#its supposed to be uncomfortable. it will have content that may be difficult to engage in

[explorya88]

**Warning: Content Advisory**

This fanfic contains sensitive and serious themes that may be difficult for some readers. If you are uncomfortable with topics such as [Violence, moral questionable behaviors, explicit contents and many others], it's advisable to reconsider reading further. Your well-being is important to me, and i encourage you to prioritize your emotional health. Take care, and thank you for understanding.

This short tale is placed one month before the interlude.

Lust II: Maledictus Liberi (The Cursed Children), too many epithets.

In this story Dracaena is Darius and Fang (SWM MC) daughter from the future like Trunks of Dragon ball series.

Dracaena while playing Injustice: Gods Among Us, recall when she choose to merge with the seed of Divashma.

Twenty six day ago...

Dracaena: I'm here to stop the bad future to come to pass, kill Kozholok and save my parents, mommy Fang and daddy Darius, tell me how merging with you is supposing to help me?

Seed of Divashma: Young Dracaena, merging with me grants you the power to alter the course of destiny, absolute freedom from stupid things that doomed your timelines and your loved one like morality, restraints, shame. Together, we shall rewrite the future and vanquish the looming threat. Are you ready to merge with embrace this power?

The only reason that Dracaena is listen to it its because it is a gift from her father...but giving that Kozholok still on the loose she must be careful so she ask a proof of its trustyworthness so the seed of Divashma tell her to sleep so it can show her its offer to her. In the ethereal realm between dreams and reality, Dracaena found herself surrounded by swirling energies. The Seed of Divashma manifested before her in a luminous display, offering glimpses of a harmonious future. Scenes unfolded like pages of a book, showcasing a world where her parents, Fang and Darius, lived without fear, laughter echoing in a peaceful land.

Seed of Divashma: Dracaena, witness the beauty of a world untainted by Kozholok's darkness. With our union, this reality can be yours to protect and cherish.

As the visions played out, Dracaena felt a profound sense of purpose and responsibility. Yet, a flicker of doubt lingered in her mind. She questioned

Dracaena: How can I be certain these visions are not illusions? What guarantee do I have that merging with you will bring about the promised future?

Seed of Divashma: Trust is forged through experience. As we merge, you shall gain the strength to discern truth from falsehood. Together, we will navigate the currents of time and rewrite the destiny that awaits us.

Dracaena, bolstered by newfound determination, nodded in agreement. With a deep breath, she entered a state of meditation, prepared to merge her essence with the Seed of Divashma. The energies intensified, enveloping her in a cocoon of transformative power, setting in motion the journey to reshape the threads of fate, as the process of merging commenced, the Seed of Divashma resonated internally with a subtle coo, observing Dracaena's innocence and determination.

Seed of Divashma: Ah, sweet and naive, yet courage flows within her veins like a river. Little does she realize the weight of the destinies intertwined. Together, we shall navigate the currents of destiny, and in her journey, she will discover the power within her heart.

The seed of Divashma created by her father as her birthday gift, is ready to guide and witness the unfolding saga through the eyes of its chosen vessel. Dracaena still sleeping in a vivid dream, her mind conjuring up a passionate scene of intense pleasure. In her dream, Yvette and Vinca were engaged in a raw and primal display of lovemaking. Vinca's skilled tongue explored every inch of Dracaena's wet and eager pussy, flicking and teasing with a fervent desire. Meanwhile, Yvette's hands worked their magic on Dracaena's breasts, massaging, squeezing, and delivering tantalizing spanks that sent waves of pleasure coursing through her body.

Yvette (breathlessly): Mmm, Dracaena, you breasts so soft. I can't get enough of them.

Vinca (moaning): I love how you squirm and moan, my love. You're so responsive to my touch.

Dracaena (gasping): Yes, don't stop... I want more. Yvette, spank me harder. Vinca, lap up every drop of my wetness.

Yvette (grinning): You asked for it, my naughty girl.

She brings her hand down with several sharp smacks on Dracaena's breasts, leaving a delightful sting.

Vinca (licking her lips): Mmm, your juices are flowing so freely, my love. I'll taste every drop, savoring your essence.

The room was filled with the intoxicating scent of sex, punctuated by the sounds of moans and gasps of pleasure. Dracaena's senses were overwhelmed as she witnessed her wives indulging in the most intense and rough form of love, filling her mind with a mixture of desire, excitement, and a hunger for more.

Dracaena (moaning): That's it, both of you... Fuck! I'm so close. Keep going, take me over the edge.

Yvette (whispering in Dracaena's ear): We're going to make you come so hard, my love. Your pleasure is all that matters right now.

Vinca (pressing her tongue against Dracaena's clit): I can feel you tightening around me, baby. Come for us, let go.

Dracaena (crying out): Yes! Yes! Oh fuck, I'm coming!

In the passionate haze of their dream, Vinca positioned herself above Dracaena, aligning their pussies so they could rub against each other in a delicious friction. With a gentle yet firm pressure, Vinca's wetness mingled with Dracaena's, creating a tantalizing sensation that sent shivers of pleasure through both of their bodies. They moved in a rhythm, their hips grinding together, seeking more pleasure with each intimate contact. The sensation was so intense that it felt as if their bodies were merging into one, becoming lost in the intoxicating blend of desire and ecstasy.

Vinca (moaning): Oh, Dracaena, your pussy feels so fucking good against mine. I love the way our wetness mixes, creating this incredible heat between us.

Vinca's voice was filled with desire as she continued to rub herself against Dracaena, their bodies moving in sync. The sensation of their intimate connection overwhelmed her senses, heightening her pleasure with each delicious movement.

Vinca (breathlessly): Yes, baby, grind against me. Feel how our pussies slide together, how we become one in this intoxicating rhythm. I want to feel your wetness, your heat, all over me.

Her words were a mix of longing and lust, reflecting her deep yearning to be completely entwined with Dracaena. Vinca's hips gyrated with a fierce passion, seeking more delicious friction, as she lost herself in the euphoria of their shared pleasure. Vinca, wishing to give her wife true ecstasy, she tapped into her abilities to enhance Dracaena's pleasure, she order her shadow to take a tangible form, and delicately caressed Dracaena's womb, specifically targeting her ovaries. With a gentle touch, the shadow massaged and stimulated Dracaena's ovaries, intensifying her pleasure to new heights. Dracaena's moans grew louder as the combination of Vinca's grinding and the shadow's sensual touch sent waves of ecstasy coursing through her body. The sensation of her ovaries being teased heightened her pleasure, creating a unique and intoxicating experience that she had never felt before.

Vinca (whispering): Feel it, my love. Let the shadow's touch bring you to new heights of pleasure. Surrender to the sensations coursing through your body.

Dracaena's body trembled with pleasure as Vinca's shadow continued its sensual manipulation. The combination of physical and magical stimulation pushed her towards the pinnacle of pleasure, her body tensing as she approached a mind-blowing climax. Yvette, driven by her own desires, straddled Dracaena's face, positioning herself in a way that her wet and eager pussy was just inches away from Dracaena's waiting mouth. With a commanding tone, Yvette asserted her desires.

Yvette (assertively): Lick my pussy, Dracaena. Taste me. Pleasure me with your tongue.

Yvette's voice brimmed with dominance, as she took control of the moment, commanding Dracaena to fulfill her desires. Dracaena, eagerly obedient, complied, her tongue reaching out to explore the folds of Yvette's pussy, tasting her wetness and responding to every movement and pressure from Yvette's hips.

Dracaena (muffled): Yes, Yvette. I'll pleasure you. I'll lick you just the way you want.

With each flick of her tongue and gentle suck, Dracaena lavished Yvette's sensitive areas, immersing herself in the act of pleasuring her wife. The room filled with the sounds of Yvette's moans and the wet, rhythmic sounds of Dracaena's oral attentions, as they both surrendered to the intoxicating dance of pleasure and dominance. Yvette, fully immersed in the moment, proced to focus to her wife's breasts. With a firm grip, she squeezed and massaged Dracaena's breasts, reveling in the softness and fullness of her flesh.

Yvette (sensually): Mmm, your breasts are so beautiful, Dracaena. They're meant to be pleasured, to be worshipped.

Yvette's touch was a blend of desire and control as she kneaded and squeezed Dracaena's breasts, her fingers exploring every curve and contour. Dracaena's moans of pleasure mingled with the wet sounds of their passionate encounter, filling the air with an intoxicating symphony of pleasure.

Dracaena (gasping): Yes, Yvette. Your touch feels amazing. Keep pleasuring me, show me how much you desire my body.

Dracaena's voice dripped with a mixture of need and surrender as she reveled in the sensations coursing through her. Yvette's touch on her breasts heightened her pleasure, sending waves of desire crashing through her body, leading her closer to the edge of complete ecstasy. Yvette, Vinca, and Dracaena continued their passionate dance, their bodies entwined in a frenzy of desire. The room echoed with their moans and cries of pleasure as they approached the pinnacle of their orgasms. Their movements became more urgent and erratic, their breaths quickening, and their bodies trembling with anticipation. Each touch, each thrust, and each caress fueled the fire within them, igniting a storm of pleasure that threatened to consume them entirely, as their climax surged through their bodies, their voices merged in a symphony of ecstasy, their screams of pleasure filling the air, waves of intense pleasure washed over them, their bodies convulsing with the intensity of their orgasms, releasing the built-up tension and leaving them spent but utterly satisfied. Their cries of pleasure reverberated in the room, a testament to the raw and unrestrained passion that had consumed them. In that moment, they existed solely for each other's pleasure, indulging in the deepest depths of their desires until they were spent and satiated. Then the dream shift, Dracaena's dream raids unfolded with calculated precision, her subconscious navigating a realm where desires denied in waking life became treasures in the dream world. Under the watchful gaze of Tyrant Darius, none dared to oppose her whims. She pilfered toys that had eluded her in childhood, adorned herself in dresses denied, and indulged in a plethora of Pokémon delights. In the midst of her dream raid, Dracaena exclaimed...

Dracaena: Finally, my stolen childhood reclaimed! Toys, dresses, and Pokémon wonders, all mine for the taking!

Tyrant Darius: Seize what was denied, my daughter. Let none challenge your desires. This world is yours to command.

Demons, humans, etc...: But, she takes everything! What about our possessions?

Tyrant Darius: Like me she is the sovereign. Cross her, and face the consequences.

Dracaena: No one can deny me now. I am the ruler of my own kingdom and none shall stand in my way! YES! YES! YES!!! Merge with me seed of Divashma!

Seed of Divashma: As your wish.

Dracaena: Oh, the merging with you seed of Divashma is an incredibly intense and pleasurable experience. It's like being enveloped in a wave of raw, primal energy that courses through every fiber of my being. The sensation is electric, as if a hundred hands caress and explore my body, igniting every nerve ending with desire. The merging of energies creates a symphony of pleasure, overwhelming my senses with a heady mix of pleasure and ecstasy. Every touch, every stroke, every movement is heightened, amplifying the pleasure to unimaginable levels. It's an experience that leaves you gasping for breath, trembling with pleasure, and craving for more.

It goes for six hour, six minutes and six seconds until Dracaena fully merged with the seed of Divashma, Dracaena, her senses now attuned to the merged power within, rises with a newfound energy. She looks around, the world itself seeming to respond to the shift in her existence.

Seed of Divashma (voice resonates with an ethereal authority): Dracaena, bearer of our merged essence, you stand at the threshold of a destiny inscribed in the annals of revolution. This world await your touch, and your father, Tyrant Darius, anticipates the manifestation of your prowess.

Dracaena, feeling the surge of power, steadies herself. Her eyes, now reflecting a glint of both uncertainty and determination, meet the unseen presence of the seed.

Dracaena: I can feel it, the power coursing through me. I am ready to embrace the legacy, to make my father proud. The dominion he envisions shall unfold under my influence.

The surroundings seem to respond, shadows elongating and swirling as if acknowledging the awakening of a force. Dracaena, with a newfound aura, steps forward, a willingness to shape the world in alignment with the aspirations of his Tyrant Darius and the seed of Divashma.

Seed of Divashma: The tapestry of revolution awaits your touch, Dracaena. May your journey carve the path to greatness and mayhem. The legacy of your father shall flourish through your dominion.

Dracaena lets out a mighty roar that echoes through the refuge. The air itself shivers in response to her newfound strength, as she warps outside, her form begins to shift, transforming into a colossal, feathered serpent.

Dracaena: Behold the embodiment of chaos! I am the serpent of dominion, the herald of my father's legacy! I am Metstlisiuateotl Iuik in Tonatiusiuateotl, Ipixkiuh Iuik in senyelistli Altepeuh!!!

[Goddess of the moon and sun, Guardian of my family Kingdom!!!]

The adversaries, caught off guard, gaze in awe and terror as Dracaena, in her colossal serpentine form, maneuvers with an effortless grace. With a voice that resonates like a tempest, she speaks to those who dare challenge her.

Dracaena: Your resistance is but a fleeting breath in the winds of destiny. Kneel before the might of Tyrant Darius, for his legacy courses through my veins.

The adversaries, realizing the overwhelming force before them, attempt futile defenses as Dracaena, with calculated precision, asserts her dominion. The chaos unfolds in the clash of powers, and the once defiant foes find themselves overpowered by the sheer might of the serpent of chaos, Dracaena with a majestic sweep of her wings, unleashes a torrent of chaotic energy as the demons before her, unable to withstand the sheer force, disintegrate into swirling dust. Her howl reverberates, a proclamation of dominance that echoes through the chaotic battlefield.

Dracaena: Witness the might of my father's bloodline! I am Tonakapilli

[Shining child]

I am the harbinger of chaos, the serpent of dominion.

As she revels in the defeat of her father's enemies, a dark euphoria emanates from Dracaena. Her colossal form weaves through the remnants of the opposition, each movement a display of power, and her howls become a symphony of triumph.

Dracaena: This is the legacy of Tyrant Darius, a legacy I now wield with unbridled might. Let his reign!

Trudy, witnessing the awe-inspiring manifestation of Dracaena's power approaches with a zeal that borders on reverence, her eyes glitter with a mixture of admiration and fervor.

Trudy: Dracaena, Ahmiki Iluikoatlsiuateotl!

[Immortal feathered Goddess serpent!]

Your power is a spectacle, a symphony of chaos that would make even the most daring demons cower. Tyrant Darius, your father would be proud.

Dracaena, her colossal form now regaining a more humanoid appearance, blushes under Trudy's praise. The remnants of her chaotic howls still linger in the air.

Dracaena: Trudy, you've been a loyal friend, and your support means more than you can imagine. But I have yet to prove my worth to my father, Tyrant Darius. The chaos I bring forth today is just the beginning.

Trudy, undeterred, caresses Dracaena's cheek with a zealous affection.

Trudy: The beginning indeed! The madness and might you've exhibited are beyond remarkable. The dominion of your father flows through you, and with each conquest, you carve your place in the legacy of your father kingdom.

Dracaena smiles, a blend of humility and determination in her eyes.

Dracaena: I'll weave a tale of chaos that i hope my father will marvel at. My father dominion shall flourish, and our family legacy will be etched in the eternity of pandemonium.

Dracaena, her eyes now attuned to the chaotic currents, senses the presence of other demons lurking in the shadows. With a focused inhale, she draws in the surrounding air, gathering the essence of malevolence. As she exhales, a swirling miasma envelops the unsuspecting demons, freezing them in a spectral paralysis.

Dracaena (whispers): In the dance of mayhem, none escape its grasp.

The miasma snakes through the air, a potent concoction of her newfound power. The demons, caught within its ethereal tendrils, become statues of their former selves, immobilized by the poisonous energy. Trudy, observing the scene, is filled with both awe and excitement.

Trudy: Dracaena, you've mastered the art of subjugation with a mere breath. The enemies stand frozen in the shadows of their own weakness.

Dracaena, with a wicked grin, surveys the paralyzed demons, deciding their final fates. She decide to play with them first, so she take her colossal feathered serpent form coiling around the paralyzed demons, squeezes gently, reveling in their helplessness. The feathered scales press against them as she taunts their feeble resistance.

Dracaena (sinister hiss): How fragile your malevolence is, demons. The Immortal feathered Goddess serpent now holds your destiny in her coils.

Trudy, standing by, watches with a mix of fascination and amusement.

Trudy (smirking): Their arrogance crumbles in the face of true chaos. Dracaena, you wield the power of your father with finesse.

Dracaena (mockingly): Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Your malevolence is but a fleeting shadow in the vastness of chaos.

One of the demons, attempting a defiant retort, struggles against the constriction.

Demon: You cannot ... gasps ... contain our power.

Dracaena tightens her coils, emphasizing their futility.

Dracaena (with a dark chuckle): Your power my toys? Mere whispers in the tempest of chaos. Submit to the dominion or vanish into the abyss.

In the dance of shadows, Trudy marveled at Dracaena's mastery. The once defiant demons, now ensnared, were mere playthings in the colossal feathered serpent's coils. The thrill of witnessing the manifestation of Tyrant Darius's legacy surged through her veins. As Dracaena mocked the demons' feeble attempts at resistance, Trudy couldn't help but smirk the balance of power had shifted, and the dominion they sought to establish was asserting itself with every twist of the feathered serpent's body as Dracaena's forked tongue flicked out with sinister precision, it danced across the immobilized demons, delivering a sensation that bordered on both discomfort and amusement the feathered serpent, reveling in the play of power, took delight in underlining their vulnerability.

Demon 1 (struggling): What madness is this? Unhand us, monster!

Dracaena's tongue continued its intricate dance, teasing and tickling, while Trudy observed with a dark satisfaction.

Demon 2 (with strained laughter): Is this the extent of our defiance? A monster's mockery?

Dracaena (mockingly): Your defiance is but a pitiful whimper in the grand symphony of chaos. Embrace the truth, your power is inconsequential.

Trudy, enjoying the spectacle, couldn't help but smirk at the demons' futile attempts to resist the serpent's playfulness. In the unfolding chaos, the echoes of their mocking laughter began to dissolve into the realization of their own insignificance. Dracaena satisfied with the demons' realization of their powerlessness decides to plunge them into a new realm of horror. With a subtle gesture, she unfurls her colossal serpent form, releasing the coiled demons.

Dracaena (whispers): Into the waking nightmare, let reality mirror your deepest fears.

As the demons regain their mobility, the surroundings warp into manifestations of their darkest nightmares, the air thickens with palpable dread as their own fears materialize before them.

Demon 1 (panicking): This... this can't be real! It's just a nightmare!Dracaena, her eyes gleaming with mischief, observes their torment with a touch of sadistic satisfaction.

Demon 2 (frantically): Make it stop! We submit! We beg you!

As Trudy return to watch over and protect Fang, she cast a vigilant gaze, ensuring the safety of her friend amidst the swirling chaos Dracaena orchestrated. The refuge, though now enshrouded in a magical wall, remained a sanctuary under Trudy's watchful eyes. Meanwhile back to Drracaena.... Dracaena savoring the demons' anguish in their manifested nightmares, shifts her focus to an illusion that plays on their deepest fears. With a subtle command, the once solid ground beneath their feet seems to liquefy into an abyss, giving the illusion that they are sinking into the road.

Demon 3 (frantically): No! What is happening? We're sinking!

Dracaena, with a hauntingly calm demeanor observes the terror etched across their faces.

Demon 4 (desperate): This can't be real! Make it stop, monster!

Dracaena, amused by the demons' desperate pleas conjures a swirling whirlpool, intensifying their illusionary descent into insanity.

Dracaena (with a sinister chuckle): How amusing that demons, who revel in chaos, call me a monster. Let the abyss consume you, for in chaos, I find my true form.

The demons, caught in the tumultuous illusion of sinking, clutch at each other in futile attempts to escape the inexorable pull.

Demon 5 (screaming): This is madness! Make it stop!

Dracaena: Madness, you say? In the grand tapestry of chaos, your feeble notions of reality are but threads. Embrace the madness, for I am the embodiment of your deepest fears.

Sensing the perfect moment to amplify the surreal nightmare, she unfurls her majestic wings. With an otherworldly melody, she begins to sing, her voice resonating with both beauty and malevolence. The haunting notes wrap around the demons like ethereal tendrils, making them susceptible to the impending illusion.

Dracaena (🎶): In the madness where insanity dwells,

A serpent's song, its eerie spells.

Whispers in the dark, illusions unfold,

A nightmare dance, a tale to be told.

Upside down, in my domain you'll sway,

As my song weaves the night and day.

Reality bends to my sweet refrain,

In the symphony of chaos, feel the pain (🎶).

As the song permeates the air, the demons, entranced by the melodic malevolence, find themselves succumbing to the whims of Dracaena's illusion.

Demon 6 (hypnotized): What... what is this enchantment?

Dracaena, with a triumphant gleam in her eyes, continues her haunting serenade, manipulating the very fabric of their perceptions.

Dracaena (🎶): Dreams and nightmares entwined,

In my illusion, truths you'll find.

Suspended, upside down, you'll be,

Dancing to the chaos, eternally (🎶).

As the last note hangs in the air, the demons, now fully ensnared by Dracaena's illusion, dangle upside down in a surreal dance orchestrated by the serpent of dominion, the suspended demons begin to perceive a myriad of ferocious creatures closing in on them.

Demon 7 (panicking): Bears! Sharks! Tigers! What is happening?

Dracaena, with a wicked grin, intensifies the illusion, each creature appearing with vivid, nightmarish realism.

Dracaena (tauntingly): Welcome to the menagerie of chaos. The predators of your deepest fears are here to greet you.

Demon 8 (frantically swatting at unseen attackers): Get them off! Get them off!

Suddenly, a colossal serpent, its scales gleaming with an otherworldly iridescence, materializes before them.

Demon 9 (stammering): Look! It's a massive snake! We're its prey!

The serpent, a creation of Dracaena's malevolent whims, hisses with an unearthly resonance. Its eyes, gleaming orbs of chaos, fixate on the suspended demons, intensifying their terror, the illusory serpent lunges, the demons, trapped in their surreal nightmare, feel the phantom coils constricting around them. Their hearts race with terror as the chaotic zoo becomes a twisted stage for their imagined demise.

Demon 10 (voice trembling): This is madness! This is madness! This is madness! This is madness!

Nahara the seer, and Quillain the silent shadow, materialize from the shadows as Dracaena weaves her illusions.

Nahara: Playing with your prey, Dracaena? How childsh.

Quillain: She's right, my young serpent.

Dracaena, her eyes gleaming with a hint of mischief, addresses them.

Dracaena: Not playing, Nahara, Quillain. I aim to master my powers within before the inevitable reunion with my father, Tyrant Darius. The dominion he envisions must be wielded with precision.

Nahara (smirking): The serpent seeks mastery. An endearing endeavor.

Quillain: Be wary, Dracaena. The balance between mastery and madness is delicate. Your father legacy is both a gift and a curse.

Dracaena (with determination): I'll navigate my powers, Quillain. When our father arrives, I shall present him with a dominion sculpted by my own hands.

Nahara: Impressive words, Dracaena. Now, let us witness the fruits of your "training" mastery.

Dracaena, with a subtle gesture, shifts the illusion once again. The demons, still suspended in the chaotic menagerie, now perceive themselves being pursued by colossal, gloating figures, phantom giants that revel in enumerating everything wrong about them.

Gloating Giant 1 (with a booming voice): Pathetic creatures! Your every flaw exposed for all to see. How entertaining!

Gloating Giant 2 (mockingly): Look at them squirm, like insects caught in the web of their own insignificance.

Nahara and Quillain, watching the spectacle unfold, exchange amused glances.

Nahara (chuckling): A delightful touch, Dracaena. Exposing their vulnerabilities with illusions.

Quillain (smirking): The giants of mockery, unveiling the demons' insecurities. Quite the theatrical insanity.

As the gloating giants continue their phantom pursuit, Nahara and Quillain revel in the demons' futile attempts to escape the relentless scrutiny of their imagined flaws. Dracaena, with a glint of satisfaction, observes the orchestrated chaos, a manifestation of her growing mastery over the illusions that dance in the shadows of her power. Dracaena still in her colossal form casts an ominous shadow as she opens her massive maw, ready to consume them and assimilate their essence into her mad being as she is hungry for food at last. The demons, suspended in their phantom torment, gaze in terror as Dracaena's maw inhales with a force that defies the very fabric of reality. The illusory creatures, once a manifestation of their fears, distort and dissipate into the swirling abyss within her. As the demons are fully assimilate, the outside world bears witness to this grotesque display of supreme power. Dracaena, now infused with the assimilated essence, stands as an embodiment of the power that dance within and around her.

Dracaena: Let's see a film!

Nahara: Fair enough, Dracaena. Let us reunite with Trudy and Fang. A film sounds like a fitting diversion while we await the grand reunion with Tyrant Darius.

Quillain (smirking): A normal film in the midst of chaos? An intriguing choice.

As they reunite with Trudy and Fang still sleep in her room, a sense of camaraderie prevails.

Nahara (to Trudy): Dracaena's growth have taken a rather entertaining turn.

Trudy (smirking): I'm sure they have. Perhaps a film is just what we need.

As they settle in, the shadows of night embracing them, they prepare to enjoy a film, finding solace in the brief respite before Tyrant Darius arrives to usher in a new era of dominion and pandemonium.

Dracaena: The future, the world and all of what is contained in it is ours, your kingdom is over Kozholok and our kingdom shall rise and will be eternal! Muhahahahaha!!!

[tlbodine]

The Great Content Warning Debate

Horror Twitter has been aflame for a few days now with heated discourse about trigger/content warnings, and I keep seeing the same arguments and questions and points come up repeatedly so I wanted to collect all of it into one place because I feel like discourse can only get so far if people keep reinventing the wheel -- so perhaps having the full discussion laid out in one place could be helpful.

Of course, the folks arguing probably won’t see this post, but perhaps there can be some benefit from talking about it anyway. This is intended to be more of an overview of arguments and counter-arguments, collected and displayed as impartially as possible, but of course my own opinions are going to leak in and color some of this. 

NOTE: This is written specifically from the perspective of the horror book community, a genre that traditionally is associated with troubling, transgressive, risk-taking and shocking works. There are discussions to be had for content labels on other types of fiction, but as I’m unfamiliar with the norms and expectations of, say, romance, I’m not going to wade too deeply into that here. 

So without further ado, the arguments and counter-arguments and discussion points that I keep seeing hashed and rehashed and circled around when the issue of trigger warnings comes up! 

If you’re sensitive, you shouldn’t be reading horror 

“Horror is supposed to be horrifying! It’s not fluffy bunnies and kittens! You’re supposed to be made uncomfortable!” 

There are a few problems with this: 

“Uncomfortable” is not the same as “Sent into a panic attack/flashback/relapse” (ie, triggered) 

People with PTSD and other issues can and do engage with horror all the time and often love the genre for entertainment or therapeutic purposes

Many people are fine with some types of content but not others; blood and guts won’t affect them the same as rape, or they’re fine with adults dying but can’t handle child death, and so on and so forth 

Knowing what you’re getting into can help you prepare/brace yourself so you’re not taken unaware; people with the right warnings can mentally prepare themselves and enjoy a book that they would not have been able to read if they were confronted with it unexpectedly

Trigger warnings are censorship 

Some folks have an implicit/kneejerk reaction that “trigger = bad thing” and respond to the request to put warnings on a book as a moral value judgment on the book’s contents. I can see why they might fear that, especially because at a glance it’s easy to conflate the groups asking for warnings with the groups who say things like “if your characters have underage sex then you the writer are literally a pedophile.” But by and large the folks asking for warnings do not seem to be asking for folks to stop writing certain difficult themes, only to provide a heads up for readers about the type of experience those readers can expect from the book. 

There is an argument to be made that warnings could affect the sales of a book, in much the same way that an NC-17 film doesn’t get the same distribution opportunities as an R-rated or PG-13 film, and that authors/publishers will make marketing decisions to include or exclude certain types of content in order to avoid this. 

Trigger warnings will spoil the book 

While some readers will benefit from content warnings, others might have their reading experience ruined by knowing about major twists. This seems especially relevant with a warning like “child death.” It’s very important that people who have, for example, recently lost a child not be unexpectedly re-traumatized by reading about a child dying without warning. But it’s also important that people who want to enjoy the full, shocking impact of such a scene have the opportunity to do so without having it dulled by forewarning. 

Any kind of warning system needs to be opt-in for a reader. Some suggestions include: 

Placing warnings at the end of a book, where readers can flip to that page to look (not helpful if you’re ordering online) 

Placing warnings on the author’s website, where readers can search (not helpful if you’re buying in person)

Given the limitations, a combination of those strategies seems to make sense. It may also be unfortunately true that someone looking for one type of warning (ie, rape) will have their experience ruined if they spoiler themselves for another warning (child death). This may be unavoidable collateral damage. 

Authors/Publishers should be responsible for putting warnings in their books

There seems to be some debate over whether the onus of responsibility for providing warnings rests on the author or the publisher. It should be acknowledged that authors may not always have the power to make this choice -- and if the presence or absence of warnings becomes a factor for judging the quality/moral fiber of authors, those authors could be punished by the reader community for a choice that was largely out of their hands (although, there’s still nothing keeping the author from hosting those warnings externally - how successfully that is implemented is another matter). 

Additionally, the demand for warnings will be placed more consistently on small presses simply because those presses are more likely to heed the request. This could create a double standard where readers might be more forgiving of large pub works that forego warnings because there’s no expectation that they would have implemented them anyway. On the other hand, this could be a way for indie publishers to differentiate themselves on the market and appeal more to certain subsets of readers. 

External groups or communities should be responsible for warnings

There’s a line of reasoning that an author or publisher may not be sensitive to the potentially triggering/damaging things in their work, and some kind of external governing body should manage this work instead. This does sound a lot more like the censorship argument that people are worried about. 

Wiki-style sites and places where people can freely tag books (such as Storygraph) also fit this bill to an extent. They would presumably have less power over the market than a ratings board like the MPAA, but could still exert influence over how a book is received. 

Demanding warnings will negatively impact marginalized authors 

We’re already seeing some evidence that BIPOC and LGBTQ authors are affected more by user-generated trigger warnings on sites like Storygraph, and that these warnings can be weaponized against marginalized authors. Much like review-bombing a book before it comes out can affect its launch, labeling a book with inaccurate trigger warnings could damage its sales. 

Similarly, lists of “safe” and “unsafe” authors have already begun to circulate among some groups, and there seems to be a disproportionate number of marginalized creators on that “unsafe” list -- at least according to the anecdotal reports I’ve seen. 

Historically, it is true that any attempts at censorship or content moderation will be more harshly applied to marginalized groups (see: film ratings for gay sex vs straight sex). 

It’s impossible to warn for everything

One hesitancy that some authors have with tagging their work is they’re not sure what to tag for. Triggers are highly personal, and there’s no way you can possibly guess what might upset a reader. 

Here’s a list of commonly agreed-upon things that might make sense to tag for in a given work: 

Violence/gore 

Suicide/self-harm

Rape/sexual assault

Domestic violence

Child death/endangerment

Animal death/abuse

Drug use/substance abuse 

Racism/slurs 

That said, it’s still difficult to account for context. At what stage do you warn for something? If a character is drinking a beer, do you need to tag for that? Do you distinguish between the tone things are written in, such as being played for laughs vs seriously? If the rape scene is written artistically/metaphorically, does the same warning apply as if it were described act-by-act in a clinical sense? What if your blanket list of warnings gives readers a false sense of what the book will be like -- is it actually helpful at all, or is it just posturing/virtue signaling to include warnings that won’t actually be effective?  

Some would argue that this is dramatically overthinking it, but this does seem to cause a great deal of distress to authors who want to do the right thing but worry about getting it wrong. An argument could be made that trying and failing might be worse than doing nothing, especially if your attempts get you labeled as a “trustworthy” or “safe” author only for that trust to be “betrayed” by a warning you used incorrectly. 

On the other hand, many would argue that we all “pretty much know” what needs to be warned for, and that warnings are intuitive. These granular questions could be viewed as a distraction from more common sense issues. 

Readers are responsible for managing their own safety

Ultimately, because it’s impossible for every potential trigger to be identified and warned for, readers will need to remain vigilant. Of course, there are already ways to identify the content of a book without any kind of established warning system -- such as, for example, reading posted book reviews, asking a question on a book’s Goodreads page, reaching out to the author directly, asking about the book in a reading group online or having a friend/parent/spouse/trusted person read the book first and report back with their findings. 

This is the system we’ve pretty much used as readers for years, before “trigger warning” became part of the common vernacular, and it does have some distinct advantages just because you can get a lot more specific information this way. 

It is possible that if warnings become more commonplace for books that readers may become less vigilant about their own safety, which could paradoxically put them at greater risk of finding troubling content unexpectedly. 

There’s also the issue of “safe” and “unsafe” author lists. At the moment, while the discourse is hot, it’s perhaps more natural to pick sides and disregard some authors for reasons that may be unfair -- for example, marking an author as unsafe or boycotting her work because she doesn’t want to include warnings, but she wants to avoid warnings because she strongly believes they will be detrimental to a reader’s safety. A reader may or may not agree with that perspective, but it’s certainly not the same motive as an author who would do something actively malicious to a reader (like, idk, emailing a screamer to a reviewer or something. that’s a made up example.) 

In the end, trigger warnings are a good idea, but the issue is complex to implement and some people do still have reservations about their overall efficacy. 

We simply won’t know one way or another until we try to implement it. But in the meantime, I do think it’s valuable to continue talking about this, as long as everyone involved remains civil and engages in good faith. Once people’s perspectives start getting thrown out the window in the heat of the moment, or strawmen arguments are erected that don’t reflect what anyone involved actually believes, the discussion ceases to be helpful. 

[thoughtfullyrainynightmare]

The second chapter of Before We Have It. Yeah... I still have a couple of chapters ready, but I don’t want to dump them all on you guys at once 😅 So, little by little

Tag list: @succulentsunrise​

Keeping in mind that this series contains themes and content, some may find uncomfortable, reader discretion is advised. However, I will tag chapters for triggers that come to mind while posting. But everything is on a content typical level

Warnings: Talk about death, implying about death

Length: ~4.4k

Chapter 2: Forever and after

There was a knock on Fuegoleon’s office door, but even without asking, he could tell who was on the other side. Even if he had been in a kind of trance before, his mind having been caught adrift in a sea of bureaucracy and thoughts swirling around the war, and international politics, in addition to trying to keep their own country afloat while still suffering the aftermath of the terrorist attack and the devil believers. It seemed, as if, the Kingdom of Clover couldn’t catch its breath, not even a gasp, one lungful of fresh air, before a new conflict was upon them.

And it all made him tired. So, very, tired. Or so he knew, even if he had forgotten how it felt, to be full of energy; to be a young man without a care in the world. Though, he supposed, he had never really been without a care in the world. There had always been something, even if only in the back of his mind. He had had the responsibilities of royalty, if nothing else. But this, the way the world was lying at the time, in that day and age, it made his bones heavy and sluggish. Or that is how he deemed them. All he could do, was wish for better days to come. Perhaps, if the fates so allowed, the war would then bring a period of peace with it.

Maybe then he could breathe. Maybe then they could all breathe, and heal, try to move forward. And he longed for that future, even if he agreed that sometimes battle, and even war, was necessary, because not taking part would have meant tyrants, darkness… devils, pouring in and taking over… everything. Sometimes battle, was necessary. He did not like it. He did not like the idea of going to war, because, at the end of the day, he was a peaceful man. He was not a harmless man, but he was a peaceful man.

And this he hated. Having to make such plans. Having to make such preparations, when he wanted to make very different kinds of preparations.

Too many times he had glanced the rose gold piece of precious metal around his finger, and thought about how he wanted to plan for the future. But he had to plan for a future that existed before the future that he wanted.

There was a conversation that needed to be had; one that they should have had a while back already. But they hadn’t. Why, he wasn’t quite sure. But he suspected that it was a combination of letting her heal, trying to settle into being engaged, trying to work around forming an alliance, and trying to prepare for a war.

And it had only been a couple of months. Though it seemed… much less than that. So little time, and yet so much of it. But he had thought about it. If he wanted to get married before the war, in which he might die.

It was a possibility for which he had to prepare. He had made a will, like any responsible person in a position of authority, or a knight for that matter, would do. It had been just one check on the list of things to do, and quite frankly, it hadn’t been difficult. It had been just another formal piece of documentation in addition to everything else. But… Getting married…

A part of him wanted it, craved for it, longed for the idea, even if it was foolish on the grounds of the idea of finally making her his, when he knew, he knew that she was already. He knew. But he also wanted. He wanted to marry her. Properly. Not in an event that was hastily wrapped together, slapped with a bow on top, but a proper wedding.

But it wasn’t something he could give her. There wasn’t time to organize it, nor could the kingdom really spare the means to do so at the moment. The labour and the manhours. And… there was something so… cruel, in the thought of marrying in a haste, only to die in the field of battle and leave her as the mourning widow. Though, on the other hand, if they weren’t to be married before it, then he would leave her without the-, fulfilment of marriage. If that was something she would feel.

What is the role of marriage in their culture? I haven’t really asked it from her, but it seems that she finds the idea pleasant. And her parents are married, as are all the noble families, as far as I know. So, marriage does have a place in their society. But does it bring a sense of… fulfilment? A sense of… completion, perhaps? Because engagement is only a middle step to getting married. And marriage… well, it can mean a lot of things to many people. For some it can be no different from a business deal, and some seem to think of it as a stabilizing agreement in a relationship. It can bring a sense of security, but it’s not a quick fix to make a relationship into-

“My love?”

He lifted his head and looked into the pair of green eyes looking back at him from the other side of the desk.

“Hm?”

“Have you been sleeping well?” There was a frown on her face, but one that wasn’t laced with anger, instead that of worry.

He took a deep breath and sighed as he brought his hand onto his temple, placing his elbow on the desk for support. “I… have slept better,” he admitted, but felt that he was still performing adequately enough. “Why do you ask?”

“I stood here for a good while before you responded,” she stated while placing a pile of papers onto the table and bringing the back of her hand onto his forehead.

“No, no, I’m not ill, dear,” he stated while placing his other hand onto hers, and pushing it away from his head. “I was just thinking.”

“Oh,” she hummed with a tone that flowed out of her like a stream, one that held intrigue. “What did you think about so intently?” There was a smile tugging the corner of her mouth into a smirk as she pulled away in order to get a better glance of him.

“You,” he replied with a hushed tone, and while averting his gaze.

“I see,” she giggled. “So, tell me, is the ‘me’ in your daydreams better than the ‘me’ in the real world?” She grinned.

He let out an amused scoff and shook his head. “That’s not… Not in that way dear,” he smirked.

“Oh? And what is ‘that way’?”

“One never knows with you.”

“Really?”

“Yes dear. Really.”

“I see,” she smiled, making one appear on his face as well. “So… What were you thinking about?” She asked again, but this time her tone was more frank, more factual and inquiring.

The smile on his lips faded, and his expression became that of no expression as he thought about how to ask. But. If there was something he had figured out for himself, was that there was no reason to wonder endlessly about how to ask from her. Because… she’d understand. Perhaps not right away, but eventually. And even if she wouldn’t understand him, relate to him, she would respect their differences.

Though… with this topic, he had to wonder if this was a difference they could solve, if there was to be a difference. And the possibility of it slightly terrified him. It settled next to his stomach, and had begun gnawing at him, making the all too familiar sense of self-doubt when it came to the matters of expressing his emotions and leaving his feelings bare, appear again. Too many times he had experienced it while they had been courting, circling around each other like a cat and mouse. Though, even now, he wasn’t sure which had been which.

“How… do you see marriage?” He finally asked, looking at her, but what he saw was confusion overtaking her expression.

“How do I see marriage?” She repeated while sitting down; her gaze shifting to the ceiling for a moment.

“Yes.”

She let out a thoughtful hum, trying to formulate a coherent idea of the matter. “Well, I … don’t think there is one definite answer…”

“There isn’t,” he agreed with faint syllables.

“But it’s… a kind of a commitment, I suppose. Though when people marry, there should already be that commitment and affection, so that marriage doesn’t in itself change anything between the couple.”

“I see,” he replied, feeling relieved. “But is there a… kind of fulfilment in it?”

“Hmm… I don’t-, maybe. Depends on what is meant, I suppose,” she thought out loud. “I never really thought about getting married, or seeking it out, because I was too busy and caught up with my own life. I mean, I suppose it was expected of me in some point but it wasn’t a goal of mine. To get married. It’s just something people do when they settle down. It’s a kind of a … testimony, I guess, a way of saying ‘this person here is my partner’.”

“A way of making a relationship seem more definite, as well as notifying those around of it?” He suggested.

“I think that’s accurate enough, though I can’t say that I wouldn’t enjoy the idea,” she admitted with a smile to his direction. “And there is a kind of fulfilment in going through with it. Taking that… pledge to live lives together and look into the future.”

A smile crept onto his lips again, it was a careful one, but it was a smile, filled with the flicker and warmth of mornings and days to come. He placed his hand onto the table, outstretching towards her, imploring her to place her hand onto his.

And she did. She took his hand, and drew circles onto the surface of his flames, as the very surface she tried to caress looked to envelop her.

“So… How do you see marriage?” She asked with almost a whisper.

“I…” he uttered as his head swayed from side to side, as he was looking for words. “Marriage is…” he paused, realizing that he never had thought of an answer himself, and let out a chuckle. “It’s something I didn’t think I’d have, out of love. Out of necessity or because it’s expected of me, quite possibly, but… because of it being… wanted… It just-“

He remained silent, not knowing how he’d finish that sentence.

“A duty?” She suggested.

“Yes…” he nodded. “It seemed like a duty. But a sustainable marriage can only be formed between people who are already committed to each other, so finding someone willing to commit to the same extent, while under the accord of being married out of duty always seemed… difficult,” he explained, more speaking out his thoughts than anything else. “Though, I suppose, that if it was out of duty, it wouldn’t have been my decision in the first place.”

There was a pause that lingered in the air as their hands held onto each other, trying to give reassurance and affection. A sacred, heavy pause, but not one that made either uncomfortable.

“It’s not easy being royalty,” she spoke; tilting her head as she looked at him.

“It’s not,” he agreed as his eyes still lingered in the depths of the surface of his desk. “And I suppose… As far as King Augustus is concerned, not even this is my decision.” There was a shadow of a smirk that passed over his lips, one that made her grin.

“Oh yes. The King’s plan to unite and benefit our nations is coming along just like he planned,” she rolled her eyes.

“Yes. And he is quite proud of it,” he smiled.

She scoffed with amusement of her own and shook her head.

“But there’s… a sense of… completion…?” He inquired as his fingers fumbled with hers, and his eyes fell onto their hands, just holding onto her.

“You already asked that dear,” she replied with silken syllables. “And yes, there is a kind of ‘fulfilment’ and ‘completion’ in seeing it through, into marriage, but it’s… not about what it says on paper. Did we not establish it?” In her voice, there was a combination of amusement, smile, hesitance, curiosity, and something… he couldn’t quite decipher. But what he did know is that she was onto him.

“We did, my love. It’s not just about what it says on paper, because real commitment must be in people’s hearts,” he replied with hushed, honey coated syllables as his eyes continued to look at their fingers fumbling with each other.

“So… where are you going with this?” She asked, trying to meet his gaze.

There was a pause, just a split second too long. “Nowhere in particular.”

“You are a terrible liar, my love…”

He sighed as the movement of his fingers ceased. “Only when it comes to you.”

“Not only me,” she tugged on his hand. “With those that know you,” she continued, still trying to meet his gaze. “So… What’s this about?”

His eyes didn’t lift from his desk, in the depths of which he knew that his will lied, buried, like a secret that wasn’t really even a secret; just something to be left alone, until the time came. “We… haven’t talked about a wedding,” he finally spoke with a heavy tone, one that dragged through the air, as if feet bound with chackles of responsibility; a responsibility that kept him from what his heart desired. But. Even if an opportunity would have presented itself, he knew that he wouldn’t abandon those shackles. Because they, his duty, was something he was proud of; it was something he wanted to carry. And quite frankly, if he didn’t have it, if he wasn’t the person he was at that moment, an honest and a respectable man, a leader, he didn’t know what he’d do with himself.

“True,” she admitted. “But we’ve been talking about a future.”

“We have, but…” his hand let go of hers and pinched the bridge of his nose, because… he didn’t know what to say.

Seconds ticked in the air, empty and waiting for him to continue. But. He didn’t.

“But…?” She tried.

“But…” he repeated, letting go of the bridge and letting his and loosely point upwards as his elbow was resting against the arm rest of his chair, as if there was a rope, a thread, hanging from the ceiling, and he was wondering whether to grab it or not. “Things progress one step at a time…”

“So…” she began with slight hesitance. “You feel that… unless we talk about a wedding, it doesn’t… it’s not quite as meaningful, yet, to talk about the future?”

“No, no, no,” he insisted. “It is meaningful, and it’s…” the corners of his lips tugged into a faint smile as his gaze fell into the depth, into the distance before him that spoke of the future dreams they had painted for their shared forever after. “So, beautiful…” But as soon as the smile appeared, it faded away as his eyes returned from those depths. “But there’s… matters to be dealt with before we reach there, and I want to make sure that-“ He halted his speech as the words felt like needles in his throat, and tumbleweed on his tongue. Only if they could have just enjoyed this time, this place in life just like so many had been able to before them; but alas, they weren’t as lucky.

“That...?” She tried again.

“That…” he began, and swallowed. His eyes gazed into hers for a moment, but fell back to the side as he spoke. “That you’re happy.”

She didn’t know what to say to him. It was a sweet notion, it was! But there was something, so… unspeakably painful in the way the talked about it that she couldn’t… quite grasp it.

“Honey…” she began, shaking her head with a slight, weak motion as she got up and circled around his desk. “That’s… a sweet thing to say, but I am happy, I am! With you…” the bitter taste of burning tears began tingling in her throat as she leaned down and placed her hand onto his cheek. “There’s… there’s something you don’t want to tell me,” she stated with bitter, prickly syllables that tasted like failure.

A scoff, and a chuckle that was far from amused, left him as he shook his head, turning his head away from her hand. “We…” he swallowed, “need to consider… every possibility.”

“Of what?” She tried, wanting to hear it from him, rather than jumping to conclusions.

“Now… more than ever, there’s… the possibility that not everyone survives. And given what happened with the Eye of the Midnight Sun, how I wasn’t able to be of assistance with the attack of the Devil and the appearance of the Shadow Castle, the Devil Banishers… There’s a good chance that you’ll be widowed soon if we decide to marry now, and I-“

“How-?!”

“How what?” He glanced at her, but she had already leaned further away, and one of her arms was wrapped around herself as the other shifted between covering her mouth and framing her temple.

She turned around and began pacing in the room with her eyes to the ceiling. Her breathing was shallow, heavy, and irregular, and her body was trying to bend over itself at times, even if only slightly, as if her postured swayed with an invisible tide of the high heavens. But the movement was twitching, almost mechanic, and he could have sworn that she was trembling.

Tears streamed down her face.

He hadn’t-, expected this. He didn’t know what he expected, but not this.

She slumped onto the couch, sitting while hunching over herself, resting her upper body against her knees with her elbows. But even then, there was that twitching. Like she was trying to face it with a straight back, but the sheer weight of it kept pushing her back down.

She was definitely trembling.

“Honey it’s…” he tried as he sat down next to her on the couch.

“Don’t-, don’tt you d-dare-, … [shit],” she swallowed while trying to push the shaking words past her lips. But. Her body refused it. Her body was too caught up with the thought, the one future and outcome she dreaded. The one outcome that always brought tears into her eyes, even if it was just a thought.

“We need to consider it…” he tried while placing his hands onto her shoulders, and felt just how much she was trembling; it was worse than when she had been cold during the harsh winter days, worse than when she pressed herself against him during autumn storms that tried to burrow under their skin… it was… a new worst.

“Y-you are-, talk-ing about it like-,” she swallowed and looked up to the ceiling while trying to push the tears away; to catch her breath and to steady her speech. “Like it was for sure,” she breathed out, as if shedding a load from her shoulders.

“It’s not, and … I am not, but it’s…” he shook his head and wrapped his arms around her; one around her upper body and the other around her head, and pulled her close. And she let him.

She didn’t manage words anymore, all she could do was let the tears run down as she pressed her face into the crook of his neck, and tried to will away the image of him, lying cold, on the ground. In the snow. Fading into the dust. She tried and she tried, to will the image away.

Her hand clenched the fabric of his jacket into its hold.

“My love I…” he began, not knowing what words might leave him, but he needed to spill them regardless. “Will try my best to survive for you, with you, for … us. But it’s… not my decision to make.”

Her grip grew tighter. And she drew in air, but it sounded like she was growling against his skin; angry at the world and the darkness in it. “Don’t you think I know that?” She asked while pulling him closer to her in turn.

The question, the syllables of it were quiet and frail, the only ones she could make, and only when she was speaking them against his skin.

He stayed silent, waiting for her to continue, listening intently so that he might not miss any of the delicate syllables that would leave her.

“You’re the type,” she sobbed, but he felt a smile on her lips. But one that wasn’t happy, not through and through, at least. “You try to help people. Pull them out of trenches and ditches, because it’s the right thing to do, the good thing to do. But the thing is…” and that was when the smile fell from her. It tumbled onto the floor and shattered into fine dust, dust of glass and crystal that could be breathed into lungs and make you cough out blood. The smile that fell from her, twisted his heart in a way that he hadn’t known possible. Not even when the strings of fate had coiled around it and made him bleed, right into the empty space in his chest.

No. This pain, this… numbing, tingling, piercing, scorching pain that made him feel like he was drowning, was new.

“…People won’t treat you back the same way…” she continued.

His eyes fell, and his hold of her grew stronger. “They… yes they would.”

There was a pause. One that seemed like one seventh of an eternity; a moment where there could as easily have been heard the ringing of a bell. But there wasn’t one.

“Would they?”

A couple of seconds ticked away. An answer. One that he believed. “Lesser men wouldn’t. But I’m not going to war with lesser men.”

She hesitated. For a while. For another one. Coming back around one fifth of an eternity this time. “So…” she swallowed, trying to force the bitterness her tongue hand gathered down her throat, and let hope take a hold of it instead. “Then… by your own logic… Wouldn’t you come home? With me?”

A smile. A faint, whisper of a smile, crept onto his lips. But in that whisper, that glimmer of … almost a promise, almost hope, there lied something much sweeter than he could have expected from the conversation. Honey. Nectar. Something from the chalice of the gods. “And then… get married?”

“Only then.”

“A promise?”

“Wasn’t engagement a promise of it already?” There was a hint of smirk in her tone.

A scoff left him; an amused one this time. “I hardly proposed properly…”

“Then what is ‘proposed properly’?” She smirked while pulling apart from him, even if only to look at him.

“It’s… more than what I did,” he gave her a defeated smile as his hand settled onto her cheek, and his thumb brushed away the already drying, glittering trails of tears that now decorated her complexion.

“Isn’t it up to me to decide if it was enough or not?” She smirked, even if her voice was tired and heavy, slightly broken still.

“That sounds eerily familiar.”

“I wonder why,” she smirked at him, with a genuine expression, this time.

“You’re an enigma, some of the time,” he placed a kiss onto her forehead.

“Some of the time?” She repeated.

“Some of the time,” he agreed.

A few more seconds ticked away, as they looked at each other, just looked at each other. Until a question popped to her.

“So why the question of what marriage is to me?”

His expression softened, melted into adoration. “It was… about if we should get married hastily before, or properly after the war.”

“I intend to make you my husband,” she grinned.

“So… After I take it?” He smirked back.

“You bet your sweet tushy that after.”

“My… I see,” he chuckled. “I see,” he repeated while adjusting his position and getting up from his seat.

There was a pop.

And a grunt.

Fuego hunched a but forward while holding onto his side.

“Are you okay honey,” she tried while reaching towards him.

He cleared his throat at straightened his posture. “Yes… My hip just popped and I had a cramp in my leg,” he paused for a moment. “I am not a young man anymore,” he looked at her with a smirk that harboured a bit of the weight of the world on his shoulders.

“Even young men have cramps and pops happen if they sit still for too long,” she giggled while standing up and nuzzling against him with force.

“Are you trying to topple me over?” He chuckled. “That’s what I get for having a young wife.”

“Hmmm…” she hummed while beginning to pepper him with kisses. “I,” a kiss. “Don’t,” another one. “See,” third. “What,” fourth. “You,” fifth. “Mean,” sixth. And another, and another, and another, and another.

“And an energetic one.”

“Mhm, you knew what you signed up for,” she smirked while tapping the tip of his nose with her index finger.

“I did, and I do. And you’ll be the death of me,” he smirked back, while placing his hand onto her cheek, drawing circles onto it with his thumb.

“Not before you’ll be mine,” she replied while nuzzling against his palm.

“I don’t intend to.”

“Neither do I.”

“Well… It’s good that one of us will keep up with the kids,” he grinned while pulling her closer.

“Back to talking about the ever after, are we?” She teased. “And who said that I’m the one keeping up?”

“Alright, my love,” he kissed her forehead. “We’ll both try to keep up with the kids.”

“Emphasis on ‘try’.”

He let out a chuckle. “Well... I know that my parents certainly didn’t keep up with me and aniue.”

“That’s not a wonder,” she smiled.

And he smiled back.

Everything… was not alright with the world. And there still lingered the shadow of uncertainty above their heads. But. For what it was worth, they had grown a little closer, accepted, that it was not all in their hands. All they could do was hope, and trust, that it’d be alright, while trying their best.

That is the stead of mortals. All they could do was try, and hope. Hope of the future they wanted, and trust that it would dawn on them. That was the stead of mortals.

[alj4890]

Misfortune's Intentions

(Liam x OC* Elisse Mallin) (Drake x Riley) in a Choices The Royal Heir fan fiction

A/N This idea came to me one night when I couldn't sleep. In this version from The Royal Heir, it has been nearly three years since Riley married Drake. Their infant daughter, Hope, was named heir to Cordonia's crown. Liam considers the possibility of dating after pining for Riley all these years. Elisse is a noble and first cousin to Queen Amalas of Monterisso. She will eventually become an ambassador, settling in Cordonia to continue Amalas's alliance. She also has a small bit of significant history coinciding with Liam's social season. This first part though will take us through the past for our main characters.

Not sure who to tag for this new miniseries, LOL. Let me know if you want to be added.

Masterlist

Prologue

Two years ago, Cordonia...

"To keep people's attention away from your brother's," Constantine's voice hardened, "decision to abdicate," his fist clinched for a moment, "we will have you participate in a season for a potential bride."

Liam swallowed uncomfortably. He knew there was a possibility his father would insist on this particular custom. He had hoped though that like Leo, he would be given a few years reprieve before he had to choose a bride.

Constantine fought through the chest pain he hid from everyone as he continued to explain what the next few months would be like for his only obedient son.

"We will have the usual bevy of ladies from Cordonia's noble houses. Perhaps sprinkle a few from other countries to appease the people."

"Yes sir." Liam mumbled when his father seemed to silently demand his agreement. "Whatever you think is the best way to move forward."

"Good." Constantine waved toward the door. "You may go. We will make our announcement tomorrow."

Liam bowed his head in acceptance. Still in a state of disbelief as he made his way to his chambers, he didn't hear his best friend calling his name.

"Liam?" Drake jogged to catch up to him. "I heard about Leo. Is it true?"

The new crown prince waited to answer until they were behind closed doors.

"It is." He rubbed a hand down his face. "Leo abdicated."

Drake poured them both a drink. He observed the slight tremble in Liam's hand as he took a healthy gulp of whiskey. Eyes closed briefly as he gathered his thoughts.

"I--I'm going to have to get married."

"What?" Drake breathed in disbelief. "Why?"

"All part of being king." Liam's lips twisted in a bitter smile.

He rolled his glass between his hands as he stared down at its contents. "I have to choose one during this year's social season."

"You have to go through all that Leo did?" Drake asked.

"Yes, but unlike his, I won't know who I'm supposed to choose." Liam grimaced as he swallowed the rest of his drink. "Madeleine had been chosen years ago by Father and Regina. The competition was mostly for the public's entertainment than to actually choose a queen."

Drake slumped back in his chair. "I'm sorry, Liam."

"It's..." He got up to pace, "it's fine. It's an honor to have a chance to serve my country. To marry and have a family...perhaps life will be better."

Perhaps this palace will feel like a home, he thought.

"When will it be announced?"

"Tomorrow."

"So soon." Drake murmured.

Liam briskly nodded.

His closest friend held his glass up in a toast. "Here's hoping, Liam."

*****************

Monterisso Royal Palace, a week later...

"Elisse." Amalas hugged her cousin. "Thank you for coming so quickly."

"Of course." Elisse took the offered chair. Her eyes dropped down to the baby bump showing. "How are you feeling?"

"Good." Amalas gently patted her tummy. "This baby has finally decided I'm not the enemy and has agreed that food is definitely a good thing."

Elisse laughed, shaking her head at her cousin's humor.

"But enough about the spoiled future king or queen I’m having." Amalas handed over a letter with Cordonia's royal seal. "Read this."

Elisse scanned the invitation, eyes widening slightly. "Prince Leo abdicated? Do we know why?"

The spy queen chuckled. "You know I do." She leaned over and grabbed a file off her table. "Let's just say that the former crown prince did not want the responsibilities that went along with the crown."

Elisse opened the file and snorted. "I've heard that Lady Madeleine can be difficult to deal with."

"That along with wanting his freedom to wander the earth like a rich playboy are his reasons." Amalas pointed out a photograph one of her agents snapped recently on a cruise ship. "This woman, Katie, is an even bigger reason."

"They're engaged?" Elisse whispered in disbelief. "He didn't waste any time, did he?"

"No, he did not." Amalas reclined in her chair. "Elisse? What would you think of Monterisso gaining an alliance with Cordonia?"

"I think it would benefit our country as well as theirs." She replied, setting Leo's folder down.

Another folder was handed to her. Her lips curved into a soft smile at the pictures of Cordonia's new crown prince. Each aspect her cousin found on Liam had made him a man she thought she would enjoy meeting.

"Marriage is the easiest and strongest alliance one can have with a foreign power."

Elisse looked up. "You're suggesting  I take part in Prince Liam's search."

"Exactly." Amalas smiled at her. "I can't think of a better queen for Cordonia than you." She reached over and grasped her hand. "But feel free to say no. I won't force you to do this if you do not wish to."

"I would like to meet him." Elisse admitted. She lowered his eyes to his picture. "He is very handsome."

"You always did like blue eyes." Amalas teased.

Elisse bit back a smile. "I do."

"Would you like to attend Cordonia's social season?"

Elisse slowly nodded. "Yes, I think I would."

Amalas picked up the letter from Constantine. "I'll go ahead and schedule your health exam."

"My what?" Elisse blinked in surprise.

"Cordonia's king isn't taking any chances that his last possible heir marries a woman unable to have children." Amalas grinned at her cousin. "Lucky for him that our family is notorious for our reproduction abilities."

Elisse laughed. "Our mothers certainly came from a large family." Her smile turned tender. "Whenever I think of my future, I always see myself with three or four children."

*****************

A few weeks later, Cordonia, the King's study...

"Have you made a list of those that are participating?" Regina asked her husband.

"I have." He handed her a sheet of paper.

The Queen scanned the names. "What happened to the Monterisso viscountess? I thought from Queen Amalas's letter that they were hoping to make a match."

Constantine's lips firmed in a disappointed frown. "She cannot have children."

Regina's countenance fell. "How tragic."

"Indeed." He replied. "It would have been a profitable match for us." He released a resigned sigh. "I suppose we now settle for Madeleine to take the crown again."

***************

The viscountess's chambers, Monterisso Palace...

"Elisse." Amalas pleaded. "Please, talk to me."

The young viscountess shook her head. Tears fell silently as she clutched a pillow to her stomach. Her thoughts were too much for her. All the plans she had dreamed of as a little girl were destroyed from one simple examination.

All from thinking Liam had beautiful blue eyes and seemed like a nice man she could easily fall for.

A choked sob burst forth as she doubled over from the pain of it all.

"Elisse." Amalas tried to wrap her arms around her. "I'm so sorry."

Elisse knew her cousin was. She knew Amalas would move heaven and earth for her if she could. Unfortunately, there were some things even a powerful queen could not do.

"We'll call in every specialist we can find." Amalas whispered, gently rocking Elisse. "I refuse to believe--"

"Stop!" Elisse cried out. "Please stop." Her anguished eyes met her cousin's. "I can't continue to hear doctors say that it is impossible."

"It's not." Amalas argued. "I can’t believe you are unable to--"

"I only have one ovary!" Elisse snapped. "It is so damaged from the endometriosis and benign tumors that I'm lucky to have a period every few months." She looked down at her worthless womb. "Even my uterus is filled with fibroids to the point they have warped it beyond repair. Surgery won't help." She wiped angrily at her tears. "No one will marry me now."

"That's not true! You--"

"Amalas, you know what nobles need." Elisse bit out. "They need heirs. They need a woman to fulfill that role. I'm completely obsolete in our world now."

She turned away from her cousin's sudden tears. She didn't want her pity. She didn't want anything except those elusive images of cuddling her own children.

If she could turn her mind off and focus on something else, anything else...

"I'm going to go away for a while."

Amalas jerked upright. "What?"

"I need to be alone." Elisse turned to face her. Her eyes filled with tears when her gaze dropped down to her cousin's ever growing baby bump. "I need to come to terms with all of this."

"Will you back in time for..." An expression of guilt flickered over the queen's face for such a selfish question.

"I'll try." Elisse hedged. "I promise."

She knew Amalas depended on her. Though the two had numerous cousins sprinkled in various titled positions all over Europe, they had always had a special bond that made them more like sisters. Perhaps it was their mothers' doing that made certain they would always have the other close at hand.

But Elisse knew deep down, she would have been close to her cousin without any outside influence. The notorious Queen of Spies distrusted most people, even some of their blood relatives. Yet, she trusted Elisse with everything.

She hated to leave her during her pregnancy, but the viscountess didn’t think she could take being around an expectant mother right now.

Amalas hugged her once more. "I'll arrange your travel. But I insist you take Felix with you as a bodyguard." She waited on Elisse's agreement. "Let me know where and when you wish to leave."

"I don't care where." Elisse whispered. "Just as long as I can leave as soon as possible."

***************

New York City, a month later...

"One nondescript bar as requested." Maxwell announced, holding the door open.

"Steaks for the table!" He yelled out.

"And four whiskeys!" Drake chimed in.

Riley rolled her eyes at Daniel. "You're really going to leave me with these guys?"

"I promise I'll work two of your shifts whenever you want." He bargained.

She let out a tired sigh. "Make it three and we have a deal."

He shook her hand. "You are brutal with negotiations."

She laughed, piled the tumblers of whiskey on her tray, and headed for the bachelor party.

She passed three drinks out. "I thought there were four of you."

"There are." Drake winked at her, causing a blush to form on her cheeks. "Right behind you is number four."

She turned around and blinked.

He's so handsome.

Liam smiled at her. "Pardon me, Miss?"

"Hmm?" She shook herself out of her daze. "Of course."

His smile flashed, making her knees feel slightly weak. "If you would..." He gestured toward his seat that she was blocking.

Her cheeks flared even more with color. "Right. Sorry."

She decided then and there to not allow her eyes to rest on him the remainder of their time here.

A few hours later, Liam approached her.

"Thank you for being so patient with us." His charming smile was a bit bashful. "I don't suppose I could repay such kindness with buying you a drink."

Riley found herself mesmerized by his blue eyes. "Where were you planning on going next?"

"I actually hoped you could help with that." He rubbed the back of his neck. "The guys hoped to go to a nightclub."

Her nose wrinkled. "I say forget the nightclub. There's a beach cove I could show you that is just the place to unwind."

"That sounds perfect." He held his hand out. "Shall we?"

****************

Six months later, Edenbrook Hospital, Boston...

Elisse chewed on her lower lip, wishing she could hear what the group of doctors were saying behind the glass partition.

After taking her file and passing it to a man in surgical scrubs, Dr. Ramsey walked back into her room.

"Ms. Mallin, after further examination," his expression gentled, "I believe your doctors in Monterisso were correct."

Elisse lowered her eyes. "I see."

"I still want to perform the surgeries we discussed." He sat down beside her hospital bed. "The severe pain in your uterus will only increase if we don't remove the fibroids. Dr. Tanka isn’t sure though how it will be after your surgery."

"Whatever you think." She closed her eyes tight. "It doesn't really matter what shape it is in. I suppose we should just remove it altogether."

Her doctor rested his hand over hers. He waited patiently for her to make eye contact.

"We won't know for certain until Dr. Tanka gets in there, but we believe we can save your ovary."

A bitter laugh escaped her lips. "By all means, hold on to that worthless body part."

His brow furrowed. "Elisse, I don't like the thought of you in this state of mind before surgery."

"I'm sorry." She replied automatically. "I don't mean to sound like this." Her gaze held his. "I--I never wanted much in life." Her shoulder lifted. "Perhaps it was the life I was born into, but having a family was more than passing on my noble title."

Ethan remained silent, allowing her time to express herself.

"I know I need to accept this, but I couldn't help but hope after reading about your diagnostic team," She rested her head back against her pillow, "I wanted the impossible."

"There's still a chance your uterus can remain intact. We might even be able to save some of your eggs." Ethan reminded her. "You could find a surrogate and--"

"I know." She sniffed. "And I also know there is a chance my eggs might not be in any shape to be saved."

She noticed his frown and gently squeezed his hand. "Thank you for trying, Dr. Ramsey."

"We're not done yet." He stood up when Dr. Tanka walked inside. "We'll talk more later."

Once everything was settled for her surgery in the morning, her bodyguard returned and kept vigil by her bedside.

"Felix," Elisse smiled softly at the middle aged man. "You should go to the hotel and rest."

"I'm fine m'lady." He grumbled.

Her eyebrow lifted at the six foot seven man. "That chair has to be uncomfortable."

A flicker of humor flashed in his eyes. "I've had better and worse, m'lady."

She began to laugh. "I can't imagine anything being worse than that."

"You haven't been on some of the queen's missions." He smiled warmly at her.

Elisse reached for his hand. "Thank you for watching over me."

He gently patted it, becoming gruff with his words that a lady didn't have to thank him for doing his job.

She smiled, taking comfort in his admonishment. Felix had tried to keep a professional distance from her, yet her sadness had him stepping in more and more to offer what comfort he could. He thought of her as a little sister and couldn't help but smile whenever she teased him as if he was family.

Such fondness for her added to the devotion and care he would have normally never given any other noble he was assigned to.

But Elisse was special. He hoped that somehow she would find a piece of happiness that could be all her own.

****************

New York, Statue of Liberty...

Riley swallowed nervously. She didn't know how she could refuse Liam, but it was no use.

After spending so much time with Drake while Liam kept up appearances with Madeleine, she had fallen out of love for Cordonia's new king. The grumpy commoner had touched her heart with his stories of not belonging. She had felt the same way while enduring every snub and insult from Madeleine and some of the other ladies at court.

With so little opportunities to be with Liam, and with feeling a bit hurt that her Prince Charming had not defended her against the allegations, she convinced herself that she had no choice. She had to be with the man that had stood by her side as she tried to locate Tariq.

"Liam, I can't marry you." Her words somehow came out steady. "I came to Cordonia for you, but I fell in love with Drake."

Liam took a step back. "What? You and Drake..."

He couldn't believe it. How had this happened without him noticing? He knew that Drake was fond of her and took her out some evenings. But love?

"Liam?" Riley was growing more nervous by his silence.

Liam couldn't think of what to say.

What should I do?

He only knew he wasn't ready to lose her from his life.

"You...you intend to live in Cordonia?"

She slowly nodded. "If that's okay. I want to see where things go with Drake."

Her words were another bitter slash to his heart.

"Of course." He slid his hands in his pockets to keep from grasping her and forcing her to take her words back. "Just because you don't feel as I do, I would never hold that against you. Cordonia is your home."

She visibly relaxed. "Thank you Liam."

"I think," he focused on her, "I think you will be a benefit to Cordonia. I'm going to make you a duchess."

"A duchess?!" She gasped. "But..."

He knew this would keep her at hand. Give him a reason to see her without appearing as the desperate, rejected suitor. Perhaps now that the scandal was over and things calmed down, she might realize that what she thought was love for Drake was nothing more than gratefulness for his assistance.

Am I wrong for hoping this? Should I instead hope their love is true?

Liam forced a smile. "I arranged for us to go to the top." He motioned toward the statue. "Would you still like to?"

Riley returned his smile. "I really can't pass up an opportunity like that, can I?"

"I hoped you wouldn't." He replied.

He followed behind her, wishing this night had ended differently.

***************

Another five months later, Cordonia...

"Anton and his minions are in chains!" Riley held her glass high as the court cheered.

Liam tugged at the stiff collar of his jacket. It had been a day filled with emotions that he could not share with a single soul. Seeing the woman he thought he loved marry his best friend had cut deep. Discovering they had been kidnapped had caused both anger and worry as he rushed to face down the man who dared to take the throne from him.

Witnessing Riley and Drake fight side by side, each trying to protect the other had been eye opening. Neither cared about anything other than keeping the one they loved safe.

He couldn't begrudge their happiness. Nor could he continue to wish that circumstances had gone differently. Riley was not meant for him after all.

He knew he would have to let the past go and somehow find a way to move forward into the future.

******************

A month later, Monterisso Royal Palace...

"King Liam chose an heir!" Amalas exclaimed when Elisse walked into the main hall.

"He chose one? That is shocking." Elisse leaned forward to see the report that just came in. "Who's the lucky child?"

"That's just it." Amalas dropped the paper. "He has named the yet to be conceived child of the Duke and Duchess of Valtoria as his heir."

Elisse's brow furrowed. "But, he might still marry. His own children should be next in line."

"He says differently." Amalas pulled up his news conference for her cousin to watch.

"This seems wrong." Elisse mumbled. " I know those two are his closest friends--"

"And they are Guardian and Champion of the Realm." Amalas reminded her with an eye roll. "That's what he has had to use to get the people on board with his decision."

"Poor Liam." Elisse couldn't help but sympathize with the king. "He's being pressured on all sides for something he can't completely control."

"I think I might pay a visit." Amalas tapped her finger against her chin. "Perhaps see if the new duke and duchess are amenable to a possible alliance."

"It couldn't hurt." Elisse added.

"Indeed." The Queen smiled warmly at her. "I want you to come along. It has been too long since you and I went on a trip. I could use your ability to read people while I guide them toward a possible arranged marriage for their child and mine."

"I suppose I have to do as my queen commands." Elisse teased. "And I've yet to ever say no to my cousin."

"Doubly lucky for me." Amalas smirked.

"When do we leave?"

"Tomorrow."

[playing-stories]

Why Playing Inside Made Me Hate Myself

There’s a level in Inside (Playdead, 2016) that sees the player-character, a nameless young boy, sprint from cover to cover as supersonic booms blast at timed intervals. I discovered pretty quickly that being caught out in the open during one of these blasts kills the boy in a horrifying explosion. His dismembered limbs go flying towards the camera before the game cuts and asks the player to try again and again. 

Even thinking about this level inspires a visceral horror in me. It took me so many attempts to finally get it right. Not only that, but this level was what made me understand what made Inside such a disturbing game - it made me loathe myself. But why self-loathing? Seeing a young helpless boy struggle through a brutal and hostile environment and seeing him die over and over is upsetting but why do I hate myself in particular? 

Perhaps in all these bad feelings I directed some of them towards myself. Do I hate myself for making me see these horrible things so many times? Maybe I feel betrayed in some way because I’ve exposed myself to something sickeningly sad and violent. 

No. There’s definitely more to it than that.

The level with the sonic booms is an excellent example of why Inside makes me hate myself for two reasons: 1) It’s deeply impersonal and 2) I’m really bad at it. Let’s address these both in turn.

It’s Deeply Impersonal 

The sonic boom level comes at mid-late point in the game. At this point, I have played enough of Inside to understand the situation at hand. I am playing as a young boy and my goal is to enter a mysterious facility. What I am running away from or towards is unknown. I have so far seen piles of dead pigs, security systems that kill trespassers, and limp men who can be controlled by whoever is wearing a special helmet. These men are being paraded in front of others; some stoic bourgeoisie types.

Notice that in my description of the game, I heavily focused on the environment of the game. The mindless slaves, the pigs, and the security systems were things that I, through the player-character, experienced but none of these were put there for me specifically. I didn’t cause any of this, and I will not be able to stop any of it. 

Then I come to the level with sonic booms. There is some sort of experimentation going on in this facility, that’s for sure. These booms are just a part of this. Everything is so big around me and I am so, so tiny. I am inconsequential here, dwarfed and alienated by my surroundings. The booms are procedural. They are not targeted. They do not care for young human boys. They are not malicious, they are completely apathetic. 

I must contend with the only human agency being present in this scene being my own. Now, in single-player videogames the player is always the only human agent, but in other games an illusion is built that NPCs have feelings, that can harbour ill will towards you, or that they can actively desire the player-character to save them. Taking all this away means that I am forced to reckon with my own complicity in killing this small scared child. Other levels that have the player chased by a pack of furious dogs or smothered to death by a mermaid at least had something that I could shift the blame onto when it killed me. In this level though, the sonic boom level, all I had was myself and the knowledge that I put the boy in this lethal situation

Tobi Smethurst, a games academic, also found this in Playdead’s other game, Limbo (2010), which has another young boy protagonist. Smethurst underlines how the levels in Limbo grew to also feature this alienation between player and environment more and more as the game progressed. Smethurst similarly points to how these games are so affective because they force the player into a place of complicity. Smethurst points out in their paper ‘Playing Dead in Videogames: Trauma in Limbo’ (2015) that in Limbo rag-doll physics mean that all of the young boy’s deaths are visually different. Becoming de-sensitised to the gruesome deaths therefore becomes more difficult. Failing one level may mean the boy falls in a way that bends his neck at an unnatural angle. Failing again may mean that this time he flops onto his front. The player must reckon with the reality that is their agency that caused a young boy’s death. I have not added a picture of a death in Limbo and I only advise looking one up with a hefty content warning.

While I found playing Limbo deeply upsetting, it did still give me a purpose to cling to. I knew from the very first level that I was looking for my lost sister. A little girl needs me is what I told myself. I clung to the fiction that I needed to rescue her. Without it then how was I supposed to face the fact the the person killing this little boy was me? Nothing was chasing me at the start of the game, nothing was out to get me. It was me, me who had walked the boy into a environment that was totally unsuitable and deadly. Inside takes the sister away. There is something at the end of the boys journey, but the player does not know this until late in the game. Whether or not the thing at the end is a good thing is also another question entirely. As I exposed the boy to killer explosions, attempted to make him jump between tall buildings, and led him deeper into the hostile facility I hated myself. I was doing this cruel horrible thing to him. All me.

I’m Really Bad At It

Which leads me on to my own lack of skill. I’m not a great gamer by any means. I love playing, but key tenets of game mechanics like pressing buttons or keeping to rhythms are things I struggle with as a . In Smethurst’s paper, an important point is made. It’s that even though Limbo makes it near impossible to complete every puzzle on the first try, it is not impossible. Both Limbo and Inside are trial and error games. In Limbo some puzzles purposely subvert behaviours that it just taught players moments ago. Nonetheless, even though it is very hard to achieve a no deaths run in either game the slither of possibility means that each death weighs on me even more.

I could have gotten the boy past the explosions this time. If it only weren’t for my lack of skill. If I were only more careful. Why am I so bad at this? I keep killing this kid. I’m going to see him die again and its my fault.

Inside not only highlights my agency in playing and failing at the game, but Inside has been actively made to be like the game environment itself. Brutal. Uncaring. Apathetic. Even though the game is hard, I cannot blame it for killing the boy without also blaming myself to a certain degree. And so I hate myself. The game has convinced me to hate myself while I’m playing. 

Killing Little Boys in Videogames

Before I end this piece I’d like to address one more videogame boy that I’ve killed. What Remains of Edith Finch (Giant Sparrow, 2017) is about the curse of the Finch family and it shows the player through a series of vignettes details of how each Finch family member died.

Calvin is just a child when he dies. He’s ambitious. He wants to swing his tree swing all the way around the branch. He swings, ignoring calls from his mother to come in for supper and goes higher and higher. The tree branch creaks and wind whistles by his ears and he’s almost made it. Then he loses control, and the player watches from Calvin’s perspective in horror as the boy flies over his garden to his untimely death.

Pretty sad cutscene, right?

Except it isn’t a cutscene. It very well could have been a cutscene. The game creators, however, elected to have the player make Calvin swing. The player is tasked with pressing two buttons in time to make Calvin slowly pick up momentum. The player knows where this is going and that this is dangerous. Yet if they want to continue playing they must kill Calvin. Again, the player is complicit in Calvin’s death with each button push leading Calvin closer to losing control of the swing.  

For a game that is thematically interested in facing trauma in order to process it, this is a perfect encapsulation of game mechanic echoing game story. By making the player a part of this scene, making their engagement essential, Edith Finch makes its players similarly face something that is uncomfortable and upsetting. Because they are active in Calvin’s death, the players are unable to stop looking at the screen, close their eyes, glaze over, or  reject what they are seeing in any other way. Sure, the controls are easy, but they still importantly require a level of effort from the player. The player can shift blame in this scenario. Unlike Inside or Limbo, survival is not an option for Calvin and so the player can easily argue that it isn’t their fault. This time, however, Calvin’s death being anyone’s fault is not the point. The engagement with the trauma of his death is what this scene is most interested in.

I would like to discuss how all of these characters being little boys might also be a contributing factor in why these games make me hate myself. I feel it would risk being too tangential so I’ll merely include a question: How do these little boys affect me simply by being little boys? For now, I will go and wallow a little more in the self-loathing that Inside has managed to make me feel.

Sources Cited:

Tobi Smethurst, ‘Playing Dead in Videogames: Trauma in Limbo’, The Journal of Popular Culture (2015).

[lillupon]

So, I've got a very long rant/opinion here and Idk really know how to say this without coming off kinda bad but I'm gonna say it anyways. I agree with the fact that the seventeen tag has been kinda dry lately on most fanfic places, but it's really only in the smut area. It's the sane way with other groups too I feel like. All of the nice little innocent tags are boomin to this day and thats completely fine. I think the smut tag is dry tho bc lately I feel like a few social issues (like sexualizing people and disrespecting them and their identity) have crossed over into kpop and have been ?blown out of proportion? Lately there's been a rampage of people who like to say that writing smut about someone is disgusting and is dehumanizing because people want to assume that it would make the idols uncomfortable which could equate to some morality issues on how you are reducing someone only to their body without their consent and a bunch of stuff like that. It kind of pisses me off bc this is fiction. About grown adults. Clamping down on horny people who simp over hot asian men isn't going to solve the issues we face in real life. I think a shit ton is wrong with the world we currently live in, and deciding to come after something that isn't even real bothers me. Like what does that actually accomplish. But yeah, I think thats a reason why smut has been dying down. I mean, on youtube almost every video about unpopular opinions, or things they dont like about kpop will include something about shipping idols in fanfics. And then everyone in the comment section will talk about how its all fine and dandy in moderation, but once people start writing smut it's crossing the idols personal boundaries. It's something I've been seeing a lot more often and I think people who are interested in writing smut are being turned away from it bc we've gotten to a point where people are being called disgusting for having fantasies.

Hi Anon, thank you for sending in this Ask. 

I want to preface this by saying: when I write or talk about Mingyu and Wonwoo fucking on my blog, it is a fantasy. I am not speculating about what the real Mingyu and Wonwoo might be like in bed. I am imagining the versions of Mingyu and Wonwoo that I have created in my head, that exist only in my stories. None of it is real. I understand that this can be a blurry boundary for some people. But for me, the separation between fantasy and reality is well-defined. Now, on to your Ask!

You’ve hit the nail on the head with this one. You’ve also touched on many of the issues I have been struggling with myself as of late. It’s difficult to argue about morals since everyone has a different set of values, as well as different comfort levels. Some people think real person fiction (RPF) is a gross invasion of privacy. Others are fine with it. And others don’t care one way or another. There is no single answer; I can only offer my answer. Which means, of course, people are welcome to disagree with it, or parts of it. 

In this essay (LOL But forreal: this is an essay), I will be sharing my experience in the k-pop fanfic community from 2014 to present, the etiquette I personally abide by as a reader and writer of RPF, as well as my stance on RPF in general.

I started reading and posting fanfics back in 2014/2015 on a website called AsianFanfics (AFF). Obviously, no one on that site had a problem with RPF, since AFF is a platform made specifically for sharing stories about Asian celebrities. For many years, I read and enjoyed RPF with zero guilt. I scribbled away by myself in my own corner of fandom and curated my own content. I didn’t interact much with other fans, readers, or writers. I didn’t have a Twitter, and I only used tumblr to reblog memes. As a result, I’ve been able to avoid a lot of anti-shipping discourse, as well as purity and cancel culture. I had no idea there were so many negative opinions about RPF. It wasn’t until I became active on the subreddit r/Fanfiction last year that I learned about all the discourse surrounding RPF. 

This newfound ‘awareness’ does make me feel guilty at times—but only because after mulling this over, I still don’t think this is something to feel guilty about.

Here’s what I remember, first and foremost, when I create and consume RPF: fanfics and my favourite ships are fictional, and fiction is fantasy. This is basic etiquette when it comes to RPF, and most people in the k-pop fandom understand this. Delusional fans exist, of course, but they are not representative of the entire k-pop community. 

Another point of etiquette is to keep fanfics within fandom spaces. I would never push my fics into celebrities’ faces, or go around claiming that my fanfics are accurate representations of a k-idol’s life or personality, in any way, shape, or form. I would also discourage directing ship-related questions to official accounts, or bringing them up during fansigns or other face-to-face interactions; I believe that in these instances, shipping does have the potential to strain real-life relationships.

So with basic etiquette out of the way, let me share my approach to RPF in general.

As much as we like to think we know our favourite celebrities, we really don’t. All we see is their public persona. And this public persona is intentionally controlled, managed, and curated by a team of people: directors, tabloids, editors, makeup artists, publicists, etc. How “real” are these celebrities? We are so distanced from them that they may as well be fictional.

I draw from the public persona that idols project, and I work them into my own writing. But at the end of the day, these personalities are my own interpretation. My interpretation is probably nothing like an idol’s actual personality. I just use the “public persona/character” that idols portray as inspiration for my own stories, which are set in wildly different universes.

More than anything, I think of k-pop idols as “actors” in my fic. You know how when you write an original novel, you scroll through Google images, looking for the perfect person to portray your original character? RPF is literally that, except you might build upon pre-existing dynamics and personalities.

When it comes to explicit fanfiction, two main concerns are prevalent: one of consent, and one of sexualisation.

If we argue against explicit RPF due to lack of consent, we should be willing to apply the same lens to all explicit works. How do we know that the creator of a movie, book, series, etc., is okay with us using their characters in our stories, explicit or not? We don’t. Perhaps some creators encourage fanfiction, but don’t want their lovingly crafted characters engaging in sexual acts or experiencing trauma. We just don’t know. I feel this line is even more blurred when we talk about characters from movies or TV series.

Let’s take Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, as portrayed by Chris Evans and Sebastian Stan, from the Captain America movies as an example. I am willing to bet that when people consume and create explicit fanfiction about Steve and Bucky, they are imagining Chris Evans and Sebastian Stan in their heads. I doubt many people are imagining the 2D cartoon versions of Steve and Bucky, even though they’re technically the exact same characters. Why? Well, it could be because movies are more readily and easily consumed than comics, and so people are unfamiliar with comic book Steve and Bucky. But it might also be because fans find Chris Evans and Sebastian Stan attractive. Is this really any different from RPF, where fic authors make up everything about a celebrity’s life?  

When readers and writers of fanfic talk about how hot Steve Rogers or Bucky Barnes is, those comments are about Chris Evans and Sebastian Stan’s bodies. When reading explicit stories, fans are going to picture Chris and Sebastian’s bodies in their head, doing sexual things. Can we say, “Well, it’s not really you, Chris/Sebastian”, when in a way, it is?

The reality is, people are going to thirst over celebrities, regardless of whether or not explicit fanfiction exists. They’re going to post thirst tweets on Twitter. They’re going to talk to friends and strangers online about how hot [insert celebrity name here] is. They’re going to fantasize about dating and having sex with their favourite celebrity. Or, as it is in my case, they’re going to make up stories in their heads about their favourite idols dating and banging each other. People are going to do all of this without ‘getting consent’ from the celebrity. Cracking down upon and shaming writers of RPF isn’t going to change any of that.

To be honest, I’m not sure why people think it is disgusting to imagine sexual scenarios about real people. It is okay and normal to have these kinds of fantasies. I suppose the alternative is to fantasise about having sex with cartoon characters instead? It’s a very binary way of thinking to say that if you imagine/write real people in explicit scenarios, you are immediately sexualising, dehumanising, or objectifying them. There is more to dehumanisation than writing smut about our favourite celebrities. For one thing, you can love someone and appreciate all parts of them, and still want to fuck their brains out. And generally, fanfics come from a place of love—love that is not only sexual in nature.

Is it the sharing aspect inherent to fanfiction? The possibility that a celebrity might stumble upon explicit works about them? The chances are very low, I think, of the k-pop idols I enjoy writing about coming across my English fics. But I also believe in curating your own content, and that applies to celebrities too. Perhaps a celebrity should not go searching for fanfics about themselves. And of course, people should not show celebrities their fanfics, unless invited.

Another argument I hear against (explicit) RPF is, “How would you feel if someone wrote fanfiction about you?” First off, I don’t like this argument because there’s a difference between someone who decides to be a public figure versus someone who decides to remain a regular private citizen. Celebrities should and do know what they’re getting into when they choose their occupation. (This is not to say, “They are celebrities; sexualise them all you want because that’s what they signed up for.” Here, I am only acknowledging that people might have sexual fantasies about celebrities they are attracted to. Presumably, celebrities are cognizant of this.)  

If someone (whose existence I am not even aware of, mind you) decides they want to write explicit fanfiction of me in some tiny corner of the Internet, I wouldn’t care so long as: (1) they don’t shove it into my face, and (2) they don’t harass me and ask invasive questions about my personal life and relationships. It’s not hurting me or negatively affecting my life, so it wouldn’t even register as a blip on my radar. When fanfiction remains within its appropriate spaces, it is largely harmless. 

Now, if a k-pop idol were to ask their fans to stop writing fanfiction about them, would I? Yes, I would. However, I can’t imagine that happening. Judging by the number of ��sexy’ concepts, fanservice moments, and variety shows such as ‘We Got Married’, I am certain that k-pop idols realise they are the stars of many fantasies—some of which are explicit in nature. Considering the prevalence of shipping in the k-pop industry, I would argue that shipping is subtly encouraged.

It’s sad that so many talented writers are shamed out of fandom, or feel that k-pop cannot be the medium through which they tell their stories, or explore their sexuality, or cope with trauma, or simply have fun. Professional works and Hollywood love their RPF—readers and writers of fanfics should be able to, as well. 

As you said Anon, “clamping down on horny people who simp over hot asian men isn't going to solve the issues we face in real life” (this is a lovely sentence, by the way). The kind of person who dehumanises another and reduces them to a sexual object will do so some other way, if not via fanfiction. I don’t think the issue of fetishisation can be fixed simply by telling people not to write explicit RPF. In my experience, people who read and write RPF are more respectful and thoughtful about these things than the general public. We’ve all seen the general public say highly sexual things about celebrities in the media and to their faces, or tag celebrities in their thirst tweets. Are these things less invasive than fanfiction? Personally, I don’t think so. And in my opinion, there are more pressing and damaging issues in stan culture than fanfic.

In conclusion, I don’t think there is anything wrong with creating and consuming RPF, both explicit and non-explicit so long as we:

Remember we are writing fiction

Keep RPF within its appropriate space, and

Do not harass celebrities about their personal lives and relationships

RPF is not for everyone. There may be people who enjoy RPF, but draw the line at explicit stories. This is fine. Everyone has their own personal preferences. What is not fine, however, is attacking people for creating things you don’t like. I’m not sure what kind of moral crusade people are on and what they hope to achieve by shaming writers of RPF, explicit or otherwise. Ultimately, fic authors are writing a fantasy. It’s not real; no one is being hurt. I think it’s important for people to curate their own content, and AO3 makes it very easy to filter out explicit works and unwanted tags. 

Maybe this is me trying to justify my own participation in explicit RPF—I don’t know. What I do know is that I love k-pop, and fandom is an important part of my media and entertainment experience. I adore the k-pop idols I write about, and I just want to imagine them being happy and getting lots of love and orgasms. Let a bitch be horny, goddamn… 

Some bonus fun facts!

At the time I am writing this, on AO3:

26.2% of Stray Kids fanfics are rated M or E

26.3% of Seventeen fanfics are rated M or E

29.0% of Merlin fanfics are rated M or E

34.9% of Captain America (Movies) fanfics are rated M or E

40.1% of BTS fanfics are rated M or E ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Coincidentally, I saw this post on Reddit this morning: Can we have a RPF positivity post?

[hellowkatey]

What are Men to Rocks and Mountains? Chapter 3

Rating: T | No warning apply | Obi-Wan Kenobi & Satine Kryze

Summary: Quinlan Vos has a good Obi-Wan bullshit-meter. Satine continues her pattern of not having fun at balls. Obi-Wan is trying his best.

Read it on AO3 Here

Chapter 3: Care to Dance?

Obi-Wan sits on the bench of the training room, pouring the cool contents of his canteen down his throat. Sweat is pouring down his back from nearly twenty minutes of sustained saber practice. Somehow Quinlan Vos, his sparring partner, is still swinging his lightsaber around in various loose katas. Obi-Wan is pretty sure his energy is endless.

"You could at least act like you are tired," Obi-Wan huffs, setting down the canteen.

"Against the Jedi Code, lying is," Quin mocks Master Yoda in a surprisingly accurate voice. Obi-Wan chuckles, standing and spinning his saber around with a loose wrist to prepare to re-engage.

"What form are you practicing?" Quin asks, knowingly eyeing the opening stance of Ataru. "Or should I say, supposed to be practicing?"

"I didn't realize I was sparring with Qui-Gon."

Quin snorts. "C'mon Obi, I'll do Makashi."

"You suck at form two," Obi-Wan deadpans.

"Exactly, maybe you'll have a chance."

Begrugedly, he shifts his stance to Soresu. The stance feels unnatural after practicing Ataru so vigorously-- mostly because Qui-Gon has just begun training him in more advanced forms. He is set on mastering Ataru to catch up to his peers like Quinlan who are already experimenting with other forms. His Kiffar friend has practically mastered Ataru himself but has been working on his Djem So the last couple of weeks.

Quin tips his saber down in the Makashi opening salute. It looks out of place, a formal duel beginning done by the unconventional and infamously roguish Jedi. Quinlan immediately steps forward with less grace than is supposed to be employed with this form, but it holds power all the same. Obi-Wan accepts his defensive position and catches the saber on his own, satisfied with the ease it blocks the blade.

Quinlan is, of course, unrelenting. He twirls, quickly performing a counter move that unblocks his saber and goes for another calculated hit. The movements remind Obi-Wan of the sparring session he witnessed while with Lady Satine, and a smile appears unwillingly on his face.

"What's that stupid look on your face?" Quin prods when they lock their blades once more. The green and blue blades light up either side of his friend's face, making his eyebrow wiggle more menacing than he meant it to be.

"Not sure what you're referring to." Obi-Wan decides to throw in some acrobatics, using the Force to launch him to the other side of Quin as he is going into a backswing. It adequately catches him off guard, making him go on the defense for a moment while Obi-Wan integrates a few more aggressive attacks.

They get into a stalemate, stalking one another from a few meters apart. "Either my chest is sending you into a conniption-- which, understandable, I have been working out." Obi-Wan glances down at his friend's bare chest, rolling his eyes. Or... it's something up there," he gestures his lightsaber at Obi-Wan's head.

"The first, obviously." Quin has always been known for being difficult to clothe. Obi-Wan can still remember the way their creché master's eyes nearly popped out of her head when she walked into him cutting the sleeves off his tunic-- unsuccessfully, as he stole a practice saber from the training room to do the job and failed to realize it was in training mode. It had the cutting ability of a flashlight. Quin claims he feels restricted in clothing and prefers to wear as little as possible. Obi-Wan has gotten used to it at this point, so Quin's half-clothed state didn't even register in his mind.

"I knew it."

They fall back into step. Quin's Makashi is beginning to look suspiciously like Ataru with every passing second, and Obi-Wan is aching to return to it as well. Remaining on defense isn't nearly as fun as getting to attack. The moment he gains the upper hand, he switches back to the more aggressive form, managing to draw a rare yield from Quin. Now he looks tired.

"I'll get you next time, Obi," Quin says as Obi-Wan extends his hand to help up his friend. Quinlan walks across the training room and unties his locks from the bun he had them strapped in. They fall in neat heaps to his shoulders. "Though I still am curious, what're you thinking about?"

"It was really nothing. Your horrible Magashi form just reminded me of something amusing."

Obi-Wan ties his tunic and slips on his outer robe. Quin has already thrown on a shirt and haphazardly secured his own robes when he appears at his side.

"What kind of amusing something?"

"Is it any of your business?"

"Things that make you look like a youngling with a crush are always my business, Obi my boy."

"Youngling with a-- you're crazy, Quin." Obi-Wan throws his bag over his shoulder but Quin trails closely behind him.

"I'll ask Bant."

"Go ahead," Obi-Wan says. He hasn't really told anyone about his current mission... he isn't sure why he is keeping it fairly guarded. He has a... feeling. Obi-Wan isn't sure if it's a good or bad feeling, but the Force is different as of late and he is still trying to figure out why.

"Interesting," Quin makes a point of rubbing his chin as though he has facial hair to stroke. "You didn't even tell Bant, then? Must be not a something, but a someone."

Obi-Wan makes the horrible mistake of stopping in the middle of the hall. Quin's eyes grow wide, making his yellow facial tattoo upturn like a giant smile. He is fairly sure the hyper Kiffar may start throwing a party.

"Obi, you dirty dewback."

"Quin, please--"

"You sneaky bastard. Who?"

He sighs. He hasn't even had the chance to figure out for himself what the hell is going on with him, but what Obi-Wan does know is that he left Lady Satine's home with a fluttering in his stomach. Why? He has no idea. The entire afternoon was practically a nightmare. He was stuck in a room with three Mandalorian teenagers who made making him as uncomfortable as possible a game. The only words Lady Satine and him exchanged were laced with sarcasm and a bit of underlying displeasure with one another, so why he found himself captivated is well beyond him.

"It's-- Well I have-- There's..."

Obi-Wan's sputtering just makes Quin laugh, slapping him on the shoulder.

"Don't worry, I'll keep the secret that you have the hots for someone unspecified so long as you promise to tell me about it when you figure out how to speak again."

"It's not the hots... Blast it, nevermind," he throws his hands up in defeat and they continue back toward their respective rooms. He can feel his cheeks flush red and he just hopes any passerby assumes from Quin's disheveled appearance it's from a recent saber training encounter. 

He steps into the shared apartment of him and Qui-Gon, finding his Master sitting in the living room, strolling lazily through a datapad. Qui-Gon glances up. "Obi-Wan. How was sparring?"

Obi-Wan drops his bag and goes straight to the kitchen to prepare himself a cup of tea. "Good, Master. I beat Padawan Vos."

A hum of approval makes Obi-Wan relax, a wave of happiness blossoming through him. He drops tea bags into two mugs and carries one to Qui-Gon.

"Thank you, padawan."

Obi-Wan takes a seat across from Master Jinn, watching as the water slowly darkens with every passing moment. "Any word from Lady Satine today?" This time, Qui-Gon puts down his datapad and looks up with a look that Obi-Wan often equates with trouble. "Master, you know I hate that look."

"What look are you referring to?"

"You know the one."

"I have no idea what you could be talking about." He reaches down and picks up his mug, taking a sip despite it definitely not being done steeping. Dramatic bastard, Obi-Wan thinks, shaking his head. "I did hear from her this morning, actually."

A pause. For dramatic effect, it seems. Obi-Wan has a very strong feeling he is not going to like this. "It appears there is a fundraiser tonight that Lady Satine is to attend. We agreed it would draw too much attention for me to attend, as the invitees of the party are young politicians and leaders and I am not as young as I once was... But you--"

"Master don't tell me I have to go to another party."

"But you won't stand out among your peer group."

Obi-Wan sighs.

"Oh, and one more thing," Qui-Gon says, a sly smile crossing his lips. Okay, Obi-Wan has a really bad feeling now.

_____

The only thing that Satine can think about is how strange it all is. Strange that she is sitting here with her sister, cousin, and a Vizla boy waiting to leave for a fundraiser. Strange to see the accents on Nel's formalwear matching her gown.

They'd been spending a lot of time together the last few days. Nel is not as quiet as she initially thought him to be, and has really grown to be a pleasant companion.

He was showing her holos from Mandalore before the war. They were reveling in the good old days when suddenly Nel's eyes caught hers, and Satine realized they were sitting quite close. Close enough that his leg pressed against hers and one of his arms had found its way across the couch behind her.

Her heart raced, and she ever so slightly shifted her leg away to reduce the tension. And then his hand slid from the couch to her shoulder and she was sure she stopped breathing.

"The fundraiser," Nel said, his eyes watching her carefully. "Could I have the honor of being your date?"

She didn't think. How could she think with a man as attractive as Nel sitting so close? She just nodded, and he cocked his head to the side. He's waiting for a real answer, she realizes, and she clears her throat. "Yes, yes that would be lovely, Nel."

Then Bo-Katan came in, and though Nel didn't seem concerned with their position, Satine sprang back, severing any contact between them.

And now she sits next to Nel, his arm across the back of the couch behind her, and his accents the same blue-green color as her gown.

Bo sits across from them, outfitted in one of Satine's old dresses. It's an emerald green dress, structured through the torso and with a lightweight skirt and long billowing sleeves. She knew Bo would like it because it was a birthday gift from her father-- meaning the structured top is really a beskar chest plate, not battle-grade but enough to provide adequate protection. Leave it to Mandalore to figure out how to make elegant dresses with beskar. Satine's own gown is a newer model, instead of a chest plate the material is woven with beskar fibers. Much more flexible and can still stop a blaster shot. It's has a similar silhouette to Bo's A-line dress, but her sleeves are cinched at the wrists rather than hanging open.

Kira walks in, dressed up in her own beskar plated dress of a more simple design. "I believe the Jedi is on his way up," she says, causing Bo to roll her eyes.

"I don't understand why he has to come."

"The Chancellor was specific. I go anywhere public, I must bring a Jedi."

"I didn't realize the throne of Mandalore bowed to the Chancellor of the Republic," Bo says spitefully.

Satine lets out a frustrated huff. It's been like this all week. Things between them are fine and then suddenly she is reminded of Bo's short circuit. Anything involving the Republic, political tasks, and the Jedi seem to set her off. Satine feels like she's been walking on eggshells ever since she came.

"It's called diplomacy, sister. I meet the requests of the Chancellor and a good relationship is achieved that may be helpful one day. You must trust me. I know more about this than you."

The door opens and in walks Obi-Wan. Satine sees him and nearly double takes in surprise.

Gone are his ratty Jedi robes. Instead, he wears a dark blue formal tunic with a long dark gray outer piece that hangs down to his knees. His blue pants tuck into a pair of shined black boots. Even his hair seems to have been contained. His messy spikes now look soft and neat. The only indication that a Jedi still stands before her is the tiny braid that peeks out from behind his ear, though it is tucked away, that horrible ponytail, and the glimpse of his lightsaber strapped to a black leather belt, complete with silver accents. It's simple, modest, yet it flatters him.

Obi-Wan bows. "Good evening, Lady Satine of House Kryze, Lady Bo-Katan of House Kryze, Nel Raiko of House Vizla, and Kira Kryze of Clan Kryze," he says fluidly. Satine suspects he rehearsed it, though it rolls off his tongue effortlessly.

"Padawan Kenobi," she replies, bowing.

"Great, now we can leave," Bo says, standing and pushing past Obi-Wan. Satine shoots him an apologetic look, and Nel comes to her side.

"Ready?" he says, extending his arm out. Satine slips her arm in the crook of his elbow. When she looks up at the Jedi she realizes he looks quite uncomfortable, his eyes trained on her arm in Nel's. The realization dawns on her. He thought we were going together? She thinks back on her conversation with Obi-Wan's master. Yes, she did word it as him accompanying her...

"Padawan Kenobi, I thought you could be Kira's date for tonight. So you two could collaborate."

She glances at Kira who nods and walks next to the Jedi.

"Yes, Lady Satine, I think that is a splendid plan." He turns, mirroring Nel and holding out his arm for Kira. Satine holds back a laugh as Kira looks surprised by this gesture, but takes it nonetheless. Coincidentally, Kira's gray dress goes well with Obi-Wan's own attire.

"This should be interesting," Nel whispers as they head toward the lift.

"Oh, undoubtedly."

They arrive at the fundraiser in higher spirits than they left. To Satine's surprise, Obi-Wan was quite attentive to her cousin Kira. The entire ride he chatted with her, not about their duty as she would have expected, but just asking questions and getting to know her. From overhearing their conversation, Satine learned that Obi-Wan is also eighteen years old (but nearly nineteen), he is from Stewjon originally but considers Coruscant and the Jedi temple his home, and he and Master Jinn have been partners for five years now. How could this be the same standoffish boy she's encountered many times in the last few weeks?

With Nel and Bo engaged in their own conversation about who-knows-what, Satine began to stew. She isn't quite sure why her mood changed, but something about being treated rudely by the Jedi when he obviously is more than capable of being civil-- even pleasant!-- doesn't sit right with her.

Nel seems to notice the shift, pressing a hand into the center of her back. "You alright?"

"Of course," she says, not bothering to lessen the sharpness in her tone. Nel's arm drops. Immediate regret fills her. She reaches up and gingerly places her fingers near the crook of his elbow. He wings it out so she can slip her arm through. "Apologies. The last time I was at a large event my life was endangered."

Nel nods. She told finally him about the occurrence the day earlier. "Not to worry. I'm sure your shadows won't allow anything to happen to you," he says, glancing back at Obi-Wan and Kira. Nel leans in, his lips slightly grazing her ear. "Nor will I."

A shiver runs down her spine, followed by a blush she hopes her makeup covers.

The fundraiser is much smaller than the Senator Ball, though still as grandiose. It is a special event that Satine has genuinely enjoyed the last few years because it only invites young politicians. They raise funds for causes that affect younger generations and give the spotlight to up and coming movements. It is quite progressive and makes Satine feel at home with like-minded individuals. The banquet hall is beautiful decorated with lights and holos advertising the various causes that are being supported. One end contains gambling games where all the proceeds go to the winner's choice. The other end is a giant dance floor that is already occupied with dozens of occupants. The border is lined with various information booths with gifts and incentives to donate. She already has a few causes she is eager to learn more about.

"I think I will visit the booths first," Satine says. Nel looks down at her, his handsome face cool and neutral.

"I told Bo I would go with her to play a few rounds of sabacc. I am considered the best player among my friends."

Disappointment fills Satine. "But how will you know what cause you want to donate to if you do not learn about them?"

Nel shrugs. "Well, whoever you want to donate to, I will oblige."

She sighs. She has half a mind to directly ask him to stay with her, but she meets the eyes of Bo, who approaches them.

"I found a table where the players are quite inexperienced," Bo says with a grin. Nel detaches himself from Satine, stopping to give her a smile. His hand reaches up and grazes her cheek.

"Only for a little bit. I very much would like to have a dance with you once we get the fundraiser portion of the night out of the way."

Her chest flutters with excitement... or nervousness? dread? She isn't sure.

"Yes, I look forward to that."

He disappears into the crowd.

Satine sighs, turning to find Obi-Wan and Kira watching. She swears she sees the Jedi raise an eyebrow in the direction of Nel. Kira leaves Obi-Wan's side and joins her. "Shall we, cousin?"

They walk from booth to booth, hearing the pitches of the representatives. Once again, Obi-Wan surprises her. He follows closely behind, seemingly interested in the causes and asking a few questions between the sessions. His interest is genuine, she can tell, but his knowledge of politics seems to be lacking. She watches the way his face seems to fall when she starts talking about political procedures. He seems more interested in the idea of change rather than the process, which disappoints her. Ideas are great, but there is much that needs to be done to insight true action.

By the end of their circuit, they are spit out near the casino area. Satine looks over to see Nel and Bo still huddled around a sabacc table, piles of chips in front of them. She stares at him, hoping to catch his attention, but he doesn't look up.

"Lady Satine," she turns to see Obi-Wan with his hand out. "Would you care to dance?"

"I would," she says without hesitation. Her eyes go wide and Obi-Wan bows and turns to find a space on the dance floor. Satine leans back so she is close to Kira.

"Did I just agree to dance with Obi-Wan Kenobi?"

Kira chuckles. "I daresay you find him amiable, Satine."

"Which would be most inconvenient since I have sworn to loathe him for all eternity."

Kira places a hand on the back of Satine's back and gives her a gentle push forward. She sighs, catching up with Obi-Wan.

The music shifts and Satine recognizes the characteristic chords of the Sarabande, an Alderaanian partner dance. For a moment she panics that Obi-Wan is not knowledgable of this, but he lines up across from her, his stance correct for the dance.

The chords pick up, indicating the first step. Obi-Wan steps toward her, holding his hands out for her to take. She grabs them softly, and he pulls her gently toward him before they separate in half-steps.

"You know this dance," she says with a hint of surprise peeking through.

"Of course, I wouldn't have asked you to dance if I was to make a fool of myself."

She holds back a smile. They meet once again, his hand taking hers and they stand parallel to one another.

"Your clothes are... different than what I was expecting."

He glances down, suddenly seeming a little insecure. "Well, I told Master Jinn it wouldn't be appropriate to wear my robes... even my good ones as it would make me stand out. I borrowed these from another StewJoni padawan."

"So they are traditional of your home planet?"

"Yes, I suppose."

"They are nice."

He smiles, his youth suddenly returning to him. Satine hadn't realized until this moment, but what was striking her as different about Obi-Wan was how much larger he looked in these clothes. Broader. Like a young man rather than a boy in oversized robes. The attention that she usually gave to his raggedy clothes was suddenly focused on the bright blue of his eyes and the dimples that appeared in his cheeks when he smiled. I daresay you find him amiable, Satine.  Satine pushes back that comment, forcing it to not echo in her mind as it has been since they began this dance.

She glances toward the cards table and sees Nel still not paying any attention. Her mood dips. Obi-Wan spins her, allowing the quiet to fall over them.

"It is your turn to say something, Padawan Kenobi. I commented on your dancing. Now you ought to remark on the party, or the number of couples who obviously have no idea what they are doing." she says, her eyes watching two Mid-rim senators struggling to keep in step.

"Do you talk as a rule while dancing?"' His tone is light, but it jabs at her efforts to attempt to be civil with the Jedi. As he had been with Kira all night.

"No, no. I prefer to be distant and taciturn. It makes it all the more enjoyable, don't you think?"

Obi-Wan is quiet for a moment. She feels his grip on her hand slightly stiffen. The air around them suddenly changes. She can feel the tension build, causing her cheeks to feel warm.

"Then I shall oblige, Lady Satine. I must say, I am curious. Nel Raiko is your date, is he not?"

They reach the part of the dance where she turns, so her back is to Obi-Wan, relieving her of his sudden question. She swallows hard, her heart beating rapidly in her chest as they meet again.

"He is a childhood friend and has been quite supportive and lovely as of late. So yes, he is my date this evening."

"I see he is being especially supportive tonight."

They turn so they are parallel once again and Satine is relieved he can't see the tightness in her lips. It is a low blow. A valid observation, but not one that he has any right to comment on.

"To use one's skill in sabacc to support a good cause is an excellent way of support, I would think. Not that you would know, but charity comes in many forms."

"Not that I would-- why would you say such a thing?" he says, his calm demeanor giving way to an emotion that Satine cannot identify.

"I am just making out your character, Padawan Kenobi."

"And what have you discovered?"

"Very little." They fall silent. His face is hardened and his jaw set in a way that makes him look much older than he is. Much more imposing. They are standing, staring at one another while the music progresses, trailing toward the end of the song. Thankfully the final cord is played. Both of them bow to one another. "I have observed such different sides of you in such a short time. It puzzles me as to how you can genuinely be all of them."

The rising and falling of his chest slow as she sees in real-time him calming his emotions. He looks at her with apathy, which is more jarring than any anger he could have displayed. "I hope to give you more clarity in the future then."

He turns, leaving Satine alone in the middle of the dance floor.

A tap on her shoulder. She turns to see Nel, his eyes trained on Obi-Wan pushing through the crowd.

"Are you okay?" he asks, finally looking down at her. "It looked pretty... tense over here."

She lets out a breath, hiding her shaking hands behind her back. So he had been watching. She can see his deep frown as he tracks the Jedi with his eyes, even still. Is he... jealous? The thought nearly makes her laugh. Nothing in the world could make her want Obi-Wan Kenobi. He has nothing to be jealous of.

"Everything is perfect, now that you are here to dance with me," she says, holding out her hand. Nel's frown becomes a small smile and he takes her hand in his.

_____

Who would Obi-Wan run into as soon as he returned to the Jedi Temple than Quin? Of course. Even worse, his other friends Bant Eerin and Garen Muln sit in the windowsill with him. As soon as Quin sees him, he jumps up, his eyes wide. Right. I'm still dressed like a blasted politician.

"Obi, where the hell did you just come from? Out seeing a certain someone?" Quin says. This is exactly the attention Obi-Wan is not in the mood for at this moment.

"Nowhere and no one," he says coldly, just wanting to go hide in his room and meditate. He tries to push past Quin, but he grabs Obi-Wan by the bicep, his playful demeanor suddenly shifted to seriousness. Even Bant and Garen have gotten to their feet, staring at him with wide eyes.

"What's wrong?"

He sighs, pulling his arm out of Quin's grasp. "I need... I need to meditate, Quinlan." He can't bring himself to look at Bant or Garen.

The use of his full name seems to catch him off guard enough that he releases him. Obi-Wan makes a mental note to apologize to him and the others later, but for now, he has two things on his mind: getting these damned clothes off and sinking into meditation so deep it rivals Master Yoda.

He takes off down the hall, leaving Quin, Bant, and Garen speechless and standing in the middle of the passage.

As soon as he gets in his apartment, Obi-Wan starts pulling off pieces of his outfit. How long did he spend tracking down that senior padawan to borrow these clothes? To look nice? To make his impact less obvious for Lady Satine's sake? He marches into his room, throwing them in the direction of his hamper. Now standing in just a plain shirt and his undergarments, he takes a deep breath, letting the Force surround him. He summons good feelings, using them to help push out the bad ones.

"Obi-Wan?" he distantly hears his name, but he ignores it for now as he sinks into a meditative pose on the floor.

It is not the Jedi way to be angry. To be affected in such a way. I release these negative sentiments to the Force.

It is not the Jedi way to be frustrated. To let the words of others, especially of those I have sworn to protect, to make me bitter. I release these negative sentiments to the Force.

The weight on his shoulders lessens and he relaxes.

It is not the Jedi way to take my emotions out on my friends. I shall explain my poor mood to them and apologize. I release these negative sentiments to the Force.

Maybe he will go see them tonight. They are likely still sitting out there discussing his strange behavior.

It is not the Jedi way... he swallows hard. It is not the Jedi way to... you know. I release these sentiments to the Force.

[cassandracaiin]

Gary’s Mental Health: An Analysis of His Character.

Spoilers ahead.

If you play Love Island The Game 2019 and make it to Day 26, you stumble upon a concerned Gary, who is sitting by himself. After a brief chat, he proceeds to tell your MC that he’s had some problems with how he felt about his body in the past. He often comes across a simple guy, who is always bantering and fooling around, and most players tend to think that he only talks about his nan and cranes, so the sudden seriousness of this conversation may have seemed odd for some of you. Despite this, the unexpected confession he makes didn’t go unnoticed by the fandom, with many starting to appreciate him more because of it.

Few realize how important and revealing this conversation is. If you connect the right dots across the whole game, it helps to explain lots of his actions, beliefs and behavior. So, in this analysis I’ll be doing that: I’ll be providing you with all the information you’ll need to understand the subject, inserting exact quotes of the game and breaking down some crucial scenes. Because of this, this post will be really long, so get comfy, grab some snacks and prepare for an extensive reading.

Before starting, I must remind you that Gary is, indeed, a fictional character. That’s why I’ll be analyzing quotes and scenes straight out of the game and trying not to speculate furthermore. I think it’s interesting to tie the traits and personality of a fictional character to real life psychology and mental health, so this will be me basically explaining his condition and relating it to his canon personality and actions. Also, in some portions of this post I’ll be applying “real world rules”, because his mental illness is a real thing that happens in the real world.

I’ll go as far as to say that, after reading this entire rant, you’ll probably never see Gary the same way again— but that’s okay, because he’s such a layered character who also used to struggle with a mental illness and, instead of mental illnesses being a taboo topic, they should be met with open arms and discussed overtly and sincerely.

Mental Illness Warning/Trigger.

As I mentioned before, Gary’s condition is a real thing, so this post contains several mentions of mental health related topics and illnesses. If you feel uncomfortable about this type of things, I advise you not to keep reading. I’ll try to keep it as light and understandable as possible, regardless. Those who want to dive deeper should check the links I’ll leave at the end of the post.

This is a heavy topic, but I strongly believe it should be addressed. Even more importantly, I want to spread awareness, because, as you will read further ahead, this is still an under-recognized and frequently left untreated condition, that is becoming more and more common all around the world.

Disclaimer: I’m not a psychiatrist, but I am a med student. I’ve had classes and training about mental health and, specifically, about Gary’s condition. I’ll be leaving some extra sources and additional content down below, for those who are interested in verifying the information that I’ll be breaking down for you. Also, I’m open to receive feedback about it from someone who could know more than me, such as a doctor or a psychiatrist, because, as I said, I’m still just a med student.

So, without further do, let’s get started.

What does Gary have?

After reading the conversation he has with MC in Day 26, Gary’s evident diagnosis is Muscle Dysmorphia. We’ll be using the acronym MD to refer to it from now on.

What is MD?

MD is a subtype of Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD).

What is a BDD, you may ask? It’s a condition in which people see themselves differently than others see them, and it’s characterized by persistent and intrusive preoccupations with one's appearance, that are really difficult to resist or control. These unwanted thoughts or ideas (called “obsessions”) make them feel that they need to perform certain activities (called “compulsions”). When applied to MD, the obsession becomes the level of muscularity, and the compulsion is to achieve a higher level of muscularity.

MD comes with the exaggerated belief that one's own body is too small, too skinny or scrawny, even though the individual's build is normal or exceptionally large and muscular already. Is often confused with vanity, but this is not the case, as most MD patients don't want to look great, they just want to look acceptable. Typically, people with MD have low self-esteem. It can be experienced by either males or females, but in this post I’ll be addressing the patients as males, because I will be also relating it to unhealthy masculinity.

What causes MD? It doesn’t have a specific cause, but there are factors that could help its development. Most studies sustain that suffering from bullying for smallness or weakness is the most frequent trait in MD patients. Some also attribute this disorder to the effect of the media, as society bombards people at younger ages with images of what an “ideal” body looks like, even more considering how marketing campaigns once targeting only female body image insecurities are now aimed at males as well. Because of this, MD is likely to increase in general population.

Does it have a treatment? Yes, it does. Most are treated with therapy that targets damaging behavior, as for example, cut down on the amount of time they’re checking themselves in the mirror or in the gym, which helps them think less about their appearance. Therapists also help them deal with the fears they might have, like possibly losing muscle mass or size if they exercise less.

Many do not seek treatment; the biggest hurdle is convincing the person with MD that he needs help. The psychological and social consequences often go unrecognized, especially because they usually appear to be in good health, at least in the short term. To properly address MD, society has to change in how we approach our body image in general. Traditionally, males are not supposed to be concerned with looks, let alone talk about them, because if they do, they will be viewed as “feminine”. Encouraging men to talk about their inner feelings is a good first step to bring down stigmas about their body image.

How does MD affect someone’s life?

People with MD engage in behaviors aimed at achieving a muscular physique, as I mentioned earlier. They include excessive exercise, following rigid diets, and also spending countless amounts of money in supplements. Sometimes, they may also use anabolic-androgenic steroids (I’ll be referring to them as “AAS”), which cause serious damage to the body if used excessively.

Low self-esteem is a crucial factor here. People with MD try to enhance their self-esteem by building muscular mass, but they keep feeling that is never enough. “Every muscle could be bigger. I could be leaner” they tell themselves. They look at the mirror and they feel like everything is still small and weak, that they’re ugly, that they have no chest muscles, no arm muscles, no abs— And the reality is that they are often huge and incredibly muscular. Some of them also touch, flex, poke or pinch their muscles a lot, to make sure that they haven’t lost size.

Their relationships with other people often fall apart as time passes. They frequently avoid important social or occupational activities, like going to family reunions or to work, because of the need to maintain their excessive exercise and rigid diet.

How does one draw the line between being fitness or having MD? Believe it or not, Gary explains it in the game. He says, “I was really shocked when the doctor told me that if it’s getting in the way of the rest of your life, then it’s a problem”. Certainly, when working out and obsessing about the body becomes a problem in the person’s life, along with having these bad thoughts about themselves, it’s better to seek help and ask a health professional about it.

So, why is Day 26 so relevant?

Day 26 is important for Gary’s character because it tells us a huge lot of things about him and his past. Across his dialogue there are so many details that few people seem to truly notice, so I’ll be breaking down this day for you.

Let’s start analyzing this day from the beginning, with it being the first conversation MC has with Gary. She finds him sitting alone by the pool, rubbing his upper arm. After greeting her, he flexes his bicep and then pokes at it. If MC asks him if he is worried about his gains, he surprisingly responds “Yeah, I am a bit”. In comparison to the rest of his answers, this is the one that tells us that the reason he is bummed out is because of how he feels about his body, rather than how he actually looks.

Next, he asks “Do you think I look as good as I did when we first met?”. After seeing him acting this way, we can notice that he is looking for reassurance, but even if MC answers that he looks better every day, he responds with things like “Thanks! It’s nice to have that support, even if I don’t think it’s true” and “I never believe anyone when they say I look buff”. As you probably read in this post, this is a common trait amongst individuals with MD. Even when people around them tell them that they are big, muscular, huge and so on, they never truly believe it themselves because they just can’t see themselves in that way—the person that looks back at them in the mirror is still somewhat skinny. And here’s a huge clarification: Gary knows that people think he is buff, but he doesn’t see it himself, and that’s why he doesn’t exactly believe it.

At this point, I think Gary is starting to notice that the chat could turn to a topic that he’s not ready to talk about yet, because he seems to divert the conversation by saying that the reason he doesn’t believe he’s buff is because he simply doesn’t want to get big-headed about it, and that thinking this way keeps him motivated. But even with those modest answers, he’s still letting us know that he’s always aiming at improving his physique.

And after that, he flexes his arm again. If you payed attention, you may have noticed a pattern here, which is another common characteristic of MD patients: the one where they have the compulsion to feel and touch their muscles, as a way of making sure they’re not as skinny as they think they are.

Gary finishes the chat by commenting lightheartedly “Those weights aren’t going to lift themselves” and walking off in the direction of the gym. This bit actually makes me sad, because it leads me to think that he gave in to the compulsion of going to the gym.

After the challenge, MC meets him again and he, indeed, says “I started to do some weights, but then I had to check my head a bit”, indicating that after compulsively going to the gym, he realized that he wasn’t working out for the right reasons and what was actually driving him to exercise were the intrusive thoughts of his MD. Beyond that, this is also a sign that he can actually distinguish between his normal and healthy interest in working out and the compulsions caused by MD.

Later in the conversation, he explains that it all started when he used to see this massive and muscular superheroes in comics and noticed he didn’t look like them, because he was small, even smaller than the rest of the kids at school. He tells MC, “I’d look at those superheroes, and then back at myself. I didn’t look like them”. This is a clear reference to the media influencing the development of BBD’s and specially MD in younger boys.

It’s evident that at this point in his life he began to believe that having a muscular body would be a solution to his problems, and you can confirm that in this phrase: “It can feel like everything is telling you, things will be better if you’re stronger or more muscly”. And after his nan stepped in to take on the role of his dad, the bullying towards him increased, which just made this belief even stronger. “And whenever someone would say something to me, I’d wish I was bigger and stronger than them so they wouldn’t dare” he states, following with “So when I got older, I started working out”.

Gary goes on to say that exercising didn’t help on the long run. “At first, working out made a huge difference. I started to feel more confident. I felt like I could stick up for myself, and I got a lot more positive comments. People started to notice me in a good way, you know?” he declares. He basically tells MC that he started building his self-esteem around his physique, rather than around his inner self.

“The problem is, it never felt enough”. We see here, once again, a classic trait of people suffering from MD.

After this, comes a phrase that got me thinking: “Especially once I left school and had more time and money”. When reading this, I asked myself why having more money was relevant in things going downhill for Gary. By this point, he had already been working out and probably paying for the gym membership anyway, so I figured that this “new” money could have gone elsewhere, maybe in buying supplements to grow muscle mass faster. I can’t rule out completely the possibility that he got to the point of using AAS, but giving his personality and recovery I don’t think he went that far. Or at least I hope he didn’t.

“I kept going to the gym even when I knew I’d been going too much” he continues “It was actually my nan who noticed things were getting out of hand”. For this, us Gary fans should feel grateful. This is one of the billion reasons why he loves his nan so much. The woman rescued him from sinking deeper into his disorder, she was the only one who noticed that he wasn’t in a good place and that working out was actually tearing his life apart. She could see right through the healthy and good looking muscular man she had in front of him, as nobody else was able to see that he was still just a scrawny insecure boy on the inside. This was probably one of the lowest points in his life, if not the lowest, and his nan pulled him up and stuck with him through it all.

Afterwards, Gary states again that he struggled when it came to stop exercising. “I’d hurt my wrist cos I was lifting more than I should, but I didn’t rest or stop lifting so the problem just kept getting worse” he says “Eventually it got so bad that I had to take time off work, but I was still trying to go to the gym because I couldn’t stand missing sessions”. Even if he wanted to stop, the compulsions and unwanted thoughts took over him and he kept going to the gym.

When being asked if he couldn’t see how bad the situation was, Gary answers with “Being so strong and tough was so important to me that it felt like I couldn’t ask for help”, yet again being a reference of the way society influences young men, leading them to believe that being masculine and strong means also not talking about one’s feelings, less opening to others about one’s insecurities.

When talking about his therapy, he explains that once he started speaking about how he felt, he could see everything more clearly. He says “I’d lost sight of why I wanted to be so buff before. I couldn’t see that it wasn’t good for me”. Indeed, at first he wanted to get more muscular to enhance his self-esteem, to make himself feel better and gain confidence, but at that point it had become an actual disorder, getting in the middle of his life, getting him injured and making him stop going to work, amongst other things. Focusing on his body was actually making him feel worse because it came along with the sensation that he wasn’t making progress, even after all the time and effort he’d put into being more muscular. He also comments “By that point, I was like, ‘mate, working out is my life’”, this also being a characteristic of patients with MD, as their obsession takes over their life.

To wrap this section of this post, let’s talk shortly about his recovery. Gary says that his wrist eventually healed and that he kept going to therapy. “It took a while, but now I know when I’m doing something for the right reasons” he tells MC “It’s a constant balance though. You have to keep working on it”. After starting therapy, he understood that he can keep working out and caring about his looks without it taking over his life again or making him feel worse about his image, but that he will always have to maintain a certain equilibrium, so he doesn’t get out of control again.

“It’s okay for me to work out and be active, but I have to check in with myself. If those thoughts start coming back I know to call up my GP and get talking again”. This phrases are a total relief, as they let us know that he has learned when to seek help and, more importantly, to read the signs of his own mind telling him about his MD thoughts coming back. It’s even more relieving when he finishes with “I can still have tough moments, but I’m so much better at working through them now”.

Overall, Day 26 makes us realize that he hasn’t always been as confident as he seems, less felt good about his body image. It gives his character more depth; he’s not just a lighthearted lad that talks about cranes, makes dad jokes and loves his nan anymore. And reading between lines helps us get an even fuller picture of what he went through and the state he is in now.

How do MD and his past affect Gary’s general behavior?

After all that information, let’s start this with something simpler. I’m going to name a few stressful events for Gary during his time at the Villa: the morning after the first recoupling, Lucas and Henrik’s arrival and all the girls-pick recouplings.

Where is he after all those events? You guessed it, he’s at the gym.

I have been asked if this is him working out to relieve anxiety, but I’m not sure if it’s always the case. Of course, he mentions that for him there’s nothing like burning off some tension in the gym, so most times he could be working out to clear his mind and to feel less stressed out.

Despite this, in other situations and considering his condition, it could be also him starting to feel insecure about himself. It’s likely that when he begins feeling that way, those bad thoughts about his body image and compulsions, caused by MD, start to come back, so he can’t avoid going to the gym to make sure he doesn’t lose body mass and muscle. Because of his MD, he could have the sensation that, if he loses size, bad things will happen to him—girls won’t pick him at the recouplings, people will start to make fun of him again for being small, he’ll look less attractive in comparison to the rest of the male Islanders and so on. Having all of this in consideration, in some cases I actually think it’s him still struggling with insecurity and his MD, rather than just anxiety and stress.

There is a moment in the game that got me confused at first, but after thinking about it I was able to figure out what was really going on. It happens when MC goes to spot the boys at the gym and, during the conversation, Rahim points out “See! I told you your form was off, Gary”, which makes the corners of Gary’s lips turn upside down. “All right, settle down. I don’t usually use a gym, okay” he responds and strikes a pose, flexing “This is all natural…”. I’m sure that in this moment he was lying. From what he confessed in Day 26, we know he’s been working out since his teens (remember that he’s 23, so he has at least been doing it for five or six years), so it’s obvious that his body built is not exactly natural, more so if we consider that he used to get bullied for being too small. In this situation and with a recoupling coming soon, he probably didn’t want to get embarrassed by Rahim’s comment in front of MC, so he blurted out some excuse, basically saying that his bad form is technically product of him being unexperienced. Again, we see him being insecure.

Now, I’m not saying that him being at the gym and working out is always a bad thing. In fact, he it looks like he has fun and socializes with the rest of the boys when they’re all exercising together. He seems to have a good balance of how much time he spends there and, most importantly, knows when to stop. We notice this when he tells MC things like “There’s nothing like burning off some tension in the gym. But I need to have some other ways to deal with how I’m feeling too” and “I don’t want to end up just going to the gym whenever I’m bored or stressed out about something else”. The thing is, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we find him at the gym after stressful events, even more when you have in mind that he doesn’t want to go there with the sole purpose of relieving stress.

So, we see Gary often flexing his muscles, right? I actually think this behavior of his has two sides. As you may have read earlier in this post, people with MD have this tendency to touch their muscles a lot. I think that in situations of stress like Day 26 this could be the case for him. But the other side of it, and the most important one in my opinion, is that this adds a cheeky, playful and confident aspect to his character. It lets us know that he enjoys the attention and that he likes to show off.

Now, it’s certain that him showing off means that his recovering has been really successful so far, knowing that people with MD tend to avoid showing their body to others because they are ashamed of the way they look. The fact that he’s in a swimming suit during the entire show, being recorded for national TV and knowing millions of people are watching, is a huge signal that he feels significantly better about his body and image. He has learned to love and appreciate his body in some way, hence the question he so often asks, so cheekily “Like what you see?” and he feels proud enough to show it off. The fact that he knows he’s attractive to others makes all the difference for his self-image, even if he doesn’t necessarily believe it himself. And, trust me, that with him being a MD patient it took him a lot to get where he is now in terms of confidence and feeling comfortable in his own skin.

Moving to another topic, something that always caught my attention is that Gary is constantly worrying about others. We see this in cases like when he comforts Lottie after Hannah gets dumped from the Island or when he pulls her for a chat when he notices that she’s stressed out about the Rocco situation, when he offers Chelsea a tissue after he sees her crying over the gossip-sneezer drama, all of the moments he demonstrates being protective of MC’s feelings when they’re coupled up and even during his Mr. Love Island speech. His type also includes a girl who cares about others and doesn’t get involved in drama, to match his personality. After analyzing his past, we understand why he is always trying to reach out when another Islander feels sad and why he is one of the first ones to offer a helping hand. It’s mainly because there was a time in his life when he struggled with getting help for feeling bad about himself and wished someone had reached out to him in a similar way. He knows that people could be struggling internally without anyone noticing, just like it happened to him.

I’m sure that during his stay in the Villa, Gary tries his best not to hurt anyone. An example of this is his chat with MC after he lies about kissing Marisol. He feels bad about it and promises to apologize to her, and the players don’t get frowns for calling him out as a signal that he owns his mistake. Another example is if MC chooses to couple with him in Day 9, right after the recoupling Gary tells her that he feels bad for Lottie, because he knows that she fancies him. He says, with a sad expression “I feel bad that I’m here treading on someone’s toes, but I guess that’s what it’s about, right? I just hope everyone here finds someone that wants to be with them, long term”.

If you’ve gone this far in this post, I’m sure that by now you may have a few questions about his overall personality, so to finish this segment I’ll answer the most relevant ones:

Is Gary’s confident personality a facade? I’m one hundred percent sure it is not, especially considering that he has a cheeky sense of humor and that he likes to show off. In my opinion, he acts this way because he has learned that confidence is good. That his body is good enough to show, and that his personality, stories and awful jokes are worth sharing with others. It’s incredibly healthy for him to feel this way about himself.

Is Gary fragile? My answer to this is yes and no. Why yes? It’s mainly because we still see him acting insecure across the game and because he will always have traces of low self-esteem, giving his condition. He will be always more likely to overthink about his physical appearance and more prone to feel poorly about himself when he compares himself to more muscular men. Why no, then? Because after the end of the chat with him at Day 26, he states that now he knows when to seek help, how to maintain a balance on his exercising habits and that, overall, he has accepted his illness. He doesn’t get hijacked by bad thoughts about himself anymore and he seems to know the boundary that distinguishes a benign interest in physical appearance from the bad thoughts that come along with MD, which makes him less prone to come back to that low point he reached in the past.

Relationships.

Now I’m going to make a few comments about his main relationships while in the Villa, with them being his relationship with Lottie and his relationship with MC.

We never know for sure if he eventually tells Lottie about his past, but I have the feeling that he doesn’t, especially because in Day 26 he tells MC “I don’t always tell people why she’s (his nan) so important in my life. And now you know”, suggesting that maybe she is the only one in the Villa that has this information as of now.

Either way, the thing that bothers me about the way the Lottie-Gary ship is written is that most of the time we see them arguing and not agreeing in lots of things. In some cases, this could be considered “cute” or “entertaining”, but it isn’t when you notice Gary confesses a few times that it worries him and has him on edge, saying that he can never know how Lottie is going to react to things or wondering in what mood she’s going to be in. As a clarification, I’m not debating in whether Lottie is unstable or not, because it really doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. What matters in this case is that Gary perceives her being that way.

The constant uncertainty of his partner’s behavior could harm Gary in the long run, as we know that he is still attending to therapy sessions and going through bad days from time to time, and without someone who he can know for sure will support him and reassuring him whenever he needs, things could start to get more difficult for him to handle.

Moving to his relationship with MC, if you have done a Gary playthrough, you know that he constantly tells her that he doesn’t feel like a weirdo when he is around her and, basically, that he feels that he can be himself. If we take in consideration his history and personality, this makes a huge difference for him, as we’ve seen him get to the point of lying so he doesn’t get embarrassed in front of the girls. When being in a relationship with MC, he is finally able to let go of some of his insecurities and stops worrying about how other girls perceive him.

So, moving past that, I just wanted to quickly point out something about their relationship that seems interesting to me. In one of the gem scenes, Gary tells MC “My nan would like you. You keep me in check. She’d say I need someone like that around”. I couldn’t help but notice that he uses the same verb in the past when referring to him getting his thoughts straight by differentiating between the intrusive beliefs caused by his MD and what is actually real. This could be his way of telling MC that she keeps him grounded, that he could never feel insecure when being with her and that she, somehow, helps him to keep away the bad thoughts about himself. And of course his nan would like that—she’d love seeing his grandson with someone who he feels safe with. Because of this, I think that his relationship with MC is by far the healthiest one he could have in the Villa, and even in the playthroughs when they’re not a couple, the reason being that he opens to her about his past either way.

In conclusion.

I think it’s really interesting the way Fusebox tried to insert real life troubles and conditions into their characters. For me, this made a big difference when playing the game, because the majority of the characters feel real, specially in comparison to Season 1; whether you like a character or not, we all have to agree that every single one of them has a very defined personality and behavior, and that is a compelling aspect of the gameplay.

I also like the way they made the Love Island boys break stereotypes and dismiss toxic masculinity. In Gary’s case, we see this reflected in him being always open and sincere with his feelings, having him making subtle comments like “Sometimes we all need a little cry. Nothing wrong with that”.

Because of everything I’ve written in this post, I could say that the fandom is not wrong when they classify Gary as being soft. He is, indeed, a softie—the softest boy in the Villa, in my opinion. But he is not just that. He is also incredibly emotionally intelligent, as he learned how to overcome his mental disorder, how to communicate and accept his feelings and how to reach out to others and offer them help, amongst a billion of other things. We see him also being very mature for his age, with many pointing out that he seems older than he actually is. I can’t deny that most of his maturity probably comes from being raised by his nan and because he has gone through a lot in terms of accepting himself and growing as a person in general.

On a quick side note, I’ve noticed people with clearly poor understanding on mental health that have tried to write him as a villain and end up usually turning him into an insecure, self-centered, egotistical character, labeling it as layering, when the reality is far from that. Vilifying insecurity, low self-esteem and fear of rejection/failure is not layering. Those are common flaws and issues that cause distraught in many people on a daily basis and, in my opinion, they should be approached with proper understanding, respect and reassurance.

Anyhow, it makes me so happy seeing much more Love Island fans recognizing the true good and soft nature of Gary’s personality as time passes, and even happier that a lot more started appreciating him because of his issues. His story represents, in my opinion, a story of recovery. There are few things better than seeing someone that used to struggle with how they felt about themselves, keeping their head up, accepting their flaws as their own and doing their best to keep getting better, and that’s what he represents at the end of Day 26.

I’ll be leaving down below some of the papers I used for my additional research, as well as some simple articles and videos about MD, if some of you would like to know more about it and spread awareness.

Let’s take this character’s story as an example to follow, as it indirectly encourages people to accept themselves and to share their mental illness stories once they feel ready to do so. I think that by supporting this type of characters we’re letting the writers know that we do like to read characters like this, with true layers, defects and with backgrounds that feel just real.

Finally, as some friend of mine said, let’s jump on the Gary tour bus and spread some love, positivity and appreciation for this amazing character*:･ﾟ✧

Links, articles and videos.

[Nature article], [The Guardian Article], [TED Talk], [TED Talk Q&A], [BDD 2015 Conference], [ABC Science Video], [ABC News Video], [Paper n°1], [Paper n°2], [Paper n°3], [Paper n°4], [Paper n°5], [Paper n°6].

[rigelmejo]

Advice I’ve found helpful:

1. For ‘easier’ immersion materials, pick things you have some familiarity already with. So: shows/books you’ve already read in your native language, or watched/read in the target language with some kind of context (seen subs before in your native language, a summary, you’ve looked up lots of words etc). I definitely find immersing in stuff I have some context for much easier, because at least sometimes I can place what certain unknown words mean/what is going on in the plot, even when I don’t actually ‘know’ all the words. 

Personally: I like using some absolutely new unknown materials for immersion, just because I like to test how much I’ve ‘improved’ with something I’m sure I have nothing to rely on ahead of time except for what I have learned. But when I’m immersing with something I want to find more comfortable/easier to immerse with, its easier for me to use things I’m already familiar with - otherwise I have to pick graded material/learner materials instead of using target language native materials. 

2. Once you find some study materials that work for you, stick to them. Specifically if they progressively teach new stuff - like textbooks, grammar guides, apps with lessons, teaching podcasts, flashcards that add grammar points/new words, etc. Anything that builds up knowledge over time. 

I used to have a bad habit of switching these kinds of materials often, and would keep ‘restarting’ myself in beginner materials, when really I should have been moving on and studying new things. I have found that even if my ‘book/guide/tool’ is imperfect, if I stick to it then I make more progress and improve at a more dependable rate.

3. For immersion material, feel free to pursue things based on interest. You don’t have to finish one material before moving to the next.

I’ve noticed that I tend to get demotivated or disinterested sometimes in materials (which happens in english with my hobbies anyway too), and its definitely better for me to just move to new material that’s interesting me in the moment (so a new show, new story, new audio). I’ve found that as long as its target language native material, its all exposing me to common things I should review, and new things I ought to pick up/learn, so regardless of the material its going to challenge me and solidify what I’ve studied already and teach me new things. Meanwhile... graded readers would fall into point 2 -  but with a special caveat - if the graded reader has a Subject i’m not interested in, I need to just switch to a new novel at a HIGHER difficulty level at a certain point. Basically - regardless of if I stick to a graded reader all the way through, or if I drop it and move to another, once I’m very comfortable with that reading level, I need to move to prioritizing higher difficulty level material. This might apply to immersion content a little - as in, its better for me to work in some dramas/audios/books with more words I don’t know, so I get more comfortable. But with target language content made for natives its less of an issue since pretty much everything made for adults is constantly teaching me new stuff right now. 

4. Its BETTER to do something consistently, than nothing. So better to study any minutes a day then never. Likewise - its better to study using ANY method that’s helping you make progress, than to not study at all because its not ‘the best way.’ 

I’m sure I’m not the only learner who’s had this issue studying languages, but its easy to wonder if you’re doing things right or doing ‘enough.’ And in the end? For me it boils down to ‘anything where I make any progress, and don’t give up IS enough.’ No method’s perfect for everyone, not everyone can stay engaged in the same methods, etc. Yeah some advice says ‘don’t ever speak before X time’ but some people only stay motivated if they speak from day one, so they might as well speak! I’ve seen plenty of advice for chinese to ‘focus on listening/speaking first’ instead of focusing on reading so early on. But I get motivated/interested by reading, so here I am doing more reading from day 1!  It’s worked well enough for me! It got me this far!

5. At some point, focus on all for skill areas because eventually you need all of them: listening/reading, speaking/writing.

This seems basic as can be but I’m guessing its still easy enough to overlook. There’s a reason good textbooks/teachers try to make sure they cover all these skills for the level you’re supposed to be comprehending/communicating at by the time you finish their class. I self-study mostly, and its easy to forget about one or multiple of these areas, especially if they don’t align as well with your goals/interest areas/preferred study methods. It’s just important to cover them all eventually, if you want roughly balanced skills in the language. I personally think its okay to have imbalanced skills - depending on your goals, and your preferences. For example: if you want to read but do not want to prioritize speaking due to low need to speak to anyone, it seems fine to spend more time on reading and work on speaking more later when its a goal or need to. Or, maybe you specifically need to speak regularly to people in your workplace/living situation/life, then it would make sense to prioritize daily needs conversation study and skills way before you bother dedicating a lot of time to reading etc.

Thankfully, there’s usually a variety of study methods to improve each skill. Though unfortunately, usually to improve in production you must eventually practice Producing language, and to improve in comprehension you must eventually practice comprehending materials. By this, I mean that even with textbook grammar drill sentence exercises and repeat-after podcasts, you must eventually practice speaking to people and writing messages/paragraphs. Even if you study sentence flashcards or read graded readers, you must eventually try to listen to real conversations/audio/shows and try to read materials you’re planning to one day engage with (newspapers/websites/novels/games/whatever your goals are). 

6. Prioritize learning the most common 500/1000/2000 words as needed. 

(Unless your goals and needs are very specialized on other vocabulary needs - who knows, maybe you only need X language for mechanical engineering words?) I ran into this tip when studying French, and then variations on this tip from a lot of polyglot blogs. I’ve also noticed a lot of the youtubers who try to learn a language in ‘x days/x months’ tend to cram in a lot of vocab early on - I saw two successful learners who studied 2000 words in the first 1-2 weeks. Then they moved onto reading grammar points, reading actual books, immersing in television, trying to speak their conversational requirements etc. What boosted their speed-run intro to the language is usually a bunch of common words - which will be their foundation for comprehending some gist when immersing, and their source of words when forming sentences as they work on speaking skills. Now, of course, these people generally get into maybe A1-A2 level-ish knowledge in a month etc. But they still make a lot of rapid progress in that first ‘uncomfortable’ hump, at least from what I can tell. There’s many a article out there about how for most languages 2000 words covers 80-90+% of words in everyday conversation, and in many media like shows (and sometimes books). 

Basically, usually at 2000 words you know enough words to start communicating anything you need to with at least basic words/ideas, and have enough words to start learning some new words from context in immersion (and will in general find immersion much less overwhelmingly difficult). I’ve personally found that it’s just a starting place - but its often a really Great starting place, at least for me. Usually its more than enough to make immersing in shows doable, and to make reading with a dictionary bearable. Its also usually enough, with a few months grammar practice/exposure too, to start expressing a lot of my basic thoughts/needs at least. I did this to some extent with French (maybe 1000 common words), then jumped into immersing and grammar books mostly. I do think if dropped into an all french country, I could read signs and forms/speak my basic needs if I were lost/needed help with X/thought something/wanted to speak with someone. I would probably sound like a wreck (since I didn’t work on pronunciation much and one day need to) but I think I could navigate having to go to a hospital/get a plane ticket/buy something/make a friend/ask how to get somewhere/read any book for gist main ideas/read the news. I could get by. And the foundation for that started with just around 1000 words to start me toward that. Ever since I’ve tried to learn common words with any language I study, and each time I’ve noticed it substantially make target language materials more % comprehensible, and make it easier for me to start having a foundation to express a lot of basic ideas (think maybe 5-8 year old that can start talking about a lot, but may need to ask for a lot of ‘what’s X word mean/what’s X thing about?’). 

Its not a lot obviously, since there’s still much that’s incomprehensible, and there’s still lots that’s hard to discuss/follow the details of. But its enough to build from more easily. And I think its a great way to direct self-study before you start specializing - it prioritizes a ton of useful words before you start moving onto words with less ‘payoff’ because they show up less frequently and not in as big a variety of situations/topics. Even if using a textbook, I find using a frequency list too helps - since some textbooks teach pitifully little like 200 words, and some teach very focused on topic-specific words like ‘my classroom’ and ‘my job’ and ‘shopping’ when you may need words that show up in ‘news’ ‘social media’ ‘shows’ too based on whatever your goals are - a frequency list helps make sure words that show up in more places get learned, even if they don’t always fit in specific topics.

7. Read through a grammar guide. (Adapt this depending on where you get the advice: read a grammar summary, or just look up grammar points once for reference when you run into one that confuses you, or just skim through a guide before you learn, or just read a grammar guide later on if you need a stronger foundation etc).

I don’t think everyone needs this. Lots of people really LOATHE grammar, or think its ‘wrong’ to study it at the wrong point in time, whenever they think that is (beginning, or later on, etc). I personally find my life gets way easier when I read at least a grammar guide/summary on AT LEAST the basic past/present/future tense way of expressing things, on adjectives, nouns, verbs, conjunctions/notable grammar particles and features, as soon as possible. Covering this stuff makes my attempts at producing language SO MUCH EASIER since I’ve got at least a rough framework of how to express things basically. And immersing likewise becomes just SO MUCH EASIER with at least a rough idea of what I’m looking at that I can break down into meaningful parts. Even if I don’t know 1 word to even 80% of words in a sentence: if I can tell which words are nouns/verbs/particles/conjunctions/what tense the sentence verbs are in/if there’s any gendered nouns/if there’s any plurals - then I can figure out a LOT about the meaning of the sentence. 

Take “Na no le mayy, ter le henent.” Here’s a sentence I just made up. Let’s say you know that ‘na’ means “there is” in this language. You know “no” is a particle meaning belonging like the japanese ‘no’ or chinese ‘de’ or english ‘s. “le” means masculine ‘the’ and is put before nouns that are masculine if a person, or objects/etc if another kind of noun. ‘ter’ you know means ‘is/are’ as a super basic verb, conjugated for a masculine person not object - now you know maybe this ‘le mayy’ is a person not an object - so the sentence so far means “this is my ‘person’.” You know le also goes before adjectives in this language to match the noun to which it refers, and ‘ent’ is a super common adjective ending in this language. So now you can guess the sentence means “This is my ‘person,’ (they) are ‘adjective describing them’.” Its possible the le henent is a noun spelled with this ending, so it could also mean “this is my ‘person,’ they are ‘noun probably describing them’.” This has narrowed down what the unknown 2 words in the sentence could mean by A LOT. Now if you understand some other context from the Surrounding sentences, you might be able to guess if the ‘person’ is a student/husband/friend/enemy, and maybe if the descriptor is something positive/negative more specific etc. Without any grammar study or overview ahead of time, the grammar pieces like ‘le’ and ‘ent’ and ‘no’ may have confused you or helped you less.

“Na shi wo de pengyou, ta hen hao,” might be how you say this in chinese, or, “Ill y a mon amie, ton est tres intelligent.” But this kind of grammar-helping-comprehension stuff translates to bigger more complex sentences, and sentences where you have less words you know and can rely on. This helped me a TON in french when i just dived into reading when I only knew a couple hundred words at first, and its constantly helped in Chinese - especially since i have no spaces to help me separate words, so recognizing how the grammar breaks down the sentences helps a lot. 

8. Don’t be scared to immerse in interesting things over high comprehensibility things, if you want.

While I do think, absolutely, that things with high comprehensibility will be easier for you to relax and enjoy, and MUCH easier for you to pick up new stuff from context - i think its possible to learn from harder materials if you want. I do it all the time. Like that higher up tip about any study better than none - if engaging with more difficult stuff keeps me interested, then it helps me more than a boring material i would give up studying and therefore stop learning from. Also, personally I really both enjoy occasionally challenging myself to really push what I can do and prove to myself what I’m capable of versus where my ‘safe zone’ is, and I think I personally learn better when I regularly get difficult bursts that challenge me. I do think for some other people, this may have the opposite effect and possibly cause them to burn out/want to give up studying. But for me, while it makes me sad I’m never as ‘competent’ with real material as I wanted to be, I’m always better at it then I was before or at least confident in knowing I’m practicing/studying something I actually want to do one day. (In comparison to me doing like podcast lessons or self-teach beginner books, where I often feel demotivated because it starts with a lot of basic convo drills, often a bit unnatural, whereas I don’t plan to have those convos much, and for my goals want to do other kinds of stuff that those podcasts may not prepare me for after months if at all...). I’d much rather get a quick foundation then be thrown into the deep end, then a slow foundation with baby steps where I have little new material regularly pushing me. 

Who knows how much this is a legacy of me being in all those honor classes/AP, and then being an engineering student in a bunch of accelerated/condensed courses taking way too many credits, studying too many hard classes at once ;-; - honestly studying anything I actually enjoy and am passionate is eons better than that past schooling. But I do think I developed a lot of my study habits back then around ‘do quick effective stuff to get basically competent then MOVE ON CAUSE THERE’S NEW HARD MATERIAL YOU GOTTA AT LEAST GET THE GIST OF IN LESS THAN A WEEK’.... aahhh. So um... I’m really skewed toward do bare minimum needed, and push difficulty asap constantly. NOT everyone is going to be able to do this, or even Want to do this. So, I’d say in general if other people apply this tip about immersing regardless of difficulty if you want to: you do not have to get the same benefits as me. I think even if the only benefit is that you’re enjoying the parts you do understand, or having fun even if its something you only do once in a while because you’re curious on how much you’d understand, that’s absolutely fine. A lot of people who do this focus on ‘comprehending the gist’ - which I guess would be me. And a lot of people who do focus on harder stuff sometimes, instead prioritize ‘focus on just getting used to it’ aka don’t worry if you can’t follow what’s going on, its okay to only catch a line or word once in a while, the familiarity you develop over time is also a benefit itself.

I do personally think, at the bare minimum, doing this does get you more okay with being dropped into situations that are harder for you and being okay with that. I imagine in language learning, eventually you run into a convo where you get lost, reading where you barely understand anything, or a show where you catch zero words! It’s nice to have the practice of not understanding but being comfortable, so that when you’re stuck in those situations you are less bothered and have possibly some other methods you’ve developed to help you cope/get by/tolerate it until you get through it or can grasp something comprehensible again or can find a way to redirect the convo/look up key words etc. In some languages there is just a huge amount of time you’ll deal with materials less than 98% comprehensible (which is comfortable level for most people), or less than 90% comprehensible (which is difficult but bearable in short bursts for most people). Also, the earlier you immerse/engage in conversation, the longer you’ll hit this ‘difficulty’ curve and either need to get used to it or else it’ll feel uncomfortable.

9. Write your GOALS down. Also, preferably, plan some SMART goals - or some study plan that roughly includes WHAT you plan to do, how you could measure it or it’s progress and test if its working or not-actually-helping-the-goal, how it contributes to your goal, and what smaller-step of your goal you want it to get you to in X time. 

Writing goals, and plans for smaller achievable steps, helps in any goal achieving process. Helps a ton with language learning too, especially when self studying if you’re not sticking to a textbook or course with very clear definited steps/goals you can just copy and aim for. There’s been studies that literally just writing your goals down makes it more likely you’ll achieve them. Its also just much easier to stick to a self study plan if you know what you’re doing, where you’re heading, why, how to check that what you’re doing is actually making progress, and have something to hold yourself accountable to study (since there may be no one else expecting you to hit your smaller-goals or bigger ones). Also personal goals will motivate you - what do you want out of this study? Personally? 

10. Make it enjoyable to you, again any study that you can keep doing and make progress is better than none. And any goal you personally will USE and Enjoy/will help you, is much better then some external goal (like oh X people will be impressed).

The enemy of progress is you giving up. Even if you Do give up - skip the being mad at yourself or feeling guilty, it is what it is and if you gave up there was a reason. Likewise, if you start studying or pick up from an absence, make sure you know what is driving you to study. Think about things you want to DO in the language - how do you want to engage with people, culture, language, that sphere of the world. 

If you are studying it for some external goal - say you want to learn it to ‘be more appealing as a job applicant’ make sure there’s something you’d DO with it (do you plan to speak to those language speakers at a job? translate? read articles in the language to improve your knowledge in the field? work in that country? do you also want to chat with friends/make friends? do you work with that country a lot and want more bg on the culture and want language to use social media/watch shows/chat online/read their news more etc?), or do you have no plans to actually use it concretely - if the second is the case, maybe a different ‘job skill’ would also help your resume and would personally be more valuable to you (maybe coding would help your job prospects, and you also think you’d use it to make an art portfolio website, for yourself or some fun little games or text-choose-your-adventure stories, maybe you would like a job specifically that codes as a part of the regular tasks, or you want to do website/portfolio coding commissions on the side even if you don’t end up getting a job that codes). 

If you’ve got some hobby reason - same things apply. Will you actually use the language if you could? How? These questions will help you form concrete goals, and possibly even help you pick the study methods you’ll want to use more. If convo and chatting is a big goal, conversation skills and practice will be way more important earlier on and also motivate you since you’ll be making friends sooner etc. If say chinese or japanese novels are a big interest of yours, and you even read painful machine translate messes of novels just to get updates or read ones never-translated that you’re into, it might really pay off for you to prioritize reading and maybe even be practicing translating yourself (for yourself) earlier on - since you may end up at the least, learning to translate fics you want to read a bit better than the machine translations you rely on (or at least so you’ll be able to double check the original writing when mtls are painfully incorrect). 

All these goals will have pretty clear smaller-milestones you’ll already know you want to aim for, and those smaller goals will make what study methods you’ll need to use for them a bit clearer. If your goal one day is to chat with people about all kinds of things, a good small step is to learn small talk, introductions, then start branching out one by one (or by depth of convo) into things you want to talk about. If it’s to connect with people, language partners might be a fantastic thing, and you might study a lot by helping someone else with your language, then they help you with theirs, the whole time you get to chat and share ideas and develop friendships. If its to read novels, small steps are learning maybe to skim novels for key information - so if a mtl novel is painfully wrong, you can pinpoint what line you want to word-by-word translate yourself for yourself. Maybe you prioritize learning a lot of words, and characters, and basic grammar, quickly, so that skimming gets easier - and so that picking up details gets easier piece by piece. Maybe you start with more basic topic novels (or comics), get to read novels you’d want to read anyway in that language, then move onto harder stuff as you progress. If you watch tons of dramas, and already know you sometimes watch no-subbed and just desperately try to follow it anyway because you want to watch it NOW or you wanted to watch THAT SHOW but it has no existing subs in your native language... now you know a major long term goal of yours, that you’ll use. You can plan smaller goals that build up to it, and also allow you to accomplish things you enjoy. Maybe first you work on following short fanmade videos with scenes, or following trailers, or watching youtubers/etc that you like watching and would probably try to watch without subs anyway. You compare the subbed versions to no subs or target language subs, you look up common unknown words that come up, common phrases etc. You work up to episodes of shows you’ve already seen and had subtitles for, and try to follow it this time without subs. Etc. 

Yes, with all of these goals you’ll eventually need to do the less fun less your-goal oriented more basic tasks, like grammar and vocab acquisition and pronunciation learning/listening etc (whatever you personally like more or less).  But you’ll have reasons WHY you’re doing it that motivate you. You’ll have a REASON you’re willing to slog through vocab flashcards or a grammar guide or a pronunciation/convo learner podcast. Because it will directly help you do something you WILL like. And you’ll know at least a PIECE of your study, WILL be some tasks you do know you’d do/enjoy anyway - like trying to chat, or reading, or watching tv, or listening to music, or browsing the internet, etc. 

[omgviolette12]

After hours- Chapter 5 A professor Loki Fanfic

Previous Chapter

Summary: Evelyn Monroe has been a TA for professor Laufeyson’s Calculus course for four months now. He was known to be quite strict, but that never deterred her from applying for the position in order to be close to the man she had been secretly pining for. One evening, she returns to his office after opening hours… and with her bountiful luck, she walks in on something not meant to be seen.

Chapters: 5/?

Words: 2100

Warnings: Explicit sexual content

Tags: @milkymaidme @dangertoozmanykids101@alexakeyloveloki @little-moonbeam-666  @marvel-ous-fics@clovermariear@lynnesm@bitchyikes@moon-child-of-a-poet, @allthecraftandthings@bubblegumspitt @shockwavee @blondekel77

If you’d like to be added, let me know. I’ve also posted this on AO3

________

“Oh lord...please say it ain’t so! Shit... shit!”

By this point, Evelyn was thoroughly convinced she was cursed with bad luck.

The night before, she made sure to set the alarm on her phone for 7 am - but upon waking up to see a glaring 9:35 on her phone, it was then that she discovered that everything had been set to silent.

The Monday lecture started promptly at 8:00 and ended at 10 am, so Evelyn jumped from her bed in a frenzy as she rushed to get ready.

Having showered late last night, all Evelyn had to do was to brush her teeth, fluff out her hair, then throw on the easiest things she could find - a sundress, jacket, and flats.

She had already painstakingly chosen an outfit before bed, but she dreaded having to wrestle on the jeans she picked out when she was already in such a rush.

Evelyn wouldn’t admit it outright, but she wanted to look nice, or substantially better than usual before she went to assist professor Laufeyson during his lecture.

She spent about half the night picking out a nice outfit she thought best suited her figure, and agonized over her hair. It was difficult to style most times because of its texture - so she washed it, then installed flexi-rods to give her curls renewed definition.

But as she rushed out the door and unto the side-walk, she realized that all of her efforts would've been laid to waste regardless as she eyed the dark clouds that loomed above her.

She had no time to run back inside for an umbrella, and she regretted her choice of wearing a dress almost immediately, especially with its short length.

Evelyn swore under her breath as she decided to just book it towards campus, hoping she could beat the rain before it started pouring.

The weather in New York had been agreeable for the most part, despite it being early April - but of all days, the spring rain decided to make its appearance.

The raindrops pelted against her skin and dress ruthlessly as she ran, and her purse provided meager protection against the droplets as she held it above her head.

By the time she finally reached the building, she was thoroughly soaked.

Not only was Evelyn disastrously late, but she looked as good as a drenched rat. Her dress clung to her form uncomfortably, hair wet and sinking to her shoulders.

Thankfully the dress was opaque in color so her panties remained unseen. However, the outlines were still plainly visible as the material stuck snug to her body...and her nipples looked as though they wanted to rob a bank with the way they shot out.

Stepping inside, she made her way to the lecture hall hurriedly, ignoring her wet appearance. Her heart hammered inside of her chest, anxious and fearful of Professor Laufeyson's reaction.

He expected her to be there to assist him. Thinking back to his email, he probably thought she no longer wanted to be his TA, when that was anything but the case.

She continued to berate herself all the way until she reached the door to his classroom, with nary a few minutes left until the lecture was over.

There were two entrances to the room, and she opted to enter through the back. She did not want to see the immediate disappointment in his eyes, so she tried to sneak in unnoticed and sulk in the corner until she could speak with him alone.

But Evelyn should've expected by now that things would never go her way, as all eyes in the room went to her direction - including the ones of her brooding professor.

At first glance, she thought she had seen disbelief, then relief fill his features, but it was quickly replaced with its usual stoic exterior.

The lecture hall was pin-drop silent as she averted her eyes from his gaze, scanning the room of its occupants as a hand clutched her jacket closed. She was surprised that mostly everyone in the room wore weary expressions - an odd sight to see whenever she helped out during his lectures in the past.

Despite it being math, and in the early hours at that, his students would still be fully engaged with the lesson from beginning to end. But now, they looked as if they were itching to leave their seats.

There was still around ten minutes left of the lecture, so Evelyn was taken aback when he decided to end it early, “I suppose everyone has done enough for today. Leave your quizzes face down on the desk, and our TA shall collect them. You may all go.”

She had never seen 50 or so students spring up so quickly from their seats at the same time.

Evelyn squished herself against the wall as a wave of students rushed past her to get to the door, leaving the room completely empty in a matter of minutes.

Woah, bad day today I guess…?

There were a few times Professor Laufeyson would get into one of his ‘moods’, and it seemed like today was one of those days. As for the cause, Evelyn was unsure.

He remained standing there at the bottom of the steps, arms crossed and leaning against the podium as he regarded her silently.

His quietness unsettled her as Evelyn awkwardly began to collect the quizzes, the patter of the rain against the windows and the squelch of her soaked flats making the majority of the noise in the room.

She slowly made her way down the steps, trembling due to both the chill in the air, and her nerves.

Evelyn did not know what to do with herself when she reached him, holding the stack of papers in an odd manner to prevent them from getting wet on her dress.

“Uhm... do you want me to just put them there, or...?” Evelyn gestured towards the desk beside the podium, cowering under his intense gaze.

He leaned off the podium to approach her quite suddenly, and Evelyn nearly fell backward in surprise as he got closer, “You are...wet.” His eyes left her own as they trailed down her figure to linger on her breasts, “No...you are positively drenched.”

Evelyn was now consciously aware of her jutting nipples through the wet fabric, and she shifted uncomfortably in a sly attempt to cover them with her jacket, “Yeah.. um- I’m... I’m sorry I’m so late, my alarm was silent, but I ran here as fast as I could… and the rain was -”

“I didn’t ask to hear an excuse, Evelyn.”

He took the papers from her fingers rather roughly, throwing them carelessly to a desk behind her.

Evelyn was startled. She knew he’d be mad, but not to this extent.

“I’m, uh… please just hear me out -”

“- I am not angry. You are here, are you not?” He slowly began to back her up against the desk, and Evelyn was thoroughly confused and concerned with the sudden turn of events.

He… he isn’t mad? And...but why the heck is he getting so close…!?

He was now so close to the point that he could wedge his legs between her own - and he did just that.

Evelyn’s eyes shot up quickly to meet his, filled with shock and disbelief. And then, her thoughts lost all comprehension when he began to idly play with a lock of her wet hair.

Ahhgkssksnhdiqfhioqgh!!!!!!

The way he looked right now...was an entirely different side of him she had yet to see. His eyes did not hold the coldness they usually carried, nor did he look kind. No...he looked as though he wanted to eat her whole. His fierce expression reminded her of that night. That predatory, animalistic look...

“I had thought.. that you no longer wanted to assist me, and that I would rarely see you, if ever,” his fingers left her hair to graze her cheek, “Yet here you are, and in this... state, no less..” His breathing picked up as he began to trace a finger down her neck, and to her collar bone, “Why must you make things so difficult for me?”

Evelyn struggled to stutter out a reply, “I.. I don’t know- I don’t mean to...to make things hard for you...I’ll try to be good for you from now on… and.. um.. uh... I’ll try to be on time...”

Perhaps it was the way she phrased her words, but it seemed to be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

The poor girl was knocked off-kilter as he pressed her body against his in a suffocating embrace; His face began to burrow into her neck to inhale, kiss, nip, and suck with such force she could only yelp in pain.

His hands then roamed across her back to grip her bum, lifting her up to roughly place her on the desk as he moved further in-between her legs.

"Holy - ow! Prof - Professor Laufeyson, what... what are you! -"

" So much better… much better than I could have ever imagined…" was all he said, his voice choked to the brim with darkness and lust. It seemed as though he was deaf to the world as he continued his rough handling of her body, groping about wherever he could. Her legs were spread quite wide as he continued to rub against her, and Evelyn began to throb painfully down below due to his rough handling.

What..what...what...what?!

She had never felt such an uncomfortable, overwhelming sensation from her privates, so she weakly began to push against him in an attempt to stop his groping.

"Wait..please just...I don't know what - oh!" His hands went underneath her dress to grip her bare hips, shoving her roughly against the hardness protruding from his pants. He grinded relentlessly against her clothed center, causing her to release an embarrassingly strangled moan.

He mumbled into her neck with harsh, breathless pants, "You have not an inkling… of how long I've staved off the temptation of having you beneath me. Across my desk, and at the mercy of my cock."

Her eyes bulged out in stunned silence, her mouth open as she gripped his shoulders for dear life. She had no idea what was happening. She was so overwhelmed, that the familiar sensation of faint began to wash over her.

It was then that Evelyn truly began to panic.

" Stop stop stop stop STOP!!! Gonna faint, gonna faint, gonna faint!"

Fortunately, her panicked pants managed to break through his trance. The predatory look disappeared from his irises in a flash as he came back to himself, and he pushed away quickly from the trembling woman beneath him.

Evelyn looked as though she had been thoroughly ravished. Her chest heaved as the jacket slipped from her shoulders, the straps of her wet dress half way down just shy of revealing her perky nipples.

Her neck was marred with bruises - and her chocolate brown legs were still spread wide as she sat on the desk, open for display to his eyes.

Apparently, her dress wasn't the only thing that was now soaked.

The sight of her debauched appearance, and by his hands especially - would forever be etched into her professor's memory.

However, panic and fear began to rush into his heart as she scrambled from on top of the desk, fixing her dress before gripping her jacket closed with both hands.

"Uh..uh....I..I-I gotta go!" Evelyn bolted towards and through the door at breakneck speed, not giving him a chance to speak.

Watching her run away from him created deep-seated despair, and he wanted to yell in frustration for scaring the poor girl. He had gotten so excited, to see that she actually showed up, that he momentarily lost control of his senses.

Loki was sure that the chances of her reappearing to continue her services as his TA, were now zero to none.

He wouldn't even be able to settle for a substitute, having now had a taste of the real thing.

Loki ran a hand through his dark hair while considering his options, until he spotted something in his periphery.

In her haste, Evelyn had forgotten to take her purse that she had settled on a desk.

Seeing it, hope rekindled in his heart. She would surely pay a visit to his office later to collect her belongings, granting him another chance to speak with her.

With that thought in mind, he retrieved her purse, taking it to his office as he anticipated her arrival.

-----

A/N: Thank you so much for reading - as always, comments/suggestions are greatly appreciated, I love reading them way too much and I look forward to them every update! Now...I have some lukewarm news regarding the camping situation. Since my twin has a position that requires more training, she left for camp yesterday and informed me of a few things regarding the wifi situation there. There is absolutely no reception within the camp, with the exception of a few spots that do have wifi - such as the camp office, dining hall, etc. However, the walk to these spots is a bit... lengthy as it's practically in the woods.

But! We do have break times and a day off, so I have time dedicated to catch up on writing/uploading chapters, as well as working on some art. Being surrounded by nature also fosters inspiration, so things won't be all that bad! There's technically a no cellphone policy, but that's only during work hours. In basic terms, there's wifi - but I can only make use of it during select times when I'm not busy with work/training. On the bright side, google docs don't require internet, so I can write during the night, then upload as soon as I get time :p I can’t upload chapters with mobile for some reason on Tumblr, so I’ll have to see if they have computers there. If not, it would be on ao3 until I get to a computer.

[kingofthewilderwest]

I totally get what you're saying about fandom and canon (or at least I think I do) and that what's really important is a love of the material, and I agree to that respect, but personally, reading the words "canon doesn't matter" kind of rustles my jimmies, because for some people (like me) and in some spaces, canon is extremely important. 1/?

People will find importance in canon for whatever reasons that are individual to them, and I think it’s important to consider that. There are also spaces where discussion of canon IS important, like when it comes to issues of representation. I think you’ve read my post about the phrase “there is no heterosexual explanation for this” and my rebuttal of “not every emotionally intimate relationship between two characters of the same gender is inherently gay” in response to people claiming that 2/

certain same gender pairings are “obviously” “gay for each other”, when there’s nothing in the canon that points to anything beyond an emotionally intimate relationship. One of the people who commented on it made a really good point that while it’s fine to ship something regardless of canon, it’s a different thing entirely to claim that something IS canon when there’s no evidence for it, or evidence that’s up to too much interpretation, because claiming that such a relationship IS canon 3/?

when in fact it’s barely hinted at and interpretable at best, it means that it’s much more difficult to call for better representation, when someone who is against representation can go “see? look at all the people who say [interpretable pairing] is canon. they don’t need anything more explicit!” 4/?

I think that there ARE spaces in fandom where that’s an important discussion to have. So I disagree with you that canon doesn’t matter, because there are places for it, and for individual people, it’s very important. But I agree entirely that there shouldn’t be arguments in fandom about what is or is not canon that basically involves gatekeeping “canon” or being mean to others because of what they think is or is not canon. 5/?

In a perfect world, people would be willing to agree to disagree about what is or is not canon and accept that other people have different opinions of how far canon goes. Unfortunately, that’s not the case, so I definitely agree that it’s bad for people to assert that their view of canon is the “correct” view, and - if I may be so audacious as to assume intent - is really the point you’re trying to make. 6/? (I think?)

I think that not caring about canon has its place in certain fandom contexts, but not all of them. It’s kind of like it’s a different analytical framework, one that’s useful sometimes but not other times. 7/? 

And certainly, I think canon has importance in places that exist at the boundaries of fandom, like when canon is considered in historical studies or in literature reviews. Though that’s also getting into discussions of where fandom ends and other disciplines begin, so it’s probably a moot point, and probably depends on someone’s perspective and intent. 9/? (or 8?)

I’m gonna stop myself here from going into literary theory/criticism/whatever about when and where canon matters, but I think I’ve made my point that while I agree with the sentiment of what you’re saying, I disagree with the statement that “canon doesn’t matter” in fandom. Because I think it does, but just not in every context. 10/10 (or whatever number)

From this.

As always, you’ve got a wealth of thoughtful and well-worded discussion here. You’re a brilliant human being, and one of the reasons I love talking to you is because of your deep analytical perspectives. I think another reason I jive with you as a friend is because we tend to hold similar perspectives. It’s fun, because we both entertain creative or emotional discussions extrapolated from source materials, and we both acknowledge what canon objectively contains. 

I apologize: I thought I’d been more clear with the context of what I was criticizing regarding fandom’s relationship with canon. I think I also banked on followers knowing I’m a logically centered individual who cares deeply about facts and not just heart. I suppose not, and I’m sorry if I were misleading. My mistake! How you disagree with my phrase “canon doesn’t matter” is not what I was intending to suggest and it’s not the values I have regarding canon. That one sentence wasn’t meant to stand on its own that much. We do in truth consider canon’s importance the same way!

My critique intended to be about the discussion of “What are the canon materials?” rather than “What information is in the canon?” As I read it, your response goes through both, and where you say you disagreed is mostly when you looked at the latter (but I was intentionally honing in only on the former). Maybe it’s a good idea for us to separate these concepts rather than conflate it into a large debate of “what is canon?” from too broad an angle.

My critique was about how fans police others’ engagement for things like Watsonian interpretations, headcanons, speculative meta, and fanfiction writing. If people want to analyze Edward Elric’s personality only from FMAB, or if they want to include minor tie-ins (ex: Prince of the Dawn, Sacred Star of Milos, omake, etc.), either perspective provides interesting analytical angles. They’re both valid ways of handling the character’s personality.

Especially since I experience the “What is canon materials?” conversation with the HTTYD fandom, I tend to see the debate centered on continuity and OOC/IC interactions. Also, at times, how “big” a material is - like video games being “less authoritative” than the films. These conversations are more about how people do or don’t emotionally reject RTTE for their personal headcanon/discussion space. These are people who acknowledge the show’s implications rather than deny RTTE’s existence or the implications of the content. It’s exactly because people engage and examine its contents, that some people might like to talk about Hiccup through RTTE lenses, and others will never entertain such speculations. 

(You know this stuff, I’m sure, but I’m spelling it all out to be clear, and for other readers to follow.)

What I’m saying is that in angles like these, what is or is not canon doesn’t matter, because we have the right to recreationally interact with Hiccup through some of the officially licensed materials, or through all of them. We have the right to completely ignore ALL canon and imagine him as something else, too!

That discussion that I focused on is about what people accept as “the most official materials” versus “unofficial materials.” Your focus for the majority of your message looks to me like a nuanced angle on something else - the other “spaces,” “places,” “frameworks” you bring up. That’s about whether or not people acknowledge what’s inside those materials. It’s about whether or not people are able to acknowledge that things happen in official materials, or are able to correctly discern objective versus subjective information within that media. That’s not something I was covering in that conversation because it wasn’t contextually relevant, but yes, you’re absolutely right that these distinctions are important!

The viral post you mentioned is one I’ll never forget from you, because I agree with it 100%. It’s the same frustration I hold, so it was so enthralling to see it put to words. It’s poor thinking for fans to subjectively interpret canon materials and try to push it as The One Truth… when it is not objectively what the source material contains. Feel free to tie things together how you want for funsies, that doesn’t make it what the source ACTUALLY says.

This is why I mentioned, at the start of my discussion, that I get uncomfortable when people dismiss officially licensed materials as “fanfiction” or “not real.” These exist whether we like them to or not. The reason it’s important to distinguish fandom from canon is because canon is what feeds us, and is what provides authority for what the franchise is. Whether or not you like the materials or engage with them for things like headcanoning, they’re there, and you have to be able to acknowledge: these materials exist. The companies gave them to us.

Because a product exists, you can’t say “bye” to the consequences of its existence. You have to know it exists, and what it does/doesn’t contain. It’s poor thinking for individuals to extrapolate materials from canon that were objectively not intended by the creators, but fans still try to push it as “the true story.” What the source material objectively contains cannot be replaced by emotional wants or denials. That’s where things like representation or romance come into play, as you mentioned: it’s (usually) fine to relate to and interpret the characters as you want, so long as you can separate that from the objective reality of the source material. You have to be able to acknowledge what the source material contains.

I want to make it very clear:

There’s an enormous difference between emotionally deciding which canonical materials you engage with for your creative frameworking…

…versus denying the existence of what officially licensed products contain, or insisting that your subjective interpretation is objectively true. 

For the former: canon doesn’t matter. That’s my discussion of the previous post. Policing fans by telling them one source is canon and one isn’t… when it’s all licensed materials… is forcing people to engage with canon a certain way. We all have the right to engage with all licensed materials to the depth we want. If I want to accept RTTE and analyze Hiccup from RTTE to GOTNF to THW… let me enjoy that! Don’t tell me to quit analyzing RTTE!Hiccup because it doesn’t feel like he’s IC to you (and ergo, outside of your own mental “canon”). It’s fiiiiine! I can write analyses about RTTE!Hiccup!

For something like the “what is canon materials?” discussion you mentioned as far as academic documentation of a body of works, that is a REALLY interesting discussion, but yeah, as you pointed out, a little outside the boundaries of this current conversation. But I’d love to talk to you sometime about it!!!

For the latter: you better be able to know what the licensed materials actually contain. You shouldn’t deny something exists. Whether or not you call it “canon,” you should be able to acknowledge it’s an official product and not something a fan put on AO3. You should be able to objectively understand what’s in officially released products. If the books have problematic elements, if a show lacks explicit queer representation, if there’s a racial stereotype that’s handled poorly, that’s a truth that you can’t imagine your way out of! You can reinterpret characters for fun in your fandom discussions, but you can’t deny the reality of what the creators produced. Ignoring the truth of these issues, or making your interpretations “reality” you force on others… is dangerous illogical thought that has severe consequences for how you interact with the world and its issues.

As you say, there’s value in all these discussions. We’ve known each other a long time, so I know you know I’m a logic-oriented individual, someone who isn’t going to say “everything is okay!” and let subjectivity fly over objective information in source materials. When I say “canon doesn’t matter,” it’s not about subjectively letting our feelings erase what is objectively presented on screen / on paper. When I say “canon doesn’t matter,” it’s about whether or not someone wants to talk about tie-ins, or only select portions of officially released products. But when I say “canon doesn’t matter,” it is also with the assumption people are smart enough to distinguish subjective interpretation from objective observation, the angle which you brought up with the nuanced discussion we’ve seen. Thanks for speaking with such finesse again on why we can’t lets fans’ desires get in the way of what they call “truth.”

I love to both discuss things from a creative speculative angle and let my imagination wander or reinterpret characters… or discuss materials from a Doylist acknowledgement of how something gets sociologically presented. Hell, I hold such a huge value to official products and canon materials that I engage with almost no fandom content (fanfictions, comics, etc.). So yeah! I also believe that canon is very, very important, and is something to be talked about! 

I think it’s important to understand the impacts that official materials have, and I get frustrated when people pretend something DreamWorks or Disney officially sanctioned is “fanfiction.” I think it’s important for fans to discuss back and forth about what they think objectively happened when there’s a lack of clarity. For the romance thing, again, as you said, it’s a good discussion to have of “what is WITHIN canon?” when looking at whether or not it’s obviously queer, or if you’re reading into it. 

I also love to create synthesized interpretations for what characters are like and I get frustrated when people try to police me on what I can/can’t include into my canon analyses. 

I just have no patience for laypersons who debate “what is canon MATERIAL?” when looking at whether or not a video game should be considered “okay” to synthesize with a movie, and gatekeeping in the sense of what fans can include in our creative engagements. Whether or not X is “as canon” as Y doesn’t matter at the end of the day if you disagree with [insert username here]. It’s your recreation. It’s still a franchise product. Know it exists, know the objective materials, and move on. Do with it as you will and let your friends do with it as they will. 

[lia-nikiforov]

Spring 2018 Anime Final Review

So, uh, this is six months late. I’ve had half of this post in my drafts forever. To make it short, as I’ve mentioned previously, mom lost her job, which has not only been a heavy hit to my sense of stability for the last six months, but also means my time to watch anime was seriously reduced and even now a slight change of plans fucks up my whole schedule and sets me back for a full week. Anyway, nobody cares about any of these shows anymore so let’s get straight to it? I’m gonna ommit the two-cours that continued into the Summer - hopefully I’ll be able to make that post soonish? idk. Worst to best, same as usual

The crappy gender politics pit of shame

Darling in the FRANXX: I think everyone has ripped this show to threads at this point and there isn’t much I could add to that. It is quite funny to me to see how many people flipped out when the show went completely bananas in its last few episodes. Feels a bit like KADO, I’ve been telling y’all this was a ton of empty crap since episode 2, it just took the writing to completely self-destruct for everyone else to notice. A part of me feels tempted to do a long post breaking down just how badly the show collapsed in its final shebang, specifically how every single twist and turn completely nulled any remote kind of message or central thesis the show may have had, but at the same time it doesn’t seem worth the time. In the end, I may have given What is Internal Consistency, The anime way too much credit. It’s not hateful antigay propaganda, it’s just dumb as shits, with a writer and creators who didn’t think for half a second of the implications of what they were doing, and who were so incompetent they couldn’t even conserve the minimal plot and character coherency within a single episode, let alone 24. In other words, Darling isn’t saying “gays shouldn’t exist” but “I have no idea of anything regarding gay people”. What makes it egregious is that the show spent so much time acting like it was “meaningful” and “important” and yet it ended saying absolutely fucking nothing. Except mayb “have babies”. Down to oblivion you go, along with the likes of KADO, to the void of shows that couldn’t even be offensively bad and no one will remember a year from now. Bonus garbage points for the half-assed “bury your gays”.

Nil of Libra Admirari or whatever this show was called: I’m not trying to diss on the show, I just genuinely never remember the title because I have the JP and EN all mixed up. Not that it matters much, as far as I could tell, the show could call Shalabalabatuna and it would have the same significance in regard to the content. But the title isn’t important. In fact, it may be a bit unfair to have this show in this section. For the most part, Main Girl is very self-determined and has an active role in the story.... but then the last two episodes heavily featured a lot of rape threats or rape themes and forced pregnancy (real and threat) and I don’t really understand why they’d go there all of a sudden. One of them was treated relatively well, even empowering the victim in the process, but when the ikemen bad guy was rambling endlessly about how he wanted to impregnate the protagonist it really turned me off :/ I’m also not a fan of “main boy was her secret fiancé all along”, but at least they also handled that somewhat decently. It’s a very disposable series, but since I watched all of Amnesia, I think I owe every otoge adaptation at least the smallest chance to clear that very low bar, and Libra of Nil does it, more competently than most other stuff in the same genre.

Hisone to Masotan: I really, really wanted to love this show. Even now, as I put it in the pit of shame category, I’m pained. There was a good show in this, and a lot of it made it to the screen: an adorable, charming little story about a woman finding her place in the world, making new friends, finding her calling and bonding with an adorable dragon. Unfortunately, it got buried down under this opressing, horrendous gender politics that tried to do something with bringing attention to sexism in the military only to cancel it out making the one dude that embodied that sexism getting rewarded with the affections of a girl he explicitly tried to crush. It also called back on the virgin or whore fallacy and even managed to shove in a “bury your gays” trope. Even though Hisone challenges the ritual bullshit, it’s too little, too late, and she does end up carrying it out anyway, so the defiance to the status quo is of little importance in terms of problematizing the ritual itself. Sorry BONES, it wasn’t meant to be this time. 

The ni fu ni fa section

Ni fu ni fa is a Mexican colloquialism for “It was okay but it didn’t change my life.”

Binan Koukou Chikyuu Boueibu HAPPY KISS: This soft reboot of the franchise had some really great episodes and did an actually good job of developping its characters. For the most part, it achieved what its predecessor did in terms of satirical comedy and I enjoyed it quite a bit. However, what bunked it down so low in the list was the final episode. At some point, the writers forgot they were doing a parody and made the show somewhat self-serious, way closer in tone to the magical girl anime it was supposed to be making fun of, rather than the satire its predecessor was. Whereas S1 ended with the whole Magical boy stuff being revealed as a crappy space reality TV show, this one ended with a real cheesy conflict about happiness and family and blablabla. Which is not bad by itself if this were a Precure show, but that kind of self-serious plot development just didn’t work for this series. I still enjoyed it, and the fanservice episode is one of the best of the whole franchise, but I’m a bit sad the finale missed the mark so badly.

Hinamatsuri: Hinamatsuri was very hit-or-miss for me. There were some truly brilliant episodes, a lot of funny vignettes and heart-warming stories, and then there was some stuff that made me uncomfortable -like every single Hitomi story- or felt unnecessary and dry. It also threw me off that the superpower dynamic completely disappeared in the second half of the show, especially in Anzu’s part of the story. It was okay but I feel like I needed something that felt like a closing, and choosing to end it with Mao who featured very minimally in the show overall didn’t cut it. It’s a fun show, I’d reccommend people check it out, but it felt a bit too disjointed for me

Persona 5: The Animation: This is a hard show to place because I love the looks of it and I think the concept is interesting and pretty cool, but there is something that’s keeping me from connecting emotionally to the story. The part where changing the villains’ heart makes them repent from their sins and become “good” feels very artificial and very tasteless when you’re dealing with rapists and abusers. I ended dropping it at episode 16, I just couldn’t find the motivation to catch up with the 6 episodes i’d fallen behind on because my schedule is a tragedy

Tokyo Ghoul: Re: I guess it’s fair to say I’ve kind of outgrown Tokyo Ghoul. There’s something messy and confusing about how this season panned out, and there comes a point in which misery porn just doesn’t cut it anymore. I still watch because Ishida has a way to make every single goddamn character extremely sympathetic, which makes for an emotionally engaging viewing even when you’re not sure of what the plot is supposed to be or who you should be rooting for. I tried picking up the new season that just started airing and immediately found I had no idea of what was going on, who was on who’s side and in general, who the fuck were 90% of the characters, so I dropped it.

Nanatsu no Taizai: Imashime no Fukkatsu: I’ve mentioned it before, this second season had the opposite problem than the first one: the pace was too slow. It took more than half of it to get to Escanor, and then the season ends at a kind of random spot. I really thought we’d get further along on the story, since Gowther’s backstory was hinted at in the openings, but no such thing happened. They did manage to give us a variety of cool moments and fights, and I love Ban so his scenes with Zhivago and Elaine made me quite happy, though I really wish the romance between Elizabeth and Meliodas wasn’t su dubious and cringy. In light of some revelations that take place further along the manga, going out of their way to emphasize that Meliodas was a sort of mentor figure for Elizabeth when she was a toddler seems unncessary and just very squeamish. I do hope we get a third season though, and an OVA of the Vampires of whatever side story would be great too.

Rokuhoudou Yotsuiro Biyori: I was pleasantly surprised by this show, and it’s closer to being one of my top of the season than it is to “meh”. It had some weaker, cheesier segments, but it also managed great whacky moments and a genuine soothing atmosphere. What surprised me most is that the vanilla looking cast of moderately handsome dudes managed to develop into interesting, funny individuals with a dynamic that made every episode enjoyable. A solid reccommendation for anyone wanting to see delicious looking food and moderately handsome dudes being ridiculous. Also, the cat episode is the best episode of anime ever produced.

The I’m probably the only person alive who enjoys these shows

Mahou Shoujo Ore: This is a difficult show to place because it wasn’t quite as great as I wanted it to be and its parodic nature took me by surprise, but somehow I was still seriously entertained more often than not. The twists in the final quarter and the absolutely bonkers finale was a total riot, but I definitely advise caution before going in, given that some of the jokes may seem insensitive or in poor taste in regards to gender presentation, sexuality and there are even some mild harrassment jokes that certainly made me roll my eyes.

Yowamushi Pedal: Glory Line: I don’t know if anyone’s noticed, but I think through half of the show’s 25 episode run, I was convinced the title was actually Glory Road. It’s kind of anticlimactic that it’s called Glory Line if they don’t actually reach the final Goal btw. Anyway, I feel I say this a lot, but really, if you didn’t like the previous Yowapeda seasons, there’s nothing here for you, and if you did, you’re probably not gonna hop off this late in the game. This season does suffer from the same dragging than its predecessors, with the added issue of being quite pessimistic for no reason in about half the episodes, and a diminished presence for Onoda. I really wish they hadn’t dragged the Day 2 goal so long, I really hoped we’d see the end of the race, but no such luck I guess. Still love most of it and hope we get one more season or a movie to complete the story.

The favorites of the season

Golden Kamuy: In spite of its pacing issues, terrible animation and general clunkiness, I can’t help but love this show. When season 1 ended my feelings for it had mellowed quite a bit, but as soon as I picked up season 2 this Fall I just fell in love all over again. It’s fun, unique, over-the-top in some ways, incredibly grounded in others, and the dynamics between the characters are incredibly charming. 

Hozuki no Reitetsu: It’s hard to talk about this one because it feels repetitive, given how tonally the show remains just the same across its three seasons. It could’ve very well been a one-season, 36 episode show, for how little it changes in spite of the time that transpired between the first season and the second. But in short, the comedy continues to be as spot on as always, the Zashikiwarashi twins are the best addition to the cast. It’s definitely a show I could watch endless episodes off, and the rare case of an episodic series with no overarching plot that I can enjoy wholeheartedly. 

Card Captor Sakura: Clear Card arc: Over the course of the series, I’ve expressed a few concerns and misgivings about how the story of this 20th anniversary sequel was playing out. The final episode was particularly troublesome in that it left the story unfinished in spite of deviating from the manga. In spite of this, more than anything I’m very happy that this continuation still retains what made the original so special, that they captured the magic behind Sakura’s “everything will be alright” spell and gave us the chance to spend more time with these beloved characters and see their stories continue. The slow but sweet development of Sakura and Syaoran’s puppy love is a definite highlight. Needs more Touya/Yukito and Yue in general.

Piano no Mori: This show got heavily overlooked because it was kidnapped by Netflix (pls stop immediately), and then when it was finally unceremoniously dumped a month or two ago, it came under fire for the wonky CGI during the piano scenes -and it is indeed very wonky-. But beyond that, I found the story very engaging, especially because Kai is such a fascinating protagonist, his intense rivalry-friendship with Megane-kun (sorry, it’s been six months, i can’t remember names) is exactly the type I can’t help but root for. Kai’s participation in the final episode gave me goosebumps. I’m very happy we’re getting a continuation,  can’t wait to see how the Chopin competition develops.

Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii: Sweet, funny and absolutely delightful from start to finish, Wotakoi was easily one of the highlights of the season. Although there were some aspects about Cosplayer-senpai and Yuri Otaku-senpai’s (I’m really trying to remember the names, I’m sorry!! ;---;) that didn’t work for me -namely the izakaya segment- Narumi and Hirotaka more than made up for it with their clumsy yet adorable romance. I spent the entirety of the amusement park episode screeching. I really hope we get a continuation -and get a chance to see more of Hirotaka’s brother and his gamer friend too- and that in general we can get more anime about adult stories

Megalobox: Who would’ve thought that a show that wasn’t even in my radar before the season started would’ve end as one of my favorites, possibly of the year? Even as someone who’s only marginally acquainted with Ashita no Joe and has no interst in the sport of boxing, I was completely enthralled by the style and passion of this production. As I said a bit above, intense rivalries are very appealing to me, and the build up in the tension between Joe and Yuri was almost palpable, their mutual respect gave me chills. Definitely the surprise of the season, made even better by its optimistic happy ending to contrast with its predecessor’s tragedy. Megalobox is a unique anniversary project that is closer to an homage and it works perfectly. Definitely check it out.

That’s it for the Spring season! I hope i can do the summer season this weekend and maaaybe even my watchlist for the Fall season. Fingers crossed i won’t get swallowed up in other stuff :’D 

[redgatessoftware]

8 SEO practices to consider before designing your website?

Did you get the message that Google is rolling out a useful content update? If so, you know how difficult it has been to rank on Google while meeting searcher intent. As a result, Google crawlers are updated to find websites that are completely built to satisfy the end-user experience. That said, what better way to rank than by following SEO best practices?

Here are 8 SEO practices to follow before creating a white label website development.

Site structure In simple terms, we can refer to site structure as the way visitors view your content, or the pattern by which you organize your site content. Why do search engine crawlers bother with your structure so much? Well, these bots are trained to satisfy visitors. On unformatted or poorly structured web pages, the user may have difficulty finding the information they were looking for. So with the right structure, you can help search engines identify what your website is about and index it properly.

Site navigation Website owners sometimes forget how important navigation is to SEO. Suppose a new visitor lands on your website. Now, if your navigation doesn't suit them, they will immediately hit the back button and move to your competitor's website. This will lead to an increase in bounce rates. To avoid such situations, make sure you use clean codes for clear navigation on your site.

URL structure Often referred to as a permalink, the URL plays a small but significant role in SEO rankings. Not everyone realizes the wonders SEO-friendly URLs can do for your website's visibility. Not only will Google rank your website, it will also make it clear enough to visitors what they are getting into. So how can you create an SEO-friendly URL? Keep it short and simple with primary keywords. And it is done!

Elements on the page On-page elements mainly include the page meta description, heading tags, and heading. These are indeed some of the factors that affect your rating the most. Let's go over the basics of these three factors. In general, your title should be around 5-60 characters with power words and numbers. Likewise, a meta description of 130-165 characters with keywords is considered good enough. Finally, your heading tags must be formatted hierarchically according to your content structure. You can also follow white label website development techniques to get better rankings.

Image optimization Now that you've started a website yourself and you've visited a few websites, you know how images can engage users. According to statistics, an article with an image engages users 94% more than an article without users. With such an impact on the searcher's intent, there was no way Google could ignore this factor when ranking. So how does a search engine know if an image is relevant to the content? Simple, it looks for the file name the image is stored in and loops through the image's alt tag. Therefore, to get the attention of search engines, make sure that you optimize your images well.

Responsive design Responsive web design is the process of creating a website so that all of its text, structure, and images look the same on any device, regardless of screen size. As of 2019, Google mostly prefers responsive websites for ranking. This means that how your website looks on different devices determines how well your website will rank. According to the survey, mobile searches can account for up to 72% of all searches in some businesses.

Website speed While things like improved aesthetics, increased functionality, and more content are essential to your website, the uncomfortable truth is that website performance comes first. According to a survey conducted by Gomez.com, 50% of online visitors do not wait more than 2 seconds for a page to display its content. If the site takes longer than three seconds, users will leave your site. The numbers are even worse. About 79% of them will not even return to your website and 44% avoid recommending it to their friends. Page speed also affects search engine results.

Continuous analysis and problem solving Even if you follow best practices from the start, SEO is not foolproof. Regular analysis of your methods and results can lead you to a better ranking of your site. It's hard to see the patterns at first, but you get used to them. Creating an SEO performance dashboard is the easiest method to stay on top of your SEO data.

Conclusion

Here ends the tour of some of the most important SEO service in USA practices. By keeping this in mind, you can create a website that beats your competition and gets traffic organically.

[okoutd2511]

“Strength-Based Strategies for Parents and Educators to Promote Mental Wellness and Resiliencies in Children and Youth”

By Dr. Ed Rawana

The topic being researched is using strengths to build competencies and encourage positive personality development. He focuses on how adults can be a positive influence on children, and how adults are their greatest supporters. Dr. Rawana talks a lot about strength-based education which is the idea of preparing the students to learn compared to teaching them only when they are engaged. He believes that by focusing on individuals strengths it can be the basis for positive development. This includes avoiding forced teachings that aren’t necessary, as well as developing more engaging teachers. Dr. Rawana’s studies don’t end with teachers, he goes on further to explain that parents play a vital role in the engagement and desire to learn developed in children. As parents they are supposed to focus on their strengths instead of maybe forcing their child into an activity they don’t enjoy for example. 

I understand Rowana’s idea behind focusing on developing strengths over weaknesses, but I disagree with such a focused approach. I believe our weakness are equally as valuable in education because it within our weaknesses that we learn the most. Our best learning environment is one that requires interpretation of our weaknesses or uncomfortable stature. This presentation didn’t focus on the research methods what’s so ever, it was hard to fact check because not many references were made. It is difficult to relate it to course content as I expected there to be more information pertaining to his research methods. I will now go on to explain the weaknesses and challenges of this presentations main idea.

Weaknesses

A major weakness is the lack of citation, the statements made about research were broad. I believe the reason this was the case is because he is already well established among Lakehead psychology department. He has a couple of books and research initiatives that students and other facility members are well aware of. There was also a section about the speaker that explained his past, which seemed to have answers about where he may get his information from, however the presentation didn’t really dress these. As a new viewer It was quite easy for me to get lost in the topics of conversation and its relatability. Considering I am a student, I expected this presentation to be more relatable however I feel that may have been the case more so for parents. The presentation could have tried focusing on relating it more to its target audiences.

Challenges

He had challenges showing consistency in his results. Proving mental wellness and resiliences is a very specific study that expects a very specific result. I think he had challenges proving a lot of what he would say as well, the introduction was quite long which seemed to take up a lot time which made him rush information and his results near the end of the presentation.

Successes

He seemed to have a lot of good parenting advice. If I were a parent attending that presentation I feel as though I would have gotten a lot more out of it rather than a student. I think it is important to include both of the demographics he’s researching in that target audience, however he did have some interesting parenting views. He has a boy of his own and made connections from the presentation with his personal life which made it more believable.

[brilliantorinsane]

The Speckled Band (1931): a.k.a. Sherlock Wilde

Note: For this meta I tagged everyone who reblogged earlier posts in the series. However, as I certainly don’t want to shove my work at anyone who isn’t interested, from this point forward I will only only tag individuals who have shown continued interest by reblogging multiple posts, or who have specifically asked to be tagged. Thank you to anyone who has been or continues to be interested in any part of this series <3

Guys, I did it. I found the Gayest Holmes. Not the best Holmes, nor the best adaptation by any stretch of the imagination; but most definitely the gayest. Well, okay, the most stereotypically gay, and one of the most nearly confirmed as such in the explicit text of the film—a fact which has me reeling given that this film was released in 1931.

This is the third installment of my series on obscure Holmes adaptations and their depiction of our beloved duo both individually and in relation to each other. For the first two installments, see below:

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (Stoll Pitures, 1921–1923)

The Speckled Band on Stage: Yep, Still Gay

Production and Reception:

[Spoilers ahead. But unless you want to avoid spoiling the ACD cannon story The Speckled Band or his play of the same name, I wouldn’t worry about it. There’s really nothing worth spoiling in this film]

This adaptation, released the year after Doyle’s death, is derived less from the cannon story of the same name than from a stage adaptation also written by Doyle. The play is wonderful, featuring a genuinely chilling villain, well-realized side characters, laugh-out-loud humor, the best Holmes and Watson, and allllll the gay subtext. You can read the script here, and my discussion of the play is linked above.

Unfortunately, the filmmakers’ 5 step adaptation plan appears to have been the following:

1. Keep the bare bones of the play, including some of the name changes, the emphasis on the Rylott household, etc.

2. Take the play’s uncomfortable undertone of Orientalism and make it the film’s prevailing atmosphere, then add casual pro-slavery rhetoric, just ‘cause.

3. Remove approximately 3/4s of what made Doyle’s script so good, then creatively undermine, dilute, and/or convolute the remaining 1/4.

4. Hire a promising actor to play Holmes, and then give him minimal interesting content.

5. Hire the actor who played Rylott in the stage play, because it can’t hurt to have one good thing.

Yeah … I’m exaggerating, but its not good. Which is disappointing on many levels, because it would have been fascinating to know how a flagrantly gay Holmes would have fared in the early 1930s. But as it is, this adaptation fails on so many levels that it seems impossible to theorize whether homophobia played a significant role in the fact that it made scarcely any impact in its day and has been entirely forgotten now. Sure, homophobia might have aided the process of erasure, but this film didn’t need any help sinking into oblivion.

Nevertheless, although the blaring racism makes it difficult to fully appreciate the filmmaker’s courage in not abandoning the play’s subtext, it is still worth being aware that filmmakers were paying attention to and actively portraying the ACD cannon subtext as early as 1931.

Raymond Massey as Sherlock Holmes

It really is a pity that this film didn’t give Raymond Massey the chance to show what he could have done with Sherlock Holmes. In his book Sherlock Holmes on Screen, Alan Barns argues that Massey might have created a Holmes to rival all his contemporaries, and whenever he appeared I paid close attention, always feeling as if he were about to get interesting. Unfortunately, he never quite did.

Massey’s Holmes spends the majority of the film in a deeply lethargic state. Depressive moods are as much a part of Sherlock’s character as his boundless curiosity, and I would have found it a rather interesting portrayal if he had ever woken up from his stupor. But although he has flashes of intensity, in the end he lounges about the crime scene as listlessly as he does 221B. Further, because we know too little about this Holmes to understand his lethargy, he never quite solidifies into a concrete or compelling individual.

In dearth of anything else, the most interesting thing about this Holmes is that he is definitely, definitively, flagrantly gay. To Massey’s credit, this is instantly apparent—my initial impression that, “wow, this Holmes is kinda a lazy dick,” was paralleled with a rather flabbergasted, “wait … is he playing him as gay???”

If I’d seen Massey’s Holmes without context, I may well have thought I was watching a film about Oscar Wilde—the stereotypical epitome of Victorian homosexuality. Even Barns, who has excellent things to say about Holmes adaptations but seems vaguely allergic to discussing the detective’s sexuality, describes Massey’s Holmes as an “aesthete” and speaks of his “almost Oscar Wilde approach” (266). And all of that registers before Holmes starts examining his fingernails, resting his hand on Watson’s leg a good few inches above his knee, and talking about marriage. But we will return to that last point shortly.

Athole Stewart as John Watson

Stewart as Watson in this film is … fine. Even good, comparatively speaking—Stewart’s Watson is hearty and kind and is not portrayed as an idiot, which really is an anomaly at this stage of Holmes adaptations. This is probably due in large part to his excellent role in Doyle’s stage play. Unfortunately, the film consistently sets up Watson’s strengths only to erase them.

Watson in the film is kind to Helen—that’s the one good quality that doesn’t get undermined. So, yay. But while in the play Watson stands up against Rylott’s tyrannical demands when he is summoned to examine the body of the first murdered sister, the film begins to replicate that scene only to have Watson give in after his initial protest. In both the play and film he initially appears to be a decidedly intelligent man who guesses exactly what is going on in the the Rylott household, but in the film this is undermined by his subsequent conversation with Holmes, in which it appears that he was entirely clueless and took everything at face value after all. The film makes an interesting but half-hearted attempt at introducing modern technology into 221B, and most of this has been installed by Watson; but Holmes finds it essentially useless for his work and relies on different tools entirely. In the play Watson himself kills the snake; in the film he … shines a light so Holmes can attack it.

In short, Stewart’s Watson goes through the motions of being a partner, but he is never quite allowed to do anything useful.

So … What About Johnlock?

Eh. I guess?

By all rights an adaptation with a gay Holmes ought to at least have one-sided unrequited Johnlock. But while its clear that Holmes is gay, it is not clear that he is in love with Watson.

Beyond the character’s aestheticism, mannerisms, and thigh grab, evidence of Holmes’s sexuality is blatantly but clumsily contained in two brief exchanges with Watson regarding Helen’s marriage to her fiancee. The first comes at the end of Holmes’s first scene, when he abruptly asks Watson to inform him when Helen becomes engaged, with an intensity which demonstrates some emotional investment in the event.

My initial (annoyed) assumption was that they were going to make Holmes out to be in love with Helen. But when Helen comes to Holmes for help two years later, it is clear that they have never met. Nor is there anything in Holmes’s treatment of her to imply some creepy at-a-distance infatuation. And yet we are definitely supposed to pay attention to his preoccupation with the wedding, because the final scene consists of Watson announcing Helen’s engagement to Glen Sternum, to which Holmes responds: “I was afraid that might happen.” Then when Watson, taking Holmes’s response for generalized cynicism, leaves the room with the amused assertion that “we all come to it [i.e. marriage],” Holmes waits until he is gone to respond with a melancholy, “not all, my dear Watson. Not all.” And that, apart from a final line about filing away the details of the case, is the end.

So what are we to make of Holmes’s sorrowful preoccupation with Helen’s marriage? Honestly, I’ve been unable to work it out. Is it is meant to refer to a generalized inability to attach a girl? But there’s no hint of that in the plot; and besides, why then would he be so concerned with this particular marriage? No, it makes more sense to suppose that Holmes’s queer-coded mannerisms are fully intentional, and he knows he will never marry because society will not allow him to marry a man. So was he afraid that Watson, a good friend of the family, might marry her? But then why is he still so sorry when she marries someone else? Is he secretly in love with the man she married (who, fun fact, is a slave-owner)??? Weirdly enough, that is my only theory which doesn’t directly contradict any of the facts, although it would make for incredibly vague and sloppy storytelling.

Just to complicate this further, Doyle’s play also contains a subplot about Holmes being sorrowful about a marriage (although the sorrow is a bit more subtextual)—but in the play it is Watson’s marriage. So basically … the filmmakers appear to have gotten the “Holmes is upset about Watson’s marriage because Holmes is in love with him but cannot marry a man because Homophobia” subtext, but—perhaps because showing Holmes being openly sorrowful over Watson’s marriage felt too obvious?—they clumsily redirected Holmes’s sorrow to a different marriage with which he textually has no connection.

As for Watson, there’s not much to say. There is an odd line in which Holmes asks Watson whether the housekeeper was good-looking and Watson answers “no” before pausing and, with an air of surprise, amending, “yes.” This could be seen as indicating that he is uninterested in the attractiveness of women. (This would make him out to be gay and not bi, which I suppose makes sense for the time). But it could just as easily be put down to the film’s sloppy writing, and if Watson is gay his cheery assurance that he and Holmes both will come round to marriage in the end indicates that he is entirely unaware of it, so … *shrugs.*

In conclusion: this film was probably made by people who Knew, at least about Holmes, but instead of creating Johnlock they gave us a Holmes who is almost definitely gay but only maybe in love with Watson; he could just as easily be in love with a slave-owner he never sees during the film or be sad about not being able to marry a man in general. Then they tossed in a narratively irrelevant Watson who might maybe possibly be gay but he definitely doesn’t know it.

It’s a mess.

Conclusion: Should You Watch It?

I mean … you could. A decent-ish recording is available on YouTube here. But while I feel like we ought to be aware of this first (as far I know) stumbling attempt at subtext, I’m not trying to talk anyone into watching it. If you’re interested in Raymond Massey’s portrayal of Holmes I suggest just skipping to his scenes, which add up to slightly over half of the 50min film. In particular I recommend his first scene, from 7.15–12.35, and the final scene, which begins at 47.30. And if you find a more coherent means of interpreting Holmes’s lines about marriage, please do let me know!

Well then. Yep. That is a thing. Which exists. 

The End

@devoursjohnlock @thespiritualmultinerd @ellinorosterberg @kajepan @spenglernot @materialofonebeing @possiblyimbiassed @oysters-and-gingernuts @sosukana @maniclemons @materialof1being @persnicketypea @cuttydarke @newshea @a-candle-for-sherlock @tjlcisthenewsexy @sarahthecoat @the-elephant-is-pink @bluebluenova @hewascharming @battledress @cumberlocked221 @victorianfantasywatson @sherlockisgayaf @alemizu @infodumpingground @believein-johnlock @disregardedletters @accuratebutunsystematic @artemisastarte @inevitably-johnlocked

[cmbynreviews]

"Call Me by Your Name" is a gay love story. The film should have included gay sex.

Luca Guadagnino's new film, Call Me by Your Name, does everything it is supposed do – well, almost everything.

Based on the 2007 novel by André Aciman and set in the Italian countryside during summer in the late 1980s, the film has Elio (Timothée Chalamet) and Oliver (Armie Hammer) meet and fall in love in what feels almost like a two-hour-and-12-minute dream sequence.

A dream sequence that is understandably difficult to wake up from, as it would be preferable to exist there for just a bit longer. Guadagnino's film is every bit as intoxicating as you would expect from the laudatory reviews. And with Chalamet and Hammer (now Golden Globe and SAG nominees) at the helm, it's nigh impossible not to leave the theater nostalgic for fresh apricot juice and a warm Italian summer.

But in the context of today's cultural conversation about queer representation, it may leave something to be desired. Especially after the director's comments about why he didn't include any explicit sex scenes, although sex between the two main characters is a central theme in the book. His reasoning furthers the supposition that in order for queer stories to be marketable, they must be presented in a way that will not alienate straight audiences.

"I wasn't interested at all", Guadagnino explained in a recent interview with the Hollywood Reporter. "The tone would've been very different from what I was looking for. I wanted the audience to completely rely on the emotional travel of these people and feel first love. I didn't want the audience to find any difference or discrimination toward these characters. It was important to me to create this powerful universality, because the whole idea of the movie is that the other person makes you beautiful – enlightens you, elevates you. The other is often confronted with rejection, fear or a sense of dread, but the welcoming of the other is a fantastic thing to do, particularly in this historical moment".

Perhaps Guadagnino's hesitancy comes in part because LGBTQ folks of his generation (Guadagnino is 46 and openly gay) were less likely to see such blatantly queer narratives – like LGBTQ characters leading a film, as opposed to being relegated to one-liner sidekicks – represented in popular culture. He seems to believe that by making a film more palatable for straight audiences, it would be able to move the needle.

However, the media available for consumption in a postmillennial digital age has become increasingly queer (although there can always, and should always, be more), so I imagine the film would have needed to be less hetero-normalized to move it more. We're now in a post-Moonlight, post-Carol, post-The Kids Are Alright, post-I Love You Phillip Morris, post-Brokeback, post post post world. Guadagnino would have done greater justice to the film and its audience to deliver a more vivid depiction of queer life – which is far messier and complicated and impolite than the film would have you believe.

Film adaptations are often met with criticism from fans of the source content for not remaining true to the story. Many cut scenes for time or to create a more linear story line. It would have made sense for Guadagnino to say he was omitting sex scenes for the sake of achieving a PG-13 rating (instead of an R, which it still has) because that would help it reach a broader audience. However, claiming that omitting explicitly gay sex will bolster the movie's ability to "create this powerful universality" is indicative of how media ensconces queer life and is inherently shaming of gay sex.

In her recent book How to Fall in Love With Anyone, Mandy Len Catron writes: "When it comes to love, I'm no longer interested in annihilating the differences. I want to engage with alternative love stories without co-opting them, without heteronomalizing them, and without saying, ‘Here's what we (straight, monogamous, cisgendered, able-bodied people) have to learn from them' – even though I do think there is a lot to learn". If Guadagnino is attempting to find "universality" in Call Me by Your Name, then he simply isn't doing justice to the story. In fact, he's doing the opposite. If the mainstream, the majority, is to learn to accept queer narratives, it must be able to see them in unfiltered, honest ways, even if that means working through initial discomfort.

Plus, sex between the two main characters is central to the power of the book. Pages and pages are dedicated not only to sex but also to the resulting passion, shame and acceptance these characters feel, and the beauty of how it emboldens them and their relationship. Most books are not necessarily visual, so imagination is required to fill in the gaps. Movies, however, are inherently so – and have the ability to make the implicit explicit. In his direction, Guadagnino chose the path of least resistance.

Knee-jerk critics of this argument might assume that my side is just looking for the titillation of sex on-screen. But in 2017, one does not have to look far to find sex, simulated or otherwise, on film, TV or the Internet. Rather, what is missing is the true telling of queer stories.

It certainly feels that what's being billed as the gayest film of 2017 – which should have been a movie for the "thems" of the world, those who are hungry for more realistic representations of their lives – instead tried its hardest to become a movie for the "us-es", a majority audience. A majority audience that likely would have been more than amenable to the inclusion of explicit sex scenes.

It is not the responsibility of marginalized groups to make their stories palatable for those outside their communities. It is their responsibility to tell authentic stories that represent the wide spectrum of the human experience – which can sometimes be uncomfortable. It falls on those in majority positions to see these stories and recognize that they are necessary and universal.

As Guadagnino said, it can be true that "[another] person makes you beautiful – enlightens you, elevates you". And it is also true that for some men, that is another man, and sometimes, those men will have sex, and that should be part of being beautiful, not alienating to anyone. At the very least – those who have both read the book and seen the film might share this sentiment – Oliver could have eaten that damn peach.

GARRETT SCHLICHTE | THE WASHINGTON POST | 18 Dec 2017