#let me write her more thanks

[anonymocha]

Bluepoch gave us the gift of barely-subtext tragic sapphic-centric media do NOT throw that away.

Context regarding PJSK and Undertale under cut.

Project Sekai cast is dominated by female characters but mlm is more popular, meanwhile Undertale has canon wlw rep and oh my god they’re at the bottom. I have nothing against these fandoms or media (I’m literally currently/was in them) but yeah. I just HOPE r99 doesn’t end up in a similar state.

[kaisollisto]

(Based off of the reality of having a metal ring in your back as a constant reminder of your fate and how that affects you as a person set in the Switzerland arc)

“Does it hurt?” 

Ava’s pressed face down into the pillow sleep curling around her limbs. She hums, she can’t remember what she says, she’s exhausted. Her arms are tangled beneath her pillow. She holds her fingers tightly between each other, her bones ache from the pressure but her hands no longer shake. Ava hasn’t experienced this before, a fear that haunts her at night. (She finds she cannot stop dreaming about dying. It’s stifling in the cover of night trying to figure out where she is.) 

She slowly opens her eyes and squints in the darkness. Beatrice is facing her a furrow in her brow that Ava knows she’s doing unconsciously. Ava’s lip quirks a smidgen, Beatrice looks funny. It’s a bit silly to her, Beatrice no doubt working out a solution to an unknown problem that Ava has yet to see in the middle of the night. In her sleepy state she wants to laugh at the imaginary cogs churning in Beatrice’s head. 

Beatrice scooches closer and Ava panics, her skin can taste the dust of Bea’s forearm. She hoists herself up on her elbows, turning to face Beatrice. “Wha?” Ava’s shaking off bits of sleep from her mouth when Beatrice repeats herself. 

“Does the Halo hurt?” 

She doesn’t know if she wants to answer that. Ava peers over Beatrice squinting at the harsh light of the digital clock on Beatrice’s side. Ava loves it, it reminds her of the early 2000’s and the aesthetic of waking up to an alarm to go somewhere. The clock blinks an innocent 1:43 Am, and Ava debates on letting her head thump back down. 

She turns her body on her side, she can feel the halo shifting in her back and it makes her want to throw up. The sides of the halo press against her shoulder blades and Ava resists the urge to yank it out. She grits her teeth and settles ignoring the skin of her back pulling tight to accommodate for the ring. Beatrice is still expecting an answer and Ava can’t lie to her, she pulls the covers of the sheet up to her chest hoping to bide more time for an answer. 

"Everything hurts Bea," Ava smiles, "getting my ass handed to me is hard work."

Beatrice frowns displeased but looks at her through her lashes, it's unguarded, the stress and worries of the world stay out of their room in the dead of night. Her lashes are so pretty and Ava wants to curse the soft glow of the moon. There’s just enough moonlight to illuminate her eyes but overshadow her freckles. Ava swallows down the taste of defeat, she can’t win, she thinks. 

Her gaze is soft, Beatrice is looking at her and it’s different yet the same. The same feeling in her chest constricting her lungs, the same soft gaze of Beatrice. Beatrice who likes what she sees in Ava when Ava can barely see where she begins. She doesn’t like to dwell on it, the truth of the matter being what belongs to Ava.

If she closes her eyes she can pretend just a little longer. She can give herself the hope of the future and what comes after all this. She can put down the fighting and the artifact and live. Ava doesn't want to think about it anymore, at least not tonight when Beatrice is here with her. 

Beatrice is soft. She knows it from hours and hours of training. She's felt it when Beatrice corrects her form, in the way she talks. She speaks from a place of care like she has turned the harsh words in her brain over and over to soften the syllables spoken to Ava. And Ava doesn't linger on it, the meaning behind it, (Ava didn't think she'd make it this far, finding a person who cares quite like Bea does.)

And Ava's got it bad, she knows she's fucked because Beatrice doesn’t say anything about her language and Ava can't not tell her the truth. She looks down, her hand fiddling with the bed sheet underneath them. 

"It doesn't hurt," if she thinks about it she can feel the fibers of the cotton between the pads of her fingers. "But it's very uncomfortable." She doesn't want to find the response in Beatrice's eyes, content to hear it from her voice. The soft British lilting accent that holds her just as soft as a touch. 

She waits, she can picture Bea’s mannerisms with her eyes closed but maybe she should check just to be sure. Ava peers up at Beatrice and she’s suddenly closer. Her eyes really are pretty, there’s a depth to them that Ava wants to spend an ungodly amount of time studying.

“Can I help?”

[mcytegg]

Roshambogames Teammate tierlist 👍

its basically just my incredibly biased personal opinion on who i think ro would work well w in a team. (mapicc gets his own tier bc he is mapicc.)

[buck-up-buck]

7x09 is titled "Unfinished Business" ....

Tell me that is not a revenge plot against Bobby. TELL ME. You can't. If I was not convinced before, I AM NOW.

hErE mE oUt.

I'm not saying they are going to burn down Buck's loft, I AM NOT... BUT, imagine Bobby is dropping a patient off at the hospital with Hen and Chim (I know this hardly ever happens but roll with me guys), and our friend, the Burn Unit Nurse, sees him, and is like...

"Bobby?" BECAUSE, he recognises him, from all those years ago in Minnesota. He lived in Bobby's apartment complex, they were somewhat neighbours, and he saw Bobby go into that vacant apartment that night (the night we do not DARE talk about), on his way to work, and was working a night shift at the hospital when suddenly, they get an influx of patients with burns and smoke inhalation from an apartment fire downtown, and he hears in passing from a nurse the address, and his heart sinks because no his fiance was at home asleep at that address and he hears from someone a few weeks later that the fire started in a vacant room due to an electrical issue with a space heater and HE JUST KNOWS.

And Bobby turns around to face him and is like "Sorry, do I know you?" Because Bobby was going through it back then, he doesn't remember this guy, and the guy is like, "Sorry, no, I was mistaken." And he walks away leaving Bobby all like huh.

Then the episode ends with the truck pulling into the firehouse and the camera pans out and we see BURN UNIT NURSE GUY STOOD ACROSS THE ROAD STARING UP AT THE FIREHOUSE BECAUSE DUN DUN DUN- He has some Unfinished Business to attend to.

If this so happens to lead to the burning down of Buck's loft because this guy does his research and he does some stalking and he sees a connection that Bobby has with Buck that he doesn't seem to share with the other members of the team, then well, ya'll didn't see it here first but I fucking called it if so, because you're telling me that is not a CRAZY storyline right there.

BUT, even if not, even if we do not get our beloved loft burning down scene that we have been writing and praying for on Fanfiction for years, you cannot tell me that there is not going to be some kind of dark revenge plot going on in the last four episodes. This nurse is about to cause some HAVOC I CAN SENSE IT. MY SPIDEY SENSES ARE TINGLING GUYS.

Anyway, @whollyjoly and @thetangycheesemanwithaplan had the absolute joy of hearing this from a very sleep-deprived me last week and now that the episode titles have been released, Buck's loft burning down and Burn Unit Nurses revenge plot is going to be my new personality trait. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU.

[kanerallels]

bestie!! Can you tell me about your book, Land of Tales? I may have just stalked the tag for a solid forty minutes and I’m dying to know more (I LOVE me some good fairytale retellings)

BESTIE I LOVE YOU FOR SENDING ME THIS ASK I'm so so honored?? Thank you so much!! (also same we love fairy tale retellings they're amazing)

OKAY SO! I'm gonna give you a brief overview of the book in case you didn't see what it's about, then I'll do some fun facts because I deserve it as a treat and I'm hyperfixating on my own book series right now (and also Valiant. Minor detail. LET'S MOVE ON)

The main plot: My girl Rebecca Wood lives on Earth, but never knew her parents. She discovers at the beginning of the book that she, and the family she never knew, is from the fairy tale world, and so she goes there with the help of this socially awkward cinnamon roll, Liam. We love Liam, and we feel bad about the amount of Horrors I put him through, including but not limited to social interactions and torture

The rest of the book is basically Rebecca and Liam's travels through Avena (fairy tale world) meeting fairy tale characters and evading the evil Empress Goldilocks (who has magic plants and fairy tale princesses for assassins). And there are more books. Or there will be. Four overall in the main series, two prequels, umm... *pauses to count* okay yeah there are a lot of stories post canon. And I've already written a handful of short stories for fun and profit!

And now it's fun facts about some of the characters time:

Cinderella is, as mentioned, an assassin! She has fabulous fashion taste, glass shoes that can morph into any shoe type she wants, and is incredibly sadistic. Her husband Gavin is what would happen if Jean-Ralphio Saperstein, Schimdt from New Girl, and Oscar from The Rookie were fused into one incredibly vain, lazy person who wore a lot of capes

Jack from Jack and the Beanstalk is a pirate (occasionally of the sky). He's married to a future seer who basically tricked him into taking her hostage the first time they met, and has two kids. They are utter gremlins and we love them

Alec and Risha, who I've been talking about lately, are from Camelot. Risha's dad is Sir Gareth, aka Gawain's cool brother. In my series, the people of Camelot have Australian accents because why not?

OH MY GOSH I JUST THOUGHT OF A CHARACTER I HAVEN'T TALKED ABOUT ON HERE okay his name is Bob. It's short for uhhhhhhhhhhhh I'm gonna be straight with y'all I don't remember his full name. It's really long. But he's the Magic Mirror from Snow White! He's a cursed prince who likes shipping his best friend with her love interest, and boba tea (if it exists in this universe. I shall ponder this) and he's just a little chaos gremlin and I would die for him

Somehow, every single ship in this series is enemies to lovers (except Alec and Risha, slow burn friends to idiots in love my beloved) and it's really funny to me. They're all different flavors of enemies to lovers, too. We've got "coworkers who annoy the crap out of each other to lovers", "I tried to kill your friends that one time and am involved in the organization that killed your brother but now we're working together and technically I'm engaged but it's a engagement of convenience and we're connecting to lovers", and one of my personal favorites, "you forced me to take you hostage that one time and now I'm stuck with you which is really annoying to lovers". There are, believe it or not, others

One more fun fact for the road: I have a book planned that's set after the series, and it's a combination of no less than three fairy tales at once. Possibly more, for all I know

Oh, and actually last of all! The first book in the series, which I shall not reveal the title of just yet because DRAMA, is finished! All polished up and shiny, and I'm currently looking into publishing options and cover artists! (also my girl a.spice is doing illustrations I can't wait for you guys to see them they're incredible)

[cairavende]

Worm Arc 15 interludes thoughts

Carol interlude:

Holy shit you really were just a fucking TERRIBLE mother!

Like I get it, you had lots of horrible childhood trauma. And you didn't want to adopt Amy and let yourself get bullied into it by your sister. But that doesn't give you an excuse for how you treated both your kids.

Got to see another trigger event!! Fuck yes. Give me more. I want to see more details on those higher dimensional beings.

Fucking hell seeing Marquis's powers in play is pretty crazy. Dangerous boy.

Carol was just going to full blown stab right through that closet door without even looking inside! She almost killed a child! God damn.

“No.  He’s just my daddy.  Reads me bedtime stories, makes me dinner, and tells me jokes.  I love him more than anything else in the world.  You can’t take him away from me.  You can’t!” Fucking ooof that's a line.

No seriously though this can't be the first time there has been a young child of a cape that needed to be adopted because their parent was arrested or killed. Is there really no system in place for this? Cause Amy should not be going with Carol.

Just the way through most of the present sections of the interlude that Carol thinks about her daughter and Amy. Not her daughters. And this was before she knew anything about what Amy had done. Terrible mother.

HOLY SHIT AMY OH MY GOD YOU MADE IT EVEN WORSE! And I thought flesh coffin Victoria was bad! FUCK!

Vic is going to need lots of therapy.

Fucking Carol basically deciding Amy is her daughter now only because she doesn't want to think about Victoria being her daughter. Damn. Bad mother.

And Amy is in the birdcage (Hellfire playing in my head the entire damn time I'm reading this part). I'd be rather terrified to see what she becomes except no one ever gets out of the birdcage so obviously there is no worries. She is never going to be an issues. (I shouldn't need the /s but just to be safe.)

Brian interlude:

Not much to say here, most of my thoughts on this relationship was said in my last post.

I do always love seeing Taylor from the PoV of someone else. Just shows how fucking badass she is. And kinda terrifying.

"She conveyed an eerie kind of confidence that he knew she didn’t have at her core." This is just incorrect bud. When she isn't thinking about how she is portraying herself she conveys the confidence she does have at her core. The stuff she hides from herself.

Alexandria interlude:

DATES! DATA! LORE! AHHHHHHH!!!!

Date of first Endbringer attack!!!!! Strong estimation of the number of capes in August 1986! Knowledge that Cauldron was working in 1986! Their "success" rate at the time that I can compare to now! (Success in quotes cause I don't personally think tentacles is a failure. I want to meet tentacle lady.)

Obviously I'm not a big fan of any of the Cauldron people on the surface. But I think I like Contessa within those boundaries. I technically have no idea what she can do but I'm almost positive she is some type of precog. And I kind of ship her and Alexandria.

Behemoth is fucking scary. Just light people on fire from the inside, shoot lightning. Full energy manipulation. Damn.

Alexandria is the head of the PRT! Damn! (I assume at least.)

I want to know more about the Terminus project!

And Coil is a product of Cauldron! But he doesn't know it (supposedly). Damn. They list him as an alternate to the Protectorate which is very interesting. I'm super curious what Cauldron's goal with the Protectorate was and how Coil can do the same.

Fucking Alexandria just going and grabbing people to be experimented on and it's "ok" cause they were dying. Holy shit! She even manages to make the comparison to her chemo treatment and still does it! Fuck lady. You can justify anything.

Triumph interlude:

See? Triumph is fine! So Skitter didn't do anything wrong.

Triumph is Cauldron created too. Cause he was only good enough at baseball for the minor league but not the majors. God damn fucking privileged ass rich white boy. And he describes it as a traumatic thing! God. At least later he does kinda call out that he got stuff from having a rich dad with connections.

Assault seems to be doing great! Sure was a good idea to let him join the Protectorate just cause he wanted to be a creep to this one girl. Turns out when that girl is gone he doesn't have any motivations to be a "good guy". Great decision Legend.

Robot daughter! Good to see you again! And you built yourself a bio body! Or a head at least. Still, fun!

AAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Defiant.

Definitely isn't Polearm McGee! Nope! Absolutely a different person. That also likes really long pointy sticks.

I am glad Frank Miller's Armsmaster was able to remove the restrictions on robot daughters code. She deserves freedom. Pretty much served his purpose now and she basically just keeps him around to humor him. "Oh yes I need Defiant to help me, even though I built his suit and could just control it directly myself."

Seven Dragon suits in Brockton Bay huh? I'm sure that won't result in anything next arc. What with Dragon specifically on the lookout for Taylor and Taylor planning on going with her dad to the town hall on the election.

Triumph gives in to the weight of not speaking up about Defiant being Armsmaster but then he gets mad at Prism for not speaking up! My dude! You didn't speak up, you can't be mad at her for the same thing!

Fucking LOVED the ending of this interlude, and thus this arc, though. Absolutely perfect. Just with the inherent comparison of Defiant to Mannequin, especially considering Colin called Mannequin a "monster" in his interlude and said "I'm nothing like you!" And then Triumph thinking how he could see the reason for every step Colin made and could see himself justifying each one. And the previous chapter had Taylor dealing with how far she had let herself go. All that and then ending this chapter with Triumph staring at the bodies of Crawler and Mannequin (finally confirmed dead) and the line "Maybe it was to find some clue, some sign he could watch out for, that would let him identify the monsters from the men."

Just fucking. So good. I think it's my favorite quotable arc ending so far. I might like Arc 11's ending more (it's close) but not in quotable way. "All lies" at the end of Arc 14 is a close second, but I like this one more.

[dollypopup]

Tired: Colin teaches Penelope how to fuck Wired: Colin teaches Penelope how to flirt Inspired: Colin teaches Penelope how to fIGHT

[tojiscrack]

as a jobless tumblr user i’m glad this is my only job

🫡 (toge calling out y/n is my favorite part, hope he does it again for the two seconds he exists)

personally i think it’s a very good occupation to have (motivating me to write). i like seeing the end results for myself and you make a lottt of people happy with the writing i end up doing. it’s a shame employers don’t think this is relevant 😐

(unfortunately toge does not mention it and neither does y/n but they 100% will talk about it in future chapters since megumi is a menace and loves using it to gag his best friend every once in a while when she steps out of line)

[inkykeiji]

>.<

[joannes-journal]

=+=+=+=+=

I was going through one of Jo's old journals while settling down at our new place. It's this beautiful cabin out in... well...a forest. Bifrons was a sweetheart and helped us move in. He even sat down and colored with the kids for a bit and told them about the local plants.

Jo said before that she couldn't get photos of DISC0RD without the camera distorting. Her solution? Draw the beast. The journal was wedged between a copy of Stephen King's IT (the book) and an empty journal.

=+=+=+=+=

[krikeymate]

Scream 7 opening concept:

It's late, the scene is a police station. It's pretty empty except for a couple of old and crotchety desk jockeys. A handcuffed Tara is being walked into a cell. Her hands are cuffed in front of her and she's a little beat up, and scowling. The cop tells her that her sister is on her way, and not to look at him like that, if she didn't want to be here then she shouldn't have assaulted an officer. She slouches down on a bench with a huff, and the cop leaves. There's some drunk who flirts with her from the other side of the cell - what's a girl like you doing in a place like this, and other such things - he's handcuffed to a bench.

The lights go out.

The drunk makes some comment about it, but Tara's alert, it sets her anxiety off. One of the cops heads over to a breaker box and fixes the lights, mumbling about shitty funding. He goes back into the office to find his partner missing. He looks around a bit, calling for him, before finding him dead under a desk, he sees nobody else around. He runs to the cells to check they're still locked, and Ghostface appears behind him, stabbing him in the neck.

"Hello, Tara. What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?"

Tara's eyes flick between the Ghostface and the drunk, who is visibly confused and upset about what is happening.

Meanwhile, Sam, irritated, walks into the police station and finds the receptionist is conked out at her computer. She puts a hand on her shoulder after she doesn't respond, and she rolls over dead.

Back to the cells, Ghostface bends down to take the cell keys from the cops body and begins to unlock the cell. Tara has stood up and backed away as far as she can. She eyes the door as Ghostface walks in, wondering if she can get past them. She tries, and fails. Ghostface slams her head into the bars, dazing her. "This isn't the place for you Tara, but I know where you belong." The Ghostface grabs her, one hand on her shoulder, the other grabs her by the hair, and marches her out of the cell and back into the office room.

They find Sam holding a gun in their direction, she took it from one of the dead cops.

"Tara, you ok?" "Well, I haven't been stabbed yet, so pretty good I guess." "Great, now fucking let go of my sister. This won't end well for you."

Ghostface releases Tara's shoulder to hold a knife to her throat instead. "Are you going to shoot me Samantha? Have you been practising your aim?" Ghostface moves Tara more in front of them, using her as a shield. "I hope so, you wouldn't want to accidentally hit Tara now, would you?"

Sam falters, the gun lowering slightly. Tara tries to struggle, but the grip on her hair is strong and they press the knife harder to her neck. "Ah ah, behave."

Ghostface starts to move forward, Sam stepping back. They pivot around the room, until their positions have been reversed. Ghostface goes to step out the room when a shot rings out and the knife goes flying. Ghostface's been shot from behind, it's Kirby.

The shock has them loosening their hold on Tara, and she throws herself forward at her sister, who grabs her and lifts the gun up again. Sam presses Tara's head against her and covers her free ear with her hand before taking a couple shots at Ghostface, while Kirby does the same from behind.

Ghostface dies, and when they unmask them... they have no idea who this person is... or what they wanted. Well, they search him and find several photographs of Tara. Guess they do know what he wanted afterall.

[chikoyama]

one of us is going to have to be bait. / i guess you know who satoru expects to be bait LMAO

The Devil in Me Prompts | Accepting

… Huh? Why? Why was Satoru looking at her strangely like that? Silence rolled over them, figurative crickets chirping quietly in the background as the younger girl took a moment to process it — his words, the inflection in his tone accompanied by a gaze that seemed to emanate a certain kind of expectancy from her.

Five long seconds it took the first-year student before it finally dawned on her what her senior suggested they do. Then, her eyes widened with realisation. “Me?!” Chiyori nearly cried out in protest, but managed to, last second, lower her voice enough to keep their hiding — they were crouched down behind an arbitrary bush — undetected by the group of Kyoto students searching for them.

With a silent but steadfast jolt of her body, Chiyori turned to face him. She was prepared to stand her ground in case he were to try coax her into it. Was Satoru really expecting her to willingly volunteer as bait? N-no way would she do that! Not with her current position in this goodwill event! That would simply be too risky, and Chiyori wasn’t going to put the few points she’d managed to scrape together all on the line just for that, especially not in the hands of her brash senior!

Sure, they needed someone to distract the Kyoto students, but… Chiyori turned away, jaw clenching… but if Satoru could manage to seize their flag and dash back to their own territory with it, then they would be declared as winners of this game. He was, after all, stronger and faster than her. Plus, she’d be able to secure her current spot on the scoreboard with some extra points to her name. Well, given that she could manage to survive long enough to not get caught and eliminated.

That would be a solid plan, wouldn’t it? There was a long pause as Chiyori considered. Though, she didn’t dare to turn her gaze back to Satoru — she could sense his intense stare on her. In silent frustration, she drove her nails into her palms. Eeeuuugh! She was going to be a pushover again now, wasn’t she? "F-fine!" She surrendered rather sheepishly before he could begin laying out any of his arguments to her.

[illogicalghost]

.

[kakusu-shipping]

I'm not very good at the classic Moe Anime Girl look but I did my best!

Darcy is @popdearest's Scarlet/Violet Self Insert that's shipped with Jacq, so I thought it'd be fun if she was friends with my SV Teacher Polycule self insert! He's kind of a smug little shit, but he's a good friend. Probably. He never hangs around anyone his own age so who knows actually kfgjkfd

[ambersky0319]

I'm gonna bash somebody's head into a wall

[lunaetis]

@apocryphis asked :

vehicled races is not exactly something the scribe is all too familiar with, but there are two things he has already concluded from his observations. firstly, those flying vehicles go dangerously fast. secondly, eden... well. something about the standard equipment of a pilot looks inexplicably, ridiculously good on her. "looking like a professional already." he teases, without making much effort to hide the fact that he cannot quite take his eyes off her as he cradles her face between his hands. "do me a favour, try not to run into a wall. run the others into the walls." and al-haitham to lean and steal one kiss from his racer - for good luck.

unprompted. || always accepting

─「エデン」─  it was new. this feeling, the RUSH of adrenaline when you were behind the controls. eden wondered if this was what the pilots upon xianzhou luofu felt when they were flying the starskiffs across the vast sky. the SPEED these spacecraft could achieve was much more than one could imagine. she didn't know what she was expecting when she signed up. and it didn't take her long to understand the MECHANICS and the system. being upon the astral express and traveling from world to world was entirely different from actually controlling the spacecraft movement with her own fingertips.

                there was a rush, a sense of danger, the risk, and the THRILL as she watched her own craft ripped through the sky, hearing the whipping of the non-existent wind within the SPACE itself. her competitiveness was flaring, too. she wanted to go faster, higher.

                as she geared up in preparation for the NEXT RACE, the familiar figure of someone immediately caught her attention. golden hues instinctively softened at the sight of him, expression mellowed as a smile stretched across her face while her feet closed the distance between them. auric met rustic emerald. something about the way his eyes followed her made her HEART race, as well as a hint of pride to well up deep from within. she couldn't explain it. to know that he was looking at her brought a sense of calmness and delight. a sense of joy bubbling up to the surface.

                " can't be looking less than my best if you're looking my way. " cheeky, but nothing less than the truth. the TRAILBLAZER didn't wear any other outfit than her standard one all that often. it was a nice change of pace. and the fact that her beloved approved of it ? that was a nice little bonus if anything. his advice earned a quiet LAUGH from the trailblazing racer. run the others into the walls, he said.

                " don't let mister welt hear you say that. he'd accuse you of being an enabler for my chaotic ways. " her head tilted slightly as the words left her lips, head craning to accept the soft kiss placed to her lips while her gloved digits curled over his hand that was on her cheek a little tighter. a kiss to seal her victory, she felt. this was all the encouragement she needed. free hand placed over his chest, tugging at his clothes a little to prolong the kiss. could you blame her for not wanting it to end too soon ? if it weren't for the announcement on the sound system for the racers to get into position, she wouldn't have pulled back.

                their lips finally parted, and she finally took a step back. there was a renewed gleam in those AMBER HUES of hers. a sense of determination. eden was never the type who was hungry for recognition, however, she was someone who took pride in being worthy of him.

                " won't you give me another kiss when i win ? " not if. when. she can't lose. she wouldn't. not when he is watching.

                " keep your eyes on me — "

                " — i'll bring you that victory, altair. "