#kit; character stories; messages etc.

[krokusplays]

Tianyu - Introduction

HSR OC - ✰✰✰✰✰

Name: Tianyu

Lore Path: Abundance

Combat Path: Destruction

Combat Type: Ice

Species: Xianzhou Native

Faction: Borisin

A young woman taken in by the Sableclaw pack of the Borisins after she slew their former pack leader during an attack on the Xianzhou Luofu when she was but a little girl. Exposed to the harsh environment of the Borisins and their violent way of living she grew up worshiping the Abundance, perceiving herself as one of the Pack and resenting the Path her homeworld has chosen.

[sorrelpaws]

ive been playing a lotta clangen recently and heres my clan.  more info on everybody under cut :3

first there’s the leader rosestar and deputy podflight. they’re close in age, but only really became friends as apprentices, and they’ve been pretty much inseparable every since. rosestar is a very silly average guy, a bit awkward at times but he really does mean the best. podflight is a bit more serious and stern, but she can also be a lot of fun and tends to command respect around her. they’re both getting kind of old, and recently rosestar’s memory has gotten kinda wonky, and he tends to be very confused. podflight tries to be supportive, keep the clan at ease etc, but it’s becoming increasingly obvious how unstable rosestar has gotten, and it causes the clan to be on edge.

one of the medicine cats, sharppath. he’s a bit strange and quiet, tends to keep to himself, but he really does mean the best. he started out as a regular apprentice, but had always shown an interest in herbs, so when he asked to change positions there wasn’t really anyone arguing against him. however he lacks a connection to starclan and rarely receives any kind of omens or prophecies. he doesn’t really let it bother him, and the clan doesn’t mind too much since his healing skills are genuinely very good.

these three are kind of the “main characters”, or at least the ones i kept my eye on the most. they’re all littermates, and they’re very close as kits. when they become apprentices meadowpaw and birchpaw start receiving frequent messages/notes/signs/whateva from starclan. birchpaw is much more fascinated by this, and has always kind of shown an interest and preference towards being a medicine cat (she never changes from a warrior apprentice though), but meadowpaw actively ignores the signs since he wants to be a warrior. he tries to talk to his sisters about his visions and dreams, but molepaw doesn’t really understand them/how to help, and birchpaw just talks about her own experiences. about halfway through their apprenticeships birchpaw dies in a dog attack, and after this meadowpaw starts feeling pressured to take on the medcat role because his sister can’t. he decides to change positions pretty much right before he’s made a warrior, and starts training under sharppath. the first months are pretty rough on him, because of his sister’s death, and him and molepaw(moledrift at this point) start growing distant. they manage to reconnect a little when they’re older, but they never really become super close.

jaggedflight and skywing are two peas in a pod, really close brothers. emy is a loner who joins the clan in search of a community, and he becomes good friends with both of them. unfortunately skywing is murdered, and this takes a massive toll on jaggedflight. after his brother’s death him and emy become a lot closer due to their shared grief. burm joins the clan pretty soon after skywing dies, and since he’s pretty young jaggedflight offers to mentor him in order to get his mind off his brother’s death. burm has a pretty similar personality to skywing, and this helps him bond with emy and jaggedwing, and the three are kind of this middle aged father trio. like you get the kind of vibe i mean right. just terrible jokes and old stories thrown around.

these four all join the clan around the same time, and because they all feel a little left out they get to bond!! hazelspirit is a calm and careful molly who joins the clan with her kits. she tends to help around the medicine den. thistlepelt is kind of an anxious and traumatized cat who joins the clan to ensure his kits have a good, safe life (hashtag girldad), and overtime he gets to kind of heal and become happier. yellownose and oscar both just kind of stumble across the clan. yellownose is a very prickly fella who tends to complain about almost everything. oscar tends to be much quieter and calmer, and he (+thistle and hazel) often goes around to apologize about yellownose’s behavior.

because hazelspirit and thistlepelt’s kits are around the same age, the four of them tend to be glued together. blossompaw and lowpaw are both very excitable and adventurous, and tend to think up fun ideas or games, and since leopardpaw and beetlepaw are a bit quieter, they tend to go along with the former twos’ antics

the actual timeline isn’t laid out here very well, i may do that at a different time, but i wanna say just in case that skywing dies a good chunk of time before rosestar’s dementia kicks in

[elatedandexasperated]

So RWRB was a movie with some discourse...

In all honesty, the discourse has bugged me more than any issues with the film itself. I get a film adaptation not living up to personal expectations set by a book is... a response that people have, but the fact some people have been trying to convince people it's not worth watching bothers me.

Don't get me wrong, I've seen all of the love for it too and I know the antis for the film are definitely in the minority. No one can control how anyone relates or who is allowed to enjoy a piece of media, but the sheer hatred I've seen from some of the people on here for the film hurts a bit to see. The arguments seem to be no deeper than "x character was removed" , "there's these plot holes" and "it's too formulaic" that last one of which I feel was kind of the point: it's a formulaic romcom so that queer people can have a fairy tale romance story like the straight ones that get shoved down our throats from a young age by companies like Disney. McQuiston, an NB writer, has gone on record stating that a huge reason why they write is to feature queer identities and make stories that people like them would have liked to read and feel represented by when they were younger.

If this was a straight Hallmark romcom (which tbf, it basically is in terms of story structure, and I low-key love it because of that) it wouldn't have made so much as a blip on most people's radars. But because it features queer characters the threshold for scrutiny seems to have been dropped to the floor (insert "Get Low" joke here). I can get having criticisms of the film, I have a few myself, but the attempt to convince people the film is bad and to disregard it as a whole because of them ignores the positive qualities, what the film means to people in the queer community, what its success can lead to in terms of representation for underrepresented people in the community (Ace, bi, NB, trans, etc.), and an understanding of intricacies that go into adaptation.

At the end of the day, this film was competently made (and in my opinion, well made) by a gay director with an inclusive team and a deep care for both the source material and an understanding of what the film would mean for millions of viewers. It featured experiences and themes that are common to many people in the community with several very poignant messages that actually have huge metatextual implications with the film (The "forced conformity of the closet" quote sticks out in particular to me: the number of op-eds speculating Nick and Taylor's sexualities and how they've been mum about them makes me think a lot of people missed that one; also looking at you, people that forced Kit Connor out of the closet 😒)

The film is a celebration of love featuring characters that people like me and others in the community can relate to. Is it formulaic? Yes. Did they remove some characters to try and create a tighter narrative focused on the main romantic pair? Yes. Is it overly cheesy and so unrealistically sweet that it will give me diabetes? Delightfully so.

So ending on a positive note, I just want to run down some things I've loved about it:

- An mlm story with an actual happy ending that features adult main leads! (Credit to youth stories, they're important, but as an adult it's hard to relate to teenage characters sometimes)

- The charisma both TZP and NG just radiate throughout the movie

- Sarah Shahi eating the absolute SHIT out of every scene she's in (Touch her and die)

- Same for Rachel Hilson

- Uma Thurman and Stephen Fry (enough said)

- The acting overall was fantastic

- The care and work put into intimate scenes and inclusion of an intimacy coordinator

- On a personal level, I loved seeing parallels between Alex and Henry's relationship and the relationship I have with my husband. For the first time in my 30 years I actually see a little of myself in an uplifting and happy piece of media and not portrayed as a dramatic tragedy, villain, or inconsequential background character.

Tl;Dr if you didn't like the movie, that's your opinion. I'm not here to try and convince you otherwise. But please stop trying to convince people it shouldn't be watched. Regardless of your opinion, this film means a lot to a lot of people, including the author of the original book! Just let us enjoy this imperfect, but tasty cheese with our w(h)ine ❤️

[cosybunny]

Hello! I read your post-sonic prime fic "Act 1: Seashell Town" over a month ago and have been thinking about it since. I am not very good with words, but I loved it so much I wanted to try to send you a message! The way you write is truly beautiful... I love the way you paint a vivid description of scenes and locations with how you choose words. I think it is amazing! From an artist perspective, I am able to visualize easily with your descriptive words, and it really made reading the fic enjoyable! Little details and scenes like the toothbrushes, the cute cleaning robot vs Sonic, everything... I love your wholesome and realistic characterization of all the characters and their interactions! The first-aid kit scene with Shadow and Tails, the scene with Amy and Sonic going around the tree, Sonic being afraid of the water and Shadow helping him, etc. I also loved your original characters! They were so well written and fit into the plot perfectly! It really made me care about them and want to see how they will impact the next acts! Thank you for creating such a wonderful work and sharing it. It has become my all-time favorite StH fic. I am currently rereading it and am really looking forward to the next Acts!✨️

Handling this precious ask more delicately than Shadow holding the pigeon. When I say reading this made me so, so, so, so happy! The biggest goofiest smile! All the warm and fuzzies! These are the highest compliments I could ever wish for, inspiring reactions like this is everything to me honestly. I am so very glad that you wrote to me, and you are SO welcome.

Despite the time crunch towards the end, there is no part of that story that I didn't love writing. Getting to bite into that feast of character interactions and motivations that we got a glimpse of in Prime and add my own seasonings to it was such good fun. I tried to make my OCs feel like a believable part of Sonic's world. I was thinking a lot about all the memorable fillers who appeared in Sonic Underground, and what made them work. I like to think Sunny, Flip and Quinn are on their own journeys, even if they've no longer got a role to play in the story. Lune managed to thread his way into the main narrative with more impact to give, and more catalyst for plot points and Shadow's own character growth. Could've sworn I told him he was a one-off, but he's really sneaky.

I have been collecting the pieces to weave my story web for the next act. I know I'll love it just as much as the first, and I hope my readers will too.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my story!

[princess-nell]

“It was remarkable and strange how much of the season seemed to be occurring in between episodes or scenes. The worst offender of this was the storyline about Nate, whose rise from kit man to assistant coach was one of the first season’s most successful arcs, and whose descent into aggrieved villainy in Season Two was well-plotted, even if it upset many viewers. Given the empathetic messages of the series, it was obvious that Nate would return to the fold by the end of this season. But pretty much every choice on that journey was mystifying. Rather than show him gradually recognizing what an abusive person he had become, how terribly he had betrayed Ted by leaking his private medical information to the press, etc., the show seemed to view his redemption as a matter of Nate learning to love himself. And the writers’ method of doing that was a bizarre love story involving Jade, the hostess at Nate’s favorite restaurant, who had no personality and no apparent reason for wanting to go out with Nate other than taking pity on him after another woman was mean to him in front of Jade. (Nor were we ever given any reason why Nate was so hung up on Jade, given how repeatedly cold she was to him prior to that moment.) Eventually, it turned out that all Nate really needed was for his emotionally-closed-off father to acknowledge Nate’s genius, and for Nate to play the violin, and suddenly everything was OK. Nate quit his dream job as head coach of an EPL team in between episodes, with no explanation other than his discomfort at club owner Rupert trying to get Nate to cheat on Jade. Early in the season, we saw the entire Richmond squad so incensed by video footage of Nate destroying Ted’s homemade “BELIEVE” sign that they spent an entire half of football being penalized for assaulting various members of Nate’s team. Yet last week, we saw three representatives from the team — two of them, winger Colin and replacement kit man Will, among the most frequent targets of Nate’s abuse in Season Two — arrive at the restaurant with smiles on their faces to tell him the team had voted unanimously to invite him back. Even if you believe Ted’s ethos that forgiveness should not require redemption or atonement, how do you not show a scene where the team — who are in the midst of the winning streak of their lives, have been shown to be a deeply superstitious lot wary of shaking up anything that’s working, and, again, are all furious with Nate for one reason or another — gets together to debate this and vote on it? How do we skip over Nate’s actual return to the building, or the moment when he’s told that he will be — or chooses to be — Will’s assistant, rather than rejoining the coaching staff?”

This whole article, start to finish, sums up everything that had me grinding my teeth about S3. The Nate arc, however, was the worst in my eyes. I rewatched S1&2 over the last week, and I was struck by how well plotted the show was for the first two seasons. Everything was carefully set up and very well acted. Then everything just deteriorated. Nate’s entire arc was set up from the get go — you can see hints of his inner toxicity early on in Season 1. And then, they wasted all this time without showing him doing any of the work. I’m all about a good redemption arc, and I thought Beard’s speech to him was beautiful. But…Nate ends up being the one character who gets everything he wants and needs, and does nothing to earn it. The writing just wasn’t there for it. Why wasn’t he in therapy along with Roy at the end? Of all the characters in Ted Lasso, Nate needed therapy the most.

I also have to say the rewatching the whole thing reminded me of what a toxic, petty little man he was. He didn’t do any real work to work through that and deal with his major relationships, which were always with his father, Ted, and Rupert. Instead he learned to love himself through Jade’s love…and I’m sorry, she has no real personality. What do we know about her, other than she’s sardonic and supports Nate? Oh, and she’s Polish. That’s it. There was a gigantic hole in the middle of that storyline.

[kc5rings]

Alright Zoids/Arknights crossover event let’s go

The story gets set off by Closure (this works better with a playable Closure but isn’t necessary) getting a message/letter from Eunectes, who’s been back home for a bit, that she needs her mentors help with something in Acahualla. Naturally Closure goes to assist

When she arrives Closure is greeted by crowds of Acahuallans and the newly above ground Durin cheering as two small scale zoids piloted by Durin duke it out in an arena/designated area of the jungle

She meets up with Eunectes, who explains that a combined group of Durin and Acahuallan’s stumbled onto an old massive machine shaped like a beast in a mine/old temple etc. Curiosity being what it is the groups work together looking into the machine, finding logs on it detailing other such machines and more importantly, logs about what they are for.

Gladiatoral combat.

Giant animal robot fighting is a massive hit with both groups, So everyone, lead by Deculture Silvermint goes all in on making smaller scale (due to lack of resources) Zoids that Durin can pilot in contests. Eunectes called Closure I’m not to put a stop to this, but for her mentors help in making her own Zoid.

Shenanigans ensue, as you might expect, all culminating in a final showdown against Silvermint either piloting or stuck inside the ancient zoid gone berserk, because I think it’s really funny if there’s a trend of the Durin characters being the bosses of their own events every time.

Character wise it’d have Silvermint as the welfare 5/6 star Artificer and if they have the FUN writers on staff the other 2 units would be a Durin pilot melee unit and a humanoid zoid that is the result of Eunectes achieving her dream of building a talking robot with the zoids tech and giving us a 6 star Robot operator.

There could also be 6 star Arts Defender Eunectes kitted out in some pilot gear and with an S3 that involves summoning her custom zoid akin to her bringing out The Big Ugly Thing in her base unit. This would be fun but I’m still jaded about not getting monhun monsters as operators so let me have my zoid operators, I need this.

[burnclan]

i want everyone to know the blog’s original name was “mapleclam” because i misspelled it

anyways serious stuff !!

main blog — @phantasmaltrain

clangen challenge .. finally ..

currently i’m playing by the basic “kits and apprentices build up the clan” rule, but with my own twists on it! those will pop up as time comes.

common tags ::

— phantas speaks / not an ask = usually some sort of commentary from me, or answering any questions or comments!

— moon recap = standard moon event posts!

— lunar message = non moon event posts that are still story relevant!

— the leaf pile = character asks!

— cat references = reference sheets for the cats!

— the gallery = misc content of any of the characters! art, writing, memes, etc

a spreadsheet with all of the current characters, moon by moon events, and other organizational information can be found here!

i’m hoping this goes well, haven’t done an ask blog in a while :D

for now, here are some refs for the two apprentices of the clan!

[jecook]

My Hero Academia and Mutual Aid

My Hero Academia continues to fascinate me not just for its fun cast of characters and sweet action scenes, but also for the well-observed commentary on justice.

An anecdote: this morning, my father told me a story about visiting a state park by a lake where many people bring paddleboards, canoes, etc. On his way to the restroom, he ran into a board that someone had left in the hallway, which was strangely darkened so he couldn't see what he was about to run into. His leg was bleeding--not bad enough for stitches but enough that they would need some first aid. He and one of our relatives couldn't find anyone in the lakeside building, so they went to a ranger station. There, the rangers said it wasn't their job to do first aid and they had no ability to give first aid. They informed my father and our relative that the state had sold the right to the lakehouse business to a private company, therefore the park rangers were not responsible for anything there. This of course includes surfboards left in dark hallways and injuries received from them. So my dad and my relative head to the camp store, where they say that he can purchase a first aid kit or he can find a medical center, but that's all they can do. The whole time, my father is annoyed that none of these people extend any help and each claim it isn't their job to help. Meanwhile, our relative keeps defending these people, reminding my father that "well, they're rangers, not emergency medical responders" and such. In the end, my dad was far angrier with the relative for defending these people than those who refused to do anything at all to help him.

If you read MHA, I hope you can see why I find this related. I am reminded of Shigaraki Tomura's origin, wandering the streets looking haggard whilst civilians all assume someone else will help, it isn't their job, that's for the heroes.

I speak from an American perspective. American culture is obsessed with "heroes." We look to police, to EMS, to firefighters, to military service members, veterans, and during the pandemic, "essential workers." We call all these people heroes and look to heroes to help others, to fight crime. So often, it is not our job to help. Yet, more and more lately we encourage mutual aid, we want programs like STAR in Denver, we want to help each other. I think about Uraraka's scene on the wall of UA in chapter 324 and the ending line, "The story of how we all became the greatest heroes," just as the Ordinary Woman and Kota rush to Midoriya's side. We see the beginnings of civilian people just like you and me who can become "heroes."

The messages in MHA can often become muddied under the gigantic cast of characters, issues with how women are (or really, how they are not) represented, and subplots being shortchanged in favor of shonen audiences being appeased, among other things. But I love this story and I love Horikoshi for what I believe shines through: his observation of our society (both in Japan and America and I am sure elsewhere) and his vision of the future. He sees (has seen for a long time) this problem of how we build up the notion of heroes and how we ignore other human beings because it is the job of the heroes we have created, not our own responsibility as neighbors to one another. Horikoshi wants us as readers to see that we need to reach out, we need to be the ones to lend a helping hand, we need to take initiative to help others who we see in trouble. My Hero Academia is a lesson in compassion, one that aligns with how our generation already wants to change our world.

Personally, I am excited to see how this manga ends; I want to see how he envisions this change when all is said and done. Will there be "heroes" anymore? How will regular people act to help others after the events of the story are over? I think about how our world is changing here and now and how it mirrors this story and I won't lie, I hope Horikoshi can show us a bright future. Maybe we will see first responders with the aim to de-escalate and provide care. Maybe we will see volunteer groups that aid others. Or maybe we will just see regular people who see a child alone and offer them love and shelter or who see a man bleeding and offer him some disinfectant and a bandage. Whatever the case, I'll see you all at the end of this manga, whenever that might be.

[findyourrp]

Hi! I'm posting this in hopes to find some new roleplay partners (18+) specifically over on discord, I'm 19 (they/them) in a GMT+ timezone and my style of writing is third person semi-lit to novella I find myself sticking to semi-lit writing where I can write between 1 to 4 paragraphs, I am fine with matching with others lengths as well. I have about 6 to 5 years of experience within the roleplay community.

They are three things I'm looking to roleplay, which are the last of us/the last of us 2, ahs (american horror story), and ocs. With the tlou/tlou2, I'm open to ocs x cc (double) and shipping, in particular looking for those interested in writing Ellie x Dina right now. For ahs, it would be mainly ocs x cc (doubles) my love interest for that being Jimmy Darling or Kit Walker. For the last one, I am looking for a couple specific dynamics, but I would love to do a roleplay set in the 50s/60s/70s/80s era mainly and I was hoping to do some role plays set in those eras. I personally lean towards more f/f, nb/f, m/m, etc, but I am open to doing f/m as well.

With characters in the fandom roleplayers, I'm very flexible with who to play and open to many, although some I do tend to avoid, though I'm mostly open to playing anyone.

All I ask is =

•18 or over (18+)

•Okay with mature subjects and nsfw

•Be third person writer, able to write 1 to 3 paragraphs at least

•Semi-lit or above that

•Happy with ooc interactions, aka chatting, making headcanons, sharing edits, etc

•Be active or at least semi-active, along with clear communication

•Use discord

If you are interested in anything related here, please interact or message me directly!

Have a good day/night~🦋

message asker

[saltywinteradult]

Haw are you going to be for Palestine when you’re still a fan of Sophie Turner?

She’s a Zionist who hasn’t spoken out about anything. AMPLE proof of her being a horrific racist and Zionist is everywhere, and she thinks reverse racism is a thing 💀.

Her organization she runs has been completely terrible to Palestinians, Palestinian refugees have reported discrimination from her org., she’s shared several “We stand with Is*rael” posts to her story, etc.

She’s even defended Kit for his statement mocking the war between Palestine and Israel and compared it to GOT.

Well, anon, because tumblr is not activism, and because, being only a fan of Sophie insofar as I like one character she portrayed, I wasn’t aware of any of this. I don’t keep up with what she does outside of acting. Maybe I should, but I only have so much time and energy. My spoons are much better spent signing petitions, attending protests against the actions of my government and my employer, and doing my job so I can afford to donate (and also, you know, food and shelter), rather than exhaustively keeping up with the current actions and beliefs of every actor who has at some point portrayed a character I like to make sure that it’s still okay to like their work.

Please note that if what you say is true, I am not going to defend Sophie, but I need something more substantial than one anon message as evidence. You’re the one who wants me to no longer like her work, so you should have no problem providing me with some of that ample proof; I’d be more than happy to read it. If what you say is true, I will reconsider spending any money to see Sophie’s projects, which is already something I have not done once since the end of GoT. I already don’t post much about her at all. I post about Sansa Stark, a fictional character she portrayed. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I have a hard time believing that me no longer reblogging gifs of a character portrayed by a B-list actress who will likely never again be as culturally relevant as she was during GoT is gonna do much for Palestine. But what do I know.

[mistwraiths]

3 stars

A Fragile Enchantment has everything I would like but somehow, this didn't hit the mark for me. It had regency, romance, political plot, and magic. I do think that for some people they will eat this up and that's PERFECTLY FINE and I love that for them. However, I can't always turn my brain off and when I find myself disliking characters it makes it harder to enjoy.

This book didn't really dive into these big topics it brought up. Niamh is Machish (Irish) and her people have been treated terribly by the Avish (English), enough so that there's been a major walkout and protests. Niamh is suffering from an illness caused by using her magical ability lots that will make her die quicker, and it's mentioned that it happens within magical bloodlines. The royal Carmine family is nearly bankrupt and despite a throwaway line about the Parliament mostly running the country/government in the beginning, and the fact that somehow the Prince Regent Jack has kept everything quiet about it so no one not even the advisors know about it and everyone is just like Jack loves to control everything. Even Jack's and Kit's terrible childhood and Kit's alcoholism is a topic brought up. But if you think ANY of these get anything in depth other than a gloss over of we'll have to figure something out and oh yeah Kit only smokes now, prepare to be disappointed.

This makes the conclusion of this story so lame. Nothing actually gets fixed or better. Congrats Kit and Niamh are married. They're still broke and not paying servants. The Machish are still being treated terribly, what will become of the reparations and better pay and practices, who knows. The illness is still there and like, okay I appreciate the terminal illness not being magicked away and I'll touch more on this a bit later.

I do appreciate the message this book mostly pushes about being kind to yourself and gentle to yourself and allowing yourself to live and be happy even if it's selfish. You deserve that because what kind of life is that and that isn't fair. However sometimes the people that are telling Niamh, who is working SO DAMN HARD on so much work that makes her ill and die quicker, to slow down and have fun etc are the SAME DAMN PEOPLE who employed her to do massive amounts of work on a strict timeline. It just felt VERY ridiculous.

I liked all the side characters actually but I really couldn't get behind Niamh or Kit. Niamh annoyed me so much and I know it's partly because I don't enjoy extremely sensitive and emotional characters. I just felt constantly like I was being told Niamh felt this and then this and then this so strongly she started crying! Half the times I was just like that's not professional throughout the book. Also Niamh is so clumsy she trips on air and never sleeps or eats because she's so busy is just all annoying traits to me. Kit is just... I didn't fall for him. He turned red a lot.

Overall, this was cute but I didn't enjoy it much. This is my second Allison Saft I didn't super enjoy so I don't think her books are for me.

[wen-kexing-apologist]

I want to talk a bit about the happy ending we got because I personally loved it and I feel like the quibbles about having a happy ending aren't justified, mostly because the happy day we get is 24 hours only. (Please no one take this as a personal attack, you have a right to your own opinions on it).

Whereas we see an indication on the passage of time when JaeWon originally snaps out of his numbness, and while he still seems more sustainably energized in that time progression, we do get moments where he seems more withdrawn, concentrated, in thought, etc. within that little classroom edit. But the happiness that radiates off of him in Episode 10 is stemming from the first day of him and JiHyun being in a relationship, he is riding an emotional high of getting what he wants in the form of dating JiHyun.

I think it makes total sense that he would have one good day, with all these new and exciting things happening with JiHyun, and even with Yoon Won. He can be in a honeymoon phase and also be excited for his friend and that doesn't mean that he is automatically cured or that he won't have bad days in the future.

And unlike with Utsukushii Kare, where Hira was only slightly successful at comforting Kiyoi when he was upset, mostly by being angry at the situation and telling Kiyoi that he is special, without really being supportive (I'm thinking of the way in UK2 Kiyoi tells Hira "hey it's okay, I failed my first competition too" versus in UK1 where Hira is just mentally killing everyone that is poking fun at Kiyoi) we've already established from Episode 6 that JaeWon trusts JiHyun enough to reach out when he is having a hard time and that JiHyun is willing to listen, help, etc. JiHyun has consistently throughout the story been running emotional support. JiHyun is in tune to JaeWon enough to notice when something is off with him, he is comfortable enough with JaeWon to call him out on it, and cares enough about JaeWon to offer to be there for him when he is struggling. JiHyun is willing to reach out even when JaeWon is isolating himself intentionally from him, and he doesn't give up the ghost at the first sign of rejection after an obviously re-traumatizing event. These are all traits we have seen throughout the length of the show which indicates to me that they will have a pretty strong, supportive, and communicative relationship moving forward, but even when there is inevitable regression, they have some tools in their tool kits to navigate it.

Now granted, I don't have the same psychology background as @emotionallychargedtowel so this could be the wrong interpretation, but this show is also a work of fiction and therefore is using its scenes, colors, words, etc as metaphors and messages rather than striving for the most realistic outcome at all times. For me, a happy ending doesn't mean a happy future, and I always like to take air time, editing, etc in to consideration when watching these shows and understand that just because they are choosing to show these happy moments doesn't mean there aren't bad days peppered in. I also appreciate happy endings without adding the complexity of bad days in when a show is emotion/mental health/trauma heavy just as a pallet cleanser (ie Bed Friend having Episode 10 just be fluff, showing that King and Uea's relationship is going well and Uea gets a chance to be happy after having 9 episodes of assault and trauma). Especially with The Eighth Sense, Episode 10 is only one day and it ends on the question "do you think we'll make it?" because not even the characters know.

The Eighth Sense doesn't give JaeWon and JiHyun a happy ending, they give JaeWon and JiHyun a happy day, and end with an uncertain (but hopeful) future.

___

Also completely tangentially related @emotionallychargedtowel, JaeWon's therapist had mentioned he had been coming to see her since high school so he's been with her for years, which I do think helps establish why she is able to be so comfortably blunt with him here re: calling him selfish, and I think they try to establish that same comfortability with her swearing and cracking a joke at him in her first introduction.

The Eighth Sense episodes 9 and 10: All we can do is try

Wow! I think for the most part the showrunners of T8S did really well with the final two episodes. I have a few quibbles, but they managed to tie up most of the loose ends convincingly and do something worthwhile with the therapy part of the story, so I’m calling it a win.

These episodes don’t include a lot of further development of the psychological themes of the show, and for good reason. They’re too busy resolving everything that has already been brought up. But they do portray some shifts and make some statements about the characters and the larger themes they’re engaged with. Some fall a bit flat, most are good, and a few are really outstanding.

Below are the subject headings I’ll be geting into under the cut:

The final therapy scene

Being selfish

A shift for Jae Won

When it’s OK to expect “too much”

All we can do is try

Miscellaneous lingering thoughts

Tagging you again, @waitmyturtles!

Keep reading

[burning-thistles-bt]

Welcome to the Official Burning Thistles AU Blog!

What is Burning Thistles? Burning Thistles, or it’s extended/original workshop title, Burning Spotted Thistles, is a warrior cats au where Fireheart--and his siblings--are the kits of Spottedpaw/leaf and Thistleclaw. The idea was originally started by @alollinglaughingcat and then expanded and co-written with @firealder2005 to create the fanfiction Burning Thistles on ArchiveOfOurOwn.

Additionally, here is the Wiki for Burning Thistles (currently unfinished)

CONTENT/TRIGGER WARNINGS: PEDOPHILIA, grooming of minors, non-platonic/familial romantic/sexual relationships between minor(s) and adult(s), implied/referenced sexual harassment/assault/non-consensual/rape, lying/cheating, toxic/abusive relationships, family-based manipulation, general manipulation, mental health state deterioration, queerphobia/LGBTQ+phobia, internalized hatred, self-hate (please note that NONE OF THIS is SUPPORTED or intentionally GLORIFIED by us, pedophiliac relationships are WRONG - pro-shippers DNI!)

Information on Us:

@alollinglaughingcat - Call me Lolling! Any pronouns welcome, though she/her is used primarily for me by others. I also created the Genetically Accurate Warrior Cats series, and various other small projects here and there. I fandom hop quite often, so my attention often quickly shifts! My warriors blog is @leafpool-loves-ashfur , my Ao3 user is LollingCat, and my YouTube is LollingCatto!

@firealder2005 - Feel free to call me Alder, much less of a mouthful! I prefer she/her pronouns, and have an additional Warrior cats Time Travel Fix-It series on Ao3. (I also have fanfics for Star Wars and the Trials of Apollo series) My main blog is @firealder2005 , my new-ish warriors sideblog is @firehollyalder and my AO3 is FireAlder2005.

Feel free to send in questions/messages to either of us!

Tags:

#lolling art / #lolling thoughts / #lolling memes / #lolling response / #lolling rb - the content of the post (art, memes, writing, random) was by Lolling

#firealder art / #firealder thoughts / #firealder memes / #alder answer / #firealder rb - the content of the post (art, memes, writing, random) was by FireAlder

#bt memes / #bt charts / #bt polls - the memes, meme-charts and polls of Burning Thistles

#bt fanart / #bt art / #bt references - art for Burning Thistles

#character ask / #asked and answered - posts/art where characters respond to questions from fans, and the ask common tag

#bt what if / #bt mini-shot / #bt snippit / #bt excerpt - posts about how the story could’ve gone, mini one-shots/drabbles, and teasers of chapters

#bt war era / #the countdown / #pack pack kill kill - referring to specific arcs, such as the Dangerous Path book and the dog pack attack

#ft apprentices group / #the apprentices gang - first refers to the Frosted Thistles apprentices (Spottedpaw, Frostpaw, etc.) and second refers to the dog pack era apprentices (Swiftpaw through Bramblepaw)

#ship-attacks - the ship attacks of March 20th, 2023, #ear rip and #berries being the targets and #waterpoppies being mentioned

#featherships / #spottedfrost - the tags for Lolling’s personal favorite ships, the first focusing on Feathercloud’s love life, and the second being between Spottedleaf and Frostfur

#firesand & #sandfire / #copperdawn & #dawncopper / #darkcherry - ship tags for Alder’s favorite BT ships. 1st being Fireheart & Sandstorm, then Copperleaf & Dawncloud, and the last is a ship involving Cherryfur and Darkstripe!

#firefam / #firesiblings / #firefriends - groups that are relating to a) Fireheart’s direct family, b) Fireheart and his siblings, c) Fireheart and his core friend group

#bt songs / #bt ships / #bt animatic / #bt pmv / #bt incorrect quotes / #bt ages / #bt family tree / #bt timeline / #chapter 161 / #pawspeak - miscellaneous organizational tags

#btr / #btr au / #burning thistles reflamed - refers to an AU of BT made by Lolling! A mash-up of “what-if’s” that gets a little angsiter.

One-Shots/Extras - series link

#frosted thistles (Read) / #roaring rivers (Read) / #elder rush (Read) / #hunted lynx (Read) / #ripened cherries (Read - In progress) / #caramel apples (Idea) / #clouded dawn (Idea) / #bitten adder (Rough outline) / #brindled beach (Idea) / #little sparks (Read) / #bubbling bubbles (Idea/Rough outline) / #longing heart (Read)

Character Asks? Currently Closed!

[therenlover]

Therenlover’s Official Fanfic Glossary!

Hey hey hey! This is the place where you can find all my up-to-date fanfics linked nicely, read about what projects I have upcoming, and learn what requests I’m taking at the moment! Cheers!

This post is massive so, for the sake of your dash, everything is under the cut

A NOTE ABOUT REQUESTS!

I will do my best to fulfill any requests I get while my ask box/requests are open! That being said, I cannot promise every request will get done, and that if they do, they’ll be done in a timely manner. I’m currently working on a long-form project that needs a lot of time and energy to come out consistently, so unless I’m doing a writing event most of my writing juice will be focused on that. That being said, if you want something ask! The worst I can possibly do is direct you towards someone else who might be able to write what you want if I cant.

If I choose not to do your request based on personal preference (it makes me uncomfy/I don’t write for the character at that time/I don’t feel I can write what you want/etc.) I will do my best to contact you and let you know! That being said, if you think your ask got buried/forgotten, feel free to message me again and let me know, but please tell me when you message me if I should be looking for a prior request.

Characters/Fandoms I will write for currently

 💙 = I’m Currently Super Inspired To Write For This Character

Marvel/X-Men

Bucky Barnes

Loki

Peter Maximoff 💙

Pietro Maximoff

Helmut Zemo 💙

Hank McCoy

Ralph Bohner 💙

Vision

American Horror Story

Tate Langdon

Kit Walker 💙

Kyle Spencer (Pre- and Post- Death)

Jimmy Darling 💙

James Patrick March 💙

Kai Anderson

Fallout 4

Nick Valentine

Hancock

Star Wars

Poe Dameron

Armitage Hux 💙

Kylo Ren/Ben Solo

Finn

Han Solo

Assorted/Random

Diarmuid Ua Duibhne - FGO

Cu Chulainn/Cu Alter - FGO

Warren Lipka - American Animals 💙

Enjolras - Les Miserables

Grantaire - Les Miserables

Gabriel - Supernatural

Imagines - REQUESTS CLOSED

Songs From Musicals Y/N Would Sing To The Evans

Characters: Tate Langdon, Kit Walker, Kyle Spencer, Jimmy Darling, James Patrick March, Kai Anderson, Peter Maximoff

Rating: T

How The Evans (+ Quicksilver) Would React To Yoplait’s New Gushers Yogurt

Characters: Tate Langdon, Kit Walker, Kyle Spencer, Jimmy Darling, James Patrick March, Rory Monahan, Kai Anderson, Peter Maximoff

Rating: T

Would The Danny Bunch Survive A Holiday With My Family?

Characters: Laszlo Kreizler, Alex Kerner, Niki Lauda, Andrea Marowski, Ernst Schmidt, Helmut Zemo

Rating: T

Headcanons - REQUESTS CLOSED

Modern! AU Armitage Hux Boyfriend Headcanons

Zemo With A Well Dress S/O Headcanons

Zemo Getting Jealous Headcanons

Oneshots - REQUESTS CLOSED

Marvel/X-Men

Helmut Zemo

One Last Night In Madripoor

Synopsis: Baron Helmut Zemo is a lonely, wanted man looking for some fun, you’re a piss-poor bounty hunter in search of a connection before leaving your life of crime behind, and fate has brought you together at a party the likes of which has never been seen before. You only have one night left in Madripoor, so why not take a chance?

Rating: 18+

Word Count: 4200~

Still Some Catching Up To Do

Synopsis: As a member of the criminal underworld, people walk out of your life all the time. Some are killed, others kill themselves, most get caught and only a couple get out of the life unscathed, disappearing into the world never to be seen again. Very few walk back in. So when your supposedly incarcerated ex-lover, the Winter Soldier, and the Falcon waltzed through your door and made you murder your boss, needless to say, you were surprised and more than a little bit pissed.

Rating: 16+

Word Count: 6800~

Nine Years Starved

Synopsis: It had been a little over nine years since Helmut Zemo lost his family, his country, and his sanity. Nine years since his last kiss. Nine years since he felt like a human man. Finally, he was ready to start over again, but first, he had to pay his penance back where it all began; Novi Grad. That’s when, by the grace of the fates, he met you.

Rating: G

Word Count: 7000~

Daddy Dearest

Synopsis: Not everyone gets lucky enough to go from being a broke college student in New York to being the sugar baby to literal royalty, but not everyone is you. Most people would be worried about messing things up or losing him to someone else, but you knew he would never find another baby just like you. Besides, you knew exactly what to do to keep him wrapped around your little finger. He may have been the daddy, but you pulled the reins.

Rating: 18+

Word Count: 8000~

In Fleeting Touches & Airy Sighs

Part One   Part Two   Part Three   Part Four

Synopsis: As a wanted man, Helmut Zemo spends most of his time jumping from place to place in the hopes of avoiding a trip back to prison. Unfortunately, that means he can’t always be home in your arms. When he is, though, in the rare moments of calm, you’re reminded of just how worth it it’s been to wait, even if that wait was only shortened by the arrival of your enemies.

Rating: 18+

Word Count: 35,700~

Two Bodies In The Rain

Synopsis: It was raining the day you finally had to admit your feelings to Helmut. You hated to tell him the way you did, under the grey skies as your blood pooled below you, but at least you knew, in the end, he had seen the real you, even just once. That was enough.

Rating: T

Word Count: 5600~

Rest

Synopsis: Living life on the lam with your escaped super-villain lover means things rarely slow down enough for a real rest. When the exhaustion starts to take its toll on you, though, he knows exactly what to do to ease the pain. He may not be a good man, but he’s a good husband when it counts.

Rating: T

Word Count: 3200~

American Horror Story

Jimmy Darling

Red Nights In Jupiter

Synopsis: At the end of another long day, you fall into bed with Jimmy Darling. The men you served throughout the day don’t matter then, nor do the coins in the mason jar by the door, or the women scheduled to attend Jimmy’s next Tupperware party. No, in that quiet darkness it’s just you and the man you love, bone-tired and happy to be home. Who could ask for more?

Rating: 16+

Word Count: 3000~

James Patrick March

Heartsick

Synopsis: When you fall ill, James is given a forceful awakening about how he’s been neglecting your needs and what he must do to prevent harm from befalling you again.

Rating: 16+

Word Count: 3700~

In Sickness And In Health

Synopsis: Normally people don’t have their wedding and funeral on the same day, but you and James don’t quite have a normal relationship, do you? Besides, you wouldn’t wanna go any other way.

Rating: 18+

Word Count: 5500~

Fallout 4

Currently Empty

Star Wars

Currently Empty

Assorted/Random

Currently Empty

Long Form Works/Series

Young Artist!Zemo AU

Chapter One: The Boy With The Easel

Synopsis: About a month into your first semester at Novi Grad’s top university, you finally meet the strange young man that you’ve taken to calling “easel boy” in the back of a bookshop. From a distance, he always seemed cold and aloof. As you get to know him, though, you realize things aren’t always what they seem.

Rating: T

Word Count: 7000~

Till Forever Falls Apart (A Peter Maximoff/Reader Series)

Chapter One: Welcome Home

Synopsis: As if getting thrown through the multiverse, trapped in an attic (albeit a cool one), mind-controlled to manipulate his grieving sister, and subsequently dragged out of Westview “for his own safety” by the FBI wasn’t enough, Peter Maximoff has now been shipped off to New York to live with a glorified baby sitter like some tragic orphan in a comic book until they find a way to get him back home. Things are not always as they seem, though, and this change might just be for the better.

Rating: T

Word Count: 2400~

Chapter Two: The Doctor Is In

Synopsis: Peter’s first few days in his new home are mostly uneventful, so he decides it’s the perfect time to dust off his running goggles and steal some shit. The building with the massive circular stained glass window seems like a great place to start! People with buildings that lavish are usually rich and weak, so what could possibly go wrong?

Rating: T

Word Count: 2800~

Chapter Three: It’s Always Been You

Synopsis: After a month of adapting to his new universe, Peter Maximoff can confidently say that he likes his new life more than his old one. Sure, he misses home sometimes, but he’s been far too busy flirting with his new roommate to spend time crying over the things he’s lost. Everything is smooth sailing until a strange journal in his roommate’s study leaves him with more questions than he knows what to do with. Now he’s on a mission to discover who he’s really living with before she has the chance to turn against him.

Rating: T

Word Count: 8600~

Chapter Four: Before You Go

Synopsis: Peter, after days of contemplation, has realized that part of him loves Y/N no matter what she is or what she’s been through. Unfortunately, he can’t find her anywhere. When she finally returns home with the intention of leaving again, Peter realizes it’s his last chance to tell her how he really feels. Will he succeed, or will he fail to be fast enough once again?

Rating: T

Word Count: 4000~

Chapter Four And A Half: Gimme Swayze

Synopsis: Now that the issue of Y/N leaving is out of the way, and Peter has finally kissed her, he falls into the motions of learning how to love someone for the first time. It’s easier than he thought it would be.

Rating: T

Word Count; 2600~

Cakes For The Evans: A Blogging And Baking Adventure!

Kai Anderson’s Disaster Cake

Hey you! If you’ve made it this far down the list, thanks for supporting me as an author! I’ll be linking my AO3 here. I post everything there shortly before I post it here, and there are some older fics there you might enjoy along the way! It’s also easier to drop comments over there and I keep them open for non-members, so give me a shout if you liked what I wrote!

I love you all, you make me so happy, and without you support I would never be motivated to write! Cheers!

[mrs-march-ahs]

What The Evans Are Like With Kids

This post pairs nicely with savanionie blanque Sauvignon Blanc, and even nicer with my existing post, What Would Evans Call Their Kids? It’s a very old post of mine so it’s short and not very detailed, but sweet nevertheless.

This wasn’t requested but I thought it’d be a cute idea, having baby fever recently :) This is my first time writing for Pietro so feel free to tell me if you hated it and I should never write for him again, still figuring things out!

Enjoy! <3

Tate Langdon

-A big kid himself

-Finds things in common with them

-Always answers the toy phone when given

-Whenever you go to the park or beach together, he loves looking at kids play

-Might even help a kid build a sandcastle

-But also would be upset if the kid build a better sandcastle than him

-The type of person to pull faces at a baby if they’re in front of you at a queue

His kids -Always cuddling and kissing them, kind of needy -Absolutely always wanting to hold his kids’ hand -Tells them he loves them on a daily -Loves taking care of his kids, giving them baths or feeding them -Will complain to them about how stinky they are if he changes a diaper -Loves laying with his face on/against your belly when you’re pregnant -Because he’s so insecure, he’d hate for his kids to be insecure too so he tells them any chance he gets that they are incredible, unique, and can achieve anything

Kit Walker

-Holds their hands and spins them around

-Picks them up and throws them all the time

-Ruffles the kids’ hair

-If you go over to a friend’s house who has kids, he doesn’t mind if the kid wants to follow him around

-Kids overall love Kit, because he’s a big kid himself

His kids -Overall, the best dad ever -Cuddles them every night before bed -On a regular, he gets them ready for bed in pyjamas with teeth brushed, and then holds them on his lap on the sofa until they fall asleep, before carrying them to their own bed -The kids come crawl in bed with you and Kit in the mornings -Loves dancing and singing and being active with his kids -The most loving and protective dad ever if the kids are sick -Will drive or walk in the storm hail and snow to get your kids medicine if they need it, or even McDonalds to cheer them up

Franken Kyle

-Doesn’t like sharing his things

-Isn’t particularly patient either

-Not that bad at playing with kids every so often, but can’t take care of them since he’s a kid himself

-Silently sits with the kid of your friend and plays trains with them, making little choo choos together

-However, if the kid just gets up and walks away, Kyle will stay and play by himself fine

His kids -If you were to have kids with Franken Kyle, you would have to accept that Kyle wouldn’t be much of a help -Kyle in himself is a big toddler who has to be taken care of -You were especially scared of Kyle being aggressive and flip out around the child or that he would accidentally hurt them -But when you were giving birth (in the academy, because you couldn’t make it to the hospital since Kyle can’t drive and you’re in labour), Kyle was actually helpful -He may have not completely understood what was happening or why you were screaming and crying, but he knew you were in pain and he didn’t like it -He held your hand and stroked your hair through the whole labour, whether you wanted it or not -You held the baby first and Kyle sat by your side and just looked at them, intrigued but slightly confused -Overtime he warmed up to the baby and helped you whenever he could, going downstairs to get a bottle for you, picking up toys after the baby, eventually learning how to change a diaper with you or bottle feed them -If you breast feed, Kyle definitely wants a sippy sip too -They’re his boobs, he cannot understand why he can’t get a sippy sip of your milk -Eventually you sat him down very carefully and calmly, and got him to hold the baby -Once he starts holding and carrying the baby, you’ll have to pry that cuddle buddy out of Kyle’s hands

Jimmy Darling

-When there’s kids at the circus, he asks them if they’re strong enough to pull his fingers apart

-Picks them up and throws them up in the air just to see their parents be scared

-Never wants to scare or intimidate children, so he’ll squat when talking to them

-Will avoid showing his hands if he can, to make sure they don’t get scared

-Loves to show kids magic tricks

-Probably has sweets in his pocket just in case a kid comes to the circus

His kids -When you’re pregnant, even if you sneeze, Jimmy is full alert -Nervous as hell when you’re giving birth -Scared for you, the baby, and the baby’s hands -Relieved if they have normal hands -Apologises to you if they don’t, so you have to console him and tell him how much you love his hands regardless -Incredibly protective of his kids, wouldn’t let anybody make them feel inferior for anything different about them -His kids would be athletic like he was when he was a child -Would cling onto his leg and he’d walk around with them, pretending he’s looking for them and doesn’t see them -Puts them on his shoulders and runs around so they feel tall -But holds them extra tight -Makes lots of dad jokes and laughs at them, making his kids groan

James March

-Doesn’t really have a ‘baby voice’

-Occasionally looks after Holden or Scarlett, so they play card games and do more mature things together

-Uncle James has definitely taken Scarlett and Holden out trick or treating

His kids -Mine and James’ daughter is called April -No I do not take constructive criticism -I think he’d only want one child so they can be his whole world -Their designated place is on his hip -That type of stereotypical dad who doesn’t let his little girl near any boys whatsoever -Kills the boy who takes his teen daughter’s virginity -Reads with his kids a lot -Has dinner with them and talks to them about all sorts of things -Wants them to be wise and inquisitive -Their birthday parties take up the whole hotel

Edward Mott

-Utterly disgusted at children

-Doesn’t want them

-Doesn’t want them in his house

-Doesn’t want them near him or his incredible and sophisticated art

Kai Anderson

-Treats them like small people, so he will not talk to any child in a baby voice, though he will alter his voice a little bit and use words they can understand

-Prefers 4+ year olds so you can have an actual conversation with them

-He’d never sit and talk about how cute a baby is, but does find them very cute

-Think about when he quoted Tolstoy and Oz thought he said Toy Story, he exhaled and clearly found it cute

His kids -Likes watching Disney films and then talking to his kid about it, curious to know which character they liked, what they should’ve done instead etc -Like being sporty with his kids -In a lot of ways, he would treat his girls similarly to the way he’d treat his sons, because he’d want his girls to be strong and manly in a way -All play football together -When playing games, Kai would never let his kids win on purpose -Definitely teaches his kids how to play chess -Incredibly strict -Lies to his kids a lot and makes sure they think that everything that Kai says is the holy grail -Makes up stories and reasons as to why they have to do what he says - “Daddy why do I have to go to bed alreadyyy?” “Because it’s 8pm” “Sooooo” “Didn’t you know? It’s illegal for people under 15 to stay up past 8pm, let’s get you in pyjamas before the police comes” -Might even call Samuels to make his point stronger -The kids always fall asleep before 8 -Kai’s Preganant S/O Headcannons

Pietro

-Similarly to Kit, he likes kids and kids like him

-Probably because they’re both big kids

-Teaches them swear words and helps them to cause mischief

-Fun uncle obviously

His kids -He was probably a little scared about having a baby, but got more and more excited over time -Talks to the baby all the time and has lots of little nicknames for them -Wants them to walk ASAP -Once they’re not a newborn anymore, takes them everywhere with him -Very specific but, whenever he’s walking down the street with them, holds their hand as they walk on a wall -They’re his new little best friend so he wants to do everything with them -They help pack their own lunch and he gives them twinkies and other things they shouldn’t eat

--

@milly-louise  @amourtentiaa  @kitwalker02  @tatestripedsweater  @therenlover  @maria-akira         @tatesimper  @thxc0untessesgl0ve  @mossybank  @ahsxual  @mxlti-fand0m-imaginess  @mrs-march-ahs-biggest-fan  @kitwalkerangel  @kitisagoldenretrieverboy @darlingkitt  @blackbat2020

Comment or message me if you want to be added or removed from the taglist, I wont be offended! :)

[clare-with-no-i]

whenever ur ready to give us the goods 🤲🤲🤲🤲🤲🤲 pretty white smile directors cut 🤲🤲🤲🤲🤲🤲🤲🤲 xo suze

hey bestie @thequibblah <3 ty for this / sorry in advance for how long it’s going to be, I’m sure

EDIT: oh god I was right this is a novel. oh my god can i shut up ever in my entire life

The Idea

So, the original conceit of pws was really about digging into the harsh, unpleasant realities of Lily’s life at Hogwarts, and I prepared to do so by making her a little bit more grey and brusque—that’s where the beginning note comes from, actually. I wrote that before most of the story was finished. Looking at it now, I don’t think it even comes into play that much in the finished product, because I spent a lot of time considering and reconsidering what this piece might mean and what messaging I wanted to get across.

I kept coming back to this one core concept, though: if I, as a Jewish person, were reading a piece about a character experiencing anti-Semitism, would I want it to be this dark, claustrophobic trauma porn that fundamentally changes a notably good and positive character? No, as a matter of fact. I wouldn’t. It’s one of those moments where the trope/the idea didn’t really fit the character or the setting, so I ended up abandoning it; and I’m glad I did! I think this is both more of an honest portrayal of Lily—something that could easily fit in my versions of canon—and it’s more of a well-rounded account of dealing with prejudicial thinking and ostracism. Like, yeah, Lily’s situation sucks (duh); but to deny her pockets of happiness and the opportunity to feel safe and loved, and to act accordingly? Not really my game.

Also, this was supposed to be 3k words. tf. I have no self control. chronic not shutting up disease wins again ig

The Motifs

So, to get into the story itself, we see two primary themes introduced in the first section:

That Lily still feels a connection to non-magical education, and that she wants to continue to teach herself disciplines like biology (and later psychology, literature, etc). This also introduces the recurring motif of ‘things lily learns through Petunia’s textbooks.’

Predator/prey imagery, and metaphors about animals. This is the biggest one IMHO, but that might just be because it’s the original motif I based the story around. Kit / Moonpuup labelled this lily “Lioness Lily” and I absolutely love that hehe

The Blood Prejudice

One day, on the walk to Hogsmeade, a Ravenclaw girl recounts loudly the story of her father rejecting a muggle-born apprentice for his archive of European wand-makers.

Not because he’s prejudiced, she disclaims loudly, but because it wouldn’t make any sense. Muggle-borns didn’t grow up with family heirloom wands, with an appreciation for the art. How could they be expected to properly account for their history?

Fitting in the different ways through which dynamics of oppression make themselves known (like this type of gross rationalization) was really important to me throughout pws. The pervasiveness of prejudiced thinking is so often that it’s easily ‘justified’, and can be masked and reframed as harmless.

There are also two mentioned incidents of a muggle-born-owned establishment being burned down or having the glass of its windows shattered; I intentionally wanted that to be reminiscent of things like Kristallnacht and pre-Nazi Germany. That’s one thing I’m pretty consistent about—I lean into the real-world parallel of Nazism, because @ Jo if you’re going to write a fake Hitler you might as well actually invest the reader in the precipitating events

She will let them walk away with her lips sealed shut, will listen to their jibes and their slurs and their cheap jokes without doing a single thing, because it serves her better to smile with pretty white teeth and let them think that her smile grew blunt-edged, that she hadn’t spent years in the mirror sanding down sharp enamel, practicing bloody-lipped grins in the mirror.

Because she knows that it’s only prey animals who mistake themselves for predators, not the other way around.

This was one of the first things I wrote in pws. I love the (metaphorical) idea of Lily sanding down fangs in the mirror and practicing something docile and unassuming like her smile, trying to tamp down the part of herself that wants to fight back. It’s a bit brutal and a bit shocking as an image, but it felt really emotionally authentic for her in this moment. Also, the teeth and smile motif follows for the rest of the story, and it’s the basis for the title.

Kisses him and thinks, I’m no better than that scientist. I want to surround myself with people who will always scope out the threats. People who will always draw first.

Having Lily get a muggle-born boyfriend was also important to me; not so much because he’d be some sort of foil character for James, but rather because it shows a lot about 1) companionship amongst people who feel targeted, and 2) Lily’s priorities at this point. She states directly what she wants out of a relationship—someone who understands her feelings, someone who grew up experiencing the same things she does.

It’s not that she wants refuge, she just wants solidarity. This changes as she grows; as she gradually allows herself to consider the possibility that safety might be possible to some degree.

First James Appearance :) :)

The transfiguration scene was really fun. Not only because I got to introduce little bits of canon like James’s talent for Transfig and Lily’s competitiveness with academia, but also because you see their belief systems but on display in this small, microcosmic interaction: Lily making a joke about how people want her dead (coping mechanism, you might say?) and James reacts disproportionately because he’s not used to being blasé about these things; he’s still, at this point, very black-and-white on what is and isn’t acceptable.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

I loved writing this, and I loved calling back to it. Fun fact - I had the callback written first, the scene where they’re making out and James saying he wants to take care of her causes the hierarchy to move around in her head. But after I wrote that, I was like: that is such a great, concrete image, and not only is it something that Lily could learn about in a muggle textbook, but it is also so deeply connected to dynamics of privilege and their complexities. I loved that it made it possible to attack hierarchies of privilege in a multifaceted way; there are some people who have blood privilege but not economic privilege, and vice versa, and other combinations thereof. Some people have needs of safety fulfilled but not esteem, or belonging. Some people have all of them - James included.

They were born in self-actualization, never worried for a second about things like safety or belonging. They sit prettily at the top of the pyramid, soft-palmed and smiling. She knows they will never recognize the calluses on her hands; the scars and the tears from sixteen years spent climbing.

I loved these lines. I loved describing something as ‘soft-palmed,’ not only because (as the CT discord girlies know) I love hand imagery, but as well, because it calls back to this aristocratic idea of softness and atrophied muscle as symbolic of wealth; the less manual labor you had to do, the more wealthy and soft you looked.

Sirius being…Sirius

Sirius’s scene was a bit of unexpected humor. I thought a lot about how I wanted the romance between James and Lily to come about, and the main thing I concluded was that I wanted it to be sort of lackadaisical, a little nonsensical and unplanned. I wanted it introduced in moments that Lily was not expecting, AKA she had not planned for, and I wanted her not to make sense of it internally. She spends so much of this fic being intentional, and observant, and I really found it enriching to make James this thing she hadn’t seen coming, and that threw her off from her survival mode.

Plus, this scene gave me the opportunity to say:

James talks slow and easy, the master of his speech, like he owns language in its entirety. If he slips up or stutters, it’s because he wants to; to make the other person feel comfortable, to lower himself like how he shrugs his shoulders down to direct the younger students, ducks his head. A man of the people.

I mean. that’s just Him, right?

Religion and The Bathroom Scene

maybe, she thinks, some part of her has always been wired to be incompatible with the church. Maybe the space in her body where faith was supposed to be stored was filled with magic instead.

Lily’s relationship with the church and religion was super fun to play around with in this fic. She’s not disdainful about it, and she doesn’t begrudge her family their faiths, but she lacks this intrinsic sense of belonging to it; further, she feels actively rejected by it. I think it’s a feeling that a lot of people can relate to, the isolation of not believing what you think you’re supposed to believe.

But I did want to keep her connected to her family. Again, it was important for me to give her reprieve, and give the reader time to take some breaths.

Before I get into the bathroom scene, there’s a little idiosyncrasy I want to point out: Lily’s description of colors. She called leaves ‘red-yellow,’ and sunlight ‘yellow-orange,’ and the light in James’s bedroom ‘red-gold.’ This was intentional! I felt really inhabited in her narrative voice in pws, and it came to me that this is a small quirk of hers, an intentional rejection of convention—a fun little rebellion for her to partake in privately. There are definitely words in the English language that describe those colors, but I really enjoyed the idea that Lily has her own creative classifications for them, and that she can sort of play around in her head to describe things in a manner that befits her. Like, she fits in some space between her two worlds, so other things (colors included) now exist in dichotomy, as well. This was sooo tiny and inconsequential but I just loved adding it.

anyway.

I had someone in the comments point out that they enjoyed that it was girls who attacked Lily and not boys, and I was like!!! Yes!!! Women get overlooked as perpetrators of harm so often, especially women in positions of privilege like straight / cis / white women. It was important to me that this attack be committed by women, and that we don’t know their houses (Pendita Parkinson, maybe, but not the others).

She knows she’s not quick enough, and she should be collapsing and writhing until they inevitably kill her, but instead, in a way it never has before, magic explodes out of her and reverberates around the room, sending the girls sprawling and throwing their wands against the walls. She sees Pendita’s snap in half.

A few things here: first, having Lily stop an Unforgivable was something I’d planned since the beginning; yes you all guessed it, I wanted to set up the Voldemort Halloween moment! She has that power! That untapped inherent magic that, if she wants to, she can weaponize! Second: I wanted to call back here to when Lily joked with James about people wanting her wand snapped, and what that symbolism means. To snap Pendita’s wand, ostensibly do this thing that bars her from magic, felt like a good way to give Lily this unexpected agency.

Instead, Lily walks over to the row of sinks to wipe the blood from her mouth and fix a pretty smile in the mirror. In her reflection, a teenage girl wears messy red lipstick and too much blush on one cheekbone. Shaking hands brush crimson hair back and off of her shoulders. She pushes the door open with one hand, grabs her wand in the other, and makes her way back to Gryffindor Tower.

This is one of the moments where the title comes in full-force: Lily turns these injuries on her face—the blood on her lips from being punched, the redness that’s going to be a bruise from being slammed into the wall, the way her hair was pulled—into some facsimile of beauty. Blood becomes lipstick; a bruise becomes blush. We see violence and femininity, the ways they can be confused and intertwined.

Loved having her say ‘I am the rapture.’ Fuck yeah you are.

What Do You Like About Me?

This entire scene was just realization after realization. And, like, you’d think she would know already that he liked her—for fuck’s sake, Sirius told her! But in pws she is so focused on getting through the day that she just has not developed a sense for people genuinely wanting good things for her, and maybe wanting her as a result; it is so foreign that James could be in love with her that it takes him drunkenly saying you know what I like about you? To make her think, YOU LIKE ME??

“I like that you let people think you’re not dangerous,” he murmurs, and she stills. “It’s like…it’s like you’re a cat, and you let people pet you—er, sorry, this is an odd metaphor, I guess, I don’t even know what that means—” he clears his throat, “—but you’re like this cat that everyone thinks is so cute, but then you still have fangs and claws. And you know how to use them.”

having James just…See Her in this way was the big thing for me. He is not put off by how dangerous she is. He does not begrudge that she hides this danger; he's beginning to understand the necessity of it. and he likes her for it all the more.

She wants to keep talking to him. She wants to know what else he likes. She wants to tell him every little thing she likes about him, all the things that are only at this very moment forming speakable words in her mind, after seven years of silent accumulation. She wants to keep being seen like this; to show him that she sees him, too. Even if she always used to pretend to look away.

This is the first time that Lily articulates a genuine, non-survival-based want. She just wants something to have it. And what a freeing thing, right?

Also, the entire conversation is left up to her: he doesn’t say here’s what I like about you. He asks a question, and he lets her lead. God the power dynamics between them are so FUN and so HEALTHY I love Jily

Dating James and Feeling Safe

Having James get into a fistfight with Slytherins over her is soooooo not new (shoutout tmwysl, it is my Bible) but hey if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. It also is so good for serving up the idea that Lily is jarred by this new security she feels, and there’s that instinct of hers to reject it and go back to warrior mode. I think it’s also emblematic of who James is when they start dating: too quick to engage, too sure that just because he believes the right thing, it should always be acted on.

But then, flash-forward, in the next scene (four months later approx) Lily describes him as:

the exquisite peak of humanity: holds himself back when he’s angry, thinks through his every move, makes existence look effortless and facile. Mammalian instincts curbed but not scrubbed from existence.

So, you see? He’s LEARNING. OR she’s just seeing him through rose-colored glasses. Or some combination thereof.

“James,” Lily says through a kiss as she parts the sides of his button-down, “leave it. You can take my shirt off later. Just, let me—”

I wanted to engage Lily’s survival instincts with her sexuality from the get-go, so this scene was really important to me. The idea that she not only feels the need to perform femininity and harmlessness in her daily life, but then she also feels compelled to perform femininity in a sexual setting insofar as the need to sacrifice her own pleasure to focus on James, felt vital to the narrative. As I’ve come into adulthood, I’ve thought a lot about what conditioned instincts women experience during intimacy: to be smaller, to divert focus, to not be ‘difficult’ or ‘needy.’ I suppose there’s something to be said for the fact that Lily’s taking some sort of initiative here, with him, but in a later paragraph, her narration elaborates:

The first time they get to this point, Lily sat herself in his lap and curled her fingers into his hair, pressed herself down on him at every possible junction. Focused on drawing gasps and groans from his throat, reached down to place one hand on his beating heart. It was strong and fast beneath her palm. Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum. She wanted so badly to feel it jump, to know that it was because of her.

She is invested in his experience not just as a willing and enthusiastic partner, but more so as someone desperate to feel sexual and wanted; insecurity masked by overcompensation, as though this experience is another in which she’ll have to calculate and prepare. It actually takes James’s articulation that he wants to take care of her that allows her to somewhat let go of that. Hoping this doesn’t come across as a ‘boy teaches girl sex’ moment but more, like…being safe in an emotional and interpersonal sense, where you can begin to let down those barriers.

Also, I believe one of my favorite and most symbolically loaded lines:

So she tips her head back and bares her neck, expects to feel teeth. Shivers when she receives lips instead.

In pretty much all things in pws, Lily is teeth; wanting to bite his neck, smiling and imagining fangs. James is lips, softness and whispers. he has a lot of the spoken dialogue in their interactions, which I did intentionally. she bares her neck to him, this incredibly vulnerable part of herself, and he chooses a path of affection and gentleness.

The “I Love You”’s

A fan fav I did not expect:

Because wizards have always understood that magic is wonderful, but they always seem to forget the other side of the equation: that wonder, in itself, is magical.

Yeah, I’ve always been really tied to the idea that Lily refuses to be ashamed of her muggle background, and there is so much about her upbringing that she wishes would be recognized in the wizarding world. And I think that we kind of forget, reading about a world with a concrete magic system, that so much of the real world is so magical. Love is magic. Happiness is magic. Wonder, of course, is magic.

This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, but with a whimper.

The TS Elliot quote was something I’ve read before but popped up recently on The Internet, and I was like oh. ok this is amazing and fitting for the scene - how the idea of telling James she loves him is, in some way, the end of the world as she knows it; and so is letting that love in, receiving it. Also helped that I literally made her whimper. I love being the arbiter of what people do

Again, I wanted to take these really significant moments in their relationship and sort of…either not mention them at all or turn them on their heads. We never get a quoted dialogue “I love you” from Lily, but we get the moment it happens, and we get how she feels and how she processes it—which, in this version of her, felt much more important to get across.

Also, the last line: 

So she does. She does, she does, she does. 

To write something that repetitive and that short felt almost whimsical, which I really liked, as though the narration itself is sort of giggling.  It’s almost childlike; and I found that to be a real comfort—that she’s healing her inner child here, letting those giddy moments arise and giving credence to them.  It’s like—squee! she does love him! she does she does she does!

Final Section: Harry

When I first wrote this scene, it went in a different direction. Lily was not as fond of James’s “no fangs” comment, and she was sort of looking to Harry as her one living relative who might get where she’s coming from. But then, as the story evolved, I completely reclassified how I think she would feel about the interaction: not resentful of James, but glad that their son will be raised in a household that is so steeped in goodness, that has both survival and leisure as normal.

I wrote the ending lines pretty much write after I wrote the beginning - which, I think, is pretty obvious, given the number of parallels between them. I was really worried that people would be freaked out by Lily mentally encouraging Harry to engage in violence, but as I refined more aspects, it felt so fitting and undeniable: she will teach him how to survive. He will have to learn, because people want him dead just like they wanted her dead, if not more.

Other Stuff

I said in the notes of the story, and I still believe it, that this is first and foremost a story about safety. But even past that, it’s about what safety might mean for a person throughout their life; does it mean freedom from harm? Does it mean intimacy without embarrassment? Does it mean belonging to someone, have someone belong to you in turn? That’s sort of what I was thinking about as I wrote.

An unspoken theme here is the ‘fight or flight’ instinct; but, as I have learned, it’s actually fight, flight, freeze, submit, attach. You see Lily do all of those in pws. She fights, she runs away, she freezes, she submits, and she attaches.

I enjoyed writing pws so much! I love Lily so much and am so protective of her as a character, so to really nestle into the hardships of her life was tough but ultimately rewarding.

YEAH that’s about it, love u thank u mwah