuto who is his twin sister, there's no one that actually stands up in his heart. It's a parallel to Seishirou's complete apathy and indifference towards human life as he simply doesn't care.

Seishirou's eye injury:

That is when we see Subaru truly snap and lose control of himself completely (he even subconsciously slapped Hokuto's hand away in that moment, something he never do otherwise). And for the first time it's his own pain: someone he personally cares about got injured. And he reacts irrationally and even shuts himself down completely afterwards. His only lifeline in that moment is Hokuto, without her Subaru would have drowned even deeper into his self-guily/self-blame and self-destructive behavior that wouldn't bring any progress to the situation at all.

However, what caught my eye when I first read the manga is how Subaru's primary concern is whether Seishirou would hate him and forgive him. Yes, he is devastated over injury itself and partial blindness resulting in complete one, but self-centered reasons exist too, for once. It might not be a right way to feel and think, but it is human way to feel, rather than one of angel's personification - for once Subaru is responding partly selfishly, something that's out of his 'adequate emotional response' script. And that's a key moment when subconscious repression of his own heart and wants begin to crumble. His emotional and cognitive response is different because to him Seishirou is different. If it weren't for what happens in vol7, I'd call this a progress, and it is. It's just that it brought Subaru way more guilt and misery than happiness and satisfaction.

Let's note here the following: Subaru's memories of his and Seishirou's first meeting aren't completely erased, just repressed (given his magical capabilities and intuition they should be blocked even less). Also Subaru spends way more time thinking "What Seishirou-san is really like?" to not be, on some subconscious level, aware that something lingers beneath the surface. A lot can be added here, but main point is that Subaru's inner defense mechanisms detected such observations would bring a heartbreak he has no chance of surviving. So no, it wouldn't be safe for Subaru's emotional wellbeing to consciously question whether Seishirou is really an assassin or not. But he does question whether love confessions are real, as Subaru in beginning dismissed it as a joke (even asked Seishirou to stop joking about such things). Within his mind, Subaru can't form a concept that someone might actually fall in love with him as he doesn't view himself as worthy due to low self-esteem. Of course, he might have subconsciously sensed confessions were fake. Only aspects in life that Subaru has somewhat normal (or rather, not critically low) level of confidence and self-esteem are his work and magical capabilities. I wouldn't say he's confident in ability to help others emotionally, even if he's, objectively observing, really good at it due to empathy and compassion.

Here, Hokuto accented 'real feelings', meaning feelings that directly involve Subaru, not a metaemotion invoked by someone else's misery or overall tragedies. Feelings are inner responses to external happenings or internalizations of them and they signal that something important is happening to us. So for Subaru to react in that uninhibited and raw manner, it means someone is finally special to him. He's not an angel sent from above or a martyr, he's human, and has human reactions and feelings that might not always be 'selfless and in others' best interest' but Subaru fails to realize there's nothing wrong with that.

"I'm sure he would have accepted anything you did with him" - again Subaru feels self-guilt (just way more intense) and since that's self-conscious emotion it comes in pack with its counterpart: self-punisment. However he partly externalized it as he projected that onto Seishirou and was willing to accept any sort of 'punishment' or blame he'd receive from Seishirou, even though logically observing the situation Subaru did absolutely nothing wrong or punishment worthy. It was Seishirou's (impulsive) decision to stand in knife's way.

Later on Hokuto asks Subaru who he thinks came out whole accident most changed. Main idea was to point out that Seishirou stopped pretending and actually hasn't changed at all, but that leaves an implicit answer of Subaru being the one who changed the most. On his way to hospital Subaru runs into blind man and his eye seeing dog being bullied, helps them and so on. What's intresting is that he sort of insisted (still kindly) to spend time with that man as to learn more about eye seeing dogs, blindness and ways to be helpful. Then "by your voice I can tell you truly love that person", combined with Hokuto's previous advice to think about what he feels for Seishirou, Subaru comes to a realization that he is in love.

These 4 pages are very significant for deeper insights into Subaru's psyche. Let's unpack few things here:

"I never thought about what I wanted them to do, or to feel about me" - this is a byproduct of 'everyone's special so noone is'. If someone personally matters to us then we'd want that person to think positively of us, in long term. Also, in order for someone's opinions to hold significance that person has to linger in our lives for some time, which given Subaru's 'unusual' lifestyle never happened to him before.

"If someone blames me or I cause them trouble I have noone to blame but myself. I may be useless and there isn't much to like about me" - most direct evidence of low self-esteem, being prone to self-blaming, sense of worthlessness, viewing oneself as a burden and so on. Note that those thoughts and feelings aren't in response to some external happening or tragedy, but rather Subaru's general view on himself. This self-view is a precursor to many more serious mental issues as well as reasons why he can't abandon his maladaptive behavior patterns and self-blaming tendencies.

"I was afraid he would hate me and that I'd never see him again" - second part could be attributed to Subaru being afraid Seishirou might die due to injury. And while yes, that could be the case, I think fear comes out of place of potential abandonment as result of hatred. What also could be a possibility, is that Subaru felt intense self-blame, guilt and beginnings of self-hatred that he externalized those feelings and then projected onto Seishirou (to be fair, Subaru couldn't be hundred percent certain Seishirou wouldn't partly blame him, even if objectively observing it'd be irrational and not in character since Seishirou always regarded everything with cold rational logic and reasons).

Subaru is crying in that confession scene. I might be out of place of fear but given how he was already 'forgiven' for eye incident I don't think that's the case. I think intensity of his emotions (both love he felt and other hardships in prior 2-3 days) overwhelmed him, especially considering how deep Subaru's emotions run. Poor boy, he'll have even more reasons to cry in next 5 minutes considering what's going to happen from there on.

Bet end:

This is where things go from one to hundred really fast. Everything Subaru ever believed in regarding worldviews and life stances, regarding himself, regarding Seishirou - it all crumbles under his feet as nothing but an illusion. I can't stress enough how deeply psychologically damaging this type of betrayal is. He was basically told all that he knew of past year was a lie. He wasn't even suppose to be alive. Not only that, but just when Subaru let someone into his heart that same person destroyed it without batting an eyelid. To a regular person it'd be devastating, but to Subaru with feelings pure as snow? It's catastrophical.

Subaru was marked for death, quiet literally. He should have died 7 years prior, when witnessed Seishirou in the act of killing. Maybe that's another reason why Subaru repressed those memories so much (even if he remembered parts of that meeting in dreams he never remembered seeing a corpse). It's a traumatic experience, especially considering he was 9 back then. I think parts of him experienced survivor guilt in those moments. After Hokuto's death that survivor guilt was combined with regular guilt and self-blame (especially for being naive and his part in her death) and it soared up to whole new heights. After all, how can someone with so much empathy as he possesses, not feel guilty for surviving a serial killer not once, but twice (and then three times in X vol16) when so many haven't. When his own sister hasn't.

Due to his already low self-esteem Subaru internalized Seishirou's words. So when he said things like "I can't tell you and a corpse apart. You have no worth to me", instead of concluding there's something wrong with Seishirou and that it's just his opinion (and not a fact), Subaru internalized that as a proof of his worthlessness. Later on, he identifies with those words, and truly views himself as worthless, proofs being Seishirou's words, Hokuto's death and oh so more.

I said prior that there was an instance where it'd be beyond appropriate for Subaru to react with anger? Here it is:

Now, there's no right way to respond to trauma and betrayal, so Subaru opting for freeze instead of fight (or flight) isn't 'wrong' per say. Sadness and utter misery are suitable emotional responses considering what's happening and their prior relationship. Anger however, it would be translated into "I don't think I deserve to be treated like this. I believe you're wrong and I'll fight for myself" - and obviously Subaru doesn't think like that. He sees Seishirou as someone who is superior to him in terms of opinions and views, so if he says Subaru has no worth then it must be true. That man is special to Subaru, so his opinions and how he views Subaru do matter, alot. The fact that he lost the bet and was deemed 'unlovable' only adds salt to the wound. We, as readers, can see there's something seriously wrong with Seishirou and that he's being cruel and manipulative for sake of his own entertainment, but Subaru can't. We can see that he's being a victim of abuse and manipulation but Subaru most likely doesn't view himself in that way. He thinks Seishirou has all the rights to do what he does. That's why he doesn't fight back.

Let note this here: all of anger and/or hatred he feels for Seishirou afterward is solely due to Hokuto's death at his hand. None of it is due to Subaru realizing he was being mistreated all along (maybe he realized logically at some point that it was 'abuse', but never concluded "ah I was treated unfairly, I didnt deserve that"). Because what did Subaru do after his grandmother rescued him? He fell into catatonic state. Putting aside all magical themes and features, catatonic depression does exist (just not so hyperbolically). Depression and sadness are two different emotions; depression is a state where something of value is permanently lost, subject feels the situation would never change for better and is slowly departing from life as it has lost all its meaning. In a way, Subaru's whole life crumbled in front of him, it all lost its meaning. Person he loved tried to kill him, told him he's the same as glass cup, broke his arm and told him he's basically worthless. Then abandoned him. Keep in mind Subaru's low sense of worth, self-blaming tendencies and self-destructive though patterns, and that he realized he's in love five minutes prior. As well as "I was afraid I'll never see him again" and "I'll have no one to blame but myself", which he thought right in front of hostipal's door. No wonder he felt into deep depression and withdrew from reality. As Hokuto explained here:

On bonus note, Subaru fails to realize his own importance to other people, as Hokuto said. He has such low opinion of himself that he doesn't care if he lives or dies. He doesn't realize that he matters to other people (well, considering what sort of trauma he endured and what Seishirou told him, it's no wonder) and that they'll be devastated if something were to happen to him. That's something he never grew up from, as in X there were few instances where he could influence Kamui to rethink his life choices and push him onto healthier life path but failed to realize he holds that sort of importance to Kamui. So to move back to this timeline.

Intensity of reality and his negative emotions was so overwhelming that he had to retreat to the inner world of his own to avoid the pain. Subaru is in dangerous situation as he's marked by Sakurazukamori, who won't leave him alone so easily. So Hokuto decides to act on her own. Alot could be said regarding her decision to sacrifice herself but that's for some other time. A month afterwards, Subaru snaps out of catatonia because of Hokuto's death, another traumatic event. His twin sister, only person who ever truly understood him, cared for him and was by his side, was dead. Killed by the other person he loved. It's beyond devastating, and it marks the beginning of Subaru's utter loneliness and isolation from world around him as he lost two people who he cared about and loved, in one go. Considering what I said above about his maladaptive behavior patterns, self-destructiveness and low self-worth, without proper help (mainly therapy) I seriously doubt Subaru ever had a chance of healing himself and even trying to move on. Guilt just won't let him. Instead he'll end up developing full blown self-destructive behaviour, mental state similar to depression and passive suicidal tendencies.

This scene is just hard to read, especially first 2 pages where his grandmother had to restrain him.

Revenge by itself is a double edged sword (there's a saying "before going on revenge mission dig a grave for two"), however even if not for personal reasons, I can't say killing an assassin is a 'bad immoral thing'. Hatered is beyond appropriate emotional response to the situation. And it might give Subaru a sense of purpose during times when he really has no guideline or meaning in life. So in that way it's positive as it makes Subaru have a reason for living, even if not something 'healthy' (actually that's debatable if revenge would bring him anything). It's just by opting for it he began to obsess over the past, which includes one who brought 99% of that trauma and mess onto him.

Yet still, by quiting school, he once and for all gave up on his dreams. By immediately choosing revenge he focused on the past rather than a way he could heal (which doubtlessly Hokuto would approve of way more). Right from the beginning of those nine years, Subaru locked himself up in the past, something that would haunt him for the rest of his life.