#like I understand that they couldn't do every line from the book for obvious reasons but god I love Mia Farrow's voice acting in the movie

[vampiredraws]

reading The Last Unicorn and I need y'all to know I'd give up my major organs to hear Mia Farrow say some of these lines likenjq

[malnivia]

My contribution to the challenge! Enjoy

(Warning: some angst, a couple swears)

***

Cleaning the shelves. Dusting the books. Rereading the same story all over, again and again until you are finally determined worthy of another less repetitive task.

"Well, that was the last of me," he murmured and got up from his chair.

He could not handle anymore of this crap. Not today, at least not right now. The headache was getting worse and the more he read, the more letters seemed to be more like blurry lines with no pattern in sight.

It was time for him to run.

He laughed nervously when leaving the room. It was that easy. Because they never even were here to keep an eye out for their tasks getting completed. They never had to – he was a perfect student and apprentice and every other random rank he had been given in order to establish the givers as the good ones. Because he would never leave that dark dusty room to wander off to other endeavors. He was taught not to from a young age.

Worried, but determined, a boy with black hair and light-blue eyes hastened to the key chamber to outrun the reasonable thoughts in his head, telling him to go back.

The creaky door announced itself to all of the library halls. Behind it there were carefully placed artifacts in form of keys, hidden from the eyes of the gullible and common outlanders.

Not from the perfect apprentice they aren't, that's for sure

"Which one should I take?" the guy from before put his thumb on his chin and scratched it in a very asshole-y way, as if he was proving some kind of point to the non-existing audience. The point being "No, you cannot understand me, I am simply more intelligent and literate than all of you and your family combined."

Anyway, his gaze has fallen onto the easiest key there is – the Heroine Key. He was never given that one for reasons, obvious to Ex Libris, yet unknown to him. Well, he never really yearned for it since the experience it offers is truly horrendous. After all, what heroines do most of the time is fall in love and spend time with the fictional princes – who in their right mind would want to do that? But this time it was not about the story rather than the simple concept of walking around, doing nothing – something he could never afford.

Finally, he grabbed the key and turned his head to the closest shelf there. "Snow White" is the first one he saw and with no room for anxious thoughts and doubts, he puts the key in the book and vanishes.

***

Once upon a time... A dude falls from the sky.

He appears then in a castle, surrounded by beautiful and high walls, in a room that looks like princesses' chambers. But the boy doesn't spare a single glance – he is truly fed up with the fairytale settings and, having visited so many stories, has lost the ability to enjoy these fantasy surroundings.

Although something does catch his eye... A weird colorful outline coming from his clothes which were supposed to be dark and stylish.

"What the-" he uttered with a hint of hate and genuine disgust as he looked into the mirror nearby and realised what he was wearing – a beautiful dress with a skirt of a golden color, with navy blue puffy sleeves and some red gems around it. He also notices a red short bow in his hair.

Truly, a horror.

"What does it think it's doing?" he referred to the key which was the creator of this outfit. The keys were rarely talked to and if they were, it was not to ask them for a new fashion choice, that's why the guy was so weirded out.

And when you think the situation couldn't get worse – he wasn't even able to punish it (with words). Taking artifacts off of their keychains was strictly forbidden without supervision to ensure no slip-ups and runaways.

The bottom line being, all the boy could do was complain about this situation under his nose.

After 5 minutes of very inappropriate words, he finally let it go and went on on his endeavors, his voice now muttering the plot of the book like some sort of incastation that would make the real world problems vanish away from his brain:

"Once upon a time, there lived a princess named Snow White. Snow White was very beautiful" he rambled while passing through the corridors. "Her skin was as white as snow, her hair as black as the ebony wood and her lips were as red as a red, red rose."

Who even has the lips of a double red rose? Clearly, the princess applied some lipstick before starting the story. "Now now, that's just cheating" a boy thought while stepping out of the castle. "Really, this is supposed to be medieval with no make-up business in sight. Me, I would prefer if my lips were compared to the actual color they are" he considered while gracefully stepping through the garden.

"Excuse me, your Highness!" a voice echoed behind him and he turned to see a local huntsman getting closer. "Princess, would you like to go on a walk in the forest with me?"

"Ah, the part where I get left behind" princess pondered.

"I would love to accept your proposal, sir" he stated instead since he was taught better than to mess with the story's flow of events.

And so they went on a walk. It wasn't really a two-person walk since Snow White has long forgotten how to relax and talk to people his social status and could only reminisce on the plot carved into his mind. He put his hands behind him and didn't pay attention to the character near him until the man cried:

"Princess, I... I have to tell you something. I believe I forgot the... the task I was given by her Majesty. I am going to have leave you."

"What? Aren't you gonna do some work and show me a place to hide from my stepmother?" the princess was very confused as to why is the story different from what he has read.

"E-excuse me, miss. But, you should stay in the forest. It's not safe at the palace right now." the huntsman mumbled with clearly no idea of a good excuse to leave.

The princess couldn't believe his ears. To think that the least this measly character would do is follow the story exactly and yet he doesn't. Snow White felt pissed and very annoyed.

"Ugh, whatever. I am in no need of my mother's subject who can't even do a casual job of killing me..." he said, whispering the last words to escape the leaving man's attention. He watched him go and after he was left alone, he realised... how quiet it actually was.

Is anyone doing their job around here? The huntsman ain't unaliving little girls and now the birds are not singing and helping out the princess. Well, guess what? Today is the opposite day. So, our heroine is going to seat right here and not move for a single inch.

...

Why would it matter anyway... If he went looking for the dwarves' hut, he would have to clean it – basically, more work for the errand boy.

He sat down by the tree in search of some comfort. The headache could not be erased by the magic of Ex Libris, but at least it wasn't getting worse – more like frozen in time.

The boy now had time to dwell on.

He wanted so much to happen, but nothing did. He was still dusting the books and reorganizing the shelves and rereading the same fricking books over and over again. It felt like no life at all. Every meeting, every training session gave him no enjoyment at all – they all became just one single mess of chores that he had to deal with.

Suddenly the boy felt his eyes getting wet. He couldn't believe it. He quickly got up from sulking (which he apparently was doing) and tried to distract himself to avoid the tears coming. After all, what good of an apprentice who cries whenever he gives in a bit too much to ponder on casualties of the present?

He then started thinking about simpler things. He thought of what the Queen was doing at the moment and the words came up to him as if he had the page opened right in front of him.

"Famed as thy beauty, Majesty,

But behold, a lovely maid I see.

Alas, she is more fair than thee,

Lips as red as a rose,

Hair as black as ebony" he brushed his hair off of his face.

"Skin as white as snow."

He sat there for a silent moment before clapping his eyes twice in a rush of thought.

"What?"

He swiftly returned his locks to the same spot.

"Hair as black as ebony huh," he realised only now when looking at his short hair. It was quite dark, a color of night.

"Skin as white as snow..." he then focused his eyes on the hand that was holding the hair, now leaving it behind. His hands were indeed pretty pale.

Instinctively, he touched his lips, but swiftly rolled his eyes after realising that they were clearly not as red as any red, red rose.

"I suppose we're not so different, now are we?" he said to himself. "And without the appearances, we are still both scullery maids, assigned by our predecessors. And in no power to express our opinion." he nervously laughed. "It's almost as if the only difference is that..."

He started, but didn't have the strength to finish.

What he wanted to say was, that in contrast to him... Snow White has a good ending. The evil Queen dies and even though the girl falls asleep, not only she gets kissed by her true love, but the random dwarves and forest animals make a damn good funeral for her.

He's definitely not asking for true love stuff... But a comfortable coffin does sound nice – as well as the people mourning him. Would someone actually do that for him? The Ex Libris probably don't have the patience and the generosity to arrange a little something of an event. Even if they would, it feels really difficult for the boy to believe in something like that.

...

Suddenly, he hears a sob. It's coming from him.

"Well... At least the old man can't hear me," he thinks before letting the tears free.

***

Once upon a time, there lived a princess named Snow White.

Snow White was very beautiful.

Her skin was as white as snow, her hair as black as the ebony wood and her life – as miserable as the most miserable life could be.

[jennawynn]

Enterprise Season 3 Eps 13-18

Episode 13

Of course they didn't have a backup of the incredibly important data.

Honestly... they really should have sent T'Pol home and lined the ship with the stuff that would stop the _rest of the crew_ from getting fucked up with gravity stuff. This is like... the easiest of the tough decisions they supposedly have to deal with. Putting the whole crew AND the ship at risk just so you can keep one person on board?

It really bothers me that the Andorians use 'pink skin' as a 'slur' towards humans. The assumption of white people as default.

Episode 14

I think they overdo the whole in media res thing where they start an episode in the middle of deceit and then show how they got to that point. Every time an episode starts with Archer not in uniform, it's obvious that there's some kind of deceit happening to keep the audience in the dark too, but that kind of thing only really works if you use it sparingly. Plus the Plot Armor of the crew means Archer being the Last Survivor of anything is laughable.

Episode 15

Ok, there was a line I legit laughed at during Trip and T'Pol's confession scene.

Episode 16

I actually kind of like this one- the deep dive on Phlox and T'Pol and their differences while they're the only ones on the ship awake and slowly going mad. Also "I'm a physician, not an engineer!" I understand that reference.

"Are you suggesting I should read the manual??" lmao. When I was in the Navy, I was what you would call an engineer. I worked in the engine room of an aircraft carrier. We were required to use the manual and go step by step on damn near every little thing we did. Every pump, every machine, pretty much every valve. The only time we didn't operate step-by-step by the book was during a casualty response when we did specific things we trained and drilled on constantly. Hell, sometimes we had one person reading the book out loud while the rest of the people did the work. The manual is written in step-by-step fashion for everything, not a theory text but a how-to guide for start up, shut down, and everything you could expect to do in between.

Episode 17

There it is. Tension between Archer's compassion and Trip's anger. Trip wants to take a torch to the hatchery of Xindi insectoids while Archer wants to save them. This is what I was talking about- this is what they should have been leaning into all along. Reed and Travis are in on it, too. But then when Reed and Travis voice discontent with the decision, Trip's loyalty kicks in and he starts making up reasons why this is a good idea actually.

Oh, nm, it appears that something is causing them to be protective of the eggs, to their detriment. Ok, that's an interesting twist. I wish it didn't come at the expense of them actually doing what they should've done all along because that means this is temporary, but it's interesting for what it is.

I'm sorry... the Eugenic WARS? What?

Oh even more interesting- that really was just Trip's loyalty to the captain. Only the captain is affected.

Episode 18

More Inconsistent!Archer. He could've waited 4 hours to see if Tucker made it back in time before firing on the station that found them.

Archer really needs to stop trying to sacrifice himself. He must not have been a very good chess player. Sacrificing the King means checkmate. I guess it's because he's Starfleet and not military that he's too cowardly to make that decision. He opts to sacrifice himself because he couldn't live with himself afterwards. Aaaand then T'Pol as the acting captain wants to sacrifice herself ahem I mean attempt a diplomatic mission.

When you skip past so much stuff that could fill time (personal and intership fights take like 1 min of screentime, they do a lot of decision making and setup for actions off screen) you end up also fast forwarding through a lot of plot, too... which means you can find a hidden weapon in a huge expanse (teehee) of space in a single season... so if you don't want to wrap up the show at that season finale.... you've gotta redirect and make a new enemy and move the goalposts. I guess that is classic storytelling trope use though... keep making the threat bigger (a first story in a franchise might be about saving a town, the second might be about saving a country, the third about saving the world, etc.). It just feels like it's less about bigger and more about redirecting. It isn't narratively satisfying.

Bet they had fun destroying the set for this episode lmao

Why don't hull breaches have automatic closure protocols? Why does Malcolm always report them then wait for the captain to respond before closing the bulkheads??

The amount of destruction at the end of the episode is almost stressful... except that the show hasn't shown that they'll actually have long-lasting repercussions. Repairs will take a week.

[taylors-fourth-cat-meow]

Why do you like Tamlin despite everything he’s done? I feel like stans will take one look at people who still like that character and outright assume they’re an abuser apologist on sight lmao. So I wanted to know what you’re reasons for liking him are, perhaps to prove that his stans aren’t actually abuser apologists but people who just like a fictional character for perfectly good reasons.

And also because I’m curious. 🙃

Hi anon!!

Why I like Tamlin?....

Well, for starters, I fell for him in the first book. I mean who wouldn't? His character just seems so... Ethereal. The protagonist goes in the mystical land of the Fae and falls for their gorgeous king. I mean- u have to agree with me... Book 1 Tamlin>>> other sjm love interests.

He comes off as being kind and gentle and loving even after everything he has been through. He is struggling, evidently but that doesn't stop him from being what people need from him. Especially with Feyre. Oh how I love their chemistry in book 1. They understand each other and their pains. They have so much in common. And like- isn't Tamlin the dream bf every teenage girl wants? He's gorgeous, plays the fiddle, writes poem, takes you aesthetic dreamy places in his kingdom, says things like "don't feel bad for one moment about doing what brings you joy" AND THE MF LITERALLY HAS A CROWN OF SUNSHINE?!?

That being said, I loved Tamlin from the very start. So I obviously, didn't love how in acomaf sjm just went "PSYCHE!! Fck Tamlin u gotta love the sexual assaulter now cause I'm obsessed with his bat dick!!"

Like that just made me feel dumb for falling for Tamlin. And I resented that. Everything he did was so out of the blue, his character was up in flames and I was so mad at sjm for doing that to him. And goodness the narration was so whiney and annoying and self centred. It was so obvious that Tamlin was also struggling? That he also needed help. And attention and care. If Tamlin abuses feyre in way of neglect then I hate to break it to you it goes the other way round as well. The narrative that sjm and her stans spin is just so... Gross. Tamlin is the man so he shud suck it up and be there of his traumatized gf. But what about my man?! He struggling too. No one's there to help him! Feyre doesn't wake up in the night and talk to Tamlin when she sees him in his beast form? Then why is tamlin blamed for doing EXACTLY what Feyre is doing???

I absolutely hated that hypocrisy. That made me gravitate more towards Tamlin. The story and narrative itself blurred the line of morality. If Rhysie can be forgiven for SA then why can't Tamlin be forgiven for 2secs of abuse? If Feyre is the victim of Tamlins neglect then doesn't that imply the him too?

But the real reason why I love him is because he is the only character in the entire series that shows growth (positive growth i.e.) Book 2 Tamlin locks Feyre up (same like a certain someone did to her sister, so again line blurred.) and restricts her from making decisions about her own body i.e restricts her from training her powers. Which is reasonable but still, he should have explained the risks to her and then let her decide what she wanted to do. (This in my opinion is the only abuse he inflicted on her cause let's be honest, he said she couldn't go out to villages with him cause he would be distracted with her safety and that is very reasonable! He does not say anything about her going out with gaurds and u mfs be forgetting that a member of the royal family IS infact always under protection.)

BUT on the other hand, book 3 Tamlin, remedies all his mistakes. Feyre IS the queen of the spring court in those few chps of Acowar. She sits in on the meetings. She takes them to survey the wall the twice without tamlin being present there! Her therefore being the supreme authority. He trusts her! He's letting go of his paranoia and ptsd for her!! Like bitches homeboy actually changed himself for his girl like how can u not stan him 😭😭😭😭

AND after everything that bitch does to him Tamlin does everything in his power TO SEE HER HAPPY!!!!!!!! 😭😭😭😭

He risks his life to save her ungrateful ass in the hyburn camp.

Like "she deserves happiness even if it's not with me" vibes.

"Be happy, Feyre"

My man literally brings back the person who killed his family FOR HER!

I'm sorry but... Anyone who doesn't wear sjm manipulation glasses can see that Tamlin isn't evil. That he made mistakes. That people are not defined by their worst mistakes especially if they actually work hard and make up for them over and over again.

So yes, I think I speak for most tamlin stans when I say this... We don't love him because we hate Feyre, we don't love him cause we abuse apologists and misogynists. We love him for his complex character that sjm unintentionally created.

[halaboyz]

back to me, cjh

pairing: non-idol! jongho x gn! reader genre: fluff wc: 1.9k warnings: profanities ! n/a: tell me WHY jongho is the best to play jiang chen

"Jongho! I heard you like cotton candies, I brought one for you!" You hand him a stick of pink cotton candy, your head peeking out on the side as you beamed at him.

"You heard wrong." Jongho simply shrugs and walks away, leaving you dumbfounded and betrayed. At least he bore effort to give you a glance.

"Jung Wooyoung, you piece of shit," You mumble, glaring at the said man two feet away behind a pillar, laughing his ass off. After throwing him your middle finger, you stomp to the nearest trash can to throw the sweet thing in your hand. You didn't like it either.

Your eyes softened when you see Jongho's back as it fades through the crowd, pouting when he doesn't even look back to look at your devastated state.

It's not like it wasn't going to be happening tomorrow, anyway.

"Jongho! I got you an americano. This time, I got it from a trusted source," You confidently, yet carefully put the cup on his table, a nod coming with a smile that never fails to drop when he's in sight. "Hot americano, here is."

"I like cold better," He looks up at you nonchalantly, unconsciously waiting for the usual pout that forms on your lips whenever he turns you down. At the sight of the confused expression, he stifles a chuckle, looking down at the cup.

"Right. I should've asked what kind." You hiss at yourself, embarrassingly pressing your lips to a thin line. "I'll just—,"

"Thanks." Jongho interrupts you and gets the cup before you do, standing up to leave you squealing internally as he hides a smile.

He just finds you cute, that's all. He doesn't like you.

"Why would I?" Jongho squints his eyes at Hongjoong, who frustratedly, only sighed at him for having to confront him for the same thing for the nth time.

"You obviously like them back! What do you not understand that about yourself?!" Hongjoong runs his hand through his hair, feet stomping lightly on the ground. "You're so stupid and dense,"

"I don't. I appreciate them— okay maybe I find them cute. But I don't like them. I desperately want them off of my tail, because god knows how much I hate the attention," Jongho explains calmly, even though he needed to do this every now and then.

"Yeah but not with y/n you don't," Hongjoong rolls his eyes, leaving Jongho all alone in their hideout who only chuckled at how much it frustrated Hongjoong. Even though he can't understand why Hongjoong thinks he likes you, he still finds it amusing.

"Y'know, I genuinely agree with Hongjoong," Mingi finally speaks up, looking at Jongho who, though unconsciously once again, had a smile on his face. "See, you're smiling."

"I'm smiling because of Hongjoong— wait, that doesn't sound right,"

"Because you couldn't make it sound right unless you confess what you're actually smiling about," Mingi shrugs, letting Jongho to his thoughts.

"No. I don't," With his always-have-been-genuine friend talking, he finally lets the idea sit in his head. "I don't like them like that,"

"Okay, Jongho. This is my last straw," You've said that a thousand times before, there's no reason to be scared now. "If it isn't obvious, well, I like you, a whole damn lot." You rambled, and even though Jongho was just looking at the book in front of him, albeit not focusing on it but on your words, you continued. "Here's a box of tons of coupons, from that favorite cafe you always go to with Hong,"

His eyes squint at the nickname you have for his best friend, feeling something churn in his stomach. But he doesn't let you see that— in your case, it just comes unnoticed since you knew Jongho wouldn't even care for a second.

"And... a shit ton of boxes of coupons of my favorite chicken place there. I wasn't sure where you always eat, so that's a suggestion of mine." A giggle leaves your lips and Jongho swears that even though he despises sweet anythings, your giggles were an exception. "Please don't give it to Yeosang,"

Jongho peaks at the box you gave him second, and for the nth time around that day, he hides a smile. It was the same as his favorite.

When he finally hears you shuffling around your bag, he still feels your gaze on him as you stood still, he wonders if you were only waiting for him to reply.

"Thank you," He mumbles, and then he leaves his table with the boxes you just gave him to head to where his feet take him. Just like always.

"Did he really just...?" You frown, shoulders drooping. "I just got rejected... right?"

"It's not the first time." Wooyoung snickers from the back, an amused smirk on his face.

"But definitely is the last time," You sigh, taking the seat beside him as you looked outside the windows, to the field where Jongho just entered, joining his group of friends play soccer.

"Wait what?" Wooyoung stands up from his seat, eyebrows connected in one line. "Are you thinking straight right now?"

"I am. For the love of god, I know when to stop. I just got rejected for the 58th time." You pout, but it turns to a smile when you see how Jongho smiled when he got the ball, shooting it to the goalpost.

"Yeah— exactly. And you're stopping now?" Wooyoung didn't seem to get the point. You were rejected continuously, though indirectly, but why stop now? What was the difference? What would be different if you were to confess again tomorrow, get rejected, who knows if Jongho makes a miracle and accepts your confession tomorrow? Who knows, right?

"Look, Woo, I get how much you're confused right now, but it's literally so obvious. I should've gotten the hint the first time, he doesn't like me, nor will he ever, because like what I said, damn, 58th time?" You scowled at yourself, sighing. "I like him, but I care for myself too, you know."

"...Fine, whatever you say."

And you were a man of your words.

The next day came, and as much as you liked to pester Jongho to death, you keep it to yourself.

Jongho just... stares, well, at his book that was sprawled to a random page when feels you walk past him without a cheerful 'Hi Jongho!' as you always did. Or maybe you did, and he just missed it. He hopes he did.

But when it happens the second time around, on the same day, he comes running to his two closest friends with a face his friends have never seen him have before— something between confusion and worry.

"Emergency." Jongho breathlessly says before taking the seat beside Mingi.

"What the fuck?" Hongjoong raises his brow before worriedly running closer to his friend. "What happened?"

"y/n isn't y/n." Hongjoong's worried face turns into a scornful one, rolling his eyes as hard as he can. "I think they're avoiding me."

"Oh yeah? Good for them," Hongjoong snickers, and this time around, Jongho reacts at Hongjoong's words as he should.

"Hongjoong, I'm being serious here! y/n can't do that, they wouldn't ever! They haven't ever! I never believed the last straws they said, they've said it a lot before already, and..."

"And what, now you're bitching because they finally realized that being ignored is not what they deserve?" Mingi calmly explains to Jongho who now just realized how bad the situation is— was. "y/n was nothing but kind to you, and lovely. What they least deserved— apart from being ignored, is being lead on."

"You obviously liked them, like what I've said for the past 58 times they confessed to you, but you were so caught up to your ass saying you don't like the attention, you don't like them like that, blah blah,"

"I get it now, Joong. Stop it," Jongho sulks, pouting as he shamefully looks down. "I thought I just found them cute. How will I ever know..."

"Look, just get your bitchy ass up and apologize, we're not going to sit around hearing you cry your shit. Feelings don't fade in a day. Apologize and confess— do your best to get them back because damn I wouldn't jump on you after you made me feel like I'm not worth it," Hongjoong shakes his head and if it wasn't for him making sense, Jongho would've punched the hell out of the older man because of his choice of words.

So he just jumps out of their hideout and immediately runs to find you, only to see you bonding with Wooyoung, more intimate than he would like to see. Wooyoung had his arms around your shoulder as you laughed around your own circle of friends.

"Okay, maybe it's time to back out,"

"We said quit bitching around. y/n confessed to you almost 60 times and you quit even before one?" Mingi stands straight behind him, arms crossed over his chest.

"You followed me?"

"To make sure." Hongjoong and Mingi shrug, closing in on Jongho to bring him closer to you, five steps away. "Now go," And with one final push, Jongho is in front of you, lost his cool and fiddling with his sweater paws.

"y/n, hi." He timidly says, swallowing the dry lump in his throat. "Can we talk?" Wooyoung cautiously removes his arm from your shoulders when he gets a glance of the once fiddling fingers stop and then fisted it, staring at his arms that lay on your shoulders.

"...Me?" Your eyes widen, pointing at yourself. "Uhm, okay," You carefully stand up from your seat, following him to the school garden. "What is it?" You felt thrilled. Even though you were very confused, a smile kept playing on the corners of your lips.

"I uh... just wanted to... you know, say something." You nod your head for him to continue. "Sorry, most of all. If ever I had led you on... ignored you, made you feel less worthy of what you really are, made you feel like you deserved everything I just said—,"

"It's nothing," You shake him off, "And no, you didn't make me feel any of that. I just stopped because... I just came to the realization that I can't push you to liking me. If you don't, you don't. That's that." You shrug, and it makes him more nervous.

"Well that's kinda it," He sighs, a little deeper than he intended, but maybe that's what he needed.

"Look, Jongho, it's really okay. I understand and you can still keep those coupons," You chuckle, but he still was very, very itching to say something. "...I swear it's—,"

"I like you too." Jongho blurts out, "That's so fucked up for me to say after a day you just avoided me, I know, but... I'm sorry," He sighs, but he finally feels relieved that he's let out everything he had been, as he realized, keeping for so long.

When a giggle emits from you, followed by a wholehearted laugh, he feels his heart at ease because maybe, just maybe, you still liked him just as much as you did yesterday even with the things he did. Maybe more.

"Why am I not surprised... Jung Wooyoung that son of a bitch. Should've kept the thrill." You sigh, taking a step closer to hold his hand.

"What?"

"Wooyoung kinda figured it out a while back and I was kinda convinced about it," You nod, a smile bigger than ever growing on your lips. As you hold his hand in yours, your thumb naturally caressed the back of his palm.

"You're unbelievable," Jongho finally heaves a smile as he instinctively pulls you close to his warmth, making you squeal on the inside, "And just how I like you,"

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[flamingo-writes]

It's Better When The Sun Goes Down — Nanami x Reader

This is a piece for the Anilysium Server NSFW Collab! Make sure to check the masterlist to see other writer's works! This month's prompt was: "I can't hold back anymore"

I'd like to dedicate this fanfic to one of my dearest and closest friends. I'm not a Nanami simp myself, but they are. And I have fun writing for Nanami, and also I love writing angsty things and flawed characters. Reg, I hope you enjoy this as much as you enjoy my more casual writing.

(it's pink bcs youre Chancho)

Word Count: 5.4K

Warnings: Mentions of breakup and heartbreak, alcohol and drug consuption, public sex, ghosting, lots and lots of angst. This does not have a happy ending. This is also non proof read bcs I kinda left it to the last minute I'm sorry, I'll go back and edit it when I am not in a rush dcj nd

Summary: Nanami’s return to the Sorcerer life wasn’t so bad. It could be better if Gojo wasn’t determined to get him back with his ex. As Nanami tries to get on good terms with them, things get out of control, only to end up where it all began.

I made this playlist while writing, in case you wanna listen to it while reading. Preferably listen to it without the shuffle, but you can hear it on shuffle, no biggie.

Nanami had forgotten how painfully unbearable Gojo could be. His return as a Sorcerer had been nothing out of the ordinary for a Sorcerer's standards. Missions here and there, or watching over some of Gojo's students. But God, he had surely stepped out of the line this time.

He couldn't even begin to explain how much he hated his current situation. Fighting by your side for the first time in years felt like rubbing hot oil on an open wound. The uncomfortable ignoring the elephant in the room between you two, as you two tracked and fought what felt like a million Curses.

When the adrenaline was at its peak, it felt almost nostalgic; though he'd then remembered everything else and immediately made his own reality bitter and awkward. Overshadowed by the advantage of years of experience ahead of him made him resent you even more. He knew it was childish and pointless to keep remembering everything that happened between you two, but that bittersweet memory would most likely keep him at bay.

You were still strong, witty, fearless, reckless and quick to act and defend yourself. The way you moved looked more swiftly and coordinated than you did back in your student days. Almost as if you were a professional dancer. He hated every bit of it. He couldn’t stop looking at you, thinking about you, and the possibilities of what you two would have become.

After the mission was over, no words were exchanged between you two. Aside from the: "Are you alright?" He told you as you simply gave him a thumbs up as you caught your breath drenched in sweat. An entire ride in an uncomfortable silence, until he reached the school and you got out of the car.

"Thanks. You did a great job. Keep it up" You said. Cold, and straight to the point. Closing his car door before he could reply. And soon, you were gone.

As Nanami tried to get his mind off the mission, Gojo made it difficult. He called him to ask for the details of the mission. He seemed amused and intrigued, as clearly you hadn't told him shit. And honestly, he could understand why. Gojo was meddling on things that weren’t his business, and things that had died a long time ago.

"Why are you interrogating me, Gojo?" He asked as he pressed hisnfingers on the bridge of his nose. "Ask your underling…"

"Because that jerk left for the bar as soon as they arrived" He explained. "And I know better than to annoy a drunk [Name], It took me a while but...I finally learned my lesson" He chuckled. “I knew they could hit hard, but damn, I had a big ass bruise…” Nanami could almost hear his stupid grin.

"You make it sound like it's a recurrent event" Nanami pointed out, slightly surprised as he didn't know you were a drinker.

"Oh, Nanami-kun, you really know nothing huh?" Gojo said, smiling widely as he had managed to manipulate Nanami into asking.

"Know what?" Nanami hissed as he now swore he could hear Nanami creepily grinning at his phone.

"No, nothing!” Gojo said as if it were nothing; trying and succeeding at peeking at Nanami’s curiosity “I'm not gonna talk over depressing things on the phone. Gotta go, bye! Kith kith, Kento-kun" Gojo sang and hung up, as he smirked, proud of his little mischief. He sighed deeply as he stretched in his bed. "Soon, those two will be back together" he smirked to himself.

Nanami hissed a curse under his breath as he locked his phone and threw it on his bed and went to the kitchen. If he had understood well, Gojo had just hinted at a possible drinking problem. He tried shaking his mind off of it. You couldn't, could you? You weren’t a drinker...You weren’t the last time he saw you. You were able to party and have fun without having to intoxicate yourself.

You were wild, cheerful, unpredictable. Everything he was not. And that’s what had made him fall in love with you back in your school days. You were so laid back, he could feel it permeating into him when you two hung out. The few times he’d broken rules was because you’d been the bad influence, however, you somehow managed to get away with it, and leave him with some distant memory in which he felt actually glad to be alive. He usually felt like he was walking on a cloud stuck in time, being present and enjoying the little things that made his everyday memories.

He’d really screwed up after breaking up with you...if he could call that a breakup... His life took a dramatic turn. And then, he turned his back to this world, and got immersed in the gray life the average man in Japan had. Away from what he's familiar with, away from his friends, away from you.

And now, apparently, you had a drinking habit. He wondered if he had caused it, or if he was one of the reasons behind it. The guilt started creeping in. The same guilt and regret he felt after ghosting on you. Not being able to bring himself to properly end things with you.

The guilt he’d managed to swipe under the rug for so many years creeped back out, and followed him around as the afternoon went by. After having a shower, changing into more comfortable clothes and in a lame attempt to cook dinner, he decided to test his luck. He put on a dark button down shirt and decided to go to the bar closest to the School. He felt the naive hope to find you there. However, if you had an actual problem, then his chances to see you there were higher.

Such was his surprise to find you there, trying to get rid of some insistent guy who kept talking to you despite your very obvious lack of interest. Before you could spot him, he watched you aggressively turn to the guy and talk to him in a rather rude tone. Sounding almost like a moody sailor as the guy’s face soon was washed with horror and disgust and walked away. As you turned your face back to your drink, your eyes scanned the bar, finally spotting him.

“Oh god” You whined as you pulled the glass to your lips. “It’s too early to be this drunk…” You hissed.

“Mind if I sit here?��� He asked, pointing at the chair in front of you.

“Tell Gojo to go fuck himself…” You snapped at him as you stood up and stumbled your way to the bar asking for a refill. Nanami looked at you, feeling slightly sorry for your tipsy state, as he’d never seen you like that. And he knew being mad and drunk was never a good combination. As you turned around with your glass and made your way back to your table, you gave him a slightly repulsed smile. “You’re still here…”

“Gojo didn’t send me here, if that’s what you’re thinking” He replied.

“He might as well have manipulated you into doing so, has that crossed your mind?” You said with a sassy tone as you sat back down. “Why are you still standin’?”

Nanami took that as an invitation as he ignored your last comment, trying to refuse the idea that Gojo had manipulated him.

“Rough day, huh?” He said as you nodded and stared at your drink.

“Look, Kento. I’m glad that you’re back. I really am. You’re strong, and you’re smart…” You began. “But I’m gonna cut the chase, I’m kinda annoyed too. Ever since you got back, Gojo has been sticking his snobby nose into my business” You explained. “Many of the missions he sends you in, I’m supposed to be there as well, but manage to get busy by then and not go”

“So you’re actively avoiding me?”

“Yes” You replied bluntly. “Mostly because Gojo is trying very hard to bring us back together. But no, I learned my lesson the first time” You said taking a sip to your scotch, feeling it smoothly sliding down your throat, no longer feeling the burn from the alcohol.

“I haven’t apologized for that…” Nanami began.

“Don’t” You interrupted him. “It’s better this way”

“Are you sure? Because you still seem to have an issue with it…” Nanami said, managing to read you like an open book like he always did. He still had that ability.

You glared at him, angrily as you opened your mouth to snap back at him, but your mind was foggy and a big portion of your brain was focused on the little details surrounding him. His black shirt, the first buttons undone. His thick wrists, one of them hiding underneath a fancy looking watch, his blond hair pushed back, his sharp features...And god, his smell. The smell of his cologne luring you in like a fly to honey. Since any words made it to your mouth, your next step was to take another sip.

“You’re drinking too fast” He pointed out.

“None of your business” You said standing up and taking your wallet out and leaving a few bills on the tale. “I’m out” You said coldly and walked out of the bar.

Nanami sighed, frustrated that he hadn’t managed to get anything out of interaction. Aside from the pretty clear fact that you disliked him. However, he didn’t think of the possibility of you resenting him so much because you still had feelings for him.

As you walked out of the bar, the chilly wind hit the back of your neck, making you shiver. You cursed, knowing it was going to make you feel drunker faster. You made your way to the school with long steps, trying to make it to your dorm before your last drink made it to your head. Despite the cold wind, the hot tears in your eyes in a way kept your face warm. As you tried to keep yourself from crying, you heard steps behind you.

“Wait” You heard Nanami’s voice calling behind you as you stopped on command, against your own will. You swallowed the lump on your throat and managed to keep the tears still in your eyes, as you refused to look at

him. “At least let me walk you home. You can’t walk on your own like this…”

“Oh, so now you care?” You said turning around and looking at him, giving him a smug smile. “You’ve changed” You scoffed bitterly.

“Please” He said, knowing better than trying to argue with you.

Your stare on him softened, as something within you urged you to say yes. To have more time with Nanami and maybe cling to the bittersweet memories you were constantly reliving since his return.

“Fine” You said, very much to his surprise. He smiled and walked closer to you with the gentle smile that had been haunting your dreams as of lately.

“C’mon. My car is not far from here…”

You stopped coldly as he mentioned a car. Taking a second look at him, you wondered how much he’d changed. He’d become an adult through and through, hadn’t he? While you were still a mess...Or so you thought. To Nanami’s eyes, you were a far better sorcerer and warrior than him. And he envied you for it.

“Are you actually going to take me to the school?” You asked, suddenly growing suspicious of him, as you’d had plenty of experiences with strangers on the street and knew better than going into someone’s car in a drunken state.

Not that you didn’t trust Nanami. You didn’t trust yourself drunk.

“I was actually thinking of taking you somewhere for dinner and then to the school” He said.

“Not hungry”

“No, but you’re drunk. It’ll sober you up, and tomorrow morning you’ll thank me when you wake up without a hangover” He said as he walked towards his car.

“I don’t have any more money on me” You lied, looking for an excuse to avoid spending any more than necessary with him.

“I didn’t ask you if you have money” He said boldly as he managed to make you smirk for the first time since his return.

“Smooth, Nanami. You’ve grown” You said as you followed him.

The walk to his car felt like your chest burnt far more than the alcohol ever did. It felt bitter, it hurt and was nauseating. Was it really it, or was it the alcohol finally catching up with you? Like flashes of instant memories being erased from your memory, the drive to a restaurant felt like a poorly edited foreign film. The car felt like some intense themed park ride as you felt dizzy with the alcohol whispering everything you missed about him. It was gross and it was sickening.

The Ramen sign on the outside on itself managed to sober you up a little by taking your mind off Nanami. As you followed him, clumsily standing on your feet, you sat on one of the tables and tried to make sense of the dancing letters in the menu. More flashes of memories were taken off your head, as you wondered what was happening and how drunk were you for you to start blacking out.

“Not good…” you muttered under your breath.

“Did you say something?” Nanami asked.

“No. Nothing”

“How are you holding up?”

“I’m not”

“You’ll feel better in a bit. Don’t worry…” He said softly as he sipped from a soda you didn’t know he had. When had he ordered it? You looked in front of you to the nice surprise that you had one too despite not knowing how or when. “I ordered some ramen for you. Something spicy...It’ll sober you up faster”

You chuckled as you looked at him.

“And how do you know that?” You asked with a cheeky tone as he smiled softly.

“Went drinking a lot with friends from work” He said. “I learned a few things here and there”

More brief black outs kept lazily painting a rather miserable painting in your memory. As you ate your ramen, you found yourself relaxing more and more. Was it the hot spicy broth? In the beginning, the balck outs weren’t getting any less frequent, however, as the night went by, you found yourself sobering up like he said. Soon, the black outs were gone, however you were still somehow locked in a haze. Although it made sense. The amount of booze as well as the short time, it was going to take a lot more than just one hot bowl of spicy ramen to get you back to a sober state.

The conversation kept flowing comfortably as both of you ate. It was reminiscent of the old days, nostalgic and somehow morbid. As the both of you tried to grasp at the old days when your worries were limited to school work. Catching up like old friends who hadn't seen each other, as if you didn’t have hard feelings for each other.

After having finished your food, Nanami paid for both of your meals and went back out into the cold night. The sky black, stars hidden by the streetlights as you made it to his car and finally noticed the silver color in it.

As he drove back to the school, you noticed he took a small detour, instantly setting alarms in your head.

“Where are we going?” You asked, your voice considerably serious as he noticed the change in tone from the pleasant talk they were having in the restaurant.

“There’s somewhere I’d like to go…” He said as he briefly looked at you and gave you a tender smile.

That smile made your heart uncomfortably skip a beat as you hated the effect he still had on you. You didn’t dare to ask any further as you slowly recognized the route he was taking. As he slowly took one of the roads towards the edge of the city close to the coast line. He stopped in a rather deserted place, as he got off the road and stopped the car.

Despite the lack of light, aside from the few streetlights, you knew exactly where you were. A whole in your chest opened dramatically as you felt your eyes tear up and happy memories attached to the location flooded your mind.

“Kento…” You said chuckling bitterly.

“When I said I wanted to apologize, I meant it…” He said as you clenched your jaw and looked out your window, avoiding his stare.

“And I told you I didn’t want to talk about it…”

“You’re still upset about it, I get it. And I don’t blame you” He began as he felt his heart beating hard in his chest. “Look at me, please”

You wanted to say something to him. But you knew you would break down crying as soon as you opened your mouth. You took a deep breath and without saying anything you looked at him. His dark brown eyes gazing into yours, as he was looking at you with a rather pained stare.

“You remember this place, don’t you?” He asked.

A bitter laugh escaped your lips as you clicked your seatbelt, getting it off.

“I’m done” You said dryly as you opened the door and got out of the car.

“No, [Name]. Please, wait” He said as he mirrored your movements and excited the car walking around it.

“Of fuckign course I know where I am, Kento” You barked as you walked away approaching the door. “I know where I lost my fucking virginity, okay?” You barked as you stopped coldly and looked at him, tears finally streaming off your face. “Look, I’ll make us a favour and summarize this conversation. Yes, you’re a fucking asshole for just taking off one day and completely disappearing. Yes, I’m still mad about it. No, I won’t take your apology. No, I don’t care about whatever shitty excuse you have for me to listen to you. You bringing me here out of all places isn’t going to change shit…” You spat all in one breath as you stopped and took a deep breath.

“I loved you, Kento. I really did. And it hurt to have you just dissipate like you were a hallucination or something...You were my first kiss, my first love, my first everything! And one day I lost all of that. You ruined sex for me!” You yelled angrily. “I could never hold, kiss or sleep with anyone, because at some point I’d see your stupid face, and then be incredibly underwhelmed because I would not enjoy sex. I can’t feel anything anymore, Kento...The only way I can actually enjoy those things is by getting drunk or high” You admitted. “I can’t walk into bookstores, nor eat sandwiches or diet coke, nor drink tea because all those things remind me of you. And yes, it’s lame that all these years later I still care about those things. And this is why I can’t forgive you” You cried, as your voice shook.

Nanami’s heart broke little by little at each one of your words. He knew he’d screwed up and had hurt you deeply. But he wasn’t aware of the actual impact. He clenched his jaw as he felt his chest tight and a lump on his throat. Now the drinking problem made sense. Gojo had painted it like you were an alcoholic, but it wasn’t exactly the case. So you’d gone to the bar to get it off with some stranger, probably pretending it was him.

The dizzying pain and weight of his mistakes blinded him for a second as he walked towards you as you kept bitterly complaining. As you tried to walk away, you made a very poor effort as he caught up with you and cupped your face in his hands, bringing you closer to him and shutting you up by pressing his lips against you.

The sudden surprise made your heart stop. Your mind turning numb and blank at once as you struggled to bring yourself to push him away. However, truth be told, you didn't want to push him away. The poor attempt to push him away was more than obvious. The strong fighter you were, barely making any physical effort. Nanami's hands wrapped around your back and pulled you close, squeezing you against him as he sighed into the kiss.

Finally kissing him back, you locked your lips against his desperately, eager to taste the lips you've been dreading in your dreams. Clinging to him like he was going to disappear again, a soft whimper escaped your mouth. Your chest pressing against him as he felt his own world getting blurry.

He broke the kiss pulling away as he pressed his forehead against yours.

“You have no idea how much I missed you” He whispered as you clung to him.

“I-I…” You stuttered, the words tasting bitter before they even made it to your mouth. “Fuck, I want you, Kento” You growled as he pulled you in, kissing you hungrily again.

His hands posessively clinging to you as he slowly guided you back to the car. One step at the time as you both melted in a hungry sour kiss. As you ran out of breath, you pulled away, gasping for air as you gripped his collar in your hands.

“I can’t hold back anymore” You said as you pulled away and grabbed his hand, walking back to his car.

Your words unleashed a shiver down his spine as his heart skipped a beat and raced like crazy, as his pants started feeling tighter on his crotch. He chuckled softly as he realized his own judgement seemed to have disappeared with that first kiss. And before you could even make it to his car, he gripped your hips and spun you around as he bumped his forehead against yours.

“I can’t either” He admitted as he guided you to the car’s hood and pulled you over it. Ass you sat on the warm hood, he got between your legs and you wasted no time wrapping them around his waist. He grunted softly feeling your crotch against his as you pulled him closer to seal your lips together.

As you soon were absorbed by the dizziness of your rising heat, his hand went to your bare thighs as he slowly caressed your skin, going up and lifting your skirt up in the process. A soft moan slid into his mouth as he gripped your ass softly and squeezed it. The way your skin got covered in goosebumps and how you jerked your hips made him moan in response.

It felt good, and intoxicating. The driving desire burning his insides. The feeling of desiring to taste you all over and have you shaking underneath him. God, he’d missed that particular rush of adrenaline. His body reacting to the deeply buried memories now loose. He felt like he was in the best high he’d experienced. Lightheadedness and presence in the moment, he hadn’t felt this alive in so long.

Your hands were slowly undoing his buttoned shirt and were quick to explore his warm skin. He pulled away from the kiss, gasping as he looked at you. Your devilish smile matching your hungry stare. You leaned forward kissing his neck, nibbling on his skin every now and then. His hand gripped your hair tightly, pulling it lightly, making you look up at him as he stared at you.

He leaned forward, kissing you once more, this time a lot more slow and a lot more tender. It was sweet and it was slow and it took you by surprise. You felt his sweet kiss begging you, still holding on to the feelings you both decided to drown unsuccessfully. It almost hurt. It was the kind of kiss that told you how much you missed and needed each other. How much you regretted the mistakes you’ve done.

As you melted against his lips, his hands slowly slid your panties off. You helped him lifting your hips a little but as you giggled against his lips.

“Eager?” You said with a playful smirk.

“You have no idea” He replied as he took off your panties and shoved them in his back pocket.

His hand made it back to your thigh, slowly going up until he palmed your hot sex. Stealing a gasp out of your mouth, he teasingly ran one of his fingers through your dripping slit, making him smile satisfied.

“I’m not the only one, huh?” He said as you looked at him with lustful eyes.

You took his glasses off and set them aside. You were about to go back to kissing his neck when he slid one finger inside of you effortlessly. A rather loud moan escaped your lips as you shut your eyes closed feeling your entire body tingle in a way you hadn’t felt in years. You smiled satisfied as you continued kissing his neck. Slowly, he got another finger inside. The delicious stretch of his second finger prompting you to bite his neck softly making him growl your name softly. His fingers explored the whole he knew so well, as he found your sweet spot almost by muscle memory. More moans came out of your throat sounding like music to his ears.

“Fuck, Kento” You hissed as you took off your top, not caring that you were outdoors and by the road. Up to this point, you were so pent up, you simply craved him like you’d never craved anything before.

Nanami wasted no time and kissed your neck, going down to your neck, gently biting your skin every now and then. Sucking delicately on your skin, leaving marks that wouldn’t last long. He pulle dhis fingers out of you, clinging to your body desperately. As you laid on the car’s hood, you devoured him with your lustful eyes, begging him to get on top of you. Wearing just your skirt by this point, Nanami groaned at the plain sight of you.

He undid his belt and his pants. Your hands playfully teasing your own body in an attempt to drive him crazier and crazier. He cursed under his breath as he couldn’t take it any longer. He pulled his painfully hard erection out of his pants. You watched hi, intrigued, stretching your hands towards him, gently gripping his dick. His breath hitched and you smiled proudly.

Nanami leaned over the car hood, slowly getting on top of you, his shaft resting on your belly as he looked at how much deep could he go inside of you. His tip almost reaching you belly button, as the idea alone made a shiver run down his spine.

"Please, Kento" you gasped, need dripping from your voice as you caressed his dick

He growled softly as he pulled away softly, aligning against your entrance and slowly going in. You gasped, pushing your head back and pressing your hips against his making him go deeper.

Hissing your name, he jerked his hips, his tip.kissing your cervix as sudden rush of pain jolted through your body, followed by pleasure. You dug your nails in his shoulders as he thrusted back and forth, hitting all the right spots. The sound of his gasps and grunts hypnotizing as you got wetter by the second. His length coated in your juices, echoing in lewd wet noises.

He was rough. He usually was. Back in student days, he was particularly rough. As quiet and collected as he seemed, he sure got his stress out if his body through wild sex.

Relentlessly pushing against you, stretching you in such a delicious way only he knew how. Strong and aggressive movements as your walls swallowed him whole every time, breathless moans escaping your lips with every push. The cool wind kissing your skin, only enhancing his warmth.

As you felt your orgasm progressively approaching, the realization of how addicted you were to him hit you. He was everything you desired. And it was wrong. Before the feeling of uneasiness started to sink in, a sudden electric rush ran through your body. Painfully and soothing, as you tightly clenched around himbsoon numbed your mind.

As you came around him, your walls sucked him in tightly, as he was right over the brink, your velvet flesh pushed him off the edge. He didn't have time to pull out. And honestly, he didn't want to pull out. The way your walls milked him felt delicious. As he rode you through your orgasm, filling you up as his head felt dizzy and the world was spinning faster than usual. His hot seed coating your insides, as you shut your eyes closed, feeling the very last of your orgasm fading away.

He pressed his forehead against yours. Loud pants echoing.

However, the world didn't quite return to its regular focus.

The rest of the night went by in a fuzzy hot mess of events. You returned to his apartment and kept feasting on each other, making up for the lost time. Both of you incredibly starved and needy, you desperately went at it over and over again. It was a rather long night. As you feared, no one made you feel as he did. All of him was addicting. His smell, his voice, his warmth, his skin...It didn’t matter how many strangers you fucked, or how drunk or high you were, he felt just right. He made you cum so easily, it seemed ridiculous everyone else couldn’t.

But you knew it was far more than that.

You were still deeply in love with him. No wonder why he had that effect on you. Just hearing his breathlessly gasp was enough to have you soaking wet and under his mercy. Between sweet kisses, fake promises and sweaty sex, he quite literally fucked you to oblivion. Until either of you could take it any longer and you two fell asleep in each other’s arms. It had been a long tiring night, as you knew many of your muscles were gonna be sore the next day. Your chest painted in red and blue bruises.

It was possibly one of the best night sleeps he’d had. In such a long time. The uncomfortable hole in his chest didn’t feel so wide now. Just like you, he didn’t know how much he actually needed you until now. His regrets, his guilt, the thoughts haunting him on how much of a jerk he’d been when he simply took off...All those feelings went away for a night. As he tasted the wonders of the universe under your skin. Feeling ecstatic and euphoric for the first time in years. However, nothing could’ve prepared Nanami for what he was about to experience when he woke up.

~

“What the hell is this?” Gojo asked as he waved around the folder you’d left a few hours earlier in the Headmaster’s office.

“Why the fuck do you care?” You said as you grabbed it, ripping it off his hands.

“You’re seriously leaving for Kyoto?” He whined.

“So my transfer was accepted? Great!” You said sarcastically as you opened the folder and saw the Headmaster’s seal at the bottom.

“What about Nanami-kun?” Gojo replied as the very last string of your patience snapped.

“Oh, fuck you, Gojo! You tried to force us back together, but it’s not going to happen” You snapped. “I’m done. I’m done with him, and I’m done with you sticking your nose in my business”

“Do you really think that running away will solve anything? You’ll still be depressed as hell”

“The less I know about him, the better” You said as you turned around, hot tears blurring your sight as you headed with long steps towards your room. “I don’t trust myself around him…” You whispered. “He’s my weakness Gojo, I can’t let that happen…” You said coldly.

You’d left that morning very early, before Nanami woke up. And you left leaving no trace of you ever being there. Unintentionally doing the same he did. It was unintentional because you hadn’t done it out of spite. Your thought process had been simply. You preferred to not have that conversation and simply leave without him noticing. You had had the exact same thought process Nanami had had all those years ago.

You didn’t waste time and soon started packing your things to leave for Kyoto right away.

[hellsbellschime]

Why Jaime Lannister's GoT Ending Was Actually Bad

Nearly every aspect of the end of Game of Thrones earned ire from the majority of the show and book fandom, but one aspect of the show's conclusion that seems to have frustrated fans across the board was the ending for Jaime Lannister. More specifically, that after a seemingly solid and nearly complete redemption arc, he returned to Cersei and King's Landing to die in a manner that somewhat works as a metaphor but didn't resonate well with the audience at all. And, while Jaime's ending was a flop, it didn't fail for the reasons that many viewers seem to think that it did.

The Lannisters are obviously some of the most complex and important characters in A Song of Ice and Fire, but one of the most interesting aspects of their family dynamic is that it was established far before the contemporary storyline actually began. And, while Game of Thrones seemed to paint it as if Cersei was a source of toxicity that Tyrion and Jaime couldn't get out from under the thumb of, the truth is that the bad apple that spoiled the bunch was never Cersei, it was always Tywin.

One of the most meaningful and important themes of George RR Martin's work is the long-term effects that abuse has on children, and there isn't really any example that is more present and potent than the horrific effects that Tywin's abuse had on all of his children, and how it affected them in different ways.

Jaime, Cersei, and Tyrion all have some of the most intriguing points of view in the entire story. And one aspect that all of their POVs seem to share in common is that while nearly everyone in their world perceives them as a villain, they all see themselves as victims. And the truth is, both sides of this coin are correct.

Yes, the Lannister children have done many horrific, irredeemable things in their lives, but they have also been the victims of extremely traumatic abuse that understandably altered their outlook on the world and on themselves in general. There is a balance between victim and perpetrator that needs to be struck with their characters, but one of Game of Thrones' bigger flaws was its inability to do that.

Unsurprisingly, nearly every character's book point of view grants themselves more sympathy than they should. Almost everyone sees themselves as a better person than they are or is capable of rationalizing away their bad deeds and focusing on their more positive decisions and personality traits. But this is of course one of the many ways in which George RR Martin utilizes his POV traps.

Translating a story that is told through the eyes of the characters themselves and filming it from a more objective third-person perspective means that plenty of important information is going to be lost in that translation. But one of the fatal flaws when it comes to the Lannisters is that, while Game of Thrones does still present Cersei as pretty forthrightly villainous, the narrative pretty drastically whitewashes Tyrion and Jaime. Essentially, it seems to take Tyrion and Jaime at their point-of-view word and treats them like they're much better people than they truly are. Thus, Jaime's ignominious end with the supposed biggest baddie of them all feels like a betrayal of his character development when it really shouldn't be.

Every character needs to be held responsible for their own choices, but the downfall of House Lannister really does rest in the hands of Tywin, and Game of Thrones ignoring that fact did a disservice to every one of the Lannister children in one way or another.

Yes, out of all of the Lannisters, Jaime was as close as Tywin could get to the golden child of his dreams, but it's easy to overlook that while Jaime may have been the favorite on the surface, every single one of Tywin's children was disgustingly mistreated, and the effects of his abuse all showed themselves in different malignant ways.

While Jaime may have gotten preferential treatment over his siblings, Tywin was never anything other than a terrible parent, and more importantly, Jaime's superior treatment only told him exactly how he could expect to be treated if he ever failed to live up to his father's high ideals. And of course, in many big and small ways, he did ultimately fail to live up to Tywin Lannister's exacting standards.

Tywin was a terrible parent because he was an abuser, but he also raised his children with his own values of pride, entitlement, and superiority. Obviously, the notion that they were simultaneously failures who had earned their own mistreatment but were also Lannisters who deserved to be above everyone else is opposing perspectives that are in constant conflict with one another, but it also seems to be how Cersei, Jaime, and Tyrion see themselves as constant victims while still perennially victimizing others.

George RR Martin has repeatedly discussed that one of the strongest themes of his work is the idea of the human heart in conflict with itself. Game of Thrones lost the plot with this in nearly every character adaptation, but Jaime's was one of the worst, largely because he is a character who has done some of the most monstrous and most heroic things in the story. He is both the man who doesn't hesitate to murder a child and the man who stopped a king from slaughtering thousands, and therefore his inner conflict is extremely vital.

Jaime's character arc in Game of Thrones follows a classic redemption arc almost perfectly, but that clearly doesn't seem to be the intent behind the character in the books. Yes, there is a part of Jaime that wants to be redeemed, but he does often revert back to his more brutal and nihilistic side, and his desire for so-called redemption seems to be driven more by how he wants the world to see him rather than how he wants to be.

And in that sense, the show did him a great disservice. Because there are many ways in which Jaime hasn't healed from Tywin's abuse, but the fact that he still seeks the approval of others in a rather superficial manner rather than developing a deeper understanding of true honor and justice is one of the clearest indications that, while Jaime does want to get out of the path that his father laid out for him, he is still crippled by what Tywin told him being a Lannister meant. And ironically, Tywin's belief about what being a Lannister means has essentially trapped all of his children into trying and failing to live up to that example simply because they can't survive unless they do.

Because ultimately, it's not necessarily just about what Jaime, or Cersei, or Tyrion wants. At some point, every single one of them has made obvious indications that they don't want to be a part of the legacy that Tywin Lannister laid out for them. But, when Game of Thrones presented Tywin as a super-intelligent master strategist instead of a completely unnecessarily violent and aggressive asshole, it made all of the Lannister children's choices harder to understand.

Both in the A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones fandoms, Tywin is typically put up on a pedestal, and that's completely baffling. Many viewers and readers perceive him to be brilliant and badass, but everything that Tywin is famous for actually makes him seem like a complete moron upon further contemplation. Winning battles by absolutely obliterating your enemies is a terrible precedent to set for many reasons, but one of the biggest is that it essentially requires all of the Lannister children to maintain this scorched earth policy because Tywin's hyper-aggressive superiority complex has put them in a position where they almost always have to choose to kill or be killed.

And, his cruel and dishonorable behavior as well as Jaime's reputation as the Kingslayer essentially guarantees that even if Jaime completely changes as a person and becomes the hero he wants to be, he really can't ever become that in the society that he lives in simply because the stigma around the Lannisters is something he can't escape.

That is one of the great tragedies that Game of Thrones failed to articulate, and that is one of the biggest reasons why Jaime's character conclusion was so off-putting to the audience. Because the audience saw the result of where this character arc would naturally go, but the story never actually took the steps to get there. In fact, the show went out of its way to erase a lot of the obvious building blocks that are leading up to both Cersei and Jaime's demise that makes it clear that, while they're obviously responsible for their own choices and actions, the groundwork that Tywin's abuse and cruelty laid and set in stone was something that they couldn't control, prevent, or undo.

Game of Thrones largely presented Jaime's characterization with the implication that if he could only escape Cersei, he would be a good man. But the reality was, if only Tywin hadn't been his father, then all of his siblings would have been better people. They may not have been good, but they almost certainly wouldn't be the kingdom-destroying villains that they became.

I also think the TV series likely bungled his character in that his story is meant to be a subversion of the classic redemption arc rather than the straightforward bad guy to good guy story that Game of Thrones told. George RR Martin obviously doesn't like flawless characters, and nearly every person in A Song of Ice and Fire does good things and bad things all the time, they never go in a straight line from point A to point B. So, of course it was going to be incredibly jarring when the show did move Jaime in a straight line from point A to point B and then abruptly gave him an ending that is probably somewhat similar to his end in the books.

But with that in mind, for all of the faults in Game of Thrones and the way they handled Jaime's character arc, I don't really understand the idea that his character was ruined by his ending either. These characters are clearly designed to never be just one thing, and if Jaime killing King Aerys or trying to kill Bran doesn't singularly define his character, then going back to Cersei in the very end shouldn't either.

[bokebelle]

just like the stories - armin arlert

WARNINGS: none, just a ton of armin fluff. 

PAIRINGS: armin arlert x gn!reader

WORD COUNT: 1.7k

a/n: this is my first time writing something this long and i’m very open to feedback and suggestions as to how i can improve! 

requests: OPEN

Armin was 18 when he first started falling for you. It was all innocent at first. He loved the way you smile was brighter than the sun, and how your eyes shone brighter than any star in the sky. But as time went on and he grew older, the love he felt for you ran deeper than any ocean he could read about.

He fell harder for your bright smile, knowing that there were days when you just didn’t feel like smiling. He fell deeper for the spark in your eyes, remembering the days he wiped the tears that threatened to douse their light. You made him feel like he was on cloud nine, but kept him grounded with your gentle words and soothing touch.

That's why 2 years later, Armin was where he was now: sitting on a bench, with you beside him, reading out loud a book he had carefully picked, hoping you would read between the lines and figure out he was in love with you.

“And it was in that moment her heart had felt the thrill of being in love.” he couldn't stop himself from looking at you. He couldn’t help admiring how you leaned your head back and closed your eyes, taking in every word that came from his mouth.

"It was intoxicating, almost addicting. She allowed herself to drown in the scent of her lover, she simply couldn’t get enough. She wasn’t afraid to be burned by the fire that bloomed in her heart when their lips were locked in heated moments of passion. Despite the pain, she wasn’t afraid if one day, her lover decided to seek shelter in the arms of another, for the love she felt was enough to make her feel alive for a lifetime and a day. She wasn’t afraid to love.

She realized that through it all, love was the thrill that made her feel alive. It was the promise of a love that made life more beautiful that made her hope and dedicate her heart no matter how many times it broke. 

In her beloved she saw the farthest of galaxies and the deepest of oceans. In their promises of love, she learned the truths of life and the secrets of the universe. As she locked eyes with the one that held her heart, she saw that the beauty in it all, in the good and the bad, was knowing that at the end of the day, she was loved and that she was in love.” Armin concluded. “The end.”

“That was such a sappy ending” you say, finally opening your eyes to look at blue eyed boy before you.

Armin was always cute, with his button nose, ocean blue eyes, golden fluffy hair, and optimism that made you think he was like the sun. The more time passed, the more you realized the word “cute” didn’t fit him anymore. He was kind and friendly, with a sharp mind and quick wit. You started to think maybe he wasn’t like the sun, maybe he was brighter than the sun itself. But the more you got to know him, the more you understood even the sun bowed to the darkness of the night.

 Armin was insecure about never being the obvious choice. He was smart, yes, but he was worried about never being as funny as Connie, or as charismatic as Jean, or as strong as Mikasa. You always assured him that he didn’t have to be like them. He didn’t need to be like his friends to be enough. To you, Armin was always enough. You were always too scared to tell him how you really felt. You were afraid he would push you away, thinking he wouldn’t be enough for you, thinking you’d ruin everything if he didn’t give you, or himself, a chance. And so you kept quiet for both your sake and his and kept your feelings hidden in the deepest corners of your heart. But despite wanting to shout the truth into the world, you felt okay keeping it a secret if it meant having him by your side a day longer. He was your bright sun that shone in the summer sky, and even in his dark moments, he shone like the moon on a clear night.

You always found Armin cute, but when you learned about the ugly things he had a hard time loving, the parts that you loved for the both of you, you started to think differently. And in this moment, as the light caught in his blond hair making him glow before you, you can’t help but think how beautiful Armin is.

“Well, I liked it.” he said, closing the book and setting it on his lap

"I’m not saying I didn’t like it. It was just sappy. And besides, you’ve always been a hopeless romantic so maybe that's why you liked it.” you tease him with a smile.

‘Hopeless, maybe’ he thought. He took a deep breath and hoped he had it in him to be romantic.

“to be loved and to be in love sounds nice though, doesn’t it?” his heart drums in his ears, a faint blush painting the apples of his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. “To feel so strongly about someone and knowing they feel the same way about you.” 

You simply smile at him, and he takes this as a cue to continue. “Imagine finding someone who makes the world make sense. Someone who makes you feel safe, and welcome. Someone who makes you feel like home wherever you go.”

“That would be nice.” you agree as you entertain his train of thought, ignoring your own thoughts of what it would be like to hold his hand, or kiss his cheeks. “But they’re works of fiction for a reason. I’m not trying to be a downer but not everyone finds love and gets it in return. Sometimes you just have to be happy watching from the sidelines.” 

Armin felt a twinge of doubt in his heart. Maybe you’re right. Maybe he should be happy watching you from the sidelines. However, he managed to stop himself before he let his negative thoughts take over. 

‘Better to have love and lost than never to have loved at all’ right? He took a deep breath and shook his doubt away. He would never know if he had a chance of winning the game if he always resigned himself to watching from the sidelines. 

“It may be fiction but it’s possible.” He counters. “It’s possible to find someone has all your words and promises but leaves you speechless. To know someone like the back of your hand, but they keep you guessing every time. Someone who makes life exciting but makes you feel at peace at the same time”

“And how do you know it’s possible, Mr. Romance expert? You in love with someone?” you manage to joke despite an ugly jealous feeling starting to bloom in your gut.

“It’s possible because that’s how I feel with you.” Armin confesses, and you could swear in that moment time froze. You suddenly became hyperaware of how he was fiddling with his fingers, how his eyes were fixed on you. His cheeks were turning pink, and he nervously licked his lips. He was flustered. More flustered than you had ever seen. 

“Just hear me out okay? I like you, I like you a lot. You make all the romance books I’ve read make sense. When they talk about that warm feeling in your chest, or the feeling of being home, suddenly I understand them because of you. Cliché and sappy words make sense because that’s what I think when I look at you, that’s what I feel. I’ve been in love with you since I was 18, you know? I don’t know when it started, but I don’t regret it one bit. And if you give me a chance, I hope you don't regret it too. I know I’m not the strongest or even the tallest, I don’t have a lot to offer except my heart that chooses you every day and my arms that were made to hold you. It’s corny, I know but that’s all I have to give you and I hope that’s enough.” 

You keep quiet for a moment before letting out a small giggle. You had spent all this time keeping quiet only to realize he felt the same way. And top it all off, after he poured his heart out to you, saying the words you always wished he would tell you, the words you were always too scared to admit, Armin was still worried about not being enough. It was in the vulnerability in his beautiful blue eyes that you finally found the strength to do what you’ve always wanted to do, to say the words you’ve always wanted to say.

“Gosh Armin, for someone so smart you can be really dumb sometimes.” you tease, accidentally giving him the wrong impression.

Armin felt numb. You didn’t feel the same. He was dumb for thinking someone like him had a chance with someone like you. But before he could feel his heart break in two, he felt your lips gently on his.

You were kissing him? His mind couldn’t process everything that was happening fast enough so that by the time he was ready to kiss you back, you had pulled away.

“Armin you’re always enough for me, you’re more than enough. I don't care about what you're not, what matter is what you are, and you are always enough” You whisper, holding his beautiful face in your hands so his eyes meet yours. “and if you still don’t believe then that's fine, I can love you enough for the both of us.”

Armin’s brain finally caught up with what was happening, and his heart had started beating to the promise of your words. He was enough. He was enough for you, and he was enough for himself. For once, his words failed him, so he decided to kiss you back, knowing that was enough for you both.

No love story could ever describe the way his lips felt against yours. No poem could detail how lovely his fingertips felt as they traced gentle patterns against your skin. The greatest novelists or poets would never come close to describe what it felt like to have a love like this. It was a love meant to be preserved in the stars. A love considered fictional by most, and rare by few. It was a love one could only dream of having, a love only you and your beautiful blue-eyed boy lived out everyday. 

You lived a love so great and pure, would happily spend all your lifetimes and more, knowing what it’s like to be loved by and to be in love with Armin Arlert.

[villainsandvictimsalliance]

It's impressively funny how people chant "it's only fiction" but then go and act exactly like the people Horikoshi writes in bnha.

And I don't know how to say this, but fiction has always been a tool to criticize our world and society. Yes, you can see it just for fun and without looking to deep in the material, but not because you want to do it suddenly all the people who want to study that are just "ovethinking".

The minute the author creates some work, it becomes bigger than the author. Let's speak in literature terms to reduce it, and let's say that Cervantes for example wrote El Quijote with a very specific intention, but the amount of themes the academy have found in that book across the years are not invalid just because the author couldn't think about them.

Bnha, for example, has a really cool view of how violence acts on our society and how the lack of communication is the reason why the cycle of violence is turning many victims into criminals and "villains". Also, bnha talks about how the idea of seeing everything black and white is damaging, because in doing so we are erasing aspects of the original thing and changing that completely, judging what we thought it is and not what it truly is (I'm not going down the philosophical mess of the thing, the perception of the thing and the thing being seen as different objects, for obvious reasons).

One big example: Bakugou.

Many of the prejudices people apply on Bakugou in the manga, are prejudices real people apply in the character. And you can say "stop analyzing Bakugou as a real person! He is not!", and I can argue that he was written, at some point, as a real person. This is not some book from the Russian Realism where the narrative was the main thing that matter and the characters are only to represent a thematic, not to be much looked into. This is an actual Shonen manga, and it'd be impossible to analyze anything if you don't at least put the thing in the wider context (this is not true if you're following some branches of literary analysis, but because I don't want to talk about the Russian formalism, let's please ignore it).

Horikoshi is not simply inventing something. He is telling you how people react to this certain set of traits and he's giving you possible views on it. Intentional or not, that's what is in the material. Intentional or not, there's a narrative of a kid with anger issues and strict parents who needs to face the backslash of a society that shaped him, and then punished him for being the form they gave him. He became just another piece in the cycle of violence, another piece to be replaced or eliminated (or canceled), until people started breaking the cycle of violence by being kind, by letting him know his own opinions and feelings mattered, by showing him a better way, by patiently walking with him those steps towards becoming a better man.

And you can say it's just fiction, and I can name you a million works and authors who has worked the lines dividing fiction and reality. I could invite you to read Six characters looking for an author, the theater play by Pirandello. Or I can even tell you to study the Russian Realism, where the authors were so worried about trying to understand how to represent reality in fiction, or I could even tell you to study the literary analysis coming based on Marx, who talk about how every artistic creation is determined by its context and author.

[hawksugarbaby]

Todoroki x reader- Fix you with gold

Angst + Villain reader Au

Quirk: kintsugi- you can manipulate strings of gold hardening it as soon as you need to you can also remelt it.

Crimson lights flooded the bare brick room as you watched from the corner waiting for your dear hero to wake up. Shoto todoroki. You had been well acquainted a few years back. When you haven't been coined as (y/n) (y/ln) the UA traitor but now, well not so much for obvious reasons.

Thankfully, the boy you had once loved more than anything was chained up against a chair with his head hanging low avoiding the glare of the red filter. No no this isn't your boring old yandere simulator storyline. You had no intentions of killing everyone who looked at your dear peppermint boy, you had no of killing him because you loved him that was just absolutely ridiculous... no, you were killing him because he was a hero. But was he really?

Your chair screeched as you pulled it along behind you appearing from your corner and sitting yourself down drinking a lovely tea from a beautiful porcelain cup... well, beauty is subjective. "Good morning shoto" you greeted, your cheery attitude slipping between your grit teeth. Yes, today would be a good day "lovely day, isn't it? For a little chit chat hm?" silence. Once again your response was silence "oh come on my little hero I know you're not dead. Yet" it was a fun game you two had. You would talk, he would not, but all your conversations were rather one-sided and you decided chess was more fun with 2 people. Today was going to be the day you broke him once again.

"Shoto, are you interested in what would happen to you if you keep up this silly game of silence?" you asked and finished off the tea spinning the handle around your index finger. You stood up and launched the cup against the wall fragmenting into small pieces that rained down like drops of blood, he winced knowing that the cup was expensive and not easily found. rich boys and their pottery. "I wonder how easily you shatter compared to a teacup. Shall we find out?"

You put your finger on his chin and forced his head up to look at you. His mismatched eyes bore into you with sadness "I used to love you" he whispered. You let go of him and maniacal laugh erupted from inside you which bounced off the walls into his ears "Shoto you still love me. You want me to change my ways and go back to the way I was, maybe join you as your sidekick hm?" he looked at you his eyes wide with the kindling of hope "WELL NEWSFLASH HERO I never was that girl. I was a lie, a book wrote and edited to suit you" you watched as the hope dwindled away the kindles blowing out in the icy wind of your words you leaned down to his ear and whispered "everything you saw in me was an illusion. I could never be a hero, do you know why? Because heroes aren't real"

you stood back up stretching your arms behind your back a Cheshire smile graced your face. "you still have so much time to join me sho, no ones coming to find you, dearest" you sat back down on your chair leaning forward on your hand "you're a villain (y/n) there isn't a way in hell you could convince me to come to your side" you bit the inside of your cheek and pushed yourself off the chair and walking up to him, your face barely inches apart. You kicked his chair over, flicking a butterfly knife out holding it close to his neck "NO. I'M THE GOOD GUY HERE I-IM THE GOOD ONE. YOUR NO HERO I'M CLOSER TO A HERO THAN YOU'LL EVER BE" you spat while he struggled on his back like a helpless tortoise. You were in the right of course you were. Heroes aren't real anymore just read the news the hierarchy was crumbling and the ones who were at the top had the furthest to fall.

No one needs saviours anymore. "Your insane (y/n) your sick please just let me help you" you hated it when they told you that "SHUT UP. I'M NOT I'M NOT I'M NOT. I'M NORMAL. YOU'RE THE SICK ONE YOU KNOW WHY" you pushed the knife up drawing pinpricks of blood that trickled to the floor slowly "because you crave to feed a hunger you cannot satisfy. You want to save as many people as possible, lock up all the villains yes?" he couldn't look away from the intense expression that hadn't left your face since he told you you were a villain "what happens when you lock up the villains hm? When you run out of people to save? Who runs wild through the city then? You pump out heroes every day leaving less and less for you and between you and me it looks like your going to run out of us soon" you pulled the knife back and todoroki released the breath stored up. Now he looked at it, you weren't wrong? What would happen when the villains disappeared. The heroes that were supposed to make people feel safe no matter what had struck fear into the hearts of every civilian in the world, no one dared to steal, to murder, to light their fires across the country for them to trace back to a warehouse in the middle of the wood?

No, he couldn't be thinking about that. He was a hero through and through you wouldn't change his mind with a petty butterfly knife. You scoffed at his pathetic state squirming under you and stood up pulling his chair back up along with you "you're still so handsome shoto, it really would be the biggest shame to ruin you" you sighed remembering a time when you truly wanted to be with him no matter what. But your ideologies just weren't compatible. "Do you know what happens when you mix bleach and rubbing alcohol?" you pulled a bottle of anti-septic out of your pocket and slipped a white cloth down from your sleeve to your hand "no answer? Or are you being ignorant again" he pursed his lips keeping his words sealed in the front of his mouth "fine. Let me show you." you poured the anti-septic on the cloth and walked up to the gorgeous boy in front of you stooping down "last chance my love" he looked at the wall and you groaned in annoyance. You forced the cloth in front of his mouth and nose and smiled sweetly "you make chloroform"

Day 2

Well, it turns out yesterday wasn't the day. But he was getting close you could feel it, you would take a slightly softer approach today there was another name for this, manipulation. "Morning shoto, are you feeling chatty today?" he looked up from his chair quickly when you entered. Despite what others thought, you weren't completely heartless, you would bring him food and water, and for a hostage, it was pretty good food. Maybe it was the remnants of your love that made you treat him differently. You unlocked his chains and passed him his plate. He knew there was no chance of escape, he had tried and failed a hundred times, he couldn't use his quirk in this room, and you were waiting around every corner when he tried to run.

"You know what I really don't understand shoto?" you wandered around the ruby room admiring the walls that kept him inside "when I first met you you said you despised your father and you would go against him in every way possible" he ceased eating at the mention of his father his appetite suddenly lost in the crowd of emotions "so why even become a hero. Why did you not run off? be the opposite of what he ever told you to be?" you were getting there you could feel it ripping through the air. He was lost, and confused? Who did he want to be? Certainly not anything like his father? Why did he ever want to be a hero? To save children who had to bear what he bore, why should he care for them if no hero ever cared for him "as I see it your father is worse than ever is he not? He lost Touya, he can't find you, he's wearing fuyumi and natsuo away desperate to have his perfect creation. Wouldn't now be the best time to join me sho" the plate hit the floor splitting apart just like his own sanity. Here we go. This would be so fun.

You sat cross-legged on the floor in front of him and picked up the pieces of the broken plate stacking them in your hand "you've heard of kintsugi I assume?" of course he had he grew up with everything, he nodded hesitantly his dual coloured fringe hanging in front of his eye as he leaned over watching you intently. You started laying the pieces of the plate out like a jigsaw fitting them together perfectly "if you just took my offer sho..." you started pushing the pieces together and lines of gold brushed over the old cracks, you lifted up the plate and put it on his lap "I could fix you up with gold" you whispered he gulped and traced his finger over the gold that welded the plate making it better than before. "We could get to know each other again. Love each other REALLY love each other shoto please I'm begging you" you really hated playing the broken lover card especially to someone you truly did love, and of course, you wanted to know him all over again but the begging really was a chore you had to fake so much emotion.

"I-i missed you (y/n) I really did I want you to come back to me the way you were before. Don't do this please" he begged. He knew this was it. He couldn't hang on any longer he had missed you for so long he couldn't stand being away from you again and ... you were right! Why should he strive to be a hero when none had ever cared for him when he was almost dead, beaten up by his own father who had the audacity to call himself a hero. He was nothing more than the creature to be puppeteered by Viktor Frankenstein. "THIS IS ME. can't you see that shoto this is who I am? The way I was before was fictional I tailored for you" you brushed your hand across his scarred cheek and brushed his hair out of his face "but you could know me, you could love me like this, couldn't you. You just need to join my side."

he looked at you, taking in your details for the first time in 4 years. You're (e/c) orbs didn't even try to attempt hiding the craziness behind them, the way your grin had a sadistic twist that could make any god coil in fear, your (h/l) (h/c) that was matted and bloody, the way the red light mimicked the bloodlust radiating off of you, yet he could still find comfort in it. "I want to know you," he said in his low monotone voice. The breaking point. You were his breaking point. "Let's get to know each other then hm?"

[stargaze-issei]

— "𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐞" (𝐛. 𝐤𝐚𝐭𝐬𝐮𝐤𝐢 𝐱 𝐟𝐞𝐦!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫)

𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭; when your father, the head of the japanese mafia, was killed, your childhood friend swore to protect you till his death. now, you're the empress of the underground world, and he doesn't know what's harder, to keep you safe or manage to hide his feelings. what will he do when, for the first time, your life's at risk and he isn't anywhere near?

𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞; mafia!au, angst.

𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬; swearing, mentions of blood, guns, murder, kidnap, yk... mafia stuff.

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭; 2.7k

𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫'𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞; lemme know if u want a part two bc i felt like it was getting too long and i don't know if anyone will read it or like it 👉🏻👈🏻

"where the fuck are you?" bakugou's voice stroke over the phone, noticeably angry. he had told you several times to never go anywhere without him, which you mostly did, if it weren't for him being away a lot of times. nothing less was expected from your right hand, who handled every dirty job, and considering your line of work, it wasn't scarce. but you did had other bodyguards, just as trained as katsuki, willing to give their lifes for you, which was extremely better than having bakugou giving his life.

to his eyes, you were still the little girl from before. he saw you as a someone who needed protection. at first, you agreed. your father was murdered, someone managed to get through all his security and killed him, none of the guns he and his security team carried around could protect him, killing you would be like stealing a sweet from a baby. bakugou had always kept you safe, despite his agressive usual safe, he cared about you more than he cared for himself. so you stuck to his side, believing, hoping, he'd die for you. but that was a long time ago, now, you could defend yourself, and had raised a sense of loyalty in your people by your own. your father's empire was based in fear, yours? by admiration. you didn't see your people as working ants, but as important parts of a whole. still, anyone who was a threat to you, bakugou made sure to erase them forever.

"don't talk to me like that, i'm your boss" you could feel him losing his shit, a smile began to form in your face. even when everyone respected you, he was still the same.

"you can't boss anyone if you're fucking dead, you dumb shit" a laugh came out of your throat, he couldn't avoid smiling at the sound "wait, oh, okay, i know we're you are. stay there, i'll be in three" he hung up before you could reply.

you looked back, at one of your guards who was just putting away his phone. of course they told him. why couldn't you go get your own coffee? being in the office all day was tiring, to be five minutes outside was all you asked for. a few seconds after, they handed you your coffee, obviously, a guard had to try it first, in case that barista wanted to suddenly murder you. of course he didn't.

"who let her go outside without me knowing, huh?" a furious katsuki appeared through the door, making a scene in the place. you gave him a warning look. if there was something you hated, was that. everyone in the area knew who you were, but why make it any more obvious. those people were just living their usual lifes, and people tend to get nervous around you. "the car is waiting outside" he understood, but you knew he was going to scold you anyways.

you walked outside, smiling, and got into the car, followed by katsuki and one of his subordinates, the other one got in the front sit, next to the driver.

"save it, i'm n–"

"the fuck you are" he cut you "your safety is my responsibility, if i say you can't go out without me, then you fucking don't. specially not when there are people after your head" there was no denying he was right, but still, it upset you.

"there's always people after my head, bakugou".

two weeks ago, two men went into your office. they were in charge of some dealing territories, though small, important. most contraband had to pass those places, you controlled those police departments making everything easier to your truck drivers. they were beaten, cover in blood and barely standing.

"our men, all of them... they all..." only one of them could talk, the other being too shocked to even look at you. "kazuhito's men, it was them... they said we had to tell you, they're coming after you" you couldn't show any fear in front of your so called soldiers, and your template remained at ease. a shout was enough to get those men the help they needed, after holding their hands, you promised to go see them once they were checked by doctors. you called bakugou as soon as they left, he was the first who should know and help you decide what to do next.

the kazuhito family had always been rivals, enemies of the worst kind. everyone suspect they were behind your father's assassination, but with no proof, even you knew it would be the biggest mistake to charge against them, despite your personal desires.

"i already told the drivers they had to take rout b for a while, but we can't let them just keep what's our" you explained to katsuki once he arrived. "those drugs have to get in town by us, damnit". it was clear how frustrated you were, those assholes had mess with your and your father's hardwork.

"if we retaliate, a war will unchain. your father tried to avoid that for years"

"and see how he ended up" bakugou didn't know if it was the anger, or you talking. "we will lose everyone's respect if we don't do something, they killed dozens of our people, katsuki".

he was trying hard to stay objective in that situation, but it was near impossible. a war would put you in more danger than ever, your life was at stake, and bakugou wasn't sure if he was willing to risk it. growing up by your side, your father taking him in when his parents died, you were his only family. more than that, he loved you. the only reason he was able to do his job right, was the fear of losing you. your head was already valued in millions, how could he protect you in the middle of a conflict, that would end only with your death or the kazuhito's leader's death? your power was bigger than theirs by little, but they did something that reckless, which meant they thought they had out powered you. had they? or were they just bluffing? had they miscalculated?.

"we're taking action, wether you support me or not" you looked into each other's eyes, you knew him enough to understand his fear, just not the reason behind it. your voice softened "but i'd much rather do it with you by my side".

"you're the boss" he spoke, already regretting it "i'll schedule a meeting so the high charges let everyone else know, i'm staying at your place so we can trace a plan".

and there you were now, being reprimanded by bakugou. he was extremely tired, he decided to stay with you until things were calmer, which could be several months from then. getting up at six a.m, going to sleep past midnight, being always looking for possible threats, it had given him bags under his eyes.

"i'm sorry" you said once you were alone with him, it was only then that you could let your guard down "i'm making this harder for you".

"yeah, you are. but it's my job, after all" that came out wrong, he thought. it wasn't his job, it was his fucking life purpose. he wanted you to live a long, happy life, as hard as it seemed.

"i guess it is" deep down, his response disappointed you.

"hey, look at me" out of nowhere, his body was insanely close to yours, you felt his breath in your face as he lifted your chin with his finger "there's nothing i wouldn't do for you, got that, dumbass?"

for a brief moment, the taste of his lips was all you could think about. i bet they're soft. but as fast as it started, it was over, katsuki pulled away harshly, inventing an excuse to leave. he had flown too close to the sun, so close that it burned his skin.

a few more people went to see you that day, asking for diverse permissions, advice and stuff like that. since it had been slow, compared to other times, you decided to home early. a call to your team, and the car was already outside. bakugou left instructions for your departure, because he had things to do somewhere else, much to his displeasure. you were accompanied by your escorts to the doors of the building, that seemed like a normal office compound. there were waiting two other guards, making a total of six people protecting you. way to go, bakugou.

"how's your wife, ryota?" you asked the driver. of course, not everyone fitted in the same car, so you got into the second one, middle seat, between a built up woman and a big man. you tried to remember everyone's name, but it was difficult.

"she's good, ma'am, sends her regards" he smiled at you over the mirror.

"and the baby? he must be a month old, right?" at the memory of his child, his face lightened "you should take some days off, i bet your wife and son miss you"

"i have a duty with you, m–" a loud impact interrupted him, the front glass had exploded. the car had an abrupt movement back and forward, all you could see was blood, everywhere.

the woman next to you took her gun out, in order to protect you , you thought, completely wrong. before everyone could react to her act, she shot the guard in front of you.  you looked at your side, searching for someone alive, the same bullet that had killed ryota was in the guard's at your right forehead. besides you , the only other person was that woman. if she hadn't glasses on, that stare could've seen throughout your soul. then you remembered, katsuki made you bare with a knife under your sleeve. with a weird move, you felt its sharpness against your skin, it was there, but she read you like a book. before you could even pull it out, another shot stroke followed by a intense pain in you thight. the bitch had shot you. you blamed it on the adrenaline, because nothing hurt. what happened after was a couple of blurry images in your memory.

bakugou had called you more than a hundred times, you, the drivers, the guards, everyone in his fucking team, but no one knew anything. the cameras at your house never showed you arriving, your phone's location was off. he was out of his head, if he didn't hear from you in the next five minutes, someone's going to die. he rushed into his car, following your rout at a dangerous speed. 

both cars were full of bullet holes, and every guard he had hired was dead. there wasn't a place without blood. tears of pure rage came to his eyes, fuck, it was his fault. he started to look for you, but the whole world was spinning around him. where were you? where was your body? were you alive?, this couldn't be happening. he had left you unprotected, alone, and now you could be dead, because of his uselessness. his phone vibrated in his pocket.

"sir, we– we have– the kazuhito's are here" he left as fast as he came. they had touch you, they had taken you away from him, and he wasn't going to let them get away with it, even if he had to go against a whole army, whoever was behind it all was going to pay.

a man in a suit was sitting in the chair of your office, smoking a cigarette, as calm as a rock. katsuki was so close to rip his head of right there, that somebody had to hold him down. his own people updated him, saying that he had gone into the building alone, with no weapons of any kind, not even a cellphone.

"where the fuck is she?" he crashed his hand against the desk.

"ah, mr. bakugou, please take a se–"

"tell me where she is right now if you want to keep your head, fucking bastard" his hand had wondered to the tip of the gun in his belt, menacing to blow up at any second.

"you won't do that, mr., if i don't return to my people in one hour, she'll be so fucked up that not even you will recognize her" a laugh surge grom bakugou, a dark, cold laugh.

"i don't have to kill you, then" one of the man's hand rested in the desk, like asking for katsuki to rip it off his body. as you did, he also carried knifes under his shirt. in less than a second, one of them was buried into the man's hand. he screamed, both in shock and pain, giving your bodyguard a hatred look. "what do you want, shitface?"

"i-it's quite simple, actually" his face was white as paper, and even though he wanted to talk normally, his voice shivered "we want you to take over the y/l/n's business, under our command of course" he let out a sigh, trying to keep his composure and ignoring his bleeding hand "if you– if you agree, she will have to leave japan and never..."

bakugou won't agree to that. not now and not ever. to give away what you and your father built from scratch, and spent decades keeping safe, was like killing your child, and your father's memory. to send you away, alone, where he most likely won't see you again in years, was also off the table. it wasn't funny anymore. he started walking around the man's chair, picking up his sleeves. he checked the clock in the office, he had forty-five minutes with the man, meaning, forty-five minutes to make him talk. he ressourced to every fast interrogation method he knew. the people outside the door weren't surprised when they heard the man's screams, even wondering what had taken so long for the boss to start acting. katsuki was never a patient man. his senses were blocked, he couldn't hear anything but screams and begging, all his eyes could see was pain through all the man's body, his hands felt nothing but warm blood. but for the first time in a while, he wasn't enjoying it. he was doing it out of need, the need to save you. every minute that went by, was a minute were your life risked. he never felt so close to losing his sanity.

"outside the city! she's in one of our safe houses outside the city! i don't know which, please stop!" ten minutes before the timeline he finally gave up. your intelligence had all their safe houses, storages, garages, every location needed. not a second passed when one of yours men delivered a map with all the points marked. there were five in total.

"throw him outside in ten minutes" he shouted, walking to the armory "two teams, six people each, my fucking people, hear me? now, dammit! we're leaving in a minute, if i have to go by my fucking self, i'll do it"

when he was armed to the teeth, almost a dozen of people followed him outside. they were his most trusted men and women, being trained together, he knew they were as skilled as him, and they were all willing to put their life's at stake for you, their boss. in the car, bakugou barked the instructions. he had narrowed it down to two possible locations with all the information he had. if they had to kill every person in those places, then be it. he's going to get you back.

[mutatismutandisx]

Shadow and Bone (Netflix Series Review)

No Spoilers!!!

"Be careful of powerful men" - Genya Safin

Welcome to the Grishaverse!

Shadow and Bone is Netflix's big gamble for young adult fiction mega-success, the kind we haven't seen since Jennifer Lawrence volunteered as tribute almost a decade ago, adapting Leigh Bardugo's popular Grishaverse novels (her debut trilogy Shadow and Bone and serving as a prequel for the Six of Crows duology), anchored by an incredibly diverse cast (mostly newcomers) and a huge production budget, showrunner Eric Heisserer, alongside Bardugo who serves as an executive producer, aim for Hunger Games and Harry Potter level phenomenon with their own fantasy epic.

To Heisserer's credit, he manages a great adaptation of Bardugo's novels, even if he falls prey to the same story tropes that made Bardugo's debut novels seem so derivative, Heisserer brings the Grishaverse to life in a (mostly) successful run of 8 episodes, and even if his grand tour of Ravka isn't the most organized or well planned, most viewers will still fall in love with this world.

Heisserer's boldest creative choice, and biggest deviation from the novels, is the introduction of Kaz Brekker and his Crows, Jesper and Inej, in this opening chapter to the story, characters that did not appear in Bardugo's original Shadow and Bone trilogy. Creatively and business-wise, his decision is an obvious one, Bardugo's Shadow and Bone novels, while a solid debut, are the typical young adult fodder that is bombarded to consumers every year, a largely derivative yet charming "chosen one" story that teens and tweens eat up every year and then mostly forget about when the next one comes around (less Percy Jacson and more Divergent if you will), truth be told Bardugo's Grishaverse only became a phenomenon after the release of her superb Six of Crows duology, featuring Bardugo's very own Suicide Squad, a ragtag group of crimials performing incredible, mind-bending heists in the tough streets of a fictional Amsterdam (and beyond!), all anchored by what is (to this day) Bardugo's best creation: Kaz Brekker, a Batman-meets-The Riddler machiavelic genius with a flair for theatrics, Six of Crows and it's follow-up Crooked Kingdom are surely the main reason Netflix even greenlit this series to begin with. And just like in the books, Brekker and his Crows provide a much needed bolt of manic energy to an otherwise very by-the-numbers storyline. Not to discredit Bardugo's talent as a writer, but her skills had simply not been honed at the time of her 2012 debut, a shortcoming that Bardugo would fix later on, in her follow up novels, through ambition and sheer force of will.

And yet, Heisserer stays extremely faithful to the books, whether it's to Bardugo's best ideas or her least creative ones, he adapts it all, while attempting to add his own flair into the mix (with varying results), take our main protagonist for example, Alina Starkov, to those unfamiliar with the novels, Alina is the Katniss Everdeen of this story, a mostly ordinary young woman who, by a struck of destiny, finds herself thrust into the spotlight in the hero/savior-of-her-people role (a most unflattering one might I add), and thus becomes an unwilling symbol to a cause she hardly understands, saddled with all the responsabilities and power that comes with the job, and with the inevitable political players and adversaries that may take advantage of her power for their own gain ("Be careful of powerful men" one of Alina's confidants warns her in episode 5). And did I mention she happens to find herself in the middle of a love triangle? Indeed Bardugo's original novel isn't the most creative, and yet Heisserer doesn't have much to offer as a way to reinvent the character, the best he can come up with is changing Alina's ethnicity (originally caucasian) to that of the fictional Shu Han people (read: China), and yet, nothing is really done with the change, it just sits there, (similarly to Alina everytime a background character hurls xenophobic abuse at her), it's not explored and hardly touched upon, which begs the question why introduce the change in the first place? While I commend the showrunners for casting a female lead of asian descent on a blockbuster property such as this, I would remind them that true diversity is more than simply ethnic tokenism. Perhaps there will be a bigger payoff for the creative change in future seasons (if we get them, season 2 has not been greenlit), doubtfull but I'll remain optimistic.

Tokenism aside, the diversity of the cast truly is commendable, and as expected with a young adult property, it's a very young and very attractive cast, on the one hand it's understandable, they need to appeal to their core demographic, on the other hand they commit themselves to one of the most glaring faults in Bardugo's Grishaverse series, Ravka doesn't seem to have soldiers, politicians or grisha over the age of 25, it seems like a huge oversight on part of a country (and Leigh Bardugo) to have the entire power of the government and the military reside upon a group of teenagers, but be that as it may, most of the cast, while young, is very talented, even if their characters aren't fully developed, they do their best with what they are given, some of the standouts are Jessie Mei Li as Alina, Mei Li is saddled with a character and plot that's as derivative as they come, and yet she finds nuances in her perfomance that are lovely to watch, she brings a sense of joy and determination to Alina that lesser actors couldn't even imagine much less portray, all that helps her stand out from most, if not all, the crowd of chosen one characters that have come before her, and even tho Mei Li doesn't reach Jennifer Lawrence levels with her performance, she certainly surpasses the Kristen Stewarts and Shailene Woodleys that have come before.

Ben Barnes is a surprise as General Kirigan, at first glance you might think him miscast (too young, too pretty to be believed as a stone cold, battle hardened general) and yet he still manages to make the character his own, a possessive, demanding, controlling, master manipulator who always seems to have the upper hand, Barnes is blessed with a tight script and he never misses a beat giving a subtle and nuanced performance. And then there is Kit Young as Jesper Fahey, sharpshooter, playboy, criminal with a heart of gold, Young is a revelation, he is as good in his role as Robert Downey Jr. is as Tony Stark, and that's all you need to know, Young was simply born to play Jesper, anchored by a strong script, he steals every scene he is in and far overshadows his fellow Crows. And as for the other Crows, Freddy Carter acts his heart out as Kaz Brekker, committing to a very physical performance, from scowl to limp, he embodies Brekker visually, but after the first 2 episodes you get the feeling the writers simply don't know what to do with his character, losing the spotlight to other actors blessed with better material, never did I think Kaz Brekker would be overshadowed by one of his fellow Crows, yet here we are. Carter's talent still shines through and his perpetual, omnipresent scowl as Brekker is a beauty to behold, even if his limping is somewhat inconsistent, which makes me hopeful he will improve when given more to do, still it's a shame to have the master strategist/evil genius Bruce Wayne replaced by a lowly con artist and not a very successful one at that. As for Amita Suman, while perfectly cast as Inej Ghafa, her character is severely underwritten, from her past work in The Menagerie, to her faith, to her interactions with Brekker, it's all done in the broadest of strokes, Suman isn't given much to do and therefore doesn't have the opportunity to excel as The Wraith.

You can feel the writers straining for time between developing this world and the large cast of characters they have to work with, inevitably some characters fall of the wayside, through none of the actors' fault. Daisy Head as Genya Safin is all untapped potential, even more underwritten here than she is in the books, which make later revelations about her character (the color of her kefta and shifting allegiances) barely register, hopefully they correct that going forward. Sujaya Dasgupta is another victim of a weak script and little screen time, Dasgupta is simply miscast as the powerful, acerbic, steely-eyed Zoya Nazyalensky, long gone is the regal, no nonsense, silver-tongued Grisha general, in Dasgupta's hands Zoya is just a watered down Grisha version of a Mean Girl, faltering every scene with the exception of one moment, as she makes her way through party goers at the Little Palace and she corrects Inej's ethnicity to a bystander, (her one good line reading in the entire show) "She's Suli", she declares, with all the strenght and defiance that's sorely missing from the rest of her performance, moving forward let's hope a stronger script can lift her performace off the ground, because right now all the wind is gone from this Squaller's wings. And as for Malyen Oretsev played by Archie Renaux, he is the Gale Hawthorne of this story, the undignified love interest, and Renaux is as boring in his role as Liam Hemsworth was in his.

Lastly, Danielle Galligan as Nina Zenik and Calahan Skogman as Matthias Helvar, are equally terrible in their performances, from their accents to their interactions, none of it rings true, and it's particularly jarring when juxtaposed with the talent portrayed by the rest of the cast, we spent way too much time with Nina and Matthias, for absolutely no payoff to their story (yet! Fans will recognize them as 2 future members of Brekker's murder of Crows), but their little side adventure is so disconnected with the events of the main plot that I can't help but feel their story was better reserved for another time, hopefully with some better actors playing the roles. A lovely moment of playfulness between Nina and Matthias while they tread along in a barren, snowy hill, is the only glimpse of hope for Galligan's and Skogman's performances, maybe there is talent to be tapped but it certainly wasn't in display this time around.

The Grishaverse is simply too large and complex, so understandably Heisserer and his writers room have a lot on their plate, but while the character work is largely uneven, his world building is quite solid, based on the impressive foundation Bardugo set out for them, the showrunners are able to bring the world of Ravka to life, the costume design is stunning, from soldiers to Grishas, to royals and diplomats, the costume department does a fabulous job with every piece and every character, one of the high points in the series.

The VFX team also does a lot of the heavy lifting for Heisserer's world building efforts, realizing the different power sets of all the Grisha in a fantastical manner while still maintaining a realistic quality to them, ("you'll believe a man can fly"), but even with a huge production budget, Heisserer strains with this world-spanning adventure, so even though the set and production design is mostly impressive, some sets simply fall out of range for the show's budget, case in point, both Ravka's Royal Palace and the Little Palace are not fully realized, viewers are given a single outside shot of the Royal Palace (and from very far away at that) and the throne room is only visited once, and as for the Little Palace, it's stripped from many of the books most sprawling details, the training grounds, the Grisha school, the fabrikators workshop, the dining room, the palace's towers, all falling victim to obvious budget restrains. Not to mention both palaces are devoid of the classic Russian influences that permeate Ravka's world.

But Heisserer's skills for world building show the most limitations on the lore of the Grishaverse, the three Orders of the Grisha are never properly explained, with Fabrikators getting next to none screen time, Heisserer is never capable to establish a clear view of the world these characters inhabit, most viewers will be very confused about Ravka's shifting borders, the civil war tensions between East and West, and the adversary foreign nations (an inclusion of a map in the opening credits of every episode would have gone a long way), the sociopolitical elements that Bardugo has infused in her books are decidedly complex and the show doesn't do them justice, unfortunately. Perhaps most glaring is the very clear disagreements on what a Ravkan's diction and accent should be, since every actor has their own interpretation of it, an oversight that I hope is fixed in future seasons.

As the few completely negative points of the show, alongside Galligan and Skogman, the sound mixing is terrible (you will need subtitles to watch this show) and the cutaway flahbacks are quite sloppy.

To conclude, Shadow and Bone is a lovingly crafted, beautifully realized, world building adventure, it has a couple of missteps along the way (like all adventures do), but the final product is strong enough to overcome some of its creative faux pas, with a solid script and anchored by a (mostly) talented cast, Shadow and Bone doesn't reach Catching Fire levels of greatness but it far outpaces the rest of the young adult fantasy competition.

[elenajohansenreads]

Books I Read in 2021

#48 - The Vagrant, by Peter Newman

Mount TBR: 46/100

Beat the Backlist Bingo: A non-human character

Rating: 2/5 stars

I did like enough about it to finish it, despite the concerns and complaints this review will list in detail; I don't care for it enough to keep going with the series.

I started this book almost two months ago, but in the middle of what eventually became obvious was a major reading slump. After 60 pages, I put the book on hold, reasoning that I was frustrated with reading in general and not with this specific book.

When I picked it back up, I started over, and this time, I annotated it to help myself pay more attention, and to pick at the edges of the mysteries that lie thick on the ground in this story. The "eight years ago" narrative line did eventually answer most of my questions--those it didn't were almost uniformly about world-building details I was struggling with.

So there's my first major complaint: this world is going for "cool" and "dark" without really having a cohesive style. Sometimes it's idyllic landscape, sometimes it's the Blasted Lands (which I will forever think of as a zone in World of Warcraft, but I guess the author hasn't played that.) The few cities had distinct but fairly generic personalities--one was a little Blade Runner, because there were neon signs everywhere, while another felt like a standard large fantasy town, and eventually the Shining City is certainly shiny, but also devoid of any originality.

The infernal aspects of the world-building--literally, the demons and how they worked--started out as an interesting concept, which I interpreted as them basically being incompatible with reality as we know it, and to combat that, they anchored themselves (in various and generally disgusting ways) to living flesh. Gross, creepy, excellent. But my early notes about what I pictured the Usurper and the Uncivil and the fallen Knights as actually looking like, or how I imagined they functioned, didn't end up jiving with information that came later. And yeah, readers can be wrong about things that authors set out clearly, but this felt more like I had developed a framework for the infernals that was more codified than what the author himself envisioned, because there were contradictions, and there were gaps, and whenever I encountered one I got frustrated.

Another frustration quickly sprouted from the style of the prose. What at first was a charming way to make sure I'm paying enough attention to connect some dots eventually became a slog. Yes, make me work for the connections about characters and plot. No, don't make me dig through every single line of a fight scene trying to figure out whose limbs are being cut off and who is buried under rubble and who died. There is a constant and deliberate lack of clarity to the narrative that I feel would serve the story better if it were saved for those big special occasions--who is the Vagrant, why can't he talk, how did he end up with the baby--than spreading it like a frosting over literally everything down to the smallest and most mundane details.

This extends to names, as many characters don't have them at all, or only get them late in the story, and even when they do, they are often still referred to by epithets. Harm doesn't need to constantly be "the green-eyed man," or I don't know, maybe he does, because half the time when he or the Vagrant look at something, the text doesn't say "The Vagrant looked at the sky," it says, "Amber eyes searched the clouds."

That's another complaint--the detachment. At the bottom of page 107, I scrawled a note to myself: "I've just hit on what I don't like about this narrative style--the descriptions sound like I'm reading a screenplay." The sentence which triggered this revelation reads: "Sweaty faces shine in shielded lamps." It's the first sentence after a scene break, and it frustrated me because I could see the effect of the description in my head--sweat glowing by lantern light in an otherwise dark space--but I didn't know who those faces belonged to! I didn't know who to picture because that sentence told me nothing about where the scene had jumped to! The following line tells me that men and women are in tunnels--okay, I'm in tunnels, but who are the men and women? The third sentence finally gives me a character name and I know I'm back with Tough Call's gang.

And this, too, is a constant problem. Not every chapter or scene break takes that long to establish who I'm reading about and where we are, but throughout the story, there's this repeated stepping back from the characters, a distancing, by referring to their actions in that deliberately obscure way. "Reluctantly, amber eyes open." "Breath labours in the dark." "A small foot twitches." I know that active verbs are great and conjugations of "to be" are easy to overuse, but it's possible to swing the pendulum too far in the other direction. Let my brain rest on some easy verbs and sentence constructions once in a while! Not everything has to be so vague and portentous!

Final stylistic complaint: I dislike present tense narratives in general, but lots of people like them, so whatever, authors are going to keep using present tense and sometimes I'm going to end up reading it. But I absolutely fail to understand the benefits of using it for the past story line. If the main bulk of the story is "now" and uses present tense, shouldn't the "eight years ago" use past tense? Because, you know, it's the past?

So after all of that, what did I even like about this? The baby. The goat--the tiny and rare scenes written from her viewpoint are generally hilarious. Harm ended up being okay, in shouldering the weight of one-sided conversations with the silent Vagrant. Though I question the wisdom of having a mute protagonist paired with a deliberately vague and detached narrative style (seems like an obvious recipe for the difficulty I had connecting to the story) I do think Harm brings out the Vagrant's desire to communicate as they get to know each other, and their deepening relationship as they bond over their struggles to save people, keep themselves and the baby safe, and still find a way to journey onward...okay, that was compelling enough to keep going even when I was frustrated by nearly everything else.

But the ending? No, sorry, this book failed to get me invested enough to care about why our protagonist achieved his apparent goal then decides to reject the dominant social order to do his own thing. I get it--it's super clear, even for this often-vague story, because the reason is exposited immediately after it happens. But I didn't care. And I don't have any need to find out what happens to our ragtag found family of weirdos afterward.

Hm, I hadn't considered that before. Found family, as a trope, pretty much relies on emotional investment in developed characters, whereas this story opted for (mostly) flat characters viewed from a safely detached distance. No wonder I couldn't get into it, these goals are fundamentally opposed.

[carlajuanascribbles]

The Little Prince

By Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

SUMMARY

The story begins with the narration of a pilot about he draw a scene from a book he read title True Stories from Nature in which a boa constrictor had swallowed a whole elephant. He draw this boa inside and out and showed it to the grown-ups to see if they understood what he draw. It saddened him when they failed to guess it and told him that he should devote himself to geography, history, arithmetic, and grammar.

Six years ago, the pilot had an accident in Sahara and that is where he met his friend, the Little Prince whom on the second day of the crash, awakened him by his voice asking him to draw him a sheep. On the days that they spent, the pilot knew things about the Little Prince that he came from a scarcely planet. The Little Prince who lived in a very small planet where it only has 3 volcanoes; 2 active and 1 extinct which "one never knows" and a rose-like flower in a globe. They talked about baobs and how the Prince tried to get rid every single seeds of it in his planet, the Little Prince fondness about sunsets, and the flowers on his planet where simple and has one ring of petal.

Eight days since the accident and the pilot was still not done fixing his engines. He run out of water, drinking the last drop of it. He told the the little prince that he was thirsty. They went for a walk to find a well to quench the thirst that made him feverish. After long hours of walking, the sky fell on darkness. They were tired and they sat down beside him. Some time the little prince told him that what makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hid a well. And somehow, he agreed with the prince is like agreeing with the fox that what is essential is invisible.

At the daybreak, they had finally found a well. He found it strange since he was expecting a hole dug in the sand rather than a well that was build like in a village. And the well gave them remedy to their thirst.

A year after of the little prince arrival on earth was the time that he needed to go back to his planet. He was bitten by a snake which helps him to go back to his place. It was a very bitter moment for him that his little friend will have to leave him. It was sad to lose a friend since not everyone will have one said the pilot.

Six years had passed about the plane incident and it was also the time he met the little prince. Whenever he look at the sky, he cannot restrain his laughter because he know that somehere upon the stars was where his friend living. He will never forget that a little prince has came and disappeared on Earth.

The pilot end the story by reminding those who will travel to Africa that they should not hurry and wait under the stars. Then, if a little man appears who laughs, who has golden hair and who refuses to answer questions, you will know who he is. If this should happen, please comfort me. Send me word that he has come back.

THE LITTLE PRINCE JOURNEY TO THE SIX PLANETS AND TO THE EARTH

(He traveled to his neighboring planets to explore and to be more knowledgeable.)

The First Planet

The first planet he visit was inhabited by a king who seated upon his simple and elegant throne. His whole planet was obstructed by the king's magnificent ermine robe. He, the king had an air of authority to his old monarch.

The Second Planet

The second planet was inhabited by a conceited man who only wanted praises and admiration for himself.

The Third Planet

The Little Prince's next visit to a planet was very short. It was homed by a tippler who is always drunk because he was ashamed of drinking.

The Fourth Planet

The fourth planet was inhabited by a businessmen who never stops counting the millions of glittering little objects— the stars. He stated that he had disturbed four times on his counting and the little prince was one of them. He believed that he owned the stars since he is the first man who think and discovered of them.

The Fifth Planet

The fifth planet was strange and the smallest planet which was an enough room for a street lamp and a lamplighter. He realized that in all he met, it was solely him not being ridiculous because he is the only one thinking besides himself unlike the king, the conceited man, the tippler, the businessman. He was sorry to leave the planet because it has 1440 sunsets.

The Sixth Planet

The sixth planet was ten times larger than the last one. It was inhabited by an old gentleman who wrote voluminous books. He is a geographer. He wrote and draw mountains, rivers, seas, desert and towns but never for once he had explore his planet. He only draw these based on the explorers journeys. He received explorers to his desk and wrote those explorers experiences.

The Seventh Planet

The seventh planet he traveled is the Earth. It was not an ordinary planet which has 111 kings, 7000 geographers, 900,000 businessmen, 7,500,000 tipplers, 311,000,000 conceited men-that is to say, about 2,000,000,000 grown-ups.

When he went down to Earth he immediately wanted to find a man. The snake, which was the first creature he encoutered on Earth, told him that he is in a desert in Africa which was no man can be seen at all. The second creature he encountered was a tree-petaled flower whom according to her, has only seen six or seven man several years ago. She thought they were blown away by the wind because they have no roots. After the little prince talked to the flower, he went up to a mountain to see the whole world bu the couldn't. His queries was just answered by his own echoes. But it happened that after walking for a long time through sand, and rocks, and snow, the little prince at last came upon a road. And all roads lead to the abodes of men. He was shocked to see a garden with a flower in-bloom. They were similar to his flower in his planet in which he thought one of kind but on Earth there were bunches of them. He was saddened by the thought which led him to cry as he lay down on the grass. And then a fox appeared who asked the little prince to tame him. After a long discussion, the little prince decided to tame him. It took days to do the rites but it finally made the fox request came true. Upon the departure of the little prince, he faced the roses and told them that they are not the same as his rose for he did not take care of them. His rose has tamed him and he did also to the rose. The time he spent watering them and taking off some caterpillar will never equate to other flowers. After that, he went back to the fox to wave goodbye and the fox reminded him his secret, "Now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." Now, he talked to a raily switchman who said that grown-ups pursued nothing at all, it was only children who know what they ate looking for. Next, he met a merchant who sold pills that quench thirst. One pill a week and you will not be able to find water to drink, you will not be able to feel thirsty. It was according to the experts that the pills can save you fifty-three minutes a week. He was asked by the merchant if he was given fifty-three weeks, what he do. The little prince answered to himself, he will spend those minutes finding spring of fresh water.

The Little Prince became Saint-Exupéry's most successful work, selling an estimated 140 million copies worldwide, which makes it one of the best-selling and most translated books ever published. It was mass produce to the audience and it has been popular to the public— and in 2015, it was adapted to movie. It is a fictional literature could be seem to appear like a children literature but it boundless when it comes to the readers who will read it.

The story of the Little Prince has its unique appeal which makes it known to the mass. The most obvious appeal of the story is its unusual plot. The idea of a little prince having its journey to other neighboring planets excites the readers of what could he discover on them which also, at the same time, lead the readers to be involved in that new discovery; a new learning. It seems like it was really written carefully by the writer. It may often use simple words, which are understandable, but the meanings of each words, phrases or sentences hit in various ways. While reading the story, it can be easily imagine because the story was defining each scene with full details. And that makes the readers mind to wander in the novella's world as they read the story. It is not plain. It can offer more to its audience by analyzing what the author means. The logic it has, if solved by the readers, lead them to realize the lessons it unleased. The novella was brief but the moral it furnish is long lasting.

INSIGHTS

"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

"It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important."

In the story, one of my favorite part was when the Little Prince met the fox who wanted to be tamed by him. Above, were the lines from the fox which I admire the most.

The first one, simply reminds me that it is not important how you see things but it is how to feel it with your heart. We often get misleaded of what we see but the essentials are hard to find since we cannot use our eyes to see it in one place. For me, it is something that does not exist physically.

On the second line, now I realize that maybe that is the reason why it is hard to let go of something you have allocate most of your time. It was not just about the time you spend on it but you have also given a part of you for it and that thing has also been part of you.

I certainly will not forget this story. The lesson I have learn is carved in my heart and it will be forever be there.

[zukoshotleafjuice]

The funniest thing about june teasing katara and zuko about being a couple is that she just sees a pretty girl and an attractive guy, both looking almost the same age which immediately makes her go "you two must be a couple" and it just reminds me of zvtara shippers, you know what i mean? I'm convinced one of the reasons a lot of ppl ship them is bc of their looks. katara being the female protagonist and also a pretty, smart and powerful girl & zuko, despite not being the male protagonist, being the most attractive guy in the gaang. Boom, a "bomb ass ship". It is worth to recall that "people ship zutara bc they projected onto katara and had a crush on zuko". And if they say they don't ship them for that reason, then it's bc they read too much between the lines in every interaction they have. So, back to june, she didn't even care if they had chemistry or if they were friends or anything, she just straight up teased them about being a couple lmao. Because in all honesty zvtara can be an appealing ship in anyone's eyes but THAT'S IT, it doesn't go further than that. I can be testimony of that😅Before even watching the show i was like june, one day i saw a zk fanart and was like "wow aren't those zuko and katara from atla? They look so good, she's gorgeous and he's hot" i already knew kataang was endgame and that mai was zuko's love interest but seeing zuko and katara together was pleasing to my eyes. However once i watched the show for the first time (2 months ago i think) i realized there was really no romantic chemistry between them, nothing, literally nothing, i mean, i wasn't even waiting for the zvtara content in the show that made ppl ship them so much, i was actually very neutral about ships, i couldn't care less about them, but i still realized nothing was happenig between them and that it was obvious since book 1 ep 1 that kataang was endgame. Zuko and katara were two teenagers from opposite sides of a war that tried to kill each other multiple times and when zuko changed sides they developed a completely platonic relationship. As i said, people either ship them because it's an appealing and aesthetically pleasing ship (water/fire, enemies to lovers, opposites attract, the common red & blue ship) or they just love reading too much between the lines, OR BOTH, because they were so thirsty about it they ended up convincing themselves there was romantic tension between them, that they liked each other and that zvtara was scrapped when it was never planned in the first place. Not to mention the reasons why they claim zvtara should've been endgame are based only on symbolism and things they have in common that are just so ??? Random. e.g. (i saw these on a post on facebook and the comment section was hilarious, it was full of ppl being sarcastic about it & making fun of it) saying they should've been canon bc:

1. "They both lost their mothers at a young age" (?)

2. "katara was good but had rage in her heart and zuko was bad but had good in his heart so it was like yin and yang, and that was the main purpose/topic of the show" (?)

3. "they both had alter egos (painted lady and blue spirit)" (???) this one sounds like saying maiko was canon bc zuko worked in a tea shop and mai worked in a flower shop😂

4. "Zuko was the only one who supported katara in taking revenge on her mom's assassin" (?) if you ask me, that just proves zuko is not right for katara, he led her to do something she was gonna regret later (not trying to hate on zuko, i love him, and since i love him i acknowledge his flaws. I understand why he thought it was the best thing to do, he's an impulsive and resentful boy (he would've done the same if it was his mom) and he noticed how thirsty katara was for revenge, ofc he wanted to help her + he wanted her to accept him and thought it was the right thing to do in order to gain her trust, but it wasn't) unlike zuko, aang tried to make katara come to her senses and do the thing that was best for her: forgive and let go, and it was basically what she did at the end. She didn't do what zuko expected her to do. She did what aang expected her to do. She didn't forgive her mom's assassin, but she forgave zuko, and she didn't do THAT thing she (and aang) knew would regret later. Aang knew katara and what was the best thing for her to do.

5. and the most ridiculous one, "they both saved each other's lives in the final agni kai"(???????) and the funniest part is that it was followed by "WHAT MORE PROOFS DO YOU WANT???". Honestly wtf did ppl expect? Did they expect zuko to stand there and watch katara die? Did they expect katara to just stand there and watch zuko lay on the floor & die? And this has been said a million times and i am going to join and say it once again: zuko would've done that for ANYONE from the gaang, he would've done the same for toph, sokka, suki and aang. Because he learned to care about them. As for katara, she would've done that for anyone too wtf she healed aang once too and even brought him back to life. (I wouldn't be surprised if zk shippers used that as a parallel for romantic zvtara proof bc they're just like that💀)

There were more "reasons" but they're just so stupid and taken out of context like "they care for each other" & "katara was the one who encouraged him to talk to his uncle" like yeah that's what friends do. Basically all zvtara shippers do is REACH.

Also, i just can't see it happening. I like the enemies to lovers trope, maybe if the writers really intended to make it canon, i would have been down for the ship, it would've been interesting to see how it developed, but,, they didn't, and later i came to the realization that if it would've really happened, it would've been so... weird. Time to bring up the "colonized and colonizer ship" and how some ppl feel uncomfortable about it. Besides the fact that a relationship between zuko and katara wouldn't have worked (they're incompatible af, katara is a girl with a strong character and zuko is a guy with anger issues that takes everything personal, they'd be at each other's throats 99% of the time) it's just weird to think that katara would choose to marry a man from the fire nation, the nation that caused a big war that traumatized her, the nation that took her mother away from her. Imagine katara ruling along with zuko a nation she despised for years. Fire lady katara doesn't sit right with me, and i'm sure it doesn't sit right with a lot of ppl as well. I don't see katara doing that, and yes, i know she forgave zuko, but still, she would've never done that 🤦🏽‍♀️ i think it would've been so OOC tbh.

Another thing i laugh my ass off at is when they say "zuko should've chosen katara instead of mai" as if they were ever in a relationship for zuko to say "ok imma choose katara i wanna be with her". As if katara was EVER an option for him. They never showed interest in each other, what's not clicking?????? And zuko only had eyes for mai, not to mention that despite zuko and mai had a rough relationship, no girl would've dealed with zuko's bs better than mai. Can you imagine katara dealing with zuko blowing up over everything? Because i can't. Also people saying things like "zuko deserves someone who is always there for him and listens to him" (and ofc they're talking about katara) like, ok, you hate that katara is aang's "therapist" but you want her to be zuko's therapist. Logic? Where? And I do remember mai being a supportive gf and trying to cheer him up multiple times. Did they watch the same show as me?

Zvtarians try to play the victims about how they were "robbed" bc some voice actors shipped them and from what i've read people who worked for the show suggested to go for zk, but that's stupid, it doesn't count as "they planned it but scrapped it, we were robbed". The only word that counts are the creators' voice and they have stated they were always rooting for kataang, so no, you were not robbed.

People are just so in love with the idea of zuko and katara together they really convinced themselves it was likely to happen. Honestly zvtara it's a fine ship as fanon but ppl ruined it for me and what i hate the most is when they ship it and hate on aang and mai at the same time and make them look SO bad to invalidate kataang and maiko. Saying aang is abusive and mai is toxic is complete ✨bullshit✨ and lastly, it's ridiculous when they say the creators were cowards for not making it canon. They're cowards for not fulfilling your greatest childhood wish? Something they never planned? It is THEIR show. If you hate sm how things turned out then quit atla once and for all and go find another show that you know is gonna give you what you expect,,, it's tiring that they've been crying about it for 15 yrs , like, i joined the fandom recently but i can imagine how tired old atla fans must be of this.

OK so I have a lot of thoughts about this and firstly,,,anon I appreciate the dedication that it took for you to write  this, and I agree with many of your points. However, the attitude I have on this blog towards Avatar ships is far more neutral than what you’re saying.

Ultimately, romance is not and never was the focus of Avatar. Romantic development was always secondary or tertiary plot, and the entire show was far more focused on platonic relationship development. My attitude towards shippers on here - including Zutara shippers - is that people can ship what they want, as long as they’re respectful of each other and of the other characters that “interfere” with their ship. End of the day, shipping is irrelevant to the core of the show. 

People shipping something because they find it aesthetically appealing is honestly,,,fine. Personally, I think it’s reductionist, but I don’t care if you do because everyone has the right to enjoy media however they want to. 

That being said, we absolutely should call out racist or problematic tropes that we see, including ‘fire lady katara”. I also agree that it’s upsetting when people bash other characters in order to further their ship, as much of the bashing is also pretty racist and/or misogynistic. Calling that out, however, is separate from calling out every single person who happens to enjoy certain ships. 

“She didn't do what zuko expected her to do. She did what aang expected her to do. She didn't forgive her mom's assassin, but she forgave zuko, and she didn't do THAT thing she (and aang) knew would regret later. Aang knew katara and what was the best thing for her to do.”

I understand where you’re coming from, but I honestly disagree with this take. Both Aang and Zuko were approaching the situations from their own life experiences, but Katara didn’t do what either of the boys wanted. She chose her own path, by both sparing Yon Rha’s life but also refusing to forgive him. The episode is about Katara and her personal trauma and its focus should not be on her relationships with either Zuko or Aang. 

When I make posts such as this, it’s less about hating Z*tara and more about how this fandom focuses all its attention on romance and shipping, to the point where if you acknowledge a relationship’s importance it’s assumed you pair the two romantically. I don’t read Zuko and Katara’s relationship as romantic (for reasons that it would take too long to explain here), but their relationship development is extremely important, the two of them share tons of parallels and the final Agni Kai marks the culmination of both of their character arcs. Yes, Zuko would have taken the lightning for any of the characters, but it’s thematically important that it was Katara. None of this inherently means it’s romantic, but refusing to acknowledge the significance of the relationship between them is equally reductionist. 

This isn’t an attack on you, anon, and you’re 100% allowed to have negative feelings about a ship. But at the end of the day, it’s not worth getting this worked up over. If I were you I’d focus more on creating/consuming content for a ship you like than bashing ships you don’t!

[dingobabywrites]

 so, in light of recent events, people have been discussing when they think Dean and Cas realized that they were in love with each other. While I 100% believe dean realized in purgatory, I dont think Castiel realized until Dean broke Naomi's connection.

BUT!!!!

I also think that is around the same time Sam realized it too. Obviously Charlie already knew ( " what about Castiel, he seems helpful and..Dreamy" she's a lesbian. That comment wasn't for Her!") I think Charlie was the one to point it out to sam and I think the two of them agreed to keep it to themselves since neither of those two would have been able to handle that information. So, I wrote a little thing about how I think it went down.

I also wanted to give myself an explanation for those wierd looks and mystery note from the end of the episode...so yeah...here's that.

Sam hobbled down the hall to the guest room, his hand still throbbing from knocking Dean unconcious . It was…worrisome, to say the least, that he was having this much trouble with healing from such a minor injury, not to mention the other things that were happening to his body; the fatigue, coughing up blood. Troubling, but, as much as he hated to admit it, worth it. Dean had been pissing him off more than usual lately anyway. It wasn't just the trials. Sure, he was frustrated with Dean for thinking he wasn't strong enough to handle them (he had fought against Lucifer in his own mind for christ's sake) but it was everything else too. His loyalty to Benny still didn't sit right with him. He had been so quick to kill Amy, just because she was a monster. He didn't care that she was just feeding her kid. She was just a monster to him. But for some reason, Benny got a pass. Sure, the guy saved both their asses, he was grateful for that, but even Bobby knew it was wrong.

And then there was Cas.

 

Sam wanted nothing more, than to tell Dean that he should have learned his lesson the first time with the Angel. It wasn't like he didn't like Castiel. Of course he did. He was appreciative of everything the guy had done for them. Dean was right that he had saved their asses more than once. It was just….at the end of the day, whether they liked him or not, Castiel had betrayed them. He understood that perfectly. What he couldn't understand, was why dean was so suprised by him doing it again. Hell, Dean had been the one to bring up that fact that the guy wasn't acting right since he got back and yet, there he was, praying to him, putting his trust in him again. It was maddening, to say the least. He had tried to talk to his brother about it, but Dean immediately shut down.

So, yeah, his hand was still hurting, but it was damn worth it.

He turned the corner to find Charlie stuffing her things into her duffle. He knocked on the door frame with his uninjured hand. "Hey, there."

"Sam." She half smiled, when she turned around, her eyes still a little bleary from crying. "Hi, I'm just…just packing up to head out and…" she sniffled and plopped down on the bed, covering her face as she began crying anew.

Sam walked into the room and pulled up the desk chair, sitting down in front of her. "Dean told me what happened, while you two were under." He said. "I am so sorry about your mom, Charlie." He placed his hand on her shoulder as she began crying harder. "I know how hard it is to let go like that…"

"Dean was right," she sniffed. "I needed to stop holding on."

Sam let out a bitter scoff and pulled his hand back, squeezing both hands between his legs. "Yeah, Dean's always right, isn't he? Too bad he can't follow his own advice."

Charlie looked up, her eyes sad and confused. "Holding on to my mom was the reason I was stuck there. If he hadn't made me let go, I would have died.we both would have."

Sam shook his head at himself, trying his damndest to let go of his own bitterness to be there for his friend. "Ya, I know. I'm sorry…just…I know you're hurting right now, I just want you to know I'm here for you."

Charlie sniffed again, wiping her arm across her face to dry it before leaning back and staring at Sam. "I don't get it." She said, as firmly as possible.

Sam, leaned back and shrugged. "Me neither, really. I always thought all djinn fed off happiness. It's like every time we figure stuff out, something new comes along to throw us off our game."

"Not that." Charlie said, waving his statement off. Sam looked at her, confused, not sure what she was referring to. She took a breath and pulled a book out of her duffle throwing it on Sam's lap. 'Mystery Spot' By Carver Edlund. "You say these books happened in real life. That everything written in them actually went down…but the past two times I've been around you guys…you certainly dont act like you do in the books."

Sam skimmed the first page of the book and chuckled, tossing it back on the bed next to Charlie. "Yeah, well, things have just been different, I guess."

"So, you used to love and support each other, no matter what and now you just, what? Stopped?" She asked.

"It's…" Sam scoffed and shook his head. "things are just, more complicated now…"

"You maybe, wanna elaborate there buddy?" She asked. "I may be a genius, but a mind reader, I am not."

Sam let out a breath and scrubbed a hand through his hair. He figured it might feel better to at least get something off his chest. "To be honest Charlie, I dont think Dean is cut out for the job anymore."

"Why not?"

"His judgment, for one thing." Sam answered. "I don't know, just ever since he got back from purgatory… he's been…it's like he can't think straight anymore. He used to be no nonsense when it came to killing monsters and only trusting people he knew he could trust and now… I mean, I get it. Purgatory was rough on him, but the guy has literally been to Hell and back. I don't see why this time is any different."

"What do you mean?" Charlie asked softly.

"I mean like, being friends with a freaking vamp." Sam answered, coldly. "Yeah, Benny wasn't like the others, and I get the whole 'brother's in arms' aspect, but it still doesn't make sense." He waved his hand, gesturing back at the book before letting it drop. "That Dean? That Dean would have never put his trust in a monster. That Dean wouldn't let people back into his life that had screwed him over, and now…I don't know, now it's like he just doesn't care about letting people in that who could hurt him, or…people who already have."

"So, it's not just about the vampire." Charlie said. "Who else has Dean been trusting that you don't think he should?"

Sam gritted his teeth and shook his head. "Cas really messed him up Charlie. I mean, the guy already turned his back on us once and Dean just let him back into our lives like nothing even happened."

"Ah." Charlie said, with complete understanding. "Okay, I get it now."

"Get what?" Sam asked.

"I get why Dean has been acting wierd, duh." She said, like it was obvious. Sam sat, staring at her, trying to peice together what puzzle she seemed to have completed. "Oh, my God. Do you really not see it?" Charlie laughed.

"Um, no?" Sam said, skeptically.

"Wow," she scoffed. "And here I thought you were the observant one." Sam waited for her to explain herself, still utterly lost on what she was talking about. "It's Castiel." She said, speaking to him as if he were a child.

"What about him?" Sam asked, hoping like hell that she wasn't talking about the angel brainwashing his brother or something.

"I've read the books, Sam." She said. "I know all about Dean's special Angel friend."

"No." Sam shook his head. "No, chuck stopped writing after Dean went to hell. There's no way you could have a read anything about Cas."

Charlie scrunched her face and bobbed her head back and forth. "Mmmm, not exactly." She reached into her bag and pulled put her laptop, turning it on. "Remember how I said the books were online now?" Sam nodded waiting for her to continue. "Okay, dont get mad," she said as she typed "but, he may have kept writing a little bit longer than you thought…."

"He what?!" Sam said, furious. They had told that dick to knock it off after that stupid convention."How long?"

"Relax." She said, scrolling through some page on her screen. "He stopped after you sacrifice yourself to Hell, actually. It was beautifully written by the way, super emotional, but no one has seen or heard from him since."

'Good!' Sam thought to himself. He felt a little bad for that thought, since Kevin was now the prophet it meant that the reason no one had heard from Chuck was likely because he was dead, but at least no one else could know more about their lives than they already did. "Okay, but what does any of this have to do with Dean? Why would Cas be the reason he's acting wierd?"

Charlie sighed, cringing to her self a little. "Well, as you already know, where there's a fandom, there's most likely fanfiction…"

"I'm aware." Sam said, peeved by the memory of stumbling upon the fanfiction written about him and Dean.

"Look, I'm not saying anything is definite, but alot of people who write fanfiction are really good at reading between the lines." She clicked her mouse a few times before closing her laptop and setting it back in her bag. "I mean, I've read all the books myself, and I totally know that you guys are real people and not some fictional characters, and it's completely not okay to speculate on your lives and feelings or whatever...but I mean, it's kinda hard not to see where they're all coming from."

"What are you talking about, Charlie?"

"Dean said that Benny helped him fight through purgatory, right?" She said. "He met him pretty early on in his time there, no?"

"Yeah," Sam said, still completely bemused, "I guess…Dean hasn't really talked a lot about what happened while he was there. He told me some things, but he never really went into detail."

Charlie nodded and shrugged sheepishly before continuing. "Okay, so he met Benny early on, and Benny told him he had a way to get back, right off the bat. So, why did it take them so long to get out of there?"

"Dean said he spent alot of his time searching for Cas." Sam answered.

"Exactly!" She exclaimed, like that should have been the answer.

"I'm sorry Charlie, I still don't understand what you're getting at here."

"Sam, he could've come back at any point after meeting Benny. They only spent as much time as they did together, because Dean wanted to bring Castiel back with him. Even after everything he did. Don't you think that's a little…suspicious?"

"That's exactly what I've been saying!" Sam said. "Why would he do that?!"

"Yeah, Sam, why?" She said, still trying to lead him. "Why would someone run back into a fire, when they have a way out? I mean, I think you, of all people, would know the answer to that."

Sam gaped at her in shock. It took a minute for him to register what she was implying, but once he did… "Charlie, that's…"

"Just a thought!" She defended before he finished. "I'm just saying that Dean doesn't normally put his trust in people. Except, maybe…the people he REALLY cares about and the people that protect them. Maybe there's more to the story when it comes to his trust in Benny than you thought. I definitely feel like there's more when it comes to Castiel."

"Charlie, come on." Sam laughed a little. " You know Dean. He's…"

"More complicated than people give him credit for." Charlie cut him off. "He also knows how hard it is to let go of the people he loves. He's actually really bad at it. Maybe, worse than you know."

"Charlie," Sam started, before being cut off once more.

"He's definitely more concerned about you than you think." Charlie said firmly, standing up as she did. She began packing once more, keeping her eyes averted from Sam's. "He's not trying to control you, you know. He raised you, Sam. You mean alot to him. You ever think for a moment that he's just really scared for you? Scared of losing you? I mean, back to my point, he is really bad at losing people."

Sam sat in silence, petulantly mulling over Charlie's words. She was right, probably. Dean may have been scared, but it was still possible that he just couldn't hack the life anymore. Sam wasn't some child. And the other stuff she was saying…she was way off base. There was a big difference between reading about someone's and living it.

"I sent you the link to the website I used to read the books." Charlie said as she zipped up her bags. She slung her backpack over her shoulder crossing her arms as she stared him down. "I know you lived through it all and everything, but not every part was about you. There's a few things you may have missed."

"Yeah, I don't think that's gonna happen." Sam shook his head.

"Just a suggestion." She shrugged. "It might open your eyes to a few things you don't understand. I get not wanting to relive those times but…if you ever decide that's something you might wanna do, hit me up. I can tell you what chapters to skip, or whatever. And, if your really curious about Dean's relationship to Castiel, 'On the Head of a Pin' is a good place to start. The torture chapters are pretty rough, and I know you'll want to skip over your parts…but the other stuff.…" she shrugged.

"Okay." He said, at a loss for more words than that.

"You ready to roll?" Dean said, from the doorway, knocking on the door frame before entering the room.

"Looks, like it." Charlie smiled up at him as he entered.

"I didn't interrupt anything did I?" Dean asked looking between her and Sam with concern written all over his face. "You guys look a little spooked."

"Ew, gross, no." Charlie said, scrunching her face at Dean's implications. "Sam, was just helping me with my bags. Right Sam?"

"Uh, yeah…" Sam said, standing up and grabbing her duffle off the bed.

"Eh, come on, you know I'm just teasin ya!" Dean chuckled, jabbing her on the shoulder playfully. "He may have the hair, but the body parts are all wrong, right?"

"Definitely." Charlie agreed.

"Come on." Dean said, tilting his head toward the door. He waited for Charlie to leave the room, then cast a skeptical glance at Sam before following after. Sam was sure he was in for an earful after she left. He began dreading it as he said his goodbyes, anticipating the lecture as he told Charlie she was welcome to comeback at anytime. But it wasn't the only thing on his mind now. After bidding Charlie farewell, he went inside, giving the two of them their time alone. He hesitated for a moment, convinced that the trials were seriously messing with his head if he was even considering this. Then again…

He headed to the library, grabbing a peice of paper and a pen on his way and sat down. 'This is just stupid.' He thought to himself as he wrote down the words 'On the Head of a Pin'. He heard the bunker door open. Dean walked up, the look on his face telling Sam that it was time for his ass- chewing, so he decided to cut it off before it could start.

He clicked the pen closed and stood up, ready to defend his actions. "Okay, look you were right. I-I should laid low. I-I know." He said as Dean approached him."I should have hung back. I'm glad I was able.."

Then Dean grabbed him. Then Dean pulled him into a hug. It wasn't at all what he was expecting. He was lost, but relieved and hugged his brother back.

Dean chuckled and patted his back before pulling away. "What do you say we find our prophet?." Dean smiled, before smaking him in the chest and walking away.

Sam was left to himself, completely bewildered by what had just occurred. Dean had certainly not been acting like himself, but this was a whole new level. Maybe there was some truth to Charlie's words? Maybe he really was just scared? Maybe Sam really didn't know everything about his brother. Now, wasn't the time to think about that, though. Dean was right, the had to look for Kevin. They had work to do. Research.

But Dean had to sleep at some point. Maybe Sam could do a little light reading in that time.

If Charlie was right about Dean being scared for him, who knew what else she was right about?