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vvienne · 3 years ago

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ZUTARA FIC RECS

(Don’t) Follow Me Down by eleventy7

Katara is the dread queen of the underworld, ruler of the dead, destined to reign her cold kingdom alone. Until a sun god catches her eye.

they call you refugee by akaiiko

Zuko goes into exile with a scar, a mission, and a wife.

The girl wears ill fitted ceremonial silks. She is too thin, with jutting bones and hollowed eyes. Dirt smudges her cheek. Her lower lip has a healing split in it. Gaudy as her finery is, she wears it like prisoner’s rags.

All of this Zuko registers in the time it takes him to reach the dais and bow. Every muscle aches with the remembrance of what happened the last time he knelt before Father. This time there is no begging, no roar of the crowd, no burning. Still—Zuko’s grateful to stand once more.

Slipping into soldier’s parade rest, he waits for what will come next, all too aware of the girl’s defiant body next to his.

“I am told that this is Katara of the Southern Water Tribe,” Father says, cruel amusement oiling his words. The phrasing makes the girl sound like a thing. “The last waterbender of their pathetic tribe.” Flames conceal all but his shadow, yet Zuko knows from long experience the exacting blade of his father’s smirk. The smirk he must surely wear now. Because he has built up his insult and now he lets it fall. “Your bride.”

the poison leaves bit by bit by paintingcranes

After the war, Katara struggles to breathe.

She’s always known who she is and what her duty was - now she hasn’t got a clue. She didn't realize that learning to live, after just surviving for so long, would be this hard.

OR: Katara falls in love with Zuko, but first she learns to love herself.

OR: Katara travels the world, Zuko supports a political revolution, Aang faces his trauma, Toph accepts help from her friends, Suki inspires other women, Sokka leads, and everyone heals.

Pulse by damagectrl

The war of conquest comes to a crashing halt when the death of Azulon puts brother against brother, with anti-war Iroh claiming victory. A young Zuko escapes capture and flees to the former colonies, hiding out for ten years, evading his uncle’s men.

While Zuko was prepared for any Fire Nation detectives and soldiers after him, he finds himself grossly unprepared for a waterbending prodigy turned bounty hunter who has yet to fail to bring in her target.

Practice by ama

Post-Ember Island Players, Zuko and Katara discuss boys, the kissing thereof, the inherent confusion of adolescence, and why love is like fish.

a deep delight of the blood by eruthros

"Me. You could practice on me. If I'm telling you that you can do it, it can't be wrong to practice - just in case - "

The Simple Joys of Tying Up Boys by Letterblade

“So, uh, Suki,” Katara says, worrying at one elbow with her other hand and trying not to let her face light on fire. “Can you teach me how to tie up boys?”

Lovable by LadyCharity

Zuko knew that he could not save Azula. He could only try to forgive her. Fittingly enough, those two were one in the same.

The Scourge of the Mo Ce Sea by ajstyling

She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen and with one look at her face he understood the truth of her words. She would kill him and not lose a minute of sleep.

---

Following the destruction and conquest of their home by the Fire Nation, the Southern Water Tribe turned to piracy in order to survive. Katara, Scourge of the Mo Ce Sea, the most infamous of the Southern Water Tribe pirate captains, devises a plot to capture and ransom the Fire Lord's son, but quickly realizes that Zuko is nothing like she expected.

The Worst Prisoner: The element of change (Book 1) by emletish

What if Sokka was there during the events of the Blue Spirit? What if he accidentally kidnapped Zuko? It's not a poor life choice of it's an accident, right?

Once Around the Sun by eleventy7

Later, Katara can see how it all fell apart. Azula in her cell, growing roses; Zuko surrounded by enemies, slowly dying; their friends in the Earth Kingdom, safely escaping. And herself at the centre of it, saving lives and breaking promises. Set after finale, eventual Zutara.

The Blackfish and the Dragon by ama

Katara grew up in the Southern Water Tribe under the tutelage of Hama, the only waterbender ever to have escaped Fire Nation captivity. When Zuko arrives at the South Pole, seeking the Avatar, they are more than ready to defend him. Iroh watches as his beloved nephew throws himself at the ice walls again and again in an impossible siege–-and resolves to do anything it takes to save his nephew from himself. With the assistance of the Order of the White Lotus, he deposes his brother on the Day of Black Sun.

A week later, the Southern Water Tribe receives a petition for peace, and a proposal of marriage.

Fire On The Ice by Dyce

Lu Ten survives the siege of Ba Sing Se, and Iroh returns home to depose the usurping Ozai. Determined that no more sons or daughters will die in war, he begins peace negotiations with the Earth Kingdom and Water Tribes.... offering Zuko and Azula, his secondary and tertiary heirs, as marriage-pieces. Zuko is offered to the Water Tribe... specifically, to Hakoda and his daughter Katara. Mild smut.

Journeys by Smediterranea

Katara, in her final year of medical school, spends her time studying and working without having very much fun. That might change when she meets another workaholic named Zuko... Modern AU Katara/Zuko, with a sprinkling of the other members of the Gaang throughout.

“This tea is delicious,” she says politely.

“I didn’t make it,” Zuko says. “I’m not allowed to handle the tea.”

“Not allowed?”

Zuko flushes and rubs the back of his neck.

“I told Uncle Iroh that tea was just hot leaf juice when I was a teenager and he’s never let me handle it since.”

Catalyst by devNdev

Zuko is captured by the Dai Li in Ba Sing Se. While held in the darkest part of the Crystal Catacombs and certain all is lost, unexpected visitors arrive. Uneasy alliances are made and the motivations behind them are quickly tested. Zuko must fight to survive and heal, facing uncomfortable truths and lies, answering the big questions, and finally fighting his greatest enemy yet.

An end of Season 2 AU leading into Season 3.

oracle bones by orphan_account

The foreign, pictorial characters that bracelet Zuko's left wrist have never been covered in any of his lessons. He cannot read them.

And then he turns thirteen, and his father burns his wrist along with his face.

like we're made of starlight by Naladot

Katara leaves her post as the ambassador to the Fire Nation to take up a new one as the ambassador to the Northern Water Tribe. Her absence makes Zuko realize that he's got an unfortunate crush, which he is determined to keep secret. Unfortunately for him, subtly has never been one of his strengths—especially when he arrives in the Northern Water Tribe and she keeps taking him on what seem to be dates.

side of the highway by visibleworlds

“Why the fuck,” Katara asked, “were you making an omelette at three in the afternoon.”

—

Zuko moves, tries to repair his relationship with his sister, almost burns the house down, and falls in love. It’s a grand time.

The Perfect Color by ParadiseAvenger

A Soul Mark could be left for any kind of love—familial, friendly, romantic, pure, fantastical. Each color represented a different bond between the people that touched skin-to-skin. The colors stayed the same until the death of that person. Then, the Soul Mark would turn grey.

Katara had never seen someone without Soul Marks.

But Zuko’s skin didn’t have colors—it only had scars.

#zutara #zuko #katara #atla #atla recs #fic recs

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fibrowarriorgirl · 3 years ago

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How I found out about my fibromyalgia

Getting diagnosed with Fibromyalgia is particularly tricky. This is because fibro doesn't show up on any test. On top of that, many medical professionals don't even believe fibromyalgia is a real illness, or lack the knowledge to diagnose in the first place (source). So how does one even get diagnosed in the first place?

I am going to be honest, I have been very lucky with my doctors. All of them have plenty of knowledge on the topic, and the rheumatologist who ended up diagnosing me did nothing to indicate that he doesn't believe it's a real illness. I realise this isn't reality for everyone suffering from fibro, so that's why I want to start of this post with a lot of gratitude to the medical profesionals who have been treating me so far.

So, how did it start for me? Technically this started almost 10 years ago, when I was 11 years old. I don't remember this, but according to my mum I was often complaining about wrist pain and fatigue. The doctor did a few tests on me and couldn't find any cause. My mum did some googling and did read up about fibromyalgia. But because no doctor ever brought it up, she thought it wouldn't be the case. The symptoms eventually went away.

When I was 14, I started having joint pain again. I was also suffering from fatigue again, but I think that at this time it was caused by depression. When I went to the doctor, she told me I needed to excercise more. I was sent home without getting any tests done. The pain never fully went away after this. It wasn't constant, it just came in episodes.

And then last June happened. I woke one day with pretty intense pain in my right ankle. Almost as if I had somehow injured it. I hadn't done anything in the days prior to then that could explain the ankle pain. I decided to ignore it. In fact, I tried to use it even more, thinking of the advice the doctor gave me last time I had joint pain. The pain never went away. After about a week and a half, I tried to use my ankle less. Resting more than usual, and trying to put more weight on my left ankle instead of my right ankle. This also did not help.

After 2 or 3 weeks, I decided to go to my GP. This time I was taken a lot more seriously. My ankle looked completely normal. No swelling, no redness, no warmth, etc. My GP theorised I had somehow broken my ankle in my sleep when it started. It was a long shot, and after getting X-rays done, it was indeed not the case.

The next week I went back to my GP. This time I was referred to a rheumatologist. I was seen by the rheumatologist later that day. He did a physical examination, which meant he moved every single joint of mine to see if it hurt. Surprisingly, almost every single joint hurt. Even though I wasn't experiencing any joint pain anywhere besides my right ankle. In fact the examination was so painful, that I passed out from the pain.

I did a few blood tests, got 2 types of scans done of my lungs, got some urine checked out. My timing on this was horrible though, because the rheumatologist was going on holiday for 3 weeks on the day I got all of these tests done. So that meant I wouldn't know my results for 3 weeks.

And in those 3 weeks I got a lot worse. First the pain spread to my other ankle. Not only was my left ankle in more pain, but it was completely swollen. The pain got worse, and in the course of a few days was in every single joint of my body. There were days I couldn't even get out of bed. I also started suffering from fatigue I have never felt before. I could do one or two tasks a day, after that it was like I did a full day of intense physical labour. I purchased a cheap walking stick, which helped a little but not enough. I ended up calling the rheumatologist's office after only a week of waiting, begging for any kind of help. The on-call doctor prescribed some heavy pain meds. Even that didn't help all that much.

Eventually the rheumatologist called me with the results, all of my tests came back negative. I wanted to cry when he told me this. If everything looks good, how could I be in so much pain? But before I could start sobbing, he told me this meant it was fibromyalgia. An invisible illness, that not only explains the joint pain, but other health issues I've been having that I will elaborate on in a different post.

As you can see, it took a very long time until I finally got diagnosed. And although it seems that in the past it was episodic, that doesn't seem to be the case right now (or this is just an insanely long episode). I'm grateful for the amazing doctors that have been able to help me.

That was a very long post. If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask them on my AMA!

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avatar-news · 4 years ago

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The Fire Nation Awaits 🌺 An in-depth look at the ever-elusive islands in the era of Korra and when we will finally pay them a visit

[Artwork by Avatar News; not official.]

Note: This article was published before the official announcement of Avatar Studios at the Paramount+ investor day.

“Water. Earth. Fire. Air. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked.” We’ve all heard those words a million times. The four elements, and the power to control them bestowed by four subspecies of giant lion-turtles, are at the very heart of the world of Avatar. The balance between them was once upon a time broken by one of the four, the Fire Nation, forming the main conflict of Avatar: The Last Airbender. For much of Aang and the Gaang’s quest at the close of the Hundred Year War, the Fire Nation was a forbidden, far-away location, until the curtain was finally drawn back in the aptly-named Book Three: Fire when our heroes entered the inferno, undercover behind enemy lines. A dramatic tropical destination! New outfits! Culture shock! Needless to say, it was a big deal.

→ 🌺 The big reveal of the Fire Nation in Book Three: Fire had its own marketing push, matching public anticipation.

When the Hundred Year War ended, the newly-instated Fire Lord Zuko dedicated his life to righting the wrongs of his forefathers and working with Avatar Aang to bring the Fire Nation back into the fold under peace. By the time Aang’s successor debuted as the next Avatar in the titular The Legend of Korra, Zuko had abdicated the five-pointed crown and his daughter, Fire Lord Izumi, took the stage leading a reformed, rebalanced Fire Nation.

There was no more war, no more enemy lines, yet the Fire Nation became more distant and mysterious than ever before.

Korra’s close encounters with the land of fire

To this day, Korra has never visited the Fire Nation, nor has it been seen at all, nor do we know anything about it in her era. In fact, practically the only thing we do know is that its leader is a noninterventionist, which conveniently gets it out of the way of making an appearance in Korra’s journey as the Avatar so far.

The closest we have come to seeing the Fire Nation in The Legend of Korra was in Book Two: Spirits, Chapter Five: Peacekeepers. In the midst of the Water Tribe Civil War, Korra sets out across the sea to get help from the royal family, however, she is intercepted by a dark spirit and never makes it to her destination. In the next episode, she washes up on a secret island home to the Bhanti sages, which probably technically counts as Fire Nation territory, but as we know from The Shadow of Kyoshi (more on that later), this faction predates the Four Nations themselves so it doesn’t really count.

→ 🌺 Korra washes up on the beach of Bhanti Island in Book Two: Spirits, Chapter Six: The Sting.

No, as cool as that location and the events of the Beginnings two-parter that happened there were, it wasn’t the main draw of seeing the Fire Nation that we’re still waiting for: seeing how the Fire Nation, which was already industrializing in Aang’s time, changed over the decades, compared to places like Republic City and Ba Sing Se; meeting new characters; visiting new and familiar locations; worldbuilding both new and expanding on what we already learned.

After this aborted tease in Book Two, we never come close to the island country again (at least not with this Avatar and in her era; yes I’m leading up to something...). Instead, the focus turns strongly to the Earth Kingdom in the third and fourth Books, and beyond.

Keep in mind that The Legend of Korra aired for about two-and-a-half years total from 2012 to 2014. Since then, the story has continued in comics. The comics era has lasted from 2015 to present-- seven years to the animated series’ two. In that time, there have only been two comic trilogies due to various production troubles, and neither have touched the Fire Nation. Instead, they directly continue the Earth Kingdom-focused threads started in Books Three and Four of Korra, both originally airing in 2014. Or, in perspective: we had a focus on Republic City in 2012, the Water Tribes in 2013, and the Earth Kingdom from 2014-2021.

Will we finally see the Fire Nation in the next graphic novel trilogy?

This question comes to mind every time new Korra content is supposed to roll around, and the powers that be know it-- it’s a pretty obvious gap in the world of Avatar right now. This franchise is iconically built around four elements and the Four Nations based on them, so one of them being MIA is quite glaring, and for that reason everyone is understandably always asking about it.

The most concrete confirmation we’ve gotten was this AMA answer from franchise co-creator Michael Dante DiMartino in 2016, two years after the show ended and a year before the first graphic novels did come out:

“Yes, hopefully in the [Korra] comics, we’ll have a chance to go to the Fire Nation and see how it has changed since A:TLA.”

Since then, as previously discussed, two comic trilogies have come and gone, obviously not getting closer to the Fire Nation-- and I would actually argue entrenching themselves further away from it.

I want to make it clear that I’m against fan entitlement. Creatives telling the tales they want to in service of the story and the artform is how the industry should run. I’m just hoping to offer some perspective on how we got to where we are almost a decade into the era of Korra and the metatextual pacing of the franchise itself.

Either way, the next Korra comic trilogy has been official confirmed by the editor for Avatar at Dark Horse Comics in this informal statement on Twitter:

We’re not ready to announce any details yet, but we are working on the next trilogy. I really appreciate your patience and hope it’s worth the wait! ✨

There’s currently some kind of holdup for which we really have zero context or information, and we of course have no idea what this next trilogy will be about. (I do speculate a bit on what it could be a few paragraphs down.)

But, like what turned out to be Ruins of the Empire before it, I faithfully made a mockup graphic for my post announcing the confirmation of the next The Legend of Korra graphic novel trilogy. And like before, I chose to completely speculatively and blindly make it Fire Nation-y, as if the next comic could/would(/should?) feature it. This is mainly because I feel like that’s what most people’s eyes would be caught by and thus result in the most successful post (hey, at least I’m honest), but also because it’s just fun.

Here are both images, from 2018 and 2020 respectively:

→ 🌺 Speculative edits I made for my posts on the announcement of previous and upcoming Korra comics before we knew anything about them.

In both cases, the response was huge, and people were super excited about the prospect of Fire Nation content just from my quick speculative mockups. I am of course hoping that the new artwork I made of the Krew for this post will have a similar effect (it’s the first time I just straight-up drew it instead of editing existing images) but again it’s really mostly just for fun.

Anyway, until the next trilogy is properly revealed, we’ll just have to wait and see.

However, that’s not the only place this could happen.

Are they saving the Fire Nation for an animated movie?

With Avatar’s HUGE success on Netflix last year, interest in the franchise rocketed to an all-time high. The streaming wars have begun, and Avatar’s owner and its parent company, Nickelodeon and ViacomCBS, have finally started to notice.

ViacomCBS is launching Paramount+ on March 4th, a relaunch of its existing streaming service CBS All Access. Paramount+ is meant to be a big expansion and refocus to compete with the big hitters: Disney+, HBO Max, and, yes, Netflix. (There’s quite an entanglement there, with Netflix being the home of Avatar’s big year and the upcoming live-action series.)

One of the keys to a successful streamer today is high-profile originals to drive new subscribers. ViacomCBS knows this and they know Avatar has just become among the highest profiles a property can have, breaking records and going toe-to-toe with other big-hitting sci-fi/fantasy/genre franchises. This knowledge goes right to the top of the food chain: the CEO of ViacomCBS mentioned Avatar by name when discussing potential originals for Paramount+.

I have previously discussed how The Search relates to this. The Search was the second ATLA comic trilogy, focused on the search for Zuko’s mother in the thick of the Fire Nation, and if you didn’t know, it was originally pitched by Bryke as an animated movie after the original series ended.

I just want to be clear that what I’m discussing here is purely speculative, but this is the only other piece of the Avatar franchise that we know was optioned for animation besides the shows themselves. It’s possible they would be interested in going back to this idea as a Paramount+ original (and it would certainly be popular among audiences), but it is of course set during the era of Aang and thus covers both a time period we’ve already seen, and also by nature of already being released as comics, events we’ve already seen too.

However, the whole point of this article is that there is one major, huge thing we haven’t seen yet, with massive anticipation building for a decade behind it: the Fire Nation in the era of Korra. So, again, this is just speculation, but it’s also possible that they could return to the very smallest seed of the original idea for a The Search movie, and do a Fire Nation-focused Korra movie now.

→ 🌺 ATLA’s Fire Nation-focused The Search was originally pitched as an animated movie.

You can skip this next part if you don’t want to see me embarrassingly promote my fan idea 😆 but this is where the artwork I made for this article comes into play. The general idea for it, and the reason I tried to replicate the show’s style as much as possible, is that it’s what a Fire Nation-focused movie could maybe look like. Something as standalone and unrelated to Earth Kingdom drama as possible, with fresh new looks for the Krew to get people excited for something fresh and new! I really feel like the Avatar franchise has so much potential for expanded content like this, that’s why I have high hopes that Paramount+ will make the most out of it! You can see the individual characters’ artwork in larger size here. Ok I’m done back to business.

If the idea of a movie seems too impossible to you, we can also take a deeper look at Bryke’s involvement with upcoming comics instead.

After Korra ended, they officially each went their separate ways. They vaguely consulted on Avatar stuff, and Mike of course wrote the Korra comics, but Bryan was planning on writing and drawing his own original non-Avatar comic series and Mike was releasing his own non-Avatar novels. This all appears to have come to a stop when they signed on to showrun the live-action retelling of ATLA at Netflix, officially reuniting the partnership and committing to Avatar again in a big way. Of course, they ended up leaving that project over creative differences, but it did result in a big, lasting change: this time they remained official creative partners and have indicated they’re still working on Avatar now, together. This is a far cry from the official breakup after Korra, so it begs the question what exactly they’re working on. I of course have my fanciful predictions of a sprawling expansion of the Avatar franchise at Paramount+, but what if it’s actually a combination of the ingredients from before the live-action series...

More speculation, but what if the reason for all the mystery behind the next Korra comics is because they will be made by Bryke, with the two of them co-writing and Bryan doing the art for the first time? If that’s the case, they could want to make them a bigger deal than the other Avatar comics have been so far, and maybe that’s why it’s taking so long to iron everything out, have a more significant story, have more of a marketing push, etc. If they’ve been saving the Fire Nation for something big, this could be it.

I personally think this is less likely than a show or movies or something, but it is possible. Anything is possible right now since we know so little about the large-scale direction of the franchise moving forward, just that it’s gonna get big.

⛰️🌋 The Fire Nation in the era of Avatar Kyoshi

We’re not done! Despite everything I’ve written here, believe it or not, the Fire Nation was actually the star of the show in the last year.

With the debut of the Avatar franchise’s first original novels, Kyoshi made a huge splash (in a way only she can). If you haven’t read them yet, you NEED to-- they’re some of the best Avatar content EVER. The Rise of Kyoshi hit shelves in 2019 and The Shadow of Kyoshi followed in 2020. The latter is of particular interest here, because it was almost entirely set in the Fire Nation and featured practically everything and anything you could want from a visit to elusive islands. Though obviously set in a historical period some four hundred years before Aang’s time, Kyoshi’s sojourn in the Fire Nation gave us a huge amount of new information, a depth and breadth of worldbuilding, culture, and character we’ve never really seen in Avatar before. It truly makes the most of the literary medium, so hats off to author F. C. Yee for the passion and effort he put in.

In The Shadow of Kyoshi, we learn about the era of the previous fire Avatar before Roku, Avatar Szeto. Through Kyoshi and her own Team Avatar, we learn about the different clans and islands of the Fire Nation, as they experience the fraught early reign of Fire Lord Zoryu and the conflict between the Keohso and Saowon clans, culminating in the Camellia-Peony War. We get a multitude of fleshed-out perspectives from the upper crust to the flea-bitten underworld, matching the heights of the worldbuilding quality of Republic City. It’s such cool, intricate stuff, and really shows Avatar’s potential (and that’s all just the worldbuilding-- the character work is also top-notch).

That’s not the only place the Fire Nation has shone recently. One of Insight Editions’ awesome scrapbooks, Legacy of the Fire Nation, gave us a tour through the royal family’s history, including never-before-seen looks at young Iroh and Ozai and much, much more.

All this just goes to show that the Fire Nation has been a hot ticket throughout the ages and there’s one conspicuous gap in that history: the era of Avatar Korra. With so much recent expansion and development of the Fire Nation in our world, it would be perfect to see the culmination of it all in the current time period in the world of Avatar too.

If this made you excited for the potential of what the Avatar franchise could look like in the coming years, same boat!

The next concrete date where something could be announced is February 24th, when ViacomCBS will host their investor day and present their streaming strategy, including Paramount+ originals. There’s no guarantee Avatar is mentioned, but I’m keeping a hopeful eye out.

As for comics, Dark Horse’s schedule marches to its own beat, so there’s no way to know when the next drop of information is coming our way.

Could this finally be the comics that take us to the Fire Nation, or could the much-anticipated visit be in another medium like animation? Stay tuned-- as always I’ll post as soon as we learn anything new!

#korra comics #paramount plus #the fire nation awaits

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1d-discourseoftheday · 4 years ago

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Thurs 14 Jan ‘21

Nobody Is Listening, officially out tomorrow, has already arrived in some parts of the world! As of press time it's #1 on itunes in 24 countries and racking up more by the minute, we should have some exciting stats by tomorrow, plus we'll have heard the whole thing! And not only that, the official listening parties begin very soon, and will hopefully have their tech issues sorted by then, cause yes, I bet you can guess what already happened.... YEP WEBSITE CRASH! Yeah baby, that's what we do! But maybe people are right to be excited the chat does include... maybe Zayn? Someone official (“Zayn admin”) anyway! And just because the event hasn't started is no reason not to gather and start screaming about the album, whether it's out in your area, you're listening to a leak (Niall voice: No Judgement... except he would actually be mad about that lol), or you only are looking at the lyrics which tbh is about more than I can handle all by itself. You guys there is a LOT there, I was going to pull a few things but it's SO MUCH. We'll be unpacking (and soaking in) all this for a while to come, wow.

Niall popped on twitter to promo the new JC Stewart song he co-wrote, and he picked a question about whether he was interested in doing more writing for other people to answer; he said “always writing something, this one just felt right for JC and he put his twist on it.” He followed Olivia Rodrigo and posted about how much he likes her new song, Driver's License (“this song is the real deal... beautifully written”), defended his comment (a series of laugh cry emoji) on a meme post using a pic from the WMYB video, said not drinking this month has been “easy!” and he did a “can't sleep talk to me” AMA-- he recommends MGMT, Kacey Musgraves, Artic Monkeys, and, for crossover excitement, Lucius (who feature on TPWK) and DMA'S (who feature as Louis' fave band)! He also agressively rejected some fan fashion suggestions (“no no no no” “I will not”) of outifts that, uh, look AN AWFUL LOT like ones he has worn to me? If he's serious (and not quietly seething about how we don't get his humor) I have to respect that kind of passion about nearly invisible detail tbh. And speaking of attention to detail! An article about the RAH livestream came out in a crew trade publication so there's just reams of very specific tech detail; but there's also plenty of people saying nice things about Niall! “Niall was very involved in every step of the process. He really gained a full grasp of the situation and during the promotion of the show, he really wanted to educate the public, and his fanbase, about what was going on in the sector,” for example. Tonight Niall told us he would want to do another virtual concert but he'd “need a good reason... a music launch or something.”

Liam has a new video for Hugo Man (that's a perfume in case you were wondering); he says about 2020, “I think we've all learned to rest a little bit more this year, I hope we all keep a little a bit of time for ourselves.” HAVE YA learned to do that though Liam, HAVE YA? Where is this sabbatical you said you were taking right now that you definitely were in great need of? Honey please-- just take a break! We worry! Sigh. Anyway also he changed his social headers and bio in honor of the new projects (SIGH) he's doing right now- it says “here's to the future...” (was previously ticket lnks) which would be a great bio to have up indefinitely while taking a break... or something... maybe he should do that...

Hey remember that YA novel about closeted boybanders in love that we were like, well, at least we won't have to deal with that until next year? WELL GUESS WHAT YEAR IT IS NOW-- the release date isn't until Dec 7 which is VERY FAR AWAY but I guess the hype is beginning now; the title and cover art for If This Gets Out, by Sophie Gonzales and Cale Dietrich, have been revealed. Becky Albertalli (who once wrote a book [Love Simon] about a gay football player with Louis in his name whose secret code name was “bluegreen”) posted to hype up the book, but then followed up with a long post to tell people that in fact you-know-who were NOT the source of those details in Love Simon, and that she is now a new Harry Styles fan but knows nothing about any of that. Sophie Gonzales, who drew the cover art for her new book- a picture of a light haired guy with a long fringe and a curly haired brunet locked in eye contact and a silhouette of the fictional band they're in that looks just like the famous Steal My Girl video shot (or Louis' Walls video reference of same)- says “this book is fictional, and while we're aware of what Larry is, this book was not written about that.”

And in today's Holivia corner, not much action! A mere trickle! Cosmo published a timeline of events that reads just like a tumblr masterpost, complete with 'what is the truth' gifs at the blatant contradictions, but that's about it. “You live in my imagination**,” indeed; much like the rumor started by a single galaxy brained anon claiming that Harry definitely fucked... wait for it... LIAM'S DAD (like, his actual father, Geoff Payne, not some kind of euphemism.) Someone tell Page Six! I have no comment until I get some good analysis of astrological compatibility from their expert...

(**Harry Styles, Olivia, 2015)

#zayn #niall horan #Liam payne #harry styles #I'm totally here for Maya posting a steady stream of cute dog content but... it certainly feels a little uh fami fami fami familiar #I think the reason Louis and Liam are in near constant contact right now is not work related #but I can definitely see some of Louis' stuff bleeding into the things Liam is doing and I can't help but feel it's related #maya henry #if this gets out

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mondaijo · 3 years ago

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hello !! sorry for the bother, but since you've already pre-ordered the mxtx books, will it be delivered on december 7? if so, can you wait a little while to pre-order or is it better to do it now in case it runs out?

i've never done this before i'm so sorry shshsgdhs. thank you!

hello!! ahhh no, it's no bother at all, anon, I hope I can help~

tl;dr: this is just my estimate and of course I can't predict anything, but yes it shouldn't be a problem so you can order them later, yes!! since it's a pre-order there will be enough for everyone no matter when you place yours, unless they state sometime later that the novels or any merch (if there are any) are limited stock. ♥

I don't have that much experience pre-ordering books either, but from the times I did, the date is usually an estimate on when they'll start shipping and am/azon (if that's where you're ordering from, since BD isn't shipping to a couple places including here /cry) might even ship them a couple days earlier. every time I pre-ordered something on ama/zon, they emailed me letting me know whenever there would be any delays and these were very few; they're usually ahead of schedule so people start getting their books on the actual release date. however, as I said, this is just my personal experience and this all depends on how smoothly production goes and it's all up to Seven Seas' logistics + shipping!

since it's not a limited pre-order, it doesn't really make a difference if you pre-order them now or right before they start shipping, too. there is a chance that the number of pre-orders exceeds their estimates by a lot and the books might be out of stock for a little while if they do, but considering how well sales were doing on the first day (SS posted a couple screenshots of the three novels getting on am/azon's sales rankings) I think they won't run out at any time soon!

I'm not sure if this helps, but someone pointed out to me on twitter that am/azon will not charge you for the pre-order until it's actually about to ship, so there's that! I'm not sure exactly when they'll make the charge, but so far I got nothing on my credit card even though I placed the pre-order yesterday so I'm guessing sometime in the end of november or early december~

#anon #mxtx #svsss #tgcf #mdzs #this is just speculation anon #but I hope it helps!#basically you're good to pre-order them later!!#there's enough time to do so when it's best for you #and considering the interest #I think SS will be printing many many books for us uwu

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djemsostylist · 4 years ago

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Thoughts on Episode 26 of SCK

In short--I loved it.

There is a lot I could say about it, and I’m sure most of it has already been said by people far more eloquent than I. But I haven’t written down my thoughts about an episode in while and if ever there was an episode to talk about, well, this one was certainly it.

There was a post I saw going around a few weeks ago about how sometimes enjoying a piece of media means viewing it with a measure of grace. As a critical person by nature, I thought a lot about what that means, and I’ve decided that it means that sometimes, a piece of media may not be perfect, but if the soul is there, that is the only thing that matters.

So, I think one of the major issues I’ve seen talked about with 26 is that it felt too good. And to some degree, that makes sense. Let’s be honest, 22-25 were not very good. They had great singular moments, but taken as a whole, they were a bit of a mess. 20-21 gave us beautiful set up and direction and forward movement with not only Serkan and Eda as a couple, but as individuals, and that’s even with the contract mess. But then 22 and 23 came along and we have Eda acting like a brat, intimate scenes that were cute and hot but ultimately a let down since the end result was always an “I love you” from Serkan followed by an -_- face from Eda, and basically no real forward movement with their relationship or character at all. Add the introduction of one of the worst characters in television, and you kind of had a mess. And while 24 was better, it still felt weird. Serkan is acting distant, Eda is acting married, and again, no going anywhere until the last 5 minutes of the episode. Plus the long awaited BA shows up and it turns out she’s a Disney villain with even thinner motives. Then there was 25, which I think left most of the fandom feeling empty. Serkan and Eda are at their very lowest possible point, and all their friends and family don’t seem to care and the amount of Edser scenes was too low to give us enough to not want to rage at the final scene. Plus, dubbed Prince showed up attempting to recreate a plot from Vampire Diaries and welp.

So in 26, we start with what should be a devastated Eda and Serkan who have no path back to each other. We were fully expecting another few weeks of breakup and Eda having to chase Serkan and more moping and more sadness and we didn’t get that. Instead, we start with an Eda who is ready to do whatever it takes to spend as little time away from Serkan as possible and a Serkan who isn’t going to let go. His plan is brilliant, and it works. He knows something fishy is going on--despite her words the night before, which certainly hurt, she was also literally in tears and had been for the whole day. And he knows she loves him. In a way, his actions at the start of 26 are another brilliant parallel to the beginning of 19--Serkan breaks and decides to tell Eda everything the moment it becomes clear that she might actually move on with her life and he will lose her forever. Eda breaks at the beginning of 26 when it’s clear Serkan is going to be a cool cucumber about everything and stop chasing her. (I’m saying they could have probably solved all their issues in 15 if Eda had asked Efe on a date-Serkan would have been on his knees confessing and proposing in 10 min. flat, but I digress.)

No, they don’t have a ton of conversation in this. There aren’t heartfelt, long dialogs about the wrongs they’ve done and the things they feel. Frankly, they aren’t necessary. Serkan has, at this point, said all he needs to say and he couldn’t be clearer. And while we still haven’t heard Eda say “I love you”, her actions this episode show it, and he knows it, and well, if that end scene isn’t the biggest “I love you” idk what is.

I was talking with @lolo-deli about the episode and she made an excellent point. I’ll quote here “Their conversation in hall was short in dialogue but heavy in meaning and implication. In very few words they established: last night was real (and implied to be meaningful), she needs time to work out some complications (he understands what this means, she loves him and the break up was what was not real) and he will both trust her and wait for her without pressuring her AND he's still worried about her (in this case over Seyman which turns out to be a non-factor ama neyse!). That's a lot of important conversation wrapped up in a a 90 sec convo but it fits them because they understand one another very well.”

This is true of their conversation in the conference room after. They almost go back down the jealousy fight spiral we’ve seen 100 times, but instead, Eda stops herself, Serkan stops himself, and instead of fighting, they talk and both agree they were wrong and acting silly and reaffirm their love and trust for each other. In fact, both of them verbalize to their friends that they are 100% sure of the other and their feelings--they aren’t threatened by the Prince and B because of their fear of losing the other, but because both of those characters are creepy and dangerous and unhinged.

I was okay with this episode because we spent 21 episodes watching them grow apart and together--sure the previous episodes were rough, but it was a transitional period. I’m giving grace--and to quote lolo-deli again “They trust each other, it's really that simple. We didn't need to have a half hour of conversation to establish that. Just like we don't need to see Eda chasing Serkan for two more episodes to prove she loves him because she does. Also simple. We know and he knows it. He deserved affirmation and he got it, she bloody well proposed marriage.”

And this is how I feel. 26 wasn’t perfect--I still didn’t care for the AAA plot, Thor and Barf need to be gone fast, and BA is kind of a one dimensional villain I want to like more than I do. Engin and the rest of the friends were better this episode--Serkan and Engin talked for the first time in what feels like forever, Melo and Ceren were excellent support for Eda, and Serkan and Ferit are still on track to becoming the besties I want them to be. I’m not 100% sure what Eda’s plan is to get around BA, although maybe she decided to take Serkan’s advice from 13 and just let it all burn down around them and they will be stronger together for it. Honestly, Serkan was back and on fire this episode (and hotter than ever as a result) so maybe she knows that together, it doesn’t matter what BA is gonna do.

We don’t know what is coming in the next few weeks, or what is left in front of us. We’ve had a string of disappointing episodes. But Serkan and Eda have been apart for 11 episodes and they are finally back together and on the same page at the same time for the first time ever in their relationship.

In closing, I’ll leave you with this. Regardless of how you feel about 26, Eda Yılız, chronic “leaper before looker” took the time to steal back Serkan’s ring, get together that look, find the world’s most extra ring box, sneak onto Serkan’s private plane, and then recreate their first real moment together (which we were oh so recently reminded of) in order to ask the love of her life to marry her. And that is beautiful, no matter how many subplots get lost or editing goes bad. Eda Yıldız asked Serkan Bolat to marry her with a ring with her name inside it on a plane where they first went from “nothing to something”. Poetry and parallels and I loved it.

#sen çal kapımı #sen cal kapimi #my thoughts on episode 26 #i'm terrible at being succinct so I put most of it under a cut #but basically yeah #it wasn't perfect but also it was and i loved it

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multifandomfanfiction · 4 years ago

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Mi Corazón es Tuyo

TITLE: Mi Corazón es Tuyo PAIRING: Spencer/OC RATING: T CHAPTER: One-shot SUMMARY: The BAU are in Laredo, Texas on a case and an old friend of Kaitlyn’s stops by.

[A/N - I know Narcos takes place in the late 70′s/early 80′s, but for the purposes of this one-shot, it happened in the early 2000′s. So this is an AU for Narcos and regular for Criminal Minds. I kinda wanted to wait until I had finished Narcos to post this, so I googled to see how the series ended so I wouldn’t get anything wrong.]

Kaitlyn stared at the crime scene photos pinned to the board, trying to find some connection.

They were in Laredo, Texas chasing a serial arsonist, who also liked to take one victim hostage.

“Careful there, cerebrito (brainiac). I can practically hear the gears turning in your head.”

Kaitlyn spun around. Only one person had ever called her that in her life.

“Javi!” she screamed. She ran to him and threw her arms around his neck. Her team watched the interaction between her and this strange man, including Spencer. “Oh my god, what are you doing here?” she asked him.

“I could ask you the same thing. Heard your name around town.”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s your family’s annual get together, isn’t it?”

“Um, I’m actually here now. Permanently.”

“Oh. Well, how’s your father?”

“He’s good. He’s good.”

The two stared at each other for a moment before Javier looked over at her team.

“Are you going to introduce me?” he asked.

Kaitlyn blushed. “Oh! Right!” She led him over to her team. “Guys, this is my good friend Javier Peña. Javi, meet the BAU.”

“THE Javier Peña?” Emily asked, “As in the one who helped take down Escobar and the Cali cartel?”

“One in the same,” Javier said. He didn’t really like to talk about his time in Colombia.

In fact, Kaitlyn avoided the subject altogether.

“How do you know Katy?” Morgan asked, ever the big brother.

“We met when I was down in Colombia,” Kaitlyn explained, “I was on vacation and Javi here saved me from being shot. We’ve stayed in touch ever since.”

“You were almost shot?” Spencer asked.

“Uh, yeah. Guess some of the cartel guys heard an FBI agent was down there and decided to try and kill me. You know, the usual stuff.” Kaitlyn said it so nonchalantly that it worried Hotch. She did the same thing when it came to close encounters on the job.

Maybe this was where it had originated from.

“Hey, I’ve gotta be heading back, but I’ll see you later okay? We’ll catch up,” Javier said, “Don’t work too hard.” He kissed her temple and she playfully shoved him away from her.

“Estúpido (Asshole),” Kaitlyn muttered.

Javier winked at her. “Pero amas cariño (But you love it, sweetheart).”

When Kaitlyn turned back around, her entire team was staring at her. “What? Let’s get back to work.” She walked back up to the board.

“You didn’t think it was a good idea to tell us you have a friend who worked for the DEA?” Hotch asked her, quietly.

“I’m sorry, Hotch. I honestly never thought you guys would meet.”

“We’ll discuss this later.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Kaitlyn met Javier a few days later before they left for Quantico.

“I hope you know I’m in deep shit with my supervisor,” she told him, “Although did I complain when all that shit went down with Emily? No.”

Javier laughed. “I’m sorry. If I had known that would get you in trouble, I wouldn’t have just shown up. But I couldn’t resist when I heard you were in town. Big guy didn’t seem happy to see me, though.”

“Big guy? Oh, you mean Morgan? He’s just protective. He’s actually exactly like you. Sleeps with anyone he wants to, no strings attached.”

“And what about you?”

“What about me?”

“What’s going on with the guy with the long hair?”

“Spencer? What about him?”

“Oh come on. I noticed the way he looked at you and the way you were trying so hard not to meet his eyes.”

Kaitlyn hit Javier on the shoulder. “I’m supposed to be the profiler, not you!”

“So what’s the story?”

Kaitlyn shrugged. “Got a job in the BAU, met Spencer, end of story. But enough about me, what about you? Any women in the picture?”

“Miel (honey), there’s always women in the picture.”

Kaitlyn laughed. “You don’t ever change, do you Peña? What about Steve and Connie? They still together?”

“Of course. Went back to Miami after everything blew over.”

“You two still keep in touch, right?”

“Of course. He wasn’t just my partner, he’s my brother.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t transfer to Mexico.”

Javier shook his head. “I’m done with Narcos and Sicarios. Bebita (baby girl), I don’t work for the DEA anymore.”

“Why? What happened?”

“I found out some stuff that caused a huge scandal, so they asked me to resign.”

“Oh my god, Javi. I’m so sorry.”

Javier shrugged. “It’s fine. I’m back working on my father’s ranch.”

“My Mexican cowboy. Sexy.” Javier smiled.

Kaitlyn’s phone started ringing. “Hello?”

“Hotch said we should be good to go in about ten minutes. We’re just waiting on you,” Spencer told her.

“Okay. I’ll see you soon then.”

“I love you.”

It wasn’t the first time they’d exchanged “I love you’s” but it never failed to take Kaitlyn’s breath away. “Yo también te quiero (I love you too).” She heard Spencer laugh.

“I don’t know what that means, but I gonna assume you reciprocated.”

“I did, idiot. See you in a bit.” She hung up and saw Javier smiling at her. “Shut-up.”

“C’mon. Don’t want you to miss your flight.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Kaitlyn nearly did miss her flight thanks to security not wanting to let Javier through.

The security guard had to call Hotch and get clearance from him first.

“Idiotas (Idiots). I’m fucking FBI! I hope they know I could have them fired in a heartbeat!” Kaitlyn snapped, pulling her luggage out of Javier’s Jeep.

“Fácil allí pequeña mama (Easy there little mama). Don’t break a nail.”

“Shut-up Javi.”

He hugged her. “Hey, take care of yourself.”

“You too.”

“And when you and that boy get married, I want an invite, do you hear?”

Kaitlyn’s cheeks burned. “Yes, hermano mayor (big brother).” She kissed him on the cheek and hurried onto the jet. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”

“It’s fine, Kaitlyn. We wouldn’t have left you behind,” Hotch told her, “Wheels up, everybody.”

Hotch went to the back of the jet to call Jack, Rossi and Morgan were sleeping, JJ and Emily were talking quietly, and Spencer sat next to Kaitlyn.

“You and Javier never did anything, did you?” Spencer asked her.

“Reid, if you have to ask that question then you don’t know me very well.”

“It’s just…you two seemed pretty close.”

“And we are. Spencer, Javi is just the Mexican version of Morgan.”

Spencer thought about that and then started laughing.

“And besides, mi corazón es tuyo.”

“Gonna have to translate.”

“My heart is yours. Always has been and always will be, Spencer.”

#spencer reid #dr. spencer reid #spencer/oc #spencer reid imagines #dr. spencer reid imagines #Criminal Minds #criminal minds imagines #narcos #narcos imagines #au #au imagines #narcos x criminal minds #crossover imagine #javier pena #javier pena imagines #aaron hotchner #derek morgan #emily prentiss

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captainkirkk · 5 years ago

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✩ WEEKLY FIC ROUND-UP ✩

A collection of fics I’ve read (/reread) and thoroughly enjoyed in the past week-ish from all kinds of fandoms and genres.

BNHA

Milk and Honey by Magdaleria

Izuku isn’t naïve, for all that he still wants to be a hero. He’s done his research, he’s lived with his mother day in and day out, and a part of him knows. Even if he doesn’t think he could say it out loud, he knows.

His mother isn’t going to live forever. Kaa-san loves him more than anything in the world, and he does her, and he never wants to hurt her. So he tucks her back into bed, cleans up the dishes, does his homework, and he waits.

Because he’s living for her. For now, he has to live.

He waits.

_____

A story in which Midoriya Inko is terminally ill, and becoming a hero isn't the hardest thing Izuku has ever done.

those hardest to love need it most by DancingInTheStorm

Shouta gripped the phone tight enough to make the phone case groan. “So it’s true. Midoriya was Quirkless.”

“Until soon before the entrance exam,” Nedzu confirmed. “That’s not relevant now, though, because—“

“Relevant?” Shouta hissed. “Midoriya is barely functional, socially. He doesn’t trust any adult. He thinks the whole world hates him. He apologizes for everything except breaking the law, and I’m sure I can trace every single one of those things back to his Quirklessness. You call that irrelevant?”

Aizawa visits Aldera Junior High and finds out some disturbing truths.

And Now I See Daylight by DancingInTheStorm

A social media fic following Deku post-graduation.

Missing by NerdofSpades

Izuku lost his notebook. It wasn't that big of a deal, could be worse, but it was still missing and he needed to find it. It just so happens that finding it now involves getting help from the rest of the class... and his teachers.

the art of scraping through by smallmightysmash

An enlightening day during those ten months of training before the U.A. Entrance Exam, an injury that Toshinori frets over and one sad Midoriya Izuku.

It (Movies)

Retweet. by plinys

Part 1 of Retweet Verse

richie tozier ✓ @trashmouth what did i miss lol

I killed a clown. AMA! by liesmyth

I (39M) got stabbed twice today and now I want a divorce. Help?

Or: the one where Eddie is on Reddit.

ATLA

Treachery of the Highest Order by LoserLife592

Sometimes life is unfair. Sometimes the universe likes to kick you when you're down. Sometimes bad things happen to good people.

But there a still lines that need to be drawn. And this? This is beyond that line.

(or, You Think You Know A Guy)

#weekly fic round up #not that many fics this time around? i've been reading a Lot of podcast fic lately #and that's going to be its own post #my posts #fic recs #bnha recs #atla recs #it recs

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mca-attack21 · 5 years ago

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Mystery Bullet Part 3

This is the third and final part to this series, thanks for joining me on the ride! Part 1: Here Part 2: Here

The phone rung a couple of times before Sherlock answered. “Awh John, you’re missing the fun.”

“She’s okay, just had a bad reaction to the antigens in the blood they gave her during surgery.”

“Did they give her the wrong blood?”

“They claim they didn’t, but that is the only thing that makes sense.”

“Oh, that’s brilliant! The bullets weren’t made of ice, they were made of blood. That explains everything.”

“I’m not sure I follow,”

“Think about it the bullet disappeared. She had a bad reaction to antigens. Ice wasn’t dense enough, but the blood would be perfect. Someone used human blood to create a projectile that when froze with liquid nitrogen and shot by pressurized air would resemble a bullet. It wouldn’t leave an exit wound and would dissolve. It also explains why she said the wound site was cold.” Sherlock explained.

“She’s awake now, you should come and see her. She’s asked about you,” John replied.

“I’m glad she is okay, I will come to visit when I have solved the case” Sherlock replied.

“Sherlock, she is still in critical condition, you do understand that right?”

“The auction is tomorrow, we are running out of time,” Sherlock answered before hanging up.

John wanted to call him back, but he knew that it was no use. He instead went into your room and sent Molly home for the night. When you woke up he explained what had happened and Sherlock’s blood bullet theory.

“Have you found the paintings yet?” you asked.

“What do you mean?”

“The real paintings are still in the Museum somewhere. There is too much traffic, extra security, and outside security cameras for them to have been removed. None of the other security cameras were tampered with and no other guards were affected. It had to be an inside job because someone walked in and out of that well-lit room without drawing suspicion and left the same way. They had to be in there well before they actually shot the security guard. Between that and the looping footage, I would assume that the guard was in on the heist and then was double-crossed. Regardless, there is no possible way that the art was removed it is somewhere in that room. I called the art restorator that you met, he said that he would meet with me to check over the paintings. He wanted me to come in that night, but I told him it would have to wait. Oh my god, it was him!” you realized.

“How so?” John asked.

“He knew that I was on to him and he knew you and Sherlock wouldn’t be home. He had access to the facility and no one would question where he was going. He has worked at the gallery for a while and would have had plenty of time to plan everything out.” you explained.

John was laughing and pulling out his phone.

“What?” you asked.

“You are insane, that is what. I need to get normal friends,” he answered.

“Is everything okay?” Sherlock answered.

“Yes, but you need to go to the museum, I’ll meet you there.”

“Why?”

“Because Y/n solved the case and we need to go pick up the paintings and culprit. I’ll explain when we get there. Call Mycroft.” he said and hung up.

“Okay now, you are going to lay here and rest. No exceptions. Sherlock and I will come by when it’s over and we will see what we have to do to get you out of here. Is there anyone you’d like me to call?” he asked.

“Nope, I think I’ll take a nap. Be careful,” you answered.

Sherlock and John went to the museum. It didn’t take them long to discover where the real paintings were being hidden. They then went to Dr. Argonza’s office, to no one’s surprise he wasn’t there. They did find a cryogenic dewar which could have easily been used to store the blood bullets. There was an airbrush and pipe that Sherlock was sure could provide enough velocity to cause the injuries. The entire rig would easily fit under a coat and be hidden. Sherlock filled his brother in and together they came up with a plan to switch the duplicates back with the originals and wait for Dr. Argonza at the auction where they would pick him up.

Convinced that not even Mycroft’s men could screw this up, John and Sherlock prepared to leave. John had them stop by the flat to pick you up some spare clothes for your return trip. He was surprised to see that Sherlock had cleaned up the blood and everything from his experiments earlier that day. He was glad that this was almost over and that things would soon be back to normal.

When they arrived at the hospital they were told visitation hours were over and made some type of excuse using their “badges” to get passed the nurse. John led the way to your room and Sherlock followed. They were surprised to hear talking from your room. That surprised turned to concern when they realized that your door was locked.

Meanwhile:

You were tired and understandably so. But how were you supposed to get any sleep when nurses were constantly coming in and poking and prodding you. This nurse was different, you hadn’t seen him yet. He came over and prepared to inject another medication into your IV.

“I had my last round of medication an hour ago,” you spoke confused.

“This is a post-op Antibiotic, Doctors’ orders,” he said nonchalantly.

“Which one?” you asked painfully forcing yourself to sit up to get a better look.

“Carbenicillin? That can’t be right. I have a severe reaction to Beta Lactums.” you explained.

“Hmm, it doesn’t say that in your chart,” he replied before injecting it in.

You immediately tore out your IV and tried to hit the Nurse call button, shouting for help.

“Shut up! Shut up!” he shouted coming over and placing his hand over your nose and mouth forcefully. You tried to fight against him but your body was too weak and the fear was taking over.

“If you would have just stayed out of it, none of this would have happened. I didn’t want to kill you, but you’re too much of a liability now,” he explained.

You were beyond scared now tears running down your cheeks. You fought against it with everything you had but it was too much. The burning in your chest took over and the black circles grew.

That is when Sherlock and John burst through the door. Sherlock ripped Dr. Argonza off of you and threw him on the ground. You gasped and struggled to breathe. John had him at gunpoint until security was able to collect him. Even then, he waited with him until Mycroft showed up with his men to take him away. Back in your room, the nurses had kicked Sherlock out so they could thoroughly check you over. You were understandably a mess and demanded AMA forms. You gave them no choice and fought through the pain to remove all of the monitors that were hooked up to you. You sat up sheepishly and started putting on the clothes that John had brought. The nurses tried to reason with you, but you weren’t having it. That is when one of them decided to let Sherlock in to see if he could talk any sense into you.

“What is it that you think you are doing?” he asked concerned.

“I’m leaving. Are you going to help me?” you replied clutching your head.

“Y/n, you can’t leave. You need to stay here and let them take care of you, you’re in no condition to go home” he tried and then he saw something that shook him; you started crying.

“I can’t stay here, please don’t make me stay here” you cried.

He felt like he was entirely unequipped to handle this situation and wished that John was there.

“It’s okay Y/n, everything is going to be okay. Just lay back down.” he tried.

“I want to go home Sherlock, I’d rather die there than stay here,” you sobbed.

He went over to your side and did something that was very rare for Sherlock, he gave you a hug.

“I was so scared” you revealed.

“I know, I’m sorry. It’s over now,” he soothed.

“I can’t stay here, Sherlock,” you added.

“I know, we’ll figure it out. Just relax,” he whispered.

“I’m sorry,”

“You have nothing to be sorry for Y/n, just lay back down until John returns,” Sherlock instructed taking a seat next to you. It wasn’t long before you fell back asleep. And shortly after that both John and Mycroft walked in.

“What is all this?” John asked referring to you sleeping in your clothes and not being hooked up to the machines.

“She doesn’t want to stay here. She signed AMA’s and tried to leave.” Sherlock informed.

“Well she doesn’t get a choice, she needs to stay and be looked after,” John replied.

“You know, I have never seen her cry before today.” Sherlock whispered, “She literally said that she rather die at our flat than to stay here.”

“We can’t take care of her in this condition,” John reminded.

“Mycroft, do you think that I can cash in a favor?” Sherlock asked acknowledging his brothers’ presence for the first time.

“You are running low on those, what do you want this time?” Mycroft returned.

“The VIP suite here until Y/n can safely check out,” Sherlock replied still not taking his eyes off of your sleeping form.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said as he exited the room.

“We almost lost her three times today John,” Sherlock realized.

“She’ll be okay though, and that’s what counts,” John reminded.

The next two days were spent in the VIP suite of the hospital. Sherlock refused to leave your side even though you told him it was okay. The Art Gallery covered the entirety of your medical expenses as compensation for you saving the auction. When you were finally allowed to go home, you were ordered to take it easy for a week. Sherlock refused to take any cases during that time, which was quite out of character. This mystery was one of the few which never made it on the blog, and that was okay.

#sherlock #sherlock holmes #sherlock bbc #sherlock benedict cumberbatch #sherlock imagine #sherlock imagines #sherlock series #sherlock x reader #sherlock x you #sherlock holmes imagine #sherlock holmes imagines #sherlock holmes x reader #sherlock holmes series #john watson #john watson imagine

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ribinapan · 4 years ago

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meteorgazing

hello everybody here is an original piece of writing i was kinda proud of bc im trying to post on social media more.

prompt - aliens receive signals from Us (as in the US)

they are from proxima b and i will give more worldbuilding info if yall interested ok here we go :’)

one - meteorgazing

---------------------------------------------

notes -

opi - (two earth days)

rings - (eleven earth days)

---------------------------------------------

We get a lot of meteors.

Reason 50678 the surface isn’t safe-- no atmosphere means no pushback. Rocks hurtling from the sky aren’t quite uncommon. There’s not much damage to anything but what they hit. Of course, while it’s scary to watch, it doesn’t do much but cause a roofquake-- a rumbling beginning from the Seeing Dome to the rest of the tunnels. There’s been some incidents, some injuries and some deaths- like everything, it’s something swept away as a horrible- but normal- natural disaster, and most of the time it’s not much more than a little shiver. Really. People in the city at the time tend to gather just to watch. There’s something memorizing about watching a hurtling ball of rock slam into the face of our planet at high speeds while completely ablaze.

Even with the commonplace activity of gathering in the center of the city to watch space rocks fall dangerously close to our Seeing Dome, however, I never thought we would go so far as to make a surface dome just to watch one of the biggest showers yet to date. It was dangerous enough as is-- really, it was-- so I wasn’t particularly interested to watch in any case- yes, a little bit curious about it, but the feeling was quickly stomped out by fear and replaced with a sense of resignation. There was always Holowatch-- a projected hologram from your home holodevice to show you the news-- mostly surface stuff, or from City Twenty, where the biggest political station we had throughout the cluster of cities was placed.

But then there was Ama. Ama, with his bright eyes and his huge grin, practically shivering with excitement as he rushed me in line to get a ticket. We didn’t have enough money for the usual, so he entered us into contests basically any chance he got-- I wasn’t worried, and no way by all the gods would they curse me so much by--

“Elli! I got it-- look, I got two!” Tickets waved in the air for the first ever surface dome built specifically for watching meteor showers in our tunnel, I felt my heart sink as I made eye contact with Ama, beaming more than I had ever seen before.

There was something about Ama and his excitement that just pulled you in and shoved away your rationality. The way he smiled made you feel like you had to do anything to preserve it-- maybe because it was so hard to get him like this, maybe because love blinds you to even the stupidest of ideas. I flattened my sweatshirt against my chest nervously and grinned back, taking my ticket out of his hand. Three rings until disaster and we had free tickets to watch.

For the next three rings, every opi I woke up to a message about strange noises coming from a sector we call Terra, holding a planet that astronomers deemed safest and most habitable for intelligent life like us. Or about giant meteor showers. Or about how rare we are to get huge rocks falling from the sky hurtling at the surface in a desperate attempt to show us the way to our doom and them staying the size they do. And it was adorable, really. Usually it was me, and usually it was seventy messages about something boring from me, and so with a sense of duty I read everything Ama sent and poured as much excitement into a response as I could.

We’re going to die! Screamed my brain, but by the sun god was I dumb enough to be happy to go along with it.

We weren’t the only tunnel with a surface dome ready for the watching, either. City Twenty had the biggest, and far on the other side of the Habitation Line was 9296- the longest lasting surface dome with even a small bit of surface travellers living on it. Of course, they had underground homes to sleep in, but they spent most of their waking hours up on the surface. Everyone knew about it, and Ama swore he wanted to be one of them one day. I wondered how it’d feel to be watching this from there-- normal? Did they see meteor showers all the time? Were they afraid it might hit the dome every time they saw one screeching towards them faster than an Aquatrain? Not for the first time and definitely not for the last, I closed my eyes to sleep before we went up to our tunnel’s first surface dome with only one thought, an absolute certainty: oh my gods, we’re going to die.

When I woke up, I found myself wandering to Ama’s home with an even stronger sense of resignation and a desire to not be alone with it. Immediately upon arrival, I was met with the most excited four-eyed gaze I’ve ever been locked in-- and there it went again, I knew I was going to do this and be just fine with it.

His chatter continued, rising as the time got closer to head up to the surface dome, and often I found myself opening my mouth to share a fact just to keep him going.

“Did you know space tastes like rubusberries?” I heard myself saying, “Do you think the rocks taste like that, too?” He stopped for a moment, frozen on the sidewalk on our way to the train to the surface dome just to stare at me. Bubbling up with laughter, he tossed his head forward in a snort,

“Are you planning to taste the meteor, Elli?” My face heated up in embarrassment, but I bit my tongue and then shot back a response. “Maybe! I mean, it’s good research! A lot of things can be identified through taste!” “Local child just up and dies because they went outside to taste a space-rock.” “At least I’d know if it tasted like rubusberries!”

Rubusberries stayed the topic for a bit longer, the topic clinging to our tongues until it faded away into excited shivering as we stepped in line for the train. It hit me like a solar flare, making me bubble with anticipation that I really was excited, too- I wanted to see it, and I wanted to see Ama see it. The voice screaming ‘we’re going to die!’ finally dulled down to a whisper in the back of my mind.

Hey, at least it’ll be interesting.

Once on the aquatrain, I watched the train-tunnel fill with water as Ama listened to the rest of the train’s quiet, excited chatter. My hands gripped the edges of my seat as I watched it slowly bubble up above my window, bracing myself for the kickback of the train shooting through the water. It was interesting technology, really, but the amount of malfunctions I’d read about had me uneasy every time I was on one. One glance at Ama told me he didn’t as much as I did- if at all- so I bit my tongue and watched as the train suddenly lurched forward, shooting through the water and up towards the surface.

Here we go.

Suddenly, there was a chaotic ball of energy at my shoulder, pressing his hand against the window as we watched ourselves shoot up towards the danger, up towards new experiences and life on the surface yet to come.

“It’s funny we’re going full circle. Surface to underground to surface.” I murmured.

“Now we know what we’re doing. We hadn’t evolved enough before. The sun god knew we’d kill ourselves up there.” He replied simply, and the casual tone of his voice made me choke on laughter.

“Then why are we going up there now?” “To prove him wrong out of spite!” Cheered Ama, leaning over me to press both hands against the window. “Look, there it is!”

Look I did, and like he said, there it was. A giant, metallic door that looked unopenable by any number of Centaurians, and yet it slid open and let the water slosh to the side as the train pressed forward and through it, coming to land and slide against the top of the tunnel as we made our way to the surface dome entrance.

I won’t lie. I screamed.

“Elli. Elli, we’re fine! This is how trains work! Elli!” Climbing the rest of the way to the entrance was much less scary, as there were stairs and stairs are solid and won’t explode under too much water pressure, certainly since there’s no water. A muffled voice boomed over speakers we couldn’t see, giving us directions we couldn’t hear-- and then the crowd started moving, so we followed. Metallic doors that looked a little more manageable by Centaurian hands slid open with a slow, painful screech in front of us- and there it was, above the slope we were climbing: another Seeing Dome. This one above the tunnels.

Ama basically squealed-- and as I was jerked away from the line by excited hands, we pushed our way to the front as Ama stared at the stars above us. Closer than ever now, our feet hit red dust and we looked up to see the sky now only separated by a dome and not red rock all around us. It felt scarily empty-- up here, there were no tall walls or caves all around us. From every angle, there was sky.

“This is literally amazing.” He breathed beside me. “Yeah.” I said back with much less air, absolutely slammed by a feeling of sheer surrealism. You could see so far-- the dark line and the light line, where the heat and cold gods warred from afar. The horizon was much more beautiful in person than in pictures.

“Elli, look!” We were now the only people standing by the entrance, the others wandering to the edges of the Seeing Dome to get a better look. To my absolute dismay, however, what should’ve been the safest spot to stand-- right beside the exit-- was where a small meteor was heading, sending itself straight at us.

Ama watched it with wide eyes. I watched it with a wince. It was beautiful-- it really was, watching them streak the sky, and the surface, and our Safety Dome, but watching it hit with a Clank! still gave me a shiver.

Wait.

Wrinkling my nose as I squinted up at it, I tugged Ama’s hand as my feet began to move on their own. Following it as the burning ball of-- well, whatever it was, slid towards an unoccupied side of the Dome, Ama stumbled behind me. “Elli, where are we going? We’re going to miss the rest of it!” “It shouldn’t have made that noise.” I said back, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“Elli, you’re nuts.” “It was metallic. It clanked. Ama, it clanked. That’s not a meteor. That’s something someone made.”

And suddenly we were both speeding towards it, Ama whooping and me with my head spinning, stumbling and hitting the side of the dome as we stared down at a mess of melted metal and a white substance bearing a strange, rectangular logo-- red stripes and a blue corner, with what looked like misshapen stars decorating the blue bit. Strange text in bold letters sat above it, smeared and burnt as the capsule remained aflame.

“ALIENS!” Ama shrieked, jumping up and down. He punched my shoulder. “Take that, everybody! ALIENS!!!”

We weren’t the only ones who found something.

Holowatch was projected all over the city as capsules popped up all over the planet. 9296 got two. City Twenty got one. Another surface dome found half of one. Cities were rushing to build more or get Centaurians on the surface to find more. They came with garbled audio-- messages we couldn’t understand. But what sent everyone reeling was the one we found-- it was the sound of another animal, not the intelligent life that kept trying to talk to us. Something big-- something that sounded like our own creatures, a series of clicks, whistles and pulsed calls. Biologists rushed to identify it-- but it was soon determined not to be one of our own, just something close. It was big, most likely lived underwater, but used the same noises ours did to get around-- they used sound for navigation.

There was no doubt about it, there was life on Terran.

“We discovered aliens.” Ama wouldn’t stop saying. “Not us.” “We found it first!” “9296 found theirs thirty-two blinks before we found ours.”

“Second! We discovered aliens second!” “...Fine. Second.” “Aliens, Elli!”

“I hear you, Ama.” I said with fake exasperation, watching him pace around his room.

“We found it. We should get to see what they do with it.” “We are literally children, they weren’t going to let us help.” I said slowly, eyeing him suspiciously as he stopped walking across the room. He looked up at me and grinned.

“Am-- no. No, absolutely not. Whatever you’re thinking is a big, fat, nope.”

He continued grinning, taking a step towards me as his expression melted into something akin to affection mixed with excitement. The mischief was there-- I could see it. Feel it. But rationality slipped away as he grabbed my shoulder. “Let’s just try to sneak around. It’s not like we’ll even get anywhere with it!”

I let out a heavy sigh as I quietly threw my life into ruin. I unleash the sun god upon you, aliens. Why do you do this to me?

“...Fine.”

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indecisive-v · 3 years ago

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NINJAMUFFIN DOING ANOTHER AMA ON TWITTER, HERE'S MORE SHIT FOR YA! keep in mind i'm just sharing the funkin related stuff, though i am including WAAAAY more than what i shared before 👍 go check out ninja's twitter profile for questions about stuff like ritz! questions in blue, answers in orange. if yall don't wanna read everything i MIGHT make a version of this post where i replace the answers with my own summaries of em (and if the questions are long, those too)

and here's a link to the ama tweet itself! dunno if it's still goin

Q: I figure the answer will be yes but do you have more plans to implement more guest appearances from people in the newgrounds community into FNF? Or are you all gunna focus on OG lore and stuff going forward

A: for guest appearances, I think we have always seen it as getting a healthy mix of both. PERSONALLY I'd like to lean towards having more OG stuff than guest stuff, BUT it's all a matter of what other boys think of that as well. I'm not the sole person working on game!

Q: Are you gonna release the full FNF game or are you gonna be releasing week after week? Like, are you gonna release week 8 or are we gonna wait some years until The Full Ass Game comes out?

A: Release plan for FNF right now is a few more updates or whatev to the 'demo' we have out right now, and then a long silence of probably no updates whatsoever until the full game is done (which will likely be a few years). That's partly why we made kickstarter for game.

Q: Hey so like, how much will Fnf cost after it's finished? And when will you ask the supporters what they want the game on?

A: It's all subject to change, but right now it prob gonna be standard 15-25$ lil steam indie game.

We will ask Kickstarter pledgers and whatnot what they want the game on SUPER close to when its released, to keep options open if we get onto anything like a console people want.

Q: 1. how was your day

2. are you releasing a week 8 song early like week 7, or are you goin full lockdown

A: I am doing GOOD today, and I think recently I've been good in general.

up to the mood, but so far we doing good about not having anything leak or whatev, so I think it'd be fun to have update come out with people not knowing what to expect at all. Build dat intrigue

Q: Will fnf ever get official plushies?? Seems like an untapped market

A: FNF plushies will prob happen some point, we have a lot of current merch stuff on our plates already though! (Mostly kickstarter type stuff, shirts, pins, posters, and all the physical OST stuff) Its a lot to sort out, but in time more and more stuff will happen. We r jus 4 boys!

Q: did you ever expect your game to blow up as it did? what was your first reaction to seeing it become super popular

A: FNF never had a humble moment, literally day 1 before the prototype even came out, the vid on twitter had like 5K likes overnight. Then when ludum dare version came out, it got 5K likes again, like it wasnt just a fluke. Was crazy, and def felt like somethin was different wit FNF

Q: Do you plan on getting other people to come in to help with the music? That seems like a lot of work to dump on one person, what with the erect mode and whatnot.

I guess the question could apply to all aspects of development. Will you be bringing on more people to help?

A: We definitely are getting help from other people. We are always keeping an eye on people for various different things. In terms of programming, already I've gotten 2 people (MtH and Geokureli) to help with certain Week 7 stuff (charting/polish, and loading stuff). Shit like dat

Q: Oh, also, will the Steam version be Workshop compatible? That'd really help streamline the process of downloading mods.

A: Steam version of FNF will likely NOT be Steam workshop compatible, because we want all the mods to NOT be spread out through different places. There WILL be modding support that is as streamlined as Steam workshop though. Mainly for non-steam versions of the game!

Q: Are there any chances that the game will have a physical release? Also any updates on a switch port? I remember one of you guys talking/joking about it.

A: Not impossible for FNF to get a physical release. We would want to see how far we could go with it though. I think it'd be super easy to do something wit people like LimitedRun games or whatev, but I think stuff like that can only go so far. I wanna see Funkin in mf Walmart!!!!!!

not that LimitedRun isn't going to be an option! Just we consider and pursue many different things! FNF release is years away, so we have time to think about everything. Whole mindset can be different just a few months from now.

Q: Out of curiosity, how are you dealing with all the popularity? It blew up so fast id barely be able to handle it if I was in your shoes.

A: The only way I've been able to handle it is having the other boys on the crew and being able to talk to them about all the overwhelmingness.

Part of it feels very lonesome, feels like NO ONE can come close to comprehending exactly how I'm feeling, except them. also other PALS!!!

Q: Do you own any of the bootleg FNF merchandise? Like any bootleg plushies or anything?

A: i dont, i genuinely think they r a waste of money, and I know any bootleg shit that gets made, we can prob go about and make it, and make it 100x cooler because we actually put effort into shit. bootleg shit just in it for the coin, so they aint gettin that from me

Q: How did you go about getting in contact with sr pelo for skid and pumps vocals?

A: Pelo i think was familiar and pals wit PhantomArcade a bit thru various Newgrounds things and collabs and whatnot.

pelo retweeted the first OG FNF posts first ever, and brought a LOT of attention to it. to pay him back, we put skid and pump in game! ask dave for more info prob

Q: what's the plan for having the full ass game open source if it's gonna cost money? couldn't people just download the source and compile the game for free?

A: when FNF is fully released, the full source code will be released as well.

the game will be DRM free so it will be way easier for people to redistribute the released/offical .exe instead of compiling it, so that's not the issue anyways. people will pay for things if they like it

Q: What are the chances of it getting on consoles like switch or Playstation, ps5 would definitely be my preferred way to play

A: it'd be a matter of hiring someone to build out backend stuff for those specific consoles. someone who knows their way around all the wacky code stuff, AND knows console hardware stuff. Then its just a matter of hittin up those console manufacturers (Sony, Microsoft, or Nintendo)

the CLOSEST one is SWITCH. pretty much all of that backend is already made, so it just a matter of gettin all that access and shit.

i think in any case though, there's a lot of NDA stuff required, i dunno how much we'd be able to talk about it even IF we get that stuf sorted

Q: any ideas of releasing it on epic store or another platform?

A: Right now, the only thing that is 100% confirmed and WILL happen is a Steam version, itchio version, and mobile versions on respective app stores. Other storefronts aren't out of the picture though, but we don't want to spread ourselves too thin with it.

Q: Will you continue using HaxeFlixel to make the rest of FNF?

A: yes, because it is what I'm the most technically proficient in, and generally is VERY flexible. just a matter of ME becoming a better coder. It's ALL open source, so if I need something done a certain way, either I can do it, or we can hire someone to do it.

Q: have you seen game theory's videos on your game yet and if so, what do you think about them? (not talking about his predictions because i dont want spoilers. i like mystery)

A: it is always good silly fun to watch the Game Theory vids about Funkin with some pals, and see what matpat thinks of the game. i lov the vids, but wish he used my face less! Or at least used a cuter pic of me like this one!!

Q: Ok so: What does the future of FNF look like to you?

A: future of FNF is a rhythm game that not only exceeds every expectation that people have of it, but subverts most expectations and conventions as well.

Q: Do you plan on retouching on older weeks once the game is fully out? Like reanimating sprites, redoing some charting, updating the background, etc

A: retouching and probably overhauling certain aspects is almost definitely gonna happen. Everything is fluid and can be changed (and should be changed when necessary). i dont think anything should be too attached to, especially this early on in development

Q: I honestly do not care if the answer to this is vague as hell to keep surprises and shit lol but… Since Week 7 was the closest we’ll get to a playable girlfriend (still bf controlling tho), do you have plans to make girlfriend playable in spin-off things or just freeplay?

A: wouldnt be out of the picture for a playable GF, i don't think we've had some hard thing AGAINST it. just a matter of what we want out of the game, and what sort of story or whatev we could do with that concept

Q: How do BF and GF manage to meet famous newgrounds characters (such as pico, tankman and the others to come) like is this all in one universe/ timeline or are they being brought in?

A: i think they are all just there existing. i think there's a lot of wacky things in other media that try to justify crossovers, like MULTIVERSE bullshit or TIMELINE shit, but i dunno, its like subspace emissary. Captain Falcon and Olimar from Pikmin just hang out. Shit like dat

disclaimer that all lore shit is in phantomarcade head pretty much and maybe there is wacky dimensions or somethin

Q: Will the game have dlc?

A: its not too unlikely that we'd have expansions of some sort, but i mean right now we plan on packing in as much as we can into base game, and trying to make that as pure as possible.

if there is ANY dlc, i would personally want it to be 100% free updates

Q: How did you meet Phantom Arcade, Kawai Sprite, and EvilSker? And what do you think about the community and its controversies?

A: me and phantomarcade been fukin around NG for years so years and years ago we naturally crossed paths and became pals

about 2 years ago i found kawaisprites music on NG, and started talkin wit him, made Ritz wit him and we fell in lov

and evilsk8r i met cuz of FNF!!!

quik elaborate on evilsk8r, wanted artist for gamejam FNF was for (ludum dare), and OG person i asked wasnt available, so he referred me to evilsk8r, who I have never met or talked to before ever.

#friday night funkin #fnf #fridaynightfunkin

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zi-i-think · 4 years ago

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16 | Restless

Pairing: Zuko x Ama (OC)

Word Count: 5500+

Rating: SFW

Masterlist link

.☽☼☾.

(A/N) Okay so usually I wouldn't post about this because it's so mild, but there's light lemon(?) I don't what it's called but it's kinda racy. This is the only time I'll be addressing something so light because I've only recently added in the book description that this book is rated M.

Happy reading!

.☽☼☾.

~Zuko ☼ ~

“I love you.” Her raspy voice trembled to tell me. She looked up at me with a blank expression. I yelled her name for her to hold on. But the light in her eyes disappeared and then her body went completely limp in my arms. Her head which was previously looking up at me weakly felt heavier on my chest. Every muscle in my body froze. It felt like I couldn't even breath for a split second.

“Ama?” My voice was questioning and quiet. I was in disbelief. She couldn’t be gone. Not like that. Ama was too strong, too stubborn to let herself die like that. But each passing moment where she didn’t move or where I didn’t hear her breathing, it just confirmed my fear more and more.

I trembled while I moved her body from its upright position to just barely tilt her backward. Her face. It was too pale, too lifeless. Her blue eyes didn’t sparkle and her cheeks didn't have their rosy color. But I still didn’t, I couldn’t, believe she was gone. “Ama!” I shouted this time in desperation.

Tears started to stream down my face. There was no fight to hold them back. “You- you can’t go yet.” I sobbed. I turned my head towards the fight my friends were still engaged in. “Katara!” I screamed. She was the only one who could heal her. Bring her back to me.

Moments later the sound of snow crunched under someone’s feet was heard until Katara slid up on the other side of her sister. She gasped loudly and covered her mouth with her palm, seeing Ama so limp in her bloodied dress. The dark red clashed with the purple in a horrific way. Katara reached for Ama’s wrist, using two fingers to find a pulse. And when she wasn’t satisfied with the lack of movement, she checked in the spot just under her jaw.

With tears already dropping from her eyes, Katara shook her head. Bowing her head to avoid seeing her dead sister. “No!” I refused. “Katara there has to be something you can do. Just try, please.” My voice was very clearly cracking while I sobbed.

“There’s nothing I can do, Zuko. She’s dead.” Katara cried. Her sentenced came out in a breathy whimper.

My chest tightened even more and another sob ripped out of me. “Please. She can’t be gone. We have to try!” I begged. I refused to let it sink in fully. Even if there were a slim chance she was still alive, we couldn’t just give up on her. I’d never do that.

Katara looked up from the snow, seeing my broken expression. Without a word, she whipped the tears from her face and shifted to sit on her knees. Katara first ripped the hole in Ama’s dress even larger, exposing the ugly stab wound. Bending some water she brought it to Ama’s injury, letting it sink through to heal her. The liquid glowed a bright blue as it worked it's magic. Slowly but surely, the wound was healed. Leaving behind a pink scar.

Letting her hands momentarily hover over Ama, Katara held her breath. We both stared at her, waiting for a sign, anything to let us know that she was still alive. But her entire being was still… dead. Katara’s hand shook as she reached towards her sister’s face, closing her departed eyes which were staring up at the starry sky. She heavily sat onto the ground, burying her face in her hands to bawl.

I just sat there in despair. Breathing heavily while I stared at her. I didn’t want to believe it, but she was gone. I’d never get the chance to heat her tea after she’s neglected it for too long. I’d never get to kiss her lips or tell her how lovely she looks in purple, or in any color for that matter. All those moments just slipped through my fingers.

I let my head fall, shutting my eyes as the tears dripped down.

“I-” A third person spoke with hesitation, not being able to get a word in. My eyes snapped open and with a sullen look, I turned my head to Azula. I’d completely forgotten that my sister had been laying in the snow this entire time with her awestricken expression. She quickly changed to an impassive one, masking her feelings. “Maybe there’s something I can do.” She muttered to herself with a contemplative look.

Azula began to drag herself towards us. But Katara jumped protectively between Azula and her sister. “Don’t you dare touch her.” She hissed. I’ve never seen Katara say something so darkly, so venomously, and mean it.

“She can’t get more dead.” Azula deadpanned with a light scoff. But Katara wasn’t moving. She continued to glare daggers at my sister. “She spared my life, now let me try to save her,” Azula said quietly like she was ashamed to show any sympathy or emotions. Katara turned her head to look at me, asking without speaking whether we should let Azula try whatever it was she had in mind. I didn’t see many options. Even the Avatar couldn’t bring back the dead. If Azula could really save her… “Well, we don’t have all night,” Azula grumbled quickly.

“Alright,” I responded with a snap. Katara scurried to the side, letting Azula sit on her knees over Ama. Not one ounce of her trusted Azula, but she trusted me enough to even give in to my sister's ideas

“Lay her down,” Azula ordered me. Typically, I wouldn’t let someone tell me, the Fire Lord, what to do, especially with a tone like that. But that didn’t matter. Azula positioned her hands over Ama’s chest, generating electricity while Katara and I looked curiously. Suddenly, the electricity she generated zapped Ama’s chest.

Katara and I flinched back. “What the hell was that?!” Katara shouted in disgust, ready to engage in another fight.

“I’m restarting her heart, give me a minute,” Azula grumbled her answer, generating more lightning in her hand.

Katara turned to me with a grimace. “Zuko, are we just going to let her shoot electricity at my sister?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer. Katara was only looking out for Ama, she’d do anything for the people she cared about. But this could work. “Do it again,” I told Azula, ignoring the betrayed look Katara sent me. Azula didn’t waste another second to zap the waterbender again. Her body lightly jolted up at the sudden shock. Still, there was no sign that she was alive. “Again.” Azula generated more lighting and shocked her.

The moment the electricity hit her, Ama sucked in a thin, quick breath through her nose, followed by multiple other deep inhales to steady her breathing. Katara gasped and placed her hand over her chest in relief. I let out the breath I’ve been holding and lifted her unconscious, but alive, body off the ground, cradling her in my arms. I looked at Azula and her relieved look. “Thank you,” I whispered genuinely.

Who knew what happened between Ama and Azula. Whatever it was, it brought out a side to Azula that I hadn’t seen since we were kids, before all of the manipulation and the hate was instilled into us. Believe it or not, Azula and I didn’t always have a bad relationship. We would chase each other playfully in the gardens and mom would read to us. I missed it, in a sense.

Still, I didn’t trust her. She may have something else up her sleeve. But she saved Ama. That was enough to give me some hope that maybe one day I’d have my sister back.

Azula sucking in a short breath at my thanks and grimaced at the sentiment. “Well don't get all mushy about it,” she rolled her eyes. “Honestly Zuzu, hanging around these people has made you far too soft.”

Okay, maybe it’ll take some time.

.☽☼☾.

The atmosphere was a mixture of somber, relieved, angry, and plenty of other things. Katara only let a few people in Ama’s room at a time in case she woke up. No one wants to wake up after almost dying to have 10 pairs of eyes staring right at you. It’d probably overwhelm her. Katara said she didn’t know when she’d wake up, but it’d happen eventually.

There were only two seats against the wall facing the bed. Sokka preferred to stay on his feet, leaning on the wall by the bed as he carved something into a piece of wood. Something both he and Ama would do if they had the tools and were anxious. I kept to one of the seats. Lighting and extinguishing a small flame in the palm of my hand in a continuous loop. “Patiently” waking for the unconscious girl to awake.

There were thousands of other things I should be doing. Preparing to head back to the Fire Nation, signing important documents, making sure that Azula wasn’t causing any problems. But I wanted to be here next to her when she wakes up.

Sokka nor I talked, keeping the quiet of the room. Just a few short words when we both came in. Now the only noise came from the flame and the scrapes of Sokka’s knife on the wood. They were both like ticking clocks. But as annoying as they were, the on and off of the flame kept me from losing my mind. And I’m sure it went the same for Sokka.

After lightly blowing some of the wood shavings off the unfinished carving, Sokka gave up and stuck the knife into its small sheath before setting it and the carving on the bedside table. “So what do you think happened out there?” He wondered while he stared at his sister. “What did she say that got Azula to suddenly want to save her life?”

My hand closed into a fist, completely having the flame snuffed out. “Not sure. Even if I did talk to Azula about it, I doubt she’d confide in me.” I looked over at Ama’s peaceful figure. “We’ll just have to wait till she’s awake and ready to talk about it.”

“She’s taking too long.” Sokka huffed. He rested his hands on his knees and leaned over her. “Hey, sis. Wakey Wakey. It’s been over twenty-four hours.” His coaxing with a singsong voice was unsurprisingly met with no response, making Sokka frown. “If you wake up I’ll bake you some cookies.”

“Sokka, that’s not going to work,” I grumbled in annoyance and crossed my arms.

“Says who?” He countered and then turned around with a hopeful grin. “I know! Zuko kiss her!”

“What?” I responded with wide, surprised eyes and flinched back. “Why would you suggest that?” Did he know something about that Ama and I were planning to get back together? Maybe she told him something about it and didn’t mention it to me? Or maybe he was just taunting me for a reaction?

Sokka chuckled at my immediate response and casually sat down into the chair next to me. “When we were little my mom used to tell this fairytale story about a princess who falls unconscious from some spell. The only way to wake up was from true love’s kiss and one day her prince came and woke her up. It used to be Ama’s favorite story.”

I smiled softly at that. It was always a joy to hear about what Ama enjoyed as a kid. She loved to tell me tons of stories, and boy were there hundreds of them. In her own words “growing up in a small, boring village just called for me to get into some trouble.” But she never mentioned anything about this story. I made a mental note to ask for a more in-depth version of it later.

“She’s going to be traumatized after this,” Sokka said softly, a dismal look in his eye. “Dying and then coming back to life, it’s… a scary thought. And she actually lived it.” Sokka turned to give me an asking look. “She’s going to need you, Zuko.”

My jaw dropped slightly at what he said. Okay, he definately knows something. “How…?”

Sokka shook his head in amusement. “I saw it the first day you got here. That look you gave her. It was a short glance, but it was the same look I give Suki after the weeks or even months we’re apart. And it just got more obvious as time went on. Most of the others started to take notice while you guys continuously glanced at each other at dinner. Plus there was that one time you two were cuddling on the couch.”

“We weren’t cuddling....” I flushed just remembering the morning I woke up on the large couch with Ama. How she snuggled closer to me in her slumber. It was probably the best sleep I’ve had in a long time. But the embarrassing part came the morning after when we both woke up by loud whispers and giggles.

Sokka laughed loudly, slapping my shoulder firmly and keeping his hand there. “Zuko, blushing? That’s not something you see every day.” I lightly clenched my jaw and rolled my eyes as Sokka teased me. “In all seriousness though,” He started while his laughter died down to just a mild smile. “You two care about each other deeply. And while I will never forget that you broke her heart six years ago, I approve of your relationship.”

“Thanks, Sokka.” I gave him an appreciative smile. Reciprocating his action, I placed a firm hand on his shoulder. “That means a lot.”

“Just promise me you won’t hurt her again. Especially not now.” Both our heads turned to the bed, the mood of the room got a lot bleaker. I couldn’t help but admire her. She looked stunning with the midday sunlight shining on her through the window, outlining her soft facial features. And her brown hair laid beside her head like silk. I could admire her all day. If only the circumstances were different.

I sighed heavily, a thin smile appearing on my lips. “You have my word, Sokka,” I promised him.

Suddenly the room door opened, grabbing Sokka’s and I’s attention. Katara stepped in with Aang and closed the door once they entered. “Any change?” She asked, anxiously walking to the bed.

“No,” Sokka responded with a frown. But he kept his voice light and tried to have a cheerful tone so that Katara wouldn’t worry more than she already was.

The room was silent again while Katara checked her sister’s pulse in her neck, then touching her forehead with the back of her hand. Making sure that everything was normal. “All good.” She sighed in relief to herself. Katara took a seat on the bed while she kept an eye on Ama.

“Any signs that she might wake up soon?” I wondered, furrowing my eyebrows in a way that was curious and uneasy.

Katara shook her head “no” as she brushed through her sister’s hair. “Just give her time. She’ll come around.” Even though Katara answered the question, I could tell that it was said absentmindedly. Her full attention was on her sister in concern. Not that I could blame her her. A part of me wondered if she accused herself for getting there too late and was now wondering what may have happened if Azula didn’t offer to help. It wasn’t my place to ask. Besides. Her husband was always better at talking to her and calming her down.

Aang stepped beside Katara, rubbing her back in a slow circle. “Zuko, maybe we should leave the siblings alone for a bit.” He suggested quietly. I nodded in understanding and stood from my seat, following Aang out of the room. Neither of us said a word until Aang shut the door behind him and let out a tense sigh.

“Are you doing alright?” I wondered. The two of us started to walk down the blue-accented hall slowly and heavily.

Aang nodded but kept his eyes ahead of him. “Katara’s just been really worried. We agreed to push back the honeymoon until Ama’s better.”

“I’m sorry. This never should have happened.” I responded disappointedly in myself. I couldn’t help but feel guilty for everything that happened. I didn’t know that all along, I was playing into Azula’s trap to get to Ama. I thought I was being smart for keeping an eye on Suh, but I was so obviously wrong.

Aang turned her head to raise his brow at me. “It’s not your fault Zuko. No one knew what to expect. If anything, it’s Azula’s fault.” Couldn’t argue with him there. “Have you figured out what to do with her yet?”

And there was the question everyone repetitively asked. Everyone else had already stated firmly that they thought she should serve life in prison. But ultimately it was up to me. And I wasn’t sure what to do. I wanted so badly to believe that she could change. And I had hope that she had that potential. After saving Ama’s life, she didn’t fight against being restrained and put in a jail cell. Not one snarky comment was made while we were questioning her.

There was only one more opinion that I needed when it came to Azula’s fate. Ama’s. I needed to know what happened before Suh stabbed her. But Ama was also incredibly effected by Azula’s actions. She needed justice for it all. In my mind, she should have the greatest say.

“Not yet,” I told Aang straight-faced.

Aang blandly rolled his eyes at my simple answer but knew better than to push it. “Anyways,” He dragged the word. “How are you holding up?”

I almost stumbled at the question. That was something no one has asked me yet. And quite frankly, I haven’t even asked myself that question. It wasn’t exactly easy to answer. I didn’t like to dwell on my feelings. And I definitely didn’t want to dwell on these. Because every time I started to think about it, my mind would take me back to the other night. Seeing her eyes dull and feeling her soul leave her body. I didn’t want to think about it.

Usually, I’d focus my time and energy on something else. But I knew I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on anything. My thoughts kept drifting to her and wondering when I’d be able to actually see her again. And when I was in the room next to her, it grounded me. I didn’t want to think about how I felt.

I didn’t answer Aang. But he must have noticed my hand clench into a fist and my face harden. “Zuko, if you aren’t going to talk to me about it, please talk to someone. Anyone. It’s not healthy to keep everything to yourself.”

“Yeah, okay,” I mumbled. But I didn’t mean it. I didn't need to talk. I needed to redirect my focus for the time being. “I have things to do. I’ll see you at dinner.” My pace quickened leaving Aang to walk by himself. I heard his frustrated sigh, but he made no efforts to follow me or persuade me to talk.

.☽☼☾.

Thick, hot flames erupted from my fists. I violently punched the air before stepping forward with my other foot, bursting flames from my other fist. Despite the freezing temperatures, the fire and my rapid movements made me sweat. My shoulders ached and my hips started to feel tightened. I’d lost track of the hours I’ve been out here.

I tried doing official Fire Lord business. But I was so distracted with other thoughts I wouldn’t even process the words I was reading. I eventually just gave up and tried to sleep, but that only made things worse. I’d close my eyes, and my dreams took me back to the other night. Holding her in my arms then losing her. That brought me out here. Vehemently spewing fire in every direction in the dead of night.

A strong, cold wind blew through the air, hitting my back. I could feel it through the two layers of clothing. As a firebender, I don’t usually get cold. But the freezing air sent a shiver up my spine. My fire extinguished quickly and my arms fell to my side. My body was too tired, but my mind was restless. There was only one thing that could possibly calm me.

I rushed back into the palace, eager to get out of the cold. And soon enough, I found myself in Ama’s dimly lit room. The windows were closed, hiding the moon. But there were only two candles placed on her bedside, being the only lighting in the room. She was still asleep. Her arms rested outside of the blanket, laying on her stomach. She still looked so unnatural laying like that.

I grabbed one of the chairs by the top, moving it to sit directly next to the bed before I took a seat in it. Letting out a deep sigh, I intertwined my hands together. “I don’t know if you can hear me or not. But I just wanted to talk for a minute.” I started with my gaze was fixed on my hands. “I know Uncle Iroh would probably hear me out and give his ever so wise advice, but I don’t need advice, I just need… I need to talk it out. I guess.”

“I miss you, Ama. A lot. These past 6 years have been so dreadful without you.” I scoffed at myself and pinched the bridge of my nose as I shut my eyes. “That probably sounds super dramatic.” Damn it, Zuko. Just get it off your chest. Who cares if it’s dramatic? “It felt like I’d just gotten you back and then you were gone. I watched you die and it tore my heart apart. I felt so empty.”

I cleared my throat just as the quiet tears pooling at my eyes fell down my cheek. “I would have given anything to take your place. I don’t know what I would’ve done if Azula didn’t do what she did. But I still keep seeing you. Dead. Every time I close my eyes. I can’t even sleep.” I looked over at her, seeing her still sleeping figure. I felt more peaceful just seeing her there. Safe. “I need to remind myself that you're okay. Hence why I’m here.”

“I can't help but blame myself for what happened. Aang and Katara say that it’s not my fault for their wedding being interrupted like that. And Uncle Iroh has told me that none of this is my fault. But I feel the most guilt just thinking about what I could have done to stop Suh. I should’ve kept a closer eye on her.”

I brought my hand up to her face, just barely stroking her cheek with my thumb. “I’m just glad you’re okay. And I'm going to be here for you. No matter what you need.” I stood up from the seat and gently leaned over her. “Because I love you, too,” I whispered, pressing a delicate kiss on her forehead.

I was still hovering over her when I pulled away. My hand softly cupping her face. My eyes trailed to her lips as I thought back to what Sokka said. About the story. I doubted that true love’s kiss was a real thing. Just a fairy tale. But what if it was? Would she wake up? Or what if I wasn’t her true love? None of it was real anyway, what did it matter? Still. My greed took over. And I found myself leaning down and placing a chaste kiss on her soft lips.

Disconnecting my lips from hers, I pulled away just slightly and opened my eyes. I marveled at her for another moment. Wishing that she’d wake up soon. And while I was gazing at her, I could’ve sworn I saw her lips twitch into a smile. I thought it was just my imagination. Until her eyes fluttered open. Her blue eyes immediately met mine and she smiled instantly. All while I probably looked like an awestricken fool; leaning over her with my jaw dropped and my eyes wide.

"Well, that's one way to wake up." She giggled. Her hand went up to stroke the side of my face.

It took a moment for me to react with a wide smile. “You’re awake.” I sighed gratefully. She’s here. She’s smiling. She's healthy.

“And you’re sweaty.” She huffed a laugh as she noticed the thin layer of sweat that still stuck to my forehead.

I shook my head at how that was completely unimportance, yet she still took notice in the small details. “I was just training outside for a bit.”

Her brows furrowed together and her head turned to look out the window but found them closed. “Sprits, what time is it?” She wondered as she tried to sit up on the bed, breathing in sharply in pain at the sudden movement.

“Hey, hey. Careful.” I scolded her softly. Immediately moving the pillows behind her and helping her lean back into them comfortably. “It’s like midnight. Something like that.” I answered her question.

“Spirits, Zuko. What are you doing up training? It’s freezing out.” She worried as she leaned into the pillows slowly.

I didn’t respond. I could come to the conclusion that she didn’t hear my little rant while she was unconscious. I didn’t know whether I should feel relieved or not. But I pushed it all aside and shook my head at her question. “That doesn’t matter. What does is that you’re awake and you’re okay.” I continued to smile, cupping both of her cheeks again and grinning happily. But then that smile faded at a realization. “Ama, do you know that you-”

“Died?” She finished flatly. “Yeah, Zuko.” Her expression was generally unreadable. She gave me a flat smile and her eyes were indifferent.

I didn’t want to make her feel uncomfortable with the subject, but if she was hurting and didn’t want to tell me I’d want to let her know that she could talk to me. “And how are you feeling?” I wondered, sitting next to her on the bed and leaning into the pillows.

Ama shrugged her shoulders quickly and lightly. Her left hand slid into my right one, intertwining her fingers in mine. “I feel fine. My whole body feels sore, though.” She grumbled, leaning her head back into the pillows.

“Other than that?” I pressed. The last thing I wanted was for Ama to feel pain. She’d already been through so much. And in a few hours or so, the others would immediately start to throw all these arguments and questions in her face about Azula. She shouldn’t have to carry all those burdens by herself.

Ama turned her head to look at me, giving me a content smile. “Feeling great.” She smiled. But it felt like it was a lie. She died and came back to life. However, knowing Ama, she’d probably bury her feelings in order to keep herself from inconveniencing anyone. Even though she wouldn’t be inconveniencing anyone.

“Ama, you know you can tell me anything-”

“Zuko, I’m fine.” She laughed, shaking her head like I was the one exaggerating. I raised an unbelieving brow at her. Her smile fell a bit, but she quickly looked away from me. Instead, she rested her head on my shoulder. “I do have a million questions, though.”

I sighed, unsatisfied with the fact that she wasn’t confiding in me. She was a strong person, mentally and physically, so maybe she really was fine. I wouldn’t know. Maybe she just hadn't processed it all, yet. I had to give her time. “And I will happily answer them all,” I responded quietly. A yawn leaving my mouth as sleepiness started to overtake me.

A gorgeous giggle left Ama’s lips. I felt her hand delicately find my jaw turning my head to look at her. Her sparkling eyes met my tired ones. “You should get some sleep.” She whispered.

“I’d much rather stay here,” I responded just as quietly. Ama opened her mouth to say something but no words came out as a slight blush crept up her face. A low chuckled left my lips at it. Seeing her get flustered always made me feel a bit prideful. With most others, she’d find a quip or answer back confidently. But with me, she’d cower back bashfully. Even if she didn’t like to admit it.

“Fine.” She huffed with a shrug. She removed her hand from mine to move her body to the other side of the bed. A low grunt sounded from her nose while she did so.

“Should I get Katara?” I wondered. I knew it was most likely normal to feel sore after that fight and then sleeping in the same position for over a day. Still, I didn’t want her to be in pain. And Katara wouldn’t mind in the slightest to check on her.

Ama shook her head. “Let her rest.” She told me, rearranging the pillows behind her. “Knowing her, she hasn’t had a lot of sleep.” Her hand pat the spot next to her, telling me to get in bed.

Now it was my turn to feel a bit flushed. I rubbed the back of my neck nervously and awkwardly. “I’m still kind of sweaty.” I said, not wanting to dirty her sheets. She opened her mouth to comment, but stopped herself. Instead, an amused giggle fell from her lips and she leaned her head into her hand. “What?” I asked, confused as to what she found funny.

“Nothing, I was about to say something, but I really shouldn’t.” She continued to giggle. I furrowed my eyebrows and tilted my head. Ama saw the pondering look I had on my face before giving in to my question. “When has being sweaty stopped anyone from sleeping in bed.” She softly remarked, throwing using her head back in laughter and running her hand through her hair.

I was still confused. Wondering what she meant but that. Was she referring to my firebending? No. It didn’t make sense. Sex, Zuko. She’s talking about sweaty people and sex. My mouth immediately went into an “o” shape once I understood. Quickly transforming my expression, I gave her a smirk while climbing into bed. “Well I thought you’d want me to be sweaty for different reasons before sleeping together.” I played into her reference roguishly.

Despite another blush creeping up, Ama snorted a laugh. “You wish.” She countered, holding her head high. I didn’t quite get into the covers yet, still making my way in to the bed. Ama’s body stiffened a bit, seeing me get close to her on my knees. Her smug smile turned into a desiring one; her lips slightly parted. My hand went under her chin, guiding her a bit closer to me.

Our lips were inches away until I stopped. Taking the moment to admire how close we were. “I missed you so much.” I whispered.

Ama placed her hand on the side of my neck, rubbing the spot beside my jaw. “I missed you too.” She reciprocated. Leaning up to get rid of the inch between us, Ama connected our lips again. It started chaste and gentle, but quickly turned more eager and thirstful. The burning sensation in my chest only grew every second that her lips were on mine. Suddenly, I wasn’t tired anymore.

Greedily, my tough swiped her bottom lip, asking for more permission. Ama quickly granted it. Her hand slid behind my head, tangling her fingers in my hair pulling me closer. My hands found their way to her waist, trailing down to her hips slowly and carefully. Once feeling the curve of her wide hips, I gripped them ever so slightly. But it was enough to get a low, quiet moan from her.

My lips curved up into a smile in the kiss. Ama’s hands pulled me down into the bed. A light thud sounded when she hit the pillows. Leaving her lips, I started to create a trail of worshiping kisses on her jaw. A content sigh left Ama’s lips and she tilted her head up, allowing me to go further.

But just as things were getting interesting, there was a knock on the door. I jumped off Ama as she scrambled to sit up. We shared the same surprised and sort of embarrassed look. “Who’s up?” She whispered first, eyeing the door.

“Not sure.” I responded lowly as I slowly and carefully got off the bed while Ama remained where she was. But we were both preparing mentally for a fight. No one else should be up at this time. Other than the guards of course, but they never had reasons to go into anyone's rooms. And who’d knock if it was known among everyone in the palace that Ama was unconscious? Well, until just now.

My hand curved around the cold, metal door knob and turned it slowly. When I opened it, I was met with the last person I thought I’d see. “What are you doing here?” They immediately asked.

.☽☼☾.

*DISCLAIMER* None of this is medically correct. I know that electricity doesn't bring a person back to life. I wrote this for the purpose of the fic. I'm an environmental science major, not pre-med or any of that. I don't watch Grey’s Anatomy (What am I? Straight?). I don't know medical stuff. This is a fanfic, please don't take it too seriously. I try to make things as realistic as possible, but then again, bending the elements isn't exactly realistic is it?

I met my own due date! Honestly I didn't know if I'd be able to update on time, but I did! I thought this chapter would only be like 4000 words, and then more happened. I might be writing a short blurb soon and posting it on here soon. So stay tuned!

If you liked the chapter, please consider liking the post or reblogging. I love seeing notifications for my story. Lights my heart up with joy!

Love you all! Hang loose, amigos 🤙🏼

#fire lord zuko #zuko fanfic #zuko #zuko x waterbender oc #water tribe #waterbender #waterbender oc #fire nation #katara #aang #avatar fanfiction #avatar #zuko x oc #her sun his moon #zuko x ama #zuko fanfiction #zuko x reader

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dreamworksconvict · 5 years ago

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She-Ra: Racism Problem Pt. 2

Thanks to everyone who said nice things about my earlier post!!!! I like am really invested in representation and media so I’m glad it’s being received well.

I also want to add a caveat that I’m not trying to cancel She-Ra. I just want to hold media to a high standard and think that we can critique the things we like.

Next I want to talk about some pretty heavy topics: the White Savior trope and colonialism. Again, I’ll be pretty spoiler-heavy here. I also want to warn people that there will be mention of genocide and antisemitism. I’ll be writing about Hordak in the next part.

In the fourth part I want to add an addendum about Catra being coded as Latina, which I think is a valid interpretation. I also want to talk about the ableism present in the show with both Hordak and Entrapta, which is a separate issue so I’ll label it differently.

Imagine a story like this:

“I am a white-coded, able-bodied, implied cisgender protagonist who has a Special Trait that makes me Stronger and/or More Unique than other characters. I also have some connection to Some Evil Colonizers from Space. Oh no! Some Evil Colonizers from Space have showed up to threaten me and my Token Diverse friends who get about half as much screentime as I do! Wait a second, “evil?” There’s no such thing! They’re only Misunderstood Colonizers Who Didn’t Mean It, and/or there was More to the Story. Maybe they came from a Dysfunctional Family or were Abused/Bullied! I think the people/places they colonized may have been Secretly Bad or Just As Bad all along, too! Wowee! Let’s all have a Heart-to-Heart and/or sacrifice one of my Token Diverse friends to save the day!”

Which story am I referring to? Well...

Voltron... or She-Ra... or Steven Universe.. and probably others...yeah.

(And for those who claim that Keith isn’t the protagonist of Voltron, well... I mean he is... but that’s an entirely different essay. But notice how Lance and Hunk are actually smaller than the other characters on the screen and are partly transparent, and that Allura gets pushed to the back row and is mostly covered? Yikes...)

(On my previous post, someone also noted that Steven is half-Jewish. I was not aware that Rebecca had confirmed this officially. As I am not Jewish myself, I don’t want to speak over this, but I do want to point out that you can be white and Jewish, as it is a Diaspora identity. There are many Jewish ethnicities, such as Ashkenazim, Sephardim, and Mizrahim. I also wish that we had seen more of that in the show--like Steven celebrating Hanukkah, or learning Hebrew, or having a Rosh Hashanah celebration... From what I can tell, Rebecca only confirmed this on a Reddit AMA post. So I don’t know specifically how Steven identifies because that was never clarified in the show, but it seems like he is coded as white. Definitely feel free to disagree, this is just how I’ve interpreted the show, especially given its treatment of colonization.)

On top of all three of these shows recycling a very similar plotline, they all share the White Savior trope. Teen Vogue has an article talking about how this is linked to colonialism and I highly encourage checking that out. I’m going to pull a large chunk of text from there because I think it’s really important and applies to animation, not just live action films.

“Many white people in films based on the stories of POC are often subliminally depicted as godlike saviors, heroes who are rational and judicious to the core. They are usually deified men or women — glorified and righteous — like scripture out of a Holy Book. Look at Hillary Swank in Freedom Writers. The white savior somehow always ends up usurping the narrative. And in this centering of whiteness and white characters, the POC characters end up becoming props, which only perpetuates ideas of our otherness and unimportance, which then establishes a status quo of racism. Whiteness is again normalized, and POC are decentralized. This is particularly problematic because whiteness is not only favored in Hollywood but also in society at large; white privilege is ever-present and ubiquitous.”

Look at the center poster for She-Ra: Adora is pictured in white and gold and red as an accent. She’s bathed in a golden light. This color combination is no coincidence, because we already associate that combination with religious iconography, like the Vatican.

(I also want to make a note that this is specifically associated with Christian/Catholic iconography. A lot of these shows could be classified as antisemitic in their handling of colonialism and genocide. I would argue--and will be arguing in my thesis--that Season 6-8 of Voltron’s plot heavily relied on antisemitic tropes, especially as it related to Lotor and the Alteans. But that’s for another day.) (Also see my discussion of Steven Universe’s Jewish identity above.)

So how exactly does She-Ra follow the White Savior trope, how is it similar to other stories’ utilization of the trope, and how does this all relate back to colonialism? I would say there are two main factors: setting up Adora as a white heroine with a darker-skinned foil (Catra), and setting up a narrative where Hordak “isn’t that bad of a guy, really.” For this part I’m gonna focus on Adora.

1: Adora as the White Savior

Adora is from the Horde. Keith is half-Galra. Steven’s mom is Pink Diamond.

All three of these protagonists have some personal tie or connection to a group of colonizing villains. The Diamonds want(ed) to take over earth and suck the life force from it, as they’d done on other planets. They also used a super-weapon to with the intent to kill all the rebel gems. The Galra created an empire and also sucked the life out of planets. They also created a super-weapon that could kill an entire planet, and had already committed genocide against the Alteans. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Big Bad of She-Ra, Horde Prime, has similar goals. Hordak certainly does.

There is an ever-so-slight separation of Adora from the other two protagonists, who, at the start of the series, do not know they are related to the villain group in some way. (Steven doesn’t know he’s a Diamond.) Adora, on the other hand, starts the series as a villain. She’s part of a group that has actively been fighting and destroying the Princesses and the planet. The first episode notes that she is particularly good at her job, with Hordak nominating her for Force Captain. Adora also notes that “this is what [she’s] been working for her entire life.” When Catra and Adora leave the Fright Zone, it is not out of goodwill. They simply want to go for a joyride on a skiff.

When Adora gains the power of She-Ra, she acts ignorant of the Horde’s actions. The first episode, Adora is completely defensive of Hordak. She even claims that “Hordak says we’re doing what’s best for Etheria.” It is not until the second episode that Adora begins to have any remorse for her actions--but also note that Adora’s main motivation during the first half of this episode is to continue onward with Bow and Glimmer because she wants to know more about herself, not repent for her actions. It is not until the end of the episode that she begins to become a bit more self-aware, but there is a key phrase that Glimmer utters that is very key to the White Savior narrative: “I feel like maybe you’re here to help us.” This line comes after Glimmer apologizes for not trusting Adora. Adora. The Horde soldier. The soldier from the group of colonizers who were responsible for the death of Glimmer’s father.

Ok sure.

Consider how realistic this is. (Not that fantasy has to be realistic, but when you’re working with a narrative based on systemic violence, you need to at least be considerate of how this works in reality.) Adora has been trained to fight and kill Princesses and their allies. She’s been trained to take over Etheria and strategically destroy and/or take resources to weaken them. Yet she acts as if this is all news to her. Suddenly meeting the people she’s been trained to destroy causes her to repent, and suddenly the people who have been victimized forgive her and trust her within two episodes.

Here’s what I think is going on here: given the current hyper-conservative political climate and rampant xenophobia in the world right now, white creators feel the need to put a white person as the hero as if they’re claiming, “See, this character--and subsequently myself--aren’t like those other bad white people!” They want a degree of separation from the reality that they have white privilege and are part of the problem.

There is no truly “woke” white person. White people have been raised in a society where they benefit off the oppression of the chosen “other,” in this case black and brown people. Even if you do your research like I’m doing, you still will mess up. White people cannot rid themselves of privilege no matter how hard they try, because in this current society, the legacy of colonialism, imperialism, and racism have made it so that white people will ultimately be more successful and have more opportunities for success than others. (Also, there is no ethical consumption under capitalism, so even attempts to be considerate about taking advantage of laborers cannot be completely successful.)

All of this results in a lot of White Guilt. Thus, we end up with narratives where the white colonizer character suddenly has a change of heart and fights against the system without really challenging the core mechanics that put that system in place. But fighting against oppression and violence doesn’t make a white person special--it just makes them decent.

It also ignores the fact that white people, to be blunt, haven’t done shit to advocate for inclusion and equity compared to literally everyone else. I want to pull another quote from the Teen Vogue article:

[White saviors] perpetuate an idea that is essentially a historical banner of colonialism: People of color need white people to save them. To this day, some people still latently believe what imperialists such as Rudyard Kipling said, that colonialism was important for everyone: the conqueror and, most importantly, the conquered. That without the colonizers, the colonized had no hope of survival. And by constantly churning out movies with plots in which white people "save" people of color, Hollywood reinforces colonialist dictum.

Why does Glimmer think that they NEED Adora to be saved? Why is this white woman the only one who can do it? Sure, Adora has the power of She-Ra, but remember that giving Adora, a white woman, that power was a CHOICE made by the writers. They could have given the sword to someone else, they could have made Adora a PoC... but they didn’t. So suddenly, because Adora, ex-Horde soldier, is there, the Princess alliance can be reformed, people start working together, the rebellion is saved! etc. etc. etc....

So then it’s extra ironic (and honestly is pretty predictable given this White Guilt narrative) when the White Savior trope goes right along with The Colonizers Weren’t Actually Evil, Just Misunderstood.

This post is way too long so I’ll continue in the next part.

#she-ra #racism #colonialism #white savior

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