#like I was pissed at Andrew for so much of this book

[kiloxy]

“Omission is the easiest way to lie.” Neil said. “You could have corrected me.”

“Could have, didn’t.” Andrew said. “Figure it out for yourself.”

(The Foxhole Court, p. 28)

^ Neil about to internalize it and tell no one about a certain countdown two books later.

[tangerinecat655]

im sorry but aftgtwt pisses me off so bad.

like?? what tf did thea do to make yall hate her sm??

i swear ppl act like she preyed on kevin or smth when he was literally the one who felt attraction towards her first.

not only that, but they didn't even start a relationship until they were both legal adults. no flirting or anything was stated to have happened between them until kevin was at least 18, like???

[perfecteggpartyland]

i can't stand the fact how foxes are more and I mean much more sympathetic and concerned for Neil for being in the nest for two weeks which I get it he's Neil but have no sympathy for Kevin who literally grow up in there for years. Even Neil he still acts the same and that's one thing I can't really stand. And Kevin's exy obsession gets made fun of when that's his literall self worth measurement. Also he gets told he's an asshole like Andrew but like all the foxes are??? I'm not saying Kevin's has no flaws like he does but his treatment always pisses me of and don't even get me started on the fact that in so many fics and in the books he's called a cowerd when he's anything but. bravery is not only knife swinging or shit talking. He literally told to run away when he find out who Neil was and he knew they would get disqualified without him. He kept his secret told Neil that he would watch him if he drank not to say anything and offered to talk about riko. When he's terrified of him and rightfully so. He gets constantly shut down or just told he's an asshole without his trauma ever being taken into consideration. Or when he gets blamed because of Neil's choices like even if the foxes did find out where Neil was what would they do? Call the police? Or Walk off without a freaking Yakuza on their tails? Like Kevin's treatment by the fandom is just unfair .

[gingersnaptaff]

Y Mab Darogan 1

(Stained glass window depicting Cadwaladr and his flag in Llandaff Cathedral, Charles Powell, 1919)

(King Arthur (top left), St Tewdrig, and St Cadwaladr, stained glass window in Llandaff Cathedral. Situated in the North Aisle, Charles Powell, 1919)

'The awen predicts they will make haste;

We shall have treasures, possessions, and peace

And broader leadership and lively leaders;

And after war, dwellings in every area;

Men fierce in fight-clamour, furious warriors,

Swift in attack, slow to leave defence-

Fighters that scatter foreigners as far as Caer Wair'

- the opening first lines of Armes Prydain

Something a bit different today but I thought I'd yell about ‘Y Mab Darogan’ or The Prophesied Son, who was seen as a messianic figure in Welsh literature and was appellated to four* (!) different lads (including King Arthur). This will be a long one so please have a snack and a drink at hand. You're gonna need ‘em.

Now, Y Mab Darogan as a concept first crops up in the 10th Century poem ‘Armes Prydain’ (The Prophecy of Britain) from the Book of Taliesin. Andrew Breeze postulated that the poem was written in about ‘940 AD.’ Taliesin’s status as ‘a seer’ write Gwyneth Lewis and Rowan Williams in their introduction to The Book of Taliesin: Poems of Warfare and Praise in an Enchanted Britain means that ‘it is not at all surprising’ to find a collection of Prophetic poems alongside the others within Llyfr Taliesin. ‘Its themes,’ Lewis and Williams further write, ‘are recycled in several later poems looking forward to a reunification of the British - usually Under the leadership of Gwynedd - and the advent of a heroic deliverer.’

It's a call for all Celtic nations (Welsh, Scots, Irish, Cornish, Britons, Manx) to come to arms against the Anglo-Saxon invaders - as can be seen in the lines 'long-haired champions, masters of war/ Will come from Ireland to drive out the Saxons.', 'Both loyal men will come from Alt Clud, / A resplendent army to drive them from Britain' 'A powerful host will come from Llydaw (Brittany),' 'Let the Cymry rise up, a war-like company' and 'On all sides shame will be the Saxons destiny' and, although it doesn't feature King Arthur proper it's writing kinda alludes to his death.

To zoom through some background, Hywel Dda (yes, he of Law fame) was seen as very much toeing the line to the Angles - who y'know were (and kinda still are) Wales’ traditional enemies. Now, for ol’ Hywel, this had meant that when Edward the Elder ruled over Wessex had had to cleave to him to ensure that Wales didn't get battered within an inch of its life as had all other Celtic nations in Britain (so the Gaels, the Picts, etc, etc). However, once he was out of the picture and his son, Athelstan, had taken over, an alliance of the kingdoms of the Strathclyde*, Dublin, and Scotland had all risen against him. In a break from tradition - y'know, the whole Men of the North business where it was acknowledged and expected that the Welsh would aid their compatriots - Hywel vehemently denied the three kingdoms’ aid leading to their defeat at the Battle of Brunanburh in 937.

Obviously, this pissed A LOT of Welsh lads off.

I mean, yeah, it'd piss me off too. if I expected a battle only to find out we weren't getting one cuz some lawmaker lad had to keep his neighbours happy I'd be LIVID. So this poem was written! No word if Hywel read it, but I imagine his Goodreads review would've been a firm one star.

In it, it refers to ‘Thus they'll avenge Garmon's* friends with force/ Four hundred and forty years on' and, according to the Annales Cambriae (my absolute beloved) in 537AD there was: ‘The Strife of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut perished; and there was plague in Britain and Ireland.’ which means ‘404 years’ after that is 941. Therefore, the poem is very much looking forward to the annihilation of the Saxons in 941 which kinda happened because Edmund had to accept a humiliating treaty at Leicester in 941, giving the north-east of England to the Viking leader Olaf Guthfrithson.

Also, the poem invokes two famous leaders - Conan of Brittany, and Cadwaladr ap Cadwallon of Gwynedd - in the line: 'Cynan and Cadwaladr, warlords in the armies' Cadwaladr is seen as hot shit - basically on par with Arthur as a ‘Great Deliver’ figure for the Welsh - and, somehow, the Welsh Dragon has become known as Cadwaladr's flag. Cadwaladr is also important because Henry VII (yeah, HIM) claimed descent from him. The hoped-for leader is seen as returning from exile - just as Cadwaladr is said to have done and Henry VII would later do once he'd hot-footed it to France to get aid - or arriving from over the sea - as Owain Lawgoch would later unsuccessfully attempt to do in the 1300’s - and ‘on their return they … overthrow corrupt or alien rulers within Wales, and rally other Welsh kingdoms to resistance and ultimate victory over the English.’

Now, as I previously alluded to, King Arthur is pretty much absent from the early corpus which makes up the ‘Mab Darogan’ legend. The ‘fierce resentment’ of the Armes Prydain makes no mention of him, and, therefore, we must look elsewhere.

We find it in the Gwyddelian composed Historia Brittonum. He's specifically indicated as fighting the Saxons (ons of the main tenets of the job, I think we'll all agree) and doing… okay. T. Charles Edwards states, ‘The victories of a Gwrthefyr, or an Arthur, might be glorious but they had no future,’ and, I think, it is this utter glory and utter ineffectualness that highlights the two main tenets of what makes you mab darogan, well, y mab darogan.

Arthur ‘echoes the achievements of Gwrthefyr’ in his chapter and so brings with it another key building block of y mab darogan. He is an echo of what has coms before and what will - hopefully, futilely - come again. A warrior will rise and lead through Britons - the Welsh, the natives of the land - to a brief taste of freedom before slipping away in a haze.

Furthermore, T. Charles Edwards states, ‘Perhaps the main concern of the author of Historia Brittonum is to encourage the Britons to come to terms with defeat of loss and territory.’ Arthur, like Macsen Wledig before him, is a rallying point for the Welsh. A flashpoint. Arthur is the ‘British Dux’ or warlord, the rebellious leader at will bring the Saxons to heel.

The legend of him being Y Mab Darogan amongst the Welsh is thought to have taken widespread hold after this. He's seen as a rallying cry for various rebellions and poets made use of his stature to advance various other disaffected Welshmen's causes. The Anglo-Norman text ‘The Description of England’ states that ‘openly they [the Welsh] go about saying,... / that in the end, they will have it all; / by means of Arthur, they will have it back... / They will call it Britain again’ So this would firmly put him in the bracket of The Welsh Lord and Saviour, kiss fuckin kiss. Furthermore, Daniel Helbert in his essay, ‘The Prophetic Hope in Twelfth Century Britain,’ states ‘at the close of the twelfth-century, the idea that King Arthur would return from the grave and lead his people to victory was not a new one,’ for the power and popularity of this legend both within Britain and on the continent as a whole (i.e. in Brittany where Arthur - and, later, Owain Lawgoch - is also seen as a somewhat Messianic figure in his own right) had an ‘allure’ to it. This suggests that, to me, the ‘Breton/Briton Hope’ was always a powerful sticking point in people's heads. Arthur had already left an indelible mark on culture, be it Welsh, Anglo-Norman, or otherwise, and people would use it in whatever ways suited them.

But I also must caution against believing this outright. *sigh* Arthur is Welsh*, yes. The building blocks of his myth are Welsh. I do not dispute that. However, O.J. Padel says that no contemporary Welsh source of a prophecy concerning Arthur's return to Britain has been found, and Charles T. Edwards further states: ‘Although the use of a Welsh battle-poem has been suspected, perhaps rightly no such source is likely … And if there was such a poem celebrating Arthur's battles, its date remains entirely uncertain.’ While there exists plenty of poetry on Arthur's ‘descendants’ as it were, Owain Lawgoch and Owain Glyndŵr, there is nothing particularly concrete for Artie and, furthermore, we must both rely on non-Welsh texts AND Henry VII's propaganda during the Wars of the Roses when he was challenging the Plantagenets for the English throne.

(Personally, Arthur just likes to be a tricksy bastard and I wish he'd CEASE AND DESIST. Bro, I went to ur fuckin Grotto in Corwen* when I was a kid. You OWE me.)

Conversely, Arthur has been used to legitimise the English’s rule over the native Britons. Edward I, after his conquest of Wales, used ‘Round Tables’ to celebrate and justify his conquest of Wales - one of many Big Kicks in the Teeth for us, ngl, other than letting the Prince of Wales be a baby because he only babbled*, and having the true last Princess of Wales, Gwenllian, be shut up in a monastery when she was a baby - and the consequent ‘reunification’ of Arthurian Britain. The Galfridian texts also were even used to justify Edward's claim over the Scottish throne - after the House of Dunkeld came to an untimely end with Margaret, the Maid of Norway's, death at sea when she was only 7 - as Arthur conquered Scotland. Geoffrey of Monmouth, I'm hitting your ghost over the head with a boot. One with iron toe caps. And smeared in dung. Arthur's use as a colonial tool by both the Normans’ and the Plantagenet dynasty cannot be overstated. To do so is a great disservice that doesn't do anybody - least of all the Celtic countries who had their great mythological king beaten into this oppressive tool to try and bring them to heel - any favours.

Aled Llion Jones writes in Darogan: Prophecy, Lament, and Absent Heroes in Medieval Literature that the imagined victory of y mab darogan represents a ‘return to a united, unified legendary state of organicism’ which was once conjured in a long-lost son called ‘Unbennaeth Prydain or ‘The Sovereignty of Britain. Furthermore, Brud and Brut (that's Prophecy and History for all you non-Welsh speakers out there) were near-homonyms in medieval Welsh and the Brut y Brenhinedd - ‘Chronicles of the King's,’ which are an adaptation of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae - was framed as being the story of how British lordship over Ynys Prydain had been gained, flourished, and lost to the Saxons. Prophecy, therefore, provided how it would ultimately be won back by those who would come after Arthur.

But, I mean, Wales would have to wait to find out who their next Mab Darogan would be. Next week: Owain Lawgoch's Hot Shit Tour of France: How he Became Y Mab Darogan, Fucked About in Guernsey and Got Assassinated When He Was Cutting His Hair.

Some notes!

*Garmon is St. Garmon the Gaulish Bishop who visited Britain in the first half of the fifth century

*You could make the case that Owain Gwynedd could be seen as Y Mab Darogan considering his various run-ins with the Normans. However, you could say that about The Lord Rhys also and, if we’re getting into the meat of it, neither of those two lads are even seen as having faulty alarm clocks. Or chillaxing beneath a mountain.

*Strathclyde wasn't incorporated into Scotland until the 11th Century when it was annexed into the Kingdom of Alba. It would still be known as Ystrad Clud at this time.) 

*Technically, Brythonic which is the forerunner to the Britons but, like, the language of the texts he is primarily featured in is Old Welsh. I know he's seen as an English figure but that's wrapped up on years and years of colonialism.

*That baby was later known as King Edward II whose reign was less than impressive, but extremely gay. Nice to see him committing to the Remarkable cosplay ngl. (Idk if he ever did that. I just think it's fun to imagine he did. Bet he was Lance.) 

*The Grotto was so fuckin fun. If I can dredge up a photo of the Red and White Dragon fighting then I'll fuckin slap it up because ooooh, baby, it was SO COOL. Also, they had an animatronic Arthur asleep under a mountain. ANYWAY.

*Myrddin/Merlin was also associated with prophecy in the early Welsh texts particularly those about the mab darogan.

Background Reading and Sources:

Land of My Father's by Gwynfor Evans

The History of Wales by J. Graham Jones

Wales: England's Colony? by Martin Johnes (A Banger.)

The Book of Taliesin by Gwyneth Lewis and Rowan Williams

The Arthur of the Welsh by Rachel Bromwich (T. Charles Edwards is included in it. Strongly recommend it.)

The Earliest Welsh Poems by Joseph Clancy

Arthur in Medieval Welsh Literature by O. J Padel

The Welsh Triads by Rachel Bromwich

Lastly a quick aside: this is my theory but it is entirely possible that Arthur disinterring Bendigeidfran's head in Branch 2 of the Mabinogi could be seen as him taking up the 'heroic deliverer' role from an earlier Celtic hero. Certainly, while his head remained buried at Gwynfryn (White Hill, speculated to be Tower Hill in London) 'no oppression would ever come from across the sea to this island while that head was in its hiding place.' Bendigeidfran, like Arthur, was seen as the High King of Britain, and there is certainly an echo of Arthur about him. Arthur, in a fit of hubris, disclosed the head of Bendigeidfran from its resting place because 'it did not seem right to him that this Island should be defended by the strength of anyone, but his own.' And this 'was known as one of the Three Unfortunate disclosures,' so the Mabinogion says.

I'm not an academic but it is perhaps something to think about.

[aboutnavi]

One of the things that pisses me off so much about AFTG relationships is whatever the fuck Nora decided to do with Kevin and Thea. For one, let’s start with the big elephant in the room shall we: Kevin was fourteen and Thea was eighteen when they met each other. Kevin was literally a child and Thea was not. When they slept together for the first time Kevin is - presumably - eighteen (Nora only said it was his first year at EAU) and Thea was twenty two/three and it was in front of everyone. We know the Raven’s mindset is fucked up at best but seriously… in front of the entire team? They never talked about themselves in a normal-relationship way when they were at Evermore. According to Nora, “Thea’s last words to Kevin–until she showed up at Fox Tower in TKM–were to get some more practice in with the girls so he’d be ready for her when he graduated.” Be for real… this isn’t normal. But let’s pretend we can put all of this under the “they are Ravens and Ravens knows no boundaries and never had any normal human interaction in their lives” belt.

Let’s do a time skip. Riko breaks Kevin’s hand and Kevin leaves EAU. He spends a year at PSU not playing and not once he reached Thea. Understandable because he was still afraid. Then he starts playing again, still doesn’t reach her. She found out about all of this - broken hand, leaving the Ravens, playing again - through the media. Then, she shows up at PSU out of nowhere and almost doesn’t give a chance for Kevin to explain himself. Except Kevin explain - at best he can, considering he couldn’t put her in danger at the moment - but still she saw how Jean was and she knew what Riko was capable off, right? WRONG. Because Nora goes on to say the worst thing possible about their future:

Be fucking for real. You telling me you saw your teammate an inch from death, saw that the supposed love of your life had his career almost destroyed - and Thea and Kevin got married, so she is aware of the amount of trauma Kevin carry from being raised with Riko at EAU - and still the hate edges off because “after all, Kevin’s playing again, so no harm no foul, right?” ???? Are we seeing this? As a fandom, are we collectively seeing this?

“But Kevin needs someone who can keep up with him and with his obsession with Exy”. Ok, but I’m pretty sure there are other women besides Thea playing Exy that would be able to keep up with Kevin and still have an ounce of sensitivity in their bodies.

Now my only logical explanation to this, which is where I always go back to is that Thea and Kevin weren’t supposed to happen if Nora had planned AFTG like a normal writer should. We know she wrote a thousand versions of AFTG - even versions where Kevin dies or where Kevin/Andrew/Neil were together - before publishing as a book and we know she had so many versions inside her head she made the books a fucking mess but there is no way someone didn’t warned her about this absolutely fuckery of a relationship. I can’t believe we as a fandom bought into this and still reinforce it as a hc.

Also, do we really think Thea helped Kevin navigate his trauma after TKM? During their lives? This is so incredibly unfair because Kevin deserved someone who could help him heal himself and understand life outside of Exy but no, Nora really had to give us/him this mess.

I needed to vent a little, anyway…

[cosmiccowboystuddies]

the sunshine court notes

first things first riko needed to be brutally beaten to death, a shot was too quick

renee talked like a fortune cookie and it was pissing me off

i wish we got more of Wymack and Jean, it was very nice of him to get on the plane with Jean

jean immediately getting annoyed with basic life is really funny

jean is also really sassy and hilarious

also something weird happened in jeremeys house

my personally theory is that he had a sibling who died and his family thinks its his fault

like maybe an accident or maybe the sibling overheard something that they weren't supposed to and his sibling had to die as a result

whatever happened the butler knows about it and is trying to protect him

and whatever happened had to be bad because the act of dying his hair had his family ban him from the dinner table

neil believing his relationship with andrew as a strength his really good for his character, considering his mom was so keen on him not forming any connections

the fact that jean actually considered reaching out to his sister, only for him to learn that she was dead breaks me every time

and neil using her to force him into a belief that he doesn't deserve to belong to anyone but himself was a necessary cruelty.

i also like that Jeremey was the one who telling him about Rikos death was good

jean has no agency in the entire 1st act of the book, he is taken from the nest and basically held captive, then he is forced to go to the sunshine court, which he doesn't like but has to

the foxes all hide info from jean for his own good

and jeremey being the one to tell him is nice because jeremey is his first taste of freedom

jean talking about his abuse in such a casual manner is horrifying bc he thinks its so normal and its horrifying

" i didn't ask" broke me in so many ways because Jean doesn't particularly trust jeremey at the time, nor did it slip out while he was angry, he just said it so casually like it was normal

At first i felt bad for Lucas, but not so much anymore.

he was a sympathetic character who was trying to straddle a thin line of having faith in his captain and who he belives is a violent stranger and his brother who is not the same boy he know

but bringing Greyson to jean was soo fucking stupid it pisses me off

and the fact that jean wasn't even really fighting back, just trying to protect himself is upsetting

also the imagery of him punching the keypad over and over again just trying to get out is gutting

jean isn't a dog who bites, he's a dog who puts his foot to the fire because he believes that he is supposed to do

the water scene was sad as well because he was trying so hard to behave but physically could not

also Jeremey and really most people on the team meet his violence with unflinching kindness is really sweet

i also appreciate how jeremey doesn't force jean to talk about his trauma or even takes the notes from him, jean has had little to no control in his life since he was 15 and forcing him to talk about it when he wasn't ready would have made it worse

and jean asking jeremey to pretend was sweet and what was even sweeter when he did

jean learning to cook is nice as well because he needs life skills

theory for book 2: jeremey buys jean his freedom and jean becomes an exy coach ( more of a pipe dream i guess)

i also think Greyson will kill lucas

jeremeys saving grace being the thought of his sister deserving better is horrifying

i wish we got more of his relationship with Zane

neil is a real one because Jean compared Greyson to drake once, and Neil took care of it for him

jean being afraid of sleeping alone is so sad because he's basically been trained to sleep next to someone

and the fact that he has nighmares, but they are hardly mentioned, and jeremey is the one to bring it up is so sad

also kevin should have tried harder to reach out to jean

jean pushed away the foxes because he knew they would eventually leave him too

jean being steadfast in the idea that if he plays a good game he will have momentary peace is heartbreaking

jean holding onto his talent despite people thinking he slept his way to the top is also upsetting

i hope we get a zane and jean reunion bc i think they truly cared for each other

maybe kevin sends jean a postcard and a magnet and they can reconnect

also him realizing his very limited possesions have been destroyed made me almost cry

and the magnet scene with jeremey is very sad, but him realizing the magnets are broken make him realize that he is

kevin and jean still both being afraid of riko is telling bc riko is dead

let me know what yall thought... always willing to talk about all for the game.

[gday-gecko]

read another stupid book 😭😭 god of fury by rina kent. (SPOILERS!!!)

Stupid, terrible book. Okay let's go.

There were so many repeated phrases like "prim and proper" and "fucked-up brain". I was already bored of Brandon and his "fucked-up brain" on page 19. Be a bit more creative, please. You don't have to bash me over the head with it.

The dialogue was SO unrealistic, like, people don't say these things??? Especially Clara. I get that she's supposed to be unliked, but that doesn't mean you can't make her at least talk normally. 😭 And the nicknames. "Lotus flower" sounds stupid, I don't care what anyone says. Yes, with their dynamic, Nikolai would give Brandon a nickname, but it doesn't have to be so fucking stupid. Plus, not everyone needs one—you don't have to get a nickname out of every name out there.

The smut was okay (that's a lie, no it wasn't, I nearly cried every time). (Also the dirty talk sucked.) (And boarder-line dubcon several times...)

She screams so loud, Dad shows up at the doorway, but he doesn't make a move. No, he just watches his son and his future son-in-law take the life of a woman and smiles.

I feel like that really captures the whole essence of the book... Just the mysoginy in these "dark romances", you know? (I know Grace was a bad person but the way it's said.)

Nikolai. He wasn't funny, everything that he did/said made me cringe so hard, it was gross. You can have manic or "insane" characters without them sounding fucking stupid. And WHY did he have to name his dick and TALK TO IT LIKE IT WAS SENTIENT WTH (plus discribing him like that when he's five?? ick). He just pissed me off so much. Brandon I disliked only slightly less.

For a book about "want" and "violence" and all those dark things, it didn't seem to show it. I felt like there was a lot of tell and not showing going on. The descriptions of Brandon's mental health could have been sooo much more graphic instead of using the same phrase over and over. And put some more feeling into it. How did Brandon and Nikolai actually feel. I could have written this so much better. Angst? Easy. (I have done it, it was so much fun.) (I am actually tempted to rewrite the goddamn thing.)

There was also just a general lack in character interactions. I didn't know Mia was Deaf until 75% of the way through. I feel like that's an important detail. (TBF, I do miss things but it should be clear enough that I can't miss it.) And Brandon and Lan's supposedly "great and loving" twin relationship? Is the relationship in the room with us? Just. Character interactions are fun. You get to show people's dynamics and make silly jokes and things. Plus you kinda need it for a story...

Also. What is it with these people and their cousins. I can't remember who's related to who and, not gonna lie, it's starting to sound incestuous.

Waste of my time.

this is basically word-for-word my storyboard review

I was looking at Goodreads reviews, and the amount of people that gave it 5 stars and said this was their first mlm 😭😭 Go read some good old AO3 smut, please.

And I was telling my mum about it (excluding some details, of course, like the TOTALLY UNNECESSARY amounts of smut) and she said, "Even I'm finding this book annoying, and I haven't even read it." (direct quote lol)

Genuinly this could have been such an interesting idea but it's just not executed properly.

My sincerest apologies to AFTG, but it does kind of remind me of it. I don't really know, just the manic behaviour of Andrew and Nikolai (yes, they are for different reasons) and mafia stuff, but I could never bring AFTG that low.

[nanatsuyu]

I feel like it’s not talked about enough that early in the books Kevin is the only person we see Andrew initiating any type of physical closeness/touch with at all … also thinking about how they’re described physically with each other in Son of Nefes like. so much tenderness (@ your tags about how Andrew carries himself around Kevin and Neil)

I definitely think their closeness in the beginning gets overshadowed a lot by how close Andrew and Neil get later in the series. And that's not a diss on andreil! I think it's important to Andrew's character to see that while Neil played a very large part in letting Andrew explore his boundaries and grow comfortable with physical affections, there were others that helped in that healing along the way too.

One of my favourite scenes is the one where Kevin takes his glove off for Andrew to inspect his hand for any damages. It's written in such a way that implies they weren't paying any attention to the rest of the world around them. Matt had been carded, the play was over and a fight had broken out, and during that sliver of time, either Andrew had hailed Kevin over or he'd gone of his own volition to the goal for Andrew to give his injuries a one over. Kevin knew he was going to get swapped out, and they both turned somewhat surprised when Dan called out to Kevin, as if the game being in play was an afterthought. (Which, considering it's Kevin, seems somewhat ooc since he always knows what's going on on court).

And, although we don't have the exact words regarding Andrew's deal with Kevin, it was implied in the most basic terms that Andrew would protect Kevin from Riko. (There's obviously nuance here given Andrew's bodyguard tendencies when Kevin gets into later spats with people, but for the sake of how vague most of Andrew's deals are spoken aloud, I think it's safe to assume he promised to protect Kevin from his big bad not sibling in the same way he promised to have Neil's back). All that just to say... It wasn't really in their deal for Andrew to protect or look after Kevin outside of his affiliations with the Ravens. And yet, even after threatening to break his own hand before all this, because Kevin annoyed the piss out of him so much, here he was, inspecting Kevin's hand and putting the game on hold to do so.

This injury has nothing to do with Riko or the Ravens. So, in terms of their deal, he didn't really need to dote on Kevin like that. And yet.

And yet.

And this is really only one instance of them being glued at the hip. Andrew does a lot of redirecting of Kevin's person in the same way we see him do later with Neil. Like you said as well, Kevin's the only one for some pages that we see Andrew physical with that isn't necessarily reactionary or defensive. I know Andrew was still on his meds at the time, but this line came across to me as him literally shoving Andrew down court who didn't seem to take much issue with the it:

He doesn't make much mention of it, but if I had to wager a guess, these moments of familiar contact are not a new thing upon Neil's arrival.

(Also it's been a hot minute since I skimmed through son nefes (the ec and I are on cherry picking terms most days) but I know Renee saw it too.)

Like it makes me insane to think about how their deal didn't have to incorporate all that closeness. It didn't require Andrew to become intertwined with the rest of Kevin's life and daily going on's. He could have agreed to keep him on a leash from getting dragged out of the fox den by the Ravens and called it a day, but we can see clear as day that Andrew treats his relationship with Kevin far more delicately than that. In terms of canon, the best friend (platonic soul bond or whatever title floats your fancy) behaviour jumped out of Andrew so fast, I'm shocked how anyone could overlook it.

And I haven't even touched on how Wymack views their relationship, or Kathy's show, or the role Andrew plays as Kevin's other half post Evermore, or the first genuine smiles are the ones they give each other, or the pseudo threat of the butter knife scene, or whatever they had going on here:

Like, there are certainly motions that can be considered varying levels of tender, but I do think it's important to remember that Andrew's gestures should not be measured with the same scale as say someone like Renee. We can obviously see in later chapters that Andrew can be incredibly gentle (ie the hip kiss that ruined my life), but I think it's a disservice to Andrew's character to understate how close he and Kevin are through the series, both physically and emotionally.

[stabbyfoxandrew]

arsonist neil for wip wed please? i love reading these snippets so much!

WIP Wednesday (4/24)  Arsonist Neil / Firefighter Andrew AU (Part 154)

The call lasts for two and a half hours. Andrew has never willingly spoken to someone this long in his entire life. Even when he was higher than a kite back in college. It’s incredible how much you can tell a man you barely know. Andrew reveals that he used to play exy himself, which led to him meeting Kevin. He also tells 10 about Nicky, the TV show he’s been watching, the book he hated himself for finishing, and that he doesn’t like sour cream. 

(That came up because apparently 10 had tacos the other day.)

But regardless of topics, which Andrew thought they would have run out of, his throat is aching by the time 10 finally says, “This has been nice.”

“Yeah.” Andrew agrees even though he’s had to piss for at least forty-five minutes and he’s currently starving to death. “It has.”

“I haven’t had breakfast. Have you?” 10 asks as if on cue.

“No.” Andrew's mind races through the food in his apartment and he has to bite his tongue to keep from inviting this man over for brunch.

“I missed the hotel’s breakfast cut off, by a lot.” 10 sighs. “I guess that means I’ll have to go somewhere to get something.”

“I highly recommend Waffle House.” Andrew says. “The food is mediocre but there’s almost always a fight going on in the parking lot. A little entertainment for you.”

10 laughs. “Thanks, but I think I’ll stick to what I know.”

“Which is…?” Andrew asks.

“Trying to figure out where I’ll be?”

“Caught me.”

“Stalker.” 10 laughs. Then, “Andrew, can we talk again later?”

“Yeah. Bye, 10.”

[dayurno]

sorryyyy for bringing some type of discourse to your inbox but I just giggle whenever anyone brings up the fact that nora soad andrews a misogynist and their only argument is the fact that he's friends with renee and dating neil who said women are the strongest ppl i know, like i don't personally think he's a misogynist, but i feel like there has to be better arguments for it😭

maybe it's bc the fandom gets on my nerves so I'm more sensitive to any attempts a defanging and making characters more palatable bc I'm not a fan of the widespread fanon versions of the characters also it's sad I feel like the fandom made some sort of progress where discussions were being had about the problems in the series and now after tsc came out it feels like we're back to where the author can do no wrong and it's hard to criticise anything

what do you think about tsc being a triology, I feel like two books can hopefully give Jeremy the depth he needs i remember you found him a bit flat as well when you read the book, I see a lot of people saying he needs to have a mean side or a traumatic past but I feel like a kind, nice character can be interesting without those things and not every kind character needs to have this secret mean side anyway, personally I groaned out loud when I found out it was a triology bc that would mean the fandom would be alive for longer and it's so crazy out of any book fandom I've ever been in for some reason the aftg fandom feels the most obnoxious maybe it's bc the books deal with heavier topics close to the heart so there's more feelings involved🤔the only book fandom who has pissed me off a comparable amount would be asoiaf but that's a whole different thing

I really do try and be happy I'm not even in the fandom anymore and I've never followed aftg twitter accounts and I don't even check the tags I just go on certain blogs but i still see things it's horrible💔like I can't believeeee we're still discussing if Kevins a coward or not and how selfish he is for leaving the nest like we've already argued about this to death on tumblr back in like 2016 now it's the same thing again💔

LOL i understand honestly so many of these discussions are repackaged wide-spread 2015 opinions which don’t reflect the original text that it’s hard to do anything except use the we have this thread every week comrade image and let it go. andrew being misogynistic is not even hard to come to terms with considering it’s not an interpretation or a headcanon it’s the author’s own words and will for the character incorporated into canon. there are things to disagree with nora sakavic for, but ultimately there is a difference between disagreeing with the author and willfully ignoring the intention with which a character was written

& i didn’t really care much for the news, i think the lack of planning and the rushed way the books are coming along are grating on both the author and the fandom, but i don’t blame her for wanting to get this done and over with. it will show more insight on jeremy hopefully, but unfortunately i already don’t care 😭 i think the route tsc took was in general uninteresting and pedestrian enough to not warrant a second thought, and i’m not particularly interested in any plotline beyond what pertains to kevin and the ravens. what surprised me really is the total lack of impact tsc had on the fandom, which is to say, i think it was so in line with the same 3-5 headcanons passed around the last 10 years that it has genuinely done nothing for anyone aside from the people who were already very invested in jean and/or jeremy. it feels like a different fandom from aftg altogether, which i’m happy about if only because it keeps us all locked in different cages, but it still baffles me to see people dedicate so much thought to a book whose characters bar jean are, as of now, the very definition of Nothing burger. all in all the answer to that question and most questions pertaining to tsc is Who cares. because literally who cares

LMFAO staying away from aftg twt is really good for you & honestly all of us. it’s still so funny to me that not even nora sakavic herself wanted to touch that mess. mentally ill white suburbanite teenage shut-in echo chamber ass fandom

[jeork]

TC Tag Game

As always I’m excessively late to the party, but thanks @renaultphile for the tag!

1. "He would not fucking say that" only they did and it's canon. When/who?

I don’t have a copy of the book at hand right now, but while Laurie is visiting home for the wedding he goes on a walk and recites this weird incest-y song to himself, then contemplates how it always felt relatable to him. I’m not saying he would not fucking say that, because obviously he does and I hear him quite clearly. But I am saying maybe he should not have fucking said that. 

Also Ralph calling Bunny “Boo”. I don’t care how drunk he was, you don’t randomly slip out with a word you wouldn’t otherwise use. It’s part of his vocabulary. This one had me in contemplation for months, like, would he ever call Laurie that? Does this count towards the bad habits and lifestyle choices he wants to abandon while being with Laurie? Whole scene’s just embarrassing af 

2. Did they kiss in the study? Yes/no + why you are 100% correct about this.

I think they probably did, but that it was very chaste. I’m convinced the kiss between Laurie and Andrew is supposed to mirror it almost exactly. The way I see it, Laurie didn’t fully process it and therefore just stood there. From the flashback he got later on while holding onto Ralph’s sleeve while they’re in Ralph's room I think Laurie might’ve grabbed onto Ralph’s arm a little. But other than that I don’t think he did much, which made Ralph decide he wasn’t ready yet.

3. Mandatory question about Ralph's alleged tattoos.

I wasn’t aware this is something people discuss lmao, I’ve only thought about it once myself. Gonna be a party pooper and say he has none, as it's "improper"

4. 53 vs 59 edition: quote a line or paragraph that is better in the edition you like the least.

I feel like me and @renaultphile are the only ‘59 truthers. I think I once even wrote an entire post just on why I like that Mary cut the knee-touch?

Again, don’t have any book copies at hand right now, but I remember one small detail in the ‘53 I really loved. During Alec’s birthday party while he’s blowing out the candles everyone is looking at him, and for a moment there’s this shared feeling of hopefulness. In the ‘53 Laurie feels someone’s eyes on him, but by the time he turns around Ralph has already stopped looking. Something about Ralph glancing at Laurie in this moment, who’s presence represents so much to Ralph, makes me ache. 

5. Which TC character would feel right at home here on tumblr dot com?

I guess the obvious answers would be something like Hazell, Sandy or Bunny, but I feel like Andrew would run the most terrifically angsty aesthetic account. Also young Laurie, he'd probably write bad poetry or something

6. Tag yourself at Alec's birthday party.

The two guys holding hands in dead silence, not because I can relate, but because they really set the scene. Or the petty shit-stirrer who snitches on Ralph having a boyfriend. Or the other petty shit-stirrer who cries "Here comes Bim"

7. Post a TC meme.

I used to run a TC meme account over on Twitter. I’ve planned on reposting all of that stuff on here sometime, in the meantime here’s one: 

8. Easy to talk about who deserved better. Who deserved worse?

Dave. The Mature Wholesome Elder act he’s putting on at the end is pissing me off. Self-serving cu- 

Also, following the heavy implications that Alec had been snuggling it up with Bunny for quite a while, I think he got off pretty scot free 

9. You can break the fourth wall (at any point in the novel) and say a single sentence to our protagonist, Laurie Odell. What do you say?

I really wanted him to stay friends with Reg. I always felt like Madge’s Aunt Vera joke was pretty funny and well intended, albeit improper and terribly timed. It didn’t come off to me as her making fun of him for being gay. More like her trying to awkwardly bond over it, similar to Reg during The Bathroom Talk™. If Laurie hadn’t been so emotionally rattled at that time I feel like he would’ve played it off. It was such bad timing for him. So I wanna scream at him “Chill out, they’re clearly not out to get you!” 

10. What's a question you have about TC? One you haven't found an answer for yet.

I think there still might be a couple minor details, but I can’t remember them right now. The only bigger piece of dialogue that’s still a little intransparent to me is Ralph’s whole speech at the beginning of their post-wedding trip argument. I have my theories about it, but would also enjoy to hear more. 

Considering I’m over a month late and have no clue who did this tag already I’ll open it up to whoever might still wanna do it. 

[that-darn-clown]

so, i now have a third Fnaf related thing. until i come up with a proper name for it, i like to call it "This Is The Closest Y'all Are Gonna Get To Me Doing Canon Fnaf"

this is mostly the result of me seeing some Fnaf designs and concepts and realizing "oh i can just. do what i want. with canon at this point."

so have some fun facts!

half because i think it's a cool concept, half because i want to make the designs different between this au and the Rewrite, Mike and Cassidy are both biracial. why is Liz the only completely white kid in the Afton family? well...we'll get there in a bit.

y'know Andrew from the books? Vengeful Spirit of the books? yeah he's here. he was one of Mike's friends prior to Getting Murdered. also close to Cassidy, but y'know.

i'm making Charlie more transmasc. specifically, she figured it out pre-Murder, but didn't get to explore gender stuff as much as he wanted :/ (still transmasc bigender, though. just more transmasc)

MCI kids are a bit different. Fritz is still here, though!

it's basically like a fusion of some of my own ideas and Dual Process Theory's timeline (Mike is (one of) the Vengeful Spirit(s), Cassidy is CC + got springlocked, stuff like that).

Cassidy, mayhaps, witnessed Andrew's murder. maybe. and Mayhaps William did some gaslighting. maybe.

Cassidy knew all of the MCI kids, especially Andrew.

Michael Definitely Took Charlie's Death And Andrew's "Disappearance" Very Well And Didn't Start Lashing Out By Bullying His Brother. Definitely Not.

the other Fnaf 4 bullies were some other kids who were "in the wrong crowd," as some might say.

Liz Gets To Live Because I Said So.

so...Willry happens in this universe. William had a Technically Affair ("technically" because Claire didn't care. if her husband wants to [REDACTED] his business partner, that's none of her business. she just wants to raise her children. similar situation to Anna; she's a lesbian and hadn't figured it out yet so she just went "huh. i'm weirdly more chill with this than i thought i'd be"). one day, William just. shows up with Elizabeth claiming "Oh I found this poor baby abandoned on my way home from work :( Guess I better take her in :(( Please ignore the fact that she's a redhead with freckles like my business partner that's just a coincidence"

then Liz got older...and it was kinda obvious that she inherited some traits from William (Bunny Teeth and the Bunny Ear Hair Things). so now it's a lot harder to just claim that it was a coincidence. the fact that Liz also had Henry's green eyes just made it ten times worse.

William ignored the rumors...and then a woman who worked at the Diner (Tammy Schmidt), who had ginger hair, green eyes, and freckles, claimed that she was the mother of Liz. so...Henry doesn't get outed as transmasc! yippee!

Claire divorced William (in 1981) because she did NOT like him roleplaying Icarus so hard and wasn't going to stick around to watch him inevitably fly too close to the sun. she was going to get her life together before deciding to take the kids (not Liz because. well, Liz isn't her biological daughter. this isn't to say that she doesn't consider Liz as effectively being her own child, but like. y'know. Not Her Kid Biologically Speaking), but uh. she ended up getting into a car accident only a few months later. RIP Claire 😔

William, being the "very reasonable" man he is, got drunk one night (because this man took the divorce Really well (sarcasm)), and because he internally blamed Henry for this mess (like he wasn't the guy who decided an affair was the greatest idea), and murdered Charlie. (which is partially why she's so pissed at him in this au; because he had the gall to take his anger towards Henry out on her. not that she would've liked it any better if he did take it out on Henry, but y'know).

the first four MCI kids (Bea, Fritz Jr., "Gabriel"/Gabi, and Isaac) were a mix of "William's on a minor power trip of sorts," "William unfortunately discovered the fact that he finds murder fun and now everyone's suffering," and "William isn't done hurting Henry. This time he's hurting Henry's business." Andrew's death was due to a minor argument that started between him and William over how Michael was doing that kinda. Escalated. William knocked Andrew out on accident, and then he went "okay guess i'll murder him now." so he springlocked Andrew. and Cassidy kinda witnessed it.

the Fredbear plush was a gift from Charlie and Andrew. Andrew partially possessed the plush to keep an eye on Cass and Mike (and it then led to him witnessing Mike being a dumbass for the next two years).

so...Mike, Andrew, Charlie, and Sammy were all around the same age (12-13) when the Murders happened in '81. so uh. Mike maybe had a crush on Andy that he never got to tell them about. he definitely doesn't have any regrets about that!! no siree!!

by the time Fnaf 2 was going on, Mike was kind of. spiraling. he recognized Jeremy as one of the few people who was nice to him after Things Went To Shit, so they started talking at work, crushes developed...and then almost half a year later, when Jeremy had started healing somewhat, they kinda went "hey we're adults. let's go to Nebraska." and then they did that. Mike had that sort of Mini Crisis that some traumatized young adults have where it's like. he has agency. he can do whatever. so he cut his hair a bit, dyed it bright red, got a tattoo on his chest, all that stuff. didn't call his dad at all during this. sort of started realizing how fucked up his childhood was. also met Tammy again, and she helped the two of them. Mike kinda changed his last name to hers, both because he viewed her as a mother figure and also because he did Not want to risk people finding out who he was.

Phone Guy survives. fuck it. he did kinda get maimed, though. unfortunately.

Mike found out about MCI stuff around the time of Fnaf 1. he was Not happy.

you now get: Charlie fun facts!

decided to give her both "weird girl" and "tomboy, but there's transness there" energy.

style vibes are sort of like. a mix of punk, "this looks like it's vaguely steampunk," and flannels. mostly because that's the kind of clothes he had readily available to him.

feral. extroverted introvert. she's even autistic. does the wildest shit and pulls Mike, Andrew, and Sammy along with him. sometimes even Cassidy (even though Cassidy was like a toddler at this point; three years old).

also just. really fucking petty and sassy. responded to a bully who was being homophobic and transphobic with, what effectively amounted to, the early '80s middle school equivalent of "You wanna kiss me so bad it makes you look stupid. 🙂"

still very protective over people, and a sweetheart. if it isn't obvious, i love this au version of Charlie. my beloved.

one time got some weed from a high schooler and went "hey guys wanna smoke this in the backroom at Freddy's on Friday night?" and then Mike and Andrew went "Fuck Yes." Sammy acted as the guard to the room. Henry and William were busy at Fredbear's, so they left one of the more reliable teen employees in charge for the evening. he walked in on those three smoking weed, was told "please don't tell our dads," shrugged, and just left. didn't say a word to Henry or William about it. Cassidy also walked in on it, but he wasn't going to snitch on them regardless. mostly 'cause he was three and didn't even know what they were doing to begin with. in Charlie's words, "8/10 experience, would do again."

just the most chaotic child imaginable. i've seen enough 80s movies to think that Charlie, a 6th grader, probably would've been believably this chaotic. like. you don't know how many movies where "kid in the age range of middle school to high school discovers weed and then proceeds to smoke some out of curiosity" was like. at least a minor plot point or scene. i also included this because I Can And It's Funny.

this song fits him perfectly. i'll let you listen to it to understand why, but. That's Just Her In This Au.

also, as for who the Vengeful Spirits/Ones William Should Not Have Killed are, here they are from Least Vengeful to Most Vengeful.

Charlie: doesn't hate William; just in UCN to do the ghost equivalent of kicking William in the balls repeatedly before leaving, hopefully with everyone else in tow.

Cassidy: Got Springlocked. also angry on behalf of his friends.

Andrew: also Got Springlocked. just pissed at William in general.

Mike: William killed him in the fire (neither he nor Henry planned for Mike to die this time. he tried to leave, but William didn't let him), William technically got him killed by sending him into the now-abandoned Freddy's, where the spirits (minus Andy, Cass, and Charlie, aka The Spirits Who Would've Recognized Him), confused, basically mauled Michael to death, where he then crawled out onto the streets and died. Charlie found him and brought him back, though. Mike's just pissed in general from where William basically ruined his fucking life. he'll probably be the last soul to leave.

also...if you're curious, i can tell you why the souls would see Mike and think he'd be William, when William would already be dead and springlocked at this point (something that they all witnessed, mind you). :]

Ough... like George I am a curious little monkey. Please tell me more ehehehe

[chungledown-bimothy]

48 and 62 for the songs on your wrapped playlist :)

48- The Beauty Underneath- Love Never Dies

Eyy you got one that's not in any way associated with Jeremy Jordan! That's a very difficult thing to do, statistically speaking.

It does come at the cost of me having to admit that I genuinely really love this song. If Love Never Dies wasn't supposed to be a Phantom of the Opera sequel, it could have been passable, I guess, but it is, so it isn't.

Yes I am aware that some of the lyrics are, uh. questionable. when you know that it's a song between a grown ass man and his 10 year old son. But I think "vaguely problematic but damn if it's not a good song" is a pretty decent summary of Andrew Lloyd Webber's works as a whole.

62- One Way Road- The Great Gatsby

This one is probably on here because I've listened to it a bunch trying to decide how I feel about it. Spoilers for the book and musical ahead, if you care.

Conceptually, I like Myrtle realizing that she'd probably end up just like Daisy and deciding to turn around and go back to George but still dying. She realizes the truth of her situation, she tries to escape, but it gets her anyway. There's good social criticism meat there, which the show otherwise did a lot of cutting away. I think it's an angle very much in keeping with the spirit of the book.

But god I hate that they made her pregnant. I hate it so fucking much that it taints the whole song. It adds absolutely nothing and to me kind of feels like they're saying that Myrtle dying wasn't tragic enough on its own. Like if it's just her, it's sad but also just the consequences of her own actions, but if there's a baby, then there's an innocent life taken in the mess and that makes it a Tragedy. I'm not explaining my thoughts on it well, I know that, it just pisses me the fuck off too much.

Also in the song's favor though is the fact that Sarah Chase absolutely fuckign crushes it.

[afurtivecake]

i'd like to hear some positive opinions, something you find impressive about the books or the characters or even exy idk

oh i have so many generally positive opinions on aftg...strap yourselves in.

the thing that blew my mind about the books especially the first time is how it really put me inside neil's head. like i felt like i was learning shit along with neil and figuring andrew out. i've got adhd and sometimes i don't pay attention to stuff i read so well because my brain is too busy spotting the patterns and predicting the direction the author is going to take the story. but aftg? it snapped me right into neil's thinking and made me follow along at his pace. it made me really feel those 'holy shit' moments when characters were doing something significant instead of just thinking, 'ah yes, of course, i thought that might happen'. and that's something special to me.

i love that aftg reads like an ace romance. and i don't mean a romance that features an ace character, i mean a romance that sees romance the way that someone who is ace might see romance. i am ace and i can't really explain it that well. but i guess it's sort of how love is contained in the small moments, the tiny gestures, like andrew opening neil's protein bar for him because he sees him struggling with it, like neil looking to andrew to silently ask him, 'hey, can i run my mouth or should i not?' and andrew understanding him. one of the most memorable moments i've had in my life that i felt was romantic but probably wouldn't be interpreted as such by others was when i watched an ad with someone and thought of a dumb joke. we looked at each other at the same time and we both burst out laughing without saying anything because we could tell that we both had arrived at that same dumb joke at the same time. I think that's very much how nora sakavic writes romance in general because you can also see bits of that kind of feel in tsc, even though jean and jeremy aren't clearly ace like neil.

i also love how relatable the characters are. the whole series is a damn good look at various trauma responses. it feels familiar to me and it reminds me of people i know. i love that the narrative doesn't judge the characters for how they deal with their trauma responses. the narrative doesn't try to push the characters to heal in professionally proscribed ways and i find that really reassuring. cuz i've been there before. i've been at a place where i wasn't letting myself want anything because i just couldn't picture a future where i could have it, i've been down that irrational, borderline paranoid trust issues hole and it would have pissed me right off if i had read a story where the message was, "it's all in your head and getting professional help would fix it". but the narrative in aftg isn't trying to fix its characters. the narrative asks, "what do you need to get through this?" and then gives it to its characters.

and lastly, i actually really like the sports narrative that is present. i think the sports narrative mostly applies to andrew. his character development is one of the only ones that actually has a lot to do with playing exy. he starts off the series as someone who is not just apathetic but disdainful of exy even though he has buckets of talent. being a goalkeeper is easy to him and it's also boring because that's all he does. that's a fairly common trope in sports. usually the arc of those kinds of characters is finding something that challenges them and finding reasons to play and to enjoy the sport. and that's exactly what andrew goes through. neil tells him at one point that he's good at being a goalkeeper because he plays it how he plays life: letting other people run themselves ragged and cleaning up afterwards. and andrew kind of takes it to heart because he starts to apply his batshit crazy methods for fixing people's problems to exy. his solution to one match that was dragging on was to tell nicky to pick a fight. and he finds that he enjoys playing that way. by the end of the series, he's having a blast being the brains behind the operation in that final ravens match where he switches neil to defense. and yes, a lot of that character development happened outside of exy (ie. andrew finally starting to let people in), but it's a progression that you can track through the matches he plays. character development that you can track through how they play a sport is what a sports narrative is, to me at least. (i came at aftg from the world of sports manga, alright? where it is ALWAYS all for the fucking game. you see the characters develop as people by playing their sport and that's what i really wanted out of my sports novels. and seeing andrew get that kind of character development isn't much, but it's pretty cool all the same)

[darkwingphoenix]

@loominggaia AU OC Trivia

Some small trivia n stuff for Amber, Justinia and their family!

Clarity was born as a test run done by Bozzag to attempt to breed "Designer Sirene" to be purchased by rich people as essentially the equivalent of someone like Andrew Tate or Jeff Bezos getting a shark or something

She was specifically bred to be leucistic, making her extremely pasty compared to her relatively tanned father Jet (it just so happened he and Justinia had the right genes for a good chance at a leucistic sirene), who's pale but on a Cyana/Skylie level, and a totally different world to her much darker-skinned mother and sister Amber

Clarity has fairly bed eyesight as a result of her leucism (The sirene leucism genes are super close to the ones for average eyesight, and leucism makes them have worse vision in my headcanon), and often wears glasses or contacts. Due to how water destroys books, she has reading glasses for reading and sirene-safe contact lenses for underwater stuff

Justinia and Jet are also carriers for vitiligo and have a good chance for having kids with it (Which they just rolled super high on as 3 of their kids have vitiligo and the other's leucistic)

Maia was gifted Clarity by Rodrig and Cerulea as a 3rd birthday present, but Cobalt and Sai had zero input on it

Pissed off they'd separate a child from their mother so casually, Cobalt went off to hunt down Justinia and buy her too, winding up making a deal with Bozzag to have her come back in in about 4-8 years and he can have her 75% off and he can buy her stud male after her next breeding with the same discount

Her next breeding it with Jet, so he buys him as part of the deal

Saheli is born blind as, again, I headcanon the sirene vitiligo/leucism genes are super close to the vision genes, and it's an entire thing amongst sirene where many albino, leucistic and vitiligo sirene have worsened vision, if not congenitally blind like Saheli

These genes are also heavily sex-based and trend for females to have a higher chance for lowered vision or blindness, so while Mako has average vision for a sirene Amber actually has relatively poor vision (As bad as Clarity's) that she wasn't tested for until she was struggling in school aged 7

Both Justinia and Jet's families have a history of albinism, leucism, and vitiligo, with poor vision super common as a result. Both of them lucked out by not having any of the pigmentation genes and no vision problems, but they had no luck with their kids, and only one has good vision, with two being heavily visually impaired (Amber and Clarity) and the fourth is completely blind (Saheli)

Amber is also colorblind, specifically tritanopia (The right images are what she sees):

Amber actually had a terrible time at school initially as she had no clue she was color blind and near-sighted until her teachers advised Cyana and Angeline to get her eyes checked

Dr. Asha checked her vision via telepathy (Prolly a common occurrence when telepathy canonically allows someone to literally look through someone's eyes) and confirmed she was heavily visually impaired and tritanopic

A few weeks later, Amber got accommodations for her shitty vision at her school, which was being funded by Jelani himself (As he knew it'd be an issue and just decided that if he was gonna help one kid unrelated to him, he'd be helping all the disabled kids in Uekoro too while he's at it)

Clarity's vision is not color blind in anyway, but this is traded for near blindness (As in Cinnamon level, just sans hearing problems too), while Amber can see shapes and stuff but it's 95% blue and red, while for Clarity she can only see something in detail beyond color and shape within like a foot of her face

Clarity develops a love language where she favors being super close to her partner as she can see their face in detail, which usually doesn't happen and so she likes it

Amber has zero color coordination for her clothes due to her tritanopia, and as she develops skill in illusions, all of her illusions are tinted how she sees them: More blue and red, making them easy as hell to spot for someone without tritanopia, but she fights this hard, managing to make super convincing illusions, if still a tad blueish or reddish

Clarity, Amber, and Saheli all take up telepathy at Justinia's recommendation to counter their vision, or rather lack of a lot of it (Or all of it for Saheli)

Jet and Justinia aren't related in the slightest, with their last ancestors being some sirene in Chadrak, their genes were just perfect to fuck up their kids' vision for no reason

[heather-can-read]

Around the World in Eighty Days ⛧ Jules Verne

Notes

January 1st: The book I have (the penguin classics version) starts off with a list of things Jules Verne did in his (I thought he was a woman this whole time lol) life, in chronological order, followed by an introduction that explains his life and accomplishments. It stated how much of his influence in his writing came from his background of growing up with ship workers in his family, having his style very evidently seem industrial. It also explained that he had a pedantic obsession with making sure his stories were scientifically accurate, giving the example of his story Five Weeks in a Balloon having had an accurate depiction of how to steer a hot air balloon before it had been common knowledge, from figuring it out himself. Some things I had found interesting were that he had been the only science fiction author to have been recognized by a pope (Leo Xlll), and that he had been shot in the foot by his nephew Gaston for not lending him money near the end of his life. Also, I am not going to make any assumptions, since I haven't finished reading the introduction, but there have been some mentions that one of his works had included bits of anti-semitism, and that he had been against a jewish officer that had been arrested for allegedly sending information to Germany being retried. From what I have read, I cannot discern whether or not the introduction author Brian Aldiss is insinuating that Verne was an anti-semite, but I may find out through further reading, or from research later on. So far, quite intrigued !

January 2nd: The rest of the introduction was nothing more than a teaser for the book. I had been gifted this book because I had seen the show starring David Tennant (my husband), so I already know some of the plot, but man, it always surprises me how different show/movie adaptations can be. The Phileas Fogg in the show is much more of a nervous person, and much more self-conscious than in the book. In the book, that man is the epitome of autism. Doing the same thing at the same places with the same people at the same time every day?? Sitting at his chair staring at the clock with his feet pressed together, hands rested on his knees, waiting for it to be SPECIFICALLY 11:20 am so he can leave? That is like, the definition of autism anthropomorphized. Also how they emphasized that despite him being 40 y/o, he looked relatively younger with no forehead wrinkles? Autism. It always disappoints me when I watch the show first then read the book and realize the characters look nothing like they did in the show. Like nothing against my husband, as he is aging like a fine wine, but he is almost nothing like the original Phileas, looks or personality wise. Like one of the big points in his character in the book is that he is never nervous, and always believes that his plan is going to work out, with Passepourtout being the one getting antsy about the delays in their schedule, when in the show it's Phileas who is constantly doubting himself. I was also disappointed to see that Passepourtout isn't actually black in the book, but it probably would have been way more controversial if he was. I think both versions of the story are well written (so far), but it genuinely pisses me off to know just how different they are from each other.

January 3rd: So Phileas Fogg just set off on his journey around the world. The difference at this point between the show and the book is 7 days after he leaves he is immediately accused of robbing a bank back in England, whereas in the show he is accused of robbing a different bank towards the end of his journey. Plus, the accusation of the bank robbery was falsely made by one of the gentlemen in his club (Nyle Bellamy) to stop him from completing the bet in order to win the money. I have a theory that the man he bet in the book, Andrew Stuart, is the guy who actually robbed the bank, and is trying to frame Phileas in order to keep from getting caught and possibly to win the bet as well. Also Fix is a guy in the book?? In the show he's the daughter of one of the gentlemen at the club, an aspiring journalist, and falls in love with Passepourtout! At this point the book is SO different from the show I don't know if I know as much about the plot as I thought I did.

January 4th: Three more chapters down!! They are relatively short chapters, but still, accomplishment! I think the show may have split the character Mr. Fix into two separate ones, because I remember the unnamed character who gets Passepourtout to betray Phileas, and Fix is the third main character, like mentioned in my last entry. In the book, Fix is the one who gets close to Passepourtout in order to arrest Phileas between Suez and Bombay. Also the show changed Fix from a detective to a journalist. More autism shown from Phileas, as he keeps his same schedule on the Mongolia (boat), while also managing to find a group of people to play whist with. Plus, in the show it didn't explain how Phileas was able to keep up the times and make sure he was on schedule besides just in his head, but the book explains that he does all the math in a notebook, which makes SO much more sense. The differences between the show and the book continue to agitate me, as the book makes a specific point to explain that Phileas is not nervous or doubtful of his scheduling in the slightest, and the Phileas in the show is a nervous wreck the whole time! Despite it all I am enjoying the book, hooray.

January 5th: Now the boys are in India. There is some racism happening, but that is to be expected in a book from the 1800s. Wasn't very appreciative of Phileas accusing a server at an Indian restaurant of serving him cat instead of rabbit, because we all know of the asian stereotype. I also have no idea if it's true, but they mention a group of Indians who live in the forest and go around killing people in the name of a god, and they praise the british army for getting rid of most of them because "you couldn't dig deep below the surface of the earth without finding at least one dead body". I am skeptical. It's hard to gauge Verne's opinion on Indians since he's french and not english, but besides the blatant stereotypes he seem rather neutral. Also sad to see that Phileas bought an elephant just for transport, and that apparently £2,000 is too much. They even mention that at this point elephants are being stolen from the wild to be used in british circuses, which is so fucking sad. Hopefully the elephant gets returned. Will keep you updated on that.