#i have to stop trying to convince people he died

[fuckyeahisawthat]

What is Mage Viktor doing?

So it turns out I do have a take on what's going on with Mage Viktor, why he's messing with timelines in the way he is, and what he hoped to achieve by bringing Jayce to the torment nexus dimension and then sending him back to his own timeline armed with facial hair, trauma, and the ruthless determination to somehow stop his own Viktor.

Of course this is just my own reading; there are many ways you can interpret the reveals of the final episode. But it's become my preferred reading because it makes Mage Viktor come off as absolutely BATSHIT. The apotheosis of all Viktor's best and worst qualities. As he would be.

First we gotta lay out some fundamental principles about how I understand Viktor that will inform this reading.

Viktor was never being controlled by the Hexcore. This deserves its own whole meta, but tl;dr, I think it is directly antithetical to the core themes of the show to think that Viktor wasn't making his own decisions all through s2.

Over and over again in Arcane, we see characters become "monsters" and do monstrous things, and every time the thematic point is that this is still the person you love. When Vi says that her sister is dead because she is Jinx now and when Jayce says "my partner died in this room" THEY ARE BOTH WRONG. The person they love is different now but they're still in there and they can still be reached.

Viktor is transformed by something terrible happening to him (like many characters in the show!) but all his decisions are still his own and to me they seem like perfectly consistent--if extreme--extensions of what we know about him as a character before he gets a Hexcore heart.

So my analysis starts with the premise that Mage Viktor is not trying to free his past self from an outside influence. He's trying to hack his own character traits to make a different version of himself do what he wants.

Viktor is BOTH genuinely altruistic and compassionate AND deeply arrogant. This is such a banger combination and I think turning down the dial on either trait makes Viktor less interesting. I think Mage Viktor has genuine remorse about what he did in his timeline and he is, fundamentally, trying to find a way he could have stopped himself from killing everyone (within certain constraints; we'll get to that). When Jayce is able to show main timeline Herald Viktor his memories of what Viktor is about to do to their world, the first thing Viktor sees is not dead Jayce, or himself left alone in an empty world. It's all the ordinary people who are going to die terrified because of him.

I do not think any version of Viktor wanted this result. But Viktor is so convinced he is always right that his arrogance carries him right past the point of no return before he realizes oh actually I haven't freed everybody I have killed them.

So I do think Mage Viktor is trying to find a timeline where this doesn't happen, but he is not timeline-hopping in order to preemptively stop other versions of himself from making the same mistake. If he wanted to do that, he would just leave all the many many timelines where Jayce dies in a blizzard as a child alone. No Jayce who grows up obsessed with magic, goes around Academy rules to get the hex crystals, invents Hextech and gives Viktor the power to fuck everything up. Easy peasy.

But no. Instead, Viktor is actively going into other timelines and changing them at the point where Jayce would have died.

He is doing things that appear to make the sequence of events that leads to his world-ending magic blast WAY MORE LIKELY. And that's because...

Viktor is obsessively selfish when it comes to Jayce.

Mage Viktor wants to find a timeline where he doesn't doom the world but not at the expense of meeting Jayce and spending years doing science with him.

If the goal was only to prevent Jayce from dying in the blizzard, he could have done it quietly, waiting for Jayce to collapse in the snow and then transporting him to the base of the mountain, leaving before Jayce had any idea who saved him. Instead he makes SUCH A DRAMATIC PRODUCTION of it that Jayce remembers and can repeat the steps of the action years later, well enough that he actually produces a working spell from a barely-tested Hextech prototype. Mage Viktor wants that shit burned into baby Jayce's brain. He wants to make sure he fundamentally alters the arc of Jayce's life, bending it into a trajectory that collides with his own.

Viktor also (as far as we see) doesn't go the route of going back in time and killing his younger self, or steering the course of his own life along a path where he never meets Jayce. He doesn't even go for a timeline where he and Jayce meet each other but they don't invent Hextech. Now maybe it's the case that some time before our Jayce arrives in his timeline, Mage Viktor tried all that, and has figured out that none of those options work. (Maybe in some of those timelines Jayce is the one who goes Machine Herald, and there's no partner there to talk him off the ledge of ending the world.) But I think it's also possible that, now that he's gotten the experience in one timeline of spending years with Jayce making once-in-a-generation scientific breakthroughs together (which I truly believe is just as important a part of their relationship to Viktor as any romantic or sexual element might be)...he can't bear to deny any version of himself the chance of having that--even if the price is the rest of the world. Because a world where Jayce isn't his partner isn't a world worth saving.

So what I think Mage Viktor is doing is sitting there with his stubborn engineer brain and the husk of his dead soulmate, fiddling with the timelines like a Rubik's cube, going Not meeting Jayce CANNOT be the only option. There MUST be a timeline where Jayce and I meet each other and entangle our lives in an alarmingly codependent way AND we dodge the apocalypse at the last minute, I don't end up killing him, and we do not doom the world together. And I'm going to fucking find it.

So he's been hitting timeline after timeline, trying to find the combination of factors where everything works. He is not trying to preemptively save every timeline from himself, he is trying to prove to himself that meeting the love of his life doesn't doom the entire fucking world. It's devotion that is SO PROFOUNDLY SELFISH that he is willing to doom timeline after timeline, but driven by someone with enough compassion and pride that he doesn't want the guilt and shame of knowing he can only have this one life-changing thing if he ruins everything else for everyone, and enough arrogance to still look at this as a problem he must be smart enough to solve.

At some point in this process, I think he also figures out that Jayce is the only person who has any chance of reasoning with any version of himself. I think it's worth paying attention to the exact wording of his "in all timelines, in all possibilities" speech, because it's not just a love confession (although it is that).

"I thought I could bring an end to the world's suffering. But when every equation was solved, all that remained were fields of dreamless solitude. There is no prize to perfection. Only an end to pursuit. In all timelines, in all possibilities, only you can show me this."

And while this is some hella romantic cosmic soulmate level shit, it is also Viktor saying I need you, because you are the only person I have ever trusted enough to save me from myself.

It's the Hexcore promise all over again. Viktor knew he couldn't destroy his own creation. I read this not as Viktor being physically unable to destroy it because the Hexcore had some power over him, but not having the will to destroy it. Because this huge leap in Hextech technology was his big breakthrough and not (as I think he saw it) him supporting Jayce's dream. He knew he couldn't do it. So he asked Jayce to do it for him. Please, save me from my own pride, my desire to leave a legacy. I can't do it on my own.

It's a huge extension of trust, for Viktor to admit such a need. And now he's doing it again when the stakes are MUCH MUCH higher. I need you, because you are the only person who can show me the horror of what I am about to do and have me believe it.

Of course, the deep irony is that really the only person Viktor trusts to tell him he is wrong is HIMSELF FROM THE FUTURE. Astral plane Machine Herald Viktor is standing right behind Jayce, watching Jayce's memory of Mage Viktor telling him what the consequences of his actions will be, and that is the moment the horror sinks in and cracks him fully out of his machine shell.

But of course Jayce is the only person he would ever trust enough to carry such a message (from himself!!) to somewhere close enough to reach him.

It's not clear exactly how much of a detailed plan Mage Viktor has when he sends Jayce back to the main timeline, or how much of that plan he shares with Jayce. But I think he has figured out some broad strokes which affect how Jayce behaves.

(1) Jayce has to immediately go and kill commune Viktor. Squishing Salo is maybe a bonus side quest, but Jayce doesn't even take time to fucking shower before he heads for the commune. (I would love to see the part of the conversation where Mage Viktor is like yeah you know that pit you just climbed out of? Yeah the first thing you gotta do is go right back in there, all the way to the bottom, and find me looking like ethereal cyborg Jesus and blast a fucking hole through my chest.) Maybe this is because if Jayce waits around at all, commune Viktor finds a way to get to him and he folds and joins the cult. Maybe this is because there are just fewer variables involved in forcing Viktor to speedrun his own villain arc by Jayce repeatedly turning him down in one "perfect" form after another. Maybe Mage Viktor knows himself well enough to realize "yeah if you say no to me even ONE TIME but ESPECIALLY when you are HOT and SUFFERING I will go fucking apeshit and we can use that to our advantage."

(2) I think Mage Viktor has realized that he can only be stopped at the very very VERY last minute. He has to be able to see the direct line between what he is about to do right now and the arcane-blasted hell world he's about to create. Otherwise his ego will get in the way and tell him he is smart enough to figure out a way to somehow not kill everybody. Yeah Mage Viktor fucked that one up obviously, but I, main timeline Viktor, will be smart enough and well-intentioned enough when the time comes to simply not do that. I think this is why, for example, Jayce doesn't go to the commune trying to get Viktor to see the error of his ways. It won't work until it is allllmost too late.

Main timeline Viktor stops literally seconds before the point of no return. The arcane corruption spikes that we see everywhere in Mage Viktor's world are already starting to appear.

I think Mage Viktor knows that Jayce has to let him get right up to the edge, close enough to be looking over into the abyss, before he'll be able to pull him back.

But he knows Jayce can do that. That's what they do for each other, right?

This is why I think it was always the plan for Jayce to fight him all the way to the top of the Hexgate, and then surrender. Jayce has to survive until the end of the fight, and maybe for magical physics reasons he has to wait until Viktor sends the anomaly into the sky above the Hexgate. But once they get to the top of the Hexgate tower he stops trying to fight Viktor altogether. Maybe Mage Viktor told him exactly when it had to happen or maybe he just realizes this is the exact same place where he died in Mage Viktor's world; this is his last chance. But in any case, Jayce lands on the top of the Hexgate on his knees and he doesn't try to get up.

He waits, and when he senses Viktor behind him he doesn't try to fight or run away.

I think he knows, either because Mage Viktor told him or through his own intuition, that he has to let Viktor pull him into the astral plane if he wants a chance at reaching him.

How exactly he was going to get through to him and/or get close enough to share the memories before Viktor assimilated him...ehhhh I don't know if either of them had that figured out. The "you were never broken" part of Jayce's speech, while important from a character perspective...very crucially DOES NOT WORK. IT DOES NOT WORK AT ALL. Viktor is assimilating Jayce the whole time. You can see Jayce's astral body changing from the unique version that's still him (like his hands on the left, when he first enters the astral plane--which still look more or less human even though Viktor has already erased "imperfections" like the scrapes and cuts from his time in the pit and the arcane corruption that's spreading up and down his arm from where the rune is embedded) into a featureless gold blob like the other assimilated people.

You can watch the gold light creeping up his body steadily during those lines until it reaches his eyes.

The ONLY thing that stops this timeline from ending the same way Mage Viktor's does...is EKKO.

I think you can make the case that Mage Viktor sent Ekko to the no-Hextech timeline intentionally. But it is such a complex chain of causality for Ekko to get to the point where he's chucking a time machine at Herald Viktor's face that there is no way anyone--even a remorseful demigod with lots of time on his hands--could control every possible factor.

However elaborate Mage Viktor's plan was, and however determined Jayce was to keep his promise to him, it all would have failed if not for factors outside their control and random fucking chance.

Arcane is FULL of near-misses and what-could-have-beens and characters who are trying their best to do something getting knocked off course by consequences they never could have foreseen. Season 2 in particular introduces a persistent thread of chaos and the sense that even events that have understandable root causes are now spiraling out of characters' control. So it feels fitting that such a moment factors into the show's ending.

This is Jayce right before Ekko blasts through spacetime right above Viktor's head.

Yeah that guy was cooked.

The only thing that stops Jayce from being assimilated is Ekko breaking time to throw the Z drive at Viktor's face.

Which startles Viktor enough that he takes his hand off Jayce's head in the physical realm, and also breaks a piece of his machine mask off in the astral realm.

As he always does when one of his "perfect" bodies gets damaged, Viktor withdraws and tried to hide, enough that he lets go of the assimilation connection with Jayce.

Jayce starts to regain his own identity/autonomy.

And he gets a do-over. Exactly the same way Ekko used the Z drive to get a do-over with Jinx when he was trying to talk her out of suicide. Jayce gets another chance, and that's when he goes for "all I want is my partner back" and "because I promised you." Which works.

Mage Viktor's plan, I think, was for Jayce to help main timeline Viktor realize what he was doing before it was too late, and then give him the runestone, which allows him to release all the minds/souls that are connected to him before this becomes some runaway chain reaction of arcane power that swallows everything around him. (How the runestone does this exactly, and how the anomalies play into it, is stuff I am still thinking about. But tbh I am less concerned with the details of made-up magic physics than I am with the character beats.) Mage Viktor had accepted that main timeline Viktor was probably going to die in this process and he'd made peace with it. That's what "should" have happened anyway, if Viktor never found a way to forestall his illness, right? As long as this Viktor got to spend the best years of his life with his Jayce, it was okay.

I don't think Mage Viktor ever expected Jayce to stay there until the end. His goal was to save the world and spare Jayce from himself. And why would he plan otherwise? We know why Jayce stays, but Mage Viktor never got that part of the story. He schlorped up his own Jayce's consciousness with everyone else and maybe he only understood the depths of what Jayce felt for him in the moment that he was killing him. And main timeline Viktor certainly does not expect Jayce to stay. He's shocked when he realizes Jayce has no intention of leaving. No, that wasn't part of any master plan. That part was all Jayce.

[arcaneconfessions]

Actually,  I don't like the concept of Felicia because she oversimplifies the story and creates plot holes.

Now suddenly Vander didn't pick up two orphans because he blamed himself for the violence, and wanted it to stop. It's not because he saw how it affected the children of Zaun, and decided right there to make a change for the future.  But because he happened to know their mom (which then brings the question. If Felicia's kids are so important to him, why are they in the thick of things? You'd think they'd have them somewhere safer.)

Also, in season one act one, Silco didn't know the kids. And even ignoring that plot hole, it still muddies things up.  Now his arc isn't about learning to care for a child, and understanding how that kind of personal connection can change your perspective. Because, he already cared for them before his sad sad case of amnesia. 

So now it's about him caring about the girls, then not caring, then caring about Jinx again. That's not an arc, that's a meandering circle. 

Instead of the men bonding with the respective girls,  because of their own personality and history. Where Vander was dealing with his own guilt, and trying to attone. Where Silco saw his own trauma reflected in Jinx, and chose to guide her in the way he wished to be. It's now “Oh they know their mom, that's why!” Which is far less intriguing and character driven.

Speaking of, instead of their fallout- and Vander’s subsequential murder attempt- being about the widening gap of their ideologies, or plans. It's now been boiled down to “When she died, I lost my head”

Okay, but that's worse. You do get how this is worse, right. Instead of Silco being the thing “worse than enforcers” as said before. He was someone mourning his friend, just to get nearly murdered by his other friend who decided to blame it all on him. 

Then, we're left to actually try to figure out when this drowning attempt even happened, since we now confirmed it's during the day of ash. Are we to believe that Vander dropped his gauntlets (symbolically representing his path of non violence) picked up the girls, tucked them into bed...then took Silco down by the river? That kind of flies in the face of the characterization Vander gave himself in the letter, of it being a heat of the moment thing.  Ya know, for Felicia.

And is now a good time to mention that Vander appears younger in the drowning flashback,  than he did in the opening scene? I was led to believe it happened years before. Absolutely muddled.

And, when everyone just happens to know everyone else, then the world just feels smaller. Which is a shame, because the team behind season one made non champion characters, to avoid this very feeling.

Not everything is about shipping, sometimes people hate bad writing…because it's bad. Also, she's in a committed relationship with Connol, and even having his baby. In what way would anyone assume that she's “getting in the way” of any ship? (Unless you have a Connol ship you're passionate about, I guess?)

You're not gonna convince me that inventing a fridged woman to slap on top of Silco and Vander’s backstory is feminist in any way. 

.

[toxinoire]

While Polites isn't my fave, he seems very strong willed but very traumatized and Open Arms shows it.

It's the fact that he's a soldier, he's killed people, he's seen the filth of the world.

He chooses to greet the rest of the world's beauty with kindness and open arms, but for a more twisted traumatized reason.

Listening to the song, you hear these specific lines: "I see in your face, there's so much guilt inside your heart" and "So why not replace it and light up the world? Here's how to start: greet the world with open arms"

It feels enthusiastic, until you recall that Polites is also a soldier.

Come on, "I know that you're tired of the war and bloodshed" so is he. "You can show a person that you trust them when you stop and lower your guard" He wants to trust more people, but ones he knows he can trust. For example: Ody, Eury, the crew. He wants them to have open vulnerability, because they're all traumatized and should, quite frankly, be open with each other.

He should have the same guilt as Odysseus. He has just as much blood on his hands as Odysseus. He does. But he lets go of the guilt, why? Those are the filth of the world, they're not the ones you can embrace with open arms, they're not the amazing parts of life.

Polites is ruthless in his own way. He greets the beautiful things in life with kindness and open arms, yes. But I'm sure he wouldn't hesitate to rid of the filth in it. The Lotus Eaters for example: they welcomed them on the island. They hadn't tried to attack, hadn't been on guard. No, they were all "Welcome :D" which is why Polites believed them to be nice, and he was willing to believe that because he literally just got back from killing multiple Trojans.

In the Cyclops Saga, Polites doesn't even protest killing Polyphemus. If he's truly as kind as he appears, he probably would have protested. He'd probably tell Ody that they killed his friend first, try to negotiate more. Maybe he'd be the one to negotiate. But he doesn't, he was also one of those soldiers fighting Polyphemus, but he had died.

But one might say "Oh but in the Underworld his last thoughts-" Yeah true, but when you're on the brink of death, after seeing so much filth in the world, you'll want to see something nice in it.

He wanted to still see the beauty of the world even as he was smashed by a club. Wanted Odysseus to let go of the guilt as Ody is very much a dear friend of his and doesn't want him to suffer, so he tries to convince him to at least see the beauty of the world.

He wasn't intending for Odysseus to try to be merciful or spare his enemies, he just wanted him to see the remaining beauty in an otherwise filthy world.

Polites is actually more layered if you take note that he's a soldier. He wasn't naive and too trusting, he just wanted to see good in an otherwise bad world. That was a trauma response.

[johndonneswife]

i have a serious problem called ‘being normal’ and it manifests in such an undeniable way when i’m around random friends who know nothing about 1d / my ~internet history~ because sometimes a random h*rry song will start playing wherever we are and i’ll just go: ‘oh. did you hear he died?’

and the worst part is that im so earnest about it people BELIEVE me and then eventually it’s just like ‘oh kari why’d you lie about that ugly man being dead? why would you do that? what’s his deal?’ and then i have to pretend to be normal agaaaain and again and again and not say shit like ‘and many false prophets will arise and lead many astray’ because if i start quoting matthew they’re going to think i’m religious and i can’t have people thinking that, so then i’ll have to correct myself by saying ‘no i was just deeply obsessed with the biblical elements on the cw’s supernatural in 2014 and need a lobotomy’

and then i’m digging my own grave all over again. i fear

[tackrusso]

whoa okay. i just had the thought that the way the program is set up there is easily the possibility that they didn't just do it once. it's not LIKELY (and i know br didn't intend to leave that loophole open) but for all we know they ran the entire phase 2 already and juilliard didn't like how it ended, so he reset the whole thing and made them do it all over again the good place style. this could have happened several times for all anyone knows. there could be a hundred universes where min died halfway through the program and juilliard just kept correcting it over and over until there was finally a universe in which she lived

[snarltoothed]

this would be so funny to send as a middle-aged wife whenever your good for nothing husband who fell either into addiction or abusiveness when he got laid off in 2008 starts acting up but you’re 55 looking 45 and he’s ambiguously in his 60s and unlike him you didn’t age out of your sense of humor and ability to socialize so he just has to humble himself and shut up

image found while on google images ©

[pholla-jm]

My Wife is Real

IMAGINE: MY WIFE IS REAL~ GOJO X WIFE!READER GENRE: FLUFF cw: not proof read. use of y/n. use of she/her. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Who do you think he’s texting?” Nobara whispers to her two classmates, Yuji and Megumi. 

Their teacher, Gojo Satoru, sat at his desk. Legs kicked up onto the desk while he was on his phone, giggling here and there. 

It was questionable if Gojo even knew that class had started. 

Megumi didn’t even bother to pay attention. He also sat on his phone, scrolling through social media. 

“I don’t know…” Yuji ponders. “Ugh, he has to be harassing a poor soul.” Yuji gasps at Nobara’s response, “no.” 

Nobara sits up in her seat, “Gojo-sensei,” she calls out. Gojo peeks up, “oh. I didn’t know you were here.” “Maybe if you stopped bothering people, you would notice.” 

Gojo places his hand on his chest and gasps dramatically. “I am not bothering anyone.” “Then who are you texting?” “My wife, duh.” 

Nobara bursts out laughing, “hahaha, yeah… yeah right.” She wheezes. Tears left the corner of her eyes as she tried to take him seriously, but she really couldn’t. 

Yuji just stares at him in confusion, “you’ve never told me about his wife. I don’t believe you.” 

Gojo gasps in shock and disbelief at his student’s words. “Huh?! I do too have a wife. That hurts my feelings that you don’t believe me!” 

Gojo’s full focus was on his students now. Trying to convince them that his wife is indeed real. “She’s literally the best person in the whole world, and the prettiest.” 

Nobara scoffs and rolls her eyes, “stop making things up Gojo-sensei. It’s getting sad at this point.” 

Gojo pouts at her words. He then grabs his phone, typing something in his phone. He puts his phone down with a triumphant smile on his face. “You’ll see.” 

“Yeah… we’ll see.” Nobara says to Megumi and Yuji. 

Megumi on the other hand was not paying attention to a single thing that was going on. He assumed something stupid was going on, so why even bother to pay attention? Yuji just has a thoughtful look on his face, trying to remember any mention of a wife. But there is no mention of one. 

“Yeah… I think you’re making this up… sorry Gojo-sensei.” “This is just getting sad…” Nobara whispers while shaking her head. 

“I can’t believe my student’s have little faith in me.” 

Only five minutes passed of slight bickering between until a knock was heard at the door. The bickering died down and all heads turned towards the door. 

Nobara’s and Yuji’s eyes widen seeing a woman at the door. 

“Who is that?” Yuji whispers to Nobara. She shrugs her shoulders, “has to be someone he hired.” 

Gojo jumps from his chair, a huge smile on his face. “Wifey!” 

He runs over to you, pulling you into a tight hold. 

You let out a strangled gasp from the impact. “Gojo,” you start, “this is the second time you forgot your lunch… and it’s only Tuesday.” 

Gojo pulls back, a faux pout on his lips, “I’m sorry.” You narrow your eyes at him, “I bet you’re just using this as an excuse to see me.” “Whoops, you caught me. Well, while you’re here. Let me introduce you to my students.” 

“Wait wait-” You didn’t get a chance to stop him because he dragged you into the front of the classroom. 

You eye the three students. Megumi had finally put down the phone, giving you an apologetic look. Nobara and Yuji were looking at you in shock. 

“Students, this is my wife, (y/n).” Gojo basically shows you off with a bright smile on his face. Hands in a jazz hand formation. You nervously smiled at the students. 

“Hello.” 

“Hello Gojo-san.” Megumi quietly said, but it was still loud enough for everyone to hear. You gave the boy a sweet smile, nodding at him. 

“What?! Do you know her?” Nobara and Yuji ask him. “Yes…” 

“Yes, they’ve known each other for quite awhile now…. Sorry guys. She’s a bit shy.” Gojo says while you continue to smile at them. 

“They didn’t believe Gojo-sensi had a wife..” Megumi tells you. 

You hum before turning to Gojo, “I see… I don’t blame them.” 

“Huh?! What is that supposed to mean?” You roll your eyes. “Ever so dramatic.” “...so mean.. How can my wife be so cruel?” 

“Ugh, no one cares,” Nobara sighs, “come sit down with us (y/n)-sensei. I have so much to ask you.” 

You just smile at the girl and move over to the desks. 

Gojo looks at you with a shocked look. Not believing that you were leaving his side. 

“What are you doing?” He asks you. You look back at him, “well, you wanted me to meet your students. So I’m getting to know them.” 

You give him a little smirk and Gojo knows that type of smirk. The one where he’s going to regret his actions later. 

Maybe not now, but he knows that this decision will come to bite him.

[clanwarrior-tumbly]

What about the Doors/Pressure shopkeepers trying to pretend they aren't giving their crush special treatment when in groups. Like, special inventory, discreet discounts, all that jazz

Jeff (Doors)

"Oye, I see what you're doin', Jeff. Thought you weren't one for giving out freebies."

*shrug*

"Don't play dumb! I saw you sneak the skeleton key into their bag! Even Bob's a witness!"

No matter what El Goblino says, Jeff will just wave off any accusations of him giving you "special treatment" whenever you stopped by the shop with your group.

While none of them donated to the tip jar, you were the only one who ever did...and even when you came back again and again, it was always you who showed him charity.

The rest of your group would just argue over what to spend their money on, try to rush ahead, mess with his radio, etc. etc.

But you trust Jeff, and he trusts you <3

So you get small discounts on his wares, and despite him not being able to speak, you could tell he's only looking after you.

The goblin jokes about Jeff's little "crush" on you...then he sees the entity's eyes widen and realizes "wait amigo,,I wasn't being serious do you actually like them?????"

He just shoos him away and will deny it to kingdom come, but it is true.

The moment you realized his feelings for you was when Rush attacked the shop once, and you thought you were done for-

When Jeff instinctively pulled you behind the counter and slammed the shutter down, keeping you uncomfortably close (yet somehow you've never felt safer).

When it's all over, he blushes and lets you go free.

You thank him with a small kiss on the forehead(?) and promise to see him again soon.

The next time you get duped by Dupe, or attacked by Eyes, Timothy, Screech, or a snare and need to heal...you discover a few bandaids in your pocket that weren't there previously...

Huh.

Wonder who gave you those?

Sebastian (Pressure)

Normally, Sebastian doesn't care to make personal connections with any of the expendables.

He's just there as their supplier before seeing them off on their journey, hoping they're putting his resources to good use.

But recently he's been seeing you more often, coming by with a new group or by yourself, trying your best to survive long enough to reach him.

Ofc, you've died to stupid things before (or maybe you're just trying to get all the monster documents..in which he's convinced you're some masochist), but you did have the most common sense out of your group and didn't try to annoy him.

The others just waste flash beacon charges on trying to blind the poor guy and stick the keycard in a medkit they couldn't afford...and for what?

Why do your "friends" do that? Are they stupid or something?

You tell them to stop, and it's...actually kinda nice to hear somebody willing to defend him.

People usually don't give a shit about the giant scary fish's feelings, yet for some reason you do.

Of course, Sebastian was reasonably suspicious about it.

"Are you acting this way just to get a freebie?" He assumes. "Because if you are, then you're definitely as stupid as-"

"No, I'd never do that to you." You shake your head. "You're here, helping us survive out there, risking a lot to get us those supplies...is it wrong for me to appreciate that?"

"......"

He goes quiet for a minute, but after the rest of your group leaves, he asks you to stay for a moment.

"You were looking at this Necrobloxicon for a while...you must reeeeally want it, huh?" He grins, flicking his tail where the book was strapped. "It's a rarity."

"I...can't afford that. I'm fine with this dingy flashlight-"

"It's yours for 70% off. Take it or leave it."

You do a double take. "Wait, wha-"

"70% off. Take it. Or leave it." He says through gritted teeth, impatient, only to smile when you accept the deal without further question. "Good. Now don't go telling anyone I'm offering discounts. That's your only one unless I feel generous. Capiche?"

"Gotcha. Thank you, Seb. This means a lot. I hope to see you again soon." You smile back, holding the spooky book tightly, and leave him alone with his thoughts.

And a warm and fuzzy feeling in his chest-

Wait.

"Oh no....what the fuck am I doing????? That's it! NO more discounts for anyone, Sebastian!" He scolds himself.

Little does he know, he's gonna keep giving them out, but only for you.

[wilwheaton]

Hey man, I could use a few talking points to help convince a friend that Musk is horrible. I'm reading 'Think Again' by Adam Grant (good read btws) and he says to help convince people to come to your viewpoint that it can be good to have 2 or 3 strong points instead of 10 mixed points. The counter argument I get from people about Musk being good is that he did spacex and tesla, and without him we'd be decades behind. Maybe, but I don't have good ammo. Please help as I get too angry tobe critical

Well, listen, the fascism, the transphobia, the chaos, and the unwavering support for autocrats all over the planet really ought to be enough to outweigh anything else, if you ask me. It sounds like you know some people who got excited about the companies he threw money at, and they are having a tough time updating their feelings due to current events. Or maybe they share his values and don't want to admit that.

But I'll try to offer some simple facts.

He did not do engineering with Tesla or SpaceX or even PayPal. He is a fraud. He walked into these existing businesses, where people had done actual work and engineering, threw some of his Apartheid money at them, and took credit for their work. He claims, over and over again, to be a founder of these companies, and that's just straight up a lie that is easily disproved.

He literally did nothing except throw money at people and take credit for their work. Look at every Tesla up to the (chokes back laughter) Cybertruck. Those Teslas look like cars, because they were designed by engineers. Look at the Cybertruck. When you stop laughing at what a joke it is, know this: that's what happens when Elon Musk is in charge. It's like a ten year-old with some crayons drew it on a menu at Denny's.

All of the things his weird fans claim he made possible, are things that would have happened, and were in the process of happening, without him. He literally did nothing to advance the technologies or engineering. In fact, SpaceX whistleblowers have told reporters how they had to keep Musk occupied with bullshit, so they could do the real work without him fucking it up all the time with his incompetence.

But even if he were telling the truth, even if the myth were fact, it would not outweigh the damage, the pain, the chaos, and the suffering he has inflicted on millions and millions of people, all over the world with his lies, his spread of misinformation, and his incitement of angry incels.

Also, don't forget, when Ukraine was trying to defend itself, he turned off Starlink access when they could have decisively ended Russia's aggression. A lot of people have suffered and died as a direct consequence of that action, which he took to support his buddy and fellow autocrat, Vladimir Putin.

That's more information than I think your friends will be willing to hear. Studies indicate that people who are heavily invested in the myth of a person will fight hard to hold onto the myth, and reject truth and facts, because it's so jarring to them. Musk has built a cult of personality, and maybe your friends are stuck to it.

I'd gently encourage your friends to consider one key fact: he has lied about his entire origin story, he has lied about his contributions to Tesla and SpaceX. He lies about everything, except when he posts on Twitter like a 12 year-old edgelord, because that's who he is, emotionally.

Finally, and this is for you, specifically: if your friends insist on supporting a fascist, a racist, a misogynist, or a bigot, because they think rockets are cool, maybe it's time to look for new friends.

I hope this helps.

And fuck Elon Musk.

[thelibrarian1895]

If your sibling is a rogue then make the best of it

I would like to think that Jason is very Hondo Onakha about kidnapping, very dramatic, fairly polite/chill to the one he kidnapped, minimal trauma, very professional overall but also very theatrical. Out of anyone in Gotham to have as your kidnapper, Jason aka the Red Hood is by far the very best person.

ALL of Jason's family whether they be legal, biological, emotional, or honorary, will absolutely try to convince Jason to kidnap them to get them out of some stupid civilian event. Whether or not Jason will go along with it will depend on several factors such as:

Does this benefit Bruce and get him out of a boring civilian event too? Then so sorry, you're just going to have to suffer!

How busy is Jason at the moment? Because being a drug lord and vigilante is actually pretty time consuming and kidnapping can be a lot of work for potentially very little gain.

What does Jason get out of it? Yes money is all well and good but Jason is rich by his own merits and can just steal from Bruce whenever, there's got to be more to it!

When is the last time Jason has kidnapped this sibling? He can't do it too often or it gets less effective. He has a reputation to maintain after all!

It may also depend on which sib is asking and what they need to be "saved" from.

Dick asks to be kidnapped from a bachelor auction charity? Ha! No chance, sorry Dickie! He will be there though and take pictures and laugh. (And also join all the other siblings who are stalking Dick and the winner of the auction in the event the winner wasn't one of the Bats or an invited member of the JL or Titans using Bruce's money) Dick asking to be kidnapped from a gala or some opening night of trendy place he's at to maintain civilian status? Maybe but the bribe has to be considerable. And it cannot benefit Bruce. Dick's normal bribes consist of taking some tedious part of an investigation over for Jason or getting intel from JL databases for Jason and the Outlaws.

Cass? Anytime and always, favorite sister who can beat him up has special kidnapping privileges, though they did stop for a very long time when some weirdos put out the theory that the Red Hood was in love with Gotham's Princess. (idk if Cass is considered Gotham's Princess in any version of canon but she is to me) Cass does still repay Jason in the form of Black Bat keeping an eye on Jason's territory when he's out of Gotham for any significant length of time.

Tim? He does owe the kid for several incidents and Tim normally doesn't abusive the privilege so he'd probably do it but there does have to be some sort of bribe for appearances sake. Tim usually gets Jason to agree in exchange for pictures of Batman tripping over his cape or in some other ridiculous position. Bonus in Jason's mind if Tim requests a kidnapping when Bruce is off world or otherwise occupied, therefore giving Brucie Wayne's reputation a hit. However if Tim wants to be kidnapped from something where Bruce is also suffering as Brucie, Tim is SOL (Tim might get revenge by getting Kon to wear Red Hood gear and "kidnap" Tim from the event if Jason refused. Kon will do it because Tim asked and also I would like to think that Kon isn't too fond of the guy who beat his best friend/boyfriend nearly to death and will mess with him if given the chance) Since kidnapping normally interferes with things that Tim wants to do however, he may instead bribe Jason to not kidnap a sibling that has asked to be kidnapped. Jason usually obliges this no kidnapping request.

Barbara? Sorry, no, he doesn't want to stress the Commissioner like that. He will, however, kidnap other people for her if she asks.

Stephanie? No Stephanie, he doesn't care what you offer, he's not kidnapping you so you can avoid your finals! Stephanie has, however, worn various wigs and been various hostages who died at the hands of the Hood in order to maintain his reputation. She gets paid in baked goods for her service.

Damian? Damian considered the idea ridiculous and proclaimed he'd never stoop so low and he would carry out his duties no matter how onerous! Damian then had to go to a Gotham gala. Damian is trying very hard to figure out a suitable bribe to get the Red Hood to kidnap him often enough that Bruce will be forced to keep Damian away from galas because of the ongoing security threat. So far it hasn't worked because Damian is very bad at bribing Jason, Jason thinks Damian forced to interact with normal people is funny, and Tim is successfully bribing Jason to ignore Damian's bribery attempts. The Red Hood has "kidnapped" Damian once, as a treat, when he thought the kid was looking particularly down about something.

Duke? Duke has yet to be made to attend any society gatherings as the solo Wayne (normally that falls to Bruce, Dick, or Tim) and can usually be spotted hanging out with Cass by the snack table at any gala or trendy event. He's not at Cass's level of reading body language but he's pretty darn good and he and Cass have reached a new level of being able to avoid annoying rich people while at parties. Duke is Cass's favorite gala buddy. Duke hasn't felt the need to ask Jason to kidnap him yet but Jason will allow the first one to be free of charge, no questions asked. After that Duke hasn't figured out suitable bribes for Jason but has realized that all of his siblings are hyper competitive and that Jason would absolutely wager a kidnapping in a competition or for a bet.

Alfred? If Alfred asked then Jason would without any caveat. Alfred will not ask however but might ask on behalf of someone else and Jason will comply.

Bruce? Jason just laughs. And if someone else is planning on kidnapping Brucie Wayne from a particularly boring business meeting or gala? Jason will actively thwart the kidnapping to force Bruce to continue to deal with social activity.

Jason usually splits a portion of the ransom money into bonuses for his goons since their original job outline is drug dealer/enforcer/mobster and not kidnapper. If they're going to get major felonies on their records, better make it financially worth it. All of Jason's goons are masked during any kidnapping event. The rest of the ransom money goes towards a charity of Jason's choosing.

Jason has also kidnapped people who are not his family or family adjacent. Barbara thought her dad could use a vacation at one point but he didn't have the PTO for it so Barbara had the Red Hood kidnap him. James Gordon experienced the weirdest kidnapping of his life that included some of the best food he'd ever eaten, an extremely soft bed, his pile of books that were on his reading list, and access to the sports games he'd meant to watch. The ransom was successfully paid after he had a week to relax. Gordon was then, as per protocol, allowed time to relax after his "harrowing" event. Barbara forced him to take the time. Strangely enough, some politicians who had been giving the Commissioner a hard time were suddenly very quiet when James Gordon came back, well rested, well fed, and ready to get back to the grind. It, of course, had nothing to do with the very polite emails with pictures attached that they all received while the Commissioner was very publicly out of the way.

Oliver Queen, when he was visiting Gotham, was kidnapped by the Red Hood. He was released after the ransom was paid and specifically he was released back in Star City. Mr. Queen was unavailable for comment after the incident but some sources say that he was cursing bats for some reason.

Lois Lane found herself kidnapped by Red Hood and ransomed by the Daily Planet while Superman was off world. Lois Lane returned safely to Metropolis and published a shocking expose on Luthor's latest scheme. Her sources for the article remain a secret.

Bruce is very grumpy about the whole thing, not just because Jason won't help his poor father get out of the stupid social event, but also because Jason being technically a rogue like this makes it very hard for him to successfully argue that Jason should let himself regain legal living status.

[nerissalmao]

Jones: *watches a bunch of clearly insane fairies insulting each other like crazy and pretending to be dead and ganging up on and harassing Annie to give them new names too because she accidentally named Red* Jones: .. This is so very subtle.

Gunnerkrigg Court

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

Murder, Love, and Destiny: An Eridan Ampora Character Study

Warnings for things from Homestuck, like discussions of child abuse, mental illness, murder, suicide, etc. etc.

Because there's a huge wall of text after this point, I'm going to summarize what I hope to convince you of in bullet point format, and then hope you'll actually read the rest of the text before arguing with me about it.

Eridan is the least casteist highblood, if you ignore all the slurs.

Those are his emotional support slurs.

Pale EriKar was not only canon, but set up to be endgame.

Eridan is incredibly plot-relevant, thematically relevant, and was definitely originally intended to be brought back to life, alongside the other dead trolls.

He's Sad.

The first thing we have to establish is what counts as "canon" for the purpose of this essay. I am only counting the original comic up to Game Over, after which there's a general consensus that Hussie kind of gave up on his original planned ending, and slapped together something that most people hate. So I am immediately disqualifying Pesterquest, supplementary material, fanworks deemed canon, the epilogues, and Homestuck^2.

Moreover, we are taking Hussie's commentaries with a grain of salt, for two reasons. The first reason is that I firmly believe - and will be arguing - that the original plan was to bring Eridan (and the other dead trolls) back; therefore, Hussie (who has a track record of playing coy with future plot twists) can't speak too fondly of him, lest he give it away. The second reason for de-emphasizing Hussie's words is that, post-retcon, Hussie isn't very well going to say that he had plans for a better ending, and then didn't execute on them; to save face, he has to act as though his trashing of several prior plot threads, including but not limited to Eridan, was the plan all along.

Therefore, this essay will not be putting too much emphasis on Word of God, and will instead be relying on textual evidence from the comic itself, of which there is plenty. So without further ado:

Eridan is a Consummate Murderer.

The reason I'm starting with this point is that, far more than any other, this truth lies at the core of his being. Eridan is formally introduced to us with a murder, and he's haunted by an overpowering genocide complex. He outright describes to Rose at one point that "killin is all i evver done practically," and uses "murder" as an expletive (ie "swweet stinkin murder"). With a conservative estimate of 5 kills per week for 4 sweeps (Vriska looks VERY young when she has to start killing, and Eridan was likely a similar age when he began), both Eridan and Vriska easily have bodycounts above 2000 - the real number is probably even higher.

At this point, many raise an objection that Eridan is only killing lusii, but I believe we need to count his kills as troll murders, for three reasons: first, a dead lusus results in the orphaned troll being culled; second, one has to assume he has had cases of trolls trying to defend their lusii, or coming after him for vengeance; and third - and most importantly - Eridan HIMSELF is thinking about the orphaned trolls.

Compare Feferi: Go Home:

That should keep her happy for a while. At least until she dies.

To Eridan: Go Home:

That should keep her happy for a while. And make a freshly orphaned troll somewhere very sad.

So Eridan, to a much greater extent than even Feferi, is thinking about the orphaned trolls he's leaving behind, and considers his own actions to be murder.

Now that we've established the facts regarding his murders - a rough bodycount, and the fact that, by his own admission, he barely had any hobbies outside of it - we can move on to the effect that it's had on him. It's not very good!

Vriska's manipul8tions and murders had to be done for her own sake - if she ever stopped, she died. Therefore, much of Vriska's personality revolves around justifying her own actions so she doesn't have to reckon with her softer feelings, like guilt or kindness - which she expresses would be viewed as scandalous by others of her caste.

But if Eridan ever stops feeding Gl'bgolyb, everybody dies. The stakes he has riding on his shoulders are, at all times, the fate of all trolls, including all his friends. Given Dualscar's title was "Orphaner," it's implied that killing lusii for Gl'bgolyb has always been a violet blood's duty, and is seen as such by the others, which is why nobody expresses gratitude for his hard work even a single time.

Which brings us to our next point:

Eridan is Crushed by Anxiety.

If Eridan stops killing lusii, everybody - especially his friends, but everybody else, too - dies.

If Eridan ever shows guilt or kindness, he'll be considered "weak" by the standards of highbloods - he shares this with Vriska.

Eridan is expected, by aristocratic tradition, to take on the mantle of his ancestor Dualscar and finish his work. Dualscar met a comedically cringefail end, so this is a massive undertaking.

Before finding out that god tiering is an option - so, for nearly his entire life - Eridan has had to live with the expectation that he will outlive all of his friends. The lowbloods from culling or dying on the battlefield, the highbloods from old age, and Feferi from being killed by the Empress when she gets old enough.

(This is reflected in who he talks to the most - Feferi, who's the only one with a natural lifespan longer than his, Vriska, who's a highblood, Kanaya, who's practically guaranteed to survive into adulthood, and Karkat, whose anonblood allows Eridan to give him the benefit of the doubt.)

Also if he can't land his concupiscent quadrants he'll die from that too, but that seems pretty secondary to the rest of his concerns.

He can't even make friends with the other highbloods, because sea dwellers are expected to hate and antagonize them.

He had a free ticket into adulthood, but would almost certainly be expected to join the army and serve as a commander. That is to say, his fate of performing the role of a vicious, murderous sea dweller seems dreadfully inevitable to him.

NO WONDER he can't stop having emotional breakdowns. NO WONDER his chatlogs swing wildly from relentless self-aggrandizement to traumadumping. NO WONDER he's obsessed with murder and death and genocide.

Doc Scratch calls him a "vengeful boy on the path of nihilism," and it's not hard to see why: Eridan's entire life has been about living up to the role imposed on him by society, sacrificing his own time and sanity for everyone else, which he "nevver got any appreciation for anywway." And all he had to look forward to was more of the same, all his friends dropping dead one by one before him. For Eridan, there has never been any hope.

SGRUB could have been a way out for him, but a combination of his own terrible choices, spurred on by his anxieties, and his teammates' unwillingness to knock some sense into him, meant that he only wound up mired even deeper in his hopelessness.

We all know about how Eridan wouldn't stop killing the angels on his planet, provoking their aggression and turning it into a ball of death. How he was definitely not supposed to be doing this, and how his stubborn insistence on it led to his further ostracization from the rest of the group. The thing is, when we look at his angel-murders from the point of view that Eridan's entire life has been about murdering things or else Something Bad™ happens, it actually starts to become... kind of sad.

KARKAT: BETWEEN A TRIGGERHAPPY PRINCE WITH A GOD WEAPON BLASTING ANYTHING THAT TWITCHED AND A MILLION CRAZED ANGELS HE DELIBERATELY ENRAGED, IT WASN'T WHAT I'D CALL AN IDEAL SOCIAL HUB. KARKAT: IF YOU WERE LONELY WHY DIDN'T YOU VENTURE OUT MORE OFTEN? ERIDAN: wwell i wwoulda but nobody else wwas vvolunteerin to pick up the slack on angel killin duties

Killing the angels is something he feels like his has to do, because his entire life has been about killing things he doesn't want to kill. He's unable to break out of that mindset on his own, and his unpleasant personality has scared off anyone who might want to help. No one on the team tries to understand his thought process on a deeper level, not even Karkat, who just tells him it was an idiotic thing to do without addressing his underlying anxieties at all. Indeed, "nobody understands."

And this is really the root of why I think so many people get the wrong read on Eridan - Eridan is constantly contradicting himself, constantly denying his own feelings, constantly pushing an image that he doesn't actually believe in, and constantly insisting that he's fine with all the horrible shit in his life - that he likes it, even. After all, he can't admit to his guilt for his murders, or how much he doesn't want to watch his friends die, or how scared he is about the future - that'd be weakness!

CC: I can't look after you anymore. CA: I DIDNT EVER NEED ANYONE TO LOOK AFTER ME CA: i was totally fuckin fine my ambitions were noble

You see his contradictory nature with his stated love of history, which he only ever offhandedly mentions - because he's not actually that interested in history, it's just something that's expected of someone of his station. And you see it with his wavy accent, which he himself calls "weird" and drops when he's trying to be emotionally sincere. And you see it with his dumbass outfit, which is very clearly an imitation of Dualscar (with the only exception being the wizard-ass scarf, because wizards are his actual interest. I don't believe he likes fashion. I genuinely believe - and Eridan himself says so - that he basically has no hobbies outside of murder).

Even being proud to be a sea dweller is pretty much an outright lie:

CC: You can't )(ave t)(e sort of affinity for "our kind" t)(at you profess if you've only spent, w)(at... CC: A few days underwater, maybe? IN YOUR W)(OL-E LIF-E!

One that he tells because he's SCARED OF THE OCEAN. Because he knows what lives in the ocean, because he's been feeding it his entire life. I see a lot of people who give Eridan an interest in marine life, and I'm telling you, that's just got no basis in canon. He's fucking TERRIFIED of the sea.

And for that matter, land dweller genocide. Eridan doesn't want to do it. Both Feferi AND his internal narration call him out for not actually wanting to do it. He outright states he wouldn't kill his friends.

CA: wwell CA: im not goin to vvery wwell kill you am i that wwould be fuckin unconscionable CA: wwhat kind of friend wwould i be

But he feels like he HAS to want it, HAS to believe in it, HAS to be talking about it constantly, because that's what's expected from him as a sea dweller, and a sea dweller is ALL that he will get to be. The mutation that puts a violet streak in his hair is damning. It's a fate he feels like he can't escape. Which brings us to:

Eridan is Not Actually Casteist, Well He Is But Not Like That, It's Complicated

Secondary title: Those Are His Emotional Support Slurs, Okay

In the exact same vein (haha) as secretly not wanting all the land dwellers dead, Eridan also genuinely doesn't feel like he's better than lower blood castes. Vriska and Equius obviously put quite a bit of stock into being nobility, and both have acted superior to Karkat for it. Feferi actually revels in her high status, and while she is genuinely well-meaning, she's not as interested in abolishing casteism as she is in changing the meaning of "culling" specifically (the hemocaste, aristocracy, and casteism still very much exist in a Beforus under her rule). Gamzee MIGHT be the only highblood less casteist than Eridan, but then again, as soon as he snaps, he does say a lot of casteist stuff to Equius, although it's unclear how serious he is, and he also proceeds to get really into his weird highblood clown cult.

Meanwhile, Eridan - despite all his slurs and talk of genocide - does not actually try to "pull rank" on a lowblood for being a lower caste than him with a single exception. That exception is Sollux... after he's already shown having entirely caste-neutral opinions on Sollux:

CC: But Sollux finally came t)(roug)(, and now I believe t)(e full c)(ain is complete! CA: man that guy CA: hes a fuckin drama machine it is fuckin pathetic CC: YOUR STUPID FIS)(Y FAC-E IS T)(-E DRAMA MAC)(IN-E T)(AT DO-ES NOT)(ING BUT W)(IN-E AND GLUB. CC: 38P CA: fuck SORRY CC: Anyway you s)(ouldn't say t)(at about )(im, )(e is a )(ero and )(e saved my life. CA: yeah sorry

CA: my feelins seem petty and meaninless noww CA: she had better things to wworry about than my ovverwwrought bullshit CA: like the dead guy wwho savved her CA: so forget it thanks anywway

It's only AFTER he's mad at Sollux for dating Feferi that he starts going in on Sollux with casteist rhetoric... which is treated as unrequited flirting and not serious casteism:

ERIDAN: hey finless this doesnt concern those wwith mustard sludge slippin through their vveins ERIDAN: its a matter for royalty only ERIDAN: so keep your mouth closed or ill slit you open ovver my next meal SOLLUX: w/e bro, not iintere2ted. FEFERI: -Eridan, please! I don't want to see any more dueling. FEFERI: Don't try to provoke )(im. It's not like I don't know w)(at you're doing! You keep trying to spark a rivalry wit)( )(im to get me to auspisticize between you two, and pull us out of our quadrant! FEFERI: It is t)(e oldest and lamest trick in t)(e book. It didn't work t)(en and it won't work now!

THEY don't even think he's being casteist.

In fact, directly contradicting this earlier argument he has with Feferi:

CC: T)(is is t)(e last time I will say t)(is. CC: W-E AR-E NOT B-ETT-ER T)(AN ANYBODY!!!!! CC: GLUB. >38( CA: pshh CA: hemospectrum begs to differ

He OUTRIGHT states his real feelings here:

CA: im the biggest fuckin idiot who ever lived CA: i cant BELIEVE i just opened up to you like a chump when i knew what was comin CA: i am one sad fuckin brinesucker CA: overemotional sappy trash youre right im not better than anybody CA: im worse than anybody CA: EVERYBODY CA: all the bodies

So the question of "is Eridan casteist" has an answer of "kind of, but also no." Eridan DOES espouse the rhetoric; he's constantly saying stuff that a casteist sea dweller "should" be saying. However, if you look at his ACTIONS, and the way he actually treats people, he doesn't actually care about blood color. He'll hit on anybody, and he's rude as fuck to everybody. The real problem with him is that he's terrible to talk to, not that he's discriminatory.

That's the thing about Eridan. Understanding him means looking past the way he presents himself, the lies he tells to himself, and even, at times, the way the narration presents him. His "overblown emotional theatrics" seem a lot less overblown when his problems ARE so real, deep-seated, and constantly causing him an unimaginable amount of anguish.

The problem is, the main people he has to bounce those problems against are Feferi, Vriska, and Kanaya, three of the people most comfortable with their privileged positions, for whom Eridan's genuine emotional distress seems like needless melodrama. Feferi loves being a princess, Vriska enjoys her noble privileges, Kanaya doesn't need to worry about culling. But for Eridan, his noble status, and the duties and expectations placed on him for it, have caused him nothing but pain - of course he would feel like nobody understands. Most of his closest friends genuinely don't, nor do they try to.

Because that's what he is at his core - a traumatized fucking child, who doesn't see any way out. Eridan is not a casteist genocidal sea dweller... he just wishes he was one, and tries to be one, because if he actually was one, he wouldn't feel so awful and scared and sad all the time. He'd be normal, like his friends.

The reason he constantly spouts anti-land dweller rhetoric and uses casteist language is to assuage this cognitive dissonance. That's why he has to come off so strong, present himself in such an aggrandized way, act like such a douchebag. They're his emotional support slurs. He doesn't actually believe what he says, which means he's a Bad Sea Dweller, which means he's Failing, which means Something Bad Will Happen, so he'd better get his ass in line and say something casteist!

And it's all made worse because:

Eridan is Dumb of Ass (and True of Word)

Oh my god you guys he's so stupid that it hurts.

Okay, that's not entirely fair. Eridan is clearly well-educated and book smart; he has some of the most elegant prose out of the trolls, and he's prone to going off on insane rants with it. (Actually, his language gets more flowery and showy when he's trying to impress a stranger, and gets progressively more laid back, chill, and even kind of "bro"-y when he starts talking to people he doesn't feel like he needs to impress.)

CA: at this point i find all her adorable black pixie dabblins to be prime kiddie playtime shit CA: all of her FRAUDULENT MAGICS cannot come close to posin threat to my mastery ovver the TRUEST SCIENCES CA: an wwith my empiricists wwand i servve as the righteous hope that wwill incinerate delusion and the deluded alike CA: my holy fire is the wwhite fury bled from the wwrath-wweary eyes of fifty thousand nonfictional angels CA: and wwhen theyre finished wweepin they wwill boww before their prince GG: wow what are you talking about

What I mean is this: his brain is so full of anxiety and cognitive dissonance and murder and death that he struggles to care about other people, which has devastating effects on his social skills. I go really in-depth on how his though process informs his behavior here. The question may have popped up in your mind already: if his casteism stuff isn't actually real, then what is Eridan actually like? The answer is, overwhelmingly, and discomfortingly, SINCERE.

This boy is gunning at 100% emotional earnestness 100% of the time, and it's deeply uncomfortable for others to deal with. He'll swing wildly from insults and derogatory language, to stating a desire to kill all land dwellers, to awe and amazement at his friends' prowess, to demanding that they do things for him, to traumadumping and venting, without missing a beat. Often in the same conversation.

CA: kan its hard GA: What CA: being a kid and growwing up CA: its hard and nobody understands

He's also specifically terrible at parsing hostility. Functionally, he interprets all hostility aimed AT him as either pitch/ashen flirting or "ironic repartee," and similarly views his own hostile words as verbal jousting, pitch/ashen advances, or even just factual descriptions of the world around him (ie calling Nepeta a "kittycat shipper cavve girl"). Hostility and aggression are just kind of his baseline, default state of being, and he basically has no ability to differentiate between good and bad attention. I talk more in-depth about his emotionally bereft upbringing (and shitty lusus) here, but suffice to say that our boy isn't getting any emotional support at home, and as a result, craves attention, no matter what kind.

This also means he's insanely gullible. For example, Rose calls him an idiot to his face, and then blows up his computer, sarcastically calling it "your first lesson in showmanship." Eridan proceeds to literally considers it that, blowing up Jade's computer after he's done talking to her. Furthermore, Kanaya sees him as a burden, insults him to his face, and pretty much just bullies him along with Rose for fun.

So she trains Eridan to become a powerful white wizard of hope to challenge her, as a joke.

And yet, in spite of all that, Eridan still has nothing but gratitude and praise for Kanaya:

ERIDAN: kan i been meanin to thank you KANAYA: For What ERIDAN: for all that trainin you did ERIDAN: i wwouldnt be the incredible holy wwizard i am noww wwithout your help KANAYA: But I Didnt Even Really Train You I Just Made You A Wand ERIDAN: yeah wwell thats all i needed i guess ERIDAN: i just needed for someone to showw a little faith in me so im sayin thanks i owwe ya KANAYA: Okay Then Youre Welcome KANAYA: I Hope You Use Your Magnificent Powers Of Light And Hope For Goodness And Purity And Lets Not Forget Science ERIDAN: dont wworry im all ovver that shit you dont evven knoww KANAYA: Uh Oh I Hope That Didnt Come Off As Too Sarcastic ERIDAN: wwhat KANAYA: The Thing I Just Said KANAYA: I Didnt Even Realize How Sarcastic I Was Being Its Starting To Become A Problem I Think KANAYA: Please Dont Take Too Much Offense ERIDAN: haha damn kan if thats your idea of offense bein made then i honestly gotta fuckin wworry for you ERIDAN: tell you wwhat ill givve you some lessons in dealin out the dark umbrage to repay you for your tutelage in the wwhite science

Like, he's in the middle of genuinely thanking her for believing in him, she makes fun of him to his face, and his response is to laugh it off and offer to teach her how to properly insult someone. It's honestly... kind of sad. Not that he doesn't deserve the ridicule, but what we're seeing here is a traumatized, emotionally neglected boy trying to communicate the best that he can that he loves and appreciates his friends, and receiving nothing but mockery in return.

It's really not a surprise, then, that he goes off the deep end. His entire life prior to the game has been shit; he got broken up with as soon as he entered the game (by someone who didn't even care enough not to use fish puns while doing it); he's ostracized and avoided for the game's duration; and then he spends the rest of his time on the meteor being bullied. He feels deeply hopeless and anxious about their situation because he literally doesn't know how else to exist, and his concerns are dismissed and mocked at every turn. When Feferi turns on him with intent to kill, that's his breaking point.

I see a lot of people say he goes grimdark, or succumbs to external influence somehow, but I don't think that needs to be true (nor is it) - he's just a deeply traumatized kid with almost no support network who's finally been pushed to the edge, despite displaying every possible warning sign and making multiple cries for help. Yes, ultimately, he's guilty for his own actions, but his killing spree - alongside Gamzee's and Vriska's - represents a cohesive failure as a team to address very clear problems in their midst.

So Feferi and Kanaya are sick of his ass. Sollux hates him platonically, Equius doesn't like him, and Nepeta thinks of him as a creep. Vriska is his awkward ex, and Terezi agrees with him when he calls himself pathetic. He never interacts with Tavros, Aradia, or sober!Gamzee. Is there anyone that treats him nicely?

Uh, okay, so I swear this isn't shipping goggles -

Pale EriKar Is Canon And I Can Prove It

So, I'm going to start this with a disclaimer: you can ship what you want to ship. I don't mind. I don't care. Headcanons are valid, death of the author, etc. What you do in your free time is up to you.

What I am attempting to argue in this section is that an Eridan/Karkat moirallegiance was heavily foreshadowed, one of the most heavily foreshadowed things in the entire comic, and - assuming that the original ending of Homestuck included all the dead trolls being brought back and redeemed - was going to be endgame. There's a torrential amount of evidence pointing to this, and very little of it is acknowledged even by the EriKar shippers, which is a shame.

At the very least, I'll be happy if I can convince some Karkat RPers to be extra nice to Eridans, because they are actually just friends who care deeply about each other. Canonically.

The first thing to note is that Eridan and Karkat, at least prior to SGRUB, talk all the time, to the point where Feferi feels the need to comment on it:

CC: You know, I'm not sure w)(y we never talk about our romantic aspirations. CC: We s)(ould more often. It is kind of -EXCITING! CA: shrug CC: Probably because you fill your gossip quota wit)( your nubby )(orned bro. CC: You leave not)(ing left to talk about wit)( your dear sweet moirail! CC: We are supposed to )(elp eac)( ot)(er wit)( t)(at stuff too, remember. CA: maybe CA: seems kinda CA: odd though

("Can you please stop having an emotional affair with Karkat" "Eh, I'll think about it")

The second thing to note is what the contents of those conversations entail. Sure, they "gossip," but it goes deeper than that, because they gossip about things that Karkat would NEVER gossip about with anybody else, because Karkat usually respects his "VERY GOOD FRIEND"s. For example, here Eridan mentions that Karkat has speculated on Kanaya's love life with him:

CA: you dont wwant to be our auspistice cause you dont wwant to get locked into that sort of relation wwith her i can respect that GA: No Thats Not It CA: yeah it is your real feelins run pretty awwful RUDDY methinks evverybody knowws it CA: especially that assblood karkat he and me havve you so pegged about that its upright silly

And it's not even a one-off thing, because here Karkat is again, mentioning Nepeta's crush on him:

KARKAT: OK, BUT TO BE FAIR, I'M PRETTY SURE SHE'S STILL OBSESSED WITH ME. KARKAT: IT'S A VERY UNFORTUNATE, VERY RED AND VERY UNREQUITED SITUATION I'VE BEEN TRYING TO TIPTOE AROUND FOR A LONG TIME, OK? KARKAT: HER DISINTEREST IN YOUR ADVANCE WASN'T A REFLECTION ON YOU AT ALL. KARKAT: COME ON, WE TALKED ABOUT THIS.

It's a situation he's been trying to "tiptoe around for a long time," and he tells ERIDAN, of all people? MULTIPLE TIMES? (AND HE ALSO TELLS ERIDAN THAT THE REJECTION WASN'T HIS FAULT???? WHAT??????)

So we've established that they talk frequently and about some pretty seriously sensitive topics. But did you know that they also talk about... their feelings?

See, the thing is, Karkat has always been weirdly nice to Eridan. Here he is in a memo near the very beginning of their game, when Karkat is at his most "rah rah, I'm the big bad leader":

FCA: i got a problem FCA: wwith feferi FCA: and im really kinda sittin here in bad shape about it emotionally speakin CCG: OK, WELL CCG: I GET THAT, I HEAR YOU BRO CCG: BUT THIS IS STILL NOT THE RIGHT PLACE FOR THIS SO I'VE GOT TO BAN YOU. CCG banned FCA from responding to memo. CCG: BUT SERIOUSLY JUST GET IN TOUCH WITH ME IN PRIVATE ABOUT IT, OK MAN? CCG: WE'LL GET YOUR SHIT STRAIGHTENED OUT.

Compare that to Tavros asking for advice later down in the same memo:

PAT: sINCE i DON'T KNOW WHERE YOU ARE NOW, bUT MAYBE HELP ME, PAT: aBOUT A THING THAT HAS TO DO WITH A GIRL, PAT: lIKE, PAT: a ROMANCE THING, yOU MIGHT KNOW ABOUT, CCG: YOU PEOPLE ARE IMBECILES. CCG: ALL OF YOU. CCG: I AM NOT POSTING THESE MEMOS TO COUNSEL YOU ON YOUR PAST AND FUTURE DATING PROBLEMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CCG: WHY ARE YOU ALL SUCH BASKET CASES. I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO SAY ANYMORE. PAT: sORRY, CCG: SHOULD I BAN YOU? WHAT'S EVEN THE POINT ANYMORE! ONE OF YOU STOOGES WILL BE RIGHT ON THE LAST ONES HEELS WITH ANOTHER SOB STORY. CCG: JUST CCG: HURRY UP AND TELL ME WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS BRO.

He then proceeds to dispense no actual love advice; he just points out that Vriska can totally read this memo too, and then mocks them both when she shows up - thus making it clear that he is giving Eridan special treatment.

You see it again in his discussion with Eridan in [S] Kanaya: Return to the Core, where Eridan invokes a "pact" between them, and Karkat immediately plays nice with him, despite himself being extremely high-strung and stressed out:

KARKAT: RIGHT, IT'S POWERED BY SCIENCE, I FORGOT. KARKAT: OR HOPE. WHATEVER THE FUCK THAT MEANS. ERIDAN: i dont fuckin need this from you i take enough shit as it is from the rest a you dirtscrapers i thought you and me had a kinda pact or wwhatevver KARKAT: OK FINE, SHUT UP, I APOLOGIZE. I KNOW IT'S TOUGH BEING YOU.

That's definitely pity, which Karkat states to be the basis of all relationships besides pitch. But, sure, okay, Karkat is sometimes nice to his friends. He is, after all, the Friendship Troll, so that's not necessarily out of the ordinary. But how about the fact that it goes both ways?

That's right, Eridan "100% aggro 100% of the time" Ampora is actually really considerate toward Karkat's feelings, and basically nobody else's. Upon hearing that Karkat is distressed that Sollux has died, Eridan actively puts his own meltdown about his breakup with Feferi on pause:

TC: BeCaUsE OuR GoOd bRo sOlLuX JuSt kIcKeD ThE WiCkEd mOtHeRfUcKiN ShIt CA: wwhat the fuck do you mean by that CA: are you sayin hes dead TC: YeAh :o( CA: oh fuck CA: oh god fuck noww i feel like an asshole

He then goes on to chastise Gamzee for his shitty advice, demanding to be given the chance to comfort Karkat himself instead:

TC: BuT I ToLd hIm tO Be cHiLl TC: BeCaUsE ThErE Is a mIrAcLe cOmInG, i cAn fEeL It CA: that is the wworst fuckin advvice CA: wwhat an awwful thing a you to say CA: MAGIC ISNT REAL STUPID STOP BELIEVVIN IN IT TC: i'Ve gOt tO BeLiEvE At wHaT My hEaRt tElLs iN Me, EvEn iF It's a fAkE ThInG TC: HoNk CA: this is a lot a pointless fuckin rubbish and isnt no emotional help to him or me either for that matter CA: put kar on

Before finally giving up when Gamzee insists he's "too scared of Jack" to help, drinking some Faygo, and trying to ask past Karkat for help, because past Karkat isn't sad yet about Sollux dying. So, to recap,

Eridan's first instinct when in emotional duress is to go to Karkat.

Eridan feels like he knows Karkat well enough to know that Gamzee's advice would be useless (and is proven right by the fact that Gamzee and Karkat's moirallegiance fails for similar reasons).

Eridan is willing to shelve his own emotional meltdown for Karkat's sake.

Eridan demands to be the one to provide Karkat with emotional support.

And this is, again, not a one-off thing. In the memo Karkat opens right after Eridan and Gamzee have both turned murderous, after he's spent several minutes making death threats toward Eridan and insulting him directly, he goes:

CCG: I'M SO UPSET, I'M JUST COMPLETELY FREAKING OUT IN EVERY WAY POSSIBLE. PCA: yeah i knoww wwhat its like you wwanna talk about it

Eridan spends this entire memo under the belief that it's a completely run-of-the-mill conversation they're having:

PCA: i mean yeah obvviously i kneww you wwerent serious PCA: i guess i appreciate the effort youre puttin into cheerin me up PCA: i can alwways count on you for some good ironic repartee kar nobody else really gets our sense a humor CCG: UGH, NO PCA: are you busy PCA: you said youd try to make it to lowwaa soon wwell howw about it

Which implies that offering to listen to Karkat's feelings is also a completely regular thing for them.

But something magical is ALSO happening within this last memo, and to really explain it, I'll first have to be a little mean to the GamKar shippers (sorry).

So, canonically, GamKar doesn't work out for them, despite also being somewhat foreshadowed. In fact, they feature on Nepeta's shipping wall, which is actually, in my opinion, foreshadowing that it WOULDN'T work out. (Nepeta's ships being wrong, and shipping being something she needs to learn to outgrow, is a whole essay on its own, that I'm not getting into here.)

But the thing is, the seeds for them not working out were also planted in the first - and only - real post-moirallegiance interaction that they have with each other, where Gamzee tries to calm Karkat down... and FAILS:

GAMZEE: naw brother, i was just about to all say for you to try and get your settle down on, maybe. GAMZEE: :o( ... KARKAT: OK KARKAT: OK YEAH KARKAT: I GUESS YOU'RE RIGHT. KARKAT: NO, YOU'RE RIGHT, I SHOULD RELAX. KARKAT: AND BREATHE. KARKAT: I MEAN, WHAT ARE MOIRAILS FOR, RIGHT? KARKAT: THIS IS HOW IT WORKS, I STOP YOU FROM KILLING EVERYBODY, THEN YOU RETURN THE FAVOR AND CALM ME DOWN AND I JUST KARKAT: BREATHE KARKAT: LIKE KARKAT: THIS... KARKAT: SNIIIIIIIIIIIIFFFFFFFFFFFFFUCK, THAT SUN IS BRIGHT. KARKAT: CALL ME CRAZY, BUT IT'S KIND OF HARD TO RELAX WITHIN A STONE'S THROW FROM, OH, I GUESS ONLY THE BIGGEST FUCKING STAR ANY MORTAL HAS EVER LAID EYES ON. ... KARKAT: BUT I MEAN, CAN THIS BE HEALTHY? KARKAT: AREN'T WE GOING TO GET BURNED OR HAVE OUR RETINAS SCORCHED BY LOOKING AT IT? KARKAT: OH GOD I THINK I'M HAVING A PANIC ATTACK.

But let's go back to that memo where Karkat is freaking out in every way possible. This is how he starts that memo - so upset about the deaths of his friends and terrified by Gamzee that he can barely string together a coherent thought:

CCG: WE ARE SO SCREWED. CCG: OH FUCK OH FUCK OH FUCK. CCG: GUYS, I AM TERRIFIED, I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO. CCG: I'M IN A ROOM FULL OF BODIES, AND I THINK I'M NOT SUPPOSED TO TURN MY BACK ON THEM? CCG: OH MY GOD, I JUST HEARD A HONK. ... CCG: FEFERI, I'M SORRY. CCG: IT WAS MY FAULT, I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT TO DO. PCC: Sorry for w)(at?? CCG: FOR CCG: I CCG: I CAN'T DO THIS CCG: IT'S TOO MUCH FOR ME, I'M SORRY.

In fact, he's so distressed that he bans Past!Feferi and Past!Gamzee almost immediately after they come in. But then Eridan comes in, and... I mean, first of all, just compare how long it takes for him to ban Eridan:

But more interesting are the contents of their conversation. Over the course of talking to Eridan... Karkat completely calms the fuck down. Like he's entirely forgotten that he's shitting his pants with fear. In fact, he even starts critiquing Eridan for his dumbassery:

PCA: evven if i wwasnt compelled to think you wwere still bein flippant and ironic wwith me you cant exactly outright reject me can you CCG: WHY NOT PCA: cause youre future you PCA: doesnt count unless its present you til then its all fair game CCG: IS THIS REAL, ARE YOU BEING IRONIC OR SOMETHING, I CAN'T EVEN TELL ANYMORE CCG: THE PROBLEM IS, I CAN'T PUT THIS SORT OF BEHAVIOR PAST YOU AT ALL, SO I DON'T KNOW. ... CCG: YOU'RE KILLING ANGELS NOW, AREN'T YOU PCA: no CCG: YOU ARE KILLING FUCKING ANGELS, RIGHT NOW, IN THE PAST, WITH YOUR SHITTY GUN. I JUST KNOW IT. PCA: wwell uh PCA: therere just so damn many kar and theyre not gettin any less bloody pissed is the thing CCG: THIS IS WHY IT WOULD NEVER WORK BETWEEN US, MAN.

It's extremely funny. Over the course of talking to Eridan, he goes from:

CCG: OH GOD OH GOD OH MAN OH GOD CCG: NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

To:

CCG banned PCA from responding to memo. CCG: ANYWAY CCG: THAT'S IT I GUESS.

Eridan isn't even trying to calm Karkat down. He still succeeds in doing so. This is because they are soul mates. And I mean that in the sense that the comic literally calls being moirails soul mates, which it doesn't do for the other quadrants:

A reasonable human translation would be the concept of a soul mate, but in a more platonic sense, and with a more specific social purpose.

That "social purpose" being that an even-tempered troll calms down a more hot-tempered one, and vice versa.

It also goes on to note:

But some pale pairings, as the one above [referring to a picture of Nepeta and Equius], will be strikingly obvious to all who know them.

But what's really interesting is the next page.

And yet others will seem to have been hatched for each other.

Did you catch that? Let me zoom in.

(Also, the blue and red cuttlefish to represent Sollux - Feferi and Sollux spend the whole game together, and even wind up talking about their feelings constantly in a pile - more on piles in a sec.)

In fact... in Eridan's first visual appearance...

The crab has always been there for him.

It's also important to talk about the bottle of Faygo that's been photoshopped to be candy red, Karkat's blood color. The path that it takes actually directly mirrors Karkat's relationships with Gamzee and Eridan - it's initially something that Gamzee has, but winds up being ejected out of his life, and washes up on Eridan's shore. In fact:

TC: SnAtCh aN IcEcOlD, dOg TC: MoThErFuCkIn cHuG ThAt sHiT LiKe yOu aNd tHe bOtTlE WaS ReUnItEd lOvErS CA: are you recommendin a bevverage to me or somethin CA: is that wwhat this is TC: YeAh mAn SlAm A FaYgO CA: i dont havve a fuckin faygo you stupid fuck wwhy wwould i keep that disgusting shit on hand TC: ArE YoU MoThErFuCkIn sUrE AbOuT ThAt? CA: oh CA: oh god youre right i do CA: i totally forgot about it TC: YoU SeE MaN TC: MoThEr TC: FuCkIn TC: MiRaClEs TC: :o)

When Gamzee and Eridan discuss this exact bottle, Gamzee even likens it to "reunited lovers"; it's something that Eridan has had this whole time (after all, he was cheating on Feferi with the guy), but never realized.

There are a few miscellaneous things that don't really mean anything on their own, but put next to all this other stuff, is worth considering, so I'll list those now.

First, they both do the bonk:

Second:

CG: ARE WE NOT FRIENDS ANYMORE BECAUSE OF STUFF I SAID. TA: eheheheh you LIITERALLY a2k me that every tiime are you jokiing. TA: ii cant even tell anymore. CG: IT'S A JOKE MORON. CG: HONESTLY I'M JUST GLAD NOBODY ELSE IS PRIVVY TO OUR CONVERSATIONS.

Third, Karkat muses to his future self about how he misses his friends, especially the assholes, two pages before staring at a dead Eridan's ass (joking, he's definitely looking at WV, but it's still significant that this thought is being associated with Eridan):

CCG: I MEAN, DON'T GET ME WRONG. CCG: I MISS ALL OF MY DEAD FRIENDS A LOT. CCG: EVEN THE ASSHOLES! I MISS THEM TOO. MAYBE EVEN ESPECIALLY THEM, IN SOME PERVERSE WAY. CCG: AND I SHOULD BE RELIEVED THAT THEY ALL SEEM TO BE HAPPY IN SOME WAY, EVEN IF IT'S BY FLOATING NEBULOUSLY THROUGH DREAM PROJECTIONS WITH THEIR FREAKY BLANK EYES. CCG: AND I GUESS I AM RELIEVED ABOUT THAT. CCG: BUT AT THE SAME TIME IT'S LEFT ME UNSETTLED.

Fourth, in the same conversation, he bemoans his failed relationship with Terezi, before Future!Karkat chastises Past!Karkat for his instability and mixed signals. Going back to the page on moirallegiances, an explicit function of a proper pale relationship is stabilizing a troll's other relationships:

The two partners in a strong pale relationship will serve to balance and complement each other's emotional profiles, and thus allow their other relationships to be more successful.

Of course, I don't need to tell you how messy and unstable Eridan's relationships have been.

And finally, Piles of Stuff™ are associated with moirails, and directly stated in-comic to cause an outpouring of emotion:

Standing near this pile stirs powerful emotions. The closer you stand to piles of stuff, the more freely the feelings flow. It is a law of reality.

So here's a seven-word tragedy for you: For Sale, Shitty Wand Pile, Never Used:

ERIDAN: at least i got the upright basic decency to hide my shitty wand pile somewwhere in the lab you wwont find it dont evven bother lookin KARKAT: WHY DO YOU ASSHOLES HAVE PILES OF THINGS, JUST STOP.

(Which he specifically tells Karkat about.)

So, yeah, what I'm saying is, there's just, like, a weirdly large amount to read into here. That Karkat and Eridan are probably soulmates or whatever. And that this is important because...

Eridan Is Plot Relevant (Well All The Dead Trolls Are But This Is An Essay About Eridan)

So. Now we are going to talk about themes. Yes, like we are in schoolfeeding again. I'm going to keep it simple, because "The Themes of Homestuck" is a whole essay on its own, and this one about just the shitty fish boy is already way too long.

I think it's fairly non-controversial to posit that the main theme of Homestuck is, "children should mature, care about each other, and throw off the shackles of their old society, because they will be responsible for a new world one day."

Up until Game Over/the Retcon, this is so prevalent and well-established that SBURB/SGRUB's coming-of-age themes will outright be commented upon by the characters, and the main villain is a child who deliberately stunted his own growth so he could go around kicking over other peoples' toys forevermore.

So, the thing is, with that being the theme of Homestuck, if ALL of the Alternian trolls don't survive to the end, the ending is thematically unsatisfying, because the message suddenly gains an addendum of "well, some kids just need to die," which totally sucks. Like, sure, Eridan was a violent, crazed murderer even at the best of times, but his permanent death within the canon ending kind of means that the comic is saying that people in his position don't deserve kindness or second chances. That position being a traumatized, emotionally neglected child, who was being bullied by people he considered his friends. It's a pretty terrible message.

It's even worse when you consider what other trolls don't make it to the end - Nepeta, the most outspoken troll against the hemospectrum (and Davepeta does NOT count, don't try to tell me the final culmination of Nepeta's character arc is being combined with some guy she barely knows and a bird). Feferi, who genuinely wanted the best for others, even if she was kind of a privileged princess. Aradia and Sollux also stay behind in the bubbles, even though their lives have pretty much been endless parades of suffering and being used by other people. Even Equius doesn't deserve it - he was kind of a casteist freak, but not irredeemably so, and the fact that he became kinder to Karkat over the course of SGRUB proved that he had the capacity to change. And Tavros, allergic to himself and being insulted by Vriska, is a terrible way to end his arc.

It's also really clear that, since half his friends are dead, Karkat just doesn't really have anything to do. His title is the Knight of Blood, and Blood is about bonds - romance, friendship. And yet, he ends the comic having never figured out what Blood was about, with no confirmed filled quadrants (sorry DaveKat likers, but within the comic itself, DaveKat is never confirmed), and most of his bonds nothing more than ghosts in the bubbles. It's a terribly unsatisfying ending for the most narratively important troll.

I think, then, that even if you don't agree that Homestuck should have ended with full revivals and redemption arcs for all the trolls, the essay is going to proceed on like you do, so, sorry, I guess.

The thing with Eridan, specifically, is that he's actually tied deeply into the plot and themes, and his return means more than just Karkat finally getting a date (although that's important, too). Eridan is directly intertwined with a prophecy to kill Lord English; he's set up to mirror Caliborn and Calliope; and thematically, his redemption would be the most clear instance of the "interrogating society" part of the theme of Homestuck, because Eridan is kind of the Society Troll. And also, he was definitely supposed to be Roxy's wizard boyfriend.

Just gonna get that last one out of the way real quick because it's a fast one, Roxy fucking loves wizards and is a hipster. Eridan is a wizard and is also a hipster. Roxy has a crush on a prince. Eridan is also a prince. Roxy wears a purple striped scarf. Eridan wears a blue striped scarf. Roxy uses rifles. Eridan uses rifles. Momlonde's introduction includes a passive-aggressive fridge battle that features a cameo of Eridan's quirk.

Using the colorful MAGNET LETTERS, you recently left a succinct message, which may or may not have been directed toward anyone in particular. But you couldn't find the letter W, so you just stuck two V's together. Your mother then purchased a fresh pack of W's and left them there for your convenience.

Yeah. So. Uh. Not only did Eridan need to be brought back to date Karkat pale, but he also needed to be brought back to date Roxy flushed. Can you imagine how funny it would be. They'd get together within 5 minutes of meeting for the first time and Rose would lose her shit. Anyway.

Him being a parallel to Calliope and Caliborn is also a quick one - Caliborn uses Riflekind/Sceptrekind, and Calliope uses Pistolkind/Wandkind. Eridan's two weapons are rifles and wands. Lord English is described as an evil wizard and at one point is shown using Calliope's wand. Eridan is also an evil wizard who uses a wand.

Look, I'm not saying that Eridan is necessarily directly related to these two, nor am I even necessarily saying that he and Roxy HAVE to date, but I am saying that he's got Weird Plot Connections that make him bizarrely relevant to characters that only come into play well after his death - almost like the comic was setting up that he would be coming back. His reaction to Cronus supports this, which I go into detail about here.

There's other strange "Eridan's plot important" things, too - like the fact that he's completely unimpressed by Faygo, considering it to be "just soda," and seems to be the only non-cultist who's okay with it. Or the fact that he's actually been awake on Derse since before the game (but unable to hear the horrorterrors, maybe foreshadowing some psychic resistance?) which he casually reveals to Kanaya and which Terezi is aware of, hence he's included in the people she names are "in" on the existence of the game. Or the fact that the genetic code for Alternia's first guardian was written within the pages of four FLARP books, with the addition of a fifth code Gamzee wrote in Karkat's ~ATH book... but Eridan was the fifth FLARP player in the team, implying that Doc Scratch/LE influencing Gamzee caused him to usurp Eridan's part of the first guardian code, giving LE his way into the trolls' universe.

Individually, it's all kind of nothing, but it just paints a bigger picture of Eridan being weirdly relevant, especially when we get to the juicy stuff:

The Prophecy

ARANEA: The 8ard of Hope may seem a little jaded these days, 8ut he once had a deeply a8iding faith in magic, and dedicated himself to 8ecoming a great wizard. He 8ecame convinced he was hatched to defeat an extraordinarily evil magician, one he swore the angels foretold of. ... [T]his magician once somehow from afar tried to strike him down at a young age, so he would never have to face him. 8ut the evil spell was deflected, sealing the magician's spirit away in a series of unassuming vessels until he could find some other cunning way to enter our universe. ... ARANEA: 8ut at some point he 8ecame disillusioned with magic. If there ever was any truth to his far fetched vision, the legacy of defeating the evil magician would have to 8e passed on to his descendant, or if his descendant proved to 8e as much of a failure as he did, then perhaps on to some other Hero of Hope.

ERIDAN: i slaughtered enough angels to knoww my limits and wwhere i stand against the lord of all angels they prophecized

GG: im pretty sure hes from the future! CA: wwhy GG: because he said hes my grandson CA: wwhat the fuck is a grandson CA: is that some kind of pervverse human familial thing GG: umm yes ... CA: that gun i just gavve you is somethin of a hatchright to the kid CA: happy i could play a role in your dirty stinkin lineage GG: like an heirloom? i guess it could be ... CA: i kinda think thats wwhy i found the gun in the first place CA: but noww im forsakin it because fuck i just found a better destiny than my old crappy one wwhich i nevver got any appreciation for anywway

Jake is supposed to have been the one to defeat Lord English. (No, Jake defeating pre-LE Caliborn right before he gets sealed into Cal doesn't count! He doesn't even get the final blow in that fight, DIRK does.)

But Eridan at one point had that destiny on his shoulders. Aranea turbohealing Jake, and the resultant hope field, summons a bunch of angels, which are heavily associated with Eridan - yet another random connection that Eridan has with future plot events.

Jake was another character, alongside Karkat, who was kind of reduced to a joke by the end, despite the fact that he had literally, directly, been passed the destiny of defeating Lord English. It's hard not to see this as a consequence, at least in part, of removing Eridan from the story. By cutting him out of the fabric of the ending, several plot threads - including this prophecy - are left dangling in irrelevance. And so Jake, like Karkat, now has nothing to do.

Homestuck is generally a series where every prophecy does come true, which makes it kind of startling when several prophecies fail to - Feferi's to "unite the two races," Jake's to defeat Lord English, and Karkat's to bring "compassion, forgiveness, and equality among all bloodlines" in the Signless's place.

That last one is actually relevant to:

The Thematic Importance of EriKar As Soul Mates

Eridan represents the worst aspects of Alternian society. He's a sea dweller at the top of the caste structure, with free reign to murder whoever he wants, soaked in the blood of thousands of innocent trolls. He espouses the casteist rhetoric that their society is built on, calling for the deaths of all land dwellers and the oppression of the lower castes. And while he should be benefitting from his position of privilege, it has also done nothing but hurt him.

Karkat, meanwhile, is a pariah. A mutant who would've been culled on sight, who spent his entire life living in hiding, and most of the game in fear that he would be ostracized or worse by the rest of his friends if they found out about his blood color. He's also the second coming of Troll Jesus, and thus, more despised by the Alternian ruling class than a mutant normally would be. For most of his life, he dreamed of nothing more than finding belonging within the society that had deemed him unfit.

Their friendship is something that "should not be." The highblood and the mutant. The royal-v and the off-spectrum. The empress's sea dweller and the second coming of the signless. Eridan "should" see Karkat as a miscreant to cull on sight. Karkat "should" be terrified of Eridan's very existence.

But in reality, Eridan doesn't give a shit about blood color, and Karkat just wants to be accepted. Eridan just wants someone to care about him, and Karkat loves his friends. Aside from Feferi, Eridan is the only highblood who never comments about Karkat's mutant blood, and they were best buddies even before Eridan knew.

Eridan and Karkat getting together isn't JUST the two most undateable trolls on the team finally landing a stable quadrant. These two, moreso than any other pairing, represent the themes of Homestuck. Children growing up, caring about each other, and throwing off the shackles of their old society.

In the pre-retcon timeline, their team failed to do so. This led to Gamzee falling into his highblood clown cult, Equius letting himself and Nepeta die by submitting to his place in the hemospectrum, Vriska killing Tavros because she couldn't allow herself to show weakness, and Eridan completing his caste's dream of genocide. Karkat spent the entire meteor trip and beyond beating himself up about it, since he considered it all to be his fault.

But with the introduction of John's retcon powers, they have the chance to, one by one, redeem themselves. I believe that's how the original ending would have gone: Terezi would ask John to bring Vriska back, because she only feels comfortable fixing her own mistakes. Vriska would then have asked John to bring back Tavros, whom she regretted killing. Tavros would be there for Gamzee, rendering him an ally. Gamzee would ask John to bring back Equius and Nepeta. Equius would ask John to help him not make the same mistakes with Aradia, and Aradiabot would catch John by the wrist and demand he bring her back in time to before she died, allowing her to circumvent her own death and Sollux's guilt. Sollux would ask John to keep him from provoking Eridan, saving Feferi. And Feferi would be pretty ok with the way things were... but KARKAT would then pull John aside, and drop an entire book of mistakes he made on John's lap, and this would result in a finalized timeline where all his friends are alive and god-tiered.

Because all the trolls SHOULD have survived.

Vriska should've survived because people should be allowed to have second chances.

Tavros should've survived because caring about each other, and being willing to show kindness and mercy, are good things.

Gamzee should have survived because people mired in religious fundamentalism and cults deserve to be offered a helping hand.

Equius should've survived because people should be allowed to grow and change their beliefs.

Nepeta should've survived because she was the anti-casteism troll. Casteism is bad, folks! Not only that, but I'm convinced that she was originally going to give the Ultimate Self exposition, and Davepetasprite^2 had to be contrived in the canon ending in order to shortcut Nepeta's character development, ruining it in the process.

Aradia should've been allowed to stay with the rest of the team and live a life free of the control of evil uncles and shitty ancestors.

Sollux should've been allowed to stay with the rest of the team because we all deserve to heal and be happy.

Feferi should've survived so she could be in a kismesistude with Nepeta, and realize that casteism itself is bad, not just the definition of culling, and then used her Witch of Life powers to even out the lifespans between the next generation of trolls, which needs to happen or else casteism will just happen again as long-lived highbloods inevitably amass power. And, also, it would complete the prophecy Gl'bgolyb gave her that she was intended to unite the two races (dream bubbles don't count, because by that metric, Sollux did more than she did by establishing a connection between the trolls and humans).

And Eridan should've survived, because the harm society has done to us can be undone. We don't have to submit to the roles it imposes, to the laws it wrote, to the abuse it inflicted. We can be free.

I've seen a lot of people who believe that such-and-such character did SUCH awful things that they don't deserve a happy ending. Oftentimes, it's Eridan, but nearly all of the dead trolls have gotten this treatment. So, let me just ask all of you who have gotten this far and still hold that opinion one thing. Do you think that's what Troll Jesus would have wanted?

This is why pale EriKar is so important: for it to happen, Eridan has to make a choice between upholding the beliefs of his shitty society, or pursuing a happier, kinder future, one where he outright rejects the caste system. For it to happen, Karkat has to shake all his insecurities about not being good enough by Alternian standards, and take on the duty of creating something better than what he came from. If pale EriKar happens, it means Eridan and Karkat choose love, not fear. Compassion, forgiveness, and equality.

This choice - this pairing - is the ultimate representation of giving Alternian society one big middle finger. Saying, we don't need you anymore, fuck off! Saying, we reject you at your core; we will choose something better! Saying, we will create a new world, and it will be kinder than the one we came from!

Pale EriKar means LOVE WINS.

Thank you for reading.

[freaksun]

Hi if you are taking requests I’m in a super soft mood.

Would you do something with Eddie not being used to affection? Super touch starved. And when he and reader start dating he is tense when you first show that your love language is physical touch? And slowly. Not to scare him you try to show and convince him he deserves nothing but kindness and loving touches?

hi honey!! always taking requests, i just take forever to answer them haha :)

your boyfriend, eddie munson, had a hard childhood - that was clear.

for one, he grew up with his uncle wayne instead of two parents. you’ve met mr munson, and he’s a truly sweet man, but you’re pretty sure he didn’t plan on raising a child.

he told you his mom died and his dad is gone but not much else and you don’t want to pry. you figure he’ll tell you on his own time and that’s good enough for you. mostly, you just want him to know he’s safe with you.

the only part that bothers you is that his past trauma has convinced him he isn’t worthy of soft touches and patience and your everlasting devotion. you have to fix this, you decide.

you noticed pretty early into the relationship that he’s timid around physical intimacy - not necessarily sex, more the sweet and loving caresses you offer him daily - since every time you mold yourself to his back in bed he suddenly has to ‘get to work’.

at first it really hurt your feelings. he could have sex with you (with minimal nervousness) but he couldn’t cuddle you??

but then the heartbreaking realization set in that he just cant let you show that you love him. cant let you be tender with the parts of him you know have been crushed by people meant to protect him.

so, you start small.

eddie gets all worked up sometimes talking about things he loves, so you wait for him to get all excited and distracted and then you start gently twirling his hair between your fingers while he goes on and on.

eventually it evolves to you running your hands through his hair, lightly massaging his head while he unknowingly unravels in front of you. you rake your nails over his scalp, scratching his stress away.

you can tell how much he appreciates such a small gesture by the way he sinks into your touch, a warm smile on his sleepy face.

he starts to expect it, much to your delight. whenever he realizes he’s getting super into a discussion he cozies up to you, laying his head in your lap usually by slumping onto you and forcing you to lay down so you can be his teddy bear.

you’re extremely proud of this progress, even moreso when he sleepily turns one evening, smushing his face against your thigh and sighing contently. you don’t stop petting his hair until you feel his breathing slow against the inside of your leg.

you figure it was a combination of you talking instead of him, and the long awful day he apparently had at work. either way, you thank the stars and make sure not to wake him. it grows your ego substantially knowing your voice guided him to a peaceful sleep.

the next morning you wake up with him still wrapped around your waist, cheek smushed into your tummy. you’re both still in your clothes, eddie in his dirty work overalls cause he couldn’t wait to cuddle you, and neither of you expected him to fall asleep. you pet his head softly - its practically instinctive whenever you see him, especially snoring softly like this

he stirs when you rake your nails across his back gently, drawing swirls and patterns on him while he’s still too sleepy to protest. his eyes meet yours, his hair adorably disheveled. he looks incredibly disoriented and confused and all you can do is smile at your puppy of a boyfriend.

“..did we fall asleep like this?” his voice comes out all gravelly how you love, its always like that in the morning, you’ve come to find out.

“yes” you giggile, fixing a stray curl. “you fell asleep like this, honey.”

he blushes and gets nervous as usual, you’re familiar with his patterns, but he doesn’t move - not yet.

you take advantage of that fact, lifting his chin so he’s forced to look at you again. this time when you look into his wide eyes, you sense guilt.

“eddie, i liked it.” you smile, moving to rub his cheek, your thumb swiping gently just below his eye. “is there some reason you think i wouldn’t? o-or did you not like it?” he panics when your smile falters, lips twitching in hesitation.

“No!” he yelps a little too loud, awkward in that sitcom way he’s always been. charming, you think.

“O-of course i liked it, baby..” his eyes flick between obeying and keeping eye contact and staring down to avoid you.

“you’re so warm.. ‘n soft..” his eyes meet yours again and theres a sincerety and vulnerability you’ve never seen. close, maybe, but this is new.

“yeah?” you coo, coaxing him further into this soft space you’ve unlocked for him.

he nods, a coy smile forming. “I like touching you, y/n. i-i always want to i-im just..” you rub his cheek. “cautious. i guess. ‘m scared.” he looks up at you again, wide eyes beaming in a way that makes you think his pupils are just holes peering into the sparkling of his heart. its clear he’s opening himself to you in a way no one’s seen before. maybe other than his mom. its an honour you refuse to waste.

“what are you scared of ed?” not once do you stop softly petting him , his cheeks, his hair, his neck, a thumb across his lip.

“I just.. i dunno. you’re so soft, so sweet and kind and i-“ he falters, and you immediately hug him to you, rubbing his back. “its ok, honey. take your time, im here.” he sighs, his hands grasping you for comfort.

“i dont wanna break you. or lose you..” he admits, maybe for the first time to himself at all. your heart breaks. obviously you could assume with what you know about his past but the details and results never stop hurting. you wish you could’ve saved him, could’ve saved his mother and given him a better father. or just taken him far, far away.

now, all you can do is hold him. one hand in his hair, one rubbing his back and you kiss the top of his head.

“im not going anywhere.” you promise, your lips still pressed in his hair.

“gonna stay and cuddle you forever, teddy” your hand sneaks under his shirt and rubs his back, up and down the soft skin. its vulnerable in a literal and figurative way you cant fully process in the moment but later you’ll cry over how poetic and sentimental it is.

you feel him sink into you, letting his weight crush you a little. his voice rumbles where hes hiding his face, a small “promise?” muffled by your chest.

you frown, wishing he never had to feel this way.

“I promise, eddie. m’yours” you can feel him smile, giddy and childish in this state.

“and you’re mine” you giggle as he rubs his face into you like a cat displaying affection.

[iarchmybaculaa]

18+!

Tags/warnings⚠️: Alcohol consumption, club setting, misunderstandings, angst if you squint, long haired Jungkook, Reader is a brat, angry Jungkook, unprotected sex (please do not practice that irl), rough sex, spitting!, breeding kink

Word count: 3.6k

🎧 : Sticky Rice-Lil Gnar, Reminder-The Weeknd, Party Monster- The Weeknd

For my loves: Tasara & @hobicakess 🩷

Beta’d by Shaq🫶🏾

A/N: I randomly found an edit in my gallery that inspired this whole thing. HEAVILY unedited bc I’m extremely sleep deprived rn so pls be nice!

Fic takes place about 4 years before "All mine" ! Enjoy?

Being married to Jungkook has single-handedly disproved every doubtful remark you've heard from everyone trying to convince you that it would be ill-advised to get married so young.

Contrary to what you've been told, the spark between has not died. In fact, you think that you find something new to love about Jungkook every day.

His love has never once not been intentional and gentle. You've never experienced being with someone who is so in tune with your body, with your mind, with your soul. Jungkook sees loving you as a competition; his only rival being his past selves.

There is no adventure that Jungkook would want to experience without you. There’s no bridge he wants to cross without holding your hand; no dance he wants to do without you beside him….or rather bent over in front of him as you are now.

The low lights of club Euphoria had switched to a dangerously deep shade of red, casting a sinful glow on your already ridiculously seductive face. Your eyes were low, whether it was from the few drinks you'd had earlier or the thick cloud of hookah smoke that floated around the club, Jungkook didn't know.

What he did know however, was that he had the most beautiful woman in the world throwing her ass back against him, in a dress so tiny that your cheeks were becoming more and more exposed as he thrust his hips forward to meet yours.

You move in sync with the music, your bodies in perfect harmony as the people around you become a blur. In that moment, it's just you and Jungkook. You and your husband.

You feel the cool air travel further up your legs as you dance. You reach behind you to pull your dress down, more out of habit than anything. You hear Jungkook groan as your hand ‘accidentally’ presses against his crotch, and you can't suppress the small giggle that escapes you.

It's a low sound, so realistically, Jungkook can't hear it that well over the near deafening music…But he sees the way your body shakes a bit. You shake the same way when you laugh at your own jokes or Jungkook's clumsiness; and he knows you well enough that he can practically hear the sound in his head.

Fuck he's in love with you.

He's so lucky to have you. He can't wait to live the rest of his life with you, to have a family with you, to take you home and fu-

His train of thought is cut off by the harsh vibration of his phone in the pocket of his slacks. He grabs your waist to stop your movements, and you stand upright. You raise a questioning brow at him.

“It's Namjoon hyung” he mouths, pointing to the phone at his ear.

You roll your eyes and shake your head. Namjoon had been on a work trip to London for the past few ( painfully long) weeks, and he still refuses to acknowledge the time difference. You two have grown to accept it, even if it means that he calls Jungkook at the most ridiculous (sometimes inconvenient) times.

The crackle of the receiver lets Jungkook know that Namjoon is talking, but he can’t make out a word he’s saying. Jungkook quickly realizes that he couldn't possibly have this conversation inside the club, so he gestures towards the door.

“I'm going to take this outside,” he says with his lips pressed up to your ear. “Do you want to come with me? Or will you be okay ‘till I get back?”

“I'm a big girl!” You pout up at him, pushing his glasses further up his nose with your pointer finger . “I’ll be fine, go take your call! Tell Joon I said hi.”

He nods and plants a quick kiss on the crook of your neck. He strokes the side of your face with his thumb and promises to be right back, before he turns on his heels. You watch as his head disappears into the crowd, leaving you standing alone and regrettably bored.

With Jungkook gone, you have nothing else to do since you two had come alone. You think standing around in a club like someone with a lost shadow would be incredibly lame. So you do what any unoccupied, married person in a club would do, you make your way to the bar to get a drink…or two.

By the time Jungkook gets back you're just a little tipsy.

You're not a stranger to alcohol per se, but unlike Jungkook who's been around enough liquor to know what blends would be good for you (strong enough to make you feel good, but not enough to make you lose your inhibitions); you don't know much (not enough if you ask him). You think of calling him, but your phone is in your purse… perched on jungkook’s shoulder.

So you do the most logical thing you can think of, and you order the prettiest sounding drink on the menu. Who can blame you?

You’re just a girl.

~

Two cups of Serendipity later, you're back in Jungkook's arms feeling absolutely giddy and incorrigibly horny.

The lights in the club are a dark blue now, and the music is even louder. Jungkook looks exactly the way he did when he left.

Sexy as all fuck.

Long hair tucked behind his hair on one side? Check.

Denim shirt? Check.

Tattoos? Double check.

Damn.

MINE! MINE! MINE!

You're not sure where he put his glasses, but you make a mental note to ask him before you leave. You do not need a repeat of the Geum putdwaeji Sikdang* incident. You know from experience that Jungkook and contacts don’t mix; and it would take over three weeks for them to get replaced…Not a fun time.

And right now? All you want to have is fun.

Jungkook’s mouth is moving, but your brain is moving too fast (or too slow) to read his lips and you can’t hear him. But his hands pull you toward him by the waist and you lean into his touch.

Your back is turned to his front as you move slowly against him the second you hear “she’s saying baby saenggakaji ma” float over the speakers.

Jungkook moves in sync with you as he always does, but his hands remain at your waist, almost rigid. His touch is shy and..Timid? His hands don’t trail up towards your breast, or towards your belly button. You find it odd, and downright ridiculous.

You grab his hands to take them upwards, and you’re instantly confused. There’s ink on both his hands? You pause.

When did Jungkook get a sleeve on both hands?

His lips brush faintly against your ear, and you’re suddenly hyper aware of the absence of the cool metal of the rings that should be in his lip.

You don��t hear a thing except the erratic beating of your heart.

Then the inconceivable happens.

Jungkook stands in front of you, arms folded across his chest and eyes glaring at you through his glasses. The lights above you start flashing, and they bounce off his shiny, silver lip rings.

But if Jungkook is in front of you…who the fuck is behind you?!

You think you might faint.

As confused as you might have been about the situation, you knew two things for sure:

1. You needed to get as far away from not- Jungkook as possible

2. You're screwed.

Not-Jungkook seems to realize your mistake, and moves his hands from your waist so can step away from him; you rip yourself away from him as if his touch burns.

You open your mouth to say something to Real- Jungkook, but your brain goes blank.

You're too dunk for this.

Jungkook gives you a quick once- over to make sure that you're unharmed, before taking a gentle hold of your wrist. He tucks you behind him as he gives Non- Jungkook a piece of his mind.

The ringing in your ears has become so loud can't even hear the music anymore, much less their argument. Your brain feels like it's been doused in water, and you feel an unwarranted giggle making it's way up your throat. You swallow it down.

Now's not the time.

From what you can see, Real Jungkook and Not-Jungkook are having a very spirited conversation. Real Jungkook seems to be holding his composure quite well, until Not-Jungkook says something that causes his jaw to tick and his hands to form fists at his sides.

But instead of throwing a punch, Jungkook takes a deep breath and walks away, pulling you behind him.

Not- Jungkook waves at you.

You don't wave back.

Jungkook is silent as he leads you out of the club and towards your car. You say nothing as he opens the passenger door and watches as you sit inside.

“Do your feet hurt?” He asks

You shake your head at him. Still, he couches on his knees and unbuckles your heels, giving your calves a brief massage before he straps you into your seat. He closes your door and grabs a bottle of water from the back seat. He hands it to you as he settles behind the steering wheel.

“Drink.” He commands. His voice isn't necessarily angry but you can hear something bubbling beneath the surface. The restraint he's exercising is audible in his voice, and for some strange reason…it excites you.

He pulls out of the parking lot slowly, careful not to accelerate too fast so your water doesn't spill.

The fog around your brain is almost completely lifted by the time you've finished the bottle. Jungkook glances at you for a moment, and releases a satisfied hum when he sees the crumpled plastic in your lap.

He doesn't smile though.

His jaw is tense and his body is rigid in his seat. He isn't touching you and you don't like it.

“Jungkook,” you say, reaching over to touch his thigh

“Are you sure?”

You look at him confused. “Am I sure about what?’

“Are you sure I'm Jungkook?”

There it is.

You have the audacity to scoff at him.

“ Of course I'm sure it's you Jungkook. Don't be ridiculous.”

“Ridiculous?! You were literally grinding your ass all over some random dude you thought was me but I'm being ridiculous?!”

Your cheeks heat up with embarrassment. You know that Jungkook has all right to be upset, fuck you're upset at yourself for making such a terrible mistake. Jungkook has all right to reprimand you, but your mouth just won't cooperate with your brain. All the brat inside you heard, was Jungkook rubbing in something that you were already very embarrassed and flustered about and it just didn't seem fair.

If you thought about it…This was all Jungkook's fault really!

“ Well it's not my fault that you look like every other Korean dude with a perm!!”

The car comes to an abrupt stop as Jungkook slams the breaks.

“Excuse me?”

You roll your eyes and cross your arms at your chest. Jungkook’s eyes flick down to where your tits are bulging, but only for a moment of course.

“Stuttering is your thing Jungkook. You heard me.”

“You’ve actually lost your fucking mind.” Jungkook marvels at you, completely in disbelief at your misplaced attitude.

“I should have bent you over my lap and spanked your ass raw in that fucking club for everyone to see… But I let you off so easy, because I knew you made the mistake because you were drunk; and this is the thanks I get?”

“No.” You quip, “I’m not thanking you in any way.”

The tension between you is as thick as it was during the first 3 months of you two flirting with each other. You were both in college, desperately holding on to the title of “study partners ” even though you kept finding yourselves in compromising positions.

You were both playing a timeless game of cat and mouse. A metaphorical tug of war. Jungkook would push and you would pull; now it appeared that you were having a rematch.

He sucks the pierced side of his lip into his mouth.

You want him so bad.

Jungkook’s eye twitches.

“You’re asking for it, you know that?” He asks, face so close to yours that you can practically taste him on your tongue.

“Give it to me then.” You challenge.

Jungkook leans forwards, and you close your eyes in anticipation of a kiss.

But Jungkook doesn’t kiss you. Instead, he sinks his teeth deep into your neck, though not hard enough to break skin.

You moan at the sting, reveling in the way his soft tongue soothes his claim.

He pulls away and runs his thumb over your lip, eyes darkening.

“Did he kiss you?” He grits out.

You frantically shake your head no.

It's then that you realize just how bad this could have truly been for you. Jungkook was right. You were getting off easy.

Jungkook pries your mouth open.

“Tongue out.” he says.

You loll your tongue out and look up at him expectantly for what you know is coming. Jungkook looks directly into your eyes as he spits into your waiting mouth. You swallow without being told to; it's almost like a reflex.

Jungkook is pleased.

“Who does that taste like, baby?”

“Tastes like you,” you reply.

Jungkook hums.

He grabs your hand and brings it over to his lap. Your breath hitches when you feel the telltale rigidness of a boner in his jeans. Your heart skips a beat as you realize how painfully hard he is.

You need him.

“What does that feel like, baby? Hm? Does that feel like me? Or are you not sure?”

You whine as he rolls his hips up into your palm. “It feels like you Jungkook, I want it.”

Jungkook’s face contorts into one of mock contemplation.

You hate when he gets like this, when he pretends to consider giving you what you want when you both know it's not going to happen.

"You want to know what I think?" he muses rhetorically.

"I think I've let you get away with a little too much lately. I've always told you that your mouth is going to get you in trouble, but I've never made good on that promise, have I?" He chuckles darkly. "Maybe it's time I change that, hm?”

Your heart thumps loudly in your chest and you feel a shiver of anticipation zoom down your spine.

“Unzip me.”

Your body is in autopilot as you undo his zipper and lean forward to take him inside your mouth.

He pulls you backwards by your braids, and brings his hand around your throat.

“You're gonna take me in your mouth and you're going to keep it there until we get home.” He growls out at you

“No licking, no sucking, no moving. By the time we get home I'll be tattooed so deep in your fucking brain that you'll never mistake someone else for me ever again.” he bites out.

But in true Jungkook fashion he brushes his lips gently against yours, then he shoves his dick down your throat .

The ride home is filled with the obscene noises of you trying not to choke on Jungkook's cock.

Your eyes are watering and your nose burns from how hard you've been breathing through it. Your chest feels hollow and your jaw aches, but you're too fucked out to care.

Jungkook's cargo pants are thoroughly soaked from the way your saliva has dripped all over him. You're sure it's beginning to get uncomfortable for him to sit like this: cock hard and throbbing and in your warm, wet mouth. Yet, he sits perfectly still; unmoving.

His breaths come out in slow, controlled gasps, and it becomes exceedingly clear to you that It's taking as much effort from Jungkook not to snap his hips upwards and fuck your throat; as it is for you to not give him an actual blowjob.

The realization is absolutely riveting.

When Jungkook pulls into the driveway of your flat, he lifts your chin up , and his dick slides out of your mouth with a wet plop.

You both try to catch your breath, chests heaving and hearts thumping. Jungkook tucks himself back into his pants, and takes a deep breath before he gets out of the car.

Like the gentleman he is, he walks over to the passenger side of the car and holds your door open for you. But when you don't make any efforts to get up, he bends down and looks expectantly at you.

You pout at him and point to your feet.

You're barefoot. Of course.

Jungkook rolls his eyes, grabs you by the waist, and tosses you over his shoulder. You squirm a bit, and Jungkook promptly delivers a warning slap to your ass which settles you completely.

He opens the front door and kicks it shut behind him, waiting until he hears the security alarm activate before he moves towards your bedroom.

He tosses you on the bed and flicks the light on. Your chin is slicked with spit, you tits are spilling out of your dress, and the curly hair in your braids are sticky to the thin sheen of sweat on your face.

You look a mess.

A hot, beautiful mess that Jungkook made. His pride swells, along with another part of him.

Jungkook turns his back to you as he takes his shirt off.

“You know I love you right?,” he asks, putting his glasses on the nightstand. He tosses his shirt onto the ground and walks over to the bed. “You know that there's nothing in the world that could ever make me stop loving you?” He asks, now face to face with you as he strokes your chin.

‘I do,” you reply, your voice comes out more of a whine than you actually want it to.

“That's great baby, because this is going to feel like I fucking hate you.”

***

You both cry out when Jungkook finally slips inside you.

You've come to accept that no matter how many times you've taken him, how many times you will take him you'll never not be taken aback by the way his cock stretches you.

The lights are on, and so you can see Jungkook in all his glory. You can see way his biceps bulge and the way his abs tense. You the way his face contorts as your pussy practically suffocates him.

“ You like what you see baby?” He taunts, “had to make sure that you can actually see who's fucking you hm? Wouldn’t want you to make another mistake now would we?”

He spits the word out as if it pains him to say, and translates that pain into a vicious snap of his hips that has you lurching forward, clawing at his chest.

His thrusts are all the same. Carefully calculated and deliciously hard. His tips brush against your gspot with every fluid movement of his hips, and all you can do is whine and beg.

At one point Jungkook slows down to a torturous pace. Pulling out of you the moment he's just shy of your gspot. You can't handle being teased, you won't. You decide to up the ante.

“Jungkook,” you moan out, eyes rolling to the back of your head as he grinds into you “please make me cum daddy”

Jungkook freezes and his hips stutter.

You've never called him that before.

For a moment you regret letting it slip out of your mouth. That's until you see the crazed look that comes into Jungkook's brown eyes.

He wraps his hand around your throat and starts pistoning his hips into you.

“Daddy huh?” He grits out as your juices start leaking down your thighs and unto the skin of his stomach “ is that what you want baby? Wanna make me a dad? Hm? Maybe that way people will keep their fucking hands off you huh?”

“Jungkook please!” You scream, tears pooling in your eyes from how desperately you want the sweet release you've been denied.

“You gonna let me put a baby in you princess? Gonna let me stake my claim on you for everyone to see?” He demands as he stills to a stop inside you.

“Fuck, Jungkook yes! Please I'll do anything you want just please!” You cry

Jungkook finally drives his cock upwards, it's curved head hitting your gspot at the perfect angle. Your orgasm rips through your body so violently that you sink your fingernails so deep into Jungkook's bicep that you break skin.

You cum in spurts, coating him in a thick sheen of your arousal. Jungkook cums with you, no longer being able to resist the pleasure that your body was bringing him.

Jungkook's cum spills out of him in a long, steady stream. You feel the warmth as it seeps inside you, and you clench around him reflexively, determined to keep all of it inside.

“You wanna have my babies so fucking bad.” Jungkook mumbles into your hair, voice hoarse and laced with fatigue.

And do, you mean to say, , though it never actually comes out of your mouth.

Instead, you hug jungkook to your chest, legs wrapped securely around his waist as sleep consumes you.

Fin.

[evilminji]

*Gasp of joy* Brain, you shouldn't have!

You know how the Wayne's have basicly been the ONLY Good And Uncorrupt Wealthy Family in Gotham? And probably fuckin curse resistant AF because otherwise, HOW!? (No, seriously, the local magical population is baffled but impressed!)

....you....you wanna bet at least a few of those suckers died thinking "but I haven't completed my orphan hospital for sickly waifish puppy's and sad eyed children, yet! I... must... save... THE CHILDREN! *le dies (×.× ) * " to the tune of their beautiful (and somehow bizarrely benevolent and well adjusted) families weeping at their bedsides.

Whoop! There's a ghost! Hello, Mr. Wayne.

(Why does this Keep Happening? Please have LESS unfinished bussiness. You're supposed to be rich. Stop trying to help people ON YOUR DEATH BEDS! FFS.)

I say all this? Beeeecause~?

( >.>)(<.< )

Allright! Time to come clean, folks! Which side of the family lead to our descendant dressing up in a Kevlar BAT SUIT!!? Throwing himself off buildings in the middle of the night. Cavorting around with Amazons!

We aren't even mad about the last one! We're actually deeply and respectfully impressed! But who pulled THAT off? Angela? That yours? (*shrug* I mean... probably? It DOES seem like something my daughter would do...)

So like?

Imagine Danny~.

Trying to eat his generic brand cereal. IN HIS Underwear. When? All these Fancy Ghosts show up to his A College Kid's, Baby's First, Crap Apartment(TM). He's eating on a pillow on the floor for God's sake. It's too early for this! C'mon guys...

But, no.

They want permission to go Haunt their Descendant.

Danny sighs. He can already FEEL his cereal going soggy. This is gonna take a while, ain't it? Okay... okay, WHO is you offspring, what did they do, and for how long? You know the rules, guys.

Then they hit him with the oh so casual "BTW he's Fuckin Batman".

YOU WANT TO WHAT!?

(They convince him. How? He couldn't tell you. It's... is? Is this what It's like meeting a Fenton? For other people? Huh. He always thought people were exaggerating...)

Which? Is how a dead Victorian Old Man has arrived to ABSOLUTELY tear this Trouble Making Youngster a new one, in front of his little friends! Just full on full names him. Oh, OH! The broken BONES! The BRUISES! Have you no regard for your poor ancestors health! Their fragile hearts! Trying to put us in the grave AGAIN, are you?! Why in MY DAY-!!!

(Nightwing? Recording this for Alfred. It's gonna be an early birthday present~)

@hypewinter @hdgnj @the-witchhunter @ailithnight @mutable-manifestation @nerdpoe

[citruslullabies]

OMG. I SAW UR CURLY HEADCANONS AND I TOUGHT THEY WERE AMAZING!! COULD U MAYBE DO THE SAME THING BUT WITH DAISUKE?? :O

Coming right up hon!

Daisuke Mouthwashing headcannons

Romantic

Pre-crash Daisuke:

He's a silly guy

Constantly cracking jokes, trying to make you laugh

People wouldn't know if you two were dating or just best friends if it weren't for the fact he's a puppy dog with you

Following you around whenever he can, looking at you for praise whenever he can

It's kind of like the meme "no, I'm not calling you good boy. That mission was shit."

..other than he is a good boy so call him such

And boy does he love PDA

Well, not really

He just loves affection, public or private

I like to think he's just a bit more silly in public

Kisses your cheek and makes an over exaggerated pop whenever he pulls away

Daisuke was hanging out with Swansea, goofing off as usual. But he saw you in the corner of his eye and without a second thought, ran to you and practically pounced. Before you could get anything but a giggle in, he pressed his lips to your cheek and kissed you with a loud pop!

He's not really a petname sort of person either

It's mostly funny nicknames for him

He will call you his grumpasaur when you're grumpy first thing in the morning. I don't make the rules.

Post-crash Daisuke:

For awhile, he still acts the same. But his personality is a little watered down, y'know?

He's stressed and scared after what happened

But he tries not to let that get him down!

Although he is more clingy, more scared of letting go of you. One accident already happened and almost wiped their captain out, what if you were next?

He didn't want to think about that

It made him nauseated to think about

And eventually well.. he crawled through that vent to get to Anya

And he got severely injured. You couldn't bear to see him like that

You most likely died soon before, trying to keep Swansea from killing Daisuke

Begging and pleading that there had to be some other way

But it didn't work out in anyone's favor

Platonic

Pre-crash Daisuke:

You guys are super duper close!!

Lots of jokes and pranks on the other crew members

Constantly goofing off whenever you can

Not too affectionate.. the occasional hug here and there. But besides that it's all fun and games

He has definitely drawn on your face before while you slept

I'm sorry. I don't make the rules. He would definitely make an attempt at drawing a flower on your cheek and it look like a penis

He'd still giggle about it though.. maybe it wasn't an accident

He has definitely (jokingly and lovingly) made fun of Swansea

Just standing up and trying to mimic his mannerisms while you're laughing

..yeah, too bad Swansea was in at that very moment

"look at me, I'm Swansea! I'm a big smelly engineer!" Daisuke said in a forcefully deeper voice, making you laugh as he held his arms out in front of him as if to mimic toting a stomach around. Swansea in question could only look unamused as he cleared his throat, making you both stop in your tracks. Oh if looks could kill.

But yeah you guys have a purely goofy relationship

Post-crash Daisuke:

It's the exact same as the romantic, but the difference is, he tries to convince you to go into the vent with him. He wants to get Anya and doesn't want to be alone

But you of course refused, stating it wasn't safe but did he listen?

No

In fact he continued on to the vent and got himself injured

You gave him the 'i told you so' look but.. you felt really bad when looking at your friend. He was in bad shape.

And so you died a similar way

The only big difference is, you died after discovering him

Thanks for requesting!