#it’s interesting to explore how far they can go with it

[lambmotifz]

The problem with Kripke-era samdean switching is that Dean would need two things in order to let it happen: to feel like he’s the one in control the entire time (maybe even to the point of forcing it on Sam), and, most importantly/impossibly, to get over his sexist preconceptions that bottoming is for the more “feminine” (read: inferior) partner. Personally, I think Dean is possessive and selfish enough to want Sam every single way he can have him, but not to the point of feeling like he’s lost that superior, in charge, big brother role he (and John) have meticulously crafted since he was four years old.

this is pretty much the meaning of the siren episode where it’s blatantly, textually said that dean’s biggest desire is a perfect, submissive version of his little brother. the version of sam that he’s attracted to. one thing about kripke era samdean (especially late kripke s4-5) is that if they ever got sexual, it’d absolutely be strictly top!dean/bottom!sam (and aside from all the reasons why dean wouldn’t bottom, there’s also the fact that sam wouldn’t try/want to top in this relationship in the first place) and personally i don’t see anything bad about it being the only possible dynamic for that period of time because it is in character and realistic in pretty much every single aspect, if you actually analyze their fucked up power imbalanced olderbrotherfather & youngerbrotherson dynamic in depth with all the nuances. besides, not every fictional ship needs switching to work

and lets be real here, dean’s diet tells you everything you need to know about the impossibility possibility of him being a bottom

[myshallweplay]

It's "Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir", they're both supposed to be flawed and learn from those flaws. The problem is that instead of acknowledging how far Marinette has come and giving her a satisfying conclusion, especially this far into the season, she's still overly panicked and doesn't feel like any of the "lessons" the world tries to teach her really matters if it isn't causing torment and stress for her. Forever crawling up a Sisyphean boulder, except she doesn't have a choice but to keep going up.

Problem is that they never explored Adrien learning healthy lifestyle outside of Gabriel, and instead gave us that awful Gabriel death scene that felt honestly like a giant middle finger to Adriens character. Still the model, not a man.

The problem is that as much as I enjoy this show and these two, these characters are never treated with any respect, and it's honestly tiring to see how they'll make Marinette the crazy anxious mess again, with Adrien as her cardboard love interest.

And I know Marinette being anxious about adrien, about her life, about everything right now is a key point for her character, but honestly, it feels like she's stressed just because the writers don't think she's interesting unless she's having a panic attack.

And it sucks for Adrien to, because hiding the truth of his father was incredibly infantilizing to me. Sure, Marinette was trying to prevent an akuma, but it just read to me like Adrien was still the helpless damsel she had to protect, or sweep off into the sunset, rather than an actual person.

Sorry for the rant. you can block if you want.

Marinette being the one making all the mistakes in their relationship so far is kinda notttttttt giving me the best vibesssssss

[sir-myst-cake]

First post on here and it's a rant!! If you want more cool takes you should totally follow me as I'll be posting here more often and have totally cool art to share‼️‼️

I'm not completely sure how to tag this? I'm talking about the ships in a positive light so I think it's okay, and besides, I want lots of peeps to see it, I'm aware I probably won't change many people's minds at all, but it's okay lol, I just want Anti's to see they genuinely have a nothing burger and need to leave people alone.

This is a mostly TikTok only problem regarding Beast x Ancient's (thank god) but I've seen my fair share elsewhere like on here. So lemme counter every argument I've seen so far cause you got a lot of time on your hands to be telling people to off themselves over Cookie ships 😭 put that hate into people who actually deserve it.

BILLFORD COMPARISON

Regarding ShadowVanilla specifically, people have compared the ship a lot from both sides, but what really got me is what I've seen here:

"Shadow Milk Cookie is way worse than Bill! He drove Pure Vanilla to insanity! He tortured him!"- This is in regards to how people bring up the fact Anti's are fine with one thing but not the other when it's basically the same thing they're against. Psychological, physical, mental, and emotional torture. I'll be honest I haven't watched Gravity Falls whatsoever, but my friend has, and from what she says, yeah Bill is the definition of a cruel and unusual punishment. He's done some crazy things, absolutely heinous, might even be a little worse than Shadow Milk or on the same level, either way though-

You can't like one thing and then not the other, it's different flavors of the same thing, it's hypocritical. Either you hate them both or you hate neither.

"Those are 2 different fandoms!"- Doesn't matter, it's the same thing, just different media, it's not different whatsoever aside from the universe, there's much torture involved on both ends.

ABUSER X VICTIM

This one I've seen A LOT and I'm just ??

"If you ship Beast x Ancient's you support Abuser x victim btw"- That's a STRETCH. You are reaching FAR. Nobody is romanticizing the abuse, nobody is normalizing it, it's stuff that happened in canon and we acknowledge it but nobody is doing any of that other stuff. I'm not condoning anyone in real life to do that shit lol. It's called exploring, they have an interesting dynamic, romantic or platonic, two sides of the same coin. You can say the same thing about horror movies, they put a lot of disturbing stuff in there. Do the movie producers CONDONE any of that stuff? Obviously not. Goes for Devsisters too, they don't condone body mutilation yet they still made Burning Spice rip off Cheese's wings.

But even so, for the people who DO like it for the angst, I won't say fiction doesn't affect reality because it does in many cases, but this isn't one of them. Not every relationship is going to be peachy and perfect, just like in real life. I can give an example on this one too actually.

GoldenLily, they aren't condoning what Lily (technically) did to Golden Cheese's kingdom, but they like it for all the potential, complicated feelings and emotions that come along with it.

Also, that's basically the same thing with Beasts x Ancients, just turn it around to enemies to lovers.

"This isn't Villain x hero, this is abuser x victim"- Are you saying MOST of media is abuser x victim then? This is in fact a typical hero x Villain trope, it's nothing new. Respectfully, you guys freak out when a Villain does villain stuff, I'd be surprised if there was a villain who DIDN'T cause any trauma for the opposing party. But according to this logic, media is just dead, no more fanfiction, no more what ifs, no more content since it's all apparently problematic and not canon. Even if somebody switches stuff up in an AU, and makes things completely fluffy, that's apparently still not enough.

"oh you had to make an AU to ship them because you know it's toxic"- No, it's just playing around with scenarios. Learn to separate fanon from canon. This specifically goes for the redeemed AU's I see of the Beasts, people still complain, they act as if people can't change. One of the biggest examples I have of that is FlutterCord, Discord did plenty of messed up things, but in the end, he still managed to change. You'll still get burned at the stake for it though.

"You must be an abuser yourself to condone this!!"- Extremely disrespectful and a WILDDD take. Need I say more??

"I ship Beast x Beast rather than Beast x Ancient's"- According to your logic, the Beasts are abusers right? And if we followed the same story, they are not mentally well whatsoever. You'd rather ship 2 dangerously mentally unstable characters together who'd just make each other worse? Destroy each other? Fuck each other up beyond belief? It doesn't make sense does it, nor is it fair for y'all to praise these ships but hate on the others. You like watching the cookies crumble huh 😭

CANON

"The ship isn't canon!"- We know that, everyone should know that. With what I said earlier, please learn to separate fanon from canon. That's what a fandom is, we do non-canon stuff, it's very fun, you should try it.

"It's a Proship/Dark ship!"- Going the canon route, Beasts are Eons old, Ancients are thousands of years old. Big gap yes, but nonetheless all of them are old as fuck. Older than bloodlines. Treating the Ancients as if they aren't grown adults. You're intentionally trying to make it weird. Stop calling ships you don't like proships please.

Also a little off topic but please don't listen to everyone you interact with on TikTok?? I remember one time I was scrolling through a comment section and saw somebody say "Doesn't Mystic Flour Cookie hate Burning Spice Cookie?" On a MysticSpice vid, looked in the replies, somebody asked for proof/where it was implied, and they didn't answer 💀 just blatantly spreading misinformation. Sources around you are way more reliable than people who don't back up their claims.

CONCLUSION

Even despite all this, you still have the right to feel how you wanna feel. Just please stop harassing people for simple stuff like this, in all honesty, I feel like it's more about seeing one of your favorite characters shipped with somebody who hurt them in canon that makes peeps upset. Which I can totally understand because I used to be exactly like that, I LIVEEEE for Dark Cacao Cookie, when Mystic Flour's update came out, I wanted her dead. Quite literally blocked someone because I couldn't stand seeing their MysticCao art. Hated what she did to my baby boy fr.

But then It started growing on me, over time, I just realized it was never that serious.

Even so, notice how I still didn't go out of my way to harass said person about it because I specifically didn't like it? It really is that easy. Block and go about your day.

I also suspect this because of stuff like this 💀

Love that person who replied, but it's not that hard y'all. We all can in fact, get along.

ANYWAYSSSS thanks to those who took the time read, I love you my pookies hope you have a good day or night💕💕

[synchodai]

"Mystra groomed Gale" takes rustle my jimmies like no other. I get how some people who don't know much about her beyond BG3 may have this interpretation, but if you're like me, a woman who's been playing since the days of AD&D, you'd understand why accusing Mystra of being the bad person in this scenario may hit a nerve.

TL;DR: Did Mystra take advantage of Gale's devotion to her as his goddess? Definitely, she's a Faerûnian deity — they subsist on worship and adulation. Does that make her his abuser? Eh... man, maybe it's high time that a lot of us learn different terminology for unhealthy relationship dynamics other than abuser-victim. I've seen a couple of posts that are really gung-ho about forcing every companion character to be some sort of abuse victim, because that's what they've decided the game is about. I mean, they're free to interpret the game that way, but damn, we're really out here flattening god, the very concept of magic itself, into the role of an abusive ex, huh? A fantastical, nuanced relationship between mortal and immortal set against the backdrop of a rich palimpsest multiverse digested like a YouTube drama video.

Let me try to explain my perspective by going through the history of Mystra, how she's utilized in Forgotten Realms lore, and treated within D&D games in general.

MYSTRA THE MAN-EATER

Since her creation, she has always been depicted as the sexy goddess whose main purpose was to be a wizard player's muse as well as their patron. Back then, D&D (and TTRPGs in general) was a heavily male-dominated hobby, so Mystra (and Mystryl, her avatars, and all her other incarnations) was catered and shaped by that demographic.

Because it's the player characters and Wizards of the Coast who have narrative agency and many of them want to fuck a goddess, they make stories where Mystra comes on to them because their character is just so good at magic. They designed Mystra to be a mysterious, beautiful love interest because they wanted to use her as the crown jewel of their power fantasy of being a super cool and powerful magic man. You can pretty much see this in the Elminster books and the Avatar series with Midnight (one of Mystra's avatars). Gale himself seems to be an exploration of this typical kind of wizard character.

As far as power fantasies go, making the goddess of magic have an intimate relationship with a mortal character is fine. It's the ultimate validation for a burger-flipper when the god and all source of burger-flipping is head over heels in love with them. It also doesn't have to have a sexual component to have "magic" and the magic system itself enamored with a character — depending on the game and DM, Mystra's favor can be entirely symbolic and metaphorical. A fine power fantasy in the power fantasy generation game.

So because everyone literally wants a piece of her, you end up with Mystra having more Chosen running around than any other god. Understandable given what she has to do to maintain her massive portfolio. It fits her as the personification of magic — someone who entices ambitious young spellcasters but burns them out through obsession and overreaching. Consume any Forgotten Realms-related media, and you've probably come across at least one campaign, novelization, or character backstory that use Mystra for the role of sexy sorceress goddess that's the alluring (yet often demanding) patron of some magic man. Whomst amongst our wizards haven't been visited by Mystra in the night ordering him to do plot point, he rolls to seduce her, and she has no choice but to admit that she's actually attracted to him because the dice said so? It was a community inside joke passed around tables: Mystra the Man-eater.

But then some BG3 fans started taking the joke seriously...

MYSTRA THE GROOMER AND WHORE

This piece of dialogue has done so much irrevocable damage.

Some (Galemancers specifically) have interpreted this to mean that Mystra is known to go after young men. She does not. She has more documented Chosen than other gods due to her massive portfolio and power level, but there are just as many female Chosen as there are male Chosen. Minsc, like most of us in this fandom, is speculating and doing so in a way that uplifts Gale at the cost of taking a bit of a jab at Mystra.

"Mystra's a whore. She boned Kelemvor and Elminster and so many of her Chosen, taking advantage of them as a goddess," they say as if she didn't have her romantic relationships all as different people and in different bodies. Her avatar Dasumia was the one who had an intimate relationship with Elminster, and it was the human Midnight (who later ascended to become Mystra) who was Kelemvor's lover (who himself was a mortal adventurer at the time).

This is why Mystra is, how other people put it, "a whore." Because WotC canonized a handful of those stories where different sexy female mage love interests whom otherwise have nothing in common are slapped with the Mystra label for one reason or another. Sometimes they're mere avatars or magical projections, sometimes they're actual people possessed by Mystra, and sometimes they're destined to be the new Mystra but don't know it yet. But those sort of nuances are lost to people who learn their lore secondhand from deliberately provocative tweets and reddit posts, flattening extremely fantastical relationships to clumsily fit a more relatable framing that'll net them more online engagement.

I don't want to argue what is and isn't grooming. But I have encountered arguments taking Gale's mentions that he was "a young man" to mean Mystra groomed him as a child. But I doubt he would have said "young man" if he meant child...

Mystra took off the gossamer veils from her body to fully reveal herself to him — or whatever romanticized way Gale tells you that they were intimate. The man speaks in half-abstraction and metaphors because it's revealed later on in the romance that all their love-making happened outside the Material Plane. They were very intimate, but never physically had sex (or had any physical contact at all because gods are only allowed to interact with mortals through their avatars or projections). If Mystra "groomed" Gale, so did every other god who revealed themselves and made themselves vulnerable to their followers. Shar grooms her justiciars when she brings them into her dark embrace. Umberlee grooms her clerics when she swallows them up and gives them her wet kiss.

MYSTRA IS A FAIR GOD ACTUALLY

Look, gods in D&D-verses are, more often than not, dicks. They have to be or else there would be no need for adventurers to fix wrong-doings if the gods weren't so detached to the suffering of mortals and regularly making earth-shattering calamities.

Mystra, as a patron, is actually one of the more fair and hands-on dieties. She's one of the few gods who rewards benevolent ambition and punishes destructive hubris, knowing the line between the two. In the Elminster series, she (or one of her avatars) assists Elminster in taking down one of her rebel Chosen who has abused her blessing to become a tyrant. Azuth, one of her Chosen, has achieved godhood through her. In fact, she is divinely obliged — forced against her will, some might say — to help mortals she would personally rather smite. There have been so many instances where Mystra has to be the bigger person. As far as gods abusing their followers go, Mystra is low on that list.

There are barely any stories of magic abusing spellcasters, but there are cautionary tales aplenty of spellcasters abusing magic.

ON GALE SPECIFICALLY: HOW IS MYSTRA THE BAD GUY HERE?

Gale is the first to tell you that he "violated her boundaries." Mystra told him not to mess with the Tome of Netheril and he did it anyway, so he's fully aware that the orb in his chest and his fall from grace is his own fault. Mystra didn't cast him aside just because she felt like he was getting too big for his britches. His actions actively endangered her and the Weave.

(Mystra is wrong about certain details on the Karsite Weave if we're going by Forgotten Realms lore, but she's not wrong about its existence being a danger. BG3 takes a lot of liberties with the world Faerûn, so I can't definitively say whether Mystra being wrong was her lying, Larian rewriting canon, or this incarnation of Mystra not knowing the true nature of the Fall of Netheril. I could go on about what effects the Karsite Weave actually would have on magic, but this post is already long enough. )

Gale only starts to resent Mystra when she asks him to detonate himself. Elminster makes it sound like an order, but from the way she doesn't punish him in the epilogue if he chooses to keep the orb, it feels more like a suggestion. If Mystra wanted Gale well and truly dead, she has so many options.

Throughout Faerûn's history, Mystra herself has constantly been betrayed and taken advantage of — her power coveted by ambitious men who claim to worship and love her. Honestly, as far as goddesses with traumatic histories of being killed by ambitious men go, she's pretty chill about Gale. The fact that she allows him to become the god of ambition in the end if you choose that path? Well... let's just say she's not the one who looks like the evil ex who was only with their partner to take advantage of them in this scenario.

CONCLUSION

Mystra isn't the only goddess to have romantic relationships with her followers. I've already yapped on about how Forgotten Realms writers and D&D players love to make goddesses fuck their heroes, and all that pearl-clutching over "power imbalance" and "consent" is moot when the mortal party is actively rolling to seduce the divine entity.

But notice how the male gods rarely have intimate relations with their mortal charges? It's almost as if Mystra was objectified for years by horny nerds to be the sexy sorceress who validates the more important male hero. Fast forward years later, she's now being slut-shamed for all the lore of her sleeping with the more important male hero by a new crop of fans who would love to think they're more progressive than the horny nerds of the 80s, but fall into the same trap. Mystra has so much potential for complexity, but they choose to flatten her because they ultimately don't care about making stories involving complex female characters.

Instead, one of the most powerful beings in Faerûn has no bigger role in this universe than to be your girlfriend or your current boyfriend's evil ex. Wow, the realms of your creativity and respect for women truly know no bounds.

[elene78-blog]

I believe in the possibility that, in this trilogy, Kevin tells Andrew something very specific before he leaves for California. Something like this:

"I need to add a clause to our deal, Andrew. An exception."

Andrew looks at Kevin without the slightest interest. With his suitcase packed for a flight to California in three hours, it's not hard to guess what Kevin wants.

"Do you really want to add a fine print or are you still drunk on self-pity?" Kevin stares at him. Andrew ends up shrugging his shoulders. "I don't know if you're confusing your memories with reality, but just because Moreau hasn't been able to defend himself in these years doesn't mean he can't break your face... or your other hand."

Kevin frowns, somewhere between annoyed and surprised.

"...How do you know I'm talking about Jean?"

"Can anyone else make you so guilty that you want me to beat you up to make you feel better?"

"I don't want Jean to beat me up. I just want you to stay out of my way if Jean decides to."

Kevin doesn't understand. Andrew had already subdued his anger when they met. It only took one look at Jean for Andrew to understand that he hasn't even explored her. If the Frenchman has half the rage Andrew has ever felt, Kevin will be dead before he blinks.

"I know Monsieur Miserable's old fury, Kevin. It's a ticking bomb and you won't want to be around when it goes off."

"Jean won't go that far. He's not... like the others Ravens, at all. And if he does, it will be a beating in return for what he has received for me."

Andrew is not convinced. Honestly, he likes this trip to California less and less. Every time someone goes there, something bad happens. Furthermore, Moreau is not a saint of his devotion. No one who had witnessed Neil and Kevin's misery was, no matter Moreau's circumstances. However, there is something that Andrew understands and respects.

The debts are paid. The promises are kept.

Neil had repaid a debt months ago. Kevin had to pay his own.

"If you are in danger of death, I will stop it. In any other case, I will not move. Enough?" Kevin nods and leaves.

[prettyboykatsuki]

oh boy lmfao.

hi. this is the extended authors note for my love, my alibi. there is nothing important to the fic itself so if you're comfortable with the presented dead dove content- you are more then welcome to skip this entirely. i hope you enjoy/enjoyed reading!

cw very long discussion about fictional incest. just me yapping.

this fic is the first long-form incest fic im publishing on ao3 in general but also the first dc fic i am posting for love and deepspace which has a very wide audience. i've been warned a few times about antis and whatnot but i don't make this post trying to specifically address them but to kind of briefly weigh in on my choice to write caleb and mcs relationship this way

despite the english localization and how it attempts to scrub out the incestual element of caleb and mcs relationship - i don't think you can remove this aspect without butchering calebs character almost entirely.

i would go as far as saying removing the familial aspect of calebs feelings and reducing him to close childhood friend makes him as significantly less moving and less interesting.

i also think a lot of the story's thematic choices and motifs (forbidden fruit for example) do not make sense unless you consider the relationship between mc and caleb as siblings first and foremost.

the level of intensity and emotional angst just really explicitly does not work the same. there's no reason for mc to react to romantic advances with such guilt and denial towards a character she explicitly considers a friend.

there is also no reason for caleb to feel explicitly responsible for behavior in the way he is in canon.

caleb and mc being siblings is a crucial aspect of their relationship - and it is also crucial to note they experience a conflicting sense of mutual attraction in the years they grow up that way. evidenced in multiple of the cards.

also in literally every other version of the game (cn, jpn, kr) it is affirmed explicitly that caleb views himself as mcs brother SDKFJSD.

for all of these reasons i wanted to explore the nature of their relationship and play with some of the discomfort because i think it makes for an interesting story. i dont think caleb sees being mcs brother as contradictory. his denial of their relationship feels intentionally hurtful to mc in order to make her address the uncomfortable underlying attraction imo. caleb wanting to be everything to mc being literal in nature. this is why he can also act very parental towards her despite the small age gap.

i can understand why incest in this regard might be uncomfortable for some of you to engage with, and i respect your feelings and your choice but i do encourage you to look beyond the moral taboo and try to examine the themes that come with incest like forbidden romance and co-dependence and think critically about how it impacts the story

and if you are still uncomfortable comfortable engaging with it, feel free to click off !! genuinely i get it, its not for everyone. but please do so without judgement of those who are comfortable. no real people are exploited in writing this. it is all make believe and for fun

all that being said, i hope you like this fic that made me crazy.

love,

fang.

[usertoxicyaoi]

found this super interesting. this person below is an acting coach and scriptwriter that's worked on/working on: kinnporsche (2022), only friends (2023), playboyy (2023) and mansruang (2023):

[shoot-i-messed-up]

…ngl the Ilana & Rick dynamic was more interesting before they fucked

[innocentcurse]

"I totally understand that," Stoker nodded their head. They couldn't understand what that was like personally, not being a beekeeper or anything of the likes themself, but what Winter said made complete sense to Stoker all the same. There were a lot of things that Stoker was made up off, things like speculation, substance use, and adventuring, and without any of those things, Stoker would have lost of piece of himself and who he was. It was different to Winter's connection with his honey, but enough for Stoker to respect that it was a big part of who Winter was.

Even while Winter was experiencing no honey shortage, Stoker still appreciated the gift endlessly. Even as Winter was just about belittling the gift, reasoning that it wasn't as special as Stoker felt it was due to the large amount of honey he had, Stoker's feelings about it didn't change. "You're a really nice person, Winter," Stoker felt a flash of insecurity hit him in the chest as he felt so very different from that. He was friendly, sure, but Stoker had also done things that would always make him feel like an inherently bad person. He ran a hand through his long hair, as if to reset himself and will the bad thoughts away. "That makes no sense to me at all," Stoker shook his head in disbelief - though he did believe that people were sometimes put off by Winter's memory issues, but only because he knew all too well how awful human beings could be. "I'm not perfect, but something like this would never put me off."

Stoker had already thought that Winter was incredibly interesting, but to be gaining an insight into his issues - issues that Stoker hadn't even caught a glimpse of, unknowingly - it bumped that interesting level up by several notches. Of course, Stoker wasn't happy to hear that his friend struggled so much, but that didn't change the fact that it was incredibly interesting to learn about, both the issues and the way that Winter dealt with them. "I can only imagine just how difficult it'd be," Stoker nodded his head. He had never experienced anything like what Winter was going through, but he had altered his mind with drugs and other substances; that was uncomfortable enough as it was, when Stoker came to, sobering up and realising he had no memory of the time he had spent under the influence. For this to be a constant for Winter, one that he didn't inflict upon himself willingly each time, would have been awful. "You don't need to be embarrassed around me, though," he smiled, though he knew his words were only words, and that if Winter were to ever believe them, it would likely take time and proof.

"Oh man," Stoker's face lit up at the comment about honey on toast. "I used to eat that for breakfast all the time as a kid, but I haven't had it for years. I'd almost forgotten about it completely," Stoker shook their head, smiling fondly in recollection. "I think I know what'll be on the menu tomorrow morning," she chuckled, wondering if it'd be a throwback for Silas, too, or if Silas wasn't subjected to the same one-trick-pony that was the live in staff that made Stoker's breakfast as a young child.

"I guess we don't really know that much about each other, no," not past the surface facts and the small pieces of information that had been relevant thus far. Stoker chuckled as he tried his best to think about what exactly he did with his days, always finding it hard to come up with an answer. "Yeah, it's absolutely fine," he first reassured the other, still not put off by the other's need to have information written down for the sake of his memory issues. "That's a hard question though, honestly," he cocked his head to the side in thought. "I like to explore kinda, I guess that's the best way to put it. I'm..." he hesitated as he thought about whether or not he wanted to be so honest, but as Winter had already established a close, open connection between them, he quickly realised that he wasn't afraid of doing so. "I'm a bit of a... Well I don't know how to put it, but I think this town is kinda strange, in ways, and I'm always trying to find out more about it. So I like to explore, and talk to people, and- well find things out, I suppose."

Nodding, Winter agreed, "Yeah, especially me. I mean...I always have honey here. It's sort of my thing. But I need different ways to enjoy it or else I'll...well, stop enjoying it, you know? And I don't want that because..." Winter trailed off; he knew what he was about to say, but he also knew it might sound stupid. Still, he said it anyway, telling Stoker, "It's so much a part of who I am, beekeeping and selling my honey and all of that, and I kind of don't know who I would be without it." There was one thing though that Winter didn't say out loud: that his bees brought him so much comfort because sometimes it felt like they were the only ones to truly understand him. Their bond was unexplainable and deep, and Winter truly loved them. But he thought that might be too much for Stoker. It seemed like the other understood Winter's point though, and that made him smile. Yes, he was glad the two of them had met.

Upon giving the honey to his new friend, Winter saw his reaction, which made him smile even more in turn. It always felt good to him to make other people happy, and he already knew he'd be giving Stoker another free jar of honey at some point. "It's no big deal," he said, still grinning at them. "I mean...I've got more honey than I can manage sometimes." Right now he didn't have quite as much because it was winter, but he still had more than enough to sell at the markets for the next couple of months. And besides, that wasn't Winter's livelihood anyway - he'd only ever done this because he loved it, not as a job. "I wanted to do something nice for you," he said softly. "I just...I always appreciate when people like me." Winter felt himself getting a little vulnerable now, and he blushed slightly, but still he continued. "Sometimes people think I'm weird or are put-off by the fact that my memory is so terrible," Winter explained further, "so I just...I'm glad you're not one of those people." His cheeks were just a little redder now, but Winter didn't feel embarrassed; he felt like Stoker would understand.

And that was why Winter found himself talking further about the memory issues - he could tell that Stoker wouldn't judge him or make an excuse to leave or something (at least he hoped not). "It's...it's been hard," Winter explained. "I don't even remember how to drive. You know that car in the driveway? That's mine, but it's pretty useless to me. And...and it's not just like a couple of notes." He walked over to a drawer nearby and pulled it open, taking out a stack of notes and holding them up to show Stoker. "See what I mean?" He didn't want to dwell on it too much, but it just felt nice being able to open up about this. There were some things Winter didn't say though, like how he was afraid to even try learning how to drive again because he was worried he wouldn't be able to retain anything he learned. This felt too personal to reveal though, at least for right now. Stoker had nothing but positive and encouraging things to say, and their support made Winter smile, feeling a little less self-conscious. "I'm getting by," he replied, "I am. It's just...it's hard sometimes, and it's embarrassing too." His cheeks were just a little red now, but mostly Winter felt safe and comfortable with his new friend, and he appreciated that greatly.

After the pair had made their tea, Winter sat at the counter with Stoker, taking a sip. "Another way I like honey is on toast," he told Stoker. "Just like drizzled on. If you haven't tried it, well..." He trailed off, nodding toward the jar of honey he'd given the other, a smile on his face. For a couple more minutes, they sat there enjoying their tea, and Winter asked, "So what do you like to do in your free time, Stoker? I guess we still don't know a ton about each other, do we?" Winter felt like Stoker could end up being a good friend, but he wanted to know them more. He removed a small notebook from his pocket as well as a pen, blushing slightly once more. "Is it okay if I take notes?" Winter asked the other.

[thevegetablewhichnoonedaresname]

i unraveled half a dishcloth about 3 times because i was having a toxic man-refusing-to-ask-for-directions moment and kept telling myself "nah you've knit stacks of these and it's literally the easiest pattern" and ignoring the fact that i've been crocheting for 3-4 years and could really spare 5 seconds to google a pattern as a refresher

[laurellala-comics]

there are two wolves inside of you. One of them is fretting that you went through all the effort of making a new art account just to pigeonhole yourself once more into a specific fandom, which holds you back from exploring original art concepts that you care about. The other one came up with three separate ace attorney comic ideas in the last hour alone and isn't stopping anytime soon

[lord-squiggletits]

This might be bc of my personal reading of exRDI/OP bc I'm pretty sure the authorial intent was to just write Optimus as having some fall from grace/borderline tyrannical edge but like

I really kinda wish the story had been written as more of a political intrigue, almost GOT-esque thing (sorry for the cliche) where like, instead of Optimus being written as the narrative's scapegoat to be condemned both by the characters in universe and the meta narrative, he was just written as...morally gray? With more of a focus on "this is a shitty situation where no decision is good" rather than having Optimus just be some sort of white guilt stand-in of how oh, he's a Prime so that means the most important part of his legacy is how Cybertronians are awful and he's no better than the other ones etc.

Like Barber doesn't write Optimus as EVIL or in a way where he's unilaterally condemned as a person who did more harm than good, it's just imo the vibes of the story is more of a dark political/war story where no person is clean and there's no solution to the war that doesn't involve moral compromise. Instead Optimus is forced to make these moral compromises but then everyone else in the story loses their absolute shit and immediately starts calling him a tyrant or a fascist or something.

Like idk, it was partially an issue of the set-up. Because for one, it was really hard to take it seriously when the humans went "omg he's annexing Earth the Autobots were literally the colonizers all along!" (I think the dialogue was written almost exactly like that too sjdjsidn, so bad dialogue was also another issue) yet were perfectly fine working with the Decepticons led by 1. Soundwave who personally helped execute the attempted invasion of Earth and 2. Galvatron who constantly talks about wanting to kill these puny organics. I feel like I would've been able to take humanity's fears of being colonized again more seriously if like, they hadn't literally teamed up with The Colonizer Faction just bc Soundwave promised they were good guys again. So really it's just execution + plot holes + bad dialogue.

And another thing about the annexing of Earth specifically that I wish got talked about more (mostly by the fandom more than in universe) is that like. Basically the reason Optimus did that was because the neo-Decepticons were planning to invade Earth again, but since he's not actually a formal political leader any more he has no power to actually force a war to stop them/request military back up. But also, Starscream didn't give a shit about Earth and neither did the Council of Worlds, so appealing to the government for help defending humanity wouldn't work either. So Optimus annexing Earth was an absolute clusterfuck yes, but in a way it was also kind of a shrewd political move to force Cybertron to dedicate a spot in the government for humans and thus grant humans a say on Cybertronian politics.

What I mean is that in a story/with an author like that of GOT, where the setting is grimmer and every character is morally ambiguous, I feel like Optimus would've had way more room to be an interesting and compelling character. Bc then instead of the story immediately screaming "ALL HAIL OPTIMUS DID YOU KNOW OP ANNEXING EARTH TO THE COUNCIL IS BASICALLY THE SAME AS MEGATRON ATTEMPTING TO GENOCIDE EARTH," Optimus could have been played around with more as a political figure making the shitty decisions in an effort to stop another genocide. Instead of just unilaterally condemning Optimus and immediately comparing him to fucking Megatron of all people, there could've been more focus on the politics of it with maybe some sort of theme of how "being a leader in war is an inherently unethical position where every decision you make will lead to death/conflict/hate."

Like idk I just think it would've been more interesting if the narrative spent less time going "zomg Optimus is totally a tyrant now" and instead went all in on exploring the political conflicts and how far politicians (Optimus now being one, since he's declaring wars and forcefully acting as an ambassador that no one asked for) can go on manipulation and forcing people's hands for the sake of an ultimately good cause. I mean, Windblade was doing shit like covering up for Chromia who killed people in a bombing, making backdoor deals with Starscream, and conspiring with Optimus to bypass Starscream/overthrow him as Cybertron's ruler somehow. The difference of course is that Windblade and exRID were written by two different authors with genre/thematic differences, but as a reader it is really disappointing to see two different political narratives where "a hero turned politician turning to morally gray/unethical methods to outmaneuver a deadly opponent" is treated as clever and heroic for one character, but tyrannical and worthy of ostracization of another character.

Like for God's sake this narrative where Optimus gets lambasted at every turn sometimes by people who work with/are literal tyrants/terrorists themselves is so fucking exhausting. I'd rather read a story that focused more on the idea of, well what Optimus did was unethical but on a political level it was actually advantageous in several ways. Then you could write a story that really dives into a view of like, idk... Does power inherently corrupt or is it just situations like war that allow leaders to seize power and become tyrannical? Are politics an inherently dirty field where the only way to beat your competition (and secure a decent future for the nation) is to become underhanded and manipulative yourself? Is it okay to bypass or work against rightfully elected officials when those officials are turning a blind eye to things like war and invasions and historic racism?

ExRID did somewhat touch on these themes to be fair, but I feel like in Optimus' case they were either poorly executed or just thrown away in favor of having every other character talk shit about him and how he's the worst person ever. Bc like goddammit, I do think Optimus' polarizing and sometimes bad decisions as a character DO make him skirt on the edge of tyranny and shouldn't be downplayed, but on the other hand, I feel like no one (fandom or in-universe) ever tangles with the OTHER side of the story, which is just... Would it have been unethical for Optimus to NOT have done anything? Cybertronians literally put a colony on Earth, injected Earth with alien technology and sleeper agents, used Earth as an incubating ground for dangerous elements like Ore-13, invaded Earth and killed 1 billion people-- after all the shit Cybertron did to Earth, is it not fair (even morally obligated) for Cybertronians to clean up their shit and help Earth defend itself against a crisis that Cybertronians caused? And if Cybertron's government/the individuals within are racist enough that they don't care about Earth, don't see it as their problem, and don't even see human life as meaningful since they don't live that wrong anyways... is it not, in a way, a good thing for Optimus to have overstepped his authority and forced diplomatic relationships between the two planets? So that humans had an actual political channel to go "fuck you, we're in your Council so you'd better ally with us" and so that Cybertron would be forced to go "welp can't write off these humans as Not Our Problem, guess we have to help them." Doesn't forcing Earth to be part of the Council in a way legitimize Optimus' fight to help Earth, since without a formal political office he's just a rogue general fighting an unauthorized war, but with the government involved, defending Earth now becomes a politically sanctioned act?

Like idk. I guess exRID and OP did get into some of this stuff, but as a whole it felt like the story underutilized its political elements and got bogged down in shit like pointless crossovers, and constantly pausing the narrative to have Side Character #2847 talk about how Optimus is a fascist, and having Optimus go on white guilt-esque monologues about how maybe all Cybertronians should die and are unworthy/unable to ever have a peaceful society because their society colonized other planets.

Just so much wasted potential honestly. ExRID/OP as written felt like it was going way too hard into "omg Cybertronians bad and Optimus is actually a tyrant" instead of just writing a complex story and letting readers come to their own conclusions. And also lambasting Optimus for doing things that other characters did (or characters who did even worse things), but letting those characters exist in peace while Optimus has to just be some allegory for colonialism that has to be torn down at every turn because that's Deep and Intellectual.

I just like the kinds of stories about politics that play around with the ethics of it all, like, "this politician is a shitty person but their policies actually prevented some sort of disaster from happening" or "this person did something illegal and defied the law but they did it because no one else was doing anything" or even "everyone hates this person for forcing them into a political deal they didn't want to be involved in, but the fact that they were all forced to become allies actually allowed them to cooperate and save themselves in a way they wouldn't have been able to alone" (which is pretty much literally how the annexing of Earth ended up going).

Like man I don't want to sit here being lectured/having my favorite character be lectured about how much tyranny is bad. I want my favorite character to do shitty things and then go "whoa that was shitty...but also kind of smart...but also caused a lot of problems...but also solved some other problems that could've turned awful if he hadn't forcefully resolved them."

[phoenixcatch7]

If there's one thing I like more than time travel it's crossover reincarnation, so.

Botk link reincarnated as Damian Wayne.

An incredible weapon master of all types, but especially prodigious with a sword - he was beating knights at the age of 4 and with his memories as intact as they get for him I can see that goalpost moving even further (probably with traps and tricks, a 3yo doesn't exactly have great bodily control).

He's an excellent survivalist, agile, strong, durable, cunning and creative. He can move like a feather in the breeze, strike from behind with ease. His first kill, an animal, did not stir him as it did the other children. With his poise, grace, skills, obedience, he ought to be ra'as' finest assassin in the making, a jewel in the crown of the league.

Except he never speaks a word. Half his targets escape unscathed. He skates by true punishment on the merit of his skills and achievements in other missions. Testing has shown it is not a physical deformity that prevents his speech, but not even talia has been able to coaxe a word from him past his second birthday.

It is a defect ra'as is growing more and more frustrated by, as each attempt to fix these two final flaws ends in resounding failure. Less extreme solutions are running dry.

Talia fears those solutions. Her child does too, she knows. For them, there is a possible solution, more extreme than anything ra'as would tolerate.

She sends him out of the league. To his father.

To Gotham.

[suffarustuffaru]

i just. remembered again that i have a fembaru fic but also the premise is. Very Messed Up hah and also it was written before the canon genderbent au with its official genderbend names for everyone so its also outdated on top of that T^T i had like. Genderqueer subtext going on too. but i also wrote this fic like almost two years ago and havent touched it in forever so im unsure if i should go back to it…. o.o but i would love to finish it one day if only for my own satisfaction hah… i had a very detailed outline for ch 2 (its a twoshot) and several scenes written already anyway!! (and also i would probably update those names, make minor edits, etc etc hmm…)

[ishouldreallybeelsewhere]

Episode one of Supernatural is so flawed that, had I watched it for the first time last night (instead of for the third), I would not have have watched the second. Ever. The flaws are things I simply didn't pick up on when I was thirteen, and memory glazed over with emotional attachment. I understand why these flaws are there, what the writers tried and failed to do through clumsy dialogue and strange character decisions. There's no subtlety. Everything Sam says is direct exposition, specifically the things that he would not have to say to his brother.

I do not do reviews so that's all I'm going to say.

[yourbuerokrat2]

Love me some onesided!qcard, where Q is either entirely oblivious that it is onesided or in denial about it.