#it's giving 'people treated me like a criminal! BECAUSE I KILLED SOMEBODY-'

[gothamite-shenanigans]

NEVER LEARNED HOW TO COUNT CAUSE I'M NUMBER ONE

*Sharpens knife in earshot*

@your-local-gothamite

[afniel]

So today I woke up and promptly remembered that hey, didn't I have jury duty at some point this month...? I went downstairs and checked the summons postcard and sure enough, I did.

Last week!

Now, this isn't me confessing a criminal misdemeanor, because I was excused, actually. Luck was on my side (and so was the Wayback Machine, which is how I had to check). No failure to appear, no foul.

The thing I'm actually proud of is that I didn't freak out about it. See, when you've got a lifetime of internalized ADHD shame, the typical reaction to realizing that You Forgot Something, Again, goes like this:

Panic so much. You're going to be In Trouble. Nothing can possibly be worse than being In Trouble. This is a category 5 emergency.

Self-flagellate as hard as humanly possible. What kind of useless sack of unreliable shit, accidentally mislabeled as a human being, could have fucked this up so badly? This is just like everything else in your life. Nothing you do is ever right no matter how hard you try. What's even the point? You're an eternal fuckup. Might as well just accept it.

Existential crisis spiral until you can't even remember what the real problem is. The problem is just you. The problem has always been you. Why are you like this?

Eat an entire thing of Oreos, or whatever your self-destructive self-soothing behavior of choice is. Do you feel better? Not really. You stopped hyperventilating at least, so it'll have to be close enough.

Actually deal with the real problem, if it's even a problem. It probably wasn't. Now you just feel stupid for getting so worked up about it.

Completely fail to realize that you punishing the hell out of yourself in steps 2-4 is just reinforcing your panic response and making you less capable of coping in the future, because you've had it beaten into your head that forgetting things, a normal and reasonable human error, is Simply Not Acceptable, even if it's ultimately pretty harmless. But hey, if you kick your own ass about it harder than anybody else would or even could, then you've personally made sure you have control over the severity of the punishment, right?

Right?

Does that sound like a trauma response? Well, it should, because it is. Many people with ADHD have this same trauma response, because having a brain that doesn't work like everyone else's in a world that is not just not built to accommodate that, but in fact is built to convince you that this is a personal, moral, and unforgivable failure is actually pretty traumatic.

That's verbatim how I've lived most of my life. Don't ask me how the hell I got this far carrying on like that, because I don't even know. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger gives you a goddamn complex. But I've been working on it over the past I don't even know how many years, and today, my response was more like this:

Oh shit jury duty was a week ago. Well, now I just feel silly.

Uhh...let's figure out the worst possible outcome. Jail time? Seems highly unlikely for a first time misdemeanor. Possibly a fine, but probably a warning.

Let's look up what actually happens to people in my county who miss their jury duty. They get sent a second summons. That's very reasonable and not at all a real problem if it happens.

Let's find out if I was even summoned to appear. If not, it isn't even a problem. Mention it to my partner at this point. They say 'yeah, I forgot I had jury duty once. I looked up whether or not I was summoned on the Wayback Machine. You told me to not worry about it either way because people honestly forget all the time, and it's a fixable problem whatever happens.'

Realize they are right (and that I forgot this happened until they mentioned it because it was such a non-issue), and I should take the advice I give and treat myself like somebody I care about. I reassure myself that it's not a big deal and people do it all the time and nobody's doing to be personally affronted, and a sincere apology goes a very long way even with a cranky judge if it comes to that. I check the Wayback Machine.

I was excused anyway, so no big deal in the end. I now have a funny story to tell, and I'll probably remember better in the future as a result. Realize that even if it had gone worse, it still would have ended up a funny story later. Yeah, even if they inexplicably threw me in jail for a night. That sure would never get old retelling.

Have a shower and get on with my day.

Gold star for me, I completely didn't even realize that I was de-catastrophizing so well until after the fact. Like I've got it down to a reflex now. I am legitimately just a much calmer person than I used to be. Feels pretty alright! I could get used to this not kicking the absolute mental health out of myself every time something goes slightly wrong. Highly recommend being nice to yourself actually, 10/10 experience.

Anyway that's me tooting my own horn. I feel very emotionally stable and pretty good about that fact. It's been a fucking journey.

[shout-it-out13]

This fandom I swear

So I know I’m basically screaming into the void here but I have seen some seriously alarming tendencies of both parasocial behaviour and now downright infantalisation regarding Yoongi’s DUI incident

Now I’m a big fan of Yoongi, and I’m just as fond of the “lil meow meow” memes about him as anybody else, but it just doesn’t apply in this case.

Let me spell out the obvious (because then takes I’m seeing is downright worrying):

1. Min Yoongi is a 31 year old man. Not a baby or a teen, a whole ass adult, in his 30s. Thus him being of legal age, makes him as fully subject to the law, as any other legal adult of legal age (or even those of minor age, persecution of underage people is very much a thing, and even if he wasn’t an adult, he would still have received criminal punishment).

(Edit: It has been brought to my attention that I had misunderstood the situation and I must admit that I based this post when I wrote it on what I had seen on Tumblr of the situation (no, I didn’t fact-check online and I won’t now either, this post was made out of an emotional response to the overall fandom situation)(I get if people thinks that’s messed up and ignorant of me (which you’re entitled to totally) but personally I have never been personally invested much in BTS beyond their music and I don’t see that changing). I just wanted to vent and say my piece, I apologise for any misinformation I may have caused. Again, I do not condone the media backlash that has gone beyond the reasonable amount (holding him accountable is different from going on a outright witch-hunt).

-I know this post is months old, and I see now I have had people in my inbox since I first posted it, and I only have seen them now (I ignore that I even have mutuale, inbox and dms on here because that’s just not what I’m here for). I must admit that I did delete your messages and could have actually researched the situation, but to be honest I can’t be bothered (again, I’m not Wikipedia, the facts are there online, this post was made and now edited out of my emotional frustration over the situation), but felt I should at least say something so here it is, lazily edited and smacked in the middle.

2. A DUI (which you can get while operation any form of vehicle or mode of transportation, be it cars, scooters, boats, bikes etc) is a serious offense, no matter what the outcome is. It’s fortunate that this situation was so mild, nobody got hurt nor no personal damages, it still is a serious offense and should have be treated as such. Yes, we shouldn’t be treating this situation as if he hit and killed somebody, but he still could have, and this needs to be taken seriously.

Min Yoongi, a man in his 30s (a grown ass man of legal age, whom I’m seeing getting his criminal offense downplayed like nothing happened by those both of legal age and those not), committed a crime, as mild as the situation was, is a serious situation and for that break of the law, he deserves to be punished for it. And the fact that there are people treating like he did nothing wrong is just idiotic.

The amount of parasocial behaviour (friendly reminder, you will never truly know any idol, youtuber, celebrity, actor etc if you don’t personally know them (no meeting them multiple times and borderline stalking them and learning evrry single detail you can about them online doesn’t count) and infantilisation in this fandom is insane.

Stop putting people you look up to on such a high pedestal until the point where you think they can do nothing wrong (like some armys are doing right now, with a man in his 30s)

I love Yoongi, I still look up to him even after this, I’m glad that he wasn’t hurt and that this doesn’t hurt his military service. I hope he learns from this, faces whatever legal punishment they give him, and hope that he can regain his license again in the future.

I hope he, the company and most importantly the fandom, recognises how serious this situation is and stops going “poor little meow meow” or “I’m in love with a criminal” (no you don’t, nobody in the fandom knows who and how BTS are in their private lives (private lives whom they are fully entitled to keep hidden from overobsessive fangirls who thinks stalking people counts as knowing them. They’re people, not objects nor saints, please treat them as such) over a man who commuted a criminal offense, aka broke the law and now needs to face said punishment.

I know I have been repeating myself over and over, but with the amount of braindead takes seen in this fandom regarding theses legal grown men, is just painful.

[forwards-beckon-rebound]

just finished watching under the red hood and oh boy i have some thoughts.

warning: spoilers for utrh the movie obviously, a very long and not particularly coherent rant, i have not read the comic yet because i heard jason gets treated even worse in it but i’ll probably get around to it soon

first of all, i didn’t realize how violent it was, especially considering it’s a kids show. not only that but how callously jason just kills people. like i was aware but i kind of assumed that he did it when it was necessary. but sometimes he kills people when he could just incapacitate them. i think it adds another layer of complexity to his character, like i see why he’s an anti-hero bordering on villain to some people and not just a misunderstood hero.

not that i don’t stand by his points about killing the joker, but i do understand why bruce wasn’t exactly eager to welcome him back with open arms (i still think he could be a better father though).

ON THE SUBJECT OF BRUCE AS A FATHER. it physically pains me to hear him never acknowledge jason as his son. jason’s always his soldier, his partner, his fault. thank god jason never heard the shit bruce said because i would rage if i were him. you can’t call somebody your partner if you don’t see them as your equal. and how could jason be his equal? he was a child. at best he is his son. at worst he is his ward. either way, no child wants to hear that they’re a mistake. not their death, not the way they were raised or trained. just their whole existence. like thanks bruce, you really know how to make amends with your children.

and on that topic, there’s this theme of like oh was jason always destined to be a criminal? like was there truly nothing bruce could’ve done to stop him? it literally broke my heart when jason said maybe he was always the monster under the mask, like to hear him give up on himself like that made me want to cry. i hate this idea of this life being his fate. especially since bruce was like oh yeah he was stealing my car tires, he was raised to be a criminal and all that. i don’t think the writers meant it in that way but for a billionaire who also breaks the law to say that a child who grew up poor was always meant to be a criminal rubs me the wrong way. like i don’t think he has the moral high ground to say some of the things he says because jason did make a point when he talked about how joker has killed way too many people for batman to let him go.

anyways, do i think murder is wrong and what jason did was reprehensible? yes, although the becoming crime lord thing to control it in gotham was very smart. but is it so bad that he couldn’t have just come home? gotten therapy and had a semi normal life again? gotten to kill the joker as a little treat? no. he was like, what, 18 or 19 during the movie? and also traumatized and in desperate need of therapy? i’m not excusing his actions but when you grow up fighting these violent criminals and also being tortured and killed by one, it certainly blurs the lines. so i understand, and i think there is still redemption for him.

and the real villain of the story is the gotham criminal justice system for never doing anything about crime alley or keeping people like the joker from breaking out of arkham every week.

[postmoderntongues]

I dont want to "feel good and righteous", I'm viscerally disgusted by men who watch porn and want nothing to do with them. And I'm open about it because why shouldn't I? Some things should be shamed, and this is without a doubt one of them. We've coddled men for far too long and look where that got us. I don't give a shit if he's struggling, he's getting off on the abuse and humiliation of women. Their pain matters more to me than his ever will.

Okay but as with any addiction it is a mental health issue not a moral one. You don’t treat addiction of any sort with hatred and punishment. It doesn’t work for people addicted to meth and it doesn’t work for people addicted to porn and the more shame somebody feels about an addiction the more likely they are to violate their morals believing they are already a lost cause in seeking out the continuation of their compulsion instead of seeking help. I’m also viscerally disgusted by porn but I don’t prioritize indulging my disgust over taking practical measures to ensure the safety of others because once again it is more important to reduce harm than to feel good about the state of the world or theorize about a utopia. In a perfect world, porn would not exist and people would just consume erotic art. I agree. What are we doing RIGHT NOW? How can we reduce the harm that comes to people living in our society RIGHT NOW? I’m all for a ban on porn theorybut until they put that in place how can we help people dealing with compulsive consumption? That is if it can even be legally enforced in a meaningful way that does not leave legitimate art open to censorship by the state or violate people’s right to privacy which like how do u round up all the hustler and playboy magazines without violating somebody’s right to privacy I don’t want to live in a country where the government can come into your house or search you on suspicion of having something the size of a single Polaroid. We are possibly headed into a tyrannical dictatorship, how many of your rights are you willing to sign over to them to not feel disgusted? Nobody likes to feel disgusted, there are priorities that supersede your disgust. actually doing the work to change things means thinking about more than what you wish was true. Absolutely speak out against it and discourage it and make people aware of the realities and dangers of it but how vulnerable are you comfortable to leaving yourself to state overstep in an attempt to legislate it? The war on drugs sounded like a noble idea until it became an excuse to criminalize and murder mentally ill people and minorities and imprison protestors of things like racial segregation and the Vietnam war. Until now decades after we’ve realized it has failed we cannot get the government to drop it to the point that nonviolent prisoners with good behavior are being denied bail and our nations supply of public court appointed defense attorneys is completely exhausted to the point of being entirely ineffective because they have to work so many nonviolent drug cases because nonviolent drug arrests makeup the majority of prisoners in America who make up the majority of the people being exploited for slave labor by American corporations so corrupt politicians (all of them) are being given enormous campaign donations by the oligarchs profiting off of the prison industrial complex to keep drugs illegal so they can keep enslaving nonviolent “criminals” because some people wanted to live in a utopia where addiction doesn’t exist so they jumped the gun and wound up letting cops stop and frisk them for dime bags on the fucking street. They kicked my friends door in and pointed loaded guns at him and his wife because he was selling a tiny bit of homegrown from a friends farm in Vermont a few months before it was legal in my state. How many innocent people should we let the government harass and kill and enslave so that you don’t have to feel disgust? Is your right to not feel yucky when you think of something upsetting more important than not giving the police the right to turn your house upside down and pour every drawer and jewelry box and music box and nick-nack container on your dresser and then every individual drawer looking for an item that small? Are you comfortable with people going to jail for something that easily planted when we know what cops did and still do during the war on drugs? We can make it SOCIALLY and MORALLY unacceptable to view porn but disgust is a healthy emotion and as an adult u need to cope with it.

[sweet-art-o-mine]

First Date HCs [Arthur Morgan x F!Reader - RDR2]

[[A/N: Author Allie here! Nobody requested this (I do currently have an Arthur ask in the inbox rn, I see you there anon 👀 I’ll get to you soon) but I reinstalled and have been replaying RDR2 for like the 6th time lately, so I am in SUCH an Arthur Morgan mood. Here’s some free headcanons about this gentle cowboy asking a female reader (assumedly one who does not live at camp with him) out on a date for the first time. 

Hope you enjoy!]]

This man is big. This man has killed many people with his bare hands or his knife. This man is scary and tough and strong as all hell. This man will blush like a lovestruck teenager the first time you lock eyes from across a street

He finds any reason to go over and say hello, just to hear your voice and get your name. Hi ma’am, did you just shoot me? Because my heart stopped when I saw you- (no he would not say that, but he might think of some stupid pickup lines and then immediately chastise himself for being stupid in front of a lady)

Arthur has a major fear of rejection. Have you HEARD the comments he says to and about himself in the mirror in-game?? He calls himself an ugly bastard and says "no wonder they all leave you". He's terrified of spilling his heart and soul to somebody and having them reject him - even if they were very kind and gentle about it, it would still shatter him. 

So it takes him a while of liking you, of your smile plaguing his every thought and your laugh lulling him to sleep every night, for him to work up the nerve to even THINK about asking you somewhere. He has to spend lots of time getting to know you, falling ever deeper in love, in order to finally make the plunge and ask you on a date

And make no mistake, that's absolutely how he approaches this possible romance - he asks you out to go to the theaters, to see a play or listen to an old timey band on stage. He doesn't know a whole lot about what women like to do as a first date, so he thinks over a ton of options and will even ask Hosea and Dutch for advice on where to take you 

Mary-Beth probably overhears while reading a book nearby and immediately gasps and goes to tell the other girls about it, they forcibly get involved and give Arthur a ton of conflicting advice

Mary-Beth tells him to treat her like a queen, to be courteous and polite like a high society gentleman. Tilly tells him to be smooth, say some suave pickup lines to sweep his lady friend off of her feet. Karen tells him to just be himself. Mrs. Grimshaw comes by and shoos all the girls back to cleaning and sewing because damn it this camp isn’t going to keep itself functional! 

After they’re gone she tells Arthur to make sure his new love interest is okay with his life as an outlaw first and foremost, and he tells her there’s no way he’s opening up the date with ‘hi I’m a criminal wanna come do crime with me’

Even with their advice, he still ends up offering you several places so you can choose for yourself... "I was thinkin' maybe we could go see a play tomorrow.. or, or a picnic in the afternoon if you'd prefer!" 

If you suggest something less "feminine" (such as hunting, visiting the gun range, going to a bar, etc.) he would definitely be surprised, but also amused and relieved. Not only for your willingness to participate and help him out with finding something to do, but also because it's something he's much more accustomed to doing so he'd feel more at ease 

Although he would absolutely still be uncomfortable in general because he's so desperate to only show you the 'good' side to him, being the most polite gentleman he knows how to be

he's convinced he's a terrible, terrible man and he's incapable of being good to anyone for any reason... yet, some deeply buried part of himself is desperate for your approval. He wants you to smile at him and laugh at his silly jokes and bond with him over shared activities... 

A very affectionate man who has spent many years closing that side of him off to the world after his messy breakup with Mary. He would find SO many opportunities to be physically close to you in some way, line up the perfect change to lay his hand on top of yours or sit so close you're touching... but he wouldn't take any of them. He'd think about it nearly obsessively, but he is so unsure of what's okay to do and what would be pushing the boundaries of a first date, so he would do nothing at all 

Please hold his hand. He needs it. He might cry he needs it so bad 

The longer the date goes on, the more ecstatic he is. He feels giddy, all full of butterflies and blushing like a damn fool 

just because you seem to be enjoying yourself with him. Imagine that! You! A beautiful woman with a beautiful soul! Enjoying his company! Incredible. Something he never thought he’d see

He has such self esteem issues, if you complimented his outfit or his hair or his beard, or ANYTHING at all, he'd laugh it off sheepishly and meekly disagree with you. But if you're determined enough he might eventually accept a compliment from you with a giddy smile 

At the very end of the date, he takes you home and stops outside your house. There’s no way he’s gonna try to come in, not on the first date - he knows better. He's holding his hat in his hands, sheepishly toying with the rim and looking down at his boots like a lovesick kid. He feels like a teen all over again 

"Thank you... for.. For givin' me a chance." 

His eyes light up like the got damn SUN if you kiss him on the cheek after the date. He'll stutter. His face heats up so bad it's like a furnace in winter. He's a tomato. Someone get this man a glass of water I think he’s stopped breathing-

When he goes back to camp, some of the men and absolutely all of the ladies are there waiting with bated breath for the details like a wild group of wine aunts over for the holidays. They NEED the tea, they need to make sure their boy is getting treated like the king he is 👑 It makes him laugh that his family friends are so invested in his romantic life

He'll be thinking about you, about your date, about your smile and your laugh and your eyes and your everything, until he can see you again 

But he'll remember that first date for the rest of his life.

[thecrxwclub]

here are my assigned vines for each of the crows + their respective ships because why not:

kaz: *girl crying* “when i was in the third grade, people treated me like a criminal” *whips a gun out from under the table* “because i KILLED somebody!!!”

inej: “let me see what you have!”

“a knife!”

“NO!!!!”

jesper: “people say i can’t do what i want without college. i don’t need to degree to be a clothing hanger”

wylan: “what up i’m jared i’m 19 and i never fucking learned how to read”

nina: *two people fucking going AT IT behind the counter*

“can i get a waffle? can i please get a waffle?”

matthias: “don’t fuck with me, i have the power of god AND anime on my side”

kanej: “don’t tell your mother”

“kiss one another”

“DIE FOR EACH OTHER”

wesper: “i made you a cd for our friendship”

“alright, cool man. i’ll give it a listen.”

the cd: i wanna suck yo’ dick, homie”

helnik: that one of the girl vaping and then the camera pans to the guy totally infatuated that just says “wow”

[alchemania]

Last night I was thinking about Scaramouche becoming a playable character and honestly, given how Hoyoverse mangles characters and forces the Traveler to be friends with them disregarding any trauma they may have experienced (looking at you, Childe and Ei), I don't even want it to happen because I already know they'll most likely sweep his actions under the rug too. The reason I even like this guy is because he's a bastard and the game doesn't try to make you feel bad for him or justify it in any way (his artifact lore gives him a sad backstory but you have to dig to find that and it's not brought up in the main story at all) and I feel like if they make him playable they're going to have him warm up to us way too fast and vent about Ei abandoning him or something cuz god forbid we have an ally we hate or just don't get along with or who has to fight to earn our trust, right?? RIGHT??

Given that Ei literally contributed to a civil war and prejudice against outsiders with her inaction and was just coddled like "oh an eternity alone is too cruel for you, you need to come outside and lead your people" no, you just need a better leader in general who doesn't get tunnel vision on what she feels is the way to handle things. Ei admits to us that she knew the Fatui were causing trouble, she just turned a blind eye to it because their actions didn't conflict with her goals: somebody like that doesn't deserve to be a leader. And then characters who have every right to be angry with her: Thoma, Ayaka, Kazuha, Kokomi, Yoimiya, Ayato - just aren't?? Ayaka and Ayato don't have anything to say about their friend being kidnapped and almost publicly executed, Kazuha doesn't resent Ei and Sara for killing his friend (he may have died in a legal duel but that law was bullshit to begin with), Thoma isn't angry for being treated like a common criminal when he's done nothing but try to help keep the peace, like these writers bend over BACKWARDS to make sure Ei doesn't experience any justifyable anger from characters we actually care about (because there's angry NPCs, sure, but most people don't care about those, ya feel me?) They just sweep everything Ei does under the rug.

I genuinely want to cry I'm so frustrated. This story has so much potential to be good but it just isn't and no matter what we do (like fix it fics, or writing characters different in our interpretations); the facts still stand that this is our canon and canon SUCKS and it could be better, and it HAS been better. So why don't the writers care. .? I don't get it...

Sometimes I don't even know why I still play this game, it's probably because I enjoy some of the found family like Albedo and Klee that's like the only thing keeping me tethered.

[tyrannosaurus-trainwreck]

I propose a new rule for action film franchises.  Let’s call it the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule.

Say you have a franchise--let’s use the Bond films as an example--where every single film, the fate of the entire fucking world hangs in the balance.  No matter what got accomplished in the last film, they’re right back at it in this film, having to save the entire world again.  But somehow, the stakes have to be higher than the last time, or it starts getting harder to get audiences back for more of the same, because it starts feeling really repetitive.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time it’s a doomsday device in the hands of two madmen, both of whom have extremely personal scores to settle with you.”

“Well in that case, I suppose I can hardly say no,” James Bond sighs wearily, already longing for the days when it was only a single madman with perhaps a nuclear warhead or two who harbored a vague and academic disapproval of spies in general.

The problem with the ever-rising stakes is that eventually it does become a bit ridiculous.  Remember when Fast and the Furious was about stealing consumer electronics for money?  And now barely eight movies later they’re stealing nukes and driving to space and somehow John Cena is involved?  Another two movies and they’ll be doing donuts on the moon to save earth from being blown up by previously-unmentioned alien conquerors.

So every so often, let’s say every third movie, writers should have to hit a reset button.  Not on the action or the mayhem or the actors’ intensity or whatever it is that gets eyes on screens and butts in seats.  Just, you know.  The stakes.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time the madman’s made off with one of the Queen’s corgis.”

“What?” James Bond demands, aghast. “How could you let this happen?”

“Their dog grooming credentials were impeccable. They passed every security check.  They’d have been allowed to groom Her Majesty herself,” M tells him grimly. “There’s something you should know, Bond.  It was... it was Trixie.”

“Not Trixie,” Bond gasps.  The look on his face is that of a man having a flashback to ‘Nam. “What do they want for her safe return?”

“That’s the sticky wicket, Bond,” Q volunteers, waving vaguely at a wall that begins playing a video.

On the wall, Willem Dafoe cuddles a corgi and stares dead-eyed at the camera.  When he speaks, it’s in an accent that’s vaguely Germanic but not like, enough to make any trade partners really mad about it.

“Trixie is such a good dog.  Such a good girl!” He looks at the dog, face becoming animated and warm. “Who’s a good girl?  Is it you?  It is you!  You’re a good girl!”

He looks back at the camera, eyes once again blank as a shark’s.

“I think, my friends, that Trixie is too good a dog for the rotting corpse of an empire that she was whelped into.  I shall take her with me, and together we shall venture into a brave new world of grassy farms with plenty of room to run and many, many children with which to play.  If you redeem yourselves, perhaps you shall live to see this world that I shall make.  Perhaps you shall live to go... to the dogs!”

The video cuts as he rubs the corgi’s ears and gives her a treat.

“That absolute bastard!” Bond snarls, hurling the fountain pen doomsday device across the room. “Tell me you have something to go on!”

And then we’re off to the races, with typical Bond-level shenanigans, fights, and body counts. 

It’s only that instead of having to come up with a scenario which is somehow more important or more dangerous than the last movie, which was already threatening to kill a billion people or knock the planet off its axis or whatever, it’s just a scenario in which everyone is really, really emotionally invested.

And before anyone starts up with the “these sorts of action-movie shenanigans are only reasonable with incredibly high stakes” argument, let me remind you that by the time they need this proposed intervention, we have already hit patently unreasonable situations and behavior.  Like, these are not reasonable people who are just in it for a boatload of money and somehow fell ass-backwards into a Bond villain scheme for making it.  They didn’t join the rotary club and oops their way into a series of flamboyantly homicidal consultation gigs.

If we can buy somebody going completely balls-to-the-wall, conspiracy-of-thousands, weirdo-cult-aesthetics, murdered-my-own-parents all-in on *checks notes* basically being the CEO of a slightly more criminal than usual international conglomerate that required precisely none of that? If we can buy the iron-jawed goons fist-fighting a guy who’s essentially at this point the goddamned terminator for a generous hourly wage?

Then I think we can buy a weirdo-cult-aesthetics conspiracy-of-thousands megalomaniac who just really, really likes that goddamn dog, or hates the protagonist, or wants to share the daguerreotype of Abraham Lincoln’s penis with the world as the Great Emancipator would have wanted, and the shadowy government-bankrolled action-hero forces driven by fate to stand in their way.

It’s not any less reasonable, anyway, and then when the next movie comes out you can go back to saving New York City from a nuke or Paris from a weather-control device or whatever and no one will be like "well this is a step down from the pageantry of the previous installment.”

I should add that there’s no reason the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule can’t be applied to any sort of serial media.

Your doom-and-gloom tv show just keeps fighting worse and worse villains every single season?  Why not take a break next season and fight a homeowner’s association instead of an artistic serial killer?  Go on a hard-fought, poorly-lit, grim-and-gritty slog through the byzantine process of figuring out which impound lot the Impala got towed to after a bullshit parking ticket. 

Instead of having your teenage characters grapple with Even Worse Demons, they can just, like, egg their principal’s house when it turns out he’s a normal human-level petty tyrant and not a master vampire.  Your nemesis figured out your secret identity, and instead of trying to kill your family or whatever, they hacked your facebook account and friended all your obnoxious relatives/coworkers/friends-of-friends and are embarrassing you in public, and now you have to go on a ridiculously convoluted and dystopian spirit quest to get The Zuck Himself to reset your password.

The possibilities are endless!  Unless you keep ratcheting things up, anyway, in which case you’re eventually and inevitably going to wind up fighting Satan, then God, then Worse God, then Satan’s Dad, Which Is Somehow Not God? Don’t @ Us, Our Mythological Research Prior to Writing This Was Confined to Metal Albums and American Horror Films.

[absolutepokemontrash]

Hey

Do You know that audio where " i was in the 3rd grade People treated me like a criminal </3

BECAUSE I KILLED SOMEBODY"

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CXyvEi-DL3-/?utm_medium=share_sheet

gives belphi's vibes

You know what… it really does.

Belphie WOULD.

[guiltycorp]

Playing Genshin for a couple of weeks now and I have some thoughts about Mondstadt, its seeming prosperity, and criminal elements!! Also dunking on Diluc a little bit lol. I'm not even going to touch hilichurls, they're probably the one issue I expect the game to come back to in time! They seem to be an intelligent race that was cursed and so we might get some sad backstory and realize that we've been assholes to them, not 100% sure but hopefully. Other than hilichurls and the Fatui (and yeahhh so fun to make russians into villains, im guessing it's for attracting the american audience or something... at least the characters are interesting enough), there are also Treasure Hoarders, who in the archive are mainly described as workers who lost their jobs or some other manner of poor people who turned to looting and crime out of desperation. And yet the angle is that 'thieving is always morally wrong'. Somebody didn't read Les Mis, I guess! Another note, there seems to be a weird gameplay and story segregation where we as the Traveler do lots of looting and treasure hunting ourselves only to be commended for it. But I digress. My actual point is that interestingly enough those elements of worldbuilding come together pretty well when you look at the city itself!   In Mondstadt it is most difficult to become a small business owner, made all the more obvious when compared to Liyue's wealth of shops, services, and traveling traders (Liyue has its own baggage of problems which tbh seem more serious to me but that's another topic). It's just not the most profitable occupation! Almost everyone we see out on the streets does their own resource supply, production, and service. Naturally, this means that those people don't earn enough to hire their own workers. In turn, that means that there are no jobs to be found in those places. So, where are all the jobs? For that we have the Dawn Winery, the Knights of Favonius, and the option to leave for Springvale to become a hunter or go to a different country altogether. The winery is described as the city's most powerful industry both for local consumption and export, but how does it actually treat its workers? Well, for example there's Patton who accidentally broke a bottle of expensive wine and is now basically an indentured servant to Diluc. He says that even if he worked without any breaks he still would need 48 years to pay off his debt. We can meet his daughter near Venti's statue who has to play by herself because her father is always working. Does that really seem like freedom to you? There's also Guy's father who works at the winery itself and can't afford to rest even when he is heavily sick and old. These are the worst examples for sure but others also have their own smaller problems like Charles who confides in us that he often feels tired and only takes nights off when Diluc is in a mood to tend the bar himself etc.  It is kind of telling that we don't have the option of engaging with their problems and we can't really talk to Diluc about it either. For all that he defends the city each night, he shows no interest in defending his own workers from his business's predatory tactics. To say nothing of the great damage he does to the adult populace of the city, always supplying alcohol and tempting people with deals and sales when there are already too many drunkards even among the named characters. When the opposing tavern (which also only has Diona for a bartender even when her own father has alcohol dependence) chose to present a non-alcoholic beverage during the holiday Angel’s Share doubled down on alcohol. And it doesn't even have snacks? This one bit was probably just for joke purposes, but tbh it's pretty dangerous to drink without any snacks at all, it makes sense why people get so heavily drunk in the first place. Note that Diluc himself doesn’t drink, showing good judgment when it comes to himself. Meanwhile the only person Diluc seemingly has no problem cutting off is Kaeya and it’s not obvious whether that’s out of concern or pettiness. Nobody is cutting off Nimrod who is ruined by his addiction! Now this is probably the core reason why Nimrod turned to crime, and I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that he and his wife are dependant on Kaeya who at the very least knows to appreciate his informants. Kaeya himself is also a gleeful enabler, by the way, which makes sense considering his uh.. everything. And his upbringing at the Dawn Winery didn’t hurt, no surprise why he’s so keen on wine himself. He might be shrewd and oh so clever when it comes to getting information in taverns, but his story details and voice lines confirm that there actually is a problem even if we don’t know the full scope of it.  Now, the Knights of Favonius? Aside from being corrupt in the past they happen to hire minors (we can read that in their handbook) whom they don't even pay. What's that, free labor for the simplest of tasks? Makes sense why some of the adult knights laze about if all the work gets done by minors or the more focused and accomplished senior knights with Visions. That's a wonky structure for sure. Guy tells us that he became a squire at 16 and still has the boring job of guarding the back gates despite repeatedly showing signs of great dissatisfaction. I wouldn't be surprised if he betrays us later or something, honestly. Maybe Kaeya is preparing him for double agent work, who knows. Right now he has no opportunities for climbing the career ladder to take better care of his sick father, stuck in a pointless job for months. And that's a talented and focused young man! what about regular folk? Well. In the end, regular people have several options. They can give up and overwork themselves while spending nights looking for coins in the wishing fountain to try and scrape enough for their sister’s medicine. They can go to the Adventurers' Guild which has highly dangerous commissions with the most profitable ones taken on by Fischl and other professionals, hardly a dependant job for a regular person. There’s also Church which we know very little about. Likely it's dependant on taxes and donations and it’s the one organization that cares about the orphans of the city (no, keeping Klee in solitary doesn’t count as caring, Knights of Favonius!). There’s Springvale for hunters, farmers and chefs, a difficult lifestyle to maintain when the hunting grounds are in one of the Four Winds’ domains with strangely intelligent wolves.  And then there’s the other more accessible and obvious option! You guessed it, it’s crime!!  And there it is, the reason why there's such a big problem with bandits and overworked people in Mondstadt :)  Honestly after writing all that down, if I were to RP a normal person in Mondstadt I’d try to get into the Treasure Hoarders guild at like 5 years old I think. Better than standing around watching random people kill my pigeons anyway. Tbh this is less of a 'makes you think huh!!' take and more of a commendation towards the writers of the game. They obviously have a more conservative outlook if they're so keen on condemning the thieves who have to steal in order to survive, but the world itself makes a lot of sense. It makes the game a lot of fun to explore.

[rayshippouuchiha]

I just had an au idea that I fucking love already. Bnha au where quirkless discrimmination is, like really, really bad. Izuku is there when the laws get tighter, when everything gets worse. When he’s young the discrimination was bad because everyone knew he was quirkless and his mother was “overprotective”abusive. He doesn’t stand up for himself, he accepts it. (Deep down he’s so angry he can barely breath, he’s so angry he wants to scream, he wants to rip and claw and scratch until everything stops. But he doesn’t because he’s quirkless, worthless, a deku. Deep down though he knows the consequences if he does. Deeper down he knows he could get away with if he really tried.)

He wants to be a hero more then anything. He holds that dream close and closer and closer until it slips through his fingers like everything else.

He doesn’t care about himself. He doesn’t. But when he sees someone else facing the discrimmination he faces, when he sees the world start changing to close him and those like him out. When he realises that he was lucky.

He wants to be a hero. So he becomes one. He disappears and gets a new identity. This one isn’t quirkless. He threatens, hurts, and does whatever has to be done to get where he needs to be. Then he becomes the hero he never got.

It’s starts in whispers but eventually he is known enough but not too much. He helps quirkless people. He gives them new identities, gives them fake quirks, gives them passports, gives them what they need to survive in the world.

And if that involves multilating willing participants to give them “quirks” if that means kidnapping little kids to get them away from situations they should never have been put it, if that means killing somebody that needs to be dead. Then, well. He always wanted to be a hero, and he is one now.

I don’t really know plot but I love the idea, maybe you can make an au out of it maybe not. I don’t know how the muse will take you. I have a lot more ideas but if I write them down this ask will become way to long. Sorry for errors in writing.

It’s me with the bnha au about quirkless midorya that gives other quirkless people fake identities and quirks. You haven’t even seen the earlier ask yet, but I just wanted add, because it bothered me, that I changed my mind about inko.

She would not be “overprotective” abusive. She would either be a really good mom, not the best but basically canon. Or, she would be neglectful and good at the same time. Like when she’s around him she treats him with respect and gives him love, but she isn’t often around and leaves him most of the time to his own devices. He has to learn some things young because he can’t trust that she’ll be there. But he can’t hate or think badly of her because she treats him the best out of everyone in his life and he thinks it’s the best he deserves. He’s grateful to her.

And later when he realizes how common it is for quirkless children to be killed, sold, abononed, abused by their caregivers he realizes that he was lucky. He knew it before but that’s when he knows. (While in reality all of these things are bad, maybe izuku’s situation wouldn’t require urgent removal but it still gives him issues and trauma.)

Izuku is already at the edge of going down his vigilante/criminal ways but inko dies and suddenly it’s there. Her death is basically the catalyst for Izuku diving into his new life head first because nothing is holding him back anymore.

This is my third ask talking about my bnha ‘quirkless Izuku giving other quirkless people fake quirks’ au idea.

But I just realised and could not leave those asks without it that the insporation for this au would be the amazing fics Anyone by Gentrychild (for izuku’s orginisation) and Horizon: Star Driven by RogueDruid (Icarius51) (for quirkless quirks).

Sorry if all my super long asks about this are annoying I just want to rant about one of my ideas while they are still fresh.

+ fake quirks they could create could be fake mutations. Find someone that could change someone’s eyes and find someone that could change someone’s hair permanently with their quirks or surgery. Anyway one idea I have is that the “quirk” would be a half snake mutation. They would with a quirk change the persons eyes to slits, and then cut their tongue in half so they had two half’s of a tongue (it’s a real thing look it up).

Sorry if my random rants are annoying I just never have anyone to share my ideas with and here seems like a chaotic enough place to do so while having fun and not being shamed.

~~~

I compiled them for easier consumption! And you’re absolutely not annoying darling, don’t worry about that at all!

[night-fallz]

It's getting better . . . right?

A small dive into how Damian’s life at school is.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Ao3 // Wattpad

previous II next

I'm confused (Part 2)

As Damian stepped onto the school grounds, he couldn’t help but feel a small amount of relief.

It was like school was the only place where nothing changed. Everyone treated him the same way they’ve always treated him before.

Even though Damian chose to listen to his heart, he still struggled to accept the fact that people cared for him.

The school was the only place of normalcy he had left.

Suddenly, Damian felt someone push him against a brick wall, driving him down on his knees.

He embraced the pain that he was feeling.

You wanted this.

You deserve this.

His face was forced upwards, causing his eyes to meet his tormentors.

Damian immediately noticed the face of the guy who pushed him.

Max Thornwell.

The guy was Damian’s age, 15 years old, yet he towered over Damian with a few inches.

The guy was adequate-looking. There was nothing special about him, blonde hair, brown eyes, and lean-ish build. But, the guy walked with the confidence of Superman. Like he ruled the school and no one could take the throne away from him.

Damian hated him but he didn’t say anything. He didn’t want to make the situation worse.

If he did, he would get in trouble again. And his father would send him the disappointed look that made Damian feel worthless. Then someone would make a comment about how he isn’t fit to be Robin anymore.

Damian needed to be Robin.

The feeling of freedom he felt when he put on the costume made him smile with glee.

If Damian believed in Greek mythology, Robin would be the string of his life. Take Robin away from him and he would be gone. Like a turtle retreating in his shell.

Without Robin, Damian would be a nobody with a family of somebodies.

He would be the shadow that no one notices. The one that everyone forgets. They would only realize he was there when they needed something. Or when they had a comment to make that’ll chip away the small amount of confidence he had left.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you, Wayne.” Max’s voice snarled, “Don’t tell me that you’re a pussy as well.” A cruel smirk settled in the blonde’s face as he heard the laughter of his peers echoing around him.

He kicked Damian in the stomach, causing the boy to wheeze in pain in front of the unexpected attack.

The laughter only got louder.

Tears began to form in his eyes but he refused to let them fall.

He would not cry in front of them.

Max leaned in, whispering in Damian’s ear so only he could hear what the boy was saying. “Don’t you think it’s sad that no one is defending you? Never forget the fact that no one likes you. The fact that one loves you.” he roughly shoved Damian’s shoulder, “Remember your place.”

Damian gritted his teeth. His body ached all over and it was like the headache he got a week ago came back.

He forced himself to reach for his backpack, only for someone to grab it right before his hand could even touch it.

His green eyes met cold blue ones.

Michelle Chuxtre.

Damian didn’t know much about her. But he heard many people comment about how “hot” or how “fine” she is. He guessed that she was one of those popular kids, meaning that she was probably there to have her fun at tormenting Damian.

As Damian stared at her, he understood how people could call her pretty. Her features would fit the beauty standard— blue eyes, dirty blonde hair, and a slim figure- but the mocking smirk she wore on her face made Damian feel uneasy.

It didn’t help that her eyes seemed to glint maliciously as she studied him.

She quickly glanced at the dirty backpack she was holding and her smirk only grew wider. “What are you hiding here?” she sarcastically asked, unzipping his backpack.

Damian winced, seeing all of his supplies fall on the ground.

She looked pleased with his reaction, stepping towards him, her shoe landing on one of his notebooks. “You understand why I had to do that right?” her voice was sympathetic as if she was actually sorry for her actions. “I just had to make sure you weren’t going to bomb the school or anything.”

Damian understood the implications of her sentence. She made it obvious enough so that the people around him understood it too.

Once Michelle left, the people around him soon followed. Their entertainment was done for the morning.

Even though Damian admitted that he was relieved at the fact that everything at school stayed the same, he couldn’t help but want to let a few tears fall.

You wanted this, he reminded himself, this is your fault.

As Damian struggled to get up, he noticed someone holding their hand out to him. He studied that hand for a few seconds before realizing that she wanted to help him up.

It’s probably a trick, his head supplied, she’ll probably push you back down.

Damian assumed that his head was right, so he accepted her hand wanting to get everything over with so that he could get to his classes. The girl pulled him up, kneeling and picking up the dropped objects from the ground.

He looked at her with confusion, “What are you doing?”

“Helping you.”

His voice faltered, “But why?”

She froze and turned to him.

It was the first time that Damian saw her face properly. She was new. The girl was no doubt Filipino. She had the trademark dark brown hair that glowed in the sun. Though, he could see that she had blonde highlights as well. Her eyes were the same as her hair. At first glance, you would believe that they were black yet in the sun, they were a beautiful golden color. She also had the same tone of skin as him.

Judging by the uniform she was wearing, she was going to be attending school with him. Meaning that they would be the only two people that weren’t white in the building.

“Because you needed help.” the girl firmly said. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” he winced in pain as he tried to walk, “I’m used to it.”

I asked for it.

“That’s not something you should get used to,” she firmly said, handing him the dirty backpack.

“Thank you.” He muttered softly.

“You’re welcome.” The dark-haired girl gave him a bright smile, “I’m Auda. Auda Arison.”

He returned it with a hesitant smile, “I’m Damian.” he repeated her gesture. “Damian Wayne.”

“Well, it’s nice to meet you Damian.” she looked around, realizing that there wasn’t another person in sight. “Since there’s no one else here, can you show me where the office is?”

Damian only nodded, walking forward as he gestured for the Filipino to follow him.

As they walked in, eyes seemed to follow them. Damian ignored them, used to people watching and silently critiquing his every move.

His eyes glanced at the girl walking beside him and she seemed deep in thought. She probably wasn’t aware of the eyes watching her.

They walked to the office in comfortable silence.

“Thank you”. she said when they arrived at the front.

“You’re welcome.” With those final words, he walked away, not bothering to give the girl a second glance.

—

Lunch was Damian’s least favorite part of the school day. He had no friends, so he had no one to sit with

And there was always a chance that someone would accidentally spill their food and beverage over him.

Damian wondered how his family would react if they found out what the kids in the school were doing.

Would they care?

Damian likes to think so.

But, his brain told him, they probably don’t.

Why can’t you just shut up for once? His heart complained.

Because you guys are acting stupid. It insisted. They don’t care. And they don’t!

Yes, they do!

No, they don’t.

Yes, they do!

No-

Yes!

His brain sighed, They only act as they care. It’s probably another scheme for them to humiliate and hurt you.

You’re wrong. His heart argued.

I hope so. His head resigned, I really do.

Damian’s back slumped against the wall, unable to focus on the book he was reading.

Did he make the wrong choice when he gave his brothers a chance?

Hopefully not.

He liked hanging out with them. He liked how they included him in things. And he liked how they don’t only talk to each other, so he could get insulted.

Damian felt someone grab the book from his hand.

What the-

Laughter echoed around the room as he felt water drip into his shirt. He shot up from his chair, trying to figure out what just happened.

His eyes analyzed the room. The librarian was gone and a crowd of 6 people was crowding him.

He notices that Max was holding his book, flipping through the pages before throwing it to one of his friends.

“Are you planning on bombing the school or something?” Max taunted him.

Damian rolled his eyes, “No. That book was just in Arabic” he couldn’t help but spit it out.

Max only smirked, “So the little terrorist finally started to talk.”

Damian tried not to flinch.

No fights. He reminded himself. Father will take Robin away.

Damian took a step back, hoping that Max would see it as him giving up.

It worked.

The boy’s face stretched into a victorious grin. “For a Wayne, you sure are pathetic.”

Someone held Damian’s arms so that he couldn’t run as Max walked slowly forward.

Like a predator stalking his prey.

Damian didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t just break away from his peer’s grip. But if he stayed, he would be left at Max’s mercy.

He scared Damian in a way that no villain ever could.

When Damian fought a criminal, he usually knew what the outcome would be. He would either live or he would die.

And he was fine with that.

But socializing?

It wasn’t his territory.

Damian was created to be a perfect clone of Batman. He was raised to be a warrior. He was raised to fight.

To kill.

Damian didn’t know how to interact with people properly. He only somewhat understands social cues when it comes to manipulation. But when he opens his mouth, he would have no filter.

And why should he?

That’s how he was raised.

And he was trying so hard to change.

In galas, he could put on the act that people wanted to see.

He would be Damian Wayne, the adorable, intelligent, charming, heartthrob son of Bruce Wayne.

He would play it nice, entertain the ones older than him with his vibrant eyes and appealing smiles. Ignoring how they seemed to eye his skin with distaste.

He would pretend that he didn’t hear whispers of how he would be the perfect Wayne if it wasn’t for his skin color.

He would pretend that it didn’t hurt because they didn’t say it right to his face.

But at school?

People didn’t try to hide what they thought of it.

They acted like everything they did to him was justified.

It didn’t help that Damian never tried to fit in with them. He distanced himself, speaking coldly to anyone that approached him.

The students began to dislike him pretty quickly. In their eyes, Damian should’ve felt lucky that they had even given him a chance.

In Damian’s eyes, they were racist. It wasn't that hard to tell. Everyone at the school was white— teachers, students, janitors— you name it. And from how they treated Damian on his first few days, they also had a white-savior mentality.

Growing up, Damian was taught the stereotypes people had regarding their race.

It wasn’t pretty.

Damian remembered staying up late in the small space he called home, wondering how people could assume such horrible things towards a group of people because of another man’s crime.

It wasn’t fair.

But even at his young age, Damian knew that nothing in life was fair.

And he accepted that.

So Damian stayed, pretending that he couldn’t break out of his peer’s grip. Max’s brown eyes met him maliciously.

He held his hand out and someone handed him Damian’s book.

“How much do you like this book?”

Damian refused to answer.

“Answer me, brat.”

“That book does not hold any value to me.” Damian spat out.

“I don’t believe you.”

Couldn’t he just get it over with?

Max glared at Damian, unsatisfied with his reaction. He threw the book on the ground as he stormed out, his goons quickly following.

Damian let out a sigh of relief as soon as they were out of sight. He picked up his book, inspecting it carefully.

He needed to make sure that the book was unharmed. It was the one thing that his mom had given him before she quickly tossed Damian away like trash.

Stupid. He scolded himself, you should’ve known better than to bring a prized possession to school.

The bell rang and he quickly hid the book in his backpack, not noticing how a girl pocketed her phone with narrowed eyes.

—

Damian would like to say that no one else bothered him for the rest of the day. But that would be a lie.

His lockers were filled with more sickening messages and everywhere he went, glares and whispers seemed to follow him.

He just wanted to go home.

He wanted to be Robin.

No, he needed to be Robin.

He just wanted to get away from the school.

He didn’t think that he bothered anyone today. All he did was defend himself against Max.

Was that so bad?

Everything we do seems to be bad. His heart couldn't help but whisper.

His brain didn’t argue.

[why-this-kolaveri-machi]

we are our family, even if we don’t want to be.

Titans 3.07

a bit over halfway through the season, and we still don’t have all of our main characters on the board! i love this show.

as always, typing this up as i watch. live reaction, baby! *shadowboxes*

SPOILERS AHEAD

1. i don’t think i’ve mentioned this before, but i kinda miss the old ‘dc universe’ intro. it was cool! the whole idea of it was wild and waaaaay over-ambitious, but also very very on-brand because of it.

2. this is... the third time we’ve seen dick sleeping this season? that’s a record! checking another thing off my s3 wishlist...

2.5. i guess i rag on titans all the time for its wafer-thin plotting and bad pacing, but i have to admit that this season has been a step-up from the last one in this regard. titans has very reactive rather than proactive protagonists, and a lot of the last season seemed to be: x happened, the team reacted badly, then y happened, they reacted badly, etc. this time around, it’s not a huge leap up by any means, but at least they’re doing something about it. 

i do appreciate the focus on character arcs over everything else. and when i say everything else, i mean it: arcs that started two seasons ago with no big cathartic moments, intermittent payoff and multiple relapses. big bads have ranged from interdimensional demons to superpowered assassins to whatever in the world scarecrow is, but trigon’s big weapon against the titans was to... use their worst fears against them. slade’s was to... use their fears to break them up. crane’s is to... use red hood to use their fears to break them up. even the threat of gotham’s citizens being in danger doesn’t feel real: gotham is mythologised into an entity of its own, infecting our heroes like a parasite. like. this is not to say that most other superhero media aren’t big character arcs intertwined with the main plot, but titans doesn’t even make pretend that it’s anything but.

anyway. that’s my entry #2345 to ‘give a grand unifying theory for titans’. thanks. i’ll be back with more.

3. “anger is just fear in a little black dress.” god I HATE HIM

(what’s he doing with barbara’s likeness? oh... oh god. a terrible thought just occurred to me. what if they introduce hush at the very last minute for plastic surgery shenanigans? would you put it past this show?)

3.5. jason, nooooooooo

3.75. i mean, they’re making it very clear here that scarecrow is the one in control--the one who’s always been in control--and is manipulating jason and literally poisoning him, but i hope it doesn’t end up erasing nuance or jason’s autonomy. if jason’s to reckon with the issues that brought him here, then the lines of responsibility will need to be set somewhere. 

(this applies to dick as well but more on that later, i guess.)

4. just--the phrase “40% loss of income” is so funny to me. like, gotham is full of these larger-than-life characters who are idiosyncratic beyond belief, colourful and dramatic and creating chaos just for the sake of chaos, and then there’s the regular criminals and their henchmen who just want to make a quick buck sitting down with pie charts and graphs, griping about the joker reducing their returns or debating high risk investments in, i don’t know, two-face’s next scheme.

“yyyyeeeeeaaah, my financial advisor is telling me that going all-in with a guy who literally makes decisions on the flip of a coin is probably not the greatest idea.”

4.5. god i hate smug!smarmy!scarecrow so much

4.85. as big plans to “control” gotham go, it’s pretty bog-standard. clearly scarecrow has some bigger plan in mind but it really feels like we’ve got no clear insight into him and he’s this generic creepy mystery-man who knows more than he lets on and springs a twist/cliffhanger every now and then. i liked the scenes with him and dick in 3.04 where it seemed like he was genuinely on the backfoot and things weren’t going as he predicted. for all of his faults, dick is at least familiar with scarecrow’s bullshit and knows not to give what he wants.

5. i mean... i see where dick is coming from with the “he’s not jason anymore; he’s red hood” because his immediate glaring concern is scarecrow’s drug and the damage it could potentially cause gotham? i do not doubt that it’s something batman drilled into him, too, but when you’re expected to take point on a situation where the lives of an entire city weigh down on your shoulders, it’s better to simplify things and prioritise. i’m not saying it’s great or healthy! gar is absolutely right to consider this facet of the situation. it’s just dick can’t.

6. hmmmmmmm. HMMMMMMMMMMM. 

i don’t know that i’m super fond of this iteration of oracle???? it looks like a cross between cerebro from x-men and jarvis from iron man. it’s giving me second-hand embarrassment. somebody help me.

(at least they remembered dick’s middle name is actually “john”. i like to think bruce printed D in that contract because for a while he genuinely thought richard “dick” grayson was his full name. duck duck goose, dick dick grayson, i don’t know alfred, the kid was in a circus, maybe they thought it was funny. or maybe it was a test in anger control, who knows.)

6.5 “maybe you two would like some time alone?” even AI can’t help hitting on dick grayson in this universe.

“oh mr grayson, if i only had another eye to see you better...”

6.8. on one hand, it’s a bit disconcerting that the title of ‘oracle’ has gone from barbara herself to this gigantic machine; from my impression of the comics-verse, barbara had an extensive computing and surveillance system, true, but she was very clearly the brains behind the operation. on the other hand, i’m kind of glad that the ethical boundaries that this kind of surveillance violates is a sticking point for barbara. (tho let’s be real, the nsa would kill to have this in their arsenal).

6.9. also it’s now obvious that scarecrow’s big plan is to take control of oracle itself. it’s why he had lady vic take that picture of her eyes, or why he’s meddling around with it on his computer.

6.95. if only i could ‘command sleep’ anybody overstepping their boundaries re: personal information...

7. “you can just sit back and watch as the titans destroy themselves.” i mean... he’s not wrong

8. “dick’s parents were killed by a criminal mob; he won’t work with them.” it’s wonderful that you have this insight into dick, kory, i just wish we could’ve watched some of these conversations actually happen on-screen.

8.5. i’m glad that kom’s being treated with such nuance and understanding, though it’s obvious that she definitely has a Plan of her own. (and did i entirely imagine her ability to mimic other people flawlessly at the end of s2? or is that going to come into play at some point?) i think her story has the potential to be genuinely poignant, and in a universe where being Different, either because of mental health or physical differences or whatever else, leads a straight line to Evil, it’s important to acknowledge and then emphasise that the mere fact of your existence as a Different Person doesn’t predispose you to evil. maybe your act of destroying a system that has destroyed you and not scrambling to “fit in” is only evil as defined by that system. 

8.8. “you’re trespassing, i should call the authorities, i feel unsafe.” now this is a villain lady who’s definitely aware of her privilege.

8.85. kom smirking knowingly at her sister is everything.

“oooh that’s the kory i remember”

9. conner and dick working together woo!

9.25. god i hate a villain who’s always just a step ahead, no matter what. so crane anticipated dick using oracle to track his personal communications and set him up? how did he know when exactly dick would get to do this? how long did he have that poor man tied up in that van?

(the “save me, grayson” is a nice touch, tho. send dick spiralling even further! because if there’s one thing dick will do, it’s take responsibility for every goddamn thing that goes wrong.)

9.5. ahem. i’m going to need a million gifs of conner yeeting dick across that yard, fandom, thankyouverymuch.

(i understand conner is invulnerable to explosions, but how do his clothes survive??)

9.8. oooh crane is already in oracle! i’m just sitting here laughing helplessly because they’re overpowering this goddamned guy so much. he can build a lab in arkham’s basement! he has access to lazarus puddles! he has minions working across gotham, including a fully functional chemical laboratory staffed by chemists who only answer to him! he has the crime families of gotham quailing in his very presence! he has assassins at his beck and call! he’s enough of a manipulative bastard to have red hood under his thumb! and now he has enough of a tech know-how to not only be aware of oracle, but know how to hack into it! i’m sick of exclamation marks! i’ll shut up now!

9.95. dick leaving behind that smouldering grave for a person he failed to save without taking a second to process how he feels about it and running towards his next plan to corner scarecrow: a microcosm of where his head’s at right now.

10. really hammering in the themes of this season, aren’t we. 

10.25. the interesting thing is the titans repeatedly call themselves a family this season (none more so than dick) and while that found family has helped encapsulate and put away their traumatic experiences with their ‘original’ families, it’s meant that they’ve not really dealt with those issues. and dick and gar and jason come from ‘found families’ of their own: they are twice removed, traumatised two times over. they still cling to this identity however, and because of it they’re losing each other. a family isn’t static. it’s an ever-evolving dynamic and you have to put in work constantly to keep it healthy.

10.5. anyway, that’s entry #2346. i’m here aaaalll night.

11. lookit gar the detective! half-transforming and using his powers to deduce things! what a hero! i’ve said this for a long time, but gar is the bedrock of this team, and an unsung one at that.

11.25. i’m confused about him calling this room jason’s though. it seems to me that this is dick’s room that jason later used, and one that dick’s using now. so the unmade bed isn’t really jason’s fault; dick was woken by barbara that morning, and in his hurry, he left without making his bed.

(it still confounds me that bruce didn’t find jason another bedroom in that gigantic mansion of his. you really didn’t give this kid a chance, did you?)

12. oh well. so much for the oracle.

13. ... sorry, wait. you didn’t think i wasn’t going to address the bit with dick right now, did you?

12.5. i honestly don’t think it’s very complicated: dick’s been reeling from one traumatic thing to the next, and just when it seemed like at the beginning of the season, he felt happy and secure with his team and his place in the world, bruce ups and leaves gotham to him, specifically naming him a successor and calling him a ‘better batman’. he’s lost garth and jericho and donna and jason and now hank and dawn. he’s not even sure where rachel is or what she’s doing. after being told that batman was a psychopath for moulding him into a weapon, he’s also been told that his failure to be a ‘better batman’ lead to further disaster. of course he’s going to get batman-goggles. of course he’s going to be a prick. 

12.8. i don’t know what to say. i feel his frustration acutely. i don’t think he should’ve said what he said to barbara (can people stop pushing her around this season????) but that pressure to step in where your parent fails? to clean up their messes and try to think like them? to fall into habits drilled into you when you developed them as coping mechanisms growing up? I FEEL THAT. 

every step he’s taking he’s putting 110% of himself in it and scarecrow’s still playing mindgames with all of them: i absolutely feel his desperation to take control of that game and turn it on scarecrow, no matter what it takes.

and he did apologise almost immediately, and finally--finally--actually works with barbara. 

12.9. again, not excusing him! but i get it. and i think that’s a sign of great character writing.

“did you know i just reminded emmram of all of her daddy issues? what the fuck????”

12.95. i love that dick&barbara, kory&kom, and gar are all approaching solving this mystery from different angles, each as valid as the other. also, conner is there as... emergency bomb defuser man?

13. it’s like all fancy rich people in fancy rich houses do is pour fancy rich alcohol into fancy rich glasses on pristine, untouched tabletops. i wonder what it’s like to live like that.

13.25. I KNEW IT! poor michael. it was nice knowing you.

13.5. man, kory is contending with a lot of issues that she’s successfully bottled up and compartmentalised until now. the cold reality that a child can seek out their parents as refuge and they can view the child as a piece to be moved in a greater game (never out of cruelty, though, never, and somehow that makes it worse), that truth of blackfire’s treatment on tamaran because she’s different, and her own culpability in what happened. she exchanged one family for another, after all, and left that family to die and her sister to suffer. like dick, like gar, kory’s being forced to reckon with what the titans are meant to be, the larger implications of creating their found family in their own space.

14. it’s probably because it’s one in the morning and i’ve had two glasses of wine but i did not follow that bit of exposition at all and victor freeze??? what? 

anyway. look at them solving things! together! go team!

“you made a deal with the mob?” oh the sense of betrayal on his face! fuck off, dick, your issues aren’t kory’s. 

15. conner is really sweet and a bit of an awestruck crush on kom is to be expected. especially after that power rangers-esque transformation (i say this as a former huge power rangers fangirl. i’ve seen every series until 2007 including the original japanese versions and written fanfic for all of them. so i love a cool costume transformation, is what i’m saying.)

also?

FUCK YEAH

16. i love the gotham crime families just chillin’ around eating ice cream. I LOVE THEM

16.5. that was a fun fight sequence, if marred slightly by that bit of awkward flirting between conner and kom. i wonder if she’s really planning to use him in a larger scheme to get kory back to tamaran, or maybe something else. 

16.75. so i’m assuming that scarecrow has jason either so paralysed by fear that he can barely move, or jason’s withdrawing from the drug that he’s been sucking in every few minutes. 

17. it’s nice to see them chill after a successful mission! and it can be awkward, but conner’s crush on kom and him striving to impress her is also, well, uh... cute.

17.5. i guess the dick/barbara scene was inevitable, especially given the... unresolved nature of their relationship in the flashbacks? and they’ve been through a rollercoaster together this episode, discovering and then destroying an incredible tool within a matter of hours, re-discovering just how well they work together as a team. dick’s swimming in the nostalgia. i don’t expect it to last as a long-term relationship, but i totally get why this is happening now. and hey, they’re cute!

i have a weeeirrrrd feeling that kory is going to leave to tamaran at the end of the season and that dick and kory will rekindle--or rather realise--their relationship just before that. it’s going to be devastating and beautiful and painful and i will be writing essays about it which would be me just wailing into the screen.

18. gar found molly!!!!!!! MOLLY’S BACK! \o/ gar is the BEST

19. that was a fun episode! i love this silly show, even if it does destroy me sometimes <3

[similartendencies]

I think I had some kind of revelation and it's made me come to terms with the fact that I have and have had violent urges almost my entire life. I used to cut and hit myself because I was violent to myself. I used to tear apart my room because I was violent towards the world. I've fantasized and plotted ways to hurt people. I never did hurt anybody except out of defense, and I never followed through with my plans. But I think one of the reasons I've been so self-restrained and self-controlled as a person is because I had to be to not hurt people. There were times I had the upper hand, standing above someone holding something heavy, or next to someone I hated holding something sharp. and it took every ounce of me to not follow through. In those moments my entire body was screaming to do it, my teeth would grind my muscles would tense. I would be shaking and not with nerves or adrenaline but literally by the sheer amount of physical restraint I was practicing against myself. I remember a bully in math class made me snap and I knocked over my desk and screamed at her some version of shut up at the top of my lungs, and in the same movement stood inches away from her with my arms raised above my head, textbook in hands, ready to strike as hard as I could, fuming. She tried to laugh but I could see that she was terrified and the entire class was frozen in an instant, even the teacher. It was frozen because I froze myself, mid swing. Everyone was waiting for the pin to drop.

I talk about my low empathy with friends sometimes. It never seems to them like a big deal, I'm kind and loving and understanding. But I do have low empathy, and it plays into these thoughts too. A lot of times I would restrain myself not because I cared about the harm I could cause someone else but that I would suffer for the decision. The only thing that would keep me was thinking about jail or prison or parole. I didn't care that their families would be upset or grieve them. I almost found further satisfaction from the thought of hurting many by hurting the one. But even at the end of that, the thought of their pain never registered in any meaningful way. The less I liked someone the more I was happy to see them hurting.

But it always felt like if I let go once it would never stop and I didn't want to open that door because it scared me and that wasn't the person I wanted to be. I honestly just wanted to be left alone, to be treated fairly. It felt like self stabbing. Someone would give me a reason to hurt them, and with all of my resistance I turned it inward and acted upon myself instead. I let myself be the victim of my thoughts instead of someone else. The feelings of anger were so strong and so loud that I felt I had no other choice but to inflict on myself what I wanted to inflict on them. I did a decent job of not internalizing a lot of what fucked me up, but I did act upon it. I never self harmed over sadness, it was always anger.

If I had been born with a tenth less common sense and a tenth more impulsiveness, and less of an inkling to get medicated, I would for sure have a violent criminal record. I think the damage I could've caused as a kid alone might've pushed me into adult trial. I never wanted to just give somebody a black eye, I wanted them to be unrecognizable. And as an adult I wanted to kill, and I don't mean that lightly, I really wanted to kill. Violently and messily and angrily. Not generally, just towards very specific people who hurt me or others I loved. There were times I absolutely should've been hospitalized for how close I was getting to acting out my fantasies and how close I was to losing my control.

Over the years my anger has dulled and my medication has made dealing with impulsive thoughts and decisions easier and I'm out of the situations that pushed me to the edge. I don't have violent urges anymore.

I just feel like I need to give myself the recognition of how severe my mental illness has been. It feels the same as ignoring or dismissing if you had been suicidal for 10+ years. I have been homocidal. I have had homicidal ideation. I have had violent thoughts and urges. I feel like violent thoughts aren't talked about in mental health conversations, or if they are it's vague. I'm definitely not a poster child but I think maybe it feels important to me that I claim this part of me and understand how it's shaped me and accept it for as bad as it was and not dismiss the feelings as justified. Maybe something could justified, but the intrusive thoughts of picturing someone die by my hands were distressing in themselves. And I need to accept that they distressed me and scared me, and also that I enjoyed them and took comfort in them too. In the way someone who's suicidal takes comfort by imagining ending their life.

I also feel like stepping into new medias and rewatching old ones with this new lense regarding a deep part of who I am, could prove to be healing and cathartic for me. The stars are kind of aligning for me to start getting into horror movies, which is a genre I avoided in it's entirety my whole life. Maybe it could give me some relief from those tight angry pent up emotions to see things acted out on screen and know that that'll never be me.

[arwenaminwho]

Trust

Hey guys! I know it's been a while since I shared a story, and I said I would but with quarantine my will to write something was gone. But now I am back and I will try to write more. (Maybe the next one will be about LOTR or HP idk) 

So here’s my second Bruce Wayne story. This is my thirth English story (English is not my native language) so I’m really sorry if I did any mistakes I tried my best.  And I don’t know much about American law system or the terms, so forgive me if I did any mistakes. Thank you for the ones who read and I would really, really appreciate if you guys give me feedback! Enjoy! (I hope.)

 Batman x Female!Reader  Angst! Fluff!

Word count: 2,913

The sky was beginning to darken to remind people that it was finally time to leave the work behind and go home to rest. But not everyone had that chance. It was hard to be a lawyer in Gotham with endless crimes and villains, and because of that law workers and police couldn't have a chance to rest even if their work hours passed. (y/n) were one of them.

It was a very busy week in the law office where you were working as a prosecutor, and the case you have been working on for a long time was your biggest fish. You were preparing to sue the biggest mobster in Gotham city, David Harden. You can't put him behind the bars by yourself but you had the help of an unexpected person. The Dark Knight.

Thanks to him, a lot of Gotham's criminals were behind the bars and the ones who didn't either quit their illegal jobs or became smarter and more dangerous. But non of them could escape the wrath of the prince of Gotham.

You were working with Batman for almost two years. You helped him with a case that he was working with Commissioner Gordon and after that day he didn't hesitate to ask for your help, and you helped him gladly. He was bringing you pieces of evidence and you would take them to court. You were his legal partner, but even you worked with him for two years, you didn't know his real identity.

You walk off from your office to reach the rooftop of your building to meet with him. When you get out of the elevator, you threw yourself into the windy weather outside and waited on the rooftop of the skyscraper. After a couple of minutes, you heard a noise and headed that way. And you saw him hiding in the shadows, looking to you.

"Good night." You told him, wanting to start conservation, but you didn't think that it would happen because after two years you know that he wasn't much of a talker.

He nods his head to greet you in return.

"Did you bring the files I asked you for?" you asked.

He nods his head again and handed the files to you. You take them from him and started to examine them.

"These will do the trick for the first couple of hearings, but I need more."

"I will get them to you. You go to your home, rest. I'll do my part."

"Okay. Tomorrow there will be a closed hearing at noon. Should I let you know how it went?"

"No. I have my ways. I'll know."

You snorted.

"Of course you will."

He looked at you and started to walk to the edge of the building.

"I'll reach you when I gather the evidence."

"Ok. See you." And he jumped.

"I don't think I can get used to seeing this," You mumbled to yourself.

After putting the files into your office and hide them, You went to your car to go home. While you drive your phone rang.

"Hey."

"Hi, beautiful. How was your day?"

The caller was your boyfriend, Bruce Wayne. You met with him on a charity event, and you were prejudiced against him because of the things people were talking about him but after spending time with him you saw he had a good heart but trying to mask it with his playboy persona, you didn't know why he did it but you wanted to give him a chance and now you’ve been dating for six months. And you loved him.

"It was tiring. How about you?"

"Same. I've missed you."

"Oh, I missed you too, but I have a trial tomorrow. I have to go home and work."

"It's fine, I'll see you tomorrow then."

"OK. See you."

"Be careful. See you too."

---------------------------------------------------------------

The next day, It was dark when you exited the court. The trial started at noon and took all of your days, but you were successful and David Harden was going to be in prison until the whole court ends and can’t be bailed out.

As you started to walk towards your car in narrow streets you couldn't help yourself to feel scared. Gotham was dangerous at night. You felt relieved after you get inside of your car and when you putting your purse to your next seat, you notice a letter. You wondered how it got in as your blood run cold.

 Drop the case, or we will drop your body to dumpsters.

 You officially got threatened by mobsters. This wasn't happening for the first time. You were a prosecutor and the threat was a common thing. But you couldn't help yourself to feel scared because of the note that somehow got inside of your car.

You couldn't know what to do but to go to the safety of your home. You would think something to deal with it once you got there.

"What should I do?" You thought. Of course, you weren't going to drop the case but you thought if you should let Gordon or anyone else know about this threat. But they could make you drop the case for your protection. You didn't want that. You weren't a coward. And Batman was trusting you. You decided to keep this threat as a secret.

Your door ranged while you lost in your thoughts. You got up to see who it was. It was Bruce.

"Hey." You smiled.

"What are you doing here?"

He laughed, "Why? Do you want me to leave?"

"Of course not. I just got surprised."

He bends to kiss you, " I know it's late but, I wanted to see you. How was the court?"

"It was fine, he'll be in prison forever if it continues like this." You smiled. You both started to walk to the living room.

"Are you okay?" He asked you worriedly like he sensed something. You took a second to think if you want to tell him or not. He was Bruce Wayne. Carefree, rich. He was known to have parties until morning before he meets you. He was a playboy. An even if you know him he was more than that, that he was a good person you couldn't help to feel insure to tell him this. It felt like if you tell him he wouldn't want to deal with mobsters threatening you, and leave. And you didn't want that.

I can deal with this by myself, or tell him later. You thought. And you decided not to tell him.

"I'm fine, just a bit tired."

"Even tired of this?" He said while making a move to kiss you. You kissed him back. He seemed like dropped to question you about your mood. You pulled him towards to couch, he smiled. You missed him, and he seemed like he missed you too. You continued to make out and forget about everything else but Him.

 ---------------------------------------------------------------

You opened your eyes with the light of the sun shining through the window. As you trying to wake up, you notice a letter on your nightstand. It's been two weeks when you first receive your threatening letter and you keep having them. But they always came to your office or your mailbox, and now somebody gets into your house and put it next to you while you sleep. This made you feel uneasy. They could've killed you so easily. You trembled with fear and start packing. You thought it was normal treats that you always had, but this time these were serious.

You found yourself a hotel room, in the cities most popular one. You though with crowed they wouldn't dare to come close to you. Maybe it was stupid, but you didn't know what to do. You still didn't tell anything to Bruce or Gordon or Batman and now when you realize how dangerous it was you were certain wasn't going to stay at Bruce's home. You wanted to ask for help from Batman, but passed two weeks you didn't see him, and your only way to reach him was bat light. But you didn't want to use it just for your own sake. It felt selfish. With these thoughts, you went to work and work until evening. You were still considering contacting Batman, but you wanted to wait just for a night. You could tell him tomorrow. While thinking these, you went to your car, just as you approached it, you were startled by the sound from come from your behind. As you turn to that direction to see the source you fell with force coming to your face. Somebody punched you.

"What the hell!" you screamed.

"We told you to drop the case, you stupid whore!" said a man with a black mask, you couldn't saw his face and he wasn't alone. Somebody came from your behind and kick you. You fall to the ground again as you were trying to get up. They continued punching and kicking you, you felt your whole body aching. You were getting threat letters for two weeks and didn't do anything about it, so you shouldn't be surprised that this was happening to you. You couldn't do anything else but to cry as they kept hitting you. Your vision became blurry.

"You will drop that case, let this be a lesson to you, or we'll kill you next time." Some of them said while kicking you for the last time. You couldn't find the energy to answer him, and everywhere went dark.

---------------------------------------------------------------  

You opened your eyes to the hospital. Your thoughts were blurry, as you shifted on your bed to understand what happened you saw a man sleeping on the bedside chair. It was Bruce. When you see him you remembered what happened, that you got beaten in an alley. While you tried to straighten up Bruce hurried to help you while sitting up instantly. You woke him up.

"Let me help." He said while holding your back.

"It's fine." You said, finally finding a comfortable position.

"Are you okay? Wait here, I will inform the doctors that you woke up." He seemed anxious.

"Where can I go?" you said while watching him leave the room.

After he came with the doctor, he told you about your condition, you had a concussion and several injuries at your arms and legs. Your face and your all of your body had bruises all over. After the doctor left you could finally look at Bruce carefully. He looked very tired and sad. He looked like he wasn't sleeping or shaving for days. He sits at your bed side chair quietly and looks at you with tearful eyes.

"What happened?" he asked you quietly.

"I-ı. How did I get here?"

"Batman brought you here apparently, they called me after they treat you."

"Batman?"

"Yes. Several people saw him bringing you here. What happened? Are you going to tell me?"

"I got beaten in an alley, that's what happened." You said bluntly.

He holds his breath, I could sense that he was becoming tense. He clung his teeth.

"Why? This doesn't look like a mugger's job."

"It wasn't." You said feeling a bit ashamed.

"It was the mob that I was suing." He looked at me with a shocked face.

"What?"

"They were threatening me to give up the case, but I didn't, so they give me a little warning."

"Why didn't you told me anything?" he said angrily while looking at you with disappointed eyes.

"I-I don't know. I got scared."

"From what?" he asked me with a demanding voice.

"You."

"Me?" he looks at me bewildered.

"That you don't want to deal with the threats and everything, and leave. And I'm a prosecutor, I got threats all the time, I can't tell you about all of them. I thought you would get bored with all of this."

He looked at my face brokenhearted.

"I won't leave you. Especially because of this! I am Bruce Wayne, I get threats all the time, why would I leave you because you do too? Do you think so low of me?"

You felt so ashamed, he's eyes were looking at you so broken, you hated yourself at that moment for not trusting him enough.

"I'm sorry. Of course, I don't. Please forgive me." He looked at my face deeply.

"I should be asking your forgiveness, not to make you trust me enough, for not protecting you."

"Please, Bruce, don't blame yourself. What happened has happened, I just have to find a way to make it not happen again without leaving my case."

"Are you thinking continuing that case? After all of this?"

"Of course I am, I'm not a quitter."

He smiled at you.

"I now." He said while looking at your eyes.

"I love you." He said. You felt like you can burst into tears.

"I love you too."

After you leave the hospital Bruce didn't let you go to your home, you were still hurt and needed help, and there was a mob still trying to harm you.

Bruce brought you to his penthouse, he and Alfred have practically cosseted you. You were grateful for the love that you were receiving. And still feeling a little ashamed for not trusting him completely.

"How do you feel? Are you in pain?" he asked you while coming inside the room. He was holding a silver tray full of delicious-looking food.

"I feel fine, I don't have pain. Thank you." You said while straightened up. You took the tray from him. You were starving.

"Don't forget to take your pills after you eat." He said while giving you the pills. You smiled at him.

"Are you going somewhere?" He was wearing his suit.

"Oh, yes. They called me from the police station, they found a new lead about who could do this to you. And there is a couple of forms that you need to sign, I will bring them to you."

"You don't have to do that." He cares for you warmed your heart.

"I don't want to hear this anymore. I want to do everything I can do for you." You smiled at him and take his hand.

"Isn't it late for this? It's almost past evening."

"I don't know. Commissioner Gordon called me. I won't be late." He kissed your lips.

"Okay. I'll be waiting."

After Bruce left you ate your food and opened a movie on the TV that was in the room. It was almost becoming night. After some time you get bored and decided to go to the kitchen to have some dessert. After you went to the kitchen to look for it, you heard some noises on the terrace.

"It must be Alfred." You said to yourself and went to check. After you go outside, you saw a man standing in the shadows. It was Batman.

"What are you doing here?" you asked him in surprise, you haven't seen him since before the incident.

"I came to check you."

"Bruce said, you were the one who found me in the alley. Is it true?"

He looked at my eyes deeply while coming closer.

"Yes. I thought you were dead."

You didn't know what to say.

"You said the police that there is a mob against you. That you were treated."

"Yes. Only to Gordon, I don't trust anyone else. Where did you learn this?"

"I have my ways."

There was silence for a few seconds.

"Why didn't you tell me that you get threatened?" he asked me as if he isn't sure to ask me or not.

"Don't you trust me?"

"What? No. I didn't talk about it to anyone. I didn't care about it at the beginning, then I get a note from them in my bedroom one morning. Then I realized how serious it could be and move to a Hotel. But they found me in the evening after the court."

"Did they get into your house?" he asked me in an enraged voice.

"Yes, but I didn't saw them, they could've killed me if they wanted to. I think they just wanted me to scare. And they did after some point." you confessed.

"I was going to tell you, but I didn't see you anywhere."

"I was trying to find evidence fort he case as you asked. You could've used the bat light." He snapped.

"I didn't what to use it for an unimportant situation."

He looks at me astonished.

"You are not unimportant." He said angrily.

You couldn't know what to say as he came closer to you. There was something familiar in his gestures that you can't put your finger on. He stopped when he came before you. He approached your face and suddenly he kissed you.

The Batman was kissing you. Your head has gone blank for a couple of seconds and after you put your thoughts together you pushed him off you.

"What are you doing?" you shouted.

"I'm kissing my girlfriend.." He said in his normal voice.

You were stunned.

"Bruce?"

"Yes. It's me. No more secrets No more trust issues. I'm with you completely."

"But, all this time you were-" He shushed you.

"We'll talk about this later. There is only one thing I want to do now."

And he leaned to your lips once again. Two-man that you were respected and adored were the same man. And just you think you couldn't love him more.