#i want to know every villains reasons for joining this cult

[orange-sunshines]

i have so many thoughts and ideas on humarise. like the dudes that bakugo fights mentions them being personally chosen by flect, which is such an interesting concept. were they chosen just because their quirks were useful or did he reach out to them because society failed them too? did he promise them acceptance and love or are they just simply selfish like bakugo says? flect’s characterization is a little weak to me, only because they don’t go deeper into it. i know it’s just a silly little movie but they have such good potential here

[y-rhywbeth2]

Gods and Clergy: Myrkul

Link: Disclaimer regarding D&D "canon" & Index [tldr: D&D lore is a giant conflicting mess. Larian's lore is also a conflicting mess. You learn to take what you want and leave the rest]

Religion | Gods | Shar | Selûne | Bhaal | Mystra | Jergal | Bane #1 | Bane #2 | Bane #3 | Myrkul | Lathander | Kelemvor | Tyr | Helm | Ilmater | Mielikki | Oghma | Gond | Tempus | Silvanus | Talos | Umberlee | Corellon | Moradin | Yondalla | Garl Glittergold | Eilistraee | Lolth | Laduguer | Gruumsh | Bahamut | Tiamat | Amodeus | The rest of the Faerûnian Pantheon --WIP

Now this is what I call a proper death cult. Now that I'm pretty sure I have all information on this asshole, here's Myrkul to finish off the Dead Three - He offers free hugs sometimes. Do not accept one.

Intro: We have too many death gods in this setting.

Clergy: Stuff like kindness is for the people who are currently dead, to hell with everybody who's alive.

Gray Ones: I know clerics usually make better necromancers than wizards who specialise in it, but come on.

Myrkul: Bane's got issues, but I think Myrkul might actually be the most effective villain here.

---

"Know me and fear me. My embrace is for all and is patient but sure. The dead can always find you. My hand is everywhere - there is no door I cannot pass, nor guardian who can withstand me." - Myrkul's dogma

"Make certain daily that all fear the Lord of Bones—who cannot be evaded, hidden from, or shut out. For the dead are his subjects, and the slide into death his pleasure and his dominion. Speak daily to all you meet of the Doombringers to come and Doombringers past— those moved by Myrkul to bring death, delivering souls to the one who shall have them all in the end, the mighty and the low-born, the cloaked in proud Art and the barely able to speak. Silently remind folk of death by your garb, the skulls you carry, and the finger bones you trail behind you as you travel. You fear nothing, or to harm you is to die." - more dogma

Myrkul's dogma that has caused a lot of confusion.

"Myrkul was the god of the dead, as opposed to the god of death [the instance of death and the transition between [life and death]], which was the province of Bhaal."

Bhaal is the god of death with a focus specifically on the moment life ends, he doesn't care about the before or after, only the moment of death. Myrkul was the god of those who have already died, shuffled off their mortal coil and joined the choir invisible - he's just a sadist about it and wants you to be aware of your mortality while you're still alive, and also enjoys it when you die. Kelemvor actually holds dominion over the dead at the moment, but I'll get back to him.

Myrkul is very keen to be feared; to remind the living that their time alive is finite, and once Bhaal ends that fleeting life then they will be in Myrkul's kingdom.

His divine portfolio includes aging, exhaustion, decay, the hours of dusk and the autumn months - things that remind mortals of the entropy looming over them throughout their every living moment, bringing you one step closer to his kingdom. Another portfolio of his is parasites: the hidden thing inside you, sucking your life away. It's so important to Myrkul that you remember that you are ageing. You are always dying, slowly.

To this effect he really enjoys crashing funerals, manifesting in front of the grief stricken funeral goers to remind them that one day they'll die too! He'll also drop by at night and visit you in your nightmares, for the same reason.

He lost rulership of the dead when slain in the Time of Troubles by Midnight (soon to be Mystra), and the portfolio eventually passed to Cyric and later to Kelemvor.

Now that Myrkul has returned, Kelemvor remains god of the dead, but Myrkul maintains his older domains. He is the god of the slow march of life into death, with all the aspects mentioned.

He's also the most sadistic asshole, but I'll talk about that further in.

Temples of Myrkul begin with a mausoleum built above ground (as big as possible and decorated with the most intimidating statuary the builders can think of), which extend into necropolis underground, which are guarded by undead. The temples are often filled/covered in smoke from the crematoriums inside. The walls are decorated with images and statues of people of all genders, races and ages depicted in various forms of death and stages of decay.

-

Myrkul and his worshippers, known as "the Anointed" are and always have been extremely unpopular. He receives offerings at funerals, but nobody particularly wants to worship him, and those that do are regarded with fear and the subject of rumour and horror stories.

His few priests come from people of a morbid bent, who enjoy the fear and the tales of how they can sicken and kill others through a mere touch, or that those who offend them in any way will die - and that all Anointed will know when one of their own has been killed, and by who. Anointed don't actually kill anyone as a rule, that's a job for Bhaalists, but they do make a special exception for people who pretend to be one of them in order to exploit their intimidating reputation. Such people die in spectacular, public fashion - as painfully as possible.

They also make an exception for law keepers and others in positions of power who try to oppress the study and practitioners of necromancy, although finding non-lethal means of making these people change their ways is common enough.

Myrkul's followers are to speak as little as possible, and when they do speak they speak as softly as they can while being as laconic as they're able. "It is poor form among the Anointed to show emotion when one can instead speak coldly and flatly, and maintain apparent calm."

At this point, people are so desperate to stay away from them that a Myrkulite can flat out just walk into your house and take whatever the hell they want. You like being alive and look forward to a happy afterlife and are not going to stop them. Many Myrkulites get extremely rich this way, and Old Lord Skull himself doesn't seem to care.

When in public they Anointed always wear skull half-masks, coating every inch of exposed flesh on their body with ash. They also carry human skulls with them - due to the skulls, they've often known as the "Grinning Anointed". While at the temple, or on ceremony, they wear full body, deep hooded black robes, tied around the waist with a white sash, and forgo shoes in favour of being bare foot.

Their entire job, as far as the living go, is basically to torment people and remind them that their life is ultimately pointless and that they're going to die.

While they're absolute monsters towards living beings. whom they and their god abhor, the Anointed typically hold those who are dead in reverence. Resurrecting the dead is a blasphemous act forbidden by the faith, and Myrkul only rarely permits it in exceptional circumstances (although a technical loophole exists in that you can get a priest of a different god to bring back a dead person for you.)

Other, less sadistic, duties include carrying out funerals and seeking out and burying the lost dead. They seek to make the dying comfortable in their last moments, and help them get their last affairs in order - a duty that they now, presumably, share with Kelemvorites. Myrkulites will typically go out of their way to make sure that the last wills and testaments (and similar) have reaching effects after a person's death, so that they may hold influence on the living from beyond the grave. Another thing they share with Kelemvorites is that they personally do not view death as unnatural or something to run from. Where they differ is that Kelemvor teaches the living not to live in fear of death, while Myrkul wants mortals in constant dread.

Myrkul's priests are often blessed with a high tolerance for disease, which makes them particularly useful for disposing of the bodies of plague victims.

Myrkulites often have a special reverence for necromancy, again due to its ability to allow the dead to affect the living. They call it "the sacred hand that reaches from the grave."

They are also charged with spreading tale of those the faith reveres as "Doombringers" - those driven to avenge the dead; friends, lovers, mentors and other loved ones sent or driven into death one way or another by the actions of their target/s.

A Myrkulite can be hired as a doombringer, the cost of which is sometimes called a "skull fee", however they will not work for the still-living. They can only be hired on behalf of the dead, or in advance of one's death.

Myrkulites should not expect much of a social life outside of the other Anointed, and most will leave wherever they were raised and/or lived, as their communities certainly wouldn't appreciate having a Myrkulite in their midst.

The clergy contains many titles, each conferring a specific necromantic spell taught or priestly duty (most of which are not actually described). Once these were in rank, however in recent times the hierarchy has become a loose grouping by age and experience into Initiates, Lesser Anointed, Anointed and Higher Anointed. Myrkul did away with the concept of high priests after certain incidents involving a rebellion against him.

The titles used to be: Daring One, Night Walker, Bone Talker, Shroud Wearer, Crypt Carver, Bone Dancer, Ritual Consecrator, Undead Master, Withering Lord, Deathbringer and Elder Doom (the later of whom have influence beyond a single temple or settlement).

Bone Dancers perform ritualistic dances that animate the dead as guardians of a site. Ritual Consecrators are basically the clergy's craftsmen, responsible for dedicating the altars, making the scythes and preparing the materials for magic. Withering Lords use magic that causes living flesh to wither and die, and Deathbringers can cause you to drop dead by pointing at you.

Anointed greet their equals and juniors as "Death [Surname]" and their senior clergy as "Most Holy Death [Surname]."

Lower ranks owe little in the way of reverence to their seniors, aside from obeying reasonable instructions and offering aid, money, food or shelter when the moment calls for it. The senior clergy should not be living off of the backs of the lower ranks, and if they attempt to abuse their power then the junior clergy are free to defy them.

Initiates to the faith are taken into the crypts, to meet the corpse of a former high-ranking priest. There, the ritual spell speak with dead is used to allow Myrkul to address the initiate personally, imparting his dogma upon them.

Myrkul is known to visit his favoured followers to give them a hug. Said hug is full of necromantic magic and is highly likely to kill you. If it doesn't you will be horrifically withered and traumatised for life, but Myrkulites consider survivors to be blessed.

When Cyric took over as god of the dead, unlike their Bhaalist and Banite counterparts who had schisms and purges over it, the Anointed simply carried on as usual. Their complete indifference was about as close to enthusiasm as Myrkulites get. While many were just as indifferent when Cyric was replaced by Kelemvor, he proved to be a bit more controversial, due to the ban on necromancy.

Myrkul is worshipped at dusk every day during a ritual named the Dusking. Grave dirt, or the bones and ash of the cremated, are offered to a black altar decorated with bones. Above the altar a human skull is enchanted so that it floats and glows dimly. The purpose of the daily ritual is to remember that death follows closely behind all living creatures, and those who don't chose Myrkul as a patron deity are encouraged to give their own offerings. The begining and ending of the ritual is marked by the toll of a bell (a deep, reverberating one, not a high note). Each time an offering is made the bell is tolled again. Particularly devout Myrkulites will hold a personal prayer at any time during the hours of darkness that night.

There is only one holy day, held during the Feast of the Moon when everybody honours the dead. Myrkulites call it "the day the dead are most with us." It's believed by them that the dead walk the world as ghosts to seek their loved ones, enemies and descendants - either to observe or to pass on messages. They celebrate the dead with chants, prayers and hyms and end the day with a ritual called the Flagons of the Fallen, where they set glasses of wine on fire with magic to grant the spirits a momentary respite from their "eternal chill."

-

The priests that dedicate themselves to Myrkul alone amongst the gods are the Grey Ones (also known by the nickname, "fingerbones")

Grey ones are master necromancers, and can command far larger hordes than normal. They are also masters of lore regarding undeath, all forms of undead and the outer planes and the fate of souls.

They're resistant to any spell effects that cause death

They do not display any negative effects of any diseases or parasites they may be hosting, although they can still contract them. For example, an Anointed could visibly have leprosy, and it will kill them, but they won't feel it or be bothered by it until it actually kills them.

They can magically put themselves into a state where they appear to be dead to onlookers.

They can summon Deaths to serve them - grim reaper looking undead who serve Myrkul.

They can wither living flesh at a touch.

Once a tenday they have access to a unique spell called the Hand of Myrkul, this wreathes their hand in flame. If they touch a living creature with this hand, then the victim must make a successful roll or they will die. If the target dies, the Gray One must also make that same roll, or be slain themselves.

They can stagnate water and create or worsen structural weak points in inanimate matter.

They can turn wounds and injuries necrotic.

They have a unique version of the spell finger of death where the priest points a finger bone at the target, says the incantation and if the damage caused kills the target then they can't be resurrected. If they don't die, then the Myrkulite can perform a ritual involving holy water that will turn them into a living zombie under their command.

-

Myrkul himself is a Neutral Evil deity and his domain is in the Lower Planes on the Grey Waste of Hades. Born Myrkul Bey al-Kursi, a talented necromancer and Crown-Prince of a kingdom called Murghom. His kingdom was a vassal state of the ancient empire Mulhorand, and the prince wasn't satisfied with such meagre power. So off he travelled, eventually running into Bhaal and Bane, who were already allied and being compelled to seek out and slay ancient gods due to horrific visions being inflicted on them by the god Jergal. This, of course, is what we call an opportunity for better power, so Myrkul joined them and the three went on to steal divinity from many beings and ended up becoming the Dead Three. He was slain by Midnight, who would become Mystra, in a battle in Waterdeep during the Time of Troubles.

Myrkul's personality is described as cold and malignant, and the god himself is known for his cruel intellect. He never gets angry or raises his voice, only ever speaking in a whisper. Whenever his plans are foiled by mortals he only ever responds with amusement.

Sometimes, just to keep mortals on their toes, he pretends to be kind.

Myrkul's avatar is much like the traditional grim reaper (scythe included), but with four arms, and his face still has some skin - flaking, withered skin covered in lesions and his lips and black and cracking. His sunken eyes "gleam with a cold, evil light." He levitates rather than standing on the ground. His touch is lethally icy, both physically and on a spiritual level. He can also inflict a flesh-eating disease on people though touching them. Regardless of how much damage it inflicts, after being in physical contact with Myrkul, a living being sees all other living beings around them as corpses for a varying period of time. His scythe causes fatigue and weakness in those it touches.

All skeletons and zombies obey him absolutely, regardless of who created them. Much like Bhaal, Myrkul can create any form of undead by touching a corpse, and sapient undead such as mummies and vampires created this way are bound to his will for a single task after which they are fully free willed. He can reduce all undead to dust with a touch, and they cannot harm him in any way.

Myrkul also manifests as a flying human skull with lights in its eye sockets, and can vary in size from normal skull to being six foot tall. He can also manifest as a skeletal arm wielding a scimitar, which has much the same effect as the scythe.

Myrkul can cast any spell except those that create light as a primary effect.

Naturally his divine servants and messengers are undead, and he's been known to unleash armies of the dead on the living.

Various things Myrkul will send to his faithful to show his favour or disfavour include; bats, panthers, hell hounds, nightmares, black roses, jet, obsidian, onyx and corvids. The animals will aid his faithful, if in favour and cause harassment or harm to show his disfavour. They can also be sent to attack his followers' enemies.

His top hits in contribution to the Realms include:

Undead krakens

The Wall of the Faithless. Nobody actually asked for the souls of those who cannot be claimed by any of the gods to all be packed together and turned into a mouldy, eternally screaming wall where they will experience agony untold for millennia as their memories and sense of self are slowly eaten away until nothing of them is left. But Myrkul is the gift that keeps on giving, so he gave the Wall to the Realms anyway.

The Spirit Eater Curse: So one of his old Chosen, raised from birth to serve him with blind loyalty, got a girlfriend. Then this girlfriend ended up in aforementioned wall of screaming souls. Said Chosen rebelled in order to rescue his girlfriend, so Myrkul did the only reasonable thing and put him in the Wall (even though this is a breach of divine cosmology) and then took him back out when his personality had been erased and dumped him back on Toril. What was left was a soul eating parasite - a void that feels only hunger and can never be filled, ruining thousands of lives and leaving spiritual desolation wherever it went. Did this have anything to do with being a punishment for the former high priests rebellion? Sort of, but ultimately, not really, no. This was Myrkul's equivalent of Iyachtu Xvim and the Bhaalspawn; as long as the curse exists, a fragment of Myrkul remains in the world and he cannot die.

The Crown of Horns: Originally crafted by Jergal. A circlet made of electrum, with four bone horns at the corners and one large black diamond centred over the brow, radiating necromantic energy. Before the Second Sundering, the crown hosted a portion of Myrkul's essence. The crown has mind-affecting magic that sows discord amongst all in its vicinity who don't worship Myrkul, who it can bind to the yugoloth fiends of the Lower Planes, and its power also drives them to covet the crown. All who wear it have their minds consumed by Myrkul as it slowly turns them into a lich. They usually then start acting as an evil necromancer overlord, raising the dead and trying to take over the nearest city/kingdom/whatever. At their worst, wearers of the crown have been strong enough to challenge Bane's church (although I don't think they've tried).

Myrkul's been keeping the crown teleporting around the world, post Time of Troubles, landing out of reach of meddling Harpers and kept within reach of idiots. He apparently greatly enjoyed the experience of brainwashing vast swathes of people into mass murder, moreso than he did actual godhood.

[rubbish-and-whatnot]

Hello, can i request a Yandere Eyeless Jack but the MC works for a different entity? Would they clash or just passive? It's up to you if you want to make the MC human or whatever you want.

If possible, i want the mc to be completely devoted to the entity they're working on, they work for it willingly and have accepted it whole heartedly. Bye i asked for too much 🥰.

Eyeless Jack x rival! cultist! reader

(unedited) I had some fun writing this one. I may have taken a few liberties here and there. Let me know what you think! I have extra time away from work for requests because of Hurricane Debby. Thanks Debra <3

The restraints on the hospital bed were a little tighter than comfortable. You thrashed around nevertheless trying to at the very least loosen them enough to slip through. When that didn’t work you screamed out in white hot anger. 

“Let me go! This isn’t fair,” You cried out to your captor who was just casually sipping his coffee and doing his crossword puzzle at his desk. 

“Do you renounce your allegiances to… what’s his face?” He waved his pencil around in the air as if to find the blank in his mind. 

“Of course not! He is my life. He is my blood! He-“

“Then no. I’m not letting you out of those restraints until you are fully deprogrammed,” he flipped the page and sighed. 

Eyeless jack. A formidable foe who works under the being called The Operator. In the past year you’ve made a group of amazing and trustworthy friends. Found yourself living in a new community. Cut your ties with your family. Made an excellent relationship with the prophet. Really threw yourself into your faith. Jack, however, has been on your trail every turn. Every book club, every fundraiser, every hunt he was there. Being a devout follower meant a very healthy social life, don’t ya know?

“How is my thing all that different from your thing?! We’re both just putting in the work for a cause we believe in,” You stop thrashing to take a breath. He snapped his magazine shut and spun around on his chair. 

“It couldn’t be more different. I am bound to my entity, you’re trapped by your own mind,” he placed his hands firmly on the guards on either side of your bed, “If one of us can actually be free then I will find away. Until then it’s restraints and force-fed meals for you.”

“You are so stubborn!” You hollered. 

“Said the cultist,” he replied. 

“I am not in a cult.” You said defensively for the billionth time. 

“Oh really. Then why do you follow what the prophet says so seriously?” 

“Because it’s a sin not to. Those who don’t trust the prophet are punished by the community, they are the conduits for Thalorgorath’s will.”

“See that is something that was drilled into you verbatim. Most people don’t take their religion that intensely. Also most religions don’t punish the non-believers by using people they thought they could trust,” Jack wrestled with one of the guards to slide it down into place and take a seat on the edge of your bed. “You used to be so full of life. The way you would laugh with your whole chest. I remember how you would sing at the top of your lungs with the radio blasting and the windows down. You glowed,” Jack took a strand of hair and rolled and twisted it around his gloved fingers. Your sparkle had dimmed so immensely since you joined that cult. You’re paler, more solemn, all seriousness and gloom. 

Jack was stationed to work mostly in a specific small town, your small town. He saw you before and after. Now, it really did help that you began to interfere with his work. That’s the only reason he can have you here now. You were looking for a sacrifice for your god and half the time that just so happened to be Jack’s next target. So your paths began to cross regularly. You would always flee the scene in a villainous ‘I’ll get you next time for sure!’ kind of fashion. As time passed and you kept returning empty handed you began to get more and more desperate. You began to waste away. 

“I brought you here because I care about you more than anyone in your community ever could. Their love is conditional on how devout a follower you are. I like you just the way you are. Good. Evil. Atheist. Cultist. I just want the real you back,” he sighed. 

You shuffled uncomfortably. The memories of before, seeing Jack and talking with him, sharing a coffee with him on the outskirts of the woods. They were comforting and feeling awfully compelling in this moment. There was a time you thought you might’ve liked Jack yourself. But that’s all in the past. A life of sin you must spend the rest of your life atoning for. 

“She’s dead.” You spat. 

“I don’t think that’s true,” He let go of your hair and started rifling in his pockets, “If your prophet were so holy then explain this,” he laid out several polaroids of the man in question. Him living in a lavish house paid for by all the tithes that were so important. Him indulging in the sin of the flesh again and again and again, coercing members and sex workers into doing exactly what he wanted. Him with his stockpile of illusionist supplies for his miracles. Even a picture of him sitting on his couch with his legs propped up on the coffee table on top of the holy text. And one of him spilling his beer on it. We weren’t even allowed to drink alcohol. It was considered contraband that was worth ten lashings. 

You just sat there and stared at them, your brain doing figure eights trying to make sense of it, and not liking that it kept coming to the same conclusion. 

“I don’t want to look at these,” You clamped your eyes shut and turned your head. Some jostling around your bed didn’t make you open your eyes but the sound of tape being ripped of the dispenser did. Jack stood on the mattress and taped the polaroids so they’d hang down from the ceiling right in your line of sight. 

“It sounds like they’re working then. I’m going to keep these up until I get new ones. But for now,” he hopped off and dusted off his hands, “It’s time for lunch. I’ll grab you a sandwich and juice,” he waved on his way out the door. You sunk deeper in bed and blew some hair out of your face. 

Jack often slept in the infirmary so this wasn’t much different. Now though he found himself watching you sleep rather than his usual ritual of tea and a book before bed. There was plenty of time for that during the day. This was the only time he could look at you without your harsh glare stabbing back. There’s no cult. There’s no hate. There’s just a guy looking at the women he can’t stop thinking about. Jack pulled up his mask and kissed your forehead before switching the lamp off. 

It was rainy. Weeks have passed now. You wouldn’t talk much at all anymore. You just watched weather pass out the window, maybe the occasional deer or cryptid. It was so hard to believe in a world where all of that impossible bullshit exists, to comprehend that the one thing you truly believed in was a sham. Your days were mostly you and your bed and two walks (handcuffed to Jack) to keep your muscles in functioning condition. Eerily enough, you stopped putting up a fight. So here you sat. Still and lost in your own mind. Jack would glance up from his book every now and then to look at you. The rain pattered against the window that was open just a crack, just enough to smell just a hint of petrichor. 

“Do you remember that first night that I almost found my sacrifice?” You asked wistfully, watching the droplets merge and plummet to the edge of the pane. 

“Uh… yeah. He was my next target. Didn’t put up much of a fight since you scared him real bad before I even got there,” He turned another page. 

“And you tossed me behind you so you could get to him first,” You laughed a meek little chuckle. 

“I didn’t realize that you fell on the ground. Then you grabbed my ankles taking me down with you,” He laughed too. 

“We were slathered in mud and dead leaves,” You began to laugh harder. 

“It got in your mouth too. I remember you trying to spit it out,” He smiled a the memory. 

“…I’m starting to wonder what it was all for,” you returned to your previous state of sitting upright and staring out the window.

“A stupid man with a god complex got in your head. It happens to the best of us. I’m just glad there was no Koolaid involved,” He cradled his chin with his interlaced fingers. 

“Flavoraid.”

“Huh?”

“It was Grape Flavoraid in Jonestown. Not Koolaid.”

Jack woke up with a startle and saw your bed empty and the restraints cut through. It had been several months and you had made excellent progress. Still you didn’t talk much, but when you did It wasn’t nearly as crazy as you’ve sounded in the past.  

He was so close to trusting you enough to let you go, but was it all a lie? Were you faking it to just run back to your community? Was everything you both worked through a ruse? He threw the blankets off the bed. Wretched the closet door open and slammed it shut. In his frenzy he didn’t notice the steam coming out from under the bathroom door. 

You opened and stepped out of the bathroom and continued to towel dry your hair. Jane had lent you some of her clothes, which were more risqué than you’ve worn in years (that’s not saying much though. It was a very modest community you lived in). Jane was a firm believer in if you got it flaunt it. She was just helping you along. Either way you paired the black slip with a sweater underneath for maximum comfort. You pressed the pedal to the trash can and dropped your old cloak into it. 

“Y/n?” Jack stood still and gaped at you. 

“Hey,” you dropped your towel onto the bed and began to make it. 

“Are you… feeling alright?” 

“I feel… different,” you walk up to him and take his hands into yours, “I’ve been thinking about it and I wanted to say thank you. You believed in me even when I didn’t,” you tried not to sound emotional but it came through in croaks and cracks in your soft voice. He felt you press something into his hands and curl his fingers around it. You walked up to the doors and hoisted up the duffel bag he didn’t notice there. In his hand was an old, used, wooden coffee stirrer, one that’s branded with the initials of the cafe you would buy both of your coffees from. 

“You’re leaving? So soon?” He followed you out of the infirmary and down the hall. 

“I need time to figure the rest out. You brought me to the water and now it’s time for me to take initiative and drink,” You adjusted the strap on your shoulder. The duffel was filled to the brim with supplies you scrounged up from all over the house. Nothing that would be missed. 

“But there’s always space for you here. Even if you aren’t with me in the infirmary we can set up a room for you. Just for you! We can put anything you could want or need in it,” He snatched your arm, you stopped in your tracks. 

“Jack. I need to start fresh. I want a new town and a new name. I want something normal. Uncomplicated,” You grimaced. He took a long pause mostly because of the frog in his throat. 

“Then I’ll make it easy for you,” he handcuffed his wrist to yours. “We’re in this together. Whether you like it or not,” his voice was more grave than you’ve ever heard it before. 

[momo-t-daye]

For the ask game: 3, 18, 19, 26 👀👀👀

Thank you for the ask~!

3.) Can you describe your AU badly?  (Because I do love hilariously misleading but not actually inaccurate descriptions of stories)

Just because Severus’ best friend sorted into Slytherin with him and he’s basically friends with the Marauders, doesn’t mean he's going to make good life choices.

and/or

"That escalated quickly"

18.) Does Voldemort exist in your AU?  Does Severus join his cause at any point in your AU?

Oh yes, Voldy exists in my self-indulgent AU! Partly because it’s fun to inflict awful small children on wannabe evil overlords trying to schmooze and partly because a great deal of the canon narrative inertia comes from Voldy and I enjoy how the element of choices etc. can (or cannot) change the story trajectory. The DE as a cult interpretation is particularly interesting to work with (and maybe I think evil villain hubris makes funny noises when jostled and upturned inadvertently by terrible small children).

19.) Does Dumbledore exist in your AU?  What role does he play in Severus’ life in your AU?

Yup!  Dumbles exists in my AU and plays a reasonably similar role in Sev’s life, although I suppose changes in Tobias alters Sev’s attitude towards any replacement father figures. Dumbledore says “Severus, please" on a regular basis, but it tends to be followed by something like "Stop", "No.", "You don’t have to escalate this situation." , "Not every conversation has to be a competition." etc. etc.  If Albus D. could bring himself to interact with Lulu and Cissy, they might find a lot in common… at least on the subject of failed attempts at housebreaking a feral Cokeworth disaster.

26.) Does Severus have any major interests (mycology, astronomy, sci-fi, baking elaborate puff pastries, art forgery, etc.) in your AU that we never got to see canon!Snape indulge in?  Do these interests play a major narrative role?

I am very very fond of giving AU!Sev an interest in space exploration and sci-fi partly because the timing of the first moon landing and when the BBC started airing Star Trek happened before he went to Hogwarts and those sorts of things seem like they would appeal to a kid growing up in a nowhere town like Cokeworth (also, if Purebloods don’t believe in the moon landing and think the concept of a heliocentric solar system is hilariously heretical, that can humorously irritate a Severus who likes to be correct and right and has a logical sort of mind). It does play a narrative role, because I find it interesting that Astronomy is a required core class, the Ancient and Noble House of Black has such a propensity for stellar names, and Divination and the appearance of planets are plot features- so perhaps harbingers and omens in the sky should have a bit more weight in the magical world. There were some spectacular comets in the 70s and, well, anyone here remember Hale-Bopp? My AU!Sev also knows lots of fun facts about parasitology, maybe it was to gross out Tuney, maybe he wanted to be a healer, maybe because someone had to introduce the concept of Cymothoa exigua to Harry’s nightmares, maybe because it’s a great way to speed-run “small talk”, y’know!

[cheemken]

next gen champions as found family?👀

Oughghghfh pls,,,, that'd be so dope

Y'know what yeah have more hcs abt them

•watch me project on to Calem now, like this boy opens up more to his fellow champs than the Kalos kids

-he's close to Hau and Florian, they're like his emotional support bros, they'd be the ones to go "excuse me, he asked for no pickles" for him

-really quiet tho, the others make sure to always ask him abt his opinions on stuff bc he really won't say a single word

-it felt nice for him tho, that they like him that much to always include him bc they're friends, not bc he's a fellow Champion

•none of them anticipated for Dawn to be so so fucking competitive, she hides it well

-wants to learn abt every battle gimmick. Hau even got her her own Z Ring and Waterium Z for her Empoleon

-Nemona also wants to learn abt all the different battle gimmicks, but still thinks terastalizing is superior hahah

•Dawn🤝Hilbert "Cynthia trauma"

-Cynthia is the reason Hilbert doesn't visit Undella anymore. He still has nightmares of his team getting swept by her Garchomp lmao

•Iris and Silver bonding tho, Iris asking abt Lance, and Silver tells her everything, your honour pls they're also siblings

-yknow imagine tho that there are moments when Silver looks at Iris, he sees Lance instead. The cape didn't help really hahah but also y'know, when Iris leads them or whatevs, or when she's being all courageous and such, Silver always sees Lance in her place

-imagine the same w Calem tho, how Iris also has qualities of Diantha. Iris once said she'd wanna see them shine bright, and in Calem's pov it flashes to when Diantha said the same thing

-pls ur honour Iris is sooooo cbdmnd

•no but can you imagine Nemona and Florian's surprise finding out abt the others fighting actual villains?? Like, the biggest threat Florian, Nemona, and their friends had to deal w were the AI Professors, but the others had to deal with actual evil organizations and cults like that lowkey fucked Florian up

-Nemona tho wished she could've fought them too, but was happy Paldea didn't get to experience anything like Galactic, Plasma, and even Flare

•the first time Gloria joined them, she honestly just followed Iris around bc she knows no one else there, not that she knows Iris well, but y'know thanks to Leon she's familiar w Iris at least

-once called Iris "Leon" too bc they looked so similar

-one time when she felt more homesick than usual, she accidentally called Iris "Hop"

•May is Cynthia's spiritual successor lmao, like this girl enables any kind of hijinks, she once successfully gaslit an adult, it terrified Calem

-May also pisses off Silver the most, she said it's the most entertained she's been since joining their ranks

-Hau just turns to Iris all "a bit familiar, don't you think?" Laughing as he watches May not listen to Silver's rage

Iris chuckled a bit, "yeah, feels like it's just them."

•okay but despite their arguments tho, May🤝Silver "would do anything to spite their father"

And yeah that's all I got for now hahah

[britcision]

Our dnd monotheist is At It Again btw

I’m having a lovely time watching their journey, they’re trying to explain “their god is the only one all the rest are fake” a little differently each time

Trying to build it into the lore, to make sense of it with what the party knows, tying in the world building but at the same time…

It’s REALLY showing me where they have and haven’t been listening to the lore cuz they’re coming up with some great explanations! Great reasons why the rest of the world makes sense!

It’s just, little things the entire rest of the world knows about the world that poke instantly straight through

There was a Big Level 20 Fight 135 years ago game time (and boy the elves working out who was alive for that was funny, one of them is lying about her age by fucking 80 years)

As in, a chunk of the map is a crater where the fight took place, because one of the gods from the Celestial Plane tried to step directly into the Prime Material where everyone lives, and use the power of the ensuing explosion

(Because yeah, the Prime Material plane is much more fucking delicate and is not capable of withstanding divine presence directly, it’s “the world is made of cardboard” but the cardboard already burned to ash)

To power themself up enough and take over the surviving realms

So the world knows exactly what happens when divinity tries to walk directly

I told our monotheist this before the game started, part of our “this is how we gonna introduce cracks in his cult conditioning” because… yeah, the cult believes their leader is the only god. In the flesh

Which the rest of the world knows can’t happen, but that does not matter to the cult because they’re a cult, all except our lone PC

And this god was defeated by an alliance of powerful heroes and villains, who solved the problem by taking the beginnings of the crack, whole punching through every realm at once, and slammed the god and their mortal accomplice out beyond time

Neither of them can be remembered, not names, species, what they looked like, what they were the god of, so most of the stories instead focus on the Incredible Love Story of a villain and her rival hero Joining Forces And Dying Tragically In Each Others Arms To Save The World

Cuz yeah, can’t try and do it again if no one knows how it was done, just that it went Really Really Fucking Badly and should not be attempted again

And our monotheist knows this story, it’s come up in game and they went to a play about it and all as part of our world building, and I gave them some spoilers for part of their cult planning

And last session, oooh they did a good last session, they had their lad justify it as maybe the Incursion was the one true god trying to come through directly? And they were proud of them and I was proud of them

And I reminded the party that the only thing y’all know about the god in question is that they have been removed from time

Can’t be remembered, is no longer here

And my dear monotheist looked so surprised? Like they expected their boy to be right? And I just

It was one of my three big bullet points about the incursion

1) god tried to come to world

2) god and follower removed from time

3) Tragic Love Story That Totally Won’t Be Relevant Later

I know they remember he’s supposed to be wrong and have the revelation because He Chose Another God To Paladin To (Verenstra) and because the bit of his story we’re fucking vibrating to get to…

Is learning the cult is wrong and attacking them to get in and rescue his Beloved Brother/I Think Originally Love Interest But They Decided On Brother and helping break his conditioning

Like, most of what we talk about is the deprogramming of brother and Fan Service Best Friend (who will be getting a character arc they don’t know about yet 😈😈😈)

Just in the moment, in character, I fucking swear they forget Every Single Time and I’m starting to worry about them

We can’t get to the arc they want to get to so badly until he starts to ask questions????

But he did just tell the cleric to his face that his god is either a lesser employee or fake and the cleric’s a petty bitch so that’ll come up again when he needs healing

Monotheist is so proud of his one level of paladin cuz he can heal now but he’s about to learn just how little that first level is because oh yeah, directly after that conversation? They’re going into a boss fight

The cleric has 100% of the time been the one connecting pieces in the background and unlocking everyone’s secrets (he also takes no notes and plays drunk I’m very impressed), he remembers EVERYTHING

[lesslie-sass]

I recently tumbled across your account and saw your whole death threat situation and people going as far as to to say they hope you get r@ped…

Let’s make one thing clear before I say what I’m about to say, anything you did does not justify these reactions. NEVER. By doing so, they’re no better than the person they’re hating on, and I genuinely hope karma bites back at them like a bitch. But that said, you genuinely need to stop acting like a victim most of the time like other anon said awhile back, as after scrolling through your account for context, you genuinely say some of the stupidest things ever and act surprised when rational people (nothing counting the actual idiots who told you to kill yourself and sent you r@pe threats) call you out. Saying Glitch never cared about MD, saying Liam hate men, you’re literal hatred of Uzi which even someone like me who isn’t that big of a fan of MD can tell is bs, as you’re treat her like she’s always whining about N and can’t do anything, where the show clearly proves you wrong. This isn’t even mentioning how you genuinely do kinda have a hate boner for Nuzi, going a far to make hate art and call all its shippers morons when they’re plenty of examples in the fandom to prove you wrong again.

Again, making it clear, I don’t and WON’T support the threats you been getting, those people can fuck off, especially over getting that mad over a ship they don’t like, but you have to realize your own flaws and improve upon them. As continuing to go down this path with your behavior will only makes thing worse. By choosing not to listen to this advice, you’re only going to make things harder for yourself

So what, wanna me to ditch my opinions, reject my own interests and preferences, so I would join your nuzi cult and dick ride Liam, eh? Because me, a terrible being such as mean, stupid, gross shipper of codegold with hate boner towards nuzi (that def didn't worsen because of it's fans, nooo) can't know shit.

This "educating thing" is just bunch of pricks being condescending towards me, invalidating my opinion and intelligence because it's different from the mass. You don't try to understand me, so why should I try to understand those who obviously hate me? (especially with my low empathy, it's already pretty hard for me to sympathize with anyone) I didn't ask for any "advice" by the way, so why you even bothered with "scrolling through my account" if you didn't even try to take into account how I stated to have my own mental problems, such as low empathy, as said above, and suicide ideation, that you all dismissed to me as just playing a victim, that I actually thought of apologizing but then came d3ath threats, which everyone ignored, so I changed me mind. You all just don't care and it's obvious, you just cherry-picking everything you don't like about me to twist everything to make me the villain of the fandom, a toxic, stupid, problematic monster to hate and harrass.

Also, my hatred towards Uzi comes not only from her being annoying character in MINE OPINION, but also because she reminds of really terrible, I would even say traumatic, period in my life when I acted similarly to her and it was awful and hurtful and sad. (which I won't discuss in details here, so I won't appear "victim playing" again, because no one gives a shit anyway and I don't want it to be used against me)

Anyway, I don't wanna waste much time, just wanted to post and show what kind of pricks bother me, even I don't post anything. (not even gonna talk about any other stuff you mentioned, like mine opinion of Glitch and Liam and so called "hate art", I'm tired of explaining every little thing I did when no one listens anyway)

And for those who for some reason continue to check my stuff despite your obvious hate boner towards me, especially you dear gaslighting victim blaming anon, just

GET OUT OF MY ACC!

No one's holding you here and I don't even "provoke" anyone at this point, yall just wanna be butthurt and trying to force your "correct" opinion on me

[thosearentcrimes]

Right, so, the post was deliberately flippant but it was summarizing beliefs I basically do hold, and this response addresses those beliefs seriously so I will respond seriously.

I do think it is true that most uses of the word cult are basically just a way expressing disapproval of an instance of a much broader concept that the social landscape is basically tiled with, call it an 'insular community', not meaningfully distinct from any other instance except in that the speaker hates them. The 'insular community' tends to be strongly distinct or at least separate from mainstream society (in ways that can but do not necessarily have to lead to the development of communes). But the reason this word works for expressing disapproval is that it associates the given 'insular community' (usually but not always unjustly) with obviously harmful instances like NXIVM, Peoples Temple, or Colonia Dignidad which hide among and often develop from 'non-cultic' insular communities.

Total refusal to engage in insular communities is indeed not a solution. When mainstream society is wrong, and basically it always is, it is necessary to oppose it, and this will separate you from mainstream society and make you more reliant on the rest of the insular community and so on and so forth.

Ayn Rand's group were hostile to community in a political sense, not a social sense. They were hostile to communism (which they saw everywhere) and to religion. I know this is a no true scotsman argument but the stance of Ayn Rand devotees to the concept of community really bears basically no resemblance to mine, up to and including the definition. As for the cultic milieu, it's populated by nonconformist (towards the mainstream) 'seeker' types, yes. But not all of those people are principally, psychologically nonconformist. Most simply reject the specific mainstream tendencies. And of course, despite the name, only some cults actually originate in the cultic milieu, many of the religious ones (Moonies, Dignidad) are at most very loosely associated.

The selection effects are significant, but I think you would expect filmmakers pushing an "it could happen to anyone" line would at the very least be actively trying to counteract those. Perhaps it is true that the intersection of 'cult member', 'willing to appear in documentary', and 'filmmakers want to put them in documentary' (and I suppose, 'alive') is relatively small and specific and not exactly representative. Perhaps people IRL who are visibly in cults are also not really representative next to the people in the same cults who are not as visible. But frankly there is just no reason to believe that cult members are evenly selected from throughout the populace and every reason to believe they are not.

I think I'm annoyed by much the same thing as you are but I just express it differently. Like just now I've been expressing it mostly in terms of what it means for me personally but I am in fact bothered about the odd non-agency of it all, for everyone involved. I'm annoyed by the way it portrays the cult leader as a straightforward villain who enthralls random people like some sort of vampire, and the cult as a sort of natural hazard.

Are the arguments in favor of joining the cult true is only one of many questions to ask and ultimately a rather marginal one. We must of course ask also if the arguments in favor of joining are sufficient. But most importantly we need to ask what counterarguments are being elided, and if those counterarguments are stronger. One very important question to ask is whether or not it will be unusually difficult to exit if you change your mind. Another is whether or not your possible children will be able to decide rationally whether or not to join the cult. But it is true that joining a cult is often about as rational and conscious a decision as people ever make (note: rational does not mean correct).

"oh anybody could fall into a cult no one is immune it's just a matter of wrong place wrong time" wrong, rip to ur grandma but im different, i start mentally checking out of groups the moment someone says 'community' you are literally not going to get me

"uh cults often target vulnerable and desperate people" in fact insofar as cults deliberately target recruits they typically go for upper middle class people on account of they have money and money can be exchanged for goods and services

"actually saying you wouldn't fall into a cult makes you really vulnerable to falling for a cult because you'll be complacent" i'm not complacent is the thing, cult fatalism now that's complacency right there, bet you half the people saying this shit have been in like 3 different cults and still haven't figured out why it keeps happening

there are two ways to end up in a cult, one is to be born into it (extremely unfortunate), the other is to be the kind of person who you rapidly become familiar with upon watching even a handful of documentaries and news reports about cults, even when those documentaries are deliberately pushing the "it could happen to anyone" line as a PSA

[alastorseye]

About Remadora

When I say I really hate the HP fandom, I'm talking about the "fans" that hate everything about the saga, but still having Harry Potter accounts. They change the original story, claim that fanonical facts are canon, and launch hatred and death threats at those who simply like HARRY POTTER JUST THE WAY IT IS. Yes, I'm mostly talking about Marauders fans, which I joined after reading the books because I thought it would be interesting and funny. I suddenly realized how toxic and hateful that fandom was, it's like a cult dedicated to deifying Remus, Sirius, James and Regulus, and it seems that hating Snape, Dumbledore, and Remadora is a requirement to be a part of it.

At the beginning I used to consider Wolfstar as something funny, a bromance, it never bothered me, I mean... every fandom has fanon ships and I respect that, but the way they always hate Remadora and their shippers is something that MUST stop.

"You see!" said a strained voice. Tonks was glaring at Lupin. "She still wants to marry him, even though he's been bitten! She doesn't care!"

"It's different," said Lupin, barely moving his lips and looking suddenly tense. "Bill will not be a full werewolf. The cases are completely -"

"But I don't care either, I don't care!" said Tonks, seizing the front ofLupin's robes and shaking them. "I've told you a million times. . . ." And the meaning of Tonks's Patronus and her mouse-colored hair, and the reason she had come running to find Dumbledore when she had heard a rumor someone had been attacked by Greyback, all suddenly became clear to Harry; it had not been Sirius that Tonks had fallen in love with after all."

"And I've told you a million times," said Lupin, refusing to meet her eyes,staring at the floor, "that I am too old for you, too poor . . . too dangerous. . ."

When I read this part of the HBP I realized that Remadora was my favorite Harry Potter ship. Of course I wasn't aware of the death threats I'd receive later. I've read some "reasons" why some fans hate Remadora.

"Tonks forced him!"

We all know how insecure Remus was. I don't have to explain what's written in Wizarding World (Pottermore). This is the Remus bio:

Well, we can read that Remus was really attracted to Dora.

"Remus, so often melancholy and lonely, was first amused, then impressed, then seriously smitten by the young witch. He had never fallen in love before. If it had happened in peacetime, Remus would have simply taken himself off to a new place and a new job, so that he did not have to endure the pain of watching Tonks fall in love with a handsome, young wizard in the Auror office, which was what he expected to happen. However, this was war; they were both needed in the Order of the Phoenix, and nobody knew what the next day would bring. Remus felt justified in remaining exactly where he was, keeping his feelings to himself but secretly rejoicing every time somebody paired him with Tonks on some overnight mission".

This is so sad and cute, and that's undeniable. I cried when I read it. If someone still thinking that Dora forced Remus to marry her after reading this paragraph... I mean... they're probably talking about another book series.

"The age gap!"

I'm so satisfied to know that some Remadora shippers have explained this. When it's about a kid and an adult... OF COURSE IS HORRENDOUS! Because children are not physically and mentally prepared to have romantic relationships. Wizards are legally adults at 17, REMUS MET TONKS WHEN SHE WAS 21!

I mean, many old people abuses of young people innocence, or something. But we all know that Remus wasn't one of those! He really loved Tonks, and that's canon. I don't know what's doing in the fandom people who denies canon facts.

Remus and Tonks were two physically, mentally, and legally adults loving each other.

"Remus didn't love her!"

He was an introvert, Tonks was an extrovert, she made his life better. And of course, I loved the way he introduced himself when he was trying to prove he wasn't a Death Eater:

"I am Remus John Lupin, werewolf, sometimes known as Moony, one of the four creators of the Marauder's Map, married to Nymphadora, usually known as Tonks, and I taught you how to produce a Patronus, Harry, which takes the form of a stag." (Remus Lupin, DH)

Maybe I'm not the only one who perceive he was proud to be Nymphadora Tonks husband.

"I.. I made a grave mistake in marrying Tonks. I did it against my better judgment and have regretted it very much every since". (Remus Lupin, DH)

This phrase makes more sense after reading Remus bio. He used to think that he was "too poor, too dangerous" for her. He thought he wasn't enough for her. He never imagined that she would love him back. He was a werewolf, and of course he knew he was dangerous, you only need to be emphatic to realize he tried to get away from Tonks because he loved her, he didn't want to hurt his beloved woman!

If you don't believe me, read this again. It's in the chapter 11 of Deathly Hallows:

"Don't you understand what I've done to my wife and my unborn child? I should never have married her, I've made her an outcast!"

So, if Remus was trying to escape it's because he loved them, he thought he spoiled their lives. And of course, no one likes to feel that their influence is bad for someone they love!

"Their relationship came from nowhere! They don't have a development"

Well, the saga's name is HARRY POTTER, not The Love Life of Remus Lupin. The story is about the tragic life of this kid and everything he went through to save the world of a cruel and dark villain. I know many readers are young people in love, and they only want to ship everything, but that's not the main topic here, maybe mother's love would be the topic. Of course Ron and Hermione had a development because they were HARRY'S BEST FRIENDS, and they were always with him, from Philosopher's Stone to Cursed Child. Remus and Tonks are minor characters, and it's funny the fact that this usually comes from Wolfstar shippers, so... is Wolfstar more developed than Remadora?! I mean... they can ship whatever they want, Snape and the Sorting Hat, Dobby and Voldemort, anything, but that does not give them the right to disrespect such a cute, tragic and beautiful canon ship as Remadora.

"They are queercoded! Their relationship is homophobic!"

It's surprising to hear this. It's like... people gets angry just because the author doesn't make queer their favourite characters? I will explain why I don't think Remus and Tonks are "queercoded":

Whether through their dress, their behavior, their language, or other subtle forms of implication, queer characters were written or designed to communicate their unstated queerness to those who were searching for representation.

And this is the definition on the website Pride.com:

"Using LGBTQIA tropes and stereotypes to allude to a character's sexuality without explicitly confirming it in the text."

We all know that Disney used queercoding on characters like Ursula, Scar, Jaffar. And why do we know that? Because DISNEY WANTED TO PORTRAY THEM LIKE THAT, get it? Disney, THE CREATORS MADE THESE CHARACTERS INTENTIONALLY QUEER. How? BASED ON STEREOTYPES.

And going back to Remadora, I was really happy to see by first time a bada*ass woman, with short hair who wasn't portrayed as a lesbian just because the way she looks. This character didn't follow the: "Straight women have long hair and are girly", and "short dyied hair is for lesbians". I'm very very very surprised the fandom follows these stereotypes.

About Remus: I don't know how the phrase "being a werewolf is a metaphor about people with HIV AIDS" means "he's gay". Fenrir Greyback bit him when he was a kid. Many people interpret this as "r4pe". Okay, even thinking that it is the meaning of the "bite", I still cannot understand how being "r4ped" and "infected" makes him queer. Is this (again) a stereotype about people with AIDS and gay?

"JK Rowling created Remadora because she didn't like people shipping Wolfstar!"

It is true that fans love shipping everything, they queerbait and queercode everything. That's great, that's not the problem. The problem is when people starts bashing fans who ship canon straight couples. A very good example is the polemic on Falcon and Bucky relationship, some fans wanted them to be a gay couple, Anthony Mackie said that two men can only be friends, and there is no need to always give them a romantic connotation. People cancelled him, they called him homophobic. Yes, just because a person with authority (on the story they're following") didn't like the fact of queercoding their favourite characters. It's the same about Remadora.

Grindeldore is a very interesting and underrated couple by the way. You can love or hate JK Rowling, but the truth is that Harry Potter story is hers, and even if Remadora was "because she didn't like Wolfstar", she is the author, it was her mind where these characters first appeared, as a big Harry Potter fan I respect and like the original story, that's not a sin. An author has the right to make some changes if some characters were misunderstood by the readers.

(Yes, I wrote this a bit angrily since I've seen too much hate towards Remadora shippers)

[nobodyfamousposts]

Miracle Queen Aftermath

Because there is a disappointing lack of focus or depth for the aftermath of Miracle Queen in canon, I have made my own.

Be warned of: Chloe salt. A lot of it. Chloe faces consequences for things.

Some Bustier salt. Some Adrien being called out on things (but he gets better).

Enjoy!

In the weeks following the Miracle Queen incident, a lot had happened.

Hawk Moth had increased his power, and was now able to summon akumas and amoks at the same time.

Master Fu was gone and now Ladybug found herself the official Guardian of the Miraculous—along with the Miracle Box, kwamis, and duties that entails.

Marinette had resolved to let go of her crush on Adrien, and to support him and Kagami in their new relationship together.

And Chloe had been arrested and would now be going on trial for assisting a terrorist.

It was that last bit of news that had caused the most commotion in Paris and the world at large. What people would have dismissed as simply another akuma attack turned into a much greater matter when accusations started to be made about Chloe helping the super villain intentionally. This was soon backed by multiple eyewitness accounts and further proven by leaked video evidence showing Chloe not only attempting to grab a butterfly for herself after she was de-akumatized but even negotiating with the terrorist before the incident in which she betrayed the heroes of Paris and revealed the identities of most of the team.

To say that the people of Paris were outraged was putting it mildly. People were akumatized over it. Chloe was in a secured facility where she had armed guards around to watch her just as much as they were there to protect her. New legislation was being considered to specifically address willingly aiding supervillains. The backlash was so severe that many were calling the mayor’s own position into question.

After all, if his daughter could do all of that, who was to say that he wasn’t also in Hawk Moth’s pocket?

For Mayor Andre, his hands were tied. While he had covered for his daughter and her selfishness in the past, this was one thing he couldn’t overlook. Not when it brought his position as mayor under scrutiny. And certainly not when it opened a probe into his own dealings.

None of this was helped either by the multitude of witnesses of Chloe‘s past behavior. In particular, her many victims over the years.

And there were a lot.

Now that Chloe was actually being held accountable for something, it seemed to have opened a floodgate of outcries as the many people she tormented finally felt able to air their grievances. They came out on TV, on social media, on radio. Stories littered the air and internet of the horrors of dealing with this single teenage girl.

“She tried to cheat during this designing competition. She apparently stole some other girl’s hat design and tried to pass it off as her own.”

“She was the reason the mayor tried to shut down my ice skating rink! To build another gym! Paris has enough gyms! Why couldn’t she just go to one of those?”

“She had her dad shut down Clara Nightingale’s music video and got her akumatized just because she didn’t get to play Ladybug. We waited in that line for HOURS and didn’t get chosen either, but no one else threw a fit over it.”

“She shoved a giant signed poster of Adrien Agreste professing his love to her in my friend’s face just to make her cry! I found out after the fact that he didn’t even know about it!”

“Our entire school was punished for someone pulling the fire alarm except for her because she threatened our principal. So while the rest of us were having to clean up the school, she spent the entire time insulting and making fun of us.“

“Knowing her, she probably pulled the fire alarm in the first place.”

“She tried to crash a train! I don’t think I can emphasize that enough: she tried to crash a train!“

“Chloe Bourgeois joined up with Hawk Moth? Can’t say it’s a shock.”

“Yeah, given how many akumas she caused, I’d been wondering if she hadn’t been working with him all along.”

It wasn’t that unbelievable to the populous. Nor did anyone feel particularly sympathetic towards her for her current situation. Some might have for lack of knowing her, but Chloe had carved herself a special place in the memories and hearts of nearly every Parisian. There was nobody who didn’t know of her or have some experience with her by this point. So when it came out that she was arrested and facing criminal charges, the response was…rather telling.

Practically everyone was calling loved ones as soon as they heard, resulting in high phone and internet traffic. The Ladyblog crashed after making the announcement. Several people threw parties. People over the internet started coming up with a list of “Things We Will Be Allowed To Do Once Chloe Is In Prison”, with a count that currently rested at 139 and was rising quickly. One guy bought 500 cupcakes and just started passing them out to people on the street singing a jaunty little tune from some late 1930’s cult classic American movie. The school had closed down for a couple of days due to several teachers calling out sick—possibly with hangovers from celebrating a bit too hard. Various Queen-related hashtags and memes were trending with each seeming to fight for the top spot of most used. #let her eat cake was currently in the lead. And Mr. Ramier somehow orchestrated a 21 pigeon salute. On Chloe’s rooftop.

As it was, nobody expressed surprise when it came out that she worked with a supervillain. Many were disappointed, shaking their heads and saying “if only something had been done sooner” or blaming the parents and teachers and other adults in her life. Most were angry, mainly that things had been allowed to get this far and that they hadn’t been acted on earlier—particularly after the train incident.

But no. Nobody was surprised.

Except, perhaps, Marinette herself.

Still reeling from the events of Miracle Queen and the aftermath of…well…everything involved, Marinette had been questioning herself. Constantly. Incessantly. Going over and over in her mind all the things she could have done differently. Blaming herself for all the major blows to their team.

She lost her mentor. Her allies have been compromised. Chloe, one of her former allies, chose to betray them all. Hawk Moth had the grimoire now. Marinette didn’t have a grimoire. Fu had no memories.

And it was all because of her mistakes.

Last time, the prospect of never having to deal with Chloe again had been a relief.

Now…it was background static to her.

She could barely hear the announcements and cheers over the endless cycle of her own thoughts.

I should have tried harder. I should have been more aware. I failed them all. This is because of me.

So while everyone else in Paris was celebrating, de-stressing, or just outright reveling in the news, Marinette was grieving. With the help of the kwamis and Chat Noir, she had been trying to come to terms with what happened and figure out the next plan of action.

Hawk Moth had changed the game, so she needed to step up hers.

The days seemed to have passed in a blur. Between working with the kwamis, trying to recreate and retranslate the grimoire, and simply trying to deal with the remnants of Fu’s life that he had left to her, Marinette had barely even kept up with the current state of things in Paris. Or in particular, Chloe.

Not until the day came when Bustier made an announcement.

Chloe‘s trial date was finally decided. And though she didn’t say as such, it was clear that the case against her was pretty solid. There was video evidence. Eye witness accounts. And Chloe’s own words and actions working against her.

The odds were not in her favor on this. Even if her parents did try to help her, she wasn’t going to get off this time. Aside from getting the best lawyers money by, there really wasn’t much they could do.

Maybe that was why Bustier had tried to step in?

“Now class, I have received word that they are moving to the next step with Chloe’s hearing. Right now, they are looking for character witnesses for Chloe’s defense.” The kind teacher explained, causing Marinette to snap to awareness and realize just what was going on. Partly because of the mention of Chloe and her court case.

But mostly because of the sudden dead silence in the class…

To be fair, she wasn’t sure she could say anything either. Marinette felt her throat go dry and her muscles tense. There was a sudden tightness in her lungs that while she could breathe, it felt like she was suffocating. Why was Bustier bringing this up now?

The teacher smiled, seemingly unaware of the sudden tension and Marinette’s slow drowning. “I know this has been a difficult experience knowing that one of your classmates is facing such a trial. And Chloe will certainly need support. So I thought it would be kind if everyone wrote a letter supporting her for the hearing coming up, so the courts can hear about Chloe and understand more about who she is.”

Silence. Dead silence.

Maybe Bustier herself picked up on the growing tension, as she proceeded to move to passing out papers to the class. “I thought it would make for a nice project, so I will give you all the forms explaining the requirements. Take some time to think over what positive things you want to say about Chloe. If you have any questions, please feel free to come talk to me.”

After that, she quickly left the room, citing the desire to let them have this free time to work on the letters.

The class remained silent for a good minute after she left. Almost as if they were questioning if she would return. Or perhaps if she was listening.

Then—

“‘Think about what positive things we want to say about Chloe?’ Well that’s easy!” Alix spoke blithely, curling the paper she received into a ball. “Nothing!” She shouted and tossed it over her shoulder. “Assignment done!”

Murmurs filled the classroom. Some sounded uncertain, but most seemed to be in agreement. Or at least expressing distaste for the assignment.

“Is she serious?”

“Does she really expect us to?”

“Of all the worst ideas...”

Marinette could hear them, but couldn’t seem to acknowledge anything around her. And furthermore, she couldn’t make herself respond.

Chloe‘s trial was set for a point in the next few weeks, and at this point there was no denying just what type of person she was. If anything, this was probably the first time that anyone was allowed to actually speak their mind about the girl, and they were all reveling in it. Her classmates in particular.

Marinette couldn’t quite bring herself to.

Sure, Chloe has tried to blackmail her more than once.

And damaged her gift to their teacher.

And attempted to frame her a few times.

And stolen her hat design.

And her diary.

And a Miraculous.

And all of the other Miraculous.

But...she had been doing better for a while there, hadn’t she?

Didn’t she only betray them all in the end because Marinette had chosen Kagami over her for her own selfish reasons? Didn’t Hawk Moth only capture Fu because of her own mistake? Hadn’t Chloe only revealed everyone else because she felt betrayed? Couldn’t Marinette have done more to prevent Chloe turning?

Wasn’t a simple letter on Chloe’s virtues the least she could do?

So why...

Why couldn’t she seem to bring herself to?

Kim frowned, looking at his paper in worry. “We’re not going to get graded on this, are we?”

Nathaniel huffed. “I’ll willingly take the failing grade any day.”

“Hear hear!”

“But if it’s a grade…” Max murmured to himself. Out of everyone in the class, he took his grades the most seriously, so this was no doubt a difficult choice for him. He looked at his paper with a rather conflicted expression for a minute before sighing and turning it face-down on the desk. “No. It’s an impossible task in the first place.”

Kim rested a hand on Max’s shoulder in sympathy. It wasn’t that he cared as much about grades as Max did, but it was clear that the fallout of refusing could be more troubling for the genius who took his academic performance so seriously. If Bustier did make it a mandatory assignment with a grade, it’d be horribly unfair of her.

“What was it Chloe said before?” Ivan asked, looking over his page with a glare. “Once a monster, always a monster? I guess she’d know more than anyone.”

Mylene hugged him. “You’re not a monster. You never chose to be.”

“None of us did.” Nino agreed.

“Nobody did except her.” Alix bit out.

Mumbles of agreement came from the rest of the class. It was clear that none of them were on board with having anything to do with Chloe, much less try to help her with her current legal woes.

There was a large part of Marinette that agreed with them. But even so, there was also a large part of her that insisted she had to do the right thing and help.

She knew she should say something. She was supposed to say something here. Because it was her fault, after all. She was Ladybug. She had to be the better person. Shouldn’t she?

“Marinette? Girl, are you okay?” Alya asked, drawing her attention. “You look a bit pale.”

It was too much. It was suffocating.

“I think I need some air. Excuse me.”

She didn’t know if anyone watched her leave the classroom. She hadn’t even noticed if anyone had chosen to follow her.

Not until…

“Marinette, are you all right?”

She spun around in surprise.

“Oh! Adrien! Hey! Hi! Hello!” She blabbered. Why was he here? Did he come out after her? Why? She didn’t need this right now! She struggled enough with him under normal circumstances, she wasn’t sure she could handle being alone with him now. Her stress over everything was bad enough, but having him approach her set her anxiety skyrocketing.

“Hey,” he replied, smiling at her—and oh, what a beautiful smile. On any other day, it would ease her worries and make her want to swoon, but right now, it just made her more nervous.

“Are you all right?” He asked again. “You didn’t look so well in class.”

“Y-yeah. Just…” she sighed. “I just have a lot on my mind. With…you know…everything.”

He nodded in understanding. “I know what you mean.”

She smiled. She could always count on Adrien to be a calming supportive friend. He was always so sweet and reliable. If anyone could understand or relate to the chaotic mix of emotions she was feeling, he could.

He sighed in sympathy. “Poor Chloe.”

She froze.

“Chloe?”

“Well, yeah.” He replied, like it was obvious. “I mean, she did a bad thing, but now she’s going through the worst experience of her life. One that could ruin her future. And people are glad about it!” He shook his head. “It’s just too cruel.”

Marinette just stared.

He wasn’t wrong. But…that was what he was worried about?

She couldn’t fault him of course, because Adrien was always so kind and considerate and of course he’d feel for Chloe but…something about this just…pulled at something inside of her and was choking it.

“Chloe is already suffering enough and it feels like no one wants to help her. You heard them.” He gestured back to the classroom. “We’re being given an opportunity to make a difference for her and they’re all just saying she deserves it. Chloe is alone and hurting and they want her to hurt more.”

She felt a denial on her lips but couldn’t give voice to it.

“Everyone is so great with each other. It’s always just Chloe who is kind of on the outside. I know you’ve seen it.”

She hadn’t, actually. Because it was never Chloe on the outside looking in, it was Chloe looking down on them. Whether it was because she genuinely thought she was better or because it made her feel better to do so.

He hesitated for a moment before looking at her. And there was something in his expression that told her he was about to ask something. A gut feeling told her that it was going to be something she wouldn’t like.

“Do you think you could talk to them?” He asked her, looking so sad and despondent that she just wanted to hug him and agree to anything to make that look go away.

“M-me?”

He wanted her to convince her classmates to help Chloe?

“I know you and Chloe have had your differences, but you’ve been able to see past her front. And you’ve done a lot to help her before.” He smiled. “Like the party you threw for her after she became Queen Bee.”

A traitorous voice asked if giving her a second chance with the Miraculous she had previously stolen wasn’t enough? Why did she have to feel bad for her leaving and throw her a party to make her feel special?

“Chloe really needs the help right now. And you’re always so good about that sort of thing.” He looked to her imploringly. “Do you think you could try to get them to at least give Chloe a hand? I don’t know what impact it’ll have in her hearing, but any little bit helps, right?”

Go back in there? With the tension and the suffocation to try and convince her classmates to help when she was questioning whether to herself?

But she had to, right? After all, couldn’t she have prevented this if she had acted sooner? Couldn’t she have helped sooner instead of being focused on her own petty problems? Isn’t that what Ladybug should do?

“Please, Marinette? They listen to you. If you asked them to, I’m sure they’d be willing to at least try.”

Her vision started to dim, seeming to tunnel in on Adrien and his sad and hopeful expression. Her thoughts crying about CHLOE and poor CHLOE and how hurt CHLOE was and how it was her fault for CHLOE—

“I—”

“Oh no! No, you do NOT.”

Marinette suddenly found herself torn away from Adrien by a sudden grab of her arm and pulling sensation. She felt as if she was pushed out of the way by a fierce gale. Like a raging whirlwind had spun her around and behind it.

That whirlwind’s name was Alya.

“How dare you? How dare you try to make my girl be responsible for this!”

Marinette floundered because she had not expected this and oh no now her best friend looked ready to tear her crush’s head off!

“Alya, we don’t have to do this!” She pleaded, trying to calm the other girl down.

“Oh, we most certainly do.” Came another voice. And sure enough, the rest of the class had stepped out as well. All of them looked in varying ranges of frustrated and that frustration was clearly directed at her and Adrien.

Or rather just Adrien, as Marinette discovered when Rose and Juleka pulled her aside and out of their direct line of sight. They were all looking at Adrien, and those were not nice or understanding expressions.

Oh no! This was a disaster! Now everyone was upset and she should have just agreed or said something sooner!

Completely unaware of Marinette’s inner turmoil, Alya stepped forward and jabbed at Adrien in the chest. “You are not going to make my girl feel bad and try to help someone who has never done a single nice thing for her or anyone.” She spat out, forcing him to back away.

Adrien held his hands up in a placating gesture. “Come on, Chloe is not that bad.“

“Not that bad?” Nino exclaimed, shaking his head in disbelief at his friend’s words. “Adrien, Chloe betrayed us!“

“She took over Paris!”

“She turned us into her servants!“

“Not to mention the other things…”

“Do we really have to name each time?” Alya started to count on her fingers. “Chloe CHOSE to take the Miraculous for herself instead of returning it. She CHOSE to transform in front of everyone and reveal her identity to the world. She CHOSE to try and crash a train, risking the lives of EVERYONE on board just to show off. She CHOSE to run off with it when Ladybug tried to take it back.”

“She also chose to continue being horrible to everyone even after Ladybug gave her a second chance.” Nathaniel added, bitterly. “She didn’t get better after becoming Queen Bee. It just became another thing for her to lord over people.”

Alya nodded. “And when Ladybug made it clear to her that she wasn’t going to be Queen Bee again, she felt ENTITLED to something that was never hers in the first place. And because of that, she made the active, knowing, and willful choice to work with Hawk Moth.”

“And out all of us while she was at it.” Kim added. “Turning us into her personal ‘guard’. Making us fight our heroes against our will.” He shuddered. “I don’t know if you were hit by those things, Adrien, but it was NOT a pleasant experience having your body turned into a puppet.”

Adrien wanted to argue that he understood full well, but that was only as Chat. He couldn’t say that here.

Unaware of his inner turmoil, Alya continued. “So no, we are not going to forgive Chloe. We are not going to try and ‘get along’ with her because her own poor choices have led her to have a ‘rough time’.”

Adrien grew nervous at the way the others drew closer to Alya as she spoke, clearly backing her statements as she continued.

“We are not going to defend her or speak up on her behalf to the entirety of Paris she ALSO betrayed. Whatever consequences Chloe has to face—quite possibly the first ones she will EVER have faced in her LIFE—are nothing less than what she deserves.”

“Yeah!” Came the exclamations from the rest of the crowd.

“She didn’t know what she was doing!” Adrien argued.

“Not know what she was doing?! Adrien, she willingly accepted an akuma! She used it to take control of us and revealed us to Hawk Moth!” Alya exclaimed. “That’s just—how can you even justify that?”

With as angry as Alya was, any lesser or wiser man would have backed off.

Adrien…well, she certainly would never call him unwise, so it had to be because he was more strong-willed than that to be willing to stand his ground here.

“Hawk Moth was the one who manipulated Chloe!” He insisted. “And he’s the one who got away scott free and left Chloe to take the fall.”

“And whose fault was that?” Alya countered. “Chloe HELPED him. He only got as far as he did because of her and he only got away because she helped him!”

“Don’t you think this is cruel?” He argued back. “Yes, Chloe was wrong, but she was already called out for what she did by Ladybug and Chat Noir. The entire city hates her. Isn’t that enough?”

“NO!” Alya shouted. “No, it isn’t! Because Chloe has always gotten away with her antics in the past but you’re actually trying to get us to let Chloe off for a legitimate crime here! If Chloe is going to prison, it’s only because she deserves it!”

Around them, several of the others in the class nodded in agreement.

“How can you say that?” Adrien demanded. “Chloe made a mistake and she’s suffering for it! All this time, she’s felt left out and cut off and this only further emphasizes that for her! She’s been alone all this time and now she’s alone and miserable!”

“Then why should that be OUR problem?” Alya questioned, raising her hands in exasperation. “Why are you trying to MAKE it our problem?!”

Adrien drew back, looking genuinely hurt.

"But treating someone badly never made them become a good person."

"Yeah, because letting Chloe have her way all this time has totally made strides in her path to becoming a good person." Alix called out sarcastically.

"If anything, it's made her worse." Max added. "She's gone from simply causing akumas to intentionally becoming one."

“But—”

Alya cut him off. “But nothing, Adrien! You have to have some gall to be trying to get us to make nice with Chloe after she betrayed us all! And here I thought your little lecture to Marinette to make her feel bad for being relieved that Chloe was leaving Paris was pretty hard to beat.”

Nino blanched at that. “You did what?” He turned on Adrien. “Dude! You know that happened after Chloe tried to crash that train!”

“She was just trying to prove herself.” Adrien weakly argued.

“PEOPLE were on there!” Nino bit out. “They could have DIED because Chloe was showing off! And you got on to MARINETTE? Where was this attitude with Chloe?”

“I’ve called her out!”

“Yeah, one time.” Alya groused. “AFTER the rest of us had spent the better part of the day cleaning up after HER mess. Which she never apologized for or admitted to doing, by the way.”

“And in response, she threw a party.” Juleka muttered.

“It was a nice party, sure.” Rose added quickly.

Alya though shook her head. “But being a good hostess is nowhere near the same thing as being a good person. And before the night was over, you rolled over for her and she went RIGHT back to acting as she always had.”

“She made Mylene cry.” Ivan glared. “She made Mylene cry and you just laughed.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“You said it yourself: ‘she’ll never change’. Except you said that like it was a good thing.”

Marinette looked back and forth between the two, everything inside her screaming at her to help. But she was completely lost on which one she was supposed to help. Because Adrien had a point about what Chloe’s going through but Alya was right about what Chloe did and she needed to do the “right thing” and help Chloe but why did everything Alya say resonate so strongly with her and bring such a feeling of vindication—

No. She was getting distracted. She needed to help. And right now, it was Adrien against the rest of the class.

But Alya was worked up. And Adrien was looking past her to Marinette, eyes begging for help and still so hopeful that she would step in. And Chloe was still in prison and Marinette could fix everything if she just tried so why can’t she try?

“Alya,” Marinette tried. “You told me to give Chloe a chance before after the fire alarm incident, remember? You said we were a lot alike.”

“That was to get you to go to a party!” Alya shouted, making Marinette step back in surprise. “I never meant it like this!”

She stepped forward and took Marinette by the shoulders, holding her sternly.

“Marinette, you are nothing like Chloe! Not where it counts! Yeah, you both can be short sighted when it comes to trying for what you want, but you at least notice and CARE how other people feel! And when you make a mistake, you at least TRY to make it right!”

She shook her head.

“Chloe…doesn’t.”

“She doesn’t try to.” Alix cut in. “If Chloe was feeling sad and lonely, that was pretty much her own fault.”

Adrien looked like he wanted to argue, but Alix didn’t even give him a chance.

“It wasn’t like we left her out. We went well out of our way to try and befriend her. We invited her to things. We tried to help her. Hell, you said it yourself—Marinette has tried to help her more than anybody! And each and every time, Chloe only took what we offered like it was something we owed her but that she was also too good for. I mean, I certainly can’t recall a time she ever thanked me. Can you?” She asked, turning to the other classmates.

All around them, there were murmurs of agreement. Maybe a couple hesitated as they tried to recall a time—one single moment of kindness on Chloe’s part only to come up empty.

“Chloe’s had a hard time.” Adrien insisted. “You know how her parents are—”

“Oh yes, her ‘Daddy the Mayor’.” Alix rolled her eyes. “Like we don’t hear enough about him every time it comes to something Chloe wants. She only threatens us or anyone with him every other day.”

Adrien shook his head and tried to explain. “It’s only because her parents aren’t there for her emotionally.”

“Again, not seeing how this is our problem? Or justification for anything she’s done to us? Or how this excuses her willingly helping a supervillain?”

“Because we’re her classmates!” He argued back, gesturing to all of them. “Out of everyone, we’ve all had the most interactions with her.”

“All of which were negative.” Came a cutting remark, followed by grumbling.

“There were good times, too!” Adrien insisted with a frown. His eyes spanned over the assembled classmates before they came to rest on one in particular. “Kim, you have to have seen Chloe’s good side. You liked her before.”

“Before.” Kim replied, emphasizing the word and the timeframe it referred to. “But being humiliated and her sending out that pic to everyone in school kind of crushed that crush.”

“How did she even have our numbers?” Ivan asked.

“But there had to be something that made you like her in the first place.” Adrien encouraged.

The taller boy shrugged, uncertain and uncaring. “Maybe so, but was it something that was really there? Or something I just wanted to see? Because I’m looking back and quite frankly, I don’t know what past me was thinking.”

“Wow, that’s deep, man.” Nathaniel whispered.

“Thanks!”

Seeing Nathaniel gave Adrien an idea. “Wait, Nathaniel! Didn’t Chloe let you put her in your comic?”

“Forced us to, more like.” The artist bit back. “And even when we tried to fit her, we got nothing but complaints from her. It was no wonder we never got past the initial concept art for her character.”

Adrien winced. “It was an attempt, at least?”

Nathaniel wasn’t buying it. “A poor one.”

“She’s been trying to be better.” Adrien was getting increasingly frustrated. This was not how he was expecting this argument to go. “Rose? What about you? You’ve seen it, haven’t you?”

After all, Rose was sweet and caring, always willing to see the good in anyone. Surely she would have something nice about Chloe!

Juleka frowned at him over his focus on her girlfriend and moved to stand beside her. “Don’t push her.”

Still he tried.

“Rose?”

“I’m sorry, Adrien.” Rose said, hugging herself. “But Chloe has done nothing but hurt people. And going out of our way to protect her has only ended up biting us.”

That wasn’t true. Not...all the time at least. There had to have been at least one instance where she did the right thing!

Adrien brightened in realization. “Didn’t she catch you when you fell after being deakumatized during Heroes Day?”

The blonde girl frowned. “Well, yes…but she wasn’t very nice about it. Even though I did the same for her before.”

“Rose, come on…”

She shook her head. “I put myself at risk to help Chloe when she was being chased by zombies, and only got turned into one for my efforts. Chloe never appreciated it. She never thanked me. She didn’t even do anything to help when we were trying to keep her safe!”

“We all ended up kissing zombies because of her.” Alix accused, crossing her arms and looking particularly annoyed. “And not just because she caused the akuma in the first place.”

“Why are you pushing this?” Mylene asked. “We’ve been asked. We said no. Isn’t that enough?”

“But—”

“Adrien, you’ve got a good heart.” Ivan started.

“Easy for him when he’s not the one who has to be on the receiving end of Chloe’s tantrums.” Alix cut in, clearly sounding bitter.

“You’ve got a good heart.” Ivan repeated, sending Alix a look that asked her to back off. “But Chloe…doesn’t.”

Adrien shook his head, remaining insistent. “That’s why she needs help.”

“If she needs help,” Mylene spoke, “It should come from her parents. Her teachers. Any of the adults in her life. She has plenty of adults who are fully capable of helping her. It should not be expected to come from the kids she’s spent years tormenting.”

She gestured to herself and the others around her. “And that’s what she’s been doing: tormenting us.”

“To great joy, might I add.” Max droned.

“She hasn’t been cruel to everyone.” Adrien muttered.

That brought out a backlash of outrage.

“She outted my crush!”

“She insulted Mylene’s cooking and made her cry!”

“She got Aurore akumatized and nearly caused Paris to be incinerated in a volcano!”

“She tried to push Mylene out of the lead role of our movie!”

“She locked Juleka in the restroom!”

Wait...

But that hadn’t been Chloe. She had stayed with the class at the time. The one who did do it was...

He glanced around until he saw her—a redhead in the background behind the rest of the class. She looked anxious and uncomfortable, and almost seemed to be trying to edge around the class to get to the stairs.

Adrien did seem aware. Or rather, he was focused on the fact she was there.

“Sabrina? What about you? Chloe was your friend!”

Of course she would help! Because who better than her own best friend to speak on her behalf?

The rest of the class broke into mutters as they realized the same.

But Sabrina...bit her lip and looked away. Refusing to even meet Adrien’s gaze.

“Sabrina?” Marinette tried, concerned about this reaction. Sabrina had been Chloe’s best friend—or at least the closest thing she could have to a friend. “Minion” or “Servant” would be more accurate. “Slave” would be more honest.

The girl had been Chloe’s only real fan and follower, and had assisted Chloe in some of her worst plots.

Marinette had briefly seen another side to her. A girl who was so desperate for friendship that she latched onto even the slightest bit of kindness and went to the greatest of extremes to appease the “friend” so they wouldn’t leave her. It was no wonder she had fallen in with Chloe—someone like that was perfect for the spoiled girl. Compared to her, Marinette’s anxieties and need to please were nothing.

And Chloe had pretty much been her world for years.

What must she be feeling now?

“Should we really be getting her opinion?” Ivan whispered. “You know how she and Chloe were…”

“Well, if anyone would have anything positive to tell the courts about Chloe, it would be her.” Mylene whispered back.

Sabrina took a breath and spoke quickly—almost shouting in her rush.

“I’m sorry but my therapist said I shouldn’t!”

That got a surprise. The rest of the classmates glanced to each other before looking back to the girl. Adrien in particular looked shell-shocked. Marinette couldn’t blame him. She felt the same.

Sabrina for her part seemed to tense up, as if ready to defend herself from the rest of the class.

Marinette stepped forward. “Sabrina? Are…you okay?”

The other girl shook her head, looking close to tears.

“After word got out what Chloe did, the police had to question me about Chloe. They were able to see that I wasn’t involved, but they…didn’t like what I told them about our relationship. Afterwards, my dad decided to have me see a counselor and she…has been telling me things that I hadn’t really considered.” She curled in on herself. “They all think I should stay away from Chloe and anything directly related to her…for my own health.”

Adrien frowned at that. “But don’t you want to help Chloe?”

Sabrina jumped. “Of course, I do!”

“Hold up, Adrien!” Nino stepped in. “She just said police took her in because of Chloe!”

“But they let her go…”

“It still happened!” Mylene argued. “It doesn’t matter how nice they are, how innocent you know you are, or if you’re released in the end, it’s still terrifying when it happens!”

"And it only happened to her because of Chloe." Alya added.

Rose, in her infinite sweetness, reached out to take Sabrina’s hand in support. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

Sabrina sobbed and covered her face. Aside from Rose, no one else really attempted to comfort her. Most of them simply watched her, pitying her current state. But they also remembered how complicit she had been in Chloe’s schemes, so they were conflicted. While they did feel bad for her current situation, there was a part of most of them that noted how she had brought it upon herself by being Chloe‘s lackey for so long, so their sympathy was limited.

Perhaps it was out of awkwardness, or maybe an attempt to give some respect for Sabrina’s privacy that the classmates turned away from her and instead focused on the heart of the argument.

“Man...” Nino tried. “Maybe you should let it go?” Though it was clear from his tone that he knew it wasn’t likely.

Because Adrien had still not given up, it seemed.

He looked around between of the classmates, growing more desperate. But those that remained either looked at him straight on as if daring him to call on them or looked away. A few of them even closed ranks as if to block his view of certain others. It was clear none of them were willing to help him on this.

None of them except…

“Marinette.” He called out, drawing her gaze to him instantly. “You understand, don’t you?”

She bit her lip. “I…”

“Back off, Adrien.” Kim said, giving the other boy an angry frown as he stood in front of her to shield her from his gaze. “It’s not on Marinette to help Chloe.”

“Yeah! She suffered more than any of us!“ Ivan shouted.

“She has been Chloe’s main target for years.” Nathaniel agreed. “She is the last person who is obligated to help Chloe now.“

Adrien winced at the harshness of their words and in their tone. “I just thought that Marinette could help. Like before.”

“Just because she could doesn’t mean she should have had to.” Alya countered. “She’s a teenager. Dealing with Chloe should have been the job of adults. Her parents. Bustier. Damocles. Any one of them should have done something—and if they can’t, the courts will. It’s their job. Not ours.”

“And getting her to help you wouldn’t make a difference anyway even if you had convinced us.” Max said, shifting his glasses. “Chloe helped Hawk Moth. There is nothing we could say that could undo that. And even if we did try, we would either be guilty of committing perjury or aiding in a conspiracy.”

“What?” Adrien jerked in surprise.

“The best we can do is be character witnesses.” Mylene explained. “But this is a court and we can’t claim something that isn’t true! We can’t say anything nice about Chloe when she hasn’t done anything nice!”

Max nodded and shifted his glasses. “Furthermore, our testimonies—even if they were positive—would only serve to create a narrative about Chloe and the type of person she is. They can’t explain away the current evidence against her.”

He rubbed the back of his head. He knew there were issues, but he also knew Chloe. He knew what she could be like. He knew she was a good person deep down. “I know she’s made some mistakes—”

“No.” Alya stated sharply. “Calling them ‘Mistakes’ implies that her actions were unintentional. ‘Mistakes’ implies that people were harmed by accident. ‘Mistakes’ implies that she would have any point learned from them. They weren’t mistakes, Adrien. They were willful acts of cruelty every single time.”

Ivan shook his head, pityingly. “We can’t save Chloe from this. We have nothing to say in her defense. The kindest thing we can do for her is stay silent.”

“She’s better than you think she is. She threw that party once for everyone, remember? You all went.” Adrien reminded them.

“That only proved that she could throw a party and be a good host, not that she could be a good person. There is a difference.” Nathaniel pointed out.

“Not that Chloe could tell.“ Alix sniped.

Adrien ignored the barb. He had given up on getting any of them to listen and now only had eyes for her. His last hope.

“Marinette….come on…please.”

She hesitated.

Everything in her that was Ladybug and her crush on Adrien and her desire to make people happy and take the high road and give second-third-fourth chances wanted nothing more than to give it to him.

Except...

There was a long pause. No one spoke.

The other classmates have had their say. They were letting Marinette have hers. And she knew in that moment that if she spoke up…if she did as Adrien wished and tried to help Chloe…she knew they would go along with her. It may be more out of respect for Marinette than it would be out of any sort of forgiveness for anything Chloe had done, but it would still help Chloe and it would still make Adrien happy.

…and hadn’t Marinette already done that enough?

“Did you know?” Marinette started, not looking at anyone. “I would have been well within my rights to press charges against Chloe?”

Adrien balked at that.

“She’s stolen from me at least three times now.” She shrugged. “I mean, sure, I wouldn’t have been able to do anything about my diary since she had Sabrina steal it for her, but she did steal my hat design for a competition and I had proof. I could have pressed charges against Chloe and let her face some consequences…but I didn’t.”

She looked up at Adrien. “I also could have pressed charges for what she did to my gift for Madame Bustier. Since she did break into my locker and vandalize my property while it was still technically mine…but I didn’t.

“Adrien.” She spoke almost in monotone, the only sign of her emotions being how she clenched her fists. “Did you know that after the fashion show, my parents and I took a train to get home?”

He furrowed his brows in confusion. What did that have to do with anything?

“It was the same train Chloe took control of and nearly caused to crash.”

Several gasps resounded around them. Apparently this had not been common knowledge.

“Even if Chloe could have bought her way out of any consequence for the other things, we all could certainly have had her face some major trouble for that one…” Marinette took a shuddering breath. “But we didn’t.”

Adrien frowned. “I…I see that—”

“No, I don’t think you do.” She cut him off. “Because instead of any of that…rather than hold Chloe accountable at any point, I catered to her. I tried to understand Chloe. I tried to make things nicer for Chloe. I tried to excuse Chloe. Time and again. Just like everyone else. Just like you wanted me to. Just like you’re asking me to now. And what did that get us?”

The more she talked, the more words filled out and she was unable to stop the torrent.

“I defended her from Alya after Madame Bustier was akumatized, and Chloe stole a Miraculous and nearly got my family killed. I helped Chloe bond with her Mom—costing myself any chance at a once in a lifetime opportunity in the process—and Chloe tried to get me banished from Paris just for saying she wasn’t a superhero. I threw Chloe a party to show her some appreciation, and she willingly worked with a supervillain to take over Paris. Just to fuel her ego and because she felt she was owed something that wasn’t hers.”

She tilted her head, considering.

“What is that American saying? Three strikes and you’re out?” Her eyes narrowed. “I have given Chloe more than three chances. I have done nothing BUT give her chances. And clean up after her. And just…try to help her. At no point has she been grateful. At no point did she ever apologize. Or show the slightest bit of remorse for anyone she hurt. Or just…try to do better.”

She stepped forward. Past her classmates. Past Alya, who looked ready to tear into Adrien herself.

“So tell me, Adrien. How much more am I supposed to do? What miracle am I supposed to achieve to help Chloe to be a better person that I haven’t already done?”

“You can just try.” Adrien begged. “Chloe’s alone. She has no one in her corner. You’ve given her chances before! Can’t you find it in your heart to give her another chance this time?”

“Why haven’t you?” Alya demanded.

Adrien drew back in surprise at that.

But the girl wasn’t letting him off. “If you’re so certain Chloe is the victim in all this, then why aren’t you stepping up to help her? Why are you pushing Marinette and the rest of us to do it?”

Alya wrapped an arm around Marinette in support. “If you truly believe Chloe has some sort of inner goodness that only needs the right person to bring it out, then it’s pretty clear Marinette is just not that person. She’s tried enough.”

Alix nodded. “I’m pretty sure she could’ve demolished a brick wall with how many time she’s banged her head against it by this point trying to drag a decent person out of Chloe.”

Others in the class also nodded and gave sounds of agreement to that.

Adrien frowned, lowering his head despondently. “I’m just one person. There’s only so much weight my word will have. I just...I just want to give her the best chance.”

“That’s nice for Chloe, I guess.” Kim muttered. “But not much for us.”

Adrien looked up in surprise. “What do you mean?”

Alya stepped forward, releasing Marinette in the process. “Adrien, why should we as Chloe’s victims have to help protect her? That’s the thing we’re not getting here. WE are the ones she hurt. WE are the ones she betrayed to Hawk Moth. So why are WE supposed to try and save her from her own consequences? Why are you wanting us to?”

Adrien hesitated.

“Can you even imagine what it was like? Being frozen in time. Unable to move or speak? Only able to hear her voice in your head? Feeling your body respond as she’s calling you and being unable to stop?” She clutched her arms, as if trying to hug herself. “Do you have any idea how terrified I was knowing what she was doing to us but being completely unable to stop it? How humiliating it was when she had us bowing to her and calling her our Queen? And then…” She took a breath. “She made us fight our heroes. Ladybug and Chat Noir trusted us to help them and we used the Miraculous they entrusted to us to try and kill them.”

“We were just lucky that they were able to turn the tables on us.” Kim muttered. “I don’t even want to know what would have happened if we had won.”

“Luka still has nightmares.” Juleka whispered. “He won’t talk about it, but he hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in weeks.”

Marinette winced. She hadn’t even considered that everyone else could be suffering ramifications of Miracle Queen as well.

“We could have killed them.” Max stated. “Given the nature of the Snake Miraculous’s power, we very well could have more than once for all we know.”

“Maybe you wouldn’t have killed them?” Rose suggested, trying to be positive. “I mean, Chloe wanted all of the Miraculous, right? She probably wanted them as her servants as well.”

Max glared. “I’m pretty sure I attempted to send Chat Noir into space. Even a Miraculous can’t protect someone from that.”

Adrien tried not to wince at the memory. How he managed to even move enough to activate the Miraculous, he still wasn’t sure.

“We fought against them. We never wanted to, but we did.” Alya bit out. “Not even because of Hawk Moth this time, but because of Chloe. And now you are wanting us to just…overlook the trauma of the whole thing to help Chloe after what she did. For something she hasn’t shown even the slightest remorse for.”

She shook her head.

“I know you’re nice, Adrien. But this level of kindness is a cruelty.”

He winced. And it looked like he wanted to argue. But he just…wilted.

“I just…it feels harsh. What’s happening to her. The amount of hate she’s getting. That her entire life could be over.”

That was true. While they felt her current status was well deserved, it was a harsh sentence for anyone. Especially a teenager.

Nathaniel sighed. “Adrien, it is harsh. Maybe cruel. But fact is that she still brought on herself.”

“Isn’t that just victim-blaming though?” Adrien countered, frustrated now. “I mean, Hawk Moth manipulated her! How was that her fault? He’s the one who did it. She was…” He clenched his fists in anger. “Chloe is a victim.”

“No, we are the victims.” Alya insisted, gesturing to herself and the other revealed former heroes. “We were the ones used to fight our heroes. We were the ones who had our identities revealed to the world against our will. And now we are the ones having to live with the results of Chloe‘s choices, just like we always are.“

Adrien looked ready to argue. And maybe he would have, except...

Nino rested a hand on Adrien’s shoulder.

“Adrien. Dude. Just stop. We have enough to deal with and this…this isn’t helping.”

Adrien frowned at that, concerned by his friend’s attitude. “Nino?”

Nino lowered his head. “I wasn’t going to say anything. Really, I was trying not to think about it. But my parents are currently talking with police about their options. Now that I’ve been exposed as one of the temporary heroes, they’re questioning if it’s not safe for us at home anymore. There is a chance of us having to go into protective custody.”

Alya winced at that, drawing attention to her. “My parents have been talking as well. My mom quit her job. She said she doesn’t want to work for someone who would let their daughter do such a thing and put me in danger. She’s looking at drawing me out of school since it was pretty much Chloe‘s base of operations. And since Chloe is the Mayor’s daughter…and Hawk Moth…and just…everything?” She looked away, clearly anxious.

“There’s a chance we may have to move out of Paris altogether.”

Marinette gasped.

Alya looked to the other girl, sad and guilty all in one. “I’m sorry, girl. I guess I’ve been hoping it wouldn’t be an issue. I’ve been trying to talk them out of it, but it’s hard given everything that happened. Currently, the only reason they’re willing to stay is to see through to the end of the trial. But after that…” She shrugged, shaking her head uncertainly. “Who can say?”

“No…” Adrien whispered in shock.

The others in class came closer around her, trying to offer some comfort and reassurances—what little they could give, at least. This was a situation that was clearly beyond them. Marinette herself hugged Alya tightly for all she was worth, and the other girl held her back just as much, neither wanting to be parted.

Adrien, however, remained on the outside looking in. Watching the people Chloe had tormented even before Miracle Queen and realizing just how badly they’ve been hurt by this. It hit him then—for what was perhaps the first time just how much pain Chloe had caused his friends. And how unfair he had been to expect them to simply deal with it.

He stayed the lone person outside of the circle. By this point, did he really deserve to join in the comfort? To try to be the one to give comfort? After what he had tried to push on them all?

After minutes passed, they were finally able to draw away from each other.

“I’m sorry for not saying anything sooner.” Alya told Marinette. “I guess I was just hoping…y’know…that it wasn’t real. Or that it would go away and things would work out on their own.”

Marinette smiled. “No, I understand.”

And she did. That’s exactly what she herself had been doing for the past few weeks as well. Trying to deal with things without really dealing with them. Working without acknowledging just what it all meant because she was scared she would break down and that would be just one more thing Hawk Moth would have won because of this whole mess.

“I was kind of the same way.” She admitted, and it felt like a slight relief to be able to say aloud to someone. “I’m sorry I couldn’t talk to you about it.”

She still couldn’t, unfortunately. Not about Ladybug and the kwamis and the Miracle Box.

But…she could talk about Fu. How she lost him. How she feels. She could help support Alya and her classmates and be there for them in the meantime.

She…hadn’t lost everything.

Not yet.

And that was the scary thing…

Adrien gaped at the group. He had thought the trauma was bad enough, and that at least could be worked through. But this...

“I’m sorry. I...I didn’t even realize...”

“Adrien, what Chloe did put a major target on our backs.” Alya explained. “Nobody knows how we became heroes, or that Ladybug was the one to specifically choose us and give us the miraculous to use. Nobody knows WHY we were chosen. It’s not just Hawk Moth, any regular criminal can come after us now in an attempt to get a hold of that power. And we can’t exactly protect ourselves.”

She shrugged helplessly.

“We kind of have enough to worry about with the fallout of Chloe‘s actions. And now you want us to try and protect Chloe on top of that?“

Seeing it now, in this light...it was cruel. It was cruel and unfair and hurtful, and Marinette felt horrible for considering letting herself be talked into it.

Adrien himself felt horrible for even suggesting it.

“We all have to live with the consequences of Chloe’s choices.” Alya stated. “So why shouldn’t she?”

Silence followed. It practically echoed throughout the entire hallway.

He said nothing in response. What could he possibly say? He’d known that Chloe was…difficult with other people, to say the least. He’d known the type of person she was. But she was his friend and friends forgive and support each other, right?

But they were right as well. It wasn’t fair to expect them to help Chloe after what she did. Especially once he knew of the level of harm she’d caused them. He felt the horror trickle in. The trauma everyone felt. The knowledge of what they’d been forced to do. The fact that…

He suddenly found it harder to breathe.

Nino could leave.

Adrien could lose his best friend because of this.

And who knew how many of the others would be forced to leave as well. Aside from Nino; Kim, Max, Alya, and Luka were other heroes as well. Juleka was Luka’s sister. And how many of the other classmates might be pulled out of this class and school because it’s unsafe? And Kagami—oh god, she was outted as well. He hadn’t heard from her in a while. Her mother is probably furious. She could move back to Japan because of this. And Marinette…she had been lucky to not be caught up in that fight since she was a hero only the one time, but that could have been just one more thing Chloe ruined for her…

…what about himself?

He paled.

He was longtime friends with Chloe. Went to school with Chloe. Was in class with Chloe. Chloe, who was currently getting a lot of heat from all of Paris. How was his Father going to react to that? The man was always focused on the company and appearances…what would he do now that Chloe had fallen from grace in such a way? Would he forbid Adrien from talking to Chloe again? Would he pull Adrien from school?

…would he ban Adrien from leaving the house altogether?

How was he only just now considering the impact? For himself or anyone else? Of course people would be hurt. Of course they would be upset. Of course people would respond. Somehow, he knew that, and yet he had only been focused on Chloe that it hadn’t actually hit home until now…

And in that light…

It had been selfish to ask. Honestly, he’d known that when he first tried to approach Marinette. But he felt he had to try. Honestly, part of him had known better than to ask in the first place. But at the same time…there was a part of him that still believed things could just go back to “normal”.

…how foolish. That was a “normal” that nobody else wanted. And even more, it was one that was now impossible…all because of Chloe herself.

“I just wanted to help.”

He deflated, losing all remaining fight.

“I’m sorry.”

The classmates glanced between each other. There was much they could have said, but really, anything they could have said already had been. And with him seeming resigned, it appeared there was no longer a need to defend themselves.

Marinette—ever the mediator, stepped up and hugged Adrien.

“Adrien, this isn’t something you can help with. None of us can. What happens in the trial is up to the courts. And what happens to Chloe is up to her.”

Slowly, he reached up and hugged her as well. The warmth and comfort brought some limited solace in this situation. He felt lost. Out of control. Like the world was moving around him and he didn’t know where he was standing much less where he was supposed to be.

They weren’t ready to forgive Chloe. And he couldn’t force them to be. Given the circumstances, he couldn’t blame them. And it was really unfair of him to try. Especially…

“I’m sorry, Marinette.” He whispered to her.

He had tried to use her. Looking back, he had a bit of a tendency to rely on Marinette to fix things when she shouldn’t have had to. Especially when it was for Chloe’s sake. He knew plenty of times Chloe had done things…but he always seemed to overlook how hurt Marinette was because of it, simply due to how well she always appeared afterwards. She was strong and confident, but also a good listener and willing to forgive. It was like nothing really brought her down.

It was due to this that Marinette was often the one he turned to whenever things happened. Because she would listen. She would understand. And she would always try to help, regardless of her position.

In this light…he may have over relied on her too much.

“I wasn’t fair to you.” He admitted. “I just saw Chloe hurting and only thought about how to fix things for her. I didn’t consider your feelings.” He hugged her more strongly. “I’m sorry.”

She didn’t speak. But she squeezed him back.

He felt another body press against him. A quick glance showed it to be Nino.

“I’m still super mad with her. And I don’t like how you tried to push us to defend her after what she did. But I get that she’s your friend and you care about her. I’d do the same if it were you in her place.” He gave a small laugh. “Not that I think you ever would, of course.”

Adrien smiled back. “Thanks.”

This…this felt much better.

Things weren’t okay right now. He still wanted to help Chloe. His classmates were still hurt. People were still angry. Hawk Moth was still out there.

But whatever happened...in this moment, he felt they could make it.

[tyrannosaurus-trainwreck]

I propose a new rule for action film franchises.  Let’s call it the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule.

Say you have a franchise--let’s use the Bond films as an example--where every single film, the fate of the entire fucking world hangs in the balance.  No matter what got accomplished in the last film, they’re right back at it in this film, having to save the entire world again.  But somehow, the stakes have to be higher than the last time, or it starts getting harder to get audiences back for more of the same, because it starts feeling really repetitive.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time it’s a doomsday device in the hands of two madmen, both of whom have extremely personal scores to settle with you.”

“Well in that case, I suppose I can hardly say no,” James Bond sighs wearily, already longing for the days when it was only a single madman with perhaps a nuclear warhead or two who harbored a vague and academic disapproval of spies in general.

The problem with the ever-rising stakes is that eventually it does become a bit ridiculous.  Remember when Fast and the Furious was about stealing consumer electronics for money?  And now barely eight movies later they’re stealing nukes and driving to space and somehow John Cena is involved?  Another two movies and they’ll be doing donuts on the moon to save earth from being blown up by previously-unmentioned alien conquerors.

So every so often, let’s say every third movie, writers should have to hit a reset button.  Not on the action or the mayhem or the actors’ intensity or whatever it is that gets eyes on screens and butts in seats.  Just, you know.  The stakes.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time the madman’s made off with one of the Queen’s corgis.”

“What?” James Bond demands, aghast. “How could you let this happen?”

“Their dog grooming credentials were impeccable. They passed every security check.  They’d have been allowed to groom Her Majesty herself,” M tells him grimly. “There’s something you should know, Bond.  It was... it was Trixie.”

“Not Trixie,” Bond gasps.  The look on his face is that of a man having a flashback to ‘Nam. “What do they want for her safe return?”

“That’s the sticky wicket, Bond,” Q volunteers, waving vaguely at a wall that begins playing a video.

On the wall, Willem Dafoe cuddles a corgi and stares dead-eyed at the camera.  When he speaks, it’s in an accent that’s vaguely Germanic but not like, enough to make any trade partners really mad about it.

“Trixie is such a good dog.  Such a good girl!” He looks at the dog, face becoming animated and warm. “Who’s a good girl?  Is it you?  It is you!  You’re a good girl!”

He looks back at the camera, eyes once again blank as a shark’s.

“I think, my friends, that Trixie is too good a dog for the rotting corpse of an empire that she was whelped into.  I shall take her with me, and together we shall venture into a brave new world of grassy farms with plenty of room to run and many, many children with which to play.  If you redeem yourselves, perhaps you shall live to see this world that I shall make.  Perhaps you shall live to go... to the dogs!”

The video cuts as he rubs the corgi’s ears and gives her a treat.

“That absolute bastard!” Bond snarls, hurling the fountain pen doomsday device across the room. “Tell me you have something to go on!”

And then we’re off to the races, with typical Bond-level shenanigans, fights, and body counts. 

It’s only that instead of having to come up with a scenario which is somehow more important or more dangerous than the last movie, which was already threatening to kill a billion people or knock the planet off its axis or whatever, it’s just a scenario in which everyone is really, really emotionally invested.

And before anyone starts up with the “these sorts of action-movie shenanigans are only reasonable with incredibly high stakes” argument, let me remind you that by the time they need this proposed intervention, we have already hit patently unreasonable situations and behavior.  Like, these are not reasonable people who are just in it for a boatload of money and somehow fell ass-backwards into a Bond villain scheme for making it.  They didn’t join the rotary club and oops their way into a series of flamboyantly homicidal consultation gigs.

If we can buy somebody going completely balls-to-the-wall, conspiracy-of-thousands, weirdo-cult-aesthetics, murdered-my-own-parents all-in on *checks notes* basically being the CEO of a slightly more criminal than usual international conglomerate that required precisely none of that? If we can buy the iron-jawed goons fist-fighting a guy who’s essentially at this point the goddamned terminator for a generous hourly wage?

Then I think we can buy a weirdo-cult-aesthetics conspiracy-of-thousands megalomaniac who just really, really likes that goddamn dog, or hates the protagonist, or wants to share the daguerreotype of Abraham Lincoln’s penis with the world as the Great Emancipator would have wanted, and the shadowy government-bankrolled action-hero forces driven by fate to stand in their way.

It’s not any less reasonable, anyway, and then when the next movie comes out you can go back to saving New York City from a nuke or Paris from a weather-control device or whatever and no one will be like "well this is a step down from the pageantry of the previous installment.”

I should add that there’s no reason the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule can’t be applied to any sort of serial media.

Your doom-and-gloom tv show just keeps fighting worse and worse villains every single season?  Why not take a break next season and fight a homeowner’s association instead of an artistic serial killer?  Go on a hard-fought, poorly-lit, grim-and-gritty slog through the byzantine process of figuring out which impound lot the Impala got towed to after a bullshit parking ticket. 

Instead of having your teenage characters grapple with Even Worse Demons, they can just, like, egg their principal’s house when it turns out he’s a normal human-level petty tyrant and not a master vampire.  Your nemesis figured out your secret identity, and instead of trying to kill your family or whatever, they hacked your facebook account and friended all your obnoxious relatives/coworkers/friends-of-friends and are embarrassing you in public, and now you have to go on a ridiculously convoluted and dystopian spirit quest to get The Zuck Himself to reset your password.

The possibilities are endless!  Unless you keep ratcheting things up, anyway, in which case you’re eventually and inevitably going to wind up fighting Satan, then God, then Worse God, then Satan’s Dad, Which Is Somehow Not God? Don’t @ Us, Our Mythological Research Prior to Writing This Was Confined to Metal Albums and American Horror Films.

[immaturityofthomasastruc]

Do you any suggestion for Super Sentai?plz

*cracks knuckles*

Well first off, if anyone wanting to get into Super Sentai watched Power Rangers growing up, I’d check out the series whatever season you watched was adapted from to see how things went there in comparison to how they were in the United States. So if you grew up with the original Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers, watch Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger. If you don’t know what the Sentai the season you grew up with is called, I’d check out RangerWiki, which provides a lot of information on both franchises.

I’d also recommend checking out a few episodes of the very first Super Sentai entry, Himitsu Sentai Gorenger. Not all 84 episodes, mind you, but I’d just watch a few to see where Super Sentai got its roots from, because the team football attack gets referenced a lot further down the line. Yes, you read that correctly.

But for individual seasons for beginners, it’s harder for me to answer. Super Sentai has varied aesthetically and tonally across its 45 year run. Some shows are dark and gritty, while others are light-hearted and goofy. Some shows have a vehicle motif, while others use animals for a motif. So the seasons I’m going to talk about will cover all kinds of tones and themes across the years. I also haven’t seen every single entry, so these are the ones I’ve seen that I recommend for beginners.

Denshi Sentai Denziman (1980-1981, 51 Episodes)

Centuries ago, the evil Vader Clan conquered and decimated the Denzi Civilization. In the modern day, the talking dog IC awoke from his slumber when the Vader Clan began their invasion of Earth. So IC recruits five people to become the Denzimen to defend their planet and stop the Vader Clan once and for all.

The first three seasons of Super Sentai were very experimental, but Denziman was where Toei started to get an identity for Sentai down. Not only would the black visors and sculpted mouthpieces become a staple for Sentai’s (and by extension, Power Rangers) suit designs, but this was also the first season to really start a few Sentai traditions. It was the first season to have female villains, the first to use a transformation device for the heroes, the first time the monsters grew to fight the team’s giant robot.

The Denzimen, while not really going through any character development, are still very likable characters, especially Denzi Blue/Daigoro (played by legendary tokusatsu actor Kenji Ohba). The villains are also a lot of fun, a real improvement from the first three villain groups, who were all basically Earth-based terrorist organizations and/or death cults. The Vader Clan is full of villains who are just as entertaining to watch as the heroes, especially Queen Hedrian, played by the late Machiko Soga, who would later go on to play Witch Bandora, the character Rita Repulsa is adapted from in Power Rangers. There’s not that much of an ongoing for most of the series, and it can get pretty goofy at times, but it’s still a really good show.

Choushinsei Flashman (1986-1987, 50 Episodes). 

Five infants are abducted by the Reconstructive Experiment Empire Mess to use as test subjects for experimentation, but are saved by benevolent aliens from the Flash Solar System. They all spend the next twenty years in the system developing their combat skills and special powers until they decide to head back to Earth to fight Mess themselves as the Flashmen, despite the warnings of their alien caretakers.

The 1980s are usually referred to by fans as Super Sentai’s golden age, with a string of great seasons thanks to famed writer Hirohisa Soda. Flashman is no exception. While Denziman tended to have more stand-alone episodes, Flashman is more story-driven. Later on, there’s a really dark plot twist that I don’t want to give away. Admittedly, some of the special effects can be dated to showcase the Flashmen’s powers in addition to stock footage being reused a lot, but the action and camerawork are still fast-paced and rarely do the fight scenes get boring.

The villains are the kind you love to hate, and their actors all give great performances, especially the late Unsho Ishizuka (the Japanese voice of Professor Oak) as Great Emperor La Deus. This is easily one of the darker Super Sentai entries, but if you don’t mind that, I highly recommend it.

Choujuu Sentai Liveman (1988-1989 49 Episodes). 

At an academy for the finest minds in the world, three of the students feel their talents are being wasted on designing a satellite to conduct scientific research. They soon join up with Great Professor Bias, leader of the Armed Brain Army Volt, who takes them all under his wing as his students and generals. Before they leave, they kill two students, leaving their three friends traumatized. Two years later, Volt begins its plan to conquer Earth, but the three friends of the two victims developed their own technology to fight them as the Livemen in the two years since they last saw their former classmates. Bias’ students have developed their own abilities through mutating their bodies, starting a conflict between some of the most intelligent youths in the world while figuring out what Bias’ evil plan is...

Some Sentai fans consider this to be even darker than Flashman at times due to the themes discussed. Unlike earlier seasons, the heroes have a more personal connection to the villains, and act as foils to them in terms of morality. The show also has some surprisingly deep themes at times, deconstructing the harsh standards the Japanese have for education and the effects they can have on people. Seriously, the main villain, Great Professor Bias, sets up a competition for his generals as a way to advance his plans, treating it like a high academic honor. 

This series also has some amazing special effects for the time. This was the first Sentai series to have an animal motif, so they go all out by using one of the most complicated models for his giant robotic lion, a stunning innovation for special effects. It was also the first series to introduce the gimmick of combining two robots, which is a genius marketing tactic when you think about it, motivating kids to buy both robots to combine them. Even putting those technical aspects aside, this is still one of the most iconic Super Sentai seasons, and a must-watch for beginners.

Choujin Sentai Jetman (1991-1992, 51 Episodes)

An elite soldier is chosen for a top-secret military project meant to turn him into the leader of a team of supersoldiers called the Jetmen. After he gets his powers, the satellite base is attacked by the Dimensional War Party Vyram. Not only are the four remaining “Birdonic Waves” meant to empower the rest of the Jetmen scattered across Earth, powering four civilians instead, but the soldier’s fiance is killed in the process. So he has to recruit the rest of the Jetmen and form a competent team to stop the Vyram from conquering their dimension.

A lot of Precure fans view Heartcatch as the best series in the entire franchise, and many Sentai fans view Jetman the same way. It was a huge success in ratings and toy sales, which actually helped to save Super Sentai from cancellation after the disastrous sales and ratings of the previous series, Chikyuu Sentai Fiveman. It also had some elements that made it stand out from earlier Sentai seasons. While I’ve talked about how Marinette was forced to become Guardian against her will while the show doesn’t acknowledge it, this show actually does point out that almost the entire team is a group of civilians with no combat experience. Earlier episodes are not only spent assembling the team, but also training them to better fight the Vyram and pilot their giant robot.

The series introduced a love triangle for three of the Jetmen, and while controversial among fans, was very popular with Japanese mothers, who were rumored to find Gai/Black Condor very attractive and begged Toei to not kill him off. The love triangle, while arguably one of the weakest parts of this show (but still better written than the Love Square), was part of the main theme of the team being more conflicted, showing they weren’t all best friends all the time.

This extended to the Vyram, who also tended to fight with each other over their plans to conquer the Earth. Sure, there was the occasional villain in earlier seasons who tried to overthrow the big bad, but this was the first time we had a whole group of villains trying to one-up each other. The best way to describe the Vyram is if the cast of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia were supervillains who were still competent at their jobs.

The series is also incredibly dark, and is often seen as the darkest Sentai has ever gotten. There’s a lot more violence and blood than usual, and a lot more onscreen deaths that aren’t just limited to the villains. Humans are actively killed or hurt in the crossfire, and it shows just how painful this war is. And because of all of that and many other reasons, this is seen as the peak of Super Sentai. If you have to watch a single Sentai series, watch Jetman.

Ninja Sentai Kakuranger (1994-1995, 53 Episodes)

During Japan’s Sengoku Era, a team of five ninja sealed away the leader of an army of Youkai, rendering their kind powerless. In the present day, one of the few surviving Youkai tricks two bikers, who are actually descendants of two of the ninja in the past, into undoing the seal and giving all of the Youkai their powers back. Another descendant of the ninja recruits them into taking on the legacy of their ancestors to fight the Youkai, becoming the Kakurangers.

The 1990s were when Super Sentai was starting to delve more into fantasy elements rather than just science-fiction, and also started to take on a more light-hearted tone. Kakuranger is no exception. It’s a lot more goofy than the other entries, even using comic book-style graphics during its fight scenes. There’s also a narrator who appears to explain the history of the Youkai of the week, a detail I really like. While this show is still unashamedly goofy, it still gets more serious in the second half, but never loses its comedic moments entirely.

Like with Jetman, Kakuranger shows the reality of drafting two civilians to fight a war against the supernatural, with only one of the first three Kakurangers knowing how to fight. That Kakuranger in question, Tsuruhime/Ninja White, is easily one of the best Sentai heroines of all time. Not only was the first female and non-Red to lead a Sentai team, but she was only fifteen years old while the other Kakurangers were in their twenties. Marinette could learn a lot from her, and no, that’s not an insult. Tsuruhime is a complete badass, and a team-up with Ladybug would be the coolest thing ever.

What was I talking about? Oh yeah, watch Kakuranger.

Kyukyu Sentai GoGoV (1999-2000, 50 Episodes)

The demonic children of the Grand Witch Grandiene begin causing natural disasters to bring destruction to Earth in order to revive their mother. In response, five rescue workers who also happen to be siblings are recruited by their estranged father to become a team dedicated to saving lives from the Psyma Family’s actions.

Did anyone ever watch Rescue Heroes as a kid? Imagine that show, but with the intensity turned up to eleven. This show is epic, with amazing action and some of the coolest giant robots in Sentai history. One of their robots is a giant train armed to the teeth with guns. Even putting aside the action, this show does a great job at highlighting all the dedication rescue workers have to their jobs by showing a lot of rescue scenes in addition to having GoGoV fight the Psyma. It even teaches the audience about firefighters from Japan’s Edo Period. There’s really not a lot of shows that explain what rescue workers were like in the past, which shows just how invested this show is in teaching people about rescue workers.

While this wasn’t the first Sentai series to feature a team of siblings (the first being the aforementioned Fiveman), I think it managed to capture the dynamic best. Family is a key theme of the series, with the healthy relationship between GoGoV contrasting with the more toxic environment the Psyma Family has.

This is easily one of the most action-packed Sentai series ever made. It is literally Fire Force twenty years before that anime premiered, and it is AWESOME.

Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger (2004-2005, 50 Episodes)

In the not-too-distant future (Next Sunday, A.D.), the universe has come together to the point where Earth has made contact with several intelligent alien civilizations. However, intergalactic arms dealer Agent Abrella starts to help out the extraterrestrial criminals on Earth, called Alienizers, by providing technology and giant robots to them because he enjoys profiting from crime, and dreams of a world without the police. In response the organization Special Police Dekaranger, or S.P.D., brings together a team of officers to apprehend the Alienizers.

You want to see space cops doing space cop stuff? Then this is the show for you. Admittedly, this isn’t the most story-driven show, but is instead carried by its characters, who go through a lot of development. The Dekarangers have one of the best team dynamics in Sentai history. All of them are very likable characters, and it’s a lot of fun to see them interact. But the best character in the show goes to the Dekarangers’ boss, Doggie Kruger/Dekamaster, a dog alien who becomes a Dekaranger himself, labeling himself The Watchdog of Hell. That has to be the coolest title any superhero has ever had. Dekamaster is another one of the greatest Super Sentai characters ever, taking down a hundred goons in his first battle by himself.

I haven’t even gotten to Agent Abrella, one of the coolest Sentai villains of all time. He’s obsessed with profit and chaos, and he’s easily one of the most sadistic main villains compared to his predecessors. He isn’t some evil emperor who wants to rule the world. He just wants to raise hell and make a quick buck from it. He’s also voiced by Ryusei Nakao, the Japanese voice of Frieza from Dragon Ball Z. That’s another appeal of Sentai, the voice talent. A lot of big-name voice actors have voiced characters, like Mao Ichimichi and Kotono Mitsuishi. Hell, the currently ongoing Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger has Yuki Kaji of Attack on Titan fame voicing one of the main characters.

Dekaranger is easily one of the most popular Sentai seasons out there, as it has a lot of additional material. Not only did the Dekarangers get a theatrically released film like many other seasons before it, they teamed up with two separate Sentai teams, some of them cameoed in the anniversary series Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger, they got a reunion movie ten years after its finale, four of the Dekarangers guest starred in another Sentai series two years after that, Uchu Sentai Kyuranger, which served as a prologue to a team-up with another Toei hero, Uchuu Kenji Gavan, and then that led into the Dekarangers cameoing in another Kyuranger movie meant to be an epilogue to that series.

Yeah, this is why I haven’t talked about the Sentai movies in this post. You don’t have to watch any of these unless you really enjoy Dekaranger, which you should at least check out. It’s slow at times, but it’s still a lot of fun.

Engine Sentai Go-Onger (2008-2009, 50 Episodes)

The Banki Clan Gaiark have traveled from their home dimension of Machine World and chosen Earth as their new home, but they have to pollute the planet to serve as an ideal living space for their kind. In response, sentient animal-themed vehicles called the Engines choose five humans to partner up with, the five humans in question becoming the Go-Ongers.

Unlike most of the shows I talked about, Go-Onger is incredibly goofy, and I love it. The characters are all incredibly likable, both the Go-Ongers and the Engines. While Sentai had touched upon the idea of treating the mecha as sentient beings, this was one of the earliest series to actually have their partners talk, leading to some interesting character dynamics. The villains are also really fun to watch. While they’re about as competent as Team Rocket at times, there are moments where you actually feel bad for them, especially towards the end of the series.

It’s also really funny. Granted, comedy is subjective, so you may not find the same things as funny, but there are a lot of funny moments in this show, all helped by the actors giving amazing performances. Go-Onger can get extremely wacky at times, like in Episode 31. I’m not going to say what happens, you should watch it for yourself.

What makes the humor really work unlike the last attempt at a comedy-focused Sentai, Carranger, it didn’t really feel mean-spirited by portraying the heroes as idiots by claiming to be “parodying” Sentai. Yes, the Go-Ongers can be dumb at times, but they still take their jobs seriously when they’re not goofing around. There’s not really much I can say about Go-Onger other than it being a bunch of dumb fun. If you’re in the mood to start off with something more light-hearted, I’d check it out.

Samurai Sentai Shinkenger (2009-2010, 49 Episodes)

For centuries, generations of samurai have waged a war against a race of demons from the underworld called the Gedoshu. After their leader was temporarily sealed away for several years, the Gedoshu begin another invasion of the surface while trying to flood the Sanzu River, which grows through human misery. In response, the current generation of samurai, the Shiba Clan, assemble to fight the Gedoshu as the Shinkengers.

This was actually one of the first Sentai seasons I ever watched, as my first Power Rangers season was Samurai. And yeah, while Samurai is a really bad adaptation, I’m here to judge Shinkenger on its own. Admittedly, there are a lot of qualities that can be chalked up to cultural differences, like the whole honor code samurai have and certain plotlines you’d see in a jidaigeki film. The Shinkengers themselves are all very likable characters, and you can really relate to their struggles of being forced into this war (again, handled a lot better than what’s going on with Marinette). All of them have different responses to their situation. Some of them dedicate themselves to wholeheartedly following their lord (Takeru/Shinken Red) or being more vocal in their hatred of their duties.

The villains are also really interesting. Sure, the big bad is pretty boring, but the side villains are just so twisted they really steal the show. Takeru/ShinkenRed gets a rival who serves as a perfect foil to him, representing the idea of why one fights. Even the concept of the Gedoushu is pretty terrifying. Demons from another world hellbent on causing misery to flood our world with their water, which I must point out, is deadly to humans. They’re not my favorite villain group, but they’re a close second.

There’s also some clever plot twists that happen late into the series that I don’t want to give away. Sure, you might have a hard time getting used to the Japanese culture at first, but Shinkenger is still a great series.

Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger (2011-2012, 51 Episodes)

The Zangyack Empire invades Earth and because of their army reaching across the universe, they become the greatest threat the planet has ever had. In response, the previous thirty-four Sentai teams unite to fight them. They succeed, but the attack they used to wipe out the battle fleet stripped them of their powers. A few years later, a group of space pirates come to Earth in search of “The Greatest Treasure in the Universe”. While the pirates couldn’t care less about stopping the Zangyack, they still have to deal with them while searching for the treasure, which is somehow connected to the previous thirty-four Sentai teams. Also, the pirates form their own Sentai team, the thirty-fifth Sentai team in particular, the Gokaigers, who have the ability to TRANSFORM INTO ANY OF THE PREVIOUS SENTAI TEAMS.

For Super Sentai’s 35th anniversary, Toei wanted to go big this time. While the previous two anniversary seasons only had movies that paid tribute to Sentai as a whole, this was the first season where the anniversary aspect was in the premise alone. 

The interesting thing is that the series was changed last-minute, and it was totally for the better. See, in March of 2011, Japan’s Tohoku Region was devastated by an earthquake registering at a 9.1 on the Richter scale. To this day, it was the largest earthquake ever recorded in Japan’s history, and that’s not even getting into the tsunami it caused the same day. What does this have to do with Gokaiger? In response to the tragedy, several tokusatsu stars including Super Sentai alumni took to social media to encourage kids to stay positive, and even asked some of Gokaiger’s showrunners if they could reprise their roles in an episode. Originally, there were going to be some cameos from past Sentai heroes, but it would only be limited to the ones whose powers would upgrade the Gokaigers’ giant robot. After this, there were a lot more cameos from Sentai alumni in the latter half of the series. Out of Gokaiger’s 51 episodes, 24 of them were tributes to past seasons. And that’s not even getting into all of the cameos in the movies too.

This was another one of the first Sentai seasons I ever saw, and it really helped me get into the franchise as a whole. It manages to explain things to people who haven’t seen certain seasons, while paying tributes to said seasons and making clever homages older fans will understand. Admittedly, the show does spoil the endings of the older seasons like Liveman and Jetman, so keep that in mind before starting this one.

Even outside of the tributes, the Gokaigers are some of the most memorable characters Super Sentai’s had in recent years. While they aren’t exactly evil, they start off not really interested in protecting Earth and care more about getting the Greatest Treasure in the Universe. The only reason they fight the Zangyack in the first episode was because their lunch was interrupted. A team of anti-heroes in Super Sentai hasn’t really been done before. Even then, there’s an interesting dynamic where some of the Gokaigers have more of a moral conscience than the others. And as the series goes on, they start to care more about protecting the Earth, even if they don’t admit it.

It’s just a really good show, and even if it isn’t your first, I’d check it out.

Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger (2013-2014, 48 Episodes)

When the alien entity known as Deboss invades Earth during the prehistoric era, another bird-like alien named Torin empowers several dinosaurs into the mighty Zyudenryu to fight off the invading force. After a brutal final battle, Deboss was sealed away, but his army of followers was still growing. In response, Torin started to recruit several humans throughout time into the modern day to become the Kyoryugers.

While Gokaiger was the first Sentai I ever watched, Kyoryuger was the first Sentai I watched every week as it aired, so it has a special place in my heart despite its middling reputation. Yeah, Kyoryuger has been criticized for starting the trend of Red Senshi stealing all the screentime, and while that can easily be applied to later entries like Shuriken Sentai Ninninger and Kishiryu Sentai Ryusoulger (the latter basically made Red and Gold the only ones to pilot the giant robots while the others watched), I don’t think it's as bad as everyone says it is.

There is just an amazing cast of characters here. It’s the first Sentai to be composed of ten rangers (while Dekaranger also had ten, three of them were just one-offs), and it does a really good job at balancing them all out. Yes, Daigo/Kyoryu Red does get a handful of power-ups and can be the focus at times, but the other characters all have their own distinct personalities and are just a blast to watch. I’d honestly recommend watching a few episodes of this show to get an idea on how to do an ensemble cast. If I end up doing the whole “tokusatsu has better toy tie-ins than Miraculous” thing, expect me to talk about how Kyoryuger introduces its new characters and giant robots.

And then there’s the soundtrack. Oh my God, the soundtrack. Sentai tends to have banger songs for their seasons, and Kyoryuger is no exception. “Vamola! Kyoryuger”, “Solid Bullet”, “Kyoryu Gold! Iza!”, “Yuuki Bakuretsu”, “Chou Shinka! Kyoryu Beat”, “Houkou! Bragigas”, and “Senkou no Brave”. So many of these songs are incredibly catchy, and I haven’t listed all of them. The show has a bit of a music motif, so it makes sense for there to be a lot of insert songs.

The one major flaw I have to point out is that you kind of have to watch the theatrical movie (which is only slightly longer than an average episode), in order to understand some of the plotpoints for the season’s endgame, but other than that, it’s still a really good season to start off on.

Mashin Sentai Kiramager (2020-2021, 45 Episodes)

The Dark Empire Yodonheim attacks the planet Crystalia, with the king’s brother betraying him and siding with the enemy. The kingdom’s princess is sent to Earth to recruit five warriors to fight the Empire. The chosen five all possess “Kiramental”, a way of weaponizing their imagination, which they use to defend the Earth’s radiance.

Precure fans might remember this being the season where Cure Star met the Red to promote the latter’s season (actually referring to Cure Star as his sempai), and I can kind of see why. A lot of fans have jokingly compared this season to Precure because of the gemstone motif and focus on creativity, with Juru/Kiramai Red acting like a Pink Cure according to some of the comments I’ve seen in Sentai discussion forums.

This is the most recent season to finish as of this post, and it’s already gotten a lot of praise in terms of writing, characters, story, and managing all of these during the COVID-19 Pandemic and having to adapt to losing five episodes in the process. The characters are very likable, the Red is one of the better ones in recent years with him being more timid compared to the more hotheaded ones, and the villains are also amazing, and some of the best in recent years. Episodes can range from funny to tragic to just plain awesome in terms of writing, with seemingly innocent filler episodes being the source of major bombshells and plot twists. 

Honestly, there’s not much I can really say about this show other than check it out for yourself.

But these are just my recommendations. If you do some research and see a season you like, I’d go for it. If anyone else wants me to do these for Kamen Rider and Ultraman, I’d be happy to.

Sorry this took so long.

[autisticsupervillain]

I don't talk about my inFAMOUS hyperfixation enough, so here's some stuff.

Dark Danny and Kessler are basically polar opposites of each other as far as Evil Future Me villains go.

Kessler: I fucked up, destroyed the world, and lost everyone I ever cared about. I need to go back in time and make sure that doesn't happen.

Dark Danny: I fucked up, destroyed the world, and lost everyone I cared about. I better go back in time and make sure that does happen.

It gets me wondering... what if Dark Danny was The Beast that Kessler wanted Cole to destroy?

Let me introduce the inFAMOUS Phantom AU.

The year is 20xx in the not so distance future. Danny Phantom finally dropped his heroic charade and embraced his ghostly nature, going on a rampage from Wisconsin to Amity Park, decimating all he sees. The Guys In White only manage to capture and contain him using their newly aquired Conduit unites. Conduits are humans who have the Conduit gene, a genetic failsafe that, when activated, could give the bearer extraordinary powers. The Conduit gene was only able to be activated recently thanks to the advancements pushed by their head scientist, Cole MacGraph.

Cole is put in charge of containing Phantom. His technology is several years ahead of the rest of the world, after all, and it's jis discoveries that unlocked the secrets of the Conduit gene and allowed Phantom to be captured to begin with.

However, Phantom is incrediblybclever and quickly thinks up a plan to escape. Taking the form of his younger, human self, Danny Fenton, Phantom tells him of his origins. Of the ghost portal that turned him half ghost, of the grand heroic adventures he had.... and of how his parents kept trying to kill him, despite his heroic deeds. Phantom claims that his ghost half and his human half have separate personalities, and that his ghost half came to despise the human race for their hatred of him.

"Please... I just want to go home. I miss my friends... I miss my mom... Wait, my parents... the Fenton Ghost Catcher! You can separate my two halves! That way my ghost half will dissolve when separated from his host!"

This is all an elaborate lie, painstakingly sprinkled with enough truth to be believable. Daniel Fenton is dead. All that happens when the Ghost Catcher is used is that the ghost (Phantom) is expunged from his non-ghost containment chamber. Phantom uses the opportunity to possess Cole with an invisible duplicate while the Conduit team recontain him. He then uses Cole's notes and free access to the facility to carefully plan his escape, whilst assassinating the Conduit team to ensure they don't stand in his way. He also kills Cole's family, both to keep them from questioning his odd behavior and to give his own strange behavior an excuse. Of course he's getting strangely close to the Conduit team, he's grieving and needs companionship.

Fortunately, Phantom didn't plan for Cole having friends outside the GIW. When Zeke Dunbar strangely stops receiving Cole's calls, he goes undercover to investigate. Putting together what happened from Cole's notes on Phantom, Zeke frees Cole with the Fenton Ghost Catcher in front of what remains of the Conduit team. Cole and Zeke escape as Phantom slaughters what remains of the Conduit team, as well as the rest of the GIW.

Zeke urges Cole to help fight off Phantom, but Cole instead becomes obsessed with resurrecting his family. He ignores Zeke's attempts to reason with him, runs away again every time Phantom shows up wherever he's hiding. Until it's to late. To late to fight back. To late to do anything. As far as Cole knows, he's the last man on Earth when Phantom sends Zeke's battered body flying through his door.

Phantom recognizes him and laughs, taunting him over the sob story he had about his family. "The best part is that it's all true, to a degree. I didn't even have to lie to trick you."

But, as soon as Dan tries to blast him, Cole is saved by two words.

"Time Out."

Clockwork appears and gives Cole a Time Medallion, before deciding to strike a deal with him. He offers Cole the chance to go 20 years back in time in order to prevent this future. Cole accepts. Taking the name Kessler upom arriving in the past, Cole gets to work.

Firstly, Kessler rejoins the GIW under his new identity, quickly rising through the ranks with his forehand knowledge and scientific prestige. He pushes development of the Conduit project ahead by several decades, giving himself powers and creating a cult of personality around himself in the process. Anyone who opposes his hostile takeover is quietly disposed of and Cole MacGrath finds himself expelled from college on mysterious grounds, never getting a chance to join the GIW.

Kessler creates a weapon called the Ray Sphere, a device designed to explode and kill any non-Conduit caught in it's blast. The Conduits will have their powers supercharged by the bio-electricity absorbed from all non-Conduits killed in the explosion, artificial advancing their development.

Kessler manipulates Cole into detonating the Ray Sphere in Empire City, before using the GIW resources to launch a hostile take over the city to "control the damage", all whilst having the government create a cover story so that Phantom doesn't get involved. Cole is forced to adabt and become stronger to survive with all the odds stacked against him, exactly as Kessler intended, forging Cole into the hero that he himself was not. After Kessler kills Cole's girlfriend to keep him from getting distracted from his mission, he challenges his past self to a climactic final battle to prove he's become as strong as he needs to be.

Cole emerges victorious and Kessler uses his final breath to show Cole visions of the future. Of the massacre of mankind, of the death of his family, of the sob story that Phantom manipulated him with. Cole is sent reeling from the revelation that Kessler is his future self and it is now up to him to save the world. As a reminder of the task he must now uptake, Cole grabs the Time Medallion off Kessler's body, not knowing it's true significance.

But, of course, that is only one path thay the parade might take. There is an equally valid timeline where Cole takes the opposite lesson from all the hardship he endures. He learns not to be responsible, but to be strong. Not to be compassionate, but to be vengeful. Not to save lives, but to gain power. While in one world Cole becomes a FAMOUS hero, in another, he becomes an inFAMOUS villain.

Both Coles set course to Amity Park, with their best friend Zeke by their side. One hoping to save the world, the other hoping to destroy the competition. Good Cole takes the sneakier approach when challenging Phantom. He has Zeke create a distraction for the Fentons by claiming to be an investor interested in their research, while Cole sneaks downstairs. MacGrath trashes the ghost portal, alongside anything else that might be useful to Phantom in the fight against him, before carving "meet me in Central Park, Phantom" into the wall with lightning.

Evil Cole takes the more direct approach, instead blasting the Fenton building apart with a giant thunder bolt. What Cole wasn't prepared for was for the Fentons to survive and for their ghost weapons to be able to harm him, forcing him back long enough for Danny Fenton to transform into Danny Phantom.

Either way, Cole MacGrath comes face to face with a Danny Phantom who is varying degrees of pissed.

Their fight is suprisingly even and both end up bring good counters to the other. Cole's resistance to mind control is sufficiently enough that he can ward off Danny's possession, his Radar Sense counters invisibility thanks to homing in on Danny's bio-electricity, while his own projectile versatility is strong enough to match most of what Danny can throw at him and then some. Danny, meanwhile, has actual flight to counter Cole's gliding, shapeshifting and Intangibility to dodge attacks, and is a better close range fighter when compared to Cole's over reliance on range. Evil Cole also has in edge in that he's willing to leverage civilian lives to give himself an edge, either by using them as hostages or by outright draining their bio-electricity to heal himself. Either way, it's a long fight that sends the two flying and fighting across all of Amity Park.

It comes to an end when Sam and Tucker and the sidelines realize Cole's weakness to water, spraying him with a hose to incapacitate him long enough for Danny to get close. Zeke rushes in to help, as do Sam and Tucker, but Danny ends up grabbing Cole's time medallion, sending the five flying off to meet Clockwork.

When there, the five witness Danny's evil future firsthand, with even Evil Cole suprised by the raw power on display by Dark Danny. Clockwork appears and explains how he sent Kessler back in time to alter history and prevent this future, but that plan "failed" so now he's going to "kill" them. However, Cole is able to quickly deduce the importance of the medallions and throws one on him and Zeke. Evil Cole only gives more to Danny and Friends upon Zeke's insistence. The five run into the future, coming face to face with Dark Danny himself.

Dan recognizes Cole, Zeke, and Clockwork's medallions, commenting about how "even dead, MacGrath's a pain in my ass". Cole and Danny try to fight him, but neither can get any good hits in, and the five are forced to run away. Cole only manages to save Zeke at the last second by blasting his time medallion, causing him to do the same to the rest of the medallions to keep Dan from following them into the past.

Cole initially thinks that that's the end of it. Danny saw his future self and was just as horrifed as they were. He's scared straight and won't be a problem anymore. Evil Cole, meanwhile, immediately goes back to trying to kill Danny to eliminate the competition. Either way, Sam and Tucker interrupt and point out that Dark Danny could still come back. He has the time medallions and if he puts them back together, he could travel back in time to prevent his past from changing. Indeed, Dark Danny is trying to do just that, as he has enough Vlad in him to try putting the advanced tech back together.

Cole and Danny are forced to train together to defeat Dark Danny, giving Danny the opportunity to learn who Cole is and what his deal is. Especially seeing how destroyed all the Fenton tech, so teaming up is the only real option. This gives Cole the opportunity to test his mettle against Danny's villains, from stomping Technus by draining all his technology to working together to beat Vlad.

Within the span of a few months, Cole and Danny are stronger than ever... and they'll have to be, because Dark Danny has arrived. The Ultimate Enemy is here, and they're the only ones who can stop him.

[dreamsmp-au-ideas]

Oops, I made a plot…

Anyways. Epithet Erased

I love the idea that the Egg was created by someone with the Epithet of Consume. Now an interesting idea I had is that the owner of Consume originally had possession of the Arsene Amulet after Copycat died. The owner of Consume created the Egg and then started using the Amulet to feed Epithets to the Egg. In return, the Egg was able to use these Epithets and temporarily bestow their powers onto those who followed it, hence the whole bloodline wanting to protect it kinda thing. When the original owner of Consume started to reach the end of their lifespan they fed themselves to the Egg in hopes that it would eventually be fed something like Immortal or Rebirth and it could bring back its former master. This is why it’s an Egg, eventually it’s going to hatch into the original owner of Consume if it’s fed the right Epithet

The reason those following the Egg want the amulet is because they want to get back to work again. Everyone else is varying degrees of aware in terms of the Egg group’s plan. The Egg Group also has a process that new members of the Egg Cult go through where they offer up their Epithet to the Egg by being “Consumed” by it and held inside the Egg for a couple days. At which point the Egg leeches out their Epithet as an extra way to force its followers to be loyal. Sure you can still use your powers, and a ton of other Epithets as well, as long as you’re linked up with the Egg. But the moment you become disloyal and break off your Epithet is gone. It belongs to the Egg, you were only renting it.

Of course this takes a lot of time so it hasn’t happened to anyone in the DSMP by the time the actual plot starts except for Skeppy who’s the bartering chip that the Egg uses to make Bad be loyal to it. Bad doesn’t belong to the bloodline that’s been taking care of the Egg, he’s just a victim of circumstance. Techno is part of the family, but he’s a member of an offshoot branch that distanced itself from the Egg. He’s Billiam’s great (however many greats) nephew, but that isn’t a strong enough link, he’s the actual great (however many greats) grandson of the Sheriff which is why the Egg has less of a hold over him than it would a typical member of the bloodline.

Mundies are actually the best people for the job when it comes to fighting the Egg since its mind control powers only work on those who have an Epithet or offered up their Epithet to the Egg. Those who lost their Epithet specifically to the amulet against their wills are also immune. The Egg has the same powers seen in canon because one of the first Epithets it ever ate was Control.

There is a trade off to the Egg taking powers however, since the Epithets can’t “mature” while inside the Egg. Meaning they stay at the same proficiency level their former owner possessed making it advantageous for the Egg to allow Epithets to “mature”. The Egg might even offer an Epithet to a Mundie to let them mature it before harvesting it at a later date. It’s worth noting also there is a difference between getting trapped on top of the Egg and getting trapped inside the Egg like Skeppy, only the latter will get your Epithet snatched while Tubbo and Ranboo who are victims of the former just get their heads scrambled.

Team Pro Omelet eventually learns of the Egg’s abilities and plans and at that point it’s a race against the clock to ensure they 1. Don’t get the Amulet and 2. Aren’t able to shove anyone powerful inside the egg (cough cough Tubbo/Ranboo cough cough). While we could have Tubbo angst with his powers getting yoinked, I don’t think it would mean as much as the angst that would come from him just being normally controlled by the Egg and having his Epithet taken against his will would partially break him out of its control. He might not actually care as much about his Epithet, but him hurting Tommy by accident while being controlled? That would break him, mentally and emotionally.

While I was thinking about the plot, I mentioned with my last post I think that Tommy’s Epithet should have been taken or lost. We’ve had a connection made between Tommy loosing his power to Ranboo causing him to forget which I really like, but what if, and hear me out, he loses it to the Amulet? The last caretaker yoinks it with the intention of giving it to the get, probably at some point a good ways before the plot starts. However, because the former caretaker loses the Amulet before depositing it, Tommy’s Epithet stays pretty much trapped inside the Amulet. Partially because I really like the idea of Antihero Dream having to 180 why he wants to Amulet when Tommy eventually admits what happened. It adds a nice dynamic of character wants.

Originally I purposed Hero as Tommy’s Epithet which is good, but I think I can outdo myself. Meaning I have two other options.

Earlier I mentioned the Egg really really wanting someone with Immortal/Rebirth. Well, it’s a running gag that I keep making Tommy a phoenix in every AU I touch because he never damn well dies. So you could give one of those two words, or heck, even the word Phoenix itself to Tommy and it’d not only be a really good Epithet but it’d be an Epithet currently inside the Amulet, giving even more of a dire air to the story as a whole. If the Egg Squad is able to get that Epithet inside of the Egg, you bet it’s gonna hatch and the results will not be pretty. It also plays well with the fact that Tommy just never seems to die. Even when he doesn’t have his Epithet it’s such an engrained character detail that people comment on it whenever he joins an SMP.

I think it could be an interesting dynamic and it gives Tommy an array of interesting powers from wings to fire to being able to bring himself back to life. Additionally, we can give Immortal or Rebirth to Foolish since he’s a sentient Totem of Undying in canon and it would work well.

Alternatively, and this is admittedly the idea I personally favor, we pull a parallel between Tommy and Tubbo by giving him a seemingly stupid Epithet that’s deceptively strong. And trust me, I spent a lot of time thinking about what this Epithet might be and how it could be misinterpreted. The idea I ultimately settled on was Archetype. Now, this idea is near and dear to my heart because it fits Tommy as much as everything I’ve posted prior and arguably even more so than Hero. Tommy throughout the entire canon DSMP has had role after role forced on him. Being called the Hero or the Villain when really he just wants to be Tommy. I like the poetic irony of his Epithet literally being Archetype when everyone around him seems so desperate to assign him one. Plus, it’s one of those things that requires not just creativity but a certain level of classical or psychological background information to use properly, leading most people to being unable to use it (Egg included if it actually managed to get the Amulet.) So people just kind of brush it off and it lends itself well to the whole do you wanna be a hero thing since Hero is an Archetype.

For this power we’d basically be able to pull some really strong parallels between Tommy and Tubbo. Both have Epithets that are strongest when they temporarily become a different Epithet. Maybe Tommy can not only use Archetype, but he can temporarily transform it into literally any societally recognized Archetype and use that as if it was his Epithet. So he could still technically use the same powers one could come up with for Hero, it would just be while he’s using an Archetype Swap ability. Not only that but he’d be able to change other people’s personalities or Archetypes. He could even imbue others with traits of a new Archetype (i.e. giving a Mundie the powers associated with a Hero Archetype, aka literal actual honest to god plot armor) to act as support, but you wouldn’t think to do that typically. You’d just assume that Archetype is a one trick kind of pony at best. But maybe if we wanna go Tommy and Tubbo childhood friends route as kids they specifically spent hours practicing alone when they figured out their Epithets. Specifically coming up with overpower combo moves, thinking up powers that interacted well with one another to make themselves an actually terrifying menace to society.

Tommy and Tubbo childhood friends also is near and dear to my heart because everyone remembers the scene where Tommy told Tubbo that he’d been the hero and Tommy was the one who was the side kick. Having Tommy’s Epithet be Archetype and the majority of his childhood used to find ways to support Tubbo’s Epithet using his own adds another layer to this. Tommy literally made Tubbo the hero, gave him the powers and assigned him the Archetype. It’s just that they’re the only ones who know that. Plus plus we get a really good queen and knight dynamic between the two when they’re going all out which I just die for.

Also if SBI is canon, it makes sense why Tommy would have learned the word Archetype as a child, he’s related to Techno, what else would you expect? Part of Tommy being stupidly good at his power is probably from Techno reading him mythology as a child and linking up characters to their Archetypes, giving Tommy even more stupidly overpowered ideas for how to use his Epithet. Unfortunately it got yoinked at some point, either because someone saw how powerful it was or maybe Tommy just got unlucky. I think out of the ideas I’ve listed Archetype is my favorite if we go the yoinked route. It also works well with Techno and Dream since, again, Tommy could play a support role to make these already terrifying Mundies even more terrifying. Plus it would be like Tommy to keep having an Epithet secret because Techno is a Mundie and then later accidentally getting it stolen or we can go double angst and have Tommy both forget he has an Epithet and get it stolen.

Obviously Archetype being the Epithet and the plot would still work with Tommy just forgetting what his Epithet was, but also I really personally just like the aching pain of Tommy being forced to describe what it’s like having your Epithet stolen. How much the gap doesn’t hurt physically but emotionally and mentally almost daily, a phantom pain that never goes away. Sweet angst my beloved.

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

Tubbo🤝Tommy

Having stupidly overpowered Epithets

Anyways. Holy shit. This is brilliant. The plot is brilliant and oh god. This could open up so much now. The Arsene Amulet is still relevant in a way.

Oh man, the Egg just consuming Epithets as well? Man. That’s great.

[alethiometry]

thinkin about an alternate take on odyssey’s cult of kosmos storyline that may culminate in a blatant ripoff of valhalla but bear with me here lmao

instead of deimos continually antagonizing you the entire game as you try desperately to convince them that the cult is simply using them, deimos is actively trying to recruit you to fight alongside them. you are both demigods descended from sparta’s greatest hero, two sides of the same coin, etc. etc. as you go around killing cultists you get those cutscenes where each cultist gets to have one final say (just like all the other ac games) and while many joined and profited from the war for selfish reasons, there are enough of those who had lofty ideals that maybe you start to see that the two warring nations are both truly broken beyond repair. people are suffering because of the war, and for every callous profiteer that joined the cult to make a quick buck there’s also someone who joined just to survive, or because if you can’t beat em, join em -- at the least, they could then maybe stand a chance at protecting the people they love, even if it means others will have to pay that price. that’s just the way the world works, right?

and so after the battle of amphipolis and after killing the rest of the cult, you return to the cave of gaia in delphi and find not only deimos but also the ghost of kosmos down there, in front of the pyramid. deimos is still nursing his wounds from where kleon shot him, and the ghost finally unveils herself. both get their villain-y monologues about how it’s all for the greater good, everyone who died along the way was sacrificing themselves for a better world and the world will remember what they did -- but that will only happen if you join them. if you’re there to make sure they mattered. and the pyramid with its weird little artifacts still draws you in like it did that first night you infiltrated their meeting, and you and deimos and the ghost all touch it and you all get teleported via videogame magic or isu technology or whatever the fuck who cares it’s just a stupid scifi game let me live to...

atlantis?

it’s the exact same look and feel as the dlc: humans and gods living in (apparent) harmony, people are happy, families are together, there’s laughter and music and plenty of food and leisure. the buildings are gorgeous, there’s like fountains and gardens and aquariums and other cool shit, and if not for the weird isu tech all over the place you’d almost think it was elysium. but it’s not elysium, because you’re not dead. deimos isn’t dead. and you’ve never felt more at peace. the ghost tells you that this is all perfectly achievable, if only you join them in helping construct this world from the ashes of the old. deimos tells you that they’ve seen this in their dreams; the world was truly like this once, and it could be again.

there’s no war to be fought here; no pain or suffering or loss. deimos sheathes their sword and tells you that they cannot just go back to being family in the real world, not after everything that has happened and all the suffering you both have experienced -- out in the real world, you were both doomed to be nothing more than shattered bones and streaks of gore at the foot of sparta’s sacred mountain. you don’t matter out there, and you never did, and they know you are tired of trying to prove that you do, because they’re tired too. but in here, in this world, you could be together. you could be the siblings you never got the chance to be. this is what they were fighting for all along. they gave their name, and their life, and their innocence and their pain -- all to achieve this. and with your help they can finally stop calling themself deimos and reclaim their old name. or the two of you could find new names. you could be gods. you could slaughter the old gods, the ones whose prophecies doomed you both to die at the foot of mount taygetos (deimos still doesn’t know the cult orchestrated that lmao listen the brainwashing runs deep). you could be anyone you want here.

all of this feels so real. you feel like you could stay here forever.

deimos extends their hand. you reach out to take it. to join them.

and something tumbles out of your pouch.

it’s a little wooden eagle, a child’s toy, battered and all scratched up with most of its defining features worn away. you know it well. you know every contour of it because a little girl gave it to you when you left the island where you and she once lived, to go make a name for yourself in a war that never seemed to end, until suddenly it did. you know this toy eagle because you folded that little girl’s cold, dead, still-bloody fingers around it one terrible night in athens. you were told, later, that the eagle burned with her on the pyre your friends constructed for her. and so the only reason this eagle is here now, the only reason you can run your hands along its outstretched wings and trace the whorls of the woodgrain with your fingertips and feel the slight weight of it in your palm is because none of this is real.

what is real is this: the cult existed, and phoibe died. leonidas died. perikles died. brasidas died. and you cannot live in a world where the very act of dying for the world they didn’t know they were helping to shape is the one thing that becomes the defining feature of their legacies. where their lives become nothing more than some kind of grotesque buttressing to prop up the very people who got them all killed.

there’s some kind of bossfight against deimos, who, despite their appeals to you to join them as a battlefield companion and true siblings after too many years lost between you, still doesn’t hesitate to turn against you as they always have the moment things do not go their way. because that’s the way it is between the two of you: they push, and you push back.

and the more you fight, the more atlantis crumbles. the others don’t seem to notice; they simply sit there and laugh and sip wine and dance and sing as stone after stone falls from the vast turrets and crushes first their companions, then them, into blood and bone and gristle. there’s a gate up on the highest tower of the city, and you know instinctively that without it you’ll be stuck here in this strange dream-limbo, fighting your sibling for eternity as both worlds, dream and real, carry on with or without you. and as you make your way to it (maybe there’s some sweet parkour opportunities here with like falling debris and such) deimos gives chase and as you draw closer to the gate you start to see that it’s not empty at all, but full of people crowing in to take a peek at all the commotion.

there’s sokrates and hippokrates and aristophanes. alkibiades looking uncharacteristically worried, and [insert any npc lieutentants you’ve recruited like roxana or odessa]. xenia is there, and so is anthousa. kyra and/or thaletas, too (depending on the outcome of the mykonos questline). and a gang of plucky little kids, all cheering you on: khloe, the girl with the clay friends; arsenios, the tour-guide-turned-con-artist; ardos and his caretaker. (and i guess nikolaos and stentor if they’re still alive lmao) (maybe pythagoras is allowed too but he’s on thin fucking ice)

and, of course, myrrine. standing at the forefront, shoulder to shoulder with barnabas and herodotos. all three of them -- alongside everyone else you’ve ever allied with, fought beside, or helped out -- everyone who loves you, everyone you’ve ever loved -- they’re beckoning you home. back to the real world, where they matter. where you matter.

where you have always mattered.

you’re so close to taking your mother’s hand, you can feel the warmth of her fingertips -- and then you hear a scream below you.

it’s deimos, and they’re falling. maybe they tripped in their haste to catch you. maybe some of the falling rubble knocked them off-balance. it doesn’t matter. the only thing that matters is that your sibling is falling to their doom. again. and there’s nothing you can do about it.

except this time there definitely is.

so you leap from the ledge with all the strength you have, the roaring in your ears drowning out myrrine’s shouts. you’ve fallen from greater heights, after all, and lived to tell the tale. this is nothing. and this time you’ll catch your sibling, because this is your dream, too. and in your dream, you can do whatever the fuck you want.

you catch deimos, the both of you still falling, the ground rushing up to meet you -- and you both wake in the cave of gaia with a jolt. each of you still have a hand on the pyramid, and you make eye contact. they give you the slightest of nods, as if to say i’m okay. i’m awake.

the ghost is still asleep, head bowed, eyes flitting to and fro behind closed eyelids, both hands still on the pyramid.

you destroy the pyramid with your grandfather’s spear. this wakes the ghost. she’s furious, and tells you that you’ve made a terrible mistake. the cult of kosmos may be extinguished, but the ideals she worked toward are not. (basically this kind of mirrors the whole spiel about the philosopher-king or whatever tf the ghost said at the end of the actual in-game storyline that foreshadowed the order of ancients and eventually the templars)

deimos looks to you and mutters that it’s your choice what to do next. the ghost tries to appeal to them but they’ve run out of fucks to give. they leave.

[kill the ghost] what it says on the label. you get a nice little ac-esque assassination cutscene and it’s actually got some emotional weight to the decision/scene, unlike the game.

[walk away] leave the ghost in the cave. the pyramid is gone, the cult is dead, your sibling is free. the ghost will live the rest of her life looking over her shoulder, knowing that the grandchildren of leonidas have seen her for what she is. knowing that whatever she does next, they’ll be watching closely.

when you leave the cave, you see deimos, pacing as they overlook the view of phokis from mount parnassos. it’s high noon and the sun glints brilliantly off their gilded armor. they glance at the temple of apollo and remark how strange it is to be standing here together, so close to the place where both your fates were sealed with just a few words from a puppet pythia a lifetime ago.

you ask what they’re going to do, now that the cult is gone.

the peace of nicias isn’t going to hold, they tell you. the war will start again soon enough, and when that happens both athens and sparta will be looking for champions to fight for their side.

dialogue choices:

[i’ll see you on the battlefield] you and your sibling part ways. subsequent conquest battles have a chance of spawning a bossfight against deimos who is fighting for the other side -- neither of you can perma-kill the other so you can encounter/fight them over and over again. at the end of the conquest battle, no matter who wins, you can see them walking up and down the battlefield and you can have some silly little sibling banter, which changes depending on who wins/loses the battle

[join me, fight with me] deimos joins your crew just like in the game. unlike the game, you can interact with them at any time while they’re walking up and down your ship and have sibling banter because i just want some decent fucking sibling banter in this game

no matter which option you pick, the first time you return to sparta after finishing this storyline you’ll have the option of entering your old family home and triggering the family dinner cutscene with all the surviving members of your family because goddammit even after all this wishful revisionism i still love that silly little family dinner

anyway in conclusion this is what i want out of odyssey, thanks for coming to my TED talk, don’t forget to smash that like&subscribe the way the eagle bearer definitely smashed brasidas’ fine spartan ass offscreen bc ubisoft were too smoothbrained to give us the romance we deserved

[black-quartz-sphinx-judge-my-vow]

Exalted 3e Villain Analysis

When I was first going through the various Adversaries of the Righteous, I skipped right past Adeimantus, because I’m shallow. His art just isn’t evocative. But ho boy! Beneath that pale, bland exterior lurks a villain worthy of an entire campaign. So let’s talk about that.

Adeimantus is the ruler of a utopian City from the Shogunate named Beimeni-Ta. A city which was consumed by the Wyld ages ago. It now creeps into Creation like an infection transforming cities and slums into itself.

What a great freaking idea, wow. The sidewalks the towers, the people all transform into echoes of a golden age lost to time. Can’t you just see the brick back alley suddenly becoming a marvelous marble tunnel? The building torn halfway between one style and material and the next? The crowds of excited peasants waiting for their shacks to complete their transformation into mansions? Now that’s a threat! How do you even deal with something like that? Do you burn down the infected part of your city to keep it from spreading? Do you jail the new citizens to stop the from singing the praises of utopia, and converting more people to their cause? Or do you go after the Raksha that’s behind it all?

What I like most about Adeimantus is that he’s totally on the up and up, at least in my interpretation. He’s not doing this because he wants to eat every baby in Creation. He genuinely wants everyone in the world to live in his perfect city. So much in fact that he has a charm that not only changes the city to match the desires of an individual, but he himself changes to match that desire.

After the players have defeated Adeimantus and sent his city back to the mists: “That’s alright, we’ll start over as many times as you need. This is all for you.”

Which brings another terrifying aspect of Adeimantus into view. When he vanishes, so too does the city, and all of it’s people. Any buildings and individuals changed by Beimeni-Ta get whisked away to the Wyld, even victory can mean that a entire slice of a city is amputated. Spooky.

As far as a combatant, meh. If you’re using Adeimantus to beat people down, you’re doing it wrong. Although he does have a knife that can make you ugly to anyone who can read, which is fun. His main power in combat comes from his ability to summon battle groups of his followers to attack the pcs. Plus ya gotta involve the city itself in any combat you do. Potholes open up beneath your feet, shingles slide off the roofs onto your head, and other such irritants. Maybe give the city it’s own initiative, and stat block, why not?

His real strength comes from his ability to manipulate intimacies. Not only can he instill them in people through their dreams, but he can also make you disregard any that make you oppose him. Very fun, and could be interesting if you have players who are very dedicated to rp. Otherwise think of all the NPCs you can target, and turn against the players. Now that’s high drama. Solars want to live in Utopia too right?

Especially since as I said before Adeimantus is a chill dude. He doesn’t want to resort to violence, he rules a utopia, and wants to share it’s bounty with the world. Of course his Utopia ends up being pure madness when it returns to the Wyld, but no one seems to be dissatisfied.

So I’ve gushed on about this beautiful bald man long enough. What are some ways you can use him in a game?

1. A world saving device was once held in Beimeni-Ta, and it’s needed once more. Do you: look for a city infected by Beimeni-Ta. Crusade into the wild to reclaim the lost city. Or maybe infect a nearby city, long enough for the vaults of Beimeni-Ta to manifest.

2. Beimeni-Ta begins to arise within Great Forks. How does the city of a thousand gods react to such an intrusion? Is the draw of Utopia enough to tempt even a deity? Or do they hold firm as more and more of their followers join the cult of Adeimantus?

3. Every Winter Adeimantus visits a struggling village in the north, and provides them with supplies needed to survive the harsh winter. What scheme is he up to? It’s been generations since he started doing this, and no apparent harm has been done. The villages are convinced he’s a benevolent god of winter, how will they react when the players try to destroy him before he can corrupt their village?

4. Beimeni-Ta is ruled not only by Adeimantus, but also a Senate of Demons. So this Fair Folk, has an alliance with demons, as well as a permanent city in the Wyld. There’s something deeply interesting going on with Adeimantus. In his Stat block it does say the Senators are Raksha too, but I much prefer him being a complete weirdo. But as for plot hooks. A city has already fully fallen to Beineni-Ta. Now there is only one thing left to do. Characters must introduce a bill to the demon senate which will revoke the city’s hold on creation, at least this part of it. Can the pcs, get it through sub-committees, and over come a filibuster lead by a second circle demon?

5. Burns 100 Poets is a monk of the Immaculate order who has thrice vanquished Adeimantus from creation. He carries the weight of the many poets he’s killed to keep Adeimantus from spreading his corruption. He is retired now nearly 200, and works day and night to craft the poems which could have been were it not for his diligence. He may hold valuable information in how to stop Beimeni-Ta from spreading. However this gentle poet of an old man may suggest methods the pcs would consider frightful.

Finally let’s talk about a campaign that has Adeimantus as it’s big bad.

I call this one: Lookshy, Rise of The Shogun.

The basic premise of it being Beimeni-Ta was a city during the Shogunate Era, a pretty important one. Reclaiming it would finally give The 7th Legion reason to accept a new individual as Shogun.

Act 1

The Players, Dragon-Blooded protectors of Lookshy are tasked with looking into strange happenings around the city. The marching band plays a song hundreds of years out of date, a new building appears seemingly out of nowhere. Things escalate when a section of the city’s rampart’s becomes infected with shiny new lightning ballista. Suddenly the General Staff is torn on how to deal with the situation. with some opting to let the infection spread to access Beimeni-Ta’s ancient resources, to others wanting to combat the plague before it’s too late. The group is forced to navigate this tenuous situation, while beating back Adeimantus’ growing cult, and corrupted gentes. Culminating in the final confrontation with Adeimantus, and a member of the general staff he’s corrupted. Adeimantus vanishes with his pawn defeated, and takes however much of Lookshy he’s corrupted away with him, back to the wild. The walls are breached, the city is in ruins, the army is divided, and things are looking dire. Were The Realm not crippled by The Scarlet Empresses’ disappearance, this would be the end.

Act 2

After a brief recovery clarity comes to the surviving populace of Lookshy. The Shogunate Bureaucracy has records detailing this Beimeni-Ta many of the afflicted citizens were rambling about. It was once a seat of power for the Shogunate a place of immense importance, that fell into the Wyld never to be seen again, until now. Most importantly it was the final resting place of The Imperial Seal. The stamp with which The Shogun made words on paper law. With it, a simple document can be stamped and a new Shogun can be appointed, the shogunate will live once more. If only Beimeni-Ta can be dragged back out of The Wyld. If only... we could find it.

No maps of Beimeni-Ti’s location survive, only records of military assignments. Letters for a general to withdraw from the defense of the city, a general by the name of Tepet...

With the only lead they have the players are sent under cover to The Realm to find what they can about Beimeni-Ta from it’s ancient defenders. There’s investigation, spy work, a heist. All of which ends in a social confrontation with Tepet’s ruling Council which presents them with an offer: fulfill their oath to the Shogunate, regain their honor by retaking Beimeni-Ta.

Act 3

The impossible has happened. The players have convinced Lookshy to break with tradition, and march on the Wyld. House Tepet has given their only legion to the cause. The two armies of the Shogunate unite like something unseen in anyone’s time, and march through the river lands towards the end of the world. It’s a long grueling march, through an untold number of kingdoms. The centuries of Lookshy’s political favors, and military threats fray with each border they cross. Threats seeks to divide them with armies and from within. The Lookshy soldiers see their Tepet allies as traitors, and the Tepet aren’t too fond of the scavengerland barbarians either. The players must use their genius to get their army through in one piece. Until they reach, the border marches.

Act 4

From here on it’s all out warfare. The players and their small army must reclaim creation step by step enduring every machination the Wyld can through at them, from raining lava, to forests of grass as tall as a warstrider, and as sharp as a blade. All until they lay siege to Beimeni-Ta. At last the jewel is within their sight. They just have to overcome Beimeni-Ta’s endless militia of maddened citizens, their 100 Demon Senate, and of course Adeimantus fully empowered by the wyld and Beimeni-Ta itself. Who can with but a look, a touch, who’s very presence beckons you to join him in Utopia, in oblivion.

And what are the rewards for such an epic journey? A brand new city to rule over? The title of Shogun, and resurrections of the shogunate? An arsenal of first age weapons from the shogunate’s richest city? Who’s to say what dreams await you in Beimeni-Ta? 

Only Adeimantus knows.

Only Adeimantus can show you the way.