#instead of that part being front and center to how he experiences the world

[jesncin]

Conner Luthor goes to National City High.

I have!! Big feelings about Conner's Smallville arc and how I wish it went deeper into teenage superhero angst and relationships,,, so have more moody clone stuff.

[honeydewandcake]

TW — Asylum/Hospital setting, mental disorders, medical malpractice

Inspired by Fran Bow, Sparklecare, Pure Trance, and other such things; I had an idea for a Dandy’s World AU that centers around a hospital setting

I feel like a lot of people don’t like asylum or hospital AUs because they are full of exaggerated or misinformed ideas of what mental illness is. I tried not to do that, though I’m not a professional so I still might be wrong about some things. I don’t want to take this idea too far in fear that it might be distasteful, but I do want to share this idea to see if others like it too.

Dandy’s Care is a separate world where, instead of a museum, Dandy and his friends were meant to be for a children’s hospital to treat the sick and ill. They were meant to be comfort characters to patients and were meant to support them during their stay. Like in Dandy’s World, the hospital shut down due to unspecified sanitation issues. Dandy, also known as Dr. Dandicus Dancifer, slowly became more and more starved for activity. He started targeting his friends, making the hospital into an asylum for them. He changed their characters, changing his friends into patients. The toons have no memory of their former self, only knowing their diseased and ill present self.

The staff is made up of the main toons. All of them are nurses and Dandy is the main doctor. They all act like their former selves, though they have no memory. I didn’t want to draw all of them so just imagine Astro and Vee in these uniforms.

Read more to see other toons (not all of them drawn or thought of yet, don’t attack me ;-;) ↓

Razzle and Dazzle, the only ones that I thought of completely because I already drew them before. They’re the reason why I made this entire thing anyway.

They are just experiments by Dandy, who wanted to see if the two could live together if they were attached. They used to love each other, now they don’t. Razzle is no longer looking for comedy, Dazzle is no longer looking for hope. Both are only set on the idea of revenge against Dandy for making them this way.

Life is hard when you can only feel the sensations on one half on your body, they can barely walk and can only stand or sit. They take many painkillers as their wounds take a long time to health properly. They wish they could escape this place and just die already, but they’re stuck and forced to live for as long as Dandy wants.

Razzle is a lot more violent now. He is prone to biting and scratching the staff. He hates doing all the lab tests and medical procedures, he hates being near Dazzle, he hates being stuck in this living hell. Razzle is the reason why they’re not allowed near sharp or blunt objects.

Dazzle became paranoid, scared of any noise that happens. He’s terrified of Razzle because of how violent he can get, he hates him too. Dazzle cries a lot, he cries until he can’t everyday. Dazzle wishes he could just die already, he thinks everything is scary and out to get him.

Shrimpo is thought to be a patient that had anger issues and aggressive tendencies. According to Dandy, he was admitted for being violent in public, although this is only part of the fake story that Dandy gave him. Shrimpo was forced to get a lobotomy, unethical but who cares. Dandy sure didn’t.

He’s still in the recovery phase, so he might be a bit loopy. Once those bandages are off, he’ll be as right as rain. Shrimpo is a wanderer around the hospital as he’s no longer a threat. He’s allowed to leave his room and go out in the play yard but only if a nurse is with him.

Shrimpo doesn’t really have much going for him. His thoughts are scrambled and he only cares for things in front of him. Although the lobotomy made him more passive, it doesn’t mean he’s any better in terms of motivation. Shrimpo certainly has no drive for anything anymore, he doesn’t mind but it gets in the way of his health as well. The staff needs to remind him to go to the dining room to eat or to go take a shower, because otherwise he’ll forget.

Boxten was made to believe that he has had problems with insomnia ever since he was little, of course it’s not true. He takes sleeping pills and melatonin, but it only seems to worsen his nightmares. This makes him skip his doses to avoid sleeping, repeating the cycle over and over.

Boxten is afraid of imaginary things that might get him. He thinks they’ve already in his head, eating away at his brain and giving him nightmares. Of course the only thing the nurses can see is his music box. Boxten has lost all trust in the staff since they couldn’t see or feel the things he can.

In my original notes, it said that Boxten might have psychosis.

Well that’s all the once I’ve drawn, I don’t really have the motivation to make every single toon. I have a couple of ideas though

— Goob somehow survived a terrible accident, but both his arms needed to be amputated making him armless. He suffers from brain damage and internal bleeding. He doesn’t seem to have any change in his personality, still as joyful as ever. Maybe it’s a coping mechanism

— Tisha has severe OCD which damages her mental health. She’s constantly worried about everything that happens around her, making her super aware of her surroundings. She could be a danger to herself and others as she sometimes has very aggressive thoughts but can’t control her actions. She unintentionally hurts herself because of her OCD, such as washing her hands so many times that they start to bleed.

Not for a toon, but I did have an idea for an added addition to the hospital. Maybe there’s a twisted reform center where the staff try and heal twisteds back to their normal self. They would clean the ichor from them but since the ichor is also inside of them their personalities don’t change as much. Twisteds such as Finn and R&D might be too far gone though, they would have to be disabled for life. I might draw this idea because I think it’s kind of cool, I definitely will if people also think this is interesting.

[comicaurora]

Have you read/watched Nimona? If so, thoughts?

The kind of emotional gutpunch I can't bear to watch without ample preparation. The first ten minutes are the hard part for me - it's always a wrench for me to get through a "good-hearted character is cruelly framed" plotline, so I really appreciate how quickly they get that out of the way and how Nimona immediately brightens the mood when she shows up.

Overall, truly one of the best examples of how a creator can use their personal grief and rage at injustice as a medium to sculpt a story. The narrative manages to feel deeply authentic to a real emotional journey while still feeling completely contained within the story. I'm not entirely sure how to put this, but sometimes when a writer gets allegorical with their experiences, it can feel like the story gets put on pause so the characters can turn out to the audience and speak in the author's voice about their thoughts on the subject - a pretty clumsy way to communicate a message. Nimona does not do that. Instead, the many real-world parallels to bigotry, propaganda, queerphobia, church corruption, xenophobia, and regressive policies driven by terror of change feel like they arise naturally from the setting within the story rather than being imposed on it from the outside, which is extremely quality writing and characterization. Nimona's story is so clearly informed by ND Stevenson's life and gender journey, but Nimona herself feels like her own person who is messy and grieving and putting up walls and self-destructing and still - still - a fundamentally joyful, gleeful person who absolutely loves being alive when she isn't being brutally beaten down for the crime of existing inconveniently.

Also, it's a comparatively minor thing, but I really like how, like with She-Ra, Nimona creates a world that is passively non-homophobic, with gay relationships front and center and evidently regarded as completely fine and not worth commenting on - which, to me at least, made both stories remarkably relaxing and comfortable to immerse myself in, because I wasn't being randomly jumpscared by reminders of real-world hate - but it still uses allegory to address the real-world roots of homophobia in the form of xenophobia, correlated injustices like classism, and the monster-ification of The Other. So it can clearly state "hating people for how they exist is Always Fucked And Wrong" without having to dunk the queer audience in the icebath of "hey remember how people in the real world think you personally should be dead?" Again, not sure I'm phrasing this super clearly, but it's a balance ND Stevenson consistently strikes with his work, and I really love how he does it.

Animation's gorgeous, voicework is consistently top-shelf, love the aesthetic of Cyberpunk Arthuriana. Wins across the board.

[vashtijoy]

Hi! Pre-emptive sorry for the long ask- I don't know if you've answered this before but I was scrolling through your blog and in one of your posts you note that the brief bit we see of Akira's hometown has high rise buildings, which implies it's a city. I could've sworn there was in game dialogue calling him a country boy though or referencing him being from a rural area? Is there something in the Japanese text to suggest these are meant to be taken as jokes (I.E. protag is from a city, but it's not as big as Tokyo so he's playfully considered 'rural') or is this a case of the game devs simply not considering what buildings they had in the background of that scene?

Hello! First of all, I think it's insanely unlikely that the game devs just forgot Joker was meant to be from a shack on top of a mountain and accidentally put him in a city. Maybe they didn't have time to design a farm and shoved him in a random cityscape instead? Well, maybe. I would at least have pasted in a couple more trees.

So what do we know about this?

Sojiro calls Joker 田舎もん inakamon, short for 田舎者 inakamono—someone from the countryside; someone provincial. This is what's translated as "country boy", or "country bumpkin". Chihaya uses it about herself, and Chihaya I think is certainly meant to be very rural. The Adorable Woman and Rural Young Man in Shibuya Station use inaka a lot:

His name did not originally use inakamono or similar, by the way—he's the 上京してきた青年 joukyou shite kita seinen, "the young man who's moved to Tokyo". Note the moving-up kanji there, 上, lol—this is not a sideways move, it's a definite move up.

so what is the inaka?

In short, the inaka can be the remote countryside—but it can also just be your hometown, of any description. It can be legit anywhere that isn't Tokyo. Here's Tofugu:

My mouth was hanging open and I know I was being rude, but it was really hard to pull myself together. The woman I was speaking with was from one of the top Japanese Universities. She has had international relationships, traveled the world, and done work that most foreign anime fans would kill to see. Someone with her experiences, to me, should be open-minded about other cultures and lifestyles. Just the same, I can't help but to be bothered by what she said: "I feel like anything outside Tokyo's 23 wards is inaka." [...] Often, people usually just use what they read in the dictionary, but I learned fast that "countryside" in American English is much different than in Japanese English. For me, countryside means farms. Countryside is driving to see your closest neighbor, riding tractors for work and pleasure, and being able to immediately tell who's from your town just by looking at them. When I say this to Japanese people and ask them to explain inaka, the joke is always the same: "Inaka is anything outside of Tokyo." Osaka and Kyoto, for many, aren't inaka, but Sapporo, which is one of the few parts of the country where this legendary thing called "insulated housing" exists, is inaka. [...] So you might be wondering how "bad" it really is out here. Truthfully, I'm living in a city, at least by American standards. Great bus and train systems, tons of malls and movie theaters, some of the major stores people visit Tokyo to see, game centers, golfing… and a few rice paddies. Not many, but there are some. Imagine a fashionable mall, famous manga store, well-respected school with a strong baseball team, and major supermarket, all within walking distance, with maybe one field of rice. Honestly, the place is so city that I don't think I would willingly eat any rice that grew in that field. I swear, it's in front of a bus stop.

So, tl;dr: if you aren't in Tokyo, Osaka or Kyoto, you're probably in the inaka—at least to someone's mind. You can be somewhere that looks to us in every way like a city, and be in the inaka. And if you pick up sticks and move to Tokyo? Then you have a good chance of being jibed about being a "country boy".

so what is joker's inaka like?

[Joker] 田舎に���りたい inaka ni kaeritai I miss the country... [lit. I want to go back to the inaka.] Ryuji ハハ、都会の洗礼ってか? haha, tokai no senrei tte ka? Hah. Not used to the big city yet, huh? [lit. Haha, so this is your first time in the city?]

We don't get a huge amount of detail in-game about Joker's home. Besides Sojiro's "country boy", Ryuji has a couple of comments. Here's another:

Ryuji あれ? お前ン家ってわりと田舎? are? omae n uchi tte wari to inaka? Wait a sec, your hometown isn't near the countryside, is it? [lit. isn't your place relatively countrified?] Ryuji いや、大自然でランニング練習とか気持ち良さそうだなーって。 iya, daishizen de ranningu renshuu to ka kimochi yasasou da naa tte I was just thinkin' it'd be great to run an' train somewhere out where it's all big, naturey open space. [lit. no, I thought it seemed like it'd feel great to train in the great outdoors and stuff.]

(I think something may be off here with that translation of daishizen, which seems to connote "the great outdoors", "a vast wilderness", etc, as well as just meaning "nature" (the sort you get out into) more generally". The word has been split up as if Ryuji was just saying "big nature" for some reason, like if you thought "the great outdoors" meant "the outdoors is great :D".)

But we can see from Ryuji's statement that Joker's home is wari to inaka, "relatively countrified", "kind of countrified"—it's more the country than Tokyo is, but it's probably not the ass end of nowhere, either. It's somewhere Ryuji pictures getting out into nature—but even if that's accurate and not just in Ryuji's city-boy head, that again doesn't connote "ass end of nowhere"; a lot of very built-up places are startlingly close to farmland or to nature, as with the putative rice field at the bus stop that we read about earlier.

the artbook picture

There is, of course, a picture of Joker's home in the artbook:

That doesn't scream "rural" to me—though it's also not the built-up area we see him in with Shido. It backs onto a cliff, it's very green. It's clearly a row of houses on a street, maybe in a fancy suburb on the edge of the city?

It's a nice house, at any rate. Joker moving into Sojiro's attic, with his clothes in a box, will have been a harsh step down.

Another detail from this image before we move on:

Look at this board. We can make out what it says. We can even, just possibly, make out a town name there...

日立自治会 掲示板 hitachi jichikai keijiban Hitachi Neighbourhood Association noticeboard

自治会 jichikai—neighbourhood associations. As you'd expect, they tend to be organised at the very local level—so Hitachi is likely to be a small district within a larger city, rather than (say) the city of Hitachi in Ibaraki Prefecture.

his city has a name guys i can't believe it lmao

the coup de grace

But there's one question I think really puts the nail in the coffin here: WTF was Shido doing in the middle of nowhere?

It's totally plausible that Joker came from a remote farm in the country, or a tiny village in far northern Honshu. But what is there in that to attract Shido? Like... Shido seems kind of an indoor guy, y'know?

He goes where his business is. He goes where the money is. It's difficult for me to picture him going to random rural areas with nobody to schmooze, with what I'm sure he'd consider to be poor facilities and shitty hotels.

Even if he did stoop to visit somewhere like that, by the time he was on his off hours getting pissed (in both senses) and attacking women, wouldn't he have gone back to civilisation?—back to the city?

conclusion??

This place Joker is wandering after dark doesn't look like The Country. It looks quite built up. I'd say it's the centre of a regional city or large town—with those nice houses we just looked at set off in suburbs along its edge. Look at this place:

It really does look like a less cramped version of Yongen-jaya, down to the trees. I don't think they spent too long on this area, but I also don't think it's inaccurate.

By the way, that "Hometown Neighbourhood" was originally 実家近くの住宅地 jikka chikaku no juutakuchi—"residential area near home". So this is not where Joker lived with his parents; it's an area close by. Like he says, he's on his way home late.

Where was he? We never find out. He has what looks like a school bag, well before his nasty crime days. Maybe he was visiting a friend we never hear about again. Maybe he was at cram school. But he's gone to this built-up part of town to do something there.

My guess would be that he lived in some prefectural capital or other. That's why Shido is there. I'd also guess that it's one of the Kanto prefectures, since the further you go from Tokyo, the less likely it becomes that Joker would have been sent to Tokyo for his probation, whether Sojiro was a friend of a friend or not.

As ever, all of this is for information only, and if you want to do something else superior in every way, you definitely should. At the end of the day Joker's a silent protagonist player insert, who can be from absolutely anywhere and as gay as you like. Let a thousand Jokers bloom.

revision history

Click here for the latest version.

v1.0 (2024/01/17)—first posted.

[reclusivebookslug]

Bella Swan is Autistic: An Analysis

(Disclaimers: I enjoy Twilight in spite of its problematic elements, not because of them or in ignorance of them. There are as many different ways to be autistic as there are autistic people. Many allistic people will relate on some level to some aspects of the autistic experience; this does not make them autistic. This is all just my opinion, based on my experience as a late-diagnosed, low-support-needs autistic woman. I am aware this is not a brand-new original idea.)

I reread Twilight (I think for the first time since getting diagnosed 4 years ago) and I found a bunch of things I relate to Bella about. Below the cut is a list of some of her autism-related character traits with quotes for textual evidence. The links lead to articles explaining how these traits relate to autism. The list is ordered chronologically based on page number of the accompanied quotes. Page numbers are based on the paperback edition with ISBN-13: 9780316015844. A backslash in a quote signifies a paragraph break. I’ll update if I read any of the other books or rewatch the movies and anything new comes up.

Bella has trouble regulating her emotional expressions: she has to put conscious effort into how she presents herself

"I'd always been a bad liar" (p. 4). "For some reason, my temper was hardwired to my tear ducts. I usually cried when I was angry, a humiliating tendency" (p. 25). "I had never been enormously tactful" (p. 31). "'My face is so easy to read -- my mother always calls me her open book'" (p. 50).

Bella is shy and a bit socially awkward: she avoids attention for fear of embarrassment

"Charlie wasn't comfortable with expressing his emotions out loud. I inherited that from him" (p. 7). "Mr. Varner... was the only one who made me stand in front of the class and introduce myself. I stammered, blushed, and tripped over my own boots on the way to my seat" (p. 17). "To my dismay, I found myself the center of attention for the rest of the week" (pp. 68-69).

Bella feels different from other people: she doesn’t know how to connect with others and feels pressure to fit in

"I didn't relate well to people my age. Maybe the truth was that I didn't relate well to people, period. Even my mother, who I was closer to than anyone else on the planet, was never in harmony with me, never on exactly the same page. Sometimes I wondered if I was seeing the same things through my eyes that the rest of the world was seeing through theirs. Maybe there was a glitch in my brain" (pp. 10-11). "I answered honestly, instead of pretending to be normal like everyone else" (p. 47). “'My mind doesn't work right? I'm a freak?' The words bothered me more than they should -- probably because his speculation hit home. I'd always suspected as much, and it embarrassed me to have it confirmed" (p. 181).

Bella has a unique sense of humor: other people don’t get her jokes and she doesn’t get other peoples’ jokes

"'You don't look very tan.' / 'My mother is part albino.' / He studied my face apprehensively, and I sighed. It looked like clouds and a sense of humor didn't mix. A few months of this and I'd forget how to use sarcasm" (p. 16). “Bella was being unintentionally funny” (p. 367).

Bella finds comfort in routine: the change in routine from moving was difficult for her, and she felt better once the new routine became familiar

"I fell into the pattern of the familiar task gladly" (p. 33).

Bella is academically gifted: she finds assignments easier than her peers do, she has already read the books assigned in her English course

"'Were you in an advanced placement program in Phoenix?' / 'Yes'" (p. 47).

Bella enjoys being alone: she is introverted and enjoys solitary activities

"In a lot of ways, living with Charlie was like having my own place, and I found myself reveling in the aloneness instead of being lonely" (p. 54). "I've never minded being alone" (p. 241).

Bella has motor difficulties: she is clumsy, uncoordinated, accident-prone, and bad at sports

"Possibly my crippling clumsiness was seen as endearing rather than pathetic, casting me as a damsel in distress" (p. 55). "My sense of direction was hopeless; I could get lost in much less helpful surroundings" (p. 136).

Bella has special interests: Edward and books

"... no one else was as aware of Edward as I always was. No one else watched him the way I did" (p. 69). "I was sitting in my room, researching vampires. What was wrong with me" (p. 135)? "... they didn't know how preoccupied I could get when surrounded by books; it was something that I preferred to do alone" (p. 156).

Bella is perceived as different by others: a history of social exclusion is hinted at, Edward’s mind-reading doesn’t work on her

"'It's better if we're not friends,' he explained. 'Trust me.' / My eyes narrowed. I'd heard that before” (pp. 74-75). "He enunciated every syllable, as if he were talking to someone mentally handicapped" (p. 83). "'My mom always says I was born thirty-five years old and that I get more middle-aged every year'" (p. 106). ".'.. maybe your mind doesn't work the same way the rest of theirs do. Like your thoughts are on the AM frequency and I'm only getting FM'” (p. 181). "'You're not like anyone I've ever known. ... / ... 'I have a better than average grasp of human nature. People are predictable. But you ... you never do what I expect. You always take me by surprise'" (p. 245).

Bella has sensory differences: she notices and is bothered by things others don’t and aren’t, she engages in sensory-seeking and sensory-avoiding behavior when stressed

"'People can't smell blood,' he contradicted. / 'Well, I can -- that's what makes me sick. It smells like rust ... and salt" (p. 100). "I put in my headphones, hit Play, and turned up the volume until it hurt my ears. I closed my eyes, but the light still intruded, so I added a pillow over the top of my face" (pp. 129-130). "'You're always crabbier when your eyes are black ... I expect it then' ... 'I have a theory about that'" (p. 171). “For three and a half hours I stared at the wall, curled in a ball, rocking” (p. 425).

[myloveforhergoeson]

hi! stealing @partiallypearl /@praetoravila 's lovely olive and writing a story about her and roxy becoming friends in a world where their boyfriends are professional hockey players instead of singers. born as the wag (wives and girlfriends) au in our dm's comes the completed (read: lightly edited...) product here! experimenting with some new friendship and relationship dynamics hehe <3 i hope you all enjoy. i love olive soooo much <3

--

blow me (one last kiss) ~ 6.5k

The Staples Center was utterly fucking freezing. 

No building should ever be allowed to be this cold, Olive thought, bundling into her thinly lined bomber jacket. Just scanning her ticket at the front gate and walking into the arena had been enough to make every hair on her body stand on end, and now, as she navigated the packed hallways to find the seating designated on her ticket, she was beginning to find the prospect of another few hours at this temperature nearly unbearable. 

Logan had warned her, over and over again, in the last few days to dress accordingly. It had taken many massages, offers to help her with carrying heavy things to and from work, cuddle sessions, and even a nudge from Wren for Olive to even entertain the idea of going to one of his games; His over-the-top attitude had her convinced that when he advised her to layer up, he’d been thoroughly overexaggerating. 

“Surly what I’m wearing won’t matter when I’m rubbing shoulders with the guy next to me,” She scoffed at his words, between bites of the lasagna Logan had spent so much time meticulously whipping up in the kitchen in his final, and ultimately successful, attempt to get her to agree to attend one of the Kings games. “If we’re packed in there like sardines - Sounds like so much fun by the way - I’ll be fine.”

He just smiled at her, brown eyes gleaming under the candlelight as if he were straight out of a stupid chick flick, “Ollie… You think I’d let you sit up in the nosebleeds?”

Taking another spoonful of lasagna, Olive stared down at her plate, hoping the low light hid the heat rising to the tops of her ears. 

The two of them had spent the rest of the night talking about the team’s upcoming schedule, planning out times they’d be able to connect while he was in town, how best to get a hold of each other when he was away… All things Olive had never considered before diving headfirst into a relationship with a professional athlete, but were now on her mind more than ever. Thankfully, he’d be in town for the next few days before jetting off to somewhere on the East Coast.

I’ll be sure to leave the time-zone calculations to him…

As she followed the signs pointing her to the marked section on the thick cut paper clutched between freezing hands, she took the descending staircase down, down, down to the very front of the row. The very front of the row which also happened to be the first row in the arena. 

Being a starting player on the team, she’d assumed he’d use a bit of sway to get her a good view, but certainly not one of the best ones in the house. 

Reserved: Olive Pasqualina read the sign draped over the padded chair Olive stood in front of, with a soft, warm-looking sweatshirt on the seat.

With a grumble, the girl swiped the paper sign and crumpled it in her hands, throwing it to the sticky arena floor at her feet, before scooping up the sweater and sitting down, balling it in her lap. 

Already, the material was warming up her fingertips, which she hardly noticed as she peered through the thick plexiglass in front of her at the wide expanse of playing field. To her left, the perfect view of where the Kings sat - if she wanted to stare at the back of Logan’s head for part of the game - and to her right the opposing team’s bench. In the center of her vision was the red line, with a spectacular view of the entire ice rink so she wouldn’t miss out on even a second of the action. 

Logan had truly gone all out for his girlfriend’s first Kings game. 

Messing with the sweatshirt in her hands again, Olive considered wearing it, but that would just prove that Logan had been right about her attire, so for now, she draped it over her legs to quell their bouncing as they tried to heat up the skin beneath her blue jeans. As far as she could tell, the Kings logo was embroidered onto the front of the purple fabric and Mitchell was written, big and bold, across the top of the back. 

He must have been crazy if he thought she’d wear such a thing… At least out in public. 

It would make her look like every other crazy fan girl in the stadium, toting their merch around, covered from head to toe in Kings gear like some kind of freaky uniform, not unlike the woman currently stepping around Olive’s seat to get to her own. 

From her Kings pom-pom beanie, to her logo patterned scarf, to her fleece jersey emblazoned with Diamond arching around her shoulders, she was sporting exactly the opposite look Olive wanted to embody. 

God, if they sold Kings thongs no doubt she’d be wearing one…

It wasn’t until the superfan waved in her direction and sat down right next to Olive in a reserved seat of her own labeled Songbird, that she realized this wasn’t just some puck bunny with a front-row season pass.

Logan mentioned a couple of weeks ago two of his best friends had gotten engaged, leading to an engagement party at one of the nicest restaurants in L.A., rented out by two people too enamored with each other to properly interact with the invitee list that Olive guessed stretched a mile long. He swore up and down he was one hundred percent on the list to be a groomsman, considering he and Logan had practically known each other since pre-school, and that James had just been waiting for the perfect time to ask him. 

When James and his fiancee had announced the ceremony would be taking place in the Amalfi Coast just as soon as the season was over, she’d nearly doubled over in laughter.

How any couple could just ask a large group of people to drop all their plans, commitments, jobs, whatever for a handful of days and fuck off to some beautiful coastal resort on the whole other side of the world to celebrate the two of them was beyond Olive; As if she wanted to spend her precious time off focused on anyone but herself and Logan. 

How selfish… Olive ruminated, allowing a side glance at the girl one more time to confirm that she was the girl attached to James’ hip at the restaurant. If her shining green eyes as she scanned the ice for her fiancee weren’t the first hint, the second would be the gigantic, glittering ruby slid around her ring finger. 

Just as Songbird sat down, the lights in the arena began to dim, and she shot up to her feet again, clapping and cheering her pretty little head off, like she was experiencing the most euphoric feeling in the world. 

And maybe, for a moment, Olive felt it too, pulling her eyes off her seatmate and up to the large jumbotron above them, playing a promotional video for the Kings before the game began. Pulling the sweatshirt tighter against her legs in anticipation, her heart skipped when a short clip of Logan hit the screen, and the fans in the arena lit up at the sight of their favorite player. She couldn’t help but take some pride in the fact his cheers seemed to be louder than most of the other players.

At least by sheer number. If it had been purely based on noise levels, Songbird might have had everyone beat when James’ segment rolled. 

Despite being a relatively new player to the Kings, traded over from the Minnesota Wild to play offense just two years ago, Logan had managed to solidify his place on the team quite quickly. Not only did he get along well with his teammates, but their play styles just seemed to click together in an unexplainable, yet effortless way. Maybe it had to do with the fact three of his childhood friends had eventually found their way to the Kings too, like James, in addition to the team goalie, Carlos, and captain, Kendall. 

“The odds of that happening are nearly a million to one,” He’d explained to her ages ago, cuddled up on the couch as they watched Make It or Break It. “But for it to happen with the four of us? All on one team?... If I weren’t a man of science, I’d almost call it divine intervention.”

In response, Olive just snorted. 

 The rink in front of her slowly filled with machine-made fog, video screen drawing eyes away from the playing field in the process, though she wouldn’t doubt for a second if it was just actually that cold in the building. A few moments later, all of the lights shut off except for a bright, white spotlight, illuminating the side of the arena the Kings emerged from, and the crowd lost it as the players came skating out into the rink, more lights following the players one by one.

A handful made their way directly to the bench, while others zoomed this way and that, gliding across the ice with so much force, yet so much control, it nearly astonished Olive. Of course, she jokingly poked fun at Logan a million times for his puck-in-net profession - “Practice is all day today? How hard can it actually be to score a goal?” - but had never seen him show off the culmination of his hard work. Skill and expertise he had been crafting since his Pee-Wee hockey league in Duluth, Minnesota.  

The SportsCenter highlights she’d looked up after he mentioned some particularly good games didn’t count. Not that she’d ever tell anyone she watched them anyway. 

When she spotted a flash of short brunette hair, stick in one hand and helmet in the other, and the mountain of black and purple padding covering his body, Olive didn’t even bother catching the sweatshirt before it fell to the ground. She was on her feet, slamming her hands together so hard they were sure to be bright red, the same color no doubt appearing on her cheeks.

Due to the bitter cold…

Kendall, James, and Carlos all came out with him, the four of them chattering about something as they made traversing over the slippery ice look as easy as walking. 

Like their teammates, Olive figured they’d either secure a spot on the bench or warm up around the rink, so she bent down to grab the piece of clothing off the ground. 

When she popped back up, to her surprise, two players were on the other side of the glass - Jesus Christ they’re fast - peering back at them. However, the taller of the two had his eyes laser-focused on the girl beside her, mouthing something Olive wasn’t able to decipher. A second later he and Songbird were all but making out across the barrier.

As her gaze shifted to Logan, the expression on his face was almost identical, though when their eyes met, Olive immediately looked to the floor. 

With a few taps on the glass with his hockey stick, he nabbed her attention again, mouthing, “I love you.”

She pretended not to notice the smile stretching across her face, matching the one cutting the most adorable dimples into his cheeks. Gripping the shirt in her hands, she replied, “Love you too, Mitchell. Good luck.”

It was a longer message, but she knew she got her point across when he nodded, eyes still never leaving her, as he moved to slide his helmet on. 

“Oh,” His mouth formed the shape, gloved hand pointing to her midsection. “Wear your jersey.”

Normally, she’d fight him. Tell him she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself, that she wasn’t interested in being branded with his name for the entire world to see. But he was right, it was cold, and he’d gotten it special, just for her. Though the thought sparked some heat in her chest, it wasn’t enough to stop the shivers. 

“Okay,” Olive promised before he skated off, one more sidelong glance over his shoulder in her direction that made her heart leap into her throat. 

I will, she declared silently, just for you,

***

“That looks so good on you, Olive!”

A voice flittered down from the aisle and Olive looked up from her phone. The game had taken its first intermission; Neither the Kings nor the Knights had scored any points. 

“I needed to see it from the back to take it in… God, it fits like a glove!”

Two large popcorn bags bigger than her head obscured Olive’s view of Songbird’s face. How she managed to see the jersey on her back was beyond her. 

Before Olive could say anything in response, the other girl practically dropped one of the bags in her lap, and the usher trailing behind her gently placed a large can of Diet Coke in the cup holder of her seat. 

“Hey, woah-”

The fanatic hadn’t even mentioned she was going on a snack run, and Olive hadn’t mentioned she was hungry. Or that if she were, she was more than capable of getting up and getting things herself. 

“Thank you, Victor!” Songbird chirped, taking her seat and collecting the Bud Light from the usher’s other hand. “If I had more hands, I could’ve grabbed some Skittles, but alas…”

In response, the man smiled, “Always happy to help Mrs. Diamond.”

The squeal that left her mouth after he ascended back up the stairs almost broke Olive’s eardrum. “That flatterer! Oh, I can’t believe he just called me that… Can you have a heart attack if your heart beats too fast? Because I think I’m about to,” she twittered on before finally taking a handful of popcorn to her mouth. 

For a second, Olive reveled in the silence as the other girl chewed. She had many questions, but was worried asking them would set her up for a lengthy conversation for the rest of the game. Both of them were there to support their partners, not make silly idle chat. 

Taking note that Olive hadn’t touched either of the items she’d brought, Songbird stuck her lip out. “Remember when Logan pissed you off a few months ago and he sent you that big rose bouquet?”

“Excuse me?” 

A fire started in the pit of her gut, licking its way up her body. She clenched her hands into tight fists. What gives her the right-

“I told him it wasn’t enough; Took James’ Corvette, picked Logan up, and forced him into a Target to buy all of your favorite snacks. That little basket he dropped off at your door with the in-person apology was so much better.”

Silence hung in the air. Olive blinked, still trying to figure out where this conversation was going. Damn the crescent-shaped indents that may appear cutting into her palms later. 

“That’s how I know what you like,” She finished, reaching into her cup holder, taking her beer, and twisting off the cap. “So you can’t tell me you don’t.”

One breath in. One breath out. Olive slid her fingers inside the sleeves of the jersey and focused on the soft fleece inside, while the other girl nearly chugged her drink. 

Some days were easier to manage her IED than others.

“Right. Got it…” Slowly, the girl dared to reach for some of the salty popcorn, thinking of it as a strange kind of peace offering from this near stranger. “You stole his Corvette?”

Closing her black, glittered eyelids, Songbird nodded. “Would’ve been too much commotion if I drove up in my Rolls, don’t you think?” 

For a second, Olive almost felt bad she couldn’t remember her name. 

Overhead, the buzzer sounded, marking the start of the second period.

*** 

A particularly rough play landed Logan in the penalty box; Songbird shot to her feet, booing the referee and banging on the glass in front of her as though the call ruined her entire life. 

Is that what I’m supposed to be doing too? Olive wondered until her phone rang, vibrating over and over in her back pocket until she managed to grab it and take in the caller ID.

One of her young clients’ parents was attempting to get a hold of her, suggesting what would likely be a long conversation she didn’t want to have off the clock. However, if one of her clients was struggling to find a helpful coping strategy for their anger or anxiety, she couldn’t let them go through that alone. 

Over the years, Olive had been afforded much patience and grace by her loved ones as she learned her own effective techniques. This was her way of paying it forward. 

Quickly taking the call, she slid out of her seat and climbed the stairs to the main concourse, finding an exit stairwell with minimal people inside where she was better able to assess the situation and work it through with the individuals on the other line. 

It didn’t take long to talk her client through one of the meditative techniques they’d discussed in their last counseling session, though every once and a while the crowd outside would roar, and Olive feared it may carry through the line and distract from the calming environment she was trying to form with her words. Even though it was often a challenge to find effective strategies for each of her clients, and meditation certainly didn’t work for her, it was always interesting to see what led someone else to feel more in control of their emotions. 

With a promise to send over some more meditative techniques to the parent over email on Monday Olive made her way back to her seat… But not before Googling “James Diamond girlfriend” to put her mind at ease. 

For a moment, she considered following it up with “Logan Mitchell girlfriend” just to see what was out there about her and the hockey star, before remembering it would probably flood her eyes with images of actress Camille Roberts too. 

Ugh…

The moment she sat back down in her seat and took a long sip of her cool drink, her eyes immediately found Logan out of the box and skating on the ice again. 

“Did you get the box I sent you?” 

Olive did her breathing technique again, preparing for some more meaningless small talk with her seatmate. 

Cocking her head, she turned to the girl beside her, running one hand through her thick, black hair. “What?”

Immediately, Songbird’s lips pressed together tightly. “Never mind! Logan did well while you were away… Almost got a goal before the other guys swept it away. I’ll tell James he wasn’t show-boating enough as a distraction after the game… And he calls himself a center… ”

Any word after “never mind” flew in one of Olive’s ears and out the other, not bothering to make a home in the auditory processing center of her brain. She could handle a lot; a high-intensity job, a famous boyfriend, and entertaining the whims of the rich girl beside her, but one thing she still struggled greatly with were surprises. 

“Roxanne.” Olive cut, thankful for the excellent internet connection in the Staples Center. The girl beside her immediately stopped talking, brows raising, pom-pom beanie falling limp to the side. “Surprises… Make me anxious. So, again, what box?”

Carefully, Roxy ran a few purple-painted nails through the ends of her hair, revealing the #1 tattoo, James’ jersey number, behind her ear. “The… um…” Her eyes shifted to the rink and followed her fiancee for a few seconds too long before she turned back to Olive and took a deep breath. “The bridesmaid proposal box?”

Taking another sip of her soda was a bad idea; Olive almost choked on the sweet liquid the moment the words left Roxy’s mouth. 

“I’m so sorry - I didn’t know surprises weren’t okay! That’s completely my fault!” She apologized, holding her hands up in defense. For a moment, Olive thought she might grab her shoulders or something, but she refrained, looking her right in the eye as she continued to speak. “It’s full of a bunch of fun stuff I thought it would be fun to propose with; Monogrammed matching PJ’s, a nice bottle of rose, a cute mug… A bunch of other little goodies too! And I swear the card I wrote inside for you is far more articulate than my freaking-out speech right now.”

For a world-class songwriter and performer to struggle with her words, Olive found a slight hint of amusement amid her shock. “Don’t we… barely know each other?”

Roxy wrung her hands together, “Not really! And this seems super weird to you…? Oh, God, I’m sorry. James told me this come on too strong-”

“Screw what James said. You’re asking me to be part of the wedding party, not him.”

Wait… She was inviting it now? When did she stop choking and start smiling? What happened to destination weddings being a selfish, dick move?

Roxy’s eyes lit up again, shining as bright as the rock on her finger. “Right! I am! Because the wedding isn’t for months, we have so much time to get to know each other, and I want to be friends with you so badly… Like every time Logan mentions you, I swear you get cooler and cooler but I’ve been so busy with my band’s tour and everything… I practically begged him to put your seat right next to mine today.”

Shifting around on the cushioned chair, Olive clutched at her drink, using it like a lifeline as she let the writer’s words swirl around her head. Her chest inflated like a balloon.

Goddamn, she had to give Songbird some credit for laying all her cards out on the table.

“You’re crazy,” Olive remarked, and just as she finished the stadium broke out into such intense cheering, that the floor shook beneath their feet. The jumbotron above them played the same video over a few times; Kendall making the first slapshot into the Knight’s goal. “And I’ve never been to Italy before.”

Looking back over at the bride-to-be, the girl’s eyes were beginning to well over with happy tears. “Me neither. And honestly? Don’t tell anyone… but I’m terrified of the plane ride over.”

***

Olive also took back her thoughts about not being able to support Logan’s game and get to know Roxy at the same time. As the game rolled into the last period, the Kings and Knights were tied 1-1. 

At this point, the two of them had chatted and cheered until their throats were raw, pounded on the glass until their hands were bright red, and ate so much popcorn their stomachs were starting to ache… All-in-all, a day the counselor would look back on fondly.

She’d also get to brag to Logan she got the wedding party invitation first… Not that that mattered in the slightest…

Now, all everyone was waiting for was the first team to make the next goal. Whoever scored first would ultimately end up being the winner of the game as the clock ticked closer and closer to zero. Neither the Knights nor the Kings were letting up. Logan and James had been slammed into the boards more times than Olive could count, Carlos had blocked at least 7 shots, and Kendall was doing his best to chart out which plays the team should chance in their last few minutes. 

The Kings had even used their time-out, trying to regroup as best they could before play resumed again. In the blink of an eye, Logan was on the left side of the field, then the right, speeding down right in front of her, lining up to take a wide-open shot-

Until the same Knights player that had been tailing him all night, the one his teammate had been supposed to guard slipped by, ramming into Logan’s side at what looked like full speed just before his stick hit the puck. 

Pads crunched. Roxy let out a frustrated scream. Olive felt her stomach hit the floor just as Logan collided with the ice, bouncing back up slightly from the sheer impact of it all. 

It took him a few seconds longer than normal to recover, and get back up on his feet as quickly as he could, but not before slinging an arm around his ribs, tilting his covered head back in what his girlfriend could only assume was a wince in pain. His fists clenched, the same way Olive’s did when she felt an intense bout of anger bloom within. 

To see how the people in her life processed their emotions was interesting; Typically Wren and Logan went about it the same way. Taking a step back, deep breaths, and evaluating the situation from an analytical standpoint. Is this worth my time and frustration? Is there a better course of action?

When Olive was younger, she was more of an act-first, think-later kind of girl. Her temper ruled her life. Landed her in juvie, and earned her a less than pleasant new adornment around her ankle. 

Though things were different for her now, that didn’t make her IED any less of a factor in her daily life. Logan had seen her through numerous incidents and was always by her side to make sure he was able to help whenever she asked.

So, when he finally caught his bearings, he skated over to where the puck was in play, shoved off his stick and gloves, before throwing a tremendous right hook right into his aggressor's jaw. All of the air left Olive’s lungs. 

She was too far away to hear any words being exchanged, but as if they could sense it, the other players immediately cleared the surrounding area as Logan’s opponent, Heinrich, recoiled from his attack, dropping his own stick and gloves in return before reaching out a hand and balling it into the Kings player’s jersey, throwing a punch of his own. 

The glass in front of her rattled, probably from her new friend at the rate she was yelling, and the arena slowly filled with a mixed chorus of reactions. Some screaming for Logan, others rooting for the Knight’s player, while a few just let out their own whoops as their thirst for violence was quenched. 

And she just stared at him, jaw hanging half open as she watched her seemingly mild-mannered boyfriend lay into a man almost half a foot taller than he was. Each graceful arc of his fist as he reared back and slammed it into Heinrich’s body had an effect on her, lighting a fire under her so quickly that she jumped to her feet as well, joining Roxy at the glass shouting her own, “You better kick his ass, Mitchell!”

By the time the referees pulled the two off of each other, they were bloody, beaten messes, and maybe Olive was slightly biased, but she was pretty sure Logan was being dragged away the victor. Her cheeks were on fire, her chest so warm as she crossed her arms across her body.

God, he’s hot.

Forget bragging about the wedding invitation, she was almost ready to climb over the barrier separating them and jump his bones in front of the entire Staples Center. 

She couldn’t keep her eyes off of him, watching with eyebrows glued to her forehead as he spat out a mouthful of dark red blood against the blindingly white ice in Heinrich’s direction. Still unable to hear, she watched the Knight’s defenceman shout something in Logan’s direction and he struggled against the referee again. 

Practically foaming at the mouth, Logan’s response could be read across his lips for miles and miles. “Not in front of my girl.”

Olive had to cling to Roxy’s arm to stay standing after that, heart hammering against her rib cage louder than her newfound friend rattled against the glass partition. 

Now clinging to her equally as tight, the musician let out a loud wolf whistle as both Logan and Heinrich were sent to the penalty box for their little showdown. “I wonder how much of a fine that’ll rack up…”

A fine? Olive wondered, taking into account how much of a penny pincher her boyfriend tended to be. Now, his getting into the fight was all the more enchanting, considering his professional reputation and finances were on the line. Silently, she chastised herself for being so into his aggression, before a moment later Roxy sighed and complained James would never get into fights because he was “too pretty.”

Ah… She gets it.

As both players skated off to the bench for what was likely the remainder of the game, Logan diverted his path there to skate by where the two girls stood, gear tangled up in his arms as he did his best to quickly put his gloves back on. 

From where they stood, mere inches separating her and her boyfriend, Olive could already see the damage to his handsome face splotching in dark purples and blues across his jaw and cheeks, maybe even one of his eyes. The worst though, was the blood running down his bottom lip from where Heinrich had thrown a punch hard enough to split it open, hence all the blood the hockey player was leaving on the ice. 

Tapping his stick on the glass, just because he could, not because he was trying to gain her attention, Logan just grinned and looked at his girlfriend, a bright smile forming on his face and showing off all the blood between his teeth and mouthguard. 

“Hey, Ollie,” he mouthed, still too much noise in the stadium to properly hear each other. The King's fans behind her started going crazy, trying to lean down into the space she was standing to get his attention, but he paid them no mind, just staring at Olive as though she were the only thing in the world. 

And she felt like the only thing in his world too, even as he raised a gloved hand to wipe some of the blood pouring down his chin. No doubt, when he took his gloves off later, she’d pull his hands into hers, and study the bruises blooming across his knuckles, looking for the splitting skin symbolizing the scuffle he’d been in. “Red’s not your color,” she mouthed back. 

“I know-” Reply cut short by the blowing of the ref’s whistle, Logan glanced over his shoulder to see the black and white striped man gesturing toward the penalty box. He was more than overstaying his welcome. Gently, he took one of his fingers and tapped it against his lip, leaning into the glass between them. “Kiss it better?” 

Out of her peripherals, she noticed the video on the jumbotron above them change. Now, she and Logan were the only ones in the frame, showing their interaction to the entire stadium. 

When did Roxy let go of me… And when did she pull her phone out to film?

The ref sounded his whistle again but Logan didn’t move. 

Olive shook her head, glancing from side to side and noticing everyone in their section looking her way. “Later.” 

“Now,” her boyfriend demanded, eyes narrowing, losing the boyish sparkle they normally held. 

At this point, Olive placed her hands on her hips, cocking one to the side as she spat back, “Box. Now. Or I’m going to shove my foot so far up-”

Two referees were heading in Logan’s direction now. The both of them were holding up the entire game at this point, and they both knew it, too lost in their exchange to care.

“I’m not moving.”

“Too many people watching.”

“Since when do you care?”

Balking, Olive realized the referees were almost at his sides, ready to haul them apart from each other before she could make up her mind. “You owe me.”

Hesitantly, the girl finally leaned in to meet him, pressing her lips up against the glass right where the corner of his lip was waiting on the other side. The glossy shimmer she had applied before the game was left in her wake, and Logan grinned like an idiot again. Still so much blood in his mouth. “Whatever you want, baby girl.”

By then, he’d happily followed the refs over to where he needed to be, and Olive just fell back into her seat as though she were in some sort of silly love trance. Logan Mitchell had just cast some sort of spell over her, one she’d certainly have to learn by rewatching the video Roxy was still taking on her phone over, and over, and over again.

***

“I’ll call you tomorrow, okay? We have to set up a date to go shopping together,” Roxy cooed, rubbing her hands together in the tunnels leading toward the King’s locker rooms. 

They had barely won the game after Logan’s little stunt. James and one of the other players Olive wasn’t familiar with had run one of Kendall’s well-designed plays to fake their opponents out, feigning shooting the puck to the left when they’d sent it halfway down the arena to the right. The counselor thought her eardrum might shatter at Roxy’s racket when James scored the goal, and now, the girl was literally bouncing on her heels as her eyes kept darting between the door and her new friend. 

“Right… Maybe dinner would work better instead?” Olive suggested, trying to divert their time getting to know each other into something they’d both enjoy.

James opened the door to the locker room, laughing at something Carlos said as they exited together, carrying his gear duffel and stick and Roxy’s attention was immediately lost. “Yeah… Sure… Absolutely…”

As if the center could sense the slightest shift in the energy of the tunnel, he turned his head in her direction and Carlos rolled his eyes.

Olive tried not to let out a snort as the goalie raised a finger to his temple, swirling it in a circle and crossing his eyes in an attempt to make her laugh as the two practically ran to meet each other halfway. His message was clear: These two are nuts!

Of all the things she had learned that evening, that fact was certainly true, especially when Roxy launched herself into his outstretched arms, bag and stick now clattering to the floor as she wrapped herself around him, squealing this and that about his game winning shot. For all of two seconds, it was a nice, wholesome scene, until James started to murmur something in her ear about her dark leggings, hands creeping down her back. “Sick of the black… I need to see you in white as soon as possible, songbird…”

Roxy didn’t waste any time rushing him out of the arena as soon as possible, leaving Olive and a few other family members straggling in the tunnel as they waited for their player to emerge from the locker room.

After a lengthy session of stalking her new friend’s ScuttleButter, the girl hadn’t even noticed the time had passed until she looked up, half an hour after the game ended, and she was the only one left in the long corridor. 

It would’ve been easy to just call him and ask where he was, but Olive knew better than to rush her meticulous, clinical partner. No doubt his after game decompressing was just as important as his quiet time before driving to the stadium or his lengthy at home stretching routine before his long days at practice. Lord forgive anyone who got in the way of him and his rituals. 

Her phone battery was nearly on the verge of dying when she got a notification from ESPN - Maybe she had an alert tone set for every time the topic”‘Logan Mitchell” trended, sue her - and one hundred different angles of the fight he and Heinrich got into earlier in the night flooded her vision. The clips should have made her gut wrench, but instead they made her stomach somersault, thinking of his final words to his opponent.

Not in front of my girl…

She sighed, audibly, like a schoolgirl laying on her bed, kicking her feet and giggling as she talked to her friends about her crush. 

“What’s that for?” Someone asked, and Olive nearly jumped out of her skin despite recognizing her boyfriend’s comforting voice almost immediately. Standing, leaning against the locker room door, his arms were crossed, gear set against the wall beside him, just watching her scroll through the clips. 

“Mitchell,” She chastised, poorly attempting to cover up her surprise and she locked her phone and placed it in her back pocket, slowly making her way toward him. The dim light in the tunnel was doing well to disguise the remnants of the fight on his face. “What did we say about surprises, jerk?” 

“Only to do it when I feel like messing with you?”

Immediately, she threw a punch to his shoulder, almost instantly regretting it as he let out a breath of pain, hand flying to cover the area she’d hit. “Jesus, you sure didn’t pull that one…”

Olive didn’t apologize, instead, she reached up to cup his face with both of her hands, feeling his cold cheeks against her warm fingertips, and pulled him into the kiss he’d requested ages ago. 

“You can take it, big boy. No matter how much you whine, I'm not playing doctor when we get home…”

Face falling in mock disappointment, he rolled his hurt arm before slinging it around her shoulders, picking his things up in the other hand and beginning to lead her out of the corridor. “Not even after my first pro-league fight?”

“Not after you embarrassed me in front of the entire Staples Center,” she shot back, leaning into his touch. “The video Roxy sent me of your stupid little stunt makes me want to beat you up too.”

His eyes lit up, “She got it on video? Ollie, you need to send it to me.”

“As if,” She scoffed in return, pulling her phone back out and feigning disinterest in continuing their conversation. “I’m too busy researching flights to Italy to do anything else.”

Brows knitting, the cool Los Angeles winter air hit the two of them as they made it out into the player’s reserved parking lot. “Italy…?”

Olive nodded, counting back from three in her mind until he froze, letting his hockey stick clatter to the black asphalt below. “She asked you? Before James asked me? God I’m going to wring his neck-”

“Easy, killer…” His girlfriend attempted to soothe, though she couldn’t bite back her smile as she teased, “Save that for when I’m living my Mamma Mia! dreams and you’re stuck here twiddling your thumbs.”

Cheeks crinkling, he sputtered out a whole bunch of nonsense as they climbed into the front and passenger seats of his sleek, silver BMW. All she caught was, “Three dudes… Wedding… Kill…” before she burst out into laughter and they drove off into the night, bruised hand in hand.

[sunderedazem]

Y'shtola!

Thank you, jess!! You chose: opinions georg, cat version XD

Wolemetraha, from Y'shtola's POV. Post "In From the Cold" in EW :)

Now, more than ever, she wishes she had better understood the younger of their two Warriors of Light before she had been forcibly removed from his life by a banquet gone horrifically wrong. Because he had been still more Miqo'tten than not then, more open with his thoughts, and it was entirely possible she could have simply- asked. And by asking, recieved both an answer, and the trust granted to the true friend she wishes he would see her as. But that had not happened. And when he and the Padjals of Gridania had prevailed upon the elementals, and seen her safely returned from the Lifestream- he had been different. Hardened. His smiles and mischief had become a mask, when he deigned to indulge in them. The Light he was had become...empty. Like to the waste past Amh Araeng.

She had not known how to quantify the change until she had been ripped from her physical form and understood nature of the First, and by then it had been far too late. Only Lelesu, barely, had been able to claw past that barrier.

No. As much as she wishes it were otherwise- it was not the Scions who had returned the spark to his eye. Instead... the culprits are a pair, both of whom had earned both her begrudging respect and pointed ire during their struggle to save the First. She has since forgiven G'raha Tia for his secrecy, of course, after the revelation of his intent to save them, the First, and both Warriors of Light at the cost of his own life (though it is a conditional forgiveness, and it's permanence hinges on such idiotic martyrdom never being reattempted).

The other, however...well, there is a certain sour irony in the fact that it was Emet-selch, of all people, to help reignite Corrain's mischievous, bright side. And despite his hand in pulling her soul from the Lifestream- she is still not entirely sure that she forgives him for the millennia of devastation he visited upon the sundered worlds. That he was tempered she has sympathy for, certainly. To be a slave to a will not one's own is a horrifying fate. But in the end, he regrets nothing but the fact that his goal is in truth unobtainable, if seen through eyes unclouded. She is not sure she will overlook that.

There's a low sigh from across the room then, the ceruluem heater burning low in the center of the small space, and the Ascian in question sits shakily back on his heels. Corrain shivers in front of him, cheeks ruddy from cold and exhaustion, the glaze of terror melting only slowly from his face. He has been tucked firmly into bed after his kidnapping and the horrific experience in a body not his own, and both Emet-selch and G'raha Tia linger over him, Lelesu only a half-pace beyond them. All three of them have been helping to settle the shaken, disoriented man, in their own way, and of the three- Emet-selch had worked magicks she had never seen, not even when she could perceive more than mere aether. And with each of his too-careful spells, Corrain's stiffness and trembling had eased, the connection between body and soul again snapping into place a little at a time. A tangible, gentle assistance, then. One only an Ascian could be so experienced in to successfully provide.

...Emet-selch had been terrifying, lashing out at Fandaniel upon Corrain's collapse in the former corpse, snarling and tearing the foreign aether she could only just glimpse from their Warrior's rightful body. There were reasons that Ascians and their machinations had been reviled for the better part of sundered existence - that the strength of their ruling members was reason in part for that came as no great shock. Even Fandaniel himself had seemed entirely caught off guard, fleeing the scene without even so much as a disparaging quip.

Y'shtola stifles a soft hum of thought, watching as G'raha and his Ascian tend to Corrain, as G'raha turns to Lelesu and speaks softly to her. As Emet-selch hesitantly cradles one reddened cheek in his palm, staring down at Corrain's face, expression a bitter mix of concern and calmness.

Ah. She raises an eyebrow at that gentle touch. Perhaps terrifying was a poor description, in truth. More accurately- he had been terrified. Hadn't he?

....no, she cannot forgive Emet-selch. She does not want to, nor does he seek such a thing, and even if he did she would not consider him worthy of it. But for being one of two to reawaken the young man within the Warrior of Light, and to be gentle with him even when on opposing sides...well. He is certainly a font of knowledge that few others possess. It can be a tolerable arrangement.

She regrets, still, that she learned to know Corrain too late. That it was none of the Scions (save Lelesu, but then, she is always the exception) who grew to understand him when they should have. But that it is G'raha and Emet-selch who have done so in their place...Corrain could do worse.

...if not by much.

[hrodvitnon]

Xenilla Arc HCs...

…or ideas- however you wanna slice it. 

I think the absolute essence of this arc hinges ride or die on the answer to the question “Does it end with Ozymandias dying?”. A lot of people seem partial to the answer being yes- I will straight up admit my biases here and say I disagree- but the answer can go either way.

If the answer is yes then I think the arc should theme around Godzilla coming to terms with the fact that his brother is gone and not coming back, and that he needs to stop comparing himself against Ozzy and be king in his own way. It would center very heavily on examining older characters like Tiamat, Mothra, Shimo, and Dagon and how they all have to move on and forward. A pretty bleak story with a sad ending. I admit there’s probably more ways to do this version of the story that I’d be down to hear if anyone wants to share.

If the answer is no then the arc should be about Godzilla and crew turning a blind eye to the insurmountable odds that stand between them and freeing Ozzy- a story seriously fraught with hardship, suffering, and anguish with a dim light at the end of the tunnel. The reason I prefer this route is I actually think it’s more true to Abraxas as a story as that’s how the original story played out. This would be very similar- except it’s Godzilla’s story instead of Vivienne’s. And the unadulterated cruelty and torment wouldn’t be focused on just her. Everyone who follows Godzilla down this path goes through some shit to get to the end. The rest of this post is written with this route in mind, but like mentioned earlier I’m open to hearing about a version of this story where Ozzy doesn’t walk away- I just struggle to find a good way to write that myself. 

However- one thing I don’t think should happen is a bait and switch. Genuinely I fail to see a satisfying end to this story if Ozzy’s baited to be able to survive but then doesn’t. Yes it would be angsty. Yes Goji would cry a lot. But I feel like you’d need to either write that extremely well or risk a very unsatisfying end. I just kinda fail to see a world where that can be pulled off with finesse. Again- fully ready to admit I’m biased here- would always be willing to hear others out on this, but idk man. 

Anyways- the additional excuse of a very weepy happy ending gives you ample breathing room to write the most horribly fucked shit imaginable. A concept I’m sure you’re familiar with. Xenilla would want to play with his food before he consigns him to infection. He knows the effect he has on Godzilla and he intends to relish every moment of it. Physical, mental, you fucking name it; he wants Godzilla to go through hell in his final days before he mercifully delivers him to Gigan’s Proliferation Chambers to be infected. A large part of this torment would be what he does to those closest to him. 

Big turning point in the arc; could happen about halfway through when the G-Team thinks they have a solid grasp on how to deal with Xenilla. The man himself shows up, wrecks Goji’s shit in front of everyone (maybe even drops him from the atmosphere like that one ask), and then kidnaps some of his closest companions to be taken to Gigan’s fleet. This could literally be anyone- but my idea is for it to be Abraxas, Mothra, and Rodan (could also throw in Leo or Ladon for some real cursed shit). They get taken right in front of Godzilla. Cue a rehash of Viv’s mental mindbreak when San got swallowed except with the King believing he’s just lost his wife and two best friends. 

While onboard the ship, couple of things happen. Everyone besides Abraxas goes through some kind of horrific experience and is additionally incapacitated by the Indoctrination radio waves permeating the ship. Abraxas is spared via San being granted immunity when Ghidorah used to live onboard, and she ends up being the key to getting everyone off alive. This is also partially an excuse to give her a fight with Gigan as a moment for her to fix one of Ghidorah’s most depraved acts (a very hard and very bloody fight, might I add). 

There ends up being serious consequences for this abduction. For one- everyone that does get taken ends up partially Indoctrinated. They can pretty easily shake off the worst effects as Abraxas would get them onto an escape craft within a day or two- but it’ll definitely leave mental scars. In addition, I think Rodan should end up partially infected. I think between Mothra and him, Xenilla would choose him to be infested because it would fuck Godzilla up more to see someone as carefree and quippy as Rodan utterly broken the parasite like he was- also because Mothra may have some unforeseen resistance to it being born of the Planet. This starts a subplot where Rodan is slowly getting more infected day by day and the return party needs to rush to find a way to cure him before losing him for good (this could also be how they find the cure they use on Ozzy later, more on that later). Very angsty all around- Rodan freaking out each time the cordies try to get control of him, everyone else worrying themselves into an early grave over him, etc. 

Subplot #2: Monarch believes the key to stopping Xenilla is somewhere in the Hollow Earth. So- they send a group of Kaiju down there to look for an answer; in my head the group consists of Kong, Dagon, Barb, and Battra. They end up being right and find an Iwi forge/refinery where the Gojiran/Zohar weaponry was forged. Through a task requiring human/Titan cooperation, they create an Ultra-Radiated weapon that they think can neutralize the parasite (again, more on this later). Thinking it could either be a knife or a spear. 

Whilst all this is happening, the few remaining Titans topside scramble in preparation as the world prepares for what could be a full-scale alien invasion. At this point- only like Goji, Tiamat, and Shimo would be left. They could all be having individual flashbacks to their most treasured moments with Ozzy whilst maybe even fighting off some advance enemies (Megaguirus or MOGUERA, anyone?). 

The final conflict would start with a 1 on 1 confrontation between Shimo and Xenilla. Reason being that she needs to buy time for the cure to be finalized and for Kong’s group to return. This could also be her first truly challenging fight in millennia and we could actually see her pushed to her limits. 

The actual fight begins when Godzilla rolls up all roars and challenges to Xenilla. He roars back- prepared to finally win this 1 on 1 and drag Goji back in a horrifically mauled state to be stuffed full of fungus- only for Godzilla to immediately halt his charge and shout ‘NOW, FATHER!’. Xenilla barely has time to turn around before he’s blasted point blank by a sub-atomic Oxygen Destroyer- only after the bombardment does the full Titan Vanguard roll up. Establishes that this fight is not for glory, to establish dominance, or to enforce Godzilla’s sovereignty. Godzilla is going to win and does not care how dirty he has to fight to do so. 

Dagon is armed with Oxygen Destroyers, Kong’s got his new weapon, Godzilla’s all powered up, and Abraxas has a new little secret weapon up their sleeve I’ll touch on in a bit. Even so- Shimo’s already been worn down and doesn’t have a lot less in the tank. Her efforts mainly go into protecting the group’s first major plan: Barb. A lot of people seem to forget that her EMP blasts disable Titan powers- taking away Xenilla’s shields and devastating Coronal Rays. This works until it inevitably doesn’t, and the group goes through plan after plan similar in tactfulness to this until Kong or Mothra or someone gets a clean impalement with the new Zohar weapon. 

Should probably explain my idea of curing the parasite now. The key to curing the infection in my eyes is two-fold and relies on two things: Neutralizing the fungus and destroying it. You can’t do one without the other. To start with it’s destruction- I think the only really viable option is literally to burn it off the bone and cells it grows on. If you’ve ever heard of Radiosurgery, it’s a form of cancer treatment that utilizes extremely precise beams of gamma radiation to literally burn away cancer cells. Obviously this is very risky to preform as screwing it up could cause irreversible damage to bone or critical tissue- if this was a normal patient. Ozymandias is Gojiran- so radiation wouldn’t have any adverse effects on him specifically, but the parasite? It would probably take a lot- a very heavy dosage and very concentrated- but Ozzy’s body would be able to endure while the fungus would not. But the infection is tricky, cunning, it would start to defend itself in some way or even try to take Ozzy with it should it be threatened like this. This is where we find the need to neutralize it- and the one who may be able to do that is Abraxas. We know that Ghidorah communicated between the heads via psionics, and we’ve seen further communication from Ichi and Ni to Vivienne and San. Vivienne and San could talk back but they could never actually initiate conversation (or maybe they could? I actually kinda can’t remember rn). Another thing- despite being shielded from Indoctrination’s worst effects- they could still hear that goddamn infernal buzzing on the ship. In fact- they heard it so well they could commit it to memory… so much that they could think about it, ponder it, learn how it works…

I’ve read asks on here that mention 'Shaking off Reaper Indoctrination’, and that’s always felt a little weird to me- because that really isn’t something you just 'shake off’- it’s very clear in ME that the damage is permanent and not something very salvageable. However- what if the 'cure’ for Indoctrination is actually just another form of Indoctrination that undoes the programming on a psychic level. An Anti-Indoctrination method created by Abraxas after scrutinizing the actual frequencies of Indoctrination to see how it works. I think this would be a fantastic way to progress Abraxas’s character past where they were left at the end of Abraxas- going from one of Ghidorah’s most tortured victims, to the one who broke free of his control and defeated him, and now acts as an Anti-Ghidorah undoing all of his past sins. First defeating Gigan and then turning Indoctrination against them. So this becomes how Rodan, Mothra, and Ozzy are saved from being Indoctrinated- and also how Abraxas becomes possibly the most dangerous Titan on Earth- now knowing the secrets of Indoctrination and able to leverage that against their enemies. I’ve got a lot more thoughts on this I’ll cover in a separate ask just because this post is getting long. 

So the actual method of curing Ozzy is essentially to reverse-indoctrinate the parasite into going dormant whilst Ozzy gets pumped with Zohar to kill off the infection- but where, I hear you ask, could we get a constant stream of Zohar and enough of it to eventually burn every bit of the fungus away? If you answered Bahamut’s Proliferation (name I gave to Tiamat’s Liar; open to additional name suggestions). It’s constantly charging from the incoming Coronal Rays and through some Monarch tech, it can be repurposed as a Cordyceps curing facility for both Rodan and Ozzy. However- the curing process would not be short- the place would’ve just been drained by Godzilla a few years ago and the stream of Solar Energy wouldn’t exactly be fast. It could take weeks or even months for the fungus to be completely gone- and Ozzy would be in a coma the entire time.

As mentioned earlier- ending’s a fucking tear-fest all around. Despite all the hardship, Goji and his subjects pulled through another impossible situation. Just like Abraxas being freed from Ghidorah- Ozzy is freed from Xenilla. 

As always- really interested to what other have to say in regards to this; also expect that followup ask with how Abraxas’s Anti-Indoctrination would work.

---

Now that it’s explained, I feel more open to the idea of Ozzy living after a lot of pain and suffering on everyone; it feels like Gigan (and the narrative) expects our heroes to fail in saving him from a life of horrors in spite of all their efforts, and yet Abraxas is like “You know what? Fuck you. Un-funguses your lizard.” (Abraxas can indeed initiate “psychic conversations” with Ghidorah; they’ve definitely done it one or two times in Chapter 18, I remember that.)

I do wonder how well crafting weapons made from the Zohar will work; the AbraxasVerse Timeline posits the idea that the Zohar may be the planet’s core and that Ghidorah consuming it would basically destroy Earth from the inside-out, and we know Battra is going to HATE that. On the other hand, @zerm2v0hg also presented an idea that maybe the Scarred Apes under Skar King’s rule might have refined elements of Zohar for their own fucked-up purposes, and that Synthetic Zohar can be produced without potential planet-cracking ramifications... although the synthetic alternative may have ramifications of their own, who knows...

On the one hand it makes sense that the Fleet would have an enormous Fuck-Off HUEG LIKE XBOX ship dedicated for Gigan, but on the other I’m not so keen on the idea of Ghidorah having previously lived there because it clashes with a lore-dump I’d made about the Fleet; namely that Ghidorah is the source of no insignificant amount of generational trauma and its actions are antithetical to the Fleet’s belief about Experience being the key to a life well lived (one must experience as many things as possible both good and bad), because Ghidorah will kill anything and everything it can, meaning no survivors to tell of the Experience.

It’s been a while since I’ve really spitballed what exactly the relationship between AbraxasVerse Gigan and Ghidorah would be like, but I definitely recall they fought each other. A lot. They had a rivalry but unlike with Godzilla it was this weird interplay of violence and sadomasochistic... mutual appreciation? Like, Gigan comes to believe that Ghidorah completes him in the sense that he’s constantly improving his technique and cybernetics and weaponry after every fight; and Ghidorah appreciates Gigan because they LOVE a good fight and Gigan always provides a good scrap. The Fleet however is scared shitless of Ghidorah due of the whole galactic genocidal road trip schtick, and because it’s come damn close to actually killing Gigan, their living god, at times. 

Ghidorah also hates Little Ones, like the members of the Fleet, with the fury of a thousand suns. They don’t even have to look remotely like the Makers, they just bring up those terrible memories just by doing their own thing without realizing it. So Ghidorah having roomed with Gigan on his own personal ship seems a bit odd with that in mind.

“Welcome to my humble abode, Ghidorah! I’d like you to room with me while we travel the stars on a glorious crusade to spread the Word of Flesh and Metal.”

“THE FUCK DO WE NEED A ROOM FOR? OR A SHIP? WE CAN FUCKING FLY THROUGH SPACE. ALSO YOUR LITTLE ONES PISS US OFF. WE’RE GOING TO KILL THEM ALL NOW.”

“Ahh, that’s what I thought you’d say, you crazy fucking noodle! Can’t let you do that to my babies, they’re mine!”

(I know it’s not the intent and I’m sorry, but Titan-sized escape shuttles also make me giggle due to the mental image of the Earthborn Titans trying to figure out how anything works. “Hey, Rodan? I think we should start the engines. Like, right now.” “I CAN’T FIGURE OUT HOW TO GET THIS THING WORKING!” “NIGHT VISION ENGAGED.”)

[nataliedanovelist]

ROTTMNT FIC MASTERPOST!

⭐️ The Apocalypse That Was, But Never Is - After a lifetime of rebelling against the Kraang, Casey Jones Jr. has a lot to adjust to. He can handle real food and new clothes just fine, but having his parents alive and well and right in front of him is entirely new - and slightly terrifying - territory.

The start of my Dad Raph AU, and really the fic that started my incredible journey. ❤️

Post-movie

Implied RaphxCass

6 chapters - COMPLETED

The Apocalypse That Was - The Kraang can stop a lot of things, but they cannot stop the Hamato Clan from accomplishing the things they wish to accomplish, from becoming the people they want to be, or from loving and protecting their family.

The prequel to The Apocalypse That Was, But Never Is

Apocalypse-centered fic

Dad Raph AU

No-longer implied RaphxCass 😉

Collaboration with Zippermoth_Mouth

7 chapters - COMPLETED

Adjustment - When April is being harassed by a jerk at college, Casey Jones Jr. steps in, but takes it one step too far.

Tw: implied sexual assault

Post-movie

One-shot - COMPLETED

You’ll Let Her Go - When Raph borrows Sunita’s cloaking broach so he can take Cass out on a “real date,” he starts to question if there’s even a chance they can have a future together, given his whole situation.

RaphxCass hurt and comfort

Post-movie

One-shot - COMPLETED

L.I.L.-E - Donnie accidentally built a grenade more intelligent than he intended, but the new droid fits into the family seamlessly, and not only does S.H.E.L.L.D.O.N. gain a little sister, but Donnie gains a new child as well.

A gift for Tulip, featuring her OC

Post-movie

A two-part fic, part one posted, part two still being written…

The Mask He Wore - One day, Casey’s precious Genius Tech built mask is cracked, and Donnie fixes it, uncovering that his future counterpart did, in fact, record everything.

Post-movie

One-shot - COMPLETED

How I Met Your Mothers - Draxum’s relationship with the turtles has definitely improved since their first introduction, and the retired alchemist doesn’t want it tarnished by secrets or things left unsaid, so he introduces the boys to someone very special…

Post-movie

One-shot - COMPLETED

The Ability To Grow Old - One of Donnie’s experiments backfire, and it’s up to Raph to make sure his brother doesn’t grow up too quickly.

Brawn & Brain fic

Mid-season 1

One-shot - COMPLETED

Best of Both Worlds - A short coming-out story for @phykoha’s Happily Ever After AU, focusing on Raph and Cass and their son, Casey.

RaphxCass

Apocalypse-centered fic

Bigender Raph & Pan Cass

One-shot - COMPLETED

Savage Son - After losing his best friend and becoming stranded in an apocalyptic New York City, Raph stumbles across a lonesome baby and is determined to help the little guy live.

Apocalypse-centered fic

Another Dad Raph fic (cuz I’d LOVE to see somebody try to stop me!)

Brand new AU

4 chapters - COMPLETED

Rise to the Challenge - The Kraang are defeated, but there is still a lot ahead for the Mad Dogs, not only overcoming the villains in front of them, but the demons in their own minds. Still struggling with the events from the Kraang invasion, they will be tested to their limits. Do they truly rely on each other? Do they truly trust in their family?

My version of season 3!!!

Multi-chapters - ON GOING

⭐️ Little Warrior - Instead of Casey Jones II going back in time to stop the Kraang alone, he is accompanied by someone special.

Dad Raph

Little Warrior AU

RaphxCass

My pride and joy…

Multi-chapter - ON GOING

[yeehaw-in-magic-space]

Session 5 Recap: Part 2/6

The Dining Car landed in the middle of a patch of prairie grass that stretched high enough to completely cover the ship from view. A landing space had been carved out in the grass’s center, and before them was a rough, unfinished road that would have been a nightmare to walk. Luckily, they didn’t have to so long as they could get their jackalopes to obey them. This was simple for Dolly: she’d visited plenty of worlds where riding had been the only way around and had enough experience with other animals to figure out how to wrangle a rabbit. Geraldine rode on the back of the one Dolly mounted, and spent most of her time soothing it and whispering praise. Dolly took the opportunity to pretend that some of the whisperings of “good girl” from her companion were directed at her and fell into a comfortable silence listening to Geraldine. 

Chuck was quick to claim the back of the second mount, which forced Prometheus to take the front. He had never ridden before and was vocally anxious about doing so, insisting that they were going to be thrown off or disappear into the grass. Chuck asked Prometheus what the jackalopes ate, which Prometheus guessed to be grass, but he didn’t actually have any idea. (Chuck also asked Dustin, who said he had no clue and got increasingly frustrated with being asked things that didn’t relate to scouting and shooting). Chuck quickly assembled a bundle of grass on a string, used his artificer abilities to make it smell extra strong, and gave it to Prometheus to dangle above the jackalope’s head to urge it forward. 

The outlaws took the third jackalope and led the party forward along the uncomfortable trail for what felt like hours, but was probably only about half of one. They eventually found themselves at an unfinished crossroads (it was clearly intended to be one, but no roads actually crossed so it was just a giant patch of smooth dirt), at which point they were allowed to dismount and ordered by the outlaws to spread out and search for signs of the lookouts and work crew that were supposed to be stationed at the crossroads.

Chuck managed to follow a rotting smell to a pile of massive birds nests crushed under branches of trees Barley's work crews must have felled. Prometheus made a quiet complaint about the size of plants and animals on this planet while Chuck continued to investigate. He discovered a few corpses, but they didn’t look entirely human. They did, however, look unfortunately familiar to the party that now gathered around Chuck. They had claws, long tongues, faces that looked as starving and wrathful as the ghouls they'd done battle with on the interstellar railway. They weren’t entirely identical, though. These ones were even more emaciated than the battle ready monsters. It was as if all traces of fat and muscle had been eaten away. Upon further investigation, even marrow had started to go missing from the bones that had begun burstring from beneath their paper-thin skin. That was not the cause of death, however, as that appeared to be wounds from weaponry. 

The party conferred with the outlaws, who said they’d found similar corpses. They denied any knowledge of what they were and seemed disturbed by the sight of them. They ordered the party to remount and move forward under the assumption that their comrades had been the ones to kill these monsters and that they’d find traces of them closer to the outpost. The party returned to their jackalopes, but couldn’t move forward as a piercing shriek caused the creatures to freeze and refuse to move. For a moment the party worried that this might be a sign of more ghouls closing in on them, but Dolly identified the screech as something natural. In fact, she matched it to a bird when she started to detect the flapping of wings in the distance. If they hadn’t found signs of giant bird’s nests, she may have been surprised to be able to hear such audible flaps. Instead, she was filled with horror as she realized that they were being circled by giant hawks.

[tmwcs]

HHP - Chapter 11 Part 2 (Fluff...lots of fluff)

PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU READ PART 1 FIRST! ITS CRUCIAL!

Warnings: Not this one.

***More parts to chapter 11 will be uploaded tomorrow. Chapter 11 is like friggin 50 pages long on my word document.

“Your father and I are pulling up to Ricky’s house. Ricky and his wife are on vacation, so we have the house to ourselves, why don’t you and Heeseung come over for dinner tomorrow night?”

You read the text your mother sent. Ricky, your father’s dear and longtime friend, retired in the nearby area. He was like an uncle to you; it didn’t even surprise you that he relinquished the entire house to your father and mother upon being away.

‘Dinner with the parents at Uncle Ricky’s house…’

Heeseung seemed relaxed and delighted as you explained your mother’s text.

“Yeah, let’s go tomorrow.” He states.

You hardly explained your reasoning, but you were feeling somewhat nervous regarding your father meeting Heeseung. Was it going to be how it was with Samuel? Was he going to act nice and polite but secretly dislike him? Or was it going to be worse since you’re in college…and your father detested ‘college boys’ more than the high school ones.

The moment in time that you ultimately were excited and yet nervous for, finally came when you both made the twenty-minute drive to your Uncle Ricky’s home. Pulling up the driveway, your heart slightly sank down the moment you saw your father’s car in front of the house as Heeseung parks his next to it.

‘Oh God…’

Walking up to the front door, you knock as you assumed the door was locked, a habit your mother instilled within you.

Hearing the footsteps up to the door, your mother opens the door and smiles widely as she greets you both.

‘It’s actually happening.’

Your mother’s eyes widen as she looks at Heeseung while you both presented a bouquet of flowers. Since your mother texted that she and your father needed nothing from the store, you both opted to get them a small token of your appreciation for dinner.

“Oh, it’s Heeseung correct?” Your mother clarifies to ensure she got the name down correctly. Which she did, her experience with working with international models and staff in the fashion industry, with people coming from many different backgrounds around the world, your mother was quite familiar with names, basic phrases, and traditional aspects of various cultures, allowing her to master proper pronunciation.

“Yes, it’s very nice to meet you Mrs. L/n.”

Your mother was charmed and took to Heeseung very well, even more so than Samuel when she first him. Of course, your mother was never an issue for concern, she always gave people a chance so long as they displayed a natural sense of respect and kindness in their nature.

Giving Heeseung a big and welcoming hug, Heeseung returns the embrace as he smiles, leaning his neck down to rest his chin on her shoulder as he caters to her very small and short frame. Much shorter, she was nearly the same height as Emily, possibly shorter by an inch or two.

Unlike any other time, Heeseung took the initiative to not wear his cap, showing a display of respect in meeting your parents. Instead, he slightly styled his hair to make it presentable, opting for a subtle side part as the front pieces of his hair left a small portion of his forehead exposed, while the remaining shaggy length was combed down and laid neatly slicked down, tapering the longer parts on the back to rest nicely on the backside of his neck.

He looked devastatingly handsome.

Your parents were all about basic formalities, and casual sense. Since you were all dining inside the home of your father’s dear friend, everyone kept it casual with the attire.

Heeseung wore a neat pair of straight jeans, darkened with a crisp, blue color as he adorned a long sleeve shirt that, of course, had the sleeves slightly rolled up, yet was branded with a designer logo at the center.

The weather had been somewhat pleasant, considering it was the start of the fall season. Since it was still rather lukewarm in temperature, you opted for a decent long sleeve blouse and an asymmetrical leather wrap skirt with the blouse loosely tucked in, paired with knee high boots. Needless to say, you had a moment where you had to pin Heeseungs hands to his own body prior to leaving the frat house as the man began to get touchy with you upon seeing how gorgeous you looked.

With your hair down in smoldering waves, carefree and alluring as it frames your face, making you look like the goddess he truly believed you to be, his breath hitched. He doesn’t know how you do it, but you never failed to marvel him with the way you, while barely putting forth any effort, found a way to encompass both beauty and sultriness.

With your medium shade of burgundy red lips, slightly glossed, and just a simple application of eyeshadow and blush to enhance your features, which without makeup, provided him enough reason alone to live for, the man became smitten with you all over again, the same way he did the moment he spotted you on campus for the first time.

Greeting your father in the great room, he welcomes you with arms wide open, a large smile on his face. Your mother stood behind with her arm looped around Heeseung’s, standing proudly as she waits for you to present the handsome young man to your father.

“Hi papa!”

“Sweetpea! Oh, my girl, my darling girl. Gosh it’s been too long, you’re a sight for sore eyes, you know that?” he remarks, eyes somewhat glossy as he takes his head back after embracing you, taking a moment to look you over, admiring his creation.

Heeseung smiles as he witnesses the interaction between you and your father, mentally noting the remarks your father made as he expresses that the world was dull without seeing you every day.

‘Oh I know…I can understand that so very well. Without her, the world is blackened with ash and dead as sand.’

“Papa, this is Heeseung, my boyfriend I told you and mama about.”

Your father approaches the taller young man. Though your father had an above average height himself, Heeseung still remained higher in manner of measurements when it came to his impressively lean and towering stature.

“Ah, yes. Heeseung, it is nice to meet you.” your father states as he extends an arm, shaking hands with him.

“It’s really nice to meet you Mr. L/n.” Heeseung calmly speaks with that dashing smirk on his face. His eyes slightly widened with intrigue as he notes the appearance of both parents, finding hints of any physical traits you inherited. They were faint, but you did carry subtle bits of their essence, the best of both worlds.

'Huh...she really is just made purely out of God's own image.'

“Well what a handsome, and strapping young man you have here y/n.” your father remarks, which earned a somewhat surprised expression from you.

“Why don’t you ladies head into the kitchen and catch up with some girl talk, Heeseung and I will sit here and get better acquainted.” he states immediately after.

‘Here we go…’

The nervous sense rises within you once more, your mother holds your hand and pats your lower back to reassure you everything is alright.

“You know how your father is, he’ll be nice and polite, no matter what.” Your mother whispers as you both made your way to the kitchen, finishing up with making dinner.

“So, tell me more about him. I know you two have been dating for…about six or seven months now? There’s a lot to catch up on.” Your mother ushers as she makes her way around the kitchen island, tending to the stove with whatever she was cooking.

You sat in one of the island’s barstools.

“Mama…”

“Mmhmm?”

“…I’m going to marry him.”

Your mother stood still, looks over to you with a soft and delicate smile on her face. You knew it was abrupt, yet there was a sense of comfort and trust that you felt with her that permitted you to speak your mind.

“Oh y/n... I already knew that.”

You were taken aback, “You do?”

“Well yeah y/n, you’re my daughter, I know you better than anyone. I also was your age at one point, and I know the signs of a young woman in love.”

She was so calm as she recounts her days when she was your age, which was when she married your father, who was fourteen years older than her. While your mother was in her late teens, your father had been reaching his mid-thirties, yet the love and attraction between the two when she was beginning her first year in college, was so strong that they chose love to conquer all other factors in life.

Naturally, your mother would be more understanding considering her own love story.

“Does papa know?”

“I think he might have a sense, he also knows you so well, more so than your other siblings. Naturally as a father, he noticed some signs. Believe me, the way you speak and laugh when it comes to this young man, it’s much different than how you spoke when you were dating Samuel.” your mother iterates.

You nodded as she expresses the attention to detail they noticed in your personality, whenever it came to you talking about Heeseung.

“He loves you, doesn’t he?” she asks.

You nodded.

“He does. Too much…to the point where it gets painful and scary. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.” You softly remark, looking up at her.

“Then…that means you should be with him.” She softly states. “Your dad was, and still is that way with me. Without him, there is no pain, no fear, and therefore no reason to live. A man’s love is worthless without the bad to go with the good.”

Meanwhile in the great room, seated across from each other, next to the fireplace, your father rests with his elbow propped on the arm of his seat, resting his hand along his chin, seemingly studying Heeseung, as the latter sits in the exact same manner.

“So, from how my daughter speaks, she seems to be really fond of you.”

Heeseung smiled softly as he looked down at his lap, his fingers stroking his chin as he gazes back up to your father’s eyes.

“Y/n is my little girl…” your father’s eyes drift to the fireplace.

“I’ve always trusted her to fend for herself. Ever since she was a young girl, just a baby in fact, she was always so attentive, so careful, without her mother or me to instruct her or to warn her. Its like she just knew what was good and what was bad, knowing what to enjoy and what to stay away from.” Your father remarks a soothing and clear voice, with the image of your child youth in his mind.

Heeseung’s eyes also drifts to the fireplace, where a calming wave of gentle flames dance on the logs.

“She’s always been…so pure hearted. Strong, yet so gentle and kind, it’s enough to melt your bones. But as she grew and became a young woman, I realized that her heart wasn’t the only thing that catches people’s attention.”

Heeseung faintly nods his head, knowing already to what the elder man was referring to, signifying that he agrees.

“The neighbors, family friends, or even random people down the street, I’ve seen the way they look at her…my beautiful girl.” Your father pauses for a moment as Heeseung remained silent.

“You know, there comes a time in every man’s life, when he’s outlived all his adventures and youth, he questions what is the one great thing that he’s contributed to the world. What is that one thing that makes him so great? What did he do in his life that made the world better?...For me.... it’s y/n.” Your father states firmly, yet a soft tone as he looks over to Heeseung.

“From what y/n tells me, you’re nearly finished with college.”

“Yes sir.” He responds in his usual calm tone.

“What do you plan to do after you graduate?”

Sitting for a moment in silence, Heeseung glances down to the floor for a moment, still stroking his chin, before he glances back up to meet with your father’s eyes, both men displaying a somewhat stern expression on their faces.

“I’m going to marry her and bring her with me.”

“Where do you intend to take my daughter?”

“Everywhere and anywhere, as long as I’m there with her.”

“And what are your plans for financial stability?”

Explaining his family’s background briefly, Heeseung continues with a calm and nearly emotionless demeanor, as your father does the same.

“Now I know my daughter, she’s not one to care about a life of luxury.”

“Oh I know.” Heeseung issues a subtle smirk as he looks down at the flames once more.

“So. What else could you provide for her? What could you give to my daughter that she couldn’t get from any other respectable man?”

Looking down at the silver ring that decorates his finger, he slightly smiles for a brief second, looking back up, he answers.

“Independence.”

“Hmm? Interesting, independence, huh? A little contradicting since you intend to marry her.”

“I didn’t mean it in an autonomous aspect.” Heeseung softly clarifies in a respective, yet still in his calm and reserved tone.

“I’m interested, please elaborate.” Your father softly insists as he sinks back into his chair.

“I want her to be independent in the manner of sovereignty, I want her to be free from whatever her deepest fears and worries are. I know she has some, though she's not going to always tell me. I want her to be liberated from what other people think, instead, to only care about her own opinions....her own thoughts. Everyone finds a meaning to live for, but with Y/n, I don’t think she’s found that reason, not yet.”

“Hmm…is she your reason for living?” your father asks.

“She sure is.”

“You don’t think you’re her reason for living then?” your father asks in a faintly piqued manner, as he raises an eyebrow.

“I know her well enough to be able to see that I’m a lot of things to her, in fact, I know I’m everything to her right now. But I also know that she’s not a woman to find the value of life within just anyone, even me.”

Your father slightly raises his brow yet again, this time in slight intrigue. Shifting his gaze over to the fire once more, your father remains attentively listening as Heeseung continues.

“But…if it was for me along with…” slightly pausing, Heeseung looks at the fire, “Our home, our future, our children, and for the sake of your peace and…for her mother’s…and our legacy…I know that’s the only way she’s going to find it.” Heeseung finishes calmly.

“You love her…” your father remarks.

Heeseung stares at your father���s eyes, very firmly. Nearly glaring at him, as he leans into his propped arm while he continues to stroke his smooth chin gently and faintly, Heeseung firmly nods.

Your father sighs, in a way as if he felt relieved.

“Then, you do deserve her.” your father speaks, breaking his hand away from his chin as he grips both arms of the chair, looking down at the ground, slightly nodding, as if he understood all too well, like he knew from experience.

“You know Heeseung, my daughter is the only light I’ve ever known. I have my sons that make me prouder than any father could ever be. Yet, my one and only daughter, y/n, she’s the only good and pure thing I’ve ever done in my life. I’ve spent all her youth, right up until the day I dropped her off at that college dorm, protecting and watching over her. I’m not an irrational man, I know when I have to pass the torch, I’ve been preparing it ever since I found out I was having a little girl. Yet, no matter how much time is offered, you’re never truly ready to let her go...But if the rarest of opportunities presents itself, then a father must realize and understand what he must do. Her grandfather told me the same thing when he gave me his daughter, her mother.” Your father accounts as he recalls meeting his young wife and gaining her father’s blessing.

“Do you understand that feeling? Could you? Even if you don’t have a daughter of your own, at least, not yet.” Your father asks. In which Heeseung nodded in the affirmative, understanding all too well merely because it was you, the most precious creation that was prominent in everyone’s lives.

“Then…as her father, please, make this easier on me. Make it easier for me to let her go….to give her to you.” your father’s eyes faintly shiny from the thin coat of moisture that glazes over his iris, which reflected a hint of your inheritance.

With his hand resting under his chin, leaning into the bend of his elbow as it remains propped up, slightly leaned back into his seated posture with his legs slightly spread apart, his free hand gripping on the other arm of the chair, Heeseung’s lips part just a sliver as his eyes, which faintly widened at your father’s response, just a hair, look down as if he was going to say something, instead, he remained silent.

He continues to stare at the floor for a second or two.

Looking back up to your father, a totally different face reflects back to face him. A dark and sinister side that reflected a violent and chaotic hell, with flames of blood curling screams and torture echoing through the black shade of his eyes. It was a darkness that reeked of torn flesh and carnage, a black hole of dead bones and teeth, burning and fueling the devil be becomes, all of which was triggered to be unleashed at any moment in time. Your father sits and notices the change in the young man’s face, noting that the demeanor, and aura within the young man had changed. It was terrible, filled with malice and horror. Upon seeing it, your father smirks.

Faintly chuckling, he speaks to the young devil across from him.

“Ah…you’re making this nearly too easy, my boy.” Glancing at the fire, noting the sporadic dancing movement of the flames as they moved, burning through the wood, he glances back up to Ethan’s face.

“You would do the unspeakable…if it meant keeping her safe, wouldn’t you?” your father asks, his smile growing slightly wider.

Glaring with that sinister look in his eye, smiling, and chuckling right back, his voice turning so deep, it nearly reflected the darkest shade of colors that pierced the mind.

You finish setting the table, as your mother prepares the main dishes on decorative platters.

“Boys! Dinner is ready!” she calls out.

Walking in, your father approaches your mother and hugs her, kissing her forehead as he remarks the pleasant smell of dinner.

“Ah smells good!” he claims excitingly.

Heeseung walks in, seeing you brings a smile to his face. He walks over and hugs you, placing his lips atop of your head, kissing it delicately as he inhales the scent of your hair, as always.

It was so sudden and caught you slightly off guard merely due to your father being in close proximity. Glancing over to your parents, you noticed how your father glanced over to you with a slight smile on his face. 'A smile? '

Yes a smile. A smile of…. reassurance?

“Did you guys get to know each other better?” your mother asks with a grin as she lightly kisses your father.

“Yeah we did." Your father states before looking over to you and Heeseung.

"Heeseung my boy, you’ll have to come by the house one of these days so you can meet the rest of the family when they come to visit us.” your father exclaims in a pleasing manner.

“I’d like that.” Heeseung spoke calmly as his lids grew slightly heavy, giving him that lazy look once more as he bites down on his bottom lip, looking down and directly into your eyes. It was that look he gave whenever he yearned to become one with you, it didn’t matter that your parents were feet away, the man would always issue you that look whether you were alone or in public. He did it in a subtle manner, that no one would make anything of it.

[tiptapricot]

Ok ok finally MacKay issue 21 thoughts. This is somewhat of a rant/ramble/drawn out analysis and summary created as I did a reread, so it’s a bit rough as far as flow of ideas go but I hope it’s interesting to y’all. But TLDR: MacKay dug into a truly essential aspect of his cast this issue, AKA, who they are outside of business, what living means to them, and how trauma affects and is shown in them all, and I’m excited to see that trend hopefully continue.

First off, I feel like I remember noticing it in the past but only solidly realized that Reese has a nose piercing when looking over this issue again. I think her design has been wonderful to see evolve, from the recent hairstyle change to locs to just her solid almost punk-ish style in general. Her dress and moon shoulder things are gorgeous this issue, and overall her styling is just a really nice visual way to give a vibe for her as a person.

And of course! First issue from her point of view. I hadn’t realized how much we had been needing that. It’s been so many issues now from Marc’s point of view or the system’s in general, that getting another one from the Midnight Mission crew feels refreshing. It allows us a look into Reese as a person again, instead of her just being part of the job or the system’s friend.

And that seems to be the focal point of the beginning here, of taking characters outside of where we’ve seen them. It’s been months, maybe almost a year that they’ve been working together, and Reese is only just now getting Soldier to loosen up and go out. She’s having to give him a crash course on how to be a person, both in the social and vampire sense. She makes him fill up on blood because she knows the rules and how it works, but MacKay also shows us it’s not just natural, they can still taste the blood, they don’t like it. Vampirism is not benign and in the background it’s front and center and constantly there to remind them what they aren’t.

But even then… they still have friends. Or Reese does at least.

I love Teddy and Shannon’s intro, because it helps to retroactively show us that Reese isn’t isolated. She’s been going out and making friends with other vampires. It’s domestic and human and normal, Teddy joking with the Draculads and Draculadies greeting (a line I just think is super fun and sweet), and Shannon wrapping Reese up in a hug. Reese has connections even when separated from humanity, friends and colleagues and people struggling with the same thing she is.

I wonder if Shannon and Teddy were vampires she met after being turned, ones who taught her the ropes, or if they were friends before hand, all getting turned in the same kind of nabbing. We get a line later about stuff they used to do “before” and how they’re just now getting back into it, but it’s unclear if they were friends and all turned to vampires, or just had similar outings. Either way, how those connections were formed opens up a lot of possibility into the world of shared trauma and experience, into finding your community and your people and moving forward with each other.

It also highlights how much of an outsider Soldier is in all this. Teddy and Shannon know him, he knows them, they’ve probably exchanged brief words when Reese has gone out with them in the past, maybe even tried to goad him into coming along, but it’s not his friend group. It’s a bit awkward. Soldier is trying but even at the start he’s confused, but they’re bringing him into the fold because it’s what he needs, and they care about him.

Then of course!! Jake! He immediately comes in with a big smile, and nicknames, and his face visible, calling them kiddos and picking them up like a chaperone to prom. Since these few pages were the preview, they’ve already been talked about a lot, but it’s deserved. MacKay nails Jake so well. He’s personable and goofy and has the warm vibe of an uncle and an old friend. He clashes slightly with Soldier’s formal vibe, again highlighting the out of place-ness Soldier has in normal friend and social interactions. Jake isn’t a boss, this isn’t a mission, Jake is for the people and they’re going out to dance!

It’s just a lovely display of Jake’s role and vibe and the relationships that have been building. Jake calls Marc and Steven the boys and slightly teases them on how they worry about mission things, once again showcasing the central focus of this issue of duty vs life, the job vs the people. And of course, all his lines are just delightful.

There’s also more hints and foreshadowing in the car ride of the overall plot we may be seeing, references to whether or not Zodiac is pulling strings again, what his influence may be in all of this. It’s a new mystery we’re being led into, and I’m excited for it.

The art on the drive is also gorgeous, the squeak of the tires the lights blurring, the city coming into view. Rosenberg, the colorist, always does an amazing job, and Cappuccio’s art (while I don’t always love how he does faces or proportions) captures movement and texture so well.

And then there’s the club scene. Jake drops them off, using his connections to get special treatment for those he cares about (and people in the line are mad about it), and then assuages Marc’s worries about having what they need (which obvs comes back later). You can tell Marc is hovering close to front because of how on edge he’s been, something I’ll touch on in a further scene.

Reese’s narration mixed with the visuals here makes for such a wonderfully tactile experience for the heightened senses of a vampire. We get to see her joy, the almost overwhelm of sensation but also how visceral and filled with life it makes the experience. The line that really gets me is “…I had to remind myself to breathe so I could talk.” It nails not just the breathless feeling of community but also the breathless feeling of being dead, the normal impulses of a body that now have to be a conscious effort.

And then Soldier.

We cut to him and his face is uncomfortable, he’s shrunken, slow, reserved. He looks out of place and it’s obvious he feels out of place, that he’s unsure and confused and doesn’t know how this works and is aware he doesn’t. There’s been an underlying current to everything of his inability to separate himself from his duties, from being the tool for something, that’s been present throughout the whole run but was especially highlighted during the end of the Structure arc, and is brought back again here. Reese even states this, states how she’s seen his patterns grow, how she doesn’t even know his name. He’s just Soldier. He’s just a soldier. But she won’t let that stand. Her smile is bright and she shoves him and teases him because he is her friend and they are still people and still get to have fun. He gets to have fun. The entire exchange about who’s in charge, and seeing a small smile grow on Soldier’s face as he finally gets into it just showcases something so special and sweet about the ways these characters exist outside of the fights and searches we’ve mainly seen them in.

This progression… it makes me so happy. (ID in ALT)

They’re friends having fun, getting out of their shell, living an unlife and losing themselves in it together.

But it doesn’t last, because for those involved in moon knight business, life gets taken over by the job, almost like it can’t be escaped. I think it’s also important to note the fact that when Reese pauses and looks concerned, Soldier immediately thinks he’s doing something wrong, that he’s doing the social activity wrong and she’s upset with him about it. There’s a lot of bigger and smaller ties into how he views himself and life, how he’s been conditioned to be a certain way an has to work to let himself go.

Reese’s immediate honing in on something being off and the way her face falls is also crushing. Even trying to be human again, even being just people, they can’t escape their hyper vigilance, the way their senses are tuned for threats and able to pick up on things others don’t. She even says it. “We had been made, or remade, to hunt and kill at night. So even across the warehouse, even through the dark and the lights, I could see him. I could see what he was doing.”

And they can’t do anything. They can know something is going to happen but not what, they’re helpless to wait to react because they have to know what they’re reacting to. And then the chaos hits and it’s mission mode. Solider pushes Reese out of the way and the glass crashes down as Marc breaks in and normalcy and an attempt at it is shattered.

And as with the rest of this run, colors work to highlight this. The pink of the club becomes tinted red by violence when the mind control audio hits, and the cool blue of moon knight cuts through to handle it. The colors are gorgeous and contrasting and show the moods of the scene and the people involved, the water on the wound.

And of course, Marc was standing by. What Jake references in the trunk had to be the suit, because Marc’s also the uncle, the watchful leader worried about the young adults he’s pulled into his crazy shit. He’s the parent walking you home from work and parked outside as you close up shop. Protection is a love language for him and it’s also compulsory. If you’re in his group you are in his group and he would fucking die for you. Normalcy scares Marc and yet he craves it, because it is both harder to control, but desires deeply. Reese and Soldier and their friends go out scared him, and he had to watch, especially after losing so many close to him so quickly in the previous issues. Just like them he’s also on watch, hyper aware, only able to act when something has happened to stop.

But Reese is right that it can’t all be rage. The people are innocent and their violence isn’t the root of the problem it’s the sound. And continuing with brute force is only going to cause further issues. Reese knows vampirism she’s lived vampirism and she doesn’t want to hurt people. We see it at the start with telling Soldier to top off and here knowing that spilled blood could send them into danger, make them a threat.

And so what does she do? When there is a threat that’s disrupted normalcy and a problem that’s hard to combat and rage may only bring more pain?

She dissociates. Physically.

It’s easy to, when it’s needed, when it’s the necessity, but pulling things together, making things work, living with what you’re able to and need to do and not just letting things drift and become chaotic, it takes effort and grounding.

And that’s… well that’s very similar to what Marc’s arc has been. Very similar to mental dissociation. It’s easy for him to try and ignore his problems, to brute force his way through them and separate himself from them, but making things work, maintaining system communication and balance, not letting him and his headmates get distanced and striated from each other, not losing hold of themselves, is hard. It takes work and practice and intention, not just what feels easiest.

And there’s also that tie between vampirism and trauma, between the way Reese has dealt with her stuff representing healthy and routine coping, versus Soldier and Marc still struggling with that. They struggle with working with what they have and both knowing it’s there, but not letting it take over or define everything. The hyper vigilance, the fear of worse happening, the self isolation and the push away from what they're experiencing because there is "shame" (other headmates, having to drink blood for safety). They’ve all been through a lot and lost people and lost themselves, and they’re working on it in different ways.

And also. Well Reese turning into smoke/mist looks super fucking cool.

And she’s not perfect! She falls mid air and doesn’t quite tackle the villain but she still ends the immediate problem. And then she gets shot. She’s fine but it still hurts. Small victories can still be rough, working towards something better can still sting.

It also sets up this arc’s conflict well. Our main characters are immune to these sounds, because they’ve been alienated from people as a whole and as a concept, even if at their core they’re still human, and that grants a separateness from the threat of being forced to lose control. But if it’s experimentation, if someone is behind the scenes pulling the strings and trying to cause conflict, how long will that safety last? Trauma can in some ways grant an awareness of threats that works as a heads up or a numbing agent, but that doesn’t mean it’s a shield. There can be cracks and people can still get in, and the hurt still happens.

They may be safe for now, but will it be that way always? Will the mission really be forever, not allowing for a break, not allowing for a breather?

This issue was from Reese’s perspective, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that it shows some of the most normal activity we’ve seen in the entire series. Her lens on life is different from the others, she’s found ways to work on healing, to not be trapped in one place, and as such her story gives us a view outside of direct missions, to other places of town and other joys. It contrasts against Marc, to the story we’ve been told thus far mainly from his perspective.

So to the previous to questions, no, it won’t. For both. The cast can’t escape their situation, they have to deal with it and confront themselves and what happens, but it also isn’t everything. There are people besides them to connect with, moments of downtime, lives to live that are not defined by a midnight mission that stretches into dawn.

It may just be a while until they’re really able to rest their feet.

(And on a side note, this can all be applied even to members not in this issue, to Steven, to Badr, both dealing with trying to make things work via logic and faith, working to make things work, to do a duty. Is Badr immune like the system? How will his changing views on the world and Khonshu and relationships play into a plot revolving around enemies being created even from people you love? The cast has been working to build up relationships and trust for so long and this, I assume, will be testing that. And it seems like next issue Greer will be involved as well, based on the cover, so we’ll see how other characters are further affected (-: )

[nicolears281spring2024]

Final Project Proposal

Title: Standstill on Woodhaven Blvd 

(I’m kind of unsure about the title I might change it) 

For my light and shadow project I want to take photos of my neighborhood. I’ve lived in the same house, in the same area, for my whole life (almost 20 years). And over time a lot of things have changed, the people I used to know have moved and the stores have changed locations. So whenever I walk home or go to the store or the park I can’t help think about all the memories I’ve had in these places. A lot of times I feel like I’m stuck in the same place, while everyone/everything else has moved on. There’s a lot of nostalgia in my neighborhood but there’s also a feeling that I’m somehow not accomplishing anything; I’m at a standstill while the world moves around me. For my final project I want to incorporate old photos of myself from my childhood into photos I take of places around my neighborhood today. I want to show this feeling of seeing every version of myself in the places I know very well, I also want to convey this idea of being stuck; instead of moving forward in always thinking about my past experiences in all of these familiar places. 

I want to aim for 8 images, but it does depend on how many old photos I find that I can use, and also how many unique locations I can think of to take photos of. So far I have a few places in mind; the front steps of my house (I have a lot of childhood photos sitting on the steps), the playground in the park, and there’s also a carousel I used to visit a lot that is closed right now. I plan on using photoshop to overlay the old photos onto my photos. I’ll probably use the selection tools to cut out parts of photos I’d like to use, and then overlay them onto my photographs in layers. I think it might be interesting to incorporate the old photos into the shadow parts of the photographs, so I might try and take photos on days where the light casts large shadows. 

I won't need any special materials, besides the old photographs and photoshop for this project.

One photographer that I’d like to draw inspiration from is Shimon Attie, whose work was exhibited at SBU last year. I particularly like his series called “The History of Another” where he photographed projections of old photographs onto architecture in Italy. I think the concept of bringing the old into the modern day is very interesting, and something I want to explore with my own work. Although I don’t think I’ll be using projections, I’d like to edit old photographs onto my own images to create the same effect of the past meeting the present. 

I also like the atmosphere in photos by Gregory Crewdson. His photographs mainly center on suburban towns/houses and he usually has one or a few main subjects that really stand out. I think I’d like to do something similar, but in my case the subject would be cut from an old photo, and the background would be a photo I’ll take of my neighborhood. I want to draw on the kind of melancholy feeling Crewdson has in his photos, maybe by editing the shadows to be more cool toned. 

[techycatartist]

For the next part of “Rollerswitched!”, I wanted to focus on two coasters with identical (or very similar) layouts. Kingda Ka fits that to a T, as his coaster has a “sibling” in Top Thrill Dragster. But there’s something else about this “role-swap” that makes it different from the Phoenix/Twister pair; I don’t have a TTD personification to “swap” with. This is reflected in his design, as it was moreso of changing the theme of the outfit instead of re-formatting a TTD personification’s outfit into Ka’s. While you might think this means I only have one drawing to showcase this “swap”, we all know that TTD isn’t what it once was….stay tuned for the “Top Thril 2-ified” design!

Click under the “Read More” to learn about this guy’s backstory & overall personality!

Just as visitors of Cedar Point were experiencing a first-of-its-kind 300 ft. roller coaster, the park was already talking with Intamin to develop their next record-breaker. As the park that kickstarted the “coaster wars”, Cedar Point wanted to claim their victory. Meanwhile, Intamin had been developing a new technology for their launch coasters, debuting the hydraulic-powered “Xcelerator” at Knott’s Berry Farm two years later. Even as the park opened a hypercoaster-sized shuttle coaster, all eyes were on the center of the peninsula as a yellow-and-red structure grew and grew. By the end of 2002, it became clear that what was being built was unlike anything that had been seen before. On January 9th, the world was officially introduced to Top Thrill Dragster— the first-ever “strata-coaster”, reaching a height of 420 ft. But not only would this be the world’s tallest coaster, it would reach a record-shattering 120 mph in a matter of 3.8 seconds. Fittingly, the coaster would be themed to a Top Fuel Drag racecar. TTD opened on May 4th, 2003 and instantly became an icon not only for Cedar Point, but for roller coasters overall. However, it soon became apparent that TTD was not the most reliable ride— the hydraulic launch, while responsible for the ride’s popularity, was also responsible for most of its technical issues. Despite this, TTD’s status as a guest favorite meant that Cedar Point was dedicated to making it as reliable as possible.

Top Thrill Dragster is the epitome of the “natural-born-leader”, unafraid to take charge whilst knowing how to best approach each situation that presents itself in front of him. Though filled with an exuberance only matched by his’ coaster’s fast acceleration, TTD has fashioned his image to be a person of sophistication and high intelligence. TTD owns his status as Cedar Point’s leader 24/7, even during moments of downtime (which in all fairness, is a frequent experience for him). TTD is dedicated to making the lives of those close to him better-- he’ll drop everything if it means that a weight will be lifted off someone’s shoulders. TTD’s patience and temper can go a long way, but those who break it are in for a world of hurt. As the third-fastest coaster on earth, TTD’s “launch” power takes him to speeds that no human can match. Additionally, TTD has the power to summon a Top Fuel Drag racecar seemingly out of nowhere; pulling the flags off his gloves, the car reveals itself in a spectacular transformation. TTD is close with the other two “world’s first” coasters at Cedar Point, Magnum-XL200 and Millennium Force; he is also close to his twin sibling Kingda Ka and cousin Xcelerator. But with the coaster’s penchant for mechanical issues, TTD sufferers frequent migraines and other health issues. However, TTD always persists through his pain, no matter how great it is.

[christianlep]

Blog 7- 1/31

Watching Mobile Suit Gundam was a nice experience, and which I would consider the first modern anime piece we have watched in this class. Despite this tag of being a modern anime, I believe there are noticeable ties to past manga and events that this show draws upon. As we’ve discussed in class and read, Tezuka’s Astro Boy was a prominent influence in Japanese literature when it came out, with many being drawn to the aesthetics and themes conveyed, such as the notion of a futuristic world in which humans and technology (or more specifically robots) are intimately intertwined. While the mechs presented in Mobile Suit Gundam and Astro are different in the fact that one requires human input and the other is autonomous, they both share the characteristic in that they heavily impact the lives (for better or worse) of the humans with their advanced capabilities. While I was watching, I couldn’t help but think if Mobile Suit Gundam also serves to provide commentary about war and a need to regulate weapons of mass destruction, as we can see the fragility of human life demonstrated with the Zeon’s ambush attack in episode 1 in which the citizens could only run. Without the Federation’s own mech to combat the Zaku, Side 7 would’ve been overtaken from the get go due to the lack of technology or defense, which in some ways draws parallels to the bombings on Japan that would ultimately force them to surrender during WW2. While I was reading Lamarre’s Introduction, the first thought I had was that this guy really loves discussing the technology behind animation and there were some parts where I wasn’t following along too much, but there were elements that I did understand. For instance, Lamarre mentions the machines and apparitions we utilize to create media ultimately affect how we digest it, such as the train example he gives, where we no longer have the feeling in which we are moving forward when we see the animation outside the train, and instead take it in as a output device which we interpret comprehensively. In his discussion of cel animation he draws upon a similar concept, although it would be the inverse of the train analogy, as the viewer (or camera) is stationary, and it's the physical movement of the elements in front of it that establish the animation. Luckily I already understood how older animation worked so when Lamarre explained it I could visualize it, but essentially the camera, as it ultimately has a single point of seeing, relies upon a phenomenon called the parallax effect, where things that are further in stance appear to move slower as it takes longer to leave your field of vision, and things that are closer move quicker because it leaves your field of vision quicker. In animation, the frames are separated by layers depending on its perceived depth (like foreground, midground, background) and are moved at a speed relative to their perceived distance. Lamerre also mentions this but Disney invented the multiplane camera, which took this concept and elevated it by having dedicated racks for each layer, which could be moved up and down, which meant that to the camera, not only do the layers move at different speeds, but can now enlarge and shrink. We can see this parallax technique is used throughout Mobile Suit Gundam, such as in the first scene of the intro, when Amuro runs into center screen at a fast pace, while the background moves at a constant speed, even after he goes into slow-motion (in this case the parallax was more abstract). I know Lamerre’s paper was published 2009, but I also wanted to note that a lot of modern animation has transitioned away from hand drawn animation and now utilize 2D softwares, although the same concept of utilizing z-space is still present.

[holisticsoulhealer]

Kind Thoughts - A Spiritual Story

I feel that kind thoughts begin at home. We aren’t always our own bestie, and are instead, sometimes our very own worst critics. This has to change, because we’re stuck with “US” 24/7 so we may as well enjoy the living heck out of it.

It’s more difficult to be lonely if we’re having fun being deeply in relationship with ourselves. To know oneself, is to love oneself.

I’ve witnessed over the more than 30 years of being in deliberate healing practice, that too many times, individuals obsessed over what someone else thought, felt, chose, and I was more often left with a scratching my head sense, wondering why they were choosing to spend so much of their valuable time on earth wondering about what was happening in someone else’s head and body, rather than taking the time to figure out their own. Kind thoughts of our own leads to an inner dialogue and focus on who we are, how we are choosing to show up, what matters most to us, and what life has to offer us, and as importantly, what we have to bring to the World at large.

Many years ago I attended what I thought was going to be a health retreat, in San Diego, California. It was really radical for me. They promoted daily enemas, raw food and weird oat bases, thick (quite horrible tasting) fluids. I didn’t like it at all, and have never been back. There was a lot of wheatgrass drinking going on, and to this day I tend to heave a little when fresh grass is cut in my presence.

However, there were a couple of other aspects of the retreat that were beyond valuable for me. One of them was a “transformational breath work class.” I had never breathed so deeply, or had such profound experiences than in those classes. I took 2 and was hooked. When I ran a healing center soon after that retreat, I had the great good fortune of snagging a brilliant breath work facilitator, who came to my healing center once a month for almost 3 years. Often nobody else showed up for the class, so I paid her and she did a private session for me.

I swear to this day, I fell in love with me during those sessions, and felt kindness and love from the depth of my being, that forever changed me. The other session that happened at that retreat, was a short, little bespectacled male psychologist, who got individuals to take the worst parts of themselves, place them in a chair in front of them and speak with them.

There were rules of engagement, for instance, they were only allowed to use words of kindness and love to unravel lost pieces or unforgiven parts, to heal themselves emotionally. I loved this and one of the things he shared was that if unkind or harsh words began to bubble up, you said “cancel, cancel” in your head and heart, and began the inner dialogue again, gentler and with more compassion. I still use this technique if I lose my way in any manner.

I am much kinder and more loving to me in this time than perhaps ever before. I wish this for each of you, darling readers.

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Love & Blessings,

Ruth

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