#it would be hard to write about 'you' in the plural sense. especially since 'you' are so physically undefined already

[witherby]

the path finding would be so cute when little wayne learns how to walk they just automatically find bruce anywhere or their brothers no matter what

That's what I was thinking! Regardless of the power Flittermouse gets, I'm wondering about how they'd use it to interact with their family members before anything else.

Duplicating? Hmm, two brothers want your attention...two yous to spend time with them both!

Circadian manipulation? Your dad looks awful tired. Maybe if you just tweaked one little thing....aaaand he's asleep! Great!

Shadow manipulation? They're a family of crime fighters that do their best work in the night! You can work with that.

Kinetic absorption? Well, you weren't just going to stand around and let your brother take a bullet, that's just silly.

Pathfinding? What are they looking for? A stray pen or joker's bombs hidden throughout the city? Either way, you know where.

[choicesficwriterscreations]

September MC & OCs of the Month - Special Edition: Ava Flores

Help us in welcoming September's MCs and OCs of the month! That's right, plural! Most months, CFWC highlights one randomly selected MC or OC from our Meet My MC / OC List. (More info here.) But this month, we're doing something different.

In August, @lilyoffandoms hosted a Writers Appreciation Month, and we announced the September Writer of the Month would be selected from its participants. But all participants agreed - Lily deserved the honor! Still, we wanted to do something nice for the eleven writers who elected to participate to help uplift other writers in the fandom. So, this month, each of the eleven participants will have one of their MCs or OCs highlighted.

We will introduce each MC / OC individually, and once all eleven have been highlighted, a masterlist for the month will be created. We hope you enjoy getting to know all about them!

The first MC of the Month is @petiteboheme 's Ava Flores!

Learn more about Ava below!

In your own words, tell us what you like most about your MC. 

Ava Flores is kind, free-spirited, loyal, adventurous, and down to earth. As an Afro-Latina, she is bilingual, with strong cultural roots and a large, close-knit family. The ‘Flores family love and support each other, and this has given Ava a strong sense of self. She knows her worth and won��t settle for less than what she knows she deserves. She is expressive of her feelings, both positive and negative, and had no issues calling Drake out on things during book 1

Following the scandal and being escorted to the airport, she refused to return when they tried to retrieve her. She’d felt unheard by a lot of the people around her and had had enough. Drake had to take drastic action and a lot of convincing to get to return in time for the first tour stop in Italy.

Do you feel your MC is like you at all? How are you alike or different?

I think, as a writer, it’s hard not to sprinkle a little bit of yourself into characters, even existing canon ones. But Ava is very different from me. Her family dynamic, upbringing, life experience background, and culture are different from my own. She has Caribbean timekeeping while I’m OCD, lol. She’s stronger, braver, louder, and more outgoing and determined than I am. I’m an introvert, and I don’t think I’d be able to deal with the Cordonian court at all lol

What is most important to your MC? What is their motivation in life?

Happiness, first and foremost. Everything she does is motivated by that. Her career choice (chef) is something she loves doing; she grew up with a mother who bakes for a living (her own business), so the fact that she wants to run her own simple little restaurant certainly influenced her mom. Writing slam poetry is her outlet and has helped her through many difficult situations. Her impromptu decision to go to Cordonia was less motivated by ‘winning a prince’ and more about adventure, making new friends, and doing things she’d never done before. The fact that she found love with Drake along the way was just the icing on the cake.

A relatively new motivation for her (since arriving in Cordonia) is making a difference in the lives of people she’s never met. Shortly after the sailing event, where Ava had worn braids, she met a young mother who told her that her daughter struggled with self-image, especially with her hair, and wouldn’t wear braids because she’d felt they were ‘ugly’. Seeing Ava wearing braids had a big impact on the little girl.  Hearing this moved Ava, who never imagined herself as a role model. 

What are their biggest pet peeves/dislikes? 

She hates racism, xenophobia, and she has had to deal with it more times than she cares to remember. Dishonesty and insincerity, she has little tolerance or patience for those either. The things most valued at court (wealth, power etc.) are alien to her, which is why she’s happier away from it. 

If your MC could change one thing - anything - what would it be? 

Very little. She believes in growing and learning from her mistakes. But in my writing, her encounter with Tariq was more intense than in canon, and she hates that it happened. Drake begins teaching her self-defense before book two, but she wishes she’d had the skill sooner. She's still carrying a lot of anger over it and won’t be as forgiving to those involved as you had to be in canon.

What is your MC’s favorite quote or song? 

She has many, from famous speeches to songs and poems that talk about injustice. Here are just a few

"You can only become accomplished at something you love. Don't make money your goal." –Maya Angelou

Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery

None but ourselves can free our mind - Bob Marley

Before we find world peace, we gotta find peace and end the war in the streets. -     Tupac

          “If you don’t live your life, then who will?” - Rhianna

Is there anything else you’d like to share about your MC?

People say you should write for yourself, and that’s pretty much what I did with Ava. She is the MC/LI for Drake, and I wanted more than anything to see and read about her. I couldn't not write her. She’s developed over time, of course, but I knew from the beginning she would be big-hearted, lively and would come from a warm, loving family whom she was close to. She is everything Drake needs and more,  Although I don’t have a lot in common with her, she’s made a big impact on me. She’s broadened my horizons, and I’ve learned from her. The response she’s created is amazing, and I am so grateful others have taken to her so well.

[miaulogy]

Hello Michi!! Feel free to answer this or not, but what is it like for you to be an autistic person? I'm making/drawing/writing an autistic character and I'm gathering as much info as i can to not cross any bounderies/not be problematic/not be stereotypical. Thank you :)

thanks for asking! i'm really happy you're doing research :3 /gen

so, my experience isn't the same as every autistic person's of course, so if any autistic person doesn't relate that doesn't mean they're faking! we're all different ^^ /gen

i think that as a child, i would get angry REALLY easily, i couldn't control my anger well at all and my mom would just lock me up in my room to not have to deal with me

so, my first reaction would be to break stuff like my books and throw things like pillows across the room

but i've learned to control my anger a lot better now! sometimes i just take a bath and cry a little and i feel a whole lot better :]

i also feel like i can't really understand when people are being serious and when they're joking, my grandma sometimes makes jokes when talking to me and i don't really get if they're jokes or if she actually means it, yk?

i also play a lot with my fingers and can't seem to focus on one thing at a time; when a teacher is talking, i can't just look at them and take all the information, i always have to look at them while doing something else with my hands

so, to do that i focus on the main thing i have to do: listening to my teacher, but if i try to only focus on them i will eventually have thoughts that will distract me from listening because i always do two things at the same time (in this case, listening and thinking), so i play with my hands to replace the thinking part with something less distracting that allows me to listen

does that make sense? lolol ^^"

anyways, when i get interested in something i can't stop thinking of it, a new show comes into my life and i relate everything i do and see to it, seemingly being unable to get it out of my head

that's actually great for creating content, it's really easy for me to make drawings and headcanons when hyperfixated on that thing, but it's very common for me to have trouble sleeping because my mind can't shut up about my fave characters, i usually lay on my bed completely tired and about to sleep but then all the thoughts about my hyperfixation come all at once and i'm completely exhausted physically but mentally i can't stop thinking!! it has taken me hours just to fall asleep, or even close my eyes :(

and oh god!! the sensory issues!!! /neg

i remember being a 7 year old lil guy and scratching the (cement) wall of my room, oh god that made me want to pull my nails off!! i hate the texture of cement walls, i can't pass my fingers through them without biting my tongue and stuff, it's just such a terrible texture! it feels so dry!!

i also remember having trouble with putting on my uniform, i had (and still have) to use a white sweater that had a texture so bad that it would make me cry whenever my mom tried to put it on me! it's a dry texture similar to cement wall's, since i had to pass it through my head to put it on it would asphyxiate me! i simply couldn't stand wearing it, i usually go to school with a random black sweater and with my school's jacket over it (we have a sweater and a jacket with the logo and we can choose which to wear)

on the gender part, i think autism has really affected my way of interpreting it

like, gender is a social construct, and i get why people identify as women or men or non-binary or something else entirely, or maybe in between some of these, but it's hard to get it for myself, especially as a plural

you see, everyone describes knowing their gender in a very complex way, but i just see the words "boy", "enby", and "xenic" and they make me happy, and that's just it, yk?

but if someone asked me what a boy is, what an enby is, or what a xenic is and why i identify as such, i couldn't answer, because i just really don't know JDJSJKS

hmm, i think that would be pretty much it, i really can't separate myself from any of my disorders, they're simply part of who i am ^_^

thanks for reading, have a nice day! /gen

[bkfstclubmember]

Invitation to Tradition

This is my gift for the Secret Santa event on the Hazelnut Discord. I hope the O’Knutzy was fluffy enough :) I’m not sure yet what I’ll do with the related ideas and other snippet pieces from my chaotic writing attempt. All credit to @lumosinlove who created the SW world and characters; thanks for letting us play with them. We love them, and you, so much.

Happy Christmas, everyone!! 

(Note: In this universe, Finn and Leo coach Katie’s hockey team, which is how they meet the Dumais and Logan.)

We wish you a merry Christmas

And a happy new year!

“Bravo! Would you all like to come in for coffee?”

“Merci, we always appreciate your hospitality, but we really must be on our way. We still have a couple of stops to make,” Dumo answered as he led his family away from the Brown’s home after bidding them good night. At Dumo’s insistence, Logan joined the Dumais this year for their annual Christmas caroling tradition. Singing wasn’t really his thing, but he loved every last one of the Dumais. He was especially grateful to them for treating him like a true member of the family while he lived in their basement.

At Katie’s request, Logan held her hand as the family collectively stepped back onto the sidewalk, the sand and ice-melt crunching under foot.

“One last house!” Dumo announced as he led his family around the street corner.

“But Papa,” Adele hesitated, “we always end on this block.“

“Don’t worry, ma fille. We have time for one more house before we go pick out a tree. We’ll make it there before they close.”

“Lolo?” Logan looked down at Katie as she tugged on his hand. “Are you going to take me to hockey practice tomorrow?

Logan took a deep breath as he considered Katie’s question. It should be a simple question with a simple answer. He knew Katie’s practice was at 4 o’clock tomorrow afternoon. He wasn’t busy and normally he wouldn’t hesitate to help out especially when it was hockey-related and especially for Katie, who Dumo often claimed had Logan wrapped around her tiny finger, but Logan faltered. He knew he would see Katie’s coaches, Finn O’Hara and Leo Knut, and he didn’t know what to do with his feelings when they looked his way. Logan felt exposed when Leo smiled revealing his dimples and heated through his core when Finn winked at him the first time they met. He had planned to avoid them until he felt less confused by these feelings. He wasn’t exactly sure where they might lead.

“It would be really helpful if you could take her, mon fils,” Celeste chimed in with a smile as they all continued following Dumo and Adele, just a few steps ahead of them.

Logan nodded. “Of course, maman, I’m happy to.” He had almost a whole day to prepare himself.

Dumo leaned forward to ring the doorbell as their family gathered on the front porch of the next house.

Logan thought he was prepared to sing Joy to the World with the rest of the Dumais clan, but Joy was all that came out when the door opened revealing Leo Knut with those dimples of his standing before them. Then, Finn joined them and Logan decided he was ready to give up on contributing outside of the bass beat being provided by his heart.

“Well, isn’t this a surprise,” Finn grinned after they sang their last song.

“Would y’all like to come inside?” Leo offered. “I baked cookies this afternoon.”

Dumo ruffled Marc’s hair. “Well, I promised the kids we’d pick up our tree and we have just enough time before it closes.”

Logan met Finn’s eyes and there was that feeling again. He was certain Finn and Leo could pluck the thoughts right out of his head. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but now that Finn and Leo were here right in front of him he knew he didn’t want to leave. He wanted to burrow as close as possible until he knew more — everything — about them.

“Let us at least send you off with some for the road,” Leo insisted. He slipped off to the kitchen before anyone could object and returned with a square container that he handed to Dumo.

Dumo nudged Logan. “Mon fils, were you planning on joining us to pick up the tree? You never said.”

Logan shifted his glance and blinked up at a Dumo. Before he could respond, Finn jumped in with “If you’re not the pining type, our invitation still stands.” He knew before he looked up at Finn and Leo that it was impossible for him to turn that invitation down now. Next thing he knew, Logan found himself inside Finn and Leo’s home.

“We were just about to enjoy one of our own traditions. Cookies, hot chocolate, and a good, old-fashioned Christmas movie,” Leo mentioned as they settled together on the couch. “Interested?”

Logan agreed it sounded like a great plan and Finn offered to start the hot chocolate and gather snacks while Leo and Logan chose the movie and set up.

Logan flipped through movie options with Leo, but at the same time the urge to know more and more about these two lingered in his mind. He wasn’t sure exactly what would satisfy, but he was willing to start anywhere and take anything, so he gave in with a simple question. “What are your other traditions?”

Leo lit up at the question. “Skating on Christmas Eve. That’s definitely a favorite in our house. We started that tradition the year we moved to Gryffindor. So, about five years or so.” Leo glanced away from the screen to look at Logan and offered his dimpled smile. “You should join us this year.”

The itchy exposed feeling was back. Logan realized it only grew brighter the more time he spent with Finn and Leo, and he was sure it was shining through his eyes in the most obvious way. He ran his fingers through his hair. “I’ll be there.”

Logan helped Leo plug in the string of lights that encircled their tree as well as the room before turning off the larger lamps and overhead lighting. Then, while Leo set off to gather blankets, which he insisted were essential for enjoying their holiday movie tradition, Logan moved towards the kitchen. “Need any help?” he asked as he leaned against the open doorway.

Finn nodded, “Just about done, so stick around and you can help carry.”

Logan watched Finn stir his creation carefully and taste test before adding more cinnamon. “Fancy,” he commented.

Finn shrugged, “It’s pretty much the only thing I make. My older brother showed me. He used to make it for me this way growing up.”

“You don’t live off hot chocolate, do you?” Logan teased.

Finn winked with a grin. “Oh no, Leo is the cooking wizard. He’s the reason I don’t exist solely on takeout.”

“I think we’re set,” Leo announced as he rounded the corner, coming to a sudden halt in front of Logan who was still perched in and blocking the doorway to the kitchen. Evidently, he didn’t expect to find Logan roaming in the doorway. Logan sensed the shift in tension, but wasn’t sure of the cause until he noticed and followed Leo’s subtle upward glance. Mistletoe in the doorway.

Logan ran his hand through his hair before dropping his head back against the doorframe. The feeling that felt strong and singular before was worthy of the plural now. Leo stood tall and still against the other side of the doorframe and Logan risked looking directly into his eyes. All he could see was blue. Blue. He hated clichés, but Logan suddenly understood why people said that it was possible to drown in someone’s eyes because those eyes truly reminded him of the ocean and he was lost at sea. Logan’s world narrowed for just a moment and all he could sense was the rushing in his ears. Then, Leo took a step forward and the feelings were overwhelming. He started to step forward too until Finn’s movement in his periphery broke through the surface. He was unsure and frozen again until Finn spoke softly.

“He’s wanted to kiss you since he met you. We’ve wanted to.”

Logan reached for Leo’s hand and pulled him forward as he searched his blue eyes again. He felt exposed and vulnerable again, but this time he didn’t feel so alone in the feeling.

Leo squeezed his hand. “Do you want to, sweetheart?”

“Please,” Logan breathed and pushed up on his toes as Leo leaned down and their lips met in the middle. Their kiss was simple rather than prolonged, but it was so satisfying; now he knew one more thing about Leo. Logan’s chest pushed out a sigh. They broke apart, once, and then again after Leo leaned back in to kiss the corner of Logan’s mouth. Leo squeezed his hand again and they remained linked while they retreated to opposite sides of the doorframe.

Finn grinned as he continued ladling hot chocolate into mugs. “I knew that mistletoe was a good idea even if this was not what I planned when I tacked it up there.”

Leo rolled his eyes, but he was grinning too and Logan smiled back. Dimples.

“Ok, holiday movie time!” Finn sang as he leaned in with a kiss for Leo before handing him the plate of cookies. Then, he turned to Logan. “ You haven’t moved.” Logan shrugged, waiting.

Finn reached for the mugs and leaned in to pass him one. Logan reached out to take it, but instead both of their hands remained wrapped together around the mug. He watched as Finn tilted his head in question. “Our turn?”

Logan leaned over the mug between them and kissed him hard. Finn’s lips tasted of the chocolate, cinnamon, and sugar of Christmas. Finn pushed back carefully so as not to rock the full mug between them too much. Logan was tempted to nibble and lick to chase the taste that was both Christmas and Finn because while his kiss with Leo was soft, this kiss felt playful. It lasted just a few moments, but it was yet another thing that Logan knew now that he didn’t just minutes before.

They pulled away and Finn cleared his throat before reiterating, “Right. Holiday movie time.”

All three moved back to the couch to settle in for one of Finn and Leo’s holiday traditions. They were all quiet until Logan broke the silence. “I want to know you.” He wasn’t sure it made sense, but he hoped they’d hear the words and let them sink in.

“We want to know you too,” Finn answers softly.

“Sometimes it feels like you’re supposed to know me. Or maybe that you’re going to,” Logan murmured. Then, he shrugged, “Don’t you find that scary?”

Leo rested his hand on Logan’s knee. “I think that sounds exciting. We’ve found,” he gestured between Finn and himself, “that it’s easiest together.”

[lampmeeting]

Hey I’m working on a fic and I really like the way you write Toki so I wanted to know if you had any advice for capturing his voice

oh wow!! :O this is really flattering and SO sweet, thank you fish! yeah, lemme see if i can organize my thoughts in a way that makes sense (i apologize in advance if i don’t, which... yeah i probably won’t haha)

Let’s bust out the capital letters and write this properly though. All right, so here’s a collection of things I think about when writing Toki:

he can be hypervigilant at times due to his childhood trauma, looking out for other people’s emotions

he’s also optimistic to a stubborn degree and sometimes gets carried away with that without meaning to (I think the intense optimism is a protective measure he developed as a kid)

he feels very deeply but doesn’t always know how to express that, which can lead to frustration and second-guessing himself

he’s smart but due to spending most of his life either in an abusive household with no proper schooling or in a mansion with servants, he’s got some serious gaps in his knowledge and social skills, so he can seem weird/spacey/stupid at times

enjoys activities that make him feel “grown up” since he’s not used to being viewed as a capable adult (i tend to write him older, too, so it’s especially difficult for him being constantly treated like someone much younger than he is)

The thing about Toki, too, is that he still has these very innocent, childlike views and opinions. A kiss and a hug should make things better. Ignoring a problem might make it go away. When someone is mad, they must be mad at him. He can be very reactionary, unless he doesn’t feel completely safe, in which case he might feel everything the same way, but be much more subdued and observational, or if he feels VERY unsafe might even retreat into himself entirely to try and escape (I also think that when he feels safe with someone, that’s when his playfulness/brattiness can sometimes pop out, which is why he’s like that a lot with the boys because he feels comfy around them).

And then of course he IS prone to just wildly explosive episodes of anger. No one can keep up the :D 24/7 with without a good outlet for negative emotions. I like to think art and making models can sometimes help him zone out and deal, and of course we know he can abuse alcohol to cope with bad feelings, but when he doesn’t have any of those outlets readily available shit can sorta boil over. It’ll always seem to others like it came outta nowhere, but Toki was probably feeling it build for a while until he finally couldn’t take it.

I feel like I’m not doing a very good job of this haha... sorry. My thoughts are always really scattered and trying to wrangle is difficult. I also tend to put a pretty fair amount of myself and my own thought process into Toki because I’ve come to relate to him the older I get, so things tend to get a bit muddled.

Basically, to me, Toki is a sensitive, socially-stunted adult man who desperately wants to be perceived as someone capable and worthy of respect, but he also wants to cuddle his teddy bear and sing silly songs and fall in love and be a mushy, goofy motherfucker, and I think he’s always trying to figure out how to find that balance that allows him to have it both ways.

And as far as, like, his actual dialogue goes, I tend to keep him in shorter sentences just because they’re easier for him (and let’s face it, me) to deal with. A lot of his “dialogue” tends to be nonverbal, too (I think? or at least it is in my mind). Expressions, what his hands are doing, how he’s positioning himself, etc. I try to keep the plurals as minimal as I can while still staying true to his canon way of speaking. If I could get away with season 1 Toki, I would, but unfortunately by the time the later seasons and Doomstar happen, he’s talking more and more like Skwisgaar (and throwing in a random 3rd person just like Dr. Rockso does...). And then it’s always fun to try and have him use words he can’t really remember how to pronounce, or maybe he uses a similar-sounding word in place of what he means to say (”blowjob” instead of “nosebleed”).

Just for like...example purposes I guess, here’s my favorite lil’ bit of Toki dialogue I’ve ever written (from What You Need, near the beginning when he’s out with Magnus):

“Thanks for coming out with me, man.”

“I’ms the ones what should be thankings you.” Magnus gave him a curious look and Toki blushed and kept talking. “Well, um. Ams just nice to gets away from everyones for a while.”

“Yeah,” Magnus said slowly, rattling his ice. “How’s that all going?”

Toki didn’t want to think about it too hard. The alcohol was making it sting. “Nots great. Nathans and Pickle ams still hatings each other. And I can’ts works for Murderface anymore ‘cause of thems photos on the news.”

Magnus stifled a wheezing laugh behind his glass, cleared his throat. “I, uh. Saw that. Just terrible.”

Toki put his head down on the table and groaned. “Whats ams gonna happens to Toki, Magnus?”

(I love sticking in those little bits when he refers to himself in 3rd person, it’s so silly and cute.)

Anyway, I hope this helped in some way?? Sorry for writing you a novella here. If you have any follow-up questions I’d love to take a crack at ‘em! :D And thank you!!!

(PS - also I should mention that @sourbat writes an exquisite Toki that really inspires me and they’re phenomenal at explaining their thought process, so if you’d like another perspective you should totally hit them up)

[roccinan]

1/? simply because you have the most galaxy brain thoughts ever,,, what do you think would've happened if they waited until s5 to reveal sergio and andrés were (half)brothers?

i do know that when my fam started watching lcdp at first i was so put off. like i watched ep 1 and the prof creeped me out. ""berlin"" creeped me out. e v e r y o n e creeped me out. and i was cringing so hard becz of the short lived romance angle with alison parker. i literally did not watch s1 at all xcept for like sneak peeks. highlights being the scene where berlin discovers monica is alive and does his dramatic door by door thing? that was so SUSPENSEFUL even tho i had no idea what was going on. DOMINGO DE RESURECCION remains forever iconic.

2/? And OF COURSE the group bella ciao dance when they hit earth (hahah i thought the banda were actually like a "found family where they all love each other LOL") i am a SUCKER for found family. but anyhoo when i properly got intrigued was s2 when tokyo was kicked out (the music from that scene is still my favourite) it's just so dramatic..!! why am i telling u all this again? right, i haven't slept a wink and it's nearly 7 am pls forgive me if these rambles make no sense. i have a point with this.. i'm going somewhere

RIGHT. so when the fam actually rewound the ep cz i wanted to know WHY berlin did that (didn't fully realise how batsht crazy he can be), the russian roulette scene played. and pedro's acting. MAN. and like just that ep they made a point of showing us these flashbacks where sergio and andrés hug....

Hi anon! Thanks for stopping by- sorry took me a while to get back to you, will do my best to answer this string of messages (got all 4 parts)! Glad you like my thoughts XD

Firstly, I believe Andres/Sergio would be the biggest LCDP ship if the writers were evil enough to wait until s5 to reveal that they’re brothers asdfasdf. They’re already the two most popular male characters anyway. 

It’d be especially crazy because it’s not like they tell the actors these things beforehand either. So that means there’d probably be a Serdres vs Berlermo vs Serquel fight every 5 minutes. I mean, even if not everyone agrees on everything in the lcdp fandom, it’s the most “peaceful” one I’ve ever been in because no character really gets in the way of any other ship (like even with helermo and berlermo there’s no true conflict since Andres is dead). But with Serdres in the mix?? CATASTROPHE. Everyone out here writing essays about how much of a bastard/bitch/homewrecker/motherfucker that Andres or Sergio or Martin or Raquel is. Never a moment’s peace!! so basically, a regular fandom lmao.

Then when we find out they’re brothers, it goes from catastrophe to Apocalypse. Suddenly serquel and berlermo have the upper hand. Everyone would double down and harass the crew/cast into whatever’s going on.  Plot-wise, everything is the same though, just without Andres calling Sergio “hermanito.” Fandom however, would be a minefield! And I’m glad that’s not the case because I’d probably be an unfortunate serdres shippers XD No joke, my mother and I thought they were a couple in S1. So bullet dodged!

Secondly: haha, everyone creeped me out in S1 too, especially Berlin, I hated him, but thinking back, I think I mostly hated the fact that I didn’t hate him as much as I should have. I’ve made peace with it now but oh boy, was he a controversial figure in my head. I actually like the professor on sight though! IDK why, maybe because I thought his plans were cool or because of Alvaro’s delivery. I was afraid of an Alison Parker romance thing too- like, I do feel like she had a storyline that got dropped, but that part was quite cringey and overall unnecessary to the plot. Same with Ariadna, which was even cringier and even Less necessary to the plot. 

Domingo de resurrecion was iconic though yes! And even with all that said, I genuinely enjoyed parts 1 and 2 because it was so different from anything else I’d seen. Not content wise, but maybe tonally? IDK, they were just really bold with a lot of things, like being objectively unafraid of having the protagonists (plural because all of them did LMAO) do objectively shitty things. Really kept me in suspense from beginning to end! 

I’m usually a big fan of found families too! The funny thing is, then banda never struck me as a “family” until season 3. In 1 and 2, I was wondering what felt different about this show; then it hit me that these people remained colleagues to the end. Like, they backstabbed each other (repeatedly) and everyone was quite selfish, and only the bonds that were already there stuck. They were the opposite of a found family LOL But I think by S3, they went down the found family route and I didn’t mind because it makes quite a lot of sense for them to feel that bond after the Mint heist and almost dying/living together (and having witnessed 3 deaths together on the team). But I still doubt Berlin and Palermo were ever really part of this found family, with good reason XD

LOL the scene where Tokyo got kicked out is also among my favorites!! It was so funny and dramatic, and it was like, wow we can go anywhere with this now! Don’t worry- your rambles and thoughts are always welcome :D

I’m rolling over how you watched the Tokyo expulsion scene before the Russian Roulette scene haha. Also yes, PEDRO. Berlin may have been “controversial” to me at first, but I became Pedro’s fan from day one! Also the Hug is probably what made me like Berlin (despite my determination to hate him rip) in the first place. 

3/? ... and like now that i think about it... tokyo had real guts huh. like she KNEW berlin was close enough to el prof to know his name (fhshshs imagine if she'd heard andrés saying 'hermanito' it's unrealistic that she didn't TBH. i mean obviously they decided to make them brothers only towards the end but like in canon universe. how tf did andrés de 'i raised my bby brother since he was 12 and i'd actually die for him and his stupidly brilliant plans' fonollosa go 5 months without slipping up once and calling sergio hermanito. or like,,, i like to imagine sergio kinda gave him lots of leeway(?) sergio's a lil oblivious too but like i'm sure half of it is.. that's my dumbass older bro shut up i'm not being partial you all have city names .. andr-berlin, pass the salt. like OOF. + sergio also knew his big bro was dYiNG so like. i'm sure they were sneaking in some quality time (i hope they did 😭 gosh imagine if sergio really did not ever consider the possibility of andrés dying in the heist so he'd tell himself he needs to perfect the plan now & anyway he'll have enough time to spend w/ his brother post heist in philippines. and then ... that happened :/

Tokyo has guts in place of braincells you bet that she’d do something like this, consequences be damned XD I also think it’s unrealistic for Andres not to slip up, but I have a feeling nobody besides Tokyo really tried to spy on them in private. I headcanon that Andres instead slips up and does things like ruffle Sergio’s hair or adjust his tie when other people are around. I also think Tokyo was convinced that they were a gay couple when she saw them hug XD And if Sergio never went on to tell the banda that Berlin was his brother, everyone would be giving Palermo such awkward looks after Nairobi accused him of being in love with Berlin LMAO. 

I agree! I also imagine Sergio giving Andres leeway because he’s just so used to interacting with his brother that way haha. So either he’d go out of his way to ignore Berlin in front of everyone else or IDK, borderline telepathically communicate with him. Not even “pass the salt” has to leave his mouth- Berlin just puts salt into his food and cuts it up for him, in front of everyone who’s just staring like O.O

I actually do think Sergio never considered the possibility of Andres dying in the heist because he was just that confident in his own plan. Plus, Andres was probably the one person he expected to survive. And a lot of it has to do with Sergio’s attachment to him + Andres’ own habit of downplaying any illness/injury over the years, which I think is safe to believe canon. He was really in no condition to be in the heist, let alone lead it. Just the fact that he needs to take those injections is a big sign that he shouldn’t be there, but Sergio didn’t catch it because he’s human and blinded by faith :’) So yeah, I think Sergio was planning to spend proper time with Andres in Palawan and at Toledo, they just settled for those little moments by the fireplace. 

4/? what always also just GETS me in the feels is that el prof was shown to be this in control creepily calm dude who is miles ahead of everyone. + in the 1st Toledo class itself we see how detached,, like how impersonal he is, how professional - choosing frickin CITY NAMES?! no 'personal relationships' ? (after recruiting his older brother, a father son pair, and war cousins... oh sergio 😂 he's such a frickin nerd and i love him) but like the earlier seasons really emphasised how robotic and down right COLD he can be. it still sometimes bothers me that he put the button in the car. he lead the police to his own damn brother, his blood, who took care of him and adopted him and was terminally ill and like - UGH i try to rationalise that sergio is that cold and unbothered. or that he has strict morals. but it still bothers me becz that button really sort of tipped andres' already unstable sanity. like andrés tells denver someth like you've robbed my future and after that he just seems so much more suicidal and accepting that he can't get out of the mint alive - WHY SERGIO WHY. I KNOW THAT AT THAT POINT YOU BASICALLY DIDN'T KNOW ANDRÉS WAS GOING TO BE YOUR BROTHER YET BECZ IT WASN'T WRITTEN IN THE SCRIPT BUT WHYYYYY

That’s so funny to me too LMAO No personal relationships, then he recruits these guys. Sergio, hello?? Also can’t forget how he just recruited his own girfrleind in the second heist too. Buddy! Love this nerd.

I don’t think that cold aspect of Sergio went away in later seasons either; he just had more opportunity to show a more open side of himself + without Andres, he had to metaphorically leave his comfort zone without a safety net. But in earlier seasons, he really did seem heartless at times XD Then again, we can argue that the same goes for Andres.

To be fair, I didn’t feel sorry for Andres over the button thing lol, but once the brothers reveal happened and all of Alvaro/Pedro’s headcanons came out and we know everything Andres did for Sergio, it makes what Sergio did REALLY harsh. We really just have to explain it through Sergio’s strict morals and him believing this to be the best non-fatal punishment for Andres, who at that point had convinced him he killed a hostage. And because he knew the television interview was coming up, maybe Sergio assumed Andres would use it to “clear” his name anyway. And empathy isn’t one of Sergio’s strong suits either, so through that lens, I can rationalize it.

Also it was lowkey funny to me how Andres was there like DENVER MUST DIE until he found out Sergio put the button there, then he was like “oh hermanito, you and your practical jokes <3″

Still, like you said, Andres and Sergio weren’t brothers yet at this point. They were probably supposed to be lovers lmao and had a dysfunctional Hannibal Lecter x Will thing going on. But because they made #hermanos canon, that button moment just feels very out of place now, especially given how much the two genuinely love each other.

Guess we could also say that Sergio’s just generally kinda bratty with Andres XD Like, he knows no matter what, Andres would forgive him anything. That’s how I see it anyway! 

[f3ar-prompts]

Hiii, hero/villain writing 10 part 2 please? It would mean the world to me

Hero/Villain writing 10, Part 2

this is technically like a prequel or something but it’s whatevs

Part 1

—

Villain watched from the open hallway above as his patrons meandered about with the party, his arms clasped behind his back. All was well in the pale yellow light.

Of course, he had been stuck in that standing position to watch over the party for what felt like hours, so he took a little walk.

Villain led himself down a darker hallway, the salty sea air thickening. A breeze drifted by, letting the lace curtains that led to the balcony fly in the wind.

He figured that, although his mansion is on free roam with the exception of a few entries, those being his personal rooms, not many people would be out on the far balcony. Aside from an excellent view of the sea, there weren’t many fun things out there. And yet, when he brushed the lace out of his way, his eyes caught a peculiar figure.

Villain thought it was a raven at first glance from the large sillouhette, but focusing in, it was a human. Their wide-bowl wine glass shimmered in the moonlight, and every now and then they swiveled the liquid in it around. A lighter color than the red wine Villain favored during the party, perhaps white wine.

Villain then noticed that their legs didn’t exactly connect with the ground- they were sat on the railing! He panicked for a moment, wondering if they were falling off- but it had been too long since and there was no sense of franticness from them, so he relaxed. Losing a patron at his party wouldn’t be a good look for him, especially at a Villain Party.... he cringed at the thought of other villains hunting him down, and made it his assignment to watch over this person so they never slipped.

Aside from Villain’s internal monologue, they didn’t seem to notice Villain at all. Villain had questioned if he actually sneaked outside to the balcony, because how does one not hear the footsteps of somebody behind them in such a quiet atmosphere as this? Villain almost didn’t want to interrupt them, they seemed so peaceful...

“Er- Hellooo,” he sang out.

The person gasped but then cut themselves off as they whipped their head around.

“Please do be careful around the bars, you could slip and fall. I will remain out here to make sure that doesn’t happen, okay?”

Their head shifted for a second before presumably looking back in Villain’s direction and nodding, turning back to face the sea.

Villain walked around their little friend to their front side and leaned against the railing, letting their friend’s featured flood onto him.

Pretty. A sharp jawline. Soft, clear skin to contrast. Shiny lips- had they lip gloss? A soft expression, and eyes as deep as he could say the sky- no color, as far as he could tell, reflected off them save the moon that glittered in them. Pristine black eyeliner that tilted up a tad and came at a point, very cat-like. Curly dark red hair, almost messy. It reflected like the blood often spilled of Villain’s victims. It swirled up and came to crash down onto the right side of their face, yet also shift up and into the wind. The left side was head-shaven.

They brandished a well-fit black tuxedo, fastened at the uppermost two buttons and the chest left open to show a white dress shirt. Now that Villain caught their neck, he noticed a dark patch. Not dark enough to match the tux, mind you, and obviously somewhat dulled by their skin color, but it seemed to be a tattoo. It just barely reached the dip in their collarbone but wrapped to the top of their shoulder. Villain briefly wondered what the tattoo could possibly be, and if he’d ever get to know what that tattoo looked like- but that included his friend undressing. He blushed- what an indecent thought about somebody you had just met! He shifted his gaze back to their face.

Their friend’s features were very charismatic. Welcoming, charming, something new. And yet, so old. Had Villain seen this person around the city before? They were practically picture-perfect- maybe a model... The way they threw their gaze off into the distance, their hair swaying in the ocean breeze, the way the moon lit up their face perfectly where Villain could make out almost every feature but their eyes- even to truly see their eyes, he’d have to be closer, and no way would he get that close to the face of a man so pretty and embarrass himself so... No, he’s the host of the party! He can’t just go sticking his nose in other people’s faces to capture all their features.

Villain’s glance shifted between most of the features- prefect. The way their friend’s lips curled up into a slight smirk- actually, while he stared, it did smile for a moment. Their friend turned to look at them curiously.

“Ah- a-a-I wasn’t staring!” Villain frantically turned away. He heard a small laugh- “Tcheheheh...”- and looked back bashfully. Of course, the one thing he hadn’t wanted to do, he did it anyway. How embarrassing... “I’m sorry, s-“

A realization dawned on Villain. For being so rude towards his ‘friend’, he didn’t even know their name!

“A-actually, I was, uh, um-” Villain stuttered nervously. He looked up at his friend, who stared at them with wide eyes. “Wondering if... I could get a name?”

That gave his friend pause for a bit. They looked out into the ocean, then around, but nothing seemed to interest them. “What confuses you, sir?”

Their eyebrows furrowed and looked at Villain, then pointed to their own mouth with a white-gloved hand.

“.. Huh? Mouth?”

They shook their head, then flipped their hand while also pointing at their mouth.

“Oral? Uh... T- talk?”

They nodded. Finally, getting somewhere.

“Your name is... Talk?”

They shook their head. Villain’s shoulders slumped. They then crossed both their pointer fingers into an X.

“Y- err.... No talk?”

They nodded.

“You... You don’t talk.”

They nodded again.

“Ohh...” Their silence made sense now. Villain patted their pockets to no avail. “I don’t have anything to write with...”

His friend put their hand to their chin for a second. Then their eyes shot open and they pointed upwards to the cosmos.

Villain paused and looked up. “S-... Sky?”

They shook their head.

“Stars?”

They nodded, then held up one finger to Villain.

“...One. Stars One? What an odd name...”

They shook their head. With their opposite hand- which was hard to make work with the wine glass they held, out up one finger, then pointed to the stars above them.

“One Star.”

“Wait.....” The mistaken plurality of Villain’s words made him feel hot. “...it’s just Star, isn’t it?”

They nodded.

“Of course, apologies...” Villain looked away again. The third time he’d embarrassed himself today, and not just to his friend Star...

“Well, it is nice to meet you, Star.” For what made of it, he smiled at Star.

Star smiled back, and in a moment, it felt like time froze, like Villain could watch Star smile forever. Such a great look for them- and with such a perfect name- it was like they were a star themself. With their mouth, their eyes seemed to curl up into that grin too. A perfect face with a perfect smile to match... Villain could take a picture and stare at it all day.

Star cleared their throat. Villain jumped a bit and looked away again. He could practically feel the heat on his face. “A thousand apologies, I don’t know what’s come over me tonight...”

Villain hoped that Star knew that they themself were attractive and understood why Villain stared. Villain held his face out to oppose the direction of the wind and fanned himself. “S-So, what brings you to the balcony tonight? The party’s inside, y’know...” He looked back over to Star.

All Star did was motion out to sea with the hand that held his wine.

“Ahh- the view is pretty tonight, I must agree.” Villain smiled and looked at Star, but his smile fell when they noticed that Star wasn’t smiling. They seemed deep in thought, like something out at sea had caught their attention.

Although Villain had embarrassed themselves enough tonight and felt in no proper place to speak, he spoke anyway, “What do you think is out there?”

Star shrugged.

“Is... something bothering you?” ‘Something’ seemed to dawn on Villain, though, that something could be him. He had made enough of a fool of himself to the prettiest man at the party tonight, after all. “I can leave, if-“

“Mm-mm,” Star hummed as they shook their head, reaching out to grab Villain’s shoulder so he didn’t leave. That caused Star’s eyes to widen.

“Hu-“ Villain caught on that the arm they used to reach was Star’s support arm that held them balanced on the railing. Star’s body slipped backwards- they were falling!

Villain lunged out to grab Star’s support arm and dip their other hand under Star’s waist and pulled them close as much as they could- Villain almost spun over the railing himself. “Hold on!” Star’s free hand flailed in the air before arching around Villain’s neck, pulling themself up close.

The two stood there in midair, their hearts pounding. Villain wondered if it was his heart he heard, Star’s, or both. They remained breathless for a while, sat in suspense for any tipping to either side. Villain glanced down. The wine glass had slipped from Star’s grasp and fell far, far down onto the rocks below- he could slightly make out a shine in the rocks, although that could be the water from the ocean. A loud wave crashed onto the rocks, chilling Villain to his core and making him grip Star tighter.

Villain let out his breath and yanked Star’s arm that he was holding to move his other arm under Star’s waist and heave them back up and over the railing. His feet reached ground, but the force of Star’s body pushing against his made him tip backwards and fall again.

Villain panicked and gripped Star’s body close to him, taking the full force of the fall with an “oomph!” Pain and a weak, dizzy feeling shot through Villain’s head and he whimpered, reaching up to rub the back of his head.

The two lay shaken, trying to comprehend the last few moments. Villain sighed shakily and his eyes fluttered open to stare at the sky above him for a few moments. The tail ends of Star’s hair was just enough in his view to be noticeable. Star panted next to his ear, which made Villain shiver and heat up.

He took just a few more breaths before sitting up, keeping Star flush up against his body. “Y’okay?” He muttered. He felt Star nod in his shoulder. Villain let his hold on Star slacken and they separated, looking into each other’s eyes.

Star looked pale, their eyes wide and body shaking. They breathed heavily.

Villain, although he didn’t notice much of a difference, did have a chance now to look at Star’s eyes properly. But his suspicions were right, they were pitch black- although there was a very fine, you could almost miss it, thin line of white where the pupil was. Usually human eyes don’t separate the pupil from the ////// part, but he didn’t bother questioning. It’s not like everybody at this party was human, anyway...

“Where’s your glass?”

Star looked down to their shaky hand that once held their wine glass. They then looked over the balcony, then immediately looked back, their eyes tightly shut.

“Hey- it’s okay,” Villain said as he brushed his hand against Star’s cheek. So intimate...... “We can just get another one, I have plenty spares.” Villain moved to get up, dragging Star along with him. “Come on, le-“

Villain was forcibly dragged back down to the floor. He looked over to Star, who buried their face into Villain’s outfit. They wrapped their arms around him.

While Star didn’t speak, their request was clear. Plus, after that event, Villain wanted a bit of relax time, too.

“Here, lemme adjust.” Villain grabbed Star’s waist and crawled over to the railing, leaning against it and holding Star’s head close to his chest. He sighed, relaxing into the bars and letting his head tip back, his gaze directed at the sky. He closed his eyes.

Well, this is certainly an eventful night it’s turning out to be, Villain thought. Possibly the cutest man at the party, whom he didn’t even think he had a chance with at first, up against his body, them both relaxing.

He felt Star rub their face against Villain’s chest, sagging into the touch. Villain smiled, running a hand through Star’s hair. He actually heard Star visibly wheeze from that, so he continued to gently massage Star’s head and scalp.

All was at peace.

[unfortunatelysirius]

The Bad Boy and Hogwarts’ Ice Princess | Part I // Sirius Black

「 ❁ 」PROMPT 「 ❁ 」 [Ten Things I Hate About You AU] James Potter is new to Hogwarts, home to giggling birds and witchcraft. Upon arrival he’s bewitched by the enchanting Lily  Evans, a popular sixth year Gyffindor. However, Lily comes with an overprotective, overbearing sister who refuses to date and refuses to let her sister date. But James is determined to win Lily over, and if it takes finding someone to thaw her scowling sister’s ice-cold heart, so be it. But there’s only one man for the task and James isn’t so sure it’ll work. But perhaps Sirius Black is FULL of surprises... 「 ❁ 」AUTHOR’S NOTE 「 ❁ 」 Hey guys, this is my new series! I SHOULD be writing new additions to my other series (hahaha plural) ASAP, especially Chocolate Frogs and Love Notes. Send some love in the inbox (aka, what do you want updated or what do you want a sequel imagine to???) and I’ll try to make it happen ;) I’m making a promise to actually write some shit this time around. For my next uploads I’ll be using a tag list SO IF YOU WANT TO BE ADDED, MESSAGE/INBOX ME!!!! 「 ❁ 」WORD COUNT 「 ❁ 」 2360

JAMES POTTER HAD ONLY BEEN AT Hogwarts for less than twenty-four hours and already he was the talk of the town for being a womanizer.

James knew letting his hormones speak over his head was a bad, badidea. He did it more often than someone should, and it had costed him immensely. His mother had taken him out of his last school, Beauxbatons, for being a playboy. He was constantly flitting from girl to girl, never to stay longer than his interest allowed him; birds there were very pretty, coming at the cost of being very insipid and unremarkable. His mother eventually caught wind that he was fooling around with girls’ hearts and that his reputation there was tarnished beyond repair (Even with the professors! How had they gotten wind of his philandering?), thus leading him to where he was at now, a new student at a new school where no one knew him or his old habits. His mother was understandably ireful and asked that James not write her for a while, so she wouldn’t try sending a Howler or Apparating to the school so she could strangle him. Really, in essence, James’s mother just wanted to avoid the walking disaster that was her son.

        James didn’t blame her.

James was easily bored and a massive flirt. If a girl was pretty, he’d play his cards until eventually the chase grew tiresome or she proved to be as indistinguishable as a hand towel. He tried explaining to his mother that it wasn’t his fault girls were so boring, but of course she was having none of it and snarked back, “Find a new hobby!”

Chasing girls isn’t a hobby, he really wanted to tell her, even if she would have rattled the neurons in his brain for backtalk. And for being an arse. It’s a lifestyle.

        An exhausting lifestyle indeed, but a lifestyle, nonetheless.

        James came to Hogwarts expecting to be disappointed. Beuaxbatons during sixth year would have been full of girls at their respective peaks, all pretty, vain, and vapid. James loved the chase as long as they didn’t play too hard to get, and usually it took mere days before they were going to him and not the other way around. He prided himself on being handsome. Maybe the conceited energy came from being coddled growing up; his mother sure did regret telling him he was her “handsome little boy.” Maybe if she jokingly called him a troll, he wouldn’t be like he was.

        He had tousled black hair that never stayed still. A mess of curls that girls always wanted to run their fingers through. His hazel eyes were mischievous and lit up at all times, hidden behind a pair of trendy circular classes. His fashion sense wasn’t too shabby either, not that he had any choice with a dress code in place. He didn’t care much as long as he could wear the socks and shoes that he wanted.

        James was tall and lean, his frame accentuated by subtle muscles. He was top-heavy, but he had some nicely shaped thighs from all his laps. He wasa Quidditch player, after all.

        There was no question why he got all the girls he wanted.

        Until he was the handsome new student at Hogwarts Academy, freshly sorted into Gryffindor, already a heartthrob among the ladies, restrictions on womanizing from his mother ringing around in his head—and he couldn’t believe what had just happened.

        “You just got rejected, mate,” some idiot twat laughed from nearby, but James’s head was stuck in space.

        Rejected…

-

Ten minutes ago…

        James was almost to his second class of the day, Potions, when he saw it. Saw her. A girl who put all of the birds he chased to shame, a girl who looked like she’d just walked out of a magazine.

Holy—

“Oh, my Merlin,” James blurted out, his eyes stuck—frozen, as a matter of fact—on the redheaded bombshell standing outside of Professor Slughorn’s classroom.

James was infatuated immediately. Call it love at first sight, call it a sexual fantasy, call it a mutation on the brain—call it whatever! Infatuated, bloody infatuated. All thoughts of Hogwarts being a disappointment escaped right out of him, and all that was left was this thought that James Potter had to have this girl.

He wasn’t even sure how he meant that, just that he wanted her. In his bed or in his arms permanently, he had no clue.

He just wasn’t used to being so… set on someone.

He was approaching her before he had any inclination of what he was doing or going to say.

“Well, hello there, love,” James said flirtatiously, putting on the French lilt he picked up from attending Beauxbatons. It worked on Hogwarts girls exceptionally well, almost alarmingly so; they ate him and his faux accent up like Shepherd’s pie.

To his complete bewilderment, the girl blatantly looked reluctant to tear her gaze away from the floor, looked him up and down like he was a disappointing distraction, then she said, “Pleasure.”

That wasn’t supposed to happen.

James back-peddled, but he didn’t lose his smug grin like weaker men would have done. Flirt game: infinite, strong. “I saw you over here and couldn’t leave a beautiful madame standing all alone,” he said, leaning on the wall next to her and crossing his legs at the ankle, like the suave master of all things effortless he was. “What’s to say you and I be Potions partners? I’m rather good with my hands… and my mind.”

The girl was completely dry, from the tiptop of her head to her feet—frown most of all. “Get bent,” she said.

Was that…

Was that…

Was that… a rejection?

James’s grin fell. Flirt game: weaker than weak. “What?”

“I said, ‘Get bent.’ You’ve been flirting with all the girls since you got here and I’m not going to be one of your victims, prat,” the girl spat, with dynamite-like fury. Maybe she’d saved all her anger for this very day, to unleash it on James the newbie playboy. “So go be a twat elsewhere.”

She turned her back to him and huffed.

…

…

-

James stood there for what felt like hours, yet the professor hadn’t shown up yet and the beautiful redhead’s friends had appeared from nowhere and dragged her into a corner. One of her friends was a brunette James remembered giggling at his advances just last night in the Gryffindor common room. No wonder the redhead knew about him and his ways.

He felt like disappearing in a hole and staying there forever. His mother was right to be peeved with him and surely she’d take the mickey when she found out that it had all backfired on her idiot philandering son.

The redhead probably wouldn’t believe him if he said he had a condition where he just couldn’t help himself around girls. She’d probably just punch him in the face.

James was still as a statue. He’d definitely win a contest.

Until he realized someone was trying to get his attention.

“Psst,” someone said from behind him, and James—ever slow and ever bewildered—took his sweet time turning around. He was even more bewildered when he saw a lanky, nervous-looking guy standing in the shadows. James threw caution to the wind and approached the guy, not even trying to act threatening.

“What’s up?” James said, like he hadn’t just been embarrassed in front of his entire Potions class.

The boy who’d called out to him was tall, taller than James actually. He was more sickly-looking, with a frame his attire seemed to drown. He had mousy brown hair and grassy eyes. He was handsome, but not a conventional sort of attractiveness--but who was judging? He was an alright bloke!

“That’s Lily Evans,” the peculiar boy said quietly.

“Pretty name… how do you think she’d feel about the nickname Lily-flower?” James asked, oblivious to the peculiar’s boy expression as it rapidly grew more nervous. “I’m sure she’ll accept me into her heart if she finds my wooing to be… more sincere.”

“You really, really shouldn’t,” the boy said, looking like he feared for James’s safety.

“Why’s that, mate?” James asked, ever oblivious.

The boy glanced around, spying for anyone bold enough to eavesdrop, then whispered, “Her sister’s Y/N Evans.”

James blinked. He didn’t remember meeting a Y/N Evans yesterday or anytime this morning. If she were anything as pretty as her sister, he would have definitely noticed her—but none of the girls he’d met so far were a Y/N. Why did she matter? “So?”

“She doesn’t take kindly to anyone harassing her sister… she may retaliate. Lily, she’s never dated. She hasn’t dated because of her sister.”

“Is this sister of hers a shrew?” James said obnoxiously, choking on his laughter.

The boy shook his head, ever nervous. “I don’t want to see you hurt. You seem nice. Y/N is a good person, but she’s… merciless, too.”

“You seem kinda nerdy. Why do you care?” James asked. The boy indeed looked like he wouldn’t care about gossip or help unknowing passersby. He looked like your average bookworm who cared less about the goings-on of school drama and more about fictional lives.

The boy’s face turned sheepish. His face said all that James needed to know.

        So he fancied Lily too, huh?

“Ah,” James’s face said but what his mouth said was, “So?”

“She’s Hogwarts’ Ice Princess,” the boy began. “She’s never fancied anyone. I guess she is a shrew, per se. She thinks men are going to use Lily and they’ll do the same to her.”

“I wouldn’t use her!” James said indignantly, but he knew he was preaching to the devil’s choir. He wasn’t the most charming or respectful of blokes; there was a reason his mother was cross with him at the moment. “Okay, maybe from the past—I wouldn’t—… well, I would change for her.”

“Y/N doesn’t know and she doesn’t care,” the boy said with a sigh, just as Professor Slughorn was arriving. The boy’s nervous face gave a nervous smile and his nervous hand reached out for a nervous shake. “I’m Remus… Remus Lupin.”

James grinned a shit-eating grin and he took Remus’s nervous hand, sealing the beginning of a beautiful friendship. “James Potter.”

-

        I have an idea. It’s a good one, James sloppily wrote on a crumbled-up piece of parchment, handing it under the table to his new friend.

        Remus had been more than eager to be James’s Potions partner, and even though he proved to be extremely studious, it seemed like their friendship mattered more. He took James’s piece of parchment immediately and wrote back, What?

        This went on as Professor Slughorn lectured and droned pointless information.

        You said Y/N’s never dated, right?

        Yes.

        Well, what if we got her to break off and date somebody?

        That’s impossible. She has a vendetta against us.

        Maybe she just hasn’t found the right bloke… wink.

        Are you going to date her yourself so you can then date her sister?

        What?!?!?!?! No!!!!! I’m just saying, what if we paid a guy to pursue her, be everything she wants in a man, then it makes her warm up to the idea of Lily dating?? Foolproof plan right?

        Lily doesn’t even like you. And she’s liked plenty before. What if this plan actually pulls through and she still doesn’t want to date you?

        All a work in progress, mate… we just have to find the perfect man for a not so perfect girl.

        James couldn’t stop smirking and winking the rest of Potions, and Remus just looked even more nervous than he began.

-

        “Sirius Black,” Remus hissed, nudging James hard.

        The two of them were in the Great Hall for dinner, eating and whispering with their heads together. James hadn’t flirted with another girl since he discovered Lily Evans’s existence—to the dismay of several beautiful birds trying in vain to get his attention—and right now he was looking for a girl who looked menacing and like she ate blokes for breakfast. He was failing miserably so far.

        Remus’s nudge made James choke on his pumpkin juice. “Wha—who?” he sputtered.

        “Sirius Black,” Remus said, directly James’s head to see a head of curly black hair bent over a plate of nothing but meat. The guy was aggressively eating, a glower on his face even though he wasn’t looking at anything except a plate. He seemed attractive but James couldn’t be sure with half his face covered.

        “He looks cool,” James said with a grin.

        “He’s a rebel,” Remus whispered. This Sirius Black bloke was also a Gryffindor, it seemed, but you couldn’t tell from how dangerous his vibe was. If James hadn’t seen him sitting here or sporting a red and yellow tie, he would have suspected the guy was a Slytherin. “He was kicked out of his family for being a Muggleborn-lover. He hates his family and hates everyone here. He gets into fights frequently and uh… he hates me.”

        James looked at Remus and laughed at the crestfallen look on his face.  “He sounds bloody perfect for the job,” he said, referencing their plan. It sounded completely foolproof to his deaf ears. “But what’s this Y/N bird look like?”

        As if on cue, a girl walked through the Great Hall entrance—a girl both doe-like and formidable. She had H/L H/C hair shooting into her face and a scowl as terrifying as it was sexy. She was wearing a modest outfit by Beauxbatons standards, but even to James, naïve to everything Hogwarts, he could tell there were alterations. He was in utter awe at this terrifying girl who definitely looked like she ate boys for breakfast.

        She caught James’s eye as she made it the Gryffindor table, giving him the most hateful glower he’d ever been at the receiving end of. James immediately looked away. He wasn’t that stupid.

        “That’s Y/N,” Remus said meekly, also awestruck. 

        James stared at him with wide eyes, then took subtle glances at both Sirius and Y/N at opposite ends of the table. Both completely terrifying… and both definitely uninterested.

         Neither of them are perfect… opposites attract, though, right? If James had any self-respect left, he would have dropped his intentions right then and there.

        Maybe Lily wasn’t worth the trouble…

       But Merlin knew James was a reckless bloke, and if something screamed for him to get away, he’d just fall in further.

[birdwonder]

Genos and Saitama | Your Heroes

|| whoo, another amazing request from @tishimaaa! honestly people, feel free to request stuff from me, it makes me so happy! i really hope you all enjoy this lil’ fic - the main plot was a struggle to come up with, but the request for a reader who liked taking photos was so cute and perfect. <3

[F/N] [L/N]. Full time journalist and sadly, only part time blogger.

As generic as your occupation sounded, your life could be the furthest thing from that. You were a young adult, living in Japan in an apartment with decent rent but little to no neighbours, which made perfect sense seeing as your surrounding area was a honeypot for swarms of monsters that were ready to kill and slaughter.

Now, as horrible as that sounded, it wasn’t all that bad! As a journalist, it gave you an easy and early access to juicy scoops that you could impress your boss and editor with; and it gave you a heap ton to talk about for your hero fan blog online. Not to forget - you weren’t living alone. To be specific, you had two other roommates living in the cramped apartment that had a generous amount of space for one person, but no room at all for three.

Well, you say roommates but more officially they were your boyfriends. Emphasis on the plural. It may be unconventional to have not one but two lovers, but after staying with the both of them for such a long time and all three of you developing mutual feelings, why just settle for one when everyone could be happy? Genos, or more popularly known as Demon Cyborg by the masses, and Saitama who was doomed with the title Caped Baldly, were the two that had captured your heart. Your perfect heroes. Which worked well considering the fact that you were a hero fanatic, and they were always out doing something incredible that you could add to your page. Well, Saitama did a lot less than Genos but when he did fight oooh boy. Was it amazing. 

It was seriously painful to know that Saitama got absolutely zero recognition for his heroic efforts, especially when he hasn’t lost a single battle to your knowledge! It’s the same routine really; a villain approaches, one hit and it’s over. ‘Caped Baldy’ really didn’t do him justice. He deserved a better name like ... The Punching Man! Or Single Punch. 

You should really just stick to writing about heroes instead of creating them.

Sometimes when you felt like your blog had gotten dry or you were in desperate need of material for your work, you would wait close by Genos so that you could be there when he was alerted of any ‘approaching life forms’ as he occasionally put it or monsters that were attacking the cities. 

Right now, your head was rested on his shoulder while you were sitting on the floor in front of a small TV, neither of you really paying attention to what was being said on the screen but it made for great white noise as the two of you simply enjoyed each other’s company. It would be even greater if Saitama was there too, arms wrapped around your waist or his head on your lap as he usually liked to laze about with you, unfortunately he was out buying groceries.

You sighed contently as Genos reached over to take a strand or two of your hair between his fingers, trying to get his sensors in his finger tips to pick up on the texture as he’s done so many times before. “It’s so soft...” He noted, focused so intently on your hair that it might as well been what was on TV instead of the weather report. 

“Thanks Genos,” you laughed, winking as you joked, “I make sure to keep it brushed and conditioned just for you.” As appreciated as his praise was, you were certain that no matter if your hair was straight, curly, long or short, he would probably have something nice to say about it.

“Don’t do it for me! You should be taking care of yourself on your own accord. I read somewhere that treating your body well and taking care of yourself can help keep your mood up by a large scale.” The cyborg began to ramble, listing off a number of ways that you could pamper yourself as though he was a walking self-care beauty kit ad. At least you knew that next time you went shopping, you had the OK to buy a face mask.

 As informative as it was, you lifted a finger to his lips to hush him, something you usually did when you wanted to keep him quiet. Or kiss him. That usually worked but then he wouldn’t speak for a good ten minutes. 

From there the two of you continue to sit in comfortable silence until you heard the sound of a door unlocking and opening, causing you to lift your head from Genos’ shoulder to see Saitama had returned, hands filled with bags which had increased since the time you and Genos officially moved it. Thankfully being a journalist and S-ranked hero helped cover the expenses.

“Sai, welcome back!” You greeted with a sweet voice that instantly put a small smile on the C-ranked hero’s face.

“Hey. See you two are comfortable.” Saitama then proceeded to start putting the products he had bought away, careful to not put something cold in the cabinet or rice in the fridge since he was trying to do it all quickly to join your cuddling session. How dare you two be lazy and snuggle up when he had to sort out 50 coupons at the check out to find at least one that wasn’t expired? Unforgivable. “Totally not like I was outside freezing my ass off or anything”

You snickered at his sarcastic comment and made a ‘come here’ gesture. “Well if you hurry up, you can join us, dummy.”

“Or you could help out? Better yet. I sit down and chill and you do all of this, and cook lunch. And make some dessert while you’re at it maybe.” Saitama retorted, huffing at his lack of assistance while you cheekily grinned and tapped your chin, as if deep in thought. 

“Hoooow about ... no.~”

Throwing his head back a little, Saitama groaned with annoyance even though he knew he wasn’t going to stay mad at you. “Maybe you want to help out, Genos?” He queried, raising a brow at the cyborg who had suddenly stood up, startling you from his unexpected move. Was he that excited to help sort out groceries?

“There’s something outside. No. Two beings are nearby.” 

Finally, some action! Your eyes sparkled with excitement, looking back and forth from Genos and Saitama with an expecting look, knowing that they'd have no choice but to go check it out. After all, no one came round here except for monsters, and they wouldn’t dare let you sleep in a dangerous environment. What sweethearts.

They gave each other a nod, both knowing what they had to do, before looking over at you. “Stay here, [F/N]. We’ll be back in a short bit, just put the food away for me, yeah?” Saitama asked, only needing to take a few steps to be standing in front of you and place a hand on your head. In return, you leant up to peck his cheek as a good luck charm, a thing you usually did when they were about to head out.

“Do your best out there, guys!” 

“We will do even better than that,” Genos corrected, mimicking Saitama by also patting your head. Guess he was trying to learn more from his sensei than just how to become a strong hero.

With that they were both gone and you were left in the apartment, standing in the middle of the square living room by your lonesome, but not for long! Turning on your heel, you rushed over to a corner of the room where you usually dumped your bag after work and rummaged inside looking for your camera. 

You cheered a small ‘yes’ once you grabbed it, rushing to the door to slip your shoes on and dash out the house and down the building’s stairs. It took a lot of frantic looking around to find out where they went but luckily they had moved to one street over, already battling it out.

Well, Saitama was just standing there talking or maybe debating with one of the monsters who looked like a mix of porcupine and a mole rat while Genos was going head to head with an identical looking being but slightly taller and stockier. Already a few seconds in and you had snapped a few shots of Genos landing hits on the monster.

 From the safety of just blatantly standing behind a brick wall’s corner, you continued to take more photos while the excitement of going home to upload them to your laptop was bubbling inside you. Obviously a few of the more up close and handsome would be saved for yourself . You may love sharing the amazing abilities of your lovers to the world but even you got a little jealous over fans looking at Genos too much. 

‘It’s not fair, why is he so perfect?’ You mentally complained, cursing the fact the cyborg looked so good while also being a badass fighter. Sadly for you, you got way too wrapped up in your thoughts and failed to noticed the looming figure behind you.

With no warning or even an idea with what’s to come, a large hand wrapped around your throat from behind, forcing a gasp and sickly choking sound to escape your throat.

“Lookie, lookie. A little lamb fresh for the slaughter house,” a gruff yet arrogant voice cooed, sending all the worst kinds of shivers down your spines. With a grip tight on your throat, it was hard to move your head, especially when the stranger’s hand seemed to cover the whole surface area of your neck. Yet you managed to tilt it just enough to see the face of your attacker.

A deep blue mole like muzzle sniffled disgustingly near your face, as if to take in your scent. Small, black squinting eyes seemed to be heavily focused on you and it was clear by his much larger porcupine quills and stature, that this guy was the superior of the two other beasts fighting Saitama and Genos. Damn, he must have been too far away at first for Genos to have detected him.

“Let...go!” It was hard to choke out the command and all of your energy was going into swinging your legs back and forth, and scratching at the hand holding you in hopes it hurt enough to make him release his grip on you. To no avail, his hand didn’t so much as loosen.

In the most mocking manner ever, the mole creature barked out in laughter and seemed to even tear up a little at your feeble attempt of escaping. “Don’t be stupid, little thing! As the Rodent King, I’m making it my mission to expand my empire by killing off every single one of you miserable humans,” he boasted, chest puffed out as though he was announcing the world’s greatest news. If you had the energy to, you’d roll your eyes. “From a burrow in the woods to the whole of the miserable planet, and then the world, I will claim all of this land and  my people and I will live long and fruitfully!”

Despite it being loud and obnoxious, the monologging rodent’s speech didn’t take your mind off the serious lack of oxygen you weren’t getting and your limbs began to go limp. The camera that was once in your hand clattered to the ground and shattered, the majority of it still being connected together with all the inner components sprung out and the lens had to have shattered; not that it mattered to a dead person. 

The loud clatter of the camera caught the Rodent King’s attention, and his looked down to spot what had fallen and yet he asked, “huh? What was that?” His nose sniffed a couple of times, trying to find the scent of what had fallen and then it struck you. He’s as blind as mole. This guy relied on scent to see! 

“No matter, it doesn’t matter now.” He shrugged, letting go of your neck, causing you to fall onto your knees and gasp for a desperate amount of air. ‘Oh sweet oxygen, don’t ever let me lose you again. I promise to walk more to work, I really do.’ 

Meekly, you looked up to see that your nightmare wasn’t over. The monster was now knelt down on one leg in front of you, one arm resting on his propped up knee and another was raised above your head, a large, clenched fist ready to crash down on your skull. “Like I said, you humans are destined to die by my hand! Now, any last words?”

Shit, shit. What to do? You weren’t ready to die, not like this. You hadn’t regained enough air to cry out for help, so all you had right now was yourself to save you. You and a ... busted camera! Patting around, you knew that the Rodent King wouldn’t notice your fidgeting so you quickly tried to search for it while still keeping eye contact with him, just so he didn’t grow suspicious.

“Yeah actually... Just three.” 

Got it!

You grabbed ahold of the largest chunk of the camera you could find, and pulled back your arm, smashing the once treasured device onto the villain’s face while simultaneously quickly standing up. “Eat shit, bitch!”

A pained cry came from the Rodent King, who slapped his previously raised hand over his face to cover where the camera had hit him. Just like you, he had quickly gotten up though you were already taking two steps away from him. Now, if you could just run away, you could head for the other two! Oh God, how you wanted to hold them. To feel safe and warm in their arms.

That desire crashed down like a burning plane however when you felt your arm be grabbed. The mole clearly was strong enough to recover quickly from the minor attack, and he looked furious, quills sticking up much higher than before. “You bitch! How dare you! Do you know who you are dealing with?!”

Before you could even make a clever comeback, or a pathetic cry for mercy, the hold on you suddenly became non existent when a blast had hit the head of the Rodent King, sending him flying back a couple of feet away. 

‘Huh? Wait, that could only mean,’ you cut off your own thoughts by swiftly turning around to see two figures standing in front of you, your boys. Oh, and did they look pissed. 

“I believe it is you who doesn’t know who they’re dealing with.” Genos harshly stated, a now closing canon whirring from within his hand as he glared at the now writhing in pain monster. Saitama looked just as deadly, his expression darkened and already he was stepping closer to the villain. 

“I’ll take this one Genos, just make sure that [F/N] isn’t hurt.”

With an accepting nod, Genos gently put an arm around you and pulled you close to his side, guiding you further away from the street for the sake of your wellbeing and your eyes not seeing what bloodshed would probably ensue. 

“[F/N], what were you doing there? Do you know how dangerous it is to follow us into battle?!” 

The scolding stung a little emotionally though his concerned expression and gentle hands lifting your chin to brush over any potential bruising on your neck made up for it, letting you know that it was just the stress of losing you that had gotten him so riled up. 

“I’m sorry, Genos. Really. I just,” you choked a little, tears threatening to spill but you wouldn’t let them, “I just love seeing you and Saitama fight, and I’m just so proud to have such incredible boyfriends- I guess I just wasn’t careful enough.”

The robotic hero sighed. He couldn’t understand why you would risk yourself for a couple of candid photos of him and his sensei, especially when you weren’t even close to being evenly matched against any hero or villain. Though it didn’t mean he wasn’t flattered, plus he also knew that heroes were a passion of your’s, something he wouldn’t dream of trying to change.

Brushing some of your hair from your face that had gotten loose and messy from the scuffle you had, he rested his forehead against your’s and let a beat of silence pass before speaking. “It’s fine, please do not let yourself cry over this. Just next time, give us a warning? We will maybe try and work something out if you are so insistent on getting photos of our fights.”

That made you smile a little. As stoic and harsh as Genos may seem, his heart was usually in the best of places, especially when it came to those he cared about. It’s one of the reasons why you love him so much. 

“Sure hon, though I doubt I’ll be taking any photos any time soon. I may have smashed my camera back here while I was being, y’know.” A weak chuckle left your lips, and Genos was about to say a few more words of comfort for your loss of a prized possession when a much calmer than before voice spoke up.

“No biggie, we can just buy you a new one, right?”

Turning around and smiling softly, the usual nonchalant expression of Saitama was as welcoming as a warm hug on a winter’s day. In his hand was a brown wallet, a few yen notes poking out of the pocket which gave the idea that a lot was inside. “Turns out even rat things carry about cash on them, and if I’m right this should cover for a new camera.”

Saitama placed a hand on your head like earlier, his eyes soft while glancing at you, something you responded to by pulling him into a tight hug and burying your face into the soft fabric of his hoodie. A much better thing to soak a few tears in than his flashy hero outfit, in your opinion. 

“Oh thank you so, so much. You guys really are my heroes.” You sniffled, pulling your face away from Saitama’s chest. “I love you boys so much!”

Of course, the two had to smile at that, both leaning down to plant a small kiss on a temple either side of your head. “We love you more,” Saitama chimed, wrapping an arm around your shoulder while Genos opted for holding your hand loosely, which was usually out of his comfort zone in public areas. Luckily, it was only you three. 

“Now, I believe Sensei brought some food home, yes? Shall we go prepare some lunch?”

“Oh yeah! If you two could make some soba that’d be great.”

“Oh Sai...”

[togglesbloggle]

So, @argumate is up to some more prosocial atheistic trolling.  As is usual with such things, the conversation isn’t particularly elevated, but it does make me nostalgic for the old bbc days.  So I thought I’d be the Discourse I’d like to see in the world.  This is the post that kicked things off; correctly noting Platonism as a philosophical foundation underpinning most versions of Abrahamic faiths.  And it’s probably the most useful place for me to target also, since hardly anybody just identifies as a Platonist but most westerners are one.  So, without further ado, a halfhearted and full-length defense of Platonism:

Well, strike that.  A little bit of ado.

I’m not a Platonist myself, so this is a devil’s advocate type of thing.  Or maybe you could call it an intellectual Turing test?  As I discuss here, my philosophical commitments are mostly to skepticism, and for instrumental reasons, to reductionist materialism.  That combo leaves me some wiggle room, and I find it fairly easy to provisionally occupy a religious mindset, so I can generally read and enjoy religious polemics.  I also have a fairly deep roster of what are often called ‘spiritual experiences’; I’m probably in the set of people that are by nature predisposed to religion.  I am not religious, and I approve of Argumate saying things like ‘God is not real’ a lot.  This is in no way a retread of the arguments in The Republic or Plato’s other writings; you can go read those if you want, but I’m going to play around with stuff that I think is better suited to this audience.

Attention conservation notice: yikes.  This got pretty long.

Anyway, on to the argument.  Argumate’s main point is pretty clear, I think: ‘forms’ in the Greek sense are a function and product of the perceiving mind.  Birds don’t conform to bird-ness; instead brains naturally produce a sort of bird-ness category to make processing the world easier, and to turn a series of wiggly and continuous phenomena into a discrete number of well-modeled objects.  Basically, we impose ‘thing-ness’ on the wavefunction of reality.  And there are some good reasons to think that it might be true!  Our understanding of categories gets a lot sharper when reality conveniently segregates itself, and whenever that boundary gets a little blurry, our ability to use categories tends to break down.  If the recognition of animal-ness came from contact with a higher plane of reality, you wouldn’t necessarily expect people to get confused about sponges.

But.  While there’s certainly plenty of support for Argumate’s position, it doesn’t strike me as anything near self-evident, or necessarily true.  So what I’ll argue is that Platonism isn’t obviously false, and that if we ever converge on a true answer to the question of our reality, then that truth could plausibly be recognizably Platonist.  My opening salvo here is, predictably enough, mathematics.

‘Mathematical Platonism’ is a whole other thing, only distantly related to Classical Platonism, and I only really mean to talk about the latter.  But nonetheless, mathematics really actually does appear to be a situation where we can simply sit in a chair, think deeply, and then more or less directly perceive truths.  Basic arithmetic can be independently discovered, and usefully applied, by almost anybody; ‘quantity’ comes naturally to most humans, and the inviolable laws of quantity are exploited just as often.  It’s also very hard to argue that these are ‘mere’ linguistic conventions, since fundamental natural behaviors like the conservation of mass depend on a kind of consistent logical framework.  In most chemical reactions, the number of atomic nuclei does not change, and the atoms added to a new molecule are perfectly mirrored by the loss of atoms in some reactant; this remains true in times and places where no thinking mind exists to count them.

There are a lot of debates about what math is, fundamentally.  But inevitably when we study math, we’re studying the set of things that must be true, given some premise: we’re asking whether some proposition is a necessary consequence of our axioms.  The so-called ‘unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics’ suggests that the phenomena that Argumate mentions- hotdogs and birds and whatnot- are observed only within the auspices of a sort of super-phenomenon.  Loosely speaking, we can call this super-phenomenon self-consistency.  

We treat phenomena as having a natural cause.  Platonism, at its crunchy intellectually rewarding center, represents a willingness to bite the bullet and say that self-consistency also has a cause.  Plato himself actually provided what might be the most elegant possible answer!  Basically, posit the simplest thing that meets the criterion of being A) autocausal and B) omnicausal, and then allow the self-consistency of the cosmos to follow from its dependence on (in Platonist terms, its emanation from) that single, unitary cause.  The universe is self-consistent for the very straightforward reason that there’s only one thing.  Any plurality, to the extent that plurality is even a thing, happens because ‘the only real thing’ is only partially expressed in a particular phenomenon.  To skip ahead to Lewis’ Christian interpretation of all this, you’d say that humans and moons and hotdogs are distinguished from God not by what they have, but by what they lack.

And for present purposes, I do want to take a step back and point out that this does feel like a reasonable answer to a very important question.  Materialism fundamentally has no answer to the question of self-consistency and/or the presence of logic and order, and that is (for me) one of its least satisfying limits.  We’ve got things like ‘the origin of the universe’, sure.  But we probe the Big Bang with mathematical models!  That’s a hell of an assumption- namely, that even at the origin of our universe, self-consistency applies.  It’s not like materialism has a bad explanation.  It just remains silent, treats the problem as outside the domain.  If we’re adopting the thing for utilitarian reasons, that’s fine.  But if we’re treating materialism as a more comprehensive philosophy, a possible approach to the bigger questions, then it’s a painful absence.  In that domain, far from being self-evidently true (in comparison to Platonism), materialism doesn’t even toss its hat in the ring!

Which, uh, gets us to the stuff about Forms and shadows in Plato’s Cave and all that- the intermediate form of existence between the omnisimple core of Platonism and the often chaotic and very plural experience of day-to-day life.  And frankly, we’re not especially bound to say that the forms are exactly as Plato described them, any more than atomism is restricted to Democritus.  Whether there is some ‘bird-ness’ that is supra- to all extant birds might be contestable; however, it’s easier to wonder whether ‘binary tree’ is supra- to speciation and the real pattern of differences between organisms that we map using Linnaean taxonomy.

But, this is an attempted defense of Platonism and not Toggle’s Version of Platonism that He Invented Because it’s Easier, so I’ll give it a try.  Fair warning to the reader, what follows is not fully endorsed (even in the context of a devil’s advocate-type essay), except the broader claim that it’s not self-evidently false.  And on the givens we came up with a couple paragraphs ago, this is a reasonable way to tackle what necessarily follows.  So let me see how far I can defend a very strong claim: in a self-consistent (or: mathematical) cosmos, beauty cannot be arbitrary.

Remember that Plato never argued that his Forms were arbitrary, or even fully discrete as such; their apparent plurality, like our own, emanates from the unitary Thing What Exists.  And so, bird-ness is treated as a contingent thing, not an absolute.  It’s just not contingent on human experience.  And so for us to believe in ‘bird-ness’ is to believe that there exists some specific and necessary pattern- a Form- which any given material bird must express.

Let’s take an obvious example: any flying bird will, for fairly simple aerodynamic reasons, tend to be symmetrical.  Usually, this means two wings.  In theory, you could… have one in the middle?  Maybe?  Even that seems rather goofy to try to imagine, but you could probably get away with it if you were extremely creative biologically.  And if we see a bird with only one wing (without a prosthetic or other form of accommodation), then we will tend quite naturally to recognize that something awful is in the process of happening.

A fully materialist explanation of our reaction here would say: we think of the one-winged bird as problematic because A) we have been socialized to recognize and appreciate two-winged birds, and spurn deviations from that socialization, or maybe B) because natural selection has given us a set of instincts that recognize when a body plan has failed in the past, so things like ‘being crippled’ or ‘being sick’ are recognizable.  

Platonism, I think, would offer a third option, that C) we recognize (as emanations of The Real Thing) that a one-winged bird body is insufficiently reflective of The Real Thing, and that accordingly it lacks the ability to keep existing.  Plato had some… basically magical ideas, about how Forms are recognized, but here I’ll point out that ‘deduction’ is a completely serviceable kind of magic for our purposes.  It is, after all, our direct experience of the self-consistency of the cosmos, which follows from the fact that we are ourselves an expression of that same self-consistency; it meets the criteria.  

Materialists, obviously, would agree that deductive reasoning could allow a person to recognize the problems inherent in a one-winged bird, but as I said a few paragraphs up, their(/our) explanation of this process is rootless.  “Yes, logic and a few high-confidence assumptions let you assume that a bird with only one wing is in trouble,” they might say.  And we might ask- “what makes you so sure?”  And then the materialist must respond, “Well, let me be more clear.  It always worked in the past, and my Bayesian priors are strongly in the direction of the method continuing to bear fruit.”  True enough, but it’s not an explanation and doesn’t pretend to be.  The universe just does this weird thing for some reason; it works ‘by magic’.  So why not call it that?  Theurgy for all!

So, consider.  We recognize (deductively, let’s say for the sake of argument) that a one-winged bird is on the road to becoming nonexistent, absent some change in circumstances.  It may keep going for a little while, but it’s not in homeostasis.  And if we reasonably admit this very basic duality to our thinking- things which can persist, and things which cannot- then we start to recognize a sort of analogy between physical phenomena and mathematical propositions.  A lemma can be right or wrong, albeit sometimes unprovably so.  Basically, it can follow- or not- from the axioms we’re working with.  And in a softer but very real sense, that one-winged body plan is wrong analogously to the lemma’s wrongness.  Not ‘wrong’ as in ‘counter to cultural norms’, but ‘wrong’ as in ‘unstable given the premises, given the Thing That Exists Most’.  Look up research on fitness landscapes, if you’re so inclined- actual biological research isn’t totally unacquainted with the notion.  There exists a surprisingly discrete ideal or set of ideals, both for flying birds as a whole and subordinately for any given flying bird species.  And we have discovered this using magic.

Insofar as beauty is something to be admired, or pursued, or is otherwise desirable, then our sense of beauty must necessarily correlate with those abstract, and dare I say supra-real, qualities which allow things to persist, and which can therefore be understood deductively.  And that set of qualities does, effectively, meet the Platonic criterion of a ‘form’.

The immediate materialist objection is: hey, wait a minute.  The supposed ‘objective’ criterion of a bird is contingent, not absolute!  It follows from the strength of gravity, the thickness of the atmosphere, the availability of food sources, and on and on.  This is one of the most important reasons why genetic drift and speciation happens in the first place, because the ‘ideal’ bird depends on an environment that’s in constant flux.

True enough.  But!  How do you think the atmosphere got there?  It’s an old trick in religious discourse, but in this case I think a valid one.  The rightness of the bird depends on the atmosphere, the rightness of the atmosphere depends on the planet, the rightness of the planet depends on the solar system, and ultimately it all depends on that necessary self-consistency which (we proclaim) implies our unitary Most Real Thing.  This does mean that we can’t really think of Platonic forms as wholly discrete objects, unconnected to one another and without internal relation among themselves- unfortunately, that’s part of the original Plato that I don’t see as defensible, even with maximum charity.  But there’s such a thing as a ‘ring species’, and if we admit Platonic Forms of that type, a kind of dense network of paths being traced through higher-dimensional spaces that correspond to the shadow of That Than Which There Is No Whicher, then it’s more than salvageable.  It’s both satisfying to imagine and, I think, quite consistent with the spirit of the original philosophy.

One thing this doesn’t mean.  Even if we were to accept all of this, we aren’t obliged to resign ourselves to the lot of that one-winged bird.  Indeed, if anything this gives us a rich language by which to justify a prosthetic wing or other form of accommodation: we can talk about ‘making the bird whole’, and can see how our compassion for that bird might lead us to create the conditions of homeostasis once again.  But it does mean that if we take a position on the merits of existence- if we’re in favor- then we don’t treat a one- and two-winged bird as coequal scenarios.

Anyway, this has gone on hideously long already for what’s basically an intellectual exercise, so I won’t dive into immortal souls or any of the other ancillaries.  I mostly want to reiterate that, far from being obviously false, I do think that (some forms of) Platonism are quite defensible, and can provide coherent answers to questions that I A) care about very deeply and B) can’t resolve to my own satisfaction.  Of course, it is not obviously nor trivially true, either.  But one can be Platonist without being willfully wrong.

[spanishskulduggery]

Hi there =) I read that you don't want to do homework for people, I get it, and this is fairly easy probably... very beginner level Spanish but with all the online lessons I don't get it. How/when/why do I know when to use a word like 'decírtelo'. I get that the te refers to the fact I'm using the second person singular and the lo stands for it. But I can't figure out when to use it or how to build it if that makes sense. Thank you

Oh that’s totally not a problem. When I say I don’t want to do people’s homework I usually mean I don’t want to write their essays for them.

So, what you’re seeing with decírtelo is a combination of three things: the infinitive form decir, plus te, and then a direct object lo

Or in other words, combining direct and indirect objects with a verb in some way.

But I will say before beginning that the accent marks appear because of something extremely complicated known as esdrújula which is not really a beginner topic. It’s really: “Why does that word have an accent mark?”

Basically that whole thing is how you decide if and where to put in accent marks.

Saying decirte “telling you” would have no accent, but then you add decírtelo and it does because you added a new particle to the word but the emphasis was always on the “cir” and without the accent mark people might put it on the “te” instead. 

Again, it’s very complicated especially for beginners so just be aware of it but don’t worry if you don’t know it.

There are three ways that you see this:

Infinitive form [which is often optional]

Gerund or progressive form

Affirmative commands

#1 - Infinitive form

The infinitive form is the textbook dictionary form a verb. It’s just unconjugated.

You would use this either because you have a conjugated verb + an unconjugated verb, usually with a helping verb that’s already conjugated like poder, querer, or debe… or when you’re using the verb as a noun like “the action or result of a verb”

When you have two verbs together, one is conjugated and the one that follows (or sometimes the multiple ones that follow) are in infinitive form. And when you add direct or indirect objects, you normally have the option to put them all in front of the conjugated verb… OR you can attach them all to the verb in the infintiive

Te lo digo. = I’m telling you. [one conjugated verb]

Tengo que decírtelo. = I have to tell you (it). [one conjugated verb + unconjugated verb]

Te lo tengo que decir. = I have to tell you (it). [alternative form]

And since you might be in a position where you could use multiple verbs here’s one:

Quiero poder decírtelo. = I want to be able to tell you (it).

It would sound really strange adding all of that in front. I’m not sure if it’s possible. Like, it would make sense but it would sound very strange.

Most people put the things at the end, particularly English speakers since in English we tend to put our objects at the end and it feels more natural.

Since infinitive can sometimes be used by itself I’ll show you sort of what that looks like:

Decírtelo es difícil. = Telling you (it) is hard.

Querer decírtelo y poder decírtelo son cosas muy distintas. = Wanting to tell you (it) and being able to tell you are very different things.

#2 - Gerund/Progressive form

The gerund is the “-ing” form of a verb. It’s a verbal form, not exactly conjugated, but it’s not the same as the infinitive.

These normally come in with estar, or a verb of motion like ir, seguir, or andar.

Me lo sigues diciendo. = You keep telling me (it). / You continue telling me (it).

Sigues diciéndomelo. = You keep telling me (it). / You continue telling me (it).

Again, sometimes you might see a helping verb in there somewhere:

Tienes que seguir diciéndomelo. = You have to keep telling me (it).

Puedes seguir diciéndomelo. = You can kee telling me (it).

#3 - Affirmative Commands

Negative commands are worded differently, but this is somewhat more complicated.

First you need to know how to conjugate commands. With commands, there’s tú command for informal, usted command for formal, and a plural command if you’re talking to multiple people.

Second you need to get the indirect object right because it could be different.

And then you need to get the direct object right because what you’re talking about might be masculine or feminine depending on context.

So for example, say that the lo in this is el regalo “gift”, while the la here is la carta “letter”:

Dámelo. = Give it to me. [informal]

Démelo. = Give it to me. [formal]Dénmelo. = Give it to me. [plural]

Dámela. = Give it to me. [informal]Démela. = Give it to me. [formal]Dénmela. = Give it to me. [plural]

There’s a lot of weirdness to unpack in all of that but it has to do with esdrújula and that’s also weird.

Side Note: When an indirect object is 3rd person [him/her/usted or them/you all] + direct object, the indirect object turns to se so that you don’t have to use le and les and trip yourself up

pedir un favor = to ask for a favorpedirte un favor = to ask a favor of you / to ask you a favorpedirle un favor = to ask a favor of him/her/Youpedirles un favor = to ask a favor of them/you all

pedírtelo = to ask you for (it) [lit. “to request it of you”]

pedírselo (a él) = to ask him for itpedírselo (a ella) = to ask her for itpedírselo (a usted) = to ask you for it [formal]pedírselo (a ellos / ellas) = to ask them for itpedírselo (a ustedes) = to ask you all for it

Spain also has vosotros which is like “you all” but informal… so like “y’all”

That would be pediros un favor and then pedíroslo

Commands can sometimes be reflexive so you might see them with accent marks too: levántate [tú], levántese [usted], and levántense [plural] which all mean “get up!” in different levels of formality.

There are cases where a command might have a direct object and also be reflexive:

ponerse la ropa = to put on clothes

Ponte el abrigo. = Put your coat on.Ponte la chaqueta. = Put your jacket on.Ponte los zapatos. = Put your shoes on.Ponte las medias. = Put your socks on. [la media is a regional word for “sock”, you’re probably used to el calcetín for “sock” and los calcetines for plural]

Póntelo. = Put it on.Póntela. = Put it on.Póntelos. = Put them on.Póntelas. = Put them on.

Again, poner is an irregular verb.

You’d get the same kind of construction with quitarse la ropa “to take off clothes”:

Quítatelo. = Take it off.Quítatela. = Take it off.Quítatelos. = Take them off.Quítatelas. = Take them off.

There are other smaller issues with this and more itty bitty details, but this is the basic gist.

[this-is-totally-plural]

Are western tulpas cultural appropriation? Just curious, because I've seen some messages from other systems saying they are.

I’ve been taking my time with this response because I wanted to do some research before giving this an answer. The situation is complicated and the topic is very much nuanced. Since we don’t have any thoughtforms (that I know of anyways) and were not in the tulpamancer community when it was circulating, we weren’t the most comfortable answering, simply because we didn’t want to spread misinformation! So we reached out to the Outlaws system, who we knew had a lot of experience with the tulpamancer community at a certain time and they offered us answers and insights about your question, as well as permission to share them. Please read the helpful information below. (And a massively HUGE shoutout and truck full of appreciation to Outlaws for sending me all of this and allowing me to use it!!)

Disclaimer: It has been awhile since Outlaws have been in said community and are not part of it anymore for personal reasons. Do not take what they say as gospel (good advice for anything you read on the internet) or try to start a witch hunt. Also the collection of writings is from different conversations about the topic, not one fluid one. Please do come to your own respectful conclusions.

���Mel: Tulpamancy as the internet presently understands it is largely derived from practices established on 4Chan's /x/ board, which is hardly a source of culturally sensitive information, that in turn were influenced by echoes of the new age movement (which is also far from culturally sensitive). Rather, it seems to me that western tulpamancy has strayed from its Buddhist roots (which in themselves were precarious) to embody concepts of thoughtforms derived from chaos magick and psychological concepts.

W: There is (or was when we were in that community) a whole Divide between metaphysical tulpamancers and psychological tulpamancers, each faction subtly, or not-so-subtly, insisting they're more Enlightened than the other party.

W: Based on what I remember reading, the purpose of the tulpa in Buddhism was (unreality cw) to teach the practitioner about the illusory nature of reality so as to bring them closer to attaining enlightenment. This was something I read Years Ago though, so take that with a grain of salt. This has led some people to (rightly imo) assert that "tulpa" is a misnomer for what's actually done, especially given that it's predominantly a secular practice online, but it leads to the problem of there being a whole community built up that's been using that label for like, ~7 years or so now (?) so change is slow going in that department. So yeah, when people talk about it being a cultural thing, they're referring to Tibetan Buddhist spiritual practices, which are Very different from what tulpamancy has become online.

W: Tulpas in Tibetan Buddhism were used as more of a spiritual meditation exercise (as Mel mentioned, David-Néel's account was pretty sensationalist) whereas in the western world, it's predominantly regarded as a psychological thing. There Are people who take a metaphysical approach, but that metaphysical approach is pretty far removed from actual, y'know, Buddhism, and more in line with creation of thoughtforms in stuff like chaos magick.

W: Tl;Dr is, "The metaphysical arm of tulpamancy was originally appropriative because Western occultism in general has a nasty tendency to be appropriative and sensationalist (just look at Kabbalah mysticism). Now Western tulpamancy has since snowballed into something regarded as a purely psychological practice far removed from its original spiritual practices, and could definitely use a label that is more accurate in both an occult and psychological sense.

W: I guess ultimately "is tulpamancy cultural appropriation" is a loaded question. Because yes, the term "tulpamancy" definitely has roots in poor Western understanding of Tibetan spiritual practices (that were in many cases sensationalist, such as David Néel's writings), and I think people should like, recognize that, especially since it's evolved into something closer to chaos magick on the spiritual end of things and... well, self-induced plurality on the psychological end of things. But you also have a whole community built up around the term, to the point of it being cited in research papers like Veissiere's and stuff like that, which makes it hard to shake on a mass scale without putting in conscious effort to slowly educate the community at large about its origins. However, the practice itself, apart from the label, has evolved into its own _thing_, and because of that there's little ties to actual Tibetan Buddhism beyond the name.

W: Are the roots of tulpamancy mired in cultural appropriation? Absolutely. Does this mean you shouldn't touch the practice or community with a ten foot pole? I would argue no, because the practice itself has evolved into something extremely far removed from any kind of Buddhist practice. Take out the 'tulpamancy' label, and you would be left with a practice that's pretty far removed from anything tied to any particular spiritual or cultural group. So, I think a change of terminology is in order in these cases, but I don't think the act of simply creating a headmate should be cancelled outright, or lead to anyone being branded as an approptiator of Tibetan Buddhism or what have you.”

- W and Mel of the Outlaws System

Furthermore, if you have questions about any of this, you can send in more asks and my system will answer them to the best of our ability.

If you are a tulpamancer or interested in tulpamancy and want to use other terms to use, Blossom recommends these:

- Parogenic: A system that is (usually) intentionally created using thought-based methods. For some, this may also include some metaphysical parts, often in the form of energy work. (Coined by the Wanderheart Collective)

- Parogenic headmate: A sentient system member intentionally created by another system member.

- Thoughtform: An umbrella term for any (intentionally or unintentionally) created entity.

Hope this helps!

- Grayson 🌿[Sprite]

[passionate-reply]

I’ve seen this questionnaire floating around Tumblr but I’m unfortunately not sure of the source. It looks like fun, though, so here goes!

FAVOURITE ALBUM

A very close race between John Foxx’s Metamatic and Gary Numan’s The Pleasure Principle. I first heard these as a young teenager and they’ve been hugely influential on me ever since...gateway drugs for sure. Not a dull moment on either of them!

FAVOURITE MUSIC GENRES

It’s phrased genres, plural, but I suppose I basically only really listen to one genre. No, I’m not hiding some collection of classical music or suchlike somewhere else, the stuff I post about here is really it! Anyway, I obviously really like synth--ever since I was a kid I only ever really connected to music with an electronic element. Not so into dance music, ambient, or hip-hop, and the poppier synth music can be okay on occasion...but my main fascination is with industrial and the more punk-adjacent New Wave that has a bite to it.

FAVOURITE SONG

JOHN FOXX & THE MATHS - “EVERGREEN”

Of all time? Very very hard, but my all-time favourite is probably John Foxx & the Maths’ “Evergreen.” Ethereal, haunting, and inviting, like a haunted forest...equal parts catchy and winsome, as well as ultimately unnerving.

MOST LISTENED-TO ARTIST

If we’re going by “my entire life so far,” Foxx is definitely up there, but I think he’s probably second to the Pet Shop Boys, who were my favourite band for most of my childhood and preteen years, and are still very near and dear to my heart! I spent years and years listening to almost nothing BUT the Pet Shop Boys. RIP to those of you who had questionable taste at that age, but I am different.

AN ALBUM IMPORTANT TO ME

Hmmm, well, I’ve already talked about my favourite albums overall, so I guess I will have to be a bit more creative. I’ll go with Helden’s Spies, a rather obscure and sadly never officially released album that was a collaboration between Ultravox percussionist Warren Cann and Hans Zimmer (yes, THAT Hans Zimmer). I’d love Spies regardless--it’s stupendously campy, big-sounding 80s fun--but it helped me appreciate the importance of Cann’s work in the context of Ultravox, as well as brought me and my girlfriend Andrea much closer together, based on our mutual love for it and various memes based on it. She is the Zimmer to my Cann, in a lot of ways...so watch for her to become famous in Hollywood someday.

WHAT MAKES YOU LIKE A SONG

I have a pretty clear mental list of my major likes, actually! It helps in being able to articulate why you like or dislike something, and find things that you do like. I’d say my biggest turn-ons are deadpan vocals, witty lyrics that are open to interpretation, high-concept songs, uncommon form structures, gloomy or otherwise not so upbeat mood, propulsive percussion, samples, exotic instruments, and other unusual sources of sound, and of course synthesisers! Especially analogue synths and that aggressive sawtooth wave type of sound.

FAVOURITE INSTRUMENT TO HEAR

Obviously, synthesisers, but I will add rhythm machines to the list. Oh, and I have a soft spot for theremin music...

A SONG TO DANCE TO

CABARET VOLTAIRE - “THE WEB”

A difficult one, as I will dance to absolutely anything I like, in whatever way seems to make sense on a second-by-second basis. But here’s something that seems especially likely for others to be sympathetic to. I find the mechanical rhythm here completely infectious, and it’s utterly impossible for me to sit still when this comes on.

A SONG FROM MY CHILDHOOD

PETER SCHILLING - “VOLLIG LOSGELOST”

I have a weirdly specific childhood memory of this song (well, the English-language version) playing on a station identifier on Animal Planet, which was one of my favourite things to watch on TV as a young child. (Back then channels like it, Discovery and History would actually show edutaining content!) It featured a frog jumping in mid-air, in slow motion, to the tune of this song’s chorus, and I would always get up and dance to it, utterly lost in the music. I hope you never hear it ever again without thinking of me and the frog.

A SONG THAT REMINDS ME OF LOVE

JOHN FOXX - “WHAT KIND OF A GIRL”

This song perfectly captures the feeling of first meeting someone who seems absolutely amazing and utterly enthralls you. I’m pretty sure that every single time that’s happened to me in my life, I’ve had this song drift through my mind...

A SONG THAT I LOVE LYRICALLY

DEPECHE MODE - “PLEASURE, LITTLE TREASURE”

I’ve long been of the hedonistic mindset, and this song always reminds me of the only real reason to be alive--enjoyment! If you’re not having a good time, what’s the point? I make just about every decision based on the amount of fun it will provide me--short term or long term. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t love writing about music so much.

I TAG:

@anysynth @cruel-but-fair @clandestine-intestine @foxxycurriespice

and the obligatory “anybody else who wants to” ;)

[realityhelixcreates]

Lasabrjotr Chapter 61: The Thousand Year Buildup to a Single Moment

Chapters: 61/? Fandom: Thor (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Mature Warnings: Death mentions, Snap flashback Relationships: Loki x Reader (There We Go) Characters: Loki (Marvel), Thor(Marvel), Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Stephan Strange Additional Tags: Post-Endgame: Best Possible Ending (Canon-Divergent), Communication Is Still Not Their Family’s Forte, Look Historically Vikings Really Got Around, The Descendant Of A Viking Could Come From Anywhere

Summary:  You spill the beans about your dreams, and Loki learns about your ancestors.

You munched apprehensively on a granola bar while the entire roster of Avengers watched quietly. They'd wanted to talk to you about something, though Loki protested. Apparently, a decision had been made over breakfast, which you'd missed, and even Thor didn't seem too happy about it.

It was definitely time to worry, when a god-king seemed put out by his friends.

“All right.” You said once you'd swallowed the last of your granola. “What kind of trouble am I in?”

“No trouble.” Steve said. “Just some questions we need to ask.”

“Does the name Thanos mean anything to you?” Tony asked.

You blinked at the directness, but said nothing.

“It's okay. You can tell us.” Steve encouraged.

“Well...cats out of the bag, huh?” You sighed. “Yeah, I remember. Everything that happened in that whole year. But to be specific, I don't actually know anything about Thanos except for what Thor, Loki, and Mynos have told me. All I know about was the result, what it was like living in that world, and then it suddenly being reversed, and no explanation for any of it. I really thought I was super crazy, you know? People disappearing, the whole world thrown into chaos for a whole year, and then it never happened? No one remembered? No I definitely thought there was something really wrong with me.”

“And there are more like you?” Banner asked. “More people who remember?”

“Yeah, but I can't tell you who they are.”

“Why not?” Steve asked.

“It was all online. I don't know any of their names. We never met each other, we're scattered out, all over the world We only really found each other by accident.”

“Are you willing to talk about it?”

“Well...”

Tara had stopped talking, stopped laughing, an odd expression on her face. It was almost midnight, the two of you had come home from a movie. It was all so sudden, the quiet, the confused whisper, the soft rustling of dust as she disintegrated in front of you, pouring through your hands.

Slamming door and running footsteps on the grass. Hyperventilating in the car, the engine roar loud. Screeching, honking, cars run off the road on either side.

Trees fell across the road, snapping, splintering cracks, blocking your path just long enough for them to decay into dust. People rushing out of their houses, out onto suddenly barren lawns, screaming muffled by the car windows, the growling engine.

It was dark, the land had changed. You almost got lost int the swirling clouds of dust, and empty cars, but you found your father's home.

Momo meowing frantically, scraping at the door. The television on, sitcom reruns, and a pile of dust in the kitchen.

Retching echoing in the tiny bathroom, flushing water swirling, swirling like clouds of dust in the wind.

People in the streets, coughing and choking on their neighbors and loved ones.

The corn was gone.

You spent the next week alternating between hysterics and numbness. You spent the week after that burying those who couldn't go on. You never actually stopped doing that, throughout the following year.

You numbers shrank and shrank, as social services failed; power and water, garbage pick up and deliveries, medicine and perishable items, all dwindling away. Your little town had been forgotten. Or maybe there really was no one else left. After the loss of electricity, there was no more news from outside.

Most people came together, but there were always those who didn't understand how to work together, or who had broken during it all, or were broken beforehand. People who couldn't put their prejudices behind them, or tried to seize control over others.

There were violent acts. Assaults. Murders.

You were a murderer.

You hadn't ceased to be a murderer, because you had never ceased to be. You had never started over like everyone else had. The weight of all of it rested on your shoulders like a great and festering tumor.

You had come now to realize that this burden would never be lifted.

The people who cared for you would do what they could. They would build braces for your legs. They would spread soothing balm. But nothing, not the Avengers support, nor your father's acceptance, nor Loki's affection could ever remove this from you. It was part of you. All anyone could offer was a little relief.

You shrugged. “I don't suppose my story is any different from anyone else. Shit sucked.”

“Fair.” Tony agreed. “So, who's Mynos?”

“Yes,” Thor asked. “Who is Mynos?”

“Uh...” Whoops. “Um. He's an alien. That I've seen in my dreams. He's one of whatever Thanos was. Big purple guy.”

Tony and Peter shared a quick glance. Thor was staring at Loki, who managed somehow to look both defiant and contrite simultaneously.

“Um...Titans are extinct.” Tony said slowly. “I was...there. I saw their world; what had happened to it. There's none left now.”

“You said this is a dream you've had?” Strange asked. “You've dreamed of Titan? Can you tell us what it looked like?”

“Yeah. It's...orange, mostly. Dry. Dusty. But I can breathe there, so there's air. There's clouds in the sky, and dust storms. The people there are trying to set back the clock on a major ecological disaster. I guess they poisoned the land and water with pollution, and now they're trying to figure out how to get plants to grow again. Mynos is the only Titan I've ever seen, I never even saw a picture of Thanos. But in my dreams, I can talk to him, and he told me some things.”

“Dreams, plural?” Strange asked. Thor was looking at Loki with open worry on his face.

“Yeah, it's sorta...” You glanced at Loki, who was squirming. “You didn't tell anybody?”

“Yeah Jafar, you didn't tell anybody?” Tony accused. “What didn't he tell?”

You stared at Loki, trying to discern what he wanted you to do. You didn't want to lie to your heroes. But Loki might have a good reason for keeping this to himself. You didn't want to throw him under the bus, but you'd already started talking about it.

He caught your eyes, saw the confusion there, and sighed heavily, dropping his gaze.

“_____ and I have been sharing dreams since the day we met.” He admitted. “For the most part, they are normal dreams, as odd and unfathomable as any other. But in others...”

“We kind of go traveling.” You finished. “We fly through space, and visit places. We've been to Titan twice. It has the potential to be beautiful, and they're trying hard. I wish we could help. But Mynos seems to be the only one who remembers what happened. He's the only one who even remembers Thanos. According to him, even people who worked for Thanos don't even remember him.”

“But these are just dreams.” Sam said. “Why take them seriously?”

“They might be kinda real.” You said. “Like I said, I had never seen a Titan before this; Loki didn't even describe them or show me a picture. And Loki hadn't been to Titan.”

“The description is accurate enough.” Tony said. “I was there. Me and the kid. It was orange, dry and dusty.”

“And there was definitely a civilization there once.” Peter added quietly. “There were ruins everywhere.”

“But no Titans. They were all gone by that time.” Strange cut in.

“Mynos told us that he remembered Thanos killing them all. Not directly, exactly, but he blew a bunch of them up, and made it so that the rest couldn't get what they needed to live. So I guess they went extinct.”

“We believe these dreams to be at least quasi-real due to the fact that, every time it happens, we bring something back with us. Planetary dust and a leaf, to be precise. These samples both reside with our scientists right now.”

Thor looked momentarily outraged, but got a handle on it almost instantly.

“Why was I not notified about this, Loki?” He growled.

“Because it is firmly within the realm of magic, which is my realm, not yours.” Loki said with sharp imperiousness. “What would you have done about it, besides fret?”

“Still think you should have mentioned it.” Thor mumbled.

“Do you mind if we look at these samples?” Dr. Banner asked.

“You can look, but you cannot take them. As you might surmise, these are very rare materials.”

“Which you got from a dream. Because magic.”

“Well, my magic is teleportation, so that's the only thing I can think that makes sense. We were kinda sorta there, and I teleported them out with us.” You added.

“Do you think it would be possible for you to take someone else with you?” Strange asked. “Into your dream escapades?”

Loki frowned and very conspicuously took your hand, cradling it in both of his. “I don't think that's necessary. We do just fine on our own.”

Strange sighed and rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, lovely couple, blah blah blah. But for the sake of what we discussed earlier, do you think you could at least record these dreams from now on? Not every single dream you have; there's plenty that no doubt goes on in your brain that I want no part in. Just these possibly real dreams?”

Loki scoffed, but you shrugged. “Nothing wrong with just writing them down, is there?”

“No, but magic, especially as ephemeral as dream magic, cannot be solved by a think tank! It requires insight, meditation, the mind of a seer-”

“Or the ability to see multiple timelines?” Strange suggested.

“Braggart.” Loki scoffed again.

“Or, like, if we're still debating whether Titans exist again, we could just ask Heimdall, right?” You asked. “Right?”

“Well...” Loki said.

“Yes, we certainly could.” Thor answered. “We can get to the bottom of this. Just write them down as they happen. No doubt you phones have a journal app that you can use. Right?” He asked Bruce, who nodded.

“Yeah, that's a thing phones can do.”

That settled, the group moved on to other subjects, the settlement of Trolerkaerhalla, Tony's missing shipment of Chitauri artifacts, the possibility that they were now on the black market, and the fact that one had shown up just outside of Asgard...

But also about funding Asgardian building projects, integrating Starktech into their computer systems, and donating those very computers so that Asgardians could get training in Earth technology. Of finding the materials for Asgard to continue rebuilding its own technology, of trying to integrate the two.

Of an Asgardian space program.

Thor wanted to mine asteroids for resources, so that they didn't put extra pressure on Earth. Tony was all the way behind this idea, but Steve had reservations. Who owned what in the solar system? Was everything going to be a free for all? Would mining other celestial bodies help ease pressure on the planet, or would it be a race between Asgardians and humans as to who could get the most stuff? Would there be space battles? Would Asgards obvious head start in space travel garner them the lion's share of the systems extraterrestrial materials, and would that foment even more human resentment against them?

Although you loved the cosmos, space jurisdiction was way over your head. You dropped out of the conversation to talk to Peter, a precious boy with boundless energy, who you still thought should be in school instead of super-heroing, but it seemed like he was trying to do both. You briefly wondered if Avenging counted as an extra-curricular.

Between the two of you, you came up with an idea to help with the funding of Asgard. You would record videos and podcasts about Asgardian life and custom. Peter helped you set up a patreon, and you ruminated over ideas. You couldn't wait to get Saldis in on this.

Natasha was the first to leave. She just said she had something else to do in Iceland, and saw herself out. The majority of the others left with Tony, on his private jet. Strange went last; all he had to do to get home was open up a portal of orange sparks and walk through. Loki took him aside and spoke quietly with him for a few moments, getting a long answer from the wizard, and obviously pleased with what he was hearing.

He kept that buzz of excitement all through dinner, while Thor seemed to be caught up in the satisfied silence after a pleasant time with friends. He didn't really seem to notice when Loki took your desserts- cubes of goat cheese and grapes drizzled in honey-and whisked you away to his favorite spot to be with you: The black sheepskin rug in front of his fireplace.

There you ate your desserts with the fancy, tiny ram horn forks provided, and he clutched you close so you could feel the solidity of his body, see the firelight sparking in his eyes.

“I found out something interesting today.” He said.

“Did it have something to do with what you were talking to Strange about?”

“Yes, it did. Do you know what I learned?”

You nodded.

“I learned that, a thousand years ago, an object once called the Tesseract  was abandoned on earth by my father. There was a great deal of devastation around it, caused by people who tried to wield its power, but the humans of the area finally came to the understanding that they could not safely use it, and built a place of secret worship around it. An order of priests rose around it, claiming their sacred duty was to safeguard the artifact until Odin returned to reclaim it.

Now, I'm sure it's been mentioned that it was actually the Space stone within the Tesseract, and these humans being in constant proximity to it...Well, it changed them, over the generations. Each of these priests was allowed to have one child; and that child was to become a priest or priestess to replace those lost to old age.

Well, one of those children decided to do something else. He ran away, and never stopped running, fearing that he was being chased, and would be dragged back to that life he didn't want. He traveled far and wide, eventually married another traveler, and his descendants also traveled. They went everywhere; deep into Africa, to the farthest reaches of Asia, into India, and all through the Mediterranean. They married in those areas, and their descendants also took to exploring the world. And their descendants, and theirs, reaching Australia, and South, Central, and North America, each generation eventually leaving the place and people they were born into, and settling down somewhere far away. Each generation having the influence of the Tesseract in their background, and never knowing it.

And so, your grandmother left her family in the Yukon, and moved far to the south, gave birth to a son who travels endlessly for a living, and gave rise to you; the first in generations to access the power of your far-flung ancestor.

My darling.” He kissed the top of your head. “My darling, we were always meant to meet.”

He took your marked hand in his, pressing the runes together briefly, only long enough to trigger the buzz. “We were always meant to be connected.”

“So, my ancestors were from Scandinavia?” You asked, caught up in his story.

“They were from everywhere, potentially.” He answered. “Stephen followed all of them on their journeys, but he did not tell me exactly which branch led to you. He did find out where your grandmother came from, and that you have many, many distant relations, all over the planet. All ultimately descended from this one man.”

“Wow. I...it goes so far back. And all because your dad left a shiny thing behind, and of course humans loved it.”

“You are the result of devout worship, and of a galactic force older than existence itself. So unique, my little space sorceress. My precious Seidkona.”

“Loki...” You leaned into him, drawn to is earnest gaze. Was this what he meant when he had said that the Norns supposedly wove peoples lives like threads? Had all these relatives down the line spread out across the tapestry, bringing your thread close to his, until they twined together?

As your lips met, you hoped that those threads would not separate, but stay wrapped around each other indefinitely, creating a beautiful new color together.

[ckret2]

Her (Word A) and His (Word B)

The language barriers, cultural assumptions, and personal baggage blocking communication between humans, aliens, and titans—as demonstrated by what should have been an incredibly simple question about Godzilla and Mothra’s relationship.

This is part of an ongoing series of one-shots set in a KOTM canon-divergent AU; but if you don’t want to read the others, the only things you need to know are: Ghidorah’s still alive and shacking up on Isla de Mara; Rodan’s been teaching Ghidorah his language and the nearest Monarch base has been eagerly recording the lessons; Rodan refers to everyone—including himself—by the names of the nearest geological feature they call home; and Rodan is oblivious to 90% of the history between Ghidorah and Godzilla. Links to the other fics are in the source at the bottom of this post.

This is actually set like... a couple fics in the future from where I’m writing right now, but it doesn’t really affect the main continuity. Inspired loosely by the ask I got earlier today like “What’s Mark doing now that he knows his theories are wrong?” that I answered “lmao he doesn’t know.” 

###

As Rodan and Ghidorah's conversations got more complicated and Rodan's language lessons to Ghidorah became more intricate, sometimes the hardworking crew at Monarch Outpost 56-B couldn't immediately offer a direct translation in the subtitles of their Rodan-to-Spanish/English language lesson videos.

Such was the case today, when they'd had to offer the following translation to a brief exchange that had taken place while Ghidorah was curled around the curve of the volcano and Rodan was hopping through the trees below:

Ghidorah: "What is Mothra and Godzilla's [relationship/interaction]?"

Rodan: "Godzilla is her [unknown word 1] and Mothra is his [unknown word 2]. The same way you[plural] are [unknown word 1 (plural form)]."

Usually, at that point, Ghidorah would ask for clarification, and Rodan would—through metaphor, synonym, story, or physical demonstration—offer a definition for the new words. But instead Ghidorah made what 56-B had dubbed his Confirmation Sound, and the exchange had quickly ended:

Rodan: "Do you understand?"

Ghidorah: "Yes."

And that was it.

By virtue of her work in paleobotany, Dr. Xochitl Flores Rosales had been hired by Monarch; by virtue of her ability to actually speak Spanish, she had received an emergency transfer to the three trailers on Isla de Mara that made up Outpost 56-B; and by virtue of her undergrad linguistics minor and college hobby of making YouTube videos synchronizing video game cut scenes with Linkin Park songs, most of her time was now taken up by creating Monarch-unapproved videos of Rodan language lessons.

This wasn't the first time Xochitl had posted a video with some words left blank. Some time back, Rodan and Ghidorah had left Isla de Mara for a few days, stayed mostly outside of the range of any cameras or recorders that could catch their conversation, and come back with their shared vocabulary doubled; Xochitl was still figuring out some of the words they'd started using while they were gone. Whenever she did, she updated the subtitles in the older videos and mentioned the updates in the next video. This, however, felt different. It felt like a Rodan-teaching-a-new-word situation, not like a Rodan-using-a-word-he'd-covered-where-Monarch-couldn't-hear situation. But he hadn't explained the words to Ghidorah—which meant the meanings should be obvious from the context, shouldn't they? But what were they?

Xochitl posted the video as usual, grumbled about the challenges of translating titans on her private twitter, and pushed her concerns aside to take her shift monitoring the titan activity on the volcano.

When she got back, she'd received commiserating likes from both Chen twins—they had their work cut out for them translating Mothra’s telepathic conversations—and an email from Mark Russell entitled "Latest translation vid." Ah. He was probably going to offer his opinion on how to translate the two unknown words.

Sure enough, when she clicked to read his email:

Dr. Flores-Rosales,

I had a thought about the two unknown words in the language lesson you put up today. What if they're indicators of rank in titan hierarchy? "Godzilla is her king and Mothra is his queen, the same way you are kings"; "Godzilla is her alpha and Mothra is his beta, the same way you are alphas"; "Godzilla is her leader and Mothra is his standard-bearer, the same way you are leaders," something like that. The fact that Rodan explains the word by comparing how Godzilla and Ghidorah have the trait in common makes it sound like he's talking about something unique to the two of them (four of them?), doesn't it? Let me know what you think.

Dr. Mark Russell

She'd considered the possibility—she didn't like it, because she wasn't too keen on how hard Mark was pushing the "cross-species herd with one alpha" hypothesis without anyone exploring the alternatives—but she'd considered it. It was on the list of possibilities, at least—a list that was unfortunately broad and woefully inconclusive.

She took a minute to think over her wording, then typed up a polite email acknowledging his suggestion and explaining that they hadn't heard the words in enough contexts yet for them to draw any conclusions.

###

"What is The Bug and Little King's relationship?"

The three of them were sure that the names that the red sprite called the bug and the little king did not, in fact, translate to "The Bug" and "Little King." But they didn't know what the red sprite's names for them did mean—didn't even know if names in the red sprite's language had meanings, many names in many languages didn't—so until they received a translation, in their minds, the names would continue to mean The Bug and Little King.

The question of the relationship between those two plagued them. Had plagued them for—how long had they been frozen?—for ages. Ever since they'd landed on this rock, stumbled on the bug that shone psychic lights too too deep into their minds, killed her, found she was simply reborn remembering everything about them except that they'd killed her; began hunting and crushing her eggs, been attacked by the little king, and found him ready to fight them at every one of her nests like her personal bodyguard. They'd grown to detest the little king as much as the bug. But they especially detested how the two of them fought side-by-side.

At last, they had someone they could pump for more information. They knew both the bug and the little king's names (sort of); they could ask about them without having to make a fuss about it, without having to draw it out into a long conversation that could be overheard and reported back to the bug and little king. This could be quick and simple.

Except that red sprite answered, without looking up from whatever curiosity he'd identified in the forest below his volcano, immediately and simply, "Little King is her something and The Bug is his something else." Two words they didn't know. At their puzzled silence, the red sprite glanced back at them and elaborated, "The same way you're something."

Something twisted inside them as they realized they knew exactly what he meant.

The first sickening translation they reached was one that fit exactly what they'd always feared and expected to be the dynamic between a warrior with the strength to destroy the world who nevertheless refused to use it and an overpowered psychic who appeared to direct the warrior's actions. The translation they reached was the little king is her slave and the bug is his master. But, no. Surely the red sprite wouldn't follow that up with the same way you're slaves.

"Aha," they said, uncomfortably.

The red sprite cocked his head. "Do you understand?"

The red sprite wouldn't speak to them like that. He'd never seen them as slaves. He'd never seen them in harness as a war machine rather than as they were now. He'd never seen them as anything but free agents of accelerated entropy. He had no reason to call them slaves.

Then, a similar word. The little king is her weapon and the bug is his wielder. The same way you're weapons. Or something similar—warrior and commander, monster and handler. The little king was something the same as they were, and the thing that he was belonged to her. That was what mattered. Him as her possession; him as something that could be possessed; them, too, as this same class of thing that could be possessed. Not possessed now, but possessable.

"Yes," they said. And then they turned away, watching the horizon, telling themselves that the psychic prickle they felt in the back of their minds was just that—all in their minds.

###

"What is Infant and Mariana's relationship?"

It was odd for Nido to hear the golden ones refer to the two of them by their proper names, the-one-from-Infant-Island and the-one-from-Mariana-Trench, rather than the more derisive "it" or "that one" they usually used when talking about either of them. Maybe they were getting over being on the losing end of that kerfuffle with them.

Without pausing his weeding, Nido said, "Mariana is her brother and Infant is his sister." He pecked up another unwelcome tree.

When the golden ones didn't reply—even to ask for elaboration—Nido looked up from the forest toward them. (The golden ones were, again, lounging around the volcanic crater instead of in it, like they had no idea what to do with a bunch of perfectly good lava.) Had they covered those words? Maybe not. "The same way you're brothers," Nido said.

The golden ones drew back, averting two of their gazes from him, and said, "Ihi." Which they usually only said when they got a word, but they looked anything but comfortable with this new knowledge. Maybe they got the words but weren't sure how they made sense? If they didn't know how Mariana's kind left their eggs in other kinds' nests, they might not understand how members of two totally different species could be siblings.

"Do you understand?" Nido asked, which he'd started using to prompt the golden ones to ask for elaboration when they seemed reluctant to ask on their own.

But they snapped, "Yes," and turned away from him; and he was left wondering whether he'd said something wrong. Did aliens not talk about family? Did the golden ones not like being compared to Mariana? Were they anti-adoption?

He hopped closer, considered asking; but decided not to bother with it until they decided to stop giving him the cold shoulder.

He continued his weeding, feeling like something had been lost in translation.

###

(Replies/reblogs are welcome & encouraged! Check the “source” link below for my masterlist of KOTM fics set in this continuity, as well as my AO3 and Ko-fi links.)

[erinelezabeth920]

Love in the Time Of

Shame. Is the thing I want to talk about. Love in the time of shame.

I mean I don’t really want to talk about it. I’d really rather not actually, except that I have the sneaking suspicion that I’m not the only one. Not by a long shot. So here we go.  Last night I wanted to go to bed by 10pm, so I could get up early and go on a run BEFORE signing into Zoom at 7:45am to lead a yoga meditation class for my friends and family, BEFORE doing some reading of self-help books and solo meditation BEFORE I start trying to do an impossible job from my living room for an unclear number of hours per day with an attention span of basically zero to negative. 

When I write this it sounds absurd. I know that. But brains are weird. Especially mine. Remember the anxiety based overfunctioning/ underfunctioning I talked about last time? Overfunctioning much?  Anyway, that didn’t happen. We had finished a DnD session with my brother and college roommate, (my character is a rouge-gnome named Huckleberry Shake who has short purple hair, is really good at sneaking and lock picking, and carries a crossbow. I like to imagine a sort of cross between ‘Midsummer's Night Dream’ and Assassin’s Creed’.) Anyway, it was around 9:30 ish pm. It was also Cinco de Mayo, and we had picked up tacos from the neighborhood about a 15 minute drive south with a strong hispanic/ latinx population. The past couple weeks I’ve been referencing that line in ‘Wet Hot American Summer’ where they all pile into the pick up truck to go into town and go batshit crazy. “It always feels good to get away from camp, even for an hour!” Just to drive somewhere to pick up food feels like a crazy adventure these days. 

I made us magaritas when I got back; they were bright blue because we had some kind of blue liquor that I can’t remember the name of. After DnD I wanted to watch some TV. I made myself another margarita and some popcorn, which is my quarantine coping crutch. I watched this trashy but great Netflix show about teenagers in North Carolina called Outer Banks. Except the episodes kept ending on cliff hangers (OMG he KILLED HIM?), so I kept watching. I painted my toenails purple, using packing peanuts to space them out. I was kind of proud of myself actually.

It was about midnight when I went to bed. I woke up with a small headache, a result of tequila and salty popcorn and poor quality sleep. I was going to go on a walk/ run and listen to the news. I didn’t. I snoozed the alarm about ten times. It was raining out. I led my yoga class and ate some sourdough toast. And here we are. The light is filtering through the apartment windows, as I sit on the couch in my sweat pants. The crazy thing is, I just feel SO much shame. And guilt. Guilt for having a headache, shame for not waking up early to do all these things I honestly don’t even need to do. I feel shame for not writing more often, shame when I look at the dishes that are dirty. Shame when I don’t go outside to go on a walk, exercise, or when I close my work laptop early to lie on the couch and scroll through my phone.  I’ve been trying the past couple weeks to figure out this phenomena that seems to be happening to me, but also to other people I talk to. I feel okay for about 3 days, and then completely collapse. I just can’t do anything, flatline, but there doesn’t really seem to be a direct cause. It’s just like dropping on the roller coaster without warning. I was telling a friend the other day that on weekends, all I do is sleep. Usually I’m a very active person who has an almost clincally hard time sitting still. I haven’t felt like this, I told him, since I worked the hardest jobs in my life- full time wilderness therapy or residential treatment for children with Autism working 12 hour days. I work MAYBE six hours a day these days but probably more like four, broken up by lying on the couch watching documentaries and scrolling on my phone. So why am I SO DAMN EXHAUSTED? 

I did some research the other week into chronic stress for a newsletter article I was writing for parents of my elementary school. Chronic stress is different than acute stress, I found, because it has no concrete beginning and end. It’s not like a car crash or a loved one dying. Instead (for those of us with the intense privelage not to be on the front lines- god bless if you are) it’s a constant low hum in the background through news headlines, grocery store lines and crossing the street when another person is coming your direction on the sidewalk. It’s a disruption of normality with no conceivable ending, sending our brains into a low key 24/7 flight or fight mode, draining us with tiny doses of adrenaline and uncertainty that build up over time. It’s not in the forefront, but it’s there in our tight shoulders, exhaustion, inattention, insomnia, short fuses and total lack of motivation. Until we can’t take it any more and crash, seemingly out of nowhere. And then the whole thing starts again. 

As Brene Brown says, “We’ve hit our collective weary.” In one podcast episode she interviews a grief expert. He says, we are all grieving right now. Even if we don’t name it, we’re showing the symptoms. But instead of grieving the death of an individual (for most of us), we are grieving the lifestyles we’ve lost (work settings, close contact, friendships, normalcy). And grief exhausts us. BUT, because most of us aren’t experiencing acute grief (ie a loved one dying) we feel shame on TOP of that grief, that we shouldn’t be tired or inept when others have it SO much worse. It’s a meta emotion. Shame layered on grief like a terrible lasagna. How can we be justified in experiencing grief when all we do is sit on the couch and watch Netflix and eat snacks for hours a day? We’re not even in a wartime or something concrete that gives justification and purpose. Instead it’s just a vague, deep sense of disruption of life as we know it. But it’s just as real. I was walking on the beach at the time I listened to the podcast; when he said the words, “We are grieving the loss of the world as we knew it,” the sun was setting over the water. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

A few weeks ago, Andy cut my hair. When the pieces fell to the floor of our friend’s porch and the scissors snipped away larger chunks than I woud have liked, my stomach dropped. I started panicking. I felt like the world was ending. I don’t panic when I read the news, go to the grocery store in a mask, or even read the death toll. But when my hair fell to the ground around me in the gathering twilight, I absolutely lost it. I came home and sobbed. It was the first time I’d cried since the pandemic began, and it’s like it just all came out. I was so angry at Andy, and he felt so bad. I was a shell of a person for twelve hours. I cancelled morning yoga for the first time in six weeks, lamenting everyone would have look at me close up on a screen. I wanted to stay in bed forever, (until we fixed the haircut and it actually looked pretty good). But for a second there I was broken, and it was because of a goddamn haircut. I mean for Christ sakes, people are dying out there. It made me feel so petty and stupid. There’s a global pandemic happening, and I am distraught FROM MY HAIR?!

But that’s how grief works. We can’t look at the thing head on, it’s too much. A death toll is just numbers. Our brains seek to survive, to normalize, to adapt just to get through. So instead the trauma seeps into the corners, slowly creeping into our bodies and collective exhaustion until one little thing causes the world to come crashing down. The straw that breaks the camel’s back. And then we feel overwhelming shame for being so affected by something so little. For me, my lizard brain was honestly convinced I would never be attractive or happy again. 

(ALSO to be fair we watched, ‘Little Women’ a few days later. In the movie there’s the scene where Jo cuts all her hair off to give her mother money to travel to their sick father in the war. She’s then pictured crying under the stairwell. “Is it mother?” her sister asks. “No,” she says, “It’s MY HAIR!”. "See?!” I said to Andy.)

The underlying theme here is shame. We’re ashamed of our emotions because they don’t seem justified. Comparative suffering. My suffering isn’t nearly as bad as others, therefore I should not feel this way. I’m ashamed of myself for eating snacks and worried I’m going to gain a bunch of weight. Then I’m ashamed for being ashamed instead of being body positive. I’m ashamed of myself for enjoying an evening with drinks (yes plural), popcorn, painting my toes and watching teenagers who are actually in their twenties look for buried treasure. Honestly, it sounds like a great night. And it was. 

I just finished re-reading “The Four Agreements”, the Toltec wisdom book. The first agreement is “Be Impeccable With Your Word.” I assumed from the first time I read it, it meant “always tell the truth”. The reality though, is it means, our words have power. Especially our words about ourselves. Just this morning I entered my enchilada and margaritas from yesterday into my ‘Weight Watchers’ app and felt terrible. I told myself I was fat, lazy and useless. Which seems absurd when I write it out, but that’s the honest to goodness narrative inside my head. Being impeccable with our word means watching what we say to ourselves, because our words create a reality. We create our own cycles of shame. 

Even at this moment, typing this, I feel ashamed that this piece of writing is so scattered. My English major brain is mad at me. Get it together Erin. Find a cohesive theme and stick to it. Get emotional, but not too emotional. Tell stories, but not too many stories. But writing at it’s best is vulnerability and transparency;  and honestly right now it’s hard to hold on to any one thought for longer than a few seconds. And I’m pretty sure it’s not just me. Little pieces, scattered thoughts, just trying to put the puzzle together. (Oh and don’t even get me STARTED on puzzles... Andy is MUCH better than me at them, and, saving the face of our relationship, let’s just say that is another dangerous straw perched on the camel’s back through only the fault of my own...) Anyway, I think at this point, just find anything that makes you smile. Literally anything. I personally like Brad Leone’s Bon Appetite Youtube channel “It’s Alive.” He makes me laugh so much. The episode with him and Orville Peck making elote almost broke me.  Find those things, hold on to them and be kind to yourself. It’s okay to feel less than. Just remember you’re not. We’ve collectively hit weary, the point in the race where you’ve been running for so long, but the finish line is so far away. It’s okay just to go one step at a time. 

Paint your toes. Eat your popcorn. Drink your margaritas. Whatever we can do just to survive. One step at a time. You’re not alone. 

And that’s love in the time of.