#it still astounds me that they managed to adapt this well

[factsilike]

Now that it has officially finished, I would like everyone in the mdzs fandom to read this absolutely phenomenal, jaw-dropping amazing fic about WWX waking up in a modern era and adapting to modern life-

It is so so so good, the way this author understood and wrote WWX just the way he is in the novel so well, with all his genius and intelligence and resilience and quirky humour, it's a breath of fresh air. The slow burn is veryyyyy slow, but this fics leans more into practical and realistic what-ifs of WWX waking up in the modern world, and the romance is more in the background. Still very sweet and wonderfully written!

Of course also featuring the juniors, aka the ducklings. I promise their earnestness, sincerity and clumsy righteousness all the while being dumb and snarky and absolutely hilarious teenagers, will have you laughing and giggling hysterically the whole time.

The well thought out character analysis as well the long research in the notes are such a bonus. I was so enraptured all throughout the reading experience and learned so much about the intricacies of the modern and historical Chinese languages, as well as the thorniness of the past Chinese dynasties and so much more.

Also the way this author manages to analyse and understand the characters and original story in a way very few do is astounding to me. Seriously, this should be The MDZS Fic Of The Fandom.

Everyone go read this ASAP, and thank me later!

[leggerefiore]

OK, you're actually getting me into Tom Nook now, especially after that one fic that mentions him wanting a "new member". If it's okay, I'd love to read a fic with him and a pregnant reader. I just think it would be cute.

cw: pregnancy, fluff

pairing: Tom Nook/Reader

Tom Nook was a man of many talents – Many of them fiscally related, but he was also capable of helping with home remodels and managing various businesses. He was no stranger to hard work. His entire life had not been anything easy.

Yet, somehow, be managed to find himself in situation he had only previously dreamed of.

Happily married and settled down.

Though he found the hardest task of his life, he had not been rebuilding his life from the ground up nor had it been managing two young tanuki while working a full-time job seven days a week.

No, it was a pregnancy.

He felt far above most of his most animalistic instincts until he first got a scent that made him panic. You were expecting — And, of course, it was his. At this point in life, you were working with him at his real estate company. The two of you were married, so it was not hard for him to leave you to head the office while he tended to pressing matters. (That could mean actual work or him disappearing off to enjoy a game of golf.) A situation would naturally arise. In the wild, tanuki often kept the gestating female in the den while the male handled hunting and whatever else.

Now, you were not a female tanuki, but his brain unfortunately could not shift the situation in his mind. His stress was unfortunately high despite knowing the relative safety of his office. No one there would dare hurt you, nor would any of your clients be so inclined. Yet, he was on edge. It was so noticeable that even the twins were being oddly reclusive, trying not to give him anything else to worry about. Everything reached a breaking point, and finally, he asked if you would take an early leave and let him have peace of mind.

It was difficult to deny him when he looked ready to beg. So, you ended up having quite a while off. Nook felt at ease, knowing you were at home and away from any unknown factors. Though, you found yourself bored easily. There was only so much you could do in the house, especially as the pregnancy progressed and limited your movement more and more.

Sitting with him one evening, you felt him gently feel the beginning swell of your stomach. His lidded eyes watched closely as you leaned against him, enjoying the softness of his fur and warmth that naturally exuded from him. Timmy and Tommy were away playing in their room. They had both been enthusiastic at the news of a new addition, despite the worries Nook had that they might take it badly. Non-stop had they been speaking about being good mini-mentors to Mr. Nook's child. You, of course, could tell it was more the aspect of being big brothers.

Though, Tom still had not warmed up to admitting that he was basically their father, and they simply were okay with saying nothing more than he was their mentor, you felt is if their relationship was more than clear from your perspective. The real estate mogul had even lacked any remarks about him being a first-time dad and instead focused on his unfamiliarity with pregnancy. It had been confirmed already that you were carrying another addition to the tanuki population.

“… You've been eating well, hm? I've been trying my best to meet your nutritional needs as best I can…” Tom's voice was a bit low and soft. Your body had been going through quite a bit… Meat consumption was a must to meet the nutritional requirements of your child. You had unconsciously begun to adapt a more nocturnal schedule due to the sleeping habits of tanuki. It was astounding that the twins and Tom both had seemingly overcome such a thing. You nodded at his words. He had taken over cooking, seemingly determined to keep you from exerting yourself in even the most miniscule of ways. Of course, you still were allowed whatever, but he certainly preferred being able to tend to meals.

“I'm glad,” he let his face shift into a gentle expression as he closed his eyes, “To think that impulsive human who moved into my town with absolutely no plans would become my spouse…” You lightly tapped his arm due to his phrasing. He certainly had mocked you for the admittedly foolish decision that you had made. There was no need to complain, though, since it was what allowed you two to meet. Granted, the twins did the heavy lifting in getting you two together. He chuckled and closed his eyes. “This is an important next step, yes, yes,” he nodded, “… Or perhaps not. I suppose you must already feel like a parent.” It seemed it was time to reassure him that you did not mind tending to the twins, nor did it bother you that they had definitely begun to see you as another parent.

His cheek came to rub against yours as you sighed. Scenting again. He had become more like this since the start of your pregnancy. You do not think you could ever recall a time previously that he had been so clingy. Your hand came to rest on top of his own. A question of what they will be like left you. “I wonder…” was his reply at first, “Hopefully, they will be grounded…” You wanted to roll your eyes. He probably had it in his mind about them inheriting a part of his businesses. You mumbled that you hope that they will be as fluffy as him, making him snort. “More than likely,” he nodded. You laughed to yourself.

At least one thing was for certain…

They would be loved.

Bonus:

@kuriarty doodled hypothetical child

[jup1ter-moon]

actually im gonna post this here too cuz twitter isn't great for longer posts and i have Things To Say (copy-pasted some stuff off my twitter and then elaborated on some of it) "okay so im listening to radio omens while transcribing it (duh) and it keeps hitting me how well adapted it is?? like, it's so insanely faithful to the book and the way it adapts things into audio form is genuinely fucking astounding idk (especially WITHOUT A NARRATOR??) Like yes its a little clunky at points and i honestly wish they'd had a narrator (would've made a lot of things so much easier and like... look at season 1 of the show!! that's tv where they have so many more opportunities to show things without a narrator and they still found it helpful) but the ways they used to work around that are so incredibly clever i'm honestly in awe. And tbh same to the show they're both such amazing adaptations that manage to stay insanely accurate to the books but provide something new at the same time" this was specifically motivated by the usage of the radio at some parts (forgive me for not having an exhaustive list of examples, i've only transcribed up to the beginning of episode 3 so that's all that's fresh in my memory), like how its used to introduce pollution in episode 3. but it's also very clever the way they've adapted specific lines (and specifically footnotes) to be included in the radio show without using a narrator? (tiny disclaimer that i don't really make a habit of listening to podcasts or radio shows or any sort of audio drama, so this is all very new and exciting for me lol so im freaking out about some of it a little :3)

[borom1r]

for the asks, how do you feel things like autism/neurodivergence are regarded in Rohirric society (as opposed to Gondorian)?

I’ve been lettin this ask marinate for a bit bc I wanted to give a relatively coherent answer snfjjs. anyways blah blah I’m too lazy to find it and link it— the post is somewhere on the blog but that ask u sent abt the fellowship + neurodivergence n my comments on Gimli being Astounded that Men make these things a Huge Issue when you could just. work to accommodate people. That.

but like. okokokok so I’ve mentioned. offhand that i quantify my gender best as an ulfheðinn. I am a wolf and I am also a man at the same time. I know my brain doesn’t work the way people expect it to. human society is a struggle. I still don’t Get It, but at least I can fake it well enough — and that’s like. A Thing. we have stories of berserkir coming home from raids and never being able to adapt to life in regular society. + that’s iron-age Norse society, right, but we know there were 1) these niches that existed on the sidelines of society that one could argue served as an outlet for people with mental illnesses (and berserkir taking part in psychoactive substances before battle is. Highly Likely Bullshit — 42:01 for discussions specifically of hallucinogens; tldr there’s no archeological evidence of such substances in viking warrior burials + the last thing you want to do is run into battle intoxicated. any substance use would be for bonding + rituals PRIOR to battle w/ enough time to recover from any adverse effects) and 2) there was some level of care for warriors/vikingar who returned with what could probably be classed as PTSD (there is at least one saga I can think of where an ex-berserkir had married and had children; Egils saga Skallagrímsonar — Skallagrím went into a fit while playing a ball game with his son and nearly killed him. He was only brought out of his rage by the intervention of a servant girl)

anyways. Rohirrim. SO, the Dunlendings seem to get all the shitty violent aspects of “viking” culture meanwhile the Rohirrim get the romanticized Wagner-esque sort of portrayal where they’re all noble mounted warriors and that’s Simply Bullshit. but if we take canon as filtered through a pro-Gondorian lens then it’s easy to understand why the Dunlendings would be portrayed this way. I’ve said it before but I do think it’s a very natural conclusion to draw that the Rohirrim were once a raiding culture and I’d argue the conflicts between them and the folk of Dunland began WELL before the Rohirrim were gifted land by Gondor. all this to say like, I’m certain the Rohirrim (and Dunlendings too, but we’re sticking with the Rohirric focus) had at least basic ideas of how to manage symptoms of PTSD even before they’d settled in what would become Rohan

as for like, autism specifically. not to be like “all the Riders have autism” nfnsjfjsjf but let’s be. Oh So Very Real here. what do you do when your child is struggling and simply cannot cope with life in the village? when they need an even more rigid, structured routine than you can give them? when they have more anger than you can manage? when you’re doing your absolute best for them but they still keep getting into trouble and you likely have other mouths to feed and responsibilities to take care of? when even if you love them to the best of your abilities, they still chafe at their surroundings? send them off to be a Rider.

let them work out their battle-lust against Orcs, let them burn off all their wild energy on horseback patrolling the open plains, let them flourish in the rigid routine of a soldier surrounded by other Riders who may not understand but still accept and embrace them because they are all brothers in arms.

and this isn’t to like. GLORIFY vikingar/berserkir from my end. this is me saying very genuinely that if I had lived in that time, knowing how my brain works and how I both struggle with societal expectations And how I quantify emotions/relationships/the Self in a decidedly non-human way— if it was socially acceptable for me to run off and live in the woods with a pack of my brothers-in-arms As A Wolf, I would do it in a heartbeat.

I think you run into a lot of “that’s Brigdwine, he’s a little strange and he still doesn’t speak, but he tends the horses well and even the meanest stallions are calm around him” where it’s like. Yeah They’re Weird But They’re Part Of The Community So Who Cares? + on the flip side, there’s probably a smaller but not insignificant amount of “did you hear Sigewynn got a letter from Sigeofor? seems he’s made a good name for himself amongst the Riders. better than terrorizing the goats and chickens and biting other children.”

sometimes nobody understands you and nothing that’s expected of you makes sense and you have no idea what to do with your emotions and everything is Too Much All The Time. and sometimes the answer is “go forge an unbreakable bond with your Éored and kill Orcs about it.”

[permanentlyexhaustedpigeon88]

This.

The look of abject surprise (and maybe even a twinge of horror?) I received when I told my medical team that I did not, in fact, want to harvest some of my eggs on the off-chance chemo blitzed my ovaries, so that I could have kids later was...astounding.

I'm 35. I've known I didn't want kids since ~20. And that was with growing up with a baby doll always in my arms, fantasizing about being a mom. As I've grown older, though, I've realized a couple things. Number one, I have no patience for what I've heard and witnessed several people dealing with, related to raising a child. It's a huge responsibility, whether you still manage to have your own semblance of a life along with it, or not. It's not something I believe I could deal with well, for the sake of the child. As a kid who was raised with a very emotionally volatile mother, who demanded and expected perfection in nearly every way, and for me to be a mini-adult from day one, with 'transgressions' punished severely, I've...got some trauma and insecurities, and I'm nowhere near through processing them enough to even begin to think I could avoid passing that trauma on to my child. Even the risk of doing to an innocent child what my parents did to me is something I absolutely refuse to consider.

Number two? (And you all are more than free to judge me, or call me selfish for this one) after 10 years living on my own, doing my own thing, when I want to do it, etc, I really just don't think I'd adapt well to sharing my space with anyone. This includes a husband, to be honest, though I'm sure for the proverbial 'right' person, I could maybe make it work. But kids, through no fault of their own, are big into not really respecting personal space, or even comprehending what that is, and why it's needed (even for them). It's yet another thing I doubt I could handle, and I absolutely will not risk dimming a child's light, their curiosity, their joy by turning into my mother, and insisting that they be perfectly mature, self-sufficient, and above all, silent. Sure, maybe I'd be fine. Maybe I'd adapt. But the concern is far too great for me to be comfortable risking it, assuming I'd change, and then finding out, to the child's detriment, that I was wrong.

It's often so, so much more than just "oh, you haven't found the right guy yet, you'll change your mind." And we really, really need to start normalizing that.

The personal reasons for not wanting/having kids should remain just that. Personal.

It isn't anyone else's business, nor is it their right to try to change your mind.

stop telling your teenage daughters who say they don't want kids that they'll change their mind

[may-bonne]

Before I share my "highly anticipated" thoughts on Bloodrayne thoughts I will say that the thought of sharing that fucking poem with Chris Sanchez is hysterical to me. She'd give such a dirty look lmao

From what I've looked into, the Bloodrayne games take place in the 1930s not the 18th century, you kill nazis, Rayne is more of a seductress type character, and only her and Kagan exist? Disappointed that there's no game version of Katarin

I like how the blood and gore is sorta cheesy. My favorite part is where a couple of guys are beating the shit out of a dude on the ground that's already been cut in half. His intestines are hanging out like I think you can stop. It's not an exploitation film like Machete but it feels like it should have been

The blue contacts they gave Mrod are so strange. I didn't even notice she was wearing them until over halfway through the movie. So subtle. Slightly unsettling too ❤️

Astounding how almost every performance is so bad. Papa Katarin was decent. Mrod gave one of the best and it's still one of the weakest she's ever given. Kagan was the worst imo that man did not give a shit to the point it was funny. The Hamburger(?) guy positively chewed the scenery. I read that the guy who played Vladimir was drunk the whole time. I kinda liked him though. I also liked Kristanna despite how wooden she was at points. Makes me think of her role in Terminator 3 (she was a y2cunty robot)

The Brimstone necklaces look like something you'd buy at Spirit Halloween. Katarin's silly little cape outfit also seems particularly like a halloween costume. I could send a whole ask about her wardrobe alone I love it. Her and Rayne stick out like sore thumbs but my favorite thing is the bright iliac coat and blatantly store bought capris

I don't know if I'm not understanding correctly or if Rayne's backstory made no sense. If a dhampir is born from a human and a vampire having a kid and Rayne was alive to watch and remember Kagan raping her mother, how did she end up a dhampir??

(The haircut they gave Kagan's lapdog was so stupid btw. I don't like the look in his eyes either. Why does he look at everything so intently!!)

They could have done something legitimately interesting with Katarin and her fahthah if they delved into how him being turned complicated her relationship with him and vampires, and how he had to leave Brimstone for being a danger or whatever but then Rayne is let in with open arms. I could also see Vladimir becoming a second father figure to her

Although it was obvious Katarin wasn't happy her betrayal heel turn moment felt abrupt. I wish we saw Rayne try to reason with Katarin before killing her and sucking the blood from her neck homoerotically. She doesn't try during their slow duel either! She says they'll continue later and leaves abruptly and never comes back to it. I wanted to see Rayne try to earn Katarin's trust. I don't get why Rayne lied about what Katarin did after she died. Or Katarin's "they fear what they don't understand" line since she never pretended to be in support of Rayne's presence outside of that

We were robbed of an enemies to lover storyline

the swordfight is SO SLOW hahaha. go for the fucking bare stomach or neck maybe!! i can't imagine uwe invested in extensive fight training but they look like kids with plastic weapons duking it out in the back yard

apparently rayne doesn't fight any nazis until the third movie despite that being her whole thing in the source material. i know this is one of those uwe boll video game adaptations that were never supposed to turn a profit to take advantage of german tax rebates or something so i wonder if he thought the nazi-fighting vampire thing wouldn't go over well. they didn't film in germany and i don't think it had government backing or anything but maybe he needed to maintain good will to keep the scheme working. i cannot believe he managed to get two sequels made. this movie kind of tanked kristanna loken's career which looked like it was maybe going to take off post-terminator so i guess i'm glad he kept employing her. apparently actors enjoy working with him bc he's chill and shoots everything really quickly and everyone understands the end product isn't going to be that great. although mrod does seem to be taking her role very seriously

i'm genuinely not sure why her performance is so terrible. the accent doesn't help and many of her lines are very stupid but i feel like she's managed to stay compelling while delivering pretty dumb lines in other movies. i wonder if either she concluded independently or somebody told her that because she's supposed to be a leader she needed to speak with! gravitas! which could be the source of that weird flat overenunciating thing

at first i thought the contacts were foreshadowing some kind of supernatural reveal but i guess she was just supposed to seem european lol. the betrayal was really abrupt but it's not like anything in this movie happens with a whole lot of buildup. i saw zero indication rayne was into that dude until he yanked her shirt off and started fucking her up against the bars

i did enjoy the underwater wrestling and the part where she's sucking katarin's neck. mm. despite the time period i'm adding katarin to my very short list of mrod characters who seem like maybe they could admit to themselves they wanted to bang chicks only because like i said before i feel like the vampire thing would overshadow it. after paul walker died when she went off the rails for a while i wish she'd said fuck it and done like...probably some kind of lesbian indie film would still be too much to ask for but maybe like a really trashy male gaze-y pulp film where she was like a bisexual serial killer. if i were cara i would've floated that between excursions to controversial exotic animal petting zoos and recreational iv spas. but instead she swung the other way and made that movie where she's like a third grade teacher lol

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Psycho Analysis: Suicide Squad Team A

(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS! Seriously, as soon as you click that read more, you’re gonna be smacked with SPOILERS! Don’t say I didn’t give you ample warning this time!)

The world’s in danger yet again, and Amanda Waller is in need of some expendable forces to take on some dirty jobs in the name of preserving peace. Last time she did this, it seems like she hired the wrong people. Nice guy Will Smith Deadshot? Bland, boring Killer Croc? El Diablo, who became attached to a bunch of reprobates after spending a couple hours with them? The only one who was useful in that squad was Katana. She had their backs, could cut all of them in half with one sword stroke just like mowing the lawn, and her sword traps the souls of its victims. Unfortunately, she was decidedly not expendable, so what is a girlboss like Waller to do?

Easy: Assemble a brand new squad of criminals to do the dirty work. Harley and Boomerang are the only ones she brought back, because let’s be real, they’re the only ones we give a damn about. Filling out the rest of the squad are the stoic, craggy crackshot Savant; the handsome, German spear-thrower Javelin; the alien warrior Mongal; the frothing, psychotic animal Weasel; the confident and all-powerful TDK; and Blackguard, who is literally just a guy. Together, this team gets deployed to Corto Maltese to do what no one else can do, and with skills like theirs, they are absolutely unstoppable!

They all fucking die before the opening credits.

Motivation/Goals: Considering the goal of the squad is to shave time off their prison sentences by going on the mission, it’s ostensibly the reason every single one of these goons accepted the job. Savant and Weasel are pretty well established in this regard; we get to focus on Savant for much of the opening, so we can get a sense of him, and Weasel is stated to have murdered no less than 27 children. So, yeah, they need to do this mission.

The rest, though? Who knows! Why are Mongal, Javelin, and TDK in prison? How did they even get an alien like Mongal? What did they do to land in the position they’d need to go on a suicide mission? Why doesn’t this movie have flashy, intrusive cards explaining everything to us in a throwaway gag in a montage?!

Blackguard, at least, has some other motivation. He sold out the entire squad to the military of Corto Maltese, which is why they’re ambushed. Now, there’s actually some ambiguity here: Did he do this of his own volition, and was this a complete surprise, or is it, as it is heavily implied, all part of Waller’s plan and she let this happen as a diversion for the other team to get in unnoticed?

Honestly, though, it doesn’t matter what their goals are. They’re all dead within five minutes of the movie starting, with one exception.

Performance: So, the reason these guys are even worth talking about is because, despite their minuscule screentime, all of their actors manage to cram in enough humor and characterization that they’re all pretty fun and likable. Michael Rooker is as stony and stoic as ever as Savant (until he hilariously isn’t), Flula Borg’s Javelin is really sweet and charming in his interactions with Harley, and Pete Davidson’s Blackguard is just amazingly douchey and pathetic. Special mention goes to Nathan Fillion’s TDK, who has an utterly endearing and unwavering faith in his astoundingly crappy ability to… detach his arms. It’s honestly kind of beautiful. Then there’s Weasel as portrayed by Sean Gunn, who is just a hilarious crackhead of an animal man.

Final Fate: Literally every single one of them die horribly thanks to Blackguard’s betrayal. He’s the first to go, because as soon as he walks out saying “Hey guys, it’s me, the one who contacted you!” he literally has his face blasted clean off. The rest go soon after. Mongal, in one of the most astounding moments of idiocy I’ve ever seen, leaps on a helicopter despite Rick Flag telling her specifically not to. Her weight and strength send it careening out of control, which leads to it shredding Captain Boomerang to bits before exploding, burning her alive as she painfully screams and writhes in agony. TDK gets his arms shot into Swiss cheese, leading to him bleeding out since even detached they still are part of him. Javelin is also shot, but gets a dying moment with Harley where he passes her Checkov’s Javelin. Finally, after witnessing all of this carnage, Savant completely loses his shit and tries to swim away, leading to Waller blowing his head up.

You may be wondering what happened to Weasel. He appears to drown as soon as the Squad deploys, because despite being actually smart in this movie, Waller forgot to make sure everyone on the Squad could swim. Thankfully, this lovable child-murdering crackhead rodent was just sleeping, and wakes up in the first credit scene.

Best Scene: Obviously, it’s their one and only scene. It’s a magnificent slaughter that puts the X-Force scene from Deadpool 2 to shame.

Final Thoughts & Score: I’ve gotta hand it to James Gunn. Even though these losers are only onscreen for a few minutes, they all get to cram a lot of charm and personality into that time, to the point it’s actually kind of sad seeing them all die. It’s a beautiful mix of comedy and tragedy. Since their screentime is so limited, though, I’m mostly going to be grading them on style, performance, and so on rather than on villainy like normal. They are all bad guys, as they don’t really get a chance to redeem themselves like the other Squad, so I’m still counting them as villains, which means they could potentially score above an 8 (which is the highest score I’m willing to give heel-face turn villains, because they end up being better as characters in general than as villains).

I’m also not going to talk about Boomerang (I’ll talk about him when I review the original Squad) or Harley (because she not only lives, but deserves her own solo Psycho Analysis). Now here we go, from best to worst:

TDK

If you thought anyone but TDK would get top marks, you’re sadly mistaken. Seeing Nathan Fillion proudly wield the insanely lame power to detach his arms to lightly tap soldiers on the head and gently grab their guns is a sight I never knew I needed to see until this movie. The fact he just seems so darn proud about this power that he doesn’t even bother to use in any way that would be remotely useful is honestly really endearing. Frankly, the sheer fact they adapted Arms-Fall-Off Boy in any way is enough for me to give him a 10/10.

Weasel

Weasel is just disgustingly delightful. He’s just a horrible, nasty, ugly little bastard… But he’s kind of adorable? He clearly has no idea where he is at any given time and is just so goddamn freaky that I can’t help but love him. The fact that, despite being a character who in the comics is noteworthy only for dying on his first mission with the Squad, he manages to survive the entire movie is pretty impressive. Hopefully he comes back in the future, but either way he gets an 8/10 from me.

Javelin

Honestly, aside from Boomerang, his death stung the most. He’s just so cute and charming, and he doesn’t even get to fling his javelin at anyone! Thankfully, he passes it on to Harley, and boy does she ever get to use it! He’s so cute, I have to give him an 8/10. I just wish we got more of him.

Savant

Savant is just an absolutely hilarious bait-and-switch. We follow him through the prologue, with everything seeming to point to him as our main character and the Squad leader. He’s stoic, he’s cranky, and he has impeccable aim… and then we get to the beach and he just freaks the hell out and starts screaming and crying and running away like a little bitch. Seeing Michael Rooker act like he’s shitting his pants after playing a badass like Yondu is just the sort of hilarious subversiveness that James Gunn loves to do when you let him loose. The fact that he looks like, to paraphrase the TVTropes YMMV page for the movie, a “cyberpunk Tommy Wiseau” is the icing on this 7/10 cake.

Blackguard

I was prepared to hate this guy just based on how lame Pete Davidson’s costume was, and you know what? I do hate him. But I love to hate him. He’s just an utterly pathetic scoundrel and a coward, true to his name. The fact he is the first to die, as just about everyone predicted, and is killed absolutely gruesomely makes any annoyance he could provide moot, and his freeakout over being seated next to Weasel on the plane is actually kind of funny. I was originally going to give him a 6, but you know what? He can have a low 7/10. He’s like the only member of this particular Squad to actually do anything evil, so I gotta give him props for that.

Mongal

Let me make this perfectly clear: I do not blame James Gunn or actress Mayling Ng. I’m not actually mad at either of them for what they chose to do, because it is ultimately hilarious and sad. It suited the narrative of the film, and I’m not actually, genuinely mad.

With all that out of the way, Mongal is one hell of a stupid cunt. It is one thing to cause your own death with your stupidity, it is something else entirely to cause the death of a beloved character with your poorly planned attack. The fact she didn’t take into account how her weight and strength would effect an airborne helicopter makes one wonder if she is really supposed to be based on a character who can take on Superman and live to tell about it.

Let’s compare her to two similar characters to really show how bad she is. Like Blackguard, she is directly responsible for a death on the beach, Blackguard being responsible for everyone by selling them out and leading them into an ambush (and yes, I’m including him as well), and Mongal killing Boomerang with the chopper. The difference is, Blackguard’s betrayal was deliberate, he meant to sell the team out, he was actively doing something evil there, while Mongal killed Boomerang out of sheer idiocy.

Now, let’s compare her to Zeitgeist from the similar bloody massacre that occurred during X-Force’s deployment in Deadpool 2. Like Mongal, he accidentally kills a teammate. The difference is, in the case of Zeitgeist, he only accidentally melted Peter, it was a freak accident, and ultimately it does get undone by the end. Meanwhile, Mongal made a conscious, stupid decision and ended up killing her squadmate with her own idiocy. She sucks, hardcore. I don’t do this lightly, but I’m giving her a 1/10. Villains just don’t get much stupider than her.

I will giver her this, though: the makeup work on her is good. She’s lowkey kinda hot if I’m being honest. But being hot and having good makeup does not a good villain make.

[kpopchangedme]

Bang Chan | camping!au [M]

Even sharing a tent with your sleeping friends won’t keep you & Chan from scratching the itch. Although, perhaps the risk of getting caught is part of the fun…

Word Count: 3.3k

Genre: NSFW - Friends with Benefits - Confession - Camping - SMUT - [drabble]

Warnings: *extended exhibitionism* *unprotected sex*

Stray Kids | M.list

“Are you asleep?” Chan’s breath hits your nape and you bite your lips, trying to pretend. There’s a minute of silence, filled by crickets and the sounds of the forest outside the tent. His murmur was so soft, you start to wonder if you haven’t dreamt, floating between slumber and consciousness. Then, “Y/n?” His hand finds your waist under the covers, right where your hip curves in. At his touch, you know for sure from every tingle of your being; you’re wide awake. His hand hovers lightly over your shirt, and unable to refrain from the urge, you reach for it. Pulling you closer, his breath breaks and he intertwines his fingers with yours.

There’s a reason you aren’t sleeping, and he’s it.

Your relationship with Chan has been… Tensed. That’s a euphemism, you’ve been a wreck ever since you hooked up with him last Friday. At first, you thought you were just having some fun between friends, but you kissed Jisung a long time ago and both never felt the need to do it ever again. Granted it was less dramatic… You and Chan really went at it, got out of the club incognito on an impulse and had sex all night – four times, but who’s counting? None of the rest of your friends even noticed you left together. You were both drunk and lonely, your best mix. You thought it was a one-time thing, but here you are craving his touch… Well, fine, at least there’s a good reason for this overwhelming hunger. Honestly, sex was mind-blowing, by far the best you ever had. This is only your first night in the tent, but this year’s camping weekend already promises to be excruciating. You all went together for a three-days canoe-camping expedition. Somehow, the guys managed to convince the rest of your squad. It had been planned for months, so, unfortunately, you couldn’t possibly bail out at the last second because you fucked your best friend. The whole first day was buzzing with tangible sexual tension, repressed urges and stolen heavy look.

Truth is, you can’t wait to do it again, but you aren’t sure were Chan stands.

Yeah, you’re royally screwed.

As your mind spins this situation for the hundredth time, Chan nuzzles himself in your neck, breathing you in like it’s the most natural thing in the world. You stay still, even when he presses his body in your back, waking something inside you’d rather he didn’t. If he hadn’t spoken before, you’d believe he’s simply asleep and cuddling with you by instinct. 

“Chan,” you exhale, eyes wide open on the darkness of the tent. 

“Am cold,” he mumbles, making excuses to free his burning hand from yours and slide it under your large shirt. Stunned, you stare at Minho’s back, merely a shadowy shape in front of you, hiding Seungmin from view. You didn’t mean do it again now, now. You are acutely aware of the proximity of every single one of your friends. You’re divided into two tents, the others – Changbin, Yeji, Jihyo and Felix – are in the second one. No funny business would ever take place in theirs, that’s for sure. Everyone was exhausted from the expedition’s first day, all but you and Chan apparently.

His hand rests on the skin of your stomach, gently tracing patterns that spread goosebumps all over your body. “I can’t sleep,” he whispers, barely audible in your ear and you shush him softly, “I can’t stop thinking…” You don’t move as he keeps caressing your tummy, creeping dangerously lower to the hem of your legging before stopping there. And God, you want him to. “Y/n?”

Exhaling cautiously, you shift on your back, bending one of your knees up ever so slightly. Not enough to pull covers from the others. You need Jesus. Your closest friends are sleeping less than a meter away from you, but Chan’s touch is giving you sinful ideas right now. “About what?” On your left, Minho’s calm breathing suggests he’s deep asleep, but you can’t know for sure about Seungmin in front of him. 

“You know what, us,” Chan doesn’t falter, pressing the proof of what you assume to be his struggle against your hip. “I’m so painfully obvious, it’s embarrassing.“ 

“Oh, that?” Heart pounding, you feel his light scoff on your cheek. This isn’t what this weekend between friends was supposed to be about, but you can’t say you aren’t into this. It’s not like his proximity wasn’t keeping you up already. If he wants sex as much as you, you aren’t going to pretend to resist.

His hand deserts your shirt to cup your chin, tilting your head. Hungry, his lips claim yours in the not-so intimate tent. You don’t bother playing shy, you’re too far gone, tongue risking tasting him. There’s absolutely no alcohol warming your blood this time, but he is as sweet and good as you remember. Better, actually. Chan deepens the kiss, hand sliding back down on your body, unable to refrain from touching you. It’s evident now that you’ve both been thinking about this all week, but were either too busy or proud to text each other. You sigh, opening your legs as subtly as possible. Encouraged by the gesture, Chan makes his way down rubbing the fabric up and down your inner thigh. His kisses get messier as he goes.

“W-we shouldn't…” Your mouth says one thing and your body requests another. Grabbing his busy hand, you straight up slip it inside your leggings, right where you need him the most. If he let out a tiny gasp of surprise, he adapts quite fast, playing along and caressing your sex. Chan is leaning over you, lips glistening in the half-light. His curls are already in disarray and you reach to run your fingers through them. “What if we get caught?” Breath catching, you roll your hips. 

“They’re sound asleep,” he promises quietly, but it’s clear he doesn’t care much. From the way he’s stroking, you can tell he likes it as much as you. You should be embarrassed by your friends’ presence, but their propinquity only turns you on more. That’s messed up. ”Shit, y/n.” Chan revels for only you, slightly out of it at your evident wetness. “That’s not what I was talking about, but now…” One of his fingers enters your core, and you curve on your back. He adds a second one, kissing your throat softly when you throw your head back. You had no idea being this naughty could feel so good. If the guys woke up now, they could never even imagine what is going on under the covers. “You’re so pretty,” his fingers keep going, “being so needy for me…” You hum, smirking, and Chan shakes his head, slightly out of it. “Is this what you wanted?” Nodding, you shut your eyes, enjoying the friction of his touch. You’re getting worked up, hips meeting his hand with each stroke until he takes it back without warning.

“C-Chan?” You protest despite yourself. It’s probably better that way, safer. You would totally get caught if you kept going.

“Not fair,” he sounds desperate, breathless, “me too.” Before you can make a move to pleasure him, he’s pushing you on your side, rolling you towards Minho. Slowly but surely Chan starts sliding your leggings and panties down to your mid-thighs. You’re heaving, completely astounded by his unusual boldness. You don’t stop him, you don’t move. Now you’re half-naked under the covers, completely exposed if the guys were to wake up. “I told you I’m cold,” Chan groans, freeing himself just enough from his own pants. Almost instantly, his erection presses on your ass, right between your cheeks. With your free hand, you reach under the covers, finding his hip and following it to your end goal. He twitches in your palm as you delicately wrap around him. You pause like that, enjoying the softness of his sultry sensitive skin.

“You are warm.” You should know better, but you want him inside you. The lack of intimacy only seems to make this idea even more irresistible. 

As though reading your mind, Chan nudges your ear with his nose, guardedly admitting; “I want to feel you, just a bit. I’m not stupid.”

Repressing a moan, you ease him down. Legs straightened, you can’t believe how amazing it feels when his erection slips between your thighs. That’s the thing about sex, when you haven’t gotten any in a while, you forget how good it is, and then you start again… You become this wanton girl, so needy she’d let her best friend screw her literally anywhere he’d want.

Chan attaches his mouth on your neck, gently nibbling and you curve your back, hungry for more. His cock is hard and firmly pressed on your slit, simply there. You are so aroused you can’t think clearly. He said he isn’t stupid, but you definitely are right now. You’re the one that moves first, rocking your hips, grinding his length on your wetness. The effect is instantaneous, his hand explores your shirt again, this time not stopping on your stomach. It keeps climbing until it finds your breasts, holding on tightly. Chan’s abdomen raises your butt when he pushes closer, cock making its way forward until it is cramped and snugged cozily between your thighs. 

That’s another thing. This should be awkward, but it’s not. Somehow sex fits between you like it’s second nature, even sober.

“S-Shit…” Chan pants, rolling again. “I f-feel everything…” Quietly, you nod, the fiction is incredible. Every back and forth between your thighs forces his cock up, inevitably rubbing your bud with its glans. “You’re crazy wet…”

You shut your eyes so tightly, you see white dots. He meets your ass again, veiny shaft stroking your swollen lips. You both keep going, rocking dully on each other. In a way, it’s like you’re jerking him off with your body. It’s mutual, all this grinding getting you off slowly too. Your thighs and ass are more and more of a mess as it goes. With each stroke, your juices and his precum smear on your skin. Shit, you could come like that. The guys would never know. You’ve never done anything as morally wrong before, but it’s exhilarating. As you’re thinking this, someone shifts under the covers ahead and you freeze caught red-handed.

Suspended in time, you and Chan both hold your breath, listening intently to every noise in the tent. Minho’s breathing is still deep and stable, but Seungmin is dead quiet. Chan doesn’t move an iota, right hand still cupping your boob, sex strained between your leg. He’s either too taken to pull away or too frightened to go on.

They would never stop teasing you if they found out you’ve had sex… But they would straight-up commit murder if they discovered you in a scandalous position… Next to them. The moment stretches into eternity before you finally hear the distinctive nasal sound of Seungmin’s faint snoring again. Thank God.

Sighing, Chan drops his head in your hair, “I thought we were dead.”

“Close call…” Struggling not to giggle in front of danger, you forget to be cautious altogether; “I guess you’ll have to do me quick then…”

“What.” In a slight panic, Chan rises on his elbow, frowning down at you. ”Seriously?” He seems unsure if you’re kidding or if you really want to go all the way. Like that, in this tent. At your place, you had protection, something obviously out of the equation here. But you know your friend through and through, his past experiences, you know he’s not a risk-taker. You’re on the pill and safe too, so this is not a deal-breaker for you. Not when you want him as much as you do. Chan purses his lips, “I don’t do short very often, y/n. I thought you noticed.“ Rolling your eyes, you clench your legs on his length, squeezing his cock tighter and his breath catches. “You’re twisted, you know that?” Like he’s a saint. They’re some instances where actions speak louder than words, you contract your thighs again. "Ok.” Shuddering, Chan pulls you closer, pressing a kiss on your cheek. He wasn’t hard to convince at all. “But if we get caught, I won’t stop,” it sounds more like a promise than a warning, and goosebumps spread over your body. “I’ll keep making love to you…” Biting your ear lightly, he slides a hand under your ass, stroking himself a few times. “So remember you asked for it.”

"Jesus.” He’s making you lose all the self-control you have left. “Shut up, Chan, you’ll wake them…”

“Oh… I’m not the loud one here.” his left hand worms under your head to firmly cover your mouth.

You can’t argue with that, not when he’s right and finally being proactive. Your friend immediately wiggles down, finding an angle while still holding on tight to you. Thankfully, your needy moan is muffled by his palm when his tip grows your entrance. His cock is large and thick. Last Friday, it caught you off-guard, but he was caring and careful. Chan takes his time again, letting your core stretch around him comfortably. It’s not hard, you’re already so hot from the foreplay session, slick and ready. When he’s fully inside after a few slow pushes, you throb in thrill, fitted perfectly.

He pulls away only to come again. The hand on your mouth bends your neck backward while his second one harshly digs your hip bone, caging you. Gagged, you’re at his mercy and he takes great advantage of that. Chan builds the slowest pace to ever be. This smooth friction is still enough for you though. That’s exactly what you needed, craved all day. You clench your ass, narrowing his path to feel more of him. There’s not a sound betraying your dirty deeds in the tent, only silence intersected with breaths, some deep and others ragged. You are pros. If fucking furtively in public was an Olympic sport, you’d deserve gold. He moves languidly for a long time, changing rhythm but never going as hard as you know he wants to. Chan’s either nervous to wake the guys or he’s trying to make this last.

It takes a moment before he gives in, beginning to lose himself. His breathing is laborious on your neck, louder as it goes. Picking up speed, his hips keep meeting your ass, making you jolt and you hold onto your mat to stay in place. Minho is so close, you could easily accidentally nudge him if you didn’t. Chan’s hand over your mouth in unyielding, forcing you to arch. It hurts, but it’s too good. His deep faster thrusts hit you just perfectly, finding your sensitive spot, the one that makes your toe curls. The tent fills with wet noises and lewd claps. You should worry, but instead, you’re mentally begging him to keep going. Chan does just that, pounding into you, unpolished and uneven. He keeps hitting that spot repetitively and, so fast it’s almost humiliating, you come.

“I-I won’t la… I…” His broken whisper goes unanswered. Shaking and spasming, you’re peaking, unable to do anything but cling to the mat, to his hand on your hip, to your hair, to your face.

You don’t know if he intended to pull out, but Chan gives soon after. Your core is contracting around his cock, waving uncontrollably. His thrusts slow down before halting altogether. His hot cum fills you by spurts as he rides off his own high. When Chan pulls away, your legs are still aquake. He leaves you feverish and empty, almost. 

That was quick. Silence falls back on the tent as you both take time to regain yourselves. It’s like you’re weighting a ton, limbs numbed and heavy from the strain and endorphins. The crickets are still singing outside, accompanied by Minho and Seungmin’s sound breathing. These two would probably sleep through a hurricane. Thank God.

Still bewildered by what just transpired, you skillfully put your clothes back in place, trying not to disturb the covers. Instantly, your panties are dampened from your exploits, but you don’t mind. Just for tonight, you let yourself embrace that filthy side of you. The one that fucks around unaware bystanders and lets their best friend come inside.

“Sorry for that,” Chan hushes after a moment, clearly flustered, “too short, and the…”

You roll to face him, smiling before pressing a chaste kiss on his lips. It’s not like you had many options, if he hadn’t come inside you, you would’ve made a whole other kind of mess. You asked for quick. At least you both came, the thrill of getting caught and the build-up was overwhelming. That’s what needed to be done, how you needed him. You had never climaxed that fast before… Not even on your first night, not for the first orgasm anyway. Chan pulls you closer into a tight hug, one that doesn’t feel like he’s about to let go anytime soon.

“Thanks for that,” mumbling against his neck, you hug him back. Your breathing and heartbeat have slowed down, you’re tired and completely spent.

"That was not… Last Friday and now…” Your eyelids are too heavy and you give up on fighting to keep your eyes open, sluggish in his arms. “It felt good, right?” Humming as an only reply, you feel yourself drift to sleep, bit by bit. “Because for me it’s pretty amazing… I mean, this isn’t awkward or anything, right? For you, I mean?” If you had any strength left, you’d roll your eyes. Captain Obvious. “It wasn’t. It wasn’t for me either…” Chan pauses his incoherent speech.

You can’t remember if he was that much of a rambler last time. Letting go of everything, you forget you could get caught cuddling in the morning. You don’t have the will to pull away from his embrace. It’s too late now to be any decent and this is a great cuddle. He is warm and comfy. Chan is the best. The steady sound of his heart pounding in his chest lulls you. You had a long day, between the expedition stuff and walking on eggshells, all that uneasiness. You could sleep forever.

“I couldn’t stop thinking about you all week… On Thursday, I even brought you coffee at work, but you were out. Jihyo said I shouldn’t do this by text so…” Chan shuts up, realizing he messed up. You don’t say a word. “I’m sorry… Felix and Jihyo are the only ones that know I swear. I mean, everyone knows about me, they just don’t know that you… That we… Anyway, I’ve been obvious about my feelings. Felix said he can’t deal with the secondhand embarrassment anymore, so I should confess since you aren’t catching up.”

Holding his breath anxiously, Chan waits… “I… I just need to know where we stand.”

There’s no reply and he deflates, wincing at the humiliation. He really thought he had a chance, especially after you couldn’t keep away from him today. Peeling himself off to peek at your face, Chan shakes you lightly. 

“Y/n?” Oh come one, you can’t be asleep. Not when he’s confessing a second time, you’ve already left him hanging like that Friday. “Y/n…”

You don’t even flinch when he calls your name in your ear one last time. Unbelievable. He’s been tricked again. Next time, he’ll have to tell you he’s more than a dick. Maybe remember to confess before letting you seduce him. Chan lays back carefully, keeping his hold on your waist, he presses a kiss on your nose.

Next time. 

Stray Kids | M.list

[galvanizedfriend]

Fic: The Wolf II

Summary: The Guerreras' threat still looms over the Mikaelson house as Caroline tries to adapt to life as a vampire, away from her daughter. But an unexpected family reunion makes everything worse, taking away the little peace Klaus, Caroline and Elijah managed to find after the war that nearly broke them.[It's The Originals Season 2, but Caroline was a witch, had Klaus' baby and now she's a vampire. Klaroline, obviously.]

S02E23 Woke Up With a Monster ✨

"Eve is... A special child, simply putting it. A lot of people didn't want her to live. And so, for the first six months of her life, I couldn't be with her. She was taken away to somewhere safe. And the idea of coming back and not being able to tell you about her, to have to lie to you and pretend that she was dead... I couldn't do it. I could barely think about it. It was hard enough not to have her with me; to talk about her as if she was gone, not knowing when I would see her again... It was a pain that I couldn't bear. The only thing that justified me being a vampire was her, and if I couldn't speak about her, then... I didn't really know how to face you."

"Why would anybody want her dead?" her mother asked. "She's just a baby."

"When you say special," Elena started tentatively. "What exactly do you mean by that?"

And that was the second part of the conversation. The one where Caroline had to come clean about how Eve was conceived. And with whom.

Vampirism and surprise baby, astounding news though it might have been, were nothing compared to the shock that registered on everyone's faces when Caroline revealed the father's identity.

Read the full chapter here on AO3!

_________________

Welcome back to Mystic Falls! :) This part of the story had been a long time coming and I’m having all sorts of anxieties over it, but I really hope you guys enjoy it. Please, mind the warnings on the A/N for some possible triggering situations.

This fic has been nominated for  @kcawards​! Thank you so much to the folks who nominated it! ❤️ You are the sweetest and I cannot thank you enough!

The lovely new art was made by the ever sweet @destellolunar​, who is just so incredibly talented! Thank you so much! ❤️ Also, shoutout to @recyclingss​ for enduring loads of meltdowns and grumpy complaints about this chapter with so much grace.

Really looking forward to your thoughts and reactions to this new arc. If you enjoy the update, pls drop me a note on the story! My inbox is always open as well. :) And your reblogs are so, so welcome! Thank you for reading! 💖

[frodos-bizarre-adventure]

@gingerreggg think i oughta make an ao3 of this?

Heads Up- Part 13 (Joseph x Bust! Caesar)

▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪▪

"Morning, Jojo," Caesar said gently, planting a kiss on Joseph's forehead.

Joseph, still not opening his eyes, hummed faintly and gave a smile, hugging the base of Caesar's torso warmly.

"Hey...this is a nicer way to wake me up," he said with a laugh.

From the first days when Caesar sat on his bedside tabe screaming at him like some sort of glorified alarm clock, their morning routines had become far more gentle and affectionate as, bit by bit, Joseph's perception of Caesar changed.

It had been a rollercoaster of emotions since the bust first came screaming and bouncing his way into his life. From initial fear, to confusion, to fascination, to guilt, to understanding, to friendship to gentle affection.

They'd come a long way in just a few weeks being together.

Joseph stood up for breakfast, but before he left he gently lifted Caesar from his bed and gently laid him onto the floor where he was able to hop over to the kitchen. As much as Joseph wanted ro grant Caesar some independence, the fact remained that he was, after all, a living disembodied head with only the smallest piece of a torso, and no matter how much he tried there were some things he simply couldn't do.

It was a bit like having a roommate with special needs, and Joseph didn't mind giving him some assistance whenever he needed it-- though he was happy to let Caesar be when he was sure about things he could do on his own.

And Caesar was surprisingly adaptable, having lived with his unusual form for over a month now. His hopping on his neck was quite slow and clumsy as always, if now a lot more balanced, but the skill of his mouth manipulation had been astounding. Not only at painting and writing, but also in holding and using tools, operating the little lifts Joseph made to help him get up and down tables, or stacking the wooden blocks Suzi brought him into fun shapes and structures.

And, with persistent gnawing, licking and nose pressing, Caesar had learned how to, in his own awkward, bizarre way, figured out how to operate the remote of the TV, and spent quite a lot of his time bingeing soap operas, much to Joseph and Suzi's amusement.

"Morning, Suzi!" Joseph greeted, as he made his way to the kitchen. She'd woken up early and was stirring a cup of coffee, and she looked up and greeted the two in her usual cheery self.

"Morning Jojo!" she said with a smile. "Morning too, Caesar," she added, looking down at the hopping bust on the floor.

Her presence had been a near-constant in the past few days, though she did have a home a few blocks down the street. Joseph could tell she enjoyed staying with them, with the alternative having been mostly alone in her apartment with little to do now that she'd graduated.

Joseph could tell she was lonely. Especially since they previously hadn't spent much time together for a couple of years.

And now Caesar had brought them together.

Caesar hopped onto the platform and pulled at the rope with his teeth, lifting himself up onto the table. Suzi couldn't help but watch in awe-- it looked as if it took Caesar so much effort to move around, but he somehow just managed.

"It's honestly quite funny how you came to just accept all this," Caesar joked as he hopped onto the kitchen table. "You'd think that you'd take much longer to get used to me, a talking head of clay."

"Well, at first it was odd," Suzi replied.

Caesar laughed, remembering their first encounter. "You kept trying to grab me and touch me all over the first time we met."

"Well...you're just amazing," she told him.

"And getting to know you more? You're a really good person deep down," she added. "Sure, a little rough around the edges at times, maybe, but your determination, your personality, your warmth... you've added so much to me and Joseph's lives since you came."

Caesar smiled, a shy, flustered smile that would have had come with a blush if he hadn't been clay.

"Plus the way you get around is rather cute," she giggled. "You remind me of the lamp from those Pixar intros."

"Oh, don't you think I didn't get that," Caesar retorted playfully.

Joseph, in the meantime, had been making breakfast, mostly just coffee, canned beans, a boiled egg and some toast. Whipping up his meal the best as he could, him being in no way a talented chef, he piled the ingredients onto his plate and sat down onto the kitchen table.

Caesar looked wistfully at the plate. "If only I could enjoy that too." he said with a dry laugh.

Made of clay, Caesar never felt the need to eat, or drink, or even breathe. He wasn't quite sure what even sustained him every time he woke up in the morning.

At this point, it was easier to just say "magic".

"Alright, here you go," Joseph grinned. He dipped his finger into the sauce of the baked beans and held it out for Caesar to taste.

He stuck out his tongue and gently touched Joseph's finger with its tip.

"Hmmm...not bad," he said. He could taste and smell, despite not needing to eat or breathe, and exactly why, or how, was a question Caesar opted not to bother himself with.

Joseph smiled. Just the knowledge that Caesar was able to enjoy the little things in life brought him a sense of satisfied joy. Sure, there were some things that he was missing out on due to his nature as a living clay bust, but what mattered were the things that could make his dull existence just a bit brighter.

There were things he couldn't change, and realities he had to accept, but he knew Caesar could make do with whatever he did have.

Sometimes it was just better to submit to the winds than fight it, Joseph thought.

Submit.

That one word suddenly struck Joseph like a freight train.

--------

"Oh no," Joseph mumbled to himself in realisation.

Both Caesar and Suzi suddenly looked concerned at the abrupt change in Joseph's demeanor.

"What's the matter, Jojo?" Caesar asked.

"What date is it?" Joseph asked, tapping his hand lightly, anxiously, on the kitchen countertop.

Suzi checked her phone. "March 24, why?"

Joseph scratched his head in frustration. "My finals project! It's...it's due in two weeks!" He knew he had to pass his work, otherwise he wouldn't graduate his final year.

He'd completely forgotten, so engrossed he was with his strange new life with Caesar, and his long-due reunion with his old friend Suzi.

He'd fallen into a little fantasy and reality suddenly burst his colorful little bubble of joy.

Joseph's heart sank in realization. His finals project was Caesar.

Except he couldn't bear to think of him as such anymore. In their time together Caesar had become much more than an artistic masterpiece. He had become a person. He was alive. He was a companion, a partner, a friend.

Joseph loved him.

"I...I need to come up with something to submit to the gallery if I expect to make it to the end of the semester," Joseph said wearily, scratching his head in exasperation.

Suzi's usual cheer suddenly faded and was replaced with unease.

"Jojo..." she said, her voice heavy with concern. "Isn't...your project..."

Joseph sighed. "Yes. I know."

Caesar knew right away what Joseph had been talking about.

He felt an immense sadness at the realization that his very existence was a roadblock to Joseph achieving his dream.

"But...but how could I?" Joseph continued. "He's not just a project anymore, Suzi. He's a person."

Joseph shuddered at the thought of the fate that awaited Caesar, to be put on display in a glass case at the gallery. And what if they found out he was alive? What would they do to him?

"Perhaps you could still make a new project in the meantime?" Suzi asked.

"We don't have time," Joseph said. "It took me months to make Caesar to his perfection, what could I do in two weeks? What would they think if someone as reputed and talented as me passed a half-assed artwork as my final masterpiece?"

"I understand," Suzi sighed.

This was a dilemma that weighed heavily on Joseph's heart. On one hand, he had dreamed of being renowned for his talent and skill in creating art. To earn his stern, distant mother's approval. To gain recognition for his passion that he had.

But on the other hand, it would mean giving up Caesar. The little unexpected miracle that had come into his life one day and made it all the more brighter. The friend he never knew he needed. He felt like to do such a thing would be tantamount to abandoning a friend.

Caesar could see the grief in Joseph's eyes.

"I can't do this," Joseph mourned. "I can't do this to you."

Caesar could see the pain and conflict in Joseph's face, and he hurt inside too. He just wanted Joseph to be happy, and it crushed his figurative heart to see Joseph, the one single person he'd known all his brief life, in such a sorry state.

He wanted him to be happy. Whatever it takes.

A determined expression crept onto Caesar's face.

"I'll do it." he said defiantly.

Joseph and Suzi's eyes widened in shock.

"Caesar, no..." was all Suzi could say.

"But I must," Caesar insisted. "It's what you made me for, right, Jojo? This...this is why I exist. To display your talent and help you achieve your dream."

"This is my purpose," Caesar concluded.

"But why?" Joseph pleaded, looking into the eyes of his precious creation. "Why are you doing this? What about you?"

"I'll be fine," Caesar reassured. "I'm good at freezing up when people are around. They wouldn't even know."

Joseph looked upset at the thought of Caesar spending the rest of his existence in a gallery. He deserved a life.

"Jojo, I owe you everything," Caesar insisted. "You've made me live, even if it wasn't your intention. You've given me the best life you could in spite of what I am. The very fact you saw me as a person, who deserved existence as much as you, when I first awoke...for that I am ever grateful," he said. "And this is the best way I can pay you back for all you've done for me."

"Because..." Caesar hesitated.

He didn't seem sure how to say it.

"Because..."

He closed his eyes and gave a sigh.

"...because I love you, Jojo."

Was it strange that a creation had feelings for his creator? Or for a creator to feel the same?

For the same feeling had been welling up in Joseph's heart, and Caesar declaring his feelings first was like opening the floodgates of Joseph's emotions.

"Caesar..." he said, tears building up in his eyes as he gazed back into Caesar's eyes, past the polished, clay pupils and into the beautiful soul that resided within.

"I love you too," he said.

Caesar felt a warmth like never before in hearing Joseph's declaration. His brilliant blue eyes were so sincere, so full of affection, and Caesar was steadfast to do anything for him, as much as he possibly could, no matter what lay ahead.

Despite his lingering anxiety at his uncertain fate.

"So, what now?" Suzi asked, interrupting the tender moment. "How do we do this?"

Joseph, encouraged by Caesar's declaration, and his refusal to let Caesar make such a tremendous sacrifice, did what he did best.

He began to think of a plan.

"Caesar, how long can you freeze up like a statue?" he asked.

"I am a statue," Caesar replied.

"No, no, like a regular, non-living statue?" Joseph specified.

"I mean, I don't have muscles to ache or need to blink, so I guess a long time?" Caesar explained. "I've never tried how long."

"I won't let them make you have to do it forever," Joseph promised. "But I have an idea."

"Hmmm?" Caesar and Suzi hummed in unison, their interest piqued.

"There's a two-day ceremony where the judges grade the artworks," Joseph explained. "I just gotta get Caesar in there, get him graded, and take him home. He'll be up on display for two days, and then I can take him back. Hopefully, assuming he doesn't get selected for permanent exhibit..."

"All you have to do is try not to move. Can you do that for me?" Joseph asked him.

"I'll try my best," Caesar answered, now with a hint of uncertainty, as he slowly realized what he'd have to do.

"Come on, Caesar," Suzi added, realizing how Joseph's plan would unfold. "People will get to see you. They'll see how beautiful you are. Wouldn't you like that?"

"But I've never been around people before!" Caesar answered, suddenly not so sure about his decision but still determined to help Joseph.

"What if I moved and gave up our whole secret?"

"Well then," Joseph said, as he resumed trying to finish his breakfast.

"I suppose we ought to start practicing."

----------

(Previous Chapter)

(Next Chapter)

[meaningofmotorsport]

Mid-Week Motorsport Headlines - 21st July 2021

F1

Don’t want to dwell on this much, as it is all that has been in the F1 news this past few days, but I do want to highlight the despicable racial abuse of Hamilton again! No matter how angry you are about what he did on Sunday, there is no reason to bring race into this, he made a mistake plain and simple, and does not deserve to be treated this way!

Also, Helmut Marko saying that they will bring lawyers into this, to try and increase the penalty that was imposed on Lewis, is a joke! These things happen in racing, we don’t like to see big crashes, and are glad that Max is fine, but racing is dangerous, and you can’t get away from that! More than anything, it suggests that Red Bull are still not ready to shoulder the responsibility of a championship, if they go off the boil in this way!

In more enjoyable F1 news, Alpine CEO, Laurent Rossi, says that Alonso is on course to stay with the team for 2022. This makes total sense, given the way he has performed on his return to the sport, and with his experience, he could help the team to grow in the future! With Alpine juniors like Piastri waiting in the wings, the decision to resign Ocon, may not have been wise, as his performances this year have never been astounding really, which you would expect with all the hype around him!

IndyCar

It has been a busy week in IndyCar, firstly as Grosjean, after loads of speculation, has finally confirmed he will race at Gateway this year, which will be his first oval appearance ever! This is the best oval to start on, at least of the options he had this year, as it is slower than Texas and Indy, and could allow him to build towards a full time ride next year! It will be interesting to see how he copes with the new style of racing, although I am sure he will adapt quickly!

The other bits of big news, are not directly to do with racing, but will help to boost the series going forward! It began with Motorsport Games, announcing that it will be making an official IndyCar game, coming out in 2023! This is something many people have wanted for a long time, and could really help to expand the series’ audience to a new segment of fans! The team making it, have been involved with games like rFactor, so they know how to make good racing games!

The other coup for IndyCar, which is arguably much bigger, is the new TV deal for the series! There were hints that it could go to CBS, however, they were dispelled by its management. This basically left NBC as the only option, but it isn’t as though IndyCar got a rough deal as a result, in fact, it could be the best one for many decades! Having 13 races on the main NBC channel is unheard of for Motorsport, and may really help to grow the sports fanbase! You can argue it will be balanced out by having two races exclusively on Peacock, which is likely being used to encourage fans to buy that package, but otherwise it is a great deal! The TV ratings for the races this year, are undoubtedly a huge factor in securing this contract, as IndyCar is starting to boom again!

Formula E

The layout for the London ePrix circuit this weekend has been revealed! It does look very technical, with many slow hairpin corners, as well as some long straights. Having the pits and start line inside a building may give a completely different aesthetic to the racing!

In some other small bits of news, Alice Powell, has been signed as sim driver for Envision Virgin, to help the team to develop their car into the future! A budget cap has been proposed for the 2023/24 season, to try and avoid the costs from spiralling in this series as well. It may come into force for the 2nd year of Gen3, to give the team a year to get comfortable with the new car, and is in response to some big teams spending as much as £40 million on a mostly spec car! Finally for Formula E, Andretti have stated they want to stay in the sport once BMW have left the team!

MotoGP

The Thai round of the championship has been cancelled for the 2nd year in a row, due to the current situation in that part of the world. This is a shame, as we have only raced once at the track, which gave us a thrilling race in 2019!

Pedrosa will return to MotoGP for the first time since leaving Honda in 2018, as he takes up a wildcard seat for KTM in Austria! As their official test rider, he should still be fit enough to do a very good job, and this experience could help to inform his development of the bike!

KTM have said that if Petrucci wished to go to do some rallying for 2022, they would help to support his efforts. This is a rather large hint that they do not wish to resign him for next year in MotoGP!

-M

Thank you very much for reading this article! To keep up to date with when they go out, and to see my reactions to races and other news, follow me on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/MeaningofMotor1

Also, if you want to support me, I have a Patreon Page at: https://www.patreon.com/meaningofmotorsport

[markantonys]

Domina was crazy good. Central female relationships, appropriate and equal (non-gross) nudity, and gay characters who, while still crazy/creepy, wasn't the only f'd up one (lookin at you Tiberius)

i enjoyed it a lot too! tho idk if i would go so far as to call it crazy good myself haha and i actually was really bugged by its female relationships. with the exception of the main livia-antigone relationship pretty much all the other female relationships were shallow and needlessly antagonistic with soooo much cattiness (i'm so exhausted by rival sisters-in-law livia vs. octavia why can't an adaptation just let them be friends for once? and the show's lack of empathy towards scribonia's suffering despite purporting itself to be a Feminist Show™ was astounding) there were hints of a nice relationship between livia and julia but they only had a couple brief scenes together. we barely saw the other girls but marcella is shaping up to be a needlessly catty bitch as well so that's a wonderful take we can look forward to if there are more seasons -__-

and i'm torn about marcellus. i'm not saying that all gay characters must be flawless and morally pure because that would be boring and unrealistic (especially in an ancient roman setting), i'm just asking that the one (1) gay character not also be by far the vilest, cruelest person on the entire show lmfao like yeah tiberius had some shit going on too (which, given that iirc they implied he has some kind of mental illness, opens a whole other can of worms) but he was afforded lots of empathy, very much an "aww poor baby tiberius gets bullied by the others uwu" whereas marcellus was a spoiled brat right from the get go with very few, if any, redeeming qualities. they did humanize him a little right before his death and the actor did a fantastic job with those moments of vulnerability, but it was too little too late. (and while we're on the subject, marcellus shouldn't have been the only gay character seeing as it was very common for roman men to sleep with men as well as women, the majority of the male characters in any ancient rome-set media should be bi (to use an anachronistic modern label) if you ask me (female sexual behavior isn't discussed much in our male-authored primary sources so it's harder to speak to that))

all this being said though, i really appreciate how much this show did with the family dynamics and marriage shuffling of the augustan household and how many of the kids they managed to include - just about all of them, which i never thought i'd get to see in an adaptation! and while the details were obviously sensationalized, the show was actually quite accurate in terms of the historical events included (i was particularly impressed that they bothered with the primus affair, and i remember while i was watching that trial scene i was thinking "wow this is playing out EXACTLY like how it was described in what i've read"). and of course MY BOY IULLUS ANTONIUS he's tied with his dad as my most beloved historical figure and for years i've dreamed of seeing him portrayed onscreen and never thought it would happen, but this show gave him to me and made him a himbo and included his relationship with julia and acknowledged his suffering with augustus destroying his whole family and his fragile position in the household, and i will never ever get over it

[missfangirll]

Ad astra per aspera

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3

Fandom: Guardian Relationship: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan, Da Qing/Ye Zun Tags: Fluff, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fix-it, Getting Together Words: 3001 Summary: The revelations keep coming. 

Read on AO3

- - -

Da Qing heaved a long-suffering sigh as he bent to pick up his crumpled t-shirt from the floor, throwing a glance at Ye Zun from the corner of his eye. The other was busy sorting the laundry into three large piles and Da Qing couldn’t quite suppress an eye-roll at the sight. Ye Zun had, naturally, never used a washing machine before he moved in, but had spent hours reading the manuals online - because Da Qing didn’t have them anymore, who keeps stuff like this anyway, Ye Zun? - and was now very confident about the correct way to use it, which included the perfect amount of detergent and the fact that certain colours weren’t allowed in the same wash. Da Qing had barely managed to bite back a comment on how that was exactly how his brother dealt with things he didn’t understand, but secretly he was a tiny bit impressed how fast Ye Zun adapted. Still, his obsession with cleaning was… something. 

Sighing, he threw the t-shirt onto one of the piles, making Ye Zun startle, then furrow his brow. Indignantly, he grabbed the offending item with two fingers and placed it onto another pile, all the while staring at the cat. Grinning, Da Qing stuck out his tongue, sauntering off to the kitchen to make tea.

Living with Ye Zun had proven to be… interesting, to say the least. Zhao Yunlan and Da Qing were kindred spirits in many things, so naturally they agreed on their take on cleaning, too. Which meant that, before Shen Wei’s merciless cleaning sprees, they had been very happy in their own mess, but now he discovered Ye Zun had more in common with his brother than he admitted. He had Shen Wei’s penchant for a spotless environment, liked the apartment to be neat and tidy, but combined this with an obsessive streak his brother didn’t have (or didn’t show, at least). Ye Zun had a manic aura around him in almost everything he did, and Da Qing teased him relentlessly for it, even though he was secretly glad to have someone clean the fridge and throw out spoiled food when he forgot to do it again. 

Additionally, he was a surprisingly good cook, moving about the small apartment kitchen with a graceful ease that always reminded Da Qing of his deadly precision on a battlefield. He couldn’t for the life of him operate a microwave or an electric rice cooker, but showed astounding intuition when it came to actual cooking. (Da Qing had tried to wheedle out of him where he had learned it, but he had stayed stubbornly silent and ignored the cat until he gave up.)

Grinning to himself, Da Qing turned on the kettle, then portioned the tea into the pot, when he felt someone flick the back of his head hard. Startled, he whirled around to complain when he saw the other’s eyes. Sparkling with mischief, they looked even more radiant than usual, and suddenly he had to swallow. Ye Zun smirked, then forced his face into a stern frown, glaring at the cat. His eyes still sparkling, he raised the hand he had been holding behind his back, shoving the object in it into Da Qing’s face. Spluttering, he took a step back, only to see the dirty sock fall down between them. Ye Zun cackled. “That’s for leaving them everywhere,” he said with a wide grin, then turned around to leave for his laundry pile. Da Qing pounced. When he hit the other’s back and threw his arms around his shoulders, Ye Zun stumbled, his arms flailing. After two staggering steps, they both toppled headfirst into the laundry, their fall somewhat cushioned by the clothes. 

Laughing, Da Qing pressed his whole weight to the other’s back, trying to immobilise his arms as well, while Ye Zun sputtered indignantly and tried to shake him off. They rolled down from the pile, and even though Ye Zun had lost his dark energy, he still was agile and strong, and thus managed to pin the cat effectively under him, grinning down with a dangerous glimmer in his eyes. 

Before he could say anything, however, they were interrupted by a loud knock on the door. Startled, they looked at each other, then at the door, then hastily scrambled away from each other to get to their feet and to the door. Upon opening it, a middle-aged woman glared at them, and before they could even manage a greeting, started yelling. “I don’t know what exactly you are doing,” she spat, the emphasis on the last word making it sound suggestive, “but you have to stop doing it on the floor.” She looked knowingly at their dishevelled state and huffed, but before she could continue, Ye Zun interrupted her. “We are not,” he had to clear his throat, “not what you… seem to think.” Sensing that he started to flounder, Da Qing chimed in. “We are roommates,” he clarified, “and we just moved in, so we apologise for disturbing you. It won’t happen again.” He bowed slightly, nudging Ye Zun to do the same. Straightening up again, Da Qing noticed that the woman’s gaze had changed somewhat. “Roommates,” she said slowly and gave Ye Zun a strange look, who nodded hastily, glancing at Da Qing. Before either of them could add anything, the woman nodded to herself, then bowed quickly and left. Da Qing turned to look at Ye Zun, who looked equally confused. Shrugging, he took a step back and closed the door.

Da Qing had almost forgotten the whole incident, until two days later he stepped out of the apartment and stumbled over something in front of the door, barely able to prevent a fall. Cursing loudly, he turned to look at what had caused his almost-accident, when he stilled. On the doormat, there was a huge pile of neatly wrapped gifts in different sizes, some flowers, stuffed teddy bears and chocolates, all of it in various shades of pink. On closer look, he noticed a name tag on one of the larger presents: To the pretty cat-owner with the silver hair. He snorted, first indignantly at the thought of Ye Zun as his owner, then with the mental image of his roommate’s middle-aged fanclub. Giggling, he scooped up the presents and stepped back into the apartment where he dumped them unceremoniously over an unsuspecting Ye Zun who sat on the couch. “What the…?”, he began, but Da Qing just snorted, “From your fanclub,” and turned around to leave for the SID.

After this, they kept finding little gifts and trinkets on their doorstep on a weekly basis, never signed, but always addressed to Ye Zun in various degrees of admiration. Ye Zun never acknowledged them, just took the chocolate to the SID and threw the rest away without a second glance, but after the third week Da Qing began to feel irked. He stubbornly avoided thinking about that fact (and what it meant) and kept teasing Ye Zun with his fanclub, but somehow he felt more uneasy the more gifts they found. 

He didn’t want to investigate these feelings further, he decided when he found yet another teddy bear on the threshold, but couldn’t bring himself to tease Ye Zun when he silently handed him the gift. However, Ye Zun didn’t even look at it, but kept his eyes on Da Qing, slightly raising one of his dark eyebrows. “What?” he asked, but the cat just shrugged. Then he added, “Why don’t you keep them?” Ye Zun’s eyebrow climbed even higher. “Why would I?” he asked, sounding incredulous, as if the thought had never occurred to him. “I don’t know,” Da Qing tried to explain, “they are gifts from someone who obviously wants to meet you. And it’s probably the neighbor’s daughters who keep sending them, not their mother, so why….” He trailed off, gesturing vaguely. “Why don’t I want to meet someone who apparently has no boundaries and likes me because of my looks?” He blinked at Da Qing, who just shrugged again. “Are you serious? I don’t even like them. I probably would keep the gifts if they came from someone I like, I don’t know, you or my brother, but not these creepy women.” He shook his head and got up to discard the teddy bear, not noticing Da Qing’s frozen face. The cat just stared after him open-mouthed. 

Someone I like.

Someone like you.

Oh. - - - - - - - -

Thinking back on his previous life in the Rebel camp, Ye Zun found that he’d had some vastly different ideas about living with other people. For once, he had never lived with someone he trusted, except from his brother of course, and found that it improved his life significantly. 

Da Qing was, objectively, a lousy roommate: He was undeniably messy, loud, and demanding, also left his dirty laundry everywhere and couldn’t be bothered to clean after himself, at least not without Ye Zun nagging him about it. 

Objectively, it should have been a nightmare. It was anything but. 

Yes, they had regular fights about dishes and laundry, some of them ending with Ye Zun shouting and throwing things at Da Qing (which had made one neighbor so angry that she had to be bribed with some home-made cupcakes, which in turn just added to Ye Zun’s gift pile the next morning), but he secretly enjoyed their banter. Da Qing gave as good as he got, but he never aimed to hurt, keeping the teasing light and in turn, Ye Zun kept nagging about the state of the apartment and nothing else. 

They had reached a mutual understanding of things the other didn’t want to talk about, and kept to these boundaries. Da Qing never mentioned Ye Zun’s powers, while the other avoided the fact that Da Qing sometimes felt abandoned by his master, even though he only admitted to this while drunk. They trusted each other, entrusted each other with their weaknesses and vulnerabilities, and even though he wanted to strangle the cat twice a day, he felt himself get closer, open up to him. It was exciting and frightening at the same time, to let another so close, but he felt safe with Da Qing, safer than he had ever before in his life.      

Their truce held until one night of drinking.

It had started rather unremarkable, with Da Qing immersed in the game on the screen and Ye Zun playing on his phone, but then Ye Zun had made a snide comment on Da Qing‘s favored team, which had made the cat first bristle and then declare that when his team lost, he would never drink anything again, but in case of a win Ye Zun had to play a drinking game with him. Ye Zun had known this was a bad idea, but the score was 0:3 and so he had agreed to this proposal. They had won 4:3, of course, and Da Qing had been very smug about this as he handed Ye Zun a glass with a dubious mixed drink.

Some refills and embarrassing stories later Ye Zun felt pleasantly fuzzy and ready for bed, but Da Qing was really out of it. He had been a few glasses ahead when they started and now looked worse for wear. With a slight smile, he tucked the grumbling cat in on the couch and went for the bathroom. He couldn't be bothered to look for his pyjamas, and returned to the bed in just a t-shirt and briefs.

He staggered to a halt in front of the bed, his fuzzy brain too slow to process the sight.

Normally, Da Qing slept in cat form on whatever surface he deemed worthy of his furry butt, and they even had shared the bed before, but Da Qing had never been in human form for it. Now, however, the cat wasn't a cat, and lay sprawled on the bed, face down, arms and legs spread, still almost fully clothed.

Ye Zun‘s treacherous heart skipped a beat. Stomping down on the strange feeling that had begun spreading in his stomach, he contemplated his options. The couch was not that comfortable: Since Zhao Yunlan had moved his giant leather monster to the new house, he and Da Qing had bought a new one, which was great to spend a relaxing evening, but not wide enough to sleep comfortably on. So, the bed… He looked at the other, taking in the almost unnervingly still form. Da Qing had somehow lost his shoes, but still wore his pants and a t-shirt, his hair in a messy halo on the pillow. He had his head slightly turned, so Ye Zun could see his dark lashes fanning his cheek, his mouth slack with sleep. He swallowed hard, looking back to the sofa. If he slept on it, he’d most likely wake up with a sore neck, not to mention his back would kill him in the morning. Plus, they had shared the bed in the past, he tried to convince himself. No big deal.

Exhaling with a deep sigh, he bent down. “Move over,” he muttered, and as Da Qing didn't move, he shoved at his shoulders to get the covers from under him. Draping it over the cat, he crept in as well, facing the room.

He felt Da Qing’s warm breath on his neck, followed the soothing rhythm and was almost asleep himself, when the cat stirred. In a clumsy motion, he put an arm over Ye Zun’s waist and drew him closer, nestling his face in the other’s neck. Wide awake, Ye Zun didn't dare to breathe. His heart fluttered like a hummingbird in his chest, he felt the heat spread from his neck over his whole body, but at the same time his stomach tightened in… in what, panic, shock, distaste? He didn't know, but it made it hard to think straight. Frozen he lay there, unable to breathe or move, his whole body thrumming in sync with his heartbeat, every point of contact burning his skin through the thin fabric of his shirt.

He didn’t know when he had fallen asleep, but at some point he had, because he woke to someone poking his shoulder. Blinking slowly, he took in the sight before him, his brain not fully operative. They had gravitated towards each other in the night, it seemed, because he now had Da Qing’s hand in his, clutching it to his chest, while their noses almost touched. As realisation sunk in, he recoiled with a start, letting go of the other’s hand as if he had burned himself, eyes wide in panic. Da Qing just grinned at him. “Good morning,” he said, showing his teeth in a wide yawn. Without a response, Ye Zun scrambled out of bed and fled to the bathroom, his heart pounding in his ears.

A knock on the door startled him. He had been staring unseeing at his image in the mirror, when he heard a soft question from outside. “Are you alright?” He inhaled shakily. Not trusting his voice, he just hummed, hoping the other would take it as confirmation and leave. But of course, his obnoxious roommate wouldn’t budge. 

“I made you coffee,” he heard, no trace of the teasing tone he had come to expect. Da Qing sounded soft, gentle, almost unsure, and somehow that made his stomach tighten even more.

Closing his eyes, he turned on the faucet to splash his face with cold water, hoping that would help clear his head and maybe also make the cat leave. Unfortunately, neither of these happened, and with a sigh, he turned to open the door.

Da Qing stood in front of it, two mugs in hand, wordlessly offering one to him. Careful not to touch the other’s fingers, he took it and made his way to the couch, not able to hold his gaze. Hesitating for a second, Da Qing turned and made his way over to the couch as well, sitting on the other end. Ye Zun felt his eyes on him when he asked again, “Are you alright?”, but couldn’t meet his gaze, stubbornly staring into his mug. “Hm,” he replied vaguely, trying to find something to say that would make the situation less awkward.

Da Qing sighed. “Are we going to talk about it?” Ye Zun blinked at him. “Talk?”, he managed to press out. The other sighed again. “Look,” he began, and Ye Zun’s heart stuttered and came to a stop. “I don’t know what you think this means,” Da Qing continued, motioning to the bed, “but as far as I’m concerned, it can mean anything, or nothing at all.” He fixed Ye Zun with a look the other couldn’t quite place. There was hope in it, but also defiance, stubbornness, and vulnerability. Ye Zun swallowed. “What.. What does what mean?”, he managed eventually, sounding hoarse. Da Qing closed his eyes in frustration, then bit out, “What do you want, Ye Zun?” Averting his eyes, he couldn’t find an answer to this. Sleeping next to the cat had been equal parts exhilarating and terrifying, he had felt held and confined at the same time, the other’s embrace suffocating, but also safe, his touch burning, but also soothing. It had been the best and worst experience of his life, and he still could feel the other’s touch, his warm breath, and he wanted. But at the same time, he was so afraid of it, of the burning closeness of another’s soul. He didn’t know how to voice any of this, if he even wanted to, and so stayed silent. Da Qing let out a low groan, then forcefully placed the mug on the coffee table. “Okay,” he said with finality, “then it means nothing.” With a look at Ye Zun, who had slumped into the couch, he stood up, changing into cat form, and leaped out of the open window. Ye Zun drew in a shaky breath, his eyes burning, his stomach in a tight knot.

Previous Chapter - - - - - -

Some notes: Maybe you noticed, but I changed the chapter titles. It was supposed to be six chapters, corresponding to the phases of grief: shock, anger, guilt, grief, and hope, chapter 6 being love.. I thought that made sense, since the title is "Through hardship to the stars", so he would have to overcome hardships. But Ye Zun decided he was done grieving in the second chapter and wanted to enjoy life 😁 (Or I discovered I write better fluff than angst, ehem 😁), so the whole thing changed its course a bit... I still keep the general plot idea (did someone mention the Regent?), but it's going to be lighter and happier, I suppose... (Can't promise anything tho, Ye Zun is a moody bitch 😁😁) Until I can come up with some good names, the chapters won't have individual titles. If you want to suggest some, feel free 😁😁

[stressedspidergirlsfandomblog]

Okay, so imagine this

Kaer Morhen is a place that little boys go to die, if they’re lucky, or they become witchers. 

(In some ways, Strangers Like Me is what fucking ran thru my head literally all night last night. I wrote nothing, I could not sleep, and my brain SPIRALED all over this)

And somehow, despite the world beating him down and beating him down and beating him down and shelling him out over and over, he runs into an idiot bard who has no fear of him. Who slowly goes from thinking he’s a simpleton to realizing there is a man in there, a boiling seething lake of feelings and anger overtopped by a thick layer of ice. And the bard makes it his life’s mission to help him learn that he is human. (the whole fic idea is more Geraskier, but it has to START the development elsewhere)

he also bumps sorceress who teaches him love and anger and all sorts of other things -fancy table manners, philosophy etc. He has access to things with her he’d never have had in the keep. She teaches him how to eat chicken on the bone with a fork and knife (book canon), and all the other fancy utensils because he’s a person dammit and he should know that his napkin goes in his lap. He devours her books, and since she can read minds she can draw out the conversations from him. She teaches him how to have those conversations and those debates. 

TWs for all the canon compliant fucking misery that is Geralt’s life. Child abuse, neglect, assault, etc. 

Geralt is incapable of believing good about himself, or expressing himself normally or knowing what to do in social situations. He mimics, he copies, he attempts to replicate, but if the situation changes he isn’t sure what to do. 

Trauma gives us 4 options. Fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. He knows how to fight, but sometimes it leads him to battles he’ll never win. Flight is usually safest. Freeze can also work well, but he doesn’t know how to fawn, no one’s praised him enough or taught him how to give praise or fake affection in turn. Usually, he chooses to freeze until he can assess better. If there’s no blades drawn, it is time to freeze. 

( I am looking at this purely from a child abuse perspective) 

He has no idea what to make of Yennefer. She is rage, and greed, and feelings, and luxury. She teaches him to fight back. She teaches him you can be angry and people will not always leave you. Some children/adults will do anything to please someone in hopes of affection until they feel safe, and they begin to test boundaries. And with Yennefer, he’s allowed. Neither one of them knows how to process emotions in a healthy way, not really. But if she wants to throw a jam jar at the wall -not at him, never at him. She doesn’t want to hurt him. She’s just angry and has to break something. Better the jar than herself. Or him. He learns to stomp and yell right back, to knock things off the dresser or desk. Maybe it’s not a good lesson, but it’s something. 

She teaches him choice in bed. He’s never had choice in bed, he’s never made love. He has had sex. Voluntary, involuntary. Me for her, let the girl go, use me instead. He heals. He always heals. He can kill them if he wants to, but that raises more problems than it solves. Kaer Morhen has no women. He learns very little about making love there, either, feelings are forbidden. However, he learns to keep himself silent and still as his cock is stroked, he learns to not let the bed so much as creak the slightest bit, not the softest change in his breathing. He learns how to use precum as lubricant because there is nothing else, and while he doesn’t learn how to kiss, or fuck, he learns how to touch. There’s no kind of education like that. It’s control, management of pain, seeking approval from people who rarely give it. 

Yennefer gives him approval. She gives him choice, and she teaches him to move his hips. She teaches him it’s alright to breathe through it, to beg for it, to twitch, it’s okay to want something for himself. He can’t reconcile it, can’t adapt well to it. But in bed, with her, he allows himself to be freer. It doesn’t translate for him, into other situations. His learning is contextual. He has trouble applying the lessons she tries to teach him to other social situations. He can fight back with her because she likes him. He can argue with her about books because she starts the conversation for him because he doesn’t know how. He is heinously smart, he can read, write, and speak at least three languages, he can synthesize information so quickly it stuns her. If he’d been chosen as a mage, if he could access the Source, he would set the world on fire. 

She teaches him to say ‘no.’ It’s not something he knew he could do. Not outside of negotiating a contract. Most of his world is lived inside of his own head because he isn’t allowed to offer opinions unless someone asks. Other than contracts. There is a script, there are rules, he can say ‘I won’t kill that’ or ‘that’s not enough coin’ or ‘no.’ Those situations he can talk freely and articulately. 

They experiment in bed, to a point. She can tell when he’s getting cagey and stops. She never makes him say ‘no’, never lets it get that far, because she knows he’ll freeze. When he’s vaguely curious about light bondage she simply tells him to see if he can even stand to put his palms on the headboard and not touch her. He can’t. He can’t stand it if she won’t touch him, either, when she offers to return the favor and see if he likes that edge of control. He doesn’t. She’s had other lovers, but none like him. None as broken and angry as she is. (The book says, it flat out says, they did not know HOW to be kind, but they wanted to be, and so they were, when it describes how they make love.) They try other things, some things he more tolerates than enjoys -the unicorn. But he doesn’t hate it, he just doesn’t prefer it. 

He can’t admit to feelings, he can’t admit to loving her, and so she can’t tell him because he isn’t ready to hear it. He can’t believe any of it, and so she can’t say a word. Telling him would chase him out of her life forever. When he tries to share things with her, when he tries to push himself to describe any part of himself, she listens. She uses many of his failings against him when they fight, but never what he tells her in confidence and struggle and broken words. When he tells her ‘they botched it’ meaning they botched him, he’s worthless, not made right, and horrible, she tells him perhaps she is the same. 

Eventually the fighting is too much, the frustration at themselves is too much. They can’t heal each other. What they need doesn’t line up yet. 

They break apart and he travels again, happy to reunite with Jaskier. Not that he understands that feeling. But something feels ...easier, with the bard around. He tries on occasion to engage in conversations, just sharing a random fact or quote with the bard and Jaskier doesn’t realize what Geralt is doing for weeks until Geralt stops and he finally asks him what his quote of the day is. Geralt visibly perks and Jaskier finally understands what Geralt has been trying to tell him. He finally asks the right question and Geralt talks to him for hours, long after the sun sets, as animated as his training allows him to be, describing how he’s connected this human myth to an elvish historical event that is corroborated by the dwarves, he had to read it in Elvish, and also Dwarfish, but he can’t find a written version of the myth he’s only heard it spoken or sung. 

Jaskier takes him to Oxenfurt and leads him in and out of guest lectures. They sit in the back so Geralt can hide, because that’s what he does. Don’t look people in the eye unless they tell you to. Don’t look up, don’t be big, don’t exist if you can help it. And he hides and scrunches in on himself, but he listens, and the bard lets him pore over libraries and scares off anyone who would complain at a mutant witcher touching precious tomes. Geralt is gentle, and careful, and sweet, and he deserves to read what he wants, he deserves answers to questions about the world he could never find in Kaer Morhen where his only training was how to survive as a witcher. 

Jaskier teaches him how to answer the question asked, not just say what he thinks people want to hear. That’s not what I asked you. I asked what your preference was. He learns that Geralt was very much raised to believe children should be seen and not heard, in terms of himself. He doesn’t speak up, doesn’t offer anything unless asked. Not unless it’s about witchering, then he is allowed. And so he makes sure to ask. Are you hungry? Would you like to stop for the night, too? Does that hurt, it looks like it hurts. And Geralt learns to listen to the words, and he learns if asked, he is allowed to speak for himself. He doesn’t have to do what he thinks Jaskier wants. Unless prompted, around people, he rarely speaks, rarely converses, and just tries not to be terrifying. Keeps his head down, hood up, he doesn’t want to be hurt. He’s sick of being hurt. He’s sick of going hungry, he is sick of being miserable. And he has found if he is invisible, people leave him alone. He doesn’t get stoned, he doesn’t get beaten, he doesn’t get chased out for just wanting a bed to sleep in and a warm meal. If he doesn’t take up space, he can exist. Jaskier speaks for him, people think perhaps he’s a simpleton who the bard travels with, they don’t know the quick mind behind the eyes focused firmly on the ground. 

It constantly breaks Jaskier’s heart. He has never seen Geralt smile. He has never heard him laugh. He has heard him talk with intonation on occasion, and usually only when reciting what he’s been told. He is an incredible mimic for tone and pitch and it astounds the bard. When he asks Were you even listening to me at all?  and Geralt begins reciting everything he had said, with perfect inflection, since Geralt’s last one word response, perfect tone, perfect everything other than he doesn’t change his voice, his gravelly voice will never soar into tenor heights. 

Children, ones who don’t know what he is, love him. Parents who don’t know, don’t see the swords strapped to Roach, they don’t mind the bard’s pet simpleton playing pat-a-cake with their children, they don’t mind them teaching him to make flower crowns. Or watching them draw in the dirt. The children never think he’s stupid, they like him all the more for knowing they aren’t, either. He lets them pet his horse, and boosts them into the saddle. He helps them reach fruit on tree branches, and pulls down prickly berry vines full of blackberries so they can gorge on the sweet fruit. Jaskier loves watching him with children, because he’s less guarded. He starts out small, makes himself so small, so nonthreatening, and when the children realize he’s happy to play with them, he relaxes. The tension leaves him and the villagers ignore him. Any adult stupid enough to want to play with children, to humor them, and listen to their stories can’t be right in the head. The bard’s assurances he won’t touch them or hurt them goes a long way. 

He used to freeze and flinch and shudder whenever Jaskier touched him, because he could not understand. He still doesn’t. Emotions make no sense, touching for affection that isn’t between lovers makes no sense. Jaskier stays with him, so they must be friends. He’d admit it openly if asked. He doesn’t understand he loves the other man. He wouldn’t know that’s what he was feeling even if he was told. He feels nothing, it’s a scooped out shell, there is nothing inside of him other than sometimes anger. That’s why he had to leave Yennefer. She was the sun and he just reflected her warmth, he had nothing of his own to give back. 

Patently untrue, but there’s nothing that would convince him otherwise and Jaskier doesn’t try. Geralt is ridiculously capable and educated, and wonderful and the bard does what he can to praise him when he can because he knows Geralt needs to hear it. No one praised him or loved him as a child. Hugs are still foreign and after years of them his first instinct is still to flinch. He will sleep comfortably draped across the bard, or with the bard curled into him. He doesn’t care about that. He doesn’t have the same personal boundaries other people do. If he’s cold, and Jaskier is there, he sees no reason not to share heat. 

It had given the bard heart failure when they’d been sitting around the fire after eating and Geralt had just started pleasuring himself without understanding why that might not be socially acceptable. He’d offered to help the bard first. Not wanting to give Geralt another reason to be ashamed, or small, or scared, he had declined, and wondered in what world could a boy grow up afraid of being held, but feel perfectly comfortable jerking himself off in the company of others. What had been even odder was the witcher had continued their conversation as though this was normal. Hadn’t lost focus, his breathing had never changed, he hadn’t seemed to take much pleasure from his actions, and Jaskier couldn’t understand why he was doing it. 

It had made his heart hurt in new ways. It’s a perfunctory action, meant to relieve an itch, not something for pleasure’s sake alone. Everything he does has function and reason and logic. 

When they run into people Jaskier knows, and they want to talk to the white wolf, or see him, or bother him, Jaskier tells them to leave him be. He won’t talk to them. His poor witcher gains a bit of a reputation as being a tame monster, trailing his bard on a leash and killing monsters as directed. 

When they’re low on grain for the horses, he goes to busk and see if he can drum up coin. When he comes back to pay the stablemaster, the last thing he expects is for Geralt to be paying with his body, a blank expression on his face as he braces himself against the door of an empty stall. He looks at Jaskier without any kind of shame, any understanding of what’s happening to him because he needs feed for Roach, and she needs a warm place to sleep out of the muck during the rainy seasons. Her hooves need to be dried out, he needs to borrow tools to clean the frogs and check her shoes. He might need the services of a ferrier. He’ll get a bit of coin for this and then some extra. If it isn’t sex with a lover, it’s just a transaction, what should he care? The bard escapes when he realizes only Geralt saw, and pukes his guts up into the gutters. He’d have tried to stop it, but the stablemaster was bigger than he was and he couldn’t take the risk the man would hurt Geralt. 

The horses taken care of, Jaskier uses the coin he’d earned to have a bath drawn up and helps Geralt bathe until all trace of stable is washed away. He tries to ask, and when Geralt openly tells him it’s just better that way, he bites his tongue so hard it bleeds rather than reply or push the issue. He has coin, they’re fine, Geralt won’t need to do that again while they’re together. 

He notices how the witcher gets thinner after, stress and shame eating his insides even if he won’t admit it. He’d been the heaviest Jaskier had ever seen him after living with Yennefer for a few years. Healthy. Shiny hair, bright eyes, enough meat over his bones to hide them. Slowly his spine creeps through his skin and the bard can count the vertebrae. It will pass, and he realizes he’s seen this pattern. This has happened before he just hadn’t seen. It passes, Geralt finds lucrative contracts, and his body fills back out. 

They continue to work on what feelings are. Geralt remains baffled by the fact the bard will not bed him in any capacity, and doesn’t understand why they can’t share a little pleasure. Jaskier knows if he gives in, Geralt will never let it progress beyond more than just skin on skin. He’ll never understand it could be more. He has to wait, he has to keep pushing for the witcher to understand there is more. 

They happen upon a town, and a small girl, perhaps three or four years old, picks flowers by the side of the road. There’s a house visible in the distance, but it’s awfully far for a small child to have wandered. Geralt immediately looks around for a dead body, half expecting to find the child’s mother dead in a ditch. Nothing. When she notices his hair peeking out from under his cloak as he crouches down to talk to her, she pushes the fabric off his head to twirl her fingers into his hair. He barely breathes as he asks her where her ma and pa are. She points at the house and said she wanted the orange flowers. He looks over and sees that while there are what seems like thousands of wildflowers much closer, none are the color she’s currently collecting. The child will be missed soon enough, he supposes as he offers her a seat on his shoulder. Before she accepts, she splays small fingers under his eye and he freezes, waiting for her to scream or reject him. She simply says ‘pretty.’ When he lifts her up, she tangles a hand back into his hair to help her hold on and keep her balance. She stuffs the flowers into her small apron -probably made more to humor her than for any practical purpose, and occasionally pats Geralt’s head and tells him again, his hair is pretty and he’s nice to take her home. 

When screaming reaches his ears, he knows the little girl’s name is Ivana, and he tells Jaskier, “Make noise, her mother is in the fields looking for her.” The bard’s trained lungs will project far better than his will. His lungs are trained to breathe evenly and slowly in all things. He will endure if he keeps his heart slow and his breathing calm. 

“Over here! We’ve found her!” Jaskier calls, his voice ringing stridently over the fields. He’s not sure how she could hear him from so far that only Geralt can hear her frantic calls, but all the same he sees how Geralt tilts his head and nods to himself. 

They speed up, Geralt’s stride long and even as the woman comes pelting across the grass, crushing flowers, and her skirts hiked up over her knees to keep them out of her way. She gasps slightly when she sees Geralt and the brightly dressed bard, not sure what they will do to her or her daughter. She can see the swords on the roan mare. “I haven’t coin, please don’t hurt her,” she says. 

Jaskier feels Geralt shrivel. “We just saw her picking flowers and knew she’d be missing,” he explains. “We don’t want coin. Not for returning a toddler to her mother,” he protests. When she reaches out for her child, and Geralt obliges by leaning to hand her off, the girl shrieks in displeasure. 

Geralt freezes, one arm half coming up to ward the mother off, but unsure. Why wouldn’t she want to go back? It’s Jaskier who saves the situation by laughing. “I see she’s gotten quite attached,” he tells the anxious mother. “Here, Ivana, come down, he’s very tired and he’s not a pony. You brought flowers for your ma, didn’t you? You can’t show her very well from up there,” and holds out his arms. The girl allows Geralt to pass her over, and he swiftly deposits her on the ground where her mother relaxes immediately. She shows the flowers, and offers Geralt one. 

“Are you a witcher?” she asks. 

“Yes,” Geralt says, careful not to open his mouth too much. His teeth are a bit too white, and his canines a bit too sharp. Not fangs, but some people choose to see them that way. They’d grown in sharper when he’d lost his baby teeth, he’d seen plenty of other humans with teeth like his, but against his pale skin and yellow eyes, the effect was more noticeable. More monstrous. 

“There’s a wyvern, my man, when he gets back from ploughing, he can show you. I see Ivana has taken to you. If you’ll watch her while I bundle herbs, I’ll feed you both lunch.” She isn’t afraid of witchers. “We don’t have much coin, but there’s a bounty on the beast, you can turn it in, if you travel up the road a bit. In the mean time, I can offer you a place to sleep, some feed for your horse, and a meal in a few hours once I’ve finished my tasks.” 

Jaskier knows Geralt is well pleased with the idea just from the shift of his shoulders. “Geralt’s a wonderful babysitter,” he smiles. “I can help you with the chores, I’m sure. Just put me to work. My name is Jaskier, that is Geralt, and you are?” 

“Oh gods above, I’m so sorry, I’m Melina.” She reaches out to shake Jaskier’s hand and the bard accepts warmly, but when she tries to do the same for Geralt the bard gives her a look and she drops her hand. Odd. “Ivana, you mind Master Geralt, or I’ll give you such a hiding you won’t sit for weeks, do you hear me?” 

“Yes, Mama,” she promises. “I will show him where to put the horse,” she says proudly and Geralt makes a ‘lead the way’ gesture at her with a little bow that makes her giggle. He takes Roach’s reins from Jaskier and follows the girl child to the barn. 

“He won’t hurt her?” 

“No, he’d die in her defense in a heartbeat.” 

“But he can’t shake hands?” 

“He wouldn’t know that’s what you wanted,” Jaskier tells her. Not sure if that makes it worse or puts her more at ease. “You don’t seem much afraid of him, considering how we started.” 

“Witchers help people,” she smiles faintly. “My pa would have died long before he met my ma if not for a witcher who saved him on the road. Took a bad rake across his face, though, the witcher. My Pa taught us, even if we don’t know much reading or writing, history turns. People used to trust witchers. Then they tried to kill them all. And they’ll trust them again. Any man willing to risk dying to save others can’t be all bad.” 

“That is what I’ve been saying.” He glances up to see the black-clad witcher come back into view with Ivana swinging his hand happily. He can’t hear her, but he knows she is chattering nonstop. 

“Is he... simple?” she asks softly, watching as her daughter teaches Geralt a new clapping game he hasn’t seen before. He seems to be devoting all his energy to the game. 

“No,” Jaskier breathes. “No, he’s brilliant,” his heart aches. “Will they be alright out here, your man won’t come home and try and beat him with a stick?” 

“No, Roddy would never. He’ll come from the back fields as is. My Roderick is a good man. How could he hit your Geralt for playing with our daughter?” 

“People have done worse for far less,” Jaskier says bitterly. He has no idea why he’s sharing with her. Perhaps months on the road of people being truly horrible to Geralt have made him desperate to talk to someone who isn’t. Someone who is kind. 

“I see.” She shows Jaskier the herbs she’s drying, some to sell, some for home remedies. Vegetables to jar and pickle, and hundreds of other small tasks made near impossible by having a small child to mind. “My boys help their father in the fields, so that he can work on other tasks once they can manage the rest.” As the bard gets the knack for how to tie the herbs, she watches him a few seconds. “So what’s wrong with him?” 

“Nothing,” Jaskier protests. “Nothing at all,” he aches for Geralt. “People, people are the ones who are wrong. He does everything he can to not draw attention. The less he talks, the less he moves, the less people notice and the less likely they are to-” His head snaps up when he hears a husky chuckle from outside. “Your man early?” 

“No, he doesn’t laugh like that,” she says. 

“Who the fuck is that then?” he demands, peering from the small window. Ivana is pointing at something dramatically and stamping a foot and he realizes the laugh is Geralt. His heart squeezes and he blinks rapidly. He hadn’t known Geralt could laugh. Not in all the years they’d been travelling together. “Oh,” he gasps, the wind knocked out of him. 

“Let them be, if she starts to have a true tantrum I’ll rescue him. It’s about time for her to nap, she’ll be fussy soon enough.” 

“Eh, he’ll be fine,” Jaskier tells her, rubbing at his eyes with a knuckle. “He’s faced worse than a grumpy toddler before.” 

“Perhaps, Master Jaskier. But he cannot swing his sword to stop her from inconveniencing him.” 

“He would never. Although, he might turn tail and run in here, seeking rescue,” he tries to turn the conversation somewhere else. 

[notes-from-sarah]

Tarnished Mirrors

Link on Fanfiction.net

Link on Archive of Our Own

Rating: G/K+

Summary: Jango oversees the training of the clones on Kamino and works to make them into a truly grand army. However, there is more to being a soldier than being a good fighter, and Jango hopes to instill a sense of dignity and honor in the clones. As the troopers near the end of their training they look towards the day when their skills will be put to use. Features Original Clone Characters. Set one year prior to Episode II. Canon compliant.

I - ARMOR DAY

"Again!" Jango Fett commanded. Looker rolled to his feet. It was Armor Day. All the clones in his unit were in armor for the very first time. The obstacle course he had run flawlessly just the day before had suddenly become insurmountable. This was his third attempt, and the third failure. Looker and the others went back to the beginning. Every time they failed they had to start over from square one. So far, each time they had run the course they had made more progress than the time before. Clones were nothing if not adaptable. Jango Fett was overseeing the training of this unit. Known as the First One Hundred they were the lucky ones who got to do everything for the first time, all under the watchful eye of the clone template. Fully armored, Jango paced in front of the group. "You've got to stop working against your armor. Let it work for you. You're not doing yourself any favors by fighting it." "Yes, sir," the clones chorused. "Now tell me, what have you learned so far?" A number of the men held up their right hand in fist, indicating they wished to speak if called upon. Jango gestured to one of them known as Scooch. "My range of movement is impeded." Other troopers were called upon in turn, each giving a different observation. "My peripheral vision is shot," said Ringer. "I can't feel anything, there's no sense of touch," said Thunder. "I'm clumsy," said Hype. Some of the other clones chuckled at this. "Well, clumsier than usual," he amended. "My head is taller with this helmet, and I keep bumping into things," said Mettle, the unit commander. All the clones nodded at this. Jango passed a hand over the dome of his own helmet. "You learn to manage the, ah, clearance issues. Now, what advantages have you found, and how will you capitalize on them?" More hands went up. "Better grip," said Tatters. "No glare from the lights," said SNAFU. "It didn't hurt as much when I fell," said Cut. Unexpectedly, Jango seized Looker, who was the nearest to him, and violently headbutted him. Their helmets crashed together with a resounding clank. Jango released the clone; Looker stepped back a little surprised, but unharmed. Raising a finger Jango said emphatically, "Never forget that your armor is also a weapon. Now run the O-Course again." The men went back to the course. This time went better. Not only were they getting used to their armor, but they were beginning to see how they could use it for their advantage. The door to the obstacle course room opened, and Boba slipped in, moving to stand by his dad. Jango glanced down at his son, the child could be hard to read sometimes. Boba stood, watching the clones tackle the course. Jango said, "Everything okay?" Boba nodded. "I wanted to see Armor Day. The others were just doing target practice again." After a moment of watching he remarked, "They're not very good." "They're better than they were. They'll get it soon enough." Another moment passed as Boba observed them. "Will I get armor too?" Jango eyed his son. "Not like the troopers. One day, soon enough, you'll get your very own Mandalorian armor." "When?" Jango lifted Boba's arm to check the length of the sleeve on his wrist. "When you stop growing so fast." Boba turned to look at his father, a little exasperated. "But Dad, I don't grow fast. I'm the only nine year old who is still a kid. Even the five year old clones are bigger than me." That was a fact that was hard on Boba. Jango and Boba didn't always stay on Kamino, but when they did Boba would sometimes fall in with a clone unit and participate in the various training. Still, even if Boba was in a unit of clones his size, in just a month or two they would all be noticeably bigger and more advanced than him because of their accelerated growth. "You'll be grown up soon enough." Seeing that the clones were coming to the end of the course, Jango thought he'd switch things up a bit. "Watch this," he said, handing Boba a pair of night-vision binoculars. He moved to the wall panel and called to the clone troopers, "Again, lights out!" Punching the lights and turning on his infrared heads up display he watched as the clones attempted to run the course in reverse in the dark. There was a loud thump and some swearing as Hype fell off the first obstacle. Boba giggled at the colourful choice of words Hype picked. Jango watched, amused, yet proud, as the clones retraced their steps towards his position. He stood, arms crossed over his chest, as the troopers made their way back through the course. When they finally reached him, Jango turned and faced Commander Mettle. "Again."

II - SNIPER TRAINING

Clones grew at an accelerated rate, and their training was accelerated right along with it. Two days later a squad from the First One Hundred were situated on a ledge with Jango. Boba had come along today, he was perched behind everyone, and keeping quiet and out of the way. Boba was generally a quiet kid, so it was never an issue of distraction. Looker was laying prone as he adjusted his sights. He and the others in the squad had all trained with the weapons before, but using the sniper rifles was a bit different once helmets were involved. The simulations were never quite good enough to prepare for the real deal.

Jango was running the snipers through the basics. Sniping was about a lot more than just shooting. "Now, you boys have been done plenty of target practice, but sniping is the real deal. It's not just hitting what you shoot at, it's also about being unobserved, and picking the right spot. A sniper's no good if he gives away his position, or can be easily avoided."

Looker let the words sink in. For now they were just working on accuracy, but they would be doing more intense training soon enough. The targets were released into the training room, they were working at a distance of 1500 meters. The pressure was on, time to show what they were capable of.

Boba sat in awe as the clones took their shots. The targets seemed to be so far away, yet these troopers hit the targets with astounding accuracy. The one called Looker was exceptionally good.

*****

Later in the day they were in a training room with simulated terrain. The men had been given simulation weapons, and were set loose against each other. Looker army crawled along a ridge with a small amount of cover. Going up against a target was one thing, going against an adaptable, thinking person was another.

Looker found his spot. Setting up his gun he adjusted his sights and began sweeping the room. Spotting movement he began picking off his squad mates one by one. A practice bolt seared by him. Time to move.

He gathered up his weapon and scrabbled along the ridge. Sliding down the incline he rolled into a new position. There was more cover, but less visibility. Setting up again, he reoriented himself and began to sweep for the rest of the squad.

Boba and Jango were watching from an observation room. The troopers were doing well, Jango could tell they would be fully trained and ready to go very soon. It was a little strange to watch nine year old men fully equipped as soldiers. Jango tried not to think about it too hard. He saw that Boba was fascinated with the sniper training. He had been transfixed by it all day.

Boba gazed at the observation screen. "Dad?"

"Yes, son?"

"Will I ever be able to shoot like that?"

"Anything those men can do, Boba, you will be able to do as well." Jango couldn't help but feeling a little proud at the prowess demonstrated by the clones. They represented everything he was capable of; he was the prototype of the perfect soldier.

He saw the man called Looker change position for the fourth time. He certainly knew how to keep on the move, even it he still didn't know how to pick a good sniping spot. "Tell me, Boba, where would be a better place for Looker to have picked? And what's wrong about the spot he's in?" Even if Boba wouldn't be ready for full sniper training until he was at least a little taller, he could always start thinking like a sniper now.

Boba enjoyed the challenge, and began rattling off what he knew about good spots for camouflage. With a little guidance from Jango, Boba soon began to identify which clones were doing better based off of their strategy for position and cover. Jango was pleased that Boba did so well. He wanted to pass on to his son more than a matched set of genetics, he wanted to give his son everything he had and everything he knew.

Boba's observations were cut short as a practice bolt lanced across the training room. Looker, the last save one, was marked as hit. As good as Looker was, Commander Mettle had better sense for cover and vantage point. Commander Mettle stood and rallied the others to him. The clones picked themselves up from their various positions and headed for the debrief room.

III - DOWN TIME

The mess hall was filled with clones as they took a break from their daily training and came for their midday sustenance. The clones of the First One Hundred were dining after their grueling first week in armor. "When do you think it'll happen?" said Cut. Scooch rolled his eyes at the obvious conversation hook. "When do we think what will happen?" "Deployment," Cut replied. "When do you think we'll get to use everything we've been learning? At this rate, we'll be fully trained in a few more weeks." "Maybe," said Hype, doubtfully. SNAFU punched Hype's arm playfully. "Some of us might take more than a few weeks of training to be ready." The others chuckled. "I'm serious," said Cut. "We're at the brink of being one of the largest, best trained, best equipped armies in the galaxy. It must mean that we'll be deployed in the near future." "That's not really your place to worry about," Commander Mettle chipped in. "We just do what we're told." The others nodded. All of their training relied on obedience to authority. Otherwise, order would disintegrate, and unit cohesion would fall apart. "It would still be nice to know," muttered Cut, but he didn't take it any further. Jango sat in a corner of the hall. He occasionally like to watch how the clones interacted with each other outside of training situations. Dressed in a simple blue tunic, he was hardly visible among so many with his face. Only his age and scars betrayed any difference. Nodding in Jango's direction, Hype said, "What do you think Stencil thinks of us? I've always wondered." "I think Stencil likes us," Looker said. "He's always pretty nice to us, certainly more friendly than the Kaminoans." SNAFU jumped in, "I've never really been clear, though, is he a soldier?" "Must be," said Commander Mettle, "he knows a lot about soldiering, no way he can know that without being a soldier." "Where's the rest of his army?" said Hype, "I mean,  you can't be much of a soldier without an army." "From what I gather," said Cut, "he doesn't really talk about his past. I don't even know where he's from. You work with him a little more, Commander, do you know anything?" "The Kaminoans hired him because they thought he would be the best soldier template. That's all I know." Commander Mettle watched as Boba came into the room and looked around, probably looking for Stencil. The boy looked through several tables of men before he was spotted by Jango and motioned over. Boba came over to his father. Jango leaned down to kiss him on the head. Boba stiffened but didn't move, groaning under his breath, "Daaad." Jango cocked an eyebrow."What? You too old for your old man to give you a kiss now?" Boba's eyes glanced around the room full of clones and muttered, "Others are watching." Jango glanced around too. He really didn't think anyone else would care, but Boba's objections were understandable. He was growing up, and didn't want to seen as a little kid any longer. It gave Jango a twinge of sadness all the same.  Patting his son on the head, he said, "All right, no more public displays of affection, then." The men at Looker's table had been watching. Looker was the first to voice his thoughts. "I wonder what it's like, having a family." "A lot of work, by the looks of it," said SNAFU, "Stencil is always having to keep tabs on the kid." Scooch watched Boba crawl up next to Jango. Jango licked his thumb and used it to scrub something off the side of Boba's face. "Why do you think he'd want a clone of himself for a kid, don't people usually have kids, you know, biologically?" All the clones at the table considered this for a minute. "Maybe he can't have kids," said Ringer. "Or, he doesn't know any females," said Tatters. "Or, he wanted to know exactly what his kid would look like when he grew up," said Thunder. "So he can trade clothes," added Cut. "It's a bit strange though," said Looker, "that Stencil would want a clone, honestly, any one of us could've been that kid. But, we're here, soldiers, and he's there, just doin' whatever." Commander Mettle put in, "I'm sure Stencil has a good reason for his actions. He don't strike me as the type to act rashly. Whatever you do, though, don't ask him. Now get back to your meal, we have chores to get to." 

IV - ADVANCED RECON COMMANDO     

In a matter of weeks, the First One Hundred were fully trained. Their aptitude toward their training had helped them excel in the armor phase, and they had shown how quickly the clones were able to adapt to new challenges. The First One Hundred had been put through their paces. They had overcome every obstacle thrown at them, which included doing every training exercise in the dark. They had good unit cohesion, and their leadership and training was exceptional. Many of them were ready for the added responsibility of training other troopers. Jango addressed the ones selected for more advanced training and higher leadership. These men he would continue working with, but only for a couple weeks more. They were so close to perfect. "Men, you are close to finishing your training. As soldiers, your skills are complete. You know how to handle weapons, move in formation, fight as a team, and respond effectively to every threat. But, there's more to soldierin' than that. You have to have loyalty, and honor, and heart. You have to depend on each other, because you won't be able to depend on any one else. "One day, soldiers, you will leave Kamino and go to war somewhere for some glorious purpose. Others will only look at you as tools. A means to an end. But never forget that you are men. Men with purpose, passion, honor, and dignity. You are superior in every way, never forget that. In the coming days you will finish your training and begin to train others. Instill in them what it means to be a man, first and foremost, or you will find yourself with a useless fighter with no heart. Train them well, give them an identity as the greatest soldiers to have ever lived. Make them understand that they are valuable. Maybe not to others, but to you, their brothers, they are valuable." Jango hoped that his words would have an effect on the men. He had repeated them often enough over the last several years as he watched them advance through their training. He didn't know what would be in store for these men, but he did know that as long as they dealt with each other with loyalty and honor they just might make it through. War was brewing, and when it finally hit boiling point these men would be ready. Mettle listened to Jango's words. He had heard these words before, and believed every one of them. They weren't just throw away troops, they weren't just clones with no individuality, they were much more. Looker felt his chest swell with pride. He had worked hard to get here. He had taken every challenge and threw everything he had at it. He had made it. They were almost at the end. In a few minutes he would be part of the first class of ARCs. After that they would be tasked with training the next batch. It would be their turn to teach. Cut was feeling the excitement of the moment. All his life had been coming to this. He knew that soon enough he would be fighting a war somewhere, fighting alongside his brothers for the honor and safety of the galaxy. He knew it was coming and it was a day he couldn't wait to see. Scooch didn't know what the future would hold. He didn't know if he'd be deployed next week, or next year, but he was confident that he could face anything that came his way. Whatever happened, he would be ready. SNAFU was exceptionally proud of all he had accomplished. He was ready to fight for the Jedi, whenever they deigned to show up. He had spent long hours studying up on every kind of enemy they might face. He was sure that he and his brethren would have no trouble at all. Thunder had only ever lived on Kamino. His love of the stormy weather had given him his name. He liked it here, but he was eager to leave. From the way Jango spoke it seemed like war might come someday soon. When the war came, then he would finally get his chance to go. Ringer knew that their training was finished, however, he wasn't so sure they were ready. It was easy to talk about honor and courage in training, but out in the real world, on the battlefield and in the trenches, he wasn't so sure. He knew many of his squad-mates were ready to go, to fight and die, but he wasn't so sure about himself. Tatters was sure that he would always be taken care of by his unit. They were the best, they had always looked out for each other. Listening to Jango speak about being a soldier with heart, and being worthy of his teammates made him squirm on the inside. He had doubts that he would be able to live up to the example of his peers. He worried that he might, when the time came, not be good enough for the others. Hype shifted his eyes to either side, taking in his fellow clones. Hype hadn't lived very long, and he didn't know how long he would live once the coming war started, but he knew that out of all the clones ever decanted he was in the unit with the best of them. The Stencil had done a good job giving them what they needed to be great fighters, but it was working and living with these other men every day that had made them excellent soldiers. Jango gave each soldier his ARC commendation. As he moved through the men he looked each one in the eye, the same eyes, each belonging to a different man. He saw the best these men were capable of, he knew that soon enough they would be caught up in the coming war. A part of him felt a twinge of regret as he looked into the innocent eyes of the clones. They had no idea what they were in for.

[silent-era-of-cinema]

John Gilbert (born John Cecil Pringle; July 10, 1897 – January 9, 1936) was an American actor, screenwriter and director. He rose to fame during the silent film era and became a popular leading man known as "The Great Lover". His legendary breakthrough came in 1925 with his starring roles in The Merry Widow and The Big Parade. At the height of his career, Gilbert rivaled Rudolph Valentino as a box office draw.

Gilbert's career declined precipitously when silent pictures gave way to talkies. Though Gilbert was often cited as one of the high-profile examples of an actor who was unsuccessful in making the transition to sound films, his decline as a star had far more to do with studio politics and money than with the sound of his screen voice, which was rich and distinctive.

Born John Cecil Pringle in Logan, Utah, to stock-company actor parents, John Pringle (1865–1929) and Ida Apperly Gilbert (1877–1913), he struggled through a childhood of abuse and neglect, with his family moving frequently and young "Jack" having to attend assorted schools throughout the United States. When his family finally settled in California, he attended Hitchcock Military Academy in San Rafael. After he left school, Gilbert worked as a rubber goods salesman in San Francisco, then performed with the Baker Stock Company in Portland, Oregon, in 1914. He subsequently found work the following year as a stage manager in another stock company in Spokane, Washington, but he soon lost that job when the company went out of business.

After losing his stage job in 1915, Gilbert decided to try screen acting, and he quickly gained work as a film extra through Herschell Mayall. Gilbert first appeared in The Mother Instinct (1915), a short directed by Wilfred Lucas. He then found work as an extra with the Thomas Ince Studios in productions such as The Coward (1915), Aloha Oe (1915), Civilization (1915), The Last Act (1916), and William Hart's Hell's Hinges (1916).

During his initial years in films, Gilbert also performed in releases by Kay-Bee Company such as Matrimony (1915), The Corner (1915), Eye of the Night (1916), and Bullets and Brown Eyes (1916). His first major costarring role was as Willie Hudson in The Apostle of Vengeance, also with William S. Hart.[6] Viewed by studio executives as a promising but still "juvenile" actor at this stage of his career, Gilbert's contract salary was $40 a week ($940 today), fairly ample pay for most American workers in the early 1900s.[7] Gilbert continued to get more substantial parts at Kay-Bee, which billed him as "Jack Gilbert" in The Aryan (1916), The Phantom (1916), Shell 43 (1916), The Sin Ye Do (1917), The Weaker Sex (1917), and The Bride of Hate (1917). His first true leading role was in Princess of the Dark (1917) with Enid Bennett, but the film was not a big success and he went back to supporting roles in The Dark Road (1917), Happiness (1917), The Millionaire Vagrant (1917), and The Hater of Men (1917).

Gilbert went over to Triangle Films where he was in The Mother Instinct (1917), Golden Rule Kate (1917), The Devil Dodger (1917) (second billed), Up or Down? (1917), and Nancy Comes Home (1918). For Paralta Plays, Gilbert did Shackled (1918), One Dollar Bid (1918), and Wedlock (1918) and More Trouble (1918) for Anderson, but the company went bankrupt.[7] He also was cast in Doing Their Bit (1918) at Fox and then returned to Triangle for The Mask (1918). Gilbert also did Three X Gordon (1918) for Jesse Hampton, The Dawn of Understanding (1918), The White Heather (1919) for Maurice Tourneur, The Busher (1919) for Thomas Ince, The Man Beneath for Haworth, A Little Brother of the Rich (1919) for Universal, The Red Viper (1919) for Tyrad, For a Woman's Honor (1919) for Jess Hampton, Widow by Proxy (1919) for Paramount, Heart o' the Hills (1919) for Mary Pickford, and Should a Woman Tell? (1919) for Screen Classics.

Maurice Tourneur signed him to a contract to both write and act in films. Gilbert performed in and co-wrote The White Circle (1920), The Great Redeemer (1921), and Deep Waters (1921). As a writer only, he worked on The Bait (1921), which starred and was produced by Hope Hampton. For Hampton, Gilbert wrote and directed as well, but he did not appear in Love's Penalty (1921).

In 1921, Gilbert signed a three-year contract with Fox Film Corporation, which subsequently cast him in romantic leading roles and promoted him now as "John Gilbert". The actor's first starring part for the studio was in Shame (1921).[10] He followed it with leading roles in Arabian Love (1922), Gleam O'Dawn (1922), The Yellow Stain (1922), Honor First (1922), Monte Cristo (1922), Calvert's Valley (1922), The Love Gambler (1922), and A California Romance (1922). Many of the scenarios for these films were written by Jules Furthman.

Gilbert returned temporarily to Tourneur to costar with Lon Chaney in While Paris Sleeps (1923). Back at Fox, he starred in Truxton King (1923), Madness of Youth (1923), St. Elmo (1923), and The Exiles (1923). The same year he starred in Cameo Kirby (1923), directed by John Ford, co starring Jean Arthur. He went into The Wolf Man (1923) with Norma Shearer, not a horror film, but the story of a man who believes he murdered his fiancée's brother while drunk. Gilbert also performed in his last films for Fox in 1924, including Just Off Broadway, A Man's Mate, The Lone Chance, and Romance Ranch.

Under the auspices of movie producer Irving Thalberg, Gilbert obtained a release from his Fox contract and moved to MGM, where he became a full-fledged star cast in major productions. First starring in His Hour (1924) directed by King Vidor and written by Elinor Glyn his film career entered its ascendancy. He followed this success with He Who Gets Slapped (1924) co-starring Chaney and Shearer and directed by Victor Sjöström; The Snob (1924) with Shearer; The Wife of the Centaur (1924) for Vidor.

The next year, Gilbert would star in two of MGM's most critically acclaimed and popular film productions of the silent era: Erich von Stroheim's The Merry Widow and King Vidor's The Big Parade.

Gilbert was assigned to star in Erich von Stroheim's The Merry Widow by Irving Thalberg, over the objections of the Austrian-American director. Von Stroheim expressed his displeasure bluntly to his leading man: "Gilbert, I am forced to use you in my picture. I do not want you, but the decision was not in my hands. I assure you I will do everything in my power to make you comfortable." Gilbert, mortified, soon stalked off the set in a rage, tearing off his costume. Von Stroheim followed him to his dressing room and apologized. The two agreed to share a drink. Then Gilbert apologized and they had another drink. The tempest subsided and was resolved amicably. According to Gilbert, the contretemps served to "cement a relationship which for my part will never end."

The public adulation that Gilbert experienced with his growing celebrity astounded him: "Everywhere I hear whispers and gasps in acknowledgment of my presence... he whole thing became too fantastic for me to comprehend. Acting, the very thing I had been fighting and ridiculing for seven years, had brought me success, riches and renown. I was a great motion picture artist. Well, I’ll be damned!"

Gilbert was next cast by Thalberg to star in the King Vidor's war-romance The Big Parade (1925), which became the second-highest grossing silent film and the most profitable film of the silent era. Gilbert's "inspired performance" as an American doughboy in France during World War I was the high point of his acting career. He fully immersed himself in the role of Jim Apperson, a Southern gentleman who, with two working class comrades, experiences the horrors of trench warfare. Gilbert declared: "No love has ever enthralled me as did the making of this picture...All that has followed is balderdash."

The following year, Vidor reunited Gilbert with two of his co-stars from that picture, Renée Adorée and Karl Dane, for the film La Bohème (1926) which also starred Lillian Gish. He then did another with Vidor, Bardelys the Magnificent (1926).

In 1926, Gilbert made Flesh and the Devil (1926), his first film with Greta Garbo. Gilbert first encountered Garbo on the set during filming of the railway station scene, and the chemistry between the two was evidently instantaneous. Director Clarence Brown remarked approvingly that he "had a love affair going for me that you couldn’t beat, any way you tried." Garbo and Gilbert soon began a highly publicized romance, much to the delight of their fans and to MGM.

He made The Show (1927) with Adoree for Tod Browning then did Twelve Miles Out (1927) with Joan Crawford and Man, Woman and Sin (1927) with Jeanne Eagels.

Gilbert was reunited with Garbo in a modern adaptation of Tolstoy's 19th-century novel, Anna Karenina. The title was changed to Love (1927) to capitalize on the real life love affair of the stars and advertised by MGM as "Garbo and Gilbert in Love."

Gilbert made The Cossacks (1928) with Adoree; Four Walls (1928) with Crawford; Show People (1928) with Marion Davies for Vidor, in which Gilbert only had a cameo; and The Masks of the Devil (1928) for Victor Sjöström.

Though officially directed by Edmund Goulding, Gilbert, though uncredited, was responsible for directing the love scenes involving Garbo. He was perhaps the only person in the industry whose "artistic judgment" she fully respected. As such, MGM approved of this arrangement.

Gilbert and Garbo were teamed for a third time in A Woman of Affairs (1928). His last silent film was Desert Nights (1929).

With the coming of sound, Gilbert's vocal talents made a good first impression, though the studio had failed to conduct a voice test. The conventional wisdom of the day dictated that actors in the new talkies should emulate "correct stage diction". Gilbert's strict adherence to this method produced an affected delivery that made audiences giggle, and not due to any particularity in Gilbert's natural speech. Indeed, the "quality of his voice compared well with that of co-star Conrad Nagel, regarded as having one of the best voices for sound."

Gilbert signed an immensely lucrative multi-picture contract with MGM in 1928 that totaled $1,500,000. The terms of the agreement positioned MGM executives Irving Thalberg and Nicholas Schenck, both sympathetic to the star, to supervise his career. Gilbert, however, frequently clashed with studio head Louis B. Mayer over creative, social and financial matters. A confrontation between the two men, one that became physical, occurred at the planned double-wedding of Garbo and Gilbert and director King Vidor and actress Eleanor Boardman. Mayer reportedly made a crude remark to Gilbert about Garbo, and Gilbert reacted by knocking Mayer to the floor with his fist.[24] While this story has been disputed or dismissed as hearsay by some historians, Vidor's bride Eleanor Boardman insisted that she actually witnessed the altercation.

In the all-star musical comedy The Hollywood Revue of 1929 (1929), Gilbert and Norma Shearer played the balcony scene from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, first as written, then followed with a slang rendition of the scene. The comic effect served to "dispell the bad impression" produced by Gilbert's original "mincing" delivery.

Audiences awaited further romantic roles from Gilbert on the talking screen. The next vehicle was the Ruritanian romance His Glorious Night (1929), directed by Lionel Barrymore. According to reviewers, audiences laughed nervously at Gilbert's performance. The offense was not Gilbert's voice, but the awkward scenario along with the overly ardent love scenes. In one, Gilbert keeps kissing his leading lady, (Catherine Dale Owen), while saying "I love you" over and over again. (The scene was parodied in the MGM musical Singin' in the Rain (1952) in which a preview of the fictional The Dueling Cavalier flops disastrously.)

Director King Vidor speculated that the late Rudolph Valentino, Gilbert's main rival for romantic leads in the silent era, probably would have suffered the same fate in the talkie era had he lived. Gilbert's inept phrasing, his "dreadful enunciation" and the "inane" script as the genuine sources of his poor performance, that drew "titters" from audiences.

The persistent myth that John Gilbert had a "squeaky voice" that doomed his career in sound films first emerged from his performance in 1929 with His Glorious Night. It was even rumored that Louis B. Mayer ordered Gilbert's voice to be gelded by manipulating the sound track to give it a higher, less masculine pitch. Later, after analyzing the film's sound track, British film historian Kevin Brownlow found that the timbre and frequency of Gilbert's speaking scenes in His Glorious Night were no different than in his subsequent talkies. Brownlow also reported from that analysis that Gilbert's voice, overall, was "quite low". With regard to the alleged manipulation of Gilbert's footage by Mayer or by anyone else, television technicians in the 1960s determined that the actor's voice was consistent with those of other performers on the same print, casting doubt that any targeted "sabotaging" of Gilbert's voice occurred.

Film critic John Baxter described Gilbert as having "a light speaking voice", a minor defect that both MGM and the star "magnified into an obsession." Despite any conflicting opinions or myths surrounding the actor's voice, Mayer's lingering resentment and hostility toward Gilbert remained apparent, especially after MGM's star signed a new contract for six pictures at $250,000 each. Those ill feelings fueled additional speculation that Mayer deliberately assigned Gilbert bad scripts and ineffective directors in an effort to void the contract.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cast Gilbert in a film adaption of The Living Corpse by Tolstoy re-titled as Redemption (1929). The bleak atmosphere and maudlin dialogue presaged the disaster looming in the stars’ personal life and career. Gilbert's confident screen presence had vanished, while his use of the exaggerated stage diction that elicited laughs from the audience persisted. In one scene Gilbert declares ominously "I’m going to kill myself to let the whole world know what it has lost."[34]

MGM put him in a more rugged film, Way for a Sailor (1930) with Wallace Beery. He followed it with Gentleman's Fate (1931). Gilbert became increasingly depressed by progressively inferior films and idle stretches between productions. Despite efforts by studio executives at MGM to cancel his contract, Gilbert resolved to thwart Louis B. Mayer and see the six-picture ordeal through to the end.

Gilbert's fortunes were temporarily restored when MGM's production chief Irving Thalberg gave him two projects that were character studies, giving Gilbert an excellent showcase for his versatility. The Phantom of Paris (1931), originally intended for Lon Chaney (who died from cancer in 1930), cast Gilbert as a debonair magician and showman who is falsely accused of murder and uses his mastery of disguise to unmask the real killer.

Downstairs (1932) was based on Gilbert's original story, with the actor playing against type as a scheming, blackmailing chauffeur. The films were well received by critics and fans but failed to revive his career. In between, he appeared in West of Broadway (1931). Shortly after making Downstairs, he married co-star Virginia Bruce; the couple divorced in 1934.

Gilbert fulfilled his contract with MGM with a perfunctory "B" picture – Fast Workers (1933) directed by Browning. He left the studio in 1933, terminating his $10,000 a week contract.

Exhausted and demoralized by his humiliations at MGM and his declining success at the box office, Gilbert began to drink heavily, contributing to his declining physical and mental health.

Gilbert announced his retirement from acting and was working at Fox as an "honorary" director when, in August 1933, Gilbert announced he had signed a seven-year contract with MGM at $75–100,000 a picture. The reason was Greta Garbo insisted that Gilbert return to MGM to play her leading man in Queen Christina (1933), directed by Rouben Mamoulian. Garbo was top-billed, with Gilbert's name beneath the title. Queen Christina, though a critical success, did not revive Gilbert's poor self-image or his career. Garbo was reported to have dropped the young Laurence Olivier scheduled to play the part, but director Rouben Mamoulian recalled that Olivier's screen tests had already eliminated him from consideration.

Columbia Pictures gave Gilbert what would be his final chance for a comeback in The Captain Hates the Sea (1934) in which he gave a capable performance as "a dissipated, bitter [and] cynical" playwright. But the off-screen cast of heavy drinkers encouraged his alcoholism. It was his last film.

Biographer Kevin Brownlow's eulogy to John Gilbert considers the destruction of both the man and his career:

"The career of John Gilbert indicates that the star, and the person playing the star, were regarded by producers as separate entities, subject to totally different attitudes. Gilbert, as an ordinary human being, had no legal right to the stardom that was the sole property of the studio. When Gilbert, as an employee, tried to seize control of the future of Gilbert the star, the studios decided to save their investment from falling into the hands of rivals, [so] they had to wreck their property. Other properties – books, films, sets – could be destroyed with impunity. But the destruction of a star carried with it the destruction of a person…it seems somewhat abhorrent that it took such tragedies as that of John Gilbert to bring us our entertainment."

Gilbert was married four times. His first marriage, on August 26, 1918, was to Olivia Burwell, a native of Mississippi whom Gilbert had met after her family moved to California. They separated the following year and Burwell returned to Mississippi for a while. She filed for divorce in Los Angeles in 1921.

In February 1921, Gilbert announced his engagement to actress Leatrice Joy. They married in Tijuana in November 1921.[44] As Gilbert had failed to secure a divorce from his first wife and the legality of Gilbert and Joy's Mexican marriage was questionable, the couple separated and had the marriage annulled to avoid a scandal. They remarried on March 3, 1922. The marriage was tumultuous and, in June 1923, Joy filed for legal separation after she claimed that Gilbert slapped her face after a night of heavy drinking. They reconciled several months later. In August 1924, Joy, who was pregnant with the couple's daughter, filed for divorce. Joy later said she left Gilbert after discovering he was having an affair with actress Laurette Taylor.[47] Joy also claimed that Gilbert had conducted affairs with Barbara La Marr (with whom he had a romance before his marriage to Joy), Lila Lee and Bebe Daniels. Gilbert and Joy had a daughter, Leatrice Gilbert (later Fountain; 4 September 1924 – 20 January 2015). Joy was granted a divorce in May 1925.

In 1929, Gilbert eloped with actress Ina Claire to Las Vegas. They separated in February 1931 and divorced six months later. Gilbert's fourth and final marriage was on August 10, 1932, to actress Virginia Bruce, who had recently costarred with him on the MGM film Downstairs. The entertainment trade paper The Film Daily reported that their "quick" wedding was held in Gilbert's dressing room on the MGM lot while Bruce was working on another studio production, Kongo. Among the people attending the small ceremony were the head of MGM production Irving Thalberg, who served as Gilbert's best man; screenwriter Donald Ogden Stewart, whose wife Beatrice acted as Bruce's matron of honor; MGM art director and set designer Cedric Gibbons; and his wife, actress Dolores del Río. Bruce retired briefly from acting following the birth of their daughter Susan Ann; however, she resumed her career after her divorce from Gilbert in May 1934.

Before his death, Gilbert dated actress Marlene Dietrich as well as Greta Garbo. When he died, he had recently been slated to play a prominent supporting role in Dietrich's film Desire.

By 1934, alcoholism had severely damaged Gilbert's health. He suffered a serious heart attack in December 1935, which left him in poor health. Gilbert suffered a second heart attack at his Bel Air home on January 9, 1936, which was fatal.

A private funeral was held on January 11 at the B.E. Mortuary in Beverly Hills. Among the mourners were Gilbert's two ex-wives, Leatrice Joy and Virginia Bruce, his two daughters, and stars Marlene Dietrich, Gary Cooper, Myrna Loy, and Raquel Torres.

Gilbert was cremated and his ashes were interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale in Glendale, California.

Gilbert left the bulk of his estate, valued at $363,494 (equivalent to $6.7 million in 2019), to his last ex-wife Virginia Bruce and their daughter, Susan Ann. He left $10,000 to his eldest daughter Leatrice, and other amounts to friends, relatives and his servants.

For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Gilbert has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1755 Vine Street. In 1994, he was honored with his image on a United States postage stamp designed by caricaturist Al Hirschfeld.