#i just ramble for a really long time about nothing

[secretamongthestars]

Third Times the Charm [ ii ]

You and Spencer run into each other at a bar.

WARNINGS: show typical violence (I don't think there's anything in this chapter though)

Spencer Reid x Teacher!Reader | meet-cute | 2.9k

A/N: hi guys!! i just wanted to say thank you guys so much for all the support that Third Times the Charm [i] got !!! i wasn't expecting that at all and just wanted to say thank you!! also, apologies for how long part ii took to come out, midterms were kicking my butt!! plus election stress. anyways! i hope you guys enjoy this chapter!

masterlist

“Reid, what’s up with you?” Morgan asked. As the youngest member of their team walked in, he noticed a pep in his step and he didn’t immediately go for another cup of the obscene office coffee.

“What? What do you mean? Nothing’s up.” Spencer word vomited, quickly realizing if his behavior didn’t give himself away, then that certainly did.

“Okay, no. Sit down. Something is up and you’re gonna tell me,” Morgan told him, sitting on the edge of a nearby desk. Spencer was silent for a few seconds, debating if he really wanted to tell Morgan. However, as he thought about what happened in the past when he kept secrets with the team, he thought it couldn’t hurt to tell Morgan. After all, it’s not like the rest of the team was there yet. A few lower-level agents were going in and out of the bullpen, but save for the two of them, Morgan and Spencer were the only two team members present.

“Fine,” Spencer huffed out, watching as a grin overtook Morgan’s features. Knowing Morgan, he quickly told him, “But you can’t tell the rest of the team okay? Not yet at least.”

Morgan looked a little disappointed at that, but conceded to Spencer’s terms, “Fine. But if they find out on their own, that’s not my fault. Remember who you work with.”

Spencer began to tell him about the irresistible teacher he met, along with the events that conspired the previous Monday and earlier that morning. As he spoke, he became more animated, beginning to talk at a speed that was almost too fast for Morgan to understand.

“And then, I thought she was going to just leave, you know? I mean she said she had to leave, so I thought she was just going to head out, but Morgan, she asked if she could give me her phone number. Isn’t that crazy? And then she just left?!” Spencer rambled, finally getting to the climax of this story.

“Pretty. Boy. Reid,” Morgan said as he clapped him on the back. “Who knew you had it in you. Good for you.”

Spencer sat at his desk, blushing. He knew it was soon, but he was hoping it would go well. From high school throughout his life, he never had a good history when it came to the dating scene, never mind his love life. But you seemed kind and funny, and he admired your job, understanding just how unruly and unpredictable high schoolers could be. Before he could daydream any longer, Morgan snapped him out of it.

“So, when are you seeing her next?” he questioned. Spencer’s eyebrows furrowed, confusedly.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, she gave you her number, have you texted her?” Morgan questioned. “Are you gonna ask her out?”

Spencer looked taken aback like Morgan had asked him to shoot the president.

“That’s a bit fast-paced, right? I don’t want to seem overbearing to her,” Spencer confessed.

“Reid, she seems great. And if she gave you her number, she’s definitely into you,” Morgan advised him. “Go for it, okay?”

As he got up, and headed back to his desk, the rest of the team trickled into the bullpen. Noticing the odd atmosphere, one which they couldn’t quite place based on the neutral expression on Morgan’s face and the confused, bordering on frightened, one on Spencer’s they weren’t sure what had just conspired.

“What was that about?” Emily questioned Morgan.

“Just talking about Reid’s coffee,” Morgan quickly came up with an excuse. “Did you know he puts five sugar packets in there? And that’s on the low end.”

Emily didn’t believe him but decided to let it rest for now.

Hearing the discussion, Garcia added, “You know, I put him on that cafe, the one where he got that coffee. Their coffee is like if a kitten and a unicorn got meshed together, crashed into a rainbow, and vomited on a sprinkle cupcake.”

The team looked at her in utter confusion.

“It’s good,” she translated. “It’s so good. Too good to be putting Reid’s obscene amount of sugar in it.”

Hearing his name, Spencer was about to interject to defend himself, though JJ cut him off before he got the chance.

“Guys, Hotch wants us in the meeting room in 5. We got a case.”

౨ৎ

The school day had ended and all of your students were gone for the day: no extra help, no club meetings, and certainly no meetings with your supervisor. You only had a few student’s assignments left to grade; figuring that it would take less than thirty minutes, you decided to leave it for after you got home and had something to eat.

However, as you were on your way out, two of your coworkers stopped in: Andy, a fellow English teacher, and Brian, a history teacher. Brian had worked at the school for a few years at this point, but Andy only started one or two years ago. Anytime you had questions about the new school or needed to confide in someone the two of them had your back.

“Heading out for the day?” the latter had asked.

“Yeah, I only have a few assignments left, figured they can wait til I get home,” you joked with them.

“Hey, by any chance do you have my copy of Cat’s Cradle? We’re reading it in about a week,” Andy questioned.

“Yeah, hangon a second, let me find it,” you told her, shuffling through your bag in attempts to find it.

“Did you lose your copy?” she asked you.

“Something like that,” you replied vaguely.

“What, did you lend it to a kid and they forgot it at home?” Brian chimed in. “I’m surprised, you usually don’t lend that out, given your annotations, notes, and everything.”

Your face reddened, thinking about what actually happened to your copy of the book.

“Okay. Yeah, tell us right now what’s up with you, because you did not lend that to anyone,” Andy had already figured you out. “I could barely get you to let me borrow your copy of Chronicle of a Death Foretold for a day.”

“Ugh, fine,” you sighed, setting your stuff down, giving up on getting home early.

Sitting on a desk, you confessed to them what had happened the past few days. From the literal run-in to the book exchange to how he was literally gorgeous.

“So, what do you know about him?” Brian asked, snapping you out of your trance.

“What do you mean?” you asked, confused.

“I mean, you know his name is Spencer, but what else?”

That was a valid question that you hadn’t thought of.

“Do you at least know what he does for work?”

“Okay! I get it, I didn’t think of asking that in the moment though. Too late now,” you huffed at them. To be fair, they did have a point. Besides his name being Spencer, you knew nothing else about him. “All I know is that he was reading the Illustrated Man and that he wears sweater vests, alright!”

“Well, did you at least get a last name? Maybe we can look him up online,” Brian proposed.

“No! That’s gotta be an invasion of privacy or something!”

“C’mon, just one search can’t do any harm,” Andy added.

“Fine! But you better not accidentally like a post or something,” you yielded. Seeing as they didn’t even have a last name or any other information to go with, you figured their searching wouldn’t lead to anything, and therefore no harm would come of it.

As they relentlessly searched through instagram for what had to be at least 10 minutes, Andy finally spoke up: “Yeah, I can’t find any guy named Spencer who fits your description.”

“Me neither. I mean, what if he’s like a serial killer or something?” Brian questioned.

“Guys! He’s not a serial killer. Your internet sleuthing was probably just bad. You didn’t even have his last name,” you told them.

“Fine, but if he does turn out to be one…” Andy left out the ‘I told you so’, but you weren’t worried. There was no way that he would even be involved in anything related to that, right?

“Anyways, next week is the beginning of fall break. You guys wanna get drinks or something? Maybe Friday?” Brian proposed.

“Yeah, why not,” Andy agreed while you nodded along. After the first month or so of your new job, you figured a fun night out was deserved.

౨ৎ

In your defense, you did try to have an active break from school, but it seemed that the stress of your new job had finally gotten to you. There was only so much cleaning, morning coffee shop runs, and reading you could do. You didn’t even have any assignments left to grade or to plan.

Friday couldn’t come fast enough.

As you got ready for the night, you decided on a casual outfit, though certainly something different from what you typically wore to work or during a casual day at home.

You were running late as you had opted to put on a bit more makeup than you typically did (not the usual concealer and lip gloss duo). Andy offered to wait outside for you, but after your insistence, she came inside.

“So has he texted at all since you saw him last?” she questioned as you were rushing to put the last of your jewelry on.

“Um,” you opted to ignore her question, busying yourself with the clasp of a bracelet.

“Really? C’mon, with the way you talked about this guy, you would think he’s some kind of prince charming,” she said, shocked. “I know I joked about him being a serial killer, but this doesn’t raise any red flags to you?”

It wasn’t that she didn’t have a valid point, it was just that Spencer seemed so sweet and genuine. You refused to believe that he was like any of the other men you had interacted with in your love-life.

“Maybe he’s busy with work or something. Last time we ran into each other he said he travels for work,” you defended him.

“Yeah, but c’mon. It’s about a week? Isn’t that suspicious? Unless he’s batman or something he has some explaining to do,” Andy stated as the two of you left your apartment, heading out to meet up with Brian.

౨ৎ

The team had gotten back from a particularly tiring case the night before, deciding to get drinks together after some sleep. It wasn’t that the case was incredibly difficult or uncharacteristically violent and strange, unlike some of their previous cases. It just so happened that the unsub was striking at such quick intervals that they had barely any time to rest. Needless to say, drinks were needed.

As the team joked around the table, the jovial mood bringing laughter and smiles to all of their faces, a group of people walked into the bar. They were standing by the counter, joking amongst each other, when one of them looked away from the group.

No one paid any particular attention to three of them, until Spencer saw the face of who exactly just walked in.

“Guys does anybody need another drink?” Spencer quickly asked. While, sure, most of the drinks at the table were near-finished, it was a bit premature to get another round. However, after the past few days the team had, no one was complaining.

The team shouted out different drinks for Spencer to order, all of which went to the back of his mind, as he was focused on you.

Immediately after ordering the team’s drinks, he turned to you, who had also seemingly been the one to volunteer to order your friends’ next round.

“Hey,” his voice sounded quiet as the speakers blared music overhead.

“Oh my gosh! Hi!” you excitedly greeted him. “How’ve you been?”

“I- I’ve been okay,” he told you, not wanting to reveal that side of his life to you just yet, nevermind in a bar. “Sorry I didn’t reach out to you. It’s been a crazy week with work.”

“No yeah, I understand,” you told him. “However, my friend over there does think you may be a serial killer.”

This took Spencer off-guard.

“What?”

“Yeah, I may have told them about our little run-in, after work the other day, and they tried to find you online, sorry,” You told him. You weren’t drunk yet, but you didn’t seem to care about letting go of your filter. “They were surprised they couldn’t find you on instagram. That’s when they suggested your potential for crime.”

“Oh,” Spencer was confused, then let out a small laugh. “Well considering I don’t even have a personal email, that may be why they couldn’t find an account.”

“Really?” now it was your turn to be perplexed.

“Yeah, besides my work email, I don’t really have an online presence,” Spencer admitted. You were still a little confused so he blurted out, “Did you know that 80% of stalking victims are tracked using technology? I mean, typically people are stalked by people they know, but still.”

“I did not know that,” was all you could really say in response. Spencer awkwardly nodded, leaving the two of you in a strange, awkward silence.

“Did you at least go anywhere interesting for work?” you asked him, attempting to get rid of the sudden awkwardness.

“We went to Seattle, but unfortunately didn’t have much time to do anything.”

“Really? They overwork you that much?” You were surprised; you finally found someone with a job that nearly equal to yours in that regard. “What do you even do for work?”

Right before Spencer could think of a response, the bartender brought out your drinks.

“Hey, before you go back to your friends– I’m sorry for not reaching out to you,” Spencer apologized again.

“It’s okay, I get it. Work can be crazy sometimes,” you told him. Before leaving to bring your drinks over to your friends, you blurted out, “to make up for it though, you should definitely call me.”

He only blinked back in response.

“Only if you want to, I mean. I’m not gonna force you or anything-”

“No, yeah I’ll make sure to call you,” Spencer smiled at you. Regardless of what case got thrown his way, he would make sure that this time would. “Promise, okay?”

“Alright, you better keep it then, Spencer,” you told him as you finally made your way back to your friends.

“Who was that?” Brian immediately questioned as soon as you got back to the small table.

“Someone to make you forget about this Spencer? Who I still think is a serial killer,” Andy muttered that last part much more quietly, but Brian and you still heard it.

“He is not a serial killer. And coincidentally, that was him,” you informed her.

“You’re joking.”

“No, why would I be lying?”

“You were not lying about that man being gorgeous,” Andy told you, now staring at the man and his table.

“Stop staring!” you whacked her in the arm, hoping to get her to stop before his friends noticed.

“What? I’m just saying you were not kidding.” You rolled your eyes.

“Did he finally tell you why he didn’t call?” Brian finally asked.

“Yeah, he said it was work,” you told the two. You could immediately tell by the look on Andy’s face that she didn’t believe you. “He said he was in Seattle!”

“Alright…. But just because he’s pretty doesn’t mean he can’t be hiding something,” Andy retorted back. You just put your head in your hands. You would not be hearing the end of this anytime soon.

౨ৎ

“Reid, who was that,” Penelope immediately questioned him, before he even put the drinks down on the table. He rushed to find a reasonable lie but even he didn’t believe it.

“I don’t know, just some girl. I’ve never seen her before,” Spencer told the group defensively. None of them believed him. “I’m serious! I’ve never met her!”

“Reid, no offense, but that’s the first time we’ve seen you talk to a girl and she didn’t immediately leave the conversation,” Emily tried to tell him gently but it didn’t work at all. Spencer was slightly discouraged, though Penelope and Morgan certainly thought it was funny.

“Okay well, I definitely don’t know her so I don’t know what to tell you.” Spencer just wanted the attention off of him.. Even if he knew the team’s jokes were just that, he still wanted to keep this one thing for himself.

Finally, the team had become distracted with the new round of drinks set down on the table, taking the topic of conversation to something completely unrelated. Except for Morgan, that is.

Spencer and him made eye contact, and he knew that Morgan knew for sure that the girl from the bar wasn’t ‘just some girl’, but most definitely the girl Spencer had told him about a few days ago.

Spencer asked him not to say anything with his expression, and either Morgan understood or didn’t care enough to press on the issue.

One thing was for sure. Spencer would call her. Nothing would get in his way this time: not paperwork, not a meeting with Strauss– not even an unsub would get in the way this time.

[murderofsomeone]

it's probably decently obvious that my main lemon demon design was created BEFORE seeing any fandom depictions (or even really that much official art past the logo) because of how violently he stands out in comparison to other designs. it's a little obvious that my inspiration was self-contained and it granted me a bit of creative freedom along with a completely different train of thought while designing him. his three eyes however is very much a relic of 2022 because I was designing a lot of demons with asymmetrical faces at the time and well, why not make another

anyway here's a comparison of him to my most recent lemon demon original design (where it's a bit more obvious I was influenced by somewhat of a fandom culture)

extra bonus rambling under the cut

my general design process has actually stayed relatively contained with a few exceptions like soft fuzzy man's color and weirdly neil himself. yeah sorry chat neil is the first guy that was highly influenced by someone else's design you can shoot me too if you'd like. but I legitimately believe he's the only real example because every other character that has a design remotely similar to someone else is likely due to us both following a similar source material (like my cabinet design being based off polybius) or there being only so many ways to interpret the design (gef the mongoose would've fallen into this category if it wasn't for the fact I made him Joker colors)

in general I tend to follow a mindset of how "weird" I can make a design or how much I can push a lyric/implement it into a design. I also like to twist around the convention and try new things. a good example of both of these apply to my doctor amnesia design.

really the main things going through my head were "well he didn't state HOW many eyes", chosing an eye color that often is overlooked in conventional beauty standards to elevate them and cause you to think, while leaning into the somewhat otherworldly nature she's depicted in by giving her blue skin, a color I associate with the song.

another fun thing I'll do is create a "design pipeline" where I'll take an attribute and run it through a list of connections before we end up in a place long past where we started or just combining a bunch of traits that could be interpreted that way, resulting in designs like this.

though wolfgang isn't my weirdest design, he definitely did not start where we ended off. I believe before the wizard of oz theming for clown circus was set in stone (a choice that has EVERYTHING to do with oz explodes and an element I'll explain later), he was some kinda mirror object head that had absolutely nothing to do with his current namesake. since I wasn't satisfied with that design, I kept a relative aspect of the personality and shapes and thus ended up creating a really interesting take on a character who is largely depicted as... well there's no really good way to say this, but Bad.

since I was working with a new fresh aspect I started by making him a wolf... and then connecting him to "there's a robot in my head". this kind of connected the dots to ultimately make him associated to the tin man, since no one was connected to that character for the wizard of oz element and it was up for grabs (this is also how he somehow got associated with toasters via connecting the previously mentioned song to "what's in the toaster", etc etc). these pipelines of connecting songs that aren't normally related, but making them Work in a believable way makes designs more interesting for me and gives them a bit more purpose and personality. I think this is what ultimately makes people get a bit lost on my interpretations considering they aren't super simple by just being about One Song, but by being about multiple that aren't originally related in the source material. just like how I connected dr amnesia to when he died, explaining a bit of her more mildly supernatural or off-putting elements by making the man in that song her father.

the final real design element that I focus on is the strange rule I follow in terms of how these characters are shaped. there's a massive sort of "alice in wonderland" theming going on in terms of how human/humanoid designs look in contrast to designs that look less and less human. their proportions become more cartoon and shaped, their sizes are affected etc etc all while the human/humanoid characters stay relatively normal next to each other with more believable design elements.

here's the horrid long strip of nearly 100 different character renders next to each other to get a general idea on what I'm talking about

the silhouettes of the human characters "pop" less because they're supposed to contrast to their nonhuman counterparts. which isn't something I normally do, but given the source idea of a sort of "wonderland", I think it works in this specific context.

in conclusion: I'm design autistic and like to use designing to try new things, which is why I fucked that lemon up. sorry about that chat

[lesbiantomservo]

IDs:

[ID: Screenshots of four tumblr posts.

The first, from @nadias-orizonta, reads "If nothing else, you're still here. I cannot stress enough YOU’RE STILL HERE!!! You were here last time, you survived long enough to still be here now. I'm proud of you! If they want us gone, make them work for it. If they want to take our rights, fight to hold on and if they win, fight back again and again and again!!! They take so much already, don't let them take your hope, don't make it easy for them, don’t give them your heart, never give up your life!

The one thing they hate more than anything, is the fact that YOU ARE STILL HERE!!!

Let them seethe, let them cry, let them be consumed by the hate in their hearts, and let them be forgotten by all but the dirt they'll rot within.

Let them watch as all of their work amounts to nothing because WE WILL STILL BE HERE!!!!"

The next post, by @lilybumblebee, reads, "Ramble that will hopefully make any sense

Love the people that you love while you can. Everything is going to suck, but so many people have lived through shitty lives and still exist.

I'm absolutely swamped in pessimism but we have to keep existing. If we just give up and die it's what they want. They want us to die young and suffer and cry and hurt us and make us hurt ourselves, but we gotta keep going. We gotta exist not only to spite them but to exist because we deserve it and others deserve to know we exist.

I'm not saying being openly queer will really be the safest thing, but I'm saying queer people need to exist. There needs to be queer elders for the future and for ourselves.

Somehow I need to go to bed now."

The next post, by @aifudanshi, reads, "Hey, I don’t know who needs to hear this, but if you're trans and Trump wins if you're black and Trump wins if you're Latino and Trump wins, if you're Palestinian in general. Live. Cuz when your very existence becomes an act of rebellion you have to live I know it's going to be hard and I know it's going to be tough but live and not just live but thrive and grow you got this we got this"

This post was tagged "#us politics".

The last post, by @boy-gender, reads "To all the trans people who see this tonight, no matter what happens, we will survive. Trans people will still be here 4 years from now and 10 years from now and 100 years from now and tomorrow. We have always existed and we always will. The world cannot unlearn about us; we are too public, too loud, too beloved, too present. I'll be here tomorrow. Please stay here with me."

/end ID]

reminders. we got this.

[wasyago]

the brainrot won

[critter-wizard]

ep 43 had me tearing up in a fucking shopping centre ‼️‼️

b+w alt version that I truly couldn't decide if I liked it more . Also I included a lot of thoughts in the tags but they're somewhat incoherent<3

[sideblogdotjpeg]

i am not immune to launchpad sol and albin thoughts

[fluffalpenguin]

Happy Shun Duel Links Day!!! (party popper emoji)

[triglycercule]

ok horror didn't go through all the different hundreds and thousands of resets that dust (and killer) went through sure but like. he went through something id consider pretty similar???? because through 7 years there HAD to have been a plethora of humans falling down into horrortale like we can see the countless amount of people that died there in toriel's home or in blue snow or in grillby's or even just that first human that aliza hides behind when she first enters snowdin!!!!!!!

and (i dont really know where this rant is going i will not lie 💀) horror (the prick he is) has to see all these humans he has to meet them and introduce him to all of them and at what point does it just turn into routine for him?? they all just blend into one skin colored bipedal figure and the only important part of them are their insides (which i could go on and on about how gross that probably is 🙁🙁) and how them eventually all fall to their deaths

everyone in horrortale is far too gone to particularly care anyways if aliza wasn't so smart and lucky (plot armor SMH) nobody except horror and paps would probably remember her name. and horror would only remember to add a name to the list of "spices" that are in papyrus's spaghetti and then forget it all again. it's all just an endless cycle of human falls down and eventually dies. nobody in horrortale cares enough (if the human doesnt make some sort of big event happen like how aliza stood up to undyne (i doubt snowdin monsters gaf about her b4 that aside from eating her)) and in the end theyll just turn into food again and then the cycle repeats. its kinda like a reverse dusttale (❓❓❓) where instead of the monsters dying over and over to the human's hands it's humans dying over and over to horror's hands

and now that i've established that 🤓👆 time to tie the trio into this! i mean technically dusttale is a loops of both those things happening with the human killing the underground over and over and then dust killing them in the end??? so i think both dust and horror could relate to that?????

a repeated cycle of a human entering the underground and eventually dying,,,, feeling everything go back to a fixed state (literally with dust's resets and a bit more metaphorically with snowdin not caring all that much in horrortale)

having to start off disgusted with killing and then eventually learning to find enjoyment in it (likely because satisfaction of death is the only reprise from the repetitive slog and boredom that is their aus),,,,

somehow feeling guilt for everyone in their world because of what you've doomed them to by your own hands but also being over it and having grown apathetic. theyre still alive. dust sees his underground alive all the time and so does horror his underground's still (mostly) alive. but dust's underground doesnt survive longer than a few minutes now when they see eithe him or the human (so does it even count as life or is it just a barely fufilled light snuffed out) and horror practically already considers them all dead men walking and theyll all probably die one day anyway with how things are in horrortale so whats the point in even trying and doing something fufilling when everything is so so so shit??? (on dust's end this next similarity is ambiguous :3)

& also what they did to their respective papyruses and how they feel??? ik horror probably feels like shit for tricking papyrus into eating humans but he did the right thing (in his eyes. his EYE). he made the right choice to trick him even if it was bad it was the only thing he could do to help snowdin (sure as hell better than undick's choice to try and use him as cannon fodder for the core) and dust i feeeeel would have a similar thought process. papyrus shouldnt die he doesnt deserve to die but its what needs to be done. he's giving papyrus the longer end of the stick by killing him because its better than being killed by the HUMAN. he doesnt like it but he does it anyway because its what "needs" to be done!!! more similarity,,,,,,, esuaghhhh mtt parallel,,,,,,,

how many more similarities can i milk out. i dont know but anyways i doubt they'd bother talking to eachother about their feelings on this because gawddamn these guys and vulnerability!!! horror wouldn't tell a soul (especially not some freak version of him that killed everyone with some cheap excuse that it was to save them from some freaky human that dust swears he should remember but doesnt. but for the sake of this rant just pretend they dont know about eachother's lore :3) about what he did and what happened in horrortale because THATS HIS BUSINESS!!! dont stick ur head into stuff that youre not involved in PRICK he never gave permission for dust to know that

and dust wouldn't tell either because (i think!!! this part is just me fanonizing dust's reason necessary for this part of my silly horrordust rant. also obligatory "this is all my fanon interpretation of them" because i ran out of space in tags) he doesn't think horror would relate nor would be care. he's gotten too used to not telling anybody what he's doing or why or explaining himself to those he knows and loves back in dusttale so why would he even tell any of that to some random stranger with his only connection to him being that they both used to be the same person b4??

he wouldn't horror wouldn't and they both live in not so blissful ignorance about eachother and just how similar they are. or maybe they only know surface level and make up assumptions and stereotypes because they dont care enough or simply just dont have any attachment invested into eachother to want to actually think things through

TRIGLYCERCULE THIS IS TOO LONG I DIDN'T READ!!!!!! ok 🤣🤣🤣 tldr horror has many parallels and similarities with dust that would only be realized by them if they got self aware enough (which like. when is that ever happening). maybe if they cared enough and liked eachother enough they'd probably bond over their shared similarities,,,,,,,, aka by hunting down horrortale frisk

[mla0]

i hate when people portray michael and/or patrick as some kind of master manipulator who was terrible to shaun and stormy. like, in the past, michael sometimes got portrayed with little autonomy, or as childish and overly innocent in a weird way. that in itself is an issue with the treatment of mentally ill characters (infantilization), but the solution isn't to argue that he's actually a monster who only wanted to hurt and mislead people. the same goes for patrick. i don't enjoy the "goofy flirty mass murderer" interpretation for very similar reasons, because in the canon patrick did indeed do some wild shit but i think it's a stretch to say it was out of malice, except maybe towards eric lol

obviously there will be different views of these characters and this isn't meant to be gatekeep-y or anything, i'm just concerned with how certain portrayals can quickly slide into negative biases towards mental illness. i think if you're going on this route you might want to ask yourself why, and consider how it could make the mentally ill people within the fandom feel when they see their own symptoms portrayed by their peers as synonymous with being dishonest or manipulative

[kyouka-supremacy]

[manasurge]

bleh

[starboundsingularities]

tbh it's really always bothered me a bit that they never actually get into the consequences of misusing the magatama. sure, sure, they say your soul shatters, and like, yeah that's ominous and all, but what does it mean? obviously we never get to see that in-game but i've been thinking about it a lot and i would like to present these thoughts because oh boy there are a lot of them. long post under cut but it's a fun little au as well

alright so before getting into it all, obviously there are some things we're aiming to explain, in some sense, with this.

for one: what is a soul, even? most depictions of souls portray them as the very essence of one's self, as the "culmination of your being" or as some similar nebulous expression of an entire person. but... well, if a soul was the entirety of a person, what would that soul shattering entail? it would just kill them. which is a valid reading i guess but not very fun to mess around with and is also a reading that comes with some... troubling implications.

most notably, the meter on how close you are to that breaking point while using the magatama is the same meter as your penalties in court. not just in the asset used, which wouldn't be worth bringing up, but in the sense that once the magatama is introduced, that same value that meter is held at is shared between court trials and the magatama. before the introduction of the magatama, that meter refilled automatically between trials, each trial starting with it completely full, but after the introduction of the magatama, it was only ever refilled by successfully breaking psyche-locks. this is concerning, because it implies a direct connection between phoenix's soul and his performance in court, which probably wasn't intended but is very fun to mess around with and i love the idea of your soul being tied to your passions. however i don't love the idea of him Straight Up Dying if he does too poorly in court so. uh, no insta-death for soul shattering. anyways this whole side tangent never comes up again. thumbs up emoji.

anyways, if a soul shattering doesn't entail simply death, and if a soul isn't just someone's essence or personality or whatever, well, what is it? well, one compelling answer is that it's merely a container. it holds someone's essence or being or personality, but it itself is not that.

thus i present:

Soul Shatter AU

a soul is just a container. one that holds everything in. someone's passions, ambitions, personality.

someone's secrets.

if it were to shatter... without a container, everything would come spilling out. whoever was involved would be unable to keep anything contained within themself. sure, their physical self might be enough to hold in some of the more ambiguous, nebulous aspects of their "self", but it would prove rather difficult to hide something with nothing there to keep it hidden inside.

a fitting punishment, really, for abusing the power to reveal what others have kept hidden.

the fun part, of course, is what comes next. who's used the magatama? who's had the chance to fall to such a fate?

off the top of my head i can think of two people. phoenix wright and miles edgeworth. (i think mia used one too? my friend says she did but i haven't gotten to that part yet i'm only on the third game)

and both of them, despite their focus on finding the truth, are very ironically prone to hiding things themselves. their feelings, their troubles, their emotions.

what if we opened them up a little?

[pokemonruby]

the cover i commissioned for my book is almost finished... this feels so surreal.

[shirtlessradfahrer]

So what do you do when your favourite rapper makes a catchy song about the hardships of life that you want to love but upon release can’t connect with at all and after a few listens almost outright dislike because none of the pain and hardship life has put you through has ever made you a better person or given you the energy/motivation to do better and it actually just did the complete opposite and you’ve lost out on precious years of your life and so many opportunities while trying to process the trauma and undo the damage

But everyone else seems to love the song to the point that you start to wonder if maybe you’re just a fucking idiot for not being able to make something good out of said trauma and hardship instead of just being filled with crippling anxiety and depression and bitterness and grief and rage

[hadesknockedupintheunderworld]

While I was reading the later chapters of Phantom of the Opera a friend of mind reminded me it was a serialization, and suddenly I had a moment of clarity in which I thought "Oh so that's why it's written like that"

[doodlboy]

wanted to make sure i told you again! it is literally basic fandom etiquette not to use the main tags for vent/anti/hate about a character! people use those tags because they LIKE solomon, not because they want to see some idiot calling him "basically a rapist" for something >>NOT EVEN ASMODEUS<< interpreted that way. fix your fucking tags! go fuck yourself!

Hi there, If your initial reaction to seeing someone talk about negative [yet still canon] things related to your favorite character is to come into that person's ask box and tell them to go fuck themselves, you need to get up, turn of your computer, and go outside for a while.

Whatever post you're mad about was made months ago, using tags that are meant to be used when discussing a character regardless of how much the op likes said character.

Solomon is fine, I don't really care for him, but what I'm most likely referring to in the post you're talking about is the hypocrisy of the obey me fandom when it comes to Solomon's behavior.

When Solomon attempted to give Lucifer a drink that was enchanted to make him want a pact with Solomon, it was fairly well agreed across the fandom that what Solomon did was pretty fucked up and not okay. However, when talking about how Solomon got his pact with Asmodeus by taking advantage of the fact he was heartbroken and drunk to tie him into a forever binding pact against his will, somehow people are making excuses as to why it was necessary and why what Solomon did is fine actually and not a problem at all. This is where my issue with Solomon and his fans lies, with the hypocrisy. I couldn't give 2 shits whether he's your favorite character or not, good for you if he is! But what we're NOT going to do is scream bloody murder when Solomon attempts to do shady shit to Lucifer, but overly demonize Asmodeus, say he deserved it, say his charming power is non consensual regardless of the fact nowhere in canon says he has ever used it to have non consensual sex and has only used it to get himself and his family out of danger, or say that he is a beast that needs to be controlled when we don't talk that way about the other 6 brothers, when Solomon succeeds in taking advantage of his inebriated state to tie them together so he can use Asmodeus' power for his own gain.

And one more thing we aren't going to do; call me an idiot and accuse me of calling your blorbo a rapist when *you* cannot tell the difference between someone saying "a character was taken advantage of while under the influence" and "this character is a rapist." Solomon did not sexually assault anyone, however the framing of that scene is open to interpretation and to my interpretation, it was heavy handed in showing Solomon doing something that is extremely not okay and laughing it off like it was completely fine. Because to him, it IS fine to treat demons like that. There is absolutely nothing wrong with my interpretation of the scene, and I will continue to use characters' main tags when talking about them because the tags are used for discussion.