#i didnt intend for this to be my first post but whatever lol

[juyendraws]

[Limbus Company] Faust’s Development (or Lack Thereof) in Intervallo 6.5

So Murder on the WARP Express came out and uh… The suspicions I had regarding Faust’s future arc ended up being confirmed. Faust is definitely not reaching out to the truth. I didn't expect the seeds for her story to be planted so soon, but here we are. It’s real. And you're probably thinking, “Uh… WTF are you talking about?” Let me explain to you what I mean.

The message of Library of Ruina is a critical part to understanding what's going on in Limbus Company. I will tell you straight-up here and now, absolutely nobody in the fanbase knows what the hell LoR is actually about. Nobody. And it is such a shame, because it has such a great message that absolutely nobody talks about. I'd love to tell you much more about it, but that involves long explications on Jungian Psychology, the Jewish Kabbalistic Tree of Life, and the story itself, which I don't wanna subject you to yet (I am saving my esoteric lore dumping for the video scripts I’m currently working on). What I will tell you, however, is that the lessons learned by Angela and Roland in LoR are all about opening oneself to everything that is possible in life. The ways in which they do this are:

(1) To listen to one's inner world, or intuition. Don’t just blindly believe whatever someone else says. Follow your own inner voice. 

(2) To listen to one's outer world, or reason. Don't just believe whatever you want to believe. Look at the facts and be receptive to others' opinions. 

That's all you need to know for now about this particular subject. The theme of opening oneself to infinite possibilities is one that carries over from LoR to Limbus Company, and it is present in every Sinners' story. Literally all of them were/are limiting themselves in one way or another due to their flawed beliefs. And each of them is on their own journey of self-realization, or in Jungian terms, “individuation.”

The Mirror Worlds also expand on this theme. They provide infinite ways of looking at the same subject, which sounds wondrous and exciting at first, but it really just reflects what's already there. Remember Yi Sang's and Heathcliff's arcs? For Yi Sang, the Mirror reflected his already-existing potential, while for Heathcliff, the Mirror reflected his surrender to a perceived fate. Mirror World Identities may offer additional combat prowess as well as insight into the characters/worldbuilding, but they end up being quite limiting due to their usage (basically “cheating”) and very nature (as "reflections"). 

Moreover, Goethe's Faust was something that repeatedly showed up in my research on Jungian Psychology. I kept finding Faust's story referenced in articles, academic journals, as well as the book I'm currently reading called Man and His Symbols. This book was written by Carl G. Jung and some of his most trusted followers, and it legitimately explains what Project Moon's mindset was while forming the world and stories of their games (I am not even exaggerating. I have to constantly pause my audiobook and write down notes on what I'd just read because it keeps indirectly revealing PM’s intentions for the series). Anyway, in one of Joseph L. Henderson's chapters named “Heroes and Hero Makers,” he talks about how the archetype of the hero cycle is represented in many stories. An aspect of this archetype essentially revolves around the “hero vs. villain,” or in Jungian terms, the “ego vs. shadow.” The hero must face off against the dragon and triumph. It’s about the development of consciousness through the "ego" (awareness that one exists and has an identity) mastering and assimilating the "shadow" (the parts about ourselves we don’t like or don’t acknowledge deep down). This archetype exemplifies the stage that’s supposed to take place during childhood and adolescence—it’s about growing up. If the hero fails to slay the dragon, i.e. a person fails to assimilate their shadow into their psyche, they become stuck in this state of immaturity. Henderson uses Faust as an example:

“One can see this theme, incidentally, in a well-known literary hero figure—Goethe’s character of Faust. In accepting the wager of Mephistopheles, Faust put himself in the power of a “shadow” figure that Goethe describes as “part of that power which, willing evil, finds the good.” Like the man whose dream I have been discussing, Faust had failed to live out to the full an important part of his early life. He was, accordingly, an unreal or incomplete person who lost himself in a fruitless quest for metaphysical goals that failed to materialize. He was still unwilling to accept life’s challenge to live both the good and the bad” (Man and His Symbols, page 121). 

Henderson is saying that Faust is reluctant to face life’s hardships, so he lets his unconscious aspects—his shadow, or Mephistophiles—control what he does because it’s easier for him to live that way. And as a result, he remains this underdeveloped, immature person. 

In Limbus, Faust’s shadow is Mephistophiles, the reflection of her inner pride and desire to learn more. The knowledge she gains from the bus, her ability to communicate with her IDs, is incapacitating her ability to develop as a person. She’s using it as a crutch. And her overreliance on this knowledge, ironically, reveals how truly ignorant she is. The literal shadow cast in Faust’s E.G.O is her IDs for these very reasons—she is afraid of not knowing what to do.

Anyway, the reason I brought up LoR’s message and the Mirror Worlds earlier is because it is very, VERY relevant to Faust’s arc. Each of the Sinners need to reach out to all the possibilities of life. To not just blindly follow their own beliefs or the beliefs of others, but to see the truth through their own eyes, unclouded by bias. Through her use of the Mirror Worlds, Faust goes, “Well, I’m already reaching out to all possibilities! I’m following my intuition and using reason!” And she technically is, but it’s paradoxical. She is using intuition and reason… But it’s all through the use of her IDs, which are both “herself” and “not herself” at the same time. So she’s still just blindly following her own beliefs and the beliefs of others; she’s only listening to her own opinions and copying down what others say to her, all at the same time. 

I noticed this while rereading key parts of the game again. In Episode 6-25, the Sinners discover the researchers’ experiments below Wuthering Heights. Faust was utterly oblivious as to what their goals were, and Dante commented on how odd her behavior was when she finally started talking.

Later in Episode 6-44, she urges them to find out who informed Erlking Heathcliff about the Mirror Worlds, causing them to pick up on the fact that she doesn’t actually know everything.

In Episode 2 of the 3rd Walpurgis Night, Faust freezes up when asked by Dante to give a more detailed explanation on the Library. She then gives soft confirmation that she is, indeed, in cahoots with her IDs.

Murder on the WARP Express spilled everything. As a result of being separated from Mephistopheles, she is forced to be without her IDs and must figure things out on by herself. Her complete cluelessness regarding what to do demonstrates her lack of any true life experience. She acts like a newborn baby attempting to walk. However, while she is clueless, she is not helpless. She, in fact, does have the potential to grow if she puts her mind to it. Faust exhibits curiosity, ingenuity, and amiability when she must undergo the trials of the WARP train incident.

She takes interest in the perspectives of the other Sinners when asking for help. She is able to discover new things and problem-solve by herself.

Faust can learn on her own and make friends if she really wanted to.

...Unfortunately, she falls back to her dependency on Mephistopheles at the end of the story and closes herself off once again.

Faust refuses to experience any pain that could otherwise spark a realization about herself. She is harming her ability to form relationships with others, as she habitually ignores them or prevents them from giving her advice. She actively denies herself the chance to truly learn about the world and come to her own conclusions—she is impeding her own personal growth. 

Out of all the Sinners, Faust is probably the least developed as a person. Yi Sang, Ishmael, Heathcliff—even those who are about to undergo or are still undergoing their arcs such as Don Quixote, Rodion, or Meursault—are fully-formed people. Faust is not. She is still stuck at the stage of having evolved ego-consciousness while everyone else around her is already achieving the Self. She's worryingly far behind. It’s honestly really sad to watch. 

I was debating on whether or not I should make this post for a few reasons. For one, I’m unable to read Goethe’s Faust at the moment, as I am still preoccupied with my research on Jungian Psychology and Jewish Mysticism for the previous two PM games (Lobotomy Corporation and Library of Ruina). I didn’t want to say anything too specific about Faust’s story until I read her book. Secondly, this topic is really difficult to explain without delving into the Jungian elements in the PM universe. I felt I would end up confusing people if I just came out of nowhere with this post; I initially wanted to speak more about the foundational elements before anything else. 

Nevertheless, I feel that this knowledge I had on Faust, Jung, and PM’s lore was relevant enough to share. I was SHOCKED at how accurately I had predicted Faust’s future character development. The only other person I told this to was my younger sister, and I said, “Faust basically found a loophole through the lessons Angela and Roland learned in LoR. She’s only believing whatever she wants to believe, while also only believing what other people tell her. She’s using Mephi and her IDs as a crutch… I think that’s why she’s alone a lot of the time.” AND I ENDED UP BEING RIGHT. I had to stand up multiple times while playing through the Intervallo with my sister because of how excited I was at this. 

Murder on the WARP Express demonstrates that a good understanding of the games’ themes and of Jungian literary analysis is absolutely essential to figuring out each Sinners’ arc in Limbus. Deciphering, for example, the specifics of Faust’s connection with Gesellschaft is not-so-much valuable as having a strong grasp on what aspects of her character PM is trying to explore. “What is the text communicating? How does it relate to Jung’s ideas? What is the lesson this character is meant to learn?”

That is what matters at the end of the day. 

[tangledinink]

i want desperately for you guys to know that this is how swanatello was born. he was designed and drawn in a span of approximately 30 minutes at work and made originally with the only intention being "pun." thanks @actuallynobutwhynot for getting me to make him lmao i gotta draw him and your sona together sometime.

[kroosluvr]

featherman seeker

as usual da cele notes under cut

had to get some food so thsi si late... i lterally gluedm yself to my chair to finish this LMAOAO

all of the not-dialogue is just straight up lines frm featherman seeker LMAOOO just rearranged

this takes place during 3rd semester (see: infiltration log on wall on 4th page, also their winter clothes strewn around akira's room) after drawing it i was rereading like oh u cld prob see this as like post-third semester but nah i intended it to be such BECAUSE

i rock w the canon that sumire has no clue abt akechi's past and black mask and the mental shutdowns and shido and the engine room she doesnt know hes supposed to be dead, that he sacrificed himself, etc. so ofc shes going thru the game like yayyy featherman yay and her sort of naivete Gets thru to goro. i imagine this is like idk a game he played in childhood bc he was a featherman fan but now revisiting it bc sumire wanted to try it, hes like. damn. this kinda. uh. well thats crazy how things line up. so i think it kinda grates at him but sumi's excitement and like. enjoyment! of it kinda helps him also enjoy it more

SO LIKE He knows he's going to die. He knows thats how grey pigeon's story ends. but he's happy here, and now, with the people he loves, so that makes it All right for now. it's a sad story but it's the good ending.

also i forgor how/where/when goro exactly Actualizes back into existence but can u imagine if he spawned right into the winter wonderland of shibuya square like (head in hands) smth so like. isolating abt it. in a crowd of ppl being excited over christmas and hes like what the hell im supposed to be Dead right now.

also "you are not alone" in the first panels very important..... right under hte panel w goro and sumi side by side :') yea

ryuji and ann holding akira back. YEA.

i really like the 3rd slide. the colors mmmm BUT YEAH so its goro/akira fighting/saving sumire, hanging out at jazz jin, last stand against adam kadmon, then goro holding sumi and akira's hands in the snow, then them smiling :') kinda like a procession of memories, or to-be memories or whatever

ANYWAY this is also like part of my whatever canon divergence where the royal trio section of 3rd sem is just longer for no reason . (aka: the thieves take longer to win over to their side, idk maruki gives u a longer time on the deal, etc etcetc.) just more royal trio time :3

sumibun akimeow and gorodog in 4th img... hidden.... also tennis rackets. ALSO THE LITTLE POLAROIDS Important. and all their clothes! i imagine they stay over at leblanc A Lot. akira prob convinces sojiro to Keep morgana at his house LOL and he handles the business and stuff just so they can have their safe haven while they struggle to try and win the thieves back and infiltrate the palace etc . (I kinda have a comic or something in the works for this)

more abt dialogue choices

"it's tough for a tutorial stage" - this means smth. i didnt think this thru 100% ASKJDHASDKJA but its to do w akechi's life and how everything was so fucking difficult for him as a kid when it shouldnt have been.

"is the second phase giving you trouble" - also smth to do w akechi. (As u can see these are all half baked metaphors) smth to do w his 'second life" aka: third semester being Difficult. because now he has sumire and akira and he doesn't want to leave them, so dying the 2nd time is gonna suck real bad.

i like shuakesumi btw

[nekropsii]

what do you see in equius ?? genuine question i don't mean to sound rude but to me she's just really offputting. she gives me such creep vibes that i can't seem to get over and every time i read a page with her it just gets worse..... like when i first read nep & eq's chats i was sitting there wondering if this was outright abuse or at least bullying of some kind??? it felt like it idk.......

but honestly i do wanna see an equius liker's opinion on him because i can't understand it like at all and i'm probably just missing something that all the equius likers saw and i didnt LMAO

Well, considering I’m an Alpha Trolls Enthusiast and have been for, like, a decade, as well as having Horror as a Special Interest since age… What, 3? I’d say I personally have a pretty strong stomach for Weird and Offputting in fiction, lol. Stronger than most. Equius isn’t a very palatable character at all, I’ll be the first to admit that - a lot of the characters I enjoy the most in Homestuck aren’t very palatable… But I find ‘em real interesting, personally. The fact that they aren’t palatable adds to the intrigue for me, and poor execution tends to be a total weakness of mine. Again, Alpha Trolls Enthusiast for a decade straight.

I have a post here that talks a bit about my reading of Equius, I’d recommend giving it a read. I see Eridan and Equius as being very similar characters - not necessarily due to their shared hemoloyalty, but because they’re both teens falling down online pipelines. They’re very prevalent Kinds Of Guy that no one wants to talk about.

But people talk about Eridan plenty even to this day - he was even a fandom favorite for a while, being the fandom’s first Prettyboy Sad Gay Anime Prince long before Dirk… So he doesn’t reel in as much interest for me as the chronically overlooked Equius.

If there’s anything to know about me, it’s that I love a good underdog.

Equius-Likers, from my experience, are very aware of his issues. It’s part of the draw. Enjoyment of him tends to be an analytical fixation. I haven’t met a single Equius-Liker that hasn’t had some very complex thoughts on him. They’re just kinda quiet about it. Fitting.

Unfortunately, I’m Aranea But Real, so. No quietness here.

Your response to Equius is valid. It’s also intended, I feel. To specifically address the bits about concerns of his relationship with Nepeta not being healthy… I mean, it’s not abusive, but it’s definitely more complicated than fan art would lead you to believe, as always. “Complicated” is to be expected from a Moirallegiance - remember what they exist for?

Nepeta is very much so in control of the things going on, and their relationship is pretty equal, all things considered, so I wouldn’t be worrying too much about that. She very distinctly does not lack agency here - Nepeta is the one who has a leash on Equius, not the other way around. Equius is mean, because that’s the way she is to… Everyone, more or less, but she’s not of any danger to Nepeta. They have a fine Moirallegiance. 1,000% more functional than whatever the fuck Karkat and Gamzee had going on.

Anyway. I think Equius is neat, and has both missed and oft overlooked potential. One of the very few characters I’d be 100% down to have seen more content of in the comic.

Once again, check out this post. I still think it’s decent. Maybe you will, too.

[seongminiz]

R U Mine ? - park serim

minors dni ; soft dom!serim x sub fem!reader ; 2432 words

warnings : jealousy/possesiveness , reader is insecure , praise , pet names (princess , good girl , baby) , fingering , unprotected sex , breeding , marking , does serim having a driving license count as mischaracterization ? , he also has a massive cock amen . an attempt at proper grammar but only partially proof read so if u find typos or me being an idiot n writing small comments in between no u didnt

first long-ish work i post on here feeling kinda nervous . no fr this is nerve wrecking idk im not good at writing descriptive smut ffs :D but i loved writing it ngl also something kinda upsetting happened today so it ended up a little more angsty than i intended it to be bc what r my fics if not insane projecting lol. the title is an arctic monkeys song bc oomf (elif) helped me change it (it was a lovejoy song before .... :] )

you and serim have been in a relationship for a few months now, and while of course you have some small arguments here and there, there have never been any big issues between you two. you love him, he loves you, and neither of you would ever doubt that. that is, until you end up being serim's plus one at some kind of event: you've been following him around all evening bc u have almost no idea of whats going on.

now, you're not usually the jealous type, you're okay with serim speaking to women other than you ffs that's his job, but the way some of them at this event are clearly flirting with him sets your jealousy issues off bad. watching your insanely handsome boyfriend be - or at least act - completely clueless about how they're clearly putting the moves on him, especially with how good he looks dressed like that, white shirt underneath his suit jacket straining against his toned body, leaving little to the imagination.. it pisses you off, to be completely honest.

you can't stand it, you can't stand how so many women, most of them you find clearly prettier than you, are able to get his attention like that, completely ignoring you even if you're basically clinging to his arm.you feel inadequate, just a mere presence they barely acknowledge with a small smile before going back to talk to serim. your serim.

what you fail to notice, though, is that serim is well aware of the shift in your mood. he doesn't know exactly what it's about, but he was pretty quick to sense how upset you had become just in a few minutes, trying to talk to as many people and as quickly as possible so you two could get out of there and he could give you his undivided attention.

of course, you don't know, too focused on dwelling on the jealousy building up inside you. you barely notice when serim gently shakes you, trying to catch your attention 'are you okay princess?' you sigh 'yeah.' your short reply isn't of any reassurance to serim, his thumb lightly rubbing your hip 'wanna go home?' you shrug, trying to hide your (very obvious) upset expression 'if we can, yes. but if you still have to... do whatever you were doing, we don't have to-'

'okay, got it. i'll talk to this one last person, and then we can go home, alright?' you nod, his arm leaves its place around your waist and you once again grab onto it, following his steps. your heart drops when you realize that, unfortunately, said person he has to talk to is a woman. which wouldn't even be that bad on its own, you can stand it for a few minutes (you really can't, but maybe you can convince yourself..), but she also happens to be the most attractive, hottest woman you've seen through the entire evening. you tune out the entire conversation, trying not to stare at her because everytime you take in another detail you feel like crying.

when serim finally cuts the conversation off, you politely - albeit coldly - bid your goodbyes to the woman, walking with serim out of the room and towards the parking lot. when you get to the car, you don't even wait for serim to open the door for you - he's dead set on giving you the full princess treatment - climbing in the passenger seat and slamming the door shut.

that's when serim realizes, this isn't just you feeling a bit under the weather, you're genuinely upset - and you weren't at the start of the evening, so he knows something that happened between then and now is the cause of your behavior. the fact you're giving him the silent treatment does irk him a little, but he knows that's how you act when something really bad happens, and he could never get mad at you for it.

despite his concern, serim still calmly gets into the car, turns it on and starts driving out of the parking lot and into the bright, artificially lit streets. glancing at you from time to time, he finds you looking out the car window, arms crossed over your chest, deep in thought. when you reach a particularly empty and straight part of the road, serim takes the chance to place his hand on your thigh, something you're both used to during your late night drives. what he doesn't expect, though, is for you to move your leg, wiggling out of his grasp (not that hard, since he wasn't putting that much strength in it in the first place).

serim raises an eyebrow, eyes still fixed on the road as his hand helplessly goes back to the wheel. his concentration on driving is what makes him miss the way you look back at him, concerned on whether you've gone too far or not. stopping at a red light, serim's eyes immediately find yours, desperate to get to the bottom of this 'what's wrong princess?' you shake your head, absent-mindedly reaching for his hand in search of any possible physical comfort. 'nothing, you're going to think it's stupid anyways,' you mumble. serim frowns, reaching to move a strand of hair behind your ear 'i would never. whatever it is, it's upsetting you, and I don't like seeing my baby like this.' his voice comes off more stern than he intended to, but his soft touch is there to remind you that he's not actually upset at you. he's just your concerned boyfriend.

serim moves his hand from the side of your head to your chin, tilting it so you have no choice but look at him 'so? what is it?' you pout. 'i'm jealous.' the look that crosses serim's face is a puzzled one 'what?' you shrug, averting his eyes 'you spent the entire night talking to other women, all better looking than me. i'm jealous,' you admit. serim is about to answer you, when the light turns green, the cold hue illuminating both of you. serim sighs, speeding up. 'we'll talk about it when we get home, yeah?' you nod, scared that you might have upset him. even if his voice didn't let that out, you can't help but wonder if he's disappointed in you.

serim parks in front of your apartment complex, a few seconds of you two sitting in the car in silence pass, until serim sighs, taking the keys and stepping out of the vehicle, making his way around it to open the door on your side too. god forbid he let you do it on your own again. you walk out, grabbing the hand he extended to you. everything is so silent, you again question if he's genuinely mad at you for how you acted. you knew you were being immature, giving him the silent treatment and all, you're just getting a taste of your own medicine, but you couldn't help it.

you were so caught up in your thoughts you didn't even realize you got to the elevator until the faint 'ding!' of it startles you. you step inside, never letting serim's hand go. 'you know i would never cheat on you,' serim breaks the silence, and your eyes widen in shock to the realization 'that's not what I was implying! i know you wouldn't! i just... those women were all so much prettier than me, and more mature and sophisticated, and hotter and... i'm just me. I felt so out of place, like i wasn't at your level. and it's totally not your fault! but i couldn't help but feel jealous, like I wouldn't even blame you if one day you decided i wasn't enough for you and left me for one of them. and i know you wouldn't but... it still hurts to think about it.' you start rambling, missing how serim tries to stop you a few times by calling your name.

when you finally look up at him, he has the softest smile plastered on his face and, before you can say anything else, he plants a kiss on your lips, his hands immediately finding their way to your hips. 'i would never chose anyone other than you. you're as perfect as you could be, i swear,' you can feel his breath against your lips as he talks, your heart beating furiously against your chest 'i don't care about any of them. you're all i need and you're more than enough, you're too perfect for me' he continues, only stopping to kiss you again. the elevator comes to a halt, and thats your cue to separate, but you know this isn't the end of it. serim's hand finds yours, as he lowers himself to speak into your ear 'i'll show you just how perfect i think you are, yeah?' he whispers, a shiver running through your body at the implication 'will you let me?' you nod furiously, your reaction making serim chuckle 'good girl' he says, kissing right below your ear before guiding you out the elevator.

the short way to your apartment is agonizingly slow, constantly interrupted by stealing kisses from each other and, when you finally manage to step inside, serim has you immediately pinned against the door, locking it behind you as he roughly kisses you. his hands are everywhere on you, your waist, your thighs as your dress slowly rides up to leave you more and more exposed with each movement.

'you don't even know how insane you've been driving me with this dress,' he groans, lifting you up with no effort and, as you wrap your legs around him, you feel his bulge pressing against you, a small moan leaving your mouth. 'serim... need you,' you whimper against his lips, a thin string of drool dripping from your lips onto his. serim smiles, capturing them in yet another kiss as he starts to carry you towards your shared bedroom.

he places you on the bed, your dress lifted all the way to your hips revealing your completely drenched panties. serim can barely contain himself, seeing you all spread out like that, for his eyes only, but he wants to make this all about you and your pleasure.

he starts to slowly undress himself, unbuttoning his shirt before slipping your dress off. your hands brush against his sides, tracing his defined body and tentatively going lower to rid him to his pants - no matter how many times you've seen him like this, it always leaves u in awe how a man this perfect could ever exist, and be your man at that. serim gently takes your hands in his, pins them over your head and places a soft kiss on your lips 'let me do all the work for once,' he says, hooking his fingers in your panties and sliding them off your legs.

before you know it, serim is three fingers deep inside you, opening you up for him bc no matter how many times you've taken him, you'll never get used to just how big his cock is. you've been incessantly whining for god knows how long, about how much you need his cock, you need him, and every time without fail serim replies that 'you already have me, princess, more than anyone in the world, you have all of me.' and proves his point by leaving yet another mark on your skin.

your thighs, your neck, your chest, every unmarked portion of your skin is soon bruised to the point anyone would assume he was the jealous one in the relationship. and maybe he is, just a little bit, recalling how revealing your dress - now discarded somewhere on the floor - was on you, so perfect on his princess but a little too perfect for any other men to look your way.

when serim removes his fingers from you, you're a mess, hair sticking to your forehead, breath heavy, tears running down your cheeks and ruining the makeup you worked so hard on for the event. but that's how serim likes you the most, when you're fucked out before he even gets to be inside of you, his pretty little mess, just for him.

and he tells you exactly that, as his cock finally sinks into you, groaning and rambling about how much he loves this sight, how he's so lucky to have you and how you're his and his only. the sweet praises partially distract you from the stretch, until he bottoms out and you both sigh in unison.

it's not long before serim starts thrusting into you, his pace picking up immediately but never getting quite as fast or rough as it usually would be. he wants to take it slow, savor the moment, his hand holding your hip while the other cradles the side of your face so your eyes don't stray away from him. it's hard to do so, when each thrust hits the perfect spot in you, as you fight the urge to let your eyes close.

'mine,' you moan against his lips, feeling him twitch inside of you 'all yours, princess. and you're mine too, can't stand it when everyone's eyes are on you, you're too pretty for this world.' despite the downright nasty predicament you're in, you can't help the way your heart fills with love at serim's words. you pull him in another kiss, your legs wrapping behind his back to push him deeper inside of you.

'then make me yours in any way possible,' you whisper. serim chuckles, slowing down his thrusts. it's not the first time he cums inside you, but before it was just a result of having unprotected sex. now it's a deliberate choice, to make you his in the most intimate way possible. 'yeah, princess? should i fill you up, mark you from the inside so everyone knows you're mine? would you like that?' you nod, squeezing around him as a particularly hard thrust hits a specific spot inside of you that has you letting out an high pitched moan.

serim's hand leaves your face, his rough fingers rubbing your clit and, before he can even tell you to, you're cumming, shaking as serim helps you ride out your orgasm and reaches his own, spilling inside of you as incoherent praises leave his mouth, telling you how good you've been for him and how much he loves you.

once you've both calmed down, serim presses a kiss to your forehead, holding you tight in his arms so that you can know you're really, uniquely his, and he's not going anywhere.

[losersroom]

could u directors cut the conversation of gay90s where it's like "I’ve been thinking about April. You know, before I left." to "“Absolutely,” says Brock, who has never understood anything less in his life"....whatever pieces of that that u want to!! i just love that conversation and would love to hear ur behind the scenes!!!!

GOD so like. alright that whole fic grew out of a conversation me and g were having Forever ago about this post, particularly the second point. and i was like, oh hey, that reminds me of this story i wanted to write about brock going to the gay 90's. and then i sat on it for like two more months.

so the important thing to take away from this is that it was only ever supposed to be that first part, where brock and jonas run into each other and then jonas sucks him off and they kind of subtly agree to not talk about it, the end. but like, i am at heart a gigantic sap and i wrote up to there and realized i couldn't leave it on the final line of. it can never happen again. because i too have been gay and closeted and sad about it, and i didnt want to give all that to brock.

(the other thing, which you didn't ask about but here it is, is like. a lot of these thoughts and attitudes i gave brock in that fic were just... how i felt, about myself and queerness and everything, at age 21/22, born and raised in the midwest. and like obviously i grew up and got over it and i'm extremely queer and trans and married now, and i want to think, hey, in this universe i'm constructing, it can get better for brock, too. we just have to get him there.)

anyway i had to then construct like. a narrative throughline from blowjobs to some sort of mutual understanding. ive said this before but i always think it's fun in these things to like, present brock's opinions and perspective and expectations and just pepper in around the edges hints of what jonas is actually thinking and feeling and doing, which. doesn't always line up. and then make people guess what's going on in his head, same way as brock is guessing. what i HOPE people took from that scene is that, you know, that whole summer brock spent thinking about jonas, jonas was thinking about him, too. trying to work out in his head if brock being there was a one-time thing or if there's an opportunity to have something more. and i DONT want to get into whether or not i think jonas actually has a history in this continuity with any of the people that brock imagines he might, because i think it's more fun to leave people room to draw their own conclusions, but he definitely has more experience with Being Queer In The NHL than brock does, and navigating that world, and being just. careful about it. exercising caution. he might want to mess around with brock again, but he has to approach it with discretion, you know, in case brock... Isn't into that. (but in my heart, because i'm me, i also like to think that jonas is interested because it's brock, not just because he's there and potentially the only one of their teammates available. u know. in my heart everybody's in love, im a romantic, i can't help it.)

so that scene was just intended as like. connective tissue. but it wound up being my favorite part of the entire fic lol. just the... palpable awkwardness of trying to figure out if a guy is interested in you. being on the same page without really being on the same page. and then jonas choosing to just hang out awkwardly and watch a terrible movie at 2 am with brock not just because he cant think of another way to extract himself from the situation now that its clear theyre not going to fuck, but because he sincerely likes spending time with this idiot, lmao. that's Real. that's a move i would have done, when i was dating.

[quaranmine]

Hi, not sure if you remember me, but i sent an ask a while ago saying how i love the Incadescence of a dying light and that i talk about it with my friend and how we both really liked the story and are juts you know discussing it well update to now. we still do that lol. i cant stop thinking about it, i listen to the firewatch OST on the daily, resonating with each track at a time. I love it. I live it. I am enamored. Everytime Im studying Polish (my native language) and revising each epoch for my upcoming finals i cant help but connect themes and motives to that wonderful story of yours. If i land on a fitting topic in my oral final exam (like pop-culture, creativity and arts, certain themes in modern media) you BET Ill be talking about this fic (with all the credit I can give of course!) cause USARWSETDYRVUHUISC I cant get it out of my head. Its such an amazing example of how the media of fanfiction elevates the story to its maximum potential. How knowing the characters makes it so much easier to connect and resonate, even though Mumbo is absent from the majority of the fic, we still feel hurt after finding out whats happened to him. Like, its such an amazing creative medium I love fanfiction and TERSSXEFJNKVCRXSERARXSXERCDJNGIKKDc :thumbsup: oh gosh The Incadescence of a Dying Light. yeah so fun fact i actually had to look up what it means cause i didnt know the word before and oh. oh. oh its so much worse and more painful. really love it, i do, oh i do! I now have acquired (idk how to spell it lul) the never subsiding lust for nature and outdoors and hiking and being a part of it. I love it, you made me regain my love for it. I loved it before, yes, but i was caught up in my own head and had so much stuff i had to do, but now i love to look out my window even more, i love strolling in my garden. i love it. thank you, thank you, thak youuuuu!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :thumbsup: So yeah, this fic is one of my faves of all time, i like it a lot, it has inspired me to live more and be alive basically and also. and for the end a fanart of an alternative ending where Mumbo somehow survives and just lives in the forest like a wild animal, living his best life, eating berries (i decided on drawing him eating berries [peace love and plants] instead of chowing down [is chowing a word??] on some rabbit lol) and then grian finds him and its super awkward

HI! Yes, of course I remember you! First of all, had a really wild day yesterday at work, but I read this at soooome point on my phone during the middle of the day and it made me smile :)

This ask is just so??? AAAAAAA???? I almost don't know how to respond, because it's just SO wonderful to hear this about something I created. Like I did that? I made a thing that is sticking deeply with people? I'm just soooo <333333

I like your point about how fanfiction can maximize story potential! I think it'd make a wonderful essay topic honestly. I have thought about this in connection with fanfic a lot--specifically, the divide between original fiction and fanfiction. In original works, you have to make the audience care. You have to introduce me to a character, setting, and story I will be interested in. I've read a lot of negative book reviews that start off with "the author didn't make me care about the characters" (i have also...said this myself about books I ended up not liking.) With fanfic, you skip that step! It lets you jump right in. I don't have to explain Mumbo and Grian's friendship or demonstrate it to you. You just Know. Someone reading it fandom blind would get the implication about how important they are to each other simply by seing the depth of Grian's grief, but for my intended audience, I can do whatever I want because I trust you to already have the background information you need.

The title is from a line I really like in a song (Post Humorous by Gus Dapperton). It just...painted such a nice word picture. Especially for a story about grief death and fire!

I just. Love that this fic helped you regain a desire for nature? That just makes me feel...warm, I guess, to know that I was able to spark that with something I created. I hope it goes well for you, and you get to take many walks. This spring I've been using the trails near my aunt's house (not.....hiking paths. too urban.) much more. I wanted to walk this week but I was too busy lol. I hope you have many wonderful experiences out in the Great Outdoors <3 one of these days, I swear I'll up and move to a place with "better" nature and "real" trails close by.

Also, SKFJSLFJSKFLSJKF your fanart made me laugh so much. I have like. Entertained this idea. Not as an actual or serious part of the story but I was like man wouldn't it just be off-the-wall if he was just vibing Out There 😭😭😭 You've caught the vibe perfectly LOL

this was all around such a special message to hear, thank you SO much!

[laithraihan]

I'm the anon who sent you the long message that apparently came off "pompous & infantilizing" and more to your followers.

I find it interesting that that message sparked such a flood of defenders, when I did not send it in bad faith at all. From your answer it seems I'm lacking context so sorry if I took some of your statements the wrong way, but nonetheless I just found the parental love addition strange and reacted to that, that was all there was to it. I clearly stated (three times) I'm not taking any issue with your headcanons.

By saying they are far removed from canon I did not mean to say they are "too unrealistic" or something is wrong with that, I literally said the opposite. I meant just that, that factually, this will not be a common interpretation for someone who is familiar with the source material but not your blog. This is not a statement that I made with any judgemental value and I thought I made that very clear but apparently not.

So I'm sorry for the additional ask.

Have a nice day.

Thank you for the response.

I was fully aware you said there was no issue with what I drew, but the way you wrote everything else sort of negated that statement. At least that's how me and many other people saw it.

If someone finds what I drew strange or confusing then they could always just... block me or ask me about it (and btw I expected people to be confused, otherwise I wouldnt have labeled it "non-coupling" as soon I posted it lol)

Someone did ask me about it, and you seem to have already seen that response, yet you still felt the need to send another message basically implying that an explanation wasn't enough (turns out it actually wasnt enough because people said I was lying and in denial) and that my explanation was weird too? Which is whatever I already ended up clarifying that, English is not my first language and I type things with the help of a translator (I wish people could actually keep this in mind. I only type in English because it'll reach a wider audience and it's the language most of my followers know. Often I have to google words people tell me online, or I ask my friends fluent in English to explain things for me)

You can say "that's not what I intended" but that's how it came across... you wrote a lot of nice words while also saying it was understandable that people were ganging up on me over a drawing, it seemed patronizing.

That's why me and others took offense to it, but I think it's difficult to tell tone through text so I don't want to keep nitpicking this any further. If you say you had no ill intent then I believe you.

The following will just be me adding more context and not necessarily aimed at you: Again I understand the lack of context of my account can make people confused about my art, Ive made that clear many times.

The art I made where I said "if your parents didnt love you then it's obvious" was a direct response to people who were mocking me specifically for tagging the art as "non-coupling" because they didnt believe me. They got the context and decided I was trying to hide a fetish because a kiss on the cheek was "obviously shippy". They proceeded to compare this to drawing NSFW of Mob and Reigen by labelling it "non-ship" as if it was comparable to tucking a child into bed, that's what upset me. I did absolutely nothing to these people, I dont know them, if they said this privately I wouldnt care but it was public, and they also targeted another friend of mine for no reason.

All Im gonna say is that my drawing shouldnt have caused this much controversy in the first place. I labeled it "non-coupling" as soon as I posted it, which should've been enough honestly. It's not like I posted porn or anything like that, I got the idea from something Ive experienced in my family as a teenager and I could easily google stock images of the exact same scenario to use as reference, like I really didnt think it was that bad.

Anyways I think I've explained myself many times already. Im not gonna be hostile and say to people "roh t9awed dont ever send me anything else related to this" but just.. check if Ive already answered your question so that it doesnt end up being repetitive. If you have a question about this that I havent answered yet, then feel free to ask.

[rontra]

holding your hand looking into your eyes is the exact energy I intended thank you for picking up on it

🤝

typeoneninja asked: Maybe though do say who powergirl is because I have actually less than zero idea

oh my god i get to talk about my blorbo...okay well you MUST understand i'm still a comics newbie and laser focus on only the stuff i directly care about so it's not like i've read everything about her or anything (and things do vary--sometimes A LOT depending on the character lol--from comic to comic as is DC's dark design). so take everything here as kinda loosy-goosy from someone who's Casually Acquainted. however (LONG POST)

^me.

you know Supergirl right. heard of her. kara zor-el (spelling may wary) she's superman's cousin (usually) and has the same power set. it's me supergirl and i have all your powers

power girl is Also kara zor-el (spelling may vary) from a Different Dimension. two of them.

the details about her backstory vary a little but the agreed upon IDEA for her is that her home dimension has like collapsed somehow or the earth in it is torn to shreds or whatever. she's either like the only survivor of a dimension that went poof or she's been isekai'd here from an earth that was getting blown up by demons or whatever.

and now there's two karas and theyre forced to coexist on the same earth and they can't both show up dressed like supergirl so now power girl has to do her own thing.

that's like generally the gist of whats going on w her conceptually. she got vooped over here and now she's stranded on an earth that isn't hers with castmates that aren't the same people she knew

like i said the specifics of her backstory vary but on top of being Dimension Displaced she usually shares Supergirl's whole "after their home planet exploded she arrived to earth much later than Superman did, due to Space Shenanigans" thing. she's usually older than supergirl. and she DOES have bigger boobs also. NOT sure why that's a dimensional difference between them but i'll take it (what were they feeding her on earth 2?)

sometimes they're drawn basically looking identical. i can understand the impulse (they are both kara zor-el after all.) but i think it's kind of a shame when power girl doesn't look Older than her because i like it when she's older than her. i guess sometimes they either ditch that part or just don't feel like it. F.

anyway when they look identical you can usually tell them apart by identifying which one DC has bequeathed the Boob Window upon and that one will be power girl. works every time

to me i became enamored with her when i was reading some green lantern comic (it was my first comic, they had launched a guy's coffin into the sun and had to go get it back it was wack) and i noticed a boob window girl (my beloved) had BEEN INVITED but didnt get to DO anything. she spent all her time standing in crowd shots while other people did the main stuff. and i thought "wow. now there's a character i need to put in my purse". and the rest is history

it was like this

i felt like bad for her i was like oh honey...you're coming with me... my girl in the ensemble

she kind of struggles in general because she doesn't get a lot of content coming her way. (and when she does it's not usually stuff that i love.) she shares this with supergirl too 🥰

anyway i hope that helps a little. she's supergirl from a different dimension and she's stuck here now. is the gist of it.

-

for a bonus side-elaboration on what IM doing over here in my AU, my main basis for CTDE power girl is her shenanigans in the n52 where she gets stuck here WITH another extremely normal girl (they get isekai'd together during like a big dumb demon war on their home earth). that's helena wayne she's batman's daughter in the other dimension and no such person exists on this earth. they're both stuck (together) (the only 2 people on earth who know and understand each other) (it's romance) (superbat for girls)

in that story power girl becomes like mildly obsessed for a bit with devising a way to get HOME to her own dimension and earth which is (as far as she knows) still under siege by Planet Fucking Hellmouth. shes building machines. shes using technology

(while helena believes there's nothing to go home to anymore and they should try to make a new life in this new dimension)

what gets me about it is that its SO FUNNY that this specific power girl's setup is basically a supervillain origin story that they just don't lean into because her name is on the book (obviously). (hey why do so many villains build a DimensionFucking Machine that's gonna Fuck Up the Dimensions because theyre obsessed with something on the other side anyway)

but i feel no such restraint obviously!!!!

so anyway my CTDE "Arc 1" is about Power Girl (now almost two decades deep in her desperate fixation) finishing building the ultimate DimensionFucker 9000 to get home. shes been working on this for years. she doesn't care very much about this earth and she needs to go back to her own one NOW

Helena is realizing with horror she's way too late to talk her babygirl out of this one because PG just isn't listening to her anymore (and as a human she would struggle to snap PG out of it by force). she feels she has no other recourse but to betray her most specialest girl and sell her out to supergirl, who's investigating the Weird Dimension Rift Shit that's been going on (and is strong enough to actually fight her)

And Supergirl has to stop PG because what that thing is doing to HER universe is NOT GOOD!!!!!

(Supergirl was like a teenager when her home planet krypton went kaboom--she Remembers it and feels detached from everything because she doesn't Have a home anymore + oh my god the trauma + also no one on earth even really needs her that much. but that doesn't mean PG can DESTROY THE DIMENSION!!!!)

(also in my AU the other earth is actually lost for good, so it's not only a Grief Quest but a FUTILE Grief Quest because there's no one alive and nothing to salvage on the other side of the portal anyway)

It's the "Power Girl As Villain In A Supergirl Book" arc. because i think women should have cute obsessions that endanger other people and i LOVE when the karas interact

this is why i drew pictures of them being very not nice to each other 😔

like it all works out. it's fine. they do some crying and screaming at each other, some kicking and punching, helena gets her piece in, and PG's brain fungus finally calms down enough for her to take the "Protagonist Kara" seat for Arc 2 (when Supergirl has her own issues to deal with)

theres just a lot of "kara zor el screaming At Herself that she can't go home because there is no such place anymore and she has to live with that forever in a place she doesn't belong". you know. girl talk

anyway that's like roughly power girl + what im doing with her in my first arc (helena is here too dont worry) hope that helps. shes my comic blorbo. hope she gets the main stage in a good comic someday. MDGHBJFGM

[notthestarwar]

gold teeth and a taste for this town sounds fascinating O.O

ahhhh ok so I kind of love this. it's entirely self indulgent and I had a great time writing the first 3000 words and then realised that i'd set myself up with a mammoth task if I were ever going to manage to explain the backstory enough so that anyone but me understood what the hell was happening.

so the story is set in this kind of small dead-end, americana esque town. one day a stranger rolls in to town and wanders in to the restaurant Fox works in. And it's like he's wandered in to the wrong story, he's walked straight out of a space opera and now he's sitting in front of Fox, like thats a thing that happens. never left this small town and thinks he probably never will: fox.

and then! maul has the cheek to start quizzing Fox, and acting like Fox is out of place. As far as Maul is concerned, he's landed on some dead end planet, walked in to an even deader town, and found a clone. Maybe the last clone. And this clone, is acting like he belongs here, like he has no idea who Maul is, like he's never known war, like he's never known anything but this place.

it's so bizzare that it shakes maul out of his usual, stab first, ask questions later attitude. he arrived on this planet a bit lost, there isnt really anything left for him. his ex master took over the galaxy, and he didnt need maul to do it. maul has tried his hand at leadership, at crime. but whats the point. but then. he stumbled upon this mystery, and against all reason it just, compells him.

so maul asks some more questions and it becomes apparent that fox woke up here with no memory, assumed he belonged, and everyone in this town felt so fucking awful for him (they're out of the way but news of the war reached them. news of the clones seemingly fizzling out after the empire, supposedly all gone). they just... didnt correct his assumption. and based on like. books he's read and the gossip he hears from the locals about each other, fox has just pieced together that he's this small town boy, who's never left. of course it doesnt QUITE feel right, fox shouldnt believe it, but he wants to.

he's a clever man and he can see the way the townspeople look at him, he sees them treating him gently and he thinks, he knows, that something really bad must have led to him losing his memory. of course he assumes its something bad of the level that might happen in a town like this. he lost his family? were they murdered? was it an illness? whatever it is, nobody speaks of them (because they were never in this town!!!) so it must have been bad.

and maul just keeps following him round trying to unravel this mystery and the companionship ends up doing something to him. maybe its a mixture of the hopelessness and boredom that brought him to this place, as well as the companionship. but either way, maul begins to connect with fox, even though fox hasnt the slightest clue who he is, and through this, Maul slowly begins to deal with his own shit. through fox, he can see what palpatine did to people. through fox, he can see it wasnt right, that fox didnt deserve it. and that eventually will lead to him realising that the same thing might apply to him as well.

and a maul without that first wound (once it begins to heal), wouldnt really be the maul we know from canon. where is his motivation to keep killing, to keep everyone away? he's still maul about it. he's still a dick and he's sharp and mean. but he isnt on a rampage anymore.

and thats the story. its a small town, slow story about two men who never really felt like they needed friends, becoming friends. its about these 2 victims of palpatine, finding solace in each other because they both went through the same thing, even though one of them has no idea. its a weird one, but I love it. i'll probably never post it tbh cause its kind of confusing i guess? but its like my ugly child lol i still love it.

its still in first draft format as i never intended to share it, but heres some of it.

thank you for asking!

[ectology]

I have a genuine question, why didn’t you just message the artist from the beginning? Like I understand where your comment came from but I feel like fandom is supposed to be fun and if you genuinely felt a micro aggression from their art you could’ve educated them. The reason people are hating is because of how you personally handled the situation from doubling down to not taking peoples criticisms seriously. I think if you weren’t interested in talking to the artist why bother posting the art? Maybe make a text post to gripe instead of including the actual art. You’re blog is your own and you have a right to your opinion on your own blog and yes their art was cringe (although v cute style!) BUT it’s better to be cringe than mean. And I say this as a follower of your art and not a hater but some of the twitter replies you left were mean and unnecessary. I think that you got dog piled enough and don’t deserve all this negative attention but I think that people are struggling to see your remorse in the situation because you keep replying and restating your og opinions. Anyways I hope this dies out for both you and the other artist, seeing all this hate can’t be good for y’all’s mental health.

i didn't message the artist from the beginning because my comment wasn't a callout post. there was nothing wrong with the art, it wasn't a microaggression or problematic or whatever. i said a pretty mild thing about their art on my own twitter specifically so the artist WOULDN'T see it because it wasnt constructive criticism, it was literally just me noting that i didn't like something. going to the artist and being like "HEY I DON'T LIKE THIS THING" would have been pretty stupid and pointless, which is why i made a separate post. but fsr this was taken as condemnation of the art/artist or me calling them evil or something?? i dont get why my opinion on it even mattered or why that shit blew up the way it did

and no im not remorseful about what i said, i didnt say anything wrong. my regret is that by posting publicly and having that many people share it, my post got around to the artist as well which i definitely didn't intend. ive since deleted the tweet and spoken to them to apologize and clear up any hard feelings. so yeah lesson learned, if i ever have a thought about anything i should just shut the fuck up or talk about it privately. but for real ....like........... it is Not that serious. i didn't say anything particularly mean or hurtful. there are a ton of ppl who directly messaged and qrt'd the art saying way worse shit than i did so idk why im the one who got dogpiled like that lmao.

i think if i actually said something insulting or genuinely rude id be happy to apologize for it or wouldnt have said it in the first place. but yeah no shit i was being mean to the hundreds of people severely overreacting in my replies lol. i dont think i really owe anyone an explanation either other than the og artist, since they're the one actually affected by the situation, and i've already done that. so im moving on. this is a non-issue

[myvillainfam]

My review of XH's Overload!!

First I'll be giving my first thoughts of the song, typing whatever comes to mind. I'll have my actual review right after. This is a long post so if you don't feel like reading everything, I'll be leaving my overall thoughts of the album and a ranking at the very bottom! :)

Zzz..

Oooo groovy!! GUNIL!!! oh~ okay~ is that ode?? damn okAY JUNGSU!! Tralalala bring it back! Yesssss SING THOSE LYRICS LIKE YOU OWN THEM (cuz you technically do) There's the part from the teaser!!! Ahhh it's so good. Very pop rock!!! The rap part! Ode wtf do you mean you don't know what you did? SIR YOU SLAYED MY HEART. I'M BACK ONLINE FEELING LIKE THE AIR~!!! GOING DEEPER AND DEEPER INTO THE CONNECTION~!!! BANANA GIREO GIREO GI~REO GIREOGI(and I can't make out the rest. forgive me I don't know Korean) THATS IT??? wish it was longer TT_TT

Actual review: 10/10

I loved it! I was a bit hesitant when I heard this song in the album teaser because I though it would sound to much like generic pop. But I'm pleasantly surprised! It's very much in the genre of music I listen to, pop rock!! I also felt a Day6 influence, whether or not they actually intended it. This song is wacky and very fun. It gets you ready to party! It's a great start to the album!

Hair Cut

I listen to this from their comeback show case. Unfortunately I did not write down my first thoughts. But here's my review on it:

Definitely leans more to the rock genre but honestly I didn't like it as much as I'd hoped. The bridge was beautiful—the best part in my opinion. I wouldn't be surprised to hear if this song was made with Hello, world! mini album. It has those HW! elements in there. I do like the song but its not the one I'd listen to the most. Score out of ten? 7/10

LUNATIC

As I queue this one, I wanna say that I really like how XH explained this song. It sounded like they really had fun making this track. Here go my stream of thoughts!

Interesting. Beginning notes remind me of a "spooky" song. AHH I wasn't expecting that scream LMAO. low-key scared me. oh okay starting with gaon! I'm enjoying the guitar. oh going slower. building up for the chorus? im still hearing the "spooky" sound lol. Oh! oh! bass drop??? YESSS!!! I'm just keeping it right~! this part really reminds me of the band All Time Low, maybe their For Baltimore song? No, but definitely something off of that album, Don't Panic (btw i really recommend to listen to this album if you haven't. its my favorite ATL one) WOW very emotional bridge! The ending was too abrupt! I expected more! I'm too greedy lol

Actual review: 10/10

I think this is my favorite song off of the album. It's just reminiscent of many rock (read emo) bands I used to listen to. After a few more listens, I don't think its very spooky but it's a song I'd listen to when I'd want to feel badass lol. There's just something about this song that really gets me excited.

Crack in the mirror

LMAO the beginning guitar sound reminded me of the Knight Rider theme song. OH OKAY EXCUSE ME I FEEL ATTACKED. MR LEE YOUR VOICE IS GREAT. GIVE MORE LINES TO JUN HAN HE SOUNDS AMAZING (or is that gaon?? either way damn) okaayyyyy giving some bad boy energy i see yall. AHHHH THE GUITAR REMINDS ME OF BMTH ahhhhh i live for this harder rock!!! GAON YOUR ENGLISH IS SO GOOD i melt every time i hear this man sing in english. he has a good deep voice that is just chefs kiss rewinded just to hear that part again and his voice reminded me of Andy Black. ode also has very fluent intonations in his english. if i didnt know anything about this kband I would have thought that gaon and ode would be the english speakers. OMG THE BRIDGE THESE DUDES REALLY KNOW HOW TO MAKE THEM

Actual review: 10/10

Another song where i feel badass! This one was hard for me to compare with the rest. I really loved the way it sounded. It goes hard. The vocals in this one are just amazing. I think this one would be one of the songs I would recommend to people that aren't really into Kpop but are willing to give it a try.

Ghost

ANOTHER SPOOKY VIBES ONE. this time its more like scary clown. IM TELLING YOU GAON'S ENGLISH IS HEAVEN. this whistle part has been stuck in my head this WHOLE DAY (since i saw the showcase. the whistle is ADDICTING. i really like the chorus. ode!! i love hearing him rap. THIS SECOND PRECHORUS DAMN. IM BROKEN~! *whistle*

Actual review: 10/10

Ah I don't even know how to properly put this one into words. It's GOOD! There's a tad bit of aggressiveness in this song with a bit of desperation??? Like I said I'm not sure how to explain it. (I'm looking for the translation of the lyrics maybe that will help me) Okay so it seems that I got the interpretation right. I can think of it like a tragic love where the lover dies or the narrator cuts them out because of their toxicity (i'm leaning toward the latter). Anyways it's a very beautiful song. The whistle is what pulls me in with the "i'm broken~" lyrics. It's paired beautifully.

X-MAS

LAST ONE!!! i'm not ready for this album to end. i'm having fun listening.

OKAY I WAS NOT EXPECTING THAT. UMMMM GAON????? theres a reason this man is my bias wrecker. SPOOKY VIBES IM TELLING YOU oh oh this chorus!!! the prechorus!!! the bass in the second verse!!!!! vibing with this song. JOOYEON THAT BRIDGE WITH JUNGSU. i mean they are the main vocalists for a reason

Actual Review: 8/10

Ah the song where Jungsu said he wanted to play on Christmas. I think it's too creppy to that but it still sounds sort of Christmas-y? This is one of those songs that I don't really know how to feel about it. I guess it kinda has one of those vibes like the Nightmare Before Christmas. It's a "spooky" song but also not at the same time??? It's a good song but idk if I'd rate it top 3.

Overall Thoughts and Ranking:

I really enjoyed this album way more than Hello, world! Their progress from that album to this one is really astonishing. I really did enjoy this album and I've been listening to it on repeat. With that being said, this was a very hard album to rank it tracks mainly because I really got into it after listening them on repeat. It's a solid album. The first track really gets you pumped for the rest of the album that just blows you away. Most of the tracks are really on the same level as each other but if I had to put them into a list of which I liked the best on the first listen it would be this:

Lunatic

Crack in the mirror

Zzz..

Ghost

X-MAS

Hair Cut

I'm not actually satisfied with this ranking mainly because each song has their own uniqueness that shines thru if your listening for different things.

[gayspock]

i didnt intend to make a post for every ep its just occurring right now

okay so i'll keep this in in one poost soim not spamming a lot but

OKAY. just started the way we werent and im excited about this one. aeryn and pilot is my favourite dynamic BY FAR!!! :D

not 2 mention.... i also do like theyre still bringing up aeryn's background. bc, you know, they did all kinda like... not forget... but they didnt rlly all go through the whole "forgiveness" process fully, either..

and heres the thing. HERES why i was always nervous about aeryn in the beginning, as a character. redemption arcs... god, especially from a current perspective, in particular with respect to modern "fandom culture" (ack!) its like... obviouslyyyy, that whole journey (and i say that so vaguely, i know) in of itself is tenuous- it takes the right balance, and it takes care to really perfect it BUT also its just exacerbated by the recent trends and behaviours... and it makes me itch. sigh.

and im GLAD here, you know, that theyre bringing this up. that chiana herself said- so what did you think she was doing? and im glad. i really am glad theyre bringing it up. bc... she was a soldier in a fascist regime... and she did horrible fucking things. we are now going to ADDRESS that. and i think the mistake - or at least, not the mistake, but the way people interpet - with other characters im thinking of is like... sometimes we never see, or have the shitty things theyve done said explicitly. and its just sort of left... vaguely open to interpetation.

and its like. im literally not trying to bring trek up all the time but sorryy it keeps happening. but again like with freaking- garak, yeah? i dont recall, or if its always left ambiguous, but we dont get a LOT of detail on his role in the occupation but ehrm. he was a fucking agent in the obsidian order - when cardassia occupied bajor. when they attempted genocide, enforced labor camps and slavery and all the repugnant things that occured tangential to that (the comfort women..god). and its like... yeah no... you cant sugarcoat it yeah?

but some ppl- are so WEIRD about it, like try to not address it and just skirt past it when its like... bewildering. because thats part of his fucking character. but they like- again its sugarcoatingggg man, and its so fucking ODD that you'd do that or try to deny it or like. take it out of his character. like between the ways they characterise others - like, ive seen people for REAL fanonise kira to be some weird, anti-cardie bigot who'd say slurs at the poor garak when ... YOU REALISE? SHE WAS IN A LABOR CAMP, YEAH? LIKE- SHE WAS LITERALLY ENSLAVED, and hes not some incidental cardassian but . LITERALLY. WAS A VERY POWERFUL PERSON, HIGH UP IN THE GOVERNMENT. and yeah thatsfine- whatever, you can think whatever of his character- but its so weird when people twist it so that like... they minimise the shit he did, or refuse to really contextualise it.

and again thats no fault of the shows- but its an example of what i mean by like. absolutely bewildering reactions and AGAIN. i think thats a wider conversation- but i mean thats like... part of an ongoing culture right now wrt everything as a whole, but haha.letsnot get into that i'll have a 3am meltdown.

BUT LIKE. what im trying to say here. IM GLAD, HERE, WE LIKE.. WE ARE NOW GETTING THE OPPORTUNITY TO SIT THERE AND ADDRESS THE SHIT AERYN DID.

because like i also said its like...literally its like the whole fucking premise of her character. like garak's was a fundamental part of him its like. YEAH MAN. WE BETTER FUCKING EXPLORE IT.

and also like- i dont know. conversations of redemption/forgiveness- theyre all so messy and im not fucking unspoooling them in a prelude to a farscape thoughts in a tumblr post. LOL. but like- first of all. we have to address them properly if we're going to unpack them. and REALLY address them...

and second of all, you know- not to dredge up other shit... but kinda like. yknow. more generally... THIS HAS JSUTBEEN ON MY MIND LATELY. SORRY THIS IS ALL IN A FUCKING FARAFP0SJ[SGD Titsfine . whos reading this. hi. hello. anyways i dont know- you know its just been irritating me, lately. when you bring something up, something from the past, and someone's like "by GOD why cant you just FORGIVE MOVE ON" and its like respectfully.... forgive but dont forget you know lik.e..

no matter what you do after the fact, when you've done something- especially something fucking. wrong - you've done it forever and its like. i dont know im just frustrated. i think its mostly with respect to fucking messy sloppy ass discourse everywhere but its like. yep. you can do better and be better and it wont define-define you. but like here in aeryns case..... a pilot still fucking died. and her actions have horrible fucking consequences. and it isnt insane to bring that back up, or for her to continuously face appropriate consequences bc of that....

& its always so unfair to like... just tell victims 2 forget sth you know. and to never ever bring it up. when its like respectfully it SHOULD be brought up.... and wrt to whoever "did something wrong" (i say sooo vaguely bc the multitude of crap, man...) i feel like. becoming a better person SHOULD be coping with who you are and what you did rather than freaking burying it. and like- hell, bringing something up... it is not even always a fucking Attack on you as a person, bc its not always about you, but again. with respect to situations wherein ppl are hurt, and there are victims they have every right to express that hurt ......

AND ITS LIKE YES. SOMETIMES it can create a cycle of pain- but to hurt others, and then demand them to be okaywiththat and not give them the fucking time .. .... but god thats getting so far away from everything now but its nott at allll

BC ITS REAAAL HERE LIKEEE . fuck yeah man. all of them were fucking tortured horrifically by peacekeepers. they have a RIGHT to be upset.... & to have the fucking blessings to not have to forgive aeryn and to STEAM instead ....!!! & YAH. forgiveness and allthat- but like godd, here, it would nottttt be their fault at ALLLLL if they did not let aeryn off the hook for some of this shit... i mean that ! [puts my FOOT down] and SOOOOO hsould everyone else in this hip be allowed to steam at fucking half the crap thats occurred...

EVEN WHEN! aeryn HERSELF is unpacking the fucking. horrifying trauma of her own with respect to being a peacekeeper-of what she was forced to do... BC LIKE FOR SURE . SITUATIONSARE SO fucking messy and unfair and complicated and its horrible she went through that but she DID still choose and DID still actively do . terrible fucking things and those two can bethe same and she has to learn to unwind them both herself... AND OMG.........

also this is going 2 be so

ok

i said all that

actual more direct htought about the ep now: i like flashback eps but execution like this can be so clunky lol SORRYY Omg. meaan cruel harsh booooo. SORRY its just the cutting between? ITS FINE! its functional and its worth it for flashback stuff. but ough. sorry its just soooo much better when flashbacks are more organically woven into the script rather than like... characters in the show quite literally calling one up. LOL.

and G-

CRAIS SORRY CRAIS JUST REAPPEARED AGAIN I DIDNT EVEN TOUCH ON HIM UP ABOVE. BUT YEAH. this is also why i fucking wanted him to be off with aeryn in this season because hes such a good fucking parallel

AND THIS IS ALL ASSUMPTION. SORRY IM GOING SOO OFF TOPIC FROM THE EPISODE. heaven knows maybe hes a right lad by the end of the show. but i think- like i said.. such a good parallel. bc he and aeryn could so, so, so brilliantly mirror each other in terms of "redemption" arc, wherein aeryn grows and chooses to be a better person and he moves away from the peacekeepers but still is so terribly self-concerned rather than self-reflective andyehaANYWAYS. SORRY. BACK

HAND ON

HEY TUMBLR. END IT.

BACK TO THE EP AMYBE I

this is such a fucking, SORRYYY TONAL SHIFT but ben browder has the shatner problem where hes like so generic in the face hes both one guy averaged out over so many guys but also all those other guys at once

also god. crichtons little smize at "lovers". COME ON MAN. but i also- thats an angle i didnt expect actually.... whichdoes. yeah shit . thats a whole other fucking angle on this i guess and fc-

OKAY. PILOT AND AERYN CONFRONTATION AND LIKE FOR REAL THAT WHOLE... "ITS HARD FOR BOTH OF US" "IT WASNT ME ON THAT RECORDING" <- so. TRUE is the thing

ALSO THE PILOT FUCKING PUPPET IS SO GOODS RORY I HAVENT SAID IT IN EPISODESSS AND EPISODESSSSSS but it for real is the fucking emotion they manage with it. i cant imagine mannnn

alsonow again ir epeat what i saidlike. i thinkits horrible and i know pilot will forgive her and thats also fine. like i of course wouldnt like. WANT him to rejectthat like- i presume, by the end, he chooses to accept her despite this but god fucking hell like... AGAIN serioussss .... complicit in a bodily violation like that and trauma and ongoing constant pain PILTO. MY FUCKING. BELOVDED

I LVEO PILOT And aeryn... i lvoe EVERYBADY

and as i said i actually i want to also say. im not always a fan of like.... random love interests introduce.d one GREAT example would be alex from that one episode- like she was... utterly pointless. i get they wanted to make her a lover, to parallel what zhaan did, but it just really. eh. it was so nothing

but here its like.. the way her relationship with this peaceekeeper is in of itself. a whole OTHER moral issue- concerning his own, how he is complicit in all of this and abiding, but also criitica and not saying anything AS WELL AS HOW. he's a mirror to crichton asking aeryn to choose differently and YEAH like its bare minimum shit but itslike i love that there is more intention behind that choice than just. random freaking affair

ALSO OKAY SORYR BUTHELP

SAME.PILOT I WILL KILLUS ALL TO. FINE. SURE.

PILTO

SEE FUCKINGCHRIST ALIVE ..........

aeryn and pilot ... best fucking dynamicin this hsow. i'll kill you. i i#

"we've come a long way since then pilot and we've got a long way to go; take the journey with me" SIGTP I TNEWOWW [SCREAMING AND SBBING[

NOBODY LOOK AT ME. I'LL KILL YOU ALL.

OKAYITS SOOO ALTE NOW BUT LIKE GOD. GOD FOR REAL man like- again eveyrhting i said at the beginning wrt aeryn. LITERALLY. ITS IMPORTANT THAT WE FUCKING DO THIS, SWEAR DOWN MAN, bc only rhen can we appreciate the growht and OMG.. GODDDD

shut up...

THE WAY I WAS SOLUKEWARM ON EPS 1,2 AND 3 OF S2 BUT4 AND 5 .... SLAAAYYY!!!!!

okay i catnt wrap this up proper im going to bed its fine . w

[mugiwara--ya]

  💕 💕 + one piece, fma and haikyuu!!

OKAY okay i said i was gonna answer this so i will. i'll start easy.

haikyuu!!: kageyama/hinata, hinata/kenma, kuroo/kenma, yeah im basic like that and also not up to date jsdkjs and as to why. look. theyre just. they. th. yeah. yeah.

aaaand im not into fma sorry!!!

AND AS FOR ONE PIECE. yeah im putting this under a read more bc it turned into a massive hc dump LMAO dont say i didnt warn you

send a  ‘💕 + fandom’ to my ask box and I’ll tell you my favourite couple/ship from the fandom. two 💕💕 and I’ll tell you why

one piece. alright. breathes in. look. i am PHYSICALLY UNABLE to ship monogamous relationships in one piece. i simply cannot. i am poly myself and i live vicariously through them. everyones been with everyone and sometimes, sometimes they go back to each other. the grandline is just one massive polycule. so yeah. that being said!

zosanlawlu. all four of them. every configuration of them has different dynamics and i love every single one of them, theyre complicated theyre stupid theyve been THROUGH it and LOOK i have so many reasons and headcanons but WAY TOO MANY to list here in PUBLIC so im just giving you the bare minimum (he said and failed and also died) (honestly i could probably write a separate post about how i see their relationships specifically if anyones interested, either that or just DM me i love talking about them jaldkfalksdf) (also. here onwards is just. hc dump LOL)

so. so alright. you take these four. put them at the very center of everything. and you let em go wild.

law? marines look in the mirror and tell themselves "do NOT fuck the pirate" and fail every single time. drake? smoker? koby? law's been there. he doesnt give a fuck. dr. heart stealer. probably not even attracted to them he just likes the power trip lol. and besides the marines and various one night stands? penguin and shachi. theyve been his partners for years and anyone who intends to stay as more than a one night stand or friends with benefits or whatever has to go through them first lol (i blame @slashseeker for this i love you and your massive brain), and they accepted the straw hats immediately no matter how much law INSISTED theyre JUST allies

also. headcanon: law and kid fucked at LEAST once and kid will NOT let him forget about it. law insists it will never happen again. it will absolutely happen again.

then.

sanji. i'll keep this short. my favorite bisexual disaster. hopeless romantic. dont get me started on the sanji fanclub bc this post will never end. i WILL mention acesan because come on, ace was sanjis biwakening, you know that i know that we all know that.

oh and pedro. sweet beautiful pedro. sanji you fucking furry. moving on!

zoro....zoro. he's easy but he'll never take it further. he rarely spends the night and if he does he's out of there first thing in the morning. he's simply not interested. he has his hands full with his captain and the cook...and law, well, law was an easy addition to their lives once luffy Assimilated him into them. things just HAPPENED on that submarine on the way to wano and that was that. (also, if they want to share him with their lovers, well, he's not about to complain lol)

and lastly. luffy. luffy has everyone wrapped around his finger. he knows this. yet at the same time hes absolutely clueless as to what hes ACTUALLY doing. like one day usopp will tell him "how do YOU OF ALL PEOPLE manage to keep this many boyfriends at the same time wtf" and luffy will go. what the hell are you talking about. then usopp will explain it to him. and luffy will say "ohhhh i get it. wait so then youre my boyfriend too? haha nice :)". usopp has yet to recover.

and look. look ive talked way too much already and i could keep going and going about luffy specifically but. luffy loves in a way thats simply unique to him. and hes selfish! he'll take and take and take but he always knows exactly what to give to his people, often even better than what they themselves know they need.

A N Y W A Y this got WAY OUT OF HAND as i knew it would and i didnt even talk about the specifics of their relationships LMFAO so uh. yeah. take this. take this and never speak of it again (unless...)

ty for the ask djflkjsdlkfjs

[hauntedzone]

man fatphobia in tma fandom... i hated how none of the other characters were ever drawn as fat. no one else just the soft uwu squishy bean (how fandom characterized martin actually made me hate him by the 3rd season lol) which is like... i made me So Uncomfortable as a fat person. and the way jon was portrayed as unhealthy skinny got like.. borderline fetishy at times especially in fic and like. its hard for me to blame this on other people and i wouldnt want anyone who wrote him like this to see this ask and feel bad but the constant waxing poetic abt like his thin wrists and exposed ribcage and whatnot was genuinely super upsetting to me and really effected my body image especially because the only fat character they ever thought to write was like... idk how to describe it really but like there was a very clear disparity in the way they were described and meant to be related to by the reader u know?

also straighttma my beloathed... they had this like disgustingly fatphobic post about flesh avatars (cw for extreme fatphobia but if u just search for "straighttma fatphobia" in the search bar it should be the first thing). i understand its a parody blog but some of the posts and that post in particular especially was just legitimately upsetting. especially since it was anon submitted and i have no way of knowing if thats coming from a thin person or not... and in general i dont really find an expicitly bigoted version of a show particularly funny. like ive definitely made and enjoyed jokes about like characters being cishet reddit bros or whatever which i think comes with an implication of bigotry but... idk i just didnt like it

my response gets long so readmore time. i posted under some tags for bl, if youre in one of these tags and see this id prefer no reblogs on this

i never really got into fanfiction in general aside from reading maybe one or two on sparse occasion, so i cant lie and say ive experienced similar to you, but based on the art ive seen during my time liking the podcast, those descs of martin & jon do check out. (aside from that one artist with tall & fat jon, that was cool.) im sorry youve experienced that, i know one of the reasons people participate in fandom is to find belonging and seeing someone portray people like you in an unempathetic way in that setting must have been incredibly hurtful. i think its important for any media creator to understand that when they write diverse body types, sexuality, race... etc, that their intention shouldnt be to score diversity points, but to communicate to readers that arent cishet white thin abled (etc) that your artwork is also for these people

also god i forgot about straighttma... i couldnt find the post you were looking for bc tumblrs search is busted as hell. i think straighttma was kind of funny as like a 1-post idea maybe but as an entire blog idk, especially since the whole show was ALREADY full of shit youd expect from a white british guy. its sort of like, oh heres a way to sort of imagine awful people in a joking context (and i feel like white people are often looking for a reason to make racist jokes anyway), and also simultaneously makes the indirect statement of "arent we so grateful that the show and creators ARENT like that? arent we glad to get good representation?" even though the show and representation sucks ass honestly. its like the opposite of media criticism

i know i keep going back to this point and i absolutely dont intend to direct attention away from what youre saying bc youre 100% correct, but it feels like the fandom would have done everything in their power to kiss jonny sims pasty ass and defend him to the death. and it was incredibly stupid.

[bigskydreaming]

Making this its own post because replying to the ask got so weirdly formatted I can’t even. Oh tumblr. You work so well.

@themessofthecentury  asked:

jsksjf my tumblr notifs are bugging and i didnt see your post but!!! The patron Saint of Robins?? I am much intrigue!!

(This is from this ask game, just....gotten to late, lololol. And I still have more I’m getting to, no worries. Just had a rough couple days is all, laid me up a bit.)

Okay, so The Patron Saint of Robins is kinda like the situation at the end of Grayson, except also not at all. And actually this is one of my older WIPs, and according to Scrivener I started it in 2015 afhislfhalhfalf, so it really has nothing to do with that. Also, its Young Justice-verse, but for two specific reasons:

1) YJ-verse is my go-to for Good Dad Bruce Wayne, when I don’t want to actually tackle the issues I have with his and his kids’ dynamic in comic book canon. I don’t carry over things like the adoption issue or the Robin succession into YJ fics, as I don’t think there’s anything that suggests they’re ever a specific issue in YJ and I don’t feel a need to make them one. So pretty much anything and everything I write in YJ goes with the backstory that Dick’s already adopted by Season One, and he’s the one to grant each later Robin permission to use the mantle, with no conflict over that, and more of a pre-Crisis transition to Nightwing than the post-Crisis firing from Robin. And this fic inherently needs Good Dad Bruce Wayne to work, lol.

2) I needed Klarion the Witch-Boy. Who of course exists in comic book canon, but is muuuuuch different there, and I just needed him to be a little demonic evil shithead, who sets everything in motion to get payback on the heroes for thwarting the Light in Season One, and he targets Robin due to being the oft-cited ‘first of the baby brat heroes’ and the ‘heart of the cape community.’

You don’t really need to be familiar with YJ canon at all for this one, as it goes sharply AU from after Season One, and only faintly and vaguely references specific events from that season. And I use my own YJ-ized version of the Titans as much as the actual YJ Team.

So basically, the plot of this one is to take revenge on the heroes for spoiling his game in Season One, Klarion plays a new game, by putting a chaos curse on Robin. It essentially erases him from peoples’ memories, though he’s perfectly able to make new ones. If he re-introduces himself to someone ask Dick Grayson, for instance, they don’t suddenly remember who Dick Grayson is or was, but they don’t forget about him again from that point onward, its like they meet him for the first time as a stranger.

But the curse part of things is only Batman can break it and restore everyone’s memories of Dick and his actual history, and only by identifying him for who he really is. And Dick can’t be part of breaking his own curse or else it seals it and makes it permanent and unbreakable forever.

Which of course leaves Dick completely miserable at first, understandably, and Bruce (and everyone else Dick knows, to varying different degrees) feeling some kind of loss but with no idea what it is they think or feel that they’re missing. Dick makes some half-hearted attempts at starting a new life for himself in Gotham, and in the process befriends a street kid named Jason Todd, though Dick introduces himself to Jason with just the name Robin.

The way the curse operates is it restitches together peoples’ memories to cover up the gaps where memories of him would go. So for instance, even though Jason never knew Dick before the curse, he was familiar with Batman and Robin just as much as any Gothammite was.....but due to the curse, the name Robin, upon meeting Dick, had no special meaning to him or anyone else. As far as he knew, Batman had always operated on his own in Gotham, the first teen superhero was that Speedy kid in Star City, etc. So when Jason first meets Dick, he just thinks he’s some dude whose name happens to be Robin.

Eventually, because Dick’s been kinda torturing himself by spying on Bruce just to ‘keep an eye on him’ and still watch his back, and he’s recognized by now that Bruce is mourning his loss without even knowing that he’s missing something....so Dick, who has also kinda come to see Jason as a little brother figure due to watching out for him as well....decides to kill two birds with one stone, unfortunate pun not intended. (Jason doesn’t die in this one, lol). Basically, Dick puts in motion the chain of events that lead Jason to stealing Batman’s tires, because he doesn’t know EXACTLY what Bruce will do but he knows it’ll get his attention in a big way and Bruce will take it from there.

One thing leads to another, Jason ends up living with Bruce and when eventually he wants to be trained by Bruce so he can do what he does and protect kids like he used to be.....when asked to pick a name....Jason names himself after the guy who always looked out for him, and who led to him being found by Bruce in the first place. He doesn’t know that his friend ‘Robin’ steered him towards those tires deliberately, just to bring him and Bruce into contact, but he does credit him with making the suggestion that ‘inadvertently’ (as far as he knows) enabled his and Bruce’s introduction, and so he names himself in honor of the boy who helped him and who he tried to track down again to similarly help, after Bruce adopted him, but was never able to find again.

Over the years, Dick also ends up steering Tim, Cass, Duke and Damian to Bruce in different ways than comic book canon (Steph and Babs’ debuts remain their own, as family adjacent but not family specifically) and thus is integral to the forming of the Batfam and has a connection with them even before the curse ultimately ends up broken and he’s able to reclaim his full identity. And each of them end up Robin at least briefly, like Steph is never Robin in this AU, and sticks with Spoiler, whereas Cass IS briefly Robin before becoming Batgirl after Babs. I did this for a few different reasons...

One, I really like that Cass is never Robin in main continuity as it creates a different dynamic between her and Dick than most of their siblings have, BUT I’ve always been curious to play around what Cass-as-Robin might even be like, just for an AU. Two, part of the Black Bat and Batgirl but never Robin sequence of mantles for Cass in the comic book continuity is like.....although it doesn’t get explored nearly enough, Babs was as much a kind of mother figure for Cass as Bruce was a father figure, despite Babs’ young age. So it makes more sense for Cass to stick more to just Bat-mantles than to ever be a Robin in the comic books. But in YJ, Babs is even younger, and just way too young to have the specific kind of dynamic that leads to that in the comic books, so its not as unreasonable IMO for her to have a different dynamic in her early days in the family here, before becoming closer with Babs and taking up the Batgirl mantle after she moves on to become Oracle.

And then also, and this is also the primary reason for making Duke a Robin briefly, before Damian is old enough....I got hung up on the title and it just didn’t work as well if it was Robins + Cass and Duke, lololol. See, in addition to helping steer the family into the points of introduction that make them a family, over the years he also acts as like, a guardian angel figure to the various family members, looking out for them and interceding in times of extreme danger, like when Jason is almost killed by the Joker. He’s always in disguise, but the kids eventually compare notes and realize there’s a singular figure behind each of their introductions to Bruce and the guy swooping out of nowhere to save their behinds whenever they’re most in danger, and Jason eventually connects this back to the guy who apparently NOT so coincidentally suggested he go after the Batmobile’s tires that fateful night, and the kids end up jokingly/not-so-jokingly referring to this figure as the Patron Saint of Robins. (Shout-out to the occasional mentions/allusions of Jason’s Catholicism).

They never tell Bruce about this figure (at least before Bruce starts to put together clues on his own), because they all figured out that for whatever reason, this person despite wanting them all to meet Bruce seems to want to avoid Bruce himself, and they kinda want to respect that as a kind of payback for his help, and also like....Bruce, even a kinder, gentler Bruce, is still Bruce. And when Bruce is gonna Bruce, that means Batparanoia. And all of them for various reasons DO trust that this guy has nothing but good intentions towards them, and so they don’t want to like....ruin or tarnish the positivity they associate with his intercession in their lives with paranoia or treating him like a bad guy. Which ultimately is really just smoke and mirrors for saying that he’s kinda a ‘just for them’ secret. Its a Robin thing.

(Until its not).

Because meanwhile, Dick, in between meeting the various Batfam members and pulling strings and looking out for them from the shadows, at first travels the world looking for ways to break his curse. But when ultimately its clear that the only way to break it is the loophole built into it already, Bruce identifying him for who he really is, but without Dick doing anything to steer him towards the answer, Dick settles into a new hero identity as Nightwing, and forms the Teen Titans, a public group of young superheroes (minus Roy and Wally, unfortunately, but still with Donna, Garth, Raven, Kory, ignoring season 3 Vic and also Terra because AU redemption arc what what, etc). And the Teen Titans avoid both the Young Justice Team and the Justlce League with EXTREME measures, much to the other heroes’ confusion and aggravation, because in the early days of the Titans, in a moment of what he’d term weakness, on one of his ‘bad days,’ Dick tells them enough of his story that they’re able to put together a good sense of what happened and who he really is by reading between the lines and what he leaves unsaid....

BUT as a result, all end up extremely committed to not mixing and mingling casually with the rest of the cape community because they don’t want to risk dropping any hints about the guy under Nightwing’s mask, in case that might count as steering Batman towards clues and seal the curse for good. So I have a lot of fun with having the Titans just nope out of the scene the second the bad guys are defeated even when they have to team up with other heroes, leaving the other heroes confused as hell and trying not to be all ‘WHY DON’T YOU LIKE US??”

Anyway, so yeah, that’s the gist of this one, lol. With it of course following the eventual plot that like...the Batfam starts to Detect and put things together.

ANYWHO!

Snippet

Damian versus Klarion: Round One

“Aww, its adorable that you think you’re in my league,” the Witch-Boy cooed in an absolute mockery of sympathy. Damian bristled, but before he could do anything more than that, he was faced with a much more pressing matter as reality completely lost its mind.

The walls of the cavern fell away in an instant, only to be replaced with a whirling dervish of winds all around them, as if they now stood in the center of a cyclone that bled red and silver and black. It shrieked and wailed in a chorus of voices just on the other side of being comprehensible, a symphony of the damned that set every nerve in Damian’s body aflame with a primal instinct to get out, to find silence, to be anywhere but here.

He’d barely staggered a step backwards when the ground erupted beneath him, splitting apart into jagged obsidian shards that bobbed precariously in the sea of magma barely glimpsed through cracks now spiderwebbing their way across the floor. Spears of lightning burst upwards through them, stabbing impossibly at the heavens rather than raining down from them. They hissed and crackled as they flickered like forked serpent tongues of electric violet and black. The forks becoming branches, the pillars of sky-shattering light transforming into the trunks of great trees that grew upwards and outward, weaving a canopy overhead. One that wept violently red leaves that fell gently to the ground, only to hiss and bubble like acid once they did.

“See, normally this is when I’d hit someone with a little razzle-dazzle like this,” Klarion called out over the song of madness he’d created, as it crooned and careened wildly all around them. He snapped his fingers, and in the span of a second it all ceased. Reality reaffirmed itself, and all was right with the world once more…except now the two of them stood at the end of a hallway in Wayne Manor.

Damian stumbled, the sudden reappearance of firm ground paradoxically being the thing to challenge his balance. The demon boy standing beside him crooked his thumb and forefinger in the semblance of a gun, the smile pasted across his face one of wickedly gleeful malice.

“But you, kiddo, you’re special. Cuz there’s nothing I could do to you now that could top what I’ve already done, so why try when I can just savor the moment instead?”

“What are you babbling about?” Damian demanded roughly. In the wake of what the Witch-Boy had just conjured up with nothing more than a gesture, he was keenly aware of how flimsy a shield his bravado made. He just had absolutely no idea what else to fall back on.

Klarion only threw back his head and laughed though, skipping merrily down the hall as he did.

“I know something you don’t know,” he sing-songed and Damian lost what little grasp of his patience he’d managed to hang onto.

“You overestimate my need for an answer. Attempt to intimidate me all you wish, but I have no desire to indulge your little game any further.”

Klarion jerked to a stop and spun around, his face screwed into a childish pout. He stomped his foot, petulance personified. “I’m not intimidating you anymore, I’m gloating! Ugh, you’re so stupid! They’re completely different, how can you not tell?”

Every light in the hallway flickered and fizzed abruptly. The walls wavered, bubbled, momentarily molten as if made of wax.

Again Damian was reminded just how mercurial this being he was faced with was, and how dangerous. Perhaps, as Father would say, this was not the time to indulge his own instinctive inclinations. Or as Todd would put it, just because you’re already fucked, that’s no reason to fuck yourself over more than you have to.

Crude as his older brother was, there was occasional merit to his…pithiness. Not that he would be admitting that any time soon, of course.

“Fine. What is it you wish to gloat about then?” Damian grated out. The appeasement, such as it was, tried its best to stick in his throat before finally clawing its way free. But at least it proved worth the effort when the godling’s mood reverted back to impishness as readily as with the flip of a switch.

“Well. Its like this, you see.” Klarion said. He dragged it out as he folded both legs underneath him to sit cross-legged in the air, plopping his head into his hands. “I did a baaaaaaaaaaaaad, bad thing to your family, a loooooong time ago. And none of you have done anything about it, because you don’t even know! Isn’t that funny? Doesn’t matter how big a hero Daddy Bats is if he doesn’t even know what needs saving huh? Little Catch-22 there, you might say.”

“Yes. Quite hysterical,” Damian said dryly. “So what is it you claim to have done then?”

The Witch-Boy just sat there, regarding him with amusement, and the seconds marched on into minutes. Damian’s skin crawled. Prickling with impatience and possibly something…more. He wasn’t quite ready to name it anxiety or something as melodramatic as all that yet. In fact, he’d rather not put a name to it at all, but today did not appear to be a day for configuring things to his liking.  

Klarion’s wicked grin grew as if sensing his thoughts, though to the best of his knowledge (and Damian did quickly ransack the library of his memory just to be sure) there was no indication telepathy was included among the Chaos Lord’s many, many powers. And still that detestable smile stretched slowly wider all the same, in perfect synchronization with the rising tide of Damian’s unease. Perhaps the Witch-Boy’s file was in need of annotation.

“How many doors would you say are in this hallway?”

“What? Seven.” Damian snapped out his answer, annoyed by the non sequitur. Not to mention baffled. Was it too much to expect even a semblance of linear thought from the Chaos brat?

“Are you suuuuuuure?” The Witch-Boy stretched his query out obnoxiously. “Maybe you should count again. Just for kicks and giggles.”

Damian throttled back each and every retort attempting to spring to his lips, stuffing them back down and cramming a lid on everything he most dearly wished to say to this most vexing of…shitheads. Once again, it appeared as though nothing less than Todd’s preferred form of nomenclature would suffice. Wonderful. On top of everything else Damian had to deal with today, he seemed to be finding common ground with the man all over the place. Was there no end to the indignities he must suffer?

But marshaling his own formidable willpower, Damian took a deep breath and indulged the Chaos Lord, glancing his eyes down the length of the hallway and counting out each doorway one by one. There was his own room of course, with Cassandra’s to the right of his, and the room Brown used when staying over to the right of hers. That was three. Then there was Thomas directly across from his own room, with Drake to his right and Todd just beyond that, with Father’s room at the very end of the hall, his master suite staggered and with no direct opposite like the others. Seven.

Except all of a sudden there was a door directly opposite his father’s. For a total of eight.

Damian’s brow furrowed in consternation. The faint whispers of uncertainty already seeded throughout him bore fruit, ripening into poisonous stabbings of doubt.

“That’s not real,” he stated with as much conviction as he could muster.

The Witch-Boy’s smile only grew wider still. “Isn’t it, though?”

“There’s never been a door there before,” Damian persisted, striding confidently down the hall towards it. The Chaos Lord flitted ahead of him, inverting til he was upside down and skipping merrily once more, though this time from the ceiling.

“Or has it been there all along?” He sing-songed some more.

“I would think we might have noticed if it had been,” Damian growled.

“Yes, you’d think, wouldn’t you? You are all supposed to be a family of detectives, I thought. Makes you wonder…if you could miss this, what else might you have failed to notice?”

Damian snarled to himself and did his best to shut out the demon boy’s prattling. He quickened his strides, eating up the length of the hallway in his haste to reach its end. He wasn’t sure what opening the door would prove, let alone what bewilderment the godling had conjured on its other side, but it appeared the only end to this game of his was through it, so let there be an end to it already.

And yet, for all his certainty - or best facsimile of it - he couldn’t help but pause once he reached the door in question. His hand hovered within reach of its brass knob, but some instinct, some…caution, held him at bay. As much as he wanted to dismiss all this as just one more of the Chaos Lord’s inane charades, there was a tension in the air that felt too weighty to be the product of just magical conjuring. Something more was in play here. Real forces were at work. His father might disdain magic, but Damian had been around enough of it himself to know when true power had been raised. And the span of empty space between his hand and this hither-to-unseen doorknob held more of it than Damian had felt throughout all the mad warpings Klarion had made of reality thus far.

“Are you sure you want to do that?” Klarion asked from somewhere overhead. His voice, usually pitched to carry, was so soft for a moment Damian mistook it for his own inner doubts. “Some doors are easier to open than to close again, you know.”

Even knowing the goading for what it was couldn’t stop Damian then, and with a simple breath to fortify himself, he reached for the knob, spun it once, and shoved the door open all in a single sharp movement.

The Witch-Boy giggled up above.

The door swung wide, a forceful arc that should have revealed anything and everything within it all at once; the better to react quickly to whatever that might be. Fine in principle, perfect in execution, but thwarted by one small detail:

There was nothing on the other side.

And not in the sense of it being just an empty room, but true nothingness. A pitch-black abyss darker than the deepest night, yawning forth from the doorway in a vast, impenetrable shroud. Nor was anything hidden in the darkness, Damian knew, even if just intuitively. He could feel it, that he stood on the edge of an impossible cliff, that there was nothing beyond this threshold but an aching chasm of emptiness and loss. The surety of it hung in the air, thick and heavy, a miasma that seeped through to his side of the doorway and clung to him like the moisture of a fog beads upon the skin.

Klarion’s head suddenly popped up alongside him, hovering just over his shoulder.

Albeit still upside down.

“Well that doesn’t seem right,” he mused, tapping at his lips with a forefinger. “What do you suppose is meant to be in there?”

The last of Damian’s brittle patience shattered.

“Enough! What is the meaning of all this, demon? Speak plainly, for once in your miserable existence!”

His self-preservation instincts and the reminder of just who it was he was shouting at kicked in too little too late, but he wouldn’t take his exasperated fury back even if he could. He was who he was after all. But fortunately, that described the Witch-Boy just as accurately, and rather take offense or perceive any actual threat from Damian’s rage, the Chaos Lord just shrieked with laughter and sprung backwards. He flipped right side up, still hovering in mid-air, and clapped his hands with glee.

“Oh, I should have done this ages ago,” Klarion sang out. “Why, you’re almost as fun as he used to be. Back before he got all droll and serious, that is. He’s no fun at all anymore, nothing like this. Never wants to play, always just running back to his tower with that little bitch of a demoness.”

His face soured like he’d just sucked on a lemon. But rather than stop there, his countenance kept morphing into an increasingly savage scowl, the longer he ranted. The hallway was suddenly sweltering, baking with unseen heat that twisted the air into shimmering ribbons. The small horns sprouting from his forehead burst into scimitars of flame that cut through those ribbons and set them similarly ablaze.

“Always putting on airs like she’s some kind of royalty, just because her Daddy Dearest put the fear into a few peasants back in the day,” the Witch-Boy snarled viciously. “As if that’s enough to put her on par with the likes of me. No one is the likes of me. NO ONE!”

Reality itself quaked with the force of his shout. White-blue flames spat forth and crescendoed down the length of the corridor, splashing against its walls and searing them to a crisp. Damian braced himself for all the good it would do, keenly aware of the void still gaping hungrily behind his back, but before the fire could become an actual danger to him as well, all was quiet once more.

Silence hung in the air much like the demon boy, poised yet motionless. Suspended. Waiting.

And then Klarion simply inhaled and brushed his hands down the front of his garments, smoothing out the wrinkles as he reclaimed his calm. The corridor restored itself to its former self, curtains of vintage reality unrolling from the ceiling to the floor as though papering over the damage. Damian felt rather than saw when the portal behind him swung shut and was replaced with the expanse of ivory paint and ornate sconces he was used to seeing in its place.

“I am one of a kind, after all,” Klarion finally remarked. It was a casual drawl offered forth almost off-handedly, as if more a reminder to himself than uttered for anyone else’s sake. He used one hand to spell out letters in the air. They appeared and vanished again in bursts of fireworks and fluorescent flame. “U-N-I-Q-U-E.”

“As I, apparently, am not,” Damian said, seizing upon the Chaos Lord’s restored calm and good cheer. “Who is this ‘he’ you mentioned? If I’m to be pitted against him as entertainment in your eyes, might I at least know his name?”

“Nuh-uh-uh,” the Witch-Boy scolded. He wagged his finger at Damian. “No spoilers. That’s not how the game is played.”

Keenly aware of the boy’s power once more, Damian gritted his teeth and pressed on. “Well, if there are to be rules, shouldn’t I at least know what those are?”

Klarion sucked in a deep breath, drawing himself up along with his inhalation as though preparing for some great speech…and instead just toppling backward, flopping onto an extravagant fainting couch that suddenly appeared beneath him, though similarly floating in the air.

“I can’t recall at the moment.” His now-faint voice drifted up from where he lay buried amid a mountain of pillows. “I’ve had a terribly exhausting day. But you’re supposed to be a detective, remember? Go…I don’t know. Detect things.”

He flapped an arm at Damian dismissively, and then crooked a finger into a twirling motion that set his divan to spinning in lazy circles.

“Isn’t life grand?” Klarion sighed fondly. “With all its twists and turns, its eddies and swirls. I mean, take the two of us. Scant hours ago, we were mortal enemies, and just look at us now.”

The Witch-Boy lazily rolled his head to the side as the couch drifted to bring him face-to-face with Damian. His lips spread wide in that malevolent, wicked grin of his once again, but somehow it managed to be even wider than any he’d shown off before. His eyes blazed with a hellish inner light, and his voice, when next he spoke, dropped deep into a demonic register. A bass that boomed forth and set Damian’s very bones to rattling.

“Ain’t we got fun?”