#i want to feel more apart of my fandoms but i’m so hesitant about sharing my creations lmao

[bluelavendre]

**Title: "Bound by Obsession"**

Fandom: BTS

Pairing: Yandere Jungkook x Reader

Genre: Dark, Romance, Psychological

Warnings: Obsessive behavior, stalking, manipulation, dark themes

---

You had always thought Jungkook was the perfect blend of warmth and mystery. He was sweet, almost too perfect, with a smile that could melt anyone's heart. But that was before you realized how far his affection for you truly went.

---

It started innocently enough. A shared glance across the room during a BTS interview, a brief interaction in the hallways of the agency. At first, you thought nothing of it. Jungkook was kind to everyone. You weren't special.

But then, the subtle signs began to show.

He started lingering near you, his eyes always watching from afar. Whenever your eyes met, there was this intense, almost unholy focus in his gaze. His smile was different, more intense than you had ever seen, as if it held a secret he was dying to share with you… but never would. The way he would appear "coincidentally" at the same places you were, making it seem like fate or mere coincidence.

And then, one day, he spoke.

"You're always so... alone."

You blinked in surprise, not knowing how to respond. You hadn’t realized he had been watching you so closely. You smiled awkwardly, brushing it off.

“I… I guess I am. I like to have some time to myself.”

He nodded, but there was something strange in his eyes—something possessive, almost hungry.

“I think you’d be happier if you didn’t have to be alone all the time,” Jungkook said softly. “I could... keep you company, if you wanted. I don’t mind. I’m always around.”

There was an intensity in his voice that made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.

But you brushed it off. He was Jungkook, after all. He was kind, he was sweet. You convinced yourself you were imagining things, that he was just being a good friend.

---

Days turned into weeks, and his behavior grew more erratic.

Jungkook would appear at your favorite coffee shop, as if by chance. He would show up at the gym you frequented, always with that quiet, knowing smile that made your heart race. He’d send you messages that seemed innocent enough, at first.

*"Hey, what are you doing tonight?"*

*"I saw you looking at that new book. I got you a copy."*

*"I’m on my way to pick you up. Don’t worry, I’ll be there soon."*

You didn’t remember inviting him anywhere. You didn’t ask for any of it.

At first, you thought it was sweet—maybe even flattering. But when he started showing up at your door without warning, you began to feel a sense of dread creeping up your spine.

One evening, you were watching TV alone in your apartment when you heard a knock on the door. Thinking it was a delivery, you opened it without hesitation.

There, standing in the hallway, was Jungkook. His usual smile was gone, replaced with something darker, more intense.

“I was worried about you,” he said softly, stepping inside without waiting for permission. “You’ve been so distant lately.”

You took a step back, trying to process what was happening. “Jungkook, what are you doing here?”

“I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.” His voice was soothing, almost too soothing. “I don’t like seeing you upset. You’re mine to protect, you know?”

You froze. The words seemed innocent, but there was a dark undertone that sent shivers down your spine. The way he said “mine” made your chest tighten. It wasn’t the possessiveness of a lover, but the claim of someone who felt entitled to you.

“I—I’m fine, Jungkook. Really. You should go.”

But he didn’t move. Instead, his gaze darkened, his jaw tightening. “I don’t want to go. Not when I’m the only one who truly cares about you. You don’t need anyone else.”

“Jungkook, this isn’t healthy,” you said, trying to keep your voice steady.

His eyes flashed. “I don’t need anyone else either. Just you.”

Before you could react, his hand shot out, grabbing your wrist with alarming strength. “You belong to me. I can’t let anyone else take you away.”

A panic blossomed in your chest, but before you could do anything, he pulled you into his chest, holding you tightly as though trying to make you understand something you were too scared to comprehend.

“You don’t have to be afraid,” he whispered, pressing his lips to the top of your head. “I’ll take care of you. I’ll protect you from everyone. I’m the only one who knows you. I’m the only one who truly understands.”

You trembled in his grip, the realization hitting you like a wave. The Jungkook you thought you knew wasn’t the person standing before you. This Jungkook was someone else—a man whose love had twisted into something dark and consuming. His affection wasn’t love. It was obsession.

---

The days that followed were filled with confusion and fear. You tried to distance yourself from him, but it was impossible. He always found a way to insert himself into your life, always watching from the shadows, always waiting for the perfect moment to “rescue” you.

He would show up at your work, pretend to be a concerned friend, and “accidentally” overhear your conversations. When you tried to tell others, they just looked at you like you were crazy. “It’s Jungkook,” they’d say. “He’s harmless.”

But you knew the truth. You could see it in his eyes—the desperation, the mania. And no one else seemed to understand.

He began to leave little gifts in your apartment—things you hadn’t asked for. A lock of your hair, a t-shirt you’d forgotten at his place. Things that made your blood run cold. It was like he was trying to leave traces of himself everywhere, marking you as his, so no one else would dare to take you from him.

---

One night, you woke up to find him sitting at the edge of your bed, watching you sleep. His dark eyes gleamed in the dim light of your room.

“I told you,” he whispered, “you don’t have to be alone. I’ll never leave you.”

And you realized, with a sickening jolt in your stomach, that you weren’t sure if you could ever escape him.

Jungkook wasn’t just a man in love. He was a man who had become addicted to the idea of you—and there was no way out.

No way but to give in.

[ikeoji-subs]

Zettai BL Ni Naru Sekai VS Zettai BL Ni Naritakunai Otoko 2024 - Episode 6 Eng Sub

VS SHOOTING and VS FALLING IN LOVE

It's the season 3 finale!

For downloading instructions and where to find the raw files, please check our masterpost.

[Subs link]

We ask that you not upload our subs to streaming sites.

Sharing with friends is fine. We’re also OK with folks sharing them in other ways as long as they aren’t public. Please use discretion when talking about the fansub outside of tumblr, but don’t hesitate to get the word out in other ways, and feel free to promote it here. Please credit ikeoji-subs whenever possible—we put a lot of time and effort into this.

Feel free to use the fansub for fandom purposes. Gif-making, meta-writing, and other fandom-related creative endeavors made using our fansub are not only welcome but encouraged.

This is the final episode of this season! We're both going to miss working on this project. When it comes to plans for the future, we're still figuring that part out, but rest assured that we'll keep everyone posted here if we have another project in the works. For the moment, we once again want to thank everyone who has spread the word or had a kind word for us in the tags and elsewhere.

Big big thanks to our pal @my-rose-tinted-glasses for letting us make use of her talents and helping our posts and translation notes look special.

translation notes:

about “acknowledge the way I feel” (20:27)

The first, more literal translation of this line, which Hatano says on the bridge, was, “Can you accept my feelings?” That line definitely gets something across, but I knew we’d be leaving it open to varied interpretations–some of them inaccurate–if we didn’t make it more specific. I might go a little overboard in the specificity department sometimes. I think it’s probably due to a combination of my ADHD-related quirks and having spent too much time picking apart variables as a researcher. Whatever the reason, this time I was kind of in overdrive because this line seemed pretty important. 

I asked Snow some questions about what “accept” meant in this instance. In English–and in the American cultural context I’m used to–there are lots of specific ways to talk about a situation like this one. Someone in Hatano’s position in the US would have a plethora of options for inquiring about Mob’s thoughts and emotions and/or making requests about how he might respond to their feelings. Is Hatano asking Mob to simply believe that he has these feelings about him? To let him show these feelings toward him openly, even if he only allows this passively, without offering anything in return? To receive them in a way that implies he returns them or that otherwise implies some degree of connection between them? And so on. 

I was expecting cultural differences to come up around this line, but they came up in a way I wasn’t expecting. Snow responded by telling me that there wasn’t a really specific meaning behind the Japanese wording of this line and that that was characteristic of the Japanese language around such things. I knew that I was more intense than the average American about wanting to pinpoint the meanings of things, but it would seem that the average American is more intense about it than the average Japanese person. 

That was a really interesting insight (one that I’m still thinking about), but it still left me with a conundrum when it came to this line. I could stick with “accept,” since it had a kind of vagueness to it (which was part of the reason I started trying to reword the line in the first place). But I thought “accepting” feelings sounded closer than I’d like to possibly reciprocating them, and I knew from my conversation with Snow that that shouldn’t be implied here. 

I started looking at thesaurus entries and going down different synonym paths. I wanted a word that, in its broadest sense, would be asking very little of the other person. I figured if the Japanese wording was open to being interpreted as either asking for very little or asking for more, then the English wording should be something that could at least be taken as not asking for much, because the implication that Hatano wants more than that from Mob is already clearly present. 

When I came across “acknowledge,” it fit the bill. At first, I just thought of its meaning on a smaller scale. It’s not much to ask of someone to simply acknowledge something, in most contexts. 

But after just a little bit of thought, I realized it also had a useful kind of vagueness. Acknowledgement can be as small as a barely perceptible nod, but it’s also used to talk about thanking someone, giving credit, commending or honoring someone, even giving someone a reward. In a romantic context, depending on the specific story, you could imagine “acknowledge” meaning anything from “yeah, I see you over there” all the way to someone’s devotion being rewarded in all the ways they’ve hoped for. 

Some of these uses are more of a stretch and would only work in just the right context. The default meaning of the word is clearly on the more modest side. But that works well, too. I took this request as coming from a pretty humble, unassuming place and I figured “acknowledge” was reflective of that. 

I ended up being really happy with this word choice. Hopefully, it’ll get the right idea across to folks who watch the show with our subtitles, even if they don’t read this translation note. But I hope that reading this gets it across even more effectively.–Towel

Tag list: @absolutebl @bengiyo @c1nto @come-back-serotonin @lurkingshan @my-rose-tinted-glasses @porridgefeast @sorry-bonebag @twig-tea @wen-kexing-apologist

[angelbarelywrites]

♡ scenarios | dating negan

♡ fandoms; The Walking Dead

♡ characters; Negan Smith

♡ reader; gender neutral

♡ cw; explicit sexual content

♡ notes; in case anyone forgot i’m technically not a dedicated slasher blog

i put this in sections so i didn’t have to make more than one post lol . also these take place while he’s still the ruler of the saviors. i’ve been obsessed since his first episode oh my god that’s eight years of hyperfixation so that’s usually where my brain goes plot- wise

i’m thinking Billy Butcher is up next? lmk who else we wanna see, Garcia Flynn from Timeless is probably too niche? but i love him so so much

•┈••✦ ❤ ✦••┈•

I. Kisses/PDA

> negan is an affectionate person

> with his wives it’s just for show- they’re hot, and he wants all his followers jealous of his lifestyle

> but with you, it’s different

> his wives don’t like him, per-se. he’s convenient to be married to and easy on the eyes, but they’re cold to him

> and he knows why, he doesn’t really give a shit. especially now that he has you.

> you may not be his spouse- you’re sure as fuck not letting him call you that without a ring- but he’s even more physical with you

> standing by him? hand on your back. sitting? you’re on his lap. look cold? he gives you his jacket and keeps you tucked under his arm

> “i just like takin’ care of you darlin’”

> and he loves kissing you in front of others- from little pecks to long, lingering kisses that makes other people look away

> he seems possessive, and he doesn’t mind people pointing it out

> it’s not that he doesn’t trust you- it’s never that

> he trusts most of his men too…maybe not simon. because simon loves staring at your ass

> but he’s proud. he’s proud you’re his, and he’s yours, and that he gets to show you off

> and like hell he ever lets anyone forget it

> alone he acts like keeping his hands off you is impossible

> he smacks your ass any time you lean over, pulls you into big bear hugs from behind and randomly pick you up

> he doesn’t ever want you to doubt his feelings for you, and physically is the easiest way for him to show it

> he’s very sexual, big shocker

> but his favorite kisses are sleepy kisses

> you wait late into the night when he’s due home from terrorizing his territories

> some part of you is afraid one day he won’t come home- so you always wait

> you’ll be exhausted, rubbing your eyes and yawning and usually wrapped up in a blanket

> but no matter how long he takes directing his men and double checking inventory and dealing with the dead

> “hey there, baby doll”

> you always run straight into his arms and bury your face in his chest. he’ll laugh and pick you up, kissing you gently before he carries you to bed

> most times he falls asleep on top of the covers with you, eager for the morning when he can make it up to you for being gone so long

II. Sharing a bed

> negan isn’t used to sharing a bed anymore

> the wives have their own rooms just down the hall, and so do you

> no reason for him not to give you at least a little space

> and having a room is the height of luxury in the sanctuary anyways. it’s a perk of dating the boss

> but you don’t know how to tell him you do want to share a bed, even though you’re barely apart when you’re awake

> so you just…don’t. you assume it’s a boundary he wants to keep and don’t mention it

> until the night terrors start up again

> you’ve seen a lot of people die a lot of different ways. most of them people you cared a lot about

> the memories always seem to come back in your dreams no matter how far back you push them

> when you’re woken up by one in the middle of a harsh storm, it’s just a bit too much

> you just can’t stop crying, and it’s loud and you need held. you need him.

> you creep as quietly as you can down the hall, and you hesitate at the door until the thunder crashes again

> when you stumble in he sits up fast with a knife in his fist

> then he gives a slightly annoyed sigh in recognition, relaxing

> “the hell are you doing?”

> “i just- um-“

> you can tell he notices the wobble in your voice and opens his arms up without another smart remark

> “hey, hey, i’ve gotcha..”

> he doesn’t ask questions- you don’t cry for nothing. and he gets nightmares too

> falling asleep in his arms feels natural…so natural it becomes a habit

> and he sleeps better with you too, curled around you and holding you so tight you think he might be worried you’ll disappear

> it’s less than a week before you stop using your bed altogether

III. Let’s get kinky

> he’s happy in pretty much any dominant role, whatever you call him is good enough for him- daddy, sir, master, etc

> and he likes when you call him whatever it is in front of his men

> the only chance of getting your dick/strap in him is if he power bottoms. but 95 percent of the time? you’re receiving and it’s big

> he likes being risky. he’ll take you out to visit settlements just to have an excuse to stop and fuck you in the car

> or even in a house there, just a room over from his men and gagging you with his fingers so you don’t get caught

> not that he’ll care if they catch you anyways

> he has a nice big office- half of the reason he uses it is so he can have you on his lap as a cockwarmer while he reads or looks over inventory numbers

> the other half is so you can suck his dick under the desk while he talks to simon or dwight

> (simon is a raging pervert so he definitely knows, too)

> he loves fucking your face, watching you get all teary eyed and drooling all over yourself from taking his massive cock

> “oh look at the fuckin’ mess you’re making!”

> he’s generous though- he loves reciprocating oral

> and he loves overstimulating you too- whether that’s by edging you for hours or just making you cum again and again and again

> he loves taking you from behind, pushing your face into the mattress and gripping your hips so hard they bruise

> but he also loves when you ride him slow, gasping quietly as he watches you fall apart completely for him

[p-artsypants]

Blurb #63

I'm going to try to share 70 blurbs from my WIPs and unfinished fics to celebrate reaching 70 posted fics! To help with this endeavor, please feel free to send me a word or a fandom you know I write for, and I'll share the blurb. IDK if I'll get 70 prompts, but let's try it! Send as many as you want!

“How did I successfully revive you?” 

“Yeah, that.” 

“Well, that’s the interesting part. It’s all about how you were frozen. Most bodies from your time period that we find in ice are mummified or you know, some state of very very dead. But you…you were frozen so quickly,” he snapped his fingers, “everything was perfectly preserved. Normally, when the human body freezes, ice forms inside and can tear apart organs and destroy the body. But that didn’t happen with you. So…how were you frozen?” 

Hiccup swallowed thickly, his last memories coming forth in his mind. The Bewilderbeast, Drago…his father. 

“You know what?” John interrupted. “We can talk about that later. It seems like a sore spot.” 

“...it’s…awful,” Hiccup whispered. He closed his eyes as he kept replaying those moments. And it wasn’t just scary being frozen, but he thought about everyone else that was there. Astrid, his mom, Gobber, the rest of the riders…even the rest of the village like Bucket and Mulch. “Are they all gone?” He breathed. 

“Who?”

“My…my friends, my lover, my family…they’re all…” he covered his mouth as it hit him hard. They weren’t just dead, they were long dead. He never arrived in Valhalla. He was all alone in this weird world, and he had failed to save Berk and the dragons. It was all his fault. 

“Hey hey hey,” John soothed, wrapping a paternal arm around him. “It’s okay. It’s okay.” 

“No! No its not! I just found my mom! Astrid and I were–and then Drago–!” He sobbed. 

John took him gently by the shoulders and looked him in the eye. “Hiccup, take a deep breath.”

“You should have left me in that ice…” 

“No, no. Stop that. Listen to me,” he said firmly. “I might get in trouble for this, but I don’t care. You need to know.” 

Hiccup sniffed. “Know what?”

“You…were not the only person we found.” 

His heart started thudding. “How many others?”

John hesitated then said, “about a village full.” 

Hiccup felt boneless as he fell forward onto John’s shoulder in shock. “They…they can be revived too?” 

“Maybe,” John admitted. “That’s why I didn’t really want to tell you.” 

Hiccup raised his head, and braced his arms on his knees. “I’m listening.” 

“Reviving you was a very expensive ordeal. In order to revive anyone else, we need money.” 

“I’m a blacksmith, I’ll get to work right away!” 

John smiled and patted his arm. “I love the enthusiasm, but that’s not necessary. No, what we need from you is simply your cooperation and your story.” 

“My story?” 

“Mmmhmm. We’ll present you to scientific institutions, government agencies, and rich old people. In the presentations, we’ll ask you to introduce yourself. Who are you? What was village life like? What’s your occupation? How’d you lose your leg? And most importantly, how did you train a dragon?” 

At the mere mention, Hiccup sat up straighter, anxiousness setting in. “Toothless! Is he awake? Can I see him?” 

“Not yet, but soon,” John assured. “You are still very weak from your thaw, and too much excitement will cause stress on you. The more calm and relaxed you stay, the sooner you’ll see...did you say his name was Toothless?” 

Hiccup shrugged. “It’s a long story.” 

“Can’t wait to hear it.” 

“I promise, I will relax so much more if I see him and know he’s okay. He…he needs me. He can’t fly without me.” 

“Well, it’s good to know that he can fly. But I suppose you’re right. I’ll check with my team to make sure they’re ready for you.” 

Hiccup heaved a sigh of relief.

[awakentheeldritchabomination]

The Thing About Redesigns, Rewrites, and Reimagines…

(Part I: Broader Discourse)

To those of you who’ve been keeping tabs or maybe seen my posts floating around the tag, you might recall me mentioning that I felt a bit of hesitancy toward the prospect of joining in on the recent wave of redesign/rewrite content. In the more likely scenario that you haven’t or do not know what the crap I’m talking about, that’s fine lol. Understandable. It was a little thing I had written into my first rewrite/redesign post about Charlie. In a short aside, I explained that it was because I’d felt “bad about tinkering with someone else’s work like this”, and then I’d left it at that. So… yeah. Why am I bringing it up now?

Well, I don’t think I need to tell you that this fandom is… a lot. Y’know people have been talking…discourse is being had… heated, moral arguments are being hurled left and right. And in light of all the growing, reactionary accusations, I…found myself starting to feel bad again.

My initial issue, the reason why I didn’t immediately jump to sharing my ideas was that, for all her faults, I empathize with Viv as a creator and didn’t want to feel like I was disrespecting her, her characters, and her vision by reworking it to suit my own. I had frustrations and criticisms, but I never wanted to make it seem like I was trying to ‘fix’ her work or her style. I really didn’t want to be one of those pretentious dipsh*ts (the kind that take a piece of art, digest it through their own preferences and biases, then spit it back in the artist’s face with a, “There. I made it better”). In the end, I went through with it because I had a small hyperfixation and a tendency to project my own issues onto characters I love (I’m sure some of y'all can relate). And also, I was having fun. But… then more discourse poured in, and I saw all the concerns I expressed reflected in the arguments presented by other fans and artists.

And well… That made me feel like I was doing something wrong, like perpetuating and becoming the exact problems I had wanted to fight against. So, I took a step back. I reevaluated.

Now, I have thoughts (shocker!).

And they are conflicted.

On one hand I agree with the idea that redesigns/rewrites are not inherently bad or disrespectful things when it comes to productions like Hazbin since Viv is not a small creator with no power. She and her team have ultimate authority over the show’s events, and those plans will not be derailed by what is basically some random tumblr artist’s fanart/fanfiction.

In regards to the critical side of things, that kinda comes with consuming and digesting the messages and presentation of a work of art. Ideally, it should get people to discuss in this capacity, especially when it deals with such sensitive subject matter as Hazbin does (and especially when it is executed with evidently problematic notions which do bleed into the designs at times).

Still, I do think this trend can be disrespectful if the intention and presentation are made with an aggressive holier-than-thou attitude which explicitly seeks to one-up the creator. Though I understand where it comes from, I think that can be just straight, undiluted maliciousness with a generous helping of pretentious, self-appointed superiority. And I don’t think it’s necessary to pick apart the style itself. You don’t have to like it, of course, but I feel like stating your preference for one way of drawing over another and asserting it as if it were some objective truth antagonizes the entire point of individual artistic expression and personal taste. Criticize the lack of diversity (something which, I’d like to add, is not actually unique to Hazbin) and potentially problematic aspects, but not the style. Even then, it’s important to be constructive not destructive.

That being said, I don’t expect everyone to agree with me (especially if anyone who’s a die-hard fan finds this) Whether you do or not is on you, and that’s okay.

This is more a snippet of my thoughts than a fully developed rant. I just wanted to share where I’m at right now. There will be a part 2 to this expanding some of my feelings while also outlining where I might go from here because things are going on in my head, and I don’t actually know whether I will continue or not with this project. Right now, it feels like it’s drifting toward a more original direction (Charlie feels like an entirely different yet vaguely similar character and dang it I’m attached…It’s kinda weird lol) so….anyway—I digress.

Thank you for reading.

[veliseraptor]

probably this is ill-advised for several reasons and I do feel like I just did it but you know what I feel like it. 150 words meme. usual rules apply: fics under the cut, send me up to three numbers and I'll write 150 words in the/each project you chose. twelve fics five fandoms aaand go

1. And then there was Vegas.

It was like a switch flipped. One day he’d had a baby cousin who might be a brat sometimes but Kinn still loved him, not as much as Khun or Kim but more than his uncle for sure. Sometimes he seemed like more friend than family.

The next he had a bristling tiger watching him simultaneously hungry and wary. (Tilted Axis)

2. “I asked you then, didn’t I?” Wei Wuxian said. Xue Yang did remember that. At the time it’d just been a question from the shameless young master with the interesting talismans. If it weren’t for what’d come later he would barely even have registered. He’d been busy watching Xiao Xingchen instead. 

“Seems like it must’ve been another boring question if I didn’t answer it,” Xue Yang said. 

“One you don’t want to answer, anyway,” Wei Wuxian said. “I have to say when you do that it makes me even more curious.You’ll admit to killing all those people without hesitating, but you don’t want to tell me anything else about it.”

Xue Yang scoffed. “Obviously I’m going to take credit for my work, Wei-qianbei.” 

Wei Wuxian hummed. “Wouldn’t be obvious to everyone,” he said. “I know you know something you’re not sharing about Chifeng-zun’s murder,” he went on, “and I can think of a lot of reasons you’re not talking about that.” 

Xue Yang widened his eyes in an expression of perfect innocence. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Wei-qianbei. What would this humble one know about the affairs of such an important person?” (demonic cultivator team up)

3. It was dark.

No, not just dark; it was nothing. There was nothing, he was adrift in a void, cold and empty. It was so cold, and he had never been so profoundly alone. But above all was the despair, the misery so thick he could choke on it. He’d done something awful. He didn’t want to be here. He didn’t want to exist, even this much, couldn’t bear it. He wanted to rip himself apart like a piece of paper; he already had and it wasn’t enough. 

Xiao Xingchen woke up crying with Xue Yang shaking him. “Xingchen,” he said. “Xingchen, hey, wake up–” 

For a moment Xiao Xingchen hung in limbo, bewildered and confused, somehow two places at once. Then reality and the weight of the nightmare came crashing down on him at once and he threw himself at Xue Yang without thinking, smashing his face into his shoulder, limbs slithering around him. (Redux)

4. He turned around and walked out. Half expecting to feel the keenly remembered pain of a bullet tearing through flesh. Or maybe he wouldn’t, if they went for the head. Nobody fired, though, and then Pete was behind him, between him and the guns again. He wasn’t supposed to do that and Vegas was going to have to try to make him understand that his life wasn’t worth any less than Vegas’s now. But he couldn’t really think about that, not when he had to focus all his energy on keeping moving, head up, stride steady, don’t scream, don’t scream, not here, don’t let them see how weak you are.

Thankfully, Pete stayed quiet. Vegas was pretty sure if he tried to open his own mouth to say anything he wouldn’t be able to control what came out.

He made it to the car. He got in the car. Pete said a few words to the driver that Vegas didn’t hear and got in on the other side, scooting over to be next to him even if it meant his legs were a little cramped. 

“Are you okay,” Pete said, voice level and calm, so fucking calm. This car was too small to hold everything inside him right now. He felt like a bomb about to go off. Three fatalities, no survivors, he thought wildly. “Vegas,” Pete said. “Can you look at me?” 

“Not now,” Vegas said, somehow managing to talk without the threads holding him together snapping. (post canon vegaspete long(er) fic)

5. Tuor said nothing. Idril turned away, dashing a hand across her face. 

“I don’t want to grieve for him,” she said, a mixture of anguish and anger. Tuor felt an odd pang in his chest and looked back over his shoulder. He thought of the hollowness he’d seen these past months. He’d tried again to make overtures, pity stirring his heart, but if Maeglin no longer seemed to hate him it was only because he no longer seemed to feel anything at all. 

It was doubtful Maeglin would thank him. But Idril didn’t want to grieve, and despite what he’d done Tuor’s pity was a stubborn thing.

“Go,” he said. “I’ll be right behind you.” (time for all the works and days of hands)

6. You’re fucked up, he thought, washing his hands. You’re so fucked up. Get it together.

The thing was, Pete had started to wonder if there was a together to get, or if this was just what he was like, now. No going back, no fixing it. Vegas had ruined him for good. 

Pete wondered if he knew that. Or maybe if, with Pete not right in front of him, he’d already forgotten about all of it, and it was just Pete who couldn’t stop circling around and around, trapped like an animal in a cage.

A hedgehog, maybe, he thought in the shower, and started laughing until his stomach hurt. (jiggety-jig)

7. Discussing a night hunt with Xue Yang was…strange. There was the unsurprising part: the continual need to remind him to consider the safety of other people.

(“Why?” he asked bluntly. “There’s no such thing as harmless innocents anyway, and these people are playing with something bloody and nasty.”

“We don’t know that all of them are involved or even aware,” Song Lan said. “Until proven otherwise, I will consider them all potentially in need of my protection.” Something ugly flashed briefly in Xue Yang’s eyes, but it was swiftly masked behind an edged grin.

“Seems stupid to me,” Xue Yang said, “but fine.”) (Walking Far From Home)

8. Song Lan gritted his teeth and forced out, *he’s not well.* What are you thinking, screamed his common sense again. Are you really going to make some kind of bargain with this creature, this demon, this dead thing–

He could almost hear in Xue Yang’s voice: dead things shouldn’t throw stones, Zichen. He could see Xue Yang breathing hard. He didn’t breathe now, or didn’t need to except by habit and the comfort of others. 

“What the fuck’s that mean,” Xue Yang said, but at least now he sounded more wary than furious. 

*I mean he’s–* Song Lan reined in his frustration. *He’s not well. He’s unhappy. He barely eats, he barely sleeps.*

Xue Yang stared at him in silence for long enough that Song Lan almost asked if he’d heard him. Then he said, “how the fuck did you mess this up again?” 

Song Lan jerked. Before he could object (can you object? You have failed him), Xue Yang ws speaking again. “I set up everything for you, Song-daozhang, I made sure he was alive again and I gave him back the stupid brat too, and you, made sure he’d see the important stuff fixed when he woke up. You just had to step up and be the fucking friend he thought you were, I figured maybe you’d’ve learned from your mistakes but I guess not!” 

*This isn’t my fault!* Song Lan said, anger rising at the sheer monstrous unfairness of that accusation. *You’re the one who wounded him so badly that he–*

“Shut up!” Xue Yang said, his voice rising to a scream. “Shut the fuck up, you don’t know anything, you don’t–” 

Wei Wuxian whistled two sharp notes and Xue Yang’s voice cut off like his vocal cords had been severed. (Life After Death)

9. But right now Sha Hualing was where she wasn’t supposed to be, deep in Cang Qiong Peak territory where Junshang…strongly discouraged demons from going. It wasn’t her fault that this was the only place she knew of this side of the Endless Abyss where you could find the Silver-Spinning Spider-Beetle, which happened to be an essential ingredient in a poison she was making to – it didn’t matter, it was important. Liu Mingyan seemed surprised, which suggested that she hadn’t actually been looking for her. Unfortunately, Sha Hualing was rapidly losing the advantage of that surprise by standing staring back at her like an idiot. 

“Saintess?” Liu Mingyan said, like she didn’t quite believe her eyes. Sha Hualing smiled. 

“Look who it is,” she said. “Mingyan-niangzi. What an honor.” 

Liu Mingyan’s eyes narrowed and she drew herself up to her full height – unfortunately a head and some over Sha Hualing’s own. She set her hand to the hilt of her sword. “You shouldn’t be here.” 

Sha Hualing batted her eyelashes, still smiling. “Why would you say that?” she said. “I’m just taking a walk in this beautiful place, enjoying the fresh air. Is that so wrong?” Her eyes darted around, scanning for what she could use if Liu Mingyan decided to attack her. And she would wait for Liu Mingyan to do it first, because then she could tell Junshang honestly that she’d just been defending herself, so maybe he should talk to his sect siblings about their behavior, how about that.

(Junshang’s relationship with Cang Qiong was peculiar and incomprehensible but he had been clear about the consequences of causing its members unprovoked harm.) (under pressure)

10. Wherever he was, it was dark, no light filtering through the black hood over his head. The cuffs holding his hands behind his back would be pickable if he had anything to do it with, but even if he could get out of those there was the hobbling on his ankles he’d have to deal with. The ground under him – no chair, that felt rude too – felt like concrete, which told him nothing.

They’d taken his shoes, which for some reason was bothering him more than anything else right now.

Fuck. Pete was probably losing his mind. 

He thought about calling out, but whoever was playing games was probably trying to get to him by leaving him on his own, isolated and disoriented. Sitting up was hard but felt worth the effort and the pain rather than being curled in a heap on the floor. 

If he was lucky, this was a dumb attempt at getting a ransom out of his family. Vegas doubted his uncle or Kinn would spend one baht coin on bringing him back; Kinn would probably at least be tempted to pay Vegas’s kidnappers to get rid of him. Or maybe they’d see it as an opportunity – let these people kill him and then take the excuse as a chance to cut down a potential threat. (All's Fair)

11. For the next couple days almost all of Vegas’s attention went to Pete. He knew he was fussing and he also couldn’t help it. Pete was mostly out of it enough not to get fidgety. Macau’s teasing was half-hearted, which said more than Vegas liked about how shaken up he was. 

Porsche came around to visit. Of course Porsche came around to visit. Vegas thought he was going to crack a molar when he opened the door. 

“Still mad, huh,” Porsche said, sounding more rueful than anything else. 

“Yes,” Vegas said. “You could say that. What do you want?” 

“Just checking on my friend,” Porsche said. “See how he’s doing, say hi–” 

“He’s fine,” Vegas said. “Resting. You can go.” (Undercut)

12. World reduced to four featureless walls and a door as formidable a barrier as the Theodosian Walls, Francis Crawford of Lymond sat, seemingly poised in still and focused contemplation, the impression spoiled only by the sheen of sweat on the back of his neck. Otherwise he showed no sign of weakness or faltering; when he eventually slept it was lightly. 

It might have been morning or afternoon - there was little light to tell by - when the gate opened. 

“Archangel Gabriel,” Lymond said. “Forgive me if I don’t rise at your coming.” 

“Pain makes you snide,” Gabriel said. “But I would rather you not strain yourself anyways, my dear.” There was a towel over his arm and he carried a bowl and a pitcher of water. “Are you hungry?” (et ipsi sunt jacula)

[banooky]

very quick, very brief, post because as much as i love song analysis i haven’t actually torn the lyrics apart to have enough content for a proper analysis like i normally would. however comma!! shameless (camila cabello) as a twifury/vivikou song. very brief rundown of why (if i am yelled at enough i will make a long version and/or do more of these for other ships and fandoms)

the first verse, if you don’t know (maybe not everyone has heard the song but i gotchu), goes like this:

the first verse mostly makes me think of vivia, as we had… literally no fuckin clue what vivia’s deal is until chapter 4. but we find out after the mystery labyrinth that vivia knew a lot about everyone else because he was just,, super casually using spectral projection to peek at everyone the entire time. (kinda hilarious.) yuma makes a comment to shinigami about how vivia seems to, at minimum, hold yakou in high regard, especially about how vivia spilled the tea on yakou’s personal life story basically kjjkwke… it really feels like vivia kept things a secret for yakou’s sake, (how fruity), cause “i didnt know what he was reading” is honestly bullshit once you think of how spectral projection works. vivia dont lie, you peeked over yakou’s shoulder then blew on his ear so it would tickle. fruitcake

and now verse 2, obviously, makes me think of yakou a bit more! knowing his history; former self-proclaimed lady’s man, NOT a master detective (just some dude), and - brief chapter 4 spoiler - a widow, his confidence is, well… kinda no better than a fart in the wind, is probably what the blue goofball would say. he would definitely see vivia as out of his league! never married, mysterious, entrancing, and definitely able to read yakou like a book. i could absolutely say yakou was uncomfortable the first time they were together, in a good way, and might’ve even had sleepless nights after that. but he misses his wife, of course (we all cried during chapter 4 don’t lie to me), and it would definitely be the only thing making him hesitate pursuing vivia. you can’t convince me yakou cares about workplace professionalism

this brings me to the chorus, which i will also connect a bit more to yakou - i’m gonna put a cut here to protect my friend from full-on chapter 4 spoilers muahahaha

so: vivia thrives on self-indulgence and likely would accept any and all of yakou’s advances. on the other hand, even though it has been 4 years, part of yakou still wants to be tethered down by the vows he made to his wife - and he feels like he owes some form of revenge on dr. huesca to her. but, maybe she fades from his mind (never his heart, obviously); and he starts seeing vivia’s hauntingly beautiful smile when he closes his eyes. he doesn’t want to let his wife go, but something inside of yakou stirs when he makes eye contact with vivia. and, maybe in a happy ending au AGGRESSIVE COUGHING he finally gives in and puts all his energy into protecting vivia instead.

i’d love to see yakou fly into a furious rage if he ever found out yomi hit vivia with that whip-cane-thingy!

feel free to share thoughts :)

[bubblegumnebulaa]

so um i wasn’t tagged but i saw everyone doing this and i wanted to do it too :3 i’ve never really shared my ocs before but here are some of them:

deputy cheyenne rook (far cry 5)

sydney aguilar (far cry 5)

captain jade mercer (far cry new dawn)

lydia (far cry new dawn)

cleo boshaw (far cry new dawn) ((YEs))

valaina lavellan (dragon age: inquisition)

kat o’connel (fallout 3)

sam mattley (fallout: new vegas)

odessia (the witcher)

elissa faust (attack on titan)

all made using this wonderful picrew: https://picrew.me/image_maker/257476

tagging a few mutuals: @rose-owl @lady-varren @dorminchu @ec-10 @isabellamarria @rinavasqwibqwib @captainlavellan @melodious-stars and anyone else who wants to do it (:

[fireinmoonshot]

CONTAINS SPOILER FOR ETERNALS.

PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE | PART FOUR Summary: In 1521, the Eternals disbanded and Druig left you despite the lengthy past you'd both shared. Now, you're forced back together by the Emergence, but after 500 years apart, neither of you are quite the same as you were. But a love like the one you shared hundreds of years ago never quite goes away. Pairing: Druig x Fem! Reader (slight enemies to lovers) Fandom: Marvel's Eternals Warnings: ETERNALS SPOILERS, mentions of injuries, mentions of death and implied smut (though there is nothing explicit, it's just a spicy scene and a line that implies a bit more). Word Count: 12,176 A/N: Hahahah, this is longer than part two and it's an accident... get comfy. Anyway, thank you for your patience in waiting for this third part! It took a little longer than I would have liked it to have taken, but I'm proud of how it's turned out. I believe that part four will be the final part, and I will try to have that up by the end of the year depending on how life goes! Thank you all for your lovely response on it so far and I can't wait to share these last two parts with you all! <3

JAPAN, 1002 AD

“I want to come back here with you when the world changes,” you smile, swinging Druig’s hand in your own as you wander down the path covered with cherry blossom trees. “I want to see these trees with you every decade for the rest of our lives.”

The falling petals look almost like snow as the breeze blows them through the air, beautiful and pink, swirling through the air. It looks magical. This is certainly the most beautiful place that you’ve ever visited on earth. It’s calming and comforting and walking through the countryside with Druig by your side almost feels like home.

You’ve spent so long on earth and never really felt at home anywhere except by Druig’s side. The Domo has always been your base, and you’ve visited hundreds of beautiful countries, but none of them have captured you as much as Japan does.

Druig smiles down at you, laughing a little to himself as a petal falls on the top of your head. It only stays there for a moment, the breeze soon carrying it away with the rest of the petals in the air. He loves seeing you so happy. If he could keep this one moment in his heart forever, he would do so without hesitation.

“We can come back here whenever you want, my love,” he says.

You look up at him, eyes glimmering in the sunlight and a smile on your lips. “Remember years ago in Crete, when we talked about living somewhere together? This might be the place, don’t you think? There are some mountains in the distance over there that would be perfect for our mountain home. And we could come see the cherry blossoms every time they bloom and relive this moment every time we see them.”

He finds himself liking that idea very much. He gives your hand a squeeze. “As soon as all of those blasted Deviants are dead, I’m whisking you away from the others and building that mountain home for you.”

You snort, the imagery of him whisking you away to a home in the mountains a particularly funny one. It makes you think of Ikaris’ powers – Druig, flying, picking you up the second the last Deviant is dead and flying you far away from the others without so much as a goodbye. You know he means it much less literally, especially considering he can’t actually fly, but it’s a funny thought nonetheless.

Druig looks at you. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” you grin. “I just imagined you whisking me away.”

“Oh?” His eyes get a cheeky glimmer in them and before you can so much as question what the look means, Druig leans down and sweeps your legs out from underneath you, picking you up off the ground and quite literally whisking you off your feet.

You laugh, arms going around his neck to hold on as he spins you in a circle. The feeling is euphoric and you don’t know if you’ve ever been this happy in your life. If you even deserve such happiness. Though, you know better than to take it for granted.

Druig, smiling larger than you’ve ever seen him smile, spins you around one more time before setting you back down on the ground, his hands resting on your hips, yours still hooked behind his neck. You’re still laughing, resting the top of your head against his chest as you try and catch your breath.

“I didn’t mean you had to whisk me away right now,” you smile.

“How could I ignore the opportunity to sweep you off of your feet?” Druig replies, a smirk on his lips and a twinkle in his eyes. You can see just by looking in them that he’s happy.

You lean up and kiss his lips gently, intending on pulling away after a second, but Druig is quick to stop you from doing that, one of his hands moving to the back of your neck to pull your lips back to his. He kisses you until you’re breathless.

“You didn’t have to take my breath away, either,” you mutter.

Druig can’t help but laugh. “Sorry,” he hums. “But I can’t promise I won’t do it again.”

~~~

AMAZON, PRESENT DAY

The silence after the fight with the Deviants ends is uncomfortable. Thena leans over Gilgamesh’s body, sobs wracking her body, while the others all stand and look on, unsure what they can do – if anything. You, Druig notes, are knelt on the ground by Thena, staring down at the leaves. Your eyes are unfocused and the way your body is swaying makes you seem dizzy.

And Gilgamesh… is dead.

Ikaris steps forward to help you up, wrapping an arm around your shoulder and holding your hand to pull you from the ground and lead you away from the others after the silence settles.

The others all follow behind you, taking the movement as a sign to leave and let Thena mourn alone without being watched before they have to take his body away.

As he walks a few steps behind you, Druig watches the way Ikaris holds you, how he has his arm wrapped around you, the way you lean into his side. He feels the intense desire to walk up to you, push Ikaris out of the way and take you himself, though he knows how much you’d hate it if he were to do that.

Instead, he stays back and surveys the damage of the very much destroyed village. His work, years of hard work, destroyed in minutes by the very things he’d stupidly thought were gone. If he’d known things would end like this, that all his years of building this community would be shattered so soon, would he have ever left? Druig doesn’t have an answer.

Ikaris takes you over to one of the only remaining verandahs and sits you down, leaning against the pole since your whole body feels heavy and tired. You suppose it has something to do with the fact that you were thrown into a building, though you know that isn’t the entire reason. The others don’t need to know why.

“I’ll go find some water and bring it back, okay?” Ikaris leans down to look you in the eyes, wanting to make sure that you heard him. When you nod, he walks away, finally leaving you to yourself.

You lean your head against the pole and close your eyes. You feel a bit faint and the feeling isn’t unfamiliar to you, though it’s been years since you’ve felt this way. You’d taught yourself to cope with it, to deal with the overwhelming feelings in your mind when you used your power, but Gilgamesh’s death combined with using your powers for the first time in so long has clearly taken its toll.

Ikaris returns a few minutes later with a jug and a cup full of water. He sets the jug down just beside you and pours the water into the cup, handing it to you and watching as you take a long sip. The feeling of the water wakes you up just a little.

“Thank you,” you mutter. “I’ll be okay if you want to go and help prepare for the funeral. You don’t need to watch me, I promise.”

Your words, unsurprisingly, aren’t very comforting to Ikaris, though he doesn’t argue with you on them and agrees to leave you alone and go and help with the preparations for the funeral, along with all of the other Eternals who are already starting to get ready.

You watch as he goes and once he becomes nothing but a pinprick in the distance, you take another long sip of water and rest your head against the pole again. This was not how you’d expected or hoped for your week to go…

~~~

Druig watches you from afar. You’re still sat leant up against the pole on the verandah where Ikaris had left you a few hours ago and you haven’t moved since. The others have all come to check on you every now and then as they prepare for Gilgamesh’s funeral, but since you’ve been in and out of sleep, they haven’t had to check in very much. He’s been helping, too, gathering supplies, but mostly, he’s been watching you.

He’s seen this before. There was only one time that you’d used your powers to this extent, and it had been a long time ago. He’d gotten mad at you after it had happened and you’d swore that you’d never let them overwhelm you again. The others hadn’t seen how it’d affected you, then, though. It was clear that they all thought you were in mourning like Thena now, knowing how close you were.

Once Ikaris, the last one hanging around the village, finally starts to make his way down to the river to finish preparing for the funeral, Druig makes his way over to you. You don’t look up at him when he sits down beside you and if he didn’t know better he’d think you were asleep, though he can tell you’re not anymore.

He nudges your shoulder gently. “You coming to the funeral?”

You force yourself to lift your head, eyes struggling to focus as you open them. Everything looks blurry, even Druig beside you, who you briefly glance at. You want to tell him to go to the funeral without you, to just leave you alone while you wait to feel better. But there’s still a certain level of comfort in his presence that only he has ever been able to bring you, even after all this time, and you don’t want to give it up just yet.

“I should,” you reply. “But I don’t know if I can.”

The exhaustion this time is worse than it had been last time. You suppose it has something to do with the fact that you felt Gilgamesh dying. Your whole body is aching and your head feels like it’s being squeezed, and even though you heal quicker as an Eternal, you feel a little worse now than you did hours ago.

“Because you used your power to sense us,” Druig finishes your sentence for you. He looks across at you, worry in his eyes, though you can’t see it since you’ve chosen to look away from him. “Thought we had that conversation eight hundred years ago…”

You smile a little. For a moment, things actually feel normal.

“I haven’t used them in about three hundred years,” you start to explain, “but I was so worried today that I made a split second decision and used them.” You knot your hands together in your lap. “I’ve never… I’ve never felt anyone die before, though. 7000 years and that feeling is new.”

Druig’s eyes darken. “You what?”

“I passed out because of my powers, and when I woke up I could feel him dying. Gilgamesh. I think that’s why it’s taking the exhaustion so long to disappear. I was sensing what he was feeling when he was dying, and now there’s a part of my mind that’s numb.”

He stands, moving to stand in front of you so you have no choice but to look at him. He meets your eyes and the look on his face is one that surprises you. It’s protective. It’s a look you haven’t seen in years, since even before you’d split up.

He wants to be mad at you. To tell you about how stupid you were, how irresponsible, how you risked not only your own life but everyone else’s lives since you’d used your powers and passed out because of it. He wants to do all those things, but he can’t.

“You could have gotten really hurt,” he says instead. “Why the hell would you do that?”

You scoff. “Would you care, Druig, if I had? Please don’t feign worry for me.”

He takes you off guard by reaching down and taking your face in his hands. The feeling of his skin on yours is one that knocks you right back in time. Suddenly it’s like you’re back in the 1300s, looking into Druig’s eyes and feeling so utterly consumed by love. But then he speaks and pulls you right back into the present.

“The days of pretending I wasn’t worried about are long gone, and they have been for a while. And never once have I ever pretended to worry about you,” he says. “Do you think that lowly of me?”

Looking into his eyes, you want to say yes. You want to tell him that you do think lowly of him because of what he did, how he left… but you can’t lie to him. You have never been able to lie to him.

“No, I don’t.” Your words are quiet.

It feels like the world stops as he looks at you. His hands are still on your cheeks, his eyes still boring into yours, the blue of them as familiar as ever. Still as bright and beautiful as they had been when you’d stare into them years ago. You feel more awake than ever, the exhaustion now in the back of your mind simply because of the feeling of his skin touching yours.

Then, he lets go and the exhaustion returns.

You want to ask him why he let go. Why he stopped holding your face and staring into your eyes like he was seeing your soul. But you can’t because he’s stepping away and moving to sit back down beside you like nothing ever happened.

“Don’t risk your life again,” he says. “We’ve already lost too much today.” He waits a few moments before standing again and offering a hand to you. “Do you need help to get down to the river, or can you make it yourself? You should be at the funeral.”

You look at his hand, though you can’t bring yourself to put your hand in his, even though you want to. It stays firmly in your lap, and Druig takes that as his answer. He nods to himself and then takes a step away from you.

He can’t blame you for not wanting to hold his hand.

~~~

Despite the fact that the funeral service was put together so quickly, it’s beautiful. The smoke rising from the fire, the reflection of the red on the river and the stars in the sky above you are the perfect send off for Gilgamesh.

You stand beside Thena, an arm around each other, both of you holding each other together, as Karun recites a prayer in his honour.

It’s a beautiful funeral, but it’s tainted with the pain of the loss, still so raw and fresh, only a few hours old. How you’d gone so long without losing any of you, only to lose two in the space of a week… you were finally feeling the loss that so many humans you knew spoke of. That so many of the humans you cared for had felt in their short lives.

You all stand there until the fire burns out and the sun starts to rise. The flames turned to nothing but a dull flickering at the bottom of the pit.

The exhaustion from your powers has gotten a little better, though you can still tell you’re not completely fine. Kingo takes Thena’s place, an arm around you, to lead you back to the village as Thena collects Gilgamesh’s ashes to take them into the water.

A part of you wants to wait and watch, but you know that the moment should be a relatively private one for her – that and you don’t know how much longer your feet will allow you to stand.

Druig and Sersi stay behind. He notices you leaving with Kingo and trusts that Kingo will help you and ensure you rest once you’re back at the village. He likes the man, even if he gets on his nerves on occasion.

He watches Thena, then, standing in the water, holding the urn of Gilgamesh’s ashes, preparing to say goodbye to the love of her life. Druig can only hope that he never has to do that with you. That even if he’s not always with you, that you will always be there in some capacity. Alive.

Sersi appears beside him.

“When I left,” he starts, “I thought about taking over the minds of every human on this planet. Violence, fear, greed, all gone.”

“Why didn’t you?” She asks.

“Because without their flaws, they wouldn’t be human.”

He’s learnt that over the years. He learnt that through you. Seeing the way you spoke to the humans, the way you cared for them and trusted in them, even when he knew they could be better. Losing you – leaving you – was one of the things that made him wake up. To understand that their flaws made them.

Sersi hesitates. She knows what they have to lose now, more than ever. “Please, Druig. You can’t stay here anymore. These Deviants are trying to keep us from killing their own kind. They have a conscience now. That makes them more dangerous.”

“Oh, Sersi,” he turns to look at her. “That makes them us. Eternals and Deviants, Arishem’s children… I’ve learnt a lot over the last few hours, but that especially.”

She looks at him. “We work better together. We’ve always known that. And she…” Sersi looks towards where you had walked away with Kingo, though you were long gone now. “She works better with you. You always worked better together, even if you didn’t really know it. We need you.”

Druig pauses, watching Thena as she lifts the lid off of the top of the urn. Her words are right. He did work better with you last time you’d fought them. He lived off of the adrenaline, when you weren’t taking risks, of course. But things have changed now, haven’t they? “She wants nothing to do with me anymore, Sersi,” he replies. “That’s the past.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Sersi shakes her head. “The past and the present, they’re all the same. What’s different now is the future. What we’re fighting for. You care for humans now – I can see it in your eyes. There’s more on the line now than just a few lives.”

He sighs. He can see where she’s coming from, even if he dislikes it. “You are asking me to take control of the mind of a Celestial. I do not have that kind of power.”

“We’ll need Phastos.”

Thena starts to pour Gilgamesh’s ashes into the water.

“Well, good luck. He gave up on humans a long time ago.”

~~~

PORTUGAL, 1232 AD

You can practically hear Druig’s voice in your mind as you focus in on your powers and concentrate on everyone else's feelings around you. Reckless. Irresponsible. Downright stupid. You’re all of those things right now and you know it – but you do it anyway.

Thena lets out a war cry as she is launched by Gilgamesh onto the head of the Deviant, stabbing it through the neck with her sword. It doesn’t do much other than to make it angrier, though, and Gilgamesh is quick to catch her when it knocks her straight off.

You can feel the way that the fall knocks the wind out of her.

It’s been over 6000 years since your arrival on Earth and you’ve never once used these powers in a fight before, only using them on rare occasions during parties or on a boring night in the Domo when everyone was feeling a little curious and wanted to see if you could correctly tell what they were feeling at that moment.

It becomes clear to you pretty quickly why you’ve never done this before.

You step back and brace yourself against a tree, taking a long deep breath and closing your eyes, trying not to focus on all of the rage and fighting spirit inside of you as you feel the other Eternals emotions. It’s overwhelming, but not in a bad way. Not when everyone is feeling the same thing as you are.

“Hey, what are you doing?” Kingo yells out to you as he runs past.

“I’m taking a breather!” You yell back, starting to jog after him.

A flash of worry from Sersi.

Now, that’s not the feeling that you need in your head right now, that you need to be feeling too. You frown and try and focus in on Gilgamesh and Thena, the rage and anger they feel as they continue to fight, Gilgamesh throwing a powerful punch to its head.

You’ve got this. Controlling your powers in a fight isn’t as hard as you’d expected.

You run up towards the Deviant and throw your knife towards it as you do. It makes impact right under its eye and it screeches and flinches backwards. Thena takes that as her chance to attack, slicing straight through its throat when it’s distracted and quickly separating its head from its body.

Kingo stops running and starts cheering, throwing his hands up in the air. As the other Eternals all join you at the conclusion of the fight thanks to you and Thena, you suddenly feel more emotions than just the two you’d felt before.

Joy. Relief. Anger. Pain. Happiness. Disappointment.

Your head feels tight, like someone is squeezing it, and you stop on the spot and wince, your hand going up to rub your forehead. You can stop using your power now, and you open your other palm, trying to force yourself to will the power from you like you can usually do… but nothing is going. The others all celebrate and you feel dizzy.

Druig is the last one to join you and the first one to notice that something is wrong. You’re swaying on the spot, your hand rubbing rather aggressively against your forehead, eyes squeezed closed. It’s a drastic difference from the way the others are acting.

He’s by your side in seconds, a hand going to your shoulder.

“Hey, you okay? Did you get hurt?”

“No,” your voice is quiet. “But my head hurts. I can’t make it stop.”

The way your voice sounds hurts him. You sound like you’re in pain, and he doesn’t even know how you’re hurt so that he can help you. The others don’t notice as he wraps an arm around your shoulders and walks you away from the others to behind a small empty house.

He sits you down on a seat against the wall and kneels in front of you, hands resting on your knees as he looks up at you. You haven’t opened your eyes once since he moved you.

“Does it still hurt?” He asks.

“Yes,” you breathe. “Can you make it stop?”

Tears start to leak from your eyes without you meaning for them to, and that’s the final straw for Druig. He stands a little, hands moving to cup your cheeks and hold your head steady as he tries to use his powers on you. But your shield is still too strong for him and he can’t even get into your mind, even when you’re like this.

He curses under his breath. “My love, I’m going to need you to make it stop. You can do that, can’t you? If you just listen to me, I’ll make the pain go away. It’ll go away.”

You start to rub your forehead again and nod once at him.

“Okay, focus on my voice,” he starts. “Do you remember Japan? When we said we were going to build a mountain home there. The cherry blossom petals were falling down on us like snow and you had this beautiful smile on your face when I was spinning you around. It was just you and me then, like it is now. You and me, your mind and my mind. It’s always just been you and me here, hasn’t it?”

Upon hearing Druig’s words, focusing on his voice and trying to pull vision of the memories he mentions into your mind, some of the other feelings start to fade away. Sersi’s relief disappears, and Ikaris’ disappointment upon him not being the one to kill the Deviant goes, too.

Druig’s voice, his words, are working.

“Keep going,” you mutter after he briefly stops speaking.

“What about Crete in the 700s? It was a beautiful rainy day and we were walking and we could just smell the rain on the dirt. The way it was falling on our heads and shoulders. And we didn’t care because it was just the two of us. Because it was you and me.”

Kingo’s joy and Gilgamesh’s anger leave your mind and slowly the squeezing around your head starts to lessen a little. Druig keeps speaking, talking about the other times it was just the two of you – like London in 1121 AD, when you’d wandered the streets together in the middle of the night or Egypt in 680 AD where you’d kissed under the stars.

You lose Makkari’s happiness and Thena’s pain and your own emotions come back to you, though you feel like you’ve been run through the dirt and thrown around like a doll. Your head falls back against the wall and you feel a little like you’re going to pass out.

“My love?” Druig places a hand over your forehead to check your temperature. You’re warm, but not so warm that it’s alarming to him. “Can you tell me how you feel?”

“Empty,” you manage. “I’m never using my powers like that again.”

Druig frowns. “Your powers?”

You hum, eyes still closed as you rest against the wall. “I wanted to see what it’d be like to use them in a fight, and it was fine until everyone was feeling all of these different things around me when we killed the Deviant. I felt like my head would explode.”

This has never happened before and he knows it. He knows how you’re usually relatively careful about your powers, even if you’re not careful about anything else, and now he feels angry at you for being reckless and using them in such a pivotal moment.

“You can’t do that again,” Druig says, moving to kneel in front of you again. He doesn’t care that you aren’t looking at him, that you can’t, because he knows you’re still listening to him. “Not until you learn how to control them in those moments, at least, because you really could have hurt yourself, and I don’t want to have to see you get hurt anymore.”

You nod once and open one eye to look down at him. He looks worried, which you find a little bit cute, and you smile a little at the sight.

Druig raises his eyebrows. “Why are you smiling?”

“Can’t I smile?” You ask. “You’re worried about me and it’s cute.”

He scoffs. “Yeah, I’m worried about you. How can I not be worried about you?” He shakes his head and stands up only to sit on the chair beside you, even though there’s barely enough room left for him. “You scared the hell out of me back there. You should be apologising, not smiling at me.”

You don’t care and continue to smile, even as you move your head to rest on his shoulder, since it’s much more comfortable than a stone wall. Druig tenses as your head hits his shoulder, knowing now that he can’t move until you choose to do so first.

“I think I’m going to fall asleep now,” you admit. “Feeling all of those emotions was enough to exhaust me for the next two hundred years.”

“Okay,” Druig replies. “Sleep on me for as long as you want to, my love.”

~~~

AMAZON, PRESENT DAY

It was decided that it would best if you didn’t all go to see Phastos, knowing that all of you showing up to his family home would have been quite the entrance and probably wouldn’t bring the attention that he wanted to bring to his family.

So, while Sersi and Ikaris left for Chicago, you all stayed in Druig’s village to wait.

Sprite, annoyed that she had been left behind, had decided to spend the time wandering amongst the trees. Kingo and Karun had decided to conduct interviews with any willing Eternals (which had ended up being none of you), Druig had started to try and clean up what remained of the village after sending his people off elsewhere and Thena had settled down by the river alone.

You, on the other hand, decide to focus on recovering after the day that yesterday had been, finding a pillow and a blanket and sleeping for several hours before Kingo accidentally wakes you up by kicking a chair on the other side of the room. You startle awake, knocking the pillow off of the edge of the couch and let out a sigh as you spot Kingo.

He’s stopped mid-step, foot still hanging in the air right in front of the chair.

“Sorry,” he whispers, as if you’re still asleep. “That was an accident.”

Frowning, you sit up and rub your eyes. You had to have been sleeping for a while now and yet you’ve woken up still feeling tired, though some of the exhaustion had gone, and the pain that you’d been feeling from being thrown into the building was less noticeable now – your quick healing abilities finally kicking in.

“How long have I been asleep for?” You ask.

Kingo looks down at his watch. “I think it’s been like fourteen hours or something. Karun thought you were dead when we came in here earlier.” He held up a notepad in his hand. “I left this in here and I needed to get it, but Druig kicked us out because you were asleep.”

“Druig?”

“Yeah,” he nods. “He went to get something so I snuck in while I had the chance.”

You stifle a yawn and kick your legs off of the couch, pulling the blanket off of you. Fourteen hours. That was longer than you’d expected, though you suppose you needed it. You could probably still sleep, too, but you figure it’s probably better to see how you feel after getting up and walking around for a little before going back to rest.

There are still several hours here before you leave for Iraq to meet up with Sersi, Ikaris and Phastos and get the whole team back together – assuming Phastos decides to join you – so you stand up and wipe some of the sleep from your eyes. Some fresh air will do you some good, and a glass of water would do you some good, too.

Kingo leaves ahead of you, wanting to sneak out before Druig returns, and after you wake yourself up a little, you follow him, crossing your arms as you stand on the verandah and look out at the village. It’s the middle of the afternoon by the looks of it, by the way the sun is shining down through the gaps in the trees. It would nearly be beautiful if the houses across from you weren’t completely in ruins.

You settle down on a chair on the verandah, crossing your legs and resting your head against the back of the chair as you look out at the village. You can see Kingo and Karun in the distance, looking at something on one of their many cameras. The others are all out of sight, all off doing their own things and waiting for the time to leave.

“You’re awake.”

Druig is standing on the other end of the verandah holding a cup of water.

“You scared Kingo and Karun off from coming in earlier.”

He smiles a little and walks towards you, holding out the glass of water for you. “They would have woken you up, and you seemed like you needed the sleep. Don’t worry. I didn’t tell any of them what happened with your powers.”

For a moment, things feel like normal again. The way Druig is standing in front of you, looking at you. The way he’d brought you water and watched over you while you slept to make sure that no one interrupted you. It was a small thing, but it was also a sweet thing. The kind of thing you do for someone that you care about.

You stand, taking a sip of the water, and offer the chair to him.

“I’m going to walk around for a little while. Thank you for the water.”

Druig watches as you leave, refusing to sit down on the chair you’d just vacated. He’d been right when he’d told Sersi that you wanted nothing to do with him now. She’d said that the past and present were the same, that what really mattered now was the future, but Druig isn’t so sure. For the two of you, at least, the past and present are drastically different because of how he’d left your relationship in 1521. He can’t change the past… and so the present stays the same.

~~~

THE DOMO, PRESENT DAY

Phastos is not particularly happy when he sees what Makkari has done to his lab, but in no time all of you are combing throughout all of the many things she has inside and finding pieces of history amongst them. Thena finds Excalibur, Druig finds a box of Twinkie’s and trades them with Ikaris for an emerald tablet. Kingo explains everything to Makkari and Phastos gets started on figuring out how to put Tiamut to sleep. You wander around the room, picking up various books.

You feel better now, at least. Your exhaustion has mostly gone, though you can still feel a twinge of it in the back of your mind if you think too much. You feel like yourself again, the feeling of Gilgamesh’s death only a memory now. The travel to Iraq, being all together as a family again, has something to do with that, you assume.

Soon after, everyone gathers around the room to see what Phastos has created. You lean up against a desk beside Sersi and look up at the several round objects above you.

“Bracelets?” Kingo is unimpressed.” You made us bracelets?”

“So, here’s a little Celestial 101. Celestials are the most powerful energy generators in the universe. When Arishem made us, he imbued us with infinite cosmic energy to keep our lives regenerating. The bracelets, in theory, shut down our regeneration process. Once that happens, our bodies accumulate extra cosmic energy,” Phastos begins to explain.

“What for?” Sersi asks.

“Well, if the Deviants can absorb our energy, what if we can absorb each others energy as well? If I can find a way to connect us all, one of us could become immensely powerful. Pulling the accumulated energy from the rest, forming…” He waves his hand and the image above him changes into something resembling a brain, “a unimind.”

Silence falls over the room, none of you saying anything despite the fact that Phastos seems quite proud of the name. Personally, you don’t think the name is too bad. The idea, however, isn’t one you feel particularly comfortable with. But you have no choice.

“Uni meaning one, mind meaning mind.”

“Oh, no we heard you the first time,” Kingo replies.

“Terrible name.” Sprite.

“Brainstorm. Brainstorm! That’s a way better name!”

“No, I invented it so I’m calling it whatever I want,” Phastos seems irritated by everyone shitting on the name and it makes you smile to yourself a little. It’s almost like the world isn’t about to be destroyed considering how comfortable things feel.

Makkari interrupts them. “So, suppose Druig can put Tiamut to sleep… what then?” It’s a reasonable question, and an important one considering the lack of time you all have.

“We find humans a new home on another planet,” Sersi says.

“Are we building a big ship, too? Take a pair of each animal?”

“You know what’s never saved the planet? Your sarcasm.”

“Space colonisation could take decades.”

“It could happen quickly with our help.”

“What if we accidentally end up killing Tiamut?” Kingo changes the subject. “We could be responsible for billions of lives not being created across the universe. Boss, am I right?” The atmosphere in the room changes in an instant and your smile fades from your face. You look down at your hands and fiddle with the rings on your fingers.

“Say something, Ikaris,” Sprite pushes. “You don’t think we should be doing this.”

Everyone looks at him. Even though Sersi is your leader now that Ajak is gone… everyone still looks to Ikaris for decisions. You suppose that it comes along with being the most powerful. He surprises you by choosing not to answer for her, though.

“Ajak chose Sersi to lead us. Sersi should decide.”

“Forget who Ajak chose. You’re the strongest. You should be making this decision.” Sprite sounds irritated. “Fine. Just keep lying to yourself.”

She walks out of the room and it feels more tense than ever.

“Sprite…”

Ikaris looks around the room at the rest of you before following her out, leaving the rest of you feeling awkward and uncomfortable.

“Okay, this is not–” Phastos tries.

“Ikaris.”

“Don’t run after him, Kingo, I– you guys…”

The rest of you sit in silence for a few moments after the others leave. You cross your arms over your chest and look around at the others. Druig is already looking at you and Sersi looks conflicted.

“I thought we’d already all come to the conclusion that we have to do this together,” you shake your head and stand up, wandering away from the rest of them. There’s one thing that’s bothering you, apart from Ikaris. “Phastos. This uni-mind thing…”

“Yeah?” He seems glad to have an actual question.

You turn to face him, looking up at the uni-mind above him. “Will we all be able to feel each others feelings when we use it? Like I can do with my powers?” You’re not telling him everything, but he doesn’t need to know everything. He doesn’t need to know that you’re scared that you’ll feel too much again. That you’re scared of feeling someone die.

Druig looks up at your question, looking between you and Phastos, intrigued.

Phastos shakes his head. “Not in the way you can when you use your powers. Essentially, we’ll be able to sense each others presence, but there shouldn’t be specific feelings.”

You let out a breath of relief. “Okay, good.”

~~~

After a while, you decide to explore the Domo a little and see if everything is still the same as the last time you were in it. Your bedroom, for example, had been a place of constant comfort for you, and though you’d taken most of your belongings from it when you’d left, there were things you couldn’t take.

The memories inside with Druig being one of them.

You sit down on the bed and run your hands over the blankets on top of it. You’d spent many nights and days just laying here with Druig, and in his bed, too. It’s funny how those memories seem so much more vivid now that you’re here, sitting in the very place.

If you close your eyes, you can nearly take yourself back to the moment…

A knock sounds on the door and you flinch.

“It’s open!”

Druig’s head peeks through the door as he opens it. “Mind if I come in?”

“I assume you will whether I say yes or not.”

He smiles to himself and closes the door behind him, coming to sit beside you. He looks around the room. At the paintings on the wall, some of the books you’d left on your shelf. He wonders if your home in Japan is as nice as your place in the Domo once was. It makes him want to reminisce. To tell you that he remembers so many good things from this place, though he assumes they’re unwelcome memories for you. So, he stares down at his feet.

“I wanted to talk to you more when you were at my home,” Druig starts. “But with everything that happened, and how much you needed to rest afterwards, I didn’t.”

You look over at him. “What did you want to say?”

He meets your eyes and something passes between you. Like electricity.

Druig sighs. “I know you don’t want to hear it, but I need to tell you why I didn’t let you come with me, why I left, all those years ago. I think you deserve to know why, and if you still want to hate me after that, I’ll let you.”

He expects you to tell him not to say anything. To tell him that you don’t want to hear about why he left, that you’ve moved on. You’d said as much to him back in the Amazon and he understood that, but that was before you’d gotten hurt, before he told you that he was still worried about you, before he made sure you got the rest you needed. And the more you refuse to understand why he left, the more it eats away at him, and he’s certain that he can’t have it weighing on his mind when he tries to put Tiamut to sleep.

He can’t change the past, but he can change the future.

You fiddle with the rings on your fingers again. “You’re going to tell me whether or not I want to hear it, aren’t you?” The look on his face tells you you’re right. Druig was the same in many ways, then. “Go on, then. I’ll listen.”

Druig hesitates for a few moments and just watches you in case you have a change of heart. When you say nothing, continuing to look down at your fingers and twist the rings around, he takes that as a sign to start.

“I left because when I took over those humans minds I knew there was no turning back. I was mad in the moment, mad at Ajak, mad at everyone except for you,” his voice is quiet, “I did it and I knew that once I’d made the choice to control them, I couldn’t just stop. I didn’t want that for you. I didn’t want that for you because I knew you needed better,” he explains.

You, most surprisingly, laugh a little. “No, I needed you, Druig. We’d decided that we would live the rest of our lives together, we’d planned out a whole future, and you were the one who gave up on that. I needed you and you didn’t need me.”

“Of course I needed you!” He raises his voice a little too much and stops for a moment to compose himself, clenching his hands into fists on his knees. “I needed you but I overlooked the fact because I knew you would do better without me. I didn’t know Ajak would split everyone up and send you off on your own. But I don’t regret what I did that day.”

With a scoff, you lay back on the bed and stare up at the ceiling. “You don’t regret breaking my heart? You don’t regret watching me go back up those stairs and feel numb for the next two hundred years? I… I don’t believe what I’m hearing.”

Druig shakes his head. “That’s not what I meant and you know it,” he huffs. “I meant that I don’t regret letting you go to live a better life. You thrive in Japan – I’ve heard all about it. And if you’d stayed with me, living a life alone with me in the Amazon, protecting generations of people from themselves… that was never your fight to begin with.”

There are stars painted onto the ceiling that you forgot about. As you stare up at them, Druig’s words play over and over in your mind. You’re not mad at him. You’re actually a little glad that he finally told you why he’d left you, and it’s been long enough now for you to be smart enough to understand why. Your life… would have been incredibly different had you gone with him that day. You wouldn’t have been able to see so much of the world, watch children from different generations grow up and learn from your teaching.

There’s nothing you would change about the life you’ve led the past 500 years.

Except for the fact that Druig wasn’t there to experience it with you.

You clench one of your fists and close your eyes, summoning your powers ever so slightly just to see into Druig’s heart. To see if what he’s really feeling is what you think it is. The realisation once you sense his feelings doesn’t surprise you as much as you expected it to.

“If there’s one thing I regret,” you start, letting your powers fade away, “it’s that I wasn’t able to convince you to stay. I used my powers on you for the first few years, needing to know if you were okay. You were. You were happy, and that broke me even more, but eventually I think I realised that I was glad that you were happy, because I became happy too.”

Druig smiles to himself and glances back at you. You’re still staring up at the ceiling, looking at the stars on it, and you look beautiful. A thousand memories swim through his head as he looks at you, and he wishes he could relive every single one of them.

You catch him looking at you when you look at him, though. He doesn’t look away.

“Druig, I stopped hating you a long time ago, but I never stopped loving you.”

Your words make his breath catch in his throat.

“Do you mean that?” He asks.

“I’m not forgiving you,” you clarify, “nor am I telling you that I want things to go back to the way they were with us, because things can never really be the same, but I just want you to know. Who knows what’s going to happen with us trying to stop Tiamut, right? I don’t want either of us to die without knowing the truth.”

Druig understands the reason behind your words, but it doesn’t make them mean any less to him. He nods to himself and then moves to lay beside you, staring up at the ceiling as well.

“For what it’s worth,” he hums, “I never stopped loving you, either.”

~~~

FRANCE, 1388 AD

Druig is in love with you.

He’s completely, totally and utterly in love with you and strangely, he doesn’t mind admitting that to himself as he watches you running towards him through the streets, holding a pastry in each hand.

Truthfully, he’s known for a long time that he loves you. If he could put a date on it, he’d say it was probably in Japan nearly 400 years ago. Seeing the way you looked at the country, at the beauty of it, made him realise that he was feeling what the humans called love. For a while, he’d worried that he wouldn’t be able to feel it, especially since he’d spent the first four hundred years of your relationship wondering if what he was feeling then was love.

It was, he knows now. He’d just been too scared of admitting it to himself.

He’s much more confident now.

You reach him, a smile on your face as you hold out one of the pastries to him, breathing heavily since you’d decided to run to him – even though neither of you are in any rush and could wander the city for as long as you desire.

“Druig, you should have come with me,” you say. “The lady at the store was so lovely. She wanted to see you when I said I was buying pastries for my boyfriend. We’ll have to go back later.”

He loves hearing the excitement in your voice when you speak. He loves the way your eyes glimmer in the light. He just loves every single small thing about you.

Druig smiles and takes the pastry from your hand. “Reckon we’ll get a free one if I go back with you next time?” He takes a bite out of the pastry – it is very delicious, and one of the better things he’s eaten in the last hundred years.

“Ooh, maybe,” you talk through a mouthful.

He loves the way that you know he’s joking, but you agree with him anyway.

He moves to wrap an arm around your shoulders as he takes another bite of the pastry. You wrap your free arm around his waist as you walk down the street together. The city is beautiful today – as it always is. One of the best things about your job as an Eternal is easily getting to visit all of the countries on Earth and watch as they grow and change.

You also think that one of the best things is coming back to the countries you’d been to years before you and Druig had gotten together and exploring them together. So much changes that it feels like a whole new place every time.

The thought of travelling the world with him by your side forever excites you.

~~~

THE DOMO, 1460 AD

Druig’s lips are on yours and they’re all you can think about. His hands running up your back, tugging at your hair. The feeling of your hands in his hair, the way your lips feel on his skin. The way you feel in his arms. It’s a feeling neither of you will ever tire of.

He smiles against your lips as he pulls away for breath.

“They’re gonna start getting suspicious soon, the others,” he mutters against your lips. He means the other Eternals. The ones who are all expecting your attendance at the party in the city. The ones who you’d lied to and told that you’d be late because you wanted to nap after today’s fight. The ones that probably didn’t believe you anyway.

You shrug a shoulder and gently kiss him again. “Let them. I want ten more minutes.”

Druig can’t help but smile again at your words. How were you the one who’d spent thousands of years getting on his nerves, driving him insane with your irresponsibility? And now he’s the one encouraging that habit of yours. The one that loves you.

He kisses you again, roughly, his hands gripping your back. All this time and he’d been missing out on this feeling, the feeling of your lips on his, the feeling of your skin touching his skin… in his opinion, he may as well have wasted the last 7000 years.

You shuffle closer to him, wanting to get as close to him as possible now since you know the other Eternals will probably try (and fail) to keep you apart during the party. Druig doesn’t mind at all. If he could keep you here like this, if he could feel like this with you forever, he would do it without hesitation.

Ten minutes, he thinks. There’s a lot he can do in ten minutes.

With nine minutes to spare, both of your clothes are thrown on the floor of his bedroom. At seven minutes, his lips are moving fiercely against yours as you move together. He intends to keep your mind on the memory of this moment for the rest of the night, so you’ll think of it and only this moment when he catches your eye across the room. At one minute, you’re pulling your clothes back on, smiling to yourself and knowing you’re running out of time before the others come looking.

At fifty seconds, Druig calls out to you as you open the door to his bedroom.

“What? We don’t have much time,” you look back at him.

He knows that the timing is probably a little off, though he can’t really bring himself to care as he tells you that he loves you for the first time. It’s been less than a hundred years since he realised, but he’s spent all that time worrying about your reaction when he tells you. What if you didn’t feel the same about him? What if this was just fun to you?

Deep down, he knows it’s not like that for you, but he can’t help but worry.

He’s never been this vulnerable with someone before.

You pause and stare back at him. He wonders if you’re just going to ignore him and walk straight out of his room. But you don’t. You close the door gently and hurry back over him, moving to straddle him where he’s still sat on the bed so you can kiss him deeply.

It takes him by surprise, but he’s quick to reciprocate.

“Took you long enough,” you pull away to mutter against his lips. “I love you, too.”

Before he can kiss you again, you stand up again and hurry out of the room, grinning. He laughs to himself, feeling a little delirious, and falls back onto his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He never wants this feeling to fade.

~~~

THE DOMO, PRESENT DAY.

Eventually, after an hour or so of staring up at the ceiling together in silence, you and Druig make your way back to the lab to meet up with everyone else. You arrive just as Makkari zips past you, sent off by Phastos to find Tiamut.

You wander over to watch what Phastos is doing, fascinated as usual by his powers, always wishing you had powers that were useful like his in terms of technology, while Druig wanders over to Thena, staring at a painting on the wall.

“You always knew the end was coming,” he says, stopping beside her to look at the painting himself. It’s beautiful, but he’s seen many things more beautiful than it. “It must be a relief.”

“That Deviant is still tracking us.”

“Revenge won’t bring peace for you, Thena.”

“Killing it might,” Thena smiles to herself.

Druig looks at her, intrigued. Thena has always been someone he never quite understood, and she remains that way now. But he’s seen how she is with you. He’s admired that for years.

“Don’t get yourself killed,” Druig says to her, entirely serious. “She won’t be able to handle another death. Not after she felt Gilgamesh dying.”

Thena knows who he’s talking about the second he starts to say the words. She had figured as much, that you’d felt Gilgamesh’s death, and she’d checked in on you when you were sleeping once or twice, but there had been little time for catch ups since then.

She looks over at you, at the way you stare up at Phastos’ work, fascinated, eyes glimmering in your intrigue.

“I didn’t get a life as long as I hoped to live with Gilgamesh,” she looks back at Druig, “but that doesn’t mean that you and her shouldn’t get to live a long life together, even after what you did.”

Druig stares at her. “If the world doesn’t end.”

Thena smiles. “True love will transcend worlds.”

~~~

It’s not long after you leave Phastos and head over to pick up one of Makkari’s books that had caught your eye earlier that Ikaris enters the room and blows Phastos’ work to pieces.

Instinctively, Druig takes a few steps towards you, Thena having left the room a few minutes before, as Kingo, confused asks what he’s doing

“I’ve let this go on long enough,” Ikaris says.

Sersi rushes past him, yelling “Don’t hurt him!” as she goes straight to help Phastos up and make sure he’s not hurt, the impact of Ikaris’ powers having thrown him across the room.

“You lied to us,” she continues, standing up in front of Phastos once she’s sure he’s okay. “You already knew about the Emergence.”

“No, he didn’t,” Kingo doesn’t believe it.

Ikaris, on the other hand, is sick of telling lies. “Ajak told me everything when we left Babylon,” he admits, with little remorse.

“What?”

“You were never gonna let her stop the Emergence,” Phastos says.

“No. I only wanted to protect you from the Deviants.”

Sersi sounds heartbroken as she speaks, and you understand the feeling of having the person you love most in the world betray you. “If Ajak wanted you to take her place, why did she choose me?” She asks.

Ikaris stays silent and it’s like a current passes around the room. His silence says too much and it sets all of you on edge.

“What have you done?”

Druig, stood not too far away from you, is the one to come to the conclusion. “He killed her.” It’s not a question, it’s a statement. He knows.

You stumble backwards a few steps. Ikaris killed Ajak?

“I had to.” There are tears in his eyes, and you want to feel bad for him, though you can’t find it in yourself to feel that way. Not after what he’d done to your family. Not after you’d spent years calling him family.

“She loved you,” Sersi says through tears.

“Did she?”

“She loved you,” she reiterates. She means it, and you all know it’s true.

Ikaris is more emotional than you’ve ever seen him over the last 7000 years, and you’re so wrapped up in watching him that you don’t even realise that Druig has made his way over to you until he nudges your arm with his to let you know that he’s there.

The comfort that only he can bring you returns and you instinctively reach down and take his hand in yours, needing the anchor of him to keep you grounded when everything feels like it’s been a lie. You can still hold hands with people you consider family, despite your past. It takes Druig by surprise, though, and he looks down at your hand in his with a smirk on his lips.

So… you do want to hold his hand…

“Do you think it was easy to live with the truth? To know that one day all this would end?” Ikaris tries to explain himself to a room full of people unwilling to accept it, “To keep on lying to you? If we gave humanity the choice, how many of them would be willing to die so that billions more could be born?”

“We’re not giving them a choice,” Phastos adds, disgust in his voice. “Is this why you’re willing to kill?” He pauses, looking at Ikaris for a moment, who says nothing. “You are so pathetic!”

Ikaris looks at him blankly. “I’m an Eternal, Phastos. I exist for Arishem, As do you. It’s who you are.”

“I wouldn’t change a single thing about who I am. Born or made,” Phastos’ voice is powerful, but you know Ikaris well enough to know it won’t intimidate him, “but I do not exist for Arishem, I exist for my family!”

There are things everyone exists for that aren’t Arishem. You exist for the students you teach. You exist to watch them grow and learn and change. You exist to watch the world change and to protect those you love. Part of you even still exists for the man you love beside you. The fact that Ikaris can’t see that makes you feel sick.

“You are making the same mistake Ajak did.”

Makkari speeds into the room, excitement on her face, unaware of everything that’s been going on, and announces that she’s found Tiamut. You can sense what’s going to happen just before it does, even without using your powers.

“No!” Phastos yells, just as Ikaris turns to her and shoots at her.

Kingo yells her name and jumps at her, knocking her out of the way but getting hurt in the process. You squeeze Druig’s hand, and he squeezes it back to let you know that he’s not going anywhere.

“Get out of here,” Kingo says as Makkari hurries to help him up.

She doesn’t need to know anything else. Those four words are enough to tell her that whatever’s happened in her absense means it isn’t safe for her anymore, and she disappears from the room like she was never even there in the first place.

Kingo pulls himself up from the ground despite the pain.

“Kingo,” Ikaris’ voice is pleading.

You watch as Kingo summons his powers and raises his hand towards Ikaris. Seeing your family like this… seeing them fighting amongst each other, after so many years of peace between you all… it’s awful.

“You do not turn against your family,” Kingo’s voice is strong and he’s voicing the thoughts of everyone else in the room. “Gilgamesh died because of you.”

It’s a sign that Ikaris is too far gone when those words don’t do anything to him. When he still looks at you all with such a blank expression that it makes you wonder if you were ever family in the first place. When hearing that he’s the reason his family died means nothing.

“You won’t succeed against me,” he starts, looking around the room at each and every one of you, “and I will kill every one of you if I have to.”

He turns and starts to walk away, preparing to leave, before Sprite steps forward.

“Wait. I’m going with you.”

“Sprite,” Sersi steps towards her.

It’s too late, though. She’s made her choice, and the second Thena comes back into the room, wondering what the commotion was about, Sprite uses her powers and she and Ikaris disappear from the room, leaving an eery silence in their wake.

You close your eyes and take a long deep breath. Druig’s hand is still in yours, and it’s the anchor you desperately knew that you needed. You’re feeling such a strong sense of deja vu for when Druig left you, though you never loved Ikaris in the same way you love Druig… he’s family. Family don’t betray each other.

And yet… you’ve been betrayed enough to know that they do.

~~~

TENOCHTITLAN, 1521 AD

It’s supposed to be a happy moment, but it’s not. It’s supposed to be the time when you only feel joy at killing the last of the Deviants, but you feel like the world is falling away. Tenochtitlan is in ruins beneath you and Thena is unconscious on the table in front of you.

This is not how this moment is meant to feel.

“I thought Mahd Wy’ry was a myth,” Sersi says, looking down at Thena.

The room is filled with an eery silence and you feel uncomfortable. Druig, beside you, is holding your hand. He can sense your unease, your worry for Thena clouding every other feeling. You just want her to wake up and be okay.

Ajak heals Phastos’ wound. “There is no cure, so no one really talks about it.”

Thena gasps, her eyes opening as she wakes. You can tell instantly that she’s back to her normal self and sigh with relief as you take a step towards her, along with the others.

“What happened?” She asks.

“Thena, you attacked everyone. You wounded Sersi, Phastos. You nearly killed Makkari,” Ajak explains. Her voice is kind, calming, but you still feel a spike of anger. It’s not her fault, you want to say, even though Ajak knows that.

Thena sits up. “I don’t remember.”

“You have Mahd Wy’ry. Your mind is fracturing under the weight of your memories.” Beside you, Druig’s gaze falls to the floor. “And all I can do is erase them, so you can start over. I will have to inform Arishem and take you back to the ship where we have the technology to help.”

Your hand grips Druig’s tighter. Erase her memories? No… she couldn’t.

“But she won’t be Thena anymore,” Makkari signs, as if she can read your mind.

“What if it happens again?” Kingo adds. “She could have killed you. She could have killed all of us.”

The fight had been brutal. You’d tried to intervene but Druig had held you back, refusing to let you get hurt when he saw that Thena wasn’t herself. You’d struggled in his arms, but he’d held you close, whispering in your ear that he wasn’t going to let you go, that Thena would be okay, until you finally gave up.

She could have killed you all, though. You all knew that.

There are tears falling from Thena’s eyes and it breaks your heart. “Please. I want to remember,” she says, pleading with Ajak. You can’t even imagine how she’s feeling, but you are certain that if you could take her place, you would. “I want to remember my life.”

“Thena, I love you, but listen to me. It’s not important if you remember or not. Your spirit will remain. You will always be Thena deep inside. Trust me.”

“Why should she trust you?” Druig’s voice comes out of nowhere.

You turn to look at him beside you, leant against the wall, one of your hands still held tightly in his. His words take you by surprise. He was usually quiet in moments like this, and you’d thought he didn’t have anything to say now either. You were wrong.

Everyone else in the room turns to look at him.

“You’re asking her to let you erase who she is.” He lets go of your hand and your whole body feels cold as he walks away from you. You watch him with furrowed eyebrows, concerned about his sudden change in demeanour.

“Druig, I know you’re upset–”

“Upset?!” He yells and you flinch. “We’ve trusted you for 7000 years and look where you’ve gotten us.” He’s got tears in his eyes. You can hear it in his voice, see it on his face, and you want to walk over to him, take his hand again, but… he’d been the one to let go. “I’ve watched humans destroy each other when I could stop it all in a heartbeat. Do you know what that does to someone after centuries? Could our mission have been a mistake? Are we really helping these people build a better world, huh?”

This wasn’t the first time you’d heard that from him. Especially lately – he’d seen so much, you all had. But he was the only one with the ability to stop the humans from killing each other. He was the only one that had to live with the fact that he couldn’t let himself do it. You could only carry so much of his burden, and he never let you carry too much.

He turns and walks to the top of the steps, overlooking the city and the chaos going down below. The fires, the screaming, the death and the fighting. It’s like you’re watching over hell, but it’s not the first time you’ve seen something like it. It doesn’t make watching it any easier, though. You can’t bring yourself to look for long and focus on his back instead.

“We’re just like the soldiers down there. Pawns to their leaders, blinded by loyalty,” he says. His voice is angry, dark. You haven’t heard him speak like that before. “It ends now.”

You watch as the soldiers slowly stop fighting. He’s using his powers, doing what he’d said he wouldn’t do. They all start to drop their weapons and look up towards where you all are, at Druig watching over them. Your stomach drops and you’re moments away from walking towards him and pulling him away, but Ikaris beats you.

He pushes past you, reaching Druig and grabbing him roughly, slamming him against the wall. “Let them go.”

“You’re gonna have to make me.”

“Stop.” Ajak steps towards them. Ikaris and Druig continue to stare at each other for a few moments until Ikaris steps back and walks away, standing beside you as he looks at Druig and Ajak, now looking at each other.

It isn’t as easy for Druig, though. “If you wanna stop me, you’re gonna have to kill me.”

He meets your eyes and you swear you can see a flash of an apology in them as he turns and starts to walk away, down the stairs towards the humans. You push away from Ikaris and walk after him, calling out his name.

“Druig! What are you doing? What’s going on?”

You stop half way down the large staircase and he turns back to look at you. You’re illuminated by the fires below and the stars in the night sky above you, and you look as stunning as always. But Druig has made his choice now.

“I’m leaving,” he says. “I just… I can’t do this anymore.”

You take another step towards him. “Let me come with you. We can go together,” you glance back at the others, watching you. “They’re my family, but you are the person that I love, Druig. You are the one person I’ve always said I wanted to spend my life with. Let me.”

Druig watches you for a few moments. He doesn’t want to do this. To leave you behind when he loves you so much. But how can he let you come with him? How can he tell you to come with him and live a life with him when he’s finally doing something with his powers? He’s known for his whole life that you deserve a better life. He doesn’t want to be the reason that you have to lose good memories. He can’t let you live among mind controlled humans.

“No,” Druig says. “You’ll stay with the others, like you should.”

“Druig, I–” You reach out a hand towards him.

“I don’t want you to come with me, my love.”

His words make you feel like you’ve just been shot and you stumble backwards, nearling falling back up the stairs before you steady yourself. He doesn’t want you to come with him. He doesn’t want you… all of a sudden, he doesn’t want you? Just sixty years ago he’d told you he loved you, and he’s told you every day since… but now this?

“What, you care about them more than you care about the future you promised me?” You’re crying. You can feel the tears on your cheeks and your throat starting to close up. If this was what heartbreak felt like – like the humans talked about – then you wish you’d never fallen in love in the first place.

You don’t let Druig reply as you fix him with a glare and turn, walking back up the stairs towards the others and leaving him behind. It takes him a few moments to look away from you and walk down the stairs towards the humans, leading them all behind him. You don’t watch, instead staring at the wall opposite you once you’re back inside, trying to calm down your breathing.

It feels like you’ve been using your powers again. Like you had done in 1232, when you’d felt like someone was squeezing your head too tight, but now it’s your heart. It feels like it’s going to burst.

Sersi comes up beside you and wraps an arm around your shoulders, pulling you into her side to try and comfort you, letting you know that she’s there for you. You appreciate it.

After a few moments of silence, Gilgamesh speaks. “I’ll watch over Thena. Let her keep her memories.”

“One day, when she attacks you, you might have to kill her,” Ajak is honest.

“We’ll take that chance.”

Thena turns to look at Gilgamesh. There are tears streaming down her cheeks and love in her eyes and you feel like your heart shatters all over again. You’d thought your relationship with Druig was like that. Where you’d give up everything for each other. But you hadn’t realised that there was one thing Druig wouldn’t be able to give up.

“You may all go,” Ajak surprises you by saying and you look up, eyes blurry as you look at her. “The Deviants are gone. There is no reason for you to stay with me.”

“Shouldn’t you ask Arishem first?” Ikaris offers. “We’re a team, we should stay together.”

“I didn’t ask you for your advice, Ikaris. Do not forget your place.” She fixes him with a look that would scare you if it were directed your way. “This is where we say goodbye. We are free to go. I want you to go out there and live a life for yourselves. Not as soldiers. Not with a purpose you were given. Find your own purpose and one day when we see each other again, I want you to tell me what you found.”

Tears start to form in your eyes again and Sersi pulls you into a hug as you start to cry again. You feel weak, empty, lost, and you hate yourself for feeling this way, but how else are you expected to feel when you’ve finally been told that you can go and live your own lives, yet the one person that was your life has just walked out of it?

It’s Druig that's being reckless and irresponsible this time, and you both know it.

~~~

Tag List: @tompetersebbuckyhazleo @freyagallileaevans @dontstopxx @shannon-posts @ln-nell @buckyandlokicanhaveme @alluringshawn @notroxanna @trickylittlewitch @itscheybaby @trencoatedwings @vampireviel @ivrypetals @measure-in-pain @suraaann @keepingitlokiii @chenlemure @ponyboys-sunsets @nifujiswhore @stubborncap @dangerdolns @binidict (If you’d like to be added, please reply to this post or message me!)

[beautyofattolia]

Jake and Lo’ak (Avatar: The Way of Water)

Warning: this post contains spoilers for Avatar: The Way of Water! Do not read if you haven’t seen the movie yet, are planning on watching it, and you want to go into it blind. I will be discussing a LOT of things that go on in it.

This post is going to be a discussion/exploration of both Jake and Lo’ak as characters with a deep dive into their relationship. I loved a lot of the character development that went on in this movie and wanted to pick apart Jake’s arc in particular. I also thought the relationship between him and Lo’ak was one of the most interesting and well-developed ones in the movie and wanted to not only examine it closer but also make some predictions about where it’s going to end up in future movies.

Just to warn you now, this is going to be a LONG post (I have SO MANY THOUGHTS Y’ALL), so I’m including a “read more” tab. I don’t want to see this entire monster on my dash every time I look through my tags and I especially don’t want people who have no interest in this topic to have to deal with my ramblings while casually scrolling.

For those of you who want to come explore with me though…let’s dive in.

(I am so sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

Introduction

I do want to start by saying that I have seen the movie twice. This analysis/exploration came to mind after the first time I saw it, but I wanted to watch it again with this idea in mind to double-check myself. I wanted to make sure I accurately remembered all the scenes I’m going to be discussing in this post. I’m not perfect and I’m sure there are things I have still managed to misremember or misquote, so please feel free to let me know if I’ve made any mistakes!

Honestly, I would love to see the movie two more times, AT LEAST, but I have no idea when that is going to happen and I wanted to get this done sooner rather than later.

There are also a few things I want to make very clear before I start. First, I absolutely adore both Jake and Lo’ak, so if you don’t and you’re looking to read something that completely bashes either one or both of them…this is not the post for you. Second, this post’s goal is not to convince you that you SHOULD love them or that how you feel about them or their relationship is wrong if you don’t agree with me. It’s not! Your feelings and opinions are completely valid, whether you like them as characters and their relationship with each other or not.

This post is simply a deeper exploration into why I think these characters behave the way they do in this movie and why I believe their relationship is the way that it is. I have seen people claim things like “Jake doesn’t love his kids” or “Jake doesn’t love his sons” or “Jake doesn’t love Lo’ak” and I, personally, think all of these statements are false based on what the movie presents to us as viewers and this post is an explanation of why I believe that.

All that to say, if none of this is up your alley, please stop reading now. I’m not here to hate on anyone’s feelings or thoughts or opinions. I’m only here to share my own, explain why I think the way that I do, and break down and explore two characters I love and the relationship they share (which I also love), in a movie that I adore. I deeply enjoy engaging with and analyzing media that I love. I can’t make fanart and fanfiction is very hit or miss for me (when I’m writing, I love reading it), so this is kind of the only way I have of showcasing my love for a fandom and series that has held my heart captive since I was fourteen.

“Jake Doesn’t Love His Kids”

I think this claim kind of goes hand in hand with the “Jake is a military dad” claim. While I do think Jake does have military dad moments in the Way of Water, I would hesitate to consider him 100% a military dad. Mostly because there is clearly a huge difference between him as a dad before the humans return and him as a dad after the humans return. I will be the first to admit that we don’t have a lot of footage from those first fourteen years, but from what we do see, it is clear there is a difference between pre-humans Jake and post-humans Jake.

Now, I consider pre-humans Jake to be who Jake really is as a dad. He’s much softer, much warmer, and overflows with love for his family. Every single moment of that sequence shows that. The look of awe when Kiri grabs his finger, how patient he is while teaching Neteyam how to fish, the way he holds Lo’ak against him when he and Neytiri tell the story of how they met, how he measures his kids’ heights on a pole in their home, even the way he breaks up the fight between Lo’ak and Kiri. It’s all consistent behavior that shows this is who Jake is as a dad naturally, without the world falling apart around him: soft, warm, loving, gentle, patient.

Then the humans come back.

Sometimes, when reading what people say about Jake as a dad, it feels like they don’t understand why there’s a change between pre-humans and post-humans. Why after a year of war, there’s a difference in how Jake parents his children, and how he behaves as a dad. Why he has become harder, someone who falls into moments of the military dad mentality.

And I don’t think the movie could be any clearer about why this happens.

They are now in the middle of a war and Jake is scared out of his mind.

Fear changes you as a person. You are not your best when you are scared, instead, you often become a version of yourself that you do not recognize and do not like. And the truth is that Jake is terrified out of his mind after the humans return. In order to cope with the fear he is now feeling, he falls back on the marine mindset because he thinks that is what is going to protect the people he loves.

Remember, that’s his whole thing. “A father protects his family. That’s his one job.” That statement is literally Jake’s core belief about what it means to be a parent and what his responsibilities are to his kids.

Now, I’ve seen this statement criticized for being sexist. Like, “oh fathers protect, but what do mothers do? Stay home and twiddle their thumbs?” and I think this misses the point entirely. Jake is not saying that at all. He does not think Neytiri is weak or somehow lacking in her ability to protect their kids because she is their mother. I mean he literally goes to her at the end and is like “I need you. I cannot rescue our children alone.” He needs her because they are mates and partners and these children are THEIR children and she is the most badass badass to ever be badass on Pandora and probably in the universe. And Jake knows that! He loves that! The man looks at his mate slaughtering people and is like “oh my God babe YES!” His statement is not that fathers are the only ones who protect. He states that it’s the parents’ job to protect their children, but he is making it personal for himself. His role in this family is the father. He refers to himself because he is making himself focus on his failings as a parent. He’s basically saying to himself “your one job as their father is to protect them and you are failing it.” He is judging himself, saying he himself has fallen short and failed, not saying that mothers can’t or shouldn’t be focused on their children’s protection.

This mentality, that a parent’s one job is to protect their kids, is why he is terrified when the humans return. Or at least one of the reasons. I think Jake is a really complex character with a lot of baggage and while not all of it is explored in the Way of Water, I think most of it is and the rest is at least hinted at. The movie focuses on his fear of the humans hurting his family, but there are other reasons why Jake is scared too.

When you think about it, Neytiri and the kids are the only family Jake has left. They are all Jake has. He has no one else. Tom is dead and while we don’t know much about their parents, we know they aren’t in the picture for one reason or another because Jake doesn’t consider them at all when he leaves. The life he has built with the Na’vi is the only life that he has. They are his whole world: his family, his friends, and his people. And the humans have the power to take that away, to hurt the people he cares about more than anything else in the world. I can’t help but think back to the first movie, in the extended version (the BEST version), where Jake says “all I’ve ever wanted was a cause worth fighting for.” And guess what? His family and the Na’vi people are now his cause!

So we have his fear of losing his family driving him, but I think we also have his fear of letting down the Omatikaya people as well. I think Jake deals a lot with guilt and I think part of his desire to fight the humans comes from feeling like he still has to make up for what he did in the first movie. Like he 100% loves them, but I do think he is still trying to prove that he belongs, that he is sorry for what he did, and that he is on their side. Jake is afraid of losing his place with the Na’vi, of not only losing the people he loves, but the life he loves too. The community he loves. The world he loves.

He is full of fear and the humans returning brings all of that fear right to the forefront of his mind. And as a result, he lets that fear take over and whenever you let fear take over, you become a lesser version of yourself. And Jake’s lesser version of himself, the one ruled by fear, is harder, colder, and not the kind of dad his kids needs or that he wants to be.

I want to make it very clear that the movie does not present this behavior as healthy or right. In fact, the movie makes it clear that Jake is making mistakes in how he handles his children, specifically Lo’ak (we’ll talk about that specifically in a bit). Neytiri herself is the voice of reason for Jake when she tells him “you are too hard on them” and “this is not a squad, it is a family.” I think this again provides a little more evidence that this is not how Jake was as a dad before. If Neytiri is troubled by his behavior now, there is no way she would have let Jake parent their children like this for fourteen years. Neytiri is not afraid of speaking her mind, especially not with Jake. She would never sit back and let something she disagrees with happen, especially not for YEARS. I do think in this instance, she understands why Jake is acting the way he is (they are bonded after all), which is why she reminds him throughout the movie of how he should be behaving gently and not flying off the handle at him. 

Back to the “family, not a squad” scene though, Jake answers he was afraid they had lost Neteyam and Lo’ak, and again that shows how scared he is of losing the children he loves. It highlights Jake’s fear. The movie is saying “Jake is making a mistake but this is why he is making the mistake.” That’s Jake’s whole arc throughout this movie! Him making mistakes with his kids and then realizing he was wrong the whole time. The movie makes that very clear! So I do get a bit frustrated when people criticize the movie for having Jake be a military dad when the movie very clearly shows that lots of Jake’s parenting choices are wrong.

But just because he makes mistakes doesn’t mean he doesn’t love his children. In fact, the reason why he makes those mistakes is because he loves his kids so freaking much that he is consumed with the fear of losing them and that fear turns him into a person who is so bent on protecting them that he pulls away from them emotionally and becomes someone harder and colder than he was before.

I also want to take a second and mention how much I appreciate that Jake is never physically hard on his kids. I think one of the stereotypes of the military dad persona is corporal punishment and that is honestly never a thing for Jake, which is a huge relief to me. Obviously, he is much more physically affectionate in the pre-humans era, but even in the post-humans era, he is still physically gentle and warm with his kids. He holds Tuk when she asks for it, he is physically supportive of Kiri when she tells him how she feels, he hugs Neteyam and Lo’ak when he saves the two from Quaritch at the beginning, he cups Lo’ak’s cheek at the end, he hugs both Lo’ak and Spider after the battle. Even when he is angry with Lo’ak and grabs him to pull him away from Tonowari and Ronal, he is still gentle. His touch is never shown to be aggressive or painful or a punishment. His kids never flinch away from him. Even when Jake is upset with them and leaning into the scared military dad persona or the angry commanding officer persona, his kids do not fear his touch. And I think that is so important because it shows how much he loves them, how much they love him, and how Jake really is a warm, gentle dad who is just scared out of his mind and desperately trying to protect his kids. The movie shows him making a lot of mistakes in this movie, but the way he is physically there for his kids is not one of them.

I think the movie does an incredible job at comparing and contrasting the dad Jake really is (pre-humans) and wants to be with the dad Jake becomes when he lets fear consume his life (post-humans). He isn’t a military dad because he doesn’t love his children, he loves his children so much that he thinks becoming a military dad is the only way to save them. And the movie straight up says “no Jake, that’s wrong and here’s why.” Parents are people who make mistakes and who have to grow and change to be better people and better parents. Loving your children doesn’t mean you don’t make mistakes, but it does mean that you need to constantly be aware of how your choices are affecting your children and make changes when needed. And I think Jake’s entire arc throughout this movie is him realizing he is wrong and then making that change at the end of the movie to be better.

“Jake Doesn’t Love His Sons”

A lot of people have been commenting on the fact that there is a difference between how Jake treats his daughters, Kiri and Tuk, and how he treats his sons, Neteyam and Lo’ak. Specifically, they claim that Jake loves his daughters more than he loves his sons. Again, I do think this is proven wrong by the movie. Now, I will say, there is definitely a difference in the post-human treatment of the girls vs. the boys, but I don’t think it has anything to do with how much Jake loves them. I don’t even think it has anything to do with their gender!

I think it’s the direct result of Jake being Olo'eyktan and the one leading the Omatikaya into battle since Neteyam and Lo’ak are both young warriors. After all, Jake has no pattern of treating women differently than men throughout the movies. He doesn’t look down on Neytiri in the first movie because she is a woman. In fact, he is totally okay with her being his teacher and while they do fall in love (something that probably wouldn’t have happened if it had been like Tsu’tey teaching him instead), there is no point in which he views Neytiri less of a warrior because she is a woman. Jake also doesn’t respect Grace any less as a scientist than Norm or Max and he doesn’t think Trudy is any less of a marine than Quaritch or the other male marines. Jake even shows the same level of respect to Ronal as he does to Tonowari, similar to how he shows the same level of respect to Mo’at as he does to Eytukan in the first movie. Jake is not sexist. He has never had a problem with women in positions of power or authority. He does not treat women any differently than he treats men in any situation.

So no, I don’t think the reason why he treats his sons differently than his daughters has anything to do with sexism or even toxic masculinity, another thing I see people mentioning and which Jake has no history of ever displaying. I think the reason why he treats them differently is because his sons have roles that require him to approach them not as their dad, but as their commanding officer. The girls do not. THAT is where the difference lies.

Being a warrior/hunter is an important part of being part of the Omatikaya clan and Neteyam and Lo’ak are the only two children who fall into that category. Kiri does not, even though she is old enough. Much like Mo’at, who also doesn’t seem to be a warrior/hunter and instead seems to be more focused on healing (although being a Tsahìk doesn’t seem to mean you aren’t a warrior since both Ronal and Neytiri are, but throughout both movies we never see Mo’at assume a warrior role), Kiri seems to be more of a healer. A spiritual leader. There is never a moment where she appears to have any interest in being a warrior/hunter the way Neteyam and Lo’ak do. I do not believe she has gone through that process the way the boys have. She doesn’t even have a weapon at any point during the movie even though the boys have both bows and knives and even Tuk has a knife at the end. Tuk obviously isn’t a warrior/hunter either as she is still too young. That may be in her future, but at the moment it is not.

But Neteyam and Lo’ak are. Or at least becoming? Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but it looks like maybe they both have completed their Iknimaya since they both appear to have their own ikran. I’m a bit iffy on that since there is no real confirmation either way, but the evidence does seem to lean toward the fact that at the VERY LEAST, they are warriors/hunters in training close to becoming full-fledged warriors/hunters. Regardless of official status, it is clear that they both are given some responsibilities when it comes to fighting alongside the older warriors. And as Olo'eyktan, Jake is their commander. He is the one who leads the warriors into battle and I think this is what causes him to treat the boys differently.

He is no longer just their father, he is also their commanding officer, and I think he struggles to find the line between the two. He tends to lean more into the commanding officer side, ESPECIALLY when it comes to chastising them for disobeying his requests as their father and his orders as their commanding officer. And again, I think the movie shows that this is a mistake on Jake’s part. He should be more focused on being their father than their commanding officer. I think in his desire to protect them from the horrors of war that they are very much involved in as members of the clan, he is falling back into treating them how he was treated as a marine to try and prepare them. Train them. Give them, in his mind, their best chance of survival. Again, I think it’s important to remember Jake’s background and that the only knowledge he has of how to be a commanding officer is the ones he had as a marine. That’s his entire fighting background! That’s what he knows and understands and can pass on to his sons. So that’s what he gives them.

I still don’t think he ever goes all the way there. I think about how he ALWAYS checks with Neteyam and Lo’ak to make sure they’re okay before anything else every time something happens to them. That’s the dad part of him coming out, making itself known and fighting against the commanding officer side that comes out when he is upset with the boys when they make mistakes. This is also where I think the “sir” comes from. You never hear the kids refer to Jake as “sir” in the pre-humans era and you don’t hear the girls use it at all. But the boys do. And the boys only do it when Jake is in commanding officer mode, giving them orders or chastising them for disobeying. For the majority of the movie, they refer to him as “dad.” It is only in those specific situations that “sir” comes out. I think the movie again leans into this being a mistake on Jake’s part, a way that he has failed the boys in the post-human era by disciplining them not as a father, but as a commanding officer.

One interesting note about the “sir” thing though, Ao’nung and the boys also use it in reference to Tonowari as well. This makes me wonder if it is the English translation of a word in Na’vi that is being used to show deference to the Olo'eyktan. I don’t know enough about the language to say for sure either way and I think my point above still stands either way as it is still Jake being more of a leader to his sons than a father, but I think it’s an interesting detail. One I would love to have some other thoughts on!

The main point is that Jake loves his boys as much as he loves his girls, but because his boys are warriors/hunters there is definitely this line he has trouble treading between being their father and being their commanding officer in a way he doesn’t have to worry about with the girls. He doesn’t have to balance two roles with them, they are simply his children while Neteyam and Lo’ak are older and have more responsibilities. They are warriors/hunters fighting alongside the other clan members whether Jake likes it or not because that is their right and duty as members of the Omaticaya. And so Jake struggles, losing sight of who he needs to be with them because he has to take on this extra role to keep both them and the other fights under his command safe. Because this is the only way he knows how to fight and he is scared that if he doesn’t prepare them, they are not going to survive. It is not an easy line to tread and while it does not excuse Jake, I think it makes it easy to understand why he is the way he is with Neteyam and Lo’ak vs. Kiri and Tuk.

“Jake Doesn’t Love Lo’ak”

And now we get into the main part of this post, which is insane considering how long it took to get here. I’m sorry. Except, you know, I’m really not. I had fun discussing the rest of it! And I am freaking excited to discuss this part too. This is the relationship that made me want to write this post, the relationship that I personally think is one of the most important ones in the entire movie.

The relationship between Jake and Lo’ak.

Now, I do want to first mention that how well you get along with someone is not always an indicator of how much you love them. Or more like, you can love a group of people equally but get along with each of them differently. For example, I have two sisters and I love them both equally, but I get along with my youngest sister better than my middle sister. My middle sister and I have personalities that clash more often so we fight more than I do with my youngest sister. But I would still die for either of them. And that’s the thing, you can love someone and still not always get along with them. That’s just part of being a person.

And I think that applies to parents and children as well. Parents can love all of their children equally, but that doesn’t mean they are going to get along with them all equally. There are going to be some that they clash with more often than others simply because every personality is going to be different and relate to each other in different ways.

And that’s the reason why Jake gets along differently with Neteyam than he does with Lo’ak. It has nothing to do with how much he loves them, it simply has to do with the fact that Jake and Lo’ak’s personalities are way too similar and they clash way more frequently as a result of that. That’s the heart of why Jake and Lo’ak have the kind of relationship they do: Lo’ak reminds Jake of himself in a way that none of the other kids do. And to a man who is already scared out of his mind for and about his children, seeing himself in Lo’ak scares him even more. 

They do such a great job throughout the movie showing the similarities between Jake and Lo’ak. There are so many scenes that draw a direct parallel between them, emphasizing their similarities. From the scenes played back-to-back in this movie showing Jake and Lo’ak trying (and failing) to ride the water creatures in the same determined (and cocky) way, to Lo’ak being attacked in the water in a way that parallels Jake being attacked by the thanator in the first movie. Then there are the little bits like Lo’ak flipping off Quaritch and the little speech he gives before decking Ao'nung that are so very much things Jake would have done himself. Even the parallels between Lo’ak bonding with Payakan as an outsider and Jake bonding with Turok also as an outsider to the way Lo’ak falls for his teacher, Tsireya, in a similar way Jake fell for Neytiri. The movie is purposefully and repeatedly showing us how similar Lo’ak is to his father.

They are both impulsive, headstrong, and quick to anger. And Jake sees all that, sees all the negative traits because at this point in his life, with all of his guilt and fear swirling around inside of him, that’s all he can see in himself as well. He has trouble seeing the good in himself, the strength of character, the desire to protect those he loves, and a heart open and willing to fully give for those he loves. All of which Lo’ak has as well, but because Jake fails to see the positive traits he himself has, he has trouble seeing the positive traits Lo’ak has, and therefore Lo’ak struggles to see the good in himself as well.

And I don’t say this as some kind of “Lo’ak is exactly like Jake” or something, because he’s not, but the movie does a lot to show how they are similar and how those similarities are the driving force behind why their relationship is the way it is.

I say all of this to explain why there is more tension between Jake and Lo’ak than between Jake and Neteyam. Lo’ak scares Jake more than any of his other kids because he sees in Lo’ak the same things he has in himself, things that led to him hurting others and, ultimately, himself. And I think Jake is terrified that Lo’ak is going to make the same mistakes he did and so he is harder and stricter with Lo’ak as a result. Again, I don’t think it has anything to do with how much he loves him. If anything, Jake loves Lo’ak so much that he’s determined to protect Lo’ak from his own faults and to prevent his son from following in his footsteps, and doesn’t see how that is hurting Lo’ak.

It’s so interesting to me that Jake tries to use the same tactics on Lo’ak that were used on him in the first movie which directly led to him rebelling against them even harder. And I know some people are going to be like “isn’t that stupid? Shouldn’t Jake KNOW those things won’t work on Lo’ak because they didn’t work on him?” And that’s what makes it so fascinating because it emphasizes the thing I think to be very true of all people: we are never more blind than when it comes to ourselves. Jake doesn’t know how to deal with Lo’ak in the way Lo’ak needs because he has no idea how to deal with himself. Because all he can see are his mistakes, his failures, and the way he has hurt people, and as he looks at his son whom he loves, all he can see are those things being repeated, and that terrifies him. And that fear once again, as is the continuing arc for Jake in this movie, overwhelms him and blinds him to what he needs to do.

Jake gets along better with Neteyam not because he loves Neteyam more, but because Neteyam’s personality is much calmer and steadier and because of that, Jake trusts him in a way that he can’t trust Lo’ak because he cannot trust himself. He’s still scared for Neteyam, but not because he’s scared Neteyam is going to do something stupid. He trusts Neteyam to think things through and be logical in a way he doesn’t trust Lo’ak to be because he himself isn’t logical. And I know that’s not fair, it’s not supposed to be fair. But here’s the thing: relationships aren’t always fair. We are constantly bringing our baggage and insecurities and personal failings into our relationships and even though it is so important to try to be fair and not let those things affect us, the truth is we are all people and we are all going to make mistakes. And this is one of Jake’s. One that the movie very clearly points out. It is not necessarily fair that Jake trusts Neteyam more than he trusts Lo’ak, but he does. And I think that lack of trust is what drives Lo’ak to act out and then results in Jake trusting him even less. It’s a cycle built on them seeing themselves in each other and failing to realize how to deal with it.

Now, bear with me for just a moment because I’m going to go a bit off-script and discuss a headcanon of mine. None of this is canon and while I think there is evidence for it, there is no proof or confirmation. My argument works perfectly fine without it, but I do think it is interesting to bring up simply for conversation and thought.

I think that Neteyam reminds Jake of Tom. And I know we have no real evidence of what Tom was like or what his relationship with Jake was like, but I’m sure James Cameron does and while he may not explicitly say it in a movie that is already super filled with information, I wouldn’t be surprised if he sprinkles in hints here and there. And I personally think Tom and Jake had a relationship very similar to the one Neteyam and Lo’ak have. Again, there is no proof of this, but it would make sense thematically from a movie standpoint for this to be the case. Since there is such a heavy emphasis placed on how similar Jake and Lo’ak are, it makes sense to me that Tom would be like Neteyam, the one who attempted to keep a younger Jake under control. Since Jake is twenty-two in the first movie and had been discharged from the Marines for a least a while, he would have had to have enlisted pretty young. My guess is right at eighteen. I also think Tom probably tried to talk him out of it and Jake, being Jake, refused to listen. This would be a direct parallel to how Neteyam tries to keep Lo’ak out of trouble and Lo’ak refuses to listen. This would be another reason why Jake encourages Neteyam to watch out for Lo’ak and tells Lo’ak to listen to his older brother. Another way he tries to keep his younger son from making the same mistakes he did. Again, none of this is canon, but it is a very interesting idea that I personally really like and I think fits really well with the story being told about these characters.

Another reason Lo’ak believes his parents, and especially his father, love Neteyam more than him is because he thinks they see Neteyam as the perfect child. While I don’t think they think of him as the perfect child, I do think they see Neteyam through rose-colored glasses because he is their firstborn child. Canonically, Neteyam was what gave Neytiri hope again after her home was destroyed and her father was killed. I want to dive deeper into Neteyam in a separate post (he deserves his own), but it’s definitely something I want to mention here because it does play into why Lo’ak sees himself as a failure and Neteyam as perfect. He’s not and I don’t think Jake or Neytiri think he is (or love him more) I simply think he is a symbol for both of them of redemption and hope and proof that after something terrible happens, good things can still happen too. Definitely not an easy thing to live with for either Neteyam or Lo’ak, but something that I think is relevant and needs to be discussed when dissecting these relationships. 

Again, this is not fair. But again, relationships aren’t fair. Parents are people too. They are not perfect. They are flawed, they make mistakes, and they stumble. The movie does not glorify this behavior, it simply explains why it is happening and then shows its negative effects.  

I think it’s ironic that Lo’ak talks about feeling like an outsider and tells Tsireya that his dad wouldn’t understand when I believe Jake is the only one who would ever understand. Mostly because I believe Jake still feels like an outsider, still feels like he has to earn his place among the people and that’s another reason why he is so filled with fear and even guilt. From what I’ve seen from the movie, even in the pre-human era, I don’t think Jake talked to his kids much about what it was like to be human. I think Jake is so determined to prove that he has left all that behind that he doesn’t help his kids understand that part of their heritage. And while I personally think that comes from a place of love and a desire to protect them (he doesn’t want them to feel different or like outsiders the way he does), it only serves to confuse Lo’ak who has the most human qualities. He doesn’t understand why he’s different and Jake hasn’t taken the time to teach him how to deal with and embrace those human qualities. Again, I don’t think it’s done purposefully, in fact, I very much believe that Jake thinks he is helping Lo’ak, but this is another way that the movie shows us that while Jake’s heart is 100% in the right place, he still makes a mistake. He still cannot understand how to give Lo’ak what he needs.

Jake struggles with guilt and is constantly trying to prove himself to the people. An example of this is when Neytiri argues with Ronal about how Jake was Toruk Makto and lead the people to war. Jake is clearly embarrassed by this and noticeably winces. He doesn’t like being referred to like that and I believe it’s because he still feels guilty. It would be like someone praising you for building them a new house when you were the one who burned down the original. You didn’t rebuild the house out of the kindness of your heart, you did it to fix the mistake you made. It is penance. And I think Jake views his time as Toruk Makto not as some great thing he did, but as him simply trying to fix his own mistake. Penance. Redemption. Correction. And I think it is so ironic that both Neteyam and Lo’ak are trying to live up to his ideal of the perfect warrior, the great Toruk Makto, that they see in their father and yet it is something that Jake is ashamed of. He doesn’t want his sons to follow in his footsteps, he wants them to be safe. But there is this critical lack of understanding between him as a parent trying to protect his sons and his sons as children trying to be like their father, not realizing that is the last thing he wants for them. It is a standard they can never meet because they are striving for the opposite of what Jake wants for them and it causes friction, especially between Jake and Lo’ak. It is another reason why Lo’ak constantly feels like a failure and Jake is so hard on him. They cannot See each other properly.

Their entire relationship and its push and pull comes to a head when Neteyam dies.

I know there are a lot of people talking about Jake blaming Lo’ak for what happens to Neteyam, especially since Jake tells Lo’ak “you’ve done enough” when telling him to stay behind. I want to make it very clear that I do not think it is ever okay to say that kind of thing to your child. And I 100% believe the movie makes a point of showing how that was totally not okay of Jake to say. But here’s the thing: I don’t think Jake ever for even a moment actually blames Lo’ak. Jake blames himself. He failed to protect his children, his whole family really, and Neteyam dies as a result. To add insult to injury, the only reason Neteyam was on the ship was to save his siblings because they were being held in order to capture Jake. That I think this is driven home when Quaritch literally tells Jake it’s his fault Neteyam is dead AS HE STANDS OVER HIS SON’S BODY! I also can’t help but think about Neteyam saying “I want to go home” right before he dies and how horrible Jake must feel about being the reason why his son was taken away from his home. And what is Neteyam’s last word? “Dad.” I believe Jake wonders about that last word and if it was a plea or an accusation, both of which would be heartbreaking for a father to consider.

Jake blames himself, in so many different ways, for Neteyam. For failing Neteyam. For not protecting Neteyam. For not being the father Neteyam needed. And that blame that he heaps on himself oozes out onto the person he sees himself in: Lo’ak. Again, this does not make this behavior okay. It simply explains why this behavior is happening. 

All of this leads us to one of my favorite scenes in the entirety of the movie: the scene where Lo’ak rescues Jake. I absolutely adore it because I think it’s the climax of everything that these two have been through together and individually.

Before I get into it, I do want to make a note about the beginning of the scene when Jake calls out Neteyam’s name. I’ve seen some people use this as evidence that Jake loves Neteyam more, but I disagree. I think this is the direct result of Jake thinking he is dead and waking up in Ewya with Neteyam. Once Lo’ak tells him who it is, you can see Jake snap back to reality and realize he is still alive and stuck in a sinking ship. And I want to talk about this next bit very carefully. Lo’ak apologizes for Neteyam’s death and even says something along the lines of “I’m so sorry, Dad” and then corrects it to “I’m so sorry, sir.” I believe the “sir” makes an appearance here because he is, in this moment, appealing not to his father, but to his commanding officer who he feels like he failed. You can see his shift from talking to Jake like a son to talking to Jake like a soldier and yes, this scene is heartbreaking and it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to hurt you. It’s supposed to make you recoil a bit. It’s showing you how exactly Lo’ak is feeling and how exactly Jake has failed him as a father in the last year. Lo’ak is not reaching out to Jake as a son who has just lost a brother, but as a soldier who has just lost his fellow soldier. I’ve seen some people say that because Jake doesn’t tell him “it’s not your fault” he still blames Lo’ak. I disagree with this. Jake tells Lo’ak to “focus” and to “not think about the past” not because he still blames him, but because he is going into protective dad mode and is realizing that he is in danger of losing the only son he has left. And Jake is not going to let that happen. His next words are asking if Lo’ak knows the way out, showing that he is thinking about his son’s safety and his life. He doesn’t want Lo’ak to focus on something he cannot fix or change, he wants Lo’ak to focus on getting out and surviving. At this point, Jake isn’t planning on surviving as well, but he has to make sure that his son will. He is refusing to let another one of his children die. You can almost see the thought running through his head that he may have failed to save Neteyam, but he is not going to fail to save Lo’ak.

The next bit where Jake basically tells Lo’ak to leave without him and let him drown is also absolutely heartbreaking. I think Jake has given up at this moment because he thinks he has killed Quaritch and is sacrificing himself to pay for his sins. Again, Jake blames himself for everything that has happened and I think he believes that he deserves to die. For failing Neteyam, for failing his family, for failing the people. For not being enough. I’ve always viewed his taming of Toruk in the first movie as Jake being willing to die to make up for his mistake. The taming of Toruk was dangerous and could have easily gotten him killed but he knew it was the only way to prove to the people that he was on their side 100%. And once again, after putting his life on the line to save his kids, to kill the one hunting them down, he is ready to die to pay for his mistakes. This whole movie has been, on Jake’s side, an exploration of how he has tried and failed to keep everyone safe to the detriment of his relationships with his children, Lo’ak specifically, up to this point.

And then here comes the moment that made me well up and cry (again) in the theater. Lo’ak tells Jake he cannot lose him too. I think this is a purposeful word choice on Lo’ak’s part. He doesn’t say “the family can’t lose you too” or “the people can’t lose you too.” He says “I cannot lose you too.” What a powerful, beautiful moment where Lo’ak is vulnerable with Jake and admits that he, personally, needs his father, especially after losing his older brother. And you can see at that moment Jake SEEING Lo’ak and realizing that while he may have failed Neteyam, he can be and do better for Lo’ak. That is what makes him fight. That is what gets him going again. He decides at that moment to be there and be a better father for Lo’ak.

I know some people are going to be like “but he didn’t say that!” And to that I reply, it’s freaking subtext bro. Not everything has to be spelled out to be true. It’s in the way the characters act, the decisions they make, and the things they say. It’s the way that Jake chooses to fight after Lo’ak says that. The way he listens to Lo’ak as his son teaches him how to breathe. The way he puts his life in his son’s hands and finally does what Lo’ak has been wanting him to do this whole entire movie: trust him. Honestly, it is such a powerful moment of non-verbal storytelling, of Cameron showing us how their relationship is starting to change and evolve and become better. It’s that moment of trust between these two that allows Lo’ak to save Jake and then when Payakun shows up and saves both of them, Jake gets to see his trust in his son pay off. It is confirmation that Payakun is on their side, that he taking care of Lo’ak and the people, and that Lo’ak was right about him the whole time. 

And I’m sorry, but if you didn’t start to cry when Jake cups Lo’ak cheek and tells him “I See you, son” then you may not have a heart. Like, damn, that one really hit me. What an incredible, beautiful parallel to the scene in the first movie when Neytiri saves Jake and they tell each other “I See you.” Absolutely gut-wrenching in the best way. I know some people are going to say “that’s just a catch-all phrase!” And I mean, yeah, it kind of is, but it’s been set up to be that way. It was always used to express heavy emotions that were hard to put into words in the first movie and it is being used in the same way here. It is a moment of apology, of acknowledgment, and of acceptance from Jake to Lo’ak. A moment where Jake finally Sees his son for who he is, that he is more than the parts of himself Jake sees in him. That he is his own person, strong and capable and worthy of trust. Yes, Lo’ak pulls some stupid stuff, but it has always been because he is trying to prove himself to his dad and now Jake Sees him and accepts him and loves him.

I’m getting kind of emotional just thinking about it, holy hell. 

I think this moment is Jake apologizing for how he has treated Lo’ak, acknowledging that Lo’ak has grown and matured and become his own person, and accepting the person Lo’ak has become. Jake is giving his son his love and his trust and his pride. He is so proud of his boy, y’all! You cannot look me in the eye and tell me that there isn’t a stupid amount of pride in Jake for everything Lo’ak manages to do. He was proud of him for beating up Ao’nung, even though he didn’t want Lo’ak to know, and he is proud of him here at this moment. I think this moment is also about Jake realizing that he needs to do better. He needs to be better, for Lo’ak and the other kids. That he may have lost Neteyam, but he still has children left that he needs to be there for. Be better for. That he can no longer let his fear consume him because by letting fear rule his life, he lost one of his children. Not that it’s Jake’s fault really, that 100% rests with Quaritch and the other humans who are trying to slaughter people and take over an entire world, but I definitely think this is what he feels. And gosh that family hug at the end, with Jake holding on to Lo’ak, and then later when he pulls both Spider and Lo’ak close for a hug once again shows how much he loves his kids. All of his kids.

To kind of wrap up this section, I do want to mention the really interesting parallel that’s set up between Spider and Quaritch and Lo’ak and Jake. Spider and Quaritch start the movie on shaky ground and then grow closer throughout the movie. Then the village burning, the Tulkan hunting, and the final confrontation happen and their relationship is put to the test. Spider still chooses to save his dad, but he leaves him afterward, choosing to sever their relationship, at least for the time being. In comparison, Lo’ak and Jake start the post-human era of their relationship off to a shaky start and throughout the movie, it is strained more and more. Then Neteyam dies and their relationship is put to the test. And like Spider, Lo’ak chooses to save his father. But instead of their relationship being severed, Jake chooses to embrace Lo’ak and there is a beautiful moment of healing and acknowledgment that things need to become better. A direct contrast to how Spider and Quaritch’s relationship ends in this movie. 

All this leads to what I think is going to be coming up next, specifically for Jake and Lo’ak. 

The Future Movies

Considering we left with Jake realizing that letting fear rule his life has hurt his family and he can no longer live that way, I think we’re going to see a return to a more pre-human dad Jake. I believe he is going to go back to being softer, warmer, and much less of a military dad. I mean don’t get me wrong, Jake is still going to be fighting the humans and kicking ass, but his entire arc was him realizing how he failed Neteyam as a father and now he will be striving to be better for all his kids. Especially Lo’ak. 

I definitely think we’re going to see them become closer in the next movie. Since the Way of Water focused on the strife in the relationship, I think we’re going to see the next movie focus on the healing in their relationship. The way they complement each other in comparison to the way they clashed in this. Jake has accepted Lo’ak as his own person and while their similarities are still going to cause some tension (because they are people who make mistakes) I definitely think we’re going to see them grow stronger and Jake really take Lo’ak under his wing. I would also love to see Jake help Lo’ak come to terms with his human heritage and what it means to feel different from everyone else. I think it’s possible since this movie focused on how Lo’ak feels like an alien and focusing next on how he isn’t alone in that feeling would be an incredible way to complete his journey to understanding himself. I also really think these two are going to bond over their grief about Neteyam and I would LOVE to see them discussing the guilt each of them carries and work through it together. I know that’s a lot I want to happen and I don’t know how long the next movie is going to be and how much it’s going to have to cover. I am confident about them getting closer and their relationship being a cornerstone of the next movie, but as for how much we see of Jake and Lo’ak discussing being “other” or their guilt is harder to say. I think it would be great though and would fit so well with the story Cameron is telling about these two characters.

I also think we’re going to see more comparisons between Spider and Quaritch and Jake and Lo’ak. I think Jake and Lo’ak are going to be the positive father/son example, not because they’re perfect but simply because they have come to an understanding in the Way of Water and are learning to be better together. I’m not sure if Quaritch is going to get a redemption arc or not (I kind of don’t want him to since the things he has done are pretty unforgivable) but with Spider added to the equation it does give him a reason to try to be better. If he does, then I imagine their relationship will parallel Jake and Lo’ak’s. If not, then I think there will be a really interesting contrast between the two. Especially with how much Quaritch mimics Jake during the Way of Water, which is setting them up as foils to each other for the rest of the series.

But those are just a few thoughts about what I think will happen in regard to these characters in particular. I’m considering doing a theory post that contains all my theories about the future movies, but that would be a separate thing if I end up doing it. I’m just really curious to see where we go from here. I think they are setting up a lot in this movie in regard to these characters and I’m honestly so excited to see it pay off. This is kind of where I think it’s going to go after everything this movie set up, but I am well aware I could end up being dead wrong. Either way though, I am so excited to see what Cameron has in store! Especially since it’s almost all but confirmed that the Way of Water made enough money to greenlight movies four and five.

Woohoo! 

Conclusion 

I love these characters. Like, seriously, Jake and Lo’ak are two of my favorites in this whole series. And I adored their relationship. Not because it was perfect or even good most of the time, but because it was complex and interesting and real. I’m always going to be a sucker for a good romance (Jake and Neytiri literally have my whole entire heart and I’m a big fan of Lo’ak and Tsireya), but I enjoy familial relationships the most. Their complexity fascinates me. The way family members, whether blood or not, choose each other and would die for each other but also sometimes tear each other apart. The way they showcase the idea of legacy and inheritance and how we are shaped by those closest to us. The way they exemplify the idea that we can love people with our whole entire hearts and still hurt them more than anyone else. People always bring their own baggage into their relationships with others, but I think that baggage affects our family members more than anyone else. And I believe that to be especially true between parents and children since our baggage often is what makes us who we are and who we are affects who our children become, for better or worse. The way our parents shape us and the way we shape our parents. The burning, ripping, tearing way we love each other. How there is nothing a parent wouldn’t do for their child and how often children are blind to that. The way that love can also be so healing, so warm, so soft, so gentle. The duality of it. I just…ugh. I wish there were more complicated, real, powerful parent/child relationships in media like this. Ones that aren’t completely negative or completely positive. Ones that are a combination of both because that is so often how actual relationships between parents and children are.

I am so glad this movie had it.  

But listen, I’m not here to tell you that you have to like these characters. I’m not here to tell you that you have to think Jake is a good dad. That is a loaded opinion and everyone is going to have different ideas and beliefs regarding what it means to be a good parent. I personally think a good parent is someone who protects their children at all costs and puts their children’s needs above their own. And I think Jake does that. But the movie clearly shows us that there are problems with how he does it. He makes mistakes. He is flawed. And that ends up hurting all the kids, especially Lo’ak. And Jake’s big character arc is learning that and realizing he has to do better. And choosing to try. To change. 

I know some people are going to be frustrated with the fact that Jake never verbally says the words “I am sorry” or “I will be better.” But I truly do believe that “I See you, son” included an apology. And the decision to be better is subtext from watching him at the end of the movie. Watching him choose to trust Lo’ak. Watching him embrace his son. Watching him grieve and mourn Neteyam. And hearing him talk about how he can’t live in fear anymore. And since that fear was what was pushing him to be harder on his kids, harder on Lo’ak, then deciding to no longer give in to that fear shows him making that first step to being a better father to his kids. I believe Jake thinks he failed Neteyam and he is determined not to fail his kids anymore. The first step of fixing a problem, after all, is admitting you have one that needs to be fixed. Jake will be striving to be better next movie and I firmly believe Lo’ak will be right beside him the entire time. This is a duo I think is going to play an important role in all the movies to come. 

So yeah guys. This is my post exploring my thoughts on these characters and dissecting how they grow and change throughout the movie. Looking at how the movie presents them and how it explains the decisions they make. I’m just here to interact with a film I adore and characters I would die for. And yes, I am here to hit back a bit against the “Jake doesn’t love all his kids equally” rhetoric. Because I do believe it to be false. And this is my insanely long-winded explanation as to why I think that.

I have a few more posts in mind. The one I mentioned about Neteyam and his role in the movie as well as the one I mentioned about all my theories about what is going to happen in the next movie. I also would like to do one about Spider and maybe even one about Kiri. I also think one just going over the parts of the movie I loved would be a lot of fun. But I haven’t settled on anything yet! I’ve been working on this monster since I saw the movie for the first time on December 15th so who knows when I’ll be ready to do another one, ha! We’ll see what ends up happening. 

Anyway. After an INSANE 10,000 words (a total that is more than any essay I have ever written), we are finally at the end. That’s how much I love this movie, these characters, and their relationship. So much so that I wrote this monster for absolutely no reason than my own enjoyment. I regret nothing. My English major self really came through strong here. For anyone who managed to get to the end of this…holy hell, my friend. You’re the real one! I hope you enjoyed reading my ramblings and exploration as much as I enjoyed writing them.

Till next time.

[nev3rfound]

option two : b.b

after nightmares continue to haunt his nights, bucky knows there’s one person left who could potentially provide some form of comfort, but is she still willing to see him after all this time? (1.5k)

masterlist / permanent taglist / etsy shop - requests open!

5k giveaway celebration 

warnings: angsty, sad bucky, minor spoilers for ep1 of tfatws  requested: nope, just something i’ve been thinking about since ep1 of tfatws

(everything on my blog is my own writing. if it is shared on another page or website without being credited, it has not been approved to be shared by me. all rights reserved.)

It felt real, as if he were back there holding the gun with no remorse.

Cold sweat covers Bucky’s body as he pants heavily, feeling the cool tags against his exposed chest rising and falling with his deep breaths that refuse to calm down.

He knew it wasn’t real, it was all in his head. But he knew it happened, even if it was many years ago, he still held the gun in his hand and pulled the trigger.

“It’s not real.” Bucky mutters to himself, glancing up to see the TV silently blaring a football game that he has no interest in, but it proves as a worthy distraction for the time being. “It’s not real.”

Remaining seated on the wooden floorboards with a blanket draped over his lap, Bucky glances over to his phone knowing there are two possible options ahead of him.

A sigh ghosts his lips as he stares at the contact list consisting of five names, only one having been used in the last week, well, month.

“James, you’ve got less than ten contacts in this phone and I’m the only person you’ve called all week.” Doctor Raynor sighs once more as she reaches for her notebook, not caring about the look of disdain crossing Bucky’s expression.

“It’s not like I’ve got anyone else to call.” Bucky shrugs it off, hearing her pen pause on the paper.

“Well, you’ve been avoiding messages from Sam for a start,”

“He doesn’t count.” Bucky remarks, hearing another quieter sigh leave her lips.

“Okay, then when was the last time you spoke to her, huh?” She counters, noticing his tense form relax at the mention of you. “Come on, James. If you want to help yourself, you have to keep in touch with those who still care about you.”

“I don’t even know if she does anymore, Doc.” Bucky admits, trying to hold back the sadness in his tone as Raynor closes her notebook.

“You have to try, James.” She reminds him. “Otherwise you’ll never know.”

Swallowing his pride, Bucky presses on the contact and listens as the number rings out. He’s counted the rings endlessly, knowing the hesitation there would be at the other end of the call.

“Hello?” He holds back the desperation clinging to his throat upon hearing someone answer, a loud yawn echoing through the line.

“Bucky?”

“Yeah,” Bucky lowers his head into his metal hand, even if it’s a different arm, it’s still part of the same tormented history. “I, could you come over?” A whisper leaves his lips as silence protrudes. “P,please?”

His ears perk up at the sound of sheets ruffling. “I’ll be there in twenty.”

Before Bucky can say his thanks, the line goes dead and the realisation sinks in; he’s going to see you again.

*

Bucky listens closely, hearing you outside of his apartment. He can hear you knock once softly, and a second time with more confidence.

He knows he should hold back a moment and pretend he hasn’t been hovering beside the front door since you hung up a mere twenty minutes ago, but he can’t help himself.

Unlocking the several locks covering the door, Bucky opens it a sliver, allowing you to slip in.

Keeping your head down, your focus remains on your feet as Bucky closes his front door before turning to you.

“I, I didn’t think you’d come.” Bucky admits quietly, afraid to hear what you have to say in response.

“Well,” You start, now lifting your head up to see him and your sentence falters in your mouth. You can’t deny that he looks worse than you envisioned, even during those late nights and early mornings when he woke up screaming in your arms, he’d never looked so grief-stricken like this.

“Yeah,” Bucky breathes out, following your gaze to his tired eyes, scratches covering his arm from attempting to claw it off in his sleep as sweat still clings to his chest. “it’s not great.”

You scoff under your breath as you follow Bucky through to his small kitchen where he pours you both glasses of water. “That is clearly an understatement.” Accepting the glass, you take the moment to reflect whilst he’s occupied. “How long has this been happening?”

Pausing at the sink, Bucky stares down into his glass of water, remembering the countless nights they attempted to drown him or try shock therapy. And how every time it didn’t work, he remembered it all.

“A while.” He mutters, his grip tightening on the kitchen ledge as his metal hand clenches around the glass, shattering it into the sink.

“James,” You call out, slowly rising from your seat and moving toward him. “I’m right here, you’re here too, alright?”

Standing beside him, you reach out for his hand, easing his grip on the counter until he lets go.

“You’re right here.” You repeat to him as his eyes remain tightly closed, his jaw locked and left hand still clenching the broken glass. “You can let go, Bucky.” The words leave your lips in a whisper as the remainder of the glass drops into the sink, and Bucky turns his body to face yours.

“It wasn’t real,” Bucky tells you weakly. “please tell me it wasn’t real.”

Without thinking twice, you lift your hand to rest it against his cheek and Bucky instantly cradles it with his flesh hand, keeping it in place.

“It wasn’t real, James.” You confidently state as he moves your hand and presses a gentle kiss against it. “Why didn’t you call me sooner?” You sigh as you both remain in the dimly lit kitchen, the only movement from Bucky as he turns the tap off.

“Nothings been the same since Steve,” He can’t help but trail off, knowing he doesn’t have to explain himself around you. “and I just couldn’t face it, not with all that history.”

Stepping backwards, you let your hand slip from his as you lean against the counter, crossing your arms. “But what about the rest of us, Bucky? You just stopped answering, after everything we’ve been through.” You try to keep your voice low, remain calm, but after all this time, it’s difficult to not let your feelings get in the way. “I’ve lost all of you. Sam, Wanda, Peter, Clint, Bruce, Thor and now you too.”

“I’m sorry, doll,” Bucky breathes out. “I never meant to hurt you, I, I’ve been making amends.”

Walking past you, Bucky rummages through his bedside table, revealing the well-worn notebook.

“Was that?” You don’t have to finish your question before Bucky nods, flipping through the pages to a series of names scribbled down.

“These are all the people I wronged or hurt or who were affected by the Winter Soldier.” Bucky explains, holding the book out to you.

He watches closely as your eyes scan over the names, flipping through the pages seeing those crossed out or circled or left untouched. Until you see the last name on the list, yours.

“Y/n, I’m truly sorry for leaving you, for causing you any pain.” Bucky begins to explain as you close the notebook, placing it back on the counter out of sight. “I know I can’t take back what I’ve done, for disappearing for months without warning, but I,” Unable to fight his emotions, Bucky cracks.

You reach out as he curls up to the ground, quiet sobs wracking through his body as you hold him close.

“It’s okay,” You shush him as you fall to a sitting position, Bucky curling his head into your lap once more. “we can talk about this in the morning, okay?”

“You’re not leaving, are you?” Bucky tenses beneath you before sparing you a glance, allowing you to see those blue eyes, the ones you’ve missed falling asleep beside and waking up to, those same blue eyes that hold so much pain you can’t comprehend.

“No,” You whisper, running your fingers through his short hair, missing how the long ends used to feel against your face in the mornings. “I promise, I won’t go.” You lean back against the cabinets as Bucky begins to relax beneath you, his metal arm outstretched whilst his flesh arm remains around your waist, hugging you close.

“This is real, isn’t it?” Bucky sadly asks, looking out toward the dark hallway of his apartment, seeing nothing besides the faint glare of the tv. “I, I’m not dreaming this again am I?”

The thought breaks your heart as you rest your hand on his shoulder, running your fingers along the faint scar that remains etched into his skin.

“It’s real, Bucky.” You tell him, trying to disguise the cry that is lodged in your throat. “And I’m not going anywhere.”

Despite your words of comfort, Bucky closes his eyes uneasily, wondering when he’ll wake up from this dream to the painful reality he truly lives in.

t a g l i s t (thank you for the support!) link in my bio and at the top of this piece to add yourself☺️(if your user isn’t tagged, it’s because nothing comes up sorry!)

@biss-stuff @psychicforest  @lourightm @mywinterwolf   @justsomedreaming @stanlux17 @smokeandnailz @supermoonchildbroski @xrosegoldwolfx @courtneychicken @marvelsangels @supraveng @tommy-lee-81 @smilexcaptainx @fandom-princess-forevermore @sarge-barnes-sir @pleasantlysecretdream @decaffeinated–fangirl @howdyherron @kirby-boo @florencxs @eldahae @handmesomecoffee @hi-my-name-is-riley @dev1lbella @thanossexual @alissaginger @sambucky8 @notbrooklynsblog @nikkixostan @cosmiccaptian @adoreyou976 @sarcasticallywitty15 @multi-fandom-princess07 @16boyfriends-and-me @courtneychicken @mackevanstan80 @torchwoodoctor @pleasantlysecretdream  @yougottalovefandoms @magicalxdaydream @soccer-100000 @tenaciousperfectionunkown @talksoprettyjjx @btsonthedaily @jessyballet @katiaw2 @buckyswildflower  @lucrea @weenersoldierr @katiaw2 @lucrea @amelia-song-pond @bluelakeee @dottirose @emilytheukuleleplayer @5-seconds-of-mendes @rudystilins  @bookfrog242​

[imagines-hoarder]

House Warming - Bucky Barnes

Summary: Hopping through some standout moments in making Bucky's apartment a place worth coming home to. (This definitely could have been a headcanon but I refuse to do headcanons at this time.)

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x reader

Word count: 2.6 k

Warnings: fluff with a lil angst

A/N: I have finished all the assignments left for my degree and decided to sit down and write today. This is probably trash but idc because it has been written and therefore I may as well release it. It's been a while since I've written and years since I've truly tried dipping my foot into a different fandom, but I figured I'd give it ago. Please don't forget to leave comments, I love interacting with y'all. Thank you @bwbatta​ for the dividers! xoxox

Masterlist

It all started with a damn candle. A ‘sandalwood & vanilla orchid’ candle tucked away in a reused cyan jar.

“I found it at the art market down the street last weekend,” you said as you placed it in the corner of the living room window. “You know we have to support local business.”

“And I shouldn’t assume this is your way of telling me my place smells, right?” Bucky quipped from the kitchen island, a cup of coffee in his hand and a lazy smile on his face. He’d just gotten back from a 12-day mission with Sam, and the last thing he had on his to-do list was to buy candles.

The smile grew firmer as you put yourself into his arms. “Complete opposite, actually. I bought it cause I thought it smelled just like you.” You hid your face within his chest, and he thanked the stars that you couldn’t see the warmth rising in his cheeks. His barren apartment felt a little bigger with a candle in the windowsill.

From there it became decorative pillows… and a couch to hold them. The small living room had quickly become a mess by the time you both had brought it up to his fourth-floor apartment, furniture wrap and packing peanuts strewn everywhere.

“I still don’t know why you needed to buy a sofa this big,” Bucky grumbled as he leaned over the back of the beige three-seater, looking down at your splayed out across its cushions.

“Don’t get me wrong, babe. I love the transient bachelor look you’ve got going on here, but you need more furniture than an armchair,” you mumbled between heavy breaths as you tried to regain control from maneuvering the couch into the apartment.

“And the pillows?” A laugh fell from your lips as you watched him look at the indigo cushions with a remarkable amount of disdain. Who buys pillows made just to look nice on a couch?

“They add character.”

“I didn’t think character was an area we were lacking in. Transient bachelor, remember?” He walked around the couch and shifted you over so he could lay beside you. You instinctively curled into him as you both closed your eyes. For a second the place felt like home. “I also don't know how you plan for us both to fit on this couch every day along with the pillows.”

“Don’t worry about it,” You looked up from his chest with a mischievous glint that made his heart skip. “It’s a pullout bed too. I’m sure it’ll be firm enough even for you.”

The home improvements didn’t stop there, but Bucky refused to admit how much he enjoyed them.

He liked having a place and person to come home to. After you had bought neutral bedding for his room, you’d spent an evening putting together ‘his and hers’ trestle bookcases for either side of the bed. He’d try to keep up his crabbish demeanor as you argued that ‘you needed a place to set your books for when you slept over,’ and a side table could no longer contain the small collection you had spilling over. Even still, he couldn’t find it in himself to banter much about the minor changes you made to make the place feel lived in.

And God, did he love living with you around. Between missions, his continued therapy, and trying to find his place in a world that had tripled in opportunity since his youth, he knew that he never had to question who he was and where he fit in when he walked through that door. You still occasionally slept at your own apartment when he was away, but he could always count on you being asleep in his bed by the time he came home.

One toothbrush in a glass became two, and from there, hand creams, face masks, and cotton pads cluttered the bathroom counter, packed away in their clear containers. You had made sure to keep lavender bath salts on hand for the late-night baths you took together when he woke up in a panic, unable to close his eyes again for fear of falling back into a nightmare.

It took time and working through plenty of hesitation before Bucky could progress from sleeping on the pull-out sofa to the bed, but ever since, you found your nights attended by restlessness whenever you weren’t wrapped in his arms.

Once your lease was up and you had a lengthy conversation about your inability to rest without him, you quickly filled the apartment with brown boxes. Bucky had been no less than astounded by how much you fit into them. From then on, no nook or cranny was without a vase or shelf.

“How many mugs does one house need,” Bucky asked skeptically while he continued to carefully pull them from their paper wrappings.

“Oh, come on! They’re fun!” You exclaimed, wrapping an arm around his waist as you took the Charlie Brown mug from his metal palm. “Plus, we go through enough coffee around here to justify some extra mugs.”

After you put the mug into the lowest shelf of the cabinet, you busied yourself with filing away the spices one cabinet over. No matter how much he tried, Bucky couldn’t pull his eyes away from you, lost in your own world as you chipped away at unpacking your belongings, making yours his, and vice versa. The domesticity in the little things you did was something he could get used to, and he wanted to return the feeling of normalcy as much as he could. He was far from the average boyfriend, but you remind him that could be a good thing. You never wanted to be average, but in these small moments, as you both did what normal couples do, he felt that he could create a new normal with you.

“So your Christmas gift came in already, and it’s too big to hide.” Your awkward tone carried over the phone as he exited a station ten minutes away from the apartment. Even though his neck ached and the cold nipped at the top of his ears, he couldn’t stop himself from releasing a breathy laugh.

“I thought you said you were good at this gift-giving thing, doll,” he teased you as he maneuvered his way to your shared apartment.

“Oh, don’t you fret, baby. I am the best gift-giver in all of New York City. I just slightly miscalculated how big this thing was and have realized it won’t fit into our closet.”

He tsked with a smirk on his face. “If you say so.”

“Hey, you gave me my Christmas gift a week ago.”

“Yeah, that’s because I didn’t know if I’d be back before Christmas.”

“Well, you will be, and I’m glad you are,” your voice softened lovingly as he pulled out his keys to the front of the building.

Bucky had gotten used to your love, but he’d vow to never take it for granted. All the pain he’d endured had somehow led him to you, the person who didn’t see his broken pieces as a burden or a project but as a potential to be whatever he desired.

When he hung up the call and unlocked the apartment, his brows furrowed into one; the apartment was pitch black. It was only when he heard your soft footstep walking towards the entrance that his face relaxed.

Before he could even kiss you, you had your palms firmly placed over his eyes. “No peeking; your gift is in the living room.”

The uncertainty in what you could have got him made his stomach clench. “Is it an animal?”

You slowly dragged him through the front hallway, making sure to avoid crashing into the entryway storage table. “I’m sorry to say it’s not alive.”

“Is it a nice welcome-home spread with candles, fruit, and the pullout bed all set up?”

He could feel your eyes roll to completion. “Easy there, sergeant. That’s for later.” You pulled him down to sit on the couch, and he kept his eyes closed as you pulled your palms away, moving to turn on a lamp. “Okay, Buck. open up.”

When he opened his eyes, it took him a moment to understand what he was seeing nestled against the wall; when he did recognize it, he could only form two words “Holy shit.”

“Holy shit indeed.”

He was quick to stand up and cross the room, eager to get a good look at the walnut centerpiece. “Does it work?”

You scoffed as you moved to kiss his cheek. “What kind of girlfriend would get her ancient boyfriend a broken phonograph console?”

He didn’t even attempt to answer as he bent down to wrap his arms around you, his lips eager to find yours. “A fucking Magnavox radio and phonograph,” he mumbled against your lips.

“A working Magnavox radio and phonograph, you mean.” When you pulled away and saw that his face held a glow reserved only for special occasions, you knew you had made the right choice. “I’ve got some records wrapped up if you want to open those now too.”

You yelped in surprise as he picked you up and made his way towards your bedroom. “I’ve got something else I’d like to unwrap first.”

Bucky Barnes had grown up in a period when the average family could seldom afford nice things or much of anything at all. The Great Depression has resulted in the slogan ‘Make it do or Do without,” being ingrained into what memories he still had, and 'doing without' had become commonplace for the Barnes household.

That’s why every gadget and gizmo you added to your household left him in awe. For much of his life, including the decades he spent as a weapon for Hydra, he hadn’t been allowed to call anything his own; he was still getting used to living so plentifully, both in love and in life. But now, he could barely move and he thought it had all been taken away from him.

The attack was supposed to have been contained, at least three miles away from the apartment. Anything less, and he would have made you visit your family upstate instead of just suggesting it. By the time Sam had told him that there’d been some confirmed damage within a block of the apartment, Bucky was already on his way home. He couldn’t think of anything but the worse: you trapped in a collapsing apartment building or pulling up to find no building there at all.

He felt his lungs fill with air again as he pulled up to your building, completely intact regardless of the severe damage less than a five-minute walk away. It felt like both seconds and hours between when he parked his outside and unlocked the front door.

“He doesn’t have his phone on him, mom. How am I supposed to…” you trailed off from your call as he walked into the living room, turning your head away from the Breaking News report you’d been glued to for the last hour. “Wait, I’ll call you back. Yeah, I’m fine. I’ll call you back.” Your eyes never left his as he walked over to you, hanging up the phone with worry in your eyes. “Buck, are you oka-”

You couldn’t even finish your sentence before he pulled you off of the couch and into his arms. His grip was less reserved than he usually kept, but he made sure not to hurt you, eager to keep you in his arms, where he knew you were safe. A single tear fell from the corner of his eyes as he realized the real possibility that he could have lost you if you lived even 5 minutes closer to the attack. You stayed like that for a while, gathered tightly in his arms as you both settled onto the floor You didn’t push him to verbalize his fear; you already understood it. And it took this occurrence for him to realize he never wanted to experience this feeling again.

Bucky was quiet for the rest of the evening, and while it worried you, his fear had been evident enough not to require questioning. The city-wide cleanup had lasted all hours of the night; for the first time in all the years you had lived in the city, the sounds of the whirring of vehicles clearing debris off the street had been too close to ignore. The sun was rising before a single word was said between you and Bucky, tangled together on the sofa as the first ray of light made itself known.

“You’ve spent so much time piecing this place together, doll.” His voice was raspy. You know he hates when you see him cry, but his pain was always evident in his voice. “And it could have been all wiped away in seconds.” You let a heavy silence settle between you as you traced a pattern into his shoulder. He couldn’t bear to say it, but you knew what he meant: You could have been gone within seconds. “I just… I don’t ever want to feel like this again.”

You’d both gone through so much to make your relationship work. Nearly normal was as close as you would ever attain to being an average couple. The distance, the days without contact, and the ever-present fear that anything could pull you away from one another was something that had taken time to work through.

You looked around the living room and saw the place you had built together. There were photos and books scattered on any flat surface, a leftover mug half-filled with cold tea, and a record left out on the phonograph. The apartment looked like what love felt like; a messy combination of everything you and Bucky. But this apartment could not contain everything that ‘home’ was; only Bucky could do that.

The words fell from your mouth before you could restrain them. “Maybe we should move.”

Your eyes found each other, and you both sat in silence, though it felt lighter, invigorated with the new proposition.

Before he even responded, you could see tension dissolve from his shoulders. “Where do you want to move?”

You hadn’t thought that far ahead, only being able to provide him with a shrug. “I don’t know… maybe upstate, maybe somewhere else.”

“Your mom would like you being Upstate.”

“My mom would love us living next door too, but I don’t see that in the cards anytime soon.” You got a ghost of a smile for that.

“We could probably afford a house if we moved out there,” he said as he moved his lips to meet your forehead.

“Buck, I’d move anywhere with you. As long as we have each other, then we have all we need to rebuild this place.”

He pressed soft kisses to the crown of your head, and you swore you felt his chest flutter. “Tomorrow, I’m gonna look for some places, bigger ones too.” He tilted your head up to find your eyes, and you were sure that all of the love you carried for each other was incredibly visible at that moment. “You have made this apartment something worth coming home to. Now let me give you a house to make a home.” Your skin tingled with adoration as you pulled him as close as possible, burying your face into his neck.

You didn’t want to let go. You wanted to lay in this room, in this bed, and in this moment until the end of time, but you knew that something bigger and better was on the horizon for you and Bucky.

“All I heard is that you’re buying me a house.” His laugh was music to your ears.

[hekate1308]

Fictober 2022, #26

Prompt: “I’m doing it, shut up“

Fandom: Death in Paradise

Rating: G

Pairings: Camille/Richard

Richard is not nearly as much a stickler for rules as she first assumed, or he pretends to be – really, he loves playing the stiff British man despite a tendency to bend the rules when he can and feels it’s right.

Even so, Camille knows that, between the two of them, she’s always been the one to think on her feet and perhaps do things in a rather… unusual way, rather than check the rule book. It’s part of the reason she did so well in undercover work.

Richard, for the most part, has come to accept that she will now and then rush in where angels fear to tread, and has even more than once covered her tracks when it needed to be done.

Anyway, here they are, watching Dan Allen drink in a bar. He’s suspected of being responsible for at least sixty percent of the contraband that flows into Saint Marie, and of course Richard feels very strongly about this, strongly enough that he didn’t complain when customs asked them for help.

“If we could just talk to him…” Camille muses.

“Yes, but we don’t have any evidence that would hold up at court” Richard reminds her.

“Look at him and tell me that man isn’t guilty.” Before he can say anything, she adds, “Yes, it’s a gut feeling, but humour me.”

It’s one of his sayings she has adopted, and it seems he accepts her request, for he frowns at Dan. “I suppose he does have a certain… air about him.”

“What gave it away” she says dryly as he knocks back another drink. “Say, we can’t talk to him as police, but he wouldn’t mind speaking to  a pretty woman who happens across him at the bar, would he?”

After all, one of the few things they know for sure is that Dan Allen is a bit of a womanizer.

“Camille, you’re not saying…”

“What? No law against it, is there?” After a pause she cannot help but add (as has become somewhat of a hobby for her because… well… she loves to see how he reacts) “Unless you don’t think I’m good-looking enough to catch his attention?”

“I – I didn’t say – of course you are – there is no – I just don’t think that –“

"I'm doing it, shut up" she decides because she can see that Allen is getting ready to leave, and she really wants to get something out of this – well, apart from having had another excuse to spend some time with Richard, but that’s neither here nor there (Again, as he would say).

So she gets up and, without giving Richard a chance to process, walks up to the bar, guessing correctly that he is the sort of man who prefers to approach the woman, rather than the other way around.

“Hello there beautiful.”

She forces herself to smile at him and is about to greet him or make some flirtatious comment when she sees the look in his eyes and the alarm bells start ringing.

She has met her fair share of men, and she knows that look. This is the kind who won’t accept No for an answer once he has decided he wants someone, and they can’t risk –

She decides to play naïve and simply ask, “Yes?”

But it seems that Richard read her body language correctly, because even as Allen licks his lips like a predatory animal and gets ready to answer, he calls out, “There you are, my love!”

And he strolls up to her, looking much more confident than he usually does – play-acting, she realizes. “I’ve been looking for you!”

He hesitates and she makes a split-second decision to press a kiss against his lips, since they are clearly meant to be together. Richard blinks at her, but quickly recovers. He turns to Allen. “Hello, I’m the husband.”

Camille takes his hand and, to her surprise, sees Allen back down. He must be one of those who doesn’t like being challenged by other man, since he immediately backs down.

They leave soon after that.

“Richard, thank you so much. Really” she says as soon as they’re a few streets away. “I had a bad feeling about this. You played the jealous husband rather well, really.”

Richard flushes scarlet and clears his throat, shaking his head. “Yes – well – it wasn’t difficult, not at all –“

A pause.

“To pretend” he then hastens to add, “That I was jealous. Or your husband. That’s what I meant.”

“Of course” she agrees happily because it’s too late – she has already realized what actually happened, and her heart is singing in her chest.

Not that cold and British after all, just as she knew all along.

She steps up and kisses his cheek. “Still – thank you. Again.”

When she pulls back, his face is still bright red, and she can only laugh.

She is ready to bet the next weeks and months will be very interesting in more ways than one.

[krreader]

loving you is a losing game | the aftermath.

pairing: park jimin x sister!reader ; kim taehyung x actress!reader fandom: bts  warnings: actress!reader ; language genre: angst ; fluff word count: 4k+ previous: x

summary: all that jimin ever wanted to do was protect you. this time, however, he failed you and his best friend, taehyung.

a/n: I told y’all I wouldn’t let you wait this time haha. I’m super glad to see all your feedback though, all your messages were wonderful and I love you all <3

Jimin had left that night when you and Taehyung had broken up. He couldn't bear looking into his eyes, knowing that he caused all this hurt to both you and him.

But when he walked back into the apartment the next day, he quietly sat down next to Taehyung for the first time since he found out about you and him and found Taehyung smiling at him.

Despite that, Jimin could tell that it didn't reach his eyes.

Throughout the next weeks, their relationship got better again. Still, he caught Taehyung stare at his phone so often and whenever the message from that special someone didn't come, he put it down and closed his eyes, visibly disappointed and sad. Jimin never mentioned you to him in those weeks, not knowing how to even bring it all up, but Taehyung didn’t seem like he wanted to talk about you anyway.

Simultaneously, Jimin tried calling you multiple times, but was never able to get a hold of you.

It was only when his mother finally called and told him that you had come home that he decided to drive up to Busan in hopes of mending the relationship with you... if that was even possible at thit point.

You weren't there when he arrived though. 

“Where is she?” he asked his mother as soon as he stepped foot inside the house.

“I don’t know... she went out a few hours ago and hasn’t come back since,” his mother fidgeted with the kitchen towel in her hand, “I’m worried, Jimin.”

Jimin knew were you were. 

Where you always were when you were upset and couldn’t stand being at home.

It was only a 10 minute walk to a secluded area at the beach where him and you used to spend all your childhood at. You often knocked heads with the family and whenever you did, you came here to think. The only one that you ever told about this place was Jimin, the only one in the family that you always knew you could lean onto. 

Funny how times had changed.

And indeed, there you were, sitting in the sand, staring out at the beach, not moving a muscle when he sat down next to you.

That’s a good start, right?

Jimin tried to find the right thing to say, but he couldn't. Nothing made sense when it was all his fault, when he was simply too proud to see you and his best friend dating, thinking that it was somehow wrong.

But what was wrong was you and Taehyung feeling this way because of him. He had only seen Taehyung, but he saw how heartbroken he was. He could only imagine what you must feel like, as Taehyung was the one that broke up with you... for Jimin.

“I looked up to you my entire life, you know? Way before you became an idol, even. Every time someone would ask who I wanted to be when I grew up, I answered Park Jimin. People would laugh, but I didn't care, because you were my biggest hero. You were the one person that always made people happy, were always happy to bring smiles into people’s faces and where always there when I needed you. And I was always so proud to call you my brother,” you turned your head to look at him, him looking right back at you with wide eyes, “Now I wish I didn't even know you.”

“You don't mean that,” he said quietly, but his voice broke nonetheless. 

“I guess it doesn't really matter anymore.”

“It does,” Jimin instantly grabbed your hands, “Please, listen to me. Let me explain why..-”

“BigHit was very kind and introduced me to someone from Marvel. They offered me a role in their newest movie,” you interrupted him mid-sentence.

BigHit? Jimin was taken aback at first, but then his blood instantly started to boil, knowing damn well they did that because they wanted you to leave for Jimin and Taehyung to mend their relationship, even if it meant further breaking that of him and you.

They couldn’t care less about your relationship with Jimin.

“I'm leaving next week and if things go well, I might stay. Being a Hollywood actress surely isn't so bad.”

“(Y/N), listen to me,” he shook his head to get BigHit out of his thoughts, “I just want you to..-”

“No, Jimin,” you got up, him instantly doing the same, “I don't think you realize just how much I meant what I said before.”

“But we're family! Stop saying these things, they don't make sense,” Jimin was a very emotional person. He couldn’t hold back his tears when he realized you were slipping out of his grasp fast. You were still staying strong though, “You're my baby sister. The one I'm always supposed to protect, the one that I can't lose...”

You gulped down hard, knowing the impact of what you said next, “You already have.”

You walked away after that, not being able to see the dispair in his eyes, before he slowly crumbled and started sobbing.

And even though you wanted to be cold, when you walked away, a few tears escaped your eyes, knowing that you just lost the love of your life and brother in a matter of weeks. 

But that was ultimately the reason why you had to leave. The loss of such important people, where everything reminded you of both, you wouldn’t be able to function anymore. So you decided that leaving was the best option.

Your mother must have known about this beforehand, because when Jimin walked back into the house, she instantly opened up her arms for him, her son cradling against her chest and crying into it like he was a young boy again.

“It’s going to be okay... she’ll forgive you,” she whispered into his hair, gently rubbing over his back, “Just give her time. Time and space is what she needs most right now.”

He knew that she was right, but not doing anything and just letting you leave was so fucking hard for him. He ended up staying at his parents the entire week, not knowing what to do with himself otherwise.

And it was only when he came home a week later and you had already left for the US, that he looked right into Taehyung’s eyes and knew he had to be the one to tell him that you were gone.

“Hollywood,” he repeated, a small smile spreading on his face. Jimin couldn’t see his eyes, but he assumed that it didn’t reach them, “She always dreamt of that.”

“Yeah... she did,” Jimin gulped down hard and continued to stare at Taehyung, because he could tell that he wouldn’t hold out for much longer.

And indeed, within seconds, he started sobbing, so hard, that Jimin instantly pulled him into his arms and tried to calm his shaking body best friend down.

And once again, all that Jimin could think was: this is all my fault. I destroyed their lives... their future.

In all these months that you were gone, Jimin didn't give up, even if his mother told him that it was no use. He kept trying to text and call, not caring that you never responded. The only way he could see was through promotional photos from set, through interviews and the only way to really know what was going on with you was when his mother told him about it. 

With each and every day you slipped more and more away from him, until one day he realized that he completely lost you, yet Taehyung was right at his side, holding his hand at a concert and smiling at him, showing him that he was still here... because he chose him.

Taehyung chose him over you.

And as Jimin was looking into his best friend’s eyes, filled with tears, Taehyung instantly knew what he was thinking about... or rather who. 

Not wanting ARMY to catch on, Taehyung pulled him into his arms and held onto him firmly.

“It's my fault,” he whispered into his ear, “We lost her... because of me.”

And unfortunately, he was right.

That night, Jimin and Taehyung sat down together on their balcony at home and talked about the entire thing for the first time... ever.

“How did it start?” Jimin asked.

Taehyung was hesitant at first, but then he started pouring his heart out, seemingly happy that he was finally able to share this story with someone, “It was when we had a concert here years ago. She came to watch it and I was having a really bad day. I locked myself in a room and just cried... or at least I thought I locked the door. She walked in on me having that mental breakdown. And you know her... she worried like crazy,” he let out a laugh, “She always worried about me. Right from the start.”

“She got that from our mom,” he said with a small smile.

“She stayed with me that day until I stopped crying, held my hand and told me that things would get better again. And the next day, she texted me this entire paragraph about how good I was doing and how proud she was, not just of me, but of the band. I felt... really bad about her worrying so much over me, so I asked her if she wanted to have dinner with me. She agreed, but then we couldn't agree on a restaurant and ended up eating Ramen at the Han. We talked all night long... just talked...”

Jimin listened tentatively, but his eyes became sadder within each second again, especially when he saw how much this still affected Taehyung. The more he talked about you, the more his eyes lit up, but then that flame quickly disappeared again when he realized this was all in the past.

“We did that once a week, then. Just meeting up to talk. We did nothing else for four months. And then one day I looked at her and I realized that I had fallen for her... without me even having noticed it. It just hit me right in the face. Like... wow. I really love that girl, you know?”

“Did you tell her?”

“Couldn't. I felt really bad for even having these feelings. Because... you know,” he looked at Jimin, but he didn't say that it was because of him, “I hid it for months until she called me one night, completely drunk and asked me to pick her up. I did, drove her home, got her into bed and that's when she began crying, poured her heart out and told me that she had fallen in love with me, but hated herself for it, because she knew that loving me would hurt you. And she couldn't hurt you, not when you meant the world to her.”

Great, he thought this couldn't get any worse.

“We put the cards out on the table a week later and realized that we only had two options. End it before it even began or try and keep it a secret so that you wouldn't get affected by it. We picked the second option and promised to not tell you until we warmed you up to the idea. But... that obviously hadn’t worked out.”

Jimin gulped down his drink in one go, swirled it around in his mouth for a moment, then quietly said after a moment: “Why'd you choose me when you loved her so much?”

A question that he had always wondered about.

“I thought it was the right decision.”

“You thought?”

Taehyung looked up at the stars, “You did so much for me in the past... I wouldn’t be here as the person that I am if it hadn’t been for you. So at the time, it made sense. But now that I see my empty future... I see that I fucked up. Because she was my future.”

Jimin didn't reply, just lowered his head in shame.

“I even bought her a ring, you know?” Taehyung laughed, though only to hide the hurt, “But that's on me that I didn't give it to her. I thought I still had time.”

“Maybe you do.”

Taehyung looked at his best friend, the sad smile back on his face, “It’s easier to forgive a brother than it is to forgive someone like me. And I can’t even blame her,” he pulled out the ring from his pocket, a beautiful ring that looked a lot like an engagement ring, but Jimin didn’t ask any further questions, “I’d pick her any day now over everything and everyone. But I don’t have that chance anymore. So all I hope for now is that you and her will be happy again.”

Jimin sighed deeply, “If I could turn back time, I would. I would do things differently, give you my blessing and tell you that I'm happy for you.”

Taehyung just leaned back, still playing with the ring as he continued to look up at the stars, “I know you would.”

You had successfully avoided your family for a while now, always putting your career first and not looking at anything other than. Your parents were often angry, up until you literally flew them out because there was no way you’d step foot into Korea again so soon.

But while you were now one of Hollywood’s upcoming actresses due to your hard work, your oldest brother had found love and was getting married. And well... this one, you couldn't get out of.

“Thanks for coming,” your brother hugged you when you finally arrived at the venue, “I missed you so much.”

“I missed you too,” you smiled, “And I'm so happy for you. I can't wait to finally get to meet the lucky woman.”

“Ha, you're just saying that, you'll tell embarrassing stories about me the moment that you meet her.”

You just wiggled your eyebrows, then smiled even brighter when you heard your mother let out a loud squeal and pull you into her arms, your father hugging both of you, not wanting to wait any longer for his daughter to be in his arms.

“Finally, my beautiful daughter,” she leaned back a little, tears in her eyes, making you and your brother chuckle.

“Mom, you're not supposed to cry yet.”

“Ah, stop it,” she hit your brother and then turned him around, “What are you even doing here, you need to get ready. I'll help you. And you? Don't run off, alright? I want to spend some time with my daughter.”

“I won't,” you chuckled and watched them disappear, your father just following them with a chuckle.

And of course, there was one person missing in the mix. Should have known that he’d show up sooner, rather than later.

“You look beautiful,” the voice made you take in a deep breath, then let it out once you were looking at him.

He wasn't the confident man that you once know standing there. He was unsure, nervous, sad, but at the same time, happy to see you.

“Thank you.”

“I wasn't sure whether or not you'd come. If I had known..-”

“Don't be ridiculous, you're his brother too.”

“I wasn't talking about me.”

A second later, Bangtan joined him, Taehyung immediately stopping when he saw you.

After all this time, you thought that you were over it. You thought that if you were to ever see him again, you’d just keep your cool, smile and be graceful about it, but your heart seemed to break all over again.

If it hadn’t been for Jeongguk, you maybe even would have started to cry as all the memories were flooding back in. Especially the ones about the break-up. 

“I saw your movie,” Jeongguk beamed, “You were so cool!”

“Thanks,” you shook your head a little, now focusing on the youngest member so that you didn’t have to look at either Taehyung, nor Jimin anymore, “I should.. probably go inside and say hello to everyone.”

Jimin took a step forward, his hand reaching out, but then he quickly dropped it, just like his shoulders did.

None of them were affected by you, only Jimin and Taehyung. Both of them were left standing there, even though the others followed you inside.

Taehyung was the first to speak: “I shouldn't be here. I'll only make her uncomfortable.”

“No, please. Please, stay.”

It was the desperation in his eyes that made Taehyung nod, ultimately.

Still, he didn't feel like he belonged here anymore. Not when he broke your heart and ruined so much in your family.

And throughout the entire wedding, he couldn't focus on anything but you. And as if you could feel his eyes burning into the back of your head, he often found you turn around to look at him, Taehyung quickly averting his gaze to look somewhere else instead.

On a more positive note, the celebration was beautiful, your brother's wife was glowing and he was the happiest you had ever seen him. Even if you had wanted to leave early... you couldn't. You had missed this, missed him, missed your mother and father, missed the memories all these three brought you.

And if you were being honest... you even missed Jimin. 

A conversation that you had with your mother a while ago came back:

“He visits a lot these days, you know? Jimin, I mean. He always goes up to your room and makes sure that it’s cleaned... just in case you’re coming back anytime soon.”

“I won’t,” you said plainly.

You heard your mother sigh on the other end of the phone, “You know, (Y/N), I will never presume to know what it must have felt like, your brother doing this to you and your partner betraying you like this. But do you want it to be like this for the rest of your life? Do you want to hate Jimin forever?”

“I don’t hate Jimin,” you hadn’t even thought about it, were even surprised when you said it, “I just.. don’t know how to forgive him.”

“You won’t know until you talk to him again, my love. You can ignore him for the next years to come, but you won’t come any closer to forgiving him. So if that is truly what you want... then talk to him.”

And so after you gulped down your champagne and took a deep breath, you walked outside and joined your brother that was standing on his own.

“So, you'll be the next to get married?” Jimin was so surprised when you started to talking to him as he was getting some fresh air outside, but you didn’t look angry. Maybe unsure of how to talk to him, but not hostile.

“What? With whom?” he laughed nervously, “I haven’t had a girlfriend in years.”

“Ah, I'm sure mom has a few girls that she's eyeing. What was that one girl’s name... the daughter of the baker.”

“Please, don't. I still have trauma from that awkward date that she forced on me,” you both snorted and suddenly the atmosphere between you felt like what it once was. And Jimin hated to ruin it, but he had to know: “Are you okay? I mean.. we haven't talked in a long time and I only hear what mom tells me.”

“You know how it is when your career is at its peek. A lot of stress, but a lot of rewards too.”

“I wasn't talking about your career, I was talking about you.”

You pondered over your next words for a moment, then you said: “I had a lot of time to think about everything. About my life,” you began to smile, even if only just a little bit, “I don’t know when I’ll be able to look at you and not feel hurt. But... when I look at you now, I also realize that I’ve missed you. And if my heart tells me that, then I can’t really hate you, right? So I would like to... I don’t know. Talk. A little. Maybe.”

And his entire stance changed instantly. His shoulder slumped, he began taking in a sharp breath of air and he was on the verge of tears.

“No, don't cry,” you shook your head, even let out a little laugh, “I’m just saying that I’d like to try again. You’re my big brother and... mom is right. I don’t want to spend my life trying to hate someone that I still love. Deep down.”

“I'd like that,” he said, pressing his fingers into his eyes when he couldn’t control the tears anymore.

You just smirked.

The wedding was slowly dissolving. The first guests had left hours ago and now it was only the family left, but even those were beginning to say their goodbye’s.

At a table, Bangtan was sitting with your brother, laughing wholeheartedly.

But one person was missing.

You walked back into the room where your brother and his wife had gotten married and found him standing at the altar, staring at it.

It was hard for you to come up with something to say, so you just waited until he finally noticed that you were here.

“Always thought I’d see you in a hall like this with a wedding dress on while you’re walking towards me, you know?” Taehyung said with a sad smile.

“It probably would have been like that if you hadn’t chosen my brother that night,” you approached him, to Taehyung’s surprise.

“Yeah, I don’t think he looks as pretty as you would in a wedding dress.”

This caught you off-guard. So much, that you actually began to laugh.

He always knew how to break the ice.

“Did you know that he used to wear mom’s dresses and play teaparty with me when we were kids? I thought he looked really pretty.”

“That’s very valuable information that I will bring up at the right time, thank you very much.”

Given your uncomfortable and awkward hello earlier, he hadn’t expected you to talk so casually with each other, but... maybe time healed some wounds.

Taehyung wanted to take a step forward to be closer to you, but he wasn’t sure if you were okay with that, so he just stayed right there.

“I regret it every single moment of my life, you know? Every waking moment I think of you and hate myself for what I did to you. For what I did to us.”

You didn’t reply, just gulped down the clump in your throat.

“If only I had made the right choice that day... if only I had tried to convince Jimin that I was good for you and that you would be safe with me... then maybe it would have been us standing here today.”

In regards to Taehyung, you also had a lot of time to think. Whereas you always just felt hurt in the beginning, you tried to put yourself in his shoes eventually.

What if it had been Taehyung’s sister that objected so much to your relationship that you knew it was either her, your best friend, or Taehyung? Would you have picked him and thrown away a year-long friendship?

Would you have picked him over the girl that knew your deepest and darkest secrets? That walked through hell and back for you? That loved you unconditionally and would forever, no matter what?

The answer to this question was the reason that you were the one to take a step towards Taehyung.

“But it is you and me standing here today.”

His breathing got uneven, even more so when you took another step towards him.

“How can I fix this, (Y/N)?” he whispered, “I’ll do anything... I swear, anything.”

You reached out until your hand cupped his cheek, your thumb brushing over the softness of his skin, “I don’t know how long it would take...”

Taehyung wrapped his hand around your wrist, making sure that you didn’t pull back.

“You have my life, (Y/N). I don’t care how long it takes, I will do anything to convince you that I’m not making the same mistake twice.”

It wouldn’t be easy, forgiving him, nor Jimin was something that you could do in a matter of minutes. But you wanted to try, so that your heart could finally get rid of all the hurt and hate.

So you wrapped your arms around him and hugged him, breathing in the scent that instantly brought back memories, but this time, all the good ones.

And so you smiled, Taehyung pulling you closer and burying his face into your neck.

“I’m so sorry, beautiful.”

And while the two of you were standing at the altar, hugging, Jimin was standing in the entryway with a smile and let out a happy sigh.

“Please be happy together... because I love you both so much.”

[pi-creates]

I hope people don’t mind – but I have a theory… one that’s been mulling around in my head for ages but didn’t really know if people would be interested in hearing it. I shared my thoughts with a few people and they seemed supportive of me sharing my theory further, so here we go.

Basically, I feel like something that the fandom deems as crucial to Violet’s character might actually be a misclassification. The short version of this post is that I theorise that Violet doesn’t have excessive abandonment issues (at least not to a significantly greater extent than any of the other characters), and what she is actually displaying is signs of survivor’s guilt.

From a behavioural view point, there’s a lot of overlap between both issues – withdrawing from others, fixating on other’s and their actions, being irrational at times as a defence mechanism, and applying unrealistic expectation on oneself and others. But the difference is the reasons behind those behaviours.

Someone with abandonment issues assumes that everyone will inevitably leave them. It leaves them insecure and assuming that they are somehow at fault for other’s leaving them. The thing is, this form of dependence on others tends to lead people to constantly be seeking approval, and they reel their neck in when they feel like someone is not going to agree with them. Basically, they become people pleasers who need constant reassurance that you aren’t planning on leaving them – but at the same time they keep things shallow, because they don’t feel like they can expose anything that the other person might leave them for. Then if things are on the rocks, they sabotage, if you push someone away before they reject you, then it doesn’t hurt as bad if they decide to leave. It’s a self-destructive cycle that centres around the person being anxious and not having trust in others to accept them as they are.

And while parts of that fits Violet, other parts don’t. I don’t feel like Violet comes across as insecure in what she offers to others or being afraid to have a contrary opinion. In fact, she seems quite confident in her skills and choices. There isn’t any hesitance to bring up tough questions or to  speak her mind when she doesn’t like something. She takes on a leadership role and makes decisions that she knows the bulk of the group don’t agree with at that point. It doesn’t come across as someone who is afraid that those people she’s disagreeing with will leave her. Basically, I don’t feel like she acts out of fear that people will leave her – she does express not liking that people leave and believes that certain levels of loss are inevitable, but it feels like cynicism rather than fear.

A big example of this is her asking Clementine in the first card game “Out of all of us here, which one is going to die first?”… to me, that doesn’t read as someone afraid of loss, it reads as someone who views loss casually and also doesn’t feel compelled to sugar-coat the morbidity of such thoughts to a newcomer or old friends.

But if you look at something like survivor’s guilt – it has some similar behavioural patterns, but those behaviours stem more from guilt than fear. They survived a situation when others did not, and I don’t think there’s any denying that everyone who’s still alive in an apocalypse situation has outlived a friend/family member, and potentially also been there when they died. And those thoughts of “Why did I survive when they didn’t?”, “Could that have been different?”, and “Was it my fault?” eats away at them. They start picking apart every detail of an event and questioning if they were responsible, or if someone could have done something to prevent it.

It doesn’t matter if it’s logical or not, they fixate on the idea that they could somehow have changed the events if only they said/did something different, they should have known the outcome and stopped it. It’s irrational, it’s placing the blame on oneself or others for situations that they had no means to avoid or predict. And all of that guilt and stress makes the people irritable, withdrawn, and regretful. They get so stuck in that moment of loss that they don’t move forward. They lose interests they used to have, they feel disconnected, they don’t trust people or the world to be safe or fair, they pull away from others...

And I think this sounds like Violet. It makes more sense with how she talks about her grandmother and the twins – we hear how she processes these events. She tells us what she was doing when someone died (or she believed they died) and how she should have been doing something else – for her grandmother she should have called for help, for the twins she should have been there and not in the greenhouse. And since we hear more about the twins, she goes further and talks about how she also questions the actions made by others – she feels like she could have changed the outcome if she was there instead of Brody or Marlon. When in reality, she couldn’t have known, she can’t change what happened, and it wasn’t her fault that those people died (or were taken).

I feel Violet did lose herself to a degree in those fixations, that’s why she withdraws and seems apathetic about things until after we learn that Minnie is still alive. Some of that guilt is somewhat absolved when it becomes clear that Minnie isn’t dead, it opens up the possibility of fixing her perceived ‘wrongs’ of the past (e.g., out surviving her). She talks about not liking arts and crafts – but she makes you a pin. She suddenly wants to dance with you when we had no indication this was an interest of hers before. She sings a song that she clearly used to hold to high regard when Minnie sang it – though we never hear her sing or hear her talk about her own voice. She’s a different person once the guilty moment is re-framed as something she can fix. Those interests she lost before are suddenly back, or maybe she’s just more open to reevaluate things and move forward with new interests.

And I think this also explains part of Violet’s ire in the captured route – it’s not just that she feels like you chose someone over her, it’s a literal replay of the thing she felt guilty about for years. She’s in Minnie’s shoes, but this time the people at the school know she was taken and not killed at the school – they could have stopped it in the way she wished she could have done with the twins. Then Clem shows up, and she isn’t exhibiting the same crushing guilt that Violet carried for so long when this happened to her friends – and that has to hurt.

Not only does the situation suck, but she’s being confronted with someone who isn’t coping with the “loss” of an important friend in the same way she did. I feel like it would only be logical for Violet to wonder why, and she is also clearly not in a good frame of mind and will come up with some of the worst possible answers.

Is she not as important to the others as Minnie was to her? Is she not worth the same emotional devastation? Was she wrong to feel the way she felt, or is Clem wrong for not feeling that way now?

The situation may be different, but after dealing with the traumatic experience of being captured, seeing Minnie again, and being manipulated into behaving – I don’t think Violet can think clearly enough to realise the differences of the situation. Clem isn’t dealing with the same level of guilt because her method of coping with the tragedy is immediate action… an option that Violet never had. It has nothing to do with Violet not being worth the same devastation as the twins, though I bet it still feels that way to her. So not only does the perceived betrayal sting worse, she also is being told she has the option of protecting Minnie by going along with the Delta – it just feeds into her preexisting guilt that she didn’t save her before, so of course she’s going to act in a way that she believes will make up for it.

And yeah… that’s my theory. Whether you agree or not, I’d be interested in hearing other’s thoughts on this – especially when I’m very aware that the abandonment narrative is seen as near universal amongst the fans. It just happens to not have been my initial stance, and I dunno, maybe an alternate point of view will be interesting to you guys.

[frost-the-ice-dragon]

So what else is going on during the Elemental Fighters AU?

Hi anon! Just wanted to say that my day has been going absolutely horrible and this ask cheered me up, so thanks for that!

Honestly, this AU kind of just started out as a joke, so I don’t have many actual plot points, but I’m more than happy to talk about what I have currently!

Okay so I already mentioned to @prime-pulse that I think it would be really funny if when they’re all dropping out of the plane onto the island to hunt Nya, Chen didn’t add any extra parachutes for Clouse. So when it gets down to the last parachute, the only ones left without on are Clouse, Garmadon, and Lloyd. Naturally, it turns into a free for all. Garmadon is fighting Lloyd to get him to take the parachute, Lloyd is fighting Garmadon to take the parachute, Clouse is fighting both of them for the parachute, etc.

I want to have lots of Garmadad and Garmason angst with them now being pitted against each other and Garmadon dealing with this new chaotic power that encourages him to fight and get involved in conflict when he really doesn’t want to fight anymore, but so far most of the AU is just season 4 except Garmadon and Clouse are duking it out in the background the whole time (well more than usual for that season anyway).

One thing Leaf and I wanted to make a comic about is Clouse (unknowingly) being the buffer between Garmadon and Lloyd being pitted against each other because every time Chen turns his back, Clouse is rearranging the fights so that he and Garmadon are opponents. Chen probably noticed after like the 10th time and is just like…. Well I wanted drama and to create strain in the father-son relationship, but this is so much better

Hmmmm another thing I want to be apart of it is maybe some Clouse angst? Like towards the season finale (this is @prime-pulse’s idea btw) Chen kind of lumps Clouse in with the other elemental masters and betrays him (cue Garmadon dragging Clouse kicking and screaming into a redemption arc and by redemption arc I mean becoming the weird uncle who only appears during family reunions and reads in the corner the whole time)

I would also want to explore Clouse vs. Garmadon fighting styles. Garmadon practices the art of the silent fist, but Clouse is freakishly fast and strong, not to mention his dark magic. Add in the fact that Garmadon’s powers feed on conflict and hatred and he could potentially exhaust himself quicker while refusing to fight because of that, etc, etc.

Honestly at this point I’m just throwing everything at the wall and I don’t really have a plot. I would absolutely love to finesse the story and possibly make an Elemental Fighters AU ask blog, but right now motivation has been in low supply and I got kneecapped by a new fandom, so I hesitate to do that in fear of creating an ask blog, posting 1 or 2 things and then just vanishing. But feel free to send in asks because I still have a lot of Thoughts about this AU and I would love to share!

(Oh and I should add that when Leaf and I first thought of this it was seriously just Garmadon and Clouse throwing hands every ten seconds, but then @keliharuza opened my eyes to the Garmafam angst! Thank you, it’s really helped the AU grow)