#if it wasn't for the murder and emotional manipulation he would have made a great dad

[scratchandplaster]

First Words

CW: grief

・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・

"Say Dad." 

The infant nestled in his lap eyed the nursery warily. Shepard realized quite fast that his son only fell asleep with him close by; a fact he didn't mind at all. After a stroll outside, he figured a short lesson in pronunciation couldn't hurt. 

"Mmuh," his son hummed instead.

"Daaad. Like that, Luke. Dada is too childish, but I'll accept it as a temporary measure."

Despite quietly babbling and entertaining himself with blowing spit bubbles, Luke didn't even try to copy the words. Stubborn little thing.

"Not Pop or Father, that's horrible. Fuck no. What am I, a priest?"

Finally, reaching both hands upwards towards him, his son spoke:

"Mah…mhh."

Oh.

"Mom is watching out for you," Shepard murmured, quick to swallow the bitter lump of hurt in his throat. Pressure weighed his heart down heavy, suddenly feeling so much lighter when Lukas' fist wrapped around his pinky.

"She's always with us."

・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・

Thanks for reading 🤍 [Masterlist]

Prompt: singing/first words/inside jokes

@augusnippets @whumpyourdamnpears

[historicity-was-already-taken]

What I'm actually furious about, isn't just the anti-Semitism I've dealt with here.

What I'm furious at is the Israeli government and military. I am furious that they have the nerve to perpetrate war crimes while appropriating the memory of the 6 million. It makes me sick. It feels me with rage. It fills me with feelings of betrayal (those are complex and require deconstruction, discussed briefly below). How dare they massacre children, civilians, and fucking hospital patients; and how dare they do so while using the 6 million as a rhetorical shield?

The edgelord who left me a snide remark comparing the situation in Gaza to the Warsaw Ghetto wasn't the first person to make that comparison to me. It was actually the Palestinian woman who translated two major sources from Hebrew into English for me.

She was translating a biography of Tossia Altman when her three nephews and sister-in-law were murdered during the IDF action in Gaza. I asked her if she wanted to stop working on the project (with no impact on her fee for the project, of course; that's where about $4000 of the money y'all helped me raise went, fyi). The brand of Zionism practiced by Tossia and her comrades is very very different from the version embodied in Netanyahu, and it was those schools of Zionism which mostly died in the Holocaust (I said), but I would completely understand if the material was too triggering for her.

She said "I’m not sure about this triggering me, I think holocaust survivors and Gazans are on the same boat to tell you the truth. It could be an opportunity for me to actually fathom the full picture, in a way." And I haven't stopped thinking about it since.

I'm not going to post the rest of our conversation here, for what I hope are obvious reasons. And for concerned parties, this woman has been living away from Gaza for a very long time.

But this is why I'm so angry and emotional.

And I'm over here having these, frankly, very painful, personal feelings (if my posts over the last 4 months haven't made it clear, I spent my teen years in an extremely manipulative right wing Israel "education" program, and was raised surrounded by first and secondhand Holocaust trauma which inevitably impacted how my elders educated me about The Conflict none of which I was fully able to deconstruct until I became a Holocaust Historian in grad school). Especially with my knowledge of how SHITTILY Holocaust survivors were treated when they got to Palestine in the mid-1940s; of how fucking disgracefully Yad Vashem treated Rachel Auerbach and Yitzhak Zuckerman. Of the way the Jewish fighters actually died in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. I became a Holocaust historian because I am the great/granddaughter of survivors and I do this work because it's a fucking calling, not something that brings me joy. And the goddamn Israeli government, the government of a nation which likes to say it exists for all Jews (when it barely even represents the Jews who live there but that's a different conversation); the way that government manipulates and misuses that history to excuse their actions in Gaza make me fucking sick. And, as demonstrated by some of you actual fucking pieces of shit, puts Diasporic Jews in danger. (side thought: Does Netanyahu WANT to put Diasporic Jews in danger?? He knows how this fucking shit works, and I wouldn't be surprised if he WANTED Jews to feel deeply unsafe and respond to that by fleeing to Israel).

And WHILE I'm experiencing all of this and trying to keep it all together while writing the what may be the most important thing I've ever written in my career, you fucking [word I don't use out loud or in writing] come in here and to throw your anti-Semitic bullshit at me when I ask you to please not spew it at me via my (year old) fucking Holocaust Remembrance Day posts, and when I ask you to be fucking mindful of it in your political speech.

So let me make it fucking clear, as far as I am concerned there are 4 separate conversations at play rn.

1) October 7 was horrific, genocidal, and traumatizing for Jews on a global basis.

2) Israel is committing heinous war crimes in Gaza right now which, if its own military's statements are anything to go by, are actively genocidal.

3) You shouldn’t harass random Jewish people because you’re disgusted with Israeli governmental and military decisions and actions.

4) The Israeli government’s appropriation of Holocaust memory within its larger state building project doesn’t give you [collective: non-Jews] the right to abuse Jews for discussing and generally having feelings about the Holocaust.

And FRANKLY I think all those conversations are accurate and valid. I also don't think I'm obligated to tear my heart open give you all my intimate feelings because a bunch of pieces of shit on this site can't grasp points 3 and 4.

So fuck that right wing program I belonged to as a teen, fuck you fucking left wing anti-Semites who can's grasp that you're touting the ideologies of people who would have wanted you dead, and fuck the Israeli government for committing war crimes. fuck them for their ongoing abuse of palestinian civil and human rights, and fuck them for invoking the memory of the 6million while doing it.

I've fucking had it with that fucking State, I've had it with you goddamn Jew-haters, and I've had it with the Jewish ppl who might want to destroy my career upon seeing this post.

I am mad as HELL.

I'm not even saying my mental health break is over. I've just had a moment of clarity, my period is over, and I'm pissed as hell. i'm tired of policing myself to make the gentiles who hate me comfortable; and I'm tired of policing myself to make my coreligionists who'd destroy me for having these thoughts comfortable. and there are 122,000 if you, so i don't care if you're so fucking fragile that this post makes you hit the unfollow button.

tl;dr:

[monimccoythings]

Human!Alastor x Daughter!Reader: Devotion

These are all part of the same AU, I suppose, or not. But I like to think they are all part of the same AU, sometimes I forget what I write. Now this are just some deranged feelings and thoughts of Alive!Alastor.

Reminder: Alastor is in hell for a reason.

Tw: obsessive behavior, possessive behavior, mentions of blood, implied murder, manipulation.

tags: @anonymousewrites, @nonetheartist, @littledolly2345, @sunnyx07, @ouroborostheunholy, @mo-0-o, @sydneyyyya @lbcreations-blog

Alastor had never been a sentimental man. Of course he loved his mama, she was a wonderful woman and her death had definitely caused him a great amount of grief.

And then you came along.

Your soft skin, your chubby hands that tried to grasp his larger fingers to no avail, your wide unfocused eyes that darted everywhere, taking notice of everything. How delicate you felt in his arms, you fit perfectly, like you were made to be there.

How easily he could break you, he ponders. One little snap and there would be no more of you. It would be so quick and simple. There was only one little thing.

He adored you.

Your quiet little coos, your incomprehensible babbling that sounded like you were trying to carry an adult conversation with him, the way you squealed with joy whenever one of your favorite songs started playing on the radio. You were delightful, and provided him with more enrichment than any of the bumbling fools he usually associated himself with could provide.

As years passed by, you started to get bigger, your world expanding, your knowledge growing. And with it, came the risk of having you slip away from him.

He had modeled you to be his perfect little angel, his little fawn. His obedient child. He would not allow anyone to take you away from him. He was your guardian, your protector. Some asshole looked at you the wrong way while you two were going on a walk? He was never heard of again. Some low-paid teacher was becoming some sort of role model to you? Ooops! Accidents happen!

He found that his reasoning for protecting you was also a good excuse to indulge in his darkest desires. A way to calm the itch that was always nagging at the back of his head.

Alastor did it for you. He was making the world a safer place for you. No matter how much fun and enjoyment he got out of it. None of those buffoons would ever taint your innocence with their dirty souls. Not even himself.

He would take his secrets to the grave, always hidden behind a wide smile. he would be the good father, the charming radio host, the modelic citizen. The blood in his hands, as delicious as it tasted, would never stain your clothes.

No one would keep you two apart, he would make sure of that. He was all that you could possibly ever need. Your world started and ended with him, as it should be. Let him be the barrier between your purity and the rotten society that lurked outside.

He suffered everytime you were forced to spend time apart of each other. Couldn't you see it? Did you feel it too? Whenever you were in school or he was working, it was complete suffering for him! His fingers drumming impatiently on the surface of the table, counting the seconds until he was back at home with you. Only the mental stimulation that took directing, writing and starrring in his own radio show for which he held great passion and the delightful hunt his side job provided were enough distraction to cope with his sorrow.

When did he become so emotional? He should be feeling embarrassed of himself or at least be very thankful that his mask of sanity wasn't cracking with all those feelings. Instead, he found himself embracing them. He embraced the painful worry about your wellbeing and his influence over you, the obssessive and twisted love he felt, the need for control, to ensure you remained his innocent and good child, and the bitter despair at your absence that sunk into his heart like a knife. Only his little baby could give him such a rush.

He was sure that not even death would be able to take you from his hands. He would personally fight God, the Devil, and anybody who got in his way. Alastor would tear the fabric of reality apart just to get to you.

You would never run away from him. There was no reason to, as he had made you as devoted of him as he was of you. Or at least he hoped so.

Having you leave him would surely break his heart, as it would mean to Alastor that you had chosen to do things the hard way. But maybe, after a very detailed and complex planification on his part and some casualties orchestrated by him, Alastor might be able to convince you to return back home, with a grim reminder about the dangers of the outside world.

For there is no safer place on Earth than in your father's embrace.

[periwinkla]

Character Parallels

I've been replaying the trilogy recently, and it made me think... there are so many parallels? Some may be unintentional perhaps, but still. But what fascinates me the most is that all the paralells have pretty blatant contrasts by the end - somehow emphasized by the 'ending' of it all. Gregory - Phoenix Both become parents at 26, but Gregory loses Miles when he's 9 and Phoenix gets Trucy when she's 8 - so the difference is that basically Phoenix resumes where Gregory left off. Trucy - Miles Both adopted by lawyers at around the same age - both lose their parents in a courthouse - both precocious children who excel in their chosen path at an extremely young age - both somewhat extravagant, Trucy with her magician getup and Miles with his formal way of dressing and fancy talk. The difference between them is obviously that Trucy was lucky enough to have a decent, loving parent while Miles was not. * the above stuff is also why I really want Miles to co-parent because it would just come full-circle and would be fodder for great character development for both him and Trucy but I digress Phoenix - Miles The contrasts between them are mostly about their attitude towards things and nothing too specific, so I'll focus on the similarities here. They're both manipulated by someone they trusted, both accused of murder because of that person's plot - both kinda try to rush to their deaths because of it (Phoenix eats a necklace(d) with poison, Miles confesses to a crime that would lead to a death penalty). The difference here is basically that Phoenix tends to prefer taking care of things himself - he likes to help, but hates to be helped. Probably didn't even let Miles be in the country during the whole thing, he probably only him help with the implementation of the jurist system from afar. Both try to hide their emotions and are secretive (but Phoenix is more successful, while Miles kinda sucks at it) - both accused of forging evidence (although Miles doesn't get disbarred because of it). Both try their darn hardest at helping people because they've helped each other and were inspired by the other's words and actions in the past and become the person they are today because of it. They're mentors, but they also learn from their mentees, and each other - okay this is turning into narumitsu real fast I'll stop Kristoph - Manfred Both manipulative, egotistical and prideful to the point where a minor blow to their ego makes them go murderous and vindicative - both dedicate their life to ruin the one that offended them. In Kristoph's case, it's both towards Phoenix and Zak, actually - Kristoph also murders a father (well, actually, he murders two fathers), like Manfred killed Gregory. Both also have a relative that needs to cope with what they did (Franziska and Klavier). The contrast here is mainly that while Manfred ultimatelly confesses fully, we never discover what Kristoph's black locks were truly about. Franziska - Manfred Both shot, but in different circumstances - Manfred takes a vacation in order to recover and make sure absolutely no one knows anything, but Franziska tries to go straight to court and wears her injury with something akin to pride (a bulletshot won't stop her, neither will what people think of her) Dahlia - Kristoph They both manipulate their sibling to do their bidding (although Klavier was unaware, unlike Iris) - both fans of poison - both destroyed by the person they despised the most - the difference here is that Kristoph did everything by himself (he manipulated Klavier, but he wasn't aware), while Dahlia conspirated with multiple people (Iris, Morgan, Valerie) There are probably others, but these are the ones that stuck out to me the most. Gosh I love Ace Attorney's writing.

[gloomyteddybear]

the slang for journalist is vulture

oneshot

tw: emotional manipulation, guilt tripping, stalking;

roseville gazette may be bordering on yellow journalism but it was the only local press that actually went into detail of the ghostface murders, as short-staffed as it is (considering the fact that literally one guy photographed, wrote, interviewed, edited the whole beat--- maybe he used to be freelancer they managed to chain down), it was surprisingly informative on the subject matter, in other news? pun intended, it was comparatively bland in such a way that literally any other corporation would do the job.

but they don't cover the case, who the victims are, how horrific their deaths are, who are the main suspects, what are the patterns (they seemed random but oh-so meticulously planned), they only post obituaries and move on to cake recipes. to your average roseville citizen, who doesn't wish to buy another subscription, which press are they going to choose? entertainment value or a possible survival guide?

despite the short staff, they paid well and had a great newsroom, once upon a time each department had it's own working space and have little to no interruptions but due to the few people that are left--- both physically and metaphysically--- they now practically had their own private office to do as they please with the place.

though, you wished you had your own, too.

you were shadowing a guy named jed olsen, technically you were his fellow journalist. but with the few experience you had bossman decided that you two needed to 'share' an office (it felt more like jed's than anything), to "see a professional in action and get a feel for what you need to do." he said.

he's nice.

the only experience you got is as a lackey. sure, you helped, but it was minimal, he let you handle almost nothing unless under a lot of scrutiny (the guy is a perfectionist) or just flat out did everything himself, he's an over-achieving workaholic.

he was overbearing, but only in the literal by-the-letter sense, over bearing as in he puts too much on his plate.

he wasn't an asshole--- he was frustrating, sure, but he always made sure to let you sign your name in the proverbial group project, he brought coffee too (it was always a bit off from your actual taste, but you didn't want to be ungrateful) and was always nice. so, you simply did the 'seeing a professional in action' bit more than the 'get a feel for what you need to do', twiddling your thumbs as you watched him work.

were you any more lazier and/or more lacking in the empathy-good-for-lasting-healthy-relationships mindset, you'd be cheering and hollering at the opportunity.

you saw his eyebags from staying overnights, though. the faint swaying whenever he stood up, almost spilling or dropping whatever he held, rants growing more... well, affected by his lack of sleep, to put it nicely.

so, you did everything in your power to at least, somewhat share the burden, bring snacks or energy drinks, keep his desk organized just the way he liked it, stay out of his way, listen to his movie-nerd ramblings.

it was all fine and dandy--- you put a styrofoam cup on coffee on his table like clockwork--- until it wasn't.

you heard squeaky plastic get hit and fall "huh--- fuck! this?!... oh god, no... no no no! shit! shit..." he pleaded.

you leaned over to see... coffee spilled all over his photos and notes.

he blew up, face red and gritted teeth, "god, damn it. all... all those fucking sleepless nights--- the amount of crunching i did, gone! from a fucking shitty ass coffee! how the fuck am i supposed to meet the deadline! fuck!." he yanked on the longer strands of black hair in his scalp.

then he deflated, face in hands, "oh god... what am i going to do? what do i tell boss? how much is this going to affect..." he murmured

he pauses in his rant, eyes peeking through the gap of his fingers, glancing at your expression and immediately straightens up; he sighs, rubbing his arms and playing with the threads of his long sleeves, "it's fine nevermind, i should've told you that this table is wobbly. i'll- uh, i'll tell him that i... we couldn't meet the deadline, it wasn't your fault, i bit off more than i could work so... you ended up not having much to do---"

before he could continue putting fuel into another apology-fest you stopped that train of thought right in it's tracks, "wait wait--- no, you... how about you leave early today?"

"you want me to leave?!" he croaked, grip on the collar his shirt growing noose-like.

"no no! uh," you fumbled, "how about you... go get yourself a nice, deserved break huh? uh, i don't think boss would hold it against you, how about a walk? fresh air? get yourself something nice---" you crushed a bill into his loose hands, ignored his looks and pushed him out the door.

you put your hands at your hips, looked at the mess and sighed.

the wet pages were still on his desk, you carefully separate and spread them, the ones that were less likely to crumble were hanged in the developing-room. the ones that were too blurry you had to transcribe onto a neater page, the ones teared to bits were carefully jig-saw'd.

---jed didn't return, you did get some info on why during breakroom gossip, seems like he took your advice and clocked out early. funny how your schedules been reversed, the first to leave being the one to stay 'til nightfall for work they never contributed to---

pictures and notes neatly arranged all across the pages, many of those photos came varying and evolving in quality, not as in blurry or framed poorly but in what type of camera they were shot with. the drying marks and negative film pointed towards them being raw polaroids, though a few were made with instantfilm. at first, it seemed like nonsense, some type of art project in abstract figures but there was a clear pattern.

lanes fencing around a car, roads filled with a cluster of potholes, harsh angles and perspective shifts turning corners; a window peeking into someone's habitat, a spare key under varying hiding places, then a person hiding under their blanket in their sleep.

you rolled a thumb against the pad of your finger, it was weirdly slippery-- watery? that's weird... a bit stickier. is it still fresh out of the developing room?

you hear it before you no longer see it, just as you were about to investigate further, the telltale de-crescendo of all appliances losing their power and the following silence means only one thing--- the main switch is off. whoever it is, you know where they were.

don't go turn it on. trap. breathe in.

you stay put, crouching underneath a table. one minute, five, six, ten.

you round around a corner towards the fire escape--- stairs clanking with your descent, you skip a few steps, you run outside.

floodlights drenches your vision--- a voice yells your name and a wailing car horn and you instinctively scream, a door slams as a body moves to shield your eyes from the flickering headlights. a black car, in the night, of course you didn't see it in your panic, wouldn't even notice if it were parked right in front of you.

olsen comes out, he looked surprised and--- had the gall, to sound exasperated, "you were about to walk right into my car."

"wait, why are you here?" he answers with a fumbled "i can explain---"

"i told you to take a break and the first thing you do after curfew, is come back here?! i swear jed, do you want to get stabbed?!" you shriek.

'honest and easy-going my ass!'

he relaxes but still has the decency to fake a grimace, "maybe i could give you a ride home?" he offers.

"why would i need a ride? i have my own---" jed points towards the direction of your car, the excess flash of the headlights bouncing around the pavement show your slashed tires.

"i call shotgun."

"there's only one passenger aside from me and it's you."

"you don't know that, some guy tried to break in earlier--- what if they're a passenger princess with a shotgun?"

the rear-view mirror was angled oddly, reflecting only your person and not the road behind.

"good point." he agrees.

he didn't question you about the break-in.

[queersouthasian]

Listen guys, I just wanted to say this, may not to be important but needs to said:

PEOPLE HATE WAY 'CAUSE HE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE HATED

that's it, that's the post...ok let me elaborate

As the saying goes, "you have to be the villain in someone's story for them to be the hero", and this may not be the most fitting sentence in context to WAY but in a way it is. Listen, why do we love characters like vegas/kiyoi/charn but dislike the dr from sign or way to be specific?? Interesting question right?

Vegas/Kiyoi/Charn are not "evil" characters, they are not supposed to be looked over or hated 'cause of whatever they did (killing for Vegas, bullying for kiyoi and Charn being the evil lawyer) 'cause their motive to commit a crime outweigh the consequences of the crime itself. Why did Vegas kill people?? He was from the minor family who were always overshadowed by the major, lived with his abusive ass mf dad, was raised and treated like an animal and when the final fallout with pete happens, he realises he treated pete the exact same way he was treated all these years, like an animal (pls don't even treat animals like that) and the realisation alone made THE vegas beg to Pete. Even though Vegas is a murderer, a criminal, people can sympathize with him 'cause he has a convincing story of extreme physical and emotional abuse to tell, his story perfectly explains him as a person and doesn't matter how bad/evil he is, people still cry out for him, people still feel the pain 'cause to some extent, people can relate to it. Same for kiyoi and Charn (I am not elaborating but there are many psychological takes on kiyoi here which are really good)

Now this solid back story lacks in the case of Dr and Way. Even if Way was not the "Enigma", he would still be a very annoying character, he is not the cool "loki" rather actually annoying lmao, mostly because nothing about way, till now, can explain what he did, like why did he hypnotise and manipulate babe?? FOR 10 YEARS?? why did he have to manipulate everyone against Charlie and Jeff about the car accident??? He was suspicious of Charlie, but actually he wasn't. He didn't know anything about him, did no research about him, did not have any reason, technically, to doubt him cause he had zero proof about Charlie or even jeff doing something, he just wanted to cut both off 'cause jealousy. He even saved the bfs in the last ep just 'cause babe was there, if only charlie was there or someone else with him, he would have left them. And I am not even kidding. Remember how after knocking the guy out, way goes "come on, Babe" totally refusing to acknowledge charlie being there. He could have just went "let's go" or "come on guys" but no. And if he infact is the enigma, then that just adds up to the selfishness and nothing. I am not saying that a character needs a dramatic backstory to explain their wrongs but way has...nothing. like from all perspectives he would have won, he did not have a loss. Also the biggest deception is literally from his part. The fact that not only babe, but literally every character including jeff - charlie, trust him, the fact that he tries to come off as a concerned friend but actually is just a manipulative bitch with victim complex, and to make it worse his "love" is more of a "possession" like unfiltered unsexy possession lmao. Exactly like the doctor. Both don't have any reason to do anything they did, they just want to see the world burn but not in the "oh the world is shitty" Charn way rather they are the upper hand and basically are toying with things for their pleasure.

Nothing worse than a character being merciless to people for no reason, they are either sociopaths or just rich and this would have been a great thing in crime/thriller genre not romance.

[cleromancy]

an underexplored aspect of red robin 26 (the one where he sets up a weeks-long rubes goldberg scheme to kill captain boomerang only to choke at the last minute) to me is the impact tim thought this would have on his place among the bats. like what he thought would happen *next.* because he absolutely did consider it and wasn't at all surprised by dick and bruce showing up afterwards to talk to him about the choices he made that day.

to start with. why now? there was no particular event that made him decide to do it. tim does say he heard harkness was trying to regain lost power, but in context its not reasoning behind his decision, it was an opportunity to kick his plan off.

and i think its fair to say tim was never gonna be able to go through with it. that was never gonna happen. but he *thought* he could, and he decided he was going to, despite repeatedly questioning what the hell he was doing. he explicitly makes the points that he thinks its wrong, he knows his dad wouldn't want him to, and he doesn't believe itll even be more emotionally satisfying than bringing harkness to justice. and yet thats still the plan! for weeks!

and he does set up an emotional failsafe for himself which he calls plausible deniability, where all he did was manipulate events so that he expects harkness to be killed by victor fries by the end of it.

except ofc when it comes down to it tim cant let fries kill a guy, which he takes to mean he wants to do it himself. any interesting moral questions here about who would potentially be at fault are very tidily sidestepped as irrelevant. bc i mean to tim they kind of are. his veneer of plausible deniability was always an excuse. the interesting thing here for the character is that this means he's willing to do away with that plausible deniability, and intends to follow through regardless. (i went back to delete some images bc i ran out, but he does explicitly say theres a change of plan and he's gonna kill harkness himself.)

this is the point he dispatches dr fries, which he calls in to 911, and follows harkness. bla bla confrontation bla, and harkness fuckin trips off the edge of the roof.

the implication here to me, with the way tims flashback is framed as an interruption and the way harkness goes from saying he has no idea who the hell tim is to saying tim doesn't have the stones, is that harkness was babbling this whole time, and that's just what actually makes it through to tims ears. and i also think the implication here is tim being like ".......heartbreaking: the worst person you know just made a great point." hes like shit! hes fucking right! i *dont* have the stones to do this!

anyway. the next page we have dickie and damian show up. hi boys!!

so to recap. tim decided he was going to murder harkness himself rather than using a proxy, *called 911 knowing the other bats would hear it,* and went off to do the deed.

(side note its always dickie loving hours in this house and. you just know dicks thinking of blockbuster here. oughe.) .....i also get the impression that dicks "timmy down the questionable-choices-well" senses were tingling somehow from the 911 call (which, i cannot stress this enough, only even mentioned fries), and i think him and damian most likely fucking hauled ass to get there, which is also fun to think about hehe

i have a lot of thoughts about whats going through dicks and tims heads here lol. but i want to get back to the point. this is the segue into the reveal that bruce was also there the whole time, he knows what tim had been planning to do, and now hes yelling at him for thinking about killing harkness at all.

AND THE COWL COMES OFF WHEEEEEEE :elmofire:

(ok actually i am going to derail here for a minute i gotta spell it out. tim kept it on when he was talking to dick bc he was lying to dick by omission. he wanted dick to think well of him, and he doesn't believe he earned the praise--most likely thinks dick would think less of him if he knew the extent to which tim had planned the whole thing. the end result--not killing harkness--does not, in tims mind, count. what dick was saying was "I understand how hard it was to not let him die, and i love you," and what tim heard was "i know you were always going to make the right choice, because you care about doing the right thing." and when you interpret it the way i do--that the deciding factor for tim was actually that he *couldn't* do it, not because he changed his mind? yeah, tims not gonna be looking dick in the eye anytime soon.)

but anyway. buce:

and the thing is that if you don't look at it from the *batshit* bruce-and-tim-mutual-god-complex perspective... tims actual non-thoughtcrime actions began and ended with a series of misdemeanors, no matter how successfully he arbitrated the end results. again any actual moral questions around hand crafting a bespoke scenario tailored to end in a mans murder by inciting another to kill him are completely sidestepped, bc to both tim and bruce its cut and dry; its just murder using another person as the weapon. tim never once actually believed the plausible deniability thing and there was no tangible difference to him btwn manipulating an intermediary, doing it himself, or even *just letting harkness go splat.* it was all fucking talking points for the sake of argument, he was preparing to play devils advocate against bruce to defend his own choice bc. this was always the endgame.

and

which like. i cant help but think of batman 424 bc, well, im the jason todd think-abouter:

and im officially out of images for this post but what happens next for tim is bruce flying away vs in jasons he tells bruce "i guess i spooked him. he slipped." and flies off in the back of a big silent panel of Angst Buce. i love how completely fucking opposite these scenarios were for the both of them but ykw actually thats its own fucking post.

all this just to say tim planned to murder a man in cold blood *fully knowing* dick and bruce would find out. tim can't even face dick when dick tells him he did good, and the confrontation with bruce feels almost like tim did the whole damn thing just to prove a point to bruce which is. hilarious bc it WORKED to that end even though tim did not actually kill anybody at all. like that was a pretty significant thing that happened. tim very much did not kill digger harkness.

(i also think its significant that this issue is like immediately after tim tries to give cass her batgirl outfit back and shes like "...No." and hes like "please i miss you so much 😭 just come back to gothammmm i dont care what name you go by you could even be black robin if you want that would be fun right cass we could be red robin and black robin together? no? what if we put your name first? ....no? .....okay just promise youll think about it... bye............" [paraphrased])

anyway. *holds tim drake up under the arms like simba* Perceive him

[viro-lil-goat]

Parents au again shoutout to this post

Basically this au (or an addition to any other au ) Jekylls parents play a role in the story.

Margaret and Ernest

^ My most recent art of Jekylls mom Margaret, she plays a bigger role in the story. (And btw this art is scanned thought an app bc lighting wasnt great.)

^ My first art of them both(was trying to figure out their designs) Margarets red dress ended up being her newer clothing and orange one is her in the past.

^My full body refs of them a bit later. I hid Ernests eyes because i couldn't decide which eye colour to give him, green, so that he kinda looks like hyde, or brown. Ended up choosing brown but that may change in the future.

^Mix with encanto i watched at the time (not the biggest fan of this drawing their head sizes are weird)

^ Andd art with her missing her past and regreting her actions (mm trauma ☺️)

^ In those 3 drawings you can see i wanted to give her a lot of old spots before the initial desing (first picture) but ended up making less of them.

^ plus height chart (sorry for bad quality im to lazy to redo the photo)

So uhh yeah thats a lot, now to context:

Margaret

[she/her] [60 y.o] [a doctor]

Hers and Ernests marriage was against their will so they have only platonic attraction

She inherited a hospital as a bisness. She is both a boss but also sometimes performs surgeries.

her shortened story [tw mention of death, abuse and depression]:

she was born in arranged marriage family.

her mothers murder was planned and made by her father (who is a leader of a mafia) because family would mess with his (secret) bisness. He sent a infected by him with rabies werewolf

but Margaret survived so he decided to leave her alive, but he used her only for his needs and was abusive and manipulative

She also had later o an arranged marriage with a man (Ernest) she knew from childhoid, but they only ever had platonic feelings for each other

Because of her father threatening her with leaving her with nothing to inherit from her family in his will, which would literally leave her on the streets, if she wouldn't have a child with her husband. At age 25 she had Jekyll.

Margaret grew with prejudice towards magical creatures and mad scientists (because of her mothers murder and the society's influence).

So when she found out her husband helps magical creatures and scientists (hid them from police in a little house in the woods) she on emotions went to the police.

Ernest was imprisoned. Where he died

so it become just her and her son now

for her son it was a hard hit, he loved his father very much

So resentment stayed with him

And Margaret also wasn't able to forgive herself ever since

She also was hyper-protective to her son and often manipulated him out of what she thought will be best for him

So one day they had a big fight because her son, Henry, wanted to create a place where the "mad" scientist who are in bad situation can have a chance to improve and not fear police anymore. She have done an ultimatum, that if he does that, he could never come back. (Or alternatively, when he changes his mind)

So he left, she was now alone, but instead of trying to fix what she had done, her pride didnt let her. Each passing year she convinced herself he will come back. For about 10 years.

she regretted her choices, her actions was haunting her which dived her into depression

But after a hard path, she will come to terms with herself.

That will happen after she will come to society to support it financially. And reunites with her son after them making peace with each other. Which dosent mean forgiveness from Jekylls side.

Alsoo there may be a sub plot about her and Frankenstein becoming "roomates".

Ernest

Well, he was a very positive and caring person. Despite that not that mature or responsible, Margaret was the responsible one. And face of the family.

While he was a househusband, and spent time with Jekyll. Thay got in trouble because Ernest didnt really twice while even little Jekyll sometimes was like "welp thats not a very good idea".

Also considering Ernest maybe inspiring Jekyll to be an alchemist. But himself he most likely had completely other interest. But still supported his son, unlike Margaret.

Mad scientists and creatures he cared for was caught with him, but they managed to escape.

His parents were mostly ignorant of his existence, exept for when that would make them a profit (like with the arranged marriage) . So he promised himself he would always care for Jekyll (🥲)

As to him and Margaret, they were pals, he always was with her when she finally was finally opening up to him. But hid his own feelings under a happy mask.

Was the same age as Margaret. Died when he was 36 (went to jail when he was 35) no one really knows what happened.

(i actually most of the time before were considering him to be alive and Margaret lying that he died, but i changed that for storys sake, i didnt felt like he had much of a purpose in the current status when jekyll is 35. BUT THAT MAY ALSO CHANGE IN THE FUTURE)

So in where hes alive version

I remember vividly daydreaming about jekyll/hyde being exited to see his/their dad after so many years, cleaning society etc while lodgers are confused. Him coming and jekyll being very exited and emotional but not knowing how to tell lodgers. Later on Margaret will come as she recieved an invitation by jekyll, which was actually written by Ernest to reunite their family. (Kinda sugar sweet compared to ver. where he died)

So uhh yeah this au was one of the most thinked about by me. Now not that much but its not forgotten ‼️

[bridgertonbabe]

Bridgerton Characters on The Traitors

So after binge-watching the first series of The Traitors Australia and reigniting my intense love for the show (after first watching The Traitors UK), naturally I began to wonder how the characters of Bridgerton would fare in this set-up. In no particular order...

Francesca (and let me tell you now, with 100% confidence, whether she's a faithful or a traitor; she's going to win)

Faithful: naturally she'd be a one of the quieter members but she'd know within a couple of days of shrewdly watching everyone who the traitors among them were. She's not going to battle to make her voice heard but she is careful in who she shares her suspicions with; she doesn't want her opinions to be too loud and get back to the traitors and be murdered in the night as a consequence. She's far too stealthy and would probably drip the seeds of who she believes a traitor is to a louder faithful so they might be murdered instead, allowing her a clear path to the final.

Traitor: the coolest, calmest, most collected Bridgerton character; she doesn't even bat an eye when the host selects her as a traitor. She is razor sharp in her strategy and planning; she isn't just ten steps ahead of the faithfuls, she's also ten steps ahead of her fellow cohorts. She perfectly assesses who she can trust among the other players, who will take the fall, who can be manipulated, who can get themselves banished without her even having to pull any strings. Even if her name were to be raised at the round table, she'd remain nonchalant and manage to talk the suspicion away and turn everyone's vote towards someone else.

Michael

Faithful: it's Michael Stirling; he's sticking around for longer than some of the other (straight) male contestants would like. He's an asset in challenges and keeps morale up. He'd either be murdered by the traitors because they know he'd never be voted out otherwise OR he'd be banished purely based on his incredibly likeable and charismatic persona and the others believing because of his affable nature that no one would suspect him to be a traitor in a case of reverse psychology.

Traitor: the reason stated above why he might end up voted out is the same reason he would make for a great traitor; he's too damn affable for anyone to immediately suspect - though that's not to say they wouldn't eventually identify him. He'd charm his way into every player's good books so they'd be less inclined to vote for him, plus he'd possess the gift of the gab to convince everyone he wasn't a traitor and lead them down the trail of believing a different person is playing against them.

Penelope

Faithful: using her wallflower abilities of quiet observation and study, she'd pick up on comments and behaviour of others and come to the correct conclusions of who the traitors are. She doesn't always speak at the banishments but when she's confident in her opinion she makes her voice heard and everyone listens when she does. Her downfall would either come at the hands of the traitors murdering her when they realise she's on to them OR the other faithfuls finding her quiet intelligence suspicious and believing her capable of being a traitor because of it.

Traitor: it's Lady Whistledown herself we're talking about here; she's definitely making it all the way to the final. She's gets a kick out of all the power she possesses in traitors tower and loves analysing and thinking through all the choices she has to wisely make. She makes careful note of how every player is planning to vote and knows the right things to say to instigate a change of vote if needs be. Her only stumbling block would be if she reached the final and was challenged by a faithful she had made a close bond with; only then would her mask slip as emotions got the better of her as she pleaded her case in a last ditch attempt to claim the money for herself.

Colin

Faithful: while some could write him off for going with the flow, Colin is more observant and astute than people give him credit for. Sure, he does tend to go with the group majority if he believes there's probable cause at banishments, but he's also not afraid to kick off a discussion if he has a strong suspicion of who a traitor could be. The traitors would hold off on murdering him as he proves to be an all-rounder in the challenges but potentially they'd underestimate him and find themselves banished by his hands.

Traitor: being personable, he'd easily ingratiate himself with all of the players and secure his safety by simply being well-liked among the group. He thinks on his feet and outsmarts the faithfuls on several occasions, however if accused he might lose his cool and become too defensive and get himself banished as a result.

Eloise

Faithful: gets in way over her head coming up with umpteen theories for every single player being a traitor and connecting dots that aren't actually there to fit in with her thoughts. She'd dissect every last word anyone has uttered and turns the banishment discussions into interrogations as she goes about getting answers. Her downfall would end up as a result of her own doing as she relentlessly insists on a single theory for who the traitors are, hammering on and on but being so narrow-minded and obsessed with her theory being right that her behaviour raises suspicions of the other players (even if one of the names she's raised was an actual traitor, she's end up doing that traitor a favour simply because nobody is taking her crazed ranting seriously).

Traitor: as big a game as she would talk, Eloise wouldn't make it to the end as a traitor. Trying to big-brain the entire game and keeping ten steps ahead of the faithfuls would overwhelm her and keep her up at night as she tries to think through every last game play possible. She'd do well for awhile but eventually other players would pick on up something being amiss with her, whether's she talking a little too much and pushing forward other names for banishment or how she acts a little furtive at the round table. She'd also be a traitor that would convince herself that another traitor is going to betray her (despite her cohort showing no signs of it) and get them banished before she believes they do the same to her, but end up shooting herself into the foot for getting rid of her teammates so prematurely.

Phillip

Faithful: his role as a faithful will go one of two ways; either he'll be an early banishment OR he'll be one of the last faithful standing. Either option is purely down to Phillip's incredibly reserved nature and in a big social game like The Traitors he'd probably keep to himself for the sake of his social battery, but when he does get involved in discussions he mainly operates as a listener who nods along and the few times he does speak he might come across a little awkward. As a result the other players might find his behaviour questionable and believe it's a sign of a traitor and banish him early on, however, being so quiet he could alternatively end up fading into the background and not being on anyone's radar until the numbers are so small that everyone has to be put under the microscope and only then would the other players truly consider his potential to be a traitor; a consideration that would most likely translate into his banishment because nobody had ever suspected him prior.

Traitor: has the potential to be a dark horse as a traitor due to his stoic persona. Though a quieter character, when he does open up and voice his thoughts the other players are intrigued by what he has to say and take his suggestions seriously. He wouldn't confront anyone at the banishment but he would suggest to other players throughout the day the names of people he has some suspicions of, but making it conversational to see what the other players' thoughts of them were. He'd be more inclined to kill off the louder and more formidable players simply because if ever challenged he knows he can hold his own against softer-spoken people who don't raise their voices compared to those who are more frank and intimidating.

Kate

Faithful: is of course going to make for a rather formidable traitor-hunter due to her incredibly competitive nature. She'd definitely be one the voices leading the way for the rest of the players and also pipe up during banishments to speak on behalf of the group of who the majority has their suspicions on. She might not always be bang on the money but the second she correctly identifies a traitor and has them banished the traitors will be signing her death warrant. She'd be too influential of a faithful to keep around - though alternatively because of her voice having so much sway, other faithfuls might believe her to be a traitor boldly doing her manipulation out in the open and she could end up banished as a result.

Traitor: would love, love, love becoming a traitor and outfoxing the faithful. Similarly in her role as a faithful, she would definitely end up as leader among the traitors - though god forbid she and Anthony were traitors together because they'd for sure butt heads over any decision they were about to make. She would use her cunning to manipulate the way the voting goes in the banishment room while also having a tend and befriend method of securing her trust among the faithful.

Anthony

Faithful: he and Kate are two sides of the same coin when it comes to playing any sort of game; they're there to win. Like Kate he would be at the forefront of round table discussions, but in comparison to Kate he would get in a bit too deep and lose his cool during confrontations and accusations. His downfall would most likely be leading the charge of a banishment with so much confidence that he identified a traitor, only for the banished player to reveal themselves as a faithful; as a result, the rest of the group lose confidence in him and believe the reason he pushed so strongly was because he's a faithful desperate to keep eyes away from him.

Traitor: would definitely have more cool as a traitor but still not as much as Kate. He would enjoy the one-upmanship against the faithful every time he steered them in the wrong direction at banishment, though his confidence could potentially grow into arrogance and lead to a slip-up as a result which would lead to his undoing.

(Bonus Kanthony note: imagine if at the start one of was a traitor and the other a faithful, but the latter has suspicions on the other right from the off. As vocal as the faithful is in their convictions, the other players dismiss it because of how obsessive they become in what almost seems like a vendetta, meanwhile the traitor simply points the finger back at them for correctly calling them out. They're so frustrated with one another; that is until the traitor is the last traitor standing and must recruit a faithful and damn it there's only one single name that comes to mind in who they're going to recruit because it's better to have their adversary onside than against them.)

Sophie

Faithful: she's never going to get herself banished, let's be real, with all the other faithfuls willing to turn a blind eye to any suspicion they might have of her because she's just so god damn lovable. While she doesn't always contribute at round table discussions for banishment, she is stubborn in her thoughts of who she believes the traitors are and isn't going to go along with the pack mentality if she believes the target in question isn't actually a traitor. She sticks to her guns but rather than being deemed suspicious, other faithful respect her for her opinions and might side with her theory instead. If she doesn't make it to the very end it's because the traitors have killed her off to shock the rest of the players; however the faithful would be out for blood to avenge her and would end up banishing a traitor straight after her murder as a result.

Traitor: the Lady in Silver knows a thing or two about wearing a mask and keeping her identity secret, meaning she'd play a blinder as a traitor. Nobody would suspect her and as mentioned above, even if her name crossed people's minds, they'd ignore it in favour of a more likely candidate. While she is quietly calculating throughout the game, she could fall at the final hurdle if challenged during banishment. By that point towards the end of the game she might just be mentally exhausted from keeping up such a facade and she crumbles enough under pressure for the others to vote her out ahead of the final.

Benedict

Faithful: honestly, Ben's just there for a laugh, he's the least invested in hunting out traitors. Sure, he finds the game interesting and all the dynamics that come with it but he's more than happy to kick back and relax and watch the carnage unfold. He goes along with whatever way the group seems to be voting and while the arguing is a bit fun, when it gets too much he does speak up to remind everyone to calm down in order to keep the peace if he feels the group are coming across as cruel with all guns blazing towards certain players. He would potentially end up being banished merely because he never offers up opinions on who the traitors are and doesn't seem to take the game as seriously as the other faithfuls.

Traitor: one of the least likely to even want to be a traitor so how he ended up in this role is just as big a mystery to him, but okay bet. He has plenty of the Bridgerton charm to form alliances and build rapports with the faithfuls to secure his place, though he'd definitely find the strategising as a traitor difficult and feel guilty for manipulating the vote against a faithful as well as murdering people. As engaging as he is among the players, some of them might pick up on the pressure getting to him and banish him as a result; but actually, he's massively relieved and has a jovial smile on his face as he bids the players farewell after revealing he's a traitor.

Hyacinth

Faithful: literally her favourite part of the game is going from person to person and group to group gossiping and theorising on who the traitors could be. She's definitely not afraid to throw a name out at the table but equally she loves watching the accusations and lines of defence as it plays out in front of her and she's the most excited every time the banished player stands before them to reveal their identity. She would probably end up being used as a pawn by the traitors, knowing if any of them drip a name of suspicion into her ear that she's going to gleefully run off and circulate the name to the rest of the group.

Traitor: would probably struggle immediately after being selected to stop herself buzzing with obvious excitement over her newly bequeathed role, though she would last a bit longer than the very first day. As much as she would love playing the role of traitor, I think that love would be worn far too blatantly on her face e.g. watching everyone reacting to someone not coming down at breakfast and smirking with amusement because her actions are what have caused this fallout. She might talk her way out of the first accusation aimed her way but any additional slip-up would be her undoing.

Gareth

Faithful: more of a follower than a leader and is quite happy for others to pave the way to identify traitors. Even when he does sit and think on who the traitors could be, he begins to overthink everything and just thinks "fuck it" and instead opts to go with whoever everyone else is planning to vote for. He would definitely be susceptible to traitors manipulating him into voting and thinking a certain way and they wouldn't murder him because of it. However the fact he has nothing to contribute at the round table combined with him keeping a low profile within with the group might lead to his banishment.

Traitor: again wouldn't be too comfortable taking charge of the group but is happy and willing for someone else to step up to the plate. Once he's built up enough confidence in the role he would definitely be a risk-taker and with luck on his side would just about be able to pull off whatever plan he had enacted. However without luck on his side, his risk could instantly turn the tables on him and be voted out as a consequence.

Lucy

Faithful: is very focused on keeping tabs on who everyone votes for at every banishment. She would be able to remember it to jot down in a notebook back in her room and before she goes to bed she would analyse everyone's voting track trying to see if any patterns emerged or anything glaring jumped out at her, hoping this method might help identify the traitors. She'd also work out the logistics of why the traitors would kill off the faithfuls that they chose, going back to her notes to see if the recently deceased faithful was onto anyone voting-wise. If she were to make her note-taking known to the group and successfully identify a traitor as a result, then she would quickly become their next victim and not make it down to breakfast the following morning.

Traitor: much in the same analytical way, she would go about her role as a traitor by thinking of it as a game of numbers, weighing up the odds of every decision she made and how it would affect the game. She's affable enough to keep under the radar of suspicion, but her downfall would be because of her loyalty. Even if one of her fellow traitors was bound to end up banished by the end of the night, she wouldn't have it in her to vote them out and instead vote elsewhere; however not voting out a traitor would place suspicion right at her door and she would struggle to argue her way out of this line of thinking.

Gregory

Faithful: feels bad for voting for just about anyone and doesn't enjoy when everyone gangs up on a player to be banished. He never really knows who he's going to vote for ahead of the banishment and simply makes his mind up after the discussion at the round table has ended. While it's more likely the traitors would kill him off then him ending up banished by the group, if he lasted long enough he would be a contestant to have an eleventh hour crystalising moment when he pieces everything together and realises who the remaining traitors really are.

Traitor: he's not lasting long as a traitor and quite frankly he's glad when he's banished because it was far too stressful. He'd be incredibly nervous throughout his time as a traitor, resembling a shivering Bichon Frisé at any given moment, casting little room for doubt amongst the other players that he is one of the traitors.

Daphne

Faithful: loves a good challenge and definitely has her eye on the prize. Her suspicions would rest on how the other players were coming across emotionally throughout the game, if any of them seemed nervous or not particularly forthcoming with their thoughts and feelings on the game at hand. She'd also keep a close eye on how every person reacts when receiving a vote during banishment, keeping note if they survive the banishing or if they are voted out and revealed as a traitor, reflecting on anyone's votes who the ousted traitor seemed visibly moved by; and building up a case that another player could have been a traitor voting out their own. Has an equal chance of being murdered for being vocal in her observations as well as being banished for arguably planting seeds and pushing the voting in a certain direction.

Traitor: would make for an incredibly organised player and come to traitors tower with a three point plan for the following day that she plans on executing flawlessly and has no qualms in directing her fellow cohorts in their designated plan of action. While she would run a very tight ship, she could fall victim to a mutiny by her fellow traitors if they believed her incredible forward-thinking skills included stabbing them in the back at an opportune time.

Simon

Faithful: while he does enjoy the thrill of the game, he's fairly laid-back and lets others take the lead in hunting out traitors. He prefers to cast his vote on reasons backed by proof but as is the nature of the game, sometimes there isn't much of a choice but to follow a hunch. He's not particularly confident speaking at the round table with just how tense and finger-pointing the group can become but he would open up the start of deliberations if they had an unsuccessful streak of previous banishments and suggest they opt for another way of thinking since their current methods haven't been panning out. Is more likely to be voted out than murdered, purely being of a quieter nature than others and people believing him capable of pulling off the role of traitor.

Traitor: plays with a level of confidence that lowkey he didn't know he possessed and everything falls into place for him, giving him a very smooth run for good portion of the show's duration. However, the one thing that stresses him out the most are the banishments, particularly the deliberation at the round table. Nervous of becoming tongue-tied if faced with accusations, he has to mentally prepare himself and put on his best game face before entering the room. He'd keep as quiet as possible during the discussions with minimal chiming in but if accused he might end up defending himself a little too strongly for the faithful to truly believe he's one of them.

[amethyste-7urquoise]

Draco Black. Prologue :

12 September 1996.

It had been almost a year since the Dark Lord had returned, a year since he had once again wreaked havoc and a year since he had taken up residence in the Malfoy household.

Malfoy Manor was dark that night. All the Death Eaters and the Malfoy family were around a large table, except for Draco who was at Hogwarts and anyway, Narcissa was telling anyone who would listen that her son was not yet ready to join them in their meetings. He was still a baby to her.

"- Severus?... Do you know if any Hogwarts students are interested in joining our cause? At this age, they have a lot of questions... Voldemort finally asked in his cold voice.

- Yes Master, I do hear some students asking questions about you... Most of them are from Slytherin... The others prefer to be on Potter's side. Professor Snape replied, bowing his head a little to show his respect.

- Well, I see... And Draco? How is he doing?

- Master!

- I know Narcissa your point of view on him... I just want to know if he's starting to make up his mind... Voldemort reassured her before staring at the Potions teacher, waiting for an answer.

- I haven't got a clue Master... I have the impression that he seems to be avoiding the subject... Whether it's with me or even his friends..."

The Dark Lord sighed as did Narcissa. But the two sighs were quite different.

One was a sigh of annoyance with perhaps even a touch of desperation, the Lord knew that Draco could be an exceptional mangemort. After all, the boy had many talents; he could put on a perfect mask to hide his emotions, he was very good at occlumancy thanks to his Aunt Bellatrix Lestrange and he was obviously very good at potions thanks to Professor Snape. In fact, come to think of it, Draco was more like Professor Snape than his own father. Snape was one of his best mangemort, so the blond could easily succeed him.

And the other was a sigh of relief, Narcissa was reassured to know that her boy wasn't bragging about the fact that the great Dark Lord saw in him the potential to be a murderer. For yes, that was how she saw the Death Eaters, murderers without an ounce of humanity. So why was she one? She had no choice but to become one... At least, that's what she believed for a long time before she realised recently that she had always had a choice but she had made one bad one, one single one, which had, afterwards, chained all her bad decisions together. Like some kind of butterfly effect. She absolutely regretted her whole life because of it, from her childhood until now. And that choice was to go to Hogwarts... When she was still a young child, she would have given anything to go to Beauxbatons. She didn't hate Hogwarts but she admired the French school, it had a charm that the blonde was sensitive to. She had spoken to her sister about it once but Bellatrix had immediately laughed at her, saying that she was weak and that it wasn't by making pretty butterflies and learning to sew that their parents would be proud of her. Narcissa was still small at the time and her sister's words had hurt her, telling her that she was probably right. So she didn't bother to tell her parents and it was this choice that destroyed her whole life. And if her parents had accepted? She wouldn't have gone to Hogwarts, she wouldn't have gone to Slytherin, she wouldn't have met Lucius Malfoy, she wouldn't have married him, he wouldn't have manipulated her into becoming a Death Eater and she wouldn't have had Draco. And all of that wouldn't have happened. She was so afraid that her son would make the same mistakes she had... So yes, she had decided to protect her son and do everything she could to make sure he didn't become a Death Eater... Even if it meant lying or standing up to her husband or Lord Voldemort.

But unfortunately, the difference in sighs was noticed by the latter. He raised an eyebrow, questioningly.

"- do you have something to tell me Narcissa?..."

She looked up at him, quickly looking for an excuse.

"- no master... I'm just tired, please excuse me..."

Lord Voldemort snorted loudly. He wasn't fooled and he could see that the more time passed, the more Narcissa was moving away from his cause. And he was also tired of her overprotecting her son, he didn't know if she realised it but she was getting in his way. He sighed heavily before looking at the other people around the table before his bright red eyes landed on Lucius. A thought came to his mind, Lucius had disappointed him tremendously during the episode at the ministry when he had destroyed the prophecy by accident and he had already punished him for that but...

"- Lucius.

- yes master? Lucius turned his cold gaze from his wife to the dark lord with a more docile look.

- Kill her."

Everyone froze at his command, Narcissa could not believe her ears. She looked at her husband, watching for a reaction from him. But nothing, Lucius simply raised his eyebrows at the order, a little surprised before looking at her with his usual cold mask.

"- If you do, you'll be forgiven everything for the accident that happened at the ministry and you'll rise in my esteem. The dark lord rose and stood behind Lucius. She stands in the way of our cause... Haven't you noticed that she's been trying to keep Draco from joining us when he has so much potential. He leaned into her ear. Wouldn't you be proud to have him by our side?

- Of course I would, Master.

- Then kill her, she destroys any hope of him ever being in our ranks."

Lucius then stood up and stared coldly at Narcissa who was also staring at him in fear, she stood up to back away. She looked quickly at the others for help but they did not move, she looked at her sister who was smiling wide, then she looked at Severus who did not know how to react. He wanted to get up too and stand in front of her to protect her from Lucius or at least try to calm the situation down but he couldn't react, he knew that if he moved or said even one word he would be killed too. He was obviously afraid of dying but he also had a lot of responsibility... If he died, who would replace him as a spy? Who would give the information he managed to get to Dumbledore and the Order of the Phoenix? All his efforts would be in vain.

He gave her a faint look of total loss and despair, faint enough for only Narcissa to understand. And Narcissa forgave him completely, but for the moment she was extremely afraid, but she knew she couldn't run, by the time she ran, the unforgivable spell would have already hit her. So she tried to reason with him.

"- Lucius! Please, pull yourself together! You know very well that Draco is still too young and not yet mature to join us! I'm allowed to worry, right? Aren't you worried? He's your son!

- ahh... he sighed in reply. You are so disappointing... No, I'm not worried because I know he can do it and he has to start sometime, right?

- Lucius please... You're not going to kill me, are you?

- But the master is right." He replied simply.

He raised his wand to her and Severus tried something desperate.

"- Master! Are you sure you want her dead? That is... perhaps a little excessive... I mean, we could just not listen to her opinion anymore...

- Are you doubting me, Severus?

- Of course not, master... I just... I just wanted to... He didn't finish his sentence, if he continued, he'd get himself into trouble. Nothing... Excuse me for wanting to give my unwanted opinion master.

- You are forgiven everything my dear... You are far too important for me to hold a grudge..." The dark lord simply replied, placing his hands on his shoulders.

This disgusted Severus and he looked back at Narcissa with a look of terrible regret. Narcissa had tears in her eyes but gave him a slight smile to thank him for trying. She turned her attention back to Lucius and saw in his eyes that it was all for naught. She was going to die, right here and now. So she decided not to pretend anymore, it was no use anyway.

"- I hate you from the bottom of my heart Lucius... You destroyed my life and you will destroy your son's... Go to hell.

- Avada Kadavra!"

1/?

[sntsrenwicks]

case     file          :          renwick     ,     achilles          you hide behind your metaphors and pray that no one sees the fare behind your poker face: your dark and twisted needs

1964     ,     port liery          such a beautiful boy filled with so much sin

let me in

let me out

basics.

full name . . . ; achilles renwick

nicknames . . . ; achi, wick

association . . . ; renwick coven (deceased)

birthplace . . . ; port liery

occupation . . . ; serial killer

date of birth . . . ; december 31th, 1964

status . . . ; single

sexuality . . . ; bisexual

gender . . . ; cis man

pronouns . . . ; he/him

languages . . . ; english, french

to note . . . ; if you see him on the street, run

scars . . . ; none

tattoos . . . ; none

piercings . . . ; none

positive traits . . . ; charming, intelligent, agille

negative traits . . . ; manipulative, cold, violent, cruel, withdrawn, reckless

connections . . . ; athena renwick . . . older sister, alive / / mother renwick . . . mother, mia / / renwick coven . . . coven, all deceased / /

BIOGRAPHY.

TW: Murder, Child Death, Sociopathy, Blood, Evil, Suicide Mention, Cruelty

Many are gifted with a big family ⸻ have it as their duty to spurt as many spawns as their body physically allows out of a sense of faux responsibility and fate. Such is the case of the Renwick's ⸻ one of the oldest, most respected, secretive but influential covens residing in the United States. A white picket fence house in Port Liery, twelve powerful children, a coven leader happily married and regarded as a great father ⸻ The Renwick family had it all; fortune, happiness, status. Not every happy ever after is meant to last, however. 

Athena and Achilles. Ridiculous. You have half a mind to be grateful your parents didn't name you Odysseus ⸻ but you aren't an odyssey. No happiness of coming home, no wonders and adventures. You are the tragedy of The Iliad ⸻ you are Paris by the river, kidnapping Helen for your own enjoyment. Names are inconsequential in shaping who you become ⸻ yet, there's irony in it, no? Your parents were so obsessed with mythology they created a Greek Tragedy. Their own little Trojan War ⸻ the horse in the house from the beginning, the infant dropped from the wall. Quite literally, but we are not there yet. 

You and Athena were the oldest of a bunch of snotty brained children set for greatness ⸻ Renwick would not accept anything less than perfection. Your father led the coven, your mother played house ⸻ despite how you knew her magic was twice more powerful than his could ever be. But the rules were clear; only a born Renwick leads the coven, no matter if they are a pathetic weak sore sight like your dickhead of a father. Skilled shapeshifters trusted by an entire community of fools ⸻ you hated it. Perhaps because you were the weakest link, the one whose power refused to show up. You were the black sheep. The family's shame. And when you finally figured out what was wrong with your magic ⸻ you knew Renwick coven was no place for you. 

Anger was always a known emotion ⸻ your father didn't treat you well, the house was constantly loud, and the kids annoyed the living shit out of you. But you had never exploded the way you did when your mother confessed, after pushing her around a bit, that you inherited her magic because your father wasn't yours ⸻ instead, a drunk human man sired you during a night of weakness on her part. A blood witch, a cunning bitch. You hated her. Despise how you didn't have a third of her power and only seemed to have gotten the weakness ⸻ the need. 

Many would say that's what made you snap ⸻ most argue you were born this way. Blood witches aren't friends with sanity. You know what happened during the night of September 26th, 1987 was meant to happen ⸻ had you known the truth or not. Athena was shaped to be the next leader ⸻ your older sister always achieved levels of perfection the entire coven could be proud of. You, the second born, always overlooked, were left to babysit the younger kids while Ares, three years your younger, were being raised to be Athena's right hand man. Honestly, it's like they were asking for it. 

Now, the baby from the wall ⸻ not your proudest moment, and not exactly a baby. Your siblings loved you up until the point you pushed your brother from the third floor window. All screams, after that. They wouldn't keep quiet even while dying. Ten of the Renwick's children died that night ⸻ the neighbors found their bodies in the morning, along with their father's. Their mother, however, was miraculously alive. Barely. Who needs their spleen, anyway? 

You and Athena were nowhere to be found. At first, people believed you both had been taken by the cruel monster who killed your family. It's only when the rest of the Renwick Coven was brutally murdered that something clicked in the brains of Port Liery's covens ⸻ only took them three days! To this day, you don't know how Athena knew to get you back ⸻ the promises she made of finding a witch that could bond her magic to yours were true, you know. But when you returned to Port Liery, they were waiting. Your mother and the coven she had enlisted for help. Your sister. Your flesh and blood turned against you. 

They crafted a personal hell you could not escape ⸻ couldn't die, either, no matter how many times you died. You were stuck in Port Liery, September 26th, 19987 day after day after day. Alone. You lost track of time. You lost track of life. Anger consumed you. Bitterness. Emotions you had never felt before. You planned, you read, you screamed, you died. Over and over again. You weren't sure if you were a person anymore. You weren't sure of anything. And then, forty years later, you were set free. 

POSSIBLE CONNECTS

The Coven that helped his mother create the prison world they sent him to. The coven would keep the knowledge of it a secret, and any means of creating another prison such as Achilles's would've been destroyed.

Athena Renwick is still alive, despite not being a part of the long gone Renwick coven. Achilles has a soft spot for his sister, and had chosen her to sacrifice to bring back the witch of the wild (desmona atticus). He didn't make it to the witch's location, for Athena convinced him to turn back and search for a witch in Port Liery that would bound Athena's magic to him. He doesn't know what happened to his sister - if she changed her name, joined a coven, or even if she is still at Port Liery.

The person who broke him out of the time prison is someone Achilles is thankful to, and will be a constant annoyance to. He needs housing, help with the world, and figuring out what next to do.

Mother Renwick disappeared when she used her magic to trap Achilles in the prison. It's unknown if she died, or somehow ended up inside the prison with him. Achilles seems to know what happened to his mother, but he is keeping his lips tightly shut about it.

[raifuujin]

The poll going around reminded me about this post from February 2017 I made because of seeing so much Kudou hate. Funny thing is that I think it was soon after I made this post that I started looking into Toichi for rp muse opinions and the possibility of him being alive just. Destroyed most of the good feels Kaito's memories were giving him.

So, in the last seven years, most of my opinions are the same, except:

Toichi is alive, knows his son gallivants as Kid, has been in contact with other people who know he's alive, and is generally well accepted to be compost as far as fandom's image of him.

Chikage comes down a little as well, because Corbeau. Her lightly trying to convince her son to stop doesn't forgive the fact that she's not giving all of the information that would be relevant to what decision he'd make. Neither of the Kuroba's were decent parent quality to begin with, and more information has brought them down even more.

My opinion of Mary tanked significantly after this post was made, because she's the freaking adult secret agent, who knows full well the danger of the BO because they almost successfully killed her, and yet she sends her teenage daughter to investigate everything related to her condition. And even if she distrusts Shinichi so much to not even attempt to ally with him and instead steal his potential cure, then stop freaking sending your daughter who clearly trusts him to do all this. wtf. And that's also not going into the detail that she's had disagreements with Akai that ended up with injuries to both of them. Frankly, that hints at a lot more emotion and getting worked up than anything they've actually shown on page, so. I don't really know how to consider that. But she claims to care about her kids safety, and implied that she didn't want Akai joining the FBI, and yet. Who cares about the trouble Sera could be getting into, I guess. Tsutomu we don't have enough context to know how he treats his kids, so he gets a neutral ranking.

Ginzo still falls under 'not okay for forgetting his daughter's birthday and being a bit of a workaholic', but the way it's presented still isn't actually bad. His wife is now in a similar boat, for not being available because of work and logic stupidity (please look up what actual sleep deprivation can do because there is no sleep banking out of three days being awake). Up in the air how much of their apparent absence is the fault of the author and how bad they actually are, but honestly? They seem pretty okay within Gosho's writing limitations. Might just be because part of Midoriko's explained lack of Kid knowledge was that, because she and Ginzo got into arguments, they both agreed it best to not discuss work with each other. I don't know if that's the best solution to that problem, but at least it implies that they can communicate and identify problems.

And I know why people hate Heizo, the main reason I really can't say he should be burned at a stake is because of the entire context of that case and why the scene needed to happen. So the worst I can say about Heizo is that he manipulated his son and used him as bait to catch a worse criminal than the actual culprit of the murder Heiji was trying to solve. So I'll stick with my opinion of 'not great, but not really on the same level as the actually bad parents'. Heiji wasn't going to leave the case alone, so I can see why he'd go with a 'well then, make yourself useful' plan, even if I don't agree with it.

Parents of DCMK

Because I feel like my views of the parents tend to be different from the norm, and I have the time, I’m finally going to go into my thoughts about each grouping. (Or at least, the main parents we actually know information about.)

Keep reading

[edelweissacermacrophyllum]

Tempting God, the beginning of wisdom, and God perhaps behaving badly

Genesis 7:1-9:17, Proverbs 1:1-7, Matthew 4:1-22

I read The Brothers Karamazov when I was much younger and I recall Ivan's poem being one of my favourite parts. In it, it suggests that in the temptations of Jesus, where Jesus is standing atop the temple, being tempted to jump down, if he had done so it would have resulted in his death. A jump would not be a sign of faith but a sign of doubt. This isn't exactly the scientific mindset, but it is the mindset we expect from relationships. If we are constantly testing eachother's trust, it's a pretty unhealthy relationship, but if we are content to not do that, it becomes healthy.

I like how, in the temptations of Jesus in the bible, it doesn't dramatize Jesus feelings at all. He was human, to be sure, and was subject to human emotions, but I like to imagine that none of these temptations had any power or lure compared to the trust he had in God and in himself and his plan. But we do know that Jesus questioned the plan later in life, so maybe he was agonizing over these temptations of easy power, shortcuts to glory without self sacrifice.

My bible in one year plan has, as one can see, a bit from the old testament, a bit from the new, and some wisdom literature. I don't know why we're starting proverbs today, but we are. Proverbs has never been a book I enjoyed because I have seen it misused and cherry picked from far too much. Not for any particular evil, but just the preacher wanted to use the bible to back up his personal opinion.

That being said, the beginning of Proverbs does say that the express purpose of wisdom is to do what is right and fair. It is not for gaining power or manipulating people. Wisdom is the servant of justice.

And finally, we come to the first great genocide of the bible. The flood narrative. I am guilty of motivated reasoning when it comes to the flood. I don't think God would have murdered everyone, therefore this story must be allegory or parable or origin fable for rainbows. To my knowledge, the genetic record doesn't show a bottleneck 7,000 years ago. The last ice age ended 11,000 years ago, but that is a pretty big leap to make. There is no good evidence for a global flood.

Some people may ask me, "Why are you trusting human science over the holy word of God?" I think it is far more likely that humans are misinterpreting the word of God, something that happens all the time, than that scientists, without any particular religious or political agenda, are independently misinterpreting the rules of the world in exactly the same way.

This isn't the issue, though, because if the flood did happen the way the bible says, we are faced with a God who is behaving badly. I have never heard a satisfactory explanation for the violent God of the old testament.

People have said, "He's God. He has the right to do what he likes with his creation." I don't think parents are allowed to do whatever they like to their children, even though they made them. By any human standard, killing and hurting large groups of people indiscriminately is wrong, and I don't have an answer for why God did it. If God did it. As I said, my reasoning is motivated, but I think that this story bears the marks of an origin story or myth much more than actual history for history's sake.

There was a cool part after the flood I hadn't noticed before, where God says that humans are allowed to eat meat now. It's strange because able definitely was a herder, and Adam and Eve wore animal skins, but here God says that now this is no longer sinful.

I thought I would have more to say about the flood, but I just keep thinking that it sucks and I wish that it wasn't used as a heart-warming Sunday school story.

[yanderes-galore]

I loved your yandere Gohin headcanons. If you're up for more beastars, could you do romantic headcanons for Riz with a carnivore reader?

At least you're a carnivore- Spoilers for Beastars.

Yandere! Riz with Carnivore! Darling

Concept

Pairing: Romantic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Yandere behavior, Threats, Mentions of murder, Possessive behavior, Obsessive behavior, Stalking, Clingy behavior, Delusional behavior, Violence, Manipulation, Intimidation.

- Even if you're a carnivore, Riz is still one of the biggest and strongest ones.

- You're safer than you would be as an herbivore but also not completely out of danger.

- Riz first tries to get along with you by doing the usual kindhearted and lovable act.

- You believe the large bear could do no wrong, even as one of the strongest in your class/club.

- Let's say he met you when Tem was still alive.

- You two chat often and speak carefree to each other.

- Even when it's just Tem and Riz you pop in to say 'Hi'.

- The bear starts to have a small crush on you that's innocent at first.

- The cute carnivore that speaks to him and Tem often.

- The precious carnivore who is actually kindhearted, unlike the beast inside him.

- The innocent carnivore whom he wishes to have for himself.

- It's clear he's bashful and nervous around you, others making jokes that Riz liked you.

- Of course they're met with Riz getting them to shut up before you know anything....

- He's not ready yet! Only Tem knows, it's supposed to be a secret.

- Then there's Tem's devouring incident....

- Where Riz lost control and ate his friend.

- Tem was the only one who knew his crush, he was also one of his greatest friends....

- This is where Riz grows more violent and delusional.

- That facade of the caring bear crumbles slightly, watching when you get so distraught over the news.

- There's no need to cry... Tem wanted this, he knows it. You didn't need him anyway as Riz will be the best for you.

- You can tell his behavior changed.

- He's sitting much closer to you, offering to cook food for you more often.

- His aggression is higher than normal.

- Riz can't control his own strength... you being manhandled whenever he hugs you or dragged too rough when he wants to go somewhere with you.

- "I don't mean it, I promise! I just get a little too excited... luckily you're a carnivore. If you were an herbivore I could've torn something...."

- His tone is dark but swaps back to his kind persona in an instant.

- Even as a carnivore you feel unsafe....

- Riz is suspicious, much different than he was before Tem's death.

- For now you explain it with him having trouble with emotions.

- You all were friends before Tem died, could you blame him?

- While you try to decipher Riz's behavior, the bear's still having unhealthy thoughts about his crush.

- You're weaker than him... he could hurt you if he wasn't careful..

- That made him feel so complicated.

- You're both carnivores, so it's okay!

- Just...what if he's too rough? Would that be bad?

- Riz is very delusional and obsessive at this point.

- He may even believe you already love him.

- That you're also just shy and unwilling to say.

- That's all good! Cute, even....

- He'll just have to confess to you somehow....

- When that eventually happens, it scares you.

- He picks a private spot to wait patiently at.

- You then approach and he can barely keep his heart from beating faster.

- Tem would want you two to be together! He just needs the courage.

- "(Y/N)..."

- It comes out more as a growl than intended.

- "Yes, Riz...?"

- Then you feel him grab you close to him.

- "I love you, I already know you do too, right?"

- Riz is great with intimidation so you may be forced to say 'Yes'.

- If you show hesitance you feel his grip tighten.

- By the end of his forced 'confession', you both walk together with his crushing hand in yours.

- Sometimes 'love' and 'friendship' need a little force.

- As a carnivore you have a lower chance of being eaten, but it's not out of the question.

- When Riz finally gets you two 'together' he is around you all the time.

- Cooking for you, Holding you, Talking about you, Pining for you....

- He's clingy and forceful.

- With his strength, even if you were a bear, you aren't leaving easily.

- "You seem rather distant... Why don't I cook you a nice meal!"

[n1kolaiz]

"You want to know what death is? I'll tell you. Death is the loss of life. Despite everything doctors like me attempt... a patient's life can still fall through our fingers. You think death lies in the apex of science? Anyone with such little regard for life will die by my hand."

Character Analysis: Yosano Akiko

Age: 25 || Ability: Thou Shalt Not Die

BSD CHAPTER CHAPTER 65-66 SPOILERS

table of contents:

1. Author counterpart.

2. Yosano's history.

3. 'Angel of Death' defined.

4. Yosano and Atsushi.

YOSANO BRAINROT!*(#&!*@#($

1. Author counterpart.

Having been given the “Sho Ho” at birth, Yosano Akiko’s counterpart—the real-life author—was known for her zealous take on both feminism and pacifism.

Side note: Once again, to avoid confusion, I will use the name Sho Ho in reference to the real-life author, and Yosano in reference to the BSD character.

Sho Ho's writings were pretty much out-of-the-ordinary in her time, and despite being suppressed by the social norms of gender hierarchy, she sought to reform society’s view on the cultural perspectives of women and their sexuality (She expressed her love for a woman in one of her poems, but many still argued on whether she identified herself as queer or not.)

"Thou Shalt Not Die," Yosano's ability, is actually named after one of Sho Ho's most famous, controversial poems. She wrote it for her brother, who was a soldier in the war between Russia and Japan (1904-1905). In her poem, she expressed her general distaste for war and how her brother was a part of it.

O my young brother, I cry for you Don't you understand you must not die! You who were born the last of all Command a special store of parents' love

Would parents place a blade in children's hands

Teaching them to murder other men Teaching them to kill and then to die? Have you so learned and grown to twenty-four?

- excerpt from Sho Ho's poem, "Kimi Shinitamou Koto Nakare"

Her words were blunt enough to inflict guilt on her brother's conscience, as she wasn't afraid to express her disapproval over how her brother took part in the typical violent bloodshed and manslaughter of war. Such opinions perturbed the authorities, and her work was eventually banned from the public for a period of time. Later on, it was used as an anti-war statement.

2. Yosano's history.

Now, as for the character in BSD, Yosano is seen to be generally strong-willed, and later on, we see that she is terrifyingly compassionately ambitious in the way she treats her patients. She treasured life itself, and hated the thought of losing a patient.

Yosano had developed her relations with Mori Ougai back in the Great War, when she was just 11 years old. Her ability was a great benefactor in saving lives. Realistically speaking, she was used for her ability to heal injured soldiers and diminish the effect of any casualty acquired.

Initially, she wasn't aware of this, until one of her close friends pointed it out by subtly accusing Mori of manipulating her to participate in the War under the close-to false pretence of 'saving lives.'

As much as her ability did save lives, it also forced soldiers to return to the frontlines and suffer injuries over and over again. The soldiers were never given the opportunity to return to their families because of her ability. This obliged them to carry on in the war without any excuse, inserting them into a vicious cycle they had no escape out of.

Metaphorically speaking, Yosano's hatred for Mori sort of mirrors Sho Ho's disdain for war and fighting, don't you think? The way Kafka materialised Yosano's past was quite interesting because he used chapters 65 and 66 to explain Yosano's dislike for Mori, reflecting how Sho Ho used her poem to explain why she condemned the idea of war and how her brother was part of it.

Before the effect of her ability was fully understood, however, every soldier praised and thanked her for what an angel she was. One of the soldiers she had befriended and gotten close to even kept a tally of the number of times she had saved him. He was the one who gifted her the butterfly hairpin she wore all the time.

The weight of the truth that her ability was a curse rather than a blessing fully dawned on her when her soldier friend ultimately committed suicide, because the fact of being indefinitely trapped in the throes of war agonised him until his spirit gave out. This drove Yosano to loathe her ability, or rather, how it was used.

In the time she participated in the War, Yosano was given the alias 'angel of death' due to the control she retained over the battlefield, but I thought that perhaps Kafka had a reason behind giving her this title, so I did my research.

3. 'Angel of Death' defined.

Side note: I wouldn't want to disrespect any culture or religion, so if my citations are inaccurate and/or disrespectful, do feel free to correct me/let me know! I did research out of pure curiosity, and I don't intend to twist the significance of any of the interpretations.

I had to grow up learning about the basics of religious stuff, so it's kind of nice to study something out of the box, and very much against my father's rigid belief system :D

ARCHANGEL ARIEL

(archangel: an angel of higher rank)

I came across the few characteristics of angels/goddesses and their roles, and the one which really caught my attention was the female archangel, Ariel, the angel of nature.

[ source ]

In Hebrew, the name Ariel means 'altar' or 'lioness of God,' and her role is to heal. In addition to that, she is also recognised as a helper to another one of the seven main archangels, Raphael, whose role is to provide physical and emotional healing, too.

She is the protecter of the environment and the animals therein, and is bestowed with the duty to oversee the order of heavenly bodies as well as earth's natural resources. She assures the sustenance of food, water, shelter, and supplies of human beings, much like how a nurse is to a patient I suppose.

In relation to Yosano, I think this part is pretty self-explanatory, or perhaps this is blown out of proportion HA, so take this as a suggestion rather than a fact, because I'd like to believe that Kafka had a reason for giving Yosano a title as such.

In the past, I've come across the angel of death only to perceive it as a female grim reaper of some sort, so it was pretty cool to find that the word 'angel' and 'death' made up a title of a someone like Ariel, one of the purest forms of humility and compassion.

GREEK GODDESS PANAKEIA

For my beloved (wannabe/or not) students of Greek mythology (much like myself, let's make a cult!), you've probably heard of Panakeia, the goddess of healing. Medicine finds most of its vital significance in Greek history, and in its mythology, Panakeia is actually known for her ability to heal any kind of sickness.

[ source ]

Her name means 'panacea,' which is actually defined as a remedy for all diseases. Terminal diseases and injuries lead to death, right? This would bring us back to Yosano's ability to nullify any injury's effects on a person, keeping them from death itself.

Now, we know that in order for Yosano's ability to work, her patient, or victim, has to be in a near-death condition in order for her treatment to take effect. This can't exactly fit into the description of resurrection, but it can be described as some sort of rebirth.

GREEK GODDESS PERSEPHONE

So another goddess which reminds me of Sho Ho/Yosano, is Persephone, the goddess of spring and rebirth. Before Hades, the god of the underworld, fell in love with Persephone to take her to live with him, Persephone lived a happy life.

Hades, with his nature of darkness and the like, was captivated by how pure Persephone was, and stole her away from her former life to live in an environment which differed sharply from her natural aura of purity.

[ source ]

Remember when Yosano's friend left a note behind before he killed himself? The note said nothing except for, "You are too righteous." Take that as you will, but figuratively speaking, you could say Mori takes the role of Hades in the story, while Yosano can be portrayed as Persephone.

Sho Ho can also be a parallel of Persephone, in that she had to adapt to the realities of war and disharmony, while Persephone had to adapt to the raw darkness of the underworld with Hades.

Sho Ho stood against society's norms and decided to reform it, making her one of the most well-known feministic pacifist in history, while Persephone managed to escape from the underworld to return to her former position, earning the title the 'Bringer of Life,' or the 'Destroyer of Death.'

Furthermore, the way Sho Ho's anti-war poem took its effect later on, reflects the way Persephone restored balance in the world after returning from the underworld.

4. Yosano and Atsushi.

chapter 66; Yosano: "It's my fault that those close to me died... Is there some place where it's okay for me to live?"

chapter 8; Atsushi: "If I have any chance of saving them all, of returning them home safely, would that mean it's okay for me to keep on living?"

I couldn't help but think of Dazai and Atsushi back when I was reading through these panels. Ranpo (my beloved), along with Fukuzawa, accepted Yosano as she was, despite how her ability was a cause of despair and misfortune.

Ranpo looked past her mistakes and the entirety of how dark her past was to welcome her into the Armed Detective Agency. Dazai, on the other hand, knew who Atsushi was and what his ability had made him do before anyone else, and still decided to provide a safe place for Atsushi to find his sense of belonging, journeying with him as he learned to use his ability properly.

For more info about Dazai and Atsushi's dynamic, you can check out the analysis I did for Dazai :D

Atsushi desired to save people to prove his right to live, while Yosano made her wish to achieve the recovery of all her patients the reason for her existence.

Others would prefer to accuse both Yosano and Atsushi of having a saviour complex, but the reason why they pursued to save people with utmost dedication, stems from the nature of what their past was like. You know the saying 'from broken to beautiful?' Yeah, it's something like that.

The way their pasts were written out gave them a desire to change, which was, I daresay, initiated by the people who took them in: Ranpo and Dazai. Their abilities were demonised because of how they were used, but once they broke from their abilities' effect over their lives, they honed their skills to control them for the right cause instead.

In a less cynical point of view, I believe both Yosano and Atsushi stood for what was right, and wanted nothing but to achieve peace and harmony in whatever way they could, even if it meant risking their own lives to save others.

So yeah, that's it for my rants today. Thank you for reading, and if you have anything to add, go ahead! I'm open to discussions ;)

[named-jiang-or-wang]

SHANG-CHI (2021) Fan Revision

In my previous posts in @welcome-to-the-cafe I posted multiple rants about the movie itself. (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3). For such a great movie, there were still some flaws, which I will attempt to correct here.

Large fish first.

I hated the final CGI fest. Not the Ten Rings battle between Wenwu and Shang-chi, the one with ugly CGI monstrosity. "Dweller in the Darkness", for a name so mysterious, the result sure was a pretty generic bat-winged western dragon-shaped bastard. Really, as soon as it popped out of the cave, it stopped being scary; it stopped doing the one thing that made it more frightening than Wenwu, which was telepathically manipulate Wenwu using his dead wife's voice. That shit was creepy! Why stop it for the climax?? We need to involve the Ten Rings themselves in its creepiness. They should be empowered directly by the Dweller and dark feelings, and the Rings should partially transfer to Shang-Chi at his lowest, most-rage filled moment.

Plus, for all of the Chineseness of the rest of the movie, the Dweller in the Darkness looked incredibly Western. I can't think of one thing it references in Chinese mythology, which was strange since Morris does! It's a Hundun （混沌）, one of the Four Perils (四凶), why not use another one of them, like the Qiongqi (穷奇）. Especially the Qiongqi, since it supposedly eats people, so we can keeping the soul-sucking mechanic.

The little bat-spawns are also poorly-designed, and not fun to watch the martial artist army fight. Martial arts are meant to fight other people, by the Heavens, not weird flying tentacle things. Why is Ta Lo's training anti-human instead of anti-monster? Because anti-human training looks cooler. And we can keep that, with a solution I'll explain after complaining about the Dragon.

The CGI Kaiju battle between the dragon and dweller was cinematic, but it eliminated the kung fu from the final fight, reducing both Shang-Chi and Xialing to boring dragon riders. The dragon wasn't really something that deserved to be a character. I get that Shang-Chi is supposed to have his 'awakening' moment, where he embodies the dragon his mother teaches him about at the beginning of the movie. But the dragon doesn't have to be "real", it should be more of a spirit that goes into him, or comes out of his heart and empowers his body. Either way, it should be more of an internal instead of external dragon. This better reflects the internal emotional conflict of Shang-Chi, his guilt over not saving his mother and then doing terrible things to get revenge; he has to let that go, accept her loss, and with that, he can let his inner dragon out. Just like...shit, just like in Kung Fu Panda 3 lmao.

So what are my solutions to the climax?

1) Make Dweller in Darkness possess Wenwu. Or suck his soul, and then take his shape. Maybe even take the shape of the mother as well at first!

2) Make the little soulsuckers transform into shadow martial-artists. They still can only be killed by dragon weapons.

3) Make the dragon a spirit that rises out of the water that goes into Shang-Chi and Xialing, enabling them to fight Wenwu/Dweller more evenly.

Here's my altered sequence of events.

The 5 humvees still arrive, the small skirmish between the Ten Rings and the villagers still happen (without the giant lions). Wenwu and Shang-Chi still duke it out, and Wenwu knocks him away. Wenwu makes the big leap to the sealed cave, and Xialing and the aunt notice. The aunt activates a magic thing that raises a giant bridge from the depths of the water and Xialing crosses over to fight her dad. Wenwu pounds the door a bit more, and the Dweller's minions shoot out in black mist, forming into humanoid shapes that begin fighting the villagers and Ten Rings.

Meanwhile, Shang-chi is having a flashbacks in the water of killing his mother's murderer, in the process, one of the Ten Rings that is knocked away during Xialing and Wenwu's fight finds its way into the water and revives Shang-Chi. He joins the fight just as Xialing is knocked aside, apparently over the cliff. Shang-Chi loses it, and fights his father more brutally, until 5 of the rings transfers to him. They whisper to him to make his father pay, and he knocks his father into the door, shattering it, and seemingly killing Wenwu. Shang-Chi is appalled at what he's done, and he collapses and drops his 5 rings. He hears his sister calling for help, and he rushes over to see her hanging off the edge of the cliff. He can't reach her, and he cries to her that he's sorry for everything. Xialing forgives him for abandoning her before, saying that him coming to Macau meant a lot, and that their mother would be proud of him. With effort, he pulls her up, while the 5 rings to his father who rises from the rubble. Shang-Chi said their mother wouldn't be proud after what he's done for revenge, but Xialing tells him that he needs to accept what has happened.

Wenwu looks triumphant at the open gateway, but a dark mist spills in front of him and take the rough shape of his wife. He is about embrace her, but she grabs him around the wrist and possesses him through the Rings. Dweller uses Wenwu's and Ying Li's voices to taunt Shang-chi and Xialing.

Shang-chi finally lets go of his guilt and stops "running away". The spirit of the dragon rises from the sea and goes into him and his sister, empowering them. They double-team the Dweller/Wenwu until he blows them back with "Enough!". The little soulsuckers return with their spoils, strengthening the Dweller, and now he has the advantage. He defeats both of them, holds Shang-chi down, trying to steal his soul. Xialing is trying to pull him away. Shang-chi looks his father in his eyes and tells him he forgives him and he is still a good man. This awakens Wenwu inside the Dweller, and in one dramatic moment, transfers the Ten Rings to his son. With this, Shang-chi knocks Wenwu/Dweller back, and Xialing restrains him with the ropedart. Shang-chi performs exorcism, deleting Dweller forever, but Wenwu is mortally wounded. He tells Shang-chi and Xialing that he loves them, and he will tell their mother how proud he is of them, then dies.

Rest of the movies is the same.

Oh, we do need to deal with the secondary characters.

Katy shouldn't be good at archery, but could save Guan Bo/Razorfist/Death Dealer in a key moment, maybe just by tacking. She could do more to counsel Shang-Chi and Xialing before their big moments.

Death Dealer was wasted. Unique, memorable design (if kinda half-assed), only to be ignominiously soulsucked first by CGI uglies. He is basically Shang-chi's primary martial arts tutor, so should know a variety of martial arts styles. To incorporate his opera mask (a full-faced one), and add even more mystery, he should be a bianlian (变脸), a Chinese facechanger, and for each face he has a different kungfu style. This could be used to semi-humorous effect, with mocking faces and angry faces. And a Monkey King face when he's using a staff! We should not see the glint of his eyes. Before Xialing runs across the bridge to fight Wenwu, she should have a showdown with Death Dealer to show she did learn kung fu even without him. They fight to standstill, until the aunt steps in and they kick his ass together. I think he should live too, and have a team up with the aunt to delete soulsuckers.

Oh I know now, Katy, Morris and Slattery should have a comical chase/fight with Razorfist. He screams "You! I recognize you from the bus! And you stole my car!!!", and he charges at them, ignoring everyone else. They find a way to beat him up, and think they've lost him, but he gets back up and almost has them, until the soulsucker bois nab him. Katy, being a good person, fires and arrow and saves his ass.

These, and some aesthetic changes, like giving the young mom a thin flowy cloth mask instead of her noisy bamboo one, would bring the movie up from a 7.5 to a 9.5 for me.