#i have a whole post about how they both think of themselves as having an older-sibling role

[reven1c]

A Little Death

Professor!Lee Byung Hun x Student!Reader

Summary: He wants you but is afraid for his reputation. Warnings: 18+ (minors do not interact), oral (male receiving), age gap (reader is 20, byung hun in his 40s), kinda a sad ending

A/N: I know it’s my 2nd post and i’m already writing a sad one but oh well who cares :3

——————————————————————————

You were a simple student trying to get through the classes of getting a degree in Psychology. You always loved psychology since you were 13 years old and always wanted to help people feel better about themselves or figure out something that bothered them. Until you joined college and realised that Psychology is a difficult subject, but no matter what that’s what you wanted to study.

For a weird reason in Psychology there is a subject called statistics that has to do with maths which you always hated, until your 3rd year in college, when the new professor who joined is a hot, charismatic, intelligent and a kinda cute man.

Since your first lesson with him, you have a crush on him. You always try and look at him in class, when you go home you always think of him, and those thoughts turn into dirty thoughts and many more. Your friend always teases you about it but you turn down the fact on having a crush on your professor.

Byung Hun noticed you since the first day he joined this college and he was the one who chose to teach your class. When he has the chance he tries to catch a glimpse of your beautiful face which he finds adorable. He always calls up on you, when you raise your hand, to answer his question so he can hear your voice.

One day you thought of approaching him, so when the class ended you walked towards his desk “Hi Mr Byung Hun”

“Oh hello, Y/N. Did something happen?” he asks a bit confused since no one would come up to his desk, all the students would quickly leave the class to go to their homes.

You chuckle “Oh no no everything is fine. I just don’t understand a unit and came here to ask you if you could help me” you say while smiling

Byung Hun stunned says “Of course of course what is it?”

You explain to him the unit you don’t understand and what exactly troubles you.

“Okay come here so i can explain it to you”

You stand next to him while your heart starts beating faster by the fact that you are standing so close to him. You lean a bit forward, closer to his face and he starts explaining to you.

Through the time he was explaining you weren’t even hearing him, you were observing his face and his facial futures. His beautiful eyes, his lips… especially his lips that you want to kiss so bad.

“Do you understand?” he turns his head towards you, his question waking you up from your dream.

“Uh yeah yeah now i understand” you throw a smile anxiously

You both freeze when you realise how close your faces are.

Byung Hun looks at your lips and back to your eyes “Okay Y/N if you have any other questions you can always come to me. Now you can leave” he says nervously.

You look into his eyes a couple seconds more and stand up “Uh thank you Mr Byung Hun. Have a good day” you turn and leave the class while your heart is ready to leave your chest by how fast is beating.

—

For a whole week there was a tension between the two of you. When you would leave his class, he would throw a smile at you and you always return it.

While Byung Hun was teaching, you and your friend were laughing which made him a bit angry “Y/L/N (your last name) will stay after class”

You freeze “But i didn’t do anything”

“I don’t care” and he returns to his lesson

After class ended you walked up to his desk “So what do i have to do?”

“Do some exercises on the unit you didn’t understand” he smiles sarcastically

“Oh okay” you say stunned cause you clearly didn’t understand that unit, even though he explained it to you, since you chose to day dream. You bring a chair to his desk, sit and try to do the exercises.

Byung Hun notices you struggling and chuckles “You didn’t actually understand when i explained it to you, did you?” he smirks

You look up to him and side smile “Uh well no” you shrug

He comes a bit closer to your face “And why is that?”

You freeze not knowing what to say.

“What? Cat got your tongue?” he chuckles

You look into his eyes and he smirks “Come here” he motions to his lap. Your eyes widen “Don’t be scared.” he chuckles and you stand up and sit on his lap.

He looks at you and observes your face. He pushes a strand of your hair behind your ear “Where you day dreaming about your professor?” he smirks.

You gulp and keep your mouth shut. Byung Hun laughs “Why are you not answering? You know girls who don’t answer to me, get punished” he smirks.

Your heart keeps getting faster and realise that you are getting wet by your professor.

“Will you answer me?” he says while he brought his hand behind my neck. You nod your head as an answer.

“Use your words, dear” he presses a bit on your neck “Y-yes i was day dreaming about you” you breath out air that you have been holding for a while now.

“Attagirl” he smiles “And what exactly were you day dreaming?” he looks deep into your eyes waiting for an answer.

You mumble and lower your head, not wanting him to hear cause you are kinda embarrassed. “I didn’t hear you, doll. Speak louder” he caps your chin to make you look at him “I was having dirty thoughts of you” your face getting red.

Byung Hun smirks with your truth “You were having dirty thoughts about me, your professor?” he says while caressing your arms making you get goosebumps.

“I know that’s fucked up-“ he shuts you up with a kiss. You freeze for a second and then kiss him back “It’s not fucked up, okay? More fucked up is me having those kinda thoughts about you”

You look at him stunned “You did?”, he nods, “Then i guess that’s more fucked up” and you both laugh.

“Since the moment i stepped on this college and saw you” he starts kissing your neck “I have been having these thoughts” he continues by leaving little bites behind and a whimper slips from your lips “Thinking about your face, your body, you” he smiles.

You smirk and kiss him. You caught him off guard which he just laughed off. The kiss was so passionate that made you melt. You break the kiss and slowly get off his lap and fall to your knees.

Byung Hun freezes “What are you doing?”

“I want to please my professor. Can’t i?” you smirk

He caresses your cheek with his thumb “Hmm i wouldn’t mind”

You smile and while looking at him you unzip his pants and slip a bit off his underwear. Your lips leave a lil gasp and he chuckles. You bring your hand to his dick and slowly stroke it. Byung Hun moans. You feel yourself getting more and more wet.

Without a second passing you take his dick into your mouth and at first you slowly go up and down making him moan “Oh just like that doll” and with him saying that, it made you moan on his dick.

You start going faster making Byung Hun groan and he brings his hand to grap your hair. Tears stream down your face.

“Your pretty face getting fucked looks so good. Keep going” you continue going up and down when suddenly Byung Hun stops you, having his dick down on your throat trying not to gag. You moan and he feels himself getting closer “I think i’m close”

Byung Hun fucks your face trying to get closer to his climax “Oh god Y/N you are taking my dick so good”

You let him do whatever he wants with your head and the only thing you can do is moan on his dick.

He lets a loud moan and he cums in your mouth “Ah yes” He takes your head off his dick “You better swallow it”

You swallow his cum and open your mouth to show him.

“That’s my good girl” he praises and wipes your tears off your face “I hope i didn’t hurt you” he looks at you in awe

“No Im okay don’t worry” you smile and stand up “I guess i have to go home now” you kiss him

Byung Hun groans “Okay”. You turn and look at him for the last time and leave the classroom.

—

Byung Hun since yesterday, the only thing he had in his mind was you. How good you looked getting face fucked. But in the back of his mind he thought that it was a bad idea.

On the other hand you were the happiest person. You couldn’t sleep because you were only thinking about him.

You went to college, entered the classroom and sit next to your friend with a smile on your face “Whose dick did you sucked?” she asks and you hit her while laughing.

Byung Hun enters the classroom without books “Today’s lesson won’t happen. Everyone you can go home”. When he finished talking the whole class cheered and quickly left the class. You, though, stayed behind to see him.

“Hi” you say happily

“Hello” he says without any emotion

You look at him confused “Byung Hun is everything okay?” you walk closer to him.

“No it’s not” he spits “What happened yesterday should be forgotten. This between us must stop”

You freeze when you see him getting angry and saying those things “W- What? Why?” you try not to cry.

“We shouldn’t have done what we did yesterday. It’s literally fucked up. Everything is fucked up” he walks closer to you raising his voice “If anyone learns what happened i can lose my job or even they can kick you out of this school” he stops in front of your face.

You look into his eyes with your eyes wide when a tear slips on your cheek.

Byung Hun groans “Don’t even try and cry in front of me”

“I will do whatever i want” you get angry “Then why did you let me suck your dick if we came to this point huh? WHY?!” You start crying “You should have stopped me- or no, I should have stopped myself” you back up slowly “I am so dumb for falling for you”

He walks towards you “No Y/N”. You raise a brow “No what now? You are gonna tell me you weren’t thinking right? That you are scared? That you are a pussy?” you laugh sarcastically “Oh my god i’m so dumb”

Byung Hun looks at you with pity since you caught him; that’s what he wanted to tell you but he brought it to this point “I’m sorry”

“No no i don’t want to hear it” you get your bag and turn to him for the last time “I don’t want to see you again” and turn to leave the class.

He watches you leave without stopping you.

[penguinmerchant]

"Pet" Binding (with a twist)

This binding is a little different than what I've done so far! This is "Pet" by C.S.Pacat, but with notes from @lucky-clover-gazette. The notes on this read along were SO funny and I knew I wanted to feature them in a bound work, but they wouldn't really make sense without the context of the original work. And so I mushed both the original work and the notes together!

So the idea here was to make it look like a composition notebook, complete with stickers on the front and (as we'll soon see...) drawings and scrawled notes on the inside. "Sam Reads CaPri" is the tag that Lucky Clover uses for her read along notes, and so I used it here just to make it clear this wasn't just the canon work. I used black and silver marbled paper to complete the look of the composition notebook, and more direct-to-film transfers for the "stickers" on the cover. I think it turned out fantastically!

More pics and a LOT of notes under the cut.

So I thought this was a really interesting project because I wanted to use the original work but add to it. I...acquired a PDF of Pet (let me have this one, I bought 2 official english copies of the short stories AND a Polish one I can't even read!) and messed with the margins a bit to make more room for Lucky Clover's notes. Here's what it looks like inside.

This whole thing was done in Libre Office, by the way. I'm sure there's a better program out there that would have done this WAY easier but I didn't want to have to learn how to use Adobe (or pay for it, honestly). But so the little notes are added with textboxes and placed next to their respective quotes, and the quotes themselves are highlighted with highlighters used for bibles, which is apparently a whole subset of office supplies I never knew about! I needed those highlighters specifically because I wanted to have archival color (no idea if regular highlighters are, these are just the only things that came up from a quick search) AND they're really good because they are made not to bleed through really thin bible paper. So on regular paper you can barely see them through the other side at all. They're great! Thanks bible highlighters, I know you thought you would be used for more holy purposes but really there's no better writer than Pacat, so you're in good hands!

So the other problem was that some of the notes were too long to shove into the margins, even after I had made them bigger than normal. That meant post-it notes! Now these aren't actual post-it notes, obviously (I can't imagine how terrible it would be to line those up in the printer) but I used colored printer paper and cut them to size, and it worked out. I used a bit of glue to get them down, and made it so that all of them fold away from the text so that everything is still readable. And then I made some of them poke out the top and sides, because I liked the way it looked.

There are little doodles throughout, some of which I colored in with a highlighter, and I the first word in each section is in a scribbly font, which I thought was funny. All of the notes are likewise in a handwritten font (Amanda Rose) and slightly rotated so that they're not in line with the text.

I also did not trim any of the sides of this textblock, so it's kind of uneven (deckled edges are common on the long side of the textblock, not so much on the top and bottom) but I kind of needed all the space. No endbands in this one either, I wanted to keep it more notebooky and the uneven pages meant it would have been impossible to do anyway. Everything else was bound normally, so aside from the two thousand years it took me to typeset this it was a pretty easy bind.

Oh, and last but not least, the endpapers:

Plain brown butcher paper, in honor of Berenger.

[420technoblazeit]

so interesting 2 me how the spin of mels canon voicelines abt viktor casts her as being disappointed in him post-herald moment. narrative parallel to viktor being disappointed in mel about how she is handling her power in ur fic. to me. they both saw someone they thought was completely admirable and idolized them (without looking beyond their mask) and both feel let down by the others insatiable humanity ♡ (their lack of compassion for each other at their lowest moments despite their overflowing compassion for most others reads to me as seeing themselves in each other and externalizing their self-hatred. btw)

AH I FORGOT TO ANSWER THIS ASK ive been thinking abt it a lot as ive been writing the next chapter. your analysis is SO good i feel so honored that you've been thinking so much about my fic and characterization of these two. i do think that viktor and mel have this kind of complicated relationship where even independent of jayce they see each other as being different than the other people in piltover. mel i think really appreciated viktor for putting scientific progress over personal gain and pursuing a peaceful solution even if she didn't initially agree on his refusal to make any hextech weapons. they're both pacifists who prefer diplomatic solutions and she respected that. in the same way viktor began to see mel as different from the other councilors because she was the only one other than jayce to really fight for the peace treaty in the council. that and her belief in his and jayce's shared dream was probably a big deal for him, a zaunite who felt out of place and underappreciated in piltover

i think what i'm getting at, and i'll expand on this more in the fic bc it deserves exploration, is that viktor's disappointment that mel isn't standing up to her family is born out of two things. one, the obvious class divide between them where viktor was born in zaun and had to work for his place in the academy. i think it would be natural for him to not so much harbor resentment against mel for her upper class status, but have complicated feelings about what she does with her privilege. she fought for the peace treaty with jayce but i don't really think she was on the front lines fighting for equality for the undercity because it wasn't a priority for her. the great thing about mel as a character is that she has selfish intentions initially and then puts those aside as she distances herself from her family

but the other part of viktor's disapproval is that he's fresh off the whole herald thing. a situation where he, while under the influence of the arcane, abused the power he had over people and led them to their deaths. i think postcanon viktor would be hyperaware of power dynamics and imbalances and i think to some extent he's projecting that guilt over what he did onto mel and that's part of why he's being so hard on her. viktor sees mel's running away from her family as being complicit to some extent to their crimes. and it's true that she is kind of running away from her problems here but he's also refusing to be compassionate to her current situation because he doesn't think he deserves that same compassion

[bumblingbabooshka]

[Tuvok & Janeway: Control, Distance, Duty & Connection.] Sources: St Voyager Transcripts / Mitski 'First Love Late Spring' / Disco Elysium

[xxplastic-cubexx]

do u think either charles or erik had trouble coming to terms with their love for one another?? like religious guilt, internalized homophobia, etc.

Many such cases really … not hard to imagine them dealin with that …

[yunmeng-jiang]

that man does NOT think of wei wuxian as his gege

[telesodalite]

I need to be weirder about the scavengers and cannibalism...

[crossbackpoke-check]

Sat politely ankles crossed hands folded please say you have more thoughts about the DC deweys. Lazarus pit cold-eyed stare pristine and bloodthirsty anyway I would love to hear any further thoughts if you have the time + energy + motivation

how i imagine you waiting for me to re-read the resurrection of ra’s al-ghul and hush vol. 1+2:

ALRIGHT. in no particular order, thoughts about the dc deweys

connor fits very well into the mold of a talia al-ghul for me; chip on his shoulder, femme fatale, deadly and precise. he’s not the loudest but he’s got a dry wit that’ll cut you!

“why is connor an al-ghul at all and not batman” well first of all he’s already got the water connection, i’m gonna go dip him into the lake a couple hours north of the pas to make him incredibly long-lived, rejuvenated and beautiful

second of all i want him to be a questionable villain/antihero because he looks evil in those pictures but like beautiful evil. you see him at a multi-million dollar soirée and he’s bored of being there wearing his “heritage” beads and jewels he originally had from a thousand years ago. he and his assassins are only here to murder the head of state who’s planning to lay a pipeline through ancestral grounds

rip brandon duhaime i simply cannot imagine you as any kind of batman. lacks the gravitas, too much of a yapper, loves his wife too much. i curse thee to be green arrow if you’re in this narrative at all

assuming connor stays with toronto, would LOVE to think about toronto as one of the sites of the lazarus pit for many reasons

(a brief aside here to say that for me personally this is interesting if connor goes to winnipeg because i think they suit him better, he’s a manitoba boy, but re: the chip on his shoulder, he’s NOT a manitoba boy. he’s from the pas and very proud of it)

a) the amount of ‘toronto is the center of the universe’ hockey creation myths i can play with & birth/rebirth/reincarnation. if you WANT to feel unhinged trying to blend hockey and comics is an ice rink not just a pool of water?

b) mr. cathal kelly i love your works!!! toronto eats its young!!! thinking about this very literally in the sense of the resurrection arc where players come to toronto and are sacrificed, give up their body, their skill, in service of the demon’s head, and lose themselves.

c) we see echos of the same narratives and styles over and over again—if i can hop over to the flyers for a second, there is of course the curse of the *8s (18 richards, 28 claude, 48 danny b, 68 nolan, 88 lindros) but ALSO the danny brière -> tk -> morgan frost celly chain. every generation a resurrection, emerging clean and new from the pit

can you just briefly hold my hand and imagine wayne gretzky as an evil ra’s al-ghul wanting to possess a new body. gretzky i’m sorry to malign you and i know you never played in toronto but you are the best player in my head to fit the idea, i’m open to other suggestions

coming BACK to green arrow dewey (i did not re-watch arrow or re-read those comics sorry) connor could also be black canary, who takes a brief dip into the lazarus pit (toronto) before getting married to oliver. i do like that narrative but because we were talking about pristine and cold-blooded i figured connor dewar head of the league of assassins was more what you were after

now that i’ve gotten through world building… choose your own adventure narratives?

hockey-ish au: connor chosen as a host for the Next One. i think the lineage of the great one -> next one -> next next one -> next one up of gretzky -> crosby -> mcdavid -> bedard is taken, BUT i can imagine that the league of old boys all have the same intentions. connor gets sent to toronto unknowingly being prepped to get body-snatched by ???? and brandon duhaime of course accidentally stumbles on the plot and they have to fight to stop it

connor assassinating people :) snapshot of the head of the league of assassins delegating which major world events they’re going to change today. would love his shark face from the gifset to have blood spattered across it, ideally.

version 1 as head of the league of assassins: brandon is one of his assassins, big strong bodyguard type. devoted to him, would lay down his life, perfectly designed for connor (lady shiva/cassandra cain-ish). connor orders for something to be done and brandon does it there for him then gently wipes the blood off his face and apologizes for being careless and getting him messy.

version 2 as head of the league of assassins: an actual plot where connor aims to assassinate SOMEONE but brandon gets in the way. they meet at odds as their respective roles (hero, leader of a crime syndicate) but are magnetically drawn together as their alter egos. eventually brandon puts together the pieces of the Big Evil and manages to (legally!-ish as much as vigilante-ism can be legal) take it down and the ending panels show a tentative friendship and recognition of potential shared goals

also, jaromir jágr is immortal. don’t know if this is relevant OR related but he is. personal hot spring lazarus pit?

um. thanks for coming to my 1.5k ted talk (including tags). what a way to moritz seider lore drop that i DID grow up a comic book nerd, lmao. thank you so much for enabling me <3 i'll be here all week thinking about which teams would get what rings in a blackest night au

[mariathechosen1]

Was Anyone But You a good Much Ado About Nothing adaptation? No, not at all, but fuck it was fun!

[seddair]

.

[webism]

pornstar!satoru and pornstar!suguru managing to talk you into letting them both fuck you at the same time on film—a double penetration scene.

apparently, after a few... lewd images of the three of you together were leaked by a blue-eyed attention whore who swears he didn't mean to edit, upload and caption them before posting them on his main twitter, your combined audiences have started begging for video content of the three of you. and what better than a filthy threesome to spark the flame of your three-way-affairs?

it's how you end up riding suguru, feeling his cock so deep inside of you that you swear he's in your stomach. your hands find purchase on his muscled pecs as you ride him to the brink of orgasm; sweat coats your skin, his too, and as it is with suguru, your moans aren't played up for the sake of porn: they're raw and real and so loud as he encourages your sounds with a finger circling over your clit.

those at home watching the pair of you, only one hand free as they stroke or finger or rub themselves in time with each thrust of Suguru's hips up into you, are all met with the sight of satoru walking into frame. cock hard and big and at attention as he climbs onto the bed behind you and takes a few moments to kiss at your neck, reach around and play with your bouncing tits.

how he teases you with his words, whispers them into you ear with full knowledge that the cameras microphone wont pick up on his words. there's no production crew this time around, no directors forcing a position or calling for breaks and ruining the building tension in your already coiled stomach.

"gonna fuck this pretty ass so deep, see if i can feel sugu through you hm? you want that?"

and his word already have you on edge, all you think you can manage is a moan of approval and the slightest nod of your head, but satoru grabs your chin and guides your gaze to the camera. "say you want it, say you want me."

"i—fuck—i want you, toru. want you to fuck my ass while i ride suguru."

the domesticity, the sweet nicknames you wouldn't have said on film if you were half as aware of the world around you—it's a lot for poor satoru to handle, what with how hard his cock is, how it's already leaking so much precum onto the sheets beneath you. he can barely still your hips for long enough to work himself into your ass, and the stretch of him is enough to push you forward and on top of suguru.

you're given a moment to adjust, a full minute of stillness to catch your breath and acclimate to the overwhelming fullness you feel—the weird way you feel whole, and the inevitable loss you'll feel once this is over. the moment is also given to stop the poor boys from cumming all too quickly. suguru can feel satoru pulsing inside of you, and satoru swears he can feel suguru's cock twitch. you squeeze around the both of them, test their resolve with a simple roll of the hips, and then choke on your spit when they both start thrusting in tandem with each other. hard and fast and mean and all at once.

it's blinding, the pleasure you feel all of a sudden.

suguru is strong and domineering with his hands on your hips and his cock nestled deep in your pussy—he thrusts his hips up, matches satoru's unkind pace in such a way you're sure you'll be unable to walk the next way. gorgeous praise slips from his lips as you hold eye contact with him—you're surely a mess, fucked stupid by two men at once.

satoru is eager and manic in the way he takes your ass. his hands perched on suguru's thighs as he ruts into you over and over in chase of a climax he knows is going to be unearthly. he'd praise you if he could, but all that spills from his mouth are incoherent babbles of pleasure that would make anyone listening think that he's the one being impaled on his almost too-large cock.

they work so well together—your pleasure seems to be the one thing they consistently agree on. you don't even have the mind to worry about the video length with how fast you're reaching orgasm, dragging the boys with you as you shake between them, wracked with pleasure so overwhelming you're nearly in tears.

it's a clip that gets shared on every porn site and blog known to man. of you, a fucked out mess between two lust-struck men each cumming inside of you at the exact same time your own orgasm crests.

the clenching of suguru's stomach as he bucks up into you, natural instincts rolling his cock as deep as possible as he empties his balls inside of you.

the way satoru tilits his head back, jaw tight and hair a mess as he forgets how to breathe when he paints the inside of your ass with his cum.

and you, impaled on both cocks at the same time, overstimulated and shaking with the remnants of the strongest orgasm you've had in a long time, and still rolling your hips in hopes of more. another round or three, as long as you stay this full.

@medusamara5 @echodead @curiositykilledthecatx3 @hirainne

@plinkuro @sooouth @megumiiiswife @nyxiswrites1200 @yveiscringe

@sharks31 @lenahathunger @aydene @dreamyokai @n0tviv

@chiiinglebells @timetoletmyimaginationfly @nayely45 @waffless-simp-blog

@zoozvie @gothicchildofthenight @repnights @flwerie @soundofraindropss

@ushijimas1simp @aliidarling @aeswin @peachygelic @silvermet

@rinadisapproves @theshxaverse @cipher00 @milkkteary @snackeyalleyjuice

@cvipped @toadtoru @keiette @satosugu4-ever

@sugurubabe @wickedpoison6 @simp-plague @tojis-ball-sack @ventila98

@xxbookdrunkdemigodxx @oikawasthirdleg @yogichi @theycallmesia

@kdrama-anna @vurelliex @anonnieghost @tadabzzzbee

@luvofbows @crywolfix @hhonaoin @gigiiiiislife @aviesnapkindoodles

@ninikrumbs @bijuu-naginata @baekhyunsbestie @grimmshold @dalnimmie

@domainexpansionmypants @5tarx @1depressedsimp @beachaddict48 @jadeis0nline

@sukunasbbygrl @luna-v-roiya @sukunaspillow @starsval @vamqyx

@laaalaaaloooppppsiiieeeee @mermaid-jewels @sugusmonkeyy @sammywo @noyaskneepad

@astrideverstar @lordchula-thagrandrula @chuuminn @angel1of-death @flooftoof

@rumi-rants @dysphoricsanity @coolcephalopod @satoruslxt @xoxo1mira

@whosmarjj @kikosaidbye @iceddragonfruit @amisuh @lotties-ashwagandha

@veraiku @niinistudies @jexx233 @logoleptic-since-06 @kirishimasboobs

@samaraxmorgan @sweetsformysoul @uranosbaaee @angeleen777

@xixflower @dilfdicks

[useless-catalanfacts]

Something very strange happened, and I think we need to have a talk about the way some people who don't know about Catalan culture misrepresent the Tió (our pre-Christian Christmas present-bringer, a log who poops presents 🪵🎁).

I have a relative who is a teacher in an adult school, she teaches Catalan language (mostly to immigrants). Some days ago, they were doing an activity about Catalan holidays, and two of her students said that Tió should be banned and that it's the worst thing they have ever heard. My relative was very shocked and asked why they could say such a thing (imagine, it's like saying Santa Claus should be banned in the USA). Their reasoning was that they completely misunderstood everything about it. These people are native Spanish speakers and assumed that the Catalan word "tió" (meaning "log" 🪵) means the same as the Spanish word "tío" (meaning "uncle"), even though both words are pronounced differently. They believed that the Tió represents a man and that we tell children to beat people up, so much until they poop themselves, threatening them to give us things. They said it promotes violence to children and that it's disgusting. Nothing further from the truth.

This is not an isolated incident because a few days ago I saw a post on Tumblr repeating this same mistake. I texted the person who posted it saying that it's not called "Poop Uncle" but "Christmas Log" and they said that this was what they were taught by their teacher (this person is from a different continent), and haven't taken down the post. I have also seen comments on Instagram repeating the same and making fun of how gross and violent it is.

The real meaning of Tió

The Log is a way of symbolically passing down our relation with nature. This is how the tradition works:

In early December, we get a log and bring him home. We take care of him: we keep him in a warm place, with a blanket over him, and we feed him things like orange/clementine peels and walnut shells. On Christmas day, all the family comes together. Children get wooden sticks and go get ready in another room, meanwhile adults place presents under the Log's blanket. Children come back and hit the Log while singing a song. There are many local variants of the song but they all come down to asking the Log to poop us good food. When they have finished singing the song, the children remove the blanket and discover the presents that the Log has pooped. Years ago (now this is only done by some farmer families in rural areas, but back in the day this was generalized), the Log was burned in the house's fireplace and its ashes were spread on the fields, believed to act as a magical fertilizer.

Notice what this whole "ritual" has been about: we take care of nature, nature takes care of us, we are part of a whole and there's no real difference between "nature" and "us" because we all give life to each other. After the winter rest, we wake up nature (the Tió) so it will bring fruits and light again.

We take a log from the forest and bring it home. We do this for the Winter Solstice because it's the time of the return of light and the rebirth of nature after the winter sleep, and wood symbolizes the most important things for human life: food, warmth and light. It's difficult for us to imagine nowadays because we are used to electricity, but for our ancestors who only had oil lamps, fire and candles, darkness was almost absolute for many hours in winter, and that's why the Winter Solstice was very important because it meant that light is coming back. We want something from the Log, his fire will allow us to cook, it will give us light, and keep us warm. So we offer him the same: we feed him (notice what we feed it, too: a kind of compost, which is complimentary to human food), we keep him warm, and we love him. Then, we hit him with sticks (mimicking the motion of cutting down a tree) and ask him to give us food, and he does. Then, our ancestors used to burn him for warmth and light, and then take him back to plants spreading his ashes so it will give life to the fields. Which in turn will give us food again, which we will poop and it will fertilize plants again. And it's a cycle that never ends, we're all part of a whole.

We give to the forests, the forests can grow with the remains that all living creatures leave on its ground: leafs, excrements, the remains of parts of our food like nuts and fruit peels. These things give life to the forest. And the forest gives life to us: gives us fruits and wood (=light and warmth). We take these things, and in return we give to forests once again.

Nowadays, the part about warmth and light is often lost to kids, but the part about food is still obvious, even if subconsciously. This is why the Log is not the horrible barbaric tradition that the "haha poop and violence" crowd would make you believe.

And don't get me wrong, it can still be funny! We're the first ones to make jokes about it. And you can, too! But don't spread false ideas: the Spanish word "uncle" appears nowhere near this tradition because it doesn't have anything to do with uncles nor with Spanish-speaking cultures. It's called the Christmas Log (Tió de Nadal, Soca de Nadal, Tronca de Nadal, Tizón de Nadal, etc depending on the area, all meaning "Christmas Log") and it's celebrated by the Catalan people and a part of the Occitan and Pyrenean Aragonese people. The word "poop" (as an imperative verb, as in "please poop for us") appears in the song, but not in the name.

I know that, now that misinformation has gone viral, a post won't stop it. But I hope at least people with a genuine interest can learn some more. By all means, keep laughing! Make all the memes you want! But knowing the whole story will give you understanding. And, please, don't argue in favour of banning our cultural practises, we've had enough of that for centuries.

[bekahdoesnerdshit]

When Cog summons her wings, they come to her easy as breathing. The shadows around her gather at her back and unfurl into feather-light, barely corporeal raven wings- black as night and held together by magic. Cog asks for her wings, and they materialize for her.

Acedia's wings rip from her back, tearing open the skin between her shoulder blades and sending rivulets of hot blood running down her spine. Her back hunches, her shoulders jerking, and as the wings unfold it's clear that every moment of it is intensely painful. The wings themselves are a mockery of a willowy tree, once draped with vines and moss, now skeletal branches.

Cog's wings are a gift from a god who grew to love her like a daughter. They're a part of her, just like the rest of her magic.

Acedia's wings are everything she's perverted and betrayed, a pointed reminder of her place from the god she sold her soul to.

[grison-in-space]

from the number of asinine complaints about how "voting is NOT a form of harm reduction" because harm reduction is for ADDICTS! ONLY! I'm seeing around... all coming from OP blogs I don't recognize and which otherwise don't have much presence... well, that coordination alongside the timing of US politics sure feels like the Russian troll bots agitating again. (Yes, they absolutely infested Tumblr; I think @ms-demeanor had a great post about what the bots looked and felt like somewhere that I will have to try and track down tomorrow.)

The thing is, if you actually do know harm reduction well, the complaint makes no sense. It's not as if the origin of harm reduction is a secret or especially hard to find out more about. I am not exactly an expert in the field: I have a educated layperson's interest in public health and infectious disease, I'm a queer feminist of a certain age and therefore have a certain degree of familiarity with AIDS-driven safer sex campaigns, and I'm interested in disability history and self advocacy (and I would in fact clarify harm reduction as a philosophy under this umbrella). So I have about twenty years of experience with harm reduction as a philosophy basically by existing in communities whose history is intertwined with harm reduction, which means I know it well from many different angles, and I know how the story of the philosophy is generally taught.

See, this is a story that starts, as so many stories do, in the 1980s with something monstrous President Reagan was doing. In this case, it was the AIDS epidemic, and Reagan refusing to devote any money or time to what eventually became called AIDS (rather than the original GRIDS, which came with its own baked in homophobia). Knowing themselves abandoned by society in this as in all things, and watching as friends and loved ones died in droves, queers and addicts are two communities who see that they are the only resources that they collectively have to save each other's lives. Queers know that sex, even casual sex, is an important part of people's lives and culture... and people aren't going to stop doing it even if there's a disease, so how can it happen safely? Condoms. Condoms every time, freely available, easy and shameless, shower them on people in the street if you have to. (And other things: this is the origin of the concept of "fluid bonding", for example... both of which were concepts that were immediately adopted in response to COVID, like outdoor socially distsnced greetings and masks and "bubbles." That wasn't an accident. Normalizing sexual health tests and seeing hard results on paper before sex was a thing, too.)

Addicts, too, knew that using was going to happen no matter how earnestly people tried to stop. If it was that easy, addiction wouldn't exist. So: how do you make using safer for longer? If you could stop someone getting HIV before they could bring themselves to get clean, that's a whole life right there. If you could stop someone overdosing once, twice, a dozen times, that's more time you're buying them to claw themselves out of addiction and into a better place. Addicts see, right, needle sharing is getting the diseases spread, so cut down on needle sharing. Well, needles aren't easy to get hold of. Their supply is controlled because people who aren't prescribed needles are theoretically junkies, so taking the needles away makes it harder to use, right— and no one is complicit, and also you see fewer discarded needles lying around where they're unsanitary and unsafe, right? Except that people want to do a buddy a good turn, so they share if there's no other option, and they'll keep a needle going until it's literally too blunt to keep using if need be. So fighting needle sharing means making it easier to get needles to shoot up with: finding a place to discard used ones and get as many fresh ones as you need to use safely!

Making free needles available to junkies and free condoms for the bathhouses was not a popular solution with politicians, for perhaps obvious reasons. Nor was routine testing of the blood supply, because that cost money too. But these things work to stop the spread of disease. Thus the principle of harm reduction: policy interventions in response to communities that frequently engage in risky behavior should focus on whatever reduces aggregate harm by reducing the risk rather than by trying to reduce the behavior. The homos and junkies say look, all your societal judgement in the world hasn't stopped us being homos and junkies yet. You ain't going to look after us? We'll look after our own. And this is the form that takes. Not increasing the pressure to act like people who aren't is, but making it safer to be the people we are while we try to be the happiest versions of ourselves. Even if that means being morally complicit in a whole lot of casual sex and drug abuse.

The thing is, harm reduction is a philosophy rooted in the defiance of people who knew that their society thought they deserved to die painfully, young, invisible and alone. This is not the kind of thing that people come up with and get mad if you adapt it and share it, especially if you tell the story of where it came from. And importantly, harm reduction is not purely the child of addiction: that philosophy, from the get go, was cooked up to apply both to substance abuse and casual sex. It didn't just spread from addiction care; it was born straddling addiction care and queer & feminist health care.

So it doesn't make sense to see actual activists who know harm reduction well complaining that this is a term exhibiting semantic drift when we talk about voting as harm reduction. It's actually a good metaphor: you're reducing the overall risk of the worst case scenario metaphors by voting Democrat, at least until future votes can install a system where multiple parties can flourish on the political scheme. (Democrats and Republicans are essentially coalitions of a pack of arguing factions anyway, and those factions are essentially what would be classed elsewhere as a party in its own right; the US essentially just lumps political granularity rather than splitting it in our political system.) And anyone who understands harm reduction itself knows that.

So it's this wildly inorganic complaint being voiced repeatedly by different sources. Sounds like a pretty good flag for a potential psyop to me.

If you want to learn more about harm reduction and its history, especially from an addiction perspective, I cannot recommend Maia Szalavitz's Undoing Drugs: How Harm Reduction is Changing the Future of Drugs and Addiction (2022) highly enough. Szalavitz has a history of addiction of her own as well as being a clear and accessible writer with an excellent grasp of neuroscience and history. I have a lot of respect for her work.

[demi-god77]

BYLER GATES: A GUIDE

(Explaining all the different theories, for anyone who is also lost with how many there are)

THE BIG 4

Flickergate: This theory involves a lot of time shenanigans and is connected to the Will having powers in s5 one (possibly manipulation of time or electricity). Theory claims Will and Mike will kiss in the UD, specifically outside Mike's garage, paralleling 1x01. Will is going to tell the truth at the same time his s1 self is ("it was a seven"), causing the garage light to flicker on Nov. 6th 1983.

Birthdaygate: This theory suggests that the Duffers didn't actually forget Will's birthday is March 22nd (the day of the rink-o-mania incident). It claims that Vecna is actually manipulating the characters' memories (possibly even Will's), making them forget his birthday in the process, maybe in an attempt to make him feel excluded/lonely and making him vulnerable. (Similar to the beginning of Harry Potter and the chamber of secrets, which happened to be on the inspo board for S4)

But also the Creel murders themselves happened on March 22nd.

Churchgate: More UD kiss related theories! This one claims Will is going to get Vecna'd or possessed in the Upside Down church (and that he's going to hurt/choke Mike in the process). With a crazy amount of religious symbolism, Mike would be the one breaking him out of his trance, through a kiss or a confession.

(More thorough explanation here.)

Lettergate: This gate's truthers believe that Mike did actually write to Will in the time period between s3 and s4, but never sent the letters. Said letters (signed "Love, Mike") are going to make an appearance in s5, revealing his true feelings. (Great post that has to do with this gate here)

Also related to:

OTHER GATES

Pocketgate: Very connected to Lettergate™️, this theory has to do with Mike's infamous triangle shaped pocket in S4. It suggests that the letter signed Love, Mike is hidden in said pocket throughout s4, since it very closely resembles an envelope. Triangles have also been used in ST as a queer symbol (with Robin) and Mike's pocket consistently points to Will like an arrow.

Phonegate: Kinda similar to the previous two, this gate claims Mike did actually call the Byers in Lenora. For some reason, the calls didn't go through, either because of Joyce's telemarketer job OR because of Vecna manipulating things again (cough, birthdaygate, cough).

This is backed up by one of Dustin's lines, saying that the Byers' phone line is always busy and Mike won't stop complaining about it. We know he must have been calling WILL, since the whole reason he was communicating with El using letters is that they couldn't talk on the phone.

Loverslakegate: Related to Lovers' lake (obviously). The lake is shaped like a heart, tying into its name, but it was split in two after the gates opened, now resembling a broken one (and Mike is ofc referred to as "the heart" so it could be a reference to him).

According to this theory, Mike and Will are going to kiss/become lovers near said lake/Reefer Rick's house.

Heartgate: To put it simply: Heart reflections EVERYWHERE. This one is better explained through pictures:

Also: Different heartgate but really interesting

Colorgate: I don't think I have to explain this one tbh but anyway

Blue meets yellow in the west.

Mike and Will have been HEAVILY associated with blue and yellow respectively since the beginning of the show (even wearing eachother's colours in both of their arguments). There's an insane amount of evidence that backs this one up.

It's speculated that the Russian code in s3 was foreshadowing for s4 ("The silver cat feeds when Blue meets Yellow in the west") Silver cat: Vecna who started killing when Mike (Blue) met Will (Yellow) in the west (California, literally west of Indiana)

Curtaingate: "They don't spent their lives trying to get a look at what's behind the curtain [...] They like the curtain. It provides them comfort, stability, definition" -Murray 2x05

Mike and El are pretty consistently framed in front of CLOSED (and more often than not, yellow) curtains, or ones that have closed blinds. According to this theory, closed curtains represent not being honest with one's true feeling. So, the truth about Mike's feelings is beyond the curtain and in s5 he will open it (and come out)

Motelgate: This one has to do with the dreaded two day time skip at the end of S4. Theory claims the Cali crew stayed at a motel during that time skip and the scenes were cut for time, but we'll flash back to them in s5. It's based on a photo a production assistant posted from the New Mexico filming, as well as some bts pics of the Cali Crew playing board games in a motel.

Shoegate: In S4, we see a pair of Will's shoes in his bedroom. In s5, Mike seems to be wearing that exact pair. This, in addition to the fact that they wear the same shoe size (a 10 according to their rollerskates from 4x02), lead people to theorize they will share clothes/shoes in s5. More importantly though, this theory suggests Mike is figuratively being put into Will's shoes (maybe pining?). Also, both of them wear the same shoes they wore in s2. Interestingly enough though, even though the design is the same, the colors are reversed (so their roles will be reversed too).

Possessiongate: This one runs DEEP so I'm going to link a bunch of posts

To put it VERY simply: this theory claims Vecna somehow attached himself to Mike (maybe when the vine grabbed him by the leg in the S2 tunnels- right before he started acting weird in s3 and s4) and he has been influenced/possessed for some time now.

He's not the dungeon master anymore, he's not in control. Both in s3 and s4 someone ELSE is the DM when they play D&D (Will and Eddie respectively)

More here and here

Victimgate: Very closely related to the previous one, this one suggests that MIKE was originally supposed to be Vecna's 4th victim instead of Patrick. Since Max escaped the first time, SHE ended up being the last victim but the original plan was for it to be Patrick. However, Patrick's curse doesn't fit the theme of all of the previous ones. We only see one of his visions, he gets cursed for ONE DAY, as opposed to the other 3 that are cursed for almost a week and we also know very little about him, even though we gradually knew more about the previous victims. Chrissy (no relation to main characters) -> Fred (friends w/ Nancy) -> Max (main character who we've known since s2)

More thorough explanation here

Twelvegate: This one is not really Byler related but i wanted to include it anyway

Theory claims Will was one of the lab kids (specifically 012) and him and El are actual twins. There are mentions of Will and El looking similar since s1, and a lot of twin imagery.

This theory obviously ties in with the Will having powers one and some people believe he wasn't 012, but him and El have a deeper connection/may be actually related. It could theoretically explain Henry's connection to Will, as well as things like El seemingly recognizing him in s1.(Alternatively called rainbowshipgate, because of the rainbow ship drawing Joyce mentions in s2 and the rainbow room)

Eightfifteengate: Again, not explicitly Byler but it's quite crazy.

TL;DR: The time 8:15 seems to have great significance in the show and it's mentioned all the time, if not by the characters themselves, (Eg. "It's 8:15, you're late"- El s2) then by small details in the background. There's even a whole track named after it.

Will left the Wheelers' house at 8:15 and it's the EXACT timestamp of his disappearance in 1x01. It's also the time in which most of the UD related weirdness happens and so it's very likely the UD is stuck on 8:15. (Also you know, 15-8=7)

Radiationgate: Related to the previous one! Clocks in Chernobyl are stuck on 8:15 and Hiroshima has been described figuratively as being frozen in time. Henry has burns identical to Chernobyl victims and almost all of his + his victims' symptoms can be explained through radiation exposure. As this post explains, for radiation levels between 8.3-11 Gy (SI unit for absorbed radiation), symptoms start with headaches and disorientation, move on to unconsciousness and bleeding (the exact symptoms of his victims) and finally, death happens at around 7 days (which is about how long Vecna's curse lasts AND how long Will was in the UD for)

Whiterabbitgate: The song "White Rabbit" is the first song in the show and it plays when we first get a sense of El's powers. Theory suggests it will also be the last song in the show (coming full circle) with either Will using his powers, or Willel using their powers together.

In general though, ST has a lot of similarities/parallels to Alice in Wonderland. The white rabbit constantly being late (Mike is late to something at the start of every season), great significance to clocks/ticking/time, a lot of hallucinations/visions, the overall similarities between the Upside Down and Wonderland. Henry's sister was literally named Alice Creel and there is SO much rabbit imagery throughout the show. There are also direct references to AIW with set pieces and paintings.

Soundtrackgate: This one has to do with the Stranger Things OST and the overall insane musical symbolism throughout the show. A lot of different theories talk about the show's soundtrack, but this one talks about 3 tracks in particular: Being Different, The First Lie, The First I love You

To put it briefly: "The First I love You" plays in both Robin's coming out scene and El's kiss with Mike at the end of s3 (Already a weird parallel). The three tracks not only share the same melody, but they also sync up perfectly. "Being Different" (s4 van scene) and "The First Lie" (Nancy and Jonathan's kiss in s2) especially, match up together to create an entirely new track, completing eachother. The scenes featuring those three tracks also share very similar themes at their core. (This post goes into a lot of detail!)

Playlistgate: Character playlists! At a certain point, every character's official playlist on Spotify was deleted, except for three: Mike's, Will's and Billy's. Songs were seemingly being added/deleted for no reason to the Mike and Will ones and people were struggling to make sense of it all.

Also, Mike's character playlist in particular is VERY interesting (so many byler coded songs, as well as "Smalltown Boy" a gay anthem, about a young gay boy forced to leave his home town to escape from their disapproval and homophobia.) There are three playlists on Finn's spotify that are very incriminating. "Love songs" (That has "BOYS DON'T CRY" on it, a song that Will literally has a poster of in his room), "drive" and the most recent one "STurn". These playlists feature songs like "Let her go", "Angst in my pants", "Me and Michael", "Gay thoughts" just to name a few. Basically a lot of the songs on all four playlists seem very relevant to some complicated feelings about Mike's relationship with El/Will but also with himself and his sexuality.

Scriptgate: Oh boy. Here we go.

On August 5th 2022, the byler fandom got #bylerscript trending worldwide on Twitter while waiting for the 8flix account (run by Nick Runyeard) to release some supposed s4 scripts (that people PAID for, mind you). These scripts dropped on August 8th, featuring lines like: "I hate who I am" from Will in the van scene, "His mouth dry, like a California summer" from the bedroom apology scene and also, Will seemingly recognizing Brenner at NINA, despite never meeting him in canon.

These turned out to be fake and the community was in shambles. Nick started calling people psychos, the Stranger Writers tweeted that everyone got scammed, Nick privated his account and the authenticity of some released s2-s3 scripts was questioned. This post explains the entire situation in detail.

Breathgate: This one is also script related and specifically about a Mike/Max parallel.

In the official van scene script, when Mike sees Will's painting "his breath catches." Then, when Lucas asks Max to the Friday movie date, "(her) breath catches" as well. People caught on that parallel very fast and since the latter is obviously a romantic moment, it boosted their confidence for both Byler and Lumax endgame.

Piggybackgate: This one refers to two different situations/theories.

One, the seemingly deliberate framing of Mike and Will inside the little bubble in El's piggyback drawing (and it referening to Byler). The framing is especially suspicious, because the bubble drawing was drawn two separate times (it's different from one shot to the other). In the second shot, they're framed directly inside of it.

Two, Mike in his monologue essentially piggybacking off of Will's van confession. His monologue was going off of El's feelings, but since they weren't actually El's, the speech was based on Will's feelings. It also ties in with the parallel/foreshadowing between the monologue and Suzie's house, with Will being paralleled to the "director" kid, directing a "choking" Tabitha and their dad (more thorough explanation here).

Footballgate: On December 25 2024, the vast majority of the byler community spent their Christmas watching hours of NFL football, in the hopes we would maybe get a teaser or at the very least a release date for s5. This started from leakers saying we would most likely get something during the game.

We got nothing.

People were disappointed they wasted hours of their lives watching a sport they neither cared for or knew anything about, and the only thing we learned is that we would probably get something before the end of January 2025.

THE SILLIES

(aka the joke-theories/memes)

Miniongate: Mike and Will are secretly minions. (Because you know, minions are primarily blue and yellow)

This information will be revealed to us in s5 and they will have a magical girl-esque transformation where we see their true minion form. (Original post here)

Localvillagegate: Related to the leaked Mike and El rooftop scene.

Basically, a mlvn used AI to lip read the scene and try to figure out what Mike is saying (and then posted the video on Twitter).

According to them, Mike was telling El they were going to leave the local village (AKA Hawkins) together and travel to a beautiful faraway land with "like, three waterfalls or something" (and also that she has to "improve her motivation", whatever that means).

People thought it was hilarious and started making a ton of memes based on it.

Parrotgate: This is directly connected to localvillagegate™️ and it was created by @cloudycleric in one of his streams.

Basically, the parrots are gay and represent Will and Mike, who in s5 will kiss under the three waterfalls depicted on the image.

Backgroundguygate: People making headcanons and creating backstories for random extras. The star of this gate is Barrett, an extra from the Lenora high school, who wears a barrette, bright red pants and a shirt that says "Hell".

According to this gate, he's actually gay and in love with Will. He has a goth best friend named Claire who is a lesbian and in love with El.

Chancegate: The theme of shipping Will with random extras continues on strong

Chance is one of Jason's friends and part of the basketball team. People thought he was attractive and somewhere along the line started making headcanons for him and shipping him with Will (Bychance). Basically, they're gonna date and Mike will be jealous.

Mikhailgate: More shipping Will with randoms! (I'm beginning to see a pattern here)

Originally created by @paladin-n-cleric

Enzo in S4 mentions his son, Mikhail Antonov. Mikhail is the Russian name for Micheal.

People started making jokes that Mikhail would arrive to Hawkins from Russia in s5 and shipped him with Will (Willhail), since he's like Mike but Russian and cooler. They made fanart, edits and posted pictures of Finn as Boris in "The Goldfinch" claiming it's Mikhail.

@will80sbyers then begun to ship Mikhail with El and thus the ship "Jail" was born.

Pastagate: On January 2nd 2025, Noah posted a 2024 recap on IG, which included a photo of a trailer door labeled "Rigatoni". People then started joking about Rigatoni being Will's new bf and the ship "Willoni" was born.

In reality, Rigatoni is a nickname for Noah and that was his trailer. But where's the fun in that?

Baldmikegate: Did you know Mike is actually bald and is bullied for it? Well, now you do.

In 2022, a cult was born and the byler tag was filled with edited pictures of Bald!Mike. Terrifying honestly.

Some people made posts about how the rest of the party feels about Mike's secret baldness and some even wrote FANFICS.

Gridgate/whiteboardgate/pixelgate: The Stranger Writers posted a picture of a pixelated/blurred whiteboard that had the entirety of s5 mapped out. People were desperately trying to decode it and figure out what was written on it.

On the space for episode 7, there was a "big black hole" that people went crazy trying to make sense of, only for it to be revealed as a pen holder.

Babygirlgate: The babygirlification of Mike Wheeler. That's it. That's the gate.

I think pretty much every line Will has ever said to Mike has been posted with the word "babygirl" replacing his name (it's hilarious and I love it)

Some examples here and here

Mattduffersbasementgate: Finn and Joe made up a third Duffer brother named Pete, who has no hair for some reason and is the actual writer of Stranger Things, while Matt and Ross are just the faces of it. Pete lives in a shed/Matt's basement and that's where he writes all of the scripts.

Finn and Noah are both also being held in Matt's basement however, and they're not allowed to leave so that they don't spoil byler endgame.

Lobegate: (This gate was officially named by @tripleatechie). In January 2025, a byler went undercover, sending asks to other members of the community pretending to be a Mlvn. In one of those, they accidentally misspelled "love" as lobe, which immediately became an inside joke. People starting speculating whether or not this was an actual Mlvn and an investigation ensued. On January 7th 2025, the identity of the undercover byler was revealed as @somewiseoutthere. The mystery didn't end there though, with people wondering if this was in reality a group effort with multiple culprits. Here is a list of all the possible culprits with a full timeline here.

omg this took SO LONG, but I will keep adding as more gates surface

(this post is for you @felix-fathoms @bibylers)

[inbarfink]

So one of the cool and interesting ways ‘Steven Universe’ used to try and balance being both a series of 11-minutes episodes that each have their own satisfying emotional resolution and being an overarching story with complicated character arcs that take multiple seasons to resolve is the… I’m going to call it the ‘Not Quite Right Lesson’ episodes. Episodes where a character kinda learns a Very Important Lesson… but a more careful and retrospective look at the situation shows that what they learned is not Quite the Right Thing for them. They internalized something in that adventure which just ended up causing more Emotional Troubles for themselves farther down the line.

‘The Test’ is the most classic example. 

As a standalone thing, it’s just a sweet episode about Steven learning to accept that his caretakers are also flawed and confused and figuring this shit up as they’re going along just like he is, and then doing a nice thing for their sake.

But looking back at this episode, it is quite obviously the nadir of Steven appointing himself as the Family Therapist and repressing all of his problems so he could better help the Gems’ with theirs. Like, there have been some early warning signs for this Complex, but this episode is the one that really cemented that idea in his mind and probably the reason it took him like the Entire Rest of the Show Including a Post-Finale Season to really untangle it.

But… also, I’ve been thinking a lot about the episode right after that, ‘Future Vision’. I think it’s also a very important ‘Not Quite Right Lesson Episode’ for the character of Garnet, and to some extent, the Crystal Gems as a whole. In many ways, it is to the CGs' character arcs' what 'the Test' is to Steven's.

So in this episode, Garnet reveals to Steven the fact that she has Future Vision. She hoped that telling Steven a little bit more about herself and being honest with him will lead to a greater understanding and a greater bond between them… but it backfired. It just led Steven to become a total paranoid, terrified wreck stuck in a total existential crisis.

And it seems like the lesson Garnet learned is that… she should’ve never taken that risk at all. That it would’ve been better for everyone if she just kept Steven ignorant of the truth forever.

Extremely reinforced with the ending of the episode, where Garnet chooses to once again hide an uncomfortable truth (that he just came very close to dying again) from Steven, for the sake of his own ‘peace of mind’.

So, like, the Gems were already hiding uncomfortable truths from Steven since day one. “If you could only know what we really are” and all of that. But I think… With the actual truth of Homeworld encroaching on them more and more at this point of the story arc, this would’ve been a great time for the Gems to reconsider their attitude and actually Explain to Steven What the Hell is Going On. 

But instead, I think Garnet saw the events of ‘Future Vision’ as a reinforcement of the idea that there’s just some things Steven is Better Off Not Knowing. Actually being frank with him about Homeworld and the Diamonds and the War right there and then, that would have just overwhelmed Steven with fears and worries and would’ve ended up doing nothing but hurting him. And Garnet can’t accept that possibility, not again.

And so, Garnet, alongside Amethyst and Pearl, keep all these truths from Steven as long as possible. Only revealing bits of information when they have to. For Amethyst it’s about her emotionally-evasive attitude (also, she legit doesn’t know all of that stuff herself). For Pearl it’s about how she learned to romanticize Rose’s own fucked-up obsession with secrets. For Garnet, with her usually very direct attitude and preference for the most straightforward solutions, I think it’s very much the events of ‘Future Vision’ that were still playing in her head every time she had the choice to actually Explain something to Steven and decided not to. 

But that, indeed, was Not Quite the Right Lesson. While being bluntly and directly told by Garnet all about the Many Ways He Could Die caused Steven to go into an anxiety spiral and an existential crisis for an episode - the way the Gems have been consistently secretive and evasive with Steven ended up causing him so much more emotional grief to him in the long run. As all of these secrets ended up revealed to him in the most surprising, dramatic and traumatizing way possible.

And the secretive attitudes ended up driving a wedge between Steven and the Gems. 

Even after they promised to be more honest with him. Because the sight of Steven crying on the roof that day is one that Garnet can easily move away from. Because Garnet’s Not Quite Right Lesson was almost as difficult for her to unlearn as Steven’s own. 

But after the big confrontation at the start of the Zoo Arc, Garnet ended up being the most upfront about the Crystal Gems’ history. Almost overeager to share what she knows about the past.

I mean also, again, Amethyst just has less to tell and Pearl is hiding secrets for reasons beyond her control - but I think it’s also important to consider from the perspective of Garnet’s arc.

Because the fallout of the Pink Diamond Reveal is very much centered around Garnet (or, well, Ruby and Sapphire). That was the Truth that was hidden from her 'for her own good'. And at the end of the day, despite all the grief that unveiling that truth has caused

It has also brought them, all of them, a lot closer.

There's a reason why 'the Truth' is Garnet's Final Missing Piece in the movie. It is as central to her character arc in the series as Lesbian AngstTM grief over lost love is to Pearl.

And still, some remnants of the Trauma of 'Future Vision' remained...

After all, even the very last episode of 'Future' was centered around the Gems once again trying to hide things from Steven (at that case, their turmoil about him leaving) for his own sake

Even though it once again just caused Steven a whole lot of grief.

It's maybe notable that at the end of this episode, Garnet, once again, tells Steven what's waiting for him in his Future...