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radioapplerevue · 24 days ago

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Radioapple Fic Recs #2

I'm finally getting around to updating my fic recs, and I decided that it would get a bit too unwieldy to just keep adding on to the original post. So, from now on I'll be putting them into different parts and then linking them in an archive post, which I will pin on my blog. For now, my first post of recs can be found here.

There are also a bunch of unfinished fics that I have been keeping an eye on that I haven't read yet because they are fairly early on and their tags say something along the lines of "it gets worse before it gets better" haha. There are enough fics grinding my heart into dust at the moment, but just know that I am seeing those chapter counts go up. I'm Watching You.

Now, onto the recs!

Home Stretch by @tarmairons (mature)

Welcome to the most convoluted game of 20 questions I've ever seen. I love the slow, purposeful approach to showing how Lucifer and Alastor's relationship is shifting and merging to not only accommodate each other, but also tie them closer together. This is an entire fic of them attempting to communicate and really, honestly trying even if neither of them are sure of what the hell they're doing. And, of course, I love when fics really take the time to explore how Alastor's asexuality (and lack of experience with intimacy in general) would affect his approach and behavior when it comes to sex with Lucifer -- and also how Lucifer learns to handle Alastor in a way that meets his needs, even if the things Alastor needs are not what Lucifer's used to.

2. To Be The Perfect Angel, Some Sin Must Be Done by @hismercytomyjustice (ratings vary by part)

This is a series I've really super been enjoying, largely because it's just fun. Don't get me wrong, the explicit parts are hot too, but it's fucking funny and there's just such an enjoyable push and pull dynamic between Alastor and Lucifer here, where each give as good as they get and actually end up... maybe.... enjoying it? Whoops? And oh shit here comes feelings, where did those come from. And as always, I enjoy seeing how Alastor's asexuality is handled here, with his discomfort with making decisions or taking the lead in bed causing them to develop a dynamic where Lucifer makes all the calls, and Alastor makes the terrifying choice to trust him with his own body, pleasure, and safety. Plus, excellent use of the shadow here. Having the shadow play a significant role in a fic is always one of my favorite things, and I am also very here for shadow fucking at all times.

3. somewhere down the line by kj_crwn (explicit)

This is one of the "Alastor and Lucifer meet in the living world first" fics. I love Lucifer basically just coming up to the living world to be the biggest nuisance to Alastor he could possibly be, but whoops, I guess Alastor's into that. There's a lot of murder, a lot of two assholes trying to drive each other nuts (and succeeding), a lot of sexual tension, and a lot of said assholes being really, really bad at feelings. I particularly enjoy what happens from the time of Alastor's death up to the conclusion of the fic, and the way they have to come to grips with what their relationship is now, what it could be, and what they want it to be.

4. T is for Tax Evasion by @radiaurapple (teen and up)

This is a brand new fic, but my goodness I loved it immediately. I loved the take on Heaven's fucked up bureaucracy, I loved Lucifer's panic, guilt and weariness, and I love how God is a fucking dick. It's such an interesting concept that is explored through Lucifer's slowly crumbling psyche as the knowledge he's going to lose Alastor becomes more and more certain. Or is it? There are few things I love more than pre-emptive grief and utter desperation, and the emotional payoff is just so good. I would have loved to have seen more of the fallout, but regardless, this is one that I'll definitely be thinking about for a while.

5. I Will Dance Divine by @rahabs (mature)

This fic caught my attention immediately. A large part of is exploring Alastor and Lucifer's relationship through dance, and the first chapter is immediately gripping. There's such an immediate magnetism to them, as well as the clash between the performance they are putting on and the quiet battle they are having with each other. It made me so look forward to seeing where it goes. So far it seems to be a slow, but very thorough burn, with the fic taking its time to really let them come together naturally, and learn about each other in tantalizing pieces. I dearly hope it is continued as I want to see more, but what there is already is also a wonderful read.

6. Muzzle for My Lover by sabbathgoat (explicit)

This is a smutty one-shot, but it has one of my favorite depictions of a sexual dynamic between Alastor and Lucifer in anything. There's such a deep undercurrent of trust here, a trust that has been hard-earned over years. Lucifer's handling of Alastor, knowledge of his fluctuating boundaries and internal battles when it comes to his own body and desires, combined with his intense love and tenderness towards him just bleeds through the entire fic. I would happily read a several chapter story with them just lying there cuddling and doing nothing else if it was written with this same weight. It's one of those cases where you don't need to be told how in love they are, because it's impossible to not feel it.

7. Stolen Moments by @mothballmilkshake (ratings vary by part)

This series is quite the rollercoaster! Alastor and Lucifer's relationship in it hits some great highs and also some serious lows, because they are both so so bad at this oh my god. I like that it's from Alastor's POV, because I feel like we don't get that very often, particularly in the longer fics. And I also like that it just shows us what an absolute fucking disaster he is, haha. The continuing plot line regarding Alastor's deal is interesting and groundwork is being laid for some serious shit to go down later on. We'll have to see if Lucifer and Alastor's foundation has been built strong enough by then to not crumble under the pressure. But hey, after all they've gone through, I believe in them (.....mostly).

8. Hope Against Hope by OrlesianHat (explicit)

I don't tend to be into non-canon AUs, but I found I enjoyed this one quite a lot. Lucifer is being sent on a blind date, and the person he meets isn't exactly what he expected... or is he? There's no murder involved so automatically the fic is much gentler than canon would be, particularly with Alastor, but a while after reading it I had to go digging to find it again because something about it stuck with me. I love Alastor's unrepentant selfishness, and Lucifer's long-suffering mood of 'these are things I really should not be okay with but apparently I'm okay with them because I'm still here'. If you're looking for something a little softer after all the angsty cliffhangers we get in other fics (the angsty cliffhanger in this one has been resolved, thank you), then this might be for you.

#radioapple #fic recs

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misscammiedawn · 7 months ago

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Ange Ushiromiya's Recontextualized Memory and Unprocessed Trauma in Umineko No Naku Kori Ni

CW: Full spoilers for Umineko, a mystery visual novel game which is best enjoyed without knowing spoilers in advance. The game and thus this essay will feature discussion of child abuse and suicide.

For those unfamiliar with my blog I have a tag called Media, Myself and I where I talk about positive/accurate representation of dissociative disorders in media.

Today I want to talk about Umineko No Naku Kori Ni the third and fourth titles in 07th Expansion's "When They Cry" franchise. The game is a multi-layered fiction that starts off as an Agatha Christie inspired closed circle murder mystery taking place during the weekend of October 4th 1986. The murder mystery displayed has no more than 18 humans stranded on an island in the middle of a storm and the audience is invited to try to work out the mystery of what happened.

As the story progresses the audience are presented with a number of different possibilities, each an in-universe attempt to rationalize the tragedy that took place and killed all but two members of the Ushiromiya family.

It is eventually revealed that to the eyes of the world, no more than 18 humans were on the island that weekend and only one returned to their life afterwards. Some in the world have been quite focused on working out what happened during that weekend.

It's a complicated narrative that has multiple layers and each layer communicates not only with the audience reading the game but an audience of people in-universe trying to solve the mystery as well. When we first experienced the game we had joked that it was sold to us as Anime Homestuck but it ended up being Anime House of Leaves.

The easiest way to describe the narrative structure is that the first 7 episodes of the game, each containing about 20 hours of narrative, have within them a fictionalized version of events written in-universe by people who may or may not have been present at the event with episode 8 is mostly its own thing. To explain in further detail would distract. The point is Umineko is a complicated narrative and there is too much to cover a play-by-play.

The narrative is intentionally convoluted and contradictory with part of the fun of playing the game being to work out what events are true and what the rules are for discerning "magic" from "truth".

Even with a concept as seemingly opaque as Truth, there is the often quoted "Without love it cannot be seen" motif, that our emotional connection to events will always color how we interpret events.

The story is remarkably long. How Long To Beat puts each half of the game up at about 60 hours. So that's 120 hours of pure reading with very little gameplay.

There are multiple plural characters ("Oh, I am one yet many", indeed) and we shall discuss them in due course, but for clarity I wish to focus my discussion today upon the relationship between a survivor and their histories. The novel has much to say on the topic.

The above image discussing the nature of truth is from Episode 4, the chapter where the protagonist is Ange Ushiromiya. Younger sister of the protagonist of the first Episodes, Battler Ushiromiya.

Ange, 6 years old at the time, was sick on the weekend of October 4th 1986 and was not present on the island for the massacre. One weekend she had a full and lively family and then in the span of a single week everyone she had a connection to was killed in unknowable circumstances, she was whisked away to live with her aunt, the sole survivor of the tragedy, and would live the life of a cursed child, forever haunted by the tragedy that stole away her life.

Ange's story takes place in "The World of 1998" where she seeks The Truth. She states multiple times how she is incapable of going on with her life until she knows The Truth.

The events of 1986 are presented via "forgeries", published stories which tell the story of the 1986 tragedy utilizing facts that are known about the family. Ange pours through them, attempting to uncover the truth. She suspects her aunt may be responsible. Why wouldn't she harbor suspicions? Aunt Eva was the only one of the no more than 18 humans to leave the island and became the sole inheritor of the Ushiromiya family fortune.

Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is formed when an individual endures long-lasting and repeated bouts of ongoing trauma, typically in childhood. Survivors often find themselves caught in an inescapable cycle of grieving that lasts months and years beyond the loss and remains fresh and raw in spite of the time and changes that have occurred since the event. The individual is tethered to the past by an inability to move on from their loss. In psychology this is referred to as Complicated Grief and though it is most commonly discussed with death, it can present itself for grieving lost time, stolen youth and lives unlived.

Ange is riddled with Complicated Grief. Her story takes place 12 years after the events on the island of Rokkenjima and yet she constantly tells those around her that she is unable to live without knowing the truth. Ange's unprocessed grief is unearthed when her aunt, the only survivor of the massacre, passes away while maliciously refusing to give Ange any insight into the truth that she alone knew, twisting the knife as she turned over the family fortune to a child that was not her own beloved George.

Ange's sole reason for existing is to make peace with the tragedy of her past and Eva's final act was to tell her she would never have it and would instead live a cursed life of a victim in the public's eye. Eternally scrutinized and criticized.

Ange, now knowing that the only chance she had to be given the truth and still feeling that she needs it in order to live her life, runs away and starts a journey to either make peace with her tortured past or end her own life.

Ange's suicidal tendencies are played up dramatically and much of the final episode is the conflict between Ange's inability to live with her grief being played out in hyperbolic fiction. The stakes of the story amounting to "will she be able to live after learning The Truth."

But what is Truth? Would learning who is responsible for her family's death truly give her peace or would it only serve to trap her further in her endless cycle of grief?

Trauma therapy tends not to focus on Talk Therapy for the most part as such therapy indulges a survivor to dwell on their unprocessed traumas and will only serve to retraumatize the client. In many cases it is detrimental to perform Motivational Interviewing (reflective statements designed to display to a client that the clinician is listening and interpreting their words without offering direct guidance or intervention) or Rogerian "person centered" (a similar tactic designed to keep a client talking without engaging in a back-and-forth, every reply should be a prompt that inspires the client to continue sharing without boundaries and reach their own conclusions) techniques.

The reason why is that these forms of therapy have a belief that "the client holds all of the answers" and the clinician's job is to let the client get out of their own way and walk towards the answer. It is a solutions based therapy where the client is trusted to clear cognitive distortions and navigate around mental blocks between themselves and what they need.

Ange's stated goals are far from healthy.

In survivors their Core Beliefs are informed by their trauma. Those who were raised in a house of neglect may have an unresolved core belief that they are unworthy of love, those who feel shame and guilt for what happened/how they were treated may have a belief that "I should have..." - A helpful list of common negative core beliefs and positive beliefs that can be instilled, click here.

Trauma therapy contains an element of identifying these beliefs and where they originated and working to overcome them. There are many different therapies in the world that attempt to do this but they all include some element of processing trauma, accepting trauma and committing to the future.

In Ange's case she does not need to know what happened in order to live. She has to accept what happened and live.

To make this clear, should Ange learn what is presented to be The Truth it will break her and she will be unable to accept it and in doing so ends up unable to live.

All of this is a prologue to talk about acceptance and our emotional connection to memory.

Prior to Eva's death, Ange was raised in a boarding school where she was ruthlessly bullied by the other students. Both Ange and her aunt are in the public eye for the scandal associated with the Rokkenjima massacre and Eva actively despises Ange and refuses to give her the care, nurture and privilege that the other students of the rich academy enjoy.

She lives a lonely and cursed life. Her one solace is getting to find time alone to sit and read her cousin Maria's "Grimoire", her journal. When she reads the journal she can clearly picture her cousin in her mind and interact with her. A form of "magic" that Maria taught Ange back when the two of them were friends, prior to the massacre in which Maria lost her life. In the past Maria had created a magical society called Mariage Sorciere and Ange was one of the members before being excommunicated.

We'll discuss it further in a while however while introducing Maria I wish to note that she was most likely forming a dissociative disorder prior to the massacre. The series writer Ryukishi07 was a social worker prior to his career in visual novels. He does a remarkably good job of displaying how abusive and neglectful family dynamics can impact a young mind. Maria, despite being 9 years old, has speech patterns linked to an infant's maturity, she often switches into a "witch" persona and she will hold up her stuffed animals and voice out their speech, treating them like separate individuals. She is bullied at school and her mother hits her when she does this but she is incapable of acting any other way. It's who she is.

A small portion of the second chapter even having some of the cousins stop to discuss the possibility that her overactive imagination and play-acting may contain elements of dissociative identity disorder. It's never fully confirmed and she dies at age 9, but Ryukishi07 displays a convincing depiction of extreme childhood neglect that would lead to a severe dissociative disorder had she have grown up.

We learn throughout the story that her journal contains sketches of many magical entities impressed upon the servants of the island and toys that Maria has. These entities becoming the magical cast of the "Gameboard".

Though not the focus of this particular essay, each episode of the game is depicted as a chess match between a game master (representing the author of a murder mystery) and an opponent (representing the reader trying to solve the mystery) and these matches take place in a world of purgatory. This world is populated by a magical cast of characters each of whom is paired with a member of the mundane cast on the island.

The game often repeats that it takes "two to create a universe". There needs to be one to imagine it and one to perceive it and mark it as real. This is displayed on the gameboard but it is also displayed with the way that for every imagined character who exists as part of the magical cast, there is the one who imagines and then there is one who their imagination is displayed onto.

Maria is a child of extreme neglect, as we will discuss soon, she had no one to displace her imagination upon (spare for her mother who she imagined as being possessed by an evil witch when she became violently abusive) and so she imbued life into her toys. Bringing Sakutarou, her stuffed lion doll, and her band of toy rabbits to life. This earned her the title "Witch of origins".

The magic in the game's universe operates on a rule that "it takes two to create a universe" logic. The concepts of Magic and Love being intertwined. "Without love it cannot be seen" has many meanings but in terms of creation it means that anyone can apply "the anti-magic toxin" of mistrust/disbelief by simply rejecting another person's reality.

So much of the magic and love in this world is built on trust and being able to believe in that which is shared. The concept is explored from many angles throughout the game, Episode 6 focusing on love in the form of trust between a writer and a reader and the contract between them requiring a murder mystery to be solvable and for a reader to earnestly engage with the fiction and accept it as it is written.

Within Mariage Sorciere, this love is to accept that the characters and imaginings of its members. To be a member is to accept all as it is presented. Sakutarou is a magical lion boy who speaks. To doubt this is to be excommunicated from the order, which is why Ange was kicked out of the witches alliance. To say Sakutarou wasn't real was tantamount to trying to kill him.

Maria's love is without doubt. In Episode 7 we learn that she is not capable of viewing people as anything more than how they present to the world. Her imagination paints how she perceives the world. When her mother's behavior drastically shifts when she enters a violent and abusive rage she firmly believes that her mother has been possessed by a cruel witch.

When a familiar adult approaches her speaking as the Golden Witch Beatrice, she does not see the adult. She only sees Beato. This is vital to her testimony throughout the game regarding the murder mysteries.

One last thing I wish to go over during this analysis of Ange and Maria and their relationship to their traumatic childhoods. That is the title of witch.

By now I hope it's been made clear that magic is imagination and love is trust. Whether it be testimony being believed, the contract between author and reader or the inner reality of one being seen and regarded and acknowledged by another.

As someone with DID, I like this concept a lot. It would be so easy to simply dismiss our condition and the presentations. But with love it can be seen.

The game shows a number of different types of witch. From the witch of origins who can make new imaginings that do not require another person to validate them to the Golden witch who has enough money to make reality via sheer financial coercion or the witch of truth who can make reality by asserting it to be so or witch of resurrection who can keep those who died alive in their memory.

Each witch is using their magical ability to "create" by taking their imagination and moving it out into the world. The Witch of Truth is a detective whose deductions are believed to be fact even if the accused disagrees. The Golden Witch can take any scheme or desire and pay people to make it a reality.

And Ange, the Witch of Resurrections, can bring back the dead by remembering them and keeping their voices in her heart. They live on in her writing. In her words. In her memory. So when she reads Maria's journal she can bring the Maria of 1986 into the world of 1998. When she reads of Maria's magical companions they can accompany her.

With this context, we return to Ange in her teen years.

Lonely and consumed by grief she is only able to find solace in imagining Maria with her, imagining Maria having forgiven her for saying Sakutarou wasn't real.

As she accepts the role of apprentice witch she is allowed to perceive Maria and her menagerie of imaginary friends.

Though there's a certain amount of strain and physical discomfort in maintaining the thought process of so many at once. Maria is able to do it remarkably easy but Ange has to struggle.

It's okay, Ange, dissociation headaches are an absolute bitch. They get better after a certain amount of stabilizing and communication work.

All the while she reads about Maria's home life.

To break the essay structure and be real for a moment. This segment hit me hard. I choked up crying and needed to take a break from the game for a while. The depiction of child neglect and abuse was too real and I feel it serves the fiction to depict it as such but it is a hard read. Please be kind to yourself as you read on.

Rosa Ushiromiya is the youngest of the Ushiromiya children, furthest from the inheritance and least respected of Kinzo's progeny. She likely suffered a large amount of abuse and neglect in her own childhood both physical from the eldest sibling, Kraus, emotional/psychological from her sister Eva and a combination of both from her other brother Rudolf.

Children raised in abusive households are more likely to develop personality disorders born from attachment trauma. A typical display of this is dichotomous thinking, praising and devaluing the same subject in waves based on stimulus. Within Borderline Personality Disorder, for instance, this is where the concept of Splitting and Black and White Thinking come from.

For Rosa, this manifests with her mood swings that have her violently scream and hit her daughter before lavishing her with apologies, affection and attention.

Every character in Umineko is burdened with a painful past. Each character feels the need to displace that pain outwards and project it onto other people. For instance Rosa displaces her pain onto Maria. Both of Ange's aunts displace theirs onto her. Kyrie displaces hers onto Battler.

Generational trauma is a heavy theme of this game.

Rosa makes her way as the head of a small fashion design label though she does not see a lot of success in her role. Early in adulthood she had a relationship that ended with her pregnant with Maria. Maria's father, upon learning of the pregnancy, left.

Rosa is young, lonely and feels that having a child makes it difficult for her to find love; in the time and culture of 1980s Japan being a single mother was seen as shameful. She finds that the best way she is able to date is to act like she does not have a daughter and take extended vacations across the country on weekends with her dates.

Leaving her daughter home alone.

Rosa has a number of hang-ups about the optics of leaving Maria in someone else's care, she is shown on multiple occasions in the story to fly into a rage when her ability to be a parent is put into question and she has massive cognitive dissonance in that she cannot bare to be seen as a bad mother and so she acts like a horrible mother to avoid looking bad.

I have seen a lot of debate on the logic here and first off, anyone who approaches this story with a view of "it does not make sense that a character acted this way" lacks the Love required to enjoy this story in full. The author enters a firm agreement with the audience to work within the confines of the fiction and not to disrespect the fiction by rejecting that which is offered. He will deceive us but never lie. In that we have to believe in the story.

But it's also a sign of those who have grown up with a proud optics obsessed parent and those who did not. Sad to say, I have experienced a few of the things which happen in this chapter and I have no doubt that Ryukishi07 saw some of it in his social worker career.

When Rosa leaves Maria alone at home, for days at a time, she orders her to never make anyone aware of her situation. More important than anything else never speak to the police about what goes on in this house.

That. I have lived that one.

What Ange reads and what Maria shows us in this episode is a weekend where Maria is home alone, her mother having forgotten a promise that was made to her and Maria is locked out of her house. She spends an entire evening searching for the lost key and eventually needs to seek a friendly store worker who recognizes her to get help.

This leads to police intervention, a social worker showing up at Rosa's house and...

I glossed over a lot. This is a dense book and this story takes up much of Episode 4. Suffice to say, Maria's friend Sakutarou was murdered in retaliation for Maria summoning attention of Rosa's bad parenting. Rosa abandoned her daughter for a full weekend after breaking a promise and when she was locked out and defenseless she asked for help and was violently punished for doing so.

Another function of the witch of origins is the ability to break the cycle of generational abuse. She does not take her pain and push it into someone else, she creates an imagined evil mother to hate and fear while continuing to love her 'real' mother. This way she never has to doubt the love she has for the mother who she has happy memories of and who custom crafted a lovely plush lion just for her.

Which leads to the discussion of trauma, memory and processing.

Ange, upon reading this story is crestfallen. She views Maria as a pitiable child, only to be confronted by MARIA who defends Rosa. Arguing that she legitimately forgot her promise, rather than deciding that her daughter was not worth the time or effort.

She claims constantly that Rosa is a good mother and that she is happy.

Maria, a being who can only view the world with love, despite being abused and hurt; chose to be happy and so through her magic it was so. She was happy.

There's a misconception I have seen and I will admit I held for myself upon reading Episode 4 that Maria was preaching to deceive ones own self in order to be happy. That it was enabling and accepting of her own abuse.

But this is actually one of the deepest things Umineko has to say about generational trauma...

Chapter 8 revisits the idea with a version of the gameboard where the Ange of 1986 is allowed to be on the island, something which was impossible because in truth she was not. Not even the witch of miracles could change that which is certain.

In this game, set by Ange's older brother BATTLER, the 6 year old Ange is treated to a fun halloween party with her aunt Eva run by her loving family. Throughout the entire story Grandfather Kinzo was made out to be the source of all evil and in this episode he is displayed as a kind and loving grandfather.

The entire reason I wanted to write this post and include it in my Media, Myself and I series (in lieu of discussing the overt plurality in the game, even) was due to a conversation Ange has with Battler about this deception.

Source: LP Archives - The full conversation can be found on this page for anyone who wants the full breakdown.

The entire story of Umineko is a struggle for those who experienced horrors to be able to come to terms with their memories and process them. This is true for Ange, it is true for Maria and it is true for the other members of the cast also.

Memory is malleable and uncertain and can and does become distorted due to understandings and contexts gained at a later stage, particularly when bias is in play.

For a graphic of how this works please look at this:

Source

The more a memory is reactivated the more it is eroded of its initial context and additional contexts bleed in. For Ange's circumstance she remembers her parents through the lens of knowing that her father was embroiled in legal troubles from his womanizing behavior. It is unlikely a 6 year old Ange remembers Rudolf in this light but her view of her father is painted through this lens and thus when she retrieves these memories the present context forces itself into the past.

This is just how the human mind works.

EMDR and other trauma treatments are focused on hijacking this system. When a traumatic memory plays out the amygdala processes the emotions and sense of danger which activates the nervous system. This process does not even require a conscious recollection; should a trauma memory be associated with a certain scent the nervous system will activate upon smelling it even if the survivor does not recall the event attached to the stimulus, the amygdala most certainly does.

I have spent too much of my life considering which of our memories had lavender scenting…

For EMDR the process involves retrieving the traumatic memory without allowing the client to reexperience it while ensuring they do so within the context of the present while highlighting safety and security. This allows the memory to be filtered through without the activating the nervous system. In some therapies this can be a process of re-parenting in which the emotional absence is provided either by the self or via a proxy. The idea is to allow the memory to break association with the trauma and be decontextualize until the memory no longer has negative associations.

Where I had assumed Maria's choice to be happy and think the best of her abuser was an act of enabling and self-deception, I now see was an attempt to stop dwelling on the negatives of the situation and allowing the past trauma to become a defining point within the present.

Maria cannot choose what happened to her. She can choose how she intends to live with what happened with her. She cannot know for certain what Rosa's motivation was in her actions. In fact as we go through the game the audience comes to be given some sympathetic information which though can never redeem Rosa's terrible parenting, can allow one inclined to feel sympathy for her. Like everyone else in the game, she's a victim too. Quite literally in 1986.

There's no way of knowing if she maliciously lied to her child and went off on vacation abandoning her or if she legitimately forgot her promise. No one is arguing that what Rosa did was forgivable. But it helps Maria continue living a happy existence knowing that she was loved and that the good memories she has of her mother are true, even if the bad ones are also true.

Maria, filled with love as she is, elected to see The Good Mommy and The Bad Mommy. Is this right or wrong? It's unimportant. What matters is if Maria can be happy.

Sakutarou was a stuffed lion said to be handcrafted by Rosa. Given as a gift and beloved above all things for Maria. When Rosa destroyed the Sakutarou doll the lion cub boy died and could not be resurrected by Beatrice because it was a unique item created by Rosa.

In Chapter 4's conclusion, Ange does the impossible and resurrects Sakutarou. She does this because Sakutarou was never a custom made doll crafed with love. He was a mass produced toy sold in travel gift stores that Rosa happened to pick up on her way home. She lied. Ange never tells Maria this. The miracle of Sakutarou's rebirth is enough. Knowing that the beloved handmade toy was not hand-crafted would not make Maria's life any better. Sometimes believing in magic is the best thing for someone living in a world painted by despair.

Funny that Ange understood that much for Maria and yet still sought after the One Truth up until the very end.

The finale of the game comes down to presenting this option to the player and by proxy Ange herself.

In a world where you cannot change the past and you cannot fully accept what happened, is it better to continue digging up the past and re-experiencing the trauma in hopes that there lays a truth that will make it all finally make sense or to try to make peace with the past and find moments of peace to hold onto. Holding to hate and pain only serves to bring the pain of the past into the present.

Ange, the witch of resurrection, has the ability to keep her family with her long after their death. Should she be haunted by the family that she was deprived or be happy for the limited memories she had and not be tethered to a world of the past she could never have possibly been part of.

Healing in Umineko is accepting love and making peace with loss. It is learning to live unburdened by tragedy and do the best with what was done to us.

If we cannot let go then we'll continue living in the world of the past turning over the events over and over trying to make sense of it and even if we are somehow granted the magical context, the one and only shining truth... it will only serve to make things worse. You can keep the past alive without letting the past control your future.

And Umineko does a remarkably good job of showing that.

Gosh... that took far longer than I'd hoped. Umineko is a difficult piece of fiction to type about because so much of it is subjective and hard to present to a broad audience without providing ample context.

I'd hoped to talk about Yasu's DID but I suppose that shall have to await another update. My original draft for this discussion was to discuss the different forms of dissociative amnesia with Ange's story serving as an example of how recontextualizing memory works. I may yet go back and do a full amnesia based ramble in the coming months. I just needed to get at least one aspect of Umineko drafted as it's been living rent free in my brain since December.

If you enjoyed this breakdown and found it interesting, please check out some of my other Media, Myself and I essays.

Derealization in Night in the Woods and Metal gear Solid 2 - Describing the sensation of derealization where the brain stops connecting associations between the self and the things one perceives in their surroundings. One example displaying how this impacts a person living with DPDR and the other showing an example of a game attempting to make a player share the experience with the player character.

DID and the healing process in Mr. Robot - A run down of the experiences of discovery, exploration, rejection and healing within DID as displayed in each season of Mr. Robot, along with a disappointed rundown of why the final episode fumbled the ball.

Bruce Banner and the roles of his alters - A breakdown of the formation of The Incredible Hulk's DID and what roles his many alters play.

Romantic relationships with systems - A look at the marriage between Bruce Banner and Betty Talbot-Ross Banner in Hulk comics and a frank discussion between Betty and one of Bruce's alters about how relationships function in a system.

Personality Play in Penlight - A review of one of the routes for a hypnokink visual novel called Penlight in which the protagonist hypnotizes a woman to have an alter personality, along with some descriptions of how dangerous play like that works in real life and what the consequences could be.

#dawn posting #umineko #ange ushiromiya #maria ushiromiya #ahaha.wav #media myself and i #media essays

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fruitbowlsngoals · 2 months ago

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So how all the Little guys meet is actually a convoluted mess of events but I'm going to try and put it in order , this all might be a little off and things might get changed in the future but this is it for the most part

Information is under the cut of course !

I'm always more than happy to share and talk about this Au as it lives rent free in my brain

↓

At some point after Ashe's wings grow in Trick decides neither of them need to be in that lab and that Mark is taking too long. So Tricks breaks out, grabs Ashe and takes them with, absconds into the woods, and settles into a clearing with a nice little cave where it and it's little sister can live until further notice they kinda just stay there. Ashe and Trick go about exploring their new surroundings together and separately. (Mark is infact searching for his kids).

Vyncent just lives in the woods and is more than happy to explore a place that's bigger than him, (he doesn't really have a lot of supervision when he explores), so he's wondering, exploring and getting the zoomies out when he ends up literally running into Dakota.

Dakota was out skating down a path so he could better his reaction time and balance and well his reaction time could use some work but seeing a purple blur dash across the path is not something you expect to see ever. Immediately seeing that Vyncent is very similar to Professor cross, so he tries to make friends .

Vynce doesn't exactly understand (language barrier) and bolts for it, Dakota of course follows because his thought process is “Oh, Tag? Hide and seek? One of those games? Okay chill, we're friends now.”

Dakota and Vyncent end up toppling into William. William ended up out here thanks to Clarence and his mild insistence that William should come for a walk in the woods with him ( Secret Whisperer training). William sheltered nervous and all around startled attempts to hide behind Clarence.

Dakota once again initiates a friendship. These are the first actual kids he's gotten to interact with since the lab. William reluctantly agrees with some encouragement from Clarence, and Vyncent is just standing there awkwardly being dragged along for the ride . They all hear some quiet laughing from the treeline and William wanting to investigate a mystery heads off in the direction the other two following along until they all end up in the Trick and Ashe's little clearing. (To Tricks dismay).

Ashe was the one watching them and they all start slowly becoming friends making excuses to hang out , and get to know each other.

#prime defenders #ashe winters #jrwi #jrwi prime defenders #just roll with it #william wisp #dakota cole #pd little guy au #jrwi ashe #jrwi ashe winters #jrwi dakota #jrwi vyncent #vyncent sol #virion sol #william jrwi #jrwi william

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bp-zb1fics · 1 year ago

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Tall & Handsome & wants birthday kisses

pairing: ricky x reader

genre: highschool au (same verse as shy, shy, shy), fluff, romantic tropes

tw/tags: longtime friends, birthdays, coming of age vibes, a lot of banter, feels, cuteness, vandalism of school property, gyuvin will be fine, violent thoughts that are mostly unserious, many kisses, rizzky

wc: 1128

summary: for ricky, the best birthdays are spent with you

a/n happy ricky day~ little late here but it's 520 somewhere ~

Read part 1 here~

“You know I’m going to miss you right?”

You’re 12. It’s Ricky’s last birthday with you before his family moves and puts oceans and time zones between your friendship.

“We have each other’s SNS,” he points out. “You already made me promise to send pictures when the plane lands. Don’t make it weird.”

“But I will,” you insist. “I’m just saying, you know, it’s going to be weird not seeing your ugly face all the time.”

“You’re ugly,” he retorts because puberty is starting to get to the both of you, making it awkward and strange in ways where only you can understand what the other is going through.

“I hope you stay ugly forever.”

“Take that back.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Nope.” You have the audacity to make a face at him.

“Take it back.”

“Okay, tell me you’ll miss me too.”

“Ugh, you’re so annoying.”

“Say it or I won’t take it back and you’ll just be ug-”

“Okay, okay, fine.”

You look at him expectantly, arms crossed over your chest with the most infuriating expression that a 12 year old can muster on your face. He takes a deep breath, staring back at you.

“I’ll miss you.”

“Really? Is that it?”

“Did you ask me to say anything else? I said it.” Okay fair enough.

“Fine. I knew you’d miss me anyways.”

God, you’re annoying. It’s even more annoying when you give him your gift and it’s an amazingly huge sketchbook along with a pizza-themed birthday card where you’ve written too many words for him to even read in one sitting. And it’s the most annoying when Ricky gets off the plane and he’s in his new bedroom in his new house and he realises that-

-well, he actually really misses you too.

__________________________________________

“Happy 16th, Ricky-ah!”

It’s been four years since Ricky’s had a birthday with you beyond the greeting messages you’d send, maybe a short call if the timing is right.

It’s absolute chaos. (But that’s mostly Gyuvin and Junhyeon’s fault)

Somehow, they’ve managed to turn his desk into a- he didn’t even know what to call it. Black construction taped over the top, someone (definitely Gyuvin) managed to hang silver streamers right from the ceiling above and his chair completely covered in gold foil and shiny red cellophane in some sort of convoluted throne.

They also tried to surprise him when he walked into the classroom but jokes on them, Ricky learned how to hold a poker face and keep himself from flinching a long time ago. Probably from that time when you were 10 and made a game out of who could give each other the bigger scare. It was stupid. So stupid that Ricky decided to learn how to do that because you were so cute when you were frustrated.

Oh cute what? He’s pretty sure 10 year old Ricky didn’t have any reasoning like that.

He’s just letting you put that silly plastic crown on him because he’s nice and it’s been awhile and he doesn’t want you whining about it to him the whole day. Nevermind that the look he gives Gyuvin promises blood, murder and death if the other boy so much as said anything.

(Gyuvin says something anyway, Ricky’s really going to punch him one day no he isn’t )

You even get him one of those little cakes from that convenience store and cafe near your school. It’s your lunch break and you’re leading the birthday song, sitting across from him, clapping your hands as Gyuvin, Junhyeon and even Gunwook decide to try and do their own harmonic rendition.

“Make a wish, Ricky-ah~”

Maybe Ricky’s definitely deaf from Junhyeon’s creative decision to belt the song out at maximum volume. Maybe his fist is twitching in an effort to resist the urge to sock the shit-eating grin off of Gyuvin’s face. But suddenly, all he can see is how your eyes shine, even if that’s probably from the light or the glow of the candle.

Ricky makes a wish and he realises that-

-well he might actually like you more than he thinks. (And by more than he thinks, yes, like more than friends).

__________________________________________

“So now will you tell me what birthday gift you want?”

Your boyfriend gives you that coy look which honestly, you don’t know how he’s capable of doing at your young age.

It’s been pretty great so far. You had birthday lunch with the dog mafia, their unofficially adopted children and a few other friends at Ricky’s favourite pizza place. And you’ll have dinner with his family later.

Right now, you’re at his house, lazing the afternoon away because Ricky had insisted on spending time together, just the two of you. Honestly, you’re pretty sure he was about one more side comment away from actually strangling Gyuvin if you hadn’t tugged him away.

“Remember when I turned 12 and you called me ugly?”

“Eh, all of a sudden?”

“You never took it back.”

The incredulity of your stare is very much felt by both of you. Dumbfounded, literally.

“What- are you- is this for real? You’re kidding me right?”

He takes your hands in his, pulling you towards him so you’re staring right at each other. You tilt your head back, seriously he needs to stop with the rizz.

“Take it back.”

“Seriously?”

“Take it back.”

“Okay, okay I'll take it back. God, anything else you want?”

He leans in, pressing his lips to yours. You jump a little, not exactly expecting that. And then you melt. He pulls back, leaving a hint of strawberry and the smell of his cologne.

“19.”

“What?”

“I want 19 of that for my birthday.” He’s managed to keep a completely straight face but you have eyes and the pink on his cheek and at the tip of his ears is definitely not a trick of the light. Well, two can play a game.

You lean forward, cup his face in between your palms and peck him on the nose a few times, giggling.

One. Two. Three. Four.

You press light ones over each eyelid, propping yourself up to kiss his foreheads, littering small ones all over his cheeks.

Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. Four-

Maybe you lose count at some point, your lips lingering over his, soft and sweet. You playfully bite at his bottom lip before pulling back to look at him. He’s definitely trying not to smile too much.

“For the record, I never really thought you were ugly.”

“I know.” Your nose scrunches up and he kisses the corner of your mouth.

“You’re lucky it’s your birthday”

“Ah, so can I have 19 more?”

Honestly? He can have all the kisses he wants. Even on days that aren’t his birthday.

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williamvapespeare · 2 months ago

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WIP/word game

tagged by @babyseraphim :) Thank you so much! Using this to inspire me to keep pouring my cancellation heartbreak into Dead Boys fic...

Rules: you will be given a word. share one sentence/excerpt from your wip(s) that start with each letter of that word. my word was SOUL

S - from a fic I started in a rage after the cancellation news. it's a missing scene from ep 8 immediately after they leave Esther's and it's just all my gritty gay sadness thrown on a page ft. Orbwin appearance. maybe i'll post it today or tomorrow (lol sorry)

“...S’alright, then. There’s a good lad.” Edwin’s mouth feels dry and strange, as if he’s gone too long without water. Only Edwin is a ghost and he does not need water. He swallows down his first attempt at speech when it sticks in his throat. Tries again, “Charles?”

O - again from the gritty gay sadness fic

Only he doesn’t get far before Charles rocks back on his heels, moving both the burn and the comforting warmth of his body out of Edwin’s reach. Something about it tears a little more at the raw place inside.

U - From an upcoming David Bowie chapter, you know the drill, it'll be up eventually. Thank you for bearing with me on that one, it's just a surprisingly intense story <3

Upstairs is still quiet, still soft. Charles can’t deal with quiet like this at the best of times. He’s always preferred to be surrounded: by people, noise, energy, by the thwack of a cricket bat. His mind gets loud when he leaves it alone for too long, silent and waiting.

L - back to the missing scene fic again

Like the legwork at the start of a particularly convoluted case, he takes stock.

The word I choose is: GHOST

I tag: @dont-offend-the-bees , @arisprite , @manicpixiedreamedwins , @lesamis if any of you desire :)

#thank you!!! :)#my fic #fic game #dead boy detectives #payneland #i'm devastated lads are you devastated?

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oodlyenough · 1 year ago

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I haven't bothered with posts about the anime episodes because for the most part they've been like... fine to moderately amusing and there's not really anything to say beyond that. 2x06 Sound the Turnabout Melody (what a title) was uh not like that lmao so

started off strong with that terrible Wright & Co commercial. god bless you Maya.

ever since they introduced the concept of the friendship keychains I've been wondering if Larry still has his or if Larry is a normal person and the keychains are a consequence of Phoenix and Edgeworth specifically being Like That.

I thought s1 really tried to be like "a no homo trio of besties!!!" so I assumed it was likely Larry did. instead not even 3 years later Larry is like "lmao you still have that?" and Phoenix is both embarrassed and defensive which is much better and funnier than I expected from this show lmfao god bless

Larry discovering girls while Phoenix is STILL thinking about Miles and then deciding to dedicate songs on the radio to him fahfkdhlhkhglh .... incredible. showstopping

the dedication just kept going and going, too. i thought it would end with like, 'to signal red from signal blue' but it went on and on. i know she read page one of his ten page letter. didn't even mention the illustrated annexes of red and blue holding hands 😔

edgeworth thanking phoenix aloud and meanwhile phoenix sensing a disturbance in the force and turning around to look ... lmaoooooooo?!?!?... I mean even by the high bar set by their game canon I was pretty stunned

the flipside of all the crazy but believably IC baby narumitsu stuff was I found the Von Karma stuff all kind of weird and not particularly believable/IC

I appreciate the anime making it unambiguous that Edgeworth was raised by MVK, I feel like in the games there's a bit of vagueness for no real reason despite it being the most logical explanation for everything. so that was nice. but:

as hilariously cruel as it is to imagine MVK raising this kid for three years before turfing him to an orphanage, even applying 5d chess psychological torment logic I can't really make sense of that. why would he wait that long lol. why would he have taken miles in to begin with if not part of a long-term scheme.

baby franziska was cute as hell but i think she was too nice. i totally believe she'd be obsessed with her new little brother and want his attention/approval/etc. i ...don't really believe she's emotionally equipped to go about it so sweetly, lol.

miles' prosecutor vs defense ambition arc was convoluted to me, and an example where i feel like the games already gave us reason enough for the switch (the idea that greg's murderer got away + mvk's influence) without the anime now presenting something that makes less sense. (i'm still playing AAI but i sense i'll have similar criticisms of it, as in, "you're offering me a new explanation that makes less sense than the original". a common issue for prequel media.)

the cravat-giving scene felt like it was presented very earnestly despite being objectively kind of creepy given, you know, everything.

dog person miles edgeworth REAL

why'd they name that puppy napalm 😭😭😭😭

oh most importantly THE EPISODE TAG?? LMAO? edgeworth giving them the only like on their commercial why can't i find a clip or gifset of it the people need to know NEVERMIND @camalyng has bravely answered the call with a gifset

#ace attorney #oodly watches AA #i didn't expect i'd need so many variations on those tags but here we are. the sprawling AA media empire #narumitsu

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lilyginnyblackv2 · 7 months ago

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More and more sources are starting to talk about a potential Kingdom Hearts movie.

The above image is a tweet from The Hollywood Handle stating: A 'KINGDOM HEARTS' movie is rumored to be in development at Disney. Their source is The DisInsider, which I will link to below in the comments section. The image they show is of the KH1 cover.

Now, I'm someone who is actually fairly intrigued by the idea, but I do think that (if they wanted to follow the series from Sora's POV) than a TV series would be the better option than a movie. Afterall, a movie is very limiting in its runtime.

There are some fans out there that think that, if this movie turns out to be true, it would be something connected to Union X or the mobile games, take place after KH4, or just be an original story that takes place between games (vaguely). But...let's be honest, it is going to be an adaptation of KH1. That makes the most sense as a way to appeal to the masses and introduce a whole new subset of potential fans and viewers to the franchise and series as whole.

When I looked at the comments, tweets, retweets, quotes, etc. on this above tweet talking about a potential and rumored KH movie, everyone is assuming that the movie would be from Sora's POV and that Sora would be the lead like in the games. But, what if they were to shake things up a bit?

What if a potential movie adaptation of KH1 followed Riku instead of Sora? It would make sense in a lot of ways:

Riku interacts solely with Disney characters. Sora interacts with Disney and Square characters (in KH1, Riku does eventually interact with some square characters like TWEWY characters, but if I was adapting the KH games into a movie franchise, I would keep the adaptations to KH1, COM, and KH2 only. It ends nicely with 2 and doesn't get too convoluted yet). But, getting back on track, this movie adaptation would be a Disney movie. So keeping the focus more on Disney only would make the most sense.

Riku interacts with the Disney villains, who have a HUGE appeal to many people, especially the Disney Renaissance villains and classic villains like Maleficent.

Riku visits Disney worlds, but not nearly as many as Sora in KH1. His story is also more focused and easier to condense down into a two hour movie, a two hour movie told from Sora's POV would require a lot more cutting down.

A KH1 retelling from Riku's POV would freshen up the experience for long time KH fans. It would make the movie a more interesting and unique experience. Plenty of fans have also expressed interest in the past of seeing the series / games from Riku's POV.

It would allow the movie to go darker and do something a bit different from the usual Disney formula.

This rumor may amount to nothing, and this speculation on my part will likely remain nothing more than a pipedream, but approaching a KH1 movie adaptation from this angle would actually be really interesting to me and hold a lot of potential to do something a bit out of the box. So, it will probably never happen, but I wanted to share my thoughts on this regardless. Feel free to add anything you want to this as well (additional thoughts, tags, comments, etc.).

#KH #Kingdom Hearts #Riku #Sora #Soriku #Disney #rumors #speculation #if they did this #it would be easier to get inside Riku's head as well #and make it way more obvious that Riku is gay for Sora too #just saying!#long post

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senlinyu · 1 month ago

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Good night. From this one end of the world.

I just finished reading my first Tomione fic after months of reading Dramione. And I feel oddly satisfied. Something is def wrong with me.

Anyways. While searching the Tomione tag on Tumblr, to look at what's popular here, recs and whatnot. And some of your recs showed up, also this: that you're working on Tomione WIP. Something to look forward too. YaY.

To summarize. Congrats on Alchemized. Loved Manacled, and LTDI. That little one shot called Stupid Games was the funniest rant from Hermione's POV I've read in a while. It was fun to read her inner thoughts while not giving a damn.

Thank you. I don't know if my tomione will ever see the light of day, it was very complicated on a worldbuilding level (idk why I also have to come up with the most convoluted sociological themes for my story premises, but fml).

Stupid Games was delightfully fun to write. I really struggle with writing first person, and that time I felt like I finally started to get a handle on it because Hermione was just nuts. lmao

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caeli0306 · 3 months ago

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20 questions for writers tag game!

tagged by @widebrimmedhatsblog and @hockeyspiral23

Total number of AO3 works

Nine!

2. Total AO3 word count

287,489

3. Fandoms I've written for

Empyrean and that's literally it lol

4. Top 5 fics by kudos

Violet Sorrengail's Guide to Spinning a Scandal, castles crumbling, Tales from the Airport Bathroom, Did Someone Say Shots?, and Did Someone Say Vacation?

5. Do I respond to comments?

Yes! Sometimes it takes me longer to get to them, especially if I get a lot within a short period of time, but I always respond to comments.

6. What has the angstiest ending?

definitely the present, the past, and you in between. That was the first one shot I ever wrote and I still get comments of people being iike "bro why did you do that???"

7. What has the happiest ending?

All of my fics (except for the one mentioned above) have happy endings if they're done, more or less! If I had to choose one, I think it would be VSGTSAS.

8. Have I received hate?

Yes, once, but honestly in my line of work I get so much online hate that I just find it funny. I wrote a very sarcastic response and moved on. One of the reasons I love this fandom is because its super positive and accepting, so why dwell on the single outlier I've come across?

9. Do I write smut? And what kind?

Yes, and as of now just Riorgail

10. Do I write crossovers?

Unless you count the Top Gun AU I've been working on a crossover, then no. I think trying to mix worlds and characters would get too confusing for me, so doing an AU based on another world is about the extent for me.

11. Have I ever had a fic stolen?

As far as I know I have not! Hopefully it stays that way.

12. Have I ever had a fic translated?

Nope!

13. Have I ever co written a fic?

I have not! I feel like it would be fun though

14. What is my all time favorite ship?

Riorgail. They are my Roman Empire.

15. A WIP I'll never finish?

So I will always maintain that I will finish everything I start, but if there is any story that I think has a chance of not getting finished, it's Swan Song. I haven't had the inspiration to write it for a while, and my backlog just keeps getting longer. I hope I'll get around to finishing it eventually, but it won't be for a long time.

16. Writing strengths?

I've been told that I write angst well, and that I'm good at writing tension between characters. Personally, I think my ability to research (thank you journalism) and write things as close to realistically as I possibly can is my greatest strength. Not kidding when I say I had a 15 page document of job descriptions for senate office staffers that I got from a friend who works on the Hill back when I was working on VSGTSAS and that bad boy was open the entire time I was writing chapter 4.

17. Writing weaknesses?

I think I struggle to describe movement and action in a way that isn't repetitive, and sometimes my writing sounds a bit robotic (thank you journalism). I also think sometimes my sentences can get a bit convoluted.

18. Do I like foreign language dialogue?

I'm not sure - I don't think I've read any fics with that.

19. First fandom I wrote for?

Empyrean!

20. Favorite fic I've written?

This is like asking me to pick a favorite child. I'm going to include Violet Sorrengail's Guide to Spinning a Scandal and castles crumbling because I love them both and they are both my favorite.

I'm tagging @skyfallscotland, @suebswrites, and @witch-and-her-witcher (unsure if any of you have already been tagged!)

#caeli's adhd thoughts #caeli's fics #fourth wing

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mrreed · 2 months ago

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an actually decent tag game

tagged by @monstraduplicia thank you <3

tagging: @humanmutate @vampvelour @a53n510n @stitchedgrave @prairietrashdotcom @loveandtolerate @gloryofnegativity and anyone else who wants to do it

Do you make your bed? - i get out of bed first every day so i dont have to. it’s @vampireassistant ‘s job, living up to his name

What's your favorite number? - 6, 5, 16

What is your job? - i sell training courses to the british government. i am subliminally controlling them. i dont think it’s working very well

If you could go back to school, would you? - done my time. nope. although i didn’t have any closure, it would be nice to go back for a semester for fun but im not too big on it

Can you parallel park? - yep and i pull it off pretty well

A job you had that would surprise people? - aside from working on film sets, i worked at royal ascot. got to see the royal family and all. boring cunts

Do you think aliens are real? - yes but i have other things to worry about right now

Can you drive a manual car? - yes i learned to drive on manual

What's your guilty pleasure? - now why should i reveal what brings me pleasure and makes me feel guilty at the same time. i dont wish to be arrested

Tattoos? - this ones funny. @vampireassistant gave me a stick and poke that’s supposed to say “property of the captain” on my inner thigh but he got too drunk halfway to finish it so now it just says “property”

Favorite color? - red, blue, black

Favorite type of music? - industrial and nu metal

Do you like puzzles? - i don’t care

Any phobias? - once again why would i reveal that

Favorite childhood sport? - i used to play basketball. i dont really know why

Do you talk to yourself? - internally yes, but that’s called having thoughts

What movies do you adore? - long and convoluted. check my letterboxed. anything rob zombie, also got fond of jack hill recently

Coffee or Tea? - coffee but i do like tea quite a lot

First thing you wanted to be when you grew up? - a mechanic. then an archeologist then a vet then a rockstar then a scientist

#tag games #text

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scarlettscribbles · 10 months ago

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semper ad meliora

PART OF neither the angels in heaven above, nor the demons by the sea DRABBLE SERIES ↠ masterlist

- Lucy Gray Baird & Daughter!OC, endgame Lucy Gray Baird x Coriolanus Snow

Summary: 2.2k words - Twenty-four District children come to the Capitol, and not for the Hunger Games.

tags-list: @cdragons

Ravinstill has lost his mind.

Coriolanus slammed open the door to his room, roughly unbuttoning his coat and throwing it to the side. A scholarship program for District children? They already had the Hunger Games to quell rebellion, Coriolanus had argued. What purpose is a scholarship program but be the antithesis of their perfectly functioning system?

Coriolanus kicked his dresser, remembering the way Ravinstill had looked down on him despite his short stature. It uncomfortably reminded him of Highbottom, the drunk, dead bastard.

“You’re a bright young man, Coriolanus Snow. One day, you will do great things.” The President of Panem had said. “But now, you need to understand that making them live in perpetual fear of losing their children is not enough to quell rebellion. Those wretched ideals live on no matter how many are reaped, and the best way to change it is to indoctrinate their youth from the beginning. Don’t you see how brilliant it would be, Coriolanus? How devastating it would be to see their own children become a part of what they are fighting against?”

By the end of the meeting, Ravinstill had a manic edge to his tone, something broken in his psyche that had begun since the day he lost his son and heir. Coriolanus thought that Ravinstill’s idea held some merit— some, not a lot. He too was curious how studying in the Capitol would affect the outlook of the children, and how it would affect the Districts in consequence. But Coriolanus also knew that by executing this new program, the Capitol would be opening themselves up for vulnerability as well.

In every way, shape, and form, the Districts were inferior, unwashed and uncouth, but they were also starving. They developed a cunning borne from sheer hunger and survival instinct. Giving them opportunity to be in the Capitol is like unleashing vermin and expecting them not to infest the city and its people.

Coriolanus was the only sane person in that council. Strabo had been in the doghouse for coming home drunk on his late son's birthday. Though why Mrs. Plinth insisted on celebrating it, he didn’t know. All Coriolanus cared was that she was upset enough that Strabo thought that getting back into her good graces was to support this endeavor. Did he mean to sponsor some poor kid from District 2 to give to his wife as an apology for not being able to protect his son?

You killed him.

Even Dr. Gaul had agreed to make room for the scholars in the Academy. Coriolanus had been counting on her to disagree. Her decision against the proposal would have stopped the entire program entirely since her position as Dean gave her considerable influence on all matters of education. Her gleeful positive vote told him that he overestimated her head for logic and thoroughly underestimated her penchant for cruelty. He could practically already hear the convoluted experiments developing in her brain.

In the end, the program was unanimously approved, with Coriolanus having been forced to vote yes lest the favor of President Ravinstill that he worked hard for vanish in an instant.

The Capitol would finalize the specifics of the scholarship program in a month, and then put out the announcement a week after. Ravinstill had tasked him with the “very important” task of overseeing the mechanics of the scholarship and vetting the sponsorship applications.

Oh joy, Coriolanus thought. At least he had the authority to put in some safeguards in place. Time would only tell if the District scholars would truly benefit the Capitol, but experience had taught him that the gap between both worlds were too distinct. Never again would Coriolanus be blindsided.

Twenty-four District children were coming to the Capitol. Twenty-four children of all ages, two from each District, each one sponsored by a Capitol citizen.

Coriolanus had not been surprised to see Tigris’ name on the list. For a moment he’d thought of denying her application, but his cousin would likely take it as some sort of indication that he was still affected by the memory of her. Ever since that day years ago when they fought outside of Tigris’ shop, she had taken it upon herself to make clever quips alluding to the past Coriolanus had already shed off himself.

Coriolanus did not care for her insipid actions. He didn't care so much that he passed off the responsibility of checking who she had chosen to sponsor to some overeager lackey. Whoever it was, they would inevitably fail. And so would his cousin.

As he walked through the familiar halls of the Academy, Coriolanus strove to clear his mind of Tigris and focus on the matter at hand. He eyed the decorations critically and politely greeted the guests making their way to the auditorium, occasionally checking the rooms to ensure that there were no stragglers.

While he deeply disapproved of the program, his perfectionism demanded that the event today must be no less than perfect.

They’d chosen the commencement ceremony to take place in the Academy instead of the Presidential Palace. It was supposed to mean something significant about education, but Coriolanus knew that Ravinstill meant it as an intentional slight. Just as the scholars’ uniform were blue in contrast to the usual red was purposefully chosen for their meaning during the Ancient Roman times. Just as the motto of the scholarship was "semper ad meliora", alluding to the children's origin.

It was rather petty and over the top, Coriolanus thought absentmindedly. Any indication of the District children’s otherness would already be present in their behavior.

Coriolanus stopped in his tracks as he heard sounds coming from the Music Room. He sighed. He had no patience for disobedient students. There was a reason why he remained a Gamemaker instead of taking the offered professorship from Dr. Gaul.

He strode into the room none too quietly, the offending student making a discordant note on the piano in shock, halting their slow play of the beginning of the “Horn of Panem.”

They were wearing blue uniform, Coriolanus observed. Already making trouble on the first day, I see.

“You’re not supposed to be here.” He said.

The girl turned to him, mouth opening and closing soundlessly. She barely looked District, cheeks full and with a healthy glow about her. Her hair was bright blonde and healthy, a color and state rarely seen outside of the Capitol. Coriolanus guessed that she might have been from one of the more wealthy Districts, perhaps 1 or 2.

“I’m sorry, sir.” He stiffened at her accent. “I got lost and found this thing. It looked too pretty to just be on display.” Her voice was soft and timid, but her excitement was not lost to him.

She began fidgeting when he failed to reply immediately. Coriolanus cleared his throat and stepped closer, looking over the shiny grand piano. It had been delivered just recently, commissioned and donated by a wealthy patron of the school. It was fully transparent and made of crystal, sectioned off in the center of the room by velvet rope barriers.

It was not meant to be played, merely to be looked at, but of course this girl would violate that. Coriolanus tried to quell the amusement he felt at her little act of rebellion, reminding himself he wanted nothing to do with that word.

The amusement came nonetheless. Just this once, he let it go. She was just a little District girl.

Coriolanus looked at her again. She was too small for the piano, feet dangling and unable to reach the pedals, but she was playing rather well for someone who most likely never had access to such an instrument before.

“You sound better than most students I’ve heard play it.” She smiled, pleased but trying to hide it, unsure about the praise coming from a stranger. Coriolanus himself was unsure why he wasn’t berating her.

He was simply saying the truth, though. Coriolanus had been required multiple times to suffer the performances of the children of his influential peers during dinners and they had not sounded half as good as this District child in front of him. The Capitol had better breeding, for certain, but it sadly did not ensure brilliance. “What’s your name?”

“A–Annabel Rose from District 12, sir.” Coriolanus had figured her origin, but hearing the confirmation still felt so damning. “And thank you. I’ve only even played guitar but the keys ain’t too hard to figure out."

"What about the song?" he asked. "I can't imagine you ever learned Horn of Panem back home."

She blinked, as if confused by his question. "They asked us to memorize it on the train, sir." Ah. Coriolanus had forgotten about that. Another of Ravinstill's requests. "I figured I could memorize it better like this."

"You can play just from hearing?"

"Yes, sir. A bit."

Since she was from District 12, there was a chance that she was Covey, just going from her musical aptitude. Coriolanus could not match her appearance with anybody from the group, apart from Maude Ivory but the connection was flimsy at best and Maude Ivory was too young.

Strangely, the thought of Annabel Rose being Covey did not bother him as he expected it would. He’d been vindictive when he heard that the Mayor banned their main livelihood, feeling satisfied that there would be no songs anymore. But, he supposed, genius will still thrive no matter the circumstances that tried to suffocate it.

(He thought of Highbottom, of his high and mighty peers, of sleeping hungry and waking with the feeling twice as worse.)

“Well, Annabel Rose from District 12, that’s a remarkable talent for someone so young. My name is Coriolanus Snow from the Capitol.” he replied, offering his hand to shake. Annabel reached over to reciprocate it, her small hands dwarfed by his. “May I sit?”

The girl nodded and scooted over, making space for him. She needn’t have done so. She barely took up space as it is. “’M not that young. I’m seven.” She replied with indignance.

Coriolanus held back an outward expression of his shock. He’d expected her to be younger, just based on her stature. But he supposed the poor state of being in District 12 must have manifested somewhere, if not in her outward appearance then her stunted growth.

“I suppose it doesn’t matter,” he said, neither agreeing nor disagreeing with her response. “Your skill speaks for itself, anyway. Genius does not follow any schedule, it manifests whenever.” Or wherever, he supposed. Even in a land as barren as District 12, one can find hidden gems.

“Genius? That's too— too—“ she cut herself off, fingers twisting at the hem of her blue jacket.

“Too much? Well, I call it as I see it, Ms. Annabel Rose.” He ran his fingers over the ivory keys. Coriolanus Snow never learned how to play any instrument. At first, it was because they couldn’t afford the lessons. And then after, it was because he couldn’t stand the sound. “And I never lie.”

Small fingers played a few lonely notes. Coriolanus couldn’t tell if it was still from Horn of Panem or if it was from another song. “Really?” she looked up at him, brown eyes seeking his own.

“What did I just say?” he raised a brow, getting a giggle in reply. He watched as Annabel Rose’s shoulders lost their tension, an indication that her wariness towards him was abating. “Now, do you think you can teach me how to play?”

Annabel Rose gave him a puzzled look. “But Mr. Snow, I don’t really know how to play.”

“Then you better learn. In the meantime, would you like me to escort you to the auditorium? The ceremony is about to start and we don’t want you to be late on your first day.”

Annabel Rose hesitated, head bowed down at the keys. "I don't wanna. I'm scared."

Coriolanus was about to ask why, but he thought better of it. It was Tigris' voice that echoed at the back of his head, from a far off time, about a different girl.

"It's going to be fine, Annabel."

"They're going to be mean." He didn't even attempt to refute that. Everyone in the Capitol were certain to look down on the new scholars, perhaps treat them as exotic pets at best. In any other circumstance, Coriolanus would be there along with them but to mistreat talent like hers was simply wasteful.

"They are mean. But you're going to prove them that you're better and that you deserve to be here. I believe that and you should too. You know why?" If she does crash and burn, there's no other witness to his promises other than him and this girl. But at the moment, he felt it safe to invest in her.

She looked up at him. "Because you never lie?"

"Because I never lie." Coriolanus stood up and offered her his arm. After a second of reluctance, she held onto him as he led them out of the music room.

(Coriolanus would regret his promises later. And not after his and Tigris' eyes met across the room, with his recent acquaintance returning his cousin's relieved embrace. The regret came moments before, when the girl let go of his arm to run to her, only for Coriolanus to immediately miss her presence by his side.

Coriolanus would call it anger about his conniving cousin. But why did anger feel like an aching absence?)

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