#i can also accept that not everything deserves defending and i see where a lot of people are coming from in their criticism of certain

[lovestory]

i've been trying to put into words why i don't feel the need to defend taylor against all the bullshit takes that came after the grammys and it's because it doesn't feel loud anymore. i used to write essays about bs like this (remember when people said she was crying because she was mad she didn't win at the 2016 grammys, when ed won?) but now it feels like a bunch of people yelling from a glass box, it doesn't feel like an overall reflection of the public opinion, it doesn't feel like it would knock her over if she were to read it. it's just background noise

[cobaltperun]

To Never See You Again

Tara Carpenter x female Reader

Summary: She was unattainable, radiating with blinding beauty that went above and beyond her appearance. And though you knew you shouldn’t, you flew too close to the Sun, hoping one day she would look at you the way you looked at her. (Set right before Scream 5)

Warning: Angst! And I don’t usually write full on angst with no happy ending, but I tried. Big spoiler, since I know some of you prefer to be warned about this, Reader dies. Also, a request, you know who you are, love you!

Masterlist

Word count: 2.2k

Growing up in Woodsboro didn’t exactly come with a lot of perks, in fact, it came with occasional Ghostface lunatics terrorizing a very specific group of people. Somehow, you didn’t care much about that, as cruel as it might have sounded you simply weren’t related to any of the victims and it’s been years since it happened the last time. You hardly even remembered all the panic and fear permeating the town, you were, after all, just a child back then. Also, you weren’t a fan of horror, despite your best friend being the biggest horror fan you knew.

You didn’t dare to try and get into horror, fearing it would make your feelings for the girl even more obvious than they already were. Because Tara Carpenter wasn’t just your best friend. She was the strongest person you knew, going through abandonment after abandonment and still finding it in her to let new people in. She was gentle, accepting of anyone who wasn’t against her or her friends, and she was fiercely loyal and protective. Willing to throw herself at anyone if it meant keeping someone she cared about safe. And you loved her, you’ve been in love with her for years, yet you never said anything, because…

Well, Tara didn’t feel the same way.

And honestly, a part of you felt like you weren’t worthy of her love.

It wasn’t anything Tara did or said, you just felt like she could do better, and that she deserved better. It wasn’t even your self-esteem, you hoped, it was more the fact that Tara deserved perfection.

So, that was where you were. Sitting in her living room with an almost completed school assignment between the two of you. She looked so focused on it you dared to look at her a bit longer than you usually did.

“Y/N?” she suddenly said your name and you jumped, embarrassed that you got caught staring, but Tara just laughed a bit. “You can tell me if I have something on my face,” she rubbed the corners of her lips, trying to find the nonexistent smudge.

“There’s nothing on your face, T,” you laughed, looking away to avoid meeting her puzzled eyes. “You just looked kinda cute,” you tried to brush it off.

Tara rolled her eyes. “You always say that,” and you did, you very much did often say that. In fact, you complimented Tara as much as you could, as much as it was acceptable for two friends. And she gave you compliments in return, but you knew there was nothing romantic in them. And there wasn’t anything particularly romantic about your compliments either, you meant them, she deserved to hear them, and you knew you would compliment her even if you weren’t in love with her.

“It’s true!” you defended yourself, turning to once again look at her and seeing that slightly mischievous look in her eyes. She was teasing you, thinking the compliment wasn’t completely serious, but more of a friends encouraging one another. You couldn’t blame her, regardless of how lovestruck you were you thought you were fairly good at hiding your feelings for her.

“Sure, it is,” she brushed it off and somehow, for whatever reason you felt compelled to just tell her everything.

“I like you, Tara,” you ignored how hot your cheeks felt, how small your voice sounded, how loud your heart was beating, pounding against your chest. You ignored all of that and waited, suddenly finding the floor between your feet to be the most interesting floor to have ever been made.

“Well, yeah, we’re friends, I like you too, Y/N,” she said, puzzled over your decision to just suddenly blurt that out.

You should have taken the way out. She was serious. She didn’t realize what you meant. You should have accepted the chance she was unknowingly giving you. But you didn’t. “As more than a friend,” you told her, because deep down you felt guilty for having these feelings for her, for threatening to ruin your friendship, and for looking at her the way a friend shouldn’t. How long would it take for you to start blurring lines, to hug her as the one you were in love with instead as your best friend.

She needed to know. She had every right to know.

“As more- oh!” she gasped as she realized what you meant.

You dared to look up, to look her in the eyes. She looked surprised, but there was no anger, no disapproval in her eyes, just acceptance and apology.

“I’m sorry, you’re important to me, but just as a friend,” she didn’t move away from you, she kept the same distance as before you confessed.

“No, I didn’t expect you to! You deserve much better than me, anyway!” you tried to tell her, to make her known it was fine, that you never expected anything from her. Sure, you hoped. Who wouldn’t? But you didn’t expect her to return your feelings.

Yet, Tara frowned, scooting a bit closer and looked you right in the eyes. Her eyes, her big, expressive dark eyes were filled with anger. “Don’t ever say that again, you hear me, Y/N? It’s not about deserving more than you. Anyone would be lucky to be with you, I just never thought of you that way, you hear me?” she said it so firmly, without a hint of doubt, with so much conviction you didn’t have it in you to argue against her words. “Okay? I’m sorry I can’t return your feelings, but it isn’t because of you, I swear. There is nothing wrong with you,” there were no lies, no dishonesty in her words, Tara was completely honest, and you found yourself nodding.

“Please don’t apologize, I’m the one who blurred the lines,” you weren’t trying to make her pity you, you genuinely wanted to help her as well, because she was going to feel sorry, no matter what you said, and you wanted to lessen that feeling as much as you could.

“We’re okay, Y/N, you can’t decide who you fall for,” you could tell she wanted to tell you more, but she held back and that may have broken your heart more than her rejection.

Something did shift, she was holding something back from you, and she never did that before. And you knew you had to leave, to give her space and let her think things through. “Would you look at the time, I should get going,” you lamely said and just barely noticed the sadness in Tara’s eyes. She opened her mouth, as if to tell you something, maybe to stop you, though that was wishful thinking on your part.

In the end, she just nodded, getting up almost at the same time as you did and walking you to her front door. You stood there for a bit, silently taking the night in. It was late, close to midnight. You weren’t supposed to stay at her place for this long, but working on the project took more time than either of you predicted. Finishing it might be a bit awkward, but there wasn’t much work left to do, so you’d push through it.

At least your parents were out of town, so no one was worried about you. Even if they were, they likely would have guessed you’d sleep over at Tara’s place instead of walking back home at this hour. Well, either way, they weren’t home, so they couldn’t worry.

“Bye, Y/N,” Tara told you as you walked down the stairs. You turned around and saw she was smiling softly, her bright eyes still filled with an apology or not returning your feelings.

You smiled back at her, accepting her decision completely. You weren’t owed a chance at a relationship, no one was. Heartbreak hurt, but judging by Tara’s reaction you could still stay friends, though it would probably be best to keep your distance for a bit, just to let the feelings still in your heart fade for a bit. “Bye, Tara,” you said, raising your hand to wave at her as you took a few steps back. And then you turned, walking down the road through the darkness, you glanced back and saw she was no longer there. Of course she wouldn’t be, as much as she tried to be strong for you, you knew the talk was emotional for her as well, she needed her rest.

And then, just as you turned around you caught a glimpse of a cloaked figure and a white mask and before you could even realize what was happening you felt something sharp cutting through your flesh.

You didn’t hear anything but the pounding of your heart in your ears as you reached up, your bloody hand touching the mask. You looked at the eyes, barely visible in the darkness and saw cold, almost angry gaze bearing down upon you as you collapsed to your knees and the figure of death took your life.

~X~

Stabbed.

Gone.

Dead.

You were dead and Tara couldn’t remember the last time she cried her heart out the way she did today, at your…

Fuck… how could this happen?

Maybe you could have been saved, if anyone found you in time, but you were already dead when your body was found in the pool of your blood in the early morning. Cold, alone, with the killer not even bothering to hide your body or move it from the sidewalk. You died all alone, less than quarter of a mile away from Tara’s home, and she didn’t have any idea. She didn’t dare to call you, to make sure you came back home safely, because she didn’t want to make things even more awkward, she just sent you a text, one you never even opened, and she just thought you didn’t want to open her message. She thought it was a justified reaction. She didn’t think twice, even as the dread filled her. She thought it was dread of what’s to come, of how your feelings and her rejection of them would affect your friendship.

She was no stranger to losing people. First her father, then Sam, but they were, as far as she knew, alive. You were dead, there was no hope of fixing the relationship, of making up for the time that would be lost from now on.

She lost you. And she cried so hard she nearly had to use her inhaler, she cried and sobbed until there were no tears left to cry.

It wasn’t like she suddenly realized she had feelings for you, that she loved you back, or anything like that. She didn’t. She never looked at you like that, and she wasn’t in denial. She lost a precious friend and she grieved for a friend. And when she wondered if she should have done something differently, she wasn’t thinking about her feelings, but just letting you go home that late.

Because she had the same feeling she had when Sam was about to leave, that unexplainable dread that something important was about to be ripped out of her life and that she had no control over it as she watched you leaving. And Tara hated herself for that, she hated that she didn’t act on that feeling. She didn’t want to make it awkward between you two by asking you to watch a movie, let alone spend the night because of how late it was. She just turned you down, after all. And then she came to a conclusion the dread was just her reaction to what would happen between the two of you now, and she relaxed, letting it flow through her, instead of holding it in. How foolish was she to believe that? To not insist on making sure you came back home safely?

She could never look at you the way you looked at her, but she would forever regret that her last words to you were. ‘Bye, Y/N,’ such meaningless words, small, so ordinary. And Tara feared those were the very last words you ever heard spoken to you. Thinking of them now, they were even chilling last words to hear, so innocent and not in any way sounding like the final words. She wished she could have told you something else. She wished she could have properly explained to you that her rejection didn’t mean the end of your friendship, that she cherished every moment you spent together and that you were one of her best friends, if not her best friend.

She didn’t though. She thought she’d have time. That she would let you process everything and then try and see if the friendship could be continued or if you’d prefer to keep your distance. She should have known better.

She should have known better.

She should have never left anything unsaid.

The sound of landline phone ringing in the kitchen broke her out of her thoughts and she reluctantly got up from the sofa to answer it.

[aoioozora]

https://www.tumblr.com/aoioozora/755542119339474944?source=share

Not you supporting literal murderers, why tf should anyone care about people who cause nothing but suffering/destruction, murdering and raping innocent civilians for a living?? Someone using "barracks bunny" isn't the end of the world, it isn't that deep who tf cares if we want to be barracks bunnies. If mfs don't want to be called that frfr then they shouldn't enlist in the first place, people like her deserve everything they get coming to them

[The post in question]

Anon, I get where you're coming from, and I admire your sense of justice towards innocents.

But please, don't generalise all soldiers as people who WANT to cause suffering. I do not condone or support any of these things you've mentioned, and people who enlist in the army, I'm sure, do not join to murder and cause suffering. They just want to serve the country. And it just so happens that when it's time, they are called to fight simply for defending the honour of their country and the safety of their citizens. I can't speak for all soldiers, but I'm sure a lot of them wish peace and safety was not brought about through strife.

And oftentimes, the ones who enlist are the ones who suffer under the oppressive hand of their government by being forced to kill. Sure, no doubt there are soldiers who revel in causing destruction out of their hatred, but can you say it's the same for all soldiers? Besides, not all the jobs in the military mean they get to kill people. My aunt is a retd. Major and she was an education officer. And when she enlisted, I'm 100% sure she didn't enlist because she wanted to kill and murder and rape.

I'm sure you're smart enough to understand this much.

Look, this is the sad reality of the world. Death, destruction, and suffering are commonplace, and it's something we have to sadly come to accept. That doesn't mean it's right. But remember, what we see around us is out of our control. We cannot control what laws governments pass, what they order their soldiers to do, etc. And sometimes, soldiers can be brainwashed by propaganda and be ignorant of facts too.

I know, the injustice sucks, and I completely get it. But you can't be unjust and blame soldiers for all the misery in the world when you don't know what they're going through. Ultimately, it's not right to judge because we don't know their thoughts, their background, their beliefs, mental state etc.

And yes, I agree with you to some extent that calling someone a "barracks bunny" isn't the end of the world. I've been called a whore and the world didn't end. We just gotta take it in our stride and move on because we have better things to do. But does it mean it's still not severely hurtful? It hurts, and for some sensitive people, the anxiety of being perceived that way can live with them for a long time. Nobody deserves to be called such hurtful things, whether you like them or not.

If you want to be called one and be one, then sure, go ahead and knock yourself out. I don't support promiscuity but I support your freedom to choose. But don't go around saying that female soldiers deserve it because they're "murderers". I don't know if you're a woman, but if you are, I feel like you're not really being a girl's girl here. A real girl's girl would support freedom of choice, whether you like that choice or not. A real girl's girl would understand that there's more to it than what meets the eye. Hell, it even goes even if you're not a woman.

Also, it's not about "if they don't want to be called that, they shouldn't enlist". They SHOULDN'T be called that, period. You hear similar shit in corporate too like "she slept her way to the top". Iterations of it are everywhere! It's disrespectful, rude, discouraging, and degrading. Women go through enough already, this is too much. No woman deserves this nonsense, especially if they're hardworking and sincere, no matter the industry. Forget about them being women for a moment; can we just treat them as human beings? With feelings, aspirations, dreams? Hell, even dignity?

In our passionate rants, are we forgetting that other people are human just like us?

Anon, you are free to have your opinions, but please don't be rude about it. Consider that not everyone is out here trying to actively hurt people. And maybe consider being brave and bringing up your concern to the OP instead of me, since she's a soldier and I'm just a civvy. I'm sure you'll get insight better than mine.

And in conclusion, I suggest you read my favourite poem No Men Are Foreign by James Falconer Kirkup. I hope it's relevant to your concern and gives you a fresh new perspective.

Thanks for reading this Anon, and whoever comes across this. Forgive me if I've been rude or inconsistent anywhere. And if I've missed anything, let me know. I'm open to a civil discussion.

I rest my case. Good day/night.

[elen-tari2]

Kastle Defense: It’s Personal

So. I’ve been scrolling through some ship war posts on my day off. I try not to let things get under my skin too much, because I’m pretty adverse to confrontations, but I have a lot of thoughts, so I decided to just bring them to my own blog rather than get into a back and forth with unreasonable fans. I don’t get why people have to be so aggressive about ships, to the point where defending their faves means they go around tearing down others. If you want to ship Karedevil (or MattFoggy or Fratt), I absolutely support you. If you ask for opinions about a ship, but then just start attacking people who disagree with you in the comments, why did you ask? Sigh, just…. Let people enjoy things.

But some criticisms of Kastle were being shared, and I do want to address my personal takes on them. I’m not going to get into if Matt or Frank is “better” for Karen, because that’s not what I care about. However, I get there are some valid concerns that Frank involved Karen in a lot of violence, some of which resulted in her getting physically hurt and otherwise was pretty traumatic.

My opinion (because everything is just opinions, no matter how hard you say your take is the only correct one) is this: None of the violence was personal. And Karen knows that. So even though that doesn’t make it right or okay, she never holds it against Frank. Look at her reactions and see how she interprets what he does.

Frank shoots at her and Grotto. Karen is terrified, but nonetheless suspects he had reasons she “didn’t fully understand” and breaks into his house to find out more.

When Frank meets her in the hospital, he makes a point of telling Karen he was not shooting at her. That she was safe, because he only hurts people who deserve it. Meanwhile, Karen is thinking *I would have deserved it* because of her past. But she challenges Frank, saying she’d just have to take his word for it. And Frank’s word becomes something he upholds again and again for her, to the point where she concludes, “you’re honest, you never lie to me.” This remains true. Sometimes there are omissions (he doesn’t tell her about her car being followed; he stays silent when she asks if he knows the bomber (Lewis)’s identity), but there are no outright lies between them.

Does he draw the bad guys to the diner by parking her car outside as bait? Yup. But that’s different that using her directly as the bait. His ultimate goal is to protect her and get information. He plans a fight he knows he can win, and tells Karen in time for her and the kitchen staff to seek shelter. Karen is pissed anyway (of course!) and calls him an asshole. After he commits two more brutal murders in front of her, he tells her to call the police and stay away from him. He realizes he is dangerous and no good to be around. But does Karen listen?? NO. She goes to the docks and spends all night waiting for them to pull Frank’s body out of the water.

Again, I don’t think they were in love at this point. At least not in a conscious, nameable way. Some people point to Matt listening to Karen’s heart at the docks and say she already loved Frank. And I think that’s fair, but also it’s not in a stage she could ever have put into words. They just had that instantaneous connection and truly saw and accepted each other, darkness and all.

So even after Frank is declared dead, Karen STILL won’t give up on him and goes to Schoonover’s house for the interview. When he holds her at gunpoint to get in the car, “Shining Star” starts playing. So she knows to expect Frank is gonna do something. And yeah, Frank crashes her car because he’s a dramatic asshole. He drags Schoonover off to deal with him in the woods. Karen wakes up and still she follows to find him. Yes, she’s hurt, but she didn’t get shot like Schoonover had been planning, so…. Not the best plan, but it did work.

Karen begs for Schoonover’s life, but she doesn’t do it for his sake. She does it for Frank’s sake. He doesn’t listen to her because he is hellbent on vengeance at this point. They’re not in love. She’s someone who helped him, who intrigues him, but it’s not a relationship. It’s not like they were dating and he was having a secret identity and carrying on an emotional affair the whole time, stripping down to his undies with his college ex after faking having sex with her to avoid being captured by security guards…. like someone. *cough cough*. Yeahhh that was a problem for me was because those actions were a conscious choice. It was personal. I’m not saying Matt treated her worse or that Frank treats her like a princess. I’m saying the trespasses against her were different because of how she perceived them. Frank is someone who she never expected to be putting in regular appearances in her life. But she knows what she gets with him and ultimately (whether for good or for bad), she trusts him. Matt broke her trust. Told her he’d stop lying to her and then lied someone more. I LOVE how they reconciled in s3, but I just don’t see the romance between them anymore. For me, that ship has sailed. (Also let’s be clear: I love Matt. I am never anti-Matt. I am critical of other things Karen and Frank do too. Characters having flaws is a good thing. Don’t freak out.)

But let’s get back to the whole picture. Along with involving Karen in all this violence that she has accepted and not judged him for, Frank does things like:

—Saves her life by throwing her to the ground and covering her body with his

—Realizes in an instant that she’s ruthless enough to kill and admires her for defending herself

—Believes her immediately when she says she’s told no one that Frank’s still alive (he asks Curtis twice!)

—Is vulnerable with her— talks openly about his wife and kids and even weeps in front of her

—Tells her he cannot lose her like he lost his family

—Says “No one goes after her, not on my watch”

—Says she is his family and puts her on the same level as Micro’s wife.

—Says “I will come for you” when she’s taken hostage

—Jumps in front of a bullet for her

—Jumps down a staircase and dislocates his shoulder to get to her

—Has a conversation without words with her and they understand each other completely

—Forehead press more intimate than a kiss level of meaning and connection (I swoon)

—Touches her name while he reads her newspaper articles

—Brings her flowers

—asks her to “Stay. Please.”

—Holds her hand for comfort

—Quotes her while in bed with another woman 😩

—Tries to send her away when he knows he has a 5 million dollar bounty on his head and people are just going to keep showing up to kill him.

—Turns down her offer to “love someone else” and “make it mean something”, and pushes her back towards Matt because he thinks he doesn’t deserve her…. but never says it’s because he doesn’t love her too.

—Was definitely thinking about kissing her before Amy interrupted them ashdhdhehwkhjw

So many of these moments are highly romance coded, right??

If Karen were still bothered by the acts of violence from DDs2, would she have come marching into the hospital as soon as she heard his name on the news in TPs2? Would she be offering to throw her life away to be with him??? Yeah, their relationship started out with a ton of scary and dangerous situations, but it evolved and continued to do so, to the point where they care so much about each other, it’s like a sacred bond between them. Karen will defend Frank at every turn, and he has a “touch her and you die” protectiveness for her.

Was his glaring absence in DDs3 something that should still be addressed…. Hell yeah. If Frank goes up against Bullseye in DDBA, it’s going to be incredible because the stakes are so personal.

If you can get through all of Daredevil and Punisher and still find them totally platonic… that’s fine. But the evidence is still open to other interpretations and going out of your way to tell kastle shippers they are just wrong and that their ship is in fact “grotesque”…. That’s just mean. It’s fine to disagree and have different tastes, this doesn’t need to be an echo chamber. We all have our hyper fixations we love to talk too much about. But, in my opinion, name-calling and being disrespectfully dismissive of someone else’s ship is in some ways just as nasty fandom behavior as trolling. An “I’m right/I know better than you/my way or the highway” interpretation of something we ALL love dearly just doesn’t belong. We should all conduct ourselves better and realize everyone can have a seat at the table.

If Frank letting Karen get hurt in s2 is a dealbreaker for you, that’s fine to criticize. For others, it was just the beginning of their interactions, which became much more. I fully recognized Kastle has a big hurdle to overcome since it falls outside of the Punisher comics. So it is more likely we will get only longing looks and ambiguous-but-still-powerful scenes that play with their connection and chemistry, rather than anything explicit. But Kastle is my ship, and the only other OTP I’ve ever cared about this much is friggin Han Solo and Princess Leia from my childhood. So, like, this is just as important to me as it is to you. It’s personal. But it’s not exclusionary.

And this is a two way street—kastle shippers should be respectful of others as well.

Okay I doubt anyone will read all this but my life is in a shitty situation where we might lose our home due to a bad landlord, so I’m clinging to my Kastle brainrot real strong right now to keep me going. I guess I just needed to organize my thoughts and get all this off my chest.

[dhiatzs]

A rant about Heimerdinger

Heimerdinger is one of my favorite characters in Arcane. I like his teacher side, his scientist side, his nice and well-meaning side and especially the approach the show gives of his immortality. I also like how his character flaws come and bite him in season 1, leaving him without anything but the promise of worse and better happening in the rest of the story.

A lot of people in the fandom expect him to have a comeuppance because of all his wrongdoings, in season 2. I fully agree with that. I think I will grow bored of Heimerdinger if he doesn't get some character developement and some charges for what he's not been doing this whole time.

However, in some way, I can't help but feel a little skeptical about the way a lot of people in the fandom feel like they straight up hate him. I guess I'll gloss over the arguments. Warning though: I've seen the show only a couple of times, and I am not the most invested in it, so some of my points might not be correct or might miss something. I've also not read many posts about Arcane, and my English is not the best since I'm not a native English speaker. All of these are just some thoughts I have and I try to translate the best I can.

About Ekko being way too nice to Heimerdinger even though he is a councelor and responsible for Zaun's state:

well, that's a mixed bag. On one hand, yes, I think this scene quickly gloss over some coldness and hostility Ekko could have felt towards Heimerdinger. If Ekko acts angry toward Caitlyn in the same episode, why was he so neutral with someone who is in a higher position in the hierarchy? It doesn't make sense, and to be fair I'm not defending that it was not treated in the way I imagined would be the most accurate for Ekko's character.

But at the same time, if you take a look at the whole context, I kinda see where it's coming from.

a/ Right before Ekko is found by Heimerdinger, Ekko had accepted the idea to negociate with the council. Only the fight with Jinx and Marcus' betrayal prevent Caitlyn, Vi and him from doing what they want; everything goes wrong, and it appears Ekko lost everything he tried to accomplish in the last hours. So… why would he consider bad news to meet a councelor, Heimerdinger especially ─ a scientist ─, who is willing to help? In this whole disaster, it is at least something he can take.

b/ Plus, when they meet, Ekko doesn't have a reason to think of the implication. He has to look for a solution, and he has the beginning of a solution with Heimerdinger, a person he didn't have a chance to meet some time ago. So he takes it.

c/ Also, Ekko doesn't have the context a viewer has. Yes, he knows what state Zaun is in, yes the enforcers are his enemies, but if you look at his actions in the course of the season… Ekko doesn't fight against Piltover. He fights against Silco. Ekko saved the people Silco has hurt. Ekko himself says his people were lost "some" to the enforcers, "most" to Silco. He believes Silco to be responsible for Piltover's violence towards Zaun, because to Piltover, Zaun as a whole appears corrupted by Silco. Once again, Ekko doesn't have the big picture.

d/ Since Vi convinced Ekko that Caitlyn is sincere if misguided, and since he accepted from Caitlyn herself that the cycle of violence needs to stop and Piltover and Zaun need to find an agreement, accepting Heimerdinger is quite the logical next step. And sure, it means that Heimerdinger gets a privilege he didn't deserve by actively doing something good himself, but I believe it to be a good start to develop Heimerdinger. If Heimerdinger's ignorance was confronted at the moment he meets Ekko, the development would have been weak and unsatisfying, given the few number of episodes left in season 1 after that. Season 2 has way more time to develop what he did wrong and how he could fix what he did. Plus, and this is my last point with that…

e/ Narratively-wise, putting a confrontation there would have been not only useless, but just a free stomp on Heimerdinger with no possible payoff. Think about it: Heimerdinger has been nothing but powerless during the course of the whole first season. His authority has been direspected times and times again, he's been excluded from the council's plans and agreements, until ultimately being pushed out of the council. Heimerdinger already lost. If there wasn't some positivity with him and Ekko, the end of season 1 would have been depressing to watch; but they're a light of hope, in the end. Sure, it isn't a duo we expected to see, but Arcane doesn't play fair with characters, it just shows the logical course of actions of broken people misunderstanding each other. And I think it's doing a pretty good job at it.

About Heimerdinger not doing anything in two hundred years to realize Zaun's situation and help it:

yes, actually. I agree with this argument, Heimerdinger had numerous occasions to see what was going on, and he didn't take any of them. But where I don't agree with most of the fandom is that this is a part of the character I actually like (given we like the flaws of our favorite characters just as much as their qualities): his heavy, heavy blindspot about Zaun. I think this is the reason why I think Heimerdinger isn't a good person; but to me, it isn't a proof of him being a bad person. It is just the proof of him being extremely coherent.

Also, just like with how Ekko reacts to Heimerdinger, there are so many contextual evidences that makes it make sense.

a/ I feel like there's some kind of math being made in the fandom where Heimerdinger equals Piltover. Which symbolicaly makes a lot of sense: Heimerdinger is this brilliant scientist whose renown you hear about times and times again. Heimerdinger founded Piltover, and the city echoes the character: immortal, wealthy, clean on himself, popular. The relation between Zaun and Piltover echoes the way we know Heimerdinger interacts with people: because of his immortality, the ones who surround him decay, and he outlives them; and he doesn't empathize with them, just like Piltover doesn't empathize with Zaun.

But as a whole, I think Piltover is also Heimerdinger's safety bubble. We know Heimerdinger has seen awful things in his past, and created Piltover firstly to escape the warmongering of mages. Under his watch, progress is made slow and careful. Under his watch, the city is some kind of wealthy peaceful place, where when something bad happens ─ the most minor thing, truly; say, a bunch of teenagers from the Undercity stealing from an Academy student ─ someone must pay. Heimerdinger is seen enjoying celebrations, concert, wonders of this kind. Heimerdinger behaves like a child in a world where he made sure any disturbance is avoided for him. His fluffy cute design and his happy-go-lucky nature are just further proof of this. We could argue that all of this is a logical reason on its own why Heimerdinger doesn't try and help Zaun: he cares about Piltover, and Piltover first. None of these things are a bad thing in themselves, but it becomes bad when you realize everything that flows from it.

b/ To support this point, one interesting thing about Heimerdinger is his ego. He sees himself as an authority figure, someone reliable ─ a teacher, even! He is wise, he is old, he keep things stable. Piltover is a city shining with pride and privilege (no pun intended). None of this leaves a door open to change. Which is pretty ironic, right? Because science should be about change, but Heimerdinger isn't. Because of his immortality, he must be a moral backbone, he must not lose his way. And since what he's been has been serving Piltover for two hundred years now, you can't make him change his mind. He's a stubborn creature, but truly, is there any character who can fully get where he is coming from? I find this awfully interesting that what he lacks is a person in the same position as him. Because the only person he can respect in this context is himself, even though it leads to permanent self-satisfaction. A permanent feeling of thinking you know better, when you actually… don't. But who could prove that?

c/ I think Piltover's council has to be mentioned. The council is made of seven people and Heimerdinger is only one of these people. This oligarchy has been present for generations; the principle allows every case presented to be examined through several nuances, which leads to debates and votes. Its core definition prevents tyrannical decisions. Sure, corruption within can lead to this instance being actually a disguised despotism… the irony is that corruption indeed runs through the council, but Heimerdinger isn't a part of it and isn't aware of it. And you can guess that since Heimerdinger is the founder of Piltover and is a part of said council, it means that he accepted the suggestion of an oligarchy. The people in the council have interests in mind that aren't purely about science: economy, politics, business… all logical angles to use to take care of a city whose importance is known across the world. Heimerdinger is described as having his only experience be science. So Zaun's situation hasn't been fixed by Heimerdinger, sure… but not by the council either. Their failure to consider Zaun's situation is even discussed in episode 4; Caitlyn's mother even argues that the Undercity can't be controlled. Plus, Marcus hide a lot of crucial information from the council, because he has to accept Silco's conditions in order not to compromise himself. The council thinks that Zaun's situation is being handled thanks to the enforcers.

And at the same time, there is such a complacency in the concept of a council made with privileged families. It is formed with elites, and this elites have an elitist view about politics, which would be better considered with a sociological approach. But this is simply the extension of Heimerdinger's wish to keep everything safe and sanitized for himself and the city. A logical outcome, which actually makes everything Heimerdinger's fault, but at the same time, which makes it logical he doesn't realize it.

This kind of is the whole point of Heimerdinger's character, isn't it…? Everything he does is flawed because he fails to see past his fears.

To conclude this (already too long) post, one thing I haven't mentioned is that I think what leads people to dislike Heimerdinger as a whole is ambiguity. The fact that we don't know yet if the writers are aware that Heimerdinger isn't a perfect person; the fact that he has such a nice presentation which distract people from the fact he's not reliable nor doing as well as you could think. The fact that all the ways in which he means well are not enough to repair what he has failed to accomplish. The fact that he is presented as a solution while being one of the cores of the problem at the same time. Believe me, like I said, I want him to get a comeuppance. But I think his flaws are as likeable as the web of flaws linking every character of this show to the others.

[onceuponalegendbg-rwby]

I think it's because people just see an easy designated punching bag online and view it's supposed "shittiness" as carte blanche to mistreat anyone who dares to not be part of that mob. We've seen it happen many times over the years.

Star Wars. Sonic the Hedgehog. RWBY. If there's a punching bag available, people will do everything they can to justify punching it.

A lot of people enjoy being cruel, but they hate being seen as cruel. So when an opportunity pops up where they can be as awful as possible because "the person/group/thing deserves it"? They just jump on it like hyenas to bloody carcasses. And then they get to pretend it's all justified to be an asshole because they're "on the right side", and will get protected and praised for their cruelty until it's not the socially acceptable thing to do anymore, or they just jumped onto the next bandwagon/fad for them to be an asshole about. Then they'll just go "Oh I'm so sorry, it wasn't that bad, can you just ignore and pretend I wasn't an absolute asshole that probably hurt you immensely? KTHXBAI. Oh and if you dare to call me out, I'll call you thin-skinned and sensitive but I'm just a victim UwU"

And the reality is that even IF this thing or media had a deserved bad reputation, more often than not that STILL doesn't justify being cruel about it. But a lot of people WANT to be cruel about it.

You are definitely not wrong. And it's gets so exhausting after a while, especially if you engage with that group, but even if you don't just seeing all the hate can wear you down after so long of seeing the same complaint (valid or not) over and over and over. Whether the piece of media deserves it or not, it just becomes redundant after a certain point.

It's hard to fight the urge to fight back, to not defend something you cherish so deeply, because you know the other person wants to get you riled up, they want act like they've got some make believe moral high ground because they're "objectively" right about how this piece of media should be perceived.

As I said in my original post, it's okay to not like something but that doesn't mean you have to make that vitriolic disdain your entire personality. More people need to figure out the ancient and therapeutic art of "Disengage if You Don't Like."

Now this also isn't to say we can't criticize media. As much as I love RWBY and will always defend it from its haters, I have my fair share of complaints about how certain elements were handled, mostly in the first four Volumes and especially in V4 itself. However, do those criticisms I have derail my overall feelings toward this show? No. Not at all. But I've already spoken at length about my feelings so I'm not going to repeat myself again here.

[fieldsofview]

Tell me about SMH!

SMH!! SMH!! SMH is my magnum opus. It's my baby. It's my pride and joy. It's my feral hyper-fixation. It's my project that proves that I can actually finish something of this scale and I'm not in fact doomed to never cross the 20k word mark (I say "finish" loosely, at 145k and counting, it's so fucking close to being done aslk;djfhas;dkj)

SMH is a story about loneliness. About repression. About sacrifice. About grief. About guilt and self-sabotage and forgiveness and mistakes and learning to let go and accepting love and taking ownership over one's life.

SMH is about how one person's choices spider-web (ha! pun intended) across the lives of everyone around them.

Spider-Man: Homesickness

Plot wise: SMH is set in July of 2029, nearly 5 years after the events of Spider-Man: No Way Home. It follows our beloved Peter Parker as he has spent nearly every waking moment, during the last 5 years, either defending his city as Spider-Man or just struggling to get by, not as Peter Parker anymore, but as Peter Strakar. New name. New identity. New life. A life where he won't let himself get too close to anyone, for fear of making the same mistakes again and getting another person he loves killed.

Through a series of choices, a series of mistakes, and a series of happenstance accidents, he's thrown into a network of people who are also, in many ways, just a little broken. He doesn't want to join them, but he's sort of forced too, anyway. Oh, and of course, he's saving his city again, as he always does.

I wanted to write the sequel I don't think the MCU will ever write for Spidey, but that had the emotional weight he deserves. The idea that he has been entirely forgotten by everyone is such a weird little area to play in and I took it to the extreme for this fic.

There are heavy mentions of The Blip and how it affected our cast of characters, as well as grief and power and responsibility. It's told from Peter's perspective, and while he tries to always do what he thinks is best, he's not perfect and he doesn't know everything. And, to top it off, he's pretty heavily in denial about several things that unfold over the story. There are a lot of moving parts amongst the background characters that he's not always privy to, but the echoes bounce around the walls of the story (I'm already considering a sequel or three from other POVs so I can explore those bits more tbh).

The supporting cast is extensive, but it primarily includes Michelle Jones-Watson, Ned Leeds, Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane Watson, Harry Osborn, Miles Morales, Eddie Brock, and Venom.

With that, I leave you with this little snippet from Chapter 3: Adrift

Gwen pushes through the partially opened door into some sort of office/breakroom combination. There’s a desk to the right, piled high with paperwork in front of an outdated computer. To the left, there’s a small table with a few mismatched chairs scattered about.

Leaning against the table is a beautiful redhead. Her hair is braided and fluffy down the center of her head like some kind of faux mohawk, and her makeup is a striking combination of dark and glittery. Sitting on a rusty barstool next to her is a slender, dark-haired man. His shirt seems to have once had sleeves, though they’re absent now, frayed edges accenting his broad shoulders.

If Gwen hears any of the conversation, she doesn’t acknowledge it. Instead, she gives a dramatic bow, bending so low that her nose nearly touches her knees. “I present to you, Peter. He’s our new friend.” She straightens, looking at the two in the room. Peter can’t see her face, but it seems as though something unspoken passes between the three of them.

“Hey,” he says lamely. “I’m, uh, excited to see you play tonight.”

“Peter, hello. Any friend of Gwen’s is a friend of ours.” The redhead walks towards him with her arms outstretched, and by the time he realizes what’s happening, she’s hugging him.

He tries really hard not to think about the fact that this is the first time anyone has hugged him, as Peter, in nearly 5 years. Sure, some people have hugged Spider-Man, especially after some tight rescues, but this is different.

An ache settles in his chest unrelated to this afternoon’s injuries.

“Thank you for coming tonight.” She pulls away from him, looking over his face in a way that makes Peter uncomfortable, though he can’t place why. “My name is Mary-Jane. You can call me Mary or MJ, whichever you prefer.”

MJ.

Nope, not doing that.

“Uh, nice to meet you, Mary.”

She gestures to the man behind her, “This brooding bastard is Harry. He’ll pretend to hate you, but insults are his love language.”

Harry stands and slings a lazy arm around Mary. “Quit giving away my secrets, MJ. And it’s nice to meet you, Pete. Gwen has told us surprisingly little about you, so I’m glad you’re here.” He holds his hand out for Peter to shake.

Gwen looks a bit sheepish at that, pulling at the cuff of her sleeve as she says, “Oh, well, you know…”

Ah. Well, no sense in embarrassing her. “We’re still getting to know each other, but I’m happy to be here. Jiji over here gave me a pretty good sales pitch.” He reaches out a hand and ruffles between the cat ears on Gwen’s hood.

She bats his hands away playfully and smiles at him. “Hey, mind the hair, Deku, I still have a crowd to impress.”

[jheseltheunswerving]

Rayla: How Selflessness Becomes Selfish

I had every intention of writing this before season 4 came out. Unfortunately, school and life got in the way, and I just didn’t have the time. However, I am writing this without having seen season 4, so please keep all spoilers out of the comments and reblogs.

Rayla is one of many people’s favorite characters. She’s cool, she’s beautiful, and she has a Scottish accent. But I wanted to get deeper into her character. 

Morals and Responsibility 

Throughout the show, Rayla is shown to be a protector, a fact that contradicts her training as an assassin. Even still, her being a protector is greatly influenced by her Moonshadow Elf ideals. 

The Moonshadow elves and their ideals are introduced early on in the show where we see a group of them making essentially a bloodpact to avenge the death of the dragon king and his son. The planned assassinations of Harrow and Ezran are not only believed to be deserved but also believed to be vital to achieving justice. As Runaan eloquently puts it, “Life is precious. We take it, but we do not take it lightly.”

This is a moral that Rayla displays. She will only take a life if she feels it is necessary or deserved. Hence why she spares Marcos’ life in the very start of the show. It isn’t until she meets Callum, and he points out the revenge cycle, that these morals begin to be… altered. 

As soon as the egg of the dragon prince is discovered, Rayla commits herself to defending Callum and Ezran. She smiles at Ez and offers to go back into the tower with Callum to stop her people from killing his and Ez’s father. 

Rayla assumes the actions of her peers are her responsibility. When she first tells Callum and Ezran about her parents, she says she’s so ashamed, and feels her journey to return the egg to the dragon queen as one of redemption. In other words, Rayla feels she needs to redeem herself because of her parents' alleged betrayal. 

She assumes this kind of second-hand responsibility from the other assassins as well. Throughout season 1 and well into season 2, Rayla is incapable of telling the boys what happened to their father. Even when Rayla asserts, “I didn’t kill anyone!” Corvus’ words illustrate exactly what she believes:

“Your leader did! What’s the difference?”

The difference is Rayla tried to stop him. She tried to get Runaan to call off the mission, and he wouldn’t listen. Now King Harrow is dead, and Rayla cannot bring herself to tell her new friends. 

And this actually becomes a problem later. More specifically, Rayla’s morals become a problem. Although she can’t find the strength to tell Callum and Ezran the truth, she still needs them to trust her. She offers to carry the egg, but when she realizes giving it to her would be a gesture of trust, she can’t let herself take it. She refuses to accept the boys’ trust until she’s told the truth. Even Callum tells her, “You don’t need to do this right now, Rayla.”

“Yes, I do,” she asserts. 

No, you don’t. Wait until you’re in a safer place.

But she can’t. She has to do what “the right thing” in her mind is before she can, and it nearly costs them everything. 

This comes back to haunt her at the end of the first season. The guilt of dropping the egg is weighing on Rayla and she will not let herself believe it was anyone’s fault but her own, even though Callum was also arguing with her. 

“I let you both down. I let the world down.”

Rayla has a lot of internalized guilt that she does not let herself let go. It might have been taught by her Moonshadow elf culture or it may have been something she learned on her own, but either way, it has shaped how she thinks of herself and how she handles situations. 

Emotional Vulnerability 

Like all characters, Rayla has moments of weakness. How she handles those moments is what differs her from other characters. The first true glimpse of this we get is after Callum told his aunt that Rayla is a bloodthirsty monster. Rayla says to Callum, “I can’t believe you’re such a jerk.” Her hood’s on, her back is turned, slouching away from the boys with her arms wrapped around her knees. 

This kind of standoffish behavior is displayed in her again the very next episode where Rayla admits to being afraid of water. “I guess I was afraid of being afraid.” This is another example of how the Moonshadow elf ideology can be harmful. Rayla comes from a culture where weakness and vulnerability are things for which to be ashamed. A culture that ghosts their own people if there is even the slightest notion of that person having betrayed them — without any chance of explanation. Although she doesn’t know it, that is exactly what happened to her parents.

When she opens up about this, Callum tries to comfort her by putting a hand on her shoulder, but she pulls away. Rayla does not like to be touched when she feels vulnerable. This is a very interesting detail about her, especially as her and Callum’s relationship develops. 

One of Rayla's main conflicts in season 1 and 2 is hesitation and struggling to do the right thing. She knows what she’s supposed to be and what she’s supposed to do, but it hasn’t felt right to her. And that causes her to doubt herself. 

This becomes a problem during their trek up the Cursed Caldera. Rayla doubts her ability to carry out Callum’s plan. Even when she is successful in carrying it out, she’s already in a state of panic, so when thousands of tiny slugs start crawling up her body, she’s understandably shaken. In a moment of weakness and desperation, Rayla calls out for help. Callum uses Aspiro to blow away the tiny slug monsters, and she gives him a subtle angry look.

Rayla becomes defensive when she’s vulnerable. Her body language becomes closed off and she doesn’t speak as much. This is shown again after Rayla sees the illusion of the mummy turning to dust. She tells everyone, “There was no one there.” This may have been more to protect the kids than herself, as she admits to Callum in confidence what she saw. Interestingly, Callum doesn’t put a hand on her shoulder here, or try to reach out to her at all. He simply asks, “Are you okay?” and lets her open up. And she does. A little. 

That’s the thing about Rayla. She doesn’t like being caught off her guard. If she’s going to open up, it’s gonna be on her terms. And this includes being touched. 

Right before the Wonderstorm when Rayla is blaming herself for the egg’s fading, Ezran reaches out to her. “You tried, Rayla. You’re so good. And brave.” Here Rayla accepts Ezran’s hug. Though, there was a bit of warning in his approach, and he was also tearing up. This is another notable detail about her character. Although Rayla does not like being touched when she feels vulnerable, she does reach out to people she cares about when they’re the ones who are upset. She does it here with Ezran, and later after Callum finally finds out about Harrow, Rayla hugs him. Rayla is not devoid of empathy. She is capable of being there for people for support or as a shoulder to lean on. But she lacks foresight in how her own actions could affect her loved ones emotionally. 

Still, Rayla does get better with being vulnerable in increments, particularly when it means helping Callum. At the end of season 2, she clings to him while he’s in his coma. She even goes as far as to nearly admit her feelings, only pulling away at the last second when he wakes up. But that isn’t the last time she’s vulnerable for him. She opens up again to Sol Regem, offering her hand to Callum and admitting she cannot finish their mission without him. However, what both of these scenes have in common is that Rayla is in control. Rayla is opening up on her own terms, no one is pressuring her to do it. It is not that Rayla is incapable of being vulnerable or opening up, it’s that she has to do it by her own choice.

And this is where hers and Callum’s love languages clash. Rayla hates being touched when she’s vulnerable, but it’s Callum’s instinct to reach out to her when she’s upset. The day after visiting the Silvergrove and finding out she’s been ghosted, Callum approaches her about how she must be feeling. But once again, Rayla keeps her back to him and says as little as possible — even denying that the previous day was difficult for her. When Callum pries and approaches her on the ambler, she snaps at him and insists that she’s fine. Finally, when he hears her crying in the oasis he reaches out to her again, only for her to smack him in the face with a pillow and run away.

And even when she tells him to leave her alone, that “she doesn’t want him to see her like this,” he still puts a hand on her shoulder. Of course, she immediately pulls away, once again shadowing that she does not like to be touched when she’s upset. To her, it’s like someone breaking through her armor.

Callum reaches out to her again, and again, she steps away. Neither of them are in the wrong here. Rayla does not like being touched when she’s upset, but it’s Callum’s instinct to comfort her the same way he’s been comforted in the past — with hugs and reassurance that he’s not alone. 

Their love languages conflict because their upbringings do. Callum comes from a family that respects each others’ feelings and encourages free expression with games such as “big feelings time”. Rayla comes from a culture that denies fear and weakness and praises hardened hearts. And all those pent up feelings, at least in Rayla, manifest as anger and defensiveness. She closes herself off, she snaps at Callum. She acts like she is alone — like she has to deal with her feelings, alone.  

By not letting the people who love her help her, she’s not only pushing them away, but she’s hurting them. When all they want to do is be there for her. It’s only when Callum snaps back and tells her to shut up that she allows him to talk. Callum has to talk her out of her hurt feelings before she finally lets him take her hands. 

Of course, Rayla isn’t required to open up if she doesn’t want to. Callum simply isn’t used to that kind of behavior. Because of his family, he’s used to people being open and honest about their feelings. And he does slowly learn not to touch Rayla when she’s upset, but to let her come to him in her own time. 

Where Selflessness Becomes Selfish

Rayla often puts herself in danger to save the lives of others. She runs out of the oasis into the Midnight Desert to save one of the mounts. She saves Nyx from the soulfangs, and she sacrifices herself to save Zym at the end of season 3. 

But wait. Aren’t these all selfless acts? Well, yes they are, but they’re also selfish to the people who care about her. However, these may be excusably selfish. Obviously, saving the mount and Nyx were noble acts, and saving Zym was necessary. But there are times where Rayla is self-sacrificing for no reason. 

Initially, Callum and Rayla planned for the group to leave the Storm Spire with Zym before Viren’s army arrived. Then Rayla said she was going to stay at the Spire to fight a hopeless battle by herself and die. And all she says to Callum after this reveal is “Goodbye”. 

This is a scene that actually makes me angry. Rayla accuses Callum of “not knowing her at all”. Which is an extremely unfair thing for her today just days after he described her to Nyx as “selfless, strong and caring. She does what’s right even if it puts her own life in danger.” Callum loves Rayla, even if at this point he hadn’t said it yet. For her to suggest that he doesn’t know her is honestly a pretty selfish thing for her to do. And then — she runs away again. Just like she always does when her “armor” is breached, as if he touched her. And this is where that behavior is a problem, because she’s avoiding a conversation about a decision that affects Callum just as well as her. 

That isn’t to say Callum was right in how he handled their argument, but understand where he is coming from. The girl he loves is willingly and pointlessly sacrificing herself for a hopeless battle and expecting him to be alright with that. And the last thing she was ever going to say to him was “Goodbye”. Her death would not have even served a purpose. She was going to throw her life away by herself for — as both her and Callum put it — ���redemption”. A redemption that she didn’t need to earn, and even if she did, wouldn’t it be better to earn it through helping to protect Zym? 

Rayla values certain ethics more than she values herself, and that turns into selfishness when it hurts people who care about her and she acts like it shouldn’t. 

Again, though, these acts of self sacrifice are sometimes necessary. Rayla becoming the last dragon guard concludes her “honor” arc satisfyingly. She doesn’t do it out of cowardice. She isn’t trying to stay out of the heat of battle. She believes the enemy will make it up to the Spire and that she will have to defend Zym. And she’s right. 

Sacrificing herself to save Zym was not unnecessary or selfish. It was a genuine act of self sacrifice for the greater good, and it is a testament to Rayla’s courage and heart. I do not believe she was thinking of herself or anyone else when she did it. Only of keeping Zym safe. 

Unfortunately, that is not the end of the story. It continues in the canon graphic novel taking place between season 3 and 4. Rayla’s understandably upset about losing Runaan and her parents without fully knowing what happened to them. Callum reached out to her at first, before pulling his hand back. Once again, his instinct is to reach out to her, but he knows Rayla doesn’t work that way. If she’s going to open up about her feelings, it will be by her own volition.

So instead of reaching out to her or trying to convince her that her feelings are misplaced, he apologizes, saying he doesn’t like seeing her upset. And that little bit of space he gives works. She goes to him and leans on his shoulder, hugs him, and even agrees to try going on vacation. 

Unfortunately, the supposed vacation does not work, and only further reminds Rayla of what is bothering her. She runs off from the group, still distressed about not knowing. Not knowing what happened to Viren, Runaan or her parents. The uncertainty is what’s troubling her. 

She removes herself from the group and Callum follows her. Though to his credit, he does almost immediately offer to leave, and she’s the one who tells him to stay.

During their time alone, Rayla does open up a little about losing the people she loves. Then Callum makes the mistake of putting a hand on her arm while saying he knows how she feels. 

I may be biased here, but Callum was once again valid in his argument. When Rayla snaps that he at least knows what happened to the people he’s lost, he says, “Yes, I know what happened to them! One of the people you’re so worried about killed my stepfather!”

His stance in the next panel tells me he’s been holding on to that one for a long time, but he didn’t want to say it because he knows Runaan is important to Rayla. It isn’t until she insinuates that she has it worse that he lets it out. 

I’m not saying either one of them is in the wrong. Both of their feelings are valid. Rayla has every right to want to know what happened to her loved ones. But she shouldn't be taking that out on Callum. And it especially irks me that at the end of the argument, she accuses him of not having “moved on” from the tensions between humans and elves that are still very much a recent thing. A thing that has affected him personally, but he’s still able to look past that tension because he loves her. He loves Rayla, but she has a bad habit of forgetting that.

At the end of the graphic novel, Rayla leaves Callum to search for Viren — even after she promised him they would go together. This is the choice that inspired this analysis. She did it because she loves Callum and she did not want to risk losing him, but as we know from the clips for season 4, she’d be gone for two years. 

This is where selflessness becomes selfish. For the entire book, Rayla’s been upset because of the not knowing. Then she did the same thing to Callum, without any forethought that it would make him feel exactly how she feels about losing her loved ones. 

This is another example of how she forgets Callum loves her. Rayla does not understand her own worth. This results in selfless acts of self-sacrifice, but it also results in selfish acts of self-sacrifice. There comes a point where her actions are not only unnecessary, but harmful to the people who love her. It is a great example of character writing — using her greatest strength as her greatest flaw. But from an in-story perspective, Rayla needs to better put herself in the minds of others and gauge how her actions would affect them. Not thinking helped when it came to saving the dragon prince, but it was ultimately selfish when abandoning Callum.

[toadcroaky]

im trying to absorb info abt tcoaal from your blog and i think ive picked up on a lot, but would you mind describing what the different routes are? like burial, decay, etc.?

Warning I’m fixing to go on an insane tangent.

ok so like there’s only 2 chapters out rn and the first chapter ends the same but in chapter 2 there’s 2 (3 kinda) choices you can make that drastically alter the ending. (There are 2 main paths but like 5 endings some are just barely different I’ll get into that in a minute)

In the basement when you have your parents tied up ready to sacrifice to the demon (they deserve it trust me) both siblings get a choice to essentially “choose” eachother.

Ashley has to chose to trust Andrew alone with their parents when he asks her to go get all the money off their moms credit card. She knows their parents always liked him more because he’s more outwardly “normal” and is scared they’ll convince him to turn on her as soon as she leaves. If you choose to trust Andrew, that’s one step closer to the Burial ending, what some people consider the “good ending” (it’s subjective, there’s still another chapter to release so we don’t know for sure!)

but if you choose to pitch a fit and say you don’t trust Andrew alone with them Andrew gets PISSED and is like I’ve already killed for you we literally have our parents tied up at gunpoint and you STILL DOUBT ME?? and that triggers the Decay ending which some consider the “bad ending” (again it’s subjective since we don’t Really know what will happen in ch. 3)

But even then, if Ashley chooses to trust Andrew and leaves he is also faced with a choice. Immediately his mother starts questioning him and telling him it’s not too late to turn on Ashley and let them go they would help him get a job, get back on his feet, etc. (keep in mind they’ve already betrayed him once by selling them both out to organ harvesters and then collected on faulty life insurance on the both of them)(like I said they deserve this)

Andrew gets the choice to either accept or decline his mothers olive branch. Now BOTH of the siblings have to choose eachother in order to get the Burial ending, but only one has to fuck up in order to get the Decay end. Basically if Andrew chooses to “accept” his mothers olive branch he straight up tells her he would if he could but Ashley has already drug him too far down to quit and he hates it and he hates her but this is how it has to be. He resigned himself to hating her for the things he feels he “has” to do and is bitter about everything and is ready to burn everything to the ground.

This is the ending where when Ashley has a vision where he chases and violently kills her with his butcher knife. Now this is where the decay route get interesting. There’s a third choice earlier in the game where in Andrew used Ashley’s gun she stole from the warden to shoot a hot man who’s been following them there’s a “Shoot.” And a “SHOOT!!!!!” Option, the later being Andrew emptying the entire clip into the guy so now they have no bullets.

Flash forward, if you get the decay ending then as Ashley is being hunted through her dreamscape by Andrew, if there’s bullets in the gun she can choose to defend herself and kill him. Or. She can put the gun down and let him kill her. Picking this option Andrew still kills her but it’s.. cleaner than if she couldn’t defend herself and she also says the saddest line in the ENTIRE game;

“Bye-bye Andrew, I had fun!”

And he turns to cradle her cheek before saying “I’ll see you in a little bit.” before slotting her throat.

I didnt play the Decay ending but that fucking broke me watching a play through.

I much prefer the Burial ending, which is where both siblings choose each other and say fuck social norms, what has society ever done for us we only have each other. Andrew is much friendly and open in this route and is unbothered by the act of butchering and eating their parents corpses. Even Ashley is shocked that he has next to no reaction to this and says he’s acting different. This is because in this ending Andrew chooses to unmask and is no longer concerned with what’s “normal”. (Even though he’s still concerned with avoiding any and all consequences to their actions, this is a core characteristic of his)

After they eat their parents Andrew suggests she try for another prophetic dream and this time he wants to try it too so they lay on their parents bed holding hands with the demonic trinket clasped between them.

In this route Ashley can have 2 different dreams and depending on how you do a certain puzzle in her dreamscape, unlocks the INCEST ROUTE (AKA the best route and I’m not even saying this for horny reasons it’s just true) doing this means they both share of vision of them post-coitus etc etc. I’m sure you’ve seen it.

They both wake up and Andrew is BEET RED and begs Ashley to tell him they would never do that. Note that for once HES giving her all the veto power implying that he wouldn’t be able to stop himself if she offered. You can say “Never” or “Never say Never” the former giving you the no-incest or Sane route and the latter obviously doubling down on the incest lol.

And yes you can still do the burial route and not do incest, this is called the “Sane” route and basically Ashley just has some weird puzzle dreams and Andrew sees nothing. The only difference is Andrew isn’t as friendly and playful with her as the incest route and ch. 2 ends.

So basically as of chapter 2 there’s 5 different “endings”

Burial

> Incest or Sane

Decay

Gun with no bullets > Andrew kills Ashley violently

Gun has bullets > Ashley kills Andrew in self defense OR allows him to kill her and he does so quickly.

I should also add that in Decay no matter what happens with the gun Andrew is always implied to kill himself right after he kills Ashley. He refuses to be separated from her and expects to see her in whatever version of the afterlife he believes in.

Anyway I’m sorry if this is incoherent but I just LOVE talking about this game I could do it all day if there’s anything you’re still curious about let me know!!! There’s also YouTube play throughs but I definitely recommend buying the game it’s so worth it.

[lady-corrine]

This is a rant abt the black and how people defend them so easily, you don’t have to read if you don’t want to,

Btw I’m teamless, I don’t support either side but I really don’t like how everyone depicts the blacks as the beacon of light (the heroes) especially in the Aemond situation

The fight between the kids was started by Daemon’s daughters and they all literally got Aemond to the floor and were ganging up on him until he picked up the rock (Which he wasn’t even gonna use because it was a scare tactic, he literally put it down until Jace pulled out the knife) and then when he starts to defend himself again luke takes his eye. I know people like to say “Well Aemond deserves it because he stole Vhagar” or “Well he shouldn’t have done it on the night of the funeral” but we are constantly told that dragons aren’t possessions and that the dragon has to bond and choose their rider, if vhagar hadn’t accepted Aemond then he’d be dead (Dragons aren’t family heirlooms passed down either) and while I do agree that it was wrong to bond with Vhagar at the night of Laena’s Funeral, I feel like people tend to block the fact that Rhaenyra sleeps with Daemon (He’s also to blame but I’m just pointing out a character flaw of Rhaenyra’s that people tend to ignore), Laena’s Widow, the exact same night also. Also Aegon, Jace and Luke bullied Aemond for not having a dragon so you can understand Aemond’s desperation because he was tired of being made fun of. Then in the next scene Rhaenyra sees that her brothers eye has been taken and still demands that he be tortured as to find out where he heard that her children were bastards, as if it wasn’t blatantly in your face that they are. Instead of Luke getting punishment (I’m not saying take his eye but this does also have something to do with a further point of mine, maybe taking his titles would have been better) the blacks get off Scott free even after starting this mess and taking a family members eye.

All that lead me onto my second point, Rhaenyra is spoiled. I know not many black fans like to see the truth but she is (I mean I saw that even her dragon is known as spoiled or smth). She’s constantly let off with a slap on the wrist because her father loves her so much he’s willing to look past everything she does, I think the perfect scene that shows this is when Viserys is telling her that Jahaerys would have disinherited her but he won’t because he holds too much love for her to do that. She acts as if she didn’t know what she did was wrong and blames everyone but herself for the outcome. Yet again when Aemond’s eye is taken by her son she gets away with it because Visery’s loves her a lot, his sons eye was just taken by her son and there’s no punishment for it 🤔. I do blame Visery’s for this because he raised her this way but it’s just a flaw of her character. She leaves Visery’s by himself for 6 years, even knowing he was ill and only came back to ask him to secure her son’s position. What kind of daughter abandons their dying father, who has shown nothing but love, and shows up only to ask him to secure her sons place even though he can hardly move and has been asked to rest? Selfish. She also expects everyone in the court to be on her side even though she’s hardly done a single thing to earn their respect. She won’t know what it’s like for Alicent who can’t refuse or go against the orders of the king like she can and just blames Alicent for being forced into a marriage.

I also feel l like if the blacks want to take a son for a son so seriously then they should have done the same for and eye for an eye.

Now don’t take this as me liking team green because I don’t, Rhaenyra would definitely be a better queen than Aegon, + I hate Aegon, I hate Otto and the others I just see a grey characters except for Helaena, she is an angel. The whole point of Hotd ,I feel, is that everyone does morally questionable things and should be seen as grey (except for the very few that are either just evil or good) and the whole reason I wrote this out is because I feel like everyone just makes the blacks the people that do no wrong, I’ve even seen people say that they’re excited for blood and cheese and excited to see this innocent child be killed and that it’s deserved when it really isn’t. If there was a punishment then Aemond wouldn’t have been so bitter.

[chloeangelic]

thoughts re: Rendezvous series and forgiveness

ive had some thoughts recently about how people might react to part 5 of rendezvous when it comes out, ie the final part, and i wanted to share for no real reason

discussions about forgiveness, infidelity and such below the cut

firstly, i want to say that zero iteration the word "forgive" appears in part 5. there is no discussion about forgiveness really at all, and i dont think there needs to be. one of the reasons is that i think the concept of forgiveness can oversimplify complex situations, as well as assign unnecessary value judgments to things. i often feel like being forgiven for something means that you have to label that thing as 100% bad and terrible, and theres no space for what sort of positive change it couldve initiated. this is often the case when it comes to infidelity - which is a whole different can of worms.

on the topic of forgiveness, however, whether its mentioned explicitly or not, ive noticed an extreme allergy to joel being forgiven for any indiscretions towards the MC in fics on this website. it seems like the MC herself can do anything and nobody really questions it when joel takes her back, we can cuck tommy into oblivion, joel can cheat on his wife etc, and all of that is cool and hot and encouraged until joel is the one making dumb decisions. people will literally forgive him for being a mass murderer but not for fucking someone else.

the discussions of morality, which are a huge focus in tlou, seem to stop short when it comes to fictional relationships between joel and MCs. we can all discuss why he merked that hospital full of fireflies, and most tlou fans will justify his actions, saying he did it for a good reason, but any relationship related indiscretions do not get the same treatment. i understand that people are sensitive about cheating, being cheated on is awful, but its unproductive to shut down all discussions about it

just to make it clear: i do not consider his actions in rendezvous cheating, not on katy and not on the MC. the MC feels more cheated on because she has an unhealthy attachment to him

am i defending his actions in rendezvous? no. do i think they need to be defended or condemned? also no. i choose not to see things as binary good/bad - even if i thought everything he did was terrible, whats he supposed to do? be alone forever because of indiscretions towards one person? i know this is fic, and i could write him living under a rock for eternity if i wanted, but this is supposed to be a realistic (in my definition) series, and realistically, thats not what happens to people who fuck up in interpersonal relationships. they move on and live their lives. we all hurt people at some point - its juvenile and delusional to think that just because someone hurt another person, theyre bound to suffer for all eternity.

i think there are a lot of nuances when it comes to relationships especially, and trying to label what hes doing in this series as cheating on the MC/katy, and then saying CHEATING BAD is an oversimplification and ignores the scope of emotion im trying to cover here. even calling it cheating ignores the depth of unlabeled relationships. i think the MC deserves more than that, cause if we say hes cheating on katy, were basically calling the MC the other woman, and the other woman is ALWAYS vilified - except in this case where shes the "reader" character. what if i wrote this entire thing in a different perspective, and katy was the reader?

im in the brainstorming stages of my next big series after love me back, and if i go with the idea thats simmering in my head right now, its gonna be a completely infidelity focused series, about when its acceptable to cheat, who is allowed to cheat and why, etc. joel will not be fucking anyone else in that series or cheating on the MC calm down

this might not be very interesting, and its not addressed to any anons in particular at all, ive just been thinking about it as the parts have been posted and thought id share my thoughts in case anyones interested. its hard to give my full thoughts without spoiling ch 5, so after thats posted i might write another reflection on it for anyone whos interested in my thought process behind the decisions ive made.

[cadybear420]

Break, guilt and hunt for Aiden and Evie

break: What would cause your OC to break down completely? What do they look like when that happens? Has anyone ever seen them at their lowest?

For Evie, there are probably many things, but a big one would be just losing a loved one. Her dad, Aiden, any of her closest friends. "Losing a loved one" is a very broad term here- whether it's them passing away, or them wanting nothing to do with her anymore (whether by her own fault or not), or them suddenly going missing, or them suddenly turning against her.

Most likely, she would mentally and emotionally shut down if this were to happen to her. How severe it would be would depend on the particular case (eg. with a loved one passing she would feel mostly grief; where as with a loved one wanting nothing to do with her, she might feel more guilt or anger). In an event where she lost someone by her own doing, she'd lose her interest in doing things she likes because she'd feel she doesn't deserve to enjoy herself.

Such an event hasn't really happened to her, however there have been some moments that have come pretty close. Like this one time she was in fifth grade and Scott was one or two hours late coming home from a meeting, and Evie had started worrying that he'd died. She spent most of that night anxious and crying.

Or whenever Evie has a terrible argument with someone, like that one argument from B2 Ch9– when band and cheer rooted against the team during the game against Hearst in the previous chapter, she'd sided with the basketball team because she felt they were picking on the wrong enemy by going against the team. She was devastated when Aiden sided with the band and cheer's actions and even agreed with Mia saying that the team was "like a second Isa". And it pissed her off because she'd been by his side ever since he got suspended, and stood in front of him to defend him from Isa and Frank.

She spent the rest of that day unable to focus on class, feeling constantly anxious, not in any mood to do anything. She was angry and confused at Aiden, but eventually she'd also start to feel unsure of herself. What if Mia and Aiden were right? What if she wasn't actually doing enough to stand up for him, or the rest of band and cheer? What if she wasn't really as good to Aiden as she thought she was?

In the end, of course, it all boiled down to everyone becoming stressed from Isa's fucking up of the school. And Aiden telling her "I'll do everything in my power to make sure you're not expelled" was sort of a reassurance to her of that fact. That this one disagreement was ultimately worthless compared to everything else she and Aiden had been through.

As for Aiden... in canon, he says failure is his biggest fear. So I like to think he's similar to Evie, in that he would break down if he were to lose someone dear to him– particularly, by screwing up so badly that they turn against him or want nothing to do with him anymore.

Were that to happen to him, he too would probably emotionally shut down. Normally, in a situation like that, he would probably try everything he can to rectify his mistake– but in his worst possible fear, where there's a point of no return, nothing he could do to rectify the situation... he would react similarly to how Evie would. Constantly beating himself up, unwilling to do anything that would make himself feel good, etc.

One of his lowest points was definitely when his parents punished him over the carnival incident. Isa blamed him entirely for it, leading to his parents seeing him as irresponsible and refusing to listen to his side of the story. It was one thing with the halftime performance where he blamed himself for it, but this time he was being directly blamed for the events. And he did have some cause in Luis's wrist getting broken, even if it was by accident.

guilt: What is your OC guilty about? How do they handle their guilt? Do they try to avoid guilt, or do they accept it?

Evie is guilty about a lot of things. There's probably a whole list, that I'm still figuring out. Even the smallest degrees of doing something thoughtless or saying/doing something hurtful back when she was a little kid who didn't know better or didn't think things through. Even as she works on herself to become a better person, a lot of those past moments still cause her anxiety.

How she handles it varies between situations. Sometimes it will be a case where she feels she can move on from it and accept that it's not a big deal or that it's something she's grown from. But there are other moments where she just... wishes she could erase them from her memory permanently. She'll often have those moments where she'll remember something awful she did, and any suppressed feelings of guilt she had will come back.

Aiden is much the same, though he doesn't tend to dwell on the past quite as much as Evie does. He tends to be more of a "focus on the now/future" person.

hunt: Who or what is your OC hunted by? A person, a feeling, a past mistake? Is your OC able to let their guard down, or are they constantly alert?

Neither of them are really in any danger from anyone or anything. Sometimes Evie does worry that a mistake she made in the past, even a smaller one, will come back to bite her in the ass, and that does tend to make her a bit more on edge at times.

Asks list here!

[writteninthesewalls28]

Between love songs and internet cruelties

A prequel to "between shards and "I love you"s

A/n: This work is part of the "be my valentine challenge" by @bemyvalentinechallenge for the day 11 prompt.

Summary: Eris, Niall’s girlfriend, starts struggling with all the hate she gets from Niall's fans and when he finds out, he has a good strategy to cheer her up…

Warnings: mental health, cyber bullying

I heard Niall unlocking the door and quickly tried hiding my tears from him.

Because we are currently in a world wide pandemic and I worked as an elementary school teacher when I wasn´t singing, I was always home, day and night, every day of the week.

Which, obviously also caused lots of boredom from time to time.

And was there any better thing than reading mean comments about myself and crying?

Niall’s and mine relationship had become official just one week after we met. And the media immediately drew all their attention to us.

Two singers as a couple? That’s something new for them.

And then, there were the fans.

Of course not all of them were mean, but there just simply were some of them, who liked saying that I don’t deserve Niall and his love, that I'm not good enough for him.

Under a video of my performance at the iHeart Jingle Ball last December, I stumbled upon some newer comments, talking about me.

That I was fat, not worthy of love, ugly, too clumsy, weird, dressed too casual…

These comments hurt. They really did.

But if I'd tell Niall about this, he'd anyways just defend his own fans (that’s at least what I'd do if someone said something bad about mine) and wouldn’t believe me. It isn’t his fault anyways.

It probably is my fault because I started dating him in the first place. That´s also what makes living together with him for quarantine so hard, I get constant reminders that I don´t even deserve him, but am still around him for most of my time and have to play it off like everything is amazing.

"Hey baby!" Niall said, taking his bag off his shoulder and placing it on the kitchen counter. "I bought your favorite sweets for tonight! Did you decide for a movie yet? Please don´t let me go through the torture of another enemies-to-lovers story." he said, laughing to himself and still not looking at me. He´s focused on packing the food out of the bag.

Then I saw Chocolat chip cookies in his hands.

They don´t taste as good in the UK as they do back in the US, but it´s better than nothing to make me feel closer to home.

That´s exactly what I needed now, somehow Niall always knew it.

He turned to me and his face changed from happy to serious really quickly.

Great, you could still see that I had been crying. Why did I always cry so ugly anyways?

"Are you okay?" He said, sitting down on the chair next to me. I knew he wouldn´t accept a ´yes´, but I tried anyways.

"Don´t lie to me, I can pratically still see the tears on your cheeks." Niall never failed to make me laugh. "So, what´s going on? Did something happen, did I maybe do something wrong?" He gently touched my arm and stroked over it, to make me feel more comfortable, which actually somehow worked.

Without saying a word, I handed him my phone, where the comments were still visible. It was quite funny to watch to see Niall´s face turn more and more confused and shocked at the same time. He couldn´t believe it.

"First off, why are you reading this?" He asked, still staring at the comments in complete disbelief.

"I don´t know. I just came across it" I had to take a deep breath to stop myself from starting to cry again. "And I know, that I´m not the perfect girl for the fans… I don´t even know why this upsets me so bad." I tried explaining my sensitivity to Niall.

For a few seconds, I wondered, if he even heard me because he was still focused on the phone, but then he said something. "But you´re perfect to me. The fans can´t decide who I date or who I love. You are perfect for me Eris!"

A small smile appeared on my lips. Before I met Niall, I never knew how great words of affection could feel, but Niall was the inofficial king in making me feel better, just through words.

I understood why so many people find comfort in his music, it was truly amazing to listen to it.

"I´m definitely post about this on Instagram, they have to stop." Niall called out and then stood up, probably to get his own phone.

Just minutes later, you could find a new post on Niall´s official instagram, addressing the cyber mobbing against his girlfriend. He knew, not all of the fans were doing this, but the ones who were doing it, should stop. It´s wrong to hurt people like that and he actually thought it was something everyone knew by now.

I loved this man so much, he would never be able to know.

"Let me show you something." he then said, after posting the new text and stood up to grab his guitar from the sofa.

You never love yourself half as much as I love you

You never treat yourself right darling, but I want you to

If I let you know, I´m here for you

Maybe you´ll love yourself like I love you.

I immediately knew which song he was singing there, and quickly added the "You sing". The fans would´ve been proud of me.

I had little tears in my eyes and as soon as Niall was finished with singing, he gently wiped them away with his hand.

Yeah, the fans could say whatever they want, he was my man.

[hexellent]

So far I've mostly just seen your Tails on display, so I gotta say that's why I followed, but man I gotta gush about how the way you write him is so unbelievably killer. That older portrayal you've got going on is so good, I adore how chill he is. One moment that stood out to me was a post where he was basically like "yeah i recreationally smoke weed, it helps me chill out and get more sleep. what's so crazy about that." and I was so instantly like. Oh yeah, this Tails is good.

You can really see that he's leveled out and come into his own over time. But he still has snark and attitude when it's time to defend against someone or something brushing up against him in a way uncomfortable to him, he hasn't lost any edge. It's only gotten more honed as he's gotten older and gained more confidence. He's so undeniably himself! I legitimately love it!

Haven't been following you long and I'm already beyond thrilled to see you on my dash every time you post. Waggles two big thumbs up.

@skyfcx // Why u here tho-

NOW YOU WAIT A GODDAMN MINUTE THERE BUCKO!! THIS IS SO FUCKING NICE? WHAT?? HOW'D YOU CLOCK THAT MUCH ARE YOU IN MY NOGGIN OR SOMETHING??

FR THOUGH, I've been thinking about Tails as he grows up for some time now, and Tails has been my favorite since I was like 12-13?? So I've always had my feelings on him and how much potential he has as a person. Dude was beyond college level smart at Eight Years Old. But at the same time, he was still a kid. So of course his intelligence doesn't mean he's perfect at everything. And on top of that, being a child of war so to speak, thats gotta leave you with some lasting effects, hence the insomnia.

He's not perfect, he knows that. And mostly accepts that. He gets jealous. He gets rough and out of hand. He has his highs and lows just like anyone else. He won't pretend like he's on some mighty high horse about useless things like drugs or petty brawls. However he still has a strong sense of justice when it comes to the distruction of other people's lives that didn't deserve it. (Sonic's cocky nature also rubbed off on him which is both hilarious and awful depending on the situation LMAO)

I take a lot of inspo on this from Steven Universe: Future, because I always think about how realistically, the hero should not just be chillin after so many near death experiences. And seeing the Post-'Good Ending' thing where Steven basically had to relearn who he was outside of saving the world/galaxy was like my favorite thing.

I applied this to Tails with my own spin on it. Like he's generally understanding of his situation, regardless of how unfair it really is. And while I haven't touched on it yet, he did have to come to terms with Sonic's methods of dealing with villains. Long story short, he's not always a fan, but he understands why, and does not want to change that, because that would mean changing Sonic as a whole, and thats not for him to decide.

BUT UH THIS IS GETTING LONG!! I HOPE YOU KNOW THE ADMIRATION IS RETURNED 100% BECAUSE I LOVE HOW YOU WRITE TAILS!! It's so spot on for his character and how he thinks, I love it sm.

[foulfirerebel]

What role do you think ghira, ilia and the new white fnag will play in the vacuo arc? Besides having cute reactions to bumblby being a thing now.

I hope they don’t do a repeat of what happened at haven where the “good Faunus” save the racist humans so all the Atlesians have a “change of heart”. The last thing this show needs is more respectability politics lol.

Put of everyone ilia seems the most likely to tell the Atlesians to their face that they brought this upon themselves for their complacency in atlas many MANY societal injustices without trying to sugarcoat it.

Simply put? Helping to arm and aid Faunus who can fight, while aiding in taking care of those who cannot. Remember: there's not been a gathering of people this big since the olden days of Ozpin and Salem, so there's going to be MASSIVE tensions between every nation.

But of course, that's not all. The New White Fang is going to need to be one of the lines of aid and defense for the combined forces, and people are NEED to accept their help. I can see them telling off some racist asshat Atlesians who complain about how the "animals" are talking back now and threatening to leave them in the desert or something if they don't accept things as they're moving.

Also, just one other thing about Haven. The choice there was either leave the kingdom itself to die, not just the school, or go and help them. It took the Belladonnas nearly being assassinated and Blake's speech to get some Faunus to WAKE UP about the situation.

And if some people STILL want to cause problems? They can do so in the harsh, unforgiving desert sands. There's too much at stake to cater to racists, and since the show itself has shown our protagonists shutting them down and basically that their ideas don't matter or deserve time in the long run? I don't see any respectability politics being used at this point.

Mistral is arguably a work in progress for now, but Vacuo? Shit, the Atlesians and Mistralians are going to be lucky that Vacuoans don't rip them a new one BEFORE or ALONGSIDE the Faunus. I say this because Atlas and Mistral both drained Vacuo dry of resources following The Great War.

So. Calming the tensions or resolving them between nations is going to be...interesting, to say the least. I don't see The New White Fang prioritizing Atlas citizens (unless they're Faunus, were already poor, etc.) that decide to keep their horrible attitudes intact after everything its done to the world and the Faunus.

This isn't saying I'm wanting fights to break out or people killed, just the tensions to be a factor at this point. Old wounds reopening, a lot of social injustices being called out, the imperialism, colonialism, racism, you get the idea.

Any sort of division at this point only aids Salem, so this is going to be interesting to see how it's resolved. I do like that Ruby's message convinced so many to come to Vacuo. The world tensions aren't going to be solved overnight, but at least they can start by helping defend the kingdom.

TLDR: I want the NWF to help Faunus across the nations, and to be helping defend Vacuo alongside others. I'd also like them to be keeping tensions low, shutting down the racists, and proving to Salem how wrong she was to underestimate and discount Faunus.

The citizens of Atlas have lost their kingdom, homes, and livelihoods. I'd like at least one of the NWF to rub salt in the wound by calling them out on things the nation did, but they'd be one of many doing that. People of Vale would want answers for the Fall of Beacon, Vacuo for the colonialism of both Mistral and Atlas, and Mistral for their lack of support following Beacon's fall.

It doesn't mean that I think all citizens of Atlas necessarily deserve to be treated like dirt, but there's a lot the nation needs to answer for when all is said and done. In the meantime, ensuring people are able to defend themselves and taking no shit from the more bigoted of people from there will absolutely be a good start.

[calypso-finale]

Hundred Four.

My mind is everywhere but this, like I want to be here for Halle, but my mind is also elsewhere because of everything, always me. Like why me, why does all the shit happen to me and it’s annoying to feel this way. I have been a bad person clearly because shit just follows me always “I did not know Rylee the great would be here” I laughed at Diji saying such shit “I came back home” he cooed out “home huh, you ain’t even taken the citizenship yet. When you becoming an official one. You little American” he sat down, I shrugged “soon, the test is hard. Like I did a test one and I failed it so yeah, you need to teach me about the British culture clearly” he pulled a face “how do I know? I am just here for vibes” he shrugged which made me laugh “for vibes, shut up. You back early from work, what you doing here?” I am asking why he is in his own place “I had a half day so I thought I would come here, then I see you. Halle still here?” nodding my head “she hasn’t come down to see me yet, and may I add I did nothing wrong” it’s annoying she is acting like this “oh, I don’t even know what happened” I guess Lillian didn’t want to tell him “I guess you about to be kicked out of the house once again” he scoffed “how are you though? I ain’t tell Lillian about anything you told me; I wasn’t sure if that was something you wanted so I kept quiet. Not like it is anything wrong but that is your issue, you may not want people to be talking about it” Diji is so sweet “thank you, and I am well. I have a lot to think about. I just don’t know what to do. Does he even want me, where do I go from here if he actually doesn’t? I can’t trust men; they don’t see me as a wife they see me as a fuck and with Aziel he won’t accept another man after the trauma and then what? I don’t know” Diji eyeballed me “relax” he kisses his teeth “relax, just talk. Speaking works you know, you need to speak to him and just be straight, Rylee you can’t jump on a scenario yet, ask him how it is. Ask him if he wants you and I think he will say yes but I can’t say, you need to speak to him on that. Relationships are hard and it’s harder when things happen, and a lot did happen, but don’t trip. I will help you find another roadman” we both laughed “I am done with it” shaking my head, it’s all so hard work “as a fellow London man, he is hurting I know bro is. They move mad in love and hurt” Diji added which made me feel sad because he won’t speak to me on it.

Halle decided to come down with Lillian, then Lillian kicked Diji out which he wasn’t happy at all “I don’t know why you are mad with me” I said to her straight up, I don’t like this shit she is being “because you let him disrespect me Rylee, he was calling me a bitch and then he punched Wyge. You allowed him to be rude to me” Halle defended “you was putting the blame on him, he was mad. What do you want him to do? Sit there and accept the blame for you both, I didn’t come here to argue. I came here to fix the issue; he swore at you, but I am sure he did out of anger. Why is it Wyge sees the wrong and you don’t? Accept you both fucked up and we all can move on” it’s crazy, Halle stared off in silence “I didn’t want this to come out yet, it’s just all so new to me, to us and now it’s out” she mumbled “and Colin deserves you to tell him, and he deserves the respect Halle. You’re reacting hard done by, I am here for you. I was upset how you came at me too, why would you do that? All I ever did was be good to you” Halle put her head down “I am sorry” she apologised “just I was caught off guard, I said it to him. I goes why didn’t you tell me that he knew, because if I did I could have prepared myself to know that you know” she shook her head “look, I am calm. It’s out and I am preparing to tell Colin” pressing my lips into a hard thin line “you sure he is the one? I mean Wyge” I am concerned for her “I am happy, I think we ran our course together. I think he knows it too” looking at Lillian “knowing Colin he is going to just accept what it is and walk off” I feel bad for him “Colin is a good man, too good for me. I know that” she put her head down “I will do right by him; I won’t hurt him because he did nothing wrong” I am glad she is seeing that.

I am glad Halle is seeing the light, but she is pregnant still because the way she rushed off to be sick once again “she is keeping the baby?” I asked Lillian “as far as I am aware yes, I can’t tell Diji. I feel like he will think I am bored with him, but I adore him so much” I cooed out “Diji is good, I called him when I was in New York. I needed advice from him, and he was like speak to your older brother, he is so kind to me. You’re lucky” Lillian giggled “my man, my man, my man” I scoffed “girl, don’t make me sick” I waved her off “how is your sister though? You went for her” rolling my eyes “that girl assumed Taylan was cheating, she needed me for support. That man was doing nothing but play video games, she was neglecting him, and he was feeling sensitive. So I was there as a third wheel with them two just being all in love” she let out an oh “he is so sexy though, Ti man is like the finest thing” Lillian needs to stop “don’t make me sick, you ain’t ever say that about Oakley” she sniggered “he is like one of the gang, he reminds me too much of Colin and Diji” Halle made her way back “Rylee girl, I am so sorry” I got up from the couch “it’s ok” we both hugged “I didn’t mean to say those words to you, I was so caught off guard that I jumped to defence mode without thinking so I attacked everything, this is on me and I know, so I am sorry. I love you so much and when I see Cench. I will apologise, this is my journey, so I need to fix it. And” she stepped back “If you want to be friends with him still, you all can. Knowing him he will want that because we were so close in friendship but it’s something I will do” nodding my head “I feel so bad, I am sorry” smiling at her “hormones raging, just everything. Don’t be feeling bad, I caught you off guard” she was not expecting me to know that, I get it so we can just move on from this.

I am glad that we can make up, that we can resolve things because Halle was being so hard headed about shit “how are you going to tell him?” I asked Halle “oh god” he groaned out “sit him down and just say the truth, he may punch a few walls. I think, but I can handle him. He will hate me, maybe. I don’t know but I just know he is going to be mad, but yeah” she shrugged “did I ruin what you and Cench was trying to build” I have to laugh “erm, no. He was pissed but I think he will be ok” I shrugged “you seem off though so what is wrong?” Halle picked on that as soon as she could “just some home truths, I just don’t think he is what he seems to be. Like he is ok and move forward, like in the moment I was ok until I thought back and realised that Oakley didn’t want me mourning his name out, he faced me away from him, twice. We only faced each other on the bus but he was put off in a weird way, but I didn’t pick it up. He hates me but had sex with me?” I am hurt “oh girl” Lillian said “he is a hundred percent thinking of the video he guarded with his chest, he is seeing the video in his head. He is hearing that, that is something wrong and it needs to be aired out, I don’t think you should be hurt by it but like, talk to him” It’s easier said then done, this is just so shit for me because why does all this shit happen to me.

My mother calling and said she needs to speak to me when I’m free, but I just know it won’t be anything good, I know it “I’m home now yeah” I said; one drama after another for me “you seem annoyed already, it’s not I’m telling you off in this texts but the difference between you as a child and you was with your dad is that you’re a girl, you grew out of it, you started to change. He’s a boy and a very charming one at that, he’s so bright. I’m proud of him but he is picking up grown men stuff, and by that I mean pretending to smoke. He talks like he’s one of the gang which doesn’t bother me but his mannerisms too. I took him to the bathroom, he said no. And ran to the men’s which Chris had to go there, he’s hanging with grown men in a setting full of adults, he even stood with his hands in the front of his pants just stood there, I told him off but it’s not good” my mom said “right” I just said “so I’m a bad mother” I added “I’m just telling you Rylee, I never said you was bad at all. You can’t just jump and say that, when he goes to school and the teacher tells you he is acting up you going to tell them are you implying I’m a bad mother? No you’re not, now he is going to school your home life will be shown, it will be exposed. So I am telling you as his nana, as his grandparent, you need to stop him from being with too many adult men. He needs to learn to not act like this, that is all. You are a good mother but little things that needed smoothing off. I had a wonderful time with him, he enjoyed himself and we got to spend time with him” my mother snapped at me “then what do you want me to do? I am trying, when he’s with his dad I can’t stop it can I?” I spat “you need to tell Oakley then; I get he’s trying to make him have manners, but he can’t monitor him always. He’s at the age where he needs to know that isn’t good, he’s going to play up for you, I am telling you now. Life is different in London, you need to think about it” this is just a headache “thanks” I mumbled “I am not trying to upset you, just wanted to tell you” my mother says but I feel like shit now “ok, thanks” what else can I say but that.

This big house is actually so lonely, even when Aziel comes home it’s just still too big for me, just me and my son but I refuse to leave because I will need it at some point. I mean I won’t be having more kids but still, I know my mother wouldn’t agree if I was to sell it, so I have to just deal with it really. Speaking of Aziel he is here with his dad, I feel so indifferent about things now. I’m not mad at him but he should just say it, and then on top of that the complaints from my mother about my child, I just give up because I’m not good enough mother now too but what do I know, I’m still learning how to be one, he’s my test child and the only child I will be having, I didn’t build my body back like this just to have it ruined for a child, that will not be happening for me again. Opening the door “welcome home” I said to him “hi mommy” he said stepping inside “mommy kiss” he said, see what I mean with my little charmer, leaning down to him and he grabbed my face and kissed my lips “thanks, sticky face” wiping my lips “you didn’t warn me” I said to Oakley “last minute thing” he said and placed his suitcase in the house “it’s fine but what if I wasn’t home?” he hasn’t even messaged me since “I know, my bad” he just said “who dropped you off?” I asked “erm Wyge” rolling my eyes “I am glad he is off my drive; he came crawling back to you. You got a minute?” I said, moving back into the house “erm yeah” he said, he stepped inside, and I just slammed the door close, I am not mad, but I just need to air it out with him “so you are going overseas now?” I asked “yeah” chewing on my bottom lip “have fun then” I have nothing else to say in regards to that “what going to do for your birthday?” He laughed “that’s months away but you ruined every single one since” side eyeing him, he’s laughing but it’s not funny really, it’s sad because I am a shit person.

This is awkward “Oakley erm, you honestly. Like haven’t bothered with me and then it hit me, you didn’t want to see my face while we had sex and now I am feeling like shit. You haven’t bothered with me Oakley. This is wrong, why? Do you hate me? Is what it is” he shook his head “hate you, I don’t hate you. I have been busy, what do you want from me? I did that grand gesture to you” he defended “then why are you blanking me, even now it’s awkward. Do you see that video when you see me, is that what it is? You thought of the video, huh? Tell me Oakley!” I shouted “it happened ok, I don’t want to bring it up because it hurts you. It happened to you, so I don’t want to bring it up for that reason. I don’t hate you Rylee, I just got to deal with shit ok” he looks annoyed at me “I wish you tell me you hate me and be done with it. Every one thinks I am stupid for having sex with you, because you haven’t healed, I don’t know really. I just want to know if you want me, because I feel like we can’t be. I feel like we are too far gone” Oakley sighed out “look, I have a lot of shit to go through. I have your mother marrying me off to you, do you want me, or do you feel secure with me?” he turned it to me “think about Rylee, you are secure with me, you feel safe because you are scared of others” I shook my head “don’t turn it on me, just go Oakley. Have your bus full of girls and go” I waved him off “yeah full of girls but they aint you” he walked off, I just don’t know what to do, this is all a mess really “I did that shit to show you that I want you, but you on this thing of questioning me. Things are going to be hard Rylee, I fucking saw you naked with another man, what you want me to do?” I waved him off walking off.